Cato: A Tragedy, and Selected Essays

Spectator 243 (December 8, 1711)

1. “You see here, Marcus, my son, the very form and as it were the face of Moral Goodness ; ‘and if,’ as Plato says, ‘it could be seen without the physical eye, it would awaken a marvelous love of wisdom.’” Cicero De Officiis I.5.15. 2. “Hypocrisy is an homage vice pays to virtue.” François de la Rochefoucauld, Maxims (South Bend, Ind.: St. Augustine, 2001), 218. Spectator, No. 243 Saturday, December 8, 1711 Forman quidem ipsam, Marce fili, & tanquam faciem Honesti vides: quae si oculis cerneretur, mirabiles amores (ut ait Plato) excitaret Sapientiae. Tull. Offic.1 I do not remember to have read any Discourse written expresly upon the Beauty and Loveliness of Virtue, without considering it as a Duty, and as the Means of making us happy both now and hereafter. I design therefore this Speculation as an Essay upon that Subject, in which I shall consider Virtue no further than as it is in it self of an amiable Nature, after having premised that I understand by the word Virtue such a general Notion as is affixed to it by the Writers of Morality, and which by Devout Men generally goes under the Name of Religion, and by Men of the World under the Name of Honour. Hypocrisie it self does great Honour, or rather Justice, to Religion , and tacitly acknowledges it to be an Ornament to Human Nature . The Hypocrite would not be at so much Pains to put on the Appearance of Virtue, if he did not know it was the most proper and effectual Means to gain the Love and Esteem of Mankind.2 spectator 243 149 3. Hierocles of Alexandria (fifth century a.d.) was a neoplatonist and a student of Plutarch’s whose most famous work is Commentary on the Golden Verses of Pythagoras. 4. Pyrrhus of Epirus (319–272 b.c.), Molossian military leader and king whose name is the origin of the term “Pyrrhic victory.” 5. Cicero De Amicitia 8.28. 6. See Cicero Paradoxa Stoicorum 1.2–3, and also Pro Murena 61. We learn from Hierocles3 it was a common Saying among the Heathens, that the Wise Man hates no Body, but only loves the Virtuous. Tully has a very beautiful Gradation of Thoughts, to shew how amiable Virtue is. We love a Virtuous Man, says he, who lives in the remotest Parts of the Earth, tho’ we are altogether out of the reach of his Virtue, and can receive from it no manner of Benefit; nay, one who died several Ages ago, raises a secret Fondness and Benevolence for him in our Minds, when we read his Story: Nay, what is still more, one who has been the Enemy of our Country, provided his Wars were regulated by Justice and Humanity, as in the Instance of Pyrrhus,4 whom Tully mentions on this Occasion in opposition to Hannibal. Such is the natural Beauty and Loveliness of Virtue.5 Stoicism, which was the Pedantry of Virtue, ascribes all good Qualifications of what kind soever to the Virtuous Man. Accordingly Cato, in the Character Tully has left of him, carried Matters so far, that he would not allow any one but a Virtuous Man to be handsom . This indeed looks more like a Philosophical Rant, than the real Opinion of a Wise Man: Yet this was whatCato very seriously maintained . In short, the Stoicks thought they cou’d not sufficiently represent the Excellence of Virtue, if they did not comprehend in the Notion of it all possible Perfection; and therefore did not only suppose , that it was transcendently Beautiful in it self, but that it made the very Body amiable, and banished every kind of Deformity from the Person in whom it resided.6 It is a common Observation, that the most abandoned to all Sense of Goodness are apt to wish those who are related to them of a different Character; and it is very observable, that none are more 150 selected essays struck with the Charms of Virtue in the fair Sex, than those who by their very Admiration of it are carried to a Desire of ruining it. A virtuous Mind in a fair Body is indeed a fine Picture in a good Light, and therefore it is no wonder that it makes the beautiful Sex all over Charms. As Virtue in general is of an amiable and...