169 



-^that laws once established were not so easily and whimsi- 

 cally modified, repealed, and re-enacted as they are now, — 

 that such innovations as were necessary, and even new laws, 

 particularly in the criminal and civil jurisdiction, were intro- 

 duced, not by formal acts of a legislator, but by the quiet, 

 gradual changes brought about by executive officers and 

 judges, with the consent of public opinion, — ^if we further 

 consider that even in the formal decisions of large popular 

 assemblies, which have only to say " Tes" or " No" not only all 

 the detail of any proposed law must be left to the decision of 

 a pre- debating body, such as the Roman Senate, but that the 

 influence of aristocracy can seldom fail to ensure the success 

 of the measures they have at heart : if we consider all this, we 

 shall come to the conclilsion, that the Roman Senate enjoyed, 

 at least in the earlier period of the republic, even more real 

 power in the state than the British Houses of Parliament. In 

 the Senate we have to look for the causes that made Rome 

 great, and in the Senate we find the first cause of decay and 

 ruin» 



Nothing could be so ill devised for ensuring a uniform, 

 systematic, and consistent, as well as energetic government, as 

 the mode in which the highest executive powers at Rome 

 were split up and distributed to a number of ever changing 

 magistrates. According to our notion of an administration, it 

 is necessary that aQ the members who compose it should be 

 bound together by the same political creed, that they should 

 mutually support each other, carry out, each in his depart- 

 ment, the principle to which they are all pledged. We re- 

 quire in fact a regular organization in the members of a min- 

 istry, an acknowledged head, and on the part of all members 

 the readiest co-operation or subordination. Without this, 

 we cannot imagine a government to be strong and capable of 

 conducting the affairs of the nation with energy and success. 

 But what was the case at Rome ? Two consuls of equal rank, 

 enjoying the constitutional power of preventing each other 



