V. The Gracchi had made themselves, so to say, the civil champions of the popular cause: Marius became its stern soldier. Born of an obscure family, bred in camps, having arrived by his courage at high grades, he had the roughness and the ambition of the class which feels itself oppressed. A great captain, but a partisan in spirit, naturally inclined to good and to justice, he became, towards the end of his life, through love of power, cruel and inexorable.[683]
After having distinguished himself at the siege of Numantia, he was elected tribune of the people, and displayed in that office a great impartiality.[684] It was the first step of his fortune. Having become the lieutenant of Metellus, in the war against Jugurtha he sought to supplant his general; and, at a later period, succeeded in allying himself to an illustrious family by marrying Julia, paternal aunt of the great Cæsar. Guided by his instinct or intelligence, he had learnt that beneath the official people there existed a people of proletaries and of allies which demanded a consideration in the State.
Having reached the consulship through his high military reputation, backed by intrigues, he was charged with the war of Numidia, and, before his departure, expressed with energy, in an address to the people, the rancours and principles of the democratic party of that time.
“You have charged me,” he said, “with the war against Jugurtha; the nobility is irritated at your choice: but why do you not change your decree, by going to seek for this expedition a man among that crowd of nobles, of old lineage, who counts many ancestors, but not a single campaign?... It is true that he would have to take among the people an adviser who could teach him his business. With these proud patricians compare Marius, a new man. What they have heard related by others, what they have read of, I have seen in part, I have in part done.... They reproach me with the obscurity of my birth and fortune; I reproach them with their cowardice and personal infamy. Nature, our common mother, has made all men equal, and the bravest is the most noble.... If they think they are justified in despising me, let them also despise their ancestors, ennobled like me by their personal merits.... And is it not more worthy to be oneself the author of his name than to degrade that which has been transmitted to you?