ernment strengthens this natural instinct by the force of public opinion, and perfects it by education and manners. And thus the citizens are preserved from vice and corruption rather by honor and shame than by fear of punishment. But this argument will be better illustrated when we treat of the love of glory and praise, which we shall discuss on another occasion.
V. As respects the private life and the manners of the citizens, they are intimately connected with the laws that constitute just marriages and legitimate offspring, under the protection of the guardian deities around the domestic hearths. By these laws, all men should be maintained in their rights of public and private property. It is only under a good government like this that men can live happily—for nothing can be more delightful than a well-constituted state.
On which account it appears to me a very strange thing what this * * *
VI. I therefore consume all my time in considering what is the power of that man, whom, as you think, we have described carefully enough in our books. Do you, then, admit our idea of that governor of a commonwealth to whom we wish to refer everything? For thus, I imagine, does Scipio speak in the fifth book: "For as a fair voyage is the object of the master of a ship, the health of his patient the aim of a physician, and victory that of a general, so the happiness of his fellow-citizens is the proper study of the ruler of a commonwealth; that they may be stable in power, rich in resources, widely known in reputation, and honorable through their virtue. For a ruler ought to be one who can perfect this, which is the best and most important employment among mankind."
And works in your literature rightly praise that ruler of a country who consults the welfare of his people more than their inclinations.
VII. Tully, in those books which he wrote upon the Commonwealth, could not conceal his opinions, when he speaks of appointing a chief of the State, who, he says, must be maintained by glory; and afterward he relates that his ancestors did many admirable and noble actions from a desire of glory.
Tully, in his treatise on the Commonwealth, wrote that the chief of a state must be maintained by glory, and that a commonwealth would last as long as honor was paid by every one to the chief.
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Which virtue is called fortitude, which consists of magnanimity, and a great contempt of death and pain.
VIII. As Marcellus was fierce, and eager to fight, Maximus prudent and cautious.
