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by the cruel orders of Mithridates. (1) These voluntary exiles were engaged, for the most part, in the occupations of commerce, agriculture, and the farm of the revenue. But after the legions were rendered permanent by the emperors, the provinces were peopled by a race of soldiers; and the veterans, whether they received the reward of their service in land or in money, usually settled with their families in the country, where they had honourably spent their youth. Throughout the empire, but more particularly in the western parts, the most fertile districts, and the most convenient situations, were reserved for the establishment of colonies; some of which were of a civil, and others of a military nature. In their manners and internal policy, the colonies formed a perfect representation of their great parent; and they were soon endeared to the natives by the ties of friendship and alliance; they effectually diffused a reverence for the Roman name, and a desire, which was seldom disappointed, of sharing, in due time, its honours and advantages.(2) The municipal cities insensibly equalled the rank and splendour of the colonies; and in toe reign of Hadrian, it was disputed which was the preferable condition, of those societies which had issued from, or those which had been received into, the bosom of Rome.(3) The right of Latium, as it was called,*conferred on the cities to which it had been granted, a more partial favour. The magistrates only, at the expiration of their office, assumed the quality of Roman citizens; but as those offices were annual, in a few years they circulated round the principal families; (4) those of the provincials who were permitted to bear arms in the legions,(5) those who exercised any civil employment, all, in a word, who performed any public service, or displayed any personal talents, were rewarded with a present, whose value was continually diminished by the increasing liberality of the emperors. Yet even, in the age of the Antonines, when the freedom of the city had been bestowed on the greater number of their subjects, it was still accompanied with very solid advantages. The bulk of the people acquired, with that title, the benefit of the Roman laws, particularly in the interesting articles of marriage, testaments, and inheritances; and the road of fortune was open to those whose pretensions were seconded by favour or merit. The grandsons of the Gauls, who had besieged Julius Cæsar in Alesia, commanded legions, governed provinces, and were admitted into the Senate of Rome.(6) Their ambition, instead of disturbing the tranquillity of the state, was intimately connected with its safety and greatness.

So sensible were the Romans of the influence of language over national manners, that it was their most serious care to extend, with the progress of their arms, the use of the Latin tongue.(7) The ancient dialects of Italy, the Sabine, the Etruscan, and the Venetian, sunk into oblivion; but in the provinces, the east was less docile than the west, to the voice of its victorious preceptors. This obvious difference marked the two por tions of the empire with a distinction of colours, which, though it was in some degree concealed during the meridian splendour of prosperity, became gradually more visible, as the shades of night descended upon the Roman world. The western countries were civilized by the same hands which subdued them. As soon as the barbarians were reconciled to obe

(1) Memnon apud Photium, c. 33. Valer. Maxim. ix. 2. Plutarch and Dion Cassius swell the massacre to 150,000 citizens; but I should esteem the smaller number to be more than sufficient (2) Twenty-five colonies were settled in Spain, (see Plin Hist. Natur. iii. 3, 4, iv. 35,) and nine in Britain, of which London, Colchester, Lincoln, Chester, Gloucester, and Bath, still remain considerable cities (see Richard of Cirencester, p. 36, and Whitaker's History of Manchester, 1. i. c. 3.) (3) Aul. Gell. Noctes Atticæ, xvi. 13. The emperor Hadrian expressed his surprise, that the cities of Utica, Gades, and [tatica, which already enjoyed the rights of Municipia should solicia the title of colonies. Their example, however, became fashionable, and the empire was filled with honorary colonies. See Spanheim, de Usu Numismatum, Dissertat. xiii.

(4) Spanheim, Orbis Roman. c. 8. p. 62.

(5) Aristid. in Rome Eucomio, tom. i. p. 218. edit. Jebb.

(6) Tacit. Annal. xi. 23, 24. Hist. iv. 74.

