The Roman also carried his business principles into his religion. His prayer or sacrifice was a contract to make the god such and such return for such and such favors, and when properly uttered it was a contract binding upon both parties; the amount given the god was considered a fair exchange. It was this principle of ex change that led to the fulfilling of so many vota, "vows"—promises of offerings to the gods for favors to be received. Among no other people do we find this form of religious service carried so far.
If all these minute conditions were met and everything performed with absolute conformity to the letter of the law, the Roman believed his prayer or sacrifice had power enough to compel the desired answer; there were prayers, he thought, of power enough to bring Jupiter him self down from heaven. Nutna had done it; Tullius Hostillius had tried it, but by a slip in the form had brought the lightning down upon his own head. As to the state of mind and heart with which the Roman was to approach his god, that played no part in his religion. The most re ligious Roman was the one who observed most diligently the rites and ceremonies prescribed by the Roman state. And that is what the Latin religio, "religion," means. "a re-selecting," "pains taking repetition" of the prescribed forms and rites; of the same root is dihgens, diligently, "ex actness," "painstaking." The same complex and minute ritual regu lated the sacrifices; particular animals of specified color. age, and sex were prescribed for the vari ous sacrifices of blood. But if the animal speci fied could not conveniently be found, the sacrifice of a waxen image of it satisfied the letter of the law. Human sacrifices were not uncommon in the earlier times, and were not unknown in the last days of the Republic, though this horror had been displaced by the symbolic sacrifice of human images, which satisfied the letter of the law.
On the whole, the religion of Rome was formal tional and religious, was evidently Sabine. Tar quin's was Grxco-Etruscan or genuinely Greek. From the Grxen-Etruscan source sprang some forms of divination, the Roman Games, the first rude temples and statues ; while the genuinely Greek elements were the introduction of art and of the Syhilline Books, written in Greek and brought from the Greek city of Cumae. Herewith was planted in the soil of Rome's religion new seed that was to take possession of the entire field. These Greek oracles found a place in the
new temple of Capitoline Jupiter; the two chief men in the college that had charge of them were native Greeks; and they were consulted by the state in times of great distress, when Rome's own religion could afford no hope and no salvation. The oracles they gave generally brought relief only through the establishment of new cults or new forms, and these, of course, were invariably Hellenic. The Sybils were priestesses and proph etesses of Apollo. Very naturally, therefore, and cold; it suggested more fears than hopes—less still of love either from or towards its gods; while omens to be averted were everywhere: And yet this religion had its happy side—its games and its many happy festivals, with sacrifices, music, and dancing. Though originally only sixty-five in number, there were at the beginning of the em pire even more "holy days" (some two hundred in all) than in the "orthodox" calendar, with feasts and sacrifices, to make the idle Roman happy.
(6) Foreign Influences. The essence of the first religion of Italy was the inheritance from Indo-Germanic times. The Latins, Sabines, etc., as sister tribes, had religiously much in common; and as they all became more and more united with Rome, many compromises were necessarily made in points where their religious develop ment had varied. Nunia's legislation, constitu the first oracle of the newly acquired Books brought to Rome the worship of Apollo Pocan, the Healer of body, mind and soul, with all his Hellenizing influences. Then came Ceres, Liber and Libero. f. e., Demeter, Dionysus and Perse phone, whose temple was the first built in Rome by Greek architects, and whose cultus was wholly Greek; then came also Asclepius with his ser pent from Epidaurus, and Cybele, in her Hellen ized form, from Pessinus. More Greek temples and temple statues, the gods in idealized human form, followed as a matter of course.
Of Oriental and Egyptian cults that came no mention need be made. They were always "for eign" cults, of which Rome was very tolerant as long as they caused no conflicts with established forms and ceremonies. Indeed, whenever Rome took in a conquered people, she took not only its goods, but its gods as well.