Cicero's Tusculan Disputations
wonderful aptitude for acquiring, and at the same time communicating,
information; and his life was in perfect correspondence and unison with
his language. He used to say that the government of Rome was superior
to that of other states for this reason, because in nearly all of them
there had been single individuals, each of whom had regulated their
commonwealth according to their own laws and their own ordinances. So
Minos had done in Crete, and Lycurgus in Sparta; and in Athens, which
experienced so many revolutions, first Theseus, then Draco, then Solon,
then Clisthenes, afterward many others; and, lastly, when it was almost
lifeless and quite prostrate, that great and wise man, Demetrius
Phalereus, supported it. But our Roman constitution, on the contrary,
did not spring from the genius of one individual, but from that of
many; and it was established, not in the lifetime of one man, but in
the course of several ages and centuries. For, added he, there never
yet existed any genius so vast and comprehensive as to allow nothing at
any time to escape its attention; and all the geniuses in the world
united in a single mind could never, within the limits of a single
life, exert a foresight sufficiently extensive to embrace and harmonize
all, without the aid of experience and practice.
Thus, according to Cato's usual habit, I now ascend in my discourse to
the "origin of the people," for I like to adopt the expression of Cato.
I shall also more easily execute my proposed task if I thus exhibit to
you our political constitution in its infancy, progress, and maturity,
now so firm and fully established, than if, after the example of
Socrates in the books of Plato, I were to delineate a mere imaginary
republic.
II. When all had signified their approbation, Scipio resumed: What
commencement of a political constitution can we conceive more
brilliant, or more universally known, than the foundation of Rome by
the hand of Romulus? And he was the son of Mars: for we may grant this
much to the common report existing among men, especially as it is not
merely ancient, but one also which has been wisely maintained by our
ancestors, in order that those who have done great service to
communities may enjoy the reputation of having received from the Gods,
not only their genius, but their very birth.
It is related, then, that soon after the birth of Romulus and his
brother Remus, Amulius, King of Alba, fearing that they might one day
undermine his authority, ordered that they should be exposed on the
banks of the Tiber; and that in this situation the infant Romulus was
suckled by a wild beast; that he was afterward educated by the
shepherds, and brought up in the rough way of living and labors of the
countrymen; and that he acquired, when he grew up, such superiority
over the rest by the vigor of his body and the courage of his soul,
that all the people who at that time inhabited the plains in the midst
of which Rome now stands, tranquilly and willingly submitted to his
government. And when he had made himself the chief of those bands, to
come from fables to facts, he took Alba Longa, a powerful and strong
city at that time, and slew its king, Amulius.
III. Having acquired this glory, he conceived the design (as they tell
us) of founding a new city and establishing a new state. As respected
the site of his new city, a point which requires the greatest foresight
in him who would lay the foundation of a durable commonwealth, he chose
the most convenient possible position. For he did not advance too near
the sea, which he might easily have done with the forces under his
command, either by entering the territory of the Rutuli and Aborigines,
or by founding his citadel at the mouth of the Tiber, where many years
after Ancus Martius established a colony. But Romulus, with admirable
genius and foresight, observed and perceived that sites very near the
sea are not the most favorable positions for cities which would attain
a durable prosperity and dominion. And this, first, because maritime
cities are always exposed, not only to many attacks, but to perils they
cannot provide against. For the continued land gives notice, by many
indications, not only of any regular approaches, but also of any sudden
surprises of an enemy, and announces them beforehand by the mere sound.
There is no adversary who, on an inland territory, can arrive so
swiftly as to prevent our knowing not only his existence, but his
character too, and where he comes from. But a maritime and naval enemy
can fall upon a town on the sea-coast before any one suspects that he
is about to come; and when he does come, nothing exterior indicates who
he is, or whence he comes, or what he wishes; nor can it even be
determined and distinguished on all occasions whether he is a friend or
a foe.
IV. But maritime cities are likewise naturally exposed to corrupt
influences, and revolutions of manners. Their civilization is more or
less adulterated by new languages and customs, and they import not only
foreign merchandise, but foreign fashions, to such a degree that
nothing can continue unalloyed in the national institutions. Those who
inhabit these maritime towns do not remain in their native place, but
are urged afar from their homes by winged hope and speculation. And
even when they do not desert their country in person, still their minds
are always expatiating and voyaging round the world.
Nor, indeed, was there any cause which more deeply undermined Corinth
and Carthage, and at last overthrew them both, than this wandering and
dispersion of their citizens, whom the passion of commerce and
navigation had induced to abandon the cultivation of their lands and
their attention to military pursuits.
