for you, who are the censor, and whose duty it is to examine into our lives, to be turned out[681] by our officers.”  When Cato had uttered these words, Catulus looked at him as if he were going to reply, but he said nothing, and either being angry or ashamed he went away in silence and perplexed.  However the man was not convicted, for when the votes for condemnation had exceeded those for acquittal by a single vote, and Lollius Marcus, one of the colleagues of Cato, owing to sickness had not attended at the trial, Catulus sent to him and prayed him to give his support to the man; and he was carried thither in a litter after the trial and gave the vote which acquitted.  However Cato did not employ the clerk nor give him his pay, nor did he take any reckoning at all of the vote of Lollius.

XVII.  Having thus humbled the clerks and reduced them to obedience, by managing the accounts in his own way, he made the treasury in a short time more respected than the Senate, so that every body said and considered that Cato had surrounded the quaestorship with the dignity of the consulship.  For in the first place finding that many persons owed old debts to the state and that the state was indebted to many, he at the same time put an end to the state being wronged and wronging others, by demanding the money from those who owed it vigorously and without relenting at all, and paying the creditors speedily and readily, so that the people respected him when they saw those pay who expected to defraud the state, and those recover who never expected it.  In the next place, it was the general practice to bring in writings without observing the proper forms, and previous quaestors used to receive false decrees to please persons, and at their request.  Cato however let nothing of this kind escape his notice, and on one occasion being in doubt about a decree, whether it was really ratified, though many persons testified to the fact, he would not trust them, nor did he allow it to be deposited until the consuls came and by oath confirmed its genuineness.  Now there were many whom Sulla had rewarded for killing proscribed persons at the rate of twelve thousand drachmae apiece, and though all detested them as accursed and abominable wretches, no one ventured to bring them to punishment; but Cato, calling to account every man who had public money by unfair means, made him give it up and at the same time upbraided him for his unholy and illegal acts with passion and argument.  Those whom this befel were immediately charged with murder and were brought before the judices in a manner prejudged, and were punished, to the joy of all who considered that the tyranny of those former times was at the same time blotted out and that they witnessed Sulla himself punished.