THE HISTORY OF THE DECLINE AND FALL OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE. CHAPTER I. THE EXTENT AND MILITARY FORCE OF THE EMPIRE IN THE AGE OF THE ANTONINES. Introduction. In the second century of the christian æra, the empire of Rome comprehended the fairest part of the earth, and the most civilized portion of mankind. The frontiers of that extensive monarchy were guarded by ancient renown and disciplined valour. The gentle, but powerful, influence of laws and manners had gradually cemented the union of the provinces. Their peaceful inhabitants enjoyed and abused the advantages of wealth and luxury. The image of a free constitution was preserved with decent reverence: the Roman senate appeared to possess the sovereign authority, and devolved on the emperors all the executive powers of government. During a happy period 98-180. of more than fourscore years, the public administration was conducted by the virtues and abilities of Nerva, Trajan, Hadrian, and the two Antonines. It is the design of this, and of the two succeeding chapters, to describe the prosperous condition of their empire; and afterwards, from the death of Marcus Antoninus, to deduce the most important circumstances of its Decline and Fall; a revolution which will ever be remembered, and is still felt by the nations of the earth. A. D. Augustus the spirit of moderation into the public councils. Inclined to peace by his temper and situation, it was easy for him to discover, that Rome, in her present exalted situation, had much less to hope than to fear from the chance of arms; and that, in the prosecution of remote wars, the undertaking became every day more difficult, the event more doubtful, and the possession more precarious, and less beneficial. The experience of Augustus added weight to these salutary reflections, and effectually convinced him, that, by the prudent vigour of his counsels, it would be easy to secure every concession, which the safety or the dignity of Rome might require from the most formidable barbarians. Instead of exposing his person and his legions to the arrows of the Parthians, he obtained, by an honourable treaty, the restitution of the standards and prisoners which had been taken in the defeat of Crassus." His generals, in the early part of his reign, attempted the reduction of Æthiopia and Arabia Felix. They marched near a thousand miles to the south of the tropic; but the heat of the climate soon repelled the invaders, and protected the unwarlike natives of those sequestered regions. The northern countries of Europe scarcely deserved the expense and labour of conquest. The forests and morasses of Germany were filled with a hardy race of barbarians, who despised life when it was separated from freedom; and though, on the first attack, they seemed to yield to the weight of the Roman power, they soon, by a signal act of despair, regained their in Moderation of The principal conquests of the Romans were achieved under the republic; and the emperors, for the most part, were satisfied with preserving those dominions which had been acquired by the policy of the senate, the active emulation of the consuls, and the martial enthusiasm of the people. The seven first centuries were filled with a rapid succession of triumphs; but it was re-dependence, and reminded Augustus of the vicissiserved for Augustus, to relinquish the ambitious design of subduing the whole earth, and to introduce a Dion Cassius (1. liv. p. 736.) with the annotations of Reymar, who has collected all that Roman vanity has left upon the subject. The marble of Ancyra, on which Augustus recorded his own exploits, asserts that he compelled the Parthians to restore the ensigns of Crassus. b Strabo, (1. xvi, p. 780.) Pliny the Elder, (Hist. Natur. I. vi. c. 3235.) and Dion Cassius, (1. liii. p. 723. and 1. liv. p. 734.) have left us very B tude of fortune. On the death of that emperor, his testament was publicly read in the senate. He becurious details concerning these wars. The Romans made themselves masters of Mariaba, or Merab, a city of Arabia Felix, well known to the Orientals. (see Abulfeda and the Nubian geography, p. 52.) They were arrived within three days' journey of the Spice country, the rich object of their invasion. By the slaughter of Varus and his three legions. See the first book At queathed, as a valuable legacy to his successors, | national glory, when the throne was disgraced by the weakest, or the most vicious, of mankind the very time when Domitian, confined to his palace, felt the terrors which he inspired; his legions, under the command of the virtuous Agricola, defeated the collected force of the Caledonians at the foot of the Grampian hills; and his fleets, venturing to explore an unknown and dangerous navigation, displayed the Roman arms round every part of the island. The conquest of Britain was considered as already achieved; and it was the design of Agricola to complete and ensure