Roman state

“ Whatever amount of belief we give to the legends of Roman wars and conquests under the kings, we can hardly doubt that the territory of several neighbouring towns was incorporated with the Roman state, and that their people, whether they removed to Rome or went on occupying their own lands elsewhere, became Romans, but not as yet full Romans. ”

“ A city-state could not rule, with justice and efficiency, an empire.
THE PROFITS OF CONQUEST In the old days, before Rome entered on a career of foreign conquest, her citizens were famous among men for their love of country, their simple lives, and their conservative, old-fashioned ways. They worked hard on their little farms, fought bravely in the legions, and kept up with careful piety all the ceremonies of their religion. But now the Roman republic was an imperial power with all the privileges of universal rule. ”

“ For a whole generation after the battle of Pydna the Roman state enjoyed a profound calm, scarcely varied by a ripple here and there on the surface. Its dominion extended over the three continents; the lustre of the Roman power and the glory of the Roman name were constantly on the increase; all eyes rested on Italy, all talents and all riches flowed thither; it seemed as if a golden age of peaceful prosperity and intellectual enjoyment of life could not but there begin. ”

“ They continued to have their own sacra, which they had had before the conquest, but these were regulated by the patrician pontiffs. Lastly, they were free land-owners, and had their own gentes.—The population of the Roman state thus consisted of two opposite elements; a ruling class or an aristocracy, and the commonalty, which, though of the same stock as the noblest among the rulers, and exceeding them in numbers, yet enjoyed none of the rights which might enable them to take a part in the management of public affairs, religious or civil. ”

“ Made up of different races, united by violence, the work of force and will, and not of relationship and nature, the Roman state contained two organised bodies, struggling regularly and legally, not through passion, but through interest, and united under the best devised and organised constitution that has ever been known. ”

“ Before the Punic Wars it was the tendency of ambitious men in Rome to court the plebeians; after that time they began to court the legions.
§ 9
The history of the Roman Republic thus far, is in many respects much more modern in flavour, especially to the American or Western European reader, than anything that has preceded it. For the first time we have something like a self-governing “nation,” something larger than a mere city state, seeking to control its own destinies. For the first time we have a wide countryside under one conception of law. ”

“ O all ye deities who have exalted the present magnitude of the Roman empire to a position of supremacy over the world, guard, preserve, and protect, I entreat and conjure you, in the name of the Commonwealth, our present state, our present peace, [our present prince [104] !] And when he shall have completed a long course on earth, grant him successors to the remotest ages, and such as shall have abilities to support the empire of the world as powerfully as we have seen him support it! ”

“ It was they, as senators, governors, consuls, generals, quaestors, who gave the people baths, theatres, and temples. They headed factions as well as armies. They were the state.
The main object to which the reigning classes gave their attention was war,—the extension of the empire. "Ubi castra, ibi respublica." Republican Rome was a camp, controlled by aristocratic generals. Dominion and conquest were their great ideas, their aim, their ambition. To these were sacrificed pleasure, gain, ease, luxury, learning, and art. And when they had conquered they sought to rule, and they knew how to rule. ”

“ But the question is not so much how the Roman Empire or any other great thing came to an end—everything must come to an end some time, it is only scientists who wonder that a state should die—the interesting question is how did the Romans become so great, under what circumstances were they born and bred? ”

“ The overthrow of the kings of Rome did not relieve the people from all their oppression. The inhabitants of that city had long been divided into two great classes, the Patricians, or nobles, and the Plebeians, or common people, and the former held in their hand nearly all the wealth and power of the state. ”

“ The dual government of the prince and the senate which follows develops into the empire, and the emperor in time becomes the autocratic monarch. In this period of a thousand years from the seventh century before our era to the fourth century after it, we may see in the practical experiences of the [Pg 4] Roman people the points of strength and of weakness in an aristocracy, a plutocracy, a parliamentary government, a democratic empire, and an autocracy. We may also trace in the history of Rome the development of a city-state into a world-wide empire. ”

“ CHAPTER XI SOURCES OF INCOME AND MEANS OF LIVING. THE ROMAN'S DAY
403 It is evident from what has been said that abundant means were necessary to support the state in which every Roman of position lived. It will be of interest to see how the great mass of the people also earned the scantier living with which they were forced to be content. For the sake of this inquiry it will be convenient, if not very accurate, to divide the people of Rome into the three great classes of nobles, knights, and commons, into which political history has distributed them. ”

“ The ancient aristocratic and military Roman society had had so great and world-wide a success, that the ideas, the institutions and the customs, that had made it a perfect model of State, considered as an organ of political and military domination, exercised a great prestige on the following generations. Even during the time of which we speak, every one was forced after eight years of peace, to admit that the Empire had been created by those ideas, those institutions and those customs ”

“ In her early history Rome was continually making fresh conquests, and in this way adding to her territory. [1] She steadfastly pursued a course of destruction to her neighbors in order that she might thereby grow rich and powerful. In this way large tracts of territory became Roman land, the property of the state or Ager Publicus. ”

“ The gradual growth of Rome as a warlike state is a most impressive example of the agency of a great Moral Governor in breaking up states that deserved to perish, and in building up a power such as the world needed in order to facilitate both a magnificent civilization and the peaceful spread of a new religion. The Greeks created art and literature ”

