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[12]
There was a motion
being made about some supplications; a kind of measure when senators are not
usually wanting; for they are under the compulsion, not of pledges, but of the
influence of those men whose honour is being complimented; and the case is the
same when the motion has reference to a triumph. The consuls are so free from
anxiety at these times, that it is almost entirely free for a senator to absent
himself if he pleases. And as the general custom of our body was well known to
me, and as I was hardly recovered from the fatigue of my journey, and was vexed
with myself, I sent a man to him, out of regard for my friendship to him, to
tell him that I should not be there. But he, in the hearing of you all, declared
that he would come with masons to my house; this was said with too much passion
and very intemperately. For, for what crime is there such a heavy punishment
appointed as that, that any one should venture to say in this assembly that he,
with the assistance of a lot of common operatives, would pull down a house which
had been built at the public expense in accordance with a vote of the senate.
And who ever employed such compulsion as the threat of such an injury as that to
a senator? or what severer punishment has ever been imposed for
absence than the forfeiture of a pledge, or a fine? But if he had known what
opinion I should have delivered on the subject, he would have remitted somewhat
of the rigour of his compulsion.
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