his success by the casy reduction of Ireland, for which, in his opinion, one legion and a few auxiliaries were suflicient. The western isle might be improved into a valuable possession, and the Britons would wear their chains with the less reluctance, if the prospect and example of freedom were on every side removed from before their eyes. the advice of confining the empire within those limits, which nature seemed to have placed as its permanent bulwarks and boundaries; on the west the Atlantic ocean; the Rhine and Danube on the north; the Euphrates on the east; and towards the south the sandy deserts of Arabia and Africa.d Imitated by his Happily for the repose of mankind, successors. the moderate system recommended by the wisdom of Augustus was adopted by the fears and vices of his immediate successors. Engaged in the pursuit of pleasure, or in the exercise of tyranny, the first Cæsars seldom showed themselves to the armies, or to the provinces; nor were they disposed to suffer that those triumphs, which their indolence neglected, should be usurped by the conduct and valour of their lieutenants. The military fame of a subject was considered as an insolent invasion of the imperial prerogative; and it became the duty, as well as interest, of every Roman general, to guard the frontiers intrusted to his care, without aspiring to conquests which might have proved no less fatal to himself than to the vanquished barbarians. The only accession which the Roman❘ Conquest of Bri. tain was the first empire received, during the first cenexception to it. tury of the christian æra, was the province of Britain. In this single instance the successors of Cæsar and Augustus were persuaded to follow the example of the former, rather than the precept of the latter. The proximity of its situation to the coast of Gaul seemed to invite their arms; the pleasing, though doubtful, intelligence of a pearl fishery, attracted their avarice'; and as Britain was viewed in the light of a distinct and insulated world, the conquest scarcely formed any exception to the general system of continental measures. After a war of about forty years, undertaken by the most stupid, maintained by the most dissolute, and terminated by the most timid, of all the emperors, the far greater part of the island submitted to the Roman yoke." The various tribes of Britons possessed valour without conduct, and the love of freedom without the spirit of union. They took up arms with savage fierceness; they laid them down, or turned them against each other, with wild inconstancy; and while they fought singly, they were successively subdued. Neither the fortitude of Caractacus, nor the despair of Boadicea, nor the fanaticism of the druids, could avert the slavery of their country, or resist the steady progress of the imperial generals, who maintained the of the Annals of Tacitus. Sueton. in August. c. 23. and Velleius Paterculus, 1. ii. c. 117, &c. Augustus did not receive the melancholy news with all the temper and firmness that might have been expected from his character. d Tacit. Annal. I. ii. Dion Cassius, 1. lvi. p. 833. and the speech of Augustus himself, in Julian's Caesars. It receives great light from the learned notes of his French translator, M. Spanheim. e Germanicus, Suetonius Paulinus, and Agricola, were checked and recalled in the course of their victories. Corbulo was put to death. Military merit, as it is admirably expressed by Tacitus, was, in the strictest sense of the word, imperatoría virtus. f Cæsar himself conceals that ignoble motive; but it is mentioned by Suetonius, c. 47. The British pearls proved, however, of little value, on account of their dark and livid colour. Tacitus observes with reason, (in Agricola, c. 12.) that it was an inherent defect. "Ego facilius crediderim, naturam margaritis deesse quam nobis avaritiam." g Claudius, Nero, and Domitian. A hope is expressed by Pomponius But the superior merit of Agricola soon occasioned his removal from the government of Britain; and for ever disappointed this rational, though extensive, scheme of conquest. Before his departure, the prudent general had provided for security as well as for dominion. He had observed, that the island is almost divided into two unequal parts by the opposite gulfs, or, as they are now called, the Friths of Scotland. Across the narrow interval of about forty miles, he had drawn a line of military stations, which was afterwards fortified in the reign of Antoninus Pius, by a turf rampart erected on foundations of stone. This wall of Antoninus, at a small distance beyond the modern cities of Edinburgh and Glasgow, was fixed as the limit of the Roman province. The native Caledonians preserved in the northern extremity of the island their wild independence, for which they were not less indebted to their poverty than to their valour. Their incursions were frequently repelled and chastised; but their country was never subdued. The