Subject: Volume 1 | History Of The Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire
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History of the Decline and Fall of
the Roman Empire
by
Edward Gibbon, Esq.

With Notes
by
H. H. Milman

Vol. I

1782 (original), 1845 (revised)

Preface
by the Editor

Preface
of the Author

Preface
to the First Volume

Preface
to the Fourth Volume of the Original Quarto Edition

I.

The
Extent of the Empire in the Age of the Antonines

II.

The
Internal Prosperity in the Age of the Antonines

III.

The
Constitution in the Age of the Antonines

IV.

The
Cruelty, Follies, and Murder of Commodus

V.

Sale
of the Empire to Didius Julianus

VI.

Death
of Severus, Tyranny of Caracalla, Usurpation of
Macrinus

VII.

Tyranny
of Maximin, Rebellion, Civil Wars, Death of Maximin

VIII.

State
of Persia and Restoration of the Monarchy

IX.

State
of Germany Until the Barbarians

X.

Emperors
Decius, Gallus, Aemilianus, Valerian and Gallienus

XI.

Reign
of Claudius, Defeat of the Goths

XII.

Reigns
of Tacitus, Probus, Carus and His Sons

XIII.

Reign
of Diocletian and His Three Associates

XIV.

Six
Emperors at the Same Time, Reunion of the Empire

XV.

Progress
of the Christian Religion

Introduction

Preface by the
Editor

The great
work of Gibbon is indispensable to the student of history. The literature of
Europe offers no substitute for "The
Decline and Fall of the Roman
Empire."
It has obtained undisputed possession, as rightful occupant, of the vast period
which it comprehends. However some subjects, which it embraces, may have
undergone more complete investigation, on the general view of the whole period,
this history is the sole undisputed authority to which all defer, and from which
few appeal to the original writers, or to more modern compilers. The inherent
interest of the subject, the inexhaustible labor employed upon it; the immense
condensation of matter; the luminous arrangement; the general accuracy; the
style, which, however monotonous from its uniform stateliness, and sometimes
wearisome from its elaborate ar., is throughout vigorous, animated, often
picturesque always commands attention, always conveys its meaning with emphatic
energy, describes with singular breadth and fidelity, and generalizes with
unrivalled felicity of expression; all these high qualifications have secured,
and seem likely to secure, its permanent place in historic
literature.

This vast
design of Gibbon, the magnificent whole into which he has cast the decay and
ruin of the ancient civilization, the formation and birth of the new order of
things, will of itself, independent of the laborious execution of his immense
plan, render "The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire" an unapproachable
subject to the future historian[1]:
in the eloquent language of his recent French editor, M. Guizot:
-

"The
gradual decline of the most extraordinary dominion which has ever invaded and
oppressed the world; the fall of that immense empire, erected on the ruins of so
many kingdoms, republics, and states both barbarous and civilized; and forming
in its turn, by its dismemberment, a multitude of states, republics, and
kingdoms; the annihilation of the religion of Greece and Rome; the birth and the
progress of the two new religions which have shared the most beautiful regions
of the earth; the decrepitude of the ancient world, the spectacle of its
expiring glory and degenerate manners; the infancy of the modern world, the
picture of its first progress, of the new direction given to the mind and
character of man - such a subject must necessarily fix the attention and excite
the interest of men, who cannot behold with indifference those memorable epochs,
during which, in the fine language of Corneille -

'Un grand
destin commence, un grand destin s'acheve.'" This
extent and harmony of design is unquestionably that which distinguishes the work
of Gibbon from all other great historical compositions. He has first bridged the
abyss between ancient and modern times, and connected together the two great
worlds of history. The great advantage which the classical historians possess
over those of modern times is in unity of plan, of course greatly facilitated by
the narrower sphere to which their researches were confined. Except Herodotus,
the great historians of Greece - we exclude the more modern
compilers, like Diodorus Siculus - limited themselves to a single period, or at
'east to the contracted sphere of Grecian affairs. As far as the Barbarians
trespassed within the Grecian boundary, or were necessarily mingled up with
Grecian politics, they were admitted into the pale of Grecian history; but to
Thucydides and to Xenophon, excepting in the Persian inroad of the latter,
Greece was the world. Natural unity
confined their narrative almost to chronological order,
the episodes were of rare occurrence and extremely brief. To the Roman
historians the course was equally clear and defined. Rome was their centre of
unity; and the uniformity with which the circle of the Roman dominion spread
around, the regularity with which their civil polity expanded, forced, as it
were, upon the Roman historian that plan which Polybius announces as the subject
of his history, the means and the manner by which the whole world became subject
to the Roman sway. How different the complicated politics of the European
kingdoms! Every national history, to be complete, must, in a certain sense, be
the history of Europe; there is no knowing to how remote a quarter it may be
necessary to trace our most domestic events; from a country, how apparently
disconnected, may originate the impulse which gives its direction to the whole
course of affairs.

In
imitation of his classical models, Gibbon places Rome as the cardinal point from
which his inquiries diverge, and to which they bear constant reference; yet how
immeasurable the space over which those inquiries range; how complicated, how
confused, how apparently inextricable the causes which tend to the decline of
the Roman empire! how countless the nations which swarm forth, in mingling and
indistinct hordes, constantly changing the geographical limits - incessantly
confounding the natural boundaries! At first sight, the whole period, the whole
state of the world, seems to offer no more secure footing to an historical
adventurer than the chaos of Milton - to be in a state of irreclaimable
disorder, best described in the language of the poet: -- "A dark, Illimitable
ocean, without bound, Without dimension, where length, breadth, and height, And
time, and place, are lost: where eldest Night And Chaos, ancestors of Nature,
hold Eternal anarchy, amidst the noise Of endless wars, and by confusion
stand."

We feel
that the unity and harmony of narrative, which shall comprehend this period of
social disorganization, must be ascribed entirely to the skill and luminous
disposition of the historian. It is in this sublime Gothic architecture of his
work, in which the boundless range, the infinite variety, the, at first sight,
incongruous gorgeousness of the separate parts, nevertheless are all subordinate
to one main and predominant idea, that Gibbon is unrivalled. We cannot but
admire the manner in which he masses his materials, and arranges his facts in
successive groups, not according to chronological order, but to their moral or
political connection; the distinctness with which he marks his periods of
gradually increasing decay; and the skill with which, though advancing on
separate parallels of history, he shows the common tendency of the slower or
more rapid religious or civil innovations. However these principles of
composition may demand more than ordinary attention on the part of the reader,
they can alone impress upon the memory the real course, and the relative
importance of the events. Whoever would justly appreciate the superiority of
Gibbon's lucid arrangement, should attempt to make his way through the regular
but wearisome annals of Tillemont, or even the less ponderous volumes of Le
Beau. Both these writers adhere, almost entirely, to chronological order; the
consequence is, that we are twenty times called upon to break off, and resume
the thread of six or eight wars in different parts of the empire; to suspend the
operations of a military expedition for a court intrigue; to hurry away from a
siege to a council; and the same page places us in the middle of a campaign
against the barbarians, and in the depths of the Monophysite controversy. In
Gibbon it is not always easy to bear in mind the exact dates but the course of
events is ever clear and distinct; like a skilful general, though his troops
advance from the most remote and opposite quarters, they are constantly bearing
down and concentrating themselves on one point - that which is still occupied by
the name, and by the waning power of Rome. Whether he traces the progress of
hostile religions, or leads from the shores of the Baltic, or the verge of the
Chinese empire, the successive hosts of barbarians - though one wave has hardly
burst and discharged itself, before another swells up and approaches - all is
made to flow in the same direction, and the impression which each makes upon the
tottering fabric of the Roman greatness, connects their distant movements, and
measures the relative importance assigned to them in the panoramic history. The
more peaceful and didactic episodes on the development of the Roman law, or even
on the details of ecclesiastical history, interpose themselves as resting-places
or divisions between the periods of barbaric invasion. In short, though
distracted first by the two capitals, and afterwards by the formal partition of
the empire, the extraordinary felicity of arrangement maintains an order and a
regular progression. As our horizon expands to reveal to us the gathering
tempests which are forming far beyond the boundaries of the civilized world - as
we follow their successive approach to the trembling frontier - the compressed
and receding line is still distinctly visible; though gradually dismembered and
the broken fragments assuming the form of regular states and kingdoms, the real
relation of those kingdoms to the empire is maintained and defined; and even
when the Roman dominion has shrunk into little more than the province of Thrace
- when the name of Rome, confined, in Italy, to the walls of the city - yet it
is still the memory, the shade of the Roman greatness, which extends over the
wide sphere into which the historian expands his later narrative; the whole
blends into the unity, and is manifestly essential to the double catastrophe of
his tragic drama.

But the
amplitude, the magnificence, or the harmony of design, are, though imposing, yet
unworthy claims on our admiration, unless the details are filled up with
correctness and accuracy. No writer has been more severely tried on this point
than Gibbon. He has undergone the triple scrutiny of theological zeal quickened
by just resentment, of literary emulation, and of that mean and invidious vanity
which delights in detecting errors in writers of established fame. On the result
of the trial, we may be permitted to summon competent witnesses before we
deliver our own judgment.

M. Guizot,
in his preface, after stating that in France and Germany, as well as in England,
in the most enlightened countries of Europe, Gibbon is constantly cited as an
authority, thus proceeds: -

"I have
had occasion, during my labors, to consult the writings of philosophers, who
have treated on the finances of the Roman empire; of scholars, who have
investigated the chronology; of theologians, who have searched the depths of
ecclesiastical history; of writers on law, who have studied with care the Roman
jurisprudence; of Orientalists, who have occupied themselves with the Arabians
and the Koran; of modern historians, who have entered upon extensive researches
touching the crusades and their influence; each of these writers has remarked
and pointed out, in the 'History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire,'
some negligences, some false or imperfect views some omissions, which it is
impossible not to suppose voluntary; they have rectified some facts combated
with advantage some assertions; but in general they have taken the researches
and the ideas of Gibbon, as points of departure, or as proofs of the researches
or of the new opinions which they have advanced."

M. Guizot
goes on to state his own impressions on reading Gibbon's history, and no
authority will have greater weight with those to whom the extent and accuracy of
his historical researches are known: -

"After a
first rapid perusal, which allowed me to feel nothing but the interest of a
narrative, always animated, and, notwithstanding its extent and the variety of
objects which it makes to pass before the view, always perspicuous, I entered
upon a minute examination of the details of which it was composed; and the
opinion which I then formed was, I confess, singularly severe. I discovered, in
certain chapters, errors which appeared to me sufficiently important and
numerous to make me believe that they had been written with extreme negligence;
in others, I was struck with a certain tinge of partiality and prejudice, which
imparted to the exposition of the facts that want of truth and justice, which
the English express by their happy term misrepresentation. Some imperfect
(tronquees) quotations; some passages, omitted unintentionally or designedly
cast a suspicion on the honesty (bonne foi) of the author; and his violation of
the first law of history - increased to my eye by the prolonged attention with
which I occupied myself with every phrase, every note, every reflection - caused
me to form upon the whole work, a judgment far too rigorous. After having
finished my labors, I allowed some time to elapse before I reviewed the whole. A
second attentive and regular perusal of the entire work, of the notes of the
author, and of those which I had thought it right to subjoin, showed me how much
I had exaggerated the importance of the reproaches which Gibbon really deserved;
I was struck with the same errors, the same partiality on certain subjects; but
I had been far from doing adequate justice to the immensity of his researches,
the variety of his knowledge, and above all, to that truly philosophical
discrimination (justesse d'esprit) which judges the past as it would judge the
present; which does not permit itself to be blinded by the clouds which time
gathers around the dead, and which prevent us from seeing that, under the toga,
as under the modern dress, in the senate as in our councils, men were what they
still are, and that events took place eighteen centuries ago, as they take place
in our days. I then felt that his book, in spite of its faults, will always be a
noble work - and that we may correct his errors and combat his prejudices,
without ceasing to admit that few men have combined, if we are not to say in so
high a degree, at least in a manner so complete, and so well regulated, the
necessary qualifications for a writer of history."

The
present editor has followed the track of Gibbon through many parts of his work;
he has read his authorities with constant reference to his pages, and must
pronounce his deliberate judgment, in terms of the highest admiration as to his
general accuracy. Many of his seeming errors are almost inevitable from the
close condensation of his matter. From the immense range of his history, it was
sometimes necessary to compress into a single sentence, a whole vague and
diffuse page of a Byzantine chronicler. Perhaps something of importance may have
thus escaped, and his expressions may not quite contain the whole substance of
the passage from which they are taken. His limits, at times, compel him to
sketch; where that is the case, it is not fair to expect the full details of the
finished picture. At times he can only deal with important results; and in his
account of a war, it sometimes requires great attention to discover that the
events which seem to be comprehended in a single campaign, occupy several years.
But this admirable skill in selecting and giving prominence to the points which
are of real weight and importance - this distribution of light and shade -
though perhaps it may occasionally betray him into vague and imperfect
statements, is one of the highest excellencies of Gibbon's historic manner. It
is the more striking, when we pass from the works of his chief authorities,
where, after laboring through long, minute, and wearisome descriptions of the
accessary and subordinate circumstances, a single unmarked and undistinguished
sentence, which we may overlook from the inattention of fatigue, contains the
great moral and political result.

Gibbon's
method of arrangement, though on the whole most favorable to the clear
comprehension of the events, leads likewise to apparent inaccuracy. That which
we expect to find in one part is reserved for another. The estimate which we are
to form, depends on the accurate balance of statements in remote parts of the
work; and we have sometimes to correct and modify opinions, formed from one
chapter by those of another. Yet, on the other hand, it is astonishing how
rarely we detect contradiction; the mind of the author has already harmonized
the whole result to truth and probability; the general impression is almost
invariably the same. The quotations of Gibbon have likewise been called in
question; - I have, in general, been more inclined to admire their exactitude,
than to complain of their indistinctness, or incompleteness. Where they are
imperfect, it is commonly from the study of brevity, and rather from the desire
of compressing the substance of his notes into pointed and emphatic sentences,
than from dishonesty, or uncandid suppression of truth.

These
observations apply more particularly to the accuracy and fidelity of the
historian as to his facts; his inferences, of course, are more liable to
exception. It is almost impossible to trace the line between unfairness and
unfaithfulness; between intentional misrepresentation and undesigned false
coloring. The relative magnitude and importance of events must, in some respect,
depend upon the mind before which they are presented; the estimate of character,
on the habits and feelings of the reader. Christians, like M. Guizot and
ourselves, will see some things, and some persons, in a different light from the
historian of the Decline and Fall. We may deplore the bias of his mind; we may
ourselves be on our guard against the danger of being misled, and be anxious to
warn less wary readers against the same perils; but we must not confound this
secret and unconscious departure from truth, with the deliberate violation of
that veracity which is the only title of an historian to our confidence. Gibbon,
it may be fearlessly asserted, is rarely chargeable even with the suppression of
any material fact, which bears upon individual character; he may, with
apparently invidious hostility, enhance the errors and crimes, and disparage the
virtues of certain persons; yet, in general, he leaves us the materials for
forming a fairer judgment; and if he is not exempt from his own prejudices,
perhaps we might write passions, yet it must be candidly acknowledged, that his
philosophical bigotry is not more unjust than the theological partialities of
those ecclesiastical writers who were before in undisputed possession of this
province of history.

We are
thus naturally led to that great misrepresentation which pervades his history -
his false estimate of the nature and influence of
Christianity.

But on
this subject some preliminary caution is necessary, lest that should be expected
from a new edition, which it is impossible that it should completely accomplish.
We must first be prepared with the only sound preservative against the false
impression likely to be produced by the perusal of Gibbon; and we must see
clearly the real cause of that false impression. The former of these cautions
will be briefly suggested in its proper place, but it may be as well to state
it, here, somewhat more at length. The art of Gibbon, or at least the unfair
impression produced by his two memorable chapters, consists in his confounding
together, in one indistinguishable mass, the origin and apostolic propagation of
the new religion, with its later progress. No argument for the divine authority
of Christianity has been urged with greater force, or traced with higher
eloquence, than that deduced from its primary development, explicable on no
other hypothesis than a heavenly origin, and from its rapid extension through
great part of the Roman empire. But this argument - one, when confined within
reasonable limits, of unanswerable force - becomes more feeble and disputable in
proportion as it recedes from the birthplace, as it were, of the religion. The
further Christianity advanced, the more causes purely human were enlisted in its
favor; nor can it be doubted that those developed with such artful exclusiveness
by Gibbon did concur most essentially to its establishment. It is in the
Christian dispensation, as in the material world. In both it is as the great
First Cause, that the Deity is most undeniably manifest. When once launched in
regular motion upon the bosom of space, and endowed with all their properties
and relations of weight and mutual attraction, the heavenly bodies appear to
pursue their courses according to secondary laws, which account for all their
sublime regularity. So Christianity proclaims its Divine Author chiefly in its
first origin and development. When it had once received its impulse from above -
when it had once been infused into the minds of its first teachers - when it had
gained full possession of the reason and affections of the favored few - it
might be - and to the Protestant, the rational Christian, it is impossible to
define when it really was - left to make its way by its native force, under the
ordinary secret agencies of all-ruling Providence. The main question, the divine
origin of the religion, was dexterously eluded, or speciously conceded by
Gibbon; his plan enabled him to commence his account, in most parts, below the
apostolic times; and it was only by the strength of the dark coloring with which
he brought out the failings and the follies of the succeeding ages, that a
shadow of doubt and suspicion was thrown back upon the primitive period of
Christianity.

"The
theologian," says Gibbon, "may indulge the pleasing task of describing religion
as she descended from heaven, arrayed in her native purity; a more melancholy
duty is imposed upon the historian: - he must discover the inevitable mixture of
error and corruption which she contracted in a long residence upon earth among a
weak and degenerate race of beings." Divest this passage of the latent sarcasm
betrayed by the subsequent tone of the whole disquisition, and it might commence
a Christian history written in the most Christian spirit of candor. But as the
historian, by seeming to respect, yet by dexterously confounding the limits of
the sacred land, contrived to insinuate that it was an Utopia which had no
existence but in the imagination of the theologian - as he suggested rather than
affirmed that the days of Christian purity were a kind of poetic golden age; -
so the theologian, by venturing too far into the domain of the historian, has
been perpetually obliged to contest points on which he had little chance of
victory - to deny facts established on unshaken evidence - and thence, to
retire, if not with the shame of defeat, yet with but doubtful and imperfect
success. Paley, with his intuitive sagacity, saw through the difficulty of
answering Gibbon by the ordinary arts of controversy; his emphatic sentence,
"Who can refute a sneer?" contains as much truth as point. But full and pregnant
as this phrase is, it is not quite the whole truth; it is the tone in which the
progress of Christianity is traced, in comparison with the rest of the splendid
and prodigally ornamented work, which is the radical defect in the "Decline and
Fall." Christianity alone receives no embellishment from the magic of Gibbon's
language; his imagination is dead to its moral dignity; it is kept down by a
general zone of jealous disparagement, or neutralized by a painfully elaborate
exposition of its darker and degenerate periods. There are occasions, indeed,
when its pure and exalted humanity, when its manifestly beneficial influence,
can compel even him, as it were, to fairness, and kindle his unguarded eloquence
to its usual fervor; but, in general, he soon relapses into a frigid apathy;
affects an ostentatiously severe impartiality; notes all the faults of
Christians in every age with bitter and almost malignant sarcasm; reluctantly,
and with exception and reservation, admits their claim to admiration. This
inextricable bias appears even to influence his manner of composition. While all
the other assailants of the Roman empire, whether warlike or religious, the
Goth, the Hun, the Arab, the Tartar, Alaric and Attila, Mahomet, and Zengis, and
Tamerlane, are each introduced upon the scene almost with dramatic animation -
their progress related in a full, complete, and unbroken narrative - the triumph
of Christianity alone takes the form of a cold and critical disquisition. The
successes of barbarous energy and brute force call forth all the consummate
skill of composition; while the moral triumphs of Christian benevolence - the
tranquil heroism of endurance, the blameless purity, the contempt of guilty fame
and of honors destructive to the human race, which, had they assumed the proud
name of philosophy, would have been blazoned in his brightest words, because
they own religion as their principle - sink into narrow asceticism. The glories
of Christianity, in short, touch on no chord in the heart of the writer; his
imagination remains unkindled; his words, though they maintain their stately and
measured march, have become cool, argumentative, and inanimate. Who would
obscure one hue of that gorgeous coloring in which Gibbon has invested the dying
forms of Paganism, or darken one paragraph in his splendid view of the rise and
progress of Mahometanism? But who would not have wished that the same equal
justice had been done to Christianity; that its real character and deeply
penetrating influence had been traced with the same philosophical sagacity, and
represented with more sober, as would become its quiet course, and perhaps less
picturesque, but still with lively and attractive, descriptiveness? He might
have thrown aside, with the same scorn, the mass of ecclesiastical fiction which
envelops the early history of the church, stripped off the legendary romance,
and brought out the facts in their primitive nakedness and simplicity - if he
had but allowed those facts the benefit of the glowing eloquence which he denied
to them alone. He might have annihilated the whole fabric of post-apostolic
miracles, if he had left uninjured by sarcastic insinuation those of the New
Testament; he might have cashiered, with Dodwell, the whole host of martyrs,
which owe their existence to the prodigal invention of later days, had he but
bestowed fair room, and dwelt with his ordinary energy on the sufferings of the
genuine witnesses to the truth of Christianity, the Polycarp, or the martyrs of
Vienne. And indeed, if, after all, the view of the early progress of
Christianity be melancholy and humiliating we must beware lest we charge the
whole of this on the infidelity of the historian. It is idle, it is
disingenuous, to deny or to dissemble the early depravations of Christianity,
its gradual but rapid departure from its primitive simplicity and purity, still
more, from its spirit of universal love. It may be no unsalutary lesson to the
Christian world, that this silent, this unavoidable, perhaps, yet fatal change
shall have been drawn by an impartial, or even an hostile hand. The Christianity
of every age may take warning, lest by its own narrow views, its want of wisdom,
and its want of charity, it give the same advantage to the future unfriendly
historian, and disparage the cause of true religion.

The design
of the present edition is partly corrective, partly supplementary: corrective,
by notes, which point out (it is hoped, in a perfectly candid and dispassionate
spirit with no desire but to establish the truth) such inaccuracies or
misstatements as may have been detected, particularly with regard to
Christianity; and which thus, with the previous caution, may counteract to a
considerable extent the unfair and unfavorable impression created against
rational religion: supplementary, by adding such additional information as the
editor's reading may have been able to furnish, from original documents or
books, not accessible at the time when Gibbon wrote.

The work
originated in the editor's habit of noting on the margin of his copy of Gibbon
references to such authors as had discovered errors, or thrown new light on the
subjects treated by Gibbon. These had grown to some extent, and seemed to him
likely to be of use to others. The annotations of M. Guizot also appeared to him
worthy of being better known to the English public than they were likely to be,
as appended to the French translation.

The chief
works from which the editor has derived his materials are,

I.
The
French translation, with notes by M. Guizot; 2d edition, Paris, 1828. The editor
has translated almost all the notes of M. Guizot. Where he has not altogether
agreed with him, his respect for the learning and judgment of that writer has,
in general, induced him to retain the statement from which he has ventured to
differ, with the grounds on which he formed his own opinion. In the notes on
Christianity, he has retained all those of M. Guizot, with his own, from the
conviction, that on such a subject, to many, the authority of a French
statesman, a Protestant, and a rational and sincere Christian, would appear more
independent and unbiased, and therefore be more commanding, than that of an
English clergyman.

The editor has not scrupled to transfer the notes of
M. Guizot to the present work. The well-known zeal for knowledge, displayed in
all the writings of that distinguished historian, has led to the natural
inference, that he would not be displeased at the attempt to make them of use to
the English readers of Gibbon. The notes of M. Guizot are signed with the letter
G.

II.
The
German translation, with the notes of Wenck. Unfortunately this learned
translator died, after having completed only the first volume; the rest of the
work was executed by a very inferior hand.

The notes of Wenck are extremely
valuable; many of them have been adopted by M. Guizot; they are distinguished by
the letter W.[2]

III.
The
new edition of Le Beau's "Histoire du Bas Empire, with notes by M. St. Martin,
and M. Brosset." That distinguished Armenian scholar, M. St. Martin (now,
unhappily, deceased) had added much information from Oriental writers,
particularly from those of Armenia, as well as from more general sources. Many
of his observations have been found as applicable to the work of Gibbon as to
that of Le Beau.

IV.
The
editor has consulted the various answers made to Gibbon on the first appearance
of his work; he must confess, with little profit. They were, in general, hastily
compiled by inferior and now forgotten writers, with the exception of Bishop
Watson, whose able apology is rather a general argument, than an examination of
misstatements. The name of Milner stands higher with a certain class of readers,
but will not carry much weight with the severe investigator of
history.

V.
Some
few classical works and fragments have come to light, since the appearance of
Gibbon's History, and have been noticed in their respective places; and much use
has been made, in the latter volumes particularly, of the increase to our stores
of Oriental literature. The editor cannot, indeed, pretend to have followed his
author, in these gleanings, over the whole vast field of his inquiries; he may
have overlooked or may not have been able to command some works, which might
have thrown still further light on these subjects; but he trusts that what he
has adduced will be of use to the student of historic
truth.

The editor would further observe, that with regard to
some other objectionable passages, which do not involve misstatement or
inaccuracy, he has intentionally abstained from directing particular attention
towards them by any special protest.

The
editor's notes are marked M.

A
considerable part of the quotations (some of which in the later editions had
fallen into great confusion) have been verified, and have been corrected by the
latest and best editions of the authors.

June,
1845.

In this
new edition, the text and the notes have been carefully revised, the latter by
the editor.

Some
additional notes have been subjoined, distinguished by the signature M.
1845.

Preface of the
Author

It is not
my intention to detain the reader by expatiating on the variety or the
importance of the subject, which I have undertaken to treat; since the merit of
the choice would serve to render the weakness of the execution still more
apparent, and still less excusable. But as I have presumed to lay before the
public a first volume only[3]
of the History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, it will, perhaps, be
expected that I should explain, in a few words, the nature and limits of my
general plan.

The
memorable series of revolutions, which in the course of about thirteen centuries
gradually undermined, and at length destroyed, the solid fabric of human
greatness, may, with some propriety, be divided into the three following
periods:

I.
The
first of these periods may be traced from the age of Trajan and the Antonines,
when the Roman monarchy, having attained its full strength and maturity, began
to verge towards its decline; and will extend to the subversion of the Western
Empire, by the barbarians of Germany and Scythia, the rude ancestors of the most
polished nations of modern Europe. This extraordinary revolution, which
subjected Rome to the power of a Gothic conqueror, was completed about the
beginning of the sixth century.

II.
The
second period of the Decline and Fall of Rome may be supposed to commence with
the reign of Justinian, who, by his laws, as well as by his victories, restored
a transient splendor to the Eastern Empire. It will comprehend the invasion of
Italy by the Lombards; the conquest of the Asiatic and African provinces by the
Arabs, who embraced the religion of Mahomet; the revolt of the Roman people
against the feeble princes of Constantinople; and the elevation of Charlemagne,
who, in the year eight hundred, established the second, or German Empire of the
West

III.
The
last and longest of these periods includes about six centuries and a half; from
the revival of the Western Empire, till the taking of Constantinople by the
Turks, and the extinction of a degenerate race of princes, who continued to
assume the titles of Caesar and Augustus, after their dominions were contracted
to the limits of a single city; in which the language, as well as manners, of
the ancient Romans, had been long since forgotten. The writer who should
undertake to relate the events of this period, would find himself obliged to
enter into the general history of the Crusades, as far as they contributed to
the ruin of the Greek Empire; and he would scarcely be able to restrain his
curiosity from making some inquiry into the state of the city of Rome, during
the darkness and confusion of the middle ages.

As I have
ventured, perhaps too hastily, to commit to the press a work which in every
sense of the word, deserves the epithet of imperfect. I consider myself as
contracting an engagement to finish, most probably in a second volume[4],
the first of these memorable periods; and to deliver to the Public the complete
History of the Decline and Fall of Rome, from the age of the Antonines to the
subversion of the Western Empire. With regard to the subsequent periods, though
I may entertain some hopes, I dare not presume to give any assurances. The
execution of the extensive plan which I have described, would connect the
ancient and modern history of the world; but it would require many years of
health, of leisure, and of perseverance.

Bentinck
Street, February 1, 1776.

P. S. The
entire History, which is now published, of the Decline and Fall of the Roman
Empire in the West, abundantly discharges my engagements with the Public.
Perhaps their favorable opinion may encourage me to prosecute a work, which,
however laborious it may seem, is the most agreeable occupation of my leisure
hours.

Bentinck
Street, March 1, 1781.

An Author
easily persuades himself that the public opinion is still favorable to his
labors; and I have now embraced the serious resolution of proceeding to the last
period of my original design, and of the Roman Empire, the taking of
Constantinople by the Turks, in the year one thousand four hundred and
fifty-three. The most patient Reader, who computes that three ponderous[5]
volumes have been already employed on the events of four centuries, may,
perhaps, be alarmed at the long prospect of nine hundred years. But it is not my
intention to expatiate with the same minuteness on the whole series of the
Byzantine history. At our entrance into this period, the reign of Justinian, and
the conquests of the Mahometans, will deserve and detain our attention, and the
last age of Constantinople (the Crusades and the Turks) is connected with the
revolutions of Modern Europe. From the seventh to the eleventh century, the
obscure interval will be supplied by a concise narrative of such facts as may
still appear either interesting or important.

Bentinck
Street, March 1, 1782.

Preface to the First
Volume

Diligence
and accuracy are the only merits which an historical writer may ascribe to
himself; if any merit, indeed, can be assumed from the performance of an
indispensable duty. I may therefore be allowed to say, that I have carefully
examined all the original materials that could illustrate the subject which I
had undertaken to treat. Should I ever complete the extensive design which has
been sketched out in the Preface, I might perhaps conclude it with a critical
account of the authors consulted during the progress of the whole work; and
however such an attempt might incur the censure of ostentation, I am persuaded
that it would be susceptible of entertainment, as well as
information.

At present
I shall content myself with a single observation. The biographers, who, under
the reigns of Diocletian and Constantine, composed, or rather compiled, the
lives of the Emperors, from Hadrian to the sons of Carus, are usually mentioned
under the names of Aelius Spartianus, Julius Capitolinus, Aelius Lampridius,
Vulcatius Gallicanus, Trebellius Pollio and Flavius Vopiscus. But there is so
much perplexity in the titles of the MSS., and so many disputes have arisen
among the critics (see Fabricius, Biblioth. Latin. l. iii. c. 6) concerning
their number, their names, and their respective property, that for the most part
I have quoted them without distinction, under the general and well-known title
of the Augustan History.

Preface to the Fourth Volume of the
Original Quarto Edition

I now
discharge my promise, and complete my design, of writing the History of the
Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, both in the West and the East. The whole
period extends from the age of Trajan and the Antonines, to the taking of
Constantinople by Mahomet the Second; and includes a review of the Crusades, and
the state of Rome during the middle ages. Since the publication of the first
volume, twelve years have elapsed; twelve years, according to my wish, "of
health, of leisure, and of perseverance." I may now congratulate my deliverance
from a long and laborious service, and my satisfaction will be pure and perfect,
if the public favor should be extended to the conclusion of my
work.

It was my
first intention to have collected, under one view, the numerous authors, of
every age and language, from whom I have derived the materials of this history;
and I am still convinced that the apparent ostentation would be more than
compensated by real use. If I have renounced this idea, if I have declined an
undertaking which had obtained the approbation of a master-artist[6],
my excuse may be found in the extreme difficulty of assigning a proper measure
to such a catalogue. A naked list of names and editions would not be
satisfactory either to myself or my readers: the characters of the principal
Authors of the Roman and Byzantine History have been occasionally connected with
the events which they describe; a more copious and critical inquiry might indeed
deserve, but it would demand, an elaborate volume, which might swell by degrees
into a general library of historical writers. For the present, I shall content
myself with renewing my serious protestation, that I have always endeavored to
draw from the fountain-head; that my curiosity, as well as a sense of duty, has
always urged me to study the originals; and that, if they have sometimes eluded
my search, I have carefully marked the secondary evidence, on whose faith a
passage or a fact were reduced to depend.

I shall
soon revisit the banks of the Lake of Lausanne, a country which I have known and
loved from my early youth. Under a mild government, amidst a beauteous
landscape, in a life of leisure and independence, and among a people of easy and
elegant manners, I have enjoyed, and may again hope to enjoy, the varied
pleasures of retirement and society. But I shall ever glory in the name and
character of an Englishman: I am proud of my birth in a free and enlightened
country; and the approbation of that country is the best and most honorable
reward of my labors. Were I ambitious of any other Patron than the Public, I
would inscribe this work to a Statesman, who, in a long, a stormy, and at length
an unfortunate administration, had many political opponents, almost without a
personal enemy; who has retained, in his fall from power, many faithful and
disinterested friends; and who, under the pressure of severe infirmity, enjoys
the lively vigor of his mind, and the felicity of his incomparable temper. Lord
North will permit me to express the feelings of friendship in the language of
truth: but even truth and friendship should be silent, if he still dispensed the
favors of the crown.

In a
remote solitude, vanity may still whisper in my ear, that my readers, perhaps,
may inquire whether, in the conclusion of the present work, I am now taking an
everlasting farewell. They shall hear all that I know myself, and all that I
could reveal to the most intimate friend. The motives of action or silence are
now equally balanced; nor can I pronounce, in my most secret thoughts, on which
side the scale will preponderate. I cannot dissemble that six quartos must have
tried, and may have exhausted, the indulgence of the Public; that, in the
repetition of similar attempts, a successful Author has much more to lose than
he can hope to gain; that I am now descending into the vale of years; and that
the most respectable of my countrymen, the men whom I aspire to imitate, have
resigned the pen of history about the same period of their lives. Yet I consider
that the annals of ancient and modern times may afford many rich and interesting
subjects; that I am still possessed of health and leisure; that by the practice
of writing, some skill and facility must be acquired; and that, in the ardent
pursuit of truth and knowledge, I am not conscious of decay. To an active mind,
indolence is more painful than labor; and the first months of my liberty will be
occupied and amused in the excursions of curiosity and taste. By such
temptations, I have been sometimes seduced from the rigid duty even of a
pleasing and voluntary task: but my time will now be my own; and in the use or
abuse of independence, I shall no longer fear my own reproaches or those of my
friends. I am fairly entitled to a year of jubilee: next summer and the
following winter will rapidly pass away; and experience only can determine
whether I shall still prefer the freedom and variety of study to the design and
composition of a regular work, which animates, while it confines, the daily
application of the Author. Caprice and accident may influence my choice; but the
dexterity of self-love will contrive to applaud either active industry or
philosophic repose.

Downing
Street, May 1, 1788.

P. S. I
shall embrace this opportunity of introducing two verbal remarks, which have not
conveniently offered themselves to my notice.

I.
As
often as I use the definitions of beyond the Alps, the Rhine, the Danube,
&c., I generally suppose myself at Rome, and afterwards at Constantinople;
without observing whether this relative geography may agree with the local, but
variable, situation of the reader, or the historian.

II.
In
proper names of foreign, and especially of Oriental origin, it should be always
our aim to express, in our English version, a faithful copy of the original. But
this rule, which is founded on a just regard to uniformity and truth, must often
be relaxed; and the exceptions will be limited or enlarged by the custom of the
language and the taste of the interpreter. Our alphabets may be often defective;
a harsh sound, an uncouth spelling, might offend the ear or the eye of our
countrymen; and some words, notoriously corrupt, are fixed, and, as it were,
naturalized in the vulgar tongue. The prophet Mohammed can no longer be stripped
of the famous, though improper, appellation of Mahomet: the well-known cities of
Aleppo, Damascus, and Cairo, would almost be lost in the strange descriptions of
Haleb, Demashk, and Al Cahira: the titles and offices of the Ottoman empire are
fashioned by the practice of three hundred years; and we are pleased to blend
the three Chinese monosyllables, Con-fu-tzee, in the respectable name of
Confucius, or even to adopt the Portuguese corruption of Mandarin. But I would
vary the use of Zoroaster and Zerdusht, as I drew my information from Greece or
Persia: since our connection with India, the genuine Timour is restored to the
throne of Tamerlane: our most correct writers have retrenched the Al, the
superfluous article, from the Koran; and we escape an ambiguous termination, by
adopting Moslem instead of Musulman, in the plural number. In these, and in a
thousand examples, the shades of distinction are often minute; and I can feel,
where I cannot explain, the motives of my choice.

Chapter I
The Extent
of the Empire in the Age of the Antonines
Part
I

Introduction

The Extent and Military
Force of the Empire in the Age of the Antonines

In the
second century of the Christian Aera, the empire of Rome comprehended the
fairest part of the earth, and the most civilized portion of mankind. The
frontiers of that extensive monarchy were guarded by ancient renown and
disciplined valor. The gentle but powerful influence of laws and manners had
gradually cemented the union of the provinces. Their peaceful inhabitants
enjoyed and abused the advantages of wealth and luxury. The image of a free
constitution was preserved with decent reverence: the Roman senate appeared to
possess the sovereign authority, and devolved on the emperors all the executive
powers of government. During a happy period of more than fourscore years, the
public administration was conducted by the virtue and abilities of Nerva,
Trajan, Hadrian, and the two Antonines. It is the design of this, and of the two
succeeding chapters, to describe the prosperous condition of their empire; and
after wards, from the death of Marcus Antoninus, to deduce the most important
circumstances of its decline and fall; a revolution which will ever be
remembered, and is still felt by the nations of the earth.

The
principal conquests of the Romans were achieved under the republic; and the
emperors, for the most part, were satisfied with preserving those dominions
which had been acquired by the policy of the senate, the active emulations of
the consuls, and the martial enthusiasm of the people. The seven first centuries
were filled with a rapid succession of triumphs; but it was reserved for
Augustus to relinquish the ambitious design of subduing the whole earth, and to
introduce a spirit of moderation into the public councils. Inclined to peace by
his temper and situation, it was easy for him to discover that Rome, in her
present exalted situation, had much less to hope than to fear from the chance of
arms; and that, in the prosecution of remote wars, the undertaking became every
day more difficult, the event more doubtful, and the possession more precarious,
and less beneficial. The experience of Augustus added weight to these salutary
reflections, and effectually convinced him that, by the prudent vigor of his
counsels, it would be easy to secure every concession which the safety or the
dignity of Rome might require from the most formidable barbarians. Instead of
exposing his person and his legions to the arrows of the Parthians, he obtained,
by an honorable treaty, the restitution of the standards and prisoners which had
been taken in the defeat of Crassus[7].

His
generals, in the early part of his reign, attempted the reduction of Ethiopia
and Arabia Felix. They marched near a thousand miles to the south of the tropic;
but the heat of the climate soon repelled the invaders, and protected the
un-warlike natives of those sequestered regions[8].
The northern countries of Europe scarcely deserved the expense and labor of
conquest. The forests and morasses of Germany were filled with a hardy race of
barbarians, who despised life when it was separated from freedom; and though, on
the first attack, they seemed to yield to the weight of the Roman power, they
soon, by a signal act of despair, regained their independence, and reminded
Augustus of the vicissitude of fortune[9].
On the death of that emperor, his testament was publicly read in the senate. He
bequeathed, as a valuable legacy to his successors, the advice of confining the
empire within those limits which nature seemed to have placed as its permanent
bulwarks and boundaries: on the west, the Atlantic Ocean; the Rhine and Danube
on the north; the Euphrates on the east; and towards the south, the sandy
deserts of Arabia and Africa[10].

Happily
for the repose of mankind, the moderate system recommended by the wisdom of
Augustus, was adopted by the fears and vices of his immediate successors.
Engaged in the pursuit of pleasure, or in the exercise of tyranny, the first
Caesars seldom showed themselves to the armies, or to the provinces; nor were
they disposed to suffer, that those triumphs which their indolence neglected,
should be usurped by the conduct and valor of their lieutenants. The military
fame of a subject was considered as an insolent invasion of the Imperial
prerogative; and it became the duty, as well as interest, of every Roman
general, to guard the frontiers intrusted to his care, without aspiring to
conquests which might have proved no less fatal to himself than to the
vanquished barbarians[11].

The only
accession which the Roman empire received, during the first century of the
Christian Aera, was the province of Britain. In this single instance, the
successors of Caesar and Augustus were persuaded to follow the example of the
former, rather than the precept of the latter. The proximity of its situation to
the coast of Gaul seemed to invite their arms; the pleasing though doubtful
intelligence of a pearl fishery, attracted their avarice[12];
and as Britain was viewed in the light of a distinct and insulated world, the
conquest scarcely formed any exception to the general system of continental
measures. After a war of about forty years, undertaken by the most stupid[13],
maintained by the most dissolute, and terminated by the most timid of all the
emperors, the far greater part of the island submitted to the Roman yoke[14].
The various tribes of Britain possessed valor without conduct, and the love of
freedom without the spirit of union. They took up arms with savage fierceness;
they laid them down, or turned them against each other, with wild inconsistency;
and while they fought singly, they were successively subdued. Neither the
fortitude of Caractacus, nor the despair of Boadicea, nor the fanaticism of the
Druids, could avert the slavery of their country, or resist the steady progress
of the Imperial generals, who maintained the national glory, when the throne was
disgraced by the weakest, or the most vicious of mankind. At the very time when
Domitian, confined to his palace, felt the terrors which he inspired, his
legions, under the command of the virtuous Agricola, defeated the collected
force of the Caledonians, at the foot of the Grampian Hills; and his fleets,
venturing to explore an unknown and dangerous navigation, displayed the Roman
arms round every part of the island. The conquest of Britain was considered as
already achieved; and it was the design of Agricola to complete and insure his
success, by the easy reduction of Ireland, for which, in his opinion, one legion
and a few auxiliaries were sufficient[15].
The western isle might be improved into a valuable possession, and the Britons
would wear their chains with the less reluctance, if the prospect and example of
freedom were on every side removed from before their eyes.

But the
superior merit of Agricola soon occasioned his removal from the government of
Britain; and forever disappointed this rational, though extensive scheme of
conquest. Before his departure, the prudent general had provided for security as
well as for dominion. He had observed, that the island is almost divided into
two unequal parts by the opposite gulfs, or, as they are now called, the Friths
of Scotland. Across the narrow interval of about forty miles, he had drawn a
line of military stations, which was afterwards fortified, in the reign of
Antoninus Pius, by a turf rampart, erected on foundations of stone[16].
This wall of Antoninus, at a small distance beyond the modern cities of
Edinburgh and Glasgow, was fixed as the limit of the Roman province. The native
Caledonians preserved, in the northern extremity of the island, their wild
independence, for which they were not less indebted to their poverty than to
their valor. Their incursions were frequently repelled and chastised; but their
country was never subdued[17].
The masters of the fairest and most wealthy climates of the globe turned with
contempt from gloomy hills, assailed by the winter tempest, from lakes concealed
in a blue mist, and from cold
and lonely heaths, over which the deer of the forest were chased by a troop of
naked barbarians[18].

Such was
the state of the Roman frontiers, and such the maxims of Imperial policy, from
the death of Augustus to the accession of Trajan. That virtuous and active
prince had received the education of a soldier, and possessed the talents of a
general[19].
The peaceful system of his predecessors was interrupted by scenes of war and
conquest; and the legions, after a long interval, beheld a military emperor at
their head. The first exploits of Trajan were against the Dacians, the most
warlike of men, who dwelt beyond the Danube, and who, during the reign of
Domitian, had insulted, with impunity, the Majesty of Rome[20].
To the strength and fierceness of barbarians they added a contempt for life,
which was derived from a warm persuasion of the immortality and transmigration
of the soul[21].
Decebalus, the Dacian king, approved himself a rival not unworthy of Trajan; nor
did he despair of his own and the public fortune, till, by the confession of his
enemies, he had exhausted every resource both of valor and policy[22].
This memorable war, with a very short suspension of hostilities, lasted five
years; and as the emperor could exert, without control, the whole force of the
state, it was terminated by an absolute submission of the barbarians[23].
The new province of Dacia, which formed a second exception to the precept of
Augustus, was about thirteen hundred miles in circumference. Its natural
boundaries were the Niester, the Teyss or Tibiscus, the Lower Danube, and the
Euxine Sea. The vestiges of a military road may still be traced from the banks
of the Danube to the neighborhood of Bender, a place famous in modern history,
and the actual frontier of the Turkish and Russian empires[24].

Trajan was
ambitious of fame; and as long as mankind shall continue to bestow more liberal
applause on their destroyers than on their benefactors, the thirst of military
glory will ever be the vice of the most exalted characters. The praises of
Alexander, transmitted by a succession of poets and historians, had kindled a
dangerous emulation in the mind of Trajan. Like him, the Roman emperor undertook
an expedition against the nations of the East; but he lamented with a sigh, that
his advanced age scarcely left him any hopes of equalling the renown of the son
of Philip[25].
Yet the success of Trajan, however transient, was rapid and specious. The
degenerate Parthians, broken by intestine discord, fled before his arms. He
descended the River Tigris in triumph, from the mountains of Armenia to the
Persian Gulf. He enjoyed the honor of being the first, as he was the last, of
the Roman generals, who ever navigated that remote sea. His fleets ravaged the
coast of Arabia; and Trajan vainly flattered himself that he was approaching
towards the confines of India[26].
Every day the astonished senate received the intelligence of new names and new
nations, that acknowledged his sway. They were informed that the kings of
Bosphorus, Colchos, Iberia, Albania, Osrhoene, and even the Parthian monarch
himself, had accepted their diadems from the hands of the emperor; that the
independent tribes of the Median and Carduchian hills had implored his
protection; and that the rich countries of Armenia, Mesopotamia, and Assyria,
were reduced into the state of provinces[27].
But the death of Trajan soon clouded the splendid prospect; and it was justly to
be dreaded, that so many distant nations would throw off the unaccustomed yoke,
when they were no longer restrained by the powerful hand which had imposed
it.

Chapter I
The Extent
of the Empire in the Age of the Antonines
Part
II

It was an
ancient tradition, that when the Capitol was founded by one of the Roman kings,
the god Terminus (who presided over boundaries, and was represented, according
to the fashion of that age, by a large stone) alone, among all the inferior
deities, refused to yield his place to Jupiter himself. A favorable inference
was drawn from his obstinacy, which was interpreted by the augurs as a sure
presage that the boundaries of the Roman power would never recede[28].
During many ages, the prediction, as it is usual, contributed to its own
accomplishment. But though Terminus had resisted the Majesty of Jupiter, he
submitted to the authority of the emperor Hadrian[29].
The resignation of all the eastern conquests of Trajan was the first measure of
his reign. He restored to the Parthians the election of an independent
sovereign; withdrew the Roman garrisons from the provinces of Armenia,
Mesopotamia, and Assyria; and, in compliance with the precept of Augustus, once
more established the Euphrates as the frontier of the empire[30].
Censure, which arraigns the public actions and the private motives of princes,
has ascribed to envy, a conduct which might be attributed to the prudence and
moderation of Hadrian. The various character of that emperor, capable, by turns,
of the meanest and the most generous sentiments, may afford some color to the
suspicion. It was, however, scarcely in his power to place the superiority of
his predecessor in a more conspicuous light, than by thus confessing himself
unequal to the task of defending the conquests of Trajan.

The
martial and ambitious of spirit Trajan formed a very singular contrast with the
moderation of his successor. The restless activity of Hadrian was not less
remarkable when compared with the gentle repose of Antoninus Pius. The life of
the former was almost a perpetual journey; and as he possessed the various
talents of the soldier, the statesman, and the scholar, he gratified his
curiosity in the discharge of his duty. Careless of the difference of seasons
and of climates, he marched on foot, and bare-headed, over the snows of
Caledonia, and the sultry plains of the Upper Egypt; nor was there a province of
the empire which, in the course of his reign, was not honored with the presence
of the monarch[31].
But the tranquil life of Antoninus Pius was spent in the bosom of Italy, and,
during the twenty-three years that he directed the public administration, the
longest journeys of that amiable prince extended no farther than from his palace
in Rome to the retirement of his Lanuvian villa[32].

Notwithstanding this difference in
their personal conduct, the general system of Augustus was equally adopted and
uniformly pursued by Hadrian and by the two Antonines. They persisted in the
design of maintaining the dignity of the empire, without attempting to enlarge
its limits. By every honorable expedient they invited the friendship of the
barbarians; and endeavored to convince mankind that the Roman power, raised
above the temptation of conquest, was actuated only by the love of order and
justice. During a long period of forty-three years, their virtuous labors were
crowned with success; and if we except a few slight hostilities, that served to
exercise the legions of the frontier, the reigns of Hadrian and Antoninus Pius
offer the fair prospect of universal peace[33].
The Roman name was revered among the most remote nations of the earth. The
fiercest barbarians frequently submitted their differences to the arbitration of
the emperor; and we are informed by a contemporary historian that he had seen
ambassadors who were refused the honor which they came to solicit of being
admitted into the rank of subjects[34]..

The terror
of the Roman arms added weight and dignity to the moderation of the emperors.
They preserved peace by a constant preparation for war; and while justice
regulated their conduct, they announced to the nations on their confines, that
they were as little disposed to endure, as to offer an injury. The military
strength, which it had been sufficient for Hadrian and the elder Antoninus to
display, was exerted against the Parthians and the Germans by the emperor
Marcus. The hostilities of the barbarians provoked the resentment of that
philosophic monarch, and, in the prosecution of a just defence, Marcus and his
generals obtained many signal victories, both on the Euphrates and on the
Danube[35].
The military establishment of the Roman empire, which thus assured either its
tranquillity or success, will now become the proper and important object of our
attention.

In the
purer ages of the commonwealth, the use of arms was reserved for those ranks of
citizens who had a country to love, a property to defend, and some share in
enacting those laws, which it was their interest as well as duty to maintain.
But in proportion as the public freedom was lost in extent of conquest, war was
gradually improved into an art, and degraded into a trade[36].
The legions themselves, even at the time when they were recruited in the most
distant provinces, were supposed to consist of Roman citizens. That distinction
was generally considered, either as a legal qualification or as a proper
recompense for the soldier; but a more serious regard was paid to the essential
merit of age, strength, and military stature[37].
In all levies, a just preference was given to the climates of the North over
those of the South: the race of men born to the exercise of arms was sought for
in the country rather than in cities; and it was very reasonably presumed, that
the hardy occupations of smiths, carpenters, and huntsmen, would supply more
vigor and resolution than the sedentary trades which are employed in the service
of luxury[38].
After every qualification of property had been laid aside, the armies of the
Roman emperors were still commanded, for the most part, by officers of liberal
birth and education; but the common soldiers, like the mercenary troops of
modern Europe, were drawn from the meanest, and very frequently from the most
profligate, of mankind.

That
public virtue, which among the ancients was denominated patriotism, is derived
from a strong sense of our own interest in the preservation and prosperity of
the free government of which we are members. Such a sentiment, which had
rendered the legions of the republic almost invincible, could make but a very
feeble impression on the mercenary servants of a despotic prince; and it became
necessary to supply that defect by other motives, of a different, but not less
forcible nature - honor and religion. The peasant, or mechanic, imbibed the
useful prejudice that he was advanced to the more dignified profession of arms,
in which his rank and reputation would depend on his own valor; and that,
although the prowess of a private soldier must often escape the notice of fame,
his own behavior might sometimes confer glory or disgrace on the company, the
legion, or even the army, to whose honors he was associated. On his first
entrance into the service, an oath was administered to him with every
circumstance of solemnity. He promised never to desert his standard, to submit
his own will to the commands of his leaders, and to sacrifice his life for the
safety of the emperor and the empire[39].
The attachment of the Roman troops to their standards was inspired by the united
influence of religion and of honor. The golden eagle, which glittered in the
front of the legion, was the object of their fondest devotion; nor was it
esteemed less impious than it was ignominious, to abandon that sacred ensign in
the hour of danger[40].
These motives, which derived their strength from the imagination, were enforced
by fears and hopes of a more substantial kind. Regular pay, occasional
donatives, and a stated recompense, after the appointed time of service,
alleviated the hardships of the military life[41],
whilst, on the other hand, it was impossible for cowardice or disobedience to
escape the severest punishment. The centurions were authorized to chastise with
blows, the generals had a right to punish with death; and it was an inflexible
maxim of Roman discipline, that a good soldier should dread his officers far
more than the enemy. From such laudable arts did the valor of the Imperial
troops receive a degree of firmness and docility unattainable by the impetuous
and irregular passions of barbarians.

And yet so
sensible were the Romans of the imperfection of valor without skill and
practice, that, in their language, the name of an army was borrowed from the
word which signified exercise[42].
Military exercises were the important and unremitted object of their discipline.
The recruits and young soldiers were constantly trained, both in the morning and
in the evening, nor was age or knowledge allowed to excuse the veterans from the
daily repetition of what they had completely learnt. Large sheds were erected in
the winter- quarters of the troops, that their useful labors might not receive
any interruption from the most tempestuous weather; and it was carefully
observed, that the arms destined to this imitation of war, should be of double
the weight which was required in real action[43].
It is not the purpose of this work to enter into any minute description of the
Roman exercises. We shall only remark, that they comprehended whatever could add
strength to the body, activity to the limbs, or grace to the motions. The
soldiers were diligently instructed to march, to run, to leap, to swim, to carry
heavy burdens, to handle every species of arms that was used either for offence
or for defence, either in distant engagement or in a closer onset; to form a
variety of evolutions; and to move to the sound of flutes in the Pyrrhic or
martial dance[44].
In the midst of peace, the Roman troops familiarized themselves with the
practice of war; and it is prettily remarked by an ancient historian who had
fought against them, that the effusion of blood was the only circumstance which
distinguished a field of battle from a field of exercise[45].
It was the policy of the ablest generals, and even of the emperors themselves,
to encourage these military studies by their presence and example; and we are
informed that Hadrian, as well as Trajan, frequently condescended to instruct
the unexperienced soldiers, to reward the diligent, and sometimes to dispute
with them the prize of superior strength or dexterity[46].
Under the reigns of those princes, the science of tactics was cultivated with
success; and as long as the empire retained any vigor, their military
instructions were respected as the most perfect model of Roman
discipline.

Nine
centuries of war had gradually introduced into the service many alterations and
improvements. The legions, as they are described by Polybius[47],
in the time of the Punic wars, differed very materially from those which
achieved the victories of Caesar, or defended the monarchy of Hadrian and the
Antonines. The constitution of the Imperial legion may be described in a few
words[48].
The heavy-armed infantry, which composed its principal strength[49],
was divided into ten cohorts, and fifty-five companies, under the orders of a
correspondent number of tribunes and centurions. The first cohort, which always
claimed the post of honor and the custody of the eagle, was formed of eleven
hundred and five soldiers, the most approved for valor and fidelity. The
remaining nine cohorts consisted each of five hundred and fifty-five; and the
whole body of legionary infantry amounted to six thousand one hundred men. Their
arms were uniform, and admirably adapted to the nature of their service: an open
helmet, with a lofty crest; a breastplate, or coat of mail; greaves on their
legs, and an ample buckler on their left arm. The buckler was of an oblong and
concave figure, four feet in length, and two and a half in breadth, framed of a
light wood, covered with a bull's hide, and strongly guarded with plates of
brass. Besides a lighter spear, the legionary soldier grasped in his right hand
the formidable pilum, a ponderous javelin, whose utmost length was about six
feet, and which was terminated by a massy triangular point of steel of eighteen
inches[50].
This instrument was indeed much inferior to our modern fire-arms; since it was
exhausted by a single discharge, at the distance of only ten or twelve paces.
Yet when it was launched by a firm and skilful hand, there was not any cavalry
that durst venture within its reach, nor any shield or corselet that could
sustain the impetuosity of its weight. As soon as the Roman had darted his
pilum, he drew his sword, and rushed forwards to close with the enemy. His sword
was a short well-tempered Spanish blade, that carried a double edge, and was
alike suited to the purpose of striking or of pushing; but the soldier was
always instructed to prefer the latter use of his weapon, as his own body
remained less exposed, whilst he inflicted a more dangerous wound on his
adversary[51].
The legion was usually drawn up eight deep; and the regular distance of three
feet was left between the files as well as ranks[52].
A body of troops, habituated to preserve this open order, in a long front and a
rapid charge, found themselves prepared to execute every disposition which the
circumstances of war, or the skill of their leader, might suggest. The soldier
possessed a free space for his arms and motions, and sufficient intervals were
allowed, through which seasonable reenforcements might be introduced to the
relief of the exhausted combatants[53].
The tactics of the Greeks and Macedonians were formed on very different
principles. The strength of the phalanx depended on sixteen ranks of long pikes,
wedged together in the closest array[54].
But it was soon discovered by reflection, as well as by the event, that the
strength of the phalanx was unable to contend with the activity of the legion[55].

The
cavalry, without which the force of the legion would have remained imperfect,
was divided into ten troops or squadrons; the first, as the companion of the
first cohort, consisted of a hundred and thirty-two men; whilst each of the
other nine amounted only to sixty-six. The entire establishment formed a
regiment, if we may use the modern expression, of seven hundred and twenty-six
horse, naturally connected with its respective legion, but occasionally
separated to act in the line, and to compose a part of the wings of the army[56].
The cavalry of the emperors was no longer composed, like that of the ancient
republic, of the noblest youths of Rome and Italy, who, by performing their
military service on horseback, prepared themselves for the offices of senator
and consul; and solicited, by deeds of valor, the future suffrages of their
countrymen[57].
Since the alteration of manners and government, the most wealthy of the
equestrian order were engaged in the administration of justice, and of the
revenue[58];
and whenever they embraced the profession of arms, they were immediately
intrusted with a troop of horse, or a cohort of foot[59].
Trajan and Hadrian formed their cavalry from the same provinces, and the same
class of their subjects, which recruited the ranks of the legion. The horses
were bred, for the most part, in Spain or Cappadocia. The Roman troopers
despised the complete armor with which the cavalry of the East was encumbered.
Their more useful arms consisted in a helmet, an oblong shield, light boots, and
a coat of mail. A javelin, and a long broad sword, were their principal weapons
of offence. The use of lances and of iron maces they seem to have borrowed from
the barbarians[60].

The safety
and honor of the empire was principally intrusted to the legions, but the policy
of Rome condescended to adopt every useful instrument of war. Considerable
levies were regularly made among the provincials, who had not yet deserved the
honorable distinction of Romans. Many dependent princes and communities,
dispersed round the frontiers, were permitted, for a while, to hold their
freedom and security by the tenure of military service[61].
Even select troops of hostile barbarians were frequently compelled or persuaded
to consume their dangerous valor in remote climates, and for the benefit of the
state[62].
All these were included under the general name of auxiliaries; and howsoever
they might vary according to the difference of times and circumstances, their
numbers were seldom much inferior to those of the legions themselves[63].
Among the auxiliaries, the bravest and most faithful bands were placed under the
command of praefects and centurions, and severely trained in the arts of Roman
discipline; but the far greater part retained those arms, to which the nature of
their country, or their early habits of life, more peculiarly adapted them. By
this institution, each legion, to whom a certain proportion of auxiliaries was
allotted, contained within itself every species of lighter troops, and of
missile weapons; and was capable of encountering every nation, with the
advantages of its respective arms and discipline[64].
Nor was the legion destitute of what, in modern language, would be styled a
train of artillery. It consisted in ten military engines of the largest, and
fifty-five of a smaller size; but all of which, either in an oblique or
horizontal manner, discharged stones and darts with irresistible violence[65].

Chapter I
The Extent
of the Empire in the Age of the Antonines
Part
III

The camp
of a Roman legion presented the appearance of a fortified city[66].
As soon as the space was marked out, the pioneers carefully levelled the ground,
and removed every impediment that might interrupt its perfect regularity. Its
form was an exact quadrangle; and we may calculate, that a square of about seven
hundred yards was sufficient for the encampment of twenty thousand Romans;
though a similar number of our own troops would expose to the enemy a front of
more than treble that extent. In the midst of the camp, the praetorium, or
general's quarters, rose above the others; the cavalry, the infantry, and the
auxiliaries occupied their respective stations; the streets were broad and
perfectly straight, and a vacant space of two hundred feet was left on all sides
between the tents and the rampart. The rampart itself was usually twelve feet
high, armed with a line of strong and intricate palisades, and defended by a
ditch of twelve feet in depth as well as in breadth. This important labor was
performed by the hands of the legionaries themselves; to whom the use of the
spade and the pickaxe was no less familiar than that of the sword or pilum.
Active valor may often be the present of nature; but such patient diligence can
be the fruit only of habit and discipline[67].

Whenever
the trumpet gave the signal of departure, the camp was almost instantly broke
up, and the troops fell into their ranks without delay or confusion. Besides
their arms, which the legendaries scarcely considered as an encumbrance, they
were laden with their kitchen furniture, the instruments of fortification, and
the provision of many days[68].
Under this weight, which would oppress the delicacy of a modern soldier, they
were trained by a regular step to advance, in about six hours, near twenty
miles[69].
On the appearance of an enemy, they threw aside their baggage, and by easy and
rapid evolutions converted the column of march into an order of battle[70].
The slingers and archers skirmished in the front; the auxiliaries formed the
first line, and were seconded or sustained by the strength of the legions; the
cavalry covered the flanks, and the military engines were placed in the
rear.

Such were
the arts of war, by which the Roman emperors defended their extensive conquests,
and preserved a military spirit, at a time when every other virtue was oppressed
by luxury and despotism. If, in the consideration of their armies, we pass from
their discipline to their numbers, we shall not find it easy to define them with
any tolerable accuracy. We may compute, however, that the legion, which was
itself a body of six thousand eight hundred and thirty-one Romans, might, with
its attendant auxiliaries, amount to about twelve thousand five hundred men. The
peace establishment of Hadrian and his successors was composed of no less than
thirty of these formidable brigades; and most probably formed a standing force
of three hundred and seventy-five thousand men. Instead of being confined within
the walls of fortified cities, which the Romans considered as the refuge of
weakness or pusillanimity, the legions were encamped on the banks of the great
rivers, and along the frontiers of the barbarians. As their stations, for the
most part, remained fixed and permanent, we may venture to describe the
distribution of the troops. Three legions were sufficient for Britain. The
principal strength lay upon the Rhine and Danube, and consisted of sixteen
legions, in the following proportions: two in the Lower, and three in the Upper
Germany; one in Rhaetia, one in Noricum, four in Pannonia, three in Maesia, and
two in Dacia. The defence of the Euphrates was intrusted to eight legions, six
of whom were planted in Syria, and the other two in Cappadocia. With regard to
Egypt, Africa, and Spain, as they were far removed from any important scene of
war, a single legion maintained the domestic tranquillity of each of those great
provinces. Even Italy was not left destitute of a military force. Above twenty
thousand chosen soldiers, distinguished by the titles of City Cohorts and
Praetorian Guards, watched over the safety of the monarch and the capital. As
the authors of almost every revolution that distracted the empire, the
Praetorians will, very soon, and very loudly, demand our attention; but, in
their arms and institutions, we cannot find any circumstance which discriminated
them from the legions, unless it were a more splendid appearance, and a less
rigid discipline[71].

The navy
maintained by the emperors might seem inadequate to their greatness; but it was
fully sufficient for every useful purpose of government. The ambition of the
Romans was confined to the land; nor was that warlike people ever actuated by
the enterprising spirit which had prompted the navigators of Tyre, of Carthage,
and even of Marseilles, to enlarge the bounds of the world, and to explore the
most remote coasts of the ocean. To the Romans the ocean remained an object of
terror rather than of curiosity[72];
the whole extent of the Mediterranean, after the destruction of Carthage, and
the extirpation of the pirates, was included within their provinces. The policy
of the emperors was directed only to preserve the peaceful dominion of that sea,
and to protect the commerce of their subjects. With these moderate views,
Augustus stationed two permanent fleets in the most convenient ports of Italy,
the one at Ravenna, on the Adriatic, the other at Misenum, in the Bay of Naples.
Experience seems at length to have convinced the ancients, that as soon as their
galleys exceeded two, or at the most three ranks of oars, they were suited
rather for vain pomp than for real service. Augustus himself, in the victory of
Actium, had seen the superiority of his own light frigates (they were called
Liburnians) over the lofty but unwieldy castles of his rival[73].
Of these Liburnians he composed the two fleets of Ravenna and Misenum, destined
to command, the one the eastern, the other the western division of the
Mediterranean; and to each of the squadrons he attached a body of several
thousand marines. Besides these two ports, which may be considered as the
principal seats of the Roman navy, a very considerable force was stationed at
Frejus, on the coast of Provence, and the Euxine was guarded by forty ships, and
three thousand soldiers. To all these we add the fleet which preserved the
communication between Gaul and Britain, and a great number of vessels constantly
maintained on the Rhine and Danube, to harass the country, or to intercept the
passage of the barbarians[74].
If we review this general state of the Imperial forces; of the cavalry as well
as infantry; of the legions, the auxiliaries, the guards, and the navy; the most
liberal computation will not allow us to fix the entire establishment by sea and
by land at more than four hundred and fifty thousand men: a military power,
which, however formidable it may seem, was equalled by a monarch of the last
century, whose kingdom was confined within a single province of the Roman
empire[75].

We have
attempted to explain the spirit which moderated, and the strength which
supported, the power of Hadrian and the Antonines. We shall now endeavor, with
clearness and precision, to describe the provinces once united under their sway,
but, at present, divided into so many independent and hostile states. Spain, the
western extremity of the empire, of Europe, and of the ancient world, has, in
every age, invariably preserved the same natural limits; the Pyrenaean
Mountains, the Mediterranean, and the Atlantic Ocean. That great peninsula, at
present so unequally divided between two sovereigns, was distributed by Augustus
into three provinces, Lusitania, Baetica, and Tarraconensis. The kingdom of
Portugal now fills the place of the warlike country of the Lusitanians; and the
loss sustained by the former on the side of the East, is compensated by an
accession of territory towards the North. The confines of Grenada and Andalusia
correspond with those of ancient Baetica. The remainder of Spain, Gallicia, and
the Asturias, Biscay, and Navarre, Leon, and the two Castiles, Murcia, Valencia,
Catalonia, and Arragon, all contributed to form the third and most considerable
of the Roman governments, which, from the name of its capital, was styled the
province of Tarragona[76].
Of the native barbarians, the Celtiberians were the most powerful, as the
Cantabrians and Asturians proved the most obstinate. Confident in the strength
of their mountains, they were the last who submitted to the arms of Rome, and
the first who threw off the yoke of the Arabs.

Ancient
Gaul, as it contained the whole country between the Pyrenees, the Alps, the
Rhine, and the Ocean, was of greater extent than modern France. To the dominions
of that powerful monarchy, with its recent acquisitions of Alsace and Lorraine,
we must add the duchy of Savoy, the cantons of Switzerland, the four electorates
of the Rhine, and the territories of Liege, Luxemburgh, Hainault, Flanders, and
Brabant. When Augustus gave laws to the conquests of his father, he introduced a
division of Gaul, equally adapted to the progress of the legions, to the course
of the rivers, and to the principal national distinctions, which had
comprehended above a hundred independent states[77].
The sea-coast of the Mediterranean, Languedoc, Provence, and Dauphine, received
their provincial appellation from the colony of Narbonne. The government of
Aquitaine was extended from the Pyrenees to the Loire. The country between the
Loire and the Seine was styled the Celtic Gaul, and soon borrowed a new
denomination from the celebrated colony of Lugdunum, or Lyons. The Belgic lay
beyond the Seine, and in more ancient times had been bounded only by the Rhine;
but a little before the age of Caesar, the Germans, abusing their superiority of
valor, had occupied a considerable portion of the Belgic territory. The Roman
conquerors very eagerly embraced so flattering a circumstance, and the Gallic
frontier of the Rhine, from Basil to Leyden, received the pompous names of the
Upper and the Lower Germany[78].
Such, under the reign of the Antonines, were the six provinces of Gaul; the
Narbonnese, Aquitaine, the Celtic, or Lyonnese, the Belgic, and the two
Germanies.

We have
already had occasion to mention the conquest of Britain, and to fix the boundary
of the Roman Province in this island. It comprehended all England, Wales, and
the Lowlands of Scotland, as far as the Friths of Dumbarton and Edinburgh.
Before Britain lost her freedom, the country was irregularly divided between
thirty tribes of barbarians, of whom the most considerable were the Belgae in
the West, the Brigantes in the North, the Silures in South Wales, and the Iceni
in Norfolk and Suffolk[79].
As far as we can either trace or credit the resemblance of manners and language,
Spain, Gaul, and Britain were peopled by the same hardy race of savages. Before
they yielded to the Roman arms, they often disputed the field, and often renewed
the contest. After their submission, they constituted the western division of
the European provinces, which extended from the columns of Hercules to the wall
of Antoninus, and from the mouth of the Tagus to the sources of the Rhine and
Danube.

Before the
Roman conquest, the country which is now called Lombardy, was not considered as
a part of Italy. It had been occupied by a powerful colony of Gauls, who,
settling themselves along the banks of the Po, from Piedmont to Romagna, carried
their arms and diffused their name from the Alps to the Apennine. The Ligurians
dwelt on the rocky coast which now forms the republic of Genoa. Venice was yet
unborn; but the territories of that state, which lie to the east of the Adige,
were inhabited by the Venetians[80].
The middle part of the peninsula, that now composes the duchy of Tuscany and the
ecclesiastical state, was the ancient seat of the Etruscans and Umbrians; to the
former of whom Italy was indebted for the first rudiments of civilized life[81].
The Tyber rolled at the foot of the seven hills of Rome, and the country of the
Sabines, the Latins, and the Volsci, from that river to the frontiers of Naples,
was the theatre of her infant victories. On that celebrated ground the first
consuls deserved triumphs, their successors adorned villas, and their posterity
have erected convents[82].
Capua and Campania possessed the immediate territory of Naples; the rest of the
kingdom was inhabited by many warlike nations, the Marsi, the Samnites, the
Apulians, and the Lucanians; and the sea-coasts had been covered by the
flourishing colonies of the Greeks. We may remark, that when Augustus divided
Italy into eleven regions, the little province of Istria was annexed to that
seat of Roman sovereignty[83].

The
European provinces of Rome were protected by the course of the Rhine and the
Danube. The latter of those mighty streams, which rises at the distance of only
thirty miles from the former, flows above thirteen hundred miles, for the most
part to the south-east, collects the tribute of sixty navigable rivers, and is,
at length, through six mouths, received into the Euxine, which appears scarcely
equal to such an accession of waters[84].
The provinces of the Danube soon acquired the general appellation of Illyricum,
or the Illyrian frontier[85],
and were esteemed the most warlike of the empire; but they deserve to be more
particularly considered under the names of Rhaetia, Noricum, Pannonia, Dalmatia,
Dacia, Maesia, Thrace, Macedonia, and Greece.

The
province of Rhaetia, which soon extinguished the name of the Vindelicians,
extended from the summit of the Alps to the banks of the Danube; from its
source, as far as its conflux with the Inn. The greatest part of the flat
country is subject to the elector of Bavaria; the city of Augsburg is protected
by the constitution of the German empire; the Grisons are safe in their
mountains, and the country of Tirol is ranked among the numerous provinces of
the house of Austria.

The wide
extent of territory which is included between the Inn, the Danube, and the Save,
- Austria, Styria, Carinthia, Carniola, the Lower Hungary, and Sclavonia, - was
known to the ancients under the names of Noricum and Pannonia. In their original
state of independence, their fierce inhabitants were intimately connected. Under
the Roman government they were frequently united, and they still remain the
patrimony of a single family. They now contain the residence of a German prince,
who styles himself Emperor of the Romans, and form the centre, as well as
strength, of the Austrian power. It may not be improper to observe, that if we
except Bohemia, Moravia, the northern skirts of Austria, and a part of Hungary
between the Teyss and the Danube, all the other dominions of the House of
Austria were comprised within the limits of the Roman
Empire.

Dalmatia,
to which the name of Illyricum more properly belonged, was a long, but narrow
tract, between the Save and the Adriatic. The best part of the sea-coast, which
still retains its ancient appellation, is a province of the Venetian state, and
the seat of the little republic of Ragusa. The inland parts have assumed the
Sclavonian names of Croatia and Bosnia; the former obeys an Austrian governor,
the latter a Turkish pacha; but the whole country is still infested by tribes of
barbarians, whose savage independence irregularly marks the doubtful limit of
the Christian and Mahometan power[86].

After the
Danube had received the waters of the Teyss and the Save, it acquired, at least
among the Greeks, the name of Ister[87].
It formerly divided Maesia and Dacia, the latter of which, as we have already
seen, was a conquest of Trajan, and the only province beyond the river. If we
inquire into the present state of those countries, we shall find that, on the
left hand of the Danube, Temeswar and Transylvania have been annexed, after many
revolutions, to the crown of Hungary; whilst the principalities of Moldavia and
Wallachia acknowledge the supremacy of the Ottoman Porte. On the right hand of
the Danube, Maesia, which, during the middle ages, was broken into the barbarian
kingdoms of Servia and Bulgaria, is again united in Turkish
slavery.

The
appellation of Roumelia, which is still bestowed by the Turks on the extensive
countries of Thrace, Macedonia, and Greece, preserves the memory of their
ancient state under the Roman empire. In the time of the Antonines, the martial
regions of Thrace, from the mountains of Haemus and Rhodope, to the Bosphorus
and the Hellespont, had assumed the form of a province. Notwithstanding the
change of masters and of religion, the new city of Rome, founded by Constantine
on the banks of the Bosphorus, has ever since remained the capital of a great
monarchy. The kingdom of Macedonia, which, under the reign of Alexander, gave
laws to Asia, derived more solid advantages from the policy of the two Philips;
and with its dependencies of Epirus and Thessaly, extended from the Aegean to
the Ionian Sea. When we reflect on the fame of Thebes and Argos, of Sparta and
Athens, we can scarcely persuade ourselves, that so many immortal republics of
ancient Greece were lost in a single province of the Roman empire, which, from
the superior influence of the Achaean league, was usually denominated the
province of Achaia.

Such was
the state of Europe under the Roman emperors. The provinces of Asia, without
excepting the transient conquests of Trajan, are all comprehended within the
limits of the Turkish power. But, instead of following the arbitrary divisions
of despotism and ignorance, it will be safer for us, as well as more agreeable,
to observe the indelible characters of nature. The name of Asia Minor is
attributed with some propriety to the peninsula, which, confined betwixt the
Euxine and the Mediterranean, advances from the Euphrates towards Europe. The
most extensive and flourishing district, westward of Mount Taurus and the River
Halys, was dignified by the Romans with the exclusive title of Asia. The
jurisdiction of that province extended over the ancient monarchies of Troy,
Lydia, and Phrygia, the maritime countries of the Pamphylians, Lycians, and
Carians, and the Grecian colonies of Ionia, which equalled in arts, though not
in arms, the glory of their parent. The kingdoms of Bithynia and Pontus
possessed the northern side of the peninsula from Constantinople to Trebizond.
On the opposite side, the province of Cilicia was terminated by the mountains of
Syria: the inland country, separated from the Roman Asia by the River Halys, and
from Armenia by the Euphrates, had once formed the independent kingdom of
Cappadocia. In this place we may observe, that the northern shores of the
Euxine, beyond Trebizond in Asia, and beyond the Danube in Europe, acknowledged
the sovereignty of the emperors, and received at their hands either tributary
princes or Roman garrisons. Budzak, Crim Tartary, Circassia, and Mingrelia, are
the modern appellations of those savage countries[88].

Under the
successors of Alexander, Syria was the seat of the Seleucidae, who reigned over
Upper Asia, till the successful revolt of the Parthians confined their dominions
between the Euphrates and the Mediterranean. When Syria became subject to the
Romans, it formed the eastern frontier of their empire: nor did that province,
in its utmost latitude, know any other bounds than the mountains of Cappadocia
to the north, and towards the south, the confines of Egypt, and the Red Sea.
Phoenicia and Palestine were sometimes annexed to, and sometimes separated from,
the jurisdiction of Syria. The former of these was a narrow and rocky coast; the
latter was a territory scarcely superior to Wales, either in fertility or
extent[89].
Yet Phoenicia and Palestine will forever live in the memory of mankind; since
America, as well as Europe, has received letters from the one, and religion from
the other[90].
A sandy desert, alike destitute of wood and water, skirts along the doubtful
confine of Syria, from the Euphrates to the Red Sea. The wandering life of the
Arabs was inseparably connected with their independence; and wherever, on some
spots less barren than the rest, they ventured to for many settled habitations,
they soon became subjects to the Roman empire[91].

The
geographers of antiquity have frequently hesitated to what portion of the globe
they should ascribe Egypt[92].
By its situation that celebrated kingdom is included within the immense
peninsula of Africa; but it is accessible only on the side of Asia, whose
revolutions, in almost every period of history, Egypt has humbly obeyed. A Roman
praefect was seated on the splendid throne of the Ptolemies; and the iron
sceptre of the Mamelukes is now in the hands of a Turkish pacha. The Nile flows
down the country, above five hundred miles from the tropic of Cancer to the
Mediterranean, and marks on either side of the extent of fertility by the
measure of its inundations. Cyrene, situate towards the west, and along the
sea-coast, was first a Greek colony, afterwards a province of Egypt, and is now
lost in the desert of Barca[93].

From
Cyrene to the ocean, the coast of Africa extends above fifteen hundred miles;
yet so closely is it pressed between the Mediterranean and the Sahara, or sandy
desert, that its breadth seldom exceeds fourscore or a hundred miles. The
eastern division was considered by the Romans as the more peculiar and proper
province of Africa. Till the arrival of the Phoenician colonies, that fertile
country was inhabited by the Libyans, the most savage of mankind. Under the
immediate jurisdiction of Carthage, it became the centre of commerce and empire;
but the republic of Carthage is now degenerated into the feeble and disorderly
states of Tripoli and Tunis. The military government of Algiers oppresses the
wide extent of Numidia, as it was once united under Massinissa and Jugurtha; but
in the time of Augustus, the limits of Numidia were contracted; and, at least,
two thirds of the country acquiesced in the name of Mauritania, with the epithet
of Caesariensis. The genuine Mauritania, or country of the Moors, which, from
the ancient city of Tingi, or Tangier, was distinguished by the appellation of
Tingitana, is represented by the modern kingdom of Fez. Salle, on the Ocean, so
infamous at present for its piratical depredations, was noticed by the Romans,
as the extreme object of their power, and almost of their geography. A city of
their foundation may still be discovered near Mequinez, the residence of the
barbarian whom we condescend to style the Emperor of Morocco; but it does not
appear, that his more southern dominions, Morocco itself, and Segelmessa, were
ever comprehended within the Roman province. The western parts of Africa are
intersected by the branches of Mount Atlas, a name so idly celebrated by the
fancy of poets[94];
but which is now diffused over the immense ocean that rolls between the ancient
and the new continent[95].

Having now
finished the circuit of the Roman empire, we may observe, that Africa is divided
from Spain by a narrow strait of about twelve miles, through which the Atlantic
flows into the Mediterranean. The columns of Hercules, so famous among the
ancients, were two mountains which seemed to have been torn asunder by some
convulsion of the elements; and at the foot of the European mountain, the
fortress of Gibraltar is now seated. The whole extent of the Mediterranean Sea,
its coasts and its islands, were comprised within the Roman dominion. Of the
larger islands, the two Baleares, which derive their name of Majorca and Minorca
from their respective size, are subject at present, the former to Spain, the
latter to Great Britain[96].
It is easier to deplore the fate, than to describe the actual condition, of
Corsica[97].
Two Italian sovereigns assume a regal title from Sardinia and Sicily. Crete, or
Candia, with Cyprus, and most of the smaller islands of Greece and Asia, have
been subdued by the Turkish arms, whilst the little rock of Malta defies their
power, and has emerged, under the government of its military Order, into fame
and opulence[98].

This long
enumeration of provinces, whose broken fragments have formed so many powerful
kingdoms, might almost induce us to forgive the vanity or ignorance of the
ancients. Dazzled with the extensive sway, the irresistible strength, and the
real or affected moderation of the emperors, they permitted themselves to
despise, and sometimes to forget, the outlying countries which had been left in
the enjoyment of a barbarous independence; and they gradually usurped the
license of confounding the Roman monarchy with the globe of the earth[99].
But the temper, as well as knowledge, of a modern historian, require a more
sober and accurate language. He may impress a juster image of the greatness of
Rome, by observing that the empire was above two thousand miles in breadth, from
the wall of Antoninus and the northern limits of Dacia, to Mount Atlas and the
tropic of Cancer; that it extended in length more than three thousand miles from
the Western Ocean to the Euphrates; that it was situated in the finest part of
the Temperate Zone, between the twenty-fourth and fifty-sixth degrees of
northern latitude; and that it was supposed to contain above sixteen hundred
thousand square miles, for the most part of fertile and well-cultivated land[100].

Chapter II
The
Internal Prosperity in the Age of the Antonines
Part
I

Of the Union and Internal
Prosperity of the Roman Empire, in the Age of the
Antonines

It is not
alone by the rapidity, or extent of conquest, that we should estimate the
greatness of Rome. The sovereign of the Russian deserts commands a larger
portion of the globe. In the seventh summer after his passage of the Hellespont,
Alexander erected the Macedonian trophies on the banks of the Hyphasis[101].
Within less than a century, the irresistible Zingis, and the Mogul princes of
his race, spread their cruel devastations and transient empire from the Sea of
China, to the confines of Egypt and Germany[102].
But the firm edifice of Roman power was raised and preserved by the wisdom of
ages. The obedient provinces of Trajan and the Antonines were united by laws,
and adorned by arts. They might occasionally suffer from the partial abuse of
delegated authority; but the general principle of government was wise, simple,
and beneficent. They enjoyed the religion of their ancestors, whilst in civil
honors and advantages they were exalted, by just degrees, to an equality with
their conquerors.

I.
The
policy of the emperors and the senate, as far as it concerned religion, was
happily seconded by the reflections of the enlightened, and by the habits of the
superstitious, part of their subjects. The various modes of worship, which
prevailed in the Roman world, were all considered by the people, as equally
true; by the philosopher, as equally false; and by the magistrate, as equally
useful. And thus toleration produced not only mutual indulgence, but even
religious concord.

The superstition of the people was
not imbittered by any mixture of theological rancor; nor was it confined by the
chains of any speculative system. The devout polytheist, though fondly attached
to his national rites, admitted with implicit faith the different religions of
the earth[103].
Fear, gratitude, and curiosity, a dream or an omen, a singular disorder, or a
distant journey, perpetually disposed him to multiply the articles of his
belief, and to enlarge the list of his protectors. The thin texture of the Pagan
mythology was interwoven with various but not discordant materials. As soon as
it was allowed that sages and heroes, who had lived or who had died for the
benefit of their country, were exalted to a state of power and immortality, it
was universally confessed, that they deserved, if not the adoration, at least
the reverence, of all mankind. The deities of a thousand groves and a thousand
streams possessed, in peace, their local and respective influence; nor could the
Romans who deprecated the wrath of the Tiber, deride the Egyptian who presented
his offering to the beneficent genius of the Nile. The visible powers of nature,
the planets, and the elements were the same throughout the universe. The
invisible governors of the moral world were inevitably cast in a similar mould
of fiction and allegory. Every virtue, and even vice, acquired its divine
representative; every art and profession its patron, whose attributes, in the
most distant ages and countries, were uniformly derived from the character of
their peculiar votaries. A republic of gods of such opposite tempers and
interests required, in every system, the moderating hand of a supreme
magistrate, who, by the progress of knowledge and flattery, was gradually
invested with the sublime perfections of an Eternal Parent, and an Omnipotent
Monarch[104].
Such was the mild spirit of antiquity, that the nations were less attentive to
the difference, than to the resemblance, of their religious worship. The Greek,
the Roman, and the Barbarian, as they met before their respective altars, easily
persuaded themselves, that under various names, and with various ceremonies,
they adored the same deities[105].
The elegant mythology of Homer gave a beautiful, and almost a regular form, to
the polytheism of the ancient world.

The philosophers of Greece deduced
their morals from the nature of man, rather than from that of God. They
meditated, however, on the Divine Nature, as a very curious and important
speculation; and in the profound inquiry, they displayed the strength and
weakness of the human understanding[106].
Of the four most celebrated schools, the Stoics and the Platonists endeavored to
reconcile the jaring interests of reason and piety. They have left us the most
sublime proofs of the existence and perfections of the first cause; but, as it
was impossible for them to conceive the creation of matter, the workman in the
Stoic philosophy was not sufficiently distinguished from the work; whilst, on
the contrary, the spiritual God of Plato and his disciples resembled an idea,
rather than a substance. The opinions of the Academics and Epicureans were of a
less religious cast; but whilst the modest science of the former induced them to
doubt, the positive ignorance of the latter urged them to deny, the providence
of a Supreme Ruler. The spirit of inquiry, prompted by emulation, and supported
by freedom, had divided the public teachers of philosophy into a variety of
contending sects; but the ingenious youth, who, from every part, resorted to
Athens, and the other seats of learning in the Roman empire, were alike
instructed in every school to reject and to despise the religion of the
multitude. How, indeed, was it possible that a philosopher should accept, as
divine truths, the idle tales of the poets, and the incoherent traditions of
antiquity; or that he should adore, as gods, those imperfect beings whom he must
have despised, as men? Against such unworthy adversaries, Cicero condescended to
employ the arms of reason and eloquence; but the satire of Lucian was a much
more adequate, as well as more efficacious, weapon. We may be well assured, that
a writer, conversant with the world, would never have ventured to expose the
gods of his country to public ridicule, had they not already been the objects of
secret contempt among the polished and enlightened orders of society[107].

Notwithstanding the fashionable
irreligion which prevailed in the age of the Antonines, both the interest of the
priests and the credulity of the people were sufficiently respected. In their
writings and conversation, the philosophers of antiquity asserted the
independent dignity of reason; but they resigned their actions to the commands
of law and of custom. Viewing, with a smile of pity and indulgence, the various
errors of the vulgar, they diligently practised the ceremonies of their fathers,
devoutly frequented the temples of the gods; and sometimes condescending to act
a part on the theatre of superstition, they concealed the sentiments of an
atheist under the sacerdotal robes. Reasoners of such a temper were scarcely
inclined to wrangle about their respective modes of faith, or of worship. It was
indifferent to them what shape the folly of the multitude might choose to
assume; and they approached with the same inward contempt, and the same external
reverence, the altars of the Libyan, the Olympian, or the Capitoline Jupiter[108].

It is not easy to conceive from
what motives a spirit of persecution could introduce itself into the Roman
councils. The magistrates could not be actuated by a blind, though honest
bigotry, since the magistrates were themselves philosophers; and the schools of
Athens had given laws to the senate. They could not be impelled by ambition or
avarice, as the temporal and ecclesiastical powers were united in the same
hands. The pontiffs were chosen among the most illustrious of the senators; and
the office of Supreme Pontiff was constantly exercised by the emperors
themselves. They knew and valued the advantages of religion, as it is connected
with civil government. They encouraged the public festivals which humanize the
manners of the people. They managed the arts of divination as a convenient
instrument of policy; and they respected, as the firmest bond of society, the
useful persuasion, that, either in this or in a future life, the crime of
perjury is most assuredly punished by the avenging gods[109].
But whilst they acknowledged the general advantages of religion, they were
convinced that the various modes of worship contributed alike to the same
salutary purposes; and that, in every country, the form of superstition, which
had received the sanction of time and experience, was the best adapted to the
climate, and to its inhabitants. Avarice and taste very frequently despoiled the
vanquished nations of the elegant statues of their gods, and the rich ornaments
of their temples[110];
but, in the exercise of the religion which they derived from their ancestors,
they uniformly experienced the indulgence, and even protection, of the Roman
conquerors. The province of Gaul seems, and indeed only seems, an exception to
this universal toleration. Under the specious pretext of abolishing human
sacrifices, the emperors Tiberius and Claudius suppressed the dangerous power of
the Druids[111]:
but the priests themselves, their gods and their altars, subsisted in peaceful
obscurity till the final destruction of Paganism[112].

Rome, the capital of a great
monarchy, was incessantly filled with subjects and strangers from every part of
the world[113],
who all introduced and enjoyed the favorite superstitions of their native
country[114].
Every city in the empire was justified in maintaining the purity of its ancient
ceremonies; and the Roman senate, using the common privilege, sometimes
interposed, to check this inundation of foreign rites[115].
The Egyptian superstition, of all the most contemptible and abject, was
frequently prohibited: the temples of Serapis and Isis demolished, and their
worshippers banished from Rome and Italy[116].
But the zeal of fanaticism prevailed over the cold and feeble efforts of policy.
The exiles returned, the proselytes multiplied, the temples were restored with
increasing splendor, and Isis and Serapis at length assumed their place among
the Roman Deities[117].
Nor was this indulgence a departure from the old maxims of government. In the
purest ages of the commonwealth, Cybele and Aesculapius had been invited by
solemn embassies[118];
and it was customary to tempt the protectors of besieged cities, by the promise
of more distinguished honors than they possessed in their native country[119].
Rome gradually became the common temple of her subjects; and the freedom of the
city was bestowed on all the gods of mankind[120].

II.
The
narrow policy of preserving, without any foreign mixture, the pure blood of the
ancient citizens, had checked the fortune, and hastened the ruin, of Athens and
Sparta. The aspiring genius of Rome sacrificed vanity to ambition, and deemed it
more prudent, as well as honorable, to adopt virtue and merit for her own
wheresoever they were found, among slaves or strangers, enemies or barbarians[121].
During the most flourishing aera of the Athenian commonwealth, the number of
citizens gradually decreased from about thirty[122]
to twenty-one thousand[123].
If, on the contrary, we study the growth of the Roman republic, we may discover,
that, notwithstanding the incessant demands of wars and colonies, the citizens,
who, in the first census of Servius Tullius, amounted to no more than
eighty-three thousand, were multiplied, before the commencement of the social
war, to the number of four hundred and sixty-three thousand men, able to bear
arms in the service of their country[124].
When the allies of Rome claimed an equal share of honors and privileges, the
senate indeed preferred the chance of arms to an ignominious concession. The
Samnites and the Lucanians paid the severe penalty of their rashness; but the
rest of the Italian states, as they successively returned to their duty, were
admitted into the bosom of the republic[125],
and soon contributed to the ruin of public freedom. Under a democratical
government, the citizens exercise the powers of sovereignty; and those powers
will be first abused, and afterwards lost, if they are committed to an unwieldy
multitude. But when the popular assemblies had been suppressed by the
administration of the emperors, the conquerors were distinguished from the
vanquished nations, only as the first and most honorable order of subjects; and
their increase, however rapid, was no longer exposed to the same dangers. Yet
the wisest princes, who adopted the maxims of Augustus, guarded with the
strictest care the dignity of the Roman name, and diffused the freedom of the
city with a prudent liberality[126].

Chapter II
The
Internal Prosperity in the Age of the Antonines
Part
II

Till the
privileges of Romans had been progressively extended to all the inhabitants of
the empire, an important distinction was preserved between Italy and the
provinces. The former was esteemed the centre of public unity, and the firm
basis of the constitution. Italy claimed the birth, or at least the residence,
of the emperors and the senate[127].
The estates of the Italians were exempt from taxes, their persons from the
arbitrary jurisdiction of governors. Their municipal corporations, formed after
the perfect model of the capital[128],
were intrusted, under the immediate eye of the supreme power, with the execution
of the laws. From the foot of the Alps to the extremity of Calabria, all the
natives of Italy were born citizens of Rome. Their partial distinctions were
obliterated, and they insensibly coalesced into one great nation, united by
language, manners, and civil institutions, and equal to the weight of a powerful
empire. The republic gloried in her generous policy, and was frequently rewarded
by the merit and services of her adopted sons. Had she always confined the
distinction of Romans to the ancient families within the walls of the city, that
immortal name would have been deprived of some of its noblest ornaments. Virgil
was a native of Mantua; Horace was inclined to doubt whether he should call
himself an Apulian or a Lucanian; it was in Padua that an historian was found
worthy to record the majestic series of Roman victories. The patriot family of
the Catos emerged from Tusculum; and the little town of Arpinum claimed the
double honor of producing Marius and Cicero, the former of whom deserved, after
Romulus and Camillus, to be styled the Third Founder of Rome; and the latter,
after saving his country from the designs of Catiline, enabled her to contend
with Athens for the palm of eloquence[129].

The
provinces of the empire (as they have been described in the preceding chapter)
were destitute of any public force, or constitutional freedom. In Etruria, in
Greece[130],
and in Gaul[131],
it was the first care of the senate to dissolve those dangerous confederacies,
which taught mankind that, as the Roman arms prevailed by division, they might
be resisted by union. Those princes, whom the ostentation of gratitude or
generosity permitted for a while to hold a precarious sceptre, were dismissed
from their thrones, as soon as they had per formed their appointed task of
fashioning to the yoke the vanquished nations. The free states and cities which
had embraced the cause of Rome were rewarded with a nominal alliance, and
insensibly sunk into real servitude. The public authority was every where
exercised by the ministers of the senate and of the emperors, and that authority
was absolute, and without control[132].
But the same salutary maxims of government, which had secured the peace and
obedience of Italy were extended to the most distant conquests. A nation of
Romans was gradually formed in the provinces, by the double expedient of
introducing colonies, and of admitting the most faithful and deserving of the
provincials to the freedom of Rome.

"Wheresoever the Roman conquers, he
inhabits," is a very just observation of Seneca[133],
confirmed by history and experience. The natives of Italy, allured by pleasure
or by interest, hastened to enjoy the advantages of victory; and we may remark,
that, about forty years after the reduction of Asia, eighty thousand Romans were
massacred in one day, by the cruel orders of Mithridates[134].
These voluntary exiles were engaged, for the most part, in the occupations of
commerce, agriculture, and the farm of the revenue. But after the legions were
rendered permanent by the emperors, the provinces were peopled by a race of
soldiers; and the veterans, whether they received the reward of their service in
land or in money, usually settled with their families in the country, where they
had honorably spent their youth. Throughout the empire, but more particularly in
the western parts, the most fertile districts, and the most convenient
situations, were reserved for the establishment of colonies; some of which were
of a civil, and others of a military nature. In their manners and internal
policy, the colonies formed a perfect representation of their great parent; and
they were soon endeared to the natives by the ties of friendship and alliance,
they effectually diffused a reverence for the Roman name, and a desire, which
was seldom disappointed, of sharing, in due time, its honors and advantages[135].
The municipal cities insensibly equalled the rank and splendor of the colonies;
and in the reign of Hadrian, it was disputed which was the preferable condition,
of those societies which had issued from, or those which had been received into,
the bosom of Rome[136].
The right of Latium, as it was called[137],
conferred on the cities to which it had been granted, a more partial favor. The
magistrates only, at the expiration of their office, assumed the quality of
Roman citizens; but as those offices were annual, in a few years they circulated
round the principal families[138].
Those of the provincials who were permitted to bear arms in the legions[139];
those who exercised any civil employment; all, in a word, who performed any
public service, or displayed any personal talents, were rewarded with a present,
whose value was continually diminished by the increasing liberality of the
emperors. Yet even, in the age of the Antonines, when the freedom of the city
had been bestowed on the greater number of their subjects, it was still
accompanied with very solid advantages. The bulk of the people acquired, with
that title, the benefit of the Roman laws, particularly in the interesting
articles of marriage, testaments, and inheritances; and the road of fortune was
open to those whose pretensions were seconded by favor or merit. The grandsons
of the Gauls, who had besieged Julius Caesar in Alcsia, commanded legions,
governed provinces, and were admitted into the senate of Rome[140].
Their ambition, instead of disturbing the tranquillity of the state, was
intimately connected with its safety and greatness.

So
sensible were the Romans of the influence of language over national manners,
that it was their most serious care to extend, with the progress of their arms,
the use of the Latin tongue[141].
The ancient dialects of Italy, the Sabine, the Etruscan, and the Venetian, sunk
into oblivion; but in the provinces, the east was less docile than the west to
the voice of its victorious preceptors. This obvious difference marked the two
portions of the empire with a distinction of colors, which, though it was in
some degree concealed during the meridian splendor of prosperity, became
gradually more visible, as the shades of night descended upon the Roman world.
The western countries were civilized by the same hands which subdued them. As
soon as the barbarians were reconciled to obedience, their minds were open to
any new impressions of knowledge and politeness. The language of Virgil and
Cicero, though with some inevitable mixture of corruption, was so universally
adopted in Africa, Spain, Gaul Britain, and Pannonia[142],
that the faint traces of the Punic or Celtic idioms were preserved only in the
mountains, or among the peasants[143].
Education and study insensibly inspired the natives of those countries with the
sentiments of Romans; and Italy gave fashions, as well as laws, to her Latin
provincials. They solicited with more ardor, and obtained with more facility,
the freedom and honors of the state; supported the national dignity in letters[144]
and in arms; and at length, in the person of Trajan, produced an emperor whom
the Scipios would not have disowned for their countryman. The situation of the
Greeks was very different from that of the barbarians. The former had been long
since civilized and corrupted. They had too much taste to relinquish their
language, and too much vanity to adopt any foreign institutions. Still
preserving the prejudices, after they had lost the virtues, of their ancestors,
they affected to despise the unpolished manners of the Roman conquerors, whilst
they were compelled to respect their superior wisdom and power[145].
Nor was the influence of the Grecian language and sentiments confined to the
narrow limits of that once celebrated country. Their empire, by the progress of
colonies and conquest, had been diffused from the Adriatic to the Euphrates and
the Nile. Asia was covered with Greek cities, and the long reign of the
Macedonian kings had introduced a silent revolution into Syria and Egypt. In
their pompous courts, those princes united the elegance of Athens with the
luxury of the East, and the example of the court was imitated, at an humble
distance, by the higher ranks of their subjects. Such was the general division
of the Roman empire into the Latin and Greek languages. To these we may add a
third distinction for the body of the natives in Syria, and especially in Egypt,
the use of their ancient dialects, by secluding them from the commerce of
mankind, checked the improvements of those barbarians[146].
The slothful effeminacy of the former exposed them to the contempt, the sullen
ferociousness of the latter excited the aversion, of the conquerors[147].
Those nations had submitted to the Roman power, but they seldom desired or
deserved the freedom of the city: and it was remarked, that more than two
hundred and thirty years elapsed after the ruin of the Ptolemies, before an
Egyptian was admitted into the senate of Rome[148].

It is a
just though trite observation, that victorious Rome was herself subdued by the
arts of Greece. Those immortal writers who still command the admiration of
modern Europe, soon became the favorite object of study and imitation in Italy
and the western provinces. But the elegant amusements of the Romans were not
suffered to interfere with their sound maxims of policy. Whilst they
acknowledged the charms of the Greek, they asserted the dignity of the Latin
tongue, and the exclusive use of the latter was inflexibly maintained in the
administration of civil as well as military government[149].
The two languages exercised at the same time their separate jurisdiction
throughout the empire: the former, as the natural idiom of science; the latter,
as the legal dialect of public transactions. Those who united letters with
business were equally conversant with both; and it was almost impossible, in any
province, to find a Roman subject, of a liberal education, who was at once a
stranger to the Greek and to the Latin language.

It was by
such institutions that the nations of the empire insensibly melted away into the
Roman name and people. But there still remained, in the centre of every province
and of every family, an unhappy condition of men who endured the weight, without
sharing the benefits, of society. In the free states of antiquity, the domestic
slaves were exposed to the wanton rigor of despotism. The perfect settlement of
the Roman empire was preceded by ages of violence and rapine. The slaves
consisted, for the most part, of barbarian captives[150],
taken in thousands by the chance of war, purchased at a vile price[151],
accustomed to a life of independence, and impatient to break and to revenge
their fetters. Against such internal enemies, whose desperate insurrections had
more than once reduced the republic to the brink of destruction[152],
the most severe[153]
regulations[154],
and the most cruel treatment, seemed almost justified by the great law of
self-preservation. But when the principal nations of Europe, Asia, and Africa
were united under the laws of one sovereign, the source of foreign supplies
flowed with much less abundance, and the Romans were reduced to the milder but
more tedious method of propagation[155].
In their numerous families, and particularly in their country estates, they
encouraged the marriage of their slaves[156].
The sentiments of nature, the habits of education, and the possession of a
dependent species of property, contributed to alleviate the hardships of
servitude[157].
The existence of a slave became an object of greater value, and though his
happiness still depended on the temper and circumstances of the master, the
humanity of the latter, instead of being restrained by fear, was encouraged by
the sense of his own interest. The progress of manners was accelerated by the
virtue or policy of the emperors; and by the edicts of Hadrian and the
Antonines, the protection of the laws was extended to the most abject part of
mankind. The jurisdiction of life and death over the slaves, a power long
exercised and often abused, was taken out of private hands, and reserved to the
magistrates alone. The subterraneous prisons were abolished; and, upon a just
complaint of intolerable treatment, the injured slave obtained either his
deliverance, or a less cruel master[158].

Hope, the
best comfort of our imperfect condition, was not denied to the Roman slave; and
if he had any opportunity of rendering himself either useful or agreeable, he
might very naturally expect that the diligence and fidelity of a few years would
be rewarded with the inestimable gift of freedom. The benevolence of the master
was so frequently prompted by the meaner suggestions of vanity and avarice, that
the laws found it more necessary to restrain than to encourage a profuse and
undistinguishing liberality, which might degenerate into a very dangerous
abuse[159].
It was a maxim of ancient jurisprudence, that a slave had not any country of his
own; he acquired with his liberty an admission into the political society of
which his patron was a member. The consequences of this maxim would have
prostituted the privileges of the Roman city to a mean and promiscuous
multitude. Some seasonable exceptions were therefore provided; and the honorable
distinction was confined to such slaves only as, for just causes, and with the
approbation of the magistrate, should receive a solemn and legal manumission.
Even these chosen freedmen obtained no more than the private rights of citizens,
and were rigorously excluded from civil or military honors. Whatever might be
the merit or fortune of their sons, they likewise were esteemed unworthy of a
seat in the senate; nor were the traces of a servile origin allowed to be
completely obliterated till the third or fourth generation[160].
Without destroying the distinction of ranks, a distant prospect of freedom and
honors was presented, even to those whom pride and prejudice almost disdained to
number among the human species.

It was
once proposed to discriminate the slaves by a peculiar habit; but it was justly
apprehended that there might be some danger in acquainting them with their own
numbers[161].
Without interpreting, in their utmost strictness, the liberal appellations of
legions and myriads[162],
we may venture to pronounce, that the proportion of slaves, who were valued as
property, was more considerable than that of servants, who can be computed only
as an expense[163].
The youths of a promising genius were instructed in the arts and sciences, and
their price was ascertained by the degree of their skill and talents[164].
Almost every profession, either liberal[165]
or mechanical, might be found in the household of an opulent senator. The
ministers of pomp and sensuality were multiplied beyond the conception of modern
luxury[166].
It was more for the interest of the merchant or manufacturer to purchase, than
to hire his workmen; and in the country, slaves were employed as the cheapest
and most laborious instruments of agriculture. To confirm the general
observation, and to display the multitude of slaves, we might allege a variety
of particular instances. It was discovered, on a very melancholy occasion, that
four hundred slaves were maintained in a single palace of Rome[167].
The same number of four hundred belonged to an estate which an African widow, of
a very private condition, resigned to her son, whilst she reserved for herself a
much larger share of her property[168].
A freedman, under the name of Augustus, though his fortune had suffered great
losses in the civil wars, left behind him three thousand six hundred yoke of
oxen, two hundred and fifty thousand head of smaller cattle, and what was almost
included in the description of cattle, four thousand one hundred and sixteen
slaves[169].

The number
of subjects who acknowledged the laws of Rome, of citizens, of provincials, and
of slaves, cannot now be fixed with such a degree of accuracy, as the importance
of the object would deserve. We are informed, that when the Emperor Claudius
exercised the office of censor, he took an account of six millions nine hundred
and forty-five thousand Roman citizens, who, with the proportion of women and
children, must have amounted to about twenty millions of souls. The multitude of
subjects of an inferior rank was uncertain and fluctuating. But, after weighing
with attention every circumstance which could influence the balance, it seems
probable that there existed, in the time of Claudius, about twice as many
provincials as there were citizens, of either sex, and of every age; and that
the slaves were at least equal in number to the free inhabitants of the Roman
world[170].
The total amount of this imperfect calculation would rise to about one hundred
and twenty millions of persons; a degree of population which possibly exceeds
that of modern Europe[171],
and forms the most numerous society that has ever been united under the same
system of government.

Chapter II
The
Internal Prosperity in the Age of the Antonines
Part
III

Domestic
peace and union were the natural consequences of the moderate and comprehensive
policy embraced by the Romans. If we turn our eyes towards the monarchies of
Asia, we shall behold despotism in the centre, and weakness in the extremities;
the collection of the revenue, or the administration of justice, enforced by the
presence of an army; hostile barbarians established in the heart of the country,
hereditary satraps usurping the dominion of the provinces, and subjects inclined
to rebellion, though incapable of freedom. But the obedience of the Roman world
was uniform, voluntary, and permanent. The vanquished nations, blended into one
great people, resigned the hope, nay, even the wish, of resuming their
independence, and scarcely considered their own existence as distinct from the
existence of Rome. The established authority of the emperors pervaded without an
effort the wide extent of their dominions, and was exercised with the same
facility on the banks of the Thames, or of the Nile, as on those of the Tyber.
The legions were destined to serve against the public enemy, and the civil
magistrate seldom required the aid of a military force[172].
In this state of general security, the leisure, as well as opulence, both of the
prince and people, were devoted to improve and to adorn the Roman
empire.

Among the
innumerable monuments of architecture constructed by the Romans, how many have
escaped the notice of history, how few have resisted the ravages of time and
barbarism! And yet, even the majestic ruins that are still scattered over Italy
and the provinces, would be sufficient to prove that those countries were once
the seat of a polite and powerful empire. Their greatness alone, or their
beauty, might deserve our attention: but they are rendered more interesting, by
two important circumstances, which connect the agreeable history of the arts
with the more useful history of human manners. Many of those works were erected
at private expense, and almost all were intended for public
benefit.

It is
natural to suppose that the greatest number, as well as the most considerable of
the Roman edifices, were raised by the emperors, who possessed so unbounded a
command both of men and money. Augustus was accustomed to boast that he had
found his capital of brick, and that he had left it of marble[173].
The strict economy of Vespasian was the source of his magnificence. The works of
Trajan bear the stamp of his genius. The public monuments with which Hadrian
adorned every province of the empire, were executed not only by his orders, but
under his immediate inspection. He was himself an artist; and he loved the arts,
as they conduced to the glory of the monarch. They were encouraged by the
Antonines, as they contributed to the happiness of the people[174].
But if the emperors were the first, they were not the only architects of their
dominions. Their example was universally imitated by their principal subjects,
who were not afraid of declaring to the world that they had spirit to conceive,
and wealth to accomplish, the noblest undertakings. Scarcely had the proud
structure of the Coliseum been dedicated at Rome, before the edifices, of a
smaller scale indeed, but of the same design and materials, were erected for the
use, and at the expense, of the cities of Capua and Verona[175].
The inscription of the stupendous bridge of Alcantara attests that it was thrown
over the Tagus by the contribution of a few Lusitanian communities. When Pliny
was intrusted with the government of Bithynia and Pontus, provinces by no means
the richest or most considerable of the empire, he found the cities within his
jurisdiction striving with each other in every useful and ornamental work, that
might deserve the curiosity of strangers, or the gratitude of their citizens. It
was the duty of the proconsul to supply their deficiencies, to direct their
taste, and sometimes to moderate their emulation[176].
The opulent senators of Rome and the provinces esteemed it an honor, and almost
an obligation, to adorn the splendor of their age and country; and the influence
of fashion very frequently supplied the want of taste or generosity. Among a
crowd of these private benefactors, we may select Herodes Atticus, an Athenian
citizen, who lived in the age of the Antonines. Whatever might be the motive of
his conduct, his magnificence would have been worthy of the greatest
kings.

The family
of Herod, at least after it had been favored by fortune, was lineally descended
from Cimon and Miltiades, Theseus and Cecrops, Aeacus and Jupiter. But the
posterity of so many gods and heroes was fallen into the most abject state. His
grandfather had suffered by the hands of justice, and Julius Atticus, his
father, must have ended his life in poverty and contempt, had he not discovered
an immense treasure buried under an old house, the last remains of his
patrimony. According to the rigor of the law, the emperor might have asserted
his claim, and the prudent Atticus prevented, by a frank confession, the
officiousness of informers. But the equitable Nerva, who then filled the throne,
refused to accept any part of it, and commanded him to use, without scruple, the
present of fortune. The cautious Athenian still insisted, that the treasure was
too considerable for a subject, and that he knew not how to use it. Abuse it
then, replied the monarch, with a good- natured peevishness; for it is your
own[177].
Many will be of opinion, that Atticus literally obeyed the emperor's last
instructions; since he expended the greatest part of his fortune, which was much
increased by an advantageous marriage, in the service of the public. He had
obtained for his son Herod the prefecture of the free cities of Asia; and the
young magistrate, observing that the town of Troas was indifferently supplied
with water, obtained from the munificence of Hadrian three hundred myriads of
drachms, (about a hundred thousand pounds,) for the construction of a new
aqueduct. But in the execution of the work, the charge amounted to more than
double the estimate, and the officers of the revenue began to murmur, till the
generous Atticus silenced their complaints, by requesting that he might be
permitted to take upon himself the whole additional expense[178].

The ablest
preceptors of Greece and Asia had been invited by liberal rewards to direct the
education of young Herod. Their pupil soon became a celebrated orator, according
to the useless rhetoric of that age, which, confining itself to the schools,
disdained to visit either the Forum or the Senate.

He was
honored with the consulship at Rome: but the greatest part of his life was spent
in a philosophic retirement at Athens, and his adjacent villas; perpetually
surrounded by sophists, who acknowledged, without reluctance, the superiority of
a rich and generous rival[179].
The monuments of his genius have perished; some considerable ruins still
preserve the fame of his taste and munificence: modern travellers have measured
the remains of the stadium which he constructed at Athens. It was six hundred
feet in length, built entirely of white marble, capable of admitting the whole
body of the people, and finished in four years, whilst Herod was president of
the Athenian games. To the memory of his wife Regilla he dedicated a theatre,
scarcely to be paralleled in the empire: no wood except cedar, very curiously
carved, was employed in any part of the building. The Odeum[180],
designed by Pericles for musical performances, and the rehearsal of new
tragedies, had been a trophy of the victory of the arts over barbaric greatness;
as the timbers employed in the construction consisted chiefly of the masts of
the Persian vessels. Notwithstanding the repairs bestowed on that ancient
edifice by a king of Cappadocia, it was again fallen to decay. Herod restored
its ancient beauty and magnificence. Nor was the liberality of that illustrious
citizen confined to the walls of Athens. The most splendid ornaments bestowed on
the temple of Neptune in the Isthmus, a theatre at Corinth, a stadium at Delphi,
a bath at Thermopylae, and an aqueduct at Canusium in Italy, were insufficient
to exhaust his treasures. The people of Epirus, Thessaly, Euboea, Boeotia, and
Peloponnesus, experienced his favors; and many inscriptions of the cities of
Greece and Asia gratefully style Herodes Atticus their patron and benefactor[181].

In the
commonwealths of Athens and Rome, the modest simplicity of private houses
announced the equal condition of freedom; whilst the sovereignty of the people
was represented in the majestic edifices designed to the public use[182];
nor was this republican spirit totally extinguished by the introduction of
wealth and monarchy. It was in works of national honor and benefit, that the
most virtuous of the emperors affected to display their magnificence. The golden
palace of Nero excited a just indignation, but the vast extent of ground which
had been usurped by his selfish luxury was more nobly filled under the
succeeding reigns by the Coliseum, the baths of Titus, the Claudian portico, and
the temples dedicated to the goddess of Peace, and to the genius of Rome[183].
These monuments of architecture, the property of the Roman people, were adorned
with the most beautiful productions of Grecian painting and sculpture; and in
the temple of Peace, a very curious library was open to the curiosity of the
learned[184].
At a small distance from thence was situated the Forum of Trajan. It was
surrounded by a lofty portico, in the form of a quadrangle, into which four
triumphal arches opened a noble and spacious entrance: in the centre arose a
column of marble, whose height, of one hundred and ten feet, denoted the
elevation of the hill that had been cut away. This column, which still subsists
in its ancient beauty, exhibited an exact representation of the Dacian victories
of its founder. The veteran soldier contemplated the story of his own campaigns,
and by an easy illusion of national vanity, the peaceful citizen associated
himself to the honors of the triumph. All the other quarters of the capital, and
all the provinces of the empire, were embellished by the same liberal spirit of
public magnificence, and were filled with amphitheatres, theatres, temples,
porticoes, triumphal arches, baths and aqueducts, all variously conducive to the
health, the devotion, and the pleasures of the meanest citizen. The last
mentioned of those edifices deserve our peculiar attention. The boldness of the
enterprise, the solidity of the execution, and the uses to which they were
subservient, rank the aqueducts among the noblest monuments of Roman genius and
power. The aqueducts of the capital claim a just preeminence; but the curious
traveller, who, without the light of history, should examine those of Spoleto,
of Metz, or of Segovia, would very naturally conclude that those provincial
towns had formerly been the residence of some potent monarch. The solitudes of
Asia and Africa were once covered with flourishing cities, whose populousness,
and even whose existence, was derived from such artificial supplies of a
perennial stream of fresh water[185].

We have
computed the inhabitants, and contemplated the public works, of the Roman
empire. The observation of the number and greatness of its cities will serve to
confirm the former, and to multiply the latter. It may not be unpleasing to
collect a few scattered instances relative to that subject without forgetting,
however, that from the vanity of nations and the poverty of language, the vague
appellation of city has been indifferently bestowed on Rome and upon
Laurentum.

I.
Ancient Italy is said to have
contained eleven hundred and ninety- seven cities; and for whatsoever aera of
antiquity the expression might be intended[186],
there is not any reason to believe the country less populous in the age of the
Antonines, than in that of Romulus. The petty states of Latium were contained
within the metropolis of the empire, by whose superior influence they had been
attracted[187].
Those parts of Italy which have so long languished under the lazy tyranny of
priests and viceroys, had been afflicted only by the more tolerable calamities
of war; and the first symptoms of decay which they experienced, were amply
compensated by the rapid improvements of the Cisalpine Gaul. The splendor of
Verona may be traced in its remains: yet Verona was less celebrated than
Aquileia or Padua, Milan or Ravenna.

II.
The
spirit of improvement had passed the Alps, and been felt even in the woods of
Britain, which were gradually cleared away to open a free space for convenient
and elegant habitations. York was the seat of government; London was already
enriched by commerce; and Bath was celebrated for the salutary effects of its
medicinal waters. Gaul could boast of her twelve hundred cities[188];
and though, in the northern parts, many of them, without excepting Paris itself,
were little more than the rude and imperfect townships of a rising people, the
southern provinces imitated the wealth and elegance of Italy[189].
Many were the cities of Gaul, Marseilles, Arles, Nismes, Narbonne, Thoulouse,
Bourdeaux, Autun, Vienna, Lyons, Langres, and Treves, whose ancient condition
might sustain an equal, and perhaps advantageous comparison with their present
state. With regard to Spain, that country flourished as a province, and has
declined as a kingdom. Exhausted by the abuse of her strength, by America, and
by superstition, her pride might possibly be confounded, if we required such a
list of three hundred and sixty cities, as Pliny has exhibited under the reign
of Vespasian[190].

III.
Three
hundred African cities had once acknowledged the authority of Carthage[191],
nor is it likely that their numbers diminished under the administration of the
emperors: Carthage itself rose with new splendor from its ashes; and that
capital, as well as Capua and Corinth, soon recovered all the advantages which
can be separated from independent sovereignty.

IV.
The
provinces of the East present the contrast of Roman magnificence with Turkish
barbarism. The ruins of antiquity scattered over uncultivated fields, and
ascribed, by ignorance to the power of magic, scarcely afford a shelter to the
oppressed peasant or wandering Arab. Under the reign of the Caesars, the proper
Asia alone contained five hundred populous cities[192],
enriched with all the gifts of nature, and adorned with all the refinements of
art. Eleven cities of Asia had once disputed the honor of dedicating a temple of
Tiberius, and their respective merits were examined by the senate[193].
Four of them were immediately rejected as unequal to the burden; and among these
was Laodicea, whose splendor is still displayed in its ruins[194].
Laodicea collected a very considerable revenue from its flocks of sheep,
celebrated for the fineness of their wool, and had received, a little before the
contest, a legacy of above four hundred thousand pounds by the testament of a
generous citizen[195].
If such was the poverty of Laodicea, what must have been the wealth of those
cities, whose claim appeared preferable, and particularly of Pergamus, of
Smyrna, and of Ephesus, who so long disputed with each other the titular primacy
of Asia?[196]
The capitals of Syria and Egypt held a still superior rank in the empire;
Antioch and Alexandria looked down with disdain on a crowd of dependent cities[197],
and yielded, with reluctance, to the majesty of Rome
itself.

Chapter II
The
Internal Prosperity in the Age of the Antonines
Part
IV

All these
cities were connected with each other, and with the capital, by the public
highways, which, issuing from the Forum of Rome, traversed Italy, pervaded the
provinces, and were terminated only by the frontiers of the empire. If we
carefully trace the distance from the wall of Antoninus to Rome, and from thence
to Jerusalem, it will be found that the great chain of communication, from the
north-west to the south-east point of the empire, was drawn out to the length if
four thousand and eighty Roman miles[198].
The public roads were accurately divided by mile-stones, and ran in a direct
line from one city to another, with very little respect for the obstacles either
of nature or private property. Mountains were perforated, and bold arches thrown
over the broadest and most rapid streams[199].
The middle part of the road was raised into a terrace which commanded the
adjacent country, consisted of several strata of sand, gravel, and cement, and
was paved with large stones, or, in some places near the capital, with granite[200].
Such was the solid construction of the Roman highways, whose firmness has not
entirely yielded to the effort of fifteen centuries. They united the subjects of
the most distant provinces by an easy and familiar intercourse; out their
primary object had been to facilitate the marches of the legions; nor was any
country considered as completely subdued, till it had been rendered, in all its
parts, pervious to the arms and authority of the conqueror. The advantage of
receiving the earliest intelligence, and of conveying their orders with
celerity, induced the emperors to establish, throughout their extensive
dominions, the regular institution of posts[201].
Houses were every where erected at the distance only of five or six miles; each
of them was constantly provided with forty horses, and by the help of these
relays, it was easy to travel a hundred miles in a day along the Roman roads[202],[203].
The use of posts was allowed to those who claimed it by an Imperial mandate; but
though originally intended for the public service, it was sometimes indulged to
the business or conveniency of private citizens[204].
Nor was the communication of the Roman empire less free and open by sea than it
was by land. The provinces surrounded and enclosed the Mediterranean: and Italy,
in the shape of an immense promontory, advanced into the midst of that great
lake. The coasts of Italy are, in general, destitute of safe harbors; but human
industry had corrected the deficiencies of nature; and the artificial port of
Ostia, in particular, situate at the mouth of the Tyber, and formed by the
emperor Claudius, was a useful monument of Roman greatness[205].
From this port, which was only sixteen miles from the capital, a favorable
breeze frequently carried vessels in seven days to the columns of Hercules, and
in nine or ten, to Alexandria in Egypt[206],[207].

Whatever
evils either reason or declamation have imputed to extensive empire, the power
of Rome was attended with some beneficial consequences to mankind; and the same
freedom of intercourse which extended the vices, diffused likewise the
improvements, of social life. In the more remote ages of antiquity, the world
was unequally divided. The East was in the immemorial possession of arts and
luxury; whilst the West was inhabited by rude and warlike barbarians, who either
disdained agriculture, or to whom it was totally unknown. Under the protection
of an established government, the productions of happier climates, and the
industry of more civilized nations, were gradually introduced into the western
countries of Europe; and the natives were encouraged, by an open and profitable
commerce, to multiply the former, as well as to improve the latter. It would be
almost impossible to enumerate all the articles, either of the animal or the
vegetable reign, which were successively imported into Europe from Asia and
Egypt[208]:
but it will not be unworthy of the dignity, and much less of the utility, of an
historical work, slightly to touch on a few of the principal
heads.

I.
Almost all the flowers, the herbs,
and the fruits, that grow in our European gardens, are of foreign extraction,
which, in many cases, is betrayed even by their names: the apple was a native of
Italy, and when the Romans had tasted the richer flavor of the apricot, the
peach, the pomegranate, the citron, and the orange, they contented themselves
with applying to all these new fruits the common denomination of apple,
discriminating them from each other by the additional epithet of their
country.

II.
In
the time of Homer, the vine grew wild in the island of Sicily, and most probably
in the adjacent continent; but it was not improved by the skill, nor did it
afford a liquor grateful to the taste, of the savage inhabitants[209].
A thousand years afterwards, Italy could boast, that of the fourscore most
generous and celebrated wines, more than two thirds were produced from her
soil[210].
The blessing was soon communicated to the Narbonnese province of Gaul; but so
intense was the cold to the north of the Cevennes, that, in the time of Strabo,
it was thought impossible to ripen the grapes in those parts of Gaul[211].
This difficulty, however, was gradually vanquished; and there is some reason to
believe, that the vineyards of Burgundy are as old as the age of the Antonines[212].

III.
The
olive, in the western world, followed the progress of peace, of which it was
considered as the symbol. Two centuries after the foundation of Rome, both Italy
and Africa were strangers to that useful plant: it was naturalized in those
countries; and at length carried into the heart of Spain and Gaul. The timid
errors of the ancients, that it required a certain degree of heat, and could
only flourish in the neighborhood of the sea, were insensibly exploded by
industry and experience[213].

IV.
The
cultivation of flax was transported from Egypt to Gaul, and enriched the whole
country, however it might impoverish the particular lands on which it was sown[214].

V.
The
use of artificial grasses became familiar to the farmers both of Italy and the
provinces, particularly the Lucerne, which derived its name and origin from
Media[215].
The assured supply of wholesome and plentiful food for the cattle during winter,
multiplied the number of the docks and herds, which in their turn contributed to
the fertility of the soil. To all these improvements may be added an assiduous
attention to mines and fisheries, which, by employing a multitude of laborious
hands, serve to increase the pleasures of the rich and the subsistence of the
poor. The elegant treatise of Columella describes the advanced state of the
Spanish husbandry under the reign of Tiberius; and it may be observed, that
those famines, which so frequently afflicted the infant republic, were seldom or
never experienced by the extensive empire of Rome. The accidental scarcity, in
any single province, was immediately relieved by the plenty of its more
fortunate neighbors.

Agriculture is the foundation of
manufactures; since the productions of nature are the materials of art. Under
the Roman empire, the labor of an industrious and ingenious people was
variously, but incessantly, employed in the service of the rich. In their dress,
their table, their houses, and their furniture, the favorites of fortune united
every refinement of conveniency, of elegance, and of splendor, whatever could
soothe their pride or gratify their sensuality. Such refinements, under the
odious name of luxury, have been severely arraigned by the moralists of every
age; and it might perhaps be more conducive to the virtue, as well as happiness,
of mankind, if all possessed the necessaries, and none the superfluities, of
life. But in the present imperfect condition of society, luxury, though it may
proceed from vice or folly, seems to be the only means that can correct the
unequal distribution of property. The diligent mechanic, and the skilful artist,
who have obtained no share in the division of the earth, receive a voluntary tax
from the possessors of land; and the latter are prompted, by a sense of
interest, to improve those estates, with whose produce they may purchase
additional pleasures. This operation, the particular effects of which are felt
in every society, acted with much more diffusive energy in the Roman world. The
provinces would soon have been exhausted of their wealth, if the manufactures
and commerce of luxury had not insensibly restored to the industrious subjects
the sums which were exacted from them by the arms and authority of Rome. As long
as the circulation was confined within the bounds of the empire, it impressed
the political machine with a new degree of activity, and its consequences,
sometimes beneficial, could never become pernicious.

But it is
no easy task to confine luxury within the limits of an empire. The most remote
countries of the ancient world were ransacked to supply the pomp and delicacy of
Rome. The forests of Scythia afforded some valuable furs. Amber was brought over
land from the shores of the Baltic to the Danube; and the barbarians were
astonished at the price which they received in exchange for so useless a
commodity[216].
There was a considerable demand for Babylonian carpets, and other manufactures
of the East; but the most important and unpopular branch of foreign trade was
carried on with Arabia and India. Every year, about the time of the summer
solstice, a fleet of a hundred and twenty vessels sailed from Myos-hormos, a
port of Egypt, on the Red Sea. By the periodical assistance of the monsoons,
they traversed the ocean in about forty days. The coast of Malabar, or the
island of Ceylon[217],
was the usual term of their navigation, and it was in those markets that the
merchants from the more remote countries of Asia expected their arrival. The
return of the fleet of Egypt was fixed to the months of December or January; and
as soon as their rich cargo had been transported on the backs of camels, from
the Red Sea to the Nile, and had descended that river as far as Alexandria, it
was poured, without delay, into the capital of the empire[218].
The objects of oriental traffic were splendid and trifling; silk, a pound of
which was esteemed not inferior in value to a pound of gold[219];
precious stones, among which the pearl claimed the first rank after the
diamond[220];
and a variety of aromatics, that were consumed in religious worship and the pomp
of funerals. The labor and risk of the voyage was rewarded with almost
incredible profit; but the profit was made upon Roman subjects, and a few
individuals were enriched at the expense of the public. As the natives of Arabia
and India were contented with the productions and manufactures of their own
country, silver, on the side of the Romans, was the principal, if not the only[221]
instrument of commerce. It was a complaint worthy of the gravity of the senate,
that, in the purchase of female ornaments, the wealth of the state was
irrecoverably given away to foreign and hostile nations[222].
The annual loss is computed, by a writer of an inquisitive but censorious
temper, at upwards of eight hundred thousand pounds sterling[223].
Such was the style of discontent, brooding over the dark prospect of approaching
poverty. And yet, if we compare the proportion between gold and silver, as it
stood in the time of Pliny, and as it was fixed in the reign of Constantine, we
shall discover within that period a very considerable increase[224].
There is not the least reason to suppose that gold was become more scarce; it is
therefore evident that silver was grown more common; that whatever might be the
amount of the Indian and Arabian exports, they were far from exhausting the
wealth of the Roman world; and that the produce of the mines abundantly supplied
the demands of commerce.

Notwithstanding the propensity of
mankind to exalt the past, and to depreciate the present, the tranquil and
prosperous state of the empire was warmly felt, and honestly confessed, by the
provincials as well as Romans. "They acknowledged that the true principles of
social life, laws, agriculture, and science, which had been first invented by
the wisdom of Athens, were now firmly established by the power of Rome, under
whose auspicious influence the fiercest barbarians were united by an equal
government and common language. They affirm, that with the improvement of arts,
the human species were visibly multiplied. They celebrate the increasing
splendor of the cities, the beautiful face of the country, cultivated and
adorned like an immense garden; and the long festival of peace which was enjoyed
by so many nations, forgetful of the ancient animosities, and delivered from the
apprehension of future danger[225]."
Whatever suspicions may be suggested by the air of rhetoric and declamation,
which seems to prevail in these passages, the substance of them is perfectly
agreeable to historic truth.

It was
scarcely possible that the eyes of contemporaries should discover in the public
felicity the latent causes of decay and corruption. This long peace, and the
uniform government of the Romans, introduced a slow and secret poison into the
vitals of the empire. The minds of men were gradually reduced to the same level,
the fire of genius was extinguished, and even the military spirit evaporated.
The natives of Europe were brave and robust. Spain, Gaul, Britain, and Illyricum
supplied the legions with excellent soldiers, and constituted the real strength
of the monarchy. Their personal valor remained, but they no longer possessed
that public courage which is nourished by the love of independence, the sense of
national honor, the presence of danger, and the habit of command. They received
laws and governors from the will of their sovereign, and trusted for their
defence to a mercenary army. The posterity of their boldest leaders was
contented with the rank of citizens and subjects. The most aspiring spirits
resorted to the court or standard of the emperors; and the deserted provinces,
deprived of political strength or union, insensibly sunk into the languid
indifference of private life.

The love
of letters, almost inseparable from peace and refinement, was fashionable among
the subjects of Hadrian and the Antonines, who were themselves men of learning
and curiosity. It was diffused over the whole extent of their empire; the most
northern tribes of Britons had acquired a taste for rhetoric; Homer as well as
Virgil were transcribed and studied on the banks of the Rhine and Danube; and
the most liberal rewards sought out the faintest glimmerings of literary merit[226].
The sciences of physic and astronomy were successfully cultivated by the Greeks;
the observations of Ptolemy and the writings of Galen are studied by those who
have improved their discoveries and corrected their errors; but if we except the
inimitable Lucian, this age of indolence passed away without having produced a
single writer of original genius, or who excelled in the arts of elegant
composition[227].
The authority of Plato and Aristotle, of Zeno and Epicurus, still reigned in the
schools; and their systems, transmitted with blind deference from one generation
of disciples to another, precluded every generous attempt to exercise the
powers, or enlarge the limits, of the human mind. The beauties of the poets and
orators, instead of kindling a fire like their own, inspired only cold and
servile imitations: or if any ventured to deviate from those models, they
deviated at the same time from good sense and propriety. On the revival of
letters, the youthful vigor of the imagination, after a long repose, national
emulation, a new religion, new languages, and a new world, called forth the
genius of Europe. But the provincials of Rome, trained by a uniform artificial
foreign education, were engaged in a very unequal competition with those bold
ancients, who, by expressing their genuine feelings in their native tongue, had
already occupied every place of honor. The name of Poet was almost forgotten;
that of Orator was usurped by the sophists. A cloud of critics, of compilers, of
commentators, darkened the face of learning, and the decline of genius was soon
followed by the corruption of taste.

The
sublime Longinus, who, in somewhat a later period, and in the court of a Syrian
queen, preserved the spirit of ancient Athens, observes and laments this
degeneracy of his contemporaries, which debased their sentiments, enervated
their courage, and depressed their talents. "In the same manner," says he, "as
some children always remain pygmies, whose infant limbs have been too closely
confined, thus our tender minds, fettered by the prejudices and habits of a just
servitude, are unable to expand themselves, or to attain that well-proportioned
greatness which we admire in the ancients; who, living under a popular
government, wrote with the same freedom as they acted[228]."
This diminutive stature of mankind, if we pursue the metaphor, was daily sinking
below the old standard, and the Roman world was indeed peopled by a race of
pygmies; when the fierce giants of the north broke in, and mended the puny
breed. They restored a manly spirit of freedom; and after the revolution of ten
centuries, freedom became the happy parent of taste and
science.

Chapter III
The
Constitution in the Age of the Antonines
Part
I

Of the Constitution of
the Roman Empire, in the Age of the Antonines

The
obvious definition of a monarchy seems to be that of a state, in which a single
person, by whatsoever name he may be distinguished, is intrusted with the
execution of the laws, the management of the revenue, and the command of the
army. But, unless public liberty is protected by intrepid and vigilant
guardians, the authority of so formidable a magistrate will soon degenerate into
despotism. The influence of the clergy, in an age of superstition, might be
usefully employed to assert the rights of mankind; but so intimate is the
connection between the throne and the altar, that the banner of the church has
very seldom been seen on the side of the people[229].
A martial nobility and stubborn commons, possessed of arms, tenacious of
property, and collected into constitutional assemblies, form the only balance
capable of preserving a free constitution against enterprises of an aspiring
prince.

Every
barrier of the Roman constitution had been levelled by the vast ambition of the
dictator; every fence had been extirpated by the cruel hand of the triumvir.
After the victory of Actium, the fate of the Roman world depended on the will of
Octavianus, surnamed Caesar, by his uncle's adoption, and afterwards Augustus,
by the flattery of the senate. The conqueror was at the head of forty-four
veteran legions[230],
conscious of their own strength, and of the weakness of the constitution,
habituated, during twenty years' civil war, to every act of blood and violence,
and passionately devoted to the house of Caesar, from whence alone they had
received, and expected the most lavish rewards. The provinces, long oppressed by
the ministers of the republic, sighed for the government of a single person, who
would be the master, not the accomplice, of those petty tyrants. The people of
Rome, viewing, with a secret pleasure, the humiliation of the aristocracy,
demanded only bread and public shows; and were supplied with both by the liberal
hand of Augustus. The rich and polite Italians, who had almost universally
embraced the philosophy of Epicurus, enjoyed the present blessings of ease and
tranquillity, and suffered not the pleasing dream to be interrupted by the
memory of their old tumultuous freedom. With its power, the senate had lost its
dignity; many of the most noble families were extinct. The republicans of spirit
and ability had perished in the field of battle, or in the proscription . The
door of the assembly had been designedly left open, for a mixed multitude of
more than a thousand persons, who reflected disgrace upon their rank, instead of
deriving honor from it[231].

The
reformation of the senate was one of the first steps in which Augustus laid
aside the tyrant, and professed himself the father of his country. He was
elected censor; and, in concert with his faithful Agrippa, he examined the list
of the senators, expelled a few members[232],
whose vices or whose obstinacy required a public example, persuaded near two
hundred to prevent the shame of an expulsion by a voluntary retreat, raised the
qualification of a senator to about ten thousand pounds, created a sufficient
number of patrician families, and accepted for himself the honorable title of
Prince of the Senate[233],
which had always been bestowed, by the censors, on the citizen the most eminent
for his honors and services[234].
But whilst he thus restored the dignity, he destroyed the independence, of the
senate. The principles of a free constitution are irrecoverably lost, when the
legislative power is nominated by the executive.

Before an
assembly thus modelled and prepared, Augustus pronounced a studied oration,
which displayed his patriotism, and disguised his ambition. “He lamented, yet
excused, his past conduct. Filial piety had required at his hands the revenge of
his father's murder; the humanity of his own nature had sometimes given way to
the stern laws of necessity, and to a forced connection with two unworthy
colleagues: as long as Antony lived, the republic forbade him to abandon her to
a degenerate Roman, and a barbarian queen. He was now at liberty to satisfy his
duty and his inclination. He solemnly restored the senate and people to all
their ancient rights; and wished only to mingle with the crowd of his
fellow-citizens, and to share the blessings which he had obtained for his
country[235]."

It would
require the pen of Tacitus (if Tacitus had assisted at this assembly) to
describe the various emotions of the senate, those that were suppressed, and
those that were affected. It was dangerous to trust the sincerity of Augustus;
to seem to distrust it was still more dangerous. The respective advantages of
monarchy and a republic have often divided speculative inquirers; the present
greatness of the Roman state, the corruption of manners, and the license of the
soldiers, supplied new arguments to the advocates of monarchy; and these general
views of government were again warped by the hopes and fears of each individual.
Amidst this confusion of sentiments, the answer of the senate was unanimous and
decisive. They refused to accept the resignation of Augustus; they conjured him
not to desert the republic, which he had saved. After a decent resistance, the
crafty tyrant submitted to the orders of the senate; and consented to receive
the government of the provinces, and the general command of the Roman armies,
under the well-known names of Proconsul and Imperator[236].
But he would receive them only for ten years. Even before the expiration of that
period, he hope that the wounds of civil discord would be completely healed, and
that the republic, restored to its pristine health and vigor, would no longer
require the dangerous interposition of so extraordinary a magistrate. The memory
of this comedy, repeated several times during the life of Augustus, was
preserved to the last ages of the empire, by the peculiar pomp with which the
perpetual monarchs of Rome always solemnized the tenth years of their reign[237].

Without
any violation of the principles of the constitution, the general of the Roman
armies might receive and exercise an authority almost despotic over the
soldiers, the enemies, and the subjects of the republic. With regard to the
soldiers, the jealousy of freedom had, even from the earliest ages of Rome,
given way to the hopes of conquest, and a just sense of military discipline. The
dictator, or consul, had a right to command the service of the Roman youth; and
to punish an obstinate or cowardly disobedience by the most severe and
ignominious penalties, by striking the offender out of the list of citizens, by
confiscating his property, and by selling his person into slavery[238].
The most sacred rights of freedom, confirmed by the Porcian and Sempronian laws,
were suspended by the military engagement. In his camp the general exercise an
absolute power of life and death; his jurisdiction was not confined by any forms
of trial, or rules of proceeding, and the execution of the sentence was
immediate and without appeal[239].
The choice of the enemies of Rome was regularly decided by the legislative
authority. The most important resolutions of peace and war were seriously
debated in the senate, and solemnly ratified by the people. But when the arms of
the legions were carried to a great distance from Italy, the general assumed the
liberty of directing them against whatever people, and in whatever manner, they
judged most advantageous for the public service. It was from the success, not
from the justice, of their enterprises, that they expected the honors of a
triumph. In the use of victory, especially after they were no longer controlled
by the commissioners of the senate, they exercised the most unbounded despotism.
When Pompey commanded in the East, he rewarded his soldiers and allies,
dethroned princes, divided kingdoms, founded colonies, and distributed the
treasures of Mithridates. On his return to Rome, he obtained, by a single act of
the senate and people, the universal ratification of all his proceedings[240].
Such was the power over the soldiers, and over the enemies of Rome, which was
either granted to, or assumed by, the generals of the republic. They were, at
the same time, the governors, or rather monarchs, of the conquered provinces,
united the civil with the military character, administered justice as well as
the finances, and exercised both the executive and legislative power of the
state.

From what
has already been observed in the first chapter of this work, some notion may be
formed of the armies and provinces thus intrusted to the ruling hand of
Augustus. But as it was impossible that he could personally command the regions
of so many distant frontiers, he was indulged by the senate, as Pompey had
already been, in the permission of devolving the execution of his great office
on a sufficient number of lieutenants. In rank and authority these officers
seemed not inferior to the ancient proconsuls; but their station was dependent
and precarious. They received and held their commissions at the will of a
superior, to whose auspicious influence the merit of their action was legally
attributed[241].
They were the representatives of the emperor. The emperor alone was the general
of the republic, and his jurisdiction, civil as well as military, extended over
all the conquests of Rome. It was some satisfaction, however, to the senate,
that he always delegated his power to the members of their body. The imperial
lieutenants were of consular or praetorian dignity; the legions were commanded
by senators, and the praefecture of Egypt was the only important trust committed
to a Roman knight.

Within six
days after Augustus had been compelled to accept so very liberal a grant, he
resolved to gratify the pride of the senate by an easy sacrifice. He represented
to them, that they had enlarged his powers, even beyond that degree which might
be required by the melancholy condition of the times. They had not permitted him
to refuse the laborious command of the armies and the frontiers; but he must
insist on being allowed to restore the more peaceful and secure provinces to the
mild administration of the civil magistrate. In the division of the provinces,
Augustus provided for his own power and for the dignity of the republic. The
proconsuls of the senate, particularly those of Asia, Greece, and Africa,
enjoyed a more honorable character than the lieutenants of the emperor, who
commanded in Gaul or Syria. The former were attended by lictors, the latter by
soldiers[242].
A law was passed, that wherever the emperor was present, his extraordinary
commission should supersede the ordinary jurisdiction of the governor; a custom
was introduced, that the new conquests belonged to the imperial portion; and it
was soon discovered that the authority of the Prince, the favorite epithet of
Augustus, was the same in every part of the empire.

In return
for this imaginary concession, Augustus obtained an important privilege, which
rendered him master of Rome and Italy. By a dangerous exception to the ancient
maxims, he was authorized to preserve his military command, supported by a
numerous body of guards, even in time of peace, and in the heart of the capital.
His command, indeed, was confined to those citizens who were engaged in the
service by the military oath; but such was the propensity of the Romans to
servitude, that the oath was voluntarily taken by the magistrates, the senators,
and the equestrian order, till the homage of flattery was insensibly converted
into an annual and solemn protestation of fidelity.

Although
Augustus considered a military force as the firmest foundation, he wisely
rejected it, as a very odious instrument of government. It was more agreeable to
his temper, as well as to his policy, to reign under the venerable names of
ancient magistracy, and artfully to collect, in his own person, all the
scattered rays of civil jurisdiction. With this view, he permitted the senate to
confer upon him, for his life, the powers of the consular[243]
and tribunitian offices[244],
which were, in the same manner, continued to all his successors. The consuls had
succeeded to the kings of Rome, and represented the dignity of the state. They
superintended the ceremonies of religion, levied and commanded the legions, gave
audience to foreign ambassadors, and presided in the assemblies both of the
senate and people. The general control of the finances was intrusted to their
care; and though they seldom had leisure to administer justice in person, they
were considered as the supreme guardians of law, equity, and the public peace.
Such was their ordinary jurisdiction; but whenever the senate empowered the
first magistrate to consult the safety of the commonwealth, he was raised by
that decree above the laws, and exercised, in the defence of liberty, a
temporary despotism[245].
The character of the tribunes was, in every respect, different from that of the
consuls. The appearance of the former was modest and humble; but their persons
were sacred and inviolable. Their force was suited rather for opposition than
for action. They were instituted to defend the oppressed, to pardon offences, to
arraign the enemies of the people, and, when they judged it necessary, to stop,
by a single word, the whole machine of government. As long as the republic
subsisted, the dangerous influence, which either the consul or the tribune might
derive from their respective jurisdiction, was diminished by several important
restrictions. Their authority expired with the year in which they were elected;
the former office was divided between two, the latter among ten persons; and, as
both in their private and public interest they were averse to each other, their
mutual conflicts contributed, for the most part, to strengthen rather than to
destroy the balance of the constitution[246].
But when the consular and tribunitian powers were united, when they were vested
for life in a single person, when the general of the army was, at the same time,
the minister of the senate and the representative of the Roman people, it was
impossible to resist the exercise, nor was it easy to define the limits, of his
imperial prerogative.

To these
accumulated honors, the policy of Augustus soon added the splendid as well as
important dignities of supreme pontiff, and of censor. By the former he acquired
the management of the religion, and by the latter a legal inspection over the
manners and fortunes, of the Roman people. If so many distinct and independent
powers did not exactly unite with each other, the complaisance of the senate was
prepared to supply every deficiency by the most ample and extraordinary
concessions. The emperors, as the first ministers of the republic, were exempted
from the obligation and penalty of many inconvenient laws: they were authorized
to convoke the senate, to make several motions in the same day, to recommend
candidates for the honors of the state, to enlarge the bounds of the city, to
employ the revenue at their discretion, to declare peace and war, to ratify
treaties; and by a most comprehensive clause, they were empowered to execute
whatsoever they should judge advantageous to the empire, and agreeable to the
majesty of things private or public, human of divine[247].

When all
the various powers of executive government were committed to the Imperial
magistrate, the ordinary magistrates of the commonwealth languished in
obscurity, without vigor, and almost without business. The names and forms of
the ancient administration were preserved by Augustus with the most anxious
care. The usual number of consuls, praetors, and tribunes[248],
were annually invested with their respective ensigns of office, and continued to
discharge some of their least important functions. Those honors still attracted
the vain ambition of the Romans; and the emperors themselves, though invested
for life with the powers of the consul ship, frequently aspired to the title of
that annual dignity, which they condescended to share with the most illustrious
of their fellow-citizens[249].
In the election of these magistrates, the people, during the reign of Augustus,
were permitted to expose all the inconveniences of a wild democracy. That artful
prince, instead of discovering the least symptom of impatience, humbly solicited
their suffrages for himself or his friends, and scrupulously practised all the
duties of an ordinary candidate[250].
But we may venture to ascribe to his councils the first measure of the
succeeding reign, by which the elections were transferred to the senate[251].
The assemblies of the people were forever abolished, and the emperors were
delivered from a dangerous multitude, who, without restoring liberty, might have
disturbed, and perhaps endangered, the established
government.

By
declaring themselves the protectors of the people, Marius and Caesar had
subverted the constitution of their country. But as soon as the senate had been
humbled and disarmed, such an assembly, consisting of five or six hundred
persons, was found a much more tractable and useful instrument of dominion. It
was on the dignity of the senate that Augustus and his successors founded their
new empire; and they affected, on every occasion, to adopt the language and
principles of Patricians. In the administration of their own powers, they
frequently consulted the great national council, and seemed to refer to its
decision the most important concerns of peace and war. Rome, Italy, and the
internal provinces, were subject to the immediate jurisdiction of the senate.
With regard to civil objects, it was the supreme court of appeal; with regard to
criminal matters, a tribunal, constituted for the trial of all offences that
were committed by men in any public station, or that affected the peace and
majesty of the Roman people. The exercise of the judicial power became the most
frequent and serious occupation of the senate; and the important causes that
were pleaded before them afforded a last refuge to the spirit of ancient
eloquence. As a council of state, and as a court of justice, the senate
possessed very considerable prerogatives; but in its legislative capacity, in
which it was supposed virtually to represent the people, the rights of
sovereignty were acknowledged to reside in that assembly. Every power was
derived from their authority, every law was ratified by their sanction. Their
regular meetings were held on three stated days in every month, the Calends, the
Nones, and the Ides. The debates were conducted with decent freedom; and the
emperors themselves, who gloried in the name of senators, sat, voted, and
divided with their equals. To resume, in a few words, the system of the Imperial
government; as it was instituted by Augustus, and maintained by those princes
who understood their own interest and that of the people, it may be defined an
absolute monarchy disguised by the forms of a commonwealth. The masters of the
Roman world surrounded their throne with darkness, concealed their irresistible
strength, and humbly professed themselves the accountable ministers of the
senate, whose supreme decrees they dictated and obeyed[252].

The face
of the court corresponded with the forms of the administration. The emperors, if
we except those tyrants whose capricious folly violated every law of nature and
decency, disdained that pomp and ceremony which might offend their countrymen,
but could add nothing to their real power. In all the offices of life, they
affected to confound themselves with their subjects, and maintained with them an
equal intercourse of visits and entertainments. Their habit, their palace, their
table, were suited only to the rank of an opulent senator. Their family, however
numerous or splendid, was composed entirely of their domestic slaves and
freedmen[253].
Augustus or Trajan would have blushed at employing the meanest of the Romans in
those menial offices, which, in the household and bedchamber of a limited
monarch, are so eagerly solicited by the proudest nobles of
Britain.

The
deification of the emperors[254]
is the only instance in which they departed from their accustomed prudence and
modesty. The Asiatic Greeks were the first inventors, the successors of
Alexander the first objects, of this servile and impious mode of adulation[255].
It was easily transferred from the kings to the governors of Asia; and the Roman
magistrates very frequently were adored as provincial deities, with the pomp of
altars and temples, of festivals and sacrifices[256].
It was natural that the emperors should not refuse what the proconsuls had
accepted; and the divine honors which both the one and the other received from
the provinces, attested rather the despotism than the servitude of Rome. But the
conquerors soon imitated the vanquished nations in the arts of flattery; and the
imperious spirit of the first Caesar too easily consented to assume, during his
lifetime, a place among the tutelar deities of Rome. The milder temper of his
successor declined so dangerous an ambition, which was never afterwards revived,
except by the madness of Caligula and Domitian. Augustus permitted indeed some
of the provincial cities to erect temples to his honor, on condition that they
should associate the worship of Rome with that of the sovereign; he tolerated
private superstition, of which he might be the object[257];
but he contented himself with being revered by the senate and the people in his
human character, and wisely left to his successor the care of his public
deification. A regular custom was introduced, that on the decease of every
emperor who had neither lived nor died like a tyrant, the senate by a solemn
decree should place him in the number of the gods: and the ceremonies of his
apotheosis were blended with those of his funeral[258].
This legal, and, as it should seem, injudicious profanation, so abhorrent to our
stricter principles, was received with a very faint murmur[259],
by the easy nature of Polytheism; but it was received as an institution, not of
religion, but of policy. We should disgrace the virtues of the Antonines by
comparing them with the vices of Hercules or Jupiter. Even the characters of
Caesar or Augustus were far superior to those of the popular deities. But it was
the misfortune of the former to live in an enlightened age, and their actions
were too faithfully recorded to admit of such a mixture of fable and mystery, as
the devotion of the vulgar requires. As soon as their divinity was established
by law, it sunk into oblivion, without contributing either to their own fame, or
to the dignity of succeeding princes.

In the
consideration of the Imperial government, we have frequently mentioned the
artful founder, under his well-known title of Augustus, which was not, however,
conferred upon him till the edifice was almost completed. The obscure name of
Octavianus he derived from a mean family, in the little town of Aricia[260].
It was stained with the blood of the proscription; and he was desirous, had it
been possible, to erase all memory of his former life. The illustrious surname
of Caesar he had assumed, as the adopted son of the dictator: but he had too
much good sense, either to hope to be confounded, or to wish to be compared with
that extraordinary man. It was proposed in the senate to dignify their minister
with a new appellation; and after a serious discussion, that of Augustus was
chosen, among several others, as being the most expressive of the character of
peace and sanctity, which he uniformly affected[261].
Augustus was therefore a personal, Caesar a family distinction. The former
should naturally have expired with the prince on whom it was bestowed; and
however the latter was diffused by adoption and female alliance, Nero was the
last prince who could allege any hereditary claim to the honors of the Julian
line. But, at the time of his death, the practice of a century had inseparably
connected those appellations with the Imperial dignity, and they have been
preserved by a long succession of emperors, Romans, Greeks, Franks, and Germans,
from the fall of the republic to the present time. A distinction was, however,
soon introduced. The sacred title of Augustus was always reserved for the
monarch, whilst the name of Caesar was more freely communicated to his
relations; and, from the reign of Hadrian, at least, was appropriated to the
second person in the state, who was considered as the presumptive heir of the
empire[262].

Chapter III
The
Constitution in the Age of the Antonines
Part
II

The tender
respect of Augustus for a free constitution which he had destroyed, can only be
explained by an attentive consideration of the character of that subtle tyrant.
A cool head, an unfeeling heart, and a cowardly disposition, prompted him at the
age of nineteen to assume the mask of hypocrisy, which he never afterwards laid
aside. With the same hand, and probably with the same temper, he signed the
proscription of Cicero, and the pardon of Cinna. His virtues, and even his
vices, were artificial; and according to the various dictates of his interest,
he was at first the enemy, and at last the father, of the Roman world[263].
When he framed the artful system of the Imperial authority, his moderation was
inspired by his fears. He wished to deceive the people by an image of civil
liberty, and the armies by an image of civil government.

I.
The
death of Caesar was ever before his eyes. He had lavished wealth and honors on
his adherents; but the most favored friends of his uncle were in the number of
the conspirators. The fidelity of the legions might defend his authority against
open rebellion; but their vigilance could not secure his person from the dagger
of a determined republican; and the Romans, who revered the memory of Brutus[264],
would applaud the imitation of his virtue. Caesar had provoked his fate, as much
as by the ostentation of his power, as by his power itself. The consul or the
tribune might have reigned in peace. The title of king had armed the Romans
against his life. Augustus was sensible that mankind is governed by names; nor
was he deceived in his expectation, that the senate and people would submit to
slavery, provided they were respectfully assured that they still enjoyed their
ancient freedom. A feeble senate and enervated people cheerfully acquiesced in
the pleasing illusion, as long as it was supported by the virtue, or even by the
prudence, of the successors of Augustus. It was a motive of self-preservation,
not a principle of liberty, that animated the conspirators against Caligula,
Nero, and Domitian. They attacked the person of the tyrant, without aiming their
blow at the authority of the emperor.

There appears, indeed, one
memorable occasion, in which the senate, after seventy years of patience, made
an ineffectual attempt to re-assume its long-forgotten rights. When the throne
was vacant by the murder of Caligula, the consuls convoked that assembly in the
Capitol, condemned the memory of the Caesars, gave the watchword liberty to the
few cohorts who faintly adhered to their standard, and during eight-and-forty
hours acted as the independent chiefs of a free commonwealth. But while they
deliberated, the praetorian guards had resolved. The stupid Claudius, brother of
Germanicus, was already in their camp, invested with the Imperial purple, and
prepared to support his election by arms. The dream of liberty was at an end;
and the senate awoke to all the horrors of inevitable servitude. Deserted by the
people, and threatened by a military force, that feeble assembly was compelled
to ratify the choice of the praetorians, and to embrace the benefit of an
amnesty, which Claudius had the prudence to offer, and the generosity to
observe[265],[266].

II.
The
insolence of the armies inspired Augustus with fears of a still more alarming
nature. The despair of the citizens could only attempt, what the power of the
soldiers was, at any time, able to execute. How precarious was his own authority
over men whom he had taught to violate every social duty! He had heard their
seditious clamors; he dreaded their calmer moments of reflection. One revolution
had been purchased by immense rewards; but a second revolution might double
those rewards. The troops professed the fondest attachment to the house of
Caesar; but the attachments of the multitude are capricious and inconstant.
Augustus summoned to his aid whatever remained in those fierce minds of Roman
prejudices; enforced the rigor of discipline by the sanction of law; and,
interposing the majesty of the senate between the emperor and the army, boldly
claimed their allegiance, as the first magistrate of the
republic.

During a long period of two hundred
and twenty years from the establishment of this artful system to the death of
Commodus, the dangers inherent to a military government were, in a great
measure, suspended. The soldiers were seldom roused to that fatal sense of their
own strength, and of the weakness of the civil authority, which was, before and
afterwards, productive of such dreadful calamities. Caligula and Domitian were
assassinated in their palace by their own domestics[267]:
the convulsions which agitated Rome on the death of the former, were confined to
the walls of the city. But Nero involved the whole empire in his ruin. In the
space of eighteen months, four princes perished by the sword; and the Roman
world was shaken by the fury of the contending armies. Excepting only this
short, though violent eruption of military license, the two centuries from
Augustus[268]
to Commodus passed away unstained with civil blood, and undisturbed by
revolutions. The emperor was elected by the authority of the senate, and the
consent of the soldiers[269].
The legions respected their oath of fidelity; and it requires a minute
inspection of the Roman annals to discover three inconsiderable rebellions,
which were all suppressed in a few months, and without even the hazard of a
battle[270].

In
elective monarchies, the vacancy of the throne is a moment big with danger and
mischief. The Roman emperors, desirous to spare the legions that interval of
suspense, and the temptation of an irregular choice, invested their designed
successor with so large a share of present power, as should enable him, after
their decease, to assume the remainder, without suffering the empire to perceive
the change of masters. Thus Augustus, after all his fairer prospects had been
snatched from him by untimely deaths, rested his last hopes on Tiberius,
obtained for his adopted son the censorial and tribunitian powers, and dictated
a law, by which the future prince was invested with an authority equal to his
own, over the provinces and the armies[271].
Thus Vespasian subdued the generous mind of his eldest son. Titus was adored by
the eastern legions, which, under his command, had recently achieved the
conquest of Judaea. His power was dreaded, and, as his virtues were clouded by
the intemperance of youth, his designs were suspected. Instead of listening to
such unworthy suspicions, the prudent monarch associated Titus to the full
powers of the Imperial dignity; and the grateful son ever approved himself the
humble and faithful minister of so indulgent a father[272].

The good
sense of Vespasian engaged him indeed to embrace every measure that might
confirm his recent and precarious elevation. The military oath, and the fidelity
of the troops, had been consecrated, by the habits of a hundred years, to the
name and family of the Caesars; and although that family had been continued only
by the fictitious rite of adoption, the Romans still revered, in the person of
Nero, the grandson of Germanicus, and the lineal successor of Augustus. It was
not without reluctance and remorse, that the praetorian guards had been
persuaded to abandon the cause of the tyrant[273].
The rapid downfall of Galba, Otho, and Vitellus, taught the armies to consider
the emperors as the creatures of their will, and the instruments of their
license. The birth of Vespasian was mean: his grandfather had been a private
soldier, his father a petty officer of the revenue[274];
his own merit had raised him, in an advanced age, to the empire; but his merit
was rather useful than shining, and his virtues were disgraced by a strict and
even sordid parsimony. Such a prince consulted his true interest by the
association of a son, whose more splendid and amiable character might turn the
public attention from the obscure origin, to the future glories, of the Flavian
house. Under the mild administration of Titus, the Roman world enjoyed a
transient felicity, and his beloved memory served to protect, above fifteen
years, the vices of his brother Domitian.

Nerva had
scarcely accepted the purple from the assassins of Domitian, before he
discovered that his feeble age was unable to stem the torrent of public
disorders, which had multiplied under the long tyranny of his predecessor. His
mild disposition was respected by the good; but the degenerate Romans required a
more vigorous character, whose justice should strike terror into the guilty.
Though he had several relations, he fixed his choice on a stranger. He adopted
Trajan, then about forty years of age, and who commanded a powerful army in the
Lower Germany; and immediately, by a decree of the senate, declared him his
colleague and successor in the empire[275].
It is sincerely to be lamented, that whilst we are fatigued with the disgustful
relation of Nero's crimes and follies, we are reduced to collect the actions of
Trajan from the glimmerings of an abridgment, or the doubtful light of a
panegyric. There remains, however, one panegyric far removed beyond the
suspicion of flattery. Above two hundred and fifty years after the death of
Trajan, the senate, in pouring out the customary acclamations on the accession
of a new emperor, wished that he might surpass the felicity of Augustus, and the
virtue of Trajan[276].

We may
readily believe, that the father of his country hesitated whether he ought to
intrust the various and doubtful character of his kinsman Hadrian with sovereign
power. In his last moments the arts of the empress Plotina either fixed the
irresolution of Trajan, or boldly supposed a fictitious adoption[277];
the truth of which could not be safely disputed, and Hadrian was peaceably
acknowledged as his lawful successor. Under his reign, as has been already
mentioned, the empire flourished in peace and prosperity. He encouraged the
arts, reformed the laws, asserted military discipline, and visited all his
provinces in person. His vast and active genius was equally suited to the most
enlarged views, and the minute details of civil policy. But the ruling passions
of his soul were curiosity and vanity. As they prevailed, and as they were
attracted by different objects, Hadrian was, by turns, an excellent prince, a
ridiculous sophist, and a jealous tyrant. The general tenor of his conduct
deserved praise for its equity and moderation. Yet in the first days of his
reign, he put to death four consular senators, his personal enemies, and men who
had been judged worthy of empire; and the tediousness of a painful illness
rendered him, at last, peevish and cruel. The senate doubted whether they should
pronounce him a god or a tyrant; and the honors decreed to his memory were
granted to the prayers of the pious Antoninus[278].

The
caprice of Hadrian influenced his choice of a successor. After revolving in his
mind several men of distinguished merit, whom he esteemed and hated, he adopted
Aelius Verus a gay and voluptuous nobleman, recommended by uncommon beauty to
the lover of Antinous[279].
But whilst Hadrian was delighting himself with his own applause, and the
acclamations of the soldiers, whose consent had been secured by an immense
donative, the new Caesar[280]
was ravished from his embraces by an untimely death. He left only one son.
Hadrian commended the boy to the gratitude of the Antonines. He was adopted by
Pius; and, on the accession of Marcus, was invested with an equal share of
sovereign power. Among the many vices of this younger Verus, he possessed one
virtue; a dutiful reverence for his wiser colleague, to whom he willingly
abandoned the ruder cares of empire. The philosophic emperor dissembled his
follies, lamented his early death, and cast a decent veil over his
memory.

As soon as
Hadrian's passion was either gratified or disappointed, he resolved to deserve
the thanks of posterity, by placing the most exalted merit on the Roman throne.
His discerning eye easily discovered a senator about fifty years of age,
blameless in all the offices of life; and a youth of about seventeen, whose
riper years opened a fair prospect of every virtue: the elder of these was
declared the son and successor of Hadrian, on condition, however, that he
himself should immediately adopt the younger. The two Antonines (for it is of
them that we are now peaking,) governed the Roman world forty-two years, with
the same invariable spirit of wisdom and virtue. Although Pius had two sons[281],
he preferred the welfare of Rome to the interest of his family, gave his
daughter Faustina, in marriage to young Marcus, obtained from the senate the
tribunitian and proconsular powers, and, with a noble disdain, or rather
ignorance of jealousy, associated him to all the labors of government. Marcus,
on the other hand, revered the character of his benefactor, loved him as a
parent, obeyed him as his sovereign[282],
and, after he was no more, regulated his own administration by the example and
maxims of his predecessor. Their united reigns are possibly the only period of
history in which the happiness of a great people was the sole object of
government.

Titus
Antoninus Pius has been justly denominated a second Numa. The same love of
religion, justice, and peace, was the distinguishing characteristic of both
princes. But the situation of the latter opened a much larger field for the
exercise of those virtues. Numa could only prevent a few neighboring villages
from plundering each other's harvests. Antoninus diffused order and tranquillity
over the greatest part of the earth. His reign is marked by the rare advantage
of furnishing very few materials for history; which is, indeed, little more than
the register of the crimes, follies, and misfortunes of mankind. In private
life, he was an amiable, as well as a good man. The native simplicity of his
virtue was a stranger to vanity or affectation. He enjoyed with moderation the
conveniences of his fortune, and the innocent pleasures of society[283];
and the benevolence of his soul displayed itself in a cheerful serenity of
temper.

The virtue
of Marcus Aurelius Antoninus was of severer and more laborious kind[284].
It was the well-earned harvest of many a learned conference, of many a patient
lecture, and many a midnight lucubration. At the age of twelve years he embraced
the rigid system of the Stoics, which taught him to submit his body to his mind,
his passions to his reason; to consider virtue as the only good, vice as the
only evil, all things external as things indifferent[285].
His meditations, composed in the tumult of the camp, are still extant; and he
even condescended to give lessons of philosophy, in a more public manner than
was perhaps consistent with the modesty of sage, or the dignity of an emperor[286].
But his life was the noblest commentary on the precepts of Zeno. He was severe
to himself, indulgent to the imperfections of others, just and beneficent to all
mankind. He regretted that Avidius Cassius, who excited a rebellion in Syria,
had disappointed him, by a voluntary death[287],
of the pleasure of converting an enemy into a friend;; and he justified the
sincerity of that sentiment, by moderating the zeal of the senate against the
adherents of the traitor[288].
War he detested, as the disgrace and calamity of human nature[289];
but when the necessity of a just defence called upon him to take up arms, he
readily exposed his person to eight winter campaigns, on the frozen banks of the
Danube, the severity of which was at last fatal to the weakness of his
constitution. His memory was revered by a grateful posterity, and above a
century after his death, many persons preserved the image of Marcus Antoninus
among those of their household gods[290].

If a man
were called to fix the period in the history of the world, during which the
condition of the human race was most happy and prosperous, he would, without
hesitation, name that which elapsed from the death of Domitian to the accession
of Commodus. The vast extent of the Roman empire was governed by absolute power,
under the guidance of virtue and wisdom. The armies were restrained by the firm
but gentle hand of four successive emperors, whose characters and authority
commanded involuntary respect. The forms of the civil administration were
carefully preserved by Nerva, Trajan, Hadrian, and the Antonines, who delighted
in the image of liberty, and were pleased with considering themselves as the
accountable ministers of the laws. Such princes deserved the honor of restoring
the republic, had the Romans of their days been capable of enjoying a rational
freedom.

The labors
of these monarchs were overpaid by the immense reward that inseparably waited on
their success; by the honest pride of virtue, and by the exquisite delight of
beholding the general happiness of which they were the authors. A just but
melancholy reflection imbittered, however, the noblest of human enjoyments. They
must often have recollected the instability of a happiness which depended on the
character of single man. The fatal moment was perhaps approaching, when some
licentious youth, or some jealous tyrant, would abuse, to the destruction, that
absolute power, which they had exerted for the benefit of their people. The
ideal restraints of the senate and the laws might serve to display the virtues,
but could never correct the vices, of the emperor. The military force was a
blind and irresistible instrument of oppression; and the corruption of Roman
manners would always supply flatterers eager to applaud, and ministers prepared
to serve, the fear or the avarice, the lust or the cruelty, of their master.
These gloomy apprehensions had been already justified by the experience of the
Romans. The annals of the emperors exhibit a strong and various picture of human
nature, which we should vainly seek among the mixed and doubtful characters of
modern history. In the conduct of those monarchs we may trace the utmost lines
of vice and virtue; the most exalted perfection, and the meanest degeneracy of
our own species. The golden age of Trajan and the Antonines had been preceded by
an age of iron. It is almost superfluous to enumerate the unworthy successors of
Augustus. Their unparalleled vices, and the splendid theatre on which they were
acted, have saved them from oblivion. The dark, unrelenting Tiberius, the
furious Caligula, the feeble Claudius, the profligate and cruel Nero, the
beastly Vitellius[291],
and the timid, inhuman Domitian, are condemned to everlasting infamy. During
fourscore years (excepting only the short and doubtful respite of Vespasian's
reign)[292]
Rome groaned beneath an unremitting tyranny, which exterminated the ancient
families of the republic, and was fatal to almost every virtue and every talent
that arose in that unhappy period.

Under the
reign of these monsters, the slavery of the Romans was accompanied with two
peculiar circumstances, the one occasioned by their former liberty, the other by
their extensive conquests, which rendered their condition more completely
wretched than that of the victims of tyranny in any other age or country. From
these causes were derived,

I.
The
exquisite sensibility of the sufferers; and,

II.
The
impossibility of escaping from the hand of the oppressor.

I.
When
Persia was governed by the descendants of Sefi, a race of princes whose wanton
cruelty often stained their divan, their table, and their bed, with the blood of
their favorites, there is a saying recorded of a young nobleman, that he never
departed from the sultan's presence, without satisfying himself whether his head
was still on his shoulders. The experience of every day might almost justify the
scepticism of Rustan[293].
Yet the fatal sword, suspended above him by a single thread, seems not to have
disturbed the slumbers, or interrupted the tranquillity, of the Persian. The
monarch's frown, he well knew, could level him with the dust; but the stroke of
lightning or apoplexy might be equally fatal; and it was the part of a wise man
to forget the inevitable calamities of human life in the enjoyment of the
fleeting hour. He was dignified with the appellation of the king's slave; had,
perhaps, been purchased from obscure parents, in a country which he had never
known; and was trained up from his infancy in the severe discipline of the
seraglio[294].
His name, his wealth, his honors, were the gift of a master, who might, without
injustice, resume what he had bestowed. Rustan's knowledge, if he possessed any,
could only serve to confirm his habits by prejudices. His language afforded not
words for any form of government, except absolute monarchy. The history of the
East informed him, that such had ever been the condition of mankind[295].
The Koran, and the interpreters of that divine book, inculcated to him, that the
sultan was the descendant of the prophet, and the vicegerent of heaven; that
patience was the first virtue of a Mussulman, and unlimited obedience the great
duty of a subject.

The minds of the Romans were very
differently prepared for slavery. Oppressed beneath the weight of their own
corruption and of military violence, they for a long while preserved the
sentiments, or at least the ideas, of their free-born ancestors. The education
of Helvidius and Thrasea, of Tacitus and Pliny, was the same as that of Cato and
Cicero. From Grecian philosophy, they had imbibed the justest and most liberal
notions of the dignity of human nature, and the origin of civil society. The
history of their own country had taught them to revere a free, a virtuous, and a
victorious commonwealth; to abhor the successful crimes of Caesar and Augustus;
and inwardly to despise those tyrants whom they adored with the most abject
flattery. As magistrates and senators they were admitted into the great council,
which had once dictated laws to the earth, whose authority was so often
prostituted to the vilest purposes of tyranny. Tiberius, and those emperors who
adopted his maxims, attempted to disguise their murders by the formalities of
justice, and perhaps enjoyed a secret pleasure in rendering the senate their
accomplice as well as their victim. By this assembly, the last of the Romans
were condemned for imaginary crimes and real virtues. Their infamous accusers
assumed the language of independent patriots, who arraigned a dangerous citizen
before the tribunal of his country; and the public service was rewarded by
riches and honors[296].
The servile judges professed to assert the majesty of the commonwealth, violated
in the person of its first magistrate[297],
whose clemency they most applauded when they trembled the most at his inexorable
and impending cruelty[298].
The tyrant beheld their baseness with just contempt, and encountered their
secret sentiments of detestation with sincere and avowed hatred for the whole
body of the senate.

