iiTL. c rU'J'Jr y//^/^//.' //- 
 
 c/?U'i'&?'yU^ y<^ ^Qa/^?y^l^ 
 
Epochs of Ancient History. 
 
 EDITED BY THE 
 
 Rev. Sir GEORGE WILLIAM COX, Bart. M.A. late 
 Scholar of Trinity College, Oxford ; 
 
 AND JOINTLY BY 
 
 CHARLES SANKEY, M.A. late Scholar of Queen's Coll. 
 Oxford. 
 
 lO Volumes. Price 2s. 6d. each. 
 
 The GRACCHI, MARIUS, and SULLA. By A. H. 
 
 Beesly, M.A. Assistant-Master, Marlborough College. With 2 Maps, 
 
 The EARLY ROMAN EMPIRE. From the Assassina- 
 tion of Julius C>esar to the Assassination of Domitian. By the Rev. 
 W. Wolfe Capes, M.A. With 2 Coloured Maps. 
 
 The ROMAN EMPIRE of the SECOND CENTURY, 
 
 or the AGE of the ANTONINES. By the Rev. W. Wolfe Capes, 
 M.A. With 2 Coloured Maps. 
 
 The ATHENIAN EMPIRE from the FLIGHT of 
 
 XERXES to the FALL of ATHENS. By the Rev. Sir G. W. Cox, 
 Bart. M.A. Joint-Editor of the Series. With 5 Maps. 
 
 The GREEKS and the PERSIANS. By the Rev. Sii 
 
 G. W. Cox, Bart. M.A. Joint-Editor of the Series. With 4 Coloured 
 Maps. 
 
 The RISE of the MACEDONIAN EMPIRE. By 
 
 Arthur M. Curteis, M.A. formerly Fellow of Trinity College, Oxford. 
 With 8 Maps. 
 
 ROME to its CAPTURE by the GAULS. By Wilhelm 
 
 Ihne, Author of * History of Rome.' With a Coloured Map. 
 
 The ROMAN TRIUMVIRATES. By the Very Rev. 
 Charles Mekivale, D.D. late Dean of Ely. With a Coloured Map. 
 
 The SPARTAN and THEBAN SUPREMACIES. By 
 
 Charles Sankey, M.A. Joint-Edito - • ~ • 
 Marlborough College. With 5 Maps, 
 
 Charles Sankey, M.A. Joint-Editor of the Series, Assistant-Master 
 ~ •■ e. With si' 
 
 ROME and CARTHAGE, the PUNIC WARS. By 
 
 R. Bosworth Smith, M.A. Assistant-Master, Harrow School. With 
 9 Maps and Plans. 
 
 LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. 
 
 LONDON, NEW YORK, AND BOMBAY 
 
EPOCHS OF MODERN HISTORY. 
 
 Edited by C. COLBECK, M.A. 
 19 Volumes. Fcap. 8vo, price 2S. 6d. each. 
 
 THE BEGINNING OF THE MIDDLE AGES. By Richard 
 William Church, D.C.L., late Dean of St. Paul's. With 3 Maps. 
 
 THE NORMANS IN EUROPE. By the Rev. A. H. Johnson, M.A. 
 With 3 Maps. 
 
 THE CRUSADES. By the Rev. Sir G. W. Cox, Bart., M.A. With a 
 
 Map. 
 THE EARi-Y PLANT AGENETS. By the Right Rev. W. Stubbs, 
 
 D.D., Bishop of Oxford. With 2 Maps. 
 EDWARD THE THIRD. By the Rev. W. Warburton, M.A. With 
 
 3 Maps and 3 Genealogical Tables. 
 
 THE HOUSES OF LANCASTER AND YORK ; with the Con- 
 quest and Loss of France. By James Gairdner. With 5 Maps. 
 
 THE EARLY TUDORS. By the Rev. C. E. Moberly, M.A. 
 
 THE ERA OF THE PROTESTANT REVOLUTION. By F. 
 Seebohm. Witli 4 Maps and 12 Diagrams. 
 
 THE AGE OF ELIZABETH. By the Right Rev, Mandell 
 Ckeighton, D.Jj., LL.D., Bishop of London. With 5 Maps and 
 
 4 Genealogical Tables. 
 
 THE FIRST TWO STUARTS AND THE PURITAN 
 
 REVOLUTION, 160^-1660. By Samuel Rawson Gardiner, 
 D.C.L., LL.D. With 4 Maps. 
 
