Romans, and covered with lids made air-tight by resin and bitumen. The Egyptians had several kinds of wine, highly praised by the ancients; and wine among them was cheap and abundant. Egypt was also renowned for drugs unknown to other nations, and for beer made of barley, as well as wine. As for fruits, they had the same variety as we have at the present day, their favorite fruit being dates. “So fond were the Egyptians of trees and flowers that they exacted a contribution from the nations tributary to them of their rarest plants, so that their gardens bloomed with flowers of every variety in all seasons of the year.” Wreaths and chaplets were in common use from the earliest antiquity. It was in their gardens, abounding with vegetables as well as with fruits and flowers, that the Egyptians entertained their friends.
In Egyptian houses were handsome chairs and fauteuils, stools and couches, the legs of which were carved in imitation of the feet of animals; and these were made of rare woods, inlaid with ivory, and covered with rich stuffs. Some of the Egyptian chairs were furnished with cushions and covered with the skins of leopards and lions; the seats were made of leather, painted with flowers. Footstools were sometimes made of elegant patterns, inlaid with ivory and precious woods. Mats were used in the sitting-rooms. The couches were of every variety of form, and utilized in some instances as beds. The tables were round, square, and oblong, and were sometimes made of stone and highly ornamented with carvings. Bronze bedsteads were used by the wealthy classes.
In their entertainments nothing was omitted by the Egyptians which would produce festivity,–music, songs, dancing, and games of chance. The guests arrived in chariots or palanquins, borne by servants on foot, who also carried parasols over the heads of their masters. Previous to entering the festive chamber water was brought for the feet and hands, the ewers employed being made often of gold and silver, of beautiful form and workmanship. Servants in attendance anointed the head with sweet-scented ointment from alabaster vases, and put around the heads of the guests garlands and wreaths in which the lotus was conspicuous; they also perfumed the apartments with myrrh and frankincense, obtained chiefly from Syria. Then wine was brought, and emptied into drinking-cups of silver or bronze, and even of porcelain, beautifully engraved, one of which was exclusively reserved for the master of the house. While at dinner the party were enlivened with musical instruments, the chief of which were the harp, the lyre, the guitar, the tambourine, the pipe, the flute, and the cymbal. Music was looked upon by the Egyptians as an important science, and was diligently studied and highly prized; the song and the dance were united with the sounds of musical instruments. Many of the ornamented vases and other vessels used by the Egyptians in their banquets were not inferior in elegance of form and artistic finish to those made by the Greeks at a later day. The Pharaoh of the Jewish Exodus had drinking-vessels of gold and silver, exquisitely engraved and ornamented with precious stones.
Some of the bronze vases found at Thebes and other parts of Egypt show great skill in the art of compounding metals, and were highly polished. Their bronze knives and daggers had an elastic spring, as if made of steel. Wilkinson expresses his surprise at the porcelain vessels recently discovered, as well as admiration of them, especially of their rich colors and beautiful shapes. There is a porcelain bowl of exquisite workmanship in the British Museum inscribed with the name of Rameses II., proving that the arts of pottery were carried to great perfection two thousand years before Christ. Boxes of elaborate workmanship, made of precious woods finely carved and inlaid with ivory, are also preserved in the different museums of Europe, all dating from a remote antiquity. These boxes are of every form, with admirably fitting lids, representing fishes, birds, and animals. The rings, bracelets, and other articles of jewelry that have been preserved show great facility on the part of the Egyptians in cutting the hardest stones. The skill displayed in the sculptures on the hard obelisks and granite monuments of Egypt was remarkable, since they were executed with hardened bronze.
Glass-blowing was another art in which the Egyptians excelled. Fifteen hundred years before Christ they made ornaments of glass, and glass vessels of large size were used for holding wine. Such was their skill in the manufacture of glass that they counterfeited precious stones with a success unknown to the moderns. We read of a counterfeited emerald six feet in length. Counterfeited necklaces were sold at Thebes which deceived strangers. The uses to which glass was applied were in the manufacture of bottles, beads, mosaic work, and drinking-cups, and their different colors show considerable knowledge of chemistry. The art of cutting and engraving stones was doubtless learned by the Israelites in their sojourn in Egypt. So perfect were the Egyptians in the arts of cutting precious stones that they were sought by foreign merchants, and they furnished an important material in commerce.
From the earliest times the Egyptians were celebrated for their manufacture of linen, which was one of the principal articles of commerce; and cotton and woollen cloths as well as linen were woven. Cotton was used not only for articles of dress, but for the covering of chairs and other kinds of furniture. The great mass of the mummy cloths is of coarse texture; but the “fine linen” spoken of in the Scripture was as fine as muslin, in some instances containing more than five hundred threads to an inch, while the finest productions of the looms of India have only one hundred threads to the inch. Not only were the threads of linen cloth of extraordinary fineness, but the dyes were equally remarkable, and were unaffected by strong alkalies. Spinning was principally the occupation of women, who also practised the art of embroidery, in which gold thread was used, supposed to be beaten out by the hammer; but in the arts of dyeing and embroidery the Egyptians were surpassed by the Babylonians, who were renowned for their cloths of various colors.
The manufacture of paper was another art for which the Egyptians were famous, made from the papyrus, a plant growing in the marsh-land of the Nile. The papyrus was also applied to the manufacture of sails, baskets, canoes, and parts of sandals. Some of the papyri, on which is hieroglyphic writing dating from two thousand years before our era, are in good preservation. Sheep-skin parchment also was used for writing.
The Egyptians were especially skilled in the preparation of leather for sandals, shields, and chairs. The curriers used the same semicircular knife which is now in use. The great consumption of leather created a demand far greater than could be satisfied by the produce of the country, and therefore skins from foreign countries were imported as part of the tribute laid on conquered nations or tribes.
More numerous than the tanners in Egypt were the potters, among whom the pottery-wheel was known from a remote antiquity, previous to the arrival of Joseph from Canaan, and long before the foundation of the Greek Athens. Earthenware was used for holding wine, oils, and other liquids; but the finest production of the potter were the vases, covered with a vitreous glaze and modelled in every variety of forms, some of which were as elegant as those made later by the Greeks, who excelled in this department of art.
Carpenters and cabinet-makers formed a large class of Egyptian workmen for making coffins, boxes, tables, chairs, doors, sofas, and other articles of furniture, frequently inlaid with ivory and rare woods. Veneering was known to these workmen, probably arising from the scarcity of wood. The tools used by the carpenters, as appear from the representations on the monuments, were the axe, the adze, the hand-saw, the chisel, the drill, and the plane. These tools were made of bronze, with handles of acacia, tamarisk, and other hard woods. The hatchet, by which trees were felled, was used by boat-builders. The boxes and other articles of furniture were highly ornamented with inlaid work.
Boat-building in Egypt also employed many workmen. Boats were made of the papyrus plant, deal, cedar, and other woods, and were propelled both by sails and oars. One ship-of-war built for Ptolemy Philopater is said by ancient writers to have been 478 feet long, to have had forty banks of oars, and to have carried 400 sailors, 4,000 rowers, and 3,000 soldiers. This is doubtless an exaggeration, but indicates great progress in naval architecture. The construction of boats varied according to the purpose for which they were intended. They were built with ribs as at the present day, with small keels, square sails, with spacious cabins in the centre, and ornamented sterns; there was usually but one mast, and the prows terminated in the heads of animals. The boats of burden were somewhat similar to our barges; the sails were generally painted with rich colors. The origin of boat-building was probably the raft, and improvement followed improvement until the ship-of-war rivalled in size our largest vessels, while Egyptian merchant vessels penetrated to distant seas, and probably doubled the Cape of Good Hope.
In regard to agriculture the Egyptians were the most advanced of the nations of antiquity, since the fertility of their soil made the occupation one of primary importance. Irrigation was universally practised, the Nile furnishing water for innumerable canals. The soil was often turned up with the hoe rather than the plough. The grain was sown broadcast, and was trodden in by goats. Their plough was very simple, and was drawn by oxen; the yoke being attached to the horns. Although the soil was rich, manures were frequently used. The chief crops were those of wheat, barley, beans, peas, lentils, vetches, lupines, clover, rice, indigo, cotton, lettuce, flax, hemp, cumin, coriander, poppy, melons, cucumbers, onions, and leeks. We do not read of carrots, cabbages, beets, or potatoes, which enter so largely into modern husbandry. Oil was obtained from the olive, the castor-berry, simsin, and coleseed. Among the principal trees which were cultivated were the vine, olive, locust, acacia, date, sycamore, pomegranate, and tamarisk. Grain, after harvest, was trodden out by oxen, and the straw was used as provender. To protect the fields from inundation dykes were built.
All classes in Egypt delighted in the sports of the field, especially in the hunting of wild animals, in which the arrow was most frequently used. Sometimes the animals were caught in nets, in enclosed places near water-brooks. The Egyptians also had numerous fish-ponds, since they were as fond of angling as they were of hunting. Hunting in Egypt was an amusement, not an occupation as among nomadic people. Not only was hunting for pleasure a great amusement among Egyptians, but also among Babylonians and Persians, who coursed the plains with dogs. They used the noose or lasso also to catch antelopes and wild cattle, which were hunted with lions; the bow used in the chase was similar to that employed in war. All the subjects of the chase were sculptured on the monuments with great spirit and fidelity, especially the stag, the ibex, the porcupine, the wolf, the hare, the lion, the fox, and the giraffe. The camel is not found among the Egyptian sculptures, nor the bear. Of the birds found in their sculptures were vultures, eagles, kites, hawks, owls, ravens, larks, swallows, turtle-doves, quails, ostriches, storks, plovers, snipes, geese, and ducks, many of which were taken in nets. The Nile and Lake Birket el Keroun furnished fish in great abundance. The profits of the fisheries were enormous, and were farmed out by the government.
The Egyptians were very fond of ornaments in dress, especially the women. They paid great attention to their sandals; they wore their hair long and plaited, bound round with an ornamented fillet fastened by a lotus bud; they wore ear-rings and a profusion of rings on the fingers and bracelets for the arms, made of gold and set with precious stones. The scarabaeus, or sacred beetle, was the adornment of rings and necklaces; even the men wore necklaces and rings and chains. Both men and women stained the eyelids and brows. Pins and needles were among the articles of the toilet, usually made of bronze; also metallic mirrors finely polished. The men carried canes or walking-sticks,–the wands of Moses and Aaron.
As the Egyptians paid great attention to health, physicians were held in great repute; and none were permitted to practise but in some particular branch, such as diseases of the eye, the ear, the head, the teeth, and the internal maladies. They were paid by government, and were skilled in the knowledge of drugs. The art of curing diseases originated, according to Pliny, in Egypt. Connected with the healing art was the practice of embalming dead bodies, which was carried to great perfection.
In elegance of life the Greeks and Romans, however, far surpassed any of the nations of antiquity, if not in luxury itself, which was confined to the palaces of kings. In social refinements the Greeks were not behind any modern nation, as one infers from reading Becker’s Charicles. Among the Greeks was the network of trades and professions, as in Paris and London, and a complicated social life in which all the amenities known to the modern world were seen, especially in Athens and Corinth and the Ionian capitals. What could be more polite and courteous than the intercourse carried on in Greece among cultivated and famous people? When were symposia more attractive than when the _elite_ of Athens, in the time of Pericles, feasted and communed together? When was art ever brought in support of luxury to greater perfection? We read of libraries and books and booksellers, of social games, of attractive gardens and villas, as well as of baths and spectacles, of markets and fora in Athens. The common life of a Pericles or a Cicero differed but little from that of modern men of rank and fortune.
In describing the various arts which marked the nations of antiquity, we cannot but feel that in a material point of view the ancient civilization in its important features was as splendid as our own. In the decoration of houses, in social entertainments, in cookery, the Romans were our equals. The mosaics, the signet rings, cameos, bracelets, bronzes, vases, couches, banqueting-tables, lamps, colored glass, potteries, all attest great elegance and beauty. The tables of thuga root and Delian bronze were as expensive as modern sideboards; wood and ivory were carved in Rome as exquisitely as in Japan and China; mirrors were made of polished silver. Glass-cutters could imitate the colors of precious stones so well that the Portland vase, from the tomb of Alexander Severus, was long considered as a genuine sardonyx. The palace of Nero glittered with gold and jewels; perfumes and flowers were showered from ivory ceilings. The halls of Heliogabalus were hung with cloth of gold, enriched with jewels; his beds were silver, and his tables of gold. A banquet dish of Drusillus weighed five hundred pounds of silver. Tunics were embroidered with the figures of various animals; sandals were garnished with precious stones. Paulina wore jewels, when she paid visits, valued at $800,000. Drinking-cups were engraved with scenes from the poets; libraries were adorned with busts, and presses of rare woods; sofas were inlaid with tortoise-shell, and covered with gorgeous purple. The Roman grandees rode in gilded chariots, bathed in marble baths, dined from golden plate, drank from crystal cups, slept on beds of down, reclined on luxurious couches, wore embroidered robes, and were adorned with precious stones. They ransacked the earth and the seas for rare dishes for their banquets, and ornamented their houses with carpets from Babylon, onyx cups from Bithynia, marbles from Numidia, bronzes from Corinth, statues from Athens,–whatever, in short, was precious or rare or curious in the most distant countries.
