[55]
But, however, to give up dwelling on my own case, recollect the rest of the
calamities of that year. For by that means you will most easily perceive
what a rigorous application of all sorts of remedies the republic required
from the next magistrates, and what a multitude of laws wanted remedying,
both such as had been passed, and such as had been only
proposed. For some were passed while those consuls (shall I say, were silent
respecting them? Yes, rather while they) actually approved of them; laws,
that the notice of the censors and the most important decisions of the most
holy magistrates should be abolished; that not only those ancient guilds
which had existed before should be restored in defiance of the resolution of
the senate, but that innumerable new ones should be established by one
gladiator; that by abandoning the collection of the half as, and third of an
as, nearly one-fifth part of our revenues should be destroyed; that
Syria should be given to
Gabinius instead of Cilicia, which
he had bargained for, if he succeeded in betraying the republic; that one
glutton should have the power of deliberating twice over about the same
thing, and that he might propose a new law for the purpose of changing his
province, after one law had been actually passed on that subject.
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