Catiline's War
by Gaius Sallustius Crispus

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Chapters 1 - 61

   I. Every man who is anxious to excel the lower animals should strive with all his power not to pass his life in obscurity like the brute beasts, whom nature has made the grovelling slaves of their bellies. Now our whole ability resides jointly in our mind and body. In the case of the mind it is its power of guidance, in the case of the body its obedient service that we rather use, sharing the former faculty with the gods, the latter with the brute creation. This being so, I think right to seek repute by my powers rather of intellect than of strength, and since the very life which we enjoy is short, to make the memory of us as abiding as may be. The glory of wealth and beauty is fleeting and frail, but personal merit is held in eternal honor.
   Now it was long hotly contested among men whether military success was more advanced by mental ability or by bodily strength, for what we need is deliberation before we begin, and after deliberation, then well-timed action; either of itself is deficient and lacks the other's help.

   II. Thus, at the outset, those who were called "kings"--for that was the first title of dominion known on earth--differed from each other, some using their intellect, others their bodily powers, for even as late as this men's lives were passed in freedom from avarice, and each was contented with his own possession. After Cyrus, however, in Asia, and the Lacedaemonians and Athenians in Greece, began the subjugation of towns and nations, and, convinced that the greatest glory was to be found in the greatest empire, held their lust for dominion a fair pretext for war, then at last, by the actual test of results it was proved that it was intellect which was most effective in war. Were then the genius of kings and commanders as potent in peace as in war, there would be more smoothness and consistency in human affairs, nor would you see power tossed from hand to hand, and the whole world subject to change and confusion. For empire is easily retained by the very devices by which it is originally acquired. When diligence, however, has been superseded by sloth, and self-restraint and moderation by lustfulness and pride, a change of fortune accompanies that of character, and thus empire is continually being transferred to the most capable from those who are less so.
   Whether they be farmers, sailors, or builders, men find that everything is obedient to merit. Many, however, the slaves of gluttony and sloth, without learning or cultivation, have passed through life as though it were a journey in a foreign land, and thus, in defiance of nature, have actually found their body a pleasure and their real vital powers a burden. Of these, for my own part, I hold the life and death to be alike, since of neither is there any record. To me, indeed, the only man who really seems to live and enjoy his vital powers is he who, in devotion to some task, seeks the fame of a brilliant exploit or virtuous accomplishment.

   III. Where the field is so wide, nature points out different paths to different persons. It is a fine thing to serve the state by action, nor is eloquence without its glory. Men may become illustrious alike in peace and war, and many by their own acts, many by their record of the acts of others, win applause. The glory which attends the doer and the recorder of brave deeds is certainly by no means equal. For my own part, however, I count historical narration as one of the hardest of tasks. In the first place, a full equivalent has to be found in words for the deeds narrated, and in the second the historian's censures of crimes are by many thought to be the utterances of ill-will and envy, while his record of the high virtue and glory of the good, tranquilly accepted so long as it deals with what the reader deems to be easily performable, so soon as it passes beyond this is disbelieved as mere invention.
   As regards myself, my inclination originally led me, like many others, while still a youth, into public life. There I found many things against me. Modesty, temperance, and virtue had departed, and hardihood, corruption, and avarice were flourishing in their stead. My mind, a stranger to bad acquirements, contemned these qualities; nevertheless, with the weakness of my age, I was kept amid this sea of vice by perverse ambition. I presented a contrast to the evil characters of my fellows, none the less I was tormented by the same craving for the honors of office, and the same sensitiveness to popularity and unpopularity as the rest.

   IV. At last, after many miseries and perils, my mind was at peace, and I determined to pass the remainder of my days at a distance from public affairs. It was not, however, my plan to waste this honorable leisure in idleness and sloth, nor yet to spend my life in devotion to such slavish tastes as agriculture or hunting. I returned to the studies I had once begun, from which my unhappy ambition had held me back, and determined to narrate the history of the Roman people in separate essays, wherever it seemed worthy of record. I was the more inclined to this by the fact that my mind was free alike from the hopes and fears of the political partisan.
   I am about, therefore, with the utmost truth I can, briefly to relate the history of the conspiracy of Catiline, for I account this affair as in the highest degree memorable for the novelty both of the crime itself and of the danger it involved. Before I begin my history, a few points concerning this man's character must be made clear.

   V. Lucius Catiline was of noble birth, of great mental and bodily vigor, but of an evil and depraved disposition. From his youth he had delighted in domestic war, murder, rapine, and civil discord, and among these he had passed his early manhood. His body could bear privation, cold, and sleeplessness, to an incredible extent. His mind was bold, crafty, and versatile, skillful alike to feign or conceal whatever he chose. As covetous as prodigal, his desires knew no bounds. Not deficient in eloquence, he had little solid wisdom. The aims of his monstrous mind were always immoderate, incredible, and placed too high. This man, after the tyranny of Lucius Sulla, had been possessed by an overwhelming passion to control the state, nor so long as he gained supreme power for himself did he attach any weight to the means by which he should attain it. His headstrong spirit was daily spurred more and more by his want of means and his consciousness of his crimes, each increased by the qualities I have named. Besides this, he was urged on by the corruption of a society, plagues at once by those worst and opposite evils, luxury and avarice.
   Since occasion has reminded me of the public morality, I seemed called upon by my subject to go back and briefly explain the civil and military customs of our ancestors, their mode of administering the state, the size at which they left it, and how its beauty and nobility were gradually exchanged for vileness and crime.

   VI. The city of Rome, according to tradition, was originally founded and inhabited by Trojans, who, with Aeneas, their leader, were wandering about as exiles with no settled home. These were aided by Aborigines, a wild race who lived free and unshackled, without laws and without government. It passes belief to tell with what ease these two peoples of unlike race and different language, and each with their own way of life, coalesced after they came within one stronghold. After, however, their state, improved in population, customs, and territory, seemed to have gained some degree of strength and prosperity, as is usual in mortal affairs, their wealth gave rise to ill-will. The neighboring kings and peoples assailed them, few of their friends came to their aid, the rest, panic-stricken, held aloof from the danger. The Romans, however, alike active at home and in the field, made their preparations in all haste. With mutual exhortations they advanced against the enemy, and shielded with their arms their freedom, country, and kin. When their courage had repelled their own danger, they brought help to their friends and allies, and won themselves friendships by their greater readiness to give than to receive a service.
   Their government was according to law, and with the name of "royalty." Chosen men, of bodies enfeebled by age, but of characters strong in wisdom, formed the council of the state. These, either from their age or from a resemblance in their duties, were called "Fathers." The royal power, which had originally conducted to the maintenance of liberty and the increase of the state, was turned at last into mere arrogance and tyranny. They then changed their constitutions, and instituted yearly magistracies and pairs of magistrates, thinking that by this way men's minds would be least able to wax wanton by license.

   VII. It was at this conjuncture that individuals began more to distinguish themselves, and to display their talents with greater readiness. By kings the good are more liable to be suspected than the bad, and cause for alarm is always found in the merit of others. As soon, then as the state had gained its freedom, it is incredible to relate what progress it quickly made; so great was the thirst for glory that had ensued. Now, for the first time, the young men, as soon as they were of age for service, learnt warfare by the experience of hard labor in camp. Handsome arms and warlike steeds now formed their pleasures in preference to women and wine. To men like these no toil was unwonted, no ground rugged or steep, no foe in arms an object of fear; their courage had subdued all things. But their greatest contests for glory were with one another. Each was eager to strike the foe, to scale the wall, and to be seen so engaged; this they counted wealth, this as good repute and the highest birth. Greedy for fame, they were liberal of money, and wished that their glory might be unbounded, and their wealth honorably won. I could tell of places in which a small Roman force routed huge bodies of the enemy, and of towns naturally strong taken by assault, were it not that this would be too wide a digression.

   VIII. Fortune, however, is truly everywhere paramout, and she makes known or obscures every event according to her own whim rather than its real value. The performances of the Athenians, as I esteem them, were sufficiently noble and magnificent, and yet somewhat less than fame reports. At Athens, however, there flourished historians of genius, and, consequently, throughout the world the exploits of the Athenians are esteemed as of the highest order. Thus the merits of men of action are valued in proportion to the capabilities of men of genius to extol them in words. Of these the Roman people have never had any great abundance; among them the most capable men were always the most occupied, no one exercised his mind apart from his body, and the best men preferred action to narration, and to have their own services praised by others rather than themselves to be another's historian.

   IX. Thus, as I have said, virtue was practiced both at home and on the field. There was the utmost concord and the least possible avarice; the right and the good obtained among them not so much by law as by nature; strife, discord, and enmity, they carried on with their foes; citizens contended with citizens only in virtue. In their offerings to the gods they were magnificent, in their domestic expenses sparing, to their friends loyal. Their own and their country's interests they guarded by these two devices--hardihood in war, and generous treatment when peace had ensued. Of this I can adduce a striking proof; in war, punishment was more often inflicted on those who had fought the enemy contrary to orders, or who had too slowly obeyed the signal of recall from battle, than on those who had dared to desert the standard or give way when hard pressed; in peace, they governed rather by kindness than by fear, and when they had received an injury, preferred rather to pardon than adjudge it.

