was finished; much even
was merely begun. Whether the plan was complete, those who venture
to vie in thought with such a man may decide; we observe no material
defect in what lies before us--every single stone of the building
enough to make a man immortal, and yet all combining to form
one harmonious whole. Caesar ruled as king of Rome for five years
and a half, not half as long as Alexander; in the intervals
of seven great campaigns, which allowed him to stay not more
than fifteen months altogether(119) in the capital of his empire,
he regulated the destinies of the world for the present
and the future, from the establishment of the boundary-line
between civilization and barbarism down to the removal of the pools
of rain in the streets of the capital, and yet retained time
and composure enough attentively to follow the prize-pieces in the theatre
and to confer the chaplet on the victor with improvised verses.
The rapidity and self-precision with which the plan was executed
prove that it had been long meditated thoroughly and all its parts
settled in detail; but, even thus, they remain not much less wonderful than
the plan itself. The outlines were laid down and thereby the new state
was defined for all coming time; the boundless future alone could complete
the structure. So far Caesar might say, that his aim was attained;
and this was probably the meaning of the words which were sometimes
heard to fall from him--that he had "lived enough." But precisely because
the building was an endless one, the master as long as he lived restlessly
added stone to stone, with always the same dexterity and always the same
elasticity busy at his work, without ever overturning or postponing,
just as if there were for him merely a to-day and no to-morrow.
Thus he worked and created as never did any mortal before or after him;
and as a worker and creator he still, after wellnigh two thousand years,
lives in the memory of the nations--the first, and withal unique,
Imperator Caesar.

CHAPTER XII

Religion, Culture, Literature, and Art

State Religion

In the development of religion and philosophy no new element
appeared during this epoch. The Romano-Hellenic state-religion
and the Stoic state-philosophy inseparably combined with it
were for every government--oligarchy, democracy or monarchy--not merely
a convenient instrument, but quite indispensable for the very reason
that it was just as impossible to construct the stat