[54]
When in the Aurelian tribunal you were openly enrolling not only freemen but
slaves also, got together out of all the streets in the city, were you not
at that time preparing for violence? When by your edicts, you ordered all
the shops to be shut, were you aiming not at the violence of the mob, but at
a modest and prudent gathering of honourable men? When you were having arms
collected and carried to the temple of Castor, had you no other object
beyond preventing others from being able to effect anything by violence? But
when you tore up and removed the steps of the temple of Castor, did you
then, in order to be able to act in a moderate manner, repel audacious men
from the approaches and ascents leading to the temple? When you ordered
those persons who, in an assembly of virtuous men, had spoken in defence of,
my safety, to come forward, and had driven away their companions and
seconders by blows and arms and stones; then, no doubt, you showed that
violence was excessively disagreeable to you.
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