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Not quite so obvious as the youths had imagined, fell, as if by accident, upon the ground, and touched, with his lips, the earth, as the common parent of all mankind. But Brutus, supposing that the import of the prediction was To have drawn lots, for the purpose of determining which of them, on his return to Rome, should first salute his mother. The sovereignty of Rome, received, as an answer to their enquiry, that "the first who should kiss his mother should possess the supreme power." In their perplexity they are said Under a contemptible exterior, it concealed a treasure of great value." It is also related that the young men, anxious to ascertain, from the oracle, which of them should obtain "Thus (says Livy) was it an emblem of the state of his own mind: for, But they were ignorant that this staff was hollow, and contained a golden wand. Brutus accompanied them and is said to have much amused the youths, by carrying, as an offering to that god, a staffįormed of cornel wood. With propitiatory offerings to Apollo, of immense value. Whilst he was in this state of servitude, a famine raged in Rome, so dreadful that Tarquin, alarmed lest his own family should suffer from it, was induced to send his sons to Delphi, In which he was treated but resolved, patiently to wait, in the hope that a time would arrive, when he could, with safety, throw off his disguise, and not only liberate himself,īut aid in liberating his country from the power of the tyrant. Lucius had prudence enough to exhibit no symptoms of dislike, either to his name, or to the mode Or "fool " and suffered him to reside in the palace, for the amusement of his sons. Tarquin, despising his apparent imbecility, gave him the surname of Brutus, Thus, although he would have found no protection from justice, did he find security in contempt. Marcus Junius, his brother and eldest son, had all been privately murdered by command of the despot and Lucius, whose talents and acquirements were much beyond those of hisĬontemporaries in general, perceiving that the only mode by which he could escape destruction, was to affect a state of mental incapacity, assumed the manner and the character ofĪn ideot. He had enslaved the people, slaughtered many of the nobility and, despising the laws of the country, had appropriated To obtain it he had murdered his father-in-law, his sister, and his wife Īnd his whole reign was marked by injustice and oppression. Tarquin had usurped the crown of Rome, against the consent of the senate and the people. The father of this eminent Roman was Marcus Junius, a descendant from one of the chiefs of the colony which had been planted in Italy by AEneas: his mother was a He was killed inīattle, by Aruns, the son of Tarquin, in the year 246 of Rome, and 508 years before the birth of Christ. A principal agent in the expulsion of the Tarquins from the throne of Rome, and one of the founders of the republic.