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<p>The Project Gutenberg Etext of History Of The Decline And Fall
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<p>History Of The Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire Volume
2<br>
<br>
</p>

<p>by Edward Gibbon, Esq. With notes by the Rev. H. H. Milman<br>
</p>

<p>April, 1997 [Etext # 891]<br>
<br>
</p>

<p>The Project Gutenberg Etext of History Of The Decline And Fall
Of The Roman Empire Volume 2<br>
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<p>This is volume two of the six volumes of Edward Gibbon's
History Of The Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire. If you find
any errors please feel free to notify me of them. I want to make
this the best etext edition possible for both scholars and the
general public. I would like to thank those who have helped in
making this text better. Especially Dale R. Fredrickson who has
hand entered the Greek characters in the footnotes and who has
suggested retaining the conjoined ae character in the text.
Haradda@aol.com and davidr@inconnect.com are my email addresses
for now. Please feel free to send me your comments and I hope you
enjoy this.<br>
</p>

<p>David Reed<br>
</p>

<p align="center"><strong>History Of The Decline And Fall Of The
Roman Empire</strong><br>
</p>

<p>Edward Gibbon, Esq.</p>

<p>With notes by the Rev. H. H. Milman</p>

<p>Vol. 2</p>

<p>1782 (Written), 1845 (Revised)<br>
</p>

<p><strong>Chapter XVI * Conduct Towards The Christians, From
Nero To Constantine.</strong></p>

<p><strong><em>Part I.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>The Conduct Of The Roman Government Towards The Christians,
From The Reign Of Nero To That Of Constantine.<br>
</p>

<p>If we seriously consider the purity of the Christian religion,
the sanctity of its moral precepts, and the innocent as well as
austere lives of the greater number of those who during the first
ages embraced the faith of the gospel, we should naturally
suppose, that so benevolent a doctrine would have been received
with due reverence, even by the unbelieving world; that the
learned and the polite, however they may deride the miracles,
would have esteemed the virtues, of the new sect; and that the
magistrates, instead of persecuting, would have protected an
order of men who yielded the most passive obedience to the laws,
though they declined the active cares of war and government. If,
on the other hand, we recollect the universal toleration of
Polytheism, as it was invariably maintained by the faith of the
people, the incredulity of philosophers, and the policy of the
Roman senate and emperors, we are at a loss to discover what new
offence the Christians had committed, what new provocation could
exasperate the mild indifference of antiquity, and what new
motives could urge the Roman princes, who beheld without concern
a thousand forms of religion subsisting in peace under their
gentle sway, to inflict a severe punishment on any part of their
subjects, who had chosen for themselves a singular but an
inoffensive mode of faith and worship.<br>
</p>

<p>The religious policy of the ancient world seems to have
assumed a more stern and intolerant character, to oppose the
progress of Christianity. About fourscore years after the death
of Christ, his innocent disciples were punished with death by the
sentence of a proconsul of the most amiable and philosophic
character, and according to the laws of an emperor distinguished
by the wisdom and justice of his general administration. The
apologies which were repeatedly addressed to the successors of
Trajan are filled with the most pathetic complaints, that the
Christians, who obeyed the dictates, and solicited the liberty,
of conscience, were alone, among all the subjects of the Roman
empire, excluded from the common benefits of their auspicious
government. The deaths of a few eminent martyrs have been
recorded with care; and from the time that Christianity was
invested with the supreme power, the governors of the church have
been no less diligently employed in displaying the cruelty, than
in imitating the conduct, of their Pagan adversaries. To separate
(if it be possible) a few authentic as well as interesting facts
from an undigested mass of fiction and error, and to relate, in a
clear and rational manner, the causes, the extent, the duration,
and the most important circumstances of the persecutions to which
the first Christians were exposed, is the design of the present
chapter. *<br>
</p>

<p>The sectaries of a persecuted religion, depressed by fear
animated with resentment, and perhaps heated by enthusiasm, are
seldom in a proper temper of mind calmly to investigate, or
candidly to appreciate, the motives of their enemies, which often
escape the impartial and discerning view even of those who are
placed at a secure distance from the flames of persecution. A
reason has been assigned for the conduct of the emperors towards
the primitive Christians, which may appear the more specious and
probable as it is drawn from the acknowledged genius of
Polytheism. It has already been observed, that the religious
concord of the world was principally supported by the implicit
assent and reverence which the nations of antiquity expressed for
their respective traditions and ceremonies. It might therefore be
expected, that they would unite with indignation against any sect
or people which should separate itself from the communion of
mankind, and claiming the exclusive possession of divine
knowledge, should disdain every form of worship, except its own,
as impious and idolatrous. The rights of toleration were held by
mutual indulgence: they were justly forfeited by a refusal of the
accustomed tribute. As the payment of this tribute was inflexibly
refused by the Jews, and by them alone, the consideration of the
treatment which they experienced from the Roman magistrates, will
serve to explain how far these speculations are justified by
facts, and will lead us to discover the true causes of the
persecution of Christianity.<br>
</p>

<p>Without repeating what has already been mentioned of the
reverence of the Roman princes and governors for the temple of
Jerusalem, we shall only observe, that the destruction of the
temple and city was accompanied and followed by every
circumstance that could exasperate the minds of the conquerors,
and authorize religious persecution by the most specious
arguments of political justice and the public safety. From the
reign of Nero to that of Antoninus Pius, the Jews discovered a
fierce impatience of the dominion of Rome, which repeatedly broke
out in the most furious massacres and insurrections. Humanity is
shocked at the recital of the horrid cruelties which they
committed in the cities of Egypt, of Cyprus, and of Cyrene, where
they dwelt in treacherous friendship with the unsuspecting
natives; and we are tempted to applaud the severe retaliation
which was exercised by the arms of the legions against a race of
fanatics, whose dire and credulous superstition seemed to render
them the implacable enemies not only of the Roman government, but
of human kind. The enthusiasm of the Jews was supported by the
opinion, that it was unlawful for them to pay taxes to an
idolatrous master; and by the flattering promise which they
derived from their ancient oracles, that a conquering Messiah
would soon arise, destined to break their fetters, and to invest
the favorites of heaven with the empire of the earth. It was by
announcing himself as their long-expected deliverer, and by
calling on all the descendants of Abraham to assert the hope of
Isr&aelig;l, that the famous Barchochebas collected a formidable
army, with which he resisted during two years the power of the
emperor Hadrian.<br>
</p>

<p>Notwithstanding these repeated provocations, the resentment of
the Roman princes expired after the victory; nor were their
apprehensions continued beyond the period of war and danger. By
the general indulgence of polytheism, and by the mild temper of
Antoninus Pius, the Jews were restored to their ancient
privileges, and once more obtained the permission of circumcising
their children, with the easy restraint, that they should never
confer on any foreign proselyte that distinguishing mark of the
Hebrew race. The numerous remains of that people, though they
were still excluded from the precincts of Jerusalem, were
permitted to form and to maintain considerable establishments
both in Italy and in the provinces, to acquire the freedom of
Rome, to enjoy municipal honors, and to obtain at the same time
an exemption from the burdensome and expensive offices of
society. The moderation or the contempt of the Romans gave a
legal sanction to the form of ecclesiastical police which was
instituted by the vanquished sect. The patriarch, who had fixed
his residence at Tiberias, was empowered to appoint his
subordinate ministers and apostles, to exercise a domestic
jurisdiction, and to receive from his dispersed brethren an
annual contribution. New synagogues were frequently erected in
the principal cities of the empire; and the sabbaths, the fasts,
and the festivals, which were either commanded by the Mosaic law,
or enjoined by the traditions of the Rabbis, were celebrated in
the most solemn and public manner. Such gentle treatment
insensibly assuaged the stern temper of the Jews. Awakened from
their dream of prophecy and conquest, they assumed the behavior
of peaceable and industrious subjects. Their irreconcilable
hatred of mankind, instead of flaming out in acts of blood and
violence, evaporated in less dangerous gratifications. They
embraced every opportunity of overreaching the idolaters in
trade; and they pronounced secret and ambiguous imprecations
against the haughty kingdom of Edom.<br>
</p>

<p>Since the Jews, who rejected with abhorrence the deities
adored by their sovereign and by their fellow-subjects, enjoyed,
however, the free exercise of their unsocial religion, there must
have existed some other cause, which exposed the disciples of
Christ to those severities from which the posterity of Abraham
was exempt. The difference between them is simple and obvious;
but, according to the sentiments of antiquity, it was of the
highest importance. The Jews were a
<strong><em>nation</em></strong>; the Christians were a
<strong><em>sect</em></strong>: and if it was natural for every
community to respect the sacred institutions of their neighbors,
it was incumbent on them to persevere in those of their
ancestors. The voice of oracles, the precepts of philosophers,
and the authority of the laws, unanimously enforced this national
obligation. By their lofty claim of superior sanctity the Jews
might provoke the Polytheists to consider them as an odious and
impure race. By disdaining the intercourse of other nations, they
might deserve their contempt. The laws of Moses might be for the
most part frivolous or absurd; yet, since they had been received
during many ages by a large society, his followers were justified
by the example of mankind; and it was universally acknowledged,
that they had a right to practise what it would have been
criminal in them to neglect. But this principle, which protected
the Jewish synagogue, afforded not any favor or security to the
primitive church. By embracing the faith of the gospel, the
Christians incurred the supposed guilt of an unnatural and
unpardonable offence. They dissolved the sacred ties of custom
and education, violated the religious institutions of their
country, and presumptuously despised whatever their fathers had
believed as true, or had reverenced as sacred. Nor was this
apostasy (if we may use the expression) merely of a partial or
local kind; since the pious deserter who withdrew himself from
the temples of Egypt or Syria, would equally disdain to seek an
asylum in those of Athens or Carthage. Every Christian rejected
with contempt the superstitions of his family, his city, and his
province. The whole body of Christians unanimously refused to
hold any communion with the gods of Rome, of the empire, and of
mankind. It was in vain that the oppressed believer asserted the
inalienable rights of conscience and private judgment. Though his
situation might excite the pity, his arguments could never reach
the understanding, either of the philosophic or of the believing
part of the Pagan world. To their apprehensions, it was no less a
matter of surprise, that any individuals should entertain
scruples against complying with the established mode of worship,
than if they had conceived a sudden abhorrence to the manners,
the dress, or the language of their native country. *<br>
</p>

<p>The surprise of the Pagans was soon succeeded by resentment;
and the most pious of men were exposed to the unjust but
dangerous imputation of impiety. Malice and prejudice concurred
in representing the Christians as a society of atheists, who, by
the most daring attack on the religious constitution of the
empire, had merited the severest animadversion of the civil
magistrate. They had separated themselves (they gloried in the
confession) from every mode of superstition which was received in
any part of the globe by the various temper of polytheism: but it
was not altogether so evident what deity, or what form of
worship, they had substituted to the gods and temples of
antiquity. The pure and sublime idea which they entertained of
the Supreme Being escaped the gross conception of the Pagan
multitude, who were at a loss to discover a spiritual and
solitary God, that was neither represented under any corporeal
figure or visible symbol, nor was adored with the accustomed pomp
of libations and festivals, of altars and sacrifices. The sages
of Greece and Rome, who had elevated their minds to the
contemplation of the existence and attributes of the First Cause,
were induced by reason or by vanity to reserve for themselves and
their chosen disciples the privilege of this philosophical
devotion. They were far from admitting the prejudices of mankind
as the standard of truth, but they considered them as flowing
from the original disposition of human nature; and they supposed
that any popular mode of faith and worship which presumed to
disclaim the assistance of the senses, would, in proportion as it
receded from superstition, find itself incapable of restraining
the wanderings of the fancy, and the visions of fanaticism. The
careless glance which men of wit and learning condescended to
cast on the Christian revelation, served only to confirm their
hasty opinion, and to persuade them that the principle, which
they might have revered, of the Divine Unity, was defaced by the
wild enthusiasm, and annihilated by the airy speculations, of the
new sectaries. The author of a celebrated dialogue, which has
been attributed to Lucian, whilst he affects to treat the
mysterious subject of the Trinity in a style of ridicule and
contempt, betrays his own ignorance of the weakness of human
reason, and of the inscrutable nature of the divine
perfections.<br>
</p>

<p>It might appear less surprising, that the founder of
Christianity should not only be revered by his disciples as a
sage and a prophet, but that he should be adored as a God. The
Polytheists were disposed to adopt every article of faith, which
seemed to offer any resemblance, however distant or imperfect,
with the popular mythology; and the legends of Bacchus, of
Hercules, and of &AElig;sculapius, had, in some measure, prepared
their imagination for the appearance of the Son of God under a
human form. But they were astonished that the Christians should
abandon the temples of those ancient heroes, who, in the infancy
of the world, had invented arts, instituted laws, and vanquished
the tyrants or monsters who infested the earth, in order to
choose for the exclusive object of their religious worship an
obscure teacher, who, in a recent age, and among a barbarous
people, had fallen a sacrifice either to the malice of his own
countrymen, or to the jealousy of the Roman government. The Pagan
multitude, reserving their gratitude for temporal benefits alone,
rejected the inestimable present of life and immortality, which
was offered to mankind by Jesus of Nazareth. His mild constancy
in the midst of cruel and voluntary sufferings, his universal
benevolence, and the sublime simplicity of his actions and
character, were insufficient, in the opinion of those carnal men,
to compensate for the want of fame, of empire, and of success;
and whilst they refused to acknowledge his stupendous triumph
over the powers of darkness and of the grave, they
misrepresented, or they insulted, the equivocal birth, wandering
life, and ignominious death, of the divine Author of
Christianity.<br>
</p>

<p>The personal guilt which every Christian had contracted, in
thus preferring his private sentiment to the national religion,
was aggravated in a very high degree by the number and union of
the criminals. It is well known, and has been already observed,
that Roman policy viewed with the utmost jealousy and distrust
any association among its subjects; and that the privileges of
private corporations, though formed for the most harmless or
beneficial purposes, were bestowed with a very sparing hand. The
religious assemblies of the Christians who had separated
themselves from the public worship, appeared of a much less
innocent nature; they were illegal in their principle, and in
their consequences might become dangerous; nor were the emperors
conscious that they violated the laws of justice, when, for the
peace of society, they prohibited those secret and sometimes
nocturnal meetings. The pious disobedience of the Christians made
their conduct, or perhaps their designs, appear in a much more
serious and criminal light; and the Roman princes, who might
perhaps have suffered themselves to be disarmed by a ready
submission, deeming their honor concerned in the execution of
their commands, sometimes attempted, by rigorous punishments, to
subdue this independent spirit, which boldly acknowledged an
authority superior to that of the magistrate. The extent and
duration of this spiritual conspiracy seemed to render it
everyday more deserving of his animadversion. We have already
seen that the active and successful zeal of the Christians had
insensibly diffused them through every province and almost every
city of the empire. The new converts seemed to renounce their
family and country, that they might connect themselves in an
indissoluble band of union with a peculiar society, which every
where assumed a different character from the rest of mankind.
Their gloomy and austere aspect, their abhorrence of the common
business and pleasures of life, and their frequent predictions of
impending calamities, inspired the Pagans with the apprehension
of some danger, which would arise from the new sect, the more
alarming as it was the more obscure. "Whatever," says Pliny, "may
be the principle of their conduct, their inflexible obstinacy
appeared deserving of punishment."<br>
</p>

<p>The precautions with which the disciples of Christ performed
the offices of religion were at first dictated by fear and
necessity; but they were continued from choice. By imitating the
awful secrecy which reigned in the Eleusinian mysteries, the
Christians had flattered themselves that they should render their
sacred institutions more respectable in the eyes of the Pagan
world. But the event, as it often happens to the operations of
subtile policy, deceived their wishes and their expectations. It
was concluded, that they only concealed what they would have
blushed to disclose. Their mistaken prudence afforded an
opportunity for malice to invent, and for suspicious credulity to
believe, the horrid tales which described the Christians as the
most wicked of human kind, who practised in their dark recesses
every abomination that a depraved fancy could suggest, and who
solicited the favor of their unknown God by the sacrifice of
every moral virtue. There were many who pretended to confess or
to relate the ceremonies of this abhorred society. It was
asserted, "that a new-born infant, entirely covered over with
flour, was presented, like some mystic symbol of initiation, to
the knife of the proselyte, who unknowingly inflicted many a
secret and mortal wound on the innocent victim of his error; that
as soon as the cruel deed was perpetrated, the sectaries drank up
the blood, greedily tore asunder the quivering members, and
pledged themselves to eternal secrecy, by a mutual consciousness
of guilt. It was as confidently affirmed, that this inhuman
sacrifice was succeeded by a suitable entertainment, in which
intemperance served as a provocative to brutal lust; till, at the
appointed moment, the lights were suddenly extinguished, shame
was banished, nature was forgotten; and, as accident might
direct, the darkness of the night was polluted by the incestuous
commerce of sisters and brothers, of sons and of mothers."<br>
</p>

<p>But the perusal of the ancient apologies was sufficient to
remove even the slightest suspicion from the mind of a candid
adversary. The Christians, with the intrepid security of
innocence, appeal from the voice of rumor to the equity of the
magistrates. They acknowledge, that if any proof can be produced
of the crimes which calumny has imputed to them, they are worthy
of the most severe punishment. They provoke the punishment, and
they challenge the proof. At the same time they urge, with equal
truth and propriety, that the charge is not less devoid of
probability, than it is destitute of evidence; they ask, whether
any one can seriously believe that the pure and holy precepts of
the gospel, which so frequently restrain the use of the most
lawful enjoyments, should inculcate the practice of the most
abominable crimes; that a large society should resolve to
dishonor itself in the eyes of its own members; and that a great
number of persons of either sex, and every age and character,
insensible to the fear of death or infamy, should consent to
violate those principles which nature and education had imprinted
most deeply in their minds. Nothing, it should seem, could weaken
the force or destroy the effect of so unanswerable a
justification, unless it were the injudicious conduct of the
apologists themselves, who betrayed the common cause of religion,
to gratify their devout hatred to the domestic enemies of the
church. It was sometimes faintly insinuated, and sometimes boldly
asserted, that the same bloody sacrifices, and the same
incestuous festivals, which were so falsely ascribed to the
orthodox believers, were in reality celebrated by the
Marcionites, by the Carpocratians, and by several other sects of
the Gnostics, who, notwithstanding they might deviate into the
paths of heresy, were still actuated by the sentiments of men,
and still governed by the precepts of Christianity. Accusations
of a similar kind were retorted upon the church by the
schismatics who had departed from its communion, and it was
confessed on all sides, that the most scandalous licentiousness
of manners prevailed among great numbers of those who affected
the name of Christians. A Pagan magistrate, who possessed neither
leisure nor abilities to discern the almost imperceptible line
which divides the orthodox faith from heretical pravity, might
easily have imagined that their mutual animosity had extorted the
discovery of their common guilt. It was fortunate for the repose,
or at least for the reputation, of the first Christians, that the
magistrates sometimes proceeded with more temper and moderation
than is usually consistent with religious zeal, and that they
reported, as the impartial result of their judicial inquiry, that
the sectaries, who had deserted the established worship, appeared
to them sincere in their professions, and blameless in their
manners; however they might incur, by their absurd and excessive
superstition, the censure of the laws.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XVI: Conduct Towards The Christians, From
Nero To Constantine. -- Part II.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>History, which undertakes to record the transactions of the
past, for the instruction of future ages, would ill deserve that
honorable office, if she condescended to plead the cause of
tyrants, or to justify the maxims of persecution. It must,
however, be acknowledged, that the conduct of the emperors who
appeared the least favorable to the primitive church, is by no
means so criminal as that of modern sovereigns, who have employed
the arm of violence and terror against the religious opinions of
any part of their subjects. From their reflections, or even from
their own feelings, a Charles V. or a Lewis XIV. might have
acquired a just knowledge of the rights of conscience, of the
obligation of faith, and of the innocence of error. But the
princes and magistrates of ancient Rome were strangers to those
principles which inspired and authorized the inflexible obstinacy
of the Christians in the cause of truth, nor could they
themselves discover in their own breasts any motive which would
have prompted them to refuse a legal, and as it were a natural,
submission to the sacred institutions of their country. The same
reason which contributes to alleviate the guilt, must have tended
to abate the vigor, of their persecutions. As they were actuated,
not by the furious zeal of bigots, but by the temperate policy of
legislators, contempt must often have relaxed, and humanity must
frequently have suspended, the execution of those laws which they
enacted against the humble and obscure followers of Christ. From
the general view of their character and motives we might
naturally conclude: I. That a considerable time elapsed before
they considered the new sectaries as an object deserving of the
attention of government. II. That in the conviction of any of
their subjects who were accused of so very singular a crime, they
proceeded with caution and reluctance. III. That they were
moderate in the use of punishments; and, IV. That the afflicted
church enjoyed many intervals of peace and tranquility.
Notwithstanding the careless indifference which the most copious
and the most minute of the Pagan writers have shown to the
affairs of the Christians, it may still be in our power to
confirm each of these probable suppositions, by the evidence of
authentic facts.<br>
</p>

<p>1. By the wise dispensation of Providence, a mysterious veil
was cast over the infancy of the church, which, till the faith of
the Christians was matured, and their numbers were multiplied,
served to protect them not only from the malice but even from the
knowledge of the Pagan world. The slow and gradual abolition of
the Mosaic ceremonies afforded a safe and innocent disguise to
the more early proselytes of the gospel. As they were, for the
greater part, of the race of Abraham, they were distinguished by
the peculiar mark of circumcision, offered up their devotions in
the Temple of Jerusalem till its final destruction, and received
both the Law and the Prophets as the genuine inspirations of the
Deity. The Gentile converts, who by a spiritual adoption had been
associated to the hope of Isr&aelig;l, were likewise confounded
under the garb and appearance of Jews, and as the Polytheists
paid less regard to articles of faith than to the external
worship, the new sect, which carefully concealed, or faintly
announced, its future greatness and ambition, was permitted to
shelter itself under the general toleration which was granted to
an ancient and celebrated people in the Roman empire. It was not
long, perhaps, before the Jews themselves, animated with a
fiercer zeal and a more jealous faith, perceived the gradual
separation of their Nazarene brethren from the doctrine of the
synagogue; and they would gladly have extinguished the dangerous
heresy in the blood of its adherents. But the decrees of Heaven
had already disarmed their malice; and though they might
sometimes exert the licentious privilege of sedition, they no
longer possessed the administration of criminal justice; nor did
they find it easy to infuse into the calm breast of a Roman
magistrate the rancor of their own zeal and prejudice. The
provincial governors declared themselves ready to listen to any
accusation that might affect the public safety; but as soon as
they were informed that it was a question not of facts but of
words, a dispute relating only to the interpretation of the
Jewish laws and prophecies, they deemed it unworthy of the
majesty of Rome seriously to discuss the obscure differences
which might arise among a barbarous and superstitious people. The
innocence of the first Christians was protected by ignorance and
contempt; and the tribunal of the Pagan magistrate often proved
their most assured refuge against the fury of the synagogue. If
indeed we were disposed to adopt the traditions of a too
credulous antiquity, we might relate the distant peregrinations,
the wonderful achievements, and the various deaths of the twelve
apostles: but a more accurate inquiry will induce us to doubt,
whether any of those persons who had been witnesses to the
miracles of Christ were permitted, beyond the limits of
Palestine, to seal with their blood the truth of their testimony.
From the ordinary term of human life, it may very naturally be
presumed that most of them were deceased before the discontent of
the Jews broke out into that furious war, which was terminated
only by the ruin of Jerusalem. During a long period, from the
death of Christ to that memorable rebellion, we cannot discover
any traces of Roman intolerance, unless they are to be found in
the sudden, the transient, but the cruel persecution, which was
exercised by Nero against the Christians of the capital,
thirty-five years after the former, and only two years before the
latter, of those great events. The character of the philosophic
historian, to whom we are principally indebted for the knowledge
of this singular transaction, would alone be sufficient to
recommend it to our most attentive consideration.<br>
</p>

<p>In the tenth year of the reign of Nero, the capital of the
empire was afflicted by a fire which raged beyond the memory or
example of former ages. The monuments of Grecian art and of Roman
virtue, the trophies of the Punic and Gallic wars, the most holy
temples, and the most splendid palaces, were involved in one
common destruction. Of the fourteen regions or quarters into
which Rome was divided, four only subsisted entire, three were
levelled with the ground, and the remaining seven, which had
experienced the fury of the flames, displayed a melancholy
prospect of ruin and desolation. The vigilance of government
appears not to have neglected any of the precautions which might
alleviate the sense of so dreadful a calamity. The Imperial
gardens were thrown open to the distressed multitude, temporary
buildings were erected for their accommodation, and a plentiful
supply of corn and provisions was distributed at a very moderate
price. The most generous policy seemed to have dictated the
edicts which regulated the disposition of the streets and the
construction of private houses; and as it usually happens, in an
age of prosperity, the conflagration of Rome, in the course of a
few years, produced a new city, more regular and more beautiful
than the former. But all the prudence and humanity affected by
Nero on this occasion were insufficient to preserve him from the
popular suspicion. Every crime might be imputed to the assassin
of his wife and mother; nor could the prince who prostituted his
person and dignity on the theatre be deemed incapable of the most
extravagant folly. The voice of rumor accused the emperor as the
incendiary of his own capital; and as the most incredible stories
are the best adapted to the genius of an enraged people, it was
gravely reported, and firmly believed, that Nero, enjoying the
calamity which he had occasioned, amused himself with singing to
his lyre the destruction of ancient Troy. To divert a suspicion,
which the power of despotism was unable to suppress, the emperor
resolved to substitute in his own place some fictitious
criminals. "With this view," continues Tacitus, "he inflicted the
most exquisite tortures on those men, who, under the vulgar
appellation of Christians, were already branded with deserved
infamy. They derived their name and origin from Christ, who in
the reign of Tiberius had suffered death by the sentence of the
procurator Pontius Pilate. For a while this dire superstition was
checked; but it again burst forth; * and not only spread itself
over Jud&aelig;a, the first seat of this mischievous sect, but
was even introduced into Rome, the common asylum which receives
and protects whatever is impure, whatever is atrocious. The
confessions of those who were seized discovered a great multitude
of their accomplices, and they were all convicted, not so much
for the crime of setting fire to the city, as for their hatred of
human kind. They died in torments, and their torments were
imbittered by insult and derision. Some were nailed on crosses;
others sewn up in the skins of wild beasts, and exposed to the
fury of dogs; others again, smeared over with combustible
materials, were used as torches to illuminate the darkness of the
night. The gardens of Nero were destined for the melancholy
spectacle, which was accompanied with a horse-race and honored
with the presence of the emperor, who mingled with the populace
in the dress and attitude of a charioteer. The guilt of the
Christians deserved indeed the most exemplary punishment, but the
public abhorrence was changed into commiseration, from the
opinion that those unhappy wretches were sacrificed, not so much
to the public welfare, as to the cruelty of a jealous tyrant."
Those who survey with a curious eye the revolutions of mankind,
may observe, that the gardens and circus of Nero on the Vatican,
which were polluted with the blood of the first Christians, have
been rendered still more famous by the triumph and by the abuse
of the persecuted religion. On the same spot, a temple, which far
surpasses the ancient glories of the Capitol, has been since
erected by the Christian Pontiffs, who, deriving their claim of
universal dominion from an humble fisherman of Galilee, have
succeeded to the throne of the C&aelig;sars, given laws to the
barbarian conquerors of Rome, and extended their spiritual
jurisdiction from the coast of the Baltic to the shores of the
Pacific Ocean.<br>
</p>

<p>But it would be improper to dismiss this account of Nero's
persecution, till we have made some observations that may serve
to remove the difficulties with which it is perplexed, and to
throw some light on the subsequent history of the church.<br>
</p>

<p><strong>1</strong>. The most sceptical criticism is obliged to
respect the truth of this extraordinary fact, and the integrity
of this celebrated passage of Tacitus. The former is confirmed by
the diligent and accurate Suetonius, who mentions the punishment
which Nero inflicted on the Christians, a sect of men who had
embraced a new and criminal superstition. The latter may be
proved by the consent of the most ancient manuscripts; by the
inimitable character of the style of Tacitus by his reputation,
which guarded his text from the interpolations of pious fraud;
and by the purport of his narration, which accused the first
Christians of the most atrocious crimes, without insinuating that
they possessed any miraculous or even magical powers above the
rest of mankind. <strong>2</strong>. Notwithstanding it is
probable that Tacitus was born some years before the fire of
Rome, he could derive only from reading and conversation the
knowledge of an event which happened during his infancy. Before
he gave himself to the public, he calmly waited till his genius
had attained its full maturity, and he was more than forty years
of age, when a grateful regard for the memory of the virtuous
Agricola extorted from him the most early of those historical
compositions which will delight and instruct the most distant
posterity. After making a trial of his strength in the life of
Agricola and the description of Germany, he conceived, and at
length executed, a more arduous work; the history of Rome, in
thirty books, from the fall of Nero to the accession of Nerva.
The administration of Nerva introduced an age of justice and
propriety, which Tacitus had destined for the occupation of his
old age; but when he took a nearer view of his subject, judging,
perhaps, that it was a more honorable or a less invidious office
to record the vices of past tyrants, than to celebrate the
virtues of a reigning monarch, he chose rather to relate, under
the form of annals, the actions of the four immediate successors
of Augustus. To collect, to dispose, and to adorn a series of
fourscore years, in an immortal work, every sentence of which is
pregnant with the deepest observations and the most lively
images, was an undertaking sufficient to exercise the genius of
Tacitus himself during the greatest part of his life. In the last
years of the reign of Trajan, whilst the victorious monarch
extended the power of Rome beyond its ancient limits, the
historian was describing, in the second and fourth books of his
annals, the tyranny of Tiberius; and the emperor Hadrian must
have succeeded to the throne, before Tacitus, in the regular
prosecution of his work, could relate the fire of the capital,
and the cruelty of Nero towards the unfortunate Christians. At
the distance of sixty years, it was the duty of the annalist to
adopt the narratives of contemporaries; but it was natural for
the philosopher to indulge himself in the description of the
origin, the progress, and the character of the new sect, not so
much according to the knowledge or prejudices of the age of Nero,
as according to those of the time of Hadrian. <strong>3</strong>
Tacitus very frequently trusts to the curiosity or reflection of
his readers to supply those intermediate circumstances and ideas,
which, in his extreme conciseness, he has thought proper to
suppress. We may therefore presume to imagine some probable cause
which could direct the cruelty of Nero against the Christians of
Rome, whose obscurity, as well as innocence, should have shielded
them from his indignation, and even from his notice. The Jews,
who were numerous in the capital, and oppressed in their own
country, were a much fitter object for the suspicions of the
emperor and of the people: nor did it seem unlikely that a
vanquished nation, who already discovered their abhorrence of the
Roman yoke, might have recourse to the most atrocious means of
gratifying their implacable revenge. But the Jews possessed very
powerful advocates in the palace, and even in the heart of the
tyrant; his wife and mistress, the beautiful Popp&aelig;a, and a
favorite player of the race of Abraham, who had already employed
their intercession in behalf of the obnoxious people. In their
room it was necessary to offer some other victims, and it might
easily be suggested that, although the genuine followers of Moses
were innocent of the fire of Rome, there had arisen among them a
new and pernicious sect of Galil&aelig;ans, which was capable of
the most horrid crimes. Under the appellation of Galil&aelig;ans,
two distinctions of men were confounded, the most opposite to
each other in their manners and principles; the disciples who had
embraced the faith of Jesus of Nazareth, and the zealots who had
followed the standard of Judas the Gaulonite. The former were the
friends, the latter were the enemies, of human kind; and the only
resemblance between them consisted in the same inflexible
constancy, which, in the defence of their cause, rendered them
insensible of death and tortures. The followers of Judas, who
impelled their countrymen into rebellion, were soon buried under
the ruins of Jerusalem; whilst those of Jesus, known by the more
celebrated name of Christians, diffused themselves over the Roman
empire. How natural was it for Tacitus, in the time of Hadrian,
to appropriate to the Christians the guilt and the sufferings, *
which he might, with far greater truth and justice, have
attributed to a sect whose odious memory was almost extinguished!
4. Whatever opinion may be entertained of this conjecture, (for
it is no more than a conjecture,) it is evident that the effect,
as well as the cause, of Nero's persecution, was confined to the
walls of Rome, that the religious tenets of the Galil&aelig;ans
or Christians, were never made a subject of punishment, or even
of inquiry; and that, as the idea of their sufferings was for a
long time connected with the idea of cruelty and injustice, the
moderation of succeeding princes inclined them to spare a sect,
oppressed by a tyrant, whose rage had been usually directed
against virtue and innocence.<br>
</p>

<p>It is somewhat remarkable that the flames of war consumed,
almost at the same time, the temple of Jerusalem and the Capitol
of Rome; and it appears no less singular, that the tribute which
devotion had destined to the former, should have been converted
by the power of an assaulting victor to restore and adorn the
splendor of the latter. The emperors levied a general capitation
tax on the Jewish people; and although the sum assessed on the
head of each individual was inconsiderable, the use for which it
was designed, and the severity with which it was exacted, were
considered as an intolerable grievance. Since the officers of the
revenue extended their unjust claim to many persons who were
strangers to the blood or religion of the Jews, it was impossible
that the Christians, who had so often sheltered themselves under
the shade of the synagogue, should now escape this rapacious
persecution. Anxious as they were to avoid the slightest
infection of idolatry, their conscience forbade them to
contribute to the honor of that d&aelig;mon who had assumed the
character of the Capitoline Jupiter. As a very numerous though
declining party among the Christians still adhered to the law of
Moses, their efforts to dissemble their Jewish origin were
detected by the decisive test of circumcision; nor were the Roman
magistrates at leisure to inquire into the difference of their
religious tenets. Among the Christians who were brought before
the tribunal of the emperor, or, as it seems more probable,
before that of the procurator of Jud&aelig;a, two persons are
said to have appeared, distinguished by their extraction, which
was more truly noble than that of the greatest monarchs. These
were the grandsons of St. Jude the apostle, who himself was the
brother of Jesus Christ. Their natural pretensions to the throne
of David might perhaps attract the respect of the people, and
excite the jealousy of the governor; but the meanness of their
garb, and the simplicity of their answers, soon convinced him
that they were neither desirous nor capable of disturbing the
peace of the Roman empire. They frankly confessed their royal
origin, and their near relation to the Messiah; but they
disclaimed any temporal views, and professed that his kingdom,
which they devoutly expected, was purely of a spiritual and
angelic nature. When they were examined concerning their fortune
and occupation, they showed their hands, hardened with daily
labor, and declared that they derived their whole subsistence
from the cultivation of a farm near the village of Cocaba, of the
extent of about twenty-four English acres, and of the value of
nine thousand drachms, or three hundred pounds sterling. The
grandsons of St. Jude were dismissed with compassion and
contempt.<br>
</p>

<p>But although the obscurity of the house of David might protect
them from the suspicions of a tyrant, the present greatness of
his own family alarmed the pusillanimous temper of Domitian,
which could only be appeased by the blood of those Romans whom he
either feared, or hated, or esteemed. Of the two sons of his
uncle Flavius Sabinus, the elder was soon convicted of
treasonable intentions, and the younger, who bore the name of
Flavius Clemens, was indebted for his safety to his want of
courage and ability. The emperor for a long time, distinguished
so harmless a kinsman by his favor and protection, bestowed on
him his own niece Domitilla, adopted the children of that
marriage to the hope of the succession, and invested their father
with the honors of the consulship.<br>
</p>

<p>But he had scarcely finished the term of his annual
magistracy, when, on a slight pretence, he was condemned and
executed; Domitilla was banished to a desolate island on the
coast of Campania; and sentences either of death or of
confiscation were pronounced against a great number of who were
involved in the same accusation. The guilt imputed to their
charge was that of <strong><em>Atheism</em></strong> and
<strong><em>Jewish manners</em></strong>; a singular association
of ideas, which cannot with any propriety be applied except to
the Christians, as they were obscurely and imperfectly viewed by
the magistrates and by the writers of that period. On the
strength of so probable an interpretation, and too eagerly
admitting the suspicions of a tyrant as an evidence of their
honorable crime, the church has placed both Clemens and Domitilla
among its first martyrs, and has branded the cruelty of Domitian
with the name of the second persecution. But this persecution (if
it deserves that epithet) was of no long duration. A few months
after the death of Clemens, and the banishment of Domitilla,
Stephen, a freedman belonging to the latter, who had enjoyed the
favor, but who had not surely embraced the faith, of his
mistress, * assassinated the emperor in his palace. The memory of
Domitian was condemned by the senate; his acts were rescinded;
his exiles recalled; and under the gentle administration of
Nerva, while the innocent were restored to their rank and
fortunes, even the most guilty either obtained pardon or escaped
punishment.<br>
</p>

<p>II. About ten years afterwards, under the reign of Trajan, the
younger Pliny was intrusted by his friend and master with the
government of Bithynia and Pontus. He soon found himself at a
loss to determine by what rule of justice or of law he should
direct his conduct in the execution of an office the most
repugnant to his humanity. Pliny had never assisted at any
judicial proceedings against the Christians, with whose lame
alone he seems to be acquainted; and he was totally uninformed
with regard to the nature of their guilt, the method of their
conviction, and the degree of their punishment. In this
perplexity he had recourse to his usual expedient, of submitting
to the wisdom of Trajan an impartial, and, in some respects, a
favorable account of the new superstition, requesting the
emperor, that he would condescend to resolve his doubts, and to
instruct his ignorance. The life of Pliny had been employed in
the acquisition of learning, and in the business of the world.
Since the age of nineteen he had pleaded with distinction in the
tribunals of Rome, filled a place in the senate, had been
invested with the honors of the consulship, and had formed very
numerous connections with every order of men, both in Italy and
in the provinces. From his ignorance therefore we may derive some
useful information. We may assure ourselves, that when he
accepted the government of Bithynia, there were no general laws
or decrees of the senate in force against the Christians; that
neither Trajan nor any of his virtuous predecessors, whose edicts
were received into the civil and criminal jurisprudence, had
publicly declared their intentions concerning the new sect; and
that whatever proceedings had been carried on against the
Christians, there were none of sufficient weight and authority to
establish a precedent for the conduct of a Roman magistrate.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XVI: Conduct Towards The Christians, From
Nero To Constantine. -- Part III.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>The answer of Trajan, to which the Christians of the
succeeding age have frequently appealed, discovers as much regard
for justice and humanity as could be reconciled with his mistaken
notions of religious policy. Instead of displaying the implacable
zeal of an inquisitor, anxious to discover the most minute
particles of heresy, and exulting in the number of his victims,
the emperor expresses much more solicitude to protect the
security of the innocent, than to prevent the escape of the
guilty. He acknowledged the difficulty of fixing any general
plan; but he lays down two salutary rules, which often afforded
relief and support to the distressed Christians. Though he
directs the magistrates to punish such persons as are legally
convicted, he prohibits them, with a very humane inconsistency,
from making any inquiries concerning the supposed criminals. Nor
was the magistrate allowed to proceed on every kind of
information. Anonymous charges the emperor rejects, as too
repugnant to the equity of his government; and he strictly
requires, for the conviction of those to whom the guilt of
Christianity is imputed, the positive evidence of a fair and open
accuser. It is likewise probable, that the persons who assumed so
invidiuous an office, were obliged to declare the grounds of
their suspicions, to specify (both in respect to time and place)
the secret assemblies, which their Christian adversary had
frequented, and to disclose a great number of circumstances,
which were concealed with the most vigilant jealousy from the eye
of the profane. If they succeeded in their prosecution, they were
exposed to the resentment of a considerable and active party, to
the censure of the more liberal portion of mankind, and to the
ignominy which, in every age and country, has attended the
character of an informer. If, on the contrary, they failed in
their proofs, they incurred the severe and perhaps capital
penalty, which, according to a law published by the emperor
Hadrian, was inflicted on those who falsely attributed to their
fellow-citizens the crime of Christianity. The violence of
personal or superstitious animosity might sometimes prevail over
the most natural apprehensions of disgrace and danger but it
cannot surely be imagined, that accusations of so unpromising an
appearance were either lightly or frequently undertaken by the
Pagan subjects of the Roman empire. *<br>
</p>

<p>The expedient which was employed to elude the prudence of the
laws, affords a sufficient proof how effectually they
disappointed the mischievous designs of private malice or
superstitious zeal. In a large and tumultuous assembly, the
restraints of fear and shame, so forcible on the minds of
individuals, are deprived of the greatest part of their
influence. The pious Christian, as he was desirous to obtain, or
to escape, the glory of martyrdom, expected, either with
impatience or with terror, the stated returns of the public games
and festivals. On those occasions the inhabitants of the great
cities of the empire were collected in the circus or the theatre,
where every circumstance of the place, as well as of the
ceremony, contributed to kindle their devotion, and to extinguish
their humanity. Whilst the numerous spectators, crowned with
garlands, perfumed with incense, purified with the blood of
victims, and surrounded with the altars and statues of their
tutelar deities, resigned themselves to the enjoyment of
pleasures, which they considered as an essential part of their
religious worship, they recollected, that the Christians alone
abhorred the gods of mankind, and by their absence and melancholy
on these solemn festivals, seemed to insult or to lament the
public felicity. If the empire had been afflicted by any recent
calamity, by a plague, a famine, or an unsuccessful war; if the
Tyber had, or if the Nile had not, risen beyond its banks; if the
earth had shaken, or if the temperate order of the seasons had
been interrupted, the superstitious Pagans were convinced that
the crimes and the impiety of the Christians, who were spared by
the excessive lenity of the government, had at length provoked
the divine justice. It was not among a licentious and exasperated
populace, that the forms of legal proceedings could be observed;
it was not in an amphitheatre, stained with the blood of wild
beasts and gladiators, that the voice of compassion could be
heard. The impatient clamors of the multitude denounced the
Christians as the enemies of gods and men, doomed them to the
severest tortures, and venturing to accuse by name some of the
most distinguished of the new sectaries, required with
irresistible vehemence that they should be instantly apprehended
and cast to the lions. The provincial governors and magistrates
who presided in the public spectacles were usually inclined to
gratify the inclinations, and to appease the rage, of the people,
by the sacrifice of a few obnoxious victims. But the wisdom of
the emperors protected the church from the danger of these
tumultuous clamors and irregular accusations, which they justly
censured as repugnant both to the firmness and to the equity of
their administration. The edicts of Hadrian and of Antoninus Pius
expressly declared, that the voice of the multitude should never
be admitted as legal evidence to convict or to punish those
unfortunate persons who had embraced the enthusiasm of the
Christians.<br>
</p>

<p>III. Punishment was not the inevitable consequence of
conviction, and the Christians, whose guilt was the most clearly
proved by the testimony of witnesses, or even by their voluntary
confession, still retained in their own power the alternative of
life or death. It was not so much the past offence, as the actual
resistance, which excited the indignation of the magistrate. He
was persuaded that he offered them an easy pardon, since, if they
consented to cast a few grains of incense upon the altar, they
were dismissed from the tribunal in safety and with applause. It
was esteemed the duty of a humane judge to endeavor to reclaim,
rather than to punish, those deluded enthusiasts. Varying his
tone according to the age, the sex, or the situation of the
prisoners, he frequently condescended to set before their eyes
every circumstance which could render life more pleasing, or
death more terrible; and to solicit, nay, to entreat, them, that
they would show some compassion to themselves, to their families,
and to their friends. If threats and persuasions proved
ineffectual, he had often recourse to violence; the scourge and
the rack were called in to supply the deficiency of argument, and
every art of cruelty was employed to subdue such inflexible, and,
as it appeared to the Pagans, such criminal, obstinacy. The
ancient apologists of Christianity have censured, with equal
truth and severity, the irregular conduct of their persecutors
who, contrary to every principle of judicial proceeding, admitted
the use of torture, in order to obtain, not a confession, but a
denial, of the crime which was the object of their inquiry. The
monks of succeeding ages, who, in their peaceful solitudes,
entertained themselves with diversifying the deaths and
sufferings of the primitive martyrs, have frequently invented
torments of a much more refined and ingenious nature. In
particular, it has pleased them to suppose, that the zeal of the
Roman magistrates, disdaining every consideration of moral virtue
or public decency, endeavored to seduce those whom they were
unable to vanquish, and that by their orders the most brutal
violence was offered to those whom they found it impossible to
seduce. It is related, that females, who were prepared to despise
death, were sometimes condemned to a more severe trial, and
called upon to determine whether they set a higher value on their
religion or on their chastity. The youths to whose licentious
embraces they were abandoned, received a solemn exhortation from
the judge, to exert their most strenuous efforts to maintain the
honor of Venus against the impious virgin who refused to burn
incense on her altars. Their violence, however, was commonly
disappointed, and the seasonable interposition of some miraculous
power preserved the chaste spouses of Christ from the dishonor
even of an involuntary defeat. We should not indeed neglect to
remark, that the more ancient as well as authentic memorials of
the church are seldom polluted with these extravagant and
indecent fictions.<br>
</p>

<p>The total disregard of truth and probability in the
representation of these primitive martyrdoms was occasioned by a
very natural mistake. The ecclesiastical writers of the fourth or
fifth centuries ascribed to the magistrates of Rome the same
degree of implacable and unrelenting zeal which filled their own
breasts against the heretics or the idolaters of their own times.
It is not improbable that some of those persons who were raised
to the dignities of the empire, might have imbibed the prejudices
of the populace, and that the cruel disposition of others might
occasionally be stimulated by motives of avarice or of personal
resentment. But it is certain, and we may appeal to the grateful
confessions of the first Christians, that the greatest part of
those magistrates who exercised in the provinces the authority of
the emperor, or of the senate, and to whose hands alone the
jurisdiction of life and death was intrusted, behaved like men of
polished manners and liberal education, who respected the rules
of justice, and who were conversant with the precepts of
philosophy. They frequently declined the odious task of
persecution, dismissed the charge with contempt, or suggested to
the accused Christian some legal evasion, by which he might elude
the severity of the laws. Whenever they were invested with a
discretionary power, they used it much less for the oppression,
than for the relief and benefit of the afflicted church. They
were far from condemning all the Christians who were accused
before their tribunal, and very far from punishing with death all
those who were convicted of an obstinate adherence to the new
superstition. Contenting themselves, for the most part, with the
milder chastisements of imprisonment, exile, or slavery in the
mines, they left the unhappy victims of their justice some reason
to hope, that a prosperous event, the accession, the marriage, or
the triumph of an emperor, might speedily restore them, by a
general pardon, to their former state. The martyrs, devoted to
immediate execution by the Roman magistrates, appear to have been
selected from the most opposite extremes. They were either
bishops and presbyters, the persons the most distinguished among
the Christians by their rank and influence, and whose example
might strike terror into the whole sect; or else they were the
meanest and most abject among them, particularly those of the
servile condition, whose lives were esteemed of little value, and
whose sufferings were viewed by the ancients with too careless an
indifference. The learned Origen, who, from his experience as
well as reading, was intimately acquainted with the history of
the Christians, declares, in the most express terms, that the
number of martyrs was very inconsiderable. His authority would
alone be sufficient to annihilate that formidable army of
martyrs, whose relics, drawn for the most part from the catacombs
of Rome, have replenished so many churches, and whose marvellous
achievements have been the subject of so many volumes of Holy
Romance. But the general assertion of Origen may be explained and
confirmed by the particular testimony of his friend Dionysius,
who, in the immense city of Alexandria, and under the rigorous
persecution of Decius, reckons only ten men and seven women who
suffered for the profession of the Christian name.<br>
</p>

<p>During the same period of persecution, the zealous, the
eloquent, the ambitious Cyprian governed the church, not only of
Carthage, but even of Africa. He possessed every quality which
could engage the reverence of the faithful, or provoke the
suspicions and resentment of the Pagan magistrates. His character
as well as his station seemed to mark out that holy prelate as
the most distinguished object of envy and danger. The experience,
however, of the life of Cyprian, is sufficient to prove that our
fancy has exaggerated the perilous situation of a Christian
bishop; and the dangers to which he was exposed were less
imminent than those which temporal ambition is always prepared to
encounter in the pursuit of honors. Four Roman emperors, with
their families, their favorites, and their adherents, perished by
the sword in the space of ten years, during which the bishop of
Carthage guided by his authority and eloquence the councils of
the African church. It was only in the third year of his
administration, that he had reason, during a few months, to
apprehend the severe edicts of Decius, the vigilance of the
magistrate and the clamors of the multitude, who loudly demanded,
that Cyprian, the leader of the Christians, should be thrown to
the lions. Prudence suggested the necessity of a temporary
retreat, and the voice of prudence was obeyed. He withdrew
himself into an obscure solitude, from whence he could maintain a
constant correspondence with the clergy and people of Carthage;
and, concealing himself till the tempest was past, he preserved
his life, without relinquishing either his power or his
reputation. His extreme caution did not, however, escape the
censure of the more rigid Christians, who lamented, or the
reproaches of his personal enemies, who insulted, a conduct which
they considered as a pusillanimous and criminal desertion of the
most sacred duty. The propriety of reserving himself for the
future exigencies of the church, the example of several holy
bishops, and the divine admonitions, which, as he declares
himself, he frequently received in visions and ecstacies, were
the reasons alleged in his justification. But his best apology
may be found in the cheerful resolution, with which, about eight
years afterwards, he suffered death in the cause of religion. The
authentic history of his martyrdom has been recorded with unusual
candor and impartiality. A short abstract, therefore, of its most
important circumstances, will convey the clearest information of
the spirit, and of the forms, of the Roman persecutions.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XVI: Conduct Towards The Christians, From
Nero To Constantine. -- Part IV.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>When Valerian was consul for the third, and Gallienus for the
fourth time, Paternus, proconsul of Africa, summoned Cyprian to
appear in his private council-chamber. He there acquainted him
with the Imperial mandate which he had just received, that those
who had abandoned the Roman religion should immediately return to
the practice of the ceremonies of their ancestors. Cyprian
replied without hesitation, that he was a Christian and a bishop,
devoted to the worship of the true and only Deity, to whom he
offered up his daily supplications for the safety and prosperity
of the two emperors, his lawful sovereigns. With modest
confidence he pleaded the privilege of a citizen, in refusing to
give any answer to some invidious and indeed illegal questions
which the proconsul had proposed. A sentence of banishment was
pronounced as the penalty of Cyprian's disobedience; and he was
conducted without delay to Curubis, a free and maritime city of
Zeugitania, in a pleasant situation, a fertile territory, and at
the distance of about forty miles from Carthage. The exiled
bishop enjoyed the conveniences of life and the consciousness of
virtue. His reputation was diffused over Africa and Italy; an
account of his behavior was published for the edification of the
Christian world; and his solitude was frequently interrupted by
the letters, the visits, and the congratulations of the faithful.
On the arrival of a new proconsul in the province the fortune of
Cyprian appeared for some time to wear a still more favorable
aspect. He was recalled from banishment; and though not yet
permitted to return to Carthage, his own gardens in the
neighborhood of the capital were assigned for the place of his
residence.<br>
</p>

<p>At length, exactly one year after Cyprian was first
apprehended, Galerius Maximus, proconsul of Africa, received the
Imperial warrant for the execution of the Christian teachers. The
bishop of Carthage was sensible that he should be singled out for
one of the first victims; and the frailty of nature tempted him
to withdraw himself, by a secret flight, from the danger and the
honor of martyrdom; * but soon recovering that fortitude which
his character required, he returned to his gardens, and patiently
expected the ministers of death. Two officers of rank, who were
intrusted with that commission, placed Cyprian between them in a
chariot, and as the proconsul was not then at leisure, they
conducted him, not to a prison, but to a private house in
Carthage, which belonged to one of them. An elegant supper was
provided for the entertainment of the bishop, and his Christian
friends were permitted for the last time to enjoy his society,
whilst the streets were filled with a multitude of the faithful,
anxious and alarmed at the approaching fate of their spiritual
father. In the morning he appeared before the tribunal of the
proconsul, who, after informing himself of the name and situation
of Cyprian, commanded him to offer sacrifice, and pressed him to
reflect on the consequences of his disobedience. The refusal of
Cyprian was firm and decisive; and the magistrate, when he had
taken the opinion of his council, pronounced with some reluctance
the sentence of death. It was conceived in the following terms:
"That Thascius Cyprianus should be immediately beheaded, as the
enemy of the gods of Rome, and as the chief and ringleader of a
criminal association, which he had seduced into an impious
resistance against the laws of the most holy emperors, Valerian
and Gallienus." The manner of his execution was the mildest and
least painful that could be inflicted on a person convicted of
any capital offence; nor was the use of torture admitted to
obtain from the bishop of Carthage either the recantation of his
principles or the discovery of his accomplices.<br>
</p>

<p>As soon as the sentence was proclaimed, a general cry of "We
will die with him," arose at once among the listening multitude
of Christians who waited before the palace gates. The generous
effusions of their zeal and their affection were neither
serviceable to Cyprian nor dangerous to themselves. He was led
away under a guard of tribunes and centurions, without resistance
and without insult, to the place of his execution, a spacious and
level plain near the city, which was already filled with great
numbers of spectators. His faithful presbyters and deacons were
permitted to accompany their holy bishop. * They assisted him in
laying aside his upper garment, spread linen on the ground to
catch the precious relics of his blood, and received his orders
to bestow five-and-twenty pieces of gold on the executioner. The
martyr then covered his face with his hands, and at one blow his
head was separated from his body. His corpse remained during some
hours exposed to the curiosity of the Gentiles: but in the night
it was removed, and transported in a triumphal procession, and
with a splendid illumination, to the burial-place of the
Christians. The funeral of Cyprian was publicly celebrated
without receiving any interruption from the Roman magistrates;
and those among the faithful, who had performed the last offices
to his person and his memory, were secure from the danger of
inquiry or of punishment. It is remarkable, that of so great a
multitude of bishops in the province of Africa, Cyprian was the
first who was esteemed worthy to obtain the crown of
martyrdom.<br>
</p>

<p>It was in the choice of Cyprian, either to die a martyr, or to
live an apostate; but on the choice depended the alternative of
honor or infamy. Could we suppose that the bishop of Carthage had
employed the profession of the Christian faith only as the
instrument of his avarice or ambition, it was still incumbent on
him to support the character he had assumed; and if he possessed
the smallest degree of manly fortitude, rather to expose himself
to the most cruel tortures, than by a single act to exchange the
reputation of a whole life, for the abhorrence of his Christian
brethren, and the contempt of the Gentile world. But if the zeal
of Cyprian was supported by the sincere conviction of the truth
of those doctrines which he preached, the crown of martyrdom must
have appeared to him as an object of desire rather than of
terror. It is not easy to extract any distinct ideas from the
vague though eloquent declamations of the Fathers, or to
ascertain the degree of immortal glory and happiness which they
confidently promised to those who were so fortunate as to shed
their blood in the cause of religion. They inculcated with
becoming diligence, that the fire of martyrdom supplied every
defect and expiated every sin; that while the souls of ordinary
Christians were obliged to pass through a slow and painful
purification, the triumphant sufferers entered into the immediate
fruition of eternal bliss, where, in the society of the
patriarchs, the apostles, and the prophets, they reigned with
Christ, and acted as his assessors in the universal judgment of
mankind. The assurance of a lasting reputation upon earth, a
motive so congenial to the vanity of human nature, often served
to animate the courage of the martyrs. The honors which Rome or
Athens bestowed on those citizens who had fallen in the cause of
their country, were cold and unmeaning demonstrations of respect,
when compared with the ardent gratitude and devotion which the
primitive church expressed towards the victorious champions of
the faith. The annual commemoration of their virtues and
sufferings was observed as a sacred ceremony, and at length
terminated in religious worship. Among the Christians who had
publicly confessed their religious principles, those who (as it
very frequently happened) had been dismissed from the tribunal or
the prisons of the Pagan magistrates, obtained such honors as
were justly due to their imperfect martyrdom and their generous
resolution. The most pious females courted the permission of
imprinting kisses on the fetters which they had worn, and on the
wounds which they had received. Their persons were esteemed holy,
their decisions were admitted with deference, and they too often
abused, by their spiritual pride and licentious manners, the
preeminence which their zeal and intrepidity had acquired.
Distinctions like these, whilst they display the exalted merit,
betray the inconsiderable number of those who suffered, and of
those who died, for the profession of Christianity.<br>
</p>

<p>The sober discretion of the present age will more readily
censure than admire, but can more easily admire than imitate, the
fervor of the first Christians, who, according to the lively
expressions of Sulpicius Severus, desired martyrdom with more
eagerness than his own contemporaries solicited a bishopric. The
epistles which Ignatius composed as he was carried in chains
through the cities of Asia, breathe sentiments the most repugnant
to the ordinary feelings of human nature. He earnestly beseeches
the Romans, that when he should be exposed in the amphitheatre,
they would not, by their kind but unseasonable intercession,
deprive him of the crown of glory; and he declares his resolution
to provoke and irritate the wild beasts which might be employed
as the instruments of his death. Some stories are related of the
courage of martyrs, who actually performed what Ignatius had
intended; who exasperated the fury of the lions, pressed the
executioner to hasten his office, cheerfully leaped into the
fires which were kindled to consume them, and discovered a
sensation of joy and pleasure in the midst of the most exquisite
tortures. Several examples have been preserved of a zeal
impatient of those restraints which the emperors had provided for
the security of the church. The Christians sometimes supplied by
their voluntary declaration the want of an accuser, rudely
disturbed the public service of paganism, and rushing in crowds
round the tribunal of the magistrates, called upon them to
pronounce and to inflict the sentence of the law. The behavior of
the Christians was too remarkable to escape the notice of the
ancient philosophers; but they seem to have considered it with
much less admiration than astonishment. Incapable of conceiving
the motives which sometimes transported the fortitude of
believers beyond the bounds of prudence or reason, they treated
such an eagerness to die as the strange result of obstinate
despair, of stupid insensibility, or of superstitious frenzy.
"Unhappy men!" exclaimed the proconsul Antoninus to the
Christians of Asia; "unhappy men! if you are thus weary of your
lives, is it so difficult for you to find ropes and precipices?"
He was extremely cautious (as it is observed by a learned and
pious historian) of punishing men who had found no accusers but
themselves, the Imperial laws not having made any provision for
so unexpected a case: condemning therefore a few as a warning to
their brethren, he dismissed the multitude with indignation and
contempt. Notwithstanding this real or affected disdain, the
intrepid constancy of the faithful was productive of more
salutary effects on those minds which nature or grace had
disposed for the easy reception of religious truth. On these
melancholy occasions, there were many among the Gentiles who
pitied, who admired, and who were converted. The generous
enthusiasm was communicated from the sufferer to the spectators;
and the blood of martyrs, according to a well-known observation,
became the seed of the church.<br>
</p>

<p>But although devotion had raised, and eloquence continued to
inflame, this fever of the mind, it insensibly gave way to the
more natural hopes and fears of the human heart, to the love of
life, the apprehension of pain, and the horror of dissolution.
The more prudent rulers of the church found themselves obliged to
restrain the indiscreet ardor of their followers, and to distrust
a constancy which too often abandoned them in the hour of trial.
As the lives of the faithful became less mortified and austere,
they were every day less ambitious of the honors of martyrdom;
and the soldiers of Christ, instead of distinguishing themselves
by voluntary deeds of heroism, frequently deserted their post,
and fled in confusion before the enemy whom it was their duty to
resist. There were three methods, however, of escaping the flames
of persecution, which were not attended with an equal degree of
guilt: first, indeed, was generally allowed to be innocent; the
second was of a doubtful, or at least of a venial, nature; but
the third implied a direct and criminal apostasy from the
Christian faith.<br>
</p>

<p>I. A modern inquisitor would hear with surprise, that whenever
an information was given to a Roman magistrate of any person
within his jurisdiction who had embraced the sect of the
Christians, the charge was communicated to the party accused, and
that a convenient time was allowed him to settle his domestic
concerns, and to prepare an answer to the crime which was imputed
to him. If he entertained any doubt of his own constancy, such a
delay afforded him the opportunity of preserving his life and
honor by flight, of withdrawing himself into some obscure
retirement or some distant province, and of patiently expecting
the return of peace and security. A measure so consonant to
reason was soon authorized by the advice and example of the most
holy prelates; and seems to have been censured by few except by
the Montanists, who deviated into heresy by their strict and
obstinate adherence to the rigor of ancient discipline. II. The
provincial governors, whose zeal was less prevalent than their
avarice, had countenanced the practice of selling certificates,
(or libels, as they were called,) which attested, that the
persons therein mentioned had complied with the laws, and
sacrificed to the Roman deities. By producing these false
declarations, the opulent and timid Christians were enabled to
silence the malice of an informer, and to reconcile in some
measure their safety with their religion. A slight penance atoned
for this profane dissimulation. * III. In every persecution there
were great numbers of unworthy Christians who publicly disowned
or renounced the faith which they had professed; and who
confirmed the sincerity of their abjuration, by the legal acts of
burning incense or of offering sacrifices. Some of these
apostates had yielded on the first menace or exhortation of the
magistrate; whilst the patience of others had been subdued by the
length and repetition of tortures. The affrighted countenances of
some betrayed their inward remorse, while others advanced with
confidence and alacrity to the altars of the gods. But the
disguise which fear had imposed, subsisted no longer than the
present danger. As soon as the severity of the persecution was
abated, the doors of the churches were assailed by the returning
multitude of penitents who detested their idolatrous submission,
and who solicited with equal ardor, but with various success,
their readmission into the society of Christians.<br>
</p>

<p>IV. Notwithstanding the general rules established for the
conviction and punishment of the Christians, the fate of those
sectaries, in an extensive and arbitrary government, must still
in a great measure, have depended on their own behavior, the
circumstances of the times, and the temper of their supreme as
well as subordinate rulers. Zeal might sometimes provoke, and
prudence might sometimes avert or assuage, the superstitious fury
of the Pagans. A variety of motives might dispose the provincial
governors either to enforce or to relax the execution of the
laws; and of these motives the most forcible was their regard not
only for the public edicts, but for the secret intentions of the
emperor, a glance from whose eye was sufficient to kindle or to
extinguish the flames of persecution. As often as any occasional
severities were exercised in the different parts of the empire,
the primitive Christians lamented and perhaps magnified their own
sufferings; but the celebrated number of ten persecutions has
been determined by the ecclesiastical writers of the fifth
century, who possessed a more distinct view of the prosperous or
adverse fortunes of the church, from the age of Nero to that of
Diocletian. The ingenious parallels of the ten plagues of Egypt,
and of the ten horns of the Apocalypse, first suggested this
calculation to their minds; and in their application of the faith
of prophecy to the truth of history, they were careful to select
those reigns which were indeed the most hostile to the Christian
cause. But these transient persecutions served only to revive the
zeal and to restore the discipline of the faithful; and the
moments of extraordinary rigor were compensated by much longer
intervals of peace and security. The indifference of some
princes, and the indulgence of others, permitted the Christians
to enjoy, though not perhaps a legal, yet an actual and public,
toleration of their religion.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XVI: Conduct Towards The Christians, From
Nero To Constantine. -- Part V.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>The apology of Tertullian contains two very ancient, very
singular, but at the same time very suspicious, instances of
Imperial clemency; the edicts published by Tiberius, and by
Marcus Antoninus, and designed not only to protect the innocence
of the Christians, but even to proclaim those stupendous miracles
which had attested the truth of their doctrine. The first of
these examples is attended with some difficulties which might
perplex a sceptical mind. We are required to believe,
<strong><em>that</em></strong> Pontius Pilate informed the
emperor of the unjust sentence of death which he had pronounced
against an innocent, and, as it appeared, a divine, person; and
that, without acquiring the merit, he exposed himself to the
danger of martyrdom; <strong><em>that</em></strong> Tiberius, who
avowed his contempt for all religion, immediately conceived the
design of placing the Jewish Messiah among the gods of Rome;
<strong><em>that</em></strong> his servile senate ventured to
disobey the commands of their master;
<strong><em>that</em></strong> Tiberius, instead of resenting
their refusal, contented himself with protecting the Christians
from the severity of the laws, many years before such laws were
enacted, or before the church had assumed any distinct name or
existence; and lastly, <strong><em>that</em></strong> the memory
of this extraordinary transaction was preserved in the most
public and authentic records, which escaped the knowledge of the
historians of Greece and Rome, and were only visible to the eyes
of an African Christian, who composed his apology one hundred and
sixty years after the death of Tiberius. The edict of Marcus
Antoninus is supposed to have been the effect of his devotion and
gratitude for the miraculous deliverance which he had obtained in
the Marcomannic war. The distress of the legions, the seasonable
tempest of rain and hail, of thunder and of lightning, and the
dismay and defeat of the barbarians, have been celebrated by the
eloquence of several Pagan writers. If there were any Christians
in that army, it was natural that they should ascribe some merit
to the fervent prayers, which, in the moment of danger, they had
offered up for their own and the public safety. But we are still
assured by monuments of brass and marble, by the Imperial medals,
and by the Antonine column, that neither the prince nor the
people entertained any sense of this signal obligation, since
they unanimously attribute their deliverance to the providence of
Jupiter, and to the interposition of Mercury. During the whole
course of his reign, Marcus despised the Christians as a
philosopher, and punished them as a sovereign. *<br>
</p>

<p>By a singular fatality, the hardships which they had endured
under the government of a virtuous prince, immediately ceased on
the accession of a tyrant; and as none except themselves had
experienced the injustice of Marcus, so they alone were protected
by the lenity of Commodus. The celebrated Marcia, the most
favored of his concubines, and who at length contrived the murder
of her Imperial lover, entertained a singular affection for the
oppressed church; and though it was impossible that she could
reconcile the practice of vice with the precepts of the gospel,
she might hope to atone for the frailties of her sex and
profession by declaring herself the patroness of the Christians.
Under the gracious protection of Marcia, they passed in safety
the thirteen years of a cruel tyranny; and when the empire was
established in the house of Severus, they formed a domestic but
more honorable connection with the new court. The emperor was
persuaded, that in a dangerous sickness, he had derived some
benefit, either spiritual or physical, from the holy oil, with
which one of his slaves had anointed him. He always treated with
peculiar distinction several persons of both sexes who had
embraced the new religion. The nurse as well as the preceptor of
Caracalla were Christians; * and if that young prince ever
betrayed a sentiment of humanity, it was occasioned by an
incident, which, however trifling, bore some relation to the
cause of Christianity. Under the reign of Severus, the fury of
the populace was checked; the rigor of ancient laws was for some
time suspended; and the provincial governors were satisfied with
receiving an annual present from the churches within their
jurisdiction, as the price, or as the reward, of their
moderation. The controversy concerning the precise time of the
celebration of Easter, armed the bishops of Asia and Italy
against each other, and was considered as the most important
business of this period of leisure and tranquillity. Nor was the
peace of the church interrupted, till the increasing numbers of
proselytes seem at length to have attracted the attention, and to
have alienated the mind of Severus. With the design of
restraining the progress of Christianity, he published an edict,
which, though it was designed to affect only the new converts,
could not be carried into strict execution, without exposing to
danger and punishment the most zealous of their teachers and
missionaries. In this mitigated persecution we may still discover
the indulgent spirit of Rome and of Polytheism, which so readily
admitted every excuse in favor of those who practised the
religious ceremonies of their fathers.<br>
</p>

<p>But the laws which Severus had enacted soon expired with the
authority of that emperor; and the Christians, after this
accidental tempest, enjoyed a calm of thirty-eight years. Till
this period they had usually held their assemblies in private
houses and sequestered places. They were now permitted to erect
and consecrate convenient edifices for the purpose of religious
worship; to purchase lands, even at Rome itself, for the use of
the community; and to conduct the elections of their
ecclesiastical ministers in so public, but at the same time in so
exemplary a manner, as to deserve the respectful attention of the
Gentiles. This long repose of the church was accompanied with
dignity. The reigns of those princes who derived their extraction
from the Asiatic provinces, proved the most favorable to the
Christians; the eminent persons of the sect, instead of being
reduced to implore the protection of a slave or concubine, were
admitted into the palace in the honorable characters of priests
and philosophers; and their mysterious doctrines, which were
already diffused among the people, insensibly attracted the
curiosity of their sovereign. When the empress Mamm&aelig;a
passed through Antioch, she expressed a desire of conversing with
the celebrated Origen, the fame of whose piety and learning was
spread over the East. Origen obeyed so flattering an invitation,
and though he could not expect to succeed in the conversion of an
artful and ambitious woman, she listened with pleasure to his
eloquent exhortations, and honorably dismissed him to his
retirement in Palestine. The sentiments of Mamm&aelig;a were
adopted by her son Alexander, and the philosophic devotion of
that emperor was marked by a singular but injudicious regard for
the Christian religion. In his domestic chapel he placed the
statues of Abraham, of Orpheus, of Apollonius, and of Christ, as
an honor justly due to those respectable sages who had instructed
mankind in the various modes of addressing their homage to the
supreme and universal Deity. A purer faith, as well as worship,
was openly professed and practised among his household. Bishops,
perhaps for the first time, were seen at court; and, after the
death of Alexander, when the inhuman Maximin discharged his fury
on the favorites and servants of his unfortunate benefactor, a
great number of Christians of every rank and of both sexes, were
involved the promiscuous massacre, which, on their account, has
improperly received the name of Persecution. *<br>
</p>

<p>Notwithstanding the cruel disposition of Maximin, the effects
of his resentment against the Christians were of a very local and
temporary nature, and the pious Origen, who had been proscribed
as a devoted victim, was still reserved to convey the truths of
the gospel to the ear of monarchs. He addressed several edifying
letters to the emperor Philip, to his wife, and to his mother;
and as soon as that prince, who was born in the neighborhood of
Palestine, had usurped the Imperial sceptre, the Christians
acquired a friend and a protector. The public and even partial
favor of Philip towards the sectaries of the new religion, and
his constant reverence for the ministers of the church, gave some
color to the suspicion, which prevailed in his own times, that
the emperor himself was become a convert to the faith; and
afforded some grounds for a fable which was afterwards invented,
that he had been purified by confession and penance from the
guilt contracted by the murder of his innocent predecessor. the
fall of Philip introduced, with the change of masters, a new
system of government, so oppressive to the Christians, that their
former condition, ever since the time of Domitian, was
represented as a state of perfect freedom and security, if
compared with the rigorous treatment which they experienced under
the short reign of Decius. The virtues of that prince will
scarcely allow us to suspect that he was actuated by a mean
resentment against the favorites of his predecessor; and it is
more reasonable to believe, that in the prosecution of his
general design to restore the purity of Roman manners, he was
desirous of delivering the empire from what he condemned as a
recent and criminal superstition. The bishops of the most
considerable cities were removed by exile or death: the vigilance
of the magistrates prevented the clergy of Rome during sixteen
months from proceeding to a new election; and it was the opinion
of the Christians, that the emperor would more patiently endure a
competitor for the purple, than a bishop in the capital. Were it
possible to suppose that the penetration of Decius had discovered
pride under the disguise of humility, or that he could foresee
the temporal dominion which might insensibly arise from the
claims of spiritual authority, we might be less surprised, that
he should consider the successors of St. Peter, as the most
formidable rivals to those of Augustus.<br>
</p>

<p>The administration of Valerian was distinguished by a levity
and inconstancy ill suited to the gravity of the
<strong><em>Roman Censor</em></strong>. In the first part of his
reign, he surpassed in clemency those princes who had been
suspected of an attachment to the Christian faith. In the last
three years and a half, listening to the insinuations of a
minister addicted to the superstitions of Egypt, he adopted the
maxims, and imitated the severity, of his predecessor Decius. The
accession of Gallienus, which increased the calamities of the
empire, restored peace to the church; and the Christians obtained
the free exercise of their religion by an edict addressed to the
bishops, and conceived in such terms as seemed to acknowledge
their office and public character. The ancient laws, without
being formally repealed, were suffered to sink into oblivion; and
(excepting only some hostile intentions which are attributed to
the emperor Aurelian ) the disciples of Christ passed above forty
years in a state of prosperity, far more dangerous to their
virtue than the severest trials of persecution.<br>
</p>

<p>The story of Paul of Samosata, who filled the metropolitan see
of Antioch, while the East was in the hands of Odenathus and
Zenobia, may serve to illustrate the condition and character of
the times. The wealth of that prelate was a sufficient evidence
of his guilt, since it was neither derived from the inheritance
of his fathers, nor acquired by the arts of honest industry. But
Paul considered the service of the church as a very lucrative
profession. His ecclesiastical jurisdiction was venal and
rapacious; he extorted frequent contributions from the most
opulent of the faithful, and converted to his own use a
considerable part of the public revenue. By his pride and luxury,
the Christian religion was rendered odious in the eyes of the
Gentiles. His council chamber and his throne, the splendor with
which he appeared in public, the suppliant crowd who solicited
his attention, the multitude of letters and petitions to which he
dictated his answers, and the perpetual hurry of business in
which he was involved, were circumstances much better suited to
the state of a civil magistrate, than to the humility of a
primitive bishop. When he harangued his people from the pulpit,
Paul affected the figurative style and the theatrical gestures of
an Asiatic sophist, while the cathedral resounded with the
loudest and most extravagant acclamations in the praise of his
divine eloquence. Against those who resisted his power, or
refused to flatter his vanity, the prelate of Antioch was
arrogant, rigid, and inexorable; but he relaxed the discipline,
and lavished the treasures of the church on his dependent clergy,
who were permitted to imitate their master in the gratification
of every sensual appetite. For Paul indulged himself very freely
in the pleasures of the table, and he had received into the
episcopal palace two young and beautiful women as the constant
companions of his leisure moments.<br>
</p>

<p>Notwithstanding these scandalous vices, if Paul of Samosata
had preserved the purity of the orthodox faith, his reign over
the capital of Syria would have ended only with his life; and had
a seasonable persecution intervened, an effort of courage might
perhaps have placed him in the rank of saints and martyrs. * Some
nice and subtle errors, which he imprudently adopted and
obstinately maintained, concerning the doctrine of the Trinity,
excited the zeal and indignation of the Eastern churches. From
Egypt to the Euxine Sea, the bishops were in arms and in motion.
Several councils were held, confutations were published,
excommunications were pronounced, ambiguous explanations were by
turns accepted and refused, treaties were concluded and violated,
and at length Paul of Samosata was degraded from his episcopal
character, by the sentence of seventy or eighty bishops, who
assembled for that purpose at Antioch, and who, without
consulting the rights of the clergy or people, appointed a
successor by their own authority. The manifest irregularity of
this proceeding increased the numbers of the discontented
faction; and as Paul, who was no stranger to the arts of courts,
had insinuated himself into the favor of Zenobia, he maintained
above four years the possession of the episcopal house and
office. * The victory of Aurelian changed the face of the East,
and the two contending parties, who applied to each other the
epithets of schism and heresy, were either commanded or permitted
to plead their cause before the tribunal of the conqueror. This
public and very singular trial affords a convincing proof that
the existence, the property, the privileges, and the internal
policy of the Christians, were acknowledged, if not by the laws,
at least by the magistrates, of the empire. As a Pagan and as a
soldier, it could scarcely be expected that Aurelian should enter
into the discussion, whether the sentiments of Paul or those of
his adversaries were most agreeable to the true standard of the
orthodox faith. His determination, however, was founded on the
general principles of equity and reason. He considered the
bishops of Italy as the most impartial and respectable judges
among the Christians, and as soon as he was informed that they
had unanimously approved the sentence of the council, he
acquiesced in their opinion, and immediately gave orders that
Paul should be compelled to relinquish the temporal possessions
belonging to an office, of which, in the judgment of his
brethren, he had been regularly deprived. But while we applaud
the justice, we should not overlook the policy, of Aurelian, who
was desirous of restoring and cementing the dependence of the
provinces on the capital, by every means which could bind the
interest or prejudices of any part of his subjects.<br>
</p>

<p>Amidst the frequent revolutions of the empire, the Christians
still flourished in peace and prosperity; and notwithstanding a
celebrated &aelig;ra of martyrs has been deduced from the
accession of Diocletian, the new system of policy, introduced and
maintained by the wisdom of that prince, continued, during more
than eighteen years, to breathe the mildest and most liberal
spirit of religious toleration. The mind of Diocletian himself
was less adapted indeed to speculative inquiries, than to the
active labors of war and government. His prudence rendered him
averse to any great innovation, and though his temper was not
very susceptible of zeal or enthusiasm, he always maintained an
habitual regard for the ancient deities of the empire. But the
leisure of the two empresses, of his wife Prisca, and of Valeria,
his daughter, permitted them to listen with more attention and
respect to the truths of Christianity, which in every age has
acknowledged its important obligations to female devotion. The
principal eunuchs, Lucian and Dorotheus, Gorgonius and Andrew,
who attended the person, possessed the favor, and governed the
household of Diocletian, protected by their powerful influence
the faith which they had embraced. Their example was imitated by
many of the most considerable officers of the palace, who, in
their respective stations, had the care of the Imperial
ornaments, of the robes, of the furniture, of the jewels, and
even of the private treasury; and, though it might sometimes be
incumbent on them to accompany the emperor when he sacrificed in
the temple, they enjoyed, with their wives, their children, and
their slaves, the free exercise of the Christian religion.
Diocletian and his colleagues frequently conferred the most
important offices on those persons who avowed their abhorrence
for the worship of the gods, but who had displayed abilities
proper for the service of the state. The bishops held an
honorable rank in their respective provinces, and were treated
with distinction and respect, not only by the people, but by the
magistrates themselves. Almost in every city, the ancient
churches were found insufficient to contain the increasing
multitude of proselytes; and in their place more stately and
capacious edifices were erected for the public worship of the
faithful. The corruption of manners and principles, so forcibly
lamented by Eusebius, may be considered, not only as a
consequence, but as a proof, of the liberty which the Christians
enjoyed and abused under the reign of Diocletian. Prosperity had
relaxed the nerves of discipline. Fraud, envy, and malice
prevailed in every congregation. The presbyters aspired to the
episcopal office, which every day became an object more worthy of
their ambition. The bishops, who contended with each other for
ecclesiastical preeminence, appeared by their conduct to claim a
secular and tyrannical power in the church; and the lively faith
which still distinguished the Christians from the Gentiles, was
shown much less in their lives, than in their controversial
writings.<br>
</p>

<p>Notwithstanding this seeming security, an attentive observer
might discern some symptoms that threatened the church with a
more violent persecution than any which she had yet endured. The
zeal and rapid progress of the Christians awakened the
Polytheists from their supine indifference in the cause of those
deities, whom custom and education had taught them to revere. The
mutual provocations of a religious war, which had already
continued above two hundred years, exasperated the animosity of
the contending parties. The Pagans were incensed at the rashness
of a recent and obscure sect, which presumed to accuse their
countrymen of error, and to devote their ancestors to eternal
misery. The habits of justifying the popular mythology against
the invectives of an implacable enemy, produced in their minds
some sentiments of faith and reverence for a system which they
had been accustomed to consider with the most careless levity.
The supernatural powers assumed by the church inspired at the
same time terror and emulation. The followers of the established
religion intrenched themselves behind a similar fortification of
prodigies; invented new modes of sacrifice, of expiation, and of
initiation; attempted to revive the credit of their expiring
oracles; and listened with eager credulity to every impostor, who
flattered their prejudices by a tale of wonders. Both parties
seemed to acknowledge the truth of those miracles which were
claimed by their adversaries; and while they were contented with
ascribing them to the arts of magic, and to the power of
d&aelig;mons, they mutually concurred in restoring and
establishing the reign of superstition. Philosophy, her most
dangerous enemy, was now converted into her most useful ally. The
groves of the academy, the gardens of Epicurus, and even the
portico of the Stoics, were almost deserted, as so many different
schools of scepticism or impiety; and many among the Romans were
desirous that the writings of Cicero should be condemned and
suppressed by the authority of the senate. The prevailing sect of
the new Platonicians judged it prudent to connect themselves with
the priests, whom perhaps they despised, against the Christians,
whom they had reason to fear. These fashionable Philosophers
prosecuted the design of extracting allegorical wisdom from the
fictions of the Greek poets; instituted mysterious rites of
devotion for the use of their chosen disciples; recommended the
worship of the ancient gods as the emblems or ministers of the
Supreme Deity, and composed against the faith of the gospel many
elaborate treatises, which have since been committed to the
flames by the prudence of orthodox emperors.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XVI: Conduct Towards The Christians, From
Nero To Constantine. -- Part VI.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>Although the policy of Diocletian and the humanity of
Constantius inclined them to preserve inviolate the maxims of
toleration, it was soon discovered that their two associates,
Maximian and Galerius, entertained the most implacable aversion
for the name and religion of the Christians. The minds of those
princes had never been enlightened by science; education had
never softened their temper. They owed their greatness to their
swords, and in their most elevated fortune they still retained
their superstitious prejudices of soldiers and peasants. In the
general administration of the provinces they obeyed the laws
which their benefactor had established; but they frequently found
occasions of exercising within their camp and palaces a secret
persecution, for which the imprudent zeal of the Christians
sometimes offered the most specious pretences. A sentence of
death was executed upon Maximilianus, an African youth, who had
been produced by his own father *before the magistrate as a
sufficient and legal recruit, but who obstinately persisted in
declaring, that his conscience would not permit him to embrace
the profession of a soldier. It could scarcely be expected that
any government should suffer the action of Marcellus the
Centurion to pass with impunity. On the day of a public festival,
that officer threw away his belt, his arms, and the ensigns of
his office, and exclaimed with a loud voice, that he would obey
none but Jesus Christ the eternal King, and that he renounced
forever the use of carnal weapons, and the service of an
idolatrous master. The soldiers, as soon as they recovered from
their astonishment, secured the person of Marcellus. He was
examined in the city of Tingi by the president of that part of
Mauritania; and as he was convicted by his own confession, he was
condemned and beheaded for the crime of desertion. Examples of
such a nature savor much less of religious persecution than of
martial or even civil law; but they served to alienate the mind
of the emperors, to justify the severity of Galerius, who
dismissed a great number of Christian officers from their
employments; and to authorize the opinion, that a sect of
enthusiastics, which avowed principles so repugnant to the public
safety, must either remain useless, or would soon become
dangerous, subjects of the empire.<br>
</p>

<p>After the success of the Persian war had raised the hopes and
the reputation of Galerius, he passed a winter with Diocletian in
the palace of Nicomedia; and the fate of Christianity became the
object of their secret consultations. The experienced emperor was
still inclined to pursue measures of lenity; and though he
readily consented to exclude the Christians from holding any
employments in the household or the army, he urged in the
strongest terms the danger as well as cruelty of shedding the
blood of those deluded fanatics. Galerius at length extorted from
him the permission of summoning a council, composed of a few
persons the most distinguished in the civil and military
departments of the state. The important question was agitated in
their presence, and those ambitious courtiers easily discerned,
that it was incumbent on them to second, by their eloquence, the
importunate violence of the C&aelig;sar. It may be presumed, that
they insisted on every topic which might interest the pride, the
piety, or the fears, of their sovereign in the destruction of
Christianity. Perhaps they represented, that the glorious work of
the deliverance of the empire was left imperfect, as long as an
independent people was permitted to subsist and multiply in the
heart of the provinces. The Christians, (it might specially be
alleged,) renouncing the gods and the institutions of Rome, had
constituted a distinct republic, which might yet be suppressed
before it had acquired any military force; but which was already
governed by its own laws and magistrates, was possessed of a
public treasure, and was intimately connected in all its parts by
the frequent assemblies of the bishops, to whose decrees their
numerous and opulent congregations yielded an implicit obedience.
Arguments like these may seem to have determined the reluctant
mind of Diocletian to embrace a new system of persecution; but
though we may suspect, it is not in our power to relate, the
secret intrigues of the palace, the private views and
resentments, the jealousy of women or eunuchs, and all those
trifling but decisive causes which so often influence the fate of
empires, and the councils of the wisest monarchs.<br>
</p>

<p>The pleasure of the emperors was at length signified to the
Christians, who, during the course of this melancholy winter, had
expected, with anxiety, the result of so many secret
consultations. The twenty-third of February, which coincided with
the Roman festival of the Terminalia, was appointed (whether from
accident or design) to set bounds to the progress of
Christianity. At the earliest dawn of day, the Pr&aelig;torian
pr&aelig;fect, accompanied by several generals, tribunes, and
officers of the revenue, repaired to the principal church of
Nicomedia, which was situated on an eminence in the most populous
and beautiful part of the city. The doors were instantly broke
open; they rushed into the sanctuary; and as they searched in
vain for some visible object of worship, they were obliged to
content themselves with committing to the flames the volumes of
the holy Scripture. The ministers of Diocletian were followed by
a numerous body of guards and pioneers, who marched in order of
battle, and were provided with all the instruments used in the
destruction of fortified cities. By their incessant labor, a
sacred edifice, which towered above the Imperial palace, and had
long excited the indignation and envy of the Gentiles, was in a
few hours levelled with the ground.<br>
</p>

<p>The next day the general edict of persecution was published;
and though Diocletian, still averse to the effusion of blood, had
moderated the fury of Galerius, who proposed, that every one
refusing to offer sacrifice should immediately be burnt alive,
the penalties inflicted on the obstinacy of the Christians might
be deemed sufficiently rigorous and effectual. It was enacted,
that their churches, in all the provinces of the empire, should
be demolished to their foundations; and the punishment of death
was denounced against all who should presume to hold any secret
assemblies for the purpose of religious worship. The
philosophers, who now assumed the unworthy office of directing
the blind zeal of persecution, had diligently studied the nature
and genius of the Christian religion; and as they were not
ignorant that the speculative doctrines of the faith were
supposed to be contained in the writings of the prophets, of the
evangelists, and of the apostles, they most probably suggested
the order, that the bishops and presbyters should deliver all
their sacred books into the hands of the magistrates; who were
commanded, under the severest penalties, to burn them in a public
and solemn manner. By the same edict, the property of the church
was at once confiscated; and the several parts of which it might
consist were either sold to the highest bidder, united to the
Imperial domain, bestowed on the cities and corporations, or
granted to the solicitations of rapacious courtiers. After taking
such effectual measures to abolish the worship, and to dissolve
the government of the Christians, it was thought necessary to
subject to the most intolerable hardships the condition of those
perverse individuals who should still reject the religion of
nature, of Rome, and of their ancestors. Persons of a liberal
birth were declared incapable of holding any honors or
employments; slaves were forever deprived of the hopes of
freedom, and the whole body of the people were put out of the
protection of the law. The judges were authorized to hear and to
determine every action that was brought against a Christian. But
the Christians were not permitted to complain of any injury which
they themselves had suffered; and thus those unfortunate
sectaries were exposed to the severity, while they were excluded
from the benefits, of public justice. This new species of
martyrdom, so painful and lingering, so obscure and ignominious,
was, perhaps, the most proper to weary the constancy of the
faithful: nor can it be doubted that the passions and interest of
mankind were disposed on this occasion to second the designs of
the emperors. But the policy of a well-ordered government must
sometimes have interposed in behalf of the oppressed Christians;
* nor was it possible for the Roman princes entirely to remove
the apprehension of punishment, or to connive at every act of
fraud and violence, without exposing their own authority and the
rest of their subjects to the most alarming dangers.<br>
</p>

<p>This edict was scarcely exhibited to the public view, in the
most conspicuous place of Nicomedia, before it was torn down by
the hands of a Christian, who expressed at the same time, by the
bitterest invectives, his contempt as well as abhorrence for such
impious and tyrannical governors. His offence, according to the
mildest laws, amounted to treason, and deserved death. And if it
be true that he was a person of rank and education, those
circumstances could serve only to aggravate his guilt. He was
burnt, or rather roasted, by a slow fire; and his executioners,
zealous to revenge the personal insult which had been offered to
the emperors, exhausted every refinement of cruelty, without
being able to subdue his patience, or to alter the steady and
insulting smile which in his dying agonies he still preserved in
his countenance. The Christians, though they confessed that his
conduct had not been strictly conformable to the laws of
prudence, admired the divine fervor of his zeal; and the
excessive commendations which they lavished on the memory of
their hero and martyr, contributed to fix a deep impression of
terror and hatred in the mind of Diocletian.<br>
</p>

<p>His fears were soon alarmed by the view of a danger from which
he very narrowly escaped. Within fifteen days the palace of
Nicomedia, and even the bed-chamber of Diocletian, were twice in
flames; and though both times they were extinguished without any
material damage, the singular repetition of the fire was justly
considered as an evident proof that it had not been the effect of
chance or negligence. The suspicion naturally fell on the
Christians; and it was suggested, with some degree of
probability, that those desperate fanatics, provoked by their
present sufferings, and apprehensive of impending calamities, had
entered into a conspiracy with their faithful brethren, the
eunuchs of the palace, against the lives of two emperors, whom
they detested as the irreconcilable enemies of the church of God.
Jealousy and resentment prevailed in every breast, but especially
in that of Diocletian. A great number of persons, distinguished
either by the offices which they had filled, or by the favor
which they had enjoyed, were thrown into prison. Every mode of
torture was put in practice, and the court, as well as city, was
polluted with many bloody executions. But as it was found
impossible to extort any discovery of this mysterious
transaction, it seems incumbent on us either to presume the
innocence, or to admire the resolution, of the sufferers. A few
days afterwards Galerius hastily withdrew himself from Nicomedia,
declaring, that if he delayed his departure from that devoted
palace, he should fall a sacrifice to the rage of the Christians.
The ecclesiastical historians, from whom alone we derive a
partial and imperfect knowledge of this persecution, are at a
loss how to account for the fears and dangers of the emperors.
Two of these writers, a prince and a rhetorician, were
eye-witnesses of the fire of Nicomedia. The one ascribes it to
lightning, and the divine wrath; the other affirms, that it was
kindled by the malice of Galerius himself.<br>
</p>

<p>As the edict against the Christians was designed for a general
law of the whole empire, and as Diocletian and Galerius, though
they might not wait for the consent, were assured of the
concurrence, of the Western princes, it would appear more
consonant to our ideas of policy, that the governors of all the
provinces should have received secret instructions to publish, on
one and the same day, this declaration of war within their
respective departments. It was at least to be expected, that the
convenience of the public highways and established posts would
have enabled the emperors to transmit their orders with the
utmost despatch from the palace of Nicomedia to the extremities
of the Roman world; and that they would not have suffered fifty
days to elapse, before the edict was published in Syria, and near
four months before it was signified to the cities of Africa. This
delay may perhaps be imputed to the cautious temper of
Diocletian, who had yielded a reluctant consent to the measures
of persecution, and who was desirous of trying the experiment
under his more immediate eye, before he gave way to the disorders
and discontent which it must inevitably occasion in the distant
provinces. At first, indeed, the magistrates were restrained from
the effusion of blood; but the use of every other severity was
permitted, and even recommended to their zeal; nor could the
Christians, though they cheerfully resigned the ornaments of
their churches, resolve to interrupt their religious assemblies,
or to deliver their sacred books to the flames. The pious
obstinacy of Felix, an African bishop, appears to have
embarrassed the subordinate ministers of the government. The
curator of his city sent him in chains to the proconsul. The
proconsul transmitted him to the Pr&aelig;torian pr&aelig;fect of
Italy; and Felix, who disdained even to give an evasive answer,
was at length beheaded at Venusia, in Lucania, a place on which
the birth of Horace has conferred fame. This precedent, and
perhaps some Imperial rescript, which was issued in consequence
of it, appeared to authorize the governors of provinces, in
punishing with death the refusal of the Christians to deliver up
their sacred books. There were undoubtedly many persons who
embraced this opportunity of obtaining the crown of martyrdom;
but there were likewise too many who purchased an ignominious
life, by discovering and betraying the holy Scripture into the
hands of infidels. A great number even of bishops and presbyters
acquired, by this criminal compliance, the opprobrious epithet of
<strong><em>Traditors</em></strong>; and their offence was
productive of much present scandal and of much future discord in
the African church.<br>
</p>

<p>The copies as well as the versions of Scripture, were already
so multiplied in the empire, that the most severe inquisition
could no longer be attended with any fatal consequences; and even
the sacrifice of those volumes, which, in every congregation,
were preserved for public use, required the consent of some
treacherous and unworthy Christians. But the ruin of the churches
was easily effected by the authority of the government, and by
the labor of the Pagans. In some provinces, however, the
magistrates contented themselves with shutting up the places of
religious worship. In others, they more literally complied with
the terms of the edict; and after taking away the doors, the
benches, and the pulpit, which they burnt as it were in a funeral
pile, they completely demolished the remainder of the edifice. It
is perhaps to this melancholy occasion that we should apply a
very remarkable story, which is related with so many
circumstances of variety and improbability, that it serves rather
to excite than to satisfy our curiosity. In a small town in
Phrygia, of whose names as well as situation we are left
ignorant, it should seem that the magistrates and the body of the
people had embraced the Christian faith; and as some resistance
might be apprehended to the execution of the edict, the governor
of the province was supported by a numerous detachment of
legionaries. On their approach the citizens threw themselves into
the church, with the resolution either of defending by arms that
sacred edifice, or of perishing in its ruins. They indignantly
rejected the notice and permission which was given them to
retire, till the soldiers, provoked by their obstinate refusal,
set fire to the building on all sides, and consumed, by this
extraordinary kind of martyrdom, a great number of Phrygians,
with their wives and children.<br>
</p>

<p>Some slight disturbances, though they were suppressed almost
as soon as excited, in Syria and the frontiers of Armenia,
afforded the enemies of the church a very plausible occasion to
insinuate, that those troubles had been secretly fomented by the
intrigues of the bishops, who had already forgotten their
ostentatious professions of passive and unlimited obedience. The
resentment, or the fears, of Diocletian, at length transported
him beyond the bounds of moderation, which he had hitherto
preserved, and he declared, in a series of cruel edicts, his
intention of abolishing the Christian name. By the first of these
edicts, the governors of the provinces were directed to apprehend
all persons of the ecclesiastical order; and the prisons,
destined for the vilest criminals, were soon filled with a
multitude of bishops, presbyters, deacons, readers, and
exorcists. By a second edict, the magistrates were commanded to
employ every method of severity, which might reclaim them from
their odious superstition, and oblige them to return to the
established worship of the gods. This rigorous order was
extended, by a subsequent edict, to the whole body of Christians,
who were exposed to a violent and general persecution. Instead of
those salutary restraints, which had required the direct and
solemn testimony of an accuser, it became the duty as well as the
interest of the Imperial officers to discover, to pursue, and to
torment the most obnoxious among the faithful. Heavy penalties
were denounced against all who should presume to save a
prescribed sectary from the just indignation of the gods, and of
the emperors. Yet, notwithstanding the severity of this law, the
virtuous courage of many of the Pagans, in concealing their
friends or relations, affords an honorable proof, that the rage
of superstition had not extinguished in their minds the
sentiments of nature and humanity.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XVI: Conduct Towards The Christians, From
Nero To Constantine. -- Part VII.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>Diocletian had no sooner published his edicts against the
Christians, than, as if he had been desirous of committing to
other hands the work of persecution, he divested himself of the
Imperial purple. The character and situation of his colleagues
and successors sometimes urged them to enforce and sometimes
inclined them to suspend, the execution of these rigorous laws;
nor can we acquire a just and distinct idea of this important
period of ecclesiastical history, unless we separately consider
the state of Christianity, in the different parts of the empire,
during the space of ten years, which elapsed between the first
edicts of Diocletian and the final peace of the church.<br>
</p>

<p>The mild and humane temper of Constantius was averse to the
oppression of any part of his subjects. The principal offices of
his palace were exercised by Christians. He loved their persons,
esteemed their fidelity, and entertained not any dislike to their
religious principles. But as long as Constantius remained in the
subordinate station of C&aelig;sar, it was not in his power
openly to reject the edicts of Diocletian, or to disobey the
commands of Maximian. His authority contributed, however, to
alleviate the sufferings which he pitied and abhorred. He
consented with reluctance to the ruin of the churches; but he
ventured to protect the Christians themselves from the fury of
the populace, and from the rigor of the laws. The provinces of
Gaul (under which we may probably include those of Britain) were
indebted for the singular tranquillity which they enjoyed, to the
gentle interposition of their sovereign. But Datianus, the
president or governor of Spain, actuated either by zeal or
policy, chose rather to execute the public edicts of the
emperors, than to understand the secret intentions of
Constantius; and it can scarcely be doubted, that his provincial
administration was stained with the blood of a few martyrs. The
elevation of Constantius to the supreme and independent dignity
of Augustus, gave a free scope to the exercise of his virtues,
and the shortness of his reign did not prevent him from
establishing a system of toleration, of which he left the precept
and the example to his son Constantine. His fortunate son, from
the first moment of his accession, declaring himself the
protector of the church, at length deserved the appellation of
the first emperor who publicly professed and established the
Christian religion. The motives of his conversion, as they may
variously be deduced from benevolence, from policy, from
conviction, or from remorse, and the progress of the revolution,
which, under his powerful influence and that of his sons,
rendered Christianity the reigning religion of the Roman empire,
will form a very interesting and important chapter in the present
volume of this history. At present it may be sufficient to
observe, that every victory of Constantine was productive of some
relief or benefit to the church.<br>
</p>

<p>The provinces of Italy and Africa experienced a short but
violent persecution. The rigorous edicts of Diocletian were
strictly and cheerfully executed by his associate Maximian, who
had long hated the Christians, and who delighted in acts of blood
and violence. In the autumn of the first year of the persecution,
the two emperors met at Rome to celebrate their triumph; several
oppressive laws appear to have issued from their secret
consultations, and the diligence of the magistrates was animated
by the presence of their sovereigns., After Diocletian had
divested himself of the purple, Italy and Africa were
administered under the name of Severus, and were exposed, without
defence, to the implacable resentment of his master Galerius.
Among the martyrs of Rome, Adauctus deserves the notice of
posterity. He was of a noble family in Italy, and had raised
himself, through the successive honors of the palace, to the
important office of treasurer of the private Jemesnes. Adauctus
is the more remarkable for being the only person of rank and
distinction who appears to have suffered death, during the whole
course of this general persecution.<br>
</p>

<p>The revolt of Maxentius immediately restored peace to the
churches of Italy and Africa; and the same tyrant who oppressed
every other class of his subjects, showed himself just, humane,
and even partial, towards the afflicted Christians. He depended
on their gratitude and affection, and very naturally presumed,
that the injuries which they had suffered, and the dangers which
they still apprehended from his most inveterate enemy, would
secure the fidelity of a party already considerable by their
numbers and opulence. Even the conduct of Maxentius towards the
bishops of Rome and Carthage may be considered as the proof of
his toleration, since it is probable that the most orthodox
princes would adopt the same measures with regard to their
established clergy. Marcellus, the former of these prelates, had
thrown the capital into confusion, by the severe penance which he
imposed on a great number of Christians, who, during the late
persecution, had renounced or dissembled their religion. The rage
of faction broke out in frequent and violent seditions; the blood
of the faithful was shed by each other's hands, and the exile of
Marcellus, whose prudence seems to have been less eminent than
his zeal, was found to be the only measure capable of restoring
peace to the distracted church of Rome. The behavior of
Mensurius, bishop of Carthage, appears to have been still more
reprehensible. A deacon of that city had published a libel
against the emperor. The offender took refuge in the episcopal
palace; and though it was somewhat early to advance any claims of
ecclesiastical immunities, the bishop refused to deliver him up
to the officers of justice. For this treasonable resistance,
Mensurius was summoned to court, and instead of receiving a legal
sentence of death or banishment, he was permitted, after a short
examination, to return to his diocese. Such was the happy
condition of the Christian subjects of Maxentius, that whenever
they were desirous of procuring for their own use any bodies of
martyrs, they were obliged to purchase them from the most distant
provinces of the East. A story is related of Agl&aelig;, a Roman
lady, descended from a consular family, and possessed of so ample
an estate, that it required the management of seventy-three
stewards. Among these Boniface was the favorite of his mistress;
and as Agl&aelig; mixed love with devotion, it is reported that
he was admitted to share her bed. Her fortune enabled her to
gratify the pious desire of obtaining some sacred relics from the
East. She intrusted Boniface with a considerable sum of gold, and
a large quantity of aromatics; and her lover, attended by twelve
horsemen and three covered chariots, undertook a remote
pilgrimage, as far as Tarsus in Cilicia.<br>
</p>

<p>The sanguinary temper of Galerius, the first and principal
author of the persecution, was formidable to those Christians
whom their misfortunes had placed within the limits of his
dominions; and it may fairly be presumed that many persons of a
middle rank, who were not confined by the chains either of wealth
or of poverty, very frequently deserted their native country, and
sought a refuge in the milder climate of the West. As long as he
commanded only the armies and provinces of Illyricum, he could
with difficulty either find or make a considerable number of
martyrs, in a warlike country, which had entertained the
missionaries of the gospel with more coldness and reluctance than
any other part of the empire. But when Galerius had obtained the
supreme power, and the government of the East, he indulged in
their fullest extent his zeal and cruelty, not only in the
provinces of Thrace and Asia, which acknowledged his immediate
jurisdiction, but in those of Syria, Palestine, and Egypt, where
Maximin gratified his own inclination, by yielding a rigorous
obedience to the stern commands of his benefactor. The frequent
disappointments of his ambitious views, the experience of six
years of persecution, and the salutary reflections which a
lingering and painful distemper suggested to the mind of
Galerius, at length convinced him that the most violent efforts
of despotism are insufficient to extirpate a whole people, or to
subdue their religious prejudices. Desirous of repairing the
mischief that he had occasioned, he published in his own name,
and in those of Licinius and Constantine, a general edict, which,
after a pompous recital of the Imperial titles, proceeded in the
following manner: --<br>
</p>

<p>"Among the important cares which have occupied our mind for
the utility and preservation of the empire, it was our intention
to correct and reestablish all things according to the ancient
laws and public discipline of the Romans. We were particularly
desirous of reclaiming into the way of reason and nature, the
deluded Christians who had renounced the religion and ceremonies
instituted by their fathers; and presumptuously despising the
practice of antiquity, had invented extravagant laws and
opinions, according to the dictates of their fancy, and had
collected a various society from the different provinces of our
empire. The edicts, which we have published to enforce the
worship of the gods, having exposed many of the Christians to
danger and distress, many having suffered death, and many more,
who still persist in their impious folly, being left destitute of
<strong><em>any</em></strong> public exercise of religion, we are
disposed to extend to those unhappy men the effects of our wonted
clemency. We permit them therefore freely to profess their
private opinions, and to assemble in their conventicles without
fear or molestation, provided always that they preserve a due
respect to the established laws and government. By another
rescript we shall signify our intentions to the judges and
magistrates; and we hope that our indulgence will engage the
Christians to offer up their prayers to the Deity whom they
adore, for our safety and prosperity for their own, and for that
of the republic." It is not usually in the language of edicts and
manifestos that we should search for the real character or the
secret motives of princes; but as these were the words of a dying
emperor, his situation, perhaps, may be admitted as a pledge of
his sincerity.<br>
</p>

<p>When Galerius subscribed this edict of toleration, he was well
assured that Licinius would readily comply with the inclinations
of his friend and benefactor, and that any measures in favor of
the Christians would obtain the approbation of Constantine. But
the emperor would not venture to insert in the preamble the name
of Maximin, whose consent was of the greatest importance, and who
succeeded a few days afterwards to the provinces of Asia. In the
first six months, however, of his new reign, Maximin affected to
adopt the prudent counsels of his predecessor; and though he
never condescended to secure the tranquillity of the church by a
public edict, Sabinus, his Pr&aelig;torian pr&aelig;fect,
addressed a circular letter to all the governors and magistrates
of the provinces, expatiating on the Imperial clemency,
acknowledging the invincible obstinacy of the Christians, and
directing the officers of justice to cease their ineffectual
prosecutions, and to connive at the secret assemblies of those
enthusiasts. In consequence of these orders, great numbers of
Christians were released from prison, or delivered from the
mines. The confessors, singing hymns of triumph, returned into
their own countries; and those who had yielded to the violence of
the tempest, solicited with tears of repentance their readmission
into the bosom of the church.<br>
</p>

<p>But this treacherous calm was of short duration; nor could the
Christians of the East place any confidence in the character of
their sovereign. Cruelty and superstition were the ruling
passions of the soul of Maximin. The former suggested the means,
the latter pointed out the objects of persecution. The emperor
was devoted to the worship of the gods, to the study of magic,
and to the belief of oracles. The prophets or philosophers, whom
he revered as the favorites of Heaven, were frequently raised to
the government of provinces, and admitted into his most secret
councils. They easily convinced him that the Christians had been
indebted for their victories to their regular discipline, and
that the weakness of polytheism had principally flowed from a
want of union and subordination among the ministers of religion.
A system of government was therefore instituted, which was
evidently copied from the policy of the church. In all the great
cities of the empire, the temples were repaired and beautified by
the order of Maximin, and the officiating priests of the various
deities were subjected to the authority of a superior pontiff
destined to oppose the bishop, and to promote the cause of
paganism. These pontiffs acknowledged, in their turn, the supreme
jurisdiction of the metropolitans or high priests of the
province, who acted as the immediate vicegerents of the emperor
himself. A white robe was the ensign of their dignity; and these
new prelates were carefully selected from the most noble and
opulent families. By the influence of the magistrates, and of the
sacerdotal order, a great number of dutiful addresses were
obtained, particularly from the cities of Nicomedia, Antioch, and
Tyre, which artfully represented the well-known intentions of the
court as the general sense of the people; solicited the emperor
to consult the laws of justice rather than the dictates of his
clemency; expressed their abhorrence of the Christians, and
humbly prayed that those impious sectaries might at least be
excluded from the limits of their respective territories. The
answer of Maximin to the address which he obtained from the
citizens of Tyre is still extant. He praises their zeal and
devotion in terms of the highest satisfaction, descants on the
obstinate impiety of the Christians, and betrays, by the
readiness with which he consents to their banishment, that he
considered himself as receiving, rather than as conferring, an
obligation. The priests as well as the magistrates were empowered
to enforce the execution of his edicts, which were engraved on
tables of brass; and though it was recommended to them to avoid
the effusion of blood, the most cruel and ignominious punishments
were inflicted on the refractory Christians.<br>
</p>

<p>The Asiatic Christians had every thing to dread from the
severity of a bigoted monarch who prepared his measures of
violence with such deliberate policy. But a few months had
scarcely elapsed before the edicts published by the two Western
emperors obliged Maximin to suspend the prosecution of his
designs: the civil war which he so rashly undertook against
Licinius employed all his attention; and the defeat and death of
Maximin soon delivered the church from the last and most
implacable of her enemies.<br>
</p>

<p>In this general view of the persecution, which was first
authorized by the edicts of Diocletian, I have purposely
refrained from describing the particular sufferings and deaths of
the Christian martyrs. It would have been an easy task, from the
history of Eusebius, from the declamations of Lactantius, and
from the most ancient acts, to collect a long series of horrid
and disgustful pictures, and to fill many pages with racks and
scourges, with iron hooks and red-hot beds, and with all the
variety of tortures which fire and steel, savage beasts, and more
savage executioners, could inflict upon the human body. These
melancholy scenes might be enlivened by a crowd of visions and
miracles destined either to delay the death, to celebrate the
triumph, or to discover the relics of those canonized saints who
suffered for the name of Christ. But I cannot determine what I
ought to transcribe, till I am satisfied how much I ought to
believe. The gravest of the ecclesiastical historians, Eusebius
himself, indirectly confesses, that he has related whatever might
redound to the glory, and that he has suppressed all that could
tend to the disgrace, of religion. Such an acknowledgment will
naturally excite a suspicion that a writer who has so openly
violated one of the fundamental laws of history, has not paid a
very strict regard to the observance of the other; and the
suspicion will derive additional credit from the character of
Eusebius, * which was less tinctured with credulity, and more
practised in the arts of courts, than that of almost any of his
contemporaries. On some particular occasions, when the
magistrates were exasperated by some personal motives of interest
or resentment, the rules of prudence, and perhaps of decency, to
overturn the altars, to pour out imprecations against the
emperors, or to strike the judge as he sat on his tribunal, it
may be presumed, that every mode of torture which cruelty could
invent, or constancy could endure, was exhausted on those devoted
victims. Two circumstances, however, have been unwarily
mentioned, which insinuate that the general treatment of the
Christians, who had been apprehended by the officers of justice,
was less intolerable than it is usually imagined to have been. 1.
The confessors who were condemned to work in the mines were
permitted by the humanity or the negligence of their keepers to
build chapels, and freely to profess their religion in the midst
of those dreary habitations. 2. The bishops were obliged to check
and to censure the forward zeal of the Christians, who
voluntarily threw themselves into the hands of the magistrates.
Some of these were persons oppressed by poverty and debts, who
blindly sought to terminate a miserable existence by a glorious
death. Others were allured by the hope that a short confinement
would expiate the sins of a whole life; and others again were
actuated by the less honorable motive of deriving a plentiful
subsistence, and perhaps a considerable profit, from the alms
which the charity of the faithful bestowed on the prisoners.
After the church had triumphed over all her enemies, the interest
as well as vanity of the captives prompted them to magnify the
merit of their respective sufferings. A convenient distance of
time or place gave an ample scope to the progress of fiction; and
the frequent instances which might be alleged of holy martyrs,
whose wounds had been instantly healed, whose strength had been
renewed, and whose lost members had miraculously been restored,
were extremely convenient for the purpose of removing every
difficulty, and of silencing every objection. The most
extravagant legends, as they conduced to the honor of the church,
were applauded by the credulous multitude, countenanced by the
power of the clergy, and attested by the suspicious evidence of
ecclesiastical history.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XVI: Conduct Towards The Christians, From
Nero To Constantine. -- Part VIII.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>The vague descriptions of exile and imprisonment, of pain and
torture, are so easily exaggerated or softened by the pencil of
an artful orator, * that we are naturally induced to inquire into
a fact of a more distinct and stubborn kind; the number of
persons who suffered death in consequence of the edicts published
by Diocletian, his associates, and his successors. The recent
legendaries record whole armies and cities, which were at once
swept away by the undistinguishing rage of persecution. The more
ancient writers content themselves with pouring out a liberal
effusion of loose and tragical invectives, without condescending
to ascertain the precise number of those persons who were
permitted to seal with their blood their belief of the gospel.
From the history of Eusebius, it may, however, be collected, that
only nine bishops were punished with death; and we are assured,
by his particular enumeration of the martyrs of Palestine, that
no more than ninety-two Christians were entitled to that
honorable appellation. As we are unacquainted with the degree of
episcopal zeal and courage which prevailed at that time, it is
not in our power to draw any useful inferences from the former of
these facts: but the latter may serve to justify a very important
and probable conclusion. According to the distribution of Roman
provinces, Palestine may be considered as the sixteenth part of
the Eastern empire: and since there were some governors, who from
a real or affected clemency had preserved their hands unstained
with the blood of the faithful, it is reasonable to believe, that
the country which had given birth to Christianity, produced at
least the sixteenth part of the martyrs who suffered death within
the dominions of Galerius and Maximin; the whole might
consequently amount to about fifteen hundred, a number which, if
it is equally divided between the ten years of the persecution,
will allow an annual consumption of one hundred and fifty
martyrs. Allotting the same proportion to the provinces of Italy,
Africa, and perhaps Spain, where, at the end of two or three
years, the rigor of the penal laws was either suspended or
abolished, the multitude of Christians in the Roman empire, on
whom a capital punishment was inflicted by a judicial, sentence,
will be reduced to somewhat less than two thousand persons. Since
it cannot be doubted that the Christians were more numerous, and
their enemies more exasperated, in the time of Diocletian, than
they had ever been in any former persecution, this probable and
moderate computation may teach us to estimate the number of
primitive saints and martyrs who sacrificed their lives for the
important purpose of introducing Christianity into the world.<br>
</p>

<p>We shall conclude this chapter by a melancholy truth, which
obtrudes itself on the reluctant mind; that even admitting,
without hesitation or inquiry, all that history has recorded, or
devotion has feigned, on the subject of martyrdoms, it must still
be acknowledged, that the Christians, in the course of their
intestine dissensions, have inflicted far greater severities on
each other, than they had experienced from the zeal of infidels.
During the ages of ignorance which followed the subversion of the
Roman empire in the West, the bishops of the Imperial city
extended their dominion over the laity as well as clergy of the
Latin church. The fabric of superstition which they had erected,
and which might long have defied the feeble efforts of reason,
was at length assaulted by a crowd of daring fanatics, who from
the twelfth to the sixteenth century assumed the popular
character of reformers. The church of Rome defended by violence
the empire which she had acquired by fraud; a system of peace and
benevolence was soon disgraced by proscriptions, war, massacres,
and the institution of the holy office. And as the reformers were
animated by the love of civil as well as of religious freedom,
the Catholic princes connected their own interest with that of
the clergy, and enforced by fire and the sword the terrors of
spiritual censures. In the Netherlands alone, more than one
hundred thousand of the subjects of Charles V. are said to have
suffered by the hand of the executioner; and this extraordinary
number is attested by Grotius, a man of genius and learning, who
preserved his moderation amidst the fury of contending sects, and
who composed the annals of his own age and country, at a time
when the invention of printing had facilitated the means of
intelligence, and increased the danger of detection. If we are
obliged to submit our belief to the authority of Grotius, it must
be allowed, that the number of Protestants, who were executed in
a single province and a single reign, far exceeded that of the
primitive martyrs in the space of three centuries, and of the
Roman empire. But if the improbability of the fact itself should
prevail over the weight of evidence; if Grotius should be
convicted of exaggerating the merit and sufferings of the
Reformers; we shall be naturally led to inquire what confidence
can be placed in the doubtful and imperfect monuments of ancient
credulity; what degree of credit can be assigned to a courtly
bishop, and a passionate declaimer, * who, under the protection
of Constantine, enjoyed the exclusive privilege of recording the
persecutions inflicted on the Christians by the vanquished rivals
or disregarded predecessors of their gracious sovereign.<br>
</p>

<p><strong>Chapter XVII: Foundation Of
Constantinople.</strong><br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Part I.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>Foundation Of Constantinople. -- Political System Constantine,
And His Successors. -- Military Discipline. -- The Palace. -- The
Finances.<br>
</p>

<p>The unfortunate Licinius was the last rival who opposed the
greatness, and the last captive who adorned the triumph, of
Constantine. After a tranquil and prosperous reign, the conqueror
bequeathed to his family the inheritance of the Roman empire; a
new capital, a new policy, and a new religion; and the
innovations which he established have been embraced and
consecrated by succeeding generations. The age of the great
Constantine and his sons is filled with important events; but the
historian must be oppressed by their number and variety, unless
he diligently separates from each other the scenes which are
connected only by the order of time. He will describe the
political institutions that gave strength and stability to the
empire, before he proceeds to relate the wars and revolutions
which hastened its decline. He will adopt the division unknown to
the ancients of civil and ecclesiastical affairs: the victory of
the Christians, and their intestine discord, will supply copious
and distinct materials both for edification and for scandal.<br>
</p>

<p>After the defeat and abdication of Licinius, his victorious
rival proceeded to lay the foundations of a city destined to
reign in future times, the mistress of the East, and to survive
the empire and religion of Constantine. The motives, whether of
pride or of policy, which first induced Diocletian to withdraw
himself from the ancient seat of government, had acquired
additional weight by the example of his successors, and the
habits of forty years. Rome was insensibly confounded with the
dependent kingdoms which had once acknowledged her supremacy; and
the country of the C&aelig;sars was viewed with cold indifference
by a martial prince, born in the neighborhood of the Danube,
educated in the courts and armies of Asia, and invested with the
purple by the legions of Britain. The Italians, who had received
Constantine as their deliverer, submissively obeyed the edicts
which he sometimes condescended to address to the senate and
people of Rome; but they were seldom honored with the presence of
their new sovereign. During the vigor of his age, Constantine,
according to the various exigencies of peace and war, moved with
slow dignity, or with active diligence, along the frontiers of
his extensive dominions; and was always prepared to take the
field either against a foreign or a domestic enemy. But as he
gradually reached the summit of prosperity and the decline of
life, he began to meditate the design of fixing in a more
permanent station the strength as well as majesty of the throne.
In the choice of an advantageous situation, he preferred the
confines of Europe and Asia; to curb with a powerful arm the
barbarians who dwelt between the Danube and the Tanais; to watch
with an eye of jealousy the conduct of the Persian monarch, who
indignantly supported the yoke of an ignominious treaty. With
these views, Diocletian had selected and embellished the
residence of Nicomedia: but the memory of Diocletian was justly
abhorred by the protector of the church: and Constantine was not
insensible to the ambition of founding a city which might
perpetuate the glory of his own name. During the late operations
of the war against Licinius, he had sufficient opportunity to
contemplate, both as a soldier and as a statesman, the
incomparable position of Byzantium; and to observe how strongly
it was guarded by nature against a hostile attack, whilst it was
accessible on every side to the benefits of commercial
intercourse. Many ages before Constantine, one of the most
judicious historians of antiquity had described the advantages of
a situation, from whence a feeble colony of Greeks derived the
command of the sea, and the honors of a flourishing and
independent republic.<br>
</p>

<p>If we survey Byzantium in the extent which it acquired with
the august name of Constantinople, the figure of the Imperial
city may be represented under that of an unequal triangle. The
obtuse point, which advances towards the east and the shores of
Asia, meets and repels the waves of the Thracian Bosphorus. The
northern side of the city is bounded by the harbor; and the
southern is washed by the Propontis, or Sea of Marmara. The basis
of the triangle is opposed to the west, and terminates the
continent of Europe. But the admirable form and division of the
circumjacent land and water cannot, without a more ample
explanation, be clearly or sufficiently understood.<br>
</p>

<p>The winding channel through which the waters of the Euxine
flow with a rapid and incessant course towards the Mediterranean,
received the appellation of Bosphorus, a name not less celebrated
in the history, than in the fables, of antiquity. A crowd of
temples and of votive altars, profusely scattered along its steep
and woody banks, attested the unskilfulness, the terrors, and the
devotion of the Grecian navigators, who, after the example of the
Argonauts, explored the dangers of the inhospitable Euxine. On
these banks tradition long preserved the memory of the palace of
Phineus, infested by the obscene harpies; and of the sylvan reign
of Amycus, who defied the son of Leda to the combat of the
cestus. The straits of the Bosphorus are terminated by the
Cyanean rocks, which, according to the description of the poets,
had once floated on the face of the waters; and were destined by
the gods to protect the entrance of the Euxine against the eye of
profane curiosity. From the Cyanean rocks to the point and harbor
of Byzantium, the winding length of the Bosphorus extends about
sixteen miles, and its most ordinary breadth may be computed at
about one mile and a half. The <strong><em>new</em></strong>
castles of Europe and Asia are constructed, on either continent,
upon the foundations of two celebrated temples, of Serapis and of
Jupiter Urius. The <strong><em>old</em></strong>castles, a work
of the Greek emperors, command the narrowest part of the channel
in a place where the opposite banks advance within five hundred
paces of each other. These fortresses were destroyed and
strengthened by Mahomet the Second, when he meditated the siege
of Constantinople: but the Turkish conqueror was most probably
ignorant, that near two thousand years before his reign,
continents by a bridge of boats. At a small distance from the old
castles we discover the little town of Chrysopolis, or Scutari,
which may almost be considered as the Asiatic suburb of
Constantinople. The Bosphorus, as it begins to open into the
Propontis, passes between Byzantium and Chalcedon. The latter of
those cities was built by the Greeks, a few years before the
former; and the blindness of its founders, who overlooked the
superior advantages of the opposite coast, has been stigmatized
by a proverbial expression of contempt.<br>
</p>

<p>The harbor of Constantinople, which may be considered as an
arm of the Bosphorus, obtained, in a very remote period, the
denomination of the <strong><em>Golden Horn</em></strong>. The
curve which it describes might be compared to the horn of a stag,
or as it should seem, with more propriety, to that of an ox. The
epithet of <strong><em>golden</em></strong> was expressive of the
riches which every wind wafted from the most distant countries
into the secure and capacious port of Constantinople. The River
Lycus, formed by the conflux of two little streams, pours into
the harbor a perpetual supply of fresh water, which serves to
cleanse the bottom, and to invite the periodical shoals of fish
to seek their retreat in that convenient recess. As the
vicissitudes of tides are scarcely felt in those seas, the
constant depth of the harbor allows goods to be landed on the
quays without the assistance of boats; and it has been observed,
that in many places the largest vessels may rest their prows
against the houses, while their sterns are floating in the water.
From the mouth of the Lycus to that of the harbor, this arm of
the Bosphorus is more than seven miles in length. The entrance is
about five hundred yards broad, and a strong chain could be
occasionally drawn across it, to guard the port and city from the
attack of a hostile navy.<br>
</p>

