on, and by proper nourishment brought it to such perfection,
that, when their strength was now developed, they were able to bring
forth the wholesome fruits of liberty. The first beginnings of
liberty, however, one may date from this period, rather because
the consular authority was made annual, than because of the royal
prerogative was in any way curtailed. The first consuls kept all the
privileges and outward signs of authority, care only being taken to
prevent the terror appearing doubled, should both have the fasces at
the same time. Brutus, with the consent of his colleague, was first
attended by the fasces, he who proved himself afterward as keen in
protecting liberty as he had previously shown himself in asserting it.
First of all he bound over the people, jealous of their newly-acquired
liberty, by an oath that they would suffer no one to be king in Rome,
for fear that later they might be influenced by the importunities
or bribes of the royal house. Next, that a full house might give
additional strength to the senate, he filled up the number of
senators, which had been diminished by the assassinations of
Tarquinius, to the full number of three hundred, by electing the
principal men of equestrian rank to fill their places: from this is
said to have been derived the custom of summoning into the senate both
the patres and those who were conscripti. They called those who
were elected, conscripti, enrolled, that is, as a new senate. It is
surprising how much that contributed to the harmony of the state, and
toward uniting the patricians and commons in friendship.

Attention was then paid to religious matters, and, as certain public
functions had been regularly performed by the kings in person, to
prevent their loss being felt in any particular, they appointed a
king of the sacrifices.[1] This office they made subordinate to the
pontifex maximus, that the holder might not, if high office were added
to the title, prove detrimental to liberty, which was then their
principal care. And I do not know but that, by fencing it in on every
side to excess, even in the most trivial matters, they exceeded
bounds. For, though there was nothing else that gave offence, the name
of one of the consuls was an object of dislike to the state.
They declared that the Tarquins had been too much habituated to
sovereignty; that it had originated with Priscus: that Servius Tullius
had reigned next; that Tarquinius Superbus had not even, in spi