 THE THIRTY YEARS' WAR, 1618-1648. By Samuel Rawson 
 
 Gardiner, D.C.L., LL.D. With a Map. 
 THE ENGLISH RESTORATION AND LOUIS XIV., 1648- 
 
 1678. By Osmund Airy, one of H.M. Inspectors of Schools. 
 
 THE FALL OF THE STUARTS; and WESTERN EUROPE 
 
 from 1678 to 1697. By the Rev. Edward Hale, M.A. With 11 
 Maps and Plans. 
 
 THE AGE OF ANNE. By E. E. Morris, M.A. With 7 Maps and 
 
 Plans. 
 
 THE EARLY HANOVERIANS. By E. E. Morris, M.A. With 
 9 Maps and Plans. 
 
 FREDERICK THE GREAT and the SEVEN YEARS' WAR. 
 
 By F. W. Longman. With 2 Maps. 
 
 THE WAR OF AMERICAN INDEPENDENCE, 1775-1783. By 
 J. M. Ludlow. With 4 ]\Iaps. 
 
 THE FRENCH REVOLUTION, 1789-1795. By Mrs. S. R. Gar- 
 diner. With 7 Maps. 
 
 THE EPOCH OF REFORM, 1830-1850. By Justin McCarthy, 
 M.P. 
 
 LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. 
 
 LONDON, NEW YORK, AND BOMBAY. 
 
Epochs of Ancient History 
 
 EDITED BY 
 
 Rev. sir G. W. COX, Bart. M.A. and C. SANKEY, M.A 
 
 The ROMAN EMPIRE of the SECOND CENTURY 
 
 W. W. CAPES, M.A. 
 
Digitized by tine Internet Arciiive 
 
 in 2008 witii funding from 
 
 IVIicrosoft Corporation 
 
 littp://www.archive.org/details/antoninesageOOcapericli 
 
EPOCHS OF ANCIENT HISTORY 
 
 THE ROMAN EMPIRE 
 
 OF THE 
 
 SECOND CENTURY 
 
 THE AGE OF THE ANTONINES 
 
 BY 
 
 W. W. CAPES, M.A. 
 
 LATE Fellow and tutor of queen's college 
 
 WITH TWO MAPS 
 
 SEVENTH EDITION 
 
 LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. 
 
 39 PATERNOSTER ROW,. LONDON 
 NEW YORK AND BO WAY i '" 
 
 1S97 ■• :.^ ; :,:'; ^.^^ ,'. 
 
 ^ // rights reserved 
 
HENRV MOPSE ?TEPHEJI8 
 
 . Pvnte^ fy ^ALLANTYNR, HaNSON & Cc 
 
 • • • **• 2t ihe Ballantyne Press 
 

 CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 NERVA.— A.D. 96-98. 
 
 PA6II 
 
 Nerva raised to the throne by the murderers of Domitian . 1 
 Treats the agents of past tyranny with forbearance, though 
 
 Pliny and others cried for vengeance .... 3 
 
 Nerva's measures for the poorer citizens .... 4 
 
 The mutiny on the Danube appeased by Dion Chrysostom 5 
 The violence of the praetorians caused the Emperor to choose 
 
 Trajan as his colleague and successor, A.D. 97 . . 6 
 
 Deathof Nerva, A.D. 98 7 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 TRAJAN. — A.D. 97-II7. 
 
 Trajan avenges the outrage done to Nerva 
 
 After a year's delay enters Rome without parade 
 
 The simple bearing of his wife Plotina .... 
 
 His respect for constitutional forms 
 
 His frank covirtesy and fearless confidence 
 
 His thrift and moderation excite the surprise of Plmy . 
 
