Page:The Ancient City- A Study on the Religion, Laws, and Institutions of Greece and Rome.djvu/352

 ^46 THE KEVOLUTIONS. BOOK IV. faith and by religion; and, besides, what temptation €ould tie client have to free liimself? He saw no horizon beyond this family, to which eveiything be- Jonged. In it alone he found life calm and subsistence assured ; in it alone, although he had a master, he bad also a protector; in it alone, in fine, he found an altar which he could approach, and gods whom he was permitted to invoke. To quit tins liimily was to place himself outside all social organization and all law ; it Avas to lose his gods and to renounce the right of prayer. But when the city had been founded, the clients of the different families could see each other, could confer together, could make an interchange of their desires and griefs, compare their masters, and obtain a glimpse of a better fate. Then their view began to extend be- yond the limits of the family. They saw that beyond their circle there existed society, rules, laws, altars, temples, and gods. To quit the family was no longer, therefore, for them, an evil without a remedy. The temptation' became every day stronger; clientship i5eemed to them a burden every day heavier, and they ceased to believe that the master's authority was legit- imate and sacred. Then s])rang up in the hearts of these men an ardent desire to be free. True, we do not iind in the history of any city mention made of a gen- eral insurrection among this class. If there were armed struggles, they were shut up and concealed within the circle of each family. For more than one generation there were on one side energetic efforts for independence, and implacable repression on the other. There took place in each house a long and dramatic series of events which it is impossible to-day to retrace. All that we can say is, that the efforts of the lower