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There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924028264434 SOME OBSERVATIONS ON THE ECONOMIC INTERPRETATION OF EARLY ROMAN HISTORY BY C. W. MACFARLANE, Ph.D. (Freiburg Baden) EX-TICB-FBESIDBHT 07 THB AMBBICAH BCOHOUIC A8SOCIAIIOH PEESS OF J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY PHILADELPHIA 1915 COPYRIGHT, APHIL, 1915, BY C. W, MACFARLANE Av , -i^ 5 4 S fc PREFACE The purpose of the present paper is to expand in some measure the argument contained in a previous brochure: — "The Place of Philosophy and Economics in the Curriculum of a Modern University" (J. B. Lippincott Company, 1914). It was there maintained that the failure of the uni- versities of to-day to give us young men as well equipped for straight, clear thinking as were turned out some fifty years ago is due to the over-accenting, in these latter days, of those studies that involve merely inductive processes, and the practical ignoring of those studies, like Philosophy and Economics, that afford an ade- quate training in deductive processes of thought. It was also urged that some real acquaintance with these latter subjects is essential to any intel- ligent study of the larger problems of history and we shall here attempt to make this clear by a somewhat critical examination of a recently published volume by Professor Tenny Frank on " Roman Imperial- PREFACE ism." We shall follow this study with some care through all its strange contradictions of thought, its impossible pictures of Roman civilization and its ofttimes wilful distortion of the facts of history in a vain endeavor to force them into agreement with an unproved theory of Roman expansion. Finally, we shall endeavor to show that all this confusion of thought is due not so much to a de- fective logic as to a defective metaphysic which prevents the author from recognizing the funda- mental error in his premises. If in this paper we shall seem at times to de- vote too much space to a criticism of the work of a single author, we can only urge in defense that our desire is not to attack any particular writer, but to show the importance of adequate training in Philosophy and Economics to every student of the larger historical problems. C. W. M. CONTENTS CHAP. PAGE I. The Troubles of the Historian 5 II. Rome's Expropriation of Land in Italy . . 13 III. The Commerce and Coinage of Rome ... 22 IV. The Mos Maiorum Theory of Roman Imperialism 35 V. The Two Pictures of Rome 47 VI. The Soul of Truth 52 CHAPTER I The Tkoubles of the Histobian Literature, as we all know, had its beginnings in tales in which the gods and demigods were the most conspicuous if not the sole dramatic figures. From this a gradual progress was made toward those literary forms in which the life, activities and psychology of the common people were found to yield just as interesting material as may be found in those old Epics with which the infancy of mankind was beguiled. Now in the same way our earlier historic studies are found to centre around the fortune and fate of a few of the more prominent figures while the life of the great mass of the people is treated as a wholly negligible phenomenon. In these latter days, however, we have come to see that the real function of the historian is to trace the effect of all changes in the life or activities of the whole people upon their slowly changing psychology. 5 THE ECONOMIC INTERPRETATION Possibly no human activities have been more potential in effecting these changes in psychology than those involved in the "struggle for existence," for this struggle stiU occupies, and will long con- tinue to occupy, a large part of the waking hours of mankind. This interrelation between the economic activities and the psychology of a people finds familiar illustration in the well-known conservatism of men engaged in agriculture as compared with those engaged in manufacturing pursuits. This is evidenced in many ways but nowhere more notably than in the fact that the strength of most socialist parties is found not in the farming communities but in the manufacturing or industrial centres. It follows from the above that the study of the economic conditions and activities of a people, so sadly neglected in the past, must of necessity occupy many pages in the works of all future his- torians. At the same time it needs to be remem- bered that there is some danger of over-accenting this phase of human life and experience; some danger of forgetting that "the life is more than meat and the body more than raiment"; some danger of losing sight of the fact that the historian 6 OF EARLY ROMAN HISTORY has to deal with the whole sum of human life and interests or with the struggle of the whole people to realize the best and fullest life possible for them in the environment in which they are placed. But while remembering all this let us hold fast to the fact that man's economic activities occupy so many of his waking hours that they of necessity play an important part in determining the changes in human psychology, or, if you like, the course of human development. Those who have read Professor Guglielmo Ferrero's "Greatness and Decline of Rome" will remember with what keen pleasure they welcomed these volumes because of their promise to give us, at last, a study of Roman civilization in which the economic factors would be given their due importance. Many of us, however, suffered some disappointment when we found this brilliant and profound scholar devoting well nigh a volume to a biography of Julius Caesar, so confessing that he had not entirely escaped from bondage to the older conception of historic method in which the action is made to centre around the fortune and fate of a few of the more important characters rather than 7 THE ECONOMIC INTERPRETATION around the welfare and progress of the great mass of the people. There are indeed repeated evidences, throughout this great work, of a keen desire to reckon seriously with the economic aspects of Roman history, but unfortunately the point of view of the economist cannot be had save by a special study of economic phenomena so long continued that one acquires the instinctive mental habit of searching for the eco- nomic forces or influences lying back of any and every historic phenomenon. That Professor Fer- rero has not quite attained this point of view may be shown by his treatment of two very interesting episodes in Roman history. He tells us in one place that up to the time of the great triumvirate the Med- iterranean had been, for many years, under the control of pirates but that they were finally swept from that sea by Pompey. Professor Ferrero also tells us that the King of Egypt, dying about this time, left his Kingdom by some sort of will or testament to Rome. We are also told that the great triumvirate, Csesar, Pompey, and Crassus, wished to take ad- vantage of this will and so secure possession of the 8 OF EARLY ROMAN HISTORY rich Nile valley. They were estopped, however, by the Roman Senate, which set up, as a defense for their action, the claim that heretofore Rome had never occupied another country except to ex- ercise a beneficent protectorate over it and that they would not now commence to take other coun- tries with a view to their exploitation. It seems rather curious that a truly great his- torian like Professor Ferrero never pauses to ask why the pirates were so long permitted to con- trol the waters of this sea, or to demand what were the real motives of the Roman Senate when it declined to take possession of Egypt. It is weU known that the Latian plain was not very liberally endowed with fertile land. Cicero tells us that in his day grain was but sixth in the list of its prod- ucts, the larger part of the land being given over to grazing. The result of this was that from the very earliest days the growing population of Rome began to press upon its subsistence, thus forcing Rome to import corn from Etruria, Campania, and even so far afield as Sicily. Now in the light of these facts does it not seem possible and even probable that the Senate, made 9 THE ECONOMIC INTERPRETATION up, as it largely was, of the old land-holding aris- tocracy, had no keen interest in the destruction of these pirates whose marauding adventures may have acted as a sort of protective tariff in main- taining a high price for grain in the markets of Rome. So, too, and for much the same reason, they were not