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For now with greater carnage of mankind

       The rival hosts in weightier battle meet.

       To exiled Marius, successful strife

       Was Rome regained; triumphant Sulla knew

       No greater joy than on his hated foes

       To wreak his vengeance with unsparing sword.

       But these more powerful rivals Fortune calls

       To worse ambitions; nor would either chief

       For such reward as Sulla's wage the war."

       Thus, mindful of his youth, the aged man

       Wept for the past, but feared the coming days.

      Such terrors found in haughty Brutus' breast

       No home. When others sat them down to fear

       He did not so, but in the dewy night

       When the great wain was turning round the pole

       He sought his kinsman Cato's humble home.

       Him sleepless did he find, not for himself

       Fearing, but pondering the fates of Rome,

       And deep in public cares. And thus he spake:

       "O thou in whom that virtue, which of yore

       Took flight from earth, now finds its only home,

       Outcast to all besides, but safe with thee:

       Vouchsafe thy counsel to my wavering soul

       And make my weakness strength. While Caesar some,

       Pompeius others, follow in the fight,

       Cato is Brutus' guide. Art thou for peace,

       Holding thy footsteps in a tottering world

       Unshaken? Or wilt thou with the leaders' crimes

       And with the people's fury take thy part,

       And by thy presence purge the war of guilt?

       In impious battles men unsheath the sword;

       But each by cause impelled: the household crime;

       Laws feared in peace; want by the sword removed;

       And broken credit, that its ruin hides

       In general ruin. Drawn by hope of gain,

       And not by thirst for blood, they seek the camp.

       Shall Cato for war's sake make war alone?

       What profits it through all these wicked years

       That thou hast lived untainted? This were all

       Thy meed of virtue, that the wars which find

       Guilt in all else, shall make thee guilty too.

       Ye gods, permit not that this fatal strife

       Should stir those hands to action! When the clouds

       Of flying javelins hiss upon the air,

       Let not a dart be thine; nor spent in vain

       Such virtue! All the fury of the war

       Shall launch itself on thee, for who, when faint

       And wounded, would not rush upon thy sword,

       Take thence his death, and make the murder thine?

       Do thou live on thy peaceful life apart

       As on their paths the stars unshaken roll.

       The lower air that verges on the earth

       Gives flame and fury to the levin bolt;

       The deeps below the world engulph the winds

       And tracts of flaming fire. By Jove's decree

       Olympus rears his summit o'er the clouds:

       In lowlier valleys storms and winds contend,

       But peace eternal reigns upon the heights.

       What joy for Caesar, if the tidings come

       That such a citizen has joined the war?

       Glad would he see thee e'en in Magnus' tents;

       For Cato's conduct shall approve his own.

       Pompeius, with the Consul in his ranks,

       And half the Senate and the other chiefs,

       Vexes my spirit; and should Cato too

       Bend to a master's yoke, in all the world

       The one man free is Caesar. But if thou

       For freedom and thy country's laws alone

       Be pleased to raise the sword, nor Magnus then

       Nor Caesar shall in Brutus find a foe.

       Not till the fight is fought shall Brutus strike,

       Then strike the victor."

      Brutus thus; but spake

       Cato from inmost breast these sacred words:

       "Chief in all wickedness is civil war,

       Yet virtue in the paths marked out by fate

       Treads on securely. Heaven's will be the crime

       To have made even Cato guilty. Who has strength

       To gaze unawed upon a toppling world?

       When stars and sky fall headlong, and when earth

       Slips from her base, who sits with folded hands?

       Shall unknown nations, touched by western strife,

       And monarchs born beneath another clime

       Brave the dividing seas to join the war?

       Shall Scythian tribes desert their distant north,

       And Getae haste to view the fall of Rome,

       And I look idly on? As some fond sire,

       Reft of his sons, compelled by grief, himself

       Marshals the long procession to the tomb,

       Thrusts his own hand within the funeral flames,

       Soothing his heart, and, as the lofty pyre

       Rises on high, applies the kindled torch:

       Nought, Rome, shall tear thee from me, till I hold

       Thy form in death embraced; and Freedom's name,

       Shade though it be, I'll follow to the grave.

       Yea! let the cruel gods exact in full

       Rome's expiation: of no drop of blood

       The war be robbed. I would that, to the gods

       Of heaven and hell devoted, this my life

       Might satisfy their vengeance. Decius fell,

       Crushed by the hostile ranks. When Cato falls

       Let Rhine's fierce barbarous hordes and both the hosts

       Thrust through my frame their darts! May I alone

       Receive in death the wounds of all the war!

       Thus may the people be redeemed, and thus

       Rome for her guilt pay the atonement due.

       Why should men die who wish to bear the yoke

       And shrink not from the tyranny to come?

       Strike me, and me alone, of laws and rights

       In vain the guardian: this vicarious life

       Shall give Hesperia peace and end her toils.

       Who then will reign shall find no need for war.

       You ask, 'Why follow Magnus? If he wins (13)

       He too will claim the Empire of the world.'

       Then let him, conquering with my service, learn

       Not for himself to conquer." Thus he spoke

      

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