2. _Fannius_. You are quite right, Laelius! there never was a better
or more illustrious character than Africanus. But you should
consider that at the present moment all eyes are on you. Everybody
calls you "the wise" _par excellence_, and thinks you so. The same
mark of respect was lately paid Cato, and we know that in the last
generation Lucius Atilius was called "the wise." But in both cases
the word was applied with a certain difference. Atilius was so
called from his reputation as a jurist; Cato got the name as a kind
of honorary title and in extreme old age because of his varied
experience of affairs, and his reputation for foresight and firmness,
and the sagacity of the opinions which he delivered in senate and
forum. You, however, are regarded as wise in a somewhat
different sense not alone on account of natural ability and
character, but also from your industry and learning; and not in the
sense in which the vulgar, but that in which scholars, give that
title. In this sense we do not read of any one being called wise in
Greece except one man at Athens; and he, to be sure, had been
declared by the oracle of Apollo also to be "the supremely wise
man." For those who commonly go by the name of the Seven
Sages are not admitted into the category of the wise by fastidious
critics. Your wisdom people believe to consist in this, that you
look upon yourself as self-sufficing and regard the changes and
chances of mortal life as powerless to affect your virtue.
Accordingly they are always asking me, and doubtless also our
Scaevola here, how you bear the death of Africanus. This curiosity
has been the more excited from the fact that on the Nones of this
month, when we augurs met as usual in the suburban villa of
Decimus Brutus for consultation, you were not present, though it
had always been your habit to keep that appointment and perform