keenly interested in the acquisition by Rome of the fertile corn lands of the Nile valley. The present writer does not lay claim to any such knowledge of the sources of Roman history as would justify his insistence upon this interpre- tation of the facts. On the contrary, he is merely urging that any one regarding these facts from the view-point of the economist would not have allowed them to pass without some inquiry as to their ultimate meaning. The failure of Professor Ferrero fully to attain this point of view has, as it seems to the present writer, somewhat marred the value of a work which in other respects should long con- tinue to be a source of profound satisfaction as well for the author as for his numerous and justly admiring readers. The semi-occasional lapses from grace in Professor Ferrero's great work become a more or less chronic 10 OF EARLY ROMAN HISTORY condition in Professor Tenny Frank's * volume on "Roman Imperialism," for this more recent writer sets himseK the impossible task of explaining the expansion of Roman territory, until it included the entire Italian peninsula, without any consideration of the economic motives that were of necessity actuating the Roman people at that time. He even declares, and in set terms, that "material needs" played no part in determining the foreign policy of Rome during that period. In support of this contention he maintains that there was at that time no land-hunger in Rome, since, as he claims, Rome did not expropriate more than three per cent, of the conquered territory. He also lu-ges that Rome had neither shipping nor foreign commerce prior to 290 B. C. and that the low estate of her commerce is shown by her backwardness in coinage. He then proceeds to draw a picture of the Rome of this time and tells us that it was made up of "farmers and little else" and that its port at Ostia was "merely a gravel bank where river craft could be drawn up." Having disposed of the land question, as of the shipping and commerce * Professor of Latin at the Bryn Mawr College for Women. 11 THE ECONOMIC INTERPRETATION of Rome, in this summary way, he proceeds to inform his readers that Roman expansion during all this time was but the accidental result of wars undertaken solely in defense of her frontiers. These contentions are of course widely at variance with the general trend of modern thought, but, as we shall take occasion to show later on, this writer is not entirely alone in this interpretation of Roman history and hence it will be necessary to examine with some care the arguments he advances in support of these contentions.^ * All quotations from "Roman Imperialism" will be niun- bered and the page references will be foimd at the end of this article. 12 CHAPTER II Rome's Expropriation of Land in Italy We wiU first consider what Professor Frank has to say in support of his contention that Rome could not have been land hungry, in spite of all that ancient annalists and modern historians have written to the contrary, because she only expro- priated about three per cent, of the conquered territory. It is in this connection that he gives us his most expUcit repudiation of the part played by economic motives. He writes: — "The fact is that the economist has overstepped his bounds in Roman history. The critic who tries to under- stand the growth of Rome from the point of view of material needs wiU never solve the problem. Primarily, Rome did not expand because its citi- zens needed land; it would be nearer the truth to say that the Romans became land holders — an agricultural people — ^because they expanded and had to hold their frontiers. The Roman annalists 18 THE ECONOMIC INTEEPRETATION fell into the same mistake as the modems have done in giving so much room to the cry for land and to agrarian laws. The ancient Roman con- querors did not expropriate a tenth of the land that the annalists supposed they did." ^ The reasoning by which this conclusion is reached is as foUows: — ^The period between 338 B.C. and 264 B.C. is taken and we are told that during this period only twenty Latin colonies were founded, that "each colony received about 3,000 settlers and each settler about SVs acres of land, making a total of 320,000 acres. Since each colony was furthermore given a public domain from which to defray municipal expenses this figure might be raised to 500,000 acres." To this is added another half million acres held directly by Rome as state land and so this writer concludes that allowing for all possible contingencies "the sum total will not exceed a million acres, that is, less than 3 per cent, of the Italian territory then conquered was ex- propriated." " The reader will note that of this million acres 680,000 acres are wholly conjectural, being made up of the assumed amounts taken by the several 14 OF EARLY ROMAN HISTORY municipalities and by Rome itself as State land. That these figures are without any substantial basis in fact, is shown by the author's own statement that after the battle of Lake Vadimon, 285 B. C, "12 per cent, of Etruria was Ager Romanus."' Since Etruria contained about 10,000 square miles, this would mean that some 750,000 acres were expropriated in Etruria alone. We are also in- formed that after the Samnite wars "the victor confiscated a valley tract which commanded the northern approach to the Samnite capitol" and that "they also took possession of a segment straight through from the old colony of Saticula to Luceria." ^ Again we learn that after the final conquest of the jEqui in 304 B.C. "most of the people were driven out of their confined mountain home and the land was then appropriated for two Latin colonies." As this seems to have been a confisca- tion of nearly 100 per cent.. Professor Frank is forced to write — "It is probable that here, as at Cales in 334" [where there was another wholesale confiscation of land], "the fetial law was read through glasses colored with a tint of expediency."* 15 THE ECONOMIC INTERPRETATION Stm again we are told that after the final sub- jugation of the Senone Gauls in 284 B. C. Rome expropriated 1,000 square miles, or 640,000 acres, of their territory.* It is true that a large part of this territory was probably on the far side of the Rubicon and so was expressly excluded from Professor Frank's figures, since its inclusion would have seriously modified his estimate of three per cent. In any event, this experience serves to show that Rome on occasions did not hesitate to take land in very considerable blocks. We are also told by Dionysius that at the con- clusion of the Pyrrhic war in 275 B.C. Rome expropriated one-half of the pitch pine forest of Sila on the peninsula of the Bruttii.^ Just what the acreage was we are not told, though it is doubt- less fair to assume that this too was no inconsider- able area. Professor Frank at first attempts to discredit this statement by Dionysius, for since this forest is several hundred miles from Rome its confiscation is rather disconcerting for the theory that Rome oiily waged war in defense of her frontier; afterwards however he admits that "Dio- nysius may be correct, for confiscation of the central 16 OF EARLY ROMAN HISJORY Ej^C forest would have given prote^|^ to Rome's friends along the coast, of Rhegium and Locri." " I cannot think, however," he continues, "that Rome was at this time interested in the timber of Sila, since she had little shipping, and there was still abundance of forest near Rome." ' The treatment of this incident by the author of "Roman Imperialism" throws an interesting light upon the curious workings of his mind. The state- ment of Dionysius is here discredited so long as it seems to conflict with this writer's theory of Roman expansion. On the other hand, it is treated as worthy of aU acceptation if by any means it can be forced into some sort of agreement with that theory. This of course is somewhat disconcerting to the reader, who naturally asks, why should the facts be thus tried by this unproved theory instead of trying this theory by the facts? Again, even though we grant, for the sake of the argument, that Rome at this time had little shipping and that there was abundance of forest near Rome, why might not a market have been found both for the pitch and for the timber of this forest in the nearby Greek maritime cities? 