What a concentration of material wonders was to be seen in all the countries that bordered on the Mediterranean,–not merely in Italy and Greece, but in Sicily and Asia Minor, and even in Gaul and Spain! Every country was dotted with cities, villas, and farms. Every country was famous for oil, or fruit, or wine, or vegetables, or timber, or flocks, or pastures, or horses. More than two hundred and fifty cities or towns in Italy alone are historical, and some were famous.
The excavations of Pompeii attest great luxury and elegance of life. Cortona, Clusium, Veii, Ancona, Ostia, Praeneste, Antium, Misenum, Baiae, Puteoli, Neapolis, Brundusium, Sybaris, were all celebrated.
And still more remarkable were the old capitals of Greece, Asia Minor, and Africa. Syracuse was older than Rome, and had a fortress of a mile and a half in length. Carthage, under the emperors, nearly equalled its ancient magnificence. Athens was never more splendid than in the time of the Roman Antonines. In spite of successive conquests, there still towered upon the Acropolis the most wonderful temple of antiquity, built of Pentelic marble, and adorned with the sculptures of Phidias. Corinth was richer and more luxurious than Athens, and possessed the most valuable pictures of Greece, as well as the finest statues; a single street for three miles was adorned with costly edifices. And even the islands which were colonized by Greeks were seats of sculpture and painting, as well as of schools of learning. Still grander were the cities of Asia Minor. Antioch had a street four miles in length, with double colonnades; and its baths, theatres, museums, and temples excited universal admiration. At Ephesus was the grand temple of Diana, four times as large as the Parthenon at Athens, covering as much ground as Cologne Cathedral, with one hundred and twenty-eight columns sixty feet high. The Ephesian theatre was capable of seating sixty thousand spectators. Tarsus, the birthplace of Paul, was no mean city; and Damascus, the old capital of Syria, was both beautiful and rich.
Laodicea was famous for tapestries, Hierapolis for its iron wares, Cybara for its dyes, Sardis for its wines, Smyrna for its beautiful monuments, Delos for its slave-trade, Cyrene for its horses, Paphos for its temple of Venus, in which were a hundred altars. Seleucia, on the Tigris, had a population of four hundred thousand. Caesarea in Palestine, founded by Herod the Great, and the principal seat of government to the Roman prefects, had a harbor equal in size to the renowned Piraeus, and was secured against the southwest winds by a mole of such massive construction that the blocks of stone, sunk under the water, were fifty feet in length, eighteen in width, and nine in thickness. The city itself was constructed of polished stone, with an agora, a theatre, a circus, a praetorium, and a temple to Caesar. Tyre, which had resisted for seven months the armies of Alexander, remained to the fall of the empire a great emporium of trade; it monopolized the manufacture of imperial purple. Sidon was equally celebrated for its glass and embroidered robes. The Sidonians cast glass mirrors, and imitated precious stones. But the glory of both Tyre and Sidon was in ships, which visited all the coasts of the Mediterranean, and even penetrated to Britain and India.
But greater than Tyre or Antioch, or any eastern city, was Alexandria, the capital of Egypt. Egypt even in its decline was still a great monarchy; and when the sceptre of three hundred kings passed from Cleopatra the last of the Ptolemies, to Augustus Caesar the conqueror at Actium, the military force of Egypt is said to have amounted to seven hundred thousand men. The annual revenues of this State under the Ptolemies amounted to about seventeen million dollars in gold and silver, besides the produce of the earth. A single feast cost Philadelphus more than half a million of pounds sterling, and he had accumulated treasures to the amount of seven hundred and forty thousand talents, or about eight hundred and sixty million dollars. What European monarch ever possessed such a sum? The kings of Egypt, even when tributary to Rome, were richer in gold and silver than was Louis XIV. in the proudest hour of his life.
The ground-plan of Alexandria was traced by Alexander himself, but it was not completed until the reign of Ptolemy Philadelphus. Its circumference was about fifteen miles; the streets were regular, and crossed one another at right angles, being wide enough for free passage of both carriages and foot passengers. Its harbor could hold the largest fleet ever congregated; its walls and gates were constructed with all the skill and strength known to antiquity; its population numbered six hundred thousand, and all nations were represented in its crowded streets. The wealth of the city may be inferred from the fact that in one year sixty-two hundred and fifty talents, or more than six million dollars, were paid to the public treasury for port dues. The library was the largest in the world, numbering over seven hundred thousand volumes; and this was connected with a museum, a menagerie, a botanical garden, and various halls for lectures, altogether forming the most famous university in the Roman empire. The inhabitants were chiefly Greek, and had all the cultivated tastes and mercantile thrift of that quick-witted people. In a commercial point of view Alexandria was the most important city in the world, and its ships whitened every sea. Unlike most commercial cities, it was intellectual, and its schools of poetry, mathematics, medicine, philosophy, and theology were more renowned than even those of Athens during the third and fourth centuries. Alexandria, could it have been transported in its former splendor to our modern world, would be a great capital in these times.
And all these cities were connected with one another and with Rome by magnificent roads, perfectly straight, and paved with large blocks of stone. They were originally constructed for military purposes, but were used by travellers, and on them posts were regularly established; they crossed valleys upon arches, and penetrated mountains; in Italy, especially, they were great works of art, and connected all the provinces. There was an uninterrupted communication from the wall of Antoninus through York, London, Sandwich, Boulogne, Rheims, Lyons, Milan, Rome, Brundusium, Dyrrachium, Byzantium, Ancyra, Tarsus, Antioch, Tyre, Jerusalem,–a distance of thirty-seven hundred and forty miles; and these roads were divided by milestones, and houses for travellers erected upon them at points of every five or six miles.
Commerce under the Roman emperors was not what it now is, but still was very considerable, and thus united the various provinces together. The most remote countries were ransacked to furnish luxuries for Rome; every year a fleet of one hundred and twenty vessels sailed from the Red Sea for the islands of the Indian Ocean. But the Mediterranean, with the rivers which flowed into it, was the great highway of the ancient navigator. Navigation by the ancients was even more rapid than in modern times before the invention of steam, since oars were employed as well as sails. In summer one hundred and sixty-two Roman miles were sailed over in twenty-four hours; this was the average speed, or about seven knots. From the mouth of the Tiber vessels could usually reach Africa in two days, Massilia in three, and the Pillars of Hercules in seven; from Puteoli the passage to Alexandria had been effected, with moderate winds, in nine days. These facts, however, apply only to the summer, and to favorable winds. The Romans did not navigate in the inclement seasons; but in summer the great inland sea was white with sails. Great fleets brought corn from Gaul, Spain, Sardinia, Africa, Sicily, and Egypt. This was the most important trade; but a considerable commerce was carried on also in ivory, tortoise-shell, cotton and silk fabrics, pearls and precious stones, gums, spices, wines, wool, and oil. Greek and Asiatic wines, especially the Chian and Lesbian, were in great demand at Rome. The transport of earthenware, made generally in the Grecian cities, of wild animals for the amphitheatre, of marble, of the spoils of eastern cities, of military engines and stores, and of horses, required very large fleets and thousands of mariners, which probably belonged chiefly to great maritime cities. These cities with their dependencies required even more vessels for communication with one another than for Rome herself,–the great central object of enterprise and cupidity.
In this survey of ancient cities I have not yet spoken of the great central city,–the City of the Seven Hills, to which all the world was tributary. Whatever was costly or rare or beautiful, in Greece or Asia or Egypt, was appropriated by her citizen kings, since citizens were provincial governors. All the great highways, from the Atlantic to the Tigris, converged to the capital,–all roads led to Rome; all the ships of Alexandria and Carthage and Tarentum, and other commercial capitals, were employed in furnishing her with luxuries or necessities. Never was there so proud a city as this “Epitome of the Universe.” London, Paris, Vienna, Constantinople, St. Petersburg, Berlin, are great centres of fashion and power; but they are rivals, and excel only in some great department of human enterprise and genius, as in letters, or fashions, or commerce, or manufactures,–centres of influence and power in the countries of which they are capitals, yet they do not monopolize the wealth and energies of the world. London may contain more people than did ancient Rome, and may possess more commercial wealth; but London represents only the British monarchy, not a universal empire. Rome, however, monopolized every thing, and controlled all nations and peoples; she could shut up the schools of Athens, or disperse the ships of Alexandria, or regulate the shops of Antioch. What Lyons and Bordeaux are to Paris, Corinth and Babylon were to Rome,–mere dependent cities. Paul, condemned at Jerusalem, stretched out his arms to Rome, and Rome protected him. The philosophers of Greece were the tutors of Roman nobility. The kings of the East resorted to the palaces of Mount Palatine for favors or safety; the governors of Syria and Egypt, reigning in the palaces of ancient kings, returned to Rome to squander the riches they had accumulated. Senators and nobles took their turn as sovereign rulers of all the known countries of the world. The halls in which Darius and Alexander and Pericles and Croesus and Solomon and Cleopatra had feasted, became the witness of the banquets of Roman proconsuls. Babylon, Thebes, and Athens were only what Delhi and Calcutta are to the English of our day,–cities to be ruled by the delegates of the imperial Senate. Rome was the only “home” of the proud governors who reigned on the banks of the Thames, of the Seine, of the Rhine, of the Nile, of the Tigris. After they had enriched themselves with the spoils of the ancient monarchies they returned to their estates in Italy, or to their palaces on the Aventine. What a concentration of works of art on the hills, and around the Forum, and in the Campus Martius, and other celebrated quarters! There were temples rivalling those of Athens and Ephesus; baths covering more ground than the Pyramids, surrounded with Corinthian columns, and filled with the choicest treasures ransacked from the cities of Greece and Asia; palaces in comparison with which the Tuileries and Versailles are small; theatres which seated a larger audience than any present public buildings in Europe; amphitheatres more extensive and costly than Cologne, Milan, and York Minster cathedrals combined, and seating eight times as many spectators as could be crowded into St. Peter’s Church; circuses where, it is said, three hundred and eighty-five thousand persons could witness the games and chariot-races at a time; bridges, still standing, which have furnished models for the most beautiful at Paris and London; aqueducts carried over arches one hundred feet in height, through which flowed the surplus water of distant lakes; drains of solid masonry in which large boats could float; pillars more than one hundred feet in height, coated with precious marbles or plates of brass, and covered with bas-reliefs; obelisks brought from Egypt; fora and basilicas connected together, and extending more than three thousand feet in length, every part of which was filled with “animated busts” of conquerors, kings, statesmen, poets, publicists, and philosophers; mausoleums greater and more splendid than that Artemisia erected to the memory of her husband; triumphal arches under which marched in stately procession the victorious armies of the Eternal City, preceded by the spoils and trophies of conquered empires.