 His economy could save little except in personal expenditure 
 
 Large outlay on roads, bridges, ports and aqueducts, baths 
 
 and theatres 
 
 The charitable endowments for poor children 
 Which lead others to act in a like spirit 
 Trajan's policy with regard to the corn trade - 
 
VI Contents. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 His treatment of provincial interests as shown in the corre- 
 spondence with Pliny, A.D. 111-113 .... 22 
 He would not meddle needlessly or centralize too fast . . 24 
 
 His war policy . . . .• 25 
 
 On the side of Germany he had strengthened the frontier with 
 
 defensive works 26 
 
 The rise of the Dacian kingdom and threats of Decebalus . 27 
 
 Trajan declared war and set out, A.D. loi .... 28 
 
 1 he course of the campaign 29 
 
 The battle of Tapae, advance into Transylvania, and Roman 
 
 victories bring the first war to a close. A.D. 102 . . 31 
 
 F'eace did not last long 32 
 
 Trajan's preparations and bridge of stone across the Danube . 33 
 The legions converged on Dacia and crushed the enemy, 
 
 A.D. 106 34 
 
 The country was colonized and garrisoned • • • • 35 
 The survival of Rome's influence in the Roumanian lan- 
 guage 36 
 
 Trajan's forum and triumphal column . . . . . — 
 
 The conquest of Arabia 38 
 
 War declared against Parthia, A.D. 113 40 
 
 Trajan arrives at Antioch, and marches through Armenia . 41 
 
 Parthamasiris deposed and slain 43 
 
 Submission of the neighbouring princes .... — 
 
 The great earthquake at Antioch, A.D. 115 .... 44 
 Trajan crossed the Tigris and carried ali before him as far as 
 
 the Persian Gulf 45 
 
 But the lately conquered countries rose in his rear, and he was 
 
 forced to retire 46 
 
 His death at Selinus, and character 47 
 
 Taken as a tjrpe of heathen justice in legend and art . . 48 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 HADRIAN.— A.D. II7-138. 
 
 The earlier life of Hadrian ....... 49 
 
 His sudden elevation to the throne caused ugly rumours . 50 
 
 His policy of peace accompanied by personal hardihood and 
 
 regard for discipline 5a 
 
Contents. vii 
 
 PAGE 
 
 He travelled constantly through the provinces • • • S3 
 We hear of him in Britain, Africa, Asia Minor, and in Athens 
 
 above all 55 
 
 And in Egypt 56 
 
 The death and apotheosis of Antinous .... 57 
 
 Hadrian's interests cosmopolitan more than Roman 58 
 
 The levelling influence of the ' Perpetual Edict,' a.d. 132 . 59 
 
 Hadrian's frugality and good finance . . . . ' 61 
 
 The dark moods and caprices attributed to him ... 61 
 His suspicious temper, system of espionage, and jealousy of 
 
 brilliant powers 63 
 
 His fickleness, superstition, and variety of temper . . 64 
 
 Reasons for mistrusting these accounts of ancient authors . 65 
 
 His villa at Tivoli • 66 
 
 Struck by disease, he chose Verus as successor, A. D. 135, who 
 
 died soon after 68 
 
 Antoninus was adopted in his place — 
 
 Hadrian's dying agony, and fitful moods of cruelty . . 69 
 
 His death and canonization ...... 70 
 
 The mausoleum of Hadrian — 
 
 The outbreak in Palestine was at last terribly stamped out . 71 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 ANTONINUS PIUS.- A.D. 138-161. 
 
 The reign of Antoninus was uneventful 73 
 
 Why called Pius 74 
 
 His good-nature was free from weakness • • • • 75 
 He did not travel abroad, but was careful of provincial 
 
 interests — 
 
 Wars were needful with Moors, Dacians, and Brigantes, yet 
 
 he gained more by diplomacy 76 
 
 His homely life at Lorium ^^ 
 
 His easy and forgiving temp>er 78 
 
 Tender care of his adopted son, to whom he left the Empire 
 
 at his death 79 
 
viii Contefits. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 MARCUS AURELIUS ANTONINUS. — A.D. 147-180. 
 
 PACiK 
 
 The early life of M. Aurelius 80 
 
 His correspondence with Fronto, his old tutor ... 81 
 
 His conversion from rhetoric to philosophy .... 8a 
 
 The jealousy of Fronto 83 
 
 Offices of state and popular favour did not turn the head of the 
 
 young prince 84 
 
 He looked to the Stoic creed for guidance, but without loss of 
 
 tenderness 85 
 
 Fronto, like Faustina, had little love for philosophers , . 86 
 On the death of Antoninus M. Aurelius shared his power with 
 
