Page:The City-State of the Greeks and Romans.djvu/235

VII are characterised by a peculiarly rigid formality, — that is, that the rigid formality of pre-existing Roman practice is to characterise also the written law. As in politics the Romans thought clearly and logically, and expressed their thoughts in pregnant technical terms, so also in the region of law.

The Tables were regarded for centuries with profound veneration, and throughout Roman history continued to form the nucleus of the jus civile (law of the City-State), which was expanded to meet further needs almost entirely by interpreting and adjusting them. This veneration for prescribed rules and forms is perhaps the most striking feature in the Roman character; it passed from their practice in religious ritual into their practice in legal procedure, and gave their conception of law a distinctness and certainty never realised by any other people. The conservative instinct inherent in human nature, the spirit that shrinks from losing one jot of what laborious forefathers have stored up with infinite pains — this spirit was far stronger in the Roman than the Greek, and it is one great secret of the extraordinary solidity of the legal structure which he raised. It was in this way that the Romans realised "the good life"; not, like the Greek, by rising from the to new vigour of intellect in poetry and art, but in perceiving with a vision so direct how justice could best be secured between citizen and citizen, and in holding to the formulated result with a veneration so deep and so lasting. They never entirely ignored anything that they had once discovered and prized.