<p>Between the Bosphorus and the Hellespont, the shores of Europe
and Asia, receding on either side, enclose the sea of Marmara,
which was known to the ancients by the denomination of Propontis.
The navigation from the issue of the Bosphorus to the entrance of
the Hellespont is about one hundred and twenty miles. Those who
steer their westward course through the middle of the Propontis,
amt at once descry the high lands of Thrace and Bithynia, and
never lose sight of the lofty summit of Mount Olympus, covered
with eternal snows. They leave on the left a deep gulf, at the
bottom of which Nicomedia was seated, the Imperial residence of
Diocletian; and they pass the small islands of Cyzicus and
Proconnesus before they cast anchor at Gallipoli; where the sea,
which separates Asia from Europe, is again contracted into a
narrow channel.<br>
</p>

<p>The geographers who, with the most skilful accuracy, have
surveyed the form and extent of the Hellespont, assign about
sixty miles for the winding course, and about three miles for the
ordinary breadth of those celebrated straits. But the narrowest
part of the channel is found to the northward of the old Turkish
castles between the cities of Sestus and Abydus. It was here that
the adventurous Leander braved the passage of the flood for the
possession of his mistress. It was here likewise, in a place
where the distance between the opposite banks cannot exceed five
hundred paces, that Xerxes imposed a stupendous bridge of boats,
for the purpose of transporting into Europe a hundred and seventy
myriads of barbarians. A sea contracted within such narrow limits
may seem but ill to deserve the singular epithet of
<strong><em>broad</em></strong>, which Homer, as well as Orpheus,
has frequently bestowed on the Hellespont. * But our ideas of
greatness are of a relative nature: the traveller, and especially
the poet, who sailed along the Hellespont, who pursued the
windings of the stream, and contemplated the rural scenery, which
appeared on every side to terminate the prospect, insensibly lost
the remembrance of the sea; and his fancy painted those
celebrated straits, with all the attributes of a mighty river
flowing with a swift current, in the midst of a woody and inland
country, and at length, through a wide mouth, discharging itself
into the &AElig;gean or Archipelago. Ancient Troy, seated on a an
eminence at the foot of Mount Ida, overlooked the mouth of the
Hellespont, which scarcely received an accession of waters from
the tribute of those immortal rivulets the Simois and Scamander.
The Grecian camp had stretched twelve miles along the shore from
the Sig&aelig;an to the Rh&aelig;tean promontory; and the flanks
of the army were guarded by the bravest chiefs who fought under
the banners of Agamemnon. The first of those promontories was
occupied by Achilles with his invincible myrmidons, and the
dauntless Ajax pitched his tents on the other. After Ajax had
fallen a sacrifice to his disappointed pride, and to the
ingratitude of the Greeks, his sepulchre was erected on the
ground where he had defended the navy against the rage of Jove
and of Hector; and the citizens of the rising town of
Rh&aelig;teum celebrated his memory with divine honors. Before
Constantine gave a just preference to the situation of Byzantium,
he had conceived the design of erecting the seat of empire on
this celebrated spot, from whence the Romans derived their
fabulous origin. The extensive plain which lies below ancient
Troy, towards the Rh&aelig;tean promontory and the tomb of Ajax,
was first chosen for his new capital; and though the undertaking
was soon relinquished the stately remains of unfinished walls and
towers attracted the notice of all who sailed through the straits
of the Hellespont.<br>
</p>

<p>We are at present qualified to view the advantageous position
of Constantinople; which appears to have been formed by nature
for the centre and capital of a great monarchy. Situated in the
forty-first degree of latitude, the Imperial city commanded, from
her seven hills, the opposite shores of Europe and Asia; the
climate was healthy and temperate, the soil fertile, the harbor
secure and capacious; and the approach on the side of the
continent was of small extent and easy defence. The Bosphorus and
the Hellespont may be considered as the two gates of
Constantinople; and the prince who possessed those important
passages could always shut them against a naval enemy, and open
them to the fleets of commerce. The preservation of the eastern
provinces may, in some degree, be ascribed to the policy of
Constantine, as the barbarians of the Euxine, who in the
preceding age had poured their armaments into the heart of the
Mediterranean, soon desisted from the exercise of piracy, and
despaired of forcing this insurmountable barrier. When the gates
of the Hellespont and Bosphorus were shut, the capital still
enjoyed within their spacious enclosure every production which
could supply the wants, or gratify the luxury, of its numerous
inhabitants. The sea-coasts of Thrace and Bithynia, which
languish under the weight of Turkish oppression, still exhibit a
rich prospect of vineyards, of gardens, and of plentiful
harvests; and the Propontis has ever been renowned for an
inexhaustible store of the most exquisite fish, that are taken in
their stated seasons, without skill, and almost without labor.
But when the passages of the straits were thrown open for trade,
they alternately admitted the natural and artificial riches of
the north and south, of the Euxine, and of the Mediterranean.
Whatever rude commodities were collected in the forests of
Germany and Scythia, and far as the sources of the Tanais and the
Borysthenes; whatsoever was manufactured by the skill of Europe
or Asia; the corn of Egypt, and the gems and spices of the
farthest India, were brought by the varying winds into the port
of Constantinople, which for many ages attracted the commerce of
the ancient world.<br>
</p>

<p>[See Basilica Of Constantinople]<br>
</p>

<p>The prospect of beauty, of safety, and of wealth, united in a
single spot, was sufficient to justify the choice of Constantine.
But as some decent mixture of prodigy and fable has, in every
age, been supposed to reflect a becoming majesty on the origin of
great cities, the emperor was desirous of ascribing his
resolution, not so much to the uncertain counsels of human
policy, as to the infallible and eternal decrees of divine
wisdom. In one of his laws he has been careful to instruct
posterity, that in obedience to the commands of God, he laid the
everlasting foundations of Constantinople: and though he has not
condescended to relate in what manner the celestial inspiration
was communicated to his mind, the defect of his modest silence
has been liberally supplied by the ingenuity of succeeding
writers; who describe the nocturnal vision which appeared to the
fancy of Constantine, as he slept within the walls of Byzantium.
The tutelar genius of the city, a venerable matron sinking under
the weight of years and infirmities, was suddenly transformed
into a blooming maid, whom his own hands adorned with all the
symbols of Imperial greatness. The monarch awoke, interpreted the
auspicious omen, and obeyed, without hesitation, the will of
Heaven The day which gave birth to a city or colony was
celebrated by the Romans with such ceremonies as had been
ordained by a generous superstition; and though Constantine might
omit some rites which savored too strongly of their Pagan origin,
yet he was anxious to leave a deep impression of hope and respect
on the minds of the spectators. On foot, with a lance in his
hand, the emperor himself led the solemn procession; and directed
the line, which was traced as the boundary of the destined
capital: till the growing circumference was observed with
astonishment by the assistants, who, at length, ventured to
observe, that he had already exceeded the most ample measure of a
great city. "I shall still advance," replied Constantine, "till
He, the invisible guide who marches before me, thinks proper to
stop." Without presuming to investigate the nature or motives of
this extraordinary conductor, we shall content ourselves with the
more humble task of describing the extent and limits of
Constantinople.<br>
</p>

<p>In the actual state of the city, the palace and gardens of the
Seraglio occupy the eastern promontory, the first of the seven
hills, and cover about one hundred and fifty acres of our own
measure. The seat of Turkish jealousy and despotism is erected on
the foundations of a Grecian republic; but it may be supposed
that the Byzantines were tempted by the conveniency of the harbor
to extend their habitations on that side beyond the modern limits
of the Seraglio. The new walls of Constantine stretched from the
port to the Propontis across the enlarged breadth of the
triangle, at the distance of fifteen stadia from the ancient
fortification; and with the city of Byzantium they enclosed five
of the seven hills, which, to the eyes of those who approach
Constantinople, appear to rise above each other in beautiful
order. About a century after the death of the founder, the new
buildings, extending on one side up the harbor, and on the other
along the Propontis, already covered the narrow ridge of the
sixth, and the broad summit of the seventh hill. The necessity of
protecting those suburbs from the incessant inroads of the
barbarians engaged the younger Theodosius to surround his capital
with an adequate and permanent enclosure of walls. From the
eastern promontory to the golden gate, the extreme length of
Constantinople was about three Roman miles; the circumference
measured between ten and eleven; and the surface might be
computed as equal to about two thousand English acres. It is
impossible to justify the vain and credulous exaggerations of
modern travellers, who have sometimes stretched the limits of
Constantinople over the adjacent villages of the European, and
even of the Asiatic coast. But the suburbs of Pera and Galata,
though situate beyond the harbor, may deserve to be considered as
a part of the city; and this addition may perhaps authorize the
measure of a Byzantine historian, who assigns sixteen Greek
(about fourteen Roman) miles for the circumference of his native
city. Such an extent may not seem unworthy of an Imperial
residence. Yet Constantinople must yield to Babylon and Thebes,
to ancient Rome, to London, and even to Paris.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XVII: Foundation Of Constantinople. --
Part II.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>The master of the Roman world, who aspired to erect an eternal
monument of the glories of his reign could employ in the
prosecution of that great work, the wealth, the labor, and all
that yet remained of the genius of obedient millions. Some
estimate may be formed of the expense bestowed with Imperial
liberality on the foundation of Constantinople, by the allowance
of about two millions five hundred thousand pounds for the
construction of the walls, the porticos, and the aqueducts. The
forests that overshadowed the shores of the Euxine, and the
celebrated quarries of white marble in the little island of
Proconnesus, supplied an inexhaustible stock of materials, ready
to be conveyed, by the convenience of a short water carriage, to
the harbor of Byzantium. A multitude of laborers and artificers
urged the conclusion of the work with incessant toil: but the
impatience of Constantine soon discovered, that, in the decline
of the arts, the skill as well as numbers of his architects bore
a very unequal proportion to the greatness of his designs. The
magistrates of the most distant provinces were therefore directed
to institute schools, to appoint professors, and by the hopes of
rewards and privileges, to engage in the study and practice of
architecture a sufficient number of ingenious youths, who had
received a liberal education. The buildings of the new city were
executed by such artificers as the reign of Constantine could
afford; but they were decorated by the hands of the most
celebrated masters of the age of Pericles and Alexander. To
revive the genius of Phidias and Lysippus, surpassed indeed the
power of a Roman emperor; but the immortal productions which they
had bequeathed to posterity were exposed without defence to the
rapacious vanity of a despot. By his commands the cities of
Greece and Asia were despoiled of their most valuable ornaments.
The trophies of memorable wars, the objects of religious
veneration, the most finished statues of the gods and heroes, of
the sages and poets, of ancient times, contributed to the
splendid triumph of Constantinople; and gave occasion to the
remark of the historian Cedrenus, who observes, with some
enthusiasm, that nothing seemed wanting except the souls of the
illustrious men whom these admirable monuments were intended to
represent. But it is not in the city of Constantine, nor in the
declining period of an empire, when the human mind was depressed
by civil and religious slavery, that we should seek for the souls
of Homer and of Demosthenes.<br>
</p>

<p>During the siege of Byzantium, the conqueror had pitched his
tent on the commanding eminence of the second hill. To perpetuate
the memory of his success, he chose the same advantageous
position for the principal Forum; which appears to have been of a
circular, or rather elliptical form. The two opposite entrances
formed triumphal arches; the porticos, which enclosed it on every
side, were filled with statues; and the centre of the Forum was
occupied by a lofty column, of which a mutilated fragment is now
degraded by the appellation of the <strong><em>burnt
pillar</em></strong>. This column was erected on a pedestal of
white marble twenty feet high; and was composed of ten pieces of
porphyry, each of which measured about ten feet in height, and
about thirty-three in circumference. On the summit of the pillar,
above one hundred and twenty feet from the ground, stood the
colossal statue of Apollo. It was a bronze, had been transported
either from Athens or from a town of Phrygia, and was supposed to
be the work of Phidias. The artist had represented the god of
day, or, as it was afterwards interpreted, the emperor
Constantine himself, with a sceptre in his right hand, the globe
of the world in his left, and a crown of rays glittering on his
head. The Circus, or Hippodrome, was a stately building about
four hundred paces in length, and one hundred in breadth. The
space between the two met or goals were filled with statues and
obelisks; and we may still remark a very singular fragment of
antiquity; the bodies of three serpents, twisted into one pillar
of brass. Their triple heads had once supported the golden tripod
which, after the defeat of Xerxes, was consecrated in the temple
of Delphi by the victorious Greeks. The beauty of the Hippodrome
has been long since defaced by the rude hands of the Turkish
conquerors; but, under the similar appellation of Atmeidan, it
still serves as a place of exercise for their horses. From the
throne, whence the emperor viewed the Circensian games, a winding
staircase descended to the palace; a magnificent edifice, which
scarcely yielded to the residence of Rome itself, and which,
together with the dependent courts, gardens, and porticos,
covered a considerable extent of ground upon the banks of the
Propontis between the Hippodrome and the church of St. Sophia. We
might likewise celebrate the baths, which still retained the name
of Zeuxippus, after they had been enriched, by the munificence of
Constantine, with lofty columns, various marbles, and above
threescore statues of bronze. But we should deviate from the
design of this history, if we attempted minutely to describe the
different buildings or quarters of the city. It may be sufficient
to observe, that whatever could adorn the dignity of a great
capital, or contribute to the benefit or pleasure of its numerous
inhabitants, was contained within the walls of Constantinople. A
particular description, composed about a century after its
foundation, enumerates a capitol or school of learning, a circus,
two theatres, eight public, and one hundred and fifty-three
private baths, fifty-two porticos, five granaries, eight
aqueducts or reservoirs of water, four spacious halls for the
meetings of the senate or courts of justice, fourteen churches,
fourteen palaces, and four thousand three hundred and
eighty-eight houses, which, for their size or beauty, deserved to
be distinguished from the multitude of plebeian inhabitants.<br>
</p>

<p>The populousness of his favored city was the next and most
serious object of the attention of its founder. In the dark ages
which succeeded the translation of the empire, the remote and the
immediate consequences of that memorable event were strangely
confounded by the vanity of the Greeks and the credulity of the
Latins. It was asserted, and believed, that all the noble
families of Rome, the senate, and the equestrian order, with
their innumerable attendants, had followed their emperor to the
banks of the Propontis; that a spurious race of strangers and
plebeians was left to possess the solitude of the ancient
capital; and that the lands of Italy, long since converted into
gardens, were at once deprived of cultivation and inhabitants. In
the course of this history, such exaggerations will be reduced to
their just value: yet, since the growth of Constantinople cannot
be ascribed to the general increase of mankind and of industry,
it must be admitted that this artificial colony was raised at the
expense of the ancient cities of the empire. Many opulent
senators of Rome, and of the eastern provinces, were probably
invited by Constantine to adopt for their country the fortunate
spot, which he had chosen for his own residence. The invitations
of a master are scarcely to be distinguished from commands; and
the liberality of the emperor obtained a ready and cheerful
obedience. He bestowed on his favorites the palaces which he had
built in the several quarters of the city, assigned them lands
and pensions for the support of their dignity, and alienated the
demesnes of Pontus and Asia to grant hereditary estates by the
easy tenure of maintaining a house in the capital. But these
encouragements and obligations soon became superfluous, and were
gradually abolished. Wherever the seat of government is fixed, a
considerable part of the public revenue will be expended by the
prince himself, by his ministers, by the officers of justice, and
by the domestics of the palace. The most wealthy of the
provincials will be attracted by the powerful motives of interest
and duty, of amusement and curiosity. A third and more numerous
class of inhabitants will insensibly be formed, of servants, of
artificers, and of merchants, who derive their subsistence from
their own labor, and from the wants or luxury of the superior
ranks. In less than a century, Constantinople disputed with Rome
itself the preeminence of riches and numbers. New piles of
buildings, crowded together with too little regard to health or
convenience, scarcely allowed the intervals of narrow streets for
the perpetual throng of men, of horses, and of carriages. The
allotted space of ground was insufficient to contain the
increasing people; and the additional foundations, which, on
either side, were advanced into the sea, might alone have
composed a very considerable city.<br>
</p>

<p>The frequent and regular distributions of wine and oil, of
corn or bread, of money or provisions, had almost exempted the
poorest citizens of Rome from the necessity of labor. The
magnificence of the first C&aelig;sars was in some measure
imitated by the founder of Constantinople: but his liberality,
however it might excite the applause of the people, has in curred
the censure of posterity. A nation of legislators and conquerors
might assert their claim to the harvests of Africa, which had
been purchased with their blood; and it was artfully contrived by
Augustus, that, in the enjoyment of plenty, the Romans should
lose the memory of freedom. But the prodigality of Constantine
could not be excused by any consideration either of public or
private interest; and the annual tribute of corn imposed upon
Egypt for the benefit of his new capital, was applied to feed a
lazy and insolent populace, at the expense of the husbandmen of
an industrious province. * Some other regulations of this emperor
are less liable to blame, but they are less deserving of notice.
He divided Constantinople into fourteen regions or quarters,
dignified the public council with the appellation of senate,
communicated to the citizens the privileges of Italy, and
bestowed on the rising city the title of Colony, the first and
most favored daughter of ancient Rome. The venerable parent still
maintained the legal and acknowledged supremacy, which was due to
her age, her dignity, and to the remembrance of her former
greatness.<br>
</p>

<p>As Constantine urged the progress of the work with the
impatience of a lover, the walls, the porticos, and the principal
edifices were completed in a few years, or, according to another
account, in a few months; but this extraordinary diligence should
excite the less admiration, since many of the buildings were
finished in so hasty and imperfect a manner, that under the
succeeding reign, they were preserved with difficulty from
impending ruin. But while they displayed the vigor and freshness
of youth, the founder prepared to celebrate the dedication of his
city. The games and largesses which crowned the pomp of this
memorable festival may easily be supposed; but there is one
circumstance of a more singular and permanent nature, which ought
not entirely to be overlooked. As often as the birthday of the
city returned, the statute of Constantine, framed by his order,
of gilt wood, and bearing in his right hand a small image of the
genius of the place, was erected on a triumphal car. The guards,
carrying white tapers, and clothed in their richest apparel,
accompanied the solemn procession as it moved through the
Hippodrome. When it was opposite to the throne of the reigning
emperor, he rose from his seat, and with grateful reverence
adored the memory of his predecessor. At the festival of the
dedication, an edict, engraved on a column of marble, bestowed
the title of Second or New Rome on the city of Constantine. But
the name of Constantinople has prevailed over that honorable
epithet; and after the revolution of fourteen centuries, still
perpetuates the fame of its author.<br>
</p>

<p>The foundation of a new capital is naturally connected with
the establishment of a new form of civil and military
administration. The distinct view of the complicated system of
policy, introduced by Diocletian, improved by Constantine, and
completed by his immediate successors, may not only amuse the
fancy by the singular picture of a great empire, but will tend to
illustrate the secret and internal causes of its rapid decay. In
the pursuit of any remarkable institution, we may be frequently
led into the more early or the more recent times of the Roman
history; but the proper limits of this inquiry will be included
within a period of about one hundred and thirty years, from the
accession of Constantine to the publication of the Theodosian
code; from which, as well as from the
<strong><em>Notitia</em></strong> * of the East and West, we
derive the most copious and authentic information of the state of
the empire. This variety of objects will suspend, for some time,
the course of the narrative; but the interruption will be
censured only by those readers who are insensible to the
importance of laws and manners, while they peruse, with eager
curiosity, the transient intrigues of a court, or the accidental
event of a battle.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XVII: Foundation Of Constantinople. --
Part III.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>The manly pride of the Romans, content with substantial power,
had left to the vanity of the East the forms and ceremonies of
ostentatious greatness. But when they lost even the semblance of
those virtues which were derived from their ancient freedom, the
simplicity of Roman manners was insensibly corrupted by the
stately affectation of the courts of Asia. The distinctions of
personal merit and influence, so conspicuous in a republic, so
feeble and obscure under a monarchy, were abolished by the
despotism of the emperors; who substituted in their room a severe
subordination of rank and office from the titled slaves who were
seated on the steps of the throne, to the meanest instruments of
arbitrary power. This multitude of abject dependants was
interested in the support of the actual government from the dread
of a revolution, which might at once confound their hopes and
intercept the reward of their services. In this divine hierarchy
(for such it is frequently styled) every rank was marked with the
most scrupulous exactness, and its dignity was displayed in a
variety of trifling and solemn ceremonies, which it was a study
to learn, and a sacrilege to neglect. The purity of the Latin
language was debased, by adopting, in the intercourse of pride
and flattery, a profusion of epithets, which Tully would scarcely
have understood, and which Augustus would have rejected with
indignation. The principal officers of the empire were saluted,
even by the sovereign himself, with the deceitful titles of your
<strong><em>Sincerity</em></strong>, your
<strong><em>Gravity</em></strong>, your
<strong><em>Excellency</em></strong>, your
<strong><em>Eminence</em></strong>, your <strong><em>sublime and
wonderful Magnitude</em></strong>, your <strong><em>illustrious
and magnificent Highness</em></strong>. The codicils or patents
of their office were curiously emblazoned with such emblems as
were best adapted to explain its nature and high dignity; the
image or portrait of the reigning emperors; a triumphal car; the
book of mandates placed on a table, covered with a rich carpet,
and illuminated by four tapers; the allegorical figures of the
provinces which they governed; or the appellations and standards
of the troops whom they commanded Some of these official ensigns
were really exhibited in their hall of audience; others preceded
their pompous march whenever they appeared in public; and every
circumstance of their demeanor, their dress, their ornaments, and
their train, was calculated to inspire a deep reverence for the
representatives of supreme majesty. By a philosophic observer,
the system of the Roman government might have been mistaken for a
splendid theatre, filled with players of every character and
degree, who repeated the language, and imitated the passions, of
their original model.<br>
</p>

<p>All the magistrates of sufficient importance to find a place
in the general state of the empire, were accurately divided into
three classes. 1. The <strong><em>Illustrious</em></strong>. 2.
The <strong><em>Spectabiles</em></strong>, or
<strong><em>Respectable</em></strong>. And, 3. the
<strong><em>Clarissimi</em></strong>; whom we may translate by
the word <strong><em>Honorable</em></strong>. In the times of
Roman simplicity, the last-mentioned epithet was used only as a
vague expression of deference, till it became at length the
peculiar and appropriated title of all who were members of the
senate, and consequently of all who, from that venerable body,
were selected to govern the provinces. The vanity of those who,
from their rank and office, might claim a superior distinction
above the rest of the senatorial order, was long afterwards
indulged with the new appellation of
<strong><em>Respectable</em></strong>; but the title of
<strong><em>Illustrious</em></strong> was always reserved to some
eminent personages who were obeyed or reverenced by the two
subordinate classes. It was communicated only, I. To the consuls
and patricians; II. To the Pr&aelig;torian pr&aelig;fects, with
the pr&aelig;fects of Rome and Constantinople; III. To the
masters-general of the cavalry and the infantry; and IV. To the
seven ministers of the palace, who exercised their
<strong><em>sacred</em></strong> functions about the person of
the emperor. Among those illustrious magistrates who were
esteemed coordinate with each other, the seniority of appointment
gave place to the union of dignities. By the expedient of
honorary codicils, the emperors, who were fond of multiplying
their favors, might sometimes gratify the vanity, though not the
ambition, of impatient courtiers.<br>
</p>

<p>I. As long as the Roman consuls were the first magistrates of
a free state, they derived their right to power from the choice
of the people. As long as the emperors condescended to disguise
the servitude which they imposed, the consuls were still elected
by the real or apparent suffrage of the senate. From the reign of
Diocletian, even these vestiges of liberty were abolished, and
the successful candidates who were invested with the annual
honors of the consulship, affected to deplore the humiliating
condition of their predecessors. The Scipios and the Catos had
been reduced to solicit the votes of plebeians, to pass through
the tedious and expensive forms of a popular election, and to
expose their dignity to the shame of a public refusal; while
their own happier fate had reserved them for an age and
government in which the rewards of virtue were assigned by the
unerring wisdom of a gracious sovereign. In the epistles which
the emperor addressed to the two consuls elect, it was declared,
that they were created by his sole authority. Their names and
portraits, engraved on gilt tables of ivory, were dispersed over
the empire as presents to the provinces, the cities, the
magistrates, the senate, and the people. Their solemn
inauguration was performed at the place of the Imperial
residence; and during a period of one hundred and twenty years,
Rome was constantly deprived of the presence of her ancient
magistrates. On the morning of the first of January, the consuls
assumed the ensigns of their dignity. Their dress was a robe of
purple, embroidered in silk and gold, and sometimes ornamented
with costly gems. On this solemn occasion they were attended by
the most eminent officers of the state and army, in the habit of
senators; and the useless fasces, armed with the once formidable
axes, were borne before them by the lictors. The procession moved
from the palace to the Forum or principal square of the city;
where the consuls ascended their tribunal, and seated themselves
in the curule chairs, which were framed after the fashion of
ancient times. They immediately exercised an act of jurisdiction,
by the manumission of a slave, who was brought before them for
that purpose; and the ceremony was intended to represent the
celebrated action of the elder Brutus, the author of liberty and
of the consulship, when he admitted among his fellow-citizens the
faithful Vindex, who had revealed the conspiracy of the Tarquins.
The public festival was continued during several days in all the
principal cities in Rome, from custom; in Constantinople, from
imitation in Carthage, Antioch, and Alexandria, from the love of
pleasure, and the superfluity of wealth. In the two capitals of
the empire the annual games of the theatre, the circus, and the
amphitheatre, cost four thousand pounds of gold, (about) one
hundred and sixty thousand pounds sterling: and if so heavy an
expense surpassed the faculties or the inclinations of the
magistrates themselves, the sum was supplied from the Imperial
treasury. As soon as the consuls had discharged these customary
duties, they were at liberty to retire into the shade of private
life, and to enjoy, during the remainder of the year, the
undisturbed contemplation of their own greatness. They no longer
presided in the national councils; they no longer executed the
resolutions of peace or war. Their abilities (unless they were
employed in more effective offices) were of little moment; and
their names served only as the legal date of the year in which
they had filled the chair of Marius and of Cicero. Yet it was
still felt and acknowledged, in the last period of Roman
servitude, that this empty name might be compared, and even
preferred, to the possession of substantial power. The title of
consul was still the most splendid object of ambition, the
noblest reward of virtue and loyalty. The emperors themselves,
who disdained the faint shadow of the republic, were conscious
that they acquired an additional splendor and majesty as often as
they assumed the annual honors of the consular dignity.<br>
</p>

<p>The proudest and most perfect separation which can be found in
any age or country, between the nobles and the people, is perhaps
that of the Patricians and the Plebeians, as it was established
in the first age of the Roman republic. Wealth and honors, the
offices of the state, and the ceremonies of religion, were almost
exclusively possessed by the former who, preserving the purity of
their blood with the most insulting jealousy, held their clients
in a condition of specious vassalage. But these distinctions, so
incompatible with the spirit of a free people, were removed,
after a long struggle, by the persevering efforts of the
Tribunes. The most active and successful of the Plebeians
accumulated wealth, aspired to honors, deserved triumphs,
contracted alliances, and, after some generations, assumed the
pride of ancient nobility. The Patrician families, on the other
hand, whose original number was never recruited till the end of
the commonwealth, either failed in the ordinary course of nature,
or were extinguished in so many foreign and domestic wars, or,
through a want of merit or fortune, insensibly mingled with the
mass of the people. Very few remained who could derive their pure
and genuine origin from the infancy of the city, or even from
that of the republic, when C&aelig;sar and Augustus, Claudius and
Vespasian, created from the body of the senate a competent number
of new Patrician families, in the hope of perpetuating an order,
which was still considered as honorable and sacred. But these
artificial supplies (in which the reigning house was always
included) were rapidly swept away by the rage of tyrants, by
frequent revolutions, by the change of manners, and by the
intermixture of nations. Little more was left when Constantine
ascended the throne, than a vague and imperfect tradition, that
the Patricians had once been the first of the Romans. To form a
body of nobles, whose influence may restrain, while it secures
the authority of the monarch, would have been very inconsistent
with the character and policy of Constantine; but had he
seriously entertained such a design, it might have exceeded the
measure of his power to ratify, by an arbitrary edict, an
institution which must expect the sanction of time and of
opinion. He revived, indeed, the title of Patricians, but he
revived it as a personal, not as an hereditary distinction. They
yielded only to the transient superiority of the annual consuls;
but they enjoyed the pre-eminence over all the great officers of
state, with the most familiar access to the person of the prince.
This honorable rank was bestowed on them for life; and as they
were usually favorites, and ministers who had grown old in the
Imperial court, the true etymology of the word was perverted by
ignorance and flattery; and the Patricians of Constantine were
reverenced as the adopted <strong><em>Fathers</em></strong> of
the emperor and the republic.<br>
</p>

<p>II. The fortunes of the Pr&aelig;torian pr&aelig;fects were
essentially different from those of the consuls and Patricians.
The latter saw their ancient greatness evaporate in a vain title.
The former, rising by degrees from the most humble condition,
were invested with the civil and military administration of the
Roman world. From the reign of Severus to that of Diocletian, the
guards and the palace, the laws and the finances, the armies and
the provinces, were intrusted to their superintending care; and,
like the Viziers of the East, they held with one hand the seal,
and with the other the standard, of the empire. The ambition of
the pr&aelig;fects, always formidable, and sometimes fatal to the
masters whom they served, was supported by the strength of the
Pr&aelig;torian bands; but after those haughty troops had been
weakened by Diocletian, and finally suppressed by Constantine,
the pr&aelig;fects, who survived their fall, were reduced without
difficulty to the station of useful and obedient ministers. When
they were no longer responsible for the safety of the emperor's
person, they resigned the jurisdiction which they had hitherto
claimed and exercised over all the departments of the palace.
They were deprived by Constantine of all military command, as
soon as they had ceased to lead into the field, under their
immediate orders, the flower of the Roman troops; and at length,
by a singular revolution, the captains of the guards were
transformed into the civil magistrates of the provinces.
According to the plan of government instituted by Diocletian, the
four princes had each their Pr&aelig;torian pr&aelig;fect; and
after the monarchy was once more united in the person of
Constantine, he still continued to create the same number of Four
Pr&aelig;fects, and intrusted to their care the same provinces
which they already administered. 1. The pr&aelig;fect of the East
stretched his ample jurisdiction into the three parts of the
globe which were subject to the Romans, from the cataracts of the
Nile to the banks of the Phasis, and from the mountains of Thrace
to the frontiers of Persia. 2. The important provinces of
Pannonia, Dacia, Macedonia, and Greece, once acknowledged the
authority of the pr&aelig;fect of Illyricum. 3. The power of the
pr&aelig;fect of Italy was not confined to the country from
whence he derived his title; it extended over the additional
territory of Rh&aelig;tia as far as the banks of the Danube, over
the dependent islands of the Mediterranean, and over that part of
the continent of Africa which lies between the confines of Cyrene
and those of Tingitania. 4. The pr&aelig;fect of the Gauls
comprehended under that plural denomination the kindred provinces
of Britain and Spain, and his authority was obeyed from the wall
of Antoninus to the foot of Mount Atlas.<br>
</p>

<p>After the Pr&aelig;torian pr&aelig;fects had been dismissed
from all military command, the civil functions which they were
ordained to exercise over so many subject nations, were adequate
to the ambition and abilities of the most consummate ministers.
To their wisdom was committed the supreme administration of
justice and of the finances, the two objects which, in a state of
peace, comprehend almost all the respective duties of the
sovereign and of the people; of the former, to protect the
citizens who are obedient to the laws; of the latter, to
contribute the share of their property which is required for the
expenses of the state. The coin, the highways, the posts, the
granaries, the manufactures, whatever could interest the public
prosperity, was moderated by the authority of the Pr&aelig;torian
pr&aelig;fects. As the immediate representatives of the Imperial
majesty, they were empowered to explain, to enforce, and on some
occasions to modify, the general edicts by their discretionary
proclamations. They watched over the conduct of the provincial
governors, removed the negligent, and inflicted punishments on
the guilty. From all the inferior jurisdictions, an appeal in
every matter of importance, either civil or criminal, might be
brought before the tribunal of the pr&aelig;fect; but
<strong><em>his</em></strong> sentence was final and absolute;
and the emperors themselves refused to admit any complaints
against the judgment or the integrity of a magistrate whom they
honored with such unbounded confidence. His appointments were
suitable to his dignity; and if avarice was his ruling passion,
he enjoyed frequent opportunities of collecting a rich harvest of
fees, of presents, and of perquisites. Though the emperors no
longer dreaded the ambition of their pr&aelig;fects, they were
attentive to counterbalance the power of this great office by the
uncertainty and shortness of its duration.<br>
</p>

<p>From their superior importance and dignity, Rome and
Constantinople were alone excepted from the jurisdiction of the
Pr&aelig;torian pr&aelig;fects. The immense size of the city, and
the experience of the tardy, ineffectual operation of the laws,
had furnished the policy of Augustus with a specious pretence for
introducing a new magistrate, who alone could restrain a servile
and turbulent populace by the strong arm of arbitrary power.
Valerius Messalla was appointed the first pr&aelig;fect of Rome,
that his reputation might countenance so invidious a measure;
but, at the end of a few days, that accomplished citizen resigned
his office, declaring, with a spirit worthy of the friend of
Brutus, that he found himself incapable of exercising a power
incompatible with public freedom. As the sense of liberty became
less exquisite, the advantages of order were more clearly
understood; and the pr&aelig;fect, who seemed to have been
designed as a terror only to slaves and vagrants, was permitted
to extend his civil and criminal jurisdiction over the equestrian
and noble families of Rome. The pr&aelig;tors, annually created
as the judges of law and equity, could not long dispute the
possession of the Forum with a vigorous and permanent magistrate,
who was usually admitted into the confidence of the prince. Their
courts were deserted, their number, which had once fluctuated
between twelve and eighteen, was gradually reduced to two or
three, and their important functions were confined to the
expensive obligation of exhibiting games for the amusement of the
people. After the office of the Roman consuls had been changed
into a vain pageant, which was rarely displayed in the capital,
the pr&aelig;fects assumed their vacant place in the senate, and
were soon acknowledged as the ordinary presidents of that
venerable assembly. They received appeals from the distance of
one hundred miles; and it was allowed as a principle of
jurisprudence, that all municipal authority was derived from them
alone. In the discharge of his laborious employment, the governor
of Rome was assisted by fifteen officers, some of whom had been
originally his equals, or even his superiors. The principal
departments were relative to the command of a numerous watch,
established as a safeguard against fires, robberies, and
nocturnal disorders; the custody and distribution of the public
allowance of corn and provisions; the care of the port, of the
aqueducts, of the common sewers, and of the navigation and bed of
the Tyber; the inspection of the markets, the theatres, and of
the private as well as the public works. Their vigilance insured
the three principal objects of a regular police, safety, plenty,
and cleanliness; and as a proof of the attention of government to
preserve the splendor and ornaments of the capital, a particular
inspector was appointed for the statues; the guardian, as it
were, of that inanimate people, which, according to the
extravagant computation of an old writer, was scarcely inferior
in number to the living inhabitants of Rome. About thirty years
after the foundation of Constantinople, a similar magistrate was
created in that rising metropolis, for the same uses and with the
same powers. A perfect equality was established between the
dignity of the two municipal, and that of the
<strong><em>four</em></strong>Pr&aelig;torian pr&aelig;fects.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XVII: Foundation Of Constantinople. --
Part IV.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>Those who, in the imperial hierarchy, were distinguished by
the title of <strong><em>Respectable</em></strong>, formed an
intermediate class between the
<strong><em>illustrious</em></strong> pr&aelig;fects, and the
<strong><em>honorable</em></strong> magistrates of the provinces.
In this class the proconsuls of Asia, Achaia, and Africa, claimed
a pre&euml;minence, which was yielded to the remembrance of their
ancient dignity; and the appeal from their tribunal to that of
the pr&aelig;fects was almost the only mark of their dependence.
But the civil government of the empire was distributed into
thirteen great Dioceses, each of which equalled the just measure
of a powerful kingdom. The first of these dioceses was subject to
the jurisdiction of the <strong><em>count</em></strong> of the
east; and we may convey some idea of the importance and variety
of his functions, by observing, that six hundred apparitors, who
would be styled at present either secretaries, or clerks, or
ushers, or messengers, were employed in his immediate office. The
place of <strong><em>Augustal prfect</em></strong> of Egypt was
no longer filled by a Roman knight; but the name was retained;
and the extraordinary powers which the situation of the country,
and the temper of the inhabitants, had once made indispensable,
were still continued to the governor. The eleven remaining
dioceses, of Asiana, Pontica, and Thrace; of Macedonia, Dacia,
and Pannonia, or Western Illyricum; of Italy and Africa; of Gaul,
Spain, and Britain; were governed by twelve
<strong><em>vicars</em></strong> or
<strong><em>vice-prfects</em></strong>, whose name sufficiently
explains the nature and dependence of their office. It may be
added, that the lieutenant-generals of the Roman armies, the
military counts and dukes, who will be hereafter mentioned, were
allowed the rank and title of
<strong><em>Respectable</em></strong>.<br>
</p>

<p>As the spirit of jealousy and ostentation prevailed in the
councils of the emperors, they proceeded with anxious diligence
to divide the substance and to multiply the titles of power. The
vast countries which the Roman conquerors had united under the
same simple form of administration, were imperceptibly crumbled
into minute fragments; till at length the whole empire was
distributed into one hundred and sixteen provinces, each of which
supported an expensive and splendid establishment. Of these,
three were governed by <strong><em>proconsuls</em></strong>,
thirty-seven by <strong><em>consulars</em></strong>, five by
<strong><em>correctors</em></strong>, and seventy-one by
<strong><em>presidents</em></strong>. The appellations of these
magistrates were different; they ranked in successive order, the
ensigns of and their situation, from accidental circumstances,
might be more or less agreeable or advantageous. But they were
all (excepting only the pro-consuls) alike included in the class
of <strong><em>honorable</em></strong> persons; and they were
alike intrusted, during the pleasure of the prince, and under the
authority of the pr&aelig;fects or their deputies, with the
administration of justice and the finances in their respective
districts. The ponderous volumes of the Codes and Pandects would
furnish ample materials for a minute inquiry into the system of
provincial government, as in the space of six centuries it was
approved by the wisdom of the Roman statesmen and lawyers. It may
be sufficient for the historian to select two singular and
salutary provisions, intended to restrain the abuse of authority.
1. For the preservation of peace and order, the governors of the
provinces were armed with the sword of justice. They inflicted
corporal punishments, and they exercised, in capital offences,
the power of life and death. But they were not authorized to
indulge the condemned criminal with the choice of his own
execution, or to pronounce a sentence of the mildest and most
honorable kind of exile. These prerogatives were reserved to the
pr&aelig;fects, who alone could impose the heavy fine of fifty
pounds of gold: their vicegerents were confined to the trifling
weight of a few ounces. This distinction, which seems to grant
the larger, while it denies the smaller degree of authority, was
founded on a very rational motive. The smaller degree was
infinitely more liable to abuse. The passions of a provincial
magistrate might frequently provoke him into acts of oppression,
which affected only the freedom or the fortunes of the subject;
though, from a principle of prudence, perhaps of humanity, he
might still be terrified by the guilt of innocent blood. It may
likewise be considered, that exile, considerable fines, or the
choice of an easy death, relate more particularly to the rich and
the noble; and the persons the most exposed to the avarice or
resentment of a provincial magistrate, were thus removed from his
obscure persecution to the more august and impartial tribunal of
the Pr&aelig;torian pr&aelig;fect. 2. As it was reasonably
apprehended that the integrity of the judge might be biased, if
his interest was concerned, or his affections were engaged, the
strictest regulations were established, to exclude any person,
without the special dispensation of the emperor, from the
government of the province where he was born; and to prohibit the
governor or his son from contracting marriage with a native, or
an inhabitant; or from purchasing slaves, lands, or houses,
within the extent of his jurisdiction. Notwithstanding these
rigorous precautions, the emperor Constantine, after a reign of
twenty-five years, still deplores the venal and oppressive
administration of justice, and expresses the warmest indignation
that the audience of the judge, his despatch of business, his
seasonable delays, and his final sentence, were publicly sold,
either by himself or by the officers of his court. The
continuance, and perhaps the impunity, of these crimes, is
attested by the repetition of impotent laws and ineffectual
menaces.<br>
</p>

<p>All the civil magistrates were drawn from the profession of
the law. The celebrated Institutes of Justinian are addressed to
the youth of his dominions, who had devoted themselves to the
study of Roman jurisprudence; and the sovereign condescends to
animate their diligence, by the assurance that their skill and
ability would in time be rewarded by an adequate share in the
government of the republic. The rudiments of this lucrative
science were taught in all the considerable cities of the east
and west; but the most famous school was that of Berytus, on the
coast of Phnicia; which flourished above three centuries from the
time of Alexander Severus, the author perhaps of an institution
so advantageous to his native country. After a regular course of
education, which lasted five years, the students dispersed
themselves through the provinces, in search of fortune and
honors; nor could they want an inexhaustible supply of business
great empire, already corrupted by the multiplicity of laws, of
arts, and of vices. The court of the Pr&aelig;torian
pr&aelig;fect of the east could alone furnish employment for one
hundred and fifty advocates, sixty-four of whom were
distinguished by peculiar privileges, and two were annually
chosen, with a salary of sixty pounds of gold, to defend the
causes of the treasury. The first experiment was made of their
judicial talents, by appointing them to act occasionally as
assessors to the magistrates; from thence they were often raised
to preside in the tribunals before which they had pleaded. They
obtained the government of a province; and, by the aid of merit,
of reputation, or of favor, they ascended, by successive steps,
to the <strong><em>illustrious</em></strong> dignities of the
state. In the practice of the bar, these men had considered
reason as the instrument of dispute; they interpreted the laws
according to the dictates of private interest and the same
pernicious habits might still adhere to their characters in the
public administration of the state. The honor of a liberal
profession has indeed been vindicated by ancient and modern
advocates, who have filled the most important stations, with pure
integrity and consummate wisdom: but in the decline of Roman
jurisprudence, the ordinary promotion of lawyers was pregnant
with mischief and disgrace. The noble art, which had once been
preserved as the sacred inheritance of the patricians, was fallen
into the hands of freedmen and plebeians, who, with cunning
rather than with skill, exercised a sordid and pernicious trade.
Some of them procured admittance into families for the purpose of
fomenting differences, of encouraging suits, and of preparing a
harvest of gain for themselves or their brethren. Others, recluse
in their chambers, maintained the dignity of legal professors, by
furnishing a rich client with subtleties to confound the plainest
truths, and with arguments to color the most unjustifiable
pretensions. The splendid and popular class was composed of the
advocates, who filled the Forum with the sound of their turgid
and loquacious rhetoric. Careless of fame and of justice, they
are described, for the most part, as ignorant and rapacious
guides, who conducted their clients through a maze of expense, of
delay, and of disappointment; from whence, after a tedious series
of years, they were at length dismissed, when their patience and
fortune were almost exhausted.<br>
</p>

<p>III. In the system of policy introduced by Augustus, the
governors, those at least of the Imperial provinces, were
invested with the full powers of the sovereign himself. Ministers
of peace and war, the distribution of rewards and punishments
depended on them alone, and they successively appeared on their
tribunal in the robes of civil magistracy, and in complete armor
at the head of the Roman legions. The influence of the revenue,
the authority of law, and the command of a military force,
concurred to render their power supreme and absolute; and
whenever they were tempted to violate their allegiance, the loyal
province which they involved in their rebellion was scarcely
sensible of any change in its political state. From the time of
Commodus to the reign of Constantine, near one hundred governors
might be enumerated, who, with various success, erected the
standard of revolt; and though the innocent were too often
sacrificed, the guilty might be sometimes prevented, by the
suspicious cruelty of their master. To secure his throne and the
public tranquillity from these formidable servants, Constantine
resolved to divide the military from the civil administration,
and to establish, as a permanent and professional distinction, a
practice which had been adopted only as an occasional expedient.
The supreme jurisdiction exercised by the Pr&aelig;torian
pr&aelig;fects over the armies of the empire, was transferred to
the two <strong><em>masters-general</em></strong> whom he
instituted, the one for the <strong><em>cavalry</em></strong>,
the other for the <strong><em>infantry</em></strong>; and though
each of these <strong><em>illustrious</em></strong> officers was
more peculiarly responsible for the discipline of those troops
which were under his immediate inspection, they both
indifferently commanded in the field the several bodies, whether
of horse or foot, which were united in the same army. Their
number was soon doubled by the division of the east and west; and
as separate generals of the same rank and title were appointed on
the four important frontiers of the Rhine, of the Upper and the
Lower Danube, and of the Euphrates, the defence of the Roman
empire was at length committed to eight masters-general of the
cavalry and infantry. Under their orders, thirty-five military
commanders were stationed in the provinces: three in Britain, six
in Gaul, one in Spain, one in Italy, five on the Upper, and four
on the Lower Danube; in Asia, eight, three in Egypt, and four in
Africa. The titles of <strong><em>counts</em></strong>, and
<strong><em>dukes</em></strong>, by which they were properly
distinguished, have obtained in modern languages so very
different a sense, that the use of them may occasion some
surprise. But it should be recollected, that the second of those
appellations is only a corruption of the Latin word, which was
indiscriminately applied to any military chief. All these
provincial generals were therefore
<strong><em>dukes</em></strong>; but no more than ten among them
were dignified with the rank of <strong><em>counts</em></strong>
or companions, a title of honor, or rather of favor, which had
been recently invented in the court of Constantine. A gold belt
was the ensign which distinguished the office of the counts and
dukes; and besides their pay, they received a liberal allowance
sufficient to maintain one hundred and ninety servants, and one
hundred and fifty-eight horses. They were strictly prohibited
from interfering in any matter which related to the
administration of justice or the revenue; but the command which
they exercised over the troops of their department, was
independent of the authority of the magistrates. About the same
time that Constantine gave a legal sanction to the ecclesiastical
order, he instituted in the Roman empire the nice balance of the
civil and the military powers. The emulation, and sometimes the
discord, which reigned between two professions of opposite
interests and incompatible manners, was productive of beneficial
and of pernicious consequences. It was seldom to be expected that
the general and the civil governor of a province should either
conspire for the disturbance, or should unite for the service, of
their country. While the one delayed to offer the assistance
which the other disdained to solicit, the troops very frequently
remained without orders or without supplies; the public safety
was betrayed, and the defenceless subjects were left exposed to
the fury of the Barbarians. The divided administration which had
been formed by Constantine, relaxed the vigor of the state, while
it secured the tranquillity of the monarch.<br>
</p>

<p>The memory of Constantine has been deservedly censured for
another innovation, which corrupted military discipline and
prepared the ruin of the empire. The nineteen years which
preceded his final victory over Licinius, had been a period of
license and intestine war. The rivals who contended for the
possession of the Roman world, had withdrawn the greatest part of
their forces from the guard of the general frontier; and the
principal cities which formed the boundary of their respective
dominions were filled with soldiers, who considered their
countrymen as their most implacable enemies. After the use of
these internal garrisons had ceased with the civil war, the
conqueror wanted either wisdom or firmness to revive the severe
discipline of Diocletian, and to suppress a fatal indulgence,
which habit had endeared and almost confirmed to the military
order. From the reign of Constantine, a popular and even legal
distinction was admitted between the
<strong><em>Palatines</em></strong> and the
<strong><em>Borderers</em></strong>; the troops of the court, as
they were improperly styled, and the troops of the frontier. The
former, elevated by the superiority of their pay and privileges,
were permitted, except in the extraordinary emergencies of war,
to occupy their tranquil stations in the heart of the provinces.
The most flourishing cities were oppressed by the intolerable
weight of quarters. The soldiers insensibly forgot the virtues of
their profession, and contracted only the vices of civil life.
They were either degraded by the industry of mechanic trades, or
enervated by the luxury of baths and theatres. They soon became
careless of their martial exercises, curious in their diet and
apparel; and while they inspired terror to the subjects of the
empire, they trembled at the hostile approach of the Barbarians.
The chain of fortifications which Diocletian and his colleagues
had extended along the banks of the great rivers, was no longer
maintained with the same care, or defended with the same
vigilance. The numbers which still remained under the name of the
troops of the frontier, might be sufficient for the ordinary
defence; but their spirit was degraded by the humiliating
reflection, that <strong><em>they</em></strong> who were exposed
to the hardships and dangers of a perpetual warfare, were
rewarded only with about two thirds of the pay and emoluments
which were lavished on the troops of the court. Even the bands or
legions that were raised the nearest to the level of those
unworthy favorites, were in some measure disgraced by the title
of honor which they were allowed to assume. It was in vain that
Constantine repeated the most dreadful menaces of fire and sword
against the Borderers who should dare desert their colors, to
connive at the inroads of the Barbarians, or to participate in
the spoil. The mischiefs which flow from injudicious counsels are
seldom removed by the application of partial severities; and
though succeeding princes labored to restore the strength and
numbers of the frontier garrisons, the empire, till the last
moment of its dissolution, continued to languish under the mortal
wound which had been so rashly or so weakly inflicted by the hand
of Constantine.<br>
</p>

<p>The same timid policy, of dividing whatever is united, of
reducing whatever is eminent, of dreading every active power, and
of expecting that the most feeble will prove the most obedient,
seems to pervade the institutions of several princes, and
particularly those of Constantine. The martial pride of the
legions, whose victorious camps had so often been the scene of
rebellion, was nourished by the memory of their past exploits,
and the consciousness of their actual strength. As long as they
maintained their ancient establishment of six thousand men, they
subsisted, under the reign of Diocletian, each of them singly, a
visible and important object in the military history of the Roman
empire. A few years afterwards, these gigantic bodies were shrunk
to a very diminutive size; and when seven legions, with some
auxiliaries, defended the city of Amida against the Persians, the
total garrison, with the inhabitants of both sexes, and the
peasants of the deserted country, did not exceed the number of
twenty thousand persons. From this fact, and from similar
examples, there is reason to believe, that the constitution of
the legionary troops, to which they partly owed their valor and
discipline, was dissolved by Constantine; and that the bands of
Roman infantry, which still assumed the same names and the same
honors, consisted only of one thousand or fifteen hundred men.
The conspiracy of so many separate detachments, each of which was
awed by the sense of its own weakness, could easily be checked;
and the successors of Constantine might indulge their love of
ostentation, by issuing their orders to one hundred and
thirty-two legions, inscribed on the muster-roll of their
numerous armies. The remainder of their troops was distributed
into several hundred cohorts of infantry, and squadrons of
cavalry. Their arms, and titles, and ensigns, were calculated to
inspire terror, and to display the variety of nations who marched
under the Imperial standard. And not a vestige was left of that
severe simplicity, which, in the ages of freedom and victory, had
distinguished the line of battle of a Roman army from the
confused host of an Asiatic monarch. A more particular
enumeration, drawn from the <strong><em>Notitia</em></strong>,
might exercise the diligence of an antiquary; but the historian
will content himself with observing, that the number of permanent
stations or garrisons established on the frontiers of the empire,
amounted to five hundred and eighty-three; and that, under the
successors of Constantine, the complete force of the military
establishment was computed at six hundred and forty-five thousand
soldiers. An effort so prodigious surpassed the wants of a more
ancient, and the faculties of a later, period.<br>
</p>

<p>In the various states of society, armies are recruited from
very different motives. Barbarians are urged by the love of war;
the citizens of a free republic may be prompted by a principle of
duty; the subjects, or at least the nobles, of a monarchy, are
animated by a sentiment of honor; but the timid and luxurious
inhabitants of a declining empire must be allured into the
service by the hopes of profit, or compelled by the dread of
punishment. The resources of the Roman treasury were exhausted by
the increase of pay, by the repetition of donatives, and by the
invention of new emolument and indulgences, which, in the opinion
of the provincial youth might compensate the hardships and
dangers of a military life. Yet, although the stature was
lowered, although slaves, least by a tacit connivance, were
indiscriminately received into the ranks, the insurmountable
difficulty of procuring a regular and adequate supply of
volunteers, obliged the emperors to adopt more effectual and
coercive methods. The lands bestowed on the veterans, as the free
reward of their valor were henceforward granted under a condition
which contain the first rudiments of the feudal tenures; that
their sons, who succeeded to the inheritance, should devote
themselves to the profession of arms, as soon as they attained
the age of manhood; and their cowardly refusal was punished by
the lose of honor, of fortune, or even of life. But as the annual
growth of the sons of the veterans bore a very small proportion
to the demands of the service, levies of men were frequently
required from the provinces, and every proprietor was obliged
either to take up arms, or to procure a substitute, or to
purchase his exemption by the payment of a heavy fine. The sum of
forty-two pieces of gold, to which it was
<strong><em>reduced</em></strong>, ascertains the exorbitant
price of volunteers, and the reluctance with which the government
admitted of this alterative. Such was the horror for the
profession of a soldier, which had affected the minds of the
degenerate Romans, that many of the youth of Italy and the
provinces chose to cut off the fingers of their right hand, to
escape from being pressed into the service; and this strange
expedient was so commonly practised, as to deserve the severe
animadversion of the laws, and a peculiar name in the Latin
language.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XVII: Foundation Of Constantinople. --
Part V.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>The introduction of Barbarians into the Roman armies became
every day more universal, more necessary, and more fatal. The
most daring of the Scythians, of the Goths, and of the Germans,
who delighted in war, and who found it more profitable to defend
than to ravage the provinces, were enrolled, not only in the
auxiliaries of their respective nations, but in the legions
themselves, and among the most distinguished of the Palatine
troops. As they freely mingled with the subjects of the empire,
they gradually learned to despise their manners, and to imitate
their arts. They abjured the implicit reverence which the pride
of Rome had exacted from their ignorance, while they acquired the
knowledge and possession of those advantages by which alone she
supported her declining greatness. The Barbarian soldiers, who
displayed any military talents, were advanced, without exception,
to the most important commands; and the names of the tribunes, of
the counts and dukes, and of the generals themselves, betray a
foreign origin, which they no longer condescended to disguise.
They were often intrusted with the conduct of a war against their
countrymen; and though most of them preferred the ties of
allegiance to those of blood, they did not always avoid the
guilt, or at least the suspicion, of holding a treasonable
correspondence with the enemy, of inviting his invasion, or of
sparing his retreat. The camps and the palace of the son of
Constantine were governed by the powerful faction of the Franks,
who preserved the strictest connection with each other, and with
their country, and who resented every personal affront as a
national indignity. When the tyrant Caligula was suspected of an
intention to invest a very extraordinary candidate with the
consular robes, the sacrilegious profanation would have scarcely
excited less astonishment, if, instead of a horse, the noblest
chieftain of Germany or Britain had been the object of his
choice. The revolution of three centuries had produced so
remarkable a change in the prejudices of the people, that, with
the public approbation, Constantine showed his successors the
example of bestowing the honors of the consulship on the
Barbarians, who, by their merit and services, had deserved to be
ranked among the first of the Romans. But as these hardy
veterans, who had been educated in the ignorance or contempt of
the laws, were incapable of exercising any civil offices, the
powers of the human mind were contracted by the irreconcilable
separation of talents as well as of professions. The accomplished
citizens of the Greek and Roman republics, whose characters could
adapt themselves to the bar, the senate, the camp, or the
schools, had learned to write, to speak, and to act with the same
spirit, and with equal abilities.<br>
</p>

<p>IV. Besides the magistrates and generals, who at a distance
from the court diffused their delegated authority over the
provinces and armies, the emperor conferred the rank of
<strong><em>Illustrious</em></strong>on seven of his more
immediate servants, to whose fidelity he intrusted his safety, or
his counsels, or his treasures. <strong>1</strong>. The private
apartments of the palace were governed by a favorite eunuch, who,
in the language of that age, was styled the
<strong><em>prpositus</em></strong>, or pr&aelig;fect of the
sacred bed-chamber. His duty was to attend the emperor in his
hours of state, or in those of amusement, and to perform about
his person all those menial services, which can only derive their
splendor from the influence of royalty. Under a prince who
deserved to reign, the great chamberlain (for such we may call
him) was a useful and humble domestic; but an artful domestic,
who improves every occasion of unguarded confidence, will
insensibly acquire over a feeble mind that ascendant which harsh
wisdom and uncomplying virtue can seldom obtain. The degenerate
grandsons of Theodosius, who were invisible to their subjects,
and contemptible to their enemies, exalted the pr&aelig;fects of
their bed-chamber above the heads of all the ministers of the
palace; and even his deputy, the first of the splendid train of
slaves who waited in the presence, was thought worthy to rank
before the <strong><em>respectable</em></strong> proconsuls of
Greece or Asia. The jurisdiction of the chamberlain was
acknowledged by the <strong><em>counts</em></strong>, or
superintendents, who regulated the two important provinces of the
magnificence of the wardrobe, and of the luxury of the Imperial
table. <strong>2</strong>. The principal administration of public
affairs was committed to the diligence and abilities of the
<strong><em>master of the offices</em></strong>. He was the
supreme magistrate of the palace, inspected the discipline of the
civil and military <strong><em>schools</em></strong>, and
received appeals from all parts of the empire, in the causes
which related to that numerous army of privileged persons, who,
as the servants of the court, had obtained for themselves and
families a right to decline the authority of the ordinary judges.
The correspondence between the prince and his subjects was
managed by the four <strong><em>scrinia</em></strong>, or offices
of this minister of state. The first was appropriated to
memorials, the second to epistles, the third to petitions, and
the fourth to papers and orders of a miscellaneous kind. Each of
these was directed by an inferior <strong><em>master of
respectable</em></strong> dignity, and the whole business was
despatched by a hundred and forty-eight secretaries, chosen for
the most part from the profession of the law, on account of the
variety of abstracts of reports and references which frequently
occurred in the exercise of their several functions. From a
condescension, which in former ages would have been esteemed
unworthy the Roman majesty, a particular secretary was allowed
for the Greek language; and interpreters were appointed to
receive the ambassadors of the Barbarians; but the department of
foreign affairs, which constitutes so essential a part of modern
policy, seldom diverted the attention of the master of the
offices. His mind was more seriously engaged by the general
direction of the posts and arsenals of the empire. There were
thirty-four cities, fifteen in the East, and nineteen in the
West, in which regular companies of workmen were perpetually
employed in fabricating defensive armor, offensive weapons of all
sorts, and military engines, which were deposited in the
arsenals, and occasionally delivered for the service of the
troops. <strong>3</strong>. In the course of nine centuries, the
office of <strong><em>qu&aelig;stor</em></strong> had experienced
a very singular revolution. In the infancy of Rome, two inferior
magistrates were annually elected by the people, to relieve the
consuls from the invidious management of the public treasure; a
similar assistant was granted to every proconsul, and to every
pr&aelig;tor, who exercised a military or provincial command;
with the extent of conquest, the two qu&aelig;stors were
gradually multiplied to the number of four, of eight, of twenty,
and, for a short time, perhaps, of forty; and the noblest
citizens ambitiously solicited an office which gave them a seat
in the senate, and a just hope of obtaining the honors of the
republic. Whilst Augustus affected to maintain the freedom of
election, he consented to accept the annual privilege of
recommending, or rather indeed of nominating, a certain
proportion of candidates; and it was his custom to select one of
these distinguished youths, to read his orations or epistles in
the assemblies of the senate. The practice of Augustus was
imitated by succeeding princes; the occasional commission was
established as a permanent office; and the favored qu&aelig;stor,
assuming a new and more illustrious character, alone survived the
suppression of his ancient and useless colleagues. As the
orations which he composed in the name of the emperor, acquired
the force, and, at length, the form, of absolute edicts, he was
considered as the representative of the legislative power, the
oracle of the council, and the original source of the civil
jurisprudence. He was sometimes invited to take his seat in the
supreme judicature of the Imperial consistory, with the
Pr&aelig;torian pr&aelig;fects, and the master of the offices;
and he was frequently requested to resolve the doubts of inferior
judges: but as he was not oppressed with a variety of subordinate
business, his leisure and talents were employed to cultivate that
dignified style of eloquence, which, in the corruption of taste
and language, still preserves the majesty of the Roman laws. In
some respects, the office of the Imperial qu&aelig;stor may be
compared with that of a modern chancellor; but the use of a great
seal, which seems to have been adopted by the illiterate
barbarians, was never introduced to attest the public acts of the
emperors. <strong>4</strong>. The extraordinary title of
<strong><em>count of the sacred largesses</em></strong> was
bestowed on the treasurer-general of the revenue, with the
intention perhaps of inculcating, that every payment flowed from
the voluntary bounty of the monarch. To conceive the almost
infinite detail of the annual and daily expense of the civil and
military administration in every part of a great empire, would
exceed the powers of the most vigorous imagination. The actual
account employed several hundred persons, distributed into eleven
different offices, which were artfully contrived to examine and
control their respective operations. The multitude of these
agents had a natural tendency to increase; and it was more than
once thought expedient to dismiss to their native homes the
useless supernumeraries, who, deserting their honest labors, had
pressed with too much eagerness into the lucrative profession of
the finances. Twenty-nine provincial receivers, of whom eighteen
were honored with the title of count, corresponded with the
treasurer; and he extended his jurisdiction over the mines from
whence the precious metals were extracted, over the mints, in
which they were converted into the current coin, and over the
public treasuries of the most important cities, where they were
deposited for the service of the state. The foreign trade of the
empire was regulated by this minister, who directed likewise all
the linen and woollen manufactures, in which the successive
operations of spinning, weaving, and dyeing were executed,
chiefly by women of a servile condition, for the use of the
palace and army. Twenty-six of these institutions are enumerated
in the West, where the arts had been more recently introduced,
and a still larger proportion may be allowed for the industrious
provinces of the East. <strong>5</strong>. Besides the public
revenue, which an absolute monarch might levy and expend
according to his pleasure, the emperors, in the capacity of
opulent citizens, possessed a very extensive property, which was
administered by the <strong><em>count</em></strong> or treasurer
of <strong><em>the private estate</em></strong>. Some part had
perhaps been the ancient demesnes of kings and republics; some
accessions might be derived from the families which were
successively invested with the purple; but the most considerable
portion flowed from the impure source of confiscations and
forfeitures. The Imperial estates were scattered through the
provinces, from Mauritania to Britain; but the rich and fertile
soil of Cappadocia tempted the monarch to acquire in that country
his fairest possessions, and either Constantine or his successors
embraced the occasion of justifying avarice by religious zeal.
They suppressed the rich temple of Comana, where the high priest
of the goddess of war supported the dignity of a sovereign
prince; and they applied to their private use the consecrated
lands, which were inhabited by six thousand subjects or slaves of
the deity and her ministers. But these were not the valuable
inhabitants: the plains that stretch from the foot of Mount
Arg&aelig;us to the banks of the Sarus, bred a generous race of
horses, renowned above all others in the ancient world for their
majestic shape and incomparable swiftness. These sacred animals,
destined for the service of the palace and the Imperial games,
were protected by the laws from the profanation of a vulgar
master. The demesnes of Cappadocia were important enough to
require the inspection of a count; officers of an inferior rank
were stationed in the other parts of the empire; and the deputies
of the private, as well as those of the public, treasurer were
maintained in the exercise of their independent functions, and
encouraged to control the authority of the provincial
magistrates. <strong>6<em>,</em> 7</strong>. The chosen bands of
cavalry and infantry, which guarded the person of the emperor,
were under the immediate command of the <strong><em>two counts of
the domestics</em></strong>. The whole number consisted of three
thousand five hundred men, divided into seven
<strong><em>schools</em></strong>, or troops, of five hundred
each; and in the East, this honorable service was almost entirely
appropriated to the Armenians. Whenever, on public ceremonies,
they were drawn up in the courts and porticos of the palace,
their lofty stature, silent order, and splendid arms of silver
and gold, displayed a martial pomp not unworthy of the Roman
majesty. From the seven schools two companies of horse and foot
were selected, of the <strong><em>protectors</em></strong>, whose
advantageous station was the hope and reward of the most
deserving soldiers. They mounted guard in the interior
apartments, and were occasionally despatched into the provinces,
to execute with celerity and vigor the orders of their master.
The counts of the domestics had succeeded to the office of the
Pr&aelig;torian pr&aelig;fects; like the pr&aelig;fects, they
aspired from the service of the palace to the command of
armies.<br>
</p>

<p>The perpetual intercourse between the court and the provinces
was facilitated by the construction of roads and the institution
of posts. But these beneficial establishments were accidentally
connected with a pernicious and intolerable abuse. Two or three
hundred agents or messengers were employed, under the
jurisdiction of the master of the offices, to announce the names
of the annual consuls, and the edicts or victories of the
emperors. They insensibly assumed the license of reporting
whatever they could observe of the conduct either of magistrates
or of private citizens; and were soon considered as the eyes of
the monarch, and the scourge of the people. Under the warm
influence of a feeble reign, they multiplied to the incredible
number of ten thousand, disdained the mild though frequent
admonitions of the laws, and exercised in the profitable
management of the posts a rapacious and insolent oppression.
These official spies, who regularly corresponded with the palace,
were encouraged by favor and reward, anxiously to watch the
progress of every treasonable design, from the faint and latent
symptoms of disaffection, to the actual preparation of an open
revolt. Their careless or criminal violation of truth and justice
was covered by the consecrated mask of zeal; and they might
securely aim their poisoned arrows at the breast either of the
guilty or the innocent, who had provoked their resentment, or
refused to purchase their silence. A faithful subject, of Syria
perhaps, or of Britain, was exposed to the danger, or at least to
the dread, of being dragged in chains to the court of Milan or
Constantinople, to defend his life and fortune against the
malicious charge of these privileged informers. The ordinary
administration was conducted by those methods which extreme
necessity can alone palliate; and the defects of evidence were
diligently supplied by the use of torture.<br>
</p>

<p>The deceitful and dangerous experiment of the criminal
<strong><em>qu&aelig;stion</em></strong>, as it is emphatically
styled, was admitted, rather than approved, in the jurisprudence
of the Romans. They applied this sanguinary mode of examination
only to servile bodies, whose sufferings were seldom weighed by
those haughty republicans in the scale of justice or humanity;
but they would never consent to violate the sacred person of a
citizen, till they possessed the clearest evidence of his guilt.
The annals of tyranny, from the reign of Tiberius to that of
Domitian, circumstantially relate the executions of many innocent
victims; but, as long as the faintest remembrance was kept alive
of the national freedom and honor, the last hours of a Roman were
secured from the danger of ignominious torture. The conduct of
the provincial magistrates was not, however, regulated by the
practice of the city, or the strict maxims of the civilians. They
found the use of torture established not only among the slaves of
oriental despotism, but among the Macedonians, who obeyed a
limited monarch; among the Rhodians, who flourished by the
liberty of commerce; and even among the sage Athenians, who had
asserted and adorned the dignity of human kind. The acquiescence
of the provincials encouraged their governors to acquire, or
perhaps to usurp, a discretionary power of employing the rack, to
extort from vagrants or plebeian criminals the confession of
their guilt, till they insensibly proceeded to confound the
distinction of rank, and to disregard the privileges of Roman
citizens. The apprehensions of the subjects urged them to
solicit, and the interest of the sovereign engaged him to grant,
a variety of special exemptions, which tacitly allowed, and even
authorized, the general use of torture. They protected all
persons of illustrious or honorable rank, bishops and their
presbyters, professors of the liberal arts, soldiers and their
families, municipal officers, and their posterity to the third
generation, and all children under the age of puberty. But a
fatal maxim was introduced into the new jurisprudence of the
empire, that in the case of treason, which included every offence
that the subtlety of lawyers could derive from a
<strong><em>hostile intention</em></strong> towards the prince or
republic, all privileges were suspended, and all conditions were
reduced to the same ignominious level. As the safety of the
emperor was avowedly preferred to every consideration of justice
or humanity, the dignity of age and the tenderness of youth were
alike exposed to the most cruel tortures; and the terrors of a
malicious information, which might select them as the
accomplices, or even as the witnesses, perhaps, of an imaginary
crime, perpetually hung over the heads of the principal citizens
of the Roman world.<br>
</p>

<p>These evils, however terrible they may appear, were confined
to the smaller number of Roman subjects, whose dangerous
situation was in some degree compensated by the enjoyment of
those advantages, either of nature or of fortune, which exposed
them to the jealousy of the monarch. The obscure millions of a
great empire have much less to dread from the cruelty than from
the avarice of their masters, and <strong><em>their</em></strong>
humble happiness is principally affected by the grievance of
excessive taxes, which, gently pressing on the wealthy, descend
with accelerated weight on the meaner and more indigent classes
of society. An ingenious philosopher has calculated the universal
measure of the public impositions by the degrees of freedom and
servitude; and ventures to assert, that, according to an
invariable law of nature, it must always increase with the
former, and diminish in a just proportion to the latter. But this
reflection, which would tend to alleviate the miseries of
despotism, is contradicted at least by the history of the Roman
empire; which accuses the same princes of despoiling the senate
of its authority, and the provinces of their wealth. Without
abolishing all the various customs and duties on merchandises,
which are imperceptibly discharged by the apparent choice of the
purchaser, the policy of Constantine and his successors preferred
a simple and direct mode of taxation, more congenial to the
spirit of an arbitrary government.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XVII: Foundation Of Constantinople. --
Part VI.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>The name and use of the <strong><em>indictions</em></strong>,
which serve to ascertain the chronology of the middle ages, were
derived from the regular practice of the Roman tributes. The
emperor subscribed with his own hand, and in purple ink, the
solemn edict, or indiction, which was fixed up in the principal
city of each diocese, during two months previous to the first day
of September. And by a very easy connection of ideas, the word
<strong><em>indiction</em></strong> was transferred to the
measure of tribute which it prescribed, and to the annual term
which it allowed for the payment. This general estimate of the
supplies was proportioned to the real and imaginary wants of the
state; but as often as the expense exceeded the revenue, or the
revenue fell short of the computation, an additional tax, under
the name of <strong><em>superindiction</em></strong>, was imposed
on the people, and the most valuable attribute of sovereignty was
communicated to the Pr&aelig;torian pr&aelig;fects, who, on some
occasions, were permitted to provide for the unforeseen and
extraordinary exigencies of the public service. The execution of
these laws (which it would be tedious to pursue in their minute
and intricate detail) consisted of two distinct operations: the
resolving the general imposition into its constituent parts,
which were assessed on the provinces, the cities, and the
individuals of the Roman world; and the collecting the separate
contributions of the individuals, the cities, and the provinces,
till the accumulated sums were poured into the Imperial
treasuries. But as the account between the monarch and the
subject was perpetually open, and as the renewal of the demand
anticipated the perfect discharge of the preceding obligation,
the weighty machine of the finances was moved by the same hands
round the circle of its yearly revolution. Whatever was honorable
or important in the administration of the revenue, was committed
to the wisdom of the pr&aelig;fects, and their provincial.
representatives; the lucrative functions were claimed by a crowd
of subordinate officers, some of whom depended on the treasurer,
others on the governor of the province; and who, in the
inevitable conflicts of a perplexed jurisdiction, had frequent
opportunities of disputing with each other the spoils of the
people. The laborious offices, which could be productive only of
envy and reproach, of expense and danger, were imposed on the
<strong><em>Decurions</em></strong>, who formed the corporations
of the cities, and whom the severity of the Imperial laws had
condemned to sustain the burdens of civil society. The whole
landed property of the empire (without excepting the patrimonial
estates of the monarch) was the object of ordinary taxation; and
every new purchaser contracted the obligations of the former
proprietor. An accurate census, or survey, was the only equitable
mode of ascertaining the proportion which every citizen should be
obliged to contribute for the public service; and from the
well-known period of the indictions, there is reason to believe
that this difficult and expensive operation was repeated at the
regular distance of fifteen years. The lands were measured by
surveyors, who were sent into the provinces; their nature,
whether arable or pasture, or vineyards or woods, was distinctly
reported; and an estimate was made of their common value from the
average produce of five years. The numbers of slaves and of
cattle constituted an essential part of the report; an oath was
administered to the proprietors, which bound them to disclose the
true state of their affairs; and their attempts to prevaricate,
or elude the intention of the legislator, were severely watched,
and punished as a capital crime, which included the double guilt
of treason and sacrilege. A large portion of the tribute was paid
in money; and of the current coin of the empire, gold alone could
be legally accepted. The remainder of the taxes, according to the
proportions determined by the annual indiction, was furnished in
a manner still more direct, and still more oppressive. According
to the different nature of lands, their real produce in the
various articles of wine or oil, corn or barley, wood or iron,
was transported by the labor or at the expense of the provincials
* to the Imperial magazines, from whence they were occasionally
distributed for the use of the court, of the army, and of two
capitals, Rome and Constantinople. The commissioners of the
revenue were so frequently obliged to make considerable
purchases, that they were strictly prohibited from allowing any
compensation, or from receiving in money the value of those
supplies which were exacted in kind. In the primitive simplicity
of small communities, this method may be well adapted to collect
the almost voluntary offerings of the people; but it is at once
susceptible of the utmost latitude, and of the utmost strictness,
which in a corrupt and absolute monarchy must introduce a
perpetual contest between the power of oppression and the arts of
fraud. The agriculture of the Roman provinces was insensibly
ruined, and, in the progress of despotism which tends to
disappoint its own purpose, the emperors were obliged to derive
some merit from the forgiveness of debts, or the remission of
tributes, which their subjects were utterly incapable of paying.
According to the new division of Italy, the fertile and happy
province of Campania, the scene of the early victories and of the
delicious retirements of the citizens of Rome, extended between
the sea and the Apennine, from the Tiber to the Silarus. Within
sixty years after the death of Constantine, and on the evidence
of an actual survey, an exemption was granted in favor of three
hundred and thirty thousand English acres of desert and
uncultivated land; which amounted to one eighth of the whole
surface of the province. As the footsteps of the Barbarians had
not yet been seen in Italy, the cause of this amazing desolation,
which is recorded in the laws, can be ascribed only to the
administration of the Roman emperors.<br>
</p>

<p>Either from design or from accident, the mode of assessment
seemed to unite the substance of a land tax with the forms of a
capitation. The returns which were sent of every province or
district, expressed the number of tributary subjects, and the
amount of the public impositions. The latter of these sums was
divided by the former; and the estimate, that such a province
contained so many <strong><em>capita</em></strong>, or heads of
tribute; and that each <strong><em>head</em></strong> was rated
at such a price, was universally received, not only in the
popular, but even in the legal computation. The value of a
tributary head must have varied, according to many accidental, or
at least fluctuating circumstances; but some knowledge has been
preserved of a very curious fact, the more important, since it
relates to one of the richest provinces of the Roman empire, and
which now flourishes as the most splendid of the European
kingdoms. The rapacious ministers of Constantius had exhausted
the wealth of Gaul, by exacting twenty-five pieces of gold for
the annual tribute of every head. The humane policy of his
successor reduced the capitation to seven pieces. A moderate
proportion between these opposite extremes of extraordinary
oppression and of transient indulgence, may therefore be fixed at
sixteen pieces of gold, or about nine pounds sterling, the common
standard, perhaps, of the impositions of Gaul. But this
calculation, or rather, indeed, the facts from whence it is
deduced, cannot fail of suggesting two difficulties to a thinking
mind, who will be at once surprised by the
<strong><em>equality</em></strong>, and by the
<strong><em>enormity</em></strong>, of the capitation. An attempt
to explain them may perhaps reflect some light on the interesting
subject of the finances of the declining empire.<br>
</p>

<p>I. It is obvious, that, as long as the immutable constitution
of human nature produces and maintains so unequal a division of
property, the most numerous part of the community would be
deprived of their subsistence, by the equal assessment of a tax
from which the sovereign would derive a very trifling revenue.
Such indeed might be the theory of the Roman capitation; but in
the practice, this unjust equality was no longer felt, as the
tribute was collected on the principle of a
<strong><em>real</em></strong>, not of a
<strong><em>personal</em></strong> imposition. * Several indigent
citizens contributed to compose a single
<strong><em>head</em></strong>, or share of taxation; while the
wealthy provincial, in proportion to his fortune, alone
represented several of those imaginary beings. In a poetical
request, addressed to one of the last and most deserving of the
Roman princes who reigned in Gaul, Sidonius Apollinaris
personifies his tribute under the figure of a triple monster, the
Geryon of the Grecian fables, and entreats the new Hercules that
he would most graciously be pleased to save his life by cutting
off three of his heads. The fortune of Sidonius far exceeded the
customary wealth of a poet; but if he had pursued the allusion,
he might have painted many of the Gallic nobles with the hundred
heads of the deadly Hydra, spreading over the face of the
country, and devouring the substance of a hundred families. II.
The difficulty of allowing an annual sum of about nine pounds
sterling, even for the average of the capitation of Gaul, may be
rendered more evident by the comparison of the present state of
the same country, as it is now governed by the absolute monarch
of an industrious, wealthy, and affectionate people. The taxes of
France cannot be magnified, either by fear or by flattery, beyond
the annual amount of eighteen millions sterling, which ought
perhaps to be shared among four and twenty millions of
inhabitants. Seven millions of these, in the capacity of fathers,
or brothers, or husbands, may discharge the obligations of the
remaining multitude of women and children; yet the equal
proportion of each tributary subject will scarcely rise above
fifty shillings of our money, instead of a proportion almost four
times as considerable, which was regularly imposed on their
Gallic ancestors. The reason of this difference may be found, not
so much in the relative scarcity or plenty of gold and silver, as
in the different state of society, in ancient Gaul and in modern
France. In a country where personal freedom is the privilege of
every subject, the whole mass of taxes, whether they are levied
on property or on consumption, may be fairly divided among the
whole body of the nation. But the far greater part of the lands
of ancient Gaul, as well as of the other provinces of the Roman
world, were cultivated by slaves, or by peasants, whose dependent
condition was a less rigid servitude. In such a state the poor
were maintained at the expense of the masters who enjoyed the
fruits of their labor; and as the rolls of tribute were filled
only with the names of those citizens who possessed the means of
an honorable, or at least of a decent subsistence, the
comparative smallness of their numbers explains and justifies the
high rate of their capitation. The truth of this assertion may be
illustrated by the following example: The &AElig;dui, one of the
most powerful and civilized tribes or
<strong><em>cities</em></strong> of Gaul, occupied an extent of
territory, which now contains about five hundred thousand
inhabitants, in the two ecclesiastical dioceses of Autun and
Nevers; and with the probable accession of those of Chalons and
Macon, the population would amount to eight hundred thousand
souls. In the time of Constantine, the territory of the
&AElig;dui afforded no more than twenty-five thousand
<strong><em>heads</em></strong> of capitation, of whom seven
thousand were discharged by that prince from the intolerable
weight of tribute. A just analogy would seem to countenance the
opinion of an ingenious historian, that the free and tributary
citizens did not surpass the number of half a million; and if, in
the ordinary administration of government, their annual payments
may be computed at about four millions and a half of our money,
it would appear, that although the share of each individual was
four times as considerable, a fourth part only of the modern
taxes of France was levied on the Imperial province of Gaul. The
exactions of Constantius may be calculated at seven millions
sterling, which were reduced to two millions by the humanity or
the wisdom of Julian.<br>
</p>

<p>But this tax, or capitation, on the proprietors of land, would
have suffered a rich and numerous class of free citizens to
escape. With the view of sharing that species of wealth which is
derived from art or labor, and which exists in money or in
merchandise, the emperors imposed a distinct and personal tribute
on the trading part of their subjects. Some exemptions, very
strictly confined both in time and place, were allowed to the
proprietors who disposed of the produce of their own estates.
Some indulgence was granted to the profession of the liberal
arts: but every other branch of commercial industry was affected
by the severity of the law. The honorable merchant of Alexandria,
who imported the gems and spices of India for the use of the
western world; the usurer, who derived from the interest of money
a silent and ignominious profit; the ingenious manufacturer, the
diligent mechanic, and even the most obscure retailer of a
sequestered village, were obliged to admit the officers of the
revenue into the partnership of their gain; and the sovereign of
the Roman empire, who tolerated the profession, consented to
share the infamous salary, of public prostitutes. As this general
tax upon industry was collected every fourth year, it was styled
the <strong><em>Lustral Contribution</em></strong>: and the
historian Zosimus laments that the approach of the fatal period
was announced by the tears and terrors of the citizens, who were
often compelled by the impending scourge to embrace the most
abhorred and unnatural methods of procuring the sum at which
their property had been assessed. The testimony of Zosimus cannot
indeed be justified from the charge of passion and prejudice;
but, from the nature of this tribute it seems reasonable to
conclude, that it was arbitrary in the distribution, and
extremely rigorous in the mode of collecting. The secret wealth
of commerce, and the precarious profits of art or labor, are
susceptible only of a discretionary valuation, which is seldom
disadvantageous to the interest of the treasury; and as the
person of the trader supplies the want of a visible and permanent
security, the payment of the imposition, which, in the case of a
land tax, may be obtained by the seizure of property, can rarely
be extorted by any other means than those of corporal
punishments. The cruel treatment of the insolvent debtors of the
state, is attested, and was perhaps mitigated by a very humane
edict of Constantine, who, disclaiming the use of racks and of
scourges, allots a spacious and airy prison for the place of
their confinement.<br>
</p>

<p>These general taxes were imposed and levied by the absolute
authority of the monarch; but the occasional offerings of the
<strong><em>coronary gold</em></strong>still retained the name
and semblance of popular consent. It was an ancient custom that
the allies of the republic, who ascribed their safety or
deliverance to the success of the Roman arms, and even the cities
of Italy, who admired the virtues of their victorious general,
adorned the pomp of his triumph by their voluntary gifts of
crowns of gold, which after the ceremony were consecrated in the
temple of Jupiter, to remain a lasting monument of his glory to
future ages. The progress of zeal and flattery soon multiplied
the number, and increased the size, of these popular donations;
and the triumph of C&aelig;sar was enriched with two thousand
eight hundred and twenty-two massy crowns, whose weight amounted
to twenty thousand four hundred and fourteen pounds of gold. This
treasure was immediately melted down by the prudent dictator, who
was satisfied that it would be more serviceable to his soldiers
than to the gods: his example was imitated by his successors; and
the custom was introduced of exchanging these splendid ornaments
for the more acceptable present of the current gold coin of the
empire. The spontaneous offering was at length exacted as the
debt of duty; and instead of being confined to the occasion of a
triumph, it was supposed to be granted by the several cities and
provinces of the monarchy, as often as the emperor condescended
to announce his accession, his consulship, the birth of a son,
the creation of a C&aelig;sar, a victory over the Barbarians, or
any other real or imaginary event which graced the annals of his
reign. The peculiar free gift of the senate of Rome was fixed by
custom at sixteen hundred pounds of gold, or about sixty-four
thousand pounds sterling. The oppressed subjects celebrated their
own felicity, that their sovereign should graciously consent to
accept this feeble but voluntary testimony of their loyalty and
gratitude.<br>
</p>

<p>A people elated by pride, or soured by discontent, are seldom
qualified to form a just estimate of their actual situation. The
subjects of Constantine were incapable of discerning the decline
of genius and manly virtue, which so far degraded them below the
dignity of their ancestors; but they could feel and lament the
rage of tyranny, the relaxation of discipline, and the increase
of taxes. The impartial historian, who acknowledges the justice
of their complaints, will observe some favorable circumstances
which tended to alleviate the misery of their condition. The
threatening tempest of Barbarians, which so soon subverted the
foundations of Roman greatness, was still repelled, or suspended,
on the frontiers. The arts of luxury and literature were
cultivated, and the elegant pleasures of society were enjoyed, by
the inhabitants of a considerable portion of the globe. The
forms, the pomp, and the expense of the civil administration
contributed to restrain the irregular license of the soldiers;
and although the laws were violated by power, or perverted by
subtlety, the sage principles of the Roman jurisprudence
preserved a sense of order and equity, unknown to the despotic
governments of the East. The rights of mankind might derive some
protection from religion and philosophy; and the name of freedom,
which could no longer alarm, might sometimes admonish, the
successors of Augustus, that they did not reign over a nation of
Slaves or Barbarians.<br>
</p>

<p><strong>Chapter XVIII: Character Of Constantine And His
Sons.</strong></p>

<p><strong><em>Part I.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>Character Of Constantine. -- Gothic War. -- Death Of
Constantine. -- Division Of The Empire Among His Three Sons. --
Persian War. -- Tragic Deaths Of Constantine The Younger And
Constans. -- Usurpation Of Magnentius. -- Civil War. -- Victory
Of Constantius.<br>
</p>

<p>The character of the prince who removed the seat of empire,
and introduced such important changes into the civil and
religious constitution of his country, has fixed the attention,
and divided the opinions, of mankind. By the grateful zeal of the
Christians, the deliverer of the church has been decorated with
every attribute of a hero, and even of a saint; while the
discontent of the vanquished party has compared Constantine to
the most abhorred of those tyrants, who, by their vice and
weakness, dishonored the Imperial purple. The same passions have
in some degree been perpetuated to succeeding generations, and
the character of Constantine is considered, even in the present
age, as an object either of satire or of panegyric. By the
impartial union of those defects which are confessed by his
warmest admirers, and of those virtues which are acknowledged by
his most-implacable enemies, we might hope to delineate a just
portrait of that extraordinary man, which the truth and candor of
history should adopt without a blush. But it would soon appear,
that the vain attempt to blend such discordant colors, and to
reconcile such inconsistent qualities, must produce a figure
monstrous rather than human, unless it is viewed in its proper
and distinct lights, by a careful separation of the different
periods of the reign of Constantine.<br>
</p>

<p>The person, as well as the mind, of Constantine, had been
enriched by nature with her choices endowments. His stature was
lofty, his countenance majestic, his deportment graceful; his
strength and activity were displayed in every manly exercise, and
from his earliest youth, to a very advanced season of life, he
preserved the vigor of his constitution by a strict adherence to
the domestic virtues of chastity and temperance. He delighted in
the social intercourse of familiar conversation; and though he
might sometimes indulge his disposition to raillery with less
reserve than was required by the severe dignity of his station,
the courtesy and liberality of his manners gained the hearts of
all who approached him. The sincerity of his friendship has been
suspected; yet he showed, on some occasions, that he was not
incapable of a warm and lasting attachment. The disadvantage of
an illiterate education had not prevented him from forming a just
estimate of the value of learning; and the arts and sciences
derived some encouragement from the munificent protection of
Constantine. In the despatch of business, his diligence was
indefatigable; and the active powers of his mind were almost
continually exercised in reading, writing, or meditating, in
giving audiences to ambassadors, and in examining the complaints
of his subjects. Even those who censured the propriety of his
measures were compelled to acknowledge, that he possessed
magnanimity to conceive, and patience to execute, the most
arduous designs, without being checked either by the prejudices
of education, or by the clamors of the multitude. In the field,
he infused his own intrepid spirit into the troops, whom he
conducted with the talents of a consummate general; and to his
abilities, rather than to his fortune, we may ascribe the signal
victories which he obtained over the foreign and domestic foes of
the republic. He loved glory as the reward, perhaps as the
motive, of his labors. The boundless ambition, which, from the
moment of his accepting the purple at York, appears as the ruling
passion of his soul, may be justified by the dangers of his own
situation, by the character of his rivals, by the consciousness
of superior merit, and by the prospect that his success would
enable him to restore peace and order to tot the distracted
empire. In his civil wars against Maxentius and Licinius, he had
engaged on his side the inclinations of the people, who compared
the undissembled vices of those tyrants with the spirit of wisdom
and justice which seemed to direct the general tenor of the
administration of Constantine.<br>
</p>

<p>Had Constantine fallen on the banks of the Tyber, or even in
the plains of Hadrianople, such is the character which, with a
few exceptions, he might have transmitted to posterity. But the
conclusion of his reign (according to the moderate and indeed
tender sentence of a writer of the same age) degraded him from
the rank which he had acquired among the most deserving of the
Roman princes. In the life of Augustus, we behold the tyrant of
the republic, converted, almost by imperceptible degrees, into
the father of his country, and of human kind. In that of
Constantine, we may contemplate a hero, who had so long inspired
his subjects with love, and his enemies with terror, degenerating
into a cruel and dissolute monarch, corrupted by his fortune, or
raised by conquest above the necessity of dissimulation. The
general peace which he maintained during the last fourteen years
of his reign, was a period of apparent splendor rather than of
real prosperity; and the old age of Constantine was disgraced by
the opposite yet reconcilable vices of rapaciousness and
prodigality. The accumulated treasures found in the palaces of
Maxentius and Licinius, were lavishly consumed; the various
innovations introduced by the conqueror, were attended with an
increasing expense; the cost of his buildings, his court, and his
festivals, required an immediate and plentiful supply; and the
oppression of the people was the only fund which could support
the magnificence of the sovereign. His unworthy favorites,
enriched by the boundless liberality of their master, usurped
with impunity the privilege of rapine and corruption. A secret
but universal decay was felt in every part of the public
administration, and the emperor himself, though he still retained
the obedience, gradually lost the esteem, of his subjects. The
dress and manners, which, towards the decline of life, he chose
to affect, served only to degrade him in the eyes of mankind. The
Asiatic pomp, which had been adopted by the pride of Diocletian,
assumed an air of softness and effeminacy in the person of
Constantine. He is represented with false hair of various colors,
laboriously arranged by the skilful artists to the times; a
diadem of a new and more expensive fashion; a profusion of gems
and pearls, of collars and bracelets, and a variegated flowing
robe of silk, most curiously embroidered with flowers of gold. In
such apparel, scarcely to be excused by the youth and folly of
Elagabalus, we are at a loss to discover the wisdom of an aged
monarch, and the simplicity of a Roman veteran. A mind thus
relaxed by prosperity and indulgence, was incapable of rising to
that magnanimity which disdains suspicion, and dares to forgive.
The deaths of Maximian and Licinius may perhaps be justified by
the maxims of policy, as they are taught in the schools of
tyrants; but an impartial narrative of the executions, or rather
murders, which sullied the declining age of Constantine, will
suggest to our most candid thoughts the idea of a prince who
could sacrifice without reluctance the laws of justice, and the
feelings of nature, to the dictates either of his passions or of
his interest.<br>
</p>

<p>The same fortune which so invariably followed the standard of
Constantine, seemed to secure the hopes and comforts of his
domestic life. Those among his predecessors who had enjoyed the
longest and most prosperous reigns, Augustus Trajan, and
Diocletian, had been disappointed of posterity; and the frequent
revolutions had never allowed sufficient time for any Imperial
family to grow up and multiply under the shade of the purple. But
the royalty of the Flavian line, which had been first ennobled by
the Gothic Claudius, descended through several generations; and
Constantine himself derived from his royal father the hereditary
honors which he transmitted to his children. The emperor had been
twice married. Minervina, the obscure but lawful object of his
youthful attachment, had left him only one son, who was called
Crispus. By Fausta, the daughter of Maximian, he had three
daughters, and three sons known by the kindred names of
Constantine, Constantius, and Constans. The unambitious brothers
of the great Constantine, Julius Constantius, Dalmatius, and
Hannibalianus, were permitted to enjoy the most honorable rank,
and the most affluent fortune, that could be consistent with a
private station. The youngest of the three lived without a name,
and died without posterity. His two elder brothers obtained in
marriage the daughters of wealthy senators, and propagated new
branches of the Imperial race. Gallus and Julian afterwards
became the most illustrious of the children of Julius
Constantius, the <strong><em>Patrician</em></strong>. The two
sons of Dalmatius, who had been decorated with the vain title of
<strong><em>Censor</em></strong>, were named Dalmatius and
Hannibalianus. The two sisters of the great Constantine,
Anastasia and Eutropia, were bestowed on Optatus and Nepotianus,
two senators of noble birth and of consular dignity. His third
sister, Constantia, was distinguished by her preeminence of
greatness and of misery. She remained the widow of the vanquished
Licinius; and it was by her entreaties, that an innocent boy, the
offspring of their marriage, preserved, for some time, his life,
the title of C&aelig;sar, and a precarious hope of the
succession. Besides the females, and the allies of the Flavian
house, ten or twelve males, to whom the language of modern courts
would apply the title of princes of the blood, seemed, according
to the order of their birth, to be destined either to inherit or
to support the throne of Constantine. But in less than thirty
years, this numerous and increasing family was reduced to the
persons of Constantius and Julian, who alone had survived a
series of crimes and calamities, such as the tragic poets have
deplored in the devoted lines of Pelops and of Cadmus.<br>
</p>

<p>Crispus, the eldest son of Constantine, and the presumptive
heir of the empire, is represented by impartial historians as an
amiable and accomplished youth. The care of his education, or at
least of his studies, was intrusted to Lactantius, the most
eloquent of the Christians; a preceptor admirably qualified to
form the taste, and the excite the virtues, of his illustrious
disciple. At the age of seventeen, Crispus was invested with the
title of C&aelig;sar, and the administration of the Gallic
provinces, where the inroads of the Germans gave him an early
occasion of signalizing his military prowess. In the civil war
which broke out soon afterwards, the father and son divided their
powers; and this history has already celebrated the valor as well
as conduct displayed by the latter, in forcing the straits of the
Hellespont, so obstinately defended by the superior fleet of
Licinius. This naval victory contributed to determine the event
of the war; and the names of Constantine and of Crispus were
united in the joyful acclamations of their eastern subjects; who
loudly proclaimed, that the world had been subdued, and was now
governed, by an emperor endowed with every virtue; and by his
illustrious son, a prince beloved of Heaven, and the lively image
of his father's perfections. The public favor, which seldom
accompanies old age, diffused its lustre over the youth of
Crispus. He deserved the esteem, and he engaged the affections,
of the court, the army, and the people. The experienced merit of
a reigning monarch is acknowledged by his subjects with
reluctance, and frequently denied with partial and discontented
murmurs; while, from the opening virtues of his successor, they
fondly conceive the most unbounded hopes of private as well as
public felicity.<br>
</p>

<p>This dangerous popularity soon excited the attention of
Constantine, who, both as a father and as a king, was impatient
of an equal. Instead of attempting to secure the allegiance of
his son by the generous ties of confidence and gratitude, he
resolved to prevent the mischiefs which might be apprehended from
dissatisfied ambition. Crispus soon had reason to complain, that
while his infant brother Constantius was sent, with the title of
C&aelig;sar, to reign over his peculiar department of the Gallic
provinces, <strong><em>he</em></strong>, a prince of mature
years, who had performed such recent and signal services, instead
of being raised to the superior rank of Augustus, was confined
almost a prisoner to his father's court; and exposed, without
power or defence, to every calumny which the malice of his
enemies could suggest. Under such painful circumstances, the
royal youth might not always be able to compose his behavior, or
suppress his discontent; and we may be assured, that he was
encompassed by a train of indiscreet or perfidious followers, who
assiduously studied to inflame, and who were perhaps instructed
to betray, the unguarded warmth of his resentment. An edict of
Constantine, published about this time, manifestly indicates his
real or affected suspicions, that a secret conspiracy had been
formed against his person and government. By all the allurements
of honors and rewards, he invites informers of every degree to
accuse without exception his magistrates or ministers, his
friends or his most intimate favorites, protesting, with a solemn
asseveration, that he himself will listen to the charge, that he
himself will revenge his injuries; and concluding with a prayer,
which discovers some apprehension of danger, that the providence
of the Supreme Being may still continue to protect the safety of
the emperor and of the empire.<br>
</p>

<p>The informers, who complied with so liberal an invitation,
were sufficiently versed in the arts of courts to select the
friends and adherents of Crispus as the guilty persons; nor is
there any reason to distrust the veracity of the emperor, who had
promised an ample measure of revenge and punishment. The policy
of Constantine maintained, however, the same appearances of
regard and confidence towards a son, whom he began to consider as
his most irreconcilable enemy. Medals were struck with the
customary vows for the long and auspicious reign of the young
C&aelig;sar; and as the people, who were not admitted into the
secrets of the palace, still loved his virtues, and respected his
dignity, a poet who solicits his recall from exile, adores with
equal devotion the majesty of the father and that of the son. The
time was now arrived for celebrating the august ceremony of the
twentieth year of the reign of Constantine; and the emperor, for
that purpose, removed his court from Nicomedia to Rome, where the
most splendid preparations had been made for his reception. Every
eye, and every tongue, affected to express their sense of the
general happiness, and the veil of ceremony and dissimulation was
drawn for a while over the darkest designs of revenge and murder.
In the midst of the festival, the unfortunate Crispus was
apprehended by order of the emperor, who laid aside the
tenderness of a father, without assuming the equity of a judge.
The examination was short and private; and as it was thought
decent to conceal the fate of the young prince from the eyes of
the Roman people, he was sent under a strong guard to Pola, in
Istria, where, soon afterwards, he was put to death, either by
the hand of the executioner, or by the more gentle operations of
poison. The C&aelig;sar Licinius, a youth of amiable manners, was
involved in the ruin of Crispus: and the stern jealousy of
Constantine was unmoved by the prayers and tears of his favorite
sister, pleading for the life of a son, whose rank was his only
crime, and whose loss she did not long survive. The story of
these unhappy princes, the nature and evidence of their guilt,
the forms of their trial, and the circumstances of their death,
were buried in mysterious obscurity; and the courtly bishop, who
has celebrated in an elaborate work the virtues and piety of his
hero, observes a prudent silence on the subject of these tragic
events. Such haughty contempt for the opinion of mankind, whilst
it imprints an indelible stain on the memory of Constantine, must
remind us of the very different behavior of one of the greatest
monarchs of the present age. The Czar Peter, in the full
possession of despotic power, submitted to the judgment of
Russia, of Europe, and of posterity, the reasons which had
compelled him to subscribe the condemnation of a criminal, or at
least of a degenerate son.<br>
</p>

<p>The innocence of Crispus was so universally acknowledged, that
the modern Greeks, who adore the memory of their founder, are
reduced to palliate the guilt of a parricide, which the common
feelings of human nature forbade them to justify. They pretend,
that as soon as the afflicted father discovered the falsehood of
the accusation by which his credulity had been so fatally misled,
he published to the world his repentance and remorse; that he
mourned forty days, during which he abstained from the use of the
bath, and all the ordinary comforts of life; and that, for the
lasting instruction of posterity, he erected a golden statue of
Crispus, with this memorable inscription: To my son, whom I
unjustly condemned. A tale so moral and so interesting would
deserve to be supported by less exceptionable authority; but if
we consult the more ancient and authentic writers, they will
inform us, that the repentance of Constantine was manifested only
in acts of blood and revenge; and that he atoned for the murder
of an innocent son, by the execution, perhaps, of a guilty wife.
They ascribe the misfortunes of Crispus to the arts of his
step-mother Fausta, whose implacable hatred, or whose
disappointed love, renewed in the palace of Constantine the
ancient tragedy of Hippolitus and of Ph&aelig;dra. Like the
daughter of Minos, the daughter of Maximian accused her
son-in-law of an incestuous attempt on the chastity of his
father's wife; and easily obtained, from the jealousy of the
emperor, a sentence of death against a young prince, whom she
considered with reason as the most formidable rival of her own
children. But Helena, the aged mother of Constantine, lamented
and revenged the untimely fate of her grandson Crispus; nor was
it long before a real or pretended discovery was made, that
Fausta herself entertained a criminal connection with a slave
belonging to the Imperial stables. Her condemnation and
punishment were the instant consequences of the charge; and the
adulteress was suffocated by the steam of a bath, which, for that
purpose, had been heated to an extraordinary degree. By some it
will perhaps be thought, that the remembrance of a conjugal union
of twenty years, and the honor of their common offspring, the
destined heirs of the throne, might have softened the obdurate
heart of Constantine, and persuaded him to suffer his wife,
however guilty she might appear, to expiate her offences in a
solitary prison. But it seems a superfluous labor to weigh the
propriety, unless we could ascertain the truth, of this singular
event, which is attended with some circumstances of doubt and
perplexity. Those who have attacked, and those who have defended,
the character of Constantine, have alike disregarded two very
remarkable passages of two orations pronounced under the
succeeding reign. The former celebrates the virtues, the beauty,
and the fortune of the empress Fausta, the daughter, wife,
sister, and mother of so many princes. The latter asserts, in
explicit terms, that the mother of the younger Constantine, who
was slain three years after his father's death, survived to weep
over the fate of her son. Notwithstanding the positive testimony
of several writers of the Pagan as well as of the Christian
religion, there may still remain some reason to believe, or at
least to suspect, that Fausta escaped the blind and suspicious
cruelty of her husband. * The deaths of a son and a nephew, with
the execution of a great number of respectable, and perhaps
innocent friends, who were involved in their fall, may be
sufficient, however, to justify the discontent of the Roman
people, and to explain the satirical verses affixed to the palace
gate, comparing the splendid and bloody reigns of Constantine and
Nero.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XVIII: Character Of Constantine And His
Sons. -- Part II.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>By the death of Crispus, the inheritance of the empire seemed
to devolve on the three sons of Fausta, who have been already
mentioned under the names of Constantine, of Constantius, and of
Constans. These young princes were successively invested with the
title of C&aelig;sar; and the dates of their promotion may be
referred to the tenth, the twentieth, and the thirtieth years of
the reign of their father. This conduct, though it tended to
multiply the future masters of the Roman world, might be excused
by the partiality of paternal affection; but it is not so easy to
understand the motives of the emperor, when he endangered the
safety both of his family and of his people, by the unnecessary
elevation of his two nephews, Dalmatius and Hannibalianus. The
former was raised, by the title of C&aelig;sar, to an equality
with his cousins. In favor of the latter, Constantine invented
the new and singular appellation of
<strong><em>Nobilissimus</em></strong>; to which he annexed the
flattering distinction of a robe of purple and gold. But of the
whole series of Roman princes in any age of the empire,
Hannibalianus alone was distinguished by the title of King; a
name which the subjects of Tiberius would have detested, as the
profane and cruel insult of capricious tyranny. The use of such a
title, even as it appears under the reign of Constantine, is a
strange and unconnected fact, which can scarcely be admitted on
the joint authority of Imperial medals and contemporary
writers.<br>
</p>

<p>The whole empire was deeply interested in the education of
these five youths, the acknowledged successors of Constantine.
The exercise of the body prepared them for the fatigues of war
and the duties of active life. Those who occasionally mention the
education or talents of Constantius, allow that he excelled in
the gymnastic arts of leaping and running that he was a dexterous
archer, a skilful horseman, and a master of all the different
weapons used in the service either of the cavalry or of the
infantry. The same assiduous cultivation was bestowed, though not
perhaps with equal success, to improve the minds of the sons and
nephews of Constantine. The most celebrated professors of the
Christian faith, of the Grecian philosophy, and of the Roman
jurisprudence, were invited by the liberality of the emperor, who
reserved for himself the important task of instructing the royal
youths in the science of government, and the knowledge of
mankind. But the genius of Constantine himself had been formed by
adversity and experience. In the free intercourse of private
life, and amidst the dangers of the court of Galerius, he had
learned to command his own passions, to encounter those of his
equals, and to depend for his present safety and future greatness
on the prudence and firmness of his personal conduct. His
destined successors had the misfortune of being born and educated
in the imperial purple. Incessantly surrounded with a train of
flatterers, they passed their youth in the enjoyment of luxury,
and the expectation of a throne; nor would the dignity of their
rank permit them to descend from that elevated station from
whence the various characters of human nature appear to wear a
smooth and uniform aspect. The indulgence of Constantine admitted
them, at a very tender age, to share the administration of the
empire; and they studied the art of reigning, at the expense of
the people intrusted to their care. The younger Constantine was
appointed to hold his court in Gaul; and his brother Constantius
exchanged that department, the ancient patrimony of their father,
for the more opulent, but less martial, countries of the East.
Italy, the Western Illyricum, and Africa, were accustomed to
revere Constans, the third of his sons, as the representative of
the great Constantine. He fixed Dalmatius on the Gothic frontier,
to which he annexed the government of Thrace, Macedonia, and
Greece. The city of C&aelig;sarea was chosen for the residence of
Hannibalianus; and the provinces of Pontus, Cappadocia, and the
Lesser Armenia, were destined to form the extent of his new
kingdom. For each of these princes a suitable establishment was
provided. A just proportion of guards, of legions, and of
auxiliaries, was allotted for their respective dignity and
defence. The ministers and generals, who were placed about their
persons, were such as Constantine could trust to assist, and even
to control, these youthful sovereigns in the exercise of their
delegated power. As they advanced in years and experience, the
limits of their authority were insensibly enlarged: but the
emperor always reserved for himself the title of Augustus; and
while he showed the <strong><em>C&aelig;sars</em></strong> to the
armies and provinces, he maintained every part of the empire in
equal obedience to its supreme head. The tranquillity of the last
fourteen years of his reign was scarcely interrupted by the
contemptible insurrection of a camel-driver in the Island of
Cyprus, or by the active part which the policy of Constantine
engaged him to assume in the wars of the Goths and
Sarmatians.<br>
</p>

<p>Among the different branches of the human race, the Sarmatians
form a very remarkable shade; as they seem to unite the manners
of the Asiatic barbarians with the figure and complexion of the
ancient inhabitants of Europe. According to the various accidents
of peace and war, of alliance or conquest, the Sarmatians were
sometimes confined to the banks of the Tanais; and they sometimes
spread themselves over the immense plains which lie between the
Vistula and the Volga. The care of their numerous flocks and
herds, the pursuit of game, and the exercises of war, or rather
of rapine, directed the vagrant motions of the Sarmatians. The
movable camps or cities, the ordinary residence of their wives
and children, consisted only of large wagons drawn by oxen, and
covered in the form of tents. The military strength of the nation
was composed of cavalry; and the custom of their warriors, to
lead in their hand one or two spare horses, enabled them to
advance and to retreat with a rapid diligence, which surprised
the security, and eluded the pursuit, of a distant enemy. Their
poverty of iron prompted their rude industry to invent a sort of
cuirass, which was capable of resisting a sword or javelin,
though it was formed only of horses' hoofs, cut into thin and
polished slices, carefully laid over each other in the manner of
scales or feathers, and strongly sewed upon an under garment of
coarse linen. The offensive arms of the Sarmatians were short
daggers, long lances, and a weighty bow vow with a quiver of
arrows. They were reduced to the necessity of employing
fish-bones for the points of their weapons; but the custom of
dipping them in a venomous liquor, that poisoned the wounds which
they inflicted, is alone sufficient to prove the most savage
manners, since a people impressed with a sense of humanity would
have abhorred so cruel a practice, and a nation skilled in the
arts of war would have disdained so impotent a resource. Whenever
these Barbarians issued from their deserts in quest of prey,
their shaggy beards, uncombed locks, the furs with which they
were covered from head to foot, and their fierce countenances,
which seemed to express the innate cruelty of their minds,
inspired the more civilized provincials of Rome with horror and
dismay.<br>
</p>

<p>The tender Ovid, after a youth spent in the enjoyment of fame
and luxury, was condemned to a hopeless exile on the frozen banks
of the Danube, where he was exposed, almost without defence, to
the fury of these monsters of the desert, with whose stern
spirits he feared that his gentle shade might hereafter be
confounded. In his pathetic, but sometimes unmanly lamentations,
he describes in the most lively colors the dress and manners, the
arms and inroads, of the Get&aelig; and Sarmatians, who were
associated for the purposes of destruction; and from the accounts
of history there is some reason to believe that these Sarmatians
were the Jazyg&aelig;, one of the most numerous and warlike
tribes of the nation. The allurements of plenty engaged them to
seek a permanent establishment on the frontiers of the empire.
Soon after the reign of Augustus, they obliged the Dacians, who
subsisted by fishing on the banks of the River Teyss or Tibiscus,
to retire into the hilly country, and to abandon to the
victorious Sarmatians the fertile plains of the Upper Hungary,
which are bounded by the course of the Danube and the
semicircular enclosure of the Carpathian Mountains. In this
advantageous position, they watched or suspended the moment of
attack, as they were provoked by injuries or appeased by
presents; they gradually acquired the skill of using more
dangerous weapons, and although the Sarmatians did not illustrate
their name by any memorable exploits, they occasionally assisted
their eastern and western neighbors, the Goths and the Germans,
with a formidable body of cavalry. They lived under the irregular
aristocracy of their chieftains: but after they had received into
their bosom the fugitive Vandals, who yielded to the pressure of
the Gothic power, they seem to have chosen a king from that
nation, and from the illustrious race of the Astingi, who had
formerly dwelt on the shores of the northern ocean.<br>
</p>

<p>This motive of enmity must have inflamed the subjects of
contention, which perpetually arise on the confines of warlike
and independent nations. The Vandal princes were stimulated by
fear and revenge; the Gothic kings aspired to extend their
dominion from the Euxine to the frontiers of Germany; and the
waters of the Maros, a small river which falls into the Teyss,
were stained with the blood of the contending Barbarians. After
some experience of the superior strength and numbers of their
adversaries, the Sarmatians implored the protection of the Roman
monarch, who beheld with pleasure the discord of the nations, but
who was justly alarmed by the progress of the Gothic arms. As
soon as Constantine had declared himself in favor of the weaker
party, the haughty Araric, king of the Goths, instead of
expecting the attack of the legions, boldly passed the Danube,
and spread terror and devastation through the province of
M&aelig;sia. To oppose the inroad of this destroying host, the
aged emperor took the field in person; but on this occasion
either his conduct or his fortune betrayed the glory which he had
acquired in so many foreign and domestic wars. He had the
mortification of seeing his troops fly before an inconsiderable
detachment of the Barbarians, who pursued them to the edge of
their fortified camp, and obliged him to consult his safety by a
precipitate and ignominious retreat. * The event of a second and
more successful action retrieved the honor of the Roman name; and
the powers of art and discipline prevailed, after an obstinate
contest, over the efforts of irregular valor. The broken army of
the Goths abandoned the field of battle, the wasted province, and
the passage of the Danube: and although the eldest of the sons of
Constantine was permitted to supply the place of his father, the
merit of the victory, which diffused universal joy, was ascribed
to the auspicious counsels of the emperor himself.<br>
</p>

<p>He contributed at least to improve this advantage, by his
negotiations with the free and warlike people of Chersonesus,
whose capital, situate on the western coast of the Tauric or
Crim&aelig;an peninsula, still retained some vestiges of a
Grecian colony, and was governed by a perpetual magistrate,
assisted by a council of senators, emphatically styled the
Fathers of the City. The Chersonites were animated against the
Goths, by the memory of the wars, which, in the preceding
century, they had maintained with unequal forces against the
invaders of their country. They were connected with the Romans by
the mutual benefits of commerce; as they were supplied from the
provinces of Asia with corn and manufactures, which they
purchased with their only productions, salt, wax, and hides.
Obedient to the requisition of Constantine, they prepared, under
the conduct of their magistrate Diogenes, a considerable army, of
which the principal strength consisted in cross-bows and military
chariots. The speedy march and intrepid attack of the
Chersonites, by diverting the attention of the Goths, assisted
the operations of the Imperial generals. The Goths, vanquished on
every side, were driven into the mountains, where, in the course
of a severe campaign, above a hundred thousand were computed to
have perished by cold and hunger Peace was at length granted to
their humble supplications; the eldest son of Araric was accepted
as the most valuable hostage; and Constantine endeavored to
convince their chiefs, by a liberal distribution of honors and
rewards, how far the friendship of the Romans was preferable to
their enmity. In the expressions of his gratitude towards the
faithful Chersonites, the emperor was still more magnificent. The
pride of the nation was gratified by the splendid and almost
royal decorations bestowed on their magistrate and his
successors. A perpetual exemption from all duties was stipulated
for their vessels which traded to the ports of the Black Sea. A
regular subsidy was promised, of iron, corn, oil, and of every
supply which could be useful either in peace or war. But it was
thought that the Sarmatians were sufficiently rewarded by their
deliverance from impending ruin; and the emperor, perhaps with
too strict an economy, deducted some part of the expenses of the
war from the customary gratifications which were allowed to that
turbulent nation.<br>
</p>

<p>Exasperated by this apparent neglect, the Sarmatians soon
forgot, with the levity of barbarians, the services which they
had so lately received, and the dangers which still threatened
their safety. Their inroads on the territory of the empire
provoked the indignation of Constantine to leave them to their
fate; and he no longer opposed the ambition of Geberic, a
renowned warrior, who had recently ascended the Gothic throne.
Wisumar, the Vandal king, whilst alone, and unassisted, he
defended his dominions with undaunted courage, was vanquished and
slain in a decisive battle, which swept away the flower of the
Sarmatian youth. * The remainder of the nation embraced the
desperate expedient of arming their slaves, a hardy race of
hunters and herdsmen, by whose tumultuary aid they revenged their
defeat, and expelled the invader from their confines. But they
soon discovered that they had exchanged a foreign for a domestic
enemy, more dangerous and more implacable. Enraged by their
former servitude, elated by their present glory, the slaves,
under the name of Limigantes, claimed and usurped the possession
of the country which they had saved. Their masters, unable to
withstand the ungoverned fury of the populace, preferred the
hardships of exile to the tyranny of their servants. Some of the
fugitive Sarmatians solicited a less ignominious dependence,
under the hostile standard of the Goths. A more numerous band
retired beyond the Carpathian Mountains, among the Quadi, their
German allies, and were easily admitted to share a superfluous
waste of uncultivated land. But the far greater part of the
distressed nation turned their eyes towards the fruitful
provinces of Rome. Imploring the protection and forgiveness of
the emperor, they solemnly promised, as subjects in peace, and as
soldiers in war, the most inviolable fidelity to the empire which
should graciously receive them into its bosom. According to the
maxims adopted by Probus and his successors, the offers of this
barbarian colony were eagerly accepted; and a competent portion
of lands in the provinces of Pannonia, Thrace, Macedonia, and
Italy, were immediately assigned for the habitation and
subsistence of three hundred thousand Sarmatians.<br>
</p>

<p>By chastising the pride of the Goths, and by accepting the
homage of a suppliant nation, Constantine asserted the majesty of
the Roman empire; and the ambassadors of &AElig;thiopia, Persia,
and the most remote countries of India, congratulated the peace
and prosperity of his government. If he reckoned, among the
favors of fortune, the death of his eldest son, of his nephew,
and perhaps of his wife, he enjoyed an uninterrupted flow of
private as well as public felicity, till the thirtieth year of
his reign; a period which none of his predecessors, since
Augustus, had been permitted to celebrate. Constantine survived
that solemn festival about ten months; and at the mature age of
sixty-four, after a short illness, he ended his memorable life at
the palace of Aquyrion, in the suburbs of Nicomedia, whither he
had retired for the benefit of the air, and with the hope of
recruiting his exhausted strength by the use of the warm baths.
The excessive demonstrations of grief, or at least of mourning,
surpassed whatever had been practised on any former occasion.
Notwithstanding the claims of the senate and people of ancient
Rome, the corpse of the deceased emperor, according to his last
request, was transported to the city, which was destined to
preserve the name and memory of its founder. The body of
Constantine adorned with the vain symbols of greatness, the
purple and diadem, was deposited on a golden bed in one of the
apartments of the palace, which for that purpose had been
splendidly furnished and illuminated. The forms of the court were
strictly maintained. Every day, at the appointed hours, the
principal officers of the state, the army, and the household,
approaching the person of their sovereign with bended knees and a
composed countenance, offered their respectful homage as
seriously as if he had been still alive. From motives of policy,
this theatrical representation was for some time continued; nor
could flattery neglect the opportunity of remarking that
Constantine alone, by the peculiar indulgence of Heaven, had
reigned after his death.<br>
</p>

<p>But this reign could subsist only in empty pageantry; and it
was soon discovered that the will of the most absolute monarch is
seldom obeyed, when his subjects have no longer anything to hope
from his favor, or to dread from his resentment. The same
ministers and generals, who bowed with such referential awe
before the inanimate corpse of their deceased sovereign, were
engaged in secret consultations to exclude his two nephews,
Dalmatius and Hannibalianus, from the share which he had assigned
them in the succession of the empire. We are too imperfectly
acquainted with the court of Constantine to form any judgment of
the real motives which influenced the leaders of the conspiracy;
unless we should suppose that they were actuated by a spirit of
jealousy and revenge against the pr&aelig;fect Ablavius, a proud
favorite, who had long directed the counsels and abused the
confidence of the late emperor. The arguments, by which they
solicited the concurrence of the soldiers and people, are of a
more obvious nature; and they might with decency, as well as
truth, insist on the superior rank of the children of
Constantine, the danger of multiplying the number of sovereigns,
and the impending mischiefs which threatened the republic, from
the discord of so many rival princes, who were not connected by
the tender sympathy of fraternal affection. The intrigue was
conducted with zeal and secrecy, till a loud and unanimous
declaration was procured from the troops, that they would suffer
none except the sons of their lamented monarch to reign over the
Roman empire. The younger Dalmatius, who was united with his
collateral relations by the ties of friendship and interest, is
allowed to have inherited a considerable share of the abilities
of the great Constantine; but, on this occasion, he does not
appear to have concerted any measure for supporting, by arms, the
just claims which himself and his royal brother derived from the
liberality of their uncle. Astonished and overwhelmed by the tide
of popular fury, they seem to have remained, without the power of
flight or of resistance, in the hands of their implacable
enemies. Their fate was suspended till the arrival of
Constantius, the second, and perhaps the most favored, of the
sons of Constantine.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XVIII: Character Of Constantine And His
Sons. -- Part III.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>The voice of the dying emperor had recommended the care of his
funeral to the piety of Constantius; and that prince, by the
vicinity of his eastern station, could easily prevent the
diligence of his brothers, who resided in their distant
government of Italy and Gaul. As soon as he had taken possession
of the palace of Constantinople, his first care was to remove the
apprehensions of his kinsmen, by a solemn oath which he pledged
for their security. His next employment was to find some specious
pretence which might release his conscience from the obligation
of an imprudent promise. The arts of fraud were made subservient
to the designs of cruelty; and a manifest forgery was attested by
a person of the most sacred character. From the hands of the
Bishop of Nicomedia, Constantius received a fatal scroll,
affirmed to be the genuine testament of his father; in which the
emperor expressed his suspicions that he had been poisoned by his
brothers; and conjured his sons to revenge his death, and to
consult their own safety, by the punishment of the guilty.
Whatever reasons might have been alleged by these unfortunate
princes to defend their life and honor against so incredible an
accusation, they were silenced by the furious clamors of the
soldiers, who declared themselves, at once, their enemies, their
judges, and their executioners. The spirit, and even the forms of
legal proceedings were repeatedly violated in a promiscuous
massacre; which involved the two uncles of Constantius, seven of
his cousins, of whom Dalmatius and Hannibalianus were the most
illustrious, the Patrician Optatus, who had married a sister of
the late emperor, and the Pr&aelig;fect Ablavius, whose power and
riches had inspired him with some hopes of obtaining the purple.
If it were necessary to aggravate the horrors of this bloody
scene, we might add, that Constantius himself had espoused the
daughter of his uncle Julius, and that he had bestowed his sister
in marriage on his cousin Hannibalianus. These alliances, which
the policy of Constantine, regardless of the public prejudice,
had formed between the several branches of the Imperial house,
served only to convince mankind, that these princes were as cold
to the endearments of conjugal affection, as they were insensible
to the ties of consanguinity, and the moving entreaties of youth
and innocence. Of so numerous a family, Gallus and Julian alone,
the two youngest children of Julius Constantius, were saved from
the hands of the assassins, till their rage, satiated with
slaughter, had in some measure subsided. The emperor Constantius,
who, in the absence of his brothers, was the most obnoxious to
guilt and reproach, discovered, on some future occasions, a faint
and transient remorse for those cruelties which the perfidious
counsels of his ministers, and the irresistible violence of the
troops, had extorted from his unexperienced youth.<br>
</p>

