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and Rome at Ancyra (now Angora), in Galatia.* with his nineteenth year, it bears witness to his filial piety in doing justice on his father's murderers; it touches lightly upon the proscriptions, and vaunts the unanimity of all good citizens in his favour, when 500,000 Romans arrayed themselves under the banner of the triumvir. It records his assignment of lands to the veterans, and the triumphs and ovations decreed him by the Senate. It signalizes his prudence in civil affairs, in revising the Senate, in multiplying the Patricians, and in three times holding a lustrum of the people. It enumerates the magistracies and priesthoods conferred upon him, and boasts of his thrice closing the temple of Janus. His liberality is commemorated in his various largesses both of corn and money, and the vast contributions he made from his private treasures to relieve the burdens of his subjects. His magnificence is made to appear in the temples and public structures he built or caused to be built; in his halls and forums, his colonnades and aqueducts; nor less in the glorious spectacles he exhibited, and the multitude of beasts he hunted in the amphitheatre. The patriotism of Octavian shone conspicuous in his overthrow of the pirate Sextus, with his crew of fugitive slaves. Italy, it is added, swore allegiance to him of her own accord, and every province in succession followed her example. Under his auspices the empire had reached the Elbe, a Roman fleet had navigated the Northern Ocean, the Pannonians and Illyrians had been reduced, the Cimbric Chersonese had sought his friendship and alliance. No nation had been attacked by him without provocation. He had added Egypt to the dominions of Rome; Armenia, with dignified moderation, he had refrained from adding. He had planted Roman colonies in every province. Finally, he had received back from the Parthians the captured standards of Crassus. For all these merits, and others more particularly enumerated, he had been honoured with the laurel wreath and the civil crown; he had received from the Senate the title of AUGUSTUS, and had been hailed by popular acclamation as the FATHER OF HIS COUNTRY.-Such are the most interesting

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From the place of its discovery, it is known as the Monumentum Ancyranum ; but some fragments of a Greek copy have also been found at Apollonia in Pisidia. Its title is "Rerum gestarum divi Augusti exemplar subjectum ;" and it is composed in the first person, beginning, "Annos undeviginti natus exercitum privato consilio et privata impensa comparavi." It is not uninteresting to compare the style and contents of the document with the "Behistun Inscription" containing the record, also in the first person, of the acts of the second founder of the Persian Empire. (See Vol. I. p. 298.)

statements of this extraordinary document; but to judge of the marvellous sobriety and dignity of its tone, the suppressed anticipation of immortal glory which it discovers, the reader must refer to the work itself. Certainly, whatever we may think of the merits of Augustus, no deed of his life became him so well as the preparation he made for quitting it."*

The still unsettled state of the Rhenish and Danubian frontiers shared the latest thoughts of Augustus with this retrospect of his life. Germanicus had already returned to his command upon the Rhine; and Tiberius set out for Illyricum, where there was disaffection among the legions, as well as danger from the barbarians. It was the middle of summer, the season when the emperor usually left Rome for Campania, and he accompanied Tiberius as far as Beneventum. The journey had, however, been broken in consequence of an attack of dysentery, which Augustus had contracted through exposure to the night air at Astura; and on his arrival at Nola in Campania, he was seized with a fatal relapse. Messengers were instantly sent after Tiberius, who had already set sail from Brundisium, and it is uncertain whether he found the emperor still alive, or whether Livia kept the event secret till her son's arrival.

With a full consciousness of his approaching end, the last concern of Augustus was to know whether it caused any popular excitement. He then collected himself to meet death with the self-possession which had governed all his life. He asked for a mirror, and saw that his grey hair and beard were so arranged as to give decent composure to his faded features. Then, looking round upon his friends, he uttered his farewell to the world in the words with which the actors were wont to claim applause for a well-played drama just before the curtain fell. He asked them if he had played his part well in the comedy of life, and added a quotation from the epilogue of a Greek play :

"If all is well, withhold not your applause,

But all with cheerful pleasure clap your hands."

