he Italic peninsula and finally the known
world under Roman dominion. During those victorious years of social and
war-like struggle, Rome grew and peopled the seven hills, and the
Palatine became but a venerable cradle with legendary temples, and was
even gradually invaded by private residences. But at last Caesar, the
incarnation of the power of his race, after Gaul and after Pharsalia
triumphed in the name of the whole Roman people, having completed the
colossal task by which the five following centuries of imperialism were
to profit, with a pompous splendour and a rush of every appetite. And
then Augustus could ascend to power; glory had reached its climax;
millions of gold were waiting to be filched from the depths of the
provinces; and the imperial gala was to begin in the world's capital,
before the eyes of the dazzled and subjected nations. Augustus had been
born on the Palatine, and after Actium had given him the empire, he set
his pride in reigning from the summit of that sacred mount, venerated by
the people. He bought up private houses and there built his palace with
luxurious splendour: an atrium upheld by four pilasters and eight
columns; a peristylium encompassed by fifty-six Ionic columns; private
apartments all around, and all in marble; a profusion of marble, brought
at great cost from foreign lands, and of the brightest hues, resplendent
like gems. And he lodged himself with the gods, building near his own
abode a large temple of Apollo and a shrine of Vesta in order to ensure
himself divine and eternal sovereignty. And then the seed of the imperial
palaces was sown; they were to spring up, grow and swarm, and cover the
entire mount.

Ah! the all-powerfulness of Augustus, his four and forty years of total,
absolute, superhuman power, such as no despot has known even in his
dreams! He had taken to himself every title, united every magistracy in
his person. Imperator and consul, he commanded the armies and exercised
executive power; pro-consul, he was supreme in the provinces; perpetual
censor and princeps, he reigned over the senate; tribune, he was the
master of the people. And, formerly called Octavius, he had caused
himself to be declared Augustus, sacred, god among men, having his
temples and his priests, worshipped in his lifetime like a divinity
deigning to visit the earth. And finally he had resolved to be supreme
pontiff, annexing religious to civil power, and thus by a stroke of
genius attainin