the islands of the Ægean sea, of which the
inhabitants seem at that time to have been
pretty much in the same state as those of Sicily
and Italy. The mother city, though she
considered the colony as a child, at all times
entitled to great favour and assistance, and
owing in return much gratitude and respect,
yet considered it as an emancipated child,
over whom she pretended to claim no direct
authority or jurisdiction. The colony settled
its own form of government, enacted its own
laws, elected its own magistrates, and made
peace or war with its neighbours, as an independent
state, which had no occasion to wait
for the approbation or consent of the mother
city. Nothing can be more plain and distinct
than the interest which directed every such
establishment.
Rome, like most of the other ancient republics,
was originally founded upon an agrarian
law, which divided the public territory,
in a certain proportion, among the different
citizens who composed the state. The course
of human affairs, by marriage, by succession,
and by alienation, necessarily deranged this
original division, and frequently threw the
lands which had been allotted for the maintenance
of many different families, into the
possession of a single person. To remedy
this disorder, for such it was supposed to be,
a law was made, restricting the quantity of
land which any citizen could possess to five
hundred jugera, about 350 English acres.
This law, however, though we read of its
having been executed upon one or two occasions,
was either neglected or evaded, and the
inequality of fortunes went on continually increasing.
The greater part of the citizens
had no land; and without it the manners and
customs of those times rendered it difficult for
a freeman to maintain his independency. In
the present times, though a poor man has no
land of his own, if he has a little stock, he
may either farm the lands of another, or he
may carry on some little retail trade; and if
he has no stock, he may find employment
either as a country labourer, or as an artificer.
But among the ancient Romans, the lands of
the rich were all cultivated by slaves, who
wrought under an overseer, who was likewise
a slave; so that a poor freeman had little
chance of being employed either as a farmer
or as a labourer. All trades and manufactures,
too, even the retail trade, were carried
on by the slaves of the rich for the benefit of
their masters, whose wealth, authority, and
protection, made it difficult for a poor freeman
to maintain the competition against them.
The citizens, therefore, who had no land, had
scarce any other means of subsistence but the
bounties of the candidates at the annual elections.
The tribunes, when they had a mind
to animate the people against the rich and the
great, put them in mind of the ancient divisions
of lands, and represented that law which
restricted this sort of private property as the
fundamental law of the republic. The people
became clamorous to get land, and the rich
and the great, we may believe, were perfectly
determined not to give them any part of theirs.
To satisfy them in some measure, therefore,
they frequently proposed to send out a new
colony. But conquering Rome was, even
upon such occasions, under no necessity of
turning out her citizens to seek their fortune,
if one may so, through the wide world, without
knowing where they were to settle. She
assigned them lands generally in the conquered
provinces of Italy, where, being within the
dominions of the republic, they could never
form any independent state, but were at best
but a sort of corporation, which, though it had
the power of enacting bye-laws for its own
government, was at all times subject to the
correction, jurisdiction, and legislative authority
of the mother city. The sending out a
colony of this kind not only gave some satisfaction
to the people, but often established a
sort of garrison, too, in a newly conquered
province, of which the obedience might otherwise
have been doubtful. A Roman colony,
therefore, whether we consider the nature of
the establishment itself, or the motives for
making it, was altogether different from a
Greek one. The words, accordingly, which
in the original languages denote those different
establishments, have very different meanings.
The Latin word (colonia) signifies simply
a plantation. The Greek word (αποικια),
on the contrary, signifies a separation of dwelling,
a departure from home, a going out of
the house. But though the Roman colonies
were, in many respects, different from the
Greek ones, the interest which prompted to
establish them was equally plain and distinct.
Both institutions derived their origin, either
from irresistible necessity, or from clear and
evident utility.
The establishment of the European colonies
in America and the West Indies arose
from no necessity; and though the utility
which has resulted from them has been very
great, it is not altogether so clear and evident.
It was not understood at their first establishment,
and was not the motive, either of that
establishment, or of the discoveries which gave
occasion to it; and the nature, extent, and limits
of that utility, are not, perhaps, well understood
at this day.
The Venetians, during the fourteenth and
fifteenth centuries, carried on a very advantageous
commerce in spiceries and other East
India goods, which they distributed among
the other nations of Europe. They purchased
them chiefly in Egypt, at that time under the
dominion of the Mamelukes, the enemies of
the Turks, of whom the Venetians were the
enemies: and this union of interest, assisted by