He sought a fine. According to what law? Because he had not
 taken the oath to observe the law: a thing which never yet was brought against any man as a
 crime: and because Caius Verres, the city praetor, a very conscientious and careful man, had not
 the list out of which judges were to be chosen in the place of those who had been rejected, in
 that book which was then produced full of erasures. On all these accounts Caius Junius was
 condemned, O judges, for these trivial and unproved reasons, which had no business to have been
 ever brought before the court at all. And therefore he was defeated, not on the merits of his
 case, but by the time. Do you think that this decision ought to be any hindrance to Cluentius? On what account? If
 Junius had not appointed the judges in the place of those who had been objected to according to
 law—if he had omitted to take the oath to obey the law—does it follow that any decision bearing
 on Cluentius's case was pronounced or implied in his condemnation? “No,” says he; “but he was
 condemned by these laws, because he had committed an offence against another law.” Can those who
 admit this urge also in defence that that was a regular decision? “Therefore,” says he, “the
 praetor was hostile to Junius on this account, because the tribunal was thought to have been
 bribed by his means.” Was then the whole cause changed at this time? Is the case different, is
 the principle of that decision different, is the nature of the whole business different now from
 what it was then? I do not think that of all the things that were done then anything can be
 altered. What, then, is the reason why our defence is
 listened to with such silence now, but that all opportunity of defending himself was refused to
 Junius then? Because at that time there was nothing in the cause but envy, mistake, suspicion,
 daily assemblies, seditiously stirred up by appeals to popular feeling. The same tribune of the
 people was the accuser before the assemblies, and the prosecutor in the courts of law. Be came
 into the court of justice not from the, assembly, but bringing the whole assembly with him.
 Those steps of Aurelius , These
 were steps built in the forum by Marcus Aurelius Cotta, and called by his name. which
 were new at that time, appeared as if they had been built on purpose for a theatre for the
 display of that tribunal. And when the prosecutor had filled them with men in a state of great
 excitement, there was not only no opportunity of speaking in favour of the defendant, but none
 of even rising up to speak. It happened lately, before Caius
 Orchinius, my colleague, that the judges refused to sanction a prosecution against Faustus
 Sulla, in a cause concerning some money which remained unpaid. Not because they considered that
 Sulla was an outlaw, or because they thought the cause of the public money insignificant or
 contemptible; but because, when a tribune of the people was the accuser, they did not think that
 there could be a fair trial. What? Shall I compare Sulla with
 Junius ? or this tribune of the people with Quinctius?
 or one time with the other time? Sulla, with his great wealth, his numerous relations,
 connections, friends, and clients; but in the case of
 Junius all these things were small, and insignificant,
 and collected and acquired by his own exertions. The one a tribune of the people, moderate,
 modest, not only not seditious himself, but an enemy to seditious men; the other bitter, fond of
 raking up accusations, a hunter after popularity, and a turbulent man. The present a tranquil
 and a peaceable time; the former time one ruffled with every imaginable storm of ill-will. And
 as all this was the case, still in the case of Faustus those judges decided that a defendant was
 brought before the court on very unfair terms, when his adversary was in possession of the
 greatest power known to the state, which he could avail himself of to add force to his
 accusations. And this principle you, O judges, ought, as your wisdom and humanity prompts and enables you
 to do, to consider over in your mind carefully; and to be thoroughly aware what disaster and
 what danger the tribunitian power can bring upon every one individual among us, especially when
 it is egged on by party spirit, and by assemblies of the people, stirred up in a seditious
 manner. In the very best times, forsooth, when men defended themselves, not by boastings
 addressed to the populace, but by their own worth and innocence, still neither Publius
 Popillius, nor Quintus Metellus, most illustrious and most honourable men, could withstand the
 power of the tribunes; much less at the present time, with such manners as we now have, and such
 magistrates, can we possibly be saved without the aid of your wisdom, and without the relief
 which is afforded by the courts of justice.