Augustus had already been more than once invested with the consulship. His first was in 709; the second, which he immediately afterwards resigned, was ten years later; two years afterwards came his third; the others, down to the eleventh, followed year by year: he was altogether thirteen times consul. It was soon after the end of the war of Actium, that he behaved as if he wanted to lay down his power as dictator. This was, as every body knew, a farce; nor could he have been taken at his word, as the whole army had sworn obedience to him, and besides the soldiers, no citizens were under arms. And no man in his senses could have wished him to resign his authority: for, if under far more favourable circumstances, when very many eminent men were living, and people were still quite accustomed to the republic, the free constitution had not been able to stand its ground, and the state was ruled by individuals; how should it now have held its own, if Augustus had given up his power: some one else, and very likely some more unworthy person, would have been placed at the helm; and thus there would only have arisen new civil wars. The senate therefore may have been quite in earnest when beseeching him; and Augustus may also have put on a serious face, as he hoped thus to have his former cruelties forgotten. To show the exact date of the rise of his power might be impossible, or at least very difficult. The name of Imperator was now—this was a peculiar form of flattery—given him as a prænomen; so that instead of C. Julius Cæsar Octavianus, he was now called Imperator Julius Cæsar Octavianus: from thence, Imperator was always the prænomen of the Roman emperors; as we may see from the coins. In the second century, this was forgotten: in official style indeed one said Imperator Antoninus Augustus, but otherwise Imperator M. Antoninus Augustus as well. Octavian in fact wished to have Romulus as a kind of agnomen; but as some took umbrage at this, it was resolved on the motion of L. Munatius Plancus—who now distinguished himself by his flatteries, just as had been done among the Greeks with regard to their Macedonian rulers—to call him Augustus, which the Greeks at once translated into Σεβαστός. The dictatorship was offered to him; but he declined it: this may have been owing to superstition, from which he was not free. It is possible that Sylla’s and Cæsar’s ends frightened him; but perhaps also, the thing seemed to him to be too straightforward, and it pleased him as it were to play with it. But he was named consul every year, if he chose: they wanted to make him sole consul; but he refused it, and rather wished to have two consuls to help him: this again was opposed by the senate; “one besides him was already too much.” At the same time, the proconsular power out of Rome was given him over the whole of the empire, and he could always exercise it by deputy; so that he was enabled to give away the provinces at his pleasure. With the censorship, he got the privilege of excluding from the senate, or calling into it, any one whom he chose. By virtue of his office of tribune, he could annul the decrees of the senate, and interfere with every act of all the magistrates: moreover it gave him the provocatio from all judicial decisions, which is the source of the modern appeal. He was tribune for life, and as such had the right of calling the senate together, of making motions, and of putting matters to the vote: this first began in the seventh century, and no one was now startled at it.^[27] To Lepidus he left indeed the name of pontifex maximus; but after his death, he had that dignity also conferred upon himself, and thus he engrossed the whole authority of the spiritual law. Moreover, he had, by means of the tribunician and censorial powers, the supreme control over the ærarium; so that, by an artificial accumulation, all the powers of government, with the exception of the administrative ones of the præetors and consuls, were concentrated in his person.

When Augustus, after the battle of Actium, tried to give a new form to the state, he, for the sake of appearance, went back in everything to the ancient form. Cæsar took into his own hands half of the elections, and at last even all of them; but Augustus restored the elections which were held by the comitia, though the Candidati Cæsaris now stood, of whom it was an understood thing that they were to suffer no repulsa. The poets of that time, for instance Horace, speak of the ambitio Campi, and of the uncertainty of the elections, in language which one could only have used in the days of the republic; and there is some truth in it: for Augustus did not give himself the trouble, or did not take it upon himself to meddle with all the elections. This was so much the case, that owing to Egnatius Rufus in particular a tumult arose; as the latter, in defiance of the person who represented Augustus, and in violation of the leges annales, stood for the prætorship, just after he had been ædile; and also, immediately after his prætorship, for the consulship: to such a degree was the show of liberty kept up! Yet, after all, assemblies of the people were in reality confined to those elections. Of plebiscita no mention is made in earnest in the reign of Augustus: for we cannot reckon that to be one, which Pacuvius, a tribune, brought forward to have the month of Sextilis called August. Of laws, there were several passed: the form in which this was done, was that a decree of the senate was laid by the consuls before the centuries, and approved of by the latter. This, as there is reason to believe, may have lasted until some time in the reign of Tiberius, to judge from the Lex Julia Norbana: afterwards we do not hear any more of laws properly so called.

