# 47. Though Men make Mistakes about Things in General, they do not make Mistakes about Particulars

The Roman people, as I have already said, came to look on the consular office as a nuisance, and wished this office to be thrown open to plebeians, or, alternatively, that the authority of the consuls should be reduced. To prevent the authority of the consuls from being sullied by the adoption of either of these alternatives, the nobility suggested a middle course, and agreed to the appointment of four tribunes with consular power who might be either plebeians or nobles. With this the plebs was content, since it was tantamount to abolishing the consulate, and in the highest office of the state they had a share. An event now took place which is noteworthy. When it came to electing these tribunes, though they might have elected plebeians in all cases, all those the Roman people elected were nobles. On this Titus Livy remarks that ‘the result of these elections shows that the attitude adopted in the struggle for liberty and honour was different from that adopted when the struggle was over and gave place to unbiased judgement’.

If one asks how this could have come about, I believe it came about because men make quite a number of mistakes about things in general, but not so many about particulars. In general the Roman plebs thought that they deserved the consulate because they were the more numerous party in the city, because it was they who had been exposed to greater danger in the wars, because it was they who by brawn and muscle had kept Rome free and made it powerful. And since, as I have said, this desire appeared to them reasonable, they were determined to acquire this authority by some means or other. But when it came to deciding which particular members of their party to elect, they recognized their weakness and judged that no one of them was worthy of that of which all of them, taken together, had seemed to be worthy; so that being ashamed of their own people, they had recourse to those who were worthy of the office. It is no wonder Titus Livy is astonished at this decision, and remarks: ‘Where today will you find in anyone that modesty, fairness and highmindedness which the whole people then displayed?’

In confirmation of this may be adduced another notable instance which occurred in Capua after Hannibal had routed the Romans at Cannae. By this disaster the whole of Italy was stirred, and Capua was again on the brink of tumult owing to the hatred which existed between the populace and the senate. Pacuvius Calavius, who at the time was the city’s chief magistrate and realized the danger the city was in, considered how best he could use his position in order to reconcile the plebs with the nobility. This was the plan he adopted. He summoned the senate, told them of the hatred which the populace had for them, and that this meant they were in danger of being killed and of the city’s being handed over to Hannibal, so sorry was the plight the Romans were in. He then added that, if they would leave it to him to deal with the matter, he would do it in such a way that they should again be reunited, but he proposed to lock them up in the palace, and, in order to save them, to appeal to the power which the populace would thus have of chastizing them. The senators yielded to his advice. So when he had locked the senate up in the palace he called a meeting of the populace, and told them that the time had come when they could humble the pride of the nobility and obtain vengeance for the injuries done them, since the whole senate was locked up in his custody. He was sure, however, that they would not want their city to remain without a government, so that, if they proposed to kill the old senators, it would be necessary to appoint new ones. With this end in view he had put the names of all the senators in a bag, from which he would proceed to draw them in their presence. He would then put to death those whose names had been drawn, one after the other, as soon as they had found for each a successor. He then began by drawing out one name. On hearing the man’s name an uproar was raised, and they called him a proud and cruel and arrogant fellow. Pacuvius then called on them to appoint someone in his stead; whereupon the shouting subsided altogether, and after a pause one of the plebs was nominated. At his name some began to hiss, some to laugh, some to abuse him in one way, some in another. And so it went on, time upon time, till all who had been nominated had been judged to be unworthy of senatorial rank. Pacuvius then took occasion to remark: since you think this city cannot get on without a senate, but are not agreed as to who should replace the old senators, I think the best thing is for you to become reconciled; for the fear which has been hanging over the senators will have so humiliated them that you will find in them now that considerateness for which you have been looking elsewhere. To this they agreed, and unity in this institution was thus brought about, so that the mistake they had been making was discovered as soon as they were forced to get down to particulars. Other mistakes that are made by the populace in judging of things and of the properties of things in general also vanish when they come to study them in detail.

After 1494 when those who had been princes in Florence were expelled from that city, and there was no proper government, but rather a state in which anarchy and ambition were commingled and public business was going from bad to worse, many belonging to the popular party, seeing the city going to ruin and discerning no other cause for it, laid the blame on those powerful citizens who had fomented the disturbances that they might be able to set up the kind of state they wanted and take away liberty. They advocated these views in the colonnades and squares, spoke ill of many citizens, and threatened that if ever they got into the Signoria they would show them their mistake and would chastise them.

It has often happened that a man of this sort has risen to the highest office, and, when he has got there, has looked at things more closely and so has come to recognize the source of the disorders, the dangers which they entail, and the difficulty of putting matters right. Realizing that it is circumstances,a not men, that have brought the disorders about, he has then quickly changed both his mind and his line of conduct; for acquaintance with things in detail has removed the wrong impression that had been taken for granted when only general considerations were taken into account. Consequently those who have heard such a one speak when he was a private person, and, later on, have noticed how silent he remained when he held high office, have ascribed this not to his better acquaintance with affairs, but to his having been suborned and corrupted by the great. It is the sort of thing that happens to many and on many occasions. Hence the proverb which says: ‘He is of a different opinion in the market place from what he is in the palace.’

In view of all that has been said in this discourse, it should be clear, then, that it is possible to make the populace open its eyes as soon as a way can be found of making it see that it is a mistake to generalize, and that it ought to get down to particulars, as Pacuvius made it do in Capua, and the senate in Rome. We may infer, I think, too, that a wise man will not ignore public opinion in regard to particular matters, such as the distribution of offices and preferments; for here the populace, when left to itself, does not make mistakes, or, if sometimes it does, its mistakes are rare in comparison with those that would occur if the few had to make such a distribution. Nor will it be superfluous, I think, for me to point out in the next chapter the means taken by the senate to delude the populace when it was making its appointments.