17 THE EC^OMIC INTERPRETATION Note, too, HI this would have been in entire keeping with Livy's statement —"That state con- tractors were surely at work here with the timber and pitch industry as early as 213 B.C." (Livy, XXV, I). Again, since pitch was doubtless, then as now, a quite valuable product this seizure of half the forest of Sila and the subsequent exploit- ing of its pitch and timber by state contractors throws a valuable side light upon the fiscal method of the Roman government in meeting their ever- growing budget. Unfortunately for our author's theory of Roman expansion, it also shows the important part played by "material needs" in determining the foreign policy of Rome. It will be remembered that in the estimate of the 320,000 acres taken directly by settlers the figures were based on the assumption that each colony contained about 3,000 souls. Here again Dionysius returns to plague our author, for he tells us that — "The colony at Venusia in Apulia num- bered 20,000 souls" (XVII, 5). This statement, if true, plays sad havoc with the estimate of 320,000 acres as the amount of land taken up directly by colonists and so in a note our author writes as 18 OF EARLY ROMAN HISTORY follows: — "That it contained twenty thousand colonists, as Dionysius says, is hardly possible. The Latin colonies of this period usually received four thousand settlers, or less." Again he adds, "The Oscan that appears on the coins points to a large Campanian element among the colonists." * Now the fact that the "Latin colonies usually received 4,000 settlers or less" is hardly convincing evidence that the colony at Venusia did not contain 20,000 settlers, situated as it was on the border be- tween Samnium and Lucania, remote from Rome and so quite probably at a point of serious danger. Again in the final sentence of this note there is a complete waiving of the case as to the number of colonists and this on the ground that there was "a large Campanian element among the colonists." Else- where we are informed that "in a Latin colony all allies, including the neighboring Capuans, were allowed to share," ^° and hence the presence of these people among the 20,000 colonists at Venusia was not an unusual experience. Nor does it in any way affect the question of the amount of land that was confiscated to say that some of these colonists were not inhabitants of Rome proper, or even of 19 THE ECONOMIC INTERPRETATION Latium, but were drawn from among her allies. Here again, unfortunately, the facts are not tried on their merits but on the ground of their agree- ment or non-agreement with the writer's unproved theory of Roman expansion. Can anything be more hopeless than this as a method of historical inquiry? It would seem then, by the confession of this writer, that Rome expropriated about 750,000 acres in Etruria and some 640,000 acres in the country of the Senone Gauls, that in Samnium she "confiscated a valley tract" and a "segment straight through from the old colony of Saticula to Luceria" and that after the final conquest of the JEqui she expropriated almost the entire territory of that small but troublesome tribe, as she had the lands of the Cales in 334 B.C., while at the conclusion of the Pyrrhic war she laid violent hands upon one-haK of the forest of Sila. How then, with these facts and figures before him, can any one maintain that Rome took less than 1,000,- 000 acres, or less than three per cent, of the ter- ritory conquered by her arms? Again we are told of the confiscated Samnium 20 OF EARLY ROMAN HISTORY lands, that "on the best portion of this territory the splendid Latin colony of Beneventum was im- mediately placed." This would seem to indicate that the practice of Rome was, naturally enough, to select the more fertile land in any conquered territory. It would seem then that Rome's expropriation of such land as was worth having was probably nearer to the old estimate of thirty per cent, than to the more recent estimate of three per cent. In any event it is clear that the later estimate is so hopelessly at fault that neither ancient annalists nor modern economists need be greatly perturbed by any con- clusions that may be drawn from it. 21 CHAPTER III The Commerce and Coinage op Rome We have read Professor Frank's contention that Rome could have had no interest in expropriating one-half of the forest of Sila because "she had little shipping and there was still abundance of forest near Rome." Now when you remember how necessary it is for this writer to show that Rome had no commercial interests if he is to maintain his thesis that "material needs" played no part in determining the foreign policy of Rome and when you further remember how prone he is to repudiate all statements of fact that do not agree with his unproved theory of Roman expansion,, you are likely to approach his discussion of Roman com- merce and coinage in a more or less critical spirit. It wiU be remembered that the Pyrrhic war was precipitated by a fleet of Roman ships which, while on their way to the Roman colonies in the Adriatic, called at the Greek city of Tarentum on the south- em coast of Italy. These ships were there attacked 22 OF EARLY ROMAN HISTORY in a presumably friendly port. Five of them were sunk and their crews were either executed or sold into slavery. Now the presence of this fleet of Roman vessels in the harbor of Tarentum about 282 B.C. is rather disturbing for the contention that Rome had little or no shipping at this time, but what is even more interesting is the fact that the people of Tarentum justified their action on the ground "that, according to an old treaty Roman ships were forbidden to sail in those waters." ^^ Now if such an old treaty ever existed it is manifest that Rome was seriously interested in shipping long prior to 282 B.C., a fact that does not fit in very well with our author's theory of Roman expansion, and so we find him again resorting to the old method of confession and avoidance. He writes : "This tale comes from a very unreliable source, but it may be true." "It is hard," he continues, "to under- stand how or when Rome could have signed a treaty not to pass the Licinian headland." ^^ This difficulty, however, would seem to have no other basis than our author's contention that he who attempts to explain "the growth of Rome from the point of view of material needs will never solve the problem." 23 THE ECONOMIC INTERPRETATION Professor Mommsen, who fortunately has no such theory to defend, finds no difficulty in ad- mitting the probable existence of such a treaty, though confessing at the same time that we do not know its exact terms and that we are only told that it was concluded a considerable time before 282 B.C. (B. Ill, page 426). It would seem then that our author's rejection of this treaty is but another instance in which he is betrayed into trying the facts by his theory and so is disposed to question the existence of such a treaty on the whoUy inade- quate ground that it cannot be made to agree with that unproved theory. We have now to consider the three treaties with Carthage executed respectively in 348 B.C., 306 B.C. and 279 B.C., or all prior to the First Punic war. Polybius refers the first of these treaties to 509 B. C. and says that it was executed by Lucius Junius Brutus and Marcus Horatius, the first consuls appointed after the expulsion of Tarquin. Mommsen at first accepted this date but later, under more critical examination of the evidence, he fixed the date of the first treaty at 348 B.C. Professor Frank, however, accepts the date given 9A OF EARLY ROMAN HISTORY by Polybius and writes — "A word of caution is in place against using this document as proof of certain political conditions or of commercial activity at Rome. It was a document drawn up by the Car- thaginians, then a great trading nation, for their own benefit and against all future contingencies. It therefore pictures Carthaginian conditions and ambitions rather than Roman. Rome had no mari- time commerce at the time of this treaty."" In this arbitrary way three of the most important documents in Roman history are summarily dis- missed, because they do not agree with an unproved theory. Fortunately for the modern student, Polybius has preserved for us the text of all three treaties, though he says that the first was written in such archaic Latin as to make it very difiicult to decipher. That the reader may see for himself the real bearing of these treaties upon the question of Roman trade and commerce at this time we will quote the first treaty in full: — 1st, "There shall be friendship between the Romans and their allies, and the Carthaginians and their allies, on these conditions." 