Cæsar had already introduced a host of adventurers into the senate, and Antony a great many more; and it was just the same in the times of the triumvirate. Augustus now caused it to be made known, that those who felt that they were not fit for the senate, had better to leave it of their own free will; so that he might not have to strike them off the list: whoever acted thus should be treated in the most considerate manner. A few only, not more than about fifty, did so. As this was not enough, he put out a great many more: but not to hurt their feelings, and because he feared for his life from their offended vanity, he left to them the latus clavus and the first seats in the theatre; which was a great consolation for those wretches. He raised the census senatorius, which for an indefinite period had been double the census equestris, to a million sesterces: at the same time, he behaved liberally, and to those whom he wished to keep in the senate, he made up what was wanting from the public means. The senate had until then its regular sittings three times a month, and extraordinary ones only when summoned; Augustus reduced these to two, and gave it holidays during the months of September and October. Even now, the whole of October is still the vacation time at Rome; after the end of September, no more business can be done: under the emperors, all the courts of law had vacations in the autumn, which was a thing quite unknown in the days of the republic. In the senate, nothing else could be taken in hand but what the consul laid before it, as to him belonged the jus relationis. Augustus, however, was also princeps senatus; and as such he revived the claim he had by the old forms to the jus relationis, a right which had been dropped in the later times of the republic. He now formed for himself another and more select council of state, which had previously to discuss all those matters that were to be brought before the senate. Anything like a debate in the senate is no more to be thought of: all that was proposed, was sure to pass; there was nothing else done but making fine phrases and compliments.

