I remarked before, that when the highest dignities and employments in the republick were laid open to the Plebeians, and the decrees of the people had the same force, and affected the Patricians in the same manner as those which were issued by the senate, the democratick power was raised to an equality with the aristocratick. But as a third power, or estate (as we term it) was wanting, capable of preserving the requisite æquilibrium between the other two, it was impossible from the very nature of the republican constitution, that the equality between the two powers could be long supported. The concessions made by Hortensius quieted indeed the civil dissensions; and it is remarkable too, that after peace was restored to the republick, the progress of the Roman conquests was so amazingly rapid, that in little more than two hundred years from that period they had subjugated the most opulent empires in the universe. But the same conquests, which raised the republick to the summit of her grandeur, threw too much weight into the democratick scale, and, by totally corrupting the Roman manners, brought on the final ruin of their liberty and constitution. For as every conquered province created successively a new government, these new dignities immediately became new objects of avarice and ambition. But as the command of the armies, the government of provinces, and the highest posts in the state, were disposed of by the suffrages of the people; the candidates for those lucrative employments left no means unattempted to secure a majority. Hence, as the poor Plebeians were extremely numerous, the man who was able to distribute the greatest largesses, or divert the mob with the finest shows, was generally the most successful. When the interest of the candidates was nearly equal, force was frequently made use of to decide the contest; and it was not uncommon to see the forum[262] covered with the slaughtered bodies of the electors. The generals who were elected fleeced the provinces to enable themselves to keep up their interest at home with the people, and connived at the rapines of their soldiers to secure their affections. Hence at Rome liberty degenerated into the most outrageous licentiousness, whilst the soldiers gradually wore off that parental love for their country, which was once the characteristick of the Romans, and attached themselves wholly to the fortunes of their generals. Hence the most succesful leaders began to look upon themselves no longer as servants, but as masters of the republick, and each endeavoured to support his pretensions by force of arms. The faction of Sylla and Marius filled the city alternately with slaughter and rapine, as the fortune of their respective leaders prevailed in the course of that destructive contest. And Rome frequently felt the calamitous effects of war in her own bowels, at a time when her victorious arms abroad were adding new provinces to her dominions. These factions were far from expiring with