Montesquieu, Considerations Concerning the Causes of the Greatness of the Romans and their Decline (14)
There is no crueler tyranny than the one which is exercised in the shadow of the law with the colors of justice, when one comes, as it were, to drown the unfortunate under the same board on which they were saved.
And, since it is never happened that a tyrant was lacking instruments for his tyranny, Tiberius found at all times judges prepared to condemn as many people as he was able to suspect. At the time of the Republic, the Senate, which did not as a body judge private affairs, learned from a delegation of the people about crimes which were imputed to allies. Similarly, Tiberius delegated to it the judgment of everything which he called the crime of lèse-majesté against himself. This deliberative body fell into a state of baseness which cannot be expressed. The senators went out to meet with their servitude; under the favor of Sejanus, the most illustrious members of them went into business as informers.
Il n’y a point de plus cruelle tyrannie que celle que l’on exerce à l’ombre des lois et avec les couleurs de la justice, lorsqu’on va, pour ainsi dire, noyer des malheureux sur la planche même sur laquelle ils s’étaient sauvés.
Et, comme il n’est jamais arrivé qu’un tyran ait manqué d’instruments de sa tyrannie, Tibère trouva toujours des juges prêts à condamner autant de gens qu’il en put soupçonner. Du temps de la république, le Sénat, qui ne jugeait point en corps les affaires des particuliers, connaissait, par une délégation du peuple, des crimes qu’on imputait aux alliés. Tibère lui renvoya de même le jugement de tout ce qu’il appelait crime de lèse-majesté contre lui. Ce corps tomba dans un état de bassesse qui ne peut s’exprimer : les sénateurs allaient au-devant de la servitude ; sous la faveur de Séjan, les plus illustres d’entre eux faisaient le métier de délateurs.
“drown the unfortunate under the same board” should be “on the same board” to match the original.