Page:The Ancient City- A Study on the Religion, Laws, and Institutions of Greece and Rome.djvu/289

 CHAP. XVI. THE EOMAN. 283 He knows of formulas for avoiding sickness, and of others for caring it; but he must repeat them twenty- seven times, and spit in a certain fashion at each Tepetition.' He does not deliberate in the senate if the victims have not given favorable signs. He leaves the as- sembly of the people if he hears the cry of a mouse. He renounces the best laid plans if he perceives a bad presage, or if an ill-omened word has struck his ear. He is brave in battle, but on condition that the aus- piiies assure him the victory. This Koman whom we present liere is not the man of the people, the feeble-minded man whom misery and ignorance have made superstitious. We are speak- ing of the patrician, the noble, powerful, and rich man. This patrician is, by turns, warrior, magistrate, consul, farmer, merchant; but everywhere and always he is & priest, and his thoughts are fixed upon the gods. Patriotism, love of glory, and love of gold, whatever power these may have over his soul, the fear of the gods still governs everything. Horace has written the most striking truth concerning the Romans : — " Dis te minorem quod geris, imperas." Men have sometimes called this a political religion ; but can we suppose that a senate of three hundred mem- bers, a body of three thousand patricians, should have agreed so unanimously to deceive an ignorant people? and that, for ages, during so many rivalries, struggles, and personal hatreds, not a single voice was raised to say, This is a falsehood ? If a patrician had betrayed ' Cato, De Re Rust, 160. Varro, De Re Rust., I. 2; I. 37. Pliny, N. U., VIII. 82; XVII. 28; XXVII. 12; XXVIII. 2. Juvenal, X. 55. Aulus Gellius, IV. 6.