We have no reason to doubt the honesty of Augustus’ intentions, but it is obvious that all the prerogatives of the senate insured it a fair share in the government only so long as the sovereign chose to respect them. The reign of terror under his successors sufficed to set in the most glaring light the absolute impotence of the senate when opposed to a despot, and overturned the neatly balanced system of Augustus. It is easier, we cannot but confess, to blame the author of this system and to demonstrate its impracticability than to put a better in its place. For can it be supposed that if Augustus had set up an absolute monarchy such as Cæsar contemplated, the Romans would have been spared the tyranny of a Caligula or a Nero? Again, if Augustus had handed over to the senate even a share in the command of the army, would the empire have been so much as possible, or would he not immediately have conjured up the demon of civil war? Nor was the co-operation of the senate in the government altogether a failure; it proved salutary under emperors such as Nerva and his successors. The history of all ages goes to prove that chartered rights are of no avail against despots, and what guarantee is there in modern monarchies for the maintenance of a constitution confirmed by oath, except the conscience of the sovereign, and, even more, the steadfast will of the nation, which will endure no curtailment of its rights? UNFULFILLED POSSIBILITIES But the Roman nation existed no more, and in the senate under the empire a Cineas would now have seen, not a council of kings, but, like the emperor Tiberius, an assemblage of men prepared to brook any form of servitude. If it had been possible to give legal representation to the Roman citizens in Italy and the romanised provinces, the system devised by Augustus might have been destined to enjoy a longer lease of life. The emperor Claudius, who had some sensible ideas intermingled with his follies, would have admitted Gauls of noble birth to the senate, as Julius Cæsar had done. We can read in Tacitus of the vehement opposition with which this proposal was received by the senators, who would not hear of any diminution of their exclusive class privileges; and even the Spaniard Seneca has nothing but angry scorn for the defunct emperor who wanted to make the whole world a present of the rights of Roman citizenship and “to see all Greeks, Gauls, Spaniards, and Britons, in the toga.”