In treating of the distinction between comitia and concilium scholars have invariably begun with the juristic definition of Laelius Felix,[710] quoted by Gellius,[711] “He who orders not the whole people but some part of it to be present (in assembly) ought to proclaim not comitia but a concilium;” they have limited themselves to illustrating this definition, and to setting down as lax or inaccurate the many uses of the two words which cannot be forced into line with it. The object of this discussion, on the contrary, is to consider all the occurrences of these words in the principal extant literature, especially prose, of the republic and of the Augustan age—a period in which the assemblies were still in existence—for the purpose of testing the definition of Laelius, and of establishing new definitions by induction in case his should prove wrong. It is convenient to begin with Livy, who though an imperial writer, and under the stylistic influence of his age, probably adhered in the main to the technical terminology of the republican annalists from whom he drew. The first point which will be established is that in Livy’s usage the difference between comitia and concilium is not a difference between the whole people and a part of the people.[712] The plebeian tribal assembly is termed comitia in Livy ii. 56. 1, 2; ii. 58. 1; ii. 60. 4; iii. 13. 9 (“Verginio comitia habente conlegae appellati dimisere concilium,” in which comitia and concilium in one sentence are applied to the same assembly); iii. 17. 4 (the comitia for passing the Terentilian law, which from Livy’s point of view was the plebeian assembly);[713] iii. 24. 9; iii. 30. 6; iii. 51. 8 (comitia of plebeian soldiers for electing military tribunes and tribunes of the plebs); iii. 54. 9, 11: (plebeian comitia under the pontifex maximus); iv. 44. 1; v. 10. 10; vi. 35. 10 (“Comitia praeter aedilium tribunorumque plebi nulla sunt habita”); vi. 36. 9 (the comitia for voting on the Licinian-Sextian laws); vi. 39. 5; xxv. 4. 6; xxxiv. 2. 11; xlv. 35. 7. Other examples of comitia of a part of the people are Livy ii. 64. 1 (as the plebeians refused to participate in the consular election, the patricians and clients held the comitia); xxvi. 2. 2 (comitia held by the soldiers, and hence by only a part of the people, for the election of a propraetor). Still more to the point are the comitia sacerdotum: for electing a chief pontiff, Livy xxv. 5. 2; for electing an augur, xxxix. 45. 8; for electing a chief curio, xxvii. 8. 1. Comitia sacerdotum were composed of seventeen tribes, and hence of only a part of the people.[714] Lastly is to be noted the fact that the plebeian assembly met on a comitialis dies; Livy iii. 11. 3.