I.—From the Latin Translation of
Cassiodorus. [M. Aurelius
Cassiodorus (whose name is also Senator) was an author and public man
of the sixth century, and a very voluminous writer. He would shine
with a greater lustre were he not so nearly lost in the brighter light
of Boëthius, his illustrious contemporary. After the death of his
patron, Theodoric, he continued for a time in the public service, and in
high positions, but, at seventy years of age, began another career, and
for twenty years devoted himself to letters and the practice of piety in a
monastery which he established in the Neopolitan kingdom, near his native
Squillace. Died about a.d.
560.]