Nor may we entirely pass by one feature of this system in its nature highly conservative-the Roman Senate. The wisest men in the nation were embraced in this legislative body. No means were spared to render it the most august tribunal on earth, and, except the Areopagus, it actually stood unrivalled among the ancients. The nobleness of this body was greatly promoted by the singular power conferred upon the Censors. These were constituted the guardians of the public morals, and no class of men were exempt from the tremendous power of their sentences. A very peculiar fact concerning this office is, that during the four hundred years of its existence it was occupied by men, with few exceptions, distinguished for their probity, intelligence, love of law, and morality. To such men, elected not because they might be Plebeians or Patricians, but because they were the best men in the nation, was committed the guardianship of the Senate. At the end of every fifth year this high officer was privileged to expel any Senator judged by him to be unworthy of membership. In the hands of men of whom great Cato stands the noblest representative, we may well infer that the Roman Senate, in its days of glory, was one of the noblest assemblages ever seen. The Roman aspiring to become a Senator must pass his probation in civil and military life, and possess a character so unblemished that the Catos of Rome could not prohibit the honor. Gravity, wisdom, moderation, piety to the gods, characterized their movements, and the majority of them wore the most splendid of ornaments, the crown of honorable gray hairs.

No

Such was the assembly which wielded an immense influence on the destinies of Rome. Cicero called it "Ordo amplissimus et sanctissimus; summum Populi Romani, populorumque et gentium omnium ac Regum consilium." wonder that Cinneas, the ambassador of Pyrrhus, after beholding this magnificent and venerable body, exclaimed to his master, "that the Roman Senate seemed to him an assembly of kings." No wonder that Brennus and his savage Gauls, entering the Senate-chamber, mistook the venerable Senators for the gods of the city, and regarded them with

reverence, until the kinglike rebuke of an insulted Senator kindled the passions of the barbarians, and gave up the city to the unmitigated horrors of sword and fire.

But in this luxuriant field there is danger of satiety, and enthusiasm must be checked. And yet, who can traverse this field without drinking in the inspiration of the past, and standing by the side of the noble, the unforgotten, the living dead? Cincinnatus and Fabius, Fabricius and Cato, of loftier nobility than kings can confer, awake our admiration, and compel our praise. Regulus still lives, the hero of patriotism. Brutus and Manlius vindicating the law, whilst its wheels crush their own sons, can never die. Terrible-visaged Marius, and noble Scipio, with an hundred others, start up before us, like the living realities of the present, and extort from us exclamations of delighted wonder! They were the great sons of a stern mother. From her they derived a countenance cold as the frown of justice, a step and carriage haughty as the tread of power, a courage unquailing as the onward rush of a thunder-cloud, a love of law which spurned the movings of pity, and which rent asunder the cords of natural affection.

Rome reached her zenith about the time Carthage and Corinth were overthrown, and the great principle running throughout her entire history, is, the binding power of law. This was the moving energy of the nation from Romulus to Cicero, and in this respect Rome stands unrivalled. In this consisted her true sublimity, her proudest glory, her mightiest energy. In this consisted the real experiment she was destined to make in the science of human government. As the inspired statuary wrought into perfection this gigantic figure, erecting it proudly among the nations, the representative of legal power, a figure whose mighty proportions excited within the mind, not so much emotions of beauty as of power, for ages he fancied this to be the realized ideal, perfection in government. The perfect, yet lifeless beauty of its predecessor arrested the beholder's attention, but in this, though not destitute of symmetry, the gigantic frame, the hardened mus

cle and brawn which fleshed that frame, its proud step, its unquailing courage, its tremendous strength, these riveted attention and compelled homage. Whilst the earth trembled before it, it seemed a being of real life, and its energy the inspiration of heaven. But it was not a being of real life. Its power was that of a mighty automaton, driven on by an energetic, yet perishable principle, which so nearly resembled the principle of immortality that the nations were deceived. For ages it stood the sublime image of perfection; the world admired and were duped. But when ages had passed away, its earth-born nature was disclosed. It began to stoop with decrepitude, its matchless energy waned, its stern frown gave way to an imbecile stare, and when the barbarian smote it, it fell. The power of law was not sufficient to save it from destruction, and many centuries since, the history of this long and momentous experiment was completed. It was a failure.

