26
PRINCIPLES OF
Chap. II.
the occasion, or emergency." If this had been the author's meaning, he would probably have used either the words ad occasionem, or pro re nata. But even allowing the phrase to be susceptible of this meaning[1], it is not the meaning which Tacitus chose to give it in this passage. That the author meant that the Dictator was created for a limited time, is, I think, evident from the sentence immediately following, which is connected by the copulative neque with the preceding: Dictaturæ ad tempus sumebantur: neque Decemviralis potestas ultra biennium valuit: "The
- ↑ Mr Gordon, who had great critical knowledge of the Latin language, has translated the words ad tempus "in pressing emergencies." This sense is, therefore, probably warranted by good authorities. But it is evidently not the sense of the author in this passage, as the context indicates, to which Mr Gordon has not sufficiently attended.
"office
