brother-in-law advocated, it is sufficient to reply that Rome did
not rest till those changes had been adopted, and that the hearty
co-operation of himself and his friends would have gone far to turn
failure into success. But his mind was too narrow to break through the
associations which had environed him from his childhood. When Tiberius
Gracchus, a nobler man than himself, had suffered martyrdom for the
cause with which he had only dallied, he was base enough to quote from
Homer [Greek: os apoloito kai allos hotis toiaita ge hoezoi]--'So
perish all who do the like again.'

[Sidenote: Tiberius Gracchus.] But the splendid peril which Scipio
shrank from encountering, his brother-in-law courted with the fire
and passion of youth. Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus was, according to
Plutarch, not quite thirty when he was murdered. Plutarch may have
been mistaken, and possibly he was thirty-five. His father, whose
name he bore, had been a magnificent aristocrat, and his mother
was Cornelia, daughter of Hannibal's conqueror, the first Scipio
Africanus, and one of the comparatively few women whose names are
famous in history. He had much in common with Scipio Aemilianus, whom
he resembled in rank and refinement, in valour, in his familiarity
with Hellenic culture, and in the style of his speeches. Diophanes, of
Mitylene, taught him oratory. The philosopher, Blossius, of Cumae, was
his friend. He belonged to the most distinguished circle at Rome. He
had married the daughter of Appius, and his brother had married the
daughter of Mucianus. He had served under Scipio, and displayed
striking bravery at Carthage; and, as quaestor of the incompetent
Mancinus, had by his character for probity saved a Roman army from
destruction; for the Numantines would not treat with the consul, but
only with Gracchus. No man had a more brilliant career open to him
at Rome, had he been content only to shut his eyes to the fate that