The control of Rome over conquered provinces introduced a new class of magistrates, selected by the Senate, and chosen from the aristocratic circles. These were the provincial governors or prætors, who had great power, and who sometimes appeared in all the pomp of kings. They resided in the ancient palaces of the kings, and had great opportunities for accumulating fortunes. Nor could the governors be called to account, until after their term of office [pg 480] expired, which rarely happened. The governors were, virtually, sovereigns while they continued in office—were satraps, who conducted a legalized tyranny abroad, and returned home arrogant and accustomed to adulation—a class of men who proved dangerous to the old institutions, those which recognized equality within the aristocracy and the subordination of power to the senatorial college.
Decline of the burgesses. Public amusements.
The burgesses, or citizens, before this period, were a very respectable body, patriotic and sagacious. They occupied chiefly Latium, a part of Campania, and the maritime colonies. But gradually, a rabble of clients grew up on footing equality with these independent burgesses. These clients, as the aristocracy increased in wealth and power, became parasites and beggars, and undermined the burgess class, and controlled the Comitia. This class rapidly increased, and were clamorous for games, festivals, and cheap bread, for corn was distributed to them by those who wished to gain their favor at elections, at less than cost. Hence, festivals and popular amusements became rapidly a great feature of the times. For five hundred years the people had been contented with one festival in a year, and one circus. Flaminius added another festival, and another circus. In the year 550 of the city, there were five festivals. The candidates for the consulship spent large sums on these games, the splendor of which became the standard by which the electoral body measured the fitness of candidates. A gladiatorial show cost seven hundred and twenty thousand sesterces, or thirty-six thousand dollars.
Decay of military sports. Distinctions in society.
And corruption extended to the army. The old burgess militia were contented to return home with some trifling gift as a memorial of victory, but the troops of Scipio, and the veterans of the Macedonian and Asiatic wars, came back enriched with spoils. A decay of a warlike spirit was observable from the time the burgesses converted war into a traffic in plunder. A great passion also arose for titles and insignia, which appeared under different [pg 481] forms, especially for the honors of a triumph, originally granted only to the supreme magistrate who had signally augmented the power of the State. Statues and monuments were often erected at the expense of the person whom they purported to honor. And finally, the ring, the robe, and the amulet case distinguished not only the burgesses from the foreigners and slaves, but also the person who was born free from one who had been a slave, the son of the free-born from the son of the manumitted, the son of a knight from a common burgess, the descendant of a curule house from the common senators. These distinctions in rank kept pace with the extension of conquests, until, at last, there was as complete a net work of aristocratic distinctions as in England at the present day.
Cato.
All these distinctions and changes were bitterly deplored by Marcus Portius Cato—the last great statesman of the older school—a genuine Roman of the antique stamp. He was also averse to schemes of universal empire. He was a patrician, brought up at the plow, and in love with his Sabine farm. Yet he rose to the consulship, and even the censorship. He served in war under Marcellus, Fabius, and Scipio, and showed great ability as a soldier. He was as distinguished in the forum as in the camp and battle-field, having a bold address, pungent wit, and great knowledge of the Roman laws. He was the most influential political orator of his day. He was narrow in his political ideas, conservative, austere, and upright; an enemy to all corruption and villainy, also to genius, and culture, and innovation. He was the protector of the Roman farmer, plain, homely in person, disdained by the ruling nobles, but fearless in exposing corruption from any quarter, and irreconcilably at war with aristocratic coteries, like the Scipios and Flaminii. He was publicly accused twenty-four times, but he was always backed by the farmers, notwithstanding the opposition of the nobles. He erased, while censor, the name of the brother of Flaminius from the roll of senators, and the brother of Scipio from that of the equites. He [pg 482] attempted a vigorous reform, but the current of corruption could only be stemmed for awhile. The effect of the sumptuary laws, which were passed through his influence, was temporary and unsatisfactory. No legislation has proved of avail against a deep-seated corruption of morals, for the laws will be avoided, even if they are not defied. In vain was the eloquence of the hard, arbitrary, narrow, worldly wise, but patriotic and stern old censor. The age of Grecian culture, of wealth, of banquets, of palaces, of games, of effeminate manners, had set in with the conquest of Greece and Asia. The divisions of society widened, and the seeds of luxury and pride were to produce violence and decay.
Political changes. Rise of demagogues.
Still some political changes were effected at this time. The Comitia Centuriata was remodeled. The equites no longer voted first. The five classes obtained an equal number of votes, and the freedmen were placed on an equal footing with free-born. Thus terminated the long conflict between patricians and plebeians. But although the right of precedence in voting was withdrawn from the equites, still the patrician order was powerful enough to fill, frequently, the second consulship and the second censorship, which were open to patricians and plebeians alike, with men of their own order. At this time the office of dictator went into abeyance, and was practically abolished; the priests were elected by the whole community; the public assemblies interfered with the administration of the public property—the exclusive prerogative of the Senate in former times—and thus transferred the public domains to their own pockets. These were changes which showed the disorganization of the government rather than healthy reform. To this period we date the rise of demagogues, for a minority in the Senate had the right to appeal to the Comitia, which opened the way for wealthy or popular men to thwart the wisest actions and select incompetent magistrates and generals. Even Publius Scipio was not more distinguished for his arrogance and title-hunting than for the army of [pg 483] clients he supported, and for the favor which he courted, of both legions and people, by his largesses of grain.
Agriculture. The slaves. Small farmers.