ubmit to the penalty, to bring the case
before the community. Already in the course of the fifth century
quasi-criminal proceedings had been in this way instituted against
immorality of life both in men and women, against the forestalling of
grain, witchcraft, and similar matters. Closely akin to this was the
quasi-jurisdiction of the censors, which likewise sprang up at this
period. They were invested with authority to adjust the Roman budget
and the burgess-roll, and they availed themselves of it, partly to
impose of their own accord taxes on luxury which differed only in form
from penalties on it, partly to abridge or withdraw the political
privileges of the burgess who was reported to have been guilty of any
infamous action.(3) The extent to which this surveillance was already
carried is shown by the fact that penalties of this nature were
inflicted for the negligent cultivation of a man's own land, and that
such a man as Publius Cornelius Rufinus (consul in 464, 477) was
struck off the list of senators by the censors of 479, because he
possessed silver plate to the value of 3360 sesterces (34 pounds).
No doubt, according to the rule generally applicable to the edicts of
magistrates,(4) the sentences of the censors had legal force only
during their censorship, that is on an average for the next five
years, and might be renewed or not by the next censors at pleasure.
Nevertheless this censorial prerogative was of so immense importance,
that in virtue of it the censorship, originally a subordinate
magistracy, became in rank and consideration the first of all.(5)
The government of the senate rested essentially on this twofold
police control supreme and subordinate, vested in the community and
its officials, and furnished with powers as extensive as they were
arbitrary. Like every such arbitrary government, it was productive
of much good and much evil, and we do not mean to combat the view of
those who hold that the evil preponderated. But we must not forget
that--amidst the morality external certainly but stern and energetic,
and the powerful enkindling of public spirit, that were the genuine
characteristics of this period--these institutions remained exempt
as yet from any really base misuse; and if they were the chief
instruments in repressing individual freedom, they were also the means
by which the public spirit and the good old manners and order of the
Roman community were with might and main upheld.

Modif