<p>The massacre of the Flavian race was succeeded by a new
division of the provinces; which was ratified in a personal
interview of the three brothers. Constantine, the eldest of the
C&aelig;sars, obtained, with a certain preeminence of rank, the
possession of the new capital, which bore his own name and that
of his father. Thrace, and the countries of the East, were
allotted for the patrimony of Constantius; and Constans was
acknowledged as the lawful sovereign of Italy, Africa, and the
Western Illyricum. The armies submitted to their hereditary
right; and they condescended, after some delay, to accept from
the Roman senate the title of Augustus. When they first assumed
the reins of government, the eldest of these princes was
twenty-one, the second twenty, and the third only seventeen,
years of age.<br>
</p>

<p>While the martial nations of Europe followed the standards of
his brothers, Constantius, at the head of the effeminate troops
of Asia, was left to sustain the weight of the Persian war. At
the decease of Constantine, the throne of the East was filled by
Sapor, son of Hormouz, or Hormisdas, and grandson of Narses, who,
after the victory of Galerius, had humbly confessed the
superiority of the Roman power. Although Sapor was in the
thirtieth year of his long reign, he was still in the vigor of
youth, as the date of his accession, by a very strange fatality,
had preceded that of his birth. The wife of Hormouz remained
pregnant at the time of her husband's death; and the uncertainty
of the sex, as well as of the event, excited the ambitious hopes
of the princes of the house of Sassan. The apprehensions of civil
war were at length removed, by the positive assurance of the
Magi, that the widow of Hormouz had conceived, and would safely
produce a son. Obedient to the voice of superstition, the
Persians prepared, without delay, the ceremony of his coronation.
A royal bed, on which the queen lay in state, was exhibited in
the midst of the palace; the diadem was placed on the spot, which
might be supposed to conceal the future heir of Artaxerxes, and
the prostrate satraps adored the majesty of their invisible and
insensible sovereign. If any credit can be given to this
marvellous tale, which seems, however, to be countenanced by the
manners of the people, and by the extraordinary duration of his
reign, we must admire not only the fortune, but the genius, of
Sapor. In the soft, sequestered education of a Persian harem, the
royal youth could discover the importance of exercising the vigor
of his mind and body; and, by his personal merit, deserved a
throne, on which he had been seated, while he was yet unconscious
of the duties and temptations of absolute power. His minority was
exposed to the almost inevitable calamities of domestic discord;
his capital was surprised and plundered by Thair, a powerful king
of Yemen, or Arabia; and the majesty of the royal family was
degraded by the captivity of a princess, the sister of the
deceased king. But as soon as Sapor attained the age of manhood,
the presumptuous Thair, his nation, and his country, fell beneath
the first effort of the young warrior; who used his victory with
so judicious a mixture of rigor and clemency, that he obtained
from the fears and gratitude of the Arabs the title of
<strong><em>Dhoulacnaf</em></strong>, or protector of the
nation.<br>
</p>

<p>The ambition of the Persian, to whom his enemies ascribe the
virtues of a soldier and a statesman, was animated by the desire
of revenging the disgrace of his fathers, and of wresting from
the hands of the Romans the five provinces beyond the Tigris. The
military fame of Constantine, and the real or apparent strength
of his government, suspended the attack; and while the hostile
conduct of Sapor provoked the resentment, his artful negotiations
amused the patience of the Imperial court. The death of
Constantine was the signal of war, and the actual condition of
the Syrian and Armenian frontier seemed to encourage the Persians
by the prospect of a rich spoil and an easy conquest. The example
of the massacres of the palace diffused a spirit of
licentiousness and sedition among the troops of the East, who
were no longer restrained by their habits of obedience to a
veteran commander. By the prudence of Constantius, who, from the
interview with his brothers in Pannonia, immediately hastened to
the banks of the Euphrates, the legions were gradually restored
to a sense of duty and discipline; but the season of anarchy had
permitted Sapor to form the siege of Nisibis, and to occupy
several of the most important fortresses of Mesopotamia. In
Armenia, the renowned Tiridates had long enjoyed the peace and
glory which he deserved by his valor and fidelity to the cause of
Rome. The firm alliance which he maintained with Constantine was
productive of spiritual as well as of temporal benefits; by the
conversion of Tiridates, the character of a saint was applied to
that of a hero, the Christian faith was preached and established
from the Euphrates to the shores of the Caspian, and Armenia was
attached to the empire by the double ties of policy and religion.
But as many of the Armenian nobles still refused to abandon the
plurality of their gods and of their wives, the public
tranquillity was disturbed by a discontented faction, which
insulted the feeble age of their sovereign, and impatiently
expected the hour of his death. He died at length after a reign
of fifty-six years, and the fortune of the Armenian monarchy
expired with Tiridates. His lawful heir was driven into exile,
the Christian priests were either murdered or expelled from their
churches, the barbarous tribes of Albania were solicited to
descend from their mountains; and two of the most powerful
governors, usurping the ensigns or the powers of royalty,
implored the assistance of Sapor, and opened the gates of their
cities to the Persian garrisons. The Christian party, under the
guidance of the Archbishop of Artaxata, the immediate successor
of St. Gregory the Illuminator, had recourse to the piety of
Constantius. After the troubles had continued about three years,
Antiochus, one of the officers of the household, executed with
success the Imperial commission of restoring Chosroes, * the son
of Tiridates, to the throne of his fathers, of distributing
honors and rewards among the faithful servants of the house of
Arsaces, and of proclaiming a general amnesty, which was accepted
by the greater part of the rebellious satraps. But the Romans
derived more honor than advantage from this revolution. Chosroes
was a prince of a puny stature and a pusillanimous spirit.
Unequal to the fatigues of war, averse to the society of mankind,
he withdrew from his capital to a retired palace, which he built
on the banks of the River Eleutherus, and in the centre of a
shady grove; where he consumed his vacant hours in the rural
sports of hunting and hawking. To secure this inglorious ease, he
submitted to the conditions of peace which Sapor condescended to
impose; the payment of an annual tribute, and the restitution of
the fertile province of Atropatene, which the courage of
Tiridates, and the victorious arms of Galerius, had annexed to
the Armenian monarchy.<br>
</p>

<p>During the long period of the reign of Constantius, the
provinces of the East were afflicted by the calamities of the
Persian war. The irregular incursions of the light troops
alternately spread terror and devastation beyond the Tigris and
beyond the Euphrates, from the gates of Ctesiphon to those of
Antioch; and this active service was performed by the Arabs of
the desert, who were divided in their interest and affections;
some of their independent chiefs being enlisted in the party of
Sapor, whilst others had engaged their doubtful fidelity to the
emperor. The more grave and important operations of the war were
conducted with equal vigor; and the armies of Rome and Persia
encountered each other in nine bloody fields, in two of which
Constantius himself commanded in person. The event of the day was
most commonly adverse to the Romans, but in the battle of
Singara, heir imprudent valor had almost achieved a signal and
decisive victory. The stationary troops of Singara * retired on
the approach of Sapor, who passed the Tigris over three bridges,
and occupied near the village of Hilleh an advantageous camp,
which, by the labor of his numerous pioneers, he surrounded in
one day with a deep ditch and a lofty rampart. His formidable
host, when it was drawn out in order of battle, covered the banks
of the river, the adjacent heights, and the whole extent of a
plain of above twelve miles, which separated the two armies. Both
were alike impatient to engage; but the Barbarians, after a
slight resistance, fled in disorder; unable to resist, or
desirous to weary, the strength of the heavy legions, who,
fainting with heat and thirst, pursued them across the plain, and
cut in pieces a line of cavalry, clothed in complete armor, which
had been posted before the gates of the camp to protect their
retreat. Constantius, who was hurried along in the pursuit,
attempted, without effect, to restrain the ardor of his troops,
by representing to them the dangers of the approaching night, and
the certainty of completing their success with the return of day.
As they depended much more on their own valor than on the
experience or the abilities of their chief, they silenced by
their clamors his timid remonstrances; and rushing with fury to
the charge, filled up the ditch, broke down the rampart, and
dispersed themselves through the tents to recruit their exhausted
strength, and to enjoy the rich harvest of their labors. But the
prudent Sapor had watched the moment of victory. His army, of
which the greater part, securely posted on the heights, had been
spectators of the action, advanced in silence, and under the
shadow of the night; and his Persian archers, guided by the
illumination of the camp, poured a shower of arrows on a disarmed
and licentious crowd. The sincerity of history declares, that the
Romans were vanquished with a dreadful slaughter, and that the
flying remnant of the legions was exposed to the most intolerable
hardships. Even the tenderness of panegyric, confessing that the
glory of the emperor was sullied by the disobedience of his
soldiers, chooses to draw a veil over the circumstances of this
melancholy retreat. Yet one of those venal orators, so jealous of
the fame of Constantius, relates, with amazing coolness, an act
of such incredible cruelty, as, in the judgment of posterity,
must imprint a far deeper stain on the honor of the Imperial
name. The son of Sapor, the heir of his crown, had been made a
captive in the Persian camp. The unhappy youth, who might have
excited the compassion of the most savage enemy, was scourged,
tortured, and publicly executed by the inhuman Romans.<br>
</p>

<p>Whatever advantages might attend the arms of Sapor in the
field, though nine repeated victories diffused among the nations
the fame of his valor and conduct, he could not hope to succeed
in the execution of his designs, while the fortified towns of
Mesopotamia, and, above all, the strong and ancient city of
Nisibis, remained in the possession of the Romans. In the space
of twelve years, Nisibis, which, since the time of Lucullus, had
been deservedly esteemed the bulwark of the East, sustained three
memorable sieges against the power of Sapor; and the disappointed
monarch, after urging his attacks above sixty, eighty, and a
hundred days, was thrice repulsed with loss and ignominy. This
large and populous city was situate about two days' journey from
the Tigris, in the midst of a pleasant and fertile plain at the
foot of Mount Masius. A treble enclosure of brick walls was
defended by a deep ditch; and the intrepid resistance of Count
Lucilianus, and his garrison, was seconded by the desperate
courage of the people. The citizens of Nisibis were animated by
the exhortations of their bishop, inured to arms by the presence
of danger, and convinced of the intentions of Sapor to plant a
Persian colony in their room, and to lead them away into distant
and barbarous captivity. The event of the two former sieges
elated their confidence, and exasperated the haughty spirit of
the Great King, who advanced a third time towards Nisibis, at the
head of the united forces of Persia and India. The ordinary
machines, invented to batter or undermine the walls, were
rendered ineffectual by the superior skill of the Romans; and
many days had vainly elapsed, when Sapor embraced a resolution
worthy of an eastern monarch, who believed that the elements
themselves were subject to his power. At the stated season of the
melting of the snows in Armenia, the River Mygdonius, which
divides the plain and the city of Nisibis, forms, like the Nile,
an inundation over the adjacent country. By the labor of the
Persians, the course of the river was stopped below the town, and
the waters were confined on every side by solid mounds of earth.
On this artificial lake, a fleet of armed vessels filled with
soldiers, and with engines which discharged stones of five
hundred pounds weight, advanced in order of battle, and engaged,
almost upon a level, the troops which defended the ramparts. *The
irresistible force of the waters was alternately fatal to the
contending parties, till at length a portion of the walls, unable
to sustain the accumulated pressure, gave way at once, and
exposed an ample breach of one hundred and fifty feet. The
Persians were instantly driven to the assault, and the fate of
Nisibis depended on the event of the day. The heavy-armed
cavalry, who led the van of a deep column, were embarrassed in
the mud, and great numbers were drowned in the unseen holes which
had been filled by the rushing waters. The elephants, made
furious by their wounds, increased the disorder, and trampled
down thousands of the Persian archers. The Great King, who, from
an exalted throne, beheld the misfortunes of his arms, sounded,
with reluctant indignation, the signal of the retreat, and
suspended for some hours the prosecution of the attack. But the
vigilant citizens improved the opportunity of the night; and the
return of day discovered a new wall of six feet in height, rising
every moment to fill up the interval of the breach.
Notwithstanding the disappointment of his hopes, and the loss of
more than twenty thousand men, Sapor still pressed the reduction
of Nisibis, with an obstinate firmness, which could have yielded
only to the necessity of defending the eastern provinces of
Persia against a formidable invasion of the Massaget&aelig;.
Alarmed by this intelligence, he hastily relinquished the siege,
and marched with rapid diligence from the banks of the Tigris to
those of the Oxus. The danger and difficulties of the Scythian
war engaged him soon afterwards to conclude, or at least to
observe, a truce with the Roman emperor, which was equally
grateful to both princes; as Constantius himself, after the death
of his two brothers, was involved, by the revolutions of the
West, in a civil contest, which required and seemed to exceed the
most vigorous exertion of his undivided strength.<br>
</p>

<p>After the partition of the empire, three years had scarcely
elapsed before the sons of Constantine seemed impatient to
convince mankind that they were incapable of contenting
themselves with the dominions which they were unqualified to
govern. The eldest of those princes soon complained, that he was
defrauded of his just proportion of the spoils of their murdered
kinsmen; and though he might yield to the superior guilt and
merit of Constantius, he exacted from Constans the cession of the
African provinces, as an equivalent for the rich countries of
Macedonia and Greece, which his brother had acquired by the death
of Dalmatius. The want of sincerity, which Constantine
experienced in a tedious and fruitless negotiation, exasperated
the fierceness of his temper; and he eagerly listened to those
favorites, who suggested to him that his honor, as well as his
interest, was concerned in the prosecution of the quarrel. At the
head of a tumultuary band, suited for rapine rather than for
conquest, he suddenly broke onto the dominions of Constans, by
the way of the Julian Alps, and the country round Aquileia felt
the first effects of his resentment. The measures of Constans,
who then resided in Dacia, were directed with more prudence and
ability. On the news of his brother's invasion, he detached a
select and disciplined body of his Illyrian troops, proposing to
follow them in person, with the remainder of his forces. But the
conduct of his lieutenants soon terminated the unnatural contest.
By the artful appearances of flight, Constantine was betrayed
into an ambuscade, which had been concealed in a wood, where the
rash youth, with a few attendants, was surprised, surrounded, and
slain. His body, after it had been found in the obscure stream of
the Alsa, obtained the honors of an Imperial sepulchre; but his
provinces transferred their allegiance to the conqueror, who,
refusing to admit his elder brother Constantius to any share in
these new acquisitions, maintained the undisputed possession of
more than two thirds of the Roman empire.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XVIII: Character Of Constantine And His
Sons. -- Part IV.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>The fate of Constans himself was delayed about ten years
longer, and the revenge of his brother's death was reserved for
the more ignoble hand of a domestic traitor. The pernicious
tendency of the system introduced by Constantine was displayed in
the feeble administration of his sons; who, by their vices and
weakness, soon lost the esteem and affections of their people.
The pride assumed by Constans, from the unmerited success of his
arms, was rendered more contemptible by his want of abilities and
application. His fond partiality towards some German captives,
distinguished only by the charms of youth, was an object of
scandal to the people; and Magnentius, an ambitious soldier, who
was himself of Barbarian extraction, was encouraged by the public
discontent to assert the honor of the Roman name. The chosen
bands of Jovians and Herculians, who acknowledged Magnentius as
their leader, maintained the most respectable and important
station in the Imperial camp. The friendship of Marcellinus,
count of the sacred largesses, supplied with a liberal hand the
means of seduction. The soldiers were convinced by the most
specious arguments, that the republic summoned them to break the
bonds of hereditary servitude; and, by the choice of an active
and vigilant prince, to reward the same virtues which had raised
the ancestors of the degenerate Constans from a private condition
to the throne of the world. As soon as the conspiracy was ripe
for execution, Marcellinus, under the pretence of celebrating his
son's birthday, gave a splendid entertainment to the
<strong><em>illustrious</em></strong> and
<strong><em>honorable</em></strong>persons of the court of Gaul,
which then resided in the city of Autun. The intemperance of the
feast was artfully protracted till a very late hour of the night;
and the unsuspecting guests were tempted to indulge themselves in
a dangerous and guilty freedom of conversation. On a sudden the
doors were thrown open, and Magnentius, who had retired for a few
moments, returned into the apartment, invested with the diadem
and purple. The conspirators instantly saluted him with the
titles of Augustus and Emperor. The surprise, the terror, the
intoxication, the ambitious hopes, and the mutual ignorance of
the rest of the assembly, prompted them to join their voices to
the general acclamation. The guards hastened to take the oath of
fidelity; the gates of the town were shut; and before the dawn of
day, Magnentius became master of the troops and treasure of the
palace and city of Autun. By his secrecy and diligence he
entertained some hopes of surprising the person of Constans, who
was pursuing in the adjacent forest his favorite amusement of
hunting, or perhaps some pleasures of a more private and criminal
nature. The rapid progress of fame allowed him, however, an
instant for flight, though the desertion of his soldiers and
subjects deprived him of the power of resistance. Before he could
reach a seaport in Spain, where he intended to embark, he was
overtaken near Helena, at the foot of the Pyrenees, by a party of
light cavalry, whose chief, regardless of the sanctity of a
temple, executed his commission by the murder of the son of
Constantine.<br>
</p>

<p>As soon as the death of Constans had decided this easy but
important revolution, the example of the court of Autun was
imitated by the provinces of the West. The authority of
Magnentius was acknowledged through the whole extent of the two
great pr&aelig;fectures of Gaul and Italy; and the usurper
prepared, by every act of oppression, to collect a treasure,
which might discharge the obligation of an immense donative, and
supply the expenses of a civil war. The martial countries of
Illyricum, from the Danube to the extremity of Greece, had long
obeyed the government of Vetranio, an aged general, beloved for
the simplicity of his manners, and who had acquired some
reputation by his experience and services in war. Attached by
habit, by duty, and by gratitude, to the house of Constantine, he
immediately gave the strongest assurances to the only surviving
son of his late master, that he would expose, with unshaken
fidelity, his person and his troops, to inflict a just revenge on
the traitors of Gaul. But the legions of Vetranio were seduced,
rather than provoked, by the example of rebellion; their leader
soon betrayed a want of firmness, or a want of sincerity; and his
ambition derived a specious pretence from the approbation of the
princess Constantina. That cruel and aspiring woman, who had
obtained from the great Constantine, her father, the rank of
<strong><em>Augusta</em></strong>, placed the diadem with her own
hands on the head of the Illyrian general; and seemed to expect
from his victory the accomplishment of those unbounded hopes, of
which she had been disappointed by the death of her husband
Hannibalianus. Perhaps it was without the consent of Constantina,
that the new emperor formed a necessary, though dishonorable,
alliance with the usurper of the West, whose purple was so
recently stained with her brother's blood.<br>
</p>

<p>The intelligence of these important events, which so deeply
affected the honor and safety of the Imperial house, recalled the
arms of Constantius from the inglorious prosecution of the
Persian war. He recommended the care of the East to his
lieutenants, and afterwards to his cousin Gallus, whom he raised
from a prison to a throne; and marched towards Europe, with a
mind agitated by the conflict of hope and fear, of grief and
indignation. On his arrival at Heraclea in Thrace, the emperor
gave audience to the ambassadors of Magnentius and Vetranio. The
first author of the conspiracy Marcellinus, who in some measure
had bestowed the purple on his new master, boldly accepted this
dangerous commission; and his three colleagues were selected from
the illustrious personages of the state and army. These deputies
were instructed to soothe the resentment, and to alarm the fears,
of Constantius. They were empowered to offer him the friendship
and alliance of the western princes, to cement their union by a
double marriage; of Constantius with the daughter of Magnentius,
and of Magnentius himself with the ambitious Constantina; and to
acknowledge in the treaty the preeminence of rank, which might
justly be claimed by the emperor of the East. Should pride and
mistaken piety urge him to refuse these equitable conditions, the
ambassadors were ordered to expatiate on the inevitable ruin
which must attend his rashness, if he ventured to provoke the
sovereigns of the West to exert their superior strength; and to
employ against him that valor, those abilities, and those
legions, to which the house of Constantine had been indebted for
so many triumphs. Such propositions and such arguments appeared
to deserve the most serious attention; the answer of Constantius
was deferred till the next day; and as he had reflected on the
importance of justifying a civil war in the opinion of the
people, he thus addressed his council, who listened with real or
affected credulity: "Last night," said he, "after I retired to
rest, the shade of the great Constantine, embracing the corpse of
my murdered brother, rose before my eyes; his well-known voice
awakened me to revenge, forbade me to despair of the republic,
and assured me of the success and immortal glory which would
crown the justice of my arms." The authority of such a vision, or
rather of the prince who alleged it, silenced every doubt, and
excluded all negotiation. The ignominious terms of peace were
rejected with disdain. One of the ambassadors of the tyrant was
dismissed with the haughty answer of Constantius; his colleagues,
as unworthy of the privileges of the law of nations, were put in
irons; and the contending powers prepared to wage an implacable
war.<br>
</p>

<p>Such was the conduct, and such perhaps was the duty, of the
brother of Constans towards the perfidious usurper of Gaul. The
situation and character of Vetranio admitted of milder measures;
and the policy of the Eastern emperor was directed to disunite
his antagonists, and to separate the forces of Illyricum from the
cause of rebellion. It was an easy task to deceive the frankness
and simplicity of Vetranio, who, fluctuating some time between
the opposite views of honor and interest, displayed to the world
the insincerity of his temper, and was insensibly engaged in the
snares of an artful negotiation. Constantius acknowledged him as
a legitimate and equal colleague in the empire, on condition that
he would renounce his disgraceful alliance with Magnentius, and
appoint a place of interview on the frontiers of their respective
provinces; where they might pledge their friendship by mutual
vows of fidelity, and regulate by common consent the future
operations of the civil war. In consequence of this agreement,
Vetranio advanced to the city of Sardica, at the head of twenty
thousand horse, and of a more numerous body of infantry; a power
so far superior to the forces of Constantius, that the Illyrian
emperor appeared to command the life and fortunes of his rival,
who, depending on the success of his private negotiations, had
seduced the troops, and undermined the throne, of Vetranio. The
chiefs, who had secretly embraced the party of Constantius,
prepared in his favor a public spectacle, calculated to discover
and inflame the passions of the multitude. The united armies were
commanded to assemble in a large plain near the city. In the
centre, according to the rules of ancient discipline, a military
tribunal, or rather scaffold, was erected, from whence the
emperors were accustomed, on solemn and important occasions, to
harangue the troops. The well-ordered ranks of Romans and
Barbarians, with drawn swords, or with erected spears, the
squadrons of cavalry, and the cohorts of infantry, distinguished
by the variety of their arms and ensigns, formed an immense
circle round the tribunal; and the attentive silence which they
preserved was sometimes interrupted by loud bursts of clamor or
of applause. In the presence of this formidable assembly, the two
emperors were called upon to explain the situation of public
affairs: the precedency of rank was yielded to the royal birth of
Constantius; and though he was indifferently skilled in the arts
of rhetoric, he acquitted himself, under these difficult
circumstances, with firmness, dexterity, and eloquence. The first
part of his oration seemed to be pointed only against the tyrant
of Gaul; but while he tragically lamented the cruel murder of
Constans, he insinuated, that none, except a brother, could claim
a right to the succession of his brother. He displayed, with some
complacency, the glories of his Imperial race; and recalled to
the memory of the troops the valor, the triumphs, the liberality
of the great Constantine, to whose sons they had engaged their
allegiance by an oath of fidelity, which the ingratitude of his
most favored servants had tempted them to violate. The officers,
who surrounded the tribunal, and were instructed to act their
part in this extraordinary scene, confessed the irresistible
power of reason and eloquence, by saluting the emperor
Constantius as their lawful sovereign. The contagion of loyalty
and repentance was communicated from rank to rank; till the plain
of Sardica resounded with the universal acclamation of "Away with
these upstart usurpers! Long life and victory to the son of
Constantine! Under his banners alone we will fight and conquer."
The shout of thousands, their menacing gestures, the fierce
clashing of their arms, astonished and subdued the courage of
Vetranio, who stood, amidst the defection of his followers, in
anxious and silent suspense. Instead of embracing the last refuge
of generous despair, he tamely submitted to his fate; and taking
the diadem from his head, in the view of both armies fell
prostrate at the feet of his conqueror. Constantius used his
victory with prudence and moderation; and raising from the ground
the aged suppliant, whom he affected to style by the endearing
name of Father, he gave him his hand to descend from the throne.
The city of Prusa was assigned for the exile or retirement of the
abdicated monarch, who lived six years in the enjoyment of ease
and affluence. He often expressed his grateful sense of the
goodness of Constantius, and, with a very amiable simplicity,
advised his benefactor to resign the sceptre of the world, and to
seek for content (where alone it could be found) in the peaceful
obscurity of a private condition.<br>
</p>

<p>The behavior of Constantius on this memorable occasion was
celebrated with some appearance of justice; and his courtiers
compared the studied orations which a Pericles or a Demosthenes
addressed to the populace of Athens, with the victorious
eloquence which had persuaded an armed multitude to desert and
depose the object of their partial choice. The approaching
contest with Magnentius was of a more serious and bloody kind.
The tyrant advanced by rapid marches to encounter Constantius, at
the head of a numerous army, composed of Gauls and Spaniards, of
Franks and Saxons; of those provincials who supplied the strength
of the legions, and of those barbarians who were dreaded as the
most formidable enemies of the republic. The fertile plains of
the Lower Pannonia, between the Drave, the Save, and the Danube,
presented a spacious theatre; and the operations of the civil war
were protracted during the summer months by the skill or timidity
of the combatants. Constantius had declared his intention of
deciding the quarrel in the fields of Cibalis, a name that would
animate his troops by the remembrance of the victory, which, on
the same auspicious ground, had been obtained by the arms of his
father Constantine. Yet by the impregnable fortifications with
which the emperor encompassed his camp, he appeared to decline,
rather than to invite, a general engagement. It was the object of
Magnentius to tempt or to compel his adversary to relinquish this
advantageous position; and he employed, with that view, the
various marches, evolutions, and stratagems, which the knowledge
of the art of war could suggest to an experienced officer. He
carried by assault the important town of Siscia; made an attack
on the city of Sirmium, which lay in the rear of the Imperial
camp, attempted to force a passage over the Save into the eastern
provinces of Illyricum; and cut in pieces a numerous detachment,
which he had allured into the narrow passes of Adarne. During the
greater part of the summer, the tyrant of Gaul showed himself
master of the field. The troops of Constantius were harassed and
dispirited; his reputation declined in the eye of the world; and
his pride condescended to solicit a treaty of peace, which would
have resigned to the assassin of Constans the sovereignty of the
provinces beyond the Alps. These offers were enforced by the
eloquence of Philip the Imperial ambassador; and the council as
well as the army of Magnentius were disposed to accept them. But
the haughty usurper, careless of the remonstrances of his
friends, gave orders that Philip should be detained as a captive,
or, at least, as a hostage; while he despatched an officer to
reproach Constantius with the weakness of his reign, and to
insult him by the promise of a pardon if he would instantly
abdicate the purple. "That he should confide in the justice of
his cause, and the protection of an avenging Deity," was the only
answer which honor permitted the emperor to return. But he was so
sensible of the difficulties of his situation, that he no longer
dared to retaliate the indignity which had been offered to his
representative. The negotiation of Philip was not, however,
ineffectual, since he determined Sylvanus the Frank, a general of
merit and reputation, to desert with a considerable body of
cavalry, a few days before the battle of Mursa.<br>
</p>

<p>The city of Mursa, or Essek, celebrated in modern times for a
bridge of boats, five miles in length, over the River Drave, and
the adjacent morasses, has been always considered as a place of
importance in the wars of Hungary. Magnentius, directing his
march towards Mursa, set fire to the gates, and, by a sudden
assault, had almost scaled the walls of the town. The vigilance
of the garrison extinguished the flames; the approach of
Constantius left him no time to continue the operations of the
siege; and the emperor soon removed the only obstacle that could
embarrass his motions, by forcing a body of troops which had
taken post in an adjoining amphitheatre. The field of battle
round Mursa was a naked and level plain: on this ground the army
of Constantius formed, with the Drave on their right; while their
left, either from the nature of their disposition, or from the
superiority of their cavalry, extended far beyond the right flank
of Magnentius. The troops on both sides remained under arms, in
anxious expectation, during the greatest part of the morning; and
the son of Constantine, after animating his soldiers by an
eloquent speech, retired into a church at some distance from the
field of battle, and committed to his generals the conduct of
this decisive day. They deserved his confidence by the valor and
military skill which they exerted. They wisely began the action
upon the left; and advancing their whole wing of cavalry in an
oblique line, they suddenly wheeled it on the right flank of the
enemy, which was unprepared to resist the impetuosity of their
charge. But the Romans of the West soon rallied, by the habits of
discipline; and the Barbarians of Germany supported the renown of
their national bravery. The engagement soon became general; was
maintained with various and singular turns of fortune; and
scarcely ended with the darkness of the night. The signal victory
which Constantius obtained is attributed to the arms of his
cavalry. His cuirassiers are described as so many massy statues
of steel, glittering with their scaly armor, and breaking with
their ponderous lances the firm array of the Gallic legions. As
soon as the legions gave way, the lighter and more active
squadrons of the second line rode sword in hand into the
intervals, and completed the disorder. In the mean while, the
huge bodies of the Germans were exposed almost naked to the
dexterity of the Oriental archers; and whole troops of those
Barbarians were urged by anguish and despair to precipitate
themselves into the broad and rapid stream of the Drave. The
number of the slain was computed at fifty-four thousand men, and
the slaughter of the conquerors was more considerable than that
of the vanquished; a circumstance which proves the obstinacy of
the contest, and justifies the observation of an ancient writer,
that the forces of the empire were consumed in the fatal battle
of Mursa, by the loss of a veteran army, sufficient to defend the
frontiers, or to add new triumphs to the glory of Rome.
Notwithstanding the invectives of a servile orator, there is not
the least reason to believe that the tyrant deserted his own
standard in the beginning of the engagement. He seems to have
displayed the virtues of a general and of a soldier till the day
was irrecoverably lost, and his camp in the possession of the
enemy. Magnentius then consulted his safety, and throwing away
the Imperial ornaments, escaped with some difficulty from the
pursuit of the light horse, who incessantly followed his rapid
flight from the banks of the Drave to the foot of the Julian
Alps.<br>
</p>

<p>The approach of winter supplied the indolence of Constantius
with specious reasons for deferring the prosecution of the war
till the ensuing spring. Magnentius had fixed his residence in
the city of Aquileia, and showed a seeming resolution to dispute
the passage of the mountains and morasses which fortified the
confines of the Venetian province. The surprisal of a castle in
the Alps by the secret march of the Imperialists, could scarcely
have determined him to relinquish the possession of Italy, if the
inclinations of the people had supported the cause of their
tyrant. But the memory of the cruelties exercised by his
ministers, after the unsuccessful revolt of Nepotian, had left a
deep impression of horror and resentment on the minds of the
Romans. That rash youth, the son of the princess Eutropia, and
the nephew of Constantine, had seen with indignation the sceptre
of the West usurped by a perfidious barbarian. Arming a desperate
troop of slaves and gladiators, he overpowered the feeble guard
of the domestic tranquillity of Rome, received the homage of the
senate, and assuming the title of Augustus, precariously reigned
during a tumult of twenty-eight days. The march of some regular
forces put an end to his ambitious hopes: the rebellion was
extinguished in the blood of Nepotian, of his mother Eutropia,
and of his adherents; and the proscription was extended to all
who had contracted a fatal alliance with the name and family of
Constantine. But as soon as Constantius, after the battle of
Mursa, became master of the sea-coast of Dalmatia, a band of
noble exiles, who had ventured to equip a fleet in some harbor of
the Adriatic, sought protection and revenge in his victorious
camp. By their secret intelligence with their countrymen, Rome
and the Italian cities were persuaded to display the banners of
Constantius on their walls. The grateful veterans, enriched by
the liberality of the father, signalized their gratitude and
loyalty to the son. The cavalry, the legions, and the auxiliaries
of Italy, renewed their oath of allegiance to Constantius; and
the usurper, alarmed by the general desertion, was compelled,
with the remains of his faithful troops, to retire beyond the
Alps into the provinces of Gaul. The detachments, however, which
were ordered either to press or to intercept the flight of
Magnentius, conducted themselves with the usual imprudence of
success; and allowed him, in the plains of Pavia, an opportunity
of turning on his pursuers, and of gratifying his despair by the
carnage of a useless victory.<br>
</p>

<p>The pride of Magnentius was reduced, by repeated misfortunes,
to sue, and to sue in vain, for peace. He first despatched a
senator, in whose abilities he confided, and afterwards several
bishops, whose holy character might obtain a more favorable
audience, with the offer of resigning the purple, and the promise
of devoting the remainder of his life to the service of the
emperor. But Constantius, though he granted fair terms of pardon
and reconciliation to all who abandoned the standard of
rebellion, avowed his inflexible resolution to inflict a just
punishment on the crimes of an assassin, whom he prepared to
overwhelm on every side by the effort of his victorious arms. An
Imperial fleet acquired the easy possession of Africa and Spain,
confirmed the wavering faith of the Moorish nations, and landed a
considerable force, which passed the Pyrenees, and advanced
towards Lyons, the last and fatal station of Magnentius. The
temper of the tyrant, which was never inclined to clemency, was
urged by distress to exercise every act of oppression which could
extort an immediate supply from the cities of Gaul. Their
patience was at length exhausted; and Treves, the seat of
Pr&aelig;torian government, gave the signal of revolt, by
shutting her gates against Decentius, who had been raised by his
brother to the rank either of C&aelig;sar or of Augustus. From
Treves, Decentius was obliged to retire to Sens, where he was
soon surrounded by an army of Germans, whom the pernicious arts
of Constantius had introduced into the civil dissensions of Rome.
In the mean time, the Imperial troops forced the passages of the
Cottian Alps, and in the bloody combat of Mount Seleucus
irrevocably fixed the title of rebels on the party of Magnentius.
He was unable to bring another army into the field; the fidelity
of his guards was corrupted; and when he appeared in public to
animate them by his exhortations, he was saluted with a unanimous
shout of "Long live the emperor Constantius!" The tyrant, who
perceived that they were preparing to deserve pardon and rewards
by the sacrifice of the most obnoxious criminal, prevented their
design by falling on his sword; a death more easy and more
honorable than he could hope to obtain from the hands of an
enemy, whose revenge would have been colored with the specious
pretence of justice and fraternal piety. The example of suicide
was imitated by Decentius, who strangled himself on the news of
his brother's death. The author of the conspiracy, Marcellinus,
had long since disappeared in the battle of Mursa, and the public
tranquillity was confirmed by the execution of the surviving
leaders of a guilty and unsuccessful faction. A severe
inquisition was extended over all who, either from choice or from
compulsion, had been involved in the cause of rebellion. Paul,
surnamed Catena from his superior skill in the judicial exercise
of tyranny, * was sent to explore the latent remains of the
conspiracy in the remote province of Britain. The honest
indignation expressed by Martin, vice-pr&aelig;fect of the
island, was interpreted as an evidence of his own guilt; and the
governor was urged to the necessity of turning against his breast
the sword with which he had been provoked to wound the Imperial
minister. The most innocent subjects of the West were exposed to
exile and confiscation, to death and torture; and as the timid
are always cruel, the mind of Constantius was inaccessible to
mercy.<br>
</p>

<p><strong>Chapter XIX: Constantius Sole Emperor.</strong></p>

<p><strong><em>Part I.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>Constantius Sole Emperor. -- Elevation And Death Of Gallus. --
Danger And Elevation Of Julian. -- Sarmatian And Persian Wars. --
Victories Of Julian In Gaul.<br>
</p>

<p>The divided provinces of the empire were again united by the
victory of Constantius; but as that feeble prince was destitute
of personal merit, either in peace or war; as he feared his
generals, and distrusted his ministers; the triumph of his arms
served only to establish the reign of the eunuchs over the Roman
world. Those unhappy beings, the ancient production of Oriental
jealousy and despotism, were introduced into Greece and Rome by
the contagion of Asiatic luxury. Their progress was rapid; and
the eunuchs, who, in the time of Augustus, had been abhorred, as
the monstrous retinue of an Egyptian queen, were gradually
admitted into the families of matrons, of senators, and of the
emperors themselves. Restrained by the severe edicts of Domitian
and Nerva, cherished by the pride of Diocletian, reduced to an
humble station by the prudence of Constantine, they multiplied in
the palaces of his degenerate sons, and insensibly acquired the
knowledge, and at length the direction, of the secret councils of
Constantius. The aversion and contempt which mankind had so
uniformly entertained for that imperfect species, appears to have
degraded their character, and to have rendered them almost as
incapable as they were supposed to be, of conceiving any generous
sentiment, or of performing any worthy action. But the eunuchs
were skilled in the arts of flattery and intrigue; and they
alternately governed the mind of Constantius by his fears, his
indolence, and his vanity. Whilst he viewed in a deceitful mirror
the fair appearance of public prosperity, he supinely permitted
them to intercept the complaints of the injured provinces, to
accumulate immense treasures by the sale of justice and of
honors; to disgrace the most important dignities, by the
promotion of those who had purchased at their hands the powers of
oppression, and to gratify their resentment against the few
independent spirits, who arrogantly refused to solicit the
protection of slaves. Of these slaves the most distinguished was
the chamberlain Eusebius, who ruled the monarch and the palace
with such absolute sway, that Constantius, according to the
sarcasm of an impartial historian, possessed some credit with
this haughty favorite. By his artful suggestions, the emperor was
persuaded to subscribe the condemnation of the unfortunate
Gallus, and to add a new crime to the long list of unnatural
murders which pollute the honor of the house of Constantine.<br>
</p>

<p>When the two nephews of Constantine, Gallus and Julian, were
saved from the fury of the soldiers, the former was about twelve,
and the latter about six, years of age; and, as the eldest was
thought to be of a sickly constitution, they obtained with the
less difficulty a precarious and dependent life, from the
affected pity of Constantius, who was sensible that the execution
of these helpless orphans would have been esteemed, by all
mankind, an act of the most deliberate cruelty. * Different
cities of Ionia and Bithynia were assigned for the places of
their exile and education; but as soon as their growing years
excited the jealousy of the emperor, he judged it more prudent to
secure those unhappy youths in the strong castle of Macellum,
near C&aelig;sarea. The treatment which they experienced during a
six years' confinement, was partly such as they could hope from a
careful guardian, and partly such as they might dread from a
suspicious tyrant. Their prison was an ancient palace, the
residence of the kings of Cappadocia; the situation was pleasant,
the buildings of stately, the enclosure spacious. They pursued
their studies, and practised their exercises, under the tuition
of the most skilful masters; and the numerous household appointed
to attend, or rather to guard, the nephews of Constantine, was
not unworthy of the dignity of their birth. But they could not
disguise to themselves that they were deprived of fortune, of
freedom, and of safety; secluded from the society of all whom
they could trust or esteem, and condemned to pass their
melancholy hours in the company of slaves devoted to the commands
of a tyrant who had already injured them beyond the hope of
reconciliation. At length, however, the emergencies of the state
compelled the emperor, or rather his eunuchs, to invest Gallus,
in the twenty-fifth year of his age, with the title of
C&aelig;sar, and to cement this political connection by his
marriage with the princess Constantina. After a formal interview,
in which the two princes mutually engaged their faith never to
undertake any thing to the prejudice of each other, they repaired
without delay to their respective stations. Constantius continued
his march towards the West, and Gallus fixed his residence at
Antioch; from whence, with a delegated authority, he administered
the five great dioceses of the eastern pr&aelig;fecture. In this
fortunate change, the new C&aelig;sar was not unmindful of his
brother Julian, who obtained the honors of his rank, the
appearances of liberty, and the restitution of an ample
patrimony.<br>
</p>

<p>The writers the most indulgent to the memory of Gallus, and
even Julian himself, though he wished to cast a veil over the
frailties of his brother, are obliged to confess that the
C&aelig;sar was incapable of reigning. Transported from a prison
to a throne, he possessed neither genius nor application, nor
docility to compensate for the want of knowledge and experience.
A temper naturally morose and violent, instead of being
corrected, was soured by solitude and adversity; the remembrance
of what he had endured disposed him to retaliation rather than to
sympathy; and the ungoverned sallies of his rage were often fatal
to those who approached his person, or were subject to his power.
Constantina, his wife, is described, not as a woman, but as one
of the infernal furies tormented with an insatiate thirst of
human blood. Instead of employing her influence to insinuate the
mild counsels of prudence and humanity, she exasperated the
fierce passions of her husband; and as she retained the vanity,
though she had renounced, the gentleness of her sex, a pearl
necklace was esteemed an equivalent price for the murder of an
innocent and virtuous nobleman. The cruelty of Gallus was
sometimes displayed in the undissembled violence of popular or
military executions; and was sometimes disguised by the abuse of
law, and the forms of judicial proceedings. The private houses of
Antioch, and the places of public resort, were besieged by spies
and informers; and the C&aelig;sar himself, concealed in a
plebeian habit, very frequently condescended to assume that
odious character. Every apartment of the palace was adorned with
the instruments of death and torture, and a general consternation
was diffused through the capital of Syria. The prince of the
East, as if he had been conscious how much he had to fear, and
how little he deserved to reign, selected for the objects of his
resentment the provincials accused of some imaginary treason, and
his own courtiers, whom with more reason he suspected of
incensing, by their secret correspondence, the timid and
suspicious mind of Constantius. But he forgot that he was
depriving himself of his only support, the affection of the
people; whilst he furnished the malice of his enemies with the
arms of truth, and afforded the emperor the fairest pretence of
exacting the forfeit of his purple, and of his life.<br>
</p>

<p>As long as the civil war suspended the fate of the Roman
world, Constantius dissembled his knowledge of the weak and cruel
administration to which his choice had subjected the East; and
the discovery of some assassins, secretly despatched to Antioch
by the tyrant of Gaul, was employed to convince the public, that
the emperor and the C&aelig;sar were united by the same interest,
and pursued by the same enemies. But when the victory was decided
in favor of Constantius, his dependent colleague became less
useful and less formidable. Every circumstance of his conduct was
severely and suspiciously examined, and it was privately
resolved, either to deprive Gallus of the purple, or at least to
remove him from the indolent luxury of Asia to the hardships and
dangers of a German war. The death of Theophilus, consular of the
province of Syria, who in a time of scarcity had been massacred
by the people of Antioch, with the connivance, and almost at the
instigation, of Gallus, was justly resented, not only as an act
of wanton cruelty, but as a dangerous insult on the supreme
majesty of Constantius. Two ministers of illustrious rank,
Domitian the Oriental pr&aelig;fect, and Montius, qu&aelig;stor
of the palace, were empowered by a special commission * to visit
and reform the state of the East. They were instructed to behave
towards Gallus with moderation and respect, and, by the gentlest
arts of persuasion, to engage him to comply with the invitation
of his brother and colleague. The rashness of the pr&aelig;fect
disappointed these prudent measures, and hastened his own ruin,
as well as that of his enemy. On his arrival at Antioch, Domitian
passed disdainfully before the gates of the palace, and alleging
a slight pretence of indisposition, continued several days in
sullen retirement, to prepare an inflammatory memorial, which he
transmitted to the Imperial court. Yielding at length to the
pressing solicitations of Gallus, the pr&aelig;fect condescended
to take his seat in council; but his first step was to signify a
concise and haughty mandate, importing that the C&aelig;sar
should immediately repair to Italy, and threatening that he
himself would punish his delay or hesitation, by suspending the
usual allowance of his household. The nephew and daughter of
Constantine, who could ill brook the insolence of a subject,
expressed their resentment by instantly delivering Domitian to
the custody of a guard. The quarrel still admitted of some terms
of accommodation. They were rendered impracticable by the
imprudent behavior of Montius, a statesman whose arts and
experience were frequently betrayed by the levity of his
disposition. The qu&aelig;stor reproached Gallus in a haughty
language, that a prince who was scarcely authorized to remove a
municipal magistrate, should presume to imprison a
Pr&aelig;torian pr&aelig;fect; convoked a meeting of the civil
and military officers; and required them, in the name of their
sovereign, to defend the person and dignity of his
representatives. By this rash declaration of war, the impatient
temper of Gallus was provoked to embrace the most desperate
counsels. He ordered his guards to stand to their arms, assembled
the populace of Antioch, and recommended to their zeal the care
of his safety and revenge. His commands were too fatally obeyed.
They rudely seized the pr&aelig;fect and the qu&aelig;stor, and
tying their legs together with ropes, they dragged them through
the streets of the city, inflicted a thousand insults and a
thousand wounds on these unhappy victims, and at last
precipitated their mangled and lifeless bodies into the stream of
the Orontes.<br>
</p>

<p>After such a deed, whatever might have been the designs of
Gallus, it was only in a field of battle that he could assert his
innocence with any hope of success. But the mind of that prince
was formed of an equal mixture of violence and weakness. Instead
of assuming the title of Augustus, instead of employing in his
defence the troops and treasures of the East, he suffered himself
to be deceived by the affected tranquillity of Constantius, who,
leaving him the vain pageantry of a court, imperceptibly recalled
the veteran legions from the provinces of Asia. But as it still
appeared dangerous to arrest Gallus in his capital, the slow and
safer arts of dissimulation were practised with success. The
frequent and pressing epistles of Constantius were filled with
professions of confidence and friendship; exhorting the
C&aelig;sar to discharge the duties of his high station, to
relieve his colleague from a part of the public cares, and to
assist the West by his presence, his counsels, and his arms.
After so many reciprocal injuries, Gallus had reason to fear and
to distrust. But he had neglected the opportunities of flight and
of resistance; he was seduced by the flattering assurances of the
tribune Scudilo, who, under the semblance of a rough soldier,
disguised the most artful insinuation; and he depended on the
credit of his wife Constantina, till the unseasonable death of
that princess completed the ruin in which he had been involved by
her impetuous passions.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XIX: Constantius Sole Emperor. -- Part
II.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>After a long delay, the reluctant C&aelig;sar set forwards on
his journey to the Imperial court. From Antioch to Hadrianople,
he traversed the wide extent of his dominions with a numerous and
stately train; and as he labored to conceal his apprehensions
from the world, and perhaps from himself, he entertained the
people of Constantinople with an exhibition of the games of the
circus. The progress of the journey might, however, have warned
him of the impending danger. In all the principal cities he was
met by ministers of confidence, commissioned to seize the offices
of government, to observe his motions, and to prevent the hasty
sallies of his despair. The persons despatched to secure the
provinces which he left behind, passed him with cold salutations,
or affected disdain; and the troops, whose station lay along the
public road, were studiously removed on his approach, lest they
might be tempted to offer their swords for the service of a civil
war. After Gallus had been permitted to repose himself a few days
at Hadrianople, he received a mandate, expressed in the most
haughty and absolute style, that his splendid retinue should halt
in that city, while the C&aelig;sar himself, with only ten
post-carriages, should hasten to the Imperial residence at Milan.
In this rapid journey, the profound respect which was due to the
brother and colleague of Constantius, was insensibly changed into
rude familiarity; and Gallus, who discovered in the countenances
of the attendants that they already considered themselves as his
guards, and might soon be employed as his executioners, began to
accuse his fatal rashness, and to recollect, with terror and
remorse, the conduct by which he had provoked his fate. The
dissimulation which had hitherto been preserved, was laid aside
at Petovio, * in Pannonia. He was conducted to a palace in the
suburbs, where the general Barbatio, with a select band of
soldiers, who could neither be moved by pity, nor corrupted by
rewards, expected the arrival of his illustrious victim. In the
close of the evening he was arrested, ignominiously stripped of
the ensigns of C&aelig;sar, and hurried away to Pola, in Istria,
a sequestered prison, which had been so recently polluted with
royal blood. The horror which he felt was soon increased by the
appearance of his implacable enemy the eunuch Eusebius, who, with
the assistance of a notary and a tribune, proceeded to
interrogate him concerning the administration of the East. The
C&aelig;sar sank under the weight of shame and guilt, confessed
all the criminal actions and all the treasonable designs with
which he was charged; and by imputing them to the advice of his
wife, exasperated the indignation of Constantius, who reviewed
with partial prejudice the minutes of the examination. The
emperor was easily convinced, that his own safety was
incompatible with the life of his cousin: the sentence of death
was signed, despatched, and executed; and the nephew of
Constantine, with his hands tied behind his back, was beheaded in
prison like the vilest malefactor. Those who are inclined to
palliate the cruelties of Constantius, assert that he soon
relented, and endeavored to recall the bloody mandate; but that
the second messenger, intrusted with the reprieve, was detained
by the eunuchs, who dreaded the unforgiving temper of Gallus, and
were desirous of reuniting to <strong><em>their</em></strong>
empire the wealthy provinces of the East.<br>
</p>

<p>Besides the reigning emperor, Julian alone survived, of all
the numerous posterity of Constantius Chlorus. The misfortune of
his royal birth involved him in the disgrace of Gallus. From his
retirement in the happy country of Ionia, he was conveyed under a
strong guard to the court of Milan; where he languished above
seven months, in the continual apprehension of suffering the same
ignominious death, which was daily inflicted almost before his
eyes, on the friends and adherents of his persecuted family. His
looks, his gestures, his silence, were scrutinized with malignant
curiosity, and he was perpetually assaulted by enemies whom he
had never offended, and by arts to which he was a stranger. But
in the school of adversity, Julian insensibly acquired the
virtues of firmness and discretion. He defended his honor, as
well as his life, against the insnaring subtleties of the
eunuchs, who endeavored to extort some declaration of his
sentiments; and whilst he cautiously suppressed his grief and
resentment, he nobly disdained to flatter the tyrant, by any
seeming approbation of his brother's murder. Julian most devoutly
ascribes his miraculous deliverance to the protection of the
gods, who had exempted his innocence from the sentence of
destruction pronounced by their justice against the impious house
of Constantine. As the most effectual instrument of their
providence, he gratefully acknowledges the steady and generous
friendship of the empress Eusebia, a woman of beauty and merit,
who, by the ascendant which she had gained over the mind of her
husband, counterbalanced, in some measure, the powerful
conspiracy of the eunuchs. By the intercession of his patroness,
Julian was admitted into the Imperial presence: he pleaded his
cause with a decent freedom, he was heard with favor; and,
notwithstanding the efforts of his enemies, who urged the danger
of sparing an avenger of the blood of Gallus, the milder
sentiment of Eusebia prevailed in the council. But the effects of
a second interview were dreaded by the eunuchs; and Julian was
advised to withdraw for a while into the neighborhood of Milan,
till the emperor thought proper to assign the city of Athens for
the place of his honorable exile. As he had discovered, from his
earliest youth, a propensity, or rather passion, for the
language, the manners, the learning, and the religion of the
Greeks, he obeyed with pleasure an order so agreeable to his
wishes. Far from the tumult of arms, and the treachery of courts,
he spent six months under the groves of the academy, in a free
intercourse with the philosophers of the age, who studied to
cultivate the genius, to encourage the vanity, and to inflame the
devotion of their royal pupil. Their labors were not
unsuccessful; and Julian inviolably preserved for Athens that
tender regard which seldom fails to arise in a liberal mind, from
the recollection of the place where it has discovered and
exercised its growing powers. The gentleness and affability of
manners, which his temper suggested and his situation imposed,
insensibly engaged the affections of the strangers, as well as
citizens, with whom he conversed. Some of his fellow-students
might perhaps examine his behavior with an eye of prejudice and
aversion; but Julian established, in the schools of Athens, a
general prepossession in favor of his virtues and talents, which
was soon diffused over the Roman world.<br>
</p>

<p>Whilst his hours were passed in studious retirement, the
empress, resolute to achieve the generous design which she had
undertaken, was not unmindful of the care of his fortune. The
death of the late C&aelig;sar had left Constantius invested with
the sole command, and oppressed by the accumulated weight, of a
mighty empire. Before the wounds of civil discord could be
healed, the provinces of Gaul were overwhelmed by a deluge of
Barbarians. The Sarmatians no longer respected the barrier of the
Danube. The impunity of rapine had increased the boldness and
numbers of the wild Isaurians: those robbers descended from their
craggy mountains to ravage the adjacent country, and had even
presumed, though without success, to besiege the important city
of Seleucia, which was defended by a garrison of three Roman
legions. Above all, the Persian monarch, elated by victory, again
threatened the peace of Asia, and the presence of the emperor was
indispensably required, both in the West and in the East. For the
first time, Constantius sincerely acknowledged, that his single
strength was unequal to such an extent of care and of dominion.
Insensible to the voice of flattery, which assured him that his
all-powerful virtue, and celestial fortune, would still continue
to triumph over every obstacle, he listened with complacency to
the advice of Eusebia, which gratified his indolence, without
offending his suspicious pride. As she perceived that the
remembrance of Gallus dwelt on the emperor's mind, she artfully
turned his attention to the opposite characters of the two
brothers, which from their infancy had been compared to those of
Domitian and of Titus. She accustomed her husband to consider
Julian as a youth of a mild, unambitious disposition, whose
allegiance and gratitude might be secured by the gift of the
purple, and who was qualified to fill with honor a subordinate
station, without aspiring to dispute the commands, or to shade
the glories, of his sovereign and benefactor. After an obstinate,
though secret struggle, the opposition of the favorite eunuchs
submitted to the ascendency of the empress; and it was resolved
that Julian, after celebrating his nuptials with Helena, sister
of Constantius, should be appointed, with the title of
C&aelig;sar, to reign over the countries beyond the Alps.<br>
</p>

<p>Although the order which recalled him to court was probably
accompanied by some intimation of his approaching greatness, he
appeals to the people of Athens to witness his tears of
undissembled sorrow, when he was reluctantly torn away from his
beloved retirement. He trembled for his life, for his fame, and
even for his virtue; and his sole confidence was derived from the
persuasion, that Minerva inspired all his actions, and that he
was protected by an invisible guard of angels, whom for that
purpose she had borrowed from the Sun and Moon. He approached,
with horror, the palace of Milan; nor could the ingenuous youth
conceal his indignation, when he found himself accosted with
false and servile respect by the assassins of his family.
Eusebia, rejoicing in the success of her benevolent schemes,
embraced him with the tenderness of a sister; and endeavored, by
the most soothing caresses, to dispel his terrors, and reconcile
him to his fortune. But the ceremony of shaving his beard, and
his awkward demeanor, when he first exchanged the cloak of a
Greek philosopher for the military habit of a Roman prince,
amused, during a few days, the levity of the Imperial court.<br>
</p>

<p>The emperors of the age of Constantine no longer deigned to
consult with the senate in the choice of a colleague; but they
were anxious that their nomination should be ratified by the
consent of the army. On this solemn occasion, the guards, with
the other troops whose stations were in the neighborhood of
Milan, appeared under arms; and Constantius ascended his lofty
tribunal, holding by the hand his cousin Julian, who entered the
same day into the twenty-fifth year of his age. In a studied
speech, conceived and delivered with dignity, the emperor
represented the various dangers which threatened the prosperity
of the republic, the necessity of naming a C&aelig;sar for the
administration of the West, and his own intention, if it was
agreeable to their wishes, of rewarding with the honors of the
purple the promising virtues of the nephew of Constantine. The
approbation of the soldiers was testified by a respectful murmur;
they gazed on the manly countenance of Julian, and observed with
pleasure, that the fire which sparkled in his eyes was tempered
by a modest blush, on being thus exposed, for the first time, to
the public view of mankind. As soon as the ceremony of his
investiture had been performed, Constantius addressed him with
the tone of authority which his superior age and station
permitted him to assume; and exhorting the new C&aelig;sar to
deserve, by heroic deeds, that sacred and immortal name, the
emperor gave his colleague the strongest assurances of a
friendship which should never be impaired by time, nor
interrupted by their separation into the most distant climes. As
soon as the speech was ended, the troops, as a token of applause,
clashed their shields against their knees; while the officers who
surrounded the tribunal expressed, with decent reserve, their
sense of the merits of the representative of Constantius.<br>
</p>

<p>The two princes returned to the palace in the same chariot;
and during the slow procession, Julian repeated to himself a
verse of his favorite Homer, which he might equally apply to his
fortune and to his fears. The four-and-twenty days which the
C&aelig;sar spent at Milan after his investiture, and the first
months of his Gallic reign, were devoted to a splendid but severe
captivity; nor could the acquisition of honor compensate for the
loss of freedom. His steps were watched, his correspondence was
intercepted; and he was obliged, by prudence, to decline the
visits of his most intimate friends. Of his former domestics,
four only were permitted to attend him; two pages, his physician,
and his librarian; the last of whom was employed in the care of a
valuable collection of books, the gift of the empress, who
studied the inclinations as well as the interest of her friend.
In the room of these faithful servants, a household was formed,
such indeed as became the dignity of a C&aelig;sar; but it was
filled with a crowd of slaves, destitute, and perhaps incapable,
of any attachment for their new master, to whom, for the most
part, they were either unknown or suspected. His want of
experience might require the assistance of a wise council; but
the minute instructions which regulated the service of his table,
and the distribution of his hours, were adapted to a youth still
under the discipline of his preceptors, rather than to the
situation of a prince intrusted with the conduct of an important
war. If he aspired to deserve the esteem of his subjects, he was
checked by the fear of displeasing his sovereign; and even the
fruits of his marriage-bed were blasted by the jealous artifices
of Eusebia herself, who, on this occasion alone, seems to have
been unmindful of the tenderness of her sex, and the generosity
of her character. The memory of his father and of his brothers
reminded Julian of his own danger, and his apprehensions were
increased by the recent and unworthy fate of Sylvanus. In the
summer which preceded his own elevation, that general had been
chosen to deliver Gaul from the tyranny of the Barbarians; but
Sylvanus soon discovered that he had left his most dangerous
enemies in the Imperial court. A dexterous informer, countenanced
by several of the principal ministers, procured from him some
recommendatory letters; and erasing the whole of the contents,
except the signature, filled up the vacant parchment with matters
of high and treasonable import. By the industry and courage of
his friends, the fraud was however detected, and in a great
council of the civil and military officers, held in the presence
of the emperor himself, the innocence of Sylvanus was publicly
acknowledged. But the discovery came too late; the report of the
calumny, and the hasty seizure of his estate, had already
provoked the indignant chief to the rebellion of which he was so
unjustly accused. He assumed the purple at his head-quarters of
Cologne, and his active powers appeared to menace Italy with an
invasion, and Milan with a siege. In this emergency, Ursicinus, a
general of equal rank, regained, by an act of treachery, the
favor which he had lost by his eminent services in the East.
Exasperated, as he might speciously allege, by the injuries of a
similar nature, he hastened with a few followers to join the
standard, and to betray the confidence, of his too credulous
friend. After a reign of only twenty-eight days, Sylvanus was
assassinated: the soldiers who, without any criminal intention,
had blindly followed the example of their leader, immediately
returned to their allegiance; and the flatterers of Constantius
celebrated the wisdom and felicity of the monarch who had
extinguished a civil war without the hazard of a battle.<br>
</p>

<p>The protection of the Rh&aelig;tian frontier, and the
persecution of the Catholic church, detained Constantius in Italy
above eighteen months after the departure of Julian. Before the
emperor returned into the East, he indulged his pride and
curiosity in a visit to the ancient capital. He proceeded from
Milan to Rome along the &AElig;milian and Flaminian ways, and as
soon as he approached within forty miles of the city, the march
of a prince who had never vanquished a foreign enemy, assumed the
appearance of a triumphal procession. His splendid train was
composed of all the ministers of luxury; but in a time of
profound peace, he was encompassed by the glittering arms of the
numerous squadrons of his guards and cuirassiers. Their streaming
banners of silk, embossed with gold, and shaped in the form of
dragons, waved round the person of the emperor. Constantius sat
alone in a lofty car, resplendent with gold and precious gems;
and, except when he bowed his head to pass under the gates of the
cities, he affected a stately demeanor of inflexible, and, as it
might seem, of insensible gravity. The severe discipline of the
Persian youth had been introduced by the eunuchs into the
Imperial palace; and such were the habits of patience which they
had inculcated, that during a slow and sultry march, he was never
seen to move his hand towards his face, or to turn his eyes
either to the right or to the left. He was received by the
magistrates and senate of Rome; and the emperor surveyed, with
attention, the civil honors of the republic, and the consular
images of the noble families. The streets were lined with an
innumerable multitude. Their repeated acclamations expressed
their joy at beholding, after an absence of thirty-two years, the
sacred person of their sovereign, and Constantius himself
expressed, with some pleasantry, he affected surprise that the
human race should thus suddenly be collected on the same spot.
The son of Constantine was lodged in the ancient palace of
Augustus: he presided in the senate, harangued the people from
the tribunal which Cicero had so often ascended, assisted with
unusual courtesy at the games of the Circus, and accepted the
crowns of gold, as well as the Panegyrics which had been prepared
for the ceremony by the deputies of the principal cities. His
short visit of thirty days was employed in viewing the monuments
of art and power which were scattered over the seven hills and
the interjacent valleys. He admired the awful majesty of the
Capitol, the vast extent of the baths of Caracalla and
Diocletian, the severe simplicity of the Pantheon, the massy
greatness of the amphitheatre of Titus, the elegant architecture
of the theatre of Pompey and the Temple of Peace, and, above all,
the stately structure of the Forum and column of Trajan;
acknowledging that the voice of fame, so prone to invent and to
magnify, had made an inadequate report of the metropolis of the
world. The traveller, who has contemplated the ruins of ancient
Rome, may conceive some imperfect idea of the sentiments which
they must have inspired when they reared their heads in the
splendor of unsullied beauty.<br>
</p>

<p>[See The Pantheon: The severe simplicity of the Pantheon]<br>
</p>

<p>The satisfaction which Constantius had received from this
journey excited him to the generous emulation of bestowing on the
Romans some memorial of his own gratitude and munificence. His
first idea was to imitate the equestrian and colossal statue
which he had seen in the Forum of Trajan; but when he had
maturely weighed the difficulties of the execution, he chose
rather to embellish the capital by the gift of an Egyptian
obelisk. In a remote but polished age, which seems to have
preceded the invention of alphabetical writing, a great number of
these obelisks had been erected, in the cities of Thebes and
Heliopolis, by the ancient sovereigns of Egypt, in a just
confidence that the simplicity of their form, and the hardness of
their substance, would resist the injuries of time and violence.
Several of these extraordinary columns had been transported to
Rome by Augustus and his successors, as the most durable
monuments of their power and victory; but there remained one
obelisk, which, from its size or sanctity, escaped for a long
time the rapacious vanity of the conquerors. It was designed by
Constantine to adorn his new city; and, after being removed by
his order from the pedestal where it stood before the Temple of
the Sun at Heliopolis, was floated down the Nile to Alexandria.
The death of Constantine suspended the execution of his purpose,
and this obelisk was destined by his son to the ancient capital
of the empire. A vessel of uncommon strength and capaciousness
was provided to convey this enormous weight of granite, at least
a hundred and fifteen feet in length, from the banks of the Nile
to those of the Tyber. The obelisk of Constantius was landed
about three miles from the city, and elevated, by the efforts of
art and labor, in the great Circus of Rome.<br>
</p>

<p>The departure of Constantius from Rome was hastened by the
alarming intelligence of the distress and danger of the Illyrian
provinces. The distractions of civil war, and the irreparable
loss which the Roman legions had sustained in the battle of
Mursa, exposed those countries, almost without defence, to the
light cavalry of the Barbarians; and particularly to the inroads
of the Quadi, a fierce and powerful nation, who seem to have
exchanged the institutions of Germany for the arms and military
arts of their Sarmatian allies. The garrisons of the frontiers
were insufficient to check their progress; and the indolent
monarch was at length compelled to assemble, from the extremities
of his dominions, the flower of the Palatine troops, to take the
field in person, and to employ a whole campaign, with the
preceding autumn and the ensuing spring, in the serious
prosecution of the war. The emperor passed the Danube on a bridge
of boats, cut in pieces all that encountered his march,
penetrated into the heart of the country of the Quadi, and
severely retaliated the calamities which they had inflicted on
the Roman province. The dismayed Barbarians were soon reduced to
sue for peace: they offered the restitution of his captive
subjects as an atonement for the past, and the noblest hostages
as a pledge of their future conduct. The generous courtesy which
was shown to the first among their chieftains who implored the
clemency of Constantius, encouraged the more timid, or the more
obstinate, to imitate their example; and the Imperial camp was
crowded with the princes and ambassadors of the most distant
tribes, who occupied the plains of the Lesser Poland, and who
might have deemed themselves secure behind the lofty ridge of the
Carpathian Mountains. While Constantius gave laws to the
Barbarians beyond the Danube, he distinguished, with specious
compassion, the Sarmatian exiles, who had been expelled from
their native country by the rebellion of their slaves, and who
formed a very considerable accession to the power of the Quadi.
The emperor, embracing a generous but artful system of policy,
released the Sarmatians from the bands of this humiliating
dependence, and restored them, by a separate treaty, to the
dignity of a nation united under the government of a king, the
friend and ally of the republic. He declared his resolution of
asserting the justice of their cause, and of securing the peace
of the provinces by the extirpation, or at least the banishment,
of the Limigantes, whose manners were still infected with the
vices of their servile origin. The execution of this design was
attended with more difficulty than glory. The territory of the
Limigantes was protected against the Romans by the Danube,
against the hostile Barbarians by the Teyss. The marshy lands
which lay between those rivers, and were often covered by their
inundations, formed an intricate wilderness, pervious only to the
inhabitants, who were acquainted with its secret paths and
inaccessible fortresses. On the approach of Constantius, the
Limigantes tried the efficacy of prayers, of fraud, and of arms;
but he sternly rejected their supplications, defeated their rude
stratagems, and repelled with skill and firmness the efforts of
their irregular valor. One of their most warlike tribes,
established in a small island towards the conflux of the Teyss
and the Danube, consented to pass the river with the intention of
surprising the emperor during the security of an amicable
conference. They soon became the victims of the perfidy which
they meditated. Encompassed on every side, trampled down by the
cavalry, slaughtered by the swords of the legions, they disdained
to ask for mercy; and with an undaunted countenance, still
grasped their weapons in the agonies of death. After this
victory, a considerable body of Romans was landed on the opposite
banks of the Danube; the Taifal&aelig;, a Gothic tribe engaged in
the service of the empire, invaded the Limigantes on the side of
the Teyss; and their former masters, the free Sarmatians,
animated by hope and revenge, penetrated through the hilly
country, into the heart of their ancient possessions. A general
conflagration revealed the huts of the Barbarians, which were
seated in the depth of the wilderness; and the soldier fought
with confidence on marshy ground, which it was dangerous for him
to tread. In this extremity, the bravest of the Limigantes were
resolved to die in arms, rather than to yield: but the milder
sentiment, enforced by the authority of their elders, at length
prevailed; and the suppliant crowd, followed by their wives and
children, repaired to the Imperial camp, to learn their fate from
the mouth of the conqueror. After celebrating his own clemency,
which was still inclined to pardon their repeated crimes, and to
spare the remnant of a guilty nation, Constantius assigned for
the place of their exile a remote country, where they might enjoy
a safe and honorable repose. The Limigantes obeyed with
reluctance; but before they could reach, at least before they
could occupy, their destined habitations, they returned to the
banks of the Danube, exaggerating the hardships of their
situation, and requesting, with fervent professions of fidelity,
that the emperor would grant them an undisturbed settlement
within the limits of the Roman provinces. Instead of consulting
his own experience of their incurable perfidy, Constantius
listened to his flatterers, who were ready to represent the honor
and advantage of accepting a colony of soldiers, at a time when
it was much easier to obtain the pecuniary contributions than the
military service of the subjects of the empire. The Limigantes
were permitted to pass the Danube; and the emperor gave audience
to the multitude in a large plain near the modern city of Buda.
They surrounded the tribunal, and seemed to hear with respect an
oration full of mildness and dignity when one of the Barbarians,
casting his shoe into the air, exclaimed with a loud voice,
<strong><em>Marha! Marha!</em></strong> * a word of defiance,
which was received as a signal of the tumult. They rushed with
fury to seize the person of the emperor; his royal throne and
golden couch were pillaged by these rude hands; but the faithful
defence of his guards, who died at his feet, allowed him a moment
to mount a fleet horse, and to escape from the confusion. The
disgrace which had been incurred by a treacherous surprise was
soon retrieved by the numbers and discipline of the Romans; and
the combat was only terminated by the extinction of the name and
nation of the Limigantes. The free Sarmatians were reinstated in
the possession of their ancient seats; and although Constantius
distrusted the levity of their character, he entertained some
hopes that a sense of gratitude might influence their future
conduct. He had remarked the lofty stature and obsequious
demeanor of Zizais, one of the noblest of their chiefs. He
conferred on him the title of King; and Zizais proved that he was
not unworthy to reign, by a sincere and lasting attachment to the
interests of his benefactor, who, after this splendid success,
received the name of <strong><em>Sarmaticus</em></strong> from
the acclamations of his victorious army.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XIX: Constantius Sole Emperor. -- Part
III.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>While the Roman emperor and the Persian monarch, at the
distance of three thousand miles, defended their extreme limits
against the Barbarians of the Danube and of the Oxus, their
intermediate frontier experienced the vicissitudes of a languid
war, and a precarious truce. Two of the eastern ministers of
Constantius, the Pr&aelig;torian pr&aelig;fect Musonian, whose
abilities were disgraced by the want of truth and integrity, and
Cassian, duke of Mesopotamia, a hardy and veteran soldier, opened
a secret negotiation with the satrap Tamsapor. These overtures of
peace, translated into the servile and flattering language of
Asia, were transmitted to the camp of the Great King; who
resolved to signify, by an ambassador, the terms which he was
inclined to grant to the suppliant Romans. Narses, whom he
invested with that character, was honorably received in his
passage through Antioch and Constantinople: he reached Sirmium
after a long journey, and, at his first audience, respectfully
unfolded the silken veil which covered the haughty epistle of his
sovereign. Sapor, King of Kings, and Brother of the Sun and Moon,
(such were the lofty titles affected by Oriental vanity,)
expressed his satisfaction that his brother, Constantius
C&aelig;sar, had been taught wisdom by adversity. As the lawful
successor of Darius Hystaspes, Sapor asserted, that the River
Strymon, in Macedonia, was the true and ancient boundary of his
empire; declaring, however, that as an evidence of his
moderation, he would content himself with the provinces of
Armenia and Mesopotamia, which had been fraudulently extorted
from his ancestors. He alleged, that, without the restitution of
these disputed countries, it was impossible to establish any
treaty on a solid and permanent basis; and he arrogantly
threatened, that if his ambassador returned in vain, he was
prepared to take the field in the spring, and to support the
justice of his cause by the strength of his invincible arms.
Narses, who was endowed with the most polite and amiable manners,
endeavored, as far as was consistent with his duty, to soften the
harshness of the message. Both the style and substance were
maturely weighed in the Imperial council, and he was dismissed
with the following answer: "Constantius had a right to disclaim
the officiousness of his ministers, who had acted without any
specific orders from the throne: he was not, however, averse to
an equal and honorable treaty; but it was highly indecent, as
well as absurd, to propose to the sole and victorious emperor of
the Roman world, the same conditions of peace which he had
indignantly rejected at the time when his power was contracted
within the narrow limits of the East: the chance of arms was
uncertain; and Sapor should recollect, that if the Romans had
sometimes been vanquished in battle, they had almost always been
successful in the event of the war." A few days after the
departure of Narses, three ambassadors were sent to the court of
Sapor, who was already returned from the Scythian expedition to
his ordinary residence of Ctesiphon. A count, a notary, and a
sophist, had been selected for this important commission; and
Constantius, who was secretly anxious for the conclusion of the
peace, entertained some hopes that the dignity of the first of
these ministers, the dexterity of the second, and the rhetoric of
the third, would persuade the Persian monarch to abate of the
rigor of his demands. But the progress of their negotiation was
opposed and defeated by the hostile arts of Antoninus, a Roman
subject of Syria, who had fled from oppression, and was admitted
into the councils of Sapor, and even to the royal table, where,
according to the custom of the Persians, the most important
business was frequently discussed. The dexterous fugitive
promoted his interest by the same conduct which gratified his
revenge. He incessantly urged the ambition of his new master to
embrace the favorable opportunity when the bravest of the
Palatine troops were employed with the emperor in a distant war
on the Danube. He pressed Sapor to invade the exhausted and
defenceless provinces of the East, with the numerous armies of
Persia, now fortified by the alliance and accession of the
fiercest Barbarians. The ambassadors of Rome retired without
success, and a second embassy, of a still more honorable rank,
was detained in strict confinement, and threatened either with
death or exile.<br>
</p>

<p>The military historian, who was himself despatched to observe
the army of the Persians, as they were preparing to construct a
bridge of boats over the Tigris, beheld from an eminence the
plain of Assyria, as far as the edge of the horizon, covered with
men, with horses, and with arms. Sapor appeared in the front,
conspicuous by the splendor of his purple. On his left hand, the
place of honor among the Orientals, Grumbates, king of the
Chionites, displayed the stern countenance of an aged and
renowned warrior. The monarch had reserved a similar place on his
right hand for the king of the Albanians, who led his independent
tribes from the shores of the Caspian. * The satraps and generals
were distributed according to their several ranks, and the whole
army, besides the numerous train of Oriental luxury, consisted of
more than one hundred thousand effective men, inured to fatigue,
and selected from the bravest nations of Asia. The Roman
deserter, who in some measure guided the councils of Sapor, had
prudently advised, that, instead of wasting the summer in tedious
and difficult sieges, he should march directly to the Euphrates,
and press forwards without delay to seize the feeble and wealthy
metropolis of Syria. But the Persians were no sooner advanced
into the plains of Mesopotamia, than they discovered that every
precaution had been used which could retard their progress, or
defeat their design. The inhabitants, with their cattle, were
secured in places of strength, the green forage throughout the
country was set on fire, the fords of the rivers were fortified
by sharp stakes; military engines were planted on the opposite
banks, and a seasonable swell of the waters of the Euphrates
deterred the Barbarians from attempting the ordinary passage of
the bridge of Thapsacus. Their skilful guide, changing his plan
of operations, then conducted the army by a longer circuit, but
through a fertile territory, towards the head of the Euphrates,
where the infant river is reduced to a shallow and accessible
stream. Sapor overlooked, with prudent disdain, the strength of
Nisibis; but as he passed under the walls of Amida, he resolved
to try whether the majesty of his presence would not awe the
garrison into immediate submission. The sacrilegious insult of a
random dart, which glanced against the royal tiara, convinced him
of his error; and the indignant monarch listened with impatience
to the advice of his ministers, who conjured him not to sacrifice
the success of his ambition to the gratification of his
resentment. The following day Grumbates advanced towards the
gates with a select body of troops, and required the instant
surrender of the city, as the only atonement which could be
accepted for such an act of rashness and insolence. His proposals
were answered by a general discharge, and his only son, a
beautiful and valiant youth, was pierced through the heart by a
javelin, shot from one of the balist&aelig;. The funeral of the
prince of the Chionites was celebrated according to the rites of
the country; and the grief of his aged father was alleviated by
the solemn promise of Sapor, that the guilty city of Amida should
serve as a funeral pile to expiate the death, and to perpetuate
the memory, of his son.<br>
</p>

<p>The ancient city of Amid or Amida, which sometimes assumes the
provincial appellation of Diarbekir, is advantageously situate in
a fertile plain, watered by the natural and artificial channels
of the Tigris, of which the least inconsiderable stream bends in
a semicircular form round the eastern part of the city. The
emperor Constantius had recently conferred on Amida the honor of
his own name, and the additional fortifications of strong walls
and lofty towers. It was provided with an arsenal of military
engines, and the ordinary garrison had been reenforced to the
amount of seven legions, when the place was invested by the arms
of Sapor. His first and most sanguine hopes depended on the
success of a general assault. To the several nations which
followed his standard, their respective posts were assigned; the
south to the Vert&aelig;; the north to the Albanians; the east to
the Chionites, inflamed with grief and indignation; the west to
the Segestans, the bravest of his warriors, who covered their
front with a formidable line of Indian elephants. The Persians,
on every side, supported their efforts, and animated their
courage; and the monarch himself, careless of his rank and
safety, displayed, in the prosecution of the siege, the ardor of
a youthful soldier. After an obstinate combat, the Barbarians
were repulsed; they incessantly returned to the charge; they were
again driven back with a dreadful slaughter, and two rebel
legions of Gauls, who had been banished into the East, signalized
their undisciplined courage by a nocturnal sally into the heart
of the Persian camp. In one of the fiercest of these repeated
assaults, Amida was betrayed by the treachery of a deserter, who
indicated to the Barbarians a secret and neglected staircase,
scooped out of the rock that hangs over the stream of the Tigris.
Seventy chosen archers of the royal guard ascended in silence to
the third story of a lofty tower, which commanded the precipice;
they elevated on high the Persian banner, the signal of
confidence to the assailants, and of dismay to the besieged; and
if this devoted band could have maintained their post a few
minutes longer, the reduction of the place might have been
purchased by the sacrifice of their lives. After Sapor had tried,
without success, the efficacy of force and of stratagem, he had
recourse to the slower but more certain operations of a regular
siege, in the conduct of which he was instructed by the skill of
the Roman deserters. The trenches were opened at a convenient
distance, and the troops destined for that service advanced under
the portable cover of strong hurdles, to fill up the ditch, and
undermine the foundations of the walls. Wooden towers were at the
same time constructed, and moved forwards on wheels, till the
soldiers, who were provided with every species of missile
weapons, could engage almost on level ground with the troops who
defended the rampart. Every mode of resistance which art could
suggest, or courage could execute, was employed in the defence of
Amida, and the works of Sapor were more than once destroyed by
the fire of the Romans. But the resources of a besieged city may
be exhausted. The Persians repaired their losses, and pushed
their approaches; a large preach was made by the battering-ram,
and the strength of the garrison, wasted by the sword and by
disease, yielded to the fury of the assault. The soldiers, the
citizens, their wives, their children, all who had not time to
escape through the opposite gate, were involved by the conquerors
in a promiscuous massacre.<br>
</p>

<p>But the ruin of Amida was the safety of the Roman provinces.
As soon as the first transports of victory had subsided, Sapor
was at leisure to reflect, that to chastise a disobedient city,
he had lost the flower of his troops, and the most favorable
season for conquest. Thirty thousand of his veterans had fallen
under the walls of Amida, during the continuance of a siege,
which lasted seventy-three days; and the disappointed monarch
returned to his capital with affected triumph and secret
mortification. It is more than probable, that the inconstancy of
his Barbarian allies was tempted to relinquish a war in which
they had encountered such unexpected difficulties; and that the
aged king of the Chionites, satiated with revenge, turned away
with horror from a scene of action where he had been deprived of
the hope of his family and nation. The strength as well as the
spirit of the army with which Sapor took the field in the ensuing
spring was no longer equal to the unbounded views of his
ambition. Instead of aspiring to the conquest of the East, he was
obliged to content himself with the reduction of two fortified
cities of Mesopotamia, Singara and Bezabde; the one situate in
the midst of a sandy desert, the other in a small peninsula,
surrounded almost on every side by the deep and rapid stream of
the Tigris. Five Roman legions, of the diminutive size to which
they had been reduced in the age of Constantine, were made
prisoners, and sent into remote captivity on the extreme confines
of Persia. After dismantling the walls of Singara, the conqueror
abandoned that solitary and sequestered place; but he carefully
restored the fortifications of Bezabde, and fixed in that
important post a garrison or colony of veterans; amply supplied
with every means of defence, and animated by high sentiments of
honor and fidelity. Towards the close of the campaign, the arms
of Sapor incurred some disgrace by an unsuccessful enterprise
against Virtha, or Tecrit, a strong, or, as it was universally
esteemed till the age of Tamerlane, an impregnable fortress of
the independent Arabs.<br>
</p>

<p>The defence of the East against the arms of Sapor required and
would have exercised, the abilities of the most consummate
general; and it seemed fortunate for the state, that it was the
actual province of the brave Ursicinus, who alone deserved the
confidence of the soldiers and people. In the hour of danger,
Ursicinus was removed from his station by the intrigues of the
eunuchs; and the military command of the East was bestowed, by
the same influence, on Sabinian, a wealthy and subtle veteran,
who had attained the infirmities, without acquiring the
experience, of age. By a second order, which issued from the same
jealous and inconstant councils, Ursicinus was again despatched
to the frontier of Mesopotamia, and condemned to sustain the
labors of a war, the honors of which had been transferred to his
unworthy rival. Sabinian fixed his indolent station under the
walls of Edessa; and while he amused himself with the idle parade
of military exercise, and moved to the sound of flutes in the
Pyrrhic dance, the public defence was abandoned to the boldness
and diligence of the former general of the East. But whenever
Ursicinus recommended any vigorous plan of operations; when he
proposed, at the head of a light and active army, to wheel round
the foot of the mountains, to intercept the convoys of the enemy,
to harass the wide extent of the Persian lines, and to relieve
the distress of Amida; the timid and envious commander alleged,
that he was restrained by his positive orders from endangering
the safety of the troops. Amida was at length taken; its bravest
defenders, who had escaped the sword of the Barbarians, died in
the Roman camp by the hand of the executioner: and Ursicinus
himself, after supporting the disgrace of a partial inquiry, was
punished for the misconduct of Sabinian by the loss of his
military rank. But Constantius soon experienced the truth of the
prediction which honest indignation had extorted from his injured
lieutenant, that as long as such maxims of government were
suffered to prevail, the emperor himself would find it is no easy
task to defend his eastern dominions from the invasion of a
foreign enemy. When he had subdued or pacified the Barbarians of
the Danube, Constantius proceeded by slow marches into the East;
and after he had wept over the smoking ruins of Amida, he formed,
with a powerful army, the siege of Bezabde. The walls were shaken
by the reiterated efforts of the most enormous of the
battering-rams; the town was reduced to the last extremity; but
it was still defended by the patient and intrepid valor of the
garrison, till the approach of the rainy season obliged the
emperor to raise the siege, and ingloriously to retreat into his
winter quarters at Antioch. The pride of Constantius, and the
ingenuity of his courtiers, were at a loss to discover any
materials for panegyric in the events of the Persian war; while
the glory of his cousin Julian, to whose military command he had
intrusted the provinces of Gaul, was proclaimed to the world in
the simple and concise narrative of his exploits.<br>
</p>

<p>In the blind fury of civil discord, Constantius had abandoned
to the Barbarians of Germany the countries of Gaul, which still
acknowledged the authority of his rival. A numerous swarm of
Franks and Alemanni were invited to cross the Rhine by presents
and promises, by the hopes of spoil, and by a perpetual grant of
all the territories which they should be able to subdue. But the
emperor, who for a temporary service had thus imprudently
provoked the rapacious spirit of the Barbarians, soon discovered
and lamented the difficulty of dismissing these formidable
allies, after they had tasted the richness of the Roman soil.
Regardless of the nice distinction of loyalty and rebellion,
these undisciplined robbers treated as their natural enemies all
the subjects of the empire, who possessed any property which they
were desirous of acquiring Forty-five flourishing cities,
Tongres, Cologne, Treves, Worms, Spires, Strasburgh, &amp;c.,
besides a far greater number of towns and villages, were
pillaged, and for the most part reduced to ashes. The Barbarians
of Germany, still faithful to the maxims of their ancestors,
abhorred the confinement of walls, to which they applied the
odious names of prisons and sepulchres; and fixing their
independent habitations on the banks of rivers, the Rhine, the
Moselle, and the Meuse, they secured themselves against the
danger of a surprise, by a rude and hasty fortification of large
trees, which were felled and thrown across the roads. The
Alemanni were established in the modern countries of Alsace and
Lorraine; the Franks occupied the island of the Batavians,
together with an extensive district of Brabant, which was then
known by the appellation of Toxandria, and may deserve to be
considered as the original seat of their Gallic monarchy. From
the sources, to the mouth, of the Rhine, the conquests of the
Germans extended above forty miles to the west of that river,
over a country peopled by colonies of their own name and nation:
and the scene of their devastations was three times more
extensive than that of their conquests. At a still greater
distance the open towns of Gaul were deserted, and the
inhabitants of the fortified cities, who trusted to their
strength and vigilance, were obliged to content themselves with
such supplies of corn as they could raise on the vacant land
within the enclosure of their walls. The diminished legions,
destitute of pay and provisions, of arms and discipline, trembled
at the approach, and even at the name, of the Barbarians.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XIX: Constantius Sole Emperor. -- Part
IV.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>Under these melancholy circumstances, an unexperienced youth
was appointed to save and to govern the provinces of Gaul, or
rather, as he expressed it himself, to exhibit the vain image of
Imperial greatness. The retired scholastic education of Julian,
in which he had been more conversant with books than with arms,
with the dead than with the living, left him in profound
ignorance of the practical arts of war and government; and when
he awkwardly repeated some military exercise which it was
necessary for him to learn, he exclaimed with a sigh, "O Plato,
Plato, what a task for a philosopher!" Yet even this speculative
philosophy, which men of business are too apt to despise, had
filled the mind of Julian with the noblest precepts and the most
shining examples; had animated him with the love of virtue, the
desire of fame, and the contempt of death. The habits of
temperance recommended in the schools, are still more essential
in the severe discipline of a camp. The simple wants of nature
regulated the measure of his food and sleep. Rejecting with
disdain the delicacies provided for his table, he satisfied his
appetite with the coarse and common fare which was allotted to
the meanest soldiers. During the rigor of a Gallic winter, he
never suffered a fire in his bed-chamber; and after a short and
interrupted slumber, he frequently rose in the middle of the
night from a carpet spread on the floor, to despatch any urgent
business, to visit his rounds, or to steal a few moments for the
prosecution of his favorite studies. The precepts of eloquence,
which he had hitherto practised on fancied topics of declamation,
were more usefully applied to excite or to assuage the passions
of an armed multitude: and although Julian, from his early habits
of conversation and literature, was more familiarly acquainted
with the beauties of the Greek language, he had attained a
competent knowledge of the Latin tongue. Since Julian was not
originally designed for the character of a legislator, or a
judge, it is probable that the civil jurisprudence of the Romans
had not engaged any considerable share of his attention: but he
derived from his philosophic studies an inflexible regard for
justice, tempered by a disposition to clemency; the knowledge of
the general principles of equity and evidence, and the faculty of
patiently investigating the most intricate and tedious questions
which could be proposed for his discussion. The measures of
policy, and the operations of war, must submit to the various
accidents of circumstance and character, and the unpractised
student will often be perplexed in the application of the most
perfect theory. But in the acquisition of this important science,
Julian was assisted by the active vigor of his own genius, as
well as by the wisdom and experience of Sallust, and officer of
rank, who soon conceived a sincere attachment for a prince so
worthy of his friendship; and whose incorruptible integrity was
adorned by the talent of insinuating the harshest truths without
wounding the delicacy of a royal ear.<br>
</p>

<p>Immediately after Julian had received the purple at Milan, he
was sent into Gaul with a feeble retinue of three hundred and
sixty soldiers. At Vienna, where he passed a painful and anxious
winter in the hands of those ministers to whom Constantius had
intrusted the direction of his conduct, the C&aelig;sar was
informed of the siege and deliverance of Autun. That large and
ancient city, protected only by a ruined wall and pusillanimous
garrison, was saved by the generous resolution of a few veterans,
who resumed their arms for the defence of their country. In his
march from Autun, through the heart of the Gallic provinces,
Julian embraced with ardor the earliest opportunity of
signalizing his courage. At the head of a small body of archers
and heavy cavalry, he preferred the shorter but the more
dangerous of two roads; * and sometimes eluding, and sometimes
resisting, the attacks of the Barbarians, who were masters of the
field, he arrived with honor and safety at the camp near Rheims,
where the Roman troops had been ordered to assemble. The aspect
of their young prince revived the drooping spirits of the
soldiers, and they marched from Rheims in search of the enemy,
with a confidence which had almost proved fatal to them. The
Alemanni, familiarized to the knowledge of the country, secretly
collected their scattered forces, and seizing the opportunity of
a dark and rainy day, poured with unexpected fury on the
rear-guard of the Romans. Before the inevitable disorder could be
remedied, two legions were destroyed; and Julian was taught by
experience that caution and vigilance are the most important
lessons of the art of war. In a second and more successful
action, * he recovered and established his military fame; but as
the agility of the Barbarians saved them from the pursuit, his
victory was neither bloody nor decisive. He advanced, however, to
the banks of the Rhine, surveyed the ruins of Cologne, convinced
himself of the difficulties of the war, and retreated on the
approach of winter, discontented with the court, with his army,
and with his own success. The power of the enemy was yet
unbroken; and the C&aelig;sar had no sooner separated his troops,
and fixed his own quarters at Sens, in the centre of Gaul, than
he was surrounded and besieged, by a numerous host of Germans.
Reduced, in this extremity, to the resources of his own mind, he
displayed a prudent intrepidity, which compensated for all the
deficiencies of the place and garrison; and the Barbarians, at
the end of thirty days, were obliged to retire with disappointed
rage.<br>
</p>

<p>The conscious pride of Julian, who was indebted only to his
sword for this signal deliverance, was imbittered by the
reflection, that he was abandoned, betrayed, and perhaps devoted
to destruction, by those who were bound to assist him, by every
tie of honor and fidelity. Marcellus, master-general of the
cavalry in Gaul, interpreting too strictly the jealous orders of
the court, beheld with supine indifference the distress of
Julian, and had restrained the troops under his command from
marching to the relief of Sens. If the C&aelig;sar had dissembled
in silence so dangerous an insult, his person and authority would
have been exposed to the contempt of the world; and if an action
so criminal had been suffered to pass with impunity, the emperor
would have confirmed the suspicions, which received a very
specious color from his past conduct towards the princes of the
Flavian family. Marcellus was recalled, and gently dismissed from
his office. In his room Severus was appointed general of the
cavalry; an experienced soldier, of approved courage and
fidelity, who could advise with respect, and execute with zeal;
and who submitted, without reluctance to the supreme command
which Julian, by the interest of his patroness Eusebia, at length
obtained over the armies of Gaul. A very judicious plan of
operations was adopted for the approaching campaign. Julian
himself, at the head of the remains of the veteran bands, and of
some new levies which he had been permitted to form, boldly
penetrated into the centre of the German cantonments, and
carefully reestablished the fortifications of Saverne, in an
advantageous post, which would either check the incursions, or
intercept the retreat, of the enemy. At the same time, Barbatio,
general of the infantry, advanced from Milan with an army of
thirty thousand men, and passing the mountains, prepared to throw
a bridge over the Rhine, in the neighborhood of Basil. It was
reasonable to expect that the Alemanni, pressed on either side by
the Roman arms, would soon be forced to evacuate the provinces of
Gaul, and to hasten to the defence of their native country. But
the hopes of the campaign were defeated by the incapacity, or the
envy, or the secret instructions, of Barbatio; who acted as if he
had been the enemy of the C&aelig;sar, and the secret ally of the
Barbarians. The negligence with which he permitted a troop of
pillagers freely to pass, and to return almost before the gates
of his camp, may be imputed to his want of abilities; but the
treasonable act of burning a number of boats, and a superfluous
stock of provisions, which would have been of the most essential
service to the army of Gaul, was an evidence of his hostile and
criminal intentions. The Germans despised an enemy who appeared
destitute either of power or of inclination to offend them; and
the ignominious retreat of Barbatio deprived Julian of the
expected support; and left him to extricate himself from a
hazardous situation, where he could neither remain with safety,
nor retire with honor.<br>
</p>

<p>As soon as they were delivered from the fears of invasion, the
Alemanni prepared to chastise the Roman youth, who presumed to
dispute the possession of that country, which they claimed as
their own by the right of conquest and of treaties. They employed
three days, and as many nights, in transporting over the Rhine
their military powers. The fierce Chnodomar, shaking the
ponderous javelin which he had victoriously wielded against the
brother of Magnentius, led the van of the Barbarians, and
moderated by his experience the martial ardor which his example
inspired. He was followed by six other kings, by ten princes of
regal extraction, by a long train of high-spirited nobles, and by
thirty-five thousand of the bravest warriors of the tribes of
Germany. The confidence derived from the view of their own
strength, was increased by the intelligence which they received
from a deserter, that the C&aelig;sar, with a feeble army of
thirteen thousand men, occupied a post about one-and-twenty miles
from their camp of Strasburgh. With this inadequate force, Julian
resolved to seek and to encounter the Barbarian host; and the
chance of a general action was preferred to the tedious and
uncertain operation of separately engaging the dispersed parties
of the Alemanni. The Romans marched in close order, and in two
columns; the cavalry on the right, the infantry on the left; and
the day was so far spent when they appeared in sight of the
enemy, that Julian was desirous of deferring the battle till the
next morning, and of allowing his troops to recruit their
exhausted strength by the necessary refreshments of sleep and
food. Yielding, however, with some reluctance, to the clamors of
the soldiers, and even to the opinion of his council, he exhorted
them to justify by their valor the eager impatience, which, in
case of a defeat, would be universally branded with the epithets
of rashness and presumption. The trumpets sounded, the military
shout was heard through the field, and the two armies rushed with
equal fury to the charge. The C&aelig;sar, who conducted in
person his right wing, depended on the dexterity of his archers,
and the weight of his cuirassiers. But his ranks were instantly
broken by an irregular mixture of light horse and of light
infantry, and he had the mortification of beholding the flight of
six hundred of his most renowned cuirassiers. The fugitives were
stopped and rallied by the presence and authority of Julian, who,
careless of his own safety, threw himself before them, and urging
every motive of shame and honor, led them back against the
victorious enemy. The conflict between the two lines of infantry
was obstinate and bloody. The Germans possessed the superiority
of strength and stature, the Romans that of discipline and
temper; and as the Barbarians, who served under the standard of
the empire, united the respective advantages of both parties,
their strenuous efforts, guided by a skilful leader, at length
determined the event of the day. The Romans lost four tribunes,
and two hundred and forty-three soldiers, in this memorable
battle of Strasburgh, so glorious to the C&aelig;sar, and so
salutary to the afflicted provinces of Gaul. Six thousand of the
Alemanni were slain in the field, without including those who
were drowned in the Rhine, or transfixed with darts while they
attempted to swim across the river. Chnodomar himself was
surrounded and taken prisoner, with three of his brave
companions, who had devoted themselves to follow in life or death
the fate of their chieftain. Julian received him with military
pomp in the council of his officers; and expressing a generous
pity for the fallen state, dissembled his inward contempt for the
abject humiliation, of his captive. Instead of exhibiting the
vanquished king of the Alemanni, as a grateful spectacle to the
cities of Gaul, he respectfully laid at the feet of the emperor
this splendid trophy of his victory. Chnodomar experienced an
honorable treatment: but the impatient Barbarian could not long
survive his defeat, his confinement, and his exile.<br>
</p>

<p>After Julian had repulsed the Alemanni from the provinces of
the Upper Rhine, he turned his arms against the Franks, who were
seated nearer to the ocean, on the confines of Gaul and Germany;
and who, from their numbers, and still more from their intrepid
valor, had ever been esteemed the most formidable of the
Barbarians. Although they were strongly actuated by the
allurements of rapine, they professed a disinterested love of
war; which they considered as the supreme honor and felicity of
human nature; and their minds and bodies were so completely
hardened by perpetual action, that, according to the lively
expression of an orator, the snows of winter were as pleasant to
them as the flowers of spring. In the month of December, which
followed the battle of Strasburgh, Julian attacked a body of six
hundred Franks, who had thrown themselves into two castles on the
Meuse. In the midst of that severe season they sustained, with
inflexible constancy, a siege of fifty-four days; till at length,
exhausted by hunger, and satisfied that the vigilance of the
enemy, in breaking the ice of the river, left them no hopes of
escape, the Franks consented, for the first time, to dispense
with the ancient law which commanded them to conquer or to die.
The C&aelig;sar immediately sent his captives to the court of
Constantius, who, accepting them as a valuable present, rejoiced
in the opportunity of adding so many heroes to the choicest
troops of his domestic guards. The obstinate resistance of this
handful of Franks apprised Julian of the difficulties of the
expedition which he meditated for the ensuing spring, against the
whole body of the nation. His rapid diligence surprised and
astonished the active Barbarians. Ordering his soldiers to
provide themselves with biscuit for twenty days, he suddenly
pitched his camp near Tongres, while the enemy still supposed him
in his winter quarters of Paris, expecting the slow arrival of
his convoys from Aquitain. Without allowing the Franks to unite
or deliberate, he skilfully spread his legions from Cologne to
the ocean; and by the terror, as well as by the success, of his
arms, soon reduced the suppliant tribes to implore the clemency,
and to obey the commands, of their conqueror. The Chamavians
submissively retired to their former habitations beyond the
Rhine; but the Salians were permitted to possess their new
establishment of Toxandria, as the subjects and auxiliaries of
the Roman empire. The treaty was ratified by solemn oaths; and
perpetual inspectors were appointed to reside among the Franks,
with the authority of enforcing the strict observance of the
conditions. An incident is related, interesting enough in itself,
and by no means repugnant to the character of Julian, who
ingeniously contrived both the plot and the catastrophe of the
tragedy. When the Chamavians sued for peace, he required the son
of their king, as the only hostage on whom he could rely. A
mournful silence, interrupted by tears and groans, declared the
sad perplexity of the Barbarians; and their aged chief lamented
in pathetic language, that his private loss was now imbittered by
a sense of public calamity. While the Chamavians lay prostrate at
the foot of his throne, the royal captive, whom they believed to
have been slain, unexpectedly appeared before their eyes; and as
soon as the tumult of joy was hushed into attention, the
C&aelig;sar addressed the assembly in the following terms:
"Behold the son, the prince, whom you wept. You had lost him by
your fault. God and the Romans have restored him to you. I shall
still preserve and educate the youth, rather as a monument of my
own virtue, than as a pledge of your sincerity. Should you
presume to violate the faith which you have sworn, the arms of
the republic will avenge the perfidy, not on the innocent, but on
the guilty." The Barbarians withdrew from his presence, impressed
with the warmest sentiments of gratitude and admiration.<br>
</p>

<p>It was not enough for Julian to have delivered the provinces
of Gaul from the Barbarians of Germany. He aspired to emulate the
glory of the first and most illustrious of the emperors; after
whose example, he composed his own commentaries of the Gallic
war. C&aelig;sar has related, with conscious pride, the manner in
which he <strong><em>twice</em></strong> passed the Rhine. Julian
could boast, that before he assumed the title of Augustus, he had
carried the Roman eagles beyond that great river in
<strong><em>three</em></strong> successful expeditions. The
consternation of the Germans, after the battle of Strasburgh,
encouraged him to the first attempt; and the reluctance of the
troops soon yielded to the persuasive eloquence of a leader, who
shared the fatigues and dangers which he imposed on the meanest
of the soldiers. The villages on either side of the Meyn, which
were plentifully stored with corn and cattle, felt the ravages of
an invading army. The principal houses, constructed with some
imitation of Roman elegance, were consumed by the flames; and the
C&aelig;sar boldly advanced about ten miles, till his progress
was stopped by a dark and impenetrable forest, undermined by
subterraneous passages, which threatened with secret snares and
ambush every step of the assailants. The ground was already
covered with snow; and Julian, after repairing an ancient castle
which had been erected by Trajan, granted a truce of ten months
to the submissive Barbarians. At the expiration of the truce,
Julian undertook a second expedition beyond the Rhine, to humble
the pride of Surmar and Hortaire, two of the kings of the
Alemanni, who had been present at the battle of Strasburgh. They
promised to restore all the Roman captives who yet remained
alive; and as the C&aelig;sar had procured an exact account from
the cities and villages of Gaul, of the inhabitants whom they had
lost, he detected every attempt to deceive him, with a degree of
readiness and accuracy, which almost established the belief of
his supernatural knowledge. His third expedition was still more
splendid and important than the two former. The Germans had
collected their military powers, and moved along the opposite
banks of the river, with a design of destroying the bridge, and
of preventing the passage of the Romans. But this judicious plan
of defence was disconcerted by a skilful diversion. Three hundred
light-armed and active soldiers were detached in forty small
boats, to fall down the stream in silence, and to land at some
distance from the posts of the enemy. They executed their orders
with so much boldness and celerity, that they had almost
surprised the Barbarian chiefs, who returned in the fearless
confidence of intoxication from one of their nocturnal festivals.
Without repeating the uniform and disgusting tale of slaughter
and devastation, it is sufficient to observe, that Julian
dictated his own conditions of peace to six of the haughtiest
kings of the Alemanni, three of whom were permitted to view the
severe discipline and martial pomp of a Roman camp. Followed by
twenty thousand captives, whom he had rescued from the chains of
the Barbarians, the C&aelig;sar repassed the Rhine, after
terminating a war, the success of which has been compared to the
ancient glories of the Punic and Cimbric victories.<br>
</p>

<p>As soon as the valor and conduct of Julian had secured an
interval of peace, he applied himself to a work more congenial to
his humane and philosophic temper. The cities of Gaul, which had
suffered from the inroads of the Barbarians, he diligently
repaired; and seven important posts, between Mentz and the mouth
of the Rhine, are particularly mentioned, as having been rebuilt
and fortified by the order of Julian. The vanquished Germans had
submitted to the just but humiliating condition of preparing and
conveying the necessary materials. The active zeal of Julian
urged the prosecution of the work; and such was the spirit which
he had diffused among the troops, that the auxiliaries
themselves, waiving their exemption from any duties of fatigue,
contended in the most servile labors with the diligence of the
Roman soldiers. It was incumbent on the C&aelig;sar to provide
for the subsistence, as well as for the safety, of the
inhabitants and of the garrisons. The desertion of the former,
and the mutiny of the latter, must have been the fatal and
inevitable consequences of famine. The tillage of the provinces
of Gaul had been interrupted by the calamities of war; but the
scanty harvests of the continent were supplied, by his paternal
care, from the plenty of the adjacent island. Six hundred large
barks, framed in the forest of the Ardennes, made several voyages
to the coast of Britain; and returning from thence, laden with
corn, sailed up the Rhine, and distributed their cargoes to the
several towns and fortresses along the banks of the river. The
arms of Julian had restored a free and secure navigation, which
Constantius had offered to purchase at the expense of his
dignity, and of a tributary present of two thousand pounds of
silver. The emperor parsimoniously refused to his soldiers the
sums which he granted with a lavish and trembling hand to the
Barbarians. The dexterity, as well as the firmness, of Julian was
put to a severe trial, when he took the field with a discontented
army, which had already served two campaigns, without receiving
any regular pay or any extraordinary donative.<br>
</p>

<p>A tender regard for the peace and happiness of his subjects
was the ruling principle which directed, or seemed to direct, the
administration of Julian. He devoted the leisure of his winter
quarters to the offices of civil government; and affected to
assume, with more pleasure, the character of a magistrate than
that of a general. Before he took the field, he devolved on the
provincial governors most of the public and private causes which
had been referred to his tribunal; but, on his return, he
carefully revised their proceedings, mitigated the rigor of the
law, and pronounced a second judgment on the judges themselves.
Superior to the last temptation of virtuous minds, an indiscreet
and intemperate zeal for justice, he restrained, with calmness
and dignity, the warmth of an advocate, who prosecuted, for
extortion, the president of the Narbonnese province. "Who will
ever be found guilty," exclaimed the vehement Delphidius, "if it
be enough to deny?" "And who," replied Julian, "will ever be
innocent, if it be sufficient to affirm?" In the general
administration of peace and war, the interest of the sovereign is
commonly the same as that of his people; but Constantius would
have thought himself deeply injured, if the virtues of Julian had
defrauded him of any part of the tribute which he extorted from
an oppressed and exhausted country. The prince who was invested
with the ensigns of royalty, might sometimes presume to correct
the rapacious insolence of his inferior agents, to expose their
corrupt arts, and to introduce an equal and easier mode of
collection. But the management of the finances was more safely
intrusted to Florentius, pr&aelig;torian pr&aelig;fect of Gaul,
an effeminate tyrant, incapable of pity or remorse: and the
haughty minister complained of the most decent and gentle
opposition, while Julian himself was rather inclined to censure
the weakness of his own behavior. The C&aelig;sar had rejected,
with abhorrence, a mandate for the levy of an extraordinary tax;
a new superindiction, which the pr&aelig;fect had offered for his
signature; and the faithful picture of the public misery, by
which he had been obliged to justify his refusal, offended the
court of Constantius. We may enjoy the pleasure of reading the
sentiments of Julian, as he expresses them with warmth and
freedom in a letter to one of his most intimate friends. After
stating his own conduct, he proceeds in the following terms: "Was
it possible for the disciple of Plato and Aristotle to act
otherwise than I have done? Could I abandon the unhappy subjects
intrusted to my care? Was I not called upon to defend them from
the repeated injuries of these unfeeling robbers? A tribune who
deserts his post is punished with death, and deprived of the
honors of burial. With what justice could I pronounce
<strong><em>his</em></strong>sentence, if, in the hour of danger,
I myself neglected a duty far more sacred and far more important?
God has placed me in this elevated post; his providence will
guard and support me. Should I be condemned to suffer, I shall
derive comfort from the testimony of a pure and upright
conscience. Would to Heaven that I still possessed a counsellor
like Sallust! If they think proper to send me a successor, I
shall submit without reluctance; and had much rather improve the
short opportunity of doing good, than enjoy a long and lasting
impunity of evil." The precarious and dependent situation of
Julian displayed his virtues and concealed his defects. The young
hero who supported, in Gaul, the throne of Constantius, was not
permitted to reform the vices of the government; but he had
courage to alleviate or to pity the distress of the people.
Unless he had been able to revive the martial spirit of the
Romans, or to introduce the arts of industry and refinement among
their savage enemies, he could not entertain any rational hopes
of securing the public tranquillity, either by the peace or
conquest of Germany. Yet the victories of Julian suspended, for a
short time, the inroads of the Barbarians, and delayed the ruin
of the Western Empire.<br>
</p>

<p>His salutary influence restored the cities of Gaul, which had
been so long exposed to the evils of civil discord, Barbarian
war, and domestic tyranny; and the spirit of industry was revived
with the hopes of enjoyment. Agriculture, manufactures, and
commerce, again flourished under the protection of the laws; and
the <strong><em>curi</em></strong>, or civil corporations, were
again filled with useful and respectable members: the youth were
no longer apprehensive of marriage; and married persons were no
longer apprehensive of posterity: the public and private
festivals were celebrated with customary pomp; and the frequent
and secure intercourse of the provinces displayed the image of
national prosperity. A mind like that of Julian must have felt
the general happiness of which he was the author; but he viewed,
with particular satisfaction and complacency, the city of Paris;
the seat of his winter residence, and the object even of his
partial affection. That splendid capital, which now embraces an
ample territory on either side of the Seine, was originally
confined to the small island in the midst of the river, from
whence the inhabitants derived a supply of pure and salubrious
water. The river bathed the foot of the walls; and the town was
accessible only by two wooden bridges. A forest overspread the
northern side of the Seine, but on the south, the ground, which
now bears the name of the University, was insensibly covered with
houses, and adorned with a palace and amphitheatre, baths, an
aqueduct, and a field of Mars for the exercise of the Roman
troops. The severity of the climate was tempered by the
neighborhood of the ocean; and with some precautions, which
experience had taught, the vine and fig-tree were successfully
cultivated. But in remarkable winters, the Seine was deeply
frozen; and the huge pieces of ice that floated down the stream,
might be compared, by an Asiatic, to the blocks of white marble
which were extracted from the quarries of Phrygia. The
licentiousness and corruption of Antioch recalled to the memory
of Julian the severe and simple manners of his beloved Lutetia;
where the amusements of the theatre were unknown or despised. He
indignantly contrasted the effeminate Syrians with the brave and
honest simplicity of the Gauls, and almost forgave the
intemperance, which was the only stain of the Celtic character.
If Julian could now revisit the capital of France, he might
converse with men of science and genius, capable of understanding
and of instructing a disciple of the Greeks; he might excuse the
lively and graceful follies of a nation, whose martial spirit has
never been enervated by the indulgence of luxury; and he must
applaud the perfection of that inestimable art, which softens and
refines and embellishes the intercourse of social life.<br>
</p>

<p><strong>Chapter XX: Conversion Of Constantine.</strong></p>

<p><strong><em>Part I.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>The Motives, Progress, And Effects Of The Conversion Of
Constantine. -- Legal Establishment And Constitution Of The
Christian Or Catholic Church.<br>
</p>

<p>The public establishment of Christianity may be considered as
one of those important and domestic revolutions which excite the
most lively curiosity, and afford the most valuable instruction.
The victories and the civil policy of Constantine no longer
influence the state of Europe; but a considerable portion of the
globe still retains the impression which it received from the
conversion of that monarch; and the ecclesiastical institutions
of his reign are still connected, by an indissoluble chain, with
the opinions, the passions, and the interests of the present
generation.<br>
</p>

<p>In the consideration of a subject which may be examined with
impartiality, but cannot be viewed with indifference, a
difficulty immediately arises of a very unexpected nature; that
of ascertaining the real and precise date of the conversion of
Constantine. The eloquent Lactantius, in the midst of his court,
seems impatient to proclaim to the world the glorious example of
the sovereign of Gaul; who, in the first moments of his reign,
acknowledged and adored the majesty of the true and only God. The
learned Eusebius has ascribed the faith of Constantine to the
miraculous sign which was displayed in the heavens whilst he
meditated and prepared the Italian expedition. The historian
Zosimus maliciously asserts, that the emperor had imbrued his
hands in the blood of his eldest son, before he publicly
renounced the gods of Rome and of his ancestors. The perplexity
produced by these discordant authorities is derived from the
behavior of Constantine himself. According to the strictness of
ecclesiastical language, the first of the
<strong><em>Christian</em></strong> emperors was unworthy of that
name, till the moment of his death; since it was only during his
last illness that he received, as a catechumen, the imposition of
hands, and was afterwards admitted, by the initiatory rites of
baptism, into the number of the faithful. The Christianity of
Constantine must be allowed in a much more vague and qualified
sense; and the nicest accuracy is required in tracing the slow
and almost imperceptible gradations by which the monarch declared
himself the protector, and at length the proselyte, of the
church. It was an arduous task to eradicate the habits and
prejudices of his education, to acknowledge the divine power of
Christ, and to understand that the truth of his revelation was
incompatible with the worship of the gods. The obstacles which he
had probably experienced in his own mind, instructed him to
proceed with caution in the momentous change of a national
religion; and he insensibly discovered his new opinions, as far
as he could enforce them with safety and with effect. During the
whole course of his reign, the stream of Christianity flowed with
a gentle, though accelerated, motion: but its general direction
was sometimes checked, and sometimes diverted, by the accidental
circumstances of the times, and by the prudence, or possibly by
the caprice, of the monarch. His ministers were permitted to
signify the intentions of their master in the various language
which was best adapted to their respective principles; and he
artfully balanced the hopes and fears of his subjects, by
publishing in the same year two edicts; the first of which
enjoined the solemn observance of Sunday, and the second directed
the regular consultation of the Aruspices. While this important
revolution yet remained in suspense, the Christians and the
Pagans watched the conduct of their sovereign with the same
anxiety, but with very opposite sentiments. The former were
prompted by every motive of zeal, as well as vanity, to
exaggerate the marks of his favor, and the evidences of his
faith. The latter, till their just apprehensions were changed
into despair and resentment, attempted to conceal from the world,
and from themselves, that the gods of Rome could no longer reckon
the emperor in the number of their votaries. The same passions
and prejudices have engaged the partial writers of the times to
connect the public profession of Christianity with the most
glorious or the most ignominious &aelig;ra of the reign of
Constantine.<br>
</p>

<p>Whatever symptoms of Christian piety might transpire in the
discourses or actions of Constantine, he persevered till he was
near forty years of age in the practice of the established
religion; and the same conduct which in the court of Nicomedia
might be imputed to his fear, could be ascribed only to the
inclination or policy of the sovereign of Gaul. His liberality
restored and enriched the temples of the gods; the medals which
issued from his Imperial mint are impressed with the figures and
attributes of Jupiter and Apollo, of Mars and Hercules; and his
filial piety increased the council of Olympus by the solemn
apotheosis of his father Constantius. But the devotion of
Constantine was more peculiarly directed to the genius of the
Sun, the Apollo of Greek and Roman mythology; and he was pleased
to be represented with the symbols of the God of Light and
Poetry. The unerring shafts of that deity, the brightness of his
eyes, his laurel wreath, immortal beauty, and elegant
accomplishments, seem to point him out as the patron of a young
hero. The altars of Apollo were crowned with the votive offerings
of Constantine; and the credulous multitude were taught to
believe, that the emperor was permitted to behold with mortal
eyes the visible majesty of their tutelar deity; and that, either
walking or in a vision, he was blessed with the auspicious omens
of a long and victorious reign. The Sun was universally
celebrated as the invincible guide and protector of Constantine;
and the Pagans might reasonably expect that the insulted god
would pursue with unrelenting vengeance the impiety of his
ungrateful favorite.<br>
</p>

<p>As long as Constantine exercised a limited sovereignty over
the provinces of Gaul, his Christian subjects were protected by
the authority, and perhaps by the laws, of a prince, who wisely
left to the gods the care of vindicating their own honor. If we
may credit the assertion of Constantine himself, he had been an
indignant spectator of the savage cruelties which were inflicted,
by the hands of Roman soldiers, on those citizens whose religion
was their only crime. In the East and in the West, he had seen
the different effects of severity and indulgence; and as the
former was rendered still more odious by the example of Galerius,
his implacable enemy, the latter was recommended to his imitation
by the authority and advice of a dying father. The son of
Constantius immediately suspended or repealed the edicts of
persecution, and granted the free exercise of their religious
ceremonies to all those who had already professed themselves
members of the church. They were soon encouraged to depend on the
favor as well as on the justice of their sovereign, who had
imbibed a secret and sincere reverence for the name of Christ,
and for the God of the Christians.<br>
</p>

<p>About five months after the conquest of Italy, the emperor
made a solemn and authentic declaration of his sentiments by the
celebrated edict of Milan, which restored peace to the Catholic
church. In the personal interview of the two western princes,
Constantine, by the ascendant of genius and power, obtained the
ready concurrence of his colleague, Licinius; the union of their
names and authority disarmed the fury of Maximin; and after the
death of the tyrant of the East, the edict of Milan was received
as a general and fundamental law of the Roman world.<br>
</p>

<p>The wisdom of the emperors provided for the restitution of all
the civil and religious rights of which the Christians had been
so unjustly deprived. It was enacted that the places of worship,
and public lands, which had been confiscated, should be restored
to the church, without dispute, without delay, and without
expense; and this severe injunction was accompanied with a
gracious promise, that if any of the purchasers had paid a fair
and adequate price, they should be indemnified from the Imperial
treasury. The salutary regulations which guard the future
tranquillity of the faithful are framed on the principles of
enlarged and equal toleration; and such an equality must have
been interpreted by a recent sect as an advantageous and
honorable distinction. The two emperors proclaim to the world,
that they have granted a free and absolute power to the
Christians, and to all others, of following the religion which
each individual thinks proper to prefer, to which he has addicted
his mind, and which he may deem the best adapted to his own use.
They carefully explain every ambiguous word, remove every
exception, and exact from the governors of the provinces a strict
obedience to the true and simple meaning of an edict, which was
designed to establish and secure, without any limitation, the
claims of religious liberty. They condescend to assign two
weighty reasons which have induced them to allow this universal
toleration: the humane intention of consulting the peace and
happiness of their people; and the pious hope, that, by such a
conduct, they shall appease and propitiate the Deity, whose seat
is in heaven. They gratefully acknowledge the many signal proofs
which they have received of the divine favor; and they trust that
the same Providence will forever continue to protect the
prosperity of the prince and people. From these vague and
indefinite expressions of piety, three suppositions may be
deduced, of a different, but not of an incompatible nature. The
mind of Constantine might fluctuate between the Pagan and the
Christian religions. According to the loose and complying notions
of Polytheism, he might acknowledge the God of the Christians as
<strong><em>one</em></strong> of the
<strong><em>many</em></strong> deities who compose the hierarchy
of heaven. Or perhaps he might embrace the philosophic and
pleasing idea, that, notwithstanding the variety of names, of
rites, and of opinions, all the sects, and all the nations of
mankind, are united in the worship of the common Father and
Creator of the universe.<br>
</p>

<p>But the counsels of princes are more frequently influenced by
views of temporal advantage, than by considerations of abstract
and speculative truth. The partial and increasing favor of
Constantine may naturally be referred to the esteem which he
entertained for the moral character of the Christians; and to a
persuasion, that the propagation of the gospel would inculcate
the practice of private and public virtue. Whatever latitude an
absolute monarch may assume in his own conduct, whatever
indulgence he may claim for his own passions, it is undoubtedly
his interest that all his subjects should respect the natural and
civil obligations of society. But the operation of the wisest
laws is imperfect and precarious. They seldom inspire virtue,
they cannot always restrain vice. Their power is insufficient to
prohibit all that they condemn, nor can they always punish the
actions which they prohibit. The legislators of antiquity had
summoned to their aid the powers of education and of opinion. But
every principle which had once maintained the vigor and purity of
Rome and Sparta, was long since extinguished in a declining and
despotic empire. Philosophy still exercised her temperate sway
over the human mind, but the cause of virtue derived very feeble
support from the influence of the Pagan superstition. Under these
discouraging circumstances, a prudent magistrate might observe
with pleasure the progress of a religion which diffused among the
people a pure, benevolent, and universal system of ethics,
adapted to every duty and every condition of life; recommended as
the will and reason of the supreme Deity, and enforced by the
sanction of eternal rewards or punishments. The experience of
Greek and Roman history could not inform the world how far the
system of national manners might be reformed and improved by the
precepts of a divine revelation; and Constantine might listen
with some confidence to the flattering, and indeed reasonable,
assurances of Lactantius. The eloquent apologist seemed firmly to
expect, and almost ventured to promise,
<strong><em>that</em></strong> the establishment of Christianity
would restore the innocence and felicity of the primitive age;
<strong><em>that</em></strong>the worship of the true God would
extinguish war and dissension among those who mutually considered
themselves as the children of a common parent;
<strong><em>that</em></strong> every impure desire, every angry
or selfish passion, would be restrained by the knowledge of the
gospel; and <strong><em>that</em></strong> the magistrates might
sheath the sword of justice among a people who would be
universally actuated by the sentiments of truth and piety, of
equity and moderation, of harmony and universal love.<br>
</p>

<p>The passive and unresisting obedience, which bows under the
yoke of authority, or even of oppression, must have appeared, in
the eyes of an absolute monarch, the most conspicuous and useful
of the evangelic virtues. The primitive Christians derived the
institution of civil government, not from the consent of the
people, but from the decrees of Heaven. The reigning emperor,
though he had usurped the sceptre by treason and murder,
immediately assumed the sacred character of vicegerent of the
Deity. To the Deity alone he was accountable for the abuse of his
power; and his subjects were indissolubly bound, by their oath of
fidelity, to a tyrant, who had violated every law of nature and
society. The humble Christians were sent into the world as sheep
among wolves; and since they were not permitted to employ force
even in the defence of their religion, they should be still more
criminal if they were tempted to shed the blood of their
fellow-creatures in disputing the vain privileges, or the sordid
possessions, of this transitory life. Faithful to the doctrine of
the apostle, who in the reign of Nero had preached the duty of
unconditional submission, the Christians of the three first
centuries preserved their conscience pure and innocent of the
guilt of secret conspiracy, or open rebellion. While they
experienced the rigor of persecution, they were never provoked
either to meet their tyrants in the field, or indignantly to
withdraw themselves into some remote and sequestered corner of
the globe. The Protestants of France, of Germany, and of Britain,
who asserted with such intrepid courage their civil and religious
freedom, have been insulted by the invidious comparison between
the conduct of the primitive and of the reformed Christians.
Perhaps, instead of censure, some applause may be due to the
superior sense and spirit of our ancestors, who had convinced
themselves that religion cannot abolish the unalienable rights of
human nature. Perhaps the patience of the primitive church may be
ascribed to its weakness, as well as to its virtue. A sect of
unwarlike plebeians, without leaders, without arms, without
fortifications, must have encountered inevitable destruction in a
rash and fruitless resistance to the master of the Roman legions.
But the Christians, when they deprecated the wrath of Diocletian,
or solicited the favor of Constantine, could allege, with truth
and confidence, that they held the principle of passive
obedience, and that, in the space of three centuries, their
conduct had always been conformable to their principles. They
might add, that the throne of the emperors would be established
on a fixed and permanent basis, if all their subjects, embracing
the Christian doctrine, should learn to suffer and to obey.<br>
</p>