 L. Verus, A.D. 161 87 
 
 Ominous prospects, floods, dangers on the Euphrates . . — 
 
 Verus starts for the East, where the soldiers were demoralized 89 
 The Parthians were humbled, and Verus claimed the merit of 
 
 his generals' successes, A.D. 166 90 
 
 Fronto' s courtly panegyric 91 
 
 M. Aurelius meantime endows charities for foundlings, appoints 
 juridici, and guardians for orphans, and works unremit- 
 tingly 93 
 
 But he is called away to the scene of war .... 94 
 
 The fortune of the Roman arms in Britain .... 95 
 Both Emperors started for the Danube, where the border races 
 
 sued for peace 96 
 
 The ravages of the plague, A.D. 167-8 ... 97 
 The war begins again, but is checked by the spread of the 
 
 plague 98 
 
 Verus dies, and M. Aurelius rules henceforth alone, A.D. 169 99 
 The long and arduous struggle on the Northern frontier . 100 
 The Marcomannic war followed by the campaign against 
 the Quadi, in which we read of the marvel of the ' Thunder- 
 ing Legion ' 102 
 
 The revolt of Avidius Cassius, A.D, 175 103 
 
 Contempt expressed by him for the Emperor as a ruler . 105 
 
 The sjjeedy failure of the insurrection 106 
 
 The Emperor showed no vindictive feeling . . \qq 
 
Contents. ix 
 
 I'AGE 
 
 He went to restore order in the East, and Faustina died on 
 
 the way io8 
 
 His short rest at Rome, and endowments in memory of his 
 
 wife 109 
 
 Recalled to the war in the North, he died at Vienna or 
 
 Sirmium, A.D. 180 — 
 
 Grief of his subjects, and monuments in his honour . no 
 His ' Meditations ' reflect his habits of self-inquiry and grati- 
 tude 112 
 
 There is no trace in them of morbid vanity or self-contempt it6 
 
 He tried to be patient and cheerful in the hard work of life . 117 
 Nor was he too ambitious or too sanguine in his aims . .119 
 
 His anticipations of Christian feeling 120 
 
 The thought of a Ruling Providence stirred his heart with 
 
 tenderness and love 122 
 
 His delicate sympathy with Nature 123 
 
 His melancholy and sense of isolation 124 
 
 The austere Stoic creed could not content him . 125 
 
 The contrast of the contemporary Christians .... 126 
 
 M. Aurelius was unfortunate in his son C'ommodus . . t26 
 Was he also in his wife Faustina? Reasons for doubting the 
 
 truth of the common story. 127 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE ATTITUDE OF THK IMPERIAL GOVERNMENT 
 TOWARDS THE CHltlSTIANS. 
 
 The Christians at first regarded as a Jewish sect, and not dis- 
 turbed 129 
 
 In the time of Nero we trace dislike to the Christians as such 131 
 
 They were regarded as unsocial and morose fanatics, accusefl 
 of impiety and of foul excesses 132 
 
 Christianity was not made illegal till the time of Trajan, whose 
 answer to Pliny determined the law 135 
 
 The reasons why the government might distrust the Christian 
 Church 137 
 
 Succeeding Emperors inclined to mercy, but the popular dis- 
 like grew more intense 139 
 
 The rescripts of Hadrian and Antoninus very questionable . 140 
 
X Contents. 
 
 PAGB 
 
 The martyrdom of Polycarp ...... 141 
 
 The persecution at Vienna and Lugdunum .... 142 
 
 Lucian's account of Peregrinus Proteus reflects some noble 
 
 features of the early Church, A.D. 165 .... 144 
 
 The attack of Celsus, A.D. 150, was answered in later days . 145 
 
 The line of argument taken by the Apologists of the age . 148 
 
 The life of Justin Martyr 149 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE CHARACTERISTICS OF THE STATE RELIGION, AND 
 OF THE RITES IMPORTED FROM THE EAST. 
 