The extraordinary powers which Augustus had, he caused to be given him, after the battle of Actium, first for ten years; then, for five; then, once more, for five; then, three times, for ten years: in the very beginning of the third decennium, he died. The tribunician authority he had given him for life. The senate had formerly been, for their Roman subjects, the supreme court to judge political crimes; and this privilege Augustus left to it, so as to shift the odium thereof from himself upon the senators: it afterwards became their chief business. With the taxation, the senate had nothing whatever to do, as Augustus had the control over the finances of the whole empire, and could raise or lower the taxes. In Italy itself there was no land-tax, even as with us there is none on the seignorial estates; but indirect taxes were paid, and of these there was a variety, as, for instance, on legacies and bequests, and when slaves were made free. Even as the hereditary Stadtholder of Holland was Captain General and high Admiral, so was Augustus master of the whole army, that is of the forty-three or forty-seven legions, and of the innumerable auxilia, about 400,000 men in all: over these, the senate had not the slightest power, not even over the enlistment of them. The provinces in which no troops were regularly stationed, and which therefore did not belong to the military department, (Italy, as the country of the sovereign people, was excepted from all these regulations,) came under the care of the senate: these were Asia, Africa (so far as it was not subject to Juba), Gallia Narbonensis, Hispania Bætica, Achaia, Macedon, Bithynia, Cyprus, Crete, and Cyrene.^[28] For himself, Augustus kept by far the larger and richer share, namely, Spain, all but Bætica; Gallia Lugdunensis and Aquitaine; the countries north of the Alps, Rhætia, and Vindelicia; Dalmatia, Pannonia, (Thrace had a king,) Mœsia; Pontus, (Cappadocia had a king,) Cilicia, Syria, and Egypt: the revenues of these provinces may have hardly been sufficient to keep the armies which lay there in fortified camps. The senate had two proconsular and ten pro-prætorian provinces; but it was not until five years after a man had been consul or prætor, that he could be admitted to cast lots with those who were to preside over the provinces. Augustus made some wholesome changes with regard to the arbitrary rule which was exercised in the provinces; certainly in his own provinces, yet very likely also in those of the senate. Until then, all governors had unchecked power to take whatever they pleased: he was the first to assign fixed appointments to these functionaries. His governors, whom he chose indiscriminately from the senators, viri consulares, prætorii, and knights, were called legati Augusti: as we learn from coins and inscriptions, their official title was legati pro Consule, Prætore, and so forth. The senatorial governors were as before, for one year; those of Augustus, for an indefinite period; for four, five, or even ten years. This was a very happy change for the provinces; yet the ones which had an imperial governor, were much better off than those which were senatorial: in these last, we are sorry to meet with actiones repetundarum; even as late as the second century; in fact their whole establishment was but a pageant for which the subjects had to pay dearly. There was a double ærarium, that of the senate, and that of the emperor: how far the latter had also the disposal of that of the senate, is more than we can tell. Among the proofs of Augustus’ thoughtfulness, are to be reckoned measures like the Lex Ælia Sentia, by which a stop was put to those disgraceful emancipations which brought down the franchise to the very lowest slaves. The way in which the Roman citizens were spread far and wide, was prodigious: the franchise reached much beyond the frontiers of Italy, and Narbonnese Gaul, and a great many places in Spain, had likewise the privileges of citizenship. Such provincials could not, however, get into the senate. Yet even to this rule there were exceptions: as early as in the days of Cæsar, some of them had been brought into it; and under Augustus there were yet more, especially from Provence, where Latin was spoken very early, so much so indeed that the country itself was called Italia altera.^[29] The number of the capita civium, as is given at that time,—somewhat more than four millions,—seems to us frightfully small; for we are not to look upon it as that of the fathers of families, as all free men who in their sixteenth year had put on the prætexta must be reckoned therein. One quite shudders at the falling off of the population, and by this again we learn how great was the rage and fury of the civil wars.

Among the praiseworthy regulations which he made, are also those about the police of Rome. The state of the capital was awful. Since the days of Sylla and the proscriptions, no one at Rome was sure of his life, nor was there any kind of police: to see this, we have only to read the orations of Cicero pro Cluentio, pro Milone, pro Sexto Roscio Amerino; in Suetonius, we meet with accounts of bandits (grassatores) openly showing themselves in Rome with their short swords. Augustus, with great determination, put that down. We see what consequences will arise, when old institutions are allowed to go on without being modified according to the wants of the times: that which at first was wise and expedient, in after days becomes perverted and mischievous. Augustus made a new division of the city. Rome had kept all its municipal arrangements even as Servius Tullius had left them: it had four regions, and also the liberties of the Aventine, as a sort of suburb: the real suburbs were quite neglected. These four regions had vici, and this perhaps was also the case with the other districts: all police matters there were under the charge of the ædiles plebis, which was quite insufficient. Augustus, without troubling himself about what was old town, new town, pomœrium, and so forth, now divided the whole extent of the city, as it was then really inhabited, into fourteen regions: over each region he placed a magistrate, and it had likewise a number of vici, every one of which was presided over by a magister vici. This division proved excellent, and by it security was restored in Rome. Owing to the extension of the empire, the Roman magistrates, who at first had been the magistrates of a city, could now no longer give their time to city business; and therefore several magistratus minores had been established: but these offices had no authority, and they were in the hands of freedmen, as no man of any rank would have anything to do with them. Some years after the battle of Actium, Augustus instituted a præfectus urbi in whom the whole of the city administration was concentrated: this place he bestowed according to his own pleasure; L. Piso held it for twenty years. The good done by this magistracy, and his most happy choice of the person who filled it, was one of the chief causes which gained for him the affection of the inhabitants of the capital. Moreover he set up a sort of Gensd’armerie, vigiles, cohortes urbanæ, which had to act and to be at hand whenever it was wanted; as when there was a riot, a fire, in short, anything serious. The men were in barracks, thus forming a sort of garrison which he might keep without its making any show. He also established a præfectura ærarii, very likely, not only for his own ærarium, but also for that of the senate: at least, the imperial treasury afterwards absorbed the other which had formerly been managed by quæstors. For all these offices he chose, from a εὐπρόσωτος αἰτία, equites Romani, not senators: these last, cringing and fawning as they were, still had a mighty opinion of their own dignity.

