To such an extreme had luxury been carried that nothing was too sacred, nothing too costly to be enjoyed.

Digestion had become a science, courtship an art, sleep a nightmare, comfort an accomplishment, and the very act of living an industry.

Almost one may say that the gods lived only in the imagination of the ignorant and the jests of the learned.

In a growing patriciate home had become a weariness, marriage a form, children a trouble, and the decline of motherhood an alarming fact.

Augustus tried the remedy of legislation.
Henceforth marriage became a duty to the state.