only by public oppression, and his ambition never aspired to secure, by their actual distress, the future

increasing the weight of taxes, which, in the space of forty years, had been gradually doubled, he reduced, in the first year of his reign, one fourth of the tribute of the east.' Valentinian appears to have been less attentive and less anxious to relieve the burthens 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.*

Valentinian

A. D. 364-375.

physicians, with stipends and privileges, in the fourteen quarters of Rome. The good sense of an illiterate soldier founded a useful and liberal in-strength and prosperity of his people. Instead of stitution 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 pre-eminence. 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 libraries 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 præfect 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 De-lar insult; nor was any mode of worship prohibited fensors; 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

que constituta est subjacebit. For the present I shall not interfere in the dispute between Noodt and Binkershoek: how far, or how long, this unnatural practice had been condemned or abolished by law, philosophy, and the more civilized state of society.

These salutary institutions are explained in the Theodosian Code, 1. xiii. tit. iii. De Professoribus et Medicis, and 1. xiv. tit. ix. De Studiis liberalitus Urbis Rome. Besides our usual guide, (Godefroy,) We may consult Giannone, (Istoria di Napoli, tom. i. p. 105-111.) who has treated the interesting subject with the zeal and curiosity of a man of letters, who studies his domestic history.

Cod. Theodos. 1. i. tit. xi. with Godefroy's Paratitlon, which diligently gleans from the rest of the code.

Three lines of Ammianus (xxxi. 14.) countenance a whole oration of Themistius, (viii. p. 101-120.) full of adulation, pedantry, and

But the most honourable circumstance of the character of Valentinian, maintains the religious tolera. is the firm and temperate impartiality tion, 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 earth 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 honour 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 popu

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 excrcised by the Tuscan haruspices. He had condemned, with the consent of the most rational pagans, the licence of nocturnal sacrifices; but he immediately admitted the petition of Prætextatus,

common-place morality. The eloquent M. Thomas (tom. i. p. 366– 396.) has amused himself with celebrating the virtues and genius of Themistius, who was not unworthy of the age in which he lived.

8 Zosimus, l. iv. p. 262. Ammian. xxx. 9. His reformation of costly abuses might entitle him to the praise of, in provinciales admodum parcus, tributorum ubique molliens sarcinas. By some his frugality was styled avarice. (Jerom. Chron. p. 186.)

t Testes sunt leges a me in exordio imperii mei datæ ; quibus unicuique quod animo imbibisset colendi libera facultas tributa est. Cod. Theodos, 1. ix. tit. xvi. leg. 9. To this declaration of Valentinian, we may add the various testimonies of Ammianus, (xxx. 9.) Zosimus, (l. iv. p. 204.) and Sozomen, (1. vi. c. 7. 21.) Baronius would naturally blame such rational toleration, (Annal. Eccles. A. D. 370, No. 129-132. A. D. 376. No. 3, 4.)