Such was the proud capital,–a city of palaces, a residence of nobles who were virtually kings, enriched with the accumulated treasures of ancient civilization. Great were the capitals of Greece and Asia, but how pre-eminent was Rome, since all were subordinate to her! How bewildering and bewitching to a traveller must have been the varied wonders of the city! Go where he would, his eye rested on something which was both a study and a marvel. Let him drive or walk about the suburbs,–there were villas, tombs, aqueducts looking like our railroads on arches, sculptured monuments, and gardens of surpassing beauty and luxury. Let him approach the walls,–they were great fortifications extending twenty-one miles in circuit, according to the measurement of Ammon as adopted by Gibbon, and forty-five miles according to other authorities. Let him enter any of the various gates that opened into the city from the roads which radiated to all parts of Italy and the world,–they were of monumental brass covered with bas-reliefs, on which the victories of generals for a thousand years were commemorated. Let him pass through any of the crowded thoroughfares,–he saw houses towering scarcely ever less than seventy feet, as tall as those of Edinburgh in its oldest sections. Most of the houses in which this vast population lived, according to Strabo, possessed pipes which gave a never-failing supply of water from the rivers that flowed into the city through the aqueducts and out again through the sewers into the Tiber. Let the traveller walk up the Via Sacra,–that short street, scarcely half a mile in length,–and he passed the Flavian Amphitheatre, the Temple of Venus and Rome, the Arch of Titus, the Temples of Peace, of Vesta, and of Castor, the Forum Romanum, the Basilica Julia, the Arch of Severus, the Temple of Saturn, and stood before the majestic ascent to the Capitoline Jupiter, with its magnificent portico and ornamented pediment, surpassing the facade of any modern church. On his left, as he emerged from beneath the sculptured Arch of Titus, was the Palatine Mount, nearly covered by the palace of the Caesars, the magnificent residences of the higher nobility, and various temples, of which that of Apollo was the most magnificent, built by Augustus, of solid white marble from Luna. Here were the palaces of Vaccus, of Flaccus, of Cicero, of Catiline, of Scaurus, of Antoninus, of Clodius, of Agrippa, and of Hortensius. Still on his left, in the valley between the Palatine and the Capitoline, though he could not see it, concealed from view by the great Temples of Vesta and of Castor, and the still greater edifice known as the Basilica Julia, was the quarter called the Velabrum, extending to the river, where the Pons Aemilius crossed it,–a low quarter of narrow streets and tall houses where the rabble lived and died. On his right, concealed from view by the Aedes Divi Julii and the Forum Romanum, was that magnificent series of edifices extending from the Temple of Peace to the Temple of Trajan, including the Basilica Pauli, the Forum Julii, the Forum Augusti, the Forum Trajani, the Basilica Ulpia,–a space more than three thousand feet in length, and six hundred in breadth, almost entirely surrounded by porticos and colonnades, and filled with statues and pictures,–displaying on the whole probably the grandest series of public buildings clustered together ever erected, especially if we include the Forum Romanum and the various temples and basilicas which connected the whole,–a forest of marble pillars and statues. Ascending the steps which led from the Temple of Concord to the Temple of Juno Moneta upon the Arx, or Tarpeian Rock, on the southwestern summit of the hill, itself one of the most beautiful temples in Rome, erected by Camillus on the spot where the house of M. Manlius Capitolinus had stood, and one came upon the Roman mint. Near this was the temple erected by Augustus to Jupiter Tonans, and that built by Domitian to Jupiter Custos. But all the sacred edifices which crowned the Capitoline were subordinate to the Templum Jovis Capitolini, standing on a platform of eight thousand square feet, and built of the richest materials. The portico which faced the Via Sacra consisted of three rows of Doric columns, the pediment profusely ornamented with the choicest sculptures, the apex of the roof surmounted by the bronze horses of Lysippus, and the roof itself covered with gilded tiles. The temple had three separate cells, though covered with one roof; in front of each stood colossal statues of the three deities to whom it was consecrated. Here were preserved what was most sacred in the eyes of Romans, and it was itself the richest of all the temples of the city.
What a beautiful panorama was presented to the view from the summit of this consecrated hill, only mounted by a steep ascent of one hundred steps! To the south was the Via Sacra extending to the Colosseum, and beyond it the Appia Via, lined with monuments as far as the eye could reach. A little beyond the fora to the east was the Carinae, a fashionable quarter of beautiful shops and houses, and still farther off were the Baths of Titus, extending from the Carinae to the Esquiline Mount. To the northeast were the Viminal and Quirinal hills, after the Palatine the most ancient part of the city, the seat of the Sabine population, abounding in fanes and temples, the most splendid of which was the Temple of Quirinus, erected originally to Romulus by Numa, but rebuilt by Augustus, with a double row of columns on each of its sides, seventy-six in number. Near by was the house of Atticus, and the gardens of Sallust in the valley between the Quirinal and Pincian, afterward the property of the Emperor. Far back on the Quirinal, near the wall of Servius, were the Baths of Diocletian, and still farther to the east the Pretorian Camp established by Tiberius, and included within the wall of Aurelian. To the northeast the eye lighted on the Pincian Hill covered with the gardens of Lucullus, to possess which Messalina caused the death of Valerius Asiaticus, into whose possession they had fallen. In the valley which lay between the fora and the Quirinal was the celebrated Subura, the quarter of shops, markets, and artificers,–a busy, noisy, vulgar section, not beautiful, but full of life and enterprise and wickedness. The eye then turned to the north, and the whole length of the Via Flamina was exposed to view, extending from the Capitoline to the Flaminian gate, perfectly straight, the finest street in Rome, and parallel to the modern Corso; it was the great highway to the north of Italy. Monuments and temples and palaces lined this celebrated street; it was spanned by the triumphal arches of Claudius and Marcus Aurelius. To the west of it was the Campus Martius, with its innumerable objects of interest,–the Baths of Agrippa, the Pantheon, the Thermae Alexandrinae, the Column of Marcus Aurelius, and the Mausoleum of Augustus. Beneath the Capitoline on the west, toward the river, was the Circus Flaminius, the Portico of Octavius, the Theatre of Balbus, and the Theatre of Pompey, where forty thousand spectators were accommodated. Stretching beyond the Thermae Alexandrinae, near the Pantheon, was the magnificent bridge which crossed the Tiber, built by Hadrian when he founded his Mausoleum, to which it led, still standing under the name of the Ponte S. Angelo. The eye took in eight or nine bridges over the Tiber, some of wood, but generally of stone, of beautiful masonry, and crowned with statues. In the valley between the Palatine and the Aventine, was the great Circus Maximus, founded by the early Tarquin; it was the largest open space, inclosed by walls and porticos, in the city; it seated three hundred and eighty-five thousand spectators. How vast a city, which could spare nearly four hundred thousand of its population to see the chariot-races! Beyond was the Aventine itself. This also was rich in legendary monuments and in the palaces of the great, though originally a plebeian quarter. Here dwelt Trajan before he was emperor, and Ennius the poet, and Paula the friend of Saint Jerome. Beneath the Aventine, and a little south of the Circus Maximus, were the great Baths of Caracalla, the ruins of which, next to those of the Colosseum, made on my mind the strongest impression of all I saw that pertains to antiquity, though these were not so large as those of Diocletian. The view south took in the Caelian Hill, the ancient residence of Tullus Hostilius. This hill was the residence of many distinguished Romans, among whose palaces was that of Claudius Centumalus, which towered ten or twelve stories into the air. But grander than any of these palaces was that of Plautius Lateranus, on whose site now stands the basilica of St. John Lateran,–the gift of Constantine to the bishop of Rome,–one of the most ancient of the Christian churches, in which, for fifteen hundred years, daily services have been performed.
Such were the objects of interest and grandeur that met the eye as it was turned toward the various quarters of the city, which contained between three and four millions of people. Lipsius estimates four millions as the population, including slaves, women, children, and strangers. Though this estimate is regarded as too large by Merivale and others, yet how enormous must have been the number of the people when there were nine thousand and twenty-five baths, and when those of Diocletian could accommodate thirty-two hundred bathers at a time! The wooden theatre of Scaurus contained eighty thousand seats; that of Marcellus twenty thousand; the Colosseum would seat eighty-seven thousand persons, and give standing space for twenty-two thousand more. The Circus Maximus would hold three hundred and eighty-five thousand spectators. If only one person out of four of the free population witnessed the games and spectacles at a time, we thus must have four millions of people altogether in the city. The Aurelian walls are now only thirteen miles in circumference, but Lipsius estimates the original circumference at forty-five miles, and Vopiscus at nearly fifty. The diameter of the city must have been eleven miles, since Strabo tells us that the actual limit of Rome was at a place between the fifth and sixth milestone from the column of Trajan in the Forum,–the central and most conspicuous object in the city except the capitol.
Modern writers, taking London and Paris for their measure of material civilization, seem unwilling to admit that Rome could have reached such a pitch of glory and wealth and power. To him who stands within the narrow limits of the Forum, as it now appears, it seems incredible that it could have been the centre of a much larger city than Europe can now boast of. Grave historians are loath to compromise their dignity and character for truth by admitting statements which seem, to men of limited views, to be fabulous, and which transcend modern experience. But we should remember that most of the monuments of ancient Rome have entirely disappeared. Nothing remains of the Palace of the Caesars, which nearly covered the Palatine Hill; little of the fora which, connected together, covered a space twice as large as that inclosed by the palaces of the Louvre and Tuileries, with all their galleries and courts; almost nothing of the glories of the Capitoline Hill; and little comparatively of those Thermae which were a mile in circuit. But what does remain attests an unparalleled grandeur,–the broken pillars of the Forum; the lofty columns of Trajan and Marcus Aurelius; the Pantheon, lifting its spacious dome two hundred feet into the air; the mere vestibule of the Baths of Agrippa; the triumphal arches of Titus and Trajan and Constantine; the bridges which span the Tiber; the aqueducts which cross the Campagna; the Cloaca Maxima, which drained the marshes and lakes of the infant city; and, above all, the Colosseum. What glory and shame are associated with that single edifice! That alone, if nothing else remained of Pagan antiquity, would indicate a grandeur and a folly such as cannot now be seen on earth. It reveals a wonderful skill in masonry and great architectural strength; it shows the wealth and resources of rulers who must have had the treasures of the world at their command; it shows the restless passions of the people for excitement, and the necessity on the part of government of yielding to this taste. What leisure and indolence marked a city which could afford to give up so much time to the demoralizing sports! What facilities for transportation were afforded, when so many wild beasts could be brought to the capitol from the central parts of Africa without calling out unusual comment! How imperious a populace that compels the government to provide such expensive pleasures! The games of Titus, on the dedication of the Colosseum, lasted one hundred days, and five thousand wild beasts were slaughtered in the arena. The number of the gladiators who fought surpasses belief. At the triumph of Trajan over the Dacians, ten thousand gladiators were exhibited, and the Emperor himself presided under a gilded canopy, surrounded by thousands of his lords. Underneath the arena, strewed with yellow sand and sawdust, was a solid pavement, so closely cemented that it could be turned into an artificial lake, on which naval battles were fought. But it was the conflict of gladiators which most deeply stimulated the passions of the people. The benches were crowded with eager spectators, and the voices of one hundred thousand were raised in triumph or rage as the miserable victims sank exhausted in the bloody sport.
Yet it was not the gladiatorial sports of the amphitheatre which most strikingly attested the greatness and splendor of the city; nor the palaces, in which as many as four hundred slaves were sometimes maintained as domestic servants for a single establishment,–twelve hundred in number according to the lowest estimate, but probably five times as numerous, since every senator, every knight, and every rich man was proud to possess a residence which would attract attention; nor the temples, which numbered four hundred and twenty-four, most of which were of marble, filled with statues, the contributions of ages, and surrounded with groves; nor the fora and basilicas, with their porticos, statues, and pictures, covering more space than any cluster of public buildings in Europe, a mile and a half in circuit; nor the baths, nearly as large, still more completely filled with works of art; nor the Circus Maximus, where more people witnessed the chariot races at a time than are nightly assembled in all the places of public amusement in Paris, London, and New York combined,–more than could be seated in all the cathedrals of England and France. It is not these which most impressively make us feel the amazing grandeur of the old capital of the world. The triumphal processions of the conquering generals were still more exciting to behold, for these appealed more directly to the imagination, and excited those passions which urged the Romans to a career of conquest from generation to generation. No military review of modern times equalled those gorgeous triumphs, even as no scenic performance compares with the gladiatorial shows; the sun has never shone upon any human assemblage so magnificent and so grand, so imposing and yet so guilty. Not only were displayed the spoils of conquered kingdoms, and the triumphal cars of generals, but the whole military strength of the capital; an army of one hundred thousand men, flushed with victory, followed the gorgeous procession of nobles and princes. The triumph of Aurelian, on his return from the East, gives us some idea of the grandeur of that ovation to conquerors. “The pomp was opened by twenty elephants, four royal tigers, and two hundred of the most curious animals from every climate, north, south, east, and west. These were followed by sixteen hundred gladiators, devoted to the cruel amusement of the amphitheatre. Then were displayed the arms and ensigns of conquered nations, the plate and wardrobe of the Syrian queen. Then ambassadors from all parts of the earth, all remarkable in their rich dresses, with their crowns and offerings. Then the captives taken in the various wars,–Goths, Vandals, Samaritans, Alemanni, Franks, Gauls, Syrians, and Egyptians, each marked by their national costume. Then the Queen of the East, the beautiful Zenobia, confined by fetters of gold, and fainting under the weight of jewels, preceding the beautiful chariot in which she had hoped to enter the gates of Rome. Then the chariot of the Persian king. Then the triumphal car of Aurelian himself, drawn by elephants. Finally the most illustrious of the Senate and the army closed the solemn procession, amid the acclamations of the people, and the sound of musical instruments. It took from dawn of day until the ninth hour for the procession to pass to the capitol; and the festival was protracted by theatrical representations, the games of the circus, the hunting of wild beasts, combats of gladiators, and naval engagements.”
