; and if
de facto
, the plural
powers
would apply to the Parliament far better than to the King, and to Cromwell as well as to Nero. Every even decently good Emperor professed himself the servant of the Roman Senate. The very term
Imperator
, as Gravina observes, implies it; for it expresses a delegated and instrumental power. Before the assumption of the Tribunitial character by Augustus, by which he became the representative of the majority of the people, —
majestatem indutus est, — Senatus consulit, Populus jubet, imperent Consules
, was the constitutional language.
Ib.