II.
The
division of Europe into a number of independent states, connected, however, with
each other by the general resemblance of religion, language, and manners, is
productive of the most beneficial consequences to the liberty of mankind. A
modern tyrant, who should find no resistance either in his own breast, or in his
people, would soon experience a gentle restrain form the example of his equals,
the dread of present censure, the advice of his allies, and the apprehension of
his enemies. The object of his displeasure, escaping from the narrow limits of
his dominions, would easily obtain, in a happier climate, a secure refuge, a new
fortune adequate to his merit, the freedom of complaint, and perhaps the means
of revenge. But the empire of the Romans filled the world, and when the empire
fell into the hands of a single person, he world became a safe and dreary prison
for his enemies. The slave of Imperial despotism, whether he was condemned to
drags his gilded chain in Rome and the senate, or to were out a life of exile on
the barren rock of Seriphus, or the frozen bank of the Danube, expected his fate
in silent despair[299].
To resist was fatal, and it was impossible to fly. On every side he was
encompassed with a vast extent of sea and land, which he could never hope to
traverse without being discovered, seized, and restored to his irritated master.
Beyond the frontiers, his anxious view could discover nothing, except the ocean,
inhospitable deserts, hostile tribes of barbarians, of fierce manners and
unknown language, or dependent kings, who would gladly purchase the emperor's
protection by the sacrifice of an obnoxious fugitive[300].
“Wherever you are," said Cicero to the exiled Marcellus, "remember that you are
equally within the power of the conqueror[301]."

Chapter IV
The
Cruelty, Follies, and Murder of Commodus
Part
I

The Cruelty, Follies, and
Murder of Commodus - Election of Pertinax - His Attempts to Reform the State -
His Assassination by the Praetorian Guards

The
mildness of Marcus, which the rigid discipline of the Stoics was unable to
eradicate, formed, at the same time, the most amiable, and the only defective
part of his character. His excellent understanding was often deceived by the
unsuspecting goodness of his heart. Artful men, who study the passions of
princes, and conceal their own, approached his person in the disguise of
philosophic sanctity, and acquired riches and honors by affecting to despise
them[302].
His excessive indulgence to his brother[303],
his wife, and his son, exceeded the bounds of private virtue, and became a
public injury, by the example and consequences of their
vices.

Faustina,
the daughter of Pius and the wife of Marcus, has been as much celebrated for her
gallantries as for her beauty. The grave simplicity of the philosopher was ill
calculated to engage her wanton levity, or to fix that unbounded passion for
variety, which often discovered personal merit in the meanest of mankind[304].
The Cupid of the ancients was, in general, a very sensual deity; and the amours
of an empress, as they exact on her side the plainest advances, are seldom
susceptible of much sentimental delicacy. Marcus was the only man in the empire
who seemed ignorant or insensible of the irregularities of Faustina; which,
according to the prejudices of every age, reflected some disgrace on the injured
husband. He promoted several of her lovers to posts of honor and profit[305],
and during a connection of thirty years, invariably gave her proofs of the most
tender confidence, and of a respect which ended not with her life. In his
Meditations, he thanks the gods, who had bestowed on him a wife so faithful, so
gentle, and of such a wonderful simplicity of manners[306].
The obsequious senate, at his earnest request, declared her a goddess. She was
represented in her temples, with the attributes of Juno, Venus, and Ceres; and
it was decreed, that, on the day of their nuptials, the youth of either sex
should pay their vows before the altar of their chaste patroness[307].

The
monstrous vices of the son have cast a shade on the purity of the father's
virtues. It has been objected to Marcus, that he sacrificed the happiness of
millions to a fond partiality for a worthless boy; and that he chose a successor
in his own family, rather than in the republic. Nothing however, was neglected
by the anxious father, and by the men of virtue and learning whom he summoned to
his assistance, to expand the narrow mind of young Commodus, to correct his
growing vices, and to render him worthy of the throne for which he was designed.
But the power of instruction is seldom of much efficacy, except in those happy
dispositions where it is almost superfluous. The distasteful lesson of a grave
philosopher was, in a moment, obliterated by the whisper of a profligate
favorite; and Marcus himself blasted the fruits of this labored education, by
admitting his son, at the age of fourteen or fifteen, to a full participation of
the Imperial power. He lived but four years afterwards: but he lived long enough
to repent a rash measure, which raised the impetuous youth above the restraint
of reason and authority.

Most of
the crimes which disturb the internal peace of society, are produced by the
restraints which the necessary but unequal laws of property have imposed on the
appetites of mankind, by confining to a few the possession of those objects that
are coveted by many. Of all our passions and appetites, the love of power is of
the most imperious and unsociable nature, since the pride of one man requires
the submission of the multitude. In the tumult of civil discord, the laws of
society lose their force, and their place is seldom supplied by those of
humanity. The ardor of contention, the pride of victory, the despair of success,
the memory of past injuries, and the fear of future dangers, all contribute to
inflame the mind, and to silence the voice of pity. From such motives almost
every page of history has been stained with civil blood; but these motives will
not account for the unprovoked cruelties of Commodus, who had nothing to wish
and every thing to enjoy. The beloved son of Marcus succeeded to his father,
amidst the acclamations of the senate and armies[308];
and when he ascended the throne, the happy youth saw round him neither
competitor to remove, nor enemies to punish. In this calm, elevated station, it
was surely natural that he should prefer the love of mankind to their
detestation, the mild glories of his five predecessors to the ignominious fate
of Nero and Domitian.

Yet
Commodus was not, as he has been represented, a tiger born with an insatiate
thirst of human blood, and capable, from his infancy, of the most inhuman
actions[309].
Nature had formed him of a weak rather than a wicked disposition. His simplicity
and timidity rendered him the slave of his attendants, who gradually corrupted
his mind. His cruelty, which at first obeyed the dictates of others, degenerated
into habit, and at length became the ruling passion of his soul[310].

Upon the
death of his father, Commodus found himself embarrassed with the command of a
great army, and the conduct of a difficult war against the Quadi and
Marcomanni[311].
The servile and profligate youths whom Marcus had banished, soon regained their
station and influence about the new emperor. They exaggerated the hardships and
dangers of a campaign in the wild countries beyond the Danube; and they assured
the indolent prince that the terror of his name, and the arms of his
lieutenants, would be sufficient to complete the conquest of the dismayed
barbarians, or to impose such conditions as were more advantageous than any
conquest. By a dexterous application to his sensual appetites, they compared the
tranquillity, the splendor, the refined pleasures of Rome, with the tumult of a
Pannonian camp, which afforded neither leisure nor materials for luxury[312].
Commodus listened to the pleasing advice; but whilst he hesitated between his
own inclination and the awe which he still retained for his father's
counsellors, the summer insensibly elapsed, and his triumphal entry into the
capital was deferred till the autumn. His graceful person[313],
popular address, and imagined virtues, attracted the public favor; the honorable
peace which he had recently granted to the barbarians, diffused a universal
joy[314];
his impatience to revisit Rome was fondly ascribed to the love of his country;
and his dissolute course of amusements was faintly condemned in a prince of
nineteen years of age.

During the
three first years of his reign, the forms, and even the spirit, of the old
administration, were maintained by those faithful counsellors, to whom Marcus
had recommended his son, and for whose wisdom and integrity Commodus still
entertained a reluctant esteem. The young prince and his profligate favorites
revelled in all the license of sovereign power; but his hands were yet unstained
with blood; and he had even displayed a generosity of sentiment, which might
perhaps have ripened into solid virtue[315].
A fatal incident decided his fluctuating character.

One
evening, as the emperor was returning to the palace, through a dark and narrow
portico in the amphitheatre[316],
an assassin, who waited his passage, rushed upon him with a drawn sword, loudly
exclaiming, "The senate sends you this." The menace prevented the deed; the
assassin was seized by the guards, and immediately revealed the authors of the
conspiracy. It had been formed, not in the state, but within the walls of the
palace. Lucilla, the emperor's sister, and widow of Lucius Verus, impatient of
the second rank, and jealous of the reigning empress, had armed the murderer
against her brother's life. She had not ventured to communicate the black design
to her second husband, Claudius Pompeiarus, a senator of distinguished merit and
unshaken loyalty; but among the crowd of her lovers (for she imitated the
manners of Faustina) she found men of desperate fortunes and wild ambition, who
were prepared to serve her more violent, as well as her tender passions. The
conspirators experienced the rigor of justice, and the abandoned princess was
punished, first with exile, and afterwards with death[317].

But the
words of the assassin sunk deep into the mind of Commodus, and left an indelible
impression of fear and hatred against the whole body of the senate[318].
Those whom he had dreaded as importunate ministers, he now suspected as secret
enemies. The Delators, a race of men discouraged, and almost extinguished, under
the former reigns, again became formidable, as soon as they discovered that the
emperor was desirous of finding disaffection and treason in the senate. That
assembly, whom Marcus had ever considered as the great council of the nation,
was composed of the most distinguished of the Romans; and distinction of every
kind soon became criminal. The possession of wealth stimulated the diligence of
the informers; rigid virtue implied a tacit censure of the irregularities of
Commodus; important services implied a dangerous superiority of merit; and the
friendship of the father always insured the aversion of the son. Suspicion was
equivalent to proof; trial to condemnation. The execution of a considerable
senator was attended with the death of all who might lament or revenge his fate;
and when Commodus had once tasted human blood, he became incapable of pity or
remorse.

Of these
innocent victims of tyranny, none died more lamented than the two brothers of
the Quintilian family, Maximus and Condianus; whose fraternal love has saved
their names from oblivion, and endeared their memory to posterity. Their studies
and their occupations, their pursuits and their pleasures, were still the same.
In the enjoyment of a great estate, they never admitted the idea of a separate
interest: some fragments are now extant of a treatise which they composed in
common[319];
and in every action of life it was observed that their two bodies were animated
by one soul. The Antonines, who valued their virtues, and delighted in their
union, raised them, in the same year, to the consulship; and Marcus afterwards
intrusted to their joint care the civil administration of Greece, and a great
military command, in which they obtained a signal victory over the Germans. The
kind cruelty of Commodus united them in death[320].

The
tyrant's rage, after having shed the noblest blood of the senate, at length
recoiled on the principal instrument of his cruelty. Whilst Commodus was
immersed in blood and luxury, he devolved the detail of the public business on
Perennis, a servile and ambitious minister, who had obtained his post by the
murder of his predecessor, but who possessed a considerable share of vigor and
ability. By acts of extortion, and the forfeited estates of the nobles
sacrificed to his avarice, he had accumulated an immense treasure. The
Praetorian guards were under his immediate command; and his son, who already
discovered a military genius, was at the head of the Illyrian legions. Perennis
aspired to the empire; or what, in the eyes of Commodus, amounted to the same
crime, he was capable of aspiring to it, had he not been prevented, surprised,
and put to death. The fall of a minister is a very trifling incident in the
general history of the empire; but it was hastened by an extraordinary
circumstance, which proved how much the nerves of discipline were already
relaxed. The legions of Britain, discontented with the administration of
Perennis, formed a deputation of fifteen hundred select men, with instructions
to march to Rome, and lay their complaints before the emperor. These military
petitioners, by their own determined behaviour, by inflaming the divisions of
the guards, by exaggerating the strength of the British army, and by alarming
the fears of Commodus, exacted and obtained the minister's death, as the only
redress of their grievances[321].
This presumption of a distant army, and their discovery of the weakness of
government, was a sure presage of the most dreadful
convulsions.

The
negligence of the public administration was betrayed, soon afterwards, by a new
disorder, which arose from the smallest beginnings. A spirit of desertion began
to prevail among the troops: and the deserters, instead of seeking their safety
in flight or concealment, infested the highways. Maternus, a private soldier, of
a daring boldness above his station, collected these bands of robbers into a
little army, set open the prisons, invited the slaves to assert their freedom,
and plundered with impunity the rich and defenceless cities of Gaul and Spain.
The governors of the provinces, who had long been the spectators, and perhaps
the partners, of his depredations, were, at length, roused from their supine
indolence by the threatening commands of the emperor. Maternus found that he was
encompassed, and foresaw that he must be overpowered. A great effort of despair
was his last resource. He ordered his followers to disperse, to pass the Alps in
small parties and various disguises, and to assemble at Rome, during the
licentious tumult of the festival of Cybele[322].
To murder Commodus, and to ascend the vacant throne, was the ambition of no
vulgar robber. His measures were so ably concerted that his concealed troops
already filled the streets of Rome. The envy of an accomplice discovered and
ruined this singular enterprise, in a moment when it was ripe for execution[323].

Suspicious
princes often promote the last of mankind, from a vain persuasion, that those
who have no dependence, except on their favor, will have no attachment, except
to the person of their benefactor. Cleander, the successor of Perennis, was a
Phrygian by birth; of a nation over whose stubborn, but servile temper, blows
only could prevail[324].
He had been sent from his native country to Rome, in the capacity of a slave. As
a slave he entered the Imperial palace, rendered himself useful to his master's
passions, and rapidly ascended to the most exalted station which a subject could
enjoy. His influence over the mind of Commodus was much greater than that of his
predecessor; for Cleander was devoid of any ability or virtue which could
inspire the emperor with envy or distrust. Avarice was the reigning passion of
his soul, and the great principle of his administration. The rank of Consul, of
Patrician, of Senator, was exposed to public sale; and it would have been
considered as disaffection, if any one had refused to purchase these empty and
disgraceful honors with the greatest part of his fortune[325].
In the lucrative provincial employments, the minister shared with the governor
the spoils of the people. The execution of the laws was penal and arbitrary. A
wealthy criminal might obtain, not only the reversal of the sentence by which he
was justly condemned, but might likewise inflict whatever punishment he pleased
on the accuser, the witnesses, and the judge.

By these
means, Cleander, in the space of three years, had accumulated more wealth than
had ever yet been possessed by any freedman[326].
Commodus was perfectly satisfied with the magnificent presents which the artful
courtier laid at his feet in the most seasonable moments. To divert the public
envy, Cleander, under the emperor's name, erected baths, porticos, and places of
exercise, for the use of the people[327].
He flattered himself that the Romans, dazzled and amused by this apparent
liberality, would be less affected by the bloody scenes which were daily
exhibited; that they would forget the death of Byrrhus, a senator to whose
superior merit the late emperor had granted one of his daughters; and that they
would forgive the execution of Arrius Antoninus, the last representative of the
name and virtues of the Antonines. The former, with more integrity than
prudence, had attempted to disclose, to his brother-in-law, the true character
of Cleander. An equitable sentence pronounced by the latter, when proconsul of
Asia, against a worthless creature of the favorite, proved fatal to him[328].
After the fall of Perennis, the terrors of Commodus had, for a short time,
assumed the appearance of a return to virtue. He repealed the most odious of his
acts; loaded his memory with the public execration, and ascribed to the
pernicious counsels of that wicked minister all the errors of his inexperienced
youth. But his repentance lasted only thirty days; and, under Cleander's
tyranny, the administration of Perennis was often
regretted.

Chapter IV
The
Cruelty, Follies, and Murder of Commodus
Part
II

Pestilence
and famine contributed to fill up the measure of the calamities of Rome[329].
The first could be only imputed to the just indignation of the gods; but a
monopoly of corn, supported by the riches and power of the minister, was
considered as the immediate cause of the second. The popular discontent, after
it had long circulated in whispers, broke out in the assembled circus. The
people quitted their favorite amusements for the more delicious pleasure of
revenge, rushed in crowds towards a palace in the suburbs, one of the emperor's
retirements, and demanded, with angry clamors, the head of the public enemy.
Cleander, who commanded the Praetorian guards[330],
ordered a body of cavalry to sally forth, and disperse the seditious multitude.
The multitude fled with precipitation towards the city; several were slain, and
many more were trampled to death; but when the cavalry entered the streets,
their pursuit was checked by a shower of stones and darts from the roofs and
windows of the houses. The foot guards[331],
who had been long jealous of the prerogatives and insolence of the Praetorian
cavalry, embraced the party of the people. The tumult became a regular
engagement, and threatened a general massacre. The Praetorians, at length, gave
way, oppressed with numbers; and the tide of popular fury returned with
redoubled violence against the gates of the palace, where Commodus lay,
dissolved in luxury, and alone unconscious of the civil war. It was death to
approach his person with the unwelcome news. He would have perished in this
supine security, had not two women, his eldest sister Fadilla, and Marcia, the
most favored of his concubines, ventured to break into his presence. Bathed in
tears, and with dishevelled hair, they threw themselves at his feet; and with
all the pressing eloquence of fear, discovered to the affrighted emperor the
crimes of the minister, the rage of the people, and the impending ruin, which,
in a few minutes, would burst over his palace and person. Commodus started from
his dream of pleasure, and commanded that the head of Cleander should be thrown
out to the people. The desired spectacle instantly appeased the tumult; and the
son of Marcus might even yet have regained the affection and confidence of his
subjects[332].

But every
sentiment of virtue and humanity was extinct in the mind of Commodus. Whilst he
thus abandoned the reins of empire to these unworthy favorites, he valued
nothing in sovereign power, except the unbounded license of indulging his
sensual appetites. His hours were spent in a seraglio of three hundred beautiful
women, and as many boys, of every rank, and of every province; and, wherever the
arts of seduction proved ineffectual, the brutal lover had recourse to violence.
The ancient historians[333]
have expatiated on these abandoned scenes of prostitution, which scorned every
restraint of nature or modesty; but it would not be easy to translate their too
faithful descriptions into the decency of modern language. The intervals of lust
were filled up with the basest amusements. The influence of a polite age, and
the labor of an attentive education, had never been able to infuse into his rude
and brutish mind the least tincture of learning; and he was the first of the
Roman emperors totally devoid of taste for the pleasures of the understanding.
Nero himself excelled, or affected to excel, in the elegant arts of music and
poetry: nor should we despise his pursuits, had he not converted the pleasing
relaxation of a leisure hour into the serious business and ambition of his life.
But Commodus, from his earliest infancy, discovered an aversion to whatever was
rational or liberal, and a fond attachment to the amusements of the populace;
the sports of the circus and amphitheatre, the combats of gladiators, and the
hunting of wild beasts. The masters in every branch of learning, whom Marcus
provided for his son, were heard with inattention and disgust; whilst the Moors
and Parthians, who taught him to dart the javelin and to shoot with the bow,
found a disciple who delighted in his application, and soon equalled the most
skilful of his instructors in the steadiness of the eye and the dexterity of the
hand.

The
servile crowd, whose fortune depended on their master's vices, applauded these
ignoble pursuits. The perfidious voice of flattery reminded him, that by
exploits of the same nature, by the defeat of the Nemaean lion, and the
slaughter of the wild boar of Erymanthus, the Grecian Hercules had acquired a
place among the gods, and an immortal memory among men. They only forgot to
observe, that, in the first ages of society, when the fiercer animals often
dispute with man the possession of an unsettled country, a successful war
against those savages is one of the most innocent and beneficial labors of
heroism. In the civilized state of the Roman empire, the wild beasts had long
since retired from the face of man, and the neighborhood of populous cities. To
surprise them in their solitary haunts, and to transport them to Rome, that they
might be slain in pomp by the hand of an emperor, was an enterprise equally
ridiculous for the prince and oppressive for the people[334].
Ignorant of these distinctions, Commodus eagerly embraced the glorious
resemblance, and styled himself (as we still read on his medal[335]s)
the Roman Hercules[336].
The club and the lion's hide were placed by the side of the throne, amongst the
ensigns of sovereignty; and statues were erected, in which Commodus was
represented in the character, and with the attributes, of the god, whose valor
and dexterity he endeavored to emulate in the daily course of his ferocious
amusements[337].

Elated
with these praises, which gradually extinguished the innate sense of shame,
Commodus resolved to exhibit before the eyes of the Roman people those
exercises, which till then he had decently confined within the walls of his
palace, and to the presence of a few favorites. On the appointed day, the
various motives of flattery, fear, and curiosity, attracted to the amphitheatre
an innumerable multitude of spectators; and some degree of applause was
deservedly bestowed on the uncommon skill of the Imperial performer. Whether he
aimed at the head or heart of the animal, the wound was alike certain and
mortal. With arrows whose point was shaped into the form of crescent, Commodus
often intercepted the rapid career, and cut asunder the long, bony neck of the
ostrich[338].
A panther was let loose; and the archer waited till he had leaped upon a
trembling malefactor. In the same instant the shaft flew, the beast dropped
dead, and the man remained unhurt. The dens of the amphitheatre disgorged at
once a hundred lions: a hundred darts from the unerring hand of Commodus laid
them dead as they run raging round the Arena. Neither the huge bulk of the
elephant, nor the scaly hide of the rhinoceros, could defend them from his
stroke. Aethiopia and India yielded their most extraordinary productions; and
several animals were slain in the amphitheatre, which had been seen only in the
representations of art, or perhaps of fancy[339].
In all these exhibitions, the securest precautions were used to protect the
person of the Roman Hercules from the desperate spring of any savage, who might
possibly disregard the dignity of the emperor and the sanctity of the god[340].

But the
meanest of the populace were affected with shame and indignation when they
beheld their sovereign enter the lists as a gladiator, and glory in a profession
which the laws and manners of the Romans had branded with the justest note of
infamy[341].
He chose the habit and arms of the Secutor, whose combat with the Retiarius
formed one of the most lively scenes in the bloody sports of the amphitheatre.
The Secutor was armed with a helmet, sword, and buckler; his naked antagonist
had only a large net and a trident; with the one he endeavored to entangle, with
the other to despatch his enemy. If he missed the first throw, he was obliged to
fly from the pursuit of the Secutor, till he had prepared his net for a second
cast[342].
The emperor fought in this character seven hundred and thirty-five several
times. These glorious achievements were carefully recorded in the public acts of
the empire; and that he might omit no circumstance of infamy, he received from
the common fund of gladiators a stipend so exorbitant that it became a new and
most ignominious tax upon the Roman people[343].
It may be easily supposed, that in these engagements the master of the world was
always successful; in the amphitheatre, his victories were not often sanguinary;
but when he exercised his skill in the school of gladiators, or his own palace,
his wretched antagonists were frequently honored with a mortal wound from the
hand of Commodus, and obliged to seal their flattery with their blood[344].
He now disdained the appellation of Hercules. The name of Paulus, a celebrated
Secutor, was the only one which delighted his ear. It was inscribed on his
colossal statues, and repeated in the redoubled acclamations[345]
of the mournful and applauding senate[346].
Claudius Pompeianus, the virtuous husband of Lucilla, was the only senator who
asserted the honor of his rank. As a father, he permitted his sons to consult
their safety by attending the amphitheatre. As a Roman, he declared, that his
own life was in the emperor's hands, but that he would never behold the son of
Marcus prostituting his person and dignity. Notwithstanding his manly resolution
Pompeianus escaped the resentment of the tyrant, and, with his honor, had the
good fortune to preserve his life[347].

Commodus
had now attained the summit of vice and infamy. Amidst the acclamations of a
flattering court, he was unable to disguise from himself, that he had deserved
the contempt and hatred of every man of sense and virtue in his empire. His
ferocious spirit was irritated by the consciousness of that hatred, by the envy
of every kind of merit, by the just apprehension of danger, and by the habit of
slaughter, which he contracted in his daily amusements. History has preserved a
long list of consular senators sacrificed to his wanton suspicion, which sought
out, with peculiar anxiety, those unfortunate persons connected, however
remotely, with the family of the Antonines, without sparing even the ministers
of his crimes or pleasures[348].
His cruelty proved at last fatal to himself. He had shed with impunity the
noblest blood of Rome: he perished as soon as he was dreaded by his own
domestics. Marcia, his favorite concubine, Eclectus, his chamberlain, and
Laetus, his Praetorian praefect, alarmed by the fate of their companions and
predecessors, resolved to prevent the destruction which every hour hung over
their heads, either from the mad caprice of the tyrant[349],
or the sudden indignation of the people. Marcia seized the occasion of
presenting a draught of wine to her lover, after he had fatigued himself with
hunting some wild beasts. Commodus retired to sleep; but whilst he was laboring
with the effects of poison and drunkenness, a robust youth, by profession a
wrestler, entered his chamber, and strangled him without resistance. The body
was secretly conveyed out of the palace, before the least suspicion was
entertained in the city, or even in the court, of the emperor's death. Such was
the fate of the son of Marcus, and so easy was it to destroy a hated tyrant,
who, by the artificial powers of government, had oppressed, during thirteen
years, so many millions of subjects, each of whom was equal to their master in
personal strength and personal abilities[350].

The
measures of he conspirators were conducted with the deliberate coolness and
celerity which the greatness of the occasion required. They resolved instantly
to fill the vacant throne with an emperor whose character would justify and
maintain the action that had been committed. They fixed on Pertinax, praefect of
the city, an ancient senator of consular rank, whose conspicuous merit had broke
through the obscurity of his birth, and raised him to the first honors of the
state. He had successively governed most of the provinces of the empire; and in
all his great employments, military as well as civil, he had uniformly
distinguished himself by the firmness, the prudence, and the integrity of his
conduct[351].
He now remained almost alone of the friends and ministers of Marcus; and when,
at a late hour of the night, he was awakened with the news, that the chamberlain
and the praefect were at his door, he received them with intrepid resignation,
and desired they would execute their master's orders. Instead of death, they
offered him the throne of the Roman world. During some moments he distrusted
their intentions and assurances. Convinced at length of the death of Commodus,
he accepted the purple with a sincere reluctance, the natural effect of his
knowledge both of the duties and of the dangers of the supreme rank[352].

Laetus
conducted without delay his new emperor to the camp of the Praetorians,
diffusing at the same time through the city a seasonable report that Commodus
died suddenly of an apoplexy; and that the virtuous Pertinax had already
succeeded to the throne. The guards were rather surprised than pleased with the
suspicious death of a prince, whose indulgence and liberality they alone had
experienced; but the emergency of the occasion, the authority of their praefect,
the reputation of Pertinax, and the clamors of the people, obliged them to
stifle their secret discontents, to accept the donative promised by the new
emperor, to swear allegiance to him, and with joyful acclamations and laurels in
their hands to conduct him to the senate house, that the military consent might
be ratified by the civil authority. This important night was now far spent; with
the dawn of day, and the commencement of the new year, the senators expected a
summons to attend an ignominious ceremony[353].
In spite of all remonstrances, even of those of his creatures who yet preserved
any regard for prudence or decency, Commodus had resolved to pass the night in
the gladiators' school, and from thence to take possession of the consulship, in
the habit and with the attendance of that infamous crew. On a sudden, before the
break of day, the senate was called together in the temple of Concord, to meet
the guards, and to ratify the election of a new emperor. For a few minutes they
sat in silent suspense, doubtful of their unexpected deliverance, and suspicious
of the cruel artifices of Commodus: but when at length they were assured that
the tyrant was no more, they resigned themselves to all the transports of joy
and indignation. Pertinax, who modestly represented the meanness of his
extraction, and pointed out several noble senators more deserving than himself
of the empire, was constrained by their dutiful violence to ascend the throne,
and received all the titles of Imperial power, confirmed by the most sincere
vows of fidelity. The memory of Commodus was branded with eternal infamy. The
names of tyrant, of gladiator, of public enemy resounded in every corner of the
house. They decreed in tumultuous votes[354],
that his honors should be reversed, his titles erased from the public monuments,
his statues thrown down, his body dragged with a hook into the stripping room of
the gladiators, to satiate the public fury; and they expressed some indignation
against those officious servants who had already presumed to screen his remains
from the justice of the senate. But Pertinax could not refuse those last rites
to the memory of Marcus, and the tears of his first protector Claudius
Pompeianus, who lamented the cruel fate of his brother-in- law, and lamented
still more that he had deserved it[355].

These
effusions of impotent rage against a dead emperor, whom the senate had flattered
when alive with the most abject servility, betrayed a just but ungenerous spirit
of revenge.

The
legality of these decrees was, however, supported by the principles of the
Imperial constitution. To censure, to depose, or to punish with death, the first
magistrate of the republic, who had abused his delegated trust, was the ancient
and undoubted prerogative of the Roman senate[356];
but the feeble assembly was obliged to content itself with inflicting on a
fallen tyrant that public justice, from which, during his life and reign, he had
been shielded by the strong arm of military despotism[357].

Pertinax
found a nobler way of condemning his predecessor's memory; by the contrast of
his own virtues with the vices of Commodus. On the day of his accession, he
resigned over to his wife and son his whole private fortune; that they might
have no pretence to solicit favors at the expense of the state. He refused to
flatter the vanity of the former with the title of Augusta; or to corrupt the
inexperienced youth of the latter by the rank of Caesar. Accurately
distinguishing between the duties of a parent and those of a sovereign, he
educated his son with a severe simplicity, which, while it gave him no assured
prospect of the throne, might in time have rendered him worthy of it. In public,
the behavior of Pertinax was grave and affable. He lived with the virtuous part
of the senate, (and, in a private station, he had been acquainted with the true
character of each individual,) without either pride or jealousy; considered them
as friends and companions, with whom he had shared the danger of the tyranny,
and with whom he wished to enjoy the security of the present time. He very
frequently invited them to familiar entertainments, the frugality of which was
ridiculed by those who remembered and regretted the luxurious prodigality of
Commodus[358].

To heal,
as far as I was possible, the wounds inflicted by the hand of tyranny, was the
pleasing, but melancholy, task of Pertinax. The innocent victims, who yet
survived, were recalled from exile, released from prison, and restored to the
full possession of their honors and fortunes. The unburied bodies of murdered
senators (for the cruelty of Commodus endeavored to extend itself beyond death)
were deposited in the sepulchres of their ancestors; their memory was justified
and every consolation was bestowed on their ruined and afflicted families. Among
these consolations, one of the most grateful was the punishment of the Delators;
the common enemies of their master, of virtue, and of their country. Yet even in
the inquisition of these legal assassins, Pertinax proceeded with a steady
temper, which gave every thing to justice, and nothing to popular prejudice and
resentment. The finances of the state demanded the most vigilant care of the
emperor. Though every measure of injustice and extortion had been adopted, which
could collect the property of the subject into the coffers of the prince, the
rapaciousness of Commodus had been so very inadequate to his extravagance, that,
upon his death, no more than eight thousand pounds were found in the exhausted
treasury[359],
to defray the current expenses of government, and to discharge the pressing
demand of a liberal donative, which the new emperor had been obliged to promise
to the Praetorian guards. Yet under these distressed circumstances, Pertinax had
the generous firmness to remit all the oppressive taxes invented by Commodus,
and to cancel all the unjust claims of the treasury; declaring, in a decree of
the senate, "that he was better satisfied to administer a poor republic with
innocence, than to acquire riches by the ways of tyranny and dishonor. "Economy
and industry he considered as the pure and genuine sources of wealth; and from
them he soon derived a copious supply for the public necessities. The expense of
the household was immediately reduced to one half. All the instruments of luxury
Pertinax exposed to public auction[360],
gold and silver plate, chariots of a singular construction, a superfluous
wardrobe of silk and embroidery, and a great number of beautiful slaves of both
sexes; excepting only, with attentive humanity, those who were born in a state
of freedom, and had been ravished from the arms of their weeping parents. At the
same time that he obliged the worthless favorites of the tyrant to resign a part
of their ill- gotten wealth, he satisfied the just creditors of the state, and
unexpectedly discharged the long arrears of honest services. He removed the
oppressive restrictions which had been laid upon commerce, and granted all the
uncultivated lands in Italy and the provinces to those who would improve them;
with an exemption from tribute during the term of ten years[361].

Such a
uniform conduct had already secured to Pertinax the noblest reward of a
sovereign, the love and esteem of his people. Those who remembered the virtues
of Marcus were happy to contemplate in their new emperor the features of that
bright original; and flattered themselves, that they should long enjoy the
benign influence of his administration. A hasty zeal to reform the corrupted
state, accompanied with less prudence than might have been expected from the
years and experience of Pertinax, proved fatal to himself and to his country.
His honest indiscretion united against him the servile crowd, who found their
private benefit in the public disorders, and who preferred the favor of a tyrant
to the inexorable equality of the laws[362].

Amidst the
general joy, the sullen and angry countenance of the Praetorian guards betrayed
their inward dissatisfaction. They had reluctantly submitted to Pertinax; they
dreaded the strictness of the ancient discipline, which he was preparing to
restore; and they regretted the license of the former reign. Their discontents
were secretly fomented by Laetus, their praefect, who found, when it was too
late, that his new emperor would reward a servant, but would not be ruled by a
favorite. On the third day of his reign, the soldiers seized on a noble senator,
with a design to carry him to the camp, and to invest him with the Imperial
purple. Instead of being dazzled by the dangerous honor, the affrighted victim
escaped from their violence, and took refuge at the feet of Pertinax. A short
time afterwards, Sosius Falco, one of the consuls of the year, a rash youth[363],
but of an ancient and opulent family, listened to the voice of ambition; and a
conspiracy was formed during a short absence of Pertinax, which was crushed by
his sudden return to Rome, and his resolute behavior. Falco was on the point of
being justly condemned to death as a public enemy had he not been saved by the
earnest and sincere entreaties of the injured emperor, who conjured the senate,
that the purity of his reign might not be stained by the blood even of a guilty
senator.

These
disappointments served only to irritate the rage of the Praetorian guards. On
the twenty-eighth of March, eighty-six days only after the death of Commodus, a
general sedition broke out in the camp, which the officers wanted either power
or inclination to suppress. Two or three hundred of the most desperate soldiers
marched at noonday, with arms in their hands and fury in their looks, towards
the Imperial palace. The gates were thrown open by their companions upon guard,
and by the domestics of the old court, who had already formed a secret
conspiracy against the life of the too virtuous emperor. On the news of their
approach, Pertinax, disdaining either flight or concealment, advanced to meet
his assassins; and recalled to their minds his own innocence, and the sanctity
of their recent oath. For a few moments they stood in silent suspense, ashamed
of their atrocious design, and awed by the venerable aspect and majestic
firmness of their sovereign, till at length, the despair of pardon reviving
their fury, a barbarian of the country of Tongress[364]
levelled the first blow against Pertinax, who was instantly despatched with a
multitude of wounds. His head, separated from his body, and placed on a lance,
was carried in triumph to the Praetorian camp, in the sight of a mournful and
indignant people, who lamented the unworthy fate of that excellent prince, and
the transient blessings of a reign, the memory of which could serve only to
aggravate their approaching misfortunes[365].

Chapter V
Sale of the
Empire to Didius Julianus
Part I

Public Sale of the Empire
to Didius Julianus by the Praetorian Guards - Clodius Albinus in Britain,
Pescennius Niger in Syria, and Septimius Severus in Pannonia, Declare Against
the Murderers of Pertinax - Civil Wars and Victory of Severus Over His Three
Rivals - Relaxation of Discipline - New Maxims of
Government

The power
of the sword is more sensibly felt in an extensive monarchy, than in a small
community. It has been calculated by the ablest politicians, that no state,
without being soon exhausted, can maintain above the hundredth part of its
members in arms and idleness. But although this relative proportion may be
uniform, the influence of the army over the rest of the society will vary
according to the degree of its positive strength. The advantages of military
science and discipline cannot be exerted, unless a proper number of soldiers are
united into one body, and actuated by one soul. With a handful of men, such a
union would be ineffectual; with an unwieldy host, it would be impracticable;
and the powers of the machine would be alike destroyed by the extreme minuteness
or the excessive weight of its springs. To illustrate this observation, we need
only reflect, that there is no superiority of natural strength, artificial
weapons, or acquired skill, which could enable one man to keep in constant
subjection one hundred of his fellow-creatures: the tyrant of a single town, or
a small district, would soon discover that a hundred armed followers were a weak
defence against ten thousand peasants or citizens; but a hundred thousand
well-disciplined soldiers will command, with despotic sway, ten millions of
subjects; and a body of ten or fifteen thousand guards will strike terror into
the most numerous populace that ever crowded the streets of an immense capital.
The Praetorian bands, whose licentious fury was the first symptom and cause of
the decline of the Roman empire, scarcely amounted to the last- mentioned
number[366].
They derived their institution from Augustus. That crafty tyrant, sensible that
laws might color, but that arms alone could maintain, his usurped dominion, had
gradually formed this powerful body of guards, in constant readiness to protect
his person, to awe the senate, and either to prevent or to crush the first
motions of rebellion. He distinguished these favored troops by a double pay and
superior privileges; but, as their formidable aspect would at once have alarmed
and irritated the Roman people, three cohorts only were stationed in the
capital, whilst the remainder was dispersed in the adjacent towns of Italy[367].
But after fifty years of peace and servitude, Tiberius ventured on a decisive
measure, which forever rivetted the fetters of his country. Under the fair
pretences of relieving Italy from the heavy burden of military quarters, and of
introducing a stricter discipline among the guards, he assembled them at Rome,
in a permanent camp[368],
which was fortified with skilful care[369],
and placed on a commanding situation[370].

Such
formidable servants are always necessary, but often fatal to the throne of
despotism. By thus introducing the Praetorian guards as it were into the palace
and the senate, the emperors taught them to perceive their own strength, and the
weakness of the civil government; to view the vices of their masters with
familiar contempt, and to lay aside that reverential awe, which distance only,
and mystery, can preserve towards an imaginary power. In the luxurious idleness
of an opulent city, their pride was nourished by the sense of their irresistible
weight; nor was it possible to conceal from them, that the person of the
sovereign, the authority of the senate, the public treasure, and the seat of
empire, were all in their hands. To divert the Praetorian bands from these
dangerous reflections, the firmest and best established princes were obliged to
mix blandishments with commands, rewards with punishments, to flatter their
pride, indulge their pleasures, connive at their irregularities, and to purchase
their precarious faith by a liberal donative; which, since the elevation of
Claudius, was enacted as a legal claim, on the accession of every new emperor[371].

The
advocate of the guards endeavored to justify by arguments the power which they
asserted by arms; and to maintain that, according to the purest principles of
the constitution, their consent was essentially necessary in the appointment of
an emperor. The election of consuls, of generals, and of magistrates, however it
had been recently usurped by the senate, was the ancient and undoubted right of
the Roman people[372].
But where was the Roman people to be found? Not surely amongst the mixed
multitude of slaves and strangers that filled the streets of Rome; a servile
populace, as devoid of spirit as destitute of property. The defenders of the
state, selected from the flower of the Italian youth[373],
and trained in the exercise of arms and virtue, were the genuine representatives
of the people, and the best entitled to elect the military chief of the
republic. These assertions, however defective in reason, became unanswerable
when the fierce Praetorians increased their weight, by throwing, like the
barbarian conqueror of Rome, their swords into the scale[374].

The
Praetorians had violated the sanctity of the throne by the atrocious murder of
Pertinax; they dishonored the majesty of it by their subsequent conduct. The
camp was without a leader, for even the praefect Laetus, who had excited the
tempest, prudently declined the public indignation. Amidst the wild disorder,
Sulpicianus, the emperor's father-in-law, and governor of the city, who had been
sent to the camp on the first alarm of mutiny, was endeavoring to calm the fury
of the multitude, when he was silenced by the clamorous return of the murderers,
bearing on a lance the head of Pertinax. Though history has accustomed us to
observe every principle and every passion yielding to the imperious dictates of
ambition, it is scarcely credible that, in these moments of horror, Sulpicianus
should have aspired to ascend a throne polluted with the recent blood of so near
a relation and so excellent a prince. He had already begun to use the only
effectual argument, and to treat for the Imperial dignity; but the more prudent
of the Praetorians, apprehensive that, in this private contract, they should not
obtain a just price for so valuable a commodity, ran out upon the ramparts; and,
with a loud voice, proclaimed that the Roman world was to be disposed of to the
best bidder by public auction[375].

This
infamous offer, the most insolent excess of military license, diffused a
universal grief, shame, and indignation throughout the city. It reached at
length the ears of Didius Julianus, a wealthy senator, who, regardless of the
public calamities, was indulging himself in the luxury of the table[376].
His wife and his daughter, his freedmen and his parasites, easily convinced him
that he deserved the throne, and earnestly conjured him to embrace so fortunate
an opportunity. The vain old man hastened to the Praetorian camp, where
Sulpicianus was still in treaty with the guards, and began to bid against him
from the foot of the rampart. The unworthy negotiation was transacted by
faithful emissaries, who passed alternately from one candidate to the other, and
acquainted each of them with the offers of his rival. Sulpicianus had already
promised a donative of five thousand drachms (above one hundred and sixty
pounds) to each soldier; when Julian, eager for the prize, rose at once to the
sum of six thousand two hundred and fifty drachms, or upwards of two hundred
pounds sterling. The gates of the camp were instantly thrown open to the
purchaser; he was declared emperor, and received an oath of allegiance from the
soldiers, who retained humanity enough to stipulate that he should pardon and
forget the competition of Sulpicianus[377].

It was now
incumbent on the Praetorians to fulfil the conditions of the sale. They placed
their new sovereign, whom they served and despised, in the centre of their
ranks, surrounded him on every side with their shields, and conducted him in
close order of battle through the deserted streets of the city. The senate was
commanded to assemble; and those who had been the distinguished friends of
Pertinax, or the personal enemies of Julian, found it necessary to affect a more
than common share of satisfaction at this happy revolution[378].
After Julian had filled the senate house with armed soldiers, he expatiated on
the freedom of his election, his own eminent virtues, and his full assurance of
the affections of the senate. The obsequious assembly congratulated their own
and the public felicity; engaged their allegiance, and conferred on him all the
several branches of the Imperial power[379].
From the senate Julian was conducted, by the same military procession, to take
possession of the palace. The first objects that struck his eyes, were the
abandoned trunk of Pertinax, and the frugal entertainment prepared for his
supper. The one he viewed with indifference, the other with contempt. A
magnificent feast was prepared by his order, and he amused himself, till a very
late hour, with dice, and the performances of Pylades, a celebrated dancer. Yet
it was observed, that after the crowd of flatterers dispersed, and left him to
darkness, solitude, and terrible reflection, he passed a sleepless night;
revolving most probably in his mind his own rash folly, the fate of his virtuous
predecessor, and the doubtful and dangerous tenure of an empire which had not
been acquired by merit, but purchased by money[380].

He had
reason to tremble. On the throne of the world he found himself without a friend,
and even without an adherent. The guards themselves were ashamed of the prince
whom their avarice had persuaded them to accept; nor was there a citizen who did
not consider his elevation with horror, as the last insult on the Roman name.
The nobility, whose conspicuous station, and ample possessions, exacted the
strictest caution, dissembled their sentiments, and met the affected civility of
the emperor with smiles of complacency and professions of duty. But the people,
secure in their numbers and obscurity, gave a free vent to their passions. The
streets and public places of Rome resounded with clamors and imprecations. The
enraged multitude affronted the person of Julian, rejected his liberality, and,
conscious of the impotence of their own resentment, they called aloud on the
legions of the frontiers to assert the violated majesty of the Roman empire. The
public discontent was soon diffused from the centre to the frontiers of the
empire. The armies of Britain, of Syria, and of Illyricum, lamented the death of
Pertinax, in whose company, or under whose command, they had so often fought and
conquered. They received with surprise, with indignation, and perhaps with envy,
the extraordinary intelligence, that the Praetorians had disposed of the empire
by public auction; and they sternly refused to ratify the ignominious bargain.
Their immediate and unanimous revolt was fatal to Julian, but it was fatal at
the same time to the public peace, as the generals of the respective armies,
Clodius Albinus, Pescennius Niger, and Septimius Severus, were still more
anxious to succeed than to revenge the murdered Pertinax. Their forces were
exactly balanced. Each of them was at the head of three legions[381],
with a numerous train of auxiliaries; and however different in their characters,
they were all soldiers of experience and capacity.

Clodius
Albinus, governor of Britain, surpassed both his competitors in the nobility of
his extraction, which he derived from some of the most illustrious names of the
old republic[382].
But the branch from which he claimed his descent was sunk into mean
circumstances, and transplanted into a remote province. It is difficult to form
a just idea of his true character. Under the philosophic cloak of austerity, he
stands accused of concealing most of the vices which degrade human nature[383].
But his accusers are those venal writers who adored the fortune of Severus, and
trampled on the ashes of an unsuccessful rival. Virtue, or the appearances of
virtue, recommended Albinus to the confidence and good opinion of Marcus; and
his preserving with the son the same interest which he had acquired with the
father, is a proof at least that he was possessed of a very flexible
disposition. The favor of a tyrant does not always suppose a want of merit in
the object of it; he may, without intending it, reward a man of worth and
ability, or he may find such a man useful to his own service. It does not appear
that Albinus served the son of Marcus, either as the minister of his cruelties,
or even as the associate of his pleasures. He was employed in a distant
honorable command, when he received a confidential letter from the emperor,
acquainting him of the treasonable designs of some discontented generals, and
authorizing him to declare himself the guardian and successor of the throne, by
assuming the title and ensigns of Caesar[384].
The governor of Britain wisely declined the dangerous honor, which would have
marked him for the jealousy, or involved him in the approaching ruin, of
Commodus. He courted power by nobler, or, at least, by more specious arts. On a
premature report of the death of the emperor, he assembled his troops; and, in
an eloquent discourse, deplored the inevitable mischiefs of despotism, described
the happiness and glory which their ancestors had enjoyed under the consular
government, and declared his firm resolution to reinstate the senate and people
in their legal authority. This popular harangue was answered by the loud
acclamations of the British legions, and received at Rome with a secret murmur
of applause. Safe in the possession of his little world, and in the command of
an army less distinguished indeed for discipline than for numbers and valor[385],
Albinus braved the menaces of Commodus, maintained towards Pertinax a stately
ambiguous reserve, and instantly declared against the usurpation of Julian. The
convulsions of the capital added new weight to his sentiments, or rather to his
professions of patriotism. A regard to decency induced him to decline the lofty
titles of Augustus and Emperor; and he imitated perhaps the example of Galba,
who, on a similar occasion, had styled himself the Lieutenant of the senate and
people[386].

Personal
merit alone had raised Pescennius Niger, from an obscure birth and station, to
the government of Syria; a lucrative and important command, which in times of
civil confusion gave him a near prospect of the throne. Yet his parts seem to
have been better suited to the second than to the first rank; he was an unequal
rival, though he might have approved himself an excellent lieutenant, to
Severus, who afterwards displayed the greatness of his mind by adopting several
useful institutions from a vanquished enemy[387].
In his government Niger acquired the esteem of the soldiers and the love of the
provincials. His rigid discipline fortified the valor and confirmed the
obedience of the former, whilst the voluptuous Syrians were less delighted with
the mild firmness of his administration, than with the affability of his
manners, and the apparent pleasure with which he attended their frequent and
pompous festivals[388].
As soon as the intelligence of the atrocious murder of Pertinax had reached
Antioch, the wishes of Asia invited Niger to assume the Imperial purple and
revenge his death. The legions of the eastern frontier embraced his cause; the
opulent but unarmed provinces, from the frontiers of Aethiopia[389]
to the Hadriatic, cheerfully submitted to his power; and the kings beyond the
Tigris and the Euphrates congratulated his election, and offered him their
homage and services. The mind of Niger was not capable of receiving this sudden
tide of fortune: he flattered himself that his accession would be undisturbed by
competition and unstained by civil blood; and whilst he enjoyed the vain pomp of
triumph, he neglected to secure the means of victory. Instead of entering into
an effectual negotiation with the powerful armies of the West, whose resolution
might decide, or at least must balance, the mighty contest; instead of advancing
without delay towards Rome and Italy, where his presence was impatiently
expected[390],
Niger trifled away in the luxury of Antioch those irretrievable moments which
were diligently improved by the decisive activity of Severus[391].

The
country of Pannonia and Dalmatia, which occupied the space between the Danube
and the Hadriatic, was one of the last and most difficult conquests of the
Romans. In the defence of national freedom, two hundred thousand of these
barbarians had once appeared in the field, alarmed the declining age of
Augustus, and exercised the vigilant prudence of Tiberius at the head of the
collected force of the empire[392].
The Pannonians yielded at length to the arms and institutions of Rome. Their
recent subjection, however, the neighborhood, and even the mixture, of the
unconquered tribes, and perhaps the climate, adapted, as it has been observed,
to the production of great bodies and slow minds[393],
all contributed to preserve some remains of their original ferocity, and under
the tame and uniform countenance of Roman provincials, the hardy features of the
natives were still to be discerned. Their warlike youth afforded an
inexhaustible supply of recruits to the legions stationed on the banks of the
Danube, and which, from a perpetual warfare against the Germans and Sarmazans,
were deservedly esteemed the best troops in the service.

The
Pannonian army was at this time commanded by Septimius Severus, a native of
Africa, who, in the gradual ascent of private honors, had concealed his daring
ambition, which was never diverted from its steady course by the allurements of
pleasure, the apprehension of danger, or the feelings of humanity[394].
On the first news of the murder of Pertinax, he assembled his troops, painted in
the most lively colors the crime, the insolence, and the weakness of the
Praetorian guards, and animated the legions to arms and to revenge. He concluded
(and the peroration was thought extremely eloquent) with promising every soldier
about four hundred pounds; an honorable donative, double in value to the
infamous bribe with which Julian had purchased the empire[395].
The acclamations of the army immediately saluted Severus with the names of
Augustus, Pertinax, and Emperor; and he thus attained the lofty station to which
he was invited, by conscious merit and a long train of dreams and omens, the
fruitful offsprings either of his superstition or policy[396].

The new
candidate for empire saw and improved the peculiar advantage of his situation.
His province extended to the Julian Alps, which gave an easy access into Italy;
and he remembered the saying of Augustus, That a Pannonian army might in ten
days appear in sight of Rome[397].
By a celerity proportioned to the greatness of the occasion, he might reasonably
hope to revenge Pertinax, punish Julian, and receive the homage of the senate
and people, as their lawful emperor, before his competitors, separated from
Italy by an immense tract of sea and land, were apprised of his success, or even
of his election. During the whole expedition, he scarcely allowed himself any
moments for sleep or food; marching on foot, and in complete armor, at the head
of his columns, he insinuated himself into the confidence and affection of his
troops, pressed their diligence, revived their spirits, animated their hopes,
and was well satisfied to share the hardships of the meanest soldier, whilst he
kept in view the infinite superiority of his reward.

The
wretched Julian had expected, and thought himself prepared, to dispute the
empire with the governor of Syria; but in the invincible and rapid approach of
the Pannonian legions, he saw his inevitable ruin. The hasty arrival of every
messenger increased his just apprehensions. He was successively informed, that
Severus had passed the Alps; that the Italian cities, unwilling or unable to
oppose his progress, had received him with the warmest professions of joy and
duty; that the important place of Ravenna had surrendered without resistance,
and that the Hadriatic fleet was in the hands of the conqueror. The enemy was
now within two hundred and fifty miles of Rome; and every moment diminished the
narrow span of life and empire allotted to Julian.

He
attempted, however, to prevent, or at least to protract, his ruin. He implored
the venal faith of the Praetorians, filled the city with unavailing preparations
for war, drew lines round the suburbs, and even strengthened the fortifications
of the palace; as if those last intrenchments could be defended, without hope of
relief, against a victorious invader. Fear and shame prevented the guards from
deserting his standard; but they trembled at the name of the Pannonian legions,
commanded by an experienced general, and accustomed to vanquish the barbarians
on the frozen Danube[398].
They quitted, with a sigh, the pleasures of the baths and theatres, to put on
arms, whose use they had almost forgotten, and beneath the weight of which they
were oppressed. The unpractised elephants, whose uncouth appearance, it was
hoped, would strike terror into the army of the north, threw their unskilful
riders; and the awkward evolutions of the marines, drawn from the fleet of
Misenum, were an object of ridicule to the populace; whilst the senate enjoyed,
with secret pleasure, the distress and weakness of the usurper[399].

Every
motion of Julian betrayed his trembling perplexity. He insisted that Severus
should be declared a public enemy by the senate. He entreated that the Pannonian
general might be associated to the empire. He sent public ambassadors of
consular rank to negotiate with his rival; he despatched private assassins to
take away his life. He designed that the Vestal virgins, and all the colleges of
priests, in their sacerdotal habits, and bearing before them the sacred pledges
of the Roman religion, should advance in solemn procession to meet the Pannonian
legions; and, at the same time, he vainly tried to interrogate, or to appease,
the fates, by magic ceremonies and unlawful sacrifices[400].

Chapter V
Sale of the
Empire to Didius Julianus
Part II

Severus,
who dreaded neither his arms nor his enchantments, guarded himself from the only
danger of secret conspiracy, by the faithful attendance of six hundred chosen
men, who never quitted his person or their cuirasses, either by night or by day,
during the whole march. Advancing with a steady and rapid course, he passed,
without difficulty, the defiles of the Apennine, received into his party the
troops and ambassadors sent to retard his progress, and made a short halt at
Interamnia, about seventy miles from Rome. His victory was already secure, but
the despair of the Praetorians might have rendered it bloody; and Severus had
the laudable ambition of ascending the throne without drawing the sword[401].
His emissaries, dispersed in the capital, assured the guards, that provided they
would abandon their worthless prince, and the perpetrators of the murder of
Pertinax, to the justice of the conqueror, he would no longer consider that
melancholy event as the act of the whole body. The faithless Praetorians, whose
resistance was supported only by sullen obstinacy, gladly complied with the easy
conditions, seized the greatest part of the assassins, and signified to the
senate, that they no longer defended the cause of Julian. That assembly,
convoked by the consul, unanimously acknowledged Severus as lawful emperor,
decreed divine honors to Pertinax, and pronounced a sentence of deposition and
death against his unfortunate successor. Julian was conducted into a private
apartment of the baths of the palace, and beheaded as a common criminal, after
having purchased, with an immense treasure, an anxious and precarious reign of
only sixty-six days[402].
The almost incredible expedition of Severus, who, in so short a space of time,
conducted a numerous army from the banks of the Danube to those of the Tyber,
proves at once the plenty of provisions produced by agriculture and commerce,
the goodness of the roads, the discipline of the legions, and the indolent,
subdued temper of the provinces[403].

The first
cares of Severus were bestowed on two measures the one dictated by policy, the
other by decency; the revenge, and the honors, due to the memory of Pertinax.
Before the new emperor entered Rome, he issued his commands to the Praetorian
guards, directing them to wait his arrival on a large plain near the city,
without arms, but in the habits of ceremony, in which they were accustomed to
attend their sovereign. He was obeyed by those haughty troops, whose contrition
was the effect of their just terrors. A chosen part of the Illyrian army
encompassed them with levelled spears. Incapable of flight or resistance, they
expected their fate in silent consternation. Severus mounted the tribunal,
sternly reproached them with perfidy and cowardice, dismissed them with ignominy
from the trust which they had betrayed, despoiled them of their splendid
ornaments, and banished them, on pain of death, to the distance of a hundred
miles from the capital. During the transaction, another detachment had been sent
to seize their arms, occupy their camp, and prevent the hasty consequences of
their despair[404].

The
funeral and consecration of Pertinax was next solemnized with every circumstance
of sad magnificence[405].
The senate, with a melancholy pleasure, performed the last rites to that
excellent prince, whom they had loved, and still regretted. The concern of his
successor was probably less sincere; he esteemed the virtues of Pertinax, but
those virtues would forever have confined his ambition to a private station.
Severus pronounced his funeral oration with studied eloquence, inward
satisfaction, and well-acted sorrow; and by this pious regard to his memory,
convinced the credulous multitude, that he alone was worthy to supply his place.
Sensible, however, that arms, not ceremonies, must assert his claim to the
empire, he left Rome at the end of thirty days, and without suffering himself to
be elated by this easy victory, prepared to encounter his more formidable
rivals.

The
uncommon abilities and fortune of Severus have induced an elegant historian to
compare him with the first and greatest of the Caesars[406].
The parallel is, at least, imperfect. Where shall we find, in the character of
Severus, the commanding superiority of soul, the generous clemency, and the
various genius, which could reconcile and unite the love of pleasure, the thirst
of knowledge, and the fire of ambition?[407]
In one instance only, they may be compared, with some degree of propriety, in
the celerity of their motions, and their civil victories. In less than four
years[408],
Severus subdued the riches of the East, and the valor of the West. He vanquished
two competitors of reputation and ability, and defeated numerous armies,
provided with weapons and discipline equal to his own. In that age, the art of
fortification, and the principles of tactics, were well understood by all the
Roman generals; and the constant superiority of Severus was that of an artist,
who uses the same instruments with more skill and industry than his rivals. I
shall not, however, enter into a minute narrative of these military operations;
but as the two civil wars against Niger and against Albinus were almost the same
in their conduct, event, and consequences, I shall collect into one point of
view the most striking circumstances, tending to develop the character of the
conqueror and the state of the empire.

Falsehood
and insincerity, unsuitable as they seem to the dignity of public transactions,
offend us with a less degrading idea of meanness, than when they are found in
the intercourse of private life. In the latter, they discover a want of courage;
in the other, only a defect of power: and, as it is impossible for the most able
statesmen to subdue millions of followers and enemies by their own personal
strength, the world, under the name of policy, seems to have granted them a very
liberal indulgence of craft and dissimulation. Yet the arts of Severus cannot be
justified by the most ample privileges of state reason. He promised only to
betray, he flattered only to ruin; and however he might occasionally bind
himself by oaths and treaties, his conscience, obsequious to his interest,
always released him from the inconvenient obligation[409].

If his two
competitors, reconciled by their common danger, had advanced upon him without
delay, perhaps Severus would have sunk under their united effort. Had they even
attacked him, at the same time, with separate views and separate armies, the
contest might have been long and doubtful. But they fell, singly and
successively, an easy prey to the arts as well as arms of their subtle enemy,
lulled into security by the moderation of his professions, and overwhelmed by
the rapidity of his action. He first marched against Niger, whose reputation and
power he the most dreaded: but he declined any hostile declarations, suppressed
the name of his antagonist, and only signified to the senate and people his
intention of regulating the eastern provinces. In private, he spoke of Niger,
his old friend and intended successor[410],
with the most affectionate regard, and highly applauded his generous design of
revenging the murder of Pertinax. To punish the vile usurper of the throne, was
the duty of every Roman general. To persevere in arms, and to resist a lawful
emperor, acknowledged by the senate, would alone render him criminal[411].
The sons of Niger had fallen into his hands among the children of the provincial
governors, detained at Rome as pledges for the loyalty of their parents[412].
As long as the power of Niger inspired terror, or even respect, they were
educated with the most tender care, with the children of Severus himself; but
they were soon involved in their father's ruin, and removed first by exile, and
afterwards by death, from the eye of public compassion[413].

Whilst
Severus was engaged in his eastern war, he had reason to apprehend that the
governor of Britain might pass the sea and the Alps, occupy the vacant seat of
empire, and oppose his return with the authority of the senate and the forces of
the West. The ambiguous conduct of Albinus, in not assuming the Imperial title,
left room for negotiation. Forgetting, at once, his professions of patriotism,
and the jealousy of sovereign power, he accepted the precarious rank of Caesar,
as a reward for his fatal neutrality. Till the first contest was decided,
Severus treated the man, whom he had doomed to destruction, with every mark of
esteem and regard. Even in the letter, in which he announced his victory over
Niger, he styles Albinus the brother of his soul and empire, sends him the
affectionate salutations of his wife Julia, and his young family, and entreats
him to preserve the armies and the republic faithful to their common interest.
The messengers charged with this letter were instructed to accost the Caesar
with respect, to desire a private audience, and to plunge their daggers into his
heart[414].
The conspiracy was discovered, and the too credulous Albinus, at length, passed
over to the continent, and prepared for an unequal contest with his rival, who
rushed upon him at the head of a veteran and victorious
army.

The
military labors of Severus seem inadequate to the importance of his conquests.
Two engagements[415],
the one near the Hellespont, the other in the narrow defiles of Cilicia, decided
the fate of his Syrian competitor; and the troops of Europe asserted their usual
ascendant over the effeminate natives of Asia[416].
The battle of Lyons, where one hundred and fifty thousand Romans[417]
were engaged, was equally fatal to Albinus. The valor of the British army
maintained, indeed, a sharp and doubtful contest, with the hardy discipline of
the Illyrian legions. The fame and person of Severus appeared, during a few
moments, irrecoverably lost, till that warlike prince rallied his fainting
troops, and led them on to a decisive victory[418].
The war was finished by that memorable day[419].

The civil
wars of modern Europe have been distinguished, not only by the fierce animosity,
but likewise by the obstinate perseverance, of the contending factions. They
have generally been justified by some principle, or, at least, colored by some
pretext, of religion, freedom, or loyalty. The leaders were nobles of
independent property and hereditary influence. The troops fought like men
interested in the decision of the quarrel; and as military spirit and party zeal
were strongly diffused throughout the whole community, a vanquished chief was
immediately supplied with new adherents, eager to shed their blood in the same
cause. But the Romans, after the fall of the republic, combated only for the
choice of masters. Under the standard of a popular candidate for empire, a few
enlisted from affection, some from fear, many from interest, none from
principle. The legions, uninflamed by party zeal, were allured into civil war by
liberal donatives, and still more liberal promises. A defeat, by disabling the
chief from the performance of his engagements, dissolved the mercenary
allegiance of his followers, and left them to consult their own safety by a
timely desertion of an unsuccessful cause. It was of little moment to the
provinces, under whose name they were oppressed or governed; they were driven by
the impulsion of the present power, and as soon as that power yielded to a
superior force, they hastened to implore the clemency of the conqueror, who, as
he had an immense debt to discharge, was obliged to sacrifice the most guilty
countries to the avarice of his soldiers. In the vast extent of the Roman
empire, there were few fortified cities capable of protecting a routed army; nor
was there any person, or family, or order of men, whose natural interest,
unsupported by the powers of government, was capable of restoring the cause of a
sinking party[420].

Yet, in
the contest between Niger and Severus, a single city deserves an honorable
exception. As Byzantium was one of the greatest passages from Europe into Asia,
it had been provided with a strong garrison, and a fleet of five hundred vessels
was anchored in the harbor[421].
The impetuosity of Severus disappointed this prudent scheme of defence; he left
to his generals the siege of Byzantium, forced the less guarded passage of the
Hellespont, and, impatient of a meaner enemy, pressed forward to encounter his
rival. Byzantium, attacked by a numerous and increasing army, and afterwards by
the whole naval power of the empire, sustained a siege of three years, and
remained faithful to the name and memory of Niger. The citizens and soldiers (we
know not from what cause) were animated with equal fury; several of the
principal officers of Niger, who despaired of, or who disdained, a pardon, had
thrown themselves into this last refuge: the fortifications were esteemed
impregnable, and, in the defence of the place, a celebrated engineer displayed
all the mechanic powers known to the ancients[422].
Byzantium, at length, surrendered to famine. The magistrates and soldiers were
put to the sword, the walls demolished, the privileges suppressed, and the
destined capital of the East subsisted only as an open village, subject to the
insulting jurisdiction of Perinthus. The historian Dion, who had admired the
flourishing, and lamented the desolate, state of Byzantium, accused the revenge
of Severus, for depriving the Roman people of the strongest bulwark against the
barbarians of Pontus and Asia[423].
The truth of this observation was but too well justified in the succeeding age,
when the Gothic fleets covered the Euxine, and passed through the undefined
Bosphorus into the centre of the Mediterranean[424].

Both Niger
and Albinus were discovered and put to death in their flight from the field of
battle. Their fate excited neither surprise nor compassion. They had staked
their lives against the chance of empire, and suffered what they would have
inflicted; nor did Severus claim the arrogant superiority of suffering his
rivals to live in a private station. But his unforgiving temper, stimulated by
avarice, indulged a spirit of revenge, where there was no room for apprehension.
The most considerable of the provincials, who, without any dislike to the
fortunate candidate, had obeyed the governor under whose authority they were
accidentally placed, were punished by death, exile, and especially by the
confiscation of their estates. Many cities of the East were stripped of their
ancient honors, and obliged to pay, into the treasury of Severus, four times the
amount of the sums contributed by them for the service of Niger[425].

Till the
final decision of the war, the cruelty of Severus was, in some measure,
restrained by the uncertainty of the event, and his pretended reverence for the
senate. The head of Albinus, accompanied with a menacing letter, announced to
the Romans that he was resolved to spare none of the adherents of his
unfortunate competitors. He was irritated by the just suspicion that he had
never possessed the affections of the senate, and he concealed his old
malevolence under the recent discovery of some treasonable correspondences.
Thirty-five senators, however, accused of having favored the party of Albinus,
he freely pardoned, and, by his subsequent behavior, endeavored to convince
them, that he had forgotten, as well as forgiven, their supposed offences. But,
at the same time, he condemned forty-one[426]
other senators, whose names history has recorded; their wives, children, and
clients attended them in death[427],
and the noblest provincials of Spain and Gaul were involved in the same ruin[428].
Such rigid justice - for so he termed it - was, in the opinion of Severus, the
only conduct capable of insuring peace to the people or stability to the prince;
and he condescended slightly to lament, that to be mild, it was necessary that
he should first be cruel[429].

The true
interest of an absolute monarch generally coincides with that of his people.
Their numbers, their wealth, their order, and their security, are the best and
only foundations of his real greatness; and were he totally devoid of virtue,
prudence might supply its place, and would dictate the same rule of conduct.
Severus considered the Roman empire as his property, and had no sooner secured
the possession, than he bestowed his care on the cultivation and improvement of
so valuable an acquisition. Salutary laws, executed with inflexible firmness,
soon corrected most of the abuses with which, since the death of Marcus, every
part of the government had been infected. In the administration of justice, the
judgments of the emperor were characterized by attention, discernment, and
impartiality; and whenever he deviated from the strict line of equity, it was
generally in favor of the poor and oppressed; not so much indeed from any sense
of humanity, as from the natural propensity of a despot to humble the pride of
greatness, and to sink all his subjects to the same common level of absolute
dependence. His expensive taste for building, magnificent shows, and above all a
constant and liberal distribution of corn and provisions, were the surest means
of captivating the affection of the Roman people[430].
The misfortunes of civil discord were obliterated. The clam of peace and
prosperity was once more experienced in the provinces; and many cities, restored
by the munificence of Severus, assumed the title of his colonies, and attested
by public monuments their gratitude and felicity[431].
The fame of the Roman arms was revived by that warlike and successful emperor[432],
and he boasted, with a just pride, that, having received the empire oppressed
with foreign and domestic wars, he left it established in profound, universal,
and honorable peace[433].

Although
the wounds of civil war appeared completely healed, its mortal poison still
lurked in the vitals of the constitution. Severus possessed a considerable share
of vigor and ability; but the daring soul of the first Caesar, or the deep
policy of Augustus, were scarcely equal to the task of curbing the insolence of
the victorious legions. By gratitude, by misguided policy, by seeming necessity,
Severus was reduced to relax the nerves of discipline[434].
The vanity of his soldiers was flattered with the honor of wearing gold rings
their ease was indulged in the permission of living with their wives in the
idleness of quarters. He increased their pay beyond the example of former times,
and taught them to expect, and soon to claim, extraordinary donatives on every
public occasion of danger or festivity. Elated by success, enervated by luxury,
and raised above the level of subjects by their dangerous privileges[435],
they soon became incapable of military fatigue, oppressive to the country, and
impatient of a just subordination. Their officers asserted the superiority of
rank by a more profuse and elegant luxury. There is still extant a letter of
Severus, lamenting the licentious stage of the army[436],
and exhorting one of his generals to begin the necessary reformation from the
tribunes themselves; since, as he justly observes, the officer who has forfeited
the esteem, will never command the obedience, of his soldiers[437].
Had the emperor pursued the train of reflection, he would have discovered, that
the primary cause of this general corruption might be ascribed, not indeed to
the example, but to the pernicious indulgence, however, of the
commander-in-chief.

The
Praetorians, who murdered their emperor and sold the empire, had received the
just punishment of their treason; but the necessary, though dangerous,
institution of guards was soon restored on a new model by Severus, and increased
to four times the ancient number[438].
Formerly these troops had been recruited in Italy; and as the adjacent provinces
gradually imbibed the softer manners of Rome, the levies were extended to
Macedonia, Noricum, and Spain. In the room of these elegant troops, better
adapted to the pomp of courts than to the uses of war, it was established by
Severus, that from all the legions of the frontiers, the soldiers most
distinguished for strength, valor, and fidelity, should be occasionally
draughted; and promoted, as an honor and reward, into the more eligible service
of the guards[439].
By this new institution, the Italian youth were diverted from the exercise of
arms, and the capital was terrified by the strange aspect and manners of a
multitude of barbarians. But Severus flattered himself, that the legions would
consider these chosen Praetorians as the representatives of the whole military
order; and that the present aid of fifty thousand men, superior in arms and
appointments to any force that could be brought into the field against them,
would forever crush the hopes of rebellion, and secure the empire to himself and
his posterity.

The
command of these favored and formidable troops soon became the first office of
the empire. As the government degenerated into military despotism, the
Praetorian Praefect, who in his origin had been a simple captain of the guards[440],
was placed not only at the head of the army, but of the finances, and even of
the law. In every department of administration, he represented the person, and
exercised the authority, of the emperor. The first praefect who enjoyed and
abused this immense power was Plautianus, the favorite minister of Severus. His
reign lasted above then years, till the marriage of his daughter with the eldest
son of the emperor, which seemed to assure his fortune, proved the occasion of
his ruin[441].
The animosities of the palace, by irritating the ambition and alarming the fears
of Plautianus[442],
threatened to produce a revolution, and obliged the emperor, who still loved
him, to consent with reluctance to his death[443].
After the fall of Plautianus, an eminent lawyer, the celebrated Papinian, was
appointed to execute the motley office of Praetorian
Praefect.

Till the
reign of Severus, the virtue and even the good sense of the emperors had been
distinguished by their zeal or affected reverence for the senate, and by a
tender regard to the nice frame of civil policy instituted by Augustus. But the
youth of Severus had been trained in the implicit obedience of camps, and his
riper years spent in the despotism of military command. His haughty and
inflexible spirit could not discover, or would not acknowledge, the advantage of
preserving an intermediate power, however imaginary, between the emperor and the
army. He disdained to profess himself the servant of an assembly that detested
his person and trembled at his frown; he issued his commands, where his requests
would have proved as effectual; assumed the conduct and style of a sovereign and
a conqueror, and exercised, without disguise, the whole legislative, as well as
the executive power.

The
victory over the senate was easy and inglorious. Every eye and every passion
were directed to the supreme magistrate, who possessed the arms and treasure of
the state; whilst the senate, neither elected by the people, nor guarded by
military force, nor animated by public spirit, rested its declining authority on
the frail and crumbling basis of ancient opinion. The fine theory of a republic
insensibly vanished, and made way for the more natural and substantial feelings
of monarchy. As the freedom and honors of Rome were successively communicated to
the provinces, in which the old government had been either unknown, or was
remembered with abhorrence, the tradition of republican maxims was gradually
obliterated. The Greek historians of the age of the Antonines[444]
observe, with a malicious pleasure, that although the sovereign of Rome, in
compliance with an obsolete prejudice, abstained from the name of king, he
possessed the full measure of regal power. In the reign of Severus, the senate
was filled with polished and eloquent slaves from the eastern provinces, who
justified personal flattery by speculative principles of servitude. These new
advocates of prerogative were heard with pleasure by the court, and with
patience by the people, when they inculcated the duty of passive obedience, and
descanted on the inevitable mischiefs of freedom. The lawyers and historians
concurred in teaching, that the Imperial authority was held, not by the
delegated commission, but by the irrevocable resignation of the senate; that the
emperor was freed from the restraint of civil laws, could command by his
arbitrary will the lives and fortunes of his subjects, and might dispose of the
empire as of his private patrimony[445].
The most eminent of the civil lawyers, and particularly Papinian, Paulus, and
Ulpian, flourished under the house of Severus; and the Roman jurisprudence,
having closely united itself with the system of monarchy, was supposed to have
attained its full majority and perfection.

The
contemporaries of Severus in the enjoyment of the peace and glory of his reign,
forgave the cruelties by which it had been introduced. Posterity, who
experienced the fatal effects of his maxims and example, justly considered him
as the principal author of the decline of the Roman
empire.

Chapter VI
Death of
Severus, Tyranny of Caracalla, Usurpation of Macrinus
Part
I

The Death of Severus -
Tyranny of Caracalla - Usurpation of Macrinus - Follies of Elagabalus - Virtues
of Alexander Severus - Licentiousness of the Army - General State of the Roman
Finances

The ascent
to greatness, however steep and dangerous, may entertain an active spirit with
the consciousness and exercise of its own powers: but the possession of a throne
could never yet afford a lasting satisfaction to an ambitious mind. This
melancholy truth was felt and acknowledged by Severus. Fortune and merit had,
from an humble station, elevated him to the first place among mankind. "He had
been all things," as he said himself, "and all was of little value[446]"
Distracted with the care, not of acquiring, but of preserving an empire,
oppressed with age and infirmities, careless of fame[447],
and satiated with power, all his prospects of life were closed. The desire of
perpetuating the greatness of his family was the only remaining wish of his
ambition and paternal tenderness.

Like most
of the Africans, Severus was passionately addicted to the vain studies of magic
and divination, deeply versed in the interpretation of dreams and omens, and
perfectly acquainted with the science of judicial astrology; which, in almost
every age except the present, has maintained its dominion over the mind of man.
He had lost his first wife, while he was governor of the Lionnese Gaul[448].
In the choice of a second, he sought only to connect himself with some favorite
of fortune; and as soon as he had discovered that the young lady of Emesa in
Syria had a royal nativity, he solicited and obtained her hand[449].
Julia Domna (for that was her name) deserved all that the stars could promise
her. She possessed, even in advanced age, the attractions of beauty[450],
and united to a lively imagination a firmness of mind, and strength of judgment,
seldom bestowed on her sex. Her amiable qualities never made any deep impression
on the dark and jealous temper of her husband; but in her son's reign, she
administered the principal affairs of the empire, with a prudence that supported
his authority, and with a moderation that sometimes corrected his wild
extravagancies[451].
Julia applied herself to letters and philosophy, with some success, and with the
most splendid reputation. She was the patroness of every art, and the friend of
every man of genius[452].
The grateful flattery of the learned has celebrated her virtues; but, if we may
credit the scandal of ancient history, chastity was very far from being the most
conspicuous virtue of the empress Julia[453].

Two sons,
Caracalla[454]
and Geta, were the fruit of this marriage, and the destined heirs of the empire.
The fond hopes of the father, and of the Roman world, were soon disappointed by
these vain youths, who displayed the indolent security of hereditary princes;
and a presumption that fortune would supply the place of merit and application.
Without any emulation of virtue or talents, they discovered, almost from their
infancy, a fixed and implacable antipathy for each other.

Their
aversion, confirmed by years, and fomented by the arts of their interested
favorites, broke out in childish, and gradually in more serious competitions;
and, at length, divided the theatre, the circus, and the court, into two
factions, actuated by the hopes and fears of their respective leaders. The
prudent emperor endeavored, by every expedient of advice and authority, to allay
this growing animosity. The unhappy discord of his sons clouded all his
prospects, and threatened to overturn a throne raised with so much labor,
cemented with so much blood, and guarded with every defence of arms and
treasure. With an impartial hand he maintained between them an exact balance of
favor, conferred on both the rank of Augustus, with the revered name of
Antoninus; and for the first time the Roman world beheld three emperors[455].
Yet even this equal conduct served only to inflame the contest, whilst the
fierce Caracalla asserted the right of primogeniture, and the milder Geta
courted the affections of the people and the soldiers. In the anguish of a
disappointed father, Severus foretold that the weaker of his sons would fall a
sacrifice to the stronger; who, in his turn, would be ruined by his own vices[456].

In these
circumstances the intelligence of a war in Britain, and of an invasion of the
province by the barbarians of the North, was received with pleasure by Severus.
Though the vigilance of his lieutenants might have been sufficient to repel the
distant enemy, he resolved to embrace the honorable pretext of withdrawing his
sons from the luxury of Rome, which enervated their minds and irritated their
passions; and of inuring their youth to the toils of war and government.
Notwithstanding his advanced age, (for he was above threescore,) and his gout,
which obliged him to be carried in a litter, he transported himself in person
into that remote island, attended by his two sons, his whole court, and a
formidable army. He immediately passed the walls of Hadrian and Antoninus, and
entered the enemy's country, with a design of completing the long attempted
conquest of Britain. He penetrated to the northern extremity of the island,
without meeting an enemy. But the concealed ambuscades of the Caledonians, who
hung unseen on the rear and flanks of his army, the coldness of the climate and
the severity of a winter march across the hills and morasses of Scotland, are
reported to have cost the Romans above fifty thousand men. The Caledonians at
length yielded to the powerful and obstinate attack, sued for peace, and
surrendered a part of their arms, and a large tract of territory. But their
apparent submission lasted no longer than the present terror. As soon as the
Roman legions had retired, they resumed their hostile independence. Their
restless spirit provoked Severus to send a new army into Caledonia, with the
most bloody orders, not to subdue, but to extirpate the natives. They were saved
by the death of their haughty enemy[457].

This
Caledonian war, neither marked by decisive events, nor attended with any
important consequences, would ill deserve our attention; but it is supposed, not
without a considerable degree of probability, that the invasion of Severus is
connected with the most shining period of the British history or fable. Fingal,
whose fame, with that of his heroes and bards, has been revived in our language
by a recent publication, is said to have commanded the Caledonians in that
memorable juncture, to have eluded the power of Severus, and to have obtained a
signal victory on the banks of the Carun, in which the son of the King of the
World, Caracul, fled from his arms along the fields of his pride[458].
Something of a doubtful mist still hangs over these Highland traditions; nor can
it be entirely dispelled by the most ingenious researches of modern criticism[459];
but if we could, with safety, indulge the pleasing supposition, that Fingal
lived, and that Ossian sung, the striking contrast of the situation and manners
of the contending nations might amuse a philosophic mind. The parallel would be
little to the advantage of the more civilized people, if we compared the
unrelenting revenge of Severus with the generous clemency of Fingal; the timid
and brutal cruelty of Caracalla with the bravery, the tenderness, the elegant
genius of Ossian; the mercenary chiefs, who, from motives of fear or interest,
served under the imperial standard, with the free-born warriors who started to
arms at the voice of the king of Morven; if, in a word, we contemplated the
untutored Caledonians, glowing with the warm virtues of nature, and the
degenerate Romans, polluted with the mean vices of wealth and
slavery.

The
declining health and last illness of Severus inflamed the wild ambition and
black passions of Caracalla's soul. Impatient of any delay or division of
empire, he attempted, more than once, to shorten the small remainder of his
father's days, and endeavored, but without success, to excite a mutiny among the
troops[460].
The old emperor had often censured the misguided lenity of Marcus, who, by a
single act of justice, might have saved the Romans from the tyranny of his
worthless son. Placed in the same situation, he experienced how easily the rigor
of a judge dissolves away in the tenderness of a parent. He deliberated, he
threatened, but he could not punish; and this last and only instance of mercy
was more fatal to the empire than a long series of cruelty[461].
The disorder of his mind irritated the pains of his body; he wished impatiently
for death, and hastened the instant of it by his impatience. He expired at York
in the sixty-fifth year of his life, and in the eighteenth of a glorious and
successful reign. In his last moments he recommended concord to his sons, and
his sons to the army. The salutary advice never reached the heart, or even the
understanding, of the impetuous youths; but the more obedient troops, mindful of
their oath of allegiance, and of the authority of their deceased master,
resisted the solicitations of Caracalla, and proclaimed both brothers emperors
of Rome. The new princes soon left the Caledonians in peace, returned to the
capital, celebrated their father's funeral with divine honors, and were
cheerfully acknowledged as lawful sovereigns, by the senate, the people, and the
provinces. Some preeminence of rank seems to have been allowed to the elder
brother; but they both administered the empire with equal and independent
power[462].

Such a
divided form of government would have proved a source of discord between the
most affectionate brothers. It was impossible that it could long subsist between
two implacable enemies, who neither desired nor could trust a reconciliation. It
was visible that one only could reign, and that the other must fall; and each of
them, judging of his rival's designs by his own, guarded his life with the most
jealous vigilance from the repeated attacks of poison or the sword. Their rapid
journey through Gaul and Italy, during which they never ate at the same table,
or slept in the same house, displayed to the provinces the odious spectacle of
fraternal discord. On their arrival at Rome, they immediately divided the vast
extent of the imperial palace[463].
No communication was allowed between their apartments; the doors and passages
were diligently fortified, and guards posted and relieved with the same
strictness as in a besieged place. The emperors met only in public, in the
presence of their afflicted mother; and each surrounded by a numerous train of
armed followers. Even on these occasions of ceremony, the dissimulation of
courts could ill disguise the rancor of their hearts[464].

This
latent civil war already distracted the whole government, when a scheme was
suggested that seemed of mutual benefit to the hostile brothers. It was
proposed, that since it was impossible to reconcile their minds, they should
separate their interest, and divide the empire between them. The conditions of
the treaty were already drawn with some accuracy. It was agreed that Caracalla,
as the elder brother should remain in possession of Europe and the western
Africa; and that he should relinquish the sovereignty of Asia and Egypt to Geta,
who might fix his residence at Alexandria or Antioch, cities little inferior to
Rome itself in wealth and greatness; that numerous armies should be constantly
encamped on either side of the Thracian Bosphorus, to guard the frontiers of the
rival monarchies; and that the senators of European extraction should
acknowledge the sovereign of Rome, whilst the natives of Asia followed the
emperor of the East. The tears of the empress Julia interrupted the negotiation,
the first idea of which had filled every Roman breast with surprise and
indignation. The mighty mass of conquest was so intimately united by the hand of
time and policy, that it required the most forcible violence to rend it asunder.
The Romans had reason to dread, that the disjointed members would soon be
reduced by a civil war under the dominion of one master; but if the separation
was permanent, the division of the provinces must terminate in the dissolution
of an empire whose unity had hitherto remained inviolate[465].

Had the
treaty been carried into execution, the sovereign of Europe might soon have been
the conqueror of Asia; but Caracalla obtained an easier, though a more guilty,
victory. He artfully listened to his mother's entreaties, and consented to meet
his brother in her apartment, on terms of peace and reconciliation. In the midst
of their conversation, some centurions, who had contrived to conceal themselves,
rushed with drawn swords upon the unfortunate Geta. His distracted mother strove
to protect him in her arms; but, in the unavailing struggle, she was wounded in
the hand, and covered with the blood of her younger son, while she saw the elder
animating and assisting[466]
the fury of the assassins. As soon as the deed was perpetrated, Caracalla, with
hasty steps, and horror in his countenance, ran towards the Praetorian camp, as
his only refuge, and threw himself on the ground before the statues of the
tutelar deities[467].
The soldiers attempted to raise and comfort him. In broken and disordered words
he informed them of his imminent danger, and fortunate escape; insinuating that
he had prevented the designs of his enemy, and declared his resolution to live
and die with his faithful troops. Geta had been the favorite of the soldiers;
but complaint was useless, revenge was dangerous, and they still reverenced the
son of Severus. Their discontent died away in idle murmurs, and Caracalla soon
convinced them of the justice of his cause, by distributing in one lavish
donative the accumulated treasures of his father's reign[468].
The real sentiments of the soldiers alone were of importance to his power or
safety. Their declaration in his favor commanded the dutiful professions of the
senate. The obsequious assembly was always prepared to ratify the decision of
fortune[469];
but as Caracalla wished to assuage the first emotions of public indignation, the
name of Geta was mentioned with decency, and he received the funeral honors of a
Roman emperor[470].
Posterity, in pity to his misfortune, has cast a veil over his vices. We
consider that young prince as the innocent victim of his brother's ambition,
without recollecting that he himself wanted power, rather than inclination, to
consummate the same attempts of revenge and murder[471].

The crime
went not unpunished. Neither business, nor pleasure, nor flattery, could defend
Caracalla from the stings of a guilty conscience; and he confessed, in the
anguish of a tortured mind, that his disordered fancy often beheld the angry
forms of his father and his brother rising into life, to threaten and upbraid
him[472].
The consciousness of his crime should have induced him to convince mankind, by
the virtues of his reign, that the bloody deed had been the involuntary effect
of fatal necessity. But the repentance of Caracalla only prompted him to remove
from the world whatever could remind him of his guilt, or recall the memory of
his murdered brother. On his return from the senate to the palace, he found his
mother in the company of several noble matrons, weeping over the untimely fate
of her younger son. The jealous emperor threatened them with instant death; the
sentence was executed against Fadilla, the last remaining daughter of the
emperor Marcus[473];
and even the afflicted Julia was obliged to silence her lamentations, to
suppress her sighs, and to receive the assassin with smiles of joy and
approbation. It was computed that, under the vague appellation of the friends of
Geta, above twenty thousand persons of both sexes suffered death. His guards and
freedmen, the ministers of his serious business, and the companions of his
looser hours, those who by his interest had been promoted to any commands in the
army or provinces, with the long connected chain of their dependants, were
included in the proscription; which endeavored to reach every one who had
maintained the smallest correspondence with Geta, who lamented his death, or who
even mentioned his name[474].
Helvius Pertinax, son to the prince of that name, lost his life by an
unseasonable witticism[475].
It was a sufficient crime of Thrasea Priscus to be descended from a family in
which the love of liberty seemed an hereditary quality[476].
The particular causes of calumny and suspicion were at length exhausted; and
when a senator was accused of being a secret enemy to the government, the
emperor was satisfied with the general proof that he was a man of property and
virtue. From this well-grounded principle he frequently drew the most bloody
inferences[477].

Chapter VI
Death of
Severus, Tyranny of Caracalla, Usurpation 0f Macrinus
Part
II

The
execution of so many innocent citizens was bewailed by the secret tears of their
friends and families. The death of Papinian, the Praetorian Praefect, was
lamented as a public calamity[478].
During the last seven years of Severus, he had exercised the most important
offices of the state, and, by his salutary influence, guided the emperor's steps
in the paths of justice and moderation. In full assurance of his virtue and
abilities, Severus, on his death-bed, had conjured him to watch over the
prosperity and union of the Imperial family[479].
The honest labors of Papinian served only to inflame the hatred which Caracalla
had already conceived against his father's minister. After the murder of Geta,
the Praefect was commanded to exert the powers of his skill and eloquence in a
studied apology for that atrocious deed. The philosophic Seneca had condescended
to compose a similar epistle to the senate, in the name of the son and assassin
of Agrippina[480].
“That it was easier to commit than to justify a parricide," was the glorious
reply of Papinian[481];
who did not hesitate between the loss of life and that of honor. Such intrepid
virtue, which had escaped pure and unsullied from the intrigues courts, the
habits of business, and the arts of his profession, reflects more lustre on the
memory of Papinian, than all his great employments, his numerous writings, and
the superior reputation as a lawyer, which he has preserved through every age of
the Roman jurisprudence[482].

It had
hitherto been the peculiar felicity of the Romans, and in the worst of times the
consolation, that the virtue of the emperors was active, and their vice
indolent. Augustus, Trajan, Hadrian, and Marcus visited their extensive
dominions in person, and their progress was marked by acts of wisdom and
beneficence. The tyranny of Tiberius, Nero, and Domitian, who resided almost
constantly at Rome, or in the adjacent was confined to the senatorial and
equestrian orders[483].
But Caracalla was the common enemy of mankind. He left capital (and he never
returned to it) about a year after the murder of Geta. The rest of his reign was
spent in the several provinces of the empire, particularly those of the East,
and province was by turns the scene of his rapine and cruelty. The senators,
compelled by fear to attend his capricious motions, were obliged to provide
daily entertainments at an immense expense, which he abandoned with contempt to
his guards; and to erect, in every city, magnificent palaces and theatres, which
he either disdained to visit, or ordered immediately thrown down. The most
wealthy families ruined by partial fines and confiscations, and the great body
of his subjects oppressed by ingenious and aggravated taxes[484].
In the midst of peace, and upon the slightest provocation, he issued his
commands, at Alexandria, in Egypt for a general massacre. From a secure post in
the temple of Serapis, he viewed and directed the slaughter of many thousand
citizens, as well as strangers, without distinguishing the number or the crime
of the sufferers; since as he coolly informed the senate, all the Alexandrians,
those who perished, and those who had escaped, were alike guilty[485].

The wise
instructions of Severus never made any lasting impression on the mind of his
son, who, although not destitute of imagination and eloquence, was equally
devoid of judgment and humanity[486].
One dangerous maxim, worthy of a tyrant, was remembered and abused by Caracalla.
"To secure the affections of the army, and to esteem the rest of his subjects as
of little moment[487]."
But the liberality of the father had been restrained by prudence, and his
indulgence to the troops was tempered by firmness and authority. The careless
profusion of the son was the policy of one reign, and the inevitable ruin both
of the army and of the empire. The vigor of the soldiers, instead of being
confirmed by the severe discipline of camps, melted away in the luxury of
cities. The excessive increase of their pay and donatives[488]
exhausted the state to enrich the military order, whose modesty in peace, and
service in war, is best secured by an honorable poverty. The demeanor of
Caracalla was haughty and full of pride; but with the troops he forgot even the
proper dignity of his rank, encouraged their insolent familiarity, and,
neglecting the essential duties of a general, affected to imitate the dress and
manners of a common soldier.

It was
impossible that such a character, and such conduct as that of Caracalla, could
inspire either love or esteem; but as long as his vices were beneficial to the
armies, he was secure from the danger of rebellion. A secret conspiracy,
provoked by his own jealousy, was fatal to the tyrant. The Praetorian
praefecture was divided between two ministers. The military department was
intrusted to Adventus, an experienced rather than able soldier; and the civil
affairs were transacted by Opilius Macrinus, who, by his dexterity in business,
had raised himself, with a fair character, to that high office. But his favor
varied with the caprice of the emperor, and his life might depend on the
slightest suspicion, or the most casual circumstance. Malice or fanaticism had
suggested to an African, deeply skilled in the knowledge of futurity, a very
dangerous prediction, that Macrinus and his son were destined to reign over the
empire. The report was soon diffused through the province; and when the man was
sent in chains to Rome, he still asserted, in the presence of the praefect of
the city, the faith of his prophecy. That magistrate, who had received the most
pressing instructions to inform himself of the successors of Caracalla,
immediately communicated the examination of the African to the Imperial court,
which at that time resided in Syria. But, notwithstanding the diligence of the
public messengers, a friend of Macrinus found means to apprise him of the
approaching danger. The emperor received the letters from Rome; and as he was
then engaged in the conduct of a chariot race, he delivered them unopened to the
Praetorian Praefect, directing him to despatch the ordinary affairs, and to
report the more important business that might be contained in them. Macrinus
read his fate, and resolved to prevent it. He inflamed the discontents of some
inferior officers, and employed the hand of Martialis, a desperate soldier, who
had been refused the rank of centurion. The devotion of Caracalla prompted him
to make a pilgrimage from Edessa to the celebrated temple of the Moon at
Carrhae[489].
He was attended by a body of cavalry: but having stopped on the road for some
necessary occasion, his guards preserved a respectful distance, and Martialis,
approaching his person under a presence of duty, stabbed him with a dagger. The
bold assassin was instantly killed by a Scythian archer of the Imperial guard.
Such was the end of a monster whose life disgraced human nature, and whose reign
accused the patience of the Romans[490].
The grateful soldiers forgot his vices, remembered only his partial liberality,
and obliged the senate to prostitute their own dignity and that of religion, by
granting him a place among the gods. Whilst he was upon earth, Alexander the
Great was the only hero whom this god deemed worthy his admiration. He assumed
the name and ensigns of Alexander, formed a Macedonian phalanx of guards,
persecuted the disciples of Aristotle, and displayed, with a puerile enthusiasm,
the only sentiment by which he discovered any regard for virtue or glory. We can
easily conceive, that after the battle of Narva, and the conquest of Poland,
Charles XII. (though he still wanted the more elegant accomplishments of the son
of Philip) might boast of having rivalled his valor and magnanimity; but in no
one action of his life did Caracalla express the faintest resemblance of the
Macedonian hero, except in the murder of a great number of his own and of his
father's friends[491].

After the
extinction of the house of Severus, the Roman world remained three days without
a master. The choice of the army (for the authority of a distant and feeble
senate was little regarded) hung in anxious suspense, as no candidate presented
himself whose distinguished birth and merit could engage their attachment and
unite their suffrages. The decisive weight of the Praetorian guards elevated the
hopes of their praefects, and these powerful ministers began to assert their
legal claim to fill the vacancy of the Imperial throne. Adventus, however, the
senior praefect, conscious of his age and infirmities, of his small reputation,
and his smaller abilities, resigned the dangerous honor to the crafty ambition
of his colleague Macrinus, whose well-dissembled grief removed all suspicion of
his being accessary to his master's death[492].
The troops neither loved nor esteemed his character. They cast their eyes around
in search of a competitor, and at last yielded with reluctance to his promises
of unbounded liberality and indulgence. A short time after his accession, he
conferred on his son Diadumenianus, at the age of only ten years, the Imperial
title, and the popular name of Antoninus. The beautiful figure of the youth,
assisted by an additional donative, for which the ceremony furnished a pretext,
might attract, it was hoped, the favor of the army, and secure the doubtful
throne of Macrinus.

The
authority of the new sovereign had been ratified by the cheerful submission of
the senate and provinces. They exulted in their unexpected deliverance from a
hated tyrant, and it seemed of little consequence to examine into the virtues of
the successor of Caracalla. But as soon as the first transports of joy and
surprise had subsided, they began to scrutinize the merits of Macrinus with a
critical severity, and to arraign the nasty choice of the army. It had hitherto
been considered as a fundamental maxim of the constitution, that the emperor
must be always chosen in the senate, and the sovereign power, no longer
exercised by the whole body, was always delegated to one of its members. But
Macrinus was not a senator[493].
The sudden elevation of the Praetorian praefects betrayed the meanness of their
origin; and the equestrian order was still in possession of that great office,
which commanded with arbitrary sway the lives and fortunes of the senate. A
murmur of indignation was heard, that a man, whose obscure[494]
extraction had never been illustrated by any signal service, should dare to
invest himself with the purple, instead of bestowing it on some distinguished
senator, equal in birth and dignity to the splendor of the Imperial station. As
soon as the character of Macrinus was surveyed by the sharp eye of discontent,
some vices, and many defects, were easily discovered. The choice of his
ministers was in many instances justly censured, and the dissatisfied people,
with their usual candor, accused at once his indolent tameness and his excessive
severity[495].

His rash
ambition had climbed a height where it was difficult to stand with firmness, and
impossible to fall without instant destruction. Trained in the arts of courts
and the forms of civil business, he trembled in the presence of the fierce and
undisciplined multitude, over whom he had assumed the command; his military
talents were despised, and his personal courage suspected; a whisper that
circulated in the camp, disclosed the fatal secret of the conspiracy against the
late emperor, aggravated the guilt of murder by the baseness of hypocrisy, and
heightened contempt by detestation. To alienate the soldiers, and to provoke
inevitable ruin, the character of a reformer was only wanting; and such was the
peculiar hardship of his fate, that Macrinus was compelled to exercise that
invidious office. The prodigality of Caracalla had left behind it a long train
of ruin and disorder; and if that worthless tyrant had been capable of
reflecting on the sure consequences of his own conduct, he would perhaps have
enjoyed the dark prospect of the distress and calamities which he bequeathed to
his successors.

In the
management of this necessary reformation, Macrinus proceeded with a cautious
prudence, which would have restored health and vigor to the Roman army in an
easy and almost imperceptible manner. To the soldiers already engaged in the
service, he was constrained to leave the dangerous privileges and extravagant
pay given by Caracalla; but the new recruits were received on the more moderate
though liberal establishment of Severus, and gradually formed to modesty and
obedience[496].
One fatal error destroyed the salutary effects of this judicious plan. The
numerous army, assembled in the East by the late emperor, instead of being
immediately dispersed by Macrinus through the several provinces, was suffered to
remain united in Syria, during the winter that followed his elevation. In the
luxurious idleness of their quarters, the troops viewed their strength and
numbers, communicated their complaints, and revolved in their minds the
advantages of another revolution. The veterans, instead of being flattered by
the advantageous distinction, were alarmed by the first steps of the emperor,
which they considered as the presage of his future intentions. The recruits,
with sullen reluctance, entered on a service, whose labors were increased while
its rewards were diminished by a covetous and unwarlike sovereign. The murmurs
of the army swelled with impunity into seditious clamors; and the partial
mutinies betrayed a spirit of discontent and disaffection that waited only for
the slightest occasion to break out on every side into a general rebellion. To
minds thus disposed, the occasion soon presented itself.

The
empress Julia had experienced all the vicissitudes of fortune. From an humble
station she had been raised to greatness, only to taste the superior bitterness
of an exalted rank. She was doomed to weep over the death of one of her sons,
and over the life of the other. The cruel fate of Caracalla, though her good
sense must have long taught her to expect it, awakened the feelings of a mother
and of an empress. Notwithstanding the respectful civility expressed by the
usurper towards the widow of Severus, she descended with a painful struggle into
the condition of a subject, and soon withdrew herself, by a voluntary death,
from the anxious and humiliating dependence[497],[498].
Julia Maesa, her sister, was ordered to leave the court and Antioch. She retired
to Emesa with an immense fortune, the fruit of twenty years' favor accompanied
by her two daughters, Soaemias and Mamae, each of whom was a widow, and each had
an only son. Bassianus[499],
for that was the name of the son of Soaemias, was consecrated to the honorable
ministry of high priest of the Sun; and this holy vocation, embraced either from
prudence or superstition, contributed to raise the Syrian youth to the empire of
Rome. A numerous body of troops was stationed at Emesa; and as the severe
discipline of Macrinus had constrained them to pass the winter encamped, they
were eager to revenge the cruelty of such unaccustomed hardships. The soldiers,
who resorted in crowds to the temple of the Sun, beheld with veneration and
delight the elegant dress and figure of the young pontiff; they recognized, or
they thought that they recognized, the features of Caracalla, whose memory they
now adored. The artful Maesa saw and cherished their rising partiality, and
readily sacrificing her daughter's reputation to the fortune of her grandson,
she insinuated that Bassianus was the natural son of their murdered sovereign.
The sums distributed by her emissaries with a lavish hand silenced every
objection, and the profusion sufficiently proved the affinity, or at least the
resemblance, of Bassianus with the great original. The young Antoninus (for he
had assumed and polluted that respectable name) was declared emperor by the
troops of Emesa, asserted his hereditary right, and called aloud on the armies
to follow the standard of a young and liberal prince, who had taken up arms to
revenge his father's death and the oppression of the military order[500].

Whilst a
conspiracy of women and eunuchs was concerted with prudence, and conducted with
rapid vigor, Macrinus, who, by a decisive motion, might have crushed his infant
enemy, floated between the opposite extremes of terror and security, which alike
fixed him inactive at Antioch. A spirit of rebellion diffused itself through all
the camps and garrisons of Syria, successive detachments murdered their
officers[501],
and joined the party of the rebels; and the tardy restitution of military pay
and privileges was imputed to the acknowledged weakness of Macrinus. At length
he marched out of Antioch, to meet the increasing and zealous army of the young
pretender. His own troops seemed to take the field with faintness and
reluctance; but, in the heat of the battle[502],
the Praetorian guards, almost by an involuntary impulse, asserted the
superiority of their valor and discipline. The rebel ranks were broken; when the
mother and grandmother of the Syrian prince, who, according to their eastern
custom, had attended the army, threw themselves from their covered chariots,
and, by exciting the compassion of the soldiers, endeavored to animate their
drooping courage. Antoninus himself, who, in the rest of his life, never acted
like a man, in this important crisis of his fate, approved himself a hero,
mounted his horse, and, at the head of his rallied troops, charged sword in hand
among the thickest of the enemy; whilst the eunuch Gannys[503],
whose occupations had been confined to female cares and the soft luxury of Asia,
displayed the talents of an able and experienced general. The battle still raged
with doubtful violence, and Macrinus might have obtained the victory, had he not
betrayed his own cause by a shameful and precipitate flight. His cowardice
served only to protract his life a few days, and to stamp deserved ignominy on
his misfortunes. It is scarcely necessary to add, that his son Diadumenianus was
involved in the same fate. As soon as the stubborn Praetorians could be
convinced that they fought for a prince who had basely deserted them, they
surrendered to the conqueror: the contending parties of the Roman army, mingling
tears of joy and tenderness, united under the banners of the imagined son of
Caracalla, and the East acknowledged with pleasure the first emperor of Asiatic
extraction.

The
letters of Macrinus had condescended to inform the senate of the slight
disturbance occasioned by an impostor in Syria, and a decree immediately passed,
declaring the rebel and his family public enemies; with a promise of pardon,
however, to such of his deluded adherents as should merit it by an immediate
return to their duty. During the twenty days that elapsed from the declaration
of the victory of Antoninus, (for in so short an interval was the fate of the
Roman world decided,) the capital and the provinces, more especially those of
the East, were distracted with hopes and fears, agitated with tumult, and
stained with a useless effusion of civil blood, since whosoever of the rivals
prevailed in Syria must reign over the empire. The specious letters in which the
young conqueror announced his victory to the obedient senate were filled with
professions of virtue and moderation; the shining examples of Marcus and
Augustus, he should ever consider as the great rule of his administration; and
he affected to dwell with pride on the striking resemblance of his own age and
fortunes with those of Augustus, who in the earliest youth had revenged, by a
successful war, the murder of his father. By adopting the style of Marcus
Aurelius Antoninus, son of Antoninus and grandson of Severus, he tacitly
asserted his hereditary claim to the empire; but, by assuming the tribunitian
and proconsular powers before they had been conferred on him by a decree of the
senate, he offended the delicacy of Roman prejudice. This new and injudicious
violation of the constitution was probably dictated either by the ignorance of
his Syrian courtiers, or the fierce disdain of his military followers[504].

As the
attention of the new emperor was diverted by the most trifling amusements, he
wasted many months in his luxurious progress from Syria to Italy, passed at
Nicomedia his first winter after his victory, and deferred till the ensuing
summer his triumphal entry into the capital. A faithful picture, however, which
preceded his arrival, and was placed by his immediate order over the altar of
Victory in the senate house, conveyed to the Romans the just but unworthy
resemblance of his person and manners. He was drawn in his sacerdotal robes of
silk and gold, after the loose flowing fashion of the Medes and Phoenicians; his
head was covered with a lofty tiara, his numerous collars and bracelets were
adorned with gems of an inestimable value. His eyebrows were tinged with black,
and his cheeks painted with an artificial red and white[505].
The grave senators confessed with a sigh, that, after having long experienced
the stern tyranny of their own countrymen, Rome was at length humbled beneath
the effeminate luxury of Oriental despotism.

The Sun
was worshipped at Emesa, under the name of Elagabalus[506],
and under the form of a black conical stone, which, as it was universally
believed, had fallen from heaven on that sacred place. To this protecting deity,
Antoninus, not without some reason, ascribed his elevation to the throne. The
display of superstitious gratitude was the only serious business of his reign.
The triumph of the god of Emesa over all the religions of the earth, was the
great object of his zeal and vanity; and the appellation of Elagabalus (for he
presumed as pontiff and favorite to adopt that sacred name) was dearer to him
than all the titles of Imperial greatness. In a solemn procession through the
streets of Rome, the way was strewed with gold dust; the black stone, set in
precious gems, was placed on a chariot drawn by six milk-white horses richly
caparisoned. The pious emperor held the reins, and, supported by his ministers,
moved slowly backwards, that he might perpetually enjoy the felicity of the
divine presence. In a magnificent temple raised on the Palatine Mount, the
sacrifices of the god Elagabalus were celebrated with every circumstance of cost
and solemnity. The richest wines, the most extraordinary victims, and the rarest
aromatics, were profusely consumed on his altar. Around the altar, a chorus of
Syrian damsels performed their lascivious dances to the sound of barbarian
music, whilst the gravest personages of the state and army, clothed in long
Phoenician tunics, officiated in the meanest functions, with affected zeal and
secret indignation[507].

Chapter VI
Death of
Severus, Tyranny of Caracalla, Usurpation of Macrinus
Part
III

To this
temple, as to the common centre of religious worship, the Imperial fanatic
attempted to remove the Ancilia, the Palladium[508],
and all the sacred pledges of the faith of Numa. A crowd of inferior deities
attended in various stations the majesty of the god of Emesa; but his court was
still imperfect, till a female of distinguished rank was admitted to his bed.
Pallas had been first chosen for his consort; but as it was dreaded lest her
warlike terrors might affright the soft delicacy of a Syrian deity, the Moon,
adorned by the Africans under the name of Astarte, was deemed a more suitable
companion for the Sun. Her image, with the rich offerings of her temple as a
marriage portion, was transported with solemn pomp from Carthage to Rome, and
the day of these mystic nuptials was a general festival in the capital and
throughout the empire[509].

A rational
voluptuary adheres with invariable respect to the temperate dictates of nature,
and improves the gratifications of sense by social intercourse, endearing
connections, and the soft coloring of taste and the imagination. But Elagabalus,
(I speak of the emperor of that name,) corrupted by his youth, his country, and
his fortune, abandoned himself to the grossest pleasures with ungoverned fury,
and soon found disgust and satiety in the midst of his enjoyments. The
inflammatory powers of art were summoned to his aid: the confused multitude of
women, of wines, and of dishes, and the studied variety of attitude and sauces,
served to revive his languid appetites. New terms and new inventions in these
sciences, the only ones cultivated and patronized by the monarch[510],
signalized his reign, and transmitted his infamy to succeeding times. A
capricious prodigality supplied the want of taste and elegance; and whilst
Elagabalus lavished away the treasures of his people in the wildest
extravagance, his own voice and that of his flatterers applauded a spirit of
magnificence unknown to the tameness of his predecessors. To confound the order
of seasons and climates[511],
to sport with the passions and prejudices of his subjects, and to subvert every
law of nature and decency, were in the number of his most delicious amusements.
A long train of concubines, and a rapid succession of wives, among whom was a
vestal virgin, ravished by force from her sacred asylum[512],
were insufficient to satisfy the impotence of his passions. The master of the
Roman world affected to copy the dress and manners of the female sex, preferred
the distaff to the sceptre, and dishonored the principal dignities of the empire
by distributing them among his numerous lovers; one of whom was publicly
invested with the title and authority of the emperor's, or, as he more properly
styled himself, of the empress's husband[513].

It may
seem probable, the vices and follies of Elagabalus have been adorned by fancy,
and blackened by prejudice[514].
Yet, confining ourselves to the public scenes displayed before the Roman people,
and attested by grave and contemporary historians, their inexpressible infamy
surpasses that of any other age or country. The license of an eastern monarch is
secluded from the eye of curiosity by the inaccessible walls of his seraglio.
The sentiments of honor and gallantry have introduced a refinement of pleasure,
a regard for decency, and a respect for the public opinion, into the modern
courts of Europe[515];
but the corrupt and opulent nobles of Rome gratified every vice that could be
collected from the mighty conflux of nations and manners. Secure of impunity,
careless of censure, they lived without restraint in the patient and humble
society of their slaves and parasites. The emperor, in his turn, viewing every
rank of his subjects with the same contemptuous indifference, asserted without
control his sovereign privilege of lust and luxury.

The most
worthless of mankind are not afraid to condemn in others the same disorders
which they allow in themselves; and can readily discover some nice difference of
age, character, or station, to justify the partial distinction. The licentious
soldiers, who had raised to the throne the dissolute son of Caracalla, blushed
at their ignominious choice, and turned with disgust from that monster, to
contemplate with pleasure the opening virtues of his cousin Alexander, the son
of Mamaea. The crafty Maesa, sensible that her grandson Elagabalus must
inevitably destroy himself by his own vices, had provided another and surer
support of her family. Embracing a favorable moment of fondness and devotion,
she had persuaded the young emperor to adopt Alexander, and to invest him with
the title of Caesar, that his own divine occupations might be no longer
interrupted by the care of the earth. In the second rank that amiable prince
soon acquired the affections of the public, and excited the tyrant's jealousy,
who resolved to terminate the dangerous competition, either by corrupting the
manners, or by taking away the life, of his rival. His arts proved unsuccessful;
his vain designs were constantly discovered by his own loquacious folly, and
disappointed by those virtuous and faithful servants whom the prudence of Mamaea
had placed about the person of her son. In a hasty sally of passion, Elagabalus
resolved to execute by force what he had been unable to compass by fraud, and by
a despotic sentence degraded his cousin from the rank and honors of Caesar. The
message was received in the senate with silence, and in the camp with fury. The
Praetorian guards swore to protect Alexander, and to revenge the dishonored
majesty of the throne. The tears and promises of the trembling Elagabalus, who
only begged them to spare his life, and to leave him in the possession of his
beloved Hierocles, diverted their just indignation; and they contented
themselves with empowering their praefects to watch over the safety of
Alexander, and the conduct of the emperor[516].

It was
impossible that such a reconciliation should last, or that even the mean soul of
Elagabalus could hold an empire on such humiliating terms of dependence. He soon
attempted, by a dangerous experiment, to try the temper of the soldiers. The
report of the death of Alexander, and the natural suspicion that he had been
murdered, inflamed their passions into fury, and the tempest of the camp could
only be appeased by the presence and authority of the popular youth. Provoked at
this new instance of their affection for his cousin, and their contempt for his
person, the emperor ventured to punish some of the leaders of the mutiny. His
unseasonable severity proved instantly fatal to his minions, his mother, and
himself. Elagabalus was massacred by the indignant Praetorians, his mutilated
corpse dragged through the streets of the city, and thrown into the Tiber. His
memory was branded with eternal infamy by the senate; the justice of whose
decree has been ratified by posterity[517],[518].

In the
room of Elagabalus, his cousin Alexander was raised to the throne by the
Praetorian guards. His relation to the family of Severus, whose name he assumed,
was the same as that of his predecessor; his virtue and his danger had already
endeared him to the Romans, and the eager liberality of the senate conferred
upon him, in one day, the various titles and powers of the Imperial dignity[519].
But as Alexander was a modest and dutiful youth, of only seventeen years of age,
the reins of government were in the hands of two women, of his mother, Mamaea,
and of Maesa, his grandmother. After the death of the latter, who survived but a
short time the elevation of Alexander, Mamaea remained the sole regent of her
son and of the empire.

In every
age and country, the wiser, or at least the stronger, of the two sexes, has
usurped the powers of the state, and confined the other to the cares and
pleasures of domestic life. In hereditary monarchies, however, and especially in
those of modern Europe, the gallant spirit of chivalry, and the law of
succession, have accustomed us to allow a singular exception; and a woman is
often acknowledged the absolute sovereign of a great kingdom, in which she would
be deemed incapable of exercising the smallest employment, civil or military.
But as the Roman emperors were still considered as the generals and magistrates
of the republic, their wives and mothers, although distinguished by the name of
Augusta were never associated to their personal honors; and a female reign would
have appeared an inexpiable prodigy in the eyes of those primitive Romans, who
married without love, or loved without delicacy and respect[520].
The haughty Agripina aspired, indeed, to share the honors of the empire which
she had conferred on her son; but her mad ambition, detested by every citizen
who felt for the dignity of Rome, was disappointed by the artful firmness of
Seneca and Burrhus[521].
The good sense, or the indifference, of succeeding princes, restrained them from
offending the prejudices of their subjects; and it was reserved for the
profligate Elagabalus to discharge the acts of the senate with the name of his
mother Soaemias, who was placed by the side of the consuls, and subscribed, as a
regular member, the decrees of the legislative assembly. Her more prudent
sister, Mamaea, declined the useless and odious prerogative, and a solemn law
was enacted, excluding women forever from the senate, and devoting to the
infernal gods the head of the wretch by whom this sanction should be violated[522].
The substance, not the pageantry, of power was the object of Mamaea's manly
ambition. She maintained an absolute and lasting empire over the mind of her
son, and in his affection the mother could not brook a rival. Alexander, with
her consent, married the daughter of a patrician; but his respect for his
father-in-law, and love for the empress, were inconsistent with the tenderness
of interest of Mamaea. The patrician was executed on the ready accusation of
treason, and the wife of Alexander driven with ignominy from the palace, and
banished into Africa[523].

Notwithstanding this act of jealous
cruelty, as well as some instances of avarice, with which Mamaea is charged, the
general tenor of her administration was equally for the benefit of her son and
of the empire. With the approbation of the senate, she chose sixteen of the
wisest and most virtuous senators as a perpetual council of state, before whom
every public business of moment was debated and determined. The celebrated
Ulpian, equally distinguished by his knowledge of, and his respect for, the laws
of Rome, was at their head; and the prudent firmness of this aristocracy
restored order and authority to the government. As soon as they had purged the
city from foreign superstition and luxury, the remains of the capricious tyranny
of Elagabalus, they applied themselves to remove his worthless creatures from
every department of the public administration, and to supply their places with
men of virtue and ability. Learning, and the love of justice, became the only
recommendations for civil offices; valor, and the love of discipline, the only
qualifications for military employments[524].

But the
most important care of Mamaea and her wise counsellors, was to form the
character of the young emperor, on whose personal qualities the happiness or
misery of the Roman world must ultimately depend. The fortunate soil assisted,
and even prevented, the hand of cultivation. An excellent understanding soon
convinced Alexander of the advantages of virtue, the pleasure of knowledge, and
the necessity of labor. A natural mildness and moderation of temper preserved
him from the assaults of passion, and the allurements of vice. His unalterable
regard for his mother, and his esteem for the wise Ulpian, guarded his
unexperienced youth from the poison of flattery[525].

The simple
journal of his ordinary occupations exhibits a pleasing picture of an
accomplished emperor[526],
and, with some allowance for the difference of manners, might well deserve the
imitation of modern princes. Alexander rose early: the first moments of the day
were consecrated to private devotion, and his domestic chapel was filled with
the images of those heroes, who, by improving or reforming human life, had
deserved the grateful reverence of posterity. But as he deemed the service of
mankind the most acceptable worship of the gods, the greatest part of his
morning hours was employed in his council, where he discussed public affairs,
and determined private causes, with a patience and discretion above his years.
The dryness of business was relieved by the charms of literature; and a portion
of time was always set apart for his favorite studies of poetry, history, and
philosophy. The works of Virgil and Horace, the republics of Plato and Cicero,
formed his taste, enlarged his understanding, and gave him the noblest ideas of
man and government. The exercises of the body succeeded to those of the mind;
and Alexander, who was tall, active, and robust, surpassed most of his equals in
the gymnastic arts. Refreshed by the use of the bath and a slight dinner, he
resumed, with new vigor, the business of the day; and, till the hour of supper,
the principal meal of the Romans, he was attended by his secretaries, with whom
he read and answered the multitude of letters, memorials, and petitions, that
must have been addressed to the master of the greatest part of the world. His
table was served with the most frugal simplicity, and whenever he was at liberty
to consult his own inclination, the company consisted of a few select friends,
men of learning and virtue, amongst whom Ulpian was constantly invited. Their
conversation was familiar and instructive; and the pauses were occasionally
enlivened by the recital of some pleasing composition, which supplied the place
of the dancers, comedians, and even gladiators, so frequently summoned to the
tables of the rich and luxurious Romans[527].
The dress of Alexander was plain and modest, his demeanor courteous and affable:
at the proper hours his palace was open to all his subjects, but the voice of a
crier was heard, as in the Eleusinian mysteries, pronouncing the same salutary
admonition: "Let none enter these holy walls, unless he is conscious of a pure
and innocent mind[528]."

Such a
uniform tenor of life, which left not a moment for vice or folly, is a better
proof of the wisdom and justice of Alexander's government, than all the trifling
details preserved in the compilation of Lampridius. Since the accession of
Commodus, the Roman world had experienced, during the term of forty years, the
successive and various vices of four tyrants. From the death of Elagabalus, it
enjoyed an auspicious calm of thirteen years[529].
The provinces, relieved from the oppressive taxes invented by Caracalla and his
pretended son, flourished in peace and prosperity, under the administration of
magistrates, who were convinced by experience that to deserve the love of the
subjects, was their best and only method of obtaining the favor of their
sovereign. While some gentle restraints were imposed on the innocent luxury of
the Roman people, the price of provisions and the interest of money, were
reduced by the paternal care of Alexander, whose prudent liberality, without
distressing the industrious, supplied the wants and amusements of the populace.
The dignity, the freedom, the authority of the senate was restored; and every
virtuous senator might approach the person of the emperor without a fear and
without a blush.

The name
of Antoninus, ennobled by the virtues of Pius and Marcus, had been communicated
by adoption to the dissolute Verus, and by descent to the cruel Commodus. It
became the honorable appellation of the sons of Severus, was bestowed on young
Diadumenianus, and at length prostituted to the infamy of the high priest of
Emesa. Alexander, though pressed by the studied, and, perhaps, sincere
importunity of the senate, nobly refused the borrowed lustre of a name; whilst
in his whole conduct he labored to restore the glories and felicity of the age
of the genuine Antonines[530].

In the
civil administration of Alexander, wisdom was enforced by power, and the people,
sensible of the public felicity, repaid their benefactor with their love and
gratitude. There still remained a greater, a more necessary, but a more
difficult enterprise; the reformation of the military order, whose interest and
temper, confirmed by long impunity, rendered them impatient of the restraints of
discipline, and careless of the blessings of public tranquillity. In the
execution of his design, the emperor affected to display his love, and to
conceal his fear of the army. The most rigid economy in every other branch of
the administration supplied a fund of gold and silver for the ordinary pay and
the extraordinary rewards of the troops. In their marches he relaxed the severe
obligation of carrying seventeen days' provision on their shoulders. Ample
magazines were formed along the public roads, and as soon as they entered the
enemy's country, a numerous train of mules and camels waited on their haughty
laziness. As Alexander despaired of correcting the luxury of his soldiers, he
attempted, at least, to direct it to objects of martial pomp and ornament, fine
horses, splendid armor, and shields enriched with silver and gold. He shared
whatever fatigues he was obliged to impose, visited, in person, the sick and
wounded, preserved an exact register of their services and his own gratitude,
and expressed on every occasion, the warmest regard for a body of men, whose
welfare, as he affected to declare, was so closely connected with that of the
state[531].
By the most gentle arts he labored to inspire the fierce multitude with a sense
of duty, and to restore at least a faint image of that discipline to which the
Romans owed their empire over so many other nations, as warlike and more
powerful than themselves. But his prudence was vain, his courage fatal, and the
attempt towards a reformation served only to inflame the ills it was meant to
cure.

The
Praetorian guards were attached to the youth of Alexander. They loved him as a
tender pupil, whom they had saved from a tyrant's fury, and placed on the
Imperial throne. That amiable prince was sensible of the obligation; but as his
gratitude was restrained within the limits of reason and justice, they soon were
more dissatisfied with the virtues of Alexander, than they had ever been with
the vices of Elagabalus. Their praefect, the wise Ulpian, was the friend of the
laws and of the people; he was considered as the enemy of the soldiers, and to
his pernicious counsels every scheme of reformation was imputed. Some trifling
accident blew up their discontent into a furious mutiny; and the civil war
raged, during three days, in Rome, whilst the life of that excellent minister
was defended by the grateful people. Terrified, at length, by the sight of some
houses in flames, and by the threats of a general conflagration, the people
yielded with a sigh, and left the virtuous but unfortunate Ulpian to his fate.
He was pursued into the Imperial palace, and massacred at the feet of his
master, who vainly strove to cover him with the purple, and to obtain his pardon
from the inexorable soldiers[532].
Such was the deplorable weakness of government, that the emperor was unable to
revenge his murdered friend and his insulted dignity, without stooping to the
arts of patience and dissimulation. Epagathus, the principal leader of the
mutiny, was removed from Rome, by the honorable employment of praefect of Egypt:
from that high rank he was gently degraded to the government of Crete; and when
at length, his popularity among the guards was effaced by time and absence,
Alexander ventured to inflict the tardy but deserved punishment of his crimes[533].
Under the reign of a just and virtuous prince, the tyranny of the army
threatened with instant death his most faithful ministers, who were suspected of
an intention to correct their intolerable disorders. The historian Dion Cassius
had commanded the Pannonian legions with the spirit of ancient discipline. Their
brethren of Rome, embracing the common cause of military license, demanded the
head of the reformer. Alexander, however, instead of yielding to their seditious
clamors, showed a just sense of his merit and services, by appointing him his
colleague in the consulship, and defraying from his own treasury the expense of
that vain dignity: but as was justly apprehended, that if the soldiers beheld
him with the ensigns of his office, they would revenge the insult in his blood,
the nominal first magistrate of the state retired, by the emperor's advice, from
the city, and spent the greatest part of his consulship at his villas in
Campania[534],[535].

Chapter VI
Death of
Severus, Tyranny of Caracalla, Usurpation of Macrinus
Part
IV

The lenity
of the emperor confirmed the insolence of the troops; the legions imitated the
example of the guards, and defended their prerogative of licentiousness with the
same furious obstinacy. The administration of Alexander was an unavailing
struggle against the corruption of his age. In llyricum, in Mauritania, in
Armenia, in Mesopotamia, in Germany, fresh mutinies perpetually broke out; his
officers were murdered, his authority was insulted, and his life at last
sacrificed to the fierce discontents of the army[536].
One particular fact well deserves to be recorded, as it illustrates the manners
of the troops, and exhibits a singular instance of their return to a sense of
duty and obedience. Whilst the emperor lay at Antioch, in his Persian
expedition, the particulars of which we shall hereafter relate, the punishment
of some soldiers, who had been discovered in the baths of women, excited a
sedition in the legion to which they belonged. Alexander ascended his tribunal,
and with a modest firmness represented to the armed multitude the absolute
necessity, as well as his inflexible resolution, of correcting the vices
introduced by his impure predecessor, and of maintaining the discipline, which
could not be relaxed without the ruin of the Roman name and empire. Their
clamors interrupted his mild expostulation. "Reserve your shout," said the
undaunted emperor, "till you take the field against the Persians, the Germans,
and the Sarmatians. Be silent in the presence of your sovereign and benefactor,
who bestows upon you the corn, the clothing, and the money of the provinces. Be
silent, or I shall no longer style you solders, but citizens[537],
if those indeed who disclaim the laws of Rome deserve to be ranked among the
meanest of the people." His menaces inflamed the fury of the legion, and their
brandished arms already threatened his person. “Your courage," resumed the
intrepid Alexander, "would be more nobly displayed in the field of battle; me
you may destroy, you cannot intimidate; and the severe justice of the republic
would punish your crime and revenge my death." The legion still persisted in
clamorous sedition, when the emperor pronounced, with a cud voice, the decisive
sentence, "Citizens! lay down your arms, and depart in peace to your respective
habitations." The tempest was instantly appeased: the soldiers, filled with
grief and shame, silently confessed the justice of their punishment, and the
power of discipline, yielded up their arms and military ensigns, and retired in
confusion, not to their camp, but to the several inns of the city. Alexander
enjoyed, during thirty days, the edifying spectacle of their repentance; nor did
he restore them to their former rank in the army, till he had punished with
death those tribunes whose connivance had occasioned the mutiny. The grateful
legion served the emperor whilst living, and revenged him when dead[538].

The
resolutions of the multitude generally depend on a moment; and the caprice of
passion might equally determine the seditious legion to lay down their arms at
the emperor's feet, or to plunge them into his breast. Perhaps, if this singular
transaction had been investigated by the penetration of a philosopher, we should
discover the secret causes which on that occasion authorized the boldness of the
prince, and commanded the obedience of the troops; and perhaps, if it had been
related by a judicious historian, we should find this action, worthy of Caesar
himself, reduced nearer to the level of probability and the common standard of
the character of Alexander Severus. The abilities of that amiable prince seem to
have been inadequate to the difficulties of his situation, the firmness of his
conduct inferior to the purity of his intentions. His virtues, as well as the
vices of Elagabalus, contracted a tincture of weakness and effeminacy from the
soft climate of Syria, of which he was a native; though he blushed at his
foreign origin, and listened with a vain complacency to the flattering
genealogists, who derived his race from the ancient stock of Roman nobility[539].
The pride and avarice of his mother cast a shade on the glories of his reign; an
by exacting from his riper years the same dutiful obedience which she had justly
claimed from his unexperienced youth, Mamaea exposed to public ridicule both her
son's character and her own[540].
The fatigues of the Persian war irritated the military discontent; the
unsuccessful event[541]
degraded the reputation of the emperor as a general, and even as a soldier.
Every cause prepared, and every circumstance hastened, a revolution, which
distracted the Roman empire with a long series of intestine
calamities.

The
dissolute tyranny of Commodus, the civil wars occasioned by his death, and the
new maxims of policy introduced by the house of Severus, had all contributed to
increase the dangerous power of the army, and to obliterate the faint image of
laws and liberty that was still impressed on the minds of the Romans. The
internal change, which undermined the foundations of the empire, we have
endeavored to explain with some degree of order and perspicuity. The personal
characters of the emperors, their victories, laws, follies, and fortunes, can
interest us no farther than as they are connected with the general history of
the Decline and Fall of the monarchy. Our constant attention to that great
object will not suffer us to overlook a most important edict of Antoninus
Caracalla, which communicated to all the free inhabitants of the empire the name
and privileges of Roman citizens. His unbounded liberality flowed not, however,
from the sentiments of a generous mind; it was the sordid result of avarice, and
will naturally be illustrated by some observations on the finances of that
state, from the victorious ages of the commonwealth to the reign of Alexander
Severus. The siege of Veii in Tuscany, the first considerable enterprise of the
Romans, was protracted to the tenth year, much less by the strength of the place
than by the unskilfulness of the besiegers. The unaccustomed hardships of so
many winter campaigns, at the distance of near twenty miles from home[542],
required more than common encouragements; and the senate wisely prevented the
clamors of the people, by the institution of a regular pay for the soldiers,
which was levied by a general tribute, assessed according to an equitable
proportion on the property of the citizens[543].
During more than two hundred years after the conquest of Veii, the victories of
the republic added less to the wealth than to the power of Rome. The states of
Italy paid their tribute in military service only, and the vast force, both by
sea and land, which was exerted in the Punic wars, was maintained at the expense
of the Romans themselves. That high-spirited people (such is often the generous
enthusiasm of freedom) cheerfully submitted to the most excessive but voluntary
burdens, in the just confidence that they should speedily enjoy the rich harvest
of their labors. Their expectations were not disappointed. In the course of a
few years, the riches of Syracuse, of Carthage, of Macedonia, and of Asia, were
brought in triumph to Rome. The treasures of Perseus alone amounted to near two
millions sterling, and the Roman people, the sovereign of so many nations, was
forever delivered from the weight of taxes[544].
The increasing revenue of the provinces was found sufficient to defray the
ordinary establishment of war and government, and the superfluous mass of gold
and silver was deposited in the temple of Saturn, and reserved for any
unforeseen emergency of the state[545].

History
has never, perhaps, suffered a greater or more irreparable injury than in the
loss of the curious register[546]
bequeathed by Augustus to the senate, in which that experienced prince so
accurately balanced the revenues and expenses of the Roman empire[547].
Deprived of this clear and comprehensive estimate, we are reduced to collect a
few imperfect hints from such of the ancients as have accidentally turned aside
from the splendid to the more useful parts of history. We are informed that, by
the conquests of Pompey, the tributes of Asia were raised from fifty to one
hundred and thirty-five millions of drachms; or about four millions and a half
sterling[548],[549].
Under the last and most indolent of the Ptolemies, the revenue of Egypt is said
to have amounted to twelve thousand five hundred talents; a sum equivalent to
more than two millions and a half of our money, but which was afterwards
considerably improved by the more exact economy of the Romans, and the increase
of the trade of Aethiopia and India[550].
Gaul was enriched by rapine, as Egypt was by commerce, and the tributes of those
two great provinces have been compared as nearly equal to each other in value[551].
The ten thousand Euboic or Phoenician talents, about four millions sterling[552],
which vanquished Carthage was condemned to pay within the term of fifty years,
were a slight acknowledgment of the superiority of Rome[553],
and cannot bear the least proportion with the taxes afterwards raised both on
the lands and on the persons of the inhabitants, when the fertile coast of
Africa was reduced into a province[554].

Spain, by
a very singular fatality, was the Peru and Mexico of the old world. The
discovery of the rich western continent by the Phoenicians, and the oppression
of the simple natives, who were compelled to labor in their own mines for the
benefit of strangers, form an exact type of the more recent history of Spanish
America[555].
The Phoenicians were acquainted only with the sea-coast of Spain; avarice, as
well as ambition, carried the arms of Rome and Carthage into the heart of the
country, and almost every part of the soil was found pregnant with copper,
silver, and gold[556].
Mention is made of a mine near Carthagena which yielded every day twenty-five
thousand drachmas of silver, or about three hundred thousand pounds a year[557].
Twenty thousand pound weight of gold was annually received from the provinces of
Asturia, Gallicia, and Lusitania[558].

We want
both leisure and materials to pursue this curious inquiry through the many
potent states that were annihilated in the Roman empire. Some notion, however,
may be formed of the revenue of the provinces where considerable wealth had been
deposited by nature, or collected by man, if we observe the severe attention
that was directed to the abodes of solitude and sterility. Augustus once
received a petition from the inhabitants of Gyarus, humbly praying that they
might be relieved from one third of their excessive impositions. Their whole tax
amounted indeed to no more than one hundred and fifty drachms, or about five
pounds: but Gyarus was a little island, or rather a rock, of the Aegean Sea,
destitute of fresh water and every necessary of life, and inhabited only by a
few wretched fishermen[559].

From the
faint glimmerings of such doubtful and scattered lights, we should be inclined
to believe, 1st, That (with every fair allowance for the differences of times
and circumstances) the general income of the Roman provinces could seldom amount
to less than fifteen or twenty millions of our money[560];
and, 2dly, That so ample a revenue must have been fully adequate to all the
expenses of the moderate government instituted by Augustus, whose court was the
modest family of a private senator, and whose military establishment was
calculated for the defence of the frontiers, without any aspiring views of
conquest, or any serious apprehension of a foreign
invasion.

Notwithstanding the seeming
probability of both these conclusions, the latter of them at least is positively
disowned by the language and conduct of Augustus. It is not easy to determine
whether, on this occasion, he acted as the common father of the Roman world, or
as the oppressor of liberty; whether he wished to relieve the provinces, or to
impoverish the senate and the equestrian order. But no sooner had he assumed the
reins of government, than he frequently intimated the insufficiency of the
tributes, and the necessity of throwing an equitable proportion of the public
burden upon Rome and Italy[561].
In the prosecution of this unpopular design, he advanced, however, by cautious
and well-weighed steps. The introduction of customs was followed by the
establishment of an excise, and the scheme of taxation was completed by an
artful assessment on the real and personal property of the Roman citizens, who
had been exempted from any kind of contribution above a century and a half.

I.
In a
great empire like that of Rome, a natural balance of money must have gradually
established itself. It has been already observed, that as the wealth of the
provinces was attracted to the capital by the strong hand of conquest and power,
so a considerable part of it was restored to the industrious provinces by the
gentle influence of commerce and arts. In the reign of Augustus and his
successors, duties were imposed on every kind of merchandise, which through a
thousand channels flowed to the great centre of opulence and luxury; and in
whatsoever manner the law was expressed, it was the Roman purchaser, and not the
provincial merchant, who paid the tax[562].
The rate of the customs varied from the eighth to the fortieth part of the value
of the commodity; and we have a right to suppose that the variation was directed
by the unalterable maxims of policy; that a higher duty was fixed on the
articles of luxury than on those of necessity, and that the productions raised
or manufactured by the labor of the subjects of the empire were treated with
more indulgence than was shown to the pernicious, or at least the unpopular
commerce of Arabia and India[563].
There is still extant a long but imperfect catalogue of eastern commodities,
which about the time of Alexander Severus were subject to the payment of duties;
cinnamon, myrrh, pepper, ginger, and the whole tribe of aromatics a great
variety of precious stones, among which the diamond was the most remarkable for
its price, and the emerald for its beauty[564];
Parthian and Babylonian leather, cottons, silks, both raw and manufactured,
ebony ivory, and eunuchs[565].
We may observe that the use and value of those effeminate slaves gradually rose
with the decline of the empire.

II.
The
excise, introduced by Augustus after the civil wars, was extremely moderate, but
it was general. It seldom exceeded one per cent.; but it comprehended whatever
was sold in the markets or by public auction, from the most considerable
purchases of lands and houses, to those minute objects which can only derive a
value from their infinite multitude and daily consumption. Such a tax, as it
affects the body of the people, has ever been the occasion of clamor and
discontent. An emperor well acquainted with the wants and resources of the state
was obliged to declare, by a public edict, that the support of the army depended
in a great measure on the produce of the excise[566].

III.
When
Augustus resolved to establish a permanent military force for the defence of his
government against foreign and domestic enemies, he instituted a peculiar
treasury for the pay of the soldiers, the rewards of the veterans, and the
extra-ordinary expenses of war. The ample revenue of the excise, though
peculiarly appropriated to those uses, was found inadequate. To supply the
deficiency, the emperor suggested a new tax of five per cent. on all legacies
and inheritances. But the nobles of Rome were more tenacious of property than of
freedom. Their indignant murmurs were received by Augustus with his usual
temper. He candidly referred the whole business to the senate, and exhorted them
to provide for the public service by some other expedient of a less odious
nature. They were divided and perplexed. He insinuated to them, that their
obstinacy would oblige him to propose a general land tax and capitation. They
acquiesced in silence[567]..
The new imposition on legacies and inheritances was, however, mitigated by some
restrictions. It did not take place unless the object was of a certain value,
most probably of fifty or a hundred pieces of gold[568];
nor could it be exacted from the nearest of kin on the father's side[569].
When the rights of nature and poverty were thus secured, it seemed reasonable,
that a stranger, or a distant relation, who acquired an unexpected accession of
fortune, should cheerfully resign a twentieth part of it, for the benefit of the
state[570].

Such a
tax, plentiful as it must prove in every wealthy community, was most happily
suited to the situation of the Romans, who could frame their arbitrary wills,
according to the dictates of reason or caprice, without any restraint from the
modern fetters of entails and settlements. From various causes, the partiality
of paternal affection often lost its influence over the stern patriots of the
commonwealth, and the dissolute nobles of the empire; and if the father
bequeathed to his son the fourth part of his estate, he removed all ground of
legal complaint[571].
But a rich childish old man was a domestic tyrant, and his power increased with
his years and infirmities. A servile crowd, in which he frequently reckoned
praetors and consuls, courted his smiles, pampered his avarice, applauded his
follies, served his passions, and waited with impatience for his death. The arts
of attendance and flattery were formed into a most lucrative science; those who
professed it acquired a peculiar appellation; and the whole city, according to
the lively descriptions of satire, was divided between two parties, the hunters
and their game[572].
Yet, while so many unjust and extravagant wills were every day dictated by
cunning and subscribed by folly, a few were the result of rational esteem and
virtuous gratitude. Cicero, who had so often defended the lives and fortunes of
his fellow-citizens, was rewarded with legacies to the amount of a hundred and
seventy thousand pounds[573];
nor do the friends of the younger Pliny seem to have been less generous to that
amiable orator[574].
Whatever was the motive of the testator, the treasury claimed, without
distinction, the twentieth part of his estate: and in the course of two or three
generations, the whole property of the subject must have gradually passed
through the coffers of the state.

In the
first and golden years of the reign of Nero, that prince, from a desire of
popularity, and perhaps from a blind impulse of benevolence, conceived a wish of
abolishing the oppression of the customs and excise. The wisest senators
applauded his magnanimity: but they diverted him from the execution of a design
which would have dissolved the strength and resources of the republic[575].
Had it indeed been possible to realize this dream of fancy, such princes as
Trajan and the Antonines would surely have embraced with ardor the glorious
opportunity of conferring so signal an obligation on mankind. Satisfied,
however, with alleviating the public burden, they attempted not to remove it.
The mildness and precision of their laws ascertained the rule and measure of
taxation, and protected the subject of every rank against arbitrary
interpretations, antiquated claims, and the insolent vexation of the farmers of
the revenue[576].
For it is somewhat singular, that, in every age, the best and wisest of the
Roman governors persevered in this pernicious method of collecting the principal
branches at least of the excise and customs[577].

The
sentiments, and, indeed, the situation, of Caracalla were very different from
those of the Antonines. Inattentive, or rather averse, to the welfare of his
people, he found himself under the necessity of gratifying the insatiate avarice
which he had excited in the army. Of the several impositions introduced by
Augustus, the twentieth on inheritances and legacies was the most fruitful, as
well as the most comprehensive. As its influence was not confined to Rome or
Italy, the produce continually increased with the gradual extension of the Roman
City. The new citizens, though charged, on equal terms[578],
with the payment of new taxes, which had not affected them as subjects, derived
an ample compensation from the rank they obtained, the privileges they acquired,
and the fair prospect of honors and fortune that was thrown open to their
ambition. But the favor which implied a distinction was lost in the prodigality
of Caracalla, and the reluctant provincials were compelled to assume the vain
title, and the real obligations, of Roman citizens[579].
Nor was the rapacious son of Severus contented with such a measure of taxation
as had appeared sufficient to his moderate predecessors. Instead of a twentieth,
he exacted a tenth of all legacies and inheritances; and during his reign (for
the ancient proportion was restored after his death) he crushed alike every part
of the empire under the weight of his iron sceptre[580].

When all
the provincials became liable to the peculiar impositions of Roman citizens,
they seemed to acquire a legal exemption from the tributes which they had paid
in their former condition of subjects. Such were not the maxims of government
adopted by Caracalla and his pretended son. The old as well as the new taxes
were, at the same time, levied in the provinces. It was reserved for the virtue
of Alexander to relieve them in a great measure from this intolerable grievance,
by reducing the tributes to a thirteenth part of the sum exacted at the time of
his accession[581].
It is impossible to conjecture the motive that engaged him to spare so trifling
a remnant of the public evil; but the noxious weed, which had not been totally
eradicated, again sprang up with the most luxuriant growth, and in the
succeeding age darkened the Roman world with its deadly shade. In the course of
this history, we shall be too often summoned to explain the land tax, the
capitation, and the heavy contributions of corn, wine, oil, and meat, which were
exacted from the provinces for the use of the court, the army, and the
capital.

As long as
Rome and Italy were respected as the centre of government, a national spirit was
preserved by the ancient, and insensibly imbibed by the adopted, citizens. The
principal commands of the army were filled by men who had received a liberal
education, were well instructed in the advantages of laws and letters, and who
had risen, by equal steps, through the regular succession of civil and military
honors[582].
To their influence and example we may partly ascribe the modest obedience of the
legions during the two first centuries of the Imperial
history.

But when
the last enclosure of the Roman constitution was trampled down by Caracalla, the
separation of professions gradually succeeded to the distinction of ranks. The
more polished citizens of the internal provinces were alone qualified to act as
lawyers and magistrates. The rougher trade of arms was abandoned to the peasants
and barbarians of the frontiers, who knew no country but their camp, no science
but that of war no civil laws, and scarcely those of military discipline. With
bloody hands, savage manners, and desperate resolutions, they sometimes guarded,
but much oftener subverted, the throne of the
emperors.

Chapter VII
Tyranny of
Maximin, Rebellion, Civil Wars, Death of Maximin
Part
I

The Elevation and Tyranny of
Maximin - Rebellion in Africa and Italy, Under the Authority of the Senate -
Civil Wars and Seditions - Violent Deaths of Maximin and His Son, of Maximus and
Balbinus, and of the Three Gordians - Usurpation and Secular Games of
Philip.

Of the
various forms of government which have prevailed in the world, an hereditary
monarchy seems to present the fairest scope for ridicule. Is it possible to
relate without an indignant smile, that, on the father's decease, the property
of a nation, like that of a drove of oxen, descends to his infant son, as yet
unknown to mankind and to himself; and that the bravest warriors and the wisest
statesmen, relinquishing their natural right to empire, approach the royal
cradle with bended knees and protestations of inviolable fidelity? Satire and
declamation may paint these obvious topics in the most dazzling colors, but our
more serious thoughts will respect a useful prejudice, that establishes a rule
of succession, independent of the passions of mankind; and we shall cheerfully
acquiesce in any expedient which deprives the multitude of the dangerous, and
indeed the ideal, power of giving themselves a master.

In the
cool shade of retirement, we may easily devise imaginary forms of government, in
which the sceptre shall be constantly bestowed on the most worthy, by the free
and incorrupt suffrage of the whole community. Experience overturns these airy
fabrics, and teaches us, that in a large society, the election of a monarch can
never devolve to the wisest, or to the most numerous part of the people. The
army is the only order of men sufficiently united to concur in the same
sentiments, and powerful enough to impose them on the rest of their
fellow-citizens; but the temper of soldiers, habituated at once to violence and
to slavery, renders them very unfit guardians of a legal, or even a civil
constitution. Justice, humanity, or political wisdom, are qualities they are too
little acquainted with in themselves, to appreciate them in others. Valor will
acquire their esteem, and liberality will purchase their suffrage; but the first
of these merits is often lodged in the most savage breasts; the latter can only
exert itself at the expense of the public; and both may be turned against the
possessor of the throne, by the ambition of a daring
rival.

The
superior prerogative of birth, when it has obtained the sanction of time and
popular opinion, is the plainest and least invidious of all distinctions among
mankind. The acknowledged right extinguishes the hopes of faction, and the
conscious security disarms the cruelty of the monarch. To the firm establishment
of this idea we owe the peaceful succession and mild administration of European
monarchies. To the defect of it we must attribute the frequent civil wars,
through which an Asiatic despot is obliged to cut his way to the throne of his
fathers. Yet, even in the East, the sphere of contention is usually limited to
the princes of the reigning house, and as soon as the more fortunate competitor
has removed his brethren by the sword and the bowstring, he no longer entertains
any jealousy of his meaner subjects. But the Roman empire, after the authority
of the senate had sunk into contempt, was a vast scene of confusion. The royal,
and even noble, families of the provinces had long since been led in triumph
before the car of the haughty republicans. The ancient families of Rome had
successively fallen beneath the tyranny of the Caesars; and whilst those princes
were shackled by the forms of a commonwealth, and disappointed by the repeated
failure of their posterity[583],
it was impossible that any idea of hereditary succession should have taken root
in the minds of their subjects. The right to the throne, which none could claim
from birth, every one assumed from merit. The daring hopes of ambition were set
loose from the salutary restraints of law and prejudice; and the meanest of
mankind might, without folly, entertain a hope of being raised by valor and
fortune to a rank in the army, in which a single crime would enable him to wrest
the sceptre of the world from his feeble and unpopular master. After the murder
of Alexander Severus, and the elevation of Maximin, no emperor could think
himself safe upon the throne, and every barbarian peasant of the frontier might
aspire to that august, but dangerous station.

About
thirty-two years before that event, the emperor Severus, returning from an
eastern expedition, halted in Thrace, to celebrate, with military games, the
birthday of his younger son, Geta. The country flocked in crowds to behold their
sovereign, and a young barbarian of gigantic stature earnestly solicited, in his
rude dialect, that he might be allowed to contend for the prize of wrestling. As
the pride of discipline would have been disgraced in the overthrow of a Roman
soldier by a Thracian peasant, he was matched with the stoutest followers of the
camp, sixteen of whom he successively laid on the ground. His victory was
rewarded by some trifling gifts, and a permission to enlist in the troops. The
next day, the happy barbarian was distinguished above a crowd of recruits,
dancing and exulting after the fashion of his country. As soon as he perceived
that he had attracted the emperor's notice, he instantly ran up to his horse,
and followed him on foot, without the least appearance of fatigue, in a long and
rapid career. "Thracian," said Severus with astonishment, "art thou disposed to
wrestle after thy race?" "Most willingly, sir," replied the unwearied youth;
and, almost in a breath, overthrew seven of the strongest soldiers in the army.
A gold collar was the prize of his matchless vigor and activity, and he was
immediately appointed to serve in the horseguards who always attended on the
person of the sovereign[584].

Maximin,
for that was his name, though born on the territories of the empire, descended
from a mixed race of barbarians. His father was a Goth, and his mother of the
nation of the Alani. He displayed on every occasion a valor equal to his
strength; and his native fierceness was soon tempered or disguised by the
knowledge of the world. Under the reign of Severus and his son, he obtained the
rank of centurion, with the favor and esteem of both those princes, the former
of whom was an excellent judge of merit. Gratitude forbade Maximin to serve
under the assassin of Caracalla. Honor taught him to decline the effeminate
insults of Elagabalus. On the accession of Alexander he returned to court, and
was placed by that prince in a station useful to the service, and honorable to
himself. The fourth legion, to which he was appointed tribune, soon became,
under his care, the best disciplined of the whole army. With the general
applause of the soldiers, who bestowed on their favorite hero the names of Ajax
and Hercules, he was successively promoted to the first military command[585];
and had not he still retained too much of his savage origin, the emperor might
perhaps have given his own sister in marriage to the son of Maximin[586].

Instead of
securing his fidelity, these favors served only to inflame the ambition of the
Thracian peasant, who deemed his fortune inadequate to his merit, as long as he
was constrained to acknowledge a superior. Though a stranger to real wisdom, he
was not devoid of a selfish cunning, which showed him that the emperor had lost
the affection of the army, and taught him to improve their discontent to his own
advantage. It is easy for faction and calumny to shed their poison on the
administration of the best of princes, and to accuse even their virtues by
artfully confounding them with those vices to which they bear the nearest
affinity. The troops listened with pleasure to the emissaries of Maximin. They
blushed at their own ignominious patience, which, during thirteen years, had
supported the vexatious discipline imposed by an effeminate Syrian, the timid
slave of his mother and of the senate. It was time, they cried, to cast away
that useless phantom of the civil power, and to elect for their prince and
general a real soldier, educated in camps, exercised in war, who would assert
the glory, and distribute among his companions the treasures, of the empire. A
great army was at that time assembled on the banks of the Rhine, under the
command of the emperor himself, who, almost immediately after his return from
the Persian war, had been obliged to march against the barbarians of Germany.
The important care of training and reviewing the new levies was intrusted to
Maximin. One day, as he entered the field of exercise, the troops either from a
sudden impulse, or a formed conspiracy, saluted him emperor, silenced by their
loud acclamations his obstinate refusal, and hastened to consummate their
rebellion by the murder of Alexander Severus.

The
circumstances of his death are variously related. The writers, who suppose that
he died in ignorance of the ingratitude and ambition of Maximin, affirm, that,
after taking a frugal repast in the sight of the army, he retired to sleep, and
that, about the seventh hour of the day, a part of his own guards broke into the
imperial tent, and, with many wounds, assassinated their virtuous and
unsuspecting prince[587].
If we credit another, and indeed a more probable account, Maximin was invested
with the purple by a numerous detachment, at the distance of several miles from
the head-quarters; and he trusted for success rather to the secret wishes than
to the public declarations of the great army. Alexander had sufficient time to
awaken a faint sense of loyalty among the troops; but their reluctant
professions of fidelity quickly vanished on the appearance of Maximin, who
declared himself the friend and advocate of the military order, and was
unanimously acknowledged emperor of the Romans by the applauding legions. The
son of Mamaea, betrayed and deserted, withdrew into his tent, desirous at least
to conceal his approaching fate from the insults of the multitude. He was soon
followed by a tribune and some centurions, the ministers of death; but instead
of receiving with manly resolution the inevitable stroke, his unavailing cries
and entreaties disgraced the last moments of his life, and converted into
contempt some portion of the just pity which his innocence and misfortunes must
inspire. His mother, Mamaea, whose pride and avarice he loudly accused as the
cause of his ruin, perished with her son. The most faithful of his friends were
sacrificed to the first fury of the soldiers. Others were reserved for the more
deliberate cruelty of the usurper; and those who experienced the mildest
treatment, were stripped of their employments, and ignominiously driven from the
court and army[588].

The former
tyrants, Caligula and Nero, Commodus, and Caracalla, were all dissolute and
unexperienced youths[589],
educated in the purple, and corrupted by the pride of empire, the luxury of
Rome, and the perfidious voice of flattery. The cruelty of Maximin was derived
from a different source, the fear of contempt. Though he depended on the
attachment of the soldiers, who loved him for virtues like their own, he was
conscious that his mean and barbarian origin, his savage appearance, and his
total ignorance of the arts and institutions of civil life[590],
formed a very unfavorable contrast with the amiable manners of the unhappy
Alexander. He remembered, that, in his humbler fortune, he had often waited
before the door of the haughty nobles of Rome, and had been denied admittance by
the insolence of their slaves. He recollected too the friendship of a few who
had relieved his poverty, and assisted his rising hopes. But those who had
spurned, and those who had protected, the Thracian, were guilty of the same
crime, the knowledge of his original obscurity. For this crime many were put to
death; and by the execution of several of his benefactors, Maximin published, in
characters of blood, the indelible history of his baseness and ingratitude[591].

The dark
and sanguinary soul of the tyrant was open to every suspicion against those
among his subjects who were the most distinguished by their birth or merit.
Whenever he was alarmed with the sound of treason, his cruelty was unbounded and
unrelenting. A conspiracy against his life was either discovered or imagined,
and Magnus, a consular senator, was named as the principal author of it. Without
a witness, without a trial, and without an opportunity of defence, Magnus, with
four thousand of his supposed accomplices, was put to death. Italy and the whole
empire were infested with innumerable spies and informers. On the slightest
accusation, the first of the Roman nobles, who had governed provinces, commanded
armies, and been adorned with the consular and triumphal ornaments, were chained
on the public carriages, and hurried away to the emperor's presence.
Confiscation, exile, or simple death, were esteemed uncommon instances of his
lenity. Some of the unfortunate sufferers he ordered to be sewed up in the hides
of slaughtered animals, others to be exposed to wild beasts, others again to be
beaten to death with clubs. During the three years of his reign, he disdained to
visit either Rome or Italy. His camp, occasionally removed from the banks of the
Rhine to those of the Danube, was the seat of his stern despotism, which
trampled on every principle of law and justice, and was supported by the avowed
power of the sword[592].
No man of noble birth, elegant accomplishments, or knowledge of civil business,
was suffered near his person; and the court of a Roman emperor revived the idea
of those ancient chiefs of slaves and gladiators, whose savage power had left a
deep impression of terror and detestation[593].

As long as
the cruelty of Maximin was confined to the illustrious senators, or even to the
bold adventurers, who in the court or army expose themselves to the caprice of
fortune, the body of the people viewed their sufferings with indifference, or
perhaps with pleasure. But the tyrant's avarice, stimulated by the insatiate
desires of the soldiers, at length attacked the public property. Every city of
the empire was possessed of an independent revenue, destined to purchase corn
for the multitude, and to supply the expenses of the games and entertainments.
By a single act of authority, the whole mass of wealth was at once confiscated
for the use of the Imperial treasury. The temples were stripped of their most
valuable offerings of gold and silver, and the statues of gods, heroes, and
emperors, were melted down and coined into money. These impious orders could not
be executed without tumults and massacres, as in many places the people chose
rather to die in the defence of their altars, than to behold in the midst of
peace their cities exposed to the rapine and cruelty of war. The soldiers
themselves, among whom this sacrilegious plunder was distributed, received it
with a blush; and hardened as they were in acts of violence, they dreaded the
just reproaches of their friends and relations. Throughout the Roman world a
general cry of indignation was heard, imploring vengeance on the common enemy of
human kind; and at length, by an act of private oppression, a peaceful and
unarmed province was driven into rebellion against him[594].

The
procurator of Africa was a servant worthy of such a master, who considered the
fines and confiscations of the rich as one of the most fruitful branches of the
Imperial revenue. An iniquitous sentence had been pronounced against some
opulent youths of that country, the execution of which would have stripped them
of far the greater part of their patrimony. In this extremity, a resolution that
must either complete or prevent their ruin, was dictated by despair. A respite
of three days, obtained with difficulty from the rapacious treasurer, was
employed in collecting from their estates a great number of slaves and peasants
blindly devoted to the commands of their lords, and armed with the rustic
weapons of clubs and axes. The leaders of the conspiracy, as they were admitted
to the audience of the procurator, stabbed him with the daggers concealed under
their garments, and, by the assistance of their tumultuary train, seized on the
little town of Thysdrus[595],
and erected the standard of rebellion against the sovereign of the Roman empire.
They rested their hopes on the hatred of mankind against Maximin, and they
judiciously resolved to oppose to that detested tyrant an emperor whose mild
virtues had already acquired the love and esteem of the Romans, and whose
authority over the province would give weight and stability to the enterprise.
Gordianus, their proconsul, and the object of their choice, refused, with
unfeigned reluctance, the dangerous honor, and begged with tears, that they
would suffer him to terminate in peace a long and innocent life, without
staining his feeble age with civil blood. Their menaces compelled him to accept
the Imperial purple, his only refuge, indeed, against the jealous cruelty of
Maximin; since, according to the reasoning of tyrants, those who have been
esteemed worthy of the throne deserve death, and those who deliberate have
already rebelled[596].

The family
of Gordianus was one of the most illustrious of the Roman senate. On the
father's side he was descended from the Gracchi; on his mother's, from the
emperor Trajan. A great estate enabled him to support the dignity of his birth,
and in the enjoyment of it, he displayed an elegant taste and beneficent
disposition. The palace in Rome, formerly inhabited by the great Pompey, had
been, during several generations, in the possession of Gordian's family[597].
It was distinguished by ancient trophies of naval victories, and decorated with
the works of modern painting. His villa on the road to Praeneste was celebrated
for baths of singular beauty and extent, for three stately rooms of a hundred
feet in length, and for a magnificent portico, supported by two hundred columns
of the four most curious and costly sorts of marble[598].
The public shows exhibited at his expense, and in which the people were
entertained with many hundreds of wild beasts and gladiators[599],
seem to surpass the fortune of a subject; and whilst the liberality of other
magistrates was confined to a few solemn festivals at Rome, the magnificence of
Gordian was repeated, when he was aedile, every month in the year, and extended,
during his consulship, to the principal cities of Italy. He was twice elevated
to the last-mentioned dignity, by Caracalla and by Alexander; for he possessed
the uncommon talent of acquiring the esteem of virtuous princes, without
alarming the jealousy of tyrants. His long life was innocently spent in the
study of letters and the peaceful honors of Rome; and, till he was named
proconsul of Africa by the voice of the senate and the approbation of
Alexander[600],
he appears prudently to have declined the command of armies and the government
of provinces[601].
As long as that emperor lived, Africa was happy under the administration of his
worthy representative: after the barbarous Maximin had usurped the throne,
Gordianus alleviated the miseries which he was unable to prevent. When he
reluctantly accepted the purple, he was above fourscore years old; a last and
valuable remains of the happy age of the Antonines, whose virtues he revived in
his own conduct, and celebrated in an elegant poem of thirty books. With the
venerable proconsul, his son, who had accompanied him into Africa as his
lieutenant, was likewise declared emperor. His manners were less pure, but his
character was equally amiable with that of his father. Twenty-two acknowledged
concubines, and a library of sixty-two thousand volumes, attested the variety of
his inclinations; and from the productions which he left behind him, it appears
that the former as well as the latter were designed for use rather than for
ostentation[602].
The Roman people acknowledged in the features of the younger Gordian the
resemblance of Scipio Africanus[603],
recollected with pleasure that his mother was the granddaughter of Antoninus
Pius, and rested the public hope on those latent virtues which had hitherto, as
they fondly imagined, lain concealed in the luxurious indolence of private
life.

As soon as
the Gordians had appeased the first tumult of a popular election, they removed
their court to Carthage. They were received with the acclamations of the
Africans, who honored their virtues, and who, since the visit of Hadrian, had
never beheld the majesty of a Roman emperor. But these vain acclamations neither
strengthened nor confirmed the title of the Gordians. They were induced by
principle, as well as interest, to solicit the approbation of the senate; and a
deputation of the noblest provincials was sent, without delay, to Rome, to
relate and justify the conduct of their countrymen, who, having long suffered
with patience, were at length resolved to act with vigor. The letters of the new
princes were modest and respectful, excusing the necessity which had obliged
them to accept the Imperial title; but submitting their election and their fate
to the supreme judgment of the senate[604].

The
inclinations of the senate were neither doubtful nor divided. The birth and
noble alliances of the Gordians had intimately connected them with the most
illustrious houses of Rome. Their fortune had created many dependants in that
assembly, their merit had acquired many friends. Their mild administration
opened the flattering prospect of the restoration, not only of the civil but
even of the republican government. The terror of military violence, which had
first obliged the senate to forget the murder of Alexander, and to ratify the
election of a barbarian peasant[605],
now produced a contrary effect, and provoked them to assert the injured rights
of freedom and humanity. The hatred of Maximin towards the senate was declared
and implacable; the tamest submission had not appeased his fury, the most
cautious innocence would not remove his suspicions; and even the care of their
own safety urged them to share the fortune of an enterprise, of which (if
unsuccessful) they were sure to be the first victims. These considerations, and
perhaps others of a more private nature, were debated in a previous conference
of the consuls and the magistrates. As soon as their resolution was decided,
they convoked in the temple of Castor the whole body of the senate, according to
an ancient form of secrecy[606],[607],
calculated to awaken their attention, and to conceal their decrees. "Conscript
fathers," said the consul Syllanus, "the two Gordians, both of consular dignity,
the one your proconsul, the other your lieutenant, have been declared emperors
by the general consent of Africa. Let us return thanks," he boldly continued,
"to the youth of Thysdrus; let us return thanks to the faithful people of
Carthage, our generous deliverers from a horrid monster - Why do you hear me
thus coolly, thus timidly? Why do you cast those anxious looks on each other?
Why hesitate? Maximin is a public enemy! may his enmity soon expire with him,
and may we long enjoy the prudence and felicity of Gordian the father, the valor
and constancy of Gordian the son![608]"
The noble ardor of the consul revived the languid spirit of the senate. By a
unanimous decree, the election of the Gordians was ratified, Maximin, his son,
and his adherents, were pronounced enemies of their country, and liberal rewards
were offered to whomsoever had the courage and good fortune to destroy
them.

During the
emperor's absence, a detachment of the Praetorian guards remained at Rome, to
protect, or rather to command, the capital. The praefect Vitalianus had
signalized his fidelity to Maximin, by the alacrity with which he had obeyed,
and even prevented the cruel mandates of the tyrant. His death alone could
rescue the authority of the senate, and the lives of the senators from a state
of danger and suspense. Before their resolves had transpired, a quaestor and
some tribunes were commissioned to take his devoted life. They executed the
order with equal boldness and success; and, with their bloody daggers in their
hands, ran through the streets, proclaiming to the people and the soldiers the
news of the happy revolution. The enthusiasm of liberty was seconded by the
promise of a large donative, in lands and money; the statues of Maximin were
thrown down; the capital of the empire acknowledged, with transport, the
authority of the two Gordians and the senate[609];
and the example of Rome was followed by the rest of Italy.

A new
spirit had arisen in that assembly, whose long patience had been insulted by
wanton despotism and military license. The senate assumed the reins of
government, and, with a calm intrepidity, prepared to vindicate by arms the
cause of freedom. Among the consular senators recommended by their merit and
services to the favor of the emperor Alexander, it was easy to select twenty,
not unequal to the command of an army, and the conduct of a war. To these was
the defence of Italy intrusted. Each was appointed to act in his respective
department, authorized to enroll and discipline the Italian youth; and
instructed to fortify the ports and highways, against the impending invasion of
Maximin. A number of deputies, chosen from the most illustrious of the
senatorian and equestrian orders, were despatched at the same time to the
governors of the several provinces, earnestly conjuring them to fly to the
assistance of their country, and to remind the nations of their ancient ties of
friendship with the Roman senate and people. The general respect with which
these deputies were received, and the zeal of Italy and the provinces in favor
of the senate, sufficiently prove that the subjects of Maximin were reduced to
that uncommon distress, in which the body of the people has more to fear from
oppression than from resistance. The consciousness of that melancholy truth,
inspires a degree of persevering fury, seldom to be found in those civil wars
which are artificially supported for the benefit of a few factious and designing
leaders[610].

For while
the cause of the Gordians was embraced with such diffusive ardor, the Gordians
themselves were no more. The feeble court of Carthage was alarmed by the rapid
approach of Capelianus, governor of Mauritania, who, with a small band of
veterans, and a fierce host of barbarians, attacked a faithful, but unwarlike
province. The younger Gordian sallied out to meet the enemy at the head of a few
guards, and a numerous undisciplined multitude, educated in the peaceful luxury
of Carthage. His useless valor served only to procure him an honorable death on
the field of battle. His aged father, whose reign had not exceeded thirty-six
days, put an end to his life on the first news of the defeat. Carthage,
destitute of defence, opened her gates to the conqueror, and Africa was exposed
to the rapacious cruelty of a slave, obliged to satisfy his unrelenting master
with a large account of blood and treasure[611].

The fate
of the Gordians filled Rome with just but unexpected terror. The senate,
convoked in the temple of Concord, affected to transact the common business of
the day; and seemed to decline, with trembling anxiety, the consideration of
their own and the public danger. A silent consternation prevailed in the
assembly, till a senator, of the name and family of Trajan, awakened his
brethren from their fatal lethargy. He represented to them that the choice of
cautious, dilatory measures had been long since out of their power; that
Maximin, implacable by nature, and exasperated by injuries, was advancing
towards Italy, at the head of the military force of the empire; and that their
only remaining alternative was either to meet him bravely in the field, or
tamely to expect the tortures and ignominious death reserved for unsuccessful
rebellion. "We have lost," continued he, "two excellent princes; but unless we
desert ourselves, the hopes of the republic have not perished with the Gordians.
Many are the senators whose virtues have deserved, and whose abilities would
sustain, the Imperial dignity. Let us elect two emperors, one of whom may
conduct the war against the public enemy, whilst his colleague remains at Rome
to direct the civil administration. I cheerfully expose myself to the danger and
envy of the nomination, and give my vote in favor of Maximus and Balbinus.
Ratify my choice, conscript fathers, or appoint in their place, others more
worthy of the empire." The general apprehension silenced the whispers of
jealousy; the merit of the candidates was universally acknowledged; and the
house resounded with the sincere acclamations of "Long life and victory to the
emperors Maximus and Balbinus. You are happy in the judgment of the senate; may
the republic be happy under your administration![612]"

Chapter VII
Tyranny of
Maximin, Rebellion, Civil Wars, Death of Maximin
Part
II

The
virtues and the reputation of the new emperors justified the most sanguine hopes
of the Romans. The various nature of their talents seemed to appropriate to each
his peculiar department of peace and war, without leaving room for jealous
emulation. Balbinus was an admired orator, a poet of distinguished fame, and a
wise magistrate, who had exercised with innocence and applause the civil
jurisdiction in almost all the interior provinces of the empire. His birth was
noble[613],
his fortune affluent, his manners liberal and affable. In him the love of
pleasure was corrected by a sense of dignity, nor had the habits of ease
deprived him of a capacity for business. The mind of Maximus was formed in a
rougher mould. By his valor and abilities he had raised himself from the meanest
origin to the first employments of the state and army. His victories over the
Sarmatians and the Germans, the austerity of his life, and the rigid
impartiality of his justice, while he was a Praefect of the city, commanded the
esteem of a people whose affections were engaged in favor of the more amiable
Balbinus. The two colleagues had both been consuls, (Balbinus had twice enjoyed
that honorable office,) both had been named among the twenty lieutenants of the
senate; and since the one was sixty and the other seventy-four years old[614],
they had both attained the full maturity of age and experience.

After the
senate had conferred on Maximus and Balbinus an equal portion of the consular
and tribunitian powers, the title of Fathers of their country, and the joint
office of Supreme Pontiff, they ascended to the Capitol to return thanks to the
gods, protectors of Rome[615].
The solemn rites of sacrifice were disturbed by a sedition of the people. The
licentious multitude neither loved the rigid Maximus, nor did they sufficiently
fear the mild and humane Balbinus. Their increasing numbers surrounded the
temple of Jupiter; with obstinate clamors they asserted their inherent right of
consenting to the election of their sovereign; and demanded, with an apparent
moderation, that, besides the two emperors, chosen by the senate, a third should
be added of the family of the Gordians, as a just return of gratitude to those
princes who had sacrificed their lives for the republic. At the head of the
city-guards, and the youth of the equestrian order, Maximus and Balbinus
attempted to cut their way through the seditious multitude. The multitude, armed
with sticks and stones, drove them back into the Capitol. It is prudent to yield
when the contest, whatever may be the issue of it, must be fatal to both
parties. A boy, only thirteen years of age, the grandson of the elder, and
nephew[616]
of the younger Gordian, was produced to the people, invested with the ornaments
and title of Caesar. The tumult was appeased by this easy condescension; and the
two emperors, as soon as they had been peaceably acknowledged in Rome, prepared
to defend Italy against the common enemy.

Whilst in
Rome and Africa, revolutions succeeded each other with such amazing rapidity,
that the mind of Maximin was agitated by the most furious passions. He is said
to have received the news of the rebellion of the Gordians, and of the decree of
the senate against him, not with the temper of a man, but the rage of a wild
beast; which, as it could not discharge itself on the distant senate, threatened
the life of his son, of his friends, and of all who ventured to approach his
person. The grateful intelligence of the death of the Gordians was quickly
followed by the assurance that the senate, laying aside all hopes of pardon or
accommodation, had substituted in their room two emperors, with whose merit he
could not be unacquainted. Revenge was the only consolation left to Maximin, and
revenge could only be obtained by arms. The strength of the legions had been
assembled by Alexander from all parts of the empire. Three successful campaigns
against the Germans and the Sarmatians, had raised their fame, confirmed their
discipline, and even increased their numbers, by filling the ranks with the
flower of the barbarian youth. The life of Maximin had been spent in war, and
the candid severity of history cannot refuse him the valor of a soldier, or even
the abilities of an experienced general[617].
It might naturally be expected, that a prince of such a character, instead of
suffering the rebellion to gain stability by delay, should immediately have
marched from the banks of the Danube to those of the Tyber, and that his
victorious army, instigated by contempt for the senate, and eager to gather the
spoils of Italy, should have burned with impatience to finish the easy and
lucrative conquest. Yet as far as we can trust to the obscure chronology of that
period[618],
it appears that the operations of some foreign war deferred the Italian
expedition till the ensuing spring. From the prudent conduct of Maximin, we may
learn that the savage features of his character have been exaggerated by the
pencil of party, that his passions, however impetuous, submitted to the force of
reason, and that the barbarian possessed something of the generous spirit of
Sylla, who subdued the enemies of Rome before he suffered himself to revenge his
private injuries[619].

When the
troops of Maximin, advancing in excellent order, arrived at the foot of the
Julian Alps, they were terrified by the silence and desolation that reigned on
the frontiers of Italy. The villages and open towns had been abandoned on their
approach by the inhabitants, the cattle was driven away, the provisions removed
or destroyed, the bridges broken down, nor was any thing left which could afford
either shelter or subsistence to an invader. Such had been the wise orders of
the generals of the senate: whose design was to protract the war, to ruin the
army of Maximin by the slow operation of famine, and to consume his strength in
the sieges of the principal cities of Italy, which they had plentifully stored
with men and provisions from the deserted country. Aquileia received and
withstood the first shock of the invasion. The streams that issue from the head
of the Hadriatic Gulf, swelled by the melting of the winter snows[620],
opposed an unexpected obstacle to the arms of Maximin. At length, on a singular
bridge, constructed with art and difficulty, of large hogsheads, he transported
his army to the opposite bank, rooted up the beautiful vineyards in the
neighborhood of Aquileia, demolished the suburbs, and employed the timber of the
buildings in the engines and towers, with which on every side he attacked the
city. The walls, fallen to decay during the security of a long peace, had been
hastily repaired on this sudden emergency: but the firmest defence of Aquileia
consisted in the constancy of the citizens; all ranks of whom, instead of being
dismayed, were animated by the extreme danger, and their knowledge of the
tyrant's unrelenting temper. Their courage was supported and directed by
Crispinus and Menophilus, two of the twenty lieutenants of the senate, who, with
a small body of regular troops, had thrown themselves into the besieged place.
The army of Maximin was repulsed in repeated attacks, his machines destroyed by
showers of artificial fire; and the generous enthusiasm of the Aquileians was
exalted into a confidence of success, by the opinion that Belenus, their tutelar
deity, combated in person in the defence of his distressed worshippers[621].