   X. Thus by diligence and fair dealing the state was advanced; great kings were conquered in war, wild races and vast peoples subdued by force; Carthage, the rival of the Roman Empire, perished root and branch, sea and land everywhere lay open before us, when at last fortune began to turn cruel, and throw everything into confusion. Those who had lightly borne toils and dangers, doubtful fortunes and desperate straits, found the leisure and wealth elsewhere so coveted a pitiable burden. At first the lust of money increased, then that of power, and these, it may be said, were the sources of every evil. Avarice subverted loyalty, uprightness, and every other good quality, and in their stead taught men to be proud and cruel, to neglect the gods, and to hold all things venal. Ambition compelled many to become deceitful; they had one thought buried in their breast, another ready on their tongue; their friendships and enmities they valued not at their real worth, but at the advantage they could bring, and they maintained the look rather than the nature of honest men. These evils at first grew gradually, and were occasionally punished; later, when the contagion advanced like some plague, the state was revolutionized, and the government, from being one of the justest and best, became cruel and unbearable.

   XI. At first it was not so much avarice as ambition which spurred men's minds, a vice, indeed, but one akin to virtue. For glory, distinction, and power in the state are equally desired by good and bad, though the first strives to reach ihs goal by the path of honor, the second, in the lack of honest arts, uses the weapons of falsehood and deceit. Avarice, on the other hand, implies a zeal for money, an object for which no philosopher ever yearned. Tainting the body and mind of the strong, it weakens them as by some deadly poison; it is always boundless, always insatiable; plenty and want alike fail to lessen it. After Lucius Sulla had seized the government by force of arms, and made a bad end to a good beginning, robbery and plunder became universal; one coveted a house, another an estate, the victors knew neither limit nor sobriety, and citizens became the object of vile and cruel outrage. To make matters worse, Sulla, to secure the loyalty of the army he had led in Asia, had treated it, in defiance of ancient usage, in a lavish and far too liberal manner. Pleasant and voluptuous quarters while at peace, had easily enervated the hardy spirit of his men. It was in Asia that a Roman army first gained habits of lustfulness and intemperance, learned to admire statues, paintings, and plate, stole them from their private or public owners, plundered shrines, and polluted everything whether sacred or common. Soldiers like these, when they gained a victory, stripped their victims bare, for, since even the wise have their temper tried by prosperity, much less could the men of this abandoned character use their success with moderation.

   XII. Riches became a means of distinction and glory, power and influence followed their possession. As a result the edge of virtue was dulled, poverty was accounted a disgrace, and uprightness a kind of ill-nature. Riches made the youth a prey to luxury, avarice, and pride: at once grasping and prodigal, they valued lightly their own property, while they coveted that of others; all modesty and purity, alike things human and things divine, everything, in short, was despised and disregarded. To one acquainted with mansions and villas built on the scale of towns, it is worthwhile to visit the temples erected by our ancestors, the most god-fearing of men. They, indeed, decorated the shrines of the gods with piety, and their own homes with glory, while they deprived their conquered enemies of nothing save the power of doing them harm; but in this generation the most worthless of men in the depth of their wickedness have deprived our allies of everything which those brave men in the hour of victory had left them, as if the one and only use of empire were to inflict harm.

   XIII. Why should I tell of things which no one who has not seen could believe, of how often private individuals have levelled mountains and built over seas? Such men seem to me to have trifled with their riches in the hate with which they ignobly abused what they might honorably have enjoyed. But the passion for defilement, gluttony, and all other kinds of indulgence, had kept pace with that for wealth. Each sex alike trampled on their modesty. Sea and land were ransacked to supply the table. Men went to rest before they felt a desire for sleep; they did not wait for hunger or thirst, cold, or weariness, but anticipated them all by luxurious expedients. Such a life, when means had failed, spurred youth into crime. Their minds, tainted with bad accomplishments, could not endure to be deprived of their sensual pleasures, and they abandoned themselves with all the more recklessness to every kind both of gain and expense.

   XIV. It was in a state of this magnitude and corruption that Catiline, as was indeed easily done, gathered round him, to serve as bodyguard, troops of men stained by every vice and crime. Every gambler, adulterer, and glutton, who, by the gratification of his passion, had cruelly impaired his patrimony, everyone whose debts had swollen to buy indemnity for some shameless deed, all parricides from every quarter, all who had committed sacrilege, who had been tried and condemned, or whose deeds made them fear a trial, all who gained a living by polluting their tongues with perjury, or their hands with their countrymen's blood, in fine, all who were harassed by crime, by need, or by the pangs of conscience--it was these who were Catiline's intimate associates; while, did anyone as yet free from guilt chance to become his friend, by daily intercourse and allurement, he was easily made a fit fellow to the rest. It was especially, however, the intimacy of young men that Catiline affected; and their pliable and unformed minds fell an easy prey to his wiles. Complying with the several forms of youthful passion, he helped some to mistresses, bought hounds and horses for others, and, in fine, spared neither his purse nor his honor to make them his faithful creatures. I am aware that there were some who held the belief that the young men who made Catiline's house their resort, behaved with too little regard for decency, but the report obtained credence rather from other considerations than from any direct testimony.

   XV. At the very outset of his youth Catiline engaged in many scandalous intrigues; one with a high-born maiden, another with a priestess of Vesta, and others which in like manner set law and morality at defiance. Finally he was seized with a passion for Aurelia Orestilla (a lady in whom no respectable man ever found anything to praise except her beauty), and, on her hesitating to marry him in her dislike of a grown-up stepson, killed the youth,--so it is positively believed,--and thus cleared his house for the unhallowed union. In this deed I trace one of the chief causes of Catiline's bringing his attempt to a point. His impure mind, hateful alike to gods and men, could find rest neither awake nor asleep, so terribly was his frenzied soul ravaged by the pangs of conscience. His countenance grew bloodless, his eyes haggard, his pace now hurried and now slow. Madness was plainly stamped upon his face and expression.

   XVI. The young men whom, as narrated above, he had enticed, he kept instructing in many varieties of crime. It was from their ranks that he provided false witnesses to facts and documents; he bade them think cheaply alike of honor, fortune, and danger, and then, when he had crushed their sense of fame and decency, his yoke became heavier. If motives for crime were for the moment wanting, they had to ensnare or assassinate the inoffensive as though they had offended; he would rather, forsooth, indulge his wickedness and cruelty without a cause than allow hand or brain to become sluggish by disuse. In reliance on friends and associates such as these, and encouraged by the enormous prevalence of debt throughout the world, and by the number of Sulla's soldiers who had squandered their fortunes, and were now dwelling on the memory of plunder and ancient victories, and hoping for civil war, Catiline formed a plan for destroying the constitution. There was no army in Italy; Gnaeus Pompeius was engaged in a war in far distant lands; he had great hopes of success i his own candidature for the consulship; the Senate was unprepared for any emergency; everything was in peace and quietness, and here Catiline saw his opportunity.

   XVII. It was about the first of June in the year when Lucius Caesar and Gaius Figulus were consuls that he began making overtures to single individuals, encouraging some and sounding others, and expatiating on his own resources, on the lack of preparation in the government, and on the great prizes a conspiracy would gain. When he had satisfied himself on the points he desired, he summoned a meeting of all whose needs were most pressing, and spirit the most daring. To the meeting came Publius Lentulus Sura, Publius Antronius, Lucius Cassius Longinus, Gaius Cethegus, Publius and Servius the two sons of Servius Sulla, Lucius Vargunteius, Quintus Annius, Marcus Porcius Laeca, Lucius Bestia, Quintus Curius; all of senatorial rank; with them were Marcus Fulvius Nobilior, Lucius Statilius, Publius Gabinius Capito, and Gaius Cornelius, from the equestrian order; besides many persons from the military colonies and borough towns, men of rank in their own neighborhood. Many, moreover, of the nobility were associated in this plot, though they kept more in the background. These were spurred on rather by the hope of power than by want or any other necessity. Indeed, great numbers of young men, especially those of noble birth, were favorable of Catiline's attempt, and though, while tranquillity lasted, they had every means of living in splendor and luxury, preferred the doubtful to the certain, and war to peace. There were, too, at that crisis, some who believed that Marcus Licinius Crassus was no stranger to the conspiracy. Gnaeus Pompeius, his personal enemy, was at the head of a large army, and Crassus was thought to be favorable to the growth of any influence that might balance his power, in the confident belief, that, should the plot succeed, he would easily secure the chief place among its leaders.

   XVIII. A few conspirators, it must be remarked, of whom Catiline was one, had before this formed a plot against the state, of which I will give the most accurate account I can. In the consulship of Lucius Tullus and Marcus Lepidus, Publius Autronius, and Publius Sulla, the consuls-elect, were put on their trial and punished under the bribery laws. A little after this, Catiline was charged with extortion, and so disqualified as a candidate for the consulship [since he could not give in his name within the legal time.] At the same time a certain Gnaeus Piso, a young man of good birth but needy, ill-affected and of desperate daring, was being urged by his poverty and evil disposition to embroil the State. With this man, Catiline and Autronius discussed their plot about the first week in December, and planned to murder the consuls, Lucius Cotta and Lucius Torquatus, in the Capitol on January 1st, to seize the insignia of office for themselves, and to send Piso with an army to hold the two Spanish provinces. The plot was discovered, and they again postponed their plans of murder to February 5th. On this occasion they were to contrive the destruction not only of the consuls, but of many of the senators, and had not Catiline, who was stationed in front of the Senate-house, been too hasty in giving the signal to his confederates, on that day would have been accomplished the worst outrage of any since the foundation of Rome. As it was, their armed supporters had not yet mustered in force, and this circumstance ruined the plot.

