It seemed to have occurred to nobody that Caesar would possibly stand on his defence, or that Pompeius and Crassus would combine with him afresh and more closely than ever.

This seems incredible; but it becomes intelligible, when we glance at the persons who then led the constitutional opposition in the senate.

Cato was still absent;( 4) the most influential man in the senate at this time was Marcus Bibulus, the hero of passive resistance, the most obstinate and most stupid of all consulars.

They had taken up arms only to lay them down, so soon as the adversary merely put his hand to the sheath; the bare news of the conferences in Luca sufficed to suppress all thought of a serious opposition and to bring the mass of the timid--that is, the immense majority of the senate-- back to their duty as subjects, which in an unhappy hour they had abandoned.

There was no further talk of the appointed discussion to try the validity of the Julian laws; the legions raised by Caesar on his own behalf were charged by decree of the senate on the public chest; the attempts on occasion of regulating the next consular provinces to take away both Gauls or one of them by decree from Caesar were rejected by the majority (end of May 698).
Thus the corporation did public penance.