25 THE ECONOMIC INTERPRETATION 2nd— "Neither the Romans nor their allies are to sail beyond the Fair Promontory (Cape Bon) unless driven by stress of weather or the fear of enemies. If any one of them be driven ashore he shall not buy or take ought for himself save what is needful for the repair of his ship and the service of the gods, and he shall depart in five days." (How very modern this all seems to be.) 3rd — "Men landing for traffic shall strike no bargain save in the presence of a herald or town- clerk. Whatever is sold in the presence of these, let the price be secured to the seUer on the credit of the state — that is to say, if such sale be in Lydia or Sardinia." 4th — "If any Roman comes to the Carthaginian province in Sicily he shall enjoy aU rights enjoyed by others. The Carthaginians shall do no injury to the people of Ardea, Antium, Laurentium, Circeii, Tarracina, nor any other people of the Latins which are subject to Rome." 5th — "From those townships that are not sub^ ject to Rome (in Latium) they shall hold their hands; and if they shaU take one shall deliver it tmharmed to the Romans. They shall build no 26 OF EARLY ROMAN HISTORY fort in Latium; and if they enter the district in arms, they shall not stay a night therein." (B. Ill, Sec. 22.)" We have quoted this treaty in extenso, first, because it is one of the most important documents bearing upon early Roman history that has come down to us, and then only by means of a Greek translation, and second, because the simple reading of this treaty should satisfy any one that it cannot be dismissed as an instrument drawn solely in the interest of Carthage. Again, whatever restrictions may have been placed upon Roman trade and commerce by Sections 2 and 3, it is manifest even from these restrictions that there were at this time Roman ships sailing in Carthaginian waters and that there were Roman merchants selling their wares in the market places of the Carthaginian towns. Not only so, but their transactions, when conducted in the presence of a town officer, were guaranteed "on the credit of the state." To say that these sections were drawn to cover some "^ These treaties Polybius tells us were preserved to his day, engraved on brass, in the treasury of the ^Ediles in the temple of Jupiter Capitolinus. 27 THE ECONOMIC INTERPRETATION remotely possible future commercial activity of Rome is to put a rather severe strain upon the credulity of the reader. How then can it be said in the presence of this and the two subsequent treaties, which are as clearly commercial as the first, that "Rome had no maritime commerce at the time of this treaty," Indeed it is only in the light of these treaties and their revelation of the increasing restrictions that Carthage sought to impose upon the commercial activities of Rome at this time that we can rightly understand the inevitable nature of the struggle that was precipitated in 268 B. C. One of the greatest of modem historians has written: "Rome was indeed from the first a mari- time city and in the period of its vigor never was so foolish or so untrue to its ancient traditions as wholly to neglect its war marine and to desire to be merely a continental power." (Mommsen, B. II, page 425.) This period of Rome's vigor, as of its flourishing marine, is credited by Mommsen to the days when Etruscan princes sat upon the throne of Rome; to the days when the citizen army of Rome was re- 28 OF EARLY ROMAN HISTORY organized in centuries in which men were rated or grouped not according to their ancient lineage or holdings of land but according to their wealth; to the days when trade and commerce were so active that the bourgeoisie or wealthy trading class was strong enough in combination with an Etruscan king to curb the arrogance of the feudal aristocracy. " During the perilous crisis, however, which the expulsion of the Kings, the internal disturbances in the Romano-Italian confederacy, and the unhappy wars with the Etruscans and the Celts brought upon Rome, the Romans could take little or no interest in the state of affairs in the Mediterranean and in consequence of the policy of Rome directing itseK more and more to the subjugation of the Italian Continent the growth of its naval power was arrested." — "But even when their marine was at its lowest ebb Rome never gave up the idea of possessing a fleet of its own." So wrote Professor Mommsen (Book II, page 625), who with his sympathetic insight into Roman character and institutions has illuminated so many pages of Roman history. 29 THE ECONOMIC INTERPRETATION It is true that we are told that the excavations at Ostia have as yet revealed nothing prior to 300 B.C., but it will take more than this negative evidence to persuade the careful student that Rome, which at this time was a city of 200,000 people, was hopelessly lacking in trade and com- merce, or that the "inhabitants of this city" were "farmers and little else," as Professor Frank else- where assures us. It may be well to note that there is here an interesting parallel to the history of our own times. Prior to the outbreak of the Civil War in 1861, the United States had a considerable merchant ma- rine which was swept from the seas by Confederate privateers. At the conclusion of that war we too had a continent to conquer, not, it is true, by force of arms, but commercially and industrially, and so for a long time we were content to hold our home market with the aid of a protective tariff. To-day with the enormous expansion of our industrial resources we have commenced to reach out, if not for a place in the sun, at least for a liberal share in the trade of the world, and so whether England or Germany wins out in the present struggle we will 30 OF EARLY ROMAN HISTORY be for some time the sole remaining industrial and commercial competitor of the survivor. So, too, back in those early days in the Mediter- ranean basin there were at first Etruscans, Greeks, Romans and Carthaginians, all competing for its commerce. First the Etruscans and then the Greeks were eliminated from the race and Rome, encompassed on all sides by Etruscans, Gauls, Samnites and other hill tribes, was having her struggle for existence. She too was busy conquer- ing the continent of Italy and so was forced to see the trade and commerce established by her Etrus- can kings slip from her hands. That Carthage promptly availed herself of the dif- ficulties in which Rome was now involved is shown by the increased restrictions placed upon Roman commerce in the treaties of 348 and 306 B. C. But Rome, with the completion of her conquest of the Italian peninsula in 275 B. C, again turned her face towards the sea; again began to consider ways and means by which she might recover her old- time maritime power, and from that day the con- flict with Carthage became as inevitable as fate. Are we to-day facing a like inevitable conflict in 31 THE ECONOMIC INTERPRETATION the not distant future when we shall be the sole remaining commercial and industrial competitor of the victor in the present conflict. ? The history of Roman coinage has here a special interest for us since the author of "Roman Imperi- ialism" has urged that the low estate of Roman commerce is shown by her backwardness in the art of coinage. He writes as follows: "The Roman mint at Capua had struck silver (for Rome) since about 335 B.C.; the mint at Rome issued only bronze coins till 268 B.C., a striking commentary," he adds, "on Rome's lack of interest in commerce and industry." " It might of course be urged against this that Carthage did not commence to coin silver until 410 B.C., and then largely for use in Sicily, con- tenting herseK for a time at least with a leather coinage for her local exchanges. Again, while Lydia had both gold and silver coins at a very early date and the Ionian cities of Greece had silver coins prior to 600 B.C., the commercial cities of Tyre and Sidon did not issue silver coins much before the beginning of the fourth century (see G. F. Hills' " Greek and Roman Coins," page 9). Now since Rome was coining bronze at Rome and 32 OF EARLY ROMAN HISTORY silver at Capua in 335 B . C . , or only seventy-five years after these great trading centres commenced their coinage of silver, how can it be said that her failure to coin silver in the mint at Rome until 268 B.C. indicates