   XIX. Piso was subsequently sent as quaestor, with the powers of a praetor, to Hither-Spain. This appointment Crassus supported, as he knew Piso for a bitter enemy of Gnaeus Pompeius; nor was the Senate unwilling to grant him a province in their eagerness to remove so abandoned a man from the sphere of politics, while many of the aristocracy looked on him in the light of a bulwark, and were already panic-stricken at the power of Pompeius. Piso, however, was murdered in his province by a troop of Spanish horse at whose head he had placed himself on a march without any other force. Some would make out that the barbarians could not submit to the injustice, arrogance, and cruelty, that marked his rule; others, that the horsemen were old and faithful dependents of Gnaeus Pompeius, and attacked Piso with his consent. The Spaniards, they remarked, had never committed such an outrage on other occasions, but had patiently submitted to much previous tyranny. I shall leave this point as an open question, and have now said enough about the earlier conspiracy.

   XX. When Catiline saw assembled the men whom I named a little above, although he had held many communications with each of them separately, he yet thought it would serve his purpose to address and encourage them collectively. He conducted them, therefore, to a secluded part of his house, and then, having secured the absence of any witness, spoke somewhat as follows:--
   "Had I not myself tested your courage and loyalty this favorable conjuncture would have offered itself in vain. Our hopes might have been high, and power have lain ready to our hands, but it would have availed nothing. I should not now be abandoning the certain to pursue the doubtful had I only cowardly or frivolous supporters to depend on. As it is, I have learnt your valor and devotion to myself on many important occasions, and my mind has therefore dared to embark on this greatest and noblest of attempts. I am encouraged, too, by my clear perception that, whether in good or evil fortune, your interests are identical with mine; for in this identity of hopes and fears lies the true bond of friendship."
   "The plans which I have been revolving in my mind you have all separately heard ere now. For my own part, however, I find my spirit daily more on fire at the thought of what will be our lot if we fail to assert our claim to freedom. Ever since the government of the state was merged in the prerogatives and authority of a few influential men, it is to these that kings and princes have been tributary, and peoples and races have paid their dues. We, the remainder of the nation, however energetic and virtuous, whatever our birth, whether noble or base, have formed an undistinguished crowd without interest or influence, and lie at the mercy of a party to whom, were the state in a sound condition, we should be a terror. Thus all influence and power, distinction and wealth remain in their own, or their favorites' hand; to us they have left danger and rejections, prosecutions and want. Bravest of men, what is the limit of your endurance? Is it not better to die once for all a brave man's death than to drag out a life of misery and dishonor, as the butts of your enemies' insolence, and lose it shamefully at the end?"
   "But why speak of this? I call Gods and men to witness that victory is within our grasp. Our age is in its prime and our minds at their strongest, our enemies are enfeebled by years and riches. We have only to make a beginning, the course of events will do the rest. And what man, with a temper worthy of that name, can brook their possession of a surplus of wealth to squander on driving back the sea and levelling mountains, while we lack the means to procure even the necessaries of life? That they should join house to house and houses to houses, while we have nowhere a hearth to call our own? They are buying pictures and statuary and plate; are pulling down the work of yesterday to build it anew; in a word, are squandering and abusing their wealth in all possible ways; and yet, though they indulge every passion to the full, they cannot exhaust their riches. We are met by poverty at home and creditors abroad. Our fortunes are bad, our expectations still more forbidding. In fine, what have we left except the breath we draw in misery?"
   "Must I not then bid you awake? Before you there dawns the freedom for which you have often yearned, and now freedom, wealth, splendor, and glory rise before your eyes. Such, to the full, are the rewards which fortune has decreed to the conquerors. Your dangers and your beggary, the rich spoils which war offers, plead more powerfully with you than any words of mine. Use me as your general or your fellow-soldier; my mind and my body shall ever be at your service. These very plans I hope, with your aid, to carry into execution as consul, unless, haply, my mind deceives me, and you are more ready to serve than to command."

   XXI. These words were listened to by men who had every evil in abundance, but no good fortune, nor any hope of it. Great, however, as the wages of revolution appeared to them, many yet asked Catiline to explain what would be the nature of the war, what the prizes their arms were to seek, what help he counted on or hoped for, and from what quarter. He proceeded to promise them an abolition of debts, a proscription of the rich, magistracies and priestly offices, together with plunder, and all the gratifications enjoyed by the victors in a war. In Hither-Spain, he continued, was Piso; in Mauritania, at the head of an army, Publius Sittius Nucerinus; both of them partners in their conspiracy. Gaius Antonius, too, was a candidate for the consulship, and he hoped to have him as his colleague, as a man at once intimate with himself and entangled in the greatest difficulties. When himself consul hs should join Antonius in making the first move. He then railed and inveighed against the whole aristocratic party; made laudatory mention of each of his own followers; and reminded one of his poverty, another of his desires, many of the danger they stood in or the shame they had undergone, and many more of the triumph of Sulla, in which they had found an opportunity for plunder. At last, seeing every mind thoroughly aroused, he bade them be zealous in support of his candidature, and dismissed the meeting.

   XXII. It was asserted by some at the time that Catiline, when, after making a speech, he was preparing to administer an oath to his accomplices, carried round in bowls a mixture of human blood and wine, and only revealed his design after all had tasted of it with such an imprecation as was customary in solemn rites. This [they maintained] he did that their mutual consciousness of such an abomination might make them more loyal to each other. Some, however, were of opinion that this story, together with many others, was invented by people who thought that the unpopularity which Cicero subsequently incurred would be diminished if the crime of his victims were recognized as peculiarly hideous. The evidence I have found for the incident is too slight to support so monstrous a charge.

   XXIII. Among the conspirators was a certain Quintus Curius, a man of no mean station; he was covered, however, with shame and crime, and his infamy had caused the censors to expel him from the Senate. The man was as frivolous as bold, and could neither keep a secret nor conceal his own crimes; in short, he was heedless alike of his words and deeds. Between him and certain Fulvia, a woman of birth, there was a long-standing intrigue. He had lately fallen in her good graces owing to his poverty making him less lavish in his presents, when suddenly he began to boast, made her outrageous promises, and threw out at times threats of violence should she fail to be compliant; in fine, his whole behavior became more haughty than was his wont. On discovering the cause of Curius' strange conduct, Fulvia did not keep secret a danger so threatening to the state, but, while suppressing the name of her informant, told several persons what, and how, she had heard of Catiline's plot. This, more than anything else, roused men's zeal to confer the consulship on Marcus Tullius Cicero. Till that time many of the nobility had been in a ferment of jealousy, and had thought the consulship would be in a manner polluted if obtained by a man of no family, however distinguished. When, however, danger was imminent, jealousy and pride fell into the background.

   XXIV. On the poll being taken, Marcus Tullius and Gaius Antonius were declared elected. This, as was afterwards seen, was the first blow that confounded the conspirators. It did not, however, lessen the frenzy of Catiline; on the contrary, his activity increased daily, he stored arms in suitable places throughout Italy, and conveyed money, borrowed on his own or his friends' security, to a certain Manlius at Faesulae, who afterwards took the first step in beginning the war. He is said also at this period to have gained over many men of every rank, with a number of women, who, though at the outset their beauty had provided them means to support their extravagance, now found their gains, but not their luxury, limited by advancing age, and consequently had contracted huge debts. Through them Catiline hoped to tamper with the slaves of Rome, to fire the city, and either to win over or murder their husbands.

   XXV. Among these women was a certain Sempronia, who had perpetrated many crimes, often worthy of a man's daring. She was well endowed with birth and beauty and fortunate in her husband and children; was well read in Greek and Latin literature, could sing, play, and dance more gracefully than an honest woman need, and had many of the other accomplishments of a riotous life. There was nothing she held less dear than purity and honor; indeed, it would be hard to determine if she were more careless of her wealth or her repute; so destitute was she of all modesty that more often than not, she was the first to begin an intrigue. Often ere this she had broken her engagements, forsworn her trust, and been an accomplice in murder; an extravagance which outran her resources had hurried her downwards. Her talents, however, were by no means despicable; she could write verses, bandy jests, and talk modestly, voluptuously, or pertly at will; in short, she was a woman of much pleasantry and wit.

   XXVI. Catiline, though he had made these preparations, was yet a candidate for the next year's consulship, hoping, should he be elected, easily to make a tool of Antonius. In the meantime he was not inactive, but was using every method of intrigue against Cicero. The latter, however, had no lack of craft and adroitness for his own protection. At the very beginning of his consulship, by dint of great promises, he had, through Fulvia, prevailed on the Quintus Curius described above to betray to him Catiline's designs. By an agreement about the provinces he had constrained his colleague, Antonius, to desist from all disloyalty, while he secretly surrounded his own person with a bodyguard of friends and dependents. The day of election came, and Catiline failed alike in his candidature and in the secret attack he had planned against the consuls in the Campus. He determined, therefore, to make open war and to go to every length, since his secret attempt had had so adverse and disgraceful an issue.

