Nor have you only made me a Consul, much as that is, but you have done so in such a fashion that but few among the old nobles have been so treated, and no new man--'novus ante me nemo.' I have, if you will think of it, been the only new man who has stood for the Consulship in the first year in which it was legal, and who has got it." Then he goes on to remind them, in words which I have quoted before, that they had elected him by their unanimous voices.

All this, he says, had been very grateful to him, but he had quite understood that it had been done that he might labor on their behalf.

That such labor was severe, he declares.
The Consulship itself must be defended.

His period of Consulship to any Consul must be a year of grave responsibility, but more so to him than to any other.

To him, should he be in doubt, the great nobles would give no kind advice.