For what would have been the consequence if that rabble of shepherds and strangers, fugitives from their own countries, having, under the protection of an inviolable asylum, found liberty, or at least impunity, uncontrolled by the dread of regal authority, had begun to be distracted by tribunician storms, and to engage in contests with the fathers in a strange city, before the pledges of wives and children, and love of the very soil, to which it requires a length of time to become habituated, had united their affections.

Their affairs not yet matured would have been destroyed by discord, which the tranquil moderation of the government so cherished, and by proper nourishment brought to such perfection, that, their strength being now developed, they were able to produce the wholesome fruits of liberty.

But the origin of liberty you may date from this period, rather because the consular authority was made annual, than that any diminution was made from the kingly prerogative.

The first consuls had all their privileges and ensigns of authority, only care was taken that the terror might not appear doubled, by both having the fasces at the same time.

Brutus was, with the consent of his colleague, first attended by the fasces, who had not been a more zealous assertor of liberty than he was afterwards its guardian.