   XXVII. Accordingly he dispatched Gaius Manlius to Faesulae and that part of Etruria, a certain Septimus of Camerinum to Picenum, Gaius Julius to Apulia, and to other quarters such persons as he thought would in each place be able to advance his ends. Meanwhile at Rome he was working at many plans at the same time, directing secret attacks on the consuls, making arrangements for a conflagration, and occupying suitable points with armed men. He himself went about armed, and bade others do the same, exhorting them always to be ready and on the watch. By day and by night he was active and wakeful, and neither sleeplessness or toil could wear him out. When nothing came of all his activity, at dead of night he again summoned the chiefs of the conspiracy to meet, this time at the house of Marcus Porcius Laeca, and there, after many complaints of their cowardice, informed them that he had dispatched Manlius to head the force which he had collected for taking up arms, as well as other agents to other favorable points to begin the war. He was anxious, he said, himself to set out to the army if he could first work the destruction of Cicero, who was a great obstacle to his plans.

   XXVIII. While all the rest showed fear and hesitation, a Roman knight, named Gaius Cornelius, offered his help, and was joined by a senator, named Lucius Vargunteius. The two determined to proceed, a little later on in the same night, with an armed force to gain entrance to Cicero's house, as though to attend his levee, and then suddenly to take him unprepared and assassinate him in his own home. Curius, on hearing the greatness of the peril which threatened the consul, lost no time in acquainting Cicero, through Fulvia, with the plot laid against him. The assassins were turned away at the gate, and found they planned their atrocious crime in vain.
   Meanwhile, in Etruria, Manlius was tampering with a populace whose poverty, combined with their indignation at the wrong they had suffered in losing, under the tyranny of Sulla, their lands and all their property, now made them eager for revolution. With them were joined robbers of every description who greatly abounded in these parts, besides some veterans from the Sullan colonies, whose lavish indulgence of their passions had left them with nothing out of all their immense booty.

   XXIX. Cicero, when informed of this, was distracted by the double nature of his difficulty. On the one hand, he was unable any longer to protect the city from the conspirators' attack by such measures as he could take on his own authority; on the other, he had no certain information as to either the numbers or the designs of the army of Manlius. Under these circumstances he laid the matter before the Senate, which had now for some time been disquieted by the reports prevalent among the people. Following the course usual in dealing with any threatening emergency, the Senate made the decree: "The consuls are to take measures to protect the state from harm." This is the greatest power which the Roman constitution allows the Senate to confer on a magistrate. It authorizes him to raise an army, wage war, control in every possible way both citizens and allies, and exercise the highest military and judicial authority at home and in the field. Without this decree the consul has no powers in any of these matters except by command of the people.

   XXX. A few days afterwards, Lucius Saenius, a senator, read before the House a letter which he said he had received from Faesulae. It contained the news that Gaius Manlius, with a large force, had taken up arms on October 23rd. As usual in such cases, some at once began to report signs and wonders; others, to assert that meetings had been held and weapons conveyed, and that at Capua and in Apulia the slaves were rising. By a decree of the Senate, Quintus Marcus Rex was dispatched to Faesulae, and Quintus Metellus Creticus to Apulia and its neighborhood. Both these officers were waiting near the city, still retaining their commission as generals. The celebration of their triumphs had been obstructed by the underhand tactics of a clique who were accustomed to set a price on everything whether honorable or the reverse. Besides these, two praetors, Quintus Pompeius Rufus, and Quintus Metellus Celer, were sent to Capua and Picenum respectively, with powers to raise an army adequate to the needs of the time and the danger of the state. Rewards were also offered for any information as to the conspiracy against the state. These rewards were, in the case of a slave, his freedom and one hundred thousand sesterces, and for a free man, a pardon for any share he might have had in the plot and double that sum. A decree was at the same time passed that the gladiatorial schools should be quartered on Capua and the other borough towns according to their means, and that, at Rome, watches should be set throughout the city under the charge of the minor magistrates.

   XXXI. By these measures the state was violently excited, and the appearance of the capital quite changed. The life of unrestrained pleasure and indulgence begotten of a long period of peace was suddenly replaced by universal gloom. A state of feverish anxiety ensued. No person or place was thoroughly trusted. There was neither open war nor secured peace, and each man measured the danger only by the terror in his own breast. The women, too, to whom the fear, now that the limits of the empire were so vast, had come as an unwonted feeling, were in great distress. They raised their hands in prayer to heaven; wept over their little children; were full of questions; and saw danger in everything; throwing aside pride and frivolity, they despaired of themselves and their country.
   Despite these preparations for defense, the ruthless mind of Catiline was busy with all its former plans, and he was accused by Lucius Paulus under the Plautian law. At last, either by way of dissembling or to clear himself should he be denounced, he attended the Senate. Thereupon, the consul, Marcus Tullius, either from fear of his presence or in a burst of anger, did good service to his country by delivering a noble speech, which he afterwards wrote out and published. On his resuming his seat, Catiline, following out his determination to dissemble everything, with downcast look and in tones of entreaty began to beg the senators to form no hasty opinion of him. His birth and conduct from his youth justified him in cherishing the highest hopes; it would be wrong of them to imagine that he, a patrician born, whose own and whose ancestors' public services had been so numerous, could find it his interest to destroy the state, while Marcus Tullius, a mere citizen-at-will, was engaged in its preservation. He was proceeding to further abuse when a storm of shouts and cries of "Enemy" and "Traitor" interrupted him. Furious with rage, he exclaimed, "Since I am beset and driven to destruction by my foes, I will quench in a general ruin the fire that surrounds me."

   XXXII. With these words he dashed out of the Senate-house and hurried to his home. There his brain was soon busy. His treacherous attack on the consul was a failure, and he saw that the city was protected from incendiaries by the watches set. He thought it best, therefore, to increase his army, and to employ the time before the legions could be levied in seizing the numerous positions that might be useful for the war. At dead of night he set out with a few companions for the camp of Manlius, leaving instructions to Cethegus, Lentulus, and the others whose readiness and daring he had tested, to use every possible means of increasing the strength of their party, of pushing forward the plots against the consul, and or arranging for a massacre, a conflagration, and the other horrors of war. He promised shortly to march against the city in person, with a large army.

   XXXIII. While these events were taking place at Rome, Gaius Manlius sent deputies from his force to Marcius Rex with a message to this effect,--"We call gods and men to witness, general, that we have taken up arms with no designs against our country nor with any wish to bring others into danger. To ensure the safety of our own persons is our only motive; for, needy wretches as we are, the violence and cruelty of usurers has robbed most of us of our country, and all of fame and fortune. Not one of us was allowed, according to ancient custom, to avail himself of that law, by which, on sacrificing his property, his person would have remained free; so pitiless were the usurers and the judge. Your ancestors often, in compassion for the commons of Rome, relieved their destitution by the decrees they proposed; and, quite recently, within our own recollection, owing to the prevalence of debt, bronze was raised for purposes of repayment to the value of silver, and this with the approval of all honest men. Often, again, the commons themselves, roused either by a lust for power, or by the insolence of magistrates, took up arms, and revolted from the Senate. We, however, ask for neither rule nor riches, though these are the cause of every war and struggle among men; we ask only for that freedom which no brave man ever abandoned while life remained. We adjure you and the Senate to take measures to relieve us, your fellow-citizens, to restore to us the protection of the law, wrested from us by judicial corruption, and not to force us to seek a course, by which, while perishing ourselves, we may wreak the completest vengeance for our blood."

   XXXIV. To this Quintus Marcius replied, "If you have anything to ask of the Senate, throw down your arms, and go to Rome with your petition. Such has ever been the clemency and compassion of the Senate of the Roman people that no one ever asked their help in vain."
   To return to Catiline; on his way to join Manlius he sent letters to many men of consular rank, and, besides these, to all persons of any mark, informing them that beset by false accusations, and unable to make head against the cabal of his enemies, he was resigning himself to fortune, and was now on his way to exile at Massilia. This course he was taking, not because his conscience reproached him with the crimes with which he was charged, but to secure the peace of the State and to prevent any dispute about himself giving rise to sedition. To a very different effect was a letter read before the House by Quintus Catulus, which he said had been delivered to him in Catiline's name: of this letter the following is a copy:--

   XXXV. "Lucius Catilina to Quintus Catulus--Your honor, at once so eminent and so practically proved, on which amid my great dangers it pleases me to think, encourages me to commit my affairs into your hands. I have determined, therefore, to enter on no defense as regards the fresh step I have taken, but have made up my mind, since I am conscious of no fault, to lay before you an explanation, of which, I profess, you can easily recognize the truth. Roused by the wrongs and insults I have endured, finding myself robbed of all reward for my toil and energy, and unable to gain any official position, I followed my usual bent and undertook the championship of the wretched. This I did, not because my property was insufficient to discharge my personal debts; on the contrary, the generosity of Orestilla was ready to pay off, from her own and her daughter's funds, those contracted as surety for others. No, it was the sight of unworthy men raised to the honors of office that impelled me, and the feeling that I myself was excluded on false suspicions. For these reasons I have embraced the hope, honorable in my present fortunes, of preserving what position I yet hold. I would write more, but news has just been brought that I am threatened with attack. For the present I commend Orestilla to you, and entrust her to your honor. I implore, as you love your own children, shield her from harm. Farewell."