The
emperor Maximus, who had advanced as far as Ravenna, to secure that important
place, and to hasten the military preparations, beheld the event of the war in
the more faithful mirror of reason and policy. He was too sensible, that a
single town could not resist the persevering efforts of a great army; and he
dreaded, lest the enemy, tired with the obstinate resistance of Aquileia, should
on a sudden relinquish the fruitless siege, and march directly towards Rome. The
fate of the empire and the cause of freedom must then be committed to the chance
of a battle; and what arms could he oppose to the veteran legions of the Rhine
and Danube? Some troops newly levied among the generous but enervated youth of
Italy; and a body of German auxiliaries, on whose firmness, in the hour of
trial, it was dangerous to depend. In the midst of these just alarms, the stroke
of domestic conspiracy punished the crimes of Maximin, and delivered Rome and
the senate from the calamities that would surely have attended the victory of an
enraged barbarian.

The people
of Aquileia had scarcely experienced any of the common miseries of a siege;
their magazines were plentifully supplied, and several fountains within the
walls assured them of an inexhaustible resource of fresh water. The soldiers of
Maximin were, on the contrary, exposed to the inclemency of the season, the
contagion of disease, and the horrors of famine. The open country was ruined,
the rivers filled with the slain, and polluted with blood. A spirit of despair
and disaffection began to diffuse itself among the troops; and as they were cut
off from all intelligence, they easily believed that the whole empire had
embraced the cause of the senate, and that they were left as devoted victims to
perish under the impregnable walls of Aquileia. The fierce temper of the tyrant
was exasperated by disappointments, which he imputed to the cowardice of his
army; and his wanton and ill-timed cruelty, instead of striking terror, inspired
hatred, and a just desire of revenge. A party of Praetorian guards, who trembled
for their wives and children in the camp of Alba, near Rome, executed the
sentence of the senate. Maximin, abandoned by his guards, was slain in his tent,
with his son, (whom he had associated to the honors of the purple,) Anulinus the
praefect, and the principal ministers of his tyranny[622].
The sight of their heads, borne on the point of spears, convinced the citizens
of Aquileia that the siege was at an end; the gates of the city were thrown
open, a liberal market was provided for the hungry troops of Maximin, and the
whole army joined in solemn protestations of fidelity to the senate and the
people of Rome, and to their lawful emperors Maximus and Balbinus. Such was the
deserved fate of a brutal savage, destitute, as he has generally been
represented, of every sentiment that distinguishes a civilized, or even a human
being. The body was suited to the soul. The stature of Maximin exceeded the
measure of eight feet, and circumstances almost incredible are related of his
matchless strength and appetite[623].
Had he lived in a less enlightened age, tradition and poetry might well have
described him as one of those monstrous giants, whose supernatural power was
constantly exerted for the destruction of mankind.

It is
easier to conceive than to describe the universal joy of the Roman world on the
fall of the tyrant, the news of which is said to have been carried in four days
from Aquileia to Rome. The return of Maximus was a triumphal procession; his
colleague and young Gordian went out to meet him, and the three princes made
their entry into the capital, attended by the ambassadors of almost all the
cities of Italy, saluted with the splendid offerings of gratitude and
superstition, and received with the unfeigned acclamations of the senate and
people, who persuaded themselves that a golden age would succeed to an age of
iron[624].
The conduct of the two emperors corresponded with these expectations. They
administered justice in person; and the rigor of the one was tempered by the
other's clemency. The oppressive taxes with which Maximin had loaded the rights
of inheritance and succession, were repealed, or at least moderated. Discipline
was revived, and with the advice of the senate many wise laws were enacted by
their imperial ministers, who endeavored to restore a civil constitution on the
ruins of military tyranny. "What reward may we expect for delivering Rome from a
monster?" was the question asked by Maximus, in a moment of freedom and
confidence. Balbinus answered it without hesitation - "The love of the senate,
of the people, and of all mankind." "Alas!" replied his more penetrating
colleague - "alas! I dread the hatred of the soldiers, and the fatal effects of
their resentment[625]."
His apprehensions were but too well justified by the
event.

Whilst
Maximus was preparing to defend Italy against the common foe, Balbinus, who
remained at Rome, had been engaged in scenes of blood and intestine discord.
Distrust and jealousy reigned in the senate; and even in the temples where they
assembled, every senator carried either open or concealed arms. In the midst of
their deliberations, two veterans of the guards, actuated either by curiosity or
a sinister motive, audaciously thrust themselves into the house, and advanced by
degrees beyond the altar of Victory. Gallicanus, a consular, and Maecenas, a
Praetorian senator, viewed with indignation their insolent intrusion: drawing
their daggers, they laid the spies (for such they deemed them) dead at the foot
of the altar, and then, advancing to the door of the senate, imprudently
exhorted the multitude to massacre the Praetorians, as the secret adherents of
the tyrant. Those who escaped the first fury of the tumult took refuge in the
camp, which they defended with superior advantage against the reiterated attacks
of the people, assisted by the numerous bands of gladiators, the property of
opulent nobles. The civil war lasted many days, with infinite loss and confusion
on both sides. When the pipes were broken that supplied the camp with water, the
Praetorians were reduced to intolerable distress; but in their turn they made
desperate sallies into the city, set fire to a great number of houses, and
filled the streets with the blood of the inhabitants. The emperor Balbinus
attempted, by ineffectual edicts and precarious truces, to reconcile the
factions at Rome. But their animosity, though smothered for a while, burnt with
redoubled violence. The soldiers, detesting the senate and the people, despised
the weakness of a prince, who wanted either the spirit or the power to command
the obedience of his subjects[626].

After the
tyrant's death, his formidable army had acknowledged, from necessity rather than
from choice, the authority of Maximus, who transported himself without delay to
the camp before Aquileia. As soon as he had received their oath of fidelity, he
addressed them in terms full of mildness and moderation; lamented, rather than
arraigned the wild disorders of the times, and assured the soldiers, that of all
their past conduct the senate would remember only their generous desertion of
the tyrant, and their voluntary return to their duty. Maximus enforced his
exhortations by a liberal donative, purified the camp by a solemn sacrifice of
expiation, and then dismissed the legions to their several provinces, impressed,
as he hoped, with a lively sense of gratitude and obedience[627].
But nothing could reconcile the haughty spirit of the Praetorians. They attended
the emperors on the memorable day of their public entry into Rome; but amidst
the general acclamations, the sullen, dejected countenance of the guards
sufficiently declared that they considered themselves as the object, rather than
the partners, of the triumph. When the whole body was united in their camp,
those who had served under Maximin, and those who had remained at Rome,
insensibly communicated to each other their complaints and apprehensions. The
emperors chosen by the army had perished with ignominy; those elected by the
senate were seated on the throne[628].
The long discord between the civil and military powers was decided by a war, in
which the former had obtained a complete victory. The soldiers must now learn a
new doctrine of submission to the senate; and whatever clemency was affected by
that politic assembly, they dreaded a slow revenge, colored by the name of
discipline, and justified by fair pretences of the public good. But their fate
was still in their own hands; and if they had courage to despise the vain
terrors of an impotent republic, it was easy to convince the world, that those
who were masters of the arms, were masters of the authority, of the
state.

When the
senate elected two princes, it is probable that, besides the declared reason of
providing for the various emergencies of peace and war, they were actuated by
the secret desire of weakening by division the despotism of the supreme
magistrate. Their policy was effectual, but it proved fatal both to their
emperors and to themselves. The jealousy of power was soon exasperated by the
difference of character. Maximus despised Balbinus as a luxurious noble, and was
in his turn disdained by his colleague as an obscure soldier. Their silent
discord was understood rather than seen[629];
but the mutual consciousness prevented them from uniting in any vigorous
measures of defence against their common enemies of the Praetorian camp. The
whole city was employed in the Capitoline games, and the emperors were left
almost alone in the palace. On a sudden, they were alarmed by the approach of a
troop of desperate assassins. Ignorant of each other's situation or designs,
(for they already occupied very distant apartments,) afraid to give or to
receive assistance, they wasted the important moments in idle debates and
fruitless recriminations. The arrival of the guards put an end to the vain
strife. They seized on these emperors of the senate, for such they called them
with malicious contempt, stripped them of their garments, and dragged them in
insolent triumph through the streets of Rome, with the design of inflicting a
slow and cruel death on these unfortunate princes. The fear of a rescue from the
faithful Germans of the Imperial guards, shortened their tortures; and their
bodies, mangled with a thousand wounds, were left exposed to the insults or to
the pity of the populace[630].

In the
space of a few months, six princes had been cut off by the sword. Gordian, who
had already received the title of Caesar, was the only person that occurred to
the soldiers as proper to fill the vacant throne[631].
They carried him to the camp, and unanimously saluted him Augustus and Emperor.
His name was dear to the senate and people; his tender age promised a long
impunity of military license; and the submission of Rome and the provinces to
the choice of the Praetorian guards, saved the republic, at the expense indeed
of its freedom and dignity, from the horrors of a new civil war in the heart of
the capital[632].

As the
third Gordian was only nineteen years of age at the time of his death, the
history of his life, were it known to us with greater accuracy than it really
is, would contain little more than the account of his education, and the conduct
of the ministers, who by turns abused or guided the simplicity of his
unexperienced youth. Immediately after his accession, he fell into the hands of
his mother's eunuchs, that pernicious vermin of the East, who, since the days of
Elagabalus, had infested the Roman palace. By the artful conspiracy of these
wretches, an impenetrable veil was drawn between an innocent prince and his
oppressed subjects, the virtuous disposition of Gordian was deceived, and the
honors of the empire sold without his knowledge, though in a very public manner,
to the most worthless of mankind. We are ignorant by what fortunate accident the
emperor escaped from this ignominious slavery, and devolved his confidence on a
minister, whose wise counsels had no object except the glory of his sovereign
and the happiness of the people. It should seem that love and learning
introduced Misitheus to the favor of Gordian. The young prince married the
daughter of his master of rhetoric, and promoted his father-in-law to the first
offices of the empire. Two admirable letters that passed between them are still
extant. The minister, with the conscious dignity of virtue, congratulates
Gordian that he is delivered from the tyranny of the eunuchs[633],
and still more that he is sensible of his deliverance. The emperor acknowledges,
with an amiable confusion, the errors of his past conduct; and laments, with
singular propriety, the misfortune of a monarch, from whom a venal tribe of
courtiers perpetually labor to conceal the truth[634].

The life
of Misitheus had been spent in the profession of letters, not of arms; yet such
was the versatile genius of that great man, that, when he was appointed
Praetorian Praefect, he discharged the military duties of his place with vigor
and ability. The Persians had invaded Mesopotamia, and threatened Antioch. By
the persuasion of his father-in-law, the young emperor quitted the luxury of
Rome, opened, for the last time recorded in history, the temple of Janus, and
marched in person into the East. On his approach, with a great army, the
Persians withdrew their garrisons from the cities which they had already taken,
and retired from the Euphrates to the Tigris. Gordian enjoyed the pleasure of
announcing to the senate the first success of his arms, which he ascribed, with
a becoming modesty and gratitude, to the wisdom of his father and Praefect.
During the whole expedition, Misitheus watched over the safety and discipline of
the army; whilst he prevented their dangerous murmurs by maintaining a regular
plenty in the camp, and by establishing ample magazines of vinegar, bacon,
straw, barley, and wheat in all the cities of the frontier[635].
But the prosperity of Gordian expired with Misitheus, who died of a flux, not
with out very strong suspicions of poison. Philip, his successor in the
praefecture, was an Arab by birth, and consequently, in the earlier part of his
life, a robber by profession. His rise from so obscure a station to the first
dignities of the empire, seems to prove that he was a bold and able leader. But
his boldness prompted him to aspire to the throne, and his abilities were
employed to supplant, not to serve, his indulgent master. The minds of the
soldiers were irritated by an artificial scarcity, created by his contrivance in
the camp; and the distress of the army was attributed to the youth and
incapacity of the prince. It is not in our power to trace the successive steps
of the secret conspiracy and open sedition, which were at length fatal to
Gordian. A sepulchral monument was erected to his memory on the spot[636]
where he was killed, near the conflux of the Euphrates with the little river
Aboras[637].
The fortunate Philip, raised to the empire by the votes of the soldiers, found a
ready obedience from the senate and the provinces[638].

We cannot
forbear transcribing the ingenious, though somewhat fanciful description, which
a celebrated writer of our own times has traced of the military government of
the Roman empire. "What in that age was called the Roman empire, was only an
irregular republic, not unlike the aristocracy[639]
of Algiers[640],
where the militia, possessed of the sovereignty, creates and deposes a
magistrate, who is styled a Dey. Perhaps, indeed, it may be laid down as a
general rule, that a military government is, in some respects, more republican
than monarchical. Nor can it be said that the soldiers only partook of the
government by their disobedience and rebellions. The speeches made to them by
the emperors, were they not at length of the same nature as those formerly
pronounced to the people by the consuls and the tribunes? And although the
armies had no regular place or forms of assembly; though their debates were
short, their action sudden, and their resolves seldom the result of cool
reflection, did they not dispose, with absolute sway, of the public fortune?
What was the emperor, except the minister of a violent government, elected for
the private benefit of the soldiers?

"When the
army had elected Philip, who was Praetorian praefect to the third Gordian, the
latter demanded that he might remain sole emperor; he was unable to obtain it.
He requested that the power might be equally divided between them; the army
would not listen to his speech. He consented to be degraded to the rank of
Caesar; the favor was refused him. He desired, at least, he might be appointed
Praetorian praefect; his prayer was rejected. Finally, he pleaded for his life.
The army, in these several judgments, exercised the supreme magistracy."
According to the historian, whose doubtful narrative the President De
Montesquieu has adopted, Philip, who, during the whole transaction, had
preserved a sullen silence, was inclined to spare the innocent life of his
benefactor; till, recollecting that his innocence might excite a dangerous
compassion in the Roman world, he commanded, without regard to his suppliant
cries, that he should be seized, stripped, and led away to instant death. After
a moment's pause, the inhuman sentence was executed[641].

Chapter VII
Tyranny of
Maximin, Rebellion, Civil Wars, Death of Maximin
Part
III

On his
return from the East to Rome, Philip, desirous of obliterating the memory of his
crimes, and of captivating the affections of the people, solemnized the secular
games with infinite pomp and magnificence. Since their institution or revival by
Augustus[642],
they had been celebrated by Claudius, by Domitian, and by Severus, and were now
renewed the fifth time, on the accomplishment of the full period of a thousand
years from the foundation of Rome. Every circumstance of the secular games was
skilfully adapted to inspire the superstitious mind with deep and solemn
reverence. The long interval between them[643]
exceeded the term of human life; and as none of the spectators had already seen
them, none could flatter themselves with the expectation of beholding them a
second time. The mystic sacrifices were performed, during three nights, on the
banks of the Tyber; and the Campus Martius resounded with music and dances, and
was illuminated with innumerable lamps and torches. Slaves and strangers were
excluded from any participation in these national ceremonies. A chorus of
twenty-seven youths, and as many virgins, of noble families, and whose parents
were both alive, implored the propitious gods in favor of the present, and for
the hope of the rising generation; requesting, in religious hymns, that
according to the faith of their ancient oracles, they would still maintain the
virtue, the felicity, and the empire of the Roman people[644].
The magnificence of Philip's shows and entertainments dazzled the eyes of the
multitude. The devout were employed in the rites of superstition, whilst the
reflecting few revolved in their anxious minds the past history and the future
fate of the empire.

Since
Romulus, with a small band of shepherds and outlaws, fortified himself on the
hills near the Tyber, ten centuries had already elapsed[645].
During the four first ages, the Romans, in the laborious school of poverty, had
acquired the virtues of war and government: by the vigorous exertion of those
virtues, and by the assistance of fortune, they had obtained, in the course of
the three succeeding centuries, an absolute empire over many countries of
Europe, Asia, and Africa. The last three hundred years had been consumed in
apparent prosperity and internal decline. The nation of soldiers, magistrates,
and legislators, who composed the thirty-five tribes of the Roman people, were
dissolved into the common mass of mankind, and confounded with the millions of
servile provincials, who had received the name, without adopting the spirit, of
Romans. A mercenary army, levied among the subjects and barbarians of the
frontier, was the only order of men who preserved and abused their independence.
By their tumultuary election, a Syrian, a Goth, or an Arab, was exalted to the
throne of Rome, and invested with despotic power over the conquests and over the
country of the Scipios.

The limits
of the Roman empire still extended from the Western Ocean to the Tigris, and
from Mount Atlas to the Rhine and the Danube. To the undiscerning eye of the
vulgar, Philip appeared a monarch no less powerful than Hadrian or Augustus had
formerly been. The form was still the same, but the animating health and vigor
were fled. The industry of the people was discouraged and exhausted by a long
series of oppression. The discipline of the legions, which alone, after the
extinction of every other virtue, had propped the greatness of the state, was
corrupted by the ambition, or relaxed by the weakness, of the emperors. The
strength of the frontiers, which had always consisted in arms rather than in
fortifications, was insensibly undermined; and the fairest provinces were left
exposed to the rapaciousness or ambition of the barbarians, who soon discovered
the decline of the Roman empire.

Chapter VIII
State of
Persia and Restoration of the Monarchy
Part
I

Of the State of Persia
After the Restoration of the Monarchy by Artaxerxes

Whenever
Tacitus indulges himself in those beautiful episodes, in which he relates some
domestic transaction of the Germans or of the Parthians, his principal object is
to relieve the attention of the reader from a uniform scene of vice and misery.
From the reign of Augustus to the time of Alexander Severus, the enemies of Rome
were in her bosom - the tyrants and the soldiers; and her prosperity had a very
distant and feeble interest in the revolutions that might happen beyond the
Rhine and the Euphrates. But when the military order had levelled, in wild
anarchy, the power of the prince, the laws of the senate, and even the
discipline of the camp, the barbarians of the North and of the East, who had
long hovered on the frontier, boldly attacked the provinces of a declining
monarchy. Their vexatious inroads were changed into formidable irruptions, and,
after a long vicissitude of mutual calamities, many tribes of the victorious
invaders established themselves in the provinces of the Roman Empire. To obtain
a clearer knowledge of these great events, we shall endeavor to form a previous
idea of the character, forces, and designs of those nations who avenged the
cause of Hannibal and Mithridates.

In the
more early ages of the world, whilst the forest that covered Europe afforded a
retreat to a few wandering savages, the inhabitants of Asia were already
collected into populous cities, and reduced under extensive empires, the seat of
the arts, of luxury, and of despotism. The Assyrians reigned over the East[646],
till the sceptre of Ninus and Semiramis dropped from the hands of their
enervated successors. The Medes and the Babylonians divided their power, and
were themselves swallowed up in the monarchy of the Persians, whose arms could
not be confined within the narrow limits of Asia. Followed, as it is said, by
two millions of men, Xerxes, the descendant of Cyrus, invaded Greece. Thirty
thousand soldiers, under the command of Alexander, the son of Philip, who was
intrusted by the Greeks with their glory and revenge, were sufficient to subdue
Persia. The princes of the house of Seleucus usurped and lost the Macedonian
command over the East. About the same time, that, by an ignominious treaty, they
resigned to the Romans the country on this side Mount Tarus, they were driven by
the Parthians[647],
an obscure horde of Scythian origin, from all the provinces of Upper Asia. The
formidable power of the Parthians, which spread from India to the frontiers of
Syria, was in its turn subverted by Ardshir, or Artaxerxes; the founder of a new
dynasty, which, under the name of Sassanides, governed Persia till the invasion
of the Arabs. This great revolution, whose fatal influence was soon experienced
by the Romans, happened in the fourth year of Alexander Severus, two hundred and
twenty-six years after the Christian era[648],[649].

Artaxerxes
had served with great reputation in the armies of Artaban, the last king of the
Parthians, and it appears that he was driven into exile and rebellion by royal
ingratitude, the customary reward for superior merit. His birth was obscure, and
the obscurity equally gave room to the aspersions of his enemies, and the
flattery of his adherents. If we credit the scandal of the former, Artaxerxes
sprang from the illegitimate commerce of a tanner's wife with a common soldier[650].
The latter represent him as descended from a branch of the ancient kings of
Persian, though time and misfortune had gradually reduced his ancestors to the
humble station of private citizens[651].
As the lineal heir of the monarchy, he asserted his right to the throne, and
challenged the noble task of delivering the Persians from the oppression under
which they groaned above five centuries since the death of Darius. The Parthians
were defeated in three great battles[652].
In the last of these their king Artaban was slain, and the spirit of the nation
was forever broken[653].
The authority of Artaxerxes was solemnly acknowledged in a great assembly held
at Balch in Khorasan[654].
Two younger branches of the royal house of Arsaces were confounded among the
prostrate satraps. A third, more mindful of ancient grandeur than of present
necessity, attempted to retire, with a numerous train of vessels, towards their
kinsman, the king of Armenia; but this little army of deserters was intercepted,
and cut off, by the vigilance of the conqueror[655],
who boldly assumed the double diadem, and the title of King of Kings, which had
been enjoyed by his predecessor. But these pompous titles, instead of gratifying
the vanity of the Persian, served only to admonish him of his duty, and to
inflame in his soul and should the ambition of restoring in their full splendor,
the religion and empire of Cyrus.

I.
During the long servitude of Persia
under the Macedonian and the Parthian yoke, the nations of Europe and Asia had
mutually adopted and corrupted each other's superstitions. The Arsacides,
indeed, practised the worship of the Magi; but they disgraced and polluted it
with a various mixture of foreign idolatry[656].
The memory of Zoroaster, the ancient prophet and philosopher of the Persians[657],
was still revered in the East; but the obsolete and mysterious language, in
which the Zendavesta was composed[658],
opened a field of dispute to seventy sects, who variously explained the
fundamental doctrines of their religion, and were all indifferently divided by a
crowd of infidels, who rejected the divine mission and miracles of the prophet.
To suppress the idolaters, reunite the schismatics, and confute the unbelievers,
by the infallible decision of a general council, the pious Artaxerxes summoned
the Magi from all parts of his dominions. These priests, who had so long sighed
in contempt and obscurity obeyed the welcome summons; and, on the appointed day,
appeared, to the number of about eighty thousand. But as the debates of so
tumultuous an assembly could not have been directed by the authority of reason,
or influenced by the art of policy, the Persian synod was reduced, by successive
operations, to forty thousand, to four thousand, to four hundred, to forty, and
at last to seven Magi, the most respected for their learning and piety. One of
these, Erdaviraph, a young but holy prelate, received from the hands of his
brethren three cups of soporiferous wine. He drank them off, and instantly fell
into a long and profound sleep. As soon as he waked, he related to the king and
to the believing multitude, his journey to heaven, and his intimate conferences
with the Deity. Every doubt was silenced by this supernatural evidence; and the
articles of the faith of Zoroaster were fixed with equal authority and
precision[659].
A short delineation of that celebrated system will be found useful, not only to
display the character of the Persian nation, but to illustrate many of their
most important transactions, both in peace and war, with the Roman empire[660].

The great and fundamental article
of the system, was the celebrated doctrine of the two principles; a bold and
injudicious attempt of Eastern philosophy to reconcile the existence of moral
and physical evil with the attributes of a beneficent Creator and Governor of
the world. The first and original Being, in whom, or by whom, the universe
exists, is denominated in the writings of Zoroaster, Time without bounds[661];
but it must be confessed, that this infinite substance seems rather a
metaphysical, abstraction of the mind, than a real object endowed with
self-consciousness, or possessed of moral perfections. From either the blind or
the intelligent operation of this infinite Time, which bears but too near an
affinity with the chaos of the Greeks, the two secondary but active principles
of the universe, were from all eternity produced, Ormusd and Ahriman, each of
them possessed of the powers of creation, but each disposed, by his invariable
nature, to exercise them with different designs[662].
The principle of good is eternally absorbed in light; the principle of evil
eternally buried in darkness. The wise benevolence of Ormusd formed man capable
of virtue, and abundantly provided his fair habitation with the materials of
happiness. By his vigilant providence, the motion of the planets, the order of
the seasons, and the temperate mixture of the elements, are preserved. But the
malice of Ahriman has long since pierced Ormusd's egg; or, in other words, has
violated the harmony of his works. Since that fatal eruption, the most minute
articles of good and evil are intimately intermingled and agitated together; the
rankest poisons spring up amidst the most salutary plants; deluges, earthquakes,
and conflagrations attest the conflict of Nature, and the little world of man is
perpetually shaken by vice and misfortune. Whilst the rest of human kind are led
away captives in the chains of their infernal enemy, the faithful Persian alone
reserves his religious adoration for his friend and protector Ormusd, and fights
under his banner of light, in the full confidence that he shall, in the last
day, share the glory of his triumph. At that decisive period, the enlightened
wisdom of goodness will render the power of Ormusd superior to the furious
malice of his rival. Ahriman and his followers, disarmed and subdued, will sink
into their native darkness; and virtue will maintain the eternal peace and
harmony of the universe[663],[664].

Chapter VIII
State of
Persia and Restoration of the Monarchy
Part
II

The
theology of Zoroaster was darkly comprehended by foreigners, and even by the far
greater number of his disciples; but the most careless observers were struck
with the philosophic simplicity of the Persian worship. “That people," said
Herodotus[665],
"rejects the use of temples, of altars, and of statues, and smiles at the folly
of those nations who imagine that the gods are sprung from, or bear any affinity
with, the human nature. The tops of the highest mountains are the places chosen
for sacrifices. Hymns and prayers are the principal worship; the Supreme God,
who fills the wide circle of heaven, is the object to whom they are addressed."
Yet, at the same time, in the true spirit of a polytheist, he accuseth them of
adoring Earth, Water, Fire, the Winds, and the Sun and Moon. But the Persians of
every age have denied the charge, and explained the equivocal conduct, which
might appear to give a color to it. The elements, and more particularly Fire,
Light, and the Sun, whom they called Mithra[666],
were the objects of their religious reverence, because they considered them as
the purest symbols, the noblest productions, and the most powerful agents of the
Divine Power and Nature[667].

Every mode
of religion, to make a deep and lasting impression on the human mind, must
exercise our obedience, by enjoining practices of devotion, for which we can
assign no reason; and must acquire our esteem, by inculcating moral duties
analogous to the dictates of our own hearts. The religion of Zoroaster was
abundantly provided with the former and possessed a sufficient portion of the
latter. At the age of puberty, the faithful Persian was invested with a
mysterious girdle, the badge of the divine protection; and from that moment all
the actions of his life, even the most indifferent, or the most necessary, were
sanctified by their peculiar prayers, ejaculations, or genuflections; the
omission of which, under any circumstances, was a grievous sin, not inferior in
guilt to the violation of the moral duties. The moral duties, however, of
justice, mercy, liberality, &c., were in their turn required of the disciple
of Zoroaster, who wished to escape the persecution of Ahriman, and to live with
Ormusd in a blissful eternity, where the degree of felicity will be exactly
proportioned to the degree of virtue and piety[668].

But there
are some remarkable instances in which Zoroaster lays aside the prophet, assumes
the legislator, and discovers a liberal concern for private and public
happiness, seldom to be found among the grovelling or visionary schemes of
superstition. Fasting and celibacy, the common means of purchasing the divine
favor, he condemns with abhorrence, as a criminal rejection of the best gifts of
Providence. The saint, in the Magian religion, is obliged to beget children, to
plant useful trees, to destroy noxious animals, to convey water to the dry lands
of Persia, and to work out his salvation by pursuing all the labors of
agriculture[669].
We may quote from the Zendavesta a wise and benevolent maxim, which compensates
for many an absurdity. "He who sows the ground with care and diligence acquires
a greater stock of religious merit than he could gain by the repetition of ten
thousand prayers[670]."
In the spring of every year a festival was celebrated, destined to represent the
primitive equality, and the present connection, of mankind. The stately kings of
Persia, exchanging their vain pomp for more genuine greatness, freely mingled
with the humblest but most useful of their subjects. On that day the husbandmen
were admitted, without distinction, to the table of the king and his satraps.
The monarch accepted their petitions, inquired into their grievances, and
conversed with them on the most equal terms. "From your labors," was he
accustomed to say, (and to say with truth, if not with sincerity,) "from your
labors we receive our subsistence; you derive your tranquillity from our
vigilance: since, therefore, we are mutually necessary to each other, let us
live together like brothers in concord and love[671]."
Such a festival must indeed have degenerated, in a wealthy and despotic empire,
into a theatrical representation; but it was at least a comedy well worthy of a
royal audience, and which might sometimes imprint a salutary lesson on the mind
of a young prince.

Had
Zoroaster, in all his institutions, invariably supported this exalted character,
his name would deserve a place with those of Numa and Confucius, and his system
would be justly entitled to all the applause, which it has pleased some of our
divines, and even some of our philosophers, to bestow on it. But in that motley
composition, dictated by reason and passion, by enthusiasm and by selfish
motives, some useful and sublime truths were disgraced by a mixture of the most
abject and dangerous superstition. The Magi, or sacerdotal order, were extremely
numerous, since, as we have already seen, fourscore thousand of them were
convened in a general council. Their forces were multiplied by discipline. A
regular hierarchy was diffused through all the provinces of Persia; and the
Archimagus, who resided at Balch, was respected as the visible head of the
church, and the lawful successor of Zoroaster[672].
The property of the Magi was very considerable. Besides the less invidious
possession of a large tract of the most fertile lands of Media[673],
they levied a general tax on the fortunes and the industry of the Persians[674].
“Though your good works," says the interested prophet, "exceed in number the
leaves of the trees, the drops of rain, the stars in the heaven, or the sands on
the sea-shore, they will all be unprofitable to you, unless they are accepted by
the destour, or priest. To obtain the acceptation of this guide to salvation,
you must faithfully pay him tithes of all you possess, of your goods, of your
lands, and of your money. If the destour be satisfied, your soul will escape
hell tortures; you will secure praise in this world and happiness in the next.
For the destours are the teachers of religion; they know all things, and they
deliver all men[675],[676]."

These
convenient maxims of reverence and implicit were doubtless imprinted with care
on the tender minds of youth; since the Magi were the masters of education in
Persia, and to their hands the children even of the royal family were
intrusted[677].
The Persian priests, who were of a speculative genius, preserved and
investigated the secrets of Oriental philosophy; and acquired, either by
superior knowledge, or superior art, the reputation of being well versed in some
occult sciences, which have derived their appellation from the Magi[678].
Those of more active dispositions mixed with the world in courts and cities; and
it is observed, that the administration of Artaxerxes was in a great measure
directed by the counsels of the sacerdotal order, whose dignity, either from
policy or devotion, that prince restored to its ancient splendor[679].

The first
counsel of the Magi was agreeable to the unsociable genius of their faith[680],
to the practice of ancient kings[681],
and even to the example of their legislator, who had a victim to a religious
war, excited by his own intolerant zeal[682].
By an edict of Artaxerxes, the exercise of every worship, except that of
Zoroaster, was severely prohibited. The temples of the Parthians, and the
statues of their deified monarchs, were thrown down with ignominy[683].
The sword of Aristotle (such was the name given by the Orientals to the
polytheism and philosophy of the Greeks) was easily broken[684];
the flames of persecution soon reached the more stubborn Jews and Christians[685];
nor did they spare the heretics of their own nation and religion. The majesty of
Ormusd, who was jealous of a rival, was seconded by the despotism of Artaxerxes,
who could not suffer a rebel; and the schismatics within his vast empire were
soon reduced to the inconsiderable number of eighty thousand[686],[687].
This spirit of persecution reflects dishonor on the religion of Zoroaster; but
as it was not productive of any civil commotion, it served to strengthen the new
monarchy, by uniting all the various inhabitants of Persia in the bands of
religious zeal[688].

II.
Artaxerxes, by his valor and
conduct, had wrested the sceptre of the East from the ancient royal family of
Parthia. There still remained the more difficult task of establishing,
throughout the vast extent of Persia, a uniform and vigorous administration. The
weak indulgence of the Arsacides had resigned to their sons and brothers the
principal provinces, and the greatest offices of the kingdom in the nature of
hereditary possessions. The vitaxoe, or eighteen most powerful satraps, were
permitted to assume the regal title; and the vain pride of the monarch was
delighted with a nominal dominion over so many vassal kings. Even tribes of
barbarians in their mountains, and the Greek cities of Upper Asia[689],
within their walls, scarcely acknowledged, or seldom obeyed any superior; and
the Parthian empire exhibited, under other names, a lively image of the feudal
system[690]
which has since prevailed in Europe. But the active victor, at the head of a
numerous and disciplined army, visited in person every province of Persia. The
defeat of the boldest rebels, and the reduction of the strongest
fortifications[691],
diffused the terror of his arms, and prepared the way for the peaceful reception
of his authority. An obstinate resistance was fatal to the chiefs; but their
followers were treated with lenity[692].
A cheerful submission was rewarded with honors and riches, but the prudent
Artaxerxes suffering no person except himself to assume the title of king,
abolished every intermediate power between the throne and the people. His
kingdom, nearly equal in extent to modern Persia, was, on every side, bounded by
the sea, or by great rivers; by the Euphrates, the Tigris, the Araxes, the Oxus,
and the Indus, by the Caspian Sea, and the Gulf of Persia[693].
That country was computed to contain, in the last century, five hundred and
fifty-four cities, sixty thousand villages, and about forty millions of souls[694].
If we compare the administration of the house of Sassan with that of the house
of Sefi, the political influence of the Magian with that of the Mahometan
religion, we shall probably infer, that the kingdom of Artaxerxes contained at
least as great a number of cities, villages, and inhabitants. But it must
likewise be confessed, that in every age the want of harbors on the sea- coast,
and the scarcity of fresh water in the inland provinces, have been very
unfavorable to the commerce and agriculture of the Persians; who, in the
calculation of their numbers, seem to have indulged one of the nearest, though
most common, artifices of national vanity.

As soon as the ambitious mind of
Artaxerxes had triumphed ever the resistance of his vassals, he began to
threaten the neighboring states, who, during the long slumber of his
predecessors, had insulted Persia with impunity. He obtained some easy victories
over the wild Scythians and the effeminate Indians; but the Romans were an
enemy, who, by their past injuries and present power, deserved the utmost
efforts of his arms. A forty years' tranquillity, the fruit of valor and
moderation, had succeeded the victories of Trajan. During the period that
elapsed from the accession of Marcus to the reign of Alexander, the Roman and
the Parthian empires were twice engaged in war; and although the whole strength
of the Arsacides contended with a part only of the forces of Rome, the event was
most commonly in favor of the latter. Macrinus, indeed, prompted by his
precarious situation and pusillanimous temper, purchased a peace at the expense
of near two millions of our money[695];
but the generals of Marcus, the emperor Severus, and his son, erected many
trophies in Armenia, Mesopotamia, and Assyria. Among their exploits, the
imperfect relation of which would have unseasonably interrupted the more
important series of domestic revolutions, we shall only mention the repeated
calamities of the two great cities of Seleucia and Ctesiphon.

Seleucia, on the western bank of
the Tigris, about forty-five miles to the north of ancient Babylon, was the
capital of the Macedonian conquests in Upper Asia[696].
Many ages after the fall of their empire, Seleucia retained the genuine
characters of a Grecian colony, arts, military virtue, and the love of freedom.
The independent republic was governed by a senate of three hundred nobles; the
people consisted of six hundred thousand citizens; the walls were strong, and as
long as concord prevailed among the several orders of the state, they viewed
with contempt the power of the Parthian: but the madness of faction was
sometimes provoked to implore the dangerous aid of the common enemy, who was
posted almost at the gates of the colony[697].
The Parthian monarchs, like the Mogul sovereigns of Hindostan, delighted in the
pastoral life of their Scythian ancestors; and the Imperial camp was frequently
pitched in the plain of Ctesiphon, on the eastern bank of the Tigris, at the
distance of only three miles from Seleucia[698].
The innumerable attendants on luxury and despotism resorted to the court, and
the little village of Ctesiphon insensibly swelled into a great city[699].
Under the reign of Marcus, the Roman generals penetrated as far as Ctesiphon and
Seleucia. They were received as friends by the Greek colony; they attacked as
enemies the seat of the Parthian kings; yet both cities experienced the same
treatment. The sack and conflagration of Seleucia, with the massacre of three
hundred thousand of the inhabitants, tarnished the glory of the Roman triumph[700].
Seleucia, already exhausted by the neighborhood of a too powerful rival, sunk
under the fatal blow; but Ctesiphon, in about thirty- three years, had
sufficiently recovered its strength to maintain an obstinate siege against the
emperor Severus. The city was, however, taken by assault; the king, who defended
it in person, escaped with precipitation; a hundred thousand captives, and a
rich booty, rewarded the fatigues of the Roman soldiers[701].
Notwithstanding these misfortunes, Ctesiphon succeeded to Babylon and to
Seleucia, as one of the great capitals of the East. In summer, the monarch of
Persia enjoyed at Ecbatana the cool breezes of the mountains of Media; but the
mildness of the climate engaged him to prefer Ctesiphon for his winter
residence.

From these successful inroads the
Romans derived no real or lasting benefit; nor did they attempt to preserve such
distant conquests, separated from the provinces of the empire by a large tract
of intermediate desert. The reduction of the kingdom of Osrhoene was an
acquisition of less splendor indeed, but of a far more solid advantage. That
little state occupied the northern and most fertile part of Mesopotamia, between
the Euphrates and the Tigris. Edessa, its capital, was situated about twenty
miles beyond the former of those rivers; and the inhabitants, since the time of
Alexander, were a mixed race of Greeks, Arabs, Syrians, and Armenians[702].
The feeble sovereigns of Osrhoene, placed on the dangerous verge of two
contending empires, were attached from inclination to the Parthian cause; but
the superior power of Rome exacted from them a reluctant homage, which is still
attested by their medals. After the conclusion of the Parthian war under Marcus,
it was judged prudent to secure some substantia, pledges of their doubtful
fidelity. Forts were constructed in several parts of the country, and a Roman
garrison was fixed in the strong town of Nisibis. During the troubles that
followed the death of Commodus, the princes of Osrhoene attempted to shake off
the yoke; but the stern policy of Severus confirmed their dependence[703],
and the perfidy of Caracalla completed the easy conquest. Abgarus, the last king
of Edessa, was sent in chains to Rome, his dominions reduced into a province,
and his capital dignified with the rank of colony; and thus the Romans, about
ten years before the fall of the Parthian monarchy, obtained a firm and
permanent establishment beyond the Euphrates[704].

Prudence as well as glory might
have justified a war on the side of Artaxerxes, had his views been confined to
the defence or acquisition of a useful frontier. but the ambitious Persian
openly avowed a far more extensive design of conquest; and he thought himself
able to support his lofty pretensions by the arms of reason as well as by those
of power. Cyrus, he alleged, had first subdued, and his successors had for a
long time possessed, the whole extent of Asia, as far as the Propontis and the
Aegean Sea; the provinces of Caria and Ionia, under their empire, had been
governed by Persian satraps, and all Egypt, to the confines of Aethiopia, had
acknowledged their sovereignty[705].
Their rights had been suspended, but not destroyed, by a long usurpation; and as
soon as he received the Persian diadem, which birth and successful valor had
placed upon his head, the first great duty of his station called upon him to
restore the ancient limits and splendor of the monarchy. The Great King,
therefore, (such was the haughty style of his embassies to the emperor
Alexander,) commanded the Romans instantly to depart from all the provinces of
his ancestors, and, yielding to the Persians the empire of Asia, to content
themselves with the undisturbed possession of Europe. This haughty mandate was
delivered by four hundred of the tallest and most beautiful of the Persians;
who, by their fine horses, splendid arms, and rich apparel, displayed the pride
and greatness of their master[706].
Such an embassy was much less an offer of negotiation than a declaration of war.
Both Alexander Severus and Artaxerxes, collecting the military force of the
Roman and Persian monarchies, resolved in this important contest to lead their
armies in person.

If we credit what should seem the
most authentic of all records, an oration, still extant, and delivered by the
emperor himself to the senate, we must allow that the victory of Alexander
Severus was not inferior to any of those formerly obtained over the Persians by
the son of Philip. The army of the Great King consisted of one hundred and
twenty thousand horse, clothed in complete armor of steel; of seven hundred
elephants, with towers filled with archers on their backs, and of eighteen
hundred chariots armed with scythes. This formidable host, the like of which is
not to be found in eastern history, and has scarcely been imagined in eastern
romance[707],
was discomfited in a great battle, in which the Roman Alexander proved himself
an intrepid soldier and a skilful general. The Great King fled before his valor;
an immense booty, and the conquest of Mesopotamia, were the immediate fruits of
this signal victory. Such are the circumstances of this ostentatious and
improbable relation, dictated, as it too plainly appears, by the vanity of the
monarch, adorned by the unblushing servility of his flatterers, and received
without contradiction by a distant and obsequious senate[708].
Far from being inclined to believe that the arms of Alexander obtained any
memorable advantage over the Persians, we are induced to suspect that all this
blaze of imaginary glory was designed to conceal some real
disgrace.

Our suspicious are confirmed by the
authority of a contemporary historian, who mentions the virtues of Alexander
with respect, and his faults with candor. He describes the judicious plan which
had been formed for the conduct of the war. Three Roman armies were destined to
invade Persia at the same time, and by different roads. But the operations of
the campaign, though wisely concerted, were not executed either with ability or
success. The first of these armies, as soon as it had entered the marshy plains
of Babylon, towards the artificial conflux of the Euphrates and the Tigris[709],
was encompassed by the superior numbers, and destroyed by the arrows of the
enemy. The alliance of Chosroes, king of Armenia[710],
and the long tract of mountainous country, in which the Persian cavalry was of
little service, opened a secure entrance into the heart of Media, to the second
of the Roman armies. These brave troops laid waste the adjacent provinces, and
by several successful actions against Artaxerxes, gave a faint color to the
emperor's vanity. But the retreat of this victorious army was imprudent, or at
least unfortunate. In repassing the mountains, great numbers of soldiers
perished by the badness of the roads, and the severity of the winter season. It
had been resolved, that whilst these two great detachments penetrated into the
opposite extremes of the Persian dominions, the main body, under the command of
Alexander himself, should support their attack, by invading the centre of the
kingdom. But the unexperienced youth, influenced by his mother's counsels, and
perhaps by his own fears, deserted the bravest troops, and the fairest prospect
of victory; and after consuming in Mesopotamia an inactive and inglorious
summer, he led back to Antioch an army diminished by sickness, and provoked by
disappointment. The behavior of Artaxerxes had been very different. Flying with
rapidity from the hills of Media to the marshes of the Euphrates, he had
everywhere opposed the invaders in person; and in either fortune had united with
the ablest conduct the most undaunted resolution. But in several obstinate
engagements against the veteran legions of Rome, the Persian monarch had lost
the flower of his troops. Even his victories had weakened his power. The
favorable opportunities of the absence of Alexander, and of the confusions that
followed that emperor's death, presented themselves in vain to his ambition.
Instead of expelling the Romans, as he pretended, from the continent of Asia, he
found himself unable to wrest from their hands the little province of
Mesopotamia[711].

The reign of Artaxerxes, which,
from the last defeat of the Parthians, lasted only fourteen years, forms a
memorable aera in the history of the East, and even in that of Rome. His
character seems to have been marked by those bold and commanding features, that
generally distinguish the princes who conquer, from those who inherit an empire.
Till the last period of the Persian monarchy, his code of laws was respected as
the groundwork of their civil and religious policy[712].
Several of his sayings are preserved. One of them in particular discovers a deep
insight into the constitution of government. "The authority of the prince," said
Artaxerxes, "must be defended by a military force; that force can only be
maintained by taxes; all taxes must, at last, fall upon agriculture; and
agriculture can never flourish except under the protection of justice and
moderation[713]."
Artaxerxes bequeathed his new empire, and his ambitious designs against the
Romans, to Sapor, a son not unworthy of his great father; but those designs were
too extensive for the power of Persia, and served only to involve both nations
in a long series of destructive wars and reciprocal calamities.

The Persians, long since civilized
and corrupted, were very far from possessing the martial independence, and the
intrepid hardiness, both of mind and body, which have rendered the northern
barbarians masters of the world. The science of war, that constituted the more
rational force of Greece and Rome, as it now does of Europe, never made any
considerable progress in the East. Those disciplined evolutions which harmonize
and animate a confused multitude, were unknown to the Persians. They were
equally unskilled in the arts of constructing, besieging, or defending regular
fortifications. They trusted more to their numbers than to their courage; more
to their courage than to their discipline. The infantry was a half-armed,
spiritless crowd of peasants, levied in haste by the allurements of plunder, and
as easily dispersed by a victory as by a defeat. The monarch and his nobles
transported into the camp the pride and luxury of the seraglio. Their military
operations were impeded by a useless train of women, eunuchs, horses, and
camels; and in the midst of a successful campaign, the Persian host was often
separated or destroyed by an unexpected famine[714].

But the nobles of Persia, in the
bosom of luxury and despotism, preserved a strong sense of personal gallantry
and national honor. From the age of seven years they were taught to speak truth,
to shoot with the bow, and to ride; and it was universally confessed, that in
the two last of these arts, they had made a more than common proficiency[715].
The most distinguished youth were educated under the monarch's eye, practised
their exercises in the gate of his palace, and were severely trained up to the
habits of temperance and obedience, in their long and laborious parties of
hunting. In every province, the satrap maintained a like school of military
virtue. The Persian nobles (so natural is the idea of feudal tenures) received
from the king's bounty lands and houses, on the condition of their service in
war. They were ready on the first summons to mount on horseback, with a martial
and splendid train of followers, and to join the numerous bodies of guards, who
were carefully selected from among the most robust slaves, and the bravest
adventures of Asia. These armies, both of light and of heavy cavalry, equally
formidable by the impetuosity of their charge and the rapidity of their motions,
threatened, as an impending cloud, the eastern provinces of the declining empire
of Rome[716].

Chapter IX
State of
Germany Until the Barbarians
Part I

The State of Germany Till
the Invasion of the Barbarians in the Time of the Emperor
Decius

The
government and religion of Persia have deserved some notice, from their
connection with the decline and fall of the Roman empire. We shall occasionally
mention the Scythian or Sarmatian tribes[717],[718],
which, with their arms and horses, their flocks and herds, their wives and
families, wandered over the immense plains which spread themselves from the
Caspian Sea to the Vistula, from the confines of Persia to those of Germany. But
the warlike Germans, who first resisted, then invaded, and at length overturned
the Western monarchy of Rome, will occupy a much more important place in this
history, and possess a stronger, and, if we may use the expression, a more
domestic, claim to our attention and regard. The most civilized nations of
modern Europe issued from the woods of Germany; and in the rude institutions of
those barbarians we may still distinguish the original principles of our present
laws and manners. In their primitive state of simplicity and independence, the
Germans were surveyed by the discerning eye, and delineated by the masterly
pencil, of Tacitus[719],
the first of historians who applied the science of philosophy to the study of
facts. The expressive conciseness of his descriptions has served to exercise the
diligence of innumerable antiquarians, and to excite the genius and penetration
of the philosophic historians of our own times. The subject, however various and
important, has already been so frequently, so ably, and so successfully
discussed, that it is now grown familiar to the reader, and difficult to the
writer. We shall therefore content ourselves with observing, and indeed with
repeating, some of the most important circumstances of climate, of manners, and
of institutions, which rendered the wild barbarians of Germany such formidable
enemies to the Roman power.

Ancient
Germany, excluding from its independent limits the province westward of the
Rhine, which had submitted to the Roman yoke, extended itself over a third part
of Europe[720].
Almost the whole of modern Germany, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Livonia,
Prussia, and the greater part of Poland, were peopled by the various tribes of
one great nation, whose complexion, manners, and language denoted a common
origin, and preserved a striking resemblance. On the west, ancient Germany was
divided by the Rhine from the Gallic, and on the south, by the Danube, from the
Illyrian, provinces of the empire. A ridge of hills, rising from the Danube, and
called the Carpathian Mountains, covered Germany on the side of Dacia or
Hungary. The eastern frontier was faintly marked by the mutual fears of the
Germans and the Sarmatians, and was often confounded by the mixture of warring
and confederating tribes of the two nations. In the remote darkness of the
north, the ancients imperfectly descried a frozen ocean that lay beyond the
Baltic Sea, and beyond the Peninsula, or islands[721]
of Scandinavia.

Some
ingenious writers[722]
have suspected that Europe was much colder formerly than it is at present; and
the most ancient descriptions of the climate of Germany tend exceedingly to
confirm their theory. The general complaints of intense frost and eternal
winter, are perhaps little to be regarded, since we have no method of reducing
to the accurate standard of the thermometer, the feelings, or the expressions,
of an orator born in the happier regions of Greece or Asia. But I shall select
two remarkable circumstances of a less equivocal nature.

I.
The
great rivers which covered the Roman provinces, the Rhine and the Danube, were
frequently frozen over, and capable of supporting the most enormous weights. The
barbarians, who often chose that severe season for their inroads, transported,
without apprehension or danger, their numerous armies, their cavalry, and their
heavy wagons, over a vast and solid bridge of ice[723].
Modern ages have not presented an instance of a like
phenomenon.

II.
The
reindeer, that useful animal, from whom the savage of the North derives the best
comforts of his dreary life, is of a constitution that supports, and even
requires, the most intense cold. He is found on the rock of Spitzberg, within
ten degrees of the Pole; he seems to delight in the snows of Lapland and
Siberia: but at present he cannot subsist, much less multiply, in any country to
the south of the Baltic[724].
In the time of Caesar the reindeer, as well as the elk and the wild bull, was a
native of the Hercynian forest, which then overshadowed a great part of Germany
and Poland[725].
The modern improvements sufficiently explain the causes of the diminution of the
cold. These immense woods have been gradually cleared, which intercepted from
the earth the rays of the sun[726].
The morasses have been drained, and, in proportion as the soil has been
cultivated, the air has become more temperate. Canada, at this day, is an exact
picture of ancient Germany. Although situated in the same parallel with the
finest provinces of France and England, that country experiences the most
rigorous cold. The reindeer are very numerous, the ground is covered with deep
and lasting snow, and the great river of St. Lawrence is regularly frozen, in a
season when the waters of the Seine and the Thames are usually free from ice[727].

It is
difficult to ascertain, and easy to exaggerate, the influence of the climate of
ancient Germany over the minds and bodies of the natives. Many writers have
supposed, and most have allowed, though, as it should seem, without any adequate
proof, that the rigorous cold of the North was favorable to long life and
generative vigor, that the women were more fruitful, and the human species more
prolific, than in warmer or more temperate climates[728].
We may assert, with greater confidence, that the keen air of Germany formed the
large and masculine limbs of the natives, who were, in general, of a more lofty
stature than the people of the South[729],
gave them a kind of strength better adapted to violent exertions than to patient
labor, and inspired them with constitutional bravery, which is the result of
nerves and spirits. The severity of a winter campaign, that chilled the courage
of the Roman troops, was scarcely felt by these hardy children of the North[730],
who, in their turn, were unable to resist the summer heats, and dissolved away
in languor and sickness under the beams of an Italian sun[731].

Chapter IX
State of
Germany Until the Barbarians
Part II

There is
not any where upon the globe a large tract of country, which we have discovered
destitute of inhabitants, or whose first population can be fixed with any degree
of historical certainty. And yet, as the most philosophic minds can seldom
refrain from investigating the infancy of great nations, our curiosity consumes
itself in toilsome and disappointed efforts. When Tacitus considered the purity
of the German blood, and the forbidding aspect of the country, he was disposed
to pronounce those barbarians Indigence, or natives of the soil. We may allow
with safety, and perhaps with truth, that ancient Germany was not originally
peopled by any foreign colonies already formed into a political society[732];
but that the name and nation received their existence from the gradual union of
some wandering savages of the Hercynian woods. To assert those savages to have
been the spontaneous production of the earth which they inhabited would be a
rash inference, condemned by religion, and unwarranted by reason.

Such rational doubt is but ill
suited with the genius of popular vanity. Among the nations who have adopted the
Mosaic history of the world, the ark of Noah has been of the same use, as was
formerly to the Greeks and Romans the siege of Troy. On a narrow basis of
acknowledged truth, an immense but rude superstructure of fable has been
erected; and the wild Irishman[733],
as well as the wild Tartar[734],
could point out the individual son of Japhet, from whose loins his ancestors
were lineally descended. The last century abounded with antiquarians of profound
learning and easy faith, who, by the dim light of legends and traditions, of
conjectures and etymologies, conducted the great grandchildren of Noah from the
Tower of Babel to the extremities of the globe. Of these judicious critics, one
of the most entertaining was Oaus Rudbeck, professor in the university of
Upsal[735].
Whatever is celebrated either in history or fable, this zealous patriot ascribes
to his country. From Sweden (which formed so considerable a part of ancient
Germany) the Greeks themselves derived their alphabetical characters, their
astronomy, and their religion. Of that delightful region (for such it appeared
to the eyes of a native) the Atlantis of Plato, the country of the Hyperboreans,
the gardens of the Hesperides, the Fortunate Islands, and even the Elysian
Fields, were all but faint and imperfect transcripts. A clime so profusely
favored by Nature could not long remain desert after the flood. The learned
Rudbeck allows the family of Noah a few years to multiply from eight to about
twenty thousand persons. He then disperses them into small colonies to replenish
the earth, and to propagate the human species. The German or Swedish detachment
(which marched, if I am not mistaken, under the command of Askenaz, the son of
Gomer, the son of Japhet) distinguished itself by a more than common diligence
in the prosecution of this great work. The northern hive cast its swarms over
the greatest part of Europe, Africa, and Asia; and (to use the author's
metaphor) the blood circulated from the extremities to the
heart.

But all
this well-labored system of German antiquities is annihilated by a single fact,
too well attested to admit of any doubt, and of too decisive a nature to leave
room for any reply. The Germans, in the age of Tacitus, were unacquainted with
the use of letters[736];
and the use of letters is the principal circumstance that distinguishes a
civilized people from a herd of savages incapable of knowledge or reflection.
Without that artificial help, the human memory soon dissipates or corrupts the
ideas intrusted to her charge; and the nobler faculties of the mind, no longer
supplied with models or with materials, gradually forget their powers; the
judgment becomes feeble and lethargic, the imagination languid or irregular.
Fully to apprehend this important truth, let us attempt, in an improved society,
to calculate the immense distance between the man of learning and the illiterate
peasant. The former, by reading and reflection, multiplies his own experience,
and lives in distant ages and remote countries; whilst the latter, rooted to a
single spot, and confined to a few years of existence, surpasses but very little
his fellow-laborer, the ox, in the exercise of his mental faculties. The same,
and even a greater, difference will be found between nations than between
individuals; and we may safely pronounce, that without some species of writing,
no people has ever preserved the faithful annals of their history, ever made any
considerable progress in the abstract sciences, or ever possessed, in any
tolerable degree of perfection, the useful and agreeable arts of
life.

Of these
arts, the ancient Germans were wretchedly destitute. They passed their lives in
a state of ignorance and poverty, which it has pleased some declaimers to
dignify with the appellation of virtuous simplicity[737].
Modern Germany is said to contain about two thousand three hundred walled
towns[738].
In a much wider extent of country, the geographer Ptolemy could discover no more
than ninety places which he decorates with the name of cities[739];
though, according to our ideas, they would but ill deserve that splendid title.
We can only suppose them to have been rude fortifications, constructed in the
centre of the woods, and designed to secure the women, children, and cattle,
whilst the warriors of the tribe marched out to repel a sudden invasion[740].
But Tacitus asserts, as a well-known fact, that the Germans, in his time, had no
cities[741];
and that they affected to despise the works of Roman industry, as places of
confinement rather than of security[742].
Their edifices were not even contiguous, or formed into regular villas[743];
each barbarian fixed his independent dwelling on the spot to which a plain, a
wood, or a stream of fresh water, had induced him to give the preference.
Neither stone, nor brick, nor tiles, were employed in these slight habitations[744].
They were indeed no more than low huts, of a circular figure, built of rough
timber, thatched with straw, and pierced at the top to leave a free passage for
the smoke. In the most inclement winter, the hardy German was satisfied with a
scanty garment made of the skin of some animal. The nations who dwelt towards
the North clothed themselves in furs; and the women manufactured for their own
use a coarse kind of linen[745].
The game of various sorts, with which the forests of Germany were plentifully
stocked, supplied its inhabitants with food and exercise[746].
Their monstrous herds of cattle, less remarkable indeed for their beauty than
for their utility[747],
formed the principal object of their wealth. A small quantity of corn was the
only produce exacted from the earth; the use of orchards or artificial meadows
was unknown to the Germans; nor can we expect any improvements in agriculture
from a people, whose prosperity every year experienced a general change by a new
division of the arable lands, and who, in that strange operation, avoided
disputes, by suffering a great part of their territory to lie waste and without
tillage[748].

Gold,
silver, and iron, were extremely scarce in Germany. Its barbarous inhabitants
wanted both skill and patience to investigate those rich veins of silver, which
have so liberally rewarded the attention of the princes of Brunswick and Saxony.
Sweden, which now supplies Europe with iron, was equally ignorant of its own
riches; and the appearance of the arms of the Germans furnished a sufficient
proof how little iron they were able to bestow on what they must have deemed the
noblest use of that metal. The various transactions of peace and war had
introduced some Roman coins (chiefly silver) among the borderers of the Rhine
and Danube; but the more distant tribes were absolutely unacquainted with the
use of money, carried on their confined traffic by the exchange of commodities,
and prized their rude earthen vessels as of equal value with the silver vases,
the presents of Rome to their princes and ambassadors[749].
To a mind capable of reflection, such leading facts convey more instruction,
than a tedious detail of subordinate circumstances. The value of money has been
settled by general consent to express our wants and our property, as letters
were invented to express our ideas; and both these institutions, by giving a
more active energy to the powers and passions of human nature, have contributed
to multiply the objects they were designed to represent. The use of gold and
silver is in a great measure factitious; but it would be impossible to enumerate
the important and various services which agriculture, and all the arts, have
received from iron, when tempered and fashioned by the operation of fire, and
the dexterous hand of man. Money, in a word, is the most universal incitement,
iron the most powerful instrument, of human industry; and it is very difficult
to conceive by what means a people, neither actuated by the one, nor seconded by
the other, could emerge from the grossest barbarism[750].

If we
contemplate a savage nation in any part of the globe, a supine indolence and a
carelessness of futurity will be found to constitute their general character. In
a civilized state, every faculty of man is expanded and exercised; and the great
chain of mutual dependence connects and embraces the several members of society.
The most numerous portion of it is employed in constant and useful labor. The
select few, placed by fortune above that necessity, can, however, fill up their
time by the pursuits of interest or glory, by the improvement of their estate or
of their understanding, by the duties, the pleasures, and even the follies of
social life. The Germans were not possessed of these varied resources. The care
of the house and family, the management of the land and cattle, were delegated
to the old and the infirm, to women and slaves. The lazy warrior, destitute of
every art that might employ his leisure hours, consumed his days and nights in
the animal gratifications of sleep and food. And yet, by a wonderful diversity
of nature, (according to the remark of a writer who had pierced into its darkest
recesses,) the same barbarians are by turns the most indolent and the most
restless of mankind. They delight in sloth, they detest tranquility[751].
The languid soul, oppressed with its own weight, anxiously required some new and
powerful sensation; and war and danger were the only amusements adequate to its
fierce temper. The sound that summoned the German to arms was grateful to his
ear. It roused him from his uncomfortable lethargy, gave him an active pursuit,
and, by strong exercise of the body, and violent emotions of the mind, restored
him to a more lively sense of his existence. In the dull intervals of peace,
these barbarians were immoderately addicted to deep gaming and excessive
drinking; both of which, by different means, the one by inflaming their
passions, the other by extinguishing their reason, alike relieved them from the
pain of thinking. They gloried in passing whole days and nights at table; and
the blood of friends and relations often stained their numerous and drunken
assemblies[752].
Their debts of honor (for in that light they have transmitted to us those of
play) they discharged with the most romantic fidelity. The desperate gamester,
who had staked his person and liberty on a last throw of the dice, patiently
submitted to the decision of fortune, and suffered himself to be bound,
chastised, and sold into remote slavery, by his weaker but more lucky
antagonist[753].

Strong
beer, a liquor extracted with very little art from wheat or barley, and
corrupted (as it is strongly expressed by Tacitus) into a certain semblance of
wine, was sufficient for the gross purposes of German debauchery. But those who
had tasted the rich wines of Italy, and afterwards of Gaul, sighed for that more
delicious species of intoxication. They attempted not, however, (as has since
been executed with so much success,) to naturalize the vine on the banks of the
Rhine and Danube; nor did they endeavor to procure by industry the materials of
an advantageous commerce. To solicit by labor what might be ravished by arms,
was esteemed unworthy of the German spirit[754].
The intemperate thirst of strong liquors often urged the barbarians to invade
the provinces on which art or nature had bestowed those much envied presents.
The Tuscan who betrayed his country to the Celtic nations, attracted them into
Italy by the prospect of the rich fruits and delicious wines, the productions of
a happier climate[755].
And in the same manner the German auxiliaries, invited into France during the
civil wars of the sixteenth century, were allured by the promise of plenteous
quarters in the provinces of Champaigne and Burgundy[756].
Drunkenness, the most illiberal, but not the most dangerous of our vices, was
sometimes capable, in a less civilized state of mankind, of occasioning a
battle, a war, or a revolution.

The
climate of ancient Germany has been modified, and the soil fertilized, by the
labor of ten centuries from the time of Charlemagne. The same extent of ground
which at present maintains, in ease and plenty, a million of husbandmen and
artificers, was unable to supply a hundred thousand lazy warriors with the
simple necessaries of life[757].
The Germans abandoned their immense forests to the exercise of hunting, employed
in pasturage the most considerable part of their lands, bestowed on the small
remainder a rude and careless cultivation, and then accused the scantiness and
sterility of a country that refused to maintain the multitude of its
inhabitants. When the return of famine severely admonished them of the
importance of the arts, the national distress was sometimes alleviated by the
emigration of a third, perhaps, or a fourth part of their youth[758].
The possession and the enjoyment of property are the pledges which bind a
civilized people to an improved country. But the Germans, who carried with them
what they most valued, their arms, their cattle, and their women, cheerfully
abandoned the vast silence of their woods for the unbounded hopes of plunder and
conquest. The innumerable swarms that issued, or seemed to issue, from the great
storehouse of nations, were multiplied by the fears of the vanquished, and by
the credulity of succeeding ages. And from facts thus exaggerated, an opinion
was gradually established, and has been supported by writers of distinguished
reputation, that, in the age of Caesar and Tacitus, the inhabitants of the North
were far more numerous than they are in our days[759].
A more serious inquiry into the causes of population seems to have convinced
modern philosophers of the falsehood, and indeed the impossibility, of the
supposition. To the names of Mariana and of Machiavel[760],
we can oppose the equal names of Robertson and Hume[761].

A warlike
nation like the Germans, without either cities, letters, arts, or money, found
some compensation for this savage state in the enjoyment of liberty. Their
poverty secured their freedom, since our desires and our possessions are the
strongest fetters of despotism. "Among the Suiones (says Tacitus) riches are
held in honor. They are therefore subject to an absolute monarch, who, instead
of intrusting his people with the free use of arms, as is practised in the rest
of Germany, commits them to the safe custody, not of a citizen, or even of a
freedman, but of a slave. The neighbors of the Suiones, the Sitones, are sunk
even below servitude; they obey a woman[762]."
In the mention of these exceptions, the great historian sufficiently
acknowledges the general theory of government. We are only at a loss to conceive
by what means riches and despotism could penetrate into a remote corner of the
North, and extinguish the generous flame that blazed with such fierceness on the
frontier of the Roman provinces, or how the ancestors of those Danes and
Norwegians, so distinguished in latter ages by their unconquered spirit, could
thus tamely resign the great character of German liberty[763].
Some tribes, however, on the coast of the Baltic, acknowledged the authority of
kings, though without relinquishing the rights of men[764],
but in the far greater part of Germany, the form of government was a democracy,
tempered, indeed, and controlled, not so much by general and positive laws, as
by the occasional ascendant of birth or valor, of eloquence or superstition[765].

Civil
governments, in their first institution, are voluntary associations for mutual
defence. To obtain the desired end, it is absolutely necessary that each
individual should conceive himself obliged to submit his private opinions and
actions to the judgment of the greater number of his associates. The German
tribes were contented with this rude but liberal outline of political society.
As soon as a youth, born of free parents, had attained the age of manhood, he
was introduced into the general council of his countrymen, solemnly invested
with a shield and spear, and adopted as an equal and worthy member of the
military commonwealth. The assembly of the warriors of the tribe was convened at
stated seasons, or on sudden emergencies. The trial of public offences, the
election of magistrates, and the great business of peace and war, were
determined by its independent voice. Sometimes indeed, these important questions
were previously considered and prepared in a more select council of the
principal chieftains[766].
The magistrates might deliberate and persuade, the people only could resolve and
execute; and the resolutions of the Germans were for the most part hasty and
violent. Barbarians accustomed to place their freedom in gratifying the present
passion, and their courage in overlooking all future consequences, turned away
with indignant contempt from the remonstrances of justice and policy, and it was
the practice to signify by a hollow murmur their dislike of such timid counsels.
But whenever a more popular orator proposed to vindicate the meanest citizen
from either foreign or domestic injury, whenever he called upon his
fellow-countrymen to assert the national honor, or to pursue some enterprise
full of danger and glory, a loud clashing of shields and spears expressed the
eager applause of the assembly. For the Germans always met in arms, and it was
constantly to be dreaded, lest an irregular multitude, inflamed with faction and
strong liquors, should use those arms to enforce, as well as to declare, their
furious resolves. We may recollect how often the diets of Poland have been
polluted with blood, and the more numerous party has been compelled to yield to
the more violent and seditious[767].

A general
of the tribe was elected on occasions of danger; and, if the danger was pressing
and extensive, several tribes concurred in the choice of the same general. The
bravest warrior was named to lead his countrymen into the field, by his example
rather than by his commands. But this power, however limited, was still
invidious. It expired with the war, and in time of peace the German tribes
acknowledged not any supreme chief[768].
Princes were, however, appointed, in the general assembly, to administer
justice, or rather to compose differences[769],
in their respective districts. In the choice of these magistrates, as much
regard was shown to birth as to merit[770].
To each was assigned, by the public, a guard, and a council of a hundred
persons, and the first of the princes appears to have enjoyed a preeminence of
rank and honor which sometimes tempted the Romans to compliment him with the
regal title[771].

The
comparative view of the powers of the magistrates, in two remarkable instances,
is alone sufficient to represent the whole system of German manners. The
disposal of the landed property within their district was absolutely vested in
their hands, and they distributed it every year according to a new division[772].
At the same time they were not authorized to punish with death, to imprison, or
even to strike a private citizen[773].
A people thus jealous of their persons, and careless of their possessions, must
have been totally destitute of industry and the arts, but animated with a high
sense of honor and independence.

Chapter IX
State of
Germany Until the Barbarians
Part III

The
Germans respected only those duties which they imposed on themselves. The most
obscure soldier resisted with disdain the authority of the magistrates. "The
noblest youths blushed not to be numbered among the faithful companions of some
renowned chief, to whom they devoted their arms and service. A noble emulation
prevailed among the companions, to obtain the first place in the esteem of their
chief; amongst the chiefs, to acquire the greatest number of valiant companions.
To be ever surrounded by a band of select youths was the pride and strength of
the chiefs, their ornament in peace, their defence in war. The glory of such
distinguished heroes diffused itself beyond the narrow limits of their own
tribe. Presents and embassies solicited their friendship, and the fame of their
arms often insured victory to the party which they espoused. In the hour of
danger it was shameful for the chief to be surpassed in valor by his companions;
shameful for the companions not to equal the valor of their chief. To survive
his fall in battle, was indelible infamy. To protect his person, and to adorn
his glory with the trophies of their own exploits, were the most sacred of their
duties. The chiefs combated for victory, the companions for the chief. The
noblest warriors, whenever their native country was sunk into the laziness of
peace, maintained their numerous bands in some distant scene of action, to
exercise their restless spirit, and to acquire renown by voluntary dangers.
Gifts worthy of soldiers - the warlike steed, the bloody and even victorious
lance - were the rewards which the companions claimed from the liberality of
their chief. The rude plenty of his hospitable board was the only pay that he
could bestow, or they would accept. War, rapine, and the free-will offerings of
his friends, supplied the materials of this munificence[774].
This institution, however it might accidentally weaken the several republics,
invigorated the general character of the Germans, and even ripened amongst them
all the virtues of which barbarians are susceptible; the faith and valor, the
hospitality and the courtesy, so conspicuous long afterwards in the ages of
chivalry. The honorable gifts, bestowed by the chief on his brave companions,
have been supposed, by an ingenious writer, to contain the first rudiments of
the fiefs, distributed after the conquest of the Roman provinces, by the
barbarian lords among their vassals, with a similar duty of homage and military
service[775].
These conditions are, however, very repugnant to the maxims of the ancient
Germans, who delighted in mutual presents; but without either imposing, or
accepting, the weight of obligations[776].

"In the
days of chivalry, or more properly of romance, all the men were brave, and all
the women were chaste;" and notwithstanding the latter of these virtues is
acquired and preserved with much more difficulty than the former, it is
ascribed, almost without exception, to the wives of the ancient Germans.
Polygamy was not in use, except among the princes, and among them only for the
sake of multiplying their alliances. Divorces were prohibited by manners rather
than by laws. Adulteries were punished as rare and inexpiable crimes; nor was
seduction justified by example and fashion[777].
We may easily discover that Tacitus indulges an honest pleasure in the contrast
of barbarian virtue with the dissolute conduct of the Roman ladies; yet there
are some striking circumstances that give an air of truth, or at least
probability, to the conjugal faith and chastity of the Germans.

Although
the progress of civilization has undoubtedly contributed to assuage the fiercer
passions of human nature, it seems to have been less favorable to the virtue of
chastity, whose most dangerous enemy is the softness of the mind. The
refinements of life corrupt while they polish the intercourse of the sexes. The
gross appetite of love becomes most dangerous when it is elevated, or rather,
indeed, disguised by sentimental passion. The elegance of dress, of motion, and
of manners, gives a lustre to beauty, and inflames the senses through the
imagination. Luxurious entertainments, midnight dances, and licentious
spectacles, present at once temptation and opportunity to female frailty[778].
From such dangers the unpolished wives of the barbarians were secured by
poverty, solitude, and the painful cares of a domestic life. The German huts,
open, on every side, to the eye of indiscretion or jealousy, were a better
safeguard of conjugal fidelity, than the walls, the bolts, and the eunuchs of a
Persian haram. To this reason another may be added, of a more honorable nature.
The Germans treated their women with esteem and confidence, consulted them on
every occasion of importance, and fondly believed, that in their breasts resided
a sanctity and wisdom more than human. Some of the interpreters of fate, such as
Velleda, in the Batavian war, governed, in the name of the deity, the fiercest
nations of Germany[779].
The rest of the sex, without being adored as goddesses, were respected as the
free and equal companions of soldiers; associated even by the marriage ceremony
to a life of toil, of danger, and of glory[780].
In their great invasions, the camps of the barbarians were filled with a
multitude of women, who remained firm and undaunted amidst the sound of arms,
the various forms of destruction, and the honorable wounds of their sons and
husbands[781].
Fainting armies of Germans have, more than once, been driven back upon the
enemy, by the generous despair of the women, who dreaded death much less than
servitude. If the day was irrecoverably lost, they well knew how to deliver
themselves and their children, with their own hands, from an insulting victor[782].
Heroines of such a cast may claim our admiration; but they were most assuredly
neither lovely, nor very susceptible of love. Whilst they affected to emulate
the stern virtues of man, they must have resigned that attractive softness, in
which principally consist the charm and weakness of woman. Conscious pride
taught the German females to suppress every tender emotion that stood in
competition with honor, and the first honor of the sex has ever been that of
chastity. The sentiments and conduct of these high-spirited matrons may, at
once, be considered as a cause, as an effect, and as a proof of the general
character of the nation. Female courage, however it may be raised by fanaticism,
or confirmed by habit, can be only a faint and imperfect imitation of the manly
valor that distinguishes the age or country in which it may be
found.

The
religious system of the Germans (if the wild opinions of savages can deserve
that name) was dictated by their wants, their fears, and their ignorance[783].
They adored the great visible objects and agents of nature, the Sun and the
Moon, the Fire and the Earth; together with those imaginary deities, who were
supposed to preside over the most important occupations of human life. They were
persuaded, that, by some ridiculous arts of divination, they could discover the
will of the superior beings, and that human sacrifices were the most precious
and acceptable offering to their altars. Some applause has been hastily bestowed
on the sublime notion, entertained by that people, of the Deity, whom they
neither confined within the walls of the temple, nor represented by any human
figure; but when we recollect, that the Germans were unskilled in architecture,
and totally unacquainted with the art of sculpture, we shall readily assign the
true reason of a scruple, which arose not so much from a superiority of reason,
as from a want of ingenuity. The only temples in Germany were dark and ancient
groves, consecrated by the reverence of succeeding generations. Their secret
gloom, the imagined residence of an invisible power, by presenting no distinct
object of fear or worship, impressed the mind with a still deeper sense of
religious horror[784];
and the priests, rude and illiterate as they were, had been taught by experience
the use of every artifice that could preserve and fortify impressions so well
suited to their own interest.

The same
ignorance, which renders barbarians incapable of conceiving or embracing the
useful restraints of laws, exposes them naked and unarmed to the blind terrors
of superstition. The German priests, improving this favorable temper of their
countrymen, had assumed a jurisdiction even in temporal concerns, which the
magistrate could not venture to exercise; and the haughty warrior patiently
submitted to the lash of correction, when it was inflicted, not by any human
power, but by the immediate order of the god of war[785].
The defects of civil policy were sometimes supplied by the interposition of
ecclesiastical authority. The latter was constantly exerted to maintain silence
and decency in the popular assemblies; and was sometimes extended to a more
enlarged concern for the national welfare. A solemn procession was occasionally
celebrated in the present countries of Mecklenburgh and Pomerania. The unknown
symbol of the Earth, covered with a thick veil, was placed on a carriage drawn
by cows; and in this manner the goddess, whose common residence was in the Isles
of Rugen, visited several adjacent tribes of her worshippers. During her
progress the sound of war was hushed, quarrels were suspended, arms laid aside,
and the restless Germans had an opportunity of tasting the blessings of peace
and harmony[786].
The truce of God, so often and so ineffectually proclaimed by the clergy of the
eleventh century, was an obvious imitation of this ancient custom[787].

But the
influence of religion was far more powerful to inflame, than to moderate, the
fierce passions of the Germans. Interest and fanaticism often prompted its
ministers to sanctify the most daring and the most unjust enterprises, by the
approbation of Heaven, and full assurances of success. The consecrated
standards, long revered in the groves of superstition, were placed in the front
of the battle[788];
and the hostile army was devoted with dire execrations to the gods of war and of
thunder[789].
In the faith of soldiers (and such were the Germans) cowardice is the most
unpardonable of sins. A brave man was the worthy favorite of their martial
deities; the wretch who had lost his shield was alike banished from the
religious and civil assemblies of his countrymen. Some tribes of the north seem
to have embraced the doctrine of transmigration[790],
others imagined a gross paradise of immortal drunkenness[791].
All agreed, that a life spent in arms, and a glorious death in battle, were the
best preparations for a happy futurity, either in this or in another
world.

The
immortality so vainly promised by the priests, was, in some degree, conferred by
the bards. That singular order of men has most deservedly attracted the notice
of all who have attempted to investigate the antiquities of the Celts, the
Scandinavians, and the Germans. Their genius and character, as well as the
reverence paid to that important office, have been sufficiently illustrated. But
we cannot so easily express, or even conceive, the enthusiasm of arms and glory
which they kindled in the breast of their audience. Among a polished people, a
taste for poetry is rather an amusement of the fancy, than a passion of the
soul. And yet, when in calm retirement we peruse the combats described by Homer
or Tasso, we are insensibly seduced by the fiction, and feel a momentary glow of
martial ardor. But how faint, how cold is the sensation which a peaceful mind
can receive from solitary study! It was in the hour of battle, or in the feast
of victory, that the bards celebrated the glory of the heroes of ancient days,
the ancestors of those warlike chieftains, who listened with transport to their
artless but animated strains. The view of arms and of danger heightened the
effect of the military song; and the passions which it tended to excite, the
desire of fame, and the contempt of death, were the habitual sentiments of a
German mind[792],[793].

Such was
the situation, and such were the manners of the ancient Germans. Their climate,
their want of learning, of arts, and of laws, their notions of honor, of
gallantry, and of religion, their sense of freedom, impatience of peace, and
thirst of enterprise, all contributed to form a people of military heroes. And
yet we find, that during more than two hundred and fifty years that elapsed from
the defeat of Varus to the reign of Decius, these formidable barbarians made few
considerable attempts, and not any material impression on the luxurious and
enslaved provinces of the empire. Their progress was checked by their want of
arms and discipline, and their fury was diverted by the intestine divisions of
ancient Germany.

I.
It
has been observed, with ingenuity, and not without truth, that the command of
iron soon gives a nation the command of gold. But the rude tribes of Germany,
alike destitute of both those valuable metals, were reduced slowly to acquire,
by their unassisted strength, the possession of the one as well as the other.
The face of a German army displayed their poverty of iron. Swords, and the
longer kind of lances, they could seldom use. Their frameoe (as they called them
in their own language) were long spears headed with a sharp but narrow iron
point, and which, as occasion required, they either darted from a distance, or
pushed in close onset. With this spear, and with a shield, their cavalry was
contented. A multitude of darts, scattered[794]
with incredible force, were an additional resource of the infantry. Their
military dress, when they wore any, was nothing more than a loose mantle. A
variety of colors was the only ornament of their wooden or osier shields. Few of
the chiefs were distinguished by cuirasses, scarcely any by helmets. Though the
horses of Germany were neither beautiful, swift, nor practised in the skilful
evolutions of the Roman manege, several of the nations obtained renown by their
cavalry; but, in general, the principal strength of the Germans consisted in
their infantry[795],
which was drawn up in several deep columns, according to the distinction of
tribes and families. Impatient of fatigue and delay, these half-armed warriors
rushed to battle with dissonant shouts and disordered ranks; and sometimes, by
the effort of native valor, prevailed over the constrained and more artificial
bravery of the Roman mercenaries. But as the barbarians poured forth their whole
souls on the first onset, they knew not how to rally or to retire. A repulse was
a sure defeat; and a defeat was most commonly total destruction. When we
recollect the complete armor of the Roman soldiers, their discipline, exercises,
evolutions, fortified camps, and military engines, it appears a just matter of
surprise, how the naked and unassisted valor of the barbarians could dare to
encounter, in the field, the strength of the legions, and the various troops of
the auxiliaries, which seconded their operations. The contest was too unequal,
till the introduction of luxury had enervated the vigor, and a spirit of
disobedience and sedition had relaxed the discipline, of the Roman armies. The
introduction of barbarian auxiliaries into those armies, was a measure attended
with very obvious dangers, as it might gradually instruct the Germans in the
arts of war and of policy. Although they were admitted in small numbers and with
the strictest precaution, the example of Civilis was proper to convince the
Romans, that the danger was not imaginary, and that their precautions were not
always sufficient[796].
During the civil wars that followed the death of Nero, that artful and intrepid
Batavian, whom his enemies condescended to compare with Hannibal and Sertorius[797],
formed a great design of freedom and ambition. Eight Batavian cohorts renowned
in the wars of Britain and Italy, repaired to his standard. He introduced an
army of Germans into Gaul, prevailed on the powerful cities of Treves and
Langres to embrace his cause, defeated the legions, destroyed their fortified
camps, and employed against the Romans the military knowledge which he had
acquired in their service. When at length, after an obstinate struggle, he
yielded to the power of the empire, Civilis secured himself and his country by
an honorable treaty. The Batavians still continued to occupy the islands of the
Rhine[798],
the allies, not the servants, of the Roman monarchy.

II.
The
strength of ancient Germany appears formidable, when we consider the effects
that might have been produced by its united effort. The wide extent of country
might very possibly contain a million of warriors, as all who were of age to
bear arms were of a temper to use them. But this fierce multitude, incapable of
concerting or executing any plan of national greatness, was agitated by various
and often hostile intentions. Germany was divided into more than forty
independent states; and, even in each state, the union of the several tribes was
extremely loose and precarious. The barbarians were easily provoked; they knew
not how to forgive an injury, much less an insult; their resentments were bloody
and implacable. The casual disputes that so frequently happened in their
tumultuous parties of hunting or drinking, were sufficient to inflame the minds
of whole nations; the private feuds of any considerable chieftains diffused
itself among their followers and allies. To chastise the insolent, or to plunder
the defenceless, were alike causes of war. The most formidable states of Germany
affected to encompass their territories with a wide frontier of solitude and
devastation. The awful distance preserved by their neighbors attested the terror
of their arms, and in some measure defended them from the danger of unexpected
incursions[799].

"The Bructeri[800]
(it is Tacitus who now speaks) were totally exterminated by the neighboring
tribes[801],
provoked by their insolence, allured by the hopes of spoil, and perhaps inspired
by the tutelar deities of the empire. Above sixty thousand barbarians were
destroyed; not by the Roman arms, but in our sight, and for our entertainment.
May the nations, enemies of Rome, ever preserve this enmity to each other! We
have now attained the utmost verge of prosperity[802],
and have nothing left to demand of fortune, except the discord of the
barbarians[803]."
- These sentiments, less worthy of the humanity than of the patriotism of
Tacitus, express the invariable maxims of the policy of his countrymen. They
deemed it a much safer expedient to divide than to combat the barbarians, from
whose defeat they could derive neither honor nor advantage. The money and
negotiations of Rome insinuated themselves into the heart of Germany; and every
art of seduction was used with dignity, to conciliate those nations whom their
proximity to the Rhine or Danube might render the most useful friends as well as
the most troublesome enemies. Chiefs of renown and power were flattered by the
most trifling presents, which they received either as marks of distinction, or
as the instruments of luxury. In civil dissensions the weaker faction endeavored
to strengthen its interest by entering into secret connections with the
governors of the frontier provinces. Every quarrel among the Germans was
fomented by the intrigues of Rome; and every plan of union and public good was
defeated by the stronger bias of private jealousy and interest[804].

The general conspiracy which
terrified the Romans under the reign of Marcus Antoninus, comprehended almost
all the nations of Germany, and even Sarmatia, from the mouth of the Rhine to
that of the Danube[805].
It is impossible for us to determine whether this hasty confederation was formed
by necessity, by reason, or by passion; but we may rest assured, that the
barbarians were neither allured by the indolence, nor provoked by the ambition,
of the Roman monarch. This dangerous invasion required all the firmness and
vigilance of Marcus. He fixed generals of ability in the several stations of
attack, and assumed in person the conduct of the most important province on the
Upper Danube. After a long and doubtful conflict, the spirit of the barbarians
was subdued. The Quadi and the Marcomanni[806],
who had taken the lead in the war, were the most severely punished in its
catastrophe. They were commanded to retire five miles[807]
from their own banks of the Danube, and to deliver up the flower of the youth,
who were immediately sent into Britain, a remote island, where they might be
secure as hostages, and useful as soldiers[808].
On the frequent rebellions of the Quadi and Marcomanni, the irritated emperor
resolved to reduce their country into the form of a province. His designs were
disappointed by death. This formidable league, however, the only one that
appears in the two first centuries of the Imperial history, was entirely
dissipated, without leaving any traces behind in Germany.

In the
course of this introductory chapter, we have confined ourselves to the general
outlines of the manners of Germany, without attempting to describe or to
distinguish the various tribes which filled that great country in the time of
Caesar, of Tacitus, or of Ptolemy. As the ancient, or as new tribes successively
present themselves in the series of this history, we shall concisely mention
their origin, their situation, and their particular character. Modern nations
are fixed and permanent societies, connected among themselves by laws and
government, bound to their native soil by arts and agriculture. The German
tribes were voluntary and fluctuating associations of soldiers, almost of
savages. The same territory often changed its inhabitants in the tide of
conquest and emigration. The same communities, uniting in a plan of defence or
invasion, bestowed a new title on their new confederacy. The dissolution of an
ancient confederacy restored to the independent tribes their peculiar but
long-forgotten appellation. A victorious state often communicated its own name
to a vanquished people. Sometimes crowds of volunteers flocked from all parts to
the standard of a favorite leader; his camp became their country, and some
circumstance of the enterprise soon gave a common denomination to the mixed
multitude. The distinctions of the ferocious invaders were perpetually varied by
themselves, and confounded by the astonished subjects of the Roman empire[809].

Wars, and
the administration of public affairs, are the principal subjects of history; but
the number of persons interested in these busy scenes is very different,
according to the different condition of mankind. In great monarchies, millions
of obedient subjects pursue their useful occupations in peace and obscurity. The
attention of the writer, as well as of the reader, is solely confined to a
court, a capital, a regular army, and the districts which happen to be the
occasional scene of military operations. But a state of freedom and barbarism,
the season of civil commotions, or the situation of petty republics[810],
raises almost every member of the community into action, and consequently into
notice. The irregular divisions, and the restless motions, of the people of
Germany, dazzle our imagination, and seem to multiply their numbers. The profuse
enumeration of kings, of warriors, of armies and nations, inclines us to forget
that the same objects are continually repeated under a variety of appellations,
and that the most splendid appellations have been frequently lavished on the
most inconsiderable objects.

Chapter X
Emperors
Decius, Gallus, Aemilianus, Valerian and Gallienus
Part
I

The Emperors Decius,
Gallus, Aemilianus, Valerian, and Gallienus - The General Irruption of the
Barbarians - The Thirty Tyrants

From the
great secular games celebrated by Philip, to the death of the emperor Gallienus,
there elapsed twenty years of shame and misfortune. During that calamitous
period, every instant of time was marked, every province of the Roman world was
afflicted, by barbarous invaders, and military tyrants, and the ruined empire
seemed to approach the last and fatal moment of its dissolution. The confusion
of the times, and the scarcity of authentic memorials, oppose equal difficulties
to the historian, who attempts to preserve a clear and unbroken thread of
narration. Surrounded with imperfect fragments, always concise, often obscure,
and sometimes contradictory, he is reduced to collect, to compare, and to
conjecture: and though he ought never to place his conjectures in the rank of
facts, yet the knowledge of human nature, and of the sure operation of its
fierce and unrestrained passions, might, on some occasions, supply the want of
historical materials.

There is
not, for instance, any difficulty in conceiving, that the successive murders of
so many emperors had loosened all the ties of allegiance between the prince and
people; that all the generals of Philip were disposed to imitate the example of
their master; and that the caprice of armies, long since habituated to frequent
and violent revolutions, might every day raise to the throne the most obscure of
their fellow-soldiers. History can only add, that the rebellion against the
emperor Philip broke out in the summer of the year two hundred and forty-nine,
among the legions of Maesia; and that a subaltern officer[811],
named Marinus, was the object of their seditious choice. Philip was alarmed. He
dreaded lest the treason of the Maesian army should prove the first spark of a
general conflagration. Distracted with the consciousness of his guilt and of his
danger, he communicated the intelligence to the senate. A gloomy silence
prevailed, the effect of fear, and perhaps of disaffection; till at length
Decius, one of the assembly, assuming a spirit worthy of his noble extraction,
ventured to discover more intrepidity than the emperor seemed to possess. He
treated the whole business with contempt, as a hasty and inconsiderate tumult,
and Philip's rival as a phantom of royalty, who in a very few days would be
destroyed by the same inconstancy that had created him. The speedy completion of
the prophecy inspired Philip with a just esteem for so able a counsellor; and
Decius appeared to him the only person capable of restoring peace and discipline
to an army whose tumultuous spirit did not immediately subside after the murder
of Marinus. Decius[812],
who long resisted his own nomination, seems to have insinuated the danger of
presenting a leader of merit to the angry and apprehensive minds of the
soldiers; and his prediction was again confirmed by the event. The legions of
Maesia forced their judge to become their accomplice. They left him only the
alternative of death or the purple. His subsequent conduct, after that decisive
measure, was unavoidable. He conducted, or followed, his army to the confines of
Italy, whither Philip, collecting all his force to repel the formidable
competitor whom he had raised up, advanced to meet him. The Imperial troops were
superior in number; but the rebels formed an army of veterans, commanded by an
able and experienced leader. Philip was either killed in the battle, or put to
death a few days afterwards at Verona. His son and associate in the empire was
massacred at Rome by the Praetorian guards; and the victorious Decius, with more
favorable circumstances than the ambition of that age can usually plead, was
universally acknowledged by the senate and provinces. It is reported, that,
immediately after his reluctant acceptance of the title of Augustus, he had
assured Philip, by a private message, of his innocence and loyalty, solemnly
protesting, that, on his arrival on Italy, he would resign the Imperial
ornaments, and return to the condition of an obedient subject. His professions
might be sincere; but in the situation where fortune had placed him, it was
scarcely possible that he could either forgive or be forgiven[813].

The
emperor Decius had employed a few months in the works of peace and the
administration of justice, when he was summoned to the banks of the Danube by
the invasion of the Goths. This is the first considerable occasion in which
history mentions that great people, who afterwards broke the Roman power, sacked
the Capitol, and reigned in Gaul, Spain, and Italy. So memorable was the part
which they acted in the subversion of the Western empire, that the name of Goths
is frequently but improperly used as a general appellation of rude and warlike
barbarism.

In the
beginning of the sixth century, and after the conquest of Italy, the Goths, in
possession of present greatness, very naturally indulged themselves in the
prospect of past and of future glory. They wished to preserve the memory of
their ancestors, and to transmit to posterity their own achievements. The
principal minister of the court of Ravenna, the learned Cassiodorus, gratified
the inclination of the conquerors in a Gothic history, which consisted of twelve
books, now reduced to the imperfect abridgment of Jornandes[814].
These writers passed with the most artful conciseness over the misfortunes of
the nation, celebrated its successful valor, and adorned the triumph with many
Asiatic trophies, that more properly belonged to the people of Scythia. On the
faith of ancient songs, the uncertain, but the only memorials of barbarians,
they deduced the first origin of the Goths from the vast island, or peninsula,
of Scandinavia[815],[816].
That extreme country of the North was not unknown to the conquerors of Italy:
the ties of ancient consanguinity had been strengthened by recent offices of
friendship; and a Scandinavian king had cheerfully abdicated his savage
greatness, that he might pass the remainder of his days in the peaceful and
polished court of Ravenna[817].
Many vestiges, which cannot be ascribed to the arts of popular vanity, attest
the ancient residence of the Goths in the countries beyond the Rhine. From the
time of the geographer Ptolemy, the southern part of Sweden seems to have
continued in the possession of the less enterprising remnant of the nation, and
a large territory is even at present divided into east and west Gothland. During
the middle ages, (from the ninth to the twelfth century,) whilst Christianity
was advancing with a slow progress into the North, the Goths and the Swedes
composed two distinct and sometimes hostile members of the same monarchy[818].
The latter of these two names has prevailed without extinguishing the former.
The Swedes, who might well be satisfied with their own fame in arms, have, in
every age, claimed the kindred glory of the Goths. In a moment of discontent
against the court of Rome, Charles the Twelfth insinuated, that his victorious
troops were not degenerated from their brave ancestors, who had already subdued
the mistress of the world[819].

Till the
end of the eleventh century, a celebrated temple subsisted at Upsal, the most
considerable town of the Swedes and Goths. It was enriched with the gold which
the Scandinavians had acquired in their piratical adventures, and sanctified by
the uncouth representations of the three principal deities, the god of war, the
goddess of generation, and the god of thunder. In the general festival, that was
solemnized every ninth year, nine animals of every species (without excepting
the human) were sacrificed, and their bleeding bodies suspended in the sacred
grove adjacent to the temple[820].
The only traces that now subsist of this barbaric superstition are contained in
the Edda[821],
a system of mythology, compiled in Iceland about the thirteenth century, and
studied by the learned of Denmark and Sweden, as the most valuable remains of
their ancient traditions.

Notwithstanding the mysterious
obscurity of the Edda, we can easily distinguish two persons confounded under
the name of Odin; the god of war, and the great legislator of Scandinavia. The
latter, the Mahomet of the North, instituted a religion adapted to the climate
and to the people. Numerous tribes on either side of the Baltic were subdued by
the invincible valor of Odin, by his persuasive eloquence, and by the fame which
he acquired of a most skilful magician. The faith that he had propagated, during
a long and prosperous life, he confirmed by a voluntary death. Apprehensive of
the ignominious approach of disease and infirmity, he resolved to expire as
became a warrior. In a solemn assembly of the Swedes and Goths, he wounded
himself in nine mortal places, hastening away (as he asserted with his dying
voice) to prepare the feast of heroes in the palace of the God of war[822].

The native
and proper habitation of Odin is distinguished by the appellation of As-gard.
The happy resemblance of that name with As-burg, or As-of[823],
words of a similar signification, has given rise to an historical system of so
pleasing a contexture, that we could almost wish to persuade ourselves of its
truth. It is supposed that Odin was the chief of a tribe of barbarians which
dwelt on the banks of the Lake Maeotis, till the fall of Mithridates and the
arms of Pompey menaced the North with servitude. That Odin, yielding with
indignant fury to a power which he was unable to resist, conducted his tribe
from the frontiers of the Asiatic Sarmatia into Sweden, with the great design of
forming, in that inaccessible retreat of freedom, a religion and a people,
which, in some remote age, might be subservient to his immortal revenge; when
his invincible Goths, armed with martial fanaticism, should issue in numerous
swarms from the neighborhood of the Polar circle, to chastise the oppressors of
mankind[824].

If so many
successive generations of Goths were capable of preserving a faint tradition of
their Scandinavian origin, we must not expect, from such unlettered barbarians,
any distinct account of the time and circumstances of their emigration. To cross
the Baltic was an easy and natural attempt. The inhabitants of Sweden were
masters of a sufficient number of large vessels, with oars[825],
and the distance is little more than one hundred miles from Carlscroon to the
nearest ports of Pomerania and Prussia. Here, at length, we land on firm and
historic ground. At least as early as the Christian aera[826],
and as late as the age of the Antonines[827],
the Goths were established towards the mouth of the Vistula, and in that fertile
province where the commercial cities of Thorn, Elbing, Koningsberg, and
Dantzick, were long afterwards founded[828].
Westward of the Goths, the numerous tribes of the Vandals were spread along the
banks of the Oder, and the sea-coast of Pomerania and Mecklenburgh. A striking
resemblance of manners, complexion, religion, and language, seemed to indicate
that the Vandals and the Goths were originally one great people[829].
The latter appear to have been subdivided into Ostrogoths, Visigoths, and
Gepidae[830].
The distinction among the Vandals was more strongly marked by the independent
names of Heruli, Burgundians, Lombards, and a variety of other petty states,
many of which, in a future age, expanded themselves into powerful monarchies[831].

In the age
of the Antonines, the Goths were still seated in Prussia. About the reign of
Alexander Severus, the Roman province of Dacia had already experienced their
proximity by frequent and destructive inroads[832].
In this interval, therefore, of about seventy years, we must place the second
migration of about seventy years, we must place the second migration of the
Goths from the Baltic to the Euxine; but the cause that produced it lies
concealed among the various motives which actuate the conduct of unsettled
barbarians. Either a pestilence or a famine, a victory or a defeat, an oracle of
the gods or the eloquence of a daring leader, were sufficient to impel the
Gothic arms on the milder climates of the south. Besides the influence of a
martial religion, the numbers and spirit of the Goths were equal to the most
dangerous adventures. The use of round bucklers and short swords rendered them
formidable in a close engagement; the manly obedience which they yielded to
hereditary kings, gave uncommon union and stability to their councils[833];
and the renowned Amala, the hero of that age, and the tenth ancestor of
Theodoric, king of Italy, enforced, by the ascendant of personal merit, the
prerogative of his birth, which he derived from the Anses, or demigods of the
Gothic nation[834].

The fame
of a great enterprise excited the bravest warriors from all the Vandalic states
of Germany, many of whom are seen a few years afterwards combating under the
common standard of the Goths[835].
The first motions of the emigrants carried them to the banks of the Prypec, a
river universally conceived by the ancients to be the southern branch of the
Borysthenes[836].
The windings of that great stream through the plains of Poland and Russia gave a
direction to their line of march, and a constant supply of fresh water and
pasturage to their numerous herds of cattle. They followed the unknown course of
the river, confident in their valor, and careless of whatever power might oppose
their progress. The Bastarnae and the Venedi were the first who presented
themselves; and the flower of their youth, either from choice or compulsion,
increased the Gothic army. The Bastarnae dwelt on the northern side of the
Carpathian Mountains: the immense tract of land that separated the Bastarnae
from the savages of Finland was possessed, or rather wasted, by the Venedi[837];
we have some reason to believe that the first of these nations, which
distinguished itself in the Macedonian war[838],
and was afterwards divided into the formidable tribes of the Peucini, the
Borani, the Carpi, &c., derived its origin from the Germans[839].
With better authority, a Sarmatian extraction may be assigned to the Venedi, who
rendered themselves so famous in the middle ages[840].
But the confusion of blood and manners on that doubtful frontier often perplexed
the most accurate observers[841].
As the Goths advanced near the Euxine Sea, they encountered a purer race of
Sarmatians, the Jazyges, the Alani[842],
and the Roxolani; and they were probably the first Germans who saw the mouths of
the Borysthenes, and of the Tanais. If we inquire into the characteristic marks
of the people of Germany and of Sarmatia, we shall discover that those two great
portions of human kind were principally distinguished by fixed huts or movable
tents, by a close dress or flowing garments, by the marriage of one or of
several wives, by a military force, consisting, for the most part, either of
infantry or cavalry; and above all, by the use of the Teutonic, or of the
Sclavonian language; the last of which has been diffused by conquest, from the
confines of Italy to the neighborhood of Japan.

Chapter X
Emperors
Decius, Gallus, Aemilianus, Valerian and Gallienus
Part
II

The Goths
were now in possession of the Ukraine, a country of considerable extent and
uncommon fertility, intersected with navigable rivers, which, from either side,
discharge themselves into the Borysthenes; and interspersed with large and leafy
forests of oaks. The plenty of game and fish, the innumerable bee-hives
deposited in the hollow of old trees, and in the cavities of rocks, and forming,
even in that rude age, a valuable branch of commerce, the size of the cattle,
the temperature of the air, the aptness of the soil for every species of gain,
and the luxuriancy of the vegetation, all displayed the liberality of Nature,
and tempted the industry of man[843].
But the Goths withstood all these temptations, and still adhered to a life of
idleness, of poverty, and of rapine.

The
Scythian hordes, which, towards the east, bordered on the new settlements of the
Goths, presented nothing to their arms, except the doubtful chance of an
unprofitable victory. But the prospect of the Roman territories was far more
alluring; and the fields of Dacia were covered with rich harvests, sown by the
hands of an industrious, and exposed to be gathered by those of a warlike,
people. It is probable that the conquests of Trajan, maintained by his
successors, less for any real advantage than for ideal dignity, had contributed
to weaken the empire on that side. The new and unsettled province of Dacia was
neither strong enough to resist, nor rich enough to satiate, the rapaciousness
of the barbarians. As long as the remote banks of the Niester were considered as
the boundary of the Roman power, the fortifications of the Lower Danube were
more carelessly guarded, and the inhabitants of Maesia lived in supine security,
fondly conceiving themselves at an inaccessible distance from any barbarian
invaders. The irruptions of the Goths, under the reign of Philip, fatally
convinced them of their mistake. The king, or leader, of that fierce nation,
traversed with contempt the province of Dacia, and passed both the Niester and
the Danube without encountering any opposition capable of retarding his
progress. The relaxed discipline of the Roman troops betrayed the most important
posts, where they were stationed, and the fear of deserved punishment induced
great numbers of them to enlist under the Gothic standard. The various multitude
of barbarians appeared, at length, under the walls of Marcianopolis, a city
built by Trajan in honor of his sister, and at that time the capital of the
second Maesia[844].
The inhabitants consented to ransom their lives and property by the payment of a
large sum of money, and the invaders retreated back into their deserts,
animated, rather than satisfied, with the first success of their arms against an
opulent but feeble country. Intelligence was soon transmitted to the emperor
Decius, that Cniva, king of the Goths, had passed the Danube a second time, with
more considerable forces; that his numerous detachments scattered devastation
over the province of Maesia, whilst the main body of the army, consisting of
seventy thousand Germans and Sarmatians, a force equal to the most daring
achievements, required the presence of the Roman monarch, and the exertion of
his military power.

Decius
found the Goths engaged before Nicopolis, one of the many monuments of Trajan's
victories[845].
On his approach they raised the siege, but with a design only of marching away
to a conquest of greater importance, the siege of Philippopolis, a city of
Thrace, founded by the father of Alexander, near the foot of Mount Haemus[846].
Decius followed them through a difficult country, and by forced marches; but
when he imagined himself at a considerable distance from the rear of the Goths,
Cniva turned with rapid fury on his pursuers. The camp of the Romans was
surprised and pillaged, and, for the first time, their emperor fled in disorder
before a troop of half-armed barbarians. After a long resistance, Philippopolis,
destitute of succor, was taken by storm. A hundred thousand persons are reported
to have been massacred in the sack of that great city[847].
Many prisoners of consequence became a valuable accession to the spoil; and
Priscus, a brother of the late emperor Philip, blushed not to assume the purple,
under the protection of the barbarous enemies of Rome[848].
The time, however, consumed in that tedious siege, enabled Decius to revive the
courage, restore the discipline, and recruit the numbers of his troops. He
intercepted several parties of Carpi, and other Germans, who were hastening to
share the victory of their countrymen[849],
intrusted the passes of the mountains to officers of approved valor and
fidelity[850],
repaired and strengthened the fortifications of the Danube, and exerted his
utmost vigilance to oppose either the progress or the retreat of the Goths.
Encouraged by the return of fortune, he anxiously waited for an opportunity to
retrieve, by a great and decisive blow, his own glory, and that of the Roman
arms[851].

At the
same time when Decius was struggling with the violence of the tempest, his mind,
calm and deliberate amidst the tumult of war, investigated the more general
causes, that, since the age of the Antonines, had so impetuously urged the
decline of the Roman greatness. He soon discovered that it was impossible to
replace that greatness on a permanent basis, without restoring public virtue,
ancient principles and manners, and the oppressed majesty of the laws. To
execute this noble but arduous design, he first resolved to revive the obsolete
office of censor; an office which, as long as it had subsisted in its pristine
integrity, had so much contributed to the perpetuity of the state[852],
till it was usurped and gradually neglected by the Caesars[853].
Conscious that the favor of the sovereign may confer power, but that the esteem
of the people can alone bestow authority, he submitted the choice of the censor
to the unbiased voice of the senate. By their unanimous votes, or rather
acclamations, Valerian, who was afterwards emperor, and who then served with
distinction in the army of Decius, was declared the most worthy of that exalted
honor. As soon as the decree of the senate was transmitted to the emperor, he
assembled a great council in his camp, and before the investiture of the censor
elect, he apprised him of the difficulty and importance of his great office.
"Happy Valerian," said the prince to his distinguished subject, "happy in the
general approbation of the senate and of the Roman republic! Accept the
censorship of mankind; and judge of our manners. You will select those who
deserve to continue members of the senate; you will restore the equestrian order
to its ancient splendor; you will improve the revenue, yet moderate the public
burdens. You will distinguish into regular classes the various and infinite
multitude of citizens, and accurately view the military strength, the wealth,
the virtue, and the resources of Rome. Your decisions shall obtain the force of
laws. The army, the palace, the ministers of justice, and the great officers of
the empire, are all subject to your tribunal. None are exempted, excepting only
the ordinary consuls[854],
the praefect of the city, the king of the sacrifices, and (as long as she
preserves her chastity inviolate) the eldest of the vestal virgins. Even these
few, who may not dread the severity, will anxiously solicit the esteem, of the
Roman censor[855]."

A
magistrate, invested with such extensive powers, would have appeared not so much
the minister, as the colleague of his sovereign[856].
Valerian justly dreaded an elevation so full of envy and of suspicion. He
modestly argued the alarming greatness of the trust, his own insufficiency, and
the incurable corruption of the times. He artfully insinuated, that the office
of censor was inseparable from the Imperial dignity, and that the feeble hands
of a subject were unequal to the support of such an immense weight of cares and
of power[857].
The approaching event of war soon put an end to the prosecution of a project so
specious, but so impracticable; and whilst it preserved Valerian from the
danger, saved the emperor Decius from the disappointment, which would most
probably have attended it. A censor may maintain, he can never restore, the
morals of a state. It is impossible for such a magistrate to exert his authority
with benefit, or even with effect, unless he is supported by a quick sense of
honor and virtue in the minds of the people, by a decent reverence for the
public opinion, and by a train of useful prejudices combating on the side of
national manners. In a period when these principles are annihilated, the
censorial jurisdiction must either sink into empty pageantry, or be converted
into a partial instrument of vexatious oppression[858].
It was easier to vanquish the Goths than to eradicate the public vices; yet even
in the first of these enterprises, Decius lost his army and his
life.

The Goths
were now, on every side, surrounded and pursued by the Roman arms. The flower of
their troops had perished in the long siege of Philippopolis, and the exhausted
country could no longer afford subsistence for the remaining multitude of
licentious barbarians. Reduced to this extremity, the Goths would gladly have
purchased, by the surrender of all their booty and prisoners, the permission of
an undisturbed retreat. But the emperor, confident of victory, and resolving, by
the chastisement of these invaders, to strike a salutary terror into the nations
of the North, refused to listen to any terms of accommodation. The high-spirited
barbarians preferred death to slavery. An obscure town of Maesia, called Forum
Terebronii[859],
was the scene of the battle. The Gothic army was drawn up in three lines, and
either from choice or accident, the front of the third line was covered by a
morass. In the beginning of the action, the son of Decius, a youth of the
fairest hopes, and already associated to the honors of the purple, was slain by
an arrow, in the sight of his afflicted father; who, summoning all his
fortitude, admonished the dismayed troops, that the loss of a single soldier was
of little importance to the republic[860].
The conflict was terrible; it was the combat of despair against grief and rage.
The first line of the Goths at length gave way in disorder; the second,
advancing to sustain it, shared its fate; and the third only remained entire,
prepared to dispute the passage of the morass, which was imprudently attempted
by the presumption of the enemy. "Here the fortune of the day turned, and all
things became adverse to the Romans; the place deep with ooze, sinking under
those who stood, slippery to such as advanced; their armor heavy, the waters
deep; nor could they wield, in that uneasy situation, their weighty javelins.
The barbarians, on the contrary, were inured to encounter in the bogs, their
persons tall, their spears long, such as could wound at a distance[861]."
In this morass the Roman army, after an ineffectual struggle, was irrecoverably
lost; nor could the body of the emperor ever be found[862].
Such was the fate of Decius, in the fiftieth year of his age; an accomplished
prince, active in war and affable in peace[863];
who, together with his son, has deserved to be compared, both in life and death,
with the brightest examples of ancient virtue[864].

This fatal
blow humbled, for a very little time, she insolence of the legions. They
appeared to have patiently expected, and submissively obeyed, the decree of the
senate which regulated the succession to the throne. From a just regard for the
memory of Decius, the Imperial title was conferred on Hostilianus, his only
surviving son; but an equal rank, with more effectual power, was granted to
Gallus, whose experience and ability seemed equal to the great trust of guardian
to the young prince and the distressed empire[865].
The first care of the new emperor was to deliver the Illyrian provinces from the
intolerable weight of the victorious Goths. He consented to leave in their hands
the rich fruits of their invasion, an immense booty, and what was still more
disgraceful, a great number of prisoners of the highest merit and quality. He
plentifully supplied their camp with every conveniency that could assuage their
angry spirits or facilitate their so much wished-for departure; and he even
promised to pay them annually a large sum of gold, on condition they should
never afterwards infest the Roman territories by their incursions[866].

In the age
of the Scipios, the most opulent kings of the earth, who courted the protection
of the victorious commonwealth, were gratified with such trifling presents as
could only derive a value from the hand that bestowed them; an ivory chair, a
coarse garment of purple, an inconsiderable piece of plate, or a quantity of
copper coin[867].
After the wealth of nations had centred in Rome, the emperors displayed their
greatness, and even their policy, by the regular exercise of a steady and
moderate liberality towards the allies of the state. They relieved the poverty
of the barbarians, honored their merit, and recompensed their fidelity. These
voluntary marks of bounty were understood to flow, not from the fears, but
merely from the generosity or the gratitude of the Romans; and whilst presents
and subsidies were liberally distributed among friends and suppliants, they were
sternly refused to such as claimed them as a debt[868].
But this stipulation, of an annual payment to a victorious enemy, appeared
without disguise in the light of an ignominious tribute; the minds of the Romans
were not yet accustomed to accept such unequal laws from a tribe of barbarians;
and the prince, who by a necessary concession had probably saved his country,
became the object of the general contempt and aversion. The death of
Hostiliamus, though it happened in the midst of a raging pestilence, was
interpreted as the personal crime of Gallus[869];
and even the defeat of the later emperor was ascribed by the voice of suspicion
to the perfidious counsels of his hated successor[870].
The tranquillity which the empire enjoyed during the first year of his
administration[871],
served rather to inflame than to appease the public discontent; and as soon as
the apprehensions of war were removed, the infamy of the peace was more deeply
and more sensibly felt.

But the
Romans were irritated to a still higher degree, when they discovered that they
had not even secured their repose, though at the expense of their honor. The
dangerous secret of the wealth and weakness of the empire had been revealed to
the world. New swarms of barbarians, encouraged by the success, and not
conceiving themselves bound by the obligation of their brethren, spread
devastation though the Illyrian provinces, and terror as far as the gates of
Rome. The defence of the monarchy, which seemed abandoned by the pusillanimous
emperor, was assumed by Aemilianus, governor of Pannonia and Maesia; who rallied
the scattered forces, and revived the fainting spirits of the troops. The
barbarians were unexpectedly attacked, routed, chased, and pursued beyond the
Danube. The victorious leader distributed as a donative the money collected for
the tribute, and the acclamations of the soldiers proclaimed him emperor on the
field of battle[872].
Gallus, who, careless of the general welfare, indulged himself in the pleasures
of Italy, was almost in the same instant informed of the success, of the revolt,
and of the rapid approach of his aspiring lieutenant. He advanced to meet him as
far as the plains of Spoleto. When the armies came in right of each other, the
soldiers of Gallus compared the ignominious conduct of their sovereign with the
glory of his rival. They admired the valor of Aemilianus; they were attracted by
his liberality, for he offered a considerable increase of pay to all deserters[873].
The murder of Gallus, and of his son Volusianus, put an end to the civil war;
and the senate gave a legal sanction to the rights of conquest. The letters of
Aemilianus to that assembly displayed a mixture of moderation and vanity. He
assured them, that he should resign to their wisdom the civil administration;
and, contenting himself with the quality of their general, would in a short time
assert the glory of Rome, and deliver the empire from all the barbarians both of
the North and of the East[874].
His pride was flattered by the applause of the senate; and medals are still
extant, representing him with the name and attributes of Hercules the Victor,
and Mars the Avenger[875].

If the new
monarch possessed the abilities, he wanted the time, necessary to fulfil these
splendid promises. Less than four months intervened between his victory and his
fall[876].
He had vanquished Gallus: he sunk under the weight of a competitor more
formidable than Gallus. That unfortunate prince had sent Valerian, already
distinguished by the honorable title of censor, to bring the legions of Gaul and
Germany[877]
to his aid. Valerian executed that commission with zeal and fidelity; and as he
arrived too late to save his sovereign, he resolved to revenge him. The troops
of Aemilianus, who still lay encamped in the plains of Spoleto, were awed by the
sanctity of his character, but much more by the superior strength of his army;
and as they were now become as incapable of personal attachment as they had
always been of constitutional principle, they readily imbrued their hands in the
blood of a prince who so lately had been the object of their partial choice. The
guilt was theirs[878],
but the advantage of it was Valerian's; who obtained the possession of the
throne by the means indeed of a civil war, but with a degree of innocence
singular in that age of revolutions; since he owed neither gratitude nor
allegiance to his predecessor, whom he dethroned.

Valerian
was about sixty years of age[879]
when he was invested with the purple, not by the caprice of the populace, or the
clamors of the army, but by the unanimous voice of the Roman world. In his
gradual ascent through the honors of the state, he had deserved the favor of
virtuous princes, and had declared himself the enemy of tyrants[880].
His noble birth, his mild but unblemished manners, his learning, prudence, and
experience, were revered by the senate and people; and if mankind (according to
the observation of an ancient writer) had been left at liberty to choose a
master, their choice would most assuredly have fallen on Valerian[881].
Perhaps the merit of this emperor was inadequate to his reputation; perhaps his
abilities, or at least his spirit, were affected by the languor and coldness of
old age. The consciousness of his decline engaged him to share the throne with a
younger and more active associate[882];
the emergency of the times demanded a general no less than a prince; and the
experience of the Roman censor might have directed him where to bestow the
Imperial purple, as the reward of military merit. But instead of making a
judicious choice, which would have confirmed his reign and endeared his memory,
Valerian, consulting only the dictates of affection or vanity, immediately
invested with the supreme honors his son Gallienus, a youth whose effeminate
vices had been hitherto concealed by the obscurity of a private station. The
joint government of the father and the son subsisted about seven, and the sole
administration of Gallien continued about eight, years. But the whole period was
one uninterrupted series of confusion and calamity. As the Roman empire was at
the same time, and on every side, attacked by the blind fury of foreign
invaders, and the wild ambition of domestic usurpers, we shall consult order and
perspicuity, by pursuing, not so much the doubtful arrangement of dates, as the
more natural distribution of subjects. The most dangerous enemies of Rome,
during the reigns of Valerian and Gallienus, were,

I.
The
Franks;

II.
The
Alemanni;

III.
The
Goths; and,

IV.
The
Persians.

Under
these general appellations, we may comprehend the adventures of less
considerable tribes, whose obscure and uncouth names would only serve to oppress
the memory and perplex the attention of the reader.

I.
As
the posterity of the Franks compose one of the greatest and most enlightened
nations of Europe, the powers of learning and ingenuity have been exhausted in
the discovery of their unlettered ancestors. To the tales of credulity have
succeeded the systems of fancy. Every passage has been sifted, every spot has
been surveyed, that might possibly reveal some faint traces of their origin. It
has been supposed that Pannonia[883],
that Gaul, that the northern parts of Germany[884],
gave birth to that celebrated colony of warriors. At length the most rational
critics, rejecting the fictitious emigrations of ideal conquerors, have
acquiesced in a sentiment whose simplicity persuades us of its truth[885].
They suppose, that about the year two hundred and forty[886],
a new confederacy was formed under the name of Franks, by the old inhabitants of
the Lower Rhine and the Weser[887].
The present circle of Westphalia, the Landgraviate of Hesse, and the duchies of
Brunswick and Luneburg, were the ancient of the Chauci who, in their
inaccessible morasses, defied the Roman arms[888];
of the Cherusci, proud of the fame of Arminius; of the Catti, formidable by
their firm and intrepid infantry; and of several other tribes of inferior power
and renown[889].
The love of liberty was the ruling passion of these Germans; the enjoyment of it
their best treasure; the word that expressed that enjoyment, the most pleasing
to their ear. They deserved, they assumed, they maintained the honorable
appellation of Franks, or Freemen; which concealed, though it did not
extinguish, the peculiar names of the several states of the confederacy[890].
Tacit consent, and mutual advantage, dictated the first laws of the union; it
was gradually cemented by habit and experience. The league of the Franks may
admit of some comparison with the Helvetic body; in which every canton,
retaining its independent sovereignty, consults with its brethren in the common
cause, without acknowledging the authority of any supreme head, or
representative assembly[891].
But the principle of the two confederacies was extremely different. A peace of
two hundred years has rewarded the wise and honest policy of the Swiss. An
inconstant spirit, the thirst of rapine, and a disregard to the most solemn
treaties, disgraced the character of the Franks.

Chapter X
Emperors
Decius, Gallus, Aemilianus, Valerian and Gallienus
Part
III

The Romans
had long experienced the daring valor of the people of Lower Germany. The union
of their strength threatened Gaul with a more formidable invasion, and required
the presence of Gallienus, the heir and colleague of Imperial power[892].
Whilst that prince, and his infant son Salonius, displayed, in the court of
Treves, the majesty of the empire its armies were ably conducted by their
general, Posthumus, who, though he afterwards betrayed the family of Valerian,
was ever faithful to the great interests of the monarchy. The treacherous
language of panegyrics and medals darkly announces a long series of victories.
Trophies and titles attest (if such evidence can attest) the fame of Posthumus,
who is repeatedly styled the Conqueror of the Germans, and the Savior of Gaul[893].

But a
single fact, the only one indeed of which we have any distinct knowledge,
erases, in a great measure, these monuments of vanity and adulation. The Rhine,
though dignified with the title of Safeguard of the provinces, was an imperfect
barrier against the daring spirit of enterprise with which the Franks were
actuated. Their rapid devastations stretched from the river to the foot of the
Pyrenees; nor were they stopped by those mountains. Spain, which had never
dreaded, was unable to resist, the inroads of the Germans. During twelve years,
the greatest part of the reign of Gallienus, that opulent country was the
theatre of unequal and destructive hostilities. Tarragona, the flourishing
capital of a peaceful province, was sacked and almost destroyed[894];
and so late as the days of Orosius, who wrote in the fifth century, wretched
cottages, scattered amidst the ruins of magnificent cities, still recorded the
rage of the barbarians[895].
When the exhausted country no longer supplied a variety of plunder, the Franks
seized on some vessels in the ports of Spain[896],
and transported themselves into Mauritania. The distant province was astonished
with the fury of these barbarians, who seemed to fall from a new world, as their
name, manners, and complexion, were equally unknown on the coast of Africa[897].

II.
In
that part of Upper Saxony, beyond the Elbe, which is at present called the
Marquisate of Lusace, there existed, in ancient times, a sacred wood, the awful
seat of the superstition of the Suevi. None were permitted to enter the holy
precincts, without confessing, by their servile bonds and suppliant posture, the
immediate presence of the sovereign Deity[898].
Patriotism contributed, as well as devotion, to consecrate the Sonnenwald, or
wood of the Semnones[899].
It was universally believed, that the nation had received its first existence on
that sacred spot. At stated periods, the numerous tribes who gloried in the
Suevic blood, resorted thither by their ambassadors; and the memory of their
common extraction was perpetrated by barbaric rites and human sacrifices. The
wide-extended name of Suevi filled the interior countries of Germany, from the
banks of the Oder to those of the Danube. They were distinguished from the other
Germans by their peculiar mode of dressing their long hair, which they gathered
into a rude knot on the crown of the head; and they delighted in an ornament
that showed their ranks more lofty and terrible in the eyes of the enemy[900].
Jealous as the Germans were of military renown, they all confessed the superior
valor of the Suevi; and the tribes of the Usipetes and Tencteri, who, with a
vast army, encountered the dictator Caesar, declared that they esteemed it not a
disgrace to have fled before a people to whose arms the immortal gods themselves
were unequal[901].

In the reign of the emperor
Caracalla, an innumerable swarm of Suevi appeared on the banks of the Mein, and
in the neighborhood of the Roman provinces, in quest either of food, of plunder,
or of glory[902].
The hasty army of volunteers gradually coalesced into a great and permanent
nation, and as it was composed from so many different tribes, assumed the name
of Alemanni[903],
or Allmen; to denote at once their various lineage and their common bravery[904].
The latter was soon felt by the Romans in many a hostile inroad. The Alemanni
fought chiefly on horseback; but their cavalry was rendered still more
formidable by a mixture of light infantry, selected from the bravest and most
active of the youth, whom frequent exercise had inured to accompany the horsemen
in the longest march, the most rapid charge, or the most precipitate retreat[905].

This warlike people of Germans had
been astonished by the immense preparations of Alexander Severus; they were
dismayed by the arms of his successor, a barbarian equal in valor and fierceness
to themselves. But still hovering on the frontiers of the empire, they increased
the general disorder that ensued after the death of Decius. They inflicted
severe wounds on the rich provinces of Gaul; they were the first who removed the
veil that covered the feeble majesty of Italy. A numerous body of the Alemanni
penetrated across the Danube and through the Rhaetian Alps into the plains of
Lombardy, advanced as far as Ravenna, and displayed the victorious banners of
barbarians almost in sight of Rome[906].

The insult and the danger rekindled
in the senate some sparks of their ancient virtue. Both the emperors were
engaged in far distant wars, Valerian in the East, and Gallienus on the Rhine.
All the hopes and resources of the Romans were in themselves. In this emergency,
the senators resumed he defence of the republic, drew out the Praetorian guards,
who had been left to garrison the capital, and filled up their numbers, by
enlisting into the public service the stoutest and most willing of the
Plebeians. The Alemanni, astonished with the sudden appearance of an army more
numerous than their own, retired into Germany, laden with spoil; and their
retreat was esteemed as a victory by the unwarlike Romans[907].

When Gallienus received the
intelligence that his capital was delivered from the barbarians, he was much
less delighted than alarmed with the courage of the senate, since it might one
day prompt them to rescue the public from domestic tyranny as well as from
foreign invasion. His timid ingratitude was published to his subjects, in an
edict which prohibited the senators from exercising any military employment, and
even from approaching the camps of the legions. But his fears were groundless.
The rich and luxurious nobles, sinking into their natural character, accepted,
as a favor, this disgraceful exemption from military service; and as long as
they were indulged in the enjoyment of their baths, their theatres, and their
villas, they cheerfully resigned the more dangerous cares of empire to the rough
hands of peasants and soldiers[908].

Another invasion of the Alemanni,
of a more formidable aspect, but more glorious event, is mentioned by a writer
of the lower empire. Three hundred thousand are said to have been vanquished, in
a battle near Milan, by Gallienus in person, at the head of only ten thousand
Romans[909].
We may, however, with great probability, ascribe this incredible victory either
to the credulity of the historian, or to some exaggerated exploits of one of the
emperor's lieutenants. It was by arms of a very different nature, that Gallienus
endeavored to protect Italy from the fury of the Germans. He espoused Pipa, the
daughter of a king of the Marcomanni, a Suevic tribe, which was often confounded
with the Alemanni in their wars and conquests[910].
To the father, as the price of his alliance, he granted an ample settlement in
Pannonia. The native charms of unpolished beauty seem to have fixed the daughter
in the affections of the inconstant emperor, and the bands of policy were more
firmly connected by those of love. But the haughty prejudice of Rome still
refused the name of marriage to the profane mixture of a citizen and a
barbarian; and has stigmatized the German princess with the opprobrious title of
concubine of Gallienus[911].

III.
We
have already traced the emigration of the Goths from Scandinavia, or at least
from Prussia, to the mouth of the Borysthenes, and have followed their
victorious arms from the Borysthenes to the Danube. Under the reigns of Valerian
and Gallienus, the frontier of the last- mentioned river was perpetually
infested by the inroads of Germans and Sarmatians; but it was defended by the
Romans with more than usual firmness and success. The provinces that were the
seat of war, recruited the armies of Rome with an inexhaustible supply of hardy
soldiers; and more than one of these Illyrian peasants attained the station, and
displayed the abilities, of a general. Though flying parties of the barbarians,
who incessantly hovered on the banks of the Danube, penetrated sometimes to the
confines of Italy and Macedonia, their progress was commonly checked, or their
return intercepted, by the Imperial lieutenants[912].
But the great stream of the Gothic hostilities was diverted into a very
different channel. The Goths, in their new settlement of the Ukraine, soon
became masters of the northern coast of the Euxine: to the south of that inland
sea were situated the soft and wealthy provinces of Asia Minor, which possessed
all that could attract, and nothing that could resist, a barbarian
conqueror.

The banks of the Borysthenes are
only sixty miles distant from the narrow entrance[913]
of the peninsula of Crim Tartary, known to the ancients under the name of
Chersonesus Taurica[914].
On that inhospitable shore, Euripides, embellishing with exquisite art the tales
of antiquity, has placed the scene of one of his most affecting tragedies[915].
The bloody sacrifices of Diana, the arrival of Orestes and Pylades, and the
triumph of virtue and religion over savage fierceness, serve to represent an
historical truth, that the Tauri, the original inhabitants of the peninsula,
were, in some degree, reclaimed from their brutal manners by a gradual
intercourse with the Grecian colonies, which settled along the maritime coast.
The little kingdom of Bosphorus, whose capital was situated on the Straits,
through which the Maeotis communicates itself to the Euxine, was composed of
degenerate Greeks and half-civilized barbarians. It subsisted, as an independent
state, from the time of the Peloponnesian war[916],
was at last swallowed up by the ambition of Mithridates[917],
and, with the rest of his dominions, sunk under the weight of the Roman arms.
From the reign of Augustus[918],
the kings of Bosphorus were the humble, but not useless, allies of the empire.
By presents, by arms, and by a slight fortification drawn across the Isthmus,
they effectually guarded against the roving plunderers of Sarmatia, the access
of a country, which, from its peculiar situation and convenient harbors,
commanded the Euxine Sea and Asia Minor[919].
As long as the sceptre was possessed by a lineal succession of kings, they
acquitted themselves of their important charge with vigilance and success.
Domestic factions, and the fears, or private interest, of obscure usurpers, who
seized on the vacant throne, admitted the Goths into the heart of Bosphorus.
With the acquisition of a superfluous waste of fertile soil, the conquerors
obtained the command of a naval force, sufficient to transport their armies to
the coast of Asia[920].
This ships used in the navigation of the Euxine were of a very singular
construction. They were slight flat-bottomed barks framed of timber only,
without the least mixture of iron, and occasionally covered with a shelving
roof, on the appearance of a tempest[921].
In these floating houses, the Goths carelessly trusted themselves to the mercy
of an unknown sea, under the conduct of sailors pressed into the service, and
whose skill and fidelity were equally suspicious. But the hopes of plunder had
banished every idea of danger, and a natural fearlessness of temper supplied in
their minds the more rational confidence, which is the just result of knowledge
and experience. Warriors of such a daring spirit must have often murmured
against the cowardice of their guides, who required the strongest assurances of
a settled calm before they would venture to embark; and would scarcely ever be
tempted to lose sight of the land. Such, at least, is the practice of the modern
Turks[922];
and they are probably not inferior, in the art of navigation, to the ancient
inhabitants of Bosphorus.

The fleet of the Goths, leaving the
coast of Circassia on the left hand, first appeared before Pityus[923],
the utmost limits of the Roman provinces; a city provided with a convenient
port, and fortified with a strong wall. Here they met with a resistance more
obstinate than they had reason to expect from the feeble garrison of a distant
fortress. They were repulsed; and their disappointment seemed to diminish the
terror of the Gothic name. As long as Successianus, an officer of superior rank
and merit, defended that frontier, all their efforts were ineffectual; but as
soon as he was removed by Valerian to a more honorable but less important
station, they resumed the attack of Pityus; and by the destruction of that city,
obliterated the memory of their former disgrace[924].

Circling round the eastern
extremity of the Euxine Sea, the navigation from Pityus to Trebizond is about
three hundred miles[925].
The course of the Goths carried them in sight of the country of Colchis, so
famous by the expedition of the Argonauts; and they even attempted, though
without success, to pillage a rich temple at the mouth of the River Phasis.
Trebizond, celebrated in the retreat of the ten thousand as an ancient colony of
Greeks[926],
derived its wealth and splendor from the magnificence of the emperor Hadrian,
who had constructed an artificial port on a coast left destitute by nature of
secure harbors[927].
The city was large and populous; a double enclosure of walls seemed to defy the
fury of the Goths, and the usual garrison had been strengthened by a
reenforcement of ten thousand men. But there are not any advantages capable of
supplying the absence of discipline and vigilance. The numerous garrison of
Trebizond, dissolved in riot and luxury, disdained to guard their impregnable
fortifications. The Goths soon discovered the supine negligence of the besieged,
erected a lofty pile of fascines, ascended the walls in the silence of the
night, and entered the defenceless city sword in hand. A general massacre of the
people ensued, whilst the affrighted soldiers escaped through the opposite gates
of the town. The most holy temples, and the most splendid edifices, were
involved in a common destruction. The booty that fell into the hands of the
Goths was immense: the wealth of the adjacent countries had been deposited in
Trebizond, as in a secure place of refuge. The number of captives was
incredible, as the victorious barbarians ranged without opposition through the
extensive province of Pontus[928].
The rich spoils of Trebizond filled a great fleet of ships that had been found
in the port. The robust youth of the sea-coast were chained to the oar; and the
Goths, satisfied with the success of their first naval expedition, returned in
triumph to their new establishment in the kingdom of Bosphorus[929].

The second expedition of the Goths
was undertaken with greater powers of men and ships; but they steered a
different course, and, disdaining the exhausted provinces of Pontus, followed
the western coast of the Euxine, passed before the wide mouths of the
Borysthenes, the Niester, and the Danube, and increasing their fleet by the
capture of a great number of fishing barks, they approached the narrow outlet
through which the Euxine Sea pours its waters into the Mediterranean, and
divides the continents of Europe and Asia. The garrison of Chalcedon was
encamped near the temple of Jupiter Urius, on a promontory that commanded the
entrance of the Strait; and so inconsiderable were the dreaded invasions of the
barbarians that this body of troops surpassed in number the Gothic army. But it
was in numbers alone that they surpassed it. They deserted with precipitation
their advantageous post, and abandoned the town of Chalcedon, most plentifully
stored with arms and money, to the discretion of the conquerors. Whilst they
hesitated whether they should prefer the sea or land Europe or Asia, for the
scene of their hostilities, a perfidious fugitive pointed out Nicomedia[930],
once the capital of the kings of Bithynia, as a rich and easy conquest. He
guided the march which was only sixty miles from the camp of Chalcedon[931],
directed the resistless attack, and partook of the booty; for the Goths had
learned sufficient policy to reward the traitor whom they detested. Nice, Prusa,
Apamaea, Cius[932],
cities that had sometimes rivalled, or imitated, the splendor of Nicomedia, were
involved in the same calamity, which, in a few weeks, raged without control
through the whole province of Bithynia. Three hundred years of peace, enjoyed by
the soft inhabitants of Asia, had abolished the exercise of arms, and removed
the apprehension of danger. The ancient walls were suffered to moulder away, and
all the revenue of the most opulent cities was reserved for the construction of
baths, temples, and theatres[933].

When the city of Cyzicus withstood
the utmost effort of Mithridates[934],
it was distinguished by wise laws, a naval power of two hundred galleys, and
three arsenals, of arms, of military engines, and of corn[935].
It was still the seat of wealth and luxury; but of its ancient strength, nothing
remained except the situation, in a little island of the Propontis, connected
with the continent of Asia only by two bridges. From the recent sack of Prusa,
the Goths advanced within eighteen miles[936]
of the city, which they had devoted to destruction; but the ruin of Cyzicus was
delayed by a fortunate accident. The season was rainy, and the Lake
Apolloniates, the reservoir of all the springs of Mount Olympus, rose to an
uncommon height. The little river of Rhyndacus, which issues from the lake,
swelled into a broad and rapid stream, and stopped the progress of the Goths.
Their retreat to the maritime city of Heraclea, where the fleet had probably
been stationed, was attended by a long train of wagons, laden with the spoils of
Bithynia, and was marked by the flames of Nico and Nicomedia, which they
wantonly burnt[937].
Some obscure hints are mentioned of a doubtful combat that secured their
retreat[938].
But even a complete victory would have been of little moment, as the approach of
the autumnal equinox summoned them to hasten their return. To navigate the
Euxine before the month of May, or after that of September, is esteemed by the
modern Turks the most unquestionable instance of rashness and folly[939].

When we are informed that the third
fleet, equipped by the Goths in the ports of Bosphorus, consisted of five
hundred sails of ships[940],
our ready imagination instantly computes and multiplies the formidable armament;
but, as we are assured by the judicious Strabo[941],
that the piratical vessels used by the barbarians of Pontus and the Lesser
Scythia, were not capable of containing more than twenty-five or thirty men we
may safely affirm, that fifteen thousand warriors, at the most, embarked in this
great expedition. Impatient of the limits of the Euxine, they steered their
destructive course from the Cimmerian to the Thracian Bosphorus. When they had
almost gained the middle of the Straits, they were suddenly driven back to the
entrance of them; till a favorable wind, springing up the next day, carried them
in a few hours into the placid sea, or rather lake, of the Propontis. Their
landing on the little island of Cyzicus was attended with the ruin of that
ancient and noble city. From thence issuing again through the narrow passage of
the Hellespont, they pursued their winding navigation amidst the numerous
islands scattered over the Archipelago, or the Aegean Sea. The assistance of
captives and deserters must have been very necessary to pilot their vessels, and
to direct their various incursions, as well on the coast of Greece as on that of
Asia. At length the Gothic fleet anchored in the port of Piraeus, five miles
distant from Athens[942],
which had attempted to make some preparations for a vigorous defence. Cleodamus,
one of the engineers employed by the emperor's orders to fortify the maritime
cities against the Goths, had already begun to repair the ancient walls, fallen
to decay since the time of Scylla. The efforts of his skill were ineffectual,
and the barbarians became masters of the native seat of the muses and the arts.
But while the conquerors abandoned themselves to the license of plunder and
intemperance, their fleet, that lay with a slender guard in the harbor of
Piraeus, was unexpectedly attacked by the brave Dexippus, who, flying with the
engineer Cleodamus from the sack of Athens, collected a hasty band of
volunteers, peasants as well as soldiers, and in some measure avenged the
calamities of his country[943].

But this exploit, whatever lustre
it might shed on the declining age of Athens, served rather to irritate than to
subdue the undaunted spirit of the northern invaders. A general conflagration
blazed out at the same time in every district of Greece. Thebes and Argos,
Corinth and Sparta, which had formerly waged such memorable wars against each
other, were now unable to bring an army into the field, or even to defend their
ruined fortifications. The rage of war, both by land and by sea, spread from the
eastern point of Sunium to the western coast of Epirus. The Goths had already
advanced within sight of Italy, when the approach of such imminent danger
awakened the indolent Gallienus from his dream of pleasure. The emperor appeared
in arms; and his presence seems to have checked the ardor, and to have divided
the strength, of the enemy. Naulobatus, a chief of the Heruli, accepted an
honorable capitulation, entered with a large body of his countrymen into the
service of Rome, and was invested with the ornaments of the consular dignity,
which had never before been profaned by the hands of a barbarian[944].
Great numbers of the Goths, disgusted with the perils and hardships of a tedious
voyage, broke into Maesia, with a design of forcing their way over the Danube to
their settlements in the Ukraine. The wild attempt would have proved inevitable
destruction, if the discord of the Roman generals had not opened to the
barbarians the means of an escape[945].
The small remainder of this destroying host returned on board their vessels; and
measuring back their way through the Hellespont and the Bosphorus, ravaged in
their passage the shores of Troy, whose fame, immortalized by Homer, will
probably survive the memory of the Gothic conquests. As soon as they found
themselves in safety within the basin of the Euxine, they landed at Anchialus in
Thrace, near the foot of Mount Haemus; and, after all their toils, indulged
themselves in the use of those pleasant and salutary hot baths. What remained of
the voyage was a short and easy navigation[946].
Such was the various fate of this third and greatest of their naval enterprises.
It may seem difficult to conceive how the original body of fifteen thousand
warriors could sustain the losses and divisions of so bold an adventure. But as
their numbers were gradually wasted by the sword, by shipwrecks, and by the
influence of a warm climate, they were perpetually renewed by troops of banditti
and deserters, who flocked to the standard of plunder, and by a crowd of
fugitive slaves, often of German or Sarmatian extraction, who eagerly seized the
glorious opportunity of freedom and revenge. In these expeditions, the Gothic
nation claimed a superior share of honor and danger; but the tribes that fought
under the Gothic banners are sometimes distinguished and sometimes confounded in
the imperfect histories of that age; and as the barbarian fleets seemed to issue
from the mouth of the Tanais, the vague but familiar appellation of Scythians
was frequently bestowed on the mixed multitude[947].

Chapter X
Emperors
Decius, Gallus, Aemilianus, Valerian and Gallienus
Part
IV

In the
general calamities of mankind, the death of an individual, however exalted, the
ruin of an edifice, however famous, are passed over with careless inattention.
Yet we cannot forget that the temple of Diana at Ephesus, after having risen
with increasing splendor from seven repeated misfortunes[948],
was finally burnt by the Goths in their third naval invasion. The arts of
Greece, and the wealth of Asia, had conspired to erect that sacred and
magnificent structure. It was supported by a hundred and twenty-seven marble
columns of the Ionic order. They were the gifts of devout monarchs, and each was
sixty feet high. The altar was adorned with the masterly sculptures of
Praxiteles, who had, perhaps, selected from the favorite legends of the place
the birth of the divine children of Latona, the concealment of Apollo after the
slaughter of the Cyclops, and the clemency of Bacchus to the vanquished
Amazons[949].
Yet the length of the temple of Ephesus was only four hundred and twenty-five
feet, about two thirds of the measure of the church of St. Peter's at Rome[950].
In the other dimensions, it was still more inferior to that sublime production
of modern architecture. The spreading arms of a Christian cross require a much
greater breadth than the oblong temples of the Pagans; and the boldest artists
of antiquity would have been startled at the proposal of raising in the air a
dome of the size and proportions of the Pantheon. The temple of Diana was,
however, admired as one of the wonders of the world. Successive empires, the
Persian, the Macedonian, and the Roman, had revered its sanctity and enriched
its splendor[951].
But the rude savages of the Baltic were destitute of a taste for the elegant
arts, and they despised the ideal terrors of a foreign superstition[952].

Another
circumstance is related of these invasions, which might deserve our notice, were
it not justly to be suspected as the fanciful conceit of a recent sophist. We
are told, that in the sack of Athens the Goths had collected all the libraries,
and were on the point of setting fire to this funeral pile of Grecian learning,
had not one of their chiefs, of more refined policy than his brethren, dissuaded
them from the design; by the profound observation, that as long as the Greeks
were addicted to the study of books, they would never apply themselves to the
exercise of arms[953].
The sagacious counsellor (should the truth of the fact be admitted) reasoned
like an ignorant barbarian. In the most polite and powerful nations, genius of
every kind has displayed itself about the same period; and the age of science
has generally been the age of military virtue and success.

IV.
The
new sovereign of Persia, Artaxerxes and his son Sapor, had triumphed (as we have
already seen) over the house of Arsaces. Of the many princes of that ancient
race. Chosroes, king of Armenia, had alone preserved both his life and his
independence. He defended himself by the natural strength of his country; by the
perpetual resort of fugitives and malecontents; by the alliance of the Romans,
and above all, by his own courage. Invincible in arms, during a thirty years'
war, he was at length assassinated by the emissaries of Sapor, king of Persia.
The patriotic satraps of Armenia, who asserted the freedom and dignity of the
crown, implored the protection of Rome in favor of Tiridates, the lawful heir.
But the son of Chosroes was an infant, the allies were at a distance, and the
Persian monarch advanced towards the frontier at the head of an irresistible
force. Young Tiridates, the future hope of his country, was saved by the
fidelity of a servant, and Armenia continued above twenty-seven years a
reluctant province of the great monarchy of Persia[954].
Elated with this easy conquest, and presuming on the distresses or the
degeneracy of the Romans, Sapor obliged the strong garrisons of Carrhae and
Nisibis[955]
to surrender, and spread devastation and terror on either side of the
Euphrates.

The loss of an important frontier,
the ruin of a faithful and natural ally, and the rapid success of Sapor's
ambition, affected Rome with a deep sense of the insult as well as of the
danger. Valerian flattered himself, that the vigilance of his lieutenants would
sufficiently provide for the safety of the Rhine and of the Danube; but he
resolved, notwithstanding his advanced age, to march in person to the defence of
the Euphrates. During his progress through Asia Minor, the naval enterprises of
the Goths were suspended, and the afflicted province enjoyed a transient and
fallacious calm. He passed the Euphrates, encountered the Persian monarch near
the walls of Edessa, was vanquished, and taken prisoner by Sapor. The
particulars of this great event are darkly and imperfectly represented; yet, by
the glimmering light which is afforded us, we may discover a long series of
imprudence, of error, and of deserved misfortunes on the side of the Roman
emperor. He reposed an implicit confidence in Macrianus, his Praetorian
praefect[956].
That worthless minister rendered his master formidable only to the oppressed
subjects, and contemptible to the enemies of Rome[957].
By his weak or wicked counsels, the Imperial army was betrayed into a situation
where valor and military skill were equally unavailing[958].
The vigorous attempt of the Romans to cut their way through the Persian host was
repulsed with great slaughter[959];
and Sapor, who encompassed the camp with superior numbers, patiently waited till
the increasing rage of famine and pestilence had insured his victory. The
licentious murmurs of the legions soon accused Valerian as the cause of their
calamities; their seditious clamors demanded an instant capitulation. An immense
sum of gold was offered to purchase the permission of a disgraceful retreat. But
the Persian, conscious of his superiority, refused the money with disdain; and
detaining the deputies, advanced in order of battle to the foot of the Roman
rampart, and insisted on a personal conference with the emperor. Valerian was
reduced to the necessity of intrusting his life and dignity to the faith of an
enemy. The interview ended as it was natural to expect. The emperor was made a
prisoner, and his astonished troops laid down their arms[960].
In such a moment of triumph, the pride and policy of Sapor prompted him to fill
the vacant throne with a successor entirely dependent on his pleasure. Cyriades,
an obscure fugitive of Antioch, stained with every vice, was chosen to dishonor
the Roman purple; and the will of the Persian victor could not fail of being
ratified by the acclamations, however reluctant, of the captive army[961].

The Imperial slave was eager to
secure the favor of his master by an act of treason to his native country. He
conducted Sapor over the Euphrates, and, by the way of Chalcis, to the
metropolis of the East. So rapid were the motions of the Persian cavalry, that,
if we may credit a very judicious historian[962],
the city of Antioch was surprised when the idle multitude was fondly gazing on
the amusements of the theatre. The splendid buildings of Antioch, private as
well as public, were either pillaged or destroyed; and the numerous inhabitants
were put to the sword, or led away into captivity[963].
The tide of devastation was stopped for a moment by the resolution of the high
priest of Emesa. Arrayed in his sacerdotal robes, he appeared at the head of a
great body of fanatic peasants, armed only with slings, and defended his god and
his property from the sacrilegious hands of the followers of Zoroaster[964].
But the ruin of Tarsus, and of many other cities, furnishes a melancholy proof
that, except in this singular instance, the conquest of Syria and Cilicia
scarcely interrupted the progress of the Persian arms. The advantages of the
narrow passes of Mount Taurus were abandoned, in which an invader, whose
principal force consisted in his cavalry, would have been engaged in a very
unequal combat: and Sapor was permitted to form the siege of Caesarea, the
capital of Cappadocia; a city, though of the second rank, which was supposed to
contain four hundred thousand inhabitants. Demosthenes commanded in the place,
not so much by the commission of the emperor, as in the voluntary defence of his
country. For a long time he deferred its fate; and when at last Caesarea was
betrayed by the perfidy of a physician, he cut his way through the Persians, who
had been ordered to exert their utmost diligence to take him alive. This heroic
chief escaped the power of a foe who might either have honored or punished his
obstinate valor; but many thousands of his fellow-citizens were involved in a
general massacre, and Sapor is accused of treating his prisoners with wanton and
unrelenting cruelty[965].
Much should undoubtedly be allowed for national animosity, much for humbled
pride and impotent revenge; yet, upon the whole, it is certain, that the same
prince, who, in Armenia, had displayed the mild aspect of a legislator, showed
himself to the Romans under the stern features of a conqueror. He despaired of
making any permanent establishment in the empire, and sought only to leave
behind him a wasted desert, whilst he transported into Persia the people and the
treasures of the provinces[966].

At the time when the East trembled
at the name of Sapor, he received a present not unworthy of the greatest kings;
a long train of camels, laden with the most rare and valuable merchandises. The
rich offering was accompanied with an epistle, respectful, but not servile, from
Odenathus, one of the noblest and most opulent senators of Palmyra. "Who is this
Odenathus," (said the haughty victor, and he commanded that the present should
be cast into the Euphrates,) "that he thus insolently presumes to write to his
lord? If he entertains a hope of mitigating his punishment, let him fall
prostrate before the foot of our throne, with his hands bound behind his back.
Should he hesitate, swift destruction shall be poured on his head, on his whole
race, and on his country[967]."
The desperate extremity to which the Palmyrenian was reduced, called into action
all the latent powers of his soul. He met Sapor; but he met him in arms.
Infusing his own spirit into a little army collected from the villages of
Syria[968]
and the tents of the desert[969],
he hovered round the Persian host, harassed their retreat, carried off part of
the treasure, and, what was dearer than any treasure, several of the women of
the great king; who was at last obliged to repass the Euphrates with some marks
of haste and confusion[970].
By this exploit, Odenathus laid the foundations of his future fame and fortunes.
The majesty of Rome, oppressed by a Persian, was protected by a Syrian or Arab
of Palmyra.

The voice of history, which is
often little more than the organ of hatred or flattery, reproaches Sapor with a
proud abuse of the rights of conquest. We are told that Valerian, in chains, but
invested with the Imperial purple, was exposed to the multitude, a constant
spectacle of fallen greatness; and that whenever the Persian monarch mounted on
horseback, he placed his foot on the neck of a Roman emperor. Notwithstanding
all the remonstrances of his allies, who repeatedly advised him to remember the
vicissitudes of fortune, to dread the returning power of Rome, and to make his
illustrious captive the pledge of peace, not the object of insult, Sapor still
remained inflexible. When Valerian sunk under the weight of shame and grief, his
skin, stuffed with straw, and formed into the likeness of a human figure, was
preserved for ages in the most celebrated temple of Persia; a more real monument
of triumph, than the fancied trophies of brass and marble so often erected by
Roman vanity[971].
The tale is moral and pathetic, but the truth[972]
of it may very fairly be called in question. The letters still extant from the
princes of the East to Sapor are manifest forgeries[973];
nor is it natural to suppose that a jealous monarch should, even in the person
of a rival, thus publicly degrade the majesty of kings. Whatever treatment the
unfortunate Valerian might experience in Persia, it is at least certain that the
only emperor of Rome who had ever fallen into the hands of the enemy, languished
away his life in hopeless captivity.

The emperor Gallienus, who had long
supported with impatience the censorial severity of his father and colleague,
received the intelligence of his misfortunes with secret pleasure and avowed
indifference. "I knew that my father was a mortal," said he; "and since he has
acted as it becomes a brave man, I am satisfied." Whilst Rome lamented the fate
of her sovereign, the savage coldness of his son was extolled by the servile
courtiers as the perfect firmness of a hero and a stoic[974].
It is difficult to paint the light, the various, the inconstant character of
Gallienus, which he displayed without constraint, as soon as he became sole
possessor of the empire. In every art that he attempted, his lively genius
enabled him to succeed; and as his genius was destitute of judgment, he
attempted every art, except the important ones of war and government. He was a
master of several curious, but useless sciences, a ready orator, an elegant
poet[975],
a skilful gardener, an excellent cook, and most contemptible prince. When the
great emergencies of the state required his presence and attention, he was
engaged in conversation with the philosopher Plotinus[976],
wasting his time in trifling or licentious pleasures, preparing his initiation
to the Grecian mysteries, or soliciting a place in the Arcopagus of Athens. His
profuse magnificence insulted the general poverty; the solemn ridicule of his
triumphs impressed a deeper sense of the public disgrace[977].
The repeated intelligence of invasions, defeats, and rebellions, he received
with a careless smile; and singling out, with affected contempt, some particular
production of the lost province, he carelessly asked, whether Rome must be
ruined, unless it was supplied with linen from Egypt, and arras cloth from Gaul.
There were, however, a few short moments in the life of Gallienus, when,
exasperated by some recent injury, he suddenly appeared the intrepid soldier and
the cruel tyrant; till, satiated with blood, or fatigued by resistance, he
insensibly sunk into the natural mildness and indolence of his character[978].

At the time when the reins of
government were held with so loose a hand, it is not surprising, that a crowd of
usurpers should start up in every province of the empire against the son of
Valerian. It was probably some ingenious fancy, of comparing the thirty tyrants
of Rome with the thirty tyrants of Athens, that induced the writers of the
Augustan History to select that celebrated number, which has been gradually
received into a popular appellation[979].
But in every light the parallel is idle and defective. What resemblance can we
discover between a council of thirty persons, the united oppressors of a single
city, and an uncertain list of independent rivals, who rose and fell in
irregular succession through the extent of a vast empire? Nor can the number of
thirty be completed, unless we include in the account the women and children who
were honored with the Imperial title. The reign of Gallienus, distracted as it
was, produced only nineteen pretenders to the throne: Cyriades, Macrianus,
Balista, Odenathus, and Zenobia, in the East; in Gaul, and the western
provinces, Posthumus, Lollianus, Victorinus, and his mother Victoria, Marius,
and Tetricus; in Illyricum and the confines of the Danube, Ingenuus,
Regillianus, and Aureolus; in Pontus[980],
Saturninus; in Isauria, Trebellianus; Piso in Thessaly; Valens in Achaia;
Aemilianus in Egypt; and Celsus in Africa[981].
To illustrate the obscure monuments of the life and death of each individual,
would prove a laborious task, alike barren of instruction and of amusement. We
may content ourselves with investigating some general characters, that most
strongly mark the condition of the times, and the manners of the men, their
pretensions, their motives, their fate, and their destructive consequences of
their usurpation[982].

It is sufficiently known, that the
odious appellation of Tyrant was often employed by the ancients to express the
illegal seizure of supreme power, without any reference to the abuse of it.
Several of the pretenders, who raised the standard of rebellion against the
emperor Gallienus, were shining models of virtue, and almost all possessed a
considerable share of vigor and ability. Their merit had recommended them to the
favor of Valerian, and gradually promoted them to the most important commands of
the empire. The generals, who assumed the title of Augustus, were either
respected by their troops for their able conduct and severe discipline, or
admired for valor and success in war, or beloved for frankness and generosity.
The field of victory was often the scene of their election; and even the armorer
Marius, the most contemptible of all the candidates for the purple, was
distinguished, however by intrepid courage, matchless strength, and blunt
honesty[983].
His mean and recent trade cast, indeed, an air of ridicule on his elevation[984];
but his birth could not be more obscure than was that of the greater part of his
rivals, who were born of peasants, and enlisted in the army as private soldiers.
In times of confusion, every active genius finds the place assigned him by
nature: in a general state of war, military merit is the road to glory and to
greatness. Of the nineteen tyrants Tetricus only was a senator; Piso alone was a
noble. The blood of Numa, through twenty-eight successive generations, ran in
the veins of Calphurnius Piso[985],
who, by female alliances, claimed a right of exhibiting, in his house, the
images of Crassus and of the great Pompey[986],[987].
His ancestors had been repeatedly dignified with all the honors which the
commonwealth could bestow; and of all the ancient families of Rome, the
Calphurnian alone had survived the tyranny of the Caesars. The personal
qualities of Piso added new lustre to his race. The usurper Valens, by whose
order he was killed, confessed, with deep remorse, that even an enemy ought to
have respected the sanctity of Piso; and although he died in arms against
Gallienus, the senate, with the emperor's generous permission, decreed the
triumphal ornaments to the memory of so virtuous a rebel[988].

The lieutenants of Valerian were
grateful to the father, whom they esteemed. They disdained to serve the
luxurious indolence of his unworthy son. The throne of the Roman world was
unsupported by any principle of loyalty; and treason against such a prince might
easily be considered as patriotism to the state. Yet if we examine with candor
the conduct of these usurpers, it will appear, that they were much oftener
driven into rebellion by their fears, than urged to it by their ambition. They
dreaded the cruel suspicions of Gallienus; they equally dreaded the capricious
violence of their troops. If the dangerous favor of the army had imprudently
declared them deserving of the purple, they were marked for sure destruction;
and even prudence would counsel them to secure a short enjoyment of empire, and
rather to try the fortune of war than to expect the hand of an executioner. When
the clamor of the soldiers invested the reluctant victims with the ensigns of
sovereign authority, they sometimes mourned in secret their approaching fate.
“You have lost," said Saturninus, on the day of his elevation, "you have lost a
useful commander, and you have made a very wretched emperor[989]."

The apprehensions of Saturninus
were justified by the repeated experience of revolutions. Of the nineteen
tyrants who started up under the reign of Gallienus, there was not one who
enjoyed a life of peace, or a natural death. As soon as they were invested with
the bloody purple, they inspired their adherents with the same fears and
ambition which had occasioned their own revolt. Encompassed with domestic
conspiracy, military sedition, and civil war, they trembled on the edge of
precipices, in which, after a longer or shorter term of anxiety, they were
inevitably lost. These precarious monarchs received, however, such honors as the
flattery of their respective armies and provinces could bestow; but their claim,
founded on rebellion, could never obtain the sanction of law or history. Italy,
Rome, and the senate, constantly adhered to the cause of Gallienus, and he alone
was considered as the sovereign of the empire. That prince condescended, indeed,
to acknowledge the victorious arms of Odenathus, who deserved the honorable
distinction, by the respectful conduct which he always maintained towards the
son of Valerian. With the general applause of the Romans, and the consent of
Gallienus, the senate conferred the title of Augustus on the brave Palmyrenian;
and seemed to intrust him with the government of the East, which he already
possessed, in so independent a manner, that, like a private succession, he
bequeathed it to his illustrious widow, Zenobia[990].

The rapid and perpetual transitions
from the cottage to the throne, and from the throne to the grave, might have
amused an indifferent philosopher; were it possible for a philosopher to remain
indifferent amidst the general calamities of human kind. The election of these
precarious emperors, their power and their death, were equally destructive to
their subjects and adherents. The price of their fatal elevation was instantly
discharged to the troops by an immense donative, drawn from the bowels of the
exhausted people. However virtuous was their character, however pure their
intentions, they found themselves reduced to the hard necessity of supporting
their usurpation by frequent acts of rapine and cruelty. When they fell, they
involved armies and provinces in their fall. There is still extant a most savage
mandate from Gallienus to one of his ministers, after the suppression of
Ingenuus, who had assumed the purple in Illyricum. “It is not enough," says that
soft but inhuman prince, "that you exterminate such as have appeared in arms;
the chance of battle might have served me as effectually. The male sex of every
age must be extirpated; provided that, in the execution of the children and old
men, you can contrive means to save our reputation. Let every one die who has
dropped an expression, who has entertained a thought against me, against me, the
son of Valerian, the father and brother of so many princes[991].
Remember that Ingenuus was made emperor: tear, kill, hew in pieces. I write to
you with my own hand, and would inspire you with my own feelings[992]."
Whilst the public forces of the state were dissipated in private quarrels, the
defenceless provinces lay exposed to every invader. The bravest usurpers were
compelled, by the perplexity of their situation, to conclude ignominious
treaties with the common enemy, to purchase with oppressive tributes the
neutrality or services of the Barbarians, and to introduce hostile and
independent nations into the heart of the Roman monarchy[993].

Such were
the barbarians, and such the tyrants, who, under the reigns of Valerian and
Gallienus, dismembered the provinces, and reduced the empire to the lowest pitch
of disgrace and ruin, from whence it seemed impossible that it should ever
emerge. As far as the barrenness of materials would permit, we have attempted to
trace, with order and perspicuity, the general events of that calamitous period.
There still remain some particular facts;

I.
The
disorders of Sicily;

II.
The
tumults of Alexandria; and,

III.
The
rebellion of the Isaurians,

which may
serve to reflect a strong light on the horrid picture.

I.
Whenever numerous troops of
banditti, multiplied by success and impunity, publicly defy, instead of eluding
the justice of their country, we may safely infer, that the excessive weakness
of the government is felt and abused by the lowest ranks of the community. The
situation of Sicily preserved it from the Barbarians; nor could the disarmed
province have supported a usurper. The sufferings of that once flourishing and
still fertile island were inflicted by baser hands. A licentious crowd of slaves
and peasants reigned for a while over the plundered country, and renewed the
memory of the servile wars of more ancient times[994].
Devastations, of which the husbandman was either the victim or the accomplice,
must have ruined the agriculture of Sicily; and as the principal estates were
the property of the opulent senators of Rome, who often enclosed within a farm
the territory of an old republic, it is not improbable, that this private injury
might affect the capital more deeply, than all the conquests of the Goths or the
Persians.

II.
The
foundation of Alexandria was a noble design, at once conceived and executed by
the son of Philip. The beautiful and regular form of that great city, second
only to Rome itself, comprehended a circumference of fifteen miles[995];
it was peopled by three hundred thousand free inhabitants, besides at least an
equal number of slaves[996].
The lucrative trade of Arabia and India flowed through the port of Alexandria,
to the capital and provinces of the empire[997].
Idleness was unknown. Some were employed in blowing of glass, others in weaving
of linen, others again manufacturing the papyrus. Either sex, and every age, was
engaged in the pursuits of industry, nor did even the blind or the lame want
occupations suited to their condition[998].
But the people of Alexandria, a various mixture of nations, united the vanity
and inconstancy of the Greeks with the superstition and obstinacy of the
Egyptians. The most trifling occasion, a transient scarcity of flesh or lentils,
the neglect of an accustomed salutation, a mistake of precedency in the public
baths, or even a religious dispute[999],
were at any time sufficient to kindle a sedition among that vast multitude,
whose resentments were furious and implacable[1000].
After the captivity of Valerian and the insolence of his son had relaxed the
authority of the laws, the Alexandrians abandoned themselves to the ungoverned
rage of their passions, and their unhappy country was the theatre of a civil
war, which continued (with a few short and suspicious truces) above twelve
years[1001].
All intercourse was cut off between the several quarters of the afflicted city,
every street was polluted with blood, every building of strength converted into
a citadel; nor did the tumults subside till a considerable part of Alexandria
was irretrievably ruined. The spacious and magnificent district of Bruchion[1002],
with its palaces and musaeum, the residence of the kings and philosophers of
Egypt, is described above a century afterwards, as already reduced to its
present state of dreary solitude[1003].

III.
The
obscure rebellion of Trebellianus, who assumed the purple in Isauria, a petty
province of Asia Minor, was attended with strange and memorable consequences.
The pageant of royalty was soon destroyed by an officer of Gallienus; but his
followers, despairing of mercy, resolved to shake off their allegiance, not only
to the emperor, but to the empire, and suddenly returned to the savage manners
from which they had never perfectly been reclaimed. Their craggy rocks, a branch
of the wide-extended Taurus, protected their inaccessible retreat. The tillage
of some fertile valleys[1004]
supplied them with necessaries, and a habit of rapine with the luxuries of life.
In the heart of the Roman monarchy, the Isaurians long continued a nation of
wild barbarians. Succeeding princes, unable to reduce them to obedience, either
by arms or policy, were compelled to acknowledge their weakness, by surrounding
the hostile and independent spot with a strong chain of fortifications[1005],
which often proved insufficient to restrain the incursions of these domestic
foes. The Isaurians, gradually extending their territory to the sea-coast,
subdued the western and mountainous part of Cilicia, formerly the nest of those
daring pirates, against whom the republic had once been obliged to exert its
utmost force, under the conduct of the great Pompey[1006].

Our habits
of thinking so fondly connect the order of the universe with the fate of man,
that this gloomy period of history has been decorated with inundations,
earthquakes, uncommon meteors, preternatural darkness, and a crowd of prodigies
fictitious or exaggerated[1007].
But a long and general famine was a calamity of a more serious kind. It was the
inevitable consequence of rapine and oppression, which extirpated the produce of
the present, and the hope of future harvests. Famine is almost always followed
by epidemical diseases, the effect of scanty and unwholesome food. Other causes
must, however, have contributed to the furious plague, which, from the year two
hundred and fifty to the year two hundred and sixty-five, raged without
interruption in every province, every city, and almost every family, of the
Roman empire. During some time five thousand persons died daily in Rome; and
many towns, that had escaped the hands of the Barbarians, were entirely
depopulated[1008].

We have
the knowledge of a very curious circumstance, of some use perhaps in the
melancholy calculation of human calamities. An exact register was kept at
Alexandria of all the citizens entitled to receive the distribution of corn. It
was found, that the ancient number of those comprised between the ages of forty
and seventy, had been equal to the whole sum of claimants, from fourteen to
fourscore years of age, who remained alive after the reign of Gallienus[1009].
Applying this authentic fact to the most correct tables of mortality, it
evidently proves, that above half the people of Alexandria had perished; and
could we venture to extend the analogy to the other provinces, we might suspect,
that war, pestilence, and famine, had consumed, in a few years, the moiety of
the human species[1010].

Chapter XI
Reign of
Claudius, Defeat of the Goths
Part I

Reign of Claudius -
Defeat of the Goths - Victories, Triumph, and Death of
Aurelian

Under the
deplorable reigns of Valerian and Gallienus, the empire was oppressed and almost
destroyed by the soldiers, the tyrants, and the barbarians. It was saved by a
series of great princes, who derived their obscure origin from the martial
provinces of Illyricum. Within a period of about thirty years, Claudius,
Aurelian, Probus, Diocletian and his colleagues, triumphed over the foreign and
domestic enemies of the state, reestablished, with the military discipline, the
strength of the frontiers, and deserved the glorious title of Restorers of the
Roman world. The removal of an effeminate tyrant made way for a succession of
heroes. The indignation of the people imputed all their calamities to Gallienus,
and the far greater part were indeed, the consequence of his dissolute manners
and careless administration. He was even destitute of a sense of honor, which so
frequently supplies the absence of public virtue; and as long as he was
permitted to enjoy the possession of Italy, a victory of the barbarians, the
loss of a province, or the rebellion of a general, seldom disturbed the tranquil
course of his pleasures. At length, a considerable army, stationed on the Upper
Danube, invested with the Imperial purple their leader Aureolus; who, disdaining
a confined and barren reign over the mountains of Rhaetia, passed the Alps,
occupied Milan, threatened Rome, and challenged Gallienus to dispute in the
field the sovereignty of Italy. The emperor, provoked by the insult, and alarmed
by the instant danger, suddenly exerted that latent vigor which sometimes broke
through the indolence of his temper. Forcing himself from the luxury of the
palace, he appeared in arms at the head of his legions, and advanced beyond the
Po to encounter his competitor. The corrupted name of Pontirolo[1011]
still preserves the memory of a bridge over the Adda, which, during the action,
must have proved an object of the utmost importance to both armies. The Rhaetian
usurper, after receiving a total defeat and a dangerous wound, retired into
Milan. The siege of that great city was immediately formed; the walls were
battered with every engine in use among the ancients; and Aureolus, doubtful of
his internal strength, and hopeless of foreign succors already anticipated the
fatal consequences of unsuccessful rebellion.

His last
resource was an attempt to seduce the loyalty of the besiegers. He scattered
libels through the camp, inviting the troops to desert an unworthy master, who
sacrificed the public happiness to his luxury, and the lives of his most
valuable subjects to the slightest suspicions. The arts of Aureolus diffused
fears and discontent among the principal officers of his rival. A conspiracy was
formed by Heraclianus the Praetorian praefect, by Marcian, a general of rank and
reputation, and by Cecrops, who commanded a numerous body of Dalmatian guards.
The death of Gallienus was resolved; and notwithstanding their desire of first
terminating the siege of Milan, the extreme danger which accompanied every
moment's delay obliged them to hasten the execution of their daring purpose. At
a late hour of the night, but while the emperor still protracted the pleasures
of the table, an alarm was suddenly given, that Aureolus, at the head of all his
forces, had made a desperate sally from the town; Gallienus, who was never
deficient in personal bravery, started from his silken couch, and without
allowing himself time either to put on his armor, or to assemble his guards, he
mounted on horseback, and rode full speed towards the supposed place of the
attack. Encompassed by his declared or concealed enemies, he soon, amidst the
nocturnal tumult, received a mortal dart from an uncertain hand. Before he
expired, a patriotic sentiment using in the mind of Gallienus, induced him to
name a deserving successor; and it was his last request, that the Imperial
ornaments should be delivered to Claudius, who then commanded a detached army in
the neighborhood of Pavia. The report at least was diligently propagated, and
the order cheerfully obeyed by the conspirators, who had already agreed to place
Claudius on the throne. On the first news of the emperor's death, the troops
expressed some suspicion and resentment, till the one was removed, and the other
assuaged, by a donative of twenty pieces of gold to each soldier. They then
ratified the election, and acknowledged the merit of their new sovereign[1012].

The
obscurity which covered the origin of Claudius, though it was afterwards
embellished by some flattering fictions[1013],
sufficiently betrays the meanness of his birth. We can only discover that he was
a native of one of the provinces bordering on the Danube; that his youth was
spent in arms, and that his modest valor attracted the favor and confidence of
Decius. The senate and people already considered him as an excellent officer,
equal to the most important trusts; and censured the inattention of Valerian,
who suffered him to remain in the subordinate station of a tribune. But it was
not long before that emperor distinguished the merit of Claudius, by declaring
him general and chief of the Illyrian frontier, with the command of all the
troops in Thrace, Maesia, Dacia, Pannonia, and Dalmatia, the appointments of the
praefect of Egypt, the establishment of the proconsul of Africa, and the sure
prospect of the consulship. By his victories over the Goths, he deserved from
the senate the honor of a statue, and excited the jealous apprehensions of
Gallienus. It was impossible that a soldier could esteem so dissolute a
sovereign, nor is it easy to conceal a just contempt. Some unguarded expressions
which dropped from Claudius were officiously transmitted to the royal ear. The
emperor's answer to an officer of confidence describes in very lively colors his
own character, and that of the times. "There is not any thing capable of giving
me more serious concern, than the intelligence contained in your last despatch[1014];
that some malicious suggestions have indisposed towards us the mind of our
friend and parent Claudius. As you regard your allegiance, use every means to
appease his resentment, but conduct your negotiation with secrecy; let it not
reach the knowledge of the Dacian troops; they are already provoked, and it
might inflame their fury. I myself have sent him some presents: be it your care
that he accept them with pleasure. Above all, let him not suspect that I am made
acquainted with his imprudence. The fear of my anger might urge him to desperate
counsels[1015]."
The presents which accompanied this humble epistle, in which the monarch
solicited a reconciliation with his discontented subject, consisted of a
considerable sum of money, a splendid wardrobe, and a valuable service of silver
and gold plate. By such arts Gallienus softened the indignation and dispelled
the fears of his Illyrian general; and during the remainder of that reign, the
formidable sword of Claudius was always drawn in the cause of a master whom he
despised. At last, indeed, he received from the conspirators the bloody purple
of Gallienus: but he had been absent from their camp and counsels; and however
he might applaud the deed, we may candidly presume that he was innocent of the
knowledge of it[1016].
When Claudius ascended the throne, he was about fifty-four years of age.

The siege
of Milan was still continued, and Aureolus soon discovered that the success of
his artifices had only raised up a more determined adversary. He attempted to
negotiate with Claudius a treaty of alliance and partition. "Tell him," replied
the intrepid emperor, "that such proposals should have been made to Gallienus;
he, perhaps, might have listened to them with patience, and accepted a colleague
as despicable as himself[1017]."
This stern refusal, and a last unsuccessful effort, obliged Aureolus to yield
the city and himself to the discretion of the conqueror. The judgment of the
army pronounced him worthy of death; and Claudius, after a feeble resistance,
consented to the execution of the sentence. Nor was the zeal of the senate less
ardent in the cause of their new sovereign. They ratified, perhaps with a
sincere transport of zeal, the election of Claudius; and, as his predecessor had
shown himself the personal enemy of their order, they exercised, under the name
of justice, a severe revenge against his friends and family. The senate was
permitted to discharge the ungrateful office of punishment, and the emperor
reserved for himself the pleasure and merit of obtaining by his intercession a
general act of indemnity[1018].

