Curiosities & wonders > Titus Livius' Roman history

344
TITUS LIVTUS’
Book IV.
once more }o be created dictator. He named for master
of the horse A. Posthumius Tubertus; and preparations
were made for the war, with a vigour proportioned to the
force of all Etruria, compared to that of only two of its
constituent parts.
CHAP. XXIV.
The Dictator passes a popular law, which is highly resented
. by the Censors.
But this affair'created less disturbance than was ge¬
nerally expected: wherefore, when advices were brought
by the merchants, that the Etrurians had refused to be
concerned with the Vejentes, telling them, since they had
engaged in a* \var, without consulting them, they .must
carry it on without their assistance, and not involve those
in their misfortunes, whom they excluded from their hopes
in more promising days.
The dictator then, thus disappointed in bis expectation
of military glory, that he might not seem to have been
created in vain, wished to leave a monument of his dicta¬
torship in-time of p*'ace; and, with that view, set about
reducing the privileges of the censors; either because he
thought their power too extensive, or perhaps because he
was less dissatisfied with the greatness of their honours
than the time of their duration. Therefore, having cal¬
led an assembly, he represented, ‘ That as the immortal
* gods had taken upon themselves the charge of the re-
‘ public’s affairs abroad, under whose protection they
* might rest secure ; it was his business to attend to the
‘ liberty of the people, which could only be done with-
‘ in the walls of the city. That for this purpose, he. had
‘ to observe, that it was a matter of the last importance,
* to take care, that the great offices of the state should
* not continue long in the same hands, and that bounds
‘ be set to the duration of employments, to the power
‘ annexed to which, all limitation is impossible. That
‘ all other offices were annual, the censorship alone quin-
' (piennial. That it was intolerable to live for so many
‘ years exposed to the power of the same persons. That
‘ therefore, he was to propose a law restricting the cen-
* sorship to the continuance of eighteen months.’