very persistence of a nobility was in itself a favorable
factor in establishing a better position for women. Not only did the
accumulation of wealth in the household and the persistence of
courtly manners demand respect for the _domina_ of the villa, but the
transference of noble blood and of a goodly inheritance of name and land
through the mother's hand were matters of vital importance. The nobility
of the senate moreover long controlled the foreign policy of the empire,
and as the empire grew the men were called away to foreign parts on
missions and legations. At such times, the lady in an important household
was mistress of large affairs. It has been pointed out as a significant
fact that the father of the Gracchi was engaged for long years in
ambassadorial and military duties. The training of the lads consequently
fell to the share of Cornelia, a fact which may in some measure account
for the humanitarian interests of those two brilliant reformers. The
responsibilities that fell upon the shoulders of such women must have
stimulated their keenest powers and thus won for them the high esteem
which, in this case, we know the sons accorded their mother. One does
not soon forget the scene (Cicero, _Ad Att_. XV, II) at which Brutus and
Cassius together with their wives, Porcia and Tertia, and Servilia, the
mother of Brutus, discussed momentous decisions with Cicero. When Brutus
stood wavering, Cicero avoiding the issue, and Cassius as usual losing
his temper, it was Servilia who offered the only feasible solution,
and it was her program which they adopted. Is it surprising that Greek
historians like Plutarch could never quite comprehend the part in Roman
politics played by women like Clodia, Porcia and Terentia? In sheer
despair he usually resorts to the hypotheses of some personal intrigue
for an explanation of their powerful influence.

It is in truth very likely that had Roman literature been permitted to
run its own natural course, without being overwhelmed, as was the Italian
literature of the renaissance, it would have progressed much farther on
the road to Romanticism. Apollonius was far more a restraining influence
in this respect than an inspiration. As it is, Vergil's first and fourth
books are as unthinkable in Greek dress as is the sixth. They constitute
a very conspicuous landmark in the history of literature.

Vergil does not wholly escape the powerful conventions of his Greek
predecessors: in his fourth b