Such were the material wonders of the ancient civilizations, culminating in their latest and greatest representative, and displayed in its proud capital,–nearly all of which became later the spoil of barbarians, who ruthlessly marched over the classic world, having no regard for its choicest treasures. Those old glories are now indeed succeeded by a prouder civilization,–the work of nobler races after sixteen hundred years of new experiments. But why such an eclipse of the glory of man? The reason is apparent if we survey the internal state of the ancient empires, especially of society as it existed under the Roman emperors.
* * * * *
AUTHORITIES.
Herodotus, Strabo, Pliny, Polybius, Diodorus Siculus, Titus Livius, Pausanias, on the geography and resources of the ancient nations. See an able chapter on Mediterranean prosperity in Louis Napoleon’s History of Caesar. Smith’s Dictionary of Ancient Geography is exhaustive. Wilkinson has revealed the civilization of ancient Egypt. Professor Becker’s Handbook of Rome, as well as his Gallus and Charicles shed much light on manners and customs. Dyer’s History of the City of Rome is the fullest description of its wonders that I have read. Niebuhr, Bunsen, and Platner, among the Germans, have written learnedly, but also have created much doubt about things supposed to be established. Mommsen, Curtius, and Merivale are also great authorities. Nor are the magnificent chapters of Gibbon to be disregarded by the student of Roman history, notwithstanding his elaborate and inflated style.
THE MILITARY ART.
WEAPONS, ENGINES, DISCIPLINE.
1300-100 A.D.
In surveying the nations of antiquity nothing impresses us more forcibly than the perpetual wars in which they were engaged, and the fact that military art and science seem to have been among the earliest things that occupied the thoughts of men. Personal strife and tribal warfare are coeval with the earliest movements of humanity.
The first recorded act in the Hebraic history of the world after the expulsion of Adam from Paradise is a murder. In patriarchal times we read of contentions between the servants of Abraham and of Lot, and between the petty kings and chieftains of the countries where they journeyed. Long before Abraham was born, violence was the greatest evil with which the world was afflicted. Before his day mighty conquerors arose and founded kingdoms. Babylon and Egypt were powerful military States in pre-historic times. Wars more or less fierce were waged before nations were civilized. The earliest known art, therefore, was the art of destruction, growing out of the wicked and brutal passions of men,–envy and hatred, ambition and revenge; in a word, selfishness. Race fought with race, kingdom with kingdom, and city with city, in the very infancy of society. In secular history the greatest names are those of conquerors and heroes in every land under the sun; and it was by conquerors that those grand monuments were erected the ruins of which astonish every traveller, especially in Egypt and Assyria.
But wars in the earliest ages were not carried on scientifically, or even as an art. There was little to mark them except brute force. Armies were scarcely more than great collections of armed men, led by kings, either to protect their States from hostile invaders, or to acquire new territory, or to exact tribute from weaker nations. We do not read of military discipline, or of skill in strategy and tactics. A battle was lost or won by individual prowess; it was generally a hand-to-hand encounter, in which the strongest and bravest gained the victory.
One of the earliest descriptions of war is to be found in the Iliad of Homer, where individual heroes fought with one another, armed with the sword, the lance, and the javelin, protected by shields, helmets, and coats of mail. They fought on foot, or from chariots, which were in use before cavalry. The war-horse was driven before he was ridden in Egypt or Palestine; but the Aryan barbarians in their invasion rode their horses, and fought on horseback, like the modern Cossacks.
Until the Greeks became familiar with war as an art, armies were usually very large, as if a great part of the population of a country followed the sovereign who commanded them. Rameses the Great, the Sesostris of the Greeks, according to Herodotus led nearly a million of men in his expeditions. He was the most noted of ancient warriors until Cyrus the Persian arose, and was nearly contemporaneous with Moses. The Trojan war is supposed to have taken place during the period when the Israelites were subject to the Ammonites; and about the time that the Philistines were defeated by David, the Greeks were forced by war to found colonies in Asia Minor.
After authentic history begins, war is the main subject with which it has to deal; and for three thousand years history is simply the record of the feats of warriors and generals, of their conquests and defeats, of the rise and fall of kingdoms and cities, of the growth or decline of military virtues. No arts of civilization have preserved nations from the sword of the conqueror, and war has been both the amusement and the business of kings. From the earliest ages, the most valued laurels have been bestowed for success in war, and military fame has eclipsed all other glories. The cry of the mourner has been unheeded in the blaze of conquest; even the aspirations of the poet and the labors of the artist have been as nought, except to celebrate the achievements of heroes.
It is interesting then to inquire how far the ancients advanced in the arts of war, which include military weapons, movements, the structure of camps, the discipline of armies, the construction of ships and of military engines, and the concentration and management of forces under a single man. What was that mighty machinery by which nations were subdued, or rose to greatness on the ruin of States and Empires? The conquests of Rameses, of David, of Nebuchadnezzar, of Cyrus, of Alexander, of Hannibal, of Caesar, and other heroes are still the subjects of contemplation among statesmen and schoolboys. The exploits of heroes are the pith of history.
The art of war must have made great progress in the infancy of civilization, when bodily energies were most highly valued, when men were fierce, hardy, strong, and uncorrupted by luxury; when mere physical forces gave law alike to the rich and the poor, to the learned and the ignorant; and when the avenue to power led across the field of battle.
We must go to Egypt for the earliest development of art and science in all departments; and so far as the art of war consists in the organization of physical forces for conquest or defence, under the direction of a single man, it was in Egypt that this was first accomplished, about seventeen hundred years before Christ, as chronologists think, by Rameses the Great.
This monarch, according to Wilkinson, the greatest and most ambitious of the Egyptian kings, to whom the Greeks gave the name of Sesostris, showed great ability in collecting together large bodies of his subjects, and controlling them by a rigid military discipline. He accustomed them to heat and cold, hunger and thirst, fatigue, and exposure to danger. With bodies thus rendered vigorous by labor and discipline, they were fitted for distant expeditions. Rameses first subdued the Arabians and Libyans, and annexed them to the Egyptian monarchy. While he inured his subjects to fatigue and danger, he was careful to win their affections by acts of munificence and clemency. He then made his preparations for the conquest of the known world, and collected an army, according to Diodorus Siculus, of six hundred thousand infantry, twenty-four thousand cavalry, and twenty-seven thousand war-chariots. It is difficult to understand how a small country like Egypt could furnish such an immense force. If the account of the historian be not exaggerated, Rameses must have enrolled the conquered Libyans and Arabians and other nations among his soldiers. He subjected his army to a stern discipline and an uncomplaining obedience to orders,–the first principle in the science of war, which no successful general in the world’s history has ever disregarded, from Alexander to Napoleon. With this powerful army his march was irresistible. Ethiopia was first subdued, and an exaction made from the conquered of a tribute of gold, ivory, and ebony. In those ancient times a conquering army did not resettle or colonize the territories it had subdued, but was contented with overrunning the country and exacting tribute from the people. Such was the nature of the Babylonian and Persian conquests. After overrunning Ethiopia and some other countries near the Straits of Babelmandeb, the conqueror proceeded to India, which he overran beyond the Ganges, and ascended the high table-land of Central Asia; then proceeding westward, he entered Europe, nor halted in his devastating career until he reached Thrace. From thence he marched to Asia Minor, conquering as he went, and invaded Assyria, seating himself on the throne of Ninus and Semiramis. Then, laden with booty from the Eastern world, he returned to Egypt after an absence of thirty years and consolidated his empire, building those vast structures at Thebes, which for magnitude have never been surpassed. Thus was Egypt enriched with the spoil of nations, and made formidable for a thousand years. Rameses was the last of the Pharaohs who pursued the phantom of military renown, or sought glory in distant expeditions.
We are in ignorance as to the details of the conquests and the generals who served under Rameses. There is doubtless some exaggeration in the statements of the Greek historian, but there is no doubt that this monarch was among the first of the great conquerors to establish a regular army, and to provide a fleet to co-operate with his land forces.
The strength of the Egyptian army consisted mainly in archers. They fought either on foot or in chariots; cavalry was not much relied upon, although mention is frequently made of horsemen as well as of chariots. The Egyptian infantry was divided into regiments, and Wilkinson tells us that they were named according to the arms they bore,–as “bowmen, spearmen, swordsmen, clubmen, slingers.” These regiments were divided into battalions and companies, commanded by their captains. The infantry, heavily armed with spears and shields, formed a phalanx almost impenetrable of twelve men deep, who marched with great regularity. Each company had its standard-bearer, who was an officer of approved valor; the royal standards were carried by the royal princes or by persons of the royal household. The troops were summoned by the sound of trumpet, and also by the drum, both used from the earliest period. The offensive weapons were the bow, the spear, the javelin, the sword, the club, or mace, and the battle-axe. The chief defensive weapon was the shield, about three feet in length, covered with bull’s hide, having the hair outward and studded with nails. The shape of the bow was not essentially different from that used in Europe in the Middle Ages, being about five feet and a half long, round, and tapering at the ends; the bowstring was of hide or catgut. The arrows of the archers averaged about thirty inches in length, and were made of wood or reeds, tipped with a metal point, or flint, and winged with feathers. Each bowman was furnished with a plentiful supply of arrows. When arrows were exhausted, the bowman fought with swords and battle-axes; his defensive armor was confined chiefly to the helmet and a sort of quilted coat. The spear was of wood, with a metal head, was about five or six feet in length, and used for thrusting. The javelin was lighter, for throwing. The sling was a thong of plaited leather, broad in the middle, with a loop at the end. The sword was straight and short, between two and three feet in length, with a double edge, tapering to a sharp point, and used for either cut or thrust; the handle was frequently inlaid with precious stones. The metal used in the manufacture of swords and spear-heads was bronze, hardened by a process unknown to us. The battle-axe had a handle about two-and a-half feet in length, and was less ornamented than other weapons. The cuirass, or coat of armor, was made of horizontal rows of metal plate, about an inch in breadth, well secured together by bronze pieces. The Egyptian chariot held two persons,–the charioteer, and the warrior armed with his bow-and-arrow and wearing a cuirass, or coat of mail. The warrior carried also other weapons for close encounter, when he should descend from his chariot to fight on foot. The chariot was of wood, the body of which was light, strengthened with metal; the pole was inserted in the axle; the two wheels usually had six spokes, but sometimes only four; the wheel revolved on the axle, and was secured by a lynch-pin. The leathern harness and housings were simple, and the bridles, or reins, were nearly the same as are now in use.
“The Egyptian chariot corps, like the infantry,” says Wilkinson, “were divided into light and heavy troops, both armed with bows,–the former chiefly employed in harassing the enemy with missiles; the latter called upon to break through opposing masses of infantry.” The infantry, when employed in the assault of fortified towns, were provided with shields, under cover of which they made their approaches to the place to be attacked. In their attack they advanced under cover of the arrows of the bowmen, and instantly applied the scaling-ladder to the ramparts. The testudo, a wooden shelter, was also used, large enough to contain several men. The battering-ram and movable towers resembled those of the Romans a thousand years later.
It would thus appear that the ancient Egyptians, in the discipline of armies, in military weapons offensive and defensive, in chariots and horses, and in military engines for the reduction of fortified towns, were scarcely improved upon by the Greeks and Romans, or by the Europeans in the Middle Ages. Yet the Egyptians were an ingenious rather than a warlike people, fond of peace, and devoted to agricultural pursuits.
More warlike than they were the Assyrians and the Persians, although we fail to discover any essential difference in the organization of armies, or in military weapons. The great difference between the Persian and the Egyptian armies was in the use of cavalry. From their earliest settlements the Persians were skilful horsemen, and these formed the guard of their kings. Under Cyrus, the Persians became the masters of the world, but they rapidly degenerated, not being able to withstand the luxurious life of the conquered Babylonians; and when they were marshalled against the Greeks, and especially against the disciplined forces of Alexander, they were disgracefully routed in spite of their enormous armies, which could not be handled, and became mere mobs of armed men.
The art of war made a great advance under the Greeks, although we do not notice any striking superiority of arms over the Eastern armies led by Sesostris or Cyrus. The Greeks were among the most warlike of all the races of men; they had a genius for war. The Grecian States were engaged in perpetual strifes with one another, and constant contention developed military strength; and yet the Greeks, until the time of Philip, had no standing armies. They relied for offence and defence on the volunteer militia, which was animated by intense patriotic ideas. All armies in the nature of things are more or less machines, moved by one commanding will; but the Greek armies owed much of their success to the individual bravery of their troops, who were citizens of States under constitutional forms of government.