<p>In the general order of Providence, princes and tyrants are
considered as the ministers of Heaven, appointed to rule or to
chastise the nations of the earth. But sacred history affords
many illustrious examples of the more immediate interposition of
the Deity in the government of his chosen people. The sceptre and
the sword were committed to the hands of Moses, of Joshua, of
Gideon, of David, of the Maccabees; the virtues of those heroes
were the motive or the effect of the divine favor, the success of
their arms was destined to achieve the deliverance or the triumph
of the church. If the judges of Isr&aelig;l were occasional and
temporary magistrates, the kings of Judah derived from the royal
unction of their great ancestor an hereditary and indefeasible
right, which could not be forfeited by their own vices, nor
recalled by the caprice of their subjects. The same extraordinary
providence, which was no longer confined to the Jewish people,
might elect Constantine and his family as the protectors of the
Christian world; and the devout Lactantius announces, in a
prophetic tone, the future glories of his long and universal
reign. Galerius and Maximin, Maxentius and Licinius, were the
rivals who shared with the favorite of heaven the provinces of
the empire. The tragic deaths of Galerius and Maximin soon
gratified the resentment, and fulfilled the sanguine
expectations, of the Christians. The success of Constantine
against Maxentius and Licinius removed the two formidable
competitors who still opposed the triumph of the second David,
and his cause might seem to claim the peculiar interposition of
Providence. The character of the Roman tyrant disgraced the
purple and human nature; and though the Christians might enjoy
his precarious favor, they were exposed, with the rest of his
subjects, to the effects of his wanton and capricious cruelty.
The conduct of Licinius soon betrayed the reluctance with which
he had consented to the wise and humane regulations of the edict
of Milan. The convocation of provincial synods was prohibited in
his dominions; his Christian officers were ignominiously
dismissed; and if he avoided the guilt, or rather danger, of a
general persecution, his partial oppressions were rendered still
more odious by the violation of a solemn and voluntary
engagement. While the East, according to the lively expression of
Eusebius, was involved in the shades of infernal darkness, the
auspicious rays of celestial light warmed and illuminated the
provinces of the West. The piety of Constantine was admitted as
an unexceptionable proof of the justice of his arms; and his use
of victory confirmed the opinion of the Christians, that their
hero was inspired, and conducted, by the Lord of Hosts. The
conquest of Italy produced a general edict of toleration; and as
soon as the defeat of Licinius had invested Constantine with the
sole dominion of the Roman world, he immediately, by circular
letters, exhorted all his subjects to imitate, without delay, the
example of their sovereign, and to embrace the divine truth of
Christianity.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XX: Conversion Of Constantine. -- Part
II.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>The assurance that the elevation of Constantine was intimately
connected with the designs of Providence, instilled into the
minds of the Christians two opinions, which, by very different
means, assisted the accomplishment of the prophecy. Their warm
and active loyalty exhausted in his favor every resource of human
industry; and they confidently expected that their strenuous
efforts would be seconded by some divine and miraculous aid. The
enemies of Constantine have imputed to interested motives the
alliance which he insensibly contracted with the Catholic church,
and which apparently contributed to the success of his ambition.
In the beginning of the fourth century, the Christians still bore
a very inadequate proportion to the inhabitants of the empire;
but among a degenerate people, who viewed the change of masters
with the indifference of slaves, the spirit and union of a
religious party might assist the popular leader, to whose
service, from a principle of conscience, they had devoted their
lives and fortunes. The example of his father had instructed
Constantine to esteem and to reward the merit of the Christians;
and in the distribution of public offices, he had the advantage
of strengthening his government, by the choice of ministers or
generals, in whose fidelity he could repose a just and unreserved
confidence. By the influence of these dignified missionaries, the
proselytes of the new faith must have multiplied in the court and
army; the Barbarians of Germany, who filled the ranks of the
legions, were of a careless temper, which acquiesced without
resistance in the religion of their commander; and when they
passed the Alps, it may fairly be presumed, that a great number
of the soldiers had already consecrated their swords to the
service of Christ and of Constantine. The habits of mankind and
the interests of religion gradually abated the horror of war and
bloodshed, which had so long prevailed among the Christians; and
in the councils which were assembled under the gracious
protection of Constantine, the authority of the bishops was
seasonably employed to ratify the obligation of the military
oath, and to inflict the penalty of excommunication on those
soldiers who threw away their arms during the peace of the
church. While Constantine, in his own dominions, increased the
number and zeal of his faithful adherents, he could depend on the
support of a powerful faction in those provinces which were still
possessed or usurped by his rivals. A secret disaffection was
diffused among the Christian subjects of Maxentius and Licinius;
and the resentment, which the latter did not attempt to conceal,
served only to engage them still more deeply in the interest of
his competitor. The regular correspondence which connected the
bishops of the most distant provinces, enabled them freely to
communicate their wishes and their designs, and to transmit
without danger any useful intelligence, or any pious
contributions, which might promote the service of Constantine,
who publicly declared that he had taken up arms for the
deliverance of the church.<br>
</p>

<p>The enthusiasm which inspired the troops, and perhaps the
emperor himself, had sharpened their swords while it satisfied
their conscience. They marched to battle with the full assurance,
that the same God, who had formerly opened a passage to the
Isr&aelig;lites through the waters of Jordan, and had thrown down
the walls of Jericho at the sound of the trumpets of Joshua,
would display his visible majesty and power in the victory of
Constantine. The evidence of ecclesiastical history is prepared
to affirm, that their expectations were justified by the
conspicuous miracle to which the conversion of the first
Christian emperor has been almost unanimously ascribed. The real
or imaginary cause of so important an event, deserves and demands
the attention of posterity; and I shall endeavor to form a just
estimate of the famous vision of Constantine, by a distinct
consideration of the <strong><em>standard</em></strong>, the
<strong><em>dream</em></strong>, and the <strong><em>celestial
sign</em></strong>; by separating the historical, the natural,
and the marvellous parts of this extraordinary story, which, in
the composition of a specious argument, have been artfully
confounded in one splendid and brittle mass.<br>
</p>

<p>I. An instrument of the tortures which were inflicted only on
slaves and strangers, became on object of horror in the eyes of a
Roman citizen; and the ideas of guilt, of pain, and of ignominy,
were closely united with the idea of the cross. The piety, rather
than the humanity, of Constantine soon abolished in his dominions
the punishment which the Savior of mankind had condescended to
suffer; but the emperor had already learned to despise the
prejudices of his education, and of his people, before he could
erect in the midst of Rome his own statue, bearing a cross in its
right hand; with an inscription which referred the victory of his
arms, and the deliverance of Rome, to the virtue of that salutary
sign, the true symbol of force and courage. The same symbol
sanctified the arms of the soldiers of Constantine; the cross
glittered on their helmet, was engraved on their shields, was
interwoven into their banners; and the consecrated emblems which
adorned the person of the emperor himself, were distinguished
only by richer materials and more exquisite workmanship. But the
principal standard which displayed the triumph of the cross was
styled the <strong><em>Labarum</em></strong>, an obscure, though
celebrated name, which has been vainly derived from almost all
the languages of the world. It is described as a long pike
intersected by a transversal beam. The silken veil, which hung
down from the beam, was curiously inwrought with the images of
the reigning monarch and his children. The summit of the pike
supported a crown of gold which enclosed the mysterious monogram,
at once expressive of the figure of the cross, and the initial
letters, of the name of Christ. The safety of the labarum was
intrusted to fifty guards, of approved valor and fidelity; their
station was marked by honors and emoluments; and some fortunate
accidents soon introduced an opinion, that as long as the guards
of the labarum were engaged in the execution of their office,
they were secure and invulnerable amidst the darts of the enemy.
In the second civil war, Licinius felt and dreaded the power of
this consecrated banner, the sight of which, in the distress of
battle, animated the soldiers of Constantine with an invincible
enthusiasm, and scattered terror and dismay through the ranks of
the adverse legions. The Christian emperors, who respected the
example of Constantine, displayed in all their military
expeditions the standard of the cross; but when the degenerate
successors of Theodosius had ceased to appear in person at the
head of their armies, the labarum was deposited as a venerable
but useless relic in the palace of Constantinople. Its honors are
still preserved on the medals of the Flavian family. Their
grateful devotion has placed the monogram of Christ in the midst
of the ensigns of Rome. The solemn epithets of, safety of the
republic, glory of the army, restoration of public happiness, are
equally applied to the religious and military trophies; and there
is still extant a medal of the emperor Constantius, where the
standard of the labarum is accompanied with these memorable
words, By This Sign Thou Shalt Conquer.<br>
</p>

<p>II. In all occasions of danger and distress, it was the
practice of the primitive Christians to fortify their minds and
bodies by the sign of the cross, which they used, in all their
ecclesiastical rites, in all the daily occurrences of life, as an
infallible preservative against every species of spiritual or
temporal evil. The authority of the church might alone have had
sufficient weight to justify the devotion of Constantine, who in
the same prudent and gradual progress acknowledged the truth, and
assumed the symbol, of Christianity. But the testimony of a
contemporary writer, who in a formal treatise has avenged the
cause of religion, bestows on the piety of the emperor a more
awful and sublime character. He affirms, with the most perfect
confidence, that in the night which preceded the last battle
against Maxentius, Constantine was admonished in a dream * to
inscribe the shields of his soldiers with the
<strong><em>celestial sign of God</em></strong>, the sacred
monogram of the name of Christ; that he executed the commands of
Heaven, and that his valor and obedience were rewarded by the
decisive victory of the Milvian Bridge. Some considerations might
perhaps incline a sceptical mind to suspect the judgment or the
veracity of the rhetorician, whose pen, either from zeal or
interest, was devoted to the cause of the prevailing faction. He
appears to have published his deaths of the persecutors at
Nicomedia about three years after the Roman victory; but the
interval of a thousand miles, and a thousand days, will allow an
ample latitude for the invention of declaimers, the credulity of
party, and the tacit approbation of the emperor himself who might
listen without indignation to a marvellous tale, which exalted
his fame, and promoted his designs. In favor of Licinius, who
still dissembled his animosity to the Christians, the same author
has provided a similar vision, of a form of prayer, which was
communicated by an angel, and repeated by the whole army before
they engaged the legions of the tyrant Maximin. The frequent
repetition of miracles serves to provoke, where it does not
subdue, the reason of mankind; but if the dream of Constantine is
separately considered, it may be naturally explained either by
the policy or the enthusiasm of the emperor. Whilst his anxiety
for the approaching day, which must decide the fate of the
empire, was suspended by a short and interrupted slumber, the
venerable form of Christ, and the well-known symbol of his
religion, might forcibly offer themselves to the active fancy of
a prince who reverenced the name, and had perhaps secretly
implored the power, of the God of the Christians. As readily
might a consummate statesman indulge himself in the use of one of
those military stratagems, one of those pious frauds, which
Philip and Sertorius had employed with such art and effect. The
pr&aelig;ternatural origin of dreams was universally admitted by
the nations of antiquity, and a considerable part of the Gallic
army was already prepared to place their confidence in the
salutary sign of the Christian religion. The secret vision of
Constantine could be disproved only by the event; and the
intrepid hero who had passed the Alps and the Apennine, might
view with careless despair the consequences of a defeat under the
walls of Rome. The senate and people, exulting in their own
deliverance from an odious tyrant, acknowledged that the victory
of Constantine surpassed the powers of man, without daring to
insinuate that it had been obtained by the protection of the
<strong><em>Gods</em></strong>. The triumphal arch, which was
erected about three years after the event, proclaims, in
ambiguous language, that by the greatness of his own mind, and by
an <strong><em>instinct</em></strong> or impulse of the Divinity,
he had saved and avenged the Roman republic. The Pagan orator,
who had seized an earlier opportunity of celebrating the virtues
of the conqueror, supposes that he alone enjoyed a secret and
intimate commerce with the Supreme Being, who delegated the care
of mortals to his subordinate deities; and thus assigns a very
plausible reason why the subjects of Constantine should not
presume to embrace the new religion of their sovereign.<br>
</p>

<p>III. The philosopher, who with calm suspicion examines the
dreams and omens, the miracles and prodigies, of profane or even
of ecclesiastical history, will probably conclude, that if the
eyes of the spectators have sometimes been deceived by fraud, the
understanding of the readers has much more frequently been
insulted by fiction. Every event, or appearance, or accident,
which seems to deviate from the ordinary course of nature, has
been rashly ascribed to the immediate action of the Deity; and
the astonished fancy of the multitude has sometimes given shape
and color, language and motion, to the fleeting but uncommon
meteors of the air. Nazarius and Eusebius are the two most
celebrated orators, who, in studied panegyrics, have labored to
exalt the glory of Constantine. Nine years after the Roman
victory, Nazarius describes an army of divine warriors, who
seemed to fall from the sky: he marks their beauty, their spirit,
their gigantic forms, the stream of light which beamed from their
celestial armor, their patience in suffering themselves to be
heard, as well as seen, by mortals; and their declaration that
they were sent, that they flew, to the assistance of the great
Constantine. For the truth of this prodigy, the Pagan orator
appeals to the whole Gallic nation, in whose presence he was then
speaking; and seems to hope that the ancient apparitions would
now obtain credit from this recent and public event. The
Christian fable of Eusebius, which, in the space of twenty-six
years, might arise from the original dream, is cast in a much
more correct and elegant mould. In one of the marches of
Constantine, he is reported to have seen with his own eyes the
luminous trophy of the cross, placed above the meridian sun and
inscribed with the following words: By This Conquer. This amazing
object in the sky astonished the whole army, as well as the
emperor himself, who was yet undetermined in the choice of a
religion: but his astonishment was converted into faith by the
vision of the ensuing night. Christ appeared before his eyes; and
displaying the same celestial sign of the cross, he directed
Constantine to frame a similar standard, and to march, with an
assurance of victory, against Maxentius and all his enemies. The
learned bishop of C&aelig;sarea appears to be sensible, that the
recent discovery of this marvellous anecdote would excite some
surprise and distrust among the most pious of his readers. Yet,
instead of ascertaining the precise circumstances of time and
place, which always serve to detect falsehood or establish truth;
instead of collecting and recording the evidence of so many
living witnesses who must have been spectators of this stupendous
miracle; Eusebius contents himself with alleging a very singular
testimony; that of the deceased Constantine, who, many years
after the event, in the freedom of conversation, had related to
him this extraordinary incident of his own life, and had attested
the truth of it by a solemn oath. The prudence and gratitude of
the learned prelate forbade him to suspect the veracity of his
victorious master; but he plainly intimates, that in a fact of
such a nature, he should have refused his assent to any meaner
authority. This motive of credibility could not survive the power
of the Flavian family; and the celestial sign, which the Infidels
might afterwards deride, was disregarded by the Christians of the
age which immediately followed the conversion of Constantine. But
the Catholic church, both of the East and of the West, has
adopted a prodigy which favors, or seems to favor, the popular
worship of the cross. The vision of Constantine maintained an
honorable place in the legend of superstition, till the bold and
sagacious spirit of criticism presumed to depreciate the triumph,
and to arraign the truth, of the first Christian emperor.<br>
</p>

<p>The Protestant and philosophic readers of the present age will
incline to believe, that in the account of his own conversion,
Constantine attested a wilful falsehood by a solemn and
deliberate perjury. They may not hesitate to pronounce, that in
the choice of a religion, his mind was determined only by a sense
of interest; and that (according to the expression of a profane
poet ) he used the altars of the church as a convenient footstool
to the throne of the empire. A conclusion so harsh and so
absolute is not, however, warranted by our knowledge of human
nature, of Constantine, or of Christianity. In an age of
religious fervor, the most artful statesmen are observed to feel
some part of the enthusiasm which they inspire, and the most
orthodox saints assume the dangerous privilege of defending the
cause of truth by the arms of deceit and falsehood. Personal
interest is often the standard of our belief, as well as of our
practice; and the same motives of temporal advantage which might
influence the public conduct and professions of Constantine,
would insensibly dispose his mind to embrace a religion so
propitious to his fame and fortunes. His vanity was gratified by
the flattering assurance, that <strong><em>he</em></strong> had
been chosen by Heaven to reign over the earth; success had
justified his divine title to the throne, and that title was
founded on the truth of the Christian revelation. As real virtue
is sometimes excited by undeserved applause, the specious piety
of Constantine, if at first it was only specious, might
gradually, by the influence of praise, of habit, and of example,
be matured into serious faith and fervent devotion. The bishops
and teachers of the new sect, whose dress and manners had not
qualified them for the residence of a court, were admitted to the
Imperial table; they accompanied the monarch in his expeditions;
and the ascendant which one of them, an Egyptian or a Spaniard,
acquired over his mind, was imputed by the Pagans to the effect
of magic. Lactantius, who has adorned the precepts of the gospel
with the eloquence of Cicero, and Eusebius, who has consecrated
the learning and philosophy of the Greeks to the service of
religion, were both received into the friendship and familiarity
of their sovereign; and those able masters of controversy could
patiently watch the soft and yielding moments of persuasion, and
dexterously apply the arguments which were the best adapted to
his character and understanding. Whatever advantages might be
derived from the acquisition of an Imperial proselyte, he was
distinguished by the splendor of his purple, rather than by the
superiority of wisdom, or virtue, from the many thousands of his
subjects who had embraced the doctrines of Christianity. Nor can
it be deemed incredible, that the mind of an unlettered soldier
should have yielded to the weight of evidence, which, in a more
enlightened age, has satisfied or subdued the reason of a
Grotius, a Pascal, or a Locke. In the midst of the incessant
labors of his great office, this soldier employed, or affected to
employ, the hours of the night in the diligent study of the
Scriptures, and the composition of theological discourses; which
he afterwards pronounced in the presence of a numerous and
applauding audience. In a very long discourse, which is still
extant, the royal preacher expatiates on the various proofs still
extant, the royal preacher expatiates on the various proofs of
religion; but he dwells with peculiar complacency on the
Sibylline verses, and the fourth eclogue of Virgil. Forty years
before the birth of Christ, the Mantuan bard, as if inspired by
the celestial muse of Isaiah, had celebrated, with all the pomp
of oriental metaphor, the return of the Virgin, the fall of the
serpent, the approaching birth of a godlike child, the offspring
of the great Jupiter, who should expiate the guilt of human kind,
and govern the peaceful universe with the virtues of his father;
the rise and appearance of a heavenly race, primitive nation
throughout the world; and the gradual restoration of the
innocence and felicity of the golden age. The poet was perhaps
unconscious of the secret sense and object of these sublime
predictions, which have been so unworthily applied to the infant
son of a consul, or a triumvir; but if a more splendid, and
indeed specious interpretation of the fourth eclogue contributed
to the conversion of the first Christian emperor, Virgil may
deserve to be ranked among the most successful missionaries of
the gospel.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XX: Conversion Of Constantine. -- Part
III.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>The awful mysteries of the Christian faith and worship were
concealed from the eyes of strangers, and even of catechumens,
with an affected secrecy, which served to excite their wonder and
curiosity. But the severe rules of discipline which the prudence
of the bishops had instituted, were relaxed by the same prudence
in favor of an Imperial proselyte, whom it was so important to
allure, by every gentle condescension, into the pale of the
church; and Constantine was permitted, at least by a tacit
dispensation, to enjoy <strong><em>most</em></strong> of the
privileges, before he had contracted
<strong><em>any</em></strong> of the obligations, of a Christian.
Instead of retiring from the congregation, when the voice of the
deacon dismissed the profane multitude, he prayed with the
faithful, disputed with the bishops, preached on the most sublime
and intricate subjects of theology, celebrated with sacred rites
the vigil of Easter, and publicly declared himself, not only a
partaker, but, in some measure, a priest and hierophant of the
Christian mysteries. The pride of Constantine might assume, and
his services had deserved, some extraordinary distinction: and
ill-timed rigor might have blasted the unripened fruits of his
conversion; and if the doors of the church had been strictly
closed against a prince who had deserted the altars of the gods,
the master of the empire would have been left destitute of any
form of religious worship. In his last visit to Rome, he piously
disclaimed and insulted the superstition of his ancestors, by
refusing to lead the military procession of the equestrian order,
and to offer the public vows to the Jupiter of the Capitoline
Hill. Many years before his baptism and death, Constantine had
proclaimed to the world, that neither his person nor his image
should ever more be seen within the walls of an idolatrous
temple; while he distributed through the provinces a variety of
medals and pictures, which represented the emperor in an humble
and suppliant posture of Christian devotion.<br>
</p>

<p>The pride of Constantine, who refused the privileges of a
catechumen, cannot easily be explained or excused; but the delay
of his baptism may be justified by the maxims and the practice of
ecclesiastical antiquity. The sacrament of baptism was regularly
administered by the bishop himself, with his assistant clergy, in
the cathedral church of the diocese, during the fifty days
between the solemn festivals of Easter and Pentecost; and this
holy term admitted a numerous band of infants and adult persons
into the bosom of the church. The discretion of parents often
suspended the baptism of their children till they could
understand the obligations which they contracted: the severity of
ancient bishops exacted from the new converts a novitiate of two
or three years; and the catechumens themselves, from different
motives of a temporal or a spiritual nature, were seldom
impatient to assume the character of perfect and initiated
Christians. The sacrament of baptism was supposed to contain a
full and absolute expiation of sin; and the soul was instantly
restored to its original purity, and entitled to the promise of
eternal salvation. Among the proselytes of Christianity, there
are many who judged it imprudent to precipitate a salutary rite,
which could not be repeated; to throw away an inestimable
privilege, which could never be recovered. By the delay of their
baptism, they could venture freely to indulge their passions in
the enjoyments of this world, while they still retained in their
own hands the means of a sure and easy absolution. The sublime
theory of the gospel had made a much fainter impression on the
heart than on the understanding of Constantine himself. He
pursued the great object of his ambition through the dark and
bloody paths of war and policy; and, after the victory, he
abandoned himself, without moderation, to the abuse of his
fortune. Instead of asserting his just superiority above the
imperfect heroism and profane philosophy of Trajan and the
Antonines, the mature age of Constantine forfeited the reputation
which he had acquired in his youth. As he gradually advanced in
the knowledge of truth, he proportionally declined in the
practice of virtue; and the same year of his reign in which he
convened the council of Nice, was polluted by the execution, or
rather murder, of his eldest son. This date is alone sufficient
to refute the ignorant and malicious suggestions of Zosimus, who
affirms, that, after the death of Crispus, the remorse of his
father accepted from the ministers of Christianity the expiation
which he had vainly solicited from the Pagan pontiffs. At the
time of the death of Crispus, the emperor could no longer
hesitate in the choice of a religion; he could no longer be
ignorant that the church was possessed of an infallible remedy,
though he chose to defer the application of it till the approach
of death had removed the temptation and danger of a relapse. The
bishops whom he summoned, in his last illness, to the palace of
Nicomedia, were edified by the fervor with which he requested and
received the sacrament of baptism, by the solemn protestation
that the remainder of his life should be worthy of a disciple of
Christ, and by his humble refusal to wear the Imperial purple
after he had been clothed in the white garment of a Neophyte. The
example and reputation of Constantine seemed to countenance the
delay of baptism. Future tyrants were encouraged to believe, that
the innocent blood which they might shed in a long reign would
instantly be washed away in the waters of regeneration; and the
abuse of religion dangerously undermined the foundations of moral
virtue.<br>
</p>

<p>The gratitude of the church has exalted the virtues and
excused the failings of a generous patron, who seated
Christianity on the throne of the Roman world; and the Greeks,
who celebrate the festival of the Imperial saint, seldom mention
the name of Constantine without adding the title of
<strong><em>equal to the Apostles</em></strong>. Such a
comparison, if it allude to the character of those divine
missionaries, must be imputed to the extravagance of impious
flattery. But if the parallel be confined to the extent and
number of their evangelic victories the success of Constantine
might perhaps equal that of the Apostles themselves. By the
edicts of toleration, he removed the temporal disadvantages which
had hitherto retarded the progress of Christianity; and its
active and numerous ministers received a free permission, a
liberal encouragement, to recommend the salutary truths of
revelation by every argument which could affect the reason or
piety of mankind. The exact balance of the two religions
continued but a moment; and the piercing eye of ambition and
avarice soon discovered, that the profession of Christianity
might contribute to the interest of the present, as well as of a
future life. The hopes of wealth and honors, the example of an
emperor, his exhortations, his irresistible smiles, diffused
conviction among the venal and obsequious crowds which usually
fill the apartments of a palace. The cities which signalized a
forward zeal by the voluntary destruction of their temples, were
distinguished by municipal privileges, and rewarded with popular
donatives; and the new capital of the East gloried in the
singular advantage that Constantinople was never profaned by the
worship of idols. As the lower ranks of society are governed by
imitation, the conversion of those who possessed any eminence of
birth, of power, or of riches, was soon followed by dependent
multitudes. The salvation of the common people was purchased at
an easy rate, if it be true that, in one year, twelve thousand
men were baptized at Rome, besides a proportionable number of
women and children, and that a white garment, with twenty pieces
of gold, had been promised by the emperor to every convert. The
powerful influence of Constantine was not circumscribed by the
narrow limits of his life, or of his dominions. The education
which he bestowed on his sons and nephews secured to the empire a
race of princes, whose faith was still more lively and sincere,
as they imbibed, in their earliest infancy, the spirit, or at
least the doctrine, of Christianity. War and commerce had spread
the knowledge of the gospel beyond the confines of the Roman
provinces; and the Barbarians, who had disdained as humble and
proscribed sect, soon learned to esteem a religion which had been
so lately embraced by the greatest monarch, and the most
civilized nation, of the globe. The Goths and Germans, who
enlisted under the standard of Rome, revered the cross which
glittered at the head of the legions, and their fierce countrymen
received at the same time the lessons of faith and of humanity.
The kings of Iberia and Armenia * worshipped the god of their
protector; and their subjects, who have invariably preserved the
name of Christians, soon formed a sacred and perpetual connection
with their Roman brethren. The Christians of Persia were
suspected, in time of war, of preferring their religion to their
country; but as long as peace subsisted between the two empires,
the persecuting spirit of the Magi was effectually restrained by
the interposition of Constantine. The rays of the gospel
illuminated the coast of India. The colonies of Jews, who had
penetrated into Arabia and Ethiopia, opposed the progress of
Christianity; but the labor of the missionaries was in some
measure facilitated by a previous knowledge of the Mosaic
revelation; and Abyssinia still reveres the memory of Frumentius,
* who, in the time of Constantine, devoted his life to the
conversion of those sequestered regions. Under the reign of his
son Constantius, Theophilus, who was himself of Indian
extraction, was invested with the double character of ambassador
and bishop. He embarked on the Red Sea with two hundred horses of
the purest breed of Cappadocia, which were sent by the emperor to
the prince of the Sab&aelig;ans, or Homerites. Theophilus was
intrusted with many other useful or curious presents, which might
raise the admiration, and conciliate the friendship, of the
Barbarians; and he successfully employed several years in a
pastoral visit to the churches of the torrid zone.<br>
</p>

<p>The irresistible power of the Roman emperors was displayed in
the important and dangerous change of the national religion. The
terrors of a military force silenced the faint and unsupported
murmurs of the Pagans, and there was reason to expect, that the
cheerful submission of the Christian clergy, as well as people,
would be the result of conscience and gratitude. It was long
since established, as a fundamental maxim of the Roman
constitution, that every rank of citizens was alike subject to
the laws, and that the care of religion was the right as well as
duty of the civil magistrate. Constantine and his successors
could not easily persuade themselves that they had forfeited, by
their conversion, any branch of the Imperial prerogatives, or
that they were incapable of giving laws to a religion which they
had protected and embraced. The emperors still continued to
exercise a supreme jurisdiction over the ecclesiastical order,
and the sixteenth book of the Theodosian code represents, under a
variety of titles, the authority which they assumed in the
government of the Catholic church.<br>
</p>

<p>But the distinction of the spiritual and temporal powers,
which had never been imposed on the free spirit of Greece and
Rome, was introduced and confirmed by the legal establishment of
Christianity. The office of supreme pontiff, which, from the time
of Numa to that of Augustus, had always been exercised by one of
the most eminent of the senators, was at length united to the
Imperial dignity. The first magistrate of the state, as often as
he was prompted by superstition or policy, performed with his own
hands the sacerdotal functions; nor was there any order of
priests, either at Rome or in the provinces, who claimed a more
sacred character among men, or a more intimate communication with
the gods. But in the Christian church, which intrusts the service
of the altar to a perpetual succession of consecrated ministers,
the monarch, whose spiritual rank is less honorable than that of
the meanest deacon, was seated below the rails of the sanctuary,
and confounded with the rest of the faithful multitude. The
emperor might be saluted as the father of his people, but he owed
a filial duty and reverence to the fathers of the church; and the
same marks of respect, which Constantine had paid to the persons
of saints and confessors, were soon exacted by the pride of the
episcopal order. A secret conflict between the civil and
ecclesiastical jurisdictions embarrassed the operation of the
Roman government; and a pious emperor was alarmed by the guilt
and danger of touching with a profane hand the ark of the
covenant. The separation of men into the two orders of the clergy
and of the laity was, indeed, familiar to many nations of
antiquity; and the priests of India, of Persia, of Assyria, of
Judea, of &AElig;thiopia, of Egypt, and of Gaul, derived from a
celestial origin the temporal power and possessions which they
had acquired. These venerable institutions had gradually
assimilated themselves to the manners and government of their
respective countries; but the opposition or contempt of the civil
power served to cement the discipline of the primitive church.
The Christians had been obliged to elect their own magistrates,
to raise and distribute a peculiar revenue, and to regulate the
internal policy of their republic by a code of laws, which were
ratified by the consent of the people and the practice of three
hundred years. When Constantine embraced the faith of the
Christians, he seemed to contract a perpetual alliance with a
distinct and independent society; and the privileges granted or
confirmed by that emperor, or by his successors, were accepted,
not as the precarious favors of the court, but as the just and
inalienable rights of the ecclesiastical order.<br>
</p>

<p>The Catholic church was administered by the spiritual and
legal jurisdiction of eighteen hundred bishops; of whom one
thousand were seated in the Greek, and eight hundred in the
Latin, provinces of the empire. The extent and boundaries of
their respective dioceses had been variously and accidentally
decided by the zeal and success of the first missionaries, by the
wishes of the people, and by the propagation of the gospel.
Episcopal churches were closely planted along the banks of the
Nile, on the sea-coast of Africa, in the proconsular Asia, and
through the southern provinces of Italy. The bishops of Gaul and
Spain, of Thrace and Pontus, reigned over an ample territory, and
delegated their rural suffragans to execute the subordinate
duties of the pastoral office. A Christian diocese might be
spread over a province, or reduced to a village; but all the
bishops possessed an equal and indelible character: they all
derived the same powers and privileges from the apostles, from
the people, and from the laws. While the
<strong><em>civil</em></strong> and
<strong><em>military</em></strong> professions were separated by
the policy of Constantine, a new and perpetual order of
<strong><em>ecclesiastical</em></strong> ministers, always
respectable, sometimes dangerous, was established in the church
and state. The important review of their station and attributes
may be distributed under the following heads: I. Popular
Election. II. Ordination of the Clergy. III. Property. IV. Civil
Jurisdiction. V. Spiritual censures. VI. Exercise of public
oratory. VII. Privilege of legislative assemblies.<br>
</p>

<p>I. The freedom of election subsisted long after the legal
establishment of Christianity; and the subjects of Rome enjoyed
in the church the privilege which they had lost in the republic,
of choosing the magistrates whom they were bound to obey. As soon
as a bishop had closed his eyes, the metropolitan issued a
commission to one of his suffragans to administer the vacant see,
and prepare, within a limited time, the future election. The
right of voting was vested in the inferior clergy, who were best
qualified to judge of the merit of the candidates; in the
senators or nobles of the city, all those who were distinguished
by their rank or property; and finally in the whole body of the
people, who, on the appointed day, flocked in multitudes from the
most remote parts of the diocese, and sometimes silenced by their
tumultuous acclamations, the voice of reason and the laws of
discipline. These acclamations might accidentally fix on the head
of the most deserving competitor; of some ancient presbyter, some
holy monk, or some layman, conspicuous for his zeal and piety.
But the episcopal chair was solicited, especially in the great
and opulent cities of the empire, as a temporal rather than as a
spiritual dignity. The interested views, the selfish and angry
passions, the arts of perfidy and dissimulation, the secret
corruption, the open and even bloody violence which had formerly
disgraced the freedom of election in the commonwealths of Greece
and Rome, too often influenced the choice of the successors of
the apostles. While one of the candidates boasted the honors of
his family, a second allured his judges by the delicacies of a
plentiful table, and a third, more guilty than his rivals,
offered to share the plunder of the church among the accomplices
of his sacrilegious hopes The civil as well as ecclesiastical
laws attempted to exclude the populace from this solemn and
important transaction. The canons of ancient discipline, by
requiring several episcopal qualifications, of age, station,
&amp;c., restrained, in some measure, the indiscriminate caprice
of the electors. The authority of the provincial bishops, who
were assembled in the vacant church to consecrate the choice of
the people, was interposed to moderate their passions and to
correct their mistakes. The bishops could refuse to ordain an
unworthy candidate, and the rage of contending factions sometimes
accepted their impartial mediation. The submission, or the
resistance, of the clergy and people, on various occasions,
afforded different precedents, which were insensibly converted
into positive laws and provincial customs; but it was every where
admitted, as a fundamental maxim of religious policy, that no
bishop could be imposed on an orthodox church, without the
consent of its members. The emperors, as the guardians of the
public peace, and as the first citizens of Rome and
Constantinople, might effectually declare their wishes in the
choice of a primate; but those absolute monarchs respected the
freedom of ecclesiastical elections; and while they distributed
and resumed the honors of the state and army, they allowed
eighteen hundred perpetual magistrates to receive their important
offices from the free suffrages of the people. It was agreeable
to the dictates of justice, that these magistrates should not
desert an honorable station from which they could not be removed;
but the wisdom of councils endeavored, without much success, to
enforce the residence, and to prevent the translation, of
bishops. The discipline of the West was indeed less relaxed than
that of the East; but the same passions which made those
regulations necessary, rendered them ineffectual. The reproaches
which angry prelates have so vehemently urged against each other,
serve only to expose their common guilt, and their mutual
indiscretion.<br>
</p>

<p>II. The bishops alone possessed the faculty of spiritual
generation: and this extraordinary privilege might compensate, in
some degree, for the painful celibacy which was imposed as a
virtue, as a duty, and at length as a positive obligation. The
religions of antiquity, which established a separate order of
priests, dedicated a holy race, a tribe or family, to the
perpetual service of the gods. Such institutions were founded for
possession, rather than conquest. The children of the priests
enjoyed, with proud and indolent security, their sacred
inheritance; and the fiery spirit of enthusiasm was abated by the
cares, the pleasures, and the endearments of domestic life. But
the Christian sanctuary was open to every ambitious candidate,
who aspired to its heavenly promises or temporal possessions.
This office of priests, like that of soldiers or magistrates, was
strenuously exercised by those men, whose temper and abilities
had prompted them to embrace the ecclesiastical profession, or
who had been selected by a discerning bishop, as the best
qualified to promote the glory and interest of the church. The
bishops (till the abuse was restrained by the prudence of the
laws) might constrain the reluctant, and protect the distressed;
and the imposition of hands forever bestowed some of the most
valuable privileges of civil society. The whole body of the
Catholic clergy, more numerous perhaps than the legions, was
exempted * by the emperors from all service, private or public,
all municipal offices, and all personal taxes and contributions,
which pressed on their fellow-citizens with intolerable weight;
and the duties of their holy profession were accepted as a full
discharge of their obligations to the republic. Each bishop
acquired an absolute and indefeasible right to the perpetual
obedience of the clerk whom he ordained: the clergy of each
episcopal church, with its dependent parishes, formed a regular
and permanent society; and the cathedrals of Constantinople and
Carthage maintained their peculiar establishment of five hundred
ecclesiastical ministers. Their ranks and numbers were insensibly
multiplied by the superstition of the times, which introduced
into the church the splendid ceremonies of a Jewish or Pagan
temple; and a long train of priests, deacons, sub-deacons,
acolythes, exorcists, readers, singers, and doorkeepers,
contributed, in their respective stations, to swell the pomp and
harmony of religious worship. The clerical name and privileges
were extended to many pious fraternities, who devoutly supported
the ecclesiastical throne. Six hundred
<strong><em>parabolani</em></strong>, or adventurers, visited the
sick at Alexandria; eleven hundred
<strong><em>copiat</em></strong>, or grave-diggers, buried the
dead at Constantinople; and the swarms of monks, who arose from
the Nile, overspread and darkened the face of the Christian
world.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XX: Conversion Of Constantine. -- Part
IV.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>III. The edict of Milan secured the revenue as well as the
peace of the church. The Christians not only recovered the lands
and houses of which they had been stripped by the persecuting
laws of Diocletian, but they acquired a perfect title to all the
possessions which they had hitherto enjoyed by the connivance of
the magistrate. As soon as Christianity became the religion of
the emperor and the empire, the national clergy might claim a
decent and honorable maintenance; and the payment of an annual
tax might have delivered the people from the more oppressive
tribute, which superstition imposes on her votaries. But as the
wants and expenses of the church increased with her prosperity,
the ecclesiastical order was still supported and enriched by the
voluntary oblations of the faithful. Eight years after the edict
of Milan, Constantine granted to all his subjects the free and
universal permission of bequeathing their fortunes to the holy
Catholic church; and their devout liberality, which during their
lives was checked by luxury or avarice, flowed with a profuse
stream at the hour of their death. The wealthy Christians were
encouraged by the example of their sovereign. An absolute
monarch, who is rich without patrimony, may be charitable without
merit; and Constantine too easily believed that he should
purchase the favor of Heaven, if he maintained the idle at the
expense of the industrious; and distributed among the saints the
wealth of the republic. The same messenger who carried over to
Africa the head of Maxentius, might be intrusted with an epistle
to C&aelig;cilian, bishop of Carthage. The emperor acquaints him,
that the treasurers of the province are directed to pay into his
hands the sum of three thousand <strong><em>folles</em></strong>,
or eighteen thousand pounds sterling, and to obey his further
requisitions for the relief of the churches of Africa, Numidia,
and Mauritania. The liberality of Constantine increased in a just
proportion to his faith, and to his vices. He assigned in each
city a regular allowance of corn, to supply the fund of
ecclesiastical charity; and the persons of both sexes who
embraced the monastic life became the peculiar favorites of their
sovereign. The Christian temples of Antioch, Alexandria,
Jerusalem, Constantinople &amp;c., displayed the ostentatious
piety of a prince, ambitious in a declining age to equal the
perfect labors of antiquity. The form of these religious edifices
was simple and oblong; though they might sometimes swell into the
shape of a dome, and sometimes branch into the figure of a cross.
The timbers were framed for the most part of cedars of Libanus;
the roof was covered with tiles, perhaps of gilt brass; and the
walls, the columns, the pavement, were encrusted with variegated
marbles. The most precious ornaments of gold and silver, of silk
and gems, were profusely dedicated to the service of the altar;
and this specious magnificence was supported on the solid and
perpetual basis of landed property. In the space of two
centuries, from the reign of Constantine to that of Justinian,
the eighteen hundred churches of the empire were enriched by the
frequent and unalienable gifts of the prince and people. An
annual income of six hundred pounds sterling may be reasonably
assigned to the bishops, who were placed at an equal distance
between riches and poverty, but the standard of their wealth
insensibly rose with the dignity and opulence of the cities which
they governed. An authentic but imperfect rent-roll specifies
some houses, shops, gardens, and farms, which belonged to the
three <strong><em>Basilic</em></strong> of Rome, St. Peter, St.
Paul, and St. John Lateran, in the provinces of Italy, Africa,
and the East. They produce, besides a reserved rent of oil,
linen, paper, aromatics, &amp;c., a clear annual revenue of
twenty-two thousand pieces of gold, or twelve thousand pounds
sterling. In the age of Constantine and Justinian, the bishops no
longer possessed, perhaps they no longer deserved, the
unsuspecting confidence of their clergy and people. The
ecclesiastical revenues of each diocese were divided into four
parts for the respective uses of the bishop himself, of his
inferior clergy, of the poor, and of the public worship; and the
abuse of this sacred trust was strictly and repeatedly checked.
The patrimony of the church was still subject to all the public
compositions of the state. The clergy of Rome, Alexandria,
Thessalonica, &amp;c., might solicit and obtain some partial
exemptions; but the premature attempt of the great council of
Rimini, which aspired to universal freedom, was successfully
resisted by the son of Constantine.<br>
</p>

<p>IV. The Latin clergy, who erected their tribunal on the ruins
of the civil and common law, have modestly accepted, as the gift
of Constantine, the independent jurisdiction, which was the fruit
of time, of accident, and of their own industry. But the
liberality of the Christian emperors had actually endowed them
with some legal prerogatives, which secured and dignified the
sacerdotal character. <strong>1</strong>. Under a despotic
government, the bishops alone enjoyed and asserted the
inestimable privilege of being tried only by their
<strong><em>peers</em></strong>; and even in a capital
accusation, a synod of their brethren were the sole judges of
their guilt or innocence. Such a tribunal, unless it was inflamed
by personal resentment or religious discord, might be favorable,
or even partial, to the sacerdotal order: but Constantine was
satisfied, that secret impunity would be less pernicious than
public scandal: and the Nicene council was edited by his public
declaration, that if he surprised a bishop in the act of
adultery, he should cast his Imperial mantle over the episcopal
sinner. <strong>2</strong>. The domestic jurisdiction of the
bishops was at once a privilege and a restraint of the
ecclesiastical order, whose civil causes were decently withdrawn
from the cognizance of a secular judge. Their venial offences
were not exposed to the shame of a public trial or punishment;
and the gentle correction which the tenderness of youth may
endure from its parents or instructors, was inflicted by the
temperate severity of the bishops. But if the clergy were guilty
of any crime which could not be sufficiently expiated by their
degradation from an honorable and beneficial profession, the
Roman magistrate drew the sword of justice, without any regard to
ecclesiastical immunities. <strong>3</strong>. The arbitration of
the bishops was ratified by a positive law; and the judges were
instructed to execute, without appeal or delay, the episcopal
decrees, whose validity had hitherto depended on the consent of
the parties. The conversion of the magistrates themselves, and of
the whole empire, might gradually remove the fears and scruples
of the Christians. But they still resorted to the tribunal of the
bishops, whose abilities and integrity they esteemed; and the
venerable Austin enjoyed the satisfaction of complaining that his
spiritual functions were perpetually interrupted by the invidious
labor of deciding the claim or the possession of silver and gold,
of lands and cattle. <strong>4</strong>. The ancient privilege of
sanctuary was transferred to the Christian temples, and extended,
by the liberal piety of the younger Theodosius, to the precincts
of consecrated ground. The fugitive, and even guilty, suppliants
were permitted to implore either the justice, or the mercy, of
the Deity and his ministers. The rash violence of despotism was
suspended by the mild interposition of the church; and the lives
or fortunes of the most eminent subjects might be protected by
the mediation of the bishop.<br>
</p>

<p>V. The bishop was the perpetual censor of the morals of his
people The discipline of penance was digested into a system of
canonical jurisprudence, which accurately defined the duty of
private or public confession, the rules of evidence, the degrees
of guilt, and the measure of punishment. It was impossible to
execute this spiritual censure, if the Christian pontiff, who
punished the obscure sins of the multitude, respected the
conspicuous vices and destructive crimes of the magistrate: but
it was impossible to arraign the conduct of the magistrate,
without, controlling the administration of civil government. Some
considerations of religion, or loyalty, or fear, protected the
sacred persons of the emperors from the zeal or resentment of the
bishops; but they boldly censured and excommunicated the
subordinate tyrants, who were not invested with the majesty of
the purple. St. Athanasius excommunicated one of the ministers of
Egypt; and the interdict which he pronounced, of fire and water,
was solemnly transmitted to the churches of Cappadocia. Under the
reign of the younger Theodosius, the polite and eloquent
Synesius, one of the descendants of Hercules, filled the
episcopal seat of Ptolemais, near the ruins of ancient Cyrene,
and the philosophic bishop supported with dignity the character
which he had assumed with reluctance. He vanquished the monster
of Libya, the president Andronicus, who abused the authority of a
venal office, invented new modes of rapine and torture, and
aggravated the guilt of oppression by that of sacrilege. After a
fruitless attempt to reclaim the haughty magistrate by mild and
religious admonition, Synesius proceeds to inflict the last
sentence of ecclesiastical justice, which devotes Andronicus,
with his associates and their <strong><em>families</em></strong>,
to the abhorrence of earth and heaven. The impenitent sinners,
more cruel than Phalaris or Sennacherib, more destructive than
war, pestilence, or a cloud of locusts, are deprived of the name
and privileges of Christians, of the participation of the
sacraments, and of the hope of Paradise. The bishop exhorts the
clergy, the magistrates, and the people, to renounce all society
with the enemies of Christ; to exclude them from their houses and
tables; and to refuse them the common offices of life, and the
decent rites of burial. The church of Ptolemais, obscure and
contemptible as she may appear, addresses this declaration to all
her sister churches of the world; and the profane who reject her
decrees, will be involved in the guilt and punishment of
Andronicus and his impious followers. These spiritual terrors
were enforced by a dexterous application to the Byzantine court;
the trembling president implored the mercy of the church; and the
descendants of Hercules enjoyed the satisfaction of raising a
prostrate tyrant from the ground. Such principles and such
examples insensibly prepared the triumph of the Roman pontiffs,
who have trampled on the necks of kings.<br>
</p>

<p>VI. Every popular government has experienced the effects of
rude or artificial eloquence. The coldest nature is animated, the
firmest reason is moved, by the rapid communication of the
prevailing impulse; and each hearer is affected by his own
passions, and by those of the surrounding multitude. The ruin of
civil liberty had silenced the demagogues of Athens, and the
tribunes of Rome; the custom of preaching which seems to
constitute a considerable part of Christian devotion, had not
been introduced into the temples of antiquity; and the ears of
monarchs were never invaded by the harsh sound of popular
eloquence, till the pulpits of the empire were filled with sacred
orators, who possessed some advantages unknown to their profane
predecessors. The arguments and rhetoric of the tribune were
instantly opposed with equal arms, by skilful and resolute
antagonists; and the cause of truth and reason might derive an
accidental support from the conflict of hostile passions. The
bishop, or some distinguished presbyter, to whom he cautiously
delegated the powers of preaching, harangued, without the danger
of interruption or reply, a submissive multitude, whose minds had
been prepared and subdued by the awful ceremonies of religion.
Such was the strict subordination of the Catholic church, that
the same concerted sounds might issue at once from a hundred
pulpits of Italy or Egypt, if they were
<strong><em>tuned</em></strong> by the master hand of the Roman
or Alexandrian primate. The design of this institution was
laudable, but the fruits were not always salutary. The preachers
recommended the practice of the social duties; but they exalted
the perfection of monastic virtue, which is painful to the
individual, and useless to mankind. Their charitable exhortations
betrayed a secret wish that the clergy might be permitted to
manage the wealth of the faithful, for the benefit of the poor.
The most sublime representations of the attributes and laws of
the Deity were sullied by an idle mixture of metaphysical
subtleties, puerile rites, and fictitious miracles: and they
expatiated, with the most fervent zeal, on the religious merit of
hating the adversaries, and obeying the ministers of the church.
When the public peace was distracted by heresy and schism, the
sacred orators sounded the trumpet of discord, and, perhaps, of
sedition. The understandings of their congregations were
perplexed by mystery, their passions were inflamed by invectives;
and they rushed from the Christian temples of Antioch or
Alexandria, prepared either to suffer or to inflict martyrdom.
The corruption of taste and language is strongly marked in the
vehement declamations of the Latin bishops; but the compositions
of Gregory and Chrysostom have been compared with the most
splendid models of Attic, or at least of Asiatic, eloquence.<br>
</p>

<p>VII. The representatives of the Christian republic were
regularly assembled in the spring and autumn of each year; and
these synods diffused the spirit of ecclesiastical discipline and
legislation through the hundred and twenty provinces of the Roman
world. The archbishop or metropolitan was empowered, by the laws,
to summon the suffragan bishops of his province; to revise their
conduct, to vindicate their rights, to declare their faith, and
to examine the merits of the candidates who were elected by the
clergy and people to supply the vacancies of the episcopal
college. The primates of Rome, Alexandria, Antioch, Carthage, and
afterwards Constantinople, who exercised a more ample
jurisdiction, convened the numerous assembly of their dependent
bishops. But the convocation of great and extraordinary synods
was the prerogative of the emperor alone. Whenever the
emergencies of the church required this decisive measure, he
despatched a peremptory summons to the bishops, or the deputies
of each province, with an order for the use of post-horses, and a
competent allowance for the expenses of their journey. At an
early period, when Constantine was the protector, rather than the
proselyte, of Christianity, he referred the African controversy
to the council of Arles; in which the bishops of York of Treves,
of Milan, and of Carthage, met as friends and brethren, to debate
in their native tongue on the common interest of the Latin or
Western church. Eleven years afterwards, a more numerous and
celebrated assembly was convened at Nice in Bithynia, to
extinguish, by their final sentence, the subtle disputes which
had arisen in Egypt on the subject of the Trinity. Three hundred
and eighteen bishops obeyed the summons of their indulgent
master; the ecclesiastics of every rank, and sect, and
denomination, have been computed at two thousand and forty-eight
persons; the Greeks appeared in person; and the consent of the
Latins was expressed by the legates of the Roman pontiff. The
session, which lasted about two months, was frequently honored by
the presence of the emperor. Leaving his guards at the door, he
seated himself (with the permission of the council) on a low
stool in the midst of the hall. Constantine listened with
patience, and spoke with modesty: and while he influenced the
debates, he humbly professed that he was the minister, not the
judge, of the successors of the apostles, who had been
established as priests and as gods upon earth. Such profound
reverence of an absolute monarch towards a feeble and unarmed
assembly of his own subjects, can only be compared to the respect
with which the senate had been treated by the Roman princes who
adopted the policy of Augustus. Within the space of fifty years,
a philosophic spectator of the vicissitudes of human affairs
might have contemplated Tacitus in the senate of Rome, and
Constantine in the council of Nice. The fathers of the Capitol
and those of the church had alike degenerated from the virtues of
their founders; but as the bishops were more deeply rooted in the
public opinion, they sustained their dignity with more decent
pride, and sometimes opposed with a manly spirit the wishes of
their sovereign. The progress of time and superstition erased the
memory of the weakness, the passion, the ignorance, which
disgraced these ecclesiastical synods; and the Catholic world has
unanimously submitted to the <strong><em>infallible</em></strong>
decrees of the general councils.<br>
</p>

<p><strong>Chapter XXI: Persecution Of Heresy, State Of The
Church.</strong></p>

<p><strong><em>Part I.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>Persecution Of Heresy. -- The Schism Of The Donatists. -- The
Arian Controversy. -- Athanasius. -- Distracted State Of The
Church And Empire Under Constantine And His Sons. -- Toleration
Of Paganism.<br>
</p>

<p>The grateful applause of the clergy has consecrated the memory
of a prince who indulged their passions and promoted their
interest. Constantine gave them security, wealth, honors, and
revenge; and the support of the orthodox faith was considered as
the most sacred and important duty of the civil magistrate. The
edict of Milan, the great charter of toleration, had confirmed to
each individual of the Roman world the privilege of choosing and
professing his own religion. But this inestimable privilege was
soon violated; with the knowledge of truth, the emperor imbibed
the maxims of persecution; and the sects which dissented from the
Catholic church were afflicted and oppressed by the triumph of
Christianity. Constantine easily believed that the Heretics, who
presumed to dispute <strong><em>his</em></strong>opinions, or to
oppose <strong><em>his</em></strong> commands, were guilty of the
most absurd and criminal obstinacy; and that a seasonable
application of moderate severities might save those unhappy men
from the danger of an everlasting condemnation. Not a moment was
lost in excluding the ministers and teachers of the separated
congregations from any share of the rewards and immunities which
the emperor had so liberally bestowed on the orthodox clergy. But
as the sectaries might still exist under the cloud of royal
disgrace, the conquest of the East was immediately followed by an
edict which announced their total destruction. After a preamble
filled with passion and reproach, Constantine absolutely
prohibits the assemblies of the Heretics, and confiscates their
public property to the use either of the revenue or of the
Catholic church. The sects against whom the Imperial severity was
directed, appear to have been the adherents of Paul of Samosata;
the Montanists of Phrygia, who maintained an enthusiastic
succession of prophecy; the Novatians, who sternly rejected the
temporal efficacy of repentance; the Marcionites and
Valentinians, under whose leading banners the various Gnostics of
Asia and Egypt had insensibly rallied; and perhaps the
Manich&aelig;ans, who had recently imported from Persia a more
artful composition of Oriental and Christian theology. The design
of extirpating the name, or at least of restraining the progress,
of these odious Heretics, was prosecuted with vigor and effect.
Some of the penal regulations were copied from the edicts of
Diocletian; and this method of conversion was applauded by the
same bishops who had felt the hand of oppression, and pleaded for
the rights of humanity. Two immaterial circumstances may serve,
however, to prove that the mind of Constantine was not entirely
corrupted by the spirit of zeal and bigotry. Before he condemned
the Manich&aelig;ans and their kindred sects, he resolved to make
an accurate inquiry into the nature of their religious
principles. As if he distrusted the impartiality of his
ecclesiastical counsellors, this delicate commission was
intrusted to a civil magistrate, whose learning and moderation he
justly esteemed, and of whose venal character he was probably
ignorant. The emperor was soon convinced, that he had too hastily
proscribed the orthodox faith and the exemplary morals of the
Novatians, who had dissented from the church in some articles of
discipline which were not perhaps essential to salvation. By a
particular edict, he exempted them from the general penalties of
the law; allowed them to build a church at Constantinople,
respected the miracles of their saints, invited their bishop
Acesius to the council of Nice; and gently ridiculed the narrow
tenets of his sect by a familiar jest; which, from the mouth of a
sovereign, must have been received with applause and
gratitude.<br>
</p>

<p>The complaints and mutual accusations which assailed the
throne of Constantine, as soon as the death of Maxentius had
submitted Africa to his victorious arms, were ill adapted to
edify an imperfect proselyte. He learned, with surprise, that the
provinces of that great country, from the confines of Cyrene to
the columns of Hercules, were distracted with religious discord.
The source of the division was derived from a double election in
the church of Carthage; the second, in rank and opulence, of the
ecclesiastical thrones of the West. C&aelig;cilian and Majorinus
were the two rival prelates of Africa; and the death of the
latter soon made room for Donatus, who, by his superior abilities
and apparent virtues, was the firmest support of his party. The
advantage which C&aelig;cilian might claim from the priority of
his ordination, was destroyed by the illegal, or at least
indecent, haste, with which it had been performed, without
expecting the arrival of the bishops of Numidia. The authority of
these bishops, who, to the number of seventy, condemned
C&aelig;cilian, and consecrated Majorinus, is again weakened by
the infamy of some of their personal characters; and by the
female intrigues, sacrilegious bargains, and tumultuous
proceedings, which are imputed to this Numidian council. The
bishops of the contending factions maintained, with equal ardor
and obstinacy, that their adversaries were degraded, or at least
dishonored, by the odious crime of delivering the Holy Scriptures
to the officers of Diocletian. From their mutual reproaches, as
well as from the story of this dark transaction, it may justly be
inferred, that the late persecution had imbittered the zeal,
without reforming the manners, of the African Christians. That
divided church was incapable of affording an impartial
judicature; the controversy was solemnly tried in five successive
tribunals, which were appointed by the emperor; and the whole
proceeding, from the first appeal to the final sentence, lasted
above three years. A severe inquisition, which was taken by the
Pr&aelig;torian vicar, and the proconsul of Africa, the report of
two episcopal visitors who had been sent to Carthage, the decrees
of the councils of Rome and of Arles, and the supreme judgment of
Constantine himself in his sacred consistory, were all favorable
to the cause of C&aelig;cilian; and he was unanimously
acknowledged by the civil and ecclesiastical powers, as the true
and lawful primate of Africa. The honors and estates of the
church were attributed to his suffragan bishops, and it was not
without difficulty, that Constantine was satisfied with
inflicting the punishment of exile on the principal leaders of
the Donatist faction. As their cause was examined with attention,
perhaps it was determined with justice. Perhaps their complaint
was not without foundation, that the credulity of the emperor had
been abused by the insidious arts of his favorite Osius. The
influence of falsehood and corruption might procure the
condemnation of the innocent, or aggravate the sentence of the
guilty. Such an act, however, of injustice, if it concluded an
importunate dispute, might be numbered among the transient evils
of a despotic administration, which are neither felt nor
remembered by posterity.<br>
</p>

<p>But this incident, so inconsiderable that it scarcely deserves
a place in history, was productive of a memorable schism which
afflicted the provinces of Africa above three hundred years, and
was extinguished only with Christianity itself. The inflexible
zeal of freedom and fanaticism animated the Donatists to refuse
obedience to the usurpers, whose election they disputed, and
whose spiritual powers they denied. Excluded from the civil and
religious communion of mankind, they boldly excommunicated the
rest of mankind, who had embraced the impious party of
C&aelig;cilian, and of the Traditors, from which he derived his
pretended ordination. They asserted with confidence, and almost
with exultation, that the Apostolical succession was interrupted;
that all the bishops of Europe and Asia were infected by the
contagion of guilt and schism; and that the prerogatives of the
Catholic church were confined to the chosen portion of the
African believers, who alone had preserved inviolate the
integrity of their faith and discipline. This rigid theory was
supported by the most uncharitable conduct. Whenever they
acquired a proselyte, even from the distant provinces of the
East, they carefully repeated the sacred rites of baptism and
ordination; as they rejected the validity of those which he had
already received from the hands of heretics or schismatics.
Bishops, virgins, and even spotless infants, were subjected to
the disgrace of a public penance, before they could be admitted
to the communion of the Donatists. If they obtained possession of
a church which had been used by their Catholic adversaries, they
purified the unhallowed building with the same zealous care which
a temple of idols might have required. They washed the pavement,
scraped the walls, burnt the altar, which was commonly of wood,
melted the consecrated plate, and cast the Holy Eucharist to the
dogs, with every circumstance of ignominy which could provoke and
perpetuate the animosity of religious factions. Notwithstanding
this irreconcilable aversion, the two parties, who were mixed and
separated in all the cities of Africa, had the same language and
manners, the same zeal and learning, the same faith and worship.
Proscribed by the civil and ecclesiastical powers of the empire,
the Donatists still maintained in some provinces, particularly in
Numidia, their superior numbers; and four hundred bishops
acknowledged the jurisdiction of their primate. But the
invincible spirit of the sect sometimes preyed on its own vitals:
and the bosom of their schismatical church was torn by intestine
divisions. A fourth part of the Donatist bishops followed the
independent standard of the Maximianists. The narrow and solitary
path which their first leaders had marked out, continued to
deviate from the great society of mankind. Even the imperceptible
sect of the Rogatians could affirm, without a blush, that when
Christ should descend to judge the earth, he would find his true
religion preserved only in a few nameless villages of the
C&aelig;sarean Mauritania.<br>
</p>

<p>The schism of the Donatists was confined to Africa: the more
diffusive mischief of the Trinitarian controversy successively
penetrated into every part of the Christian world. The former was
an accidental quarrel, occasioned by the abuse of freedom; the
latter was a high and mysterious argument, derived from the abuse
of philosophy. From the age of Constantine to that of Clovis and
Theodoric, the temporal interests both of the Romans and
Barbarians were deeply involved in the theological disputes of
Arianism. The historian may therefore be permitted respectfully
to withdraw the veil of the sanctuary; and to deduce the progress
of reason and faith, of error and passion from the school of
Plato, to the decline and fall of the empire.<br>
</p>

<p>The genius of Plato, informed by his own meditation, or by the
traditional knowledge of the priests of Egypt, had ventured to
explore the mysterious nature of the Deity. When he had elevated
his mind to the sublime contemplation of the first self-existent,
necessary cause of the universe, the Athenian sage was incapable
of conceiving how the simple unity of his essence could admit the
infinite variety of distinct and successive ideas which compose
the model of the intellectual world; how a Being purely
incorporeal could execute that perfect model, and mould with a
plastic hand the rude and independent chaos. The vain hope of
extricating himself from these difficulties, which must ever
oppress the feeble powers of the human mind, might induce Plato
to consider the divine nature under the threefold modification --
of the first cause, the reason, or
<strong><em>Logos</em></strong>, and the soul or spirit of the
universe. His poetical imagination sometimes fixed and animated
these metaphysical abstractions; the three archical on original
principles were represented in the Platonic system as three Gods,
united with each other by a mysterious and ineffable generation;
and the Logos was particularly considered under the more
accessible character of the Son of an Eternal Father, and the
Creator and Governor of the world. Such appear to have been the
secret doctrines which were cautiously whispered in the gardens
of the academy; and which, according to the more recent disciples
of Plato, * could not be perfectly understood, till after an
assiduous study of thirty years.<br>
</p>

<p>The arms of the Macedonians diffused over Asia and Egypt the
language and learning of Greece; and the theological system of
Plato was taught, with less reserve, and perhaps with some
improvements, in the celebrated school of Alexandria. A numerous
colony of Jews had been invited, by the favor of the Ptolemies,
to settle in their new capital. While the bulk of the nation
practised the legal ceremonies, and pursued the lucrative
occupations of commerce, a few Hebrews, of a more liberal spirit,
devoted their lives to religious and philosophical contemplation.
They cultivated with diligence, and embraced with ardor, the
theological system of the Athenian sage. But their national pride
would have been mortified by a fair confession of their former
poverty: and they boldly marked, as the sacred inheritance of
their ancestors, the gold and jewels which they had so lately
stolen from their Egyptian masters. One hundred years before the
birth of Christ, a philosophical treatise, which manifestly
betrays the style and sentiments of the school of Plato, was
produced by the Alexandrian Jews, and unanimously received as a
genuine and valuable relic of the inspired Wisdom of Solomon. A
similar union of the Mosaic faith and the Grecian philosophy,
distinguishes the works of Philo, which were composed, for the
most part, under the reign of Augustus. The material soul of the
universe might offend the piety of the Hebrews: but they applied
the character of the Logos to the Jehovah of Moses and the
patriarchs; and the Son of God was introduced upon earth under a
visible, and even human appearance, to perform those familiar
offices which seem incompatible with the nature and attributes of
the Universal Cause.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XXI: Persecution Of Heresy, State Of The
Church. -- Part II.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>The eloquence of Plato, the name of Solomon, the authority of
the school of Alexandria, and the consent of the Jews and Greeks,
were insufficient to establish the truth of a mysterious
doctrine, which might please, but could not satisfy, a rational
mind. A prophet, or apostle, inspired by the Deity, can alone
exercise a lawful dominion over the faith of mankind: and the
theology of Plato might have been forever confounded with the
philosophical visions of the Academy, the Porch, and the
Lyc&aelig;um, if the name and divine attributes of the
<strong><em>Logos</em></strong> had not been confirmed by the
celestial pen of the last and most sublime of the Evangelists.
The Christian Revelation, which was consummated under the reign
of Nerva, disclosed to the world the amazing secret, that the
Logos, who was with God from the beginning, and was God, who had
made all things, and for whom all things had been made, was
incarnate in the person of Jesus of Nazareth; who had been born
of a virgin, and suffered death on the cross. Besides the genera
design of fixing on a perpetual basis the divine honors of
Christ, the most ancient and respectable of the ecclesiastical
writers have ascribed to the evangelic theologian a particular
intention to confute two opposite heresies, which disturbed the
peace of the primitive church. I. The faith of the Ebionites,
perhaps of the Nazarenes, was gross and imperfect. They revered
Jesus as the greatest of the prophets, endowed with supernatural
virtue and power. They ascribed to his person and to his future
reign all the predictions of the Hebrew oracles which relate to
the spiritual and everlasting kingdom of the promised Messiah.
Some of them might confess that he was born of a virgin; but they
obstinately rejected the preceding existence and divine
perfections of the <strong><em>Logos</em></strong>, or Son of
God, which are so clearly defined in the Gospel of St. John.
About fifty years afterwards, the Ebionites, whose errors are
mentioned by Justin Martyr with less severity than they seem to
deserve, formed a very inconsiderable portion of the Christian
name. II. The Gnostics, who were distinguished by the epithet of
<strong><em>Docetes</em></strong>, deviated into the contrary
extreme; and betrayed the human, while they asserted the divine,
nature of Christ. Educated in the school of Plato, accustomed to
the sublime idea of the <strong><em>Logos</em></strong>, they
readily conceived that the brightest
<strong><em>&AElig;on</em></strong>, or
<strong><em>Emanation</em></strong> of the Deity, might assume
the outward shape and visible appearances of a mortal; but they
vainly pretended, that the imperfections of matter are
incompatible with the purity of a celestial substance. While the
blood of Christ yet smoked on Mount Calvary, the Docetes invented
the impious and extravagant hypothesis, that, instead of issuing
from the womb of the Virgin, he had descended on the banks of the
Jordan in the form of perfect manhood; that he had imposed on the
senses of his enemies, and of his disciples; and that the
ministers of Pilate had wasted their impotent rage on an airy
phantom, who <strong><em>seemed</em></strong> to expire on the
cross, and, after three days, to rise from the dead.<br>
</p>

<p>The divine sanction, which the Apostle had bestowed on the
fundamental principle of the theology of Plato, encouraged the
learned proselytes of the second and third centuries to admire
and study the writings of the Athenian sage, who had thus
marvellously anticipated one of the most surprising discoveries
of the Christian revelation. The respectable name of Plato was
used by the orthodox, and abused by the heretics, as the common
support of truth and error: the authority of his skilful
commentators, and the science of dialectics, were employed to
justify the remote consequences of his opinions and to supply the
discreet silence of the inspired writers. The same subtle and
profound questions concerning the nature, the generation, the
distinction, and the equality of the three divine persons of the
mysterious <strong><em>Triad</em></strong>, or
<strong><em>Trinity</em></strong>, were agitated in the
philosophical and in the Christian schools of Alexandria. An
eager spirit of curiosity urged them to explore the secrets of
the abyss; and the pride of the professors, and of their
disciples, was satisfied with the sciences of words. But the most
sagacious of the Christian theologians, the great Athanasius
himself, has candidly confessed, that whenever he forced his
understanding to meditate on the divinity of the
<strong><em>Logos</em></strong>, his toilsome and unavailing
efforts recoiled on themselves; that the more he thought, the
less he comprehended; and the more he wrote, the less capable was
he of expressing his thoughts. In every step of the inquiry, we
are compelled to feel and acknowledge the immeasurable
disproportion between the size of the object and the capacity of
the human mind. We may strive to abstract the notions of time, of
space, and of matter, which so closely adhere to all the
perceptions of our experimental knowledge. But as soon as we
presume to reason of infinite substance, of spiritual generation;
as often as we deduce any positive conclusions from a negative
idea, we are involved in darkness, perplexity, and inevitable
contradiction. As these difficulties arise from the nature of the
subject, they oppress, with the same insuperable weight, the
philosophic and the theological disputant; but we may observe two
essential and peculiar circumstances, which discriminated the
doctrines of the Catholic church from the opinions of the
Platonic school.<br>
</p>

<p>I. A chosen society of philosophers, men of a liberal
education and curious disposition, might silently meditate, and
temperately discuss in the gardens of Athens or the library of
Alexandria, the abstruse questions of metaphysical science. The
lofty speculations, which neither convinced the understanding,
nor agitated the passions, of the Platonists themselves, were
carelessly overlooked by the idle, the busy, and even the
studious part of mankind. But after the
<strong><em>Logos</em></strong> had been revealed as the sacred
object of the faith, the hope, and the religious worship of the
Christians, the mysterious system was embraced by a numerous and
increasing multitude in every province of the Roman world. Those
persons who, from their age, or sex, or occupations, were the
least qualified to judge, who were the least exercised in the
habits of abstract reasoning, aspired to contemplate the economy
of the Divine Nature: and it is the boast of Tertullian, that a
Christian mechanic could readily answer such questions as had
perplexed the wisest of the Grecian sages. Where the subject lies
so far beyond our reach, the difference between the highest and
the lowest of human understandings may indeed be calculated as
infinitely small; yet the degree of weakness may perhaps be
measured by the degree of obstinacy and dogmatic confidence.
These speculations, instead of being treated as the amusement of
a vacant hour, became the most serious business of the present,
and the most useful preparation for a future, life. A theology,
which it was incumbent to believe, which it was impious to doubt,
and which it might be dangerous, and even fatal, to mistake,
became the familiar topic of private meditation and popular
discourse. The cold indifference of philosophy was inflamed by
the fervent spirit of devotion; and even the metaphors of common
language suggested the fallacious prejudices of sense and
experience. The Christians, who abhorred the gross and impure
generation of the Greek mythology, were tempted to argue from the
familiar analogy of the filial and paternal relations. The
character of <strong><em>Son</em></strong> seemed to imply a
perpetual subordination to the voluntary author of his existence;
but as the act of generation, in the most spiritual and
abstracted sense, must be supposed to transmit the properties of
a common nature, they durst not presume to circumscribe the
powers or the duration of the Son of an eternal and omnipotent
Father. Fourscore years after the death of Christ, the Christians
of Bithynia, declared before the tribunal of Pliny, that they
invoked him as a god: and his divine honors have been perpetuated
in every age and country, by the various sects who assume the
name of his disciples. Their tender reverence for the memory of
Christ, and their horror for the profane worship of any created
being, would have engaged them to assert the equal and absolute
divinity of the <strong><em>Logos</em></strong>, if their rapid
ascent towards the throne of heaven had not been imperceptibly
checked by the apprehension of violating the unity and sole
supremacy of the great Father of Christ and of the Universe. The
suspense and fluctuation produced in the minds of the Christians
by these opposite tendencies, may be observed in the writings of
the theologians who flourished after the end of the apostolic
age, and before the origin of the Arian controversy. Their
suffrage is claimed, with equal confidence, by the orthodox and
by the heretical parties; and the most inquisitive critics have
fairly allowed, that if they had the good fortune of possessing
the Catholic verity, they have delivered their conceptions in
loose, inaccurate, and sometimes contradictory language.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XXI: Persecution Of Heresy, State Of The
Church. -- Part III.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>II. The devotion of individuals was the first circumstance
which distinguished the Christians from the Platonists: the
second was the authority of the church. The disciples of
philosophy asserted the rights of intellectual freedom, and their
respect for the sentiments of their teachers was a liberal and
voluntary tribute, which they offered to superior reason. But the
Christians formed a numerous and disciplined society; and the
jurisdiction of their laws and magistrates was strictly exercised
over the minds of the faithful. The loose wanderings of the
imagination were gradually confined by creeds and confessions;
the freedom of private judgment submitted to the public wisdom of
synods; the authority of a theologian was determined by his
ecclesiastical rank; and the episcopal successors of the apostles
inflicted the censures of the church on those who deviated from
the orthodox belief. But in an age of religious controversy,
every act of oppression adds new force to the elastic vigor of
the mind; and the zeal or obstinacy of a spiritual rebel was
sometimes stimulated by secret motives of ambition or avarice. A
metaphysical argument became the cause or pretence of political
contests; the subtleties of the Platonic school were used as the
badges of popular factions, and the distance which separated
their respective tenets were enlarged or magnified by the
acrimony of dispute. As long as the dark heresies of Praxeas and
Sabellius labored to confound the
<strong><em>Father</em></strong> with the
<strong><em>Son</em></strong>, the orthodox party might be
excused if they adhered more strictly and more earnestly to the
<strong><em>distinction</em></strong>, than to the
<strong><em>equality</em></strong>, of the divine persons. But as
soon as the heat of controversy had subsided, and the progress of
the Sabellians was no longer an object of terror to the churches
of Rome, of Africa, or of Egypt, the tide of theological opinion
began to flow with a gentle but steady motion towards the
contrary extreme; and the most orthodox doctors allowed
themselves the use of the terms and definitions which had been
censured in the mouth of the sectaries. After the edict of
toleration had restored peace and leisure to the Christians, the
Trinitarian controversy was revived in the ancient seat of
Platonism, the learned, the opulent, the tumultuous city of
Alexandria; and the flame of religious discord was rapidly
communicated from the schools to the clergy, the people, the
province, and the East. The abstruse question of the eternity of
the <strong><em>Logos</em></strong> was agitated in ecclesiastic
conferences and popular sermons; and the heterodox opinions of
Arius were soon made public by his own zeal, and by that of his
adversaries. His most implacable adversaries have acknowledged
the learning and blameless life of that eminent presbyter, who,
in a former election, had declared, and perhaps generously
declined, his pretensions to the episcopal throne. His competitor
Alexander assumed the office of his judge. The important cause
was argued before him; and if at first he seemed to hesitate, he
at length pronounced his final sentence, as an absolute rule of
faith. The undaunted presbyter, who presumed to resist the
authority of his angry bishop, was separated from the community
of the church. But the pride of Arius was supported by the
applause of a numerous party. He reckoned among his immediate
followers two bishops of Egypt, seven presbyters, twelve deacons,
and (what may appear almost incredible) seven hundred virgins. A
large majority of the bishops of Asia appeared to support or
favor his cause; and their measures were conducted by Eusebius of
C&aelig;sarea, the most learned of the Christian prelates; and by
Eusebius of Nicomedia, who had acquired the reputation of a
statesman without forfeiting that of a saint. Synods in Palestine
and Bithynia were opposed to the synods of Egypt. The attention
of the prince and people was attracted by this theological
dispute; and the decision, at the end of six years, was referred
to the supreme authority of the general council of Nice.<br>
</p>

<p>When the mysteries of the Christian faith were dangerously
exposed to public debate, it might be observed, that the human
understanding was capable of forming three district, though
imperfect systems, concerning the nature of the Divine Trinity;
and it was pronounced, that none of these systems, in a pure and
absolute sense, were exempt from heresy and error. I. According
to the first hypothesis, which was maintained by Arius and his
disciples, the <strong><em>Logos</em></strong> was a dependent
and spontaneous production, created from nothing by the will of
the father. The Son, by whom all things were made, had been
begotten before all worlds, and the longest of the astronomical
periods could be compared only as a fleeting moment to the extent
of his duration; yet this duration was not infinite, and there
<strong><em>had</em></strong> been a time which preceded the
ineffable generation of the <strong><em>Logos</em></strong>. On
this only-begotten Son, the Almighty Father had transfused his
ample spirit, and impressed the effulgence of his glory. Visible
image of invisible perfection, he saw, at an immeasurable
distance beneath his feet, the thrones of the brightest
archangels; yet he shone only with a reflected light, and, like
the sons of the Romans emperors, who were invested with the
titles of C&aelig;sar or Augustus, he governed the universe in
obedience to the will of his Father and Monarch. II. In the
second hypothesis, the <strong><em>Logos</em></strong> possessed
all the inherent, incommunicable perfections, which religion and
philosophy appropriate to the Supreme God. Three distinct and
infinite minds or substances, three co&euml;qual and
co&euml;ternal beings, composed the Divine Essence; and it would
have implied contradiction, that any of them should not have
existed, or that they should ever cease to exist. The advocates
of a system which seemed to establish three independent Deities,
attempted to preserve the unity of the First Cause, so
conspicuous in the design and order of the world, by the
perpetual concord of their administration, and the essential
agreement of their will. A faint resemblance of this unity of
action may be discovered in the societies of men, and even of
animals. The causes which disturb their harmony, proceed only
from the imperfection and inequality of their faculties; but the
omnipotence which is guided by infinite wisdom and goodness,
cannot fail of choosing the same means for the accomplishment of
the same ends. III. Three beings, who, by the self-derived
necessity of their existence, possess all the divine attributes
in the most perfect degree; who are eternal in duration, infinite
in space, and intimately present to each other, and to the whole
universe; irresistibly force themselves on the astonished mind,
as one and the same being, who, in the economy of grace, as well
as in that of nature, may manifest himself under different forms,
and be considered under different aspects. By this hypothesis, a
real substantial trinity is refined into a trinity of names, and
abstract modifications, that subsist only in the mind which
conceives them. The <strong><em>Logos</em></strong> is no longer
a person, but an attribute; and it is only in a figurative sense
that the epithet of Son can be applied to the eternal reason,
which was with God from the beginning, and by
<strong><em>which</em></strong>, not by
<strong><em>whom</em></strong>, all things were made. The
incarnation of the <strong><em>Logos</em></strong> is reduced to
a mere inspiration of the Divine Wisdom, which filled the soul,
and directed all the actions, of the man Jesus. Thus, after
revolving around the theological circle, we are surprised to find
that the Sabellian ends where the Ebionite had begun; and that
the incomprehensible mystery which excites our adoration, eludes
our inquiry.<br>
</p>

<p>If the bishops of the council of Nice had been permitted to
follow the unbiased dictates of their conscience, Arius and his
associates could scarcely have flattered themselves with the
hopes of obtaining a majority of votes, in favor of an hypothesis
so directly averse to the two most popular opinions of the
Catholic world. The Arians soon perceived the danger of their
situation, and prudently assumed those modest virtues, which, in
the fury of civil and religious dissensions, are seldom
practised, or even praised, except by the weaker party. They
recommended the exercise of Christian charity and moderation;
urged the incomprehensible nature of the controversy, disclaimed
the use of any terms or definitions which could not be found in
the Scriptures; and offered, by very liberal concessions, to
satisfy their adversaries without renouncing the integrity of
their own principles. The victorious faction received all their
proposals with haughty suspicion; and anxiously sought for some
irreconcilable mark of distinction, the rejection of which might
involve the Arians in the guilt and consequences of heresy. A
letter was publicly read, and ignominiously torn, in which their
patron, Eusebius of Nicomedia, ingenuously confessed, that the
admission of the Homoousion, or Consubstantial, a word already
familiar to the Platonists, was incompatible with the principles
of their theological system. The fortunate opportunity was
eagerly embraced by the bishops, who governed the resolutions of
the synod; and, according to the lively expression of Ambrose,
they used the sword, which heresy itself had drawn from the
scabbard, to cut off the head of the hated monster. The
consubstantiality of the Father and the Son was established by
the council of Nice, and has been unanimously received as a
fundamental article of the Christian faith, by the consent of the
Greek, the Latin, the Oriental, and the Protestant churches. But
if the same word had not served to stigmatize the heretics, and
to unite the Catholics, it would have been inadequate to the
purpose of the majority, by whom it was introduced into the
orthodox creed. This majority was divided into two parties,
distinguished by a contrary tendency to the sentiments of the
Tritheists and of the Sabellians. But as those opposite extremes
seemed to overthrow the foundations either of natural or revealed
religion, they mutually agreed to qualify the rigor of their
principles; and to disavow the just, but invidious, consequences,
which might be urged by their antagonists. The interest of the
common cause inclined them to join their numbers, and to conceal
their differences; their animosity was softened by the healing
counsels of toleration, and their disputes were suspended by the
use of the mysterious <strong><em>Homoousion</em></strong>, which
either party was free to interpret according to their peculiar
tenets. The Sabellian sense, which, about fifty years before, had
obliged the council of Antioch to prohibit this celebrated term,
had endeared it to those theologians who entertained a secret but
partial affection for a nominal Trinity. But the more fashionable
saints of the Arian times, the intrepid Athanasius, the learned
Gregory Nazianzen, and the other pillars of the church, who
supported with ability and success the Nicene doctrine, appeared
to consider the expression of <strong><em>substance</em></strong>
as if it had been synonymous with that of
<strong><em>nature</em></strong>; and they ventured to illustrate
their meaning, by affirming that three men, as they belong to the
same common species, are consubstantial, or homoousian to each
other. This pure and distinct equality was tempered, on the one
hand, by the internal connection, and spiritual penetration which
indissolubly unites the divine persons; and, on the other, by the
preeminence of the Father, which was acknowledged as far as it is
compatible with the independence of the Son. Within these limits,
the almost invisible and tremulous ball of orthodoxy was allowed
securely to vibrate. On either side, beyond this consecrated
ground, the heretics and the d&aelig;mons lurked in ambush to
surprise and devour the unhappy wanderer. But as the degrees of
theological hatred depend on the spirit of the war, rather than
on the importance of the controversy, the heretics who degraded,
were treated with more severity than those who annihilated, the
person of the Son. The life of Athanasius was consumed in
irreconcilable opposition to the impious madness of the
<strong><em>Arians</em></strong>; but he defended above twenty
years the Sabellianism of Marcellus of Ancyra; and when at last
he was compelled to withdraw himself from his communion, he
continued to mention, with an ambiguous smile, the venial errors
of his respectable friend.<br>
</p>

<p>The authority of a general council, to which the Arians
themselves had been compelled to submit, inscribed on the banners
of the orthodox party the mysterious characters of the word
<strong><em>Homoousion</em></strong>, which essentially
contributed, notwithstanding some obscure disputes, some
nocturnal combats, to maintain and perpetuate the uniformity of
faith, or at least of language. The Consubstantialists, who by
their success have deserved and obtained the title of Catholics,
gloried in the simplicity and steadiness of their own creed, and
insulted the repeated variations of their adversaries, who were
destitute of any certain rule of faith. The sincerity or the
cunning of the Arian chiefs, the fear of the laws or of the
people, their reverence for Christ, their hatred of Athanasius,
all the causes, human and divine, that influence and disturb the
counsels of a theological faction, introduced among the sectaries
a spirit of discord and inconstancy, which, in the course of a
few years, erected eighteen different models of religion, and
avenged the violated dignity of the church. The zealous Hilary,
who, from the peculiar hardships of his situation, was inclined
to extenuate rather than to aggravate the errors of the Oriental
clergy, declares, that in the wide extent of the ten provinces of
Asia, to which he had been banished, there could be found very
few prelates who had preserved the knowledge of the true God. The
oppression which he had felt, the disorders of which he was the
spectator and the victim, appeased, during a short interval, the
angry passions of his soul; and in the following passage, of
which I shall transcribe a few lines, the bishop of Poitiers
unwarily deviates into the style of a Christian philosopher. "It
is a thing," says Hilary, "equally deplorable and dangerous, that
there are as many creeds as opinions among men, as many doctrines
as inclinations, and as many sources of blasphemy as there are
faults among us; because we make creeds arbitrarily, and explain
them as arbitrarily. The Homoousion is rejected, and received,
and explained away by successive synods. The partial or total
resemblance of the Father and of the Son is a subject of dispute
for these unhappy times. Every year, nay, every moon, we make new
creeds to describe invisible mysteries. We repent of what we have
done, we defend those who repent, we anathematize those whom we
defended. We condemn either the doctrine of others in ourselves,
or our own in that of others; and reciprocally tearing one
another to pieces, we have been the cause of each other's
ruin."<br>
</p>

<p>It will not be expected, it would not perhaps be endured, that
I should swell this theological digression, by a minute
examination of the eighteen creeds, the authors of which, for the
most part, disclaimed the odious name of their parent Arius. It
is amusing enough to delineate the form, and to trace the
vegetation, of a singular plant; but the tedious detail of leaves
without flowers, and of branches without fruit, would soon
exhaust the patience, and disappoint the curiosity, of the
laborious student. One question, which gradually arose from the
Arian controversy, may, however, be noticed, as it served to
produce and discriminate the three sects, who were united only by
their common aversion to the Homoousion of the Nicene synod.
<strong>1</strong>. If they were asked whether the Son was like
unto the Father, the question was resolutely answered in the
negative, by the heretics who adhered to the principles of Arius,
or indeed to those of philosophy; which seem to establish an
infinite difference between the Creator and the most excellent of
his creatures. This obvious consequence was maintained by
&AElig;tius, on whom the zeal of his adversaries bestowed the
surname of the Atheist. His restless and aspiring spirit urged
him to try almost every profession of human life. He was
successively a slave, or at least a husbandman, a travelling
tinker, a goldsmith, a physician, a schoolmaster, a theologian,
and at last the apostle of a new church, which was propagated by
the abilities of his disciple Eunomius. Armed with texts of
Scripture, and with captious syllogisms from the logic of
Aristotle, the subtle &AElig;tius had acquired the fame of an
invincible disputant, whom it was impossible either to silence or
to convince. Such talents engaged the friendship of the Arian
bishops, till they were forced to renounce, and even to
persecute, a dangerous ally, who, by the accuracy of his
reasoning, had prejudiced their cause in the popular opinion, and
offended the piety of their most devoted followers.
<strong>2</strong>. The omnipotence of the Creator suggested a
specious and respectful solution of the
<strong><em>likeness</em></strong> of the Father and the Son; and
faith might humbly receive what reason could not presume to deny,
that the Supreme God might communicate his infinite perfections,
and create a being similar only to himself. These Arians were
powerfully supported by the weight and abilities of their
leaders, who had succeeded to the management of the Eusebian
interest, and who occupied the principal thrones of the East.
They detested, perhaps with some affectation, the impiety of
&AElig;tius; they professed to believe, either without reserve,
or according to the Scriptures, that the Son was different from
all <strong><em>other</em></strong> creatures, and similar only
to the Father. But they denied, the he was either of the same, or
of a similar substance; sometimes boldly justifying their
dissent, and sometimes objecting to the use of the word
substance, which seems to imply an adequate, or at least, a
distinct, notion of the nature of the Deity. <strong>3</strong>.
The sect which deserted the doctrine of a similar substance, was
the most numerous, at least in the provinces of Asia; and when
the leaders of both parties were assembled in the council of
Seleucia, <strong><em>their</em></strong> opinion would have
prevailed by a majority of one hundred and five to forty-three
bishops. The Greek word, which was chosen to express this
mysterious resemblance, bears so close an affinity to the
orthodox symbol, that the profane of every age have derided the
furious contests which the difference of a single diphthong
excited between the Homoousians and the Homoiousians. As it
frequently happens, that the sounds and characters which approach
the nearest to each other accidentally represent the most
opposite ideas, the observation would be itself ridiculous, if it
were possible to mark any real and sensible distinction between
the doctrine of the Semi-Arians, as they were improperly styled,
and that of the Catholics themselves. The bishop of Poitiers, who
in his Phrygian exile very wisely aimed at a coalition of
parties, endeavors to prove that by a pious and faithful
interpretation, the <strong><em>Homoiousion</em></strong> may be
reduced to a consubstantial sense. Yet he confesses that the word
has a dark and suspicious aspect; and, as if darkness were
congenial to theological disputes, the Semi-Arians, who advanced
to the doors of the church, assailed them with the most
unrelenting fury.<br>
</p>

<p>The provinces of Egypt and Asia, which cultivated the language
and manners of the Greeks, had deeply imbibed the venom of the
Arian controversy. The familiar study of the Platonic system, a
vain and argumentative disposition, a copious and flexible idiom,
supplied the clergy and people of the East with an inexhaustible
flow of words and distinctions; and, in the midst of their fierce
contentions, they easily forgot the doubt which is recommended by
philosophy, and the submission which is enjoined by religion. The
inhabitants of the West were of a less inquisitive spirit; their
passions were not so forcibly moved by invisible objects, their
minds were less frequently exercised by the habits of dispute;
and such was the happy ignorance of the Gallican church, that
Hilary himself, above thirty years after the first general
council, was still a stranger to the Nicene creed. The Latins had
received the rays of divine knowledge through the dark and
doubtful medium of a translation. The poverty and stubbornness of
their native tongue was not always capable of affording just
equivalents for the Greek terms, for the technical words of the
Platonic philosophy, which had been consecrated, by the gospel or
by the church, to express the mysteries of the Christian faith;
and a verbal defect might introduce into the Latin theology a
long train of error or perplexity. But as the western provincials
had the good fortune of deriving their religion from an orthodox
source, they preserved with steadiness the doctrine which they
had accepted with docility; and when the Arian pestilence
approached their frontiers, they were supplied with the
seasonable preservative of the Homoousion, by the paternal care
of the Roman pontiff. Their sentiments and their temper were
displayed in the memorable synod of Rimini, which surpassed in
numbers the council of Nice, since it was composed of above four
hundred bishops of Italy, Africa, Spain, Gaul, Britain, and
Illyricum. From the first debates it appeared, that only
fourscore prelates adhered to the party, though
<strong><em>they</em></strong> affected to anathematize the name
and memory, of Arius. But this inferiority was compensated by the
advantages of skill, of experience, and of discipline; and the
minority was conducted by Valens and Ursacius, two bishops of
Illyricum, who had spent their lives in the intrigues of courts
and councils, and who had been trained under the Eusebian banner
in the religious wars of the East. By their arguments and
negotiations, they embarrassed, they confounded, they at last
deceived, the honest simplicity of the Latin bishops; who
suffered the palladium of the faith to be extorted from their
hand by fraud and importunity, rather than by open violence. The
council of Rimini was not allowed to separate, till the members
had imprudently subscribed a captious creed, in which some
expressions, susceptible of an heretical sense, were inserted in
the room of the Homoousion. It was on this occasion, that,
according to Jerom, the world was surprised to find itself Arian.
But the bishops of the Latin provinces had no sooner reached
their respective dioceses, than they discovered their mistake,
and repented of their weakness. The ignominious capitulation was
rejected with disdain and abhorrence; and the Homoousian
standard, which had been shaken but not overthrown, was more
firmly replanted in all the churches of the West.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XXI: Persecution Of Heresy, State Of The
Church. -- Part IV.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>Such was the rise and progress, and such were the natural
revolutions of those theological disputes, which disturbed the
peace of Christianity under the reigns of Constantine and of his
sons. But as those princes presumed to extend their despotism
over the faith, as well as over the lives and fortunes, of their
subjects, the weight of their suffrage sometimes inclined the
ecclesiastical balance: and the prerogatives of the King of
Heaven were settled, or changed, or modified, in the cabinet of
an earthly monarch.<br>
</p>

<p>The unhappy spirit of discord which pervaded the provinces of
the East, interrupted the triumph of Constantine; but the emperor
continued for some time to view, with cool and careless
indifference, the object of the dispute. As he was yet ignorant
of the difficulty of appeasing the quarrels of theologians, he
addressed to the contending parties, to Alexander and to Arius, a
moderating epistle; which may be ascribed, with far greater
reason, to the untutored sense of a soldier and statesman, than
to the dictates of any of his episcopal counsellors. He
attributes the origin of the whole controversy to a trifling and
subtle question, concerning an incomprehensible point of law,
which was foolishly asked by the bishop, and imprudently resolved
by the presbyter. He laments that the Christian people, who had
the same God, the same religion, and the same worship, should be
divided by such inconsiderable distinctions; and he seriously
recommend to the clergy of Alexandria the example of the Greek
philosophers; who could maintain their arguments without losing
their temper, and assert their freedom without violating their
friendship. The indifference and contempt of the sovereign would
have been, perhaps, the most effectual method of silencing the
dispute, if the popular current had been less rapid and
impetuous, and if Constantine himself, in the midst of faction
and fanaticism, could have preserved the calm possession of his
own mind. But his ecclesiastical ministers soon contrived to
seduce the impartiality of the magistrate, and to awaken the zeal
of the proselyte. He was provoked by the insults which had been
offered to his statues; he was alarmed by the real, as well as
the imaginary magnitude of the spreading mischief; and he
extinguished the hope of peace and toleration, from the moment
that he assembled three hundred bishops within the walls of the
same palace. The presence of the monarch swelled the importance
of the debate; his attention multiplied the arguments; and he
exposed his person with a patient intrepidity, which animated the
valor of the combatants. Notwithstanding the applause which has
been bestowed on the eloquence and sagacity of Constantine, a
Roman general, whose religion might be still a subject of doubt,
and whose mind had not been enlightened either by study or by
inspiration, was indifferently qualified to discuss, in the Greek
language, a metaphysical question, or an article of faith. But
the credit of his favorite Osius, who appears to have presided in
the council of Nice, might dispose the emperor in favor of the
orthodox party; and a well-timed insinuation, that the same
Eusebius of Nicomedia, who now protected the heretic, had lately
assisted the tyrant, might exasperate him against their
adversaries. The Nicene creed was ratified by Constantine; and
his firm declaration, that those who resisted the divine judgment
of the synod, must prepare themselves for an immediate exile,
annihilated the murmurs of a feeble opposition; which, from
seventeen, was almost instantly reduced to two, protesting
bishops. Eusebius of C&aelig;sarea yielded a reluctant and
ambiguous consent to the Homoousion; and the wavering conduct of
the Nicomedian Eusebius served only to delay, about three months,
his disgrace and exile. The impious Arius was banished into one
of the remote provinces of Illyricum; his person and disciples
were branded by law with the odious name of Porphyrians; his
writings were condemned to the flames, and a capital punishment
was denounced against those in whose possession they should be
found. The emperor had now imbibed the spirit of controversy, and
the angry, sarcastic style of his edicts was designed to inspire
his subjects with the hatred which he had conceived against the
enemies of Christ.<br>
</p>

<p>But, as if the conduct of the emperor had been guided by
passion instead of principle, three years from the council of
Nice were scarcely elapsed before he discovered some symptoms of
mercy, and even of indulgence, towards the proscribed sect, which
was secretly protected by his favorite sister. The exiles were
recalled, and Eusebius, who gradually resumed his influence over
the mind of Constantine, was restored to the episcopal throne,
from which he had been ignominiously degraded. Arius himself was
treated by the whole court with the respect which would have been
due to an innocent and oppressed man. His faith was approved by
the synod of Jerusalem; and the emperor seemed impatient to
repair his injustice, by issuing an absolute command, that he
should be solemnly admitted to the communion in the cathedral of
Constantinople. On the same day, which had been fixed for the
triumph of Arius, he expired; and the strange and horrid
circumstances of his death might excite a suspicion, that the
orthodox saints had contributed more efficaciously than by their
prayers, to deliver the church from the most formidable of her
enemies. The three principal leaders of the Catholics, Athanasius
of Alexandria, Eustathius of Antioch, and Paul of Constantinople
were deposed on various f accusations, by the sentence of
numerous councils; and were afterwards banished into distant
provinces by the first of the Christian emperors, who, in the
last moments of his life, received the rites of baptism from the
Arian bishop of Nicomedia. The ecclesiastical government of
Constantine cannot be justified from the reproach of levity and
weakness. But the credulous monarch, unskilled in the stratagems
of theological warfare, might be deceived by the modest and
specious professions of the heretics, whose sentiments he never
perfectly understood; and while he protected Arius, and
persecuted Athanasius, he still considered the council of Nice as
the bulwark of the Christian faith, and the peculiar glory of his
own reign.<br>
</p>

<p>The sons of Constantine must have been admitted from their
childhood into the rank of catechumens; but they imitated, in the
delay of their baptism, the example of their father. Like him
they presumed to pronounce their judgment on mysteries into which
they had never been regularly initiated; and the fate of the
Trinitarian controversy depended, in a great measure, on the
sentiments of Constantius; who inherited the provinces of the
East, and acquired the possession of the whole empire. The Arian
presbyter or bishop, who had secreted for his use the testament
of the deceased emperor, improved the fortunate occasion which
had introduced him to the familiarity of a prince, whose public
counsels were always swayed by his domestic favorites. The
eunuchs and slaves diffused the spiritual poison through the
palace, and the dangerous infection was communicated by the
female attendants to the guards, and by the empress to her
unsuspicious husband. The partiality which Constantius always
expressed towards the Eusebian faction, was insensibly fortified
by the dexterous management of their leaders; and his victory
over the tyrant Magnentius increased his inclination, as well as
ability, to employ the arms of power in the cause of Arianism.
While the two armies were engaged in the plains of Mursa, and the
fate of the two rivals depended on the chance of war, the son of
Constantine passed the anxious moments in a church of the martyrs
under the walls of the city. His spiritual comforter, Valens, the
Arian bishop of the diocese, employed the most artful precautions
to obtain such early intelligence as might secure either his
favor or his escape. A secret chain of swift and trusty
messengers informed him of the vicissitudes of the battle; and
while the courtiers stood trembling round their affrighted
master, Valens assured him that the Gallic legions gave way; and
insinuated with some presence of mind, that the glorious event
had been revealed to him by an angel. The grateful emperor
ascribed his success to the merits and intercession of the bishop
of Mursa, whose faith had deserved the public and miraculous
approbation of Heaven. The Arians, who considered as their own
the victory of Constantius, preferred his glory to that of his
father. Cyril, bishop of Jerusalem, immediately composed the
description of a celestial cross, encircled with a splendid
rainbow; which during the festival of Pentecost, about the third
hour of the day, had appeared over the Mount of Olives, to the
edification of the devout pilgrims, and the people of the holy
city. The size of the meteor was gradually magnified; and the
Arian historian has ventured to affirm, that it was conspicuous
to the two armies in the plains of Pannonia; and that the tyrant,
who is purposely represented as an idolater, fled before the
auspicious sign of orthodox Christianity.<br>
</p>

<p>The sentiments of a judicious stranger, who has impartially
considered the progress of civil or ecclesiastical discord, are
always entitled to our notice; and a short passage of Ammianus,
who served in the armies, and studied the character of
Constantius, is perhaps of more value than many pages of
theological invectives. "The Christian religion, which, in
itself," says that moderate historian, "is plain and simple,
<strong><em>he</em></strong> confounded by the dotage of
superstition. Instead of reconciling the parties by the weight of
his authority, he cherished and promulgated, by verbal disputes,
the differences which his vain curiosity had excited. The
highways were covered with troops of bishops galloping from every
side to the assemblies, which they call synods; and while they
labored to reduce the whole sect to their own particular
opinions, the public establishment of the posts was almost ruined
by their hasty and repeated journeys." Our more intimate
knowledge of the ecclesiastical transactions of the reign of
Constantius would furnish an ample commentary on this remarkable
passage, which justifies the rational apprehensions of
Athanasius, that the restless activity of the clergy, who
wandered round the empire in search of the true faith, would
excite the contempt and laughter of the unbelieving world. As
soon as the emperor was relieved from the terrors of the civil
war, he devoted the leisure of his winter quarters at Arles,
Milan, Sirmium, and Constantinople, to the amusement or toils of
controversy: the sword of the magistrate, and even of the tyrant,
was unsheathed, to enforce the reasons of the theologian; and as
he opposed the orthodox faith of Nice, it is readily confessed
that his incapacity and ignorance were equal to his presumption.
The eunuchs, the women, and the bishops, who governed the vain
and feeble mind of the emperor, had inspired him with an
insuperable dislike to the Homoousion; but his timid conscience
was alarmed by the impiety of &AElig;tius. The guilt of that
atheist was aggravated by the suspicious favor of the unfortunate
Gallus; and even the death of the Imperial ministers, who had
been massacred at Antioch, were imputed to the suggestions of
that dangerous sophist. The mind of Constantius, which could
neither be moderated by reason, nor fixed by faith, was blindly
impelled to either side of the dark and empty abyss, by his
horror of the opposite extreme; he alternately embraced and
condemned the sentiments, he successively banished and recalled
the leaders, of the Arian and Semi-Arian factions. During the
season of public business or festivity, he employed whole days,
and even nights, in selecting the words, and weighing the
syllables, which composed his fluctuating creeds. The subject of
his meditations still pursued and occupied his slumbers: the
incoherent dreams of the emperor were received as celestial
visions, and he accepted with complacency the lofty title of
bishop of bishops, from those ecclesiastics who forgot the
interest of their order for the gratification of their passions.
The design of establishing a uniformity of doctrine, which had
engaged him to convene so many synods in Gaul, Italy, Illyricum,
and Asia, was repeatedly baffled by his own levity, by the
divisions of the Arians, and by the resistance of the Catholics;
and he resolved, as the last and decisive effort, imperiously to
dictate the decrees of a general council. The destructive
earthquake of Nicomedia, the difficulty of finding a convenient
place, and perhaps some secret motives of policy, produced an
alteration in the summons. The bishops of the East were directed
to meet at Seleucia, in Isauria; while those of the West held
their deliberations at Rimini, on the coast of the Hadriatic; and
instead of two or three deputies from each province, the whole
episcopal body was ordered to march. The Eastern council, after
consuming four days in fierce and unavailing debate, separated
without any definitive conclusion. The council of the West was
protracted till the seventh month. Taurus, the Pr&aelig;torian
pr&aelig;fect was instructed not to dismiss the prelates till
they should all be united in the same opinion; and his efforts
were supported by the power of banishing fifteen of the most
refractory, and a promise of the consulship if he achieved so
difficult an adventure. His prayers and threats, the authority of
the sovereign, the sophistry of Valens and Ursacius, the distress
of cold and hunger, and the tedious melancholy of a hopeless
exile, at length extorted the reluctant consent of the bishops of
Rimini. The deputies of the East and of the West attended the
emperor in the palace of Constantinople, and he enjoyed the
satisfaction of imposing on the world a profession of faith which
established the likeness, without expressing the
<strong><em>consubstantiality</em></strong>, of the Son of God.
But the triumph of Arianism had been preceded by the removal of
the orthodox clergy, whom it was impossible either to intimidate
or to corrupt; and the reign of Constantius was disgraced by the
unjust and ineffectual persecution of the great Athanasius.<br>
</p>

<p>We have seldom an opportunity of observing, either in active
or speculative life, what effect may be produced, or what
obstacles may be surmounted, by the force of a single mind, when
it is inflexibly applied to the pursuit of a single object. The
immortal name of Athanasius will never be separated from the
Catholic doctrine of the Trinity, to whose defence he consecrated
every moment and every faculty of his being. Educated in the
family of Alexander, he had vigorously opposed the early progress
of the Arian heresy: he exercised the important functions of
secretary under the aged prelate; and the fathers of the Nicene
council beheld with surprise and respect the rising virtues of
the young deacon. In a time of public danger, the dull claims of
age and of rank are sometimes superseded; and within five months
after his return from Nice, the deacon Athanasius was seated on
the archiepiscopal throne of Egypt. He filled that eminent
station above forty-six years, and his long administration was
spent in a perpetual combat against the powers of Arianism. Five
times was Athanasius expelled from his throne; twenty years he
passed as an exile or a fugitive: and almost every province of
the Roman empire was successively witness to his merit, and his
sufferings in the cause of the Homoousion, which he considered as
the sole pleasure and business, as the duty, and as the glory of
his life. Amidst the storms of persecution, the archbishop of
Alexandria was patient of labor, jealous of fame, careless of
safety; and although his mind was tainted by the contagion of
fanaticism, Athanasius displayed a superiority of character and
abilities, which would have qualified him, far better than the
degenerate sons of Constantine, for the government of a great
monarchy. His learning was much less profound and extensive than
that of Eusebius of C&aelig;sarea, and his rude eloquence could
not be compared with the polished oratory of Gregory of Basil;
but whenever the primate of Egypt was called upon to justify his
sentiments, or his conduct, his unpremeditated style, either of
speaking or writing, was clear, forcible, and persuasive. He has
always been revered, in the orthodox school, as one of the most
accurate masters of the Christian theology; and he was supposed
to possess two profane sciences, less adapted to the episcopal
character, the knowledge of jurisprudence, and that of
divination. Some fortunate conjectures of future events, which
impartial reasoners might ascribe to the experience and judgment
of Athanasius, were attributed by his friends to heavenly
inspiration, and imputed by his enemies to infernal magic.<br>
</p>

<p>But as Athanasius was continually engaged with the prejudices
and passions of every order of men, from the monk to the emperor,
the knowledge of human nature was his first and most important
science. He preserved a distinct and unbroken view of a scene
which was incessantly shifting; and never failed to improve those
decisive moments which are irrecoverably past before they are
perceived by a common eye. The archbishop of Alexandria was
capable of distinguishing how far he might boldly command, and
where he must dexterously insinuate; how long he might contend
with power, and when he must withdraw from persecution; and while
he directed the thunders of the church against heresy and
rebellion, he could assume, in the bosom of his own party, the
flexible and indulgent temper of a prudent leader. The election
of Athanasius has not escaped the reproach of irregularity and
precipitation; but the propriety of his behavior conciliated the
affections both of the clergy and of the people. The Alexandrians
were impatient to rise in arms for the defence of an eloquent and
liberal pastor. In his distress he always derived support, or at
least consolation, from the faithful attachment of his parochial
clergy; and the hundred bishops of Egypt adhered, with unshaken
zeal, to the cause of Athanasius. In the modest equipage which
pride and policy would affect, he frequently performed the
episcopal visitation of his provinces, from the mouth of the Nile
to the confines of &AElig;thiopia; familiarly conversing with the
meanest of the populace, and humbly saluting the saints and
hermits of the desert. Nor was it only in ecclesiastical
assemblies, among men whose education and manners were similar to
his own, that Athanasius displayed the ascendancy of his genius.
He appeared with easy and respectful firmness in the courts of
princes; and in the various turns of his prosperous and adverse
fortune he never lost the confidence of his friends, or the
esteem of his enemies.<br>
</p>

<p>In his youth, the primate of Egypt resisted the great
Constantine, who had repeatedly signified his will, that Arius
should be restored to the Catholic communion. The emperor
respected, and might forgive, this inflexible resolution; and the
faction who considered Athanasius as their most formidable enemy,
was constrained to dissemble their hatred, and silently to
prepare an indirect and distant assault. They scattered rumors
and suspicions, represented the archbishop as a proud and
oppressive tyrant, and boldly accused him of violating the treaty
which had been ratified in the Nicene council, with the
schismatic followers of Meletius. Athanasius had openly
disapproved that ignominious peace, and the emperor was disposed
to believe that he had abused his ecclesiastical and civil power,
to prosecute those odious sectaries: that he had sacrilegiously
broken a chalice in one of their churches of Mareotis; that he
had whipped or imprisoned six of their bishops; and that
Arsenius, a seventh bishop of the same party, had been murdered,
or at least mutilated, by the cruel hand of the primate. These
charges, which affected his honor and his life, were referred by
Constantine to his brother Dalmatius the censor, who resided at
Antioch; the synods of C&aelig;sarea and Tyre were successively
convened; and the bishops of the East were instructed to judge
the cause of Athanasius, before they proceeded to consecrate the
new church of the Resurrection at Jerusalem. The primate might be
conscious of his innocence; but he was sensible that the same
implacable spirit which had dictated the accusation, would direct
the proceeding, and pronounce the sentence. He prudently declined
the tribunal of his enemies; despised the summons of the synod of
C&aelig;sarea; and, after a long and artful delay, submitted to
the peremptory commands of the emperor, who threatened to punish
his criminal disobedience if he refused to appear in the council
of Tyre. Before Athanasius, at the head of fifty Egyptian
prelates, sailed from Alexandria, he had wisely secured the
alliance of the Meletians; and Arsenius himself, his imaginary
victim, and his secret friend, was privately concealed in his
train. The synod of Tyre was conducted by Eusebius of
C&aelig;sarea, with more passion, and with less art, than his
learning and experience might promise; his numerous faction
repeated the names of homicide and tyrant; and their clamors were
encouraged by the seeming patience of Athanasius, who expected
the decisive moment to produce Arsenius alive and unhurt in the
midst of the assembly. The nature of the other charges did not
admit of such clear and satisfactory replies; yet the archbishop
was able to prove, that in the village, where he was accused of
breaking a consecrated chalice, neither church nor altar nor
chalice could really exist. The Arians, who had secretly
determined the guilt and condemnation of their enemy, attempted,
however, to disguise their injustice by the imitation of judicial
forms: the synod appointed an episcopal commission of six
delegates to collect evidence on the spot; and this measure which
was vigorously opposed by the Egyptian bishops, opened new scenes
of violence and perjury. After the return of the deputies from
Alexandria, the majority of the council pronounced the final
sentence of degradation and exile against the primate of Egypt.
The decree, expressed in the fiercest language of malice and
revenge, was communicated to the emperor and the Catholic church;
and the bishops immediately resumed a mild and devout aspect,
such as became their holy pilgrimage to the Sepulchre of
Christ.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XXI: Persecution Of Heresy, State Of The
Church. -- Part V.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>But the injustice of these ecclesiastical judges had not been
countenanced by the submission, or even by the presence, of
Athanasius. He resolved to make a bold and dangerous experiment,
whether the throne was inaccessible to the voice of truth; and
before the final sentence could be pronounced at Tyre, the
intrepid primate threw himself into a bark which was ready to
hoist sail for the Imperial city. The request of a formal
audience might have been opposed or eluded; but Athanasius
concealed his arrival, watched the moment of Constantine's return
from an adjacent villa, and boldly encountered his angry
sovereign as he passed on horseback through the principal street
of Constantinople. So strange an apparition excited his surprise
and indignation; and the guards were ordered to remove the
importunate suitor; but his resentment was subdued by involuntary
respect; and the haughty spirit of the emperor was awed by the
courage and eloquence of a bishop, who implored his justice and
awakened his conscience. Constantine listened to the complaints
of Athanasius with impartial and even gracious attention; the
members of the synod of Tyre were summoned to justify their
proceedings; and the arts of the Eusebian faction would have been
confounded, if they had not aggravated the guilt of the primate,
by the dexterous supposition of an unpardonable offence; a
criminal design to intercept and detain the corn-fleet of
Alexandria, which supplied the subsistence of the new capital.
The emperor was satisfied that the peace of Egypt would be
secured by the absence of a popular leader; but he refused to
fill the vacancy of the archiepiscopal throne; and the sentence,
which, after long hesitation, he pronounced, was that of a
jealous ostracism, rather than of an ignominious exile. In the
remote province of Gaul, but in the hospitable court of Treves,
Athanasius passed about twenty eight months. The death of the
emperor changed the face of public affairs and, amidst the
general indulgence of a young reign, the primate was restored to
his country by an honorable edict of the younger Constantine, who
expressed a deep sense of the innocence and merit of his
venerable guest.<br>
</p>

<p>The death of that prince exposed Athanasius to a second
persecution; and the feeble Constantius, the sovereign of the
East, soon became the secret accomplice of the Eusebians. Ninety
bishops of that sect or faction assembled at Antioch, under the
specious pretence of dedicating the cathedral. They composed an
ambiguous creed, which is faintly tinged with the colors of
Semi-Arianism, and twenty-five canons, which still regulate the
discipline of the orthodox Greeks. It was decided, with some
appearance of equity, that a bishop, deprived by a synod, should
not resume his episcopal functions till he had been absolved by
the judgment of an equal synod; the law was immediately applied
to the case of Athanasius; the council of Antioch pronounced, or
rather confirmed, his degradation: a stranger, named Gregory, was
seated on his throne; and Philagrius, the pr&aelig;fect of Egypt,
was instructed to support the new primate with the civil and
military powers of the province. Oppressed by the conspiracy of
the Asiatic prelates, Athanasius withdrew from Alexandria, and
passed three years as an exile and a suppliant on the holy
threshold of the Vatican. By the assiduous study of the Latin
language, he soon qualified himself to negotiate with the western
clergy; his decent flattery swayed and directed the haughty
Julius; the Roman pontiff was persuaded to consider his appeal as
the peculiar interest of the Apostolic see: and his innocence was
unanimously declared in a council of fifty bishops of Italy. At
the end of three years, the primate was summoned to the court of
Milan by the emperor Constans, who, in the indulgence of unlawful
pleasures, still professed a lively regard for the orthodox
faith. The cause of truth and justice was promoted by the
influence of gold, and the ministers of Constans advised their
sovereign to require the convocation of an ecclesiastical
assembly, which might act as the representatives of the Catholic
church. Ninety-four bishops of the West, seventy-six bishops of
the East, encountered each other at Sardica, on the verge of the
two empires, but in the dominions of the protector of Athanasius.
Their debates soon degenerated into hostile altercations; the
Asiatics, apprehensive for their personal safety, retired to
Philippopolis in Thrace; and the rival synods reciprocally hurled
their spiritual thunders against their enemies, whom they piously
condemned as the enemies of the true God. Their decrees were
published and ratified in their respective provinces: and
Athanasius, who in the West was revered as a saint, was exposed
as a criminal to the abhorrence of the East. The council of
Sardica reveals the first symptoms of discord and schism between
the Greek and Latin churches which were separated by the
accidental difference of faith, and the permanent distinction of
language.<br>
</p>

<p>During his second exile in the West, Athanasius was frequently
admitted to the Imperial presence; at Capua, Lodi, Milan, Verona,
Padua, Aquileia, and Treves. The bishop of the diocese usually
assisted at these interviews; the master of the offices stood
before the veil or curtain of the sacred apartment; and the
uniform moderation of the primate might be attested by these
respectable witnesses, to whose evidence he solemnly appeals.
Prudence would undoubtedly suggest the mild and respectful tone
that became a subject and a bishop. In these familiar conferences
with the sovereign of the West, Athanasius might lament the error
of Constantius, but he boldly arraigned the guilt of his eunuchs
and his Arian prelates; deplored the distress and danger of the
Catholic church; and excited Constans to emulate the zeal and
glory of his father. The emperor declared his resolution of
employing the troops and treasures of Europe in the orthodox
cause; and signified, by a concise and peremptory epistle to his
brother Constantius, that unless he consented to the immediate
restoration of Athanasius, he himself, with a fleet and army,
would seat the archbishop on the throne of Alexandria. But this
religious war, so horrible to nature, was prevented by the timely
compliance of Constantius; and the emperor of the East
condescended to solicit a reconciliation with a subject whom he
had injured. Athanasius waited with decent pride, till he had
received three successive epistles full of the strongest
assurances of the protection, the favor, and the esteem of his
sovereign; who invited him to resume his episcopal seat, and who
added the humiliating precaution of engaging his principal
ministers to attest the sincerity of his intentions. They were
manifested in a still more public manner, by the strict orders
which were despatched into Egypt to recall the adherents of
Athanasius, to restore their privileges, to proclaim their
innocence, and to erase from the public registers the illegal
proceedings which had been obtained during the prevalence of the
Eusebian faction. After every satisfaction and security had been
given, which justice or even delicacy could require, the primate
proceeded, by slow journeys, through the provinces of Thrace,
Asia, and Syria; and his progress was marked by the abject homage
of the Oriental bishops, who excited his contempt without
deceiving his penetration. At Antioch he saw the emperor
Constantius; sustained, with modest firmness, the embraces and
protestations of his master, and eluded the proposal of allowing
the Arians a single church at Alexandria, by claiming, in the
other cities of the empire, a similar toleration for his own
party; a reply which might have appeared just and moderate in the
mouth of an independent prince. The entrance of the archbishop
into his capital was a triumphal procession; absence and
persecution had endeared him to the Alexandrians; his authority,
which he exercised with rigor, was more firmly established; and
his fame was diffused from &AElig;thiopia to Britain, over the
whole extent of the Christian world.<br>
</p>

<p>But the subject who has reduced his prince to the necessity of
dissembling, can never expect a sincere and lasting forgiveness;
and the tragic fate of Constans soon deprived Athanasius of a
powerful and generous protector. The civil war between the
assassin and the only surviving brother of Constans, which
afflicted the empire above three years, secured an interval of
repose to the Catholic church; and the two contending parties
were desirous to conciliate the friendship of a bishop, who, by
the weight of his personal authority, might determine the
fluctuating resolutions of an important province. He gave
audience to the ambassadors of the tyrant, with whom he was
afterwards accused of holding a secret correspondence; and the
emperor Constantius repeatedly assured his dearest father, the
most reverend Athanasius, that, notwithstanding the malicious
rumors which were circulated by their common enemies, he had
inherited the sentiments, as well as the throne, of his deceased
brother. Gratitude and humanity would have disposed the primate
of Egypt to deplore the untimely fate of Constans, and to abhor
the guilt of Magnentius; but as he clearly understood that the
apprehensions of Constantius were his only safeguard, the fervor
of his prayers for the success of the righteous cause might
perhaps be somewhat abated. The ruin of Athanasius was no longer
contrived by the obscure malice of a few bigoted or angry
bishops, who abused the authority of a credulous monarch. The
monarch himself avowed the resolution, which he had so long
suppressed, of avenging his private injuries; and the first
winter after his victory, which he passed at Arles, was employed
against an enemy more odious to him than the vanquished tyrant of
Gaul.<br>
</p>

<p>If the emperor had capriciously decreed the death of the most
eminent and virtuous citizen of the republic, the cruel order
would have been executed without hesitation, by the ministers of
open violence or of specious injustice. The caution, the delay,
the difficulty with which he proceeded in the condemnation and
punishment of a popular bishop, discovered to the world that the
privileges of the church had already revived a sense of order and
freedom in the Roman government. The sentence which was
pronounced in the synod of Tyre, and subscribed by a large
majority of the Eastern bishops, had never been expressly
repealed; and as Athanasius had been once degraded from his
episcopal dignity by the judgment of his brethren, every
subsequent act might be considered as irregular, and even
criminal. But the memory of the firm and effectual support which
the primate of Egypt had derived from the attachment of the
Western church, engaged Constantius to suspend the execution of
the sentence till he had obtained the concurrence of the Latin
bishops. Two years were consumed in ecclesiastical negotiations;
and the important cause between the emperor and one of his
subjects was solemnly debated, first in the synod of Arles, and
afterwards in the great council of Milan, which consisted of
above three hundred bishops. Their integrity was gradually
undermined by the arguments of the Arians, the dexterity of the
eunuchs, and the pressing solicitations of a prince who gratified
his revenge at the expense of his dignity, and exposed his own
passions, whilst he influenced those of the clergy. Corruption,
the most infallible symptom of constitutional liberty, was
successfully practised; honors, gifts, and immunities were
offered and accepted as the price of an episcopal vote; and the
condemnation of the Alexandrian primate was artfully represented
as the only measure which could restore the peace and union of
the Catholic church. The friends of Athanasius were not, however,
wanting to their leader, or to their cause. With a manly spirit,
which the sanctity of their character rendered less dangerous,
they maintained, in public debate, and in private conference with
the emperor, the eternal obligation of religion and justice. They
declared, that neither the hope of his favor, nor the fear of his
displeasure, should prevail on them to join in the condemnation
of an absent, an innocent, a respectable brother. They affirmed,
with apparent reason, that the illegal and obsolete decrees of
the council of Tyre had long since been tacitly abolished by the
Imperial edicts, the honorable reestablishment of the archbishop
of Alexandria, and the silence or recantation of his most
clamorous adversaries. They alleged, that his innocence had been
attested by the unanimous bishops of Egypt, and had been
acknowledged in the councils of Rome and Sardica, by the
impartial judgment of the Latin church. They deplored the hard
condition of Athanasius, who, after enjoying so many years his
seat, his reputation, and the seeming confidence of his
sovereign, was again called upon to confute the most groundless
and extravagant accusations. Their language was specious; their
conduct was honorable: but in this long and obstinate contest,
which fixed the eyes of the whole empire on a single bishop, the
ecclesiastical factions were prepared to sacrifice truth and
justice to the more interesting object of defending or removing
the intrepid champion of the Nicene faith. The Arians still
thought it prudent to disguise, in ambiguous language, their real
sentiments and designs; but the orthodox bishops, armed with the
favor of the people, and the decrees of a general council,
insisted on every occasion, and particularly at Milan, that their
adversaries should purge themselves from the suspicion of heresy,
before they presumed to arraign the conduct of the great
Athanasius.<br>
</p>

<p>But the voice of reason (if reason was indeed on the side of
Athanasius) was silenced by the clamors of a factious or venal
majority; and the councils of Arles and Milan were not dissolved,
till the archbishop of Alexandria had been solemnly condemned and
deposed by the judgment of the Western, as well as of the
Eastern, church. The bishops who had opposed, were required to
subscribe, the sentence, and to unite in religious communion with
the suspected leaders of the adverse party. A formulary of
consent was transmitted by the messengers of state to the absent
bishops: and all those who refused to submit their private
opinion to the public and inspired wisdom of the councils of
Arles and Milan, were immediately banished by the emperor, who
affected to execute the decrees of the Catholic church. Among
those prelates who led the honorable band of confessors and
exiles, Liberius of Rome, Osius of Cordova, Paulinus of Treves,
Dionysius of Milan, Eusebius of Vercell&aelig;, Lucifer of
Cagliari and Hilary of Poitiers, may deserve to be particularly
distinguished. The eminent station of Liberius, who governed the
capital of the empire; the personal merit and long experience of
the venerable Osius, who was revered as the favorite of the great
Constantine, and the father of the Nicene faith, placed those
prelates at the head of the Latin church: and their example,
either of submission or resistance, would probable be imitated by
the episcopal crowd. But the repeated attempts of the emperor to
seduce or to intimidate the bishops of Rome and Cordova, were for
some time ineffectual. The Spaniard declared himself ready to
suffer under Constantius, as he had suffered threescore years
before under his grandfather Maximian. The Roman, in the presence
of his sovereign, asserted the innocence of Athanasius and his
own freedom. When he was banished to Ber&aelig;a in Thrace, he
sent back a large sum which had been offered for the
accommodation of his journey; and insulted the court of Milan by
the haughty remark, that the emperor and his eunuchs might want
that gold to pay their soldiers and their bishops. The resolution
of Liberius and Osius was at length subdued by the hardships of
exile and confinement. The Roman pontiff purchased his return by
some criminal compliances; and afterwards expiated his guilt by a
seasonable repentance. Persuasion and violence were employed to
extort the reluctant signature of the decrepit bishop of Cordova,
whose strength was broken, and whose faculties were perhaps
impaired by the weight of a hundred years; and the insolent
triumph of the Arians provoked some of the orthodox party to
treat with inhuman severity the character, or rather the memory,
of an unfortunate old man, to whose former services Christianity
itself was so deeply indebted.<br>
</p>

