Page:The Ancient City- A Study on the Religion, Laws, and Institutions of Greece and Rome.djvu/308

 302 THE EEVOLUTIONS. BOOK IV^ to first-born, there was never but one family chief, lib presided at the sacrifice, repeated the prayer, pro- nounced judgment, and governed. To him alone ori- ginally belonged the title of pater / for this word, which signified power, and not paternity, could be applied only to the chief of the family. His sons, his brothers,, his servants, all called him by this title. Here, then, in the inner constitution of the family is the first principle of inequality. The oldest is the priv- ileged one for the worship, for the succession, and for command. After several centuries, there were natu- rally formed, in each of these great families, younger branches, that were, according to religion and by cus- tom, inferior to the older branch, and who, living under its protection, submitted to its authority. This family, then, had servants, who did not leave it,, who were hereditarily attached to it, and upon whom the pater, or patron, exercised the triple authority of master, mngistrate, and priest. They were called by names that varied with the locality : the more common- names were Clients and Thetes. Here was another inferior class. The client was infe- rior not only to the supreme chief of the family, but ta the younger branches also. Between him and them there was this difierence, that a member of a younger branch, by ascending the series of his ancestors, always arrived at a pater, that is to say, a family chief, one of those divine ancestors, whom the family invoked in its prayers. As he was descended from a pater, they called him in Latin patricius. The son of a client, on the con- trary, however high he might ascend in his genealogy,, never arrived at anything but a client or a slave. There was no pater among his ancestors. Hence came for him a state of inferiority from which there was no escape