   XXXVI. Catiline himself abode a few days with Gaius Flaminius at Arretium, and supplied the neighborhood, which he had previously aroused, with arms. He then assumed the fasces and other marks of a consular commission, and marched to the camp of Manlius. When this was known at Rome, the Senate pronounced Catiline and Manlius public enemies, and fixed a day, up to which the rest of the conspirators, except those condemned on capital charges, would be held guiltless on throwing down their arms. A decree was also passed, ordering the consuls to hold a levy. Antonius was to put himself at the head of an army, and pursue Catiline with all haste; Cicero, to remain to protect the capital.
   It was at this crisis that the empire of the Roman people, in my opinion, reached its most pitiable condition. From the setting to the rising sun its arms had subdued every land to obedience; at home there was peace and wealth, the first of blessings, as men esteem them, in abundance; and yet there were found citizens with minds hardened, to undertake their own and their country's destruction. Two decrees of the Senate had been passed, but of all that host not one was enticed by the reward offered to betray the conspiracy, not one deserted the camp of Catiline, so virulent was the disease which had settled like a plague on the minds of many citizens.

   XXXVII. Nor was disloyalty confined to those who had been admitted to the conspiracy; it may said that the whole of the common people, in their eagerness for revolution, approved the designs of Catiline. And this seemed but natural, for it always happens in states that the penniless envy the respectable and praise the disaffected, hate the old order and long for the new, and in their disgust at their own fortunes are eager for a general change. Careless of everything, they find in riot and sedition their meat and drink, for it is easy for the poor to escape loss. The populace of the capital, however, was especially impetuous, and that for many reasons. In the first place Rome had become a sink into which there poured all who were in any place notorious for crime or vice, others who had shamefully squandered their estates, and, in fine, every one whose disgraceful conduct and actions had made him an exile from his home. Again, there were many whose thoughts dwelt on the triumph of Sulla; they saw some, who had been common soldiers, now senators, and others so rich as to live in a style of regal magnificence; each hoped that, should he take up arms, victory would bring him no less rewards. Besides these, many young men who had starved in the country on the wages of their hands, had been attracted to Rome by public or private bounties, and had learnt to prefer the ease of the capital to such thankless toil. These, and all like them, found their profit in disaster to the state, so that we need wonder the less that penniless men of bad character were filled with high hopes, and measured their country's interests by their own. Again, all those whose parents had been proscribed during Sulla's triumph, whose property had been confiscated, and their political rights impaired, were awaiting the issue of the struggle with like feelings. To these might be added all who, as being in opposition to the senatorial party, preferred a convulsion in the state to their own exclusion from power. In fine, after many years, just the old disorders had returned to threaten the state.

   XXXVIII. The tribunician power had been restored in the consulship of Pompey and Crassus, and henceforth young men, made headstrong by their age and character, possessed themselves of this important office and began to rouse the mob by attacks on the Senate, next by bribery and promises to kindle their passions, and thus, finally, to attain to distinction and influence. They were strenuously opposed by many of the nobility, who made the defense of the Senate a pretext for advancing their own importance. To put the truth shortly, from the time of Sulla forward, though those who busied themselves with state affairs might allege honorable excuses, in some cases the defense of the people's rights, in others the extension of the authority of the Senate, beneath all this pretext of the public good each was secretly striving to gain power for himself. They showed no moderation, pushed hostility to an extreme, and made a bloody use of victory when won.

   XXXIX. After the dispatch of Pompey to conduct the wars against the Pirates and Mithradates, the power of the commons was broken, and the influence of the oligarchy increased. They held the magistracies, the provincial appointments, and all other patronage, in their own hands; they passed their days in prosperity, free from trouble and anxiety, and by their control of the courts terrified all who while in office treated the populace with greater mildness. As soon, however, as, amid their perilous condition, a hope of revolution was offered to the commons, the old battle-cry raised their spirits. Had Catiline come off victor, or even on equal terms, from the first battle-field, the state would, no doubt, have been prostrated by massacre and disaster, while the victorious party would only have enjoyed their success till some stronger champion snatched power and freedom from their tired and enfeebled hands. Even as it was, many persons not connected with the conspiracy at the outbreak of the war set out to join Catiline. Among these was a certain Aulus Fulvius, a senator's son, who was dragged back when already on the way, and put to death by his father's order. At Rome, meantime, Lentulus was following out the injunction of Catiline, and tampering in person, or through his agents, with all whose character or fortunes made them, he thought, fit instruments of revolution, not confining himself to citizens, but enlisting men of every class, so long as they would be useful in war.

   XL. In pursuance of this policy, he entrusted a certain Publius Umbrenus with the task of seeking out the ambassadors from the Allobroges, and inducing them, if possible, to join in the war. Their great public and private indebtedness, and the warlike temperament of the Gallic race, led him to hope that they would readily join in such an enterprise. Umbrenus had previously been employed in Gaul, and was acquainted with many of the chief men in the different states. He went to work therefore at once, and on the first occasion of his seeing the ambassadors in the Forum, asked a few questions as to their public affairs, and, as if grieved for their misfortunes, began to inquire what issue they hoped for to such evils. They complained of the greed of the magistrates, accused the Senate for its failure to help them, and foreboded death as the one cure for their ills. On hearing this, he told them that if they would be men, he would show them a way of escape from the great evils they spoke of. Inspired with extravagant hopes by his words, the Allobroges implored Umbrenus to take pity on them. There was no task so hard or repellent that they would not be most eager to perform it, if it would but free their state from debt. Thereupon Umbrenus took them to the house of Decimus Brutus, which was near the Forum, and was thrown open to the conspirators by the influence of Sempronia, for Brutus was at the time absent from Rome. To lend greater weight to his words, he also summoned Gabinius, and in his presence disclosed the conspiracy, and named his accomplices, including among them, in order to inspire the ambassadors with greater courage, many persons of every rank who were perfectly innocent. At last he procured from the ambassadors a promise of their services, and dismissed them home.

   XLI. The Allobroges, however, wavered for a long time as to what course they should adopt. On the one side was their debt, their love of war, and the great rewards they might expect if victorious; on the other, greater resources, an absence of risk, and a certain and immediate reward instead of uncertain hope. Thus they examined both sides of the question; but the fortune of the republic at last prevailed. They betrayed the whole affair, just as they had heard it, to Quintus Fabius Sanga, whose patronage their state mostly employed. Cicero, informed by Sanga of the plot, instructed the ambassadors to make a great show of zeal for the conspiracy, to visit the rest of the intriguers, make them ample promises, and use every exertion for their complete exposure.

   XLII. Almost simultaneously, there were risings in Hither and Farther Gaul, as also in Picenum, Bruttium, and Apulia. The agents whom Catiline had previously dispatched on every side were, with a rashness that approached insanity, pushing on all their plans at once. Their midnight councils, their transport of arms and weapons, their general hurry and bustle had caused more fear than actual danger. Many of these agents had been brought to trial by the praetor, Quintus Metellus Celer, in accordance with a resolution of the Senate, and by him thrown into prison, and Gaius Murena had pursued the same course in Farther Gaul, where he held command as a legate.

   XLIII. Meanwhile at Rome, Lentulus, with the other heads of the conspiracy, had equipped what seemed to them a large force, and determined that, on the arrival of Catiline and his army at Faesulae, Lucius Bestia, a tribune of the commons, should hold a public meeting, complain of the steps taken by Cicero, and throw the odium of having caused a most terrible war on that excellent consul. Taking this as their signal, the rank and file of their supporters were on the following night to carry out their respective tasks. They were said to have been distributed in the following manner:--Statilius and Gabinius, with a large force, were to set fire simultaneously to twelve suitable points in the town; the confusion thus caused would gain them easier access to the consul, and to the others at whom they aimed; Cethegus was to beset Cicero's door and attack him by force; others of the conspirators had other victims; and the young men, most of them of noble birth, were to murder their parents, and in the general panic that the simultaneous massacre and fire would occasion, a sally was to be made to join Catiline. While these preparations and arrangements were being made, Cethegus was continually complaining of the cowardice of his associates. He declared that by their hesitation and delay they had wasted splendid chances; in such a crisis it was action that was needed, not deliberation, and he himself, he protested, were he joined by only a few others, would attack the Senate house, while the rest played the coward. Naturally bold and impetuous, he was ever ready to strike a blow, and was convinced that prompt action offered the highest advantages.

   XLIV. To return to the Allobroges; in obedience to Cicero's injunction, they procured a meeting through Gabinius with the rest of the conspirators, and demanded from Lentulus, Cethegus, Statilius, and also Cassius, an oath which they might bear, duly attested, to their countrymen. Without this it would be a difficult task to make them join in so serious an attempt. The rest did as they were asked without any suspicion, but Cassius promised to go shortly to Gaul in person, and, indeed, left the city on that journey some little time before the ambassadors. On the departure of the latter, Lentulus sent with them a certain Titus Volturcius of Crotona, so that previous to their return home they might strengthen the bonds of their alliance by exchanging assurances with Catiline. He further entrusted Volturcius with a letter to Catiline, of which I give a copy:--"Who I am you will learn from the bearer. Consider the danger of your position, and remember that you are a brave man. Think what your plans demand; seek help from all, even from the lowest." Besides this letter he sent a verbal message asking, now that he had been declared a public enemy by the Senate, what he had to gain by refusing the help of slaves? The preparation he had ordered in the capital had been made; there must be no delay on his part in advancing nearer to Rome.