Such
ostentatious clemency discovers less of the real character of Claudius, than a
trifling circumstance in which he seems to have consulted only the dictates of
his heart. The frequent rebellions of the provinces had involved almost every
person in the guilt of treason, almost every estate in the case of confiscation;
and Gallienus often displayed his liberality by distributing among his officers
the property of his subjects. On the accession of Claudius, an old woman threw
herself at his feet, and complained that a general of the late emperor had
obtained an arbitrary grant of her patrimony. This general was Claudius himself,
who had not entirely escaped the contagion of the times. The emperor blushed at
the reproach, but deserved the confidence which she had reposed in his equity.
The confession of his fault was accompanied with immediate and ample
restitution[1019].

In the
arduous task which Claudius had undertaken, of restoring the empire to its
ancient splendor, it was first necessary to revive among his troops a sense of
order and obedience. With the authority of a veteran commander, he represented
to them that the relaxation of discipline had introduced a long train of
disorders, the effects of which were at length experienced by the soldiers
themselves; that a people ruined by oppression, and indolent from despair, could
no longer supply a numerous army with the means of luxury, or even of
subsistence; that the danger of each individual had increased with the despotism
of the military order, since princes who tremble on the throne will guard their
safety by the instant sacrifice of every obnoxious subject. The emperor expiated
on the mischiefs of a lawless caprice, which the soldiers could only gratify at
the expense of their own blood; as their seditious elections had so frequently
been followed by civil wars, which consumed the flower of the legions either in
the field of battle, or in the cruel abuse of victory. He painted in the most
lively colors the exhausted state of the treasury, the desolation of the
provinces, the disgrace of the Roman name, and the insolent triumph of rapacious
barbarians. It was against those barbarians, he declared, that he intended to
point the first effort of their arms. Tetricus might reign for a while over the
West, and even Zenobia might preserve the dominion of the East[1020].
These usurpers were his personal adversaries; nor could he think of indulging
any private resentment till he had saved an empire, whose impending ruin would,
unless it was timely prevented, crush both the army and the
people.

The
various nations of Germany and Sarmatia, who fought under the Gothic standard,
had already collected an armament more formidable than any which had yet issued
from the Euxine. On the banks of the Niester, one of the great rivers that
discharge themselves into that sea, they constructed a fleet of two thousand, or
even of six thousand vessels[1021];
numbers which, however incredible they may seem, would have been insufficient to
transport their pretended army of three hundred and twenty thousand barbarians.
Whatever might be the real strength of the Goths, the vigor and success of the
expedition were not adequate to the greatness of the preparations. In their
passage through the Bosphorus, the unskilful pilots were overpowered by the
violence of the current; and while the multitude of their ships were crowded in
a narrow channel, many were dashed against each other, or against the shore. The
barbarians made several descents on the coasts both of Europe and Asia; but the
open country was already plundered, and they were repulsed with shame and loss
from the fortified cities which they assaulted. A spirit of discouragement and
division arose in the fleet, and some of their chiefs sailed away towards the
islands of Crete and Cyprus; but the main body, pursuing a more steady course,
anchored at length near the foot of Mount Athos, and assaulted the city of
Thessalonica, the wealthy capital of all the Macedonian provinces. Their
attacks, in which they displayed a fierce but artless bravery, were soon
interrupted by the rapid approach of Claudius, hastening to a scene of action
that deserved the presence of a warlike prince at the head of the remaining
powers of the empire. Impatient for battle, the Goths immediately broke up their
camp, relinquished the siege of Thessalonica, left their navy at the foot of
Mount Athos, traversed the hills of Macedonia, and pressed forwards to engage
the last defence of Italy.

We still
posses an original letter addressed by Claudius to the senate and people on this
memorable occasion. "Conscript fathers," says the emperor, "know that three
hundred and twenty thousand Goths have invaded the Roman territory. If I
vanquish them, your gratitude will reward my services. Should I fall, remember
that I am the successor of Gallienus. The whole republic is fatigued and
exhausted. We shall fight after Valerian, after Ingenuus, Regillianus,
Lollianus, Posthumus, Celsus, and a thousand others, whom a just contempt for
Gallienus provoked into rebellion. We are in want of darts, of spears, and of
shields. The strength of the empire, Gaul, and Spain, are usurped by Tetricus,
and we blush to acknowledge that the archers of the East serve under the banners
of Zenobia. Whatever we shall perform will be sufficiently great[1022]."
The melancholy firmness of this epistle announces a hero careless of his fate,
conscious of his danger, but still deriving a well-grounded hope from the
resources of his own mind.

The event
surpassed his own expectations and those of the world. By the most signal
victories he delivered the empire from this host of barbarians, and was
distinguished by posterity under the glorious appellation of the Gothic
Claudius. The imperfect historians of an irregular war[1023]
do not enable as to describe the order and circumstances of his exploits; but,
if we could be indulged in the allusion, we might distribute into three acts
this memorable tragedy.

I.
The
decisive battle was fought near Naissus, a city of Dardania. The legions at
first gave way, oppressed by numbers, and dismayed by misfortunes. Their ruin
was inevitable, had not the abilities of their emperor prepared a seasonable
relief. A large detachment, rising out of the secret and difficult passes of the
mountains, which, by his order, they had occupied, suddenly assailed the rear of
the victorious Goths. The favorable instant was improved by the activity of
Claudius. He revived the courage of his troops, restored their ranks, and
pressed the barbarians on every side. Fifty thousand men are reported to have
been slain in the battle of Naissus. Several large bodies of barbarians,
covering their retreat with a movable fortification of wagons, retired, or
rather escaped, from the field of slaughter.

II.
We
may presume that some insurmountable difficulty, the fatigue, perhaps, or the
disobedience, of the conquerors, prevented Claudius from completing in one day
the destruction of the Goths. The war was diffused over the province of Maesia,
Thrace, and Macedonia, and its operations drawn out into a variety of marches,
surprises, and tumultuary engagements, as well by sea as by land. When the
Romans suffered any loss, it was commonly occasioned by their own cowardice or
rashness; but the superior talents of the emperor, his perfect knowledge of the
country, and his judicious choice of measures as well as officers, assured on
most occasions the success of his arms. The immense booty, the fruit of so many
victories, consisted for the greater part of cattle and slaves. A select body of
the Gothic youth was received among the Imperial troops; the remainder was sold
into servitude; and so considerable was the number of female captives, that
every soldier obtained to his share two or three women. A circumstance from
which we may conclude, that the invaders entertained some designs of settlement
as well as of plunder; since even in a naval expedition, they were accompanied
by their families.

III.
The
loss of their fleet, which was either taken or sunk, had intercepted the retreat
of the Goths. A vast circle of Roman posts, distributed with skill, supported
with firmness, and gradually closing towards a common centre, forced the
barbarians into the most inaccessible parts of Mount Haemus, where they found a
safe refuge, but a very scanty subsistence. During the course of a rigorous
winter in which they were besieged by the emperor's troops, famine and
pestilence, desertion and the sword, continually diminished the imprisoned
multitude. On the return of spring, nothing appeared in arms except a hardy and
desperate band, the remnant of that mighty host which had embarked at the mouth
of the Niester.

The
pestilence which swept away such numbers of the barbarians, at length proved
fatal to their conqueror. After a short but glorious reign of two years,
Claudius expired at Sirmium, amidst the tears and acclamations of his subjects.
In his last illness, he convened the principal officers of the state and army,
and in their presence recommended Aurelian[1024],
one of his generals, as the most deserving of the throne, and the best qualified
to execute the great design which he himself had been permitted only to
undertake. The virtues of Claudius, his valor, affability, justice, and
temperance, his love of fame and of his country, place him in that short list of
emperors who added lustre to the Roman purple. Those virtues, however, were
celebrated with peculiar zeal and complacency by the courtly writers of the age
of Constantine, who was the great grandson of Crispus, the elder brother of
Claudius. The voice of flattery was soon taught to repeat, that gods, who so
hastily had snatched Claudius from the earth, rewarded his merit and piety by
the perpetual establishment of the empire in his family[1025].

Notwithstanding these oracles, the
greatness of the Flavian family (a name which it had pleased them to assume) was
deferred above twenty years, and the elevation of Claudius occasioned the
immediate ruin of his brother Quintilius, who possessed not sufficient
moderation or courage to descend into the private station to which the
patriotism of the late emperor had condemned him. Without delay or reflection,
he assumed the purple at Aquileia, where he commanded a considerable force; and
though his reign lasted only seventeen days[1026],
he had time to obtain the sanction of the senate, and to experience a mutiny of
the troops. As soon as he was informed that the great army of the Danube had
invested the well-known valor of Aurelian with Imperial power, he sunk under the
fame and merit of his rival; and ordering his veins to be opened, prudently
withdrew himself from the unequal contest[1027].

The
general design of this work will not permit us minutely to relate the actions of
every emperor after he ascended the throne, much less to deduce the various
fortunes of his private life. We shall only observe, that the father of Aurelian
was a peasant of the territory of Sirmium, who occupied a small farm, the
property of Aurelius, a rich senator. His warlike son enlisted in the troops as
a common soldier, successively rose to the rank of a centurion, a tribune, the
praefect of a legion, the inspector of the camp, the general, or, as it was then
called, the duke, of a frontier; and at length, during the Gothic war, exercised
the important office of commander- in-chief of the cavalry. In every station he
distinguished himself by matchless valor[1028],
rigid discipline, and successful conduct. He was invested with the consulship by
the emperor Valerian, who styles him, in the pompous language of that age, the
deliverer of Illyricum, the restorer of Gaul, and the rival of the Scipios. At
the recommendation of Valerian, a senator of the highest rank and merit, Ulpius
Crinitus, whose blood was derived from the same source as that of Trajan,
adopted the Pannonian peasant, gave him his daughter in marriage, and relieved
with his ample fortune the honorable poverty which Aurelian had preserved
inviolate[1029].

The reign
of Aurelian lasted only four years and about nine months; but every instant of
that short period was filled by some memorable achievement. He put an end to the
Gothic war, chastised the Germans who invaded Italy, recovered Gaul, Spain, and
Britain out of the hands of Tetricus, and destroyed the proud monarchy which
Zenobia had erected in the East on the ruins of the afflicted
empire.

It was the
rigid attention of Aurelian, even to the minutest articles of discipline, which
bestowed such uninterrupted success on his arms. His military regulations are
contained in a very concise epistle to one of his inferior officers, who is
commanded to enforce them, as he wishes to become a tribune, or as he is
desirous to live. Gaming, drinking, and the arts of divination, were severely
prohibited. Aurelian expected that his soldiers should be modest, frugal, and
laborous; that their armor should be constantly kept bright, their weapons
sharp, their clothing and horses ready for immediate service; that they should
live in their quarters with chastity and sobriety, without damaging the
cornfields, without stealing even a sheep, a fowl, or a bunch of grapes, without
exacting from their landlords, either salt, or oil, or wood. "The public
allowance," continues the emperor, "is sufficient for their support; their
wealth should be collected from the spoils of the enemy, not from the tears of
the provincials[1030]."
A single instance will serve to display the rigor, and even cruelty, of
Aurelian. One of the soldiers had seduced the wife of his host. The guilty
wretch was fastened to two trees forcibly drawn towards each other, and his
limbs were torn asunder by their sudden separation. A few such examples
impressed a salutary consternation. The punishments of Aurelian were terrible;
but he had seldom occasion to punish more than once the same offence. His own
conduct gave a sanction to his laws, and the seditious legions dreaded a chief
who had learned to obey, and who was worthy to command.

Chapter XI
Reign of
Claudius, Defeat of the Goths
Part II

The death
of Claudius had revived the fainting spirit of the Goths. The troops which
guarded the passes of Mount Haemus, and the banks of the Danube, had been drawn
away by the apprehension of a civil war; and it seems probable that the
remaining body of the Gothic and Vandalic tribes embraced the favorable
opportunity, abandoned their settlements of the Ukraine, traversed the rivers,
and swelled with new multitudes the destroying host of their countrymen. Their
united numbers were at length encountered by Aurelian, and the bloody and
doubtful conflict ended only with the approach of night[1031].
Exhausted by so many calamities, which they had mutually endured and inflicted
during a twenty years' war, the Goths and the Romans consented to a lasting and
beneficial treaty. It was earnestly solicited by the barbarians, and cheerfully
ratified by the legions, to whose suffrage the prudence of Aurelian referred the
decision of that important question. The Gothic nation engaged to supply the
armies of Rome with a body of two thousand auxiliaries, consisting entirely of
cavalry, and stipulated in return an undisturbed retreat, with a regular market
as far as the Danube, provided by the emperor's care, but at their own expense.
The treaty was observed with such religious fidelity, that when a party of five
hundred men straggled from the camp in quest of plunder, the king or general of
the barbarians commanded that the guilty leader should be apprehended and shot
to death with darts, as a victim devoted to the sanctity of their engagements[1032].
It is, however, not unlikely, that the precaution of Aurelian, who had exacted
as hostages the sons and daughters of the Gothic chiefs, contributed something
to this pacific temper. The youths he trained in the exercise of arms, and near
his own person: to the damsels he gave a liberal and Roman education, and by
bestowing them in marriage on some of his principal officers, gradually
introduced between the two nations the closest and most endearing connections[1033].

But the
most important condition of peace was understood rather than expressed in the
treaty. Aurelian withdrew the Roman forces from Dacia, and tacitly relinquished
that great province to the Goths and Vandals[1034].
His manly judgment convinced him of the solid advantages, and taught him to
despise the seeming disgrace, of thus contracting the frontiers of the monarchy.
The Dacian subjects, removed from those distant possessions which they were
unable to cultivate or defend, added strength and populousness to the southern
side of the Danube. A fertile territory, which the repetition of barbarous
inroads had changed into a desert, was yielded to their industry, and a new
province of Dacia still preserved the memory of Trajan's conquests. The old
country of that name detained, however, a considerable number of its
inhabitants, who dreaded exile more than a Gothic master[1035].
These degenerate Romans continued to serve the empire, whose allegiance they had
renounced, by introducing among their conquerors the first notions of
agriculture, the useful arts, and the conveniences of civilized life. An
intercourse of commerce and language was gradually established between the
opposite banks of the Danube; and after Dacia became an independent state, it
often proved the firmest barrier of the empire against the invasions of the
savages of the North. A sense of interest attached these more settled barbarians
to the alliance of Rome, and a permanent interest very frequently ripens into
sincere and useful friendship. This various colony, which filled the ancient
province, and was insensibly blended into one great people, still acknowledged
the superior renown and authority of the Gothic tribe, and claimed the fancied
honor of a Scandinavian origin. At the same time, the lucky though accidental
resemblance of the name of Getae[1036],
infused among the credulous Goths a vain persuasion, that in a remote age, their
own ancestors, already seated in the Dacian provinces, had received the
instructions of Zamolxis, and checked the victorious arms of Sesostris and
Darius[1037].

While the
vigorous and moderate conduct of Aurelian restored the Illyrian frontier, the
nation of the Alemanni[1038]
violated the conditions of peace, which either Gallienus had purchased, or
Claudius had imposed, and, inflamed by their impatient youth, suddenly flew to
arms. Forty thousand horse appeared in the field[1039],
and the numbers of the infantry doubled those of the cavalry[1040].
The first objects of their avarice were a few cities of the Rhaetian frontier;
but their hopes soon rising with success, the rapid march of the Alemanni traced
a line of devastation from the Danube to the Po[1041].

The
emperor was almost at the same time informed of the irruption, and of the
retreat, of the barbarians. Collecting an active body of troops, he marched with
silence and celerity along the skirts of the Hercynian forest; and the Alemanni,
laden with the spoils of Italy, arrived at the Danube, without suspecting, that
on the opposite bank, and in an advantageous post, a Roman army lay concealed
and prepared to intercept their return. Aurelian indulged the fatal security of
the barbarians, and permitted about half their forces to pass the river without
disturbance and without precaution. Their situation and astonishment gave him an
easy victory; his skilful conduct improved the advantage. Disposing the legions
in a semicircular form, he advanced the two horns of the crescent across the
Danube, and wheeling them on a sudden towards the centre, enclosed the rear of
the German host. The dismayed barbarians, on whatsoever side they cast their
eyes, beheld, with despair, a wasted country, a deep and rapid stream, a
victorious and implacable enemy.

Reduced to
this distressed condition, the Alemanni no longer disdained to sue for peace.
Aurelian received their ambassadors at the head of his camp, and with every
circumstance of martial pomp that could display the greatness and discipline of
Rome. The legions stood to their arms in well- ordered ranks and awful silence.
The principal commanders, distinguished by the ensigns of their rank, appeared
on horseback on either side of the Imperial throne. Behind the throne the
consecrated images of the emperor, and his predecessors[1042],
the golden eagles, and the various titles of the legions, engraved in letters of
gold, were exalted in the air on lofty pikes covered with silver. When Aurelian
assumed his seat, his manly grace and majestic figure[1043]
taught the barbarians to revere the person as well as the purple of their
conqueror. The ambassadors fell prostrate on the ground in silence. They were
commanded to rise, and permitted to speak. By the assistance of interpreters
they extenuated their perfidy, magnified their exploits, expatiated on the
vicissitudes of fortune and the advantages of peace, and, with an ill-timed
confidence, demanded a large subsidy, as the price of the alliance which they
offered to the Romans. The answer of the emperor was stern and imperious. He
treated their offer with contempt, and their demand with indignation, reproached
the barbarians, that they were as ignorant of the arts of war as of the laws of
peace, and finally dismissed them with the choice only of submitting to this
unconditional mercy, or awaiting the utmost severity of his resentment[1044].
Aurelian had resigned a distant province to the Goths; but it was dangerous to
trust or to pardon these perfidious barbarians, whose formidable power kept
Italy itself in perpetual alarms.

Immediately after this conference,
it should seem that some unexpected emergency required the emperor's presence in
Pannonia. He devolved on his lieutenants the care of finishing the destruction
of the Alemanni, either by the sword, or by the surer operation of famine. But
an active despair has often triumphed over the indolent assurance of success.
The barbarians, finding it impossible to traverse the Danube and the Roman camp,
broke through the posts in their rear, which were more feebly or less carefully
guarded; and with incredible diligence, but by a different road, returned
towards the mountains of Italy[1045].
Aurelian, who considered the war as totally extinguished, received the
mortifying intelligence of the escape of the Alemanni, and of the ravage which
they already committed in the territory of Milan. The legions were commanded to
follow, with as much expedition as those heavy bodies were capable of exerting,
the rapid flight of an enemy whose infantry and cavalry moved with almost equal
swiftness. A few days afterwards, the emperor himself marched to the relief of
Italy, at the head of a chosen body of auxiliaries, (among whom were the
hostages and cavalry of the Vandals,) and of all the Praetorian guards who had
served in the wars on the Danube[1046].

As the
light troops of the Alemanni had spread themselves from the Alps to the
Apennine, the incessant vigilance of Aurelian and his officers was exercised in
the discovery, the attack, and the pursuit of the numerous detachments.
Notwithstanding this desultory war, three considerable battles are mentioned, in
which the principal force of both armies was obstinately engaged[1047].
The success was various. In the first, fought near Placentia, the Romans
received so severe a blow, that, according to the expression of a writer
extremely partial to Aurelian, the immediate dissolution of the empire was
apprehended[1048].
The crafty barbarians, who had lined the woods, suddenly attacked the legions in
the dusk of the evening, and, it is most probable, after the fatigue and
disorder of a long march. The fury of their charge was irresistible; but, at
length, after a dreadful slaughter, the patient firmness of the emperor rallied
his troops, and restored, in some degree, the honor of his arms. The second
battle was fought near Fano in Umbria; on the spot which, five hundred years
before, had been fatal to the brother of Hannibal[1049].
Thus far the successful Germans had advanced along the Aemilian and Flaminian
way, with a design of sacking the defenceless mistress of the world. But
Aurelian, who, watchful for the safety of Rome, still hung on their rear, found
in this place the decisive moment of giving them a total and irretrievable
defeat[1050].
The flying remnant of their host was exterminated in a third and last battle
near Pavia; and Italy was delivered from the inroads of the
Alemanni.

Fear has
been the original parent of superstition, and every new calamity urges trembling
mortals to deprecate the wrath of their invisible enemies. Though the best hope
of the republic was in the valor and conduct of Aurelian, yet such was the
public consternation, when the barbarians were hourly expected at the gates of
Rome, that, by a decree of the senate the Sibylline books were consulted. Even
the emperor himself from a motive either of religion or of policy, recommended
this salutary measure, chided the tardiness of the senate[1051],
and offered to supply whatever expense, whatever animals, whatever captives of
any nation, the gods should require. Notwithstanding this liberal offer, it does
not appear, that any human victims expiated with their blood the sins of the
Roman people. The Sibylline books enjoined ceremonies of a more harmless nature,
processions of priests in white robes, attended by a chorus of youths and
virgins; lustrations of the city and adjacent country; and sacrifices, whose
powerful influence disabled the barbarians from passing the mystic ground on
which they had been celebrated. However puerile in themselves, these
superstitious arts were subservient to the success of the war; and if, in the
decisive battle of Fano, the Alemanni fancied they saw an army of spectres
combating on the side of Aurelian, he received a real and effectual aid from
this imaginary reenforcement[1052].

But
whatever confidence might be placed in ideal ramparts, the experience of the
past, and the dread of the future, induced the Romans to construct
fortifications of a grosser and more substantial kind. The seven hills of Rome
had been surrounded, by the successors of Romulus, with an ancient wall of more
than thirteen miles[1053].
The vast enclosure may seem disproportioned to the strength and numbers of the
infant state. But it was necessary to secure an ample extent of pasture and
arable land, against the frequent and sudden incursions of the tribes of Latium,
the perpetual enemies of the republic. With the progress of Roman greatness, the
city and its inhabitants gradually increased, filled up the vacant space,
pierced through the useless walls, covered the field of Mars, and, on every
side, followed the public highways in long and beautiful suburbs[1054].
The extent of the new walls, erected by Aurelian, and finished in the reign of
Probus, was magnified by popular estimation to near fifty[1055],
but is reduced by accurate measurement to about twenty-one miles[1056].
It was a great but a melancholy labor, since the defence of the capital betrayed
the decline of the monarchy. The Romans of a more prosperous age, who trusted to
the arms of the legions the safety of the frontier camps[1057],
were very far from entertaining a suspicion, that it would ever become necessary
to fortify the seat of empire against the inroads of the barbarians[1058].

The
victory of Claudius over the Goths, and the success of Aurelian against the
Alemanni, had already restored to the arms of Rome their ancient superiority
over the barbarous nations of the North. To chastise domestic tyrants, and to
reunite the dismembered parts of the empire, was a task reserved for the second
of those warlike emperors. Though he was acknowledged by the senate and people,
the frontiers of Italy, Africa, Illyricum, and Thrace, confined the limits of
his reign. Gaul, Spain, and Britain, Egypt, Syria, and Asia Minor, were still
possessed by two rebels, who alone, out of so numerous a list, had hitherto
escaped the dangers of their situation; and to complete the ignominy of Rome,
these rival thrones had been usurped by women.

A rapid
succession of monarchs had arisen and fallen in the provinces of Gaul. The rigid
virtues of Posthumus served only to hasten his destruction. After suppressing a
competitor, who had assumed the purple at Mentz, he refused to gratify his
troops with the plunder of the rebellious city; and in the seventh year of his
reign, became the victim of their disappointed avarice[1059].
The death of Victorinus, his friend and associate, was occasioned by a less
worthy cause. The shining accomplishments[1060]
of that prince were stained by a licentious passion, which he indulged in acts
of violence, with too little regard to the laws of society, or even to those of
love[1061].
He was slain at Cologne, by a conspiracy of jealous husbands, whose revenge
would have appeared more justifiable, had they spared the innocence of his son.
After the murder of so many valiant princes, it is somewhat remarkable, that a
female for a long time controlled the fierce legions of Gaul, and still more
singular, that she was the mother of the unfortunate Victorinus. The arts and
treasures of Victoria enabled her successively to place Marius and Tetricus on
the throne, and to reign with a manly vigor under the name of those dependent
emperors. Money of copper, of silver, and of gold, was coined in her name; she
assumed the titles of Augusta and Mother of the Camps: her power ended only with
her life; but her life was perhaps shortened by the ingratitude of Tetricus[1062].

When, at
the instigation of his ambitious patroness, Tetricus assumed the ensigns of
royalty, he was governor of the peaceful province of Aquitaine, an employment
suited to his character and education. He reigned four or five years over Gaul,
Spain, and Britain, the slave and sovereign of a licentious army, whom he
dreaded, and by whom he was despised. The valor and fortune of Aurelian at
length opened the prospect of a deliverance. He ventured to disclose his
melancholy situation, and conjured the emperor to hasten to the relief of his
unhappy rival. Had this secret correspondence reached the ears of the soldiers,
it would most probably have cost Tetricus his life; nor could he resign the
sceptre of the West without committing an act of treason against himself. He
affected the appearances of a civil war, led his forces into the field, against
Aurelian, posted them in the most disadvantageous manner, betrayed his own
counsels to his enemy, and with a few chosen friends deserted in the beginning
of the action. The rebel legions, though disordered and dismayed by the
unexpected treachery of their chief, defended themselves with desperate valor,
till they were cut in pieces almost to a man, in this bloody and memorable
battle, which was fought near Chalons in Champagne[1063].
The retreat of the irregular auxiliaries, Franks and Batavians[1064],
whom the conqueror soon compelled or persuaded to repass the Rhine, restored the
general tranquillity, and the power of Aurelian was acknowledged from the wall
of Antoninus to the columns of Hercules.

As early
as the reign of Claudius, the city of Autun, alone and unassisted, had ventured
to declare against the legions of Gaul. After a siege of seven months, they
stormed and plundered that unfortunate city, already wasted by famine[1065].
Lyons, on the contrary, had resisted with obstinate disaffection the arms of
Aurelian. We read of the punishment of Lyons[1066],
but there is not any mention of the rewards of Autun. Such, indeed, is the
policy of civil war; severely to remember injuries, and to forget the most
important services. Revenge is profitable, gratitude is
expensive.

Aurelian
had no sooner secured the person and provinces of Tetricus, than he turned his
arms against Zenobia, the celebrated queen of Palmyra and the East. Modern
Europe has produced several illustrious women who have sustained with glory the
weight of empire; nor is our own age destitute of such distinguished characters.
But if we except the doubtful achievements of Semiramis, Zenobia is perhaps the
only female whose superior genius broke through the servile indolence imposed on
her sex by the climate and manners of Asia[1067].
She claimed her descent from the Macedonian kings of Egypt[1068],
equalled in beauty her ancestor Cleopatra, and far surpassed that princess in
chastity[1069]
and valor. Zenobia was esteemed the most lovely as well as the most heroic of
her sex. She was of a dark complexion, (for in speaking of a lady these trifles
become important.) Her teeth were of a pearly whiteness, and her large black
eyes sparkled with uncommon fire, tempered by the most attractive sweetness. Her
voice was strong and harmonious. Her manly understanding was strengthened and
adorned by study. She was not ignorant of the Latin tongue, but possessed in
equal perfection the Greek, the Syriac, and the Egyptian languages. She had
drawn up for her own use an epitome of oriental history, and familiarly compared
the beauties of Homer and Plato under the tuition of the sublime
Longinus.

This
accomplished woman gave her hand to Odenathus[1070],
who, from a private station, raised himself to the dominion of the East. She
soon became the friend and companion of a hero. In the intervals of war,
Odenathus passionately delighted in the exercise of hunting; he pursued with
ardor the wild beasts of the desert, lions, panthers, and bears; and the ardor
of Zenobia in that dangerous amusement was not inferior to his own. She had
inured her constitution to fatigue, disdained the use of a covered carriage,
generally appeared on horseback in a military habit, and sometimes marched
several miles on foot at the head of the troops. The success of Odenathus was in
a great measure ascribed to her incomparable prudence and fortitude. Their
splendid victories over the Great King, whom they twice pursued as far as the
gates of Ctesiphon, laid the foundations of their united fame and power. The
armies which they commanded, and the provinces which they had saved,
acknowledged not any other sovereigns than their invincible chiefs. The senate
and people of Rome revered a stranger who had avenged their captive emperor, and
even the insensible son of Valerian accepted Odenathus for his legitimate
colleague.

Chapter XI
Reign of
Claudius, Defeat of the Goths
Part III

After a
successful expedition against the Gothic plunderers of Asia, the Palmyrenian
prince returned to the city of Emesa in Syria. Invincible in war, he was there
cut off by domestic treason, and his favorite amusement of hunting was the
cause, or at least the occasion, of his death[1071].
His nephew Maeonius presumed to dart his javelin before that of his uncle; and
though admonished of his error, repeated the same insolence. As a monarch, and
as a sportsman, Odenathus was provoked, took away his horse, a mark of ignominy
among the barbarians, and chastised the rash youth by a short confinement. The
offence was soon forgot, but the punishment was remembered; and Maeonius, with a
few daring associates, assassinated his uncle in the midst of a great
entertainment. Herod, the son of Odenathus, though not of Zenobia, a young man
of a soft and effeminate temper[1072],
was killed with his father. But Maeonius obtained only the pleasure of revenge
by this bloody deed. He had scarcely time to assume the title of Augustus,
before he was sacrificed by Zenobia to the memory of her husband[1073].

With the
assistance of his most faithful friends, she immediately filled the vacant
throne, and governed with manly counsels Palmyra, Syria, and the East, above
five years. By the death of Odenathus, that authority was at an end which the
senate had granted him only as a personal distinction; but his martial widow,
disdaining both the senate and Gallienus, obliged one of the Roman generals, who
was sent against her, to retreat into Europe, with the loss of his army and his
reputation[1074].
Instead of the little passions which so frequently perplex a female reign, the
steady administration of Zenobia was guided by the most judicious maxims of
policy. If it was expedient to pardon, she could calm her resentment; if it was
necessary to punish, she could impose silence on the voice of pity. Her strict
economy was accused of avarice; yet on every proper occasion she appeared
magnificent and liberal. The neighboring states of Arabia, Armenia, and Persia,
dreaded her enmity, and solicited her alliance. To the dominions of Odenathus,
which extended from the Euphrates to the frontiers of Bithynia, his widow added
the inheritance of her ancestors, the populous and fertile kingdom of Egypt[1075],[1076].
The emperor Claudius acknowledged her merit, and was content, that, while he
pursued the Gothic war, she should assert the dignity of the empire in the
East[1077].
The conduct, however, of Zenobia, was attended with some ambiguity; not is it
unlikely that she had conceived the design of erecting an independent and
hostile monarchy. She blended with the popular manners of Roman princes the
stately pomp of the courts of Asia, and exacted from her subjects the same
adoration that was paid to the successor of Cyrus. She bestowed on her three
sons[1078]
1 a Latin education, and often showed them to the troops adorned with the
Imperial purple. For herself she reserved the diadem, with the splendid but
doubtful title of Queen of the East.

When
Aurelian passed over into Asia, against an adversary whose sex alone could
render her an object of contempt, his presence restored obedience to the
province of Bithynia, already shaken by the arms and intrigues of Zenobia[1079].
Advancing at the head of his legions, he accepted the submission of Ancyra, and
was admitted into Tyana, after an obstinate siege, by the help of a perfidious
citizen. The generous though fierce temper of Aurelian abandoned the traitor to
the rage of the soldiers; a superstitious reverence induced him to treat with
lenity the countrymen of Apollonius the philosopher[1080].
Antioch was deserted on his approach, till the emperor, by his salutary edicts,
recalled the fugitives, and granted a general pardon to all, who, from necessity
rather than choice, had been engaged in the service of the Palmyrenian Queen.
The unexpected mildness of such a conduct reconciled the minds of the Syrians,
and as far as the gates of Emesa, the wishes of the people seconded the terror
of his arms[1081].

Zenobia
would have ill deserved her reputation, had she indolently permitted the emperor
of the West to approach within a hundred miles of her capital. The fate of the
East was decided in two great battles; so similar in almost every circumstance,
that we can scarcely distinguish them from each other, except by observing that
the first was fought near Antioch[1082],
and the second near Emesa[1083].
In both the queen of Palmyra animated the armies by her presence, and devolved
the execution of her orders on Zabdas, who had already signalized his military
talents by the conquest of Egypt. The numerous forces of Zenobia consisted for
the most part of light archers, and of heavy cavalry clothed in complete steel.
The Moorish and Illyrian horse of Aurelian were unable to sustain the ponderous
charge of their antagonists. They fled in real or affected disorder, engaged the
Palmyrenians in a laborious pursuit, harassed them by a desultory combat, and at
length discomfited this impenetrable but unwieldy body of cavalry. The light
infantry, in the mean time, when they had exhausted their quivers, remaining
without protection against a closer onset, exposed their naked sides to the
swords of the legions. Aurelian had chosen these veteran troops, who were
usually stationed on the Upper Danube, and whose valor had been severely tried
in the Alemannic war[1084].
After the defeat of Emesa, Zenobia found it impossible to collect a third army.
As far as the frontier of Egypt, the nations subject to her empire had joined
the standard of the conqueror, who detached Probus, the bravest of his generals,
to possess himself of the Egyptian provinces. Palmyra was the last resource of
the widow of Odenathus. She retired within the walls of her capital, made every
preparation for a vigorous resistance, and declared, with the intrepidity of a
heroine, that the last moment of her reign and of her life should be the same.

Amid the
barren deserts of Arabia, a few cultivated spots rise like islands out of the
sandy ocean. Even the name of Tadmor, or Palmyra, by its signification in the
Syriac as well as in the Latin language, denoted the multitude of palm-trees
which afforded shade and verdure to that temperate region. The air was pure, and
the soil, watered by some invaluable springs, was capable of producing fruits as
well as corn. A place possessed of such singular advantages, and situated at a
convenient distance[1085]
between the Gulf of Persia and the Mediterranean, was soon frequented by the
caravans which conveyed to the nations of Europe a considerable part of the rich
commodities of India. Palmyra insensibly increased into an opulent and
independent city, and connecting the Roman and the Parthian monarchies by the
mutual benefits of commerce, was suffered to observe an humble neutrality, till
at length, after the victories of Trajan, the little republic sunk into the
bosom of Rome, and flourished more than one hundred and fifty years in the
subordinate though honorable rank of a colony. It was during that peaceful
period, if we may judge from a few remaining inscriptions, that the wealthy
Palmyrenians constructed those temples, palaces, and porticos of Grecian
architecture, whose ruins, scattered over an extent of several miles, have
deserved the curiosity of our travellers. The elevation of Odenathus and Zenobia
appeared to reflect new splendor on their country, and Palmyra, for a while,
stood forth the rival of Rome: but the competition was fatal, and ages of
prosperity were sacrificed to a moment of glory[1086].

In his
march over the sandy desert between Emesa and Palmyra, the emperor Aurelian was
perpetually harassed by the Arabs; nor could he always defend his army, and
especially his baggage, from those flying troops of active and daring robbers,
who watched the moment of surprise, and eluded the slow pursuit of the legions.
The siege of Palmyra was an object far more difficult and important, and the
emperor, who, with incessant vigor, pressed the attacks in person, was himself
wounded with a dart. "The Roman people," says Aurelian, in an original letter,
"speak with contempt of the war which I am waging against a woman. They are
ignorant both of the character and of the power of Zenobia. It is impossible to
enumerate her warlike preparations, of stones, of arrows, and of every species
of missile weapons. Every part of the walls is provided with two or three
balistoe and artificial fires are thrown from her military engines. The fear of
punishment has armed her with a desperate courage. Yet still I trust in the
protecting deities of Rome, who have hitherto been favorable to all my
undertakings[1087]."
Doubtful, however, of the protection of the gods, and of the event of the siege,
Aurelian judged it more prudent to offer terms of an advantageous capitulation;
to the queen, a splendid retreat; to the citizens, their ancient privileges. His
proposals were obstinately rejected, and the refusal was accompanied with
insult.

The
firmness of Zenobia was supported by the hope, that in a very short time famine
would compel the Roman army to repass the desert; and by the reasonable
expectation that the kings of the East, and particularly the Persian monarch,
would arm in the defence of their most natural ally. But fortune, and the
perseverance of Aurelian, overcame every obstacle. The death of Sapor, which
happened about this time[1088],
distracted the councils of Persia, and the inconsiderable succors that attempted
to relieve Palmyra, were easily intercepted either by the arms or the liberality
of the emperor. From every part of Syria, a regular succession of convoys safely
arrived in the camp, which was increased by the return of Probus with his
victorious troops from the conquest of Egypt. It was then that Zenobia resolved
to fly. She mounted the fleetest of her dromedaries[1089],
and had already reached the banks of the Euphrates, about sixty miles from
Palmyra, when she was overtaken by the pursuit of Aurelian's light horse,
seized, and brought back a captive to the feet of the emperor. Her capital soon
afterwards surrendered, and was treated with unexpected lenity. The arms,
horses, and camels, with an immense treasure of gold, silver, silk, and precious
stones, were all delivered to the conqueror, who, leaving only a garrison of six
hundred archers, returned to Emesa, and employed some time in the distribution
of rewards and punishments at the end of so memorable a war, which restored to
the obedience of Rome those provinces that had renounced their allegiance since
the captivity of Valerian.

When the
Syrian queen was brought into the presence of Aurelian, he sternly asked her,
How she had presumed to rise in arms against the emperors of Rome! The answer of
Zenobia was a prudent mixture of respect and firmness. "Because I disdained to
consider as Roman emperors an Aureolus or a Gallienus. You alone I acknowledge
as my conqueror and my sovereign[1090]."
But as female fortitude is commonly artificial, so it is seldom steady or
consistent. The courage of Zenobia deserted her in the hour of trial; she
trembled at the angry clamors of the soldiers, who called aloud for her
immediate execution, forgot the generous despair of Cleopatra, which she had
proposed as her model, and ignominiously purchased life by the sacrifice of her
fame and her friends. It was to their counsels, which governed the weakness of
her sex, that she imputed the guilt of her obstinate resistance; it was on their
heads that she directed the vengeance of the cruel Aurelian. The fame of
Longinus, who was included among the numerous and perhaps innocent victims of
her fear, will survive that of the queen who betrayed, or the tyrant who
condemned him. Genius and learning were incapable of moving a fierce unlettered
soldier, but they had served to elevate and harmonize the soul of Longinus.
Without uttering a complaint, he calmly followed the executioner, pitying his
unhappy mistress, and bestowing comfort on his afflicted friends[1091].

Returning
from the conquest of the East, Aurelian had already crossed the Straits which
divided Europe from Asia, when he was provoked by the intelligence that the
Palmyrenians had massacred the governor and garrison which he had left among
them, and again erected the standard of revolt. Without a moment's deliberation,
he once more turned his face towards Syria. Antioch was alarmed by his rapid
approach, and the helpless city of Palmyra felt the irresistible weight of his
resentment. We have a letter of Aurelian himself, in which he acknowledges[1092],
that old men, women, children, and peasants, had been involved in that dreadful
execution, which should have been confined to armed rebellion; and although his
principal concern seems directed to the reestablishment of a temple of the Sun,
he discovers some pity for the remnant of the Palmyrenians, to whom he grants
the permission of rebuilding and inhabiting their city. But it is easier to
destroy than to restore. The seat of commerce, of arts, and of Zenobia,
gradually sunk into an obscure town, a trifling fortress, and at length a
miserable village. The present citizens of Palmyra, consisting of thirty or
forty families, have erected their mud cottages within the spacious court of a
magnificent temple.

Another
and a last labor still awaited the indefatigable Aurelian; to suppress a
dangerous though obscure rebel, who, during the revolt of Palmyra, had arisen on
the banks of the Nile. Firmus, the friend and ally, as he proudly styled
himself, of Odenathus and Zenobia, was no more than a wealthy merchant of Egypt.
In the course of his trade to India, he had formed very intimate connections
with the Saracens and the Blemmyes, whose situation on either coast of the Red
Sea gave them an easy introduction into the Upper Egypt. The Egyptians he
inflamed with the hope of freedom, and, at the head of their furious multitude,
broke into the city of Alexandria, where he assumed the Imperial purple, coined
money, published edicts, and raised an army, which, as he vainly boasted, he was
capable of maintaining from the sole profits of his paper trade. Such troops
were a feeble defence against the approach of Aurelian; and it seems almost
unnecessary to relate, that Firmus was routed, taken, tortured, and put to
death[1093].
Aurelian might now congratulate the senate, the people, and himself, that in
little more than three years, he had restored universal peace and order to the
Roman world.

Since the
foundation of Rome, no general had more nobly deserved a triumph than Aurelian;
nor was a triumph ever celebrated with superior pride and magnificence[1094].
The pomp was opened by twenty elephants, four royal tigers, and above two
hundred of the most curious animals from every climate of the North, the East,
and the South. They were followed by sixteen hundred gladiators, devoted to the
cruel amusement of the amphitheatre. The wealth of Asia, the arms and ensigns of
so many conquered nations, and the magnificent plate and wardrobe of the Syrian
queen, were disposed in exact symmetry or artful disorder. The ambassadors of
the most remote parts of the earth, of Aethiopia, Arabia, Persia, Bactriana,
India, and China, all remarkable by their rich or singular dresses, displayed
the fame and power of the Roman emperor, who exposed likewise to the public view
the presents that he had received, and particularly a great number of crowns of
gold, the offerings of grateful cities. The victories of Aurelian were attested
by the long train of captives who reluctantly attended his triumph, Goths,
Vandals, Sarmatians, Alemanni, Franks, Gauls, Syrians, and Egyptians. Each
people was distinguished by its peculiar inscription, and the title of Amazons
was bestowed on ten martial heroines of the Gothic nation who had been taken in
arms[1095].
But every eye, disregarding the crowd of captives, was fixed on the emperor
Tetricus and the queen of the East. The former, as well as his son, whom he had
created Augustus, was dressed in Gallic trousers[1096],
a saffron tunic, and a robe of purple. The beauteous figure of Zenobia was
confined by fetters of gold; a slave supported the gold chain which encircled
her neck, and she almost fainted under the intolerable weight of jewels. She
preceded on foot the magnificent chariot, in which she once hoped to enter the
gates of Rome. It was followed by two other chariots, still more sumptuous, of
Odenathus and of the Persian monarch. The triumphal car of Aurelian (it had
formerly been used by a Gothic king) was drawn, on this memorable occasion,
either by four stags or by four elephants[1097].
The most illustrious of the senate, the people, and the army closed the solemn
procession. Unfeigned joy, wonder, and gratitude, swelled the acclamations of
the multitude; but the satisfaction of the senate was clouded by the appearance
of Tetricus; nor could they suppress a rising murmur, that the haughty emperor
should thus expose to public ignominy the person of a Roman and a magistrate[1098].

But
however, in the treatment of his unfortunate rivals, Aurelian might indulge his
pride, he behaved towards them with a generous clemency, which was seldom
exercised by the ancient conquerors. Princes who, without success, had defended
their throne or freedom, were frequently strangled in prison, as soon as the
triumphal pomp ascended the Capitol. These usurpers, whom their defeat had
convicted of the crime of treason, were permitted to spend their lives in
affluence and honorable repose. The emperor presented Zenobia with an elegant
villa at Tibur, or Tivoli, about twenty miles from the capital; the Syrian queen
insensibly sunk into a Roman matron, her daughters married into noble families,
and her race was not yet extinct in the fifth century[1099].
Tetricus and his son were reinstated in their rank and fortunes. They erected on
the Caelian hill a magnificent palace, and as soon as it was finished, invited
Aurelian to supper. On his entrance, he was agreeably surprised with a picture
which represented their singular history. They were delineated offering to the
emperor a civic crown and the sceptre of Gaul, and again receiving at his hands
the ornaments of the senatorial dignity. The father was afterwards invested with
the government of Lucania[1100],
and Aurelian, who soon admitted the abdicated monarch to his friendship and
conversation, familiarly asked him, Whether it were not more desirable to
administer a province of Italy, than to reign beyond the Alps. The son long
continued a respectable member of the senate; nor was there any one of the Roman
nobility more esteemed by Aurelian, as well as by his successors[1101].

So long
and so various was the pomp of Aurelian's triumph, that although it opened with
the dawn of day, the slow majesty of the procession ascended not the Capitol
before the ninth hour; and it was already dark when the emperor returned to the
palace. The festival was protracted by theatrical representations, the games of
the circus, the hunting of wild beasts, combats of gladiators, and naval
engagements. Liberal donatives were distributed to the army and people, and
several institutions, agreeable or beneficial to the city, contributed to
perpetuate the glory of Aurelian. A considerable portion of his oriental spoils
was consecrated to the gods of Rome; the Capitol, and every other temple,
glittered with the offerings of his ostentatious piety; and the temple of the
Sun alone received above fifteen thousand pounds of gold[1102].
This last was a magnificent structure, erected by the emperor on the side of the
Quirinal hill, and dedicated, soon after the triumph, to that deity whom
Aurelian adored as the parent of his life and fortunes. His mother had been an
inferior priestess in a chapel of the Sun; a peculiar devotion to the god of
Light was a sentiment which the fortunate peasant imbibed in his infancy; and
every step of his elevation, every victory of his reign, fortified superstition
by gratitude[1103].

The arms
of Aurelian had vanquished the foreign and domestic foes of the republic. We are
assured, that, by his salutary rigor, crimes and factions, mischievous arts and
pernicious connivance, the luxurious growth of a feeble and oppressive
government, were eradicated throughout the Roman world[1104].
But if we attentively reflect how much swifter is the progress of corruption
than its cure, and if we remember that the years abandoned to public disorders
exceeded the months allotted to the martial reign of Aurelian, we must confess
that a few short intervals of peace were insufficient for the arduous work of
reformation. Even his attempt to restore the integrity of the coin was opposed
by a formidable insurrection. The emperor's vexation breaks out in one of his
private letters. "Surely," says he, "the gods have decreed that my life should
be a perpetual warfare. A sedition within the walls has just now given birth to
a very serious civil war. The workmen of the mint, at the instigation of
Felicissimus, a slave to whom I had intrusted an employment in the finances,
have risen in rebellion. They are at length suppressed; but seven thousand of my
soldiers have been slain in the contest, of those troops whose ordinary station
is in Dacia, and the camps along the Danube[1105]."
Other writers, who confirm the same fact, add likewise, that it happened soon
after Aurelian's triumph; that the decisive engagement was fought on the Caelian
hill; that the workmen of the mint had adulterated the coin; and that the
emperor restored the public credit, by delivering out good money in exchange for
the bad, which the people was commanded to bring into the treasury[1106].

We might
content ourselves with relating this extraordinary transaction, but we cannot
dissemble how much in its present form it appears to us inconsistent and
incredible. The debasement of the coin is indeed well suited to the
administration of Gallienus; nor is it unlikely that the instruments of the
corruption might dread the inflexible justice of Aurelian. But the guilt, as
well as the profit, must have been confined to a very few; nor is it easy to
conceive by what arts they could arm a people whom they had injured, against a
monarch whom they had betrayed. We might naturally expect that such miscreants
should have shared the public detestation with the informers and the other
ministers of oppression; and that the reformation of the coin should have been
an action equally popular with the destruction of those obsolete accounts, which
by the emperor's order were burnt in the forum of Trajan[1107].
In an age when the principles of commerce were so imperfectly understood, the
most desirable end might perhaps be effected by harsh and injudicious means; but
a temporary grievance of such a nature can scarcely excite and support a serious
civil war. The repetition of intolerable taxes, imposed either on the land or on
the necessaries of life, may at last provoke those who will not, or who cannot,
relinquish their country. But the case is far otherwise in every operation
which, by whatsoever expedients, restores the just value of money. The transient
evil is soon obliterated by the permanent benefit, the loss is divided among
multitudes; and if a few wealthy individuals experience a sensible diminution of
treasure, with their riches, they at the same time lose the degree of weight and
importance which they derived from the possession of them. However Aurelian
might choose to disguise the real cause of the insurrection, his reformation of
the coin could furnish only a faint pretence to a party already powerful and
discontented. Rome, though deprived of freedom, was distracted by faction. The
people, towards whom the emperor, himself a plebeian, always expressed a
peculiar fondness, lived in perpetual dissension with the senate, the equestrian
order, and the Praetorian guards[1108].
Nothing less than the firm though secret conspiracy of those orders, of the
authority of the first, the wealth of the second, and the arms of the third,
could have displayed a strength capable of contending in battle with the veteran
legions of the Danube, which, under the conduct of a martial sovereign, had
achieved the conquest of the West and of the East.

Whatever
was the cause or the object of this rebellion, imputed with so little
probability to the workmen of the mint, Aurelian used his victory with
unrelenting rigor[1109].
He was naturally of a severe disposition. A peasant and a soldier, his nerves
yielded not easily to the impressions of sympathy, and he could sustain without
emotion the sight of tortures and death. Trained from his earliest youth in the
exercise of arms, he set too small a value on the life of a citizen, chastised
by military execution the slightest offences, and transferred the stern
discipline of the camp into the civil administration of the laws. His love of
justice often became a blind and furious passion and whenever he deemed his own
or the public safety endangered, he disregarded the rules of evidence, and the
proportion of punishments. The unprovoked rebellion with which the Romans
rewarded his services, exasperated his haughty spirit. The noblest families of
the capital were involved in the guilt or suspicion of this dark conspiracy. A
nasty spirit of revenge urged the bloody prosecution, and it proved fatal to one
of the nephews of the emperor. The executioners (if we may use the expression of
a contemporary poet) were fatigued, the prisons were crowded, and the unhappy
senate lamented the death or absence of its most illustrious members[1110].
Nor was the pride of Aurelian less offensive to that assembly than his cruelty.
Ignorant or impatient of the restraints of civil institutions, he disdained to
hold his power by any other title than that of the sword, and governed by right
of conquest an empire which he had saved and subdued[1111].

It was
observed by one of the most sagacious of the Roman princes, that the talents of
his predecessor Aurelian were better suited to the command of an army, than to
the government of an empire[1112].
Conscious of the character in which nature and experience had enabled him to
excel, he again took the field a few months after his triumph. It was expedient
to exercise the restless temper of the legions in some foreign war, and the
Persian monarch, exulting in the shame of Valerian, still braved with impunity
the offended majesty of Rome. At the head of an army, less formidable by its
numbers than by its discipline and valor, the emperor advanced as far as the
Straits which divide Europe from Asia. He there experienced that the most
absolute power is a weak defence against the effects of despair. He had
threatened one of his secretaries who was accused of extortion; and it was known
that he seldom threatened in vain. The last hope which remained for the
criminal, was to involve some of the principal officers of the army in his
danger, or at least in his fears. Artfully counterfeiting his master's hand, he
showed them, in a long and bloody list, their own names devoted to death.
Without suspecting or examining the fraud, they resolved to secure their lives
by the murder of the emperor. On his march, between Byzantium and Heraclea,
Aurelian was suddenly attacked by the conspirators, whose stations gave them a
right to surround his person, and after a short resistance, fell by the hand of
Mucapor, a general whom he had always loved and trusted. He died regretted by
the army, detested by the senate, but universally acknowledged as a warlike and
fortunate prince, the useful, though severe reformer of a degenerate state[1113].

Chapter XII
Reigns of
Tacitus, Probus, Carus and His Sons
Part I

Conduct of the Army and
Senate After the Death of Aurelian - Reigns of Tacitus, Probus, Carus, and His
Sons

Such was
the unhappy condition of the Roman emperors, that, whatever might be their
conduct, their fate was commonly the same. A life of pleasure or virtue, of
severity or mildness, of indolence or glory, alike led to an untimely grave; and
almost every reign is closed by the same disgusting repetition of treason and
murder. The death of Aurelian, however, is remarkable by its extraordinary
consequences. The legions admired, lamented, and revenged their victorious
chief. The artifice of his perfidious secretary was discovered and punished. The
deluded conspirators attended the funeral of their injured sovereign, with
sincere or well-feigned contrition, and submitted to the unanimous resolution of
the military order, which was signified by the following epistle: "The brave and
fortunate armies to the senate and people of Rome. - The crime of one man, and
the error of many, have deprived us of the late emperor Aurelian. May it please
you, venerable lords and fathers! to place him in the number of the gods, and to
appoint a successor whom your judgment shall declare worthy of the Imperial
purple! None of those whose guilt or misfortune have contributed to our loss,
shall ever reign over us[1114]."
The Roman senators heard, without surprise, that another emperor had been
assassinated in his camp; they secretly rejoiced in the fall of Aurelian; and,
besides the recent notoriety of the facts, constantly draws his materials from
the Journals of the Senate, and the but the modest and dutiful address of the
legions, when it was communicated in full assembly by the consul, diffused the
most pleasing astonishment. Such honors as fear and perhaps esteem could extort,
they liberally poured forth on the memory of their deceased sovereign. Such
acknowledgments as gratitude could inspire, they returned to the faithful armies
of the republic, who entertained so just a sense of the legal authority of the
senate in the choice of an emperor. Yet, notwithstanding this flattering appeal,
the most prudent of the assembly declined exposing their safety and dignity to
the caprice of an armed multitude. The strength of the legions was, indeed, a
pledge of their sincerity, since those who may command are seldom reduced to the
necessity of dissembling; but could it naturally be expected, that a hasty
repentance would correct the inveterate habits of fourscore years? Should the
soldiers relapse into their accustomed seditions, their insolence might disgrace
the majesty of the senate, and prove fatal to the object of its choice. Motives
like these dictated a decree, by which the election of a new emperor was
referred to the suffrage of the military order.

The
contention that ensued is one of the best attested, but most improbable events
in the history of mankind[1115].
The troops, as if satiated with the exercise of power, again conjured the senate
to invest one of its own body with the Imperial purple. The senate still
persisted in its refusal; the army in its request. The reciprocal offer was
pressed and rejected at least three times, and, whilst the obstinate modesty of
either party was resolved to receive a master from the hands of the other, eight
months insensibly elapsed; an amazing period of tranquil anarchy, during which
the Roman world remained without a sovereign, without a usurper, and without a
sedition[1116].
The generals and magistrates appointed by Aurelian continued to execute their
ordinary functions; and it is observed, that a proconsul of Asia was the only
considerable person removed from his office in the whole course of the
interregnum.

An event
somewhat similar, but much less authentic, is supposed to have happened after
the death of Romulus, who, in his life and character, bore some affinity with
Aurelian. The throne was vacant during twelve months, till the election of a
Sabine philosopher, and the public peace was guarded in the same manner, by the
union of the several orders of the state. But, in the time of Numa and Romulus,
the arms of the people were controlled by the authority of the Patricians; and
the balance of freedom was easily preserved in a small and virtuous community[1117].
The decline of the Roman state, far different from its infancy, was attended
with every circumstance that could banish from an interregnum the prospect of
obedience and harmony: an immense and tumultuous capital, a wide extent of
empire, the servile equality of despotism, an army of four hundred thousand
mercenaries, and the experience of frequent revolutions. Yet, notwithstanding
all these temptations, the discipline and memory of Aurelian still restrained
the seditious temper of the troops, as well as the fatal ambition of their
leaders. The flower of the legions maintained their stations on the banks of the
Bosphorus, and the Imperial standard awed the less powerful camps of Rome and of
the provinces. A generous though transient enthusiasm seemed to animate the
military order; and we may hope that a few real patriots cultivated the
returning friendship of the army and the senate, as the only expedient capable
of restoring the republic to its ancient beauty and vigor.

On the
twenty-fifth of September, near eight months after the murder of Aurelian, the
consul convoked an assembly of the senate, and reported the doubtful and
dangerous situation of the empire. He slightly insinuated, that the precarious
loyalty of the soldiers depended on the chance of every hour, and of every
accident; but he represented, with the most convincing eloquence, the various
dangers that might attend any further delay in the choice of an emperor.
Intelligence, he said, was already received, that the Germans had passed the
Rhine, and occupied some of the strongest and most opulent cities of Gaul. The
ambition of the Persian king kept the East in perpetual alarms; Egypt, Africa,
and Illyricum, were exposed to foreign and domestic arms, and the levity of
Syria would prefer even a female sceptre to the sanctity of the Roman laws. The
consul, then addressing himself to Tacitus, the first of the senators[1118],
required his opinion on the important subject of a proper candidate for the
vacant throne.

If we can
prefer personal merit to accidental greatness, we shall esteem the birth of
Tacitus more truly noble than that of kings. He claimed his descent from the
philosophic historian, whose writings will instruct the last generations of
mankind[1119].
The senator Tacitus was then seventy-five years of age[1120].
The long period of his innocent life was adorned with wealth and honors. He had
twice been invested with the consular dignity[1121],
and enjoyed with elegance and sobriety his ample patrimony of between two and
three millions sterling[1122].
The experience of so many princes, whom he had esteemed or endured, from the
vain follies of Elagabalus to the useful rigor of Aurelian, taught him to form a
just estimate of the duties, the dangers, and the temptations of their sublime
station. From the assiduous study of his immortal ancestor, he derived the
knowledge of the Roman constitution, and of human nature[1123].
The voice of the people had already named Tacitus as the citizen the most worthy
of empire. The ungrateful rumor reached his ears, and induced him to seek the
retirement of one of his villas in Campania. He had passed two months in the
delightful privacy of Baiae, when he reluctantly obeyed the summons of the
consul to resume his honorable place in the senate, and to assist the republic
with his counsels on this important occasion.

He arose
to speak, when from every quarter of the house, he was saluted with the names of
Augustus and emperor. "Tacitus Augustus, the gods preserve thee! we choose thee
for our sovereign; to thy care we intrust the republic and the world. Accept the
empire from the authority of the senate. It is due to thy rank, to thy conduct,
to thy manners." As soon as the tumult of acclamations subsided, Tacitus
attempted to decline the dangerous honor, and to express his wonder, that they
should elect his age and infirmities to succeed the martial vigor of Aurelian.
"Are these limbs, conscript fathers! fitted to sustain the weight of armor, or
to practise the exercises of the camp? The variety of climates, and the
hardships of a military life, would soon oppress a feeble constitution, which
subsists only by the most tender management. My exhausted strength scarcely
enables me to discharge the duty of a senator; how insufficient would it prove
to the arduous labors of war and government! Can you hope, that the legions will
respect a weak old man, whose days have been spent in the shade of peace and
retirement? Can you desire that I should ever find reason to regret the
favorable opinion of the senate?[1124]"

The
reluctance of Tacitus (and it might possibly be sincere) was encountered by the
affectionate obstinacy of the senate. Five hundred voices repeated at once, in
eloquent confusion, that the greatest of the Roman princes, Numa, Trajan,
Hadrian, and the Antonines, had ascended the throne in a very advanced season of
life; that the mind, not the body, a sovereign, not a soldier, was the object of
their choice; and that they expected from him no more than to guide by his
wisdom the valor of the legions. These pressing though tumultuary instances were
seconded by a more regular oration of Metius Falconius, the next on the consular
bench to Tacitus himself. He reminded the assembly of the evils which Rome had
endured from the vices of headstrong and capricious youths, congratulated them
on the election of a virtuous and experienced senator, and, with a manly, though
perhaps a selfish, freedom, exhorted Tacitus to remember the reasons of his
elevation, and to seek a successor, not in his own family, but in the republic.
The speech of Falconius was enforced by a general acclamation. The emperor elect
submitted to the authority of his country, and received the voluntary homage of
his equals. The judgment of the senate was confirmed by the consent of the Roman
people, and of the Praetorian guards[1125].

The
administration of Tacitus was not unworthy of his life and principles. A
grateful servant of the senate, he considered that national council as the
author, and himself as the subject, of the laws[1126].
He studied to heal the wounds which Imperial pride, civil discord, and military
violence, had inflicted on the constitution, and to restore, at least, the image
of the ancient republic, as it had been preserved by the policy of Augustus, and
the virtues of Trajan and the Antonines. It may not be useless to recapitulate
some of the most important prerogatives which the senate appeared to have
regained by the election of Tacitus[1127].

I.
To
invest one of their body, under the title of emperor, with the general command
of the armies, and the government of the frontier
provinces.

II.
To
determine the list, or, as it was then styled, the College of Consuls. They were
twelve in number, who, in successive pairs, each, during the space of two
months, filled the year, and represented the dignity of that ancient office. The
authority of the senate, in the nomination of the consuls, was exercised with
such independent freedom, that no regard was paid to an irregular request of the
emperor in favor of his brother Florianus. "The senate," exclaimed Tacitus, with
the honest transport of a patriot, "understand the character of a prince whom
they have chosen."

III.
To
appoint the proconsuls and presidents of the provinces, and to confer on all the
magistrates their civil jurisdiction.

IV.
To
receive appeals through the intermediate office of the praefect of the city from
all the tribunals of the empire.

V.
To
give force and validity, by their decrees, to such as they should approve of the
emperor's edicts.

VI.
To
these several branches of authority we may add some inspection over the
finances, since, even in the stern reign of Aurelian, it was in their power to
divert a part of the revenue from the public service[1128].

Circular
epistles were sent, without delay, to all the principal cities of the empire,
Treves, Milan, Aquileia, Thessalonica, Corinth, Athens, Antioch, Alexandria, and
Carthage, to claim their obedience, and to inform them of the happy revolution,
which had restored the Roman senate to its ancient dignity. Two of these
epistles are still extant. We likewise possess two very singular fragments of
the private correspondence of the senators on this occasion. They discover the
most excessive joy, and the most unbounded hopes. "Cast away your indolence," it
is thus that one of the senators addresses his friend, "emerge from your
retirements of Baiae and Puteoli. Give yourself to the city, to the senate. Rome
flourishes, the whole republic flourishes. Thanks to the Roman army, to an army
truly Roman; at length we have recovered our just authority, the end of all our
desires. We hear appeals, we appoint proconsuls, we create emperors; perhaps too
we may restrain them - to the wise a word is sufficient[1129]."
These lofty expectations were, however, soon disappointed; nor, indeed, was it
possible that the armies and the provinces should long obey the luxurious and
unwarlike nobles of Rome. On the slightest touch, the unsupported fabric of
their pride and power fell to the ground. The expiring senate displayed a sudden
lustre, blazed for a moment and was extinguished forever.

All that
had yet passed at Rome was no more than a theatrical representation, unless it
was ratified by the more substantial power of the legions. Leaving the senators
to enjoy their dream of freedom and ambition, Tacitus proceeded to the Thracian
camp, and was there, by the Praetorian praefect, presented to the assembled
troops, as the prince whom they themselves had demanded, and whom the senate had
bestowed. As soon as the praefect was silent, the emperor addressed himself to
the soldiers with eloquence and propriety. He gratified their avarice by a
liberal distribution of treasure, under the names of pay and donative. He
engaged their esteem by a spirited declaration, that although his age might
disable him from the performance of military exploits, his counsels should never
be unworthy of a Roman general, the successor of the brave Aurelian[1130].

Whilst the
deceased emperor was making preparations for a second expedition into the East,
he had negotiated with the Alani[1131],
a Scythian people, who pitched their tents in the neighborhood of the Lake
Moeotis. Those barbarians, allured by presents and subsidies, had promised to
invade Persia with a numerous body of light cavalry. They were faithful to their
engagements; but when they arrived on the Roman frontier, Aurelian was already
dead, the design of the Persian war was at least suspended, and the generals,
who, during the interregnum, exercised a doubtful authority, were unprepared
either to receive or to oppose them. Provoked by such treatment, which they
considered as trifling and perfidious, the Alani had recourse to their own valor
for their payment and revenge; and as they moved with the usual swiftness of
Tartars, they had soon spread themselves over the provinces of Pontus,
Cappadocia, Cilicia, and Galatia. The legions, who from the opposite shores of
the Bosphorus could almost distinguish the flames of the cities and villages,
impatiently urged their general to lead them against the invaders. The conduct
of Tacitus was suitable to his age and station. He convinced the barbarians of
the faith, as well as the power, of the empire. Great numbers of the Alani,
appeased by the punctual discharge of the engagements which Aurelian had
contracted with them, relinquished their booty and captives, and quietly
retreated to their own deserts, beyond the Phasis. Against the remainder, who
refused peace, the Roman emperor waged, in person, a successful war. Seconded by
an army of brave and experienced veterans, in a few weeks he delivered the
provinces of Asia from the terror of the Scythian invasion[1132].

But the
glory and life of Tacitus were of short duration. Transported, in the depth of
winter, from the soft retirement of Campania to the foot of Mount Caucasus, he
sunk under the unaccustomed hardships of a military life. The fatigues of the
body were aggravated by the cares of the mind. For a while, the angry and
selfish passions of the soldiers had been suspended by the enthusiasm of public
virtue. They soon broke out with redoubled violence, and raged in the camp, and
even in the tent of the aged emperor. His mild and amiable character served only
to inspire contempt, and he was incessantly tormented with factions which he
could not assuage, and by demands which it was impossible to satisfy. Whatever
flattering expectations he had conceived of reconciling the public disorders,
Tacitus soon was convinced that the licentiousness of the army disdained the
feeble restraint of laws, and his last hour was hastened by anguish and
disappointment. It may be doubtful whether the soldiers imbrued their hands in
the blood of this innocent prince[1133].
It is certain that their insolences was the cause of his death. He expired at
Tyana in Cappadocia, after a reign of only six months and about twenty days[1134].

The eyes
of Tacitus were scarcely closed, before his brother Florianus showed himself
unworthy to reign, by the hasty usurpation of the purple, without expecting the
approbation of the senate. The reverence for the Roman constitution, which yet
influenced the camp and the provinces, was sufficiently strong to dispose them
to censure, but not to provoke them to oppose, the precipitate ambition of
Florianus. The discontent would have evaporated in idle murmurs, had not the
general of the East, the heroic Probus, boldly declared himself the avenger of
the senate. The contest, however, was still unequal; nor could the most able
leader, at the head of the effeminate troops of Egypt and Syria, encounter, with
any hopes of victory, the legions of Europe, whose irresistible strength
appeared to support the brother of Tacitus. But the fortune and activity of
Probus triumphed over every obstacle. The hardy veterans of his rival,
accustomed to cold climates, sickened and consumed away in the sultry heats of
Cilicia, where the summer proved remarkably unwholesome. Their numbers were
diminished by frequent desertion; the passes of the mountains were feebly
defended; Tarsus opened its gates; and the soldiers of Florianus, when they had
permitted him to enjoy the Imperial title about three months, delivered the
empire from civil war by the easy sacrifice of a prince whom they despised[1135].

The
perpetual revolutions of the throne had so perfectly erased every notion of
hereditary title, that the family of an unfortunate emperor was incapable of
exciting the jealousy of his successors. The children of Tacitus and Florianus
were permitted to descend into a private station, and to mingle with the general
mass of the people. Their poverty indeed became an additional safeguard to their
innocence. When Tacitus was elected by the senate, he resigned his ample
patrimony to the public service[1136];
an act of generosity specious in appearance, but which evidently disclosed his
intention of transmitting the empire to his descendants. The only consolation of
their fallen state was the remembrance of transient greatness, and a distant
hope, the child of a flattering prophecy, that at the end of a thousand years, a
monarch of the race of Tacitus should arise, the protector of the senate, the
restorer of Rome, and the conqueror of the whole earth[1137].

The
peasants of Illyricum, who had already given Claudius and Aurelian to the
sinking empire, had an equal right to glory in the elevation of Probus[1138].
Above twenty years before, the emperor Valerian, with his usual penetration, had
discovered the rising merit of the young soldier, on whom he conferred the rank
of tribune, long before the age prescribed by the military regulations. The
tribune soon justified his choice, by a victory over a great body of Sarmatians,
in which he saved the life of a near relation of Valerian; and deserved to
receive from the emperor's hand the collars, bracelets, spears, and banners, the
mural and the civic crown, and all the honorable rewards reserved by ancient
Rome for successful valor. The third, and afterwards the tenth, legion were
intrusted to the command of Probus, who, in every step of his promotion, showed
himself superior to the station which he filled. Africa and Pontus, the Rhine,
the Danube, the Euphrates, and the Nile, by turns afforded him the most splendid
occasions of displaying his personal prowess and his conduct in war. Aurelian
was indebted for the honest courage with which he often checked the cruelty of
his master. Tacitus, who desired by the abilities of his generals to supply his
own deficiency of military talents, named him commander-in-chief of all the
eastern provinces, with five times the usual salary, the promise of the
consulship, and the hope of a triumph. When Probus ascended the Imperial throne,
he was about forty-four years of age[1139];
in the full possession of his fame, of the love of the army, and of a mature
vigor of mind and body.

His
acknowledge merit, and the success of his arms against Florianus, left him
without an enemy or a competitor. Yet, if we may credit his own professions,
very far from being desirous of the empire, he had accepted it with the most
sincere reluctance. “But it is no longer in my power," says Probus, in a private
letter, "to lay down a title so full of envy and of danger. I must continue to
personate the character which the soldiers have imposed upon me[1140]."
His dutiful address to the senate displayed the sentiments, or at least the
language, of a Roman patriot: "When you elected one of your order, conscript
fathers! to succeed the emperor Aurelian, you acted in a manner suitable to your
justice and wisdom. For you are the legal sovereigns of the world, and the power
which you derive from your ancestors will descend to your posterity. Happy would
it have been, if Florianus, instead of usurping the purple of his brother, like
a private inheritance, had expected what your majesty might determine, either in
his favor, or in that of other person. The prudent soldiers have punished his
rashness. To me they have offered the title of Augustus. But I submit to your
clemency my pretensions and my merits[1141]."
When this respectful epistle was read by the consul, the senators were unable to
disguise their satisfaction, that Probus should condescend thus numbly to
solicit a sceptre which he already possessed. They celebrated with the warmest
gratitude his virtues, his exploits, and above all his moderation. A decree
immediately passed, without a dissenting voice, to ratify the election of the
eastern armies, and to confer on their chief all the several branches of the
Imperial dignity: the names of Caesar and Augustus, the title of Father of his
country, the right of making in the same day three motions in the senate[1142],
the office of Pontifex, Maximus, the tribunitian power, and the proconsular
command; a mode of investiture, which, though it seemed to multiply the
authority of the emperor, expressed the constitution of the ancient republic.
The reign of Probus corresponded with this fair beginning. The senate was
permitted to direct the civil administration of the empire. Their faithful
general asserted the honor of the Roman arms, and often laid at their feet
crowns of gold and barbaric trophies, the fruits of his numerous victories[1143].
Yet, whilst he gratified their vanity, he must secretly have despised their
indolence and weakness. Though it was every moment in their power to repeal the
disgraceful edict of Gallienus, the proud successors of the Scipios patiently
acquiesced in their exclusion from all military employments. They soon
experienced, that those who refuse the sword must renounce the sceptre.

Chapter XII
Reigns of
Tacitus, Probus, Carus and His Sons
Part II

The
strength of Aurelian had crushed on every side the enemies of Rome. After his
death they seemed to revive with an increase of fury and of numbers. They were
again vanquished by the active vigor of Probus, who, in a short reign of about
six years[1144],
equalled the fame of ancient heroes, and restored peace and order to every
province of the Roman world. The dangerous frontier of Rhaetia he so firmly
secured, that he left it without the suspicion of an enemy. He broke the
wandering power of the Sarmatian tribes, and by the terror of his arms compelled
those barbarians to relinquish their spoil. The Gothic nation courted the
alliance of so warlike an emperor[1145].
He attacked the Isaurians in their mountains, besieged and took several of their
strongest castles[1146],
and flattered himself that he had forever suppressed a domestic foe, whose
independence so deeply wounded the majesty of the empire. The troubles excited
by the usurper Firmus in the Upper Egypt had never been perfectly appeased, and
the cities of Ptolemais and Coptos, fortified by the alliance of the Blemmyes,
still maintained an obscure rebellion. The chastisement of those cities, and of
their auxiliaries the savages of the South, is said to have alarmed the court of
Persia[1147],
and the Great King sued in vain for the friendship of Probus. Most of the
exploits which distinguished his reign were achieved by the personal valor and
conduct of the emperor, insomuch that the writer of his life expresses some
amazement how, in so short a time, a single man could be present in so many
distant wars. The remaining actions he intrusted to the care of his lieutenants,
the judicious choice of whom forms no inconsiderable part of his glory. Carus,
Diocletian, Maximian, Constantius, Galerius, Asclepiodatus, Annibalianus, and a
crowd of other chiefs, who afterwards ascended or supported the throne, were
trained to arms in the severe school of Aurelian and Probus[1148].

But the
most important service which Probus rendered to the republic was the deliverance
of Gaul, and the recovery of seventy flourishing cities oppressed by the
barbarians of Germany, who, since the death of Aurelian, had ravaged that great
province with impunity[1149].
Among the various multitude of those fierce invaders we may distinguish, with
some degree of clearness, three great armies, or rather nations, successively
vanquished by the valor of Probus. He drove back the Franks into their morasses;
a descriptive circumstance from whence we may infer, that the confederacy known
by the manly appellation of Free, already occupied the flat maritime country,
intersected and almost overflown by the stagnating waters of the Rhine, and that
several tribes of the Frisians and Batavians had acceded to their alliance. He
vanquished the Burgundians, a considerable people of the Vandalic race[1150].
They had wandered in quest of booty from the banks of the Oder to those of the
Seine. They esteemed themselves sufficiently fortunate to purchase, by the
restitution of all their booty, the permission of an undisturbed retreat. They
attempted to elude that article of the treaty. Their punishment was immediate
and terrible[1151].
But of all the invaders of Gaul, the most formidable were the Lygians, a distant
people, who reigned over a wide domain on the frontiers of Poland and Silesia[1152].
In the Lygian nation, the Arii held the first rank by their numbers and
fierceness. "The Arii" (it is thus that they are described by the energy of
Tacitus) "study to improve by art and circumstances the innate terrors of their
barbarism. Their shields are black, their bodies are painted black. They choose
for the combat the darkest hour of the night. Their host advances, covered as it
were with a funeral shade[1153];
nor do they often find an enemy capable of sustaining so strange and infernal an
aspect. Of all our senses, the eyes are the first vanquished in battle[1154]."
Yet the arms and discipline of the Romans easily discomfited these horrid
phantoms. The Lygii were defeated in a general engagement, and Semno, the most
renowned of their chiefs, fell alive into the hands of Probus. That prudent
emperor, unwilling to reduce a brave people to despair, granted them an
honorable capitulation, and permitted them to return in safety to their native
country. But the losses which they suffered in the march, the battle, and the
retreat, broke the power of the nation: nor is the Lygian name ever repeated in
the history either of Germany or of the empire. The deliverance of Gaul is
reported to have cost the lives of four hundred thousand of the invaders; a work
of labor to the Romans, and of expense to the emperor, who gave a piece of gold
for the head of every barbarian[1155].
But as the fame of warriors is built on the destruction of human kind, we may
naturally suspect, that the sanguinary account was multiplied by the avarice of
the soldiers, and accepted without any very severe examination by the liberal
vanity of Probus.

Since the
expedition of Maximin, the Roman generals had confined their ambition to a
defensive war against the nations of Germany, who perpetually pressed on the
frontiers of the empire. The more daring Probus pursued his Gallic victories,
passed the Rhine, and displayed his invincible eagles on the banks of the Elbe
and the Necker. He was fully convinced that nothing could reconcile the minds of
the barbarians to peace, unless they experienced, in their own country, the
calamities of war. Germany, exhausted by the ill success of the last emigration,
was astonished by his presence. Nine of the most considerable princes repaired
to his camp, and fell prostrate at his feet. Such a treaty was humbly received
by the Germans, as it pleased the conqueror to dictate. He exacted a strict
restitution of the effects and captives which they had carried away from the
provinces; and obliged their own magistrates to punish the more obstinate
robbers who presumed to detain any part of the spoil. A considerable tribute of
corn, cattle, and horses, the only wealth of barbarians, was reserved for the
use of the garrisons which Probus established on the limits of their territory.
He even entertained some thoughts of compelling the Germans to relinquish the
exercise of arms, and to trust their differences to the justice, their safety to
the power, of Rome. To accomplish these salutary ends, the constant residence of
an Imperial governor, supported by a numerous army, was indispensably requisite.
Probus therefore judged it more expedient to defer the execution of so great a
design; which was indeed rather of specious than solid utility[1156].
Had Germany been reduced into the state of a province, the Romans, with immense
labor and expense, would have acquired only a more extensive boundary to defend
against the fiercer and more active barbarians of Scythia.

Instead of
reducing the warlike natives of Germany to the condition of subjects, Probus
contented himself with the humble expedient of raising a bulwark against their
inroads. The country which now forms the circle of Swabia had been left desert
in the age of Augustus by the emigration of its ancient inhabitants[1157].
The fertility of the soil soon attracted a new colony from the adjacent
provinces of Gaul. Crowds of adventurers, of a roving temper and of desperate
fortunes, occupied the doubtful possession, and acknowledged, by the payment of
tithes the majesty of the empire[1158].
To protect these new subjects, a line of frontier garrisons was gradually
extended from the Rhine to the Danube. About the reign of Hadrian, when that
mode of defence began to be practised, these garrisons were connected and
covered by a strong intrenchment of trees and palisades. In the place of so rude
a bulwark, the emperor Probus constructed a stone wall of a considerable height,
and strengthened it by towers at convenient distances. From the neighborhood of
Newstadt and Ratisbon on the Danube, it stretched across hills, valleys, rivers,
and morasses, as far as Wimpfen on the Necker, and at length terminated on the
banks of the Rhine, after a winding course of near two hundred miles[1159].
This important barrier, uniting the two mighty streams that protected the
provinces of Europe, seemed to fill up the vacant space through which the
barbarians, and particularly the Alemanni, could penetrate with the greatest
facility into the heart of the empire. But the experience of the world, from
China to Britain, has exposed the vain attempt of fortifying any extensive tract
of country[1160].
An active enemy, who can select and vary his points of attack, must, in the end,
discover some feeble spot, on some unguarded moment. The strength, as well as
the attention, of the defenders is divided; and such are the blind effects of
terror on the firmest troops, that a line broken in a single place is almost
instantly deserted. The fate of the wall which Probus erected may confirm the
general observation. Within a few years after his death, it was overthrown by
the Alemanni. Its scattered ruins, universally ascribed to the power of the
Daemon, now serve only to excite the wonder of the Swabian peasant.

Among the
useful conditions of peace imposed by Probus on the vanquished nations of
Germany, was the obligation of supplying the Roman army with sixteen thousand
recruits, the bravest and most robust of their youth. The emperor dispersed them
through all the provinces, and distributed this dangerous reenforcement, in
small bands of fifty or sixty each, among the national troops; judiciously
observing, that the aid which the republic derived from the barbarians should be
felt but not seen[1161].
Their aid was now become necessary. The feeble elegance of Italy and the
internal provinces could no longer support the weight of arms. The hardy
frontiers of the Rhine and Danube still produced minds and bodies equal to the
labors of the camp; but a perpetual series of wars had gradually diminished
their numbers. The infrequency of marriage, and the ruin of agriculture,
affected the principles of population, and not only destroyed the strength of
the present, but intercepted the hope of future, generations. The wisdom of
Probus embraced a great and beneficial plan of replenishing the exhausted
frontiers, by new colonies of captive or fugitive barbarians, on whom he
bestowed lands, cattle, instruments of husbandry, and every encouragement that
might engage them to educate a race of soldiers for the service of the republic.
Into Britain, and most probably into Cambridgeshire[1162],
he transported a considerable body of Vandals. The impossibility of an escape
reconciled them to their situation, and in the subsequent troubles of that
island, they approved themselves the most faithful servants of the state[1163].
Great numbers of Franks and Gepidae were settled on the banks of the Danube and
the Rhine. A hundred thousand Bastarnae, expelled from their own country,
cheerfully accepted an establishment in Thrace, and soon imbibed the manners and
sentiments of Roman subjects[1164].
But the expectations of Probus were too often disappointed. The impatience and
idleness of the barbarians could ill brook the slow labors of agriculture. Their
unconquerable love of freedom, rising against despotism, provoked them into
hasty rebellions, alike fatal to themselves and to the provinces[1165];
nor could these artificial supplies, however repeated by succeeding emperors,
restore the important limit of Gaul and Illyricum to its ancient and native
vigor.

Of all the
barbarians who abandoned their new settlements, and disturbed the public
tranquillity, a very small number returned to their own country. For a short
season they might wander in arms through the empire; but in the end they were
surely destroyed by the power of a warlike emperor. The successful rashness of a
party of Franks was attended, however, with such memorable consequences, that it
ought not to be passed unnoticed. They had been established by Probus, on the
sea-coast of Pontus, with a view of strengthening the frontier against the
inroads of the Alani. A fleet stationed in one of the harbors of the Euxine fell
into the hands of the Franks; and they resolved, through unknown seas, to
explore their way from the mouth of the Phasis to that of the Rhine. They easily
escaped through the Bosphorus and the Hellespont, and cruising along the
Mediterranean, indulged their appetite for revenge and plunder by frequent
descents on the unsuspecting shores of Asia, Greece, and Africa. The opulent
city of Syracuse, in whose port the natives of Athens and Carthage had formerly
been sunk, was sacked by a handful of barbarians, who massacred the greatest
part of the trembling inhabitants. From the Island of Sicily, the Franks
proceeded to the columns of Hercules, trusted themselves to the ocean, coasted
round Spain and Gaul, and steering their triumphant course through the British
Channel, at length finished their surprising voyage, by landing in safety on the
Batavian or Frisian shores[1166].
The example of their success, instructing their countrymen to conceive the
advantages and to despise the dangers of the sea, pointed out to their
enterprising spirit a new road to wealth and glory.

Notwithstanding the vigilance and
activity of Probus, it was almost impossible that he could at once contain in
obedience every part of his wide- extended dominions. The barbarians, who broke
their chains, had seized the favorable opportunity of a domestic war. When the
emperor marched to the relief of Gaul, he devolved the command of the East on
Saturninus. That general, a man of merit and experience, was driven into
rebellion by the absence of his sovereign, the levity of the Alexandrian people,
the pressing instances of his friends, and his own fears; but from the moment of
his elevation, he never entertained a hope of empire, or even of life. "Alas!"
he said, "the republic has lost a useful servant, and the rashness of an hour
has destroyed the services of many years. You know not," continued he, "the
misery of sovereign power; a sword is perpetually suspended over our head. We
dread our very guards, we distrust our companions. The choice of action or of
repose is no longer in our disposition, nor is there any age, or character, or
conduct, that can protect us from the censure of envy. In thus exalting me to
the throne, you have doomed me to a life of cares, and to an untimely fate. The
only consolation which remains is, the assurance that I shall not fall alone[1167]."
But as the former part of his prediction was verified by the victory, so the
latter was disappointed by the clemency of Probus. That amiable prince attempted
even to save the unhappy Saturninus from the fury of the soldiers. He had more
than once solicited the usurper himself to place some confidence in the mercy of
a sovereign who so highly esteemed his character, that he had punished, as a
malicious informer, the first who related the improbable news of his
disaffection[1168].
Saturninus might, perhaps, have embraced the generous offer, had he not been
restrained by the obstinate distrust of his adherents. Their guilt was deeper,
and their hopes more sanguine, than those of their experienced leader.

The revolt
of Saturninus was scarcely extinguished in the East, before new troubles were
excited in the West, by the rebellion of Bonosus and Proculus, in Gaul. The most
distinguished merit of those two officers was their respective prowess, of the
one in the combats of Bacchus, of the other in those of Venus[1169],
yet neither of them was destitute of courage and capacity, and both sustained,
with honor, the august character which the fear of punishment had engaged them
to assume, till they sunk at length beneath the superior genius of Probus. He
used the victory with his accustomed moderation, and spared the fortune, as well
as the lives of their innocent families[1170].

The arms
of Probus had now suppressed all the foreign and domestic enemies of the state.
His mild but steady administration confirmed the reestablishment of the public
tranquillity; nor was there left in the provinces a hostile barbarian, a tyrant,
or even a robber, to revive the memory of past disorders. It was time that the
emperor should revisit Rome, and celebrate his own glory and the general
happiness. The triumph due to the valor of Probus was conducted with a
magnificence suitable to his fortune, and the people who had so lately admired
the trophies of Aurelian, gazed with equal pleasure on those of his heroic
successor[1171].
We cannot, on this occasion, forget the desperate courage of about fourscore
gladiators, reserved, with near six hundred others, for the inhuman sports of
the amphitheatre. Disdaining to shed their blood for the amusement of the
populace, they killed their keepers, broke from the place of their confinement,
and filled the streets of Rome with blood and confusion. After an obstinate
resistance, they were overpowered and cut in pieces by the regular forces; but
they obtained at least an honorable death, and the satisfaction of a just
revenge[1172].

The
military discipline which reigned in the camps of Probus was less cruel than
that of Aurelian, but it was equally rigid and exact. The latter had punished
the irregularities of the soldiers with unrelenting severity, the former
prevented them by employing the legions in constant and useful labors. When
Probus commanded in Egypt, he executed many considerable works for the splendor
and benefit of that rich country. The navigation of the Nile, so important to
Rome itself, was improved; and temples, buildings, porticos, and palaces were
constructed by the hands of the soldiers, who acted by turns as architects, as
engineers, and as husbandmen[1173].
It was reported of Hannibal, that in order to preserve his troops from the
dangerous temptations of idleness, he had obliged them to form large plantations
of olive-trees along the coast of Africa[1174].
From a similar principle, Probus exercised his legions in covering with rich
vineyards the hills of Gaul and Pannonia, and two considerable spots are
described, which were entirely dug and planted by military labor[1175].
One of these, known under the name of Mount Almo, was situated near Sirmium, the
country where Probus was born, for which he ever retained a partial affection,
and whose gratitude he endeavored to secure, by converting into tillage a large
and unhealthy tract of marshy ground. An army thus employed constituted perhaps
the most useful, as well as the bravest, portion of Roman
subjects.

But in the
prosecution of a favorite scheme, the best of men, satisfied with the rectitude
of their intentions, are subject to forget the bounds of moderation; nor did
Probus himself sufficiently consult the patience and disposition of his fierce
legionaries[1176].
The dangers of the military profession seem only to be compensated by a life of
pleasure and idleness; but if the duties of the soldier are incessantly
aggravated by the labors of the peasant, he will at last sink under the
intolerable burden, or shake it off with indignation. The imprudence of Probus
is said to have inflamed the discontent of his troops. More attentive to the
interests of mankind than to those of the army, he expressed the vain hope,
that, by the establishment of universal peace, he should soon abolish the
necessity of a standing and mercenary force[1177].
The unguarded expression proved fatal to him. In one of the hottest days of
summer, as he severely urged the unwholesome labor of draining the marshes of
Sirmium, the soldiers, impatient of fatigue, on a sudden threw down their tools,
grasped their arms, and broke out into a furious mutiny. The emperor, conscious
of his danger, took refuge in a lofty tower, constructed for the purpose of
surveying the progress of the work[1178].
The tower was instantly forced, and a thousand swords were plunged at once into
the bosom of the unfortunate Probus. The rage of the troops subsided as soon as
it had been gratified. They then lamented their fatal rashness, forgot the
severity of the emperor, whom they had massacred, and hastened to perpetuate, by
an honorable monument, the memory of his virtues and victories[1179].

When the
legions had indulged their grief and repentance for the death of Probus, their
unanimous consent declared Carus, his Praetorian praefect, the most deserving of
the Imperial throne. Every circumstance that relates to this prince appears of a
mixed and doubtful nature. He gloried in the title of Roman Citizen; and
affected to compare the purity of his blood with the foreign and even barbarous
origin of the preceding emperors; yet the most inquisitive of his
contemporaries, very far from admitting his claim, have variously deduced his
own birth, or that of his parents, from Illyricum, from Gaul, or from Africa[1180].
Though a soldier, he had received a learned education; though a senator, he was
invested with the first dignity of the army; and in an age when the civil and
military professions began to be irrecoverably separated from each other, they
were united in the person of Carus. Notwithstanding the severe justice which he
exercised against the assassins of Probus, to whose favor and esteem he was
highly indebted, he could not escape the suspicion of being accessory to a deed
from whence he derived the principal advantage. He enjoyed, at least, before his
elevation, an acknowledged character of virtue and abilities[1181];
but his austere temper insensibly degenerated into moroseness and cruelty; and
the imperfect writers of his life almost hesitate whether they shall not rank
him in the number of Roman tyrants[1182].
When Carus assumed the purple, he was about sixty years of age, and his two
sons, Carinus and Numerian had already attained the season of manhood[1183].

The
authority of the senate expired with Probus; nor was the repentance of the
soldiers displayed by the same dutiful regard for the civil power, which they
had testified after the unfortunate death of Aurelian. The election of Carus was
decided without expecting the approbation of the senate, and the new emperor
contented himself with announcing, in a cold and stately epistle, that he had
ascended the vacant throne[1184].
A behavior so very opposite to that of his amiable predecessor afforded no
favorable presage of the new reign: and the Romans, deprived of power and
freedom, asserted their privilege of licentious murmurs[1185].
The voice of congratulation and flattery was not, however, silent; and we may
still peruse, with pleasure and contempt, an eclogue, which was composed on the
accession of the emperor Carus. Two shepherds, avoiding the noontide heat,
retire into the cave of Faunus. On a spreading beech they discover some recent
characters. The rural deity had described, in prophetic verses, the felicity
promised to the empire under the reign of so great a prince. Faunus hails the
approach of that hero, who, receiving on his shoulders the sinking weight of the
Roman world, shall extinguish war and faction, and once again restore the
innocence and security of the golden age[1186].

It is more
than probable, that these elegant trifles never reached the ears of a veteran
general, who, with the consent of the legions, was preparing to execute the
long-suspended design of the Persian war. Before his departure for this distant
expedition, Carus conferred on his two sons, Carinus and Numerian, the title of
Caesar, and investing the former with almost an equal share of the Imperial
power, directed the young prince, first to suppress some troubles which had
arisen in Gaul, and afterwards to fix the seat of his residence at Rome, and to
assume the government of the Western provinces[1187].
The safety of Illyricum was confirmed by a memorable defeat of the Sarmatians;
sixteen thousand of those barbarians remained on the field of battle, and the
number of captives amounted to twenty thousand. The old emperor, animated with
the fame and prospect of victory, pursued his march, in the midst of winter,
through the countries of Thrace and Asia Minor, and at length, with his younger
son, Numerian, arrived on the confines of the Persian monarchy. There, encamping
on the summit of a lofty mountain, he pointed out to his troops the opulence and
luxury of the enemy whom they were about to invade.

The
successor of Artaxerxes[1188],
Varanes, or Bahram, though he had subdued the Segestans, one of the most warlike
nations of Upper Asia[1189],
was alarmed at the approach of the Romans, and endeavored to retard their
progress by a negotiation of peace[1190].
His ambassadors entered the camp about sunset, at the time when the troops were
satisfying their hunger with a frugal repast. The Persians expressed their
desire of being introduced to the presence of the Roman emperor. They were at
length conducted to a soldier, who was seated on the grass. A piece of stale
bacon and a few hard peas composed his supper. A coarse woollen garment of
purple was the only circumstance that announced his dignity. The conference was
conducted with the same disregard of courtly elegance. Carus, taking off a cap
which he wore to conceal his baldness, assured the ambassadors, that, unless
their master acknowledged the superiority of Rome, he would speedily render
Persia as naked of trees as his own head was destitute of hair[1191].
Notwithstanding some traces of art and preparation, we may discover in this
scene the manners of Carus, and the severe simplicity which the martial princes,
who succeeded Gallienus, had already restored in the Roman camps. The ministers
of the Great King trembled and retired.

The
threats of Carus were not without effect. He ravaged Mesopotamia, cut in pieces
whatever opposed his passage, made himself master of the great cities of
Seleucia and Ctesiphon, (which seemed to have surrendered without resistance,)
and carried his victorious arms beyond the Tigris[1192].
He had seized the favorable moment for an invasion. The Persian councils were
distracted by domestic factions, and the greater part of their forces were
detained on the frontiers of India. Rome and the East received with transports
the news of such important advantages. Flattery and hope painted, in the most
lively colors, the fall of Persia, the conquest of Arabia, the submission of
Egypt, and a lasting deliverance from the inroads of the Scythian nations[1193].
But the reign of Carus was destined to expose the vanity of predictions. They
were scarcely uttered before they were contradicted by his death; an event
attended with such ambiguous circumstances, that it may be related in a letter
from his own secretary to the praefect of the city. “Carus," says he, "our
dearest emperor, was confined by sickness to his bed, when a furious tempest
arose in the camp. The darkness which overspread the sky was so thick, that we
could no longer distinguish each other; and the incessant flashes of lightning
took from us the knowledge of all that passed in the general confusion.
Immediately after the most violent clap of thunder, we heard a sudden cry that
the emperor was dead; and it soon appeared, that his chamberlains, in a rage of
grief, had set fire to the royal pavilion; a circumstance which gave rise to the
report that Carus was killed by lightning. But, as far as we have been able to
investigate the truth, his death was the natural effect of his disorder[1194]."

Chapter XII
Reigns of
Tacitus, Probus, Carus and His Sons
Part III

The
vacancy of the throne was not productive of any disturbance. The ambition of the
aspiring generals was checked by their natural fears, and young Numerian, with
his absent brother Carinus, were unanimously acknowledged as Roman emperors. The
public expected that the successor of Carus would pursue his father's footsteps,
and, without allowing the Persians to recover from their consternation, would
advance sword in hand to the palaces of Susa and Ecbatana[1195].
But the legions, however strong in numbers and discipline, were dismayed by the
most abject superstition. Notwithstanding all the arts that were practised to
disguise the manner of the late emperor's death, it was found impossible to
remove the opinion of the multitude, and the power of opinion is irresistible.
Places or persons struck with lightning were considered by the ancients with
pious horror, as singularly devoted to the wrath of Heaven[1196].
An oracle was remembered, which marked the River Tigris as the fatal boundary of
the Roman arms. The troops, terrified with the fate of Carus and with their own
danger, called aloud on young Numerian to obey the will of the gods, and to lead
them away from this inauspicious scene of war. The feeble emperor was unable to
subdue their obstinate prejudice, and the Persians wondered at the unexpected
retreat of a victorious enemy[1197].

The
intelligence of the mysterious fate of the late emperor was soon carried from
the frontiers of Persia to Rome; and the senate, as well as the provinces,
congratulated the accession of the sons of Carus. These fortunate youths were
strangers, however, to that conscious superiority, either of birth or of merit,
which can alone render the possession of a throne easy, and as it were natural.
Born and educated in a private station, the election of their father raised them
at once to the rank of princes; and his death, which happened about sixteen
months afterwards, left them the unexpected legacy of a vast empire. To sustain
with temper this rapid elevation, an uncommon share of virtue and prudence was
requisite; and Carinus, the elder of the brothers, was more than commonly
deficient in those qualities. In the Gallic war he discovered some degree of
personal courage[1198];
but from the moment of his arrival at Rome, he abandoned himself to the luxury
of the capital, and to the abuse of his fortune. He was soft, yet cruel; devoted
to pleasure, but destitute of taste; and though exquisitely susceptible of
vanity, indifferent to the public esteem. In the course of a few months, he
successively married and divorced nine wives, most of whom he left pregnant; and
notwithstanding this legal inconstancy, found time to indulge such a variety of
irregular appetites, as brought dishonor on himself and on the noblest houses of
Rome. He beheld with inveterate hatred all those who might remember his former
obscurity, or censure his present conduct. He banished, or put to death, the
friends and counsellors whom his father had placed about him, to guide his
inexperienced youth; and he persecuted with the meanest revenge his
school-fellows and companions who had not sufficiently respected the latent
majesty of the emperor. With the senators, Carinus affected a lofty and regal
demeanor, frequently declaring, that he designed to distribute their estates
among the populace of Rome. From the dregs of that populace he selected his
favorites, and even his ministers. The palace, and even the Imperial table, were
filled with singers, dancers, prostitutes, and all the various retinue of vice
and folly. One of his doorkeepers[1199]
he intrusted with the government of the city. In the room of the Praetorian
praefect, whom he put to death, Carinus substituted one of the ministers of his
looser pleasures. Another, who possessed the same, or even a more infamous,
title to favor, was invested with the consulship. A confidential secretary, who
had acquired uncommon skill in the art of forgery, delivered the indolent
emperor, with his own consent from the irksome duty of signing his
name.

When the
emperor Carus undertook the Persian war, he was induced, by motives of affection
as well as policy, to secure the fortunes of his family, by leaving in the hands
of his eldest son the armies and provinces of the West. The intelligence which
he soon received of the conduct of Carinus filled him with shame and regret; nor
had he concealed his resolution of satisfying the republic by a severe act of
justice, and of adopting, in the place of an unworthy son, the brave and
virtuous Constantius, who at that time was governor of Dalmatia. But the
elevation of Constantius was for a while deferred; and as soon as the father's
death had released Carinus from the control of fear or decency, he displayed to
the Romans the extravagancies of Elagabalus, aggravated by the cruelty of
Domitian[1200].

The only
merit of the administration of Carinus that history could record, or poetry
celebrate, was the uncommon splendor with which, in his own and his brother's
name, he exhibited the Roman games of the theatre, the circus, and the
amphitheatre. More than twenty years afterwards, when the courtiers of
Diocletian represented to their frugal sovereign the fame and popularity of his
munificent predecessor, he acknowledged that the reign of Carinus had indeed
been a reign of pleasure[1201].
But this vain prodigality, which the prudence of Diocletian might justly
despise, was enjoyed with surprise and transport by the Roman people. The oldest
of the citizens, recollecting the spectacles of former days, the triumphal pomp
of Probus or Aurelian, and the secular games of the emperor Philip, acknowledged
that they were all surpassed by the superior magnificence of Carinus[1202].

The
spectacles of Carinus may therefore be best illustrated by the observation of
some particulars, which history has condescended to relate concerning those of
his predecessors. If we confine ourselves solely to the hunting of wild beasts,
however we may censure the vanity of the design or the cruelty of the execution,
we are obliged to confess that neither before nor since the time of the Romans
so much art and expense have ever been lavished for the amusement of the
people[1203].
By the order of Probus, a great quantity of large trees, torn up by the roots,
were transplanted into the midst of the circus. The spacious and shady forest
was immediately filled with a thousand ostriches, a thousand stags, a thousand
fallow deer, and a thousand wild boars; and all this variety of game was
abandoned to the riotous impetuosity of the multitude. The tragedy of the
succeeding day consisted in the massacre of a hundred lions, an equal number of
lionesses, two hundred leopards, and three hundred bears[1204].
The collection prepared by the younger Gordian for his triumph, and which his
successor exhibited in the secular games, was less remarkable by the number than
by the singularity of the animals. Twenty zebras displayed their elegant forms
and variegated beauty to the eyes of the Roman people[1205].
Ten elks, and as many camelopards, the loftiest and most harmless creatures that
wander over the plains of Sarmatia and Aethiopia, were contrasted with thirty
African hyaenas and ten Indian tigers, the most implacable savages of the torrid
zone. The unoffending strength with which Nature has endowed the greater
quadrupeds was admired in the rhinoceros, the hippopotamus of the Nile[1206],
and a majestic troop of thirty-two elephants[1207].
While the populace gazed with stupid wonder on the splendid show, the naturalist
might indeed observe the figure and properties of so many different species,
transported from every part of the ancient world into the amphitheatre of Rome.
But this accidental benefit, which science might derive from folly, is surely
insufficient to justify such a wanton abuse of the public riches. There occurs,
however, a single instance in the first Punic war, in which the senate wisely
connected this amusement of the multitude with the interest of the state. A
considerable number of elephants, taken in the defeat of the Carthaginian army,
were driven through the circus by a few slaves, armed only with blunt javelins[1208].
The useful spectacle served to impress the Roman soldier with a just contempt
for those unwieldy animals; and he no longer dreaded to encounter them in the
ranks of war.

The
hunting or exhibition of wild beasts was conducted with a magnificence suitable
to a people who styled themselves the masters of the world; nor was the edifice
appropriated to that entertainment less expressive of Roman greatness. Posterity
admires, and will long admire, the awful remains of the amphitheatre of Titus,
which so well deserved the epithet of Colossal[1209].
It was a building of an elliptic figure, five hundred and sixty-four feet in
length, and four hundred and sixty-seven in breadth, founded on fourscore
arches, and rising, with four successive orders of architecture, to the height
of one hundred and forty feet[1210].
The outside of the edifice was encrusted with marble, and decorated with
statues. The slopes of the vast concave, which formed the inside, were filled
and surrounded with sixty or eighty rows of seats of marble likewise, covered
with cushions, and capable of receiving with ease about fourscore thousand
spectators[1211].
Sixty-four vomitories (for by that name the doors were very aptly distinguished)
poured forth the immense multitude; and the entrances, passages, and staircases
were contrived with such exquisite skill, that each person, whether of the
senatorial, the equestrian, or the plebeian order, arrived at his destined place
without trouble or confusion[1212].
Nothing was omitted, which, in any respect, could be subservient to the
convenience and pleasure of the spectators. They were protected from the sun and
rain by an ample canopy, occasionally drawn over their heads. The air was
continually refreshed by the playing of fountains, and profusely impregnated by
the grateful scent of aromatics. In the centre of the edifice, the arena, or
stage, was strewed with the finest sand, and successively assumed the most
different forms. At one moment it seemed to rise out of the earth, like the
garden of the Hesperides, and was afterwards broken into the rocks and caverns
of Thrace. The subterraneous pipes conveyed an inexhaustible supply of water;
and what had just before appeared a level plain, might be suddenly converted
into a wide lake, covered with armed vessels, and replenished with the monsters
of the deep[1213].
In the decoration of these scenes, the Roman emperors displayed their wealth and
liberality; and we read on various occasions that the whole furniture of the
amphitheatre consisted either of silver, or of gold, or of amber[1214].
The poet who describes the games of Carinus, in the character of a shepherd,
attracted to the capital by the fame of their magnificence, affirms that the
nets designed as a defence against the wild beasts, were of gold wire; that the
porticos were gilded; and that the belt or circle which divided the several
ranks of spectators from each other was studded with a precious mosaic of
beautiful stones[1215].

In the
midst of this glittering pageantry, the emperor Carinus, secure of his fortune,
enjoyed the acclamations of the people, the flattery of his courtiers, and the
songs of the poets, who, for want of a more essential merit, were reduced to
celebrate the divine graces of his person[1216].
In the same hour, but at the distance of nine hundred miles from Rome, his
brother expired; and a sudden revolution transferred into the hands of a
stranger the sceptre of the house of Carus[1217].

The sons
of Carus never saw each other after their father's death. The arrangements which
their new situation required were probably deferred till the return of the
younger brother to Rome, where a triumph was decreed to the young emperors for
the glorious success of the Persian war[1218].
It is uncertain whether they intended to divide between them the administration,
or the provinces, of the empire; but it is very unlikely that their union would
have proved of any long duration. The jealousy of power must have been inflamed
by the opposition of characters. In the most corrupt of times, Carinus was
unworthy to live: Numerian deserved to reign in a happier period. His affable
manners and gentle virtues secured him, as soon as they became known, the regard
and affections of the public. He possessed the elegant accomplishments of a poet
and orator, which dignify as well as adorn the humblest and the most exalted
station. His eloquence, however it was applauded by the senate, was formed not
so much on the model of Cicero, as on that of the modern declaimers; but in an
age very far from being destitute of poetical merit, he contended for the prize
with the most celebrated of his contemporaries, and still remained the friend of
his rivals; a circumstance which evinces either the goodness of his heart, or
the superiority of his genius[1219].
But the talents of Numerian were rather of the contemplative than of the active
kind. When his father's elevation reluctantly forced him from the shade of
retirement, neither his temper nor his pursuits had qualified him for the
command of armies. His constitution was destroyed by the hardships of the
Persian war; and he had contracted, from the heat of the climate[1220],
such a weakness in his eyes, as obliged him, in the course of a long retreat, to
confine himself to the solitude and darkness of a tent or litter. The
administration of all affairs, civil as well as military, was devolved on Arrius
Aper, the Praetorian praefect, who to the power of his important office added
the honor of being father-in-law to Numerian. The Imperial pavilion was strictly
guarded by his most trusty adherents; and during many days, Aper delivered to
the army the supposed mandates of their invisible sovereign[1221].

It was not
till eight months after the death of Carus, that the Roman army, returning by
slow marches from the banks of the Tigris, arrived on those of the Thracian
Bosphorus. The legions halted at Chalcedon in Asia, while the court passed over
to Heraclea, on the European side of the Propontis[1222].
But a report soon circulated through the camp, at first in secret whispers, and
at length in loud clamors, of the emperor's death, and of the presumption of his
ambitious minister, who still exercised the sovereign power in the name of a
prince who was no more. The impatience of the soldiers could not long support a
state of suspense. With rude curiosity they broke into the Imperial tent, and
discovered only the corpse of Numerian[1223].
The gradual decline of his health might have induced them to believe that his
death was natural; but the concealment was interpreted as an evidence of guilt,
and the measures which Aper had taken to secure his election became the
immediate occasion of his ruin Yet, even in the transport of their rage and
grief, the troops observed a regular proceeding, which proves how firmly
discipline had been reestablished by the martial successors of Gallienus. A
general assembly of the army was appointed to be held at Chalcedon, whither Aper
was transported in chains, as a prisoner and a criminal. A vacant tribunal was
erected in the midst of the camp, and the generals and tribunes formed a great
military council. They soon announced to the multitude that their choice had
fallen on Diocletian, commander of the domestics or body-guards, as the person
the most capable of revenging and succeeding their beloved emperor. The future
fortunes of the candidate depended on the chance or conduct of the present hour.
Conscious that the station which he had filled exposed him to some suspicions,
Diocletian ascended the tribunal, and raising his eyes towards the Sun, made a
solemn profession of his own innocence, in the presence of that all-seeing
Deity[1224].
Then, assuming the tone of a sovereign and a judge, he commanded that Aper
should be brought in chains to the foot of the tribunal. “This man," said he,
"is the murderer of Numerian;" and without giving him time to enter on a
dangerous justification, drew his sword, and buried it in the breast of the
unfortunate praefect. A charge supported by such decisive proof was admitted
without contradiction, and the legions, with repeated acclamations, acknowledged
the justice and authority of the emperor Diocletian[1225].

Before we
enter upon the memorable reign of that prince, it will be proper to punish and
dismiss the unworthy brother of Numerian. Carinus possessed arms and treasures
sufficient to support his legal title to the empire. But his personal vices
overbalanced every advantage of birth and situation. The most faithful servants
of the father despised the incapacity, and dreaded the cruel arrogance, of the
son. The hearts of the people were engaged in favor of his rival, and even the
senate was inclined to prefer a usurper to a tyrant. The arts of Diocletian
inflamed the general discontent; and the winter was employed in secret
intrigues, and open preparations for a civil war. In the spring, the forces of
the East and of the West encountered each other in the plains of Margus, a small
city of Maesia, in the neighborhood of the Danube[1226].
The troops, so lately returned from the Persian war, had acquired their glory at
the expense of health and numbers; nor were they in a condition to contend with
the unexhausted strength of the legions of Europe. Their ranks were broken, and,
for a moment, Diocletian despaired of the purple and of life. But the advantage
which Carinus had obtained by the valor of his soldiers, he quickly lost by the
infidelity of his officers. A tribune, whose wife he had seduced, seized the
opportunity of revenge, and, by a single blow, extinguished civil discord in the
blood of the adulterer[1227].

Chapter XIII
Reign of
Diocletian and His Three Associates
Part I

The Reign of Diocletian
and His Three Associates, Maximian, Galerius, and Constantius - General
Reestablishment of Order and Tranquillity - The Persian War, Victory, and
Triumph - The New Form of Administration - Abdication and Retirement of
Diocletian and Maximian

As the
reign of Diocletian was more illustrious than that of any of his predecessors,
so was his birth more abject and obscure. The strong claims of merit and of
violence had frequently superseded the ideal prerogatives of nobility; but a
distinct line of separation was hitherto preserved between the free and the
servile part of mankind. The parents of Diocletian had been slaves in the house
of Anulinus, a Roman senator; nor was he himself distinguished by any other name
than that which he derived from a small town in Dalmatia, from whence his mother
deduced her origin[1228].
It is, however, probable that his father obtained the freedom of the family, and
that he soon acquired an office of scribe, which was commonly exercised by
persons of his condition[1229].
Favorable oracles, or rather the consciousness of superior merit, prompted his
aspiring son to pursue the profession of arms and the hopes of fortune; and it
would be extremely curious to observe the gradation of arts and accidents which
enabled him in the end to fulfil those oracles, and to display that merit to the
world. Diocletian was successively promoted to the government of Maesia, the
honors of the consulship, and the important command of the guards of the palace.
He distinguished his abilities in the Persian war; and after the death of
Numerian, the slave, by the confession and judgment of his rivals, was declared
the most worthy of the Imperial throne. The malice of religious zeal, whilst it
arraigns the savage fierceness of his colleague Maximian, has affected to cast
suspicions on the personal courage of the emperor Diocletian[1230].
It would not be easy to persuade us of the cowardice of a soldier of fortune,
who acquired and preserved the esteem of the legions as well as the favor of so
many warlike princes. Yet even calumny is sagacious enough to discover and to
attack the most vulnerable part. The valor of Diocletian was never found
inadequate to his duty, or to the occasion; but he appears not to have possessed
the daring and generous spirit of a hero, who courts danger and fame, disdains
artifice, and boldly challenges the allegiance of his equals. His abilities were
useful rather than splendid; a vigorous mind, improved by the experience and
study of mankind; dexterity and application in business; a judicious mixture of
liberality and economy, of mildness and rigor; profound dissimulation, under the
disguise of military frankness; steadiness to pursue his ends; flexibility to
vary his means; and, above all, the great art of submitting his own passions, as
well as those of others, to the interest of his ambition, and of coloring his
ambition with the most specious pretences of justice and public utility. Like
Augustus, Diocletian may be considered as the founder of a new empire. Like the
adopted son of Caesar, he was distinguished as a statesman rather than as a
warrior; nor did either of those princes employ force, whenever their purpose
could be effected by policy.

The
victory of Diocletian was remarkable for its singular mildness. A people
accustomed to applaud the clemency of the conqueror, if the usual punishments of
death, exile, and confiscation, were inflicted with any degree of temper and
equity, beheld, with the most pleasing astonishment, a civil war, the flames of
which were extinguished in the field of battle. Diocletian received into his
confidence Aristobulus, the principal minister of the house of Carus, respected
the lives, the fortunes, and the dignity, of his adversaries, and even continued
in their respective stations the greater number of the servants of Carinus[1231].
It is not improbable that motives of prudence might assist the humanity of the
artful Dalmatian; of these servants, many had purchased his favor by secret
treachery; in others, he esteemed their grateful fidelity to an unfortunate
master. The discerning judgment of Aurelian, of Probus, and of Carus, had filled
the several departments of the state and army with officers of approved merit,
whose removal would have injured the public service, without promoting the
interest of his successor. Such a conduct, however, displayed to the Roman world
the fairest prospect of the new reign, and the emperor affected to confirm this
favorable prepossession, by declaring, that, among all the virtues of his
predecessors, he was the most ambitious of imitating the humane philosophy of
Marcus Antoninus[1232].

The first
considerable action of his reign seemed to evince his sincerity as well as his
moderation. After the example of Marcus, he gave himself a colleague in the
person of Maximian, on whom he bestowed at first the title of Caesar, and
afterwards that of Augustus[1233].
But the motives of his conduct, as well as the object of his choice, were of a
very different nature from those of his admired predecessor. By investing a
luxurious youth with the honors of the purple, Marcus had discharged a debt of
private gratitude, at the expense, indeed, of the happiness of the state. By
associating a friend and a fellow-soldier to the labors of government,
Diocletian, in a time of public danger, provided for the defence both of the
East and of the West. Maximian was born a peasant, and, like Aurelian, in the
territory of Sirmium. Ignorant of letters[1234],
careless of laws, the rusticity of his appearance and manners still betrayed in
the most elevated fortune the meanness of his extraction. War was the only art
which he professed. In a long course of service, he had distinguished himself on
every frontier of the empire; and though his military talents were formed to
obey rather than to command, though, perhaps, he never attained the skill of a
consummate general, he was capable, by his valor, constancy, and experience, of
executing the most arduous undertakings. Nor were the vices of Maximian less
useful to his benefactor. Insensible to pity, and fearless of consequences, he
was the ready instrument of every act of cruelty which the policy of that artful
prince might at once suggest and disclaim. As soon as a bloody sacrifice had
been offered to prudence or to revenge, Diocletian, by his seasonable
intercession, saved the remaining few whom he had never designed to punish,
gently censured the severity of his stern colleague, and enjoyed the comparison
of a golden and an iron age, which was universally applied to their opposite
maxims of government. Notwithstanding the difference of their characters, the
two emperors maintained, on the throne, that friendship which they had
contracted in a private station. The haughty, turbulent spirit of Maximian, so
fatal, afterwards, to himself and to the public peace, was accustomed to respect
the genius of Diocletian, and confessed the ascendant of reason over brutal
violence[1235].
From a motive either of pride or superstition, the two emperors assumed the
titles, the one of Jovius, the other of Herculius. Whilst the motion of the
world (such was the language of their venal orators) was maintained by the
all-seeing wisdom of Jupiter, the invincible arm of Hercules purged the earth
from monsters and tyrants[1236].

But even
the omnipotence of Jovius and Herculius was insufficient to sustain the weight
of the public administration. The prudence of Diocletian discovered that the
empire, assailed on every side by the barbarians, required on every side the
presence of a great army, and of an emperor. With this view, he resolved once
more to divide his unwieldy power, and with the inferior title of Caesars[1237],
to confer on two generals of approved merit an unequal share of the sovereign
authority[1238].
Galerius, surnamed Armentarius, from his original profession of a herdsman, and
Constantius, who from his pale complexion had acquired the denomination of
Chlorus[1239],
were the two persons invested with the second honors of the Imperial purple. In
describing the country, extraction, and manners of Herculius, we have already
delineated those of Galerius, who was often, and not improperly, styled the
younger Maximian, though, in many instances both of virtue and ability, he
appears to have possessed a manifest superiority over the elder. The birth of
Constantius was less obscure than that of his colleagues. Eutropius, his father,
was one of the most considerable nobles of Dardania, and his mother was the
niece of the emperor Claudius[1240].
Although the youth of Constantius had been spent in arms, he was endowed with a
mild and amiable disposition, and the popular voice had long since acknowledged
him worthy of the rank which he at last attained. To strengthen the bonds of
political, by those of domestic, union, each of the emperors assumed the
character of a father to one of the Caesars, Diocletian to Galerius, and
Maximian to Constantius; and each, obliging them to repudiate their former
wives, bestowed his daughter in marriage or his adopted son[1241].
These four princes distributed among themselves the wide extent of the Roman
empire. The defence of Gaul, Spain[1242],
and Britain, was intrusted to Constantius: Galerius was stationed on the banks
of the Danube, as the safeguard of the Illyrian provinces. Italy and Africa were
considered as the department of Maximian; and for his peculiar portion,
Diocletian reserved Thrace, Egypt, and the rich countries of Asia. Every one was
sovereign with his own jurisdiction; but their united authority extended over
the whole monarchy, and each of them was prepared to assist his colleagues with
his counsels or presence. The Caesars, in their exalted rank, revered the
majesty of the emperors, and the three younger princes invariably acknowledged,
by their gratitude and obedience, the common parent of their fortunes. The
suspicious jealousy of power found not any place among them; and the singular
happiness of their union has been compared to a chorus of music, whose harmony
was regulated and maintained by the skilful hand of the first artist[1243].

This
important measure was not carried into execution till about six years after the
association of Maximian, and that interval of time had not been destitute of
memorable incidents. But we have preferred, for the sake of perspicuity, first
to describe the more perfect form of Diocletian's government, and afterwards to
relate the actions of his reign, following rather the natural order of the
events, than the dates of a very doubtful chronology.

The first
exploit of Maximian, though it is mentioned in a few words by our imperfect
writers, deserves, from its singularity, to be recorded in a history of human
manners. He suppressed the peasants of Gaul, who, under the appellation of
Bagaudae[1244],
had risen in a general insurrection; very similar to those which in the
fourteenth century successively afflicted both France and England[1245].
It should seem that very many of those institutions, referred by an easy
solution to the feudal system, are derived from the Celtic barbarians. When
Caesar subdued the Gauls, that great nation was already divided into three
orders of men; the clergy, the nobility, and the common people. The first
governed by superstition, the second by arms, but the third and last was not of
any weight or account in their public councils. It was very natural for the
plebeians, oppressed by debt, or apprehensive of injuries, to implore the
protection of some powerful chief, who acquired over their persons and property
the same absolute right as, among the Greeks and Romans, a master exercised over
his slaves[1246].
The greatest part of the nation was gradually reduced into a state of servitude;
compelled to perpetual labor on the estates of the Gallic nobles, and confined
to the soil, either by the real weight of fetters, or by the no less cruel and
forcible restraints of the laws. During the long series of troubles which
agitated Gaul, from the reign of Gallienus to that of Diocletian, the condition
of these servile peasants was peculiarly miserable; and they experienced at once
the complicated tyranny of their masters, of the barbarians, of the soldiers,
and of the officers of the revenue[1247].

Their
patience was at last provoked into despair. On every side they rose in
multitudes, armed with rustic weapons, and with irresistible fury. The ploughman
became a foot soldier, the shepherd mounted on horseback, the deserted villages
and open towns were abandoned to the flames, and the ravages of the peasants
equalled those of the fiercest barbarians[1248].
They asserted the natural rights of men, but they asserted those rights with the
most savage cruelty. The Gallic nobles, justly dreading their revenge, either
took refuge in the fortified cities, or fled from the wild scene of anarchy. The
peasants reigned without control; and two of their most daring leaders had the
folly and rashness to assume the Imperial ornaments[1249].
Their power soon expired at the approach of the legions. The strength of union
and discipline obtained an easy victory over a licentious and divided
multitude[1250].
A severe retaliation was inflicted on the peasants who were found in arms; the
affrighted remnant returned to their respective habitations, and their
unsuccessful effort for freedom served only to confirm their slavery. So strong
and uniform is the current of popular passions, that we might almost venture,
from very scanty materials, to relate the particulars of this war; but we are
not disposed to believe that the principal leaders, Aelianus and Amandus, were
Christians[1251],
or to insinuate, that the rebellion, as it happened in the time of Luther, was
occasioned by the abuse of those benevolent principles of Christianity, which
inculcate the natural freedom of mankind.

Maximian
had no sooner recovered Gaul from the hands of the peasants, than he lost
Britain by the usurpation of Carausius. Ever since the rash but successful
enterprise of the Franks under the reign of Probus, their daring countrymen had
constructed squadrons of light brigantines, in which they incessantly ravaged
the provinces adjacent to the ocean[1252].
To repel their desultory incursions, it was found necessary to create a naval
power; and the judicious measure was prosecuted with prudence and vigor.
Gessoriacum, or Boulogne, in the straits of the British Channel, was chosen by
the emperor for the station of the Roman fleet; and the command of it was
intrusted to Carausius, a Menapian of the meanest origin[1253],
but who had long signalized his skill as a pilot, and his valor as a soldier.
The integrity of the new admiral corresponded not with his abilities. When the
German pirates sailed from their own harbors, he connived at their passage, but
he diligently intercepted their return, and appropriated to his own use an ample
share of the spoil which they had acquired. The wealth of Carausius was, on this
occasion, very justly considered as an evidence of his guilt; and Maximian had
already given orders for his death. But the crafty Menapian foresaw and
prevented the severity of the emperor. By his liberality he had attached to his
fortunes the fleet which he commanded, and secured the barbarians in his
interest. From the port of Boulogne he sailed over to Britain, persuaded the
legion, and the auxiliaries which guarded that island, to embrace his party, and
boldly assuming, with the Imperial purple, the title of Augustus defied the
justice and the arms of his injured sovereign[1254].

When
Britain was thus dismembered from the empire, its importance was sensibly felt,
and its loss sincerely lamented. The Romans celebrated, and perhaps magnified,
the extent of that noble island, provided on every side with convenient harbors;
the temperature of the climate, and the fertility of the soil, alike adapted for
the production of corn or of vines; the valuable minerals with which it
abounded; its rich pastures covered with innumerable flocks, and its woods free
from wild beasts or venomous serpents. Above all, they regretted the large
amount of the revenue of Britain, whilst they confessed, that such a province
well deserved to become the seat of an independent monarchy[1255].
During the space of seven years it was possessed by Carausius; and fortune
continued propitious to a rebellion supported with courage and ability. The
British emperor defended the frontiers of his dominions against the Caledonians
of the North, invited, from the continent, a great number of skilful artists,
and displayed, on a variety of coins that are still extant, his taste and
opulence. Born on the confines of the Franks, he courted the friendship of that
formidable people, by the flattering imitation of their dress and manners. The
bravest of their youth he enlisted among his land or sea forces; and, in return
for their useful alliance, he communicated to the barbarians the dangerous
knowledge of military and naval arts. Carausius still preserved the possession
of Boulogne and the adjacent country. His fleets rode triumphant in the channel,
commanded the mouths of the Seine and of the Rhine, ravaged the coasts of the
ocean, and diffused beyond the columns of Hercules the terror of his name. Under
his command, Britain, destined in a future age to obtain the empire of the sea,
already assumed its natural and respectable station of a maritime power[1256].

By seizing
the fleet of Boulogne, Carausius had deprived his master of the means of pursuit
and revenge. And when, after a vast expense of time and labor, a new armament
was launched into the water[1257],
the Imperial troops, unaccustomed to that element, were easily baffled and
defeated by the veteran sailors of the usurper. This disappointed effort was
soon productive of a treaty of peace. Diocletian and his colleague, who justly
dreaded the enterprising spirit of Carausius, resigned to him the sovereignty of
Britain, and reluctantly admitted their perfidious servant to a participation of
the Imperial honors[1258].
But the adoption of the two Caesars restored new vigor to the Romans arms; and
while the Rhine was guarded by the presence of Maximian, his brave associate
Constantius assumed the conduct of the British war. His first enterprise was
against the important place of Boulogne. A stupendous mole, raised across the
entrance of the harbor, intercepted all hopes of relief. The town surrendered
after an obstinate defence; and a considerable part of the naval strength of
Carausius fell into the hands of the besiegers. During the three years which
Constantius employed in preparing a fleet adequate to the conquest of Britain,
he secured the coast of Gaul, invaded the country of the Franks, and deprived
the usurper of the assistance of those powerful allies.

Before the
preparations were finished, Constantius received the intelligence of the
tyrant's death, and it was considered as a sure presage of the approaching
victory. The servants of Carausius imitated the example of treason which he had
given. He was murdered by his first minister, Allectus, and the assassin
succeeded to his power and to his danger. But he possessed not equal abilities
either to exercise the one or to repel the other. He beheld, with anxious
terror, the opposite shores of the continent already filled with arms, with
troops, and with vessels; for Constantius had very prudently divided his forces,
that he might likewise divide the attention and resistance of the enemy. The
attack was at length made by the principal squadron, which, under the command of
the praefect Asclepiodatus, an officer of distinguished merit, had been
assembled in the north of the Seine. So imperfect in those times was the art of
navigation, that orators have celebrated the daring courage of the Romans, who
ventured to set sail with a side-wind, and on a stormy day. The weather proved
favorable to their enterprise. Under the cover of a thick fog, they escaped the
fleet of Allectus, which had been stationed off the Isle of Wight to receive
them, landed in safety on some part of the western coast, and convinced the
Britons, that a superiority of naval strength will not always protect their
country from a foreign invasion. Asclepiodatus had no sooner disembarked the
imperial troops, then he set fire to his ships; and, as the expedition proved
fortunate, his heroic conduct was universally admired. The usurper had posted
himself near London, to expect the formidable attack of Constantius, who
commanded in person the fleet of Boulogne; but the descent of a new enemy
required his immediate presence in the West. He performed this long march in so
precipitate a manner, that he encountered the whole force of the praefect with a
small body of harassed and disheartened troops. The engagement was soon
terminated by the total defeat and death of Allectus; a single battle, as it has
often happened, decided the fate of this great island; and when Constantius
landed on the shores of Kent, he found them covered with obedient subjects.
Their acclamations were loud and unanimous; and the virtues of the conqueror may
induce us to believe, that they sincerely rejoiced in a revolution, which, after
a separation of ten years, restored Britain to the body of the Roman empire[1259].

Chapter XIII
Reign of
Diocletian and His Three Associates
Part II

Britain
had none but domestic enemies to dread; and as long as the governors preserved
their fidelity, and the troops their discipline, the incursions of the naked
savages of Scotland or Ireland could never materially affect the safety of the
province. The peace of the continent, and the defence of the principal rivers
which bounded the empire, were objects of far greater difficulty and importance.
The policy of Diocletian, which inspired the councils of his associates,
provided for the public tranquility, by encouraging a spirit of dissension among
the barbarians, and by strengthening the fortifications of the Roman limit. In
the East he fixed a line of camps from Egypt to the Persian dominions, and for
every camp, he instituted an adequate number of stationary troops, commanded by
their respective officers, and supplied with every kind of arms, from the new
arsenals which he had formed at Antioch, Emesa, and Damascus[1260].
Nor was the precaution of the emperor less watchful against the well-known valor
of the barbarians of Europe. From the mouth of the Rhine to that of the Danube,
the ancient camps, towns, and citadels, were diligently reestablished, and, in
the most exposed places, new ones were skilfully constructed: the strictest
vigilance was introduced among the garrisons of the frontier, and every
expedient was practised that could render the long chain of fortifications firm
and impenetrable[1261].
A barrier so respectable was seldom violated, and the barbarians often turned
against each other their disappointed rage. The Goths, the Vandals, the Gepidae,
the Burgundians, the Alemanni, wasted each other's strength by destructive
hostilities: and whosoever vanquished, they vanquished the enemies of Rome. The
subjects of Diocletian enjoyed the bloody spectacle, and congratulated each
other, that the mischiefs of civil war were now experienced only by the
barbarians[1262].

Notwithstanding the policy of
Diocletian, it was impossible to maintain an equal and undisturbed tranquillity
during a reign of twenty years, and along a frontier of many hundred miles.
Sometimes the barbarians suspended their domestic animosities, and the relaxed
vigilance of the garrisons sometimes gave a passage to their strength or
dexterity. Whenever the provinces were invaded, Diocletian conducted himself
with that calm dignity which he always affected or possessed; reserved his
presence for such occasions as were worthy of his interposition, never exposed
his person or reputation to any unnecessary danger, insured his success by every
means that prudence could suggest, and displayed, with ostentation, the
consequences of his victory. In wars of a more difficult nature, and more
doubtful event, he employed the rough valor of Maximian; and that faithful
soldier was content to ascribe his own victories to the wise counsels and
auspicious influence of his benefactor. But after the adoption of the two
Caesars, the emperors themselves, retiring to a less laborious scene of action,
devolved on their adopted sons the defence of the Danube and of the Rhine. The
vigilant Galerius was never reduced to the necessity of vanquishing an army of
barbarians on the Roman territory[1263].
The brave and active Constantius delivered Gaul from a very furious inroad of
the Alemanni; and his victories of Langres and Vindonissa appear to have been
actions of considerable danger and merit. As he traversed the open country with
a feeble guard, he was encompassed on a sudden by the superior multitude of the
enemy. He retreated with difficulty towards Langres; but, in the general
consternation, the citizens refused to open their gates, and the wounded prince
was drawn up the wall by the means of a rope. But, on the news of his distress,
the Roman troops hastened from all sides to his relief, and before the evening
he had satisfied his honor and revenge by the slaughter of six thousand
Alemanni[1264].
From the monuments of those times, the obscure traces of several other victories
over the barbarians of Sarmatia and Germany might possibly be collected; but the
tedious search would not be rewarded either with amusement or with
instruction.

The
conduct which the emperor Probus had adopted in the disposal of the vanquished,
was imitated by Diocletian and his associates. The captive barbarians,
exchanging death for slavery, were distributed among the provincials, and
assigned to those districts (in Gaul, the territories of Amiens, Beauvais,
Cambray, Treves, Langres, and Troyes, are particularly specified[1265])
which had been depopulated by the calamities of war. They were usefully employed
as shepherds and husbandmen, but were denied the exercise of arms, except when
it was found expedient to enroll them in the military service. Nor did the
emperors refuse the property of lands, with a less servile tenure, to such of
the barbarians as solicited the protection of Rome. They granted a settlement to
several colonies of the Carpi, the Bastarnae, and the Sarmatians; and, by a
dangerous indulgence, permitted them in some measure to retain their national
manners and independence[1266].
Among the provincials, it was a subject of flattering exultation, that the
barbarian, so lately an object of terror, now cultivated their lands, drove
their cattle to the neighboring fair, and contributed by his labor to the public
plenty. They congratulated their masters on the powerful accession of subjects
and soldiers; but they forgot to observe, that multitudes of secret enemies,
insolent from favor, or desperate from oppression, were introduced into the
heart of the empire[1267].

While the
Caesars exercised their valor on the banks of the Rhine and Danube, the presence
of the emperors was required on the southern confines of the Roman world. From
the Nile to Mount Atlas Africa was in arms. A confederacy of five Moorish
nations issued from their deserts to invade the peaceful provinces[1268].
Julian had assumed the purple at Carthage[1269].
Achilleus at Alexandria, and even the Blemmyes, renewed, or rather continued,
their incursions into the Upper Egypt. Scarcely any circumstances have been
preserved of the exploits of Maximian in the western parts of Africa; but it
appears, by the event, that the progress of his arms was rapid and decisive,
that he vanquished the fiercest barbarians of Mauritania, and that he removed
them from the mountains, whose inaccessible strength had inspired their
inhabitants with a lawless confidence, and habituated them to a life of rapine
and violence[1270].
Diocletian, on his side, opened the campaign in Egypt by the siege of
Alexandria, cut off the aqueducts which conveyed the waters of the Nile into
every quarter of that immense city[1271],
and rendering his camp impregnable to the sallies of the besieged multitude, he
pushed his reiterated attacks with caution and vigor. After a siege of eight
months, Alexandria, wasted by the sword and by fire, implored the clemency of
the conqueror, but it experienced the full extent of his severity. Many
thousands of the citizens perished in a promiscuous slaughter, and there were
few obnoxious persons in Egypt who escaped a sentence either of death or at
least of exile[1272].
The fate of Busiris and of Coptos was still more melancholy than that of
Alexandria: those proud cities, the former distinguished by its antiquity, the
latter enriched by the passage of the Indian trade, were utterly destroyed by
the arms and by the severe order of Diocletian[1273].
The character of the Egyptian nation, insensible to kindness, but extremely
susceptible of fear, could alone justify this excessive rigor. The seditions of
Alexandria had often affected the tranquillity and subsistence of Rome itself.
Since the usurpation of Firmus, the province of Upper Egypt, incessantly
relapsing into rebellion, had embraced the alliance of the savages of Aethiopia.
The number of the Blemmyes, scattered between the Island of Meroe and the Red
Sea, was very inconsiderable, their disposition was unwarlike, their weapons
rude and inoffensive[1274].
Yet in the public disorders, these barbarians, whom antiquity, shocked with the
deformity of their figure, had almost excluded from the human species, presumed
to rank themselves among the enemies of Rome[1275].
Such had been the unworthy allies of the Egyptians; and while the attention of
the state was engaged in more serious wars, their vexations inroads might again
harass the repose of the province. With a view of opposing to the Blemmyes a
suitable adversary, Diocletian persuaded the Nobatae, or people of Nubia, to
remove from their ancient habitations in the deserts of Libya, and resigned to
them an extensive but unprofitable territory above Syene and the cataracts of
the Nile, with the stipulation, that they should ever respect and guard the
frontier of the empire. The treaty long subsisted; and till the establishment of
Christianity introduced stricter notions of religious worship, it was annually
ratified by a solemn sacrifice in the Isle of Elephantine, in which the Romans,
as well as the barbarians, adored the same visible or invisible powers of the
universe[1276].

At the
same time that Diocletian chastised the past crimes of the Egyptians, he
provided for their future safety and happiness by many wise regulations, which
were confirmed and enforced under the succeeding reigns[1277].
One very remarkable edict which he published, instead of being condemned as the
effect of jealous tyranny, deserves to be applauded as an act of prudence and
humanity. He caused a diligent inquiry to be made "for all the ancient books
which treated of the admirable art of making gold and silver, and without pity,
committed them to the flames; apprehensive, as we are assumed, lest the opulence
of the Egyptians should inspire them with confidence to rebel against the
empire[1278]."
But if Diocletian had been convinced of the reality of that valuable art, far
from extinguishing the memory, he would have converted the operation of it to
the benefit of the public revenue. It is much more likely, that his good sense
discovered to him the folly of such magnificent pretensions, and that he was
desirous of preserving the reason and fortunes of his subjects from the
mischievous pursuit. It may be remarked, that these ancient books, so liberally
ascribed to Pythagoras, to Solomon, or to Hermes, were the pious frauds of more
recent adepts. The Greeks were inattentive either to the use or to the abuse of
chemistry. In that immense register, where Pliny has deposited the discoveries,
the arts, and the errors of mankind, there is not the least mention of the
transmutation of metals; and the persecution of Diocletian is the first
authentic event in the history of alchemy. The conquest of Egypt by the Arabs
diffused that vain science over the globe. Congenial to the avarice of the human
heart, it was studied in China as in Europe, with equal eagerness, and with
equal success. The darkness of the middle ages insured a favorable reception to
every tale of wonder, and the revival of learning gave new vigor to hope, and
suggested more specious arts of deception. Philosophy, with the aid of
experience, has at length banished the study of alchemy; and the present age,
however desirous of riches, is content to seek them by the humbler means of
commerce and industry[1279].

The
reduction of Egypt was immediately followed by the Persian war. It was reserved
for the reign of Diocletian to vanquish that powerful nation, and to extort a
confession from the successors of Artaxerxes, of the superior majesty of the
Roman empire.

We have
observed, under the reign of Valerian, that Armenia was subdued by the perfidy
and the arms of the Persians, and that, after the assassination of Chosroes, his
son Tiridates, the infant heir of the monarchy, was saved by the fidelity of his
friends, and educated under the protection of the emperors. Tiridates derived
from his exile such advantages as he could never have obtained on the throne of
Armenia; the early knowledge of adversity, of mankind, and of the Roman
discipline. He signalized his youth by deeds of valor, and displayed a matchless
dexterity, as well as strength, in every martial exercise, and even in the less
honorable contests of the Olympian games[1280].
Those qualities were more nobly exerted in the defence of his benefactor
Licinius[1281].
That officer, in the sedition which occasioned the death of Probus, was exposed
to the most imminent danger, and the enraged soldiers were forcing their way
into his tent, when they were checked by the single arm of the Armenian prince.
The gratitude of Tiridates contributed soon afterwards to his restoration.
Licinius was in every station the friend and companion of Galerius, and the
merit of Galerius, long before he was raised to the dignity of Caesar, had been
known and esteemed by Diocletian. In the third year of that emperor's reign
Tiridates was invested with the kingdom of Armenia. The justice of the measure
was not less evident than its expediency. It was time to rescue from the
usurpation of the Persian monarch an important territory, which, since the reign
of Nero, had been always granted under the protection of the empire to a younger
branch of the house of Arsaces[1282].

When
Tiridates appeared on the frontiers of Armenia, he was received with an
unfeigned transport of joy and loyalty. During twenty-six years, the country had
experienced the real and imaginary hardships of a foreign yoke. The Persian
monarchs adorned their new conquest with magnificent buildings; but those
monuments had been erected at the expense of the people, and were abhorred as
badges of slavery. The apprehension of a revolt had inspired the most rigorous
precautions: oppression had been aggravated by insult, and the consciousness of
the public hatred had been productive of every measure that could render it
still more implacable. We have already remarked the intolerant spirit of the
Magian religion. The statues of the deified kings of Armenia, and the sacred
images of the sun and moon, were broke in pieces by the zeal of the conqueror;
and the perpetual fire of Ormuzd was kindled and preserved upon an altar erected
on the summit of Mount Bagavan[1283].
It was natural, that a people exasperated by so many injuries, should arm with
zeal in the cause of their independence, their religion, and their hereditary
sovereign. The torrent bore down every obstacle, and the Persian garrisons
retreated before its fury. The nobles of Armenia flew to the standard of
Tiridates, all alleging their past merit, offering their future service, and
soliciting from the new king those honors and rewards from which they had been
excluded with disdain under the foreign government[1284].
The command of the army was bestowed on Artavasdes, whose father had saved the
infancy of Tiridates, and whose family had been massacred for that generous
action. The brother of Artavasdes obtained the government of a province. One of
the first military dignities was conferred on the satrap Otas, a man of singular
temperance and fortitude, who presented to the king his sister[1285]
and a considerable treasure, both of which, in a sequestered fortress, Otas had
preserved from violation. Among the Armenian nobles appeared an ally, whose
fortunes are too remarkable to pass unnoticed. His name was Mamgo[1286],
his origin was Scythian, and the horde which acknowledge his authority had
encamped a very few years before on the skirts of the Chinese empire[1287],
which at that time extended as far as the neighborhood of Sogdiana[1288].
Having incurred the displeasure of his master, Mamgo, with his followers,
retired to the banks of the Oxus, and implored the protection of Sapor. The
emperor of China claimed the fugitive, and alleged the rights of sovereignty.
The Persian monarch pleaded the laws of hospitality, and with some difficulty
avoided a war, by the promise that he would banish Mamgo to the uttermost parts
of the West, a punishment, as he described it, not less dreadful than death
itself. Armenia was chosen for the place of exile, and a large district was
assigned to the Scythian horde, on which they might feed their flocks and herds,
and remove their encampment from one place to another, according to the
different seasons of the year. They were employed to repel the invasion of
Tiridates; but their leader, after weighing the obligations and injuries which
he had received from the Persian monarch, resolved to abandon his party. The
Armenian prince, who was well acquainted with this merit as well as power of
Mamgo, treated him with distinguished respect; and, by admitting him into his
confidence, acquired a brave and faithful servant, who contributed very
effectually to his restoration[1289].

For a
while, fortune appeared to favor the enterprising valor of Tiridates. He not
only expelled the enemies of his family and country from the whole extent of
Armenia, but in the prosecution of his revenge he carried his arms, or at least
his incursions, into the heart of Assyria. The historian, who has preserved the
name of Tiridates from oblivion, celebrates, with a degree of national
enthusiasm, his personal prowess: and, in the true spirit of eastern romance,
describes the giants and the elephants that fell beneath his invincible arm. It
is from other information that we discover the distracted state of the Persian
monarchy, to which the king of Armenia was indebted for some part of his
advantages. The throne was disputed by the ambition of contending brothers; and
Hormuz, after exerting without success the strength of his own party, had
recourse to the dangerous assistance of the barbarians who inhabited the banks
of the Caspian Sea[1290].
The civil war was, however, soon terminated, either by a victor or by a
reconciliation; and Narses, who was universally acknowledged as king of Persia,
directed his whole force against the foreign enemy. The contest then became too
unequal; nor was the valor of the hero able to withstand the power of the
monarch, Tiridates, a second time expelled from the throne of Armenia, once more
took refuge in the court of the emperors[1291].
Narses soon reestablished his authority over the revolted province; and loudly
complaining of the protection afforded by the Romans to rebels and fugitives,
aspired to the conquest of the East[1292].

Neither
prudence nor honor could permit the emperors to forsake the cause of the
Armenian king, and it was resolved to exert the force of the empire in the
Persian war. Diocletian, with the calm dignity which he constantly assumed,
fixed his own station in the city of Antioch, from whence he prepared and
directed the military operations[1293].
The conduct of the legions was intrusted to the intrepid valor of Galerius, who,
for that important purpose, was removed from the banks of the Danube to those of
the Euphrates. The armies soon encountered each other in the plains of
Mesopotamia, and two battles were fought with various and doubtful success; but
the third engagement was of a more decisive nature; and the Roman army received
a total overthrow, which is attributed to the rashness of Galerius, who, with an
inconsiderable body of troops, attacked the innumerable host of the Persians[1294].
But the consideration of the country that was the scene of action, may suggest
another reason for his defeat. The same ground on which Galerius was vanquished,
had been rendered memorable by the death of Crassus, and the slaughter of ten
legions. It was a plain of more than sixty miles, which extended from the hills
of Carrhae to the Euphrates; a smooth and barren surface of sandy desert,
without a hillock, without a tree, and without a spring of fresh water[1295].
The steady infantry of the Romans, fainting with heat and thirst, could neither
hope for victory if they preserved their ranks, nor break their ranks without
exposing themselves to the most imminent danger. In this situation they were
gradually encompassed by the superior numbers, harassed by the rapid evolutions,
and destroyed by the arrows of the barbarian cavalry. The king of Armenia had
signalized his valor in the battle, and acquired personal glory by the public
misfortune. He was pursued as far as the Euphrates; his horse was wounded, and
it appeared impossible for him to escape the victorious enemy. In this extremity
Tiridates embraced the only refuge which appeared before him: he dismounted and
plunged into the stream. His armor was heavy, the river very deep, and at those
parts at least half a mile in breadth[1296];
yet such was his strength and dexterity, that he reached in safety the opposite
bank[1297].
With regard to the Roman general, we are ignorant of the circumstances of his
escape; but when he returned to Antioch, Diocletian received him, not with the
tenderness of a friend and colleague, but with the indignation of an offended
sovereign. The haughtiest of men, clothed in his purple, but humbled by the
sense of his fault and misfortune, was obliged to follow the emperor's chariot
above a mile on foot, and to exhibit, before the whole court, the spectacle of
his disgrace[1298].

As soon as
Diocletian had indulged his private resentment, and asserted the majesty of
supreme power, he yielded to the submissive entreaties of the Caesar, and
permitted him to retrieve his own honor, as well as that of the Roman arms. In
the room of the unwarlike troops of Asia, which had most probably served in the
first expedition, a second army was drawn from the veterans and new levies of
the Illyrian frontier, and a considerable body of Gothic auxiliaries were taken
into the Imperial pay[1299].
At the head of a chosen army of twenty-five thousand men, Galerius again passed
the Euphrates; but, instead of exposing his legions in the open plains of
Mesopotamia he advanced through the mountains of Armenia, where he found the
inhabitants devoted to his cause, and the country as favorable to the operations
of infantry as it was inconvenient for the motions of cavalry[1300].
Adversity had confirmed the Roman discipline, while the barbarians, elated by
success, were become so negligent and remiss, that in the moment when they least
expected it, they were surprised by the active conduct of Galerius, who,
attended only by two horsemen, had with his own eyes secretly examined the state
and position of their camp. A surprise, especially in the night time, was for
the most part fatal to a Persian army. “Their horses were tied, and generally
shackled, to prevent their running away; and if an alarm happened, a Persian had
his housing to fix, his horse to bridle, and his corselet to put on, before he
could mount[1301]."
On this occasion, the impetuous attack of Galerius spread disorder and dismay
over the camp of the barbarians. A slight resistance was followed by a dreadful
carnage, and, in the general confusion, the wounded monarch (for Narses
commanded his armies in person) fled towards the deserts of Media. His sumptuous
tents, and those of his satraps, afforded an immense booty to the conqueror; and
an incident is mentioned, which proves the rustic but martial ignorance of the
legions in the elegant superfluities of life. A bag of shining leather, filled
with pearls, fell into the hands of a private soldier; he carefully preserved
the bag, but he threw away its contents, judging that whatever was of no use
could not possibly be of any value[1302].
The principal loss of Narses was of a much more affecting nature. Several of his
wives, his sisters, and children, who had attended the army, were made captives
in the defeat. But though the character of Galerius had in general very little
affinity with that of Alexander, he imitated, after his victory, the amiable
behavior of the Macedonian towards the family of Darius. The wives and children
of Narses were protected from violence and rapine, conveyed to a place of
safety, and treated with every mark of respect and tenderness, that was due from
a generous enemy to their age, their sex, and their royal dignity[1303].

Chapter XIII
Reign of
Diocletian and His Three Associates
Part III

While the
East anxiously expected the decision of this great contest, the emperor
Diocletian, having assembled in Syria a strong army of observation, displayed
from a distance the resources of the Roman power, and reserved himself for any
future emergency of the war. On the intelligence of the victory he condescended
to advance towards the frontier, with a view of moderating, by his presence and
counsels, the pride of Galerius. The interview of the Roman princes at Nisibis
was accompanied with every expression of respect on one side, and of esteem on
the other. It was in that city that they soon afterwards gave audience to the
ambassador of the Great King[1304].
The power, or at least the spirit, of Narses, had been broken by his last
defeat; and he considered an immediate peace as the only means that could stop
the progress of the Roman arms. He despatched Apharban, a servant who possessed
his favor and confidence, with a commission to negotiate a treaty, or rather to
receive whatever conditions the conqueror should impose. Apharban opened the
conference by expressing his master's gratitude for the generous treatment of
his family, and by soliciting the liberty of those illustrious captives. He
celebrated the valor of Galerius, without degrading the reputation of Narses,
and thought it no dishonor to confess the superiority of the victorious Caesar,
over a monarch who had surpassed in glory all the princes of his race.
Notwithstanding the justice of the Persian cause, he was empowered to submit the
present differences to the decision of the emperors themselves; convinced as he
was, that, in the midst of prosperity, they would not be unmindful of the
vicissitudes of fortune. Apharban concluded his discourse in the style of
eastern allegory, by observing that the Roman and Persian monarchies were the
two eyes of the world, which would remain imperfect and mutilated if either of
them should be put out.

"It well
becomes the Persians," replied Galerius, with a transport of fury, which seemed
to convulse his whole frame, "it well becomes the Persians to expatiate on the
vicissitudes of fortune, and calmly to read us lectures on the virtues of
moderation. Let them remember their own moderation, towards the unhappy
Valerian. They vanquished him by fraud, they treated him with indignity. They
detained him till the last moment of his life in shameful captivity, and after
his death they exposed his body to perpetual ignominy." Softening, however, his
tone, Galerius insinuated to the ambassador, that it had never been the practice
of the Romans to trample on a prostrate enemy; and that, on this occasion, they
should consult their own dignity rather than the Persian merit. He dismissed
Apharban with a hope that Narses would soon be informed on what conditions he
might obtain, from the clemency of the emperors, a lasting peace, and the
restoration of his wives and children. In this conference we may discover the
fierce passions of Galerius, as well as his deference to the superior wisdom and
authority of Diocletian. The ambition of the former grasped at the conquest of
the East, and had proposed to reduce Persia into the state of a province. The
prudence of the latter, who adhered to the moderate policy of Augustus and the
Antonines, embraced the favorable opportunity of terminating a successful war by
an honorable and advantageous peace[1305].

In
pursuance of their promise, the emperors soon afterwards appointed Sicorius
Probus, one of their secretaries, to acquaint the Persian court with their final
resolution. As the minister of peace, he was received with every mark of
politeness and friendship; but, under the pretence of allowing him the necessary
repose after so long a journey, the audience of Probus was deferred from day to
day; and he attended the slow motions of the king, till at length he was
admitted to his presence, near the River Asprudus in Media. The secret motive of
Narses, in this delay, had been to collect such a military force as might enable
him, though sincerely desirous of peace, to negotiate with the greater weight
and dignity. Three persons only assisted at this important conference, the
minister Apharban, the praefect of the guards, and an officer who had commanded
on the Armenian frontier[1306].
The first condition proposed by the ambassador is not at present of a very
intelligible nature; that the city of Nisibis might be established for the place
of mutual exchange, or, as we should formerly have termed it, for the staple of
trade, between the two empires. There is no difficulty in conceiving the
intention of the Roman princes to improve their revenue by some restraints upon
commerce; but as Nisibis was situated within their own dominions, and as they
were masters both of the imports and exports, it should seem that such
restraints were the objects of an internal law, rather than of a foreign treaty.
To render them more effectual, some stipulations were probably required on the
side of the king of Persia, which appeared so very repugnant either to his
interest or to his dignity, that Narses could not be persuaded to subscribe
them. As this was the only article to which he refused his consent, it was no
longer insisted on; and the emperors either suffered the trade to flow in its
natural channels, or contented themselves with such restrictions, as it depended
on their own authority to establish.

As soon as
this difficulty was removed, a solemn peace was concluded and ratified between
the two nations. The conditions of a treaty so glorious to the empire, and so
necessary to Persia Persian, may deserve a more peculiar attention, as the
history of Rome presents very few transactions of a similar nature; most of her
wars having either been terminated by absolute conquest, or waged against
barbarians ignorant of the use of letters.

I.
The
Aboras, or, as it is called by Xenophon, the Araxes, was fixed as the boundary
between the two monarchies[1307].
That river, which rose near the Tigris, was increased, a few miles below
Nisibis, by the little stream of the Mygdonius, passed under the walls of
Singara, and fell into the Euphrates at Circesium, a frontier town, which, by
the care of Diocletian, was very strongly fortified[1308].
Mesopotamia, the object of so many wars, was ceded to the empire; and the
Persians, by this treaty, renounced all pretensions to that great
province.

II.
They
relinquished to the Romans five provinces beyond the Tigris[1309].
Their situation formed a very useful barrier, and their natural strength was
soon improved by art and military skill. Four of these, to the north of the
river, were districts of obscure fame and inconsiderable extent; Intiline,
Zabdicene, Arzanene, and Moxoene[1310];
but on the east of the Tigris, the empire acquired the large and mountainous
territory of Carduene, the ancient seat of the Carduchians, who preserved for
many ages their manly freedom in the heart of the despotic monarchies of Asia.
The ten thousand Greeks traversed their country, after a painful march, or
rather engagement, of seven days; and it is confessed by their leader, in his
incomparable relation of the retreat, that they suffered more from the arrows of
the Carduchians, than from the power of the Great King[1311].
Their posterity, the Curds, with very little alteration either of name or
manners[1312],
acknowledged the nominal sovereignty of the Turkish
sultan.

III.
It is
almost needless to observe, that Tiridates, the faithful ally of Rome, was
restored to the throne of his fathers, and that the rights of the Imperial
supremacy were fully asserted and secured. The limits of Armenia were extended
as far as the fortress of Sintha in Media, and this increase of dominion was not
so much an act of liberality as of justice. Of the provinces already mentioned
beyond the Tigris, the four first had been dismembered by the Parthians from the
crown of Armenia[1313];
and when the Romans acquired the possession of them, they stipulated, at the
expense of the usurpers, an ample compensation, which invested their ally with
the extensive and fertile country of Atropatene. Its principal city, in the same
situation perhaps as the modern Tauris, was frequently honored by the residence
of Tiridates; and as it sometimes bore the name of Ecbatana, he imitated, in the
buildings and fortifications, the splendid capital of the Medes[1314].

IV.
The
country of Iberia was barren, its inhabitants rude and savage. But they were
accustomed to the use of arms, and they separated from the empire barbarians
much fiercer and more formidable than themselves. The narrow defiles of Mount
Caucasus were in their hands, and it was in their choice, either to admit or to
exclude the wandering tribes of Sarmatia, whenever a rapacious spirit urged them
to penetrate into the richer climes of the South[1315].
The nomination of the kings of Iberia, which was resigned by the Persian monarch
to the emperors, contributed to the strength and security of the Roman power in
Asia[1316].
The East enjoyed a profound tranquillity during forty years; and the treaty
between the rival monarchies was strictly observed till the death of Tiridates;
when a new generation, animated with different views and different passions,
succeeded to the government of the world; and the grandson of Narses undertook a
long and memorable war against the princes of the house of
Constantine.

The
arduous work of rescuing the distressed empire from tyrants and barbarians had
now been completely achieved by a succession of Illyrian peasants. As soon as
Diocletian entered into the twentieth year of his reign, he celebrated that
memorable aera, as well as the success of his arms, by the pomp of a Roman
triumph[1317].
Maximian, the equal partner of his power, was his only companion in the glory of
that day. The two Caesars had fought and conquered, but the merit of their
exploits was ascribed, according to the rigor of ancient maxims, to the
auspicious influence of their fathers and emperors[1318].
The triumph of Diocletian and Maximian was less magnificent, perhaps, than those
of Aurelian and Probus, but it was dignified by several circumstances of
superior fame and good fortune. Africa and Britain, the Rhine, the Danube, and
the Nile, furnished their respective trophies; but the most distinguished
ornament was of a more singular nature, a Persian victory followed by an
important conquest. The representations of rivers, mountains, and provinces,
were carried before the Imperial car. The images of the captive wives, the
sisters, and the children of the Great King, afforded a new and grateful
spectacle to the vanity of the people[1319].
In the eyes of posterity, this triumph is remarkable, by a distinction of a less
honorable kind. It was the last that Rome ever beheld. Soon after this period,
the emperors ceased to vanquish, and Rome ceased to be the capital of the
empire.

The spot
on which Rome was founded had been consecrated by ancient ceremonies and
imaginary miracles. The presence of some god, or the memory of some hero, seemed
to animate every part of the city, and the empire of the world had been promised
to the Capitol[1320].
The native Romans felt and confessed the power of this agreeable illusion. It
was derived from their ancestors, had grown up with their earliest habits of
life, and was protected, in some measure, by the opinion of political utility.
The form and the seat of government were intimately blended together, nor was it
esteemed possible to transport the one without destroying the other[1321].
But the sovereignty of the capital was gradually annihilated in the extent of
conquest; the provinces rose to the same level, and the vanquished nations
acquired the name and privileges, without imbibing the partial affections, of
Romans. During a long period, however, the remains of the ancient constitution,
and the influence of custom, preserved the dignity of Rome. The emperors, though
perhaps of African or Illyrian extraction, respected their adopted country, as
the seat of their power, and the centre of their extensive dominions. The
emergencies of war very frequently required their presence on the frontiers; but
Diocletian and Maximian were the first Roman princes who fixed, in time of
peace, their ordinary residence in the provinces; and their conduct, however it
might be suggested by private motives, was justified by very specious
considerations of policy. The court of the emperor of the West was, for the most
part, established at Milan, whose situation, at the foot of the Alps, appeared
far more convenient than that of Rome, for the important purpose of watching the
motions of the barbarians of Germany. Milan soon assumed the splendor of an
Imperial city. The houses are described as numerous and well built; the manners
of the people as polished and liberal. A circus, a theatre, a mint, a palace,
baths, which bore the name of their founder Maximian; porticos adorned with
statues, and a double circumference of walls, contributed to the beauty of the
new capital; nor did it seem oppressed even by the proximity of Rome[1322].
To rival the majesty of Rome was the ambition likewise of Diocletian, who
employed his leisure, and the wealth of the East, in the embellishment of
Nicomedia, a city placed on the verge of Europe and Asia, almost at an equal
distance between the Danube and the Euphrates. By the taste of the monarch, and
at the expense of the people, Nicomedia acquired, in the space of a few years, a
degree of magnificence which might appear to have required the labor of ages,
and became inferior only to Rome, Alexandria, and Antioch, in extent of
populousness[1323].
The life of Diocletian and Maximian was a life of action, and a considerable
portion of it was spent in camps, or in the long and frequent marches; but
whenever the public business allowed them any relaxation, they seemed to have
retired with pleasure to their favorite residences of Nicomedia and Milan. Till
Diocletian, in the twentieth year of his reign, celebrated his Roman triumph, it
is extremely doubtful whether he ever visited the ancient capital of the empire.
Even on that memorable occasion his stay did not exceed two months. Disgusted
with the licentious familiarity of the people, he quitted Rome with
precipitation thirteen days before it was expected that he should have appeared
in the senate, invested with the ensigns of the consular dignity[1324].

The
dislike expressed by Diocletian towards Rome and Roman freedom, was not the
effect of momentary caprice, but the result of the most artful policy. That
crafty prince had framed a new system of Imperial government, which was
afterwards completed by the family of Constantine; and as the image of the old
constitution was religiously preserved in the senate, he resolved to deprive
that order of its small remains of power and consideration. We may recollect,
about eight years before the elevation, of Diocletian the transient greatness,
and the ambitious hopes, of the Roman senate. As long as that enthusiasm
prevailed, many of the nobles imprudently displayed their zeal in the cause of
freedom; and after the successes of Probus had withdrawn their countenance from
the republican party, the senators were unable to disguise their impotent
resentment. As the sovereign of Italy, Maximian was intrusted with the care of
extinguishing this troublesome, rather than dangerous spirit, and the task was
perfectly suited to his cruel temper. The most illustrious members of the
senate, whom Diocletian always affected to esteem, were involved, by his
colleague, in the accusation of imaginary plots; and the possession of an
elegant villa, or a well-cultivated estate, was interpreted as a convincing
evidence of guilt[1325].
The camp of the Praetorians, which had so long oppressed, began to protect, the
majesty of Rome; and as those haughty troops were conscious of the decline of
their power, they were naturally disposed to unite their strength with the
authority of the senate. By the prudent measures of Diocletian, the numbers of
the Praetorians were insensibly reduced, their privileges abolished[1326],
and their place supplied by two faithful legions of Illyricum, who, under the
new titles of Jovians and Herculians, were appointed to perform the service of
the Imperial guards[1327].
But the most fatal though secret wound, which the senate received from the hands
of Diocletian and Maximian, was inflicted by the inevitable operation of their
absence. As long as the emperors resided at Rome, that assembly might be
oppressed, but it could scarcely be neglected. The successors of Augustus
exercised the power of dictating whatever laws their wisdom or caprice might
suggest; but those laws were ratified by the sanction of the senate. The model
of ancient freedom was preserved in its deliberations and decrees; and wise
princes, who respected the prejudices of the Roman people, were in some measure
obliged to assume the language and behavior suitable to the general and first
magistrate of the republic. In the armies and in the provinces, they displayed
the dignity of monarchs; and when they fixed their residence at a distance from
the capital, they forever laid aside the dissimulation which Augustus had
recommended to his successors. In the exercise of the legislative as well as the
executive power, the sovereign advised with his ministers, instead of consulting
the great council of the nation. The name of the senate was mentioned with honor
till the last period of the empire; the vanity of its members was still
flattered with honorary distinctions[1328];
but the assembly which had so long been the source, and so long the instrument
of power, was respectfully suffered to sink into oblivion. The senate of Rome,
losing all connection with the Imperial court and the actual constitution, was
left a venerable but useless monument of antiquity on the Capitoline
hill.

Chapter XIII
Reign of
Diocletian and His Three Associates
Part IV

When the
Roman princes had lost sight of the senate and of their ancient capital, they
easily forgot the origin and nature of their legal power. The civil offices of
consul, of proconsul, of censor, and of tribune, by the union of which it had
been formed, betrayed to the people its republican extraction. Those modest
titles were laid aside[1329];
and if they still distinguished their high station by the appellation of
Emperor, or Imperator, that word was understood in a new and more dignified
sense, and no longer denoted the general of the Roman armies, but the sovereign
of the Roman world. The name of Emperor, which was at first of a military
nature, was associated with another of a more servile kind. The epithet of
Dominus, or Lord, in its primitive signification, was expressive, not of the
authority of a prince over his subjects, or of a commander over his soldiers,
but of the despotic power of a master over his domestic slaves[1330].
Viewing it in that odious light, it had been rejected with abhorrence by the
first Caesars. Their resistance insensibly became more feeble, and the name less
odious; till at length the style of our Lord and Emperor was not only bestowed
by flattery, but was regularly admitted into the laws and public monuments. Such
lofty epithets were sufficient to elate and satisfy the most excessive vanity;
and if the successors of Diocletian still declined the title of King, it seems
to have been the effect not so much of their moderation as of their delicacy.
Wherever the Latin tongue was in use, (and it was the language of government
throughout the empire,) the Imperial title, as it was peculiar to themselves,
conveyed a more respectable idea than the name of king, which they must have
shared with a hundred barbarian chieftains; or which, at the best, they could
derive only from Romulus, or from Tarquin. But the sentiments of the East were
very different from those of the West. From the earliest period of history, the
sovereigns of Asia had been celebrated in the Greek language by the title of
Basileus, or King; and since it was considered as the first distinction among
men, it was soon employed by the servile provincials of the East, in their
humble addresses to the Roman throne[1331].
Even the attributes, or at least the titles, of the Divinity, were usurped by
Diocletian and Maximian, who transmitted them to a succession of Christian
emperors[1332].
Such extravagant compliments, however, soon lose their impiety by losing their
meaning; and when the ear is once accustomed to the sound, they are heard with
indifference, as vague though excessive professions of
respect.

From the
time of Augustus to that of Diocletian, the Roman princes, conversing in a
familiar manner among their fellow-citizens, were saluted only with the same
respect that was usually paid to senators and magistrates. Their principal
distinction was the Imperial or military robe of purple; whilst the senatorial
garment was marked by a broad, and the equestrian by a narrow, band or stripe of
the same honorable color. The pride, or rather the policy, of Diocletian,
engaged that artful prince to introduce the stately magnificence of the court of
Persia[1333].
He ventured to assume the diadem, an ornament detested by the Romans as the
odious ensign of royalty, and the use of which had been considered as the most
desperate act of the madness of Caligula. It was no more than a broad white
fillet set with pearls, which encircled the emperor's head. The sumptuous robes
of Diocletian and his successors were of silk and gold; and it is remarked with
indignation, that even their shoes were studded with the most precious gems. The
access to their sacred person was every day rendered more difficult by the
institution of new forms and ceremonies. The avenues of the palace were strictly
guarded by the various schools, as they began to be called, of domestic
officers. The interior apartments were intrusted to the jealous vigilance of the
eunuchs, the increase of whose numbers and influence was the most infallible
symptom of the progress of despotism. When a subject was at length admitted to
the Imperial presence, he was obliged, whatever might be his rank, to fall
prostrate on the ground, and to adore, according to the eastern fashion, the
divinity of his lord and master[1334].
Diocletian was a man of sense, who, in the course of private as well as public
life, had formed a just estimate both of himself and of mankind: nor is it easy
to conceive, that in substituting the manners of Persia to those of Rome, he was
seriously actuated by so mean a principle as that of vanity. He flattered
himself, that an ostentation of splendor and luxury would subdue the imagination
of the multitude; that the monarch would be less exposed to the rude license of
the people and the soldiers, as his person was secluded from the public view;
and that habits of submission would insensibly be productive of sentiments of
veneration. Like the modesty affected by Augustus, the state maintained by
Diocletian was a theatrical representation; but it must be confessed, that of
the two comedies, the former was of a much more liberal and manly character than
the latter. It was the aim of the one to disguise, and the object of the other
to display, the unbounded power which the emperors possessed over the Roman
world.

Ostentation was the first principle
of the new system instituted by Diocletian. The second was division. He divided
the empire, the provinces, and every branch of the civil as well as military
administration. He multiplied the wheels of the machine of government, and
rendered its operations less rapid, but more secure. Whatever advantages and
whatever defects might attend these innovations, they must be ascribed in a very
great degree to the first inventor; but as the new frame of policy was gradually
improved and completed by succeeding princes, it will be more satisfactory to
delay the consideration of it till the season of its full maturity and
perfection[1335].
Reserving, therefore, for the reign of Constantine a more exact picture of the
new empire, we shall content ourselves with describing the principal and
decisive outline, as it was traced by the hand of Diocletian. He had associated
three colleagues in the exercise of the supreme power; and as he was convinced
that the abilities of a single man were inadequate to the public defence, he
considered the joint administration of four princes not as a temporary
expedient, but as a fundamental law of the constitution. It was his intention,
that the two elder princes should be distinguished by the use of the diadem, and
the title of Augusti; that, as affection or esteem might direct their choice,
they should regularly call to their assistance two subordinate colleagues; and
that the Coesars, rising in their turn to the first rank, should supply an
uninterrupted succession of emperors. The empire was divided into four parts.
The East and Italy were the most honorable, the Danube and the Rhine the most
laborious stations. The former claimed the presence of the Augusti, the latter
were intrusted to the administration of the Coesars. The strength of the legions
was in the hands of the four partners of sovereignty, and the despair of
successively vanquishing four formidable rivals might intimidate the ambition of
an aspiring general. In their civil government, the emperors were supposed to
exercise the undivided power of the monarch, and their edicts, inscribed with
their joint names, were received in all the provinces, as promulgated by their
mutual councils and authority. Notwithstanding these precautions, the political
union of the Roman world was gradually dissolved, and a principle of division
was introduced, which, in the course of a few years, occasioned the perpetual
separation of the Eastern and Western Empires.

The system
of Diocletian was accompanied with another very material disadvantage, which
cannot even at present be totally overlooked; a more expensive establishment,
and consequently an increase of taxes, and the oppression of the people. Instead
of a modest family of slaves and freedmen, such as had contented the simple
greatness of Augustus and Trajan, three or four magnificent courts were
established in the various parts of the empire, and as many Roman kings
contended with each other and with the Persian monarch for the vain superiority
of pomp and luxury. The number of ministers, of magistrates, of officers, and of
servants, who filled the different departments of the state, was multiplied
beyond the example of former times; and (if we may borrow the warm expression of
a contemporary) "when the proportion of those who received, exceeded the
proportion of those who contributed, the provinces were oppressed by the weight
of tributes[1336]."
From this period to the extinction of the empire, it would be easy to deduce an
uninterrupted series of clamors and complaints. According to his religion and
situation, each writer chooses either Diocletian, or Constantine, or Valens, or
Theodosius, for the object of his invectives; but they unanimously agree in
representing the burden of the public impositions, and particularly the land tax
and capitation, as the intolerable and increasing grievance of their own times.
From such a concurrence, an impartial historian, who is obliged to extract truth
from satire, as well as from panegyric, will be inclined to divide the blame
among the princes whom they accuse, and to ascribe their exactions much less to
their personal vices, than to the uniform system of their administration[1337].
The emperor Diocletian was indeed the author of that system; but during his
reign, the growing evil was confined within the bounds of modesty and
discretion, and he deserves the reproach of establishing pernicious precedents,
rather than of exercising actual oppression[1338].
It may be added, that his revenues were managed with prudent economy; and that
after all the current expenses were discharged, there still remained in the
Imperial treasury an ample provision either for judicious liberality or for any
emergency of the state.

It was in
the twenty first year of his reign that Diocletian executed his memorable
resolution of abdicating the empire; an action more naturally to have been
expected from the elder or the younger Antoninus, than from a prince who had
never practised the lessons of philosophy either in the attainment or in the use
of supreme power. Diocletian acquired the glory of giving to the world the first
example of a resignation[1339],
which has not been very frequently imitated by succeeding monarchs. The parallel
of Charles the Fifth, however, will naturally offer itself to our mind, not only
since the eloquence of a modern historian has rendered that name so familiar to
an English reader, but from the very striking resemblance between the characters
of the two emperors, whose political abilities were superior to their military
genius, and whose specious virtues were much less the effect of nature than of
art. The abdication of Charles appears to have been hastened by the vicissitude
of fortune; and the disappointment of his favorite schemes urged him to
relinquish a power which he found inadequate to his ambition. But the reign of
Diocletian had flowed with a tide of uninterrupted success; nor was it till
after he had vanquished all his enemies, and accomplished all his designs, that
he seems to have entertained any serious thoughts of resigning the empire.
Neither Charles nor Diocletian were arrived at a very advanced period of life;
since the one was only fifty- five, and the other was no more than fifty-nine
years of age; but the active life of those princes, their wars and journeys, the
cares of royalty, and their application to business, had already impaired their
constitution, and brought on the infirmities of a premature old age[1340].

Notwithstanding the severity of a
very cold and rainy winter, Diocletian left Italy soon after the ceremony of his
triumph, and began his progress towards the East round the circuit of the
Illyrian provinces. From the inclemency of the weather, and the fatigue of the
journey, he soon contracted a slow illness; and though he made easy marches, and
was generally carried in a close litter, his disorder, before he arrived at
Nicomedia, about the end of the summer, was become very serious and alarming.
During the whole winter he was confined to his palace: his danger inspired a
general and unaffected concern; but the people could only judge of the various
alterations of his health, from the joy or consternation which they discovered
in the countenances and behavior of his attendants. The rumor of his death was
for some time universally believed, and it was supposed to be concealed with a
view to prevent the troubles that might have happened during the absence of the
Caesar Galerius. At length, however, on the first of March, Diocletian once more
appeared in public, but so pale and emaciated, that he could scarcely have been
recognized by those to whom his person was the most familiar. It was time to put
an end to the painful struggle, which he had sustained during more than a year,
between the care of his health and that of his dignity. The former required
indulgence and relaxation, the latter compelled him to direct, from the bed of
sickness, the administration of a great empire. He resolved to pass the
remainder of his days in honorable repose, to place his glory beyond the reach
of fortune, and to relinquish the theatre of the world to his younger and more
active associates[1341].

