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Writing: The Causes of Emigration

The Causes of Emigration, § 6

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§ 6

I referred just now to Romans. The very people! How did they rise to such a height of power and fame that they became a marvel to the whole world and then collapsed again into the ashes of their past? A people that thoroughly understood the correct uses and misuses of government, whose laws are still revered throughout Europe, who by their political revolutions and vicissitudes provide a mirror for all societies, in which a thoughtful person without any prophetic gifts can read their impending fall and recovery.

It was indubitably freedom that laid the first stone for the walls of Rome. Freedom filled it with people. Rome would never have existed had Amulius had his wish fulfilled of doing away with its founder and had tyranny not been forestalled by his death.1

But what would a city be without citizens and walls without a garrison? The founder therefore made Rome a sanctuary for all refugees, oppressed people and slaves. The freedom that he offered each of them was such a valuable and rare reward that there could be no lack of participants in such a noble enterprise, and that was the first step towards the power of the new city.

It was at first ruled by monarchs, though without having lost its freedom; the community was governed by the king, but in accordance with the wishes of the councillors and the people, so that historians regard it as a stain on the government of Lucius Tarquinius2 that he obeyed neither. He tormented the common people in the workshops of the smiths and with other labour appropriate to slaves, and his son Sextus Tarquinius,3 a prince brought up in effeminate company, was even more imprudent, causing the dynasty to lose both Crown and fatherland.

By his audacity, Lucius Junius Brutus,4 inspired by a spirit of freedom more noble than conceited, removed the yoke of autocracy, the harshness of which had already turned the people against it, strengthened the laws and stripped the vices of their excuses, so that the nobles of that period (the cronies of Sextus Tarquinius) bitterly complained about it: The king, they said, is a human being, from whom one can ask for justice or injustice, whichever one needs. There is scope there for mercy and kind deeds, anger and forgiveness. One can then distinguish between friend and foe. The laws, on the other hand, are a deaf and implacable thing, more propitious and favourable to a poor man than to a rich and powerful one, never offering any reduction or remission of a sentence as soon as one oversteps the mark, and it would be hazardous where human faults are so numerous to defend oneself by innocence alone,5 hoping by such weighty arguments to overturn freedom entirely; but Brutus made the consuls annual6 and protected freedom in every respect.

During the whole period of its freedom Rome was indeed involved in bloody wars abroad and discord internally; but I can certainly see no other reason than freedom for the fact that the Republic nonetheless continued for so long to expand and that it was indeed servitude that brought about its downfall.

Every year many thousands of Romans usually died on the battlefield, but freedom compensated for that deficit many times over. Encouragements for marriage through freedom to settle and work and the means to feed a wife and children achieved a deal internally, but immigration from outside probably contributed most.

Tullus Hostilius7 in his time already devised the scheme of receiving his enemies and giving them a place on the Aventine in which to build a house. May it not have been the victorious arms of the Romans that increasingly induced the surrounding nations to come over to their side on such favourable terms?

Continual dissensions between the people and the council, the court of the former (tribunus plebis)8 and the consuls appeared to threaten the state with destruction, but remarkably enough it nevertheless continued to grow throughout all this. The people were then still aware of their power and strove for freedom. The council did indeed infringe it from time to time, but when it did so too blatantly, the common people champed at the bit and gave their riders a jolt; then the consuls had to moderate their behaviour. The group of ten men (decemviri) who were installed as rulers, on the model of Athenian laws, conducted themselves well the first year, so that the same individuals remained in power into the second year, but the third year the decemviri retained power without consulting the people at all. But as their power quickly exceeded its limits, the evil deed of the nefarious Appius soon brought that regime to an end.9

However, the Republic flourished, as I said, as long as the contest was between the council10 and the people, for the latter were then still able to curb tyranny, and the nation was relatively satisfied with itself, although the seeds of ruin were already growing in its midst.

