There may be danger in the attempt--but we attempt it amongst the monuments of the Forum: and if we fall--we shall perish worthy of our sires! Ye have high descent, and sounding titles, and wide lands, and you talk of your ancestral honours! We, too,--we plebeians of Rome,--we have ours! Our fathers were freemen! where is our heritage?
not sold--not given away: but stolen from us, now by fraud, now by force--filched from us in our sleep; or wrung from us with fierce hands, amidst our cries and struggles.

My Lord, we but ask that lawful heritage to be restored to us: to us--nay, to you it is the same; your liberty, alike, is gone.

Can you dwell in your father's house, without towers, and fortresses, and the bought swords of bravos?
can you walk in the streets at dark without arms and followers?
True, you, a noble, may retaliate; though we dare not.

You, in your turn, may terrify and outrage others; but does licence compensate for liberty?
They have given you pomp and power--but the safety of equal laws were a better gift.

Oh, were I you--were I Stephen Colonna himself, I should pant, ay, thirstily as I do now, for that free air which comes not through bars and bulwarks against my fellow-citizens, but in the open space of Heaven--safe, because protected by the silent Providence of Law, and not by the lean fears and hollow-eyed suspicions which are the comrades of a hated power.
The tyrant thinks he is free, because he commands slaves: the meanest peasant in a free state is more free than he is.