15 Catiline, in his
youth, had been guilty of many criminal connections, with a virgin of noble
birth, with a priestess of Vesta, and of many other offences of this nature in
defiance alike of law and religion. At last, when he was smitten with a passion
for Aurelia Orestilla, in whom no good man, at any time of her life, commended
anything but her beauty, it is confidently believed that because she hesitated
to marry him, from the dread of having a grown-up step-son, he cleared the
house for their nuptials by putting his son to death. And this crime appears to
me to have been the chief cause of hurrying forward the conspiracy. For his
guilty mind, at peace with neither gods nor men, found no comfort either waking
or sleeping; so effectually did conscience desolate his tortured spirit. His
complexion, in consequence, was pale, his eyes haggard, his walk sometimes
quick and sometimes slow, and distraction was plainly apparent in every feature
and look.
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