“ In the most high and palmy state of Rome, A little ere the mightiest Julius fell, The graves stood tenantless and the sheeted dead Did squeak and gibber in the Roman streets; ”

“ The history of Rome is the narrative of the building up of a single City, whose dominion gradually spread until it comprised all the countries about the Mediterranean, or what were then the civilized nations. "In this great empire was gathered up the sum total that remained of the religions, laws, customs, languages, letters, arts, and sciences of all the nations of antiquity which had successively held sway or predominance." Under the system of Roman government and Roman law they were combined in one ordered community. ”

“ The Roman Empire was a State in the true sense of the word. ”

“ Out of the wreck of the imperial Rome of the Caesars has risen papal Rome. Once more, though through different agents, the City of the Seven Hills is ruling an orbis terrarum Romanus, a Roman world-empire. The rule extends through nearly a thousand years. How deftly do cunning priests manipulate every means at their command to increase their power! Learning, wealth, beauty, art, piety,—everything is used as an asset in the ambitious game for absolute supremacy which the mitered vicegerent of Christ is playing against the world. ”

“ This book, like the volume on "Society and Politics in Ancient Rome," deals with the life of the common people, with their language and literature, their occupations and amusements, and with their social, political, and economic conditions. We are interested in the common people of Rome because they made the Roman Empire what it was. They carried the Roman standards to the Euphrates and the Atlantic; they lived abroad as traders, farmers, and soldiers to hold and Romanize the provinces, or they stayed at home, working as carpenters, masons, or bakers, to supply the daily needs of the capital. ”

“ Of all Rome’s achievements in the field of politics none was so far-reaching in its influence and so lasting in its effects as her conquest of the world and her successful government of it for five hundred years or more. ”

“ Throughout the days of the expanding republic, and even into the days of the early empire there remained a great number of men conscious of Roman citizenship, feeling it a privilege and an obligation to be a Roman citizen, confident of their rights under the Roman law and willing to make sacrifices in the name of Rome. The prestige of Rome as of something just and great and law- upholding spread far beyond the Roman boundaries. ”

“ The Roman empire—that greatest monument of human power, as Dean Church has called it—began the fusion of races into one vast political society; its dominion extended continuously from Britain on the west to Asia Minor and the countries bordering on the Caspian Sea; it settled the law and language of Southern Europe. The establishment of the Roman empire is a cardinal epoch of the world's political history. ”

“ Under the latter head we consider the Roman as a citizen, and we examine the several classes of citizens, their obligations and their privileges; we study the form of their government, its officers and machinery, its legislative, judicial, and executive procedure, its revenues and expenditures, etc. It is evident that no hard and fast line can be drawn between the two branches of the subject: they cross each other at every turn. One scarcely knows, for example, under which head to put the religion of the Romans or their games in the circus. ”

“ In all the lands which had obeyed Rome, and were included in the nominal supremacy of the revived Western Empire, it [Roman Law] acquired a prevalence and power not derived from the sanction of any distinct human authority. No such authority was for the time being strong enough to compete in men's esteem and reverence with the shadow of majesty that still clung to the relics of Roman dominion. ”

“ The whole structure of Roman Accentuation of class distinctions. society was altered, and the equality and homogeneity which had once been its chief characteristics were destroyed. The Roman nobles had not merely ceased, as in old days, to till their own farms; they had found a means of enriching themselves beyond the dreams of avarice, and when they returned from the government of a province it was to build sumptuous villas, filled with the spoils of Greece and Asia, to surround themselves with troops of slaves and dependents, and to live rather as princes than as citizens of a republic. ”

“ While it cannot be said that the constitutional development of England and of countries whose constitutions are like hers can be traced in all respects to Rome, it may be said with truth that the growth and character of their constitutions bear a strong resemblance to those of Rome, and that writers and political leaders, especially from the time of the French Revolution to our own day, have studied Roman political institutions and have applied the lessons drawn from their study to the political and constitutional questions of the day. ”

“ First, the whole eastern part of the Roman empire was made up of many various nations having a long and sometimes renowned history, kingdoms, and politics much anterior to Rome herself, of which the Romans had taken violent possession, but wherein remained still the fruits of a rich and undisturbed civilisation. ”

“ Romans! raised to the rank of your Senator, my whole thought has been for your liberties and welfare; already treason defeated in the City, our banners triumphant without, attest the favour with which the Deity regards men who seek to unite liberty with law. Let us set an example to Italy and the World! Let us prove that the Roman sword can guard the Roman Forum! In each Rione of the City is provided a Legion of the Citizens, collected from the traders and artisans of the town; they allege that they cannot leave their callings without remuneration. ”

“ Under the most despotic days of the empire any Roman citizen might rise to any position of power or dignity under the emperor; nay, more than this, any subject of the Roman empire, no matter how low his origin or condition in society, might be thrust, by a lucky turn of the wheel of fortune, into the imperial purple itself. ”

“ The aristocratical element had the ascendency when Rome was most prosperous and most respected. Yet, while the Roman constitution was essentially aristocratic for five hundred years, it had a strong popular element mingled with it. The patricians had the chief power, but they were not lords and masters in so absolute a sense as to trample on the people with impunity, nor were they able to deprive them of their rights, or of all share in the government. They were not feudal nobles, nor a Venetian oligarchy. ”