ower of a neighbouring state, is a
warrant sufficient for destroying a city, contrary to the faith of
treaties. Scipio Nasica on the other hand, was of opinion, that the ruin
of this city would draw after it that of their commonwealth; because that
the Romans, having then no rival to fear, would quit the ancient severity
of their manners, and abandon themselves to luxury and pleasures, the
never-failing subverters of the most flourishing empires.

In the mean time, divisions broke out in Carthage.(858) The popular
faction, being now become superior to that of the grandees and senators,
sent forty citizens into banishment; and bound the people by an oath,
never to suffer the least mention to be made of recalling those exiles.
They withdrew to the court of Masinissa, who despatched Gulussa and
Micipsa, his two sons, to Carthage, to solicit their recall. However, the
gates of the city were shut against them, and one of them was closely
pursued by Hamilcar, one of the generals of the republic. This gave
occasion to a new war, and accordingly armies were levied on both sides. A
battle was fought; and the younger Scipio, who afterwards ruined Carthage,
was spectator of it. He had been sent from Lucullus, who was then carrying
on war in Spain, and under whom Scipio then served, to Masinissa, to
desire some elephants from that monarch. During the whole engagement, he
stood upon a neighbouring hill; and was surprised to see Masinissa, then
upwards of eighty years of age, mounted (agreeably to the custom of his
country) on a horse without a saddle; flying from rank to rank like a
young officer, and sustaining the most arduous toils. The fight was very
obstinate, and continued from morning till night, but at last the
Carthaginians gave way. Scipio used to say afterwards, that he had been
present at many battles, but at none with so much pleasure as at this;
having never before beheld so formidable an army engage, without any
danger or trouble to himself. And being very conversant in the writings of
Homer, he added, that till his time, there were but two more who had had
the pleasure of being spectators of such an action, _viz._ Jupiter from
mount Ida, and Neptune from Samothrace, when the Greeks and Trojans fought
before Troy. I know not whether the sight of a hundred thousand men (for
so many there were) butchering one another, can administer a real
pleasure; or whether such a pleasure is consistent with the sentiments of
humanity