a serious lack of interest in commerce and industry? Nor does Professor Frank so con- strue the facts when for the moment he loses sight of his theory of Roman expansion in his interest in defending some other thesis as when he attempts to explain or justify the mintage of silver coins marked Romano in Capua in 335 B.C. He tells us in this connection that "Rome long had a branch mint at Luceria" . . . " There is other evi- dence," he adds, "that in the early days mintage contracts were let on a purely business basis without reference to political status."" This of course is quite in keeping with the general Roman practice of that time and indicates not a lack of interest in commerce and industry, but rather the existence in Rome of that fully developed business instinct which led them to buy their coins in the cheapest market or to let their mintage con- tracts on "a purely business basis." By 268 B.C. Rome had completed her conquest of the Italian 33 THE ECONOMIC INTERPRETATION peninsula and doubtless with that was born that spirit of imperialism which led her to coin her silver denarii in the mint at Rome and to endeavor to make them pass current throughout all Italy. Here at last her method of coinage was prompted by polit- ical and not solely by commercial considerations. It may be interesting to note in conclusion that the earliest Roman bronze coins have the familiar design found on the coins of the Etruscan city of Telamon — on one side a bearded Janus and on the other the prow of a ship. (Dennis — Cities and Cemeteries of Etruria, page 230.) May it not then be possible that at a still earlier date Rome let out her mintage contracts to some of the Etruscan cities? On page 35 of "Roman Imperialism" we are informed that the earliest bronze coins from the Roman mint date from 335 B. C. As this was the same year in which Capua commenced her coinage of silver for Roman use it seems quite possible that prior to this time Rome obtained her coins from some Etruscan town, since it is difficult to conceive of her trade prior to this time as con- fined to primitive barter. 34 CHAPTER IV The Mos Maioeum Theory of Roman Imperialism Thus far we have confined ourselves to an exami- nation of the arguments by which it has been sought to estabhsh the thesis that "material needs" played no part in the expansion of Roman territory prior to the Punic wars. We have now to consider the arguments in support of the contention that up to this time Rome's wars were fought solely in defense of her frontiers and not with any express view or intention to expand her borders. The origin of this theory is found in our author's abiding admiration for the ancient Roman fetial institu- tion. This institution or coUege of priests, drawn from the patrician order, supervised the rites peculiar to the declaring of war and the swearing of treaties. It seems to have been a court of first instance, or, if you like, a sort of permanent advisory board that reported to the Senate what 35 THE ECONOMIC INTERPRETATION action it thought should be taken in such matters. Professor Frank concludes his account of this ancient and honorable institution with the remark that "the important point after all is the fact, established by the existence of this institution, that the Roman mos maiorum did not recognize the right of aggression, or the desire for more territory as just cause for war." i* In the light of this very simple theory the expan- sion of Roman territory until it included the entire Italian peninsula is seen to be but a series of acci- dents that resulted from the purely defensive wars waged by a peaceful and law-abiding people to protect their frontiers, or, as our author elsewhere puts it, their wars were the results of "Rome's in- sistence upon good order on the frontiers and perfect regularity in all international transactions." " The simplicity of this theory has appealed to more than one writer in days gone by, and even as late as 1898 Professor Cunningham of Cam- bridge gives to it a qualified assent. He writes: — "It has been pointed out that the gradual exten- sion of the Roman federation in Italy may be regarded as an attempt to secure immunity from OF EARLY ROMAN HISTORY attack when no physical barrier afforded protec- tion." ("Western Civilization," page 160.) It is true that Professor Cunningham insists that a war waged for the protection of the food supply is in reality a defensive war, nevertheless the above will show that Professor Frank is not alone even in these modern days in his defense of the rule of the mos maiorum. So long as we confine ourselves to Rome's wars with the Gauls and nearby Etruscans or with the surrounding hill-tribes, this theory of the foreign poUcy of Rome may be made to serve fairly well. Even the dozen or more wars with Veil, the metrop- olis of Etruria, situated less than twelve miles north of the Tiber, might be so explained, for in the case of a war between such close neighbors it is always easy to insist that it was the other party to the difficulty that brought on the con- flict. But when the wars are undertaken against a people situated from 150-250 miles distant from Rome the difficulties are greatly increased. We here refer, of course, to the Sanmite and Pyrrhic wars. In the case of the first Samnite war, undertaken in defense of Capua, these difficulties are clearly 37 THE ECONOMIC INTERPRETATION recognized by the author of "Roman Imperialism," for he writes:— "What could have induced the Romans to form this entangling alliance so far afield it is difficult to comprehend. Perhaps her statesmen argued that it would be desirable to have friends beyond their ancient foe, the Volsci, and their new enemy, the Aurunci. They may also have been looking for friends in case the Latins should some day break out into revolt against the terms of the Cassian treaty. At any rate the alliance was made, and with serious consequences to both signatories." ^° The last sentence seems to reveal a feeling of dissatisfaction in the mind of Professor Frank with his attempt to explain, as a measure of self-defense, an incursion of 140 miles through hostile territory to succor an alien city. Capua, originally an Etruscan city, was captured by a branch of the Samnite tribe about 440 B.C. But these hill people were not long in possession of the most fertile land in Italy before they yielded to the blandishment of its climate and so soon found themselves too weak to resist the encroach- ments of their hardier Samnite brethren, whom they had left behind in the highlands of the Apen- 38 OF EARLY ROMAN HISTORY nines. In 343 B. C. they were forced to call upon Rome to protect them. Rome responded with an army and the first Samnite war was on. Now, by confession, the fibre of the Capuans had been so weakened by the fertility of their land and the soft seduction of their climate, that they were impotent to defend themselves against their hardier kinsmen from the hills. May we not then fairly ask — ^how could an alliance with these people strengthen the hands of Rome in any possible con- flict with the Volscii or Aurunci or be useful to her in the event of a revolt of the Latins against the terms of the Cassian treaty? Again, when it is remembered that in forming this alliance Rome threw down the gage of battle to the most war-like tribe in aU Italy; a tribe that was said to muster 70,000 foot and 7,000 horse, it is difficult indeed to justify such an alliance as a simple measure of self-defense. What then is the explanation? We know that the Latium plain did not contain a great deal of fertile land, 2^ so that at quite an early date the growing population of Rome was forced to draw upon Etruria and Campania to supplement her own inadequate 39 THE ECONOMIC INTERPRETATION supply of grain. Again, we are told that as early as the fourth century B. C. Rome was forced to import grain from as far off as the distant fields of Sicily. It is manifest then that access to the fertile lands of Campania was a matter of vital moment to the people of Rome, and hence they could not stand idly by and let a warlike tribe, like the Samnites, overrun these fertile lands . Nor were friendly relations with the Volscii and Aurunci a matter of vital moment in this connection, since by maintaining friendly rela- tions with Capua and the port at Naples they could send this grain around by sea to Ostia. So, too, it is fair to assume that the trade between Rome and Capua did not long continue to restrict itseK to the shipping of grain from the wheat fields of Campania. Rome must have given something in exchange and as coin was not over-plentiful at Rome about this time, they must have given some form of commodities for this grain (it would be very interesting to know what they were) and in this way a more or less important commerce had probably grown up between these two cities; a commerce which the wealthy trading class at Rome would naturally wish to hold and expand. 