|
Moreover, if the Romans had been able to receive a rule of life from
their gods, they would not have borrowed Solon's laws from the
Athenians, as they did some years after Rome was rounded; and yet
they did not keep them as they received them, but endeavored to improve
and amend them. Although Lycurgus pretended that he was authorized by
Apollo to give laws to the Lacedemonians, the sensible Romans did
not choose to believe this, and were not induced to borrow laws from
Sparta. Numa Pompilius, who succeeded Romulus in the kingdom, is
said to have framed some laws, which, however, were not sufficient
for the regulation of civic affairs. Among these regulations were many
pertaining to religious observances, and yet he is not reported to have
received even these from the gods. With respect, then, to moral
evils, evils of life and conduct, evils which are so mighty, that,
according to the wisest pagans, by them states are ruined while their
cities stand uninjured, their gods made not the smallest provision for
preserving their worshippers from these evils, but, on the contrary,
took special pains to increase them, as we have previously endeavored
to prove.
|
|