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Camillus was much less comparable to Themistocles, the Gracchi to Agis, and Cleomenes and Numa to Lycurgus? But it is folly to judge of things that have so many aspects at one view.

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When Plutarch compares them, he does not for Plutarch all that make them equal. Who could more ele-did not gantly and sincerely have marked their distinction ? mean an Does he insinuate that the victories, martial achieve- between ments, the power of the armies conducted by Pom-th he compapey, and his triumphs, were equal to those of Agesilaus?" I do not believe," says he, " that Xeno"phon himself, if he were now living, though he "was allowed to write whatever pleased him, to the "advantage of Agesilaus, would dare to bring them "into comparison." Where he speaks of comparing Lysander to Sylla, "There is," says he, "no "comparison, either in the number of victories, or "in the hazard of battles; for Lysander only won "two naval victories, &c." This is not to derogate from the Romans; for, having only simply named them with the Greeks, he can have done them no injury, what disparity soever there may be between them: and Plutarch does not weigh them entirely one against another; there is no preference in the main; he only compares the pieces and circumstances one after another, and judges of every one separately; wherefore, if any one would convince him of partiality, he ought to pick out some one of those particular judgments, or say, in general, that he was mistaken in comparing such a Greek to such a Roman, when there were others more fit for a parellel.

* In the Comparison of Pompey with Agesilaus.
In his Comparison of Sylla and Lysander.

Whether

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CHAPTER XXIV.

The Story of Spurina.

PHILOSOPHY thinks she has not ill employed her talent, when she has given the sovereignty of the soul, and the authority of checking our appetites, to reason. Of these, they who judge that there are none more violent than those which love breeds, are us appe- of the opinion, "That they seize both body and "soul, and possess the whole man;" so that health itself depends upon them, and is the medicine some times constrained to pimp for them: but it might be said, on the contrary, that the mixture of the body brings an abatement to them, for such desires are subject to satiety, and capable of material remedies.

tites are

the most violent.

Means used to mortify them.

Many, being determined to rid their souls from the continual alarms of this appetite, have made use of incision and amputation of the restless and unruly members: others have subdued their force and ardour, by the frequent application of cold things, as snow and vinegar: the sackcloths of our ancestors were used to this purpose, which was a cloth woven of horse-hair, whereof some made shirts, and others girdles to torture their reins. A prince, not long ago, told me, "That, in his youth, upon a solemn festival in the "court of king Francis I. where every-body was "finely dressed, he would needs put on his father's

hair-shirt, which was still kept in the house;" but, how great soever his devotion was, he had not patience to wear it till night, and was sick a long time after; adding withal, "That he did not think "there could be any youthful heat so fierce, that "the use of this receipt would not mortify;" yet, perhaps, he never tried the most violent; for experience shows us, that such emotions often happen under coarse beggarly clothes, and that a hair-shirt does not always render those innocent that wear it.

crates pre

cy.

Xenocrates proceeded with greater severity in this How Xenoaffair; for his disciples, to make trial of his conti- served his nency, having slipped Lais, that beautiful and fa- continenmous courtezan, into his bed, quite naked, Xenocrates finding, without the charms of her beauty, and her alluring philtres, that, in spite of his reason, and philosophical rules, there was a war rising in his flesh, he caused those members of his to be burned, that he found consenting to this rebellion:* whereas the passions, which wholly reside in the soul, as ambition, avarice, and the rest, find the reason much more to do, because it cannot there be relieved but by its own means; neither are those appetites capable of satiety, but grow sharper and increase by fruition.

ample a

is harder

The sole example of Julius Cæsar may suffice to Cæsar's exdemonstrate to us the disparity of those appetites; proof that for never was man more addicted to amorous delight; ambition of which one proof is, the delicate care he took of to be tamed his person, to such a degree as to use the most las- than love. civious means to that end, which were then practised, viz. to have the hairs of his body twiched off by pincers, and to be daubed all over with delicate perfumes; and he was a beautiful person in himself, of a fair complexion, tall and sprightly, full-faced, with brisk hazle eyes, if we may believe Suetonius ;† for the statues that we see at Rome, do not, in all points, answer this description. Besides his wives, which he four times changed, without reckoning the amours of his childhood with Nicomedes, king of Bithynia, he had the maidenhead of the renowned Cleopatra, Queen of Egypt: witness the little Cæsario that he had by her.‡ He also made love to Eunoe, queen of Mauritania; and, at Rome, to Posthumia, the wife of Servius Sulpitius; to Lollia, the wife of Gabinius to Tortulla, the wife of Crassus; and even to Mutia, wife to the great Pompey; which

* Diog. Laert. in the Life of Xenocrates, lib. iv. sect. 7.
+ In the Life of Julius Cæsar, sect. 45.

