Page:The City-State of the Greeks and Romans.djvu/290

266 acquiesced in this state of things, and let the dangerous process go on unheeded. When at last the counter-claim is made by Tiberius Gracchus, — the claim of the many for equality in wealth, — stasis at once sprang up. The oligarchy found their material interests assailed, and naturally used their constitutional advantages to defend them; Gracchus, in attacking their possessions, found it necessary also to attack their political fortress. He tried to put the oligarchical Senate aside, and to call to life again the dormant sovereignty of the people: and if he had stopped there, no serious harm need have been done. But he was tempted to break other sacred traditions of a revered constitution, and in his hurry and enthusiasm he put himself in the position of a tyrant; and he paid for his rashness with his life. "Ubi semel recto deerratum est, in præceps pervenitur."

So far we seem to see no more than the phenomena which Aristotle described. But trace the revolution a little further, and we find ourselves getting beyond the limits of the City-State, and of the political reasoning of its philosophers. The interests involved are not merely those of Rome and her citizens — the whole population of Italy has a claim to make; a claim to share in the advantages of Roman citizenship, analogous to that of the plebeians in days gone by, but infinitely more far-reaching in its importance to Rome and to the world. The dependencies which Rome has subdued have also their claim; not yet a claim for citizenship, but a claim to be governed equitably, to