There, when Titus Manlius the consul, by direction of the senate, required of them not to make war on their confederates the Samnites, Annius, as if he had taken the Capitol by arms as a victor, and were not addressing them as an ambassador protected by the law of nations, says: "It were time, Titus Manlius, and you, conscript fathers, to cease at length treating with us on a footing of superiority, when you see Latium in a most flourishing state by the bounty of the gods in arms and men, the Samnites being vanquished in war, the Sidicinians and Campanians our allies, the Volscians now united to us in alliance, and that your own colonies even prefer the government of Latium to that of Rome.

But since ye do not bring your minds to put an end to your arbitrary despotism, we, though able by force of arms to vindicate the independence of Latium, yet will make this concession to the ties of blood between us, as to offer terms of peace on terms of equality for both, since it has pleased the immortal gods that the strength of both is equalized.

One of the consuls must be selected out of Rome, the other out of Latium; an equal portion of the senate must be from both nations; we must be one people, one republic; and that the seat of government may be the same, and we all may have the same name, since the concession must be made by the one party or other, let this, and may it be auspicious to both, have the advantage of being the mother country, and let us all be called Romans." It so happened that the Romans also had a consul, a match for this man's high spirit; who, so far from restraining his angry feelings, openly declared, that if such infatuation took possession of the conscript fathers, that they would receive laws from a man of Setia, he would himself come into the senate armed with a sword, and would slay with his hand any Latin whom he should see in the senate-house.

And turning to the statue of Jupiter, "Hear thou, Jupiter," says he, "hear these impious proposals; hear ye them, Justice and Equity.

Jupiter, art thou to behold foreign consuls and a foreign senate in thy consecrated temple, as if thou wert a captive and overpowered?
Were these the treaties which Tullus, a Roman king, concluded with the Albans, your forefathers, Latins, and which Lucius Tarquinius subsequently concluded with you?
Does not the battle at the Lake Regillus occur to your thoughts?
Have you so forgotten your own calamities and our kindnesses towards you ?" 6.