The
ceremony of his abdication was performed in a spacious plain, about three miles
from Nicomedia. The emperor ascended a lofty throne, and in a speech, full of
reason and dignity, declared his intention, both to the people and to the
soldiers who were assembled on this extraordinary occasion. As soon as he had
divested himself of his purple, he withdrew from the gazing multitude; and
traversing the city in a covered chariot, proceeded, without delay, to the
favorite retirement which he had chosen in his native country of Dalmatia. On
the same day, which was the first of May[1342],
Maximian, as it had been previously concerted, made his resignation of the
Imperial dignity at Milan. Even in the splendor of the Roman triumph, Diocletian
had meditated his design of abdicating the government. As he wished to secure
the obedience of Maximian, he exacted from him either a general assurance that
he would submit his actions to the authority of his benefactor, or a particular
promise that he would descend from the throne, whenever he should receive the
advice and the example. This engagement, though it was confirmed by the
solemnity of an oath before the altar of the Capitoline Jupiter[1343],
would have proved a feeble restraint on the fierce temper of Maximian, whose
passion was the love of power, and who neither desired present tranquility nor
future reputation. But he yielded, however reluctantly, to the ascendant which
his wiser colleague had acquired over him, and retired, immediately after his
abdication, to a villa in Lucania, where it was almost impossible that such an
impatient spirit could find any lasting tranquility.

Diocletian, who, from a servile
origin, had raised himself to the throne, passed the nine last years of his life
in a private condition. Reason had dictated, and content seems to have
accompanied, his retreat, in which he enjoyed, for a long time, the respect of
those princes to whom he had resigned the possession of the world[1344].
It is seldom that minds long exercised in business have formed the habits of
conversing with themselves, and in the loss of power they principally regret the
want of occupation. The amusements of letters and of devotion, which afford so
many resources in solitude, were incapable of fixing the attention of
Diocletian; but he had preserved, or at least he soon recovered, a taste for the
most innocent as well as natural pleasures, and his leisure hours were
sufficiently employed in building, planting, and gardening. His answer to
Maximian is deservedly celebrated. He was solicited by that restless old man to
reassume the reins of government, and the Imperial purple. He rejected the
temptation with a smile of pity, calmly observing, that if he could show
Maximian the cabbages which he had planted with his own hands at Salona, he
should no longer be urged to relinquish the enjoyment of happiness for the
pursuit of power[1345].
In his conversations with his friends, he frequently acknowledged, that of all
arts, the most difficult was the art of reigning; and he expressed himself on
that favorite topic with a degree of warmth which could be the result only of
experience. "How often," was he accustomed to say, "is it the interest of four
or five ministers to combine together to deceive their sovereign! Secluded from
mankind by his exalted dignity, the truth is concealed from his knowledge; he
can see only with their eyes, he hears nothing but their misrepresentations. He
confers the most important offices upon vice and weakness, and disgraces the
most virtuous and deserving among his subjects. By such infamous arts," added
Diocletian, "the best and wisest princes are sold to the venal corruption of
their courtiers[1346]."
A just estimate of greatness, and the assurance of immortal fame, improve our
relish for the pleasures of retirement; but the Roman emperor had filled too
important a character in the world, to enjoy without alloy the comforts and
security of a private condition. It was impossible that he could remain ignorant
of the troubles which afflicted the empire after his abdication. It was
impossible that he could be indifferent to their consequences. Fear, sorrow, and
discontent, sometimes pursued him into the solitude of Salona. His tenderness,
or at least his pride, was deeply wounded by the misfortunes of his wife and
daughter; and the last moments of Diocletian were imbittered by some affronts,
which Licinius and Constantine might have spared the father of so many emperors,
and the first author of their own fortune. A report, though of a very doubtful
nature, has reached our times, that he prudently withdrew himself from their
power by a voluntary death[1347].

Before we
dismiss the consideration of the life and character of Diocletian, we may, for a
moment, direct our view to the place of his retirement. Salona, a principal city
of his native province of Dalmatia, was near two hundred Roman miles (according
to the measurement of the public highways) from Aquileia and the confines of
Italy, and about two hundred and seventy from Sirmium, the usual residence of
the emperors whenever they visited the Illyrian frontier[1348].
A miserable village still preserves the name of Salona; but so late as the
sixteenth century, the remains of a theatre, and a confused prospect of broken
arches and marble columns, continued to attest its ancient splendor[1349].
About six or seven miles from the city, Diocletian constructed a magnificent
palace, and we may infer, from the greatness of the work, how long he had
meditated his design of abdicating the empire. The choice of a spot which united
all that could contribute either to health or to luxury, did not require the
partiality of a native. “The soil was dry and fertile, the air is pure and
wholesome, and though extremely hot during the summer months, this country
seldom feels those sultry and noxious winds, to which the coasts of Istria and
some parts of Italy are exposed. The views from the palace are no less beautiful
than the soil and climate were inviting. Towards the west lies the fertile shore
that stretches along the Adriatic, in which a number of small islands are
scattered in such a manner, as to give this part of the sea the appearance of a
great lake. On the north side lies the bay, which led to the ancient city of
Salona; and the country beyond it, appearing in sight, forms a proper contrast
to that more extensive prospect of water, which the Adriatic presents both to
the south and to the east. Towards the north, the view is terminated by high and
irregular mountains, situated at a proper distance, and in many places covered
with villages, woods, and vineyards[1350]."

Though
Constantine, from a very obvious prejudice, affects to mention the palace of
Diocletian with contempt[1351],
yet one of their successors, who could only see it in a neglected and mutilated
state, celebrates its magnificence in terms of the highest admiration[1352].
It covered an extent of ground consisting of between nine and ten English acres.
The form was quadrangular, flanked with sixteen towers. Two of the sides were
near six hundred, and the other two near seven hundred feet in length. The whole
was constructed of a beautiful freestone, extracted from the neighboring
quarries of Trau, or Tragutium, and very little inferior to marble itself. Four
streets, intersecting each other at right angles, divided the several parts of
this great edifice, and the approach to the principal apartment was from a very
stately entrance, which is still denominated the Golden Gate. The approach was
terminated by a peristylium of granite columns, on one side of which we discover
the square temple of Aesculapius, on the other the octagon temple of Jupiter.
The latter of those deities Diocletian revered as the patron of his fortunes,
the former as the protector of his health. By comparing the present remains with
the precepts of Vitruvius, the several parts of the building, the baths,
bed-chamber, the atrium, the basilica, and the Cyzicene, Corinthian, and
Egyptian halls have been described with some degree of precision, or at least of
probability. Their forms were various, their proportions just; but they all were
attended with two imperfections, very repugnant to our modern notions of taste
and conveniency. These stately rooms had neither windows nor chimneys. They were
lighted from the top, (for the building seems to have consisted of no more than
one story,) and they received their heat by the help of pipes that were conveyed
along the walls. The range of principal apartments was protected towards the
south-west by a portico five hundred and seventeen feet long, which must have
formed a very noble and delightful walk, when the beauties of painting and
sculpture were added to those of the prospect.

Had this
magnificent edifice remained in a solitary country, it would have been exposed
to the ravages of time; but it might, perhaps, have escaped the rapacious
industry of man. The village of Aspalathus[1353],
and, long afterwards, the provincial town of Spalatro, have grown out of its
ruins. The Golden Gate now opens into the market-place. St. John the Baptist has
usurped the honors of Aesculapius; and the temple of Jupiter, under the
protection of the Virgin, is converted into the cathedral church. For this
account of Diocletian's palace we are principally indebted to an ingenious
artist of our own time and country, whom a very liberal curiosity carried into
the heart of Dalmatia[1354].
But there is room to suspect that the elegance of his designs and engraving has
somewhat flattered the objects which it was their purpose to represent. We are
informed by a more recent and very judicious traveller, that the awful ruins of
Spalatro are not less expressive of the decline of the art than of the greatness
of the Roman empire in the time of Diocletian[1355].
If such was indeed the state of architecture, we must naturally believe that
painting and sculpture had experienced a still more sensible decay. The practice
of architecture is directed by a few general and even mechanical rules. But
sculpture, and above all, painting, propose to themselves the imitation not only
of the forms of nature, but of the characters and passions of the human soul. In
those sublime arts, the dexterity of the hand is of little avail, unless it is
animated by fancy, and guided by the most correct taste and observation.

It is
almost unnecessary to remark, that the civil distractions of the empire, the
license of the soldiers, the inroads of the barbarians, and the progress of
despotism, had proved very unfavorable to genius, and even to learning. The
succession of Illyrian princes restored the empire without restoring the
sciences. Their military education was not calculated to inspire them with the
love of letters; and even the mind of Diocletian, however active and capacious
in business, was totally uninformed by study or speculation. The professions of
law and physic are of such common use and certain profit, that they will always
secure a sufficient number of practitioners, endowed with a reasonable degree of
abilities and knowledge; but it does not appear that the students in those two
faculties appeal to any celebrated masters who have flourished within that
period. The voice of poetry was silent. History was reduced to dry and confused
abridgments, alike destitute of amusement and instruction. A languid and
affected eloquence was still retained in the pay and service of the emperors,
who encouraged not any arts except those which contributed to the gratification
of their pride, or the defence of their power[1356].

The
declining age of learning and of mankind is marked, however, by the rise and
rapid progress of the new Platonists. The school of Alexandria silenced those of
Athens; and the ancient sects enrolled themselves under the banners of the more
fashionable teachers, who recommended their system by the novelty of their
method, and the austerity of their manners. Several of these masters, Ammonius,
Plotinus, Amelius, and Porphyry[1357],
were men of profound thought and intense application; but by mistaking the true
object of philosophy, their labors contributed much less to improve than to
corrupt the human understanding. The knowledge that is suited to our situation
and powers, the whole compass of moral, natural, and mathematical science, was
neglected by the new Platonists; whilst they exhausted their strength in the
verbal disputes of metaphysics, attempted to explore the secrets of the
invisible world, and studied to reconcile Aristotle with Plato, on subjects of
which both these philosophers were as ignorant as the rest of mankind. Consuming
their reason in these deep but unsubstantial meditations, their minds were
exposed to illusions of fancy. They flattered themselves that they possessed the
secret of disengaging the soul from its corporal prison; claimed a familiar
intercourse with demons and spirits; and, by a very singular revolution,
converted the study of philosophy into that of magic. The ancient sages had
derided the popular superstition; after disguising its extravagance by the thin
pretence of allegory, the disciples of Plotinus and Porphyry became its most
zealous defenders. As they agreed with the Christians in a few mysterious points
of faith, they attacked the remainder of their theological system with all the
fury of civil war. The new Platonists would scarcely deserve a place in the
history of science, but in that of the church the mention of them will very
frequently occur.

Chapter XIV
Six
Emperors at the Same Time, Reunion of the Empire
Part
I

Troubles After the
Abdication of Diocletian - Death of Constantius - Elevation of Constantine and
Maxentius - Six Emperors at the Same Time - Death of Maximian and Galerius -
Victories of Constantine Over Maxentius and Licinus - Reunion of the Empire
Under the Authority of Constantine

The
balance of power established by Diocletian subsisted no longer than while it was
sustained by the firm and dexterous hand of the founder. It required such a
fortunate mixture of different tempers and abilities, as could scarcely be found
or even expected a second time; two emperors without jealousy, two Caesars
without ambition, and the same general interest invariably pursued by four
independent princes. The abdication of Diocletian and Maximian was succeeded by
eighteen years of discord and confusion. The empire was afflicted by five civil
wars; and the remainder of the time was not so much a state of tranquillity as a
suspension of arms between several hostile monarchs, who, viewing each other
with an eye of fear and hatred, strove to increase their respective forces at
the expense of their subjects. As soon as Diocletian and Maximian had resigned
the purple, their station, according to the rules of the new constitution, was
filled by the two Caesars, Constantius and Galerius, who immediately assumed the
title of Augustus[1358].

The honors
of seniority and precedence were allowed to the former of those princes, and he
continued under a new appellation to administer his ancient department of Gaul,
Spain, and Britain. The government of those ample provinces was sufficient to
exercise his talents and to satisfy his ambition. Clemency, temperance, and
moderation, distinguished the amiable character of Constantius, and his
fortunate subjects had frequently occasion to compare the virtues of their
sovereign with the passions of Maximian, and even with the arts of Diocletian[1359].
Instead of imitating their eastern pride and magnificence, Constantius preserved
the modesty of a Roman prince. He declared, with unaffected sincerity, that his
most valued treasure was in the hearts of his people, and that, whenever the
dignity of the throne, or the danger of the state, required any extraordinary
supply, he could depend with confidence on their gratitude and liberality[1360].
The provincials of Gaul, Spain, and Britain, sensible of his worth, and of their
own happiness, reflected with anxiety on the declining health of the emperor
Constantius, and the tender age of his numerous family, the issue of his second
marriage with the daughter of Maximian.

The stern
temper of Galerius was cast in a very different mould; and while he commanded
the esteem of his subjects, he seldom condescended to solicit their affections.
His fame in arms, and, above all, the success of the Persian war, had elated his
haughty mind, which was naturally impatient of a superior, or even of an equal.
If it were possible to rely on the partial testimony of an injudicious writer,
we might ascribe the abdication of Diocletian to the menaces of Galerius, and
relate the particulars of a private conversation between the two princes, in
which the former discovered as much pusillanimity as the latter displayed
ingratitude and arrogance[1361].
But these obscure anecdotes are sufficiently refuted by an impartial view of the
character and conduct of Diocletian. Whatever might otherwise have been his
intentions, if he had apprehended any danger from the violence of Galerius, his
good sense would have instructed him to prevent the ignominious contest; and as
he had held the sceptre with glory, he would have resigned it without
disgrace.

After the
elevation of Constantius and Galerius to the rank of Augusti, two new Coesars
were required to supply their place, and to complete the system of the Imperial
government. Diocletian, was sincerely desirous of withdrawing himself from the
world; he considered Galerius, who had married his daughter, as the firmest
support of his family and of the empire; and he consented, without reluctance,
that his successor should assume the merit as well as the envy of the important
nomination. It was fixed without consulting the interest or inclination of the
princes of the West. Each of them had a son who was arrived at the age of
manhood, and who might have been deemed the most natural candidates for the
vacant honor. But the impotent resentment of Maximian was no longer to be
dreaded; and the moderate Constantius, though he might despise the dangers, was
humanely apprehensive of the calamities, of civil war. The two persons whom
Galerius promoted to the rank of Caesar, were much better suited to serve the
views of his ambition; and their principal recommendation seems to have
consisted in the want of merit or personal consequence. The first of these was
Daza, or, as he was afterwards called, Maximin, whose mother was the sister of
Galerius. The unexperienced youth still betrayed, by his manners and language,
his rustic education, when, to his own astonishment, as well as that of the
world, he was invested by Diocletian with the purple, exalted to the dignity of
Caesar, and intrusted with the sovereign command of Egypt and Syria[1362].
At the same time, Severus, a faithful servant, addicted to pleasure, but not
incapable of business, was sent to Milan, to receive, from the reluctant hands
of Maximian, the Caesarian ornaments, and the possession of Italy and Africa.
According to the forms of the constitution, Severus acknowledged the supremacy
of the western emperor; but he was absolutely devoted to the commands of his
benefactor Galerius, who, reserving to himself the intermediate countries from
the confines of Italy to those of Syria, firmly established his power over three
fourths of the monarchy. In the full confidence that the approaching death of
Constantius would leave him sole master of the Roman world, we are assured that
he had arranged in his mind a long succession of future princes, and that he
meditated his own retreat from public life, after he should have accomplished a
glorious reign of about twenty years[1363].

But within
less than eighteen months, two unexpected revolutions overturned the ambitious
schemes of Galerius. The hopes of uniting the western provinces to his empire
were disappointed by the elevation of Constantine, whilst Italy and Africa were
lost by the successful revolt of Maxentius.

I.
The
fame of Constantine has rendered posterity attentive to the most minute
circumstances of his life and actions. The place of his birth, as well as the
condition of his mother Helena, have been the subject, not only of literary, but
of national disputes. Notwithstanding the recent tradition, which assigns for
her father a British king[1364],
we are obliged to confess, that Helena was the daughter of an innkeeper; but at
the same time, we may defend the legality of her marriage, against those who
have represented her as the concubine of Constantius[1365].
The great Constantine was most probably born at Naissus, in Dacia[1366];
and it is not surprising that, in a family and province distinguished only by
the profession of arms, the youth should discover very little inclination to
improve his mind by the acquisition of knowledge[1367].
He was about eighteen years of age when his father was promoted to the rank of
Caesar; but that fortunate event was attended with his mother's divorce; and the
splendor of an Imperial alliance reduced the son of Helena to a state of
disgrace and humiliation. Instead of following Constantius in the West, he
remained in the service of Diocletian, signalized his valor in the wars of Egypt
and Persia, and gradually rose to the honorable station of a tribune of the
first order. The figure of Constantine was tall and majestic; he was dexterous
in all his exercises, intrepid in war, affable in peace; in his whole conduct,
the active spirit of youth was tempered by habitual prudence; and while his mind
was engrossed by ambition, he appeared cold and insensible to the allurements of
pleasure. The favor of the people and soldiers, who had named him as a worthy
candidate for the rank of Caesar, served only to exasperate the jealousy of
Galerius; and though prudence might restrain him from exercising any open
violence, an absolute monarch is seldom at a loss now to execute a sure and
secret revenge[1368].
Every hour increased the danger of Constantine, and the anxiety of his father,
who, by repeated letters, expressed the warmest desire of embracing his son. For
some time the policy of Galerius supplied him with delays and excuses; but it
was impossible long to refuse so natural a request of his associate, without
maintaining his refusal by arms. The permission of the journey was reluctantly
granted, and whatever precautions the emperor might have taken to intercept a
return, the consequences of which he, with so much reason, apprehended, they
were effectually disappointed by the incredible diligence of Constantine[1369].
Leaving the palace of Nicomedia in the night, he travelled post through
Bithynia, Thrace, Dacia, Pannonia, Italy, and Gaul, and, amidst the joyful
acclamations of the people, reached the port of Boulogne in the very moment when
his father was preparing to embark for Britain[1370].

The British expedition, and an easy
victory over the barbarians of Caledonia, were the last exploits of the reign of
Constantius. He ended his life in the Imperial palace of York, fifteen months
after he had received the title of Augustus, and almost fourteen years and a
half after he had been promoted to the rank of Caesar. His death was immediately
succeeded by the elevation of Constantine. The ideas of inheritance and
succession are so very familiar, that the generality of mankind consider them as
founded, not only in reason, but in nature itself. Our imagination readily
transfers the same principles from private property to public dominion: and
whenever a virtuous father leaves behind him a son whose merit seems to justify
the esteem, or even the hopes, of the people, the joint influence of prejudice
and of affection operates with irresistible weight. The flower of the western
armies had followed Constantius into Britain, and the national troops were
reenforced by a numerous body of Alemanni, who obeyed the orders of Crocus, one
of their hereditary chieftains[1371].
The opinion of their own importance, and the assurance that Britain, Gaul, and
Spain would acquiesce in their nomination, were diligently inculcated to the
legions by the adherents of Constantine. The soldiers were asked, whether they
could hesitate a moment between the honor of placing at their head the worthy
son of their beloved emperor, and the ignominy of tamely expecting the arrival
of some obscure stranger, on whom it might please the sovereign of Asia to
bestow the armies and provinces of the West. It was insinuated to them, that
gratitude and liberality held a distinguished place among the virtues of
Constantine; nor did that artful prince show himself to the troops, till they
were prepared to salute him with the names of Augustus and Emperor. The throne
was the object of his desires; and had he been less actuated by ambition, it was
his only means of safety. He was well acquainted with the character and
sentiments of Galerius, and sufficiently apprised, that if he wished to live he
must determine to reign. The decent and even obstinate resistance which he chose
to affect[1372],
was contrived to justify his usurpation; nor did he yield to the acclamations of
the army, till he had provided the proper materials for a letter, which he
immediately despatched to the emperor of the East. Constantine informed him of
the melancholy event of his father's death, modestly asserted his natural claim
to the succession, and respectfully lamented, that the affectionate violence of
his troops had not permitted him to solicit the Imperial purple in the regular
and constitutional manner. The first emotions of Galerius were those of
surprise, disappointment, and rage; and as he could seldom restrain his
passions, he loudly threatened, that he would commit to the flames both the
letter and the messenger. But his resentment insensibly subsided; and when he
recollected the doubtful chance of war, when he had weighed the character and
strength of his adversary, he consented to embrace the honorable accommodation
which the prudence of Constantine had left open to him. Without either
condemning or ratifying the choice of the British army, Galerius accepted the
son of his deceased colleague as the sovereign of the provinces beyond the Alps;
but he gave him only the title of Caesar, and the fourth rank among the Roman
princes, whilst he conferred the vacant place of Augustus on his favorite
Severus. The apparent harmony of the empire was still preserved, and
Constantine, who already possessed the substance, expected, without impatience,
an opportunity of obtaining the honors, of supreme power[1373].

The children of Constantius by his
second marriage were six in number, three of either sex, and whose Imperial
descent might have solicited a preference over the meaner extraction of the son
of Helena. But Constantine was in the thirty-second year of his age, in the full
vigor both of mind and body, at the time when the eldest of his brothers could
not possibly be more than thirteen years old. His claim of superior merit had
been allowed and ratified by the dying emperor[1374].
In his last moments Constantius bequeathed to his eldest son the care of the
safety as well as greatness of the family; conjuring him to assume both the
authority and the sentiments of a father with regard to the children of
Theodora. Their liberal education, advantageous marriages, the secure dignity of
their lives, and the first honors of the state with which they were invested,
attest the fraternal affection of Constantine; and as those princes possessed a
mild and grateful disposition, they submitted without reluctance to the
superiority of his genius and fortune[1375].

II.
The
ambitious spirit of Galerius was scarcely reconciled to the disappointment of
his views upon the Gallic provinces, before the unexpected loss of Italy wounded
his pride as well as power in a still more sensible part. The long absence of
the emperors had filled Rome with discontent and indignation; and the people
gradually discovered, that the preference given to Nicomedia and Milan was not
to be ascribed to the particular inclination of Diocletian, but to the permanent
form of government which he had instituted. It was in vain that, a few months
after his abdication, his successors dedicated, under his name, those
magnificent baths, whose ruins still supply the ground as well as the materials
for so many churches and convents[1376].
The tranquility of those elegant recesses of ease and luxury was disturbed by
the impatient murmurs of the Romans, and a report was insensibly circulated,
that the sums expended in erecting those buildings would soon be required at
their hands. About that time the avarice of Galerius, or perhaps the exigencies
of the state, had induced him to make a very strict and rigorous inquisition
into the property of his subjects, for the purpose of a general taxation, both
on their lands and on their persons. A very minute survey appears to have been
taken of their real estates; and wherever there was the slightest suspicion of
concealment, torture was very freely employed to obtain a sincere declaration of
their personal wealth[1377].
The privileges which had exalted Italy above the rank of the provinces were no
longer regarded[1378]:
and the officers of the revenue already began to number the Roman people, and to
settle the proportion of the new taxes. Even when the spirit of freedom had been
utterly extinguished, the tamest subjects have sometimes ventured to resist an
unprecedented invasion of their property; but on this occasion the injury was
aggravated by the insult, and the sense of private interest was quickened by
that of national honor. The conquest of Macedonia, as we have already observed,
had delivered the Roman people from the weight of personal taxes. Though they
had experienced every form of despotism, they had now enjoyed that exemption
near five hundred years; nor could they patiently brook the insolence of an
Illyrian peasant, who, from his distant residence in Asia, presumed to number
Rome among the tributary cities of his empire. The rising fury of the people was
encouraged by the authority, or at least the connivance, of the senate; and the
feeble remains of the Praetorian guards, who had reason to apprehend their own
dissolution, embraced so honorable a pretence, and declared their readiness to
draw their swords in the service of their oppressed country. It was the wish,
and it soon became the hope, of every citizen, that after expelling from Italy
their foreign tyrants, they should elect a prince who, by the place of his
residence, and by his maxims of government, might once more deserve the title of
Roman emperor. The name, as well as the situation, of Maxentius determined in
his favor the popular enthusiasm.

Maxentius was the son of the
emperor Maximian, and he had married the daughter of Galerius. His birth and
alliance seemed to offer him the fairest promise of succeeding to the empire;
but his vices and incapacity procured him the same exclusion from the dignity of
Caesar, which Constantine had deserved by a dangerous superiority of merit. The
policy of Galerius preferred such associates as would never disgrace the choice,
nor dispute the commands, of their benefactor. An obscure stranger was therefore
raised to the throne of Italy, and the son of the late emperor of the West was
left to enjoy the luxury of a private fortune in a villa a few miles distant
from the capital. The gloomy passions of his soul, shame, vexation, and rage,
were inflamed by envy on the news of Constantine's success; but the hopes of
Maxentius revived with the public discontent, and he was easily persuaded to
unite his personal injury and pretensions with the cause of the Roman people.
Two Praetorian tribunes and a commissary of provisions undertook the management
of the conspiracy; and as every order of men was actuated by the same spirit,
the immediate event was neither doubtful nor difficult. The praefect of the
city, and a few magistrates, who maintained their fidelity to Severus, were
massacred by the guards; and Maxentius, invested with the Imperial ornaments,
was acknowledged by the applauding senate and people as the protector of the
Roman freedom and dignity. It is uncertain whether Maximian was previously
acquainted with the conspiracy; but as soon as the standard of rebellion was
erected at Rome, the old emperor broke from the retirement where the authority
of Diocletian had condemned him to pass a life of melancholy and solitude, and
concealed his returning ambition under the disguise of paternal tenderness. At
the request of his son and of the senate, he condescended to reassume the
purple. His ancient dignity, his experience, and his fame in arms, added
strength as well as reputation to the party of Maxentius[1379].

According to the advice, or rather
the orders, of his colleague, the emperor Severus immediately hastened to Rome,
in the full confidence, that, by his unexpected celerity, he should easily
suppress the tumult of an unwarlike populace, commanded by a licentious youth.
But he found on his arrival the gates of the city shut against him, the walls
filled with men and arms, an experienced general at the head of the rebels, and
his own troops without spirit or affection. A large body of Moors deserted to
the enemy, allured by the promise of a large donative; and, if it be true that
they had been levied by Maximian in his African war, preferring the natural
feelings of gratitude to the artificial ties of allegiance. Anulinus, the
Praetorian praefect, declared himself in favor of Maxentius, and drew after him
the most considerable part of the troops, accustomed to obey his commands. Rome,
according to the expression of an orator, recalled her armies; and the
unfortunate Severus, destitute of force and of counsel, retired, or rather fled,
with precipitation, to Ravenna. Here he might for some time have been safe. The
fortifications of Ravenna were able to resist the attempts, and the morasses
that surrounded the town, were sufficient to prevent the approach, of the
Italian army. The sea, which Severus commanded with a powerful fleet, secured
him an inexhaustible supply of provisions, and gave a free entrance to the
legions, which, on the return of spring, would advance to his assistance from
Illyricum and the East. Maximian, who conducted the siege in person, was soon
convinced that he might waste his time and his army in the fruitless enterprise,
and that he had nothing to hope either from force or famine. With an art more
suitable to the character of Diocletian than to his own, he directed his attack,
not so much against the walls of Ravenna, as against the mind of Severus. The
treachery which he had experienced disposed that unhappy prince to distrust the
most sincere of his friends and adherents. The emissaries of Maximian easily
persuaded his credulity, that a conspiracy was formed to betray the town, and
prevailed upon his fears not to expose himself to the discretion of an irritated
conqueror, but to accept the faith of an honorable capitulation. He was at first
received with humanity and treated with respect. Maximian conducted the captive
emperor to Rome, and gave him the most solemn assurances that he had secured his
life by the resignation of the purple. But Severus, could obtain only an easy
death and an Imperial funeral. When the sentence was signified to him, the
manner of executing it was left to his own choice; he preferred the favorite
mode of the ancients, that of opening his veins; and as soon as he expired, his
body was carried to the sepulchre which had been constructed for the family of
Gallienus[1380].

Chapter XIV
Six
Emperors at the Same Time, Reunion of the Empire
Part
II

Though the
characters of Constantine and Maxentius had very little affinity with each
other, their situation and interest were the same; and prudence seemed to
require that they should unite their forces against the common enemy.
Notwithstanding the superiority of his age and dignity, the indefatigable
Maximian passed the Alps, and, courting a personal interview with the sovereign
of Gaul, carried with him his daughter Fausta as the pledge of the new alliance.
The marriage was celebrated at Arles with every circumstance of magnificence;
and the ancient colleague of Diocletian, who again asserted his claim to the
Western empire, conferred on his son-in-law and ally the title of Augustus. By
consenting to receive that honor from Maximian, Constantine seemed to embrace
the cause of Rome and of the senate; but his professions were ambiguous, and his
assistance slow and ineffectual. He considered with attention the approaching
contest between the masters of Italy and the emperor of the East, and was
prepared to consult his own safety or ambition in the event of the war[1381].

The
importance of the occasion called for the presence and abilities of Galerius. At
the head of a powerful army, collected from Illyricum and the East, he entered
Italy, resolved to revenge the death of Severus, and to chastise the rebellions
Romans; or, as he expressed his intentions, in the furious language of a
barbarian, to extirpate the senate, and to destroy the people by the sword. But
the skill of Maximian had concerted a prudent system of defence. The invader
found every place hostile, fortified, and inaccessible; and though he forced his
way as far as Narni, within sixty miles of Rome, his dominion in Italy was
confined to the narrow limits of his camp. Sensible of the increasing
difficulties of his enterprise, the haughty Galerius made the first advances
towards a reconciliation, and despatched two of his most considerable officers
to tempt the Roman princes by the offer of a conference, and the declaration of
his paternal regard for Maxentius, who might obtain much more from his
liberality than he could hope from the doubtful chance of war[1382].
The offers of Galerius were rejected with firmness, his perfidious friendship
refused with contempt, and it was not long before he discovered, that, unless he
provided for his safety by a timely retreat, he had some reason to apprehend the
fate of Severus. The wealth which the Romans defended against his rapacious
tyranny, they freely contributed for his destruction. The name of Maximian, the
popular arts of his son, the secret distribution of large sums, and the promise
of still more liberal rewards, checked the ardor and corrupted the fidelity of
the Illyrian legions; and when Galerius at length gave the signal of the
retreat, it was with some difficulty that he could prevail on his veterans not
to desert a banner which had so often conducted them to victory and honor. A
contemporary writer assigns two other causes for the failure of the expedition;
but they are both of such a nature, that a cautious historian will scarcely
venture to adopt them. We are told that Galerius, who had formed a very
imperfect notion of the greatness of Rome by the cities of the East with which
he was acquainted, found his forces inadequate to the siege of that immense
capital. But the extent of a city serves only to render it more accessible to
the enemy: Rome had long since been accustomed to submit on the approach of a
conqueror; nor could the temporary enthusiasm of the people have long contended
against the discipline and valor of the legions. We are likewise informed that
the legions themselves were struck with horror and remorse, and that those pious
sons of the republic refused to violate the sanctity of their venerable parent[1383].
But when we recollect with how much ease, in the more ancient civil wars, the
zeal of party and the habits of military obedience had converted the native
citizens of Rome into her most implacable enemies, we shall be inclined to
distrust this extreme delicacy of strangers and barbarians, who had never beheld
Italy till they entered it in a hostile manner. Had they not been restrained by
motives of a more interested nature, they would probably have answered Galerius
in the words of Caesar's veterans: "If our general wishes to lead us to the
banks of the Tyber, we are prepared to trace out his camp. Whatsoever walls he
has determined to level with the ground, our hands are ready to work the
engines: nor shall we hesitate, should the name of the devoted city be Rome
itself." These are indeed the expressions of a poet; but of a poet who has been
distinguished, and even censured, for his strict adherence to the truth of
history[1384].

The
legions of Galerius exhibited a very melancholy proof of their disposition, by
the ravages which they committed in their retreat. They murdered, they ravished,
they plundered, they drove away the flocks and herds of the Italians; they burnt
the villages through which they passed, and they endeavored to destroy the
country which it had not been in their power to subdue. During the whole march,
Maxentius hung on their rear, but he very prudently declined a general
engagement with those brave and desperate veterans. His father had undertaken a
second journey into Gaul, with the hope of persuading Constantine, who had
assembled an army on the frontier, to join in the pursuit, and to complete the
victory. But the actions of Constantine were guided by reason, and not by
resentment. He persisted in the wise resolution of maintaining a balance of
power in the divided empire, and he no longer hated Galerius, when that aspiring
prince had ceased to be an object of terror[1385].

The mind
of Galerius was the most susceptible of the sterner passions, but it was not,
however, incapable of a sincere and lasting friendship. Licinius, whose manners
as well as character, were not unlike his own, seems to have engaged both his
affection and esteem. Their intimacy had commenced in the happier period perhaps
of their youth and obscurity. It had been cemented by the freedom and dangers of
a military life; they had advanced almost by equal steps through the successive
honors of the service; and as soon as Galerius was invested with the Imperial
dignity, he seems to have conceived the design of raising his companion to the
same rank with himself. During the short period of his prosperity, he considered
the rank of Caesar as unworthy of the age and merit of Licinius, and rather
chose to reserve for him the place of Constantius, and the empire of the West.
While the emperor was employed in the Italian war, he intrusted his friend with
the defence of the Danube; and immediately after his return from that
unfortunate expedition, he invested Licinius with the vacant purple of Severus,
resigning to his immediate command the provinces of Illyricum[1386].
The news of his promotion was no sooner carried into the East, than Maximin, who
governed, or rather oppressed, the countries of Egypt and Syria, betrayed his
envy and discontent, disdained the inferior name of Caesar, and, notwithstanding
the prayers as well as arguments of Galerius, exacted, almost by violence, the
equal title of Augustus[1387].
For the first, and indeed for the last time, the Roman world was administered by
six emperors. In the West, Constantine and Maxentius affected to reverence their
father Maximian. In the East, Licinius and Maximin honored with more real
consideration their benefactor Galerius. The opposition of interest, and the
memory of a recent war, divided the empire into two great hostile powers; but
their mutual fears produced an apparent tranquillity, and even a feigned
reconciliation, till the death of the elder princes, of Maximian, and more
particularly of Galerius, gave a new direction to the views and passions of
their surviving associates.

When
Maximian had reluctantly abdicated the empire, the venal orators of the times
applauded his philosophic moderation. When his ambition excited, or at least
encouraged, a civil war, they returned thanks to his generous patriotism, and
gently censured that love of ease and retirement which had withdrawn him from
the public service[1388].
But it was impossible that minds like those of Maximian and his son could long
possess in harmony an undivided power. Maxentius considered himself as the legal
sovereign of Italy, elected by the Roman senate and people; nor would he endure
the control of his father, who arrogantly declared that by his name and
abilities the rash youth had been established on the throne. The cause was
solemnly pleaded before the Praetorian guards; and those troops, who dreaded the
severity of the old emperor, espoused the party of Maxentius[1389].
The life and freedom of Maximian were, however, respected, and he retired from
Italy into Illyricum, affecting to lament his past conduct, and secretly
contriving new mischiefs. But Galerius, who was well acquainted with his
character, soon obliged him to leave his dominions, and the last refuge of the
disappointed Maximian was the court of his son-in-law Constantine[1390].
He was received with respect by that artful prince, and with the appearance of
filial tenderness by the empress Fausta. That he might remove every suspicion,
he resigned the Imperial purple a second time[1391],
professing himself at length convinced of the vanity of greatness and ambition.
Had he persevered in this resolution, he might have ended his life with less
dignity, indeed, than in his first retirement, yet, however, with comfort and
reputation. But the near prospect of a throne brought back to his remembrance
the state from whence he was fallen, and he resolved, by a desperate effort
either to reign or to perish. An incursion of the Franks had summoned
Constantine, with a part of his army, to the banks of the Rhine; the remainder
of the troops were stationed in the southern provinces of Gaul, which lay
exposed to the enterprises of the Italian emperor, and a considerable treasure
was deposited in the city of Arles. Maximian either craftily invented, or easily
credited, a vain report of the death of Constantine. Without hesitation he
ascended the throne, seized the treasure, and scattering it with his accustomed
profusion among the soldiers, endeavored to awake in their minds the memory of
his ancient dignity and exploits. Before he could establish his authority, or
finish the negotiation which he appears to have entered into with his son
Maxentius, the celerity of Constantine defeated all his hopes. On the first news
of his perfidy and ingratitude, that prince returned by rapid marches from the
Rhine to the Saone, embarked on the last mentioned river at Chalons, and at
Lyons trusting himself to the rapidity of the Rhone, arrived at the gates of
Arles, with a military force which it was impossible for Maximian to resist, and
which scarcely permitted him to take refuge in the neighboring city of
Marseilles. The narrow neck of land which joined that place to the continent was
fortified against the besiegers, whilst the sea was open, either for the escape
of Maximian, or for the succor of Maxentius, if the latter should choose to
disguise his invasion of Gaul under the honorable pretence of defending a
distressed, or, as he might allege, an injured father. Apprehensive of the fatal
consequences of delay, Constantine gave orders for an immediate assault; but the
scaling-ladders were found too short for the height of the walls, and Marseilles
might have sustained as long a siege as it formerly did against the arms of
Caesar, if the garrison, conscious either of their fault or of their danger, had
not purchased their pardon by delivering up the city and the person of Maximian.
A secret but irrevocable sentence of death was pronounced against the usurper;
he obtained only the same favor which he had indulged to Severus, and it was
published to the world, that, oppressed by the remorse of his repeated crimes,
he strangled himself with his own hands. After he had lost the assistance, and
disdained the moderate counsels of Diocletian, the second period of his active
life was a series of public calamities and personal mortifications, which were
terminated, in about three years, by an ignominious death. He deserved his fate;
but we should find more reason to applaud the humanity of Constantine, if he had
spared an old man, the benefactor of his father, and the father of his wife.
During the whole of this melancholy transaction, it appears that Fausta
sacrificed the sentiments of nature to her conjugal duties[1392].

The last
years of Galerius were less shameful and unfortunate; and though he had filled
with more glory the subordinate station of Caesar than the superior rank of
Augustus, he preserved, till the moment of his death, the first place among the
princes of the Roman world. He survived his retreat from Italy about four years;
and wisely relinquishing his views of universal empire, he devoted the remainder
of his life to the enjoyment of pleasure, and to the execution of some works of
public utility, among which we may distinguish the discharging into the Danube
the superfluous waters of the Lake Pelso, and the cutting down the immense
forests that encompassed it; an operation worthy of a monarch, since it gave an
extensive country to the agriculture of his Pannonian subjects[1393].
His death was occasioned by a very painful and lingering disorder. His body,
swelled by an intemperate course of life to an unwieldy corpulence, was covered
with ulcers, and devoured by innumerable swarms of those insects which have
given their name to a most loathsome disease[1394];
but as Galerius had offended a very zealous and powerful party among his
subjects, his sufferings, instead of exciting their compassion, have been
celebrated as the visible effects of divine justice[1395].
He had no sooner expired in his palace of Nicomedia, than the two emperors who
were indebted for their purple to his favors, began to collect their forces,
with the intention either of disputing, or of dividing, the dominions which he
had left without a master. They were persuaded, however, to desist from the
former design, and to agree in the latter. The provinces of Asia fell to the
share of Maximin, and those of Europe augmented the portion of Licinius. The
Hellespont and the Thracian Bosphorus formed their mutual boundary, and the
banks of those narrow seas, which flowed in the midst of the Roman world, were
covered with soldiers, with arms, and with fortifications. The deaths of
Maximian and of Galerius reduced the number of emperors to four. The sense of
their true interest soon connected Licinius and Constantine; a secret alliance
was concluded between Maximin and Maxentius, and their unhappy subjects expected
with terror the bloody consequences of their inevitable dissensions, which were
no longer restrained by the fear or the respect which they had entertained for
Galerius[1396].

Among so
many crimes and misfortunes, occasioned by the passions of the Roman princes,
there is some pleasure in discovering a single action which may be ascribed to
their virtue. In the sixth year of his reign, Constantine visited the city of
Autun, and generously remitted the arrears of tribute, reducing at the same time
the proportion of their assessment from twenty-five to eighteen thousand heads,
subject to the real and personal capitation[1397].
Yet even this indulgence affords the most unquestionable proof of the public
misery. This tax was so extremely oppressive, either in itself or in the mode of
collecting it, that whilst the revenue was increased by extortion, it was
diminished by despair: a considerable part of the territory of Autun was left
uncultivated; and great numbers of the provincials rather chose to live as
exiles and outlaws, than to support the weight of civil society. It is but too
probable, that the bountiful emperor relieved, by a partial act of liberality,
one among the many evils which he had caused by his general maxims of
administration. But even those maxims were less the effect of choice than of
necessity. And if we except the death of Maximian, the reign of Constantine in
Gaul seems to have been the most innocent and even virtuous period of his life.
The provinces were protected by his presence from the inroads of the barbarians,
who either dreaded or experienced his active valor. After a signal victory over
the Franks and Alemanni, several of their princes were exposed by his order to
the wild beasts in the amphitheatre of Treves, and the people seem to have
enjoyed the spectacle, without discovering, in such a treatment of royal
captives, any thing that was repugnant to the laws of nations or of humanity[1398],[1399].

The
virtues of Constantine were rendered more illustrious by the vices of Maxentius.
Whilst the Gallic provinces enjoyed as much happiness as the condition of the
times was capable of receiving, Italy and Africa groaned under the dominion of a
tyrant, as contemptible as he was odious. The zeal of flattery and faction has
indeed too frequently sacrificed the reputation of the vanquished to the glory
of their successful rivals; but even those writers who have revealed, with the
most freedom and pleasure, the faults of Constantine, unanimously confess that
Maxentius was cruel, rapacious, and profligate[1400].
He had the good fortune to suppress a slight rebellion in Africa. The governor
and a few adherents had been guilty; the province suffered for their crime. The
flourishing cities of Cirtha and Carthage, and the whole extent of that fertile
country, were wasted by fire and sword. The abuse of victory was followed by the
abuse of law and justice. A formidable army of sycophants and delators invaded
Africa; the rich and the noble were easily convicted of a connection with the
rebels; and those among them who experienced the emperor's clemency, were only
punished by the confiscation of their estates[1401].
So signal a victory was celebrated by a magnificent triumph, and Maxentius
exposed to the eyes of the people the spoils and captives of a Roman province.
The state of the capital was no less deserving of compassion than that of
Africa. The wealth of Rome supplied an inexhaustible fund for his vain and
prodigal expenses, and the ministers of his revenue were skilled in the arts of
rapine. It was under his reign that the method of exacting a free gift from the
senators was first invented; and as the sum was insensibly increased, the
pretences of levying it, a victory, a birth, a marriage, or an imperial
consulship, were proportionably multiplied[1402].
Maxentius had imbibed the same implacable aversion to the senate, which had
characterized most of the former tyrants of Rome; nor was it possible for his
ungrateful temper to forgive the generous fidelity which had raised him to the
throne, and supported him against all his enemies. The lives of the senators
were exposed to his jealous suspicions, the dishonor of their wives and
daughters heightened the gratification of his sensual passions[1403].
It may be presumed, that an Imperial lover was seldom reduced to sigh in vain;
but whenever persuasion proved ineffectual, he had recourse to violence; and
there remains one memorable example of a noble matron, who preserved her
chastity by a voluntary death. The soldiers were the only order of men whom he
appeared to respect, or studied to please. He filled Rome and Italy with armed
troops, connived at their tumults, suffered them with impunity to plunder, and
even to massacre, the defenceless people[1404];
and indulging them in the same licentiousness which their emperor enjoyed,
Maxentius often bestowed on his military favorites the splendid villa, or the
beautiful wife, of a senator. A prince of such a character, alike incapable of
governing, either in peace or in war, might purchase the support, but he could
never obtain the esteem, of the army. Yet his pride was equal to his other
vices. Whilst he passed his indolent life either within the walls of his palace,
or in the neighboring gardens of Sallust, he was repeatedly heard to declare,
that he alone was emperor, and that the other princes were no more than his
lieutenants, on whom he had devolved the defence of the frontier provinces, that
he might enjoy without interruption the elegant luxury of the capital. Rome,
which had so long regretted the absence, lamented, during the six years of his
reign, the presence of her sovereign[1405].

Though
Constantine might view the conduct of Maxentius with abhorrence, and the
situation of the Romans with compassion, we have no reason to presume that he
would have taken up arms to punish the one or to relieve the other. But the
tyrant of Italy rashly ventured to provoke a formidable enemy, whose ambition
had been hitherto restrained by considerations of prudence, rather than by
principles of justice[1406].
After the death of Maximian, his titles, according to the established custom,
had been erased, and his statues thrown down with ignominy. His son, who had
persecuted and deserted him when alive, effected to display the most pious
regard for his memory, and gave orders that a similar treatment should be
immediately inflicted on all the statues that had been erected in Italy and
Africa to the honor of Constantine. That wise prince, who sincerely wished to
decline a war, with the difficulty and importance of which he was sufficiently
acquainted, at first dissembled the insult, and sought for redress by the milder
expedient of negotiation, till he was convinced that the hostile and ambitious
designs of the Italian emperor made it necessary for him to arm in his own
defence. Maxentius, who openly avowed his pretensions to the whole monarchy of
the West, had already prepared a very considerable force to invade the Gallic
provinces on the side of Rhaetia; and though he could not expect any assistance
from Licinius, he was flattered with the hope that the legions of Illyricum,
allured by his presents and promises, would desert the standard of that prince,
and unanimously declare themselves his soldiers and subjects[1407].
Constantine no longer hesitated. He had deliberated with caution, he acted with
vigor. He gave a private audience to the ambassadors, who, in the name of the
senate and people, conjured him to deliver Rome from a detested tyrant; and
without regarding the timid remonstrances of his council, he resolved to prevent
the enemy, and to carry the war into the heart of Italy[1408].

The
enterprise was as full of danger as of glory; and the unsuccessful event of two
former invasions was sufficient to inspire the most serious apprehensions. The
veteran troops, who revered the name of Maximian, had embraced in both those
wars the party of his son, and were now restrained by a sense of honor, as well
as of interest, from entertaining an idea of a second desertion. Maxentius, who
considered the Praetorian guards as the firmest defence of his throne, had
increased them to their ancient establishment; and they composed, including the
rest of the Italians who were enlisted into his service, a formidable body of
fourscore thousand men. Forty thousand Moors and Carthaginians had been raised
since the reduction of Africa. Even Sicily furnished its proportion of troops;
and the armies of Maxentius amounted to one hundred and seventy thousand foot
and eighteen thousand horse. The wealth of Italy supplied the expenses of the
war; and the adjacent provinces were exhausted, to form immense magazines of
corn and every other kind of provisions.

The whole
force of Constantine consisted of ninety thousand foot and eight thousand
horse[1409];
and as the defence of the Rhine required an extraordinary attention during the
absence of the emperor, it was not in his power to employ above half his troops
in the Italian expedition, unless he sacrificed the public safety to his private
quarrel[1410].
At the head of about forty thousand soldiers he marched to encounter an enemy
whose numbers were at least four times superior to his own. But the armies of
Rome, placed at a secure distance from danger, were enervated by indulgence and
luxury. Habituated to the baths and theatres of Rome, they took the field with
reluctance, and were chiefly composed of veterans who had almost forgotten, or
of new levies who had never acquired, the use of arms and the practice of war.
The hardy legions of Gaul had long defended the frontiers of the empire against
the barbarians of the North; and in the performance of that laborious service,
their valor was exercised and their discipline confirmed. There appeared the
same difference between the leaders as between the armies. Caprice or flattery
had tempted Maxentius with the hopes of conquest; but these aspiring hopes soon
gave way to the habits of pleasure and the consciousness of his inexperience.
The intrepid mind of Constantine had been trained from his earliest youth to
war, to action, and to military command.

Chapter XIV
Six
Emperors at the Same Time, Reunion of the Empire
Part
III

When
Hannibal marched from Gaul into Italy, he was obliged, first to discover, and
then to open, a way over mountains, and through savage nations, that had never
yielded a passage to a regular army[1411].
The Alps were then guarded by nature, they are now fortified by art. Citadels,
constructed with no less skill than labor and expense, command every avenue into
the plain, and on that side render Italy almost inaccessible to the enemies of
the king of Sardinia[1412].
But in the course of the intermediate period, the generals, who have attempted
the passage, have seldom experienced any difficulty or resistance. In the age of
Constantine, the peasants of the mountains were civilized and obedient subjects;
the country was plentifully stocked with provisions, and the stupendous
highways, which the Romans had carried over the Alps, opened several
communications between Gaul and Italy[1413].
Constantine preferred the road of the Cottian Alps, or, as it is now called, of
Mount Cenis, and led his troops with such active diligence, that he descended
into the plain of Piedmont before the court of Maxentius had received any
certain intelligence of his departure from the banks of the Rhine. The city of
Susa, however, which is situated at the foot of Mount Cenis, was surrounded with
walls, and provided with a garrison sufficiently numerous to check the progress
of an invader; but the impatience of Constantine's troops disdained the tedious
forms of a siege. The same day that they appeared before Susa, they applied fire
to the gates, and ladders to the walls; and mounting to the assault amidst a
shower of stones and arrows, they entered the place sword in hand, and cut in
pieces the greatest part of the garrison. The flames were extinguished by the
care of Constantine, and the remains of Susa preserved from total destruction.
About forty miles from thence, a more severe contest awaited him. A numerous
army of Italians was assembled under the lieutenants of Maxentius, in the plains
of Turin. Its principal strength consisted in a species of heavy cavalry, which
the Romans, since the decline of their discipline, had borrowed from the nations
of the East. The horses, as well as the men, were clothed in complete armor, the
joints of which were artfully adapted to the motions of their bodies. The aspect
of this cavalry was formidable, their weight almost irresistible; and as, on
this occasion, their generals had drawn them up in a compact column or wedge,
with a sharp point, and with spreading flanks, they flattered themselves that
they could easily break and trample down the army of Constantine. They might,
perhaps, have succeeded in their design, had not their experienced adversary
embraced the same method of defence, which in similar circumstances had been
practised by Aurelian. The skilful evolutions of Constantine divided and baffled
this massy column of cavalry. The troops of Maxentius fled in confusion towards
Turin; and as the gates of the city were shut against them, very few escaped the
sword of the victorious pursuers. By this important service, Turin deserved to
experience the clemency and even favor of the conqueror. He made his entry into
the Imperial palace of Milan, and almost all the cities of Italy between the
Alps and the Po not only acknowledged the power, but embraced with zeal the
party, of Constantine[1414].

From Milan
to Rome, the Aemilian and Flaminian highways offered an easy march of about four
hundred miles; but though Constantine was impatient to encounter the tyrant, he
prudently directed his operations against another army of Italians, who, by
their strength and position, might either oppose his progress, or, in case of a
misfortune, might intercept his retreat. Ruricius Pompeianus, a general
distinguished by his valor and ability, had under his command the city of
Verona, and all the troops that were stationed in the province of Venetia. As
soon as he was informed that Constantine was advancing towards him, he detached
a large body of cavalry which was defeated in an engagement near Brescia, and
pursued by the Gallic legions as far as the gates of Verona. The necessity, the
importance, and the difficulties of the siege of Verona, immediately presented
themselves to the sagacious mind of Constantine[1415].
The city was accessible only by a narrow peninsula towards the west, as the
other three sides were surrounded by the Adige, a rapid river, which covered the
province of Venetia, from whence the besieged derived an inexhaustible supply of
men and provisions. It was not without great difficulty, and after several
fruitless attempts, that Constantine found means to pass the river at some
distance above the city, and in a place where the torrent was less violent. He
then encompassed Verona with strong lines, pushed his attacks with prudent
vigor, and repelled a desperate sally of Pompeianus. That intrepid general, when
he had used every means of defence that the strength of the place or that of the
garrison could afford, secretly escaped from Verona, anxious not for his own,
but for the public safety. With indefatigable diligence he soon collected an
army sufficient either to meet Constantine in the field, or to attack him if he
obstinately remained within his lines. The emperor, attentive to the motions,
and informed of the approach of so formidable an enemy, left a part of his
legions to continue the operations of the siege, whilst, at the head of those
troops on whose valor and fidelity he more particularly depended, he advanced in
person to engage the general of Maxentius. The army of Gaul was drawn up in two
lines, according to the usual practice of war; but their experienced leader,
perceiving that the numbers of the Italians far exceeded his own, suddenly
changed his disposition, and, reducing the second, extended the front of his
first line to a just proportion with that of the enemy. Such evolutions, which
only veteran troops can execute without confusion in a moment of danger,
commonly prove decisive; but as this engagement began towards the close of the
day, and was contested with great obstinacy during the whole night, there was
less room for the conduct of the generals than for the courage of the soldiers.
The return of light displayed the victory of Constantine, and a field of carnage
covered with many thousands of the vanquished Italians. Their general,
Pompeianus, was found among the slain; Verona immediately surrendered at
discretion, and the garrison was made prisoners of war[1416].
When the officers of the victorious army congratulated their master on this
important success, they ventured to add some respectful complaints, of such a
nature, however, as the most jealous monarchs will listen to without
displeasure. They represented to Constantine, that, not contented with all the
duties of a commander, he had exposed his own person with an excess of valor
which almost degenerated into rashness; and they conjured him for the future to
pay more regard to the preservation of a life in which the safety of Rome and of
the empire was involved[1417].

While
Constantine signalized his conduct and valor in the field, the sovereign of
Italy appeared insensible of the calamities and danger of a civil war which
reigned in the heart of his dominions. Pleasure was still the only business of
Maxentius. Concealing, or at least attempting to conceal, from the public
knowledge the misfortunes of his arms[1418],
he indulged himself in a vain confidence which deferred the remedies of the
approaching evil, without deferring the evil itself[1419].
The rapid progress of Constantine[1420]
was scarcely sufficient to awaken him from his fatal security; he flattered
himself, that his well-known liberality, and the majesty of the Roman name,
which had already delivered him from two invasions, would dissipate with the
same facility the rebellious army of Gaul. The officers of experience and
ability, who had served under the banners of Maximian, were at length compelled
to inform his effeminate son of the imminent danger to which he was reduced;
and, with a freedom that at once surprised and convinced him, to urge the
necessity of preventing his ruin, by a vigorous exertion of his remaining power.
The resources of Maxentius, both of men and money, were still considerable. The
Praetorian guards felt how strongly their own interest and safety were connected
with his cause; and a third army was soon collected, more numerous than those
which had been lost in the battles of Turin and Verona. It was far from the
intention of the emperor to lead his troops in person. A stranger to the
exercises of war, he trembled at the apprehension of so dangerous a contest; and
as fear is commonly superstitious, he listened with melancholy attention to the
rumors of omens and presages which seemed to menace his life and empire. Shame
at length supplied the place of courage, and forced him to take the field. He
was unable to sustain the contempt of the Roman people. The circus resounded
with their indignant clamors, and they tumultuously besieged the gates of the
palace, reproaching the pusillanimity of their indolent sovereign, and
celebrating the heroic spirit of Constantine[1421].
Before Maxentius left Rome, he consulted the Sibylline books. The guardians of
these ancient oracles were as well versed in the arts of this world as they were
ignorant of the secrets of fate; and they returned him a very prudent answer,
which might adapt itself to the event, and secure their reputation, whatever
should be the chance of arms[1422].

The
celerity of Constantine's march has been compared to the rapid conquest of Italy
by the first of the Caesars; nor is the flattering parallel repugnant to the
truth of history, since no more than fifty-eight days elapsed between the
surrender of Verona and the final decision of the war. Constantine had always
apprehended that the tyrant would consult the dictates of fear, and perhaps of
prudence; and that, instead of risking his last hopes in a general engagement,
he would shut himself up within the walls of Rome. His ample magazines secured
him against the danger of famine; and as the situation of Constantine admitted
not of delay, he might have been reduced to the sad necessity of destroying with
fire and sword the Imperial city, the noblest reward of his victory, and the
deliverance of which had been the motive, or rather indeed the pretence, of the
civil war[1423].
It was with equal surprise and pleasure, that on his arrival at a place called
Saxa Rubra, about nine miles from Rome[1424],
he discovered the army of Maxentius prepared to give him battle[1425].
Their long front filled a very spacious plain, and their deep array reached to
the banks of the Tyber, which covered their rear, and forbade their retreat. We
are informed, and we may believe, that Constantine disposed his troops with
consummate skill, and that he chose for himself the post of honor and danger.
Distinguished by the splendor of his arms, he charged in person the cavalry of
his rival; and his irresistible attack determined the fortune of the day. The
cavalry of Maxentius was principally composed either of unwieldy cuirassiers, or
of light Moors and Numidians. They yielded to the vigor of the Gallic horse,
which possessed more activity than the one, more firmness than the other. The
defeat of the two wings left the infantry without any protection on its flanks,
and the undisciplined Italians fled without reluctance from the standard of a
tyrant whom they had always hated, and whom they no longer feared. The
Praetorians, conscious that their offences were beyond the reach of mercy, were
animated by revenge and despair. Notwithstanding their repeated efforts, those
brave veterans were unable to recover the victory: they obtained, however, an
honorable death; and it was observed that their bodies covered the same ground
which had been occupied by their ranks[1426].
The confusion then became general, and the dismayed troops of Maxentius, pursued
by an implacable enemy, rushed by thousands into the deep and rapid stream of
the Tyber. The emperor himself attempted to escape back into the city over the
Milvian bridge; but the crowds which pressed together through that narrow
passage forced him into the river, where he was immediately drowned by the
weight of his armor[1427].
His body, which had sunk very deep into the mud, was found with some difficulty
the next day. The sight of his head, when it was exposed to the eyes of the
people, convinced them of their deliverance, and admonished them to receive with
acclamations of loyalty and gratitude the fortunate Constantine, who thus
achieved by his valor and ability the most splendid enterprise of his life[1428].

In the use
of victory, Constantine neither deserved the praise of clemency, nor incurred
the censure of immoderate rigor[1429].
He inflicted the same treatment to which a defeat would have exposed his own
person and family, put to death the two sons of the tyrant, and carefully
extirpated his whole race. The most distinguished adherents of Maxentius must
have expected to share his fate, as they had shared his prosperity and his
crimes; but when the Roman people loudly demanded a greater number of victims,
the conqueror resisted with firmness and humanity, those servile clamors, which
were dictated by flattery as well as by resentment. Informers were punished and
discouraged; the innocent, who had suffered under the late tyranny, were
recalled from exile, and restored to their estates. A general act of oblivion
quieted the minds and settled the property of the people, both in Italy and in
Africa[1430].
The first time that Constantine honored the senate with his presence, he
recapitulated his own services and exploits in a modest oration, assured that
illustrious order of his sincere regard, and promised to reestablish its ancient
dignity and privileges. The grateful senate repaid these unmeaning professions
by the empty titles of honor, which it was yet in their power to bestow; and
without presuming to ratify the authority of Constantine, they passed a decree
to assign him the first rank among the three Augusti who governed the Roman
world[1431].
Games and festivals were instituted to preserve the fame of his victory, and
several edifices, raised at the expense of Maxentius, were dedicated to the
honor of his successful rival. The triumphal arch of Constantine still remains a
melancholy proof of the decline of the arts, and a singular testimony of the
meanest vanity. As it was not possible to find in the capital of the empire a
sculptor who was capable of adorning that public monument, the arch of Trajan,
without any respect either for his memory or for the rules of propriety, was
stripped of its most elegant figures. The difference of times and persons, of
actions and characters, was totally disregarded. The Parthian captives appear
prostrate at the feet of a prince who never carried his arms beyond the
Euphrates; and curious antiquarians can still discover the head of Trajan on the
trophies of Constantine. The new ornaments which it was necessary to introduce
between the vacancies of ancient sculpture are executed in the rudest and most
unskilful manner[1432].

The final
abolition of the Praetorian guards was a measure of prudence as well as of
revenge. Those haughty troops, whose numbers and privileges had been restored,
and even augmented, by Maxentius, were forever suppressed by Constantine. Their
fortified camp was destroyed, and the few Praetorians who had escaped the fury
of the sword were dispersed among the legions, and banished to the frontiers of
the empire, where they might be serviceable without again becoming dangerous[1433].
By suppressing the troops which were usually stationed in Rome, Constantine gave
the fatal blow to the dignity of the senate and people, and the disarmed capital
was exposed without protection to the insults or neglect of its distant master.
We may observe, that in this last effort to preserve their expiring freedom, the
Romans, from the apprehension of a tribute, had raised Maxentius to the throne.
He exacted that tribute from the senate under the name of a free gift. They
implored the assistance of Constantine. He vanquished the tyrant, and converted
the free gift into a perpetual tax. The senators, according to the declaration
which was required of their property, were divided into several classes. The
most opulent paid annually eight pounds of gold, the next class paid four, the
last two, and those whose poverty might have claimed an exemption, were
assessed, however, at seven pieces of gold. Besides the regular members of the
senate, their sons, their descendants, and even their relations, enjoyed the
vain privileges, and supported the heavy burdens, of the senatorial order; nor
will it any longer excite our surprise, that Constantine should be attentive to
increase the number of persons who were included under so useful a description[1434].
After the defeat of Maxentius, the victorious emperor passed no more than two or
three months in Rome, which he visited twice during the remainder of his life,
to celebrate the solemn festivals of the tenth and of the twentieth years of his
reign. Constantine was almost perpetually in motion, to exercise the legions, or
to inspect the state of the provinces. Treves, Milan, Aquileia, Sirmium,
Naissus, and Thessalonica, were the occasional places of his residence, till he
founded a new Rome on the confines of Europe and Asia[1435].

Before
Constantine marched into Italy, he had secured the friendship, or at least the
neutrality, of Licinius, the Illyrian emperor. He had promised his sister
Constantia in marriage to that prince; but the celebration of the nuptials was
deferred till after the conclusion of the war, and the interview of the two
emperors at Milan, which was appointed for that purpose, appeared to cement the
union of their families and interests[1436].
In the midst of the public festivity they were suddenly obliged to take leave of
each other. An inroad of the Franks summoned Constantine to the Rhine, and the
hostile approach of the sovereign of Asia demanded the immediate presence of
Licinius. Maximin had been the secret ally of Maxentius, and without being
discouraged by his fate, he resolved to try the fortune of a civil war. He moved
out of Syria, towards the frontiers of Bithynia, in the depth of winter. The
season was severe and tempestuous; great numbers of men as well as horses
perished in the snow; and as the roads were broken up by incessant rains, he was
obliged to leave behind him a considerable part of the heavy baggage, which was
unable to follow the rapidity of his forced marches. By this extraordinary
effort of diligence, he arrived with a harassed but formidable army, on the
banks of the Thracian Bosphorus before the lieutenants of Licinius were apprised
of his hostile intentions. Byzantium surrendered to the power of Maximin, after
a siege of eleven days. He was detained some days under the walls of Heraclea;
and he had no sooner taken possession of that city, than he was alarmed by the
intelligence, that Licinius had pitched his camp at the distance of only
eighteen miles. After a fruitless negotiation, in which the two princes
attempted to seduce the fidelity of each other's adherents, they had recourse to
arms. The emperor of the East commanded a disciplined and veteran army of above
seventy thousand men; and Licinius, who had collected about thirty thousand
Illyrians, was at first oppressed by the superiority of numbers. His military
skill, and the firmness of his troops, restored the day, and obtained a decisive
victory. The incredible speed which Maximin exerted in his flight is much more
celebrated than his prowess in the battle. Twenty- four hours afterwards he was
seen, pale, trembling, and without his Imperial ornaments, at Nicomedia, one
hundred and sixty miles from the place of his defeat. The wealth of Asia was yet
unexhausted; and though the flower of his veterans had fallen in the late
action, he had still power, if he could obtain time, to draw very numerous
levies from Syria and Egypt. But he survived his misfortune only three or four
months. His death, which happened at Tarsus, was variously ascribed to despair,
to poison, and to the divine justice. As Maximin was alike destitute of
abilities and of virtue, he was lamented neither by the people nor by the
soldiers. The provinces of the East, delivered from the terrors of civil war,
cheerfully acknowledged the authority of Licinius[1437].

The
vanquished emperor left behind him two children, a boy of about eight, and a
girl of about seven, years old. Their inoffensive age might have excited
compassion; but the compassion of Licinius was a very feeble resource, nor did
it restrain him from extinguishing the name and memory of his adversary. The
death of Severianus will admit of less excuse, as it was dictated neither by
revenge nor by policy. The conqueror had never received any injury from the
father of that unhappy youth, and the short and obscure reign of Severus, in a
distant part of the empire, was already forgotten. But the execution of
Candidianus was an act of the blackest cruelty and ingratitude. He was the
natural son of Galerius, the friend and benefactor of Licinius. The prudent
father had judged him too young to sustain the weight of a diadem; but he hoped
that, under the protection of princes who were indebted to his favor for the
Imperial purple, Candidianus might pass a secure and honorable life. He was now
advancing towards the twentieth year of his age, and the royalty of his birth,
though unsupported either by merit or ambition, was sufficient to exasperate the
jealous mind of Licinius[1438].
To these innocent and illustrious victims of his tyranny, we must add the wife
and daughter of the emperor Diocletian. When that prince conferred on Galerius
the title of Caesar, he had given him in marriage his daughter Valeria, whose
melancholy adventures might furnish a very singular subject for tragedy. She had
fulfilled and even surpassed the duties of a wife. As she had not any children
herself, she condescended to adopt the illegitimate son of her husband, and
invariably displayed towards the unhappy Candidianus the tenderness and anxiety
of a real mother. After the death of Galerius, her ample possessions provoked
the avarice, and her personal attractions excited the desires, of his successor,
Maximin[1439].
He had a wife still alive; but divorce was permitted by the Roman law, and the
fierce passions of the tyrant demanded an immediate gratification. The answer of
Valeria was such as became the daughter and widow of emperors; but it was
tempered by the prudence which her defenceless condition compelled her to
observe. She represented to the persons whom Maximin had employed on this
occasion, "that even if honor could permit a woman of her character and dignity
to entertain a thought of second nuptials, decency at least must forbid her to
listen to his addresses at a time when the ashes of her husband, and his
benefactor were still warm, and while the sorrows of her mind were still
expressed by her mourning garments. She ventured to declare, that she could
place very little confidence in the professions of a man whose cruel inconstancy
was capable of repudiating a faithful and affectionate wife[1440]."
On this repulse, the love of Maximin was converted into fury; and as witnesses
and judges were always at his disposal, it was easy for him to cover his fury
with an appearance of legal proceedings, and to assault the reputation as well
as the happiness of Valeria. Her estates were confiscated, her eunuchs and
domestics devoted to the most inhuman tortures; and several innocent and
respectable matrons, who were honored with her friendship, suffered death, on a
false accusation of adultery. The empress herself, together with her mother
Prisca, was condemned to exile; and as they were ignominiously hurried from
place to place before they were confined to a sequestered village in the deserts
of Syria, they exposed their shame and distress to the provinces of the East,
which, during thirty years, had respected their august dignity. Diocletian made
several ineffectual efforts to alleviate the misfortunes of his daughter; and,
as the last return that he expected for the Imperial purple, which he had
conferred upon Maximin, he entreated that Valeria might be permitted to share
his retirement of Salona, and to close the eyes of her afflicted father[1441].
He entreated; but as he could no longer threaten, his prayers were received with
coldness and disdain; and the pride of Maximin was gratified, in treating
Diocletian as a suppliant, and his daughter as a criminal. The death of Maximin
seemed to assure the empresses of a favorable alteration in their fortune. The
public disorders relaxed the vigilance of their guard, and they easily found
means to escape from the place of their exile, and to repair, though with some
precaution, and in disguise, to the court of Licinius. His behavior, in the
first days of his reign, and the honorable reception which he gave to young
Candidianus, inspired Valeria with a secret satisfaction, both on her own
account and on that of her adopted son. But these grateful prospects were soon
succeeded by horror and astonishment; and the bloody executions which stained
the palace of Nicomedia sufficiently convinced her that the throne of Maximin
was filled by a tyrant more inhuman than himself. Valeria consulted her safety
by a hasty flight, and, still accompanied by her mother Prisca, they wandered
above fifteen months[1442]
through the provinces, concealed in the disguise of plebeian habits. They were
at length discovered at Thessalonica; and as the sentence of their death was
already pronounced, they were immediately beheaded, and their bodies thrown into
the sea. The people gazed on the melancholy spectacle; but their grief and
indignation were suppressed by the terrors of a military guard. Such was the
unworthy fate of the wife and daughter of Diocletian. We lament their
misfortunes, we cannot discover their crimes; and whatever idea we may justly
entertain of the cruelty of Licinius, it remains a matter of surprise that he
was not contented with some more secret and decent method of revenge[1443].

The Roman
world was now divided between Constantine and Licinius, the former of whom was
master of the West, and the latter of the East. It might perhaps have been
expected that the conquerors, fatigued with civil war, and connected by a
private as well as public alliance, would have renounced, or at least would have
suspended, any further designs of ambition. And yet a year had scarcely elapsed
after the death of Maximin, before the victorious emperors turned their arms
against each other. The genius, the success, and the aspiring temper of
Constantine, may seem to mark him out as the aggressor; but the perfidious
character of Licinius justifies the most unfavorable suspicions, and by the
faint light which history reflects on this transaction[1444],
we may discover a conspiracy fomented by his arts against the authority of his
colleague. Constantine had lately given his sister Anastasia in marriage to
Bassianus, a man of a considerable family and fortune, and had elevated his new
kinsman to the rank of Caesar. According to the system of government instituted
by Diocletian, Italy, and perhaps Africa, were designed for his department in
the empire. But the performance of the promised favor was either attended with
so much delay, or accompanied with so many unequal conditions, that the fidelity
of Bassianus was alienated rather than secured by the honorable distinction
which he had obtained. His nomination had been ratified by the consent of
Licinius; and that artful prince, by the means of his emissaries, soon contrived
to enter into a secret and dangerous correspondence with the new Caesar, to
irritate his discontents, and to urge him to the rash enterprise of extorting by
violence what he might in vain solicit from the justice of Constantine. But the
vigilant emperor discovered the conspiracy before it was ripe for execution; and
after solemnly renouncing the alliance of Bassianus, despoiled him of the
purple, and inflicted the deserved punishment on his treason and ingratitude.
The haughty refusal of Licinius, when he was required to deliver up the
criminals who had taken refuge in his dominions, confirmed the suspicions
already entertained of his perfidy; and the indignities offered at Aemona, on
the frontiers of Italy, to the statues of Constantine, became the signal of
discord between the two princes[1445].

The first
battle was fought near Cibalis, a city of Pannonia, situated on the River Save,
about fifty miles above Sirmium[1446].
From the inconsiderable forces which in this important contest two such powerful
monarchs brought into the field, it may be inferred that the one was suddenly
provoked, and that the other was unexpectedly surprised. The emperor of the West
had only twenty thousand, and the sovereign of the East no more than five and
thirty thousand, men. The inferiority of number was, however, compensated by the
advantage of the ground. Constantine had taken post in a defile about half a
mile in breadth, between a steep hill and a deep morass, and in that situation
he steadily expected and repulsed the first attack of the enemy. He pursued his
success, and advanced into the plain. But the veteran legions of Illyricum
rallied under the standard of a leader who had been trained to arms in the
school of Probus and Diocletian. The missile weapons on both sides were soon
exhausted; the two armies, with equal valor, rushed to a closer engagement of
swords and spears, and the doubtful contest had already lasted from the dawn of
the day to a late hour of the evening, when the right wing, which Constantine
led in person, made a vigorous and decisive charge. The judicious retreat of
Licinius saved the remainder of his troops from a total defeat; but when he
computed his loss, which amounted to more than twenty thousand men, he thought
it unsafe to pass the night in the presence of an active and victorious enemy.
Abandoning his camp and magazines, he marched away with secrecy and diligence at
the head of the greatest part of his cavalry, and was soon removed beyond the
danger of a pursuit. His diligence preserved his wife, his son, and his
treasures, which he had deposited at Sirmium. Licinius passed through that city,
and breaking down the bridge on the Save, hastened to collect a new army in
Dacia and Thrace. In his flight he bestowed the precarious title of Caesar on
Valens, his general of the Illyrian frontier[1447].

Chapter XIV
Six
Emperors at the Same Time, Reunion of the Empire
Part
IV

The plain
of Mardia in Thrace was the theatre of a second battle no less obstinate and
bloody than the former. The troops on both sides displayed the same valor and
discipline; and the victory was once more decided by the superior abilities of
Constantine, who directed a body of five thousand men to gain an advantageous
height, from whence, during the heat of the action, they attacked the rear of
the enemy, and made a very considerable slaughter. The troops of Licinius,
however, presenting a double front, still maintained their ground, till the
approach of night put an end to the combat, and secured their retreat towards
the mountains of Macedonia[1448].
The loss of two battles, and of his bravest veterans, reduced the fierce spirit
of Licinius to sue for peace. His ambassador Mistrianus was admitted to the
audience of Constantine: he expatiated on the common topics of moderation and
humanity, which are so familiar to the eloquence of the vanquished; represented
in the most insinuating language, that the event of the war was still doubtful,
whilst its inevitable calamities were alike pernicious to both the contending
parties; and declared that he was authorized to propose a lasting and honorable
peace in the name of the two emperors his masters. Constantine received the
mention of Valens with indignation and contempt. "It was not for such a
purpose," he sternly replied, "that we have advanced from the shores of the
western ocean in an uninterrupted course of combats and victories, that, after
rejecting an ungrateful kinsman, we should accept for our colleague a
contemptible slave. The abdication of Valens is the first article of the
treaty[1449]."
It was necessary to accept this humiliating condition; and the unhappy Valens,
after a reign of a few days, was deprived of the purple and of his life. As soon
as this obstacle was removed, the tranquillity of the Roman world was easily
restored. The successive defeats of Licinius had ruined his forces, but they had
displayed his courage and abilities. His situation was almost desperate, but the
efforts of despair are sometimes formidable, and the good sense of Constantine
preferred a great and certain advantage to a third trial of the chance of arms.
He consented to leave his rival, or, as he again styled Licinius, his friend and
brother, in the possession of Thrace, Asia Minor, Syria, and Egypt; but the
provinces of Pannonia, Dalmatia, Dacia, Macedonia, and Greece, were yielded to
the Western empire, and the dominions of Constantine now extended from the
confines of Caledonia to the extremity of Peloponnesus. It was stipulated by the
same treaty, that three royal youths, the sons of emperors, should be called to
the hopes of the succession. Crispus and the young Constantine were soon
afterwards declared Caesars in the West, while the younger Licinius was invested
with the same dignity in the East. In this double proportion of honors, the
conqueror asserted the superiority of his arms and power[1450].

The
reconciliation of Constantine and Licinius, though it was imbittered by
resentment and jealousy, by the remembrance of recent injuries, and by the
apprehension of future dangers, maintained, however, above eight years, the
tranquility of the Roman world. As a very regular series of the Imperial laws
commences about this period, it would not be difficult to transcribe the civil
regulations which employed the leisure of Constantine. But the most important of
his institutions are intimately connected with the new system of policy and
religion, which was not perfectly established till the last and peaceful years
of his reign. There are many of his laws, which, as far as they concern the
rights and property of individuals, and the practice of the bar, are more
properly referred to the private than to the public jurisprudence of the empire;
and he published many edicts of so local and temporary a nature, that they would
ill deserve the notice of a general history. Two laws, however, may be selected
from the crowd; the one for its importance, the other for its singularity; the
former for its remarkable benevolence, the latter for its excessive
severity.

I.
The
horrid practice, so familiar to the ancients, of exposing or murdering their
new-born infants, was become every day more frequent in the provinces, and
especially in Italy. It was the effect of distress; and the distress was
principally occasioned by the intolerant burden of taxes, and by the vexatious
as well as cruel prosecutions of the officers of the revenue against their
insolvent debtors. The less opulent or less industrious part of mankind, instead
of rejoicing in an increase of family, deemed it an act of paternal tenderness
to release their children from the impending miseries of a life which they
themselves were unable to support. The humanity of Constantine; moved, perhaps,
by some recent and extraordinary instances of despair[1451],
engaged him to address an edict to all the cities of Italy, and afterwards of
Africa, directing immediate and sufficient relief to be given to those parents
who should produce before the magistrates the children whom their own poverty
would not allow them to educate. But the promise was too liberal, and the
provision too vague, to effect any general or permanent benefit[1452].
The law, though it may merit some praise, served rather to display than to
alleviate the public distress. It still remains an authentic monument to
contradict and confound those venal orators, who were too well satisfied with
their own situation to discover either vice or misery under the government of a
generous sovereign[1453].

II.
The
laws of Constantine against rapes were dictated with very little indulgence for
the most amiable weaknesses of human nature; since the description of that crime
was applied not only to the brutal violence which compelled, but even to the
gentle seduction which might persuade, an unmarried woman, under the age of
twenty-five, to leave the house of her parents. "The successful ravisher was
punished with death; and as if simple death was inadequate to the enormity of
his guilt, he was either burnt alive, or torn in pieces by wild beasts in the
amphitheatre. The virgin's declaration, that she had been carried away with her
own consent, instead of saving her lover, exposed her to share his fate. The
duty of a public prosecution was intrusted to the parents of the guilty or
unfortunate maid; and if the sentiments of nature prevailed on them to dissemble
the injury, and to repair by a subsequent marriage the honor of their family,
they were themselves punished by exile and confiscation. The slaves, whether
male or female, who were convicted of having been accessory to rape or
seduction, were burnt alive, or put to death by the ingenious torture of pouring
down their throats a quantity of melted lead. As the crime was of a public kind,
the accusation was permitted even to strangers. The commencement of the action
was not limited to any term of years, and the consequences of the sentence were
extended to the innocent offspring of such an irregular union[1454]."
But whenever the offence inspires less horror than the punishment, the rigor of
penal law is obliged to give way to the common feelings of mankind. The most
odious parts of this edict were softened or repealed in the subsequent reigns[1455];
and even Constantine himself very frequently alleviated, by partial acts of
mercy, the stern temper of his general institutions. Such, indeed, was the
singular humor of that emperor, who showed himself as indulgent, and even
remiss, in the execution of his laws, as he was severe, and even cruel, in the
enacting of them. It is scarcely possible to observe a more decisive symptom of
weakness, either in the character of the prince, or in the constitution of the
government[1456].

The civil
administration was sometimes interrupted by the military defence of the empire.
Crispus, a youth of the most amiable character, who had received with the title
of Caesar the command of the Rhine, distinguished his conduct, as well as valor,
in several victories over the Franks and Alemanni, and taught the barbarians of
that frontier to dread the eldest son of Constantine, and the grandson of
Constantius[1457].
The emperor himself had assumed the more difficult and important province of the
Danube. The Goths, who in the time of Claudius and Aurelian had felt the weight
of the Roman arms, respected the power of the empire, even in the midst of its
intestine divisions. But the strength of that warlike nation was now restored by
a peace of near fifty years; a new generation had arisen, who no longer
remembered the misfortunes of ancient days; the Sarmatians of the Lake Maeotis
followed the Gothic standard either as subjects or as allies, and their united
force was poured upon the countries of Illyricum. Campona, Margus, and Benonia[1458],
appear to have been the scenes of several memorable sieges and battles[1459];
and though Constantine encountered a very obstinate resistance, he prevailed at
length in the contest, and the Goths were compelled to purchased an ignominious
retreat, by restoring the booty and prisoners which they had taken. Nor was this
advantage sufficient to satisfy the indignation of the emperor. He resolved to
chastise as well as to repulse the insolent barbarians who had dared to invade
the territories of Rome. At the head of his legions he passed the Danube after
repairing the bridge which had been constructed by Trajan, penetrated into the
strongest recesses of Dacia[1460],
and when he had inflicted a severe revenge, condescended to give peace to the
suppliant Goths, on condition that, as often as they were required, they should
supply his armies with a body of forty thousand soldiers[1461].
Exploits like these were no doubt honorable to Constantine, and beneficial to
the state; but it may surely be questioned, whether they can justify the
exaggerated assertion of Eusebius, that All Scythia, as far as the extremity of
the North, divided as it was into so many names and nations of the most various
and savage manners, had been added by his victorious arms to the Roman empire[1462].

In this
exalted state of glory, it was impossible that Constantine should any longer
endure a partner in the empire. Confiding in the superiority of his genius and
military power, he determined, without any previous injury, to exert them for
the destruction of Licinius, whose advanced age and unpopular vices seemed to
offer a very easy conquest[1463].
But the old emperor, awakened by the approaching danger, deceived the
expectations of his friends, as well as of his enemies. Calling forth that
spirit and those abilities by which he had deserved the friendship of Galerius
and the Imperial purple, he prepared himself for the contest, collected the
forces of the East, and soon filled the plains of Hadrianople with his troops,
and the Straits of the Hellespont with his fleet. The army consisted of one
hundred and fifty thousand foot, and fifteen thousand horse; and as the cavalry
was drawn, for the most part, from Phrygia and Cappadocia, we may conceive a
more favorable opinion of the beauty of the horses, than of the courage and
dexterity of their riders. The fleet was composed of three hundred and fifty
galleys of three ranks of oars. A hundred and thirty of these were furnished by
Egypt and the adjacent coast of Africa. A hundred and ten sailed from the ports
of Phoenicia and the Isle of Cyprus; and the maritime countries of Bithynia,
Ionia, and Caria, were likewise obliged to provide a hundred and ten galleys.
The troops of Constantine were ordered to a rendezvous at Thessalonica; they
amounted to above a hundred and twenty thousand horse and foot[1464].
Their emperor was satisfied with their martial appearance, and his army
contained more soldiers, though fewer men, than that of his eastern competitor.
The legions of Constantine were levied in the warlike provinces of Europe;
action had confirmed their discipline, victory had elevated their hopes, and
there were among them a great number of veterans, who, after seventeen glorious
campaigns under the same leader, prepared themselves to deserve an honorable
dismission by a last effort of their valor[1465].
But the naval preparations of Constantine were in every respect much inferior to
those of Licinius. The maritime cities of Greece sent their respective quotas of
men and ships to the celebrated harbor of Piraeus, and their united forces
consisted of no more than two hundred small vessels - a very feeble armament, if
it is compared with those formidable fleets which were equipped and maintained
by the republic of Athens during the Peloponnesian war[1466].
Since Italy was no longer the seat of government, the naval establishments of
Misenum and Ravenna had been gradually neglected; and as the shipping and
mariners of the empire were supported by commerce rather than by war, it was
natural that they should the most abound in the industrious provinces of Egypt
and Asia. It is only surprising that the eastern emperor, who possessed so great
a superiority at sea, should have neglected the opportunity of carrying an
offensive war into the centre of his rival's dominions.

Instead of
embracing such an active resolution, which might have changed the whole face of
the war, the prudent Licinius expected the approach of his rival in a camp near
Hadrianople, which he had fortified with an anxious care, that betrayed his
apprehension of the event. Constantine directed his march from Thessalonica
towards that part of Thrace, till he found himself stopped by the broad and
rapid stream of the Hebrus, and discovered the numerous army of Licinius, which
filled the steep ascent of the hill, from the river to the city of Hadrianople.
Many days were spent in doubtful and distant skirmishes; but at length the
obstacles of the passage and of the attack were removed by the intrepid conduct
of Constantine. In this place we might relate a wonderful exploit of
Constantine, which, though it can scarcely be paralleled either in poetry or
romance, is celebrated, not by a venal orator devoted to his fortune, but by an
historian, the partial enemy of his fame. We are assured that the valiant
emperor threw himself into the River Hebrus, accompanied only by twelve
horsemen, and that by the effort or terror of his invincible arm, he broke,
slaughtered, and put to flight a host of a hundred and fifty thousand men. The
credulity of Zosimus prevailed so strongly over his passion, that among the
events of the memorable battle of Hadrianople, he seems to have selected and
embellished, not the most important, but the most marvellous. The valor and
danger of Constantine are attested by a slight wound which he received in the
thigh; but it may be discovered even from an imperfect narration, and perhaps a
corrupted text, that the victory was obtained no less by the conduct of the
general than by the courage of the hero; that a body of five thousand archers
marched round to occupy a thick wood in the rear of the enemy, whose attention
was diverted by the construction of a bridge, and that Licinius, perplexed by so
many artful evolutions, was reluctantly drawn from his advantageous post to
combat on equal ground on the plain. The contest was no longer equal. His
confused multitude of new levies was easily vanquished by the experienced
veterans of the West. Thirty-four thousand men are reported to have been slain.
The fortified camp of Licinius was taken by assault the evening of the battle;
the greater part of the fugitives, who had retired to the mountains, surrendered
themselves the next day to the discretion of the conqueror; and his rival, who
could no longer keep the field, confined himself within the walls of Byzantium[1467].

The siege
of Byzantium, which was immediately undertaken by Constantine, was attended with
great labor and uncertainty. In the late civil wars, the fortifications of that
place, so justly considered as the key of Europe and Asia, had been repaired and
strengthened; and as long as Licinius remained master of the sea, the garrison
was much less exposed to the danger of famine than the army of the besiegers.
The naval commanders of Constantine were summoned to his camp, and received his
positive orders to force the passage of the Hellespont, as the fleet of
Licinius, instead of seeking and destroying their feeble enemy, continued
inactive in those narrow straits, where its superiority of numbers was of little
use or advantage. Crispus, the emperor's eldest son, was intrusted with the
execution of this daring enterprise, which he performed with so much courage and
success, that he deserved the esteem, and most probably excited the jealousy, of
his father. The engagement lasted two days; and in the evening of the first, the
contending fleets, after a considerable and mutual loss, retired into their
respective harbors of Europe and Asia. The second day, about noon, a strong
south wind[1468]
sprang up, which carried the vessels of Crispus against the enemy; and as the
casual advantage was improved by his skilful intrepidity, he soon obtained a
complete victory. A hundred and thirty vessels were destroyed, five thousand men
were slain, and Amandus, the admiral of the Asiatic fleet, escaped with the
utmost difficulty to the shores of Chalcedon. As soon as the Hellespont was
open, a plentiful convoy of provisions flowed into the camp of Constantine, who
had already advanced the operations of the siege. He constructed artificial
mounds of earth of an equal height with the ramparts of Byzantium. The lofty
towers which were erected on that foundation galled the besieged with large
stones and darts from the military engines, and the battering rams had shaken
the walls in several places. If Licinius persisted much longer in the defence,
he exposed himself to be involved in the ruin of the place. Before he was
surrounded, he prudently removed his person and treasures to Chalcedon in Asia;
and as he was always desirous of associating companions to the hopes and dangers
of his fortune, he now bestowed the title of Caesar on Martinianus, who
exercised one of the most important offices of the empire[1469].

Such were
still the resources, and such the abilities, of Licinius, that, after so many
successive defeats, he collected in Bithynia a new army of fifty or sixty
thousand men, while the activity of Constantine was employed in the siege of
Byzantium. The vigilant emperor did not, however, neglect the last struggles of
his antagonist. A considerable part of his victorious army was transported over
the Bosphorus in small vessels, and the decisive engagement was fought soon
after their landing on the heights of Chrysopolis, or, as it is now called, of
Scutari. The troops of Licinius, though they were lately raised, ill armed, and
worse disciplined, made head against their conquerors with fruitless but
desperate valor, till a total defeat, and a slaughter of five and twenty
thousand men, irretrievably determined the fate of their leader[1470].
He retired to Nicomedia, rather with the view of gaining some time for
negotiation, than with the hope of any effectual defence. Constantia, his wife,
and the sister of Constantine, interceded with her brother in favor of her
husband, and obtained from his policy, rather than from his compassion, a solemn
promise, confirmed by an oath, that after the sacrifice of Martinianus, and the
resignation of the purple, Licinius himself should be permitted to pass the
remainder of this life in peace and affluence. The behavior of Constantia, and
her relation to the contending parties, naturally recalls the remembrance of
that virtuous matron who was the sister of Augustus, and the wife of Antony. But
the temper of mankind was altered, and it was no longer esteemed infamous for a
Roman to survive his honor and independence. Licinius solicited and accepted the
pardon of his offences, laid himself and his purple at the feet of his lord and
master, was raised from the ground with insulting pity, was admitted the same
day to the Imperial banquet, and soon afterwards was sent away to Thessalonica,
which had been chosen for the place of his confinement[1471].
His confinement was soon terminated by death, and it is doubtful whether a
tumult of the soldiers, or a decree of the senate, was suggested as the motive
for his execution. According to the rules of tyranny, he was accused of forming
a conspiracy, and of holding a treasonable correspondence with the barbarians;
but as he was never convicted, either by his own conduct or by any legal
evidence, we may perhaps be allowed, from his weakness, to presume his
innocence[1472].
The memory of Licinius was branded with infamy, his statues were thrown down,
and by a hasty edict, of such mischievous tendency that it was almost
immediately corrected, all his laws, and all the judicial proceedings of his
reign, were at once abolished[1473].
By this victory of Constantine, the Roman world was again united under the
authority of one emperor, thirty-seven years after Diocletian had divided his
power and provinces with his associate Maximian.

The
successive steps of the elevation of Constantine, from his first assuming the
purple at York, to the resignation of Licinius, at Nicomedia, have been related
with some minuteness and precision, not only as the events are in themselves
both interesting and important, but still more, as they contributed to the
decline of the empire by the expense of blood and treasure, and by the perpetual
increase, as well of the taxes, as of the military establishment. The foundation
of Constantinople, and the establishment of the Christian religion, were the
immediate and memorable consequences of this
revolution.

Chapter XV
Progress of
the Christian Religion
Part I

The Progress of the
Christian Religion, and the Sentiments, Manners, Numbers, and Condition of the
Primitive Christians[1474]

A candid
but rational inquiry into the progress and establishment of Christianity may be
considered as a very essential part of the history of the Roman empire. While
that great body was invaded by open violence, or undermined by slow decay, a
pure and humble religion gently insinuated itself into the minds of men, grew up
in silence and obscurity, derived new vigor from opposition, and finally erected
the triumphant banner of the Cross on the ruins of the Capitol. Nor was the
influence of Christianity confined to the period or to the limits of the Roman
empire. After a revolution of thirteen or fourteen centuries, that religion is
still professed by the nations of Europe, the most distinguished portion of
human kind in arts and learning as well as in arms. By the industry and zeal of
the Europeans, it has been widely diffused to the most distant shores of Asia
and Africa; and by the means of their colonies has been firmly established from
Canada to Chili, in a world unknown to the ancients.

But this
inquiry, however useful or entertaining, is attended with two peculiar
difficulties. The scanty and suspicious materials of ecclesiastical history
seldom enable us to dispel the dark cloud that hangs over the first age of the
church. The great law of impartiality too often obliges us to reveal the
imperfections of the uninspired teachers and believers of the gospel; and, to a
careless observer, their faults may seem to cast a shade on the faith which they
professed. But the scandal of the pious Christian, and the fallacious triumph of
the Infidel, should cease as soon as they recollect not only by whom, but
likewise to whom, the Divine Revelation was given. The theologian may indulge
the pleasing task of describing Religion as she descended from Heaven, arrayed
in her native purity. A more melancholy duty is imposed on the historian. He
must discover the inevitable mixture of error and corruption, which she
contracted in a long residence upon earth, among a weak and degenerate race of
beings[1475].

Our
curiosity is naturally prompted to inquire by what means the Christian faith
obtained so remarkable a victory over the established religions of the earth. To
this inquiry, an obvious but satisfactory answer may be returned; that it was
owing to the convincing evidence of the doctrine itself, and to the ruling
providence of its great Author. But as truth and reason seldom find so favorable
a reception in the world, and as the wisdom of Providence frequently condescends
to use the passions of the human heart, and the general circumstances of
mankind, as instruments to execute its purpose, we may still be permitted,
though with becoming submission, to ask, not indeed what were the first, but
what were the secondary causes of the rapid growth of the Christian church. It
will, perhaps, appear, that it was most effectually favored and assisted by the
five following causes:

I.
The
inflexible, and if we may use the expression, the intolerant zeal of the
Christians, derived, it is true, from the Jewish religion, but purified from the
narrow and unsocial spirit, which, instead of inviting, had deterred the
Gentiles from embracing the law of Moses[1476].

II.
The
doctrine of a future life, improved by every additional circumstance which could
give weight and efficacy to that important truth.

III.
The
miraculous powers ascribed to the primitive church.

IV.
The
pure and austere morals of the Christians.

V.
The
union and discipline of the Christian republic, which gradually formed an
independent and increasing state in the heart of the Roman empire.

I.
We
have already described the religious harmony of the ancient world, and the
facility[1477]
with which the most different and even hostile nations embraced, or at least
respected, each other's superstitions. A single people refused to join in the
common intercourse of mankind. The Jews, who, under the Assyrian and Persian
monarchies, had languished for many ages the most despised portion of their
slaves[1478],
emerged from obscurity under the successors of Alexander; and as they multiplied
to a surprising degree in the East, and afterwards in the West, they soon
excited the curiosity and wonder of other nations[1479].
The sullen obstinacy with which they maintained their peculiar rites and
unsocial manners, seemed to mark them out as a distinct species of men, who
boldly professed, or who faintly disguised, their implacable habits to the rest
of human kind[1480].
Neither the violence of Antiochus, nor the arts of Herod, nor the example of the
circumjacent nations, could ever persuade the Jews to associate with the
institutions of Moses the elegant mythology of the Greeks[1481].
According to the maxims of universal toleration, the Romans protected a
superstition which they despised[1482].
The polite Augustus condescended to give orders, that sacrifices should be
offered for his prosperity in the temple of Jerusalem[1483];
whilst the meanest of the posterity of Abraham, who should have paid the same
homage to the Jupiter of the Capitol, would have been an object of abhorrence to
himself and to his brethren. But the moderation of the conquerors was
insufficient to appease the jealous prejudices of their subjects, who were
alarmed and scandalized at the ensigns of paganism, which necessarily introduced
themselves into a Roman province[1484].
The mad attempt of Caligula to place his own statue in the temple of Jerusalem
was defeated by the unanimous resolution of a people who dreaded death much less
than such an idolatrous profanation[1485].
Their attachment to the law of Moses was equal to their detestation of foreign
religions. The current of zeal and devotion, as it was contracted into a narrow
channel, ran with the strength, and sometimes with the fury, of a
torrent.

This inflexible perseverance, which
appeared so odious or so ridiculous to the ancient world, assumes a more awful
character, since Providence has deigned to reveal to us the mysterious history
of the chosen people. But the devout and even scrupulous attachment to the
Mosaic religion, so conspicuous among the Jews who lived under the second
temple, becomes still more surprising, if it is compared with the stubborn
incredulity of their forefathers. When the law was given in thunder from Mount
Sinai, when the tides of the ocean and the course of the planets were suspended
for the convenience of the Israelites, and when temporal rewards and punishments
were the immediate consequences of their piety or disobedience, they perpetually
relapsed into rebellion against the visible majesty of their Divine King, placed
the idols of the nations in the sanctuary of Jehovah, and imitated every
fantastic ceremony that was practised in the tents of the Arabs, or in the
cities of Phoenicia[1486].
As the protection of Heaven was deservedly withdrawn from the ungrateful race,
their faith acquired a proportionable degree of vigor and purity. The
contemporaries of Moses and Joshua had beheld with careless indifference the
most amazing miracles. Under the pressure of every calamity, the belief of those
miracles has preserved the Jews of a later period from the universal contagion
of idolatry; and in contradiction to every known principle of the human mind,
that singular people seems to have yielded a stronger and more ready assent to
the traditions of their remote ancestors, than to the evidence of their own
senses[1487].

The Jewish religion was admirably fitted for defence,
but it was never designed for conquest; and it seems probable that the number of
proselytes was never much superior to that of apostates. The divine promises
were originally made, and the distinguishing rite of circumcision was enjoined,
to a single family. When the posterity of Abraham had multiplied like the sands
of the sea, the Deity, from whose mouth they received a system of laws and
ceremonies, declared himself the proper and as it were the national God of
Israel and with the most jealous care separated his favorite people from the
rest of mankind. The conquest of the land of Canaan was accompanied with so many
wonderful and with so many bloody circumstances, that the victorious Jews were
left in a state of irreconcilable hostility with all their neighbors. They had
been commanded to extirpate some of the most idolatrous tribes, and the
execution of the divine will had seldom been retarded by the weakness of
humanity. With the other nations they were forbidden to contract any marriages
or alliances; and the prohibition of receiving them into the congregation, which
in some cases was perpetual, almost always extended to the third, to the
seventh, or even to the tenth generation. The obligation of preaching to the
Gentiles the faith of Moses had never been inculcated as a precept of the law,
nor were the Jews inclined to impose it on themselves as a voluntary duty.

In the admission of new citizens,
that unsocial people was actuated by the selfish vanity of the Greeks, rather
than by the generous policy of Rome. The descendants of Abraham were flattered
by the opinion that they alone were the heirs of the covenant, and they were
apprehensive of diminishing the value of their inheritance by sharing it too
easily with the strangers of the earth. A larger acquaintance with mankind
extended their knowledge without correcting their prejudices; and whenever the
God of Israel acquired any new votaries, he was much more indebted to the
inconstant humor of polytheism than to the active zeal of his own missionaries[1488].
The religion of Moses seems to be instituted for a particular country as well as
for a single nation; and if a strict obedience had been paid to the order, that
every male, three times in the year, should present himself before the Lord
Jehovah, it would have been impossible that the Jews could ever have spread
themselves beyond the narrow limits of the promised land[1489].
That obstacle was indeed removed by the destruction of the temple of Jerusalem;
but the most considerable part of the Jewish religion was involved in its
destruction; and the Pagans, who had long wondered at the strange report of an
empty sanctuary[1490],
were at a loss to discover what could be the object, or what could be the
instruments, of a worship which was destitute of temples and of altars, of
priests and of sacrifices. Yet even in their fallen state, the Jews, still
asserting their lofty and exclusive privileges, shunned, instead of courting,
the society of strangers. They still insisted with inflexible rigor on those
parts of the law which it was in their power to practise. Their peculiar
distinctions of days, of meats, and a variety of trivial though burdensome
observances, were so many objects of disgust and aversion for the other nations,
to whose habits and prejudices they were diametrically opposite. The painful and
even dangerous rite of circumcision was alone capable of repelling a willing
proselyte from the door of the synagogue[1491].

Under these circumstances, Christianity offered
itself to the world, armed with the strength of the Mosaic law, and delivered
from the weight of its fetters. An exclusive zeal for the truth of religion, and
the unity of God, was as carefully inculcated in the new as in the ancient
system: and whatever was now revealed to mankind concerning the nature and
designs of the Supreme Being, was fitted to increase their reverence for that
mysterious doctrine. The divine authority of Moses and the prophets was
admitted, and even established, as the firmest basis of Christianity. From the
beginning of the world, an uninterrupted series of predictions had announced and
prepared the long-expected coming of the Messiah, who, in compliance with the
gross apprehensions of the Jews, had been more frequently represented under the
character of a King and Conqueror, than under that of a Prophet, a Martyr, and
the Son of God. By his expiatory sacrifice, the imperfect sacrifices of the
temple were at once consummated and abolished. The ceremonial law, which
consisted only of types and figures, was succeeded by a pure and spiritual
worship, equally adapted to all climates, as well as to every condition of
mankind; and to the initiation of blood was substituted a more harmless
initiation of water. The promise of divine favor, instead of being partially
confined to the posterity of Abraham, was universally proposed to the freeman
and the slave, to the Greek and to the barbarian, to the Jew and to the Gentile.
Every privilege that could raise the proselyte from earth to heaven, that could
exalt his devotion, secure his happiness, or even gratify that secret pride
which, under the semblance of devotion, insinuates itself into the human heart,
was still reserved for the members of the Christian church; but at the same time
all mankind was permitted, and even solicited, to accept the glorious
distinction, which was not only proffered as a favor, but imposed as an
obligation. It became the most sacred duty of a new convert to diffuse among his
friends and relations the inestimable blessing which he had received, and to
warn them against a refusal that would be severely punished as a criminal
disobedience to the will of a benevolent but all-powerful Deity.

Chapter XV
Progress of
the Christian Religion
Part II

The
enfranchisement of the church from the bonds of the synagogue was a work,
however, of some time and of some difficulty. The Jewish converts, who
acknowledged Jesus in the character of the Messiah foretold by their ancient
oracles, respected him as a prophetic teacher of virtue and religion; but they
obstinately adhered to the ceremonies of their ancestors, and were desirous of
imposing them on the Gentiles, who continually augmented the number of
believers. These Judaizing Christians seem to have argued with some degree of
plausibility from the divine origin of the Mosaic law, and from the immutable
perfections of its great Author. They affirmed, that if the Being, who is the
same through all eternity, had designed to abolish those sacred rites which had
served to distinguish his chosen people, the repeal of them would have been no
less clear and solemn than their first promulgation: that, instead of those
frequent declarations, which either suppose or assert the perpetuity of the
Mosaic religion, it would have been represented as a provisionary scheme
intended to last only to the coming of the Messiah, who should instruct mankind
in a more perfect mode of faith and of worship[1492]:
that the Messiah himself, and his disciples who conversed with him on earth,
instead of authorizing by their example the most minute observances of the
Mosaic law[1493],
would have published to the world the abolition of those useless and obsolete
ceremonies, without suffering Christianity to remain during so many years
obscurely confounded among the sects of the Jewish church. Arguments like these
appear to have been used in the defence of the expiring cause of the Mosaic law;
but the industry of our learned divines has abundantly explained the ambiguous
language of the Old Testament, and the ambiguous conduct of the apostolic
teachers. It was proper gradually to unfold the system of the gospel, and to
pronounce, with the utmost caution and tenderness, a sentence of condemnation so
repugnant to the inclination and prejudices of the believing
Jews.

The
history of the church of Jerusalem affords a lively proof of the necessity of
those precautions, and of the deep impression which the Jewish religion had made
on the minds of its sectaries. The first fifteen bishops of Jerusalem were all
circumcised Jews; and the congregation over which they presided united the law
of Moses with the doctrine of Christ[1494].
It was natural that the primitive tradition of a church which was founded only
forty days after the death of Christ, and was governed almost as many years
under the immediate inspection of his apostle, should be received as the
standard of orthodoxy[1495].
The distant churches very frequently appealed to the authority of their
venerable Parent, and relieved her distresses by a liberal contribution of alms.
But when numerous and opulent societies were established in the great cities of
the empire, in Antioch, Alexandria, Ephesus, Corinth, and Rome, the reverence
which Jerusalem had inspired to all the Christian colonies insensibly
diminished. The Jewish converts, or, as they were afterwards called, the
Nazarenes, who had laid the foundations of the church, soon found themselves
overwhelmed by the increasing multitudes, that from all the various religions of
polytheism enlisted under the banner of Christ: and the Gentiles, who, with the
approbation of their peculiar apostle, had rejected the intolerable weight of
the Mosaic ceremonies, at length refused to their more scrupulous brethren the
same toleration which at first they had humbly solicited for their own practice.
The ruin of the temple of the city, and of the public religion of the Jews, was
severely felt by the Nazarenes; as in their manners, though not in their faith,
they maintained so intimate a connection with their impious countrymen, whose
misfortunes were attributed by the Pagans to the contempt, and more justly
ascribed by the Christians to the wrath, of the Supreme Deity. The Nazarenes
retired from the ruins of Jerusalem[1496]
to the little town of Pella beyond the Jordan, where that ancient church
languished above sixty years in solitude and obscurity[1497].
They still enjoyed the comfort of making frequent and devout visits to the Holy
City, and the hope of being one day restored to those seats which both nature
and religion taught them to love as well as to revere. But at length, under the
reign of Hadrian, the desperate fanaticism of the Jews filled up the measure of
their calamities; and the Romans, exasperated by their repeated rebellions,
exercised the rights of victory with unusual rigor. The emperor founded, under
the name of Aelia Capitolina, a new city on Mount Sion[1498],
to which he gave the privileges of a colony; and denouncing the severest
penalties against any of the Jewish people who should dare to approach its
precincts, he fixed a vigilant garrison of a Roman cohort to enforce the
execution of his orders. The Nazarenes had only one way left to escape the
common proscription, and the force of truth was on this occasion assisted by the
influence of temporal advantages. They elected Marcus for their bishop, a
prelate of the race of the Gentiles, and most probably a native either of Italy
or of some of the Latin provinces. At his persuasion, the most considerable part
of the congregation renounced the Mosaic law, in the practice of which they had
persevered above a century. By this sacrifice of their habits and prejudices,
they purchased a free admission into the colony of Hadrian, and more firmly
cemented their union with the Catholic church[1499].

When the
name and honors of the church of Jerusalem had been restored to Mount Sion, the
crimes of heresy and schism were imputed to the obscure remnant of the
Nazarenes, which refused to accompany their Latin bishop. They still preserved
their former habitation of Pella, spread themselves into the villages adjacent
to Damascus, and formed an inconsiderable church in the city of Beroea, or, as
it is now called, of Aleppo, in Syria[1500].
The name of Nazarenes was deemed too honorable for those Christian Jews, and
they soon received, from the supposed poverty of their understanding, as well as
of their condition, the contemptuous epithet of Ebionites[1501].
In a few years after the return of the church of Jerusalem, it became a matter
of doubt and controversy, whether a man who sincerely acknowledged Jesus as the
Messiah, but who still continued to observe the law of Moses, could possibly
hope for salvation. The humane temper of Justin Martyr inclined him to answer
this question in the affirmative; and though he expressed himself with the most
guarded diffidence, he ventured to determine in favor of such an imperfect
Christian, if he were content to practise the Mosaic ceremonies, without
pretending to assert their general use or necessity. But when Justin was pressed
to declare the sentiment of the church, he confessed that there were very many
among the orthodox Christians, who not only excluded their Judaizing brethren
from the hope of salvation, but who declined any intercourse with them in the
common offices of friendship, hospitality, and social life[1502].
The more rigorous opinion prevailed, as it was natural to expect, over the
milder; and an eternal bar of separation was fixed between the disciples of
Moses and those of Christ. The unfortunate Ebionites, rejected from one religion
as apostates, and from the other as heretics, found themselves compelled to
assume a more decided character; and although some traces of that obsolete sect
may be discovered as late as the fourth century, they insensibly melted away,
either into the church or the synagogue[1503].

While the
orthodox church preserved a just medium between excessive veneration and
improper contempt for the law of Moses, the various heretics deviated into equal
but opposite extremes of error and extravagance. From the acknowledged truth of
the Jewish religion, the Ebionites had concluded that it could never be
abolished. From its supposed imperfections, the Gnostics as hastily inferred
that it never was instituted by the wisdom of the Deity. There are some
objections against the authority of Moses and the prophets, which too readily
present themselves to the sceptical mind; though they can only be derived from
our ignorance of remote antiquity, and from our incapacity to form an adequate
judgment of the divine economy. These objections were eagerly embraced and as
petulantly urged by the vain science of the Gnostics[1504].
As those heretics were, for the most part, averse to the pleasures of sense,
they morosely arraigned the polygamy of the patriarchs, the gallantries of
David, and the seraglio of Solomon. The conquest of the land of Canaan, and the
extirpation of the unsuspecting natives, they were at a loss how to reconcile
with the common notions of humanity and justice[1505].
But when they recollected the sanguinary list of murders, of executions, and of
massacres, which stain almost every page of the Jewish annals, they acknowledged
that the barbarians of Palestine had exercised as much compassion towards their
idolatrous enemies, as they had ever shown to their friends or countrymen[1506].
Passing from the sectaries of the law to the law itself, they asserted that it
was impossible that a religion which consisted only of bloody sacrifices and
trifling ceremonies, and whose rewards as well as punishments were all of a
carnal and temporal nature, could inspire the love of virtue, or restrain the
impetuosity of passion. The Mosaic account of the creation and fall of man was
treated with profane derision by the Gnostics, who would not listen with
patience to the repose of the Deity after six days' labor, to the rib of Adam,
the garden of Eden, the trees of life and of knowledge, the speaking serpent,
the forbidden fruit, and the condemnation pronounced against human kind for the
venial offence of their first progenitors[1507].
The God of Israel was impiously represented by the Gnostics as a being liable to
passion and to error, capricious in his favor, implacable in his resentment,
meanly jealous of his superstitious worship, and confining his partial
providence to a single people, and to this transitory life. In such a character
they could discover none of the features of the wise and omnipotent Father of
the universe[1508].
They allowed that the religion of the Jews was somewhat less criminal than the
idolatry of the Gentiles; but it was their fundamental doctrine, that the Christ
whom they adored as the first and brightest emanation of the Deity appeared upon
earth to rescue mankind from their various errors, and to reveal a new system of
truth and perfection. The most learned of the fathers, by a very singular
condescension, have imprudently admitted the sophistry of the Gnostics[1509].
Acknowledging that the literal sense is repugnant to every principle of faith as
well as reason, they deem themselves secure and invulnerable behind the ample
veil of allegory, which they carefully spread over every tender part of the
Mosaic dispensation[1510].

It has
been remarked with more ingenuity than truth, that the virgin purity of the
church was never violated by schism or heresy before the reign of Trajan or
Hadrian, about one hundred years after the death of Christ[1511].
We may observe with much more propriety, that, during that period, the disciples
of the Messiah were indulged in a freer latitude, both of faith and practice,
than has ever been allowed in succeeding ages. As the terms of communion were
insensibly narrowed, and the spiritual authority of the prevailing party was
exercised with increasing severity, many of its most respectable adherents, who
were called upon to renounce, were provoked to assert their private opinions, to
pursue the consequences of their mistaken principles, and openly to erect the
standard of rebellion against the unity of the church. The Gnostics were
distinguished as the most polite, the most learned, and the most wealthy of the
Christian name; and that general appellation, which expressed a superiority of
knowledge, was either assumed by their own pride, or ironically bestowed by the
envy of their adversaries. They were almost without exception of the race of the
Gentiles, and their principal founders seem to have been natives of Syria or
Egypt, where the warmth of the climate disposes both the mind and the body to
indolent and contemplative devotion. The Gnostics blended with the faith of
Christ many sublime but obscure tenets, which they derived from oriental
philosophy, and even from the religion of Zoroaster, concerning the eternity of
matter, the existence of two principles, and the mysterious hierarchy of the
invisible world[1512].
As soon as they launched out into that vast abyss, they delivered themselves to
the guidance of a disordered imagination; and as the paths of error are various
and infinite, the Gnostics were imperceptibly divided into more than fifty
particular sects[1513],
of whom the most celebrated appear to have been the Basilidians, the
Valentinians, the Marcionites, and, in a still later period, the Manichaeans.
Each of these sects could boast of its bishops and congregations, of its doctors
and martyrs[1514];
and, instead of the Four Gospels adopted by the church[1515],
the heretics produced a multitude of histories, in which the actions and
discourses of Christ and of his apostles were adapted to their respective
tenets[1516].
The success of the Gnostics was rapid and extensive[1517].
They covered Asia and Egypt, established themselves in Rome, and sometimes
penetrated into the provinces of the West. For the most part they arose in the
second century, flourished during the third, and were suppressed in the fourth
or fifth, by the prevalence of more fashionable controversies, and by the
superior ascendant of the reigning power. Though they constantly disturbed the
peace, and frequently disgraced the name, of religion, they contributed to
assist rather than to retard the progress of Christianity. The Gentile converts,
whose strongest objections and prejudices were directed against the law of
Moses, could find admission into many Christian societies, which required not
from their untutored mind any belief of an antecedent revelation. Their faith
was insensibly fortified and enlarged, and the church was ultimately benefited
by the conquests of its most inveterate enemies[1518].

But
whatever difference of opinion might subsist between the Orthodox, the
Ebionites, and the Gnostics, concerning the divinity or the obligation of the
Mosaic law, they were all equally animated by the same exclusive zeal; and by
the same abhorrence for idolatry, which had distinguished the Jews from the
other nations of the ancient world. The philosopher, who considered the system
of polytheism as a composition of human fraud and error, could disguise a smile
of contempt under the mask of devotion, without apprehending that either the
mockery, or the compliance, would expose him to the resentment of any invisible,
or, as he conceived them, imaginary powers. But the established religions of
Paganism were seen by the primitive Christians in a much more odious and
formidable light. It was the universal sentiment both of the church and of
heretics, that the daemons were the authors, the patrons, and the objects of
idolatry[1519].
Those rebellious spirits who had been degraded from the rank of angels, and cast
down into the infernal pit, were still permitted to roam upon earth, to torment
the bodies, and to seduce the minds, of sinful men. The daemons soon discovered
and abused the natural propensity of the human heart towards devotion, and
artfully withdrawing the adoration of mankind from their Creator, they usurped
the place and honors of the Supreme Deity. By the success of their malicious
contrivances, they at once gratified their own vanity and revenge, and obtained
the only comfort of which they were yet susceptible, the hope of involving the
human species in the participation of their guilt and misery. It was confessed,
or at least it was imagined, that they had distributed among themselves the most
important characters of polytheism, one daemon assuming the name and attributes
of Jupiter, another of Aesculapius, a third of Venus, and a fourth perhaps of
Apollo[1520];
and that, by the advantage of their long experience and aerial nature, they were
enabled to execute, with sufficient skill and dignity, the parts which they had
undertaken. They lurked in the temples, instituted festivals and sacrifices,
invented fables, pronounced oracles, and were frequently allowed to perform
miracles. The Christians, who, by the interposition of evil spirits, could so
readily explain every preternatural appearance, were disposed and even desirous
to admit the most extravagant fictions of the Pagan mythology. But the belief of
the Christian was accompanied with horror. The most trifling mark of respect to
the national worship he considered as a direct homage yielded to the daemon, and
as an act of rebellion against the majesty of God.

Chapter XV
Progress of
the Christian Religion
Part III

In
consequence of this opinion, it was the first but arduous duty of a Christian to
preserve himself pure and undefiled by the practice of idolatry. The religion of
the nations was not merely a speculative doctrine professed in the schools or
preached in the temples. The innumerable deities and rites of polytheism were
closely interwoven with every circumstance of business or pleasure, of public or
of private life; and it seemed impossible to escape the observance of them,
without, at the same time, renouncing the commerce of mankind, and all the
offices and amusements of society[1521].
The important transactions of peace and war were prepared or concluded by solemn
sacrifices, in which the magistrate, the senator, and the soldier, were obliged
to preside or to participate[1522].
The public spectacles were an essential part of the cheerful devotion of the
Pagans, and the gods were supposed to accept, as the most grateful offering, the
games that the prince and people celebrated in honor of their peculiar
festivals[1523].
The Christians, who with pious horror avoided the abomination of the circus or
the theatre, found himself encompassed with infernal snares in every convivial
entertainment, as often as his friends, invoking the hospitable deities, poured
out libations to each other's happiness[1524].
When the bride, struggling with well-affected reluctance, was forced into
hymenaeal pomp over the threshold of her new habitation[1525],
or when the sad procession of the dead slowly moved towards the funeral pile[1526];
the Christian, on these interesting occasions, was compelled to desert the
persons who were the dearest to him, rather than contract the guilt inherent to
those impious ceremonies. Every art and every trade that was in the least
concerned in the framing or adorning of idols was polluted by the stain of
idolatry[1527];
a severe sentence, since it devoted to eternal misery the far greater part of
the community, which is employed in the exercise of liberal or mechanic
professions. If we cast our eyes over the numerous remains of antiquity, we
shall perceive, that besides the immediate representations of the gods, and the
holy instruments of their worship, the elegant forms and agreeable fictions
consecrated by the imagination of the Greeks, were introduced as the richest
ornaments of the houses, the dress, and the furniture of the Pagan[1528].
Even the arts of music and painting, of eloquence and poetry, flowed from the
same impure origin. In the style of the fathers, Apollo and the Muses were the
organs of the infernal spirit; Homer and Virgil were the most eminent of his
servants; and the beautiful mythology which pervades and animates the
compositions of their genius, is destined to celebrate the glory of the daemons.
Even the common language of Greece and Rome abounded with familiar but impious
expressions, which the imprudent Christian might too carelessly utter, or too
patiently hear[1529].

The
dangerous temptations which on every side lurked in ambush to surprise the
unguarded believer, assailed him with redoubled violence on the days of solemn
festivals. So artfully were they framed and disposed throughout the year, that
superstition always wore the appearance of pleasure, and often of virtue. Some
of the most sacred festivals in the Roman ritual were destined to salute the new
calends of January with vows of public and private felicity; to indulge the
pious remembrance of the dead and living; to ascertain the inviolable bounds of
property; to hail, on the return of spring, the genial powers of fecundity; to
perpetuate the two memorable areas of Rome, the foundation of the city and that
of the republic, and to restore, during the humane license of the Saturnalia,
the primitive equality of mankind. Some idea may be conceived of the abhorrence
of the Christians for such impious ceremonies, by the scrupulous delicacy which
they displayed on a much less alarming occasion[1530].
On days of general festivity, it was the custom of the ancients to adorn their
doors with lamps and with branches of laurel, and to crown their heads with a
garland of flowers. This innocent and elegant practice might perhaps have been
tolerated as a mere civil institution. But it most unluckily happened that the
doors were under the protection of the household gods, that the laurel was
sacred to the lover of Daphne, and that garlands of flowers, though frequently
worn as a symbol of joy or mourning, had been dedicated in their first origin to
the service of superstition. The trembling Christians, who were persuaded in
this instance to comply with the fashion of their country, and the commands of
the magistrate, labored under the most gloomy apprehensions, from the reproaches
of his own conscience, the censures of the church, and the denunciations of
divine vengeance[1531].

Such was
the anxious diligence which was required to guard the chastity of the gospel
from the infectious breath of idolatry. The superstitious observances of public
or private rites were carelessly practised, from education and habit, by the
followers of the established religion. But as often as they occurred, they
afforded the Christians an opportunity of declaring and confirming their zealous
opposition. By these frequent protestations their attachment to the faith was
continually fortified; and in proportion to the increase of zeal, they combated
with the more ardor and success in the holy war, which they had undertaken
against the empire of the demons.

II.
The
writings of Cicero[1532]
represent in the most lively colors the ignorance, the errors, and the
uncertainty of the ancient philosophers with regard to the immortality of the
soul. When they are desirous of arming their disciples against the fear of
death, they inculcate, as an obvious, though melancholy position, that the fatal
stroke of our dissolution releases us from the calamities of life; and that
those can no longer suffer, who no longer exist. Yet there were a few sages of
Greece and Rome who had conceived a more exalted, and, in some respects, a
juster idea of human nature, though it must be confessed, that in the sublime
inquiry, their reason had been often guided by their imagination, and that their
imagination had been prompted by their vanity. When they viewed with complacency
the extent of their own mental powers, when they exercised the various faculties
of memory, of fancy, and of judgment, in the most profound speculations, or the
most important labors, and when they reflected on the desire of fame, which
transported them into future ages, far beyond the bounds of death and of the
grave, they were unwilling to confound themselves with the beasts of the field,
or to suppose that a being, for whose dignity they entertained the most sincere
admiration, could be limited to a spot of earth, and to a few years of duration.
With this favorable prepossession they summoned to their aid the science, or
rather the language, of Metaphysics. They soon discovered, that as none of the
properties of matter will apply to the operations of the mind, the human soul
must consequently be a substance distinct from the body, pure, simple, and
spiritual, incapable of dissolution, and susceptible of a much higher degree of
virtue and happiness after the release from its corporeal prison. From these
specious and noble principles, the philosophers who trod in the footsteps of
Plato deduced a very unjustifiable conclusion, since they asserted, not only the
future immortality, but the past eternity, of the human soul, which they were
too apt to consider as a portion of the infinite and self-existing spirit, which
pervades and sustains the universe[1533].
A doctrine thus removed beyond the senses and the experience of mankind, might
serve to amuse the leisure of a philosophic mind; or, in the silence of
solitude, it might sometimes impart a ray of comfort to desponding virtue; but
the faint impression which had been received in the schools, was soon
obliterated by the commerce and business of active life. We are sufficiently
acquainted with the eminent persons who flourished in the age of Cicero, and of
the first Caesars, with their actions, their characters, and their motives, to
be assured that their conduct in this life was never regulated by any serious
conviction of the rewards or punishments of a future state. At the bar and in
the senate of Rome the ablest orators were not apprehensive of giving offence to
their hearers, by exposing that doctrine as an idle and extravagant opinion,
which was rejected with contempt by every man of a liberal education and
understanding[1534].

Since therefore the most sublime efforts of
philosophy can extend no further than feebly to point out the desire, the hope,
or, at most, the probability, of a future state, there is nothing, except a
divine revelation, that can ascertain the existence, and describe the condition,
of the invisible country which is destined to receive the souls of men after
their separation from the body. But we may perceive several defects inherent to
the popular religions of Greece and Rome, which rendered them very unequal to so
arduous a task.

I.
The
general system of their mythology was unsupported by any solid proofs; and the
wisest among the Pagans had already disclaimed its usurped
authority.

II.
The
description of the infernal regions had been abandoned to the fancy of painters
and of poets, who peopled them with so many phantoms and monsters, who dispensed
their rewards and punishments with so little equity, that a solemn truth, the
most congenial to the human heart, was opposed and disgraced by the absurd
mixture of the wildest fictions[1535].

III.
The
doctrine of a future state was scarcely considered among the devout polytheists
of Greece and Rome as a fundamental article of faith. The providence of the
gods, as it related to public communities rather than to private individuals,
was principally displayed on the visible theatre of the present world. The
petitions which were offered on the altars of Jupiter or Apollo, expressed the
anxiety of their worshippers for temporal happiness, and their ignorance or
indifference concerning a future life[1536].
The important truth of the of the immortality of the soul was inculcated with
more diligence, as well as success, in India, in Assyria, in Egypt, and in Gaul;
and since we cannot attribute such a difference to the superior knowledge of the
barbarians, we must ascribe it to the influence of an established priesthood,
which employed the motives of virtue as the instrument of ambition[1537].

We might naturally expect that a
principle so essential to religion, would have been revealed in the clearest
terms to the chosen people of Palestine, and that it might safely have been
intrusted to the hereditary priesthood of Aaron. It is incumbent on us to adore
the mysterious dispensations of Providence[1538],
when we discover that the doctrine of the immortality of the soul is omitted in
the law of Moses it is darkly insinuated by the prophets; and during the long
period which clasped between the Egyptian and the Babylonian servitudes, the
hopes as well as fears of the Jews appear to have been confined within the
narrow compass of the present life[1539].
After Cyrus had permitted the exiled nation to return into the promised land,
and after Ezra had restored the ancient records of their religion, two
celebrated sects, the Sadducees and the Pharisees, insensibly arose at
Jerusalem[1540].
The former, selected from the more opulent and distinguished ranks of society,
were strictly attached to the literal sense of the Mosaic law, and they piously
rejected the immortality of the soul, as an opinion that received no countenance
from the divine book, which they revered as the only rule of their faith. To the
authority of Scripture the Pharisees added that of tradition, and they accepted,
under the name of traditions, several speculative tenets from the philosophy or
religion of the eastern nations. The doctrines of fate or predestination, of
angels and spirits, and of a future state of rewards and punishments, were in
the number of these new articles of belief; and as the Pharisees, by the
austerity of their manners, had drawn into their party the body of the Jewish
people, the immortality of the soul became the prevailing sentiment of the
synagogue, under the reign of the Asmonaean princes and pontiffs. The temper of
the Jews was incapable of contenting itself with such a cold and languid assent
as might satisfy the mind of a Polytheist; and as soon as they admitted the idea
of a future state, they embraced it with the zeal which has always formed the
characteristic of the nation. Their zeal, however, added nothing to its
evidence, or even probability: and it was still necessary that the doctrine of
life and immortality, which had been dictated by nature, approved by reason, and
received by superstition, should obtain the sanction of divine truth from the
authority and example of Christ.

When the promise of eternal
happiness was proposed to mankind on condition of adopting the faith, and of
observing the precepts, of the gospel, it is no wonder that so advantageous an
offer should have been accepted by great numbers of every religion, of every
rank, and of every province in the Roman empire. The ancient Christians were
animated by a contempt for their present existence, and by a just confidence of
immortality, of which the doubtful and imperfect faith of modern ages cannot
give us any adequate notion. In the primitive church, the influence of truth was
very powerfully strengthened by an opinion, which, however it may deserve
respect for its usefulness and antiquity, has not been found agreeable to
experience. It was universally believed, that the end of the world, and the
kingdom of heaven, were at hand[1541].
The near approach of this wonderful event had been predicted by the apostles;
the tradition of it was preserved by their earliest disciples, and those who
understood in their literal senses the discourse of Christ himself, were obliged
to expect the second and glorious coming of the Son of Man in the clouds, before
that generation was totally extinguished, which had beheld his humble condition
upon earth, and which might still be witness of the calamities of the Jews under
Vespasian or Hadrian. The revolution of seventeen centuries has instructed us
not to press too closely the mysterious language of prophecy and revelation; but
as long as, for wise purposes, this error was permitted to subsist in the
church, it was productive of the most salutary effects on the faith and practice
of Christians, who lived in the awful expectation of that moment, when the globe
itself, and all the various race of mankind, should tremble at the appearance of
their divine Judge[1542].

Chapter XV
Progress of
the Christian Religion
Part IV

The
ancient and popular doctrine of the Millennium was intimately connected with the
second coming of Christ. As the works of the creation had been finished in six
days, their duration in their present state, according to a tradition which was
attributed to the prophet Elijah, was fixed to six thousand years[1543].
By the same analogy it was inferred, that this long period of labor and
contention, which was now almost elapsed[1544],
would be succeeded by a joyful Sabbath of a thousand years; and that Christ,
with the triumphant band of the saints and the elect who had escaped death, or
who had been miraculously revived, would reign upon earth till the time
appointed for the last and general resurrection. So pleasing was this hope to
the mind of believers, that the New Jerusalem, the seat of this blissful
kingdom, was quickly adorned with all the gayest colors of the imagination. A
felicity consisting only of pure and spiritual pleasure would have appeared too
refined for its inhabitants, who were still supposed to possess their human
nature and senses. A garden of Eden, with the amusements of the pastoral life,
was no longer suited to the advanced state of society which prevailed under the
Roman empire. A city was therefore erected of gold and precious stones, and a
supernatural plenty of corn and wine was bestowed on the adjacent territory; in
the free enjoyment of whose spontaneous productions, the happy and benevolent
people was never to be restrained by any jealous laws of exclusive property[1545].
The assurance of such a Millennium was carefully inculcated by a succession of
fathers from Justin Martyr[1546],
and Irenaeus, who conversed with the immediate disciples of the apostles, down
to Lactantius, who was preceptor to the son of Constantine[1547].
Though it might not be universally received, it appears to have been the
reigning sentiment of the orthodox believers; and it seems so well adapted to
the desires and apprehensions of mankind, that it must have contributed in a
very considerable degree to the progress of the Christian faith. But when the
edifice of the church was almost completed, the temporary support was laid
aside. The doctrine of Christ's reign upon earth was at first treated as a
profound allegory, was considered by degrees as a doubtful and useless opinion,
and was at length rejected as the absurd invention of heresy and fanaticism[1548].
A mysterious prophecy, which still forms a part of the sacred canon, but which
was thought to favor the exploded sentiment, has very narrowly escaped the
proscription of the church[1549].

Whilst the
happiness and glory of a temporal reign were promised to the disciples of
Christ, the most dreadful calamities were denounced against an unbelieving
world. The edification of a new Jerusalem was to advance by equal steps with the
destruction of the mystic Babylon; and as long as the emperors who reigned
before Constantine persisted in the profession of idolatry, the epithet of
babylon was applied to the city and to the empire of Rome. A regular series was
prepared of all the moral and physical evils which can afflict a flourishing
nation; intestine discord, and the invasion of the fiercest barbarians from the
unknown regions of the North; pestilence and famine, comets and eclipses,
earthquakes and inundations[1550].
All these were only so many preparatory and alarming signs of the great
catastrophe of Rome, when the country of the Scipios and Caesars should be
consumed by a flame from Heaven, and the city of the seven hills, with her
palaces, her temples, and her triumphal arches, should be buried in a vast lake
of fire and brimstone. It might, however, afford some consolation to Roman
vanity, that the period of their empire would be that of the world itself;
which, as it had once perished by the element of water, was destined to
experience a second and a speedy destruction from the element of fire. In the
opinion of a general conflagration, the faith of the Christian very happily
coincided with the tradition of the East, the philosophy of the Stoics, and the
analogy of Nature; and even the country, which, from religious motives, had been
chosen for the origin and principal scene of the conflagration, was the best
adapted for that purpose by natural and physical causes; by its deep caverns,
beds of sulphur, and numerous volcanoes, of which those of Aetna, of Vesuvius,
and of Lipari, exhibit a very imperfect representation. The calmest and most
intrepid sceptic could not refuse to acknowledge that the destruction of the
present system of the world by fire, was in itself extremely probable. The
Christian, who founded his belief much less on the fallacious arguments of
reason than on the authority of tradition and the interpretation of Scripture,
expected it with terror and confidence as a certain and approaching event; and
as his mind was perpetually filled with the solemn idea, he considered every
disaster that happened to the empire as an infallible symptom of an expiring
world[1551].

The
condemnation of the wisest and most virtuous of the Pagans, on account of their
ignorance or disbelief of the divine truth, seems to offend the reason and the
humanity of the present age[1552].
But the primitive church, whose faith was of a much firmer consistence,
delivered over, without hesitation, to eternal torture, the far greater part of
the human species. A charitable hope might perhaps be indulged in favor of
Socrates, or some other sages of antiquity, who had consulted the light of
reason before that of the gospel had arisen[1553].
But it was unanimously affirmed, that those who, since the birth or the death of
Christ, had obstinately persisted in the worship of the daemons, neither
deserved nor could expect a pardon from the irritated justice of the Deity.
These rigid sentiments, which had been unknown to the ancient world, appear to
have infused a spirit of bitterness into a system of love and harmony. The ties
of blood and friendship were frequently torn asunder by the difference of
religious faith; and the Christians, who, in this world, found themselves
oppressed by the power of the Pagans, were sometimes seduced by resentment and
spiritual pride to delight in the prospect of their future triumph. "You are
fond of spectacles," exclaims the stern Tertullian; "expect the greatest of all
spectacles, the last and eternal judgment of the universe. How shall I admire,
how laugh, how rejoice, how exult, when I behold so many proud monarchs, so many
fancied gods, groaning in the lowest abyss of darkness; so many magistrates, who
persecuted the name of the Lord, liquefying in fiercer fires than they ever
kindled against the Christians; so many sage philosophers blushing in red-hot
flames with their deluded scholars; so many celebrated poets trembling before
the tribunal, not of Minos, but of Christ; so many tragedians, more tuneful in
the expression of their own sufferings; so many dancers[1554]."
But the humanity of the reader will permit me to draw a veil over the rest of
this infernal description, which the zealous African pursues in a long variety
of affected and unfeeling witticisms[1555],[1556].

Doubtless
there were many among the primitive Christians of a temper more suitable to the
meekness and charity of their profession. There were many who felt a sincere
compassion for the danger of their friends and countrymen, and who exerted the
most benevolent zeal to save them from the impending destruction. The careless
Polytheist, assailed by new and unexpected terrors, against which neither his
priests nor his philosophers could afford him any certain protection, was very
frequently terrified and subdued by the menace of eternal tortures. His fears
might assist the progress of his faith and reason; and if he could once persuade
himself to suspect that the Christian religion might possibly be true, it became
an easy task to convince him that it was the safest and most prudent party that
he could possibly embrace.

III.
The
supernatural gifts, which even in this life were ascribed to the Christians
above the rest of mankind, must have conduced to their own comfort, and very
frequently to the conviction of infidels. Besides the occasional prodigies,
which might sometimes be effected by the immediate interposition of the Deity
when he suspended the laws of Nature for the service of religion, the Christian
church, from the time of the apostles and their first disciples[1557],
has claimed an uninterrupted succession of miraculous powers, the gift of
tongues, of vision, and of prophecy, the power of expelling daemons, of healing
the sick, and of raising the dead. The knowledge of foreign languages was
frequently communicated to the contemporaries of Irenaeus, though Irenaeus
himself was left to struggle with the difficulties of a barbarous dialect,
whilst he preached the gospel to the natives of Gaul[1558].
The divine inspiration, whether it was conveyed in the form of a waking or of a
sleeping vision, is described as a favor very liberally bestowed on all ranks of
the faithful, on women as on elders, on boys as well as upon bishops. When their
devout minds were sufficiently prepared by a course of prayer, of fasting, and
of vigils, to receive the extraordinary impulse, they were transported out of
their senses, and delivered in ecstasy what was inspired, being mere organs of
the Holy Spirit, just as a pipe or flute is of him who blows into it[1559].
We may add, that the design of these visions was, for the most part, either to
disclose the future history, or to guide the present administration, of the
church. The expulsion of the daemons from the bodies of those unhappy persons
whom they had been permitted to torment, was considered as a signal though
ordinary triumph of religion, and is repeatedly alleged by the ancient
apologists, as the most convincing evidence of the truth of Christianity. The
awful ceremony was usually performed in a public manner, and in the presence of
a great number of spectators; the patient was relieved by the power or skill of
the exorcist, and the vanquished daemon was heard to confess that he was one of
the fabled gods of antiquity, who had impiously usurped the adoration of
mankind[1560].
But the miraculous cure of diseases of the most inveterate or even preternatural
kind, can no longer occasion any surprise, when we recollect, that in the days
of Irenaeus, about the end of the second century, the resurrection of the dead
was very far from being esteemed an uncommon event; that the miracle was
frequently performed on necessary occasions, by great fasting and the joint
supplication of the church of the place, and that the persons thus restored to
their prayers had lived afterwards among them many years[1561].
At such a period, when faith could boast of so many wonderful victories over
death, it seems difficult to account for the scepticism of those philosophers,
who still rejected and derided the doctrine of the resurrection. A noble Grecian
had rested on this important ground the whole controversy, and promised
Theophilus, Bishop of Antioch, that if he could be gratified with the sight of a
single person who had been actually raised from the dead, he would immediately
embrace the Christian religion. It is somewhat remarkable, that the prelate of
the first eastern church, however anxious for the conversion of his friend,
thought proper to decline this fair and reasonable challenge[1562].

The miracles of the primitive
church, after obtaining the sanction of ages, have been lately attacked in a
very free and ingenious inquiry[1563],
which, though it has met with the most favorable reception from the public,
appears to have excited a general scandal among the divines of our own as well
as of the other Protestant churches of Europe[1564].
Our different sentiments on this subject will be much less influenced by any
particular arguments, than by our habits of study and reflection; and, above
all, by the degree of evidence which we have accustomed ourselves to require for
the proof of a miraculous event. The duty of an historian does not call upon him
to interpose his private judgment in this nice and important controversy; but he
ought not to dissemble the difficulty of adopting such a theory as may reconcile
the interest of religion with that of reason, of making a proper application of
that theory, and of defining with precision the limits of that happy period,
exempt from error and from deceit, to which we might be disposed to extend the
gift of supernatural powers. From the first of the fathers to the last of the
popes, a succession of bishops, of saints, of martyrs, and of miracles, is
continued without interruption; and the progress of superstition was so gradual,
and almost imperceptible, that we know not in what particular link we should
break the chain of tradition. Every age bears testimony to the wonderful events
by which it was distinguished, and its testimony appears no less weighty and
respectable than that of the preceding generation, till we are insensibly led on
to accuse our own inconsistency, if in the eighth or in the twelfth century we
deny to the venerable Bede, or to the holy Bernard, the same degree of
confidence which, in the second century, we had so liberally granted to Justin
or to Irenaeus[1565].
If the truth of any of those miracles is appreciated by their apparent use and
propriety, every age had unbelievers to convince, heretics to confute, and
idolatrous nations to convert; and sufficient motives might always be produced
to justify the interposition of Heaven. And yet, since every friend to
revelation is persuaded of the reality, and every reasonable man is convinced of
the cessation, of miraculous powers, it is evident that there must have been
some period in which they were either suddenly or gradually withdrawn from the
Christian church. Whatever aera is chosen for that purpose, the death of the
apostles, the conversion of the Roman empire, or the extinction of the Arian
heresy[1566],
the insensibility of the Christians who lived at that time will equally afford a
just matter of surprise. They still supported their pretensions after they had
lost their power. Credulity performed the office of faith; fanaticism was
permitted to assume the language of inspiration, and the effects of accident or
contrivance were ascribed to supernatural causes. The recent experience of
genuine miracles should have instructed the Christian world in the ways of
Providence, and habituated their eye (if we may use a very inadequate
expression) to the style of the divine artist. Should the most skilful painter
of modern Italy presume to decorate his feeble imitations with the name of
Raphael or of Correggio, the insolent fraud would be soon discovered, and
indignantly rejected.

Whatever opinion may be entertained
of the miracles of the primitive church since the time of the apostles, this
unresisting softness of temper, so conspicuous among the believers of the second
and third centuries, proved of some accidental benefit to the cause of truth and
religion. In modern times, a latent and even involuntary scepticism adheres to
the most pious dispositions. Their admission of supernatural truths is much less
an active consent than a cold and passive acquiescence. Accustomed long since to
observe and to respect the variable order of Nature, our reason, or at least our
imagination, is not sufficiently prepared to sustain the visible action of the
Deity. But, in the first ages of Christianity, the situation of mankind was
extremely different. The most curious, or the most credulous, among the Pagans,
were often persuaded to enter into a society which asserted an actual claim of
miraculous powers. The primitive Christians perpetually trod on mystic ground,
and their minds were exercised by the habits of believing the most extraordinary
events. They felt, or they fancied, that on every side they were incessantly
assaulted by daemons, comforted by visions, instructed by prophecy, and
surprisingly delivered from danger, sickness, and from death itself, by the
supplications of the church. The real or imaginary prodigies, of which they so
frequently conceived themselves to be the objects, the instruments, or the
spectators, very happily disposed them to adopt with the same ease, but with far
greater justice, the authentic wonders of the evangelic history; and thus
miracles that exceeded not the measure of their own experience, inspired them
with the most lively assurance of mysteries which were acknowledged to surpass
the limits of their understanding. It is this deep impression of supernatural
truths, which has been so much celebrated under the name of faith; a state of
mind described as the surest pledge of the divine favor and of future felicity,
and recommended as the first, or perhaps the only merit of a Christian.
According to the more rigid doctors, the moral virtues, which may be equally
practised by infidels, are destitute of any value or efficacy in the work of our
justification.

Chapter XV
Progress of
the Christian Religion
Part V

IV.
But
the primitive Christian demonstrated his faith by his virtues; and it was very
justly supposed that the divine persuasion, which enlightened or subdued the
understanding, must, at the same time, purify the heart, and direct the actions,
of the believer. The first apologists of Christianity who justify the innocence
of their brethren, and the writers of a later period who celebrate the sanctity
of their ancestors, display, in the most lively colors, the reformation of
manners which was introduced into the world by the preaching of the gospel. As
it is my intention to remark only such human causes as were permitted to second
the influence of revelation, I shall slightly mention two motives which might
naturally render the lives of the primitive Christians much purer and more
austere than those of their Pagan contemporaries, or their degenerate
successors; repentance for their past sins, and the laudable desire of
supporting the reputation of the society in which they were engaged[1567].

It is a very ancient reproach,
suggested by the ignorance or the malice of infidelity, that the Christians
allured into their party the most atrocious criminals, who, as soon as they were
touched by a sense of remorse, were easily persuaded to wash away, in the water
of baptism, the guilt of their past conduct, for which the temples of the gods
refused to grant them any expiation. But this reproach, when it is cleared from
misrepresentation, contributes as much to the honor as it did to the increase of
the church[1568].
The friends of Christianity may acknowledge without a blush, that many of the
most eminent saints had been before their baptism the most abandoned sinners.
Those persons, who in the world had followed, though in an imperfect manner, the
dictates of benevolence and propriety, derived such a calm satisfaction from the
opinion of their own rectitude, as rendered them much less susceptible of the
sudden emotions of shame, of grief, and of terror, which have given birth to so
many wonderful conversions. After the example of their divine Master, the
missionaries of the gospel disdained not the society of men, and especially of
women, oppressed by the consciousness, and very often by the effects, of their
vices. As they emerged from sin and superstition to the glorious hope of
immortality, they resolved to devote themselves to a life, not only of virtue,
but of penitence. The desire of perfection became the ruling passion of their
soul; and it is well known, that while reason embraces a cold mediocrity, our
passions hurry us, with rapid violence, over the space which lies between the
most opposite extremes.

When the new converts had been
enrolled in the number of the faithful, and were admitted to the sacraments of
the church, they found themselves restrained from relapsing into their past
disorders by another consideration of a less spiritual, but of a very innocent
and respectable nature. Any particular society that has departed from the great
body of the nation, or the religion to which it belonged, immediately becomes
the object of universal as well as invidious observation. In proportion to the
smallness of its numbers, the character of the society may be affected by the
virtues and vices of the persons who compose it; and every member is engaged to
watch with the most vigilant attention over his own behavior, and over that of
his brethren, since, as he must expect to incur a part of the common disgrace,
he may hope to enjoy a share of the common reputation. When the Christians of
Bithynia were brought before the tribunal of the younger Pliny, they assured the
proconsul, that, far from being engaged in any unlawful conspiracy, they were
bound by a solemn obligation to abstain from the commission of those crimes
which disturb the private or public peace of society, from theft, robbery,
adultery, perjury, and fraud[1569],[1570].
Near a century afterwards, Tertullian with an honest pride, could boast, that
very few Christians had suffered by the hand of the executioner, except on
account of their religion[1571].
Their serious and sequestered life, averse to the gay luxury of the age, inured
them to chastity, temperance, economy, and all the sober and domestic virtues.
As the greater number were of some trade or profession, it was incumbent on
them, by the strictest integrity and the fairest dealing, to remove the
suspicions which the profane are too apt to conceive against the appearances of
sanctity. The contempt of the world exercised them in the habits of humility,
meekness, and patience. The more they were persecuted, the more closely they
adhered to each other. Their mutual charity and unsuspecting confidence has been
remarked by infidels, and was too often abused by perfidious friends[1572].

It is a very honorable circumstance
for the morals of the primitive Christians, that even their faults, or rather
errors, were derived from an excess of virtue. The bishops and doctors of the
church, whose evidence attests, and whose authority might influence, the
professions, the principles, and even the practice of their contemporaries, had
studied the Scriptures with less skill than devotion; and they often received,
in the most literal sense, those rigid precepts of Christ and the apostles, to
which the prudence of succeeding commentators has applied a looser and more
figurative mode of interpretation. Ambitious to exalt the perfection of the
gospel above the wisdom of philosophy, the zealous fathers have carried the
duties of self-mortification, of purity, and of patience, to a height which it
is scarcely possible to attain, and much less to preserve, in our present state
of weakness and corruption. A doctrine so extraordinary and so sublime must
inevitably command the veneration of the people; but it was ill calculated to
obtain the suffrage of those worldly philosophers, who, in the conduct of this
transitory life, consult only the feelings of nature and the interest of
society[1573].

There are two very natural
propensities which we may distinguish in the most virtuous and liberal
dispositions, the love of pleasure and the love of action. If the former is
refined by art and learning, improved by the charms of social intercourse, and
corrected by a just regard to economy, to health, and to reputation, it is
productive of the greatest part of the happiness of private life. The love of
action is a principle of a much stronger and more doubtful nature. It often
leads to anger, to ambition, and to revenge; but when it is guided by the sense
of propriety and benevolence, it becomes the parent of every virtue, and if
those virtues are accompanied with equal abilities, a family, a state, or an
empire, may be indebted for their safety and prosperity to the undaunted courage
of a single man. To the love of pleasure we may therefore ascribe most of the
agreeable, to the love of action we may attribute most of the useful and
respectable, qualifications. The character in which both the one and the other
should be united and harmonized, would seem to constitute the most perfect idea
of human nature. The insensible and inactive disposition, which should be
supposed alike destitute of both, would be rejected, by the common consent of
mankind, as utterly incapable of procuring any happiness to the individual, or
any public benefit to the world. But it was not in this world, that the
primitive Christians were desirous of making themselves either agreeable or
useful[1574].

The acquisition of knowledge, the
exercise of our reason or fancy, and the cheerful flow of unguarded
conversation, may employ the leisure of a liberal mind. Such amusements,
however, were rejected with abhorrence, or admitted with the utmost caution, by
the severity of the fathers, who despised all knowledge that was not useful to
salvation, and who considered all levity of discourse as a criminal abuse of the
gift of speech. In our present state of existence the body is so inseparably
connected with the soul, that it seems to be our interest to taste, with
innocence and moderation, the enjoyments of which that faithful companion is
susceptible. Very different was the reasoning of our devout predecessors; vainly
aspiring to imitate the perfection of angels, they disdained, or they affected
to disdain, every earthly and corporeal delight[1575].
Some of our senses indeed are necessary for our preservation, others for our
subsistence, and others again for our information; and thus far it was
impossible to reject the use of them. The first sensation of pleasure was marked
as the first moment of their abuse. The unfeeling candidate for heaven was
instructed, not only to resist the grosser allurements of the taste or smell,
but even to shut his ears against the profane harmony of sounds, and to view
with indifference the most finished productions of human art. Gay apparel,
magnificent houses, and elegant furniture, were supposed to unite the double
guilt of pride and of sensuality; a simple and mortified appearance was more
suitable to the Christian who was certain of his sins and doubtful of his
salvation. In their censures of luxury, the fathers are extremely minute and
circumstantial[1576];
and among the various articles which excite their pious indignation, we may
enumerate false hair, garments of any color except white, instruments of music,
vases of gold or silver, downy pillows, (as Jacob reposed his head on a stone,)
white bread, foreign wines, public salutations, the use of warm baths, and the
practice of shaving the beard, which, according to the expression of Tertullian,
is a lie against our own faces, and an impious attempt to improve the works of
the Creator[1577].
When Christianity was introduced among the rich and the polite, the observation
of these singular laws was left, as it would be at present, to the few who were
ambitious of superior sanctity. But it is always easy, as well as agreeable, for
the inferior ranks of mankind to claim a merit from the contempt of that pomp
and pleasure which fortune has placed beyond their reach. The virtue of the
primitive Christians, like that of the first Romans, was very frequently guarded
by poverty and ignorance.

The chaste severity of the fathers,
in whatever related to the commerce of the two sexes, flowed from the same
principle; their abhorrence of every enjoyment which might gratify the sensual,
and degrade the spiritual, nature of man. It was their favorite opinion, that if
Adam had preserved his obedience to the Creator, he would have lived forever in
a state of virgin purity, and that some harmless mode of vegetation might have
peopled paradise with a race of innocent and immortal beings[1578].
The use of marriage was permitted only to his fallen posterity, as a necessary
expedient to continue the human species, and as a restraint, however imperfect,
on the natural licentiousness of desire. The hesitation of the orthodox casuists
on this interesting subject, betrays the perplexity of men, unwilling to approve
an institution which they were compelled to tolerate[1579].
The enumeration of the very whimsical laws, which they most circumstantially
imposed on the marriage-bed, would force a smile from the young and a blush from
the fair. It was their unanimous sentiment, that a first marriage was adequate
to all the purposes of nature and of society. The sensual connection was refined
into a resemblance of the mystic union of Christ with his church, and was
pronounced to be indissoluble either by divorce or by death. The practice of
second nuptials was branded with the name of a legal adultery; and the persons
who were guilty of so scandalous an offence against Christian purity, were soon
excluded from the honors, and even from the alms, of the church[1580].
Since desire was imputed as a crime, and marriage was tolerated as a defect, it
was consistent with the same principles to consider a state of celibacy as the
nearest approach to the divine perfection. It was with the utmost difficulty
that ancient Rome could support the institution of six vestals[1581];
but the primitive church was filled with a great number of persons of either
sex, who had devoted themselves to the profession of perpetual chastity[1582].
A few of these, among whom we may reckon the learned Origen, judged it the most
prudent to disarm the tempter[1583].
Some were insensible and some were invincible against the assaults of the flesh.
Disdaining an ignominious flight, the virgins of the warm climate of Africa
encountered the enemy in the closest engagement; they permitted priests and
deacons to share their bed, and gloried amidst the flames in their unsullied
purity. But insulted Nature sometimes vindicated her rights, and this new
species of martyrdom served only to introduce a new scandal into the church[1584].
Among the Christian ascetics, however, (a name which they soon acquired from
their painful exercise,) many, as they were less presumptuous, were probably
more successful. The loss of sensual pleasure was supplied and compensated by
spiritual pride. Even the multitude of Pagans were inclined to estimate the
merit of the sacrifice by its apparent difficulty; and it was in the praise of
these chaste spouses of Christ that the fathers have poured forth the troubled
stream of their eloquence[1585].
Such are the early traces of monastic principles and institutions, which, in a
subsequent age, have counterbalanced all the temporal advantages of
Christianity[1586].

The Christians were not less averse
to the business than to the pleasures of this world. The defence of our persons
and property they knew not how to reconcile with the patient doctrine which
enjoined an unlimited forgiveness of past injuries, and commanded them to invite
the repetition of fresh insults. Their simplicity was offended by the use of
oaths, by the pomp of magistracy, and by the active contention of public life;
nor could their humane ignorance be convinced that it was lawful on any occasion
to shed the blood of our fellow-creatures, either by the sword of justice, or by
that of war; even though their criminal or hostile attempts should threaten the
peace and safety of the whole community[1587].
It was acknowledged, that, under a less perfect law, the powers of the Jewish
constitution had been exercised, with the approbation of Heaven, by inspired
prophets and by anointed kings. The Christians felt and confessed that such
institutions might be necessary for the present system of the world, and they
cheerfully submitted to the authority of their Pagan governors. But while they
inculcated the maxims of passive obedience, they refused to take any active part
in the civil administration or the military defence of the empire. Some
indulgence might, perhaps, be allowed to those persons who, before their
conversion, were already engaged in such violent and sanguinary occupations[1588];
but it was impossible that the Christians, without renouncing a more sacred
duty, could assume the character of soldiers, of magistrates, or of princes[1589].
This indolent, or even criminal disregard to the public welfare, exposed them to
the contempt and reproaches of the Pagans who very frequently asked, what must
be the fate of the empire, attacked on every side by the barbarians, if all
mankind should adopt the pusillanimous sentiments of the new sect[1590].
To this insulting question the Christian apologists returned obscure and
ambiguous answers, as they were unwilling to reveal the secret cause of their
security; the expectation that, before the conversion of mankind was
accomplished, war, government, the Roman empire, and the world itself, would be
no more. It may be observed, that, in this instance likewise, the situation of
the first Christians coincided very happily with their religious scruples, and
that their aversion to an active life contributed rather to excuse them from the
service, than to exclude them from the honors, of the state and
army.

Chapter XV
Progress of
the Christian Religion
Part VI

V.
But
the human character, however it may be exalted or depressed by a temporary
enthusiasm, will return by degrees to its proper and natural level, and will
resume those passions that seem the most adapted to its present condition. The
primitive Christians were dead to the business and pleasures of the world; but
their love of action, which could never be entirely extinguished, soon revived,
and found a new occupation in the government of the church. A separate society,
which attacked the established religion of the empire, was obliged to adopt some
form of internal policy, and to appoint a sufficient number of ministers,
intrusted not only with the spiritual functions, but even with the temporal
direction of the Christian commonwealth. The safety of that society, its honor,
its aggrandizement, were productive, even in the most pious minds, of a spirit
of patriotism, such as the first of the Romans had felt for the republic, and
sometimes of a similar indifference, in the use of whatever means might probably
conduce to so desirable an end. The ambition of raising themselves or their
friends to the honors and offices of the church, was disguised by the laudable
intention of devoting to the public benefit the power and consideration, which,
for that purpose only, it became their duty to solicit. In the exercise of their
functions, they were frequently called upon to detect the errors of heresy or
the arts of faction, to oppose the designs of perfidious brethren, to stigmatize
their characters with deserved infamy, and to expel them from the bosom of a
society whose peace and happiness they had attempted to disturb. The
ecclesiastical governors of the Christians were taught to unite the wisdom of
the serpent with the innocence of the dove; but as the former was refined, so
the latter was insensibly corrupted, by the habits of government. If the church
as well as in the world, the persons who were placed in any public station
rendered themselves considerable by their eloquence and firmness, by their
knowledge of mankind, and by their dexterity in business; and while they
concealed from others, and perhaps from themselves, the secret motives of their
conduct, they too frequently relapsed into all the turbulent passions of active
life, which were tinctured with an additional degree of bitterness and obstinacy
from the infusion of spiritual zeal.

The
government of the church has often been the subject, as well as the prize, of
religious contention. The hostile disputants of Rome, of Paris, of Oxford, and
of Geneva, have alike struggled to reduce the primitive and apostolic model[1591]
to the respective standards of their own policy. The few who have pursued this
inquiry with more candor and impartiality, are of opinion[1592],
that the apostles declined the office of legislation, and rather chose to endure
some partial scandals and divisions, than to exclude the Christians of a future
age from the liberty of varying their forms of ecclesiastical government
according to the changes of times and circumstances. The scheme of policy,
which, under their approbation, was adopted for the use of the first century,
may be discovered from the practice of Jerusalem, of Ephesus, or of Corinth. The
societies which were instituted in the cities of the Roman empire, were united
only by the ties of faith and charity. Independence and equality formed the
basis of their internal constitution. The want of discipline and human learning
was supplied by the occasional assistance of the prophets[1593],
who were called to that function without distinction of age, of sex[1594],
or of natural abilities, and who, as often as they felt the divine impulse,
poured forth the effusions of the Spirit in the assembly of the faithful. But
these extraordinary gifts were frequently abused or misapplied by the prophetic
teachers. They displayed them at an improper season, presumptuously disturbed
the service of the assembly, and, by their pride or mistaken zeal, they
introduced, particularly into the apostolic church of Corinth, a long and
melancholy train of disorders[1595].
As the institution of prophets became useless, and even pernicious, their powers
were withdrawn, and their office abolished. The public functions of religion
were solely intrusted to the established ministers of the church, the bishops
and the presbyters; two appellations which, in their first origin, appear to
have distinguished the same office and the same order of persons. The name of
Presbyter was expressive of their age, or rather of their gravity and wisdom.
The title of Bishop denoted their inspection over the faith and manners of the
Christians who were committed to their pastoral care. In proportion to the
respective numbers of the faithful, a larger or smaller number of these
episcopal presbyters guided each infant congregation with equal authority and
with united counsels[1596].

But the
most perfect equality of freedom requires the directing hand of a superior
magistrate: and the order of public deliberations soon introduces the office of
a president, invested at least with the authority of collecting the sentiments,
and of executing the resolutions, of the assembly. A regard for the public
tranquillity, which would so frequently have been interrupted by annual or by
occasional elections, induced the primitive Christians to constitute an
honorable and perpetual magistracy, and to choose one of the wisest and most
holy among their presbyterians to execute, during his life, the duties of their
ecclesiastical governor. It was under these circumstances that the lofty title
of Bishop began to raise itself above the humble appellation of Presbyter; and
while the latter remained the most natural distinction for the members of every
Christian senate, the former was appropriated to the dignity of its new
president[1597].
The advantages of this episcopal form of government, which appears to have been
introduced before the end of the first century[1598],
were so obvious, and so important for the future greatness, as well as the
present peace, of Christianity, that it was adopted without delay by all the
societies which were already scattered over the empire, had acquired in a very
early period the sanction of antiquity[1599],
and is still revered by the most powerful churches, both of the East and of the
West, as a primitive and even as a divine establishment[1600].
It is needless to observe, that the pious and humble presbyters, who were first
dignified with the episcopal title, could not possess, and would probably have
rejected, the power and pomp which now encircles the tiara of the Roman pontiff,
or the mitre of a German prelate. But we may define, in a few words, the narrow
limits of their original jurisdiction, which was chiefly of a spiritual, though
in some instances of a temporal nature[1601].
It consisted in the administration of the sacraments and discipline of the
church, the superintendency of religious ceremonies, which imperceptibly
increased in number and variety, the consecration of ecclesiastical ministers,
to whom the bishop assigned their respective functions, the management of the
public fund, and the determination of all such differences as the faithful were
unwilling to expose before the tribunal of an idolatrous judge. These powers,
during a short period, were exercised according to the advice of the presbyteral
college, and with the consent and approbation of the assembly of Christians. The
primitive bishops were considered only as the first of their equals, and the
honorable servants of a free people. Whenever the episcopal chair became vacant
by death, a new president was chosen among the presbyters by the suffrages of
the whole congregation, every member of which supposed himself invested with a
sacred and sacerdotal character[1602].

Such was
the mild and equal constitution by which the Christians were governed more than
a hundred years after the death of the apostles. Every society formed within
itself a separate and independent republic; and although the most distant of
these little states maintained a mutual as well as friendly intercourse of
letters and deputations, the Christian world was not yet connected by any
supreme authority or legislative assembly. As the numbers of the faithful were
gradually multiplied, they discovered the advantages that might result from a
closer union of their interest and designs. Towards the end of the second
century, the churches of Greece and Asia adopted the useful institutions of
provincial synods[1603],
and they may justly be supposed to have borrowed the model of a representative
council from the celebrated examples of their own country, the Amphictyons, the
Achaean league, or the assemblies of the Ionian cities. It was soon established
as a custom and as a law, that the bishops of the independent churches should
meet in the capital of the province at the stated periods of spring and autumn.
Their deliberations were assisted by the advice of a few distinguished
presbyters, and moderated by the presence of a listening multitude[1604].
Their decrees, which were styled Canons, regulated every important controversy
of faith and discipline; and it was natural to believe that a liberal effusion
of the Holy Spirit would be poured on the united assembly of the delegates of
the Christian people. The institution of synods was so well suited to private
ambition, and to public interest, that in the space of a few years it was
received throughout the whole empire. A regular correspondence was established
between the provincial councils, which mutually communicated and approved their
respective proceedings; and the catholic church soon assumed the form, and
acquired the strength, of a great foederative republic[1605].

As the
legislative authority of the particular churches was insensibly superseded by
the use of councils, the bishops obtained by their alliance a much larger share
of executive and arbitrary power; and as soon as they were connected by a sense
of their common interest, they were enabled to attack with united vigor, the
original rights of their clergy and people. The prelates of the third century
imperceptibly changed the language of exhortation into that of command,
scattered the seeds of future usurpations, and supplied, by scripture allegories
and declamatory rhetoric, their deficiency of force and of reason. They exalted
the unity and power of the church, as it was represented in the Episcopal
Office, of which every bishop enjoyed an equal and undivided portion[1606].
Princes and magistrates, it was often repeated, might boast an earthly claim to
a transitory dominion; it was the episcopal authority alone which was derived
from the Deity, and extended itself over this and over another world. The
bishops were the vicegerents of Christ, the successors of the apostles, and the
mystic substitutes of the high priest of the Mosaic law. Their exclusive
privilege of conferring the sacerdotal character, invaded the freedom both of
clerical and of popular elections; and if, in the administration of the church,
they still consulted the judgment of the presbyters, or the inclination of the
people, they most carefully inculcated the merit of such a voluntary
condescension. The bishops acknowledged the supreme authority which resided in
the assembly of their brethren; but in the government of his peculiar diocese,
each of them exacted from his flock the same implicit obedience as if that
favorite metaphor had been literally just, and as if the shepherd had been of a
more exalted nature than that of his sheep[1607].
This obedience, however, was not imposed without some efforts on one side, and
some resistance on the other. The democratical part of the constitution was, in
many places, very warmly supported by the zealous or interested opposition of
the inferior clergy. But their patriotism received the ignominious epithets of
faction and schism; and the episcopal cause was indebted for its rapid progress
to the labors of many active prelates, who, like Cyprian of Carthage, could
reconcile the arts of the most ambitious statesman with the Christian virtues
which seem adapted to the character of a saint and martyr[1608].

The same
causes which at first had destroyed the equality of the presbyters introduced
among the bishops a preeminence of rank, and from thence a superiority of
jurisdiction. As often as in the spring and autumn they met in provincial synod,
the difference of personal merit and reputation was very sensibly felt among the
members of the assembly, and the multitude was governed by the wisdom and
eloquence of the few. But the order of public proceedings required a more
regular and less invidious distinction; the office of perpetual presidents in
the councils of each province was conferred on the bishops of the principal
city; and these aspiring prelates, who soon acquired the lofty titles of
Metropolitans and Primates, secretly prepared themselves to usurp over their
episcopal brethren the same authority which the bishops had so lately assumed
above the college of presbyters[1609].
Nor was it long before an emulation of preeminence and power prevailed among the
Metropolitans themselves, each of them affecting to display, in the most pompous
terms, the temporal honors and advantages of the city over which he presided;
the numbers and opulence of the Christians who were subject to their pastoral
care; the saints and martyrs who had arisen among them; and the purity with
which they preserved the tradition of the faith, as it had been transmitted
through a series of orthodox bishops from the apostle or the apostolic disciple,
to whom the foundation of their church was ascribed[1610].
From every cause, either of a civil or of an ecclesiastical nature, it was easy
to foresee that Rome must enjoy the respect, and would soon claim the obedience
of the provinces. The society of the faithful bore a just proportion to the
capital of the empire; and the Roman church was the greatest, the most numerous,
and, in regard to the West, the most ancient of all the Christian
establishments, many of which had received their religion from the pious labors
of her missionaries. Instead of one apostolic founder, the utmost boast of
Antioch, of Ephesus, or of Corinth, the banks of the Tyber were supposed to have
been honored with the preaching and martyrdom of the two most eminent among the
apostles[1611];
and the bishops of Rome very prudently claimed the inheritance of whatsoever
prerogatives were attributed either to the person or to the office of St.
Peter[1612].
The bishops of Italy and of the provinces were disposed to allow them a primacy
of order and association (such was their very accurate expression) in the
Christian aristocracy[1613].
But the power of a monarch was rejected with abhorrence, and the aspiring genius
of Rome experienced from the nations of Asia and Africa a more vigorous
resistance to her spiritual, than she had formerly done to her temporal,
dominion. The patriotic Cyprian, who ruled with the most absolute sway the
church of Carthage and the provincial synods, opposed with resolution and
success the ambition of the Roman pontiff, artfully connected his own cause with
that of the eastern bishops, and, like Hannibal, sought out new allies in the
heart of Asia[1614].
If this Punic war was carried on without any effusion of blood, it was owing
much less to the moderation than to the weakness of the contending prelates.
Invectives and excommunications were their only weapons; and these, during the
progress of the whole controversy, they hurled against each other with equal
fury and devotion. The hard necessity of censuring either a pope, or a saint and
martyr, distresses the modern Catholics whenever they are obliged to relate the
particulars of a dispute in which the champions of religion indulged such
passions as seem much more adapted to the senate or to the camp[1615].

The
progress of the ecclesiastical authority gave birth to the memorable distinction
of the laity and of the clergy, which had been unknown to the Greeks and
Romans[1616].
The former of these appellations comprehended the body of the Christian people;
the latter, according to the signification of the word, was appropriated to the
chosen portion that had been set apart for the service of religion; a celebrated
order of men, which has furnished the most important, though not always the most
edifying, subjects for modern history. Their mutual hostilities sometimes
disturbed the peace of the infant church, but their zeal and activity were
united in the common cause, and the love of power, which (under the most artful
disguises) could insinuate itself into the breasts of bishops and martyrs,
animated them to increase the number of their subjects, and to enlarge the
limits of the Christian empire. They were destitute of any temporal force, and
they were for a long time discouraged and oppressed, rather than assisted, by
the civil magistrate; but they had acquired, and they employed within their own
society, the two most efficacious instruments of government, rewards and
punishments; the former derived from the pious liberality, the latter from the
devout apprehensions, of the faithful.

Chapter XV
Progress of
the Christian Religion
Part VII

I.
The
community of goods, which had so agreeably amused the imagination of Plato[1617],
and which subsisted in some degree among the austere sect of the Essenians[1618],
was adopted for a short time in the primitive church. The fervor of the first
proselytes prompted them to sell those worldly possessions, which they despised,
to lay the price of them at the feet of the apostles, and to content themselves
with receiving an equal share out of the general distribution[1619].
The progress of the Christian religion relaxed, and gradually abolished, this
generous institution, which, in hands less pure than those of the apostles,
would too soon have been corrupted and abused by the returning selfishness of
human nature; and the converts who embraced the new religion were permitted to
retain the possession of their patrimony, to receive legacies and inheritances,
and to increase their separate property by all the lawful means of trade and
industry. Instead of an absolute sacrifice, a moderate proportion was accepted
by the ministers of the gospel; and in their weekly or monthly assemblies, every
believer, according to the exigency of the occasion, and the measure of his
wealth and piety, presented his voluntary offering for the use of the common
fund[1620].
Nothing, however inconsiderable, was refused; but it was diligently inculcated;
that, in the article of Tithes, the Mosaic law was still of divine obligation;
and that since the Jews, under a less perfect discipline, had been commanded to
pay a tenth part of all that they possessed, it would become the disciples of
Christ to distinguish themselves by a superior degree of liberality[1621],
and to acquire some merit by resigning a superfluous treasure, which must so
soon be annihilated with the world itself[1622].
It is almost unnecessary to observe, that the revenue of each particular church,
which was of so uncertain and fluctuating a nature, must have varied with the
poverty or the opulence of the faithful, as they were dispersed in obscure
villages, or collected in the great cities of the empire. In the time of the
emperor Decius, it was the opinion of the magistrates, that the Christians of
Rome were possessed of very considerable wealth; that vessels of gold and silver
were used in their religious worship, and that many among their proselytes had
sold their lands and houses to increase the public riches of the sect, at the
expense, indeed, of their unfortunate children, who found themselves beggars,
because their parents had been saints[1623].
We should listen with distrust to the suspicions of strangers and enemies: on
this occasion, however, they receive a very specious and probable color from the
two following circumstances, the only ones that have reached our knowledge,
which define any precise sums, or convey any distinct idea. Almost at the same
period, the bishop of Carthage, from a society less opulent than that of Rome,
collected a hundred thousand sesterces, (above eight hundred and fifty pounds
sterling,) on a sudden call of charity to redeem the brethren of Numidia, who
had been carried away captives by the barbarians of the desert[1624].
About a hundred years before the reign of Decius, the Roman church had received,
in a single donation, the sum of two hundred thousand sesterces from a stranger
of Pontus, who proposed to fix his residence in the capital[1625].
These oblations, for the most part, were made in money; nor was the society of
Christians either desirous or capable of acquiring, to any considerable degree,
the encumbrance of landed property. It had been provided by several laws, which
were enacted with the same design as our statutes of mortmain, that no real
estates should be given or bequeathed to any corporate body, without either a
special privilege or a particular dispensation from the emperor or from the
senate[1626];
who were seldom disposed to grant them in favor of a sect, at first the object
of their contempt, and at last of their fears and jealousy. A transaction,
however, is related under the reign of Alexander Severus, which discovers that
the restraint was sometimes eluded or suspended, and that the Christians were
permitted to claim and to possess lands within the limits of Rome itself[1627].
The progress of Christianity, and the civil confusion of the empire, contributed
to relax the severity of the laws; and before the close of the third century
many considerable estates were bestowed on the opulent churches of Rome, Milan,
Carthage, Antioch, Alexandria, and the other great cities of Italy and the
provinces[1628].

