The Butte inter mountain. [volume] (Butte, Mont.) 1901-1912, 1901-11-16

"a MOST interesting meeting OF the
IA West Side Shakespeare club was
- held Tuesday evening at the
home of Mrs. Alice Stevens. The
first act of Julius Ca asar' was read and
discussed. The following paper was read
by Mrs. A. J. Daum, anu was heartily
appreciated:
Italy, the most beautiful of European
lands, has also been the richest in men
whom the world has acknowledged as
great. Long, indeed, is the list of her
men of letters, her artists, her men of
action and her great priests. OF the
worlds six greatest poets she has pro-
duced two-Virgil and Dante And twice
at least, in ages of general confusion
ana chaos, it has fallen to Italy to pro-
vide a leader strong enough to put an
end to anarchy, and by virtue of pow
erful personality, to assert the force of
a unifying principle.
In the middle ages this principle was
the spiritual supremacy of the church,
and the man who enforced 1t was Hide
brand. the greatest of the popes. Eleven
centuries earlier julius Caesar, persona
flying the principle of intelligent govern
ment by a single man, had made it pos
sib,e for the Roman dominion, then on
the point of breaking up, to grow into
a great political union, and go eventually
to provide a material foundation for
modern civilization. 1t might seem, in
decd, at first sight as if the work done
by each of these men depended for its
vitality on their own genius, and barely
survived them. But the ideas they rep
resented and enforced continued TO gov
ern the course of history for centuries
after they had passed away; and they
IN
The influence of Italy on civilization
is in fact mainly due to the marvellous
fortunes of the city on the Tiber To the
fortunes of Rome, and to the discipline
the tenacity of purpose and the political
skill of her earliest rulers, the Italians
owe their position, as, in sense, q
chosen people. The city of Rome was
originally one of those little communi-
ties consisting of a walled town with a
small adjoining territory. When history
dawns we find the city on the Tiber in
league with the other cities of the Latin
race which lay around it, and in course
of time it won a position as their leader
ana champion. Thus this wonderful city
went forward, steadily storing up mate
rial strength; and wherever she went she
took lands from the conquered. built
fortified towns, establishing in them a
Roman or a Latin population. and con-
nectel these with herself by indestructi
ole military roads.
This wonderful growth of single city
into vast empire is without parallel
In the worlds history, and it raised prob
lens unparalleled for cOmpleXity and eX-
tent. It has been achieved partly by the
stern and steady character of the con-
Quering race, by their habits of self
denial and obedience, bred in them
through their rigid family life and reli-
giOn, and by their talent for political or
ganization; partly also by the nature OF
their constitution, which had grown in
the last two centuries into a narrow and
compact, but shrewd and Woodworking
oligarchy. The outward expression of
this Oligarchy was the senate, or Council
of Three Hundred, of which all, or nearly
all, the members had seen state service
and understood the work they had to do
In the course of the long wars this
great council had shown extraordinary
administrative ability and tenacity of
purpose. The magistrates, who We're
elected for one year only, gradually lost
their independence and willingly obeyed
the decisions of a body whose function
was in theory only to advise them. When
their year of Office expired they became
practically life members of the scr lt-
The people. theoretically sovereign, elect-
ed the magistrates from families of sea
atorial renown. and ratified laws whien
the senate approved. But the Roman
democracy was unreal zed and the SEN
atorial oligarchy was supreme.
In 1873 B. c., Tiberius Gracious. by de-
yeloping the latent power Of the people