The Publilian law could not remain without consequences unfavourable to peace. The great grievance was the unlimited rule of the consuls. The consuls had come into the place of the kings, and though restricted as to time, in their power they were hardly beneath them, the consequences of which became apparent when there was an enlistment of troops. As the tribunes were now authorized to propose laws, it was first moved by C. Terentilius Harsa to appoint five men who were to draw up a law declaring the limits of the consular authority. This undertaking was very difficult to carry out. In reality, the supreme power can never be perfectly defined, and least of all in free republics: it ought to have a certain degree of pliancy, in order to admit of extraordinary expedients. The Roman republic acknowledges this principle in the formula, _videant Consules, ne quid detrimenti res publica capiat_, which in the earlier times was something quite ordinary; and in such conjunctures the limits of lawful use or of abuse could not be easily laid down. This is one of those points with regard to which we may fully understand, how with the greatest honesty on both sides, people may have spoken for and against. At the same time, if there existed a difference of opinion, it ought not to have been envenomed. The question may, however, from the very beginning have had a wider meaning: it was perhaps intended by it to divide the consulship equally between the two orders. During the first year, the commotions were still moderate; in the next they grew more violent, since another tribune, according to Dionysius’ account, again took up the _lex Terentilia_, but with this addition, that Decemvirs,--five from the _Patres_, and five from the plebeians,--were to make a general revision of the laws. The legislations of old did not only comprehend civil and criminal law and judicial procedure, but political law besides, and even transient measures also. Solon’s legislation, for instance, was a complete alteration of the constitution; but it likewise contained regulations concerning matters of quite momentary interest, as for the payment of debts. The idea so lately in vogue, that general legislations were to issue from a great assembly of men learned in the law, was quite foreign to the ancients, who were well aware, that a few only ought to discuss the laws, and the larger assembly merely to adopt or reject, inasmuch as it had to sanction them. This is the natural course of legislation, and for this reason the ancients for the most part held the principle, that lawgiving ought to be quite independent of magistracy. In all the republics of antiquity, one or a few were appointed to make the laws, and the people said yes or no. It was the same among the Romans: ten men were to be nominated _legibus scribundis_, to whom moreover consular power was to be granted. When we see from the remnants of the Roman laws, how lengthy a single statute