The bishop was the natural steward
of the church; the public stock was intrusted to his care without account or
control; the presbyters were confined to their spiritual functions, and the more
dependent order of the deacons was solely employed in the management and
distribution of the ecclesiastical revenue[1629].
If we may give credit to the vehement declamations of Cyprian, there were too
many among his African brethren, who, in the execution of their charge, violated
every precept, not only of evangelical perfection, but even of moral virtue. By
some of these unfaithful stewards the riches of the church were lavished in
sensual pleasures; by others they were perverted to the purposes of private
gain, of fraudulent purchases, and of rapacious usury[1630].
But as long as the contributions of the Christian people were free and
unconstrained, the abuse of their confidence could not be very frequent, and the
general uses to which their liberality was applied reflected honor on the
religious society. A decent portion was reserved for the maintenance of the
bishop and his clergy; a sufficient sum was allotted for the expenses of the
public worship, of which the feasts of love, the agapoe, as they were called,
constituted a very pleasing part. The whole remainder was the sacred patrimony
of the poor. According to the discretion of the bishop, it was distributed to
support widows and orphans, the lame, the sick, and the aged of the community;
to comfort strangers and pilgrims, and to alleviate the misfortunes of prisoners
and captives, more especially when their sufferings had been occasioned by their
firm attachment to the cause of religion[1631].
A generous intercourse of charity united the most distant provinces, and the
smaller congregations were cheerfully assisted by the alms of their more opulent
brethren[1632].
Such an institution, which paid less regard to the merit than to the distress of
the object, very materially conduced to the progress of Christianity. The
Pagans, who were actuated by a sense of humanity, while they derided the
doctrines, acknowledged the benevolence, of the new sect[1633].
The prospect of immediate relief and of future protection allured into its
hospitable bosom many of those unhappy persons whom the neglect of the world
would have abandoned to the miseries of want, of sickness, and of old age. There
is some reason likewise to believe that great numbers of infants, who, according
to the inhuman practice of the times, had been exposed by their parents, were
frequently rescued from death, baptized, educated, and maintained by the piety
of the Christians, and at the expense of the public treasure[1634].

II.
It is
the undoubted right of every society to exclude from its communion and benefits
such among its members as reject or violate those regulations which have been
established by general consent. In the exercise of this power, the censures of
the Christian church were chiefly directed against scandalous sinners, and
particularly those who were guilty of murder, of fraud, or of incontinence;
against the authors or the followers of any heretical opinions which had been
condemned by the judgment of the episcopal order; and against those unhappy
persons, who, whether from choice or compulsion, had polluted themselves after
their baptism by any act of idolatrous worship. The consequences of
excommunication were of a temporal as well as a spiritual nature. The Christian
against whom it was pronounced, was deprived of any part in the oblations of the
faithful. The ties both of religious and of private friendship were dissolved:
he found himself a profane object of abhorrence to the persons whom he the most
esteemed, or by whom he had been the most tenderly beloved; and as far as an
expulsion from a respectable society could imprint on his character a mark of
disgrace, he was shunned or suspected by the generality of mankind. The
situation of these unfortunate exiles was in itself very painful and melancholy;
but, as it usually happens, their apprehensions far exceeded their sufferings.
The benefits of the Christian communion were those of eternal life; nor could
they erase from their minds the awful opinion, that to those ecclesiastical
governors by whom they were condemned, the Deity had committed the keys of Hell
and of Paradise. The heretics, indeed, who might be supported by the
consciousness of their intentions, and by the flattering hope that they alone
had discovered the true path of salvation, endeavored to regain, in their
separate assemblies, those comforts, temporal as well as spiritual, which they
no longer derived from the great society of Christians. But almost all those who
had reluctantly yielded to the power of vice or idolatry were sensible of their
fallen condition, and anxiously desirous of being restored to the benefits of
the Christian communion.

With regard to the treatment of
these penitents, two opposite opinions, the one of justice, the other of mercy,
divided the primitive church. The more rigid and inflexible casuists refused
them forever, and without exception, the meanest place in the holy community,
which they had disgraced or deserted; and leaving them to the remorse of a
guilty conscience, indulged them only with a faint ray of hope that the
contrition of their life and death might possibly be accepted by the Supreme
Being[1635].
A milder sentiment was embraced in practice as well as in theory, by the purest
and most respectable of the Christian churches[1636].
The gates of reconciliation and of heaven were seldom shut against the returning
penitent; but a severe and solemn form of discipline was instituted, which,
while it served to expiate his crime, might powerfully deter the spectators from
the imitation of his example. Humbled by a public confession, emaciated by
fasting and clothed in sackcloth, the penitent lay prostrate at the door of the
assembly, imploring with tears the pardon of his offences, and soliciting the
prayers of the faithful[1637].
If the fault was of a very heinous nature, whole years of penance were esteemed
an inadequate satisfaction to the divine justice; and it was always by slow and
painful gradations that the sinner, the heretic, or the apostate, was readmitted
into the bosom of the church. A sentence of perpetual excommunication was,
however, reserved for some crimes of an extraordinary magnitude, and
particularly for the inexcusable relapses of those penitents who had already
experienced and abused the clemency of their ecclesiastical superiors. According
to the circumstances or the number of the guilty, the exercise of the Christian
discipline was varied by the discretion of the bishops. The councils of Ancyra
and Illiberis were held about the same time, the one in Galatia, the other in
Spain; but their respective canons, which are still extant, seem to breathe a
very different spirit. The Galatian, who after his baptism had repeatedly
sacrificed to idols, might obtain his pardon by a penance of seven years; and if
he had seduced others to imitate his example, only three years more were added
to the term of his exile. But the unhappy Spaniard, who had committed the same
offence, was deprived of the hope of reconciliation, even in the article of
death; and his idolatry was placed at the head of a list of seventeen other
crimes, against which a sentence no less terrible was pronounced. Among these we
may distinguish the inexpiable guilt of calumniating a bishop, a presbyter, or
even a deacon[1638].

The well-tempered mixture of
liberality and rigor, the judicious dispensation of rewards and punishments,
according to the maxims of policy as well as justice, constituted the human
strength of the church. The Bishops, whose paternal care extended itself to the
government of both worlds, were sensible of the importance of these
prerogatives; and covering their ambition with the fair pretence of the love of
order, they were jealous of any rival in the exercise of a discipline so
necessary to prevent the desertion of those troops which had enlisted themselves
under the banner of the cross, and whose numbers every day became more
considerable. From the imperious declamations of Cyprian, we should naturally
conclude that the doctrines of excommunication and penance formed the most
essential part of religion; and that it was much less dangerous for the
disciples of Christ to neglect the observance of the moral duties, than to
despise the censures and authority of their bishops. Sometimes we might imagine
that we were listening to the voice of Moses, when he commanded the earth to
open, and to swallow up, in consuming flames, the rebellious race which refused
obedience to the priesthood of Aaron; and we should sometimes suppose that we
hear a Roman consul asserting the majesty of the republic, and declaring his
inflexible resolution to enforce the rigor of the laws[1639].
“If such irregularities are suffered with impunity," (it is thus that the bishop
of Carthage chides the lenity of his colleague,) "if such irregularities are
suffered, there is an end of Episcopal Vigor[1640];
an end of the sublime and divine power of governing the Church, an end of
Christianity itself." Cyprian had renounced those temporal honors, which it is
probable he would never have obtained[1641];
but the acquisition of such absolute command over the consciences and
understanding of a congregation, however obscure or despised by the world, is
more truly grateful to the pride of the human heart, than the possession of the
most despotic power, imposed by arms and conquest on a reluctant people.

In the
course of this important, though perhaps tedious inquiry, I have attempted to
display the secondary causes which so efficaciously assisted the truth of the
Christian religion. If among these causes we have discovered any artificial
ornaments, any accidental circumstances, or any mixture of error and passion, it
cannot appear surprising that mankind should be the most sensibly affected by
such motives as were suited to their imperfect nature. It was by the aid of
these causes, exclusive zeal, the immediate expectation of another world, the
claim of miracles, the practice of rigid virtue, and the constitution of the
primitive church, that Christianity spread itself with so much success in the
Roman empire. To the first of these the Christians were indebted for their
invincible valor, which disdained to capitulate with the enemy whom they were
resolved to vanquish. The three succeeding causes supplied their valor with the
most formidable arms. The last of these causes united their courage, directed
their arms, and gave their efforts that irresistible weight, which even a small
band of well-trained and intrepid volunteers has so often possessed over an
undisciplined multitude, ignorant of the subject, and careless of the event of
the war. In the various religions of Polytheism, some wandering fanatics of
Egypt and Syria, who addressed themselves to the credulous superstition of the
populace, were perhaps the only order of priests[1642]
that derived their whole support and credit from their sacerdotal profession,
and were very deeply affected by a personal concern for the safety or prosperity
of their tutelar deities. The ministers of Polytheism, both in Rome and in the
provinces, were, for the most part, men of a noble birth, and of an affluent
fortune, who received, as an honorable distinction, the care of a celebrated
temple, or of a public sacrifice, exhibited, very frequently at their own
expense, the sacred games[1643],
and with cold indifference performed the ancient rites, according to the laws
and fashion of their country. As they were engaged in the ordinary occupations
of life, their zeal and devotion were seldom animated by a sense of interest, or
by the habits of an ecclesiastical character. Confined to their respective
temples and cities, they remained without any connection of discipline or
government; and whilst they acknowledged the supreme jurisdiction of the senate,
of the college of pontiffs, and of the emperor, those civil magistrates
contented themselves with the easy task of maintaining in peace and dignity the
general worship of mankind. We have already seen how various, how loose, and how
uncertain were the religious sentiments of Polytheists. They were abandoned,
almost without control, to the natural workings of a superstitious fancy. The
accidental circumstances of their life and situation determined the object as
well as the degree of their devotion; and as long as their adoration was
successively prostituted to a thousand deities, it was scarcely possible that
their hearts could be susceptible of a very sincere or lively passion for any of
them.

When
Christianity appeared in the world, even these faint and imperfect impressions
had lost much of their original power. Human reason, which by its unassisted
strength is incapable of perceiving the mysteries of faith, had already obtained
an easy triumph over the folly of Paganism; and when Tertullian or Lactantius
employ their labors in exposing its falsehood and extravagance, they are obliged
to transcribe the eloquence of Cicero or the wit of Lucian. The contagion of
these sceptical writings had been diffused far beyond the number of their
readers. The fashion of incredulity was communicated from the philosopher to the
man of pleasure or business, from the noble to the plebeian, and from the master
to the menial slave who waited at his table, and who eagerly listened to the
freedom of his conversation. On public occasions the philosophic part of mankind
affected to treat with respect and decency the religious institutions of their
country; but their secret contempt penetrated through the thin and awkward
disguise; and even the people, when they discovered that their deities were
rejected and derided by those whose rank or understanding they were accustomed
to reverence, were filled with doubts and apprehensions concerning the truth of
those doctrines, to which they had yielded the most implicit belief. The decline
of ancient prejudice exposed a very numerous portion of human kind to the danger
of a painful and comfortless situation. A state of scepticism and suspense may
amuse a few inquisitive minds. But the practice of superstition is so congenial
to the multitude, that if they are forcibly awakened, they still regret the loss
of their pleasing vision. Their love of the marvellous and supernatural, their
curiosity with regard to future events, and their strong propensity to extend
their hopes and fears beyond the limits of the visible world, were the principal
causes which favored the establishment of Polytheism. So urgent on the vulgar is
the necessity of believing, that the fall of any system of mythology will most
probably be succeeded by the introduction of some other mode of superstition.
Some deities of a more recent and fashionable cast might soon have occupied the
deserted temples of Jupiter and Apollo, if, in the decisive moment, the wisdom
of Providence had not interposed a genuine revelation, fitted to inspire the
most rational esteem and conviction, whilst, at the same time, it was adorned
with all that could attract the curiosity, the wonder, and the veneration of the
people. In their actual disposition, as many were almost disengaged from their
artificial prejudices, but equally susceptible and desirous of a devout
attachment; an object much less deserving would have been sufficient to fill the
vacant place in their hearts, and to gratify the uncertain eagerness of their
passions. Those who are inclined to pursue this reflection, instead of viewing
with astonishment the rapid progress of Christianity, will perhaps be surprised
that its success was not still more rapid and still more universal. It has been
observed, with truth as well as propriety, that the conquests of Rome prepared
and facilitated those of Christianity. In the second chapter of this work we
have attempted to explain in what manner the most civilized provinces of Europe,
Asia, and Africa were united under the dominion of one sovereign, and gradually
connected by the most intimate ties of laws, of manners, and of language. The
Jews of Palestine, who had fondly expected a temporal deliverer, gave so cold a
reception to the miracles of the divine prophet, that it was found unnecessary
to publish, or at least to preserve, any Hebrew gospel[1644].
The authentic histories of the actions of Christ were composed in the Greek
language, at a considerable distance from Jerusalem, and after the Gentile
converts were grown extremely numerous[1645].
As soon as those histories were translated into the Latin tongue, they were
perfectly intelligible to all the subjects of Rome, excepting only to the
peasants of Syria and Egypt, for whose benefit particular versions were
afterwards made. The public highways, which had been constructed for the use of
the legions, opened an easy passage for the Christian missionaries from Damascus
to Corinth, and from Italy to the extremity of Spain or Britain; nor did those
spiritual conquerors encounter any of the obstacles which usually retard or
prevent the introduction of a foreign religion into a distant country. There is
the strongest reason to believe, that before the reigns of Diocletian and
Constantine, the faith of Christ had been preached in every province, and in all
the great cities of the empire; but the foundation of the several congregations,
the numbers of the faithful who composed them, and their proportion to the
unbelieving multitude, are now buried in obscurity, or disguised by fiction and
declamation. Such imperfect circumstances, however, as have reached our
knowledge concerning the increase of the Christian name in Asia and Greece, in
Egypt, in Italy, and in the West, we shall now proceed to relate, without
neglecting the real or imaginary acquisitions which lay beyond the frontiers of
the Roman empire.

Chapter XV
Progress of
the Christian Religion
Part VIII

The rich
provinces that extend from the Euphrates to the Ionian Sea, were the principal
theatre on which the apostle of the Gentiles displayed his zeal and piety. The
seeds of the gospel, which he had scattered in a fertile soil, were diligently
cultivated by his disciples; and it should seem that, during the two first
centuries, the most considerable body of Christians was contained within those
limits. Among the societies which were instituted in Syria, none were more
ancient or more illustrious than those of Damascus, of Berea or Aleppo, and of
Antioch. The prophetic introduction of the Apocalypse has described and
immortalized the seven churches of Asia; Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamus, Thyatira[1646],
Sardes, Laodicea and Philadelphia; and their colonies were soon diffused over
that populous country. In a very early period, the islands of Cyprus and Crete,
the provinces of Thrace and Macedonia, gave a favorable reception to the new
religion; and Christian republics were soon founded in the cities of Corinth, of
Sparta, and of Athens[1647].
The antiquity of the Greek and Asiatic churches allowed a sufficient space of
time for their increase and multiplication; and even the swarms of Gnostics and
other heretics serve to display the flourishing condition of the orthodox
church, since the appellation of heretics has always been applied to the less
numerous party. To these domestic testimonies we may add the confession, the
complaints, and the apprehensions of the Gentiles themselves. From the writings
of Lucian, a philosopher who had studied mankind, and who describes their
manners in the most lively colors, we may learn that, under the reign of
Commodus, his native country of Pontus was filled with Epicureans and
Christians[1648].
Within fourscore years after the death of Christ[1649],
the humane Pliny laments the magnitude of the evil which he vainly attempted to
eradicate. In his very curious epistle to the emperor Trajan, he affirms, that
the temples were almost deserted, that the sacred victims scarcely found any
purchasers, and that the superstition had not only infected the cities, but had
even spread itself into the villages and the open country of Pontus and
Bithynia[1650].

Without
descending into a minute scrutiny of the expressions or of the motives of those
writers who either celebrate or lament the progress of Christianity in the East,
it may in general be observed, that none of them have left us any grounds from
whence a just estimate might be formed of the real numbers of the faithful in
those provinces. One circumstance, however, has been fortunately preserved,
which seems to cast a more distinct light on this obscure but interesting
subject. Under the reign of Theodosius, after Christianity had enjoyed, during
more than sixty years, the sunshine of Imperial favor, the ancient and
illustrious church of Antioch consisted of one hundred thousand persons, three
thousand of whom were supported out of the public oblations[1651].
The splendor and dignity of the queen of the East, the acknowledged populousness
of Caesarea, Seleucia, and Alexandria, and the destruction of two hundred and
fifty thousand souls in the earthquake which afflicted Antioch under the elder
Justin[1652],
are so many convincing proofs that the whole number of its inhabitants was not
less than half a million, and that the Christians, however multiplied by zeal
and power, did not exceed a fifth part of that great city. How different a
proportion must we adopt when we compare the persecuted with the triumphant
church, the West with the East, remote villages with populous towns, and
countries recently converted to the faith with the place where the believers
first received the appellation of Christians! It must not, however, be
dissembled, that, in another passage, Chrysostom, to whom we are indebted for
this useful information, computes the multitude of the faithful as even superior
to that of the Jews and Pagans[1653].
But the solution of this apparent difficulty is easy and obvious. The eloquent
preacher draws a parallel between the civil and the ecclesiastical constitution
of Antioch; between the list of Christians who had acquired heaven by baptism,
and the list of citizens who had a right to share the public liberality. Slaves,
strangers, and infants were comprised in the former; they were excluded from the
latter.

The
extensive commerce of Alexandria, and its proximity to Palestine, gave an easy
entrance to the new religion. It was at first embraced by great numbers of the
Theraputae, or Essenians, of the Lake Mareotis, a Jewish sect which had abated
much of its reverence for the Mosaic ceremonies. The austere life of the
Essenians, their fasts and excommunications, the community of goods, the love of
celibacy, their zeal for martyrdom, and the warmth though not the purity of
their faith, already offered a very lively image of the primitive discipline[1654].
It was in the school of Alexandria that the Christian theology appears to have
assumed a regular and scientific form; and when Hadrian visited Egypt, he found
a church composed of Jews and of Greeks, sufficiently important to attract the
notice of that inquisitive prince[1655].
But the progress of Christianity was for a long time confined within the limits
of a single city, which was itself a foreign colony, and till the close of the
second century the predecessors of Demetrius were the only prelates of the
Egyptian church. Three bishops were consecrated by the hands of Demetrius, and
the number was increased to twenty by his successor Heraclas[1656].
The body of the natives, a people distinguished by a sullen inflexibility of
temper[1657],
entertained the new doctrine with coldness and reluctance; and even in the time
of Origen, it was rare to meet with an Egyptian who had surmounted his early
prejudices in favor of the sacred animals of his country[1658].
As soon, indeed, as Christianity ascended the throne, the zeal of those
barbarians obeyed the prevailing impulsion; the cities of Egypt were filled with
bishops, and the deserts of Thebais swarmed with hermits.

A
perpetual stream of strangers and provincials flowed into the capacious bosom of
Rome. Whatever was strange or odious, whoever was guilty or suspected, might
hope, in the obscurity of that immense capital, to elude the vigilance of the
law. In such a various conflux of nations, every teacher, either of truth or
falsehood, every founder, whether of a virtuous or a criminal association, might
easily multiply his disciples or accomplices. The Christians of Rome, at the
time of the accidental persecution of Nero, are represented by Tacitus as
already amounting to a very great multitude[1659],
and the language of that great historian is almost similar to the style employed
by Livy, when he relates the introduction and the suppression of the rites of
Bacchus. After the Bacchanals had awakened the severity of the senate, it was
likewise apprehended that a very great multitude, as it were another people, had
been initiated into those abhorred mysteries. A more careful inquiry soon
demonstrated, that the offenders did not exceed seven thousand; a number indeed
sufficiently alarming, when considered as the object of public justice[1660].
It is with the same candid allowance that we should interpret the vague
expressions of Tacitus, and in a former instance of Pliny, when they exaggerate
the crowds of deluded fanatics who had forsaken the established worship of the
gods. The church of Rome was undoubtedly the first and most populous of the
empire; and we are possessed of an authentic record which attests the state of
religion in that city about the middle of the third century, and after a peace
of thirty-eight years. The clergy, at that time, consisted of a bishop,
forty-six presbyters, seven deacons, as many sub-deacons, forty-two acolythes,
and fifty readers, exorcists, and porters. The number of widows, of the infirm,
and of the poor, who were maintained by the oblations of the faithful, amounted
to fifteen hundred[1661].
From reason, as well as from the analogy of Antioch, we may venture to estimate
the Christians of Rome at about fifty thousand. The populousness of that great
capital cannot perhaps be exactly ascertained; but the most modest calculation
will not surely reduce it lower than a million of inhabitants, of whom the
Christians might constitute at the most a twentieth part[1662].

The
western provincials appeared to have derived the knowledge of Christianity from
the same source which had diffused among them the language, the sentiments, and
the manners of Rome. In this more important circumstance, Africa, as well as
Gaul, was gradually fashioned to the imitation of the capital. Yet
notwithstanding the many favorable occasions which might invite the Roman
missionaries to visit their Latin provinces, it was late before they passed
either the sea or the Alps[1663];
nor can we discover in those great countries any assured traces either of faith
or of persecution that ascend higher than the reign of the Antonines[1664].
The slow progress of the gospel in the cold climate of Gaul, was extremely
different from the eagerness with which it seems to have been received on the
burning sands of Africa. The African Christians soon formed one of the principal
members of the primitive church. The practice introduced into that province of
appointing bishops to the most inconsiderable towns, and very frequently to the
most obscure villages, contributed to multiply the splendor and importance of
their religious societies, which during the course of the third century were
animated by the zeal of Tertullian, directed by the abilities of Cyprian, and
adorned by the eloquence of Lactantius. But if, on the contrary, we turn our
eyes towards Gaul, we must content ourselves with discovering, in the time of
Marcus Antoninus, the feeble and united congregations of Lyons and Vienna; and
even as late as the reign of Decius, we are assured, that in a few cities only,
Arles, Narbonne, Thoulouse, Limoges, Clermont, Tours, and Paris, some scattered
churches were supported by the devotion of a small number of Christians[1665].
Silence is indeed very consistent with devotion; but as it is seldom compatible
with zeal, we may perceive and lament the languid state of Christianity in those
provinces which had exchanged the Celtic for the Latin tongue, since they did
not, during the three first centuries, give birth to a single ecclesiastical
writer. From Gaul, which claimed a just preeminence of learning and authority
over all the countries on this side of the Alps, the light of the gospel was
more faintly reflected on the remote provinces of Spain and Britain; and if we
may credit the vehement assertions of Tertullian, they had already received the
first rays of the faith, when he addressed his apology to the magistrates of the
emperor Severus[1666].
But the obscure and imperfect origin of the western churches of Europe has been
so negligently recorded, that if we would relate the time and manner of their
foundation, we must supply the silence of antiquity by those legends which
avarice or superstition long afterwards dictated to the monks in the lazy gloom
of their convents[1667].
Of these holy romances, that of the apostle St. James can alone, by its singular
extravagance, deserve to be mentioned. From a peaceful fisherman of the Lake of
Gennesareth, he was transformed into a valorous knight, who charged at the head
of the Spanish chivalry in their battles against the Moors. The gravest
historians have celebrated his exploits; the miraculous shrine of Compostella
displayed his power; and the sword of a military order, assisted by the terrors
of the Inquisition, was sufficient to remove every objection of profane
criticism[1668].

The
progress of Christianity was not confined to the Roman empire; and according to
the primitive fathers, who interpret facts by prophecy, the new religion, within
a century after the death of its divine Author, had already visited every part
of the globe. "There exists not," says Justin Martyr, "a people, whether Greek
or Barbarian, or any other race of men, by whatsoever appellation or manners
they may be distinguished, however ignorant of arts or agriculture, whether they
dwell under tents, or wander about in covered wagons, among whom prayers are not
offered up in the name of a crucified Jesus to the Father and Creator of all
things[1669]."
But this splendid exaggeration, which even at present it would be extremely
difficult to reconcile with the real state of mankind, can be considered only as
the rash sally of a devout but careless writer, the measure of whose belief was
regulated by that of his wishes. But neither the belief nor the wishes of the
fathers can alter the truth of history. It will still remain an undoubted fact,
that the barbarians of Scythia and Germany, who afterwards subverted the Roman
monarchy, were involved in the darkness of paganism; and that even the
conversion of Iberia, of Armenia, or of Aethiopia, was not attempted with any
degree of success till the sceptre was in the hands of an orthodox emperor[1670].
Before that time, the various accidents of war and commerce might indeed diffuse
an imperfect knowledge of the gospel among the tribes of Caledonia[1671],
and among the borderers of the Rhine, the Danube, and the Euphrates[1672].
Beyond the last-mentioned river, Edessa was distinguished by a firm and early
adherence to the faith[1673].
From Edessa the principles of Christianity were easily introduced into the Greek
and Syrian cities which obeyed the successors of Artaxerxes; but they do not
appear to have made any deep impression on the minds of the Persians, whose
religious system, by the labors of a well disciplined order of priests, had been
constructed with much more art and solidity than the uncertain mythology of
Greece and Rome[1674].

Chapter XV
Progress of
the Christian Religion
Part IX

From this
impartial though imperfect survey of the progress of Christianity, it may
perhaps seem probable, that the number of its proselytes has been excessively
magnified by fear on the one side, and by devotion on the other. According to
the irreproachable testimony of Origen[1675],
the proportion of the faithful was very inconsiderable, when compared with the
multitude of an unbelieving world; but, as we are left without any distinct
information, it is impossible to determine, and it is difficult even to
conjecture, the real numbers of the primitive Christians. The most favorable
calculation, however, that can be deduced from the examples of Antioch and of
Rome, will not permit us to imagine that more than a themselves under the banner
of the cross before the important conversion of Constantine. But their habits of
faith, of zeal, and of union, seemed to multiply their numbers; and the same
causes which contributed to their future increase, served to render their actual
strength more apparent and more formidable.

Such is
the constitution of civil society, that whilst a few persons are distinguished
by riches, by honors, and by knowledge, the body of the people is condemned to
obscurity, ignorance and poverty. The Christian religion, which addressed itself
to the whole human race, must consequently collect a far greater number of
proselytes from the lower than from the superior ranks of life. This innocent
and natural circumstance has been improved into a very odious imputation, which
seems to be less strenuously denied by the apologists, than it is urged by the
adversaries, of the faith; that the new sect of Christians was almost entirely
composed of the dregs of the populace, of peasants and mechanics, of boys and
women, of beggars and slaves, the last of whom might sometimes introduce the
missionaries into the rich and noble families to which they belonged. These
obscure teachers (such was the charge of malice and infidelity) are as mute in
public as they are loquacious and dogmatical in private. Whilst they cautiously
avoid the dangerous encounter of philosophers, they mingle with the rude and
illiterate crowd, and insinuate themselves into those minds, whom their age,
their sex, or their education, has the best disposed to receive the impression
of superstitious terrors[1676].

This
unfavorable picture, though not devoid of a faint resemblance, betrays, by its
dark coloring and distorted features, the pencil of an enemy. As the humble
faith of Christ diffused itself through the world, it was embraced by several
persons who derived some consequence from the advantages of nature or fortune.
Aristides, who presented an eloquent apology to the emperor Hadrian, was an
Athenian philosopher[1677].
Justin Martyr had sought divine knowledge in the schools of Zeno, of Aristotle,
of Pythagoras, and of Plato, before he fortunately was accosted by the old man,
or rather the angel, who turned his attention to the study of the Jewish
prophets[1678].
Clemens of Alexandria had acquired much various reading in the Greek, and
Tertullian in the Latin, language. Julius Africanus and Origen possessed a very
considerable share of the learning of their times; and although the style of
Cyprian is very different from that of Lactantius, we might almost discover that
both those writers had been public teachers of rhetoric. Even the study of
philosophy was at length introduced among the Christians, but it was not always
productive of the most salutary effects; knowledge was as often the parent of
heresy as of devotion, and the description which was designed for the followers
of Artemon, may, with equal propriety, be applied to the various sects that
resisted the successors of the apostles. "They presume to alter the Holy
Scriptures, to abandon the ancient rule of faith, and to form their opinions
according to the subtle precepts of logic. The science of the church is
neglected for the study of geometry, and they lose sight of heaven while they
are employed in measuring the earth. Euclid is perpetually in their hands.
Aristotle and Theophrastus are the objects of their admiration; and they express
an uncommon reverence for the works of Galen. Their errors are derived from the
abuse of the arts and sciences of the infidels, and they corrupt the simplicity
of the gospel by the refinements of human reason[1679]."

Nor can it
be affirmed with truth, that the advantages of birth and fortune were always
separated from the profession of Christianity. Several Roman citizens were
brought before the tribunal of Pliny, and he soon discovered, that a great
number of persons of every order of men in Bithynia had deserted the religion of
their ancestors[1680].
His unsuspected testimony may, in this instance, obtain more credit than the
bold challenge of Tertullian, when he addresses himself to the fears as well as
the humanity of the proconsul of Africa, by assuring him, that if he persists in
his cruel intentions, he must decimate Carthage, and that he will find among the
guilty many persons of his own rank, senators and matrons of nobles' extraction,
and the friends or relations of his most intimate friends[1681].
It appears, however, that about forty years afterwards the emperor Valerian was
persuaded of the truth of this assertion, since in one of his rescripts he
evidently supposes, that senators, Roman knights, and ladies of quality, were
engaged in the Christian sect[1682].
The church still continued to increase its outward splendor as it lost its
internal purity; and, in the reign of Diocletian, the palace, the courts of
justice, and even the army, concealed a multitude of Christians, who endeavored
to reconcile the interests of the present with those of a future
life.

And yet
these exceptions are either too few in number, or too recent in time, entirely
to remove the imputation of ignorance and obscurity which has been so arrogantly
cast on the first proselytes of Christianity[1683].
Instead of employing in our defence the fictions of later ages, it will be more
prudent to convert the occasion of scandal into a subject of edification. Our
serious thoughts will suggest to us, that the apostles themselves were chosen by
Providence among the fishermen of Galilee, and that the lower we depress the
temporal condition of the first Christians, the more reason we shall find to
admire their merit and success. It is incumbent on us diligently to remember,
that the kingdom of heaven was promised to the poor in spirit, and that minds
afflicted by calamity and the contempt of mankind, cheerfully listen to the
divine promise of future happiness; while, on the contrary, the fortunate are
satisfied with the possession of this world; and the wise abuse in doubt and
dispute their vain superiority of reason and knowledge.

We stand
in need of such reflections to comfort us for the loss of some illustrious
characters, which in our eyes might have seemed the most worthy of the heavenly
present. The names of Seneca, of the elder and the younger Pliny, of Tacitus, of
Plutarch, of Galen, of the slave Epictetus, and of the emperor Marcus Antoninus,
adorn the age in which they flourished, and exalt the dignity of human nature.
They filled with glory their respective stations, either in active or
contemplative life; their excellent understandings were improved by study;
Philosophy had purified their minds from the prejudices of the popular
superstition; and their days were spent in the pursuit of truth and the practice
of virtue. Yet all these sages (it is no less an object of surprise than of
concern) overlooked or rejected the perfection of the Christian system. Their
language or their silence equally discover their contempt for the growing sect,
which in their time had diffused itself over the Roman empire. Those among them
who condescended to mention the Christians, consider them only as obstinate and
perverse enthusiasts, who exacted an implicit submission to their mysterious
doctrines, without being able to produce a single argument that could engage the
attention of men of sense and learning[1684].

It is at
least doubtful whether any of these philosophers perused the apologies[1685]
which the primitive Christians repeatedly published in behalf of themselves and
of their religion; but it is much to be lamented that such a cause was not
defended by abler advocates. They expose with superfluous with and eloquence the
extravagance of Polytheism. They interest our compassion by displaying the
innocence and sufferings of their injured brethren. But when they would
demonstrate the divine origin of Christianity, they insist much more strongly on
the predictions which announced, than on the miracles which accompanied, the
appearance of the Messiah. Their favorite argument might serve to edify a
Christian or to convert a Jew, since both the one and the other acknowledge the
authority of those prophecies, and both are obliged, with devout reverence, to
search for their sense and their accomplishment. But this mode of persuasion
loses much of its weight and influence, when it is addressed to those who
neither understand nor respect the Mosaic dispensation and the prophetic style[1686].
In the unskilful hands of Justin and of the succeeding apologists, the sublime
meaning of the Hebrew oracles evaporates in distant types, affected conceits,
and cold allegories; and even their authenticity was rendered suspicious to an
unenlightened Gentile, by the mixture of pious forgeries, which, under the names
of Orpheus, Hermes, and the Sibyls[1687],
were obtruded on him as of equal value with the genuine inspirations of Heaven.
The adoption of fraud and sophistry in the defence of revelation too often
reminds us of the injudicious conduct of those poets who load their invulnerable
heroes with a useless weight of cumbersome and brittle
armor.

But how
shall we excuse the supine inattention of the Pagan and philosophic world, to
those evidences which were represented by the hand of Omnipotence, not to their
reason, but to their senses? During the age of Christ, of his apostles, and of
their first disciples, the doctrine which they preached was confirmed by
innumerable prodigies. The lame walked, the blind saw, the sick were healed, the
dead were raised, daemons were expelled, and the laws of Nature were frequently
suspended for the benefit of the church. But the sages of Greece and Rome turned
aside from the awful spectacle, and, pursuing the ordinary occupations of life
and study, appeared unconscious of any alterations in the moral or physical
government of the world. Under the reign of Tiberius, the whole earth[1688],
or at least a celebrated province of the Roman empire[1689],
was involved in a preternatural darkness of three hours. Even this miraculous
event, which ought to have excited the wonder, the curiosity, and the devotion
of mankind, passed without notice in an age of science and history[1690].
It happened during the lifetime of Seneca and the elder Pliny, who must have
experienced the immediate effects, or received the earliest intelligence, of the
prodigy. Each of these philosophers, in a laborious work, has recorded all the
great phenomena of Nature, earthquakes, meteors comets, and eclipses, which his
indefatigable curiosity could collect[1691].
Both the one and the other have omitted to mention the greatest phenomenon to
which the mortal eye has been witness since the creation of the globe. A
distinct chapter of Pliny[1692]
is designed for eclipses of an extraordinary nature and unusual duration; but he
contents himself with describing the singular defect of light which followed the
murder of Caesar, when, during the greatest part of a year, the orb of the sun
appeared pale and without splendor. The season of obscurity, which cannot surely
be compared with the preternatural darkness of the Passion, had been already
celebrated by most of the poets[1693]
and historians of that memorable age[1694].

End of Vol.
I

[1]
A considerable portion of
this preface has already appeared before us public in the Quarterly
Review.

[2]
The editor regrets that he
has not been able to find the Italian translation, mentioned by Gibbon himself
with some respect. It is not in our great libraries, the Museum or the Bodleian;
and he has never found any bookseller in London who has seen
it.

[3]
The first volume of the
quarto, which contained the sixteen first chapters.

[4]
The Author, as it frequently
happens, took an inadequate measure of his growing work. The remainder of the
first period has filled two volumes in quarto, being the third, fourth, fifth,
and sixth volumes of the octavo edition.

[5]
The first six volumes of the
octavo edition.

[6]
See Dr. Robertson's Preface
to his History of America.

[7]
Dion Cassius, (l. liv. p.
736,) with the annotations of Reimar, who has collected all that Roman vanity
has left upon the subject. The marble of Ancyra, on which Augustus recorded his
own exploits, asserted that he compelled the Parthians to restore the ensigns of
Crassus.

[8]
Strabo, (l. xvi. p. 780,)
Pliny the elder, (Hist. Natur. l. vi. c. 32, 35, [28, 29,] and Dion Cassius, (l.
liii. p. 723, and l. liv. p. 734,) have left us very curious details concerning
these wars. The Romans made themselves masters of Mariaba, or Merab, a city of
Arabia Felix, well known to the Orientals. (See Abulfeda and the Nubian
geography, p. 52) They were arrived within three days' journey of the spice
country, the rich object of their invasion.

Note: It
is the city of Merab that the Arabs say was the residence of Belkis, queen of
Saba, who desired to see Solomon. A dam, by which the waters collected in its
neighborhood were kept back, having been swept away, the sudden inundation
destroyed this city, of which, nevertheless, vestiges remain. It bordered on a
country called Adramout, where a particular aromatic plant grows: it is for this
reason that we real in the history of the Roman expedition, that they were
arrived within three days' journey of the spice country. - G. Compare
Malte-Brun, Geogr. Eng. trans. vol. ii. p. 215. The period of this flood has
been copiously discussed by Reiske, (Program. de vetusta Epocha Arabum, ruptura
cataractae Merabensis.) Add. Johannsen, Hist. Yemanae, p. 282. Bonn, 1828; and
see Gibbon, note 16. to Chap. L. - M.

Note: Two, according to Strabo. The
detailed account of Strabo makes the invaders fail before Marsuabae: this cannot
be the same place as Mariaba. Ukert observes, that Aelius Gallus would not have
failed for want of water before Mariaba. (See M. Guizot's note above.) "Either,
therefore, they were different places, or Strabo is mistaken." (Ukert,
Geographic der Griechen und Romer, vol. i. p. 181.) Strabo, indeed, mentions
Mariaba distinct from Marsuabae. Gibbon has followed Pliny in reckoning Mariaba
among the conquests of Gallus. There can be little doubt that he is wrong, as
Gallus did not approach the capital of Sabaea. Compare the note of the Oxford
editor of Strabo. - M.

[9]
By the slaughter of Varus and
his three legions. See the first book of the Annals of Tacitus. Sueton. in
August. c. 23, and Velleius Paterculus, l. ii. c. 117, &c. Augustus did not
receive the melancholy news with all the temper and firmness that might have
been expected from his character.

[10]
Tacit. Annal. l. ii. Dion
Cassius, l. lvi. p. 833, and the speech of Augustus himself, in Julian's
Caesars. It receives great light from the learned notes of his French
translator, M. Spanheim.

[11]
Germanicus, Suetonius
Paulinus, and Agricola were checked and recalled in the course of their
victories. Corbulo was put to death. Military merit, as it is admirably
expressed by Tacitus, was, in the strictest sense of the word, imperatoria
virtus.

[12]
Caesar himself conceals that
ignoble motive; but it is mentioned by Suetonius, c. 47. The British pearls
proved, however, of little value, on account of their dark and livid color.
Tacitus observes, with reason, (in Agricola, c. 12,) that it was an inherent
defect. "Ego facilius crediderim, naturam margaritis deesse quam nobis
avaritiam."

[13]
: Claudius, Nero, and
Domitian. A hope is expressed by Pomponius Mela, l. iii. c. 6, (he wrote under
Claudius,) that, by the success of the Roman arms, the island and its savage
inhabitants would soon be better known. It is amusing enough to peruse such
passages in the midst of London.

[14]
See the admirable abridgment
given by Tacitus, in the life of Agricola, and copiously, though perhaps not
completely, illustrated by our own antiquarians, Camden and
Horsley.

[15]
The Irish writers, jealous of
their national honor, are extremely provoked on this occasion, both with Tacitus
and with Agricola.

[16]
See Horsley's Britannia
Romana, l. i. c. 10. Note: Agricola fortified the line from Dumbarton to
Edinburgh, consequently within Scotland. The emperor Hadrian, during his
residence in Britain, about the year 121, caused a rampart of earth to be raised
between Newcastle and Carlisle. Antoninus Pius, having gained new victories over
the Caledonians, by the ability of his general, Lollius, Urbicus, caused a new
rampart of earth to be constructed between Edinburgh and Dumbarton. Lastly,
Septimius Severus caused a wall of stone to be built parallel to the rampart of
Hadrian, and on the same locality. See John Warburton's Vallum Romanum, or the
History and Antiquities of the Roman Wall. London, 1754, 4to. - W. See likewise
a good note on the Roman wall in Lingard's History of England, vol. i. p. 40,
4to edit - M.

[17]
The poet Buchanan celebrates
with elegance and spirit (see his Sylvae, v.) the unviolated independence of his
native country. But, if the single testimony of Richard of Cirencester was
sufficient to create a Roman province of Vespasiana to the north of the wall,
that independence would be reduced within very narrow limits.

[18]
See Appian (in Prooem.) and
the uniform imagery of Ossian's Poems, which, according to every hypothesis,
were composed by a native Caledonian.

[19]
See Pliny's Panegyric, which
seems founded on facts.

[20]
: Dion Cassius, l.
lxvii.

[21]
Herodotus, l. iv. c. 94.
Julian in the Caesars, with Spanheims observations.

[22]
Plin. Epist. viii.
9.

[23]
Dion Cassius, l. lxviii. p.
1123, 1131. Julian in Caesaribus Eutropius, viii. 2, 6. Aurelius Victor in
Epitome.

[24]
See a Memoir of M. d'Anville,
on the Province of Dacia, in the Academie des Inscriptions, tom. xxviii. p. 444
- 468.

[25]
Trajan's sentiments are
represented in a very just and lively manner in the Caesars of
Julian.

[26]
Eutropius and Sextus Rufus
have endeavored to perpetuate the illusion. See a very sensible dissertation of
M. Freret in the Academie des Inscriptions, tom. xxi. p. 55.

[27]
Dion Cassius, l. lxviii.; and
the Abbreviators.

[28]
Ovid. Fast. l. ii. ver. 667.
See Livy, and Dionysius of Halicarnassus, under the reign of
Tarquin.

[29]
St. Augustin is highly
delighted with the proof of the weakness of Terminus, and the vanity of the
Augurs. See De Civitate Dei, iv. 29.

Note
*: The turn of Gibbon's sentence is Augustin's: "Plus Hadrianum regem bominum,
quam regem Deorum timuisse videatur." - M

[30]
See the Augustan History, p.
5, Jerome's Chronicle, and all the Epitomizers. It is somewhat surprising, that
this memorable event should be omitted by Dion, or rather by
Xiphilin.

[31]
Dion, l. lxix. p. 1158. Hist.
August. p. 5, 8. If all our historians were lost, medals, inscriptions, and
other monuments, would be sufficient to record the travels of Hadrian. Note: The
journeys of Hadrian are traced in a note on Solvet's translation of Hegewisch,
Essai sur l'Epoque de Histoire Romaine la plus heureuse pour Genre Humain Paris,
1834, p. 123. – M.

[32]
See the Augustan History and
the Epitomes

[33]
We must, however, remember,
that in the time of Hadrian, a rebellion of the Jews raged with religious fury,
though only in a single province. Pausanias (l. viii. c. 43) mentions two
necessary and successful wars, conducted by the generals of Pius: 1st. Against
the wandering Moors, who were driven into the solitudes of Atlas. 2d. Against
the Brigantes of Britain, who had invaded the Roman province. Both these wars
(with several other hostilities) are mentioned in the Augustan History, p.
19.

[34]
Appian of Alexandria, in the
preface to his History of the Roman Wars.

[35]
Dion, l. lxxi. Hist. August. in Marco. The Parthian victories gave birth to a
crowd of contemptible historians, whose memory has been rescued from oblivion
and exposed to ridicule, in a very lively piece of criticism of
Lucian.

[36]
The poorest rank of soldiers possessed above forty pounds sterling, (Dionys.
Halicarn. iv. 17,) a very high qualification at a time when money was so scarce,
that an ounce of silver was equivalent to seventy pounds weight of brass. The
populace, excluded by the ancient constitution, were indiscriminately admitted
by Marius. See Sallust. de Bell. Jugurth. c. 91.

Note: On the uncertainty of all these estimates, and
the difficulty of fixing the relative value of brass and silver, compare
Niebuhr, vol. i. p. 473, &c. Eng. trans. p. 452. According to Niebuhr, the
relative disproportion in value, between the two metals, arose, in a great
degree from the abundance of brass or copper. - M. Compare also Dureau 'de la
Malle Economie Politique des Romains especially L. l. c. ix. - M.
1845.

[37]
Caesar formed his legion Alauda of Gauls and strangers; but it was during the
license of civil war; and after the victory, he gave them the freedom of the
city for their reward.

[38]
See Vegetius, de Re Militari, l. i. c. 2 - 7.

[39]
The oath of service and fidelity to the emperor was annually renewed by the
troops on the first of January.

[40]
Tacitus calls the Roman eagles, Bellorum Deos. They were placed in a chapel in
the camp, and with the other deities received the religious worship of the
troops.

Note: See also Dio. Cass. xl. c. 18. - M.

[41]
See Gronovius de Pecunia vetere, l. iii. p. 120, &c. The emperor Domitian
raised the annual stipend of the legionaries to twelve pieces of gold, which, in
his time, was equivalent to about ten of our guineas. This pay, somewhat higher
than our own, had been, and was afterwards, gradually increased, according to
the progress of wealth and military government. After twenty years' service, the
veteran received three thousand denarii, (about one hundred pounds sterling,) or
a proportionable allowance of land. The pay and advantages of the guards were,
in general, about double those of the legions.

[42]
Exercitus ab exercitando, Varro de Lingua Latina, l. iv. Cicero in Tusculan. l.
ii. 37. [15.] There is room for a very interesting work, which should lay open
the connection between the languages and manners of nations. Note I am not aware
of the existence, at present, of such a work; but the profound observations of
the late William von Humboldt, in the introduction to his posthumously published
Essay on the Language of the Island of Java, (uber die Kawi-sprache, Berlin,
1836,) may cause regret that this task was not completed by that accomplished
and universal scholar. - M.

[43]
Vegatius, l. ii. and the rest of his first book.

[44]
The Pyrrhic dance is extremely well illustrated by M. le Beau, in the Academie
des Inscriptions, tom. xxxv. p. 262, &c. That learned academician, in a
series of memoirs, has collected all the passages of the ancients that relate to
the Roman legion.

[45]
Joseph. de Bell. Judaico, l. iii. c. 5. We are indebted to this Jew for some
very curious details of Roman discipline.

[46]
Plin. Panegyr. c. 13. Life of Hadrian, in the Augustan History.

[47]
See an admirable digression on the Roman discipline, in the sixth book of his
History.

[48]
Vegetius de Re Militari, l. ii. c. 4, &c.

Considerable part of his very perplexed abridgment was
taken from the regulations of Trajan and Hadrian; and the legion, as he
describes it, cannot suit any other age of the Roman empire.

[49]
Vegetius de Re Militari, l. ii. c. 1. In the purer age of Caesar and Cicero, the
word miles was almost confined to the infantry. Under the lower empire, and the
times of chivalry, it was appropriated almost as exclusively to the men at arms,
who fought on horseback.

[50]
In the time of Polybius and Dionysius of Halicarnassus, (l. v. c. 45,) the steel
point of the pilum seems to have been much longer. In the time of Vegetius, it
was reduced to a foot, or even nine inches. I have chosen a medium.

[51]
For the legionary arms, see Lipsius de Militia Romana, l. iii. c. 2 -
7.

[52]
See the beautiful comparison of Virgil, Georgic ii. v. 279.

[53]
M. Guichard, Memoires Militaires, tom. i. c. 4, and Nouveaux Memoires, tom. i.
p. 293 - 311, has treated the subject like a scholar and an officer.

[54]
See Arrian's Tactics. With the true partiality of a Greek, Arrian rather chose
to describe the phalanx, of which he had read, than the legions which he had
commanded.

[55]
Polyb. l. xvii. (xviii. 9.)

[56]
Veget. de Re Militari, l. ii. c. 6. His positive testimony, which might be
supported by circumstantial evidence, ought surely to silence those critics who
refuse the Imperial legion its proper body of cavalry. Note: See also Joseph. B.
J. iii. vi. 2. - M.

[57]
See Livy almost throughout, particularly xlii. 61.

[58]
Plin. Hist. Natur. xxxiii. 2. The true sense of that very curious passage was
first discovered and illustrated by M. de Beaufort, Republique Romaine, l. ii.
c. 2.

[59]
As in the instance of Horace and Agricola. This appears to have been a defect in
the Roman discipline; which Hadrian endeavored to remedy by ascertaining the
legal age of a tribune.

Note: These details are not altogether accurate.
Although, in the latter days of the republic, and under the first emperors, the
young Roman nobles obtained the command of a squadron or a cohort with greater
facility than in the former times, they never obtained it without passing
through a tolerably long military service. Usually they served first in the
praetorian cohort, which was intrusted with the guard of the general: they were
received into the companionship (contubernium) of some superior officer, and
were there formed for duty. Thus Julius Caesar, though sprung from a great
family, served first as contubernalis under the praetor, M. Thermus, and later
under Servilius the Isaurian. (Suet. Jul. 2, 5. Plut. in Par. p. 516. Ed.
Froben.) The example of Horace, which Gibbon adduces to prove that young knights
were made tribunes immediately on entering the service, proves nothing. In the
first place, Horace was not a knight; he was the son of a freedman of Venusia,
in Apulia, who exercised the humble office of coactor exauctionum, (collector of
payments at auctions.) (Sat. i. vi. 45, or 86.) Moreover, when the poet was made
tribune, Brutus, whose army was nearly entirely composed of Orientals, gave this
title to all the Romans of consideration who joined him. The emperors were still
less difficult in their choice; the number of tribunes was augmented; the title
and honors were conferred on persons whom they wished to attack to the court.
Augustus conferred on the sons of senators, sometimes the tribunate, sometimes
the command of a squadron. Claudius gave to the knights who entered into the
service, first the command of a cohort of auxiliaries, later that of a squadron,
and at length, for the first time, the tribunate. (Suet in Claud. with the notes
of Ernesti.) The abuses that arose caused by the edict of Hadrian, which fixed
the age at which that honor could be attained. (Spart. in Had. &c.) This
edict was subsequently obeyed; for the emperor Valerian, in a letter addressed
to Mulvius Gallinnus, praetorian praefect, excuses himself for having violated
it in favor of the young Probus afterwards emperor, on whom he had conferred the
tribunate at an earlier age on account of his rare talents. (Vopisc. in Prob.
iv.) - W. and G. Agricola, though already invested with the title of tribune,
was contubernalis in Britain with Suetonius Paulinus. Tac. Agr. v. -
M.

[60]
See Arrian's Tactics.

[61]
Such, in particular, was the state of the Batavians. Tacit. Germania, c.
29.

[62]
Marcus Antoninus obliged the vanquished Quadi and Marcomanni to supply him with
a large body of troops, which he immediately sent into Britain. Dion Cassius, l.
lxxi. (c. 16.)

[63]
Tacit. Annal. iv. 5. Those who fix a regular proportion of as many foot, and
twice as many horse, confound the auxiliaries of the emperors with the Italian
allies of the republic.

[64]
Vegetius, ii. 2. Arrian, in his order of march and battle against the
Alani.

[65]
The subject of the ancient machines is treated with great knowledge and
ingenuity by the Chevalier Folard, (Polybe, tom. ii. p. 233- 290.) He prefers
them in many respects to our modern cannon and mortars. We may observe, that the
use of them in the field gradually became more prevalent, in proportion as
personal valor and military skill declined with the Roman empire. When men were
no longer found, their place was supplied by machines. See Vegetius, ii. 25.
Arrian.

[66]
Vegetius finishes his second book, and the description of the legion, with the
following emphatic words: - "Universa quae ix quoque belli genere necessaria
esse creduntur, secum Jegio debet ubique portare, ut in quovis loco fixerit
castra, arma'am faciat civitatem."

[67]
For the Roman Castrametation, see Polybius, l. vi. with Lipsius de Militia
Romana, Joseph. de Bell. Jud. l. iii. c. 5. Vegetius, i. 21 - 25, iii. 9, and
Memoires de Guichard, tom. i. c. 1.

[68]
Cicero in Tusculan. ii. 37, [15.] - Joseph. de Bell. Jud. l. iii. 5, Frontinus,
iv. 1.

[69]
Vegetius, i. 9. See Memoires de l'Academie des Inscriptions, tom. xxv. p.
187.

[70]
See those evolutions admirably well explained by M. Guichard Nouveaux Memoires,
tom. i. p. 141 - 234.

[71]
Tacitus (Annal. iv. 5) has given us a state of the legions under Tiberius; and
Dion Cassius (l. lv. p. 794) under Alexander Severus. I have endeavored to fix
on the proper medium between these two periods. See likewise Lipsius de
Magnitudine Romana, l. i. c. 4, 5.

[72]
The Romans tried to disguise, by the pretence of religious awe their ignorance
and terror. See Tacit. Germania, c. 34.

[73]
Plutarch, in Marc. Anton. [c. 67.] And yet, if we may credit Orosius, these
monstrous castles were no more than ten feet above the water, vi. 19.

[74]
See Lipsius, de Magnitud. Rom. l. i. c. 5. The sixteen last chapters of Vegetius
relate to naval affairs.

[75]
Voltaire, Siecle de Louis XIV. c. 29. It must, however, be remembered, that
France still feels that extraordinary effort.

[76]
See Strabo, l. ii. It is natural enough to suppose, that Arragon is derived from
Tarraconensis, and several moderns who have written in Latin use those words as
synonymous. It is, however, certain, that the Arragon, a little stream which
falls from the Pyrenees into the Ebro, first gave its name to a country, and
gradually to a kingdom. See d'Anville, Geographie du Moyen Age, p.
181.

[77]
One hundred and fifteen cities appear in the Notitia of Gaul; and it is well
known that this appellation was applied not only to the capital town, but to the
whole territory of each state. But Plutarch and Appian increase the number of
tribes to three or four hundred.

[78]
D'Anville. Notice de l'Ancienne Gaule.

[79]
Whittaker's History of Manchester, vol. i. c. 3.

[80]
The Italian Veneti, though often confounded with the Gauls, were more probably
of Illyrian origin. See M. Freret, Memoires de l'Academie des Inscriptions, tom.
xviii.

Note: Or Liburnian, according to Niebuhr. Vol. i. p.
172. - M.

[81]
See Maffei Verona illustrata, l. i.

Note: Add Niebuhr, vol. i., and Otfried Muller, die
Etrusker, which contains much that is known, and much that is conjectured, about
this remarkable people. Also Micali, Storia degli antichi popoli Italiani.
Florence, 1832 - M.

[82]
The first contrast was observed by the ancients. See Florus, i. 11. The second
must strike every modern traveller.

[83]
Pliny (Hist. Natur. l. iii.) follows the division of Italy by
Augustus.

[84]
Tournefort, Voyages en Grece et Asie Mineure, lettre xviii.

[85]
The name of Illyricum originally belonged to the sea-coast of the Adriatic, and
was gradually extended by the Romans from the Alps to the Euxine Sea. See
Severini Pannonia, l. i. c. 3.

[86]
A Venetian traveller, the Abbate Fortis, has lately given us some account of
those very obscure countries. But the geography and antiquities of the western
Illyricum can be expected only from the munificence of the emperor, its
sovereign.

[87]
The Save rises near the confines of Istria, and was considered by the more early
Greeks as the principal stream of the Danube.

[88]
See the Periplus of Arrian. He examined the coasts of the Euxine, when he was
governor of Cappadocia.

[89]
This comparison is exaggerated, with the intention, no doubt, of attacking the
authority of the Bible, which boasts of the fertility of Palestine. Gibbon's
only authorities were that of Strabo (l. xvi. 1104) and the present state of the
country. But Strabo only speaks of the neighborhood of Jerusalem, which he calls
barren and arid to the extent of sixty stadia round the city: in other parts he
gives a favorable testimony to the fertility of many parts of Palestine: thus he
says, "Near Jericho there is a grove of palms, and a country of a hundred
stadia, full of springs, and well peopled." Moreover, Strabo had never seen
Palestine; he spoke only after reports, which may be as inaccurate as those
according to which he has composed that description of Germany, in which
Gluverius has detected so many errors. (Gluv. Germ. iii. 1.) Finally, his
testimony is contradicted and refuted by that of other ancient authors, and by
medals. Tacitus says, in speaking of Palestine, "The inhabitants are healthy and
robust; the rains moderate; the soil fertile." (Hist. v. 6.) Ammianus Macellinus
says also, "The last of the Syrias is Palestine, a country of considerable
extent, abounding in clean and well-cultivated land, and containing some fine
cities, none of which yields to the other; but, as it were, being on a parallel,
are rivals." - xiv. 8. See also the historian Josephus, Hist. vi. 1. Procopius
of Caeserea, who lived in the sixth century, says that Chosroes, king of Persia,
had a great desire to make himself master of Palestine, on account of its
extraordinary fertility, its opulence, and the great number of its inhabitants.
The Saracens thought the same, and were afraid that Omar. when he went to
Jerusalem, charmed with the fertility of the soil and the purity of the air,
would never return to Medina. (Ockley, Hist. of Sarac. i. 232.) The importance
attached by the Romans to the conquest of Palestine, and the obstacles they
encountered, prove also the richness and population of the country. Vespasian
and Titus caused medals to be struck with trophies, in which Palestine is
represented by a female under a palm-tree, to signify the richness of he
country, with this legend: Judea capta. Other medals also indicate this
fertility; for instance, that of Herod holding a bunch of grapes, and that of
the young Agrippa displaying fruit. As to the present state of he country, one
perceives that it is not fair to draw any inference against its ancient
fertility: the disasters through which it has passed, the government to which it
is subject, the disposition of the inhabitants, explain sufficiently the wild
and uncultivated appearance of the land, where, nevertheless, fertile and
cultivated districts are still found, according to the testimony of travellers;
among others, of Shaw, Maundrel, La Rocque, &c. - G. The Abbe Guenee, in his
Lettres de quelques Juifs a Mons. de Voltaire, has exhausted the subject of the
fertility of Palestine; for Voltaire had likewise indulged in sarcasm on this
subject. Gibbon was assailed on this point, not, indeed, by Mr. Davis, who, he
slyly insinuates, was prevented by his patriotism as a Welshman from resenting
the comparison with Wales, but by other writers. In his Vindication, he first
established the correctness of his measurement of Palestine, which he estimates
as 7600 square English miles, while Wales is about 7011. As to fertility, he
proceeds in the following dexterously composed and splendid passage: "The
emperor Frederick II., the enemy and the victim of the clergy, is accused of
saying, after his return from his crusade, that the God of the Jews would have
despised his promised land, if he had once seen the fruitful realms of Sicily
and Naples." (See Giannone, Istor. Civ. del R. di Napoli, ii. 245.) This
raillery, which malice has, perhaps, falsely imputed to Frederick, is
inconsistent with truth and piety; yet it must be confessed that the soil of
Palestine does not contain that inexhaustible, and, as it were, spontaneous
principle of fertility, which, under the most unfavorable circumstances, has
covered with rich harvests the banks of the Nile, the fields of Sicily, or the
plains of Poland. The Jordan is the only navigable river of Palestine: a
considerable part of the narrow space is occupied, or rather lost, in the Dead
Sea whose horrid aspect inspires every sensation of disgust, and countenances
every tale of horror. The districts which border on Arabia partake of the sandy
quality of the adjacent desert. The face of the country, except the sea- coast,
and the valley of the Jordan, is covered with mountains, which appear, for the
most part, as naked and barren rocks; and in the neighborhood of Jerusalem,
there is a real scarcity of the two elements of earth and water. (See Maundrel's
Travels, p. 65, and Reland's Palestin. i. 238, 395.) These disadvantages, which
now operate in their fullest extent, were formerly corrected by the labors of a
numerous people, and the active protection of a wise government. The hills were
clothed with rich beds of artificial mould, the rain was collected in vast
cisterns, a supply of fresh water was conveyed by pipes and aqueducts to the dry
lands. The breed of cattle was encouraged in those parts which were not adapted
for tillage, and almost every spot was compelled to yield some production for
the use of the inhabitants.

Pater ispe colendi Haud facilem esse viam voluit,
primusque par artem Movit agros; curis acuens mortalia corda, Nec torpere gravi
passus sua Regna veterno.

Gibbon, Misc. Works, iv. 540.

But Gibbon has here eluded the question about the land
"flowing with milk and honey." He is describing Judaea only, without
comprehending Galilee, or the rich pastures beyond the Jordan, even now
proverbial for their flocks and herds. (See Burckhardt's Travels, and Hist of
Jews, i. 178.) The following is believed to be a fair statement: "The
extraordinary fertility of the whole country must be taken into the account. No
part was waste; very little was occupied by unprofitable wood; the more fertile
hills were cultivated in artificial terraces, others were hung with orchards of
fruit trees the more rocky and barren districts were covered with vineyards."
Even in the present day, the wars and misgovernment of ages have not exhausted
the natural richness of the soil. "Galilee," says Malte Brun, "would be a
paradise were it inhabited by an industrious people under an enlightened
government. No land could be less dependent on foreign importation; it bore
within itself every thing that could be necessary for the subsistence and
comfort of a simple agricultural people. The climate was healthy, the seasons
regular; the former rains, which fell about October, after the vintage, prepared
the ground for the seed; that latter, which prevailed during March and the
beginning of April, made it grow rapidly. Directly the rains ceased, the grain
ripened with still greater rapidity, and was gathered in before the end of May.
The summer months were dry and very hot, but the nights cool and refreshed by
copious dews. In September, the vintage was gathered. Grain of all kinds, wheat,
barley, millet, zea, and other sorts, grew in abundance; the wheat commonly
yielded thirty for one. Besides the vine and the olive, the almond, the date,
figs of many kinds, the orange, the pomegranate, and many other fruit trees,
flourished in the greatest luxuriance. Great quantity of honey was collected.
The balm-tree, which produced the opobalsamum, a great object of trade, was
probably introduced from Arabia, in the time of Solomon. It flourished about
Jericho and in Gilead." - Milman's Hist. of Jews. i. 177. - M.

[90]
The progress of religion is well known. The use of letter was introduced among
the savages of Europe about fifteen hundred years before Christ; and the
Europeans carried them to America about fifteen centuries after the Christian
Aera. But in a period of three thousand years, the Phoenician alphabet received
considerable alterations, as it passed through the hands of the Greeks and
Romans.

[91]
Dion Cassius, lib. lxviii. p. 1131.

[92]
Ptolemy and Strabo, with the modern geographers, fix the Isthmus of Suez as the
boundary of Asia and Africa. Dionysius, Mela, Pliny, Sallust, Hirtius, and
Solinus, have preferred for that purpose the western branch of the Nile, or even
the great Catabathmus, or descent, which last would assign to Asia, not only
Egypt, but part of Libya.

[93]
The French editor has a long and unnecessary note on the History of Cyrene. For
the present state of that coast and country, the volume of Captain Beechey is
full of interesting details. Egypt, now an independent and improving kingdom,
appears, under the enterprising rule of Mahommed Ali, likely to revenge its
former oppression upon the decrepit power of the Turkish empire. - M. - This
note was written in 1838. The future destiny of Egypt is an important problem,
only to be solved by time. This observation will also apply to the new French
colony in Algiers. - M. 1845.

[94]
The long range, moderate height, and gentle declivity of Mount Atlas, (see
Shaw's Travels, p. 5,) are very unlike a solitary mountain which rears its head
into the clouds, and seems to support the heavens. The peak of Teneriff, on the
contrary, rises a league and a half above the surface of the sea; and, as it was
frequently visited by the Phoenicians, might engage the notice of the Greek
poets. See Buffon, Histoire Naturelle, tom. i. p. 312. Histoire des Voyages,
tom. ii.

[95]
M. de Voltaire, tom. xiv. p. 297, unsupported by either fact or probability, has
generously bestowed the Canary Islands on the Roman empire.

[96]
Minorca was lost to Great Britain in 1782. Ann. Register for that year. -
M.

[97]
The gallant struggles of the Corsicans for their independence, under Paoli, were
brought to a close in the year 1769. This volume was published in 1776. See
Botta, Storia d'Italia, vol. xiv. - M.

[98]
Malta, it need scarcely be said, is now in the possession of the English. We
have not, however, thought it necessary to notice every change in the political
state of the world, since the time of Gibbon. - M

[99]
Bergier, Hist. des Grands Chemins, l. iii. c. 1, 2, 3, 4, a very useful
collection.

[100]
See Templeman's Survey of the Globe; but I distrust both the Doctor's learning
and his maps.

[101]
They were erected about the midway between Lahor and Delhi. The conquests of
Alexander in Hindostan were confined to the Punjab, a country watered by the
five great streams of the Indus.

Note: The Hyphasis is one of the five rivers which join
the Indus or the Sind, after having traversed the province of the Pendj-ab - a
name which in Persian, signifies five rivers. * * * G. The five rivers were,

I.
The Hydaspes, now the Chelum, Behni, or Bedusta,
(Sanscrit, Vitastha, Arrow-swift.)

II.
The Acesines, the Chenab, (Sanscrit, Chandrabhaga,
Moon-gift.)

III.
Hydraotes, the Ravey, or Iraoty, (Sanscrit,
Iravati.)

IV.
Hyphasis, the Beyah, (Sanscrit, Vepasa, Fetterless.)

V.
The Satadru, (Sanscrit, the Hundred Streamed,) the
Sutledj, known first to the Greeks in the time of Ptolemy. Rennel. Vincent,
Commerce of Anc. book 2. Lassen, Pentapotam. Ind. Wilson's Sanscrit Dict., and
the valuable memoir of Lieut. Burnes, Journal of London Geogr. Society, vol.
iii. p. 2, with the travels of that very able writer. Compare Gibbon's own note,
c. lxv. note 25. - M substit. for G.

[102]
See M. de Guignes, Histoire des Huns, l. xv. xvi. and xvii.

[103]
There is not any writer who describes in so lively a manner as Herodotus the
true genius of polytheism. The best commentary may be found in Mr. Hume's
Natural History of Religion; and the best contrast in Bossuet's Universal
History. Some obscure traces of an intolerant spirit appear in the conduct of
the Egyptians, (see Juvenal, Sat. xv.;) and the Christians, as well as Jews, who
lived under the Roman empire, formed a very important exception; so important
indeed, that the discussion will require a distinct chapter of this work.

Note: M. Constant, in his very learned and eloquent
work, "Sur la Religion," with the two additional volumes, "Du Polytheisme
Romain," has considered the whole history of polytheism in a tone of philosophy,
which, without subscribing to all his opinions, we may be permitted to admire.
"The boasted tolerance of polytheism did not rest upon the respect due from
society to the freedom of individual opinion. The polytheistic nations, tolerant
as they were towards each other, as separate states, were not the less ignorant
of the eternal principle, the only basis of enlightened toleration, that every
one has a right to worship God in the manner which seems to him the best.
Citizens, on the contrary, were bound to conform to the religion of the state;
they had not the liberty to adopt a foreign religion, though that religion might
be legally recognized in their own city, for the strangers who were its
votaries." - Sur la Religion, v. 184. Du. Polyth. Rom. ii. 308. At this time,
the growing religious indifference, and the general administration of the empire
by Romans, who, being strangers, would do no more than protect, not enlist
themselves in the cause of the local superstitions, had introduced great laxity.
But intolerance was clearly the theory both of the Greek and Roman law. The
subject is more fully considered in another place. - M.

[104]
The rights, powers, and pretensions of the sovereign of Olympus are very clearly
described in the xvth book of the Iliad; in the Greek original, I mean; for Mr.
Pope, without perceiving it, has improved the theology of Homer.

Note: There is a curious coincidence between Gibbon's
expressions and those of the newly-recovered "De Republica" of Cicero, though
the argument is rather the converse, lib. i. c. 36. "Sive haec ad utilitatem
vitae constitute sint a principibus rerum publicarum, ut rex putaretur unus esse
in coelo, qui nutu, ut ait Homerus, totum Olympum converteret, idemque et rex et
patos haberetur omnium." - M.

[105]
See, for instance, Caesar de Bell. Gall. vi. 17. Within a century or two, the
Gauls themselves applied to their gods the names of Mercury, Mars, Apollo,
&c.

[106]
The admirable work of Cicero de Natura Deorum is the best clew we have to guide
us through the dark and profound abyss. He represents with candor, and confutes
with subtlety, the opinions of the philosophers.

[107]
I do not pretend to assert, that, in this irreligious age, the natural terrors
of superstition, dreams, omens, apparitions, &c., had lost their
efficacy.

[108]
Socrates, Epicurus, Cicero, and Plutarch always inculcated a decent reverence
for the religion of their own country, and of mankind. The devotion of Epicurus
was assiduous and exemplary. Diogen. Laert. x. 10.

[109]
Polybius, l. vi. c. 53, 54. Juvenal, Sat. xiii. laments that in his time this
apprehension had lost much of its effect.

[110]
See the fate of Syracuse, Tarentum, Ambracia, Corinth, &c., the conduct of
Verres, in Cicero, (Actio ii. Orat. 4,) and the usual practice of governors, in
the viiith Satire of Juvenal.

[111]
Seuton. in Claud. - Plin. Hist. Nat. xxx. 1.

[112]
Pelloutier, Histoire des Celtes, tom. vi. p. 230 - 252.

[113]
Seneca, Consolat. ad Helviam, p. 74. Edit., Lips.

[114]
Dionysius Halicarn. Antiquitat. Roman. l. ii. (vol. i. p. 275, edit.
Reiske.)

[115]
Yet the worship of foreign gods at Rome was only guarantied to the natives of
those countries from whence they came. The Romans administered the priestly
offices only to the gods of their fathers. Gibbon, throughout the whole
preceding sketch of the opinions of the Romans and their subjects, has shown
through what causes they were free from religious hatred and its consequences.
But, on the other hand the internal state of these religions, the infidelity and
hypocrisy of the upper orders, the indifference towards all religion, in even
the better part of the common people, during the last days of the republic, and
under the Caesars, and the corrupting principles of the philosophers, had
exercised a very pernicious influence on the manners, and even on the
constitution. - W.

[116]
In the year of Rome 701, the temple of Isis and Serapis was demolished by the
order of the Senate, (Dion Cassius, l. xl. p. 252,) and even by the hands of the
consul, (Valerius Maximus, l. 3.) [Gibbon here blends into one, two events,
distant a hundred and sixty-six years from each other. It was in the year of
Rome 535, that the senate having ordered the destruction of the temples of Isis
and Serapis, the workman would lend his hand; and the consul, L. Paulus himself
(Valer. Max. 1, 3) seized the axe, to give the first blow. Gibbon attribute this
circumstance to the second demolition, which took place in the year 701 and
which he considers as the first. - W.] After the death of Caesar it was restored
at the public expense, (Dion. l. xlvii. p. 501.) When Augustus was in Egypt, he
revered the majesty of Serapis, (Dion, l. li. p. 647;) but in the Pomaerium of
Rome, and a mile round it, he prohibited the worship of the Egyptian gods,
(Dion, l. liii. p. 679; l. liv. p. 735.) They remained, however, very
fashionable under his reign (Ovid. de Art. Amand. l. i.) and that of his
successor, till the justice of Tiberius was provoked to some acts of severity.
(See Tacit. Annal. ii. 85. Joseph. Antiquit. l. xviii. c. 3.)

Note: See, in the pictures from the walls of Pompeii,
the representation of an Isiac temple and worship. Vestiges of Egyptian worship
have been traced in Gaul, and, I am informed, recently in Britain, in
excavations at York. - M.

[117]
Tertullian in Apologetic. c. 6, p. 74. Edit. Havercamp. I am inclined to
attribute their establishment to the devotion of the Flavian family.

[118]
See Livy, l. xi. [Suppl.] and xxix.

[119]
Macrob. Saturnalia, l. iii. c. 9. He gives us a form of evocation.

[120]
Minutius Faelix in Octavio, p. 54. Arnobius, l. vi. p. 115.

[121]
Tacit. Annal. xi. 24. The Orbis Romanus of the learned Spanheim is a complete
history of the progressive admission of Latium, Italy, and the provinces, to the
freedom of Rome.

Note: Democratic states, observes Denina, (delle
Revoluz. d' Italia, l. ii. c. l., are most jealous of communication the
privileges of citizenship; monarchies or oligarchies willingly multiply the
numbers of their free subjects. The most remarkable accessions to the strength
of Rome, by the aggregation of conquered and foreign nations, took place under
the regal and patrician - we may add, the Imperial government. - M.

[122]
Herodotus, v. 97. It should seem, however, that he followed a large and popular
estimation.

[123]
Athenaeus, Deipnosophist. l. vi. p. 272. Edit. Casaubon. Meursius de Fortuna
Attica, c. 4.

Note: On the number of citizens in Athens, compare
Boeckh, Public Economy of Athens, (English Tr.,) p. 45, et seq. Fynes Clinton,
Essay in Fasti Hellenici, vol. i. 381. - M.

[124]
See a very accurate collection of the numbers of each Lustrum in M. de Beaufort,
Republique Romaine, l. iv. c. 4. Note: All these questions are placed in an
entirely new point of view by Niebuhr, (Romische Geschichte, vol. i. p. 464.) He
rejects the census of Servius fullius as unhistoric, (vol. ii. p. 78, et seq.,)
and he establishes the principle that the census comprehended all the
confederate cities which had the right of Isopolity. - M.

[125]
Appian. de Bell. Civil. l. i. Velleius Paterculus, l. ii. c. 15, 16,
17.

[126]
Maecenas had advised him to declare, by one edict, all his subjects citizens.
But we may justly suspect that the historian Dion was the author of a counsel so
much adapted to the practice of his own age, and so little to that of
Augustus.

[127]
The senators were obliged to have one third of their own landed property in
Italy. See Plin. l. vi. ep. 19. The qualification was reduced by Marcus to one
fourth. Since the reign of Trajan, Italy had sunk nearer to the level of the
provinces.

[128]
It may be doubted whether the municipal government of the cities was not the old
Italian constitution rather than a transcript from that of Rome. The free
government of the cities, observes Savigny, was the leading characteristic of
Italy. Geschichte des Romischen Rechts, i. p. G. - M.

[129]
The first part of the Verona Illustrata of the Marquis Maffei gives the clearest
and most comprehensive view of the state of Italy under the Caesars.

Note: Compare Denina, Revol. d' Italia, l. ii. c. 6, p.
100, 4 to edit.

[130]
See Pausanias, l. vii. The Romans condescended to restore the names of those
assemblies, when they could no longer be dangerous.

[131]
They are frequently mentioned by Caesar. The Abbe Dubos attempts, with very
little success, to prove that the assemblies of Gaul were continued under the
emperors. Histoire de l'Etablissement de la Monarchie Francoise, l. i. c.
4.

[132]
This is, perhaps, rather overstated. Most cities retained the choice of their
municipal officers: some retained valuable privileges; Athens, for instance, in
form was still a confederate city. (Tac. Ann. ii. 53.) These privileges, indeed,
depended entirely on the arbitrary will of the emperor, who revoked or restored
them according to his caprice. See Walther Geschichte les Romischen Rechts, i.
324 - an admirable summary of the Roman constitutional history. - M.

[133]
Seneca in Consolat. ad Helviam, c. 6.

[134]
Memnon apud Photium, (c. 33,) [c. 224, p. 231, ed Bekker.] Valer. Maxim. ix. 2.
Plutarch and Dion Cassius swell the massacre to 150,000 citizens; but I should
esteem the smaller number to be more than sufficient.

[135]
Twenty-five colonies were settled in Spain, (see Plin. Hist. Nat. iii. 3, 4; iv.
35;) and nine in Britain, of which London, Colchester, Lincoln, Chester,
Gloucester, and Bath still remain considerable cities. (See Richard of
Cirencester, p. 36, and Whittaker's History of Manchester, l. i. c.
3.)

[136]
Aul. Gel. Noctes Atticae, xvi 13. The Emperor Hadrian expressed his surprise,
that the cities of Utica, Gades, and Italica, which already enjoyed the rights
of Municipia, should solicit the title of colonies. Their example, however,
became fashionable, and the empire was filled with honorary colonies. See
Spanheim, de Usu Numismatum Dissertat. xiii.

[137]
The right of Latium conferred an exemption from the government of the Roman
praefect. Strabo states this distinctly, l. iv. p. 295, edit. Caesar's. See also
Walther, p. 233. - M

[138]
Spanheim, Orbis Roman. c. 8, p. 62.

[139]
Aristid. in Romae Encomio. tom. i. p. 218, edit. Jebb.

[140]
Tacit. Annal. xi. 23, 24. Hist. iv. 74.

[141]
See Plin. Hist. Natur. iii. 5. Augustin. de Civitate Dei, xix 7 Lipsius de
Pronunciatione Linguae Latinae, c. 3.

[142]
Apuleius and Augustin will answer for Africa; Strabo for Spain and Gaul;
Tacitus, in the life of Agricola, for Britain; and Velleius Paterculus, for
Pannonia. To them we may add the language of the Inscriptions.

Note: Mr. Hallam contests this assertion as regards
Britain. "Nor did the Romans ever establish their language - I know not whether
they wished to do so - in this island, as we perceive by that stubborn British
tongue which has survived two conquests." In his note, Mr. Hallam examines the
passage from Tacitus (Agric. xxi.) to which Gibbon refers. It merely asserts the
progress of Latin studies among the higher orders. (Midd. Ages, iii. 314.)
Probably it was a kind of court language, and that of public affairs and
prevailed in the Roman colonies. - M.

[143]
The Celtic was preserved in the mountains of Wales, Cornwall, and Armorica. We
may observe, that Apuleius reproaches an African youth, who lived among the
populace, with the use of the Punic; whilst he had almost forgot Greek, and
neither could nor would speak Latin, (Apolog. p. 596.) The greater part of St.
Austin's congregations were strangers to the Punic.

[144]
Spain alone produced Columella, the Senecas, Lucan, Martial, and
Quintilian.

[145]
There is not, I believe, from Dionysius to Libanus, a single Greek critic who
mentions Virgil or Horace. They seem ignorant that the Romans had any good
writers.

[146]
The curious reader may see in Dupin, (Bibliotheque Ecclesiastique, tom. xix. p.
1, c. 8,) how much the use of the Syriac and Egyptian languages was still
preserved.

[147]
See Juvenal, Sat. iii. and xv. Ammian. Marcellin. xxii. 16.

[148]
Dion Cassius, l. lxxvii. p. 1275. The first instance happened under the reign of
Septimius Severus.

[149]
See Valerius Maximus, l. ii. c. 2, n. 2. The emperor Claudius disfranchised an
eminent Grecian for not understanding Latin. He was probably in some public
office. Suetonius in Claud. c. 16.

Note: Causes seem to have been pleaded, even in the
senate, in both languages. Val. Max. loc. cit. Dion. l. lvii. c. 15. -
M

[150]
It was this which rendered the wars so sanguinary, and the battles so obstinate.
The immortal Robertson, in an excellent discourse on the state of the world at
the period of the establishment of Christianity, has traced a picture of the
melancholy effects of slavery, in which we find all the depth of his views and
the strength of his mind. I shall oppose successively some passages to the
reflections of Gibbon. The reader will see, not without interest, the truths
which Gibbon appears to have mistaken or voluntarily neglected, developed by one
of the best of modern historians. It is important to call them to mind here, in
order to establish the facts and their consequences with accuracy. I shall more
than once have occasion to employ, for this purpose, the discourse of
Robertson.

"Captives taken in war were, in all probability, the
first persons subjected to perpetual servitude; and, when the necessities or
luxury of mankind increased the demand for slaves, every new war recruited their
number, by reducing the vanquished to that wretched condition. Hence proceeded
the fierce and desperate spirit with which wars were carried on among ancient
nations. While chains and slavery were the certain lot of the conquered, battles
were fought, and towns defended with a rage and obstinacy which nothing but
horror at such a fate could have inspired; but, putting an end to the cruel
institution of slavery, Christianity extended its mild influences to the
practice of war, and that barbarous art, softened by its humane spirit, ceased
to be so destructive. Secure, in every event, of personal liberty, the
resistance of the vanquished became less obstinate, and the triumph of the
victor less cruel. Thus humanity was introduced into the exercise of war, with
which it appears to be almost incompatible; and it is to the merciful maxims of
Christianity, much more than to any other cause, that we must ascribe the little
ferocity and bloodshed which accompany modern victories." - G.

[151]
In the camp of Lucullus, an ox sold for a drachma, and a slave for four
drachmae, or about three shillings. Plutarch. in Lucull. p. 580.

Note: Above 100,000 prisoners were taken in the Jewish
war. - G. Hist. of Jews, iii. 71. According to a tradition preserved by S.
Jerom, after the insurrection in the time of Hadrian, they were sold as cheap as
horse. Ibid. 124. Compare Blair on Roman Slavery, p. 19. - M., and Dureau de la
blalle, Economie Politique des Romains, l. i. c. 15. But I cannot think that
this writer has made out his case as to the common price of an agricultural
slave being from 2000 to 2500 francs, (80l. to 100l.) He has overlooked the
passages which show the ordinary prices, (i. e. Hor. Sat. ii. vii. 45,) and
argued from extraordinary and exceptional cases. - M. 1845.

[152]
Diodorus Siculus in Eclog. Hist. l. xxxiv. and xxxvi. Florus, iii. 19,
20.

[153]
The following is the example: we shall see whether the word "severe" is here in
its place. "At the time in which L. Domitius was praetor in Sicily, a slave
killed a wild boar of extraordinary size. The praetor, struck by the dexterity
and courage of the man, desired to see him. The poor wretch, highly gratified
with the distinction, came to present himself before the praetor, in hopes, no
doubt, of praise and reward; but Domitius, on learning that he had only a
javelin to attack and kill the boar, ordered him to be instantly crucified,
under the barbarous pretext that the law prohibited the use of this weapon, as
of all others, to slaves." Perhaps the cruelty of Domitius is less astonishing
than the indifference with which the Roman orator relates this circumstance,
which affects him so little that he thus expresses himself: "Durum hoc fortasse
videatur, neque ego in ullam partem disputo." "This may appear harsh, nor do I
give any opinion on the subject." And it is the same orator who exclaims in the
same oration, "Facinus est cruciare civem Romanum; scelus verberare; prope
parricidium necare: quid dicam in crucem tollere?" "It is a crime to imprison a
Roman citizen; wickedness to scourge; next to parricide to put to death, what
shall I call it to crucify?"

In general, this passage of Gibbon on slavery, is full,
not only of blamable indifference, but of an exaggeration of impartiality which
resembles dishonesty. He endeavors to extenuate all that is appalling in the
condition and treatment of the slaves; he would make us consider those cruelties
as possibly "justified by necessity." He then describes, with minute accuracy,
the slightest mitigations of their deplorable condition; he attributes to the
virtue or the policy of the emperors the progressive amelioration in the lot of
the slaves; and he passes over in silence the most influential cause, that
which, after rendering the slaves less miserable, has contributed at length
entirely to enfranchise them from their sufferings and their chains, -
Christianity. It would be easy to accumulate the most frightful, the most
agonizing details, of the manner in which the Romans treated their slaves; whole
works have been devoted to the description. I content myself with referring to
them. Some reflections of Robertson, taken from the discourse already quoted,
will make us feel that Gibbon, in tracing the mitigation of the condition of the
slaves, up to a period little later than that which witnessed the establishment
of Christianity in the world, could not have avoided the acknowledgment of the
influence of that beneficent cause, if he had not already determined not to
speak of it.

"Upon establishing despotic government in the Roman
empire, domestic tyranny rose, in a short time, to an astonishing height. In
that rank soil, every vice, which power nourishes in the great, or oppression
engenders in the mean, thrived and grew up apace. * * * It is not the authority
of any single detached precept in the gospel, but the spirit and genius of the
Christian religion, more powerful than any particular command. which hath
abolished the practice of slavery throughout the world. The temper which
Christianity inspired was mild and gentle; and the doctrines it taught added
such dignity and lustre to human nature, as rescued it from the dishonorable
servitude into which it was sunk."

It is in vain, then, that Gibbon pretends to attribute
solely to the desire of keeping up the number of slaves, the milder conduct
which the Romans began to adopt in their favor at the time of the emperors. This
cause had hitherto acted in an opposite direction; how came it on a sudden to
have a different influence? "The masters," he says, "encouraged the marriage of
their slaves; * * * the sentiments of nature, the habits of education,
contributed to alleviate the hardships of servitude." The children of slaves
were the property of their master, who could dispose of or alienate them like
the rest of his property. Is it in such a situation, with such notions, that the
sentiments of nature unfold themselves, or habits of education become mild and
peaceful? We must not attribute to causes inadequate or altogether without
force, effects which require to explain them a reference to more influential
causes; and even if these slighter causes had in effect a manifest influence, we
must not forget that they are themselves the effect of a primary, a higher, and
more extensive cause, which, in giving to the mind and to the character a more
disinterested and more humane bias, disposed men to second or themselves to
advance, by their conduct, and by the change of manners, the happy results which
it tended to produce. - G.

I have retained the whole of M. Guizot's note, though,
in his zeal for the invaluable blessings of freedom and Christianity, he has
done Gibbon injustice. The condition of the slaves was undoubtedly improved
under the emperors. What a great authority has said, "The condition of a slave
is better under an arbitrary than under a free government," (Smith's Wealth of
Nations, iv. 7,) is, I believe, supported by the history of all ages and
nations. The protecting edicts of Hadrian and the Antonines are historical
facts, and can as little be attributed to the influence of Christianity, as the
milder language of heathen writers, of Seneca, (particularly Ep. 47,) of Pliny,
and of Plutarch. The latter influence of Christianity is admitted by Gibbon
himself. The subject of Roman slavery has recently been investigated with great
diligence in a very modest but valuable volume, by Wm. Blair, Esq., Edin. 1833.
May we be permitted. while on the subject, to refer to the most splendid passage
extant of Mr. Pitt's eloquence, the description of the Roman slave-dealer. on
the shores of Britain, condemning the island to irreclaimable barbarism, as a
perpetual and prolific nursery of slaves? Speeches, vol. ii. p. 80.

Gibbon, it should be added, was one of the first and
most consistent opponents of the African slave-trade. (See Hist. ch. xxv. and
Letters to Lor Sheffield, Misc. Works) - M.

[154]
See a remarkable instance of severity in Cicero in Verrem, v. 3.

[155]
An active slave-trade, which was carried on in many quarters, particularly the
Euxine, the eastern provinces, the coast of Africa, and British must be taken
into the account. Blair, 23 - 32. - M.

[156]
The Romans, as well in the first ages of the republic as later, allowed to their
slaves a kind of marriage, (contubernium: ) notwithstanding this, luxury made a
greater number of slaves in demand. The increase in their population was not
sufficient, and recourse was had to the purchase of slaves, which was made even
in the provinces of the East subject to the Romans. It is, moreover, known that
slavery is a state little favorable to population. (See Hume's Essay, and
Malthus on population, i. 334. - G.) The testimony of Appian (B.C. l. i. c. 7)
is decisive in favor of the rapid multiplication of the agricultural slaves; it
is confirmed by the numbers engaged in the servile wars. Compare also Blair, p.
119; likewise Columella l. viii. - M.

[157]
See in Gruter, and the other collectors, a great number of inscriptions
addressed by slaves to their wives, children, fellow-servants, masters, &c.
They are all most probably of the Imperial age.

[158]
See the Augustan History, and a Dissertation of M. de Burigny, in the xxxvth
volume of the Academy of Inscriptions, upon the Roman slaves.

[159]
See another Dissertation of M. de Burigny, in the xxxviith volume, on the Roman
freedmen.

[160]
Spanheim, Orbis Roman. l. i. c. 16, p. 124, &c.

[161]
Seneca de Clementia, l. i. c. 24. The original is much stronger, "Quantum
periculum immineret si servi nostri numerare nos coepissent."

[162]
See Pliny (Hist. Natur. l. xxxiii.) and Athenaeus (Deipnosophist. l. vi. p.
272.) The latter boldly asserts, that he knew very many Romans who possessed,
not for use, but ostentation, ten and even twenty thousand slaves.

[163]
In Paris there are not more than 43,000 domestics of every sort, and not a
twelfth part of the inhabitants. Messange, Recherches sui la Population, p.
186.

[164]
A learned slave sold for many hundred pounds sterling: Atticus always bred and
taught them himself. Cornel. Nepos in Vit. c. 13, [on the prices of slaves.
Blair, 149.] - M.

[165]
Many of the Roman physicians were slaves. See Dr. Middleton's Dissertation and
Defence.

[166]
Their ranks and offices are very copiously enumerated by Pignorius de
Servis.

[167]
Tacit. Annal. xiv. 43. They were all executed for not preventing their master's
murder.

Note: The remarkable speech of Cassius shows the proud
feelings of the Roman aristocracy on this subject. - M

[168]
Apuleius in Apolog. p. 548. edit. Delphin

[169]
Plin. Hist. Natur. l. xxxiii. 47.

[170]
According to Robertson, there were twice as many slaves as free citizens. - G.
Mr. Blair (p. 15) estimates three slaves to one freeman, between the conquest of
Greece, B.C. 146, and the reign of Alexander Severus, A. D. 222, 235. The
proportion was probably larger in Italy than in the provinces. - M. On the other
hand, Zumpt, in his Dissertation quoted below, (p. 86,) asserts it to be a gross
error in Gibbon to reckon the number of slaves equal to that of the free
population. The luxury and magnificence of the great, (he observes,) at the
commencement of the empire, must not be taken as the groundwork of calculations
for the whole Roman world. The agricultural laborer, and the artisan, in Spain,
Gaul, Britain, Syria, and Egypt, maintained himself, as in the present day, by
his own labor and that of his household, without possessing a single slave." The
latter part of my note was intended to suggest this consideration. Yet so
completely was slavery rooted in the social system, both in the east and the
west, that in the great diffusion of wealth at this time, every one, I doubt
not, who could afford a domestic slave, kept one; and generally, the number of
slaves was in proportion to the wealth. I do not believe that the cultivation of
the soil by slaves was confined to Italy; the holders of large estates in the
provinces would probably, either from choice or necessity, adopt the same mode
of cultivation. The latifundia, says Pliny, had ruined Italy, and had begun to
ruin the provinces. Slaves were no doubt employed in agricultural labor to a
great extent in Sicily, and were the estates of those six enormous landholders
who were said to have possessed the whole province of Africa, cultivated
altogether by free coloni? Whatever may have been the case in the rural
districts, in the towns and cities the household duties were almost entirely
discharged by slaves, and vast numbers belonged to the public establishments. I
do not, however, differ so far from Zumpt, and from M. Dureau de la Malle, as to
adopt the higher and bolder estimate of Robertson and Mr. Blair, rather than the
more cautious suggestions of Gibbon. I would reduce rather than increase the
proportion of the slave population. The very ingenious and elaborate
calculations of the French writer, by which he deduces the amount of the
population from the produce and consumption of corn in Italy, appear to me
neither precise nor satisfactory bases for such complicated political
arithmetic. I am least satisfied with his views as to the population of the city
of Rome; but this point will be more fitly reserved for a note on the
thirty-first chapter of Gibbon. The work, however, of M. Dureau de la Malle is
very curious and full on some of the minuter points of Roman statistics. - M.
1845.

[171]
Compute twenty millions in France, twenty-two in Germany, four in Hungary, ten
in Italy with its islands, eight in Great Britain and Ireland, eight in Spain
and Portugal, ten or twelve in the European Russia, six in Poland, six in Greece
and Turkey, four in Sweden, three in Denmark and Norway, four in the Low
Countries. The whole would amount to one hundred and five, or one hundred and
seven millions. See Voltaire, de l'Histoire Generale.

Note: The present population of Europe is estimated at
227,700,000. Malts Bran, Geogr. Trans edit. 1832 See details in the different
volumes Another authority, (Almanach de Gotha,) quoted in a recent English
publication, gives the following details: -

France, 32,897,521 Germany, (including Hungary,
Prussian and Austrian Poland,) 56,136,213 Italy, 20,548,616 Great Britain and
Ireland, 24,062,947 Spain and Portugal, 13,953,959 and 3,144,000 Russia,
including Poland, 44,220,600 Cracow, 128,480 Turkey, (including Pachalic of
Dschesair,) 9,545,300 Greece, 637,700 Ionian Islands, 208,100 Sweden and Norway,
3,914,963 Denmark, 2,012,998 Belgium, 3,533,538 Holland, 2,444,550 Switzerland,
985,000 Total, 219,344,116

Since the publication of my first annotated edition of
Gibbon, the subject of the population of the Roman empire has been investigated
by two writers of great industry and learning; Mons. Dureau de la Malle, in his
Economie Politique des Romains, liv. ii. c. 1. to 8, and M. Zumpt, in a
dissertation printed in the Transactions of the Berlin Academy, 1840. M. Dureau
de la Malle confines his inquiry almost entirely to the city of Rome, and Roman
Italy. Zumpt examines at greater length the axiom, which he supposes to have
been assumed by Gibbon as unquestionable, "that Italy and the Roman world was
never so populous as in the time of the Antonines." Though this probably was
Gibbon's opinion, he has not stated it so peremptorily as asserted by Mr. Zumpt.
It had before been expressly laid down by Hume, and his statement was
controverted by Wallace and by Malthus. Gibbon says (p. 84) that there is no
reason to believe the country (of Italy) less populous in the age of the
Antonines, than in that of Romulus; and Zumpt acknowledges that we have no
satisfactory knowledge of the state of Italy at that early age. Zumpt, in my
opinion with some reason, takes the period just before the first Punic war, as
that in which Roman Italy (all south of the Rubicon) was most populous. From
that time, the numbers began to diminish, at first from the enormous waste of
life out of the free population in the foreign, and afterwards in the civil
wars; from the cultivation of the soil by slaves; towards the close of the
republic, from the repugnance to marriage, which resisted alike the dread of
legal punishment and the offer of legal immunity and privilege; and from the
depravity of manners, which interfered with the procreation, the birth, and the
rearing of children. The arguments and the authorities of Zumpt are equally
conclusive as to the decline of population in Greece. Still the details, which
he himself adduces as to the prosperity and populousness of Asia Minor, and the
whole of the Roman East, with the advancement of the European provinces,
especially Gaul, Spain, and Britain, in civilization, and therefore in
populousness, (for I have no confidence in the vast numbers sometimes assigned
to the barbarous inhabitants of these countries,) may, I think, fairly
compensate for any deduction to be made from Gibbon's general estimate on
account of Greece and Italy. Gibbon himself acknowledges his own estimate to be
vague and conjectural; and I may venture to recommend the dissertation of Zumpt
as deserving respectful consideration. - M 1815.

[172]
Joseph. de Bell. Judaico, l. ii. c. 16. The oration of Agrippa, or rather of the
historian, is a fine picture of the Roman empire.

[173]
Sueton. in August. c. 28. Augustus built in Rome the temple and forum of Mars
the Avenger; the temple of Jupiter Tonans in the Capitol; that of Apollo
Palatine, with public libraries; the portico and basilica of Caius and Lucius;
the porticos of Livia and Octavia; and the theatre of Marcellus. The example of
the sovereign was imitated by his ministers and generals; and his friend Agrippa
left behind him the immortal monument of the Pantheon.

[174]
See Theatre Of Marcellus: Augustus built in Rome the theatre of
Marcellus.

[175]
See Maffei, Veroni Illustrata, l. iv. p. 68.

[176]
See the xth book of Pliny's Epistles. He mentions the following works carried on
at the expense of the cities. At Nicomedia, a new forum, an aqueduct, and a
canal, left unfinished by a king; at Nice, a gymnasium, and a theatre, which had
already cost near ninety thousand pounds; baths at Prusa and Claudiopolis, and
an aqueduct of sixteen miles in length for the use of Sinope.

[177]
Hadrian afterwards made a very equitable regulation, which divided all
treasure-trove between the right of property and that of discovery. Hist.
August. p. 9.

[178]
Philostrat. in Vit. Sophist. l. ii. p. 548.

[179]
Aulus Gellius, in Noct. Attic. i. 2, ix. 2, xviii. 10, xix. 12. Phil ostrat. p.
564.

[180]
The Odeum served for the rehearsal of new comedies as well as tragedies; they
were read or repeated, before representation, without music or decorations,
&c. No piece could be represented in the theatre if it had not been
previously approved by judges for this purpose. The king of Cappadocia who
restored the Odeum, which had been burnt by Sylla, was Araobarzanes. See
Martini, Dissertation on the Odeons of the Ancients, Leipsic. 1767, p. 10 - 91.
- W.

[181]
See Philostrat. l. ii. p. 548, 560. Pausanias, l. i. and vii. 10. The life of
Herodes, in the xxxth volume of the Memoirs of the Academy of
Inscriptions.

[182]
It is particularly remarked of Athens by Dicaearchus, de Statu Graeciae, p. 8,
inter Geographos Minores, edit. Hudson.

[183]
Donatus de Roma Vetere, l. iii. c. 4, 5, 6. Nardini Roma Antica, l. iii. 11, 12,
13, and a Ms. description of ancient Rome, by Bernardus Oricellarius, or
Rucellai, of which I obtained a copy from the library of the Canon Ricardi at
Florence. Two celebrated pictures of Timanthes and of Protogenes are mentioned
by Pliny, as in the Temple of Peace; and the Laocoon was found in the baths of
Titus.

[184]
The Emperor Vespasian, who had caused the Temple of Peace to be built,
transported to it the greatest part of the pictures, statues, and other works of
art which had escaped the civil tumults. It was there that every day the artists
and the learned of Rome assembled; and it is on the site of this temple that a
multitude of antiques have been dug up. See notes of Reimar on Dion Cassius,
lxvi. c. 15, p. 1083. - W.

[185]
Montfaucon l'Antiquite Expliquee, tom. iv. p. 2, l. i. c. 9. Fabretti has
composed a very learned treatise on the aqueducts of Rome.

[186]
Aelian. Hist. Var. lib. ix. c. 16. He lived in the time of Alexander Severus.
See Fabricius, Biblioth. Graeca, l. iv. c. 21.

[187]
This may in some degree account for the difficulty started by Livy, as to the
incredibly numerous armies raised by the small states around Rome where, in his
time, a scanty stock of free soldiers among a larger population of Roman slaves
broke the solitude. Vix seminario exiguo militum relicto servitia Romana ab
solitudine vindicant, Liv. vi. vii. Compare Appian Bel Civ. i. 7. - M. subst.
for G.

[188]
Joseph. de Bell. Jud. ii. 16. The number, however, is mentioned, and should be
received with a degree of latitude. Note: Without doubt no reliance can be
placed on this passage of Josephus. The historian makes Agrippa give advice to
the Jews, as to the power of the Romans; and the speech is full of declamation
which can furnish no conclusions to history. While enumerating the nations
subject to the Romans, he speaks of the Gauls as submitting to 1200 soldiers,
(which is false, as there were eight legions in Gaul, Tac. iv. 5,) while there
are nearly twelve hundred cities. - G. Josephus (infra) places these eight
legions on the Rhine, as Tacitus does. - M.

[189]
Plin. Hist. Natur. iii. 5.

[190]
Plin. Hist. Natur. iii. 3, 4, iv. 35. The list seems authentic and accurate; the
division of the provinces, and the different condition of the cities, are
minutely distinguished.

[191]
Strabon. Geograph. l. xvii. p. 1189.

[192]
Joseph. de Bell. Jud. ii. 16. Philostrat. in Vit. Sophist. l. ii. p. 548, edit.
Olear.

[193]
Tacit. Annal. iv. 55. I have taken some pains in consulting and comparing modern
travellers, with regard to the fate of those eleven cities of Asia. Seven or
eight are totally destroyed: Hypaepe, Tralles, Laodicea, Hium, Halicarnassus,
Miletus, Ephesus, and we may add Sardes. Of the remaining three, Pergamus is a
straggling village of two or three thousand inhabitants; Magnesia, under the
name of Guzelhissar, a town of some consequence; and Smyrna, a great city,
peopled by a hundred thousand souls. But even at Smyrna, while the Franks have
maintained a commerce, the Turks have ruined the arts.

[194]
See a very exact and pleasing description of the ruins of Laodicea, in
Chandler's Travels through Asia Minor, p. 225, &c.

[195]
Strabo, l. xii. p. 866. He had studied at Tralles.

[196]
See a Dissertation of M. de Boze, Mem. de l'Academie, tom. xviii. Aristides
pronounced an oration, which is still extant, to recommend concord to the rival
cities.

[197]
The inhabitants of Egypt, exclusive of Alexandria, amounted to seven millions
and a half, (Joseph. de Bell. Jud. ii. 16.) Under the military government of the
Mamelukes, Syria was supposed to contain sixty thousand villages, (Histoire de
Timur Bec, l. v. c. 20.)

[198]
The following Itinerary may serve to convey some idea of the direction of the
road, and of the distance between the principal towns.

I.
From the wall of Antoninus to York, 222 Roman miles.

II.
London, 22.

III.
Rhutupiae or Sandwich, 67.

IV.
The navigation to Boulogne, 45.

V.
Rheims, 174.

VI.
Lyons, 330.

VII.
Milan, 324.

VIII.
Rome, 426.

IX.
Brundusium, 360.

X.
The navigation to Dyrrachium, 40.

XI.
Byzantium, 71.

XII.
Ancyra, 283.

XIII.
Tarsus, 301.

XIV.
Antioch, 141.

XV.
Tyre, 252.

XVI.
Jerusalem, 168.

In all 4080 Roman, or 3740 English miles. See the
Itineraries published by Wesseling, his annotations; Gale and Stukeley for
Britain, and M. d'Anville for Gaul and Italy.

[199]
Montfaucon, l'Antiquite Expliquee, (tom. 4, p. 2, l. i. c. 5,) has described the
bridges of Narni, Alcantara, Nismes, &c.

[200]
Bergier, Histoire des grands Chemins de l'Empire Romain, l. ii. c. l. l -
28.

[201]
Procopius in Hist. Arcana, c. 30. Bergier, Hist. des grands Chemins, l. iv.
Codex Theodosian. l. viii. tit. v. vol. ii. p. 506 - 563 with Godefroy's learned
commentary.

[202]
In the time of Theodosius, Caesarius, a magistrate of high rank, went post from
Antioch to Constantinople. He began his journey at night, was in Cappadocia (165
miles from Antioch) the ensuing evening, and arrived at Constantinople the sixth
day about noon. The whole distance was 725 Roman, or 665 English miles. See
Libanius, Orat. xxii., and the Itineria, p. 572 - 581. Note: A courier is
mentioned in Walpole's Travels, ii. 335, who was to travel from Aleppo to
Constantinople, more than 700 miles, in eight days, an unusually short journey.
- M.

[203]
Posts for the conveyance of intelligence were established by Augustus. Suet.
Aug. 49. The couriers travelled with amazing speed. Blair on Roman Slavery,
note, p. 261. It is probable that the posts, from the time of Augustus, were
confined to the public service, and supplied by impressment Nerva, as it appears
from a coin of his reign, made an important change; "he established posts upon
all the public roads of Italy, and made the service chargeable upon his own
exchequer. * * Hadrian, perceiving the advantage of this improvement, extended
it to all the provinces of the empire." Cardwell on Coins, p. 220. -
M.

[204]
Pliny, though a favorite and a minister, made an apology for granting
post-horses to his wife on the most urgent business. Epist. x. 121,
122.

[205]
Bergier, Hist. des grands Chemins, l. iv. c. 49.

[206]
Plin. Hist. Natur. xix. i. [In Prooem.]

Note: Pliny says Puteoli, which seems to have been the
usual landing place from the East. See the voyages of St. Paul, Acts xxviii. 13,
and of Josephus, Vita, c. 3 - M.

[207]
See Remains Of Claudian
Aquaduct.

[208]
It is not improbable that the Greeks and Phoenicians introduced some new arts
and productions into the neighborhood of Marseilles and Gades.

[209]
See Homer, Odyss. l. ix. v. 358.

[210]
Plin. Hist. Natur. l. xiv.

[211]
Strab. Geograph. l. iv. p. 269. The intense cold of a Gallic winter was almost
proverbial among the ancients.

Note: Strabo only says that the grape does not ripen.
Attempts had been made in the time of Augustus to naturalize the vine in the
north of Gaul; but the cold was too great. Diod. Sic. edit. Rhodom. p. 304. - W.
Diodorus (lib. v. 26) gives a curious picture of the Italian traders bartering,
with the savages of Gaul, a cask of wine for a slave. - M.

It appears from the newly discovered treatise of Cicero
de Republica, that there was a law of the republic prohibiting the culture of
the vine and olive beyond the Alps, in order to keep up the value of those in
Italy. Nos justissimi homines, qui transalpinas gentes oleam et vitem serere non
sinimus, quo pluris sint nostra oliveta nostraeque vineae. Lib. iii. 9. The
restrictive law of Domitian was veiled under the decent pretext of encouraging
the cultivation of grain. Suet. Dom. vii. It was repealed by Probus Vopis
Strobus, 18. - M.

[212]
In the beginning of the fourth century, the orator Eumenius (Panegyr. Veter.
viii. 6, edit. Delphin.) speaks of the vines in the territory of Autun, which
were decayed through age, and the first plantation of which was totally unknown.
The Pagus Arebrignus is supposed by M. d'Anville to be the district of Beaune,
celebrated, even at present for one of the first growths of Burgundy.

Note: This is proved by a passage of Pliny the Elder,
where he speaks of a certain kind of grape (vitis picata. vinum picatum) which
grows naturally to the district of Vienne, and had recently been transplanted
into the country of the Arverni, (Auvergne,) of the Helvii, (the Vivarias.) and
the Burgundy and Franche Compte. Pliny wrote A.D. 77. Hist. Nat. xiv. 1. -
W.

[213]
Plin. Hist. Natur. l. xv.

[214]
Plin. Hist. Natur. l. xix.

[215]
See the agreeable Essays on Agriculture by Mr. Harte, in which he has collected
all that the ancients and moderns have said of Lucerne.

[216]
Tacit. Germania, c. 45. Plin. Hist. Nat. xxxvii. 13. The latter observed, with
some humor, that even fashion had not yet found out the use of amber. Nero sent
a Roman knight to purchase great quantities on the spot where it was produced,
the coast of modern Prussia.

[217]
Called Taprobana by the Romans, and Serindib by the Arabs. It was discovered
under the reign of Claudius, and gradually became the principal mart of the
East.

[218]
Plin. Hist. Natur. l. vi. Strabo, l. xvii.

[219]
Hist. August. p. 224. A silk garment was considered as an ornament to a woman,
but as a disgrace to a man.

[220]
The two great pearl fisheries were the same as at present, Ormuz and Cape
Comorin. As well as we can compare ancient with modern geography, Rome was
supplied with diamonds from the mine of Jumelpur, in Bengal, which is described
in the Voyages de Tavernier, tom. ii. p. 281.

[221]
Certainly not the only one. The Indians were not so contented with regard to
foreign productions. Arrian has a long list of European wares, which they
received in exchange for their own; Italian and other wines, brass, tin, lead,
coral, chrysolith, storax, glass, dresses of one or many colors, zones, &c.
See Periplus Maris Erythraei in Hudson, Geogr. Min. i. p. 27. - W. The German
translator observes that Gibbon has confined the use of aromatics to religious
worship and funerals. His error seems the omission of other spices, of which the
Romans must have consumed great quantities in their cookery. Wenck, however,
admits that silver was the chief article of exchange. - M.

In 1787, a peasant (near Nellore in the Carnatic)
struck, in digging, on the remains of a Hindu temple; he found, also, a pot
which contained Roman coins and medals of the second century, mostly Trajans,
Adrians, and Faustinas, all of gold, many of them fresh and beautiful, others
defaced or perforated, as if they had been worn as ornaments. (Asiatic
Researches, ii. 19.) - M.

[222]
Tacit. Annal. iii. 53. In a speech of Tiberius.

[223]
Plin. Hist. Natur. xii. 18. In another place he computes half that sum;
Quingenties H. S. for India exclusive of Arabia.

[224]
The proportion, which was 1 to 10, and 12 1/2, rose to 14 2/5, the legal
regulation of Constantine. See Arbuthnot's Tables of ancient Coins, c.
5.

[225]
Among many other passages, see Pliny, (Hist. Natur. iii. 5.) Aristides, (de Urbe
Roma,) and Tertullian, (de Anima, c. 30.)

[226]
Herodes Atticus gave the sophist Polemo above eight thousand pounds for three
declamations. See Philostrat. l. i. p. 538. The Antonines founded a school at
Athens, in which professors of grammar, rhetoric, politics, and the four great
sects of philosophy were maintained at the public expense for the instruction of
youth. The salary of a philosopher was ten thousand drachmae, between three and
four hundred pounds a year. Similar establishments were formed in the other
great cities of the empire. See Lucian in Eunuch. tom. ii. p. 352, edit. Reitz.
Philostrat. l. ii. p. 566. Hist. August. p. 21. Dion Cassius, l. lxxi. p. 1195.
Juvenal himself, in a morose satire, which in every line betrays his own
disappointment and envy, is obliged, however, to say, -

" - O Juvenes, circumspicit et stimulat vos.
Materiamque sibi Ducis indulgentia quaerit." - Satir. vii. 20. Note: Vespasian
first gave a salary to professors: he assigned to each professor of rhetoric,
Greek and Roman, centena sestertia. (Sueton. in Vesp. 18. Hadrian and the
Antonines, though still liberal, were less profuse. - G. from W. Suetonius wrote
annua centena L. 807, 5, 10. - M.

[227]
This judgment is rather severe: besides the physicians, astronomers, and
grammarians, among whom there were some very distinguished men, there were
still, under Hadrian, Suetonius, Florus, Plutarch; under the Antonines, Arrian,
Pausanias, Appian, Marcus Aurelius himself, Sextus Empiricus, &c.
Jurisprudence gained much by the labors of Salvius Julianus, Julius Celsus, Sex.
Pomponius, Caius, and others. - G. from W. Yet where, among these, is the writer
of original genius, unless, perhaps Plutarch? or even of a style really elegant?
- M.

[228]
Longin. de Sublim. c. 44, p. 229, edit. Toll. Here, too, we may say of Longinus,
"his own example strengthens all his laws." Instead of proposing his sentiments
with a manly boldness, he insinuates them with the most guarded caution; puts
them into the mouth of a friend, and as far as we can collect from a corrupted
text, makes a show of refuting them himself.

[229]
Often enough in the ages of superstition, but not in the interest of the people
or the state, but in that of the church to which all others were subordinate.
Yet the power of the pope has often been of great service in repressing the
excesses of sovereigns, and in softening manners. - W. The history of the
Italian republics proves the error of Gibbon, and the justice of his German
translator's comment. - M.

[230]
Orosius, vi. 18.

Note: Dion says twenty-five, (or three,) (lv. 23.) The
united triumvirs had but forty-three. (Appian. Bell. Civ. iv. 3.) The testimony
of Orosius is of little value when more certain may be had. - W. But all the
legions, doubtless, submitted to Augustus after the battle of Actium. -
M.

[231]
Julius Caesar introduced soldiers, strangers, and half- barbarians into the
senate (Sueton. in Caesar. c. 77, 80.) The abuse became still more scandalous
after his death.

[232]
Of these Dion and Suetonius knew nothing. - W. Dion says the contrary. -
M.

[233]
But Augustus, then Octavius, was censor, and in virtue of that office, even
according to the constitution of the free republic, could reform the senate,
expel unworthy members, name the Princeps Senatus, &c. That was called, as
is well known, Senatum legere. It was customary, during the free republic, for
the censor to be named Princeps Senatus, (S. Liv. l. xxvii. c. 11, l. xl. c.
51;) and Dion expressly says, that this was done according to ancient usage. He
was empowered by a decree of the senate to admit a number of families among the
patricians. Finally, the senate was not the legislative power. - W

[234]
Dion Cassius, l. liii. p. 693. Suetonius in August. c. 35.

[235]
Dion (l. liii. p. 698) gives us a prolix and bombast speech on this great
occasion. I have borrowed from Suetonius and Tacitus the general language of
Augustus.

[236]
Imperator (from which we have derived Emperor) signified under her republic no
more than general, and was emphatically bestowed by the soldiers, when on the
field of battle they proclaimed their victorious leader worthy of that title.
When the Roman emperors assumed it in that sense, they placed it after their
name, and marked how often they had taken it.

[237]
Dion. l. liii. p. 703, &c.

[238]
Livy Epitom. l. xiv. [c. 27.] Valer. Maxim. vi. 3.

[239]
See, in the viiith book of Livy, the conduct of Manlius Torquatus and Papirius
Cursor. They violated the laws of nature and humanity, but they asserted those
of military discipline; and the people, who abhorred the action, was obliged to
respect the principle.

[240]
By the lavish but unconstrained suffrages of the people, Pompey had obtained a
military command scarcely inferior to that of Augustus. Among the extraordinary
acts of power executed by the former we may remark the foundation of twenty-nine
cities, and the distribution of three or four millions sterling to his troops.
The ratification of his acts met with some opposition and delays in the senate
See Plutarch, Appian, Dion Cassius, and the first book of the epistles to
Atticus.

[241]
Under the commonwealth, a triumph could only be claimed by the general, who was
authorized to take the Auspices in the name of the people. By an exact
consequence, drawn from this principle of policy and religion, the triumph was
reserved to the emperor; and his most successful lieutenants were satisfied with
some marks of distinction, which, under the name of triumphal honors, were
invented in their favor.

[242]
This distinction is without foundation. The lieutenants of the emperor, who were
called Propraetors, whether they had been praetors or consuls, were attended by
six lictors; those who had the right of the sword, (of life and death over the
soldiers. - M.) bore the military habit (paludamentum) and the sword. The
provincial governors commissioned by the senate, who, whether they had been
consuls or not, were called Pronconsuls, had twelve lictors when they had been
consuls, and six only when they had but been praetors. The provinces of Africa
and Asia were only given to ex- consuls. See, on the Organization of the
Provinces, Dion, liii. 12, 16 Strabo, xvii 840.- W

[243]
Cicero (de Legibus, iii. 3) gives the consular office the name of egia potestas;
and Polybius (l. vi. c. 3) observes three powers in the Roman constitution. The
monarchical was represented and exercised by the consuls.

[244]
As the tribunitian power (distinct from the annual office) was first invented by
the dictator Caesar, (Dion, l. xliv. p. 384,) we may easily conceive, that it
was given as a reward for having so nobly asserted, by arms, the sacred rights
of the tribunes and people. See his own Commentaries, de Bell. Civil. l.
i.

[245]
Augustus exercised nine annual consulships without interruption. He then most
artfully refused the magistracy, as well as the dictatorship, absented himself
from Rome, and waited till the fatal effects of tumult and faction forced the
senate to invest him with a perpetual consulship. Augustus, as well as his
successors, affected, however, to conceal so invidious a title.

[246]
The note of M. Guizot on the tribunitian power applies to the French translation
rather than to the original. The former has, maintenir la balance toujours
egale, which implies much more than Gibbon's general expression. The note
belongs rather to the history of the Republic than that of the Empire. -
M

[247]
See a fragment of a Decree of the Senate, conferring on the emperor Vespasian
all the powers granted to his predecessors, Augustus, Tiberius, and Claudius.
This curious and important monument is published in Gruter's Inscriptions, No.
ccxlii.

Note: It is also in the editions of Tacitus by Ryck,
(Annal. p. 420, 421,) and Ernesti, (Excurs. ad lib. iv. 6;) but this fragment
contains so many inconsistencies, both in matter and form, that its authenticity
may be doubted - W.

[248]
Two consuls were created on the Calends of January; but in the course of the
year others were substituted in their places, till the annual number seems to
have amounted to no less than twelve. The praetors were usually sixteen or
eighteen, (Lipsius in Excurs. D. ad Tacit. Annal. l. i.) I have not mentioned
the Aediles or Quaestors Officers of the police or revenue easily adapt
themselves to any form of government. In the time of Nero, the tribunes legally
possessed the right of intercession, though it might be dangerous to exercise it
(Tacit. Annal. xvi. 26.) In the time of Trajan, it was doubtful whether the
tribuneship was an office or a name, (Plin. Epist. i. 23.)

[249]
The tyrants themselves were ambitious of the consulship. The virtuous princes
were moderate in the pursuit, and exact in the discharge of it. Trajan revived
the ancient oath, and swore before the consul's tribunal that he would observe
the laws, (Plin. Panegyric c. 64.)

[250]
Quoties Magistratuum Comitiis interesset. Tribus cum candidatis suis circunbat:
supplicabatque more solemni. Ferebat et ipse suffragium in tribubus, ut unus e
populo. Suetonius in August c. 56.

[251]
Tum primum Comitia e campo ad patres translata sunt. Tacit. Annal. i. 15. The
word primum seems to allude to some faint and unsuccessful efforts which were
made towards restoring them to the people. Note: The emperor Caligula made the
attempt: he rest red the Comitia to the people, but, in a short time, took them
away again. Suet. in Caio. c. 16. Dion. lix. 9, 20. Nevertheless, at the time of
Dion, they preserved still the form of the Comitia. Dion. lviii. 20. -
W.

[252]
Dion Cassius (l. liii. p. 703 - 714) has given a very loose and partial sketch
of the Imperial system. To illustrate and often to correct him, I have meditated
Tacitus, examined Suetonius, and consulted the following moderns: the Abbe de la
Bleterie, in the Memoires de l'Academie des Inscriptions, tom. xix. xxi. xxiv.
xxv. xxvii. Beaufort Republique Romaine, tom. i. p. 255 - 275. The Dissertations
of Noodt aad Gronovius de lege Regia, printed at Leyden, in the year 1731
Gravina de Imperio Romano, p. 479 - 544 of his Opuscula. Maffei, Verona
Illustrata, p. i. p. 245, &c.

[253]
A weak prince will always be governed by his domestics. The power of slaves
aggravated the shame of the Romans; and the senate paid court to a Pallas or a
Narcissus. There is a chance that a modern favorite may be a
gentleman.

[254]
See a treatise of Vandale de Consecratione Principium. It would be easier for me
to copy, than it has been to verify, the quotations of that learned
Dutchman.

[255]
This is inaccurate. The successors of Alexander were not the first deified
sovereigns; the Egyptians had deified and worshipped many of their kings; the
Olympus of the Greeks was peopled with divinities who had reigned on earth;
finally, Romulus himself had received the honors of an apotheosis (Tit. Liv. i.
16) a long time before Alexander and his successors. It is also an inaccuracy to
confound the honors offered in the provinces to the Roman governors, by temples
and altars, with the true apotheosis of the emperors; it was not a religious
worship, for it had neither priests nor sacrifices. Augustus was severely blamed
for having permitted himself to be worshipped as a god in the provinces, (Tac.
Ann. i. 10: ) he would not have incurred that blame if he had only done what the
governors were accustomed to do. - G. from W. M. Guizot has been guilty of a
still greater inaccuracy in confounding the deification of the living with the
apotheosis of the dead emperors. The nature of the king-worship of Egypt is
still very obscure; the hero-worship of the Greeks very different from the
adoration of the "praesens numen" in the reigning sovereign. - M.

[256]
See a dissertation of the Abbe Mongault in the first volume of the Academy of
Inscriptions.

[257]
Jurandasque tuum per nomen ponimus aras, says Horace to the emperor himself, and
Horace was well acquainted with the court of Augustus. Note: The good princes
were not those who alone obtained the honors of an apotheosis: it was conferred
on many tyrants. See an excellent treatise of Schaepflin, de Consecratione
Imperatorum Romanorum, in his Commentationes historicae et criticae. Bale, 1741,
p. 184. - W.

[258]
The curious satire in the works of Seneca, is the strongest remonstrance of
profaned religion. - M.

[259]
See Cicero in Philippic. i. 6. Julian in Caesaribus. Inque Deum templis jurabit
Roma per umbras, is the indignant expression of Lucan; but it is a patriotic
rather than a devout indignation.

[260]
Octavius was not of an obscure family, but of a considerable one of the
equestrian order. His father, C. Octavius, who possessed great property, had
been praetor, governor of Macedonia, adorned with the title of Imperator, and
was on the point of becoming consul when he died. His mother Attia, was daughter
of M. Attius Balbus, who had also been praetor. M. Anthony reproached Octavius
with having been born in Aricia, which, nevertheless, was a considerable
municipal city: he was vigorously refuted by Cicero. Philip. iii. c. 6. - W.
Gibbon probably meant that the family had but recently emerged into notice. -
M.

[261]
Dion. Cassius, l. liii. p. 710, with the curious Annotations of
Reimar.

[262]
The princes who by their birth or their adoption belonged to the family of the
Caesars, took the name of Caesar. After the death of Nero, this name designated
the Imperial dignity itself, and afterwards the appointed successor. The time at
which it was employed in the latter sense, cannot be fixed with certainty. Bach
(Hist. Jurisprud. Rom. 304) affirms from Tacitus, H. i. 15, and Suetonius,
Galba, 17, that Galba conferred on Piso Lucinianus the title of Caesar, and from
that time the term had this meaning: but these two historians simply say that he
appointed Piso his successor, and do not mention the word Caesar. Aurelius
Victor (in Traj. 348, ed. Artzen) says that Hadrian first received this title on
his adoption; but as the adoption of Hadrian is still doubtful, and besides
this, as Trajan, on his death-bed, was not likely to have created a new title
for his successor, it is more probable that Aelius Verus was the first who was
called Caesar when adopted by Hadrian. Spart. in Aelio Vero, 102.- W.

[263]
As Octavianus advanced to the banquet of the Caesars, his color changed like
that of the chameleon; pale at first, then red, afterwards black, he at last
assumed the mild livery of Venus and the Graces, (Caesars, p. 309.) This image,
employed by Julian in his ingenious fiction, is just and elegant; but when he
considers this change of character as real and ascribes it to the power of
philosophy, he does too much honor to philosophy and to Octavianus.

[264]
Two centuries after the establishment of monarchy, the emperor Marcus Antoninus
recommends the character of Brutus as a perfect model of Roman virtue.

Note: In a very ingenious essay, Gibbon has ventured to
call in question the preeminent virtue of Brutus. Misc Works, iv. 95. -
M.

[265]
It is much to be regretted that we have lost the part of Tacitus which treated
of that transaction. We are forced to content ourselves with the popular rumors
of Josephus, and the imperfect hints of Dion and Suetonius.

[266]
See The Capitol: When the throne was vacant by the murder of Caligula, the
consuls convoked that assembly in the Capitol.

[267]
Caligula perished by a conspiracy formed by the officers of the praetorian
troops, and Domitian would not, perhaps, have been assassinated without the
participation of the two chiefs of that guard in his death. - W.

[268]
Augustus restored the ancient severity of discipline. After the civil wars, he
dropped the endearing name of Fellow-Soldiers, and called them only Soldiers,
(Sueton. in August. c. 25.) See the use Tiberius made of the Senate in the
mutiny of the Pannonian legions, (Tacit. Annal. i.)

[269]
These words seem to have been the constitutional language. See Tacit. Annal.
xiii. 4.

Note: This panegyric on the soldiery is rather too
liberal. Claudius was obliged to purchase their consent to his coronation: the
presents which he made, and those which the praetorians received on other
occasions, considerably embarrassed the finances. Moreover, this formidable
guard favored, in general, the cruelties of the tyrants. The distant revolts
were more frequent than Gibbon thinks: already, under Tiberius, the legions of
Germany would have seditiously constrained Germanicus to assume the Imperial
purple. On the revolt of Claudius Civilis, under Vespasian, the legions of Gaul
murdered their general, and offered their assistance to the Gauls who were in
insurrection. Julius Sabinus made himself be proclaimed emperor, &c. The
wars, the merit, and the severe discipline of Trajan, Hadrian, and the two
Antonines, established, for some time, a greater degree of subordination. -
W

[270]
The first was Camillus Scribonianus, who took up arms in Dalmatia against
Claudius, and was deserted by his own troops in five days, the second, L.
Antonius, in Germany, who rebelled against Domitian; and the third, Avidius
Cassius, in the reign of M. Antoninus. The two last reigned but a few months,
and were cut off by their own adherents. We may observe, that both Camillus and
Cassius colored their ambition with the design of restoring the republic; a
task, said Cassius peculiarly reserved for his name and family.

[271]
Velleius Paterculus, l. ii. c. 121. Sueton. in Tiber. c. 26.

[272]
Sueton. in Tit. c. 6. Plin. in Praefat. Hist. Natur.

[273]
This idea is frequently and strongly inculcated by Tacitus. See Hist. i. 5, 16,
ii. 76.

[274]
The emperor Vespasian, with his usual good sense, laughed at the genealogists,
who deduced his family from Flavius, the founder of Reate, (his native country,)
and one of the companions of Hercules Suet in Vespasian, c. 12.

[275]
Dion, l. lxviii. p. 1121. Plin. Secund. in Panegyric.

[276]
Felicior Augusto, Melior Trajano. Eutrop. viii. 5.

[277]
Dion (l. lxix. p. 1249) affirms the whole to have been a fiction, on the
authority of his father, who, being governor of the province where Trajan died,
had very good opportunities of sifting this mysterious transaction. Yet Dodwell
(Praelect. Camden. xvii.) has maintained that Hadrian was called to the certain
hope of the empire, during the lifetime of Trajan.

[278]
Dion, (l. lxx. p. 1171.) Aurel. Victor.

[279]
The deification of Antinous, his medals, his statues, temples, city, oracles,
and constellation, are well known, and still dishonor the memory of Hadrian. Yet
we may remark, that of the first fifteen emperors, Claudius was the only one
whose taste in love was entirely correct. For the honors of Antinous, see
Spanheim, Commentaire sui les Caesars de Julien, p. 80.

[280]
Hist. August. p. 13. Aurelius Victor in Epitom.

[281]
Without the help of medals and inscriptions, we should be ignorant of this fact,
so honorable to the memory of Pius. Note: Gibbon attributes to Antoninus Pius a
merit which he either did not possess, or was not in a situation to display.

I.
He was adopted only on the condition that he would
adopt, in his turn, Marcus Aurelius and L. Verus.

II.
His two sons died children, and one of them, M.
Galerius, alone, appears to have survived, for a few years, his father's
coronation. Gibbon is also mistaken when he says (note 42) that "without the
help of medals and inscriptions, we should be ignorant that Antoninus had two
sons." Capitolinus says expressly, (c. 1,) Filii mares duo, duae-foeminae; we
only owe their names to he medals. Pagi. Cont. Baron, i. 33, edit Paris. -
W.

[282]
During the twenty-three years of Pius's reign, Marcus was only two nights absent
from the palace, and even those were at different times. Hist. August. p.
25.

[283]
He was fond of the theatre, and not insensible to the charms of the fair sex.
Marcus Antoninus, i. 16. Hist. August. p. 20, 21. Julian in Caesar.

[284]
The enemies of Marcus charged him with hypocrisy, and with a want of that
simplicity which distinguished Pius and even Verus. (Hist. August. 6, 34.) This
suspicions, unjust as it was, may serve to account for the superior applause
bestowed upon personal qualifications, in preference to the social virtues. Even
Marcus Antoninus has been called a hypocrite; but the wildest scepticism never
insinuated that Caesar might probably be a coward, or Tully a fool. Wit and
valor are qualifications more easily ascertained than humanity or the love of
justice.

[285]
Tacitus has characterized, in a few words, the principles of the portico:
Doctores sapientiae secutus est, qui sola bona quae honesta, main tantum quae
turpia; potentiam, nobilitatem, aeteraque extra... bonis neque malis adnumerant.
Tacit. Hist. iv. 5.

[286]
Before he went on the second expedition against the Germans, he read lectures of
philosophy to the Roman people, during three days. He had already done the same
in the cities of Greece and Asia. Hist. August. in Cassio, c. 3.

[287]
Cassius was murdered by his own partisans. Vulcat. Gallic. in Cassio, c. 7.
Dion, lxxi. c. 27. - W.

[288]
Dion, l. lxxi. p. 1190. Hist. August. in Avid. Cassio. Note: See one of the
newly discovered passages of Dion Cassius. Marcus wrote to the senate, who urged
the execution of the partisans of Cassius, in these words: "I entreat and
beseech you to preserve my reign unstained by senatorial blood. None of your
order must perish either by your desire or mine." Mai. Fragm. Vatican. ii. p.
224. - M.

[289]
Marcus would not accept the services of any of the barbarian allies who crowded
to his standard in the war against Avidius Cassius. “Barbarians," he said, with
wise but vain sagacity, "must not become acquainted with the dissensions of the
Roman people." Mai. Fragm Vatican l. 224. - M.

[290]
Hist. August. in Marc. Antonin. c. 18.

[291]
Vitellius consumed in mere eating at least six millions of our money in about
seven months. It is not easy to express his vices with dignity, or even decency.
Tacitus fairly calls him a hog, but it is by substituting for a coarse word a
very fine image. "At Vitellius, umbraculis hortorum abditus, ut ignava animalia,
quibus si cibum suggeras, jacent torpentque, praeterita, instantia, futura, pari
oblivione dimiserat. Atque illum nemore Aricino desidem et marcentum," &c.
Tacit. Hist. iii. 36, ii. 95. Sueton. in Vitell. c. 13. Dion. Cassius, l xv. p.
1062.

[292]
The execution of Helvidius Priscus, and of the virtuous Eponina, disgraced the
reign of Vespasian.

[293]
Voyage de Chardin en Perse, vol. iii. p. 293.

[294]
The practice of raising slaves to the great offices of state is still more
common among the Turks than among the Persians. The miserable countries of
Georgia and Circassia supply rulers to the greatest part of the East.

[295]
Chardin says, that European travellers have diffused among the Persians some
ideas of the freedom and mildness of our governments. They have done them a very
ill office.

[296]
They alleged the example of Scipio and Cato, (Tacit. Annal. iii. 66.) Marcellus
Epirus and Crispus Vibius had acquired two millions and a half under Nero. Their
wealth, which aggravated their crimes, protected them under Vespasian. See
Tacit. Hist. iv. 43. Dialog. de Orator. c. 8. For one accusation, Regulus, the
just object of Pliny's satire, received from the senate the consular ornaments,
and a present of sixty thousand pounds.

[297]
The crime of majesty was formerly a treasonable offence against the Roman
people. As tribunes of the people, Augustus and Tiberius applied tit to their
own persons, and extended it to an infinite latitude. Note: It was Tiberius, not
Augustus, who first took in this sense the words crimen laesae majestatis.
Bachii Trajanus, 27. - W.

[298]
After the virtuous and unfortunate widow of Germanicus had been put to death,
Tiberius received the thanks of the senate for his clemency. she had not been
publicly strangled; nor was the body drawn with a hook to the Gemoniae, where
those of common malefactors were exposed. See Tacit. Annal. vi. 25. Sueton. in
Tiberio c. 53.

[299]
Seriphus was a small rocky island in the Aegean Sea, the inhabitants of which
were despised for their ignorance and obscurity. The place of Ovid's exile is
well known, by his just, but unmanly lamentations. It should seem, that he only
received an order to leave Rome in so many days, and to transport himself to
Tomi. Guards and jailers were unnecessary.

[300]
Under Tiberius, a Roman knight attempted to fly to the Parthians. He was stopped
in the straits of Sicily; but so little danger did there appear in the example,
that the most jealous of tyrants disdained to punish it. Tacit. Annal. vi.
14.

[301]
Cicero ad Familiares, iv. 7.

[302]
See the complaints of Avidius Cassius, Hist. August. p. 45. These are, it is
true, the complaints of faction; but even faction exaggerates, rather than
invents.

[303]
His brother by adoption, and his colleague, L. Verus. Marcus Aurelius had no
other brother. - W.

[304]
Faustinam satis constat apud Cajetam conditiones sibi et nauticas et
gladiatorias, elegisse. Hist. August. p. 30. Lampridius explains the sort of
merit which Faustina chose, and the conditions which she exacted. Hist. August.
p. 102.

[305]
Hist. August. p. 34.

[306]
Meditat. l. i. The world has laughed at the credulity of Marcus but Madam Dacier
assures us, (and we may credit a lady,) that the husband will always be
deceived, if the wife condescends to dissemble.

[307]
Dion Cassius, l. lxxi. [c. 31,] p. 1195. Hist. August. p. 33. Commentaire de
Spanheim sur les Caesars de Julien, p. 289. The deification of Faustina is the
only defect which Julian's criticism is able to discover in the all-accomplished
character of Marcus.

[308]
Commodus was the first Porphyrogenitus, (born since his father's accession to
the throne.) By a new strain of flattery, the Egyptian medals date by the years
of his life; as if they were synonymous to those of his reign. Tillemont, Hist.
des Empereurs, tom. ii. p. 752.

[309]
Hist. August. p. 46.

[310]
Dion Cassius, l. lxxii. p. 1203.

[311]
According to Tertullian, Apolog. c. 25,) he died at Sirmium. But the situation
of Vindobona, or Vienna, where both the Victors place his death, is better
adapted to the operations of the war against the Marcomanni and Quadi.

[312]
Herodian, l. i. p. 12.

[313]
Herodian, l. i. p. 16.

[314]
This universal joy is well described (from the medals as well as historians) by
Mr. Wotton, Hist. of Rome, p. 192, 193.

[315]
Manilius, the confidential secretary of Avidius Cassius, was discovered after he
had lain concealed several years. The emperor nobly relieved the public anxiety
by refusing to see him, and burning his papers without opening them. Dion
Cassius, l. lxxii. p. 1209.

[316]
See Maffei degli Amphitheatri, p. 126.

[317]
Dion, l. lxxi. p. 1205 Herodian, l. i. p. 16 Hist. August p. 46.

[318]
The conspirators were senators, even the assassin himself. Herod. 81. -
G.

[319]
This work was on agriculture, and is often quoted by later writers. See P.
Needham, Proleg. ad Geoponic. Camb. 1704. - W.

[320]
In a note upon the Augustan History, Casaubon has collected a number of
particulars concerning these celebrated brothers. See p. 96 of his learned
commentary.

[321]
Dion, l. lxxii. p. 1210. Herodian, l. i. p. 22. Hist. August. p. 48. Dion gives
a much less odious character of Perennis, than the other historians. His
moderation is almost a pledge of his veracity. Note: Gibbon praises Dion for the
moderation with which he speaks of Perennis: he follows, nevertheless, in his
own narrative, Herodian and Lampridius. Dion speaks of Perennis not only with
moderation, but with admiration; he represents him as a great man, virtuous in
his life, and blameless in his death: perhaps he may be suspected of partiality;
but it is singular that Gibbon, having adopted, from Herodian and Lampridius,
their judgment on this minister, follows Dion's improbable account of his death.
What likelihood, in fact, that fifteen hundred men should have traversed Gaul
and Italy, and have arrived at Rome without any understanding with the
Praetorians, or without detection or opposition from Perennis, the Praetorian
praefect? Gibbon, foreseeing, perhaps, this difficulty, has added, that the
military deputation inflamed the divisions of the guards; but Dion says
expressly that they did not reach Rome, but that the emperor went out to meet
them: he even reproaches him for not having opposed them with the guards, who
were superior in number. Herodian relates that Commodus, having learned, from a
soldier, the ambitious designs of Perennis and his son, caused them to be
attacked and massacred by night. - G. from W. Dion's narrative is remarkably
circumstantial, and his authority higher than either of the other writers. He
hints that Cleander, a new favorite, had already undermined the influence of
Perennis. - M.

[322]
During the second Punic war, the Romans imported from Asia the worship of the
mother of the gods. Her festival, the Megalesia, began on the fourth of April,
and lasted six days. The streets were crowded with mad processions, the theatres
with spectators, and the public tables with unbidden guests. Order and police
were suspended, and pleasure was the only serious business of the city. See
Ovid. de Fastis, l. iv. 189, &c.

[323]
Herodian, l. i. p. 23, 23.

[324]
Cicero pro Flacco, c. 27.

[325]
One of these dear-bought promotions occasioned a current... that Julius Solon
was banished into the senate.

[326]
Dion (l. lxxii. p. 12, 13) observes, that no freedman had possessed riches equal
to those of Cleander. The fortune of Pallas amounted, however, to upwards of
five and twenty hundred thousand pounds; Ter millies.

[327]
Dion, l. lxxii. p. 12, 13. Herodian, l. i. p. 29. Hist. August. p. 52. These
baths were situated near the Porta Capena. See Nardini Roma Antica, p.
79.

[328]
Hist. August. p. 79.

[329]
Herodian, l. i. p. 28. Dion, l. lxxii. p. 1215. The latter says that two
thousand persons died every day at Rome, during a considerable length of
time.

[330]
Tuneque primum tres praefecti praetorio fuere: inter quos libertinus. From some
remains of modesty, Cleander declined the title, whilst he assumed the powers,
of Praetorian praefect. As the other freedmen were styled, from their several
departments, a rationibus, ab epistolis, Cleander called himself a pugione, as
intrusted with the defence of his master's person. Salmasius and Casaubon seem
to have talked very idly upon this passage.

Note: M. Guizot denies that Lampridius means Cleander
as praefect a pugione. The Libertinus seems to me to mean him. - M.

[331]
Herodian, l. i. p. 31. It is doubtful whether he means the Praetorian infantry,
or the cohortes urbanae, a body of six thousand men, but whose rank and
discipline were not equal to their numbers. Neither Tillemont nor Wotton choose
to decide this question.

[332]
Dion Cassius, l. lxxii. p. 1215. Herodian, l. i. p. 32. Hist. August. p.
48.

[333]
Sororibus suis constupratis. Ipsas concubinas suas sub oculis ...stuprari
jubebat. Nec irruentium in se juvenum carebat infamia, omni parte corporis atque
ore in sexum utrumque pollutus. Hist. Aug. p. 47.

[334]
The African lions, when pressed by hunger, infested the open villages and
cultivated country; and they infested them with impunity. The royal beast was
reserved for the pleasures of the emperor and the capital; and the unfortunate
peasant who killed one of them though in his own defence, incurred a very heavy
penalty. This extraordinary game-law was mitigated by Honorius, and finally
repealed by Justinian. Codex Theodos. tom. v. p. 92, et Comment
Gothofred.

[335]
Spanheim de Numismat. Dissertat. xii. tom. ii. p. 493.

[336]
Commodus placed his own head on the colossal statue of Hercules with the
inscription, Lucius Commodus Hercules. The wits of Rome, according to a new
fragment of Dion, published an epigram, of which, like many other ancient jests,
the point is not very clear. It seems to be a protest of the god against being
confounded with the emperor. Mai Fragm. Vatican. ii. 225. - M.

[337]
Dion, l. lxxii. p. 1216. Hist. August. p. 49.

[338]
The ostrich's neck is three feet long, and composed of seventeen vertebrae. See
Buffon, Hist. Naturelle.

[339]
Commodus killed a camelopardalis or Giraffe, (Dion, l. lxxii. p. 1211,) the
tallest, the most gentle, and the most useless of the large quadrupeds. This
singular animal, a native only of the interior parts of Africa, has not been
seen in Europe since the revival of letters; and though M. de Buffon (Hist.
Naturelle, tom. xiii.) has endeavored to describe, he has not ventured to
delineate, the Giraffe.

Note: The naturalists of our days have been more
fortunate. London probably now contains more specimens of this animal than have
been seen in Europe since the fall of the Roman empire, unless in the pleasure
gardens of the emperor Frederic II., in Sicily, which possessed several.
Frederic's collections of wild beasts were exhibited, for the popular amusement,
in many parts of Italy. Raumer, Geschichte der Hohenstaufen, v. iii. p. 571.
Gibbon, moreover, is mistaken; as a giraffe was presented to Lorenzo de Medici,
either by the sultan of Egypt or the king of Tunis. Contemporary authorities are
quoted in the old work, Gesner de Quadrupedibum p. 162. - M.

[340]
Herodian, l. i. p. 37. Hist. August. p. 50.

[341]
The virtuous and even the wise princes forbade the senators and knights to
embrace this scandalous profession, under pain of infamy, or, what was more
dreaded by those profligate wretches, of exile. The tyrants allured them to
dishonor by threats and rewards. Nero once produced in the arena forty senators
and sixty knights. See Lipsius, Saturnalia, l. ii. c. 2. He has happily
corrected a passage of Suetonius in Nerone, c. 12.

[342]
Lipsius, l. ii. c. 7, 8. Juvenal, in the eighth satire, gives a picturesque
description of this combat.

[343]
Hist. August. p. 50. Dion, l. lxxii. p. 1220. He received, for each time,
decies, about 8000l. sterling.

[344]
Victor tells us, that Commodus only allowed his antagonists a ...weapon,
dreading most probably the consequences of their despair.

[345]
They were obliged to repeat, six hundred and twenty-six times, Paolus first of
the Secutors, &c.

[346]
Dion, l. lxxii. p. 1221. He speaks of his own baseness and danger.

[347]
He mixed, however, some prudence with his courage, and passed the greatest part
of his time in a country retirement; alleging his advanced age, and the weakness
of his eyes. "I never saw him in the senate," says Dion, "except during the
short reign of Pertinax." All his infirmities had suddenly left him, and they
returned as suddenly upon the murder of that excellent prince. Dion, l. lxxiii.
p. 1227.

[348]
The prefects were changed almost hourly or daily; and the caprice of Commodus
was often fatal to his most favored chamberlains. Hist. August. p. 46,
51.

[349]
Commodus had already resolved to massacre them the following night they
determined o anticipate his design. Herod. i. 17. - W.

[350]
Dion, l. lxxii. p. 1222. Herodian, l. i. p. 43. Hist. August. p. 52.

[351]
Pertinax was a native of Alba Pompeia, in Piedmont, and son of a timber
merchant. The order of his employments (it is marked by Capitolinus) well
deserves to be set down, as expressive of the form of government and manners of
the age.

I.
He was a centurion.

II.
Praefect of a cohort in Syria, in the Parthian war, and
in Britain.

III.
He obtained an Ala, or squadron of horse, in Maesia.

IV.
He was commissary of provisions on the Aemilian way.

V.
He commanded the fleet upon the Rhine.

VI.
He was procurator of Dacia, with a salary of about
1600l. a year.

VII.
He commanded the veterans of a legion.

VIII.
He obtained the rank of senator.

IX.
Of praetor.

X.
With the command of the first legion in Rhaetia and
Noricum.

XI.
He was consul about the year 175.

XII.
He attended Marcus into the East.

XIII.
He commanded an army on the Danube.

XIV.
He was consular legate of Maesia.

XV.
Of Dacia.

XVI.
Of Syria.

XVII.     Of Britain.

XVIII.   He had
the care of the public provisions at Rome.

XIX.
He was proconsul of Africa.

XX.
Praefect of the city.

Herodian (l. i. p. 48) does justice to his
disinterested spirit; but Capitolinus, who collected every popular rumor,
charges him with a great fortune acquired by bribery and corruption.

[352]
Julian, in the Caesars, taxes him with being accessory to the death of
Commodus.

[353]
The senate always assembled at the beginning of the year, on the night of the
1st January, (see Savaron on Sid. Apoll. viii. 6,) and this happened the present
year, as usual, without any particular order. - G from W.

[354]
What Gibbon improperly calls, both here and in the note, tumultuous decrees,
were no more than the applauses and acclamations which recur so often in the
history of the emperors. The custom passed from the theatre to the forum, from
the forum to the senate. Applauses on the adoption of the Imperial decrees were
first introduced under Trajan. (Plin. jun. Panegyr. 75.) One senator read the
form of the decree, and all the rest answered by acclamations, accompanied with
a kind of chant or rhythm. These were some of the acclamations addressed to
Pertinax, and against the memory of Commodus. Hosti patriae honores detrahantur.
Parricidae honores detrahantur. Ut salvi simus, Jupiter, optime, maxime, serva
nobis Pertinacem. This custom prevailed not only in the councils of state, but
in all the meetings of the senate. However inconsistent it may appear with the
solemnity of a religious assembly, the early Christians adopted and introduced
it into their synods, notwithstanding the opposition of some of the Fathers,
particularly of St. Chrysostom. See the Coll. of Franc. Bern. Ferrarius de
veterum acclamatione in Graevii Thesaur. Antiq. Rom. i. 6. - W. This note is
rather hypercritical, as regards Gibbon, but appears to be worthy of
preservation. - M.

[355]
Capitolinus gives us the particulars of these tumultuary votes, which were moved
by one senator, and repeated, or rather chanted by the whole body. Hist. August.
p. 52.

[356]
The senate condemned Nero to be put to death more majorum. Sueton. c.
49.

[357]
No particular law assigned this right to the senate: it was deduced from the
ancient principles of the republic. Gibbon appears to infer, from the passage of
Suetonius, that the senate, according to its ancient right, punished Nero with
death. The words, however, more majerum refer not to the decree of the senate,
but to the kind of death, which was taken from an old law of Romulus. (See
Victor. Epit. Ed. Artzen p. 484, n. 7. - W.

[358]
Dion (l. lxxiii. p. 1223) speaks of these entertainments, as a senator who had
supped with the emperor; Capitolinus, (Hist. August. p. 58,) like a slave, who
had received his intelligence from one the scullions.

[359]
Decies. The blameless economy of Pius left his successors a treasure of vicies
septies millies, above two and twenty millions sterling. Dion, l. lxxiii. p.
1231.

[360]
Besides the design of converting these useless ornaments into money, Dion (l.
lxxiii. p. 1229) assigns two secret motives of Pertinax. He wished to expose the
vices of Commodus, and to discover by the purchasers those who most resembled
him.

[361]
Though Capitolinus has picked up many idle tales of the private life of
Pertinax, he joins with Dion and Herodian in admiring his public
conduct.

[362]
Leges, rem surdam, inexorabilem esse. T. Liv. ii. 3.

[363]
If we credit Capitolinus, (which is rather difficult,) Falco behaved with the
most petulant indecency to Pertinax, on the day of his accession. The wise
emperor only admonished him of his youth and in experience. Hist. August. p.
55.

[364]
The modern bishopric of Liege. This soldier probably belonged to the Batavian
horse-guards, who were mostly raised in the duchy of Gueldres and the
neighborhood, and were distinguished by their valor, and by the boldness with
which they swam their horses across the broadest and most rapid rivers. Tacit.
Hist. iv. 12 Dion, l. lv p. 797 Lipsius de magnitudine Romana, l. i. c.
4.

[365]
Dion, l. lxxiii. p. 1232. Herodian, l. ii. p. 60. Hist. August. p. 58. Victor in
Epitom. et in Caesarib. Eutropius, viii. 16.

[366]
They were originally nine or ten thousand men, (for Tacitus and son are not
agreed upon the subject,) divided into as many cohorts. Vitellius increased them
to sixteen thousand, and as far as we can learn from inscriptions, they never
afterwards sunk much below that number. See Lipsius de magnitudine Romana, i.
4.

[367]
Sueton. in August. c. 49.

[368]
Tacit. Annal. iv. 2. Sueton. in Tiber. c. 37. Dion Cassius, l. lvii. p.
867.

[369]
In the civil war between Vitellius and Vespasian, the Praetorian camp was
attacked and defended with all the machines used in the siege of the best
fortified cities. Tacit. Hist. iii. 84.

[370]
Close to the walls of the city, on the broad summit of the Quirinal and Viminal
hills. See Nardini Roma Antica, p. 174. Donatus de Roma Antiqua, p. 46.

Note: Not on both these hills: neither Donatus nor
Nardini justify this position. (Whitaker's Review. p. 13.) At the northern
extremity of this hill (the Viminal) are some considerable remains of a walled
enclosure which bears all the appearance of a Roman camp, and therefore is
generally thought to correspond with the Castra Praetoria. Cramer's Italy 390. -
M.

[371]
Claudius, raised by the soldiers to the empire, was the first who gave a
donative. He gave quina dena, 120l. (Sueton. in Claud. c. 10: ) when Marcus,
with his colleague Lucius Versus, took quiet possession of the throne, he gave
vicena, 160l. to each of the guards. Hist. August. p. 25, (Dion, l. lxxiii. p.
1231.) We may form some idea of the amount of these sums, by Hadrian's complaint
that the promotion of a Caesar had cost him ter millies, two millions and a half
sterling.

[372]
Cicero de Legibus, iii. 3. The first book of Livy, and the second of Dionysius
of Halicarnassus, show the authority of the people, even in the election of the
kings.

[373]
They were originally recruited in Latium, Etruria, and the old colonies, (Tacit.
Annal. iv. 5.) The emperor Otho compliments their vanity with the flattering
titles of Italiae, Alumni, Romana were juventus. Tacit. Hist. i. 84.

[374]
In the siege of Rome by the Gauls. See Livy, v. 48. Plutarch. in Camill. p.
143.

[375]
Dion, L. lxxiii. p. 1234. Herodian, l. ii. p. 63. Hist. August p. 60. Though the
three historians agree that it was in fact an auction, Herodian alone affirms
that it was proclaimed as such by the soldiers.

[376]
Spartianus softens the most odious parts of the character and elevation of
Julian.

[377]
One of the principal causes of the preference of Julianus by the soldiers, was
the dexterity with which he reminded them that Sulpicianus would not fail to
revenge on them the death of his son-in-law. (See Dion, p. 1234, 1234. c. 11.
Herod. ii. 6.) - W.

[378]
Dion Cassius, at that time praetor, had been a personal enemy to Julian, i.
lxxiii. p. 1235.

[379]
Hist. August. p. 61. We learn from thence one curious circumstance, that the new
emperor, whatever had been his birth, was immediately aggregated to the number
of patrician families. Note: A new fragment of Dion shows some shrewdness in the
character of Julian. When the senate voted him a golden statue, he preferred one
of brass, as more lasting. He "had always observed," he said, "that the statues
of former emperors were soon destroyed. Those of brass alone remained." The
indignant historian adds that he was wrong. The virtue of sovereigns alone
preserves their images: the brazen statue of Julian was broken to pieces at his
death. Mai. Fragm. Vatican. p. 226. - M.

[380]
Dion, l. lxxiii. p. 1235. Hist. August. p. 61. I have endeavored to blend into
one consistent story the seeming contradictions of the two writers.

Note: The contradiction as M. Guizot observed, is
irreconcilable. He quotes both passages: in one Julianus is represented as a
miser, in the other as a voluptuary. In the one he refuses to eat till the body
of Pertinax has been buried; in the other he gluts himself with every luxury
almost in the sight of his headless remains. - M.

[381]
Dion, l. lxxiii. p. 1235.

[382]
The Posthumian and the Ce'onian; the former of whom was raised to the consulship
in the fifth year after its institution.

[383]
Spartianus, in his undigested collections, mixes up all the virtues and all the
vices that enter into the human composition, and bestows them on the same
object. Such, indeed are many of the characters in the Augustan
History.

[384]
Hist. August. p. 80, 84.

[385]
Pertinax, who governed Britain a few years before, had been left for dead, in a
mutiny of the soldiers. Hist. August. p 54. Yet they loved and regretted him;
admirantibus eam virtutem cui irascebantur.

[386]
Sueton. in Galb. c. 10.

[387]
Hist. August. p. 76.

[388]
Herod. l. ii. p. 68. The Chronicle of John Malala, of Antioch, shows the zealous
attachment of his countrymen to these festivals, which at once gratified their
superstition, and their love of pleasure.

[389]
A king of Thebes, in Egypt, is mentioned, in the Augustan History, as an ally,
and, indeed, as a personal friend of Niger. If Spartianus is not, as I strongly
suspect, mistaken, he has brought to light a dynasty of tributary princes
totally unknown to history.

[390]
Dion, l. lxxiii. p. 1238. Herod. l. ii. p. 67. A verse in every one's mouth at
that time, seems to express the general opinion of the three rivals; Optimus est
Niger, [Fuscus, which preserves the quantity. - M.] bonus After, pessimus Albus.
Hist. August. p. 75.

[391]
Herodian, l. ii. p. 71.

[392]
See an account of that memorable war in Velleius Paterculus, is 110, &c.,
who served in the army of Tiberius.

[393]
Such is the reflection of Herodian, l. ii. p. 74. Will the modern Austrians
allow the influence?

[394]
In the letter to Albinus, already mentioned, Commodus accuses Severus, as one of
the ambitious generals who censured his conduct, and wished to occupy his place.
Hist. August. p. 80.

[395]
Pannonia was too poor to supply such a sum. It was probably promised in the
camp, and paid at Rome, after the victory. In fixing the sum, I have adopted the
conjecture of Casaubon. See Hist. August. p. 66. Comment. p. 115.

[396]
Herodian, l. ii. p. 78. Severus was declared emperor on the banks of the Danube,
either at Carnuntum, according to Spartianus, (Hist. August. p. 65,) or else at
Sabaria, according to Victor. Mr. Hume, in supposing that the birth and dignity
of Severus were too much inferior to the Imperial crown, and that he marched
into Italy as general only, has not considered this transaction with his usual
accuracy, (Essay on the original contract.)

Note: Carnuntum, opposite to the mouth of the Morava:
its position is doubtful, either Petronel or Haimburg. A little intermediate
village seems to indicate by its name (Altenburg) the site of an old town.
D'Anville Geogr. Anc. Sabaria, now Sarvar. - G. Compare note 37. - M.

[397]
Velleius Paterculus, l. ii. c. 3. We must reckon the march from the nearest
verge of Pannonia, and extend the sight of the city as far as two hundred
miles.

[398]
This is not a puerile figure of rhetoric, but an allusion to a real fact
recorded by Dion, l. lxxi. p. 1181. It probably happened more than
once.

[399]
Dion, l. lxxiii. p. 1233. Herodian, l. ii. p. 81. There is no surer proof of the
military skill of the Romans, than their first surmounting the idle terror, and
afterwards disdaining the dangerous use, of elephants in war.

Note: These elephants were kept for processions,
perhaps for the games. Se Herod. in loc. - M.

[400]
Hist. August. p. 62, 63.

Note: Quae ad speculum dicunt fieri in quo pueri
praeligatis oculis, incantate..., respicere dicuntur. * * * Tuncque puer vidisse
dicitur et adventun Severi et Juliani decessionem. This seems to have been a
practice somewhat similar to that of which our recent Egyptian travellers relate
such extraordinary circumstances. See also Apulius, Orat. de Magia. -
M.

[401]
Victor and Eutropius, viii. 17, mention a combat near the Milvian bridge, the
Ponte Molle, unknown to the better and more ancient writers.

[402]
Dion, l. lxxiii. p. 1240. Herodian, l. ii. p. 83. Hist. August. p. 63.

[403]
From these sixty-six days, we must first deduct sixteen, as Pertinax was
murdered on the 28th of March, and Severus most probably elected on the 13th of
April, (see Hist. August. p. 65, and Tillemont, Hist. des Empereurs, tom. iii.
p. 393, note 7.) We cannot allow less than ten days after his election, to put a
numerous army in motion. Forty days remain for this rapid march; and as we may
compute about eight hundred miles from Rome to the neighborhood of Vienna, the
army of Severus marched twenty miles every day, without halt or
intermission.

[404]
Dion, l. lxxiv. p. 1241. Herodian, l. ii. p. 84.

[405]
Dion, (l. lxxiv. p. 1244,) who assisted at the ceremony as a senator, gives a
most pompous description of it.

[406]
Herodian, l. iii. p. 112

[407]
Though it is not, most assuredly, the intention of Lucan to exalt the character
of Caesar, yet the idea he gives of that hero, in the tenth book of the
Pharsalia, where he describes him, at the same time, making love to Cleopatra,
sustaining a siege against the power of Egypt, and conversing with the sages of
the country, is, in reality, the noblest panegyric.

Note: Lord Byron wrote, no doubt, from a reminiscence
of that passage - "It is possible to be a very great man, and to be still very
inferior to Julius Caesar, the most complete character, so Lord Bacon thought,
of all antiquity. Nature seems incapable of such extraordinary combinations as
composed his versatile capacity, which was the wonder even of the Romans
themselves. The first general; the only triumphant politician; inferior to none
in point of eloquence; comparable to any in the attainments of wisdom, in an age
made up of the greatest commanders, statesmen, orators, and philosophers, that
ever appeared in the world; an author who composed a perfect specimen of
military annals in his travelling carriage; at one time in a controversy with
Cato, at another writing a treatise on punuing, and collecting a set of good
sayings; fighting and making love at the same moment, and willing to abandon
both his empire and his mistress for a sight of the fountains of the Nile. Such
did Julius Caesar appear to his contemporaries, and to those of the subsequent
ages who were the most inclined to deplore and execrate his fatal genius." Note
47 to Canto iv. of Childe Harold. - M.

[408]
Reckoning from his election, April 13, 193, to the death of Albinus, February
19, 197. See Tillemont's Chronology.

[409]
Herodian, l. ii. p. 85.

[410]
Whilst Severus was very dangerously ill, it was industriously given out, that he
intended to appoint Niger and Albinus his successors. As he could not be sincere
with respect to both, he might not be so with regard to either. Yet Severus
carried his hypocrisy so far, as to profess that intention in the memoirs of his
own life.

[411]
Hist. August. p. 65.

[412]
This practice, invented by Commodus, proved very useful to Severus. He found at
Rome the children of many of the principal adherents of his rivals; and he
employed them more than once to intimidate, or seduce, the parents.

[413]
Herodian, l. iii. p. 95. Hist. August. p. 67, 68.

[414]
Hist. August. p. 84. Spartianus has inserted this curious letter at full
length.

[415]
There were three actions; one near Cyzicus, on the Hellespont, one near Nice, in
Bithynia, the third near the Issus, in Cilicia, where Alexander conquered
Darius. (Dion, lxiv. c. 6. Herodian, iii. 2, 4.) - W Herodian represents the
second battle as of less importance than Dion - M.

[416]
Consult the third book of Herodian, and the seventy-fourth book of Dion
Cassius.

[417]
Dion, l. lxxv. p. 1260.

[418]
Dion, l. lxxv. p. 1261. Herodian, l. iii. p. 110. Hist. August. p. 68. The
battle was fought in the plain of Trevoux, three or four leagues from Lyons. See
Tillemont, tom. iii. p. 406, note 18.

[419]
According to Herodian, it was his lieutenant Laetus who led back the troops to
the battle, and gained the day, which Severus had almost lost. Dion also
attributes to Laetus a great share in the victory. Severus afterwards put him to
death, either from fear or jealousy. - W. and G. Wenck and M. Guizot have not
given the real statement of Herodian or of Dion. According to the former, Laetus
appeared with his own army entire, which he was suspected of having designedly
kept disengaged when the battle was still doubtful, or rather after the rout of
Severus. Dion says that he did not move till Severus had won the victory. -
M.

[420]
Montesquieu, Considerations sur la Grandeur et la Decadence des Romains, c.
xiii.

[421]
Most of these, as may be supposed, were small open vessels; some, however, were
galleys of two, and a few of three ranks of oars.

[422]
The engineer's name was Priscus. His skill saved his life, and he was taken into
the service of the conqueror. For the particular facts of the siege, consult
Dion Cassius (l. lxxv. p. 1251) and Herodian, (l. iii. p. 95;) for the theory of
it, the fanciful chevalier de Folard may be looked into. See Polybe, tom. i. p.
76.

[423]
: Notwithstanding the authority of Spartianus, and some modern Greeks, we may be
assured, from Dion and Herodian, that Byzantium, many years after the death of
Severus, lay in ruins.

[424]
There is no contradiction between the relation of Dion and that of Spartianus
and the modern Greeks. Dion does not say that Severus destroyed Byzantium, but
that he deprived it of its franchises and privileges, stripped the inhabitants
of their property, razed the fortifications, and subjected the city to the
jurisdiction of Perinthus. Therefore, when Spartian, Suidas, Cedrenus, say that
Severus and his son Antoninus restored to Byzantium its rights and franchises,
ordered temples to be built, &c., this is easily reconciled with the
relation of Dion. Perhaps the latter mentioned it in some of the fragments of
his history which have been lost. As to Herodian, his expressions are evidently
exaggerated, and he has been guilty of so many inaccuracies in the history of
Severus, that we have a right to suppose one in this passage. - G. from W Wenck
and M. Guizot have omitted to cite Zosimus, who mentions a particular portico
built by Severus, and called, apparently, by his name. Zosim. Hist. ii. c. xxx.
p. 151, 153, edit Heyne. - M.

[425]
Dion, l. lxxiv. p. 1250.

[426]
Dion, (l. lxxv. p. 1264;) only twenty-nine senators are mentioned by him, but
forty-one are named in the Augustan History, p. 69, among whom were six of the
name of Pescennius. Herodian (l. iii. p. 115) speaks in general of the cruelties
of Severus.

[427]
Wenck denies that there is any authority for this massacre of the wives of the
senators. He adds, that only the children and relatives of Niger and Albinus
were put to death. This is true of the family of Albinus, whose bodies were
thrown into the Rhone; those of Niger, according to Lampridius, were sent into
exile, but afterwards put to death. Among the partisans of Albinus who were put
to death were many women of rank, multae foeminae illustres. Lamprid. in Sever.
- M.

[428]
A new fragment of Dion describes the state of Rome during this contest. All
pretended to be on the side of Severus; but their secret sentiments were often
betrayed by a change of countenance on the arrival of some sudden report. Some
were detected by overacting their loyalty, Mai. Fragm. Vatican. p. 227 Severus
told the senate he would rather have their hearts than their votes. - Ibid. -
M.

[429]
Aurelius Victor.

[430]
Dion, l. lxxvi. p. 1272. Hist. August. p. 67. Severus celebrated the secular
games with extraordinary magnificence, and he left in the public granaries a
provision of corn for seven years, at the rate of 75,000 modii, or about 2500
quarters per day. I am persuaded that the granaries of Severus were supplied for
a long term, but I am not less persuaded, that policy on one hand, and
admiration on the other, magnified the hoard far beyond its true
contents.

[431]
See Spanheim's treatise of ancient medals, the inscriptions, and our learned
travellers Spon and Wheeler, Shaw, Pocock, &c, who, in Africa, Greece, and
Asia, have found more monuments of Severus than of any other Roman emperor
whatsoever.

[432]
He carried his victorious arms to Seleucia and Ctesiphon, the capitals of the
Parthian monarchy. I shall have occasion to mention this war in its proper
place.

[433]
Etiam in Britannis, was his own just and emphatic expression Hist. August.
73.

[434]
Herodian, l. iii. p. 115. Hist. August. p. 68.

[435]
Upon the insolence and privileges of the soldier, the 16th satire, falsely
ascribed to Juvenal, may be consulted; the style and circumstances of it would
induce me to believe, that it was composed under the reign of Severus, or that
of his son.

[436]
Not of the army, but of the troops in Gaul. The contents of this letter seem to
prove that Severus was really anxious to restore discipline Herodian is the only
historian who accuses him of being the first cause of its relaxation. - G. from
W Spartian mentions his increase of the pays. - M.

[437]
Hist. August. p. 73.

[438]
Herodian, l. iii. p. 131.

[439]
Dion, l. lxxiv. p. 1243.

[440]
The Praetorian Praefect had never been a simple captain of the guards; from the
first creation of this office, under Augustus, it possessed great power. That
emperor, therefore, decreed that there should be always two Praetorian
Praefects, who could only be taken from the equestrian order Tiberius first
departed from the former clause of this edict; Alexander Severus violated the
second by naming senators praefects. It appears that it was under Commodus that
the Praetorian Praefects obtained the province of civil jurisdiction. it
extended only to Italy, with the exception of Rome and its district, which was
governed by the Praefectus urbi. As to the control of the finances, and the
levying of taxes, it was not intrusted to them till after the great change that
Constantine I. made in the organization of the empire at least, I know no
passage which assigns it to them before that time; and Drakenborch, who has
treated this question in his Dissertation de official praefectorum praetorio,
vi., does not quote one. - W.

[441]
One of his most daring and wanton acts of power, was the castration of a hundred
free Romans, some of them married men, and even fathers of families; merely that
his daughter, on her marriage with the young emperor, might be attended by a
train of eunuchs worthy of an eastern queen. Dion, l. lxxvi. p. 1271.

[442]
Plautianus was compatriot, relative, and the old friend, of Severus; he had so
completely shut up all access to the emperor, that the latter was ignorant how
far he abused his powers: at length, being informed of it, he began to limit his
authority. The marriage of Plautilla with Caracalla was unfortunate; and the
prince who had been forced to consent to it, menaced the father and the daughter
with death when he should come to the throne. It was feared, after that, that
Plautianus would avail himself of the power which he still possessed, against
the Imperial family; and Severus caused him to be assassinated in his presence,
upon the pretext of a conspiracy, which Dion considers fictitious. - W. This
note is not, perhaps, very necessary and does not contain the whole facts. Dion
considers the conspiracy the invention of Caracalla, by whose command, almost by
whose hand, Plautianus was slain in the presence of Severus. - M.

[443]
Dion, l. lxxvi. p. 1274. Herodian, l. iii. p. 122, 129. The grammarian of
Alexander seems, as is not unusual, much better acquainted with this mysterious
transaction, and more assured of the guilt of Plautianus than the Roman senator
ventures to be.

[444]
Appian in Prooem.

[445]
Dion Cassius seems to have written with no other view than to form these
opinions into an historical system. The Pandea's will how assiduously the
lawyers, on their side, laboree in the cause of prerogative.

[446]
Hist. August. p. 71. "Omnia fui, et nihil expedit."

[447]
Dion Cassius, l. lxxvi. p. 1284.

[448]
About the year 186. M. de Tillemont is miserably embarrassed with a passage of
Dion, in which the empress Faustina, who died in the year 175, is introduced as
having contributed to the marriage of Severus and Julia, (l. lxxiv. p. 1243.)
The learned compiler forgot that Dion is relating not a real fact, but a dream
of Severus; and dreams are circumscribed to no limits of time or space. Did M.
de Tillemont imagine that marriages were consummated in the temple of Venus at
Rome? Hist. des Empereurs, tom. iii. p. 389. Note 6.

[449]
Hist. August. p. 65.

[450]
Hist. August. p. 5.

[451]
Dion Cassius, l. lxxvii. p. 1304, 1314.

[452]
See a dissertation of Menage, at the end of his edition of Diogenes Laertius, de
Foeminis Philosophis.

[453]
Dion, l. lxxvi. p. 1285. Aurelius Victor.

[454]
Bassianus was his first name, as it had been that of his maternal grandfather.
During his reign, he assumed the appellation of Antoninus, which is employed by
lawyers and ancient historians. After his death, the public indignation loaded
him with the nicknames of Tarantus and Caracalla. The first was borrowed from a
celebrated Gladiator, the second from a long Gallic gown which he distributed to
the people of Rome.

[455]
The elevation of Caracalla is fixed by the accurate M. de Tillemont to the year
198; the association of Geta to the year 208.

[456]
Herodian, l. iii. p. 130. The lives of Caracalla and Geta, in the Augustan
History.

[457]
Dion, l. lxxvi. p. 1280, &c. Herodian, l. iii. p. 132, &c.

[458]
Ossian's Poems, vol. i. p. 175.

[459]
That the Caracul of Ossian is the Caracalla of the Roman History, is, perhaps,
the only point of British antiquity in which Mr. Macpherson and Mr. Whitaker are
of the same opinion; and yet the opinion is not without difficulty. In the
Caledonian war, the son of Severus was known only by the appellation of
Antoninus, and it may seem strange that the Highland bard should describe him by
a nickname, invented four years afterwards, scarcely used by the Romans till
after the death of that emperor, and seldom employed by the most ancient
historians. See Dion, l. lxxvii. p. 1317. Hist. August. p. 89 Aurel. Victor.
Euseb. in Chron. ad ann. 214. Note: The historical authority of Macpherson's
Ossian has not increased since Gibbon wrote. We may, indeed, consider it
exploded. Mr. Whitaker, in a letter to Gibbon (Misc. Works, vol. ii. p. 100,)
attempts, not very successfully, to weaken this objection of the historian. -
M.

[460]
Dion, l. lxxvi. p. 1282. Hist. August. p. 71. Aurel. Victor.

[461]
Dion, l. lxxvi. p. 1283. Hist. August. p. 89

[462]
Dion, l. lxxvi. p. 1284. Herodian, l. iii. p. 135.

[463]
Mr. Hume is justly surprised at a passage of Herodian, (l. iv. p. 139,) who, on
this occasion, represents the Imperial palace as equal in extent to the rest of
Rome. The whole region of the Palatine Mount, on which it was built, occupied,
at most, a circumference of eleven or twelve thousand feet, (see the Notitia and
Victor, in Nardini's Roma Antica.) But we should recollect that the opulent
senators had almost surrounded the city with their extensive gardens and suburb
palaces, the greatest part of which had been gradually confiscated by the
emperors. If Geta resided in the gardens that bore his name on the Janiculum,
and if Caracalla inhabited the gardens of Maecenas on the Esquiline, the rival
brothers were separated from each other by the distance of several miles; and
yet the intermediate space was filled by the Imperial gardens of Sallust, of
Lucullus, of Agrippa, of Domitian, of Caius, &c., all skirting round the
city, and all connected with each other, and with the palace, by bridges thrown
over the Tiber and the streets. But this explanation of Herodian would require,
though it ill deserves, a particular dissertation, illustrated by a map of
ancient Rome. (Hume, Essay on Populousness of Ancient Nations. - M.)

[464]
Herodian, l. iv. p. 139

[465]
Herodian, l. iv. p. 144.

