I have spoken at such length of the development of Scipio's character from his earliest years partly because I thought the story would be agreeable to those advanced in years and salutary for the young,
but chiefly in order to secure credence for all I shall have to tell of him in the Books which follow,
so that readers may neither hesitate to accept as true anything in his subsequent life that seems astonishing nor depriving the man himself of the credit of his meritorious achievements put them down to chance from ignorance of the true cause of each. There were some few exceptions which we may assign of good luck and chance.
After this long digression I will now resume my regular narrative.
Walbank Commentary