Conspiracy of Catiline (33)

"We call gods and men to witness, general, that we have taken up arms neither to injure our country, nor to occasion peril to any one, but to defend our own persons from harm; who, wretched and in want, have been deprived,

most of us, of our homes, and all of us of our character and property, by the oppression and cruelty of usurers; nor has any one of us been allowed, according to the usage of our ancestors, to have the benefit of the law,[*] or, when our property was lost to keep our persons free. Such has been the inhumanity of the usurers and of the prætor.[*]

"Often have your forefathers, taking compassion on the commonalty at Rome, relieved their distress by decrees ;[*] and very lately, within our, own memory, silver, by reason of the pressure of debt, and with the consent of all respectable citizens, was paid with brass.[*]

"Often too, we must own, have the commonalty themselves, driven by desire of power, or by the arrogance of their rulers, seceded[*] under arms from the patricians. But at power or wealth, for the sake of which wars, and all kinds of strife, arise among mankind, we do not aim; we desire only our liberty, which no honorable man relinquishes but with life. We therefore conjure you and the senate to befriend your unhappy fellow-citizens; to restore us the protection of the law, which the injustice of the prætor has taken from us; and not to lay on us the necessity of considering how we may perish, so as best to avenge our blood."