But Cato quickly perceiving his design,
refused all such engagements and made it a rule to do nothing else
while the Senate was assembled. For it was neither for the sake of
reputation, nor self-aggrandisement, nor by a kind of spontaneous
movement, nor by chance, like some others, that he was thrown into the
management of state affairs, but he selected a public career as the
proper labour of a good man, and thought that he ought to attend to
public concerns more than the bee to its cells, inasmuch as he made it
his business to have the affairs of the provinces and decrees and
trials and the most important measures communicated to him by his
connections and friends in every place. On one occasion by opposing
Clodius the demagogue, who was making a disturbance and laying the
foundation for great charges, and calumniating to the people the
priests and priestesses, among whom was also Fabia,[683] the sister of
Terentia, Cicero's wife, he was in great danger, but he involved
Clodius in disgrace and compelled him to withdraw from the city; and
when Cicero thanked him, Cato said that he ought to reserve his
gratitude for the state, as it was for the sake of the state that he
did every thing and directed his political measures. In consequence of
this there was a high opinion of him, so that an orator said to the
judices on a certain trial when the evidence of a single person was
produced, that it was not right to believe a single witness even if he
was Cato; and many persons now were used to say when speaking of
things incredible and contrary to all probability, as by way of
proverb, that this could not be believed even if Cato said it.
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