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 Chap, xliv] OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE 505 when the city was pressed and often famished by her Latin and Tuscan neighbours, the sale of children might be a frequent practice ; but, as a Roman could not legally purchase the liberty of his fellow-citizen, the market must gradually fail, and the trade would be destroyed by the conquests of the republic. An imperfect right of property was at length communicated to sons ; and the threefold distinction of profectitious, adventitious, and professional was ascertained by the jurisprudence of the Code and Pandects. 109 Of all that proceeded from the father, he imparted only the use, and reserved the absolute dominion; yet, if his goods were sold, the filial portion was excepted, by a favourable interpretation, from the demands of the creditors. In whatever accrued by marriage, gift, or collateral succession, the property was secured to the son ; but the father, unless he had been specially excluded, enjoyed the usufruct during his life. As a just and prudent reward of military virtue, the spoils of the enemy were acquired, possessed, and bequeathed by the soldier alone ; and the fair analogy was extended to the emoluments of any liberal profession, the salary of public service, and the sacred liberality of the emperor or the empress. The life of a citizen was less exposed than his fortune to the abuse of paternal power. Yet his life might be adverse to the interest or passions of an mrworthy father ; the same crimes that flowed from the corruption, were more sensibly felt by the humanity, of the Augustan age ; and the cruel Erixo, who whipt his son till he expired, was saved by the emperor from the just fury of the multitude. 110 The Eoman father, from the licence of servile dominion, was reduced to the gravity and moderation of a judge. The presence and opinion of Augustus confirmed the sentence of exile pronounced against an intentional parricide by the domestic tribunal of Arius. Hadrian transported to an island the jealous parent who, like a robber, had seized the opportunity of hunting, to assassinate a youth, the incestuous lover of his stepmother. 111 A private jurisprudence is repugnant to the 109 See the gradual enlargement and security of the filial peculium in the In- stitutes (1. ii. tit. ix.), the Pandects (1. xv. tit. i. 1. xli. tit. i.), and the Code (1. iv. tit. xxvi. xvii.). 110 The examples of Erixo and Arius are related^by Seneca (de Clementia, i. 14, 15), the former with horror, the latter with applause. 111 Quod latronis magis quam patris jure eum interfecit, nam patria potestas in pietate debet nonin atrocitate consistere (Marcian, Institut. 1. xiv. in Pandect. 1. xlviii. tit. ix. leg. 5).