(7) See Plin. Hist. Natur. iii. 5. Au

gustin de Civitate Dei, xix. 7. Lipsius de uronunciatione Linguæ Latinæ, c. 3

dience, their minds were opened to any new impressions of knowledge and politeness. The language of Virgil and Cicero, though with some inevitable mixture of corruption, was so universally adopted in Africa, Spain, Gaul, Britain, and Pannonia,(1) that the faint traces of the Punic or Celtic idioms were preserved only in the mountains, or among the peasants.(2) Education and study insensibly inspired the natives of those Countries with the sentiments of Romans; and Italy gave fashions, as well as laws, to her Latin provincials. They solicited with more ardour, and obtained with more facility, the freedom and honours of the state; supported the national dignity in letters(3) and in arms; and, at length, in the person of Trajan, produced an emperor whom the Scipios would not have disowned for their countryman. The situation of the Greeks was very different from that of the barbarians. The former had been long since civilized and corrupted. They had too much taste to relin quish their language, and too much vanity to adopt any foreign institu tions. Still preserving the prejudices, after they had lost the virtues of their ancestors, they affected to despise the unpolished manners of the Roman conquerors, while they were compelled to respect their superior wisdom and power.(4) Nor was the influence of the Grecian language and sentiments confined to the narrow limits of that once celebrated country. Their empire, by the progress of colonies and conquest, had been diffused from the Hadriatic to the Euphrates and the Nile. Asia was covered with Greek cities, and the long reign of the Macedonian kings had introduced a silent revolution into Syria and Egypt. In their pompous courts those princes united the elegance of Athens with the luxury of the East, and the example of the court was imitated, at an humble distance, by the higher ranks of their subjects. Such was the general division of the Roman empire into the Latin and Greek languages. To these we may add a third distinction for the body of the natives in Syria, and especially in Egypt. The use of their ancient dialects, by secluding them from the commerce of mankind, checked the improvements of those barbarians.(5) The slothful effeminacy of the former, exposed them to the contempt; the sullen ferociousness of the latter, excited the aversion of the conquerors. (6) Those nations had submitted to the Roman power, but they seldom desired or deserved the freedom of the city; and it was remarked, that more than two hundred and thirty years had elapsed after the ruin of the Ptolemies, before an Egyptian was admitted into the senate of Rome.(7)

It is a just though trite observation, that victorious Rome was herself subdued by the arts of Greece. Those unmortal writers who still command the admiration of modern Europe, soon became the favourite object of study and imitation in Italy and the western provinces. But the elegant amusements of the Romans were not suffered to interfere with their sound maxims of policy. While they acknowledged the charms of the Greek, they asserted the dignity of the Latin tongue, and the exclusive use of the latter was inflexibly maintained in the administration of civil as well as military government.(8) The two languages exercised at the

(1) Apuleius and Augustin will answer for Africa: Strabo for Spain and Gaul; Tacitus, in the life of Agricola, for Britain; and Velleius Paterculus, for Pannonia. To them we may add the language of the Inscriptions.*

(2) The Celtic was preserved in the mountains of Wales, Cornwall, and Armorica. We may observe that Apuleius reproaches an African youth, who lived among the populace, with the use of the Punic; while he had almost forgot Greek, and neither could nor would speak Latin. (Apolog. p. 599.) The greater part of St. Austin's congregations were strangers to the Punic. (3) Spain alone produced Columella, the Senecas, Lucan, Martial, and Quintilian. (4) There is not, I believe, from Dionysius to Libanius, a single Greek critic who mentions Virgil or Horace. They seem ignorant that the Romans had any good writers.

(5) The curious reader may see in Dupin (Bibliotheque Ecclesiastique, tom. xix. p. 1, c. 8), how much the use of the Syriac and Egyptian languages was still preserved. (6) See Juvenal, Sat. iii. and xv. Ammian. Marcellin, xxii. 16.

(7) Dion Cas. 1. lxxvii. 1275. The first instance happened under the reign of Septimius Severus (E) See Valerius Maximus, 1. ii. c. 2, n. 2. The emperor Claudius disfranchised an eminent Gre cian for not understanding Latin. He was probably in some public office. Suet. in Claud. o. 16†

same time their separate jurisdiction throughout the empire: the former as the natural idiom of science; the latter, as the legal dialect of public transactions. Those who united letters with business, were equally conversant with both; and it was almost impossible, in any province, to find a Roman subject, of liberal education, who was at once a stranger to the Greek and to the Latin language.

It was by such institutions that the nations of the empire insensibly melted away into the Roman name and people. But there still remained, in the centre of every province, and of every family, an unhappy condition of men who endured the weight, without sharing the benefits, of society. In the free states of antiquity, the domestic slaves were exposed to the wanton rigour of despotism. The perfect settlement of the Roman empire was preceded by ages of violence and rapine. The slaves consisted, for the most part, of barbarian captives,*taken in thousands by the chance of war, purchased at a vile price,(1) accustomed to a life of independence, and impatient to break and to revenge their fetters. Against such internal enemies, whose desperate insurrections had more than once reduced the republic to the brink of destruction, (2) the most severe regulations,(3) and the most cruel treatment, seemed almost justified by the great law of self-preservation. But when the principal nations of Europe, Asia, and Africa were united under the laws of one sovereign, the source of foreign supplies flowed with much less abundance, and the Romans were reduced to the milder but more tedious method of propagation. In their numerous families, and particularly in their country estates, they encouraged the marriage of their slaves. The sentiments of nature, the habits of education, and the possession of a dependent species of property, contributed to alleviate the hardships of servitude.(4) The existence of a slave became an object of greater value, and though his happiness still depended on the temper and circumstances of the master, the humanity of the latter, instead of being restrained by fear, was encouraged by the sense of his own interest. The progress of manners was accelerated by the virtue or policy of the emperors; and by the edicts of Hadrian and the Antonines, the protection of the laws was extended to the most abject part of mankind. The jurisdiction of life and death over the slaves, a power long exercised and often abused, was taken out of private hands, and reserved to the magistrates alone. The subterraneous prisons were abolished; and, upon a just complaint of intolerable treatment, the injured slave obtained either his deliverance, or a less cruel master.(5)

