Cato

First staged in 1713, Joseph Addison's Cato: A Tragedy inspired many in the eighteenth century with its portrayal of Roman senator Cato the Younger's (95-46 B.C.) willingness to take his own life rather than to submit to the tyrannical rule of Julius Caesar. Set in North Africa, the play depicts the final hours of Cato's resistance to Caesar. George Washington found Cato such a powerful statement of liberty, honor, virtue, and patriotism that he had it performed for his men in Valley Forge during the American Revolution.