and not discerning the
mischief really involved in it; so that in addition to the many
dissensions which it occasioned, actual violence must have followed,
had not the senate with the aid of certain grave and reverend citizens
repressed the popular fury.

[Footnote 1: Tum pietate gravem ac meritis si forte virum quem
Conspexere, silent, arrectisque auribus adstant.
_Virg. Aen._, I. 154.]

CHAPTER LV.--_That Government is easily carried on in a City wherein the
body of the People is not corrupted: and that a Princedom is impossible
where Equality prevails, and a Republic where it does not_.

Though what we have to fear or hope from cities that have grown
corrupted has already been discussed, still I think it not out of place
to notice a resolution passed by the senate touching the vow which
Camillus made to Apollo of a tenth of the spoil taken from the
Veientines. For this spoil having fallen into the hands of the people,
the senate, being unable by other means to get any account of it, passed
an edict that every man should publicly offer one tenth part of what he
had taken. And although this edict was not carried out, from the senate
having afterwards followed a different course, whereby, to the content
of the people, the claim of Apollo was otherwise satisfied, we
nevertheless see from their having entertained such a proposal, how
completely the senate trusted to the honesty of the people, when they
assumed that no one would withhold any part of what the edict commanded
him to give; on the other hand, we see that it never occurred to the
people that they might evade the law by giving less than was due, their
only thought being to free themselves from the law by openly manifesting
their displeasure. This example, together with many others already
noticed, shows how much virtue and how profound a feeling of religion
prevailed among the Roman people, and how much good was to be expected
from them. And, in truth, in the country where virtue like this does not
exist, no good can be looked for, as we should look for it in vain in
provinces which at the present day are seen to be corrupted; as Italy
is beyond all others, though, in some degree, France and Spain are
similarly tainted. In which last two countries, if we see not so many
disorders spring up as we see daily springing up in Italy, this is not
so much due to the superior virtue of their inhabitants (who, to say
truth, fall far short of our countrymen), as