In fact, some men divorce
their wives for great and manifest faults, yet the little but constant
irritation which proceeds from incompatible tempers and habits, though
unnoticed by the world at large, does gradually produce between married
people breaches which cannot be healed."
So Aemilius put away Papiria, and married again. By his second marriage
he had two sons, whom he kept at home, but those by the former marriage
he had adopted into the greatest and noblest families of Rome, the elder
into that of Fabius Maximus, who had five times been consul, while the
younger was treated by Scipio Africanus as his cousin, and took the name
of Scipio.
Of his two daughters, one married a son of Cato, the other Aelius
Tubero, an excellent man, who supported his poverty more gloriously than
any other Roman. There were sixteen in the family, all Aelii; and one
small house and estate sufficed for them all, with their numerous
offspring and their wives, among whom was the daughter of our Aemilius,
who, though her father had twice been consul and twice triumphed, was
not ashamed of the poverty of her husband, but was proud of the virtue
that kept him poor. But nowadays brothers and kinsmen, unless their
inheritances be divided by mountain ranges, rivers, and walls like
fortifications, with plenty of space between them, quarrel without
ceasing. These are the materials for reflection which history affords to
those who choose to make use of them.
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