18. We have already seen the bravery of Man'lius in defending the Capitol, and saving the last remains of Rome. For this the people were by no means ungrateful. They built him a house near the place where his valour was so conspicuous, and appointed him a public fund for his support. 19. But he aspired at being more than equal to Camil'lus, and to be sovereign of Rome. With this view he laboured to ingratiate himself with the populace, paid their debts, and railed at the patricians, whom he called their oppressors. 20. The senate was not ignorant of his speeches or his designs, and created Corne'lius Cossus dictator, with a view to curb the ambition of Man'lius. 21. The dictator soon called Man'lius to an account for his conduct. Man'lius, however, was too much the darling of the populace to be affected by the power of Cossus, who was obliged to lay down his office, and Man'lius was carried from confinement in triumph through the city. 22. This success only served to inflame his ambition. He now began to talk of a division of the lands among the people, insinuated that there should be no distinctions in the state; and, to give weight to his discourses, always appeared at the head of a large body of the dregs of the people, whom largesses had[15] made his followers. 23. The city being thus filled with sedition and clamour, the senate had recourse to another expedient, which was, to oppose the power of Camil'lus to that of the demagogue. Camil'lus, accordingly, being made one of the military tribunes, appointed Man'lius a day to answer for his life. 24. The place in which he was tried was near the Capitol, whither, when he was accused of sedition, and of aspiring to sovereignty, he turned his eyes, and pointing to that edifice, put them in mind of what he had there done for his country. 25. The multitude, whose compassion or whose justice seldom springs from rational motives, refused to condemn him, so long as he pleaded in sight of the Capitol; but when he was brought from thence to the Pe'teline grove, where the Capitol was no longer in view, they condemned him to be thrown headlong from the Tarpe'ian rock.[16] 26. Thus, the place which had been the theatre of his glory, became that of his punishment and infamy. His house, in which his conspiracies had been secretly carried on, and which had been built as the reward of his valour, was ordered to be razed to the ground, and his family were forbidden ever after to assume the name of Man'lius. 27. Thus the Romans went gradually forward, with a mixture of turbulence and superstition within their walls, and successful enterprises without. 28. With what implicit obedience they submitted to their pontiffs, and how far they might be impelled to encounter even death itself, at their command, will evidently appear from the behaviour of Cur'tius, about this time. [Sidenote: U.C. 392.]