greater triumph over its own passions. The task now lies before it of consolidating its acquisitions and imparting civilization to its subjects. — MERIVALE. A municipal corporation like Rome might be able to conquer the world, but it was a much more difficult task to govern it, to mould it into one compact body. Thus, when the work seemed done, when all the West and a great part of the East had submitted to the Roman yoke, we find an immense host of cities, of little states formed for separate existence and independence, breaking their chains, escaping on every side. This was one of the causes which made the establishment of the empire necessary; which called for a more concentrated form of government, one better able to hold together elements which had so few points of cohesion. GUIZOT. The Romans, having acquired a vast dominion, were met by the great problem which every first-class power is called upon to solve, by what means many communities, with different languages, customs, characters, and traditions, can be retained peaceably under a single ruler. LECKY. With respect to the empire, the first question which presents itself is, Whence that is, from what causes and from what era we are regu to date its decline? Gibbon, as we all know, dates it from the reign of Commodus [A. D. 180-192], but certainly upon no sufficient, or even plausible, grounds. Our own opinion we shall state boldly : the empire itself, from the very era of its establishment, was one long decline of the Roman power. A vast monarchy had been created and consolidated by the all-conquering instincts of a republic, - cradled and nursed in wars, and essentially warlike by means of all its institutions and by the habits of the people. This monarchy had been of too slow a growth, — too gradual, and too much according to the lar stages of nature herself in its development, to have any chance of being other than well cemented; the cohesion of its parts was intense; seven centuries of growth demand one or two at least for palpable decay.... Hence it was—and from the prudence of Augustus acting through a very long reign, sustained at no very distant interval by the personal inspection and revisions of Hadrian — that for some time the Roman power seemed to be stationary. What els could be expected? . . . If the empire seemed to be stationary .ing some time after its establishment by Julius, and its final settle great by Augustus, this was through no strength of its own, or inherent in its own constitution, but through the continued action of that strength which it had inherited from the republic. In a philosophical sense, therefore, it may be affirmed that the empire of the Caesars was always in decline; ceasing to go forward, it could not do other than retrograde. DE QUINCEY. The later portion of the history of the republic, though deeply disheartening, yet cannot but enlist our sympathies; it is the end of a life conducted on a certain deliberate plan, and the unavoidable issue of the events which preceded it. In the history which now follows, things are different; for the history of the empire is no longer the continuation of that which was attractive and pleasing to us in the earlier history of Rome; and the people, who formerly awakened our greatest interest, now form a thoroughly corrupted mass. Force now decides everything; and the history itself is confined to an individual, ruling over upwards of a hundred millions of men, and to the few who, next to him, are the first in the state. -NIEBUHR. THE AUGUSTAN AGE. THE reign of Augustus was a time of peace, and, in many respects, of prosperity. The literature of the Augustan Age is distinguished for genius and refinement. Virgil, Horace, Ovid, and Livy flourished during this reign. Information in regard to the Augustan Age will also be found in the succeeding century. Thou Cæsar, chief where'er thy voice ordain Your age, O Cæsar, has both restored plenteous crops to the fields, and has brought back to our Jupiter the standards torn from the proud pillars of the Parthians; and has shut up [the temple] of Janus, [founded by] Romulus, now free from war; and has imposed a due discipline upon headstrong licentiousness, and has extirpated crimes, and recalled the ancient arts; by which the Latin name and strength of Italy have increased, and the fame and majesty of the empire is extended from the sun's western bed to the east. While Cæsar is guardian of affairs, neither civil rage nor violence shall disturb tranquillity; nor hatred, which forges swords, and sets at variance unhappy states. HORACE. Then men from war shall bide in league and ease; LUCAN. Tr. Marlowe. At no period was the Roman state more flourishing. — EUTROPIUS. No war or battle's sound Was heard the world around; The idle spear and shield were high up hung; Unstained with hostile blood; The trumpet spake not to the arméd throng; And kings sat still with awful eye, As if they surely knew their sovran Lord was by. MILTON. During the first years of tyranny is reaped the harvest sown during the last years of liberty. Thus the Augustan Age was rich in great minds formed in the generation of Cicero and Cæsar. The fruits of the policy of Augustus were reserved for posterity. — MACAULAY. For centuries before the establishment of the Roman Empire, progressive development and increasing population, joined to comparative peace and security, had accumulated around the shores of the Mediterranean a mass of people enjoying material prosperity greater than had ever been known before. All this culminated in the first centuries of the Christian era. The greatness of the ancient world was then full, and a more overwhelming and gorgeous spectacle than the Roman Empire then displayed never dazzled the eyes of mankind. - FERGUSSON. THE BIRTH OF CHRIST. The last great age, foretold by sacred rhymes, VIRGIL, Pastoral IV. Tr. Dryden. THE birth of Christ took place in Judæa in 4 B. C., that is, four years before the common era. About three hundred years after his death, December 25 was fixed upon as his birthday, and two hundred years later still the year of his birth was guessed at, so that dates could be reckoned from it; but, owing to an erroneous method of computing time, there was a miscalculation of four years and six days, which error has, however, been allowed to remain, to avoid introducing confusion into established customs. However deeply we may sympathize with the fall of so many free states, we cannot fail to perceive that a new life sprang immediately from their ruins. With the overthrow of independence fell the barriers of all exclusive nationalities: the nations were conquered, they were overwhelmed together, but by that very act were they blended and united; for, as the limits of the empire were held to comprise the whole earth, so did its subjects learn to consider themselves as one people. From this moment the human family began to acquire the consciousness of its universal brotherhood. It was at this period of the world's development that Jesus Christ was born. RANKE. When Rome had united the civilized world under her sway, the time was come for Monotheism to assume and complete the work of preparation for a new and higher social life. — COMTE. ... Les restes de la république périssent avec Brutus et Cassius. Antoine et César, après avoir ruiné Lépidé, se tournent l'un contre l'autre. Toute la puissance romaine se met sur la mer. César gagne la bataille Actiaque : les forces de l'Egypte et de l'Orient, qu'Antoine menait avec lui, sont dissipées: tous ses amis l'abandonnent, et même sa Cléopâtre, pour laquelle il s'était perdu. . . . Tout cède à la fortune de César. Alexandrie lui ouvre ses portes; l'Egypte devient une province romaine; Cléopâtre, qui désespère de la pouvoir conserver, se tue elle-même après Antoine; Rome tend les bras à César, qui demeure, sous le nom d'Auguste et le titre d'empereur, seul maître de tout l'empire. Victorieux par terre et par mer, il ferme le temple de Janus. Tout l'univers vit en paix sous sa puissance, et Jésus-Christ vient au monde. - BOSSUET. An ominous restlessness in the minds of men, such as generally precedes great changes in the history of mankind, was diffused abroad. NEANDER. At the same period there arose in various quarters of the world mysterious voices, of which historians have repeated the echoes, indicating a general but undefined presentiment that an age of social or moral unity was approaching. The East was roused to a fervid anticipation of the advent of some universal conqueror, who should melt all mankind into a crude, inorganic mass. Accustomed from its infancy to a succession of monarchical dynasties, it was uneasy under the republican organization and individual development which followed upon the Roman conquest. It sighed for the coming of another Cyrus or Alexander. But these sounds found a responsive chord in the West also. The sublime vaticinations of the Virgilian Sibyl, bringing the predictions of the Hebrew prophets home to the breasts of the Italians, foreshadowed a reign of peace, equality, and |