<p>The fall of Liberius and Osius reflected a brighter lustre on
the firmness of those bishops who still adhered, with unshaken
fidelity, to the cause of Athanasius and religious truth. The
ingenious malice of their enemies had deprived them of the
benefit of mutual comfort and advice, separated those illustrious
exiles into distant provinces, and carefully selected the most
inhospitable spots of a great empire. Yet they soon experienced
that the deserts of Libya, and the most barbarous tracts of
Cappadocia, were less inhospitable than the residence of those
cities in which an Arian bishop could satiate, without restraint,
the exquisite rancor of theological hatred. Their consolation was
derived from the consciousness of rectitude and independence,
from the applause, the visits, the letters, and the liberal alms
of their adherents, and from the satisfaction which they soon
enjoyed of observing the intestine divisions of the adversaries
of the Nicene faith. Such was the nice and capricious taste of
the emperor Constantius; and so easily was he offended by the
slightest deviation from his imaginary standard of Christian
truth, that he persecuted, with equal zeal, those who defended
the <strong><em>consubstantiality</em></strong>, those who
asserted the <strong><em>similar</em></strong>
<strong><em>substance</em></strong>, and those who denied the
<strong><em>likeness</em></strong> of the Son of God. Three
bishops, degraded and banished for those adverse opinions, might
possibly meet in the same place of exile; and, according to the
difference of their temper, might either pity or insult the blind
enthusiasm of their antagonists, whose present sufferings would
never be compensated by future happiness.<br>
</p>

<p>The disgrace and exile of the orthodox bishops of the West
were designed as so many preparatory steps to the ruin of
Athanasius himself. Six-and-twenty months had elapsed, during
which the Imperial court secretly labored, by the most insidious
arts, to remove him from Alexandria, and to withdraw the
allowance which supplied his popular liberality. But when the
primate of Egypt, deserted and proscribed by the Latin church,
was left destitute of any foreign support, Constantius despatched
two of his secretaries with a verbal commission to announce and
execute the order of his banishment. As the justice of the
sentence was publicly avowed by the whole party, the only motive
which could restrain Constantius from giving his messengers the
sanction of a written mandate, must be imputed to his doubt of
the event; and to a sense of the danger to which he might expose
the second city, and the most fertile province, of the empire, if
the people should persist in the resolution of defending, by
force of arms, the innocence of their spiritual father. Such
extreme caution afforded Athanasius a specious pretence
respectfully to dispute the truth of an order, which he could not
reconcile, either with the equity, or with the former
declarations, of his gracious master. The civil powers of Egypt
found themselves inadequate to the task of persuading or
compelling the primate to abdicate his episcopal throne; and they
were obliged to conclude a treaty with the popular leaders of
Alexandria, by which it was stipulated, that all proceedings and
all hostilities should be suspended till the emperor's pleasure
had been more distinctly ascertained. By this seeming moderation,
the Catholics were deceived into a false and fatal security;
while the legions of the Upper Egypt, and of Libya, advanced, by
secret orders and hasty marches, to besiege, or rather to
surprise, a capital habituated to sedition, and inflamed by
religious zeal. The position of Alexandria, between the sea and
the Lake Mareotis, facilitated the approach and landing of the
troops; who were introduced into the heart of the city, before
any effectual measures could be taken either to shut the gates or
to occupy the important posts of defence. At the hour of
midnight, twenty-three days after the signature of the treaty,
Syrianus, duke of Egypt, at the head of five thousand soldiers,
armed and prepared for an assault, unexpectedly invested the
church of St. Theonas, where the archbishop, with a part of his
clergy and people, performed their nocturnal devotions. The doors
of the sacred edifice yielded to the impetuosity of the attack,
which was accompanied with every horrid circumstance of tumult
and bloodshed; but, as the bodies of the slain, and the fragments
of military weapons, remained the next day an unexceptionable
evidence in the possession of the Catholics, the enterprise of
Syrianus may be considered as a successful irruption rather than
as an absolute conquest. The other churches of the city were
profaned by similar outrages; and, during at least four months,
Alexandria was exposed to the insults of a licentious army,
stimulated by the ecclesiastics of a hostile faction. Many of the
faithful were killed; who may deserve the name of martyrs, if
their deaths were neither provoked nor revenged; bishops and
presbyters were treated with cruel ignominy; consecrated virgins
were stripped naked, scourged and violated; the houses of wealthy
citizens were plundered; and, under the mask of religious zeal,
lust, avarice, and private resentment were gratified with
impunity, and even with applause. The Pagans of Alexandria, who
still formed a numerous and discontented party, were easily
persuaded to desert a bishop whom they feared and esteemed. The
hopes of some peculiar favors, and the apprehension of being
involved in the general penalties of rebellion, engaged them to
promise their support to the destined successor of Athanasius,
the famous George of Cappadocia. The usurper, after receiving the
consecration of an Arian synod, was placed on the episcopal
throne by the arms of Sebastian, who had been appointed Count of
Egypt for the execution of that important design. In the use, as
well as in the acquisition, of power, the tyrant, George
disregarded the laws of religion, of justice, and of humanity;
and the same scenes of violence and scandal which had been
exhibited in the capital, were repeated in more than ninety
episcopal cities of Egypt. Encouraged by success, Constantius
ventured to approve the conduct of his minister. By a public and
passionate epistle, the emperor congratulates the deliverance of
Alexandria from a popular tyrant, who deluded his blind votaries
by the magic of his eloquence; expatiates on the virtues and
piety of the most reverend George, the elected bishop; and
aspires, as the patron and benefactor of the city to surpass the
fame of Alexander himself. But he solemnly declares his
unalterable resolution to pursue with fire and sword the
seditious adherents of the wicked Athanasius, who, by flying from
justice, has confessed his guilt, and escaped the ignominious
death which he had so often deserved.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XXI: Persecution Of Heresy, State Of The
Church. -- Part VI.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>Athanasius had indeed escaped from the most imminent dangers;
and the adventures of that extraordinary man deserve and fix our
attention. On the memorable night when the church of St. Theonas
was invested by the troops of Syrianus, the archbishop, seated on
his throne, expected, with calm and intrepid dignity, the
approach of death. While the public devotion was interrupted by
shouts of rage and cries of terror, he animated his trembling
congregation to express their religious confidence, by chanting
one of the psalms of David which celebrates the triumph of the
God of Isr&aelig;l over the haughty and impious tyrant of Egypt.
The doors were at length burst open: a cloud of arrows was
discharged among the people; the soldiers, with drawn swords,
rushed forwards into the sanctuary; and the dreadful gleam of
their arms was reflected by the holy luminaries which burnt round
the altar. Athanasius still rejected the pious importunity of the
monks and presbyters, who were attached to his person; and nobly
refused to desert his episcopal station, till he had dismissed in
safety the last of the congregation. The darkness and tumult of
the night favored the retreat of the archbishop; and though he
was oppressed by the waves of an agitated multitude, though he
was thrown to the ground, and left without sense or motion, he
still recovered his undaunted courage, and eluded the eager
search of the soldiers, who were instructed by their Arian
guides, that the head of Athanasius would be the most acceptable
present to the emperor. From that moment the primate of Egypt
disappeared from the eyes of his enemies, and remained above six
years concealed in impenetrable obscurity.<br>
</p>

<p>The despotic power of his implacable enemy filled the whole
extent of the Roman world; and the exasperated monarch had
endeavored, by a very pressing epistle to the Christian princes
of Ethiopia, * to exclude Athanasius from the most remote and
sequestered regions of the earth. Counts, pr&aelig;fects,
tribunes, whole armies, were successively employed to pursue a
bishop and a fugitive; the vigilance of the civil and military
powers was excited by the Imperial edicts; liberal rewards were
promised to the man who should produce Athanasius, either alive
or dead; and the most severe penalties were denounced against
those who should dare to protect the public enemy. But the
deserts of Thebais were now peopled by a race of wild, yet
submissive fanatics, who preferred the commands of their abbot to
the laws of their sovereign. The numerous disciples of Antony and
Pachomius received the fugitive primate as their father, admired
the patience and humility with which he conformed to their
strictest institutions, collected every word which dropped from
his lips as the genuine effusions of inspired wisdom; and
persuaded themselves that their prayers, their fasts, and their
vigils, were less meritorious than the zeal which they expressed,
and the dangers which they braved, in the defence of truth and
innocence. The monasteries of Egypt were seated in lonely and
desolate places, on the summit of mountains, or in the islands of
the Nile; and the sacred horn or trumpet of Tabenne was the
well-known signal which assembled several thousand robust and
determined monks, who, for the most part, had been the peasants
of the adjacent country. When their dark retreats were invaded by
a military force, which it was impossible to resist, they
silently stretched out their necks to the executioner; and
supported their national character, that tortures could never
wrest from an Egyptian the confession of a secret which he was
resolved not to disclose. The archbishop of Alexandria, for whose
safety they eagerly devoted their lives, was lost among a uniform
and well-disciplined multitude; and on the nearer approach of
danger, he was swiftly removed, by their officious hands, from
one place of concealment to another, till he reached the
formidable deserts, which the gloomy and credulous temper of
superstition had peopled with d&aelig;mons and savage monsters.
The retirement of Athanasius, which ended only with the life of
Constantius, was spent, for the most part, in the society of the
monks, who faithfully served him as guards, as secretaries, and
as messengers; but the importance of maintaining a more intimate
connection with the Catholic party tempted him, whenever the
diligence of the pursuit was abated, to emerge from the desert,
to introduce himself into Alexandria, and to trust his person to
the discretion of his friends and adherents. His various
adventures might have furnished the subject of a very
entertaining romance. He was once secreted in a dry cistern,
which he had scarcely left before he was betrayed by the
treachery of a female slave; and he was once concealed in a still
more extraordinary asylum, the house of a virgin, only twenty
years of age, and who was celebrated in the whole city for her
exquisite beauty. At the hour of midnight, as she related the
story many years afterwards, she was surprised by the appearance
of the archbishop in a loose undress, who, advancing with hasty
steps, conjured her to afford him the protection which he had
been directed by a celestial vision to seek under her hospitable
roof. The pious maid accepted and preserved the sacred pledge
which was intrusted to her prudence and courage. Without
imparting the secret to any one, she instantly conducted
Athanasius into her most secret chamber, and watched over his
safety with the tenderness of a friend and the assiduity of a
servant. As long as the danger continued, she regularly supplied
him with books and provisions, washed his feet, managed his
correspondence, and dexterously concealed from the eye of
suspicion this familiar and solitary intercourse between a saint
whose character required the most unblemished chastity, and a
female whose charms might excite the most dangerous emotions.
During the six years of persecution and exile, Athanasius
repeated his visits to his fair and faithful companion; and the
formal declaration, that he <strong><em>saw</em></strong> the
councils of Rimini and Seleucia, forces us to believe that he was
secretly present at the time and place of their convocation. The
advantage of personally negotiating with his friends, and of
observing and improving the divisions of his enemies, might
justify, in a prudent statesman, so bold and dangerous an
enterprise: and Alexandria was connected by trade and navigation
with every seaport of the Mediterranean. From the depth of his
inaccessible retreat the intrepid primate waged an incessant and
offensive war against the protector of the Arians; and his
seasonable writings, which were diligently circulated and eagerly
perused, contributed to unite and animate the orthodox party. In
his public apologies, which he addressed to the emperor himself,
he sometimes affected the praise of moderation; whilst at the
same time, in secret and vehement invectives, he exposed
Constantius as a weak and wicked prince, the executioner of his
family, the tyrant of the republic, and the Antichrist of the
church. In the height of his prosperity, the victorious monarch,
who had chastised the rashness of Gallus, and suppressed the
revolt of Sylvanus, who had taken the diadem from the head of
Vetranio, and vanquished in the field the legions of Magnentius,
received from an invisible hand a wound, which he could neither
heal nor revenge; and the son of Constantine was the first of the
Christian princes who experienced the strength of those
principles, which, in the cause of religion, could resist the
most violent exertions of the civil power.<br>
</p>

<p>The persecution of Athanasius, and of so many respectable
bishops, who suffered for the truth of their opinions, or at
least for the integrity of their conscience, was a just subject
of indignation and discontent to all Christians, except those who
were blindly devoted to the Arian faction. The people regretted
the loss of their faithful pastors, whose banishment was usually
followed by the intrusion of a stranger into the episcopal chair;
and loudly complained, that the right of election was violated,
and that they were condemned to obey a mercenary usurper, whose
person was unknown, and whose principles were suspected. The
Catholics might prove to the world, that they were not involved
in the guilt and heresy of their ecclesiastical governor, by
publicly testifying their dissent, or by totally separating
themselves from his communion. The first of these methods was
invented at Antioch, and practised with such success, that it was
soon diffused over the Christian world. The doxology or sacred
hymn, which celebrates the <strong><em>glory</em></strong> of the
Trinity, is susceptible of very nice, but material, inflections;
and the substance of an orthodox, or an heretical, creed, may be
expressed by the difference of a disjunctive, or a copulative,
particle. Alternate responses, and a more regular psalmody, were
introduced into the public service by Flavianus and Diodorus, two
devout and active laymen, who were attached to the Nicene faith.
Under their conduct a swarm of monks issued from the adjacent
desert, bands of well-disciplined singers were stationed in the
cathedral of Antioch, the Glory to the Father, And the Son, And
the Holy Ghost, was triumphantly chanted by a full chorus of
voices; and the Catholics insulted, by the purity of their
doctrine, the Arian prelate, who had usurped the throne of the
venerable Eustathius. The same zeal which inspired their songs
prompted the more scrupulous members of the orthodox party to
form separate assemblies, which were governed by the presbyters,
till the death of their exiled bishop allowed the election and
consecration of a new episcopal pastor. The revolutions of the
court multiplied the number of pretenders; and the same city was
often disputed, under the reign of Constantius, by two, or three,
or even four, bishops, who exercised their spiritual jurisdiction
over their respective followers, and alternately lost and
regained the temporal possessions of the church. The abuse of
Christianity introduced into the Roman government new causes of
tyranny and sedition; the bands of civil society were torn
asunder by the fury of religious factions; and the obscure
citizen, who might calmly have surveyed the elevation and fall of
successive emperors, imagined and experienced, that his own life
and fortune were connected with the interests of a popular
ecclesiastic. The example of the two capitals, Rome and
Constantinople, may serve to represent the state of the empire,
and the temper of mankind, under the reign of the sons of
Constantine.<br>
</p>

<p>I. The Roman pontiff, as long as he maintained his station and
his principles, was guarded by the warm attachment of a great
people; and could reject with scorn the prayers, the menaces, and
the oblations of an heretical prince. When the eunuchs had
secretly pronounced the exile of Liberius, the well-grounded
apprehension of a tumult engaged them to use the utmost
precautions in the execution of the sentence. The capital was
invested on every side, and the pr&aelig;fect was commanded to
seize the person of the bishop, either by stratagem or by open
force. The order was obeyed, and Liberius, with the greatest
difficulty, at the hour of midnight, was swiftly conveyed beyond
the reach of the Roman people, before their consternation was
turned into rage. As soon as they were informed of his banishment
into Thrace, a general assembly was convened, and the clergy of
Rome bound themselves, by a public and solemn oath, never to
desert their bishop, never to acknowledge the usurper
F&aelig;lix; who, by the influence of the eunuchs, had been
irregularly chosen and consecrated within the walls of a profane
palace. At the end of two years, their pious obstinacy subsisted
entire and unshaken; and when Constantius visited Rome, he was
assailed by the importunate solicitations of a people, who had
preserved, as the last remnant of their ancient freedom, the
right of treating their sovereign with familiar insolence. The
wives of many of the senators and most honorable citizens, after
pressing their husbands to intercede in favor of Liberius, were
advised to undertake a commission, which in their hands would be
less dangerous, and might prove more successful. The emperor
received with politeness these female deputies, whose wealth and
dignity were displayed in the magnificence of their dress and
ornaments: he admired their inflexible resolution of following
their beloved pastor to the most distant regions of the earth;
and consented that the two bishops, Liberius and F&aelig;lix,
should govern in peace their respective congregations. But the
ideas of toleration were so repugnant to the practice, and even
to the sentiments, of those times, that when the answer of
Constantius was publicly read in the Circus of Rome, so
reasonable a project of accommodation was rejected with contempt
and ridicule. The eager vehemence which animated the spectators
in the decisive moment of a horse-race, was now directed towards
a different object; and the Circus resounded with the shout of
thousands, who repeatedly exclaimed, "One God, One Christ, One
Bishop!" The zeal of the Roman people in the cause of Liberius
was not confined to words alone; and the dangerous and bloody
sedition which they excited soon after the departure of
Constantius determined that prince to accept the submission of
the exiled prelate, and to restore him to the undivided dominion
of the capital. After some ineffectual resistance, his rival was
expelled from the city by the permission of the emperor and the
power of the opposite faction; the adherents of F&aelig;lix were
inhumanly murdered in the streets, in the public places, in the
baths, and even in the churches; and the face of Rome, upon the
return of a Christian bishop, renewed the horrid image of the
massacres of Marius, and the proscriptions of Sylla.<br>
</p>

<p>II. Notwithstanding the rapid increase of Christians under the
reign of the Flavian family, Rome, Alexandria, and the other
great cities of the empire, still contained a strong and powerful
faction of Infidels, who envied the prosperity, and who
ridiculed, even in their theatres, the theological disputes of
the church. Constantinople alone enjoyed the advantage of being
born and educated in the bosom of the faith. The capital of the
East had never been polluted by the worship of idols; and the
whole body of the people had deeply imbibed the opinions, the
virtues, and the passions, which distinguished the Christians of
that age from the rest of mankind. After the death of Alexander,
the episcopal throne was disputed by Paul and Macedonius. By
their zeal and abilities they both deserved the eminent station
to which they aspired; and if the moral character of Macedonius
was less exceptionable, his competitor had the advantage of a
prior election and a more orthodox doctrine. His firm attachment
to the Nicene creed, which has given Paul a place in the calendar
among saints and martyrs, exposed him to the resentment of the
Arians. In the space of fourteen years he was five times driven
from his throne; to which he was more frequently restored by the
violence of the people, than by the permission of the prince; and
the power of Macedonius could be secured only by the death of his
rival. The unfortunate Paul was dragged in chains from the sandy
deserts of Mesopotamia to the most desolate places of Mount
Taurus, confined in a dark and narrow dungeon, left six days
without food, and at length strangled, by the order of Philip,
one of the principal ministers of the emperor Constantius. The
first blood which stained the new capital was spilt in this
ecclesiastical contest; and many persons were slain on both
sides, in the furious and obstinate seditions of the people. The
commission of enforcing a sentence of banishment against Paul had
been intrusted to Hermogenes, the master-general of the cavalry;
but the execution of it was fatal to himself. The Catholics rose
in the defence of their bishop; the palace of Hermogenes was
consumed; the first military officer of the empire was dragged by
the heels through the streets of Constantinople, and, after he
expired, his lifeless corpse was exposed to their wanton insults.
The fate of Hermogenes instructed Philip, the Pr&aelig;torian
pr&aelig;fect, to act with more precaution on a similar occasion.
In the most gentle and honorable terms, he required the
attendance of Paul in the baths of Zeuxippus, which had a private
communication with the palace and the sea. A vessel, which lay
ready at the garden stairs, immediately hoisted sail; and, while
the people were still ignorant of the meditated sacrilege, their
bishop was already embarked on his voyage to Thessalonica. They
soon beheld, with surprise and indignation, the gates of the
palace thrown open, and the usurper Macedonius seated by the side
of the pr&aelig;fect on a lofty chariot, which was surrounded by
troops of guards with drawn swords. The military procession
advanced towards the cathedral; the Arians and the Catholics
eagerly rushed to occupy that important post; and three thousand
one hundred and fifty persons lost their lives in the confusion
of the tumult. Macedonius, who was supported by a regular force,
obtained a decisive victory; but his reign was disturbed by
clamor and sedition; and the causes which appeared the least
connected with the subject of dispute, were sufficient to nourish
and to kindle the flame of civil discord. As the chapel in which
the body of the great Constantine had been deposited was in a
ruinous condition, the bishop transported those venerable remains
into the church of St. Acacius. This prudent and even pious
measure was represented as a wicked profanation by the whole
party which adhered to the Homoousian doctrine. The factions
immediately flew to arms, the consecrated ground was used as
their field of battle; and one of the ecclesiastical historians
has observed, as a real fact, not as a figure of rhetoric, that
the well before the church overflowed with a stream of blood,
which filled the porticos and the adjacent courts. The writer who
should impute these tumults solely to a religious principle,
would betray a very imperfect knowledge of human nature; yet it
must be confessed that the motive which misled the sincerity of
zeal, and the pretence which disguised the licentiousness of
passion, suppressed the remorse which, in another cause, would
have succeeded to the rage of the Christians at
Constantinople.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XXI: Persecution Of Heresy, State Of The
Church. -- Part VII.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>The cruel and arbitrary disposition of Constantius, which did
not always require the provocations of guilt and resistance, was
justly exasperated by the tumults of his capital, and the
criminal behavior of a faction, which opposed the authority and
religion of their sovereign. The ordinary punishments of death,
exile, and confiscation, were inflicted with partial vigor; and
the Greeks still revere the holy memory of two clerks, a reader,
and a sub-deacon, who were accused of the murder of Hermogenes,
and beheaded at the gates of Constantinople. By an edict of
Constantius against the Catholics which has not been judged
worthy of a place in the Theodosian code, those who refused to
communicate with the Arian bishops, and particularly with
Macedonius, were deprived of the immunities of ecclesiastics, and
of the rights of Christians; they were compelled to relinquish
the possession of the churches; and were strictly prohibited from
holding their assemblies within the walls of the city. The
execution of this unjust law, in the provinces of Thrace and Asia
Minor, was committed to the zeal of Macedonius; the civil and
military powers were directed to obey his commands; and the
cruelties exercised by this Semi-Arian tyrant in the support of
the <strong><em>Homoiousion</em></strong>, exceeded the
commission, and disgraced the reign, of Constantius. The
sacraments of the church were administered to the reluctant
victims, who denied the vocation, and abhorred the principles, of
Macedonius. The rites of baptism were conferred on women and
children, who, for that purpose, had been torn from the arms of
their friends and parents; the mouths of the communicants were
held open by a wooden engine, while the consecrated bread was
forced down their throat; the breasts of tender virgins were
either burnt with red-hot egg-shells, or inhumanly compressed
between sharp and heavy boards. The Novatians of Constantinople
and the adjacent country, by their firm attachment to the
Homoousian standard, deserved to be confounded with the Catholics
themselves. Macedonius was informed, that a large district of
Paphlagonia was almost entirely inhabited by those sectaries. He
resolved either to convert or to extirpate them; and as he
distrusted, on this occasion, the efficacy of an ecclesiastical
mission, he commanded a body of four thousand legionaries to
march against the rebels, and to reduce the territory of
Mantinium under his spiritual dominion. The Novatian peasants,
animated by despair and religious fury, boldly encountered the
invaders of their country; and though many of the Paphlagonians
were slain, the Roman legions were vanquished by an irregular
multitude, armed only with scythes and axes; and, except a few
who escaped by an ignominious flight, four thousand soldiers were
left dead on the field of battle. The successor of Constantius
has expressed, in a concise but lively manner, some of the
theological calamities which afflicted the empire, and more
especially the East, in the reign of a prince who was the slave
of his own passions, and of those of his eunuchs: "Many were
imprisoned, and persecuted, and driven into exile. Whole troops
of those who are styled heretics, were massacred, particularly at
Cyzicus, and at Samosata. In Paphlagonia, Bithynia, Galatia, and
in many other provinces, towns and villages were laid waste, and
utterly destroyed.<br>
</p>

<p>While the flames of the Arian controversy consumed the vitals
of the empire, the African provinces were infested by their
peculiar enemies, the savage fanatics, who, under the name of
<strong><em>Circumcellions</em></strong>, formed the strength and
scandal of the Donatist party. The severe execution of the laws
of Constantine had excited a spirit of discontent and resistance,
the strenuous efforts of his son Constans, to restore the unity
of the church, exasperated the sentiments of mutual hatred, which
had first occasioned the separation; and the methods of force and
corruption employed by the two Imperial commissioners, Paul and
Macarius, furnished the schismatics with a specious contrast
between the maxims of the apostles and the conduct of their
pretended successors. The peasants who inhabited the villages of
Numidia and Mauritania, were a ferocious race, who had been
imperfectly reduced under the authority of the Roman laws; who
were imperfectly converted to the Christian faith; but who were
actuated by a blind and furious enthusiasm in the cause of their
Donatist teachers. They indignantly supported the exile of their
bishops, the demolition of their churches, and the interruption
of their secret assemblies. The violence of the officers of
justice, who were usually sustained by a military guard, was
sometimes repelled with equal violence; and the blood of some
popular ecclesiastics, which had been shed in the quarrel,
inflamed their rude followers with an eager desire of revenging
the death of these holy martyrs. By their own cruelty and
rashness, the ministers of persecution sometimes provoked their
fate; and the guilt of an accidental tumult precipitated the
criminals into despair and rebellion. Driven from their native
villages, the Donatist peasants assembled in formidable gangs on
the edge of the Getulian desert; and readily exchanged the habits
of labor for a life of idleness and rapine, which was consecrated
by the name of religion, and faintly condemned by the doctors of
the sect. The leaders of the Circumcellions assumed the title of
captains of the saints; their principal weapon, as they were
indifferently provided with swords and spears, was a huge and
weighty club, which they termed an
<strong><em>Israelite</em></strong>; and the well-known sound of
"Praise be to God," which they used as their cry of war, diffused
consternation over the unarmed provinces of Africa. At first
their depredations were colored by the plea of necessity; but
they soon exceeded the measure of subsistence, indulged without
control their intemperance and avarice, burnt the villages which
they had pillaged, and reigned the licentious tyrants of the open
country. The occupations of husbandry, and the administration of
justice, were interrupted; and as the Circumcellions pretended to
restore the primitive equality of mankind, and to reform the
abuses of civil society, they opened a secure asylum for the
slaves and debtors, who flocked in crowds to their holy standard.
When they were not resisted, they usually contented themselves
with plunder, but the slightest opposition provoked them to acts
of violence and murder; and some Catholic priests, who had
imprudently signalized their zeal, were tortured by the fanatics
with the most refined and wanton barbarity. The spirit of the
Circumcellions was not always exerted against their defenceless
enemies; they engaged, and sometimes defeated, the troops of the
province; and in the bloody action of Bagai, they attacked in the
open field, but with unsuccessful valor, an advanced guard of the
Imperial cavalry. The Donatists who were taken in arms, received,
and they soon deserved, the same treatment which might have been
shown to the wild beasts of the desert. The captives died,
without a murmur, either by the sword, the axe, or the fire; and
the measures of retaliation were multiplied in a rapid
proportion, which aggravated the horrors of rebellion, and
excluded the hope of mutual forgiveness. In the beginning of the
present century, the example of the Circumcellions has been
renewed in the persecution, the boldness, the crimes, and the
enthusiasm of the Camisards; and if the fanatics of Languedoc
surpassed those of Numidia, by their military achievements, the
Africans maintained their fierce independence with more
resolution and perseverance.<br>
</p>

<p>Such disorders are the natural effects of religious tyranny,
but the rage of the Donatists was inflamed by a frenzy of a very
extraordinary kind; and which, if it really prevailed among them
in so extravagant a degree, cannot surely be paralleled in any
country or in any age. Many of these fanatics were possessed with
the horror of life, and the desire of martyrdom; and they deemed
it of little moment by what means, or by what hands, they
perished, if their conduct was sanctified by the intention of
devoting themselves to the glory of the true faith, and the hope
of eternal happiness. Sometimes they rudely disturbed the
festivals, and profaned the temples of Paganism, with the design
of exciting the most zealous of the idolaters to revenge the
insulted honor of their gods. They sometimes forced their way
into the courts of justice, and compelled the affrighted judge to
give orders for their immediate execution. They frequently
stopped travellers on the public highways, and obliged them to
inflict the stroke of martyrdom, by the promise of a reward, if
they consented, and by the threat of instant death, if they
refused to grant so very singular a favor. When they were
disappointed of every other resource, they announced the day on
which, in the presence of their friends and brethren, they should
east themselves headlong from some lofty rock; and many
precipices were shown, which had acquired fame by the number of
religious suicides. In the actions of these desperate
enthusiasts, who were admired by one party as the martyrs of God,
and abhorred by the other as the victims of Satan, an impartial
philosopher may discover the influence and the last abuse of that
inflexible spirit which was originally derived from the character
and principles of the Jewish nation.<br>
</p>

<p>The simple narrative of the intestine divisions, which
distracted the peace, and dishonored the triumph, of the church,
will confirm the remark of a Pagan historian, and justify the
complaint of a venerable bishop. The experience of Ammianus had
convinced him, that the enmity of the Christians towards each
other, surpassed the fury of savage beasts against man; and
Gregory Nazianzen most pathetically laments, that the kingdom of
heaven was converted, by discord, into the image of chaos, of a
nocturnal tempest, and of hell itself. The fierce and partial
writers of the times, ascribing <strong><em>all</em></strong>
virtue to themselves, and imputing <strong><em>all</em></strong>
guilt to their adversaries, have painted the battle of the angels
and d&aelig;mons. Our calmer reason will reject such pure and
perfect monsters of vice or sanctity, and will impute an equal,
or at least an indiscriminate, measure of good and evil to the
hostile sectaries, who assumed and bestowed the appellations of
orthodox and heretics. They had been educated in the same
religion and the same civil society. Their hopes and fears in the
present, or in a future life, were balanced in the same
proportion. On either side, the error might be innocent, the
faith sincere, the practice meritorious or corrupt. Their
passions were excited by similar objects; and they might
alternately abuse the favor of the court, or of the people. The
metaphysical opinions of the Athanasians and the Arians could not
influence their moral character; and they were alike actuated by
the intolerant spirit which has been extracted from the pure and
simple maxims of the gospel.<br>
</p>

<p>A modern writer, who, with a just confidence, has prefixed to
his own history the honorable epithets of political and
philosophical, accuses the timid prudence of Montesquieu, for
neglecting to enumerate, among the causes of the decline of the
empire, a law of Constantine, by which the exercise of the Pagan
worship was absolutely suppressed, and a considerable part of his
subjects was left destitute of priests, of temples, and of any
public religion. The zeal of the philosophic historian for the
rights of mankind, has induced him to acquiesce in the ambiguous
testimony of those ecclesiastics, who have too lightly ascribed
to their favorite hero the <strong><em>merit</em></strong> of a
general persecution. Instead of alleging this imaginary law,
which would have blazed in the front of the Imperial codes, we
may safely appeal to the original epistle, which Constantine
addressed to the followers of the ancient religion; at a time
when he no longer disguised his conversion, nor dreaded the
rivals of his throne. He invites and exhorts, in the most
pressing terms, the subjects of the Roman empire to imitate the
example of their master; but he declares, that those who still
refuse to open their eyes to the celestial light, may freely
enjoy their temples and their fancied gods. A report, that the
ceremonies of paganism were suppressed, is formally contradicted
by the emperor himself, who wisely assigns, as the principle of
his moderation, the invincible force of habit, of prejudice, and
of superstition. Without violating the sanctity of his promise,
without alarming the fears of the Pagans, the artful monarch
advanced, by slow and cautious steps, to undermine the irregular
and decayed fabric of polytheism. The partial acts of severity
which he occasionally exercised, though they were secretly
promoted by a Christian zeal, were colored by the fairest
pretences of justice and the public good; and while Constantine
designed to ruin the foundations, he seemed to reform the abuses,
of the ancient religion. After the example of the wisest of his
predecessors, he condemned, under the most rigorous penalties,
the occult and impious arts of divination; which excited the vain
hopes, and sometimes the criminal attempts, of those who were
discontented with their present condition. An ignominious silence
was imposed on the oracles, which had been publicly convicted of
fraud and falsehood; the effeminate priests of the Nile were
abolished; and Constantine discharged the duties of a Roman
censor, when he gave orders for the demolition of several temples
of Phnicia; in which every mode of prostitution was devoutly
practised in the face of day, and to the honor of Venus. The
Imperial city of Constantinople was, in some measure, raised at
the expense, and was adorned with the spoils, of the opulent
temples of Greece and Asia; the sacred property was confiscated;
the statues of gods and heroes were transported, with rude
familiarity, among a people who considered them as objects, not
of adoration, but of curiosity; the gold and silver were restored
to circulation; and the magistrates, the bishops, and the
eunuchs, improved the fortunate occasion of gratifying, at once,
their zeal, their avarice, and their resentment. But these
depredations were confined to a small part of the Roman world;
and the provinces had been long since accustomed to endure the
same sacrilegious rapine, from the tyranny of princes and
proconsuls, who could not be suspected of any design to subvert
the established religion.<br>
</p>

<p>The sons of Constantine trod in the footsteps of their father,
with more zeal, and with less discretion. The pretences of rapine
and oppression were insensibly multiplied; every indulgence was
shown to the illegal behavior of the Christians; every doubt was
explained to the disadvantage of Paganism; and the demolition of
the temples was celebrated as one of the auspicious events of the
reign of Constans and Constantius. The name of Constantius is
prefixed to a concise law, which might have superseded the
necessity of any future prohibitions. "It is our pleasure, that
in all places, and in all cities, the temples be immediately
shut, and carefully guarded, that none may have the power of
offending. It is likewise our pleasure, that all our subjects
should abstain from sacrifices. If any one should be guilty of
such an act, let him feel the sword of vengeance, and after his
execution, let his property be confiscated to the public use. We
denounce the same penalties against the governors of the
provinces, if they neglect to punish the criminals." But there is
the strongest reason to believe, that this formidable edict was
either composed without being published, or was published without
being executed. The evidence of facts, and the monuments which
are still extant of brass and marble, continue to prove the
public exercise of the Pagan worship during the whole reign of
the sons of Constantine. In the East, as well as in the West, in
cities, as well as in the country, a great number of temples were
respected, or at least were spared; and the devout multitude
still enjoyed the luxury of sacrifices, of festivals, and of
processions, by the permission, or by the connivance, of the
civil government. About four years after the supposed date of
this bloody edict, Constantius visited the temples of Rome; and
the decency of his behavior is recommended by a pagan orator as
an example worthy of the imitation of succeeding princes. "That
emperor," says Symmachus, "suffered the privileges of the vestal
virgins to remain inviolate; he bestowed the sacerdotal dignities
on the nobles of Rome, granted the customary allowance to defray
the expenses of the public rites and sacrifices; and, though he
had embraced a different religion, he never attempted to deprive
the empire of the sacred worship of antiquity." The senate still
presumed to consecrate, by solemn decrees, the divine memory of
their sovereigns; and Constantine himself was associated, after
his death, to those gods whom he had renounced and insulted
during his life. The title, the ensigns, the prerogatives, of
sovereign pontiff, which had been instituted by Numa, and assumed
by Augustus, were accepted, without hesitation, by seven
Christian emperors; who were invested with a more absolute
authority over the religion which they had deserted, than over
that which they professed.<br>
</p>

<p>The divisions of Christianity suspended the ruin of
<strong><em>Paganism</em></strong>; and the holy war against the
infidels was less vigorously prosecuted by princes and bishops,
who were more immediately alarmed by the guilt and danger of
domestic rebellion. The extirpation of
<strong><em>idolatry</em></strong> might have been justified by
the established principles of intolerance: but the hostile sects,
which alternately reigned in the Imperial court were mutually
apprehensive of alienating, and perhaps exasperating, the minds
of a powerful, though declining faction. Every motive of
authority and fashion, of interest and reason, now militated on
the side of Christianity; but two or three generations elapsed,
before their victorious influence was universally felt. The
religion which had so long and so lately been established in the
Roman empire was still revered by a numerous people, less
attached indeed to speculative opinion, than to ancient custom.
The honors of the state and army were indifferently bestowed on
all the subjects of Constantine and Constantius; and a
considerable portion of knowledge and wealth and valor was still
engaged in the service of polytheism. The superstition of the
senator and of the peasant, of the poet and the philosopher, was
derived from very different causes, but they met with equal
devotion in the temples of the gods. Their zeal was insensibly
provoked by the insulting triumph of a proscribed sect; and their
hopes were revived by the well-grounded confidence, that the
presumptive heir of the empire, a young and valiant hero, who had
delivered Gaul from the arms of the Barbarians, had secretly
embraced the religion of his ancestors.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XXII: Julian Declared
Emperor.</em></strong></p>

<p>Part I<br>
</p>

<p>Julian Is Declared Emperor By The Legions Of Gaul. -- His
March And Success. -- The Death Of Constantius. -- Civil
Administration Of Julian.<br>
</p>

<p>While the Romans languished under the ignominious tyranny of
eunuchs and bishops, the praises of Julian were repeated with
transport in every part of the empire, except in the palace of
Constantius. The barbarians of Germany had felt, and still
dreaded, the arms of the young C&aelig;sar; his soldiers were the
companions of his victory; the grateful provincials enjoyed the
blessings of his reign; but the favorites, who had opposed his
elevation, were offended by his virtues; and they justly
considered the friend of the people as the enemy of the court. As
long as the fame of Julian was doubtful, the buffoons of the
palace, who were skilled in the language of satire, tried the
efficacy of those arts which they had so often practised with
success. They easily discovered, that his simplicity was not
exempt from affectation: the ridiculous epithets of a hairy
savage, of an ape invested with the purple, were applied to the
dress and person of the philosophic warrior; and his modest
despatches were stigmatized as the vain and elaborate fictions of
a loquacious Greek, a speculative soldier, who had studied the
art of war amidst the groves of the academy. The voice of
malicious folly was at length silenced by the shouts of victory;
the conqueror of the Franks and Alemanni could no longer be
painted as an object of contempt; and the monarch himself was
meanly ambitious of stealing from his lieutenant the honorable
reward of his labors. In the letters crowned with laurel, which,
according to ancient custom, were addressed to the provinces, the
name of Julian was omitted. "Constantius had made his
dispositions in person; <strong><em>he</em></strong>had
signalized his valor in the foremost ranks;
<strong><em>his</em></strong> military conduct had secured the
victory; and the captive king of the barbarians was presented to
<strong><em>him</em></strong> on the field of battle," from which
he was at that time distant about forty days' journey. So
extravagant a fable was incapable, however, of deceiving the
public credulity, or even of satisfying the pride of the emperor
himself. Secretly conscious that the applause and favor of the
Romans accompanied the rising fortunes of Julian, his
discontented mind was prepared to receive the subtle poison of
those artful sycophants, who colored their mischievous designs
with the fairest appearances of truth and candor. Instead of
depreciating the merits of Julian, they acknowledged, and even
exaggerated, his popular fame, superior talents, and important
services. But they darkly insinuated, that the virtues of the
C&aelig;sar might instantly be converted into the most dangerous
crimes, if the inconstant multitude should prefer their
inclinations to their duty; or if the general of a victorious
army should be tempted from his allegiance by the hopes of
revenge and independent greatness. The personal fears of
Constantius were interpreted by his council as a laudable anxiety
for the public safety; whilst in private, and perhaps in his own
breast, he disguised, under the less odious appellation of fear,
the sentiments of hatred and envy, which he had secretly
conceived for the inimitable virtues of Julian.<br>
</p>

<p>The apparent tranquillity of Gaul, and the imminent danger of
the eastern provinces, offered a specious pretence for the design
which was artfully concerted by the Imperial ministers. They
resolved to disarm the C&aelig;sar; to recall those faithful
troops who guarded his person and dignity; and to employ, in a
distant war against the Persian monarch, the hardy veterans who
had vanquished, on the banks of the Rhine, the fiercest nations
of Germany. While Julian used the laborious hours of his winter
quarters at Paris in the administration of power, which, in his
hands, was the exercise of virtue, he was surprised by the hasty
arrival of a tribune and a notary, with positive orders, from the
emperor, which <strong><em>they</em></strong> were directed to
execute, and <strong><em>he</em></strong> was commanded not to
oppose. Constantius signified his pleasure, that four entire
legions, the Celt&aelig;, and Petulants, the Heruli, and the
Batavians, should be separated from the standard of Julian, under
which they had acquired their fame and discipline; that in each
of the remaining bands three hundred of the bravest youths should
be selected; and that this numerous detachment, the strength of
the Gallic army, should instantly begin their march, and exert
their utmost diligence to arrive, before the opening of the
campaign, on the frontiers of Persia. The C&aelig;sar foresaw and
lamented the consequences of this fatal mandate. Most of the
auxiliaries, who engaged their voluntary service, had stipulated,
that they should never be obliged to pass the Alps. The public
faith of Rome, and the personal honor of Julian, had been pledged
for the observance of this condition. Such an act of treachery
and oppression would destroy the confidence, and excite the
resentment, of the independent warriors of Germany, who
considered truth as the noblest of their virtues, and freedom as
the most valuable of their possessions. The legionaries, who
enjoyed the title and privileges of Romans, were enlisted for the
general defence of the republic; but those mercenary troops heard
with cold indifference the antiquated names of the republic and
of Rome. Attached, either from birth or long habit, to the
climate and manners of Gaul, they loved and admired Julian; they
despised, and perhaps hated, the emperor; they dreaded the
laborious march, the Persian arrows, and the burning deserts of
Asia. They claimed as their own the country which they had saved;
and excused their want of spirit, by pleading the sacred and more
immediate duty of protecting their families and friends. The
apprehensions of the Gauls were derived from the knowledge of the
impending and inevitable danger. As soon as the provinces were
exhausted of their military strength, the Germans would violate a
treaty which had been imposed on their fears; and notwithstanding
the abilities and valor of Julian, the general of a nominal army,
to whom the public calamities would be imputed, must find
himself, after a vain resistance, either a prisoner in the camp
of the barbarians, or a criminal in the palace of Constantius. If
Julian complied with the orders which he had received, he
subscribed his own destruction, and that of a people who deserved
his affection. But a positive refusal was an act of rebellion,
and a declaration of war. The inexorable jealousy of the emperor,
the peremptory, and perhaps insidious, nature of his commands,
left not any room for a fair apology, or candid interpretation;
and the dependent station of the C&aelig;sar scarcely allowed him
to pause or to deliberate. Solitude increased the perplexity of
Julian; he could no longer apply to the faithful counsels of
Sallust, who had been removed from his office by the judicious
malice of the eunuchs: he could not even enforce his
representations by the concurrence of the ministers, who would
have been afraid or ashamed to approve the ruin of Gaul. The
moment had been chosen, when Lupicinus, the general of the
cavalry, was despatched into Britain, to repulse the inroads of
the Scots and Picts; and Florentius was occupied at Vienna by the
assessment of the tribute. The latter, a crafty and corrupt
statesman, declining to assume a responsible part on this
dangerous occasion, eluded the pressing and repeated invitations
of Julian, who represented to him, that in every important
measure, the presence of the pr&aelig;fect was indispensable in
the council of the prince. In the mean while the C&aelig;sar was
oppressed by the rude and importunate solicitations of the
Imperial messengers, who presumed to suggest, that if he expected
the return of his ministers, he would charge himself with the
guilt of the delay, and reserve for them the merit of the
execution. Unable to resist, unwilling to comply, Julian
expressed, in the most serious terms, his wish, and even his
intention, of resigning the purple, which he could not preserve
with honor, but which he could not abdicate with safety.<br>
</p>

<p>After a painful conflict, Julian was compelled to acknowledge,
that obedience was the virtue of the most eminent subject, and
that the sovereign alone was entitled to judge of the public
welfare. He issued the necessary orders for carrying into
execution the commands of Constantius; a part of the troops began
their march for the Alps; and the detachments from the several
garrisons moved towards their respective places of assembly. They
advanced with difficulty through the trembling and affrighted
crowds of provincials, who attempted to excite their pity by
silent despair, or loud lamentations, while the wives of the
soldiers, holding their infants in their arms, accused the
desertion of their husbands, in the mixed language of grief, of
tenderness, and of indignation. This scene of general distress
afflicted the humanity of the C&aelig;sar; he granted a
sufficient number of post-wagons to transport the wives and
families of the soldiers, endeavored to alleviate the hardships
which he was constrained to inflict, and increased, by the most
laudable arts, his own popularity, and the discontent of the
exiled troops. The grief of an armed multitude is soon converted
into rage; their licentious murmurs, which every hour were
communicated from tent to tent with more boldness and effect,
prepared their minds for the most daring acts of sedition; and by
the connivance of their tribunes, a seasonable libel was secretly
dispersed, which painted in lively colors the disgrace of the
C&aelig;sar, the oppression of the Gallic army, and the feeble
vices of the tyrant of Asia. The servants of Constantius were
astonished and alarmed by the progress of this dangerous spirit.
They pressed the C&aelig;sar to hasten the departure of the
troops; but they imprudently rejected the honest and judicious
advice of Julian; who proposed that they should not march through
Paris, and suggested the danger and temptation of a last
interview.<br>
</p>

<p>As soon as the approach of the troops was announced, the
C&aelig;sar went out to meet them, and ascended his tribunal,
which had been erected in a plain before the gates of the city.
After distinguishing the officers and soldiers, who by their rank
or merit deserved a peculiar attention, Julian addressed himself
in a studied oration to the surrounding multitude: he celebrated
their exploits with grateful applause; encouraged them to accept,
with alacrity, the honor of serving under the eye of a powerful
and liberal monarch; and admonished them, that the commands of
Augustus required an instant and cheerful obedience. The
soldiers, who were apprehensive of offending their general by an
indecent clamor, or of belying their sentiments by false and
venal acclamations, maintained an obstinate silence; and after a
short pause, were dismissed to their quarters. The principal
officers were entertained by the C&aelig;sar, who professed, in
the warmest language of friendship, his desire and his inability
to reward, according to their deserts, the brave companions of
his victories. They retired from the feast, full of grief and
perplexity; and lamented the hardship of their fate, which tore
them from their beloved general and their native country. The
only expedient which could prevent their separation was boldly
agitated and approved the popular resentment was insensibly
moulded into a regular conspiracy; their just reasons of
complaint were heightened by passion, and their passions were
inflamed by wine; as, on the eve of their departure, the troops
were indulged in licentious festivity. At the hour of midnight,
the impetuous multitude, with swords, and bows, and torches in
their hands, rushed into the suburbs; encompassed the palace;
and, careless of future dangers, pronounced the fatal and
irrevocable words, Julian Augustus! The prince, whose anxious
suspense was interrupted by their disorderly acclamations,
secured the doors against their intrusion; and as long as it was
in his power, secluded his person and dignity from the accidents
of a nocturnal tumult. At the dawn of day, the soldiers, whose
zeal was irritated by opposition, forcibly entered the palace,
seized, with respectful violence, the object of their choice,
guarded Julian with drawn swords through the streets of Paris,
placed him on the tribunal, and with repeated shouts saluted him
as their emperor. Prudence, as well as loyalty, inculcated the
propriety of resisting their treasonable designs; and of
preparing, for his oppressed virtue, the excuse of violence.
Addressing himself by turns to the multitude and to individuals,
he sometimes implored their mercy, and sometimes expressed his
indignation; conjured them not to sully the fame of their
immortal victories; and ventured to promise, that if they would
immediately return to their allegiance, he would undertake to
obtain from the emperor not only a free and gracious pardon, but
even the revocation of the orders which had excited their
resentment. But the soldiers, who were conscious of their guilt,
chose rather to depend on the gratitude of Julian, than on the
clemency of the emperor. Their zeal was insensibly turned into
impatience, and their impatience into rage. The inflexible
C&aelig;sar sustained, till the third hour of the day, their
prayers, their reproaches, and their menaces; nor did he yield,
till he had been repeatedly assured, that if he wished to live,
he must consent to reign. He was exalted on a shield in the
presence, and amidst the unanimous acclamations, of the troops; a
rich military collar, which was offered by chance, supplied the
want of a diadem; the ceremony was concluded by the promise of a
moderate donative; and the new emperor, overwhelmed with real or
affected grief retired into the most secret recesses of his
apartment.<br>
</p>

<p>The grief of Julian could proceed only from his innocence; out
his innocence must appear extremely doubtful in the eyes of those
who have learned to suspect the motives and the professions of
princes. His lively and active mind was susceptible of the
various impressions of hope and fear, of gratitude and revenge,
of duty and of ambition, of the love of fame, and of the fear of
reproach. But it is impossible for us to calculate the respective
weight and operation of these sentiments; or to ascertain the
principles of action which might escape the observation, while
they guided, or rather impelled, the steps of Julian himself. The
discontent of the troops was produced by the malice of his
enemies; their tumult was the natural effect of interest and of
passion; and if Julian had tried to conceal a deep design under
the appearances of chance, he must have employed the most
consummate artifice without necessity, and probably without
success. He solemnly declares, in the presence of Jupiter, of the
Sun, of Mars, of Minerva, and of all the other deities, that till
the close of the evening which preceded his elevation, he was
utterly ignorant of the designs of the soldiers; and it may seem
ungenerous to distrust the honor of a hero and the truth of a
philosopher. Yet the superstitious confidence that Constantius
was the enemy, and that he himself was the favorite, of the gods,
might prompt him to desire, to solicit, and even to hasten the
auspicious moment of his reign, which was predestined to restore
the ancient religion of mankind. When Julian had received the
intelligence of the conspiracy, he resigned himself to a short
slumber; and afterwards related to his friends that he had seen
the genius of the empire waiting with some impatience at his
door, pressing for admittance, and reproaching his want of spirit
and ambition. Astonished and perplexed, he addressed his prayers
to the great Jupiter, who immediately signified, by a clear and
manifest omen, that he should submit to the will of heaven and of
the army. The conduct which disclaims the ordinary maxims of
reason, excites our suspicion and eludes our inquiry. Whenever
the spirit of fanaticism, at once so credulous and so crafty, has
insinuated itself into a noble mind, it insensibly corrodes the
vital principles of virtue and veracity.<br>
</p>

<p>To moderate the zeal of his party, to protect the persons of
his enemies, to defeat and to despise the secret enterprises
which were formed against his life and dignity, were the cares
which employed the first days of the reign of the new emperor.
Although he was firmly resolved to maintain the station which he
had assumed, he was still desirous of saving his country from the
calamities of civil war, of declining a contest with the superior
forces of Constantius, and of preserving his own character from
the reproach of perfidy and ingratitude. Adorned with the ensigns
of military and imperial pomp, Julian showed himself in the field
of Mars to the soldiers, who glowed with ardent enthusiasm in the
cause of their pupil, their leader, and their friend. He
recapitulated their victories, lamented their sufferings,
applauded their resolution, animated their hopes, and checked
their impetuosity; nor did he dismiss the assembly, till he had
obtained a solemn promise from the troops, that if the emperor of
the East would subscribe an equitable treaty, they would renounce
any views of conquest, and satisfy themselves with the tranquil
possession of the Gallic provinces. On this foundation he
composed, in his own name, and in that of the army, a specious
and moderate epistle, which was delivered to Pentadius, his
master of the offices, and to his chamberlain Eutherius; two
ambassadors whom he appointed to receive the answer, and observe
the dispositions of Constantius. This epistle is inscribed with
the modest appellation of C&aelig;sar; but Julian solicits in a
peremptory, though respectful, manner, the confirmation of the
title of Augustus. He acknowledges the irregularity of his own
election, while he justifies, in some measure, the resentment and
violence of the troops which had extorted his reluctant consent.
He allows the supremacy of his brother Constantius; and engages
to send him an annual present of Spanish horses, to recruit his
army with a select number of barbarian youths, and to accept from
his choice a Pr&aelig;torian pr&aelig;fect of approved discretion
and fidelity. But he reserves for himself the nomination of his
other civil and military officers, with the troops, the revenue,
and the sovereignty of the provinces beyond the Alps. He
admonishes the emperor to consult the dictates of justice; to
distrust the arts of those venal flatterers, who subsist only by
the discord of princes; and to embrace the offer of a fair and
honorable treaty, equally advantageous to the republic and to the
house of Constantine. In this negotiation Julian claimed no more
than he already possessed. The delegated authority which he had
long exercised over the provinces of Gaul, Spain, and Britain,
was still obeyed under a name more independent and august. The
soldiers and the people rejoiced in a revolution which was not
stained even with the blood of the guilty. Florentius was a
fugitive; Lupicinus a prisoner. The persons who were disaffected
to the new government were disarmed and secured; and the vacant
offices were distributed, according to the recommendation of
merit, by a prince who despised the intrigues of the palace, and
the clamors of the soldiers.<br>
</p>

<p>The negotiations of peace were accompanied and supported by
the most vigorous preparations for war. The army, which Julian
held in readiness for immediate action, was recruited and
augmented by the disorders of the times. The cruel persecutions
of the faction of Magnentius had filled Gaul with numerous bands
of outlaws and robbers. They cheerfully accepted the offer of a
general pardon from a prince whom they could trust, submitted to
the restraints of military discipline, and retained only their
implacable hatred to the person and government of Constantius. As
soon as the season of the year permitted Julian to take the
field, he appeared at the head of his legions; threw a bridge
over the Rhine in the neighborhood of Cleves; and prepared to
chastise the perfidy of the Attuarii, a tribe of Franks, who
presumed that they might ravage, with impunity, the frontiers of
a divided empire. The difficulty, as well as glory, of this
enterprise, consisted in a laborious march; and Julian had
conquered, as soon as he could penetrate into a country, which
former princes had considered as inaccessible. After he had given
peace to the Barbarians, the emperor carefully visited the
fortifications along the Rhine from Cleves to Basil; surveyed,
with peculiar attention, the territories which he had recovered
from the hands of the Alemanni, passed through Besan&ccedil;on,
which had severely suffered from their fury, and fixed his
headquarters at Vienna for the ensuing winter. The barrier of
Gaul was improved and strengthened with additional
fortifications; and Julian entertained some hopes that the
Germans, whom he had so often vanquished, might, in his absence,
be restrained by the terror of his name. Vadomair was the only
prince of the Alemanni whom he esteemed or feared and while the
subtle Barbarian affected to observe the faith of treaties, the
progress of his arms threatened the state with an unseasonable
and dangerous war. The policy of Julian condescended to surprise
the prince of the Alemanni by his own arts: and Vadomair, who, in
the character of a friend, had incautiously accepted an
invitation from the Roman governors, was seized in the midst of
the entertainment, and sent away prisoner into the heart of
Spain. Before the Barbarians were recovered from their amazement,
the emperor appeared in arms on the banks of the Rhine, and, once
more crossing the river, renewed the deep impressions of terror
and respect which had been already made by four preceding
expeditions.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XXII: Julian Declared Emperor. -- Part
II.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>The ambassadors of Julian had been instructed to execute, with
the utmost diligence, their important commission. But, in their
passage through Italy and Illyricum, they were detained by the
tedious and affected delays of the provincial governors; they
were conducted by slow journeys from Constantinople to
C&aelig;sarea in Cappadocia; and when at length they were
admitted to the presence of Constantius, they found that he had
already conceived, from the despatches of his own officers, the
most unfavorable opinion of the conduct of Julian, and of the
Gallic army. The letters were heard with impatience; the
trembling messengers were dismissed with indignation and
contempt; and the looks, gestures, the furious language of the
monarch, expressed the disorder of his soul. The domestic
connection, which might have reconciled the brother and the
husband of Helena, was recently dissolved by the death of that
princess, whose pregnancy had been several times fruitless, and
was at last fatal to herself. The empress Eusebia had preserved,
to the last moment of her life, the warm, and even jealous,
affection which she had conceived for Julian; and her mild
influence might have moderated the resentment of a prince, who,
since her death, was abandoned to his own passions, and to the
arts of his eunuchs. But the terror of a foreign invasion obliged
him to suspend the punishment of a private enemy: he continued
his march towards the confines of Persia, and thought it
sufficient to signify the conditions which might entitle Julian
and his guilty followers to the clemency of their offended
sovereign. He required, that the presumptuous C&aelig;sar should
expressly renounce the appellation and rank of Augustus, which he
had accepted from the rebels; that he should descend to his
former station of a limited and dependent minister; that he
should vest the powers of the state and army in the hands of
those officers who were appointed by the Imperial court; and that
he should trust his safety to the assurances of pardon, which
were announced by Epictetus, a Gallic bishop, and one of the
Arian favorites of Constantius. Several months were ineffectually
consumed in a treaty which was negotiated at the distance of
three thousand miles between Paris and Antioch; and, as soon as
Julian perceived that his modest and respectful behavior served
only to irritate the pride of an implacable adversary, he boldly
resolved to commit his life and fortune to the chance of a civil
war. He gave a public and military audience to the qu&aelig;stor
Leonas: the haughty epistle of Constantius was read to the
attentive multitude; and Julian protested, with the most
flattering deference, that he was ready to resign the title of
Augustus, if he could obtain the consent of those whom he
acknowledged as the authors of his elevation. The faint proposal
was impetuously silenced; and the acclamations of "Julian
Augustus, continue to reign, by the authority of the army, of the
people, of the republic which you have saved," thundered at once
from every part of the field, and terrified the pale ambassador
of Constantius. A part of the letter was afterwards read, in
which the emperor arraigned the ingratitude of Julian, whom he
had invested with the honors of the purple; whom he had educated
with so much care and tenderness; whom he had preserved in his
infancy, when he was left a helpless orphan. "An orphan!"
interrupted Julian, who justified his cause by indulging his
passions: "does the assassin of my family reproach me that I was
left an orphan? He urges me to revenge those injuries which I
have long studied to forget." The assembly was dismissed; and
Leonas, who, with some difficulty, had been protected from the
popular fury, was sent back to his master with an epistle, in
which Julian expressed, in a strain of the most vehement
eloquence, the sentiments of contempt, of hatred, and of
resentment, which had been suppressed and imbittered by the
dissimulation of twenty years. After this message, which might be
considered as a signal of irreconcilable war, Julian, who, some
weeks before, had celebrated the Christian festival of the
Epiphany, made a public declaration that he committed the care of
his safety to the Immortal Gods; and thus publicly renounced the
religion as well as the friendship of Constantius.<br>
</p>

<p>The situation of Julian required a vigorous and immediate
resolution. He had discovered, from intercepted letters, that his
adversary, sacrificing the interest of the state to that of the
monarch, had again excited the Barbarians to invade the provinces
of the West. The position of two magazines, one of them collected
on the banks of the Lake of Constance, the other formed at the
foot of the Cottian Alps, seemed to indicate the march of two
armies; and the size of those magazines, each of which consisted
of six hundred thousand quarters of wheat, or rather flour, was a
threatening evidence of the strength and numbers of the enemy who
prepared to surround him. But the Imperial legions were still in
their distant quarters of Asia; the Danube was feebly guarded;
and if Julian could occupy, by a sudden incursion, the important
provinces of Illyricum, he might expect that a people of soldiers
would resort to his standard, and that the rich mines of gold and
silver would contribute to the expenses of the civil war. He
proposed this bold enterprise to the assembly of the soldiers;
inspired them with a just confidence in their general, and in
themselves; and exhorted them to maintain their reputation of
being terrible to the enemy, moderate to their fellow-citizens,
and obedient to their officers. His spirited discourse was
received with the loudest acclamations, and the same troops which
had taken up arms against Constantius, when he summoned them to
leave Gaul, now declared with alacrity, that they would follow
Julian to the farthest extremities of Europe or Asia. The oath of
fidelity was administered; and the soldiers, clashing their
shields, and pointing their drawn swords to their throats,
devoted themselves, with horrid imprecations, to the service of a
leader whom they celebrated as the deliverer of Gaul and the
conqueror of the Germans. This solemn engagement, which seemed to
be dictated by affection rather than by duty, was singly opposed
by Nebridius, who had been admitted to the office of
Pr&aelig;torian pr&aelig;fect. That faithful minister, alone and
unassisted, asserted the rights of Constantius, in the midst of
an armed and angry multitude, to whose fury he had almost fallen
an honorable, but useless sacrifice. After losing one of his
hands by the stroke of a sword, he embraced the knees of the
prince whom he had offended. Julian covered the pr&aelig;fect
with his Imperial mantle, and, protecting him from the zeal of
his followers, dismissed him to his own house, with less respect
than was perhaps due to the virtue of an enemy. The high office
of Nebridius was bestowed on Sallust; and the provinces of Gaul,
which were now delivered from the intolerable oppression of
taxes, enjoyed the mild and equitable administration of the
friend of Julian, who was permitted to practise those virtues
which he had instilled into the mind of his pupil.<br>
</p>

<p>The hopes of Julian depended much less on the number of his
troops, than on the celerity of his motions. In the execution of
a daring enterprise, he availed himself of every precaution, as
far as prudence could suggest; and where prudence could no longer
accompany his steps, he trusted the event to valor and to
fortune. In the neighborhood of Basil he assembled and divided
his army. One body, which consisted of ten thousand men, was
directed under the command of Nevitta, general of the cavalry, to
advance through the midland parts of Rh&aelig;tia and Noricum. A
similar division of troops, under the orders of Jovius and
Jovinus, prepared to follow the oblique course of the highways,
through the Alps, and the northern confines of Italy. The
instructions to the generals were conceived with energy and
precision: to hasten their march in close and compact columns,
which, according to the disposition of the ground, might readily
be changed into any order of battle; to secure themselves against
the surprises of the night by strong posts and vigilant guards;
to prevent resistance by their unexpected arrival; to elude
examination by their sudden departure; to spread the opinion of
their strength, and the terror of his name; and to join their
sovereign under the walls of Sirmium. For himself Julian had
reserved a more difficult and extraordinary part. He selected
three thousand brave and active volunteers, resolved, like their
leader, to cast behind them every hope of a retreat; at the head
of this faithful band, he fearlessly plunged into the recesses of
the Marcian, or Black Forest, which conceals the sources of the
Danube; and, for many days, the fate of Julian was unknown to the
world. The secrecy of his march, his diligence, and vigor,
surmounted every obstacle; he forced his way over mountains and
morasses, occupied the bridges or swam the rivers, pursued his
direct course, without reflecting whether he traversed the
territory of the Romans or of the Barbarians, and at length
emerged, between Ratisbon and Vienna, at the place where he
designed to embark his troops on the Danube. By a well-concerted
stratagem, he seized a fleet of light brigantines, as it lay at
anchor; secured a apply of coarse provisions sufficient to
satisfy the indelicate, and voracious, appetite of a Gallic army;
and boldly committed himself to the stream of the Danube. The
labors of the mariners, who plied their oars with incessant
diligence, and the steady continuance of a favorable wind,
carried his fleet above seven hundred miles in eleven days; and
he had already disembarked his troops at Bononia, * only nineteen
miles from Sirmium, before his enemies could receive any certain
intelligence that he had left the banks of the Rhine. In the
course of this long and rapid navigation, the mind of Julian was
fixed on the object of his enterprise; and though he accepted the
deputations of some cities, which hastened to claim the merit of
an early submission, he passed before the hostile stations, which
were placed along the river, without indulging the temptation of
signalizing a useless and ill-timed valor. The banks of the
Danube were crowded on either side with spectators, who gazed on
the military pomp, anticipated the importance of the event, and
diffused through the adjacent country the fame of a young hero,
who advanced with more than mortal speed at the head of the
innumerable forces of the West. Lucilian, who, with the rank of
general of the cavalry, commanded the military powers of
Illyricum, was alarmed and perplexed by the doubtful reports,
which he could neither reject nor believe. He had taken some slow
and irresolute measures for the purpose of collecting his troops,
when he was surprised by Dagalaiphus, an active officer, whom
Julian, as soon as he landed at Bononia, had pushed forwards with
some light infantry. The captive general, uncertain of his life
or death, was hastily thrown upon a horse, and conducted to the
presence of Julian; who kindly raised him from the ground, and
dispelled the terror and amazement which seemed to stupefy his
faculties. But Lucilian had no sooner recovered his spirits, than
he betrayed his want of discretion, by presuming to admonish his
conqueror that he had rashly ventured, with a handful of men, to
expose his person in the midst of his enemies. "Reserve for your
master Constantius these timid remonstrances," replied Julian,
with a smile of contempt: "when I gave you my purple to kiss, I
received you not as a counsellor, but as a suppliant." Conscious
that success alone could justify his attempt, and that boldness
only could command success, he instantly advanced, at the head of
three thousand soldiers, to attack the strongest and most
populous city of the Illyrian provinces. As he entered the long
suburb of Sirmium, he was received by the joyful acclamations of
the army and people; who, crowned with flowers, and holding
lighted tapers in their hands, conducted their acknowledged
sovereign to his Imperial residence. Two days were devoted to the
public joy, which was celebrated by the games of the circus; but,
early on the morning of the third day, Julian marched to occupy
the narrow pass of Succi, in the defiles of Mount H&aelig;mus;
which, almost in the midway between Sirmium and Constantinople,
separates the provinces of Thrace and Dacia, by an abrupt descent
towards the former, and a gentle declivity on the side of the
latter. The defence of this important post was intrusted to the
brave Nevitta; who, as well as the generals of the Italian
division, successfully executed the plan of the march and
junction which their master had so ably conceived.<br>
</p>

<p>The homage which Julian obtained, from the fears or the
inclination of the people, extended far beyond the immediate
effect of his arms. The pr&aelig;fectures of Italy and Illyricum
were administered by Taurus and Florentius, who united that
important office with the vain honors of the consulship; and as
those magistrates had retired with precipitation to the court of
Asia, Julian, who could not always restrain the levity of his
temper, stigmatized their flight by adding, in all the Acts of
the Year, the epithet of <strong><em>fugitive</em></strong> to
the names of the two consuls. The provinces which had been
deserted by their first magistrates acknowledged the authority of
an emperor, who, conciliating the qualities of a soldier with
those of a philosopher, was equally admired in the camps of the
Danube and in the cities of Greece. From his palace, or, more
properly, from his head-quarters of Sirmium and Naissus, he
distributed to the principal cities of the empire, a labored
apology for his own conduct; published the secret despatches of
Constantius; and solicited the judgment of mankind between two
competitors, the one of whom had expelled, and the other had
invited, the Barbarians. Julian, whose mind was deeply wounded by
the reproach of ingratitude, aspired to maintain, by argument as
well as by arms, the superior merits of his cause; and to excel,
not only in the arts of war, but in those of composition. His
epistle to the senate and people of Athens seems to have been
dictated by an elegant enthusiasm; which prompted him to submit
his actions and his motives to the degenerate Athenians of his
own times, with the same humble deference as if he had been
pleading, in the days of Aristides, before the tribunal of the
Areopagus. His application to the senate of Rome, which was still
permitted to bestow the titles of Imperial power, was agreeable
to the forms of the expiring republic. An assembly was summoned
by Tertullus, pr&aelig;fect of the city; the epistle of Julian
was read; and, as he appeared to be master of Italy his claims
were admitted without a dissenting voice. His oblique censure of
the innovations of Constantine, and his passionate invective
against the vices of Constantius, were heard with less
satisfaction; and the senate, as if Julian had been present,
unanimously exclaimed, "Respect, we beseech you, the author of
your own fortune." An artful expression, which, according to the
chance of war, might be differently explained; as a manly reproof
of the ingratitude of the usurper, or as a flattering confession,
that a single act of such benefit to the state ought to atone for
all the failings of Constantius.<br>
</p>

<p>The intelligence of the march and rapid progress of Julian was
speedily transmitted to his rival, who, by the retreat of Sapor,
had obtained some respite from the Persian war. Disguising the
anguish of his soul under the semblance of contempt, Constantius
professed his intention of returning into Europe, and of giving
chase to Julian; for he never spoke of his military expedition in
any other light than that of a hunting party. In the camp of
Hierapolis, in Syria, he communicated this design to his army;
slightly mentioned the guilt and rashness of the C&aelig;sar; and
ventured to assure them, that if the mutineers of Gaul presumed
to meet them in the field, they would be unable to sustain the
fire of their eyes, and the irresistible weight of their shout of
onset. The speech of the emperor was received with military
applause, and Theodotus, the president of the council of
Hierapolis, requested, with tears of adulation, that his city
might be adorned with the head of the vanquished rebel. A chosen
detachment was despatched away in post-wagons, to secure, if it
were yet possible, the pass of Succi; the recruits, the horses,
the arms, and the magazines, which had been prepared against
Sapor, were appropriated to the service of the civil war; and the
domestic victories of Constantius inspired his partisans with the
most sanguine assurances of success. The notary Gaudentius had
occupied in his name the provinces of Africa; the subsistence of
Rome was intercepted; and the distress of Julian was increased by
an unexpected event, which might have been productive of fatal
consequences. Julian had received the submission of two legions
and a cohort of archers, who were stationed at Sirmium; but he
suspected, with reason, the fidelity of those troops which had
been distinguished by the emperor; and it was thought expedient,
under the pretence of the exposed state of the Gallic frontier,
to dismiss them from the most important scene of action. They
advanced, with reluctance, as far as the confines of Italy; but
as they dreaded the length of the way, and the savage fierceness
of the Germans, they resolved, by the instigation of one of their
tribunes, to halt at Aquileia, and to erect the banners of
Constantius on the walls of that impregnable city. The vigilance
of Julian perceived at once the extent of the mischief, and the
necessity of applying an immediate remedy. By his order, Jovinus
led back a part of the army into Italy; and the siege of Aquileia
was formed with diligence, and prosecuted with vigor. But the
legionaries, who seemed to have rejected the yoke of discipline,
conducted the defence of the place with skill and perseverance;
invited the rest of Italy to imitate the example of their courage
and loyalty; and threatened the retreat of Julian, if he should
be forced to yield to the superior numbers of the armies of the
East.<br>
</p>

<p>But the humanity of Julian was preserved from the cruel
alternative which he pathetically laments, of destroying or of
being himself destroyed: and the seasonable death of Constantius
delivered the Roman empire from the calamities of civil war. The
approach of winter could not detain the monarch at Antioch; and
his favorites durst not oppose his impatient desire of revenge. A
slight fever, which was perhaps occasioned by the agitation of
his spirits, was increased by the fatigues of the journey; and
Constantius was obliged to halt at the little town of Mopsucrene,
twelve miles beyond Tarsus, where he expired, after a short
illness, in the forty-fifth year of his age, and the
twenty-fourth of his reign. His genuine character, which was
composed of pride and weakness, of superstition and cruelty, has
been fully displayed in the preceding narrative of civil and
ecclesiastical events. The long abuse of power rendered him a
considerable object in the eyes of his contemporaries; but as
personal merit can alone deserve the notice of posterity, the
last of the sons of Constantine may be dismissed from the world,
with the remark, that he inherited the defects, without the
abilities, of his father. Before Constantius expired, he is said
to have named Julian for his successor; nor does it seem
improbable, that his anxious concern for the fate of a young and
tender wife, whom he left with child, may have prevailed, in his
last moments, over the harsher passions of hatred and revenge.
Eusebius, and his guilty associates, made a faint attempt to
prolong the reign of the eunuchs, by the election of another
emperor; but their intrigues were rejected with disdain, by an
army which now abhorred the thought of civil discord; and two
officers of rank were instantly despatched, to assure Julian,
that every sword in the empire would be drawn for his service.
The military designs of that prince, who had formed three
different attacks against Thrace, were prevented by this
fortunate event. Without shedding the blood of his
fellow-citizens, he escaped the dangers of a doubtful conflict,
and acquired the advantages of a complete victory. Impatient to
visit the place of his birth, and the new capital of the empire,
he advanced from Naissus through the mountains of H&aelig;mus,
and the cities of Thrace. When he reached Heraclea, at the
distance of sixty miles, all Constantinople was poured forth to
receive him; and he made his triumphal entry amidst the dutiful
acclamations of the soldiers, the people, and the senate. At
innumerable multitude pressed around him with eager respect and
were perhaps disappointed when they beheld the small stature and
simple garb of a hero, whose unexperienced youth had vanquished
the Barbarians of Germany, and who had now traversed, in a
successful career, the whole continent of Europe, from the shores
of the Atlantic to those of the Bosphorus. A few days afterwards,
when the remains of the deceased emperor were landed in the
harbor, the subjects of Julian applauded the real or affected
humanity of their sovereign. On foot, without his diadem, and
clothed in a mourning habit, he accompanied the funeral as far as
the church of the Holy Apostles, where the body was deposited:
and if these marks of respect may be interpreted as a selfish
tribute to the birth and dignity of his Imperial kinsman, the
tears of Julian professed to the world that he had forgot the
injuries, and remembered only the obligations, which he had
received from Constantius. As soon as the legions of Aquileia
were assured of the death of the emperor, they opened the gates
of the city, and, by the sacrifice of their guilty leaders,
obtained an easy pardon from the prudence or lenity of Julian;
who, in the thirty-second year of his age, acquired the
undisputed possession of the Roman empire.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XXII: Julian Declared Emperor. -- Part
III.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>Philosophy had instructed Julian to compare the advantages of
action and retirement; but the elevation of his birth, and the
accidents of his life, never allowed him the freedom of choice.
He might perhaps sincerely have preferred the groves of the
academy, and the society of Athens; but he was constrained, at
first by the will, and afterwards by the injustice, of
Constantius, to expose his person and fame to the dangers of
Imperial greatness; and to make himself accountable to the world,
and to posterity, for the happiness of millions. Julian
recollected with terror the observation of his master Plato, that
the government of our flocks and herds is always committed to
beings of a superior species; and that the conduct of nations
requires and deserves the celestial powers of the gods or of the
genii. From this principle he justly concluded, that the man who
presumes to reign, should aspire to the perfection of the divine
nature; that he should purify his soul from her mortal and
terrestrial part; that he should extinguish his appetites,
enlighten his understanding, regulate his passions, and subdue
the wild beast, which, according to the lively metaphor of
Aristotle, seldom fails to ascend the throne of a despot. The
throne of Julian, which the death of Constantius fixed on an
independent basis, was the seat of reason, of virtue, and perhaps
of vanity. He despised the honors, renounced the pleasures, and
discharged with incessant diligence the duties, of his exalted
station; and there were few among his subjects who would have
consented to relieve him from the weight of the diadem, had they
been obliged to submit their time and their actions to the
rigorous laws which that philosophic emperor imposed on himself.
One of his most intimate friends, who had often shared the frugal
simplicity of his table, has remarked, that his light and sparing
diet (which was usually of the vegetable kind) left his mind and
body always free and active, for the various and important
business of an author, a pontiff, a magistrate, a general, and a
prince. In one and the same day, he gave audience to several
ambassadors, and wrote, or dictated, a great number of letters to
his generals, his civil magistrates, his private friends, and the
different cities of his dominions. He listened to the memorials
which had been received, considered the subject of the petitions,
and signified his intentions more rapidly than they could be
taken in short-hand by the diligence of his secretaries. He
possessed such flexibility of thought, and such firmness of
attention, that he could employ his hand to write, his ear to
listen, and his voice to dictate; and pursue at once three
several trains of ideas without hesitation, and without error.
While his ministers reposed, the prince flew with agility from
one labor to another, and, after a hasty dinner, retired into his
library, till the public business, which he had appointed for the
evening, summoned him to interrupt the prosecution of his
studies. The supper of the emperor was still less substantial
than the former meal; his sleep was never clouded by the fumes of
indigestion; and except in the short interval of a marriage,
which was the effect of policy rather than love, the chaste
Julian never shared his bed with a female companion. He was soon
awakened by the entrance of fresh secretaries, who had slept the
preceding day; and his servants were obliged to wait alternately
while their indefatigable master allowed himself scarcely any
other refreshment than the change of occupation. The predecessors
of Julian, his uncle, his brother, and his cousin, indulged their
puerile taste for the games of the Circus, under the specious
pretence of complying with the inclinations of the people; and
they frequently remained the greatest part of the day as idle
spectators, and as a part of the splendid spectacle, till the
ordinary round of twenty-four races was completely finished. On
solemn festivals, Julian, who felt and professed an unfashionable
dislike to these frivolous amusements, condescended to appear in
the Circus; and after bestowing a careless glance at five or six
of the races, he hastily withdrew with the impatience of a
philosopher, who considered every moment as lost that was not
devoted to the advantage of the public or the improvement of his
own mind. By this avarice of time, he seemed to protract the
short duration of his reign; and if the dates were less securely
ascertained, we should refuse to believe, that only sixteen
months elapsed between the death of Constantius and the departure
of his successor for the Persian war. The actions of Julian can
only be preserved by the care of the historian; but the portion
of his voluminous writings, which is still extant, remains as a
monument of the application, as well as of the genius, of the
emperor. The Misopogon, the C&aelig;sars, several of his
orations, and his elaborate work against the Christian religion,
were composed in the long nights of the two winters, the former
of which he passed at Constantinople, and the latter at
Antioch.<br>
</p>

<p>The reformation of the Imperial court was one of the first and
most necessary acts of the government of Julian. Soon after his
entrance into the palace of Constantinople, he had occasion for
the service of a barber. An officer, magnificently dressed,
immediately presented himself. "It is a barber," exclaimed the
prince, with affected surprise, "that I want, and not a
receiver-general of the finances." He questioned the man
concerning the profits of his employment and was informed, that
besides a large salary, and some valuable perquisites, he enjoyed
a daily allowance for twenty servants, and as many horses. A
thousand barbers, a thousand cup-bearers, a thousand cooks, were
distributed in the several offices of luxury; and the number of
eunuchs could be compared only with the insects of a summer's
day. The monarch who resigned to his subjects the superiority of
merit and virtue, was distinguished by the oppressive
magnificence of his dress, his table, his buildings, and his
train. The stately palaces erected by Constantine and his sons,
were decorated with many colored marbles, and ornaments of massy
gold. The most exquisite dainties were procured, to gratify their
pride, rather than their taste; birds of the most distant
climates, fish from the most remote seas, fruits out of their
natural season, winter roses, and summer snows. The domestic
crowd of the palace surpassed the expense of the legions; yet the
smallest part of this costly multitude was subservient to the
use, or even to the splendor, of the throne. The monarch was
disgraced, and the people was injured, by the creation and sale
of an infinite number of obscure, and even titular employments;
and the most worthless of mankind might purchase the privilege of
being maintained, without the necessity of labor, from the public
revenue. The waste of an enormous household, the increase of fees
and perquisites, which were soon claimed as a lawful debt, and
the bribes which they extorted from those who feared their
enmity, or solicited their favor, suddenly enriched these haughty
menials. They abused their fortune, without considering their
past, or their future, condition; and their rapine and venality
could be equalled only by the extravagance of their dissipations.
Their silken robes were embroidered with gold, their tables were
served with delicacy and profusion; the houses which they built
for their own use, would have covered the farm of an ancient
consul; and the most honorable citizens were obliged to dismount
from their horses, and respectfully to salute a eunuch whom they
met on the public highway. The luxury of the palace excited the
contempt and indignation of Julian, who usually slept on the
ground, who yielded with reluctance to the indispensable calls of
nature; and who placed his vanity, not in emulating, but in
despising, the pomp of royalty.<br>
</p>

<p>By the total extirpation of a mischief which was magnified
even beyond its real extent, he was impatient to relieve the
distress, and to appease the murmurs of the people; who support
with less uneasiness the weight of taxes, if they are convinced
that the fruits of their industry are appropriated to the service
of the state. But in the execution of this salutary work, Julian
is accused of proceeding with too much haste and inconsiderate
severity. By a single edict, he reduced the palace of
Constantinople to an immense desert, and dismissed with ignominy
the whole train of slaves and dependants, without providing any
just, or at least benevolent, exceptions, for the age, the
services, or the poverty, of the faithful domestics of the
Imperial family. Such indeed was the temper of Julian, who seldom
recollected the fundamental maxim of Aristotle, that true virtue
is placed at an equal distance between the opposite vices. The
splendid and effeminate dress of the Asiatics, the curls and
paint, the collars and bracelets, which had appeared so
ridiculous in the person of Constantine, were consistently
rejected by his philosophic successor. But with the fopperies,
Julian affected to renounce the decencies of dress; and seemed to
value himself for his neglect of the laws of cleanliness. In a
satirical performance, which was designed for the public eye, the
emperor descants with pleasure, and even with pride, on the
length of his nails, and the inky blackness of his hands;
protests, that although the greatest part of his body was covered
with hair, the use of the razor was confined to his head alone;
and celebrates, with visible complacency, the shaggy and
<strong><em>populous</em></strong> beard, which he fondly
cherished, after the example of the philosophers of Greece. Had
Julian consulted the simple dictates of reason, the first
magistrate of the Romans would have scorned the affectation of
Diogenes, as well as that of Darius.<br>
</p>

<p>But the work of public reformation would have remained
imperfect, if Julian had only corrected the abuses, without
punishing the crimes, of his predecessor's reign. "We are now
delivered," says he, in a familiar letter to one of his intimate
friends, "we are now surprisingly delivered from the voracious
jaws of the Hydra. I do not mean to apply the epithet to my
brother Constantius. He is no more; may the earth lie light on
his head! But his artful and cruel favorites studied to deceive
and exasperate a prince, whose natural mildness cannot be praised
without some efforts of adulation. It is not, however, my
intention, that even those men should be oppressed: they are
accused, and they shall enjoy the benefit of a fair and impartial
trial." To conduct this inquiry, Julian named six judges of the
highest rank in the state and army; and as he wished to escape
the reproach of condemning his personal enemies, he fixed this
extraordinary tribunal at Chalcedon, on the Asiatic side of the
Bosphorus; and transferred to the commissioners an absolute power
to pronounce and execute their final sentence, without delay, and
without appeal. The office of president was exercised by the
venerable pr&aelig;fect of the East, a second Sallust, whose
virtues conciliated the esteem of Greek sophists, and of
Christian bishops. He was assisted by the eloquent Mamertinus,
one of the consuls elect, whose merit is loudly celebrated by the
doubtful evidence of his own applause. But the civil wisdom of
two magistrates was overbalanced by the ferocious violence of
four generals, Nevitta, Agilo, Jovinus, and Arbetio. Arbetio,
whom the public would have seen with less surprise at the bar
than on the bench, was supposed to possess the secret of the
commission; the armed and angry leaders of the Jovian and
Herculian bands encompassed the tribunal; and the judges were
alternately swayed by the laws of justice, and by the clamors of
faction.<br>
</p>

<p>The chamberlain Eusebius, who had so long abused the favor of
Constantius, expiated, by an ignominious death, the insolence,
the corruption, and cruelty of his servile reign. The executions
of Paul and Apodemius (the former of whom was burnt alive) were
accepted as an inadequate atonement by the widows and orphans of
so many hundred Romans, whom those legal tyrants had betrayed and
murdered. But justice herself (if we may use the pathetic
expression of Ammianus ) appeared to weep over the fate of
Ursulus, the treasurer of the empire; and his blood accused the
ingratitude of Julian, whose distress had been seasonably
relieved by the intrepid liberality of that honest minister. The
rage of the soldiers, whom he had provoked by his indiscretion,
was the cause and the excuse of his death; and the emperor,
deeply wounded by his own reproaches and those of the public,
offered some consolation to the family of Ursulus, by the
restitution of his confiscated fortunes. Before the end of the
year in which they had been adorned with the ensigns of the
prefecture and consulship, Taurus and Florentius were reduced to
implore the clemency of the inexorable tribunal of Chalcedon. The
former was banished to Vercell&aelig; in Italy, and a sentence of
death was pronounced against the latter. A wise prince should
have rewarded the crime of Taurus: the faithful minister, when he
was no longer able to oppose the progress of a rebel, had taken
refuge in the court of his benefactor and his lawful sovereign.
But the guilt of Florentius justified the severity of the judges;
and his escape served to display the magnanimity of Julian, who
nobly checked the interested diligence of an informer, and
refused to learn what place concealed the wretched fugitive from
his just resentment. Some months after the tribunal of Chalcedon
had been dissolved, the pr&aelig;torian vicegerent of Africa, the
notary Gaudentius, and Artemius duke of Egypt, were executed at
Antioch. Artemius had reigned the cruel and corrupt tyrant of a
great province; Gaudentius had long practised the arts of calumny
against the innocent, the virtuous, and even the person of Julian
himself. Yet the circumstances of their trial and condemnation
were so unskillfully managed, that these wicked men obtained, in
the public opinion, the glory of suffering for the obstinate
loyalty with which they had supported the cause of Constantius.
The rest of his servants were protected by a general act of
oblivion; and they were left to enjoy with impunity the bribes
which they had accepted, either to defend the oppressed, or to
oppress the friendless. This measure, which, on the soundest
principles of policy, may deserve our approbation, was executed
in a manner which seemed to degrade the majesty of the throne.
Julian was tormented by the importunities of a multitude,
particularly of Egyptians, who loudly redemanded the gifts which
they had imprudently or illegally bestowed; he foresaw the
endless prosecution of vexatious suits; and he engaged a promise,
which ought always to have been sacred, that if they would repair
to Chalcedon, he would meet them in person, to hear and determine
their complaints. But as soon as they were landed, he issued an
absolute order, which prohibited the watermen from transporting
any Egyptian to Constantinople; and thus detained his
disappointed clients on the Asiatic shore till, their patience
and money being utterly exhausted, they were obliged to return
with indignant murmurs to their native country.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XXII: Julian Declared Emperor. -- Part
IV.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>The numerous army of spies, of agents, and informers enlisted
by Constantius to secure the repose of one man, and to interrupt
that of millions, was immediately disbanded by his generous
successor. Julian was slow in his suspicions, and gentle in his
punishments; and his contempt of treason was the result of
judgment, of vanity, and of courage. Conscious of superior merit,
he was persuaded that few among his subjects would dare to meet
him in the field, to attempt his life, or even to seat themselves
on his vacant throne. The philosopher could excuse the hasty
sallies of discontent; and the hero could despise the ambitious
projects which surpassed the fortune or the abilities of the rash
conspirators. A citizen of Ancyra had prepared for his own use a
purple garment; and this indiscreet action, which, under the
reign of Constantius, would have been considered as a capital
offence, was reported to Julian by the officious importunity of a
private enemy. The monarch, after making some inquiry into the
rank and character of his rival, despatched the informer with a
present of a pair of purple slippers, to complete the
magnificence of his Imperial habit. A more dangerous conspiracy
was formed by ten of the domestic guards, who had resolved to
assassinate Julian in the field of exercise near Antioch. Their
intemperance revealed their guilt; and they were conducted in
chains to the presence of their injured sovereign, who, after a
lively representation of the wickedness and folly of their
enterprise, instead of a death of torture, which they deserved
and expected, pronounced a sentence of exile against the two
principal offenders. The only instance in which Julian seemed to
depart from his accustomed clemency, was the execution of a rash
youth, who, with a feeble hand, had aspired to seize the reins of
empire. But that youth was the son of Marcellus, the general of
cavalry, who, in the first campaign of the Gallic war, had
deserted the standard of the C&aelig;sar and the republic.
Without appearing to indulge his personal resentment, Julian
might easily confound the crime of the son and of the father; but
he was reconciled by the distress of Marcellus, and the
liberality of the emperor endeavored to heal the wound which had
been inflicted by the hand of justice.<br>
</p>

<p>Julian was not insensible of the advantages of freedom. From
his studies he had imbibed the spirit of ancient sages and
heroes; his life and fortunes had depended on the caprice of a
tyrant; and when he ascended the throne, his pride was sometimes
mortified by the reflection, that the slaves who would not dare
to censure his defects were not worthy to applaud his virtues. He
sincerely abhorred the system of Oriental despotism, which
Diocletian, Constantine, and the patient habits of fourscore
years, had established in the empire. A motive of superstition
prevented the execution of the design, which Julian had
frequently meditated, of relieving his head from the weight of a
costly diadem; but he absolutely refused the title of
<strong><em>Dominus</em></strong>, or
<strong><em>Lord</em></strong>, a word which was grown so
familiar to the ears of the Romans, that they no longer
remembered its servile and humiliating origin. The office, or
rather the name, of consul, was cherished by a prince who
contemplated with reverence the ruins of the republic; and the
same behavior which had been assumed by the prudence of Augustus
was adopted by Julian from choice and inclination. On the calends
of January, at break of day, the new consuls, Mamertinus and
Nevitta, hastened to the palace to salute the emperor. As soon as
he was informed of their approach, he leaped from his throne,
eagerly advanced to meet them, and compelled the blushing
magistrates to receive the demonstrations of his affected
humility. From the palace they proceeded to the senate. The
emperor, on foot, marched before their litters; and the gazing
multitude admired the image of ancient times, or secretly blamed
a conduct, which, in their eyes, degraded the majesty of the
purple. But the behavior of Julian was uniformly supported.
During the games of the Circus, he had, imprudently or
designedly, performed the manumission of a slave in the presence
of the consul. The moment he was reminded that he had trespassed
on the jurisdiction of <strong><em>another</em></strong>
magistrate, he condemned himself to pay a fine of ten pounds of
gold; and embraced this public occasion of declaring to the
world, that he was subject, like the rest of his fellow-citizens,
to the laws, and even to the forms, of the republic. The spirit
of his administration, and his regard for the place of his
nativity, induced Julian to confer on the senate of
Constantinople the same honors, privileges, and authority, which
were still enjoyed by the senate of ancient Rome. A legal fiction
was introduced, and gradually established, that one half of the
national council had migrated into the East; and the despotic
successors of Julian, accepting the title of Senators,
acknowledged themselves the members of a respectable body, which
was permitted to represent the majesty of the Roman name. From
Constantinople, the attention of the monarch was extended to the
municipal senates of the provinces. He abolished, by repeated
edicts, the unjust and pernicious exemptions which had withdrawn
so many idle citizens from the services of their country; and by
imposing an equal distribution of public duties, he restored the
strength, the splendor, or, according to the glowing expression
of Libanius, the soul of the expiring cities of his empire. The
venerable age of Greece excited the most tender compassion in the
mind of Julian, which kindled into rapture when he recollected
the gods, the heroes, and the men superior to heroes and to gods,
who have bequeathed to the latest posterity the monuments of
their genius, or the example of their virtues. He relieved the
distress, and restored the beauty, of the cities of Epirus and
Peloponnesus. Athens acknowledged him for her benefactor; Argos,
for her deliverer. The pride of Corinth, again rising from her
ruins with the honors of a Roman colony, exacted a tribute from
the adjacent republics, for the purpose of defraying the games of
the Isthmus, which were celebrated in the amphitheatre with the
hunting of bears and panthers. From this tribute the cities of
Elis, of Delphi, and of Argos, which had inherited from their
remote ancestors the sacred office of perpetuating the Olympic,
the Pythian, and the Nemean games, claimed a just exemption. The
immunity of Elis and Delphi was respected by the Corinthians; but
the poverty of Argos tempted the insolence of oppression; and the
feeble complaints of its deputies were silenced by the decree of
a provincial magistrate, who seems to have consulted only the
interest of the capital in which he resided. Seven years after
this sentence, Julian allowed the cause to be referred to a
superior tribunal; and his eloquence was interposed, most
probably with success, in the defence of a city, which had been
the royal seat of Agamemnon, and had given to Macedonia a race of
kings and conquerors.<br>
</p>

<p>The laborious administration of military and civil affairs,
which were multiplied in proportion to the extent of the empire,
exercised the abilities of Julian; but he frequently assumed the
two characters of Orator and of Judge, which are almost unknown
to the modern sovereigns of Europe. The arts of persuasion, so
diligently cultivated by the first C&aelig;sars, were neglected
by the military ignorance and Asiatic pride of their successors;
and if they condescended to harangue the soldiers, whom they
feared, they treated with silent disdain the senators, whom they
despised. The assemblies of the senate, which Constantius had
avoided, were considered by Julian as the place where he could
exhibit, with the most propriety, the maxims of a republican, and
the talents of a rhetorician. He alternately practised, as in a
school of declamation, the several modes of praise, of censure,
of exhortation; and his friend Libanius has remarked, that the
study of Homer taught him to imitate the simple, concise style of
Menelaus, the copiousness of Nestor, whose words descended like
the flakes of a winter's snow, or the pathetic and forcible
eloquence of Ulysses. The functions of a judge, which are
sometimes incompatible with those of a prince, were exercised by
Julian, not only as a duty, but as an amusement; and although he
might have trusted the integrity and discernment of his
Pr&aelig;torian pr&aelig;fects, he often placed himself by their
side on the seat of judgment. The acute penetration of his mind
was agreeably occupied in detecting and defeating the chicanery
of the advocates, who labored to disguise the truths of facts,
and to pervert the sense of the laws. He sometimes forgot the
gravity of his station, asked indiscreet or unseasonable
questions, and betrayed, by the loudness of his voice, and the
agitation of his body, the earnest vehemence with which he
maintained his opinion against the judges, the advocates, and
their clients. But his knowledge of his own temper prompted him
to encourage, and even to solicit, the reproof of his friends and
ministers; and whenever they ventured to oppose the irregular
sallies of his passions, the spectators could observe the shame,
as well as the gratitude, of their monarch. The decrees of Julian
were almost always founded on the principles of justice; and he
had the firmness to resist the two most dangerous temptations,
which assault the tribunal of a sovereign, under the specious
forms of compassion and equity. He decided the merits of the
cause without weighing the circumstances of the parties; and the
poor, whom he wished to relieve, were condemned to satisfy the
just demands of a wealthy and noble adversary. He carefully
distinguished the judge from the legislator; and though he
meditated a necessary reformation of the Roman jurisprudence, he
pronounced sentence according to the strict and literal
interpretation of those laws, which the magistrates were bound to
execute, and the subjects to obey.<br>
</p>

<p>The generality of princes, if they were stripped of their
purple, and cast naked into the world, would immediately sink to
the lowest rank of society, without a hope of emerging from their
obscurity. But the personal merit of Julian was, in some measure,
independent of his fortune. Whatever had been his choice of life,
by the force of intrepid courage, lively wit, and intense
application, he would have obtained, or at least he would have
deserved, the highest honors of his profession; and Julian might
have raised himself to the rank of minister, or general, of the
state in which he was born a private citizen. If the jealous
caprice of power had disappointed his expectations, if he had
prudently declined the paths of greatness, the employment of the
same talents in studious solitude would have placed beyond the
reach of kings his present happiness and his immortal fame. When
we inspect, with minute, or perhaps malevolent attention, the
portrait of Julian, something seems wanting to the grace and
perfection of the whole figure. His genius was less powerful and
sublime than that of C&aelig;sar; nor did he possess the
consummate prudence of Augustus. The virtues of Trajan appear
more steady and natural, and the philosophy of Marcus is more
simple and consistent. Yet Julian sustained adversity with
firmness, and prosperity with moderation. After an interval of
one hundred and twenty years from the death of Alexander Severus,
the Romans beheld an emperor who made no distinction between his
duties and his pleasures; who labored to relieve the distress,
and to revive the spirit, of his subjects; and who endeavored
always to connect authority with merit, and happiness with
virtue. Even faction, and religious faction, was constrained to
acknowledge the superiority of his genius, in peace as well as in
war, and to confess, with a sigh, that the apostate Julian was a
lover of his country, and that he deserved the empire of the
world.<br>
</p>

<p><strong>Chapter XXIII: Reign Of Julian.</strong></p>

<p><strong><em>Part I.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>The Religion Of Julian. -- Universal Toleration. -- He
Attempts To Restore And Reform The Pagan Worship -- To Rebuild
The Temple Of Jerusalem -- His Artful Persecution Of The
Christians. -- Mutual Zeal And Injustice.<br>
</p>

<p>The character of Apostate has injured the reputation of
Julian; and the enthusiasm which clouded his virtues has
exaggerated the real and apparent magnitude of his faults. Our
partial ignorance may represent him as a philosophic monarch, who
studied to protect, with an equal hand, the religious factions of
the empire; and to allay the theological fever which had inflamed
the minds of the people, from the edicts of Diocletian to the
exile of Athanasius. A more accurate view of the character and
conduct of Julian will remove this favorable prepossession for a
prince who did not escape the general contagion of the times. We
enjoy the singular advantage of comparing the pictures which have
been delineated by his fondest admirers and his implacable
enemies. The actions of Julian are faithfully related by a
judicious and candid historian, the impartial spectator of his
life and death. The unanimous evidence of his contemporaries is
confirmed by the public and private declarations of the emperor
himself; and his various writings express the uniform tenor of
his religious sentiments, which policy would have prompted him to
dissemble rather than to affect. A devout and sincere attachment
for the gods of Athens and Rome constituted the ruling passion of
Julian; the powers of an enlightened understanding were betrayed
and corrupted by the influence of superstitious prejudice; and
the phantoms which existed only in the mind of the emperor had a
real and pernicious effect on the government of the empire. The
vehement zeal of the Christians, who despised the worship, and
overturned the altars of those fabulous deities, engaged their
votary in a state of irreconcilable hostility with a very
numerous party of his subjects; and he was sometimes tempted by
the desire of victory, or the shame of a repulse, to violate the
laws of prudence, and even of justice. The triumph of the party,
which he deserted and opposed, has fixed a stain of infamy on the
name of Julian; and the unsuccessful apostate has been
overwhelmed with a torrent of pious invectives, of which the
signal was given by the sonorous trumpet of Gregory Nazianzen.
The interesting nature of the events which were crowded into the
short reign of this active emperor, deserve a just and
circumstantial narrative. His motives, his counsels, and his
actions, as far as they are connected with the history of
religion, will be the subject of the present chapter.<br>
</p>

<p>The cause of his strange and fatal apostasy may be derived
from the early period of his life, when he was left an orphan in
the hands of the murderers of his family. The names of Christ and
of Constantius, the ideas of slavery and of religion, were soon
associated in a youthful imagination, which was susceptible of
the most lively impressions. The care of his infancy was
intrusted to Eusebius, bishop of Nicomedia, who was related to
him on the side of his mother; and till Julian reached the
twentieth year of his age, he received from his Christian
preceptors the education, not of a hero, but of a saint. The
emperor, less jealous of a heavenly than of an earthly crown,
contented himself with the imperfect character of a catechumen,
while he bestowed the advantages of baptism on the nephews of
Constantine. They were even admitted to the inferior offices of
the ecclesiastical order; and Julian publicly read the Holy
Scriptures in the church of Nicomedia. The study of religion,
which they assiduously cultivated, appeared to produce the
fairest fruits of faith and devotion. They prayed, they fasted,
they distributed alms to the poor, gifts to the clergy, and
oblations to the tombs of the martyrs; and the splendid monument
of St. Mamas, at C&aelig;sarea, was erected, or at least was
undertaken, by the joint labor of Gallus and Julian. They
respectfully conversed with the bishops, who were eminent for
superior sanctity, and solicited the benediction of the monks and
hermits, who had introduced into Cappadocia the voluntary
hardships of the ascetic life. As the two princes advanced
towards the years of manhood, they discovered, in their religious
sentiments, the difference of their characters. The dull and
obstinate understanding of Gallus embraced, with implicit zeal,
the doctrines of Christianity; which never influenced his
conduct, or moderated his passions. The mild disposition of the
younger brother was less repugnant to the precepts of the gospel;
and his active curiosity might have been gratified by a
theological system, which explains the mysterious essence of the
Deity, and opens the boundless prospect of invisible and future
worlds. But the independent spirit of Julian refused to yield the
passive and unresisting obedience which was required, in the name
of religion, by the haughty ministers of the church. Their
speculative opinions were imposed as positive laws, and guarded
by the terrors of eternal punishments; but while they prescribed
the rigid formulary of the thoughts, the words, and the actions
of the young prince; whilst they silenced his objections, and
severely checked the freedom of his inquiries, they secretly
provoked his impatient genius to disclaim the authority of his
ecclesiastical guides. He was educated in the Lesser Asia, amidst
the scandals of the Arian controversy. The fierce contests of the
Eastern bishops, the incessant alterations of their creeds, and
the profane motives which appeared to actuate their conduct,
insensibly strengthened the prejudice of Julian, that they
neither understood nor believed the religion for which they so
fiercely contended. Instead of listening to the proofs of
Christianity with that favorable attention which adds weight to
the most respectable evidence, he heard with suspicion, and
disputed with obstinacy and acuteness, the doctrines for which he
already entertained an invincible aversion. Whenever the young
princes were directed to compose declamations on the subject of
the prevailing controversies, Julian always declared himself the
advocate of Paganism; under the specious excuse that, in the
defence of the weaker cause, his learning and ingenuity might be
more advantageously exercised and displayed.<br>
</p>

<p>As soon as Gallus was invested with the honors of the purple,
Julian was permitted to breathe the air of freedom, of
literature, and of Paganism. The crowd of sophists, who were
attracted by the taste and liberality of their royal pupil, had
formed a strict alliance between the learning and the religion of
Greece; and the poems of Homer, instead of being admired as the
original productions of human genius, were seriously ascribed to
the heavenly inspiration of Apollo and the muses. The deities of
Olympus, as they are painted by the immortal bard, imprint
themselves on the minds which are the least addicted to
superstitious credulity. Our familiar knowledge of their names
and characters, their forms and attributes,
<strong><em>seems</em></strong> to bestow on those airy beings a
real and substantial existence; and the pleasing enchantment
produces an imperfect and momentary assent of the imagination to
those fables, which are the most repugnant to our reason and
experience. In the age of Julian, every circumstance contributed
to prolong and fortify the illusion; the magnificent temples of
Greece and Asia; the works of those artists who had expressed, in
painting or in sculpture, the divine conceptions of the poet; the
pomp of festivals and sacrifices; the successful arts of
divination; the popular traditions of oracles and prodigies; and
the ancient practice of two thousand years. The weakness of
polytheism was, in some measure, excused by the moderation of its
claims; and the devotion of the Pagans was not incompatible with
the most licentious scepticism. Instead of an indivisible and
regular system, which occupies the whole extent of the believing
mind, the mythology of the Greeks was composed of a thousand
loose and flexible parts, and the servant of the gods was at
liberty to define the degree and measure of his religious faith.
The creed which Julian adopted for his own use was of the largest
dimensions; and, by strange contradiction, he disdained the
salutary yoke of the gospel, whilst he made a voluntary offering
of his reason on the altars of Jupiter and Apollo. One of the
orations of Julian is consecrated to the honor of Cybele, the
mother of the gods, who required from her effeminate priests the
bloody sacrifice, so rashly performed by the madness of the
Phrygian boy. The pious emperor condescends to relate, without a
blush, and without a smile, the voyage of the goddess from the
shores of Pergamus to the mouth of the Tyber, and the stupendous
miracle, which convinced the senate and people of Rome that the
lump of clay, which their ambassadors had transported over the
seas, was endowed with life, and sentiment, and divine power. For
the truth of this prodigy he appeals to the public monuments of
the city; and censures, with some acrimony, the sickly and
affected taste of those men, who impertinently derided the sacred
traditions of their ancestors.<br>
</p>

<p>But the devout philosopher, who sincerely embraced, and warmly
encouraged, the superstition of the people, reserved for himself
the privilege of a liberal interpretation; and silently withdrew
from the foot of the altars into the sanctuary of the temple. The
extravagance of the Grecian mythology proclaimed, with a clear
and audible voice, that the pious inquirer, instead of being
scandalized or satisfied with the literal sense, should
diligently explore the occult wisdom, which had been disguised,
by the prudence of antiquity, under the mask of folly and of
fable. The philosophers of the Platonic school, Plotinus,
Porphyry, and the divine Iamblichus, were admired as the most
skilful masters of this allegorical science, which labored to
soften and harmonize the deformed features of Paganism. Julian
himself, who was directed in the mysterious pursuit by
&AElig;desius, the venerable successor of Iamblichus, aspired to
the possession of a treasure, which he esteemed, if we may credit
his solemn asseverations, far above the empire of the world. It
was indeed a treasure, which derived its value only from opinion;
and every artist who flattered himself that he had extracted the
precious ore from the surrounding dross, claimed an equal right
of stamping the name and figure the most agreeable to his
peculiar fancy. The fable of Atys and Cybele had been already
explained by Porphyry; but his labors served only to animate the
pious industry of Julian, who invented and published his own
allegory of that ancient and mystic tale. This freedom of
interpretation, which might gratify the pride of the Platonists,
exposed the vanity of their art. Without a tedious detail, the
modern reader could not form a just idea of the strange
allusions, the forced etymologies, the solemn trifling, and the
impenetrable obscurity of these sages, who professed to reveal
the system of the universe. As the traditions of Pagan mythology
were variously related, the sacred interpreters were at liberty
to select the most convenient circumstances; and as they
translated an arbitrary cipher, they could extract from
<strong><em>any</em></strong> fable <strong><em>any</em></strong>
sense which was adapted to their favorite system of religion and
philosophy. The lascivious form of a naked Venus was tortured
into the discovery of some moral precept, or some physical truth;
and the castration of Atys explained the revolution of the sun
between the tropics, or the separation of the human soul from
vice and error.<br>
</p>

<p>The theological system of Julian appears to have contained the
sublime and important principles of natural religion. But as the
faith, which is not founded on revelation, must remain destitute
of any firm assurance, the disciple of Plato imprudently relapsed
into the habits of vulgar superstition; and the popular and
philosophic notion of the Deity seems to have been confounded in
the practice, the writings, and even in the mind of Julian. The
pious emperor acknowledged and adored the Eternal Cause of the
universe, to whom he ascribed all the perfections of an infinite
nature, invisible to the eyes and inaccessible to the
understanding, of feeble mortals. The Supreme God had created, or
rather, in the Platonic language, had generated, the gradual
succession of dependent spirits, of gods, of d&aelig;mons, of
heroes, and of men; and every being which derived its existence
immediately from the First Cause, received the inherent gift of
immortality. That so precious an advantage might be lavished upon
unworthy objects, the Creator had intrusted to the skill and
power of the inferior gods the office of forming the human body,
and of arranging the beautiful harmony of the animal, the
vegetable, and the mineral kingdoms. To the conduct of these
divine ministers he delegated the temporal government of this
lower world; but their imperfect administration is not exempt
from discord or error. The earth and its inhabitants are divided
among them, and the characters of Mars or Minerva, of Mercury or
Venus, may be distinctly traced in the laws and manners of their
peculiar votaries. As long as our immortal souls are confined in
a mortal prison, it is our interest, as well as our duty, to
solicit the favor, and to deprecate the wrath, of the powers of
heaven; whose pride is gratified by the devotion of mankind; and
whose grosser parts may be supposed to derive some nourishment
from the fumes of sacrifice. The inferior gods might sometimes
condescend to animate the statues, and to inhabit the temples,
which were dedicated to their honor. They might occasionally
visit the earth, but the heavens were the proper throne and
symbol of their glory. The invariable order of the sun, moon, and
stars, was hastily admitted by Julian, as a proof of their
<strong><em>eternal</em></strong>duration; and their eternity was
a sufficient evidence that they were the workmanship, not of an
inferior deity, but of the Omnipotent King. In the system of
Platonists, the visible was a type of the invisible world. The
celestial bodies, as they were informed by a divine spirit, might
be considered as the objects the most worthy of religious
worship. The Sun, whose genial influence pervades and sustains
the universe, justly claimed the adoration of mankind, as the
bright representative of the Logos, the lively, the rational, the
beneficent image of the intellectual Father.<br>
</p>

<p>In every age, the absence of genuine inspiration is supplied
by the strong illusions of enthusiasm, and the mimic arts of
imposture. If, in the time of Julian, these arts had been
practised only by the pagan priests, for the support of an
expiring cause, some indulgence might perhaps be allowed to the
interest and habits of the sacerdotal character. But it may
appear a subject of surprise and scandal, that the philosophers
themselves should have contributed to abuse the superstitious
credulity of mankind, and that the Grecian mysteries should have
been supported by the magic or theurgy of the modern Platonists.
They arrogantly pretended to control the order of nature, to
explore the secrets of futurity, to command the service of the
inferior d&aelig;mons, to enjoy the view and conversation of the
superior gods, and by disengaging the soul from her material
bands, to reunite that immortal particle with the Infinite and
Divine Spirit.<br>
</p>

<p>The devout and fearless curiosity of Julian tempted the
philosophers with the hopes of an easy conquest; which, from the
situation of their young proselyte, might be productive of the
most important consequences. Julian imbibed the first rudiments
of the Platonic doctrines from the mouth of &AElig;desius, who
had fixed at Pergamus his wandering and persecuted school. But as
the declining strength of that venerable sage was unequal to the
ardor, the diligence, the rapid conception of his pupil, two of
his most learned disciples, Chrysanthes and Eusebius, supplied,
at his own desire, the place of their aged master. These
philosophers seem to have prepared and distributed their
respective parts; and they artfully contrived, by dark hints and
affected disputes, to excite the impatient hopes of the
<strong><em>aspirant</em></strong>, till they delivered him into
the hands of their associate, Maximus, the boldest and most
skilful master of the Theurgic science. By his hands, Julian was
secretly initiated at Ephesus, in the twentieth year of his age.
His residence at Athens confirmed this unnatural alliance of
philosophy and superstition. He obtained the privilege of a
solemn initiation into the mysteries of Eleusis, which, amidst
the general decay of the Grecian worship, still retained some
vestiges of their prim&aelig;val sanctity; and such was the zeal
of Julian, that he afterwards invited the Eleusinian pontiff to
the court of Gaul, for the sole purpose of consummating, by
mystic rites and sacrifices, the great work of his
sanctification. As these ceremonies were performed in the depth
of caverns, and in the silence of the night, and as the
inviolable secret of the mysteries was preserved by the
discretion of the initiated, I shall not presume to describe the
horrid sounds, and fiery apparitions, which were presented to the
senses, or the imagination, of the credulous aspirant, till the
visions of comfort and knowledge broke upon him in a blaze of
celestial light. In the caverns of Ephesus and Eleusis, the mind
of Julian was penetrated with sincere, deep, and unalterable
enthusiasm; though he might sometimes exhibit the vicissitudes of
pious fraud and hypocrisy, which may be observed, or at least
suspected, in the characters of the most conscientious fanatics.
From that moment he consecrated his life to the service of the
gods; and while the occupations of war, of government, and of
study, seemed to claim the whole measure of his time, a stated
portion of the hours of the night was invariably reserved for the
exercise of private devotion. The temperance which adorned the
severe manners of the soldier and the philosopher was connected
with some strict and frivolous rules of religious abstinence; and
it was in honor of Pan or Mercury, of Hecate or Isis, that
Julian, on particular days, denied himself the use of some
particular food, which might have been offensive to his tutelar
deities. By these voluntary fasts, he prepared his senses and his
understanding for the frequent and familiar visits with which he
was honored by the celestial powers. Notwithstanding the modest
silence of Julian himself, we may learn from his faithful friend,
the orator Libanius, that he lived in a perpetual intercourse
with the gods and goddesses; that they descended upon earth to
enjoy the conversation of their favorite hero; that they gently
interrupted his slumbers by touching his hand or his hair; that
they warned him of every impending danger, and conducted him, by
their infallible wisdom, in every action of his life; and that he
had acquired such an intimate knowledge of his heavenly guests,
as readily to distinguish the voice of Jupiter from that of
Minerva, and the form of Apollo from the figure of Hercules.
These sleeping or waking visions, the ordinary effects of
abstinence and fanaticism, would almost degrade the emperor to
the level of an Egyptian monk. But the useless lives of Antony or
Pachomius were consumed in these vain occupations. Julian could
break from the dream of superstition to arm himself for battle;
and after vanquishing in the field the enemies of Rome, he calmly
retired into his tent, to dictate the wise and salutary laws of
an empire, or to indulge his genius in the elegant pursuits of
literature and philosophy.<br>
</p>

<p>The important secret of the apostasy of Julian was intrusted
to the fidelity of the <strong><em>initiated</em></strong>, with
whom he was united by the sacred ties of friendship and religion.
The pleasing rumor was cautiously circulated among the adherents
of the ancient worship; and his future greatness became the
object of the hopes, the prayers, and the predictions of the
Pagans, in every province of the empire. From the zeal and
virtues of their royal proselyte, they fondly expected the cure
of every evil, and the restoration of every blessing; and instead
of disapproving of the ardor of their pious wishes, Julian
ingenuously confessed, that he was ambitious to attain a
situation in which he might be useful to his country and to his
religion. But this religion was viewed with a hostile eye by the
successor of Constantine, whose capricious passions alternately
saved and threatened the life of Julian. The arts of magic and
divination were strictly prohibited under a despotic government,
which condescended to fear them; and if the Pagans were
reluctantly indulged in the exercise of their superstition, the
rank of Julian would have excepted him from the general
toleration. The apostate soon became the presumptive heir of the
monarchy, and his death could alone have appeased the just
apprehensions of the Christians. But the young prince, who
aspired to the glory of a hero rather than of a martyr, consulted
his safety by dissembling his religion; and the easy temper of
polytheism permitted him to join in the public worship of a sect
which he inwardly despised. Libanius has considered the hypocrisy
of his friend as a subject, not of censure, but of praise. "As
the statues of the gods," says that orator, "which have been
defiled with filth, are again placed in a magnificent temple, so
the beauty of truth was seated in the mind of Julian, after it
had been purified from the errors and follies of his education.
His sentiments were changed; but as it would have been dangerous
to have avowed his sentiments, his conduct still continued the
same. Very different from the ass in &AElig;sop, who disguised
himself with a lion's hide, our lion was obliged to conceal
himself under the skin of an ass; and, while he embraced the
dictates of reason, to obey the laws of prudence and necessity."
The dissimulation of Julian lasted about ten years, from his
secret initiation at Ephesus to the beginning of the civil war;
when he declared himself at once the implacable enemy of Christ
and of Constantius. This state of constraint might contribute to
strengthen his devotion; and as soon as he had satisfied the
obligation of assisting, on solemn festivals, at the assemblies
of the Christians, Julian returned, with the impatience of a
lover, to burn his free and voluntary incense on the domestic
chapels of Jupiter and Mercury. But as every act of dissimulation
must be painful to an ingenuous spirit, the profession of
Christianity increased the aversion of Julian for a religion
which oppressed the freedom of his mind, and compelled him to
hold a conduct repugnant to the noblest attributes of human
nature, sincerity and courage.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XXIII: Reign Of Julian. -- Part
II.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>The inclination of Julian might prefer the gods of Homer, and
of the Scipios, to the new faith, which his uncle had established
in the Roman empire; and in which he himself had been sanctified
by the sacrament of baptism. But, as a philosopher, it was
incumbent on him to justify his dissent from Christianity, which
was supported by the number of its converts, by the chain of
prophecy, the splendor of or miracles, and the weight of
evidence. The elaborate work, which he composed amidst the
preparations of the Persian war, contained the substance of those
arguments which he had long revolved in his mind. Some fragments
have been transcribed and preserved, by his adversary, the
vehement Cyril of Alexandria; and they exhibit a very singular
mixture of wit and learning, of sophistry and fanaticism. The
elegance of the style and the rank of the author, recommended his
writings to the public attention; and in the impious list of the
enemies of Christianity, the celebrated name of Porphyry was
effaced by the superior merit or reputation of Julian. The minds
of the faithful were either seduced, or scandalized, or alarmed;
and the pagans, who sometimes presumed to engage in the unequal
dispute, derived, from the popular work of their Imperial
missionary, an inexhaustible supply of fallacious objections. But
in the assiduous prosecution of these theological studies, the
emperor of the Romans imbibed the illiberal prejudices and
passions of a polemic divine. He contracted an irrevocable
obligation to maintain and propagate his religious opinions; and
whilst he secretly applauded the strength and dexterity with
which he wielded the weapons of controversy, he was tempted to
distrust the sincerity, or to despise the understandings, of his
antagonists, who could obstinately resist the force of reason and
eloquence.<br>
</p>

<p>The Christians, who beheld with horror and indignation the
apostasy of Julian, had much more to fear from his power than
from his arguments. The pagans, who were conscious of his fervent
zeal, expected, perhaps with impatience, that the flames of
persecution should be immediately kindled against the enemies of
the gods; and that the ingenious malice of Julian would invent
some cruel refinements of death and torture which had been
unknown to the rude and inexperienced fury of his predecessors.
But the hopes, as well as the fears, of the religious factions
were apparently disappointed, by the prudent humanity of a
prince, who was careful of his own fame, of the public peace, and
of the rights of mankind. Instructed by history and reflection,
Julian was persuaded, that if the diseases of the body may
sometimes be cured by salutary violence, neither steel nor fire
can eradicate the erroneous opinions of the mind. The reluctant
victim may be dragged to the foot of the altar; but the heart
still abhors and disclaims the sacrilegious act of the hand.
Religious obstinacy is hardened and exasperated by oppression;
and, as soon as the persecution subsides, those who have yielded
are restored as penitents, and those who have resisted are
honored as saints and martyrs. If Julian adopted the unsuccessful
cruelty of Diocletian and his colleagues, he was sensible that he
should stain his memory with the name of a tyrant, and add new
glories to the Catholic church, which had derived strength and
increase from the severity of the pagan magistrates. Actuated by
these motives, and apprehensive of disturbing the repose of an
unsettled reign, Julian surprised the world by an edict, which
was not unworthy of a statesman, or a philosopher. He extended to
all the inhabitants of the Roman world the benefits of a free and
equal toleration; and the only hardship which he inflicted on the
Christians, was to deprive them of the power of tormenting their
fellow-subjects, whom they stigmatized with the odious titles of
idolaters and heretics. The pagans received a gracious
permission, or rather an express order, to open All their
temples; and they were at once delivered from the oppressive
laws, and arbitrary vexations, which they had sustained under the
reign of Constantine, and of his sons. At the same time the
bishops and clergy, who had been banished by the Arian monarch,
were recalled from exile, and restored to their respective
churches; the Donatists, the Novatians, the Macedonians, the
Eunomians, and those who, with a more prosperous fortune, adhered
to the doctrine of the Council of Nice. Julian, who understood
and derided their theological disputes, invited to the palace the
leaders of the hostile sects, that he might enjoy the agreeable
spectacle of their furious encounters. The clamor of controversy
sometimes provoked the emperor to exclaim, "Hear me! the Franks
have heard me, and the Alemanni;" but he soon discovered that he
was now engaged with more obstinate and implacable enemies; and
though he exerted the powers of oratory to persuade them to live
in concord, or at least in peace, he was perfectly satisfied,
before he dismissed them from his presence, that he had nothing
to dread from the union of the Christians. The impartial Ammianus
has ascribed this affected clemency to the desire of fomenting
the intestine divisions of the church, and the insidious design
of undermining the foundations of Christianity, was inseparably
connected with the zeal which Julian professed, to restore the
ancient religion of the empire.<br>
</p>

