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Updated: May 14, 2025
The rest of the people were now organised. They were called Populus, and a hundred of the noblest were chosen from among them and formed into a council. These he called Patricians, and their assembly the Senate.
Even the tribunes of the people ultimately were selected from powerful families. The Roman people Romanus populus under the kings, the original citizens, were the warriors who built Rome, and conquered the surrounding cities and districts. They supported themselves by agriculture although engaged continually in war.
Theoretically, the populus was the real sovereign by whom power was delegated; but, for several centuries, the populus meant the patricians, who alone could take part in the assemblies. The preponderating influence was exercised by the Senate. The judicial, the legislative, and the executive authority were as clearly defined as in our times.
But it is evident that other trees, shrubs, and plants of resinous or balsamic foliage, as, for example, the Populus balsamifera, Cannabis sativa, Pinus silvestris, Pinus abies, Juniperus communis, have equally, with us, the same faculty; they are favorable also for the drying of the soil, and the more completely, as their roots are spreading, more extended, and more ramified.
To these considerations we may add two important facts: that the office of bishop was for a long time the only one in the election to which the people and by this term I mean the people as a whole, not the populus of the old laws and charters had any voice whatever; and that the bishop, from his spiritual position as pastor of the flock, and from his civil position as having great legal influence in the town and being probably the only man of superior intellect interested in the internal affairs of the community, was the proper and most effectual mediator between the people and their temporal rulers.
Some people tell us indeed in many cases, especially in trade, that putting a good face upon things goes as far as the real merit of the things themselves; and that a fine, painted, gilded shop, among the rest, has a great influence upon the people, draws customers, and brings trade; and they run a great length in this discourse by satirising on the blindness and folly of mankind, and how the world are to be taken in their own way; and seeing they are to be deluded and imposed upon in such an innocent way, they ought to be so far deluded and imposed upon, alluding to the old proverbial saying, 'Si populus vult decipi, decipiatur; that it is no fraud, no crime, and can neither be against conscience, nor prudence; for if they are pleased with a show, why should they not have it? and the like.
The making false lights, sky-lights, trunks, and other contrivances, to make goods look to be what they are not, and to deceive the eye of the buyer, these are all so many brass shillings washed over, in order to deceive the person who is to take them, and cheat him of his money; and so far these false lights are really criminal, they are cheats in trade, and made to deceive the world; to make deformity look like beauty, and to varnish over deficiencies; to make goods which are ordinary in themselves appear fine; to make things which are ill made look well; in a word, they are cheats in themselves, but being legitimated by custom, are become a general practice; the honestest tradesmen have them, and make use of them; the buyer knows of it, and suffers himself to be so imposed upon; and, in a word, if it be a cheat, as no doubt it is, they tell us that yet it is a universal cheat, and nobody trades without it; so custom and usage make it lawful, and there is little to be said but this, Si populus vult decepi, decipiatur if the people will be cheated, let them be cheated, or they shall be cheated.
A cur whose very name is enough to relegate him to limbo; whose deeds are atrocities in ink, whose " "Nevertheless he is going to lift our dues. Master Mule is the people's man," the cobbler returned valiantly. "What, Mule!" cried Populus with still greater scorn. "Where has he the power? Am I not the intendant? Is it not I who alone control the dues in my own person?
This gave to the assembly the initiative of measures, which was sanctioned by a law of L. Valerius Publicola, B.C. 449. This law gave to the decrees passed by the tribes the power of a real lex, binding upon the whole people, provided it had the sanction of the Senate and the populus in the Comitia Centuriata.
"Finally," Germain went on deliberately, "you 'hold the keys of heaven and earth in Grelot, and snap your fingers at 'this new young fool of a Seigneur who is away all the time at Versailles." Master Populus seemed powerless to move or speak as he stood fiery-faced in the middle of the floor, looking despairingly at Germain, who was seated, very coolly glancing him over.
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