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42.
In the mean time, while you yourself were absent, what a day was that for your
colleague when he overturned that tomb in the forum, which you were accustomed
to regard with veneration! And when that action was announced to you,
you—as is agreed upon by all who were with you at the
time—fainted away. What happened afterward I know not. I imagine that
terror and arms got the mastery. At all events, you dragged your colleague down
from his heaven; and you rendered him, not even now like yourself, at all events
very unlike his own former self.
[108]
After that what a return was that of yours to Rome! How great was the agitation of the whole city! We
recollected Cinna being too powerful; after him we had seen Sulla with absolute
authority, and we had lately beheld Caesar acting as king. There were perhaps
swords, but they were sheathed, and they were not very numerous. But how great
and how barbaric a procession is yours! Men follow you in battle array with
drawn swords; we see whole litters full of shields borne along. And yet by
custom, O conscript fathers, we have become inured and callous to these things,
When on the first of June we wished to come to the senate, as it had been
ordained, we were suddenly frightened and forced to flee.
[109]
But he, as having no need of a senate, did not miss any of
us, and rather rejoiced at our departure, and immediately proceeded to those
marvelous exploits of his. He who had defended the memoranda of Caesar for the
sake of his own profit, overturned the laws of Caesar—and good laws
too—for the sake of being able to agitate the republic. He increased
the number of years that magistrates were to enjoy their provinces; moreover,
though he was bound to be the defender of the acts of Caesar, he rescinded them
both with reference to public and private transactions.
In public transactions nothing is more authoritative than law; in private affairs
the most valid of all deeds is a will. Of the laws, some he abolished without
giving the least notice; others he gave notice of bills to abolish. Wills he
annulled; though they have been at all times held sacred even in the case of the
very meanest of the citizens. As for the statues and pictures which Caesar
bequeathed to the people, together with his gardens, those he carried away, some
to the house which belonged to Pompeius, and some to Scipio's villa.
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