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nean Sea, its coasts and its islands, were comprised within the Roman dominion. Of the larger Islands, the two Baleares, which derive their name of Majorca and Minorca from their respective size, are subject at present, the former to Spain, the latter to Great Britain.* It is easier to deplore the fate, than to describe the actual condition, of Corsica.† Two Italian sovereigns assume a legal title from Sardinia and Sicily. Crete, or Candia, with Cyprus, and most of the smaller islands of Greece and Asia, have been subdued by the Turkish arms; whilst the little rock of Malta defies their power, and has emerged, under the government of its military Order, into fame and opulence.‡

This long enumeration of provinces, whose broken fragments have formed so many powerful kingdoms, might almost induce us to forgive the vanity or ignorance of the ancients. Dazzled with the extensive sway, the irresistible strength, and the real or affected moderation of the emperors, they permitted themselves to despise, and sometimes to forget, the outlying countries which had been left in the enjoyment of a barbarous independence; and they gradually usurped the license of confounding the Roman monarchy with the globe of the earth.98 But the temper, as well as the knowledge, of a modern historian, require a more sober and accurate language. He may impress a juster image of the greatness of Rome, by observing that the empire was above two thousand miles in breadth, from the wall of Antoninus and the northern limits of Dacia, to Mount Atlas and the tropic of Cancer; that it extended in length more than three thousand miles from the Western Ocean to the Euphrates; that it was situated in the finest part of the Temperate Zone, between the twenty-fourth and fifty-sixth degrees of northern latitude; and that it was supposed to contain above sixteen hundred thousand square miles, for the most part of fertile and well-cultivated land. 89

88 Bergier, Hist. des Grands Chemins, 1. iii. c. 1, 2, 3, 4, a very useful collection.

89 See Templeman's Survey of the Globe; but I distrust both the Doctor's learning and his maps.

year.-M.

Minorca was last to Great Britain in 1782. Ann. Register for that †The gallant struggles of the Corsicans for their independence, under Paoli, were brought to a close in the year 1769. This volume was published in 1776. See Botta, Storia d' Italia, vol. xiv.-M.

Malta, it need scarcely be said, is now in the possession of the English. We have not, however, thought necessary to notice every charge in the political state of the world, since the time of Gibbon.-M.

CHAPTER II.

OF THE UNION AND INTERNAL PROSPERITY OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE, IN THE AGE OF THE ANTONINES.

It is not alone by the rapidity, or extent of conquest, that we should estimate the greatness of Rome. The sovereign of the Russian deserts commands a larger portion of the globe. In the seventh summer after his passage of the Hel, lespont, Alexander erected the Macedonian trophies on the banks of the Hyphasis. Within less than a century, the irresistible Zingis, and the Mogul princes of his race, spread their cruel devastations and transcient empire from the sea of China, to the confines of Egypt and Germany.2 But the firm edifice of Roman power was raised and preserved by the wisdom of ages. The obedient provinces of Trajan and the Antonines were united by laws, and adorned by arts. They might occasionally suffer from the partial abuse of delegated authority; but the general principle of government was wise, simple, and beneficent. They enjoyed the religion of their ancestors, whilst in civil honors and advantages they were exalted, by just degrees, to an equality with their conquerors.

I.

The policy of the emperors and the senate, so far as it

They were erected about the midway between Lahor and Delhi. The conquests of Alexander in Hindostan were confined to the Punjab, a country watered by the five great streams of the Indus.* 2 See M. de Guignes, Histoire des Huns, 1. xv. xvi. and xvii.

The Hyphasis is one of the five rivers which join the Indus or the Sind, after having traversed the province of Pendj-ab-a name which, in Persian, signifies five rivers. * G. The five rivers were, 1. The Hydaspes, now the Chelum, Behni, or Bedusta, (Sanscrit, Vitasha, Arrow-swift.) 2. The Acesines, the Chenab, Sanscrit, Chandrabhága, Moon-gift.) 3. Hydraotes, the Ravey, or Iraoty, (Sanscrit, Irávati.) 4. Hyphasis, the Beyah, (Sanscrit, Vespása, Fetterless.) 5. The Satadru, (Sanscrit, the Hundred Streamed,) the Sutledi, known first to the Greeks in the time of Ptolemy, Rennel, Vincent, Commerce of Anc. book 2. Lassen, Pentapotam. Ind. Wilson's Sanscrit Dict., and the valuable memoir of Lient. Burnes, Journal of London Geogr. Society, vol. iii. p. 2, with the travels of that very able writer. Compare Gibbon's own note, c. lxv. note 25.-M. substit. for G.

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concerned religion, was happily seconded by the reflections of the enlightened, and by the habits of the superstitious, part of their subjects. The various modes of worship, which prevailed in the Roman world, were all considered by the people as equally true; by the philosopher, as equally false; and by the magistrate, as equally useful. And thus toleration produced not only mutual indulgence, but even religious concord.