The strict regulations which have

Valentinian re

strains the clergy,

avarice of the

A. D. 370.

ceeded the orders, or even the intentions, of their | The ministers of Valens seem to have extended the master; and that the real measure of facts has sense of this penal statute, since they claimed a right been very liberally magnified by the vehement de-of enlisting the young and able-bodied monks in the clamation, and easy credulity, of his antagonists. imperial armies. A detachment of cavalry and in1. The silence of Valentinian may suggest a pro- | fantry, consisting of three thousand men, marched bable argument, that the partial severities, which | from Alexandria into the adjacent desert of Nitria,f were exercised in the name and provinces of his which was peopled by five thousand monks. The colleague, amounted only to some obscure and in- soldiers were conducted by Arian priests; and it is considerable deviations from the established system reported, that a considerable slaughter was made of religious toleration: and the judicious historian, in the monasteries which disobeyed the commands who has praised the equal temper of the elder bro- of their sovereign. ther, has not thought himself obliged to contrast the tranquillity of the west with the cruel persecu-been framed by the wisdom of modern tion of the east. 2. Whatever credit may be allowed legislators to restrain the wealth and to vague and distant reports, the character, or at avarice of the clergy, may be originleast the behaviour, of Valens may be most dis- ally deduced from the example of the emperor Vatinctly seen in his personal transactions with the lentinian. His edict addressed to Damasus, bishop eloquent Basil, archbishop of Cæsarea, who had of Rome, was publicly read in the churches of the succeeded Athanasius in the management of the city. He admonished the ecclesiastics and monks Trinitarian cause.b The circumstantial narrative not to frequent the houses of widows and virgins; has been composed by the friends and admirers of and menaced their disobedience with the animadBasil; and as soon as we have stripped away a version of the civil judge. The director was no thick coat of rhetoric and miracle, we shall be longer permitted to receive any gift, or legacy, or astonished by the unexpected mildness of the Arian inheritance, from the liberality of his spiritual tyrant, who admired the firmness of his character, daughter: every testament contrary to this edict or was apprehensive, if he employed violence, of a was declared null and void; and the illegal donageneral revolt in the province of Cappadocia. The tion was confiscated for the use of the treasury. archbishop, who asserted, with inflexible pride, By a subsequent regulation, it should seem, that the truth of his opinions, and the dignity of his the same provisions were extended to nuns and rank, was left in the free possession of his con- bishops; and that all persons of the ecclesiastical science, and his throne. The emperor devoutly order were rendered incapable of receiving any tesassisted at the solemn service of the cathedral; and, tamentary gifts, and strictly confined to the natural instead of a sentence of banishment, subscribed the and legal rights of inheritance. As the guardian donation of a valuable estate for the use of an hos- of domestic happiness and virtue, Valentinian appital, which Basil had lately founded in the neigh- plied this severe remedy to the growing evil. In bourhood of Cæsarca. 3. I am not able to dis- the capital of the empire, the females of noble and cover, that any law (such as Theodosius afterwards opulent houses possessed a very ample share of inenacted against the Arians) was published by Va-dependent property: and many of those devout lens against the Athanasian sectaries; and the edict which excited the most violent clamours, 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 those deserters of society to accept the fair alternative, of renouncing their temporal possessions, or of discharging the public duties of men and citizens.

2 Dr. Jortin (Remarks on Ecclesiastical History, vol. iv. p. 78.) has already conceived and intimated the same suspicion.

This reflection is so obvious and forcible, that Orosius (1. vii. c. 32, 33.) delays the persecution till after the death of Valentinian. Socrates, on the other hand, supposes (1. iii. c. 32.) that it was appeased by a philosophical oration, which Themistius pronounced in the year 374. (Orat. xii. p. 154. in Latin only.) Such contradictions diminish the evidence, and reduce the term, of the persecution of Valens.

b Tillemont, whom I follow and abridge, has extracted (Mem. Eccles. tom. viii. p. 153-167.) the most authentic circumstances from the Panegyrics of the two Gregories; the brother, and the friend, of Basil. The letters of Basil himself (Dupin, Bibliotheque Ecclesiastique, tom. ii. p. 155-180.) do not present the image of a very lively persecution. e Basilius Cæsariensis episcopus Cappadocia clarus habetur....qui multa continentiæ et ingenii bona uno superbiæ malo perdidit. This irreverent passage is perfectly in the style and character of St. Jerom. It does not appear in Scaliger's edition of his Chronicle; but Isaac Vossius found it in some old MSS. which had not been reformed by the

monks,

d This noble and charitable foundation (almost a new city) surpassed

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

in merit, if not in greatness, the pyramids, or the walls of Babylon. It was principally intended for the reception of lepers. (Greg. Nazianzen, Orat. xx. p. 439.)

e Cod. Theodos, I. xii. tit. i. leg. 63. Godefroy (tom. iv. p. 409–413.) performs the duty of a commentator and advocate. Tillemont (Mem. Eccles. tom. viii. p. 808.) supposes a second law to excuse his orthodox friends, who had misrepresented the edict of Valens, and suppressed the liberty of choice.

f See D'Anville, Description de l'Egypte, p. 74. consider the monastic institutions.

Hereafter I shall

Jerom in Chron.

g Socrates, l. iv. c. 24, 25. Orosius, 1. vii. c. 33. p. 189. and tom. ii. p. 212. The monks of Egypt performed many miracles, which prove the truth of their faith. Right, says Jortin, (Remarks, vol. iv. p. 79.) but what proves the truth of those miracles? h Cod. Theodos. 1. xvi. tit. ii. leg. 20. Godefroy, (tom. vi. p. 49.) after the example of Baronius, impartially collects all that the fathers have said on the subject of this important law; whose spirit was long afterwards revived by the emperor Frederic II. Edward I. of England, and other christian princes who reigned after the twelfth century.