masters of the fairest and most wealthy climates of the globe turned with contempt from gloomy hills, assailed by the winter tempest, from lakes concealed in a blue mist, and from cold and lonely heaths, over which the deer of the forest were chased by a troop of naked barbarians." Such was the state of the Roman Conquest of Da. frontiers, and such the maxims of impe- cia; the second exception. rial policy from the death of Augustus to the accession of Trajan. That virtuous and active prince had received the education of a soldier, and Mela, 1. iii. c. 6. (he wrote under Claudius,) that, by the success of the Roman arms, the island and its savage inhabitants would soon be better known. It is amusing enough to peruse such passages in the midst of London. h See the admirable abridgment given by Tacitus, in the Life of Agricola, and copiously, though perhaps not completely, illustrated by our own antiquarians, Camden and Horsley. i The Irish writers, jealous of their national honour, are extremely provoked on this occasion, both with Tacitus and with Agricola. k See Horsley's Britannia Romana, l. i. c. 10. 1 The poet Buchanan celebrates, with elegance and spirit, (see his Sylvæ, v.) the unviolated independence of his native country. But, if the single testimony of Richard of Cirencester was sufficient to create a Roman province of Vespasiana to the north of the wall, that independence would be reduced within very narrow limits. m See Appian (in Procem.) and the uniform imagery of Ossian's Poems, which, according to every hypothesis, were composed by a native Caledonian. 3 were informed that the kings of Bosphorus, Colchos, Iberia, Albania, Osrhoene, and even the Parthian monarch himself, had accepted their diadems from the hands of the emperor; that the independent tribes of the Median and Carducian hills had implored his protection; and that the rich countries of Armenia, Mesopotamia, and Assyria, were reduced into the state of provinces. But the death of Trajan soon clouded the splendid prospect; and it was justly to be dreaded, that so many distant nations would throw off the unaccustomed yoke, when they were no longer restrained by the powerful hand which had imposed it. successor Ha. possessed the talents of a general." The peaceful system of his predecessors was interrupted by scenes of war and conquest; and the legions, after a long interval, beheld a military emperor at their head. The first exploits of Trajan were against the Dacians, the most warlike of men, who dwelt beyond the Danube, and who, during the reign of Domitian, had insulted with impunity the majesty of Rome." To the strength and fierceness of barbarians, they added a contempt for life, which was derived from a warm persuasion of the immortality and transmigration of the soul. Decebalus, the Dacian king, approved himself a rival not unworthy of Trajan; nor did he despair of his own and the public fortune, till, by the confession of his enemies, he had exhausted every resource both of valour and policy. This memorable war, with a very short suspension of hostilities, lasted five years; and as the emperor could exert, without control, the whole force of the state, it was terminated by an absolute submission of the barbarians. The new province of Dacia, which formed a second exception to the precept of Augustus, was about thirteen hundred miles in circumference. Its natural boundaries were the Nicster, the Teyss, or Tibiscus, the Lower Danube, and the Euxine sea. The vestiges of a military road may still be traced from the banks of the Danube to the neighbourhood of Bender, a place famous in modern history, and the actual frontier of the Turk-measure of his reign. He restored to the Parthians ish and Russian empires." Conquests of Tra Trajan was ambitious of fame; and jan in the East. as long as mankind shall continue to bestow more liberal applause on their destroyers than on their benefactors, the thirst of military glory | will ever be the vice of the most exalted characters. The praises of Alexander, transmitted by a succession of poets and historians, had kindled a dangerous emulation in the mind of Trajan. Like him the Roman emperor undertook an expedition against the nations of the East, but he lamented with a sigh, that his advanced age scarcely left him any hopes of equalling the renown of the son of Philip. Yet the success of Trajan, however transient, was rapid and specious. The degenerate Parthians, broken by intestine discord, fled before his arms. He descended the river Tigris in triumph, from the mountains of Armenia to the Persian gulph. He enjoyed the ho- | nour of being the first, as he was the last, of the Roman generals, who ever navigated that remote sea. His fleets ravaged the coasts of Arabia; and Trajan vainly flattered himself that he was approaching toward the confines of India." Every day the astonished senate received the intelligence of new names and new nations, that acknowledged his sway. They See Pliny's Panegyric, which seems founded on facts. • Dion Cassius, 1. lxvii. p Herodotus, 1. iv. c. 94. Julian in the Caesars, with Spanheim's observations. a Plin. Epist. viii. 9. Dion Cassius, 1. lxviii. p. 1123-1131. Julian in Cæsaribus. tropius, viii. 2-6. Aurelius Victor in Epitome. Eu See a Memoir of M. d'Anville, on the Province of Dacia, in the Academie des Inscriptions, tom. xxviii. 