By a lex Julia, the courts of justice had been entirely restored into the hands of the knights. This law he maintained; but he prodigiously increased the lists of the jury (the decuries), inasmuch as for petty cases he admitted persons of less fortune than the census equester required.

Italy had accidentally grown into one mass. At first, it had not reached beyond the south; but by little and little it had been stretched further to Cisalpine Gaul: Etruria and Umbria thus belonged to it, whilst the Rubicon was the boundary between it and the provinces. Augustus now extended it, as was right, to the Alps, and this Italy he divided into a number of regions. What was the meaning of these regions, cannot be made out; but one would almost believe that they must have had some reference to the quæstors, of whom, at that time, there were forty to collect the revenue, and also ten prætors. Whether presidents besides were given to such districts, like the consulars appointed by Hadrian, and the correctores under Severus; is a thing of which there is no trace to be met with in the reigns of Augustus and his immediate successors. By this I do not, however, mean to say, that they had not some sort of authorities over them; for the supposition that the region must have had a corresponding office is so very natural. At a later period, we find in inscriptions and in books very many notices, which bear upon the subject; but at this time, none whatever.

Augustus had a huge private fortune. He possessed whole principalities, of which Josephus gives us a very striking example in the will of Herod, who bequeathed his property to the family of the Cæsars: such kings and tetrarchs very often left all that they had to the emperors. The stewards of the countries which belonged to these last, were the procuratores Cæsaris: they were generally knights, but never senators; they might even be imperial freedmen, though perhaps this was not yet the case under Augustus. In the provinces, the emperor was so absolute, that Augustus, for instance, changed the whole registration of land in Gaul without asking any body’s leave, were it only for form’s sake. The soldiers all swore fealty to the emperor, certainly also to the imperium populi Romani; but no one was bound to the consul. The establishment of the prætorian cohorts was no innovation. There had been such troops from the earliest times, being a sort of guards or orderlies, like the “guides des généraux” during the French revolution: they are to be met with in the Punic wars, and also in the civil wars, on both sides; and they had arisen out of the former evocati. Augustus had taken them back with him, and had founded twenty-eight military colonies, as a means of checking any popular movement; and that he might likewise curb these veterans themselves, he formed the cohortes prætoriæ, which in Italy represented in fact the armed Roman people: they were chiefly enlisted, or raised by conscription, from the districts of Latium which had been the strongholds of the Marian party. At first, he kept them scattered in Italy, so as to cause no alarm; but by degrees they were drawn nearer and nearer, until at last the castrum prætorium before the city was built. Under Augustus there were about eight thousand of them.

Formerly the provincials were called to arms only in cases when a province was threatened; henceforth from the subjects of all the provinces of the emperor, many of whom had the lesser Roman franchise, cohorts were formed, which we hear of under the name of auxilia, and which may have made up about the half of the army. Socii are no more spoken of at all. The legions, with regard to the organization of which in those days one is quite in the dark, had to serve a regular term of sixteen years; afterwards, they still remained for some time under the vexilla as a reserve, and then they were to have land assigned them. This system of allotments was Augustus’ work, as was also the increase of pay. Hitherto the soldiers had got the old pay of a hundred and twenty denarii, or twelve hundred asses, yearly; Cæsar doubled, and Augustus trebled it. This was, after all, not much, about sixty dollars of our money; and as the price of everything at Rome had then immensely risen, it was not a large pay for fellows like these who had the throne in their gift. Still, owing to the number of soldiers, it was a burthen which the state could hardly bear, as even Tiberius, who was a very able ruler, already acknowledged.