Page:The Ancient City- A Study on the Religion, Laws, and Institutions of Greece and Rome.djvu/349

 tjriAr. VI. THE CLIENTS BECOME FREE. 343 What we know with the greatest certainty concern, ing the client is, that lie could not leave one j^atron and choose another, and that he was bound, from father to son, to the same family. If we knew only this, it would be sufficient to convince us that his condition could not be a very desirable one. Let us add that the client was not a proprietor of the soil ; the land belonged to the patron, who, as chief of a domestic worship, and also as a member of a city, was the only one qualified to be a proprietor. If the client cultivated the soil, it was in the name and for the profit of the master. He was not even the owner of personal property, of his money, of his peculhcm. As a proof of this, the patron could take from him all these things to pay his own debts or his ransom. Thus nothing belonged to the client. True, the patron owed him and his children a living; but, in turn, his labor was due to the patron. We cannot say that he was precisely a slave; but he had a master, to whom he belonged, and to whose will he was in all things subject. During his whole life he was a client, and his sons after him were clients. There is some analogy between the client of ancient times and the serf of the middle ages. The principle which condemned them to obedience was not the same, it is true. For the serf, this principle was the right of property, which was exercised at the same time over the soil and over man ; for the client, this principle was the domestic religion, to which he was bound under the authority of the patron, who was its priest. •Otherwise the subordination of the client and ftf the serf was the same; the one was bound to his patron as the other was bound to his lord; the client could no more quit the gens than the serf could quit the glebe. The client, like the serf, remained subject to a master,