40 OF EARLY ROMAN HISTORY It is therefore probable that both wings of the popular party were deeply interested in the welfare of Capua: the bourgeoisie because of their com- merce, present and prospective, with that wealthy city, and the left wing of the plebeian party because of the lower prices of grain which resulted from free conamunication with the wheat lands of Cam- pania. Now one does not need to be very pro- foundly informed in the matter of Roman politics to know that when these two wings of the popular party were united on any question they did not long hesitate to over-ride the rulings of the fetial college or of its master, the Roman Senate, and this because their "material needs" demanded it. The explanation offered to us of the origin of the second Samnite war does not seem to be any happier than the account of the first incursion of the Romans into Campanian territory. We are told that "Roman expansion was an accident rather than a necessity — a by-product of Rome's insistence upon good order on the frontier and perfect regularity in aU international transac- tions." 22 Now curiously enough our author adds, on the very next page: — "The war began with a 41 THE ECONOMIC INTERPRETATION dispute about the ownership of land on the Litis, the southern boundry of Latium, where Rome had planted the colony of Fregellse in 328 B.C. The actual merits of the case/' he continues, "are now difficult to determine."^' But unless this writer is prepared to maintain that the Romans had a just claim to this land, which by confession he is not prepared to do, how can he say that this war was due to Rome's highly developed sense for order and regularity in all international transactions, or that this was not a case of mere vulgar land- grabbing, as he would probably call it if he thought it was the "democratic element" that precipitated this war. The Pyrrhic war, which completed Rome's con- quest of the Italian peninsula, was brought on by an appeal from Thurii, which in 282 B. C. was under siege by the Lucanians, a hill-tribe in the immediate neighborhood of this Greek maritime city. After some deliberation Rome sent an army and raised the siege. Tarentum, the largest city on this south- ern coast of the Italian peninsula, resented this interference of Rome within the former's sphere of influence and some Roman ships appearing 4S OF EARLY ROMAN HISTORY shortly after in the harbor of Tarentum the people of this city sank five of them and then called on Pyrrhus, the King of Epirus, on the mainland of Greece, to protect them against the expected ven- geance of Rome. We will not follow the vicissi- tudes of this war, in which Rome encountered for the first time the famous Greek phalanx. At first the Romans, as so often happened, were badly beaten, but were eventually successful and with the conclusion of this war became the masters of the entire Italian peninsula. In the discussion of this war our author candidly abandons all attempts to explain it as undertaken in defense of the Roman frontier, for this Greek city was situated on the southern coast of Italy far removed from the legitimate sphere of Roman influence. In this coimection he writes: "We may safely attribute the Thurian embroglio to the democratic party and its leaders. It is significant," he adds, " that the first instance, so far as we know, of Rome's departure from the intents and purposes of the fetial institutions occurred but five years after Rome had accepted the principle of popular sovereignty." ^* 43 THE ECONOMIC INTERPRETATION There is here an unmistakable note of regret for the passing of that venerable institution whose use of flint instruments in the celebration of "its rites would seem to carry it back to the days of the terremare." So, too, in characterizing one of the most important of Rome's wars as "The Thurian Embroglio" the author betrays his contempt for the rising democracy, which certainly as early as the first Samnite war, 343 B. C, had made its voice effective in determining the foreign policy of Rome. So long as the senate was in absolute control of the situation, or in the earliest days of the republic, the fetial coUege of priests, drawn from the patri- cian order, quite naturally opposed aU wars of expansion not merely because of the mos maiorum and its sacred traditions but for the even more important reason that the economic interests of its order — the landed aristocracy — were not directly served either by the extension of commerce or by lower prices for grain. What then can we say of the mos maiorum theory of Roman Imperialism? It must be remembered that by confession this theory only serves to explain that expansion of Roman territory which took 44 OF EARLY ROMAN HISTORY place prior to the Punic wars. Clearly then it cannot be taken as an explanation of the general problem of Roman expansion. Again, even if we restrict ourselves to the period prior to the Punic wars we find that this theory is far from giving us a satisfactory explanation of the problems in hand. That it does not serve to explain the Pyrrhic war our author frankly admits, while of the First Sam- nite war he writes: "What could have induced Rome to form this entangling alliance so far afield, it is difficult to understand." This difficulty disappears, however, the moment we abandon the futile attempt to explain the Sam- nite wars as undertaken solely in defense of the fron- tiers of Rome and frankly admit that the "material needs," or, if you like, the economic interests of both wings of the popular party, were involved in this war. This then carries us back to 343 B.C., or to the date of the first Samnite war. Again we are told that "shortly after 367 B. C, the year in which the Plebeians won their long fought battle for the privilege of holding the consulship, a policy of expansion set in, doubtless to be explained by the new democratic influences at work in Rome." " 45 THE ECONOMIC INTERPRETATION That the popular party had exercised a potential voice at an even earlier date is, curiously enough, admitted by our author in his discussion of the effects of the distribution of the Veian land in 395 B.C. He there writes: "The importance of this circumstance for the question of Roman Im- perialism lies in the fact that in the future it was usually the democratic element at Rome which favored a policy of expansion." "^ May it not then be fairly asked what good purpose can be served by a theory of Roman expansion which is only capable of a very doubtful appUcation to Roman history prior to the destruction of the city by the Senone Gauls in 387 B.C.? 46 CHAPTER V The Two Pictures of Rome It is one of the curious facts in the history of modern thought that despite many incursions into the field of Roman history there has as yet been no adequate study of the commerce and industry of Rome and this notwithstanding the fact that in these latter days many scholars have come to regard these as two of the most important pages in the history of every developed civilization. All such studies wiU of course encounter the serious difficulty that the reliable material is widely scattered and rather meager in amount. Never- theless enough material might be found to enable us to piece together some sort of a picture of Roman civilization at various stages in its development, pictures that would be sufficiently coherent and con- sistent with themselves and the generally known facts of human experience to enable us to visualize the life at Rome, say, at the beginning of the third century before Christ. Professor Frank, it is true, attempts to draw such a picture of Rome in 290 B. C, but having 47 THE ECONOMIC INTERPRETATION first repudiated the part played by "material needs" in determining Roman activities and inter- ests he gives us a rather curious picture of the Rome of that day. We are told that " The Romans were still farmers and little else." Again he de- scribes them as "the