Cato, MARCUS PORCIUS, frequently surnamed Censorius or Censor, also Sapiens ('the wise'), and afterwards PRISCUS or MAJOR—to distinguish him from his great-grandson, Cato of Utica—was born at Tusculum in 234 B.C. He was brought up on his father's farm in the Sabine country, and here he learned to love the simple and severe manners of his Roman forefathers. He made his first campaign in his seventeenth year, distinguished himself at the capture of Tarentum (209), at the defeat of Hasdrubal on the Metaurus (207), and in the later years of the second Punic war. At the same time he had been making himself a reputation as an orator and statesman. He became quaestor in 204, and served under the pro-consul Scipio Africanus in Sicily and Africa, denouncing his commander's luxury and extravagance on his return to Rome. He was aedile in 199, and praetor the following year, when he obtained Sardinia as his province. So high was his reputation for capacity and virtue, that in 195, although his family had hitherto been unknown, he was raised to the consulship. Spain fell to him as his province, and here he showed such vigour and military genius in crushing a formidable insurrection, that in the following year he was honoured by a triumph. In 191 he served in the campaign against Antiochus, and to him the great victory won at Thermopylae was mainly due. He now turned himself strenuously to civil affairs, and strove with all his might to stem the tide of Greek refinement and luxury, and advocate a return to a simpler and stricter social life after the ancient Roman pattern. In 187 he opposed the granting of a triumph to M. Fulvius Nobilior after his return from Aetolia victoriosus, on the ground that he was too indulgent to his soldiers, that he cherished literary tastes, and even kept poets in his camp. These rude prejudices of Cato were not acceptable to the senate, and his opposition was fruitless. In 184 Cato was elected censor, and discharged so rigorously the duties of his office that the epithet Censorius, formerly applied to all persons in the same station, became his permanent surname. He repaired the watercourses, paved the reservoirs, cleansed the drains, raised the rents paid by the publicans for the farming of the taxes, and diminished the contract prices paid by the state to the undertakers of public works. More questionable reforms were those in regard to the price of slaves, dress, furniture, equipage, and the like. Good and bad innovations he opposed with equal animosity and intolerance, and his despotism in enforcing his own idea of decency may be illustrated from the fact that he degraded Manilius, a man of pretorian rank, for having kissed his wife in his daughter's presence in open day.
In the year 175 Cato was sent to Carthage to arbitrate between the Carthaginians and King Masinissa, and was so impressed by the dangerous power of Carthage that ever afterwards he ended every speech in the senate-house—whatever the immediate subject might be—with the well-known words: 'Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam'
('For the rest, I vote that Carthage must be destroyed'). Cato died in the year 149, at the age of 85. He had been twice married, and in his eightieth year his second wife bore him a son, the grandfather of Cato of Utica. Cato treated his slaves with old-fashioned harshness and cruelty, and in his old age became greedy of gain, although it cannot be said that his avarice impaired his honesty. He wrote several works, of which only the De Re Rustica (ed. by Keil, 1882-94), a kind of collection of the rules of good husbandry, has come down to us. There exist but a few fragments of his Origines, a summary of the Roman annals. These are reprinted by Jordan (Leip. 1860). Of his speeches, which were read with approval by Cicero, none remain. We possess his life as written by Cornelius Nepos, Plutarch, and Aurelius Victor.