[180]
Perhaps some one
will ask, Are you then going to take upon yourself such a labour, and such violent
enmity from so many quarters? Not, of a truth, from any desire of mine, or of my own
free will. But I have not the same liberty allowed me that they have who are born of
noble family; on whom even when they are asleep all the honours of the Roman people
are showered. I must live in this city on far other terms and other conditions. For
the case of Marcus Cato, a most wise and active man, occurs to me; who, as he
thought that it was better to be recommended to the Roman people by virtue than by
high birth, and as he wished that the foundation of his race and name should be hid
and extended by himself, voluntarily encountered the enmity of most influential men,
and lived in the discharge of the greatest labours to an extreme old age with great
credit.
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M. Tullius Cicero. The Orations of Marcus Tullius Cicero, literally translated by C. D. Yonge. London. George Bell & Sons. 1903.
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