78 HISTORY OF GREECE, ROME, AND ASIA 



administration. In all this there is evidently some exaggeration, and 

 a new verification of the problem imposes itself. The grandeur and 

 the diffusion of temples, basilicas, baths, theatres, and aqueducts in 

 all the colonies and municipalities of the vast Empire is not sufficient 

 to prove that the general happiness and welfare were greater there 

 than in the capital, which under the different bad or good emperors 

 continued constantly to enrich itself with new edifices. Thus from 

 the wealth and elegance of the Roman churches of the sixteenth to 

 the eighteenth centuries nobody certainly would dare draw proofs in 

 favor of the moral power of the Papacy during that age, and of the 

 general happiness and dignity of the citizens of that state. And just 

 as it is proved by monuments, inscriptions, edifices, and institutions, 

 that the life of the capital was reproduced in a smaller way in the 

 provinces, so it is quite natural to think that also the moral and civil 

 condition should have been reflected there. 



The plebs in the capital lived on alms, at the expense of the pro- 

 vinces, and there a municipal nobility composed of a small number 

 of families uses to its advantage the resources of the community. 

 This municipal nobility will enrich the city with monuments because 

 it will find for itself a way of consuming at its leisure the municipal 

 income. In Rome, as in the provinces, they endeavor to repair the 

 loss of the free citizenship by alimentary institutions; but there can 

 never be found a spirit of charity for the poor and the oppressed; 

 something is lacking to recall even the hospitals which were attached 

 to the cult of Greek ^Esculapius. The sportulae handed to the numer- 

 ous and hungry clients under the show of power, by the disdainful and 

 wealthy pair onus, makes one naturally think of the alms which till the 

 latter part of the past century were justifying before the plebs the 

 riches and idleness of the friars in the Italian convents. And when 

 one thinks that Vespasian, certainly one of the best Roman emperors, 

 found nothing better than to redouble the taxes on the provinces, and 

 imprudently to sell absolutions, either for the culprit, or for the inno- 

 cent, in order to restore the finances of the state; and that he chose 

 as administrators of the provinces magistrates from whom he would 

 draw, as from sponges, the ill-acquired riches, one may well ask what 

 was the nature of this general welfare. At any rate Hirschf eld's 

 researches have put in evidence how little was done during the first 

 three centuries of the Empire to secure life and property in Italy and 

 in the provinces. Tacitus has made us hear the voice of protest of the 

 Roman families only. During the Csesarean despotism all free speech 

 was silenced; but if the voice of the provincials had reached us, 

 we could know how many base deeds and adulations determined 

 the raising of statues to the good Roman governors. We have not 

 as many honorary inscriptions for good emperors as for. the wicked 

 Caracalla. 



