[49] Question 49. Wherefore was it a custom among the candidates for magistracy to present themselves in their togas without tunics, as Cato tells us?
Solution. Was it not that they should not carry money in their bosoms to buy votes with? Or is it that they preferred no man as fit for the magistracy for the sake of his birth, riches, or honors, but for his wounds and scars; and that these might be visible to them that came about them, they came without tunics to the elections? Or, as by courteous behavior, supplication, and submission, so by humbling themselves in nakedness did they gain on the affections of the common people?