[466]
Caracalla consecrated, in the temple of Serapis, the sword with which, as he
boasted, he had slain his brother Geta. Dion, l. lxxvii p. 1307.

[467]
Herodian, l. iv. p. 147. In every Roman camp there was a small chapel near the
head-quarters, in which the statues of the tutelar deities were preserved and
adored; and we may remark that the eagles, and other military ensigns, were in
the first rank of these deities; an excellent institution, which confirmed
discipline by the sanction of religion. See Lipsius de Militia Romana, iv. 5, v.
2.

[468]
Herodian, l. iv. p. 148. Dion, l. lxxvii. p. 1289.

[469]
The account of this transaction, in a new passage of Dion, varies in some degree
from this statement. It adds that the next morning, in the senate, Antoninus
requested their indulgence, not because he had killed his brother, but because
he was hoarse, and could not address them. Mai. Fragm. p. 228. - M.

[470]
Geta was placed among the gods. Sit divus, dum non sit vivus said his brother.
Hist. August. p. 91. Some marks of Geta's consecration are still found upon
medals.

[471]
The favorable judgment which history has given of Geta is not founded solely on
a feeling of pity; it is supported by the testimony of contemporary historians:
he was too fond of the pleasures of the table, and showed great mistrust of his
brother; but he was humane, well instructed; he often endeavored to mitigate the
rigorous decrees of Severus and Caracalla. Herod iv. 3. Spartian in Geta. -
W.

[472]
Dion, l. lxxvii. p. 1307

[473]
The most valuable paragraph of Dion, which the industry of M. Manas recovered,
relates to this daughter of Marcus, executed by Caracalla. Her name, as appears
from Fronto, as well as from Dion, was Cornificia. When commanded to choose the
kind of death she was to suffer, she burst into womanish tears; but remembering
her father Marcus, she thus spoke: - "O my hapless soul, (... animula,) now
imprisoned in the body, burst forth! be free! show them, however reluctant to
believe it, that thou art the daughter of Marcus." She then laid aside all her
ornaments, and preparing herself for death, ordered her veins to be opened. Mai.
Fragm. Vatican ii p. 220. - M.

[474]
Dion, l. lxxvii. p. 1290. Herodian, l. iv. p. 150. Dion (p. 2298) says, that the
comic poets no longer durst employ the name of Geta in their plays, and that the
estates of those who mentioned it in their testaments were
confiscated.

[475]
Caracalla had assumed the names of several conquered nations; Pertinax observed,
that the name of Geticus (he had obtained some advantage over the Goths, or
Getae) would be a proper addition to Parthieus, Alemannicus, &c. Hist.
August. p. 89.

[476]
Dion, l. lxxvii. p. 1291. He was probably descended from Helvidius Priscus, and
Thrasea Paetus, those patriots, whose firm, but useless and unseasonable, virtue
has been immortalized by Tacitus. Note: M. Guizot is indignant at this "cold"
observation of Gibbon on the noble character of Thrasea; but he admits that his
virtue was useless to the public, and unseasonable amidst the vices of his age.
- M.

[477]
Caracalla reproached all those who demanded no favors of him. “It is clear that
if you make me no requests, you do not trust me; if you do not trust me, you
suspect me; if you suspect me, you fear me; if you fear me, you hate me." And
forthwith he condemned them as conspirators, a good specimen of the sorites in a
tyrant's logic. See Fragm. Vatican p. - M.

[478]
Papinian was no longer Praetorian Praefect. Caracalla had deprived him of that
office immediately after the death of Severus. Such is the statement of Dion;
and the testimony of Spartian, who gives Papinian the Praetorian praefecture
till his death, is of little weight opposed to that of a senator then living at
Rome. - W.

[479]
It is said that Papinian was himself a relation of the empress Julia.

[480]
Tacit. Annal. xiv. 2.

[481]
Hist. August. p. 88.

[482]
With regard to Papinian, see Heineccius's Historia Juris Roma ni, l. 330,
&c.

[483]
Tiberius and Domitian never moved from the neighborhood of Rome. Nero made a
short journey into Greece. “Et laudatorum Principum usus ex aequo, quamvis
procul agentibus. Saevi proximis ingruunt." Tacit. Hist. iv. 74.

[484]
Dion, l. lxxvii. p. 1294.

[485]
Dion, l. lxxvii. p. 1307. Herodian, l. iv. p. 158. The former represents it as a
cruel massacre, the latter as a perfidious one too. It seems probable that the
Alexandrians has irritated the tyrant by their railleries, and perhaps by their
tumults.

Note: After these massacres, Caracalla also deprived
the Alexandrians of their spectacles and public feasts; he divided the city into
two parts by a wall with towers at intervals, to prevent the peaceful
communications of the citizens. Thus was treated the unhappy Alexandria, says
Dion, by the savage beast of Ausonia. This, in fact, was the epithet which the
oracle had applied to him; it is said, indeed, that he was much pleased with the
name and often boasted of it. Dion, lxxvii. p. 1307. - G.

[486]
Dion, l. lxxvii. p. 1296.

[487]
Dion, l. lxxvi. p. 1284. Mr. Wotton (Hist. of Rome, p. 330) suspects that this
maxim was invented by Caracalla himself, and attributed to his father.

[488]
Dion (l. lxxviii. p. 1343) informs us that the extraordinary gifts of Caracalla
to the army amounted annually to seventy millions of drachmae (about two
millions three hundred and fifty thousand pounds.) There is another passage in
Dion, concerning the military pay, infinitely curious, were it not obscure,
imperfect, and probably corrupt. The best sense seems to be, that the Praetorian
guards received twelve hundred and fifty drachmae, (forty pounds a year,) (Dion,
l. lxxvii. p. 1307.) Under the reign of Augustus, they were paid at the rate of
two drachmae, or denarii, per day, 720 a year, (Tacit. Annal. i. 17.) Domitian,
who increased the soldiers' pay one fourth, must have raised the Praetorians to
960 drachmae, (Gronoviue de Pecunia Veteri, l. iii. c. 2.) These successive
augmentations ruined the empire; for, with the soldiers' pay, their numbers too
were increased. We have seen the Praetorians alone increased from 10,000 to
50,000 men. Note: Valois and Reimar have explained in a very simple and probable
manner this passage of Dion, which Gibbon seems to me not to have understood. He
ordered that the soldiers should receive, as the reward of their services the
Praetorians 1250 drachms, the other 5000 drachms. Valois thinks that the numbers
have been transposed, and that Caracalla added 5000 drachms to the donations
made to the Praetorians, 1250 to those of the legionaries. The Praetorians, in
fact, always received more than the others. The error of Gibbon arose from his
considering that this referred to the annual pay of the soldiers, while it
relates to the sum they received as a reward for their services on their
discharge: donatives means recompense for service. Augustus had settled that the
Praetorians, after sixteen campaigns, should receive 5000 drachms: the
legionaries received only 3000 after twenty years. Caracalla added 5000 drachms
to the donative of the Praetorians, 1250 to that of the legionaries. Gibbon
appears to have been mistaken both in confounding this donative on discharge
with the annual pay, and in not paying attention to the remark of Valois on the
transposition of the numbers in the text. - G

[489]
Carrhae, now Harran, between Edessan and Nisibis, famous for the defeat of
Crassus - the Haran from whence Abraham set out for the land of Canaan. This
city has always been remarkable for its attachment to Sabaism - G

[490]
Dion, l. lxxviii. p. 1312. Herodian, l. iv. p. 168.

[491]
The fondness of Caracalla for the name and ensigns of Alexander is still
preserved on the medals of that emperor. See Spanheim, de Usu Numismatum,
Dissertat. xii. Herodian (l. iv. p. 154) had seen very ridiculous pictures, in
which a figure was drawn with one side of the face like Alexander, and the other
like Caracalla.

[492]
Herodian, l. iv. p. 169. Hist. August. p. 94.

[493]
Dion, l. lxxxviii. p. 1350. Elagabalus reproached his predecessor with daring to
seat himself on the throne; though, as Praetorian praefect, he could not have
been admitted into the senate after the voice of the crier had cleared the
house. The personal favor of Plautianus and Sejanus had broke through the
established rule. They rose, indeed, from the equestrian order; but they
preserved the praefecture, with the rank of senator and even with the
annulship.

[494]
He was a native of Caesarea, in Numidia, and began his fortune by serving in the
household of Plautian, from whose ruin he narrowly escaped. His enemies asserted
that he was born a slave, and had exercised, among other infamous professions,
that of Gladiator. The fashion of aspersing the birth and condition of an
adversary seems to have lasted from the time of the Greek orators to the learned
grammarians of the last age.

[495]
Both Dion and Herodian speak of the virtues and vices of Macrinus with candor
and impartiality; but the author of his life, in the Augustan History, seems to
have implicitly copied some of the venal writers, employed by Elagabalus, to
blacken the memory of his predecessor.

[496]
Dion, l. lxxxiii. p. 1336. The sense of the author is as the intention of the
emperor; but Mr. Wotton has mistaken both, by understanding the distinction, not
of veterans and recruits, but of old and new legions. History of Rome, p.
347.

[497]
Dion, l. lxxviii. p. 1330. The abridgment of Xiphilin, though less particular,
is in this place clearer than the original.

[498]
As soon as this princess heard of the death of Caracalla, she wished to starve
herself to death: the respect shown to her by Macrinus, in making no change in
her attendants or her court, induced her to prolong her life. But it appears, as
far as the mutilated text of Dion and the imperfect epitome of Xiphilin permit
us to judge, that she conceived projects of ambition, and endeavored to raise
herself to the empire. She wished to tread in the steps of Semiramis and
Nitocris, whose country bordered on her own. Macrinus sent her an order
immediately to leave Antioch, and to retire wherever she chose. She returned to
her former purpose, and starved herself to death. - G.

[499]
He inherited this name from his great-grandfather of the mother's side,
Bassianus, father of Julia Maesa, his grandmother, and of Julia Domna, wife of
Severus. Victor (in his epitome) is perhaps the only historian who has given the
key to this genealogy, when speaking of Caracalla. His Bassianus ex avi materni
nomine dictus. Caracalla, Elagabalus, and Alexander Seyerus, bore successively
this name. - G.

[500]
According to Lampridius, (Hist. August. p. 135,) Alexander Severus lived
twenty-nine years three months and seven days. As he was killed March 19, 235,
he was born December 12, 205 and was consequently about this time thirteen years
old, as his elder cousin might be about seventeen. This computation suits much
better the history of the young princes than that of Herodian, (l. v. p. 181,)
who represents them as three years younger; whilst, by an opposite error of
chronology, he lengthens the reign of Elagabalus two years beyond its real
duration. For the particulars of the conspiracy, see Dion, l. lxxviii. p. 1339.
Herodian, l. v. p. 184.

[501]
By a most dangerous proclamation of the pretended Antoninus, every soldier who
brought in his officer's head became entitled to his private estate, as well as
to his military commission.

[502]
Dion, l. lxxviii. p. 1345. Herodian, l. v. p. 186. The battle was fought near
the village of Immae, about two-and-twenty miles from Antioch.

[503]
Gannys was not a eunuch. Dion, p. 1355. - W

[504]
Dion, l. lxxix. p. 1353.

[505]
Dion, l. lxxix. p. 1363. Herodian, l. v. p. 189.

[506]
This name is derived by the learned from two Syrian words, Ela a God, and Gabal,
to form, the forming or plastic god, a proper, and even happy epithet for the
sun. Wotton's History of Rome, p. 378 Note: The name of Elagabalus has been
disfigured in various ways. Herodian calls him; Lampridius, and the more modern
writers, make him Heliogabalus. Dion calls him Elegabalus; but Elegabalus was
the true name, as it appears on the medals. (Eckhel. de Doct. num. vet. t. vii.
p. 250.) As to its etymology, that which Gibbon adduces is given by Bochart,
Chan. ii. 5; but Salmasius, on better grounds. (not. in Lamprid. in Elagab.,)
derives the name of Elagabalus from the idol of that god, represented by
Herodian and the medals in the form of a mountain, (gibel in Hebrew,) or great
stone cut to a point, with marks which represent the sun. As it was not
permitted, at Hierapolis, in Syria, to make statues of the sun and moon,
because, it was said, they are themselves sufficiently visible, the sun was
represented at Emesa in the form of a great stone, which, as it appeared, had
fallen from heaven. Spanheim, Caesar. notes, p. 46. - G. The name of Elagabalus,
in "nummis rarius legetur." Rasche, Lex. Univ. Ref. Numm. Rasche quotes two. -
M

[507]
Herodian, l. v. p. 190.

[508]
He broke into the sanctuary of Vesta, and carried away a statue, which he
supposed to be the palladium; but the vestals boasted that, by a pious fraud,
they had imposed a counterfeit image on the profane intruder. Hist. August., p.
103.

[509]
Dion, l. lxxix. p. 1360. Herodian, l. v. p. 193. The subjects of the empire were
obliged to make liberal presents to the new married couple; and whatever they
had promised during the life of Elagabalus was carefully exacted under the
administration of Mamaea.

[510]
The invention of a new sauce was liberally rewarded; but if it was not relished,
the inventor was confined to eat of nothing else till he had discovered another
more agreeable to the Imperial palate Hist. August. p. 111.

[511]
He never would eat sea-fish except at a great distance from the sea; he then
would distribute vast quantities of the rarest sorts, brought at an immense
expense, to the peasants of the inland country. Hist. August. p. 109.

[512]
Dion, l. lxxix. p. 1358. Herodian, l. v. p. 192.

[513]
Hierocles enjoyed that honor; but he would have been supplanted by one Zoticus,
had he not contrived, by a potion, to enervate the powers of his rival, who,
being found on trial unequal to his reputation, was driven with ignominy from
the palace. Dion, l. lxxix. p. 1363, 1364. A dancer was made praefect of the
city, a charioteer praefect of the watch, a barber praefect of the provisions.
These three ministers, with many inferior officers, were all recommended
enormitate membrorum. Hist. August. p. 105.

[514]
Even the credulous compiler of his life, in the Augustan History (p. 111) is
inclined to suspect that his vices may have been exaggerated.

[515]
Wenck has justly observed that Gibbon should have reckoned the influence of
Christianity in this great change. In the most savage times, and the most
corrupt courts, since the introduction of Christianity there have been no Neros
or Domitians, no Commodus or Elagabalus. - M.

[516]
Dion, l. lxxix. p. 1365. Herodian, l. v. p. 195 - 201. Hist. August. p. 105. The
last of the three historians seems to have followed the best authors in his
account of the revolution.

[517]
The aera of the death of Elagabalus, and of the accession of Alexander, has
employed the learning and ingenuity of Pagi, Tillemont, Valsecchi, Vignoli, and
Torre, bishop of Adria. The question is most assuredly intricate; but I still
adhere to the authority of Dion, the truth of whose calculations is undeniable,
and the purity of whose text is justified by the agreement of Xiphilin, Zonaras,
and Cedrenus. Elagabalus reigned three years nine months and four days, from his
victory over Macrinus, and was killed March 10, 222. But what shall we reply to
the medals, undoubtedly genuine, which reckon the fifth year of his tribunitian
power? We shall reply, with the learned Valsecchi, that the usurpation of
Macrinus was annihilated, and that the son of Caracalla dated his reign from his
father's death? After resolving this great difficulty, the smaller knots of this
question may be easily untied, or cut asunder. Note: This opinion of Valsecchi
has been triumphantly contested by Eckhel, who has shown the impossibility of
reconciling it with the medals of Elagabalus, and has given the most
satisfactory explanation of the five tribunates of that emperor. He ascended the
throne and received the tribunitian power the 16th of May, in the year of Rome
971; and on the 1st January of the next year, 972, he began a new tribunate,
according to the custom established by preceding emperors. During the years 972,
973, 974, he enjoyed the tribunate, and commenced his fifth in the year 975,
during which be was killed on the 10th March. Eckhel de Doct. Num. viii. 430
&c. - G.

[518]
See Island In The Tiber:
Elagabalus was thrown into the Tiber.

[519]
Hist. August. p. 114. By this unusual precipitation, the senate meant to
confound the hopes of pretenders, and prevent the factions of the
armies.

[520]
Metellus Numidicus, the censor, acknowledged to the Roman people, in a public
oration, that had kind nature allowed us to exist without the help of women, we
should be delivered from a very troublesome companion; and he could recommend
matrimony only as the sacrifice of private pleasure to public duty. Aulus
Gellius, i. 6.

[521]
Tacit. Annal. xiii. 5.

[522]
Hist. August. p. 102, 107.

[523]
Dion, l. lxxx. p. 1369. Herodian, l. vi. p. 206. Hist. August. p. 131. Herodian
represents the patrician as innocent. The Augustian History, on the authority of
Dexippus, condemns him, as guilty of a conspiracy against the life of Alexander.
It is impossible to pronounce between them; but Dion is an irreproachable
witness of the jealousy and cruelty of Mamaea towards the young empress, whose
hard fate Alexander lamented, but durst not oppose.

[524]
Herodian, l. vi. p. 203. Hist. August. p. 119. The latter insinuates, that when
any law was to be passed, the council was assisted by a number of able lawyers
and experienced senators, whose opinions were separately given, and taken down
in writing.

[525]
Alexander received into his chapel all the religions which prevailed in the
empire; he admitted Jesus Christ, Abraham, Orpheus, Apollonius of Tyana, &c.
It was almost certain that his mother Mamaea had instructed him in the morality
of Christianity. Historians in general agree in calling her a Christian; there
is reason to believe that she had begun to have a taste for the principles of
Christianity. (See Tillemont, Alexander Severus) Gibbon has not noticed this
circumstance; he appears to have wished to lower the character of this empress;
he has throughout followed the narrative of Herodian, who, by the acknowledgment
of Capitolinus himself, detested Alexander. Without believing the exaggerated
praises of Lampridius, he ought not to have followed the unjust severity of
Herodian, and, above all, not to have forgotten to say that the virtuous
Alexander Severus had insured to the Jews the preservation of their privileges,
and permitted the exercise of Christianity. Hist. Aug. p. 121. The Christians
had established their worship in a public place, of which the victuallers
(cauponarii) claimed, not the property, but possession by custom. Alexander
answered, that it was better that the place should be used for the service of
God, in any form, than for victuallers. - G. I have scrupled to omit this note,
as it contains some points worthy of notice; but it is very unjust to Gibbon,
who mentions almost all the circumstances, which he is accused of omitting, in
another, and, according to his plan, a better place, and, perhaps, in stronger
terms than M. Guizot. See Chap. xvi. - M.

[526]
See his life in the Augustan History. The undistinguishing compiler has buried
these interesting anecdotes under a load of trivial unmeaning
circumstances.

[527]
See the 13th Satire of Juvenal.

[528]
Hist. August. p. 119.

[529]
Wenck observes that Gibbon, enchanted with the virtue of Alexander has
heightened, particularly in this sentence, its effect on the state of the world.
His own account, which follows, of the insurrections and foreign wars, is not in
harmony with this beautiful picture. - M.

[530]
See, in the Hist. August. p. 116, 117, the whole contest between Alexander and
the senate, extracted from the journals of that assembly. It happened on the
sixth of March, probably of the year 223, when the Romans had enjoyed, almost a
twelvemonth, the blessings of his reign. Before the appellation of Antoninus was
offered him as a title of honor, the senate waited to see whether Alexander
would not assume it as a family name.

[531]
It was a favorite saying of the emperor's Se milites magis servare, quam
seipsum, quod salus publica in his esset. Hist. Aug. p. 130.

[532]
Gibbon has confounded two events altogether different - the quarrel of the
people with the Praetorians, which lasted three days, and the assassination of
Ulpian by the latter. Dion relates first the death of Ulpian, afterwards,
reverting back according to a manner which is usual with him, he says that
during the life of Ulpian, there had been a war of three days between the
Praetorians and the people. But Ulpian was not the cause. Dion says, on the
contrary, that it was occasioned by some unimportant circumstance; whilst he
assigns a weighty reason for the murder of Ulpian, the judgment by which that
Praetorian praefect had condemned his predecessors, Chrestus and Flavian, to
death, whom the soldiers wished to revenge. Zosimus (l. 1, c. xi.) attributes
this sentence to Mamaera; but, even then, the troops might have imputed it to
Ulpian, who had reaped all the advantage and was otherwise odious to them. -
W.

[533]
Though the author of the life of Alexander (Hist. August. p. 182) mentions the
sedition raised against Ulpian by the soldiers, he conceals the catastrophe, as
it might discover a weakness in the administration of his hero. From this
designed omission, we may judge of the weight and candor of that
author.

[534]
For an account of Ulpian's fate and his own danger, see the mutilated conclusion
of Dion's History, l. lxxx. p. 1371.

[535]
Dion possessed no estates in Campania, and was not rich. He only says that the
emperor advised him to reside, during his consulate, in some place out of Rome;
that he returned to Rome after the end of his consulate, and had an interview
with the emperor in Campania. He asked and obtained leave to pass the rest of
his life in his native city, (Nice, in Bithynia: ) it was there that he finished
his history, which closes with his second consulship. - W.

[536]
Annot. Reimar. ad Dion Cassius, l. lxxx. p. 1369.

[537]
Julius Caesar had appeased a sedition with the same word, Quirites; which, thus
opposed to soldiers, was used in a sense of contempt, and reduced the offenders
to the less honorable condition of mere citizens. Tacit. Annal. i. 43.

[538]
Hist. August. p. 132.

[539]
From the Metelli. Hist. August. p. 119. The choice was judicious. In one short
period of twelve years, the Metelli could reckon seven consulships and five
triumphs. See Velleius Paterculus, ii. 11, and the Fasti.

[540]
The life of Alexander, in the Augustan History, is the mere idea of a perfect
prince, an awkward imitation of the Cyropaedia. The account of his reign, as
given by Herodian, is rational and moderate, consistent with the general history
of the age; and, in some of the most invidious particulars, confirmed by the
decisive fragments of Dion. Yet from a very paltry prejudice, the greater number
of our modern writers abuse Herodian, and copy the Augustan History. See Mess de
Tillemont and Wotton. From the opposite prejudice, the emperor Julian (in
Caesarib. p. 315) dwells with a visible satisfaction on the effeminate weakness
of the Syrian, and the ridiculous avarice of his mother.

[541]
Historians are divided as to the success of the campaign against the Persians;
Herodian alone speaks of defeat. Lampridius, Eutropius, Victor, and others, say
that it was very glorious to Alexander; that he beat Artaxerxes in a great
battle, and repelled him from the frontiers of the empire. This much is certain,
that Alexander, on his return to Rome, (Lamp. Hist. Aug. c. 56, 133, 134,)
received the honors of a triumph, and that he said, in his oration to the
people. Quirites, vicimus Persas, milites divites reduximus, vobis congiarium
pollicemur, cras ludos circenses Persicos donabimus. Alexander, says Eckhel, had
too much modesty and wisdom to permit himself to receive honors which ought only
to be the reward of victory, if he had not deserved them; he would have
contented himself with dissembling his losses. Eckhel, Doct. Num. vet. vii. 276.
The medals represent him as in triumph; one, among others, displays him crowned
by Victory between two rivers, the Euphrates and the Tigris. P. M. TR. P. xii.
Cos. iii. PP. Imperator paludatus D. hastam. S. parazonium, stat inter duos
fluvios humi jacentes, et ab accedente retro Victoria coronatur. Ae. max. mod.
(Mus. Reg. Gall.) Although Gibbon treats this question more in detail when he
speaks of the Persian monarchy, I have thought fit to place here what
contradicts his opinion. - G

[542]
According to the more accurate Dionysius, the city itself was only a hundred
stadia, or twelve miles and a half, from Rome, though some out-posts might be
advanced farther on the side of Etruria. Nardini, in a professed treatise, has
combated the popular opinion and the authority of two popes, and has removed
Veii from Civita Castellana, to a little spot called Isola, in the midway
between Rome and the Lake Bracianno.

Note: See the interesting account of the site and ruins
of Veii in Sir W Gell's topography of Rome and its Vicinity. v. ii. p. 303. -
M.

[543]
See the 4th and 5th books of Livy. In the Roman census, property, power, and
taxation were commensurate with each other.

[544]
Plin. Hist. Natur. l. xxxiii. c. 3. Cicero de Offic. ii. 22. Plutarch, P. Aemil.
p. 275.

[545]
See a fine description of this accumulated wealth of ages in Phars. l. iii. v.
155, &c.

[546]
See Rationarium imperii. Compare besides Tacitus, Suet. Aug. c. ult. Dion, p.
832. Other emperors kept and published similar registers. See a dissertation of
Dr. Wolle, de Rationario imperii Rom. Leipsig, 1773. The last book of Appian
also contained the statistics of the Roman empire, but it is lost. -
W.

[547]
Tacit. in Annal. i. ll. It seems to have existed in the time of
Appian.

[548]
Plutarch, in Pompeio, p. 642.

[549]
Wenck contests the accuracy of Gibbon's version of Plutarch, and supposes that
Pompey only raised the revenue from 50,000,000 to 85,000,000 of drachms; but the
text of Plutarch seems clearly to mean that his conquests added 85,000,000 to
the ordinary revenue. Wenck adds, "Plutarch says in another part, that Antony
made Asia pay, at one time, 200,000 talents, that is to say, 38,875,000l.
sterling." But Appian explains this by saying that it was the revenue of ten
years, which brings the annual revenue, at the time of Antonv, to 3,875 000l.
sterling. - M.

[550]
Strabo, l. xvii. p. 798.

[551]
Velleius Paterculus, l. ii. c. 39. He seems to give the preference to the
revenue of Gaul.

[552]
The Euboic, the Phoenician, and the Alexandrian talents were double in weight to
the Attic. See Hooper on ancient weights and measures, p. iv. c. 5. It is very
probable that the same talent was carried from Tyre to Carthage.

[553]
Polyb. l. xv. c. 2.

[554]
Appian in Punicis, p. 84.

[555]
Diodorus Siculus, l. 5. Oadiz was built by the Phoenicians a little more than a
thousand years before Christ. See Vell. Pa ter. i.2.

[556]
Compare Heeren's Researches vol. i. part ii. p.

[557]
Strabo, l. iii. p. 148.

[558]
Plin. Hist. Natur. l. xxxiii. c. 3. He mentions likewise a silver mine in
Dalmatia, that yielded every day fifty pounds to the state.

[559]
Strabo, l. x. p. 485. Tacit. Annal. iu. 69, and iv. 30. See Tournefort (Voyages
au Levant, Lettre viii.) a very lively picture of the actual misery of
Gyarus.

[560]
Lipsius de magnitudine Romana (l. ii. c. 3) computes the revenue at one hundred
and fifty millions of gold crowns; but his whole book, though learned and
ingenious, betrays a very heated imagination. Note: If Justus Lipsius has
exaggerated the revenue of the Roman empire Gibbon, on the other hand, has
underrated it. He fixes it at fifteen or twenty millions of our money. But if we
take only, on a moderate calculation, the taxes in the provinces which he has
already cited, they will amount, considering the augmentations made by Augustus,
to nearly that sum. There remain also the provinces of Italy, of Rhaetia, of
Noricum, Pannonia, and Greece, &c., &c. Let us pay attention, besides,
to the prodigious expenditure of some emperors, (Suet. Vesp. 16;) we shall see
that such a revenue could not be sufficient. The authors of the Universal
History, part xii., assign forty millions sterling as the sum to about which the
public revenue might amount. - G. from W.

[561]
It is not astonishing that Augustus held this language. The senate declared also
under Nero, that the state could not exist without the imposts as well augmented
as founded by Augustus. Tac. Ann. xiii. 50. After the abolition of the different
tributes paid by Italy, an abolition which took place A. U. 646, 694, and 695,
the state derived no revenues from that great country, but the twentieth part of
the manumissions, (vicesima manumissionum,) and Ciero laments this in many
places, particularly in his epistles to ii. 15. - G. from W.

[562]
Tacit. Annal. xiii. 31.

Note: The customs (portoria) existed in the times of
the ancient kings of Rome. They were suppressed in Italy, A. U. 694, by the
Praetor, Cecilius Matellus Nepos. Augustus only reestablished them. See note
above. - W.

[563]
See Pliny, (Hist. Natur. l. vi. c. 23, lxii. c. 18.) His observation that the
Indian commodities were sold at Rome at a hundred times their original price,
may give us some notion of the produce of the customs, since that original price
amounted to more than eight hundred thousand pounds.

[564]
The ancients were unacquainted with the art of cutting diamonds.

[565]
M. Bouchaud, in his treatise de l'Impot chez les Romains, has transcribed this
catalogue from the Digest, and attempts to illustrate it by a very prolix
commentary.

Note: In the Pandects, l. 39, t. 14, de Publican.
Compare Cicero in Verrem. c. 72 - 74. - W.

[566]
Tacit. Annal. i. 78. Two years afterwards, the reduction of the poor kingdom of
Cappadocia gave Tiberius a pretence for diminishing the excise of one half, but
the relief was of very short duration.

[567]
Dion Cassius, l. lv. p. 794, l. lvi. p. 825. Note: Dion neither mentions this
proposition nor the capitation. He only says that the emperor imposed a tax upon
landed property, and sent every where men employed to make a survey, without
fixing how much, and for how much each was to pay. The senators then preferred
giving the tax on legacies and inheritances. - W.

[568]
The sum is only fixed by conjecture.

[569]
As the Roman law subsisted for many ages, the Cognati, or relations on the
mother's side, were not called to the succession. This harsh institution was
gradually undermined by humanity, and finally abolished by Justinian.

[570]
Plin. Panegyric. c. 37.

[571]
See Heineccius in the Antiquit. Juris Romani, l. ii.

[572]
Horat. l. ii. Sat. v. Potron. c. 116, &c. Plin. l. ii. Epist. 20.

[573]
Cicero in Philip. ii. c. 16.

[574]
See his epistles. Every such will gave him an occasion of displaying his
reverence to the dead, and his justice to the living. He reconciled both in his
behavior to a son who had been disinherited by his mother, (v.l.)

[575]
Tacit. Annal. xiii. 50. Esprit des Loix, l. xii. c. 19.

[576]
See Pliny's Panegyric, the Augustan History, and Burman de Vectigal.
passim.

[577]
The tributes (properly so called) were not farmed; since the good princes often
remitted many millions of arrears.

[578]
The situation of the new citizens is minutely described by Pliny, (Panegyric, c.
37, 38, 39). Trajan published a law very much in their favor.

[579]
Gibbon has adopted the opinion of Spanheim and of Burman, which attributes to
Caracalla this edict, which gave the right of the city to all the inhabitants of
the provinces. This opinion may be disputed. Several passages of Spartianus, of
Aurelius Victor, and of Aristides, attribute this edict to Marc. Aurelius. See a
learned essay, entitled Joh. P. Mahneri Comm. de Marc. Aur. Antonino
Constitutionis de Civitate Universo Orbi Romano data auctore. Halae, 1772, 8vo.
It appears that Marc. Aurelius made some modifications of this edict, which
released the provincials from some of the charges imposed by the right of the
city, and deprived them of some of the advantages which it conferred. Caracalla
annulled these modifications. - W.

[580]
Dion, l. lxxvii. p. 1295.

[581]
He who paid ten aurei, the usual tribute, was charged with no more than the
third part of an aureus, and proportional pieces of gold were coined by
Alexander's order. Hist. August. p. 127, with the commentary of
Salmasius.

[582]
See the lives of Agricola, Vespasian, Trajan, Severus, and his three
competitors; and indeed of all the eminent men of those times.

[583]
There had been no example of three successive generations on the throne; only
three instances of sons who succeeded their fathers. The marriages of the
Caesars (notwithstanding the permission, and the frequent practice of divorces)
were generally unfruitful.

[584]
Hist. August p. 138.

[585]
Hist. August. p. 140. Herodian, l. vi. p. 223. Aurelius Victor. By comparing
these authors, it should seem that Maximin had the particular command of the
Tribellian horse, with the general commission of disciplining the recruits of
the whole army. His biographer ought to have marked, with more care, his
exploits, and the successive steps of his military promotions.

[586]
See the original letter of Alexander Severus, Hist. August. p. 149.

[587]
Hist. August. p. 135. I have softened some of the most improbable circumstances
of this wretched biographer. From his ill-worded narration, it should seem that
the prince's buffoon having accidentally entered the tent, and awakened the
slumbering monarch, the fear of punishment urged him to persuade the disaffected
soldiers to commit the murder.

[588]
Herodian, l. vi. 223-227.

[589]
Caligula, the eldest of the four, was only twenty-five years of age when he
ascended the throne; Caracalla was twenty-three, Commodus nineteen, and Nero no
more than seventeen.

[590]
It appears that he was totally ignorant of the Greek language; which, from its
universal use in conversation and letters, was an essential part of every
liberal education.

[591]
Hist. August. p. 141. Herodian, l. vii. p. 237. The latter of these historians
has been most unjustly censured for sparing the vices of Maximin.

[592]
The wife of Maximin, by insinuating wise counsels with female gentleness,
sometimes brought back the tyrant to the way of truth and humanity. See Ammianus
Marcellinus, l. xiv. c. l, where he alludes to the fact which he had more fully
related under the reign of the Gordians. We may collect from the medals, that
Paullina was the name of this benevolent empress; and from the title of Diva,
that she died before Maximin. (Valesius ad loc. cit. Ammian.) Spanheim de U. et
P. N. tom. ii. p. 300. Note: If we may believe Syrcellus and Zonaras, in was
Maximin himself who ordered her death - G

[593]
He was compared to Spartacus and Athenio. Hist. August p. 141.

[594]
Herodian, l. vii. p. 238. Zosim. l. i. p. 15.

[595]
In the fertile territory of Byzacium, one hundred and fifty miles to the south
of Carthage. This city was decorated, probably by the Gordians, with the title
of colony, and with a fine amphitheatre, which is still in a very perfect state.
See Intinerar. Wesseling, p. 59; and Shaw's Travels, p. 117.

[596]
Herodian, l. vii. p. 239. Hist. August. p. 153.

[597]
Hist. Aug. p. 152. The celebrated house of Pompey in Carinus was usurped by Marc
Antony, and consequently became, after the Triumvir's death, a part of the
Imperial domain. The emperor Trajan allowed, and even encouraged, the rich
senators to purchase those magnificent and useless places, (Plin. Panegyric. c.
50;) and it may seem probable, that, on this occasion, Pompey's house came into
the possession of Gordian's great- grandfather.

[598]
The Claudian, the Numidian, the Carystian, and the Synnadian. The colors of
Roman marbles have been faintly described and imperfectly distinguished. It
appears, however, that the Carystian was a sea-green, and that the marble of
Synnada was white mixed with oval spots of purple. See Salmasius ad Hist.
August. p. 164.

[599]
Hist. August. p. 151, 152. He sometimes gave five hundred pair of gladiators,
never less than one hundred and fifty. He once gave for the use of the circus
one hundred Sicilian, and as many Cappadecian horses. The animals designed for
hunting were chiefly bears, boars, bulls, stags, elks, wild asses, &c.
Elephants and lions seem to have been appropriated to Imperial
magnificence.

[600]
See the original letter, in the Augustan History, p. 152, which at once shows
Alexander's respect for the authority of the senate, and his esteem for the
proconsul appointed by that assembly.

[601]
Herodian expressly says that he had administered many provinces, lib. vii. 10. -
W.

[602]
By each of his concubines, the younger Gordian left three or four children. His
literary productions, though less numerous, were by no means
contemptible.

[603]
Not the personal likeness, but the family descent from the Scipiod. -
W.

[604]
Herodian, l. vii. p. 243. Hist. August. p. 144.

[605]
Quod. tamen patres dum periculosum existimant; inermes armato esistere
approbaverunt. - Aurelius Victor.

[606]
Even the servants of the house, the scribes, &c., were excluded, and their
office was filled by the senators themselves. We are obliged to the Augustan
History. p. 159, for preserving this curious example of the old discipline of
the commonwealth.

[607]
See Temple Of Castor and
Pollux.

[608]
This spirited speech, translated from the Augustan historian, p. 156, seems
transcribed by him from the origina registers of the senate

[609]
Herodian, l. vii. p. 244

[610]
Herodian, l. vii. p. 247, l. viii. p. 277. Hist. August. p 156-158.

[611]
Herodian, l. vii. p. 254. Hist. August. p. 150-160. We may observe, that one
month and six days, for the reign of Gordian, is a just correction of Casaubon
and Panvinius, instead of the absurd reading of one year and six months. See
Commentar. p. 193. Zosimus relates, l. i. p. 17, that the two Gordians perished
by a tempest in the midst of their navigation. A strange ignorance of history,
or a strange abuse of metaphors!

[612]
See the Augustan History, p. 166, from the registers of the senate; the date is
confessedly faulty but the coincidence of the Apollinatian games enables us to
correct it.

[613]
He was descended from Cornelius Balbus, a noble Spaniard, and the adopted son of
Theophanes, the Greek historian. Balbus obtained the freedom of Rome by the
favor of Pompey, and preserved it by the eloquence of Cicero. (See Orat. pro
Cornel. Balbo.) The friendship of Caesar, (to whom he rendered the most
important secret services in the civil war) raised him to the consulship and the
pontificate, honors never yet possessed by a stranger. The nephew of this Balbus
triumphed over the Garamantes. See Dictionnaire de Bayle, au mot Balbus, where
he distinguishes the several persons of that name, and rectifies, with his usual
accuracy, the mistakes of former writers concerning them.

[614]
Zonaras, l. xii. p. 622. But little dependence is to be had on the authority of
a modern Greek, so grossly ignorant of the history of the third century, that he
creates several imaginary emperors, and confounds those who really
existed.

[615]
Herodian, l. vii. p. 256, supposes that the senate was at first convoked in the
Capitol, and is very eloquent on the occasion. The Augustar History p. 116,
seems much more authentic.

[616]
According to some, the son. - G.

[617]
In Herodian, l. vii. p. 249, and in the Augustan History, we have three several
orations of Maximin to his army, on the rebellion of Africa and Rome: M. de
Tillemont has very justly observed that they neither agree with each other nor
with truth. Histoire des Empereurs, tom. iii. p. 799.

[618]
The carelessness of the writers of that age, leaves us in a singular
perplexity.

I.
We know that Maximus and Balbinus were killed during the
Capitoline games. Herodian, l. viii. p. 285. The authority of Censorinus (de Die
Natali, c. 18) enables us to fix those games with certainty to the year 238, but
leaves us in ignorance of the month or day.

II.
The election of Gordian by the senate is fixed with
equal certainty to the 27th of May; but we are at a loss to discover whether it
was in the same or the preceding year. Tillemont and Muratori, who maintain the
two opposite opinions, bring into the field a desultory troop of authorities,
conjectures and probabilities. The one seems to draw out, the other to contract
the series of events between those periods, more than can be well reconciled to
reason and history. Yet it is necessary to choose between them. Note: Eckhel has
more recently treated these chronological questions with a perspicuity which
gives great probability to his conclusions. Setting aside all the historians,
whose contradictions are irreconcilable, he has only consulted the medals, and
has arranged the events before us in the following order: -

Maximin, A. U. 990, after having conquered the Germans,
reenters Pannonia, establishes his winter quarters at Sirmium, and prepares
himself to make war against the people of the North. In the year 991, in the cal
ends of January, commences his fourth tribunate. The Gordians are chosen
emperors in Africa, probably at the beginning of the month of March. The senate
confirms this election with joy, and declares Maximin the enemy of Rome. Five
days after he had heard of this revolt, Maximin sets out from Sirmium on his
march to Italy. These events took place about the beginning of April; a little
after, the Gordians are slain in Africa by Capellianus, procurator of
Mauritania. The senate, in its alarm, names as emperors Balbus and Maximus
Pupianus, and intrusts the latter with the war against Maximin. Maximin is
stopped on his road near Aquileia, by the want of provisions, and by the melting
of the snows: he begins the siege of Aquileia at the end of April. Pupianus
assembles his army at Ravenna. Maximin and his son are assassinated by the
soldiers enraged at the resistance of Aquileia: and this was probably in the
middle of May. Pupianus returns to Rome, and assumes the government with
Balbinus; they are assassinated towards the end of July Gordian the younger
ascends the throne. Eckhel de Doct. Vol vii 295. - G.

[619]
Velleius Paterculus, l. ii. c. 24. The president de Montesquieu (in his dialogue
between Sylla and Eucrates) expresses the sentiments of the dictator in a
spirited, and even a sublime manner.

[620]
Muratori (Annali d' Italia, tom. ii. p. 294) thinks the melting of the snows
suits better with the months of June or July, than with those of February. The
opinion of a man who passed his life between the Alps and the Apennines, is
undoubtedly of great weight; yet I observe,

I.
That the long winter, of which Muratori takes advantage,
is to be found only in the Latin version, and not in the Greek text of
Herodian.

II.
That the vicissitudes of suns and rains, to which the
soldiers of Maximin were exposed, (Herodian, l. viii. p. 277,) denote the spring
rather than the summer. We may observe, likewise, that these several streams, as
they melted into one, composed the Timavus, so poetically (in every sense of the
word) described by Virgil. They are about twelve miles to the east of Aquileia.
See Cluver. Italia Antiqua, tom. i. p. 189, &c.

[621]
Herodian, l. viii. p. 272. The Celtic deity was supposed to be Apollo, and
received under that name the thanks of the senate. A temple was likewise built
to Venus the Bald, in honor of the women of Aquileia, who had given up their
hair to make ropes for the military engines.

[622]
Herodian, l. viii. p. 279. Hist. August. p. 146. The duration of Maximin's reign
has not been defined with much accuracy, except by Eutropius, who allows him
three years and a few days, (l. ix. 1;) we may depend on the integrity of the
text, as the Latin original is checked by the Greek version of
Paeanius.

[623]
Eight Roman feet and one third, which are equal to above eight English feet, as
the two measures are to each other in the proportion of 967 to 1000. See
Graves's discourse on the Roman foot. We are told that Maximin could drink in a
day an amphora (or about seven gallons) of wine, and eat thirty or forty pounds
of meat. He could move a loaded wagon, break a horse's leg with his fist,
crumble stones in his hand, and tear up small trees by the roots. See his life
in the Augustan History.

[624]
See the congratulatory letter of Claudius Julianus, the consul to the two
emperors, in the Augustan History.

[625]
Hist. August. p. 171.

[626]
Herodian, l. viii. p. 258.

[627]
Herodian, l. viii. p. 213.

[628]
The observation had been made imprudently enough in the acclamations of the
senate, and with regard to the soldiers it carried the appearance of a wanton
insult. Hist. August. p. 170.

[629]
Discordiae tacitae, et quae intelligerentur potius quam viderentur. Hist.
August. p. 170. This well-chosen expression is probably stolen from some better
writer.

[630]
Herodian, l. viii. p. 287, 288.

[631]
Quia non alius erat in praesenti, is the expression of the Augustan
History.

[632]
Quintus Curtius (l. x. c. 9,) pays an elegant compliment to the emperor of the
day, for having, by his happy accession, extinguished so many firebrands,
sheathed so many swords, and put an end to the evils of a divided government.
After weighing with attention every word of the passage, I am of opinion, that
it suits better with the elevation of Gordian, than with any other period of the
Roman history. In that case, it may serve to decide the age of Quintus Curtius.
Those who place him under the first Caesars, argue from the purity of his style
but are embarrassed by the silence of Quintilian, in his accurate list of Roman
historians.

Note: This conjecture of Gibbon is without foundation.
Many passages in the work of Quintus Curtius clearly place him at an earlier
period. Thus, in speaking of the Parthians, he says, Hinc in Parthicum perventum
est, tunc ignobilem gentem: nunc caput omnium qui post Euphratem et Tigrim amnes
siti Rubro mari terminantur. The Parthian empire had this extent only in the
first age of the vulgar aera: to that age, therefore, must be assigned the date
of Quintus Curtius. Although the critics (says M. de Sainte Croix) have
multiplied conjectures on this subject, most of them have ended by adopting the
opinion which places Quintus Curtius under the reign of Claudius. See Just.
Lips. ad Ann. Tac. ii. 20. Michel le Tellier Praef. in Curt. Tillemont Hist. des
Emp. i. p. 251. Du Bos Reflections sur la Poesie, 2d Partie. Tiraboschi Storia
della, Lett. Ital. ii. 149. Examen. crit. des Historiens d'Alexandre, 2d ed. p.
104, 849, 850. - G.

This interminable question seems as much perplexed as
ever. The first argument of M. Guizot is a strong one, except that Parthian is
often used by later writers for Persian. Cunzius, in his preface to an edition
published at Helmstadt, (1802,) maintains the opinion of Bagnolo, which assigns
Q. Curtius to the time of Constantine the Great. Schmieder, in his edit.
Gotting. 1803, sums up in this sentence, aetatem Curtii ignorari pala mest. -
M.

[633]
Hist. August. p. 161. From some hints in the two letters, I should expect that
the eunuchs were not expelled the palace without some degree of gentle violence,
and that the young Gordian rather approved of, than consented to, their
disgrace.

[634]
Duxit uxorem filiam Misithei, quem causa eloquentiae dignum parentela sua
putavit; et praefectum statim fecit; post quod, non puerile jam et contemptibile
videbatur imperium.

[635]
Hist. August. p. 162. Aurelius Victor. Porphyrius in Vit Plotin. ap. Fabricium,
Biblioth. Graec. l. iv. c. 36. The philosopher Plotinus accompanied the army,
prompted by the love of knowledge, and by the hope of penetrating as far as
India.

[636]
About twenty miles from the little town of Circesium, on the frontier of the two
empires.

Note: Now Kerkesia; placed in the angle formed by the
juncture of the Chaboras, or al Khabour, with the Euphrates. This situation
appeared advantageous to Diocletian, that he raised fortifications to make it
the bulwark of the empire on the side of Mesopotamia. D'Anville. Geog. Anc. ii.
196. - G. It is the Carchemish of the Old Testament, 2 Chron. xxxv. 20. ler.
xlvi. 2. - M.

[637]
The inscription (which contained a very singular pun) was erased by the order of
Licinius, who claimed some degree of relationship to Philip, (Hist. August. p.
166;) but the tumulus, or mound of earth which formed the sepulchre, still
subsisted in the time of Julian. See Ammian Marcellin. xxiii. 5.

[638]
Aurelius Victor. Eutrop. ix. 2. Orosius, vii. 20. Ammianus Marcellinus, xxiii.
5. Zosimus, l. i. p. 19. Philip, who was a native of Bostra, was about forty
years of age.

Note: Now Bosra. It was once the metropolis of a
province named Arabia, and the chief city of Auranitis, of which the name is
preserved in Beled Hauran, the limits of which meet the desert. D'Anville. Geog.
Anc. ii. 188. According to Victor, (in Caesar.,) Philip was a native of
Tracbonitis another province of Arabia. - G.

[639]
Can the epithet of Aristocracy be applied, with any propriety, to the government
of Algiers? Every military government floats between two extremes of absolute
monarchy and wild democracy.

[640]
The military republic of the Mamelukes in Egypt would have afforded M. de
Montesquieu (see Considerations sur la Grandeur et la Decadence des Romains, c.
16) a juster and more noble parallel.

[641]
The Augustan History (p. 163, 164) cannot, in this instance, be reconciled with
itself or with probability. How could Philip condemn his predecessor, and yet
consecrate his memory? How could he order his public execution, and yet, in his
letters to the senate, exculpate himself from the guilt of his death? Philip,
though an ambitious usurper, was by no means a mad tyrant. Some chronological
difficulties have likewise been discovered by the nice eyes of Tillemont and
Muratori, in this supposed association of Philip to the empire.

Note: Wenck endeavors to reconcile these discrepancies.
He supposes that Gordian was led away, and died a natural death in prison. This
is directly contrary to the statement of Capitolinus and of Zosimus, whom he
adduces in support of his theory. He is more successful in his precedents of
usurpers deifying the victims of their ambition. Sit divus, dummodo non sit
vivus. - M.

[642]
The account of the last supposed celebration, though in an enlightened period of
history, was so very doubtful and obscure, that the alternative seems not
doubtful. When the popish jubilees, the copy of the secular games, were invented
by Boniface VII., the crafty pope pretended that he only revived an ancient
institution. See M. le Chais, Lettres sur les Jubiles.

[643]
Either of a hundred or a hundred and ten years. Varro and Livy adopted the
former opinion, but the infallible authority of the Sybil consecrated the
latter, (Censorinus de Die Natal. c. 17.) The emperors Claudius and Philip,
however, did not treat the oracle with implicit respect.

[644]
The idea of the secular games is best understood from the poem of Horace, and
the description of Zosimus, 1. l. ii. p. 167, &c.

[645]
The received calculation of Varro assigns to the foundation of Rome an aera that
corresponds with the 754th year before Christ. But so little is the chronology
of Rome to be depended on, in the more early ages, that Sir Isaac Newton has
brought the same event as low as the year 627 (Compare Niebuhr vol. i. p. 271. -
M.)

[646]
An ancient chronologist, quoted by Valleius Paterculus, (l. i. c. 6,) observes,
that the Assyrians, the Medes, the Persians, and the Macedonians, reigned over
Asia one thousand nine hundred and ninety-five years, from the accession of
Ninus to the defeat of Antiochus by the Romans. As the latter of these great
events happened 289 years before Christ, the former may be placed 2184 years
before the same aera. The Astronomical Observations, found at Babylon, by
Alexander, went fifty years higher.

[647]
The Parthians were a tribe of the Indo-Germanic branch which dwelt on the
south-east of the Caspian, and belonged to the same race as the Getae, the
Massagetae, and other nations, confounded by the ancients under the vague
denomination of Scythians. Klaproth, Tableaux Hist. d l'Asie, p. 40. Strabo (p.
747) calls the Parthians Carduchi, i.e., the inhabitants of Curdistan. -
M.

[648]
In the five hundred and thirty-eighth year of the aera of Seleucus. See
Agathias, l. ii. p. 63. This great event (such is the carelessness of the
Orientals) is placed by Eutychius as high as the tenth year of Commodus, and by
Moses of Chorene as low as the reign of Philip. Ammianus Marcellinus has so
servilely copied (xxiii. 6) his ancient materials, which are indeed very good,
that he describes the family of the Arsacides as still seated on the Persian
throne in the middle of the fourth century.

[649]
The Persian History, if the poetry of the Shah Nameh, the Book of Kings, may
deserve that name mentions four dynasties from the earliest ages to the invasion
of the Saracens. The Shah Nameh was composed with the view of perpetuating the
remains of the original Persian records or traditions which had survived the
Saracenic invasion. The task was undertaken by the poet Dukiki, and afterwards,
under the patronage of Mahmood of Ghazni, completed by Ferdusi. The first of
these dynasties is that of Kaiomors, as Sir W. Jones observes, the dark and
fabulous period; the second, that of the Kaianian, the heroic and poetical, in
which the earned have discovered some curious, and imagined some fanciful,
analogies with the Jewish, the Greek, and the Roman accounts of the eastern
world. See, on the Shah Nameh, Translation by Goerres, with Von Hammer's Review,
Vienna Jahrbuch von Lit. 17, 75, 77. Malcolm's Persia, 8vo. ed. i. 503. Macan's
Preface to his Critical Edition of the Shah Nameh. On the early Persian History,
a very sensible abstract of various opinions in Malcolm's Hist. of Persian. -
M.

[650]
The tanner's name was Babec; the soldier's, Sassan: from the former Artaxerxes
obtained the surname of Babegan, from the latter all his descendants have been
styled Sassanides.

[651]
D'Herbelot, Bibliotheque Orientale, Ardshir.

[652]
In the plain of Hormuz, the son of Babek was hailed in the field with the proud
title of Shahan Shah, king of kings - a name ever since assumed by the
sovereigns of Persia. Malcolm, i. 71. - M.

[653]
Dion Cassius, l. lxxx. Herodian, l. vi. p. 207. Abulpharagins Dynast. p.
80.

[654]
See the Persian account of the rise of Ardeschir Babegan in Malcolm l 69. -
M.

[655]
See Moses Chorenensis, l. ii. c. 65 - 71.

[656]
Silvestre de Sacy (Antiquites de la Perse) had proved the neglect of the
Zoroastrian religion under the Parthian kings. - M.

[657]
Hyde and Prideaux, working up the Persian legends and their own conjectures into
a very agreeable story, represent Zoroaster as a contemporary of Darius
Hystaspes. But it is sufficient to observe, that the Greek writers, who lived
almost in the age of Darius, agree in placing the aera of Zoroaster many
hundred, or even thousand, years before their own time. The judicious criticisms
of Mr. Moyle perceived, and maintained against his uncle, Dr. Prideaux, the
antiquity of the Persian prophet. See his work, vol. ii.

Note: There are three leading theories concerning the
age of Zoroaster:

I.
That which assigns him to an age of great and almost
indefinite antiquity - it is that of Moyle, adopted by Gibbon, Volney,
Recherches sur l'Histoire, ii.

II.
Rhode, also, (die Heilige Sage, &c.,) in a very
ingenious and ably-developed theory, throws the Bactrian prophet far back into
antiquity 2. Foucher, (Mem. de l'Acad. xxvii. 253,) Tychsen, (in Com. Soc. Gott.
ii. 112), Heeren, (ldeen. i. 459,) and recently Holty, identify the Gushtasp of
the Persian mythological history with Cyaxares the First, the king of the Medes,
and consider the religion to be Median in its origin. M. Guizot considers this
opinion most probable, note in loc.

III.
Hyde, Prideaux, Anquetil du Perron, Kleuker, Herder,
Goerres, (Mythen-Geschichte,) Von Hammer. (Wien. Jahrbuch, vol. ix.,) Malcolm,
(i. 528,) De Guigniaut, (Relig. de l'Antiq. 2d part, vol. iii.,) Klaproth,
(Tableaux de l'Asie, p. 21,) make Gushtasp Darius Hystaspes, and Zoroaster his
contemporary. The silence of Herodotus appears the great objection to this
theory. Some writers, as M. Foucher (resting, as M. Guizot observes, on the
doubtful authority of Pliny,) make more than one Zoroaster, and so attempt to
reconcile the conflicting theories. - M.

[658]
That ancient idiom was called the Zend. The language of the commentary, the
Pehlvi, though much more modern, has ceased many ages ago to be a living tongue.
This fact alone (if it is allowed as authentic) sufficiently warrants the
antiquity of those writings which M d'Anquetil has brought into Europe, and
translated into French.

Note: Zend signifies life, living. The word means,
either the collection of the canonical books of the followers of Zoroaster, or
the language itself in which they are written. They are the books that contain
the word of life whether the language was originally called Zend, or whether it
was so called from the contents of the books. Avesta means word, oracle,
revelation: this term is not the title of a particular work, but of the
collection of the books of Zoroaster, as the revelation of Ormuzd. This
collection is sometimes called Zendavesta, sometimes briefly Zend.

The Zend was the ancient language of Media, as is
proved by its affinity with the dialects of Armenia and Georgia; it was already
a dead language under the Arsacides in the country which was the scene of the
events recorded in the Zendavesta. Some critics, among others Richardson and Sir
W. Jones, have called in question the antiquity of these books. The former
pretended that Zend had never been a written or spoken language, but had been
invented in the later times by the Magi, for the purposes of their art; but
Kleuker, in the dissertations which he added to those of Anquetil and the Abbe
Foucher, has proved that the Zend was a living and spoken language. - G. Sir W.
Jones appears to have abandoned his doubts, on discovering the affinity between
the Zend and the Sanskrit. Since the time of Kleuker, this question has been
investigated by many learned scholars. Sir W. Jones, Leyden, (Asiat. Research.
x. 283,) and Mr. Erskine, (Bombay Trans. ii. 299,) consider it a derivative from
the Sanskrit. The antiquity of the Zendavesta has likewise been asserted by
Rask, the great Danish linguist, who, according to Malcolm, brought back from
the East fresh transcripts and additions to those published by Anquetil.
According to Rask, the Zend and Sanskrit are sister dialects; the one the parent
of the Persian, the other of the Indian family of languages. - G. and M. But the
subject is more satisfactorily illustrated in Bopp's comparative Grammar of the
Sanscrit, Zend, Greek, Latin, Lithuanian, Gothic, and German languages. Berlin.
1833-5. According to Bopp, the Zend is, in some respects, of a more remarkable
structure than the Sanskrit. Parts of the Zendavesta have been published in the
original, by M. Bournouf, at Paris, and M. Ol. shausen, in Hamburg. - M.

The Pehlvi was the language of the countries bordering
on Assyria, and probably of Assyria itself. Pehlvi signifies valor, heroism; the
Pehlvi, therefore, was the language of the ancient heroes and kings of Persia,
the valiant. (Mr. Erskine prefers the derivation from Pehla, a border. - M.) It
contains a number of Aramaic roots. Anquetil considered it formed from the Zend.
Kleuker does not adopt this opinion. The Pehlvi, he says, is much more flowing,
and less overcharged with vowels, than the Zend. The books of Zoroaster, first
written in Zend, were afterwards translated into Pehlvi and Parsi. The Pehlvi
had fallen into disuse under the dynasty of the Sassanides, but the learned
still wrote it. The Parsi, the dialect of Pars or Farristan, was then prevailing
dialect. Kleuker, Anhang zum Zend Avesta, 2, ii. part i. p. 158, part ii. 31. -
G.

Mr. Erskine (Bombay Transactions) considers the
existing Zendavesta to have been compiled in the time of Ardeschir Babegan. -
M.

[659]
Hyde de Religione veterum Pers. c. 21.

[660]
I have principally drawn this account from the Zendavesta of M. d'Anquetil, and
the Sadder, subjoined to Dr. Hyde's treatise. It must, however, be confessed,
that the studied obscurity of a prophet, the figurative style of the East, and
the deceitful medium of a French or Latin version may have betrayed us into
error and heresy, in this abridgment of Persian theology.

Note: It is to be regretted that Gibbon followed the
post- Mahometan Sadder of Hyde. - M.

[661]
Zeruane Akerene, so translated by Anquetil and Kleuker. There is a dissertation
of Foucher on this subject, Mem. de l'Acad. des Inscr. t. xxix. According to
Bohlen (das alte Indien) it is the Sanskrit Sarvan Akaranam, the Uncreated
Whole; or, according to Fred. Schlegel, Sarvan Akharyam the Uncreate
Indivisible. - M.

[662]
This is an error. Ahriman was not forced by his invariable nature to do evil;
the Zendavesta expressly recognizes (see the Izeschne) that he was born good,
that in his origin he was light; envy rendered him evil; he became jealous of
the power and attributes of Ormuzd; then light was changed into darkness, and
Ahriman was precipitated into the abyss. See the Abridgment of the Doctrine of
the Ancient Persians, by Anquetil, c. ii Section 2. - G.

[663]
The modern Parsees (and in some degree the Sadder) exalt Ormusd into the first
and omnipotent cause, whilst they degrade Ahriman into an inferior but
rebellious spirit. Their desire of pleasing the Mahometans may have contributed
to refine their theological systems.

[664]
According to the Zendavesta, Ahriman will not be annihilated or precipitated
forever into darkness: at the resurrection of the dead he will be entirely
defeated by Ormuzd, his power will be destroyed, his kingdom overthrown to its
foundations, he will himself be purified in torrents of melting metal; he will
change his heart and his will, become holy, heavenly establish in his dominions
the law and word of Ormuzd, unite himself with him in everlasting friendship,
and both will sing hymns in honor of the Great Eternal. See Anquetil's
Abridgment. Kleuker, Anhang part iii. p 85, 36; and the Izeschne, one of the
books of the Zendavesta. According to the Sadder Bun-Dehesch, a more modern
work, Ahriman is to be annihilated: but this is contrary to the text itself of
the Zendavesta, and to the idea its author gives of the kingdom of Eternity,
after the twelve thousand years assigned to the contest between Good and Evil. -
G.

[665]
Herodotus, l. i. c. 131. But Dr. Prideaux thinks, with reason, that the use of
temples was afterwards permitted in the Magian religion. Note: The Pyraea, or
fire temples of the Zoroastrians, (observes Kleuker, Persica, p. 16,) were only
to be found in Media or Aderbidjan, provinces into which Herodotus did not
penetrate. - M.

[666]
Among the Persians Mithra is not the Sun: Anquetil has contested and
triumphantly refuted the opinion of those who confound them, and it is evidently
contrary to the text of the Zendavesta. Mithra is the first of the genii, or
jzeds, created by Ormuzd; it is he who watches over all nature. Hence arose the
misapprehension of some of the Greeks, who have said that Mithra was the summus
deus of the Persians: he has a thousand ears and ten thousand eyes. The
Chaldeans appear to have assigned him a higher rank than the Persians. It is he
who bestows upon the earth the light of the sun. The sun. named Khor,
(brightness,) is thus an inferior genius, who, with many other genii, bears a
part in the functions of Mithra. These assistant genii to another genius are
called his kamkars; but in the Zendavesta they are never confounded. On the days
sacred to a particular genius, the Persian ought to recite, not only the prayers
addressed to him, but those also which are addressed to his kamkars; thus the
hymn or iescht of Mithra is recited on the day of the sun, (Khor,) and vice
versa. It is probably this which has sometimes caused them to be confounded; but
Anquetil had himself exposed this error, which Kleuker, and all who have studied
the Zendavesta, have noticed. See viii. Diss. of Anquetil. Kleuker's Anhang,
part iii. p. 132. - G. M. Guizot is unquestionably right, according to the pure
and original doctrine of the Zend. The Mithraic worship, which was so
extensively propagated in the West, and in which Mithra and the sun were
perpetually confounded, seems to have been formed from a fusion of
Zoroastrianism and Chaldaism, or the Syrian worship of the sun. An excellent
abstract of the question, with references to the works of the chief modern
writers on his curious subject, De Sacy, Kleuker, Von Hammer, &c., may be
found in De Guigniaut's translation of Kreuzer. Relig. d'Antiquite, notes viii.
ix. to book ii. vol. i. 2d part, page 728. - M.

[667]
Hyde de Relig. Pers. c. 8. Notwithstanding all their distinctions and
protestations, which seem sincere enough, their tyrants, the Mahometans, have
constantly stigmatized them as idolatrous worshippers of the fire.

[668]
See the Sadder, the smallest part of which consists of moral precepts. The
ceremonies enjoined are infinite and trifling. Fifteen genuflections, prayers,
&c., were required whenever the devout Persian cut his nails or made water;
or as often as he put on the sacred girdle Sadder, Art. 14, 50, 60.

Note: Zoroaster exacted much less ceremonial
observance, than at a later period, the priests of his doctrines. This is the
progress of all religions the worship, simple in its origin, is gradually
overloaded with minute superstitions. The maxim of the Zendavesta, on the
relative merit of sowing the earth and of prayers, quoted below by Gibbon,
proves that Zoroaster did not attach too much importance to these observances.
Thus it is not from the Zendavesta that Gibbon derives the proof of his
allegation, but from the Sadder, a much later work. - G

[669]
See, on Zoroaster's encouragement of agriculture, the ingenious remarks of
Heeren, Ideen, vol. i. p. 449, &c., and Rhode, Heilige Sage, p. 517 -
M.

[670]
Zendavesta, tom. i. p. 224, and Precis du Systeme de Zoroastre, tom.
iii.

[671]
Hyde de Religione Persarum, c. 19.

[672]
Hyde de Religione Persarum, c. 28. Both Hyde and Prideaux affect to apply to the
Magian the terms consecrated to the Christian hierarchy.

[673]
Ammian. Marcellin. xxiii. 6. He informs us (as far as we may credit him) of two
curious particulars:

I.
That the Magi derived some of their most secret
doctrines from the Indian Brachmans; and

II.
That they were a tribe, or family, as well as
order.

[674]
The divine institution of tithes exhibits a singular instance of conformity
between the law of Zoroaster and that of Moses. Those who cannot otherwise
account for it, may suppose, if they please that the Magi of the latter times
inserted so useful an interpolation into the writings of their
prophet.

[675]
Sadder, Art. viii.

[676]
The passage quoted by Gibbon is not taken from the writings of Zoroaster, but
from the Sadder, a work, as has been before said, much later than the books
which form the Zendavesta. and written by a Magus for popular use; what it
contains, therefore, cannot be attributed to Zoroaster. It is remarkable that
Gibbon should fall into this error, for Hyde himself does not ascribe the Sadder
to Zoroaster; he remarks that it is written inverse, while Zoroaster always
wrote in prose. Hyde, i. p. 27. Whatever may be the case as to the latter
assertion, for which there appears little foundation, it is unquestionable that
the Sadder is of much later date. The Abbe Foucher does not even believe it to
be an extract from the works of Zoroaster. See his Diss. before quoted. Mem. de
l'Acad. des Ins. t. xxvii. - G. Perhaps it is rash to speak of any part of the
Zendavesta as the writing of Zoroaster, though it may be a genuine
representation of his. As to the Sadder, Hyde (in Praef.) considered it not
above 200 years old. It is manifestly post-Mahometan. See Art. xxv. on fasting.
- M.

[677]
Plato in Alcibiad.

[678]
Pliny (Hist. Natur. l. xxx. c. 1) observes, that magic held mankind by the
triple chain of religion, of physic, and of astronomy.

[679]
Agathias, l. iv. p. 134.

[680]
Mr. Hume, in the Natural History of Religion, sagaciously remarks, that the most
refined and philosophic sects are constantly the most intolerant.

Note: Hume's comparison is rather between theism and
polytheism. In India, in Greece, and in modern Europe, philosophic religion has
looked down with contemptuous toleration on the superstitions of the vulgar. -
M.

[681]
Cicero de Legibus, ii. 10. Xerxes, by the advice of the Magi, destroyed the
temples of Greece.

[682]
Hyde de Relig. Persar. c. 23, 24. D'Herbelot, Bibliotheque Orientale, Zurdusht.
Life of Zoroaster in tom. ii. of the Zendavesta.

[683]
Compare Moses of Chorene, l. ii. c. 74, with Ammian. Marcel lin. xxiii. 6.
Hereafter I shall make use of these passages.

[684]
Rabbi Abraham, in the Tarikh Schickard, p. 108, 109.

[685]
Basnage, Histoire des Juifs, l. viii. c. 3. Sozomen, l. ii. c. 1 Manes, who
suffered an ignominious death, may be deemed a Magian as well as a Christian
heretic.

[686]
Hyde de Religione Persar. c. 21.

[687]
It is incorrect to attribute these persecutions to Artaxerxes. The Jews were
held in honor by him, and their schools flourished during his reign. Compare
Jost, Geschichte der Israeliter, b. xv. 5, with Basnage. Sapor was forced by the
people to temporary severities; but their real persecution did not begin till
the reigns of Yezdigerd and Kobad. Hist. of Jews, iii. 236. According to Sozomen
, i. viii., Sapor first persecuted the Christians. Manes was put to death by
Varanes the First, A. D. 277. Beausobre, Hist. de Man. i. 209. - M.

[688]
In the testament of Ardischer in Ferdusi, the poet assigns these sentiments to
the dying king, as he addresses his son: Never forget that as a king, you are at
once the protector of religion and of your country. Consider the altar and the
throne as inseparable; they must always sustain each other. Malcolm's Persia. i.
74 - M

[689]
These colonies were extremely numerous. Seleucus Nicator founded thirty-nine
cities, all named from himself, or some of his relations, (see Appian in Syriac.
p. 124.) The aera of Seleucus (still in use among the eastern Christians)
appears as late as the year 508, of Christ 196, on the medals of the Greek
cities within the Parthian empire. See Moyle's works, vol. i. p. 273, &c.,
and M. Freret, Mem. de l'Academie, tom. xix.

[690]
The modern Persians distinguish that period as the dynasty of the kings of the
nations. See Plin. Hist. Nat. vi. 25.

[691]
Eutychius (tom. i. p. 367, 371, 375) relates the siege of the island of Mesene
in the Tigris, with some circumstances not unlike the story of Nysus and
Scylla.

[692]
Agathias, ii. 64, [and iv. p. 260.] The princes of Segestan de fended their
independence during many years. As romances generally transport to an ancient
period the events of their own time, it is not impossible that the fabulous
exploits of Rustan, Prince of Segestan, many have been grafted on this real
history.

[693]
We can scarcely attribute to the Persian monarchy the sea-coast of Gedrosia or
Macran, which extends along the Indian Ocean from Cape Jask (the promontory
Capella) to Cape Goadel. In the time of Alexander, and probably many ages
afterwards, it was thinly inhabited by a savage people of Icthyophagi, or
Fishermen, who knew no arts, who acknowledged no master, and who were divided by
in-hospitable deserts from the rest of the world. (See Arrian de Reb. Indicis.)
In the twelfth century, the little town of Taiz (supposed by M. d'Anville to be
the Teza of Ptolemy) was peopled and enriched by the resort of the Arabian
merchants. (See Geographia Nubiens, p. 58, and d'Anville, Geographie Ancienne,
tom. ii. p. 283.) In the last age, the whole country was divided between three
princes, one Mahometan and two Idolaters, who maintained their independence
against the successors of Shah Abbas. (Voyages de Tavernier, part i. l. v. p.
635.

[694]
Chardin, tom. iii c 1 2, 3.

[695]
Dion, l. xxviii. p. 1335.

[696]
For the precise situation of Babylon, Seleucia, Ctesiphon, Moiain, and Bagdad,
cities often confounded with each other, see an excellent Geographical Tract of
M. d'Anville, in Mem. de l'Academie, tom. xxx.

[697]
Tacit. Annal. xi. 42. Plin. Hist. Nat. vi. 26.

[698]
This may be inferred from Strabo, l. xvi. p. 743.

[699]
That most curious traveller, Bernier, who followed the camp of Aurengzebe from
Delhi to Cashmir, describes with great accuracy the immense moving city. The
guard of cavalry consisted of 35,000 men, that of infantry of 10,000. It was
computed that the camp contained 150,000 horses, mules, and elephants; 50,000
camels, 50,000 oxen, and between 300,000 and 400,000 persons. Almost all Delhi
followed the court, whose magnificence supported its industry.

[700]
Dion, l. lxxi. p. 1178. Hist. August. p. 38. Eutrop. viii. 10 Euseb. in Chronic.
Quadratus (quoted in the Augustan History) attempted to vindicate the Romans by
alleging that the citizens of Seleucia had first violated their faith.

[701]
Dion, l. lxxv. p. 1263. Herodian, l. iii. p. 120. Hist. August. p. 70.

[702]
The polished citizens of Antioch called those of Edessa mixed barbarians. It
was, however, some praise, that of the three dialects of the Syriac, the purest
and most elegant (the Aramaean) was spoken at Edessa. This remark M. Bayer
(Hist. Edess. p 5) has borrowed from George of Malatia, a Syrian
writer.

[703]
Dion, l. lxxv. p. 1248, 1249, 1250. M. Bayer has neglected to use this most
important passage.

[704]
This kingdom, from Osrhoes, who gave a new name to the country, to the last
Abgarus, had lasted 353 years. See the learned work of M. Bayer, Historia
Osrhoena et Edessena.

[705]
Xenophon, in the preface to the Cyropaedia, gives a clear and magnificent idea
of the extent of the empire of Cyrus. Herodotus (l. iii. c. 79, &c.) enters
into a curious and particular description of the twenty great Satrapies into
which the Persian empire was divided by Darius Hystaspes.

[706]
Herodian, vi. 209, 212.

[707]
There were two hundred scythed chariots at the battle of Arbela, in the host of
Darius. In the vast army of Tigranes, which was vanquished by Lucullus,
seventeen thousand horse only were completely armed. Antiochus brought
fifty-four elephants into the field against the Romans: by his frequent wars and
negotiations with the princes of India, he had once collected a hundred and
fifty of those great animals; but it may be questioned whether the most powerful
monarch of Hindostan evci formed a line of battle of seven hundred elephants.
Instead of three or four thousand elephants, which the Great Mogul was supposed
to possess, Tavernier (Voyages, part ii. l. i. p. 198) discovered, by a more
accurate inquiry, that he had only five hundred for his baggage, and eighty or
ninety for the service of war. The Greeks have varied with regard to the number
which Porus brought into the field; but Quintus Curtius, (viii. 13,) in this
instance judicious and moderate, is contented with eighty-five elephants,
distinguished by their size and strength. In Siam, where these animals are the
most numerous and the most esteemed, eighteen elephants are allowed as a
sufficient proportion for each of the nine brigades into which a just army is
divided. The whole number, of one hundred and sixty-two elephants of war, may
sometimes be doubled. Hist. des Voyages, tom. ix. p. 260.

Note: Compare Gibbon's note 10 to ch. lvii -
M.

[708]
Hist. August. p. 133.

Note: See M. Guizot's note, p. 267. According to the
Persian authorities Ardeschir extended his conquests to the Euphrates. Malcolm
i. 71. - M.

[709]
M. de Tillemont has already observed, that Herodian's geography is somewhat
confused.

[710]
Moses of Chorene (Hist. Armen. l. ii. c. 71) illustrates this invasion of Media,
by asserting that Chosroes, king of Armenia, defeated Artaxerxes, and pursued
him to the confines of India. The exploits of Chosroes have been magnified; and
he acted as a dependent ally to the Romans.

[711]
For the account of this war, see Herodian, l. vi. p. 209, 212. The old
abbreviators and modern compilers have blindly followed the Augustan
History.

[712]
Eutychius, tom. ii. p. 180, vers. Pocock. The great Chosroes Noushirwan sent the
code of Artaxerxes to all his satraps, as the invariable rule of their
conduct.

[713]
D'Herbelot, Bibliotheque Orientale, au mot Ardshir. We may observe, that after
an ancient period of fables, and a long interval of darkness, the modern
histories of Persia begin to assume an air of truth with the dynasty of
Sassanides. [Compare Malcolm, i. 79. - M.]

[714]
Herodian, l. vi. p. 214. Ammianus Marcellinus, l. xxiii. c. 6. Some differences
may be observed between the two historians, the natural effects of the changes
produced by a century and a half.

[715]
The Persians are still the most skilful horsemen, and their horses the finest in
the East.

[716]
From Herodotus, Xenophon, Herodian, Ammianus, Chardin, &c., I have extracted
such probable accounts of the Persian nobility, as seem either common to every
age, or particular to that of the Sassanides.

[717]
The Greeks, after having divided the world into Greeks and barbarians. divided
the barbarians into four great classes, the Celts, the Scythians, the Indians,
and the Ethiopians. They called Celts all the inhabitants of Gaul. Scythia
extended from the Baltic Sea to the Lake Aral: the people enclosed in the angle
to the north-east, between Celtica and Scythia, were called Celto- Scythians,
and the Sarmatians were placed in the southern part of that angle. But these
names of Celts, of Scythians, of Celto-Scythians, and Sarmatians, were invented,
says Schlozer, by the profound cosmographical ignorance of the Greeks, and have
no real ground; they are purely geographical divisions, without any relation to
the true affiliation of the different races. Thus all the inhabitants of Gaul
are called Celts by most of the ancient writers; yet Gaul contained three
totally distinct nations, the Belgae, the Aquitani, and the Gauls, properly so
called. Hi omnes lingua institutis, legibusque inter se differunt. Caesar. Com.
c. i. It is thus the Turks call all Europeans Franks. Schlozer, Allgemeine
Nordische Geschichte, p. 289. 1771. Bayer (de Origine et priscis Sedibus
Scytharum, in Opusc. p. 64) says, Primus eorum, de quibus constat, Ephorus, in
quarto historiarum libro, orbem terrarum inter Scythas, Indos, Aethiopas et
Celtas divisit. Fragmentum ejus loci Cosmas Indicopleustes in topographia
Christiana, f. 148, conservavit. Video igitur Ephorum, cum locorum positus per
certa capita distribuere et explicare constitueret, insigniorum nomina gentium
vastioribus spatiis adhibuisse, nulla mala fraude et successu infelici. Nam
Ephoro quoquomodo dicta pro exploratis habebant Graeci plerique et Romani: ita
gliscebat error posteritate. Igitur tot tamque diversae stirpis gentes non modo
intra communem quandam regionem definitae, unum omnes Scytharum nomen his
auctoribus subierunt, sed etiam ab illa regionis adpellatione in eandem nationem
sunt conflatae. Sic Cimmeriorum res cum Scythicis, Scytharum cum Sarmaticis,
Russicis, Hunnicis, Tataricis commiscentur. - G.

[718]
The Scythians, even according to the ancients, are not Sarmatians. It may be
doubted whether Gibbon intended to confound them. - M.

[719]
The Germania of Tacitus has been a fruitful source of hypothesis to the
ingenuity of modern writers, who have endeavored to account for the form of the
work and the views of the author. According to Luden, (Geschichte des T. V. i.
432, and note,) it contains the unfinished and disarranged for a larger work. An
anonymous writer, supposed by Luden to be M. Becker, conceives that it was
intended as an episode in his larger history. According to M. Guizot, "Tacite a
peint les Germains comme Montaigne et Rousseau les sauvages, dans un acces
d'humeur contre sa patrie: son livre est une satire des moeurs Romaines,
l'eloquente boutade d'un patriote philosophe qui veut voir la vertu la, ou il ne
rencontre pas la mollesse honteuse et la depravation savante d'une vielle
societe." Hist. de la Civilisation Moderne, i. 258. - M.

[720]
Germany was not of such vast extent. It is from Caesar, and more particularly
from Ptolemy, (says Gatterer,) that we can know what was the state of ancient
Germany before the wars with the Romans had changed the positions of the tribes.
Germany, as changed by these wars, has been described by Strabo, Pliny, and
Tacitus. Germany, properly so called, was bounded on the west by the Rhine, on
the east by the Vistula, on the north by the southern point of Norway, by
Sweden, and Esthonia. On the south, the Maine and the mountains to the north of
Bohemia formed the limits. Before the time of Caesar, the country between the
Maine and the Danube was partly occupied by the Helvetians and other Gauls,
partly by the Hercynian forest but, from the time of Caesar to the great
migration, these boundaries were advanced as far as the Danube, or, what is the
same thing, to the Suabian Alps, although the Hercynian forest still occupied,
from north to south, a space of nine days' journey on both banks of the Danube.
“Gatterer, Versuch einer all-gemeinen Welt-Geschichte," p. 424, edit. de 1792.
This vast country was far from being inhabited by a single nation divided into
different tribes of the same origin. We may reckon three principal races, very
distinct in their language, their origin, and their customs.

I.
To the east, the Slaves or Vandals.

II.
To the west, the Cimmerians or Cimbri.

III.
Between the Slaves and Cimbrians, the Germans, properly
so called, the Suevi of Tacitus. The South was inhabited, before Julius Caesar,
by nations of Gaulish origin, afterwards by the Suevi. - G. On the position of
these nations, the German antiquaries differ.

I.
The Slaves, or Sclavonians, or Wendish tribes, according
to Schlozer, were originally settled in parts of Germany unknown to the Romans,
Mecklenburgh, Pomerania, Brandenburgh, Upper Saxony; and Lusatia. According to
Gatterer, they remained to the east of the Theiss, the Niemen, and the Vistula,
till the third century. The Slaves, according to Procopius and Jornandes, formed
three great divisions.

I.
The Venedi or Vandals, who took the latter name, (the
Wenden,) having expelled the Vandals, properly so called, (a Suevian race, the
conquerors of Africa,) from the country between the Memel and the Vistula.

II.
The Antes, who inhabited between the Dneister and the
Dnieper.

III.
The Sclavonians, properly so called, in the north of
Dacia. During the great migration, these races advanced into Germany as far as
the Saal and the Elbe. The Sclavonian language is the stem from which have
issued the Russian, the Polish, the Bohemian, and the dialects of Lusatia, of
some parts of the duchy of Luneburgh, of Carniola, Carinthia, and Styria,
&c.; those of Croatia, Bosnia, and Bulgaria. Schlozer, Nordische Geschichte,
p. 323, 335.

II.
The Cimbric race. Adelung calls by this name all who
were not Suevi. This race had passed the Rhine, before the time of Caesar,
occupied Belgium, and are the Belgae of Caesar and Pliny. The Cimbrians also
occupied the Isle of Jutland. The Cymri of Wales and of Britain are of this
race. Many tribes on the right bank of the Rhine, the Guthini in Jutland, the
Usipeti in Westphalia, the Sigambri in the duchy of Berg, were German
Cimbrians.

III.
The Suevi, known in very early times by the Romans, for
they are mentioned by L. Corn. Sisenna, who lived 123 years before Christ,
(Nonius v. Lancea.) This race, the real Germans, extended to the Vistula, and
from the Baltic to the Hercynian forest. The name of Suevi was sometimes
confined to a single tribe, as by Caesar to the Catti. The name of the Suevi has
been preserved in Suabia.

These three were the principal races which inhabited
Germany; they moved from east to west, and are the parent stem of the modern
natives. But northern Europe, according to Schlozer, was not peopled by them
alone; other races, of different origin, and speaking different languages, have
inhabited and left descendants in these countries.

The German tribes called themselves, from very remote
times, by the generic name of Teutons, (Teuten, Deutschen,) which Tacitus
derives from that of one of their gods, Tuisco. It appears more probable that it
means merely men, people. Many savage nations have given themselves no other
name. Thus the Laplanders call themselves Almag, people; the Samoiedes Nilletz,
Nissetsch, men, &c. As to the name of Germans, (Germani,) Caesar found it in
use in Gaul, and adopted it as a word already known to the Romans. Many of the
learned (from a passage of Tacitus, de Mor Germ. c. 2) have supposed that it was
only applied to the Teutons after Caesar's time; but Adelung has triumphantly
refuted this opinion. The name of Germans is found in the Fasti Capitolini. See
Gruter, Iscrip. 2899, in which the consul Marcellus, in the year of Rome 531, is
said to have defeated the Gauls, the Insubrians, and the Germans, commanded by
Virdomar. See Adelung, Aelt. Geschichte der Deutsch, p. 102. - Compressed from
G.

[721]
The modern philosophers of Sweden seem agreed that the waters of the Baltic
gradually sink in a regular proportion, which they have ventured to estimate at
half an inch every year. Twenty centuries ago the flat country of Scandinavia
must have been covered by the sea; while the high lands rose above the waters,
as so many islands of various forms and dimensions. Such, indeed, is the notion
given us by Mela, Pliny, and Tacitus, of the vast countries round the Baltic.
See in the Bibliotheque Raisonnee, tom. xl. and xlv. a large abstract of Dalin's
History of Sweden, composed in the Swedish language.

Note: Modern geologists have rejected this theory of
the depression of the Baltic, as inconsistent with recent observation. The
considerable changes which have taken place on its shores, Mr. Lyell, from
actual observation now decidedly attributes to the regular and uniform elevation
of the land. - Lyell's Geology, b. ii. c. 17 - M.

[722]
In particular, Mr. Hume, the Abbe du Bos, and M. Pelloutier. Hist. des Celtes,
tom. i.

[723]
Diodorus Siculus, l. v. p. 340, edit. Wessel. Herodian, l. vi. p. 221.
Jornandes, c. 55. On the banks of the Danube, the wine, when brought to table,
was frequently frozen into great lumps, frusta vini. Ovid. Epist. ex Ponto, l.
iv. 7, 9, 10. Virgil. Georgic. l. iii. 355. The fact is confirmed by a soldier
and a philosopher, who had experienced the intense cold of Thrace. See Xenophon,
Anabasis, l. vii. p. 560, edit. Hutchinson. Note: The Danube is constantly
frozen over. At Pesth the bridge is usually taken up, and the traffic and
communication between the two banks carried on over the ice. The Rhine is
likewise in many parts passable at least two years out of five. Winter campaigns
are so unusual, in modern warfare, that I recollect but one instance of an army
crossing either river on the ice. In the thirty years' war, (1635,) Jan van
Werth, an Imperialist partisan, crossed the Rhine from Heidelberg on the ice
with 5000 men, and surprised Spiers. Pichegru's memorable campaign, (1794-5,)
when the freezing of the Meuse and Waal opened Holland to his conquests, and his
cavalry and artillery attacked the ships frozen in, on the Zuyder Zee, was in a
winter of unprecedented severity. - M. 1845.

[724]
Buffon, Histoire Naturelle, tom. xii. p. 79, 116.

[725]
Caesar de Bell. Gallic. vi. 23, &c. The most inquisitive of the Germans were
ignorant of its utmost limits, although some of them had travelled in it more
than sixty days' journey.

Note: The passage of Caesar, "parvis renonum tegumentis
utuntur," is obscure, observes Luden, (Geschichte des Teutschen Volkes,) and
insufficient to prove the reindeer to have existed in Germany. It is supported
however, by a fragment of Sallust. Germani intectum rhenonibus corpus tegunt. -
M. It has been suggested to me that Caesar (as old Gesner supposed) meant the
reindeer in the following description. Est bos cervi figura cujus a media fronte
inter aures unum cornu existit, excelsius magisque directum (divaricatum, qu ?)
his quae nobis nota sunt cornibus. At ejus summo, sicut palmae, rami quam late
diffunduntur. Bell. vi. - M. 1845.

[726]
Cluverius (Germania Antiqua, l. iii. c. 47) investigates the small and scattered
remains of the Hercynian wood.

[727]
Charlevoix, Histoire du Canada.

[728]
Olaus Rudbeck asserts that the Swedish women often bear ten or twelve children,
and not uncommonly twenty or thirty; but the authority of Rudbeck is much to be
suspected.

[729]
In hos artus, in haec corpora, quae miramur, excrescunt. Taeit Germania, 3, 20.
Cluver. l. i. c. 14.

[730]
Plutarch. in Mario. The Cimbri, by way of amusement, often did down mountains of
snow on their broad shields.

[731]
The Romans made war in all climates, and by their excellent discipline were in a
great measure preserved in health and vigor. It may be remarked, that man is the
only animal which can live and multiply in every country from the equator to the
poles. The hog seems to approach the nearest to our species in that
privilege.

[732]
Facit. Germ. c. 3. The emigration of the Gauls followed the course of the
Danube, and discharged itself on Greece and Asia. Tacitus could discover only
one inconsiderable tribe that retained any traces of a Gallic origin.

Note: The Gothini, who must not be confounded with the
Gothi, a Suevian tribe. In the time of Caesar many other tribes of Gaulish
origin dwelt along the course of the Danube, who could not long resist the
attacks of the Suevi. The Helvetians, who dwelt on the borders of the Black
Forest, between the Maine and the Danube, had been expelled long before the time
of Caesar. He mentions also the Volci Tectosagi, who came from Languedoc and
settled round the Black Forest. The Boii, who had penetrated into that forest,
and also have left traces of their name in Bohemia, were subdued in the first
century by the Marcomanni. The Boii settled in Noricum, were mingled afterwards
with the Lombards, and received the name of Boio Arii (Bavaria) or Boiovarii:
var, in some German dialects, appearing to mean remains, descendants. Compare
Malte B-m, Geography, vol. i. p. 410, edit 1832 - M.

[733]
According to Dr. Keating, (History of Ireland, p. 13, 14,) the giant
Portholanus, who was the son of Seara, the son of Esra, the son of Sru, the son
of Framant, the son of Fathaclan, the son of Magog, the son of Japhet, the son
of Noah, landed on the coast of Munster the 14th day of May, in the year of the
world one thousand nine hundred and seventy-eight. Though he succeeded in his
great enterprise, the loose behavior of his wife rendered his domestic life very
unhappy, and provoked him to such a degree, that he killed - her favorite
greyhound. This, as the learned historian very properly observes, was the first
instance of female falsehood and infidelity ever known in Ireland.

[734]
Genealogical History of the Tartars, by Abulghazi Bahadur Khan.

[735]
His work, entitled Atlantica, is uncommonly scarce. Bayle has given two most
curious extracts from it. Republique des Lettres Janvier et Fevrier,
1685.

[736]
Tacit. Germ. ii. 19. Literarum secreta viri pariter ac foeminae ignorant. We may
rest contented with this decisive authority, without entering into the obscure
disputes concerning the antiquity of the Runic characters. The learned Celsius,
a Swede, a scholar, and a philosopher, was of opinion, that they were nothing
more than the Roman letters, with the curves changed into straight lines for the
ease of engraving. See Pelloutier, Histoire des Celtes, l. ii. c. 11.
Dictionnaire Diplomatique, tom. i. p. 223. We may add, that the oldest Runic
inscriptions are supposed to be of the third century, and the most ancient
writer who mentions the Runic characters is Venan tius Frotunatus, (Carm. vii.
18,) who lived towards the end of the sixth century.

Barbara fraxineis pingatur Runa tabellis.

Note: The obscure subject of the Runic characters has
exercised the industry and ingenuity of the modern scholars of the north. There
are three distinct theories; one, maintained by Schlozer, (Nordische Geschichte,
p. 481, &c.,) who considers their sixteen letters to be a corruption of the
Roman alphabet, post-Christian in their date, and Schlozer would attribute their
introduction into the north to the Alemanni. The second, that of Frederick
Schlegel, (Vorlesungen uber alte und neue Literatur,) supposes that these
characters were left on the coasts of the Mediterranean and Northern Seas by the
Phoenicians, preserved by the priestly castes, and employed for purposes of
magic. Their common origin from the Phoenician would account for heir similarity
to the Roman letters. The last, to which we incline, claims much higher and more
venerable antiquity for the Runic, and supposes them to have been the original
characters of the Indo-Teutonic tribes, brought from the East, and preserved
among the different races of that stock. See Ueber Deutsche Runen von W. C.
Grimm, 1821. A Memoir by Dr. Legis. Fundgruben des alten Nordens. Foreign
Quarterly Review vol. ix. p. 438. - M.

[737]
Luden (the author of the Geschichte des Teutschen Volkes) has surpassed most
writers in his patriotic enthusiasm for the virtues and noble manners of his
ancestors. Even the cold of the climate, and the want of vines and fruit trees,
as well as the barbarism of the inhabitants, are calumnies of the luxurious
Italians. M. Guizot, on the other side, (in his Histoire de la Civilisation,
vol. i. p. 272, &c.,) has drawn a curious parallel between the Germans of
Tacitus and the North American Indians. - M.

[738]
Recherches Philosophiques sur les Americains, tom. iii. p. 228. The author of
that very curious work is, if I am not misinformed, a German by birth. (De
Pauw.)

[739]
The Alexandrian Geographer is often criticized by the accurate
Cluverius.

[740]
See Caesar, and the learned Mr. Whitaker in his History of Manchester, vol.
i.

[741]
Tacit. Germ. 15.

[742]
When the Germans commanded the Ubii of Cologne to cast off the Roman yoke, and
with their new freedom to resume their ancient manners, they insisted on the
immediate demolition of the walls of the colony. "Postulamus a vobis, muros
coloniae, munimenta servitii, detrahatis; etiam fera animalia, si clausa teneas,
virtutis obliviscuntur." Tacit. Hist. iv. 64.

[743]
The straggling villages of Silesia are several miles in length. See Cluver. l.
i. c. 13.

[744]
One hundred and forty years after Tacitus, a few more regular structures were
erected near the Rhine and Danube. Herodian, l. vii. p. 234.

[745]
Tacit. Germ. 17.

[746]
Tacit. Germ. 5.

[747]
Caesar de Bell. Gall. vi. 21.

[748]
Tacit. Germ. 26. Caesar, vi. 22.

[749]
Tacit. Germ. 6.

[750]
It is said that the Mexicans and Peruvians, without the use of either money or
iron, had made a very great progress in the arts. Those arts, and the monuments
they produced, have been strangely magnified. See Recherches sur les Americains,
tom. ii. p. 153, &c

[751]
Tacit. Germ. 15.

[752]
Tacit. Germ. 22, 23.

[753]
Id. 24. The Germans might borrow the arts of play from the Romans, but the
passion is wonderfully inherent in the human species.

[754]
Tacit. Germ. 14.

[755]
Plutarch. in Camillo. T. Liv. v. 33.

[756]
Dubos. Hist. de la Monarchie Francoise, tom. i. p. 193.

[757]
The Helvetian nation, which issued from a country called Switzerland, contained,
of every age and sex, 368,000 persons, (Caesar de Bell. Gal. i. 29.) At present,
the number of people in the Pays de Vaud (a small district on the banks of the
Leman Lake, much more distinguished for politeness than for industry) amounts to
112,591. See an excellent tract of M. Muret, in the Memoires de la Societe de
Born.

[758]
Paul Diaconus, c. 1, 2, 3. Machiavel, Davila, and the rest of Paul's followers,
represent these emigrations too much as regular and concerted
measures.

[759]
Sir William Temple and Montesquieu have indulged, on this subject, the usual
liveliness of their fancy.

[760]
Machiavel, Hist. di Firenze, l. i. Mariana, Hist. Hispan. l. v. c. 1

[761]
Robertson's Charles V. Hume's Political Essays. Note: It is a wise observation
of Malthus, that these nations "were not populous in proportion to the land they
occupied, but to the food they produced. They were prolific from their pure
morals and constitutions, but their institutions were not calculated to produce
food for those whom they brought into being. - M - 1845.

[762]
Tacit. German. 44, 45. Freinshemius (who dedicated his supplement to Livy to
Christina of Sweden) thinks proper to be very angry with the Roman who expressed
so very little reverence for Northern queens. Note: The Suiones and the Sitones
are the ancient inhabitants of Scandinavia, their name may be traced in that of
Sweden; they did not belong to the race of the Suevi, but that of the non-Suevi
or Cimbri, whom the Suevi, in very remote times, drove back part to the west,
part to the north; they were afterwards mingled with Suevian tribes, among
others the Goths, who have traces of their name and power in the isle of
Gothland. - G

[763]
May we not suspect that superstition was the parent of despotism? The
descendants of Odin, (whose race was not extinct till the year 1060) are said to
have reigned in Sweden above a thousand years. The temple of Upsal was the
ancient seat of religion and empire. In the year 1153 I find a singular law,
prohibiting the use and profession of arms to any except the king's guards. Is
it not probable that it was colored by the pretence of reviving an old
institution? See Dalin's History of Sweden in the Bibliotheque Raisonneo tom.
xl. and xlv.

[764]
Tacit. Germ. c. 43.

[765]
Id. c. 11, 12, 13, & c.

[766]
Grotius changes an expression of Tacitus, pertractantur into Proetractantur. The
correction is equally just and ingenious.

[767]
Even in our ancient parliament, the barons often carried a question, not so much
by the number of votes, as by that of their armed followers.

[768]
Caesar de Bell. Gal. vi. 23.

[769]
Minuunt controversias, is a very happy expression of Caesar's.

[770]
Reges ex nobilitate, duces ex virtute sumunt. Tacit Germ. 7

[771]
Cluver. Germ. Ant. l. i. c. 38.

[772]
Caesar, vi. 22. Tacit Germ. 26.

[773]
Tacit. Germ. 7.

[774]
Tacit. Germ. 13, 14.

[775]
Esprit des Loix, l. xxx. c. 3. The brilliant imagination of Montesquieu is
corrected, however, by the dry, cold reason of the Abbe de Mably. Observations
sur l'Histoire de France, tom. i. p. 356.

[776]
Gaudent muneribus, sed nec data imputant, nec acceptis obligautur. Tacit. Germ.
c. 21.

[777]
The adulteress was whipped through the village. Neither wealth nor beauty could
inspire compassion, or procure her a second husband. 18, 19.

[778]
Ovid employs two hundred lines in the research of places the most favorable to
love. Above all, he considers the theatre as the best adapted to collect the
beauties of Rome, and to melt them into tenderness and sensuality,

[779]
Tacit. Germ. iv. 61, 65.

[780]
The marriage present was a yoke of oxen, horses, and arms. See Germ. c. 18.
Tacitus is somewhat too florid on the subject.

[781]
The change of exigere into exugere is a most excellent correction.

[782]
Tacit. Germ. c. 7. Plutarch in Mario. Before the wives of the Teutones destroyed
themselves and their children, they had offered to surrender, on condition that
they should be received as the slaves of the vestal virgins.

[783]
Tacitus has employed a few lines, and Cluverius one hundred and twenty-four
pages, on this obscure subject. The former discovers in Germany the gods of
Greece and Rome. The latter is positive, that, under the emblems of the sun, the
moon, and the fire, his pious ancestors worshipped the Trinity in
unity

[784]
The sacred wood, described with such sublime horror by Lucan, was in the
neighborhood of Marseilles; but there were many of the same kind in Germany.

Note: The ancient Germans had shapeless idols, and,
when they began to build more settled habitations, they raised also temples,
such as that to the goddess Teufana, who presided over divination. See Adelung,
Hist. of Ane Germans, p 296 - G

[785]
Tacit. Germania, c. 7.

[786]
Tacit. Germania, c. 40.

[787]
See Dr. Robertson's History of Charles V. vol. i. note 10.

[788]
Tacit. Germania, c. 7. These standards were only the heads of wild
beasts.

[789]
See an instance of this custom, Tacit. Annal. xiii. 57.

[790]
Caesar Diodorus, and Lucan, seem to ascribe this doctrine to the Gauls, but M.
Pelloutier (Histoire des Celtes, l. iii. c. 18) labors to reduce their
expressions to a more orthodox sense.

[791]
Concerning this gross but alluring doctrine of the Edda, see Fable xx. in the
curious version of that book, published by M. Mallet, in his Introduction to the
History of Denmark.

[792]
See Tacit. Germ. c. 3. Diod. Sicul. l. v. Strabo, l. iv. p. 197. The classical
reader may remember the rank of Demodocus in the Phaeacian court, and the ardor
infused by Tyrtaeus into the fainting Spartans. Yet there is little probability
that the Greeks and the Germans were the same people. Much learned trifling
might be spared, if our antiquarians would condescend to reflect, that similar
manners will naturally be produced by similar situations.

[793]
Besides these battle songs, the Germans sang at their festival banquets, (Tac.
Ann. i. 65,) and around the bodies of their slain heroes. King Theodoric, of the
tribe of the Goths, killed in a battle against Attila, was honored by songs
while he was borne from the field of battle. Jornandes, c. 41. The same honor
was paid to the remains of Attila. Ibid. c. 49. According to some historians,
the Germans had songs also at their weddings; but this appears to me
inconsistent with their customs, in which marriage was no more than the purchase
of a wife. Besides, there is but one instance of this, that of the Gothic king,
Ataulph, who sang himself the nuptial hymn when he espoused Placidia, sister of
the emperors Arcadius and Honorius, (Olympiodor. p. 8.) But this marriage was
celebrated according to the Roman rites, of which the nuptial songs formed a
part. Adelung, p. 382. - G. Charlemagne is said to have collected the national
songs of the ancient Germans. Eginhard, Vit. Car. Mag. - M.

[794]
Missilia spargunt, Tacit. Germ. c. 6. Either that historian used a vague
expression, or he meant that they were thrown at random.

[795]
It was their principal distinction from the Sarmatians, who generally fought on
horseback.

[796]
The relation of this enterprise occupies a great part of the fourth and fifth
books of the History of Tacitus, and is more remarkable for its eloquence than
perspicuity. Sir Henry Saville has observed several inaccuracies.

[797]
Tacit. Hist. iv. 13. Like them he had lost an eye.

[798]
It was contained between the two branches of the old Rhine, as they subsisted
before the face of the country was changed by art and nature. See Cluver German.
Antiq. l. iii. c. 30, 37.

[799]
Caesar de Bell. Gal. l. vi. 23.

[800]
The Bructeri were a non-Suevian tribe, who dwelt below the duchies of
Oldenburgh, and Lauenburgh, on the borders of the Lippe, and in the Hartz
Mountains. It was among them that the priestess Velleda obtained her renown. -
G.

[801]
They are mentioned, however, in the ivth and vth centuries by Nazarius,
Ammianus, Claudian, &c., as a tribe of Franks. See Cluver. Germ. Antiq. l.
iii. c. 13.

[802]
Urgentibus is the common reading; but good sense, Lipsius, and some Mss. declare
for Vergentibus.

[803]
Tacit Germania, c. 33. The pious Abbe de la Bleterie is very angry with Tacitus,
talks of the devil, who was a murderer from the beginning, &c.,
&c.

[804]
Many traces of this policy may be discovered in Tacitus and Dion: and many more
may be inferred from the principles of human nature.

[805]
Hist. Aug. p. 31. Ammian. Marcellin. l. xxxi. c. 5. Aurel. Victor. The emperor
Marcus was reduced to sell the rich furniture of the palace, and to enlist
slaves and robbers.

[806]
The Marcomanni, a colony, who, from the banks of the Rhine occupied Bohemia and
Moravia, had once erected a great and formidable monarchy under their king
Maroboduus. See Strabo, l. vii. [p. 290.] Vell. Pat. ii. 108. Tacit. Annal. ii.
63.

Note: The Mark-manaen, the March-men or borderers.
There seems little doubt that this was an appellation, rather than a proper name
of a part of the great Suevian or Teutonic race. - M.

[807]
Mr. Wotton (History of Rome, p. 166) increases the prohibition to ten times the
distance. His reasoning is specious, but not conclusive. Five miles were
sufficient for a fortified barrier.

[808]
Dion, l. lxxi. and lxxii.

[809]
See an excellent dissertation on the origin and migrations of nations, in the
Memoires de l'Academie des Inscriptions, tom. xviii. p. 48 - 71. It is seldom
that the antiquarian and the philosopher are so happily blended.

[810]
Should we suspect that Athens contained only 21,000 citizens, and Sparta no more
than 39,000? See Hume and Wallace on the number of mankind in ancient and modern
times.

Note: This number, though too positively stated, is
probably not far wrong, as an average estimate. On the subject of Athenian
population, see St. Croix, Acad. des Inscrip. xlviii. Boeckh, Public Economy of
Athens, i. 47. Eng Trans, Fynes Clinton, Fasti Hellenici, vol. i. p. 381. The
latter author estimates the citizens of Sparta at 33,000 - M.

[811]
The expression used by Zosimus and Zonaras may signify that Marinus commanded a
century, a cohort, or a legion.

[812]
His birth at Bubalia, a little village in Pannonia, (Eutrop. ix. Victor. in
Caesarib. et Epitom.,) seems to contradict, unless it was merely accidental, his
supposed descent from the Decii. Six hundred years had bestowed nobility on the
Decii: but at the commencement of that period, they were only plebeians of
merit, and among the first who shared the consulship with the haughty
patricians. Plebeine Deciorum animae, &c. Juvenal, Sat. viii. 254. See the
spirited speech of Decius, in Livy. x. 9, 10.

[813]
Zosimus, l. i. p. 20, c. 22. Zonaras, l. xii. p. 624, edit. Louvre.

[814]
See the prefaces of Cassiodorus and Jornandes; it is surprising that the latter
should be omitted in the excellent edition, published by Grotius, of the Gothic
writers.

[815]
On the authority of Ablavius, Jornandes quotes some old Gothic chronicles in
verse. De Reb. Geticis, c. 4.

[816]
The Goths have inhabited Scandinavia, but it was not their original habitation.
This great nation was anciently of the Suevian race; it occupied, in the time of
Tacitus, and long before, Mecklenburgh, Pomerania Southern Prussia and the
north-west of Poland. A little before the birth of J. C., and in the first years
of that century, they belonged to the kingdom of Marbod, king of the Marcomanni:
but Cotwalda, a young Gothic prince, delivered them from that tyranny, and
established his own power over the kingdom of the Marcomanni, already much
weakened by the victories of Tiberius. The power of the Goths at that time must
have been great: it was probably from them that the Sinus Codanus (the Baltic)
took this name, as it was afterwards called Mare Suevicum, and Mare Venedicum,
during the superiority of the proper Suevi and the Venedi. The epoch in which
the Goths passed into Scandinavia is unknown. See Adelung, Hist. of Anc.
Germany, p. 200. Gatterer, Hist. Univ. 458. - G.

M. St. Martin observes, that the Scandinavian descent
of the Goths rests on the authority of Jornandes, who professed to derive it
from the traditions of the Goths. He is supported by Procopius and Paulus
Diaconus. Yet the Goths are unquestionably the same with the Getae of the
earlier historians. St. Martin, note on Le Beau, Hist. du bas Empire, iii. 324.
The identity of the Getae and Goths is by no means generally admitted. On the
whole, they seem to be one vast branch of the Indo-Teutonic race, who spread
irregularly towards the north of Europe, and at different periods, and in
different regions, came in contact with the more civilized nations of the south.
At this period, there seems to have been a reflux of these Gothic tribes from
the North.

Malte Brun considers that there are strong grounds for
receiving the Islandic traditions commented by the Danish Varro, M. Suhm. From
these, and the voyage of Pytheas, which Malte Brun considers genuine, the Goths
were in possession of Scandinavia, Ey-Gothland, 250 years before J. C., and of a
tract on the continent (Reid-Gothland) between the mouths of the Vistula and the
Oder. In their southern migration, they followed the course of the Vistula;
afterwards, of the Dnieper. Malte Brun, Geogr. i. p. 387, edit. 1832. Geijer,
the historian of Sweden, ably maintains the Scandinavian origin of the Goths.
The Gothic language, according to Bopp, is the link between the Sanscrit and the
modern Teutonic dialects: "I think that I am reading Sanscrit when I am reading
Olphilas." Bopp, Conjugations System der Sanscrit Sprache, preface, p. x -
M.

[817]
Jornandes, c. 3.

[818]
See in the Prolegomena of Grotius some large extracts from Adam of Bremen, and
Saxo-Grammaticus. The former wrote in the year 1077, the latter flourished about
the year 1200.

[819]
Voltaire, Histoire de Charles XII. l. iii. When the Austrians desired the aid of
the court of Rome against Gustavus Adolphus, they always represented that
conqueror as the lineal successor of Alaric. Harte's History of Gustavus, vol.
ii. p. 123.

[820]
See Adam of Bremen in Grotii Prolegomenis, p. 105. The temple of Upsal was
destroyed by Ingo, king of Sweden, who began his reign in the year 1075, and
about fourscore years afterwards, a Christian cathedral was erected on its
ruins. See Dalin's History of Sweden, in the Bibliotheque Raisonee.

[821]
The Eddas have at length been made accessible to European scholars by the
completion of the publication of the Saemundine Edda by the Arna Magnaean
Commission, in 3 vols. 4to., with a copious lexicon of northern mythology. -
M.

[822]
Mallet, Introduction a l'Histoire du Dannemarc.

[823]
Mallet, c. iv. p. 55, has collected from Strabo, Pliny, Ptolemy, and Stephanus
Byzantinus, the vestiges of such a city and people.

[824]
This wonderful expedition of Odin, which, by deducting the enmity of the Goths
and Romans from so memorable a cause, might supply the noble groundwork of an
epic poem, cannot safely be received as authentic history. According to the
obvious sense of the Edda, and the interpretation of the most skilful critics,
As-gard, instead of denoting a real city of the Asiatic Sarmatia, is the
fictitious appellation of the mystic abode of the gods, the Olympus of
Scandinavia; from whence the prophet was supposed to descend, when he announced
his new religion to the Gothic nations, who were already seated in the southern
parts of Sweden.

Note: A curious letter may be consulted on this subject
from the Swede, Ihre counsellor in the Chancery of Upsal, printed at Upsal by
Edman, in 1772 and translated into German by M. Schlozer. Gottingen, printed for
Dietericht, 1779. - G.

Gibbon, at a later period of his work, recanted his
opinion of the truth of this expedition of Odin. The Asiatic origin of the Goths
is almost certain from the affinity of their language to the Sanscrit and
Persian; but their northern writers, when all mythology was reduced to hero
worship. - M.

[825]
Tacit. Germania, c. 44.

[826]
Tacit. Annal. ii. 62. If we could yield a firm assent to the navigations of
Pytheas of Marseilles, we must allow that the Goths had passed the Baltic at
least three hundred years before Christ.

[827]
Ptolemy, l. ii.

[828]
By the German colonies who followed the arms of the Teutonic knights. The
conquest and conversion of Prussia were completed by those adventurers in the
thirteenth century.

[829]
Pliny (Hist. Natur. iv. 14) and Procopius (in Bell. Vandal. l. i. c. l) agree in
this opinion. They lived in distant ages, and possessed different means of
investigating the truth.

[830]
The Ostro and Visi, the eastern and western Goths, obtained those denominations
from their original seats in Scandinavia. In all their future marches and
settlements they preserved, with their names, the same relative situation. When
they first departed from Sweden, the infant colony was contained in three
vessels. The third, being a heavy sailor, lagged behind, and the crew, which
afterwards swelled into a nation, received from that circumstance the
appellation of Gepidae or Loiterers. Jornandes, c. 17. Note: It was not in
Scandinavia that the Goths were divided into Ostrogoths and Visigoths; that
division took place after their irruption into Dacia in the third century: those
who came from Mecklenburgh and Pomerania were called Visigoths; those who came
from the south of Prussia, and the northwest of Poland, called themselves
Ostrogoths. Adelung, Hist. All. p. 202 Gatterer, Hist. Univ. 431. - G.

[831]
This opinion is by no means probable. The Vandals and the Goths equally belonged
to the great division of the Suevi, but the two tribes were very different.
Those who have treated on this part of history, appear to me to have neglected
to remark that the ancients almost always gave the name of the dominant and
conquering people to all the weaker and conquered races. So Pliny calls Vindeli,
Vandals, all the people of the north-east of Europe, because at that epoch the
Vandals were doubtless the conquering tribe. Caesar, on the contrary, ranges
under the name of Suevi, many of the tribes whom Pliny reckons as Vandals,
because the Suevi, properly so called, were then the most powerful tribe in
Germany. When the Goths, become in their turn conquerors, had subjugated the
nations whom they encountered on their way, these nations lost their name with
their liberty, and became of Gothic origin. The Vandals themselves were then
considered as Goths; the Heruli, the Gepidae, &c., suffered the same fate. A
common origin was thus attributed to tribes who had only been united by the
conquests of some dominant nation, and this confusion has given rise to a number
of historical errors. - G.

M. St. Martin has a learned note (to Le Beau, v. 261)
on the origin of the Vandals. The difficulty appears to be in rejecting the
close analogy of the name with the Vend or Wendish race, who were of Sclavonian,
not of Suevian or German, origin. M. St. Martin supposes that the different
races spread from the head of the Adriatic to the Baltic, and even the Veneti,
on the shores of the Adriatic, the Vindelici, the tribes which gave their name
to Vindobena, Vindoduna, Vindonissa, were branches of the same stock with the
Sclavonian Venedi, who at one time gave their name to the Baltic; that they all
spoke dialects of the Wendish language, which still prevails in Carinthia,
Carniola, part of Bohemia, and Lusatia, and is hardly extinct in Mecklenburgh
and Pomerania. The Vandal race, once so fearfully celebrated in the annals of
mankind, has so utterly perished from the face of the earth, that we are not
aware that any vestiges of their language can be traced, so as to throw light on
the disputed question of their German, their Sclavonian, or independent origin.
The weight of ancient authority seems against M. St. Martin's opinion. Compare,
on the Vandals, Malte Brun. 394. Also Gibbon's note, c. xli. n. 38. -
M.

[832]
See a fragment of Peter Patricius in the Excerpta Legationum and with regard to
its probable date, see Tillemont, Hist, des Empereurs, tom. iii. p.
346.

[833]
Omnium harum gentium insigne, rotunda scuta, breves gladii, et erga rages
obsequium. Tacit. Germania, c. 43. The Goths probably acquired their iron by the
commerce of amber.

[834]
Jornandes, c. 13, 14.

[835]
The Heruli, and the Uregundi or Burgundi, are particularly mentioned. See
Mascou's History of the Germans, l. v. A passage in the Augustan History, p. 28,
seems to allude to this great emigration. The Marcomannic war was partly
occasioned by the pressure of barbarous tribes, who fled before the arms of more
northern barbarians.

[836]
D'Anville, Geographie Ancienne, and the third part of his incomparable map of
Europe.

[837]
Tacit. Germania, c. 46.

[838]
Cluver. Germ. Antiqua, l. iii. c. 43.

[839]
The Bastarnae cannot be considered original inhabitants of Germany Strabo and
Tacitus appear to doubt it; Pliny alone calls them Germans: Ptolemy and Dion
treat them as Scythians, a vague appellation at this period of history; Livy,
Plutarch, and Diodorus Siculus, call them Gauls, and this is the most probable
opinion. They descended from the Gauls who entered Germany under Signoesus. They
are always found associated with other Gaulish tribes, such as the Boll, the
Taurisci, &c., and not to the German tribes. The names of their chiefs or
princes, Chlonix, Chlondicus. Deldon, are not German names. Those who were
settled in the island of Peuce in the Danube, took the name of Peucini.

The Carpi appear in 237 as a Suevian tribe who had made
an irruption into Maesia. Afterwards they reappear under the Ostrogoths, with
whom they were probably blended. Adelung, p. 236, 278. - G.

[840]
The Venedi, the Slavi, and the Antes, were the three great tribes of the same
people. Jornandes, 24.

Note Dagger: They formed the great Sclavonian nation. -
G.

[841]
Tacitus most assuredly deserves that title, and even his cautious suspense is a
proof of his diligent inquiries.

[842]
Jac. Reineggs supposed that he had found, in the mountains of Caucasus, some
descendants of the Alani. The Tartars call them Edeki-Alan: they speak a
peculiar dialect of the ancient language of the Tartars of Caucasus. See J.
Reineggs' Descr. of Caucasus, p. 11, 13. - G. According to Klaproth, they are
the Ossetes of the present day in Mount Caucasus and were the same with the
Albanians of antiquity. Klaproth, Hist. de l'Asie, p. 180. - M.

[843]
Genealogical History of the Tartars, p. 593. Mr. Bell (vol. ii. p 379) traversed
the Ukraine, in his journey from Petersburgh to Constantinople. The modern face
of the country is a just representation of the ancient, since, in the hands of
the Cossacks, it still remains in a state of nature.

[844]
In the sixteenth chapter of Jornandes, instead of secundo Maesiam we may venture
to substitute secundam, the second Maesia, of which Marcianopolis was certainly
the capital. (See Hierocles de Provinciis, and Wesseling ad locum, p. 636.
Itinerar.) It is surprising how this palpable error of the scribe should escape
the judicious correction of Grotius. Note: Luden has observed that Jornandes
mentions two passages over the Danube; this relates to the second irruption into
Maesia. Geschichte des T V. ii. p. 448. - M.

[845]
The place is still called Nicop. D'Anville, Geographie Ancienne, tom. i. p. 307.
The little stream, on whose banks it stood, falls into the Danube.

[846]
Stephan. Byzant. de Urbibus, p. 740. Wesseling, Itinerar. p. 136. Zonaras, by an
odd mistake, ascribes the foundation of Philippopolis to the immediate
predecessor of Decius.

Note: Now Philippopolis or Philiba; its situation among
the hills caused it to be also called Trimontium. D'Anville, Geog. Anc. i. 295.
- G.

[847]
Ammian. xxxi. 5.

[848]
Aurel. Victor. c. 29.

[849]
Victorioe Carpicoe, on some medals of Decius, insinuate these
advantages.

[850]
Claudius (who afterwards reigned with so much glory) was posted in the pass of
Thermopylae with 200 Dardanians, 100 heavy and 160 light horse, 60 Cretan
archers, and 1000 well-armed recruits. See an original letter from the emperor
to his officer, in the Augustan History, p. 200.

[851]
Jornandes, c. 16 - 18. Zosimus, l. i. p. 22. In the general account of this war,
it is easy to discover the opposite prejudices of the Gothic and the Grecian
writer. In carelessness alone they are alike.

[852]
Montesquieu, Grandeur et Decadence des Romains, c. viii. He illustrates the
nature and use of the censorship with his usual ingenuity, and with uncommon
precision.

[853]
Vespasian and Titus were the last censors, (Pliny, Hist. Natur vii. 49.
Censorinus de Die Natali.) The modesty of Trajan refused an honor which he
deserved, and his example became a law to the Antonines. See Pliny's Panegyric,
c. 45 and 60.

[854]
Yet in spite of his exemption, Pompey appeared before that tribunal during his
consulship. The occasion, indeed, was equally singular and honorable. Plutarch
in Pomp. p. 630.

[855]
See the original speech in the Augustan Hist. p. 173-174.

[856]
This transaction might deceive Zonaras, who supposes that Valerian was actually
declared the colleague of Decius, l. xii. p. 625.

[857]
Hist. August. p. 174. The emperor's reply is omitted.

[858]
Such as the attempts of Augustus towards a reformation of manness. Tacit. Annal.
iii. 24.

[859]
Tillemont, Histoire des Empereurs, tom. iii. p. 598. As Zosimus and some of his
followers mistake the Danube for the Tanais, they place the field of battle in
the plains of Scythia.

[860]
Aurelius Victor allows two distinct actions for the deaths of the two Decii; but
I have preferred the account of Jornandes.

[861]
I have ventured to copy from Tacitus (Annal. i. 64) the picture of a similar
engagement between a Roman army and a German tribe.

[862]
Jornandes, c. 18. Zosimus, l. i. p. 22, [c. 23.] Zonaras, l. xii. p. 627.
Aurelius Victor.

[863]
The Decii were killed before the end of the year two hundred and fifty-one,
since the new princes took possession of the consulship on the ensuing calends
of January.

[864]
Hist. August. p. 223, gives them a very honorable place among the small number
of good emperors who reigned between Augustus and Diocletian.

[865]
Haec ubi Patres comperere . . . . decernunt. Victor in Caesaribus.

[866]
Zonaras, l. xii. p. 628.

[867]
A Sella, a Toga, and a golden Patera of five pounds weight, were accepted with
joy and gratitude by the wealthy king of Egypt. (Livy, xxvii. 4.) Quina millia
Aeris, a weight of copper, in value about eighteen pounds sterling, was the
usual present made to foreign are ambassadors. (Livy, xxxi. 9.)

[868]
See the firmness of a Roman general so late as the time of Alexander Severus, in
the Excerpta Legationum, p. 25, edit. Louvre.

[869]
For the plague, see Jornandes, c. 19, and Victor in Caesaribus.

[870]
These improbable accusations are alleged by Zosimus, l. i. p. 28, 24.

[871]
Jornandes, c. 19. The Gothic writer at least observed the peace which his
victorious countrymen had sworn to Gallus.

[872]
Zosimus, l. i. p. 25, 26.

[873]
Victor in Caesaribus.

[874]
Zonaras, l. xii. p. 628.

[875]
Banduri Numismata, p. 94.

[876]
Eutropius, l. ix. c. 6, says tertio mense. Eusebio this emperor.

[877]
Zosimus, l. i. p. 28. Eutropius and Victor station Valerian's army in
Rhaetia.

[878]
Aurelius Victor says that Aemilianus died of a natural disorder. Tropius, in
speaking of his death, does not say that he was assassinated - G.

[879]
He was about seventy at the time of his accession, or, as it is more probable,
of his death. Hist. August. p. 173. Tillemont, Hist. des Empereurs, tom. iii. p.
893, note 1.

[880]
Inimicus tyrannorum. Hist. August. p. 173. In the glorious struggle of the
senate against Maximin, Valerian acted a very spirited part. Hist. August. p.
156.

[881]
According to the distinction of Victor, he seems to have received the title of
Imperator from the army, and that of Augustus from the senate.

[882]
From Victor and from the medals, Tillemont (tom. iii. p. 710) very justly
infers, that Gallienus was associated to the empire about the month of August of
the year 253.

[883]
Various systems have been formed to explain a difficult passage in Gregory of
Tours, l. ii. c. 9.

[884]
The Geographer of Ravenna, i. 11, by mentioning Mauringania, on the confines of
Denmark, as the ancient seat of the Franks, gave birth to an ingenious system of
Leibritz.

[885]
See Cluver. Germania Antiqua, l. iii. c. 20. M. Freret, in the Memoires de
l'Academie des Inscriptions, tom. xviii.

[886]
Most probably under the reign of Gordian, from an accidental circumstance fully
canvassed by Tillemont, tom. iii. p. 710, 1181.

[887]
The confederation of the Franks appears to have been formed,

I.
Of the Chauci.

II.
Of the Sicambri, the inhabitants of the duchy of
Berg.

III.
Of the Attuarii, to the north of the Sicambri, in the
principality of Waldeck, between the Dimel and the Eder.

IV.
Of the Bructeri, on the banks of the Lippe, and in the
Hartz.

V.
Of the Chamavii, the Gambrivii of Tacitua, who were
established, at the time of the Frankish confederation, in the country of the
Bructeri.

VI.
Of the Catti, in Hessia. - G.

The Salii and Cherasci are added. Greenwood's Hist. of
Germans, i 193. - M.

[888]
Plin. Hist. Natur. xvi. l. The Panegyrists frequently allude to the morasses of
the Franks.

[889]
Tacit. Germania, c. 30, 37.

[890]
In a subsequent period, most of those old names are occasionally mentioned. See
some vestiges of them in Cluver. Germ. Antiq. l. iii.

[891]
Simler de Republica Helvet. cum notis Fuselin.

[892]
Zosimus, l. i. p. 27.

[893]
M. de Brequigny (in the Memoires de l'Academie, tom. xxx.) has given us a very
curious life of Posthumus. A series of the Augustan History from Medals and
Inscriptions has been more than once planned, and is still much wanted.

Note: M. Eckhel, Keeper of the Cabinet of Medals, and
Professor of Antiquities at Vienna, lately deceased, has supplied this want by
his excellent work, Doctrina veterum Nummorum, conscripta a Jos. Eckhel, 8 vol.
in 4to Vindobona, 1797. - G. Captain Smyth has likewise printed (privately) a
valuable Descriptive Catologue of a series of Large Brass Medals of this period
Bedford, 1834. - M. 1845.

[894]
Aurel. Victor, c. 33. Instead of Poene direpto, both the sense and the
expression require deleto; though indeed, for different reasons, it is alike
difficult to correct the text of the best, and of the worst, writers.

[895]
In the time of Ausonius (the end of the fourth century) Ilerda or Lerida was in
a very ruinous state, (Auson. Epist. xxv. 58,) which probably was the
consequence of this invasion.

[896]
Valesius is therefore mistaken in supposing that the Franks had invaded Spain by
sea.

[897]
Aurel. Victor. Eutrop. ix. 6.

[898]
Tacit. Germania, 38.

[899]
Cluver. Germ. Antiq. iii. 25.

[900]
Sic Suevi a ceteris Germanis, sic Suerorum ingenui a servis separantur. A proud
separation!

[901]
Caesar in Bello Gallico, iv. 7.

[902]
Victor in Caracal. Dion Cassius, lxvii. p. 1350.

[903]
The nation of the Alemanni was not originally formed by the Suavi properly so
called; these have always preserved their own name. Shortly afterwards they made
(A. D. 357) an irruption into Rhaetia, and it was not long after that they were
reunited with the Alemanni. Still they have always been a distinct people; at
the present day, the people who inhabit the north-west of the Black Forest call
themselves Schwaben, Suabians, Sueves, while those who inhabit near the Rhine,
in Ortenau, the Brisgaw, the Margraviate of Baden, do not consider themselves
Suabians, and are by origin Alemanni.

The Teucteri and the Usipetae, inhabitants of the
interior and of the north of Westphalia, formed, says Gatterer, the nucleus of
the Alemannic nation; they occupied the country where the name of the Alemanni
first appears, as conquered in 213, by Caracalla. They were well trained to
fight on horseback, (according to Tacitus, Germ. c. 32;) and Aurelius Victor
gives the same praise to the Alemanni: finally, they never made part of the
Frankish league. The Alemanni became subsequently a centre round which gathered
a multitude of German tribes, See Eumen. Panegyr. c. 2. Amm. Marc. xviii. 2,
xxix. 4. - G.

The question whether the Suevi was a generic name
comprehending the clans which peopled central Germany, is rather hastily decided
by M. Guizot Mr. Greenwood, who has studied the modern German writers on their
own origin, supposes the Suevi, Alemanni, and Marcomanni, one people, under
different appellations. History of Germany, vol i. - M.

[904]
This etymology (far different from those which amuse the fancy of the learned)
is preserved by Asinius Quadratus, an original historian, quoted by Agathias, i.
c. 5.

[905]
The Suevi engaged Caesar in this manner, and the manoeuvre deserved the
approbation of the conqueror, (in Bello Gallico, i. 48.)

[906]
Hist. August. p. 215, 216. Dexippus in the Excerpts. Legationam, p. 8. Hieronym.
Chron. Orosius, vii. 22.

[907]
Zosimus, l. i. p. 34.

[908]
Aurel. Victor, in Gallieno et Probo. His complaints breathe as uncommon spirit
of freedom.

[909]
Zonaras, l. xii. p. 631.

[910]
One of the Victors calls him king of the Marcomanni; the other of the
Germans.

[911]
See Tillemont, Hist. des Empereurs, tom. iii. p. 398, &c.

[912]
See the lives of Claudius, Aurelian, and Probus, in the Augustan
History.

[913]
It is about half a league in breadth. Genealogical History of the Tartars, p
598.

[914]
M. de Peyssonel, who had been French Consul at Caffa, in his Observations sur
les Peuples Barbares, que ont habite les bords du Danube

[915]
Eeripides in Iphigenia in Taurid.

[916]
Strabo, l. vii. p. 309. The first kings of Bosphorus were the allies of
Athens.

[917]
Appian in Mithridat.

[918]
It was reduced by the arms of Agrippa. Orosius, vi. 21. Eutropius, vii. 9. The
Romans once advanced within three days' march of the Tanais. Tacit. Annal. xii.
17.

[919]
See the Toxaris of Lucian, if we credit the sincerity and the virtues of the
Scythian, who relates a great war of his nation against the kings of
Bosphorus.

[920]
Zosimus, l. i. p. 28.

[921]
Strabo, l. xi. Tacit. Hist. iii. 47. They were called Camaroe.

[922]
See a very natural picture of the Euxine navigation, in the xvith letter of
Tournefort.

[923]
Arrian places the frontier garrison at Dioscurias, or Sebastopolis, forty-four
miles to the east of Pityus. The garrison of Phasis consisted in his time of
only four hundred foot. See the Periplus of the Euxine.

Note: Pityus is Pitchinda, according to D'Anville, ii.
115. - G. Rather Boukoun. - M. Dioscurias is Iskuriah. - G.

[924]
Zosimus, l. i. p. 30.

[925]
Arrian (in Periplo Maris Euxine, p. 130) calls the distance 2610
stadia.

[926]
Xenophon, Anabasis, l. iv. p. 348, edit. Hutchinson. Note: Fallmerayer
(Geschichte des Kaiserthums von Trapezunt, p. 6, &c) assigns a very ancient
date to the first (Pelasgic) foundation of Trapezun (Trebizond) - M.

[927]
Arrian, p. 129. The general observation is Tournefort's.

[928]
See an epistle of Gregory Thaumaturgus, bishop of Neo-Caeoarea, quoted by
Mascou, v. 37.

[929]
Zosimus, l. i. p. 32, 33.

[930]
It has preserved its name, joined to the preposition of place in that of Nikmid.
D'Anv. Geog. Anc. ii. 28. - G.

[931]
Itiner. Hierosolym. p. 572. Wesseling.

[932]
Now Isnik, Bursa, Mondania Ghio or Kemlik D'Anv. ii. 23. - G.

[933]
Zosimus, l. . p. 32, 33.

[934]
He besieged the place with 400 galleys, 150,000 foot, and a numerous cavalry.
See Plutarch in Lucul. Appian in Mithridat Cicero pro Lege Manilia, c.
8.

[935]
Strabo, l. xii. p. 573.

[936]
Pocock's Description of the East, l. ii. c. 23, 24.

[937]
Zosimus, l. i. p. 33.

[938]
Syncellus tells an unintelligible story of Prince Odenathus, who defeated the
Goths, and who was killed by Prince Odenathus.

[939]
Voyages de Chardin, tom. i. p. 45. He sailed with the Turks from Constantinople
to Caffa.

[940]
Syncellus (p. 382) speaks of this expedition, as undertaken by the
Heruli.

[941]
Strabo, l. xi. p. 495.

[942]
Plin. Hist. Natur. iii. 7.

[943]
Hist. August. p. 181. Victor, c. 33. Orosius, vii. 42. Zosimus, l. i. p. 35.
Zonaras, l. xii. 635. Syncellus, p. 382. It is not without some attention, that
we can explain and conciliate their imperfect hints. We can still discover some
traces of the partiality of Dexippus, in the relation of his own and his
countrymen's exploits.

Note: According to a new fragment of Dexippus,
published by Mai, he 2000 men. He took up a strong position in a mountainous and
woods district, and kept up a harassing warfare. He expresses a hope of being
speedily joined by the Imperial fleet. Dexippus in rov. Byzantinorum Collect a
Niebuhr, p. 26, 8 - M.

[944]
Syncellus, p. 382. This body of Heruli was for a long time faithful and
famous.

[945]
Claudius, who commanded on the Danube, thought with propriety and acted with
spirit. His colleague was jealous of his fame Hist. August. p. 181.

[946]
Jornandes, c. 20.

[947]
Zosimus and the Greeks (as the author of the Philopatris) give the name of
Scythians to those whom Jornandes, and the Latin writers, constantly represent
as Goths.

[948]
Hist. Aug. p. 178. Jornandes, c. 20.

[949]
Strabo, l. xiv. p. 640. Vitruvius, l. i. c. i. praefat l vii. Tacit Annal. iii.
61. Plin. Hist. Nat. xxxvi. 14.

[950]
The length of St. Peter's is 840 Roman palms; each palm is very little short of
nine English inches. See Greaves's Miscellanies vol. i. p. 233; on the Roman
Foot.

Note: St. Paul's Cathedral is 500 feet. Dallaway on
Architecture - M.

[951]
The policy, however, of the Romans induced them to abridge the extent of the
sanctuary or asylum, which by successive privileges had spread itself two stadia
round the temple. Strabo, l. xiv. p. 641. Tacit. Annal. iii. 60,
&c.

[952]
They offered no sacrifices to the Grecian gods. See Epistol Gregor.
Thaumat.

[953]
Zonaras, l. xii. p. 635. Such an anecdote was perfectly suited to the taste of
Montaigne. He makes use of it in his agreeable Essay on Pedantry, l. i. c.
24.

[954]
Moses Chorenensis, l. ii. c. 71, 73, 74. Zonaras, l. xii. p. 628. The authentic
relation of the Armenian historian serves to rectify the confused account of the
Greek. The latter talks of the children of Tiridates, who at that time was
himself an infant. (Compare St Martin Memoires sur l'Armenie, i. p. 301. -
M.)

[955]
Nisibis, according to Persian authors, was taken by a miracle, the wall fell, in
compliance with the prayers of the army. Malcolm's Persia, l. 76. - M

[956]
Hist. Aug. p. 191. As Macrianus was an enemy to the Christians, they charged him
with being a magician.

[957]
Zosimus, l. i. p. 33.

[958]
Hist. Aug. p. 174.

[959]
Victor in Caesar. Eutropius, ix. 7.

[960]
Zosimus, l. i. p. 33. Zonaras, l. xii. p. 630. Peter Patricius, in the Excerpta
Legat. p. 29.

[961]
Hist. August. p. 185. The reign of Cyriades appears in that collection prior to
the death of Valerian; but I have preferred a probable series of events to the
doubtful chronology of a most inaccurate writer

[962]
The sack of Antioch, anticipated by some historians, is assigned, by the
decisive testimony of Ammianus Marcellinus, to the reign of Gallienus, xxiii.
5.

Note: Heyne, in his note on Zosimus, contests this
opinion of Gibbon and observes, that the testimony of Ammianus is in fact by no
means clear, decisive. Gallienus and Valerian reigned together. Zosimus, in a
passage, l. iiii. 32, 8, distinctly places this event before the capture of
Valerian. - M.

[963]
Zosimus, l. i. p. 35.

[964]
John Malala, tom. i. p. 391. He corrupts this probable event by some fabulous
circumstances.

[965]
Zonaras, l. xii. p. 630. Deep valleys were filled up with the slain. Crowds of
prisoners were driven to water like beasts, and many perished for want of
food.

[966]
Zosimus, l. i. p. 25 asserts, that Sapor, had he not preferred spoil to
conquest, might have remained master of Asia.

[967]
Peter Patricius in Excerpt. Leg. p. 29.

[968]
Syrorum agrestium manu. Sextus Rufus, c. 23. Rufus Victor the Augustan History,
(p. 192,) and several inscriptions, agree in making Odenathus a citizen of
Palmyra.

[969]
He possessed so powerful an interest among the wandering tribes, that Procopius
(Bell. Persic. l. ii. c. 5) and John Malala, (tom. i. p. 391) style him Prince
of the Saracens.

[970]
Peter Patricius, p. 25.

[971]
The Pagan writers lament, the Christian insult, the misfortunes of Valerian.
Their various testimonies are accurately collected by Tillemont, tom. iii. p.
739, &c. So little has been preserved of eastern history before Mahomet,
that the modern Persians are totally ignorant of the victory Sapor, an event so
glorious to their nation. See Bibliotheque Orientale.

Note: Malcolm appears to write from Persian
authorities, i. 76. - M.

[972]
Yet Gibbon himself records a speech of the emperor Galerius, which alludes to
the cruelties exercised against the living, and the indignities to which they
exposed the dead Valerian, vol. ii. ch. 13. Respect for the kingly character
would by no means prevent an eastern monarch from ratifying his pride and his
vengeance on a fallen foe. - M.

[973]
One of these epistles is from Artavasdes, king of Armenia; since Armenia was
then a province of Persia, the king, the kingdom, and the epistle must be
fictitious.

[974]
See his life in the Augustan History.

[975]
There is still extant a very pretty Epithalamium, composed by Gallienus for the
nuptials of his nephews: -

"Ite ait, O juvenes, pariter sudate medullis Omnibus,
inter vos: non murmura vestra columbae, Brachia non hederae, non vincant oscula
conchae."

[976]
He was on the point of giving Plotinus a ruined city of Campania to try the
experiment of realizing Plato's Republic. See the Life of Plotinus, by Porphyry,
in Fabricius's Biblioth. Graec. l. iv.

[977]
A medal which bears the head of Gallienus has perplexed the antiquarians by its
legend and reverse; the former Gallienoe Augustoe, the latter Ubique Pax. M.
Spanheim supposes that the coin was struck by some of the enemies of Gallienus,
and was designed as a severe satire on that effeminate prince. But as the use of
irony may seem unworthy of the gravity of the Roman mint, M. de Vallemont has
deduced from a passage of Trebellius Pollio (Hist. Aug. p. 198) an ingenious and
natural solution. Galliena was first cousin to the emperor. By delivering Africa
from the usurper Celsus, she deserved the title of Augusta. On a medal in the
French king's collection, we read a similar inscription of Faustina Augusta
round the head of Marcus Aurelius. With regard to the Ubique Pax, it is easily
explained by the vanity of Gallienus, who seized, perhaps, the occasion of some
momentary calm. See Nouvelles de la Republique des Lettres, Janvier, 1700, p. 21
- 34.

[978]
This singular character has, I believe, been fairly transmitted to us. The reign
of his immediate successor was short and busy; and the historians who wrote
before the elevation of the family of Constantine could not have the most remote
interest to misrepresent the character of Gallienus.

[979]
Pollio expresses the most minute anxiety to complete the number.

Note: Compare a dissertation of Manso on the thirty
tyrants at the end of his Leben Constantius des Grossen. Breslau, 1817. -
M.

[980]
The place of his reign is somewhat doubtful; but there was a tyrant in Pontus,
and we are acquainted with the seat of all the others.

[981]
Captain Smyth, in his "Catalogue of Medals," p. 307, substitutes two new names
to make up the number of nineteen, for those of Odenathus and Zenobia. He
subjoins this list: -

I.
Of those whose coins are undoubtedly true.

II.
Those whose coins are suspected.

III.
Those of whom no coins are known.

Posthumus. Cyriades. Valens. Laelianus, (Lollianus, G.)
Ingenuus. Balista Victorinus Celsus. Saturninus. Marius. Piso Frugi.
Trebellianus. Tetricus. - M. 1815 Macrianus. Quietus. Regalianus (Regillianus,
G.) Alex. Aemilianus. Aureolus. Sulpicius Antoninus

[982]
Tillemont, tom. iii. p. 1163, reckons them somewhat differently.

[983]
See the speech of Marius in the Augustan History, p. 197. The accidental
identity of names was the only circumstance that could tempt Pollio to imitate
Sallust.

[984]
Marius was killed by a soldier, who had formerly served as a workman in his
shop, and who exclaimed, as he struck, "Behold the sword which thyself hast
forged." Trob vita. - G.

[985]
"Vos, O Pompilius sanguis!" is Horace's address to the Pisos See Art. Poet. v.
292, with Dacier's and Sanadon's notes.

[986]
Tacit. Annal. xv. 48. Hist. i. 15. In the former of these passages we may
venture to change paterna into materna. In every generation from Augustus to
Alexander Severus, one or more Pisos appear as consuls. A Piso was deemed worthy
of the throne by Augustus, (Tacit. Annal. i. 13;) a second headed a formidable
conspiracy against Nero; and a third was adopted, and declared Caesar, by
Galba.

[987]
See Roman Coins: From The
British Museum. Number four depicts Crassus.

[988]
Hist. August. p. 195. The senate, in a moment of enthusiasm, seems to have
presumed on the approbation of Gallienus.

[989]
Hist. August p. 196.

[990]
The association of the brave Palmyrenian was the most popular act of the whole
reign of Gallienus. Hist. August. p. 180.

[991]
Gallienus had given the titles of Caesar and Augustus to his son Saloninus,
slain at Cologne by the usurper Posthumus. A second son of Gallienus succeeded
to the name and rank of his elder brother Valerian, the brother of Gallienus,
was also associated to the empire: several other brothers, sisters, nephews, and
nieces of the emperor formed a very numerous royal family. See Tillemont, tom
iii, and M. de Brequigny in the Memoires de l'Academie, tom xxxii p.
262.

[992]
Hist. August. p. 188.

[993]
Regillianus had some bands of Roxolani in his service; Posthumus a body of
Franks. It was, perhaps, in the character of auxiliaries that the latter
introduced themselves into Spain.

[994]
The Augustan History, p. 177. See Diodor. Sicul. l. xxxiv.

[995]
Plin. Hist. Natur. v. 10.

[996]
Diodor. Sicul. l. xvii. p. 590, edit. Wesseling.

[997]
Berenice, or Myos-Hormos, on the Red Sea, received the eastern commodities. From
thence they were transported to the Nile, and down the Nile to Alexandria. -
M.

[998]
See a very curious letter of Hadrian, in the Augustan History, p. 245.

[999]
Such as the sacrilegious murder of a divine cat. See Diodor. Sicul. l. i.

Note: The hostility between the Jewish and Grecian part
of the population afterwards between the two former and the Christian, were
unfailing causes of tumult, sedition, and massacre. In no place were the
religious disputes, after the establishment of Christianity, more frequent or
more sanguinary. See Philo. de Legat. Hist. of Jews, ii. 171, iii. 111, 198.
Gibbon, iii c. xxi. viii. c. xlvii. - M.

[1000]
Hist. August. p. 195. This long and terrible sedition was first occasioned by a
dispute between a soldier and a townsman about a pair of shoes.

[1001]
Dionysius apud. Euses. Hist. Eccles. vii. p. 21. Ammian xxii. 16.

[1002]
The Bruchion was a quarter of Alexandria which extended along the largest of the
two ports, and contained many palaces, inhabited by the Ptolemies. D'Anv. Geogr.
Anc. iii. 10. - G.

[1003]
Scaliger. Animadver. ad Euseb. Chron. p. 258. Three dissertations of M. Bonamy,
in the Mem. de l'Academie, tom. ix.

[1004]
Strabo, l. xiii. p. 569.

[1005]
Hist. August. p. 197.

[1006]
See Cellarius, Geogr Antiq. tom. ii. p. 137, upon the limits of
Isauria.

[1007]
Hist August p 177.

[1008]
Hist. August. p. 177. Zosimus, l. i. p. 24. Zonaras, l. xii. p. 623. Euseb.
Chronicon. Victor in Epitom. Victor in Caesar. Eutropius, ix. 5. Orosius, vii.
21.

[1009]
Euseb. Hist. Eccles. vii. 21. The fact is taken from the Letters of Dionysius,
who, in the time of those troubles, was bishop of Alexandria.

[1010]
In a great number of parishes, 11,000 persons were found between fourteen and
eighty; 5365 between forty and seventy. See Buffon, Histoire Naturelle, tom. ii.
p. 590.

[1011]
Pons Aureoli, thirteen miles from Bergamo, and thirty-two from Milan. See
Cluver. Italia, Antiq. tom. i. p. 245. Near this place, in the year 1703, the
obstinate battle of Cassano was fought between the French and Austrians. The
excellent relation of the Chevalier de Folard, who was present, gives a very
distinct idea of the ground. See Polybe de Folard, tom. iii. p.
233-248.

[1012]
On the death of Gallienus, see Trebellius Pollio in Hist. August. p. 181.
Zosimus, l. i. p. 37. Zonaras, l. xii. p. 634. Eutrop. ix. ll. Aurelius Victor
in Epitom. Victor in Caesar. I have compared and blended them all, but have
chiefly followed Aurelius Victor, who seems to have had the best
memoirs.

[1013]
Some supposed him, oddly enough, to be a bastard of the younger Gordian. Others
took advantage of the province of Dardania, to deduce his origin from Dardanus,
and the ancient kings of Troy.

[1014]
Notoria, a periodical and official despatch which the emperor received from the
frumentarii, or agents dispersed through the provinces. Of these we may speak
hereafter.

[1015]
Hist. August. p. 208. Gallienus describes the plate, vestments, etc., like a man
who loved and understood those splendid trifles.

[1016]
Julian (Orat. i. p. 6) affirms that Claudius acquired the empire in a just and
even holy manner. But we may distrust the partiality of a kinsman.

[1017]
Hist. August. p. 203. There are some trifling differences concerning the
circumstances of the last defeat and death of Aureolus

[1018]
Aurelius Victor in Gallien. The people loudly prayed for the damnation of
Gallienus. The senate decreed that his relations and servants should be thrown
down headlong from the Gemonian stairs. An obnoxious officer of the revenue had
his eyes torn out whilst under examination. Note: The expression is curious,
"terram matrem deosque inferos impias uti Gallieno darent." - M.

[1019]
Zonaras, l. xii. p. 137.

[1020]
Zonaras on this occasion mentions Posthumus but the registers of the senate
(Hist. August. p. 203) prove that Tetricus was already emperor of the western
provinces.

[1021]
The Augustan History mentions the smaller, Zonaras the larger number; the lively
fancy of Montesquieu induced him to prefer the latter.

[1022]
Trebell. Pollio in Hist. August. p. 204.

[1023]
Hist. August. in Claud. Aurelian. et Prob. Zosimus, l. i. p. 38-42. Zonaras, l.
xii. p. 638. Aurel. Victor in Epitom. Victor Junior in Caesar. Eutrop. ix ll.
Euseb. in Chron.

[1024]
According to Zonaras, (l. xii. p. 638,) Claudius, before his death, invested him
with the purple; but this singular fact is rather contradicted than confirmed by
other writers.

[1025]
See the Life of Claudius by Pollio, and the Orations of Mamertinus, Eumenius,
and Julian. See likewise the Caesars of Julian p. 318. In Julian it was not
adulation, but superstition and vanity.

[1026]
Such is the narrative of the greater part of the older historians; but the
number and the variety of his medals seem to require more time, and give
probability to the report of Zosimus, who makes him reign some months. -
G.

[1027]
Zosimus, l. i. p. 42. Pollio (Hist. August. p. 107) allows him virtues, and
says, that, like Pertinax, he was killed by the licentious soldiers. According
to Dexippus, he died of a disease.

[1028]
Theoclius (as quoted in the Augustan History, p. 211) affirms that in one day he
killed with his own hand forty-eight Sarmatians, and in several subsequent
engagements nine hundred and fifty. This heroic valor was admired by the
soldiers, and celebrated in their rude songs, the burden of which was, mille,
mile, mille, occidit.

[1029]
Acholius (ap. Hist. August. p. 213) describes the ceremony of the adoption, as
it was performed at Byzantium, in the presence of the emperor and his great
officers.

[1030]
Hist. August, p. 211 This laconic epistle is truly the work of a soldier; it
abounds with military phrases and words, some of which cannot be understood
without difficulty. Ferramenta samiata is well explained by Salmasius. The
former of the words means all weapons of offence, and is contrasted with Arma,
defensive armor The latter signifies keen and well sharpened.

[1031]
Zosimus, l. i. p. 45.

[1032]
The five hundred stragglers were all slain. - M.

[1033]
Dexipphus (ap. Excerpta Legat. p. 12) relates the whole transaction under the
name of Vandals. Aurelian married one of the Gothic ladies to his general
Bonosus, who was able to drink with the Goths and discover their secrets. Hist.
August. p. 247.

[1034]
Hist. August. p. 222. Eutrop. ix. 15. Sextus Rufus, c. 9. de Mortibus
Persecutorum, c. 9.

[1035]
The Walachians still preserve many traces of the Latin language and have
boasted, in every age, of their Roman descent. They are surrounded by, but not
mixed with, the barbarians. See a Memoir of M. d'Anville on ancient Dacia, in
the Academy of Inscriptions, tom. xxx.

[1036]
The connection between the Getae and the Goths is still in my opinion
incorrectly maintained by some learned writers - M.

[1037]
See the first chapter of Jornandes. The Vandals, however, (c. 22,) maintained a
short independence between the Rivers Marisia and Crissia, (Maros and Keres,)
which fell into the Teiss.

[1038]
Dexippus, p. 7 - 12. Zosimus, l. i. p. 43. Vopiscus in Aurelian in Hist. August.
However these historians differ in names,) Alemanni Juthungi, and Marcomanni,)
it is evident that they mean the same people, and the same war; but it requires
some care to conciliate and explain them.

[1039]
Cantoclarus, with his usual accuracy, chooses to translate three hundred
thousand: his version is equally repugnant to sense and to grammar.

[1040]
We may remark, as an instance of bad taste, that Dexippus applies to the light
infantry of the Alemanni the technical terms proper only to the Grecian
phalanx.

[1041]
In Dexippus, we at present read Rhodanus: M. de Valois very judiciously alters
the word to Eridanus.

[1042]
The emperor Claudius was certainly of the number; but we are ignorant how far
this mark of respect was extended; if to Caesar and Augustus, it must have
produced a very awful spectacle; a long line of the masters of the
world.

[1043]
Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 210.

[1044]
Dexippus gives them a subtle and prolix oration, worthy of a Grecian
sophist.

[1045]
Hist. August. p. 215.

[1046]
Dexippus, p. 12.

[1047]
Victor Junior in Aurelian.

[1048]
Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 216.

[1049]
The little river, or rather torrent, of, Metaurus, near Fano, has been
immortalized, by finding such an historian as Livy, and such a poet as
Horace.

[1050]
It is recorded by an inscription found at Pesaro. See Gruter cclxxvi.
3.

[1051]
One should imagine, he said, that you were assembled in a Christian church, not
in the temple of all the gods.

[1052]
Vopiscus, in Hist. August. p. 215, 216, gives a long account of these ceremonies
from the Registers of the senate.

[1053]
Plin. Hist. Natur. iii. 5. To confirm our idea, we may observe, that for a long
time Mount Caelius was a grove of oaks, and Mount Viminal was overrun with
osiers; that, in the fourth century, the Aventine was a vacant and solitary
retirement; that, till the time of Augustus, the Esquiline was an unwholesome
burying-ground; and that the numerous inequalities, remarked by the ancients in
the Quirinal, sufficiently prove that it was not covered with buildings. Of the
seven hills, the Capitoline and Palatine only, with the adjacent valleys, were
the primitive habitations of the Roman people. But this subject would require a
dissertation.

[1054]
Exspatiantia tecta multas addidere urbes, is the expression of Pliny.

[1055]
Hist. August. p. 222. Both Lipsius and Isaac Vossius have eagerly embraced this
measure.

[1056]
See Nardini, Roman Antica, l. i. c. 8.

Note: But compare Gibbon, ch. xli. note 77. -
M.

[1057]
Tacit. Hist. iv. 23.

[1058]
For Aurelian's walls, see Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 216, 222. Zosimus, l. i.
p. 43. Eutropius, ix. 15. Aurel. Victor in Aurelian Victor Junior in Aurelian.
Euseb. Hieronym. et Idatius in Chronic

[1059]
His competitor was Lollianus, or Aelianus, if, indeed, these names mean the same
person. See Tillemont, tom. iii. p. 1177. Note: The medals which bear the name
of Lollianus are considered forgeries except one in the museum of the Prince of
Waldeck there are many extent bearing the name of Laelianus, which appears to
have been that of the competitor of Posthumus. Eckhel. Doct. Num. t. vi. 149 -
G.

[1060]
The character of this prince by Julius Aterianus (ap. Hist. August. p. 187) is
worth transcribing, as it seems fair and impartial Victorino qui Post Junium
Posthumium Gallias rexit neminem existemo praeferendum; non in virtute Trajanum;
non Antoninum in clementia; non in gravitate Nervam; non in gubernando aerario
Vespasianum; non in Censura totius vitae ac severitate militari Pertinacem vel
Severum. Sed omnia haec libido et cupiditas voluptatis mulierriae sic perdidit,
ut nemo audeat virtutes ejus in literas mittere quem constat omnium judicio
meruisse puniri.

[1061]
He ravished the wife of Attitianus, an actuary, or army agent, Hist. August. p.
186. Aurel. Victor in Aurelian.

[1062]
Pollio assigns her an article among the thirty tyrants. Hist. August. p.
200.

[1063]
Pollio in Hist. August. p. 196. Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 220. The two
Victors, in the lives of Gallienus and Aurelian. Eutrop. ix. 13. Euseb. in
Chron. Of all these writers, only the two last (but with strong probability)
place the fall of Tetricus before that of Zenobia. M. de Boze (in the Academy of
Inscriptions, tom. xxx.) does not wish, and Tillemont (tom. iii. p. 1189) does
not dare to follow them. I have been fairer than the one, and bolder than the
other.

[1064]
Victor Junior in Aurelian. Eumenius mentions Batavicoe; some critics, without
any reason, would fain alter the word to Bagandicoe.

[1065]
Eumen. in Vet. Panegyr. iv. 8.

[1066]
Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 246. Autun was not restored till the reign of
Diocletian. See Eumenius de restaurandis scholis.

[1067]
Almost everything that is said of the manners of Odenathus and Zenobia is taken
from their lives in the Augustan History, by Trebeljus Pollio; see p. 192,
198.

[1068]
According to some Christian writers, Zenobia was a Jewess. (Jost Geschichte der
Israel. iv. 16. Hist. of Jews, iii. 175.) - M.

[1069]
She never admitted her husband's embraces but for the sake of posterity. If her
hopes were baffled, in the ensuing month she reiterated the
experiment.

[1070]
According to Zosimus, Odenathus was of a noble family in Palmyra and according
to Procopius, he was prince of the Saracens, who inhabit the ranks of the
Euphrates. Echhel. Doct. Num. vii. 489. - G.

[1071]
Hist. August. p. 192, 193. Zosimus, l. i. p. 36. Zonaras, l. xii p. 633. The
last is clear and probable, the others confused and inconsistent. The text of
Syncellus, if not corrupt, is absolute nonsense.

[1072]
Odenathus and Zenobia often sent him, from the spoils of the enemy, presents of
gems and toys, which he received with infinite delight.

[1073]
Some very unjust suspicions have been cast on Zenobia, as if she was accessory
to her husband's death.

[1074]
Hist. August. p. 180, 181.

[1075]
See, in Hist. August. p. 198, Aurelian's testimony to her merit; and for the
conquest of Egypt, Zosimus, l. i. p. 39, 40.

[1076]
This seems very doubtful. Claudius, during all his reign, is represented as
emperor on the medals of Alexandria, which are very numerous. If Zenobia
possessed any power in Egypt, it could only have been at the beginning of the
reign of Aurelian. The same circumstance throws great improbability on her
conquests in Galatia. Perhaps Zenobia administered Egypt in the name of
Claudius, and emboldened by the death of that prince, subjected it to her own
power. - G.

[1077]
Timolaus, Herennianus, and Vaballathus. It is supposed that the two former were
already dead before the war. On the last, Aurelian bestowed a small province of
Armenia, with the title of King; several of his medals are still extant. See
Tillemont, tom. 3, p. 1190.

[1078]
Zonaras, l. xii. p. 637. The Alexandrian Chronicle, by an obvious mistake,
transfers that age to Aurelian.

[1079]
Zosimus, l. i. p. 44.

[1080]
Vopiscus (in Hist. August. p. 217) gives us an authentic letter and a doubtful
vision, of Aurelian. Apollonius of Tyana was born about the same time as Jesus
Christ. His life (that of the former) is related in so fabulous a manner by his
disciples, that we are at a loss to discover whether he was a sage, an impostor,
or a fanatic.

[1081]
Zosimus, l. i. p. 46.

[1082]
At a place called Immae. Eutropius, Sextus Rufus, and Jerome, mention only this
first battle.

[1083]
Vopiscus (in Hist. August. p. 217) mentions only the second.

[1084]
Zosimus, l. i. p. 44 - 48. His account of the two battles is clear and
circumstantial.

[1085]
It was five hundred and thirty-seven miles from Seleucia, and two hundred and
three from the nearest coast of Syria, according to the reckoning of Pliny, who,
in a few words, (Hist. Natur. v. 21,) gives an excellent description of
Palmyra.

Note: Talmor, or Palmyra, was probably at a very early
period the connecting link between the commerce of Tyre and Babylon. Heeren,
Ideen, v. i. p. ii. p. 125. Tadmor was probably built by Solomon as a commercial
station. Hist. of Jews, v. p. 271 - M.

[1086]
Some English travellers from Aleppo discovered the ruins of Palmyra about the
end of the last century. Our curiosity has since been gratified in a more
splendid manner by Messieurs Wood and Dawkins. For the history of Palmyra, we
may consult the masterly dissertation of Dr. Halley in the Philosophical
Transactions: Lowthorp's Abridgment, vol. iii. p. 518.

[1087]
Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 218.

[1088]
From a very doubtful chronology I have endeavored to extract the most probable
date.

[1089]
Hist. August. p. 218. Zosimus, l. i. p. 50. Though the camel is a heavy beast of
burden, the dromedary, which is either of the same or of a kindred species, is
used by the natives of Asia and Africa on all occasions which require celerity.
The Arabs affirm, that he will run over as much ground in one day as their
fleetest horses can perform in eight or ten. See Buffon, Hist. Naturelle, tom.
xi. p. 222, and Shaw's Travels p. 167

[1090]
Pollio in Hist. August. p. 199.

[1091]
Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 219. Zosimus, l. i. p. 51.

[1092]
Hist. August. p. 219.

[1093]
See Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 220, 242. As an instance of luxury, it is
observed, that he had glass windows. He was remarkable for his strength and
appetite, his courage and dexterity. From the letter of Aurelian, we may justly
infer, that Firmus was the last of the rebels, and consequently that Tetricus
was already suppressed.

[1094]
See the triumph of Aurelian, described by Vopiscus. He relates the particulars
with his usual minuteness; and, on this occasion, they happen to be interesting.
Hist. August. p. 220.

[1095]
Among barbarous nations, women have often combated by the side of their
husbands. But it is almost impossible that a society of Amazons should ever have
existed either in the old or new world.

Note: Klaproth's theory on the origin of such
traditions is at least recommended by its ingenuity. The males of a tribe having
gone out on a marauding expedition, and having been cut off to a man, the
females may have endeavored, for a time, to maintain their independence in their
camp village, till their children grew up. Travels, ch. xxx. Eng. Trans -
M.

[1096]
The use of braccoe, breeches, or trousers, was still considered in Italy as a
Gallic and barbarian fashion. The Romans, however, had made great advances
towards it. To encircle the legs and thighs with fascioe, or bands, was
understood, in the time of Pompey and Horace, to be a proof of ill health or
effeminacy. In the age of Trajan, the custom was confined to the rich and
luxurious. It gradually was adopted by the meanest of the people. See a very
curious note of Casaubon, ad Sueton. in August. c. 82.

[1097]
Most probably the former; the latter seen on the medals of Aurelian, only denote
(according to the learned Cardinal Norris) an oriental victory.

[1098]
The expression of Calphurnius, (Clogs. i. 50) Nullos decet captiva triumphos, as
applied to Rome, contains a very manifest allusion and censure.

[1099]
Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 199. Hieronym. in Chron. Prosper in Chron. Baronius
supposes that Zenobius, bishop of Florence in the time of St. Ambrose, was of
her family.

[1100]
Vopisc. in Hist. August. p. 222. Eutropius, ix. 13. Victor Junior. But Pollio,
in Hist. August. p. 196, says, that Tetricus was made corrector of all
Italy.

[1101]
Hist. August. p. 197.

[1102]
Vopiscus in Hist. August. 222. Zosimus, l. i. p. 56. He placed in it the images
of Belus and of the Sun, which he had brought from Palmyra. It was dedicated in
the fourth year of his reign, (Euseb in Chron.,) but was most assuredly begun
immediately on his accession.

[1103]
See, in the Augustan History, p. 210, the omens of his fortune. His devotion to
the Sun appears in his letters, on his medals, and is mentioned in the Caesars
of Julian. Commentaire de Spanheim, p. 109.

[1104]
Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 221.

[1105]
Hist. August. p. 222. Aurelian calls these soldiers Hiberi Riporiences
Castriani, and Dacisci.

[1106]
Zosimus, l. i. p. 56. Eutropius, ix. 14. Aurel Victor.

[1107]
Hist. August. p. 222. Aurel Victor.

[1108]
It already raged before Aurelian's return from Egypt. See Vipiscus, who quotes
an original letter. Hist. August. p. 244.

[1109]
Vopiscus in Hist. August p. 222. The two Victors. Eutropius ix. 14. Zosimus (l.
i. p. 43) mentions only three senators, and placed their death before the
eastern war.

[1110]
Nulla catenati feralis pompa senatus Carnificum lassabit opus; nec carcere pleno
Infelix raros numerabit curia Patres.

Calphurn. Eclog. i. 60.

[1111]
According to the younger Victor, he sometimes wore the diadem, Deus and Dominus
appear on his medals.

[1112]
It was the observation of Dioclatian. See Vopiscus in Hist. August. p.
224.

[1113]
Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 221. Zosimus, l. i. p. 57. Eutrop ix. 15. The two
Victors.

[1114]
Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 222. Aurelius Victor mentions a formal deputation
from the troops to the senate.

[1115]
Vopiscus, our principal authority, wrote at Rome, sixteen years only after the
death of Aurelian; and, besides the recent notoriety of the facts, constantly
draws his materials from the Journals of the Senate, and the original papers of
the Ulpian library. Zosimus and Zonaras appear as ignorant of this transaction
as they were in general of the Roman constitution.

[1116]
The interregnum could not be more than seven months; Aurelian was assassinated
in the middle of March, the year of Rome 1028. Tacitus was elected the 25th
September in the same year. - G.

[1117]
Liv. i. 17 Dionys. Halicarn. l. ii. p. 115. Plutarch in Numa, p. 60. The first
of these writers relates the story like an orator, the second like a lawyer, and
the third like a moralist, and none of them probably without some intermixture
of fable.

[1118]
Vopiscus (in Hist. August p. 227) calls him "primae sententia consularis;" and
soon afterwards Princeps senatus. It is natural to suppose, that the monarchs of
Rome, disdaining that humble title, resigned it to the most ancient of the
senators.

[1119]
The only objection to this genealogy is, that the historian was named Cornelius,
the emperor, Claudius. But under the lower empire, surnames were extremely
various and uncertain.

[1120]
The question of the time when Maximian received the honors of Caesar and
Augustus has divided modern critics, and given occasion to a great deal of
learned wrangling. I have followed M. de Tillemont, (Histoire des Empereurs,
tom. iv. p. 500-505,) who has weighed the several reasons and difficulties with
his scrupulous accuracy.

Note: Eckbel concurs in this view, viii p. 15. -
M.

[1121]
In the year 273, he was ordinary consul. But he must have been Suffectus many
years before, and most probably under Valerian.

[1122]
Bis millies octingenties. Vopiscus in Hist. August p. 229. This sum, according
to the old standard, was equivalent to eight hundred and forty thousand Roman
pounds of silver, each of the value of three pounds sterling. But in the age of
Tacitus, the coin had lost much of its weight and purity.

[1123]
After his accession, he gave orders that ten copies of the historian should be
annually transcribed and placed in the public libraries. The Roman libraries
have long since perished, and the most valuable part of Tacitus was preserved in
a single Ms., and discovered in a monastery of Westphalia. See Bayle,
Dictionnaire, Art. Tacite, and Lipsius ad Annal. ii. 9.

[1124]
Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 227.

[1125]
Hist. August. p. 228. Tacitus addressed the Praetorians by the appellation of
sanctissimi milites, and the people by that of sacratissim. Quirites.

[1126]
In his manumissions he never exceeded the number of a hundred, as limited by the
Caninian law, which was enacted under Augustus, and at length repealed by
Justinian. See Casaubon ad locum Vopisci.

[1127]
See the lives of Tacitus, Florianus, and Probus, in the Augustan History; we may
be well assured, that whatever the soldier gave the senator had already
given.

[1128]
Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 216. The passage is perfectly clear, both Casaubon
and Salmasius wish to correct it.

[1129]
Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 230, 232, 233. The senators celebrated the happy
restoration with hecatombs and public rejoicings.

[1130]
Hist. August. p. 228.

[1131]
On the Alani, see ch. xxvi. note 55. - M.

[1132]
Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 230. Zosimus, l. i. p. 57. Zonaras, l. xii. p. 637.
Two passages in the life of Probus (p. 236, 238) convince me, that these
Scythian invaders of Pontus were Alani. If we may believe Zosimus, (l. i. p.
58,) Florianus pursued them as far as the Cimmerian Bosphorus. But he had
scarcely time for so long and difficult an expedition.

[1133]
Eutropius and Aurelius Victor only say that he died; Victor Junior adds, that it
was of a fever. Zosimus and Zonaras affirm, that he was killed by the soldiers.
Vopiscus mentions both accounts, and seems to hesitate. Yet surely these jarring
opinions are easily reconciled.

[1134]
According to the two Victors, he reigned exactly two hundred days.

[1135]
Hist. August, p. 231. Zosimus, l. i. p. 58, 59. Zonaras, l. xii. p. 637.
Aurelius Victor says, that Probus assumed the empire in Illyricum; an opinion
which (though adopted by a very learned man) would throw that period of history
into inextricable confusion.

[1136]
Hist. August. p. 229

[1137]
He was to send judges to the Parthians, Persians, and Sarmatians, a president to
Taprobani, and a proconsul to the Roman island, (supposed by Casaubon and
Salmasius to mean Britain.) Such a history as mine (says Vopiscus with proper
modesty) will not subsist a thousand years, to expose or justify the
prediction.

[1138]
For the private life of Probus, see Vopiscus in Hist. August p. 234 -
237

[1139]
According to the Alexandrian chronicle, he was fifty at the time of his
death.

[1140]
This letter was addressed to the Praetorian praefect, whom (on condition of his
good behavior) he promised to continue in his great office. See Hist. August. p.
237.

[1141]
Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 237. The date of the letter is assuredly faulty.
Instead of Nen. Februar. we may read Non August.

[1142]
Hist. August. p. 238. It is odd that the senate should treat Probus less
favorably than Marcus Antoninus. That prince had received, even before the death
of Pius, Jus quintoe relationis. See Capitolin. in Hist. August. p.
24.

[1143]
See the dutiful letter of Probus to the senate, after his German victories.
Hist. August. p. 239.

[1144]
The date and duration of the reign of Probus are very correctly ascertained by
Cardinal Noris in his learned work, De Epochis Syro-Macedonum, p. 96 - 105. A
passage of Eusebius connects the second year of Probus with the aeras of several
of the Syrian cities.

[1145]
Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 239.

[1146]
Zosimus (l. i. p. 62 - 65) tells us a very long and trifling story of Lycius,
the Isaurian robber.

[1147]
Zosim. l. i. p. 65. Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 239, 240. But it seems
incredible that the defeat of the savages of Aethiopia could affect the Persian
monarch.

[1148]
Besides these well-known chiefs, several others are named by Vopiscus, (Hist.
August. p. 241,) whose actions have not reached knowledge.

[1149]
See the Caesars of Julian, and Hist. August. p. 238, 240, 241.

[1150]
It was only under the emperors Diocletian and Maximian, that the Burgundians, in
concert with the Alemanni, invaded the interior of Gaul; under the reign of
Probus, they did no more than pass the river which separated them from the Roman
Empire: they were repelled. Gatterer presumes that this river was the Danube; a
passage in Zosimus appears to me rather to indicate the Rhine. Zos. l. i. p. 37,
edit H. Etienne, 1581. - G. On the origin of the Burgundians may be consulted
Malte Brun, Geogr vi. p. 396, (edit. 1831,) who observes that all the remains of
the Burgundian language indicate that they spoke a Gothic dialect. -
M.

[1151]
Zosimus, l. i. p. 62. Hist. August. p. 240. But the latter supposes the
punishment inflicted with the consent of their kings: if so, it was partial,
like the offence.

[1152]
See Cluver. Germania Antiqua, l. iii. Ptolemy places in their country the city
of Calisia, probably Calish in Silesia.

Note: Luden (vol ii. 501) supposes that these have been
erroneously identified with the Lygii of Tacitus. Perhaps one fertile source of
mistakes has been, that the Romans have turned appellations into national names.
Malte Brun observes of the Lygii, "that their name appears Sclavonian, and
signifies 'inhabitants of plains;' they are probably the Lieches of the middle
ages, and the ancestors of the Poles. We find among the Arii the worship of the
two twin gods known in the Sclavian mythology." Malte Brun, vol. i. p. 278,
(edit. 1831.) - M.

But compare Schafarik, Slawische Alterthumer, 1, p.
406. They were of German or Keltish descent, occupying the Wendish (or Slavian)
district, Luhy. - M. 1845.

[1153]
Feralis umbra, is the expression of Tacitus: it is surely a very bold
one.

[1154]
Tacit. Germania, (c. 43.)

[1155]
Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 238

[1156]
Hist. August. 238, 239. Vopiscus quotes a letter from the emperor to the senate,
in which he mentions his design of reducing Germany into a province.

[1157]
Strabo, l. vii. According to Valleius Paterculus, (ii. 108,) Maroboduus led his
Marcomanni into Bohemia; Cluverius (German. Antiq. iii. 8) proves that it was
from Swabia.

[1158]
These settlers, from the payment of tithes, were denominated Decunates. Tacit.
Germania, c. 29

[1159]
See notes de l'Abbe de la Bleterie a la Germanie de Tacite, p. 183. His account
of the wall is chiefly borrowed (as he says himself) from the Alsatia Illustrata
of Schoepflin.

[1160]
See Recherches sur les Chinois et les Egyptiens, tom. ii. p. 81 - 102. The
anonymous author is well acquainted with the globe in general, and with Germany
in particular: with regard to the latter, he quotes a work of M. Hanselman; but
he seems to confound the wall of Probus, designed against the Alemanni, with the
fortification of the Mattiaci, constructed in the neighborhood of Frankfort
against the Catti.

Note: De Pauw is well known to have been the author of
this work, as of the Recherches sur les Americains before quoted. The judgment
of M. Remusat on this writer is in a very different, I fear a juster tone. Quand
au lieu de rechercher, d'examiner, d'etudier, on se borne, comme cet ecrivain, a
juger a prononcer, a decider, sans connoitre ni l'histoire. ni les langues, sans
recourir aux sources, sans meme se douter de leur existence, on peut en imposer
pendant quelque temps a des lecteurs prevenus ou peu instruits; mais le mepris
qui ne manque guere de succeder a cet engouement fait bientot justice de ces
assertions hazardees, et elles retombent dans l'oubli d'autant plus promptement,
qu'elles ont ete posees avec plus de confiance. Sur les l angues Tartares, p.
231. - M.

[1161]
He distributed about fifty or sixty barbarians to a Numerus, as it was then
called, a corps with whose established number we are not exactly
acquainted.

[1162]
Camden's Britannia, Introduction, p. 136; but he speaks from a very doubtful
conjecture.

[1163]
Zosimus, l. i. p. 62. According to Vopiscus, another body of Vandals was less
faithful.

