The next striking fact is that these associations were organized, as we shall also find them at Rome, in imitation of the constitution of the city itself. Each had its law, its assembly, its magistrates or officers (i.e. secretary, treasurer) as well as priests or priestesses, and its finance. The law regulated the conditions of admission, which involved an entrance fee and an examination ([Greek: dokimasia]) as to character; the contributions, which had to be paid by the month, and the steps to be taken to enforce payment, e.g. exclusion in case of persistent neglect of this duty; the use to be made of the revenues, such as the building or maintenance of temple or club-house, and the cost of crowns or other honours voted by the assembly to its officers. This assembly, in accordance with the law, elected its officers once a year, and these, like those of the state itself, took an oath on entering office, and gave an account of their stewardship at the end of the year. Further details on these points of internal government will be found in Foucart's work (pp. 20 foll.), chiefly derived from inscriptions of the orgeones engaged in the cult of the Mother of the Gods at the Peiraeus. The important question whether these religious associations were in any sense benefit clubs, or relieved the sick and needy, is answered by him emphatically in the negative.
As might naturally be supposed, the religious clubs increased rather than diminished in number and importance in the later periods of Greek history, and a large proportion of the inscriptions relating to them belong to the Macedonian and Roman empires. One of the most interesting, found in 1868, belongs to the 2nd century A.D., viz. that which reveals the worship of M[=e]n Tyrannos at Laurium (Foucart, pp. 119 foll.). This Phrygian deity was introduced into Attica by a Lycian slave, employed by a Roman in working the mines at Laurium. He founded the cult and the _eranos_ which was to maintain it, and seems also to have drawn up the law regulating its ritual and government. This may help us to understand the way in which similar associations of an earlier age were instituted.
_Roman._--At Rome the principle of private association was recognized very early by the state; _sodalitates_ for religious purposes are mentioned in the XII. Tables (Gaius in _Digest_, 47. 22. 4), and _collegia opificum_, or trade gilds, were believed to have been instituted by Numa, which probably means that they were regulated by the _jus divinum_ as being associated with particular worships. It is difficult to distinguish between the two words _collegium_ and _sodalitas_; but _collegium_ is the wider of the two in meaning, and may be used for associations of all kinds, public and private, while _sodalitas_ is more especially a union for the purpose of maintaining a cult. Both words indicate the permanence of the object undertaken by the association, while a _societas_ is a temporary combination without strictly permanent duties. With the _societates publicanorum_ and other contracting bodies of which money-making was the main object, we are not here concerned.