<p>As soon as he ascended the throne, he assumed, according to
the custom of his predecessors, the character of supreme pontiff;
not only as the most honorable title of Imperial greatness, but
as a sacred and important office; the duties of which he was
resolved to execute with pious diligence. As the business of the
state prevented the emperor from joining every day in the public
devotion of his subjects, he dedicated a domestic chapel to his
tutelar deity the Sun; his gardens were filled with statues and
altars of the gods; and each apartment of the palace displaced
the appearance of a magnificent temple. Every morning he saluted
the parent of light with a sacrifice; the blood of another victim
was shed at the moment when the Sun sunk below the horizon; and
the Moon, the Stars, and the Genii of the night received their
respective and seasonable honors from the indefatigable devotion
of Julian. On solemn festivals, he regularly visited the temple
of the god or goddess to whom the day was peculiarly consecrated,
and endeavored to excite the religion of the magistrates and
people by the example of his own zeal. Instead of maintaining the
lofty state of a monarch, distinguished by the splendor of his
purple, and encompassed by the golden shields of his guards,
Julian solicited, with respectful eagerness, the meanest offices
which contributed to the worship of the gods. Amidst the sacred
but licentious crowd of priests, of inferior ministers, and of
female dancers, who were dedicated to the service of the temple,
it was the business of the emperor to bring the wood, to blow the
fire, to handle the knife, to slaughter the victim, and,
thrusting his bloody hands into the bowels of the expiring
animal, to draw forth the heart or liver, and to read, with the
consummate skill of an haruspex, imaginary signs of future
events. The wisest of the Pagans censured this extravagant
superstition, which affected to despise the restraints of
prudence and decency. Under the reign of a prince, who practised
the rigid maxims of economy, the expense of religious worship
consumed a very large portion of the revenue a constant supply of
the scarcest and most beautiful birds was transported from
distant climates, to bleed on the altars of the gods; a hundred
oxen were frequently sacrificed by Julian on one and the same
day; and it soon became a popular jest, that if he should return
with conquest from the Persian war, the breed of horned cattle
must infallibly be extinguished. Yet this expense may appear
inconsiderable, when it is compared with the splendid presents
which were offered either by the hand, or by order, of the
emperor, to all the celebrated places of devotion in the Roman
world; and with the sums allotted to repair and decorate the
ancient temples, which had suffered the silent decay of time, or
the recent injuries of Christian rapine. Encouraged by the
example, the exhortations, the liberality, of their pious
sovereign, the cities and families resumed the practice of their
neglected ceremonies. "Every part of the world," exclaims
Libanius, with devout transport, "displayed the triumph of
religion; and the grateful prospect of flaming altars, bleeding
victims, the smoke of incense, and a solemn train of priests and
prophets, without fear and without danger. The sound of prayer
and of music was heard on the tops of the highest mountains; and
the same ox afforded a sacrifice for the gods, and a supper for
their joyous votaries."<br>
</p>

<p>But the genius and power of Julian were unequal to the
enterprise of restoring a religion which was destitute of
theological principles, of moral precepts, and of ecclesiastical
discipline; which rapidly hastened to decay and dissolution, and
was not susceptible of any solid or consistent reformation. The
jurisdiction of the supreme pontiff, more especially after that
office had been united with the Imperial dignity, comprehended
the whole extent of the Roman empire. Julian named for his
vicars, in the several provinces, the priests and philosophers
whom he esteemed the best qualified to cooperate in the execution
of his great design; and his pastoral letters, if we may use that
name, still represent a very curious sketch of his wishes and
intentions. He directs, that in every city the sacerdotal order
should be composed, without any distinction of birth and fortune,
of those persons who were the most conspicuous for the love of
the gods, and of men. "If they are guilty," continues he, "of any
scandalous offence, they should be censured or degraded by the
superior pontiff; but as long as they retain their rank, they are
entitled to the respect of the magistrates and people. Their
humility may be shown in the plainness of their domestic garb;
their dignity, in the pomp of holy vestments. When they are
summoned in their turn to officiate before the altar, they ought
not, during the appointed number of days, to depart from the
precincts of the temple; nor should a single day be suffered to
elapse, without the prayers and the sacrifice, which they are
obliged to offer for the prosperity of the state, and of
individuals. The exercise of their sacred functions requires an
immaculate purity, both of mind and body; and even when they are
dismissed from the temple to the occupations of common life, it
is incumbent on them to excel in decency and virtue the rest of
their fellow-citizens. The priest of the gods should never be
seen in theatres or taverns. His conversation should be chaste,
his diet temperate, his friends of honorable reputation; and if
he sometimes visits the Forum or the Palace, he should appear
only as the advocate of those who have vainly solicited either
justice or mercy. His studies should be suited to the sanctity of
his profession. Licentious tales, or comedies, or satires, must
be banished from his library, which ought solely to consist of
historical or philosophical writings; of history, which is
founded in truth, and of philosophy, which is connected with
religion. The impious opinions of the Epicureans and sceptics
deserve his abhorrence and contempt; but he should diligently
study the systems of Pythagoras, of Plato, and of the Stoics,
which unanimously teach that there <strong><em>are</em></strong>
gods; that the world is governed by their providence; that their
goodness is the source of every temporal blessing; and that they
have prepared for the human soul a future state of reward or
punishment." The Imperial pontiff inculcates, in the most
persuasive language, the duties of benevolence and hospitality;
exhorts his inferior clergy to recommend the universal practice
of those virtues; promises to assist their indigence from the
public treasury; and declares his resolution of establishing
hospitals in every city, where the poor should be received
without any invidious distinction of country or of religion.
Julian beheld with envy the wise and humane regulations of the
church; and he very frankly confesses his intention to deprive
the Christians of the applause, as well as advantage, which they
had acquired by the exclusive practice of charity and
beneficence. The same spirit of imitation might dispose the
emperor to adopt several ecclesiastical institutions, the use and
importance of which were approved by the success of his enemies.
But if these imaginary plans of reformation had been realized,
the forced and imperfect copy would have been less beneficial to
Paganism, than honorable to Christianity. The Gentiles, who
peaceably followed the customs of their ancestors, were rather
surprised than pleased with the introduction of foreign manners;
and in the short period of his reign, Julian had frequent
occasions to complain of the want of fervor of his own party.<br>
</p>

<p>The enthusiasm of Julian prompted him to embrace the friends
of Jupiter as his personal friends and brethren; and though he
partially overlooked the merit of Christian constancy, he admired
and rewarded the noble perseverance of those Gentiles who had
preferred the favor of the gods to that of the emperor. If they
cultivated the literature, as well as the religion, of the
Greeks, they acquired an additional claim to the friendship of
Julian, who ranked the Muses in the number of his tutelar
deities. In the religion which he had adopted, piety and learning
were almost synonymous; and a crowd of poets, of rhetoricians,
and of philosophers, hastened to the Imperial court, to occupy
the vacant places of the bishops, who had seduced the credulity
of Constantius. His successor esteemed the ties of common
initiation as far more sacred than those of consanguinity; he
chose his favorites among the sages, who were deeply skilled in
the occult sciences of magic and divination; and every impostor,
who pretended to reveal the secrets of futurity, was assured of
enjoying the present hour in honor and affluence. Among the
philosophers, Maximus obtained the most eminent rank in the
friendship of his royal disciple, who communicated, with
unreserved confidence, his actions, his sentiments, and his
religious designs, during the anxious suspense of the civil war.
As soon as Julian had taken possession of the palace of
Constantinople, he despatched an honorable and pressing
invitation to Maximus, who then resided at Sardes in Lydia, with
Chrysanthius, the associate of his art and studies. The prudent
and superstitious Chrysanthius refused to undertake a journey
which showed itself, according to the rules of divination, with
the most threatening and malignant aspect: but his companion,
whose fanaticism was of a bolder cast, persisted in his
interrogations, till he had extorted from the gods a seeming
consent to his own wishes, and those of the emperor. The journey
of Maximus through the cities of Asia displayed the triumph of
philosophic vanity; and the magistrates vied with each other in
the honorable reception which they prepared for the friend of
their sovereign. Julian was pronouncing an oration before the
senate, when he was informed of the arrival of Maximus. The
emperor immediately interrupted his discourse, advanced to meet
him, and after a tender embrace, conducted him by the hand into
the midst of the assembly; where he publicly acknowledged the
benefits which he had derived from the instructions of the
philosopher. Maximus, who soon acquired the confidence, and
influenced the councils of Julian, was insensibly corrupted by
the temptations of a court. His dress became more splendid, his
demeanor more lofty, and he was exposed, under a succeeding
reign, to a disgraceful inquiry into the means by which the
disciple of Plato had accumulated, in the short duration of his
favor, a very scandalous proportion of wealth. Of the other
philosophers and sophists, who were invited to the Imperial
residence by the choice of Julian, or by the success of Maximus,
few were able to preserve their innocence or their reputation.
The liberal gifts of money, lands, and houses, were insufficient
to satiate their rapacious avarice; and the indignation of the
people was justly excited by the remembrance of their abject
poverty and disinterested professions. The penetration of Julian
could not always be deceived: but he was unwilling to despise the
characters of those men whose talents deserved his esteem: he
desired to escape the double reproach of imprudence and
inconstancy; and he was apprehensive of degrading, in the eyes of
the profane, the honor of letters and of religion.<br>
</p>

<p>The favor of Julian was almost equally divided between the
Pagans, who had firmly adhered to the worship of their ancestors,
and the Christians, who prudently embraced the religion of their
sovereign. The acquisition of new proselytes gratified the ruling
passions of his soul, superstition and vanity; and he was heard
to declare, with the enthusiasm of a missionary, that if he could
render each individual richer than Midas, and every city greater
than Babylon, he should not esteem himself the benefactor of
mankind, unless, at the same time, he could reclaim his subjects
from their impious revolt against the immortal gods. A prince who
had studied human nature, and who possessed the treasures of the
Roman empire, could adapt his arguments, his promises, and his
rewards, to every order of Christians; and the merit of a
seasonable conversion was allowed to supply the defects of a
candidate, or even to expiate the guilt of a criminal. As the
army is the most forcible engine of absolute power, Julian
applied himself, with peculiar diligence, to corrupt the religion
of his troops, without whose hearty concurrence every measure
must be dangerous and unsuccessful; and the natural temper of
soldiers made this conquest as easy as it was important. The
legions of Gaul devoted themselves to the faith, as well as to
the fortunes, of their victorious leader; and even before the
death of Constantius, he had the satisfaction of announcing to
his friends, that they assisted with fervent devotion, and
voracious appetite, at the sacrifices, which were repeatedly
offered in his camp, of whole hecatombs of fat oxen. The armies
of the East, which had been trained under the standard of the
cross, and of Constantius, required a more artful and expensive
mode of persuasion. On the days of solemn and public festivals,
the emperor received the homage, and rewarded the merit, of the
troops. His throne of state was encircled with the military
ensigns of Rome and the republic; the holy name of Christ was
erased from the Labarum; and the symbols of war, of majesty, and
of pagan superstition, were so dexterously blended, that the
faithful subject incurred the guilt of idolatry, when he
respectfully saluted the person or image of his sovereign. The
soldiers passed successively in review; and each of them, before
he received from the hand of Julian a liberal donative,
proportioned to his rank and services, was required to cast a few
grains of incense into the flame which burnt upon the altar. Some
Christian confessors might resist, and others might repent; but
the far greater number, allured by the prospect of gold, and awed
by the presence of the emperor, contracted the criminal
engagement; and their future perseverance in the worship of the
gods was enforced by every consideration of duty and of interest.
By the frequent repetition of these arts, and at the expense of
sums which would have purchased the service of half the nations
of Scythia, Julian gradually acquired for his troops the
imaginary protection of the gods, and for himself the firm and
effectual support of the Roman legions. It is indeed more than
probable, that the restoration and encouragement of Paganism
revealed a multitude of pretended Christians, who, from motives
of temporal advantage, had acquiesced in the religion of the
former reign; and who afterwards returned, with the same
flexibility of conscience, to the faith which was professed by
the successors of Julian.<br>
</p>

<p>While the devout monarch incessantly labored to restore and
propagate the religion of his ancestors, he embraced the
extraordinary design of rebuilding the temple of Jerusalem. In a
public epistle to the nation or community of the Jews, dispersed
through the provinces, he pities their misfortunes, condemns
their oppressors, praises their constancy, declares himself their
gracious protector, and expresses a pious hope, that after his
return from the Persian war, he may be permitted to pay his
grateful vows to the Almighty in his holy city of Jerusalem. The
blind superstition, and abject slavery, of those unfortunate
exiles, must excite the contempt of a philosophic emperor; but
they deserved the friendship of Julian, by their implacable
hatred of the Christian name. The barren synagogue abhorred and
envied the fecundity of the rebellious church; the power of the
Jews was not equal to their malice; but their gravest rabbis
approved the private murder of an apostate; and their seditious
clamors had often awakened the indolence of the Pagan
magistrates. Under the reign of Constantine, the Jews became the
subjects of their revolted children nor was it long before they
experienced the bitterness of domestic tyranny. The civil
immunities which had been granted, or confirmed, by Severus, were
gradually repealed by the Christian princes; and a rash tumult,
excited by the Jews of Palestine, seemed to justify the lucrative
modes of oppression which were invented by the bishops and
eunuchs of the court of Constantius. The Jewish patriarch, who
was still permitted to exercise a precarious jurisdiction, held
his residence at Tiberias; and the neighboring cities of
Palestine were filled with the remains of a people who fondly
adhered to the promised land. But the edict of Hadrian was
renewed and enforced; and they viewed from afar the walls of the
holy city, which were profaned in their eyes by the triumph of
the cross and the devotion of the Christians.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XXIII: Reign Of Julian. -- Part
III.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>In the midst of a rocky and barren country, the walls of
Jerusalem enclosed the two mountains of Sion and Acra, within an
oval figure of about three English miles. Towards the south, the
upper town, and the fortress of David, were erected on the lofty
ascent of Mount Sion: on the north side, the buildings of the
lower town covered the spacious summit of Mount Acra; and a part
of the hill, distinguished by the name of Moriah, and levelled by
human industry, was crowned with the stately temple of the Jewish
nation. After the final destruction of the temple by the arms of
Titus and Hadrian, a ploughshare was drawn over the consecrated
ground, as a sign of perpetual interdiction. Sion was deserted;
and the vacant space of the lower city was filled with the public
and private edifices of the &AElig;lian colony, which spread
themselves over the adjacent hill of Calvary. The holy places
were polluted with mountains of idolatry; and, either from design
or accident, a chapel was dedicated to Venus, on the spot which
had been sanctified by the death and resurrection of Christ. *
Almost three hundred years after those stupendous events, the
profane chapel of Venus was demolished by the order of
Constantine; and the removal of the earth and stones revealed the
holy sepulchre to the eyes of mankind. A magnificent church was
erected on that mystic ground, by the first Christian emperor;
and the effects of his pious munificence were extended to every
spot which had been consecrated by the footstep of patriarchs, of
prophets, and of the Son of God.<br>
</p>

<p>The passionate desire of contemplating the original monuments
of their redemption attracted to Jerusalem a successive crowd of
pilgrims, from the shores of the Atlantic Ocean, and the most
distant countries of the East; and their piety was authorized by
the example of the empress Helena, who appears to have united the
credulity of age with the warm feelings of a recent conversion.
Sages and heroes, who have visited the memorable scenes of
ancient wisdom or glory, have confessed the inspiration of the
genius of the place; and the Christian who knelt before the holy
sepulchre, ascribed his lively faith, and his fervent devotion,
to the more immediate influence of the Divine Spirit. The zeal,
perhaps the avarice, of the clergy of Jerusalem, cherished and
multiplied these beneficial visits. They fixed, by unquestionable
tradition, the scene of each memorable event. They exhibited the
instruments which had been used in the passion of Christ; the
nails and the lance that had pierced his hands, his feet, and his
side; the crown of thorns that was planted on his head; the
pillar at which he was scourged; and, above all, they showed the
cross on which he suffered, and which was dug out of the earth in
the reign of those princes, who inserted the symbol of
Christianity in the banners of the Roman legions. Such miracles
as seemed necessary to account for its extraordinary
preservation, and seasonable discovery, were gradually propagated
without opposition. The custody of the <strong><em>true
cross</em></strong>, which on Easter Sunday was solemnly exposed
to the people, was intrusted to the bishop of Jerusalem; and he
alone might gratify the curious devotion of the pilgrims, by the
gift of small pieces, which they encased in gold or gems, and
carried away in triumph to their respective countries. But as
this gainful branch of commerce must soon have been annihilated,
it was found convenient to suppose, that the marvelous wood
possessed a secret power of vegetation; and that its substance,
though continually diminished, still remained entire and
unimpaired. It might perhaps have been expected, that the
influence of the place and the belief of a perpetual miracle,
should have produced some salutary effects on the morals, as well
as on the faith, of the people. Yet the most respectable of the
ecclesiastical writers have been obliged to confess, not only
that the streets of Jerusalem were filled with the incessant
tumult of business and pleasure, but that every species of vice
-- adultery, theft, idolatry, poisoning, murder -- was familiar
to the inhabitants of the holy city. The wealth and preeminence
of the church of Jerusalem excited the ambition of Arian, as well
as orthodox, candidates; and the virtues of Cyril, who, since his
death, has been honored with the title of Saint, were displayed
in the exercise, rather than in the acquisition, of his episcopal
dignity.<br>
</p>

<p>The vain and ambitious mind of Julian might aspire to restore
the ancient glory of the temple of Jerusalem. As the Christians
were firmly persuaded that a sentence of everlasting destruction
had been pronounced against the whole fabric of the Mosaic law,
the Imperial sophist would have converted the success of his
undertaking into a specious argument against the faith of
prophecy, and the truth of revelation. He was displeased with the
spiritual worship of the synagogue; but he approved the
institutions of Moses, who had not disdained to adopt many of the
rites and ceremonies of Egypt. The local and national deity of
the Jews was sincerely adored by a polytheist, who desired only
to multiply the number of the gods; and such was the appetite of
Julian for bloody sacrifice, that his emulation might be excited
by the piety of Solomon, who had offered, at the feast of the
dedication, twenty-two thousand oxen, and one hundred and twenty
thousand sheep. These considerations might influence his designs;
but the prospect of an immediate and important advantage would
not suffer the impatient monarch to expect the remote and
uncertain event of the Persian war. He resolved to erect, without
delay, on the commanding eminence of Moriah, a stately temple,
which might eclipse the splendor of the church of the
resurrection on the adjacent hill of Calvary; to establish an
order of priests, whose interested zeal would detect the arts,
and resist the ambition, of their Christian rivals; and to invite
a numerous colony of Jews, whose stern fanaticism would be always
prepared to second, and even to anticipate, the hostile measures
of the Pagan government. Among the friends of the emperor (if the
names of emperor, and of friend, are not incompatible) the first
place was assigned, by Julian himself, to the virtuous and
learned Alypius. The humanity of Alypius was tempered by severe
justice and manly fortitude; and while he exercised his abilities
in the civil administration of Britain, he imitated, in his
poetical compositions, the harmony and softness of the odes of
Sappho. This minister, to whom Julian communicated, without
reserve, his most careless levities, and his most serious
counsels, received an extraordinary commission to restore, in its
pristine beauty, the temple of Jerusalem; and the diligence of
Alypius required and obtained the strenuous support of the
governor of Palestine. At the call of their great deliverer, the
Jews, from all the provinces of the empire, assembled on the holy
mountain of their fathers; and their insolent triumph alarmed and
exasperated the Christian inhabitants of Jerusalem. The desire of
rebuilding the temple has in every age been the ruling passion of
the children of Isr&aelig;l. In this propitious moment the men
forgot their avarice, and the women their delicacy; spades and
pickaxes of silver were provided by the vanity of the rich, and
the rubbish was transported in mantles of silk and purple. Every
purse was opened in liberal contributions, every hand claimed a
share in the pious labor, and the commands of a great monarch
were executed by the enthusiasm of a whole people.<br>
</p>

<p>Yet, on this occasion, the joint efforts of power and
enthusiasm were unsuccessful; and the ground of the Jewish
temple, which is now covered by a Mahometan mosque, still
continued to exhibit the same edifying spectacle of ruin and
desolation. Perhaps the absence and death of the emperor, and the
new maxims of a Christian reign, might explain the interruption
of an arduous work, which was attempted only in the last six
months of the life of Julian. But the Christians entertained a
natural and pious expectation, that, in this memorable contest,
the honor of religion would be vindicated by some signal miracle.
An earthquake, a whirlwind, and a fiery eruption, which
overturned and scattered the new foundations of the temple, are
attested, with some variations, by contemporary and respectable
evidence. This public event is described by Ambrose, bishop of
Milan, in an epistle to the emperor Theodosius, which must
provoke the severe animadversion of the Jews; by the eloquent
Chrysostom, who might appeal to the memory of the elder part of
his congregation at Antioch; and by Gregory Nazianzen, who
published his account of the miracle before the expiration of the
same year. The last of these writers has boldly declared, that
this preternatural event was not disputed by the infidels; and
his assertion, strange as it may seem is confirmed by the
unexceptionable testimony of Ammianus Marcellinus. The
philosophic soldier, who loved the virtues, without adopting the
prejudices, of his master, has recorded, in his judicious and
candid history of his own times, the extraordinary obstacles
which interrupted the restoration of the temple of Jerusalem.
"Whilst Alypius, assisted by the governor of the province, urged,
with vigor and diligence, the execution of the work, horrible
balls of fire breaking out near the foundations, with frequent
and reiterated attacks, rendered the place, from time to time,
inaccessible to the scorched and blasted workmen; and the
victorious element continuing in this manner obstinately and
resolutely bent, as it were, to drive them to a distance, the
undertaking was abandoned." * Such authority should satisfy a
believing, and must astonish an incredulous, mind. Yet a
philosopher may still require the original evidence of impartial
and intelligent spectators. At this important crisis, any
singular accident of nature would assume the appearance, and
produce the effects of a real prodigy. This glorious deliverance
would be speedily improved and magnified by the pious art of the
clergy of Jerusalem, and the active credulity of the Christian
world and, at the distance of twenty years, a Roman historian,
care less of theological disputes, might adorn his work with the
specious and splendid miracle.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XXIII: Reign Of Julian. -- Part
IV.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>The restoration of the Jewish temple was secretly connected
with the ruin of the Christian church. Julian still continued to
maintain the freedom of religious worship, without distinguishing
whether this universal toleration proceeded from his justice or
his clemency. He affected to pity the unhappy Christians, who
were mistaken in the most important object of their lives; but
his pity was degraded by contempt, his contempt was embittered by
hatred; and the sentiments of Julian were expressed in a style of
sarcastic wit, which inflicts a deep and deadly wound, whenever
it issues from the mouth of a sovereign. As he was sensible that
the Christians gloried in the name of their Redeemer, he
countenanced, and perhaps enjoined, the use of the less honorable
appellation of Galil&aelig;ans. He declared, that by the folly of
the Galil&aelig;ans, whom he describes as a sect of fanatics,
contemptible to men, and odious to the gods, the empire had been
reduced to the brink of destruction; and he insinuates in a
public edict, that a frantic patient might sometimes be cured by
salutary violence. An ungenerous distinction was admitted into
the mind and counsels of Julian, that, according to the
difference of their religious sentiments, one part of his
subjects deserved his favor and friendship, while the other was
entitled only to the common benefits that his justice could not
refuse to an obedient people. According to a principle, pregnant
with mischief and oppression, the emperor transferred to the
pontiffs of his own religion the management of the liberal
allowances for the public revenue, which had been granted to the
church by the piety of Constantine and his sons. The proud system
of clerical honors and immunities, which had been constructed
with so much art and labor, was levelled to the ground; the hopes
of testamentary donations were intercepted by the rigor of the
laws; and the priests of the Christian sect were confounded with
the last and most ignominious class of the people. Such of these
regulations as appeared necessary to check the ambition and
avarice of the ecclesiastics, were soon afterwards imitated by
the wisdom of an orthodox prince. The peculiar distinctions which
policy has bestowed, or superstition has lavished, on the
sacerdotal order, must be confined to those priests who profess
the religion of the state. But the will of the legislator was not
exempt from prejudice and passion; and it was the object of the
insidious policy of Julian, to deprive the Christians of all the
temporal honors and advantages which rendered them respectable in
the eyes of the world.<br>
</p>

<p>A just and severe censure has been inflicted on the law which
prohibited the Christians from teaching the arts of grammar and
rhetoric. The motives alleged by the emperor to justify this
partial and oppressive measure, might command, during his
lifetime, the silence of slaves and the applause of flatterers.
Julian abuses the ambiguous meaning of a word which might be
indifferently applied to the language and the religion of the
Greeks: he contemptuously observes, that the men who exalt the
merit of implicit faith are unfit to claim or to enjoy the
advantages of science; and he vainly contends, that if they
refuse to adore the gods of Homer and Demosthenes, they ought to
content themselves with expounding Luke and Matthew in the church
of the Galil&aelig;ans. In all the cities of the Roman world, the
education of the youth was intrusted to masters of grammar and
rhetoric; who were elected by the magistrates, maintained at the
public expense, and distinguished by many lucrative and honorable
privileges. The edict of Julian appears to have included the
physicians, and professors of all the liberal arts; and the
emperor, who reserved to himself the approbation of the
candidates, was authorized by the laws to corrupt, or to punish,
the religious constancy of the most learned of the Christians. As
soon as the resignation of the more obstinate teachers had
established the unrivalled dominion of the Pagan sophists, Julian
invited the rising generation to resort with freedom to the
public schools, in a just confidence, that their tender minds
would receive the impressions of literature and idolatry. If the
greatest part of the Christian youth should be deterred by their
own scruples, or by those of their parents, from accepting this
dangerous mode of instruction, they must, at the same time,
relinquish the benefits of a liberal education. Julian had reason
to expect that, in the space of a few years, the church would
relapse into its prim&aelig;val simplicity, and that the
theologians, who possessed an adequate share of the learning and
eloquence of the age, would be succeeded by a generation of blind
and ignorant fanatics, incapable of defending the truth of their
own principles, or of exposing the various follies of
Polytheism.<br>
</p>

<p>It was undoubtedly the wish and design of Julian to deprive
the Christians of the advantages of wealth, of knowledge, and of
power; but the injustice of excluding them from all offices of
trust and profit seems to have been the result of his general
policy, rather than the immediate consequence of any positive
law. Superior merit might deserve and obtain, some extraordinary
exceptions; but the greater part of the Christian officers were
gradually removed from their employments in the state, the army,
and the provinces. The hopes of future candidates were
extinguished by the declared partiality of a prince, who
maliciously reminded them, that it was unlawful for a Christian
to use the sword, either of justice, or of war; and who
studiously guarded the camp and the tribunals with the ensigns of
idolatry. The powers of government were intrusted to the pagans,
who professed an ardent zeal for the religion of their ancestors;
and as the choice of the emperor was often directed by the rules
of divination, the favorites whom he preferred as the most
agreeable to the gods, did not always obtain the approbation of
mankind. Under the administration of their enemies, the
Christians had much to suffer, and more to apprehend. The temper
of Julian was averse to cruelty; and the care of his reputation,
which was exposed to the eyes of the universe, restrained the
philosophic monarch from violating the laws of justice and
toleration, which he himself had so recently established. But the
provincial ministers of his authority were placed in a less
conspicuous station. In the exercise of arbitrary power, they
consulted the wishes, rather than the commands, of their
sovereign; and ventured to exercise a secret and vexatious
tyranny against the sectaries, on whom they were not permitted to
confer the honors of martyrdom. The emperor, who dissembled as
long as possible his knowledge of the injustice that was
exercised in his name, expressed his real sense of the conduct of
his officers, by gentle reproofs and substantial rewards.<br>
</p>

<p>The most effectual instrument of oppression, with which they
were armed, was the law that obliged the Christians to make full
and ample satisfaction for the temples which they had destroyed
under the preceding reign. The zeal of the triumphant church had
not always expected the sanction of the public authority; and the
bishops, who were secure of impunity, had often marched at the
head of their congregation, to attack and demolish the fortresses
of the prince of darkness. The consecrated lands, which had
increased the patrimony of the sovereign or of the clergy, were
clearly defined, and easily restored. But on these lands, and on
the ruins of Pagan superstition, the Christians had frequently
erected their own religious edifices: and as it was necessary to
remove the church before the temple could be rebuilt, the justice
and piety of the emperor were applauded by one party, while the
other deplored and execrated his sacrilegious violence. After the
ground was cleared, the restitution of those stately structures
which had been levelled with the dust, and of the precious
ornaments which had been converted to Christian uses, swelled
into a very large account of damages and debt. The authors of the
injury had neither the ability nor the inclination to discharge
this accumulated demand: and the impartial wisdom of a legislator
would have been displayed in balancing the adverse claims and
complaints, by an equitable and temperate arbitration. But the
whole empire, and particularly the East, was thrown into
confusion by the rash edicts of Julian; and the Pagan
magistrates, inflamed by zeal and revenge, abused the rigorous
privilege of the Roman law, which substitutes, in the place of
his inadequate property, the person of the insolvent debtor.
Under the preceding reign, Mark, bishop of Arethusa, had labored
in the conversion of his people with arms more effectual than
those of persuasion. The magistrates required the full value of a
temple which had been destroyed by his intolerant zeal: but as
they were satisfied of his poverty, they desired only to bend his
inflexible spirit to the promise of the slightest compensation.
They apprehended the aged prelate, they inhumanly scourged him,
they tore his beard; and his naked body, anointed with honey, was
suspended, in a net, between heaven and earth, and exposed to the
stings of insects and the rays of a Syrian sun. From this lofty
station, Mark still persisted to glory in his crime, and to
insult the impotent rage of his persecutors. He was at length
rescued from their hands, and dismissed to enjoy the honor of his
divine triumph. The Arians celebrated the virtue of their pious
confessor; the Catholics ambitiously claimed his alliance; and
the Pagans, who might be susceptible of shame or remorse, were
deterred from the repetition of such unavailing cruelty. Julian
spared his life: but if the bishop of Arethusa had saved the
infancy of Julian, posterity will condemn the ingratitude,
instead of praising the clemency, of the emperor.<br>
</p>

<p>At the distance of five miles from Antioch, the Macedonian
kings of Syria had consecrated to Apollo one of the most elegant
places of devotion in the Pagan world. A magnificent temple rose
in honor of the god of light; and his colossal figure almost
filled the capacious sanctuary, which was enriched with gold and
gems, and adorned by the skill of the Grecian artists. The deity
was represented in a bending attitude, with a golden cup in his
hand, pouring out a libation on the earth; as if he supplicated
the venerable mother to give to his arms the cold and beauteous
Daphne: for the spot was ennobled by fiction; and the fancy of
the Syrian poets had transported the amorous tale from the banks
of the Peneus to those of the Orontes. The ancient rites of
Greece were imitated by the royal colony of Antioch. A stream of
prophecy, which rivalled the truth and reputation of the Delphic
oracle, flowed from the <strong><em>Castalian</em></strong>
fountain of Daphne. In the adjacent fields a stadium was built by
a special privilege, which had been purchased from Elis; the
Olympic games were celebrated at the expense of the city; and a
revenue of thirty thousand pounds sterling was annually applied
to the public pleasures. The perpetual resort of pilgrims and
spectators insensibly formed, in the neighborhood of the temple,
the stately and populous village of Daphne, which emulated the
splendor, without acquiring the title, of a provincial city. The
temple and the village were deeply bosomed in a thick grove of
laurels and cypresses, which reached as far as a circumference of
ten miles, and formed in the most sultry summers a cool and
impenetrable shade. A thousand streams of the purest water,
issuing from every hill, preserved the verdure of the earth, and
the temperature of the air; the senses were gratified with
harmonious sounds and aromatic odors; and the peaceful grove was
consecrated to health and joy, to luxury and love. The vigorous
youth pursued, like Apollo, the object of his desires; and the
blushing maid was warned, by the fate of Daphne, to shun the
folly of unseasonable coyness. The soldier and the philosopher
wisely avoided the temptation of this sensual paradise: where
pleasure, assuming the character of religion, imperceptibly
dissolved the firmness of manly virtue. But the groves of Daphne
continued for many ages to enjoy the veneration of natives and
strangers; the privileges of the holy ground were enlarged by the
munificence of succeeding emperors; and every generation added
new ornaments to the splendor of the temple.<br>
</p>

<p>When Julian, on the day of the annual festival, hastened to
adore the Apollo of Daphne, his devotion was raised to the
highest pitch of eagerness and impatience. His lively imagination
anticipated the grateful pomp of victims, of libations and of
incense; a long procession of youths and virgins, clothed in
white robes, the symbol of their innocence; and the tumultuous
concourse of an innumerable people. But the zeal of Antioch was
diverted, since the reign of Christianity, into a different
channel. Instead of hecatombs of fat oxen sacrificed by the
tribes of a wealthy city to their tutelar deity the emperor
complains that he found only a single goose, provided at the
expense of a priest, the pale and solitary in habitant of this
decayed temple. The altar was deserted, the oracle had been
reduced to silence, and the holy ground was profaned by the
introduction of Christian and funereal rites. After Babylas (a
bishop of Antioch, who died in prison in the persecution of
Decius) had rested near a century in his grave, his body, by the
order of C&aelig;sar Gallus, was transported into the midst of
the grove of Daphne. A magnificent church was erected over his
remains; a portion of the sacred lands was usurped for the
maintenance of the clergy, and for the burial of the Christians
at Antioch, who were ambitious of lying at the feet of their
bishop; and the priests of Apollo retired, with their affrighted
and indignant votaries. As soon as another revolution seemed to
restore the fortune of Paganism, the church of St. Babylas was
demolished, and new buildings were added to the mouldering
edifice which had been raised by the piety of Syrian kings. But
the first and most serious care of Julian was to deliver his
oppressed deity from the odious presence of the dead and living
Christians, who had so effectually suppressed the voice of fraud
or enthusiasm. The scene of infection was purified, according to
the forms of ancient rituals; the bodies were decently removed;
and the ministers of the church were permitted to convey the
remains of St. Babylas to their former habitation within the
walls of Antioch. The modest behavior which might have assuaged
the jealousy of a hostile government was neglected, on this
occasion, by the zeal of the Christians. The lofty car, that
transported the relics of Babylas, was followed, and accompanied,
and received, by an innumerable multitude; who chanted, with
thundering acclamations, the Psalms of David the most expressive
of their contempt for idols and idolaters. The return of the
saint was a triumph; and the triumph was an insult on the
religion of the emperor, who exerted his pride to dissemble his
resentment. During the night which terminated this indiscreet
procession, the temple of Daphne was in flames; the statue of
Apollo was consumed; and the walls of the edifice were left a
naked and awful monument of ruin. The Christians of Antioch
asserted, with religious confidence, that the powerful
intercession of St. Babylas had pointed the lightnings of heaven
against the devoted roof: but as Julian was reduced to the
alternative of believing either a crime or a miracle, he chose,
without hesitation, without evidence, but with some color of
probability, to impute the fire of Daphne to the revenge of the
Galil&aelig;ans. Their offence, had it been sufficiently proved,
might have justified the retaliation, which was immediately
executed by the order of Julian, of shutting the doors, and
confiscating the wealth, of the cathedral of Antioch. To discover
the criminals who were guilty of the tumult, of the fire, or of
secreting the riches of the church, several of the ecclesiastics
were tortured; and a Presbyter, of the name of Theodoret, was
beheaded by the sentence of the Count of the East. But this hasty
act was blamed by the emperor; who lamented, with real or
affected concern, that the imprudent zeal of his ministers would
tarnish his reign with the disgrace of persecution.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XXIII: Reign Of Julian. -- Part
V.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>The zeal of the ministers of Julian was instantly checked by
the frown of their sovereign; but when the father of his country
declares himself the leader of a faction, the license of popular
fury cannot easily be restrained, nor consistently punished.
Julian, in a public composition, applauds the devotion and
loyalty of the holy cities of Syria, whose pious inhabitants had
destroyed, at the first signal, the sepulchres of the
Galil&aelig;ans; and faintly complains, that they had revenged
the injuries of the gods with less moderation than he should have
recommended. This imperfect and reluctant confession may appear
to confirm the ecclesiastical narratives; that in the cities of
Gaza, Ascalon, C&aelig;sarea, Heliopolis, &amp;c., the Pagans
abused, without prudence or remorse, the moment of their
prosperity. That the unhappy objects of their cruelty were
released from torture only by death; and as their mangled bodies
were dragged through the streets, they were pierced (such was the
universal rage) by the spits of cooks, and the distaffs of
enraged women; and that the entrails of Christian priests and
virgins, after they had been tasted by those bloody fanatics,
were mixed with barley, and contemptuously thrown to the unclean
animals of the city. Such scenes of religious madness exhibit the
most contemptible and odious picture of human nature; but the
massacre of Alexandria attracts still more attention, from the
certainty of the fact, the rank of the victims, and the splendor
of the capital of Egypt.<br>
</p>

<p>George, from his parents or his education, surnamed the
Cappadocian, was born at Epiphania in Cilicia, in a fuller's
shop. From this obscure and servile origin he raised himself by
the talents of a parasite; and the patrons, whom he assiduously
flattered, procured for their worthless dependent a lucrative
commission, or contract, to supply the army with bacon. His
employment was mean; he rendered it infamous. He accumulated
wealth by the basest arts of fraud and corruption; but his
malversations were so notorious, that George was compelled to
escape from the pursuits of justice. After this disgrace, in
which he appears to have saved his fortune at the expense of his
honor, he embraced, with real or affected zeal, the profession of
Arianism. From the love, or the ostentation, of learning, he
collected a valuable library of history rhetoric, philosophy, and
theology, and the choice of the prevailing faction promoted
George of Cappadocia to the throne of Athanasius. The entrance of
the new archbishop was that of a Barbarian conqueror; and each
moment of his reign was polluted by cruelty and avarice. The
Catholics of Alexandria and Egypt were abandoned to a tyrant,
qualified, by nature and education, to exercise the office of
persecution; but he oppressed with an impartial hand the various
inhabitants of his extensive diocese. The primate of Egypt
assumed the pomp and insolence of his lofty station; but he still
betrayed the vices of his base and servile extraction. The
merchants of Alexandria were impoverished by the unjust, and
almost universal, monopoly, which he acquired, of nitre, salt,
paper, funerals, &amp;c.: and the spiritual father of a great
people condescended to practise the vile and pernicious arts of
an informer. The Alexandrians could never forget, nor forgive,
the tax, which he suggested, on all the houses of the city; under
an obsolete claim, that the royal founder had conveyed to his
successors, the Ptolemies and the C&aelig;sars, the perpetual
property of the soil. The Pagans, who had been flattered with the
hopes of freedom and toleration, excited his devout avarice; and
the rich temples of Alexandria were either pillaged or insulted
by the haughty prince, who exclaimed, in a loud and threatening
tone, "How long will these sepulchres be permitted to stand?"
Under the reign of Constantius, he was expelled by the fury, or
rather by the justice, of the people; and it was not without a
violent struggle, that the civil and military powers of the state
could restore his authority, and gratify his revenge. The
messenger who proclaimed at Alexandria the accession of Julian,
announced the downfall of the archbishop. George, with two of his
obsequious ministers, Count Diodorus, and Dracontius, master of
the mint were ignominiously dragged in chains to the public
prison. At the end of twenty-four days, the prison was forced
open by the rage of a superstitious multitude, impatient of the
tedious forms of judicial proceedings. The enemies of gods and
men expired under their cruel insults; the lifeless bodies of the
archbishop and his associates were carried in triumph through the
streets on the back of a camel; * and the inactivity of the
Athanasian party was esteemed a shining example of evangelical
patience. The remains of these guilty wretches were thrown into
the sea; and the popular leaders of the tumult declared their
resolution to disappoint the devotion of the Christians, and to
intercept the future honors of these
<strong><em>martyrs</em></strong>, who had been punished, like
their predecessors, by the enemies of their religion. The fears
of the Pagans were just, and their precautions ineffectual. The
meritorious death of the archbishop obliterated the memory of his
life. The rival of Athanasius was dear and sacred to the Arians,
and the seeming conversion of those sectaries introduced his
worship into the bosom of the Catholic church. The odious
stranger, disguising every circumstance of time and place,
assumed the mask of a martyr, a saint, and a Christian hero; and
the infamous George of Cappadocia has been transformed into the
renowned St. George of England, the patron of arms, of chivalry,
and of the garter.<br>
</p>

<p>About the same time that Julian was informed of the tumult of
Alexandria, he received intelligence from Edessa, that the proud
and wealthy faction of the Arians had insulted the weakness of
the Valentinians, and committed such disorders as ought not to be
suffered with impunity in a well-regulated state. Without
expecting the slow forms of justice, the exasperated prince
directed his mandate to the magistrates of Edessa, by which he
confiscated the whole property of the church: the money was
distributed among the soldiers; the lands were added to the
domain; and this act of oppression was aggravated by the most
ungenerous irony. "I show myself," says Julian, "the true friend
of the Galil&aelig;ans. Their <strong><em>admirable</em></strong>
law has promised the kingdom of heaven to the poor; and they will
advance with more diligence in the paths of virtue and salvation,
when they are relieved by my assistance from the load of temporal
possessions. Take care," pursued the monarch, in a more serious
tone, "take care how you provoke my patience and humanity. If
these disorders continue, I will revenge on the magistrates the
crimes of the people; and you will have reason to dread, not only
confiscation and exile, but fire and the sword." The tumults of
Alexandria were doubtless of a more bloody and dangerous nature:
but a Christian bishop had fallen by the hands of the Pagans; and
the public epistle of Julian affords a very lively proof of the
partial spirit of his administration. His reproaches to the
citizens of Alexandria are mingled with expressions of esteem and
tenderness; and he laments, that, on this occasion, they should
have departed from the gentle and generous manners which attested
their Grecian extraction. He gravely censures the offence which
they had committed against the laws of justice and humanity; but
he recapitulates, with visible complacency, the intolerable
provocations which they had so long endured from the impious
tyranny of George of Cappadocia. Julian admits the principle,
that a wise and vigorous government should chastise the insolence
of the people; yet, in consideration of their founder Alexander,
and of Serapis their tutelar deity, he grants a free and gracious
pardon to the guilty city, for which he again feels the affection
of a brother.<br>
</p>

<p>After the tumult of Alexandria had subsided, Athanasius,
amidst the public acclamations, seated himself on the throne from
whence his unworthy competitor had been precipitated: and as the
zeal of the archbishop was tempered with discretion, the exercise
of his authority tended not to inflame, but to reconcile, the
minds of the people. His pastoral labors were not confined to the
narrow limits of Egypt. The state of the Christian world was
present to his active and capacious mind; and the age, the merit,
the reputation of Athanasius, enabled him to assume, in a moment
of danger, the office of Ecclesiastical Dictator. Three years
were not yet elapsed since the majority of the bishops of the
West had ignorantly, or reluctantly, subscribed the Confession of
Rimini. They repented, they believed, but they dreaded the
unseasonable rigor of their orthodox brethren; and if their pride
was stronger than their faith, they might throw themselves into
the arms of the Arians, to escape the indignity of a public
penance, which must degrade them to the condition of obscure
laymen. At the same time the domestic differences concerning the
union and distinction of the divine persons, were agitated with
some heat among the Catholic doctors; and the progress of this
metaphysical controversy seemed to threaten a public and lasting
division of the Greek and Latin churches. By the wisdom of a
select synod, to which the name and presence of Athanasius gave
the authority of a general council, the bishops, who had unwarily
deviated into error, were admitted to the communion of the
church, on the easy condition of subscribing the Nicene Creed;
without any formal acknowledgment of their past fault, or any
minute definition of their scholastic opinions. The advice of the
primate of Egypt had already prepared the clergy of Gaul and
Spain, of Italy and Greece, for the reception of this salutary
measure; and, notwithstanding the opposition of some ardent
spirits, the fear of the common enemy promoted the peace and
harmony of the Christians.<br>
</p>

<p>The skill and diligence of the primate of Egypt had improved
the season of tranquillity, before it was interrupted by the
hostile edicts of the emperor. Julian, who despised the
Christians, honored Athanasius with his sincere and peculiar
hatred. For his sake alone, he introduced an arbitrary
distinction, repugnant at least to the spirit of his former
declarations. He maintained, that the Galil&aelig;ans, whom he
had recalled from exile, were not restored, by that general
indulgence, to the possession of their respective churches; and
he expressed his astonishment, that a criminal, who had been
repeatedly condemned by the judgment of the emperors, should dare
to insult the majesty of the laws, and insolently usurp the
archiepiscopal throne of Alexandria, without expecting the orders
of his sovereign. As a punishment for the imaginary offence, he
again banished Athanasius from the city; and he was pleased to
suppose, that this act of justice would be highly agreeable to
his pious subjects. The pressing solicitations of the people soon
convinced him, that the majority of the Alexandrians were
Christians; and that the greatest part of the Christians were
firmly attached to the cause of their oppressed primate. But the
knowledge of their sentiments, instead of persuading him to
recall his decree, provoked him to extend to all Egypt the term
of the exile of Athanasius. The zeal of the multitude rendered
Julian still more inexorable: he was alarmed by the danger of
leaving at the head of a tumultuous city, a daring and popular
leader; and the language of his resentment discovers the opinion
which he entertained of the courage and abilities of Athanasius.
The execution of the sentence was still delayed, by the caution
or negligence of Ecdicius, pr&aelig;fect of Egypt, who was at
length awakened from his lethargy by a severe reprimand. "Though
you neglect," says Julian, "to write to me on any other subject,
at least it is your duty to inform me of your conduct towards
Athanasius, the enemy of the gods. My intentions have been long
since communicated to you. I swear by the great Serapis, that
unless, on the calends of December, Athanasius has departed from
Alexandria, nay, from Egypt, the officers of your government
shall pay a fine of one hundred pounds of gold. You know my
temper: I am slow to condemn, but I am still slower to forgive."
This epistle was enforced by a short postscript, written with the
emperor's own hand. "The contempt that is shown for all the gods
fills me with grief and indignation. There is nothing that I
should see, nothing that I should hear, with more pleasure, than
the expulsion of Athanasius from all Egypt. The abominable
wretch! Under my reign, the baptism of several Grecian ladies of
the highest rank has been the effect of his persecutions." The
death of Athanasius was not <strong><em>expressly</em></strong>
commanded; but the pr&aelig;fect of Egypt understood that it was
safer for him to exceed, than to neglect, the orders of an
irritated master. The archbishop prudently retired to the
monasteries of the Desert; eluded, with his usual dexterity, the
snares of the enemy; and lived to triumph over the ashes of a
prince, who, in words of formidable import, had declared his wish
that the whole venom of the Galil&aelig;an school were contained
in the single person of Athanasius.<br>
</p>

<p>I have endeavored faithfully to represent the artful system by
which Julian proposed to obtain the effects, without incurring
the guilt, or reproach, of persecution. But if the deadly spirit
of fanaticism perverted the heart and understanding of a virtuous
prince, it must, at the same time, be confessed that the
<strong><em>real</em></strong> sufferings of the Christians were
inflamed and magnified by human passions and religious
enthusiasm. The meekness and resignation which had distinguished
the primitive disciples of the gospel, was the object of the
applause, rather than of the imitation of their successors. The
Christians, who had now possessed above forty years the civil and
ecclesiastical government of the empire, had contracted the
insolent vices of prosperity, and the habit of believing that the
saints alone were entitled to reign over the earth. As soon as
the enmity of Julian deprived the clergy of the privileges which
had been conferred by the favor of Constantine, they complained
of the most cruel oppression; and the free toleration of
idolaters and heretics was a subject of grief and scandal to the
orthodox party. The acts of violence, which were no longer
countenanced by the magistrates, were still committed by the zeal
of the people. At Pessinus, the altar of Cybele was overturned
almost in the presence of the emperor; and in the city of
C&aelig;sarea in Cappadocia, the temple of Fortune, the sole
place of worship which had been left to the Pagans, was destroyed
by the rage of a popular tumult. On these occasions, a prince,
who felt for the honor of the gods, was not disposed to interrupt
the course of justice; and his mind was still more deeply
exasperated, when he found that the fanatics, who had deserved
and suffered the punishment of incendiaries, were rewarded with
the honors of martyrdom. The Christian subjects of Julian were
assured of the hostile designs of their sovereign; and, to their
jealous apprehension, every circumstance of his government might
afford some grounds of discontent and suspicion. In the ordinary
administration of the laws, the Christians, who formed so large a
part of the people, must frequently be condemned: but their
indulgent brethren, without examining the merits of the cause,
presumed their innocence, allowed their claims, and imputed the
severity of their judge to the partial malice of religious
persecution. These present hardships, intolerable as they might
appear, were represented as a slight prelude of the impending
calamities. The Christians considered Julian as a cruel and
crafty tyrant; who suspended the execution of his revenge till he
should return victorious from the Persian war. They expected,
that as soon as he had triumphed over the foreign enemies of
Rome, he would lay aside the irksome mask of dissimulation; that
the amphitheatre would stream with the blood of hermits and
bishops; and that the Christians who still persevered in the
profession of the faith, would be deprived of the common benefits
of nature and society. Every calumny that could wound the
reputation of the Apostate, was credulously embraced by the fears
and hatred of his adversaries; and their indiscreet clamors
provoked the temper of a sovereign, whom it was their duty to
respect, and their interest to flatter. They still protested,
that prayers and tears were their only weapons against the
impious tyrant, whose head they devoted to the justice of
offended Heaven. But they insinuated, with sullen resolution,
that their submission was no longer the effect of weakness; and
that, in the imperfect state of human virtue, the patience, which
is founded on principle, may be exhausted by persecution. It is
impossible to determine how far the zeal of Julian would have
prevailed over his good sense and humanity; but if we seriously
reflect on the strength and spirit of the church, we shall be
convinced, that before the emperor could have extinguished the
religion of Christ, he must have involved his country in the
horrors of a civil war.<br>
</p>

<p><strong>Chapter XXIV: The Retreat And Death Of
Julian.</strong></p>

<p><strong><em>Part I.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>Residence Of Julian At Antioch. -- His Successful Expedition
Against The Persians. -- Passage Of The Tigris -- The Retreat And
Death Of Julian. -- Election Of Jovian. -- He Saves The Roman
Army By A Disgraceful Treaty.<br>
</p>

<p>The philosophical fable which Julian composed under the name
of the C&aelig;sars, is one of the most agreeable and instructive
productions of ancient wit. During the freedom and equality of
the days of the Saturnalia, Romulus prepared a feast for the
deities of Olympus, who had adopted him as a worthy associate,
and for the Roman princes, who had reigned over his martial
people, and the vanquished nations of the earth. The immortals
were placed in just order on their thrones of state, and the
table of the C&aelig;sars was spread below the Moon in the upper
region of the air. The tyrants, who would have disgraced the
society of gods and men, were thrown headlong, by the inexorable
Nemesis, into the Tartarean abyss. The rest of the C&aelig;sars
successively advanced to their seats; and as they passed, the
vices, the defects, the blemishes of their respective characters,
were maliciously noticed by old Silenus, a laughing moralist, who
disguised the wisdom of a philosopher under the mask of a
Bacchanal. As soon as the feast was ended, the voice of Mercury
proclaimed the will of Jupiter, that a celestial crown should be
the reward of superior merit. Julius C&aelig;sar, Augustus,
Trajan, and Marcus Antoninus, were selected as the most
illustrious candidates; the effeminate Constantine was not
excluded from this honorable competition, and the great Alexander
was invited to dispute the prize of glory with the Roman heroes.
Each of the candidates was allowed to display the merit of his
own exploits; but, in the judgment of the gods, the modest
silence of Marcus pleaded more powerfully than the elaborate
orations of his haughty rivals. When the judges of this awful
contest proceeded to examine the heart, and to scrutinize the
springs of action, the superiority of the Imperial Stoic appeared
still more decisive and conspicuous. Alexander and C&aelig;sar,
Augustus, Trajan, and Constantine, acknowledged, with a blush,
that fame, or power, or pleasure had been the important object of
<strong><em>their</em></strong> labors: but the gods themselves
beheld, with reverence and love, a virtuous mortal, who had
practised on the throne the lessons of philosophy; and who, in a
state of human imperfection, had aspired to imitate the moral
attributes of the Deity. The value of this agreeable composition
(the C&aelig;sars of Julian) is enhanced by the rank of the
author. A prince, who delineates, with freedom, the vices and
virtues of his predecessors, subscribes, in every line, the
censure or approbation of his own conduct.<br>
</p>

<p>In the cool moments of reflection, Julian preferred the useful
and benevolent virtues of Antoninus; but his ambitious spirit was
inflamed by the glory of Alexander; and he solicited, with equal
ardor, the esteem of the wise, and the applause of the multitude.
In the season of life when the powers of the mind and body enjoy
the most active vigor, the emperor who was instructed by the
experience, and animated by the success, of the German war,
resolved to signalize his reign by some more splendid and
memorable achievement. The ambassadors of the East, from the
continent of India, and the Isle of Ceylon, had respectfully
saluted the Roman purple. The nations of the West esteemed and
dreaded the personal virtues of Julian, both in peace and war. He
despised the trophies of a Gothic victory, and was satisfied that
the rapacious Barbarians of the Danube would be restrained from
any future violation of the faith of treaties by the terror of
his name, and the additional fortifications with which he
strengthened the Thracian and Illyrian frontiers. The successor
of Cyrus and Artaxerxes was the only rival whom he deemed worthy
of his arms; and he resolved, by the final conquest of Persia, to
chastise the naughty nation which had so long resisted and
insulted the majesty of Rome. As soon as the Persian monarch was
informed that the throne of Constantius was filed by a prince of
a very different character, he condescended to make some artful,
or perhaps sincere, overtures towards a negotiation of peace. But
the pride of Sapor was astonished by the firmness of Julian; who
sternly declared, that he would never consent to hold a peaceful
conference among the flames and ruins of the cities of
Mesopotamia; and who added, with a smile of contempt, that it was
needless to treat by ambassadors, as he himself had determined to
visit speedily the court of Persia. The impatience of the emperor
urged the diligence of the military preparations. The generals
were named; and Julian, marching from Constantinople through the
provinces of Asia Minor, arrived at Antioch about eight months
after the death of his predecessor. His ardent desire to march
into the heart of Persia, was checked by the indispensable duty
of regulating the state of the empire; by his zeal to revive the
worship of the gods; and by the advice of his wisest friends; who
represented the necessity of allowing the salutary interval of
winter quarters, to restore the exhausted strength of the legions
of Gaul, and the discipline and spirit of the Eastern troops.
Julian was persuaded to fix, till the ensuing spring, his
residence at Antioch, among a people maliciously disposed to
deride the haste, and to censure the delays, of their
sovereign.<br>
</p>

<p>If Julian had flattered himself, that his personal connection
with the capital of the East would be productive of mutual
satisfaction to the prince and people, he made a very false
estimate of his own character, and of the manners of Antioch. The
warmth of the climate disposed the natives to the most
intemperate enjoyment of tranquillity and opulence; and the
lively licentiousness of the Greeks was blended with the
hereditary softness of the Syrians. Fashion was the only law,
pleasure the only pursuit, and the splendor of dress and
furniture was the only distinction of the citizens of Antioch.
The arts of luxury were honored; the serious and manly virtues
were the subject of ridicule; and the contempt for female modesty
and reverent age announced the universal corruption of the
capital of the East. The love of spectacles was the taste, or
rather passion, of the Syrians; the most skilful artists were
procured from the adjacent cities; a considerable share of the
revenue was devoted to the public amusements; and the
magnificence of the games of the theatre and circus was
considered as the happiness and as the glory of Antioch. The
rustic manners of a prince who disdained such glory, and was
insensible of such happiness, soon disgusted the delicacy of his
subjects; and the effeminate Orientals could neither imitate, nor
admire, the severe simplicity which Julian always maintained, and
sometimes affected. The days of festivity, consecrated, by
ancient custom, to the honor of the gods, were the only occasions
in which Julian relaxed his philosophic severity; and those
festivals were the only days in which the Syrians of Antioch
could reject the allurements of pleasure. The majority of the
people supported the glory of the Christian name, which had been
first invented by their ancestors: they contended themselves with
disobeying the moral precepts, but they were scrupulously
attached to the speculative doctrines of their religion. The
church of Antioch was distracted by heresy and schism; but the
Arians and the Athanasians, the followers of Meletius and those
of Paulinus, were actuated by the same pious hatred of their
common adversary.<br>
</p>

<p>The strongest prejudice was entertained against the character
of an apostate, the enemy and successor of a prince who had
engaged the affections of a very numerous sect; and the removal
of St. Babylas excited an implacable opposition to the person of
Julian. His subjects complained, with superstitious indignation,
that famine had pursued the emperor's steps from Constantinople
to Antioch; and the discontent of a hungry people was exasperated
by the injudicious attempt to relieve their distress. The
inclemency of the season had affected the harvests of Syria; and
the price of bread, in the markets of Antioch, had naturally
risen in proportion to the scarcity of corn. But the fair and
reasonable proportion was soon violated by the rapacious arts of
monopoly. In this unequal contest, in which the produce of the
land is claimed by one party as his exclusive property, is used
by another as a lucrative object of trade, and is required by a
third for the daily and necessary support of life, all the
profits of the intermediate agents are accumulated on the head of
the defenceless customers. The hardships of their situation were
exaggerated and increased by their own impatience and anxiety;
and the apprehension of a scarcity gradually produced the
appearances of a famine. When the luxurious citizens of Antioch
complained of the high price of poultry and fish, Julian publicly
declared, that a frugal city ought to be satisfied with a regular
supply of wine, oil, and bread; but he acknowledged, that it was
the duty of a sovereign to provide for the subsistence of his
people. With this salutary view, the emperor ventured on a very
dangerous and doubtful step, of fixing, by legal authority, the
value of corn. He enacted, that, in a time of scarcity, it should
be sold at a price which had seldom been known in the most
plentiful years; and that his own example might strengthen his
laws, he sent into the market four hundred and twenty-two
thousand <strong><em>modii</em></strong>, or measures, which were
drawn by his order from the granaries of Hierapolis, of Chalcis,
and even of Egypt. The consequences might have been foreseen, and
were soon felt. The Imperial wheat was purchased by the rich
merchants; the proprietors of land, or of corn, withheld from the
city the accustomed supply; and the small quantities that
appeared in the market were secretly sold at an advanced and
illegal price. Julian still continued to applaud his own policy,
treated the complaints of the people as a vain and ungrateful
murmur, and convinced Antioch that he had inherited the
obstinacy, though not the cruelty, of his brother Gallus. The
remonstrances of the municipal senate served only to exasperate
his inflexible mind. He was persuaded, perhaps with truth, that
the senators of Antioch who possessed lands, or were concerned in
trade, had themselves contributed to the calamities of their
country; and he imputed the disrespectful boldness which they
assumed, to the sense, not of public duty, but of private
interest. The whole body, consisting of two hundred of the most
noble and wealthy citizens, were sent, under a guard, from the
palace to the prison; and though they were permitted, before the
close of evening, to return to their respective houses, the
emperor himself could not obtain the forgiveness which he had so
easily granted. The same grievances were still the subject of the
same complaints, which were industriously circulated by the wit
and levity of the Syrian Greeks. During the licentious days of
the Saturnalia, the streets of the city resounded with insolent
songs, which derided the laws, the religion, the personal
conduct, and even the <strong><em>beard</em></strong>, of the
emperor; the spirit of Antioch was manifested by the connivance
of the magistrates, and the applause of the multitude. The
disciple of Socrates was too deeply affected by these popular
insults; but the monarch, endowed with a quick sensibility, and
possessed of absolute power, refused his passions the
gratification of revenge. A tyrant might have proscribed, without
distinction, the lives and fortunes of the citizens of Antioch;
and the unwarlike Syrians must have patiently submitted to the
lust, the rapaciousness and the cruelty, of the faithful legions
of Gaul. A milder sentence might have deprived the capital of the
East of its honors and privileges; and the courtiers, perhaps the
subjects, of Julian, would have applauded an act of justice,
which asserted the dignity of the supreme magistrate of the
republic. But instead of abusing, or exerting, the authority of
the state, to revenge his personal injuries, Julian contented
himself with an inoffensive mode of retaliation, which it would
be in the power of few princes to employ. He had been insulted by
satires and libels; in his turn, he composed, under the title of
the <strong><em>Enemy of the Beard</em></strong>, an ironical
confession of his own faults, and a severe satire on the
licentious and effeminate manners of Antioch. This Imperial reply
was publicly exposed before the gates of the palace; and the
Misopogon still remains a singular monument of the resentment,
the wit, the humanity, and the indiscretion of Julian. Though he
affected to laugh, he could not forgive. His contempt was
expressed, and his revenge might be gratified, by the nomination
of a governor worthy only of such subjects; and the emperor,
forever renouncing the ungrateful city, proclaimed his resolution
to pass the ensuing winter at Tarsus in Cilicia.<br>
</p>

<p>Yet Antioch possessed one citizen, whose genius and virtues
might atone, in the opinion of Julian, for the vice and folly of
his country. The sophist Libanius was born in the capital of the
East; he publicly professed the arts of rhetoric and declamation
at Nice, Nicomedia, Constantinople, Athens, and, during the
remainder of his life, at Antioch. His school was assiduously
frequented by the Grecian youth; his disciples, who sometimes
exceeded the number of eighty, celebrated their incomparable
master; and the jealousy of his rivals, who persecuted him from
one city to another, confirmed the favorable opinion which
Libanius ostentatiously displayed of his superior merit. The
preceptors of Julian had extorted a rash but solemn assurance,
that he would never attend the lectures of their adversary: the
curiosity of the royal youth was checked and inflamed: he
secretly procured the writings of this dangerous sophist, and
gradually surpassed, in the perfect imitation of his style, the
most laborious of his domestic pupils. When Julian ascended the
throne, he declared his impatience to embrace and reward the
Syrian sophist, who had preserved, in a degenerate age, the
Grecian purity of taste, of manners, and of religion. The
emperor's prepossession was increased and justified by the
discreet pride of his favorite. Instead of pressing, with the
foremost of the crowd, into the palace of Constantinople,
Libanius calmly expected his arrival at Antioch; withdrew from
court on the first symptoms of coldness and indifference;
required a formal invitation for each visit; and taught his
sovereign an important lesson, that he might command the
obedience of a subject, but that he must deserve the attachment
of a friend. The sophists of every age, despising, or affecting
to despise, the accidental distinctions of birth and fortune,
reserve their esteem for the superior qualities of the mind, with
which they themselves are so plentifully endowed. Julian might
disdain the acclamations of a venal court, who adored the
Imperial purple; but he was deeply flattered by the praise, the
admonition, the freedom, and the envy of an independent
philosopher, who refused his favors, loved his person, celebrated
his fame, and protected his memory. The voluminous writings of
Libanius still exist; for the most part, they are the vain and
idle compositions of an orator, who cultivated the science of
words; the productions of a recluse student, whose mind,
regardless of his contemporaries, was incessantly fixed on the
Trojan war and the Athenian commonwealth. Yet the sophist of
Antioch sometimes descended from this imaginary elevation; he
entertained a various and elaborate correspondence; he praised
the virtues of his own times; he boldly arraigned the abuse of
public and private life; and he eloquently pleaded the cause of
Antioch against the just resentment of Julian and Theodosius. It
is the common calamity of old age, to lose whatever might have
rendered it desirable; but Libanius experienced the peculiar
misfortune of surviving the religion and the sciences, to which
he had consecrated his genius. The friend of Julian was an
indignant spectator of the triumph of Christianity; and his
bigotry, which darkened the prospect of the visible world, did
not inspire Libanius with any lively hopes of celestial glory and
happiness.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XXIV: The Retreat And Death Of Julian. --
Part II.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>The martial impatience of Julian urged him to take the field
in the beginning of the spring; and he dismissed, with contempt
and reproach, the senate of Antioch, who accompanied the emperor
beyond the limits of their own territory, to which he was
resolved never to return. After a laborious march of two days, he
halted on the third at Ber&aelig;a, or Aleppo, where he had the
mortification of finding a senate almost entirely Christian; who
received with cold and formal demonstrations of respect the
eloquent sermon of the apostle of paganism. The son of one of the
most illustrious citizens of Ber&aelig;a, who had embraced,
either from interest or conscience, the religion of the emperor,
was disinherited by his angry parent. The father and the son were
invited to the Imperial table. Julian, placing himself between
them, attempted, without success, to inculcate the lesson and
example of toleration; supported, with affected calmness, the
indiscreet zeal of the aged Christian, who seemed to forget the
sentiments of nature, and the duty of a subject; and at length,
turning towards the afflicted youth, "Since you have lost a
father," said he, "for my sake, it is incumbent on me to supply
his place." The emperor was received in a manner much more
agreeable to his wishes at Batn&aelig;, * a small town pleasantly
seated in a grove of cypresses, about twenty miles from the city
of Hierapolis. The solemn rites of sacrifice were decently
prepared by the inhabitants of Batn&aelig;, who seemed attached
to the worship of their tutelar deities, Apollo and Jupiter; but
the serious piety of Julian was offended by the tumult of their
applause; and he too clearly discerned, that the smoke which
arose from their altars was the incense of flattery, rather than
of devotion. The ancient and magnificent temple which had
sanctified, for so many ages, the city of Hierapolis, no longer
subsisted; and the consecrated wealth, which afforded a liberal
maintenance to more than three hundred priests, might hasten its
downfall. Yet Julian enjoyed the satisfaction of embracing a
philosopher and a friend, whose religious firmness had withstood
the pressing and repeated solicitations of Constantius and
Gallus, as often as those princes lodged at his house, in their
passage through Hierapolis. In the hurry of military preparation,
and the careless confidence of a familiar correspondence, the
zeal of Julian appears to have been lively and uniform. He had
now undertaken an important and difficult war; and the anxiety of
the event rendered him still more attentive to observe and
register the most trifling presages, from which, according to the
rules of divination, any knowledge of futurity could be derived.
He informed Libanius of his progress as far as Hierapolis, by an
elegant epistle, which displays the facility of his genius, and
his tender friendship for the sophist of Antioch.<br>
</p>

<p>Hierapolis, * situate almost on the banks of the Euphrates,
had been appointed for the general rendezvous of the Roman
troops, who immediately passed the great river on a bridge of
boats, which was previously constructed. If the inclinations of
Julian had been similar to those of his predecessor, he might
have wasted the active and important season of the year in the
circus of Samosata or in the churches of Edessa. But as the
warlike emperor, instead of Constantius, had chosen Alexander for
his model, he advanced without delay to Carrh&aelig;, a very
ancient city of Mesopotamia, at the distance of fourscore miles
from Hierapolis. The temple of the Moon attracted the devotion of
Julian; but the halt of a few days was principally employed in
completing the immense preparations of the Persian war. The
secret of the expedition had hitherto remained in his own breast;
but as Carrh&aelig; is the point of separation of the two great
roads, he could no longer conceal whether it was his design to
attack the dominions of Sapor on the side of the Tigris, or on
that of the Euphrates. The emperor detached an army of thirty
thousand men, under the command of his kinsman Procopius, and of
Sebastian, who had been duke of Egypt. They were ordered to
direct their march towards Nisibis, and to secure the frontier
from the desultory incursions of the enemy, before they attempted
the passage of the Tigris. Their subsequent operations were left
to the discretion of the generals; but Julian expected, that
after wasting with fire and sword the fertile districts of Media
and Adiabene, they might arrive under the walls of Ctesiphon at
the same time that he himself, advancing with equal steps along
the banks of the Euphrates, should besiege the capital of the
Persian monarchy. The success of this well-concerted plan
depended, in a great measure, on the powerful and ready
assistance of the king of Armenia, who, without exposing the
safety of his own dominions, might detach an army of four
thousand horse, and twenty thousand foot, to the assistance of
the Romans. But the feeble Arsaces Tiranus, king of Armenia, had
degenerated still more shamefully than his father Chosroes, from
the manly virtues of the great Tiridates; and as the
pusillanimous monarch was averse to any enterprise of danger and
glory, he could disguise his timid indolence by the more decent
excuses of religion and gratitude. He expressed a pious
attachment to the memory of Constantius, from whose hands he had
received in marriage Olympias, the daughter of the pr&aelig;fect
Ablavius; and the alliance of a female, who had been educated as
the destined wife of the emperor Constans, exalted the dignity of
a Barbarian king. Tiranus professed the Christian religion; he
reigned over a nation of Christians; and he was restrained, by
every principle of conscience and interest, from contributing to
the victory, which would consummate the ruin of the church. The
alienated mind of Tiranus was exasperated by the indiscretion of
Julian, who treated the king of Armenia as his slave, and as the
enemy of the gods. The haughty and threatening style of the
Imperial mandates awakened the secret indignation of a prince,
who, in the humiliating state of dependence, was still conscious
of his royal descent from the Arsacides, the lords of the East,
and the rivals of the Roman power.<br>
</p>

<p>The military dispositions of Julian were skilfully contrived
to deceive the spies and to divert the attention of Sapor. The
legions appeared to direct their march towards Nisibis and the
Tigris. On a sudden they wheeled to the right; traversed the
level and naked plain of Carrh&aelig;; and reached, on the third
day, the banks of the Euphrates, where the strong town of
Nicephorium, or Callinicum, had been founded by the Macedonian
kings. From thence the emperor pursued his march, above ninety
miles, along the winding stream of the Euphrates, till, at
length, about one month after his departure from Antioch, he
discovered the towers of Circesium, * the extreme limit of the
Roman dominions. The army of Julian, the most numerous that any
of the C&aelig;sars had ever led against Persia, consisted of
sixty-five thousand effective and well-disciplined soldiers. The
veteran bands of cavalry and infantry, of Romans and Barbarians,
had been selected from the different provinces; and a just
preeminence of loyalty and valor was claimed by the hardy Gauls,
who guarded the throne and person of their beloved prince. A
formidable body of Scythian auxiliaries had been transported from
another climate, and almost from another world, to invade a
distant country, of whose name and situation they were ignorant.
The love of rapine and war allured to the Imperial standard
several tribes of Saracens, or roving Arabs, whose service Julian
had commanded, while he sternly refuse the payment of the
accustomed subsidies. The broad channel of the Euphrates was
crowded by a fleet of eleven hundred ships, destined to attend
the motions, and to satisfy the wants, of the Roman army. The
military strength of the fleet was composed of fifty armed
galleys; and these were accompanied by an equal number of
flat-bottomed boats, which might occasionally be connected into
the form of temporary bridges. The rest of the ships, partly
constructed of timber, and partly covered with raw hides, were
laden with an almost inexhaustible supply of arms and engines, of
utensils and provisions. The vigilant humanity of Julian had
embarked a very large magazine of vinegar and biscuit for the use
of the soldiers, but he prohibited the indulgence of wine; and
rigorously stopped a long string of superfluous camels that
attempted to follow the rear of the army. The River Chaboras
falls into the Euphrates at Circesium; and as soon as the trumpet
gave the signal of march, the Romans passed the little stream
which separated two mighty and hostile empires. The custom of
ancient discipline required a military oration; and Julian
embraced every opportunity of displaying his eloquence. He
animated the impatient and attentive legions by the example of
the inflexible courage and glorious triumphs of their ancestors.
He excited their resentment by a lively picture of the insolence
of the Persians; and he exhorted them to imitate his firm
resolution, either to extirpate that perfidious nation, or to
devote his life in the cause of the republic. The eloquence of
Julian was enforced by a donative of one hundred and thirty
pieces of silver to every soldier; and the bridge of the Chaboras
was instantly cut away, to convince the troops that they must
place their hopes of safety in the success of their arms. Yet the
prudence of the emperor induced him to secure a remote frontier,
perpetually exposed to the inroads of the hostile Arabs. A
detachment of four thousand men was left at Circesium, which
completed, to the number of ten thousand, the regular garrison of
that important fortress.<br>
</p>

<p>From the moment that the Romans entered the enemy's country,
the country of an active and artful enemy, the order of march was
disposed in three columns. The strength of the infantry, and
consequently of the whole army was placed in the centre, under
the peculiar command of their master-general Victor. On the
right, the brave Nevitta led a column of several legions along
the banks of the Euphrates, and almost always in sight of the
fleet. The left flank of the army was protected by the column of
cavalry. Hormisdas and Arinth&aelig;us were appointed generals of
the horse; and the singular adventures of Hormisdas are not
undeserving of our notice. He was a Persian prince, of the royal
race of the Sassanides, who, in the troubles of the minority of
Sapor, had escaped from prison to the hospitable court of the
great Constantine. Hormisdas at first excited the compassion, and
at length acquired the esteem, of his new masters; his valor and
fidelity raised him to the military honors of the Roman service;
and though a Christian, he might indulge the secret satisfaction
of convincing his ungrateful country, than at oppressed subject
may prove the most dangerous enemy. Such was the disposition of
the three principal columns. The front and flanks of the army
were covered by Lucilianus with a flying detachment of fifteen
hundred light-armed soldiers, whose active vigilance observed the
most distant signs, and conveyed the earliest notice, of any
hostile approach. Dagalaiphus, and Secundinus duke of Osrhoene,
conducted the troops of the rear-guard; the baggage securely
proceeded in the intervals of the columns; and the ranks, from a
motive either of use or ostentation, were formed in such open
order, that the whole line of march extended almost ten miles.
The ordinary post of Julian was at the head of the centre column;
but as he preferred the duties of a general to the state of a
monarch, he rapidly moved, with a small escort of light cavalry,
to the front, the rear, the flanks, wherever his presence could
animate or protect the march of the Roman army. The country which
they traversed from the Chaboras, to the cultivated lands of
Assyria, may be considered as a part of the desert of Arabia, a
dry and barren waste, which could never be improved by the most
powerful arts of human industry. Julian marched over the same
ground which had been trod above seven hundred years before by
the footsteps of the younger Cyrus, and which is described by one
of the companions of his expedition, the sage and heroic
Xenophon. "The country was a plain throughout, as even as the
sea, and full of wormwood; and if any other kind of shrubs or
reeds grew there, they had all an aromatic smell, but no trees
could be seen. Bustards and ostriches, antelopes and wild asses,
appeared to be the only inhabitants of the desert; and the
fatigues of the march were alleviated by the amusements of the
chase." The loose sand of the desert was frequently raised by the
wind into clouds of dust; and a great number of the soldiers of
Julian, with their tents, were suddenly thrown to the ground by
the violence of an unexpected hurricane.<br>
</p>

<p>The sandy plains of Mesopotamia were abandoned to the
antelopes and wild asses of the desert; but a variety of populous
towns and villages were pleasantly situated on the banks of the
Euphrates, and in the islands which are occasionally formed by
that river. The city of Annah, or Anatho, the actual residence of
an Arabian emir, is composed of two long streets, which enclose,
within a natural fortification, a small island in the midst, and
two fruitful spots on either side, of the Euphrates. The warlike
inhabitants of Anatho showed a disposition to stop the march of a
Roman emperor; till they were diverted from such fatal
presumption by the mild exhortations of Prince Hormisdas, and the
approaching terrors of the fleet and army. They implored, and
experienced, the clemency of Julian, who transplanted the people
to an advantageous settlement, near Chalcis in Syria, and
admitted Pus&aelig;us, the governor, to an honorable rank in his
service and friendship. But the impregnable fortress of Thilutha
could scorn the menace of a siege; and the emperor was obliged to
content himself with an insulting promise, that, when he had
subdued the interior provinces of Persia, Thilutha would no
longer refuse to grace the triumph of the emperor. The
inhabitants of the open towns, unable to resist, and unwilling to
yield, fled with precipitation; and their houses, filled with
spoil and provisions, were occupied by the soldiers of Julian,
who massacred, without remorse and without punishment, some
defenceless women. During the march, the Surenas, * or Persian
general, and Malek Rodosaces, the renowned emir of the tribe of
Gassan, incessantly hovered round the army; every straggler was
intercepted; every detachment was attacked; and the valiant
Hormisdas escaped with some difficulty from their hands. But the
Barbarians were finally repulsed; the country became every day
less favorable to the operations of cavalry; and when the Romans
arrived at Macepracta, they perceived the ruins of the wall,
which had been constructed by the ancient kings of Assyria, to
secure their dominions from the incursions of the Medes. These
preliminaries of the expedition of Julian appear to have employed
about fifteen days; and we may compute near three hundred miles
from the fortress of Circesium to the wall of Macepracta.<br>
</p>

<p>The fertile province of Assyria, which stretched beyond the
Tigris, as far as the mountains of Media, extended about four
hundred miles from the ancient wall of Macepracta, to the
territory of Basra, where the united streams of the Euphrates and
Tigris discharge themselves into the Persian Gulf. The whole
country might have claimed the peculiar name of Mesopotamia; as
the two rivers, which are never more distant than fifty,
approach, between Bagdad and Babylon, within twenty-five miles,
of each other. A multitude of artificial canals, dug without much
labor in a soft and yielding soil connected the rivers, and
intersected the plain of Assyria. The uses of these artificial
canals were various and important. They served to discharge the
superfluous waters from one river into the other, at the season
of their respective inundations. Subdividing themselves into
smaller and smaller branches, they refreshed the dry lands, and
supplied the deficiency of rain. They facilitated the intercourse
of peace and commerce; and, as the dams could be speedily broke
down, they armed the despair of the Assyrians with the means of
opposing a sudden deluge to the progress of an invading army. To
the soil and climate of Assyria, nature had denied some of her
choicest gifts, the vine, the olive, and the fig-tree; * but the
food which supports the life of man, and particularly wheat and
barley, were produced with inexhaustible fertility; and the
husbandman, who committed his seed to the earth, was frequently
rewarded with an increase of two, or even of three, hundred. The
face of the country was interspersed with groves of innumerable
palm-trees; and the diligent natives celebrated, either in verse
or prose, the three hundred and sixty uses to which the trunk,
the branches, the leaves, the juice, and the fruit, were
skilfully applied. Several manufactures, especially those of
leather and linen, employed the industry of a numerous people,
and afforded valuable materials for foreign trade; which appears,
however, to have been conducted by the hands of strangers.
Babylon had been converted into a royal park; but near the ruins
of the ancient capital, new cities had successively arisen, and
the populousness of the country was displayed in the multitude of
towns and villages, which were built of bricks dried in the sun,
and strongly cemented with bitumen; the natural and peculiar
production of the Babylonian soil. While the successors of Cyrus
reigned over Asia, the province of Syria alone maintained, during
a third part of the year, the luxurious plenty of the table and
household of the Great King. Four considerable villages were
assigned for the subsistence of his Indian dogs; eight hundred
stallions, and sixteen thousand mares, were constantly kept, at
the expense of the country, for the royal stables; and as the
daily tribute, which was paid to the satrap, amounted to one
English bushel of silver, we may compute the annual revenue of
Assyria at more than twelve hundred thousand pounds sterling.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XXIV: The Retreat And Death Of Julian. --
Part III.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>The fields of Assyria were devoted by Julian to the calamities
of war; and the philosopher retaliated on a guiltless people the
acts of rapine and cruelty which had been committed by their
haughty master in the Roman provinces. The trembling Assyrians
summoned the rivers to their assistance; and completed, with
their own hands, the ruin of their country. The roads were
rendered impracticable; a flood of waters was poured into the
camp; and, during several days, the troops of Julian were obliged
to contend with the most discouraging hardships. But every
obstacle was surmounted by the perseverance of the legionaries,
who were inured to toil as well as to danger, and who felt
themselves animated by the spirit of their leader. The damage was
gradually repaired; the waters were restored to their proper
channels; whole groves of palm-trees were cut down, and placed
along the broken parts of the road; and the army passed over the
broad and deeper canals, on bridges of floating rafts, which were
supported by the help of bladders. Two cities of Assyria presumed
to resist the arms of a Roman emperor: and they both paid the
severe penalty of their rashness. At the distance of fifty miles
from the royal residence of Ctesiphon, Perisabor, * or Anbar,
held the second rank in the province; a city, large, populous,
and well fortified, surrounded with a double wall, almost
encompassed by a branch of the Euphrates, and defended by the
valor of a numerous garrison. The exhortations of Hormisdas were
repulsed with contempt; and the ears of the Persian prince were
wounded by a just reproach, that, unmindful of his royal birth,
he conducted an army of strangers against his king and country.
The Assyrians maintained their loyalty by a skilful, as well as
vigorous, defence; till the lucky stroke of a battering-ram,
having opened a large breach, by shattering one of the angles of
the wall, they hastily retired into the fortifications of the
interior citadel. The soldiers of Julian rushed impetuously into
the town, and after the full gratification of every military
appetite, Perisabor was reduced to ashes; and the engines which
assaulted the citadel were planted on the ruins of the smoking
houses. The contest was continued by an incessant and mutual
discharge of missile weapons; and the superiority which the
Romans might derive from the mechanical powers of their
balist&aelig; and catapult&aelig; was counterbalanced by the
advantage of the ground on the side of the besieged. But as soon
as an <strong><em>Helepolis</em></strong> had been constructed,
which could engage on equal terms with the loftiest ramparts, the
tremendous aspect of a moving turret, that would leave no hope of
resistance or mercy, terrified the defenders of the citadel into
an humble submission; and the place was surrendered only two days
after Julian first appeared under the walls of Perisabor. Two
thousand five hundred persons, of both sexes, the feeble remnant
of a flourishing people, were permitted to retire; the plentiful
magazines of corn, of arms, and of splendid furniture, were
partly distributed among the troops, and partly reserved for the
public service; the useless stores were destroyed by fire or
thrown into the stream of the Euphrates; and the fate of Amida
was revenged by the total ruin of Perisabor.<br>
</p>

<p>The city or rather fortress, of Maogamalcha, which was
defended by sixteen large towers, a deep ditch, and two strong
and solid walls of brick and bitumen, appears to have been
constructed at the distance of eleven miles, as the safeguard of
the capital of Persia. The emperor, apprehensive of leaving such
an important fortress in his rear, immediately formed the siege
of Maogamalcha; and the Roman army was distributed, for that
purpose, into three divisions. Victor, at the head of the
cavalry, and of a detachment of heavy-armed foot, was ordered to
clear the country, as far as the banks of the Tigris, and the
suburbs of Ctesiphon. The conduct of the attack was assumed by
Julian himself, who seemed to place his whole dependence in the
military engines which he erected against the walls; while he
secretly contrived a more efficacious method of introducing his
troops into the heart of the city Under the direction of Nevitta
and Dagalaiphus, the trenches were opened at a considerable
distance, and gradually prolonged as far as the edge of the
ditch. The ditch was speedily filled with earth; and, by the
incessant labor of the troops, a mine was carried under the
foundations of the walls, and sustained, at sufficient intervals,
by props of timber. Three chosen cohorts, advancing in a single
file, silently explored the dark and dangerous passage; till
their intrepid leader whispered back the intelligence, that he
was ready to issue from his confinement into the streets of the
hostile city. Julian checked their ardor, that he might insure
their success; and immediately diverted the attention of the
garrison, by the tumult and clamor of a general assault. The
Persians, who, from their walls, contemptuously beheld the
progress of an impotent attack, celebrated with songs of triumph
the glory of Sapor; and ventured to assure the emperor, that he
might ascend the starry mansion of Ormusd, before he could hope
to take the impregnable city of Maogamalcha. The city was already
taken. History has recorded the name of a private soldier the
first who ascended from the mine into a deserted tower. The
passage was widened by his companions, who pressed forwards with
impatient valor. Fifteen hundred enemies were already in the
midst of the city. The astonished garrison abandoned the walls,
and their only hope of safety; the gates were instantly burst
open; and the revenge of the soldier, unless it were suspended by
lust or avarice, was satiated by an undistinguishing massacre.
The governor, who had yielded on a promise of mercy, was burnt
alive, a few days afterwards, on a charge of having uttered some
disrespectful words against the honor of Prince Hormisdas. * The
fortifications were razed to the ground; and not a vestige was
left, that the city of Maogamalcha had ever existed. The
neighborhood of the capital of Persia was adorned with three
stately palaces, laboriously enriched with every production that
could gratify the luxury and pride of an Eastern monarch. The
pleasant situation of the gardens along the banks of the Tigris,
was improved, according to the Persian taste, by the symmetry of
flowers, fountains, and shady walks: and spacious parks were
enclosed for the reception of the bears, lions, and wild boars,
which were maintained at a considerable expense for the pleasure
of the royal chase. The park walls were broken down, the savage
game was abandoned to the darts of the soldiers, and the palaces
of Sapor were reduced to ashes, by the command of the Roman
emperor. Julian, on this occasion, showed himself ignorant, or
careless, of the laws of civility, which the prudence and
refinement of polished ages have established between hostile
princes. Yet these wanton ravages need not excite in our breasts
any vehement emotions of pity or resentment. A simple, naked
statue, finished by the hand of a Grecian artist, is of more
genuine value than all these rude and costly monuments of
Barbaric labor; and, if we are more deeply affected by the ruin
of a palace than by the conflagration of a cottage, our humanity
must have formed a very erroneous estimate of the miseries of
human life.<br>
</p>

<p>Julian was an object of hatred and terror to the Persian and
the painters of that nation represented the invader of their
country under the emblem of a furious lion, who vomited from his
mouth a consuming fire. To his friends and soldiers the
philosophic hero appeared in a more amiable light; and his
virtues were never more conspicuously displayed, than in the last
and most active period of his life. He practised, without effort,
and almost without merit, the habitual qualities of temperance
and sobriety. According to the dictates of that artificial
wisdom, which assumes an absolute dominion over the mind and
body, he sternly refused himself the indulgence of the most
natural appetites. In the warm climate of Assyria, which
solicited a luxurious people to the gratification of every
sensual desire, a youthful conqueror preserved his chastity pure
and inviolate; nor was Julian ever tempted, even by a motive of
curiosity, to visit his female captives of exquisite beauty, who,
instead of resisting his power, would have disputed with each
other the honor of his embraces. With the same firmness that he
resisted the allurements of love, he sustained the hardships of
war. When the Romans marched through the flat and flooded
country, their sovereign, on foot, at the head of his legions,
shared their fatigues and animated their diligence. In every
useful labor, the hand of Julian was prompt and strenuous; and
the Imperial purple was wet and dirty as the coarse garment of
the meanest soldier. The two sieges allowed him some remarkable
opportunities of signalizing his personal valor, which, in the
improved state of the military art, can seldom be exerted by a
prudent general. The emperor stood before the citadel before the
citadel of Perisabor, insensible of his extreme danger, and
encouraged his troops to burst open the gates of iron, till he
was almost overwhelmed under a cloud of missile weapons and huge
stones, that were directed against his person. As he examined the
exterior fortifications of Maogamalcha, two Persians, devoting
themselves for their country, suddenly rushed upon him with drawn
cimeters: the emperor dexterously received their blows on his
uplifted shield; and, with a steady and well-aimed thrust, laid
one of his adversaries dead at his feet. The esteem of a prince
who possesses the virtues which he approves, is the noblest
recompense of a deserving subject; and the authority which Julian
derived from his personal merit, enabled him to revive and
enforce the rigor of ancient discipline. He punished with death
or ignominy the misbehavior of three troops of horse, who, in a
skirmish with the Surenas, had lost their honor and one of their
standards: and he distinguished with
<strong><em>obsidional</em></strong> crowns the valor of the
foremost soldiers, who had ascended into the city of Maogamalcha.
After the siege of Perisabor, the firmness of the emperor was
exercised by the insolent avarice of the army, who loudly
complained, that their services were rewarded by a trifling
donative of one hundred pieces of silver. His just indignation
was expressed in the grave and manly language of a Roman. "Riches
are the object of your desires; those riches are in the hands of
the Persians; and the spoils of this fruitful country are
proposed as the prize of your valor and discipline. Believe me,"
added Julian, "the Roman republic, which formerly possessed such
immense treasures, is now reduced to want and wretchedness once
our princes have been persuaded, by weak and interested
ministers, to purchase with gold the tranquillity of the
Barbarians. The revenue is exhausted; the cities are ruined; the
provinces are dispeopled. For myself, the only inheritance that I
have received from my royal ancestors is a soul incapable of
fear; and as long as I am convinced that every real advantage is
seated in the mind, I shall not blush to acknowledge an honorable
poverty, which, in the days of ancient virtue, was considered as
the glory of Fabricius. That glory, and that virtue, may be your
own, if you will listen to the voice of Heaven and of your
leader. But if you will rashly persist, if you are determined to
renew the shameful and mischievous examples of old seditions,
proceed. As it becomes an emperor who has filled the first rank
among men, I am prepared to die, standing; and to despise a
precarious life, which, every hour, may depend on an accidental
fever. If I have been found unworthy of the command, there are
now among you, (I speak it with pride and pleasure,) there are
many chiefs whose merit and experience are equal to the conduct
of the most important war. Such has been the temper of my reign,
that I can retire, without regret, and without apprehension, to
the obscurity of a private station" The modest resolution of
Julian was answered by the unanimous applause and cheerful
obedience of the Romans, who declared their confidence of
victory, while they fought under the banners of their heroic
prince. Their courage was kindled by his frequent and familiar
asseverations, (for such wishes were the oaths of Julian,) "So
may I reduce the Persians under the yoke!" "Thus may I restore
the strength and splendor of the republic!" The love of fame was
the ardent passion of his soul: but it was not before he trampled
on the ruins of Maogamalcha, that he allowed himself to say, "We
have now provided some materials for the sophist of Antioch."<br>
</p>

<p>The successful valor of Julian had triumphed over all the
obstacles that opposed his march to the gates of Ctesiphon. But
the reduction, or even the siege, of the capital of Persia, was
still at a distance: nor can the military conduct of the emperor
be clearly apprehended, without a knowledge of the country which
was the theatre of his bold and skilful operations. Twenty miles
to the south of Bagdad, and on the eastern bank of the Tigris,
the curiosity of travellers has observed some ruins of the
palaces of Ctesiphon, which, in the time of Julian, was a great
and populous city. The name and glory of the adjacent Seleucia
were forever extinguished; and the only remaining quarter of that
Greek colony had resumed, with the Assyrian language and manners,
the primitive appellation of Coche. Coche was situate on the
western side of the Tigris; but it was naturally considered as a
suburb of Ctesiphon, with which we may suppose it to have been
connected by a permanent bridge of boats. The united parts
contribute to form the common epithet of Al Modain, the cities,
which the Orientals have bestowed on the winter residence of the
Sassinades; and the whole circumference of the Persian capital
was strongly fortified by the waters of the river, by lofty
walls, and by impracticable morasses. Near the ruins of Seleucia,
the camp of Julian was fixed, and secured, by a ditch and
rampart, against the sallies of the numerous and enterprising
garrison of Coche. In this fruitful and pleasant country, the
Romans were plentifully supplied with water and forage: and
several forts, which might have embarrassed the motions of the
army, submitted, after some resistance, to the efforts of their
valor. The fleet passed from the Euphrates into an artificial
derivation of that river, which pours a copious and navigable
stream into the Tigris, at a small distance
<strong><em>below</em></strong> the great city. If they had
followed this royal canal, which bore the name of Nahar-Malcha,
the intermediate situation of Coche would have separated the
fleet and army of Julian; and the rash attempt of steering
against the current of the Tigris, and forcing their way through
the midst of a hostile capital, must have been attended with the
total destruction of the Roman navy. The prudence of the emperor
foresaw the danger, and provided the remedy. As he had minutely
studied the operations of Trajan in the same country, he soon
recollected that his warlike predecessor had dug a new and
navigable canal, which, leaving Coche on the right hand, conveyed
the waters of the Nahar-Malcha into the river Tigris, at some
distance <strong><em>above</em></strong> the cities. From the
information of the peasants, Julian ascertained the vestiges of
this ancient work, which were almost obliterated by design or
accident. By the indefatigable labor of the soldiers, a broad and
deep channel was speedily prepared for the reception of the
Euphrates. A strong dike was constructed to interrupt the
ordinary current of the Nahar-Malcha: a flood of waters rushed
impetuously into their new bed; and the Roman fleet, steering
their triumphant course into the Tigris, derided the vain and
ineffectual barriers which the Persians of Ctesiphon had erected
to oppose their passage.<br>
</p>

<p>As it became necessary to transport the Roman army over the
Tigris, another labor presented itself, of less toil, but of more
danger, than the preceding expedition. The stream was broad and
rapid; the ascent steep and difficult; and the intrenchments
which had been formed on the ridge of the opposite bank, were
lined with a numerous army of heavy cuirassiers, dexterous
archers, and huge elephants; who (according to the extravagant
hyperbole of Libanius) could trample with the same ease a field
of corn, or a legion of Romans. In the presence of such an enemy,
the construction of a bridge was impracticable; and the intrepid
prince, who instantly seized the only possible expedient,
concealed his design, till the moment of execution, from the
knowledge of the Barbarians, of his own troops, and even of his
generals themselves. Under the specious pretence of examining the
state of the magazines, fourscore vessels * were gradually
unladen; and a select detachment, apparently destined for some
secret expedition, was ordered to stand to their arms on the
first signal. Julian disguised the silent anxiety of his own mind
with smiles of confidence and joy; and amused the hostile nations
with the spectacle of military games, which he insultingly
celebrated under the walls of Coche. The day was consecrated to
pleasure; but, as soon as the hour of supper was passed, the
emperor summoned the generals to his tent, and acquainted them
that he had fixed that night for the passage of the Tigris. They
stood in silent and respectful astonishment; but, when the
venerable Sallust assumed the privilege of his age and
experience, the rest of the chiefs supported with freedom the
weight of his prudent remonstrances. Julian contented himself
with observing, that conquest and safety depended on the attempt;
that instead of diminishing, the number of their enemies would be
increased, by successive reenforcements; and that a longer delay
would neither contract the breadth of the stream, nor level the
height of the bank. The signal was instantly given, and obeyed;
the most impatient of the legionaries leaped into five vessels
that lay nearest to the bank; and as they plied their oars with
intrepid diligence, they were lost, after a few moments, in the
darkness of the night. A flame arose on the opposite side; and
Julian, who too clearly understood that his foremost vessels, in
attempting to land, had been fired by the enemy, dexterously
converted their extreme danger into a presage of victory. "Our
fellow-soldiers," he eagerly exclaimed, "are already masters of
the bank; see -- they make the appointed signal; let us hasten to
emulate and assist their courage." The united and rapid motion of
a great fleet broke the violence of the current, and they reached
the eastern shore of the Tigris with sufficient speed to
extinguish the flames, and rescue their adventurous companions.
The difficulties of a steep and lofty ascent were increased by
the weight of armor, and the darkness of the night. A shower of
stones, darts, and fire, was incessantly discharged on the heads
of the assailants; who, after an arduous struggle, climbed the
bank and stood victorious upon the rampart. As soon as they
possessed a more equal field, Julian, who, with his light
infantry, had led the attack, darted through the ranks a skilful
and experienced eye: his bravest soldiers, according to the
precepts of Homer, were distributed in the front and rear: and
all the trumpets of the Imperial army sounded to battle. The
Romans, after sending up a military shout, advanced in measured
steps to the animating notes of martial music; launched their
formidable javelins; and rushed forwards with drawn swords, to
deprive the Barbarians, by a closer onset, of the advantage of
their missile weapons. The whole engagement lasted above twelve
hours; till the gradual retreat of the Persians was changed into
a disorderly flight, of which the shameful example was given by
the principal leader, and the Surenas himself. They were pursued
to the gates of Ctesiphon; and the conquerors might have entered
the dismayed city, if their general, Victor, who was dangerously
wounded with an arrow, had not conjured them to desist from a
rash attempt, which must be fatal, if it were not successful. On
<strong><em>their</em></strong> side, the Romans acknowledged the
loss of only seventy-five men; while they affirmed, that the
Barbarians had left on the field of battle two thousand five
hundred, or even six thousand, of their bravest soldiers. The
spoil was such as might be expected from the riches and luxury of
an Oriental camp; large quantities of silver and gold, splendid
arms and trappings, and beds and tables of massy silver. * The
victorious emperor distributed, as the rewards of valor, some
honorable gifts, civic, and mural, and naval crowns; which he,
and perhaps he alone, esteemed more precious than the wealth of
Asia. A solemn sacrifice was offered to the god of war, but the
appearances of the victims threatened the most inauspicious
events; and Julian soon discovered, by less ambiguous signs, that
he had now reached the term of his prosperity.<br>
</p>

<p>On the second day after the battle, the domestic guards, the
Jovians and Herculians, and the remaining troops, which composed
near two thirds of the whole army, were securely wafted over the
Tigris. While the Persians beheld from the walls of Ctesiphon the
desolation of the adjacent country, Julian cast many an anxious
look towards the North, in full expectation, that as he himself
had victoriously penetrated to the capital of Sapor, the march
and junction of his lieutenants, Sebastian and Procopius, would
be executed with the same courage and diligence. His expectations
were disappointed by the treachery of the Armenian king, who
permitted, and most probably directed, the desertion of his
auxiliary troops from the camp of the Romans; and by the
dissensions of the two generals, who were incapable of forming or
executing any plan for the public service. When the emperor had
relinquished the hope of this important reenforcement, he
condescended to hold a council of war, and approved, after a full
debate, the sentiment of those generals, who dissuaded the siege
of Ctesiphon, as a fruitless and pernicious undertaking. It is
not easy for us to conceive, by what arts of fortification a city
thrice besieged and taken by the predecessors of Julian could be
rendered impregnable against an army of sixty thousand Romans,
commanded by a brave and experienced general, and abundantly
supplied with ships, provisions, battering engines, and military
stores. But we may rest assured, from the love of glory, and
contempt of danger, which formed the character of Julian, that he
was not discouraged by any trivial or imaginary obstacles. At the
very time when he declined the siege of Ctesiphon, he rejected,
with obstinacy and disdain, the most flattering offers of a
negotiation of peace. Sapor, who had been so long accustomed to
the tardy ostentation of Constantius, was surprised by the
intrepid diligence of his successor. As far as the confines of
India and Scythia, the satraps of the distant provinces were
ordered to assemble their troops, and to march, without delay, to
the assistance of their monarch. But their preparations were
dilatory, their motions slow; and before Sapor could lead an army
into the field, he received the melancholy intelligence of the
devastation of Assyria, the ruin of his palaces, and the
slaughter of his bravest troops, who defended the passage of the
Tigris. The pride of royalty was humbled in the dust; he took his
repasts on the ground; and the disorder of his hair expressed the
grief and anxiety of his mind. Perhaps he would not have refused
to purchase, with one half of his kingdom, the safety of the
remainder; and he would have gladly subscribed himself, in a
treaty of peace, the faithful and dependent ally of the Roman
conqueror. Under the pretence of private business, a minister of
rank and confidence was secretly despatched to embrace the knees
of Hormisdas, and to request, in the language of a suppliant,
that he might be introduced into the presence of the emperor. The
Sassanian prince, whether he listened to the voice of pride or
humanity, whether he consulted the sentiments of his birth, or
the duties of his situation, was equally inclined to promote a
salutary measure, which would terminate the calamities of Persia,
and secure the triumph of Rome. He was astonished by the
inflexible firmness of a hero, who remembered, most unfortunately
for himself and for his country, that Alexander had uniformly
rejected the propositions of Darius. But as Julian was sensible,
that the hope of a safe and honorable peace might cool the ardor
of his troops, he earnestly requested that Hormisdas would
privately dismiss the minister of Sapor, and conceal this
dangerous temptation from the knowledge of the camp.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XXIV: The Retreat And Death Of Julian. --
Part IV.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>The honor, as well as interest, of Julian, forbade him to
consume his time under the impregnable walls of Ctesiphon and as
often as he defied the Barbarians, who defended the city, to meet
him on the open plain, they prudently replied, that if he desired
to exercise his valor, he might seek the army of the Great King.
He felt the insult, and he accepted the advice. Instead of
confining his servile march to the banks of the Euphrates and
Tigris, he resolved to imitate the adventurous spirit of
Alexander, and boldly to advance into the inland provinces, till
he forced his rival to contend with him, perhaps in the plains of
Arbela, for the empire of Asia. The magnanimity of Julian was
applauded and betrayed, by the arts of a noble Persian, who, in
the cause of his country, had generously submitted to act a part
full of danger, of falsehood, and of shame. With a train of
faithful followers, he deserted to the Imperial camp; exposed, in
a specious tale, the injuries which he had sustained; exaggerated
the cruelty of Sapor, the discontent of the people, and the
weakness of the monarchy; and confidently offered himself as the
hostage and guide of the Roman march. The most rational grounds
of suspicion were urged, without effect, by the wisdom and
experience of Hormisdas; and the credulous Julian, receiving the
traitor into his bosom, was persuaded to issue a hasty order,
which, in the opinion of mankind, appeared to arraign his
prudence, and to endanger his safety. He destroyed, in a single
hour, the whole navy, which had been transported above five
hundred miles, at so great an expense of toil, of treasure, and
of blood. Twelve, or, at the most, twenty-two small vessels were
saved, to accompany, on carriages, the march of the army, and to
form occasional bridges for the passage of the rivers. A supply
of twenty days' provisions was reserved for the use of the
soldiers; and the rest of the magazines, with a fleet of eleven
hundred vessels, which rode at anchor in the Tigris, were
abandoned to the flames, by the absolute command of the emperor.
The Christian bishops, Gregory and Augustin, insult the madness
of the Apostate, who executed, with his own hands, the sentence
of divine justice. Their authority, of less weight, perhaps, in a
military question, is confirmed by the cool judgment of an
experienced soldier, who was himself spectator of the
conflagration, and who could not disapprove the reluctant murmurs
of the troops. Yet there are not wanting some specious, and
perhaps solid, reasons, which might justify the resolution of
Julian. The navigation of the Euphrates never ascended above
Babylon, nor that of the Tigris above Opis. The distance of the
last-mentioned city from the Roman camp was not very
considerable: and Julian must soon have renounced the vain and
impracticable attempt of forcing upwards a great fleet against
the stream of a rapid river, which in several places was
embarrassed by natural or artificial cataracts. The power of
sails and oars was insufficient; it became necessary to tow the
ships against the current of the river; the strength of twenty
thousand soldiers was exhausted in this tedious and servile
labor, and if the Romans continued to march along the banks of
the Tigris, they could only expect to return home without
achieving any enterprise worthy of the genius or fortune of their
leader. If, on the contrary, it was advisable to advance into the
inland country, the destruction of the fleet and magazines was
the only measure which could save that valuable prize from the
hands of the numerous and active troops which might suddenly be
poured from the gates of Ctesiphon. Had the arms of Julian been
victorious, we should now admire the conduct, as well as the
courage, of a hero, who, by depriving his soldiers of the hopes
of a retreat, left them only the alternative of death or
conquest.<br>
</p>

<p>The cumbersome train of artillery and wagons, which retards
the operations of a modern army, were in a great measure unknown
in the camps of the Romans. Yet, in every age, the subsistence of
sixty thousand men must have been one of the most important cares
of a prudent general; and that subsistence could only be drawn
from his own or from the enemy's country. Had it been possible
for Julian to maintain a bridge of communication on the Tigris,
and to preserve the conquered places of Assyria, a desolated
province could not afford any large or regular supplies, in a
season of the year when the lands were covered by the inundation
of the Euphrates, and the unwholesome air was darkened with
swarms of innumerable insects. The appearance of the hostile
country was far more inviting. The extensive region that lies
between the River Tigris and the mountains of Media, was filled
with villages and towns; and the fertile soil, for the most part,
was in a very improved state of cultivation. Julian might expect,
that a conqueror, who possessed the two forcible instruments of
persuasion, steel and gold, would easily procure a plentiful
subsistence from the fears or avarice of the natives. But, on the
approach of the Romans, the rich and smiling prospect was
instantly blasted. Wherever they moved, the inhabitants deserted
the open villages, and took shelter in the fortified towns; the
cattle was driven away; the grass and ripe corn were consumed
with fire; and, as soon as the flames had subsided which
interrupted the march of Julian, he beheld the melancholy face of
a smoking and naked desert. This desperate but effectual method
of defence can only be executed by the enthusiasm of a people who
prefer their independence to their property; or by the rigor of
an arbitrary government, which consults the public safety without
submitting to their inclinations the liberty of choice. On the
present occasion the zeal and obedience of the Persians seconded
the commands of Sapor; and the emperor was soon reduced to the
scanty stock of provisions, which continually wasted in his
hands. Before they were entirely consumed, he might still have
reached the wealthy and unwarlike cities of Ecbatana or Susa, by
the effort of a rapid and well-directed march; but he was
deprived of this last resource by his ignorance of the roads, and
by the perfidy of his guides. The Romans wandered several days in
the country to the eastward of Bagdad; the Persian deserter, who
had artfully led them into the spare, escaped from their
resentment; and his followers, as soon as they were put to the
torture, confessed the secret of the conspiracy. The visionary
conquests of Hyrcania and India, which had so long amused, now
tormented, the mind of Julian. Conscious that his own imprudence
was the cause of the public distress, he anxiously balanced the
hopes of safety or success, without obtaining a satisfactory
answer, either from gods or men. At length, as the only
practicable measure, he embraced the resolution of directing his
steps towards the banks of the Tigris, with the design of saving
the army by a hasty march to the confines of Corduene; a fertile
and friendly province, which acknowledged the sovereignty of
Rome. The desponding troops obeyed the signal of the retreat,
only seventy days after they had passed the Chaboras, with the
sanguine expectation of subverting the throne of Persia.<br>
</p>

<p>As long as the Romans seemed to advance into the country,
their march was observed and insulted from a distance, by several
bodies of Persian cavalry; who, showing themselves sometimes in
loose, and sometimes in close order, faintly skirmished with the
advanced guards. These detachments were, however, supported by a
much greater force; and the heads of the columns were no sooner
pointed towards the Tigris than a cloud of dust arose on the
plain. The Romans, who now aspired only to the permission of a
safe and speedy retreat, endeavored to persuade themselves, that
this formidable appearance was occasioned by a troop of wild
asses, or perhaps by the approach of some friendly Arabs. They
halted, pitched their tents, fortified their camp, passed the
whole night in continual alarms; and discovered at the dawn of
day, that they were surrounded by an army of Persians. This army,
which might be considered only as the van of the Barbarians, was
soon followed by the main body of cuirassiers, archers, and
elephants, commanded by Meranes, a general of rank and
reputation. He was accompanied by two of the king's sons, and
many of the principal satraps; and fame and expectation
exaggerated the strength of the remaining powers, which slowly
advanced under the conduct of Sapor himself. As the Romans
continued their march, their long array, which was forced to bend
or divide, according to the varieties of the ground, afforded
frequent and favorable opportunities to their vigilant enemies.
The Persians repeatedly charged with fury; they were repeatedly
repulsed with firmness; and the action at Maronga, which almost
deserved the name of a battle, was marked by a considerable loss
of satraps and elephants, perhaps of equal value in the eyes of
their monarch. These splendid advantages were not obtained
without an adequate slaughter on the side of the Romans: several
officers of distinction were either killed or wounded; and the
emperor himself, who, on all occasions of danger, inspired and
guided the valor of his troops, was obliged to expose his person,
and exert his abilities. The weight of offensive and defensive
arms, which still constituted the strength and safety of the
Romans, disabled them from making any long or effectual pursuit;
and as the horsemen of the East were trained to dart their
javelins, and shoot their arrows, at full speed, and in every
possible direction, the cavalry of Persia was never more
formidable than in the moment of a rapid and disorderly flight.
But the most certain and irreparable loss of the Romans was that
of time. The hardy veterans, accustomed to the cold climate of
Gaul and Germany, fainted under the sultry heat of an Assyrian
summer; their vigor was exhausted by the incessant repetition of
march and combat; and the progress of the army was suspended by
the precautions of a slow and dangerous retreat, in the presence
of an active enemy. Every day, every hour, as the supply
diminished, the value and price of subsistence increased in the
Roman camp. Julian, who always contented himself with such food
as a hungry soldier would have disdained, distributed, for the
use of the troops, the provisions of the Imperial household, and
whatever could be spared, from the sumpter-horses, of the
tribunes and generals. But this feeble relief served only to
aggravate the sense of the public distress; and the Romans began
to entertain the most gloomy apprehensions that, before they
could reach the frontiers of the empire, they should all perish,
either by famine, or by the sword of the Barbarians.<br>
</p>

<p>While Julian struggled with the almost insuperable
difficulties of his situation, the silent hours of the night were
still devoted to study and contemplation. Whenever he closed his
eyes in short and interrupted slumbers, his mind was agitated
with painful anxiety; nor can it be thought surprising, that the
Genius of the empire should once more appear before him, covering
with a funeral veil his head, and his horn of abundance, and
slowly retiring from the Imperial tent. The monarch started from
his couch, and stepping forth to refresh his wearied spirits with
the coolness of the midnight air, he beheld a fiery meteor, which
shot athwart the sky, and suddenly vanished. Julian was convinced
that he had seen the menacing countenance of the god of war; the
council which he summoned, of Tuscan Haruspices, unanimously
pronounced that he should abstain from action; but on this
occasion, necessity and reason were more prevalent than
superstition; and the trumpets sounded at the break of day. The
army marched through a hilly country; and the hills had been
secretly occupied by the Persians. Julian led the van with the
skill and attention of a consummate general; he was alarmed by
the intelligence that his rear was suddenly attacked. The heat of
the weather had tempted him to lay aside his cuirass; but he
snatched a shield from one of his attendants, and hastened, with
a sufficient reenforcement, to the relief of the rear-guard. A
similar danger recalled the intrepid prince to the defence of the
front; and, as he galloped through the columns, the centre of the
left was attacked, and almost overpowered by the furious charge
of the Persian cavalry and elephants. This huge body was soon
defeated, by the well-timed evolution of the light infantry, who
aimed their weapons, with dexterity and effect, against the backs
of the horsemen, and the legs of the elephants. The Barbarians
fled; and Julian, who was foremost in every danger, animated the
pursuit with his voice and gestures. His trembling guards,
scattered and oppressed by the disorderly throng of friends and
enemies, reminded their fearless sovereign that he was without
armor; and conjured him to decline the fall of the impending
ruin. As they exclaimed, a cloud of darts and arrows was
discharged from the flying squadrons; and a javelin, after razing
the skin of his arm, transpierced the ribs, and fixed in the
inferior part of the liver. Julian attempted to draw the deadly
weapon from his side; but his fingers were cut by the sharpness
of the steel, and he fell senseless from his horse. His guards
flew to his relief; and the wounded emperor was gently raised
from the ground, and conveyed out of the tumult of the battle
into an adjacent tent. The report of the melancholy event passed
from rank to rank; but the grief of the Romans inspired them with
invincible valor, and the desire of revenge. The bloody and
obstinate conflict was maintained by the two armies, till they
were separated by the total darkness of the night. The Persians
derived some honor from the advantage which they obtained against
the left wing, where Anatolius, master of the offices, was slain,
and the pr&aelig;fect Sallust very narrowly escaped. But the
event of the day was adverse to the Barbarians. They abandoned
the field; their two generals, Meranes and Nohordates, fifty
nobles or satraps, and a multitude of their bravest soldiers; and
the success of the Romans, if Julian had survived, might have
been improved into a decisive and useful victory.<br>
</p>

<p>The first words that Julian uttered, after his recovery from
the fainting fit into which he had been thrown by loss of blood,
were expressive of his martial spirit. He called for his horse
and arms, and was impatient to rush into the battle. His
remaining strength was exhausted by the painful effort; and the
surgeons, who examined his wound, discovered the symptoms of
approaching death. He employed the awful moments with the firm
temper of a hero and a sage; the philosophers who had accompanied
him in this fatal expedition, compared the tent of Julian with
the prison of Socrates; and the spectators, whom duty, or
friendship, or curiosity, had assembled round his couch, listened
with respectful grief to the funeral oration of their dying
emperor. "Friends and fellow-soldiers, the seasonable period of
my departure is now arrived, and I discharge, with the
cheerfulness of a ready debtor, the demands of nature. I have
learned from philosophy, how much the soul is more excellent than
the body; and that the separation of the nobler substance should
be the subject of joy, rather than of affliction. I have learned
from religion, that an early death has often been the reward of
piety; and I accept, as a favor of the gods, the mortal stroke
that secures me from the danger of disgracing a character, which
has hitherto been supported by virtue and fortitude. I die
without remorse, as I have lived without guilt. I am pleased to
reflect on the innocence of my private life; and I can affirm
with confidence, that the supreme authority, that emanation of
the Divine Power, has been preserved in my hands pure and
immaculate. Detesting the corrupt and destructive maxims of
despotism, I have considered the happiness of the people as the
end of government. Submitting my actions to the laws of prudence,
of justice, and of moderation, I have trusted the event to the
care of Providence. Peace was the object of my counsels, as long
as peace was consistent with the public welfare; but when the
imperious voice of my country summoned me to arms, I exposed my
person to the dangers of war, with the clear foreknowledge (which
I had acquired from the art of divination) that I was destined to
fall by the sword. I now offer my tribute of gratitude to the
Eternal Being, who has not suffered me to perish by the cruelty
of a tyrant, by the secret dagger of conspiracy, or by the slow
tortures of lingering disease. He has given me, in the midst of
an honorable career, a splendid and glorious departure from this
world; and I hold it equally absurd, equally base, to solicit, or
to decline, the stroke of fate. This much I have attempted to
say; but my strength fails me, and I feel the approach of death.
I shall cautiously refrain from any word that may tend to
influence your suffrages in the election of an emperor. My choice
might be imprudent or injudicious; and if it should not be
ratified by the consent of the army, it might be fatal to the
person whom I should recommend. I shall only, as a good citizen,
express my hopes, that the Romans may be blessed with the
government of a virtuous sovereign." After this discourse, which
Julian pronounced in a firm and gentle tone of voice, he
distributed, by a military testament, the remains of his private
fortune; and making some inquiry why Anatolius was not present,
he understood, from the answer of Sallust, that Anatolius was
killed; and bewailed, with amiable inconsistency, the loss of his
friend. At the same time he reproved the immoderate grief of the
spectators; and conjured them not to disgrace, by unmanly tears,
the fate of a prince, who in a few moments would be united with
heaven, and with the stars. The spectators were silent; and
Julian entered into a metaphysical argument with the philosophers
Priscus and Maximus, on the nature of the soul. The efforts which
he made, of mind as well as body, most probably hastened his
death. His wound began to bleed with fresh violence; his
respiration was embarrassed by the swelling of the veins; he
called for a draught of cold water, and, as soon as he had drank
it, expired without pain, about the hour of midnight. Such was
the end of that extraordinary man, in the thirty-second year of
his age, after a reign of one year and about eight months, from
the death of Constantius. In his last moments he displayed,
perhaps with some ostentation, the love of virtue and of fame,
which had been the ruling passions of his life.<br>
</p>

<p>The triumph of Christianity, and the calamities of the empire,
may, in some measure, be ascribed to Julian himself, who had
neglected to secure the future execution of his designs, by the
timely and judicious nomination of an associate and successor.
But the royal race of Constantius Chlorus was reduced to his own
person; and if he entertained any serious thoughts of investing
with the purple the most worthy among the Romans, he was diverted
from his resolution by the difficulty of the choice, the jealousy
of power, the fear of ingratitude, and the natural presumption of
health, of youth, and of prosperity. His unexpected death left
the empire without a master, and without an heir, in a state of
perplexity and danger, which, in the space of fourscore years,
had never been experienced, since the election of Diocletian. In
a government which had almost forgotten the distinction of pure
and noble blood, the superiority of birth was of little moment;
the claims of official rank were accidental and precarious; and
the candidates, who might aspire to ascend the vacant throne
could be supported only by the consciousness of personal merit,
or by the hopes of popular favor. But the situation of a famished
army, encompassed on all sides by a host of Barbarians, shortened
the moments of grief and deliberation. In this scene of terror
and distress, the body of the deceased prince, according to his
own directions, was decently embalmed; and, at the dawn of day,
the generals convened a military senate, at which the commanders
of the legions, and the officers both of cavalry and infantry,
were invited to assist. Three or four hours of the night had not
passed away without some secret cabals; and when the election of
an emperor was proposed, the spirit of faction began to agitate
the assembly. Victor and Arinth&aelig;us collected the remains of
the court of Constantius; the friends of Julian attached
themselves to the Gallic chiefs, Dagalaiphus and Nevitta; and the
most fatal consequences might be apprehended from the discord of
two factions, so opposite in their character and interest, in
their maxims of government, and perhaps in their religious
principles. The superior virtues of Sallust could alone reconcile
their divisions, and unite their suffrages; and the venerable
pr&aelig;fect would immediately have been declared the successor
of Julian, if he himself, with sincere and modest firmness, had
not alleged his age and infirmities, so unequal to the weight of
the diadem. The generals, who were surprised and perplexed by his
refusal, showed some disposition to adopt the salutary advice of
an inferior officer, that they should act as they would have
acted in the absence of the emperor; that they should exert their
abilities to extricate the army from the present distress; and,
if they were fortunate enough to reach the confines of
Mesopotamia, they should proceed with united and deliberate
counsels in the election of a lawful sovereign. While they
debated, a few voices saluted Jovian, who was no more than
<strong><em>first</em></strong> of the domestics, with the names
of Emperor and Augustus. The tumultuary acclamation * was
instantly repeated by the guards who surrounded the tent, and
passed, in a few minutes, to the extremities of the line. The new
prince, astonished with his own fortune was hastily invested with
the Imperial ornaments, and received an oath of fidelity from the
generals, whose favor and protection he so lately solicited. The
strongest recommendation of Jovian was the merit of his father,
Count Varronian, who enjoyed, in honorable retirement, the fruit
of his long services. In the obscure freedom of a private
station, the son indulged his taste for wine and women; yet he
supported, with credit, the character of a Christian and a
soldier. Without being conspicuous for any of the ambitious
qualifications which excite the admiration and envy of mankind,
the comely person of Jovian, his cheerful temper, and familiar
wit, had gained the affection of his fellow-soldiers; and the
generals of both parties acquiesced in a popular election, which
had not been conducted by the arts of their enemies. The pride of
this unexpected elevation was moderated by the just apprehension,
that the same day might terminate the life and reign of the new
emperor. The pressing voice of necessity was obeyed without
delay; and the first orders issued by Jovian, a few hours after
his predecessor had expired, were to prosecute a march, which
could alone extricate the Romans from their actual distress.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XXIV: The Retreat And Death Of Julian. --
Part V.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>The esteem of an enemy is most sincerely expressed by his
fears; and the degree of fear may be accurately measured by the
joy with which he celebrates his deliverance. The welcome news of
the death of Julian, which a deserter revealed to the camp of
Sapor, inspired the desponding monarch with a sudden confidence
of victory. He immediately detached the royal cavalry, perhaps
the ten thousand Immortals, to second and support the pursuit;
and discharged the whole weight of his united forces on the
rear-guard of the Romans. The rear-guard was thrown into
disorder; the renowned legions, which derived their titles from
Diocletian, and his warlike colleague, were broke and trampled
down by the elephants; and three tribunes lost their lives in
attempting to stop the flight of their soldiers. The battle was
at length restored by the persevering valor of the Romans; the
Persians were repulsed with a great slaughter of men and
elephants; and the army, after marching and fighting a long
summer's day, arrived, in the evening, at Samara, on the banks of
the Tigris, about one hundred miles above Ctesiphon. On the
ensuing day, the Barbarians, instead of harassing the march,
attacked the camp, of Jovian; which had been seated in a deep and
sequestered valley. From the hills, the archers of Persia
insulted and annoyed the wearied legionaries; and a body of
cavalry, which had penetrated with desperate courage through the
Pr&aelig;torian gate, was cut in pieces, after a doubtful
conflict, near the Imperial tent. In the succeeding night, the
camp of Carche was protected by the lofty dikes of the river; and
the Roman army, though incessantly exposed to the vexatious
pursuit of the Saracens, pitched their tents near the city of
Dura, four days after the death of Julian. The Tigris was still
on their left; their hopes and provisions were almost consumed;
and the impatient soldiers, who had fondly persuaded themselves
that the frontiers of the empire were not far distant, requested
their new sovereign, that they might be permitted to hazard the
passage of the river. With the assistance of his wisest officers,
Jovian endeavored to check their rashness; by representing, that
if they possessed sufficient skill and vigor to stem the torrent
of a deep and rapid stream, they would only deliver themselves
naked and defenceless to the Barbarians, who had occupied the
opposite banks, Yielding at length to their clamorous
importunities, he consented, with reluctance, that five hundred
Gauls and Germans, accustomed from their infancy to the waters of
the Rhine and Danube, should attempt the bold adventure, which
might serve either as an encouragement, or as a warning, for the
rest of the army. In the silence of the night, they swam the
Tigris, surprised an unguarded post of the enemy, and displayed
at the dawn of day the signal of their resolution and fortune.
The success of this trial disposed the emperor to listen to the
promises of his architects, who propose to construct a floating
bridge of the inflated skins of sheep, oxen, and goats, covered
with a floor of earth and fascines. Two important days were spent
in the ineffectual labor; and the Romans, who already endured the
miseries of famine, cast a look of despair on the Tigris, and
upon the Barbarians; whose numbers and obstinacy increased with
the distress of the Imperial army.<br>
</p>

