SENATE. 



fefled very confiJerable prerogatives ; but in its legidative 

 eapacity, in which it was fuppofed virtually to reprefent the 

 people, the ritjhts of fovereignty were acknowledged to 

 refide in that afrembly. Every power was derived from tiieir 

 authoritv ; every law was ratified by their fanftion. Their 

 regular meetings were held, as we have ah-eady faid, on three 

 ftated days in^every month ; their debates were condufted 

 with decent freedom ; and the emperors themfelves, who 

 gloried in the name of fenators, fat, voted, and divided with 

 tlieir eqnals. 



Augullus found by experience, what he had previoully 

 expended, that the fenate and people would fubmit to flavery, 

 provided they were refpeafiilly affured, that they iliU enjoyed 

 their ancient freedom; a feeble fenate and an enervated 

 people cheerfully acquiefced in the pleafing illufion, as long 

 as it was fupported by the virtue, or even by the prudence 

 of tlie fuccedbrs of Augullus. It was a motive of felf- 

 prcfervation, not a principle of liberty, that animated the 

 confpirators agaiuit Caligula, Nero, and Domitian. After 

 feventy years of patience, the fenate made an ineffectual at- 

 tempt to reallume its long-forgotten rights. When the 

 throne was vacated by the murder of Caligula, the confuls 

 convoked the aiiembly in the Capitol, and daring forty-eight 

 hours afted as the independent chiefs of the commonwealth. 

 But while they deliberated, the prxtorian guards had re- 

 folved : the dream of liberty was at an end ; and the (enate 

 awoke to all the horrors of inevitable fervitude. Dcfertedby 

 the people, and threatened by a military force, that feeble 

 ailembly was compelled to ratify the choice of the pr^- 

 torians, and to embrace the benefit of an amnefly, which 

 Claudius had the prudence to offer, and the generulity to 

 obferve. To cenfure, to depofe, er to punilh with death tlie 

 firlt magillrate of the republic, who had abufed his delegated 

 trull, was the eminent and undoubted prerogative of the 

 Roman fenate ; accordingly they condemned Nero to be put 

 to death, as Suetonius oblerves, more ma'jorum ; but on the 

 death of Commodus, that feeble aliembly was obliged to 

 content itfelf with inflifting on a fallen tyrant that public 

 juftice from which, during his life and reign, he had been 

 fhielded by the ftrong arm of military defpotifm. Till the 

 reign of Severus, the virtue and even the good lenfe of the 

 emperors, had been diltinguilhed by their real or affefted 

 reverence for the fenate, and by a tender regard to the nice 

 frame of civil policy inftitutej by Augullus. But Severus, 

 trained from his youth to the delpntifm of military command, 

 difdained to profefs liinifelf the fervant of an affembly that 

 dctelled his perfon, and trembled at his power ; he alfumed 

 the conduct and tlyle of a fovereign and a conqueror, and 

 exercifed, without difguife, the whole legiflative as well as 

 executive power. Hence the fenate, neither elefted by the 

 people, nor guarded by military force, nor animated by pub- 

 lic fpirit, relied its declining authority on the frail and crum- 

 bling bafis of ancient opinion. The fine theory of a republic 

 infenfibly vanilhed, and made way for the more natural and 

 fubllantial feelings of monarchy. The polifhed and eloquent 

 Haves from the eaftern provinces, by wliom the fenate was 

 filled, jullified pcrfonal flattery by fpeculative principles of 

 fervitude. The lawyers and the hiftorians concurred in teach- 

 ing, that the imperial authority was held, not by the dele- 

 gated commifTion, but by the irrevocable refignation of the 

 fenate ; that the emperor was freed from therellraint of civil 

 laws, could command by his arbitrary will the lives and for- 

 tunes of his fubjefts, and might difpofe of the empire as of 

 his private patrimony. Poilerity, who experienced the fatal 

 eflefts of the maxims and example of Severus, jullly coii- 

 fidered him as the principal author of the decline of the Ro- 

 man empire. Such was the timid ingratitude of Gallienus, 



that, unmindful of his obligations to the fenate aud people for 

 repulfing the Alemanni from Rome, he publilhed an edid, 

 prohibiting the fenators from cxercifing any mihtary em- 

 ploy ; and even from approaching the camps of the legions. 

