Octavian (Augustus) - demonstrated his political genius by reconciling his military monarchy with republican institutions
    * by maintaining the facade of the Republic => he camouflaged his absolute power and contained senatorial opposition
- his statesmanship - inaugurated the two hundred year period - known as the pax Romana => it was a period of peace, order, efficient administration, and prosperity => this was Rome's greatest age
- the Empire was at the height of its power and prosperity => during the period of the Five Good Emperors (96 A.D. - 180 A.D.)
- during the Time of Happiness - Roman rule was constructive:
    1. public works were undertaken throughout the Empire
    2. the condition of women and slaves improved
    3. Rome constructed a world community that broke down barriers between nations, preserved and spread Greco - Roman civilization, and developed a rational system of law that applied to all humanity. This community represented a fulfillment of the trend toward universalism and cosmopolitanism that emerged during the Hellenistic Age.

- the high point of Roman cultural life was reached during the reign of Augustus
    1. Rome experienced the golden age of Latin literature ( represented by Virgil, Livy, Horace, and Tacitus)
    2. Stoicism was expounded by Epictetus and Marcus Aurelius
    3. The two greatest scientists of the Greco - Roman Age were Ptolemy and Galen. Ptolemy - mathematician, geographer, and astronomer - from Alexandria. He wrote => Almagest (13 volumes) - which summed up antiquity's knowledge of astronomy and became the authoritative text on the subject during the Middle Ages. The Ptolemaic system was based on the idea of a round, motionless earth in the center of the universe, with the sun, moon, and planets moving around it in orbits that were either circular of composed of combinations of circles. Galen - physician => his anatomical theories dominated medicine until modern times
    4. Rome's greatest legacy to the Western civilization => the law.
        2 branches: - civil law
                           - the law of nations

* the law of nations - raises the issue of natural law (which Cicero explored); jurisprudence in the modern period is greatly informed by Roman law

- Roman Culture => presents a paradox
    - on one hand => there were high standards of civilization in Roman law and literature
    - on the other hand => the Romans institutionalized brutal, bizarre, and barbaric practices in their entertainment

- During the pax Romana - signs of trouble appeared that would grow during the crisis of the crisis of the third century A.D.
    1. separatist and dissident movements existed in such areas as Egypt, Gaul, and Judea
    2. there were fundamental weaknesses in the economy
    3. Greco - Roman civilization lost its creative energies during the 2nd. C. A.D., and the values of classical humanism were challenged by a mythic - religious movement. This challenge may be traced to the failure of the Roman Empire to alleviate feelings of anxiety, impotence, and alienation that had been growing in the Mediterranean world since the decline of the polis in the 4th C. B.C.
    4. Mystery religions became popular because people felt they offered what reason, natural law, and world affairs failed to provide
    5. Philosophers like Plotinus - retreated from attempts to understand nature and human relationships, instead sought communion with a higher reality