Laudator Temporis Acti

Sallust, War with Catiline 52.19-3 (from Cato's speech; tr. J.C Rolfe):

[19] Do not suppose that it was by arms that our forefathers raised our country from obscurity to greatness. [20] If that were so, we should have a much fairer state than theirs, since we have a greater number of citizens and allies than they possessed, to say nothing of arms and horses. [21] But there were other qualities which made them great, which we do not possess at all: efficiency at home, a just rule abroad, in counsel an independent spirit free from guilt or passion. [22] In place of these we have extravagance and greed, public poverty and private opulence. We extol wealth and foster idleness. We make no distinction between good men and bad, and ambition appropriates all the prizes of merit. [23] And no wonder! When each of you schemes for his own private interests, when you are slaves to pleasure in your homes and to money or influence here, the natural result is an attack upon the defenceless republic.

[19] Nolite existumare maiores nostros armis rem publicam ex parva magnam fecisse. [20] Si ita res esset, multo pulcherrumam eam nos haberemus, quippe sociorum atque civium, praeterea armorum atque equorum maior copia nobis quam illis est. [21] Sed alia fuere quae illos magnos fecere, quae nobis nulla sunt; domi industria, foris iustum imperium, animus in consulundo liber neque delicto neque lubidini obnoxius. [22] Pro his nos habemus luxuriam atque avaritiam, publice egestatem, privatim opulentiam. Laudamus divitias, sequimur inertiam. Inter bonos et malos discrimen nullum, omnia virtutis praemia ambitio possidet. [23] Neque mirum; ubi vos separatim sibi quisque consilium capitis, ubi domi voluptatibus, hic pecuniae aut gratiae servitis, eo fit ut impetus fiat in vacuam rem publicam.

L.R. Lind, "Concept, Action, and Character: The Reasons for Rome's Greatness," Transactions and Proceedings of the American Philological Association 103 (1972) 235-283 (at 245), called Cato's speech "a bitter Roman antithesis to the funeral speech of Pericles in Sallust's great model, Thucydides."