The New Student's Reference Work/Cato, Marcus Porcius (Cato the Younger)

2343708The New Student's Reference Work — Cato, Marcus Porcius (Cato the Younger)

Ca′to, Marcus Porcius, called Cato the Younger, the great-grandson of the elder Cato, was born at Rome in 95 B. C., and committed suicide in North Africa in 46 B. C. When only 14 years old, he went with his tutor one day to call upon Sulla, and, seeing the heads of several famous men, who had been put to death by the tyrant, carried away from the house, he asked why some one did not kill him. His tutor answering that no one dared to do so, he exclaimed that he would do it himself, if he would give him a sword. He greatly admired his great-grandfather, and took him as his model in life. He was rich, but lived in a simple manner, always walking instead of riding, wherever he went, and often going barefoot.

He held the office of quæstor, and carried through so many needed reforms that when he left office, he was praised by all classes of citizens. He was an open enemy of the three most powerful men in Rome, Cæsar, Pompey and Crassus, who, he foresaw, would destroy the republic, as they did when they formed the first triumvirate or government of three. Cæsar he had denounced years before as a friend of the traitor Catiline, and after the battle of Pharsalia he set out to join Pompey, now the defeated rival of Cæsar, but, hearing of his death, fled to Africa. He wished to defend Utica, but on the approach of the conqueror the citizens refused to fight. Cato, disdaining to surrender, killed himself after spending the evening talking with his friends and reading Plato's Phædo. His death was for two centuries regarded as the right death for a Stoic by the noblest of Romans.