23 Among those
present at this meeting was Quintus Curius, a man of no mean family, but
immersed in vices and crimes, and whom the censors had ignominiously expelled
from the senate. In this person there was not less levity than impudence; he
could neither keep secret what he heard, nor conceal his own crimes; he was
altogether heedless what he said or what he did. He had long had a criminal
intercourse with Fulvia, a woman of high birth, but growing less acceptable to
her, because in his reduced circumstances he had less means of being liberal,
he began, on a sudden, to boast, and to promise her seas and mountains;
threatening her, at times, with the sword, if she were not submissive to his
will; and acting, in his general conduct, with greater arrogance than ever.
Fulvia, having learned the cause of his extravagant behavior, did not keep such
danger to the state a secret; but, without naming her informant, communicated
to several persons what she had heard, and under what circumstances, concerning
Catiline’s conspiracy. This intelligence it w-as that incited the feelings of
the citizens to give the consulship to Marcus Tullius Cicero. For before this
period, most of the nobility were moved with jealousy, and thought the
consulship in some degree sullied, if a man of no family, however meritorious,
obtained it. But when danger showed itself, envy and pride were laid aside.
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