M. Antonius (fl. 119 B.C.) entered public life as a pleader, and thus laid the foundation of his brilliant career; but he was through life greater as a judicial than as a deliberative orator. He was indefatigable in preparing his case, and made every point tell. He was a great master of the pathetic, and knew the way to the heart. Although he did not himself give his speeches to posterity, some of his most pointed expressions and favorite passages left an indelible impression on the memories of his hearers, and many of them were preserved by Cicero. In the prime of life he fell a victim to political fury, and his bleeding head was placed upon the rostrum, which was so frequently the scene of his eloquent triumphs.
L. Licinius Crassus was four years younger than Antonius, and acquired great reputation for his knowledge of jurisprudence, for his eminence as a pleader, and, above all, for his powerful and triumphant orations in support of the restoration of the judicial office to the senators. From among the crowd of orators, who were then flourishing in the last days of expiring Roman liberty, Cicero selected Crassus to be the representative of his sentiments in his imaginary conversation in "The Orator." Like Lord Chatham, Crassus almost died on the floor of the Senate house, and his last effort was in support of the aristocratic party.
Q. Hortensius was born 114 B.C. He was only eight years senior to the greatest of all Roman orators. He early commenced his career as a pleader, and he was the acknowledged leader of the Roman bar, until the star of Cicero arose. His political connection with the faction of Sylla, and his unscrupulous support of the profligate corruption which characterized that administration, both at home and abroad, enlisted his legal talents in defense of the infamous Verres; but the eloquence of Cicero, together with the justice of the cause which he espoused, prevailed; and from that time forward his superiority over Hortensius was established and complete. The style of Hortensius was Asiatic—more florid and ornate than polished and refined.
9. ROMAN JURISPRUDENCE.—The framework of their jurisprudence the Romans derived from Athens, but the complete structure was built up by their own hands. They were the authors of a system possessing such stability that they bequeathed it, as an inheritance, to modern Europe, and traces of Roman law are visible in the legal systems of the whole civilized world.
The complicated principles of jurisprudence of the Roman constitution became, in Rome, a necessary part of a liberal education. When a Roman youth had completed his studies, under his teacher of rhetoric, he not only frequented the forum, in order to learn the application of the rhetorical principles he had acquired, and frequently took some celebrated orator as a model, but also studied the principles of jurisprudence under eminent jurists, and attended the consultations in which they gave to their clients their expositions of law.
The earliest systematic works on Roman law were the "Manual" of Pomponius, and the "Institutes" of Gaius, who flourished in the time of Hadrian and the Antonines. Both of these works were, for a long time, lost, though fragments were preserved in the pandects of Justinian. In 1816, however, Niebuhr discovered a palimpsest MS., in which the epistles of St. Jerome were written over the erased "Institutes" of Gaius. From the numerous misunderstandings of the Roman historians respecting the laws and constitutional history of their country, the subject continued long in a state of confusion, until Vico, in his "Scienza nuova," dispelled the clouds of error, and reduced it to a system; and he was followed so successfully by Niebuhr, that modern students can have a more comprehensive and antiquarian knowledge of the subject than the writers of the Augustan age.
The earliest Roman laws were the "Leges Regiae," which were collected and codified by Sextus Papirius, and were hence called the Papirian code; but these were rude and unconnected—simply a collection of isolated enactments. The laws of the "Twelve Tables" stand next in point of antiquity. They exhibited the first attempt at regular system, and embodied not only legislative enactments, but legal principles. So popular were they that when Cicero was a child every Roman boy committed them to memory, as our children do their catechism, and the great orator laments that in the course of his lifetime this practice had become obsolete.
The oral traditional expositions of these laws formed the groundwork of the Roman civil law. To these were added, from time to time, the decrees of the people, the acts of the senate, and praetorian edicts, and from these various elements the whole body of Roman law was composed. So early was the subject diligently studied, that the age preceding the first two centuries of our era was rich in jurists whose powers are celebrated in history.
The most eminent jurists who adorned this period were the Scaevolae, a family in whom the profession seems to have been hereditary. After them flourished Aelius Gallus (123-67 B.C.), eminent as a law reformer, C. Juventius, Sextus Papirius, and L. Lucilius Balbus, three distinguished jurists, who were a few years senior to Cicero.
10. GRAMMARIANS.—Towards the conclusion of this literary period a great increase took place in the numbers of those learned men whom the Romans at first termed literati, but afterwards, following the custom of the Greeks, grammarians. To them literature was under great obligations. Although few of them were authors, and all of them possessed acquired learning rather than original genius, they exercised a powerful influence over the public mind as professors, lecturers, critics, and schoolmasters. By them the youths of the best families not only were imbued with a taste for Greek philosophy and poetry, but were also taught to appreciate the literature of their own country. Livius Andronicus and Ennius may be placed at the head of this class, followed by Crates Mallotes, C. Octavius Lampadio, Laelius, Archelaus, and others, most of whom were emancipated slaves, either from Greece or from other foreign countries.