Cato The Elder
FameRank: 6

"Marcus Porcius Cato" was a Ancient Rome/Roman statesman, commonly referred to as "Cato Censorius" (the Censor), "Cato Sapiens" (the Wise), "Cato Priscus" (the Ancient), "Cato Major", or "Cato the Elder" (to distinguish him from his great-grandson, Cato the Younger); known for his conservatism and opposition to Hellenization.

He came of an ancient Plebs/Plebeian family who all were noted for some military service but not for the discharge of the higher civil offices. He was bred, after the manner of his Latin forefathers, to agriculture, to which he devoted himself when not engaged in military service. But, having attracted the notice of Lucius Valerius Flaccus, he was brought to Rome, and successively held the offices of Cursus honorum/Cursus Honorum: Military tribune (214 BC), Quaestor (204 BC), Aedile (199 BC), Praetor (198 BC), in which capacity he expelled the usury/usurers from Sardinia, Roman consul/consul (195 BC) together with his old patron, and finally Roman censor/Censor (184 BC). In the latter office he tried to preserve the mos maiorum (“ancestral custom”) and combat "degeneration/degenerate" Hellenistic period/Hellenistic influences.

More Cato The Elder on Wikipedia.

Patience is the greatest of all virtues.

We cannot control the evil tongues of others; but a good life enables us to disregard them.

I think the first virtue is to restrain the tongue; he approaches nearest to gods who knows how to be silent, even though he is in the right.

Wise men profit more from fools than fools from wise men; for the wise men shun the mistakes of fools, but fools do not imitate the successes of the wise.

Tis sometimes the height of wisdom to feign stupidity.

Grasp the subject, the words will follow.

Wise men learn more from fools than fools from the wise.

Carthage must be destroyed.

The best way to keep good acts in memory is to refresh them with new.

An orator is a good man who is skilled in speaking.

Speech is the gift of all, but the thought of few.

After I'm dead I'd rather have people ask why I have no monument than why I have one.

Even though work stops, expenses run on.

From lightest words sometimes the direst quarrel springs.

It is thus with farming: if you do one thing late, you will be late in all your work.

Anger so clouds the mind, that it cannot perceive the truth.

Lighter is the wound foreseen.