Plutarch, in the Life of Cæsar, cap. 13, sect. 50.

The exam

homet ano

was the reason, the Roman historians say, that she
was repudiated by her husband, which Plutarch owns
he did not know: and the Curios, both father and
son, afterwards reproached Pompey, when he mar-
ried Cæsar's daughter, "That he had made himself
"son-in-law to a man who had made him a cuckold,
"and one that he himself was wont to call Ægys-
66 tus."*
Besides all these, he kept Servilia, Cato's
sister, and mother to Marcus Brutus, from whence
every one believes the great affection he had to Bru-
tus proceeded. So that I have reason, methinks, to
take him for a man extremely given to this debauch,
and of a very amorous constitution: but the other
passion of ambition, with which he was also exceed-
ingly infected, arising in him to contend with the
former, soon compelled it to give way.

And here calling to mind Mahomet, who subdued ple of Ma-Constantinople, and totally exterminated the Grether proof, cian name, I do not know where these two passions are so evenly balanced, being equally an indefatigable lecher and soldier: but where they both meet in his life, and jostle one another, the quarrelsome passion always gets the better of the amorous: and this, though it was out of its natural season, did not regain an absolute sovereignty over the other, till he came to be very old indeed, and unable to undergo the fatigues of war.

A notable

proving

stronger than ambition.

What is related, for a contrary example, of Ladiexample slaus, king of Naples, is very remarkable; that being love to be a great captain, valiant and ambitious, he proposed to himself, for the principal end of his ambition, the execution of his pleasure, and the enjoyment of some rare beauty which he obtained, and thereby his death; for having, by a close and tedious siege, reduced the city of Florence to so great distress, that the inhabitants were glad to capitulate; he was content to set them free, provided they would deliver up to him a most beautiful virgin, whom he had

*Suetonius, in Cæsar's Life, sect. 25Q.

heard of in their city. They were forced to yield her to him, and by a private injury to avert the public ruin. She was the daughter of a physician of eminence in his time, who, finding himself involved in so foul a necessity, resolved upon a high attempt; for as every one was setting a hand to trick up his daughter, and to adorn her with ornaments and jewels, to render her agreeable to this new lover; he also gave her a handkerchief, most richly wrought, and of an exquisite perfume (an implement they never go without in those parts), which she was to make use of in their first proaches. This handkerchief, which he had the art to poison, coming to be rubbed between the chafed flesh and open pores, both of the one and the other, so suddenly infused its poison, that their warm sweat soon turned into a cold sweat, and they expired in one another's arms.

ap

sures of

Cæsar's

1ing him

But I return to Cæsar: his pleasures never made The plea him steal one minute, nor turn one step aside from love never occasions that offered for his aggrandisement. That hindered passion was so sovereign in him over all the rest, views of and with such absolute authority possessed his soul, that it guided him at pleasure. In earnest, it trou-self. bles me, when (as to every thing else) I consider the greatness of this man, and the wonderful parts wherewith he was endued, learned to such a degree, in all sorts of knowledge, that there is hardly any one science of which he has not written: he was so great an orator, that many have preferred his eloquence to that of Cicero: and he, I conceive, did not think himself inferior to him in that particular; for his two Anti-Catos were chiefly written to counter-balance the eloquence that Cicero had expended in his Cato. As to the rest, was ever soul so vigilant, so active, and so patient of labour as his? And, doubtless, it was embellished with many rare seeds of virtue, I mean, innate, and not assumed.

He was singularly sober, and so far from being His singu delicate in his diet, Oppius relates, "That, having lar sobri"one day at table physical instead of common oil,

VOL. II.

2 G

ety.

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