The year of Cicero's consulship (64 B.C.) was disturbed by the famous conspiracy of Lucius Sergius Catiline. It was in this conspiracy, and during this consulship, that the culmination was reached of the discontent and plotting which had been fermenting at Rome for a number of years among a large class of the Roman nobility. The most discontented men in any community are generally to be found among those who, while belonging by birth to the upper classes of society, and accustomed to and desirous of the luxuries of life, have lost their fortunes and are unable to live in the style to which they consider themselves as of right entitled. Rome, at this time, was filled with this class of malcontents, the extravagant and wasteful style of living, combined with the reckless gambling of the age, having reduced great numbers among the young nobles almost to beggary. The overthrow of Sulla's system of government, resulting from the defection of Pompey and the consequential loss of power and prestige by the Senate, had also roused a bitter feeling of resentment among the whole aristocratic party. The effect of this resentment upon the more solid and substantial element of this party had been to lead them to make preparations for the overthrow of Pompey upon his return to Rome; while the effect upon the ruined young nobles was to render them more than ever ready for any desperate undertaking by which they stood a chance of repairing their fortunes. No cause, whether good or bad, ever lacks a leader; and the leader at this time was found in Catiline, a young noble of the most profligate character, but of some degree of ability and possessed of boundless audacity and ambition. Catiline was descended from one of the oldest families in Rome, and his loyalty to the cause of the aristocracy was proved by the ferocity with which he had served under Sulla and had assisted in carrying into execution his most bloodthirsty orders. Catiline did not fail to derive some profit from these terrible times, as he secured the proscription and murder of his brother and the grant to himself of his brother's forfeited estate.