e west and in Egypt, Massilia
and Alexandria were neither destroyed nor denationalized.

Latinizing

On the other hand the Roman element was promoted by the government
through colonization and Latinizing with all vigour and at the most
various points of the empire. The principle, which originated
no doubt from a bad combination of formal law and brute force,
but was inevitably necessary in order to freedom in dealing
with the nations destined to destruction--that all the soil
in the provinces not ceded by special act of the government
to communities or private persons was the property of the state,
and the holder of it for the time being had merely an heritable
possession on sufferance and revocable at any time--was retained
also by Caesar and raised by him from a democratic party-theory
to a fundamental principle of monarchical law.

Cisalpine Gaul

Gaul, of course, fell to be primarily dealt with in the extension
of Roman nationality. Cisalpine Gaul obtained throughout--
what a great part of the inhabitants had long enjoyed--
political equalization with the leading country by the admission
of the Transpadane communities into the Roman burgess-union,
which had for long been assumed by the democracy as accomplished,(90)
and was now (705) finally accomplished by Caesar. Practically
this province had already completely Latinized itself during
the forty years which had elapsed since the bestowal of Latin rights.
The exclusives might ridicule the broad and gurgling accent
of the Celtic Latin, and miss "an undefined something of the grace
of the capital" in the Insubrian or Venetian, who as Caesar's legionary
had conquered for himself with his sword a place in the Roman Forum
and even in the Roman senate-house. Nevertheless Cisalpine Gaul
with its dense chiefly agricultural population was even before
Caesar's time in reality an Italian country, and remained
for centuries the true asylum of Italian manners and Italian culture;
indeed the teachers of Latin literature found nowhere else
out of the capital so much encouragement and approbation.

The Province of Narbo

While Cisalpine Gaul was thus substantially merged in Italy,
the place which it had hitherto occupied was taken by the Transalpine
province, which had been converted by the conquests of Caesar
from a frontier into an inland province, and which by its vicinity
as well as by its climate was fitted beyond all other regions
to become in due course of time