ooperation in the election
of king pertained to the burgesses only after his nomination; -de
jure- the kingly office was based on the permanent college of the
Fathers (-patres-), which by means of the interim holder of the
power installed the new king for life. Thus "the august blessing
of the gods, under which renowned Rome was founded," was transmitted
from its first regal recipient in constant succession to those that
followed him, and the unity of the state was preserved unchanged
notwithstanding the personal change of the holders of power.

This unity of the Roman people, represented in the field of
religion by the Roman Diovis, was in the field of law represented
by the prince, and therefore his costume was the same as that of
the supreme god; the chariot even in the city, where every one else
went on foot, the ivory sceptre with the eagle, the vermilion-painted
face, the chaplet of oaken leaves in gold, belonged alike to the
Roman god and to the Roman king. It would be a great error, however,
to regard the Roman constitution on that account as a theocracy:
among the Italians the ideas of god and king never faded away into
each other, as they did in Egypt and the East. The king was not
the god of the people; it were much more correct to designate him as
the proprietor of the state. Accordingly the Romans knew nothing
of special divine grace granted to a particular family, or of
any other sort of mystical charm by which a king should be made
of different stuff from other men: noble descent and relationship
with earlier rulers were recommendations, but were not necessary
conditions; the office might be lawfully filled by any Roman come
to years of discretion and sound in body and mind.(4) The king
was thus simply an ordinary burgess, whom merit or fortune, and
the primary necessity of having one as master in every house, had
placed as master over his equals--a husbandman set over husbandmen,
a warrior set over warriors. As the son absolutely obeyed his father
and yet did not esteem himself inferior, so the burgess submitted
to his ruler without precisely accounting him his better. This
constituted the moral and practical limitation of the regal power.
The king might, it is true, do much that was inconsistent with equity
without exactly breaking the law of the land: he might diminish his
fellow-combatants' share of the spoil; he might impose exorbitant
task-works or otherwise by his imposts unreasonably encro