which Cicero dreamed that the Republic could be re-established by means
of an honest Senate, which Senate was then to be kept alive by the
constant infusion of new blood, accruing to it from the entrance of
magistrates who had been chosen by the people. Tacitus tells us that it
was with this object that Sulla had increased the number of
Quaestors.[88] Cicero's hopes--his futile hopes of what an honest Senate
might be made to do--still ran high, although at the very time in which
he was elected Quaestor he was aware that the judges, then elected from
the Senate, were so corrupt that their judgment could not be trusted. Of
this popular mode of filling the Senate he speaks afterward in his
treatise De Legibus. "From those who have acted as magistrates the
Senate is composed--a measure altogether in the popular interest, as no
one can now reach the highest rank"--namely, the Senate--"except by the
votes of the people, all power of selecting having been taken away from
the Censors."[89] In his pleadings for P. Sextus he makes the same boast
as to old times, not with absolute accuracy, as far as we can understand
the old constitution, but with the same passionate ardor as to the body.
"Romans, when they could no longer endure the rule of kings, created
annual magistrates, but after such fashion that the Council of the
Senate was set over the Republic for its guidance. Senators were chosen
for that work by the entire people, and the entrance to that order was
opened to the virtue and to the industry of the citizens at large."[90]
When defending Cluentius, he expatiates on the glorious privileges of
the Roman Senate. "Its high place, its authority, its splendor at home,
its name and fame abroad, the purple robe, the ivory chair, the appanage
of office, the fasces, the army with its command, the government of the
provinces!"[91] On that splendor "apud exteras gentes," he expatiates in
one of his attacks upon Verres.[92] From all this will be seen Cicero's
idea of the chamber into which he had made his way as soon as he had
been chosen Quaestor.

In this matter, which was the pivot on which his whole life turned--the
character, namely, of the Roman Senate--it cannot but be observed that
he was wont to blow both hot and cold. It was his nature to do so, not
from any aptitude for deceit, but because he was sanguine and
vacillating--because he now aspired and now despaired. He blew hot and
cold in regard to the Senate, because at t