 The Emperors respected the old forms of national religion . 150 
 
 The Collegia or brotherhoods 151 
 
 The official registers of the Arval Brothers, containing a full 
 
 description of their ritual 152 
 
 We may note (i) their punctilious regard for ancient forms . 154 
 
 (2) The absence of moral or spiritual influence . . 155 
 
 {3) The loyalty to the established powers of state . . 156 
 The old religion was cold and meagre, and supplemented by 
 
 exotic creeds 157 
 
 The civil power only feebly opposed the new rites, which were 
 
 welcomed by devout minds like Plutarch and Maximus 
 
 Tyrius 159 
 
 The mystic reveries and visions of Aristides in his sickness, 
 
 A.D. 144-161 160 
 
 New moods of ecstatic feeling, self-denial, and excitement, and 
 
 mystic gloom encouraged by Eastern religions . . . i6i 
 
 The rite of the tauroboUum 163 
 
 The new comers lived in peace in the imperial Pantheon . 164 
 
 CHAPTER VIII, 
 
 THE LITERARY CURRENTS OF THE AGE. 
 
 The enthusiasm for learning, but want of creative power . 165 
 
 The culture of the age was mainly Greek and professorial 166 
 
 The various classes of Sophists 167 
 
 I. Moralists and Philosophers 168 
 
Contents, 
 
 XI 
 
 Epictetus, fl. under Trajan 
 Dion Chrysostom ,. 
 Plutarch ,, ,, 
 
 Literary artists and rhetoricians 
 Fronto, A.D. 90-168 
 Polemon, fl. under Hadrian . 
 Favorinus ,, ,, 
 
 Herodes Atticus, A.D.101-177 
 Apuleius, fi. under M. Aurelius 
 Lucian ,, ,, 
 
 PAGE 
 
 170 
 
 174 
 177 
 181 
 182 
 184 
 
 18s 
 
 188 
 191 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 THE ADMINISTRATIVE FORMS OF THE IMPERIAL 
 GOVERNMENT, 
 
 The Emperor was an absolute sovereign, and his ministers 
 
 wf.re at tirst his domestics, afterwards knipi;hts . . 194 
 
 Tne osi miporianc otticers were, (i; a rationibus (treasurer) . 195 
 
 2. Ab epistulis (secretary) 196 
 
 3. A libellis (clerk of petitions) 196 
 
 4. A cubiculo (chamberlain) 197 
 
 The Privy Council — 
 
 The Prsefect of the city 198 
 
 The Proefect of the Praetorian Guard — 
 
 The provincial governors and their suite .... 199 
 
 Local magistrates and local freedom . . . . . 200 
 
 Few guarantees of permanence 201 
 
 The municipalities courted interference 202 
 
 The governors began to meddle mor" . . 203 
 
 The Coesar was more appealed to .... — 
 
 The actual evils of a later age ...... 204 
 
 r. The pressure of taxation, moderate at first, became 
 
 more and more intense 204 
 
 2. The increase of bureaucracy was followed by oppressive 
 
 restrictions on the Civil Service .... 207 
 
 3. The municipal honours became onerous charges . 208 
 
 4. Trades and industries became hereditary burdens . 210 
 
 INDEX 
 
 ats 
 
ORIGINAL AUTHORITIES. 
 
 Scripiores Historice Attgusia. 
 
 Dion Cassius, Hist. Rom. Xiphilini Epit. 
 
 Pliny, Letters. 
 
 Fronto, Letters. 
 
 Marcus Antoninus, quoted commonly in the transla- 
 tion OF G. Long. 
 
 EusEBius, Eccl. Hist. 
 
 Piiilosostratus, Vita Sophistaiiim. 
 
 Epictetus, Manual and Dissert. 
 
 Plutarch, Moral Treatises. 
 
 LuciAN, Works. 
 
 Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum. 
 
LIST OF MAPS. 
 
 — — •Ot 
 
 I. Map to illustrate the Dacian War To face page 29 
 11. Map to illustrate the Parthian War ,, 41 
 
ROMAN HISTORY. 
 
 THE AGE OF THE ANTONINES. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 NERVA. A.D. 96-98. 
 
 Before the murderers of Domitian raised their handi 
 to strike the fatal blow, they looked around, 
 we read, to find a successor to replace him. rafse^tothe 
 Others whom they sounded on the subject throne by 
 
 •' •* the murder- 
 
 shrunk away in fear or in suspicion, till they ers of Do- 
 thought of M. Cocceius Nerva, who was '""'^"' 
 likely to fill worthily the office that would soon be vacant. 
 Little is known of his career for more than sixty years, 
 till after he had twice been consul, and when his work 
 seemed almost done, he rose for a little while to take the 
 highest place on earth. The tyrant on the throne had 
 eyed him darkly, had banished him because he heard 
 that the stars pointed in his case to the signs of sovereign 
 power, and indeed only spared his life because other 
 dabblers in the mystic lore said that he was fated soon to 
 die. The sense of his danger, heightened by his know- 
 ledge of the plot, made Nerva bold when others flinched ; 
 so he lent the conspirators his name, and rose by their 
 help to the imperial seat. He had dallied with th? 
 Muses, and courted poetry in earlier years ; but he showed 
 
 A.M. B 
 
• *•* ^-fi^yi^e of the Antonines. 
 
