The unity of the Empire was due far more to this great economic development that began under Augustus than to the political action of the early emperors.  Little by little, imperial interests became so numerous and so considerable that Rome saw the effort necessary to keep up the unity diminish.  Everywhere, even in the most distant regions, powerful minorities formed that worked for Rome and against old separating, anti-uniting forces, against old traditions and local patriotism alike.  The wealthy classes everywhere became in a special way wholly favourable to Rome.  Therefore there is no more serious mistake than regarding the Roman Empire as the exclusive work of a government:  it was in truth created by two diverse forces, operating one after the other—­each in its own time, for both were necessary:  a force of destruction—­the state-devouring policy of Rome; a force of reconstruction—­the economic unification.  The annihilation of states, without which there would have been no economic unification, was the work of the government and the armies.  It was the politicians of the Senate that destroyed so many states by wars and diplomatic intrigues; but the economic unification was made chiefly by the infinitely little—­the peasant, the artisan, the educated man—­the nameless many, that lived and worked and passed away, leaving hardly trace or record.  These unknown that laboured, each seeking his own personal happiness, contributed to create the Empire as much as did the great statesmen and generals.  For this reason I can never regard without a certain emotion the mutilated inscriptions in the museums, chance salvage from the great shipwreck of the ancient world, that have preserved the name of some land-owner, or merchant, or physician, or freedman.  Lo! what remains of these generations of obscure workers, who were the indispensable collaborators of the great statesmen and diplomatists of Rome, and without whom the political world of Rome would have been but a gigantic enterprise of military brigandage!

The great historic merit of Augustus and of Tiberius is that they presided over the passage from the destructive to the reorganising phase with their wise, prudent, apparently inactive policy.  The transition, like all transitions, was difficult; the disintegrating forces were not yet exhausted; the upbuilding forces were still very weak; the world of the time was in unstable equilibrium, violent perturbations certainly yet possible.  Without doubt, it is hard to say what would have happened if, instead of being governed by the policy of Augustus, the world had fallen into the hands of an adventurous oligarchy like that which gathered around Alexander the Great; but we can at least affirm that the sagacity and prudence of Augustus, which twenty centuries afterward appear as inactivity, did much to avoid such disturbances, the consequences of which, in a world so exhausted, would have been grave.