[112]
But if any one depends
on the fact of his being meanly born as his chief claim, he often goes greater lengths than if
he was a man of the highest birth devoted to the same vices. As, in the case of Quinctius,
(for I will say nothing of the others,) if he had been a man of noble birth, who could have
endured him with his pride and intolerance? But because he was of the rank of which he was,
people put up with it, as if they thought that if he had any good quality by nature, it ought
to be allowed to save him and as if, owing to the meanness of his birth, they thought his
pride and arrogance matters to be laughed at rather than feared.
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M. Tullius Cicero. The Orations of Marcus Tullius Cicero, literally translated by C. D. Yonge, B. A. London. Henry G. Bohn, York Street, Covent Garden. 1856.
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