Nor were any relaxations made in these laws during the most flourishing periods of the empire. On the contrary, as was the case during many previous centuries, noblemen, persons filling exalted offices, and great capitalists, were forbidden the exercise of any trade whatever, lest they should by such means become suddenly rich, and thus draw down upon them the envy of the people. [Sidenote: Cicero’s opinion of merchants.] The emperors Honorius and Theodosius, in consolidating these laws, state that “as trade might be carried on with greater ease among men of base extraction, the respect due to persons of quality renders it necessary to deprive them of the full liberty of trading.” And Cicero observes, that “Trade is mean if it has only a small profit for its object: but it is otherwise if it has large dealings, bringing many sorts of merchandise from foreign parts, and distributing them to the public without deceit; and if, after a reasonable profit, such merchants are contented with the riches they have acquired, and purchasing land with them retire into the country and apply themselves to agriculture, I cannot,” says the great orator, in quite a vein of aristocratical condescension, “perceive wherein is the dishonour of that function.”[297] [Sidenote: Contempt for mariners.] From the whole tenor of this legislation it is easy to understand why persons engaged in seafaring pursuits were so long despised; and that the strongest measures were necessary to secure for them even ordinary justice. Naturally, however, when, on the destruction of Corinth and Carthage, a more extended trade arose, the prejudice against mariners somewhat abated, though among the nobility and great landowners of Rome, a lasting aversion prevailed against seafaring men. In the time of Cicero, the advantages of foreign commerce were only beginning to be felt at Rome, for previously her traders had been simply retailers of corn and provisions. But when the empire of the seas fell indisputably into the hands of the Romans, there arose merchants and large owners of sea-going ships, who in their operations with distant countries realised colossal fortunes, and were thus deemed by Cicero and his class worthy of being distinguished from the mere retailers; and thus, too, in Rome, as has befallen elsewhere, wealth at length supplied the place of birth and genius, Roman merchants entering at last into friendly relations with even its proudest landowners and citizens, and Rome itself becoming the depôt for numberless articles produced abroad. “The most remote countries of the ancient world,” remarks Gibbon, “were ransacked, to supply the pomp and delicacy of Rome. The forests of Scythia afforded some valuable furs. Amber was brought overland from the shores of the Baltic to the Danube, and the barbarians were astonished at the price which they received in exchange for so useless a commodity. There was a considerable demand for Babylonian