XV. For the present Tiberius[71] dissolved the assembly, seeing that his proceedings with respect to Octavius were not liked either by the nobles or the people, for they considered that the high and honourable dignity of the tribunate, which had been kept unimpaired up to that time, had been destroyed and trampled upon. He made an harangue to the people, a few of the arguments of which it will not be out of place to mention, for the purpose of showing the persuasive eloquence and the subtlety of the man. He said that a tribune was sacred and inviolate, only because he was dedicated to the people and was the guardian of the people. If then a tribune should deviate from his duty and wrong the people, abridge their power and deprive them of the opportunity of voting, he had by his own act deprived himself of his rank, by not fulfilling the conditions on which he received it. Now we must consider a tribune to be still a tribune, though he should dig down the Capitol and burn the naval arsenal. If he should commit such excesses as these, he is a bad tribune; but if he should attempt to deprive the people of their power, he is not a tribune at all. And is it not a monstrous thing if a tribune shall have power to order a consul to be put in prison, and the people shall not be able to deprive a tribune of his power when he is using it against the people who gave it to him? for both tribune and consul are equally chosen by the people. Now the kingly office, besides comprehending within it all civil power, is consecrated to the divinity by the discharge of the chief ceremonials of religion; and yet the state ejected Tarquinius for his wrong-doing, and for the violence of one man the ancient power which established Rome was overthrown. And what is there at Rome so sacred, so venerated as the virgins who guard the ever-burning fire? but if any of them offends, she is buried alive; for when they sin against the gods, they no longer retain that inviolable sanctity which they have by being devoted to the gods. In like manner, neither has a tribune when he is wronging the people any right to retain the inviolable character which he receives from the people, for he is destroying the very power which is the origin of his own power. And indeed, if he has legally received the tribunitian power by the votes of a majority of the tribes, how is it that he cannot even still more legally be deposed by the vote of all the tribes? Now, nothing is so sacred and inviolable as things dedicated to the gods; but yet no one has ever hindered the people from using such things, moving them, and changing their places as they please. It is therefore legal for the people to transfer the tribunate, as a consecrated thing, from one man to another. And that the tribunate is not an inviolable thing, nor an office of which a man cannot be divested, is clear from this that many magistrates have abdicated their office and prayed to be excused from it of their own free will.