"Rome Rome imperial, bows her to the storm,
In the same dust and blackness, and we pass
The skeleton of her Titanic form."

"Come and see

The cypress,
hear the owl, and plod your way
O'er steps of broken thrones and temples, Ye!
Whose agonies are evils of a day-

A world is at our feet, as fragile as our clay.
The Niobe of nations! there she stands
Childless and crownless in her voiceless woe;
An empty urn within her withered hands,
Whose holy dust was scattered long ago;
The Scipios' tomb contains no ashes now;
The very sepulchres lie tenantless

Of their heroic dwellers."

We have thus traced the history of two grand experiments in government. The first system was beautiful, but lifeless. Such symmetrical beauty in government is one grand requisite, and for this reason this gorgeous beauty did not sweep over the stage of life, a vain display. It accomplished its destined part, it evolved and demonstrated its important principle

and then perished. The second experiment combined much symmetry with a new feature of an important nature, the power of law. This was a marked advance upon the former. A wreath of flowers may be exquisitely beautiful, but can it restrain the frantic struggles of a madman? A glass palace, bedizzened with gold and bestudded with gems, may be exceedingly beautiful, but can it sustain the furious bombardment of a besieging army? Thus in government, mere beauty is not sufficient of itself to secure perpetuity. The boisterous heavings of human passion, and the terrific tempests of human selfishness, sooner or later defy and overleap such restraint. The addition, then, of the element of legal power, whose stern energies should restrain within defined boundaries, at least, the outward manifestations of human passion and selfishness, was a noble stride toward perfection. And we do not wonder that a government based upon this principle so long stood firm, giving hope of deathless perpetuity. It was like its own Coliseum, with its massive foundations, its stupendous columns, its vast capaciousness, the grandeur of whose ruins even now astonish the beholder.

"While stands the Coliseum, Rome shall stand,
When falls the Coliseum, Rome shall fall;
And when Rome falls-the World!"

The feelings of mankind are well expressed in this metrical version of an old prophecy. The Coliseum is now in ruins. Rome also is in ruins, but the World is not in ruins. The grand experiment has not yet been consummated, the sublime evolutions of ages have not yet reached their completion, and till this be true, great nature will calmly move forward in her simple and majestic operations.

And here we may notice one particular in which the figure of the statuary fails, when applied to these governmental experiments. It is in this; for many ages these systems were moving along parallel with each other, and not successively. Thus when Grecian Democracy perished, the Roman power was nearly at its zenith. Of course the real value of the

results in each case is not affected, since to all intents the two nations were isolated. We now enter upon an examination of the last experiment, which, for want of a more appropriate phrase, we choose to denominate Christian Republicanism.

And here we would not fall into some common mistakes about the perfectibility of human government. It has already been remarked that the higher the mind soars, and the loftier its aspirations after its ideal perfection, the more deeply will it realize that this is found only in God. From the very nature of the case, this absolute perfection cannot be attained by creatures imperfect in knowledge and virtue. It seems an axiom, that knowledge commensurate with omniscience, and virtue pure as that enthroned in the heart of Deity, are essential to such a quality as absolute perfection. When perfection in government is mentioned, it is in a qualified and relative sense. The absolute perfection belongs only to that mighty sovereignty whose "flaming boundaries" encircle an infinity of worlds.

This last experiment belongs not to a single nation; it does not reach its perfection in a single age. Its constituent elements belong to man; they are the offspring of centuries, and all nations, directly or indirectly, have contributed to their evolution. These combined into a perfect, glorious, immortal whole, is the realized perfection in government. This experiment, in different forms, and by diverse processes, has been progressing ever since the formation of nations. According to the analogy of divine operations, ages were occupied in preparing mankind for a demonstration reaching onward through thousands of years. Sixteen centuries were employed in solving the problem of what men would be, given up to the unchecked control of vice. Then came the awful result in the whirlwind rush of tempests, the gathering fury of oceans, in an earth rent asunder, disgorging its fountains of wrath, in the stifled wail of a drowning race, whilst the Ark, with its sole representative of virtue, rode sublimely over a sepulchred world. The path of national as well as individual virtue