canvass;

24 but Cæsar, who bought others, could not himself be bought by any bribe.

It was about the same time that Cato set out from the city, together with some learned friends, to spend a few leisure weeks at his estate in Lucania. As he journeyed thither with the usual train of slaves, besides his companions, he heard that Metellus Nepos, for the last three or four years a favorite officer of Pompey, was on his way to seek the tribuneship at Rome. Cato instantly ordered his attendants to turn back; and on being asked by his friends, the philosophers, why he had so suddenly changed his mind, he answered, that it was no time for retirement, when such a man as Metellus was about to fall like a thunderbolt upon the Commonwealth.25 The purpose had ripened during Pompey's absence, especially amongst the party of the Senate, to prevent his return to the almost unlimited authority he had possessed. None were more resolute in this respect than Cato; and the readiness with which he renounced his intended visit to Lucania, where his books and his companions would have entertained him, however little he may have cared for country life, betrays the apprehension which Pompey could excite merely by sending home a follower for an office, while he kept himself away. Cato went on, indeed, to his estate; but swiftly returned, to offer himself as a candidate for the same place which Metellus sought. The Senate

24 Plut., Cæs., 7.

25 Ibid., Cat., 20.

supported him as their chosen champion, and he was easily elected; but not, as he had hoped, to the exclusion of Metellus, who was chosen one of his colleagues.

The anxieties of the few patriots in Rome were already absorbed in greater cares than any connected with the return of Pompey. Catiline, the conspirator of a former year, was again seeking the consulship; and having twice before been rejected at the elections, he was now advancing towards his object, as was well known, at the head of a band of associates, who, some thinking to lead, and others aware of following him, were, before the present canvass, resolved to create him Consul for their sakes as well as for his own. This extraordinary man, in whom, it would seem, the worst and the best blood, the highest and the basest capacities of his race, were combined, had pursued a career of wickedness and prodigality to which there were many counterparts in public, but few in private, even amongst his corrupted countrymen. Though nothing would be more unjust than to repeat the reproaches which he has received, as if he had been a solitary monster in the midst of a virtuous people," it is evident that the

26

26 His public life began with the proscriptions and murders in which he took a fearful part under Sulla. He was afterwards a Quæstor (A. C. 78), a Lieutenant (76), and a Prætor (68); while, on the other side, if it may be so distinguished, of the sketch, appear his prosecution for extortion in Africa, which

he governed in the year following his prætorship, and his arraignment on the list of Sulla's assassins. On both trials he easily obtained an acquittal; on the second with the help of Cæsar. Dion Cass. XXXVII. 10.

27"Incitabant præterea corrupti civitatis mores." Sall., Cat., 5.

oppressions and the debaucheries which marked the ruler, the citizen, and the lowest slave in Rome had never yet been so openly paraded and indulged as by Catiline. This, again, is not to his shame alone, but to that of the nation in which public opinion was extinct or else no longer respectable. Ardent in intellect 28 and strong in physical energies, until his vices had enfeebled his frame and inflamed his bloodshot eyes, Catiline was foremost in revelry, in brilliancy, and in ambition. As generous to those he cared to serve as he was grasping towards those he chose to abuse,30 he was the hero of one as much as the terror of another multitude. Nor was he admired alone by infamous men or profligate women; the virtuous, or they who bore the name, were inclined to indulge him, as one whose faults were not so striking as his powers.31 "Me even," exclaimed Cicero, "me had he almost deceived, so nearly did he seem to me the good citizen, the associate of the excellent, the firm and the faithful friend." Catiline must now have been upwards of forty years of age.

32

Cicero took upon himself the charge of preventing Catiline's election as his successor; and although it was generally, but indistinctly, known that the inten

30

See the whole of Cap. 38. It was 29 Magna vi et animi et cornot every people, as Juvenal (Sat. poris." Ibid. XIV. 41, 42) would have us believe, that could produce a Catiline.

Alieni appetens, sui profusus." Ibid.

31 Cic., Pro Cæl., 5, 6.

32 Ibid., 6. It was insincere,. however, in Cicero to say so. Cf. Ad Att., I. 1, 2.

tions of the candidate and his comrades, whose troops were already gathering in Etruria, extended far beyond the limits of the consulship, the opposition of Cicero alone appears in any prominence. He urged a new law against bribery; 33 he induced his colleague to separate from the conspirators; he united the supporters, generous or interested, of the Commonwealth under his direction; he adjourned the election; and finally, as he says himself, he bade Catiline answer, "if he would," before the Senate, for the rumors brought in on every side.34 The conspirator retorted, that there were two bodies belonging to the Commonwealth, the one weak and with a feeble head, the other strong, but without a head at all; " to this," he added menacingly, "while I live, a head shall no more be wanting.' "35 And so he broke forth, as Cicero continues, from the Senate-house in triumph. But the Consul remained, firm and resolved, with the Senate, from whom he obtained the decree investing himself and his colleague, according to the usual form, with unlimited authority to preserve the public safety. He then descended, armed and guarded, into the Campus Martius, where the elections were held; and there, to his infinite joy, was enabled to declare two other citizens, Junius Silanus and Licinius Murena, to be chosen Consuls in the face of the thrice disappointed Catiline. Neither Pompey with the army,

33 Attempted in vain before. Ascon., Argum. Orat. in Tog. Cand. Cic., Pro Murena, 23. Dion Cass., XXXVII. 29.

34 Pro Mur., 25.

35 Ibid. Plut., Cic., 14. Cf. Dion Cass., XXXVII. 29.

nor Cato in the Senate, nor Lucullus in his luxuries, nor, least of all, Crassus and Cæsar, themselves suspected of conspiring with Catiline,36 were watching over the liberty and the preservation of Rome; her guardian on earth was Cicero.

66

To him alone had been disclosed 37 the extent and the purposes of the conspiracy which Catiline had begun to organize so early as at the time when he and Cicero were competitors for the consulship. The leading associates whom Catiline then selected were men of various ranks and still more various aims: some weak-minded, like Cornelius Lentulus, — formerly Consul, afterwards expelled from the Senate, but now again in the prætorship, who aspired to " 38 reign,' as he did; others dull, like Cassius Longinus, who would rise through rebellion to some of the opportunities of fortune or authority above their reach in peace; and others still, bankrupt and debauched, like Quintus Curius, an ejected Senator, or the younger Cornelius Cethegus, who rather sought indulgence for their lusts and prodigalities. Many Senators and more Knights, from the country and the colonies which Sulla spread 39 over Italy, as well as from the city, were sooner or later involved, through their own will, in the same toils.40

36 They had, at all events, supported his canvass against Cicero; but there is no proof of their having taken part in the conspiracy.

37 Through Fulvia, a lady of high rank, and the mistress of Quintus Curius, the conspirator. Sall., Cat., 23, 26.

38 There was a prophecy current that a third Cornelius (Cinna having been a first, and Sulla a second) should reign at Rome. Plut., Cic., 17.

39 Plut., Cic., 14. Sall., Cat., 28. Cic., In Cat., II. 9.

40 Sall., Cat., 17. Cic., In Cat.,