ideas--but as it
did not for any length of time attain the helm, its projects
were left unfulfilled. It was not till the democracy practically took
in hand the government on the overthrow of the Sullan constitution
in 684, that a revolution in this respect occurred. First of all
their sovereignty on the Mediterranean was restored--the most
vital question for a state like that of Rome. Towards the east,
moreover, the boundary of the Euphrates was secured by the annexation
of the provinces of Pontus and Syria. But there still remained beyond
the Alps the task of at once rounding off the Roman territory towards
the north and west, and of gaining a fresh virgin soil there
for Hellenic civilization and for the yet unbroken vigour
of the Italic race.

Historical Significance of the Conquests of Caesar

This task Gaius Caesar undertook. It is more than an error,
it is an outrage upon the sacred spirit dominant in history,
to regard Gaul solely as the parade ground on which Caesar
exercised himself and his legions for the impending civil war.
Though the subjugation of the west was for Caesar so far a means
to an end that he laid the foundations of his later height of power
in the Transalpine wars, it is the especial privilege of a statesman
of genius that his means themselves are ends in their turn. Caesar
needed no doubt for his party aims a military power, but he did not
conquer Gaul as a partisan. There was a direct political necessity
for Rome to meet the perpetually threatened invasion of the Germans
thus early beyond the Alps, and to construct a rampart there
which should secure the peace of the Roman world. But even this
important object was not the highest and ultimate reason for which Gaul
was conquered by Caesar. When the old home had become too
narrow for the Roman burgesses and they were in danger of decay,
the senate's policy of Italian conquest saved them from ruin.
Now the Italian home had become in its turn too narrow; once more
the state languished under the same social evils repeating themselves
in similar fashion only on a greater scale. It was a brilliant
idea, a grand hope, which led Caesar over the Alps--the idea
and the confident expectation that he should gain there for his
fellow-burgesses a new boundless home, and regenerate the state
a second time by placing it on a broader basis.

Caesar in Spain

The campaign which Caesar undertook in 693 in Further Spain, may
be in some sense inclu