s
implacable foes.

We now return to Cato, whose Censorship (B.C. 184) was a great epoch in
his life. He applied himself strenuously to the duties of his office,
regardless of the enemies he was making. He repaired the water-courses,
paved the reservoirs, cleansed the drains, raised the rents paid by the
publicani for farming the taxes, and diminished the contract-prices
disbursed by the state to the undertakers of public works. There can be
no doubt that great abuses existed in the management of the public
finances, with which nothing but the undaunted courage and
administrative abilities of Cato could have successfully grappled. He
was disturbing a nest of hornets, and all his future life was troubled
by their buzz, and their attempts to sting. But, though he was accused
no fewer than forty-four times during the course of his life, it was
only once that his enemies prevailed against him. His enactments against
luxury were severe and stringent. He levied a heavy tax upon expensive
slaves and costly furniture and dress. He justly degraded from the
Senate L. Flamininus for the act of abominable cruelty in Gaul which has
been already narrated.[56]

The strong national prejudices of Cato appear to have diminished in
force as he grew older and wiser. He applied himself in old age to the
study of Greek literature, with which in youth he had no acquaintance,
although he was not ignorant of the Greek language. Himself an historian
and orator, the excellences of Demosthenes and Thucydides made a deep
impression upon his kindred mind. But throughout life his conduct was
guided by prejudices against classes and nations whose influence he
deemed to be hostile to the simplicity of the old Roman character. When
Eumenes, king of Pergamus, visited Rome after the war with Antiochus,
and was received with honor by the Senate, and splendidly entertained by
the nobles, Cato was indignant at the respect paid to the monarch,
refused to go near him, and declared that "kings were naturally
carnivorous animals." He had an antipathy to physicians, because they
were mostly Greeks, and therefore unfit to be trusted with Roman lives.
He loudly cautioned his eldest son against them, and dispensed with
their attendance. When Athens sent three celebrated philosophers,
Carneades, Diogenes, and Critolaues, to Rome, in order to negotiate a
remission of the 500 talents which the Athenians had been awarded to pay
to the Oropians, Carneades excited great