These concessions were the work of
the plebeians who had been admitted to the senate. But when their position
was assured and it was no longer necessary for them to make concessions
to the commons in order to sustain themselves, they manifested the same
passions that the patricians had shown before them. Livy has expressed the
situation very clearly: "These noble plebeians had been initiated into the
same mysteries, and despised the people as soon as they themselves ceased
to be despised by the patricians."[42] Thus, then, the unity and fusion
which had been established by the tribunician laws disappeared and there
again existed two peoples, the rich and the poor.
If we examine into the elements of these two distinct populations,
separated by the pride of wealth and the misery and degradation of poverty,
we shall understand this. The new nobility was made up partially of the
descendants of the ancient patrician _gentes_ who had adapted themselves to
the modifications and transformations in society. Of these persons, some
had adopted the ideas of reform; they had flattered the lower classes
in order to obtain power; they profited by their consulships and their
prefectures to increase or at least conserve their fortunes.
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