resolution to do his very best. He was "Novus Homo"--a man, that is,
belonging to a family of which no member had as yet filled high office
in the State. Against such there was a strong prejudice with the
aristocracy, who did not like to see the good things of the Republic
dispersed among an increased number of hands.

The power of voting was common to all Roman male citizens; but the
power of influencing the electors had passed very much into the hands
of the rich. The admiration which Cicero had determined to elicit
would not go very far, unless it could be produced in a very high
degree. A Verres could get himself made Praetor; a Lepidus some years
since could receive the Consulship; or now an Antony, or almost a
Catiline. The candidate would borrow money on the security of his own
audacity, and would thus succeed--perhaps with some minor gifts of
eloquence, if he could achieve them. With all this, the borrowing and
the spending of money, that is, with direct bribery, Cicero would have
nothing to do; but of the art of canvassing--that art by which he
could at the moment make himself beloved by the citizens who had a
vote to give--he was a profound master.

There is a short treatise, De Petitione Consulatus, on canvassing for
the Consulship, of which mention may be made here, because all the
tricks of the trade were as essential to him, when looking to be
Quaestor, as when he afterward desired to be Consul, and because the
political doings of his life will hurry us on too quickly in the days
of his Consulship to admit of our referring to these lessons. This
little piece, of which we have only a fragment, is supposed to have
been addressed to Cicero by his brother Quintus, giving fraternal
advice as to the then coming great occasion. The critics say that
it was retouched by the orator himself. The reader who has studied