simple folk of that homely and insignificant town" and in still another place he speaks of Rome as "a state of peasants." ^' Not only does this fail to agree with much that we know about the Roman people, but when this writer further teUs us that Rome at this date contained something like two hundred thousand souls we find that the picture which he has drawn is absolutely incapable of realization in thought. For how could such a population, confined within the seven miles of the city's wall, be made up largely of "farmers and Jittle else"? Is it not indeed manifest that any city population of two hundred thousand souls must include many thou- sands who are actively engaged in industry and commerce, and practically no "farmers" at all? Our information about the industrial activities of the Roman people is as yet all too meager to permit us to speak with any great assurance, but 48 OF EARLY ROMAN HISTORY whatever view one may hold of the industrial and commercial development of Rome at this time no one will question the statement that Veii was the metropolis of Etruria or that it was the great centre of the business life of an essentially industrial and commercial people. Is it not difficult then to conceive of any equally large city situated on the Tiber and less than twelve miles from Veii as a town absolutely devoid of similar interests and ac- tivities or as made up of "farmers and little else"? Again, is not one constrained to admit that with the fall of Veii a large part of the trade of that city was probably absorbed by Rome, which must then (395 B.C.) have become the distributing centre for the wares of Carthage, SjTacuse and the other Greek cities of the south, not only in Latium but throughout the greater part of the valley of the Tiber? So, too, when you remember the early and long standing rivalry between Rome and Veii, the two largest cities of all Italy, situated at almost equal distances from the mouth of the Tiber and yet not more than twelve miles apart, the suspicion occasionally flits across the mind that Romulus and Remus may have been but the personifica- tions of these two rival cities. 49 THE ECONOMIC INTERPRETATION Curiously enough the author of "Roman Im- periahsm," in explaining the rapid recovery of Rome after the partial destruction of the city by the Senone Gauls in 387 B.C., gives us a descrip- tion of Rome that is quite in keeping with that here suggested. He writes: "Her citizens had been taught valuable lessons in arts and crafts, in trade and political organization, by the Etruscan princes, and had received from them an ambition and im- petus which they had not before possessed. The recent doubling of Rome's territory (conquest of Veii) enabled the city to absorb a far greater popular tion than hitherto. Rome had a fairly safe harbor (Ostia) which attracted traders from Sicily, Car- thage and Etruria and by commanding a bridge over the Tiber she became the natural emporium for the products of both sides of the river." ^^ How then, it may be asked, could this writer describe the Rome of 290 B.C. as "that state of peasants" or as made up of "farmers and little else" — "the simple folk of that homely and insig- nificant town "? The explanation will, we take it, be found in the fact that in his first picture he clearly had in mind his theory of Roman expansion and so is constrained to construe the facts in conformity 50 OF EARLY ROMAN HISTORY with that theory, while in the second picture he has for the moment lost sight of the fetial college of priests and their mos maiorum and so is enabled to give us a more adequate picture of Roman civilization in the Third Century, B. C. This apparent willingness to distort the facts of history is again revealed in the two descriptions of Ostia given by this writer. In one place he tells us that the "Roman harbor of the time, 290 B.C., boasted merely a gravel bank where river craft could be drawn up, and where, nearby, on an un- paved area, set off by stakes, primitive bartering of farm products and trade by means of copper coins, could be carried on." ^^ When, however, he loses sight of his theory of Roman expansion in his interest in the influence of Etruscan civilization upon that of Rome, he tells us that: "Rome had a fairly safe harbor which attracted traders from Sicily, Carthage and Etruria." '" Now if we try these two pictures by the fundamental test of at- tempting to visualize them, in keeping with the fact that Rome at this time was a city of two himdred thousand people, the utterly impossible character of the first picture becomes at once manifest. 51 CHAPTER VI The Soul of Truth Some one has said that "That there is a soul of truth in all things false," and so in justice to Pro- fessor Frank we wiU endeavor to unravel the some- what tangled skein of his argument with a view to discovering what it may contain of genuine truth. If this writer stood alone in his championing of the Mos Maiorum theory of Roman Imperialism his work might have been dismissed with much less consideration than we have here accorded it, but the fact that this theory has found a somewhat wide acceptance among certain students of Roman history would seem to indicate that it contains some important elements of truth and so places upon us the obligation to discover just what this truth may be. In order to make this quite clear we are constrained to ask the reader to recall his earher studies in Pure Philosophy and if in this we shall seem to be wandering rather far afield from 52 OF EARLY ROMAN HISTORY the legitimate domain of historical inquiry we can only ask for the patient consideration of this part of our argument on the ground that its mas- tery is as essential to a right understanding of the problems of historical philosophy as to the right understanding of the ultimate problems in all fields of thought. Much of the confusion that we find in our studies in Pure Philosophy is due to our failure clearly to recognize just what the task was that philosophers had set for themselves — namely, the discovery of some test that will serve to determine the truth of our premises, just as the Aristotelian syllogism enables us to determine the truth of the conclusions that may be drawn from these premises. In a word, philosophers have been trying through all the ages to resolve that confusion of thought which arises with the discovery of the fact that of two diametrically opposed propositions both may be true despite their manifest contradiction of each other. This is the difficulty in which we are in- volved in such opposed conceptions as action and reaction, matter and force, the freedom of the will and the external determination of our actions. 53 THE ECONOMIC INTERPRETATION How much time and paper have been wasted in the discussion of the latter problem! One group of writers insisting that man is a free agent and so is morally responsible for his actions, while another insists that man's actions are determined by his environments and hence he cannot be held morally responsible for his actions. The resolution of these difficulties was found for modem philosophy about 1830 by Cousin in France and Hegel in Germany. They said, in effect, that man looks out upon the phenomenal world and at first gets only vague, indefinite and unanalyzed conceptions of that world. In endeavoring to get clearer, sharper or more definite pictures on the retina of the mind's eye, he is constrained to analyze these phenomena and in obedience to our innate tendency to think in terms of likeness and unlikeness we separate the various elements of a given phenomenon into two opposed groups, or, if you like, into two concepts both of which are true and yet are in flat contradiction to each other. These writers then called attention to the fact that this contradiction is not seen in the original pic- ture or conception of the phenomenon but is merely 54 OF EARLY ROMAN HISTORY the result of our analysis, or of our separating of the elements of the phenomenon into two opposed groups in response to our innate tendency to think in terms of likeness and unlikeness. It follows from this that any adequate explanation of the real phenomenon must include both the elements into which we have resolved it by our analysis or that any explanation expressed solely in terms of one or the other of these two variables must lack completeness or contain less than the whole truth. Strictly speaking, we cannot even conceive of action wholly separated from some opposing force or reaction. Again we cannot form even the most elusive picture of force without at the same time picturing the matter in the moving of which this force manifests itself. Nor can we think of the win of an individual or of a people as operating in a world in which there is no limiting or restraining environment.