The leading advocates belonged to the same class.

If the proconsular thief, when he had made his bag, would divide the spoil with some semblance of equity among his brethren, nothing could be more convenient.

The provinces were so large, and the Greek spirit of commercial enterprise which prevailed in them so lively, that there was room for plunder ample, at any rate, for a generation or two.

The Republic boasted that, in its love of pure justice, it had provided by certain laws for the protection of its allied subjects against any possible faults of administration on the part of its own officers.

If any injury were done to a province, or a city, or even to an individual, the province, or city, or individual could bring its grievance to the ivory chair of the Praetor in Rome and demand redress; and there had been cases not a few in which a delinquent officer had been condemned to banishment.