In the midst
of the confusion and uproar which followed, Cicero could only shriek that
he had saved his country: a declaration which could have been dispensed
with, since he had so often insisted upon it already without producing the
assent which he desired.
Notwithstanding his many fine qualities, Cicero was wanting in dignity.
His vanity was wounded in its tenderest point, and he attacked Metellus a
day or two after, in one of those violently abusive outpourings of which
so many specimens of his own survive, and which happily so few other
statesmen attempted to imitate. Metellus retorted with a threat of
impeaching Cicero, and the grave Roman Curia became no better than a
kennel of mad dogs. For days the storm raged on with no symptom of
abatement. At last Metellus turned to the people and proposed in the
assembly that Pompey should be recalled with his army to restore law and
order.
Caesar, who was now praetor, warmly supported Metellus. To him, if to no
one else, it was clear as the sun at noonday, that unless some better
government could be provided than could be furnished by five hundred such
gentlemen as the Roman senators, the State was drifting on to destruction.
Resolutions to be submitted to the people were generally first drawn in
writing, and were read from the Rostra. When Metellus produced his
proposal, Cato, who was a tribune also, sprang to his side, ordered him to
be silent, and snatched the scroll out of his hands.
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