 A.D. 
 
 Inrf .ciTeaJiiVSf iims ^^'s ,ruier, and no genius for heroic 
 measures. The fancy* or the sanguine confidence of 
 youth was chequered perhaps by waning strength and 
 feeble health, or more probably a natural kindliness of 
 temper made him more careful of his people's wants. 
 After the long nightmare of oppression caused by the 
 caprices of a moody despot, Rome woke again to find 
 herself at rest under a sovereign who indulged no 
 wanton fancies, but was gentle and calm and unassuming, 
 . homely in his personal bearing, and thrifty 
 
 gentle mode- with the coffers of the state. He had few 
 ration. expensive tastes, it seemed, and Httle love for 
 
 grand parade, refusing commonly the proffered statues 
 and gaudy trappings of official rank. As an old senator, 
 he felt a pride in the dignity of the august assembly, 
 consulted it in all concerns of moment, and pledged him- 
 self to look upon its members' lives as sacred. A short 
 while since and they were cowering before Domitian's 
 sullen frown, or shut up in the senate house by men-at- 
 arms while the noblest of their number were dragged 
 out before their eyes to death. But now they had an 
 Emperor who treated them as his peers, who listened 
 patiently to their debates, and met them on an easy 
 treating footing in the courtesies ofsocial life. He rose 
 
 wfth re-*^^ above the petty jealousy which looks askant at 
 spect, brilliant powers or great historic names, and 
 
 chose even as his colleague in the consulship the old 
 Verginius Rufus, in whose hands once lay the miperial 
 power had he only cared to grasp it. Nor was he 
 haunted by suspicious fears, such as sometimes give the 
 timid a fierce appetite for blood. For when he learr.t 
 that a noble of old family had formed a plot against his 
 life, he took no steps to punish him, but kept him close 
 beside him in his train, talked to him at the theatre 
 with calm composure, and even handed him a sword to 
 
w, 
 
 Nerva. 3 
 
 try its edge and temper, as if intent to prove that he had 
 no mistrustful or revengeful thought ■ 
 
 There were many indeed to whom he seemed too 
 easy-going, too careless of the memories of wrong-doing, 
 to satisfy their passionate zeal for justice. There were 
 those who had seen their friends or kinsmen hunted to 
 death by false accusers, who thought that surely now at 
 length they might wreak their vengeance on the tyrant's 
 bloodhounds. The early days of Nerva's ^^^ ^^^ 
 rule seemed to flatter all their hopes, for the agents of 
 prison doors were opened to let the innocent mnny^with 
 go forth, while their place was taken by spies forbearance, 
 and perjurers and all the harpies who had preyed on 
 noble victims. For a while it seemed as if the days of 
 retribution were at hand, but the Emperor's gentle temper, 
 or the advice of wary counsellors, prevailed ; Nerva 
 soon stayed his hand, and would not have the first pages 
 of his annals scored in characters of blood. To many, 
 such clemency seemed idle weakness ; Pliny, humane 
 and tender-hearted as he was, reflects in his familiar 
 letters the indignation of his class, and sorely though 
 frets to think of the great criminals who othersTrfed 
 flaunted in the eyes of men the pride of their for ven- 
 ill-gotten wealth. He tells with a malicious Ep!Tv^"22.) 
 glee the story of a supper-party in the palace, where the 
 name of a notorious informer happened to come up, and 
 first one and then another of the guests told tale after 
 tale of his misdeeds, till the Emperor asked at last what 
 could be done with him if he were living still. Where- 
 upon one bolder than the rest replied, 'he would be asked 
 to supper with us here to-night; ' and indeed close beside 
 Nerva there was lolling on the couch an infamous pro- 
 fessor of the same black art. We may read, too, in a 
 letter written long afterwards to a young friend, how 
 Pliny came forward in the senate to laud the memory ol 
 