Hope, the best comfort of our imperfect condition, was not denied to the Roman slave, and if he had any opportunity of rendering himself either useful or agreeable, he might very naturally expect that the diligence and fidelity of a few years would be rewarded with the inestimable gift of freedom. The benevolence of the master was so frequently prompted by the meaner suggestions of vanity and avarice, that the laws found it more necessary to restrain than to encourage a profuse and undistinguished liberality, which might degenerate into a very dangerous abuse.(6) It was a maxim of ancient jurisprudence, that a slave had not any country of his own; he acquired with his liberty an admission into the political society of which his patron was a member. The consequences of this maxim would have prostituted the privileges of the Roman city to a mean and promiscuous multitude. Some seasonable

(1) In the camp of Lucullus, an ox sold for a drachma, and a slave for four drachmæ, or about three shillings. Plutarch. in Lucull. p. 580.†

(2) Diodorus Siculus in Eclog. Hist. I. xxxiv. and xxxvi. Florus, iii. 19, 20.

(3) See a remarkable instance of severity in Cicero in Verrem, v. 3.

(4) See in Gruter, and the other collectors, a great number of inscriptions addressed by slaves t their wives, children, fellow-servants, masters, &c. They are all, most probably, of the Imperia age. (5) See the Augustan History, and a Dissertation of M. de Burigny, in the xxxvth volume of the Academy of Inscriptions, upon the Roman slaves.

(6) See another Dissertation of M.de Burigny in the xxxviith volume, on the Roman freedmen.

exceptions were therefore provided; and the honourable distinction was confined to such slaves only, as for just causes, and with the approbation of the magistrate, should receive a solemn and legal manumission. Even these chosen freedmen obtained no more than the private rights of citizens, and were rigorously excluded from civil or military honours. Whatever might be the merit or fortune of their sons, they likewise were esteemed unworthy of a seat in the senate; nor were the traces of a servile origin allowed to be completely obliterated till the third or fourth generation.(1) Without destroying the distinction of ranks, a distant prospect of freedom and honours was presented, even to those whom pride and prejudice almost disdained to number among the human species.

It was once proposed to discriminate the slaves by a peculiar habit; but it was justly apprehended that there might be some danger in acquainting them with their own numbers. (2) Without interpreting, in their utmost strictness, the liberal appellations of legions and myriads,(3) we may venture to pronounce, that the proportion of slaves, who were valued as property, was more considerable than that of servants, who can be computed only as an expense.(4) The youths of a promising genius were instructed in the arts and sciences, and their price was ascertained by the degree of their skill and talents.(5) Almost every profession, either liberal(6) or mechanical, might be found in the household of an opulent senator. The ministers of pomp and sensuality were multiplied beyond the conception of modern luxury.(7) It was more for the interest of the merchant or manufacturer to purchase, than to hire his workmen; and in the country, slaves were employed as the cheapest and most laborious instruments of agriculture. To confirm the general observation, and to display the multitude of slaves, we might allege a variety of particular instances. It was discovered, on a very melancholy occasion, that four hundred slaves were maintained in a single palace of Rome.(8) The same number of four hundred belonged to an estate which an African widow, of very private condition, resigned to her son, while she reserved for herself a much larger share of her property.(9) A freedman, under the reign of Augustus, though his fortune had suffered great losses in the civil wars, left behind him three thousand six hundred yoke of oxen, two hundred and fifty thousand head of smaller cattle, and what was almost included in the description of cattle, four thousand one hundred and sixteen slaves. (10)

The number of subjects who acknowledged the laws of Rome, of citizens, of provincials, and of slaves, cannot now be fixed with such a degree of accuracy as the importance of the object would deserve. We are informed, that when the emperor Claudius exercised the office of censor, he took an account of six millions nine hundred and forty-five thousand Roman citizens, who, with the proportion of women and children, must have amounted to about twenty millions of souls. The multitude of subjects of an inferior rank, was uncertain and fluctuating. But, after weighing with attention every circumstance which could influence the balance, it seems probable, that there existed, in the time of

(1) Spanheim, Orbis Roman. I. i. c. 16. p. 124, &c.

