Publia by name — a union which resulted unhappily. The death of his much-loved daughter, Tullia, B. C. 45, led him to seek consolation in his favorite study of philosophy. On the death of Caesar, B. C. 44, Cicero again mingled in the political strife of the times, and, attaching himself to Octavius, attempted to thwart the success of Antony by his powerful Philippics. Cicero was included - probably at the instigation of Antony in the list of the proscribed, which was made out in the second triumvirate. He was at Tusculum when he heard of this proscription, and instantly made preparations for flight. His intention was to go to Astŭra, a town on the coast of Latium, with the design of embarking at that place for Macedonia. From this port he set sail; but the winds were contrary and the sea rough, and he was compelled to put into the harbor of Caïēta, near his Formian villa. He reached his villa December 7, B. C. 43, but there learned that the pursuers sent by Antony were already in the vicinity. He was forced into his litter, and on his way through a thick wood to the sea-shore, was overtaken by the assassins. Seeing clearly that his last hour had come, he ordered his attendants to set down the litter, and, thrusting out his head, called upon his murderers to strike. Herennius, one of the leaders, stepped forward and severed his head from his body, which, with the orator's hands, was carried to Rome and delivered to Antony, as he was seated in the Forum. It is related that Antony presented the head to his wife, Fulvia, who took it, and, placing it on her lap, addressed it as though it were yet alive, and, drawing out the tongue, pierced it with her bodkin, thus evincing the rage which she had so often felt at its sarcasms.

The head and hands were afterwards taken to the Forum and nailed to the Rostra, there to decay in the very place which he had rendered renowned by his eloquence.

Among his philosophical works, nearly all of which were composed between 46-44 B. C., the two dialogues De Senectute and De Amicitia occupy a prominent place. The agreeable and genial style in which they are written, their pure classic taste, and their high and ennobling sentiments, have always made them favorite treatises. In order to present the theme in its most practical bearings, and free it from merely abstract theory, he has given them to us in a conversational form, and by numerous citations of historical facts, and apt illustrations from well-known poets, has brought the subject nearer to the popular heart than he could have done by works founded merely on pure reasoning.

CATO MAIOR.

THE treatise De Senectute, or, "On Old Age," was written, probably, B. C. 44, when Cicero was sixtythree years old. It is entitled CATO MAIOR, from the principal character introduced into the dialogue, who is represented as discoursing on old age with P. Scipio Africanus the Younger and C. Laelius, one of Scipio's friends. The work is dedicated to Titus Pomponius Atticus.

MARCUS PORCIUS CATO CENSORIUS, called also SAPIENS, and later (in order to distinguish him from Cato of Utica) PRISCUS and MAIOR, was born at Tusculum, B. C. 234. Upon the death of his father he inherited a small estate in the Sabine territory, where he spent a great part of his boyhood in the rough but healthful exercises of a farmer's life. In his seventeenth year, B. C. 217, he served his first campaign at Capua, under Fabius Maximus, at that time the leading military man in the war against Hannibal. With this general he also served again as a soldier at the siege of Tarentum, B. C. 209. Two years later, B. C. 207, he accompanied (probably in the capacity of tribunus militum) the consul, Claudius Nero, on his march from Lucania to check the progress of Hasdrubal, who was defeated and slain at Sena, on the Metaurus, in which battle the services of Cato contributed not a little to the victory over the Carthaginians. When re

leased from warlike service, Cato returned to his Sabine estate, where he engaged in the works of agriculture, wearing the plainest dress and sharing the fare of his field-laborers. His neighbors were not slow to recognize the stern simplicity and energetic character which he here exhibited. Among these was L. Valerius Flaccus, a nobleman of influence, who induced Cato to remove to Rome, there to do battle against the degeneracy of the times, and to attempt to restore the ancient integrity, as well as simplicity, of Roman life. In this new field he became the most influential pleader and greatest political orator of the times, and throughout his long life exerted his greatest efforts in opposing the spread of luxury, with all its consequent train of vices, and the prevalent corruption of morals.

In B. C. 205 he was appointed quaestor, and accompanied P. Scipio Africanus to Sicily and Africa. In B. C. 199, he became aedile, and in the following year praetor, with Sardinia for his province, in which office he discharged his duties with an absence of pomp strikingly in contrast with the ordinary splendor of his predecessors. On this island he became acquainted with Ennius, from whom he learned the Greek language, and by whom he was accompanied on his return to Rome. Cato was elected consul, B. C. 195, with his old friend, L. Valerius Flaccus, as colleague, in the thirty-ninth year of his age, and received for his province Hispania Citerior, and by the successful management of the Spanish campaign, received a triumph the following year. After his consulship he accompanied Ti. Sempronius Longus, as legatus, to Thrace; and in B. C. 191, notwithstanding their consular dignity, Cato and his friend Valerius were appointed tribuni mili

tares, under M' Acilius Glabrio, who had been sent to oppose the invasion of Antiochus, king of Syria. Here, at the decisive battle of Thermopylae, Cato exhibited extraordinary valor and high military genius, and, after the action, was embraced, at the head of the army, by the consul, who ascribed to him the whole credit of the victory. We have no trustworthy accounts of any later military acts performed by Cato; but his valuable services and characteristic genius were afterwards seen in the censorship which he obtained, B. C. 184, with his friend Valerius. In this office he showed himself such a bitter enemy to the habits of luxury and the relaxation of the old code of Roman morals, that he met with the most strenuous opposition of the patricians, and was compelled to live in almost constant warfare against the most influential of his fellow-citizens. Although a rigid censor of the public morals, he was himself accused, probably in most cases from factious bitterness and political prejudice, and compelled to stand trial forty-four times, the last in the eighty-first year of his life, when he uttered the complaint that "it was hard to be obliged to defend himself before men of an age different from that in which he himself had lived."

After this, the public life of Cato was passed chiefly in the business of the Forum, the senate, and in popular assemblies. But his inflexible opposition to luxury still continued. In B. C. 181, he favored the adoption of the Lex Orchia, by the provisions of which the number of guests at banquets was to be restricted; and in B. C. 169, when sixty-five years of age, he supported with all his youthful vigor the Lex Voconia (v. 14), which had for its object to prevent the accumulation of wealth in the hands of women.