§23.4.1hoc modo Pacuvius cum obnoxium vitae beneficio senatum multo sibi magis quam plebi fecisset, sine armis, iam omnibus concedentibus, dominabatur.
In this manner Pacuvius, since he had made the senate much more beholden to himself than to the plebs by the favor of their lives, ruled without arms, everyone now yielding.
§23.4.2hinc senatores omissa dignitatis libertatisque memoria plebem adulari: salutare, benigne invitare, apparatis accipere epulis; §23.4.3eas causas suscipere, ei semper parti adesse, secundum eam litem iudices dare, quae magis popularis aptiorque in volgus favori conciliando esset; iam vero nihil in senatu agi aliter, §23.4.4quam si plebis ibi esset concilium.
From this time on, the senators, casting aside all memory of dignity and liberty, began to flatter the plebs: they would greet them, invite them kindly, and receive them with sumptuous banquets; they would undertake their causes, always stand by that party, and appoint judges in favor of that suit which was more popular and more suited for winning favor among the common people; indeed, now nothing was done in the senate otherwise than as if there were a council of the plebs there.
prona semper civitas in luxuriam non ingeniorum modo vitio sed afluenti copia voluptatium et inlecebris omnis amoenitatis maritimae terrestrisque, §23.4.5tum vero ita obsequio principum et licentia plebei lascivire, ut nec libidini nec sumptibus modus esset.
The state, always prone to luxury not only by the defect of their natural disposition but also by the overflowing abundance of pleasures and the allurements of all the charms of sea and land, was then indeed running so riot through the compliance of the leading men and the lawlessness of the plebeians, that there was limit neither to lust nor to expense.
§23.4.6ad contemptum legum magistratuum senatus accessit tum, post Cannensem cladem, ut, cuius aliqua verecundia erat, Romanum quoque spernerent imperium.
To their contempt of the laws, the magistrates, and the senate, there was added then, after the defeat at Cannae, the fact that they also despised Roman rule, for which there had previously been some respect.
§23.4.7id modo erat in mora ne extemplo deficerent, quod conubium vetustum multas familias claras ac potentis Romanis miscuerat, §23.4.8et, cum militarent aliquot apud Romanos, maximum vinculum erant trecenti equites, nobilissimus quisque Campanorum, in praesidia Sicularum urbium delecti ab Romanis ac missi.
This alone was a source of delay to prevent them from revolting immediately: that ancient intermarriage had allied many famous and powerful families with the Romans, and, while some were serving in the army among the Romans, the strongest bond was three hundred cavalrymen, the noblest of each of the Campanians, who had been chosen by the Romans and sent to garrison the Sicilian cities.