<p>In this hopeless condition, the fainting spirits of the Romans
were revived by the sound of peace. The transient presumption of
Sapor had vanished: he observed, with serious concern, that, in
the repetition of doubtful combats, he had lost his most faithful
and intrepid nobles, his bravest troops, and the greatest part of
his train of elephants: and the experienced monarch feared to
provoke the resistance of despair, the vicissitudes of fortune,
and the unexhausted powers of the Roman empire; which might soon
advance to relieve, or to revenge, the successor of Julian. The
Surenas himself, accompanied by another satrap, * appeared in the
camp of Jovian; and declared, that the clemency of his sovereign
was not averse to signify the conditions on which he would
consent to spare and to dismiss the C&aelig;sar with the relics
of his captive army. The hopes of safety subdued the firmness of
the Romans; the emperor was compelled, by the advice of his
council, and the cries of his soldiers, to embrace the offer of
peace; and the pr&aelig;fect Sallust was immediately sent, with
the general Arinth&aelig;us, to understand the pleasure of the
Great King. The crafty Persian delayed, under various pretenses,
the conclusion of the agreement; started difficulties, required
explanations, suggested expedients, receded from his concessions,
increased his demands, and wasted four days in the arts of
negotiation, till he had consumed the stock of provisions which
yet remained in the camp of the Romans. Had Jovian been capable
of executing a bold and prudent measure, he would have continued
his march, with unremitting diligence; the progress of the treaty
would have suspended the attacks of the Barbarians; and, before
the expiration of the fourth day, he might have safely reached
the fruitful province of Corduene, at the distance only of one
hundred miles. The irresolute emperor, instead of breaking
through the toils of the enemy, expected his fate with patient
resignation; and accepted the humiliating conditions of peace,
which it was no longer in his power to refuse. The five provinces
beyond the Tigris, which had been ceded by the grandfather of
Sapor, were restored to the Persian monarchy. He acquired, by a
single article, the impregnable city of Nisibis; which had
sustained, in three successive sieges, the effort of his arms.
Singara, and the castle of the Moors, one of the strongest places
of Mesopotamia, were likewise dismembered from the empire. It was
considered as an indulgence, that the inhabitants of those
fortresses were permitted to retire with their effects; but the
conqueror rigorously insisted, that the Romans should forever
abandon the king and kingdom of Armenia. &sect; A peace, or
rather a long truce, of thirty years, was stipulated between the
hostile nations; the faith of the treaty was ratified by solemn
oaths and religious ceremonies; and hostages of distinguished
rank were reciprocally delivered to secure the performance of the
conditions.<br>
</p>

<p>The sophist of Antioch, who saw with indignation the sceptre
of his hero in the feeble hand of a Christian successor,
professes to admire the moderation of Sapor, in contenting
himself with so small a portion of the Roman empire. If he had
stretched as far as the Euphrates the claims of his ambition, he
might have been secure, says Libanius, of not meeting with a
refusal. If he had fixed, as the boundary of Persia, the Orontes,
the Cydnus, the Sangarius, or even the Thracian Bosphorus,
flatterers would not have been wanting in the court of Jovian to
convince the timid monarch, that his remaining provinces would
still afford the most ample gratifications of power and luxury.
Without adopting in its full force this malicious insinuation, we
must acknowledge, that the conclusion of so ignominious a treaty
was facilitated by the private ambition of Jovian. The obscure
domestic, exalted to the throne by fortune, rather than by merit,
was impatient to escape from the hands of the Persians, that he
might prevent the designs of Procopius, who commanded the army of
Mesopotamia, and establish his doubtful reign over the legions
and provinces which were still ignorant of the hasty and
tumultuous choice of the camp beyond the Tigris. In the
neighborhood of the same river, at no very considerable distance
from the fatal station of Dura, the ten thousand Greeks, without
generals, or guides, or provisions, were abandoned, above twelve
hundred miles from their native country, to the resentment of a
victorious monarch. The difference of
<strong><em>their</em></strong> conduct and success depended much
more on their character than on their situation. Instead of
tamely resigning themselves to the secret deliberations and
private views of a single person, the united councils of the
Greeks were inspired by the generous enthusiasm of a popular
assembly; where the mind of each citizen is filled with the love
of glory, the pride of freedom, and the contempt of death.
Conscious of their superiority over the Barbarians in arms and
discipline, they disdained to yield, they refused to capitulate:
every obstacle was surmounted by their patience, courage, and
military skill; and the memorable retreat of the ten thousand
exposed and insulted the weakness of the Persian monarchy.<br>
</p>

<p>As the price of his disgraceful concessions, the emperor might
perhaps have stipulated, that the camp of the hungry Romans
should be plentifully supplied; and that they should be permitted
to pass the Tigris on the bridge which was constructed by the
hands of the Persians. But, if Jovian presumed to solicit those
equitable terms, they were sternly refused by the haughty tyrant
of the East, whose clemency had pardoned the invaders of his
country. The Saracens sometimes intercepted the stragglers of the
march; but the generals and troops of Sapor respected the
cessation of arms; and Jovian was suffered to explore the most
convenient place for the passage of the river. The small vessels,
which had been saved from the conflagration of the fleet,
performed the most essential service. They first conveyed the
emperor and his favorites; and afterwards transported, in many
successive voyages, a great part of the army. But, as every man
was anxious for his personal safety, and apprehensive of being
left on the hostile shore, the soldiers, who were too impatient
to wait the slow returns of the boats, boldly ventured themselves
on light hurdles, or inflated skins; and, drawing after them
their horses, attempted, with various success, to swim across the
river. Many of these daring adventurers were swallowed by the
waves; many others, who were carried along by the violence of the
stream, fell an easy prey to the avarice or cruelty of the wild
Arabs: and the loss which the army sustained in the passage of
the Tigris, was not inferior to the carnage of a day of battle.
As soon as the Romans were landed on the western bank, they were
delivered from the hostile pursuit of the Barbarians; but, in a
laborious march of two hundred miles over the plains of
Mesopotamia, they endured the last extremities of thirst and
hunger. They were obliged to traverse the sandy desert, which, in
the extent of seventy miles, did not afford a single blade of
sweet grass, nor a single spring of fresh water; and the rest of
the inhospitable waste was untrod by the footsteps either of
friends or enemies. Whenever a small measure of flour could be
discovered in the camp, twenty pounds weight were greedily
purchased with ten pieces of gold: the beasts of burden were
slaughtered and devoured; and the desert was strewed with the
arms and baggage of the Roman soldiers, whose tattered garments
and meagre countenances displayed their past sufferings and
actual misery. A small convoy of provisions advanced to meet the
army as far as the castle of Ur; and the supply was the more
grateful, since it declared the fidelity of Sebastian and
Procopius. At Thilsaphata, the emperor most graciously received
the generals of Mesopotamia; and the remains of a once
flourishing army at length reposed themselves under the walls of
Nisibis. The messengers of Jovian had already proclaimed, in the
language of flattery, his election, his treaty, and his return;
and the new prince had taken the most effectual measures to
secure the allegiance of the armies and provinces of Europe, by
placing the military command in the hands of those officers, who,
from motives of interest, or inclination, would firmly support
the cause of their benefactor.<br>
</p>

<p>The friends of Julian had confidently announced the success of
his expedition. They entertained a fond persuasion that the
temples of the gods would be enriched with the spoils of the
East; that Persia would be reduced to the humble state of a
tributary province, governed by the laws and magistrates of Rome;
that the Barbarians would adopt the dress, and manners, and
language of their conquerors; and that the youth of Ecbatana and
Susa would study the art of rhetoric under Grecian masters. The
progress of the arms of Julian interrupted his communication with
the empire; and, from the moment that he passed the Tigris, his
affectionate subjects were ignorant of the fate and fortunes of
their prince. Their contemplation of fancied triumphs was
disturbed by the melancholy rumor of his death; and they
persisted to doubt, after they could no longer deny, the truth of
that fatal event. The messengers of Jovian promulgated the
specious tale of a prudent and necessary peace; the voice of
fame, louder and more sincere, revealed the disgrace of the
emperor, and the conditions of the ignominious treaty. The minds
of the people were filled with astonishment and grief, with
indignation and terror, when they were informed, that the
unworthy successor of Julian relinquished the five provinces
which had been acquired by the victory of Galerius; and that he
shamefully surrendered to the Barbarians the important city of
Nisibis, the firmest bulwark of the provinces of the East. The
deep and dangerous question, how far the public faith should be
observed, when it becomes incompatible with the public safety,
was freely agitated in popular conversation; and some hopes were
entertained that the emperor would redeem his pusillanimous
behavior by a splendid act of patriotic perfidy. The inflexible
spirit of the Roman senate had always disclaimed the unequal
conditions which were extorted from the distress of their captive
armies; and, if it were necessary to satisfy the national honor,
by delivering the guilty general into the hands of the
Barbarians, the greatest part of the subjects of Jovian would
have cheerfully acquiesced in the precedent of ancient times.<br>
</p>

<p>But the emperor, whatever might be the limits of his
constitutional authority, was the absolute master of the laws and
arms of the state; and the same motives which had forced him to
subscribe, now pressed him to execute, the treaty of peace. He
was impatient to secure an empire at the expense of a few
provinces; and the respectable names of religion and honor
concealed the personal fears and ambition of Jovian.
Notwithstanding the dutiful solicitations of the inhabitants,
decency, as well as prudence, forbade the emperor to lodge in the
palace of Nisibis; but the next morning after his arrival.
Bineses, the ambassador of Persia, entered the place, displayed
from the citadel the standard of the Great King, and proclaimed,
in his name, the cruel alternative of exile or servitude. The
principal citizens of Nisibis, who, till that fatal moment, had
confided in the protection of their sovereign, threw themselves
at his feet. They conjured him not to abandon, or, at least, not
to deliver, a faithful colony to the rage of a Barbarian tyrant,
exasperated by the three successive defeats which he had
experienced under the walls of Nisibis. They still possessed arms
and courage to repel the invaders of their country: they
requested only the permission of using them in their own defence;
and, as soon as they had asserted their independence, they should
implore the favor of being again admitted into the ranks of his
subjects. Their arguments, their eloquence, their tears, were
ineffectual. Jovian alleged, with some confusion, the sanctity of
oaths; and, as the reluctance with which he accepted the present
of a crown of gold, convinced the citizens of their hopeless
condition, the advocate Sylvanus was provoked to exclaim, "O
emperor! may you thus be crowned by all the cities of your
dominions!" Jovian, who in a few weeks had assumed the habits of
a prince, was displeased with freedom, and offended with truth:
and as he reasonably supposed, that the discontent of the people
might incline them to submit to the Persian government, he
published an edict, under pain of death, that they should leave
the city within the term of three days. Ammianus has delineated
in lively colors the scene of universal despair, which he seems
to have viewed with an eye of compassion. The martial youth
deserted, with indignant grief, the walls which they had so
gloriously defended: the disconsolate mourner dropped a last tear
over the tomb of a son or husband, which must soon be profaned by
the rude hand of a Barbarian master; and the aged citizen kissed
the threshold, and clung to the doors, of the house where he had
passed the cheerful and careless hours of infancy. The highways
were crowded with a trembling multitude: the distinctions of
rank, and sex, and age, were lost in the general calamity. Every
one strove to bear away some fragment from the wreck of his
fortunes; and as they could not command the immediate service of
an adequate number of horses or wagons, they were obliged to
leave behind them the greatest part of their valuable effects.
The savage insensibility of Jovian appears to have aggravated the
hardships of these unhappy fugitives. They were seated, however,
in a new-built quarter of Amida; and that rising city, with the
reenforcement of a very considerable colony, soon recovered its
former splendor, and became the capital of Mesopotamia. Similar
orders were despatched by the emperor for the evacuation of
Singara and the castle of the Moors; and for the restitution of
the five provinces beyond the Tigris. Sapor enjoyed the glory and
the fruits of his victory; and this ignominious peace has justly
been considered as a memorable &aelig;ra in the decline and fall
of the Roman empire. The predecessors of Jovian had sometimes
relinquished the dominion of distant and unprofitable provinces;
but, since the foundation of the city, the genius of Rome, the
god Terminus, who guarded the boundaries of the republic, had
never retired before the sword of a victorious enemy.<br>
</p>

<p>After Jovian had performed those engagements which the voice
of his people might have tempted him to violate, he hastened away
from the scene of his disgrace, and proceeded with his whole
court to enjoy the luxury of Antioch. Without consulting the
dictates of religious zeal, he was prompted, by humanity and
gratitude, to bestow the last honors on the remains of his
deceased sovereign: and Procopius, who sincerely bewailed the
loss of his kinsman, was removed from the command of the army,
under the decent pretence of conducting the funeral. The corpse
of Julian was transported from Nisibis to Tarsus, in a slow march
of fifteen days; and, as it passed through the cities of the
East, was saluted by the hostile factions, with mournful
lamentations and clamorous insults. The Pagans already placed
their beloved hero in the rank of those gods whose worship he had
restored; while the invectives of the Christians pursued the soul
of the Apostate to hell, and his body to the grave. One party
lamented the approaching ruin of their altars; the other
celebrated the marvellous deliverance of their church. The
Christians applauded, in lofty and ambiguous strains, the stroke
of divine vengeance, which had been so long suspended over the
guilty head of Julian. They acknowledge, that the death of the
tyrant, at the instant he expired beyond the Tigris, was
<strong><em>revealed</em></strong> to the saints of Egypt, Syria,
and Cappadocia; and instead of suffering him to fall by the
Persian darts, their indiscretion ascribed the heroic deed to the
obscure hand of some mortal or immortal champion of the faith.
Such imprudent declarations were eagerly adopted by the malice,
or credulity, of their adversaries; who darkly insinuated, or
confidently asserted, that the governors of the church had
instigated and directed the fanaticism of a domestic assassin.
Above sixteen years after the death of Julian, the charge was
solemnly and vehemently urged, in a public oration, addressed by
Libanius to the emperor Theodosius. His suspicions are
unsupported by fact or argument; and we can only esteem the
generous zeal of the sophist of Antioch for the cold and
neglected ashes of his friend.<br>
</p>

<p>It was an ancient custom in the funerals, as well as in the
triumphs, of the Romans, that the voice of praise should be
corrected by that of satire and ridicule; and that, in the midst
of the splendid pageants, which displayed the glory of the living
or of the dead, their imperfections should not be concealed from
the eyes of the world. This custom was practised in the funeral
of Julian. The comedians, who resented his contempt and aversion
for the theatre, exhibited, with the applause of a Christian
audience, the lively and exaggerated representation of the faults
and follies of the deceased emperor. His various character and
singular manners afforded an ample scope for pleasantry and
ridicule. In the exercise of his uncommon talents, he often
descended below the majesty of his rank. Alexander was
transformed into Diogenes; the philosopher was degraded into a
priest. The purity of his virtue was sullied by excessive vanity;
his superstition disturbed the peace, and endangered the safety,
of a mighty empire; and his irregular sallies were the less
entitled to indulgence, as they appeared to be the laborious
efforts of art, or even of affectation. The remains of Julian
were interred at Tarsus in Cilicia; but his stately tomb, which
arose in that city, on the banks of the cold and limpid Cydnus,
was displeasing to the faithful friends, who loved and revered
the memory of that extraordinary man. The philosopher expressed a
very reasonable wish, that the disciple of Plato might have
reposed amidst the groves of the academy; while the soldier
exclaimed, in bolder accents, that the ashes of Julian should
have been mingled with those of C&aelig;sar, in the field of
Mars, and among the ancient monuments of Roman virtue. The
history of princes does not very frequently renew the examples of
a similar competition.<br>
</p>

<p><strong>Chapter XXV: Reigns Of Jovian And Valentinian,
Division Of The Empire.</strong></p>

<p><strong><em>Part I.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>The Government And Death Of Jovian. -- Election Of
Valentinian, Who Associates His Brother Valens, And Makes The
Final Division Of The Eastern And Western Empires. -- Revolt Of
Procopius. -- Civil And Ecclesiastical Administration. --
Germany. -- Britain. -- Africa. -- The East. -- The Danube. --
Death Of Valentinian. -- His Two Sons, Gratian And Valentinian
II., Succeed To The Western Empire.<br>
</p>

<p>The death of Julian had left the public affairs of the empire
in a very doubtful and dangerous situation. The Roman army was
saved by an inglorious, perhaps a necessary treaty; and the first
moments of peace were consecrated by the pious Jovian to restore
the domestic tranquility of the church and state. The
indiscretion of his predecessor, instead of reconciling, had
artfully fomented the religious war: and the balance which he
affected to preserve between the hostile factions, served only to
perpetuate the contest, by the vicissitudes of hope and fear, by
the rival claims of ancient possession and actual favor. The
Christians had forgotten the spirit of the gospel; and the Pagans
had imbibed the spirit of the church. In private families, the
sentiments of nature were extinguished by the blind fury of zeal
and revenge: the majesty of the laws was violated or abused; the
cities of the East were stained with blood; and the most
implacable enemies of the Romans were in the bosom of their
country. Jovian was educated in the profession of Christianity;
and as he marched from Nisibis to Antioch, the banner of the
Cross, the Labarum of Constantine, which was again displayed at
the head of the legions, announced to the people the faith of
their new emperor. As soon as he ascended the throne, he
transmitted a circular epistle to all the governors of provinces;
in which he confessed the divine truth, and secured the legal
establishment, of the Christian religion. The insidious edicts of
Julian were abolished; the ecclesiastical immunities were
restored and enlarged; and Jovian condescended to lament, that
the distress of the times obliged him to diminish the measure of
charitable distributions. The Christians were unanimous in the
loud and sincere applause which they bestowed on the pious
successor of Julian. But they were still ignorant what creed, or
what synod, he would choose for the standard of orthodoxy; and
the peace of the church immediately revived those eager disputes
which had been suspended during the season of persecution. The
episcopal leaders of the contending sects, convinced, from
experience, how much their fate would depend on the earliest
impressions that were made on the mind of an untutored soldier,
hastened to the court of Edessa, or Antioch. The highways of the
East were crowded with Homoousian, and Arian, and Semi-Arian, and
Eunomian bishops, who struggled to outstrip each other in the
holy race: the apartments of the palace resounded with their
clamors; and the ears of the prince were assaulted, and perhaps
astonished, by the singular mixture of metaphysical argument and
passionate invective. The moderation of Jovian, who recommended
concord and charity, and referred the disputants to the sentence
of a future council, was interpreted as a symptom of
indifference: but his attachment to the Nicene creed was at
length discovered and declared, by the reverence which he
expressed for the <strong><em>celestial</em></strong> virtues of
the great Athanasius. The intrepid veteran of the faith, at the
age of seventy, had issued from his retreat on the first
intelligence of the tyrant's death. The acclamations of the
people seated him once more on the archiepiscopal throne; and he
wisely accepted, or anticipated, the invitation of Jovian. The
venerable figure of Athanasius, his calm courage, and insinuating
eloquence, sustained the reputation which he had already acquired
in the courts of four successive princes. As soon as he had
gained the confidence, and secured the faith, of the Christian
emperor, he returned in triumph to his diocese, and continued,
with mature counsels and undiminished vigor, to direct, ten years
longer, the ecclesiastical government of Alexandria, Egypt, and
the Catholic church. Before his departure from Antioch, he
assured Jovian that his orthodox devotion would be rewarded with
a long and peaceful reign. Athanasius, had reason to hope, that
he should be allowed either the merit of a successful prediction,
or the excuse of a grateful though ineffectual prayer.<br>
</p>

<p>The slightest force, when it is applied to assist and guide
the natural descent of its object, operates with irresistible
weight; and Jovian had the good fortune to embrace the religious
opinions which were supported by the spirit of the times, and the
zeal and numbers of the most powerful sect. Under his reign,
Christianity obtained an easy and lasting victory; and as soon as
the smile of royal patronage was withdrawn, the genius of
Paganism, which had been fondly raised and cherished by the arts
of Julian, sunk irrecoverably in the. In many cities, the temples
were shut or deserted: the philosophers who had abused their
transient favor, thought it prudent to shave their beards, and
disguise their profession; and the Christians rejoiced, that they
were now in a condition to forgive, or to revenge, the injuries
which they had suffered under the preceding reign. The
consternation of the Pagan world was dispelled by a wise and
gracious edict of toleration; in which Jovian explicitly
declared, that although he should severely punish the
sacrilegious rites of magic, his subjects might exercise, with
freedom and safety, the ceremonies of the ancient worship. The
memory of this law has been preserved by the orator Themistius,
who was deputed by the senate of Constantinople to express their
royal devotion for the new emperor. Themistius expatiates on the
clemency of the Divine Nature, the facility of human error, the
rights of conscience, and the independence of the mind; and, with
some eloquence, inculcates the principles of philosophical
toleration; whose aid Superstition herself, in the hour of her
distress, is not ashamed to implore. He justly observes, that in
the recent changes, both religions had been alternately disgraced
by the seeming acquisition of worthless proselytes, of those
votaries of the reigning purple, who could pass, without a
reason, and without a blush, from the church to the temple, and
from the altars of Jupiter to the sacred table of the
Christians.<br>
</p>

<p>In the space of seven months, the Roman troops, who were now
returned to Antioch, had performed a march of fifteen hundred
miles; in which they had endured all the hardships of war, of
famine, and of climate. Notwithstanding their services, their
fatigues, and the approach of winter, the timid and impatient
Jovian allowed only, to the men and horses, a respite of six
weeks. The emperor could not sustain the indiscreet and malicious
raillery of the people of Antioch. He was impatient to possess
the palace of Constantinople; and to prevent the ambition of some
competitor, who might occupy the vacant allegiance of Europe. But
he soon received the grateful intelligence, that his authority
was acknowledged from the Thracian Bosphorus to the Atlantic
Ocean. By the first letters which he despatched from the camp of
Mesopotamia, he had delegated the military command of Gaul and
Illyricum to Malarich, a brave and faithful officer of the nation
of the Franks; and to his father-in-law, Count Lucillian, who had
formerly distinguished his courage and conduct in the defence of
Nisibis. Malarich had declined an office to which he thought
himself unequal; and Lucillian was massacred at Rheims, in an
accidental mutiny of the Batavian cohorts. But the moderation of
Jovinus, master-general of the cavalry, who forgave the intention
of his disgrace, soon appeased the tumult, and confirmed the
uncertain minds of the soldiers. The oath of fidelity was
administered and taken, with loyal acclamations; and the deputies
of the Western armies saluted their new sovereign as he descended
from Mount Taurus to the city of Tyana in Cappadocia. From Tyana
he continued his hasty march to Ancyra, capital of the province
of Galatia; where Jovian assumed, with his infant son, the name
and ensigns of the consulship. Dadastana, an obscure town, almost
at an equal distance between Ancyra and Nice, was marked for the
fatal term of his journey and life. After indulging himself with
a plentiful, perhaps an intemperate, supper, he retired to rest;
and the next morning the emperor Jovian was found dead in his
bed. The cause of this sudden death was variously understood. By
some it was ascribed to the consequences of an indigestion,
occasioned either by the quantity of the wine, or the quality of
the mushrooms, which he had swallowed in the evening. According
to others, he was suffocated in his sleep by the vapor of
charcoal, which extracted from the walls of the apartment the
unwholesome moisture of the fresh plaster. But the want of a
regular inquiry into the death of a prince, whose reign and
person were soon forgotten, appears to have been the only
circumstance which countenanced the malicious whispers of poison
and domestic guilt. The body of Jovian was sent to
Constantinople, to be interred with his predecessors, and the sad
procession was met on the road by his wife Charito, the daughter
of Count Lucillian; who still wept the recent death of her
father, and was hastening to dry her tears in the embraces of an
Imperial husband. Her disappointment and grief were imbittered by
the anxiety of maternal tenderness. Six weeks before the death of
Jovian, his infant son had been placed in the curule chair,
adorned with the title of <strong><em>Nobilissimus</em></strong>,
and the vain ensigns of the consulship. Unconscious of his
fortune, the royal youth, who, from his grandfather, assumed the
name of Varronian, was reminded only by the jealousy of the
government, that he was the son of an emperor. Sixteen years
afterwards he was still alive, but he had already been deprived
of an eye; and his afflicted mother expected every hour, that the
innocent victim would be torn from her arms, to appease, with his
blood, the suspicions of the reigning prince.<br>
</p>

<p>After the death of Jovian, the throne of the Roman world
remained ten days, without a master. The ministers and generals
still continued to meet in council; to exercise their respective
functions; to maintain the public order; and peaceably to conduct
the army to the city of Nice in Bithynia, which was chosen for
the place of the election. In a solemn assembly of the civil and
military powers of the empire, the diadem was again unanimously
offered to the pr&aelig;fect Sallust. He enjoyed the glory of a
second refusal: and when the virtues of the father were alleged
in favor of his son, the pr&aelig;fect, with the firmness of a
disinterested patriot, declared to the electors, that the feeble
age of the one, and the unexperienced youth of the other, were
equally incapable of the laborious duties of government. Several
candidates were proposed; and, after weighing the objections of
character or situation, they were successively rejected; but, as
soon as the name of Valentinian was pronounced, the merit of that
officer united the suffrages of the whole assembly, and obtained
the sincere approbation of Sallust himself. Valentinian was the
son of Count Gratian, a native of Cibalis, in Pannonia, who from
an obscure condition had raised himself, by matchless strength
and dexterity, to the military commands of Africa and Britain;
from which he retired with an ample fortune and suspicious
integrity. The rank and services of Gratian contributed, however,
to smooth the first steps of the promotion of his son; and
afforded him an early opportunity of displaying those solid and
useful qualifications, which raised his character above the
ordinary level of his fellow-soldiers. The person of Valentinian
was tall, graceful, and majestic. His manly countenance, deeply
marked with the impression of sense and spirit, inspired his
friends with awe, and his enemies with fear; and to second the
efforts of his undaunted courage, the son of Gratian had
inherited the advantages of a strong and healthy constitution. By
the habits of chastity and temperance, which restrain the
appetites and invigorate the faculties, Valentinian preserved his
own and the public esteem. The avocations of a military life had
diverted his youth from the elegant pursuits of literature; * he
was ignorant of the Greek language, and the arts of rhetoric; but
as the mind of the orator was never disconcerted by timid
perplexity, he was able, as often as the occasion prompted him,
to deliver his decided sentiments with bold and ready elocution.
The laws of martial discipline were the only laws that he had
studied; and he was soon distinguished by the laborious
diligence, and inflexible severity, with which he discharged and
enforced the duties of the camp. In the time of Julian he
provoked the danger of disgrace, by the contempt which he
publicly expressed for the reigning religion; and it should seem,
from his subsequent conduct, that the indiscreet and unseasonable
freedom of Valentinian was the effect of military spirit, rather
than of Christian zeal. He was pardoned, however, and still
employed by a prince who esteemed his merit; and in the various
events of the Persian war, he improved the reputation which he
had already acquired on the banks of the Rhine. The celerity and
success with which he executed an important commission,
recommended him to the favor of Jovian; and to the honorable
command of the second school, or company, of Targetiers, of the
domestic guards. In the march from Antioch, he had reached his
quarters at Ancyra, when he was unexpectedly summoned, without
guilt and without intrigue, to assume, in the forty-third year of
his age, the absolute government of the Roman empire.<br>
</p>

<p>The invitation of the ministers and generals at Nice was of
little moment, unless it were confirmed by the voice of the army.
The aged Sallust, who had long observed the irregular
fluctuations of popular assemblies, proposed, under pain of
death, that none of those persons, whose rank in the service
might excite a party in their favor, should appear in public on
the day of the inauguration. Yet such was the prevalence of
ancient superstition, that a whole day was voluntarily added to
this dangerous interval, because it happened to be the
intercalation of the Bissextile. At length, when the hour was
supposed to be propitious, Valentinian showed himself from a
lofty tribunal; the judicious choice was applauded; and the new
prince was solemnly invested with the diadem and the purple,
amidst the acclamation of the troops, who were disposed in
martial order round the tribunal. But when he stretched forth his
hand to address the armed multitude, a busy whisper was
accidentally started in the ranks, and insensibly swelled into a
loud and imperious clamor, that he should name, without delay, a
colleague in the empire. The intrepid calmness of Valentinian
obtained silence, and commanded respect; and he thus addressed
the assembly: "A few minutes since it was in
<strong><em>your</em></strong> power, fellow-soldiers, to have
left me in the obscurity of a private station. Judging, from the
testimony of my past life, that I deserved to reign, you have
placed me on the throne. It is now <strong><em>my</em></strong>
duty to consult the safety and interest of the republic. The
weight of the universe is undoubtedly too great for the hands of
a feeble mortal. I am conscious of the limits of my abilities,
and the uncertainty of my life; and far from declining, I am
anxious to solicit, the assistance of a worthy colleague. But,
where discord may be fatal, the choice of a faithful friend
requires mature and serious deliberation. That deliberation shall
be <strong><em>my</em></strong> care. Let
<strong><em>your</em></strong> conduct be dutiful and consistent.
Retire to your quarters; refresh your minds and bodies; and
expect the accustomed donative on the accession of a new
emperor." The astonished troops, with a mixture of pride, of
satisfaction, and of terror, confessed the voice of their master.
Their angry clamors subsided into silent reverence; and
Valentinian, encompassed with the eagles of the legions, and the
various banners of the cavalry and infantry, was conducted, in
warlike pomp, to the palace of Nice. As he was sensible, however,
of the importance of preventing some rash declaration of the
soldiers, he consulted the assembly of the chiefs; and their real
sentiments were concisely expressed by the generous freedom of
Dagalaiphus. "Most excellent prince," said that officer, "if you
consider only your family, you have a brother; if you love the
republic, look round for the most deserving of the Romans." The
emperor, who suppressed his displeasure, without altering his
intention, slowly proceeded from Nice to Nicomedia and
Constantinople. In one of the suburbs of that capital, thirty
days after his own elevation, he bestowed the title of Augustus
on his brother Valens; * and as the boldest patriots were
convinced, that their opposition, without being serviceable to
their country, would be fatal to themselves, the declaration of
his absolute will was received with silent submission. Valens was
now in the thirty-sixth year of his age; but his abilities had
never been exercised in any employment, military or civil; and
his character had not inspired the world with any sanguine
expectations. He possessed, however, one quality, which
recommended him to Valentinian, and preserved the domestic peace
of the empire; devout and grateful attachment to his benefactor,
whose superiority of genius, as well as of authority, Valens
humbly and cheerfully acknowledged in every action of his
life.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XXV: Reigns Of Jovian And Valentinian,
Division Of The Empire. -- Part II.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>Before Valentinian divided the provinces, he reformed the
administration of the empire. All ranks of subjects, who had been
injured or oppressed under the reign of Julian, were invited to
support their public accusations. The silence of mankind attested
the spotless integrity of the pr&aelig;fect Sallust; and his own
pressing solicitations, that he might be permitted to retire from
the business of the state, were rejected by Valentinian with the
most honorable expressions of friendship and esteem. But among
the favorites of the late emperor, there were many who had abused
his credulity or superstition; and who could no longer hope to be
protected either by favor or justice. The greater part of the
ministers of the palace, and the governors of the provinces, were
removed from their respective stations; yet the eminent merit of
some officers was distinguished from the obnoxious crowd; and,
notwithstanding the opposite clamors of zeal and resentment, the
whole proceedings of this delicate inquiry appear to have been
conducted with a reasonable share of wisdom and moderation. The
festivity of a new reign received a short and suspicious
interruption from the sudden illness of the two princes; but as
soon as their health was restored, they left Constantinople in
the beginning of the spring. In the castle, or palace, of
Mediana, only three miles from Naissus, they executed the solemn
and final division of the Roman empire. Valentinian bestowed on
his brother the rich pr&aelig;fecture of the
<strong><em>East</em></strong>, from the Lower Danube to the
confines of Persia; whilst he reserved for his immediate
government the warlike * pr&aelig;fectures of
<strong><em>Illyricum</em></strong>,
<strong><em>Italy</em></strong>, and
<strong><em>Gaul</em></strong>, from the extremity of Greece to
the Caledonian rampart, and from the rampart of Caledonia to the
foot of Mount Atlas. The provincial administration remained on
its former basis; but a double supply of generals and magistrates
was required for two councils, and two courts: the division was
made with a just regard to their peculiar merit and situation,
and seven master-generals were soon created, either of the
cavalry or infantry. When this important business had been
amicably transacted, Valentinian and Valens embraced for the last
time. The emperor of the West established his temporary residence
at Milan; and the emperor of the East returned to Constantinople,
to assume the dominion of fifty provinces, of whose language he
was totally ignorant.<br>
</p>

<p>The tranquility of the East was soon disturbed by rebellion;
and the throne of Valens was threatened by the daring attempts of
a rival whose affinity to the emperor Julian was his sole merit,
and had been his only crime. Procopius had been hastily promoted
from the obscure station of a tribune, and a notary, to the joint
command of the army of Mesopotamia; the public opinion already
named him as the successor of a prince who was destitute of
natural heirs; and a vain rumor was propagated by his friends, or
his enemies, that Julian, before the altar of the Moon at
Carrh&aelig;, had privately invested Procopius with the Imperial
purple. He endeavored, by his dutiful and submissive behavior, to
disarm the jealousy of Jovian; resigned, without a contest, his
military command; and retired, with his wife and family, to
cultivate the ample patrimony which he possessed in the province
of Cappadocia. These useful and innocent occupations were
interrupted by the appearance of an officer with a band of
soldiers, who, in the name of his new sovereigns, Valentinian and
Valens, was despatched to conduct the unfortunate Procopius
either to a perpetual prison or an ignominious death. His
presence of mind procured him a longer respite, and a more
splendid fate. Without presuming to dispute the royal mandate, he
requested the indulgence of a few moments to embrace his weeping
family; and while the vigilance of his guards was relaxed by a
plentiful entertainment, he dexterously escaped to the sea-coast
of the Euxine, from whence he passed over to the country of
Bosphorus. In that sequestered region he remained many months,
exposed to the hardships of exile, of solitude, and of want; his
melancholy temper brooding over his misfortunes, and his mind
agitated by the just apprehension, that, if any accident should
discover his name, the faithless Barbarians would violate,
without much scruple, the laws of hospitality. In a moment of
impatience and despair, Procopius embarked in a merchant vessel,
which made sail for Constantinople; and boldly aspired to the
rank of a sovereign, because he was not allowed to enjoy the
security of a subject. At first he lurked in the villages of
Bithynia, continually changing his habitation and his disguise.
By degrees he ventured into the capital, trusted his life and
fortune to the fidelity of two friends, a senator and a eunuch,
and conceived some hopes of success, from the intelligence which
he obtained of the actual state of public affairs. The body of
the people was infected with a spirit of discontent: they
regretted the justice and the abilities of Sallust, who had been
imprudently dismissed from the pr&aelig;fecture of the East. They
despised the character of Valens, which was rude without vigor,
and feeble without mildness. They dreaded the influence of his
father-in-law, the patrician Petronius, a cruel and rapacious
minister, who rigorously exacted all the arrears of tribute that
might remain unpaid since the reign of the emperor Aurelian. The
circumstances were propitious to the designs of a usurper. The
hostile measures of the Persians required the presence of Valens
in Syria: from the Danube to the Euphrates the troops were in
motion; and the capital was occasionally filled with the soldiers
who passed or repassed the Thracian Bosphorus. Two cohorts of
Gaul were persuaded to listen to the secret proposals of the
conspirators; which were recommended by the promise of a liberal
donative; and, as they still revered the memory of Julian, they
easily consented to support the hereditary claim of his
proscribed kinsman. At the dawn of day they were drawn up near
the baths of Anastasia; and Procopius, clothed in a purple
garment, more suitable to a player than to a monarch, appeared,
as if he rose from the dead, in the midst of Constantinople. The
soldiers, who were prepared for his reception, saluted their
trembling prince with shouts of joy and vows of fidelity. Their
numbers were soon increased by a band of sturdy peasants,
collected from the adjacent country; and Procopius, shielded by
the arms of his adherents, was successively conducted to the
tribunal, the senate, and the palace. During the first moments of
his tumultuous reign, he was astonished and terrified by the
gloomy silence of the people; who were either ignorant of the
cause, or apprehensive of the event. But his military strength
was superior to any actual resistance: the malecontents flocked
to the standard of rebellion; the poor were excited by the hopes,
and the rich were intimidated by the fear, of a general pillage;
and the obstinate credulity of the multitude was once more
deceived by the promised advantages of a revolution. The
magistrates were seized; the prisons and arsenals broke open; the
gates, and the entrance of the harbor, were diligently occupied;
and, in a few hours, Procopius became the absolute, though
precarious, master of the Imperial city. * The usurper improved
this unexpected success with some degree of courage and
dexterity. He artfully propagated the rumors and opinions the
most favorable to his interest; while he deluded the populace by
giving audience to the frequent, but imaginary, ambassadors of
distant nations. The large bodies of troops stationed in the
cities of Thrace and the fortresses of the Lower Danube, were
gradually involved in the guilt of rebellion: and the Gothic
princes consented to supply the sovereign of Constantinople with
the formidable strength of several thousand auxiliaries. His
generals passed the Bosphorus, and subdued, without an effort,
the unarmed, but wealthy provinces of Bithynia and Asia. After an
honorable defence, the city and island of Cyzicus yielded to his
power; the renowned legions of the Jovians and Herculians
embraced the cause of the usurper, whom they were ordered to
crush; and, as the veterans were continually augmented with new
levies, he soon appeared at the head of an army, whose valor, as
well as numbers, were not unequal to the greatness of the
contest. The son of Hormisdas, a youth of spirit and ability,
condescended to draw his sword against the lawful emperor of the
East; and the Persian prince was immediately invested with the
ancient and extraordinary powers of a Roman Proconsul. The
alliance of Faustina, the widow of the emperor Constantius, who
intrusted herself and her daughter to the hands of the usurper,
added dignity and reputation to his cause. The princess
Constantia, who was then about five years of age, accompanied, in
a litter, the march of the army. She was shown to the multitude
in the arms of her adopted father; and, as often as she passed
through the ranks, the tenderness of the soldiers was inflamed
into martial fury: they recollected the glories of the house of
Constantine, and they declared, with loyal acclamation, that they
would shed the last drop of their blood in the defence of the
royal infant.<br>
</p>

<p>In the mean while Valentinian was alarmed and perplexed by the
doubtful intelligence of the revolt of the East. * The
difficulties of a German was forced him to confine his immediate
care to the safety of his own dominions; and, as every channel of
communication was stopped or corrupted, he listened, with
doubtful anxiety, to the rumors which were industriously spread,
that the defeat and death of Valens had left Procopius sole
master of the Eastern provinces. Valens was not dead: but on the
news of the rebellion, which he received at C&aelig;sarea, he
basely despaired of his life and fortune; proposed to negotiate
with the usurper, and discovered his secret inclination to
abdicate the Imperial purple. The timid monarch was saved from
disgrace and ruin by the firmness of his ministers, and their
abilities soon decided in his favor the event of the civil war.
In a season of tranquillity, Sallust had resigned without a
murmur; but as soon as the public safety was attacked, he
ambitiously solicited the preeminence of toil and danger; and the
restoration of that virtuous minister to the pr&aelig;fecture of
the East, was the first step which indicated the repentance of
Valens, and satisfied the minds of the people. The reign of
Procopius was apparently supported by powerful armies and
obedient provinces. But many of the principal officers, military
as well as civil, had been urged, either by motives of duty or
interest, to withdraw themselves from the guilty scene; or to
watch the moment of betraying, and deserting, the cause of the
usurper. Lupicinus advanced by hasty marches, to bring the
legions of Syria to the aid of Valens. Arintheus, who, in
strength, beauty, and valor, excelled all the heroes of the age,
attacked with a small troop a superior body of the rebels. When
he beheld the faces of the soldiers who had served under his
banner, he commanded them, with a loud voice, to seize and
deliver up their pretended leader; and such was the ascendant of
his genius, that this extraordinary order was instantly obeyed.
Arbetio, a respectable veteran of the great Constantine, who had
been distinguished by the honors of the consulship, was persuaded
to leave his retirement, and once more to conduct an army into
the field. In the heat of action, calmly taking off his helmet,
he showed his gray hairs and venerable countenance: saluted the
soldiers of Procopius by the endearing names of children and
companions, and exhorted them no longer to support the desperate
cause of a contemptible tyrant; but to follow their old
commander, who had so often led them to honor and victory. In the
two engagements of Thyatira and Nacolia, the unfortunate
Procopius was deserted by his troops, who were seduced by the
instructions and example of their perfidious officers. After
wandering some time among the woods and mountains of Phrygia, he
was betrayed by his desponding followers, conducted to the
Imperial camp, and immediately beheaded. He suffered the ordinary
fate of an unsuccessful usurper; but the acts of cruelty which
were exercised by the conqueror, under the forms of legal
justice, excited the pity and indignation of mankind.<br>
</p>

<p>Such indeed are the common and natural fruits of despotism and
rebellion. But the inquisition into the crime of magic, which,
under the reign of the two brothers, was so rigorously prosecuted
both at Rome and Antioch, was interpreted as the fatal symptom,
either of the displeasure of Heaven, or of the depravity of
mankind. Let us not hesitate to indulge a liberal pride, that, in
the present age, the enlightened part of Europe has abolished a
cruel and odious prejudice, which reigned in every climate of the
globe, and adhered to every system of religious opinions. The
nations, and the sects, of the Roman world, admitted with equal
credulity, and similar abhorrence, the reality of that infernal
art, which was able to control the eternal order of the planets,
and the voluntary operations of the human mind. They dreaded the
mysterious power of spells and incantations, of potent herbs, and
execrable rites; which could extinguish or recall life, inflame
the passions of the soul, blast the works of creation, and extort
from the reluctant d&aelig;mons the secrets of futurity. They
believed, with the wildest inconsistency, that this preternatural
dominion of the air, of earth, and of hell, was exercised, from
the vilest motives of malice or gain, by some wrinkled hags and
itinerant sorcerers, who passed their obscure lives in penury and
contempt. The arts of magic were equally condemned by the public
opinion, and by the laws of Rome; but as they tended to gratify
the most imperious passions of the heart of man, they were
continually proscribed, and continually practised. An imaginary
cause as capable of producing the most serious and mischievous
effects. The dark predictions of the death of an emperor, or the
success of a conspiracy, were calculated only to stimulate the
hopes of ambition, and to dissolve the ties of fidelity; and the
intentional guilt of magic was aggravated by the actual crimes of
treason and sacrilege. Such vain terrors disturbed the peace of
society, and the happiness of individuals; and the harmless flame
which insensibly melted a waxen image, might derive a powerful
and pernicious energy from the affrighted fancy of the person
whom it was maliciously designed to represent. From the infusion
of those herbs, which were supposed to possess a supernatural
influence, it was an easy step to the use of more substantial
poison; and the folly of mankind sometimes became the instrument,
and the mask, of the most atrocious crimes. As soon as the zeal
of informers was encouraged by the ministers of Valens and
Valentinian, they could not refuse to listen to another charge,
too frequently mingled in the scenes of domestic guilt; a charge
of a softer and less malignant nature, for which the pious,
though excessive, rigor of Constantine had recently decreed the
punishment of death. This deadly and incoherent mixture of
treason and magic, of poison and adultery, afforded infinite
gradations of guilt and innocence, of excuse and aggravation,
which in these proceedings appear to have been confounded by the
angry or corrupt passions of the judges. They easily discovered
that the degree of their industry and discernment was estimated,
by the Imperial court, according to the number of executions that
were furnished from the respective tribunals. It was not without
extreme reluctance that they pronounced a sentence of acquittal;
but they eagerly admitted such evidence as was stained with
perjury, or procured by torture, to prove the most improbable
charges against the most respectable characters. The progress of
the inquiry continually opened new subjects of criminal
prosecution; the audacious informer, whose falsehood was
detected, retired with impunity; but the wretched victim, who
discovered his real or pretended accomplices, were seldom
permitted to receive the price of his infamy. From the extremity
of Italy and Asia, the young, and the aged, were dragged in
chains to the tribunals of Rome and Antioch. Senators, matrons,
and philosophers, expired in ignominious and cruel tortures. The
soldiers, who were appointed to guard the prisons, declared, with
a murmur of pity and indignation, that their numbers were
insufficient to oppose the flight, or resistance, of the
multitude of captives. The wealthiest families were ruined by
fines and confiscations; the most innocent citizens trembled for
their safety; and we may form some notion of the magnitude of the
evil, from the extravagant assertion of an ancient writer, that,
in the obnoxious provinces, the prisoners, the exiles, and the
fugitives, formed the greatest part of the inhabitants.<br>
</p>

<p>When Tacitus describes the deaths of the innocent and
illustrious Romans, who were sacrificed to the cruelty of the
first C&aelig;sars, the art of the historian, or the merit of the
sufferers, excites in our breast the most lively sensations of
terror, of admiration, and of pity. The coarse and
undistinguishing pencil of Ammianus has delineated his bloody
figures with tedious and disgusting accuracy. But as our
attention is no longer engaged by the contrast of freedom and
servitude, of recent greatness and of actual misery, we should
turn with horror from the frequent executions, which disgraced,
both at Rome and Antioch, the reign of the two brothers. Valens
was of a timid, and Valentinian of a choleric, disposition. An
anxious regard to his personal safety was the ruling principle of
the administration of Valens. In the condition of a subject, he
had kissed, with trembling awe, the hand of the oppressor; and
when he ascended the throne, he reasonably expected, that the
same fears, which had subdued his own mind, would secure the
patient submission of his people. The favorites of Valens
obtained, by the privilege of rapine and confiscation, the wealth
which his economy would have refused. They urged, with persuasive
eloquence, <strong><em>that</em></strong>, in all cases of
treason, suspicion is equivalent to proof;
<strong><em>that</em></strong> the power supposes the intention,
of mischief; <strong><em>that</em></strong> the intention is not
less criminal than the act; and <strong><em>that</em></strong> a
subject no longer deserves to live, if his life may threaten the
safety, or disturb the repose, of his sovereign. The judgment of
Valentinian was sometimes deceived, and his confidence abused;
but he would have silenced the informers with a contemptuous
smile, had they presumed to alarm his fortitude by the sound of
danger. They praised his inflexible love of justice; and, in the
pursuit of justice, the emperor was easily tempted to consider
clemency as a weakness, and passion as a virtue. As long as he
wrestled with his equals, in the bold competition of an active
and ambitious life, Valentinian was seldom injured, and never
insulted, with impunity: if his prudence was arraigned, his
spirit was applauded; and the proudest and most powerful generals
were apprehensive of provoking the resentment of a fearless
soldier. After he became master of the world, he unfortunately
forgot, that where no resistance can be made, no courage can be
exerted; and instead of consulting the dictates of reason and
magnanimity, he indulged the furious emotions of his temper, at a
time when they were disgraceful to himself, and fatal to the
defenceless objects of his displeasure. In the government of his
household, or of his empire, slight, or even imaginary, offences
-- a hasty word, a casual omission, an involuntary delay -- were
chastised by a sentence of immediate death. The expressions which
issued the most readily from the mouth of the emperor of the West
were, "Strike off his head;" "Burn him alive;" "Let him be beaten
with clubs till he expires;" and his most favored ministers soon
understood, that, by a rash attempt to dispute, or suspend, the
execution of his sanguinary commands, they might involve
themselves in the guilt and punishment of disobedience. The
repeated gratification of this savage justice hardened the mind
of Valentinian against pity and remorse; and the sallies of
passion were confirmed by the habits of cruelty. He could behold
with calm satisfaction the convulsive agonies of torture and
death; he reserved his friendship for those faithful servants
whose temper was the most congenial to his own. The merit of
Maximin, who had slaughtered the noblest families of Rome, was
rewarded with the royal approbation, and the pr&aelig;fecture of
Gaul. Two fierce and enormous bears, distinguished by the
appellations of <strong><em>Innocence</em></strong>, and
<strong><em>Mica Aurea</em></strong>, could alone deserve to
share the favor of Maximin. The cages of those trusty guards were
always placed near the bed-chamber of Valentinian, who frequently
amused his eyes with the grateful spectacle of seeing them tear
and devour the bleeding limbs of the malefactors who were
abandoned to their rage. Their diet and exercises were carefully
inspected by the Roman emperor; and when
<strong><em>Innocence</em></strong> had earned her discharge, by
a long course of meritorious service, the faithful animal was
again restored to the freedom of her native woods.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XXV: Reigns Of Jovian And Valentinian,
Division Of The Empire. -- Part III.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>But in the calmer moments of reflection, when the mind of
Valens was not agitated by fear, or that of Valentinian by rage,
the tyrant resumed the sentiments, or at least the conduct, of
the father of his country. The dispassionate judgment of the
Western emperor could clearly perceive, and accurately pursue,
his own and the public interest; and the sovereign of the East,
who imitated with equal docility the various examples which he
received from his elder brother, was sometimes guided by the
wisdom and virtue of the pr&aelig;fect Sallust. Both princes
invariably retained, in the purple, the chaste and temperate
simplicity which had adorned their private life; and, under their
reign, the pleasures of the court never cost the people a blush
or a sigh. They gradually reformed many of the abuses of the
times of Constantius; judiciously adopted and improved the
designs of Julian and his successor; and displayed a style and
spirit of legislation which might inspire posterity with the most
favorable opinion of their character and government. It is not
from the master of <strong><em>Innocence</em></strong>, that we
should expect the tender regard for the welfare of his subjects,
which prompted Valentinian to condemn the exposition of new-born
infants; and to establish fourteen skilful physicians, with
stipends and privileges, in the fourteen quarters of Rome. The
good sense of an illiterate soldier founded a useful and liberal
institution for the education of youth, and the support of
declining science. It was his intention, that the arts of
rhetoric and grammar should be taught in the Greek and Latin
languages, in the metropolis of every province; and as the size
and dignity of the school was usually proportioned to the
importance of the city, the academies of Rome and Constantinople
claimed a just and singular preeminence. The fragments of the
literary edicts of Valentinian imperfectly represent the school
of Constantinople, which was gradually improved by subsequent
regulations. That school consisted of thirty-one professors in
different branches of learning. One philosopher, and two lawyers;
five sophists, and ten grammarians for the Greek, and three
orators, and ten grammarians for the Latin tongue; besides seven
scribes, or, as they were then styled, antiquarians, whose
laborious pens supplied the public library with fair and correct
copies of the classic writers. The rule of conduct, which was
prescribed to the students, is the more curious, as it affords
the first outlines of the form and discipline of a modern
university. It was required, that they should bring proper
certificates from the magistrates of their native province. Their
names, professions, and places of abode, were regularly entered
in a public register. The studious youth were severely prohibited
from wasting their time in feasts, or in the theatre; and the
term of their education was limited to the age of twenty. The
pr&aelig;fect of the city was empowered to chastise the idle and
refractory by stripes or expulsion; and he was directed to make
an annual report to the master of the offices, that the knowledge
and abilities of the scholars might be usefully applied to the
public service. The institutions of Valentinian contributed to
secure the benefits of peace and plenty; and the cities were
guarded by the establishment of the
<strong><em>Defensors</em></strong>; freely elected as the
tribunes and advocates of the people, to support their rights,
and to expose their grievances, before the tribunals of the civil
magistrates, or even at the foot of the Imperial throne. The
finances were diligently administered by two princes, who had
been so long accustomed to the rigid economy of a private
fortune; but in the receipt and application of the revenue, a
discerning eye might observe some difference between the
government of the East and of the West. Valens was persuaded,
that royal liberality can be supplied only by public oppression,
and his ambition never aspired to secure, by their actual
distress, the future strength and prosperity of his people.
Instead of increasing the weight of taxes, which, in the space of
forty years, had been gradually doubled, he reduced, in the first
years of his reign, one fourth of the tribute of the East.
Valentinian appears to have been less attentive and less anxious
to relieve the burdens of his people. He might reform the abuses
of the fiscal administration; but he exacted, without scruple, a
very large share of the private property; as he was convinced,
that the revenues, which supported the luxury of individuals,
would be much more advantageously employed for the defence and
improvement of the state. The subjects of the East, who enjoyed
the present benefit, applauded the indulgence of their prince.
The solid but less splendid, merit of Valentinian was felt and
acknowledged by the subsequent generation.<br>
</p>

<p>But the most honorable circumstance of the character of
Valentinian, is the firm and temperate impartiality which he
uniformly preserved in an age of religious contention. His strong
sense, unenlightened, but uncorrupted, by study, declined, with
respectful indifference, the subtle questions of theological
debate. The government of the <strong><em>Earth</em></strong>
claimed his vigilance, and satisfied his ambition; and while he
remembered that he was the disciple of the church, he never
forgot that he was the sovereign of the clergy. Under the reign
of an apostate, he had signalized his zeal for the honor of
Christianity: he allowed to his subjects the privilege which he
had assumed for himself; and they might accept, with gratitude
and confidence, the general toleration which was granted by a
prince addicted to passion, but incapable of fear or of disguise.
The Pagans, the Jews, and all the various sects which
acknowledged the divine authority of Christ, were protected by
the laws from arbitrary power or popular insult; nor was any mode
of worship prohibited by Valentinian, except those secret and
criminal practices, which abused the name of religion for the
dark purposes of vice and disorder. The art of magic, as it was
more cruelly punished, was more strictly proscribed: but the
emperor admitted a formal distinction to protect the ancient
methods of divination, which were approved by the senate, and
exercised by the Tuscan haruspices. He had condemned, with the
consent of the most rational Pagans, the license of nocturnal
sacrifices; but he immediately admitted the petition of
Pr&aelig;textatus, proconsul of Achaia, who represented, that the
life of the Greeks would become dreary and comfortless, if they
were deprived of the invaluable blessing of the Eleusinian
mysteries. Philosophy alone can boast, (and perhaps it is no more
than the boast of philosophy,) that her gentle hand is able to
eradicate from the human mind the latent and deadly principle of
fanaticism. But this truce of twelve years, which was enforced by
the wise and vigorous government of Valentinian, by suspending
the repetition of mutual injuries, contributed to soften the
manners, and abate the prejudices, of the religious factions.<br>
</p>

<p>The friend of toleration was unfortunately placed at a
distance from the scene of the fiercest controversies. As soon as
the Christians of the West had extricated themselves from the
snares of the creed of Rimini, they happily relapsed into the
slumber of orthodoxy; and the small remains of the Arian party,
that still subsisted at Sirmium or Milan, might be considered
rather as objects of contempt than of resentment. But in the
provinces of the East, from the Euxine to the extremity of
Thebais, the strength and numbers of the hostile factions were
more equally balanced; and this equality, instead of recommending
the counsels of peace, served only to perpetuate the horrors of
religious war. The monks and bishops supported their arguments by
invectives; and their invectives were sometimes followed by
blows. Athanasius still reigned at Alexandria; the thrones of
Constantinople and Antioch were occupied by Arian prelates, and
every episcopal vacancy was the occasion of a popular tumult. The
Homoousians were fortified by the reconciliation of fifty-nine
Macedonian, or Semi-Arian, bishops; but their secret reluctance
to embrace the divinity of the Holy Ghost, clouded the splendor
of the triumph; and the declaration of Valens, who, in the first
years of his reign, had imitated the impartial conduct of his
brother, was an important victory on the side of Arianism. The
two brothers had passed their private life in the condition of
catechumens; but the piety of Valens prompted him to solicit the
sacrament of baptism, before he exposed his person to the dangers
of a Gothic war. He naturally addressed himself to Eudoxus, *
bishop of the Imperial city; and if the ignorant monarch was
instructed by that Arian pastor in the principles of heterodox
theology, his misfortune, rather than his guilt, was the
inevitable consequence of his erroneous choice. Whatever had been
the determination of the emperor, he must have offended a
numerous party of his Christian subjects; as the leaders both of
the Homoousians and of the Arians believed, that, if they were
not suffered to reign, they were most cruelly injured and
oppressed. After he had taken this decisive step, it was
extremely difficult for him to preserve either the virtue, or the
reputation of impartiality. He never aspired, like Constantius,
to the fame of a profound theologian; but as he had received with
simplicity and respect the tenets of Eudoxus, Valens resigned his
conscience to the direction of his ecclesiastical guides, and
promoted, by the influence of his authority, the reunion of the
<strong><em>Athanasian heretics</em></strong> to the body of the
Catholic church. At first, he pitied their blindness; by degrees
he was provoked at their obstinacy; and he insensibly hated those
sectaries to whom he was an object of hatred. The feeble mind of
Valens was always swayed by the persons with whom he familiarly
conversed; and the exile or imprisonment of a private citizen are
the favors the most readily granted in a despotic court. Such
punishments were frequently inflicted on the leaders of the
Homoousian party; and the misfortune of fourscore ecclesiastics
of Constantinople, who, perhaps accidentally, were burned on
shipboard, was imputed to the cruel and premeditated malice of
the emperor, and his Arian ministers. In every contest, the
Catholics (if we may anticipate that name) were obliged to pay
the penalty of their own faults, and of those of their
adversaries. In every election, the claims of the Arian candidate
obtained the preference; and if they were opposed by the majority
of the people, he was usually supported by the authority of the
civil magistrate, or even by the terrors of a military force. The
enemies of Athanasius attempted to disturb the last years of his
venerable age; and his temporary retreat to his father's
sepulchre has been celebrated as a fifth exile. But the zeal of a
great people, who instantly flew to arms, intimidated the
pr&aelig;fect: and the archbishop was permitted to end his life
in peace and in glory, after a reign of forty-seven years. The
death of Athanasius was the signal of the persecution of Egypt;
and the Pagan minister of Valens, who forcibly seated the
worthless Lucius on the archiepiscopal throne, purchased the
favor of the reigning party, by the blood and sufferings of their
Christian brethren. The free toleration of the heathen and Jewish
worship was bitterly lamented, as a circumstance which aggravated
the misery of the Catholics, and the guilt of the impious tyrant
of the East.<br>
</p>

<p>The triumph of the orthodox party has left a deep stain of
persecution on the memory of Valens; and the character of a
prince who derived his virtues, as well as his vices, from a
feeble understanding and a pusillanimous temper, scarcely
deserves the labor of an apology. Yet candor may discover some
reasons to suspect that the ecclesiastical ministers of Valens
often exceeded the orders, or even the intentions, of their
master; and that the real measure of facts has been very
liberally magnified by the vehement declamation and easy
credulity of his antagonists. <strong>1</strong>. The silence of
Valentinian may suggest a probable argument that the partial
severities, which were exercised in the name and provinces of his
colleague, amounted only to some obscure and inconsiderable
deviations from the established system of religious toleration:
and the judicious historian, who has praised the equal temper of
the elder brother, has not thought himself obliged to contrast
the tranquillity of the West with the cruel persecution of the
East. <strong>2</strong>. Whatever credit may be allowed to vague
and distant reports, the character, or at least the behavior, of
Valens, may be most distinctly seen in his personal transactions
with the eloquent Basil, archbishop of C&aelig;sarea, who had
succeeded Athanasius in the management of the Trinitarian cause.
The circumstantial narrative has been composed by the friends and
admirers of Basil; and as soon as we have stripped away a thick
coat of rhetoric and miracle, we shall be astonished by the
unexpected mildness of the Arian tyrant, who admired the firmness
of his character, or was apprehensive, if he employed violence,
of a general revolt in the province of Cappadocia. The
archbishop, who asserted, with inflexible pride, the truth of his
opinions, and the dignity of his rank, was left in the free
possession of his conscience and his throne. The emperor devoutly
assisted at the solemn service of the cathedral; and, instead of
a sentence of banishment, subscribed the donation of a valuable
estate for the use of a hospital, which Basil had lately founded
in the neighborhood of C&aelig;sarea. <strong>3</strong>. I am
not able to discover, that any law (such as Theodosius afterwards
enacted against the Arians) was published by Valens against the
Athanasian sectaries; and the edict which excited the most
violent clamors, may not appear so extremely reprehensible. The
emperor had observed, that several of his subjects, gratifying
their lazy disposition under the pretence of religion, had
associated themselves with the monks of Egypt; and he directed
the count of the East to drag them from their solitude; and to
compel these deserters of society to accept the fair alternative
of renouncing their temporal possessions, or of discharging the
public duties of men and citizens. The ministers of Valens seem
to have extended the sense of this penal statute, since they
claimed a right of enlisting the young and able-bodied monks in
the Imperial armies. A detachment of cavalry and infantry,
consisting of three thousand men, marched from Alexandria into
the adjacent desert of Nitria, which was peopled by five thousand
monks. The soldiers were conducted by Arian priests; and it is
reported, that a considerable slaughter was made in the
monasteries which disobeyed the commands of their sovereign.<br>
</p>

<p>The strict regulations which have been framed by the wisdom of
modern legislators to restrain the wealth and avarice of the
clergy, may be originally deduced from the example of the emperor
Valentinian. His edict, addressed to Damasus, bishop of Rome, was
publicly read in the churches of the city. He admonished the
ecclesiastics and monks not to frequent the houses of widows and
virgins; and menaced their disobedience with the animadversion of
the civil judge. The director was no longer permitted to receive
any gift, or legacy, or inheritance, from the liberality of his
spiritual-daughter: every testament contrary to this edict was
declared null and void; and the illegal donation was confiscated
for the use of the treasury. By a subsequent regulation, it
should seem, that the same provisions were extended to nuns and
bishops; and that all persons of the ecclesiastical order were
rendered incapable of receiving any testamentary gifts, and
strictly confined to the natural and legal rights of inheritance.
As the guardian of domestic happiness and virtue, Valentinian
applied this severe remedy to the growing evil. In the capital of
the empire, the females of noble and opulent houses possessed a
very ample share of independent property: and many of those
devout females had embraced the doctrines of Christianity, not
only with the cold assent of the understanding, but with the
warmth of affection, and perhaps with the eagerness of fashion.
They sacrificed the pleasures of dress and luxury; and renounced,
for the praise of chastity, the soft endearments of conjugal
society. Some ecclesiastic, of real or apparent sanctity, was
chosen to direct their timorous conscience, and to amuse the
vacant tenderness of their heart: and the unbounded confidence,
which they hastily bestowed, was often abused by knaves and
enthusiasts; who hastened from the extremities of the East, to
enjoy, on a splendid theatre, the privileges of the monastic
profession. By their contempt of the world, they insensibly
acquired its most desirable advantages; the lively attachment,
perhaps of a young and beautiful woman, the delicate plenty of an
opulent household, and the respectful homage of the slaves, the
freedmen, and the clients of a senatorial family. The immense
fortunes of the Roman ladies were gradually consumed in lavish
alms and expensive pilgrimages; and the artful monk, who had
assigned himself the first, or possibly the sole place, in the
testament of his spiritual daughter, still presumed to declare,
with the smooth face of hypocrisy, that
<strong><em>he</em></strong> was only the instrument of charity,
and the steward of the poor. The lucrative, but disgraceful,
trade, which was exercised by the clergy to defraud the
expectations of the natural heirs, had provoked the indignation
of a superstitious age: and two of the most respectable of the
Latin fathers very honestly confess, that the ignominious edict
of Valentinian was just and necessary; and that the Christian
priests had deserved to lose a privilege, which was still enjoyed
by comedians, charioteers, and the ministers of idols. But the
wisdom and authority of the legislator are seldom victorious in a
contest with the vigilant dexterity of private interest; and
Jerom, or Ambrose, might patiently acquiesce in the justice of an
ineffectual or salutary law. If the ecclesiastics were checked in
the pursuit of personal emolument, they would exert a more
laudable industry to increase the wealth of the church; and
dignify their covetousness with the specious names of piety and
patriotism.<br>
</p>

<p>Damasus, bishop of Rome, who was constrained to stigmatize the
avarice of his clergy by the publication of the law of
Valentinian, had the good sense, or the good fortune, to engage
in his service the zeal and abilities of the learned Jerom; and
the grateful saint has celebrated the merit and purity of a very
ambiguous character. But the splendid vices of the church of
Rome, under the reign of Valentinian and Damasus, have been
curiously observed by the historian Ammianus, who delivers his
impartial sense in these expressive words: "The pr&aelig;fecture
of Juventius was accompanied with peace and plenty, but the
tranquillity of his government was soon disturbed by a bloody
sedition of the distracted people. The ardor of Damasus and
Ursinus, to seize the episcopal seat, surpassed the ordinary
measure of human ambition. They contended with the rage of party;
the quarrel was maintained by the wounds and death of their
followers; and the pr&aelig;fect, unable to resist or appease the
tumult, was constrained, by superior violence, to retire into the
suburbs. Damasus prevailed: the well-disputed victory remained on
the side of his faction; one hundred and thirty-seven dead bodies
were found in the <strong><em>Basilica</em></strong> of
Sicininus, where the Christians hold their religious assemblies;
and it was long before the angry minds of the people resumed
their accustomed tranquillity. When I consider the splendor of
the capital, I am not astonished that so valuable a prize should
inflame the desires of ambitious men, and produce the fiercest
and most obstinate contests. The successful candidate is secure,
that he will be enriched by the offerings of matrons; that, as
soon as his dress is composed with becoming care and elegance, he
may proceed, in his chariot, through the streets of Rome; and
that the sumptuousness of the Imperial table will not equal the
profuse and delicate entertainments provided by the taste, and at
the expense, of the Roman pontiffs. How much more rationally
(continues the honest Pagan) would those pontiffs consult their
true happiness, if, instead of alleging the greatness of the city
as an excuse for their manners, they would imitate the exemplary
life of some provincial bishops, whose temperance and sobriety,
whose mean apparel and downcast looks, recommend their pure and
modest virtue to the Deity and his true worshippers!" The schism
of Damasus and Ursinus was extinguished by the exile of the
latter; and the wisdom of the pr&aelig;fect Pr&aelig;textatus
restored the tranquillity of the city. Pr&aelig;textatus was a
philosophic Pagan, a man of learning, of taste, and politeness;
who disguised a reproach in the form of a jest, when he assured
Damasus, that if he could obtain the bishopric of Rome, he
himself would immediately embrace the Christian religion. This
lively picture of the wealth and luxury of the popes in the
fourth century becomes the more curious, as it represents the
intermediate degree between the humble poverty of the apostolic
fishermen, and the royal state of a temporal prince, whose
dominions extend from the confines of Naples to the banks of the
Po.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XXV: Reigns Of Jovian And Valentinian,
Division Of The Empire. -- Part IV.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>When the suffrage of the generals and of the army committed
the sceptre of the Roman empire to the hands of Valentinian, his
reputation in arms, his military skill and experience, and his
rigid attachment to the forms, as well as spirit, of ancient
discipline, were the principal motives of their judicious choice.
The eagerness of the troops, who pressed him to nominate his
colleague, was justified by the dangerous situation of public
affairs; and Valentinian himself was conscious, that the
abilities of the most active mind were unequal to the defence of
the distant frontiers of an invaded monarchy. As soon as the
death of Julian had relieved the Barbarians from the terror of
his name, the most sanguine hopes of rapine and conquest excited
the nations of the East, of the North, and of the South. Their
inroads were often vexatious, and sometimes formidable; but,
during the twelve years of the reign of Valentinian, his firmness
and vigilance protected his own dominions; and his powerful
genius seemed to inspire and direct the feeble counsels of his
brother. Perhaps the method of annals would more forcibly express
the urgent and divided cares of the two emperors; but the
attention of the reader, likewise, would be distracted by a
tedious and desultory narrative. A separate view of the five
great theatres of war; I. Germany; II. Britain; III. Africa; IV.
The East; and, V. The Danube; will impress a more distinct image
of the military state of the empire under the reigns of
Valentinian and Valens.<br>
</p>

<p>I. The ambassadors of the Alemanni had been offended by the
harsh and haughty behavior of Ursacius, master of the offices;
who by an act of unseasonable parsimony, had diminished the
value, as well as the quantity, of the presents to which they
were entitled, either from custom or treaty, on the accession of
a new emperor. They expressed, and they communicated to their
countrymen, their strong sense of the national affront. The
irascible minds of the chiefs were exasperated by the suspicion
of contempt; and the martial youth crowded to their standard.
Before Valentinian could pass the Alps, the villages of Gaul were
in flames; before his general Degalaiphus could encounter the
Alemanni, they had secured the captives and the spoil in the
forests of Germany. In the beginning of the ensuing year, the
military force of the whole nation, in deep and solid columns,
broke through the barrier of the Rhine, during the severity of a
northern winter. Two Roman counts were defeated and mortally
wounded; and the standard of the Heruli and Batavians fell into
the hands of the Heruli and Batavians fell into the hands of the
conquerors, who displayed, with insulting shouts and menaces, the
trophy of their victory. The standard was recovered; but the
Batavians had not redeemed the shame of their disgrace and flight
in the eyes of their severe judge. It was the opinion of
Valentinian, that his soldiers must learn to fear their
commander, before they could cease to fear the enemy. The troops
were solemnly assembled; and the trembling Batavians were
enclosed within the circle of the Imperial army. Valentinian then
ascended his tribunal; and, as if he disdained to punish
cowardice with death, he inflicted a stain of indelible ignominy
on the officers, whose misconduct and pusillanimity were found to
be the first occasion of the defeat. The Batavians were degraded
from their rank, stripped of their arms, and condemned to be sold
for slaves to the highest bidder. At this tremendous sentence,
the troops fell prostrate on the ground, deprecated the
indignation of their sovereign, and protested, that, if he would
indulge them in another trial, they would approve themselves not
unworthy of the name of Romans, and of his soldiers. Valentinian,
with affected reluctance, yielded to their entreaties; the
Batavians resumed their arms, and with their arms, the invincible
resolution of wiping away their disgrace in the blood of the
Alemanni. The principal command was declined by Dagalaiphus; and
that experienced general, who had represented, perhaps with too
much prudence, the extreme difficulties of the undertaking, had
the mortification, before the end of the campaign, of seeing his
rival Jovinus convert those difficulties into a decisive
advantage over the scattered forces of the Barbarians. At the
head of a well-disciplined army of cavalry, infantry, and light
troops, Jovinus advanced, with cautious and rapid steps, to
Scarponna, * in the territory of Metz, where he surprised a large
division of the Alemanni, before they had time to run to their
arms; and flushed his soldiers with the confidence of an easy and
bloodless victory. Another division, or rather army, of the
enemy, after the cruel and wanton devastation of the adjacent
country, reposed themselves on the shady banks of the Moselle.
Jovinus, who had viewed the ground with the eye of a general,
made a silent approach through a deep and woody vale, till he
could distinctly perceive the indolent security of the Germans.
Some were bathing their huge limbs in the river; others were
combing their long and flaxen hair; others again were swallowing
large draughts of rich and delicious wine. On a sudden they heard
the sound of the Roman trumpet; they saw the enemy in their camp.
Astonishment produced disorder; disorder was followed by flight
and dismay; and the confused multitude of the bravest warriors
was pierced by the swords and javelins of the legionaries and
auxiliaries. The fugitives escaped to the third, and most
considerable, camp, in the Catalonian plains, near Chalons in
Champagne: the straggling detachments were hastily recalled to
their standard; and the Barbarian chiefs, alarmed and admonished
by the fate of their companions, prepared to encounter, in a
decisive battle, the victorious forces of the lieutenant of
Valentinian. The bloody and obstinate conflict lasted a whole
summer's day, with equal valor, and with alternate success. The
Romans at length prevailed, with the loss of about twelve hundred
men. Six thousand of the Alemanni were slain, four thousand were
wounded; and the brave Jovinus, after chasing the flying remnant
of their host as far as the banks of the Rhine, returned to
Paris, to receive the applause of his sovereign, and the ensigns
of the consulship for the ensuing year. The triumph of the Romans
was indeed sullied by their treatment of the captive king, whom
they hung on a gibbet, without the knowledge of their indignant
general. This disgraceful act of cruelty, which might be imputed
to the fury of the troops, was followed by the deliberate murder
of Withicab, the son of Vadomair; a German prince, of a weak and
sickly constitution, but of a daring and formidable spirit. The
domestic assassin was instigated and protected by the Romans; and
the violation of the laws of humanity and justice betrayed their
secret apprehension of the weakness of the declining empire. The
use of the dagger is seldom adopted in public councils, as long
as they retain any confidence in the power of the sword.<br>
</p>

<p>While the Alemanni appeared to be humbled by their recent
calamities, the pride of Valentinian was mortified by the
unexpected surprisal of Moguntiacum, or Mentz, the principal city
of the Upper Germany. In the unsuspicious moment of a Christian
festival, * Rando, a bold and artful chieftain, who had long
meditated his attempt, suddenly passed the Rhine; entered the
defenceless town, and retired with a multitude of captives of
either sex. Valentinian resolved to execute severe vengeance on
the whole body of the nation. Count Sebastian, with the bands of
Italy and Illyricum, was ordered to invade their country, most
probably on the side of Rh&aelig;tia. The emperor in person,
accompanied by his son Gratian, passed the Rhine at the head of a
formidable army, which was supported on both flanks by Jovinus
and Severus, the two masters-general of the cavalry and infantry
of the West. The Alemanni, unable to prevent the devastation of
their villages, fixed their camp on a lofty, and almost
inaccessible, mountain, in the modern duchy of Wirtemberg, and
resolutely expected the approach of the Romans. The life of
Valentinian was exposed to imminent danger by the intrepid
curiosity with which he persisted to explore some secret and
unguarded path. A troop of Barbarians suddenly rose from their
ambuscade: and the emperor, who vigorously spurred his horse down
a steep and slippery descent, was obliged to leave behind him his
armor-bearer, and his helmet, magnificently enriched with gold
and precious stones. At the signal of the general assault, the
Roman troops encompassed and ascended the mountain of Solicinium
on three different sides. Every step which they gained, increased
their ardor, and abated the resistance of the enemy: and after
their united forces had occupied the summit of the hill, they
impetuously urged the Barbarians down the northern descent, where
Count Sebastian was posted to intercept their retreat. After this
signal victory, Valentinian returned to his winter quarters at
Treves; where he indulged the public joy by the exhibition of
splendid and triumphal games. But the wise monarch, instead of
aspiring to the conquest of Germany, confined his attention to
the important and laborious defence of the Gallic frontier,
against an enemy whose strength was renewed by a stream of daring
volunteers, which incessantly flowed from the most distant tribes
of the North. The banks of the Rhine from its source to the
straits of the ocean, were closely planted with strong castles
and convenient towers; new works, and new arms, were invented by
the ingenuity of a prince who was skilled in the mechanical arts;
and his numerous levies of Roman and Barbarian youth were
severely trained in all the exercises of war. The progress of the
work, which was sometimes opposed by modest representations, and
sometimes by hostile attempts, secured the tranquillity of Gaul
during the nine subsequent years of the administration of
Valentinian.<br>
</p>

<p>That prudent emperor, who diligently practised the wise maxims
of Diocletian, was studious to foment and excite the intestine
divisions of the tribes of Germany. About the middle of the
fourth century, the countries, perhaps of Lusace and Thuringia,
on either side of the Elbe, were occupied by the vague dominion
of the Burgundians; a warlike and numerous people, * of the
Vandal race, whose obscure name insensibly swelled into a
powerful kingdom, and has finally settled on a flourishing
province. The most remarkable circumstance in the ancient manners
of the Burgundians appears to have been the difference of their
civil and ecclesiastical constitution. The appellation of
<strong><em>Hendinos</em></strong> was given to the king or
general, and the title of <strong><em>Sinistus</em></strong> to
the high priest, of the nation. The person of the priest was
sacred, and his dignity perpetual; but the temporal government
was held by a very precarious tenure. If the events of war
accuses the courage or conduct of the king, he was immediately
deposed; and the injustice of his subjects made him responsible
for the fertility of the earth, and the regularity of the
seasons, which seemed to fall more properly within the sacerdotal
department. The disputed possession of some salt-pits engaged the
Alemanni and the Burgundians in frequent contests: the latter
were easily tempted, by the secret solicitations and liberal
offers of the emperor; and their fabulous descent from the Roman
soldiers, who had formerly been left to garrison the fortresses
of Drusus, was admitted with mutual credulity, as it was
conducive to mutual interest. An army of fourscore thousand
Burgundians soon appeared on the banks of the Rhine; and
impatiently required the support and subsidies which Valentinian
had promised: but they were amused with excuses and delays, till
at length, after a fruitless expectation, they were compelled to
retire. The arms and fortifications of the Gallic frontier
checked the fury of their just resentment; and their massacre of
the captives served to imbitter the hereditary feud of the
Burgundians and the Alemanni. The inconstancy of a wise prince
may, perhaps, be explained by some alteration of circumstances;
and perhaps it was the original design of Valentinian to
intimidate, rather than to destroy; as the balance of power would
have been equally overturned by the extirpation of either of the
German nations. Among the princes of the Alemanni, Macrianus,
who, with a Roman name, had assumed the arts of a soldier and a
statesman, deserved his hatred and esteem. The emperor himself,
with a light and unencumbered band, condescended to pass the
Rhine, marched fifty miles into the country, and would infallibly
have seized the object of his pursuit, if his judicious measures
had not been defeated by the impatience of the troops. Macrianus
was afterwards admitted to the honor of a personal conference
with the emperor; and the favors which he received, fixed him,
till the hour of his death, a steady and sincere friend of the
republic.<br>
</p>

<p>The land was covered by the fortifications of Valentinian; but
the sea-coast of Gaul and Britain was exposed to the depredations
of the Saxons. That celebrated name, in which we have a dear and
domestic interest, escaped the notice of Tacitus; and in the maps
of Ptolemy, it faintly marks the narrow neck of the Cimbric
peninsula, and three small islands towards the mouth of the Elbe.
This contracted territory, the present duchy of Sleswig, or
perhaps of Holstein, was incapable of pouring forth the
inexhaustible swarms of Saxons who reigned over the ocean, who
filled the British island with their language, their laws, and
their colonies; and who so long defended the liberty of the North
against the arms of Charlemagne. The solution of this difficulty
is easily derived from the similar manners, and loose
constitution, of the tribes of Germany; which were blended with
each other by the slightest accidents of war or friendship. The
situation of the native Saxons disposed them to embrace the
hazardous professions of fishermen and pirates; and the success
of their first adventures would naturally excite the emulation of
their bravest countrymen, who were impatient of the gloomy
solitude of their woods and mountains. Every tide might float
down the Elbe whole fleets of canoes, filled with hardy and
intrepid associates, who aspired to behold the unbounded prospect
of the ocean, and to taste the wealth and luxury of unknown
worlds. It should seem probable, however, that the most numerous
auxiliaries of the Saxons were furnished by the nations who dwelt
along the shores of the Baltic. They possessed arms and ships,
the art of navigation, and the habits of naval war; but the
difficulty of issuing through the northern columns of Hercules
(which, during several months of the year, are obstructed with
ice) confined their skill and courage within the limits of a
spacious lake. The rumor of the successful armaments which sailed
from the mouth of the Elbe, would soon provoke them to cross the
narrow isthmus of Sleswig, and to launch their vessels on the
great sea. The various troops of pirates and adventurers, who
fought under the same standard, were insensibly united in a
permanent society, at first of rapine, and afterwards of
government. A military confederation was gradually moulded into a
national body, by the gentle operation of marriage and
consanguinity; and the adjacent tribes, who solicited the
alliance, accepted the name and laws, of the Saxons. If the fact
were not established by the most unquestionable evidence, we
should appear to abuse the credulity of our readers, by the
description of the vessels in which the Saxon pirates ventured to
sport in the waves of the German Ocean, the British Channel, and
the Bay of Biscay. The keel of their large flat-bottomed boats
were framed of light timber, but the sides and upper works
consisted only of wicker, with a covering of strong hides. In the
course of their slow and distant navigations, they must always
have been exposed to the danger, and very frequently to the
misfortune, of shipwreck; and the naval annals of the Saxons were
undoubtedly filled with the accounts of the losses which they
sustained on the coasts of Britain and Gaul. But the daring
spirit of the pirates braved the perils both of the sea and of
the shore: their skill was confirmed by the habits of enterprise;
the meanest of their mariners was alike capable of handling an
oar, of rearing a sail, or of conducting a vessel, and the Saxons
rejoiced in the appearance of a tempest, which concealed their
design, and dispersed the fleets of the enemy. After they had
acquired an accurate knowledge of the maritime provinces of the
West, they extended the scene of their depredations, and the most
sequestered places had no reason to presume on their security.
The Saxon boats drew so little water that they could easily
proceed fourscore or a hundred miles up the great rivers; their
weight was so inconsiderable, that they were transported on
wagons from one river to another; and the pirates who had entered
the mouth of the Seine, or of the Rhine, might descend, with the
rapid stream of the Rhone, into the Mediterranean. Under the
reign of Valentinian, the maritime provinces of Gaul were
afflicted by the Saxons: a military count was stationed for the
defence of the sea-coast, or Armorican limit; and that officer,
who found his strength, or his abilities, unequal to the task,
implored the assistance of Severus, master-general of the
infantry. The Saxons, surrounded and outnumbered, were forced to
relinquish their spoil, and to yield a select band of their tall
and robust youth to serve in the Imperial armies. They stipulated
only a safe and honorable retreat; and the condition was readily
granted by the Roman general, who meditated an act of perfidy,
imprudent as it was inhuman, while a Saxon remained alive, and in
arms, to revenge the fate of their countrymen. The premature
eagerness of the infantry, who were secretly posted in a deep
valley, betrayed the ambuscade; and they would perhaps have
fallen the victims of their own treachery, if a large body of
cuirassiers, alarmed by the noise of the combat, had not hastily
advanced to extricate their companions, and to overwhelm the
undaunted valor of the Saxons. Some of the prisoners were saved
from the edge of the sword, to shed their blood in the
amphitheatre; and the orator Symmachus complains, that
twenty-nine of those desperate savages, by strangling themselves
with their own hands, had disappointed the amusement of the
public. Yet the polite and philosophic citizens of Rome were
impressed with the deepest horror, when they were informed, that
the Saxons consecrated to the gods the tithe of their
<strong><em>human</em></strong> spoil; and that they ascertained
by lot the objects of the barbarous sacrifice.<br>
</p>

<p>II. The fabulous colonies of Egyptians and Trojans, of
Scandinavians and Spaniards, which flattered the pride, and
amused the credulity, of our rude ancestors, have insensibly
vanished in the light of science and philosophy. The present age
is satisfied with the simple and rational opinion, that the
islands of Great Britain and Ireland were gradually peopled from
the adjacent continent of Gaul. From the coast of Kent, to the
extremity of Caithness and Ulster, the memory of a Celtic origin
was distinctly preserved, in the perpetual resemblance of
language, of religion, and of manners; and the peculiar
characters of the British tribes might be naturally ascribed to
the influence of accidental and local circumstances. The Roman
Province was reduced to the state of civilized and peaceful
servitude; the rights of savage freedom were contracted to the
narrow limits of Caledonia. The inhabitants of that northern
region were divided, as early as the reign of Constantine,
between the two great tribes of the Scots and of the Picts, who
have since experienced a very different fortune. The power, and
almost the memory, of the Picts have been extinguished by their
successful rivals; and the Scots, after maintaining for ages the
dignity of an independent kingdom, have multiplied, by an equal
and voluntary union, the honors of the English name. The hand of
nature had contributed to mark the ancient distinctions of the
Scots and Picts. The former were the men of the hills, and the
latter those of the plain. The eastern coast of Caledonia may be
considered as a level and fertile country, which, even in a rude
state of tillage, was capable of producing a considerable
quantity of corn; and the epithet of
<strong><em>cruitnich</em></strong>, or wheat-eaters, expressed
the contempt or envy of the carnivorous highlander. The
cultivation of the earth might introduce a more accurate
separation of property, and the habits of a sedentary life; but
the love of arms and rapine was still the ruling passion of the
Picts; and their warriors, who stripped themselves for a day of
battle, were distinguished, in the eyes of the Romans, by the
strange fashion of painting their naked bodies with gaudy colors
and fantastic figures. The western part of Caledonia irregularly
rises into wild and barren hills, which scarcely repay the toil
of the husbandman, and are most profitably used for the pasture
of cattle. The highlanders were condemned to the occupations of
shepherds and hunters; and, as they seldom were fixed to any
permanent habitation, they acquired the expressive name of Scots,
which, in the Celtic tongue, is said to be equivalent to that of
<strong><em>wanderers</em></strong>, or
<strong><em>vagrants</em></strong>. The inhabitants of a barren
land were urged to seek a fresh supply of food in the waters. The
deep lakes and bays which intersect their country, are
plentifully supplied with fish; and they gradually ventured to
cast their nets in the waves of the ocean. The vicinity of the
Hebrides, so profusely scattered along the western coast of
Scotland, tempted their curiosity, and improved their skill; and
they acquired, by slow degrees, the art, or rather the habit, of
managing their boats in a tempestuous sea, and of steering their
nocturnal course by the light of the well-known stars. The two
bold headlands of Caledonia almost touch the shores of a spacious
island, which obtained, from its luxuriant vegetation, the
epithet of <strong><em>Green</em></strong>; and has preserved,
with a slight alteration, the name of Erin, or Ierne, or Ireland.
It is <strong><em>probable</em></strong>, that in some remote
period of antiquity, the fertile plains of Ulster received a
colony of hungry Scots; and that the strangers of the North, who
had dared to encounter the arms of the legions, spread their
conquests over the savage and unwarlike natives of a solitary
island. It is <strong><em>certain</em></strong>, that, in the
declining age of the Roman empire, Caledonia, Ireland, and the
Isle of Man, were inhabited by the Scots, and that the kindred
tribes, who were often associated in military enterprise, were
deeply affected by the various accidents of their mutual
fortunes. They long cherished the lively tradition of their
common name and origin; and the missionaries of the Isle of
Saints, who diffused the light of Christianity over North
Britain, established the vain opinion, that their Irish
countrymen were the natural, as well as spiritual, fathers of the
Scottish race. The loose and obscure tradition has been preserved
by the venerable Bede, who scattered some rays of light over the
darkness of the eighth century. On this slight foundation, a huge
superstructure of fable was gradually reared, by the bards and
the monks; two orders of men, who equally abused the privilege of
fiction. The Scottish nation, with mistaken pride, adopted their
Irish genealogy; and the annals of a long line of imaginary kings
have been adorned by the fancy of Boethius, and the classic
elegance of Buchanan.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XXV: Reigns Of Jovian And Valentinian,
Division Of The Empire. -- Part V.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>Six years after the death of Constantine, the destructive
inroads of the Scots and Picts required the presence of his
youngest son, who reigned in the Western empire. Constans visited
his British dominions: but we may form some estimate of the
importance of his achievements, by the language of panegyric,
which celebrates only his triumph over the elements or, in other
words, the good fortune of a safe and easy passage from the port
of Boulogne to the harbor of Sandwich. The calamities which the
afflicted provincials continued to experience, from foreign war
and domestic tyranny, were aggravated by the feeble and corrupt
administration of the eunuchs of Constantius; and the transient
relief which they might obtain from the virtues of Julian, was
soon lost by the absence and death of their benefactor. The sums
of gold and silver, which had been painfully collected, or
liberally transmitted, for the payment of the troops, were
intercepted by the avarice of the commanders; discharges, or, at
least, exemptions, from the military service, were publicly sold;
the distress of the soldiers, who were injuriously deprived of
their legal and scanty subsistence, provoked them to frequent
desertion; the nerves of discipline were relaxed, and the
highways were infested with robbers. The oppression of the good,
and the impunity of the wicked, equally contributed to diffuse
through the island a spirit of discontent and revolt; and every
ambitious subject, every desperate exile, might entertain a
reasonable hope of subverting the weak and distracted government
of Britain. The hostile tribes of the North, who detested the
pride and power of the King of the World, suspended their
domestic feuds; and the Barbarians of the land and sea, the
Scots, the Picts, and the Saxons, spread themselves with rapid
and irresistible fury, from the wall of Antoninus to the shores
of Kent. Every production of art and nature, every object of
convenience and luxury, which they were incapable of creating by
labor or procuring by trade, was accumulated in the rich and
fruitful province of Britain. A philosopher may deplore the
eternal discords of the human race, but he will confess, that the
desire of spoil is a more rational provocation than the vanity of
conquest. From the age of Constantine to the Plantagenets, this
rapacious spirit continued to instigate the poor and hardy
Caledonians; but the same people, whose generous humanity seems
to inspire the songs of Ossian, was disgraced by a savage
ignorance of the virtues of peace, and of the laws of war. Their
southern neighbors have felt, and perhaps exaggerated, the cruel
depredations of the Scots and Picts; and a valiant tribe of
Caledonia, the Attacotti, the enemies, and afterwards the
soldiers, of Valentinian, are accused, by an eye-witness, of
delighting in the taste of human flesh. When they hunted the
woods for prey, it is said, that they attacked the shepherd
rather than his flock; and that they curiously selected the most
delicate and brawny parts, both of males and females, which they
prepared for their horrid repasts. If, in the neighborhood of the
commercial and literary town of Glasgow, a race of cannibals has
really existed, we may contemplate, in the period of the Scottish
history, the opposite extremes of savage and civilized life. Such
reflections tend to enlarge the circle of our ideas; and to
encourage the pleasing hope, that New Zealand may produce, in
some future age, the Hume of the Southern Hemisphere.<br>
</p>

<p>Every messenger who escaped across the British Channel,
conveyed the most melancholy and alarming tidings to the ears of
Valentinian; and the emperor was soon informed that the two
military commanders of the province had been surprised and cut
off by the Barbarians. Severus, count of the domestics, was
hastily despatched, and as suddenly recalled, by the court of
Treves. The representations of Jovinus served only to indicate
the greatness of the evil; and, after a long and serious
consultation, the defence, or rather the recovery, of Britain was
intrusted to the abilities of the brave Theodosius. The exploits
of that general, the father of a line of emperors, have been
celebrated, with peculiar complacency, by the writers of the age:
but his real merit deserved their applause; and his nomination
was received, by the army and province, as a sure presage of
approaching victory. He seized the favorable moment of
navigation, and securely landed the numerous and veteran bands of
the Heruli and Batavians, the Jovians and the Victors. In his
march from Sandwich to London, Theodosius defeated several
parties of the Barbarians, released a multitude of captives, and,
after distributing to his soldiers a small portion of the spoil,
established the fame of disinterested justice, by the restitution
of the remainder to the rightful proprietors. The citizens of
London, who had almost despaired of their safety, threw open
their gates; and as soon as Theodosius had obtained from the
court of Treves the important aid of a military lieutenant, and a
civil governor, he executed, with wisdom and vigor, the laborious
task of the deliverance of Britain. The vagrant soldiers were
recalled to their standard; an edict of amnesty dispelled the
public apprehensions; and his cheerful example alleviated the
rigor of martial discipline. The scattered and desultory warfare
of the Barbarians, who infested the land and sea, deprived him of
the glory of a signal victory; but the prudent spirit, and
consummate art, of the Roman general, were displayed in the
operations of two campaigns, which successively rescued every
part of the province from the hands of a cruel and rapacious
enemy. The splendor of the cities, and the security of the
fortifications, were diligently restored, by the paternal care of
Theodosius; who with a strong hand confined the trembling
Caledonians to the northern angle of the island; and perpetuated,
by the name and settlement of the new province of
<strong><em>Valentia</em></strong>, the glories of the reign of
Valentinian. The voice of poetry and panegyric may add, perhaps
with some degree of truth, that the unknown regions of Thule were
stained with the blood of the Picts; that the oars of Theodosius
dashed the waves of the Hyperborean ocean; and that the distant
Orkneys were the scene of his naval victory over the Saxon
pirates. He left the province with a fair, as well as splendid,
reputation; and was immediately promoted to the rank of
master-general of the cavalry, by a prince who could applaud,
without envy, the merit of his servants. In the important station
of the Upper Danube, the conqueror of Britain checked and
defeated the armies of the Alemanni, before he was chosen to
suppress the revolt of Africa.<br>
</p>

<p>III. The prince who refuses to be the judge, instructs the
people to consider him as the accomplice, of his ministers. The
military command of Africa had been long exercised by Count
Romanus, and his abilities were not inadequate to his station;
but, as sordid interest was the sole motive of his conduct, he
acted, on most occasions, as if he had been the enemy of the
province, and the friend of the Barbarians of the desert. The
three flourishing cities of Oea, Leptis, and Sabrata, which,
under the name of Tripoli, had long constituted a federal union,
were obliged, for the first time, to shut their gates against a
hostile invasion; several of their most honorable citizens were
surprised and massacred; the villages, and even the suburbs, were
pillaged; and the vines and fruit trees of that rich territory
were extirpated by the malicious savages of Getulia. The unhappy
provincials implored the protection of Romanus; but they soon
found that their military governor was not less cruel and
rapacious than the Barbarians. As they were incapable of
furnishing the four thousand camels, and the exorbitant present,
which he required, before he would march to the assistance of
Tripoli; his demand was equivalent to a refusal, and he might
justly be accused as the author of the public calamity. In the
annual assembly of the three cities, they nominated two deputies,
to lay at the feet of Valentinian the customary offering of a
gold victory; and to accompany this tribute of duty, rather than
of gratitude, with their humble complaint, that they were ruined
by the enemy, and betrayed by their governor. If the severity of
Valentinian had been rightly directed, it would have fallen on
the guilty head of Romanus. But the count, long exercised in the
arts of corruption, had despatched a swift and trusty messenger
to secure the venal friendship of Remigius, master of the
offices. The wisdom of the Imperial council was deceived by
artifice; and their honest indignation was cooled by delay. At
length, when the repetition of complaint had been justified by
the repetition of public misfortunes, the notary Palladius was
sent from the court of Treves, to examine the state of Africa,
and the conduct of Romanus. The rigid impartiality of Palladius
was easily disarmed: he was tempted to reserve for himself a part
of the public treasure, which he brought with him for the payment
of the troops; and from the moment that he was conscious of his
own guilt, he could no longer refuse to attest the innocence and
merit of the count. The charge of the Tripolitans was declared to
be false and frivolous; and Palladius himself was sent back from
Treves to Africa, with a special commission to discover and
prosecute the authors of this impious conspiracy against the
representatives of the sovereign. His inquiries were managed with
so much dexterity and success, that he compelled the citizens of
Leptis, who had sustained a recent siege of eight days, to
contradict the truth of their own decrees, and to censure the
behavior of their own deputies. A bloody sentence was pronounced,
without hesitation, by the rash and headstrong cruelty of
Valentinian. The president of Tripoli, who had presumed to pity
the distress of the province, was publicly executed at Utica;
four distinguished citizens were put to death, as the accomplices
of the imaginary fraud; and the tongues of two others were cut
out, by the express order of the emperor. Romanus, elated by
impunity, and irritated by resistance, was still continued in the
military command; till the Africans were provoked, by his
avarice, to join the rebellious standard of Firmus, the Moor.<br>
</p>

<p>His father Nabal was one of the richest and most powerful of
the Moorish princes, who acknowledged the supremacy of Rome. But
as he left, either by his wives or concubines, a very numerous
posterity, the wealthy inheritance was eagerly disputed; and
Zamma, one of his sons, was slain in a domestic quarrel by his
brother Firmus. The implacable zeal, with which Romanus
prosecuted the legal revenge of this murder, could be ascribed
only to a motive of avarice, or personal hatred; but, on this
occasion, his claims were just; his influence was weighty; and
Firmus clearly understood, that he must either present his neck
to the executioner, or appeal from the sentence of the Imperial
consistory, to his sword, and to the people. He was received as
the deliverer of his country; and, as soon as it appeared that
Romanus was formidable only to a submissive province, the tyrant
of Africa became the object of universal contempt. The ruin of
C&aelig;sarea, which was plundered and burnt by the licentious
Barbarians, convinced the refractory cities of the danger of
resistance; the power of Firmus was established, at least in the
provinces of Mauritania and Numidia; and it seemed to be his only
doubt whether he should assume the diadem of a Moorish king, or
the purple of a Roman emperor. But the imprudent and unhappy
Africans soon discovered, that, in this rash insurrection, they
had not sufficiently consulted their own strength, or the
abilities of their leader. Before he could procure any certain
intelligence, that the emperor of the West had fixed the choice
of a general, or that a fleet of transports was collected at the
mouth of the Rhone, he was suddenly informed that the great
Theodosius, with a small band of veterans, had landed near
Igilgilis, or Gigeri, on the African coast; and the timid usurper
sunk under the ascendant of virtue and military genius. Though
Firmus possessed arms and treasures, his despair of victory
immediately reduced him to the use of those arts, which, in the
same country, and in a similar situation, had formerly been
practised by the crafty Jugurtha. He attempted to deceive, by an
apparent submission, the vigilance of the Roman general; to
seduce the fidelity of his troops; and to protract the duration
of the war, by successively engaging the independent tribes of
Africa to espouse his quarrel, or to protect his flight.
Theodosius imitated the example, and obtained the success, of his
predecessor Metellus. When Firmus, in the character of a
suppliant, accused his own rashness, and humbly solicited the
clemency of the emperor, the lieutenant of Valentinian received
and dismissed him with a friendly embrace: but he diligently
required the useful and substantial pledges of a sincere
repentance; nor could he be persuaded, by the assurances of
peace, to suspend, for an instant, the operations of an active
war. A dark conspiracy was detected by the penetration of
Theodosius; and he satisfied, without much reluctance, the public
indignation, which he had secretly excited. Several of the guilty
accomplices of Firmus were abandoned, according to ancient
custom, to the tumult of a military execution; many more, by the
amputation of both their hands, continued to exhibit an
instructive spectacle of horror; the hatred of the rebels was
accompanied with fear; and the fear of the Roman soldiers was
mingled with respectful admiration. Amidst the boundless plains
of Getulia, and the innumerable valleys of Mount Atlas, it was
impossible to prevent the escape of Firmus; and if the usurper
could have tired the patience of his antagonist, he would have
secured his person in the depth of some remote solitude, and
expected the hopes of a future revolution. He was subdued by the
perseverance of Theodosius; who had formed an inflexible
determination, that the war should end only by the death of the
tyrant; and that every nation of Africa, which presumed to
support his cause, should be involved in his ruin. At the head of
a small body of troops, which seldom exceeded three thousand five
hundred men, the Roman general advanced, with a steady prudence,
devoid of rashness or of fear, into the heart of a country, where
he was sometimes attacked by armies of twenty thousand Moors. The
boldness of his charge dismayed the irregular Barbarians; they
were disconcerted by his seasonable and orderly retreats; they
were continually baffled by the unknown resources of the military
art; and they felt and confessed the just superiority which was
assumed by the leader of a civilized nation. When Theodosius
entered the extensive dominions of Igmazen, king of the
Isaflenses, the haughty savage required, in words of defiance,
his name, and the object of his expedition. "I am," replied the
stern and disdainful count, "I am the general of Valentinian, the
lord of the world; who has sent me hither to pursue and punish a
desperate robber. Deliver him instantly into my hands; and be
assured, that if thou dost not obey the commands of my invincible
sovereign, thou, and the people over whom thou reignest, shall be
utterly extirpated." * As soon as Igmazen was satisfied, that his
enemy had strength and resolution to execute the fatal menace, he
consented to purchase a necessary peace by the sacrifice of a
guilty fugitive. The guards that were placed to secure the person
of Firmus deprived him of the hopes of escape; and the Moorish
tyrant, after wine had extinguished the sense of danger,
disappointed the insulting triumph of the Romans, by strangling
himself in the night. His dead body, the only present which
Igmazen could offer to the conqueror, was carelessly thrown upon
a camel; and Theodosius, leading back his victorious troops to
Sitifi, was saluted by the warmest acclamations of joy and
loyalty.<br>
</p>

<p>Africa had been lost by the vices of Romanus; it was restored
by the virtues of Theodosius; and our curiosity may be usefully
directed to the inquiry of the respective treatment which the two
generals received from the Imperial court. The authority of Count
Romanus had been suspended by the master-general of the cavalry;
and he was committed to safe and honorable custody till the end
of the war. His crimes were proved by the most authentic
evidence; and the public expected, with some impatience, the
decree of severe justice. But the partial and powerful favor of
Mellobaudes encouraged him to challenge his legal judges, to
obtain repeated delays for the purpose of procuring a crowd of
friendly witnesses, and, finally, to cover his guilty conduct, by
the additional guilt of fraud and forgery. About the same time,
the restorer of Britain and Africa, on a vague suspicion that his
name and services were superior to the rank of a subject, was
ignominiously beheaded at Carthage. Valentinian no longer
reigned; and the death of Theodosius, as well as the impunity of
Romanus, may justly be imputed to the arts of the ministers, who
abused the confidence, and deceived the inexperienced youth, of
his sons.<br>
</p>

<p>If the geographical accuracy of Ammianus had been fortunately
bestowed on the British exploits of Theodosius, we should have
traced, with eager curiosity, the distinct and domestic footsteps
of his march. But the tedious enumeration of the unknown and
uninteresting tribes of Africa may be reduced to the general
remark, that they were all of the swarthy race of the Moors; that
they inhabited the back settlements of the Mauritanian and
Numidian province, the country, as they have since been termed by
the Arabs, of dates and of locusts; and that, as the Roman power
declined in Africa, the boundary of civilized manners and
cultivated land was insensibly contracted. Beyond the utmost
limits of the Moors, the vast and inhospitable desert of the
South extends above a thousand miles to the banks of the Niger.
The ancients, who had a very faint and imperfect knowledge of the
great peninsula of Africa, were sometimes tempted to believe,
that the torrid zone must ever remain destitute of inhabitants;
and they sometimes amused their fancy by filling the vacant space
with headless men, or rather monsters; with horned and
cloven-footed satyrs; with fabulous centaurs; and with human
pygmies, who waged a bold and doubtful warfare against the
cranes. Carthage would have trembled at the strange intelligence
that the countries on either side of the equator were filled with
innumerable nations, who differed only in their color from the
ordinary appearance of the human species: and the subjects of the
Roman empire might have anxiously expected, that the swarms of
Barbarians, which issued from the North, would soon be
encountered from the South by new swarms of Barbarians, equally
fierce and equally formidable. These gloomy terrors would indeed
have been dispelled by a more intimate acquaintance with the
character of their African enemies. The inaction of the negroes
does not seem to be the effect either of their virtue or of their
pusillanimity. They indulge, like the rest of mankind, their
passions and appetites; and the adjacent tribes are engaged in
frequent acts of hostility. But their rude ignorance has never
invented any effectual weapons of defence, or of destruction;
they appear incapable of forming any extensive plans of
government, or conquest; and the obvious inferiority of their
mental faculties has been discovered and abused by the nations of
the temperate zone. Sixty thousand blacks are annually embarked
from the coast of Guinea, never to return to their native
country; but they are embarked in chains; and this constant
emigration, which, in the space of two centuries, might have
furnished armies to overrun the globe, accuses the guilt of
Europe, and the weakness of Africa.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XXV: Reigns Of Jovian And Valentinian,
Division Of The Empire. -- Part VI.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>IV. The ignominious treaty, which saved the army of Jovian,
had been faithfully executed on the side of the Romans; and as
they had solemnly renounced the sovereignty and alliance of
Armenia and Iberia, those tributary kingdoms were exposed,
without protection, to the arms of the Persian monarch. Sapor
entered the Armenian territories at the head of a formidable host
of cuirassiers, of archers, and of mercenary foot; but it was the
invariable practice of Sapor to mix war and negotiation, and to
consider falsehood and perjury as the most powerful instruments
of regal policy. He affected to praise the prudent and moderate
conduct of the king of Armenia; and the unsuspicious Tiranus was
persuaded, by the repeated assurances of insidious friendship, to
deliver his person into the hands of a faithless and cruel enemy.
In the midst of a splendid entertainment, he was bound in chains
of silver, as an honor due to the blood of the Arsacides; and,
after a short confinement in the Tower of Oblivion at Ecbatana,
he was released from the miseries of life, either by his own
dagger, or by that of an assassin. * The kingdom of Armenia was
reduced to the state of a Persian province; the administration
was shared between a distinguished satrap and a favorite eunuch;
and Sapor marched, without delay, to subdue the martial spirit of
the Iberians. Sauromaces, who reigned in that country by the
permission of the emperors, was expelled by a superior force;
and, as an insult on the majesty of Rome, the king of kings
placed a diadem on the head of his abject vassal Aspacuras. The
city of Artogerassa was the only place of Armenia which presumed
to resist the efforts of his arms. The treasure deposited in that
strong fortress tempted the avarice of Sapor; but the danger of
Olympias, the wife or widow of the Armenian king, excited the
public compassion, and animated the desperate valor of her
subjects and soldiers. &sect; The Persians were surprised and
repulsed under the walls of Artogerassa, by a bold and
well-concerted sally of the besieged. But the forces of Sapor
were continually renewed and increased; the hopeless courage of
the garrison was exhausted; the strength of the walls yielded to
the assault; and the proud conqueror, after wasting the
rebellious city with fire and sword, led away captive an
unfortunate queen; who, in a more auspicious hour, had been the
destined bride of the son of Constantine. Yet if Sapor already
triumphed in the easy conquest of two dependent kingdoms, he soon
felt, that a country is unsubdued as long as the minds of the
people are actuated by a hostile and contumacious spirit. The
satraps, whom he was obliged to trust, embraced the first
opportunity of regaining the affection of their countrymen, and
of signalizing their immortal hatred to the Persian name. Since
the conversion of the Armenians and Iberians, these nations
considered the Christians as the favorites, and the Magians as
the adversaries, of the Supreme Being: the influence of the
clergy, over a superstitious people was uniformly exerted in the
cause of Rome; and as long as the successors of Constantine
disputed with those of Artaxerxes the sovereignty of the
intermediate provinces, the religious connection always threw a
decisive advantage into the scale of the empire. A numerous and
active party acknowledged Para, the son of Tiranus, as the lawful
sovereign of Armenia, and his title to the throne was deeply
rooted in the hereditary succession of five hundred years. By the
unanimous consent of the Iberians, the country was equally
divided between the rival princes; and Aspacuras, who owed his
diadem to the choice of Sapor, was obliged to declare, that his
regard for his children, who were detained as hostages by the
tyrant, was the only consideration which prevented him from
openly renouncing the alliance of Persia. The emperor Valens, who
respected the obligations of the treaty, and who was apprehensive
of involving the East in a dangerous war, ventured, with slow and
cautious measures, to support the Roman party in the kingdoms of
Iberia and Armenia. $ Twelve legions established the authority of
Sauromaces on the banks of the Cyrus. The Euphrates was protected
by the valor of Arintheus. A powerful army, under the command of
Count Trajan, and of Vadomair, king of the Alemanni, fixed their
camp on the confines of Armenia. But they were strictly enjoined
not to commit the first hostilities, which might be understood as
a breach of the treaty: and such was the implicit obedience of
the Roman general, that they retreated, with exemplary patience,
under a shower of Persian arrows till they had clearly acquired a
just title to an honorable and legitimate victory. Yet these
appearances of war insensibly subsided in a vain and tedious
negotiation. The contending parties supported their claims by
mutual reproaches of perfidy and ambition; and it should seem,
that the original treaty was expressed in very obscure terms,
since they were reduced to the necessity of making their
inconclusive appeal to the partial testimony of the generals of
the two nations, who had assisted at the negotiations. The
invasion of the Goths and Huns which soon afterwards shook the
foundations of the Roman empire, exposed the provinces of Asia to
the arms of Sapor. But the declining age, and perhaps the
infirmities, of the monarch suggested new maxims of tranquillity
and moderation. His death, which happened in the full maturity of
a reign of seventy years, changed in a moment the court and
councils of Persia; and their attention was most probably engaged
by domestic troubles, and the distant efforts of a Carmanian war.
The remembrance of ancient injuries was lost in the enjoyment of
peace. The kingdoms of Armenia and Iberia were permitted, by the
mutual, though tacit consent of both empires, to resume their
doubtful neutrality. In the first years of the reign of
Theodosius, a Persian embassy arrived at Constantinople, to
excuse the unjustifiable measures of the former reign; and to
offer, as the tribute of friendship, or even of respect, a
splendid present of gems, of silk, and of Indian elephants.<br>
</p>

<p>In the general picture of the affairs of the East under the
reign of Valens, the adventures of Para form one of the most
striking and singular objects. The noble youth, by the persuasion
of his mother Olympias, had escaped through the Persian host that
besieged Artogerassa, and implored the protection of the emperor
of the East. By his timid councils, Para was alternately
supported, and recalled, and restored, and betrayed. The hopes of
the Armenians were sometimes raised by the presence of their
natural sovereign, * and the ministers of Valens were satisfied,
that they preserved the integrity of the public faith, if their
vassal was not suffered to assume the diadem and title of King.
But they soon repented of their own rashness. They were
confounded by the reproaches and threats of the Persian monarch.
They found reason to distrust the cruel and inconstant temper of
Para himself; who sacrificed, to the slightest suspicions, the
lives of his most faithful servants, and held a secret and
disgraceful correspondence with the assassin of his father and
the enemy of his country. Under the specious pretence of
consulting with the emperor on the subject of their common
interest, Para was persuaded to descend from the mountains of
Armenia, where his party was in arms, and to trust his
independence and safety to the discretion of a perfidious court.
The king of Armenia, for such he appeared in his own eyes and in
those of his nation, was received with due honors by the
governors of the provinces through which he passed; but when he
arrived at Tarsus in Cilicia, his progress was stopped under
various pretences; his motions were watched with respectful
vigilance, and he gradually discovered, that he was a prisoner in
the hands of the Romans. Para suppressed his indignation,
dissembled his fears, and after secretly preparing his escape,
mounted on horseback with three hundred of his faithful
followers. The officer stationed at the door of his apartment
immediately communicated his flight to the consular of Cilicia,
who overtook him in the suburbs, and endeavored without success,
to dissuade him from prosecuting his rash and dangerous design. A
legion was ordered to pursue the royal fugitive; but the pursuit
of infantry could not be very alarming to a body of light
cavalry; and upon the first cloud of arrows that was discharged
into the air, they retreated with precipitation to the gates of
Tarsus. After an incessant march of two days and two nights, Para
and his Armenians reached the banks of the Euphrates; but the
passage of the river which they were obliged to swim, * was
attended with some delay and some loss. The country was alarmed;
and the two roads, which were only separated by an interval of
three miles had been occupied by a thousand archers on horseback,
under the command of a count and a tribune. Para must have
yielded to superior force, if the accidental arrival of a
friendly traveller had not revealed the danger and the means of
escape. A dark and almost impervious path securely conveyed the
Armenian troop through the thicket; and Para had left behind him
the count and the tribune, while they patiently expected his
approach along the public highways. They returned to the Imperial
court to excuse their want of diligence or success; and seriously
alleged, that the king of Armenia, who was a skilful magician,
had transformed himself and his followers, and passed before
their eyes under a borrowed shape. After his return to his native
kingdom, Para still continued to profess himself the friend and
ally of the Romans: but the Romans had injured him too deeply
ever to forgive, and the secret sentence of his death was signed
in the council of Valens. The execution of the bloody deed was
committed to the subtle prudence of Count Trajan; and he had the
merit of insinuating himself into the confidence of the credulous
prince, that he might find an opportunity of stabbing him to the
heart Para was invited to a Roman banquet, which had been
prepared with all the pomp and sensuality of the East; the hall
resounded with cheerful music, and the company was already heated
with wine; when the count retired for an instant, drew his sword,
and gave the signal of the murder. A robust and desperate
Barbarian instantly rushed on the king of Armenia; and though he
bravely defended his life with the first weapon that chance
offered to his hand, the table of the Imperial general was
stained with the royal blood of a guest, and an ally. Such were
the weak and wicked maxims of the Roman administration, that, to
attain a doubtful object of political interest the laws of
nations, and the sacred rights of hospitality were inhumanly
violated in the face of the world.<br>
</p>

<p>V. During a peaceful interval of thirty years, the Romans
secured their frontiers, and the Goths extended their dominions.
The victories of the great Hermanric, king of the Ostrogoths, and
the most noble of the race of the Amali, have been compared, by
the enthusiasm of his countrymen, to the exploits of Alexander;
with this singular, and almost incredible, difference, that the
martial spirit of the Gothic hero, instead of being supported by
the vigor of youth, was displayed with glory and success in the
extreme period of human life, between the age of fourscore and
one hundred and ten years. The independent tribes were persuaded,
or compelled, to acknowledge the king of the Ostrogoths as the
sovereign of the Gothic nation: the chiefs of the Visigoths, or
Thervingi, renounced the royal title, and assumed the more humble
appellation of <strong><em>Judges</em></strong>; and, among those
judges, Athanaric, Fritigern, and Alavivus, were the most
illustrious, by their personal merit, as well as by their
vicinity to the Roman provinces. These domestic conquests, which
increased the military power of Hermanric, enlarged his ambitious
designs. He invaded the adjacent countries of the North; and
twelve considerable nations, whose names and limits cannot be
accurately defined, successively yielded to the superiority of
the Gothic arms The Heruli, who inhabited the marshy lands near
the lake M&aelig;otis, were renowned for their strength and
agility; and the assistance of their light infantry was eagerly
solicited, and highly esteemed, in all the wars of the
Barbarians. But the active spirit of the Heruli was subdued by
the slow and steady perseverance of the Goths; and, after a
bloody action, in which the king was slain, the remains of that
warlike tribe became a useful accession to the camp of Hermanric.
He then marched against the Venedi; unskilled in the use of arms,
and formidable only by their numbers, which filled the wide
extent of the plains of modern Poland. The victorious Goths, who
were not inferior in numbers, prevailed in the contest, by the
decisive advantages of exercise and discipline. After the
submission of the Venedi, the conqueror advanced, without
resistance, as far as the confines of the &AElig;stii; an ancient
people, whose name is still preserved in the province of
Esthonia. Those distant inhabitants of the Baltic coast were
supported by the labors of agriculture, enriched by the trade of
amber, and consecrated by the peculiar worship of the Mother of
the Gods. But the scarcity of iron obliged the &AElig;stian
warriors to content themselves with wooden clubs; and the
reduction of that wealthy country is ascribed to the prudence,
rather than to the arms, of Hermanric. His dominions, which
extended from the Danube to the Baltic, included the native
seats, and the recent acquisitions, of the Goths; and he reigned
over the greatest part of Germany and Scythia with the authority
of a conqueror, and sometimes with the cruelty of a tyrant. But
he reigned over a part of the globe incapable of perpetuating and
adorning the glory of its heroes. The name of Hermanric is almost
buried in oblivion; his exploits are imperfectly known; and the
Romans themselves appeared unconscious of the progress of an
aspiring power which threatened the liberty of the North, and the
peace of the empire.<br>
</p>

<p>The Goths had contracted an hereditary attachment for the
Imperial house of Constantine, of whose power and liberality they
had received so many signal proofs. They respected the public
peace; and if a hostile band sometimes presumed to pass the Roman
limit, their irregular conduct was candidly ascribed to the
ungovernable spirit of the Barbarian youth. Their contempt for
two new and obscure princes, who had been raised to the throne by
a popular election, inspired the Goths with bolder hopes; and,
while they agitated some design of marching their confederate
force under the national standard, they were easily tempted to
embrace the party of Procopius; and to foment, by their dangerous
aid, the civil discord of the Romans. The public treaty might
stipulate no more than ten thousand auxiliaries; but the design
was so zealously adopted by the chiefs of the Visigoths, that the
army which passed the Danube amounted to the number of thirty
thousand men. They marched with the proud confidence, that their
invincible valor would decide the fate of the Roman empire; and
the provinces of Thrace groaned under the weight of the
Barbarians, who displayed the insolence of masters and the
licentiousness of enemies. But the intemperance which gratified
their appetites, retarded their progress; and before the Goths
could receive any certain intelligence of the defeat and death of
Procopius, they perceived, by the hostile state of the country,
that the civil and military powers were resumed by his successful
rival. A chain of posts and fortifications, skilfully disposed by
Valens, or the generals of Valens, resisted their march,
prevented their retreat, and intercepted their subsistence. The
fierceness of the Barbarians was tamed and suspended by hunger;
they indignantly threw down their arms at the feet of the
conqueror, who offered them food and chains: the numerous
captives were distributed in all the cities of the East; and the
provincials, who were soon familiarized with their savage
appearance, ventured, by degrees, to measure their own strength
with these formidable adversaries, whose name had so long been
the object of their terror. The king of Scythia (and Hermanric
alone could deserve so lofty a title) was grieved and exasperated
by this national calamity. His ambassadors loudly complained, at
the court of Valens, of the infraction of the ancient and solemn
alliance, which had so long subsisted between the Romans and the
Goths. They alleged, that they had fulfilled the duty of allies,
by assisting the kinsman and successor of the emperor Julian;
they required the immediate restitution of the noble captives;
and they urged a very singular claim, that the Gothic generals
marching in arms, and in hostile array, were entitled to the
sacred character and privileges of ambassadors. The decent, but
peremptory, refusal of these extravagant demands, was signified
to the Barbarians by Victor, master-general of the cavalry; who
expressed, with force and dignity, the just complaints of the
emperor of the East. The negotiation was interrupted; and the
manly exhortations of Valentinian encouraged his timid brother to
vindicate the insulted majesty of the empire.<br>
</p>

<p>The splendor and magnitude of this Gothic war are celebrated
by a contemporary historian: but the events scarcely deserve the
attention of posterity, except as the preliminary steps of the
approaching decline and fall of the empire. Instead of leading
the nations of Germany and Scythia to the banks of the Danube, or
even to the gates of Constantinople, the aged monarch of the
Goths resigned to the brave Athanaric the danger and glory of a
defensive war, against an enemy, who wielded with a feeble hand
the powers of a mighty state. A bridge of boats was established
upon the Danube; the presence of Valens animated his troops; and
his ignorance of the art of war was compensated by personal
bravery, and a wise deference to the advice of Victor and
Arintheus, his masters-general of the cavalry and infantry. The
operations of the campaign were conducted by their skill and
experience; but they found it impossible to drive the Visigoths
from their strong posts in the mountains; and the devastation of
the plains obliged the Romans themselves to repass the Danube on
the approach of winter. The incessant rains, which swelled the
waters of the river, produced a tacit suspension of arms, and
confined the emperor Valens, during the whole course of the
ensuing summer, to his camp of Marcianopolis. The third year of
the war was more favorable to the Romans, and more pernicious to
the Goths. The interruption of trade deprived the Barbarians of
the objects of luxury, which they already confounded with the
necessaries of life; and the desolation of a very extensive tract
of country threatened them with the horrors of famine. Athanaric
was provoked, or compelled, to risk a battle, which he lost, in
the plains; and the pursuit was rendered more bloody by the cruel
precaution of the victorious generals, who had promised a large
reward for the head of every Goth that was brought into the
Imperial camp. The submission of the Barbarians appeased the
resentment of Valens and his council: the emperor listened with
satisfaction to the flattering and eloquent remonstrance of the
senate of Constantinople, which assumed, for the first time, a
share in the public deliberations; and the same generals, Victor
and Arintheus, who had successfully directed the conduct of the
war, were empowered to regulate the conditions of peace. The
freedom of trade, which the Goths had hitherto enjoyed, was
restricted to two cities on the Danube; the rashness of their
leaders was severely punished by the suppression of their
pensions and subsidies; and the exception, which was stipulated
in favor of Athanaric alone, was more advantageous than honorable
to the Judge of the Visigoths. Athanaric, who, on this occasion,
appears to have consulted his private interest, without expecting
the orders of his sovereign, supported his own dignity, and that
of his tribe, in the personal interview which was proposed by the
ministers of Valens. He persisted in his declaration, that it was
impossible for him, without incurring the guilt of perjury, ever
to set his foot on the territory of the empire; and it is more
than probable, that his regard for the sanctity of an oath was
confirmed by the recent and fatal examples of Roman treachery.
The Danube, which separated the dominions of the two independent
nations, was chosen for the scene of the conference. The emperor
of the East, and the Judge of the Visigoths, accompanied by an
equal number of armed followers, advanced in their respective
barges to the middle of the stream. After the ratification of the
treaty, and the delivery of hostages, Valens returned in triumph
to Constantinople; and the Goths remained in a state of
tranquillity about six years; till they were violently impelled
against the Roman empire by an innumerable host of Scythians, who
appeared to issue from the frozen regions of the North.<br>
</p>