66

his impartial sense in these expressive words: The præfecture 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 ardour 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 præfect, unable to resist or to 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 Basilica 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 splendour 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 contest. The suc

enthusiasts; who hastened from the extremes 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 he 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 cessful candidate is secure, that he will be enriched had deserved to lose a privilege, which was still by the offerings of matrons; that, as soon as his enjoyed by comedians, charioteers, and the minis- dress is composed with becoming care and elegance, ters of idols. But the wisdom and authority of the he may proceed, in his chariot, through the streets legislator are seldom victorious in a contest with of Rome; and, that the sumptuousness of the imthe vigilant dexterity of private interest: and Jc- perial table will not equal the profuse and delicate rom, or Ambrose, might patiently acquiesce in the entertainments provided by the taste, and at the justice of an ineffectual or salutary law. If the expense, of the Roman pontiffs. How much more ecclesiastics were checked in the pursuit of personal rationally (continues the honest pagan) would those emolument, they would exert a more laudable in- | pontiffs consult their true happiness, if, instead of dustry to increase the wealth of the church; and alleging the greatness of the city as an excuse for dignify their covetousness with the specious names their manners, they would imitate the exemplary of piety and patriotism. life of some provincial bishops, whose temperance and sobriety, whose mean apparel and downcast looks, recommended 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 præfect Prætextatus' restored the tranquillity of the city. Prætextatus 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

Ambition and

luxury of Damasus, bishop of Rome,

A. D. 366-384.

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

i The expressions which I have used are temperate and feeble, if compared with the vehement invectives of Jerom, (tom. i. p. 13. 45. 144, &c.) In his turn, he was reproached with the guilt which he im. puted to his brother monks: and the Sceleratus, the Versipellis, was publicly accused as the lover of the widow Paula, (tom. ii. p. 363.) He undoubtedly possessed the affections, both of the mother and the daughter; but he declares, that he never abused his influence to any selfish or sensual purpose.

k Pudet dicere, sacerdotes idolorum, mimi et auriga, et scorta, hæreditates capiunt: solis clericis ac monachis hâc lege prohibetur. Et non prohibetur a persecutoribus, sed a principibus christianis. Nec de lege queror; sed doleo cur meruerimus hanc legem. Jerom (tom. i. p. 13.) discreetly insinuates the secret policy of his patron Da.

masus.

1 Three words of Jerom, sancta memoriæ Damasus (tom. ii. p. 119.) wash away all his stains, and blind the devout eyes of Tillemont, (Mem. Eccles, tom. viii. p. 386-424.)

m Jerom himself is forced to allow, crudelissimæ interfectiones di. versi sexus perpetratæ, (in Chron. p. 186.) But an original libel or petition of two presbyters of the adverse party, has unaccountably escaped. They affirm, that the doors of the Basilica were burut, and that the roof was untiled; that Damasus marched at the head of his own clergy, gravediggers, charioteers, and hired gladiators; that none of his party were killed, but that one hundred and sixty dead bodies

were found. This petition is published by the P. Sirmond, in the first

volume of his works.

The Basilica of Sicininus, or Liberius, is probably the church of Sancta Maria Maggiore, on the Esquiline hill. Baronius, A. D. 367, No. 3. and Donatus, Roma Antiqua et Nova, I. iv. c. 8. p. 462.

The enemies of Damasus styled him Auriscalpius Matronarum, the ladies' ear-scratcher.

P Gregory Nazianzen (Orat. xxxii. p. 526.) describes the pride and luxury of the prelates, who reigned in the imperial cities; their gilt car, fiery steeds, numerous train, &c. The crowd gave way as to a wild

beast.

Ammian, xxvii. 3. Perpetuo Numini, verisque ejus cultoribus. The incomparable pliancy of a polytheist !

Ammianus, who makes a fair report of his præfecture (xxvii. 9.) styles him præclaræ indolis, gravitatisque, senator, (xxii. 7. and Vales. ad loc.) A curious inscription (Gruter MCII. No. 2.) records, in two columns, his religious and civil honours. In one line he was pontiff of the Sun, and of Vesta, Augur, Quindecemvir, Hierophant, &c. &c. In the other, L. Quæstor candidatus, more probably titular. 2. Prætor. 3. Corrector of Tuscany and Umbria. 4. Consular of Lusitania. 5. Proconsul of Achaia. 6. Præfect of Rome. 7. Prætorian præfect of Italy. 8. Of Illyricum. 9. Consal elect; but he died before the beginning of the year 385. See Tillemont, Hist. des Empereurs, tom. v. p. 241. 736.

christian religion. This lively picture of the wealth | broke through the barrier of the Rhine, during the 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.