rebus optaverant otium, postquam adepti sunt, asperius acerbiusque fuit.
Namque coepere nobilitas dignitatem, populus libertatem in libidinem
vertere, sibi quisque ducere, trahere, rapere. Ita omnia in duas partes
abstracta sunt, res publica, quae media fuerat, dilacerata. Ceterum
nobilitas factione magis pollebat, plebis vis soluta atque dispersa in
multitudine minus poterat. Paucorum arbitrio belli domique agitabatur,
penes eosdem aerarium, provinciae, magistratus, gloriae triumphique
erant; populus militia atque inopia urguebatur; praedas bellicas
imperatores cum paucis diripiebant; interea parentes aut parvi liberi
militum, uti quisque potentiori confinis erat, sedibus pellebantur.[244]
Ita cum potentia avaritia sine modo modestiaque invadere, polluere et
vastare omnia, nihil pensi neque sancti habere, quoad semet ipsa
praecipitavit. Nam ubi primum ex nobilitate reperti sunt, qui veram
gloriam injustae potentiae anteponerent, moveri civitas et dissensio
civilis quasi permixtio terrae[245] oriri coepit.

[241] 'The custom of (forming) parties among the people, and of factions
in the senate;' the people are divided into _partes_, the senate
into _factiones_; the latter evidently implies intriguing
combinations.
[242] 'From the abundance of those things which mortals deem of the
first importance.' _Prima_ is used substantively, and with it the
relative pronoun (_quae_) agrees. Sallust might have said
_quas--primas_.
[243] _Scilicet_, 'naturally,' is used here as an adverb. See Zumpt,
S 271.
[244] The annexation of small free farms to the adjoining large estates,
is described by all the ancient authors as the cause of the great
misery of the Roman state, and, as Sallust remarks, it was
facilitated by the absence of many of the free citizens who were