3.
[18] Iliad, vi. 442. Lord Derby's translation.
[19] _To Atticus_, ii. 5.
CHAPTER XIII.
The consulship of Caesar was the last chance for the Roman aristocracy. He
was not a revolutionist. Revolutions are the last desperate remedy when
all else has failed. They may create as many evils as they cure, and wise
men always hate them. But if revolution was to be escaped, reform was
inevitable, and it was for the Senate to choose between the alternatives.
Could the noble lords have known then, in that their day, the things that
belonged to their peace--could they have forgotten their fish-ponds and
their game-preserves, and have remembered that, as the rulers of the
civilized world, they had duties which the eternal order of nature would
exact at their hands--the shaken constitution might again have regained
its stability, and the forms and even the reality of the Republic might
have continued for another century. It was not to be. Had the Senate been
capable of using the opportunity, they would long before have undertaken a
reformation for themselves. Even had their eyes been opened, there were
disintegrating forces at work which the highest political wisdom could do
no more than arrest; and little good is really effected by prolonging
artificially the lives of either constitutions or individuals beyond their
natural period.
Pages:
226
227
228
229
230
231
232
233
234
235
236
237
238
239
240
241
242
243
244
245
246
247
248
249
250