The most remarkable improvement in the art of war was made by the Spartans, who, in addition to their strict military discipline, introduced the _phalanx_,–files of picked soldiers, eight deep, heavily armed with spear, sword, and shield, placed in ranks of eight, at intervals of about six feet apart. This phalanx of eight files and eight ranks,–sixty-four men,–closely locked when the soldiers received or advanced to attack, proved nearly impregnable and irresistible. It combined solidity and the power of resistance with mobility. The picked men were placed in the front and rear; for in skilful evolutions the front often became the rear, and the rear became the front. Armed with spears projecting beyond the front, and with their shields locked together, the phalanx advanced to meet the enemy with regular step, and to the cadence of music; if beaten, it retired in perfect order. After battle, each soldier was obliged to produce his shield as a proof that he had fought or retired as a soldier should. The Athenian phalanx was less solid than that of Sparta,–Miltiades having decreased the depth to four ranks, in order to lengthen his front,–but was more efficient in a charge against the enemy. The Spartan phalanx was stronger in defence, the Athenian more agile in attack. The attack was nearly irresistible, as the soldiers advanced with accelerated motion, corresponding to the double-quick time of modern warfare. This was first introduced by Miltiades at Marathon.
Philip of Macedon adopted the Spartan phalanx, but made it sixteen deep, which gave it greater solidity, and rendered it still more effective. He introduced the large oval buckler and a larger and heavier spear. When the phalanx was closed for action, each man occupied but three square feet of ground: as the pikes were twenty-four feet in length, and projected eighteen feet beyond the front, the formation presented an array of points such as had never been seen before. The greatest improvement effected by Philip, however, was the adoption of standing armies instead of the militia heretofore in use throughout the Grecian States. He also attached great importance to his cavalry, which was composed of the flower of the nobility, about twelve hundred in number, all covered with defensive armor; these he formed into eight squadrons, and constituted them his body-guard. The usual formation of the regular cavalry was in the form of a wedge, so as to penetrate and break the enemy’s line,–a manoeuvre probably learned from Epaminondas of Thebes, a great master in the art of war, who defeated the Spartan phalanx by forming his columns upon a front less than their depth, thus enabling him to direct his whole force against a given point. By these tactics he gained the great victory at Leuctra, as Napoleon likewise prevailed over the Austrians in his Italian campaign. In like manner Philip’s son Alexander, following the example of Epaminondas, concentrated his forces upon the enemy’s centre, and easily defeated the Persian hosts by creating a panic. There was no resisting a phalanx sixteen files deep, with their projecting pikes, aided by the heavily armed cavalry, all under the strictest military discipline and animated by patriotic ardor. This terrible Macedonian phalanx was a great advance over the early armies of the Greeks, who fought without discipline in a hand to hand encounter, with swords and spears, after exhausting their arrows. They had learned two things of great importance,–a rigid discipline, and a concentration of forces which made an army a machine. Under Alexander, the grand phalanx consisted of 16,384 men, made up of four divisions and smaller phalanxes.
In Roman armies we see a still further advance in the military art, as it existed in the time of Augustus, which required centuries to perfect. The hardy physique and stern nature of the Romans, exercised and controlled by their organizing genius, evolved the Roman legion, which learned to resist the impetuous assaults of the elephants of the East, the phalanx of the Greeks, and the Teutonic barbarians. The indomitable courage of the Romans, trained under severest discipline and directed by means of an organization divided and subdivided and officered almost as perfectly as our modern corps and divisions and brigades and regiments and companies and squads, marched over and subdued the world.
The Roman soldier was trained to march twenty miles a day, under a burden of eighty pounds; to swim rivers, to climb mountains, to penetrate forests, and to encounter every kind of danger. He was taught that his destiny was to die in battle: death was at once his duty and his glory. He enlisted in the army with little hope of revisiting his home; he crossed seas and deserts and forests with the idea of spending his life in the service of his country. His pay was only a denarius daily, equal to about sixteen cents of our money. Marriage for him was discouraged or forbidden. However insignificant the legionary was as a man, he gained importance from the great body with which he was identified: he was both the servant and the master of the State. He had an intense _esprit de corps_; he was bound up in the glory of his legion. Both religion and honor bound him to his standards; the golden eagle which glittered in his front was the object of his fondest devotion. Nor was it possible to escape the penalty of cowardice or treachery or disobedience; he could be chastised with blows by his centurion, and his general could doom him to death. Never was the severity of military discipline relaxed; military exercises were incessant, in winter as in summer. In the midst of peace the Roman troops were familiarized with the practice of war.
It was the spirit which animated the Roman legions, and the discipline to which they were inured that gave them their irresistible strength. When we remember that they had not our firearms, we can but be surprised at their efficiency, especially in taking strongly fortified cities. Jerusalem was defended by a triple wall, the most elaborate fortifications, and twenty-four thousand soldiers, besides the aid received from the citizens; and yet it fell in little more than four months before an army of eighty thousand under Titus. How great must have been the military science that could reduce a place of such strength, in so short a time, without the aid of other artillery than the ancient catapult and battering-ram! Whether the military science of the Romans was superior or inferior to our own, no one can question that it was as perfect as it could be, lacking any knowledge of gunpowder; we surpass them only in the application of this great invention, especially in artillery. There can be no doubt that a Roman army was superior to a feudal army in the brightest days of chivalry. The world has produced no generals greater than Caesar, Pompey, Sulla, and Marius. No armies ever won greater victories over superior numbers than the Roman, and no armies of their size ever retained in submission so vast an empire, and for so long a time. At no period in the history of the Roman empire were the armies so large as those sustained by France in time of peace. Two hundred thousand legionaries, and as many more auxiliaries, controlled diverse nations and powerful monarchies. The single province of Syria once boasted of a military force equal in the number of soldiers to that wielded by the Emperor Tiberius. Twenty-five Roman legions made the conquest of the world, and retained that conquest for five hundred years. The self-sustained energy of Caesar in Gaul puts to the blush the efforts of all modern generals, unless we except Frederic II., Marlborough, Napoleon, Wellington, Grant, Sherman, and a few other great geniuses whom warlike crises have developed; nor is there a better text-book on the art of war than that furnished by Caesar himself in his Commentaries. The great victories of the Romans over barbarians, over Gauls, over Carthaginians, over Greeks, over Syrians, over Persians, were not the result of a short-lived enthusiasm, like those of Attila and Tamerlane, but extended over a thousand years.
The Romans were essentially military in all their tastes and habits. Luxurious senators and nobles showed the greatest courage and skill in the most difficult campaigns. Antony, Caesar, Pompey, and Lucullus at home were enervated and self-indulgent, but at the head of their legions they were capable of any privation and fatigue.
The Roman legion was a most perfect organization, a great mechanical force, and could sustain furious attacks after vigor, patriotism, and public spirit had fled. For three hundred years a vast empire was sustained by mechanism alone. The legion is coeval with the foundation of Rome, but the number of the troops of which it was composed varied at different periods. It rarely exceeded six thousand men; Gibbon estimates the number at six thousand eight hundred and twenty-six men. For many centuries it was composed exclusively of Roman citizens. Up to the year B.C. 107, no one was permitted to serve among the regular troops except those who were regarded as possessing a strong personal interest in the stability of the republic. Marius admitted all orders of citizens; and after the close of the Social War, B.C. 87, the whole free population of Italy was allowed to serve in the regular army. Claudius incorporated with the legion the vanquished Goths, and after him the barbarians filled up the ranks on account of the degeneracy of the times. But during the period when the Romans were conquering the world every citizen was trained to arms, like the Germans of the present day, and was liable to be called upon to serve in the armies. In the early age of the republic the legion was disbanded as soon as the special service was performed, and was in all essential respects a militia. For three centuries we have no record of a Roman army wintering in the field; but when Southern Italy became the seat of war, and especially when Rome was menaced by foreign enemies, and still more when a protracted foreign service became inevitable, the same soldiers remained in activity for several years. Gradually the distinction between the soldier and the civilian was entirely obliterated. The distant wars of the republic–such as the prolonged operations of Caesar in Gaul, and the civil contests–made a standing army a necessity. During the civil wars between Caesar and Pompey the legions were forty in number; under Augustus, but twenty-five. Alexander Severus increased them to thirty-two. This was the standing force of the empire,–from one hundred and fifty thousand to two hundred and forty thousand men, stationed in the various provinces.
The main dependence of the legion was on the infantry, which wore heavy armor consisting of helmet, breastplate, greaves on the right leg, and on the left arm a buckler, four feet in length and two and a half in width. The helmet was originally made of leather or untanned skin, strengthened and adorned by bronze or gold, and surmounted by a crest which was often of horse-hair, and so made as to give an imposing look. The crests served not only for ornament, but to distinguish the different centurions. The breastplate, or cuirass, was generally made of metal, and sometimes was highly ornamented. Chain-mail was also used. The greaves were of bronze or brass, with a lining of leather or felt, and reached above the knees. The shield worn by the heavy-armed infantry was not round, like that of the early Greeks, but oval or oblong, adapted to the shape of the body, such as was adopted by Philip and Alexander, and was made of wood or wicker-work. The weapons were a light spear, a pilum, or javelin, over six feet long, terminated by a steel point, and a short cut-and-thrust sword with a double edge. Besides the armor and weapons of the legionary, he usually carried on the marches provisions for two weeks, three or four stakes used in forming the palisade of the camp, besides various tools,–altogether a burden of sixty or eighty pounds per man. The legion was drawn up eight deep, and three feet intervened between rank and file, which disposition gave great activity, and made it superior to the Macedonian phalanx, the strength of which depended on sixteen ranks of long pikes wedged together. The general period of service for the infantry was twenty years, after which the soldier received a discharge, together with a bounty in money or land.
The cavalry attached to each legion consisted of three hundred men, who originally were selected from the leading men in the State. They were mounted at the expense of the State, and formed a distinct order. The cavalry was divided into ten squadrons. To each legion was attached also a train of ten military engines of the largest size, and fifty-five of the smaller,–all of which discharged stones and darts with great effect. This train corresponded with our artillery.
The Roman legion–whether it was composed of four thousand men, as in the early ages of the republic, or six thousand, as in the time of Augustus–was divided into ten cohorts, and each cohort was composed of Hastati (raw troops), Principes (trained troops), Triarii (veterans), and Velites (light troops, or skirmishers). The soldiers of the first line, called Hastati, consisted of youths in the bloom of manhood, who were distributed into fifteen companies, or maniples. Each company contained sixty privates, two centurions, and a standard-bearer. Two thirds were heavily armed, and bore the long shield; the remainder carried only a spear and light javelins. The second line, the Principes, was composed of men in the full vigor of life, divided also into fifteen companies, all heavily armed, and distinguished by the splendor of their equipments. The third body, the Triarii, was composed of tried veterans, in fifteen companies, the least trustworthy of which were placed in the rear; these formed three lines. The Velites were light-armed troops, employed on out-post duty, and mingled with the horsemen. The Hastati were so called because they were armed with the _hasta_, or spear; the Principes for being placed so near to the front; the Triarii, from having been arrayed behind the first two lines as a body of reserve. The Triarii were armed with the pilum, thicker and stronger than the Grecian lance, four and a half feet long, of wood, with a barbed head of iron,–so that the whole length of the weapon was six feet nine inches. It was used either to throw or thrust with, and when it pierced the enemy’s shield the iron head was bent, and the spear, owing to the twist in the iron, still held to the shield. Each soldier carried two of these weapons, and threw the heavy pilum over the heads of their comrades in front, in order to break the enemy’s line. In the time of the empire, when the legion was modified, the infantry wore cuirasses and helmets, and carried a sword and dagger. The select infantry were armed with a long spear and a shield; the rest, with a pilum. Each man carried a saw, a basket, a mattock, a hatchet, a leather strap, a hook, a chain, and provisions for three days. The Equites (cavalry) wore helmets and cuirasses, like the infantry, having a broadsword at the right side, and in the hand a long pole. A buckler swung at the horse’s flank. They were also furnished with a quiver containing three or four javelins.
