which was the preferable condition, of those societies which had issued
from, or those which had been received into, the bosom of Rome. [33] The
right of Latium, as it was called, [331] conferred on the cities to which
it had been granted, a more partial favor. The magistrates only, at the
expiration of their office, assumed the quality of Roman citizens; but
as those offices were annual, in a few years they circulated round the
principal families. [34] Those of the provincials who were permitted to
bear arms in the legions; [35] those who exercised any civil employment;
all, in a word, who performed any public service, or displayed any
personal talents, were rewarded with a present, whose value was
continually diminished by the increasing liberality of the emperors. Yet
even, in the age of the Antonines, when the freedom of the city had
been bestowed on the greater number of their subjects, it was still
accompanied with very solid advantages. The bulk of the people acquired,
with that title, the benefit of the Roman laws, particularly in the
interesting articles of marriage, testaments, and inheritances; and the
road of fortune was open to those whose pretensions were seconded by
favor or merit. The grandsons of the Gauls, who had besieged Julius
Caesar in Alcsia, commanded legions, governed provinces, and were
admitted into the senate of Rome. [36] Their ambition, instead of
disturbing the tranquillity of the state, was intimately connected with
its safety and greatness.

[Footnote 30: Seneca in Consolat. ad Helviam, c. 6.]

[Footnote 31: Memnon apud Photium, (c. 33,) [c. 224, p. 231, ed Bekker.]
Valer. Maxim. ix. 2. Plutarch and Dion Cassius swell the massacre to
150,000 citizens; but I should esteem the smaller number to be more than
sufficient.]

[Footnote 32: Twenty-five colonies were settled in Spain, (see Plin.
Hist. Nat. iii. 3, 4; iv. 35;) and nine in Britain, of which London,
Colchester, Lincoln, Chester, Gloucester, and Bath still remain
considerable cities. (See Richard of Cirencester, p. 36, and Whittaker's
History of Manchester, l. i. c. 3.)]

[Footnote 33: Aul. Gel. Noctes Atticae, xvi 13. The Emperor Hadrian
expressed his surprise, that the cities of Utica, Gades, and Italica,
which already enjoyed the rights of Municipia, should solicit the title
of colonies. Their example, however, became fashionable, and the empire
was filled with honorary colonies. See Spanheim, de Usu Numismatum
Dissertat. xi