444-468. Trajan's sentiments are represented in a very just and lively manner in the Caesars of Julian. It was an ancient tradition, that Resigned by his when the Capitol was founded by one drian of the Roman kings, the god Terminus (who presided over boundaries, and was represented according to the fashion of that age by a large stone) alone, among all the inferior deities, refused to yield his place to Jupiter himself. A favourable inference was drawn from his obstinacy, which was interpreted by the augurs, as a sure presage that the boundaries of the Roman power would never recede. During many ages, the prediction, as it is usual, contributed to its own accomplishment. But though Terminus had resisted the majesty of Jupiter, he submitted to the authority of the emperor Hadrian. The resignation of all the eastern conquests of Trajan was the first the election of an independent sovereign, withdrew the Roman garrisons from the provinces of Armenia, Mesopotamia, and Assyria, and, in compliance with the precept of Augustus, once more established the Euphrates as the frontier of the empire. Censure, which arraigns the public actions and the private motives of princes, has ascribed to envy, a conduct, which might be attributed to the prudence and moderation of Hadrian. The various character of that emperor, capable, by turns, of the meanest and the most generous sentiments, may afford some colour to the suspicion. It was, however, scarcely in his power to place the superiority of his predecessor in a more conspicuous light, than by thus confessing himself unequal to the task of defending the conquests of Trajan. Contrast of Ha. drian and Anto The martial and ambitious spirit of Trajan formed a very singular contrast ninus Pius. with the moderation of his successor. The restless activity of Hadrian was not less remarkable, when compared with the gentle repose of Antoninus Pius. The life of the former was almost a perpetual journey; and as he possessed the various talents of the soldier, the statesman, and the scholar, he gratified his curiosity in the discharge of his duty. Careless u Eutropius and Sextus Rufus have endeavoured to perpetuate the illusion. See a very sensible dissertation of M. Freret in the Academie des Inscriptions, tom. xxi. p. 55. x Dion Cassius, I. Ixviii.; and the Abbreviators. y Ovid. Fast. I. ii. ver. 667. See Livy, and Dionysius of Halicarnassus, under the reign of Tarquin. St. Augustin is highly delighted with the proof of the weakness of Terminus, and the vanity of the augurs. See De Civitate Dei, iv. 29. a See the Augustan History, p. 5. Jerome's Chronicle, and all the Epitomisers. It is somewhat surprising, that this memorable event should be omitted by Dion, or rather by Xiphilin. two Antonines. cess, will now become the proper and important object of our attention. blishment of the Roman emper. of the difference of seasons and of climates, he marched on foot, and bare-headed, over the snows of Caledonia, and the sultry plains of the Upper Egypt; In the purer ages of the common- Military esta. nor was there a province of the empire, which, in wealth, the use of arms was reserved the course of his reign, was not honoured with the for those ranks of citizens who had a ors. presence of the monarch. But the tranquil life of country to love, a property to defend, and some Antoninus Pius was spent in the bosom of Italy; share in enacting those laws, which it was their inand, during the twenty-three years that he directed terest, as well as duty, to maintain. But in proporthe public administration, the longest journeys of tion as the public freedom was lost in extent of that amiable prince extended no farther than from conquest, war was gradually improved into an art, his palace in Rome, to the retirement of his Lanu- and degraded into a trade. The legions themselves, vian villa.c even at the time when they were recruited in the Notwithstanding this difference in most distant provinces, were supposed to consist of Pacific system of Hadrian and the their personal conduct, the general sys- Roman citizens. That distinction was generally tem of Augustus was equally adopted considered, either as a legal qualification, or as a and uniformly pursued by Hadrian and by the two proper recompence for the soldier; but a more seAntonines. They persisted in the design of maintain-rious regard was paid to the essential merit of age, ing the dignity of the empire, without attempting to enlarge its limits. By every honourable expedient they invited the friendship of the