The proximity of the sea likewise administers to maritime cities a
multitude of pernicious incentives to luxury, which are either acquired
by victory or imported by commerce; and the very agreeableness of their
position nourishes many expensive and deceitful gratifications of the
passions. And what I have spoken of Corinth may be applied, for aught I
know, without incorrectness to the whole of Greece. For the
Peloponnesus itself is almost wholly on the sea-coast; nor, besides the
Phliasians, are there any whose lands do not touch the sea; and beyond
the Peloponnesus, the AEnianes, the Dorians, and the Dolopes are the
only inland people. Why should I speak of the Grecian islands, which,
girded by the waves, seem all afloat, as it were, together with the
institutions and manners of their cities? And these things, I have
before noticed, do not respect ancient Greece only; for which of all
those colonies which have been led from Greece into Asia, Thracia,
Italy, Sicily, and Africa, with the single exception of Magnesia, is
there that is not washed by the sea? Thus it seems as if a sort of
Grecian coast had been annexed to territories of the barbarians. For
among the barbarians themselves none were heretofore a maritime people,
if we except the Carthaginians and Etruscans; one for the sake of
commerce, the other of pillage. And this is one evident reason of the
calamities and revolutions of Greece, because she became infected with
the vices which belong to maritime cities, which I just now briefly
enumerated. But yet, notwithstanding these vices, they have one great
advantage, and one which is of universal application, namely, that
there is a great facility for new inhabitants flocking to them. And,
again, that the inhabitants are enabled to export and send abroad the
produce of their native lands to any nation they please, which offers
them a market for their goods.
V. By what divine wisdom, then, could Romulus embrace all the benefits
that could belong to maritime cities, and at the same time avoid the
dangers to which they are exposed, except, as he did, by building his
city on the bank of an inexhaustible river, whose equal current
discharges itself into the sea by a vast mouth, so that the city could
receive all it wanted from the sea, and discharge its superabundant
commodities by the same channel? And in the same river a communication
is found by which it not only receives from the sea all the productions
necessary to the conveniences and elegances of life, but those also
which are brought from the inland districts. So that Romulus seems to
me to have divined and anticipated that this city would one day become
the centre and abode of a powerful and opulent empire; for there is no
other part of Italy in which a city could be situated so as to be able
to maintain so wide a dominion with so much ease.
VI. As to the natural fortifications of Rome, who is so negligent and
unobservant as not to have them depicted and deeply stamped on his
memory? Such is the plan and direction of the walls, which, by the
prudence of Romulus and his royal successors, are bounded on all sides
by steep and rugged hills; and the only aperture between the Esquiline
and Quirinal mountains is enclosed by a formidable rampart, and
surrounded by an immense fosse. And as for our fortified citadel, it is
so secured by a precipitous barrier and enclosure of rocks, that, even
in that horrible attack and invasion of the Gauls, it remained
impregnable and inviolable. Moreover, the site which he selected had
also an abundance of fountains, and was healthy, though it was in the
midst of a pestilential region; for there are hills which at once
create a current of fresh air, and fling an agreeable shade over the
valleys.
VII. These things he effected with wonderful rapidity, and thus
established the city, which, from his own name Romulus, he determined
to call Rome. And in order to strengthen his new city, he conceived a
design, singular enough, and even a little rude, yet worthy of a great
man, and of a genius which discerned far away in futurity the means of
strengthening his power and his people. The young Sabine females of
honorable birth who had come to Rome, attracted by the public games and
spectacles which Romulus then, for the first time, established as
annual games in the circus, were suddenly carried off at the feast of
Consus[313] by his orders, and were given in marriage to the men of the
noblest families in Rome. And when, on this account, the Sabines had
declared war against Rome, the issue of the battle being doubtful and
undecided, Romulus made an alliance with Tatius, King of the Sabines,
at the intercession of the matrons themselves who had been carried off.
By this compact he admitted the Sabines into the city, gave them a
participation in the religious ceremonies, and divided his power with
their king.
VIII. But after the death of Tatius, the entire government was again
vested in the hands of Romulus, although, besides making Tatius his own
partner, he had also elected some of the chiefs of the Sabines into the
royal council, who on account of their affectionate regard for the
people were called _patres_, or fathers. He also divided the people
into three tribes, called after the name of Tatius, and his own name,
and that of Locumo, who had fallen as his ally in the Sabine war; and
also into thirty curiae, designated by the names of those Sabine
virgins, who, after being carried off at the festivals, generously
offered themselves as the mediators of peace and coalition.
But though these orders were established in the life of Tatius, yet,
after his death, Romulus reigned with still greater power by the
counsel and authority of the senate.
IX. In this respect he approved and adopted the principle which
Lycurgus but little before had applied to the government of Lacedaemon;
namely, that the monarchical authority and the royal power operate best
in the government of states when to this supreme authority is joined
the influence of the noblest of the citizens.