Page:Cicero And The Fall Of The Roman Republic.djvu/209

61 B.C.] up his command in Spain. It had doubtless been settled between the two, that Clodius would be useful to them in the future, and that he must be saved at all costs. Crassus accordingly paid down an enormous sum of money, and in the course of two days bought the votes of a majority of the jury.

The acquittal was a heavy blow to the hopes of the constitutional party. The scandal was so notorious that it seemed to proclaim the hopelessness of orderly government and pure justice in Rome. "That settlement," Cicero writes, "which you used to ascribe to my policy, and I to Providence, which seemed firmly established by the union of all loyal citizens and by the events of my consulship, has now, I must tell you, crumbled beneath our feet, unless Heaven takes pity on us, all through this single verdict—if indeed one can call it a verdict—that thirty men, as worthless and base as you could find in our State, should take money to outrage all law and all right, and that when every man, and, let alone men, every beast in Rome knows that a thing was done, Thalna and Plautus and Spongia and riff-raff of that sort should decide that it was not done."

The scandal gave rise to some neat epigrams. "They did not trust you on your oath," Clodius said, taunting Cicero. "Twenty-five of them," was the retort, "did trust me, and the other thirty-one certainly did not trust you, for they got their money down beforehand." In the same vein was the