 Tacitus was chofen emperor by the fenate, and the judg- 

 ment of this aflembly was confirmed by the confent <.f the 

 Roman people, and of the praetorian guards. By this elec- 

 tion the fenate regained feveral important prerogatives, the 

 principal of whicli were the following : I. To invelt one of 

 their bodv, under the title of emperor, with the general com- 

 mand of the armies and the government of the frontier pro- 

 vinces. 2. To determine the lill, or as it was then ftyled, 

 the college of confuts. 3. To appoint the proconfuls and 

 prefidents of the provinces, and to confer on all the magif- 

 trates their civil jurifdidion. 4. To receive appeals through 

 the immediate office of the prefeft of the city from all the 

 tribunals of the emperor. 5. To give force and validity by 

 their decrees to Inch as they Ihould approve of the emperor's 

 edifts. 6. To thofe feveral branches of authority, we may 

 add fome infpeSion of the finances, fince even in the Hern 

 reign of Aurclian, it was in their power to divert a part of 

 the revenue from the public fervice. Diocletian expreffed 

 his diflike of Rome and Roman freedom, by framiii>; a nev7 

 fyilem of imperial government, which was nfterwardi com- 

 pleted by the family of Conllantine; and as the image of 

 the old conftitution was religioufly preferved in the fenate, 

 he refolved to deprive that order of its fmall remains of power 

 and confideration. The name of the fenate was mentior.ei 

 with honour till the lall period of the empire ; the vanity of 

 its members was Hill flattered with honorary dilliiiAlons ; 

 and the aflembly which had been fo long the fource, and fo 

 long the inflrument of power, was refpeflfuUy fuffered to 

 fall into oblivion. The fenate of Rome lofmg all connec- 

 tion with the imperial court and the actual conllitution, was 

 left a venerable but ufelefs monument of antiquity on the 

 Capitoline hill. During the Goth'c war, and in conleqiiencc 

 of the conquell of Rome by Naries, the inftitution of Ro- 

 mulus, after a period of thirteen centuries, expired ; and if 

 the nobles of Rome ilill affumed the title of fenators, few 

 fubfequcnt traces can be difcovered of a public council, or 

 conllitutional order. Afcend fix hundred years, and contem- 

 plate the kings of the earth foliciting an audience, as the 

 fiaves or freedmen of the Roman fenate. From the year 

 1 144 the fenate was reftored, and its eftablifliment is dated as 

 a glorious era in the acls of the city. After its revival, the 

 confcript fathers, if the expreffion may be ufed, were inverted 

 with the legiflative and executive power ; but their views 

 feldom reached beyond the prefent day, and that day was 

 molt frequently dillurbed by violence and tumult. In its 

 utmoll plenitude, the order or aflembly confilU-d of fifty-fix 

 fenators, the moll eminent of whom were diltinguifhed by 

 the title of counfellors : they were nominated, perhaps an- 

 nually, by the people ; and a previous choice of their eledors, 

 ten perfons in each region or parifli, might afford a bafis for 

 a free and permanent conllicutioii. The popes confirmed by 

 treaty the ellablifliment and privileges of the fenate, and 

 expefted from time, peace, and religion, the reftoration of 

 their government. The motives of public and private in- 

 tereft; might fometimes draw from the Romans an occafional ■ 

 and temporary facrifice of their claim? ; and they renewed | 

 their oaths of allegiance to the fiicceffors of St. Peter and 

 Conftantine, the lawful head of the church and republic. At 

 length the union and vigour of a public council were dif- 

 folved in a lawlefs city ; and the Roman fee adopted a more 

 ftrong and fimple mode of adminiltration. They condenfed 

 the name and authority of the fenate in a fingle magillrate, 

 or two colleagues ; and as they were changed at the end of 1 



a year. 



