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Lucius Catiline was descended of an illustrious family:3 he was a man of great vigour, both of body and mind, but of a disposition extremely profligate and depraved. From his youth he took pleasure in civil wars, massacres, depredations, and intestine broils; and in these he employed his younger days. His body was formed for enduring cold, hunger, and want of rest, to a degree indeed incredible: his spirit was daring, subtle, and changeable: he was expert in all the arts of simulation and dissimulation; covetous of what belonged to others, lavish of his own; violent in his passions: he had eloquence enough, but a small share of wisdom. His boundless soul was constantly engaged in extravagant and romantic projects, too high to be attempted.4

Such was the character of Catiline; who, after Sylla’s usurpation, was fired with a violent desire of seizing the government; and, provided he could but carry his point, he was not at all solicitous by what means. His spirit, naturally violent, was daily more and more hurried on to the execution of his design by his poverty and the consciousness of his crimes; both which evils he had heightened by the practices above mentioned. He was encouraged to it by the wickedness of the state, thoroughly debased by luxury and avarice; vices equally fatal, though of contrary natures.

Now that I have occasion to mention the Roman manners, I am naturally led to look back a little to past ages, and to give a short account of the institutions of our ancestors, both in war and peace; how they governed the state, and in what grandeur they left it; and how, by a gradual declension, it has fallen from the highest degree of virtue and glory to the lowest pitch of vice and depravity.