repeal of all the restrictions which the
Gracchi had placed upon assignments of public land. The object of this
clause was to secure the success of their great reforms, and to establish
a number of small proprietors who would cultivate their little farms, and
breed citizens and soldiers. But forced cultivation is impossible, and
sumptuary laws have never yet succeeded in increasing[5] population. Again
it is inconsistent to give land to a man and deprive him of the power of
sale, for this is an essential part of that domain which we call property
in land. If a man wishes to sell, he will always have sufficient reasons
for so doing, and a rich man can afford to pay[6] the highest price,
freedom of exchange thus bringing ultimate good to both parties. It is easy
to comprehend the consequences of this law. It was the commencement of
a reaction entirely aristocratic in its nature.[7] It was skillfully
conducted with the ordinary spirit of the Roman senate, the ruses, mental
reservations, and dissimulations under guise of public interest. The
aristocracy presented to the plebeian farmers, established by the lex
Sempronia, a means of promptly and easily satisfying their passions.
They had never earned their little farms, nor did they appreciate the
independence of the tiller of the soil. Unaccustomed to farm labor,[8] and
the plodding unexciting life of the Roman _agricola_, they made haste to
abandon a toilsome husbandry, the results of which seemed to them slow and
uncertain, and with the pieces of silver which they received as the price
of their lands, returned to Rome to swell the idle and vicious throng[9]
which enjoyed the sweet privilege of an existence sustained without labor.

Thus the nobles re-entered promptly and cheaply into the possession of the
lands of which Tiberius had but a short time before deprived them, and,
by means of a little sacrifice, substantially and legally converted their
possessions into real property, while the plebeians whom Tiberius had
wished to elevate by means of forcing[10] upon them the necessity of labor,
fell back into their accustomed poverty and brutality. But the object for
which the nobles were striving was not yet completely gained. The present
victory was theirs; they now strove to guarantee the future, and so render
impossible dangers similar to those already passed through.

2. A second law was thus enacted: "Spurius Borius, a tribune, proposed a
law to this effect; that there