barbarians; and endeavoured to convince mankind, that the Roman power, raised above the temptation of conquest, was actuated only by the love of order and justice. During a long period of forty-three years their virtuous labours were crowned with success; and if we except a few slight hostilitics that served to exercise the legions of the frontier, the reigns of Hadrian and Antoninus Pius offer the fair prospect of universal peace. The Roman name was revered among the most remote nations of the earth. The fiercest barbarians frequently submitted their differences to the arbitration of the emperor; and we are informed by a contemporary historian, that he had seen ambassadors who were refused the honour which they came to solicit, of being admitted into the rank of subjects. The terror of the Roman arms added of Marcus An- weight and dignity to the moderation toninus. of the emperors. They preserved peace by a constant preparation for war; and while justice regulated their conduct, they announced to the nations on their confines, that they were as little disposed to endure, as to offer, an injury. The military strength, which it had been sufficient for Hadrian and the elder Antoninus to display, was exerted against the Parthians and the Germans by the Emperor Marcus. The hostilities of the barbarians provoked the resentment of that philosophic monarch, and, in the prosecution of a just defence, Marcus and his generals obtained many signal victories, both on the Euphrates, and on the Danube. The military establishment of the Roman empire, which thus assured either its tranquillity or its suc strength, and military stature. In all levies, a just preference was given to the climates of the north over those of the south: the race of men born to the exercise of arms was sought for in the country rather than in cities; and it was very reasonably presumed that the hardy occupations of smiths, carpenters, and huntsmen, would supply more vigour and resolution, than the sedentary trades which are employed in the service of luxury. After every qualification of property had been laid aside, the armies of the Roman emperors were still commanded, for the most part, by officers of a liberal birth and education; but the common soldiers, like the mercenary troops of modern Europe, were drawn from the meanest, and very frequently from the most profligate, of mankind. Defensive wars b Dion, 1. Ixix. p. 1158. Hist. August. p. 5-8. If all our historians were lost, medals, inscriptions, and other monuments, would be suffi cient to record the travels of Hadrian. e See the Augustan History and the Epitomes. d We must, however, remember that in the time of Hadrian, a rebellion of the Jews raged with religious fury, though only in a single province: Pausanias (1. viii. c. 43.) mentions two necessary and succes. ful wars, conducted by the generals of Pius. 1st, Against the wandering Moors, who were driven into the solitudes of Atlas. 2nd, Against the Brigantes of Britain, who had invaded the Roman province. Both these wars (with several other hostilities) are mentioned in the Augustan History, p. 19. e Appian of Alexandria, in the preface to his history of the Roman wars. That public virtue which among the Discipline. ancients was denominated patriotism, is derived from a strong sense of our own interest in the preservation and prosperity of the free government of which we are members. Such a sentiment, which had rendered the legions of the republic almost invincible, could make but a very feeble impression on the mercenary servants of a despotic prince; and it became necessary to supply that defect by other motives, of a different, but not less forcible nature; honour and religion. The peasant, or mechanic, imbibed the useful prejudice that he was advanced to the more dignified profession of arms, in which his rank and reputation would depend on his own valour; and that, although the prowess of a private soldier must often escape the notice of fame, his own behaviour might sometimes confer glory or disgrace on the company, the legion, or even the army, to whose honours he was associated. On his first f Dion, 1. lxxi. Hist. August. in Marco. The Parthian victories gave birth to a crowd of contemptible historians, whose memory has been rescued from oblivion, and exposed to ridicule, in a very lively piece of criticism of Lucian. The poorest rank of soldiers possessed above forty pound sterling, (Dionys. Halicarn. iv. 17.) a very high qualification at a time when money was so scarce, that an ounce of silver was equivalent to seventy pound weight of brass. The populace, excluded by the ancient constitution, were indiscriminately admitted by Marius. See Sallust. de Bell. Jugurth. c. 91. h Cæsar formed his legion Alauda of Gauls and strangers: but it was during the licence of civil war; and after the victory, he gave them the freedom of the city for their reward. i See Vegetius de Re Militari, I. i. c. 2–7. |