Cicero had rendered important services to the state, and enjoyed for a time unbounded popularity. Catulus in the Senate and Cato in the forum hailed him as the "Father of his Country;" thanksgivings in his name were voted to the gods; and all Italy joined in testifying enthusiastic admiration and gratitude. Cicero's elation knew no bounds; he fancied that his political influence was now supreme, and looked upon himself as a match even for Pompey. But his splendid achievement contained the germ of his humiliation and downfall. There could be no doubt that the punishment inflicted by the Senate upon Lentulus and his associates was a violation of the fundamental principles of the Roman Constitution, which declared that no citizen could be put to death until sentenced by the whole body of the people assembled in their Comitia, and for this act Cicero, as the presiding magistrate, was held responsible. It was in vain to urge that the Consuls had been armed with dictatorial power; the Senate, in the present instance, assuming to themselves judicial functions which they had no right to exercise, gave orders for the execution of a sentence which they had no right to pronounce. Nor were his enemies long in discovering this vulnerable point. On the last day of the year, when, according to established custom, he ascended the Rostra to give an account to the people of the events of his Consulship, Metellus Celer, one of the new Tribunes, forbade him to speak, exclaiming that the man who had put Roman citizens to death without granting them a hearing was himself unworthy to be heard. But this attack was premature. The audience had not yet forgotten their recent escape; so that, when Cicero swore with a loud voice that "he had saved the Republic and the city from ruin," the crowd with one voice responded that he had sworn truly.