The artillery were used both for hurling missiles in battle, and for the attack on fortresses. The _tormentum_, which was an elastic instrument, discharged stones and darts, and was held in general use until the discovery of gunpowder. In besieging a city, the ram was employed for destroying the lower part of a wall, and the _balista,_ which discharged stones, was used to overthrow the battlements. The balista would project a stone weighing from fifty to three hundred pounds. The _aries_, or battering-ram, consisted of a large beam made of the trunk of a tree, frequently one hundred feet in length, to one end of which was fastened a mace of iron or bronze resembling in form the head of a ram; it was often suspended by ropes from a beam fixed transversely over it, so that the soldiers were relieved from supporting its weight, and were able to give it a rapid and forcible swinging motion backward and forward. When this machine was further perfected by rigging it upon wheels, and constructing over it a roof, so as to form a _testudo_, which protected the besieging party from the assaults of the besieged, there was no tower so strong, no wall so thick, as to resist a long-continued attack, the great length of the beam enabling the soldiers to work across the defensive ditch, and as many as one hundred men being often employed upon it. The Romans learned from the Greeks the art of building this formidable engine, which was used with great effect by Alexander, but with still greater by Titus in the siege of Jerusalem; it was first used by the Romans in the siege of Syracuse. The _vinea_ was a sort of roof under which the soldiers protected themselves when they undermined walls. The _helepolis_, also used in the attack on cities, was a square tower furnished with all the means of assault. This also was a Greek invention; and the one used by Demetrius at the siege of Rhodes, B. C. 306, was one hundred and thirty-five feet high and sixty-eight wide, divided into nine stories. The _turris_, a tower of the same class, was used both by Greeks and Romans, and even by Asiatics. Mithridates used one at the siege of Cyzicus one hundred and fifty feet in height. These most formidable engines were generally made of beams of wood covered on three sides with iron and sometimes with rawhides. They were higher than the walls and all the other fortifications of a besieged place, and divided into stories pierced with windows; in and upon them were stationed archers and slingers, and in the lower story was a battering-ram. The soldiers in the turris were also provided with scaling-ladders, sometimes on wheels; so that when the top of the wall was cleared by means of the turris, it might be scaled by means of the ladders. It was impossible to resist these powerful engines except by burning them, or by undermining the ground upon which they stood, or by overturning them with stones or iron-shod beams hung from a mast on the wall, or by increasing the height of the wall, or by erecting temporary towers on the wall beside them.
Thus there was no ancient fortification capable of withstanding a long siege when the besieged city was short of defenders or provisions. With forces equal between the combatants an attack was generally a failure, for the defenders had always a great advantage; but when the number of defenders was reduced, or when famine pressed, the skill and courage of the assailants would ultimately triumph. Some ancient cities made a most obstinate resistance, like Tarentum; like Carthage, which stood a siege of four years; like Numantia in Spain, and like Jerusalem. When cities were of immense size, population, and resources, like Rome when besieged by Alaric, it was easier to take them by cutting off all ingress and egress, so as to produce famine. Tyre was taken by Alexander only by cutting off the harbor. Cyrus could not have taken Babylon by assault, since the walls were of such enormous height, and the ditch was too wide for the use of battering-rams; he resorted to an expedient of which the blinded inhabitants of that doomed city never dreamed, which rendered their impregnable fortifications useless. Nor probably would the Romans have prevailed against Jerusalem had not famine decimated and weakened its defenders. Fortified cities, though scarcely ever impregnable, were yet more in use in ancient than modern times, and greatly delayed the operations of advancing armies; and it was probably the fortified camp of the Romans, which protected an army against surprises and other misfortunes, that gave such permanent efficacy to the legions.
The chief officers of the legion were the Tribunes; and originally there was one in each legion from the three tribes,–the Ramnes, Luceres, and Tities. In the time of Polybius the number in each legion was six. Their authority extended equally over the whole legion; but to prevent confusion, it was the custom for them to divide into three sections of two, and each pair undertook the routine duties for two months out of six; they nominated the centurions, and assigned each to the company to which he belonged. These tribunes at first were chosen the commanders-in-chief, by the kings and consuls; but during the palmy days of the republic, when the patrician power was pre-eminent, they were elected by the people, that is, the citizens. Later they were named, half by the Senate and half by the consuls. No one was eligible to this great office who had not served ten years in the infantry or five in the cavalry. The tribunes were distinguished by their dress from the common soldier. Next in rank to the tribunes, who corresponded to the rank of brigadiers and colonels in our times, were the Centurions, of whom there were sixty in each legion,–men who were more remarkable for calmness and sagacity than for courage and daring valor; men who would keep their posts at all hazards. It was their duty to drill the soldiers, to inspect arms, clothing, and food, to visit the sentinels and regulate the conduct of the men. They had the power of inflicting corporal punishment. They were chosen for merit solely, until the later ages of the empire, when their posts were bought, as is the case to some extent to-day in the English army. The centurions were of unequal rank,–those of the Triarii before those of the Principes, and those of the Principes before those of the Hastati. The first centurion of the first maniple of the Triarii stood next in rank to the tribunes, and had a seat in the military councils. His office was very lucrative. To his charge was intrusted the eagle of the legion. As the centurion might rise from the ranks by regular gradation through the different maniples of the Hastati, Principes, and Triarii, there was great inducement held out to the soldiers. It would, however, appear that the centurion received only twice the pay of the ordinary legionary. There was not therefore so much difference in rank between a private and a captain as there is in our day. There were no aristocratic distinctions in the ancient world so marked as those existing in the modern. In the Roman legion there was nevertheless a regular gradation of rank, although there were but few distinct offices. The gradation was determined not by length of service, but for merit alone, of which the tribunes were the sole judges; hence the tribune in a Roman legion had more power than that of a modern colonel. As the tribunes named the centurions, so the centurions appointed their lieutenants, who were called sub-centurions. Still below these were two sub-officers, or sergeants, and the _decanus_, or corporal, to every ten men.
There was a change in the constitution and disposition of the legion after the time of Marius, until the fall of the republic. The legions were thrown open to men of all grades; they were all armed and equipped alike; the lines were reduced to two, with a space between every two cohorts, of which there were five in each line; the young soldiers were placed in the rear; the distinction between Hastati, Principes, and Triarii ceased; the Velites disappeared, their work being done by the foreign mercenaries; the cavalry ceased to be part of the legion, and became a distinct body; and the military was completely severed from the rest of the State. Formerly no one could aspire to office who had not completed ten years of military service, but in the time of Cicero a man could pass through all the great dignities of the State with a very limited experience of military life. Cicero himself did military service in but one campaign.
Under the emperors there were still other changes. The regular army consisted of legions and supplementa,–the latter being subdivided into the imperial guards and the auxiliary troops.
The Auxiliaries (_Socii_) consisted of troops from the States in alliance with Rome, or those compelled to furnish subsidies. The infantry of the allies was generally more numerous than that of the Romans, while the cavalry was three times as numerous. All the auxiliaries were paid by the State; their infantry received the same pay as the Roman infantry, but their cavalry received only two thirds of what was paid to the Roman cavalry. The common foot-soldier received in the time of Polybius three and a half asses a day, equal to about three cents; the horseman three times as much. The praetorian cohorts received twice as much as the legionaries. Julius Caesar allowed about six asses a day as the pay of the legionary, and under Augustus the daily pay was raised to ten asses,–little more than eight cents per day. Domitian raised the stipend still higher. The soldier, however, was fed and clothed by the government.
The Praetorian Cohort was a select body of troops instituted by Augustus to protect his person, and consisted of ten cohorts, each of one thousand men, chosen from Italy. This number was increased by Vitellius to sixteen thousand, and they were assembled by Tiberius in a permanent camp, which was strongly fortified. They had peculiar privileges, and when they had served sixteen years received twenty thousand sesterces, or more than one hundred pounds sterling. Each praetorian had the rank of a centurion in the regular army. Like the body-guard of Louis XIV. they were all gentlemen, and formed gradually a great power, like the Janissaries at Constantinople, and frequently disposed of the purple itself.
Our notice of the Roman legion would be incomplete without some description of the camp in which the soldier virtually lived. A Roman army never halted for a single night without forming a regular intrenchment capable of holding all the fighting men, the beasts of burden, and the baggage. During the winter months, when the army could not retire into some city, it was compelled to live in the camp, which was arranged and fortified according to a uniform plan, so that every company and individual had a place assigned. We cannot tell when this practice of intrenchment began; it was matured gradually, like all other things pertaining to all arts. The system was probably brought to perfection during the wars with Hannibal. Skill in the choice of ground, giving facilities for attack and defence, and for procuring water and other necessities, was of great account with the generals. An area of about five thousand square feet was allowed for a company of infantry, and ten thousand feet for a troop of thirty dragoons. The form of a camp was an exact square, the length of each side being two thousand and seventeen feet; there was a space of two hundred feet between the ramparts and the tents to facilitate the marching in and out of soldiers, and to guard the cattle and booty; the principal street was one hundred feet wide, and was called Principia. The defences of the camp consisted of a ditch, the earth from which was thrown inward, and of strong palisades of wooden stakes driven into the top of the earthwork so formed; the ditch was sometimes fifteen feet deep, and the _vallum_, or rampart, ten feet in height. When the army encamped for the first time the tribunes administered an oath to each individual, including slaves, to the effect that they would steal nothing out of the camp. Every morning at daybreak the centurions and the equites presented themselves before the tents of the tribunes, and the tribunes in like manner presented themselves before the praetorian, to learn the orders of the consuls, which through the centurions were communicated to the soldiers. Four companies took charge of the principal street, to see that it was properly cleaned and watered; one company took charge of the tent of the tribune; a strong guard attended to the horses, and another of fifty men stood beside the tent of the general, that he might be protected from open danger and secret treachery. The _velites_ mounted guard the whole night and day along the whole extent of the vallum, and each gate was guarded by ten men; the _equites_ were intrusted with the duty of acting as sentinels during the night, and most ingenious measures were adopted to secure their watchfulness and fidelity. The watchword for the night was given by the commander-in-chief. “On the first signal being given by the trumpet, the tents were all struck and the baggage packed; at the second signal, the baggage was placed upon the beasts of burden; and at the third, the whole army began to move. Then the herald, standing at the right hand of the general, demands thrice if they are ready for war, to which they all respond with loud and repeated cheers that they are ready, and for the most part, being filled with martial ardor, anticipate the question, ‘and raise their right hands on high with a shout.'” [3]
[Footnote 3: Smith’s Dictionary of Antiquities, article “Castra.”]
From what has come down to us of Roman military life, it appears to have been full of excitement, toil, danger, and hardship. The pecuniary rewards of the soldier were small; he was paid in glory. No profession brought so much honor as the military; and it was from the undivided attention of a great people to this profession, that it was carried to all the perfection which could be attained before the great invention of gunpowder changed the art of war. It was not the number of men employed in the Roman armies which particularly arrests attention, but the genius of organization which controlled and the spirit which animated them. The Romans loved war, but so reduced it to a science that it required comparatively small armies to conquer the world. Sulla defeated Mithridates with only thirty thousand men, while his adversary marshalled against him over one hundred thousand. Caesar had only ten legions to effect the conquest of Gaul, and none of these were of Italian origin. At the great decisive battle of Pharsalia, when most of the available forces of the empire were employed on one side or the other, Pompey commanded a legionary army of forty-five thousand men, and his cavalry amounted to seven thousand more, but among them were included the flower of the Roman nobility; the auxiliary force has not been computed, although it was probably numerous. In the same battle Caesar had under him only twenty-two thousand legionaries and one thousand cavalry. But every man in both armies was prepared to conquer or die. The forces were posted on the open plain, and the battle was really a hand-to-hand encounter, in which the soldiers, after hurling their lances, fought with their swords chiefly; and when the cavalry of Pompey rushed upon the legionaries of Caesar, no blows were wasted on the mailed panoply of the mounted Romans, but were aimed at the face alone, as that only was unprotected. The battle was decided by the coolness, bravery, and discipline of Caesar’s veterans, inspired by the genius of the greatest general of antiquity. Less than one hundred thousand men, in all probability, were engaged in one of the most memorable conflicts which the world has seen.
Thus it was by blended art and heroism that the Roman legions prevailed over the armies of the ancient world. But this military power was not gained in a say; it took nearly two hundred years, after the expulsion of the kings, to regain supremacy over the neighboring people, and another century to conquer Italy. The Romans did not contend with regular armies until they were brought in conflict with the king of Epirus and the phalanx of the Greeks, “which improved their military tactics, and introduced between the combatants those mutual regards of civilized nations which teach men to honor their adversaries, to spare the vanquished, and to lay aside wrath when the struggle is ended.”
After the consolidation of Roman power in Italy, it took but one hundred and fifty years more to complete the conquest of the world,–of Northern Africa, Spain, Gaul, Illyria, Epirus, Greece, Macedonia, Asia Minor, Pontus, Syria, Egypt, Bithynia, Cappadocia, Pergamus, and the islands of the Mediterranean. The conquest of Carthage left Rome without a rival in the Mediterranean, and promoted intercourse with the Greeks. The Illyrian wars opened to the Romans the road to Greece and Asia, and destroyed the pirates of the Adriatic. The invasion of Cisalpine Gaul, now that part of Italy which is north of the Apennines, protected Italy from the invasion of barbarians. The Macedonian War against Philip put Greece under the protection of Rome, and that against Antiochus laid Syria at her mercy; when these kingdoms were reduced to provinces, the way was opened to further conquests in the East, and the Mediterranean became a Roman lake.