But when a different contest developed, between the councillors11 themselves, matters took on a quite different complexion. Then the disputes were no longer about freedom but about which of them would have the honour of being its destroyer. The common people effectively lost their voice. The consuls, who were also commanders of the army, had already had time to acquire riches, which posed a threat to freedom. Caesar, Pompey, Antony, Sulla, Octavius and others12 competed among themselves to gain support among the soldiers, for power often accompanies armed force, and when it could not be gained otherwise, it was bought for large sums, and the soldier soon began to believe that his arbitrary will represented the freedom of society as a whole, but when the common people had to be consulted, they were also made accustomed to respond to gilded arguments. Although unprecedented encroachments were thus now made, the heart of the republic languished in bondage under the tyranny of greed, voluptuousness and arrogance, so that when it was at its most impressive in the eyes of other nations, little more than the shell remained, for Tacitus says that it was weakened by the mutual rivalry of the powerful and the greed of the government, therefore grew tired of the consuls and threw itself into the arms of autocracy.13

Under the Empire, vanity, effeminacy and voluptuousness corrupted the rulers of Rome. The army was the supreme power; its extravagance became limitless; emperors were elevated and overthrown at its might; but the rest of the people already toiled under intolerable burdens; and that state would never have lasted so long if the illusion that Romans were happier than all other people in the world had not been imbibed for so many generations with their mothers’ milk.

It may thus be possible for a time to maintain by illusions a state that has previously flourished and developed a positive view of its happiness, but one that has long suffered oppression cannot be restored and made content with flattery and shadow-play.

  1. Rome would never have existed had Amulius ... by his death.: Refers to Amulius, who according to Roman mythology was the son of Procas and the unfriendly uncle of Romulus’s and Remus’s (the founders of Rome) mother. Amulius tried to drown his nephews, but they were famously saved by a she-wolf and eventually overthrew their great-uncle.
  2. Lucius Tarquinius Superbus (535–496 BC) was the seventh and last king of Rome until the revolt in 509 BC, which led to the establishment of the Republic. He was remembered as a despot.
  3. Sextus Tarquinius was the son of Lucius Tarquinius Superbus and is said to have instigated the revolt by raping the noblewoman Lucretia
  4. Lucius Junius Brutus was the leader of the revolt that led to the founding of the Roman Republic in 509 BC and served as one of its first consuls.
  5. The king is a human being ... by innocence alone: cited from Livy’s Ab urbe condita 2.3.
  6. made the consuls annual: The two consuls were the highest officials in the Roman Republic and were elected by the people for a one-year term.
  7. Tullus Hostilius was, according to the annalistic tradition, the third king of Rome. His traditional regnal dates are 673–641 BC, though it must be noted that the chronology of early Roman history is problematic.
  8. (tribunus plebis): In republican Rome, the tribunes of the plebs, ten inviolable officials who were charged with protecting the plebeians against the patricians, were elected annually in the plebeian assembly (concilium plebis). The tribunes, who had authority to intercede against any Roman magistrate, had to be plebeians themselves.
  9. Decemviri is Latin for “ten men”. In ancient Rome the designation is most often used in reference to the decemviri legibus scribundis, a board of ten charged with writing down the laws. Demands for the codification of the customary laws had long been raised by the tribunes in their struggle to improve the legal security of plebeian citizens. Two separate boards of decemviri were elected, for one year each, and during all of this time the regular government was suspended. The first board of decemviri ruled with moderation and prepared ten tables of law in 451 BC, and the second one completed the Law of the Twelve Tables (Lex Duodecim Tabularum), but when the decemviri refused to resign and their rule turned violent, an uprising broke out, in 449 BC, and the ordinary administration was restored. Chydenius makes a mistake here: in fact, only Appius Claudius Crassus was member of both boards, which was controversial, because re-election was against traditions. According to Livy (Ab urbe condita 3.44–58), Appius was attracted to the plebeian girl Verginia, daughter of Lucius Verginius, who as a consequence of a conflict had to murder her in order to preserve her innocence.
  10. the council: i.e. senate.
  11. the councillors: i.e. senators.
  12. Caesar, Pompey, Antony, Sulla, Octavius and others: this is a reference to the power struggles and the strong men of the last century BC.
  13. for Tacitus says that it was weakened ... into the arms of autocracy.: Chydenius is probably referring to Tacitus’s Annales 1.2.

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