The superstition of the people was not imbittered by any mixture of theological rancor; nor was it confined by the chains of any speculative system. The devout polytheist, though fondly attached to his national rites, admitted with implicit faith the different religions of the earth. Fear, gratitude, and curiosity, a dream or an omen, a singular disorder, or a distant journey, perpetually disposed him to multiply the articles of his belief, and to enlarge the list of his protectors. The thin texture of the Pagan mythology was interwoven with various, but not discordant materials. As soon as it was allowed that sages and heroes, who had lived or who had died for the benefit of their country, were exalted to a state of power and immortality, it was universally confessed, that they

3 There is not any writer who describes in so lively a manner as Herodotus the true genius of polytheism. The best commentary may be found in Mr. Hume's Natural History of Religion; and the best contrast in Bossuet's Universal History. Some obscure traces of an intolerant spirit appear in the conduct of the Egyptians, (see Juvenal, Sat. xv. ;) and the Christians, as well as Jews, who lived under the Roman empire, formed a very important exception; so important indeed, that the discussion will require a distinct chapter of this work.*

*M Constant in his very learned and eloquent work, "Sur la Religion," with two additional volumes, "Du Polytheisme Romain," has considered the whole history of polytheism in a tone of philosophy, which without subscribing to all his opinions, we may be permitted to admire. "The boasted tolerance of polytheism did not rest upon the respect due from society to the freedom of individual opinion. The polytheistic nations, tolerant as they were towards each other, as separate states, were not the less ignorant of the eternal principle, the only basis of enlightened toleration, that every one has a right to worship God in the manner which seems to him the best. Citizens, on the contrary were bound to conform to the religion of the state; they had not the liberty to adopt a foreign religion, though that religion might be legally recognized in their own city,for the strangers who were its votaries."-Sur la Religion, v. 184. Du Polyth. Rom. ii. 308. At this time, the growing religious indifference, and the general administration of the empire by Romans, who being strangers, would do no more than protect, not enlist themselves in the cause of the local superstitions, had introduced great laxity. But intolerance was clearly the theory both of the Greek and Roman law. The subject is more fully considered in another place.-M.

deserved, if not the adoration, at least the reverence, of all mankind, The deities of a thousand groves and a thousand streams possessed, in peace, their local and respective influence; nor could the Roman who deprecated the wrath of the Tiber, deride the Egyptian who presented his offering to the beneficent genius of the Nile. The visible powers of nature, the planets, and the elements, were the same throughout the universe. The invisible governors of the moral world were inevitably cast in a similar mould of fiction and allegory. Every virtue, and even vice, acquired its divine representasive; every art and profession its patron, whose attributes, in the most distant ages and countries, were uniformly derived from the character of their peculiar votaries. A republic of gods, of such opposite tempers and interests, required, in every system, the moderating hand of a supreme magistrate, who, by the progress of knowledge and flattery, was gradualy invested with the sublime perfections of an Eternal Parent, and an Omnipotent Monarch. Such was the mild spirit of antiquity, that the nations were less attentive to the difference, than to the resemblance, of their religious worship. The Greek, the Roman, and the Barbarian, as they met before their respective altars, easily persuaded themselves, that under various names, and with various ceremonies, they adored the same deities. The elegant mythology of Homer gave a beautiful, and almost a regular form, to the polytheism of the ancient world.

The philosophers of Greece deduced their morals from the nature of man, rather than from that of God. They meditated, however, on the Divine Nature, as a very curious and important speculation; and in the profound inquiry, they displayed the strength and weakness of the human understand

The rights, powers, and pretensions of the sovereign of Olympus, are very clearly described in the xvth book of the Ilhad; in the Greek original, I mean; for Mr. Pope, without perceiving it, has improved the theology of Homer.*

See, for instance, Cæsar de Bell. Gall. vi 17. Within a century or two, the Gauls themselves applied to their gods the names of Mercury, Mars, Appollo, &c.

There is a curious coincidence between Gibbon's explanation and those of the newly-recovered “De Republica" of Cicero, though the argument is rather the converse, lib. i. c. 36. "Sive hæc ad utilitatem vitæ constituta sint a pricipibus rerum publicarum, ut rex putaretur unus esse in cœlo, qui nutu, ut ait Homerus, totum Olympum converteret, idemque et rex et pater haberetur omniuin."-M.

ing. Of the four most celebrated schools, the Stoics and the Platonists endeavored to reconcile the jarring interests of rea son and piety. They have left us the most sublime proofs of the existence and perfections of the first cause; but, as it was impossible for them to conceive the creation of matter, the workman in the Stoic philosophy was not sufficiently distin, guished from the work; whilst, on the contrary, the Spiritual God of Plato and his disciples resembled an idea, rather than a substance. The opinions of the Academics and Epicureans were of a less religious cast; but whilst the modest science of the former induced them to doubt, the positive ignorance of the latter urged them to deny, the providence of a Supreme Ruler. The spirit of inquiry, prompted by emulation, and supported by freedom, had divided the public teachers of philosophy into a variety of contending sects; but the ingenious youth, who, from every part, resorted to Athens, and the other seats of learning in the Roman Empire, were alike instructed in every school to reject and to despise the religion of the multitude. How, indeed, was it possible, that a philosopher should accept, as divine truths, the idle tales of the poets, and the incoherent traditions of antiquity; or that he should adore, as gods, those imperfect beings whom he must have despised, as men? Against such unworthy adversaries, Cicero conde scended to employ the arms of reason and eloquence; but the satire of Lucian was a much more adequte, as well as more efficacious weapon. We may be well assured, that a writer, conversant with the world, would never have ventured to expose the gods of his country to public ridicule, had they not already been the objects of secret contempt among the polished and enlightened orders of society."

Notwithstanding the fashionable irreligion which prevailed in the age of the Antonines, both the interest of the priests and the eredulity of the people were sufficiently respected. In their writings and conversation, the philosophers of antiquity asserted the independent dignity of reason; but they resigned their actions to the commands of law and of custom. View

The admirable work of Cicero de Natura Deorum is the best clew we have to guide us through the dark and profound abyss. He rep resents with candor, and confutes with subtlety, the opinions of the philosophers

7 I do not pretend to assert, that, in this irreligious age, the natu ural terrors of superstition, dreams, omens, apparitions, &c., had los their efficacy.

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