<p>The emperor of the West, who had resigned to his brother the
command of the Lower Danube, reserved for his immediate care the
defence of the Rh&aelig;tian and Illyrian provinces, which spread
so many hundred miles along the greatest of the European rivers.
The active policy of Valentinian was continually employed in
adding new fortifications to the security of the frontier: but
the abuse of this policy provoked the just resentment of the
Barbarians. The Quadi complained, that the ground for an intended
fortress had been marked out on their territories; and their
complaints were urged with so much reason and moderation, that
Equitius, master-general of Illyricum, consented to suspend the
prosecution of the work, till he should be more clearly informed
of the will of his sovereign. This fair occasion of injuring a
rival, and of advancing the fortune of his son, was eagerly
embraced by the inhuman Maximin, the pr&aelig;fect, or rather
tyrant, of Gaul. The passions of Valentinian were impatient of
control; and he credulously listened to the assurances of his
favorite, that if the government of Valeria, and the direction of
the work, were intrusted to the zeal of his son Marcellinus, the
emperor should no longer be importuned with the audacious
remonstrances of the Barbarians. The subjects of Rome, and the
natives of Germany, were insulted by the arrogance of a young and
worthless minister, who considered his rapid elevation as the
proof and reward of his superior merit. He affected, however, to
receive the modest application of Gabinius, king of the Quadi,
with some attention and regard: but this artful civility
concealed a dark and bloody design, and the credulous prince was
persuaded to accept the pressing invitation of Marcellinus. I am
at a loss how to vary the narrative of similar crimes; or how to
relate, that, in the course of the same year, but in remote parts
of the empire, the inhospitable table of two Imperial generals
was stained with the royal blood of two guests and allies,
inhumanly murdered by their order, and in their presence. The
fate of Gabinius, and of Para, was the same: but the cruel death
of their sovereign was resented in a very different manner by the
servile temper of the Armenians, and the free and daring spirit
of the Germans. The Quadi were much declined from that formidable
power, which, in the time of Marcus Antoninus, had spread terror
to the gates of Rome. But they still possessed arms and courage;
their courage was animated by despair, and they obtained the
usual reenforcement of the cavalry of their Sarmatian allies. So
improvident was the assassin Marcellinus, that he chose the
moment when the bravest veterans had been drawn away, to suppress
the revolt of Firmus; and the whole province was exposed, with a
very feeble defence, to the rage of the exasperated Barbarians.
They invaded Pannonia in the season of harvest; unmercifully
destroyed every object of plunder which they could not easily
transport; and either disregarded, or demolished, the empty
fortifications. The princess Constantia, the daughter of the
emperor Constantius, and the granddaughter of the great
Constantine, very narrowly escaped. That royal maid, who had
innocently supported the revolt of Procopius, was now the
destined wife of the heir of the Western empire. She traversed
the peaceful province with a splendid and unarmed train. Her
person was saved from danger, and the republic from disgrace, by
the active zeal of Messala, governor of the provinces. As soon as
he was informed that the village, where she stopped only to dine,
was almost encompassed by the Barbarians, he hastily placed her
in his own chariot, and drove full speed till he reached the
gates of Sirmium, which were at the distance of six-and-twenty
miles. Even Sirmium might not have been secure, if the Quadi and
Sarmatians had diligently advanced during the general
consternation of the magistrates and people. Their delay allowed
Probus, the Pr&aelig;torian pr&aelig;fect, sufficient time to
recover his own spirits, and to revive the courage of the
citizens. He skilfully directed their strenuous efforts to repair
and strengthen the decayed fortifications; and procured the
seasonable and effectual assistance of a company of archers, to
protect the capital of the Illyrian provinces. Disappointed in
their attempts against the walls of Sirmium, the indignant
Barbarians turned their arms against the master general of the
frontier, to whom they unjustly attributed the murder of their
king. Equitius could bring into the field no more than two
legions; but they contained the veteran strength of the
M&aelig;sian and Pannonian bands. The obstinacy with which they
disputed the vain honors of rank and precedency, was the cause of
their destruction; and while they acted with separate forces and
divided councils, they were surprised and slaughtered by the
active vigor of the Sarmatian horse. The success of this invasion
provoked the emulation of the bordering tribes; and the province
of M&aelig;sia would infallibly have been lost, if young
Theodosius, the duke, or military commander, of the frontier, had
not signalized, in the defeat of the public enemy, an intrepid
genius, worthy of his illustrious father, and of his future
greatness.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XXV: Reigns Of Jovian And Valentinian,
Division Of The Empire. -- Part VII.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>The mind of Valentinian, who then resided at Treves, was
deeply affected by the calamities of Illyricum; but the lateness
of the season suspended the execution of his designs till the
ensuing spring. He marched in person, with a considerable part of
the forces of Gaul, from the banks of the Moselle: and to the
suppliant ambassadors of the Sarmatians, who met him on the way,
he returned a doubtful answer, that, as soon as he reached the
scene of action, he should examine, and pronounce. When he
arrived at Sirmium, he gave audience to the deputies of the
Illyrian provinces; who loudly congratulated their own felicity
under the auspicious government of Probus, his Pr&aelig;torian
pr&aelig;fect. Valentinian, who was flattered by these
demonstrations of their loyalty and gratitude, imprudently asked
the deputy of Epirus, a Cynic philosopher of intrepid sincerity,
whether he was freely sent by the wishes of the province. "With
tears and groans am I sent," replied Iphicles, "by a reluctant
people." The emperor paused: but the impunity of his ministers
established the pernicious maxim, that they might oppress his
subjects, without injuring his service. A strict inquiry into
their conduct would have relieved the public discontent. The
severe condemnation of the murder of Gabinius, was the only
measure which could restore the confidence of the Germans, and
vindicate the honor of the Roman name. But the haughty monarch
was incapable of the magnanimity which dares to acknowledge a
fault. He forgot the provocation, remembered only the injury, and
advanced into the country of the Quadi with an insatiate thirst
of blood and revenge. The extreme devastation, and promiscuous
massacre, of a savage war, were justified, in the eyes of the
emperor, and perhaps in those of the world, by the cruel equity
of retaliation: and such was the discipline of the Romans, and
the consternation of the enemy, that Valentinian repassed the
Danube without the loss of a single man. As he had resolved to
complete the destruction of the Quadi by a second campaign, he
fixed his winter quarters at Bregetio, on the Danube, near the
Hungarian city of Presburg. While the operations of war were
suspended by the severity of the weather, the Quadi made an
humble attempt to deprecate the wrath of their conqueror; and, at
the earnest persuasion of Equitius, their ambassadors were
introduced into the Imperial council. They approached the throne
with bended bodies and dejected countenances; and without daring
to complain of the murder of their king, they affirmed, with
solemn oaths, that the late invasion was the crime of some
irregular robbers, which the public council of the nation
condemned and abhorred. The answer of the emperor left them but
little to hope from his clemency or compassion. He reviled, in
the most intemperate language, their baseness, their ingratitude,
their insolence. His eyes, his voice, his color, his gestures,
expressed the violence of his ungoverned fury; and while his
whole frame was agitated with convulsive passion, a large blood
vessel suddenly burst in his body; and Valentinian fell
speechless into the arms of his attendants. Their pious care
immediately concealed his situation from the crowd; but, in a few
minutes, the emperor of the West expired in an agony of pain,
retaining his senses till the last; and struggling, without
success, to declare his intentions to the generals and ministers,
who surrounded the royal couch. Valentinian was about fifty-four
years of age; and he wanted only one hundred days to accomplish
the twelve years of his reign.<br>
</p>

<p>The polygamy of Valentinian is seriously attested by an
ecclesiastical historian. "The empress Severa (I relate the
fable) admitted into her familiar society the lovely Justina, the
daughter of an Italian governor: her admiration of those naked
charms, which she had often seen in the bath, was expressed with
such lavish and imprudent praise, that the emperor was tempted to
introduce a second wife into his bed; and his public edict
extended to all the subjects of the empire the same domestic
privilege which he had assumed for himself." But we may be
assured, from the evidence of reason as well as history, that the
two marriages of Valentinian, with Severa, and with Justina, were
<strong><em>successively</em></strong> contracted; and that he
used the ancient permission of divorce, which was still allowed
by the laws, though it was condemned by the church Severa was the
mother of Gratian, who seemed to unite every claim which could
entitle him to the undoubted succession of the Western empire. He
was the eldest son of a monarch whose glorious reign had
confirmed the free and honorable choice of his fellow-soldiers.
Before he had attained the ninth year of his age, the royal youth
received from the hands of his indulgent father the purple robe
and diadem, with the title of Augustus; the election was solemnly
ratified by the consent and applause of the armies of Gaul; and
the name of Gratian was added to the names of Valentinian and
Valens, in all the legal transactions of the Roman government. By
his marriage with the granddaughter of Constantine, the son of
Valentinian acquired all the hereditary rights of the Flavian
family; which, in a series of three Imperial generations, were
sanctified by time, religion, and the reverence of the people. At
the death of his father, the royal youth was in the seventeenth
year of his age; and his virtues already justified the favorable
opinion of the army and the people. But Gratian resided, without
apprehension, in the palace of Treves; whilst, at the distance of
many hundred miles, Valentinian suddenly expired in the camp of
Bregetio. The passions, which had been so long suppressed by the
presence of a master, immediately revived in the Imperial
council; and the ambitious design of reigning in the name of an
infant, was artfully executed by Mellobaudes and Equitius, who
commanded the attachment of the Illyrian and Italian bands. They
contrived the most honorable pretences to remove the popular
leaders, and the troops of Gaul, who might have asserted the
claims of the lawful successor; they suggested the necessity of
extinguishing the hopes of foreign and domestic enemies, by a
bold and decisive measure. The empress Justina, who had been left
in a palace about one hundred miles from Bregetio, was
respectively invited to appear in the camp, with the son of the
deceased emperor. On the sixth day after the death of
Valentinian, the infant prince of the same name, who was only
four years old, was shown, in the arms of his mother, to the
legions; and solemnly invested, by military acclamation, with the
titles and ensigns of supreme power. The impending dangers of a
civil war were seasonably prevented by the wise and moderate
conduct of the emperor Gratian. He cheerfully accepted the choice
of the army; declared that he should always consider the son of
Justina as a brother, not as a rival; and advised the empress,
with her son Valentinian to fix their residence at Milan, in the
fair and peaceful province of Italy; while he assumed the more
arduous command of the countries beyond the Alps. Gratian
dissembled his resentment till he could safely punish, or
disgrace, the authors of the conspiracy; and though he uniformly
behaved with tenderness and regard to his infant colleague, he
gradually confounded, in the administration of the Western
empire, the office of a guardian with the authority of a
sovereign. The government of the Roman world was exercised in the
united names of Valens and his two nephews; but the feeble
emperor of the East, who succeeded to the rank of his elder
brother, never obtained any weight or influence in the councils
of the West.<br>
</p>

<p><strong>Chapter XXVI: Progress of The Huns.</strong></p>

<p><strong><em>Part I.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>Manners Of The Pastoral Nations. -- Progress Of The Huns, From
China To Europe. -- Flight Of The Goths. -- They Pass The Danube.
-- Gothic War. -- Defeat And Death Of Valens. -- Gratian Invests
Theodosius With The Eastern Empire. -- His Character And Success.
-- Peace And Settlement Of The Goths.<br>
</p>

<p>In the second year of the reign of Valentinian and Valens, on
the morning of the twenty-first day of July, the greatest part of
the Roman world was shaken by a violent and destructive
earthquake. The impression was communicated to the waters; the
shores of the Mediterranean were left dry, by the sudden retreat
of the sea; great quantities of fish were caught with the hand;
large vessels were stranded on the mud; and a curious spectator
amused his eye, or rather his fancy, by contemplating the various
appearance of valleys and mountains, which had never, since the
formation of the globe, been exposed to the sun. But the tide
soon returned, with the weight of an immense and irresistible
deluge, which was severely felt on the coasts of Sicily, of
Dalmatia, of Greece, and of Egypt: large boats were transported,
and lodged on the roofs of houses, or at the distance of two
miles from the shore; the people, with their habitations, were
swept away by the waters; and the city of Alexandria annually
commemorated the fatal day, on which fifty thousand persons had
lost their lives in the inundation. This calamity, the report of
which was magnified from one province to another, astonished and
terrified the subjects of Rome; and their affrighted imagination
enlarged the real extent of a momentary evil. They recollected
the preceding earthquakes, which had subverted the cities of
Palestine and Bithynia: they considered these alarming strokes as
the prelude only of still more dreadful calamities, and their
fearful vanity was disposed to confound the symptoms of a
declining empire and a sinking world. It was the fashion of the
times to attribute every remarkable event to the particular will
of the Deity; the alterations of nature were connected, by an
invisible chain, with the moral and metaphysical opinions of the
human mind; and the most sagacious divines could distinguish,
according to the color of their respective prejudices, that the
establishment of heresy tended to produce an earthquake; or that
a deluge was the inevitable consequence of the progress of sin
and error. Without presuming to discuss the truth or propriety of
these lofty speculations, the historian may content himself with
an observation, which seems to be justified by experience, that
man has much more to fear from the passions of his
fellow-creatures, than from the convulsions of the elements. The
mischievous effects of an earthquake, or deluge, a hurricane, or
the eruption of a volcano, bear a very inconsiderable portion to
the ordinary calamities of war, as they are now moderated by the
prudence or humanity of the princes of Europe, who amuse their
own leisure, and exercise the courage of their subjects, in the
practice of the military art. But the laws and manners of modern
nations protect the safety and freedom of the vanquished soldier;
and the peaceful citizen has seldom reason to complain, that his
life, or even his fortune, is exposed to the rage of war. In the
disastrous period of the fall of the Roman empire, which may
justly be dated from the reign of Valens, the happiness and
security of each individual were personally attacked; and the
arts and labors of ages were rudely defaced by the Barbarians of
Scythia and Germany. The invasion of the Huns precipitated on the
provinces of the West the Gothic nation, which advanced, in less
than forty years, from the Danube to the Atlantic, and opened a
way, by the success of their arms, to the inroads of so many
hostile tribes, more savage than themselves. The original
principle of motion was concealed in the remote countries of the
North; and the curious observation of the pastoral life of the
Scythians, or Tartars, will illustrate the latent cause of these
destructive emigrations.<br>
</p>

<p>The different characters that mark the civilized nations of
the globe, may be ascribed to the use, and the abuse, of reason;
which so variously shapes, and so artificially composes, the
manners and opinions of a European, or a Chinese. But the
operation of instinct is more sure and simple than that of
reason: it is much easier to ascertain the appetites of a
quadruped than the speculations of a philosopher; and the savage
tribes of mankind, as they approach nearer to the condition of
animals, preserve a stronger resemblance to themselves and to
each other. The uniform stability of their manners is the natural
consequence of the imperfection of their faculties. Reduced to a
similar situation, their wants, their desires, their enjoyments,
still continue the same: and the influence of food or climate,
which, in a more improved state of society, is suspended, or
subdued, by so many moral causes, most powerfully contributes to
form, and to maintain, the national character of Barbarians. In
every age, the immense plains of Scythia, or Tartary, have been
inhabited by vagrant tribes of hunters and shepherds, whose
indolence refuses to cultivate the earth, and whose restless
spirit disdains the confinement of a sedentary life. In every
age, the Scythians, and Tartars, have been renowned for their
invincible courage and rapid conquests. The thrones of Asia have
been repeatedly overturned by the shepherds of the North; and
their arms have spread terror and devastation over the most
fertile and warlike countries of Europe. On this occasion, as
well as on many others, the sober historian is forcibly awakened
from a pleasing vision; and is compelled, with some reluctance,
to confess, that the pastoral manners, which have been adorned
with the fairest attributes of peace and innocence, are much
better adapted to the fierce and cruel habits of a military life.
To illustrate this observation, I shall now proceed to consider a
nation of shepherds and of warriors, in the three important
articles of, I. Their diet; II. Their habitations; and, III.
Their exercises. The narratives of antiquity are justified by the
experience of modern times; and the banks of the Borysthenes, of
the Volga, or of the Selinga, will indifferently present the same
uniform spectacle of similar and native manners.<br>
</p>

<p>I. The corn, or even the rice, which constitutes the ordinary
and wholesome food of a civilized people, can be obtained only by
the patient toil of the husbandman. Some of the happy savages,
who dwell between the tropics, are plentifully nourished by the
liberality of nature; but in the climates of the North, a nation
of shepherds is reduced to their flocks and herds. The skilful
practitioners of the medical art will determine (if they are able
to determine) how far the temper of the human mind may be
affected by the use of animal, or of vegetable, food; and whether
the common association of carnivorous and cruel deserves to be
considered in any other light than that of an innocent, perhaps a
salutary, prejudice of humanity. Yet, if it be true, that the
sentiment of compassion is imperceptibly weakened by the sight
and practice of domestic cruelty, we may observe, that the horrid
objects which are disguised by the arts of European refinement,
are exhibited in their naked and most disgusting simplicity in
the tent of a Tartarian shepherd. The ox, or the sheep, are
slaughtered by the same hand from which they were accustomed to
receive their daily food; and the bleeding limbs are served, with
very little preparation, on the table of their unfeeling
murderer. In the military profession, and especially in the
conduct of a numerous army, the exclusive use of animal food
appears to be productive of the most solid advantages. Corn is a
bulky and perishable commodity; and the large magazines, which
are indispensably necessary for the subsistence of our troops,
must be slowly transported by the labor of men or horses. But the
flocks and herds, which accompany the march of the Tartars,
afford a sure and increasing supply of flesh and milk: in the far
greater part of the uncultivated waste, the vegetation of the
grass is quick and luxuriant; and there are few places so
extremely barren, that the hardy cattle of the North cannot find
some tolerable pasture. The supply is multiplied and prolonged by
the undistinguishing appetite, and patient abstinence, of the
Tartars. They indifferently feed on the flesh of those animals
that have been killed for the table, or have died of disease.
Horseflesh, which in every age and country has been proscribed by
the civilized nations of Europe and Asia, they devour with
peculiar greediness; and this singular taste facilitates the
success of their military operations. The active cavalry of
Scythia is always followed, in their most distant and rapid
incursions, by an adequate number of spare horses, who may be
occasionally used, either to redouble the speed, or to satisfy
the hunger, of the Barbarians. Many are the resources of courage
and poverty. When the forage round a camp of Tartars is almost
consumed, they slaughter the greatest part of their cattle, and
preserve the flesh, either smoked, or dried in the sun. On the
sudden emergency of a hasty march, they provide themselves with a
sufficient quantity of little balls of cheese, or rather of hard
curd, which they occasionally dissolve in water; and this
unsubstantial diet will support, for many days, the life, and
even the spirits, of the patient warrior. But this extraordinary
abstinence, which the Stoic would approve, and the hermit might
envy, is commonly succeeded by the most voracious indulgence of
appetite. The wines of a happier climate are the most grateful
present, or the most valuable commodity, that can be offered to
the Tartars; and the only example of their industry seems to
consist in the art of extracting from mare's milk a fermented
liquor, which possesses a very strong power of intoxication. Like
the animals of prey, the savages, both of the old and new world,
experience the alternate vicissitudes of famine and plenty; and
their stomach is inured to sustain, without much inconvenience,
the opposite extremes of hunger and of intemperance.<br>
</p>

<p>II. In the ages of rustic and martial simplicity, a people of
soldiers and husbandmen are dispersed over the face of an
extensive and cultivated country; and some time must elapse
before the warlike youth of Greece or Italy could be assembled
under the same standard, either to defend their own confines, or
to invade the territories of the adjacent tribes. The progress of
manufactures and commerce insensibly collects a large multitude
within the walls of a city: but these citizens are no longer
soldiers; and the arts which adorn and improve the state of civil
society, corrupt the habits of the military life. The pastoral
manners of the Scythians seem to unite the different advantages
of simplicity and refinement. The individuals of the same tribe
are constantly assembled, but they are assembled in a camp; and
the native spirit of these dauntless shepherds is animated by
mutual support and emulation. The houses of the Tartars are no
more than small tents, of an oval form, which afford a cold and
dirty habitation, for the promiscuous youth of both sexes. The
palaces of the rich consist of wooden huts, of such a size that
they may be conveniently fixed on large wagons, and drawn by a
team perhaps of twenty or thirty oxen. The flocks and herds,
after grazing all day in the adjacent pastures, retire, on the
approach of night, within the protection of the camp. The
necessity of preventing the most mischievous confusion, in such a
perpetual concourse of men and animals, must gradually introduce,
in the distribution, the order, and the guard, of the encampment,
the rudiments of the military art. As soon as the forage of a
certain district is consumed, the tribe, or rather army, of
shepherds, makes a regular march to some fresh pastures; and thus
acquires, in the ordinary occupations of the pastoral life, the
practical knowledge of one of the most important and difficult
operations of war. The choice of stations is regulated by the
difference of the seasons: in the summer, the Tartars advance
towards the North, and pitch their tents on the banks of a river,
or, at least, in the neighborhood of a running stream. But in the
winter, they return to the South, and shelter their camp, behind
some convenient eminence, against the winds, which are chilled in
their passage over the bleak and icy regions of Siberia. These
manners are admirably adapted to diffuse, among the wandering
tribes, the spirit of emigration and conquest. The connection
between the people and their territory is of so frail a texture,
that it may be broken by the slightest accident. The camp, and
not the soil, is the native country of the genuine Tartar. Within
the precincts of that camp, his family, his companions, his
property, are always included; and, in the most distant marches,
he is still surrounded by the objects which are dear, or
valuable, or familiar in his eyes. The thirst of rapine, the
fear, or the resentment of injury, the impatience of servitude,
have, in every age, been sufficient causes to urge the tribes of
Scythia boldly to advance into some unknown countries, where they
might hope to find a more plentiful subsistence or a less
formidable enemy. The revolutions of the North have frequently
determined the fate of the South; and in the conflict of hostile
nations, the victor and the vanquished have alternately drove,
and been driven, from the confines of China to those of Germany.
These great emigrations, which have been sometimes executed with
almost incredible diligence, were rendered more easy by the
peculiar nature of the climate. It is well known that the cold of
Tartary is much more severe than in the midst of the temperate
zone might reasonably be expected; this uncommon rigor is
attributed to the height of the plains, which rise, especially
towards the East, more than half a mile above the level of the
sea; and to the quantity of saltpetre with which the soil is
deeply impregnated. In the winter season, the broad and rapid
rivers, that discharge their waters into the Euxine, the Caspian,
or the Icy Sea, are strongly frozen; the fields are covered with
a bed of snow; and the fugitive, or victorious, tribes may
securely traverse, with their families, their wagons, and their
cattle, the smooth and hard surface of an immense plain.<br>
</p>

<p>III. The pastoral life, compared with the labors of
agriculture and manufactures, is undoubtedly a life of idleness;
and as the most honorable shepherds of the Tartar race devolve on
their captives the domestic management of the cattle, their own
leisure is seldom disturbed by any servile and assiduous cares.
But this leisure, instead of being devoted to the soft enjoyments
of love and harmony, is use fully spent in the violent and
sanguinary exercise of the chase. The plains of Tartary are
filled with a strong and serviceable breed of horses, which are
easily trained for the purposes of war and hunting. The Scythians
of every age have been celebrated as bold and skilful riders; and
constant practice had seated them so firmly on horseback, that
they were supposed by strangers to perform the ordinary duties of
civil life, to eat, to drink, and even to sleep, without
dismounting from their steeds. They excel in the dexterous
management of the lance; the long Tartar bow is drawn with a
nervous arm; and the weighty arrow is directed to its object with
unerring aim and irresistible force. These arrows are often
pointed against the harmless animals of the desert, which
increase and multiply in the absence of their most formidable
enemy; the hare, the goat, the roebuck, the fallow-deer, the
stag, the elk, and the antelope. The vigor and patience, both of
the men and horses, are continually exercised by the fatigues of
the chase; and the plentiful supply of game contributes to the
subsistence, and even luxury, of a Tartar camp. But the exploits
of the hunters of Scythia are not confined to the destruction of
timid or innoxious beasts; they boldly encounter the angry wild
boar, when he turns against his pursuers, excite the sluggish
courage of the bear, and provoke the fury of the tiger, as he
slumbers in the thicket. Where there is danger, there may be
glory; and the mode of hunting, which opens the fairest field to
the exertions of valor, may justly be considered as the image,
and as the school, of war. The general hunting matches, the pride
and delight of the Tartar princes, compose an instructive
exercise for their numerous cavalry. A circle is drawn, of many
miles in circumference, to encompass the game of an extensive
district; and the troops that form the circle regularly advance
towards a common centre; where the captive animals, surrounded on
every side, are abandoned to the darts of the hunters. In this
march, which frequently continues many days, the cavalry are
obliged to climb the hills, to swim the rivers, and to wind
through the valleys, without interrupting the prescribed order of
their gradual progress. They acquire the habit of directing their
eye, and their steps, to a remote object; of preserving their
intervals of suspending or accelerating their pace, according to
the motions of the troops on their right and left; and of
watching and repeating the signals of their leaders. Their
leaders study, in this practical school, the most important
lesson of the military art; the prompt and accurate judgment of
ground, of distance, and of time. To employ against a human enemy
the same patience and valor, the same skill and discipline, is
the only alteration which is required in real war; and the
amusements of the chase serve as a prelude to the conquest of an
empire.<br>
</p>

<p>The political society of the ancient Germans has the
appearance of a voluntary alliance of independent warriors. The
tribes of Scythia, distinguished by the modern appellation of
<strong><em>Hords</em></strong>, assume the form of a numerous
and increasing family; which, in the course of successive
generations, has been propagated from the same original stock.
The meanest, and most ignorant, of the Tartars, preserve, with
conscious pride, the inestimable treasure of their genealogy; and
whatever distinctions of rank may have been introduced, by the
unequal distribution of pastoral wealth, they mutually respect
themselves, and each other, as the descendants of the first
founder of the tribe. The custom, which still prevails, of
adopting the bravest and most faithful of the captives, may
countenance the very probable suspicion, that this extensive
consanguinity is, in a great measure, legal and fictitious. But
the useful prejudice, which has obtained the sanction of time and
opinion, produces the effects of truth; the haughty Barbarians
yield a cheerful and voluntary obedience to the head of their
blood; and their chief, or <strong><em>mursa</em></strong>, as
the representative of their great father, exercises the authority
of a judge in peace, and of a leader in war. In the original
state of the pastoral world, each of the
<strong><em>mursas</em></strong> (if we may continue to use a
modern appellation) acted as the independent chief of a large and
separate family; and the limits of their peculiar territories
were gradually fixed by superior force, or mutual consent. But
the constant operation of various and permanent causes
contributed to unite the vagrant Hords into national communities,
under the command of a supreme head. The weak were desirous of
support, and the strong were ambitious of dominion; the power,
which is the result of union, oppressed and collected the divided
force of the adjacent tribes; and, as the vanquished were freely
admitted to share the advantages of victory, the most valiant
chiefs hastened to range themselves and their followers under the
formidable standard of a confederate nation. The most successful
of the Tartar princes assumed the military command, to which he
was entitled by the superiority, either of merit or of power. He
was raised to the throne by the acclamations of his equals; and
the title of <strong><em>Khan</em></strong> expresses, in the
language of the North of Asia, the full extent of the regal
dignity. The right of hereditary succession was long confined to
the blood of the founder of the monarchy; and at this moment all
the Khans, who reign from Crimea to the wall of China, are the
lineal descendants of the renowned Zingis. But, as it is the
indispensable duty of a Tartar sovereign to lead his warlike
subjects into the field, the claims of an infant are often
disregarded; and some royal kinsman, distinguished by his age and
valor, is intrusted with the sword and sceptre of his
predecessor. Two distinct and regular taxes are levied on the
tribes, to support the dignity of the national monarch, and of
their peculiar chief; and each of those contributions amounts to
the tithe, both of their property, and of their spoil. A Tartar
sovereign enjoys the tenth part of the wealth of his people; and
as his own domestic riches of flocks and herds increase in a much
larger proportion, he is able plentifully to maintain the rustic
splendor of his court, to reward the most deserving, or the most
favored of his followers, and to obtain, from the gentle
influence of corruption, the obedience which might be sometimes
refused to the stern mandates of authority. The manners of his
subjects, accustomed, like himself, to blood and rapine, might
excuse, in their eyes, such partial acts of tyranny, as would
excite the horror of a civilized people; but the power of a
despot has never been acknowledged in the deserts of Scythia. The
immediate jurisdiction of the khan is confined within the limits
of his own tribe; and the exercise of his royal prerogative has
been moderated by the ancient institution of a national council.
The Coroultai, or Diet, of the Tartars, was regularly held in the
spring and autumn, in the midst of a plain; where the princes of
the reigning family, and the mursas of the respective tribes, may
conveniently assemble on horseback, with their martial and
numerous trains; and the ambitious monarch, who reviewed the
strength, must consult the inclination of an armed people. The
rudiments of a feudal government may be discovered in the
constitution of the Scythian or Tartar nations; but the perpetual
conflict of those hostile nations has sometimes terminated in the
establishment of a powerful and despotic empire. The victor,
enriched by the tribute, and fortified by the arms of dependent
kings, has spread his conquests over Europe or Asia: the
successful shepherds of the North have submitted to the
confinement of arts, of laws, and of cities; and the introduction
of luxury, after destroying the freedom of the people, has
undermined the foundations of the throne.<br>
</p>

<p>The memory of past events cannot long be preserved in the
frequent and remote emigrations of illiterate Barbarians. The
modern Tartars are ignorant of the conquests of their ancestors;
and our knowledge of the history of the Scythians is derived from
their intercourse with the learned and civilized nations of the
South, the Greeks, the Persians, and the Chinese. The Greeks, who
navigated the Euxine, and planted their colonies along the
sea-coast, made the gradual and imperfect discovery of Scythia;
from the Danube, and the confines of Thrace, as far as the frozen
M&aelig;otis, the seat of eternal winter, and Mount Caucasus,
which, in the language of poetry, was described as the utmost
boundary of the earth. They celebrated, with simple credulity,
the virtues of the pastoral life: they entertained a more
rational apprehension of the strength and numbers of the warlike
Barbarians, who contemptuously baffled the immense armament of
Darius, the son of Hystaspes. The Persian monarchs had extended
their western conquests to the banks of the Danube, and the
limits of European Scythia. The eastern provinces of their empire
were exposed to the Scythians of Asia; the wild inhabitants of
the plains beyond the Oxus and the Jaxartes, two mighty rivers,
which direct their course towards the Caspian Sea. The long and
memorable quarrel of Iran and Touran is still the theme of
history or romance: the famous, perhaps the fabulous, valor of
the Persian heroes, Rustan and Asfendiar, was signalized, in the
defence of their country, against the Afrasiabs of the North; and
the invincible spirit of the same Barbarians resisted, on the
same ground, the victorious arms of Cyrus and Alexander. In the
eyes of the Greeks and Persians, the real geography of Scythia
was bounded, on the East, by the mountains of Imaus, or Caf; and
their distant prospect of the extreme and inaccessible parts of
Asia was clouded by ignorance, or perplexed by fiction. But those
inaccessible regions are the ancient residence of a powerful and
civilized nation, which ascends, by a probable tradition, above
forty centuries; and which is able to verify a series of near two
thousand years, by the perpetual testimony of accurate and
contemporary historians. The annals of China illustrate the state
and revolutions of the pastoral tribes, which may still be
distinguished by the vague appellation of Scythians, or Tartars;
the vassals, the enemies, and sometimes the conquerors, of a
great empire; whose policy has uniformly opposed the blind and
impetuous valor of the Barbarians of the North. From the mouth of
the Danube to the Sea of Japan, the whole longitude of Scythia is
about one hundred and ten degrees, which, in that parallel, are
equal to more than five thousand miles. The latitude of these
extensive deserts cannot be so easily, or so accurately,
measured; but, from the fortieth degree, which touches the wall
of China, we may securely advance above a thousand miles to the
northward, till our progress is stopped by the excessive cold of
Siberia. In that dreary climate, instead of the animated picture
of a Tartar camp, the smoke that issues from the earth, or rather
from the snow, betrays the subterraneous dwellings of the
Tongouses, and the Samoides: the want of horses and oxen is
imperfectly supplied by the use of reindeer, and of large dogs;
and the conquerors of the earth insensibly degenerate into a race
of deformed and diminutive savages, who tremble at the sound of
arms.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XXVI: Progress of The Huns. -- Part
II.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>The Huns, who under the reign of Valens threatened the empire
of Rome, had been formidable, in a much earlier period, to the
empire of China. Their ancient, perhaps their original, seat was
an extensive, though dry and barren, tract of country,
immediately on the north side of the great wall. Their place is
at present occupied by the forty-nine Hords or Banners of the
Mongous, a pastoral nation, which consists of about two hundred
thousand families. But the valor of the Huns had extended the
narrow limits of their dominions; and their rustic chiefs, who
assumed the appellation of <strong><em>Tanjou</em></strong>,
gradually became the conquerors, and the sovereigns of a
formidable empire. Towards the East, their victorious arms were
stopped only by the ocean; and the tribes, which are thinly
scattered between the Amoor and the extreme peninsula of Corea,
adhered, with reluctance, to the standard of the Huns. On the
West, near the head of the Irtish, in the valleys of Imaus, they
found a more ample space, and more numerous enemies. One of the
lieutenants of the Tanjou subdued, in a single expedition,
twenty-six nations; the Igours, distinguished above the Tartar
race by the use of letters, were in the number of his vassals;
and, by the strange connection of human events, the flight of one
of those vagrant tribes recalled the victorious Parthians from
the invasion of Syria. On the side of the North, the ocean was
assigned as the limit of the power of the Huns. Without enemies
to resist their progress, or witnesses to contradict their
vanity, they might securely achieve a real, or imaginary,
conquest of the frozen regions of Siberia. The
<strong><em>Northern Sea</em></strong> was fixed as the remote
boundary of their empire. But the name of that sea, on whose
shores the patriot Sovou embraced the life of a shepherd and an
exile, may be transferred, with much more probability, to the
Baikal, a capacious basin, above three hundred miles in length,
which disdains the modest appellation of a lake and which
actually communicates with the seas of the North, by the long
course of the Angara, the Tongusha, and the Jenissea. The
submission of so many distant nations might flatter the pride of
the Tanjou; but the valor of the Huns could be rewarded only by
the enjoyment of the wealth and luxury of the empire of the
South. In the third century before the Christian &aelig;ra, a
wall of fifteen hundred miles in length was constructed, to
defend the frontiers of China against the inroads of the Huns;
but this stupendous work, which holds a conspicuous place in the
map of the world, has never contributed to the safety of an
unwarlike people. The cavalry of the Tanjou frequently consisted
of two or three hundred thousand men, formidable by the matchless
dexterity with which they managed their bows and their horses: by
their hardy patience in supporting the inclemency of the weather;
and by the incredible speed of their march, which was seldom
checked by torrents, or precipices, by the deepest rivers, or by
the most lofty mountains. They spread themselves at once over the
face of the country; and their rapid impetuosity surprised,
astonished, and disconcerted the grave and elaborate tactics of a
Chinese army. The emperor Kaoti, a soldier of fortune, whose
personal merit had raised him to the throne, marched against the
Huns with those veteran troops which had been trained in the
civil wars of China. But he was soon surrounded by the
Barbarians; and, after a siege of seven days, the monarch,
hopeless of relief, was reduced to purchase his deliverance by an
ignominious capitulation. The successors of Kaoti, whose lives
were dedicated to the arts of peace, or the luxury of the palace,
submitted to a more permanent disgrace. They too hastily
confessed the insufficiency of arms and fortifications. They were
too easily convinced, that while the blazing signals announced on
every side the approach of the Huns, the Chinese troops, who
slept with the helmet on their head, and the cuirass on their
back, were destroyed by the incessant labor of ineffectual
marches. A regular payment of money, and silk, was stipulated as
the condition of a temporary and precarious peace; and the
wretched expedient of disguising a real tribute, under the names
of a gift or subsidy, was practised by the emperors of China as
well as by those of Rome. But there still remained a more
disgraceful article of tribute, which violated the sacred
feelings of humanity and nature. The hardships of the savage
life, which destroy in their infancy the children who are born
with a less healthy and robust constitution, introduced a
remarkable disproportion between the numbers of the two sexes.
The Tartars are an ugly and even deformed race; and while they
consider their own women as the instruments of domestic labor,
their desires, or rather their appetites, are directed to the
enjoyment of more elegant beauty. A select band of the fairest
maidens of China was annually devoted to the rude embraces of the
Huns; and the alliance of the haughty Tanjous was secured by
their marriage with the genuine, or adopted, daughters of the
Imperial family, which vainly attempted to escape the
sacrilegious pollution. The situation of these unhappy victims is
described in the verses of a Chinese princess, who laments that
she had been condemned by her parents to a distant exile, under a
Barbarian husband; who complains that sour milk was her only
drink, raw flesh her only food, a tent her only palace; and who
expresses, in a strain of pathetic simplicity, the natural wish,
that she were transformed into a bird, to fly back to her dear
country; the object of her tender and perpetual regret.<br>
</p>

<p>The conquest of China has been twice achieved by the pastoral
tribes of the North: the forces of the Huns were not inferior to
those of the Moguls, or of the Mantcheoux; and their ambition
might entertain the most sanguine hopes of success. But their
pride was humbled, and their progress was checked, by the arms
and policy of Vouti, the fifth emperor of the powerful dynasty of
the Han. In his long reign of fifty-four years, the Barbarians of
the southern provinces submitted to the laws and manners of
China; and the ancient limits of the monarchy were enlarged, from
the great river of Kiang, to the port of Canton. Instead of
confining himself to the timid operations of a defensive war, his
lieutenants penetrated many hundred miles into the country of the
Huns. In those boundless deserts, where it is impossible to form
magazines, and difficult to transport a sufficient supply of
provisions, the armies of Vouti were repeatedly exposed to
intolerable hardships: and, of one hundred and forty thousand
soldiers, who marched against the Barbarians, thirty thousand
only returned in safety to the feet of their master. These
losses, however, were compensated by splendid and decisive
success. The Chinese generals improved the superiority which they
derived from the temper of their arms, their chariots of war, and
the service of their Tartar auxiliaries. The camp of the Tanjou
was surprised in the midst of sleep and intemperance; and, though
the monarch of the Huns bravely cut his way through the ranks of
the enemy, he left above fifteen thousand of his subjects on the
field of battle. Yet this signal victory, which was preceded and
followed by many bloody engagements, contributed much less to the
destruction of the power of the Huns than the effectual policy
which was employed to detach the tributary nations from their
obedience. Intimidated by the arms, or allured by the promises,
of Vouti and his successors, the most considerable tribes, both
of the East and of the West, disclaimed the authority of the
Tanjou. While some acknowledged themselves the allies or vassals
of the empire, they all became the implacable enemies of the
Huns; and the numbers of that haughty people, as soon as they
were reduced to their native strength, might, perhaps, have been
contained within the walls of one of the great and populous
cities of China. The desertion of his subjects, and the
perplexity of a civil war, at length compelled the Tanjou himself
to renounce the dignity of an independent sovereign, and the
freedom of a warlike and high-spirited nation. He was received at
Sigan, the capital of the monarchy, by the troops, the mandarins,
and the emperor himself, with all the honors that could adorn and
disguise the triumph of Chinese vanity. A magnificent palace was
prepared for his reception; his place was assigned above all the
princes of the royal family; and the patience of the Barbarian
king was exhausted by the ceremonies of a banquet, which
consisted of eight courses of meat, and of nine solemn pieces of
music. But he performed, on his knees, the duty of a respectful
homage to the emperor of China; pronounced, in his own name, and
in the name of his successors, a perpetual oath of fidelity; and
gratefully accepted a seal, which was bestowed as the emblem of
his regal dependence. After this humiliating submission, the
Tanjous sometimes departed from their allegiance and seized the
favorable moments of war and rapine; but the monarchy of the Huns
gradually declined, till it was broken, by civil dissension, into
two hostile and separate kingdoms. One of the princes of the
nation was urged, by fear and ambition, to retire towards the
South with eight hords, which composed between forty and fifty
thousand families. He obtained, with the title of Tanjou, a
convenient territory on the verge of the Chinese provinces; and
his constant attachment to the service of the empire was secured
by weakness, and the desire of revenge. From the time of this
fatal schism, the Huns of the North continued to languish about
fifty years; till they were oppressed on every side by their
foreign and domestic enemies. The proud inscription of a column,
erected on a lofty mountain, announced to posterity, that a
Chinese army had marched seven hundred miles into the heart of
their country. The Sienpi, a tribe of Oriental Tartars,
retaliated the injuries which they had formerly sustained; and
the power of the Tanjous, after a reign of thirteen hundred
years, was utterly destroyed before the end of the first century
of the Christian &aelig;ra.<br>
</p>

<p>The fate of the vanquished Huns was diversified by the various
influence of character and situation. Above one hundred thousand
persons, the poorest, indeed, and the most pusillanimous of the
people, were contented to remain in their native country, to
renounce their peculiar name and origin, and to mingle with the
victorious nation of the Sienpi. Fifty-eight hords, about two
hundred thousand men, ambitious of a more honorable servitude,
retired towards the South; implored the protection of the
emperors of China; and were permitted to inhabit, and to guard,
the extreme frontiers of the province of Chansi and the territory
of Ortous. But the most warlike and powerful tribes of the Huns
maintained, in their adverse fortune, the undaunted spirit of
their ancestors. The Western world was open to their valor; and
they resolved, under the conduct of their hereditary chieftains,
to conquer and subdue some remote country, which was still
inaccessible to the arms of the Sienpi, and to the laws of China.
The course of their emigration soon carried them beyond the
mountains of Imaus, and the limits of the Chinese geography; but
we are able to distinguish the two great divisions of these
formidable exiles, which directed their march towards the Oxus,
and towards the Volga. The first of these colonies established
their dominion in the fruitful and extensive plains of Sogdiana,
on the eastern side of the Caspian; where they preserved the name
of Huns, with the epithet of Euthalites, or Nepthalites. * Their
manners were softened, and even their features were insensibly
improved, by the mildness of the climate, and their long
residence in a flourishing province, which might still retain a
faint impression of the arts of Greece. The
<strong><em>white</em></strong>Huns, a name which they derived
from the change of their complexions, soon abandoned the pastoral
life of Scythia. Gorgo, which, under the appellation of Carizme,
has since enjoyed a temporary splendor, was the residence of the
king, who exercised a legal authority over an obedient people.
Their luxury was maintained by the labor of the Sogdians; and the
only vestige of their ancient barbarism, was the custom which
obliged all the companions, perhaps to the number of twenty, who
had shared the liberality of a wealthy lord, to be buried alive
in the same grave. The vicinity of the Huns to the provinces of
Persia, involved them in frequent and bloody contests with the
power of that monarchy. But they respected, in peace, the faith
of treaties; in war, she dictates of humanity; and their
memorable victory over Peroses, or Firuz, displayed the
moderation, as well as the valor, of the Barbarians. The
<strong><em>second</em></strong> division of their countrymen,
the Huns, who gradually advanced towards the North-west, were
exercised by the hardships of a colder climate, and a more
laborious march. Necessity compelled them to exchange the silks
of China for the furs of Siberia; the imperfect rudiments of
civilized life were obliterated; and the native fierceness of the
Huns was exasperated by their intercourse with the savage tribes,
who were compared, with some propriety, to the wild beasts of the
desert. Their independent spirit soon rejected the hereditary
succession of the Tanjous; and while each horde was governed by
its peculiar mursa, their tumultuary council directed the public
measures of the whole nation. As late as the thirteenth century,
their transient residence on the eastern banks of the Volga was
attested by the name of Great Hungary. In the winter, they
descended with their flocks and herds towards the mouth of that
mighty river; and their summer excursions reached as high as the
latitude of Saratoff, or perhaps the conflux of the Kama. Such at
least were the recent limits of the black Calmucks, who remained
about a century under the protection of Russia; and who have
since returned to their native seats on the frontiers of the
Chinese empire. The march, and the return, of those wandering
Tartars, whose united camp consists of fifty thousand tents or
families, illustrate the distant emigrations of the ancient
Huns.<br>
</p>

<p>It is impossible to fill the dark interval of time, which
elapsed, after the Huns of the Volga were lost in the eyes of the
Chinese, and before they showed themselves to those of the
Romans. There is some reason, however, to apprehend, that the
same force which had driven them from their native seats, still
continued to impel their march towards the frontiers of Europe.
The power of the Sienpi, their implacable enemies, which extended
above three thousand miles from East to West, must have gradually
oppressed them by the weight and terror of a formidable
neighborhood; and the flight of the tribes of Scythia would
inevitably tend to increase the strength or to contract the
territories, of the Huns. The harsh and obscure appellations of
those tribes would offend the ear, without informing the
understanding, of the reader; but I cannot suppress the very
natural suspicion, <strong><em>that</em></strong> the Huns of the
North derived a considerable reenforcement from the ruin of the
dynasty of the South, which, in the course of the third century,
submitted to the dominion of China;
<strong><em>that</em></strong> the bravest warriors marched away
in search of their free and adventurous countrymen;
<strong><em>and</em></strong> that, as they had been divided by
prosperity, they were easily reunited by the common hardships of
their adverse fortune. The Huns, with their flocks and herds,
their wives and children, their dependents and allies, were
transported to the west of the Volga, and they boldly advanced to
invade the country of the Alani, a pastoral people, who occupied,
or wasted, an extensive tract of the deserts of Scythia. The
plains between the Volga and the Tanais were covered with the
tents of the Alani, but their name and manners were diffused over
the wide extent of their conquests; and the painted tribes of the
Agathyrsi and Geloni were confounded among their vassals. Towards
the North, they penetrated into the frozen regions of Siberia,
among the savages who were accustomed, in their rage or hunger,
to the taste of human flesh; and their Southern inroads were
pushed as far as the confines of Persia and India. The mixture of
Somatic and German blood had contributed to improve the features
of the Alani, * to whiten their swarthy complexions, and to tinge
their hair with a yellowish cast, which is seldom found in the
Tartar race. They were less deformed in their persons, less
brutish in their manners, than the Huns; but they did not yield
to those formidable Barbarians in their martial and independent
spirit; in the love of freedom, which rejected even the use of
domestic slaves; and in the love of arms, which considered war
and rapine as the pleasure and the glory of mankind. A naked
cimeter, fixed in the ground, was the only object of their
religious worship; the scalps of their enemies formed the costly
trappings of their horses; and they viewed, with pity and
contempt, the pusillanimous warriors, who patiently expected the
infirmities of age, and the tortures of lingering disease. On the
banks of the Tanais, the military power of the Huns and the Alani
encountered each other with equal valor, but with unequal
success. The Huns prevailed in the bloody contest; the king of
the Alani was slain; and the remains of the vanquished nation
were dispersed by the ordinary alternative of flight or
submission. A colony of exiles found a secure refuge in the
mountains of Caucasus, between the Euxine and the Caspian, where
they still preserve their name and their independence. Another
colony advanced, with more intrepid courage, towards the shores
of the Baltic; associated themselves with the Northern tribes of
Germany; and shared the spoil of the Roman provinces of Gaul and
Spain. But the greatest part of the nation of the Alani embraced
the offers of an honorable and advantageous union; and the Huns,
who esteemed the valor of their less fortunate enemies,
proceeded, with an increase of numbers and confidence, to invade
the limits of the Gothic empire.<br>
</p>

<p>The great Hermanric, whose dominions extended from the Baltic
to the Euxine, enjoyed, in the full maturity of age and
reputation, the fruit of his victories, when he was alarmed by
the formidable approach of a host of unknown enemies, on whom his
barbarous subjects might, without injustice, bestow the epithet
of Barbarians. The numbers, the strength, the rapid motions, and
the implacable cruelty of the Huns, were felt, and dreaded, and
magnified, by the astonished Goths; who beheld their fields and
villages consumed with flames, and deluged with indiscriminate
slaughter. To these real terrors they added the surprise and
abhorrence which were excited by the shrill voice, the uncouth
gestures, and the strange deformity of the Huns. * These savages
of Scythia were compared (and the picture had some resemblance)
to the animals who walk very awkwardly on two legs and to the
misshapen figures, the Termini, which were often placed on the
bridges of antiquity. They were distinguished from the rest of
the human species by their broad shoulders, flat noses, and small
black eyes, deeply buried in the head; and as they were almost
destitute of beards, they never enjoyed either the manly grace of
youth, or the venerable aspect of age. A fabulous origin was
assigned, worthy of their form and manners; that the witches of
Scythia, who, for their foul and deadly practices, had been
driven from society, had copulated in the desert with infernal
spirits; and that the Huns were the offspring of this execrable
conjunction. The tale, so full of horror and absurdity, was
greedily embraced by the credulous hatred of the Goths; but,
while it gratified their hatred, it increased their fear, since
the posterity of d&aelig;mons and witches might be supposed to
inherit some share of the pr&aelig;ternatural powers, as well as
of the malignant temper, of their parents. Against these enemies,
Hermanric prepared to exert the united forces of the Gothic
state; but he soon discovered that his vassal tribes, provoked by
oppression, were much more inclined to second, than to repel, the
invasion of the Huns. One of the chiefs of the Roxolani had
formerly deserted the standard of Hermanric, and the cruel tyrant
had condemned the innocent wife of the traitor to be torn asunder
by wild horses. The brothers of that unfortunate woman seized the
favorable moment of revenge. The aged king of the Goths
languished some time after the dangerous wound which he received
from their daggers; but the conduct of the war was retarded by
his infirmities; and the public councils of the nation were
distracted by a spirit of jealousy and discord. His death, which
has been imputed to his own despair, left the reins of government
in the hands of Withimer, who, with the doubtful aid of some
Scythian mercenaries, maintained the unequal contest against the
arms of the Huns and the Alani, till he was defeated and slain in
a decisive battle. The Ostrogoths submitted to their fate; and
the royal race of the Amali will hereafter be found among the
subjects of the haughty Attila. But the person of Witheric, the
infant king, was saved by the diligence of Alatheus and Saphrax;
two warriors of approved valor and fidelity, who, by cautious
marches, conducted the independent remains of the nation of the
Ostrogoths towards the Danastus, or Niester; a considerable
river, which now separates the Turkish dominions from the empire
of Russia. On the banks of the Niester, the prudent Athanaric,
more attentive to his own than to the general safety, had fixed
the camp of the Visigoths; with the firm resolution of opposing
the victorious Barbarians, whom he thought it less advisable to
provoke. The ordinary speed of the Huns was checked by the weight
of baggage, and the encumbrance of captives; but their military
skill deceived, and almost destroyed, the army of Athanaric.
While the Judge of the Visigoths defended the banks of the
Niester, he was encompassed and attacked by a numerous detachment
of cavalry, who, by the light of the moon, had passed the river
in a fordable place; and it was not without the utmost efforts of
courage and conduct, that he was able to effect his retreat
towards the hilly country. The undaunted general had already
formed a new and judicious plan of defensive war; and the strong
lines, which he was preparing to construct between the mountains,
the Pruth, and the Danube, would have secured the extensive and
fertile territory that bears the modern name of Walachia, from
the destructive inroads of the Huns. But the hopes and measures
of the Judge of the Visigoths was soon disappointed, by the
trembling impatience of his dismayed countrymen; who were
persuaded by their fears, that the interposition of the Danube
was the only barrier that could save them from the rapid pursuit,
and invincible valor, of the Barbarians of Scythia. Under the
command of Fritigern and Alavivus, the body of the nation hastily
advanced to the banks of the great river, and implored the
protection of the Roman emperor of the East. Athanaric himself,
still anxious to avoid the guilt of perjury, retired, with a band
of faithful followers, into the mountainous country of Caucaland;
which appears to have been guarded, and almost concealed, by the
impenetrable forests of Transylvania. *<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XXVI: Progress of The Huns. -- Part
III.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>After Valens had terminated the Gothic war with some
appearance of glory and success, he made a progress through his
dominions of Asia, and at length fixed his residence in the
capital of Syria. The five years which he spent at Antioch was
employed to watch, from a secure distance, the hostile designs of
the Persian monarch; to check the depredations of the Saracens
and Isaurians; to enforce, by arguments more prevalent than those
of reason and eloquence, the belief of the Arian theology; and to
satisfy his anxious suspicions by the promiscuous execution of
the innocent and the guilty. But the attention of the emperor was
most seriously engaged, by the important intelligence which he
received from the civil and military officers who were intrusted
with the defence of the Danube. He was informed, that the North
was agitated by a furious tempest; that the irruption of the
Huns, an unknown and monstrous race of savages, had subverted the
power of the Goths; and that the suppliant multitudes of that
warlike nation, whose pride was now humbled in the dust, covered
a space of many miles along the banks of the river. With
outstretched arms, and pathetic lamentations, they loudly
deplored their past misfortunes and their present danger;
acknowledged that their only hope of safety was in the clemency
of the Roman government; and most solemnly protested, that if the
gracious liberality of the emperor would permit them to cultivate
the waste lands of Thrace, they should ever hold themselves
bound, by the strongest obligations of duty and gratitude, to
obey the laws, and to guard the limits, of the republic. These
assurances were confirmed by the ambassadors of the Goths, * who
impatiently expected from the mouth of Valens an answer that must
finally determine the fate of their unhappy countrymen. The
emperor of the East was no longer guided by the wisdom and
authority of his elder brother, whose death happened towards the
end of the preceding year; and as the distressful situation of
the Goths required an instant and peremptory decision, he was
deprived of the favorite resources of feeble and timid minds, who
consider the use of dilatory and ambiguous measures as the most
admirable efforts of consummate prudence. As long as the same
passions and interests subsist among mankind, the questions of
war and peace, of justice and policy, which were debated in the
councils of antiquity, will frequently present themselves as the
subject of modern deliberation. But the most experienced
statesman of Europe has never been summoned to consider the
propriety, or the danger, of admitting, or rejecting, an
innumerable multitude of Barbarians, who are driven by despair
and hunger to solicit a settlement on the territories of a
civilized nation. When that important proposition, so essentially
connected with the public safety, was referred to the ministers
of Valens, they were perplexed and divided; but they soon
acquiesced in the flattering sentiment which seemed the most
favorable to the pride, the indolence, and the avarice of their
sovereign. The slaves, who were decorated with the titles of
pr&aelig;fects and generals, dissembled or disregarded the
terrors of this national emigration; so extremely different from
the partial and accidental colonies, which had been received on
the extreme limits of the empire. But they applauded the
liberality of fortune, which had conducted, from the most distant
countries of the globe, a numerous and invincible army of
strangers, to defend the throne of Valens; who might now add to
the royal treasures the immense sums of gold supplied by the
provincials to compensate their annual proportion of recruits.
The prayers of the Goths were granted, and their service was
accepted by the Imperial court: and orders were immediately
despatched to the civil and military governors of the Thracian
diocese, to make the necessary preparations for the passage and
subsistence of a great people, till a proper and sufficient
territory could be allotted for their future residence. The
liberality of the emperor was accompanied, however, with two
harsh and rigorous conditions, which prudence might justify on
the side of the Romans; but which distress alone could extort
from the indignant Goths. Before they passed the Danube, they
were required to deliver their arms: and it was insisted, that
their children should be taken from them, and dispersed through
the provinces of Asia; where they might be civilized by the arts
of education, and serve as hostages to secure the fidelity of
their parents.<br>
</p>

<p>During the suspense of a doubtful and distant negotiation, the
impatient Goths made some rash attempts to pass the Danube,
without the permission of the government, whose protection they
had implored. Their motions were strictly observed by the
vigilance of the troops which were stationed along the river and
their foremost detachments were defeated with considerable
slaughter; yet such were the timid councils of the reign of
Valens, that the brave officers who had served their country in
the execution of their duty, were punished by the loss of their
employments, and narrowly escaped the loss of their heads. The
Imperial mandate was at length received for transporting over the
Danube the whole body of the Gothic nation; but the execution of
this order was a task of labor and difficulty. The stream of the
Danube, which in those parts is above a mile broad, had been
swelled by incessant rains; and in this tumultuous passage, many
were swept away, and drowned, by the rapid violence of the
current. A large fleet of vessels, of boats, and of canoes, was
provided; many days and nights they passed and repassed with
indefatigable toil; and the most strenuous diligence was exerted
by the officers of Valens, that not a single Barbarian, of those
who were reserved to subvert the foundations of Rome, should be
left on the opposite shore. It was thought expedient that an
accurate account should be taken of their numbers; but the
persons who were employed soon desisted, with amazement and
dismay, from the prosecution of the endless and impracticable
task: and the principal historian of the age most seriously
affirms, that the prodigious armies of Darius and Xerxes, which
had so long been considered as the fables of vain and credulous
antiquity, were now justified, in the eyes of mankind, by the
evidence of fact and experience. A probable testimony has fixed
the number of the Gothic warriors at two hundred thousand men:
and if we can venture to add the just proportion of women, of
children, and of slaves, the whole mass of people which composed
this formidable emigration, must have amounted to near a million
of persons, of both sexes, and of all ages. The children of the
Goths, those at least of a distinguished rank, were separated
from the multitude. They were conducted, without delay, to the
distant seats assigned for their residence and education; and as
the numerous train of hostages or captives passed through the
cities, their gay and splendid apparel, their robust and martial
figure, excited the surprise and envy of the Provincials. * But
the stipulation, the most offensive to the Goths, and the most
important to the Romans, was shamefully eluded. The Barbarians,
who considered their arms as the ensigns of honor and the pledges
of safety, were disposed to offer a price, which the lust or
avarice of the Imperial officers was easily tempted to accept. To
preserve their arms, the haughty warriors consented, with some
reluctance, to prostitute their wives or their daughters; the
charms of a beauteous maid, or a comely boy, secured the
connivance of the inspectors; who sometimes cast an eye of
covetousness on the fringed carpets and linen garments of their
new allies, or who sacrificed their duty to the mean
consideration of filling their farms with cattle, and their
houses with slaves. The Goths, with arms in their hands, were
permitted to enter the boats; and when their strength was
collected on the other side of the river, the immense camp which
was spread over the plains and the hills of the Lower
M&aelig;sia, assumed a threatening and even hostile aspect. The
leaders of the Ostrogoths, Alatheus and Saphrax, the guardians of
their infant king, appeared soon afterwards on the Northern banks
of the Danube; and immediately despatched their ambassadors to
the court of Antioch, to solicit, with the same professions of
allegiance and gratitude, the same favor which had been granted
to the suppliant Visigoths. The absolute refusal of Valens
suspended their progress, and discovered the repentance, the
suspicions, and the fears, of the Imperial council.<br>
</p>

<p>An undisciplined and unsettled nation of Barbarians required
the firmest temper, and the most dexterous management. The daily
subsistence of near a million of extraordinary subjects could be
supplied only by constant and skilful diligence, and might
continually be interrupted by mistake or accident. The insolence,
or the indignation, of the Goths, if they conceived themselves to
be the objects either of fear or of contempt, might urge them to
the most desperate extremities; and the fortune of the state
seemed to depend on the prudence, as well as the integrity, of
the generals of Valens. At this important crisis, the military
government of Thrace was exercised by Lupicinus and Maximus, in
whose venal minds the slightest hope of private emolument
outweighed every consideration of public advantage; and whose
guilt was only alleviated by their incapacity of discerning the
pernicious effects of their rash and criminal administration.
Instead of obeying the orders of their sovereign, and satisfying,
with decent liberality, the demands of the Goths, they levied an
ungenerous and oppressive tax on the wants of the hungry
Barbarians. The vilest food was sold at an extravagant price;
and, in the room of wholesome and substantial provisions, the
markets were filled with the flesh of dogs, and of unclean
animals, who had died of disease. To obtain the valuable
acquisition of a pound of bread, the Goths resigned the
possession of an expensive, though serviceable, slave; and a
small quantity of meat was greedily purchased with ten pounds of
a precious, but useless metal, when their property was exhausted,
they continued this necessary traffic by the sale of their sons
and daughters; and notwithstanding the love of freedom, which
animated every Gothic breast, they submitted to the humiliating
maxim, that it was better for their children to be maintained in
a servile condition, than to perish in a state of wretched and
helpless independence. The most lively resentment is excited by
the tyranny of pretended benefactors, who sternly exact the debt
of gratitude which they have cancelled by subsequent injuries: a
spirit of discontent insensibly arose in the camp of the
Barbarians, who pleaded, without success, the merit of their
patient and dutiful behavior; and loudly complained of the
inhospitable treatment which they had received from their new
allies. They beheld around them the wealth and plenty of a
fertile province, in the midst of which they suffered the
intolerable hardships of artificial famine. But the means of
relief, and even of revenge, were in their hands; since the
rapaciousness of their tyrants had left to an injured people the
possession and the use of arms. The clamors of a multitude,
untaught to disguise their sentiments, announced the first
symptoms of resistance, and alarmed the timid and guilty minds of
Lupicinus and Maximus. Those crafty ministers, who substituted
the cunning of temporary expedients to the wise and salutary
counsels of general policy, attempted to remove the Goths from
their dangerous station on the frontiers of the empire; and to
disperse them, in separate quarters of cantonment, through the
interior provinces. As they were conscious how ill they had
deserved the respect, or confidence, of the Barbarians, they
diligently collected, from every side, a military force, that
might urge the tardy and reluctant march of a people, who had not
yet renounced the title, or the duties, of Roman subjects. But
the generals of Valens, while their attention was solely directed
to the discontented Visigoths, imprudently disarmed the ships and
the fortifications which constituted the defence of the Danube.
The fatal oversight was observed, and improved, by Alatheus and
Saphrax, who anxiously watched the favorable moment of escaping
from the pursuit of the Huns. By the help of such rafts and
vessels as could be hastily procured, the leaders of the
Ostrogoths transported, without opposition, their king and their
army; and boldly fixed a hostile and independent camp on the
territories of the empire.<br>
</p>

<p>Under the name of Judges, Alavivus and Fritigern were the
leaders of the Visigoths in peace and war; and the authority
which they derived from their birth was ratified by the free
consent of the nation. In a season of tranquility, their power
might have been equal, as well as their rank; but, as soon as
their countrymen were exasperated by hunger and oppression, the
superior abilities of Fritigern assumed the military command,
which he was qualified to exercise for the public welfare. He
restrained the impatient spirit of the Visigoths till the
injuries and the insults of their tyrants should justify their
resistance in the opinion of mankind: but he was not disposed to
sacrifice any solid advantages for the empty praise of justice
and moderation. Sensible of the benefits which would result from
the union of the Gothic powers under the same standard, he
secretly cultivated the friendship of the Ostrogoths; and while
he professed an implicit obedience to the orders of the Roman
generals, he proceeded by slow marches towards Marcianopolis, the
capital of the Lower M&aelig;sia, about seventy miles from the
banks of the Danube. On that fatal spot, the flames of discord
and mutual hatred burst forth into a dreadful conflagration.
Lupicinus had invited the Gothic chiefs to a splendid
entertainment; and their martial train remained under arms at the
entrance of the palace. But the gates of the city were strictly
guarded, and the Barbarians were sternly excluded from the use of
a plentiful market, to which they asserted their equal claim of
subjects and allies. Their humble prayers were rejected with
insolence and derision; and as their patience was now exhausted,
the townsmen, the soldiers, and the Goths, were soon involved in
a conflict of passionate altercation and angry reproaches. A blow
was imprudently given; a sword was hastily drawn; and the first
blood that was spilt in this accidental quarrel, became the
signal of a long and destructive war. In the midst of noise and
brutal intemperance, Lupicinus was informed, by a secret
messenger, that many of his soldiers were slain, and despoiled of
their arms; and as he was already inflamed by wine, and oppressed
by sleep he issued a rash command, that their death should be
revenged by the massacre of the guards of Fritigern and Alavivus.
The clamorous shouts and dying groans apprised Fritigern of his
extreme danger; and, as he possessed the calm and intrepid spirit
of a hero, he saw that he was lost if he allowed a moment of
deliberation to the man who had so deeply injured him. "A
trifling dispute," said the Gothic leader, with a firm but gentle
tone of voice, "appears to have arisen between the two nations;
but it may be productive of the most dangerous consequences,
unless the tumult is immediately pacified by the assurance of our
safety, and the authority of our presence." At these words,
Fritigern and his companions drew their swords, opened their
passage through the unresisting crowd, which filled the palace,
the streets, and the gates, of Marcianopolis, and, mounting their
horses, hastily vanished from the eyes of the astonished Romans.
The generals of the Goths were saluted by the fierce and joyful
acclamations of the camp; war was instantly resolved, and the
resolution was executed without delay: the banners of the nation
were displayed according to the custom of their ancestors; and
the air resounded with the harsh and mournful music of the
Barbarian trumpet. The weak and guilty Lupicinus, who had dared
to provoke, who had neglected to destroy, and who still presumed
to despise, his formidable enemy, marched against the Goths, at
the head of such a military force as could be collected on this
sudden emergency. The Barbarians expected his approach about nine
miles from Marcianopolis; and on this occasion the talents of the
general were found to be of more prevailing efficacy than the
weapons and discipline of the troops. The valor of the Goths was
so ably directed by the genius of Fritigern, that they broke, by
a close and vigorous attack, the ranks of the Roman legions.
Lupicinus left his arms and standards, his tribunes and his
bravest soldiers, on the field of battle; and their useless
courage served only to protect the ignominious flight of their
leader. "That successful day put an end to the distress of the
Barbarians, and the security of the Romans: from that day, the
Goths, renouncing the precarious condition of strangers and
exiles, assumed the character of citizens and masters, claimed an
absolute dominion over the possessors of land, and held, in their
own right, the northern provinces of the empire, which are
bounded by the Danube." Such are the words of the Gothic
historian, who celebrates, with rude eloquence, the glory of his
countrymen. But the dominion of the Barbarians was exercised only
for the purposes of rapine and destruction. As they had been
deprived, by the ministers of the emperor, of the common benefits
of nature, and the fair intercourse of social life, they
retaliated the injustice on the subjects of the empire; and the
crimes of Lupicinus were expiated by the ruin of the peaceful
husbandmen of Thrace, the conflagration of their villages, and
the massacre, or captivity, of their innocent families. The
report of the Gothic victory was soon diffused over the adjacent
country; and while it filled the minds of the Romans with terror
and dismay, their own hasty imprudence contributed to increase
the forces of Fritigern, and the calamities of the province. Some
time before the great emigration, a numerous body of Goths, under
the command of Suerid and Colias, had been received into the
protection and service of the empire. They were encamped under
the walls of Hadrianople; but the ministers of Valens were
anxious to remove them beyond the Hellespont, at a distance from
the dangerous temptation which might so easily be communicated by
the neighborhood, and the success, of their countrymen. The
respectful submission with which they yielded to the order of
their march, might be considered as a proof of their fidelity;
and their moderate request of a sufficient allowance of
provisions, and of a delay of only two days was expressed in the
most dutiful terms. But the first magistrate of Hadrianople,
incensed by some disorders which had been committed at his
country-house, refused this indulgence; and arming against them
the inhabitants and manufacturers of a populous city, he urged,
with hostile threats, their instant departure. The Barbarians
stood silent and amazed, till they were exasperated by the
insulting clamors, and missile weapons, of the populace: but when
patience or contempt was fatigued, they crushed the undisciplined
multitude, inflicted many a shameful wound on the backs of their
flying enemies, and despoiled them of the splendid armor, which
they were unworthy to bear. The resemblance of their sufferings
and their actions soon united this victorious detachment to the
nation of the Visigoths; the troops of Colias and Suerid expected
the approach of the great Fritigern, ranged themselves under his
standard, and signalized their ardor in the siege of Hadrianople.
But the resistance of the garrison informed the Barbarians, that
in the attack of regular fortifications, the efforts of
unskillful courage are seldom effectual. Their general
acknowledged his error, raised the siege, declared that "he was
at peace with stone walls," and revenged his disappointment on
the adjacent country. He accepted, with pleasure, the useful
reenforcement of hardy workmen, who labored in the gold mines of
Thrace, for the emolument, and under the lash, of an unfeeling
master: and these new associates conducted the Barbarians,
through the secret paths, to the most sequestered places, which
had been chosen to secure the inhabitants, the cattle, and the
magazines of corn. With the assistance of such guides, nothing
could remain impervious or inaccessible; resistance was fatal;
flight was impracticable; and the patient submission of helpless
innocence seldom found mercy from the Barbarian conqueror. In the
course of these depredations, a great number of the children of
the Goths, who had been sold into captivity, were restored to the
embraces of their afflicted parents; but these tender interviews,
which might have revived and cherished in their minds some
sentiments of humanity, tended only to stimulate their native
fierceness by the desire of revenge. They listened, with eager
attention, to the complaints of their captive children, who had
suffered the most cruel indignities from the lustful or angry
passions of their masters, and the same cruelties, the same
indignities, were severely retaliated on the sons and daughters
of the Romans.<br>
</p>

<p>The imprudence of Valens and his ministers had introduced into
the heart of the empire a nation of enemies; but the Visigoths
might even yet have been reconciled, by the manly confession of
past errors, and the sincere performance of former engagements.
These healing and temperate measures seemed to concur with the
timorous disposition of the sovereign of the East: but, on this
occasion alone, Valens was brave; and his unseasonable bravery
was fatal to himself and to his subjects. He declared his
intention of marching from Antioch to Constantinople, to subdue
this dangerous rebellion; and, as he was not ignorant of the
difficulties of the enterprise, he solicited the assistance of
his nephew, the emperor Gratian, who commanded all the forces of
the West. The veteran troops were hastily recalled from the
defence of Armenia; that important frontier was abandoned to the
discretion of Sapor; and the immediate conduct of the Gothic war
was intrusted, during the absence of Valens, to his lieutenants
Trajan and Profuturus, two generals who indulged themselves in a
very false and favorable opinion of their own abilities. On their
arrival in Thrace, they were joined by Richomer, count of the
domestics; and the auxiliaries of the West, that marched under
his banner, were composed of the Gallic legions, reduced indeed,
by a spirit of desertion, to the vain appearances of strength and
numbers. In a council of war, which was influenced by pride,
rather than by reason, it was resolved to seek, and to encounter,
the Barbarians, who lay encamped in the spacious and fertile
meadows, near the most southern of the six mouths of the Danube.
Their camp was surrounded by the usual fortification of wagons;
and the Barbarians, secure within the vast circle of the
enclosure, enjoyed the fruits of their valor, and the spoils of
the province. In the midst of riotous intemperance, the watchful
Fritigern observed the motions, and penetrated the designs, of
the Romans. He perceived, that the numbers of the enemy were
continually increasing: and, as he understood their intention of
attacking his rear, as soon as the scarcity of forage should
oblige him to remove his camp, he recalled to their standard his
predatory detachments, which covered the adjacent country. As
soon as they descried the flaming beacons, they obeyed, with
incredible speed, the signal of their leader: the camp was filled
with the martial crowd of Barbarians; their impatient clamors
demanded the battle, and their tumultuous zeal was approved and
animated by the spirit of their chiefs. The evening was already
far advanced; and the two armies prepared themselves for the
approaching combat, which was deferred only till the dawn of day.
While the trumpets sounded to arms, the undaunted courage of the
Goths was confirmed by the mutual obligation of a solemn oath;
and as they advanced to meet the enemy, the rude songs, which
celebrated the glory of their forefathers, were mingled with
their fierce and dissonant outcries, and opposed to the
artificial harmony of the Roman shout. Some military skill was
displayed by Fritigern to gain the advantage of a commanding
eminence; but the bloody conflict, which began and ended with the
light, was maintained on either side, by the personal and
obstinate efforts of strength, valor, and agility. The legions of
Armenia supported their fame in arms; but they were oppressed by
the irresistible weight of the hostile multitude the left wing of
the Romans was thrown into disorder and the field was strewed
with their mangled carcasses. This partial defeat was balanced,
however, by partial success; and when the two armies, at a late
hour of the evening, retreated to their respective camps, neither
of them could claim the honors, or the effects, of a decisive
victory. The real loss was more severely felt by the Romans, in
proportion to the smallness of their numbers; but the Goths were
so deeply confounded and dismayed by this vigorous, and perhaps
unexpected, resistance, that they remained seven days within the
circle of their fortifications. Such funeral rites, as the
circumstances of time and place would admit, were piously
discharged to some officers of distinguished rank; but the
indiscriminate vulgar was left unburied on the plain. Their flesh
was greedily devoured by the birds of prey, who in that age
enjoyed very frequent and delicious feasts; and several years
afterwards the white and naked bones, which covered the wide
extent of the fields, presented to the eyes of Ammianus a
dreadful monument of the battle of Salices.<br>
</p>

<p>The progress of the Goths had been checked by the doubtful
event of that bloody day; and the Imperial generals, whose army
would have been consumed by the repetition of such a contest,
embraced the more rational plan of destroying the Barbarians by
the wants and pressure of their own multitudes. They prepared to
confine the Visigoths in the narrow angle of land between the
Danube, the desert of Scythia, and the mountains of H&aelig;mus,
till their strength and spirit should be insensibly wasted by the
inevitable operation of famine. The design was prosecuted with
some conduct and success: the Barbarians had almost exhausted
their own magazines, and the harvests of the country; and the
diligence of Saturninus, the master-general of the cavalry, was
employed to improve the strength, and to contract the extent, of
the Roman fortifications. His labors were interrupted by the
alarming intelligence, that new swarms of Barbarians had passed
the unguarded Danube, either to support the cause, or to imitate
the example, of Fritigern. The just apprehension, that he himself
might be surrounded, and overwhelmed, by the arms of hostile and
unknown nations, compelled Saturninus to relinquish the siege of
the Gothic camp; and the indignant Visigoths, breaking from their
confinement, satiated their hunger and revenge by the repeated
devastation of the fruitful country, which extends above three
hundred miles from the banks of the Danube to the straits of the
Hellespont. The sagacious Fritigern had successfully appealed to
the passions, as well as to the interest, of his Barbarian
allies; and the love of rapine, and the hatred of Rome, seconded,
or even prevented, the eloquence of his ambassadors. He cemented
a strict and useful alliance with the great body of his
countrymen, who obeyed Alatheus and Saphrax as the guardians of
their infant king: the long animosity of rival tribes was
suspended by the sense of their common interest; the independent
part of the nation was associated under one standard; and the
chiefs of the Ostrogoths appear to have yielded to the superior
genius of the general of the Visigoths. He obtained the
formidable aid of the Taifal&aelig;, * whose military renown was
disgraced and polluted by the public infamy of their domestic
manners. Every youth, on his entrance into the world, was united
by the ties of honorable friendship, and brutal love, to some
warrior of the tribe; nor could he hope to be released from this
unnatural connection, till he had approved his manhood by
slaying, in single combat, a huge bear, or a wild boar of the
forest. But the most powerful auxiliaries of the Goths were drawn
from the camp of those enemies who had expelled them from their
native seats. The loose subordination, and extensive possessions,
of the Huns and the Alani, delayed the conquests, and distracted
the councils, of that victorious people. Several of the hords
were allured by the liberal promises of Fritigern; and the rapid
cavalry of Scythia added weight and energy to the steady and
strenuous efforts of the Gothic infantry. The Sarmatians, who
could never forgive the successor of Valentinian, enjoyed and
increased the general confusion; and a seasonable irruption of
the Alemanni, into the provinces of Gaul, engaged the attention,
and diverted the forces, of the emperor of the West.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XXVI: Progress of The Huns. -- Part
IV.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>One of the most dangerous inconveniences of the introduction
of the Barbarians into the army and the palace, was sensibly felt
in their correspondence with their hostile countrymen; to whom
they imprudently, or maliciously, revealed the weakness of the
Roman empire. A soldier, of the lifeguards of Gratian, was of the
nation of the Alemanni, and of the tribe of the Lentienses, who
dwelt beyond the Lake of Constance. Some domestic business
obliged him to request a leave of absence. In a short visit to
his family and friends, he was exposed to their curious
inquiries: and the vanity of the loquacious soldier tempted him
to display his intimate acquaintance with the secrets of the
state, and the designs of his master. The intelligence, that
Gratian was preparing to lead the military force of Gaul, and of
the West, to the assistance of his uncle Valens, pointed out to
the restless spirit of the Alemanni the moment, and the mode, of
a successful invasion. The enterprise of some light detachments,
who, in the month of February, passed the Rhine upon the ice, was
the prelude of a more important war. The boldest hopes of rapine,
perhaps of conquest, outweighed the considerations of timid
prudence, or national faith. Every forest, and every village,
poured forth a band of hardy adventurers; and the great army of
the Alemanni, which, on their approach, was estimated at forty
thousand men by the fears of the people, was afterwards magnified
to the number of seventy thousand by the vain and credulous
flattery of the Imperial court. The legions, which had been
ordered to march into Pannonia, were immediately recalled, or
detained, for the defence of Gaul; the military command was
divided between Nanienus and Mellobaudes; and the youthful
emperor, though he respected the long experience and sober wisdom
of the former, was much more inclined to admire, and to follow,
the martial ardor of his colleague; who was allowed to unite the
incompatible characters of count of the domestics, and of king of
the Franks. His rival Priarius, king of the Alemanni, was guided,
or rather impelled, by the same headstrong valor; and as their
troops were animated by the spirit of their leaders, they met,
they saw, they encountered each other, near the town of
Argentaria, or Colmar, in the plains of Alsace. The glory of the
day was justly ascribed to the missile weapons, and
well-practised evolutions, of the Roman soldiers; the Alemanni,
who long maintained their ground, were slaughtered with
unrelenting fury; five thousand only of the Barbarians escaped to
the woods and mountains; and the glorious death of their king on
the field of battle saved him from the reproaches of the people,
who are always disposed to accuse the justice, or policy, of an
unsuccessful war. After this signal victory, which secured the
peace of Gaul, and asserted the honor of the Roman arms, the
emperor Gratian appeared to proceed without delay on his Eastern
expedition; but as he approached the confines of the Alemanni, he
suddenly inclined to the left, surprised them by his unexpected
passage of the Rhine, and boldly advanced into the heart of their
country. The Barbarians opposed to his progress the obstacles of
nature and of courage; and still continued to retreat, from one
hill to another, till they were satisfied, by repeated trials, of
the power and perseverance of their enemies. Their submission was
accepted as a proof, not indeed of their sincere repentance, but
of their actual distress; and a select number of their brave and
robust youth was exacted from the faithless nation, as the most
substantial pledge of their future moderation. The subjects of
the empire, who had so often experienced that the Alemanni could
neither be subdued by arms, nor restrained by treaties, might not
promise themselves any solid or lasting tranquillity: but they
discovered, in the virtues of their young sovereign, the prospect
of a long and auspicious reign. When the legions climbed the
mountains, and scaled the fortifications of the Barbarians, the
valor of Gratian was distinguished in the foremost ranks; and the
gilt and variegated armor of his guards was pierced and shattered
by the blows which they had received in their constant attachment
to the person of their sovereign. At the age of nineteen, the son
of Valentinian seemed to possess the talents of peace and war;
and his personal success against the Alemanni was interpreted as
a sure presage of his Gothic triumphs.<br>
</p>

<p>While Gratian deserved and enjoyed the applause of his
subjects, the emperor Valens, who, at length, had removed his
court and army from Antioch, was received by the people of
Constantinople as the author of the public calamity. Before he
had reposed himself ten days in the capital, he was urged by the
licentious clamors of the Hippodrome to march against the
Barbarians, whom he had invited into his dominions; and the
citizens, who are always brave at a distance from any real
danger, declared, with confidence, that, if they were supplied
with arms, <strong><em>they</em></strong> alone would undertake
to deliver the province from the ravages of an insulting foe. The
vain reproaches of an ignorant multitude hastened the downfall of
the Roman empire; they provoked the desperate rashness of Valens;
who did not find, either in his reputation or in his mind, any
motives to support with firmness the public contempt. He was soon
persuaded, by the successful achievements of his lieutenants, to
despise the power of the Goths, who, by the diligence of
Fritigern, were now collected in the neighborhood of Hadrianople.
The march of the Taifal&aelig; had been intercepted by the
valiant Frigerid: the king of those licentious Barbarians was
slain in battle; and the suppliant captives were sent into
distant exile to cultivate the lands of Italy, which were
assigned for their settlement in the vacant territories of Modena
and Parma. The exploits of Sebastian, who was recently engaged in
the service of Valens, and promoted to the rank of master-general
of the infantry, were still more honorable to himself, and useful
to the republic. He obtained the permission of selecting three
hundred soldiers from each of the legions; and this separate
detachment soon acquired the spirit of discipline, and the
exercise of arms, which were almost forgotten under the reign of
Valens. By the vigor and conduct of Sebastian, a large body of
the Goths were surprised in their camp; and the immense spoil,
which was recovered from their hands, filled the city of
Hadrianople, and the adjacent plain. The splendid narratives,
which the general transmitted of his own exploits, alarmed the
Imperial court by the appearance of superior merit; and though he
cautiously insisted on the difficulties of the Gothic war, his
valor was praised, his advice was rejected; and Valens, who
listened with pride and pleasure to the flattering suggestions of
the eunuchs of the palace, was impatient to seize the glory of an
easy and assured conquest. His army was strengthened by a
numerous reenforcement of veterans; and his march from
Constantinople to Hadrianople was conducted with so much military
skill, that he prevented the activity of the Barbarians, who
designed to occupy the intermediate defiles, and to intercept
either the troops themselves, or their convoys of provisions. The
camp of Valens, which he pitched under the walls of Hadrianople,
was fortified, according to the practice of the Romans, with a
ditch and rampart; and a most important council was summoned, to
decide the fate of the emperor and of the empire. The party of
reason and of delay was strenuously maintained by Victor, who had
corrected, by the lessons of experience, the native fierceness of
the Sarmatian character; while Sebastian, with the flexible and
obsequious eloquence of a courtier, represented every precaution,
and every measure, that implied a doubt of immediate victory, as
unworthy of the courage and majesty of their invincible monarch.
The ruin of Valens was precipitated by the deceitful arts of
Fritigern, and the prudent admonitions of the emperor of the
West. The advantages of negotiating in the midst of war were
perfectly understood by the general of the Barbarians; and a
Christian ecclesiastic was despatched, as the holy minister of
peace, to penetrate, and to perplex, the councils of the enemy.
The misfortunes, as well as the provocations, of the Gothic
nation, were forcibly and truly described by their ambassador;
who protested, in the name of Fritigern, that he was still
disposed to lay down his arms, or to employ them only in the
defence of the empire; if he could secure for his wandering
countrymen a tranquil settlement on the waste lands of Thrace,
and a sufficient allowance of corn and cattle. But he added, in a
whisper of confidential friendship, that the exasperated
Barbarians were averse to these reasonable conditions; and that
Fritigern was doubtful whether he could accomplish the conclusion
of the treaty, unless he found himself supported by the presence
and terrors of an Imperial army. About the same time, Count
Richomer returned from the West to announce the defeat and
submission of the Alemanni, to inform Valens that his nephew
advanced by rapid marches at the head of the veteran and
victorious legions of Gaul, and to request, in the name of
Gratian and of the republic, that every dangerous and decisive
measure might be suspended, till the junction of the two emperors
should insure the success of the Gothic war. But the feeble
sovereign of the East was actuated only by the fatal illusions of
pride and jealousy. He disdained the importunate advice; he
rejected the humiliating aid; he secretly compared the
ignominious, at least the inglorious, period of his own reign,
with the fame of a beardless youth; and Valens rushed into the
field, to erect his imaginary trophy, before the diligence of his
colleague could usurp any share of the triumphs of the day.<br>
</p>

<p>On the ninth of August, a day which has deserved to be marked
among the most inauspicious of the Roman Calendar, the emperor
Valens, leaving, under a strong guard, his baggage and military
treasure, marched from Hadrianople to attack the Goths, who were
encamped about twelve miles from the city. By some mistake of the
orders, or some ignorance of the ground, the right wing, or
column of cavalry arrived in sight of the enemy, whilst the left
was still at a considerable distance; the soldiers were
compelled, in the sultry heat of summer, to precipitate their
pace; and the line of battle was formed with tedious confusion
and irregular delay. The Gothic cavalry had been detached to
forage in the adjacent country; and Fritigern still continued to
practise his customary arts. He despatched messengers of peace,
made proposals, required hostages, and wasted the hours, till the
Romans, exposed without shelter to the burning rays of the sun,
were exhausted by thirst, hunger, and intolerable fatigue. The
emperor was persuaded to send an ambassador to the Gothic camp;
the zeal of Richomer, who alone had courage to accept the
dangerous commission, was applauded; and the count of the
domestics, adorned with the splendid ensigns of his dignity, had
proceeded some way in the space between the two armies, when he
was suddenly recalled by the alarm of battle. The hasty and
imprudent attack was made by Bacurius the Iberian, who commanded
a body of archers and targiteers; and as they advanced with
rashness, they retreated with loss and disgrace. In the same
moment, the flying squadrons of Alatheus and Saphrax, whose
return was anxiously expected by the general of the Goths,
descended like a whirlwind from the hills, swept across the
plain, and added new terrors to the tumultuous, but irresistible
charge of the Barbarian host. The event of the battle of
Hadrianople, so fatal to Valens and to the empire, may be
described in a few words: the Roman cavalry fled; the infantry
was abandoned, surrounded, and cut in pieces. The most skilful
evolutions, the firmest courage, are scarcely sufficient to
extricate a body of foot, encompassed, on an open plain, by
superior numbers of horse; but the troops of Valens, oppressed by
the weight of the enemy and their own fears, were crowded into a
narrow space, where it was impossible for them to extend their
ranks, or even to use, with effect, their swords and javelins. In
the midst of tumult, of slaughter, and of dismay, the emperor,
deserted by his guards and wounded, as it was supposed, with an
arrow, sought protection among the Lancearii and the Mattiarii,
who still maintained their ground with some appearance of order
and firmness. His faithful generals, Trajan and Victor, who
perceived his danger, loudly exclaimed that all was lost, unless
the person of the emperor could be saved. Some troops, animated
by their exhortation, advanced to his relief: they found only a
bloody spot, covered with a heap of broken arms and mangled
bodies, without being able to discover their unfortunate prince,
either among the living or the dead. Their search could not
indeed be successful, if there is any truth in the circumstances
with which some historians have related the death of the emperor.
By the care of his attendants, Valens was removed from the field
of battle to a neighboring cottage, where they attempted to dress
his wound, and to provide for his future safety. But this humble
retreat was instantly surrounded by the enemy: they tried to
force the door, they were provoked by a discharge of arrows from
the roof, till at length, impatient of delay, they set fire to a
pile of dry fagots, and consumed the cottage with the Roman
emperor and his train. Valens perished in the flames; and a
youth, who dropped from the window, alone escaped, to attest the
melancholy tale, and to inform the Goths of the inestimable prize
which they had lost by their own rashness. A great number of
brave and distinguished officers perished in the battle of
Hadrianople, which equalled in the actual loss, and far surpassed
in the fatal consequences, the misfortune which Rome had formerly
sustained in the fields of Cann&aelig;. Two master-generals of
the cavalry and infantry, two great officers of the palace, and
thirty-five tribunes, were found among the slain; and the death
of Sebastian might satisfy the world, that he was the victim, as
well as the author, of the public calamity. Above two thirds of
the Roman army were destroyed: and the darkness of the night was
esteemed a very favorable circumstance, as it served to conceal
the flight of the multitude, and to protect the more orderly
retreat of Victor and Richomer, who alone, amidst the general
consternation, maintained the advantage of calm courage and
regular discipline.<br>
</p>

<p>While the impressions of grief and terror were still recent in
the minds of men, the most celebrated rhetorician of the age
composed the funeral oration of a vanquished army, and of an
unpopular prince, whose throne was already occupied by a
stranger. "There are not wanting," says the candid Libanius,
"those who arraign the prudence of the emperor, or who impute the
public misfortune to the want of courage and discipline in the
troops. For my own part, I reverence the memory of their former
exploits: I reverence the glorious death, which they bravely
received, standing, and fighting in their ranks: I reverence the
field of battle, stained with their
<strong><em>blood</em></strong>, and the blood of the Barbarians.
Those honorable marks have been already washed away by the rains;
but the lofty monuments of their bones, the bones of generals, of
centurions, and of valiant warriors, claim a longer period of
duration. The king himself fought and fell in the foremost ranks
of the battle. His attendants presented him with the fleetest
horses of the Imperial stable, that would soon have carried him
beyond the pursuit of the enemy. They vainly pressed him to
reserve his important life for the future service of the
republic. He still declared that he was unworthy to survive so
many of the bravest and most faithful of his subjects; and the
monarch was nobly buried under a mountain of the slain. Let none,
therefore, presume to ascribe the victory of the Barbarians to
the fear, the weakness, or the imprudence, of the Roman troops.
The chiefs and the soldiers were animated by the virtue of their
ancestors, whom they equalled in discipline and the arts of war.
Their generous emulation was supported by the love of glory,
which prompted them to contend at the same time with heat and
thirst, with fire and the sword; and cheerfully to embrace an
honorable death, as their refuge against flight and infamy. The
indignation of the gods has been the only cause of the success of
our enemies." The truth of history may disclaim some parts of
this panegyric, which cannot strictly be reconciled with the
character of Valens, or the circumstances of the battle: but the
fairest commendation is due to the eloquence, and still more to
the generosity, of the sophist of Antioch.<br>
</p>

<p>The pride of the Goths was elated by this memorable victory;
but their avarice was disappointed by the mortifying discovery,
that the richest part of the Imperial spoil had been within the
walls of Hadrianople. They hastened to possess the reward of
their valor; but they were encountered by the remains of a
vanquished army, with an intrepid resolution, which was the
effect of their despair, and the only hope of their safety. The
walls of the city, and the ramparts of the adjacent camp, were
lined with military engines, that threw stones of an enormous
weight; and astonished the ignorant Barbarians by the noise, and
velocity, still more than by the real effects, of the discharge.
The soldiers, the citizens, the provincials, the domestics of the
palace, were united in the danger, and in the defence: the
furious assault of the Goths was repulsed; their secret arts of
treachery and treason were discovered; and, after an obstinate
conflict of many hours, they retired to their tents; convinced,
by experience, that it would be far more advisable to observe the
treaty, which their sagacious leader had tacitly stipulated with
the fortifications of great and populous cities. After the hasty
and impolitic massacre of three hundred deserters, an act of
justice extremely useful to the discipline of the Roman armies,
the Goths indignantly raised the siege of Hadrianople. The scene
of war and tumult was instantly converted into a silent solitude:
the multitude suddenly disappeared; the secret paths of the woods
and mountains were marked with the footsteps of the trembling
fugitives, who sought a refuge in the distant cities of Illyricum
and Macedonia; and the faithful officers of the household, and
the treasury, cautiously proceeded in search of the emperor, of
whose death they were still ignorant. The tide of the Gothic
inundation rolled from the walls of Hadrianople to the suburbs of
Constantinople. The Barbarians were surprised with the splendid
appearance of the capital of the East, the height and extent of
the walls, the myriads of wealthy and affrighted citizens who
crowded the ramparts, and the various prospect of the sea and
land. While they gazed with hopeless desire on the inaccessible
beauties of Constantinople, a sally was made from one of the
gates by a party of Saracens, who had been fortunately engaged in
the service of Valens. The cavalry of Scythia was forced to yield
to the admirable swiftness and spirit of the Arabian horses:
their riders were skilled in the evolutions of irregular war; and
the Northern Barbarians were astonished and dismayed, by the
inhuman ferocity of the Barbarians of the South. A Gothic soldier
was slain by the dagger of an Arab; and the hairy, naked savage,
applying his lips to the wound, expressed a horrid delight, while
he sucked the blood of his vanquished enemy. The army of the
Goths, laden with the spoils of the wealthy suburbs and the
adjacent territory, slowly moved, from the Bosphorus, to the
mountains which form the western boundary of Thrace. The
important pass of Succi was betrayed by the fear, or the
misconduct, of Maurus; and the Barbarians, who no longer had any
resistance to apprehend from the scattered and vanquished troops
of the East, spread themselves over the face of a fertile and
cultivated country, as far as the confines of Italy and the
Hadriatic Sea.<br>
</p>

<p>The Romans, who so coolly, and so concisely, mention the acts
of <strong><em>justice</em></strong> which were exercised by the
legions, reserve their compassion, and their eloquence, for their
own sufferings, when the provinces were invaded, and desolated,
by the arms of the successful Barbarians. The simple
circumstantial narrative (did such a narrative exist) of the ruin
of a single town, of the misfortunes of a single family, might
exhibit an interesting and instructive picture of human manners:
but the tedious repetition of vague and declamatory complaints
would fatigue the attention of the most patient reader. The same
censure may be applied, though not perhaps in an equal degree, to
the profane, and the ecclesiastical, writers of this unhappy
period; that their minds were inflamed by popular and religious
animosity; and that the true size and color of every object is
falsified by the exaggerations of their corrupt eloquence. The
vehement Jerom might justly deplore the calamities inflicted by
the Goths, and their barbarous allies, on his native country of
Pannonia, and the wide extent of the provinces, from the walls of
Constantinople to the foot of the Julian Alps; the rapes, the
massacres, the conflagrations; and, above all, the profanation of
the churches, that were turned into stables, and the contemptuous
treatment of the relics of holy martyrs. But the Saint is surely
transported beyond the limits of nature and history, when he
affirms, "that, in those desert countries, nothing was left
except the sky and the earth; that, after the destruction of the
cities, and the extirpation of the human race, the land was
overgrown with thick forests and inextricable brambles; and that
the universal desolation, announced by the prophet Zephaniah, was
accomplished, in the scarcity of the beasts, the birds, and even
of the fish." These complaints were pronounced about twenty years
after the death of Valens; and the Illyrian provinces, which were
constantly exposed to the invasion and passage of the Barbarians,
still continued, after a calamitous period of ten centuries, to
supply new materials for rapine and destruction. Could it even be
supposed, that a large tract of country had been left without
cultivation and without inhabitants, the consequences might not
have been so fatal to the inferior productions of animated
nature. The useful and feeble animals, which are nourished by the
hand of man, might suffer and perish, if they were deprived of
his protection; but the beasts of the forest, his enemies or his
victims, would multiply in the free and undisturbed possession of
their solitary domain. The various tribes that people the air, or
the waters, are still less connected with the fate of the human
species; and it is highly probable that the fish of the Danube
would have felt more terror and distress, from the approach of a
voracious pike, than from the hostile inroad of a Gothic
army.<br>
</p>

<p><strong><em>Chapter XXVI: Progress of The Huns. -- Part
V.</em></strong><br>
</p>

<p>Whatever may have been the just measure of the calamities of
Europe, there was reason to fear that the same calamities would
soon extend to the peaceful countries of Asia. The sons of the
Goths had been judiciously distributed through the cities of the
East; and the arts of education were employed to polish, and
subdue, the native fierceness of their temper. In the space of
about twelve years, their numbers had continually increased; and
the children, who, in the first emigration, were sent over the
Hellespont, had attained, with rapid growth, the strength and
spirit of perfect manhood. It was impossible to conceal from
their knowledge the events of the Gothic war; and, as those
daring youths had not studied the language of dissimulation, they
betrayed their wish, their desire, perhaps their intention, to
emulate the glorious example of their fathers The danger of the
times seemed to justify the jealous suspicions of the
provincials; and these suspicions were admitted as unquestionable
evidence, that the Goths of Asia had formed a secret and
dangerous conspiracy against the public safety. The death of
Valens had left the East without a sovereign; and Julius, who
filled the important station of master-general of the troops,
with a high reputation of diligence and ability, thought it his
duty to consult the senate of Constantinople; which he
considered, during the vacancy of the throne, as the
representative council of the nation. As soon as he had obtained
the discretionary power of acting as he should judge most
expedient for the good of the republic, he assembled the
principal officers, and privately concerted effectual measures
for the execution of his bloody design. An order was immediately
promulgated, that, on a stated day, the Gothic youth should
assemble in the capital cities of their respective provinces;
and, as a report was industriously circulated, that they were
summoned to receive a liberal gift of lands and money, the
pleasing hope allayed the fury of their resentment, and, perhaps,
suspended the motions of the conspiracy. On the appointed day,
the unarmed crowd of the Gothic youth was carefully collected in
the square or Forum; the streets and avenues were occupied by the
Roman troops, and the roofs of the houses were covered with
archers and slingers. At the same hour, in all the cities of the
East, the signal was given of indiscriminate slaughter; and the
provinces of Asia were delivered by the cruel prudence of Julius,
from a domestic enemy, who, in a few months, might have carried
fire and sword from the Hellespont to the Euphrates. The urgent
consideration of the public safety may undoubtedly authorize the
violation of every positive law. How far that, or any other,
consideration may operate to dissolve the natural obligations of
humanity and justice, is a doctrine of which I still desire to
remain ignorant.<br>
</p>

<p>The emperor Gratian was far advanced on his march towards the
plains of Hadrianople, when he was informed, at first by the
confused voice of fame, and afterwards by the more accurate
reports of Victor and Richomer, that his impatient colleague had
been slain in battle, and that two thirds of the Roman army were
exterminated by the sword of the victorious Goths. Whatever
resentment the rash and jealous vanity of his uncle might
deserve, the resentment of a generous mind is easily subdued by
the softer emotions of grief and compassion; and even the sense
of pity was soon lost in the serious and alarming consideration
of the state of the republic. Gratian was too late to assist, he
was too weak to revenge, his unfortunate colleague; and the
valiant and modest youth felt himself unequal to the support of a
sinking world. A formidable tempest of the Barbarians of Germany
seemed ready to burst over the provinces of Gaul; and the mind of
Gratian was oppressed and distracted by the administration of the
Western empire. In this important crisis, the government of the
East, and the conduct of the Gothic war, required the undivided
attention of a hero and a statesman. A subject invested with such
ample command would not long have preserved his fidelity to a
distant benefactor; and the Imperial council embraced the wise
and manly resolution of conferring an obligation, rather than of
yielding to an insult. It was the wish of Gratian to bestow the
purple as the reward of virtue; but, at the age of nineteen, it
is not easy for a prince, educated in the supreme rank, to
understand the true characters of his ministers and generals. He
attempted to weigh, with an impartial hand, their various merits
and defects; and, whilst he checked the rash confidence of
ambition, he distrusted the cautious wisdom which despaired of
the republic. As each moment of delay diminished something of the
power and resources of the future sovereign of the East, the
situation of the times would not allow a tedious debate. The
choice of Gratian was soon declared in favor of an exile, whose
father, only three years before, had suffered, under the sanction
of <strong><em>his</em></strong> authority, an unjust and
ignominious death. The great Theodosius, a name celebrated in
history, and dear to the Catholic church, was summoned to the
Imperial court, which had gradually retreated from the confines
of Thrace to the more secure station of Sirmium. Five months
after the death of Valens, the emperor Gratian produced before
the assembled troops <strong><em>his</em></strong> colleague and
<strong><em>their</em></strong>master; who, after a modest,
perhaps a sincere, resistance, was compelled to accept, amidst
the general acclamations, the diadem, the purple, and the equal
title of Augustus. The provinces of Thrace, Asia, and Egypt, over
which Valens had reigned, were resigned to the administration of
the new emperor; but, as he was specially intrusted with the
conduct of the Gothic war, the Illyrian pr&aelig;fecture was
dismembered; and the two great dioceses of Dacia and Macedonia
were added to the dominions of the Eastern empire.<br>
</p>

<p>The same province, and perhaps the same city, which had given
to the throne the virtues of Trajan, and the talents of Hadrian,
was the original seat of another family of Spaniards, who, in a
less fortunate age, possessed, near fourscore years, the
declining empire of Rome. They emerged from the obscurity of
municipal honors by the active spirit of the elder Theodosius, a
general whose exploits in Britain and Africa have formed one of
the most splendid parts of the annals of Valentinian. The son of
that general, who likewise bore the name of Theodosius, was
educated, by skilful preceptors, in the liberal studies of youth;
but he was instructed in the art of war by the tender care and
severe discipline of his father. Under the standard of such a
leader, young Theodosius sought glory and knowledge, in the most
distant scenes of military action; inured his constitution to the
difference of seasons and climates; distinguished his valor by
sea and land; and observed the various warfare of the Scots, the
Saxons, and the Moors. His own merit, and the recommendation of
the conqueror of Africa, soon raised him to a separate command;
and, in the station of Duke of M&aelig;sia, he vanquished an army
of Sarmatians; saved the province; deserved the love of the
soldiers; and provoked the envy of the court. His rising fortunes
were soon blasted by the disgrace and execution of his
illustrious father; and Theodosius obtained, as a favor, the
permission of retiring to a private life in his native province
of Spain. He displayed a firm and temperate character in the ease
with which he adapted himself to this new situation. His time was
almost equally divided between the town and country; the spirit,
which had animated his public conduct, was shown in the active
and affectionate performance of every social duty; and the
diligence of the soldier was profitably converted to the
improvement of his ample patrimony, which lay between Valladolid
and Segovia, in the midst of a fruitful district, still famous
for a most exquisite breed of sheep. From the innocent, but
humble labors of his farm, Theodosius was transported, in less
than four months, to the throne of the Eastern empire; and the
whole period of the history of the world will not perhaps afford
a similar example, of an elevation at the same time so pure and
so honorable. The princes who peaceably inherit the sceptre of
their fathers, claim and enjoy a legal right, the more secure as
it is absolutely distinct from the merits of their personal
characters. The subjects, who, in a monarchy, or a popular state,
acquire the possession of supreme power, may have raised
themselves, by the superiority either of genius or virtue, above
the heads of their equals; but their virtue is seldom exempt from
ambition; and the cause of the successful candidate is frequently
stained by the guilt of conspiracy, or civil war. Even in those
governments which allow the reigning monarch to declare a
colleague or a successor, his partial choice, which may be
influenced by the blindest passions, is often directed to an
unworthy object But the most suspicious malignity cannot ascribe
to Theodosius, in his obscure solitude of Caucha, the arts, the
desires, or even the hopes, of an ambitious statesman; and the
name of the Exile would long since have been forgotten, if his
genuine and distinguished virtues had not left a deep impression
in the Imperial court. During the season of prosperity, he had
been neglected; but, in the public distress, his superior merit
was universally felt and acknowledged. What confidence must have
been reposed in his integrity, since Gratian could trust, that a
pious son would forgive, for the sake of the republic, the murder
of his father! What expectations must have been formed of his
abilities to encourage the hope, that a single man could save,
and restore, the empire of the East! Theodosius was invested with
the purple in the thirty-third year of his age. The vulgar gazed
with admiration on the manly beauty of his face, and the graceful
majesty of his person, which they were pleased to compare with
the pictures and medals of the emperor Trajan; whilst intelligent
observers discovered, in the qualities of his heart and
understanding, a more important resemblance to the best and
greatest of the Roman princes.<br>
</p>

<p>It is not without the most sincere regret, that I must now
take leave of an accurate and faithful guide, who has composed
the history of his own times, without indulging the prejudices
and passions, which usually affect the mind of a contemporary.
Ammianus Marcellinus, who terminates his useful work with the
defeat and death of Valens, recommends the more glorious subject
of the ensuing reign to the youthful vigor and eloquence of the
rising generation. The rising generation was not disposed to
accept his advice or to imitate his example; and, in the study of
the reign of Theodosius, we are reduced to illustrate the partial
narrative of Zosimus, by the obscure hints of fragments and
chronicles, by the figurative style of poetry or panegyric, and
by the precarious assistance of the ecclesiastical writers, who,
in the heat of religious faction, are apt to despise the profane
virtues of sincerity and moderation. Conscious of these
disadvantages, which will continue to involve a considerable
portion of the decline and fall of the Roman empire, I shall
proceed with doubtful and timorous steps. Yet I may boldly
pronounce, that the battle of Hadrianople was never revenged by
any signal or decisive victory of Theodosius over the Barbarians:
and the expressive silence of his venal orators may be confirmed
by the observation of the condition and circumstances of the
times. The fabric of a mighty state, which has been reared by the
labors of successive ages, could not be overturned by the
misfortune of a single day, if the fatal power of the imagination
did not exaggerate the real measure of the calamity. The loss of
forty thousand Romans, who fell in the plains of Hadrianople,
might have been soon recruited in the populous provinces of the
East, which contained so many millions of inhabitants. The
courage of a soldier is found to be the cheapest, and most
common, quality of human nature; and sufficient skill to
encounter an undisciplined foe might have been speedily taught by
the care of the surviving centurions. If the Barbarians were
mounted on the horses, and equipped with the armor, of their
vanquished enemies, the numerous studs of Cappadocia and Spain
would have supplied new squadrons of cavalry; the thirty-four
arsenals of the empire were plentifully stored with magazines of
offensive and defensive arms: and the wealth of Asia might still
have yielded an ample fund for the expenses of the war. But the
effects which were produced by the battle of Hadrianople on the
minds of the Barbarians and of the Romans, extended the victory
of the former, and the defeat of the latter, far beyond the
limits of a single day. A Gothic chief was heard to declare, with
insolent moderation, that, for his own part, he was fatigued with
slaughter: but that he was astonished how a people, who fled
before him like a flock of sheep, could still presume to dispute
the possession of their treasures and provinces. The same terrors
which the name of the Huns had spread among the Gothic tribes,
were inspired, by the formidable name of the Goths, among the
subjects and soldiers of the Roman empire. If Theodosius, hastily
collecting his scattered forces, had led them into the field to
encounter a victorious enemy, his army would have been vanquished
by their own fears; and his rashness could not have been excused
by the chance of success. But the <strong><em>great</em></strong>
Theodosius, an epithet which he honorably deserved on this
momentous occasion, conducted himself as the firm and faithful
guardian of the republic. He fixed his head-quarters at
Thessalonica, the capital of the Macedonian diocese; from whence
he could watch the irregular motions of the Barbarians, and
direct the operations of his lieutenants, from the gates of
Constantinople to the shores of the Hadriatic. The fortifications
and garrisons of the cities were strengthened; and the troops,
among whom a sense of order and discipline was revived, were
insensibly emboldened by the confidence of their own safety. From
these secure stations, they were encouraged to make frequent
sallies on the Barbarians, who infested the adjacent country;
and, as they were seldom allowed to engage, without some decisive
superiority, either of ground or of numbers, their enterprises
were, for the most part, successful; and they were soon
convinced, by their own experience, of the possibility of
vanquishing their <strong><em>invincible</em></strong> enemies.
The detachments of these separate garrisons were generally united
into small armies; the same cautious measures were pursued,
according to an extensive and well-concerted plan of operations;
the events of each day added strength and spirit to the Roman
arms; and the artful diligence of the emperor, who circulated the
most favorable reports of the success of the war, contributed to
subdue the pride of the Barbarians, and to animate the hopes and
courage of his subjects. If, instead of this faint and imperfect
outline, we could accurately represent the counsels and actions
of Theodosius, in four successive campaigns, there is reason to
believe, that his consummate skill would deserve the applause of
every military reader. The republic had formerly been saved by
the delays of Fabius; and, while the splendid trophies of Scipio,
in the field of Zama, attract the eyes of posterity, the camps
and marches of the dictator among the hills of the Campania, may
claim a juster proportion of the solid and independent fame,
which the general is not compelled to share, either with fortune
or with his troops. Such was likewise the merit of Theodosius;
and the infirmities of his body, which most unseasonably
languished under a long and dangerous disease, could not oppress
the vigor of his mind, or divert his attention from the public
service.<br>
</p>

<p>The deliverance and peace of the Roman provinces was the work
of prudence, rather than of valor: the prudence of Theodosius was
seconded by fortune: and the emperor never failed to seize, and
to improve, every favorable circumstance. As long as the superior
genius of Fritigern preserved the union, and directed the motions
of the Barbarians, their power was not inadequate to the conquest
of a great empire. The death of that hero, the predecessor and
master of the renowned Alaric, relieved an impatient multitude
from the intolerable yoke of discipline and discretion. The
Barbarians, who had been restrained by his authority, abandoned
themselves to the dictates of their passions; and their passions
were seldom uniform or consistent. An army of conquerors was
broken into many disorderly bands of savage robbers; and their
blind and irregular fury was not less pernicious to themselves,
than to their enemies. Their mischievous disposition was shown in
the destruction of every object which they wanted strength to
remove, or taste to enjoy; and they often consumed, with
improvident rage, the harvests, or the granaries, which soon
afterwards became necessary for their own subsistence. A spirit
of discord arose among the independent tribes and nations, which
had been united only by the bands of a loose and voluntary
alliance. The troops of the Huns and the Alani would naturally
upbraid the flight of the Goths; who were not disposed to use
with moderation the advantages of their fortune; the ancient
jealousy of the Ostrogoths and the Visigoths could not long be
suspended; and the haughty chiefs still remembered the insults
and injuries, which they had reciprocally offered, or sustained,
while the nation was seated in the countries beyond the Danube.
The progress of domestic faction abated the more diffusive
sentiment of national animosity; and the officers of Theodosius
were instructed to purchase, with liberal gifts and promises, the
retreat or service of the discontented party. The acquisition of
Modar, a prince of the royal blood of the Amali, gave a bold and
faithful champion to the cause of Rome. The illustrious deserter
soon obtained the rank of master-general, with an important
command; surprised an army of his countrymen, who were immersed
in wine and sleep; and, after a cruel slaughter of the astonished
Goths, returned with an immense spoil, and four thousand wagons,
to the Imperial camp. In the hands of a skilful politician, the
most different means may be successfully applied to the same
ends; and the peace of the empire, which had been forwarded by
the divisions, was accomplished by the reunion, of the Gothic
nation. Athanaric, who had been a patient spectator of these
extraordinary events, was at length driven, by the chance of
arms, from the dark recesses of the woods of Caucaland. He no
longer hesitated to pass the Danube; and a very considerable part
of the subjects of Fritigern, who already felt the inconveniences
of anarchy, were easily persuaded to acknowledge for their king a
Gothic Judge, whose birth they respected, and whose abilities
they had frequently experienced. But age had chilled the daring
spirit of Athanaric; and, instead of leading his people to the
field of battle and victory, he wisely listened to the fair
proposal of an honorable and advantageous treaty. Theodosius, who
was acquainted with the merit and power of his new ally,
condescended to meet him at the distance of several miles from
Constantinople; and entertained him in the Imperial city, with
the confidence of a friend, and the magnificence of a monarch.
"The Barbarian prince observed, with curious attention, the
variety of objects which attracted his notice, and at last broke
out into a sincere and passionate exclamation of wonder. I now
behold (said he) what I never could believe, the glories of this
stupendous capital! And as he cast his eyes around, he viewed,
and he admired, the commanding situation of the city, the
strength and beauty of the walls and public edifices, the
capacious harbor, crowded with innumerable vessels, the perpetual
concourse of distant nations, and the arms and discipline of the
troops. Indeed, (continued Athanaric,) the emperor of the Romans
is a god upon earth; and the presumptuous man, who dares to lift
his hand against him, is guilty of his own blood." The Gothic
king did not long enjoy this splendid and honorable reception;
and, as temperance was not the virtue of his nation, it may
justly be suspected, that his mortal disease was contracted
amidst the pleasures of the Imperial banquets. But the policy of
Theodosius derived more solid benefit from the death, than he
could have expected from the most faithful services, of his ally.
The funeral of Athanaric was performed with solemn rites in the
capital of the East; a stately monument was erected to his
memory; and his whole army, won by the liberal courtesy, and
decent grief, of Theodosius, enlisted under the standard of the
Roman empire. The submission of so great a body of the Visigoths
was productive of the most salutary consequences; and the mixed
influence of force, of reason, and of corruption, became every
day more powerful, and more extensive. Each independent chieftain
hastened to obtain a separate treaty, from the apprehension that
an obstinate delay might expose <strong><em>him</em></strong>,
alone and unprotected, to the revenge, or justice, of the
conqueror. The general, or rather the final, capitulation of the
Goths, may be dated four years, one month, and twenty-five days,
after the defeat and death of the emperor Valens.<br>
</p>

<p>The provinces of the Danube had been already relieved from the
oppressive weight of the Gruthungi, or Ostrogoths, by the
voluntary retreat of Alatheus and Saphrax, whose restless spirit
had prompted them to seek new scenes of rapine and glory. Their
destructive course was pointed towards the West; but we must be
satisfied with a very obscure and imperfect knowledge of their
various adventures. The Ostrogoths impelled several of the German
tribes on the provinces of Gaul; concluded, and soon violated, a
treaty with the emperor Gratian; advanced into the unknown
countries of the North; and, after an interval of more than four
years, returned, with accumulated force, to the banks of the
Lower Danube. Their troops were recruited with the fiercest
warriors of Germany and Scythia; and the soldiers, or at least
the historians, of the empire, no longer recognized the name and
countenances of their former enemies. The general who commanded
the military and naval powers of the Thracian frontier, soon
perceived that his superiority would be disadvantageous to the
public service; and that the Barbarians, awed by the presence of
his fleet and legions, would probably defer the passage of the
river till the approaching winter. The dexterity of the spies,
whom he sent into the Gothic camp, allured the Barbarians into a
fatal snare. They were persuaded that, by a bold attempt, they
might surprise, in the silence and darkness of the night, the
sleeping army of the Romans; and the whole multitude was hastily
embarked in a fleet of three thousand canoes. The bravest of the
Ostrogoths led the van; the main body consisted of the remainder
of their subjects and soldiers; and the women and children
securely followed in the rear. One of the nights without a moon
had been selected for the execution of their design; and they had
almost reached the southern bank of the Danube, in the firm
confidence that they should find an easy landing and an unguarded
camp. But the progress of the Barbarians was suddenly stopped by
an unexpected obstacle a triple line of vessels, strongly
connected with each other, and which formed an impenetrable chain
of two miles and a half along the river. While they struggled to
force their way in the unequal conflict, their right flank was
overwhelmed by the irresistible attack of a fleet of galleys,
which were urged down the stream by the united impulse of oars
and of the tide. The weight and velocity of those ships of war
broke, and sunk, and dispersed, the rude and feeble canoes of the
Barbarians; their valor was ineffectual; and Alatheus, the king,
or general, of the Ostrogoths, perished with his bravest troops,
either by the sword of the Romans, or in the waves of the Danube.
The last division of this unfortunate fleet might regain the
opposite shore; but the distress and disorder of the multitude
rendered them alike incapable, either of action or counsel; and
they soon implored the clemency of the victorious enemy. On this
occasion, as well as on many others, it is a difficult task to
reconcile the passions and prejudices of the writers of the age
of Theodosius. The partial and malignant historian, who
misrepresents every action of his reign, affirms, that the
emperor did not appear in the field of battle till the Barbarians
had been vanquished by the valor and conduct of his lieutenant
Promotus. The flattering poet, who celebrated, in the court of
Honorius, the glory of the father and of the son, ascribes the
victory to the personal prowess of Theodosius; and almost
insinuates, that the king of the Ostrogoths was slain by the hand
of the emperor. The truth of history might perhaps be found in a
just medium between these extreme and contradictory
assertions.<br>
</p>

<p>The original treaty which fixed the settlement of the Goths,
ascertained their privileges, and stipulated their obligations,
would illustrate the history of Theodosius and his successors.
The series of their history has imperfectly preserved the spirit
and substance of this single agreement. The ravages of war and
tyranny had provided many large tracts of fertile but
uncultivated land for the use of those Barbarians who might not
disdain the practice of agriculture. A numerous colony of the
Visigoths was seated in Thrace; the remains of the Ostrogoths
were planted in Phrygia and Lydia; their immediate wants were
supplied by a distribution of corn and cattle; and their future
industry was encouraged by an exemption from tribute, during a
certain term of years. The Barbarians would have deserved to feel
the cruel and perfidious policy of the Imperial court, if they
had suffered themselves to be dispersed through the provinces.
They required, and they obtained, the sole possession of the
villages and districts assigned for their residence; they still
cherished and propagated their native manners and language;
asserted, in the bosom of despotism, the freedom of their
domestic government; and acknowledged the sovereignty of the
emperor, without submitting to the inferior jurisdiction of the
laws and magistrates of Rome. The hereditary chiefs of the tribes
and families were still permitted to command their followers in
peace and war; but the royal dignity was abolished; and the
generals of the Goths were appointed and removed at the pleasure
of the emperor. An army of forty thousand Goths was maintained
for the perpetual service of the empire of the East; and those
haughty troops, who assumed the title of Fderati, or allies, were
distinguished by their gold collars, liberal pay, and licentious
privileges. Their native courage was improved by the use of arms
and the knowledge of discipline; and, while the republic was
guarded, or threatened, by the doubtful sword of the Barbarians,
the last sparks of the military flame were finally extinguished
in the minds of the Romans. Theodosius had the address to
persuade his allies, that the conditions of peace, which had been
extorted from him by prudence and necessity, were the voluntary
expressions of his sincere friendship for the Gothic nation. A
different mode of vindication or apology was opposed to the
complaints of the people; who loudly censured these shameful and
dangerous concessions. The calamities of the war were painted in
the most lively colors; and the first symptoms of the return of
order, of plenty, and security, were diligently exaggerated. The
advocates of Theodosius could affirm, with some appearance of
truth and reason, that it was impossible to extirpate so many
warlike tribes, who were rendered desperate by the loss of their
native country; and that the exhausted provinces would be revived
by a fresh supply of soldiers and husbandmen. The Barbarians
still wore an angry and hostile aspect; but the experience of
past times might encourage the hope, that they would acquire the
habits of industry and obedience; that their manners would be
polished by time, education, and the influence of Christianity;
and that their posterity would insensibly blend with the great
body of the Roman people.<br>
</p>

<p>Notwithstanding these specious arguments, and these sanguine
expectations, it was apparent to every discerning eye, that the
Goths would long remain the enemies, and might soon become the
conquerors of the Roman empire. Their rude and insolent behavior
expressed their contempt of the citizens and provincials, whom
they insulted with impunity. To the zeal and valor of the
Barbarians Theodosius was indebted for the success of his arms:
but their assistance was precarious; and they were sometimes
seduced, by a treacherous and inconstant disposition, to abandon
his standard, at the moment when their service was the most
essential. During the civil war against Maximus, a great number
of Gothic deserters retired into the morasses of Macedonia,
wasted the adjacent provinces, and obliged the intrepid monarch
to expose his person, and exert his power, to suppress the rising
flame of rebellion. The public apprehensions were fortified by
the strong suspicion, that these tumults were not the effect of
accidental passion, but the result of deep and premeditated
design. It was generally believed, that the Goths had signed the
treaty of peace with a hostile and insidious spirit; and that
their chiefs had previously bound themselves, by a solemn and
secret oath, never to keep faith with the Romans; to maintain the
fairest show of loyalty and friendship, and to watch the
favorable moment of rapine, of conquest, and of revenge. But as
the minds of the Barbarians were not insensible to the power of
gratitude, several of the Gothic leaders sincerely devoted
themselves to the service of the empire, or, at least, of the
emperor; the whole nation was insensibly divided into two
opposite factions, and much sophistry was employed in
conversation and dispute, to compare the obligations of their
first, and second, engagements. The Goths, who considered
themselves as the friends of peace, of justice, and of Rome, were
directed by the authority of Fravitta, a valiant and honorable
youth, distinguished above the rest of his countrymen by the
politeness of his manners, the liberality of his sentiments, and
the mild virtues of social life. But the more numerous faction
adhered to the fierce and faithless Priulf, * who inflamed the
passions, and asserted the independence, of his warlike
followers. On one of the solemn festivals, when the chiefs of
both parties were invited to the Imperial table, they were
insensibly heated by wine, till they forgot the usual restraints
of discretion and respect, and betrayed, in the presence of
Theodosius, the fatal secret of their domestic disputes. The
emperor, who had been the reluctant witness of this extraordinary
controversy, dissembled his fears and resentment, and soon
dismissed the tumultuous assembly. Fravitta, alarmed and
exasperated by the insolence of his rival, whose departure from
the palace might have been the signal of a civil war, boldly
followed him; and, drawing his sword, laid Priulf dead at his
feet. Their companions flew to arms; and the faithful champion of
Rome would have been oppressed by superior numbers, if he had not
been protected by the seasonable interposition of the Imperial
guards. Such were the scenes of Barbaric rage, which disgraced
the palace and table of the Roman emperor; and, as the impatient
Goths could only be restrained by the firm and temperate
character of Theodosius, the public safety seemed to depend on
the life and abilities of a single man.<br>
</p>

<p>Vol. 2</p>
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