ABSTRACT
The attitude of the Roman government both under the Republic and under the empire was a tolerance such as might be expected in a world which hardly knew what intolerance meant. Plots and executions of the Republican nobility varied according as the character of the emperor rendered them more or less common. The official relations between emperor and Senate varied according to the whim of the emperor of the moment. Under the Republic, the nomination and recommendation of candidates had always been the rule; and it will be easily understood that a candidate nominated or recommended by the emperor was not likely to be opposed. North-west Greece was made into a free state under Nicopolis, the town Augustus had founded in commemoration of the victory of Actium. For the first century and a half of the Principate, the Greeks enjoyed a fussy local life varied by the visits of Nero with his concert party and of that inveterate tourist Hadrian.
