A new era in the history of Rome now commences, a period of glory and shame, when a great change took place in the internal structure of the State, now corrupted by the introduction of Greek and Asiatic refinements, and the vast wealth which rolled into the capital of the world.
Rome after the battle of Pydna.
“For a whole generation after the battle of Pydna, the Roman State enjoyed a profound calm, scarcely varied by a ripple here and there upon the surface. Its dominion extended over three continents; 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 had begun. The Orientals of this period told each other with astonishment of the mighty republic of the West. And such was the glory of the Romans, that no one usurped the crown, and no one glittered in purple dress; but they obeyed whomsoever from year to year they made their master, and there was among them neither envy nor discord.”
The inefficiency of the government.
So things seemed at a distance. But this splendid external was deceptive. The government of the aristocracy was hastening to its ruin. There was a profound meaning, says Mommsen, in the question of Cato: “What was to become of Rome when she should no longer have any State to fear?” All her neighbors were now politically annihilated, and the single thought of the aristocracy was how they should perpetuate their privileges. A government of aristocratic nobodies was now inaugurated, which kept new men of merit from doing any thing, for fear they should [pg 489] belong to their exclusive ranks. Even an aristocratic conqueror was inconvenient.
Opposition to the ruling classes. Capitalists. Slaves.
Still opposition existed to this aristocratic régime, and some reforms had been carried out. The administration of justice was improved. The senatorial commissions to the provinces were found inadequate. An effort was made to emancipate the Comitia from the prepondering influence of the aristocracy. The senators were compelled to renounce their public horse on admission to the Senate, and also the privilege of voting in the eighteen equestrian centimes. But there was the semblance of increased democratic power rather than the reality. All the great questions of the day turned upon the election of the curule magistracies, and there was sufficient influence among the nobles to secure these offices. Young men from noble families crowded into the political arena, and claimed what once was the reward of distinguished merit. Powerful connections were indispensable for the enjoyment of political power, as in England at the time of Burke. A large body of clients waited on their patron early every morning, and the candidates for office used all those arts which are customary when votes were to be bought. The government no longer disposed of the property of burgesses for the public good, nor favored the idea among them that they were exempted from taxes. Political corruption reached through all grades and classes. Capitalists absorbed the small farms, and great fortunes were the scandal of the times. Capital was more valued than labor. Italian farms depreciated from the conversion of tillage into pasture lands and parks, as in England in the present day. Slavery inordinately increased from the captives taken in war. Western Asia furnished the greatest number of this miserable population, and Cretan and Cilician slave-hunters were found on all the coasts of Syria and Greece. Delos was the great slave-market of the world, where the slave-dealers of Asia Minor disposed of their wares to Italian speculators. In one day as many as ten thousand slaves were [pg 490] disembarked and sold. Farms, and trades, and mines were alike carried on by these slaves from Asia, and their sufferings and hardships were vastly greater than ever endured by negroes on the South Carolinian and Cuban plantations. But they were of a different race—men who had seen better days, and accustomed to civilization—and hence they often rose upon their masters. Servile wars were of common occurrence, Sicily at one time had seventy thousand slaves in arms, and when consular armies were sent to suppress the revolt, the most outrageous cruelties were inflicted. Twenty thousand men, at one time, were crucified in Sicily by Publius Rupilius.
Tiberius Gracchus.
At this crisis, when disproportionate wealth and slavery were the great social evils, Tiberius Gracchus arose—a young man of high rank, chivalrous, noble, and eloquent. His mother, Cornelia, was the daughter of Scipio Africanus, and therefore belonged to the most exclusive of the aristocratic circles. Tiberius Gracchus was therefore the cousin of Scipio Æmilianus, under whom he served with distinction in Africa. He was seconded in his views of reform by some stern old patriots and aristocrats, who had not utterly forgotten the interests of the State, now being undermined. Appius Claudius, his father-in-law, who had been both consul and censor; Publius Mucius Scævola, the great lawyer and founder of scientific jurisprudence; his brother, Publius Crassus Mucianus; the Pontifex Maximus; Quintus Metellus, the conqueror of Macedonia—all men of the highest rank and universally respected, entered into his schemes of reform.
His reforms.