(2) Seneca de Clementia, 1. i. c. 24. The original is much stronger, "Quantum periculum Immineret si servi nostri numerare nos cœpissent."

(3) See Pliny (Hist. Natur. 1. xxxiii.) and Athenæus (Deipnosophist. 1. vi. p. 272.) The latter boldly asserts, that ne knew very many (apoor) Romans who possessed, not for use, but ostentation, ten and even twenty thousand slaves.

(4) In Paris there are not more than 43,700 domestics of every sort, and not a twelfth part of the inhabitants. Messange Recherches sur la Population, p. 186.

(5) A learned slave sold for many hundred pounds sterling; Atticus always bred and taught them himself. Cornel. Nepos in Vit. c. 13.

(6) Many of the Roman physicians were slaves. See Dr. Middleton's Dissertation and Defence (Their ranks and offices are very copiously enumerated by Pignorious de Servis.

(8) Tacit. Annal. xiv 43. They were all executed for not preventing their master's murder.* (9) Apuleius in Apolog. p. 548. Edit. Delphin.

o Plin. Hist. Natur. 1. xxxiii. 47.

Claudius, about twice as many provincials as there were citizens, of either sex, and of every age; and that the slaves were at least equal in number to the free inhabitants of the Roman world. The total amount of this imperfect calculation would rise to about one hundred and twenty millions of persons: a degree of population which possibly exceeds that of modern Europe,(1) and forms the most numerous society that has ever been united under the same system of government.

Domestic peace and union were the natural consequences of the moderate and comprehensive policy embraced by the Romans. If we turn our eyes towards the monarchies of Asia, we shall behold despotism in the centre, and weakness in the extremities; the collection of the revenue, or the administration of justice, enforced by the presence of an army; hostile barbarians established in the heart of the country; hereditary satraps usurping the dominion of the provinces, and subjects inclined to rebellion, though incapable of freedom. But the obedience of the Roman world was uniform, voluntary, and permanent. The vanquished nations, blended into one great people, resigned the hope, nay even the wish, of resuming their independence, and scarcely considered their own existence as distinct from the existence of Rome. The established authority of the emperors pervaded without an effort the wide extent of their dominions, and was exercised with the same facility on the banks of the Thames, or of the Nile, as on those of the Tiber. The legions were destined to serve against the public enemy, and the civil magistrate seldom required the aid of a military force. (2) In this state of general security, the leisure as well as opulence both of the prince and people, were devoted to improve and to adorn the Roman empire.

Among the innumerable monuments of architecture constructed by the Romans, how many have escaped the notice of history, how few have resisted the ravages of time and barbarism! And yet even the majestic ruins that are still scattered over Italy and the provinces, would be sufficient to prove, that those countries were once the seat of a polite and powerful empire. Their greatness alone, or their beauty, might deserve our attention; but they are rendered more interesting, by two important circumstances, which connect the agreeable history of the arts, with the more useful history of human manners. Many of those works were erected at private expense, and almost all were intended for public benefit. It is natural to suppose that the greatest number, as well as the most considerable of the Roman edifices, were raised by the emperors, who possessed so unbounded a command both of men and money. Augustus was accustomed to boast that he had found his capital of brick, and that he had left it of marble.(3) The strict economy of Vespasian, was the source of his magnificence. The works of Trajan bear the stamp of his genius. The public monuments with which Hadrian adorned every province of the empire, were executed not only by his orders, but under his immediate inspection. He was himself an artist; and he loved the arts as they contributed to the happiness of the people. But if the emperors were the first, they were not the only architects of their dominions. Their example was universally imitated by their principal subjects, who were not afraid of declaring to the world that they had spirit to conceive, and

(1) Compute twenty millions in France, twenty-two in Germany, four in Hungary, ten in Italy, with its islands, eight in Great Britain and Ireland, eight in Spain and Portugal, ten or twelve in the European Russia, six in Poland, six in Greece and Turkey, four in Sweden, three In Denmark and Norway, four in the Low Countries. The whole would amount to one hundred and five, or one hundred and seven millions. See Voltaire, de Histoire Generale.†

(2) Joseph. de Bell. Judaico, 1. ii. c. 16. The oration of Agrippa, or rather of the historian, is a fine picture of the Roman empire.

(3) Sueton. in August. c. 28. Augustus built in Rome the temple and forum of Mars the Avenger; the temple of Jupiter Tonans in the Capitol; that of Apollo Palatine, with public braries; the portico and basilica of Caius and Lucius, the porticoes of Livia and Octavia, and the theatre of Marcellus. The example of the sovereign was imitated by his ministers and generals; and his friend Agrippa left behind him the immortal monument of the Pantheon

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