| LIVES OF THE NOBLE | | |
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| IULIUS | and on the sea coast next unto Rome, to cast great high bankes, | |
| CÆSAR | and to clense all the haven about Ostia, of rockes | |
| | and stones hidden under the water, and to take away all | |
| | other impedimentes that made the harborough daungerous | |
| | for shippes, and to make new havens and arsenalls meete to | |
| | harbor such shippes, as did continually trafficke thither. All | |
| | these thinges were purposed to be done, but tooke no effecte. | |
| Caesar re- | But, the ordinaunce of the kalender, and reformation of the | |
| formed the | yeare, to take away all confusion of time, being exactly cal- | |
| inequality of | ulated by the Mathematicians, and brought to perfection, | |
| the yeare. | was a great commoditie unto all men. For the Romanes | |
| | using then the auncient computacion of the yeare, had not | |
| | only such incertainty and alteracion of the moneth and times, | |
| | that the sacrifices and yearely feasts came by litle and litle | |
| | to seasons contrary for the purpose they were ordained: but | |
| | also in the revolution of the sunne (which is called Annus | |
| | Solaris) no other nation agreed with them in account: and | |
| | of the Romanes them selves, only the priests understood it. | |
| | And therefore when they listed, they sodainly (no man being | |
| | able to controll them) did thrust in a moneth, above their | |
| *Mercedo- | ordinary number, which they called in old time, *Merce- | |
| nius, mensis | donius. Some say, that Numa Pompilius was the first, that | |
| intercularis. | devised this way, to put a moneth betwene: but it was a | |
| | weake remedy, and did litle helpe the correction of the errors | |
| | that were made in the account of the yeare, to frame them | |
| | to perfection. But Caesar committing this matter unto the | |
| | Philosophers, and best expert Mathematicians at that time, | |
| | did set foorth an excellent and perfect kalender, more exactly | |
| | calculated, then any other that was before: the which the | |
| | Romanes doe use untill this present day, and doe nothing erre | |
| | as others, in the difference of time. But his enemies notwith- | |
| | standing that envied his greatnes, did not sticke to finde | |
| | fault withall. As Cicero the Orator, when one sayd, To | |
| | morow the starre Lyra will rise: Yea, sayd he, at the com- | |
| | maundement of Caesar, as if men were compelled so to say | |
| | and thinke, by Caesars edict. But the chiefest cause | |
| Why Caesar | that made him mortally hated, was the covetous desire he had to | |
| was hated. | be called king: which first gave the people just cause, and | |
| | next his secret enemies, honest colour to beare him ill will. | |
| | 60 | |