est quod natura omnia animalia docuit 2;" e.g. self-preservation, the Jus Gen procreation of the species, &c. Jus Gentium is defined by Justinian as "quod naturalis ratio inter omnes homines constituit." Puffendorf defines it as ipsum jus naturale integrarum gentium negotiis et causis adplicatum. By modern writers it is reduced to the simple term jus inter gentes, that law which governs the intercourse of civilized nations with each other.
Jus Civile est quod quisque populus sibi constituit, et cujusque civitatis proprium ests. It is the law by which each independent state is go
Jus Singulare, called also Privilegium, was where any privilege was granted to a person or class of persons, contrary to the Jus commune. The will of a soldier, and the Senatusconsultum Velleianum, may be taken as examples.
Jus Feciale. The Feciales were a body of
priests said to have been established by Numa, CHAP. whose business it was to declare war, and to ratify peace with neighbouring nations. The rules and regulations established by them were called the Jus Feciale1.
Lex is defined by Papinian as commune præ- Lex. ceptum, virorum prudentium consultum: delictorum quæ sponte vel ignorantia contrahuntur coercitio: communis reipublicæ sponsi2. Laws are classed under four heads by Modestinus, Legis virtus hæc est: imperare, vetare, permittere, punire3. Lex differs from Jus as the species differs from the genus.
Lex is what was enacted by the whole body of the Roman people, assembled at the Comitia Curiata or Centuriata, at the recommendation of one of the greater magistrates.
The oldest legislative assembly of the Romans Comitia was the Comitia Curiata, divided into three tribes, the Ramnes, Tities, and Luceres, which were subdivided into thirty curiæ consisting of patrician families. Servius Tullius, the sixth king of Rome, introduced a material change U.c. 176. It became necessary to recognise the plebs as part of the populus, which was not the case in the Comitia Curiata. He established the census1, and arranged the citizens when assembled for legislative purposes according to their order when on military service, that is, according to their property. This arrangement considered the whole state as forming a regular army, and it consisted of 195 centuries, thence called the Comitia Centuriata, which con- Centuriata. tinued to be the form of the legislative body until its functions were suspended and finally extinguished by the emperors5.
The Comitia Centuriata met in the Campus Martius. The consul presided, and put the question to the people when the moment for voting
1 Colq. I. 287.
2 D. I. 3. I.
5 Colq. 25.
3 D. I. 3. 7.
BOOK came; hence Lex is said to be quam populus Romanus constituit superiore magistratu rogante'.
The institution of the tribunes and the Comitia Tributa date from the year U.c. 260. The plebs then acquired the right of holding their own comitia, Lex Hora- and of passing laws by the Lex Horatia obligatory only upon themselves. This assembly was summoned by the tribune who presided; it did not meet in the Campus Martius, but generally in the Flaminian Circus. The laws passed by the plebs were called Plebiscita, i.e. quæ plebs plebeio magistratu interrogante, veluti tribuno constituebat. So long as a plebiscitum bound only the plebs it dif fered from a lex, but in the year u.c. 468,3 when Lex Hor the Lex Hortensia was passed, the patricians were compelled to acknowledge the obligatory force of the plebiscita, and from this time they were in fact leges. The Lex Aquilia, Falcidia, Voconia, and many others, were plebiscites.
Mode of passing a Lex.
In passing a Lex the proceedings observed were as follows:
First, it was drawn up in writing.
Secondly, permission to lay it before the populus was asked of the senate. If this were granted, Thirdly, it was published by being fixed up in some public place during trinundinum, three market days, that the voters might be made acquainted with its provisions.
Fourthly, due publication being made, a herald ascended the rostrum in the Campus Martius, and Recitatio. made the recitatio, i.e. he