The arrangements concluded at Lucca had thus succeeded, and the ambition of the three eminent personages who absorbed public attention was satisfied; but the aim of this ambition varied according to their several tempers. Crassus only desired the command of an army, in order to increase his reputation and his immense riches. Pompey, without deep convictions, placed his vanity in being the first man of the Republic. Cæsar, the head of the popular party, aspired to power, in order, above all other considerations, to ensure the triumph of his cause. The way which would offer itself to his mind was not to excite civil war, but to obtain his own nomination several times to the consulship; the great citizens who had preceded him had followed no other way, and the there is a natural tendency to take for our example that which has been successful in the past. The glory acquired in Gaul assured Cæsar beforehand of the public favour, which was to carry him again to the first magistracy. Nevertheless, to dispel the obstacles continually raised by a powerful party, it was necessary to remove hostile competitors from important offices; to gain the support of distinguished men, such as Cicero; and, as everything was venal, to buy, with the produce of the booty he made by war, the consciences which were for sale. This course, seconded by Pompey and Crassus, promised success. Pompey, always under the influence of his wife’s charms, appeared to rest satisfied with the part which was assigned to him. Had he been free from all engagement, and obeyed his own instincts, he would have embraced the cause of the Senate rather than that which he was sustaining; for men of a nature so vain as his, prefer the flattering adherence of the aristocracy in the middle of which they live, to the expression of the approbation of the people, which rarely reaches their ears. Dragged on by the force of circumstances, he was obliged to wrestle against those who stood in his way; and the more the opposition showed itself ardent, the more he gave way to the violence of his temper. Legality, moreover, was observed by nobody, as the following incident proves. Cato aspired to the prætorship. On the day of the comitia, the first century, to which the epithet of _prœrogativæ_ was given, and the suffrage of which exercised a great influence over the others, voted for him. Pompey, not doubting the same result from the other centuries, declared suddenly that he heard a clap of thunder,[661] and dismissed the assembly. Some days afterwards, by purchasing votes and employing all the means of intimidation at their disposal, the new consuls caused P. Vatinius, the author of the motion which, in 695, procured for Cæsar the government of the Cisalpine province, to be elected prætor, in the place of M. Cato.[662] Most of the other magistrates were similarly chosen among their creatures, and there were only two tribunes of the people, C. Ateius Capito and P.