Ab urbe condita

He kept talking about the contempt of orders as though the reason why he forbade all fighting were not precisely the same as that which makes him vexed now that we have fought.

Then, prompted by jealousy, he wanted to suppress the merits of others and deprive of their arms men who were most eager to use them, so as to prevent their being employed in his absence; now he is exasperated and furious because the soldiers were not crippled or defenceless though L. Papirius was not with them, and because Q. Fabius considered himself Master of the Horse and not the lacquey of the Dictator.

What would he have done if, as often happens amid the chances of war, the battle had gone against us, seeing that now, after the enemy has been thoroughly defeated and a victory won for the republic which even under his unrivalled generalship could not have been more complete, he is actually menacing the Master of the Horse with punishment! He would, were it in his power, treat all with equal severity, not only the Master of Horse but the military tribunes, the centurions, the men of the rank and file.