M. Tullius Cicero, Cato the Elder: on old age
William Armistead Falconer, Ed.

[43] 13. I often heard from my elders—who, in turn, said they, when boys, had heard it from old men— that Gaius Fabricius used to marvel at the story told him, while an envoy at the headquarters of King Pyrrhus, by Cineas of Thessaly, that there was a man¹ at Athens who professed himself “wise” and used to say that everything we do should be judged by the standard of pleasure. Now when Manius Curius and Tiberius Coruncanius learned of this from Fabricius they expressed the wish that the Samnites and Pyrrhus himself would become converts to it, because, when given up to pleasure, they would be much easier to overcome. Manius Curius had lived on intimate terms with Publius Decius who, in his fourth consulship, and five years before Curius held that office, had offered up his life for his country's safety; Fabricius and Coruncanius also knew him, and they all were firmly persuaded, both by their own experience and especially by the heroic deed of Decius, that assuredly there are ends, inherently pure and noble, which are sought for their own sake, and which will be [p. 55] pursued by all good men who look on self-gratification with loathing and contempt.