defeat? Is this what you call an equal distribution of honours, when it is lawful for two plebeians to be made consuls, but not for two patricians; when one must necessarily be taken from the plebs, while it is open to reject every patrician? What is this comradeship, this equality of yours? Do you count it little to come into a share of what you have had no share in hitherto, unless whilst you are seeking to obtain the half you can carry off the

whole? He says, “I am afraid if it is left open for two patricians to be elected, you will never elect a plebeian.” What is this but saying, “Because you would not of your own will elect unworthy persons, I will impose upon you the necessity of electing them against your

will”? What follows? That if only one plebeian is standing with two patricians he has not to thank the people for his election; he may say he was appointed by the law not by their vote.”

“Their aim is not to sue for honours but to extort them from you, and they will get the greatest favours from you without showing the gratitude due even for the smallest. They prefer seeking posts of honour by trusting to accident rather than by personal merit.

There is many a man, too proud to submit his merits and claims to inspection and examination, who would think it quite fair that he alone among his competitors should be quite certain of attaining a post of honour, who would withdraw himself from your judgment and transfer your free votes into compulsory and servile ones.

Not to mention Licinius and Sextius, whose years of uninterrupted power you number up as though they were kings in the Capitolkings in the Capitol —Referring probably to the statues of the kings which were set up on pedestals in the Capitol, but at a later date than Livy is dealing with here., who is there in the State to-day in such humble circumstances as not to find the path to the consulship made easier by the opportunities offered in that measure for him than it is for us and our children? Even when you sometimes wish to elect us you will not have the power; those people you will be compelled to elect, even if you do not wish to do so.” “Enough has been said about the indignity of the

thing. Questions of dignity, however, only concern men; what shall I say about the duties of religion and the auspices, the contempt and profanation of which specially concern the gods? Who is there who knows not that it was under auspices that this City was founded, that only after auspices have been taken is anything done in war or peace, at home or in the

field? Who have the right to take the auspices in accordance with the usage of our fathers? The patricians, surely, for not a single plebeian magistrate is elected under

auspices. So exclusively do the auspices belong to us that not only do the people when electing patrician magistrates elect them only when the auspices are favourable, but even we, when, independently of the people, we are choosing an interrex, only do so after the auspices have been taken: we as private citizens have the auspices which your order does not possess even as

magistrates. What else is the man doing who by the creation of plebeian consuls takes away the auspices from the patricians who alone can possess them —what else, I ask, is he doing but depriving the State of the auspices? Now, men are at liberty to mock at our religious

fears. “What does it matter if the sacred chickens do not feed, if they hesitate to come out of their coop, if a bird has shrieked ominously?” These are small matters, but it was by not despising these small matters that our ancestors have achieved the supreme greatness of this State. Now, as though there were no need of securing peace with the gods, we are polluting all ceremonial