[1164]
Hist. August. p. 240. They were probably expelled by the Goths. Zosim. l. i. p.
66.

[1165]
Hist. August. p. 240.

[1166]
Panegyr. Vet. v. 18. Zosimus, l. i. p. 66.

[1167]
Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 245, 246. The unfortunate orator had studied
rhetoric at Carthage; and was therefore more probably a Moor (Zosim. l. i. p.
60) than a Gaul, as Vopiscus calls him.

[1168]
Zonaras, l. xii. p. 638.

[1169]
A very surprising instance is recorded of the prowess of Procufus. He had taken
one hundred Sarmatian virgins. The rest of the story he must relate in his own
language: "Ex his una necte decem inivi; omnes tamen, quod in me erat, mulieres
intra dies quindecim reddidi. Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 246.

[1170]
Proculus, who was a native of Albengue, on the Genoese coast armed two thousand
of his own slaves. His riches were great, but they were acquired by robbery. It
was afterwards a saying of his family, sibi non placere esse vel principes vel
latrones. Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 247.

[1171]
Hist. August. p. 240.

[1172]
Zosim. l. i. p. 66.

[1173]
Hist. August. p. 236.

[1174]
Aurel. Victor. in Prob. But the policy of Hannibal, unnoticed by any more
ancient writer, is irreconcilable with the history of his life. He left Africa
when he was nine years old, returned to it when he was forty- five, and
immediately lost his army in the decisive battle of Zama. Livilus, xxx.
37.

[1175]
Hist. August. p. 240. Eutrop. ix. 17. Aurel. Victor. in Prob. Victor Junior. He
revoked the prohibition of Domitian, and granted a general permission of
planting vines to the Gauls, the Britons, and the Pannonians.

[1176]
Julian bestows a severe, and indeed excessive, censure on the rigor of Probus,
who, as he thinks, almost deserved his fate.

[1177]
Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 241. He lavishes on this idle hope a large stock of
very foolish eloquence.

[1178]
Turris ferrata. It seems to have been a movable tower, and cased with
iron.

[1179]
Probus, et vere probus situs est; Victor omnium gentium Barbararum; victor etiam
tyrannorum.

[1180]
Yet all this may be conciliated. He was born at Narbonne in Illyricum,
confounded by Eutropius with the more famous city of that name in Gaul. His
father might be an African, and his mother a noble Roman. Carus himself was
educated in the capital. See Scaliger Animadversion. ad Euseb. Chron. p.
241.

[1181]
Probus had requested of the senate an equestrian statue and a marble palace, at
the public expense, as a just recompense of the singular merit of Carus.
Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 249.

[1182]
Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 242, 249. Julian excludes the emperor Carus and
both his sons from the banquet of the Caesars.

[1183]
John Malala, tom. i. p. 401. But the authority of that ignorant Greek is very
slight. He ridiculously derives from Carus the city of Carrhae, and the province
of Caria, the latter of which is mentioned by Homer.

[1184]
Hist. August. p. 249. Carus congratulated the senate, that one of their own
order was made emperor.

[1185]
Hist. August. p. 242.

[1186]
See the first eclogue of Calphurnius. The design of it is preferes by Fontenelle
to that of Virgil's Pollio. See tom. iii. p. 148.

[1187]
Hist. August. p. 353. Eutropius, ix. 18. Pagi. Annal.

[1188]
Three monarchs had intervened, Sapor, (Shahpour,) Hormisdas, (Hormooz,) Varanes;
Baharam the First. - M.

[1189]
Agathias, l. iv. p. 135. We find one of his sayings in the Bibliotheque
Orientale of M. d'Herbelot. "The definition of humanity includes all other
virtues."

[1190]
The manner in which his life was saved by the Chief Pontiff from a conspiracy of
his nobles, is as remarkable as his saying. "By the advice (of the Pontiff) all
the nobles absented themselves from court. The king wandered through his palace
alone. He saw no one; all was silence around. He became alarmed and distressed.
At last the Chief Pontiff appeared, and bowed his head in apparent misery, but
spoke not a word. The king entreated him to declare what had happened. The
virtuous man boldly related all that had passed, and conjured Bahram, in the
name of his glorious ancestors, to change his conduct and save himself from
destruction. The king was much moved, professed himself most penitent, and said
he was resolved his future life should prove his sincerity. The overjoyed High
Priest, delighted at this success, made a signal, at which all the nobles and
attendants were in an instant, as if by magic, in their usual places. The
monarch now perceived that only one opinion prevailed on his past conduct. He
repeated therefore to his nobles all he had said to the Chief Pontiff, and his
future reign was unstained by cruelty or oppression." Malcolm's Persia, -
M.

[1191]
Synesius tells this story of Carinus; and it is much more natural to understand
it of Carus, than (as Petavius and Tillemont choose to do) of Probus.

[1192]
Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 250. Eutropius, ix. 18. The two Victors.

[1193]
To the Persian victory of Carus I refer the dialogue of the Philopatris, which
has so long been an object of dispute among the learned. But to explain and
justify my opinion, would require a dissertation.

Note: Niebuhr, in the new edition of the Byzantine
Historians, (vol. x.) has boldly assigned the Philopatris to the tenth century,
and to the reign of Nicephorus Phocas. An opinion so decisively pronounced by
Niebuhr and favorably received by Hase, the learned editor of Leo Diaconus,
commands respectful consideration. But the whole tone of the work appears to me
altogether inconsistent with any period in which philosophy did not stand, as it
were, on some ground of equality with Christianity. The doctrine of the Trinity
is sarcastically introduced rather as the strange doctrine of a new religion,
than the established tenet of a faith universally prevalent. The argument,
adopted from Solanus, concerning the formula of the procession of the Holy
Ghost, is utterly worthless, as it is a mere quotation in the words of the
Gospel of St. John, xv. 26. The only argument of any value is the historic one,
from the allusion to the recent violation of many virgins in the Island of
Crete. But neither is the language of Niebuhr quite accurate, nor his reference
to the Acroases of Theodosius satisfactory. When, then, could this occurrence
take place? Why not in the devastation of the island by the Gothic pirates,
during the reign of Claudius. Hist. Aug. in Claud. p. 814. edit. Var. Lugd. Bat
1661. - M.

[1194]
Hist. August. p. 250. Yet Eutropius, Festus, Rufus, the two Victors, Jerome,
Sidonius Apollinaris, Syncellus, and Zonaras, all ascribe the death of Carus to
lightning.

[1195]
See Nemesian. Cynegeticon, v. 71, &c.

[1196]
See Festus and his commentators on the word Scribonianum. Places struck by
lightning were surrounded with a wall; things were buried with mysterious
ceremony.

[1197]
Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 250. Aurelius Victor seems to believe the
prediction, and to approve the retreat.

[1198]
Nemesian. Cynegeticon, v 69. He was a contemporary, but a poet.

[1199]
Cancellarius. This word, so humble in its origin, has, by a singular fortune,
risen into the title of the first great office of state in the monarchies of
Europe. See Casaubon and Salmasius, ad Hist. August, p. 253.

[1200]
Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 253, 254. Eutropius, x. 19. Vic to Junior. The
reign of Diocletian indeed was so long and prosperous, that it must have been
very unfavorable to the reputation of Carinus.

[1201]
Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 254. He calls him Carus, but the sense is
sufficiently obvious, and the words were often confounded.

[1202]
See Calphurnius, Eclog. vii. 43. We may observe, that the spectacles of Probus
were still recent, and that the poet is seconded by the historian.

[1203]
The philosopher Montaigne (Essais, l. iii. 6) gives a very just and lively view
of Roman magnificence in these spectacles.

[1204]
Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 240.

[1205]
They are called Onagri; but the number is too inconsiderable for mere wild
asses. Cuper (de Elephantis Exercitat. ii. 7) has proved from Oppian, Dion, and
an anonymous Greek, that zebras had been seen at Rome. They were brought from
some island of the ocean, perhaps Madagascar.

[1206]
Carinus gave a hippopotamus, (see Calphurn. Eclog. vi. 66.) In the latter
spectacles, I do not recollect any crocodiles, of which Augustus once exhibited
thirty-six. Dion Cassius, l. lv. p. 781.

[1207]
Capitolin. in Hist. August. p. 164, 165. We are not acquainted with the animals
which he calls archeleontes; some read argoleontes others agrioleontes: both
corrections are very nugatory

[1208]
Plin. Hist. Natur. viii. 6, from the annals of Piso.

[1209]
See Maffei, Verona Illustrata, p. iv. l. i. c. 2.

[1210]
Maffei, l. ii. c. 2. The height was very much exaggerated by the ancients. It
reached almost to the heavens, according to Calphurnius, (Eclog. vii. 23,) and
surpassed the ken of human sight, according to Ammianus Marcellinus (xvi. 10.)
Yet how trifling to the great pyramid of Egypt, which rises 500 feet
perpendicular

[1211]
According to different copies of Victor, we read 77,000, or 87,000 spectators;
but Maffei (l. ii. c. 12) finds room on the open seats for no more than 34,000.
The remainder were contained in the upper covered galleries.

[1212]
See Maffei, l. ii. c. 5 - 12. He treats the very difficult subject with all
possible clearness, and like an architect, as well as an antiquarian.

[1213]
Calphurn. Eclog vii. 64, 73. These lines are curious, and the whole eclogue has
been of infinite use to Maffei. Calphurnius, as well as Martial, (see his first
book,) was a poet; but when they described the amphitheatre, they both wrote
from their own senses, and to those of the Romans.

[1214]
Consult Plin. Hist. Natur. xxxiii. 16, xxxvii. 11.

[1215]
Balteus en gemmis, en inlita porticus auro Certatim radiant, &c. Calphurn.
vii.

[1216]
Et Martis vultus et Apollinis esse putavi, says Calphurnius; but John Malala,
who had perhaps seen pictures of Carinus, describes him as thick, short, and
white, tom. i. p. 403.

[1217]
With regard to the time when these Roman games were celebrated, Scaliger,
Salmasius, and Cuper have given themselves a great deal of trouble to perplex a
very clear subject.

[1218]
Nemesianus (in the Cynegeticon) seems to anticipate in his fancy that auspicious
day.

[1219]
He won all the crowns from Nemesianus, with whom he vied in didactic poetry. The
senate erected a statue to the son of Carus, with a very ambiguous inscription,
"To the most powerful of orators." See Vopiscus in Hist. August. p.
251.

[1220]
A more natural cause, at least, than that assigned by Vopiscus, (Hist. August.
p. 251,) incessantly weeping for his father's death.

[1221]
In the Persian war, Aper was suspected of a design to betray Carus. Hist.
August. p. 250.

[1222]
We are obliged to the Alexandrian Chronicle, p. 274, for the knowledge of the
time and place where Diocletian was elected emperor.

[1223]
Hist. August. p. 251. Eutrop. ix. 88. Hieronym. in Chron. According to these
judicious writers, the death of Numerian was discovered by the stench of his
dead body. Could no aromatics be found in the Imperial household?

[1224]
Aurel. Victor. Eutropius, ix. 20. Hieronym. in Chron.

[1225]
Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 252. The reason why Diocletian killed Aper, (a wild
boar,) was founded on a prophecy and a pun, as foolish as they are well
known.

[1226]
Eutropius marks its situation very accurately; it was between the Mons Aureus
and Viminiacum. M. d'Anville (Geographic Ancienne, tom. i. p. 304) places Margus
at Kastolatz in Servia, a little below Belgrade and Semendria.

Not: Kullieza - Eton Atlas - M.

[1227]
Hist. August. p. 254. Eutropius, ix. 20. Aurelius Victor et Epitome

[1228]
Eutrop. ix. 19. Victor in Epitome. The town seems to have been properly called
Doclia, from a small tribe of Illyrians, (see Cellarius, Geograph. Antiqua, tom.
i. p. 393;) and the original name of the fortunate slave was probably Docles; he
first lengthened it to the Grecian harmony of Diocles, and at length to the
Roman majesty of Diocletianus. He likewise assumed the Patrician name of
Valerius and it is usually given him by Aurelius Victor.

[1229]
See Dacier on the sixth satire of the second book of Horace Cornel. Nepos, 'n
Vit. Eumen. c. l.

[1230]
Lactantius (or whoever was the author of the little treatise De Mortibus
Persecutorum) accuses Diocletian of timidity in two places, c. 7. 8. In chap. 9
he says of him, "erat in omni tumultu meticulosu et animi disjectus."

[1231]
In this encomium, Aurelius Victor seems to convey a just, though indirect,
censure of the cruelty of Constantius. It appears from the Fasti, that
Aristobulus remained praefect of the city, and that he ended with Diocletian the
consulship which he had commenced with Carinus.

[1232]
Aurelius Victor styles Diocletian, "Parentum potius quam Dominum." See Hist.
August. p. 30.

[1233]
His diligence and fidelity are acknowledged even by Lactantius, de M. P. c.
18.

[1234]
In an oration delivered before him, (Panegyr. Vet. ii. 8,) Mamertinus expresses
a doubt, whether his hero, in imitating the conduct of Hannibal and Scipio, had
ever heard of their names. From thence we may fairly infer, that Maximian was
more desirous of being considered as a soldier than as a man of letters; and it
is in this manner that we can often translate the language of flattery into that
of truth.

[1235]
Lactantius de M. P. c. 8. Aurelius Victor. As among the Panegyrics, we find
orations pronounced in praise of Maximian, and others which flatter his
adversaries at his expense, we derive some knowledge from the
contrast.

[1236]
See the second and third Panegyrics, particularly iii. 3, 10, 14 but it would be
tedious to copy the diffuse and affected expressions of their false eloquence.
With regard to the titles, consult Aurel. Victor Lactantius de M. P. c. 52.
Spanheim de Usu Numismatum, &c. xii 8.

[1237]
On the relative power of the Augusti and the Caesars, consult a dissertation at
the end of Manso's Leben Constantius des Grossen - M.

[1238]
Aurelius Victor. Victor in Epitome. Eutrop. ix. 22. Lactant de M. P. c. 8.
Hieronym. in Chron.

[1239]
It is only among the modern Greeks that Tillemont can discover his appellation
of Chlorus. Any remarkable degree of paleness seems inconsistent with the rubor
mentioned in Panegyric, v. 19.

[1240]
Julian, the grandson of Constantius, boasts that his family was derived from the
warlike Maesians. Misopogon, p. 348. The Dardanians dwelt on the edge of
Maesia.

[1241]
Galerius married Valeria, the daughter of Diocletian; if we speak with
strictness, Theodora, the wife of Constantius, was daughter only to the wife of
Maximian. Spanheim, Dissertat, xi. 2.

[1242]
This division agrees with that of the four praefectures; yet there is some
reason to doubt whether Spain was not a province of Maximian. See Tillemont,
tom. iv. p. 517.

Note: According to Aurelius Victor and other
authorities, Thrace belonged to the division of Galerius. See Tillemont, iv. 36.
But the laws of Diocletian are in general dated in Illyria or Thrace. -
M.

[1243]
Julian in Caesarib. p. 315. Spanheim's notes to the French translation, p.
122.

[1244]
The general name of Bagaudoe (in the signification of rebels) continued till the
fifth century in Gaul. Some critics derive it from a Celtic word Bagad, a
tumultuous assembly. Scaliger ad Euseb. Du Cange Glossar. (Compare S. Turner,
Anglo-Sax. History, i. 214. - M.)

[1245]
Chronique de Froissart, vol. i. c. 182, ii. 73, 79. The naivete of his story is
lost in our best modern writers.

[1246]
Caesar de Bell. Gallic. vi. 13. Orgetorix, the Helvetian, could arm for his
defence a body of ten thousand slaves.

[1247]
Their oppression and misery are acknowledged by Eumenius (Panegyr. vi. 8,)
Gallias efferatas injuriis.

[1248]
Panegyr. Vet. ii. 4. Aurelius Victor.

[1249]
Aelianus and Amandus. We have medals coined by them Goltzius in Thes. R. A. p.
117, 121.

[1250]
Levibus proeliis domuit. Eutrop. ix. 20.

[1251]
The fact rests indeed on very slight authority, a life of St. Babolinus, which
is probably of the seventh century. See Duchesne Scriptores Rer. Francicar. tom.
i. p. 662.

[1252]
Aurelius Victor calls them Germans. Eutropius (ix. 21) gives them the name of
Saxons. But Eutropius lived in the ensuing century, and seems to use the
language of his own times.

[1253]
The three expressions of Eutropius, Aurelius Victor, and Eumenius, "vilissime
natus," "Bataviae alumnus," and "Menapiae civis," give us a very doubtful
account of the birth of Carausius. Dr. Stukely, however, (Hist. of Carausius, p.
62,) chooses to make him a native of St. David's and a prince of the blood royal
of Britain. The former idea he had found in Richard of Cirencester, p. 44.

Note: The Menapians were settled between the Scheldt
and the Meuse, is the northern part of Brabant. D'Anville, Geogr. Anc. i. 93. -
G.

[1254]
Panegyr. v. 12. Britain at this time was secure, and slightly guarded.

[1255]
Panegyr. Vet v 11, vii. 9. The orator Eumenius wished to exalt the glory of the
hero (Constantius) with the importance of the conquest. Notwithstanding our
laudable partiality for our native country, it is difficult to conceive, that,
in the beginning of the fourth century England deserved all these commendations.
A century and a half before, it hardly paid its own establishment.

[1256]
As a great number of medals of Carausius are still preserved, he is become a
very favorite object of antiquarian curiosity, and every circumstance of his
life and actions has been investigated with sagacious accuracy. Dr. Stukely, in
particular, has devoted a large volume to the British emperor. I have used his
materials, and rejected most of his fanciful conjectures.

[1257]
When Mamertinus pronounced his first panegyric, the naval preparations of
Maximian were completed; and the orator presaged an assured victory. His silence
in the second panegyric might alone inform us that the expedition had not
succeeded.

[1258]
Aurelius Victor, Eutropius, and the medals, (Pax Augg.) inform us of this
temporary reconciliation; though I will not presume (as Dr. Stukely has done,
Medallic History of Carausius, p. 86, &c) to insert the identical articles
of the treaty.

[1259]
With regard to the recovery of Britain, we obtain a few hints from Aurelius
Victor and Eutropius.

[1260]
John Malala, in Chron, Antiochen. tom. i. p. 408, 409.

[1261]
Zosim. l. i. p. 3. That partial historian seems to celebrate the vigilance of
Diocletian with a design of exposing the negligence of Constantine; we may,
however, listen to an orator: "Nam quid ego alarum et cohortium castra
percenseam, toto Rheni et Istri et Euphraus limite restituta." Panegyr. Vet. iv.
18.

[1262]
Ruunt omnes in sanguinem suum populi, quibus ron contigilesse Romanis,
obstinataeque feritatis poenas nunc sponte persolvunt. Panegyr. Vet. iii. 16.
Mamertinus illustrates the fact by the example of almost all the nations in the
world.

[1263]
He complained, though not with the strictest truth, "Jam fluxisse annos
quindecim in quibus, in Illyrico, ad ripam Danubii relegatus cum gentibus
barbaris luctaret." Lactant. de M. P. c. 18.

[1264]
In the Greek text of Eusebius, we read six thousand, a number which I have
preferred to the sixty thousand of Jerome, Orosius Eutropius, and his Greek
translator Paeanius.

[1265]
Panegyr. Vet. vii. 21.

[1266]
There was a settlement of the Sarmatians in the neighborhood of Treves, which
seems to have been deserted by those lazy barbarians. Ausonius speaks of them in
his Mosella: -

"Unde iter ingrediens nemorosa per avia solum, Et nulla
humani spectans vestigia cultus; . . . . . . . . Arvaque Sauromatum nuper metata
colonis.

[1267]
There was a town of the Carpi in the Lower Maesia. See the rhetorical exultation
of Eumenius.

[1268]
Scaliger (Animadvers. ad Euseb. p. 243) decides, in his usual manner, that the
Quinque gentiani, or five African nations, were the five great cities, the
Pentapolis of the inoffensive province of Cyrene.

[1269]
After his defeat, Julian stabbed himself with a dagger, and immediately leaped
into the flames. Victor in Epitome.

[1270]
Tu ferocissimos Mauritaniae populos inaccessis montium jugis et naturali
munitione fidentes, expugnasti, recepisti, transtulisti. Panegyr Vet. vi.
8.

[1271]
See the description of Alexandria, in Hirtius de Bel. Alexandrin c. 5.

[1272]
Eutrop. ix. 24. Orosius, vii. 25. John Malala in Chron. Antioch. p. 409, 410.
Yet Eumenius assures us, that Egypt was pacified by the clemency of
Diocletian.

[1273]
Eusebius (in Chron.) places their destruction several years sooner and at a time
when Egypt itself was in a state of rebellion against the Romans.

[1274]
Strabo, l. xvii. p. 172. Pomponius Mela, l. i. c. 4. His words are curious:
"Intra, si credere libet vix, homines magisque semiferi Aegipanes, et Blemmyes,
et Satyri."

[1275]
Ausus sese inserere fortunae et provocare arma Romana.

[1276]
See Procopius de Bell. Persic. l. i. c. 19. Note: Compare, on the epoch of the
final extirpation of the rites of Paganism from the Isle of Philae,
(Elephantine,) which subsisted till the edict of Theodosius, in the sixth
century, a dissertation of M. Letronne, on certain Greek inscriptions. The
dissertation contains some very interesting observations on the conduct and
policy of Diocletian in Egypt. Mater pour l'Hist. du Christianisme en Egypte,
Nubie et Abyssinie, Paris 1817 - M.

[1277]
He fixed the public allowance of corn, for the people of Alexandria, at two
millions of medimni; about four hundred thousand quarters. Chron. Paschal. p.
276 Procop. Hist. Arcan. c. 26.

[1278]
John Antioch, in Excerp. Valesian. p. 834. Suidas in Diocletian.

[1279]
See a short history and confutation of Alchemy, in the works of that
philosophical compiler, La Mothe le Vayer, tom. i. p. 32 - 353.

[1280]
See the education and strength of Tiridates in the Armenian history of Moses of
Chorene, l. ii. c. 76. He could seize two wild bulls by the horns, and break
them off with his hands.

[1281]
If we give credit to the younger Victor, who supposes that in the year 323
Licinius was only sixty years of age, he could scarcely be the same person as
the patron of Tiridates; but we know from much better authority, (Euseb. Hist.
Ecclesiast. l. x. c. 8,) that Licinius was at that time in the last period of
old age: sixteen years before, he is represented with gray hairs, and as the
contemporary of Galerius. See Lactant. c. 32. Licinius was probably born about
the year 250.

[1282]
See the sixty-second and sixty-third books of Dion Cassius.

[1283]
Moses of Chorene. Hist. Armen. l. ii. c. 74. The statues had been erected by
Valarsaces, who reigned in Armenia about 130 years before Christ, and was the
first king of the family of Arsaces, (see Moses, Hist. Armen. l. ii. 2, 3.) The
deification of the Arsacides is mentioned by Justin, (xli. 5,) and by Ammianus
Marcellinus, (xxiii. 6.)

[1284]
The Armenian nobility was numerous and powerful. Moses mentions many families
which were distinguished under the reign of Valarsaces, (l. ii. 7,) and which
still subsisted in his own time, about the middle of the fifth century. See the
preface of his Editors.

[1285]
She was named Chosroiduchta, and had not the os patulum like other women. (Hist.
Armen. l. ii. c. 79.) I do not understand the expression.

Note: Os patulum signifies merely a large and widely
opening mouth. Ovid (Metam. xv. 513) says, speaking of the monster who attacked
Hippolytus, patulo partem maris evomit ore. Probably a wide mouth was a common
defect among the Armenian women. - G.

[1286]
Mamgo (according to M. St. Martin, note to Le Beau. ii. 213) belonged to the
imperial race of Hon, who had filled the throne of China for four hundred years.
Dethroned by the usurping race of Wei, Mamgo found a hospitable reception in
Persia in the reign of Ardeschir. The emperor of china having demanded the
surrender of the fugitive and his partisans, Sapor, then king, threatened with
war both by Rome and China, counselled Mamgo to retire into Armenia. "I have
expelled him from my dominions, (he answered the Chinese ambassador;) I have
banished him to the extremity of the earth, where the sun sets; I have dismissed
him to certain death." Compare Mem. sur l'Armenie, ii. 25. - M.

[1287]
In the Armenian history, (l. ii. 78,) as well as in the Geography, (p. 367,)
China is called Zenia, or Zenastan. It is characterized by the production of
silk, by the opulence of the natives, and by their love of peace, above all the
other nations of the earth.

Note: See St. Martin, Mem. sur l'Armenie, i.
304.

[1288]
Vou-ti, the first emperor of the seventh dynasty, who then reigned in China, had
political transactions with Fergana, a province of Sogdiana, and is said to have
received a Roman embassy, (Histoire des Huns, tom. i. p. 38.) In those ages the
Chinese kept a garrison at Kashgar, and one of their generals, about the time of
Trajan, marched as far as the Caspian Sea. With regard to the intercourse
between China and the Western countries, a curious memoir of M. de Guignes may
be consulted, in the Academie des Inscriptions, tom. xxii. p. 355.

Note: The Chinese Annals mention, under the ninth year
of Yan-hi, which corresponds with the year 166 J. C., an embassy which arrived
from Tathsin, and was sent by a prince called An-thun, who can be no other than
Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, who then ruled over the Romans. St. Martin, Mem. sur
l'Armaenic. ii. 30. See also Klaproth, Tableaux Historiques de l'Asie, p. 69.
The embassy came by Jy-nan, Tonquin. - M.

[1289]
See Hist. Armen. l. ii. c. 81.

[1290]
Ipsos Persas ipsumque Regem ascitis Saccis, et Russis, et Gellis, petit frater
Ormies. Panegyric. Vet. iii. 1. The Saccae were a nation of wandering Scythians,
who encamped towards the sources of the Oxus and the Jaxartes. The Gelli where
the inhabitants of Ghilan, along the Caspian Sea, and who so long, under the
name of Dilemines, infested the Persian monarchy. See d'Herbelot,
Bibliotheque

[1291]
M St. Martin represents this differently. Le roi de Perse * * * profits d'un
voyage que Tiridate avoit fait a Rome pour attaquer ce royaume. This reads like
the evasion of the national historians to disguise the fact discreditable to
their hero. See Mem. sur l'Armenie, i. 304. - M.

[1292]
Moses of Chorene takes no notice of this second revolution, which I have been
obliged to collect from a passage of Ammianus Marcellinus, (l. xxiii. c. 5.)
Lactantius speaks of the ambition of Narses: "Concitatus domesticis exemplis avi
sui Saporis ad occupandum orientem magnis copiis inhiabat." De Mort. Persecut.
c. 9.

[1293]
We may readily believe, that Lactantius ascribes to cowardice the conduct of
Diocletian. Julian, in his oration, says, that he remained with all the forces
of the empire; a very hyperbolical expression.

[1294]
Our five abbreviators, Eutropius, Festus, the two Victors, and Orosius, all
relate the last and great battle; but Orosius is the only one who speaks of the
two former.

[1295]
The nature of the country is finely described by Plutarch, in the life of
Crassus; and by Xenophon, in the first book of the Anabasis

[1296]
See Foster's Dissertation in the second volume of the translation of the
Anabasis by Spelman; which I will venture to recommend as one of the best
versions extant.

[1297]
Hist. Armen. l. ii. c. 76. I have transferred this exploit of Tiridates from an
imaginary defeat to the real one of Galerius.

[1298]
Ammian. Marcellin. l. xiv. The mile, in the hands of Eutropoius, (ix. 24,) of
Festus (c. 25,) and of Orosius, (vii 25), easily increased to several
miles

[1299]
Aurelius Victor. Jornandes de Rebus Geticis, c. 21.

[1300]
Aurelius Victor says, "Per Armeniam in hostes contendit, quae fermo sola, seu
facilior vincendi via est." He followed the conduct of Trajan, and the idea of
Julius Caesar.

[1301]
Xenophon's Anabasis, l. iii. For that reason the Persian cavalry encamped sixty
stadia from the enemy.

[1302]
The story is told by Ammianus, l. xxii. Instead of saccum, some read
scutum.

[1303]
The Persians confessed the Roman superiority in morals as well as in arms.
Eutrop. ix. 24. But this respect and gratitude of enemies is very seldom to be
found in their own accounts.

[1304]
The account of the negotiation is taken from the fragments of Peter the
Patrician, in the Excerpta Legationum, published in the Byzantine Collection.
Peter lived under Justinian; but it is very evident, by the nature of his
materials, that they are drawn from the most authentic and respectable
writers.

[1305]
Adeo victor (says Aurelius) ut ni Valerius, cujus nutu omnis gerebantur,
abnuisset, Romani fasces in provinciam novam ferrentur Verum pars terrarum tamen
nobis utilior quaesita.

[1306]
He had been governor of Sumium, (Pot. Patricius in Excerpt. Legat. p. 30.) This
province seems to be mentioned by Moses of Chorene, (Geograph. p. 360,) and lay
to the east of Mount Ararat.

Note: The Siounikh of the Armenian writers St. Martin
i. 142. - M.

[1307]
By an error of the geographer Ptolemy, the position of Singara is removed from
the Aboras to the Tigris, which may have produced the mistake of Peter, in
assigning the latter river for the boundary, instead of the former. The line of
the Roman frontier traversed, but never followed, the course of the Tigris.

Note: There are here several errors. Gibbon has
confounded the streams, and the towns which they pass. The Aboras, or rather the
Chaboras, the Araxes of Xenophon, has its source above Ras-Ain or Re-Saina,
(Theodosiopolis,) about twenty-seven leagues from the Tigris; it receives the
waters of the Mygdonius, or Saocoras, about thirty-three leagues below Nisibis.
at a town now called Al Nahraim; it does not pass under the walls of Singara; it
is the Saocoras that washes the walls of that town: the latter river has its
source near Nisibis. at five leagues from the Tigris. See D'Anv. l'Euphrate et
le Tigre, 46, 49, 50, and the map.

To the east of the Tigris is another less considerable
river, named also the Chaboras, which D'Anville calls the Centrites, Khabour,
Nicephorius, without quoting the authorities on which he gives those names.
Gibbon did not mean to speak of this river, which does not pass by Singara, and
does not fall into the Euphrates. See Michaelis, Supp. ad Lex. Hebraica. 3d
part, p. 664, 665. - G.

[1308]
Procopius de Edificiis, l. ii. c. 6.

[1309]
Three of the provinces, Zabdicene, Arzanene, and Carduene, are allowed on all
sides. But instead of the other two, Peter (in Excerpt. Leg. p. 30) inserts
Rehimene and Sophene. I have preferred Ammianus, (l. xxv. 7,) because it might
be proved that Sophene was never in the hands of the Persians, either before the
reign of Diocletian, or after that of Jovian. For want of correct maps, like
those of M. d'Anville, almost all the moderns, with Tillemont and Valesius at
their head, have imagined, that it was in respect to Persia, and not to Rome,
that the five provinces were situate beyond the Tigris.

[1310]
See St. Martin, note on Le Beau, i. 380. He would read, for Intiline, Ingeleme,
the name of a small province of Armenia, near the sources of the Tigris,
mentioned by St. Epiphanius, (Haeres, 60;) for the unknown name Arzacene, with
Gibbon, Arzanene. These provinces do not appear to have made an integral part of
the Roman empire; Roman garrisons replaced those of Persia, but the sovereignty
remained in the hands of the feudatory princes of Armenia. A prince of Carduene,
ally or dependent on the empire, with the Roman name of Jovianus, occurs in the
reign of Julian. - M.

[1311]
Xenophon's Anabasis, l. iv. Their bows were three cubits in length, their arrows
two; they rolled down stones that were each a wagon load. The Greeks found a
great many villages in that rude country.

[1312]
I travelled through this country in 1810, and should judge, from what I have
read and seen of its inhabitants, that they have remained unchanged in their
appearance and character for more than twenty centuries Malcolm, note to Hist.
of Persia, vol. i. p. 82. - M.

[1313]
According to Eutropius, (vi. 9, as the text is represented by the best Mss.,)
the city of Tigranocerta was in Arzanene. The names and situation of the other
three may be faintly traced.

[1314]
Compare Herodotus, l. i. c. 97, with Moses Choronens. Hist Armen. l. ii. c. 84,
and the map of Armenia given by his editors.

[1315]
Hiberi, locorum potentes, Caspia via Sarmatam in Armenios raptim effundunt.
Tacit. Annal. vi. 34. See Strabon. Geograph. l. xi. p. 764, [edit.
Casaub.]

[1316]
Peter Patricius (in Excerpt. Leg. p. 30) is the only writer who mentions the
Iberian article of the treaty.

[1317]
Euseb. in Chron. Pagi ad annum. Till the discovery of the treatise De Mortibus
Persecutorum, it was not certain that the triumph and the Vicennalia was
celebrated at the same time.

[1318]
At the time of the Vicennalia, Galerius seems to have kept station on the
Danube. See Lactant. de M. P. c. 38.

[1319]
Eutropius (ix. 27) mentions them as a part of the triumph. As the persons had
been restored to Narses, nothing more than their images could be
exhibited.

[1320]
Livy gives us a speech of Camillus on that subject, (v. 51 - 55,) full of
eloquence and sensibility, in opposition to a design of removing the seat of
government from Rome to the neighboring city of Veii.

[1321]
Julius Caesar was reproached with the intention of removing the empire to Ilium
or Alexandria. See Sueton. in Caesar. c. 79. According to the ingenious
conjecture of Le Fevre and Dacier, the ode of the third book of Horace was
intended to divert from the execution of a similar design.

[1322]
See Aurelius Victor, who likewise mentions the buildings erected by Maximian at
Carthage, probably during the Moorish war. We shall insert some verses of
Ausonius de Clar. Urb. v.

Et Mediolani miraeomnia: copia rerum; Innumerae
cultaeque domus; facunda virorum Ingenia, et mores laeti: tum duplice muro
Amplificata loci species; populique voluptas Circus; et inclusi moles cuneata
Theatri; Templa, Palatinaeque arces, opulensque Moneta, Et regio Herculei
celebris sub honore lavacri. Cunctaque marmoreis ornata Peristyla signis;
Moeniaque in valli formam circumdata labro, Omnia quae magnis operum velut
aemula formis Excellunt: nec juncta premit vicinia Romae.

[1323]
Lactant. de M. P. c. 17. Libanius, Orat. viii. p. 203.

[1324]
Lactant. de M. P. c. 17. On a similar occasion, Ammianus mentions the dicacitas
plebis, as not very agreeable to an Imperial ear. (See l. xvi. c. 10.)

[1325]
Lactantius accuses Maximian of destroying fictis criminationibus lumina senatus,
(De M. P. c. 8.) Aurelius Victor speaks very doubtfully of the faith of
Diocletian towards his friends.

[1326]
Truncatae vires urbis, imminuto praetoriarum cohortium atque in armis vulgi
numero. Aurelius Victor. Lactantius attributes to Galerius the prosecution of
the same plan, (c. 26.)

[1327]
They were old corps stationed in Illyricum; and according to the ancient
establishment, they each consisted of six thousand men. They had acquired much
reputation by the use of the plumbatoe, or darts loaded with lead. Each soldier
carried five of these, which he darted from a considerable distance, with great
strength and dexterity. See Vegetius, i. 17.

[1328]
See the Theodosian Code, l. vi. tit. ii. with Godefroy's commentary.

[1329]
See the 12th dissertation in Spanheim's excellent work de Usu Numismatum. From
medals, inscriptions, and historians, he examines every title separately, and
traces it from Augustus to the moment of its disappearing.

[1330]
Pliny (in Panegyr. c. 3, 55, &c.) speaks of Dominus with execration, as
synonymous to Tyrant, and opposite to Prince. And the same Pliny regularly gives
that title (in the tenth book of the epistles) to his friend rather than master,
the virtuous Trajan. This strange contradiction puzzles the commentators, who
think, and the translators, who can write.

[1331]
Synesius de Regno, edit. Petav. p. 15. I am indebted for this quotation to the
Abbe de la Bleterie.

[1332]
Soe Vandale de Consecratione, p. 354, &c. It was customary for the emperors
to mention (in the preamble of laws) their numen, sacreo majesty, divine
oracles, &c. According to Tillemont, Gregory Nazianzen complains most
bitterly of the profanation, especially when it was practised by an Arian
emperor.

Note: In the time of the republic, says Hegewisch, when
the consuls, the praetors, and the other magistrates appeared in public, to
perform the functions of their office, their dignity was announced both by the
symbols which use had consecrated, and the brilliant cortege by which they were
accompanied. But this dignity belonged to the office, not to the individual;
this pomp belonged to the magistrate, not to the man. * * The consul, followed,
in the comitia, by all the senate, the praetors, the quaestors, the aediles, the
lictors, the apparitors, and the heralds, on reentering his house, was served
only by freedmen and by his slaves. The first emperors went no further. Tiberius
had, for his personal attendance, only a moderate number of slaves, and a few
freedmen. (Tacit. Ann. iv. 7.) But in proportion as the republican forms
disappeared, one after another, the inclination of the emperors to environ
themselves with personal pomp, displayed itself more and more. * * The
magnificence and the ceremonial of the East were entirely introduced by
Diocletian, and were consecrated by Constantine to the Imperial use. Thenceforth
the palace, the court, the table, all the personal attendance, distinguished the
emperor from his subjects, still more than his superior dignity. The
organization which Diocletian gave to his new court, attached less honor and
distinction to rank than to services performed towards the members of the
Imperial family. Hegewisch, Essai, Hist. sur les Finances Romains.

Few historians have characterized, in a more
philosophic manner, the influence of a new institution. - G.

It is singular that the son of a slave reduced the
haughty aristocracy of Home to the offices of servitude. - M.

[1333]
See Spanheim de Usu Numismat. Dissert. xii.

[1334]
Aurelius Victor. Eutropius, ix. 26. It appears by the Panegyrists, that the
Romans were soon reconciled to the name and ceremony of adoration.

[1335]
The innovations introduced by Diocletian are chiefly deduced, 1st, from some
very strong passages in Lactantius; and, 2dly, from the new and various offices
which, in the Theodosian code, appear already established in the beginning of
the reign of Constantine.

[1336]
Lactant. de M. P. c. 7.

[1337]
The most curious document which has come to light since the publication of
Gibbon's History, is the edict of Diocletian, published from an inscription
found at Eskihissar, (Stratoniccia,) by Col. Leake. This inscription was first
copied by Sherard, afterwards much more completely by Mr. Bankes. It is
confirmed and illustrated by a more imperfect copy of the same edict, found in
the Levant by a gentleman of Aix, and brought to this country by M. Vescovali.
This edict was issued in the name of the four Caesars, Diocletian, Maximian,
Constantius, and Galerius. It fixed a maximum of prices throughout the empire,
for all the necessaries and commodities of life. The preamble insists, with
great vehemence on the extortion and inhumanity of the venders and merchants.
Quis enim adeo obtunisi (obtusi) pectores (is) et a sensu inhumanitatis extorris
est qui ignorare potest immo non senserit in venalibus rebus quaevel in
mercimoniis aguntur vel diurna urbium conversatione tractantur, in tantum se
licen liam defusisse, ut effraenata libido rapien - rum copia nec annorum
ubertatibus mitigaretur. The edict, as Col. Leake clearly shows, was issued A.
C. 303. Among the articles of which the maximum value is assessed, are oil,
salt, honey, butchers' meat, poultry, game, fish, vegetables, fruit the wages of
laborers and artisans, schoolmasters and skins, boots and shoes, harness,
timber, corn, wine, and beer, (zythus.) The depreciation in the value of money,
or the rise in the price of commodities, had been so great during the past
century, that butchers' meat, which, in the second century of the empire, was in
Rome about two denaril the pound, was now fixed at a maximum of eight. Col.
Leake supposes the average price could not be less than four: at the same time
the maximum of the wages of the agricultural laborers was twenty-five. The whole
edict is, perhaps, the most gigantic effort of a blind though well-intentioned
despotism, to control that which is, and ought to be, beyond the regulation of
the government. See an Edict of Diocletian, by Col. Leake, London, 1826. Col.
Leake has not observed that this Edict is expressly named in the treatise de
Mort. Persecut. ch. vii. Idem cum variis iniquitatibus immensam faceret
caritatem, legem pretiis rerum venalium statuere conatus. - M

[1338]
Indicta lex nova quae sane illorum temporum modestia tolerabilis, in perniciem
processit. Aurel. Victor., who has treated the character of Diocletian with good
sense, though in bad Latin.

[1339]
Solus omnium post conditum Romanum Imperium, qui extanto fastigio sponte ad
privatae vitae statum civilitatemque remearet, Eutrop. ix. 28.

[1340]
The particulars of the journey and illness are taken from Laclantius, c. 17,)
who may sometimes be admitted as an evidence of public facts, though very seldom
of private anecdotes.

[1341]
Aurelius Victor ascribes the abdication, which had been so variously accounted
for, to two causes: 1st, Diocletian's contempt of ambition; and 2dly, His
apprehension of impending troubles. One of the panegyrists (vi. 9) mentions the
age and infirmities of Diocletian as a very natural reason for his
retirement.

Note: Constantine (Orat. ad Sanct. c. 401) more than
insinuated that derangement of mind, connected with the conflagration of the
palace at Nicomedia by lightning, was the cause of his abdication. But
Heinichen. in a very sensible note on this passage in Eusebius, while he admits
that his long illness might produce a temporary depression of spirits,
triumphantly appeals to the philosophical conduct of Diocletian in his retreat,
and the influence which he still retained on public affairs. - M.

[1342]
The difficulties as well as mistakes attending the dates both of the year and of
the day of Diocletian's abdication are perfectly cleared up by Tillemont, Hist.
des Empereurs, tom. iv. p 525, note 19, and by Pagi ad annum.

[1343]
See Panegyr. Veter. vi. 9. The oration was pronounced after Maximian had resumed
the purple.

[1344]
Eumenius pays him a very fine compliment: "At enim divinum illum virum, qui
primus imperium et participavit et posuit, consilii et fact isui non poenitet;
nec amisisse se putat quod sponte transcripsit. Felix beatusque vere quem
vestra, tantorum principum, colunt privatum." Panegyr. Vet. vii. 15.

[1345]
We are obliged to the younger Victor for this celebrated item. Eutropius
mentions the thing in a more general manner.

[1346]
Hist. August. p. 223, 224. Vopiscus had learned this conversation from his
father.

[1347]
The younger Victor slightly mentions the report. But as Diocletian had
disobliged a powerful and successful party, his memory has been loaded with
every crime and misfortune. It has been affirmed that he died raving mad, that
he was condemned as a criminal by the Roman senate, &c.

[1348]
See the Itiner. p. 269, 272, edit. Wessel.

[1349]
The Abate Fortis, in his Viaggio in Dalmazia, p. 43, (printed at Venice in the
year 1774, in two small volumes in quarto,) quotes a Ms account of the
antiquities of Salona, composed by Giambattista Giustiniani about the middle of
the xvith century.

[1350]
Adam's Antiquities of Diocletian's Palace at Spalatro, p. 6. We may add a
circumstance or two from the Abate Fortis: the little stream of the Hyader,
mentioned by Lucan, produces most exquisite trout, which a sagacious writer,
perhaps a monk, supposes to have been one of the principal reasons that
determined Diocletian in the choice of his retirement. Fortis, p. 45. The same
author (p. 38) observes, that a taste for agriculture is reviving at Spalatro;
and that an experimental farm has lately been established near the city, by a
society of gentlemen.

[1351]
Constantin. Orat. ad Coetum Sanct. c. 25. In this sermon, the emperor, or the
bishop who composed it for him, affects to relate the miserable end of all the
persecutors of the church.

[1352]
Constantin. Porphyr. de Statu Imper. p. 86.

[1353]
D'Anville, Geographie Ancienne, tom. i. p. 162.

[1354]
Messieurs Adam and Clerisseau, attended by two draughtsmen visited Spalatro in
the month of July, 1757. The magnificent work which their journey produced was
published in London seven years afterwards.

[1355]
I shall quote the words of the Abate Fortis. “E'bastevolmente agli amatori dell'
Architettura, e dell' Antichita, l'opera del Signor Adams, che a donato molto a
que' superbi vestigi coll'abituale eleganza del suo toccalapis e del bulino. In
generale la rozzezza del scalpello, e'l cattivo gusto del secolo vi gareggiano
colla magnificenz del fabricato." See Viaggio in Dalmazia, p. 40.

[1356]
The orator Eumenius was secretary to the emperors Maximian and Constantius, and
Professor of Rhetoric in the college of Autun. His salary was six hundred
thousand sesterces, which, according to the lowest computation of that age, must
have exceeded three thousand pounds a year. He generously requested the
permission of employing it in rebuilding the college. See his Oration De
Restaurandis Scholis; which, though not exempt from vanity, may atone for his
panegyrics.

[1357]
Porphyry died about the time of Diocletian's abdication. The life of his master
Plotinus, which he composed, will give us the most complete idea of the genius
of the sect, and the manners of its professors. This very curious piece is
inserted in Fabricius Bibliotheca Graeca tom. iv. p. 88 - 148.

[1358]
M. de Montesquieu (Considerations sur la Grandeur et La Decadence des Romains,
c. 17) supposes, on the authority of Orosius and Eusebius, that, on this
occasion, the empire, for the first time, was really divided into two parts. It
is difficult, however, to discover in what respect the plan of Galerius differed
from that of Diocletian.

[1359]
Hic non modo amabilis, sed etiam venerabilis Gallis fuit; praecipuc quod
Diocletiani suspectam prudentiam, et Maximiani sanguinariam violentiam imperio
ejus evaserant. Eutrop. Breviar. x. i.

[1360]
Divitiis Provincialium (mel. provinciarum) ac privatorum studens, fisci commoda
non admodum affectans; ducensque melius publicas opes a privatis haberi, quam
intra unum claustrum reservari. Id. ibid. He carried this maxim so far, that
whenever he gave an entertainment, he was obliged to borrow a service of
plate.

[1361]
Lactantius de Mort. Persecutor. c. 18. Were the particulars of this conference
more consistent with truth and decency, we might still ask how they came to the
knowledge of an obscure rhetorician. But there are many historians who put us in
mind of the admirable saying of the great Conde to Cardinal de Retz: "Ces
coquins nous font parlor et agir, comme ils auroient fait eux-memes a notre
place."

Note: This attack upon Lactantius is unfounded.
Lactantius was so far from having been an obscure rhetorician, that he had
taught rhetoric publicly, and with the greatest success, first in Africa, and
afterwards in Nicomedia. His reputation obtained him the esteem of Constantine,
who invited him to his court, and intrusted to him the education of his son
Crispus. The facts which he relates took place during his own time; he cannot be
accused of dishonesty or imposture. Satis me vixisse arbitrabor et officium
hominis implesse si labor meus aliquos homines, ab erroribus iberatos, ad iter
coeleste direxerit. De Opif. Dei, cap. 20. The eloquence of Lactantius has
caused him to be called the Christian Cicero. Annon Gent. - G.

Yet no unprejudiced person can read this coarse and
particular private conversation of the two emperors, without assenting to the
justice of Gibbon's severe sentence. But the authorship of the treatise is by no
means certain. The fame of Lactantius for eloquence as well as for truth, would
suffer no loss if it should be adjudged to some more "obscure rhetorician."
Manso, in his Leben Constantins des Grossen, concurs on this point with Gibbon
Beylage, iv. - M.

[1362]
Sublatus nuper a pecoribus et silvis (says Lactantius de M. P. c. 19) statim
Scutarius, continuo Protector, mox Tribunus, postridie Caesar, accepit Orientem.
Aurelius Victor is too liberal in giving him the whole portion of
Diocletian.

[1363]
These schemes, however, rest only on the very doubtful authority of Lactantius
de M. P. c. 20.

[1364]
This tradition, unknown to the contemporaries of Constantine was invented in the
darkness of monastaries, was embellished by Jeffrey of Monmouth, and the writers
of the xiith century, has been defended by our antiquarians of the last age, and
is seriously related in the ponderous History of England, compiled by Mr. Carte,
(vol. i. p. 147.) He transports, however, the kingdom of Coil, the imaginary
father of Helena, from Essex to the wall of Antoninus.

[1365]
Eutropius (x. 2) expresses, in a few words, the real truth, and the occasion of
the error "ex obscuriori matrimonio ejus filius." Zosimus (l. ii. p. 78) eagerly
seized the most unfavorable report, and is followed by Orosius, (vii. 25,) whose
authority is oddly enough overlooked by the indefatigable, but partial
Tillemont. By insisting on the divorce of Helena, Diocletian acknowledged her
marriage.

[1366]
There are three opinions with regard to the place of Constantine's birth.

I.
Our English antiquarians were used to dwell with rapture
on the words of his panegyrist, "Britannias illic oriendo nobiles fecisti." But
this celebrated passage may be referred with as much propriety to the accession,
as to the nativity of Constantine.

II.
Some of the modern Greeks have ascribed the honor of his
birth to Drepanum, a town on the Gulf of Nicomedia, (Cellarius, tom. ii. p.
174,) which Constantine dignified with the name of Helenopolis, and Justinian
adorned with many splendid buildings, (Procop. de Edificiis, v. 2.) It is indeed
probable enough, that Helena's father kept an inn at Drepanum, and that
Constantius might lodge there when he returned from a Persian embassy, in the
reign of Aurelian. But in the wandering life of a soldier, the place of his
marriage, and the places where his children are born, have very little
connection with each other.

III.
The claim of Naissus is supported by the anonymous
writer, published at the end of Ammianus, p. 710, and who in general copied very
good materials; and it is confirmed by Julius Firmicus, (de Astrologia, l. i. c.
4,) who flourished under the reign of Constantine himself. Some objections have
been raised against the integrity of the text, and the application of the
passage of Firmicus but the former is established by the best Mss., and the
latter is very ably defended by Lipsius de Magnitudine Romana, l. iv. c. 11, et
Supplement.

[1367]
Literis minus instructus. Anonym. ad Ammian. p. 710.

[1368]
Galerius, or perhaps his own courage, exposed him to single combat with a
Sarmatian, (Anonym. p. 710,) and with a monstrous lion. See Praxagoras apud
Photium, p. 63. Praxagoras, an Athenian philosopher, had written a life of
Constantine in two books, which are now lost. He was a contemporary.

[1369]
Zosimus, l. ii. p. 78, 79. Lactantius de M. P. c. 24. The former tells a very
foolish story, that Constantine caused all the post- horses which he had used to
be hamstrung. Such a bloody execution, without preventing a pursuit, would have
scattered suspicions, and might have stopped his journey.

Note: Zosimus is not the only writer who tells this
story. The younger Victor confirms it. Ad frustrandos insequentes, publica
jumenta, quaqua iter ageret, interficiens. Aurelius Victor de Caesar says the
same thing, G. as also the Anonymus Valesii. - M.

Manso, (Leben Constantins,) p. 18, observes that the
story has been exaggerated; he took this precaution during the first stage of
his journey. - M.

[1370]
Anonym. p. 710. Panegyr. Veter. vii. 4. But Zosimus, l. ii. p. 79, Eusebius de
Vit. Constant. l. i. c. 21, and Lactantius de M. P. c. 24. suppose, with less
accuracy, that he found his father on his death-bed.

[1371]
Cunctis qui aderant, annitentibus, sed praecipue Croco (alii Eroco) [Erich?]
Alamannorum Rege, auxilii gratia Constantium comitato, imperium capit. Victor
Junior, c. 41. This is perhaps the first instance of a barbarian king, who
assisted the Roman arms with an independent body of his own subjects. The
practice grew familiar and at last became fatal.

[1372]
His panegyrist Eumenius (vii. 8) ventures to affirm in the presence of
Constantine, that he put spurs to his horse, and tried, but in vain, to escape
from the hands of his soldiers.

[1373]
Lactantius de M. P. c. 25. Eumenius (vii. 8.) gives a rhetorical turn to the
whole transaction.

[1374]
The choice of Constantine, by his dying father, which is warranted by reason,
and insinuated by Eumenius, seems to be confirmed by the most unexceptionable
authority, the concurring evidence of Lactantius (de M. P. c. 24) and of
Libanius, (Oratio i.,) of Eusebius (in Vit. Constantin. l. i. c. 18, 21) and of
Julian, (Oratio i)

[1375]
Of the three sisters of Constantine, Constantia married the emperor Licinius,
Anastasia the Caesar Bassianus, and Eutropia the consul Nepotianus. The three
brothers were, Dalmatius, Julius Constantius, and Annibalianus, of whom we shall
have occasion to speak hereafter.

[1376]
See Gruter. Inscrip. p. 178. The six princes are all mentioned, Diocletian and
Maximian as the senior Augusti, and fathers of the emperors. They jointly
dedicate, for the use of their own Romans, this magnificent edifice. The
architects have delineated the ruins of these Thermoe, and the antiquarians,
particularly Donatus and Nardini, have ascertained the ground which they
covered. One of the great rooms is now the Carthusian church; and even one of
the porter's lodges is sufficient to form another church, which belongs to the
Feuillans.

[1377]
See Lactantius de M. P. c. 26, 31.

[1378]
Saviguy, in his memoir on Roman taxation, (Mem. Berl. Academ. 1822, 1823, p. 5,)
dates from this period the abolition of the Jus Italicum. He quotes a remarkable
passage of Aurelius Victor. Hinc denique parti Italiae invec tum tributorum
ingens malum. Aur. Vict. c. 39. It was a necessary consequence of the division
of the empire: it became impossible to maintain a second court and executive,
and leave so large and fruitful a part of the territory exempt from
contribution. - M.

[1379]
The sixth Panegyric represents the conduct of Maximian in the most favorable
light, and the ambiguous expression of Aurelius Victor, "retractante diu," may
signify either that he contrived, or that he opposed, the conspiracy. See
Zosimus, l. ii. p. 79, and Lactantius de M. P. c. 26.

[1380]
The circumstances of this war, and the death of Severus, are very doubtfully and
variously told in our ancient fragments, (see Tillemont, Hist. des Empereurs,
tom. iv. part i. p. 555.) I have endeavored to extract from them a consistent
and probable narration.

Note: Manso justly observes that two totally different
narratives might be formed, almost upon equal authority. Beylage, iv. -
M.

[1381]
The sixth Panegyric was pronounced to celebrate the elevation of Constantine;
but the prudent orator avoids the mention either of Galerius or of Maxentius. He
introduces only one slight allusion to the actual troubles, and to the majesty
of Rome.

Note: Compare Manso, Beylage, iv. p. 302. Gibbon's
account is at least as probable as that of his critic. - M.

[1382]
With regard to this negotiation, see the fragments of an anonymous historian,
published by Valesius at the end of his edition of Ammianus Marcellinus, p. 711.
These fragments have furnished with several curious, and, as it should seem,
authentic anecdotes.

[1383]
Lactantius de M. P. c. 28. The former of these reasons is probably taken from
Virgil's Shepherd: "Illam * * * ego huic notra similem, Meliboee, putavi,"
&c. Lactantius delights in these poetical illusions.

[1384]
Castra super Tusci si ponere Tybridis undas; (jubeus) Hesperios audax veniam
metator in agros. Tu quoscunque voles in planum effundere muros, His aries actus
disperget saxa lacertis; Illa licet penitus tolli quam jusseris urbem Roma sit.
Lucan. Pharsal. i. 381.

[1385]
Lactantius de M. P. c. 27. Zosim. l. ii. p. 82. The latter, that Constantine, in
his interview with Maximian, had promised to declare war against
Galerius.

[1386]
M. de Tillemont (Hist. des Empereurs, tom. iv. part i. p. 559) has proved that
Licinius, without passing through the intermediate rank of Caesar, was declared
Augustus, the 11th of November, A. D. 307, after the return of Galerius from
Italy.

[1387]
Lactantius de M. P. c. 32. When Galerius declared Licinius Augustus with
himself, he tried to satisfy his younger associates, by inventing for
Constantine and Maximin (not Maxentius; see Baluze, p. 81) the new title of sons
of the Augusti. But when Maximin acquainted him that he had been saluted
Augustus by the army, Galerius was obliged to acknowledge him as well as
Constantine, as equal associates in the Imperial dignity.

[1388]
See Panegyr. Vet. vi. 9. Audi doloris nostri liberam vocem, &c. The whole
passage is imagined with artful flattery, and expressed with an easy flow of
eloquence.

[1389]
Lactantius de M. P. c. 28. Zosim. l. ii. p. 82. A report was spread, that
Maxentius was the son of some obscure Syrian, and had been substituted by the
wife of Maximian as her own child. See Aurelius Victor, Anonym. Valesian, and
Panegyr. Vet. ix. 3, 4.

[1390]
Ab urbe pulsum, ab Italia fugatum, ab Illyrico repudiatum, provinciis, tuis
copiis, tuo palatio recepisti. Eumen. in Panegyr Vet. vii. 14.

[1391]
Lactantius de M. P. c. 29. Yet, after the resignation of the purple, Constantine
still continued to Maximian the pomp and honors of the Imperial dignity; and on
all public occasions gave the right hand place to his father-in-law. Panegyr.
Vet. viii. 15.

[1392]
Zosim. l. ii. p. 82. Eumenius in Panegyr. Vet. vii. 16 - 21. The latter of these
has undoubtedly represented the whole affair in the most favorable light for his
sovereign. Yet even from this partial narrative we may conclude, that the
repeated clemency of Constantine, and the reiterated treasons of Maximian, as
they are described by Lactantius, (de M. P. c. 29, 30,) and copied by the
moderns, are destitute of any historical foundation. Note: Yet some pagan
authors relate and confirm them. Aurelius Victor speaking of Maximin, says,
cumque specie officii, dolis compositis, Constantinum generum tentaret acerbe,
jure tamen interierat. Aur. Vict. de Caesar l. p. 623. Eutropius also says, inde
ad Gallias profectus est (Maximianus) composito tamquam a filio esset expulsus,
ut Constantino genero jun geretur: moliens tamen Constantinum, reperta
occasione, interficere, dedit justissimo exitu. Eutrop. x. p. 661. (Anon. Gent.)
- G.

These writers hardly confirm more than Gibbon admits;
he denies the repeated clemency of Constantine, and the reiterated treasons of
Maximian Compare Manso, p. 302. - M.

[1393]
Aurelius Victor, c. 40. But that lake was situated on the upper Pannonia, near
the borders of Noricum; and the province of Valeria (a name which the wife of
Galerius gave to the drained country) undoubtedly lay between the Drave and the
Danube, (Sextus Rufus, c. 9.) I should therefore suspect that Victor has
confounded the Lake Pelso with the Volocean marshes, or, as they are now called,
the Lake Sabaton. It is placed in the heart of Valeria, and its present extent
is not less than twelve Hungarian miles (about seventy English) in length, and
two in breadth. See Severini Pannonia, l. i. c. 9.

[1394]
Lactantius (de M. P. c. 33) and Eusebius (l. viii. c. 16) describe the symptoms
and progress of his disorder with singular accuracy and apparent
pleasure.

[1395]
If any (like the late Dr. Jortin, Remarks on Ecclesiastical History, vol. ii. p.
307 - 356) still delight in recording the wonderful deaths of the persecutors, I
would recommend to their perusal an admirable passage of Grotius (Hist. l. vii.
p. 332) concerning the last illness of Philip II. of Spain.

[1396]
See Eusebius, l. ix. 6, 10. Lactantius de M. P. c. 36. Zosimus is less exact,
and evidently confounds Maximian with Maximin.

[1397]
See the viiith Panegyr., in which Eumenius displays, in the presence of
Constantine, the misery and the gratitude of the city of Autun.

[1398]
Eutropius, x. 3. Panegyr. Veter. vii. 10, 11, 12. A great number of the French
youth were likewise exposed to the same cruel and ignominious death.

[1399]
Yet the panegyric assumes something of an apologetic tone. Te vero Constantine,
quantumlibet oderint hoses, dum perhorrescant. Haec est enim vera virtus, ut non
ament et quiescant. The orator appeals to the ancient ideal of the republic. -
M.

[1400]
Julian excludes Maxentius from the banquet of the Caesars with abhorrence and
contempt; and Zosimus (l. ii. p. 85) accuses him of every kind of cruelty and
profligacy.

[1401]
Zosimus, l. ii. p. 83 - 85. Aurelius Victor.

[1402]
The passage of Aurelius Victor should be read in the following manner: Primus
instituto pessimo, munerum specie, Patres Oratores que pecuniam conferre
prodigenti sibi cogeret.

[1403]
Panegyr. Vet. ix. 3. Euseb. Hist Eccles. viii. 14, et in Vit. Constant i. 33,
34. Rufinus, c. 17. The virtuous matron who stabbed herself to escape the
violence of Maxentius, was a Christian, wife to the praefect of the city, and
her name was Sophronia. It still remains a question among the casuists, whether,
on such occasions, suicide is justifiable.

[1404]
Praetorianis caedem vulgi quondam annueret, is the vague expression of Aurelius
Victor. See more particular, though somewhat different, accounts of a tumult and
massacre which happened at Rome, in Eusebius, (l. viii. c. 14,) and in Zosimus,
(l. ii. p. 84.)

[1405]
See, in the Panegyrics, (ix. 14,) a lively description of the indolence and vain
pride of Maxentius. In another place the orator observes that the riches which
Rome had accumulated in a period of 1060 years, were lavished by the tyrant on
his mercenary bands; redemptis ad civile latrocinium manibus in
gesserat.

[1406]
After the victory of Constantine, it was universally allowed, that the motive of
delivering the republic from a detested tyrant, would, at any time, have
justified his expedition into Italy. Euseb in Vi'. Constantin. l. i. c. 26.
Panegyr. Vet. ix. 2.

[1407]
Zosimus, l. ii. p. 84, 85. Nazarius in Panegyr. x. 7 - 13.

[1408]
See Panegyr. Vet. ix. 2. Omnibus fere tuis Comitibus et Ducibus non solum tacite
mussantibus, sed etiam aperte timentibus; contra consilia hominum, contra
Haruspicum monita, ipse per temet liberandae arbis tempus venisse sentires. The
embassy of the Romans is mentioned only by Zonaras, (l. xiii.,) and by Cedrenus,
(in Compend. Hist. p. 370;) but those modern Greeks had the opportunity of
consulting many writers which have since been lost, among which we may reckon
the life of Constantine by Praxagoras. Photius (p. 63) has made a short extract
from that historical work.

[1409]
Zosimus (l. ii. p. 86) has given us this curious account of the forces on both
sides. He makes no mention of any naval armaments, though we are assured
(Panegyr. Vet. ix. 25) that the war was carried on by sea as well as by land;
and that the fleet of Constantine took possession of Sardinia, Corsica, and the
ports of Italy.

[1410]
Panegyr. Vet. ix. 3. It is not surprising that the orator should diminish the
numbers with which his sovereign achieved the conquest of Italy; but it appears
somewhat singular that he should esteem the tyrant's army at no more than
100,000 men.

[1411]
The three principal passages of the Alps between Gaul and Italy, are those of
Mount St. Bernard, Mount Cenis, and Mount Genevre. Tradition, and a resemblance
of names, (Alpes Penninoe,) had assigned the first of these for the march of
Hannibal, (see Simler de Alpibus.) The Chevalier de Folard (Polyp. tom. iv.) and
M. d'Anville have led him over Mount Genevre. But notwithstanding the authority
of an experienced officer and a learned geographer, the pretensions of Mount
Cenis are supported in a specious, not to say a convincing, manner, by M.
Grosley. Observations sur l'Italie, tom. i. p. 40, &c. [The dissertation of
Messrs. Cramer and Wickham has clearly shown that the Little St. Bernard must
claim the honor of Hannibal's passage. Mr. Long (London, 1831) has added some
sensible corrections re Hannibal's march to the Alps. - M]

[1412]
La Brunette near Suse, Demont, Exiles, Fenestrelles, Coni, &c.

[1413]
See Ammian. Marcellin. xv. 10. His description of the roads over the Alps is
clear, lively, and accurate.

[1414]
Zosimus as well as Eusebius hasten from the passage of the Alps to the decisive
action near Rome. We must apply to the two Panegyrics for the intermediate
actions of Constantine.

[1415]
The Marquis Maffei has examined the siege and battle of Verona with that degree
of attention and accuracy which was due to a memorable action that happened in
his native country. The fortifications of that city, constructed by Gallienus,
were less extensive than the modern walls, and the amphitheatre was not included
within their circumference. See Verona Illustrata, part i. p. 142 150.

[1416]
They wanted chains for so great a multitude of captives; and the whole council
was at a loss; but the sagacious conqueror imagined the happy expedient of
converting into fetters the swords of the vanquished. Panegyr. Vet. ix.
11.

[1417]
Panegyr. Vet. ix. 11.

[1418]
Literas calamitatum suarum indices supprimebat. Panegyr Vet. ix. 15.

[1419]
Remedia malorum potius quam mala differebat, is the fine censure which Tacitus
passes on the supine indolence of Vitellius.

[1420]
The Marquis Maffei has made it extremely probable that Constantine was still at
Verona, the 1st of September, A.D. 312, and that the memorable aera of the
indications was dated from his conquest of the Cisalpine Gaul.

[1421]
See Panegyr. Vet. xi. 16. Lactantius de M. P. c. 44.

[1422]
Illo die hostem Romanorum esse periturum. The vanquished became of course the
enemy of Rome.

[1423]
See Panegyr. Vet. ix. 16, x. 27. The former of these orators magnifies the
hoards of corn, which Maxentius had collected from Africa and the Islands. And
yet, if there is any truth in the scarcity mentioned by Eusebius, (in Vit.
Constantin. l. i. c. 36,) the Imperial granaries must have been open only to the
soldiers.

[1424]
Maxentius . . . tandem urbe in Saxa Rubra, millia ferme novem aegerrime
progressus. Aurelius Victor. See Cellarius Geograph. Antiq. tom. i. p. 463. Saxa
Rubra was in the neighborhood of the Cremera, a trifling rivulet, illustrated by
the valor and glorious death of the three hundred Fabii.

[1425]
The post which Maxentius had taken, with the Tyber in his rear is very clearly
described by the two Panegyrists, ix. 16, x. 28.

[1426]
Exceptis latrocinii illius primis auctoribus, qui desperata venia ocum quem
pugnae sumpserant texere corporibus. Panegyr. Vet 17.

[1427]
A very idle rumor soon prevailed, that Maxentius, who had not taken any
precaution for his own retreat, had contrived a very artful snare to destroy the
army of the pursuers; but that the wooden bridge, which was to have been
loosened on the approach of Constantine, unluckily broke down under the weight
of the flying Italians. M. de Tillemont (Hist. des Empereurs, tom. iv. part i.
p. 576) very seriously examines whether, in contradiction to common sense, the
testimony of Eusebius and Zosimus ought to prevail over the silence of
Lactantius, Nazarius, and the anonymous, but contemporary orator, who composed
the ninth Panegyric.

Note: Manso (Beylage, vi.) examines the question, and
adduces two manifest allusions to the bridge, from the Life of Constantine by
Praxagoras, and from Libanius. Is it not very probable that such a bridge was
thrown over the river to facilitate the advance, and to secure the retreat, of
the army of Maxentius? In case of defeat, orders were given for destroying it,
in order to check the pursuit: it broke down accidentally, or in the confusion
was destroyed, as has not unfrequently been the case, before the proper time. -
M.

[1428]
Zosimus, l. ii. p. 86-88, and the two Panegyrics, the former of which was
pronounced a few months afterwards, afford the clearest notion of this great
battle. Lactantius, Eusebius, and even the Epitomes, supply several useful
hints.

[1429]
Zosimus, the enemy of Constantine, allows (l. ii. p. 88) that only a few of the
friends of Maxentius were put to death; but we may remark the expressive passage
of Nazarius, (Panegyr. Vet. x. 6.) Omnibus qui labefactari statum ejus poterant
cum stirpe deletis. The other orator (Panegyr. Vet. ix. 20, 21) contents himself
with observing, that Constantine, when he entered Rome, did not imitate the
cruel massacres of Cinna, of Marius, or of Sylla.

Note: This may refer to the son or sons of Maxentius. -
M.

[1430]
See the two Panegyrics, and the laws of this and the ensuing year, in the
Theodosian Code.

[1431]
Panegyr. Vet. ix. 20. Lactantius de M. P. c. 44. Maximin, who was confessedly
the eldest Caesar, claimed, with some show of reason, the first rank among the
Augusti.

[1432]
Adhuc cuncta opera quae magnifice construxerat, urbis fanum atque basilicam,
Flavii meritis patres sacravere. Aurelius Victor. With regard to the theft of
Trajan's trophies, consult Flaminius Vacca, apud Montfaucon, Diarium Italicum,
p. 250, and l'Antiquite Expliquee of the latter, tom. iv. p. 171.

[1433]
Praetoriae legiones ac subsidia factionibus aptiora quam urbi Romae, sublata
penitus; simul arma atque usus indumenti militaris Aurelius Victor. Zosimus (l.
ii. p. 89) mentions this fact as an historian, and it is very pompously
celebrated in the ninth Panegyric.

[1434]
Ex omnibus provinciis optimates viros Curiae tuae pigneraveris ut Senatus
dignitas . . . . ex totius Orbis flore consisteret. Nazarius in Panegyr. Vet x.
35. The word pigneraveris might almost seem maliciously chosen. Concerning the
senatorial tax, see Zosimus, l. ii. p. 115, the second title of the sixth book
of the Theodosian Code, with Godefroy's Commentary, and Memoires de l'Academic
des Inscriptions, tom. xxviii. p. 726.

[1435]
From the Theodosian Code, we may now begin to trace the motions of the emperors;
but the dates both of time and place have frequently been altered by the
carelessness of transcribers.

[1436]
Zosimus (l. ii. p. 89) observes, that before the war the sister of Constantine
had been betrothed to Licinius. According to the younger Victor, Diocletian was
invited to the nuptials; but having ventured to plead his age and infirmities,
he received a second letter, filled with reproaches for his supposed partiality
to the cause of Maxentius and Maximin.

[1437]
Zosimus mentions the defeat and death of Maximin as ordinary events; but
Lactantius expatiates on them, (de M. P. c. 45-50,) ascribing them to the
miraculous interposition of Heaven. Licinius at that time was one of the
protectors of the church.

[1438]
Lactantius de M. P. c. 50. Aurelius Victor touches on the different conduct of
Licinius, and of Constantine, in the use of victory.

[1439]
The sensual appetites of Maximin were gratified at the expense of his subjects.
His eunuchs, who forced away wives and virgins, examined their naked charms with
anxious curiosity, lest any part of their body should be found unworthy of the
royal embraces. Coyness and disdain were considered as treason, and the
obstinate fair one was condemned to be drowned. A custom was gradually
introduced, that no person should marry a wife without the permission of the
emperor, "ut ipse in omnibus nuptiis praegustator esset." Lactantius de M. P. c.
38.

[1440]
Lactantius de M. P. c. 39.

[1441]
Diocletian at last sent cognatum suum, quendam militarem ae potentem virum, to
intercede in favor of his daughter, (Lactantius de M. P. c. 41.) We are not
sufficiently acquainted with the history of these times to point out the person
who was employed.

[1442]
Valeria quoque per varias provincias quindecim mensibus plebeio cultu pervagata.
Lactantius de M. P. c. 51. There is some doubt whether we should compute the
fifteen months from the moment of her exile, or from that of her escape. The
expression of parvagata seems to denote the latter; but in that case we must
suppose that the treatise of Lactantius was written after the first civil war
between Licinius and Constantine. See Cuper, p. 254.

[1443]
Ita illis pudicitia et conditio exitio fuit. Lactantius de M. P. c. 51. He
relates the misfortunes of the innocent wife and daughter of Discletian with a
very natural mixture of pity and exultation.

[1444]
The curious reader, who consults the Valesian fragment, p. 713, will probably
accuse me of giving a bold and licentious paraphrase; but if he considers it
with attention, he will acknowledge that my interpretation is probable and
consistent.

[1445]
The situation of Aemona, or, as it is now called, Laybach, in Carniola,
(D'Anville, Geographie Ancienne, tom. i. p. 187,) may suggest a conjecture. As
it lay to the north-east of the Julian Alps, that important territory became a
natural object of dispute between the sovereigns of Italy and of
Illyricum.

[1446]
Cibalis or Cibalae (whose name is still preserved in the obscure ruins of
Swilei) was situated about fifty miles from Sirmium, the capital of Illyricum,
and about one hundred from Taurunum, or Belgrade, and the conflux of the Danube
and the Save. The Roman garrisons and cities on those rivers are finely
illustrated by M. d'Anville in a memoir inserted in l'Academie des Inscriptions,
tom. xxviii.

[1447]
Zosimus (l. ii. p. 90, 91) gives a very particular account of this battle; but
the descriptions of Zosimus are rhetorical rather than military

[1448]
Zosimus, l. ii. p. 92, 93. Anonym. Valesian. p. 713. The Epitomes furnish some
circumstances; but they frequently confound the two wars between Licinius and
Constantine.

[1449]
Petrus Patricius in Excerpt. Legat. p. 27. If it should be thought that
signifies more properly a son-in-law, we might conjecture that Constantine,
assuming the name as well as the duties of a father, had adopted his younger
brothers and sisters, the children of Theodora. But in the best authors
sometimes signifies a husband, sometimes a father-in-law, and sometimes a
kinsman in general. See Spanheim, Observat. ad Julian. Orat. i. p. 72.

[1450]
Zosimus, l. ii. p. 93. Anonym. Valesian. p. 713. Eutropius, x. v. Aurelius
Victor, Euseb. in Chron. Sozomen, l. i. c. 2. Four of these writers affirm that
the promotion of the Caesars was an article of the treaty. It is, however,
certain, that the younger Constantine and Licinius were not yet born; and it is
highly probable that the promotion was made the 1st of March, A. D. 317. The
treaty had probably stipulated that the two Caesars might be created by the
western, and one only by the eastern emperor; but each of them reserved to
himself the choice of the persons.

[1451]
This explanation appears to me little probable. Godefroy has made a much more
happy conjecture, supported by all the historical circumstances which relate to
this edict. It was published the 12th of May, A. D. 315. at Naissus in Pannonia,
the birthplace of Constantine. The 8th of October, in that year, Constantine
gained the victory of Cibalis over Licinius. He was yet uncertain as to the fate
of the war: the Christians, no doubt, whom he favored, had prophesied his
victory. Lactantius, then preceptor of Crispus, had just written his work upon
Christianity, (his Divine Institutes;) he had dedicated it to Constantine. In
this book he had inveighed with great force against infanticide, and the
exposure of infants, (l. vi. c. 20.) Is it not probable that Constantine had
read this work, that he had conversed on the subject with Lactantius, that he
was moved, among other things, by the passage to which I have referred, and in
the first transport of his enthusiasm, he published the edict in question? The
whole of the edict bears the character of precipitation, of excitement,
(entrainement,) rather than of deliberate reflection - the extent of the
promises, the indefiniteness of the means, of the conditions, and of the time
during which the parents might have a right to the succor of the state. Is there
not reason to believe that the humanity of Constantine was excited by the
influence of Lactantius, by that of the principles of Christianity, and of the
Christians themselves, already in high esteem with the emperor, rather than by
some "extraordinary instances of despair"? * * * See Hegewisch, Essai Hist. sur
les Finances Romaines

The edict for Africa was not published till 322: of
that we may say in truth that its origin was in the misery of the times. Africa
had suffered much from the cruelty of Maxentius. Constantine says expressly,
that he had learned that parents, under the pressure of distress, were there
selling their children. This decree is more distinct, more maturely deliberated
than the former; the succor which was to be given to the parents, and the source
from which it was to be derived, are determined. (Code Theod. l. xi. tit. 27, c
2.) If the direct utility of these laws may not have been very extensive, they
had at least the great and happy effect of establishing a decisive opposition
between the principles of the government and those which, at this time, had
prevailed among the subjects of the empire. - G.

[1452]
Codex Theodosian. l. xi. tit. 27, tom. iv. p. 188, with Godefroy's observations.
See likewise l. v. tit. 7, 8.

[1453]
Omnia foris placita, domi prospera, annonae ubertate, fructuum copia, &c.
Panegyr. Vet. x. 38. This oration of Nazarius was pronounced on the day of the
Quinquennalia of the Caesars, the 1st of March, A. D. 321.

[1454]
See the edict of Constantine, addressed to the Roman people, in the Theodosian
Code, l. ix. tit. 24, tom. iii. p. 189.

[1455]
His son very fairly assigns the true reason of the repeal: "Na sub specie
atrocioris judicii aliqua in ulciscendo crimine dilatio nae ceretur." Cod.
Theod. tom. iii. p. 193

[1456]
Eusebius (in Vita Constant. l. iii. c. 1) chooses to affirm, that in the reign
of this hero, the sword of justice hung idle in the hands of the magistrates.
Eusebius himself, (l. iv. c. 29, 54,) and the Theodosian Code, will inform us
that this excessive lenity was not owing to the want either of atrocious
criminals or of penal laws.

[1457]
Nazarius in Panegyr. Vet. x. The victory of Crispus over the Alemanni is
expressed on some medals.

Note: Other medals are extant, the legends of which
commemorate the success of Constantine over the Sarmatians and other barbarous
nations, Sarmatia Devicta. Victoria Gothica. Debellatori Gentium Barbarorum.
Exuperator Omnium Gentium. St. Martin, note on Le Beau, i. 148. - M.

[1458]
Campona, Old Buda in Hungary; Margus, Benonia, Widdin, in Maesia - G and
M.

[1459]
See Zosimus, l. ii. p. 93, 94; though the narrative of that historian is neither
clear nor consistent. The Panegyric of Optatianus (c. 23) mentions the alliance
of the Sarmatians with the Carpi and Getae, and points out the several fields of
battle. It is supposed that the Sarmatian games, celebrated in the month of
November, derived their origin from the success of this war.

[1460]
In the Caesars of Julian, (p. 329. Commentaire de Spanheim, p. 252.) Constantine
boasts, that he had recovered the province (Dacia) which Trajan had subdued. But
it is insinuated by Silenus, that the conquests of Constantine were like the
gardens of Adonis, which fade and wither almost the moment they
appear.

[1461]
Jornandes de Rebus Geticis, c. 21. I know not whether we may entirely depend on
his authority. Such an alliance has a very recent air, and scarcely is suited to
the maxims of the beginning of the fourth century.

[1462]
Eusebius in Vit. Constantin. l. i. c. 8. This passage, however, is taken from a
general declamation on the greatness of Constantine, and not from any particular
account of the Gothic war.

[1463]
Constantinus tamen, vir ingens, et omnia efficere nitens quae animo
praeparasset, simul principatum totius urbis affectans, Licinio bellum intulit.
Eutropius, x. 5. Zosimus, l. ii. p 89. The reasons which they have assigned for
the first civil war, may, with more propriety, be applied to the
second.

[1464]
Zosimus, l. ii. p. 94, 95.

[1465]
Constantine was very attentive to the privileges and comforts of his
fellow-veterans, (Conveterani,) as he now began to style them. See the
Theodosian Code, l. vii. tit. 10, tom. ii. p. 419, 429.

[1466]
Whilst the Athenians maintained the empire of the sea, their fleet consisted of
three, and afterwards of four, hundred galleys of three ranks of oars, all
completely equipped and ready for immediate service. The arsenal in the port of
Piraeus had cost the republic a thousand talents, about two hundred and sixteen
thousand pounds. See Thucydides de Bel. Pelopon. l. ii. c. 13, and Meursius de
Fortuna Attica, c. 19.

[1467]
Zosimus, l. ii. p. 95, 96. This great battle is described in the Valesian
fragment, (p. 714,) in a clear though concise manner. "Licinius vero circum
Hadrianopolin maximo exercitu latera ardui montis impleverat; illuc toto agmine
Constantinus inflexit. Cum bellum terra marique traheretur, quamvis per arduum
suis nitentibus, attamen disciplina militari et felicitate, Constantinus Licinu
confusum et sine ordine agentem vicit exercitum; leviter femore sau
ciatus."

[1468]
Zosimus, l. ii. p. 97, 98. The current always sets out of the Hellespont; and
when it is assisted by a north wind, no vessel can attempt the passage. A south
wind renders the force of the current almost imperceptible. See Tournefort's
Voyage au Levant, Let. xi.

[1469]
Aurelius Victor. Zosimus, l. ii. p. 93. According to the latter, Martinianus was
Magister Officiorum, (he uses the Latin appellation in Greek.) Some medals seem
to intimate, that during his short reign he received the title of
Augustus.

[1470]
Eusebius (in Vita Constantin. I. ii. c. 16, 17) ascribes this decisive victory
to the pious prayers of the emperor. The Valesian fragment (p. 714) mentions a
body of Gothic auxiliaries, under their chief Aliquaca, who adhered to the party
of Licinius.

[1471]
Zosimus, l. ii. p. 102. Victor Junior in Epitome. Anonym. Valesian. p.
714.

[1472]
Contra religionem sacramenti Thessalonicae privatus occisus est. Eutropius, x.
6; and his evidence is confirmed by Jerome (in Chronic.) as well as by Zosimus,
l. ii. p. 102. The Valesian writer is the only one who mentions the soldiers,
and it is Zonaras alone who calls in the assistance of the senate. Eusebius
prudently slides over this delicate transaction. But Sozomen, a century
afterwards, ventures to assert the treasonable practices of Licinius.

[1473]
See the Theodosian Code, l. xv. tit. 15, tom. v. p 404, 405. These edicts of
Constantine betray a degree of passion and precipitation very unbecoming the
character of a lawgiver.

[1474]
In spite of my resolution, Lardner led me to look through the famous fifteenth
and sixteenth chapters of Gibbon. I could not lay them down without finishing
them. The causes assigned, in the fifteenth chapter, for the diffusion of
Christianity, must, no doubt, have contributed to it materially; but I doubt
whether he saw them all. Perhaps those which he enumerates are among the most
obvious. They might all be safely adopted by a Christian writer, with some
change in the language and manner. Mackintosh see Life, i. p. 244. -
M.

[1475]
The art of Gibbon, or at least the unfair impression produced by these two
memorable chapters, consists in confounding together, in one undistinguishable
mass, the origin and apostolic propagation of the Christian religion with its
later progress. The main question, the divine origin of the religion, is
dexterously eluded or speciously conceded; his plan enables him to commence his
account, in most parts, below the apostolic times; and it is only by the
strength of the dark coloring with which he has brought out the failings and the
follies of succeeding ages, that a shadow of doubt and suspicion is thrown back
on the primitive period of Christianity. Divest this whole passage of the latent
sarcasm betrayed by the subsequent one of the whole disquisition, and it might
commence a Christian history, written in the most Christian spirit of candor. -
M.

[1476]
Though we are thus far agreed with respect to the inflexibility and intolerance
of Christian zeal, yet as to the principle from which it was derived, we are,
toto coelo, divided in opinion. You deduce it from the Jewish religion; I would
refer it to a more adequate and a more obvious source, a full persuasion of the
truth of Christianity. Watson. Letters Gibbon, i. 9. - M.

[1477]
This facility has not always prevented intolerance, which seems inherent in the
religious spirit, when armed with authority. The separation of the
ecclesiastical and civil power, appears to be the only means of at once
maintaining religion and tolerance: but this is a very modern notion. The
passions, which mingle themselves with opinions, made the Pagans very often
intolerant and persecutors; witness the Persians, the Egyptians even the Greeks
and Romans.

1st. The Persians. - Cambyses, conqueror of the
Egyptians, condemned to death the magistrates of Memphis, because they had
offered divine honors to their god. Apis: he caused the god to be brought before
him, struck him with his dagger, commanded the priests to be scourged, and
ordered a general massacre of all the Egyptians who should be found celebrating
the festival of the statues of the gods to be burnt. Not content with this
intolerance, he sent an army to reduce the Ammonians to slavery, and to set on
fire the temple in which Jupiter delivered his oracles. See Herod. iii. 25 - 29,
37. Xerxes, during his invasion of Greece, acted on the same principles: l c
destroyed all the temples of Greece and Ionia, except that of Ephesus. See Paus.
l. vii. p. 533, and x. p. 887. Strabo, l. xiv. b. 941. 2d. The Egyptians. - They
thought themselves defiled when they had drunk from the same cup or eaten at the
same table with a man of a different belief from their own. "He who has
voluntarily killed any sacred animal is punished with death; but if any one,
even involuntarily, has killed a cat or an ibis, he cannot escape the extreme
penalty: the people drag him away, treat him in the most cruel manner, sometimes
without waiting for a judicial sentence. * * * Even at the time when King
Ptolemy was not yet the acknowledged friend of the Roman people, while the
multitude were paying court with all possible attention to the strangers who
came from Italy * * a Roman having killed a cat, the people rushed to his house,
and neither the entreaties of the nobles, whom the king sent to them, nor the
terror of the Roman name, were sufficiently powerful to rescue the man from
punishment, though he had committed the crime involuntarily." Diod. Sic. i 83.
Juvenal, in his 13th Satire, describes the sanguinary conflict between the
inhabitants of Ombos and of Tentyra, from religious animosity. The fury was
carried so far, that the conquerors tore and devoured the quivering limbs of the
conquered.

Ardet adhuc Ombos et Tentyra, summus utrinque Inde
furor vulgo, quod numina vicinorum Odit uterque locus; quum solos credat
habendos Esse Deos quos ipse colit. Sat. xv. v. 85.

3d. The Greeks. - "Let us not here," says the Abbe
Guenee, "refer to the cities of Peloponnesus and their severity against atheism;
the Ephesians prosecuting Heraclites for impiety; the Greeks armed one against
the other by religious zeal, in the Amphictyonic war. Let us say nothing either
of the frightful cruelties inflicted by three successors of Alexander upon the
Jews, to force them to abandon their religion, nor of Antiochus expelling the
philosophers from his states. Let us not seek our proofs of intolerance so far
off. Athens, the polite and learned Athens, will supply us with sufficient
examples. Every citizen made a public and solemn vow to conform to the religion
of his country, to defend it, and to cause it to be respected. An express law
severely punished all discourses against the gods, and a rigid decree ordered
the denunciation of all who should deny their existence. * * * The practice was
in unison with the severity of the law. The proceedings commenced against
Protagoras; a price set upon the head of Diagoras; the danger of Alcibiades;
Aristotle obliged to fly; Stilpo banished; Anaxagoras hardly escaping death;
Pericles himself, after all his services to his country, and all the glory he
had acquired, compelled to appear before the tribunals and make his defence; * *
a priestess executed for having introduced strange gods; Socrates condemned and
drinking the hemlock, because he was accused of not recognizing those of his
country, &c.; these facts attest too loudly, to be called in question, the
religious intolerance of the most humane and enlightened people in Greece."
Lettres de quelques Juifs a Mons. Voltaire, i. p. 221. (Compare Bentley on
Freethinking, from which much of this is derived.) - M.

4th. The Romans. - The laws of Rome were not less
express and severe. The intolerance of foreign religions reaches, with the
Romans, as high as the laws of the twelve tables; the prohibitions were
afterwards renewed at different times. Intolerance did not discontinue under the
emperors; witness the counsel of Maecenas to Augustus. This counsel is so
remarkable, that I think it right to insert it entire. "Honor the gods
yourself," says Maecenas to Augustus, "in every way according to the usage of
your ancestors, and compel others to worship them. Hate and punish those who
introduce strange gods, not only for the sake of the gods, (he who despises them
will respect no one,) but because those who introduce new gods engage a
multitude of persons in foreign laws and customs. From hence arise unions bound
by oaths and confederacies, and associations, things dangerous to a monarchy."
Dion Cass. l. ii. c. 36. (But, though some may differ from it, see Gibbon's just
observation on this passage in Dion Cassius, ch. xvi. note 117; impugned,
indeed, by M. Guizot, note in loc.) - M.

Even the laws which the philosophers of Athens and of
Rome wrote for their imaginary republics are intolerant. Plato does not leave to
his citizens freedom of religious worship; and Cicero expressly prohibits them
from having other gods than those of the state. Lettres de quelques Juifs a
Mons. Voltaire, i. p. 226. - G.

According to M. Guizot's just remarks, religious
intolerance will always ally itself with the passions of man, however different
those passions may be. In the instances quoted above, with the Persians it was
the pride of despotism; to conquer the gods of a country was the last mark of
subjugation. With the Egyptians, it was the gross Fetichism of the superstitious
populace, and the local jealousy of neighboring towns. In Greece, persecution
was in general connected with political party; in Rome, with the stern supremacy
of the law and the interests of the state. Gibbon has been mistaken in
attributing to the tolerant spirit of Paganism that which arose out of the
peculiar circumstances of the times. 1st. The decay of the old Polytheism,
through the progress of reason and intelligence, and the prevalence of
philosophical opinions among the higher orders. 2d. The Roman character, in
which the political always predominated over the religious party. The Romans
were contented with having bowed the world to a uniformity of subjection to
their power, and cared not for establishing the (to them) less important
uniformity of religion. - M.

[1478]
Dum Assyrios penes, Medosque, et Persas Oriens fuit, despectissima pars
servientium. Tacit. Hist. v. 8. Herodotus, who visited Asia whilst it obeyed the
last of those empires, slightly mentions the Syrians of Palestine, who,
according to their own confession, had received from Egypt the rite of
circumcision. See l. ii. c. 104.

[1479]
Diodorus Siculus, l. xl. Dion Cassius, l. xxxvii. p. 121. Tacit Hist. v. 1 - 9.
Justin xxxvi. 2, 3.

[1480]
Tradidit arcano quaecunque volumine Moses, Non monstrare vias cadem nisi sacra
colenti, Quaesitum ad fontem solos deducere verpas.

The letter of this law is not to be found in the
present volume of Moses. But the wise, the humane Maimonides openly teaches that
if an idolater fall into the water, a Jew ought not to save him from instant
death. See Basnage, Histoire des Juifs, l. vi. c. 28.

Note: It is diametrically opposed to its spirit and to
its letter, see, among other passages, Deut. v. 18. 19, (God) "loveth the
stranger in giving him food and raiment. Love ye, therefore, the stranger: for
ye were strangers in the land of Egypt." Comp. Lev. xxiii. 25. Juvenal is a
satirist, whose strong expressions can hardly be received as historic evidence;
and he wrote after the horrible cruelties of the Romans, which, during and after
the war, might give some cause for the complete isolation of the Jew from the
rest of the world. The Jew was a bigot, but his religion was not the only source
of his bigotry. After how many centuries of mutual wrong and hatred, which had
still further estranged the Jew from mankind, did Maimonides write? -
M.

[1481]
A Jewish sect, which indulged themselves in a sort of occasional conformity,
derived from Herod, by whose example and authority they had been seduced, the
name of Herodians. But their numbers were so inconsiderable, and their duration
so short, that Josephus has not thought them worthy of his notice. See
Prideaux's Connection, vol. ii. p. 285.

Note: The Herodians were probably more of a political
party than a religious sect, though Gibbon is most likely right as to their
occasional conformity. See Hist. of the Jews, ii. 108. - M.

[1482]
Cicero pro Flacco, c. 28.

Note: The edicts of Julius Caesar, and of some of the
cities in Asia Minor (Krebs. Decret. pro Judaeis,) in favor of the nation in
general, or of the Asiatic Jews, speak a different language. - M.

[1483]
Philo de Legatione. Augustus left a foundation for a perpetual sacrifice. Yet he
approved of the neglect which his grandson Caius expressed towards the temple of
Jerusalem. See Sueton. in August. c. 93, and Casaubon's notes on that
passage.

[1484]
See, in particular, Joseph. Antiquitat. xvii. 6, xviii. 3; and de Bell. Judiac.
i. 33, and ii. 9, edit. Havercamp.

Note: This was during the government of Pontius Pilate.
(Hist. of Jews, ii. 156.) Probably in part to avoid this collision, the Roman
governor, in general, resided at Caesarea. - M.

[1485]
Jussi a Caio Caesare, effigiem ejus in templo locare, arma potius sumpsere.
Tacit. Hist. v. 9. Philo and Josephus gave a very circumstantial, but a very
rhetorical, account of this transaction, which exceedingly perplexed the
governor of Syria. At the first mention of this idolatrous proposal, King
Agrippa fainted away; and did not recover his senses until the third day. (Hist.
of Jews, ii. 181, &c.)

[1486]
For the enumeration of the Syrian and Arabian deities, it may be observed, that
Milton has comprised in one hundred and thirty very beautiful lines the two
large and learned syntagmas which Selden had composed on that abstruse
subject.

[1487]
"How long will this people provoke me? and how long will it be ere they believe
me, for all the signs which I have shown among them?" (Numbers xiv. 11.) It
would be easy, but it would be unbecoming, to justify the complaint of the Deity
from the whole tenor of the Mosaic history. Note: Among a rude and barbarous
people, religious impressions are easily made, and are as soon effaced. The
ignorance which multiplies imaginary wonders, would weaken and destroy the
effect of real miracle. At the period of the Jewish history, referred to in the
passage from Numbers, their fears predominated over their faith, - the fears of
an unwarlike people, just rescued from debasing slavery, and commanded to attack
a fierce, a well-armed, a gigantic, and a far more numerous race, the
inhabitants of Canaan. As to the frequent apostasy of the Jews, their religion
was beyond their state of civilization. Nor is it uncommon for a people to cling
with passionate attachment to that of which, at first, they could not appreciate
the value. Patriotism and national pride will contend, even to death, for
political rights which have been forced upon a reluctant people. The Christian
may at least retort, with justice, that the great sign of his religion, the
resurrection of Jesus, was most ardently believed, and most resolutely asserted,
by the eye witnesses of the fact. - M.

[1488]
All that relates to the Jewish proselytes has been very ably by Basnage, Hist.
des Juifs, l. vi. c. 6, 7.

[1489]
See Exod. xxiv. 23, Deut. xvi. 16, the commentators, and a very sensible note in
the Universal History, vol. i. p. 603, edit. fol.

[1490]
When Pompey, using or abusing the right of conquest, entered into the Holy of
Holies, it was observed with amazement, "Nulli intus Deum effigie, vacuam sedem
et inania arcana." Tacit. Hist. v. 9. It was a popular saying, with regard to
the Jews, "Nil praeter nubes et coeli numen adorant."

[1491]
A second kind of circumcision was inflicted on a Samaritan or Egyptian
proselyte. The sullen indifference of the Talmudists, with respect to the
conversion of strangers, may be seen in Basnage Histoire des Juifs, l. xi. c.
6.

[1492]
These arguments were urged with great ingenuity by the Jew Orobio, and refuted
with equal ingenuity and candor by the Christian Limborch. See the Amica
Collatio, (it well deserves that name,) or account of the dispute between
them.

[1493]
Jesus . . . circumcisus erat; cibis utebatur Judaicis; vestitu simili; purgatos
scabie mittebat ad sacerdotes; Paschata et alios dies festos religiose
observabat: Si quos sanavit sabbatho, ostendit non tantum ex lege, sed et
exceptis sententiis, talia opera sabbatho non interdicta. Grotius de Veritate
Religionis Christianae, l. v. c. 7. A little afterwards, (c. 12,) he expatiates
on the condescension of the apostles.

[1494]
Paene omnes Christum Deum sub legis observatione credebant Sulpicius Severus,
ii. 31. See Eusebius, Hist. Ecclesiast. l. iv. c. 5.

[1495]
Mosheim de Rebus Christianis ante Constantinum Magnum, page 153. In this
masterly performance, which I shall often have occasion to quote he enters much
more fully into the state of the primitive church than he has an opportunity of
doing in his General History.

[1496]
This is incorrect: all the traditions concur in placing the abandonment of the
city by the Christians, not only before it was in ruins, but before the siege
had commenced. Euseb. loc. cit., and Le Clerc. - M.

[1497]
Eusebius, l. iii. c. 5. Le Clerc, Hist. Ecclesiast. p. 605. During this
occasional absence, the bishop and church of Pella still retained the title of
Jerusalem. In the same manner, the Roman pontiffs resided seventy years at
Avignon; and the patriarchs of Alexandria have long since transferred their
episcopal seat to Cairo.

[1498]
Dion Cassius, l. lxix. The exile of the Jewish nation from Jerusalem is attested
by Aristo of Pella, (apud Euseb. l. iv. c. 6,) and is mentioned by several
ecclesiastical writers; though some of them too hastily extend this interdiction
to the whole country of Palestine.

[1499]
Eusebius, l. iv. c. 6. Sulpicius Severus, ii. 31. By comparing their
unsatisfactory accounts, Mosheim (p. 327, &c.) has drawn out a very distinct
representation of the circumstances and motives of this revolution.

[1500]
Le Clerc (Hist. Ecclesiast. p. 477, 535) seems to have collected from Eusebius,
Jerome, Epiphanius, and other writers, all the principal circumstances that
relate to the Nazarenes or Ebionites. The nature of their opinions soon divided
them into a stricter and a milder sect; and there is some reason to conjecture,
that the family of Jesus Christ remained members, at least, of the latter and
more moderate party.

[1501]
Some writers have been pleased to create an Ebion, the imaginary author of their
sect and name. But we can more safely rely on the learned Eusebius than on the
vehement Tertullian, or the credulous Epiphanius. According to Le Clerc, the
Hebrew word Ebjonim may be translated into Latin by that of Pauperes. See Hist.
Ecclesiast. p. 477.

Note: The opinion of Le Clerc is generally admitted;
but Neander has suggested some good reasons for supposing that this term only
applied to poverty of condition. The obscure history of their tenets and
divisions, is clearly and rationally traced in his History of the Church, vol.
i. part ii. p. 612, &c., Germ. edit. - M.

[1502]
See the very curious Dialogue of Justin Martyr with the Jew Tryphon. The
conference between them was held at Ephesus, in the reign of Antoninus Pius, and
about twenty years after the return of the church of Pella to Jerusalem. For
this date consult the accurate note of Tillemont, Memoires Ecclesiastiques, tom.
ii. p. 511.

Note: Justin Martyr makes an important distinction,
which Gibbon has neglected to notice. * * * There were some who were not content
with observing the Mosaic law themselves, but enforced the same observance, as
necessary to salvation, upon the heathen converts, and refused all social
intercourse with them if they did not conform to the law. Justin Martyr himself
freely admits those who kept the law themselves to Christian communion, though
he acknowledges that some, not the Church, thought otherwise; of the other
party, he himself thought less favorably. The former by some are considered the
Nazarenes the atter the Ebionites - G and M.

[1503]
Of all the systems of Christianity, that of Abyssinia is the only one which
still adheres to the Mosaic rites. (Geddes's Church History of Aethiopia, and
Dissertations de La Grand sur la Relation du P. Lobo.) The eunuch of the queen
Candace might suggest some suspicious; but as we are assured (Socrates, i. 19.
Sozomen, ii. 24. Ludolphus, p. 281) that the Aethiopians were not converted till
the fourth century, it is more reasonable to believe that they respected the
sabbath, and distinguished the forbidden meats, in imitation of the Jews, who,
in a very early period, were seated on both sides of the Red Sea. Circumcision
had been practised by the most ancient Aethiopians, from motives of health and
cleanliness, which seem to be explained in the Recherches Philosophiques sur les
Americains, tom. ii. p. 117.

[1504]
Beausobre, Histoire du Manicheisme, l. i. c. 3, has stated their objections,
particularly those of Faustus, the adversary of Augustin, with the most learned
impartiality.

[1505]
On the "war law" of the Jews, see Hist. of Jews, i. 137. - M.

[1506]
Apud ipsos fides obstinata, misericordia in promptu: adversus amnes alios
hostile odium. Tacit. Hist. v. 4. Surely Tacitus had seen the Jews with too
favorable an eye. The perusal of Josephus must have destroyed the
antithesis.

Note: Few writers have suspected Tacitus of partiality
towards the Jews. The whole later history of the Jews illustrates as well their
strong feelings of humanity to their brethren, as their hostility to the rest of
mankind. The character and the position of Josephus with the Roman authorities,
must be kept in mind during the perusal of his History. Perhaps he has not
exaggerated the ferocity and fanaticism of the Jews at that time; but
insurrectionary warfare is not the best school for the humaner virtues, and much
must be allowed for the grinding tyranny of the later Roman governors. See Hist.
of Jews, ii. 254. - M.

[1507]
Dr. Burnet (Archaeologia, l. ii. c. 7) has discussed the first chapters of
Genesis with too much wit and freedom.

Note: Dr. Burnet apologized for the levity with which
he had conducted some of his arguments, by the excuse that he wrote in a learned
language for scholars alone, not for the vulgar. Whatever may be thought of his
success in tracing an Eastern allegory in the first chapters of Genesis, his
other works prove him to have been a man of great genius, and of sincere piety.
- M

[1508]
The milder Gnostics considered Jehovah, the Creator, as a Being of a mixed
nature between God and the Daemon. Others confounded him with an evil principle.
Consult the second century of the general history of Mosheim, which gives a very
distinct, though concise, account of their strange opinions on this
subject.

[1509]
The Gnostics, and the historian who has stated these plausible objections with
so much force as almost to make them his own, would have shown a more
considerate and not less reasonable philosophy, if they had considered the
religion of Moses with reference to the age in which it was promulgated; if they
had done justice to its sublime as well as its more imperfect views of the
divine nature; the humane and civilizing provisions of the Hebrew law, as well
as those adapted for an infant and barbarous people. See Hist of Jews, i. 36,
37, &c. - M.

[1510]
See Beausobre, Hist. du Manicheisme, l. i. c. 4. Origen and St. Augustin were
among the allegorists.

[1511]
Hegesippus, ap. Euseb. l. iii. 32, iv. 22. Clemens Alexandrin Stromat. vii.
17.

Note: The assertion of Hegesippus is not so positive:
it is sufficient to read the whole passage in Eusebius, to see that the former
part is modified by the matter. Hegesippus adds, that up to this period the
church had remained pure and immaculate as a virgin. Those who labored to
corrupt the doctrines of the gospel worked as yet in obscurity - G

[1512]
In the account of the Gnostics of the second and third centuries, Mosheim is
ingenious and candid; Le Clerc dull, but exact; Beausobre almost always an
apologist; and it is much to be feared that the primitive fathers are very
frequently calumniators.

Note The Histoire du Gnosticisme of M. Matter is at
once the fairest and most complete account of these sects. - M.

[1513]
See the catalogues of Irenaeus and Epiphanius. It must indeed be allowed, that
those writers were inclined to multiply the number of sects which opposed the
unity of the church.

[1514]
Eusebius, l. iv. c. 15. Sozomen, l. ii. c. 32. See in Bayle, in the article of
Marcion, a curious detail of a dispute on that subject. It should seem that some
of the Gnostics (the Basilidians) declined, and even refused the honor of
Martyrdom. Their reasons were singular and abstruse. See Mosheim, p.
539.

[1515]
M. Hahn has restored the Marcionite Gospel with great ingenuity. His work is
reprinted in Thilo. Codex. Apoc. Nov. Test. vol. i. - M.

[1516]
See a very remarkable passage of Origen, (Proem. ad Lucam.) That indefatigable
writer, who had consumed his life in the study of the Scriptures, relies for
their authenticity on the inspired authority of the church. It was impossible
that the Gnostics could receive our present Gospels, many parts of which
(particularly in the resurrection of Christ) are directly, and as it might seem
designedly, pointed against their favorite tenets. It is therefore somewhat
singular that Ignatius (Epist. ad Smyrn. Patr. Apostol. tom. ii. p. 34) should
choose to employ a vague and doubtful tradition, instead of quoting the certain
testimony of the evangelists. Note: Bishop Pearson has attempted very happily to
explain this singularity.' The first Christians were acquainted with a number of
sayings of Jesus Christ, which are not related in our Gospels, and indeed have
never been written. Why might not St. Ignatius, who had lived with the apostles
or their disciples, repeat in other words that which St. Luke has related,
particularly at a time when, being in prison, he could have the Gospels at hand?
Pearson, Vind Ign. pp. 2, 9 p. 396 in tom. ii. Patres Apost. ed. Coteler -
G.

[1517]
Faciunt favos et vespae; faciunt ecclesias et Marcionitae, is the strong
expression of Tertullian, which I am obliged to quote from memory. In the time
of Epiphanius (advers. Haereses, p. 302) the Marcionites were very numerous in
Italy, Syria, Egypt, Arabia, and Persia.

[1518]
Augustin is a memorable instance of this gradual progress from reason to faith.
He was, during several years, engaged in the Manichaear sect.

[1519]
The unanimous sentiment of the primitive church is very clearly explained by
Justin Martyr, Apolog. Major, by Athenagoras, Legat. c. 22. &c., and by
Lactantius, Institut. Divin. ii. 14 - 19.

[1520]
Tertullian (Apolog. c. 23) alleges the confession of the daemons themselves as
often as they were tormented by the Christian exorcists

[1521]
Tertullian has written a most severe treatise against idolatry, to caution his
brethren against the hourly danger of incurring that guilt. Recogita sylvam, et
quantae latitant spinae. De Corona Militis, c. 10.

[1522]
The Roman senate was always held in a temple or consecrated place. (Aulus
Gellius, xiv. 7.) Before they entered on business, every senator dropped some
wine and frankincense on the altar. Sueton. in August. c. 35.

[1523]
See Tertullian, De Spectaculis. This severe reformer shows no more indulgence to
a tragedy of Euripides, than to a combat of gladiators. The dress of the actors
particularly offends him. By the use of the lofty buskin, they impiously strive
to add a cubit to their stature. c. 23.

[1524]
The ancient practice of concluding the entertainment with libations, may be
found in every classic. Socrates and Seneca, in their last moments, made a noble
application of this custom. Postquam stagnum, calidae aquae introiit, respergens
proximos servorum, addita voce, libare se liquorem illum Jovi Liberatori. Tacit.
Annal. xv. 64.

[1525]
See the elegant but idolatrous hymn of Catullus, on the nuptials of Manlius and
Julia. O Hymen, Hymenaee Io! Quis huic Deo compararier ausit?

[1526]
The ancient funerals (in those of Misenus and Pallas) are no less accurately
described by Virgil, than they are illustrated by his commentator Servius. The
pile itself was an altar, the flames were fed with the blood of victims, and all
the assistants were sprinkled with lustral water.

[1527]
Tertullian de Idololatria, c. 11.

Note: The exaggerated and declamatory opinions of
Tertullian ought not to be taken as the general sentiment of the early
Christians. Gibbon has too often allowed himself to consider the peculiar
notions of certain Fathers of the Church as inherent in Christianity. This is
not accurate. - G.

[1528]
See every part of Montfaucon's Antiquities. Even the reverses of the Greek and
Roman coins were frequently of an idolatrous nature. Here indeed the scruples of
the Christian were suspended by a stronger passion. Note: All this scrupulous
nicety is at variance with the decision of St. Paul about meat offered to idols,
1 Cor. x. 21 - 32. - M.

[1529]
Tertullian de Idololatria, c. 20, 21, 22. If a Pagan friend (on the occasion
perhaps of sneezing) used the familiar expression of "Jupiter bless you," the
Christian was obliged to protest against the divinity of Jupiter.

[1530]
Consult the most labored work of Ovid, his imperfect Fasti. He finished no more
than the first six months of the year. The compilation of Macrobius is called
the Saturnalia, but it is only a small part of the first book that bears any
relation to the title.

[1531]
Tertullian has composed a defence, or rather panegyric, of the rash action of a
Christian soldier, who, by throwing away his crown of laurel, had exposed
himself and his brethren to the most imminent danger. By the mention of the
emperors, (Severus and Caracalla,) it is evident, notwithstanding the wishes of
M. de Tillemont, that Tertullian composed his treatise De Corona long before he
was engaged in the errors of the Montanists. See Memoires Ecclesiastiques, tom.
iii. p. 384. Note: The soldier did not tear off his crown to throw it down with
contempt; he did not even throw it away; he held it in his hand, while others
were it on their heads. Solus libero capite, ornamento in manu otioso. – G

Note: Tertullian does not expressly name the two
emperors, Severus and Caracalla: he speaks only of two emperors, and of a long
peace which the church had enjoyed. It is generally agreed that Tertullian
became a Montanist about the year 200: his work, de Corona Militis, appears to
have been written, at the earliest about the year 202 before the persecution of
Severus: it may be maintained, then, that it is subsequent to the Montanism of
the author. See Mosheim, Diss. de Apol. Tertull. p. 53. Biblioth. Amsterd. tom.
x. part ii. p. 292. Cave's Hist. Lit. p. 92, 93. - G.

The state of Tertullian's opinions at the particular
period is almost an idle question. "The fiery African" is not at any time to be
considered a fair representative of Christianity. - M.

[1532]
In particular, the first book of the Tusculan Questions, and the treatise De
Senectute, and the Somnium Scipionis, contain, in the most beautiful language,
every thing that Grecian philosophy, on Roman good sense, could possibly suggest
on this dark but important object.

[1533]
The preexistence of human souls, so far at least as that doctrine is compatible
with religion, was adopted by many of the Greek and Latin fathers. See
Beausobre, Hist. du Manicheisme, l. vi. c. 4.

[1534]
See Cicero pro Cluent. c. 61. Caesar ap. Sallust. de Bell. Catilis n 50.
Juvenal. Satir. ii. 149.

Esse aliquid manes, et subterranea regna, - - - - - - -
Nec pueri credunt, nisi qui nondum aeree lavantae.

[1535]
The xith book of the Odyssey gives a very dreary and incoherent account of the
infernal shades. Pindar and Virgil have embellished the picture; but even those
poets, though more correct than their great model, are guilty of very strange
inconsistencies. See Bayle, Responses aux Questions d'un Provincial, part iii.
c. 22.

[1536]
See xvith epistle of the first book of Horace, the xiiith Satire of Juvenal, and
the iid Satire of Persius: these popular discourses express the sentiment and
language of the multitude.

[1537]
If we confine ourselves to the Gauls, we may observe, that they intrusted, not
only their lives, but even their money, to the security of another world. Vetus
ille mos Gallorum occurrit (says Valerius Maximus, l. ii. c. 6, p. 10) quos,
memoria proditum est pecunias montuas, quae his apud inferos redderentur, dare
solitos. The same custom is more darkly insinuated by Mela, l. iii. c. 2. It is
almost needless to add, that the profits of trade hold a just proportion to the
credit of the merchant, and that the Druids derived from their holy profession a
character of responsibility, which could scarcely be claimed by any other order
of men.

[1538]
The right reverend author of the Divine Legation of Moses as signs a very
curious reason for the omission, and most ingeniously retorts it on the
unbelievers.

Note: The hypothesis of Warburton concerning this
remarkable fact, which, as far as the Law of Moses, is unquestionable, made few
disciples; and it is difficult to suppose that it could be intended by the
author himself for more than a display of intellectual strength. Modern writers
have accounted in various ways for the silence of the Hebrew legislator on the
immortality of the soul. According to Michaelis, "Moses wrote as an historian
and as a lawgiver; he regulated the ecclesiastical discipline, rather than the
religious belief of his people; and the sanctions of the law being temporal, he
had no occasion, and as a civil legislator could not with propriety, threaten
punishments in another world. See Michaelis, Laws of Moses, art. 272, vol. iv.
p. 209, Eng. Trans.; and Syntagma Commentationum, p. 80, quoted by Guizot. M.
Guizot adds, the "ingenious conjecture of a philosophic theologian," which
approximates to an opinion long entertained by the Editor. That writer believes,
that in the state of civilization at the time of the legislator, this doctrine,
become popular among the Jews, would necessarily have given birth to a multitude
of idolatrous superstitions which he wished to prevent. His primary object was
to establish a firm theocracy, to make his people the conservators of the
doctrine of the Divine Unity, the basis upon which Christianity was hereafter to
rest. He carefully excluded everything which could obscure or weaken that
doctrine. Other nations had strangely abused their notions on the immortality of
the soul; Moses wished to prevent this abuse: hence he forbade the Jews from
consulting necromancers, (those who evoke the spirits of the dead.) Deut. xviii.
11. Those who reflect on the state of the Pagans and the Jews, and on the
facility with which idolatry crept in on every side, will not be astonished that
Moses has not developed a doctrine of which the influence might be more
pernicious than useful to his people. Orat. Fest. de Vitae Immort. Spe.,
&c., auct. Ph. Alb. Stapfer, p. 12 13, 20. Berne, 1787.

Moses, as well from the intimations scattered in his
writings, the passage relating to the translation of Enoch, (Gen. v. 24,) the
prohibition of necromancy, (Michaelis believes him to be the author of the Book
of Job though this opinion is in general rejected; other learned writers
consider this Book to be coeval with and known to Moses,) as from his long
residence in Egypt, and his acquaintance with Egyptian wisdom, could not be
ignorant of the doctrine of the immortality of the soul. But this doctrine if
popularly known among the Jews, must have been purely Egyptian, and as so,
intimately connected with the whole religious system of that country. It was no
doubt moulded up with the tenet of the transmigration of the soul, perhaps with
notions analogous to the emanation system of India in which the human soul was
an efflux from or indeed a part of, the Deity. The Mosaic religion drew a wide
and impassable interval between the Creator and created human beings: in this it
differed from the Egyptian and all the Eastern religions. As then the
immortality of the soul was thus inseparably blended with those foreign
religions which were altogether to be effaced from the minds of the people, and
by no means necessary for the establishment of the theocracy, Moses maintained
silence on this point and a purer notion of it was left to be developed at a
more favorable period in the history of man. - M.

[1539]
See Le Clerc (Prolegomena ad Hist. Ecclesiast. sect. 1, c. 8 His authority seems
to carry the greater weight, as he has written a learned and judicious
commentary on the books of the Old Testament.

[1540]
Joseph. Antiquitat. l. xiii. c. 10. De Bell. Jud. ii. 8. According to the most
natural interpretation of his words, the Sadducees admitted only the Pentateuch;
but it has pleased some modern critics to add the Prophets to their creed, and
to suppose that they contented themselves with rejecting the traditions of the
Pharisees. Dr. Jortin has argued that point in his Remarks on Ecclesiastical
History, vol. ii. p. 103.

[1541]
This was, in fact, an integral part of the Jewish notion of the Messiah, from
which the minds of the apostles themselves were but gradually detached. See
Bertholdt, Christologia Judaeorum, concluding chapters - M.

[1542]
This expectation was countenanced by the twenty-fourth chapter of St. Matthew,
and by the first epistle of St. Paul to the Thessalonians. Erasmus removes the
difficulty by the help of allegory and metaphor; and the learned Grotius
ventures to insinuate, that, for wise purposes, the pious deception was
permitted to take place.

Note: Some modern theologians explain it without
discovering either allegory or deception. They say, that Jesus Christ, after
having proclaimed the ruin of Jerusalem and of the Temple, speaks of his second
coming and the sings which were to precede it; but those who believed that the
moment was near deceived themselves as to the sense of two words, an error which
still subsists in our versions of the Gospel according to St. Matthew, xxiv. 29,
34. In verse 29, we read, "Immediately after the tribulation of those days shall
the sun be darkened," &c. The Greek word signifies all at once, suddenly,
not immediately; so that it signifies only the sudden appearance of the signs
which Jesus Christ announces not the shortness of the interval which was to
separate them from the "days of tribulation," of which he was speaking. The
verse 34 is this "Verily I say unto you, This generation shall not pass till all
these things shall be fulfilled." Jesus, speaking to his disciples, uses these
words, which the translators have rendered by this generation, but which means
the race, the filiation of my disciples; that is, he speaks of a class of men,
not of a generation. The true sense then, according to these learned men, is, In
truth I tell you that this race of men, of which you are the commencement, shall
not pass away till this shall take place; that is to say, the succession of
Christians shall not cease till his coming. See Commentary of M. Paulus on the
New Test., edit. 1802, tom. iii. p. 445, - 446. - G. Others, as Rosenmuller and
Kuinoel, in loc., confine this passage to a highly figurative description of the
ruins of the Jewish city and polity. - M.

[1543]
See Burnet's Sacred Theory, part iii. c. 5. This tradition may be traced as high
as the author of Epistle of Barnabas, who wrote in the first century, and who
seems to have been half a Jew.

Note: In fact it is purely Jewish. See Mosheim, De Reb.
Christ. ii. 8. Lightfoot's Works, 8vo. edit. vol. iii. p. 37. Bertholdt,
Christologia Judaeorum ch. 38. - M.

[1544]
The primitive church of Antioch computed almost 6000 years from the creation of
the world to the birth of Christ. Africanus, Lactantius, and the Greek church,
have reduced that number to 5500, and Eusebius has contented himself with 5200
years. These calculations were formed on the Septuagint, which was universally
received during the six first centuries. The authority of the vulgate and of the
Hebrew text has determined the moderns, Protestants as well as Catholics, to
prefer a period of about 4000 years; though, in the study of profane antiquity,
they often find themselves straitened by those narrow limits.

Note: Most of the more learned modern English
Protestants, Dr. Hales, Mr. Faber, Dr. Russel, as well as the Continental
writers, adopt the larger chronology. There is little doubt that the narrower
system was framed by the Jews of Tiberias; it was clearly neither that of St.
Paul, nor of Josephus, nor of the Samaritan Text. It is greatly to be regretted
that the chronology of the earlier Scriptures should ever have been made a
religious question - M.

[1545]
Most of these pictures were borrowed from a misrepresentation of Isaiah, Daniel,
and the Apocalypse. One of the grossest images may be found in Irenaeus, (l. v.
p. 455,) the disciple of Papias, who had seen the apostle St. John.

[1546]
See the second dialogue of Justin with Tryphon, and the seventh book of
Lactantius. It is unnecessary to allege all the intermediate fathers, as the
fact is not disputed. Yet the curious reader may consult Daille de Uus Patrum,
l. ii. c. 4.

[1547]
The testimony of Justin of his own faith and that of his orthodox brethren, in
the doctrine of a Millennium, is delivered in the clearest and most solemn
manner, (Dialog. cum Tryphonte Jud. p. 177, 178, edit. Benedictin.) If in the
beginning of this important passage there is any thing like an inconsistency, we
may impute it, as we think proper, either to the author or to his
transcribers.

Note: The Millennium is described in what once stood as
the XLIst Article of the English Church (see Collier, Eccles. Hist., for
Articles of Edw. VI.) as "a fable of Jewish dotage." The whole of these gross
and earthly images may be traced in the works which treat on the Jewish
traditions, in Lightfoot, Schoetgen, and Eisenmenger; "Das enthdeckte Judenthum"
t. ii 809; and briefly in Bertholdt, i. c. 38, 39. - M.

[1548]
Dupin, Bibliotheque Ecclesiastique, tom. i. p. 223, tom. ii. p. 366, and
Mosheim, p. 720; though the latter of these learned divines is not altogether
candid on this occasion.

[1549]
In the council of Laodicea, (about the year 360,) the Apocalypse was tacitly
excluded from the sacred canon, by the same churches of Asia to which it is
addressed; and we may learn from the complaint of Sulpicius Severus, that their
sentence had been ratified by the greater number of Christians of his time. From
what causes then is the Apocalypse at present so generally received by the
Greek, the Roman, and the Protestant churches? The following ones may be
assigned.

I.
The Greeks were subdued by the authority of an impostor,
who, in the sixth century, assumed the character of Dionysius the
Areopagite.

II.
A just apprehension that the grammarians might become
more important than the theologians, engaged the council of Trent to fix the
seal of their infallibility on all the books of Scripture contained in the Latin
Vulgate, in the number of which the Apocalypse was fortunately included. (Fr.
Paolo, Istoria del Concilio Tridentino, l. ii.)

III.
The advantage of turning those mysterious prophecies
against the See of Rome, inspired the Protestants with uncommon veneration for
so useful an ally. See the ingenious and elegant discourses of the present
bishop of Litchfield on that unpromising subject.

Note: The exclusion of the Apocalypse is not improbably
assigned to its obvious unfitness to be read in churches. It is to be feared
that a history of the interpretation of the Apocalypse would not give a very
favorable view either of the wisdom or the charity of the successive ages of
Christianity. Wetstein's interpretation, differently modified, is adopted by
most Continental scholars. - M.

[1550]
Lactantius (Institut. Divin. vii. 15, &c.) relates the dismal talk of
futurity with great spirit and eloquence.

Note: Lactantius had a notion of a great Asiatic
empire, which was previously to rise on the ruins of the Roman: quod Romanum
nomen animus dicere, sed dicam. quia futurum est) tolletur de terra, et impere.
Asiam revertetur. - M.

[1551]
On this subject every reader of taste will be entertained with the third part of
Burnet's Sacred Theory. He blends philosophy, Scripture, and tradition, into one
magnificent system; in the description of which he displays a strength of fancy
not inferior to that of Milton himself.

[1552]
And yet whatever may be the language of individuals, it is still the public
doctrine of all the Christian churches; nor can even our own refuse to admit the
conclusions which must be drawn from the viiith and the xviiith of her Articles.
The Jansenists, who have so diligently studied the works of the fathers,
maintain this sentiment with distinguished zeal; and the learned M. de Tillemont
never dismisses a virtuous emperor without pronouncing his damnation. Zuinglius
is perhaps the only leader of a party who has ever adopted the milder sentiment,
and he gave no less offence to the Lutherans than to the Catholics. See Bossuet,
Histoire des Variations des Eglises Protestantes, l. ii. c. 19 - 22.

[1553]
Justin and Clemens of Alexandria allow that some of the philosophers were
instructed by the Logos; confounding its double signification of the human
reason, and of the Divine Word.

[1554]
This translation is not exact: the first sentence is imperfect. Tertullian says,
Ille dies nationibus insperatus, ille derisus, cum tanta sacculi vetustas et tot
ejus nativitates uno igne haurientur. The text does not authorize the
exaggerated expressions, so many magistrates, so many sago philosophers, so many
poets, &c.; but simply magistrates, philosophers, poets. - G.

It is not clear that Gibbon's version or paraphrase is
incorrect: Tertullian writes, tot tantosque reges item praesides, &c. -
M.

[1555]
Tertullian, de Spectaculis, c. 30. In order to ascertain the degree of authority
which the zealous African had acquired it may be sufficient to allege the
testimony of Cyprian, the doctor and guide of all the western churches. (See
Prudent. Hym. xiii. 100.) As often as he applied himself to his daily study of
the writings of Tertullian, he was accustomed to say, "Da mihi magistrum, Give
me my master." (Hieronym. de Viris Illustribus, tom. i. p. 284.)

[1556]
The object of Tertullian's vehemence in his Treatise, was to keep the Christians
away from the secular games celebrated by the Emperor Severus: It has not
prevented him from showing himself in other places full of benevolence and
charity towards unbelievers: the spirit of the gospel has sometimes prevailed
over the violence of human passions: Qui ergo putaveris nihil nos de salute
Caesaris curare (he says in his Apology) inspice Dei voces, literas nostras.
Scitote ex illis praeceptum esse nobis ad redudantionem, benignitates etiam pro
inimicis Deum orare, et pro persecutoribus cona precari. Sed etiam nominatim
atque manifeste orate inquit (Christus) pro regibus et pro principibus et
potestatibus ut omnia sint tranquilla vobis Tert. Apol. c. 31. - G.

It would be wiser for Christianity, retreating upon its
genuine records in the New Testament, to disclaim this fierce African, than to
identify itself with his furious invectives by unsatisfactory apologies for
their unchristian fanaticism. - M.

[1557]
Notwithstanding the evasions of Dr. Middleton, it is impossible to overlook the
clear traces of visions and inspiration, which may be found in the apostolic
fathers.

Note: Gibbon should have noticed the distinct and
remarkable passage from Chrysostom, quoted by Middleton, (Works, vol. i. p.
105,) in which he affirms the long discontinuance of miracles as a notorious
fact. - M.

[1558]
Irenaeus adv. Haeres. Proem. p.3 Dr. Middleton (Free Inquiry, p. 96, &c.)
observes, that as this pretension of all others was the most difficult to
support by art, it was the soonest given up. The observation suits his
hypothesis.

Note: This passage of Irenaeus contains no allusion to
the gift of tongues; it is merely an apology for a rude and unpolished Greek
style, which could not be expected from one who passed his life in a remote and
barbarous province, and was continually obliged to speak the Celtic language. -
M. Note: Except in the life of Pachomius, an Egyptian monk of the fourth
century. (see Jortin, Ecc. Hist. i. p. 368, edit. 1805,) and the latter (not
earlier) lives of Xavier, there is no claim laid to the gift of tongues since
the time of Irenaeus; and of this claim, Xavier's own letters are profoundly
silent. See Douglas's Criterion, p. 76 edit. 1807. - M.

[1559]
Athenagoras in Legatione. Justin Martyr, Cohort. ad Gentes Tertullian advers.
Marcionit. l. iv. These descriptions are not very unlike the prophetic fury, for
which Cicero (de Divinat.ii. 54) expresses so little reverence.

[1560]
Tertullian (Apolog. c. 23) throws out a bold defiance to the Pagan magistrates.
Of the primitive miracles, the power of exorcising is the only one which has
been assumed by Protestants.

Note: But by Protestants neither of the most
enlightened ages nor most reasoning minds. - M.

[1561]
Irenaeus adv. Haereses, l. ii. 56, 57, l. v. c. 6. Mr. Dodwell (Dissertat. ad
Irenaeum, ii. 42) concludes, that the second century was still more fertile in
miracles than the first.

Note: It is difficult to answer Middleton's objection
to this statement of Irenaeus: "It is very strange, that from the time of the
apostles there is not a single instance of this miracle to be found in the three
first centuries; except a single case, slightly intimated in Eusebius, from the
Works of Papias; which he seems to rank among the other fabulous stories
delivered by that weak man." Middleton, Works, vol. i. p. 59. Bp. Douglas
(Criterion, p 389) would consider Irenaeus to speak of what had "been performed
formerly." not in his own time. - M.

[1562]
Theophilus ad Autolycum, l. i. p. 345. Edit. Benedictin. Paris, 1742.

Note: A candid sceptic might discern some impropriety
in the Bishop being called upon to perform a miracle on demand. - M.

[1563]
Dr. Middleton sent out his Introduction in the year 1747, published his Free
Inquiry in 1749, and before his death, which happened in 1750, he had prepared a
vindication of it against his numerous adversaries.

[1564]
The university of Oxford conferred degrees on his opponents. From the
indignation of Mosheim, (p. 221,) we may discover the sentiments of the Lutheran
divines.

Note: Yet many Protestant divines will now without
reluctance confine miracles to the time of the apostles, or at least to the
first century. - M

[1565]
It may seem somewhat remarkable, that Bernard of Clairvaux, who records so many
miracles of his friend St. Malachi, never takes any notice of his own, which, in
their turn, however, are carefully related by his companions and disciples. In
the long series of ecclesiastical history, does there exist a single instance of
a saint asserting that he himself possessed the gift of miracles?

[1566]
The conversion of Constantine is the aera which is most usually fixed by
Protestants. The more rational divines are unwilling to admit the miracles of
the ivth, whilst the more credulous are unwilling to reject those of the vth
century.

Note: All this appears to proceed on the principle that
any distinct line can be drawn in an unphilosophic age between wonders and
miracles, or between what piety, from their unexpected and extraordinary nature,
the marvellous concurrence of secondary causes to some remarkable end, may
consider providential interpositions, and miracles strictly so called, in which
the laws of nature are suspended or violated. It is impossible to assign, on one
side, limits to human credulity, on the other, to the influence of the
imagination on the bodily frame; but some of the miracles recorded in the
Gospels are such palpable impossibilities, according to the known laws and
operations of nature, that if recorded on sufficient evidence, and the evidence
we believe to be that of eye-witnesses, we cannot reject them, without either
asserting, with Hume, that no evidence can prove a miracle, or that the Author
of Nature has no power of suspending its ordinary laws. But which of the
post-apostolic miracles will bear this test? - M.

[1567]
These, in the opinion of the editor, are the most uncandid paragraphs in
Gibbon's History. He ought either, with manly courage, to have denied the moral
reformation introduced by Christianity, or fairly to have investigated all its
motives; not to have confined himself to an insidious and sarcastic description
of the less pure and generous elements of the Christian character as it appeared
even at that early time. - M.

[1568]
The imputations of Celsus and Julian, with the defence of the fathers, are very
fairly stated by Spanheim, Commentaire sur les Cesars de Julian, p.
468.

[1569]
Plin. Epist. x. 97.

Note: Is not the sense of Tertullian rather, if guilty
of any other offence, be had thereby ceased to be a Christian? - M.

[1570]
And this blamelessness was fully admitted by the candid and enlightened Roman. -
M.

[1571]
Tertullian, Apolog. c. 44. He adds, however, with some degree of hesitation,
"Aut si aliud, jam non Christianus."

Note: Tertullian says positively no Christian, nemo
illic Christianus; for the rest, the limitation which he himself subjoins, and
which Gibbon quotes in the foregoing note, diminishes the force of this
assertion, and appears to prove that at least he knew none such. - G.

[1572]
The philosopher Peregrinus (of whose life and death Lucian has left us so
entertaining an account) imposed, for a long time, on the credulous simplicity
of the Christians of Asia.

[1573]
See a very judicious treatise of Barbeyrac sur la Morale des Peres.

[1574]
El que me fait cette homelie semi-stoicienne, semi-epicurienne? t'on jamais
regarde l'amour du plaisir comme l'un des principes de la perfection morale? Et
de quel droit faites vous de l'amour de l'action, et de l'amour du plaisir, les
seuls elemens de l'etre humain? Est ce que vous faites abstraction de la verite
en elle-meme, de la conscience et du sentiment du devoir? Est ce que vous ne
sentez point, par exemple, que le sacrifice du moi a la justice et a la verite,
est aussi dans le coeur de l'homme: que tout n'est pas pour lui action ou
plaisir, et que dans le bien ce n'est pas le mouvement, mais la verite, qu'il
cherche? Et puis * * Thucy dide et Tacite. ces maitres de l'histoire, ont ils
jamais introduits dans leur recits un fragment de dissertation sur le plaisir et
sur l'action. Villemain Cours de Lit. Franc part ii. Lecon v. - M.

[1575]
Lactant. Institut. Divin. l. vi. c. 20, 21, 22.

[1576]
Consult a work of Clemens of Alexandria, entitled The Paedagogue, which contains
the rudiments of ethics, as they were taught in the most celebrated of the
Christian schools.

[1577]
Tertullian, de Spectaculis, c. 23. Clemens Alexandrin. Paedagog. l. iii. c.
8.

[1578]
Beausobro, Hist. Critique du Manicheisme, l. vii. c. 3. Justin, Gregory of
Nyssa, Augustin, &c., strongly incline to this opinion. Note: But these were
Gnostic or Manichean opinions. Beausobre distinctly describes Autustine's bias
to his recent escape from Manicheism; and adds that be afterwards changed his
views. - M.

[1579]
Some of the Gnostic heretics were more consistent; they rejected the use of
marriage.

[1580]
See a chain of tradition, from Justin Martyr to Jerome, in the Morale des Peres,
c. iv. 6 - 26.

[1581]
See a very curious Dissertation on the Vestals, in the Memoires de l'Academie
des Inscriptions, tom. iv. p. 161 - 227. Notwithstanding the honors and rewards
which were bestowed on those virgins, it was difficult to procure a sufficient
number; nor could the dread of the most horrible death always restrain their
incontinence.

[1582]
Cupiditatem procreandi aut unam scimus aut nullam. Minutius Faelix, c. 31.
Justin. Apolog. Major. Athenagoras in Legat. c 28. Tertullian de Cultu Foemin.
l. ii.

[1583]
Eusebius, l. vi. 8. Before the fame of Origen had excited envy and persecution,
this extraordinary action was rather admired than censured. As it was his
general practice to allegorize Scripture, it seems unfortunate that in this
instance only, he should have adopted the literal sense.

[1584]
Cyprian. Epist. 4, and Dodwell, Dissertat. Cyprianic. iii. Something like this
rash attempt was long afterwards imputed to the founder of the order of
Fontevrault. Bayle has amused himself and his readers on that very delicate
subject.

[1585]
Dupin (Bibliotheque Ecclesiastique, tom. i. p. 195) gives a particular account
of the dialogue of the ten virgins, as it was composed by Methodius, Bishop of
Tyre. The praises of virginity are excessive.

[1586]
The Ascetics (as early as the second century) made a public profession of
mortifying their bodies, and of abstaining from the use of flesh and wine.
Mosheim, p. 310.

[1587]
See the Morale des Peres. The same patient principles have been revived since
the Reformation by the Socinians, the modern Anabaptists, and the Quakers.
Barclay, the Apologist of the Quakers, has protected his brethren by the
authority of the primitive Christian; p. 542 - 549

[1588]
Tertullian, Apolog. c. 21. De Idololatria, c. 17, 18. Origen contra Celsum, l.
v. p. 253, l. vii. p. 348, l. viii. p. 423 - 428.

[1589]
Tertullian (de Corona Militis, c. 11) suggested to them the expedient of
deserting; a counsel which, if it had been generally known, was not very proper
to conciliate the favor of the emperors towards the Christian sect.

Note: There is nothing which ought to astonish us in
the refusal of the primitive Christians to take part in public affairs; it was
the natural consequence of the contrariety of their principles to the customs,
laws, and active life of the Pagan world. As Christians, they could not enter
into the senate, which, according to Gibbon himself, always assembled in a
temple or consecrated place, and where each senator, before he took his seat,
made a libation of a few drops of wine, and burnt incense on the altar; as
Christians, they could not assist at festivals and banquets, which always
terminated with libations, &c.; finally, as "the innumerable deities and
rites of polytheism were closely interwoven with every circumstance of public
and private life," the Christians could not participate in them without
incurring, according to their principles, the guilt of impiety. It was then much
less by an effect of their doctrine, than by the consequence of their situation,
that they stood aloof from public business. Whenever this situation offered no
impediment, they showed as much activity as the Pagans. Proinde, says Justin
Martyr, (Apol. c. 17,) nos solum Deum adoramus, et vobis in rebus aliis laeti
inservimus. - G.

This latter passage, M. Guizot quotes in Latin; if he
had consulted the original, he would have found it to be altogether irrelevant:
it merely relates to the payment of taxes. - M.

Tertullian does not suggest to the soldiers the
expedient of deserting; he says that they ought to be constantly on their guard
to do nothing during their service contrary to the law of God, and to resolve to
suffer martyrdom rather than submit to a base compliance, or openly to renounce
the service. (De Cor. Mil. ii. p. 127.) He does not positively decide that the
military service is not permitted to Christians; he ends, indeed, by saying,
Puta denique licere militiam usque ad causam coronae. - G.

M. Guizot is. I think, again unfortunate in his defence
of Tertullian. That father says, that many Christian soldiers had deserted, aut
deserendum statim sit, ut a multis actum. The latter sentence, Puta, &c,
&c., is a concession for the sake of argument: wha follows is more to the
purpose. - M. Many other passages of Tertullian prove that the army was full of
Christians, Hesterni sumus et vestra omnia implevimus, urbes, insulas, castella,
municipia, conciliabula, castra ipsa. (Apol. c. 37.) Navigamus et not vobiscum
et militamus. (c. 42.) Origen, in truth, appears to have maintained a more rigid
opinion, (Cont. Cels. l. viii.;) but he has often renounced this exaggerated
severity, perhaps necessary to produce great results, and be speaks of the
profession of arms as an honorable one. (l. iv. c. 218.) - G.

On these points Christian opinion, it should seem, was
much divided Tertullian, when he wrote the De Cor. Mil., was evidently inclining
to more ascetic opinions, and Origen was of the same class. See Neander, vol. l
part ii. p. 305, edit. 1828. - M.

[1590]
As well as we can judge from the mutilated representation of Origen, (1. viii.
p. 423,) his adversary, Celsus, had urged his objection with great force and
candor.

[1591]
The aristocratical party in France, as well as in England, has strenuously
maintained the divine origin of bishops. But the Calvinistical presbyters were
impatient of a superior; and the Roman Pontiff refused to acknowledge an equal.
See Fra Paolo.

[1592]
In the history of the Christian hierarchy, I have, for the most part, followed
the learned and candid Mosheim.

[1593]
For the prophets of the primitive church, see Mosheim, Dissertationes ad Hist.
Eccles. pertinentes, tom. ii. p. 132 - 208.

[1594]
St. Paul distinctly reproves the intrusion of females into the prophets office.
1 Cor. xiv. 34, 35. 1 Tim. ii. 11. - M.

[1595]
See the epistles of St. Paul, and of Clemens, to the Corinthians.

Note: The first ministers established in the church
were the deacons, appointed at Jerusalem, seven in number; they were charged
with the distribution of the alms; even females had a share in this employment.
After the deacons came the elders or priests, charged with the maintenance of
order and decorum in the community, and to act every where in its name. The
bishops were afterwards charged to watch over the faith and the instruction of
the disciples: the apostles themselves appointed several bishops. Tertullian,
(adv. Marium, c. v.,) Clement of Alexandria, and many fathers of the second and
third century, do not permit us to doubt this fact. The equality of rank between
these different functionaries did not prevent their functions being, even in
their origin, distinct; they became subsequently still more so. See Plank,
Geschichte der Christ. Kirch. Verfassung., vol. i. p. 24. - G. On this extremely
obscure subject, which has been so much perplexed by passion and interest, it is
impossible to justify any opinion without entering into long and controversial
details. It must be admitted, in opposition to Plank, that in the New Testament,
several words are sometimes indiscriminately used. (Acts xx. v. 17, comp. with
28 Tit. i. 5 and 7. Philip. i. 1.) But it is as clear, that as soon as we can
discern the form of church government, at a period closely bordering upon, if
not within, the apostolic age, it appears with a bishop at the head of each
community, holding some superiority over the presbyters. Whether he was, as
Gibbon from Mosheim supposes, merely an elective head of the College of
Presbyters, (for this we have, in fact, no valid authority,) or whether his
distinct functions were established on apostolic authority, is still contested.
The universal submission to this episcopacy, in every part of the Christian
world appears to me strongly to favor the latter view. - M.

[1596]
Hooker's Ecclesiastical Polity, l. vii.

[1597]
See Jerome and Titum, c. i. and Epistol. 85, (in the Benedictine edition, 101,)
and the elaborate apology of Blondel, pro sententia Hieronymi. The ancient
state, as it is described by Jerome, of the bishop and presbyters of Alexandria,
receives a remarkable confirmation from the patriarch Eutychius, (Annal. tom. i.
p. 330, Vers Pocock;) whose testimony I know not how to reject, in spite of all
the objections of the learned Pearson in his Vindiciae Ignatianae, part i. c.
11.

[1598]
See the introduction to the Apocalypse. Bishops, under the name of angels, were
already instituted in the seven cities of Asia. And yet the epistle of Clemens
(which is probably of as ancient a date) does not lead us to discover any traces
of episcopacy either at Corinth or Rome.

[1599]
Nulla Ecclesia sine Episcopo, has been a fact as well as a maxim since the time
of Tertullian and Irenaeus.

[1600]
After we have passed the difficulties of the first century, we find the
episcopal government universally established, till it was interrupted by the
republican genius of the Swiss and German reformers.

[1601]
See Mosheim in the first and second centuries. Ignatius (ad Smyrnaeos, c. 3,
&c.) is fond of exalting the episcopal dignity. Le Clerc (Hist. Eccles. p.
569) very bluntly censures his conduct, Mosheim, with a more critical judgment,
(p. 161,) suspects the purity even of the smaller epistles.

[1602]
Nonne et Laici sacerdotes sumus? Tertullian, Exhort. ad Castitat. c. 7. As the
human heart is still the same, several of the observations which Mr. Hume has
made on Enthusiasm, (Essays, vol. i. p. 76, quarto edit.) may be applied even to
real inspiration.

Note: This expression was employed by the earlier
Christian writers in the sense used by St. Peter, 1 Ep ii. 9. It was the
sanctity and virtue not the power of priesthood, in which all Christians were to
be equally distinguished. - M.

[1603]
The synods were not the first means taken by the insulated churches to enter
into communion and to assume a corporate character. The dioceses were first
formed by the union of several country churches with a church in a city: many
churches in one city uniting among themselves, or joining a more considerable
church, became metropolitan. The dioceses were not formed before the beginning
of the second century: before that time the Christians had not established
sufficient churches in the country to stand in need of that union. It is towards
the middle of the same century that we discover the first traces of the
metropolitan constitution. (Probably the country churches were founded in
general by missionaries from those in the city, and would preserve a natural
connection with the parent church.) - M. The provincial synods did not commence
till towards the middle of the third century, and were not the first synods.
History gives us distinct notions of the synods, held towards the end of the
second century, at Ephesus at Jerusalem, at Pontus, and at Rome, to put an end
to the disputes which had arisen between the Latin and Asiatic churches about
the celebration of Easter. But these synods were not subject to any regular form
or periodical return; this regularity was first established with the provincial
synods, which were formed by a union of the bishops of a district, subject to a
metropolitan. Plank, p. 90. Geschichte der Christ. Kirch. Verfassung -
G

[1604]
Acta Concil. Carthag. apud Cyprian. edit. Fell, p. 158. This council was
composed of eighty-seven bishops from the provinces of Mauritania, Numidia, and
Africa; some presbyters and deacons assisted at the assembly; praesente plebis
maxima parte.

[1605]
Aguntur praeterea per Graecias illas, certis in locis concilia, &c
Tertullian de Jejuniis, c. 13. The African mentions it as a recent and foreign
institution. The coalition of the Christian churches is very ably explained by
Mosheim, p. 164 170.

[1606]
Cyprian, in his admired treatise De Unitate Ecclesiae. p. 75 - 86

[1607]
We may appeal to the whole tenor of Cyprian's conduct, of his doctrine, and of
his epistles. Le Clerc, in a short life of Cyprian, (Bibliotheque Universelle,
tom. xii. p. 207 - 378,) has laid him open with great freedom and
accuracy.

[1608]
If Novatus, Felicissimus, &c., whom the Bishop of Carthage expelled from his
church, and from Africa, were not the most detestable monsters of wickedness,
the zeal of Cyprian must occasionally have prevailed over his veracity. For a
very just account of these obscure quarrels, see Mosheim, p. 497 -
512.

[1609]
Mosheim, p. 269, 574. Dupin, Antiquae Eccles. Disciplin. p. 19, 20.

[1610]
Tertullian, in a distinct treatise, has pleaded against the heretics the right
of prescription, as it was held by the apostolic churches.

[1611]
The journey of St. Peter to Rome is mentioned by most of the ancients, (see
Eusebius, ii. 25,) maintained by all the Catholics, allowed by some Protestants,
(see Pearson and Dodwell de Success. Episcop. Roman,) but has been vigorously
attacked by Spanheim, (Miscellanes Sacra, iii. 3.) According to Father Hardouin,
the monks of the thirteenth century, who composed the Aeneid, represented St.
Peter under the allegorical character of the Trojan hero.

Note: It is quite clear that, strictly speaking, the
church of Rome was not founded by either of these apostles. St. Paul's Epistle
to the Romans proves undeniably the flourishing state of the church before his
visit to the city; and many Roman Catholic writers have given up the
impracticable task of reconciling with chronology any visit of St. Peter to Rome
before the end of the reign of Claudius, or the beginning of that of Nero. -
M.

[1612]
It is in French only that the famous allusion to St. Peter's name is exact. Tu
es Pierre, et sur cette pierre. - The same is imperfect in Greek, Latin,
Italian, &c., and totally unintelligible in our Teutonic languages.

Note: It is exact in Syro-Chaldaic, the language in
which it was spoken by Jesus Christ. (St. Matt. xvi. 17.) Peter was called
Cephas; and cepha signifies base, foundation, rock - G.

[1613]
Irenaeus adv. Haereses, iii. 3. Tertullian de Praescription. c. 36, and Cyprian,
Epistol. 27, 55, 71, 75. Le Clere (Hist. Eccles. p. 764) and Mosheim (p. 258,
578) labor in the interpretation of these passages. But the loose and rhetorical
style of the fathers often appears favorable to the pretensions of
Rome.

[1614]
See the sharp epistle from Firmilianus, bishop of Caesarea, to Stephen, bishop
of Rome, ap. Cyprian, Epistol. 75.

[1615]
Concerning this dispute of the rebaptism of heretics, see the epistles of
Cyprian, and the seventh book of Eusebius.

[1616]
For the origin of these words, see Mosheim, p. 141. Spanheim, Hist. Ecclesiast.
p. 633. The distinction of Clerus and Iaicus was established before the time of
Tertullian.

[1617]
The community instituted by Plato is more perfect than that which Sir Thomas
More had imagined for his Utopia. The community of women, and that of temporal
goods, may be considered as inseparable parts of the same system.

[1618]
Joseph. Antiquitat. xviii. 2. Philo, de Vit. Contemplativ.

[1619]
See the Acts of the Apostles, c. 2, 4, 5, with Grotius's Commentary. Mosheim, in
a particular dissertation, attacks the common opinion with very inconclusive
arguments.

Note: This is not the general judgment on Mosheim's
learned dissertation. There is no trace in the latter part of the New Testament
of this community of goods, and many distinct proofs of the contrary. All
exhortations to almsgiving would have been unmeaning if property had been in
common - M.

[1620]
Justin Martyr, Apolog. Major, c. 89. Tertullian, Apolog. c. 39.

[1621]
Irenaeus ad Haeres. l. iv. c. 27, 34. Origen in Num. Hom. ii Cyprian de Unitat.
Eccles. Constitut. Apostol. l. ii. c. 34, 35, with the notes of Cotelerius. The
Constitutions introduce this divine precept, by declaring that priests are as
much above kings as the soul is above the body. Among the tithable articles,
they enumerate corn, wine, oil, and wool. On this interesting subject, consult
Prideaux's History of Tithes, and Fra Paolo delle Materie Beneficiarie; two
writers of a very different character.

[1622]
The same opinion which prevailed about the year one thousand, was productive of
the same effects. Most of the Donations express their motive, "appropinquante
mundi fine." See Mosheim's General History of the Church, vol. i. p.
457.

[1623]
Tum summa cura est fratribus (Ut sermo testatur loquax.) Offerre, fundis
venditis Sestertiorum millia. Addicta avorum praedia Foedis sub auctionibus,
Successor exheres gemit Sanctis egens Parentibus.

[1624]
Cyprian, Epistol. 62.

[1625]
Tertullian de Praescriptione, c. 30.

[1626]
Diocletian gave a rescript, which is only a declaration of the old law;
"Collegium, si nullo speciali privilegio subnixum sit, haereditatem capere non
posse, dubium non est." Fra Paolo (c. 4) thinks that these regulations had been
much neglected since the reign of Valerian.

[1627]
Hist. August. p. 131. The ground had been public; and was row disputed between
the society of Christians and that of butchers. Note *: Carponarii, rather
victuallers. - M.

[1628]
Haec occuluntur abditis
Ecclesiarum in angulis. Et summa pietas creditur Nudare dulces
liberos.

Prudent.
Hymn 2.

The
subsequent conduct of the deacon Laurence only proves how proper a use was made
of the wealth of the Roman church; it was undoubtedly very considerable; but Fra
Paolo (c. 3) appears to exaggerate, when he supposes that the successors of
Commodus were urged to persecute the Christians by their own avarice, or that of
their Praetorian praefects.

[1629]
Constitut. Apostol. ii. 35.

[1630]
Cyprian de Lapsis, p. 89. Epistol. 65. The charge is confirmed by the 19th and
20th canon of the council of Illiberis.

[1631]
See the apologies of Justin, Tertullian, &c.

[1632]
The wealth and liberality of the Romans to their most distant brethren is
gratefully celebrated by Dionysius of Corinth, ap. Euseb. l. iv. c.
23.

[1633]
See Lucian iu Peregrin. Julian (Epist. 49) seems mortified that the Christian
charity maintains not only their own, but likewise the heathen poor.

[1634]
Such, at least, has been the laudable conduct of more modern missionaries, under
the same circumstances. Above three thousand new-born infants are annually
exposed in the streets of Pekin. See Le Comte, Memoires sur la Chine, and the
Recherches sur les Chinois et les Egyptians, tom. i. p. 61.

[1635]
The Montanists and the Novatians, who adhered to this opinion with the greatest
rigor and obstinacy, found themselves at last in the number of excommunicated
heretics. See the learned and copious Mosheim, Secul. ii. and iii.

[1636]
Dionysius ap. Euseb. iv. 23. Cyprian, de Lapsis.

[1637]
Cave's Primitive Christianity, part iii. c. 5. The admirers of antiquity regret
the loss of this public penance.

[1638]
See in Dupin, Bibliotheque Ecclesiastique, tom. ii. p. 304 - 313, a short but
rational exposition of the canons of those councils, which were assembled in the
first moments of tranquillity, after the persecution of Diocletian. This
persecution had been much less severely felt in Spain than in Galatia; a
difference which may, in some measure account for the contrast of their
regulations.

[1639]
Gibbon has been accused of injustice to the character of Cyprian, as exalting
the "censures and authority of the church above the observance of the moral
duties." Felicissimus had been condemned by a synod of bishops, (non tantum mea,
sed plurimorum coepiscorum, sententia condemnatum,) on the charge not only of
schism, but of embezzlement of public money, the debauching of virgins, and
frequent acts of adultery. His violent menaces had extorted his readmission into
the church, against which Cyprian protests with much vehemence: ne pecuniae
commissae sibi fraudator, ne stuprator virginum, ne matrimoniorum multorum
depopulator et corruptor, ultra adhuc sponsam Christi incorruptam praesentiae
suae dedecore, et impudica atque incesta contagione, violaret. See Chelsum's
Remarks, p. 134. If these charges against Felicissimus were true, they were
something more than "irregularities," A Roman censor would have been a fairer
subject of comparison than a consul. On the other hand, it must be admitted that
the charge of adultery deepens very rapidly as the controversy becomes more
violent. It is first represented as a single act, recently detected, and which
men of character were prepared to substantiate: adulterii etiam crimen accedit.
quod patres nostri graves viri deprehendisse se nuntiaverunt, et probaturos se
asseverarunt. Epist. xxxviii. The heretic has now darkened into a man of
notorious and general profligacy. Nor can it be denied that of the whole long
epistle, very far the larger and the more passionate part dwells on the breach
of ecclesiastical unity rather than on the violation of Christian holiness. -
M.

[1640]
Cyprian Epist. 69.

[1641]
This supposition appears unfounded: the birth and the talents of Cyprian might
make us presume the contrary. Thascius Caecilius Cyprianus, Carthaginensis,
artis oratoriae professione clarus, magnam sibi gloriam, opes, honores
acquisivit, epularibus caenis et largis dapibus assuetus, pretiosa veste
conspicuus, auro atque purpura fulgens, fascibus oblectatus et honoribus,
stipatus clientium cuneis, frequentiore comitatu officii agminis honestatus, ut
ipse de se loquitur in Epistola ad Donatum. See De Cave, Hist. Liter. b. i. p.
87. - G.

Cave has rather embellished Cyprian's language. -
M.

[1642]
The arts, the manners, and the vices of the priests of the Syrian goddess are
very humorously described by Apuleius, in the eighth book of his
Metamorphosis.

[1643]
The office of Asiarch was of this nature, and it is frequently mentioned in
Aristides, the Inscriptions, &c. It was annual and elective. None but the
vainest citizens could desire the honor; none but the most wealthy could support
the expense. See, in the Patres Apostol. tom. ii. p. 200, with how much
indifference Philip the Asiarch conducted himself in the martyrdom of Polycarp.
There were likewise Bithyniarchs, Lyciarchs, &c.

[1644]
The modern critics are not disposed to believe what the fathers almost
unanimously assert, that St. Matthew composed a Hebrew gospel, of which only the
Greek translation is extant. It seems, however, dangerous to reject their
testimony.

Note: Strong reasons appear to confirm this testimony.
Papias, contemporary of the Apostle St. John, says positively that Matthew had
written the discourses of Jesus Christ in Hebrew, and that each interpreted them
as he could. This Hebrew was the Syro-Chaldaic dialect, then in use at
Jerusalem: Origen, Irenaeus, Eusebius, Jerome, Epiphanius, confirm this
statement. Jesus Christ preached himself in Syro-Chaldaic, as is proved by many
words which he used, and which the Evangelists have taken the pains to
translate. St. Paul, addressing the Jews, used the same language: Acts xxi. 40,
xxii. 2, xxvi. 14. The opinions of some critics prove nothing against such
undeniable testimonies. Moreover, their principal objection is, that St. Matthew
quotes the Old Testament according to the Greek version of the LXX., which is
inaccurate; for of ten quotations, found in his Gospel, seven are evidently
taken from the Hebrew text; the three others offer little that differ: moreover,
the latter are not literal quotations. St. Jerome says positively, that,
according to a copy which he had seen in the library of Caesarea, the quotations
were made in Hebrew (in Catal.) More modern critics, among others Michaelis, do
not entertain a doubt on the subject. The Greek version appears to have been
made in the time of the apostles, as St. Jerome and St. Augustus affirm, perhaps
by one of them. - G.

Among modern critics, Dr. Hug has asserted the Greek
original of St. Matthew, but the general opinion of the most learned biblical
writer, supports the view of M. Guizot. - M.

[1645]
Under the reigns of Nero and Domitian, and in the cities of Alexandria, Antioch,
Rome, and Ephesus. See Mill. Prolegomena ad Nov. Testament, and Dr. Lardner's
fair and extensive collection, vol. xv. Note: This question has, it is well
known, been most elaborately discussed since the time of Gibbon. The Preface to
the Translation of Schleiermacher's Version of St. Luke contains a very able
summary of the various theories. - M.

[1646]
The Alogians (Epiphanius de Haeres. 51) disputed the genuineness of the
Apocalypse, because the church of Thyatira was not yet founded. Epiphanius, who
allows the fact, extricates himself from the difficulty by ingeniously supposing
that St. John wrote in the spirit of prophecy. See Abauzit, Discours sur
l'Apocalypse.

[1647]
The epistles of Ignatius and Dionysius (ap. Euseb. iv. 23) point out many
churches in Asia and Greece. That of Athens seems to have been one of the least
flourishing.

[1648]
Lucian in Alexandro, c. 25. Christianity however, must have been very unequally
diffused over Pontus; since, in the middle of the third century, there was no
more than seventeen believers in the extensive diocese of Neo-Caesarea. See M.
de Tillemont, Memoires Ecclesiast. tom. iv. p. 675, from Basil and Gregory of
Nyssa, who were themselves natives of Cappadocia. Note: Gibbon forgot the
conclusion of this story, that Gregory left only seventeen heathens in his
diocese. The antithesis is suspicious, and both numbers may have been chosen to
magnify the spiritual fame of the wonder-worker. - M.

[1649]
According to the ancients, Jesus Christ suffered under the consulship of the two
Gemini, in the year 29 of our present aera. Pliny was sent into Bithynia
(according to Pagi) in the year 110.

[1650]
Plin. Epist. x. 97.

[1651]
Chrysostom. Opera, tom. vii. p. 658, 810, [edit. Savil. ii. 422, 329.]

[1652]
John Malala, tom. ii. p. 144. He draws the same conclusion with regard to the
populousness of Antioch.

[1653]
Chrysostom. tom. i. p. 592. I am indebted for these passages, though not for my
inference, to the learned Dr. Lardner. Credibility of the Gospel of History,
vol. xii. p. 370.

Note: The statements of Chrysostom with regard to the
population of Antioch, whatever may be their accuracy, are perfectly consistent.
In one passage he reckons the population at 200,000. In a second the Christians
at 100,000. In a third he states that the Christians formed more than half the
population. Gibbon has neglected to notice the first passage, and has drawn by
estimate of the population of Antioch from other sources. The 8000 maintained by
alms were widows and virgins alone - M.

[1654]
Basnage, Histoire des Juifs, l. 2, c. 20, 21, 22, 23, has examined with the most
critical accuracy the curious treatise of Philo, which describes the
Therapeutae. By proving that it was composed as early as the time of Augustus,
Basnage has demonstrated, in spite of Eusebius (l. ii. c. 17) and a crowd of
modern Catholics, that the Therapeutae were neither Christians nor monks. It
still remains probable that they changed their name, preserved their manners,
adopted some new articles of faith, and gradually became the fathers of the
Egyptian Ascetics.

[1655]
See a letter of Hadrian in the Augustan History, p. 245.

[1656]
For the succession of Alexandrian bishops, consult Renaudot's History, p. 24,
&c. This curious fact is preserved by the patriarch Eutychius, Annal. tom.
i. p. 334, Vers. Pocock,) and its internal evidence would alone be a sufficient
answer to all the objections which Bishop Pearson has urged in the Vindiciae
Ignatianae.

[1657]
Ammian. Marcellin. xxii. 16.

[1658]
Origen contra Celsum, l. i. p. 40.

[1659]
Ingens multitudo is the expression of Tacitus, xv. 44.

[1660]
T. Liv. xxxix. 13, 15, 16, 17. Nothing could exceed the horror and consternation
of the senate on the discovery of the Bacchanalians, whose depravity is
described, and perhaps exaggerated, by Livy.

[1661]
Eusebius, l. vi. c. 43. The Latin translator (M. de Valois) has thought proper
to reduce the number of presbyters to forty-four.

[1662]
This proportion of the presbyters and of the poor, to the rest of the people,
was originally fixed by Burnet, (Travels into Italy, p. 168,) and is approved by
Moyle, (vol. ii. p. 151.) They were both unacquainted with the passage of
Chrysostom, which converts their conjecture almost into a fact.

[1663]
Serius trans Alpes, religione Dei suscepta. Sulpicius Severus, l. ii. With
regard to Africa, see Tertullian ad Scapulam, c. 3. It is imagined that the
Scyllitan martyrs were the first, (Acta Sincera Rumart. p. 34.) One of the
adversaries of Apuleius seems to have been a Christian. Apolog. p. 496, 497,
edit. Delphin.

[1664]
Tum primum intra Gallias martyria visa. Sulp. Severus, l. ii. These were the
celebrated martyrs of Lyons. See Eusebius, v. i. Tillemont, Mem. Ecclesiast.
tom. ii. p. 316. According to the Donatists, whose assertion is confirmed by the
tacit acknowledgment of Augustin, Africa was the last of the provinces which
received the gospel. Tillemont, Mem. Ecclesiast. tom. i. p. 754.

[1665]
Rarae in aliquibus civitatibus ecclesiae, paucorum Christianorum devotione,
resurgerent. Acta Sincera, p. 130. Gregory of Tours, l i. c. 28. Mosheim, p.
207, 449. There is some reason to believe that in the beginning of the fourth
century, the extensive dioceses of Liege, of Treves, and of Cologne, composed a
single bishopric, which had been very recently founded. See Memoires de
Tillemont, tom vi. part i. p. 43, 411.

[1666]
The date of Tertullian's Apology is fixed, in a dissertation of Mosheim, to the
year 198.

[1667]
In the fifteenth century, there were few who had either inclination or courage
to question, whether Joseph of Arimathea founded the monastery of Glastonbury,
and whether Dionysius the Areopagite preferred the residence of Paris to that of
Athens.

[1668]
The stupendous metamorphosis was performed in the ninth century. See Mariana,
(Hist. Hispan. l. vii. c. 13, tom. i. p. 285, edit. Hag. Com. 1733,) who, in
every sense, imitates Livy, and the honest detection of the legend of St. James
by Dr. Geddes, Miscellanies, vol. ii. p. 221.

[1669]
Justin Martyr, Dialog. cum Tryphon. p. 341. Irenaeus adv. Haeres. l. i. c. 10.
Tertullian adv. Jud. c. 7. See Mosheim, p. 203.

[1670]
See the fourth century of Mosheim's History of the Church. Many, though very
confused circumstances, that relate to the conversion of Iberia and Armenia, may
be found in Moses of Chorene, l. ii. c. 78 - 89. Note: Mons. St. Martin has
shown that Armenia was the first nation that embraced Christianity. Memoires sur
l'Armenie, vol. i. p. 306, and notes to Le Beae. Gibbon, indeed had expressed
his intention of withdrawing the words "of Armenia" from the text of future
editions. (Vindication, Works, iv. 577.) He was bitterly taunted by Person for
neglecting or declining to fulfil his promise. Preface to Letters to Travis. -
M.

[1671]
According to Tertullian, the Christian faith had penetrated into parts of
Britain inaccessible to the Roman arms. About a century afterwards, Ossian, the
son of Fingal, is said to have disputed, in his extreme old age, with one of the
foreign missionaries, and the dispute is still extant, in verse, and in the Erse
language. See Mr. Macpherson's Dissertation on the Antiquity of Ossian's Poems,
p. 10.

[1672]
The Goths, who ravaged Asia in the reign of Gallienus, carried away great
numbers of captives; some of whom were Christians, and became missionaries. See
Tillemont, Memoires Ecclesiast. tom. iv. p. 44.

[1673]
The legends of Abgarus, fabulous as it is, affords a decisive proof, that many
years before Eusebius wrote his history, the greatest part of the inhabitants of
Edessa had embraced Christianity. Their rivals, the citizens of Carrhae,
adhered, on the contrary, to the cause of Paganism, as late as the sixth
century.

[1674]
According to Bardesanes (ap. Euseb. Praepar. Evangel.) there were some
Christians in Persia before the end of the second century. In the time of
Constantine (see his epistle to Sapor, Vit. l. iv. c. 13) they composed a
flourishing church. Consult Beausobre, Hist. Cristique du Manicheisme, tom. i.
p. 180, and the Bibliotheca Orietalis of Assemani.

[1675]
Origen contra Celsum, l. viii. p. 424.

[1676]
Minucius Felix, c. 8, with Wowerus's notes. Celsus ap. Origen, l. iii. p. 138,
142. Julian ap. Cyril. l. vi. p. 206, edit. Spanheim.

[1677]
Euseb. Hist. Eccles. iv. 3. Hieronym. Epist. 83.

[1678]
The story is prettily told in Justin's Dialogues. Tillemont, (Mem Ecclesiast.
tom. ii. p. 384,) who relates it after him is sure that the old man was a
disguised angel.

[1679]
Eusebius, v. 28. It may be hoped, that none, except the heretics, gave occasion
to the complaint of Celsus, (ap. Origen, l. ii. p. 77,) that the Christians were
perpetually correcting and altering their Gospels.

Note: Origen states in reply, that he knows of none who
had altered the Gospels except the Marcionites, the Valentinians, and perhaps
some followers of Lucanus. - M.

[1680]
Plin. Epist. x. 97. Fuerunt alii similis amentiae, cives Romani - - Multi enim
omnis aetatis, omnis ordinis, utriusque sexus, etiam vocuntur in periculum et
vocabuntur.

[1681]
Tertullian ad Scapulum. Yet even his rhetoric rises no higher than to claim a
tenth part of Carthage.

[1682]
Cyprian. Epist. 70.

[1683]
This incomplete enumeration ought to be increased by the names of several Pagans
converted at the dawn of Christianity, and whose conversion weakens the reproach
which the historian appears to support. Such are, the Proconsul Sergius Paulus,
converted at Paphos, (Acts xiii. 7 - 12.) Dionysius, member of the Areopagus,
converted with several others, al Athens, (Acts xvii. 34;) several persons at
the court of Nero, (Philip. iv 22;) Erastus, receiver at Corinth, (Rom. xvi.23;)
some Asiarchs, (Acts xix. 31) As to the philosophers, we may add Tatian,
Athenagoras, Theophilus of Antioch, Hegesippus, Melito, Miltiades, Pantaenus,
Ammenius, all distinguished for their genius and learning. - G.

[1684]
Dr. Lardner, in his first and second volumes of Jewish and Christian
testimonies, collects and illustrates those of Pliny the younger, of Tacitus, of
Galen, of Marcus Antoninus, and perhaps of Epictetus, (for it is doubtful
whether that philosopher means to speak of the Christians.) The new sect is
totally unnoticed by Seneca, the elder Pliny, and Plutarch.

[1685]
The emperors Hadrian, Antoninus &c., read with astonishment the apologies of
Justin Martyr, of Aristides, of Melito, &c. (See St. Hieron. ad mag. orat.
Orosius, lviii. c. 13.) Eusebius says expressly, that the cause of Christianity
was defended before the senate, in a very elegant discourse, by Apollonius the
Martyr. - G.

Gibbon, in his severer spirit of criticism, may have
questioned the authority of Jerome and Eusebius. There are some difficulties
about Apollonius, which Heinichen (note in loc. Eusebii) would solve, by suppose
lag him to have been, as Jerome states, a senator. - M.

[1686]
If the famous prophecy of the Seventy Weeks had been alleged to a Roman
philosopher, would he not have replied in the words of Cicero, "Quae tandem ista
auguratio est, annorum potius quam aut raensium aut dierum?" De Divinatione, ii.
30. Observe with what irreverence Lucian, (in Alexandro, c. 13.) and his friend
Celsus ap. Origen, (l. vii. p. 327,) express themselves concerning the Hebrew
prophets.

[1687]
The philosophers who derided the more ancient predictions of the Sibyls, would
easily have detected the Jewish and Christian forgeries, which have been so
triumphantly quoted by the fathers, from Justin Martyr to Lactantius. When the
Sibylline verses had performed their appointed task, they, like the system of
the millennium, were quietly laid aside. The Christian Sybil had unluckily fixed
the ruin of Rome for the year 195, A. U. C. 948.

[1688]
The fathers, as they are drawn out in battle array by Dom Calmet, (Dissertations
sur la Bible, tom. iii. p. 295 - 308,) seem to cover the whole earth with
darkness, in which they are followed by most of the moderns.

[1689]
Origen ad Matth. c. 27, and a few modern critics, Beza, Le Clerc, Lardner,
&c., are desirous of confining it to the land of Judea.

[1690]
The celebrated passage of Phlegon is now wisely abandoned. When Tertullian
assures the Pagans that the mention of the prodigy is found in Arcanis (not
Archivis) vestris, (see his Apology, c. 21,) he probably appeals to the
Sibylline verses, which relate it exactly in the words of the Gospel.

Note: According to some learned theologians a
misunderstanding of the text in the Gospel has given rise to this mistake, which
has employed and wearied so many laborious commentators, though Origen had
already taken the pains to preinform them. The expression does not mean, they
assert, an eclipse, but any kind of obscurity occasioned in the atmosphere,
whether by clouds or any other cause. As this obscuration of the sun rarely took
place in Palestine, where in the middle of April the sky was usually clear, it
assumed, in the eyes of the Jews and Christians, an importance conformable to
the received notion, that the sun concealed at midday was a sinister presage.
See Amos viii. 9, 10. The word is often taken in this sense by contemporary
writers; the Apocalypse says the sun was concealed, when speaking of an
obscuration caused by smoke and dust. (Revel. ix. 2.) Moreover, the Hebrew word
ophal, which in the LXX. answers to the Greek, signifies any darkness; and the
Evangelists, who have modelled the sense of their expressions by those of the
LXX., must have taken it in the same latitude. This darkening of the sky usually
precedes earthquakes. (Matt. xxvii. 51.) The Heathen authors furnish us a number
of examples, of which a miraculous explanation was given at the time. See Ovid.
ii. v. 33, l. xv. v. 785. Pliny, Hist. Nat. l. ii. c 30. Wetstein has collected
all these examples in his edition of the New Testament.

We need not, then, be astonished at the silence of the
Pagan authors concerning a phenomenon which did not extend beyond Jerusalem, and
which might have nothing contrary to the laws of nature; although the Christians
and the Jews may have regarded it as a sinister presage. See Michaelia Notes on
New Testament, v. i. p. 290. Paulus, Commentary on New Testament, iii. p. 760. -
G.

[1691]
Seneca, Quaest. Natur. l. i. 15, vi. l. vii. 17. Plin. Hist. Natur. l.
ii.

[1692]
Plin. Hist. Natur. ii. 30.

[1693]
Virgil. Georgic. i. 466. Tibullus, l. i. Eleg. v. ver. 75. Ovid Metamorph. xv.
782. Lucan. Pharsal. i. 540. The last of these poets places this prodigy before
the civil war.

[1694]
See a public epistle of M. Antony in Joseph. Antiquit. xiv. 12. Plutarch in
Caesar. p. 471. Appian. Bell. Civil. l. iv. Dion Cassius, l. xlv. p. 431. Julius
Obsequens, c. 128. His little treatise is an abstract of Livy's
prodigies.