After an enquiry concerning a sick grandchild of Tiberius, he fell back into the arms of Livia, and spent his last breath in words of affection for the wife, who had played her part in the comedy so well, that the Romans believed her capable of hastening her husband's end to ensure the succession of her son. The ancient biographer of the Caesars tells us that whenever Augustus heard.

Merivale, Vol. iv. pp. 374-5.

that a man had had a swift and painless death, he prayed for himself and his friends the like euthanasia; and in this too he followed the opinion of Julius, that the best death is that which is least expected. "He obtained"—the modern historian observes -"the euthanasia he had always desired, very different, but not less in harmony with his character, from that of his predecessor." It would be a profanation of the noblest instincts of our nature and of the pure teaching of a self-denying faith, to compare the calmness of such an end with the deaths of a Cato or a Washington. It sufficed for him and for those who believe that the Cæsars are the true Messiahs. But morality refuses to be debarred from investigating the authority by which they set themselves above their fellow-men, and history tries their work, not by its immediate success, but by its permanent results,-results which now remain to be described in the dark annals of the emperors who succeeded to the power of Augustus over the world, without inheriting his ability to command themselves. The judgment to be passed upon his deeds is perfectly distinct from the acknowledgment of those great ends of which he was the unconscious minister; and the despots who claim to be honoured as if such ends were their merit, may be answered in the words of the prophet to Cyrus, which solve the whole mystery of their career-"I guided thee, though thou hast not known Me."

Augustus died on the 19th of August, A.D. 14, within thirtyfive days of his seventy-seventh birthday (Sept. 23), after a reign of nearly forty-four years from the battle of Actium, or fifty-six from the triumvirate.

CHAPTER XXXVIII.

THE DEGENERACY OF THE CÆSARS; AND THE FLAVIAN DYNASTY. A.D. 14 TO A.D. 96.

"Rome shall perish-write that word

In the blood that she has spilt;
Perish, hopeless and abhorred,

Deep in ruin as in guilt."-COWPER.

TACITUS AND THE HISTORY OF THE CÆSARS-ACCESSION, CHARACTER, AND FIRST ACTS OF TIBERIUS-OATH OF ALLEGIANCE TAKEN BY THE SENATE-TESTAMENT, FUNERAL, AND APOTHEOSIS OF AUGUSTUS-SCENE BETWEEN TIBERIUS AND THE SENATE-ASINIUS GALLUS-ELECTION OF MAGISTRATES TRANSFERRED FROM THE COMITIA TO THE SENATE-MUTINIES OF THE LEGIONS IN PANNONIA AND ON THE RHINE-NOBLE CONDUCT OF GERMANICUS-HIS CAMPAIGNS IN GERMANY-BURIAL OF THE REMAINS OF THE LEGIONS OF VARUS-RETREAT OF CECINA AND GERMANICUS-ARMINIUS AND HIS BROTHER-VICTORY OF THE ROMANS THEIR FINAL RETREAT BEYOND THE RHINE-RECAL OF GERMANICUS-DRUSUS IN ILLYRICUM-WAR BETWEEN THE CHERUSCI AND MARCOMANNI-FATE OF MAROBODUUS AND ARMINIUS-ARMINIUS WORSHIPPED AS A HERO-GERMANICUS IN THE EAST-INTRIGUES OF PISO AND PLANCINA -DEATH OF GERMANICUS-TRIAL AND DEATH OF PISO-TACFARINAS IN AFRICA, AND OTHER WARS-GOVERNMENT OF TIBERIUS-LAW OF TREASON, INFORMERS AND EXECUTIONS VARIOUS INTERNAL MEASURES-EARLIER PROMISE OF TIBERIUS-MARKED CHANGE IN HIS CHARACTER-RISE AND INFLUENCE OF SEJANUS-DRUSUS DESIGNATED AS HEIR, AND MURDERED BY SEJANUS-THE PRÆTORIAN CAMP FORMED AT ROME-NEW VICTIMS OF THE INFORMERS-TIBERIUS QUARRELS WITH AGRIPPINAWITHDRAWS ΤΟ CAPREE HIS OCCUPATIONS, AND ALLEGED ORGIES-DEATH OP LIVIA CONDEMNATION OF AGRIPPINA AND HER SONS ELEVATION AND FALL OF SEJANUS-STARVATION OF DRUSUS AND AGRIPFINA-DEATH OF TIBERIUS-AC

