I should hardly have thought it necessary to devote a chapter of my book to the religion of a pagan, had I not, while studying Cicero's life, found that I was not dealing¹ with a pagan's mind. The mind of the Roman who so lived as to cause his life to be written in after-times was at this period, in most instances, nearly a blank as to any ideas of a God. Horace is one who in his writing speaks much of himself. Ovid does so still more constantly. They are both full of allusions² to "the gods." They are both aware that it is a good thing to speak with respect of the national worship, and that the orders of the Emperor will be best obeyed by believers. "Dis te minorem quod geris, imperas," says Horace, when, in obedience⁴ probably to Augustus, he tells his fellow-citizens that they are forgetting their duties in their unwillingness⁵ to pay for the repairs of the temples. "Superi, quorum⁶ sumus omnia," says Ovid, thinking it well to show in one of his writings, which he sent home from his banishment⁷, that he still entertained the fashionable creed⁸. But they did not believe. It was at that time the fashion to pretend a light belief, in order that those below might live as though they believed, and might induce an absolute belief in the women and the children. It was not well that the temple of the gods should fall into ruins. It was not well that the augurs⁹, who were gentlemen of high family, should go for nothing. C?sar himself was the high-priest, and thought much of the position, but he certainly was bound by no priestcraft. A religious belief was not expected from a322 gentleman. Religious ceremonies had gradually sunk so low in the world's esteem¹⁰ that the Roman nobility had come to think of their gods as things to swear by, or things to amuse them, or things from which, if times were bad with them, some doubtful assistance might perchance come. In dealing with ordinary pagans of those days religion may be laid altogether on one side. I remember no passage in Livy or Tacitus indicating a religious belief.

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