Greek subjects wherever it still existed. Civic life and civic government are terms which perfectly well express the nature of the Roman polity even after all these conquests. The government which conquered Spain and Africa, Syria and Gaul, was essentially the same in form as that which had ruled Rome when she had yet to conquer Italy. The magistrates continued to convene the Senate in Roman temples, to transact there the business of the world; in the ancient Forum of Romulus the "Roman people" still passed laws and ratified treaties. Even after Rome had become the world's emporium, and the resort of men of business and learning from every quarter of the Empire, her social life was still, as it was for Cicero,[1] that of a City-State, and it was as a City-State that she still ruled the world. And wherever she found the City-State in existence among the cities she conquered, she retained it, if only as a matter of policy, at least in its outward form and features.
We may best realise the truth of all this, and the nature of the change which finally came over the world, if we turn our attention for a moment to the way in which the Roman oligarchy of the Republic dealt with the conquered peoples. To meet the needs of government as they successively arose, the Roman Senate invented no new system;
- ↑ Cicero stands in this respect to Rome as Demosthenes to Athens; he was the last-born legitimate son of the Roman City-State. Perhaps this may be best seen illustrated in the second and third books of his treatise, "De Legibus"; but it is obvious throughout his writings, and is the real clue to the right appreciation of his political career.