   XLV. When matters had gone thus far, on the night agreed on for their departure, Cicero, whose emissaries had informed him of everything, gave orders to the praetors, Lucius Valerius Flaccus, and Gaius Pomptinus, to plant an ambush by the Mulvian bridge, and seize the Allobroges, with their retinue. He explained clearly the object on which they were sent, and empowered them to manage the details as need might arise. The praetors, men used to war, quietly stationed their guards, and secretly occupied the bridge, according to their instructions. The ambassadors, with Volturcius, had no sooner arrived at the place than a simultaneous shout arose from either side. The Gauls quickly recognized the design, and promptly surrendered to the praetors. Volturcius at first encouraged the rest to resistance, and defended himself with his sword against his numerous assailants; finding, however, that he was deserted by the ambassadors, after many entreaties to Pomptinus on the score of their acquaintance to secure his safety, he at last, in great fear and trembling for his life, surrendered to the praetors as though to declared enemies.

   XLVI. On the successful execution of the design a full account was quickly conveyed to the consul, whose mind was filled at once with anxiety and rejoicing, with joy at the news that by disclosure of the plot, the state was saved from its danger; but with deep anxiety, in his hesitation as to what must be done with citizens of such rank detected in so great a crime. To punish them, he thought, would bring trouble on himself, while to allow them to escape might ruin the state. Summoning all his resolution, he ordered Lentulus, Cethegus, Statilius, and Gabinius, to be called before him, and with them a certain Caeparius of Tarracina, who was preparing to set out for Apulia, there to rouse the slaves. The rest appeared without delay; Caeparius, who had left his house a little before, had learnt the discovery of the plot, and escaped from the city. Lentulus, as praetor, the consul himself conducted, holding him by the hand, the rest under guard he ordered to come to the Temple of Concord. Thither he had summoned the Senate, and in a crowded assembly of its members he now introduced Volturcius with the ambassadors, while he ordered the praetor Flaccus to bring the dispatch box, with the letters which he had received from the ambassadors.

   XLVII. Volturcius was then examined on the subject of his journey, the letter, and finally as to his purpose and motive. At first he made pretenses, and tried to conceal all knowledge of the conspiracy; afterwards, when bidden to speak with a guarantee from the state of his safety, he betrayed everything just as it had taken place, and informed the Senate that, as he himself had only been admitted to the conspiracy by Gabinius and Caeparius a few days before, he knew no more than the ambassadors. he could only say that he had been used to hear from Gabinius that Publius Autronius, Servius Sulla, Lucius Varguntius, and many others were among its members. The confession of the Gauls was to the same effect, and when Lentulus pretended ignorance, they convicted him not only by the letter but by the words he had often used. "The Sibylline books," he had said, "prophesied that three Cornelii should rule Rome; Cinna and Sulla had already done so, and he himself was the third to whom fate assigned the government of the city; moreover, this was the twentieth year from that in which the Capitol had been burnt, and augurs had frequently declared on the strength of prodigies that it should be rendered bloody by a civil war." All the prisoners had previously acknowledged their seals; and, accordingly, after the letters had been read, the Senate made a decree that Lentulus on laying down his office, as well as the rest, should be kept in "free" or private custody. Accordingly they were delivered to the following guardians:--Lentulus, to Publius Lentulus Spinther, at that time an aedile; Cethegus, to Quintus Cornificius; Statilius, to Gaius Caesar; Gabinius, to Marcus Crassus; and Caeparius (who had been pursued and just brought back), to a senator named Gnaeus Terentius.

   XLVIII. Meanwhile the commons, who, at first, in their eagerness for a revolution, were too favorable to the idea of war, now that the nature of the conspiracy was laid bare, experienced a revulsion of feeling. They cursed the designs of Catiline, exalted Cicero to heaven, and were as full of joy and gladness as though they had escaped from slavery. Any other outrage of war would rather have given them plunder than have done them harm, but a conflagration they thought a ruthless and extravagant measure, and one fraught with misery to themselves, whose whole wealth consisted in articles of daily use and personal clothing.
   On the following day there was brought before the Senate a certain Lucius Tarquinius, who was said to have been pursued and captured on his way to join Catiline. He offered, if granted a public guarantee, to give information about the plot, and was ordered by the consul to make a full confession of all he knew. He told the Senate a tale very similar to that of Volturcius, about preparations for firing the city, a massacre of the respectable classes, and the approach of the enemy, but added that he himself had been sent by Marcus Crassus with a message to Catiline "not to let the seizure of Lentulus, Cethegus, and others of the conspirators alarm him, but to make it an additional reason for a rapid advance on Rome, by which the spirits of the rest would be revived and the prisoners more easily rescued from danger." On the mention, however, of Crassus, a man of birth, of enormous wealth, and the very greatest influence, some thought the story unworthy of belief, others again deemed it true, yet were of the opinion that at such a crisis a man of his importance should rather be conciliated than provoked, and as most of the senators were, in their private affairs, at the mercy of Crassus, all united in a cry that the witness was no honest one, and demanded that a motion should be made on the subject. On the motion therefore of Cicero, and in a crowded house, the Senate resolved that, "Whereas the witness of Tarquinius appears dishonest, he is to be kept in custody, and to be granted no further privilege of audience until such time as he confess at whose instigation he fabricated so grievous a charge." It was thought at the time by some that the information was contrived by Publius Autronius, in order that Crassus by the accusation might be made to share the peril of the rest, and these then gain the protection of his power. Others asserted that Tarquinius was set on by Cicero to prevent Crassus, according to his wont, taking the sedition under his patronage, and so embroiling the state. At a later period I personally heard Crassus declare that Cicero had actually put this insult upon him.

   XLIX. At the same conjuncture Quintus Catulus and Gaius Piso failed, either by bribery or influence, to induce Cicero to have Gaius Caesar dishonestly accused by means of the Allobroges or some other informer. Both these nobles were at bitter enmity with Caesar; Piso he had assailed when on his trial for malversation, on the score of having unjustly punished a certain Transpadane; Catulus hated him on account of their contest for the Pontificate, in that, at the close of his life and after filling the highest offices, he had been beaten by such a mere youth as Caesar. The state of the latter's affairs also favored the accusation, as his extraordinary profusion and the splendor of his public entertainments had sunk him heavily in debt. Unable to induce the consul to commit such a crime, they applied themselves to individual intrigues, and, by coining falsehoods, which they declared they had heard from Volturcius or the Allobroges, raised much odium against Caesar. So successful, indeed, were they, that some Roman knights, who were on guard under arms round the Temple of Concord, were carried away either by the greatness of the danger, or their own excitable character, and, on Caesar's leaving the Senate, threatened him with their swords, in order to show their zeal for the constitution.

   L. While the Senate was engaged with this business, and in decreeing rewards to the ambassadors of the Allobroges, and to Titus Volturcius, as informers whose witness had been verified, the freedmen and a few of the dependents of Lentulus went different ways about the city, trying to rouse the artisans and slaves in the streets to rescue him; while others sought out the popular mob captains, who had been wont to sell their services in disturbing the state. Cethegus, moreover, employed messengers to entreat the slaves and freedmen of his household, men picked and trained [in the school of audacity], to come in an armed body and break into the house where he lay. The consul, on learning of these designs, posted guards wherever occasion demanded, and having summoned the Senate, put the question how they would deal with the men in custody. It should be mentioned that, shortly before this, the Senate in a crowded house had pronounced their conduct treasonable. On the present occasion, Decimus Junius Silanus, who as consul-elect was the first called upon to give his opinion as to what was to be done with the actual prisoners, and besides them with Lucius Cassius, Publius Furius, Publius Umbrenus, and Quintus Annius, in the event of their capture, at first gave his vote for their punishment; afterwards, however, he was so influenced by the speech of Gaius Caesar that he declared that on a division he would side with Tiberius Nero, who had proposed that the question should be adjourned till the guards round the Senate house had been increased. The speech of Caesar, when it came to him to be asked his opinion by the consul, was to the following effect:--