* When therefore Professor Frank tells us that the Roman people did not make war in any spirit of conquest but only to protect their frontiers or to *See "The Place of Philosophy and Economics in The Curriculum of a Modern University" — Macfarlane, J. B. lappincott Company, Philadelphia. 55 THE ECONOMIC INTERPRETATION preserve order and regularity in all international relations he is telling us something that un- doubtedly contains an element of truth, and he might weU have added that this sense of order in the Roman people is shown by their wonderful development along the line of jurisprudence. Here then we find the foreign policy of Rome explained in terms of the peculiar psychology of the Roman people, or if you like, in terms of their freedom to determine their own actions. When, however, this writer essays the task of explaining Roman expansion solely in terms of this one variable he is attempting the impossible, for this freedom of the will or this psychology of the Romans can only manifest itself when exerted against some restraining environment, the final re- sult of this play of forces depending on the character of this resistance quite as much as upon the peculiar psychology of the Roman people. From this it follows that any attempt to explain historical phenomena solely in terms of one or the other of these two variables must lead us into serious error because in our statement of the problem we have included only one-half of the truth. 56 OF EARLY ROMAN HISTORY Possibly the most interesting phase of all histori- cal studies is found in following the interplay of these two essential conditions of all historical movements. I have elsewhere written that in the days when European society was under the dominion of its feudal lords property was largely in land and as even the wealthier class spent most of their time on their estates the urban population was small. But with the great impulse to commerce and industry that came in with the Crusades there was a corresponding increase in urban population and what is even more important for our present purposes an ever-increasing share of the wealth of society was invested in the means of manufacture and transportation, or in the form of capital goods instead of in land, and so the bourgeoisie, the men controlling these new forms of property, grew in wealth and power.* Again it is interesting to note that so long as the great bulk of mankind were engaged in agriculture, tilling the land whose title was vested in some feudal *See the present writer's: "Primary Laws of Social Evo- lution," Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science. 57 THE ECONOMIC INTERPRETATION lord, their position was not a very hopeful one, nor one Hkely to beget in them any strong faith in their individual judgments even in matters affecting their daily toil. The results of man's labors were here largely beyond his control, being subject to vari- ations of time and season, so that no matter how assiduously or inteUigibly he might toil the results are never entirely certain. With the rise of manufactures and the growth of commerce there was a rapid increase in the number of men engaged in these new forms of industrial activity. Note, too, that time and season here play a much less important part. The results of man's efforts are more assured, a given effort being almost invariably followed by the same result. In conse- quence of this, man's confidence in his own judg- ments grew apace and no longer in isolation on remote farms he finds his confidence strengthened by association with his fellows. Ere long this confidence in his own judgment in regard to his industrial activities extends itself to the domain of political opinions and religious beliefs. "Civil and reUgious liberty" therefore is no chance bit of phrase-making, but rests upon that 58 OF EARLY ROMAN HISTORY change in the psychology of men which was effected when their industrial activities were transferred from a feudal agricultural system to an industrial and social system based upon commerce and manu- factures. Now if, as I have endeavored to show, there is a more or less definite relation between the industrial activities of a people and the changes in their psychology and political institutions, may we not avail ourselves of this fact in our attempt to in- terpret Roman history during the period in which our direct information is aU too meager and sadly mixed with tales that are mayhap but little re- moved from myth and fable? If we find for instance that under one of the Etruscan kings there was a political reorganization of the army in which men were grouped in centuries according to their wealth and not according to their lineage or holdings of land it seems quite fair to assume the existence of a wealthy and powerful trading class and so of a more or less active trade and commerce in the Rome of that day. Again, if it is true that in modern Europe liberty arose with the towns or with the growth of manufacture and commerce, is it not fair to assume that the 59 THE ECONOMIC INTERPKETATION rise of liberty in Rome was associated with a like growth in its industrial and commercial activities. Note, too, that the keen sense of the Romans for order and for the faithful performance of their contracts, upon which Professor Frank so rightly insists, indicates a psychology not usually bom in a strictly agricultural community, while their devel- opment of jurisprudence as of their Proetor Pere- grinus, or court in which strangers could be pro- tected in their rights, all suggest a civilization based upon a highly developed trade and commerce rather than upon a strictly agricultural economy. That there is some such correspondence between the industrial activities of a people and their political and other institutions cannot be seriously questioned. Is it not therefore quite legitimate to infer, in a tentative way, the commercial and trade relations of the Rome of this time, about which we know so little on direct evidence, from their political and other institutions, about which we know much more? Indeed it is dijQBcult to see how without employing some such comparative method we are to sift the truth of this early period of Roman history from the mass of fable and fiction in which it is buried. 60 OF EARLY ROMAN HISTORY In any event the employment of this method would enable us to visualize the pictures we at- tempt to draw and so save us from such absurdities as the describing of a city of 200,000 people as made up of "farmers and little else." The necessity of recognizing both the psychology of a people and the limitations of their environment in all historical studies lies so much on the face of things as to make our reference of it to the funda- mental problem of philosophy seem like a work of supererogation, but the fact that the author of "Roman Imperialism" is not alone in losing sight of this truth seemed to make necessary this refer- ence of the difficulty to the fundamental conditions of all thought. In conclusion let us express our sincere admira- tion for the intimate acquaintance with the orig- inal sources of Roman history that is evidenced throughout the entire length and breadth of Pro- fessor Frank's study, and if his devotion to the time-honored f etial institution and its mos maiorum has betrayed him into more than one inaccuracy of statement, it may be said in extenuation that this veneration for the institutions of the past is 61 THE ECONOMIC INTERPRETATION after all an amiable failing and possibly our American life would be a little fuller and richer if more of us were imbued with somewhat of this spirit. Finally, as it seems to the present writer, the defects in this volume on "Roman Imperialism" are due not so much to mere inaccuracies of statement or of logical form as to a defective metaphysic which prevents the author from recog- nizing the fundamental error in his premises. Again, his oft-repeated trying of the facts of his- tory by his unproved theory of Roman expansion is certain to weaken the influence of his work among his more serious-minded readers. 62