Institutions to their City, in carrying out their Enterprises, and in
quelling Tumults._
Here it seems to me not out of place to cite instances of the Romans
seeking assistance from religion in reforming their institutions and in
carrying out their warlike designs. And although many such are related
by Titus Livius, I content myself with mentioning the following only:
The Romans having appointed tribunes with consular powers, all of them,
save one, plebeians, it so chanced that in that very year they were
visited by plague and famine, accompanied by many strange portents.
Taking occasion from this, the nobles, at the next creation of
tribunes, gave out that the gods were angry with Rome for lowering the
majesty of her government, nor could be appeased but by the choice of
tribunes being restored to a fair footing. Whereupon the people,
smitten with religious awe, chose all the tribunes from the nobles.
Again, at the siege of Veii, we find the Roman commanders making use of
religion to keep the minds of their men well disposed towards that
enterprise. For when, in the last year of the siege, the soldiers,
disgusted with their protracted service, began to clamour to be led
back to Rome, on the Alban lake suddenly rising to an uncommon height,
it was found that the oracles at Delphi and elsewhere had foretold that
Veii should fall that year in which the Alban lake overflowed. The hope
of near victory thus excited in the minds of the soldiers, led them to
put up with the weariness of the war, and to continue in arms; until,
on Camillus being named dictator, Veii was taken after a ten years’
siege. In these cases, therefore, we see religion, wisely used, assist
in the reduction of this city, and in restoring the tribuneship to the
nobles; neither of which ends could well have been effected without it.
One other example bearing on the same subject I must not omit. Constant
disturbances were occasioned in Rome by the tribune Terentillus, who,
for reasons to be noticed in their place, sought to pass a certain law.
The nobles, in their efforts to baffle him, had recourse to religion,
which they sought to turn to account in two ways. For first they caused
the Sibylline books to be searched, and a feigned answer returned, that
in that year the city ran great risk of losing its freedom through
civil discord; which fraud, although exposed by the tribunes,
nevertheless aroused such alarm in the minds of the commons that they
slackened in their support of their leaders. Their other contrivance
was as follows: A certain Appius Herdonius, at the head of a band of
slaves and outlaws, to the number of four thousand, having seized the
Capitol by night, an alarm was spread that were the Equians and
Volscians, those perpetual enemies of the Roman name, then to attack
the city, they might succeed in taking it. And when, in spite of this,
the tribunes stubbornly persisted in their efforts to pass the law,
declaring the act of Herdonius to be a device of the nobles and no real
danger. Publius Rubetius, a citizen of weight and authority, came forth
from the Senate House, and in words partly friendly and partly
menacing, showed them the peril in which the city stood, and that their
demands were unseasonable; and spoke to such effect that the commons
bound themselves by oath to stand by the consul; in fulfilment of which
engagement they aided the consul, Publius Valerius, to carry the
Capitol by assault. But Valerius being slain in the attack, Titus
Quintius was at once appointed in his place, who, to leave the people
no breathing time, nor suffer their thoughts to revert to the
Terentillian law, ordered them to quit Rome and march against the
Volscians; declaring them bound to follow him by virtue of the oath
they had sworn not to desert the consul. And though the tribunes
withstood him, contending that the oath had been sworn to the dead
consul and not to Quintius, yet the people under the influence of
religious awe, chose rather to obey the consul than believe the
tribunes. And Titus Livius commends their behaviour when he says:
“_That neglect of the gods which now prevails, had not then made its
way nor was it then the practice for every man to interpret his oath,
or the laws, to suit his private ends_.” The tribunes accordingly,
fearing to lose their entire ascendency, consented to obey the consul,
and to refrain for a year from moving in the matter of the Terentillian
law; while the consuls, on their part, undertook that for a year the
commons should not be called forth to war. And thus, with the help of
religion, the senate were able to overcome a difficulty which they
never could have overcome without it.