13.3
But the most reasonable opinion for any one to hold is that Romulus thought it the duty of the foremost and most influential citizens to watch over the more lowly with fatherly care and concern, while he taught the multitude not to fear their superiors nor be vexed at their honours, but to exercise goodwill towards them, considering them and addressing them as fathers, whence their name of Patricii.
13.4
For down to the present time foreign peoples call the members of their senate chief men, but the Romans themselves call them conscript fathers, using that name which has the greatest dignity and honour, and awakens the least envy. At first, then, they called them simply fathers, but later, when more had been added to their number, they addressed them as conscript fathers.
13.5
By this more imposing title Romulus distinguished the senate from the commonalty, and in other ways, too, he separated the nobles from the multitude, calling the one patrons, that is to say, protectors, and the other clients, that is to say, dependants. At the same time he inspired both classes with an astonishing goodwill towards each other, and one which became the basis of important rights and privileges. For the patrons advised their clients in matters of custom, and represented them in courts of justice, in short, were their counsellors and friends in all things;
