76
STATE OF AFFAIBS AT ROME.
sluices, though not unknown to the Romans, were not con-
structed by them.2 The fact of Caesar forming such enormous
plans is not very surprising; but we can scarcely comprehend
how it was possible for him to accomplish so much of what
he undertook in the short time of five months preceding his
death. Following the unfortunate system of Sulla, Caesar
founded throughout Italy a number of colonies of veterans.
The old Sullanian colonists were treated with great severity,
and many of them and their children were expelled from their
lands, and were thus punished for the cruelty which they or
their fathers had committed against the inhabitants of the
municipia. In like manner, colonies were established in south-
ern Gaul, Italy, Africa, and other parts; I may mention in
particular the colonies founded at Carthage and Corinth. The
latter, however, was a colonia Vibertinorvrn, and never rose to
any importance. We do not know the details of its founda-
tion, but one would imagine that Caesar would have preferred
restoring the place as a purely Greek town. This, however,
he did not do. Its population was and remained a mixed one,
and Corinth never rose to a state of real prosperity.
Caesar made various new arrangements in the state, and,
among others, he restored the full franchise, or theʃws honorum,
to the sons of those who had been proscribed in the time of
Sulla. He had obtained for himself the title of imperator and
the dictatorship for life, and the consulship for ten years.
Half of the offices of the republic, to which persons had before
been elected by the centuries, were in his gift; and for the
other half he usually recommended candidates, so that the
elections were merely nominal. The tribes seem to have
retained their rights of election uncurtailed, and the last
tribunes must have been elected by the people. But although
Caesar did not himself confer the consulship, yet the whole
republic was reduced to a mere form and appearance. Caesar
made various new laws and regulations ; for example, to lighten
the burdens of debtors, and the like ; but the changes he in-
troduced in the form of the constitution were of little import-
ance. He increased the number of praetors, which Sulla had
raised to eight, successively to ten, twelve, fourteen, and six-
teen, and the number of quaestors was increased to forty.3
2 The first canals with sluices were executed by the Dutch in the fifteenth
century.—N. 3 Dion Cassius, xliιi. 47, fol.
REGULATIONS OF CAESAR.
77
Hence the number of persons from whom the senate was to be
filled up became greater than that of the vacancies, and Caesar
accordi. gly increased the number of senators, though it is
uncertain what number he fixed upon4, and raised a great
many of his friends to the dignity of senators. In this, as in
many other cases, he acted very arbitrarily ; for he elected into
the senate whomsoever he pleased, and conferred the franchise
in a manner equally arbitrary. These things did not fail to
create much discontent. It is a remarkable fact that, notwith-
standing his mode of filling up the senate, not even the majority
of senators were attached to his cause after his death.
If we consider the changes and regulations which Caesar
introduced, it must strike us as a singular circumstance that,
among all his measures, there is no trace of any indicating
that he thought of modifying the constitution, for the purpose
of putting an end to the anarchy, for all his changes are in
reality not essential or of great importance. Sulla felt the
necessity of remodelling the constitution, but he did not attain
his end; and the manner, too, in which he set about it, was
that of a short-sighted man; but he was, at least, intelligent
enough to sec that the constitution, as it then was, could not
continue to exist. In the regulations of Caesar we see no trace
of such a conviction; and I think that he despaired of the
possibility of effecting any real good by constitutional reforms.
Hence, among all his laws, there is not one that had any re-
lation to the constitution. The fact of his increasing the
number of patrician familiess had no reference to the constitu-
tion; so far, in fact, were the patricians from having any
advantages over the plebeians, that the office of the two aediles
Cereales, which Caesar instituted, was confined to the plebeians6,
—a regulation which was opposed to the very nature of the
patriciate. His raising persons to the rank of patricians was
neither more nor less than the modern practice of raising a
family to the rank of nobility; he picked out an individual,
and gave him the rank of patrician for himself and his descend-
ants, but did not elevate a whole gens. The distinction itself
4 When Dion Cassius, I. c., says, Sστe καi ivvaκoσlm>s τδ κεφiKau>v aυτωv
yeveιrθaι, he probably does not mean that this was a fixed number, but only
indicates that it was the highest number to which the senate was then acci-
dentally raised.—N.
s Tacitus, Annal xi. 25; Sueton. Caes. 41; Dion Cassius, xlιii. 47, xlv. 2.
6 Dion Cassiu. , xlιu. 51.