After the fall of the republic indifference spread, the temples were abandoned and threatened to tumble into ruins, the clergy found it difficult to recruit members, the festivities, once so popular, fell into desuetude, and {38} Varro, at the beginning of his _Antiquities_, expressed his fear lest "the gods might perish, not from the blows of foreign enemies, but from very neglect on the part of the citizens."[21] It is well known that Augustus, prompted by political rather than by religious reasons, attempted to revive the dying religion. His religious reforms stood in close relation to his moral legislation and the establishment of the imperial dignity. Their tendency was to bring the people back to the pious practice of ancient virtues but also to chain them to the new political order. The alliance of throne and altar in Europe dates from that time. This attempted reform failed entirely. Making religion an auxiliary to moral policing is not a means of establishing its empire over souls. Formal reverence for the official gods is not incompatible with absolute and practical skepticism. The restoration attempted by Augustus is nevertheless very characteristic because it is so consistent with the Roman spirit which by temperament and tradition demanded that religion should support morality and the state. The Asiatic religions fulfilled the requirements. The change of regime, although unwelcome, brought about a change of religion. The increasing tendency of Caesarism toward absolute monarchy made it lean more and more upon the Oriental clergy. True to the traditions of the Achemenides and the Pharaohs, those priests preached doctrines tending to elevate the sovereign above humanity, and they supplied the emperors with dogmatic justification for their despotism.[22] It is a noteworthy fact that the rulers who most loudly proclaimed their autocratic pretentions, like {39} Domitian and Commodus, were also those that favored foreign creeds most openly. But his selfish support merely sanctioned a power already established. The propaganda of the Oriental religions was originally democratic and sometimes even revolutionary like the Isis worship. Step by step they advanced, always reaching higher social classes and appealing to popular conscience rather than to the zeal of functionaries.