Cicero had surely often owned this to himself; but he saw no
one who would have entered into such an idea. The title of king had a
great fascination for Caesar, as it had for Cromwell--a surprising
phenomenon in a practical mind like that of Caesar. Everyone knows the
fact that while Caesar was sitting on the _suggestum_, during the
celebration of the _Lupercalia_, Antony presented to him the diadem, to
try how the people would take it. Caesar saw the great alarm which the
act created and declined the diadem for the sake of appearance; but had
the people been silent, Caesar would unquestionably have accepted it. His
refusal was accompanied by loud shouts of acclamation, which for the
present rendered all further attempts impossible. Antony then had a
statue of Caesar adorned with the diadem; but two tribunes of the people,
L. Caesetius Flavus and Epidius Marullus, took it away: and here Caesar
showed the real state of his feelings, for he treated the conduct of the
tribunes as a personal insult toward himself.
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