But these conquests introduced luxury, wealth, pride, and avarice, which degrade while they elevate. Successful war created great generals, and founded great families; increased slavery, and promoted inequalities. Meanwhile the great generals struggled for supremacy; civil wars followed in the train of foreign conquests; Marius, Sulla, Pompey, Caesar, Antony, Augustus, sacrificed the State to their own ambitions. Good men lamented and protested, and hid themselves; Cato, Cicero, Brutus, spoke in vain. Degenerate morals kept pace with civil contests. Rome revelled in the spoils of all kingdoms and countries, was intoxicated with power, became cruel and tyrannical, and after sacrificing the lives of citizens to fortunate generals, yielded at last her liberties, and imperial despotism began its reign. War had added empire, but undermined prosperity; it had created a great military monarchy, but destroyed liberty; it had brought wealth, but introduced inequalities; it had filled the city with spoils, but sown the vices of self-interest. The machinery remained perfect, but life had fled. It henceforth became the labor of Emperors to keep together their vast possessions with this machinery, which at last wore out, since there was neither genius to repair it nor patriotism to work it. It lasted three hundred years, but was broken to pieces by the barbarians.
* * * * *
AUTHORITIES.
Wilkinson is the best authority pertaining to Egyptian armies. The highest authority in relation to the construction of an army is Polybius, contemporary with Scipio, when Roman discipline was most perfect. The eighth chapter of Livy is also very much prized. Salmasius and Lepsius wrote learned treatises. Tacitus, Sallust, Livy, Dion Cassius, Pliny, and Caesar reveal incidentally much that we wish to know, the last giving us the liveliest idea of the military habits and tactics of the Romans. Gibbon gives some important facts. The subject of ancient machines is treated by Folard’s Commentary attached to his translation of Polybius. Josephus describes with great vividness the siege of Jerusalem. Smith’s Dictionary of Antiquities is full of details in everything pertaining to the weapons, the armor, the military engines, the rewards and punishments of the soldiers. The articles “Exercitus,” in Smith’s Dictionary, and “Army,” in the Encyclopedia Britannica, give a practical summary of the best writers.
CICERO.
106-43 B.C.
ROMAN LITERATURE.
Marcus Tullius Cicero is one of the great lights of history, because his genius and influence were directed to the conservation of what was most precious in civilization among the cultivated nations of antiquity.
He was not a warrior, like so many of the Roman Senators, but his excellence was higher than that of a conqueror. “He was doomed, by his literary genius, to an immortality,” and was confessedly the most prominent figure in the political history of his time, next to Caesar and Pompey. His influence was greater than his power, reaching down to our time; and if his character had faults, let us remember that he was stained by no crimes and vices, in an age of violence and wickedness. Until lately he has received almost unmixed praise. The Fathers of the Church revered him. To Erasmus, as well as to Jerome and Augustine, he was an oracle.
In presenting this immortal benefactor, I have no novelties to show. Novelties are for those who seek to upturn the verdicts of past ages by offering something new, rather than what is true.
Cicero was born B.C. 106, in the little suburban town of Arpinum, about fifty miles from Rome,–the town which produced Marius. The period of his birth was one of marked national prosperity. Great military roads were built, which were a marvel of engineering skill; canals were dug; sails whitened the sea; commerce was prosperous; the arts of Greece were introduced, and its literature also; elegant villas lined the shores of the Mediterranean; pictures and statues were indefinitely multiplied,–everything indicated an increase of wealth and culture. With these triumphs of art and science and literature, we are compelled to notice likewise a decline in morals. Money had become the god which everybody worshipped. Religious life faded away; there was a general eclipse of faith. An Epicurean life produced an Epicurean philosophy. Pleasure-seeking was universal, and even revolting in the sports of the Amphitheatre. Sensualism became the convertible word for utilities. The Romans were thus rapidly “advancing” to a materialistic millennium,–an outward progress of wealth and industries, but an inward decline in “those virtues on which the strength of man is based,” accompanied with seditions among the people, luxury and pride among the nobles, and usurpations on the part of successful generals,–when Cicero began his memorable career.
He was well-born, but not of noble ancestors. The great peculiarity of his youth was his precocity. He was an intellectual prodigy,–like Pitt, Macaulay, and Mill. Like them, he had a wonderful memory. He early mastered the Greek language; he wrote poetry, studied under eminent professors, frequented the Forum, listened to the speeches of different orators, watched the posture and gestures of actors, and plunged into the mazes of literature and philosophy. He was conscious of his marvellous gifts, and was, of course, ambitious of distinction.
There were only three ways at Rome in which a man could rise to eminence and power. One was by making money, like army contractors and merchants, such as the Equites, to whose ranks he belonged; the second was by military service; and the third by the law,–an honorable profession. Like Caesar, a few years younger than he, Cicero selected the law. But he was a _new man_,–not a patrician, as Caesar was,–and had few powerful friends. Hence his progress was not rapid in the way of clients. He was twenty-five years of age before he had a case. He was twenty-seven when he defended Roscius, which seems to have brought him into notice,–even as the fortune of Erskine was made in the Greenwich Hospital case and that of Daniel Webster in the case of Dartmouth College. To have defended Roscius against all the influence of Sulla, then the most powerful man in Rome, was considered bold and audacious. His fame for great logical power rests on his defence of Milo,–the admiration of all lawyers.
Cicero was not naturally robust. His figure was tall and spare, his neck long and slender, and his mouth anything but sensual. He looked more like an elegant scholar than a popular public speaker. Yet he was impetuous, ardent, and fiery, like Demosthenes, resorting to violent gesticulations. The health of such a young man could not stand the strain on his nervous system, and he was obliged to leave Rome for recreation; he therefore made the tour of Greece and Asia Minor, which every fashionable and cultivated man was supposed to do. Yet he did not abandon himself to the pleasures of cities more fascinating than Rome itself, but pursued his studies in rhetoric and philosophy under eminent masters, or “professors” as we should now call them. He remained abroad two years, returning when he was thirty years of age and settling down in his profession, taking at first but little part in politics. He married Terentia, with whom he lived happily for thirty years.
But the Roman lawyer was essentially a politician, looking ultimately to political office, since only through the great public offices could he enter the Senate,–the object of ambition to all distinguished Romans, as a seat in Parliament is the goal of an Englishman. The Roman lawyer did not receive fees, like modern lawyers, but derived his support from presents and legacies. When he became a political leader, a man of influence with the great, his presents were enormous. Cicero acknowledged, late in life, to have received what would now be equal to more than a million of dollars from legacies alone. The great political leaders and orators were the stipendiaries of Eastern princes and nobles who wanted favors from the Senate, and who knew as well how to reward such services as do the railway kings in our times.
Before Cicero, then, could be a Senator, he must pass through those great public offices which were in the gift of the people. The first step on the ladder of advancement was the office of quaestor, which entailed the duty of collecting revenues in one of the provinces. This office he was sufficiently influential to secure, being sent to Sicily, where he distinguished himself for his activity and integrity. At the end of a year he renewed his practice in the courts at Rome,–being hardly anything more than a mere lawyer for five years, when he was elected an Aedile, to whom the care of the public buildings was intrusted.
It was while he was aedile-elect that Cicero appeared as the public prosecutor of Verres. This was one of the great cases of antiquity, and the one from which the orator’s public career fairly dates. His residence in Sicily had prepared him for this duty; and he secured the conviction of this great criminal, whose peculations and corruptions would amaze our modern New Yorkers and all the “rings” of our great cities combined. But the Praetor of Sicily was a provincial governor,–more like Warren Hastings than Tweed. For this public service Cicero gained more _eclat_ than Burke did for his prosecution of Hastings; since Hastings, though a corrupt man, laid, after Clive, the foundation of the English empire in India, and was a man of immense talents,–greater than those of any who has since filled his place. Hence the nation screened Hastings. But Verres had no virtues and no great abilities; he was an outrageous public robber, and hoped, from his wealth and powerful connections, to purchase immunity for his crimes. In the hands of such an orator as Cicero he could not escape the penalty of the law, powerful as he was, even at Rome. This case placed Cicero above Hortensius, hitherto the leader of the Roman bar.
It was at this period that the extant correspondence of Cicero began, which is the best picture we have of the manners and habits of the Roman aristocracy at the time. History could scarcely spare those famous letters, especially to Atticus, in which also the private life and character of Cicero shine to the most advantage, revealing no vices, no treacheries,–only egotism, vanity, and vacillation, and a way that some have of speaking about people in private very differently from what they say in public, which looks like insincerity. In these letters Cicero appears as a very frank man, genial, hospitable, domestic, witty, whose society and conversation must have been delightful. In no modern correspondence do we see a higher perfection in the polished courtesies and urbanities of social life, with the alloy of vanity, irony, and discontent. But in these letters he also evinces a friendship which is immortal; and what is nobler than the capacity of friendship? In these he not only shines as a cultivated scholar, but as a great statesman and patriot, living for the good of his country, though not unmindful of the luxuries of home and the charms of country retirement, and those enjoyments which are ever associated with refined and favored life. We read here of pictures, books, medals, statues, curiosities of every kind, all of which adorned his various villas, as well as his magnificent palace on Mount Palatine, which cost him what would be equal in our money to two hundred and fifty thousand dollars. To keep up this town house, and some fifteen villas in different parts of Italy, and to feast the greatest nobles, like Pompey and Caesar, would imply that his income was enormous, much greater than that of any modern professional man. And yet he seems to have lived, like Bacon and our Webster, beyond his income, and was in debt the greater part of his life,–another flaw in his character; for I do not wish to paint him without faults, but only as a good as well as a great man, for his times. His private character was as lofty as that of Chatham or Canning,–if we could forget his vanity, which after all is not so offensive as the intellectual pride of Burke and Pitt, and of sundry other great lights who might be mentioned, conscious of their gifts and attainments. There is something very different in the egotism of a silly and self-seeking aristocrat from that of a great benefactor who has something to be proud of, and with whose private experiences the greatest national deeds are connected. I speak of this fault because it has been handled too severely by modern critics. What were the faults of Cicero, compared with those of Theodosius or Constantine, to say nothing of his contemporaries, like Caesar, before whom so much incense has been burned?
At the age of forty Cicero became Praetor, or Supreme Judge. This office, when it expired, entitled him to a provincial government,–the great ultimate ambition of a senator; since the administration of a province, even for a single year, usually secured an enormous fortune. But this tempting offer he resigned, since he felt he could not be spared from Rome in such a crisis of public affairs, when the fortunate generals were grasping power and the demagogues were almost preparing the way for despotism. Some might say he was a far-sighted and ambitious statesman, who could not afford to weaken his chances of being made Consul by absence from the capital.
This great office, the consulship, the highest in the gift of the people,–which gave supreme executive control,–was rarely conferred, although elective, upon any but senators of ancient family and enormous wealth. It was as difficult for a “new man” to reach this dignity, under an aristocratic Constitution, as for a commoner a hundred years ago to become prime minister of England. Transcendent talents and services scarcely sufficed. Only generals who had won great military fame, or the highest of the nobles, stood much chance. For a lawyer to aim at the highest office in the State, without a great family to back him, would have been deemed as audacious as for such a man as Burke to aspire to a seat in the cabinet during the reign of George III. A lawyer at Rome, like a lawyer in London, might become a lord chancellor or praetor, but not easily a prime minister: he would be defeated by aristocratic influence and jealousies. Although the people had the right of election, they voted at the dictation of those who had money and power. Yet Cicero obtained the consulship, probably with the aid of senators, which he justly regarded as a great triumph. It was a very unusual thing. It was more marvellous than for a Jew to reign in Great Britain, or, like Mordecai, in the court of a Persian king.
The most distinguished service of Cicero as consul was to ferret out the conspiracy of Catiline. Now, this traitor belonged to the very highest rank in a Senate of nobles; he was like an ancient duke in the British House of Peers. It was no easy thing for a plebeian consul to bring to justice so great a culprit. He was more formidable than Essex in the reign of Elizabeth, or Bassompierre in the time of Richelieu. He was a man of profligate life, but of marked ability and boundless ambition. He had a band of numerous and faithful followers, armed and desperate. He was also one of those oily and aristocratic demagogues who bewitch the people,–not, as in our times, by sophistries, but by flatteries. He was as debauched as Mirabeau, but without his patriotism, though like him he aimed to overturn the Constitution by allying himself with the democracy. The people, whom he despised, he gained by his money and promises; and he had powerful confederates of his own rank, so that he was on the point of deluging Rome with blood, his aim being nothing less than the extermination of the Senate and the magistrates by assassination, and a general division of the public treasure, with personal assumption of public power.