   LI. "All men, Senators, who deliberate on doubtful matters should be equally free from hate and friendship, from anger and compassion. When these obstruct the view, the mind does not easily discern the truth; nor has anyone ever harmonized the dictates of passion and interest. When the intellect is alert it is strong; but if passion gains a footing it becomes a tyrant, and the reason is reduced to impotence. I have no lack of examples of kings and peoples who, under the sway of anger or compassion have erred in their counsels. I prefer, however, to remind you of some occasions on which our ancestors preserved a due and orderly course of action though it conflicted with their passions. In the Macedonian war, which we carried on with King Perseus, the great and splendid State of Rhodes, which had prospered by the help of the Roman people, proved disloyal and hostile to us. When the war was finished and the conduct of the Rhodians came to be considered, our ancestors, to avoid giving any pretext for an assertion that they went to war not to avenge an injury, but for the sake of wealth, allowed them to go unpunished. Similarly in all our Punic wars, though the Carthaginians often committed many outrages in times both of peace and of truce, our ancestors availed themselves of no opportunity to do the like, but took in consideration rather what was worthy of themselves than what might fairly be inflicted on their enemy.
   A like occasion has now arisen, and you, Senators, must be on your guard lest the crime of Publius Lentulus and his fellows weigh heavier with you than your own dignity, and lead you to a resolution that will better satisfy your wrath than your repute. If, indeed, the object of our search is some penalty adequate to the offense, then I approve of our abandoning all precedent in our measures; but if the enormity of the crime taxes our ingenuity too heavily for this, I am of opinion that we should confine ourselves to such punishments as are by law provided. Most of those who have spoken before me have in studied and noble language bewailed the misfortune of the republic, have dilated on the horrors of war and the fate of the vanquished, and have reminded you of how maids are ravished, children torn from their parents' arms, matrons placed at the mercy of the conquerors' passions, temples and houses plundered, fire and slaughter carried everywhere, and whole towns filled with arms and corpses, blood and mourning. But at what, I ask, was all this eloquence aimed? To stir you to detestation of the conspiracy? As if the man whom the horrible reality has not moved could be roused by any eloquence! That is not human nature, nor are men ever wont to underestimate their own injuries; rather, in many cases they have been known to take too serious a view of them. Extravagance of behavior, Senators, takes a different hue in different stations. Men of low rank pass their life in obscurity, and their faults of passion are known to few, for their notoriety never rises above their fortunes. Those, on the other hand, who are the heirs of a great sovereignty, and live in a high position, have their doings known to all the world. The higher their fortunes the greater the restrictions upon them; they must know nothing of favor or disfavor, and least of all of anger; for what in others is called anger, in rulers receives the name of pride and cruelty. And, though, for my own part, I think any and every punishment inadequate to the crimes of the prisoners, yet most people only remember the end of an incident, and, in the case of the wicked, often forget their misdeeds in talking of their punishment, if that has been somewhat usually severe."
   "I feel sure that the proposal of that brave and active citizen, Decimus Silanus, was made in all zeal for the state, and that in a matter of such importance he would allow himself to be influenced neither by hatred nor partiality. My knowledge of his character and self-restraint convinces me of this. But his motion strikes me, I will not say as cruel--for what proposal could be cruel when aimed at men like these?--but as foreign to the spirit of our state. It must certainly have been either panic or a strong sense of wrong that moved you, Silanus, a consul-elect, to propose an unprecedented form of punishment. To speak of terror were needless, especially when, by the activity of our illustrious consul, we have such numerous guards under arms. As to the actual punishment you propose, I might observe, what is indeed the case, that to men in grief and misery death comes as a relief, not as a pain, that it annuls all the ills that flesh is heir to, and that beyond it neither trouble nor joy find place. But what I wish to ask you is, Why did you not add to your motion that the condemned should first be punished with the scourge? Was it because it is forbidden by the Porcian law? If so, there are other laws which forbid condemned citizens to be deprived of life, and offer the alternative of exile. Did you omit it, then, because scourging is a heavier punishment than death? Yet what sentence can be too harsh or too severe for men convicted for so atrocious a crime? Again, if you thought scourging the lighter punishment, how can it be proper to fear the law in the smaller matter after neglecting it in the greater?"
   "It may be asked, Who will take exception to any decree against traitors? I answer, time, the events of a day, and fortune whose caprice rules the world. Whatever the prisoners' fate, it will have been well deserved; but you, Senators, must consider the precedent which you are establishing. Every bad precedent has arisen out of a measure in itself good; but, when power has fallen to unskillful or less worthy hands, the precedent is no longer applied to fit and deserving subjects, but to unfit and undeserving. The Lacedaemonians, when they had crushed the Athenians, imposed on them an oligarchy of thirty members. This government began by executing, without trial, those whose guilt or unpopularity was greatest; the people rejoiced, and justified their action. As the spirit of license gradually increased, they killed good and bad alike in mere wantonness, while they filled the rest of the citizens with terror. Thus the state paid for its foolish rejoicing the heavy price of slavery. In our own times the victorious Sulla, amid universal approval, ordered the execution of Damasippus and his fellows, who had fattened on the public disasters. The men were stained with crime and treason, their seditious spirit had embroiled the state, and it was agreed that their death was richly deserved. Nevertheless, that action was the inauguration of a great massacre. Did a man covet a house or villa, nay, even a piece of pottery or of raiment, he used all his exertions to include its owner in the list of the proscribed. Those who had rejoiced at the death of Damasippus were soon themselves dragged to execution, and the massacre only ceased when Sulla had glutted all his followers with wealth. I do not fear any such conduct on the part of Marcus Tullius, nor at the present crisis; but a large state contains many and diverse characters. At a future time, and under another consul, entrusted, in his turn, with an army, some false charge may be believed true, and when the consul has followed this precedent, and, at the decree of the Senate, drawn his sword, who will there be to check or restrain him?"
   "Senators, our ancestors never showed themselves wanting in either wisdom or courage, nor did they allow their pride to prevent them imitating the customs of foreign nations, so long as they were good. Most of their armor and weapons of warfare they adopted from the Samnites, and the emblems of their magistracies from the Etruscans; in fine, they zealously copied in their own administration all that seemed serviceable among their allies or enemies. They preferred, I may say, to imitate rather than to envy the good. Now, it was at this period of imitation that they adopted the [Greek] custom of scourging citizens and inflicting capital punishment on convicted criminals. With the growth, however, of the state, and the greater violence of party strife, which resulted from the increase of population, it was found that innocent persons were made victims and that other like abuses were becoming common. To meet this danger, the Porcian and other laws were provided, by which convicted persons were allowed to retire into exile. This, Senators, I think a most weighty reason against our adopting any resolution for which there is no precedent. I cannot but think that the men, who, with the small resources at their command, won so great an empire, were endowed with greater courage and wisdom than are we who find a difficulty even in keeping what they so nobly won."
   "Am I then in favor of dismissing our prisoners, to swell the army of Catiline? Far from it. My proposal is that their goods be confiscated, and that their persons be imprisoned in such borough towns as are best able to support the charge, and that no one hereafter make any motion with reference to them in the Senate, or bring their case before the people, on pain of the Senate's adjudging his action treasonable and prejudicial to the State."

   LII. On the close of Caesar's speech, all the senators merely gave their votes for the different motions, some for the one, some for the other, until it came to Marcus Porcius Cato. He, when asked his opinion, delivered himself as follows:--
   "When I turn, Senators, from surveying the dangers of our position, and reflect on the opinions of certain previous speakers, the impression I receive is very different. These speakers appear to have discussed the punishment of the men who have raised war against their country and parents, their altars and hearths. Our position warns us rather to guard against their attack than to consider their sentence. Other crimes you may be content to avenge when they have actually been committed; against this, if you fail to prevent it, you will in vain invoke the law, for when a city is once stormed the conquered have no further resources. I profess, though, I should remember that in you I am appealing to men who ever valued their houses and villas, their statues and paintings more highly than they did the state. If you would keep these cherished possessions, of whatever kind--if you would have leisure to indulge in your pleasures--now at last awake and take an active part in the work of government. This is no question of tribute or of the wrongs done to our allies; it is our liberty and our lives that are at stake."
   "Many a time, Senators, have I spoken at length in this house. Often have I complained of the self-indulgence and avarice of our citizens. By so doing I have made many enemies; but as I never had to excuse any such sin to my own conscience, I could scarcely be so tender to another's vices as to pardon his ill deeds. You made slight account of this advice, but the stability of the state was not shaken; its resources could bear the strain of your neglect. The question, however, now at stake is not whether our lives shall be moral or immortal, nor as to the size or speldnor of the empire of the Roman people; it is whether this empire, just as it is, shall remain our own, or fall, with ourselves, a prey to our enemies. Here someone reminds me of clemency and compassion. Why, long ere this we have ceased to call things by their right names. To be lavish of the goods of others is now called generosity, and to be daring in the commission of crime courage. This fashion has brought the state to the brink of ruin; but even granting, since morality is come to this, that men may be generous with the fortunes of our allies, and compassionate in dealing with the plunderers of the exchequer, at least let them hesitate to squander our blood, and, in sparing a few villains, work the ruin of all honest men."
   "Gaius Caesar has just addressed to you an eloquent and polished disquisition on life and death. He disbelieves, I suppose, those traditions about the dead which assign to the bad a path different from that of the good, and lead them to noisome and savage abodes full of horrors and terrors. Holding this opinion, he has moved that the property of the prisoners be confiscated, and they themselves kept in confinement in the borough towns. He evidently fears that, should they remain at Rome, they may be rescued either by their accomplices or by a hired mob. As if bad and abandoned men were to be found only in the capital, and not throughout Italy, or boldness were not more powerful where the means of repelling it are less! His proposal is thus plainly idle, if he really apprehends danger from the prisoners, while if, amid such general alarm, he alone is fearless, there is the more reason why we others should be cautious. In making you decision, then, on Publius Lentulus and his associates, be assured that you are at the same time deciding the fate of the army of Catiline and of all the conspirators. The more vigorous your measures, the more will their courage be shaken. If they see you hesitating, but for a moment, you will have the whole pack marching valiant against you."
   "Think not that it was by arms that our ancestors raised the state from insignificance to grandeur. If that were so, it would now be at its noblest beneath our sway, for our force of allies and citizens, not to mention that of arms and horses, is far greater than was theirs. The sources, however, of their greatness were very different from these, and we have none of them. Such were their energy at home, the justice of their rule abroad, and the unbiased mind, the slave neither of sin nor of lust, which they brought to their councils. For these we have substituted self-indulgence and avarice, a bankrupt state and private millionaires. Our praise is of riches; idleness our pursuit. Good and bad can no longer be distinguished; intrigue wins all the prizes which merit deserves, and who can wonder at it? Each of you frames his policy to serve his individual ends; in your homes you worship pleasure, in the Senate money or influence; and so, when an attack comes, the state is found with none to defend her."
   "However, I will say no more of this. Citizens of the highest rank have conspired to destroy their country; to aid them in the war they summon the Gauls, a people most hostile to the name of Rome; the leader of our enemies with his army at our doors. Can you still be hesitating how to treat enemies caught within your walls? You are to pity them, I suppose. The young men have been led into a mistake, and you are to dismiss them, armed though they be. Look to it that this clemency and mercy do not turn to your own misery, if once they take up arms. The state of affairs is indeed unpromising, but perhaps you do not fear it? Say rather that you are in the greatest terror, but that in your sloth and irresolution you hesitate and wait one for another, full, of course, of a pious trust in the eternal gods who have so often upheld this state amid the greatest dangers. I tell you that the help of heaven is not won by vows and womnish prayers; but that by vigilance, by action, by wise counsels, a happy issue is attained. Abandon yourself to sloth and cowardice, and you may invoke the gods, but it will be in vain; they are angered and adverse. In the days of our forefathers, Titus Manlius Torquatus, during the Gallic war, ordered his son to be executed for having fought the enemy against orders. That noble youth atoned by his death for his untempered valor, and are you hesitating as to your sentence on these ruthless traitors? Of course the rest of their lives stand in contrast to this one crime! Respect then the rank of Lentulus, if ever he respected his modesty, his honor, or any god or man. Pardon the youth of Cethegus, if this be not the second time he has made war on his country. What am I to say of Gabinius, of Statilius, of Caeparius? If it had not been for their utter heedlessness they could never, I suppose, have entertained such designs upon the state! To conclude, Senators, I profess that, if we could safely make a mistake, I would readily suffer you to be convinced of your error by the course of events, since you despise my words. We are, however, actually beset on every side. Catiline, with his army, is at our throats; we have other enemies within the walls and in the very heart of the city; we can make no preparation and come to no determination without its being known; all these are so many reasons for greater dispatch."
   "I therefore move that 'inasmuch as the criminal designs of traitorous citizens have placed the state in the greatest danger, and inasmuch as the prisoners by the information of Titus Volturcius and the ambassadors of the Allobroges, stand convicted of having planned a massacre, a conflagration, and other disgraceful and cruel atrocities, against their fellow-citizens and their country; that, therefore, punishment be inflicted according to ancient custom, on those who have confessed their guilt, as though they had been convicted of capital offenses.'"

