Yet, after
having violently objected to the prorogation of Caesar's term of office
as consul, he put it in his power to capture Rome itself, and to say
to Metellus that he regarded him and all the rest of the citizens as
prisoners of war.
IV. Agesilaus, when he was the stronger, always forced his enemy to
fight, and when weaker, always avoided a battle. By always practising
this, the highest art of a general, he passed through his life without
a single defeat; whereas Pompeius was unable to make use of his
superiority to Caesar by sea, and was forced by him to hazard
everything on the event of a land battle; for as soon as Caesar had
defeated him, he at once obtained possession of all Pompeius's
treasure, supplies, and command of the sea, without gaining which he
must inevitably have been defeated, even without a battle. Pompeius's
excuse for his conduct is, in truth, his severest condemnation. It is
very natural and pardonable for a young general to be influenced by
clamours and accusations of remissness and cowardice, so as to abandon
the course which he had previously decided upon as the safest; but
that the great Pompeius, of whom the Romans used to say that the camp
was his home, and that he only made an occasional campaign in the
senate house, at a time when his followers called the consuls and
generals of Rome traitors and rebels, and when they knew that he was
in possession of absolute uncontrolled power, and had already
conducted so many campaigns with such brilliant success as
commander-in-chief--that he should be moved by the scoffs of a
Favonius or a Domitius, and hazard his army and his life lest they
should call him Agamemnon, is a most discreditable supposition.
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