But all his schemes were foiled by Cicero, who added unwearied activity to extraordinary penetration. For this great and signal service Cicero received the highest tribute the State could render. He was called the savior of his country; and he succeeded in staving off for a time the fall of his country’s liberties. It was a mournful sight to him to see the ascendency which demagogues had already gained, since it betokened the approaching destruction of the Constitution, which, good or bad, was dear to him, and which as an aristocrat he sought to conserve.
Cicero’s evil star was not Catiline, but Clodius,–another aristocratic demagogue whose crimes he exposed, although he failed to bring him to justice. Clodius was shielded by his powerful connections; and he was, besides, a popular favorite, as well as a petted scion of one of the greatest families. Clodius showed his hostility to Cicero, and sought revenge by artfully causing the people to pass or revive a law that whoever had inflicted capital punishment on a citizen without a trial should be banished. This seemed to the people to be a protection to their liberties. Now Cicero, when consul, had executed some of the conspirators associated with Catiline, for which he was called the savior of his country. But by the law which was now passed or revived by the influence of Clodius, Cicero was himself a culprit, and it would seem that all the influence of the Senate and his friends could not prevent his exile. He appealed to his friend Pompey, but Pompey turned a deaf ear; and also to Caesar, but Caesar was then outside the walls of the city in command of an army. In fact, both these generals wished him out of the way, although they equally admired and feared him; for each of them was bent on being the supreme ruler of Rome.
So it was permitted for the most illustrious patriot which Rome then held to go into exile. What a comment on the demoralization of the times! Here was the best, the most gifted, and the most accomplished man of the Republic,–a man who had rendered invaluable and acknowledged services, that man of consular dignity and one of the leaders of the Senate,–sent into inglorious banishment, on a mere technicality and for an act which saved the State. And the “magnanimous” Caesar and the “illustrious” Pompey allowed him to go! Where was salvation to a Republic which banished its savior, and for having saved it? The heart sickens over such a fact, although it occurred two thousand years ago. When the citizens of Rome saw that great man depart mournfully from among them, and to all appearance forever, for having rescued them from violence and slaughter, and by their own act,–they ought to have known that the days of the Republic were numbered. But this only a few far-seeing patriots felt. And not only was Cicero banished, but his palace was burned and his villas confiscated. He was not only disgraced, but ruined; he was an exile and a pauper. What a fall! What an unmerited treatment!
Very few people conceive what a dreadful punishment it was in Greece and Rome to be banished; or, as the formula went, “to be interdicted from fire and water,”–the sacred fire of the hearth, the lustral water which served for sacrifices. The exile was deprived of these by being forced to extinguish the hearth-fire,–the elemental, fundamental religion of a Greek and Roman. “He could not, deprived of this, hold property; having no longer a worship, he had no longer a family. He ceased to be a husband and father; his sons were no longer in his power, his wife was no longer his wife, and when he died he had not the right to be buried in the tombs of his ancestors.” [4]
[Footnote 4: Coulanges: Ancient City.]
Is it to be wondered at that even so good and great a man as Cicero should bitterly feel his disgrace and misfortunes? Is it surprising that, philosopher as he was, he should have given way to grief and despondency. He would have been more than human not to have lost his spirits and his hopes. How natural were grief and despair, in such complicated miseries, especially to a religious man! Chrysostom could support _his_ exile with dignity; for Christianity had abolished the superstitions of Greece and Rome as to household gods. Cicero could not: he was not great enough for such a martyrdom. It is true we should have esteemed him higher, had he accepted his fate with resignation: no man should yield to despair. Had he been as old as Socrates, and had he accomplished his mission, possibly he would have shown more equanimity. But his work was not yet done. He was cut off in his prime and in the midst of usefulness from his home, his religion, his family, his honor, and his influence; he was utterly ruined. I think the critics make too much of the grief and misery of Cicero in his banishment. We may be disappointed that Cicero was not equal to his circumstances; but we need not be hard on him. My surprise is, not that he was overwhelmed with grief, but that he did not attempt to drown his grief in books and literature. His sole relief was in pathetic and unmanly letters.
The great injustice of this punishment naturally produced a reaction. Nor could the Romans afford to lose the services of their greatest orator. They also craved the excitement of his speeches, more thrilling and delightful than the performance of any actor. So he was recalled. Cicero ought to have anticipated this; it seems, however, he had that unfortunate temperament which favors alternate depression and exhilaration of spirits, without measure or reason.
His return was a triumph,–a grand ovation, an unbounded tribute to his vanity. His palace was rebuilt at the expense of the State, and his property was restored. His popularity was regained. In fact, his influence was never lost; and, because it was so great, his enemies wished him out of the way. He was one of the few who retain influence after they have lost power.
The excess of his joy on his restoration to home and friends and property and fame and position, was as great as the excess of his grief in his short exile. But this is a defect in temperament, in his mental constitution, rather than a flaw in his character. We could have wished more placidity and equanimity; but to condemn him because he was not great in everything is unjust.
On his return to Rome Cicero resumed his practice in the courts with greater devotion than ever. He was now past fifty years of age, in the prime of his strength and in the height of his forensic fame. But, notwithstanding his success and honors, his life was saddened by the growing dissensions between Caesar and Pompey, the decline of public spirit, and the approaching fall of the institutions in which he gloried. It was clear that one or the other of these fortunate generals would soon become the master of the Roman world, and that liberty was about to perish. His eloquence now became sad; he sings the death-song of departing glories; he wails his Jeremiads over the demoralization which was sweeping away not merely liberty, but religion, and extinguishing faith in the world. To console himself he retired to one of his beautiful villas and wrote that immortal essay, “De Oratore,” which has come down to us entire. His literary genius now blazed equally with his public speeches in the Forum and in the Senate. Literature was his solace and amusement, not a source of profit, or probably of contemporary fame. He wrote treatises on the same principles that he talked with friends, or that Fra Angelico painted pictures. He renewed his attempts in poetry, but failed. His poetry is in the transcendent rhythm of his prose compositions, like that of Madame de Stael, and Macaulay, and Rousseau.
But he was dragged from his literary and forensic life to accept the office of a governor of a province. It was forced upon him,–an honor to him without a charm. Had he been venal and unscrupulous, he would have seized it with avidity. He was too conscientious to enrich himself by public corruption, as other Senators did, and unless he could accumulate a fortune the command of a distant province was an honorable exile. He was fifty-six years of age when he became Proconsul of Cilicia, an Eastern province; and all historians have united in praising his proconsulate for its justice, its integrity, and its ability. He committed no extortions, and returned home, when his term of office expired, as poor as when he went. One of the highest praises which can be given to a public man who has chances of enriching himself is, that he remains poor. When a member of Congress, known not to be worth ten thousand dollars, returns to his home worth one hundred thousand dollars, the public have an instinct that he has, somehow or other, been untrue to himself and his country. When a great man returns home from Washington poorer than when he went, his influence is apt to survive his power; and this perpetuated influence is the highest glory of a public man,–the glory of Jefferson, of Hamilton, of Washington, like the voice of Gladstone during his retirement. Now Cicero had pre-eminently this influence as long as he lived; and it was ever exerted for the good of his country. Had his country been free, he would have died in honor. But his country was enslaved, and his voice was drowned, and he had to pay the penalty of speaking the truth about those unscrupulous men who usurped authority.
On his return to Rome the state of public affairs was most alarming. Caesar and Pompey were in antagonism. He must choose between them, and he distrusted both. Caesar was the more able, accomplished, and magnanimous, but he was the more unscrupulous and dangerous. He had ventured to cross the Rubicon,–the first general who ever dared thus openly to assail his country’s liberties. Pompey was pompous, overrated, and proud, and had been fortunate in the East. But then he sided with the Constitutional authorities,–that is, with the Senate,–so far as his ambition allowed. So Cicero took his side feebly, reluctantly, as the least of the evils he had to choose, but not without vacillation, which is one of the popular charges against him. “His distraction almost took the form of insanity.” “His inconsistency was an incoherence.” Never did a more wretched man than Cicero resort to Pompey’s camp, where he remained until his cause was lost. He returned, after the battle of Pharsalia, a suppliant at the feet of Caesar, the conqueror. This, to me, is one of his weakest acts. It would have been more lofty and heroic to have perished in the camp of Pompey’s sons.
In the midst of these public misfortunes which saddened his soul, his private miseries began. He was now prematurely an old man, under sixty years of age, almost broken down with grief. His beloved daughter Tullia, with whom his life was bound up, died; and he was divorced from his wife Terentia,–a proceeding the cause of which remains a mystery. Neither in his most confidential letters, nor in his conversations with most intimate friends, does it appear that he ever unbosomed himself, although he was the frankest and most social of men. In his impressive silence he has set one of the noblest examples of a man afflicted with domestic infelicities. He buries his conjugal troubles in eternal silence; although he is forced to give vent to sorrows, so plaintive and bitter that both friend and foe were constrained to pity. He expects no sympathy, even at Rome, for the sundering of conjugal relations, and he communicates no secrets. In his grief and sadness he does, however, a most foolish thing: he marries a young lady one-third his age. She accepted him for his name and rank; he sought her for her beauty, her youth, and her fortune. This union of May with December was of course a failure. Both parties were soon disenchanted and disappointed. Neither party found happiness, only discontent and chagrin. The everlasting incongruities of such a relation–he sixty and she nineteen–soon led to another divorce. _He_ expected his young wife to mourn with him the loss of his daughter Tullia. _She_ expected that her society and charms would be a compensation for all that he had lost; yea, more, enough to make him the most fortunate and happy of mortals. In truth, he was too old a man to have married a young woman whatever were the inducements. It was the great folly of his life; an illustration of the fact that, as a general thing, the older a man grows the greater fool he becomes, so far as women are concerned; a folly that disgraced and humiliated the two wisest and greatest men who ever sat on the Jewish throne.
In his accumulated sorrows Cicero now plunged for relief into literary labors. It was thus that his private sorrows were the means which Providence employed to transmit his precious thoughts and experiences to future ages, as the most valued inheritance he could bestow on posterity. What a precious legacy to the mind of the world was the book of “Ecclesiastes,” yet by what bitter experiences was its wisdom earned!
It was in the short period when Caesar rejoiced in the mighty power which he transmitted to the Roman Emperors that Cicero wrote, in comparative retirement, his history of “Roman Eloquence,” his inquiry as to the “Greatest Good and Evil,” his “Cato,” his “Orator,” his “Nature of the Gods,” and his treatises on “Glory,” on “Fate,” on “Friendship,” on “Old Age,” and his grandest work of all, the “Offices.”–the best manual in ethics which has come down to us from heathen antiquity. In his studious retirement he reminds us of Bacon after his fall, when on his estate, surrounded with friends, and in the enjoyment of elegant leisure, he penned the most valued of his immortal compositions. And in those degenerate days at Rome, when liberty was crushed under foot forever, it is beautiful to see the greatest of Roman statesmen and lawyers consoling himself and instructing posterity by his exhaustive treatises on the fundamental principles of law, of morality, and of philosophy.
The assassination of Caesar by Roman senators, which Cicero seems to have foreseen, and in which he rejoiced, at this time shocked and disturbed the world. For nearly two thousand years the verdict of the civilized world respecting this great conqueror has been unanimous. But Mr. Froude has attempted to reverse this verdict, as he has in reference to Henry VIII., and as Carlyle–another idolater of force–has attempted in the cases of Oliver Cromwell and Frederick II. This remarkable word-painter, in his Life of Caesar,–which is, however, interesting from first to last, as everything he writes is interesting,–has presented him as an object of unbounded admiration, as I have already noticed in my lecture on Caesar. Whether in his eagerness to say something new, or from an ill-concealed hostility to aristocratic and religious institutions, or from an admiration of imperialism, or disdain of the people in their efforts at self-government, this able special pleader seems to hail the Roman conqueror as a benefactor to the cause of civilization. But imperialism crushed all alike,–the people, no longer able to send their best men to the Senate through the higher offices perchance to represent their interests, and the nobles, shorn of the administration of the Empire. Soldiers, not civilians, henceforth were to rule the world,–a dreary thought to a great lawyer like Cicero, or a landed proprietor like Brutus. Even if such a terrible revolution as occurred in Rome under Caesar may have been ordered wisely by a Superintending Power for those degenerate times, and as a preservation of the peace of the world, that Christianity might take root and spread in countries where all religions were dead,–still, the prostration of what was dearest to the hearts of all true citizens by the sword was a crime; and men are not to be commended for crime, even if those crimes may be palliated. “It must need be that offences come, but woe to those by whom they come.”