   LIII. On Cato resuming his seat, all the men of consular rank, together with many other members of the Senate, commended his proposal, and praised his courage to the skies. Reproaching each other for what they now called their timidity, they accounted Cato a great and brilliant statesman, and a decree of the Senate was passed in the words of resolution.
   I have read and heard much of the noble deeds of the Roman people in peace and in war, on land and on sea; and chance has disposed me to consider what circumstance it was that had done most to support it in its gigantic task. I was aware that on many occasions it had confronted large bodies of the enemy with but a handful of troops. I knew of the wars which Rome, with her scanty resources, had waged against wealthy kings. I knew, too, that she had often had to bear the rude attack of fortune; and that in eloquence the Greek, in warlike renown the Gaul, had outstripped her children. After much reflection, however, I arrived at the conclusion that it was the pre-eminent merit of a few of our citizens that had accomplished all; that this was the power that had enabled poverty to subdue wealth, a handful to rout a host. When, however, the state was corrupted by luxury and indolence, the republic, in its turn, by its very greatness, lent strength to its blundering generals and magistrates; while, as if the vigor of their fathers had perished, at many periods there was not a single man in Rome of conspicuous merit. In my own time, however, there have been two men of surpassing merit, though different character--Marcus Cato and Gaius Caesar. As my subject has brought them into notice, it is not my design to pass them over without disclosing their respective natures and characters, so far as my ability will allow me.

   LIV. In birth, age, and eloquence, Caesar and Cato were nearly equal; and they were well matched in the loftiness of their aims, and in the renown which, each in his own way, they attained. Caesar was esteemed for his kind offices and munificence; Cato for the strict uprightness of his life. The former was distinguished by his clemency and compassion; sternness added dignity to the latter. Caesar won renown by his readiness to give, to help, and to pardon; Cato by never offering a bribe. The one was the refuge of the wretched; the other, the destruction of the bad. The former was praised for his affability; the latter for his consistency. In fine Caesar had formed the resolve to work, to be ever on the watch, to promote his friends' interest even to the detriment of his own, and to refuse nothing which was worth the giving. He aimed at a high command, an army, a war in some new field where his talents might be displayed. Cato, on the other hand, made temperance, dignity, and, above all, austerity of behavior, his pursuit. He did not vie in wealth with the wealthy, nor in intrigue with the intriguer, but in courage with the man of action, in honor with the scrupulous, in self-restraint with the upright. He preferred to be good rather than to seem so; and thus, the less he pursued renown, the more it attended him.

   LV. When, as I related, the Senate had passed Cato's resolution, the consul, thinking it better to forestall the coming night, lest the interval should be used for any revolutionary movement, ordered the officers to make the necessary preparations for the execution. After posting guards at various points he personally conducted Lentulus to the prison, while the praetors did the same to the rest. In the prison there is a place, called the Tullianum, which, after a slight ascent to the left, you find sunk about twelve feet in the ground. It is guarded on every side by walls, and above it is an arched roof of stone; desolation, darkness, and stench give it a loathsome and dreadful appearance. To this place Lentulus was conducted, and there strangled by the appointed executioners. A patrician of the illustrious house of the Cornelii, and a man who had held the office of consul at Rome, he met an end worthy of his character and his crimes. On Cethegus, Statilius, Gabinius, and Caeparius, the same punishment was inflicted.

   LVI. While this was happening at Rome, Catiline, from the whole force made up of his own contingent and of the original army of Manlius, organized two legions, and filled up the cohorts in proportion to the number of his men. Afterwards, as volunteers or members of the conspiracy arrived in the camp they were drafted in equal numbers into the several divisions; and in a short time he had raised his legions to their proper strength, although at first he had not more than two thousand men. Not more than a quarter, however, of his whole force was equipped with weapons of war. The rest, as chance had armed them, carried hunting spears or javelins, and, in some cases, pointed stakes. On the approach of Antonius with his army, Catiline moved to and fro among the mountains, frequently changed his quarters, turning now towards Rome, now towards Gaul, and offered the enemy no chance of fighting; for he hoped, should his accomplices at Rome succeed in their plans, soon to be at the head of large forces. Meanwhile he rejected the slave hands, which at the outset rallied round him in large numbers. He trusted to the strength of the conspiracy, and at the same time thought it prejudicial to his designs to appear to have made the cause of citizens one with that of runaway slaves.

   LVII. On the arrival at the camp of the news that at Rome the plot was discovered, and that Lentulus, Cethegus, and the others whom I have named above, had been executed, many, who had been attracted by the hope of plunder or desire for revolution, now deserted. The rest Catiline led by forced marches over rugged mountains to the district of Pistoria, intending to retreat secretly by cross roads into Transalpine Gaul. Quintus Metellus Celer, however, was stationed in Picenum with three legions, and surmised that Catiline, in his present difficulty, would be adopting the very course I have described. Learning the latter's route from deserters, he hastily advanced and pitched his camp at the very foot of the mountains which Catiline would have to descend on his hasty march towards Gaul. Antonius also was close upon him; his army was large, but it was aided by the more level character of its road, and he could thus follow in pursuit. Catiline now saw himself hemmed in between the mountains and the forces of the enemy; in the capital he had been defeated; and he had no hope either of escape or refuge. He thought best, therefore, in so perilous a case, to try the fortune of war, and determined to come to an instant engagement with Antonius. Accordingly, he called his troops around him, and spoke as follows:--

   LVIII. "Soldiers, I have long discovered that words cannot inspire courage, and that no speech of a general, can give a flagging army energy, or the timid courage. Just so much daring, natural or acquired, as resides in each man's breast, does he display in war. The man insensible to the call of glory and danger you will harangue in vain; his cowardice stops his ears. Nevertheless I have called you together to give you a few words of advice and at the same time to disclose the motive of my resolution."
   "I make certain, soldiers, that you know of the disastrous consequences, to himself and to us, of the cowardice and indolence of Lentulus, and how, while awaiting reinforcements from the capital, I have been prevented from marching towards Gaul. You know, too, as well as I do, our present position. Two hostile armies close our path, the one of the side of Rome, the other of Gaul. Want of corn and other necessaries forbid us to remain longer in our present quarters, desire it though we may. In whatever direction we determine to march, we must cut our way with our swords. I exhort you, therefore, to keep a brave and ready heart, and, when you enter battle, to remember that in your own right hands li