CHAPTER XLVIII.: one of the means of preventing an important magistracy from being conferred upon a vile and wicked individual is to have it applied for by one still more vile and wicked, or by the most noble and deserving in the state.

When the Roman Senate apprehended lest the Tribunes with consular powers should be taken from amongst the plebeians, they adopted one of the two following methods: either they caused the most distinguished and influential men of Rome to become candidates, or by suitable means they bribed some of the most sordid and ignoble to come forward as candidates at the same time with the better quality of plebeians, who usually asked for these offices. This latter course caused the people to be ashamed of bestowing them upon such candidates, and the former course made them ashamed to refuse them to such honorable citizens. All of which corroborates what I have maintained in the preceding chapter, that in general matters the people are apt to deceive themselves, but rarely in particulars.