CESSION OF CAIUS CESAR (CALIGULA)-HIS TYRANNY, MADNESS, AND DEATHREIGN OF CLAUDIUS-MAURETANIA AND BRITAIN SENECA-REIGN OP NERO-HIS CHARACTER, TYRANNY, AND DEATH-THE JEWISH WAR-GALBA, OTHO, AND VITELLIUS VICTORY OF VESPASIAN-THE FLAVIAN DYNASTY-CAPTURE OF JERUSALEMCIVILIS AND THE BATAVIANS-AFFAIRS OF THE EAST-REIGN OF TITUS-ERUPTION OF VESUVIUS-FIRE AT ROME THE COLOSSEUM-REIGN AND TYRANNY OF DOMITIAN— DACIAN AND SARMATIAN WARS-CAMPAIGNS OF AGRICOLA IN BRITAIN-PERSECUTION OF THE CHRISTIANS-DEATH OF DOMITIAN.

THE space of fourscore years from the accession of Tiberius to the fall of Domitian includes the accomplishment of the mission of the Saviour of the world, and the end of the Jewish dispensation by the destruction of Jerusalem. In all other aspects, it is one of the most repulsive in the annals of the human race. A few brilliant deeds of arms, and a few noble characters-like Germanicus, Drusus, and Agricola-relieve the story of the degradation of the Roman world under rulers in whom the monstrous growth of vice and cruelty engendered by irresponsible power culminates in an insanity which might excite our pity, did it not aggravate the sufferings of the people :

"Quidquid delirant reges, plectuntur Achivi."

There is a curiosity of horror, for which the repulsive biogra

phies of Suetonius may provide a morbid gratification; * and feelings far deeper and more wholesome are roused by the spectacle of Tacitus, recording the ruin of his country in a spirit which recals the forebodings of Scipio amidst the flames of Carthage, and adorning with a poetic spirit the details over which his sententious brevity throws a veil. But, in pursuing the general course of the history of the world, those details need not detain us longer than the time sufficient to trace the workings of human nature when suffered to exercise uncontrolled dominion, the retribution which the system of despotism brings upon itself, and the course by which Rome was destroyed when her work was done. The change which came over the first successor of Augustus during his reign of twenty-three years is a type of the degeneracy of the whole imperial system.

Tiberius succeeded to the empire of the world, from the mouth of the Rhine to the borders of Ethiopia, and from the Pillars of Hercules to the Euphrates, at the mature age of fifty-six. He had well earned the character of a most skilful and prudent general, and had the benefit of long experience in the administrative system of Augustus. The Roman people were prepared to accept him for their legitimate ruler, unsuspicious as yet of those deep-seated defects of character which Augustus had detected, and the consciousness of which left Tiberius no confidence in himself or those about him. Destitute of "that generous reliance on his personal merits, which nerved the arm of his great predecessor, and imbued him with so lofty a sense of his political mission without the power of "kindling the imagination of the soldiers, like Julius, nor of the citizens, like Augustus," Tiberius led, from his accession, that life of mistrust which made him, in the words of Pliny, "the saddest of mankind," and which at last reduced the hero of the Rhine and Danube to the cruel and sensual monster

The spirit in which Suetonius gloats upon the horrors he relates raises more than a suspicion of wilful exaggeration.

The profound admiration inspired by Tacitus must not blind us to one drawback upon his authority. That very unity of purpose which guides the indignant pen of the patriot and moralist, seems sometimes to betray him into following his own conceptions of characters and events, without a sufficient basis of ascertained facts. In such cases, however, the penetration of genius sometimes gives us a deeper truth than we could have learned from a more literal record. The imagination by which Tacitus, divining the hidden motives of such a man as Tiberius, fills up the picture with traits in perfect keeping with his character, must be distinguished from that more lively and treacherous fancy which can construct a whole picture of events out of the vague hints contained in a few words of an authority who may or may not be trustworthy.

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