During the republic the Senate had been the actual center of the administration and Augustus intended that it should continue to be so for the greater part of the empire. Through the ordinary magistrates it should govern Rome and Italy, and through the promagistrates the senatorial provinces. Furthermore, the state treasury, the _aerarium saturni_, supported by the revenues from Italy and the Senate’s provinces, remained under the authority of that body. However, to render it capable of fulfilling its task and to reëstablish its prestige, the Senate which now numbered over one thousand had to be purged of many undesirable members who had been admitted to its roll during the recent civil wars. Therefore, in 28 B. C., Augustus in his consular capacity supervised a revision of the senatorial list whereby two hundred unworthy persons were excluded. On that occasion his name was placed at the head of the new roll as the _princeps senatus_. A second recension ten years later reduced the total membership to six hundred. A third, in 4 A. D., commenced through a specially chosen committee of three with the object of further reducing their number was not carried out. The Senate was automatically recruited by the annual admission of the twenty quaestors, but in addition the princeps enjoyed the right of appointing new members who might be entered upon the roll of the Senate among the past holders of any magistracy. In this way many prominent equestrians were admitted to the senatorial order. *The equestrian order.* For the conduct of his share of the public administration the princeps required a great number of assistants in his personal employ. For his legates to command the legions or his provinces with delegated military authority Augustus could draw upon the senators, but both custom and the prestige of the Senate forbade their entering his service in other capacities. On the other hand, freedmen and slaves, who might well be employed in a clerical position, obviously could not be made the sole civil servants of the princeps. Therefore, Augustus drew into his service the equestrian order whose business interests and traditional connection with the public finances seemed to mark them out as peculiarly fitted to be his agents in the financial administration of the provinces. The equestrian order in general was open to all Roman citizens in Italy and the provinces who were eighteen years of age, of free birth and good character, and possessed a census rating of 400,000 sesterces ($20,000). Admission to the order was in the control of the princeps, and carried the right to wear a narrow purple stripe on the toga and to receive a public horse, the possession of which qualified an equestrian for the imperial civil and military service. With the bestowal of the public horse Augustus revived the long neglected annual parade and inspection of the _equites_.