4 The Age of the Antonines. a.d. 
 
 the great Helvidius, and brand with infamy the wretch 
 who caused his death. At first he found 
 ^' ^' ^^' scant sympathy from those who heard him. 
 Some troubled with a guilty conscience tried to drown 
 his voice in clamour, on the plea that no notice had been 
 given of his motion ; some begged him not to raise the 
 ghosts of worn-out feuds, but to let them rest in peace 
 awhile after the long reign of terror. Wary friends, too, 
 •varned him to be cautious, lest he should make himself 
 a mark for the jealousy of future rulers. But Pliny was 
 resolute and persevered. The consul, who acted as 
 Speaker in the senate, silenced him indeed at first, but 
 let him rise at length in his own turn, and, leaving the 
 subject then before the house, speak for the memory of 
 his injured friend, till the full stream of his indignant 
 eloquence carried the listening senators along, and swept 
 away the timid protests raised for the accused. The 
 Emperor stepped in, and stayed proceedings in the senate ; 
 but the orator recalled with pride in later years the 
 enthusiasm which his vehemence had stirred, and felt no 
 throb of pity in his kindly heart when he was told that 
 the wretched man whom he accused was haunted soon 
 after in his dying moments by his own stern look and 
 passionate words. 
 
 But Nerva was determined to let the veil fall on the 
 past. He raised no question about the favours and the 
 boons of earher rulers, but respected the immunities and 
 dispensations however carelessly bestowed. 
 
 There were still three powers that must be reckoned 
 Ncrva's ^'^^ before any government could feel 
 
 measures securc — the populace of Rome, the frontier 
 poorer citi- legions, and the praetorian guards. The first 
 zcns. looked to be courted and caressed as usual ; 
 
 but the treasury was empty, and Nerva was too thrifty 
 to spend lavishly on the circus or the theatres or the 
 
96-98. Nerva. 5 
 
 processions which helped to make a Roman holiday. 
 Still he was careful of the real interests of the poor ; he 
 gave large sums for land to be granted freely to the colonists 
 who would exchange the lounging indolence of Rome for 
 honest industry in country work. Where funds were 
 wanting for this purpose, he stripped the palace of its 
 costly wares, sold even the heirlooms of his family, and 
 gave up houses and broad lands to carry out his plans 
 for the well-being of his subjects. To show that such 
 self-sacrifice was due to no caprice of passing fancy, he 
 had the new name of ' The Palace of the People ' set up 
 in characters which all might read upon the mansion of the 
 Caesars, while the coins that were struck in his imperial 
 mint bore the old name of Liberty upon their 
 face. For he tried, says Tacitus, to reconcile ^^^ ^' 
 the claims of monarchy and freedom — the two things 
 found incompatible before. 
 
 The distant legions had suffered little from Domitian's 
 misrule. His father and brother had been generals of 
 mark, and the thought of his own inglorious campaigns 
 soon faded from their memory ; they knew him chiefly 
 as a liberal paymaster and indulgent chief, and they 
 heard with discontent that the Flavian dynasty had fallen, 
 and that Rome had chosen a new ruler. The soldiers on 
 the Danube broke out into open riot when they heard 
 the news, and talked of marching to avenge their master. 
 But by good hap, a certain Dion, a poor The mutiny 
 wandering scholar, was at hand. Driven by Danube ap- 
 the fallen tyrant into exile as a philosopher Pf^sed by 
 
 r i. T- 1 J 1- , ,-r , ^'"n Chry- 
 
 ot note, he had lived a vagrant life upon the soston. 
 frontier, working for a paltry pittance as a gardener's 
 daily drudge, and carrying in his little bundle for the 
 solace of his leisure only the Phaedon of Plato and a 
 single oration of Demosthenes. Roused now to sudden 
 action by the mutiny among the legions, he flung aside, 
 
6 The Age of the Antonines. a.d. 
 
 like the hero of the Odyssey, the rags that had disguised 
 him, and gathering a crowd together he held the rude 
 soldiers spellbound by the charms of an eloquence which 
 had won for him the name of Chrysostom or Golden- 
 mouthed, while he called up before their fancy the out- 
 rages that had wearied a long-suffering world, and armed 
 against the despot the foes of his own household. So 
 Dion's well-turned phrases, on which his biographer 
 dwells with admiring pride, soothed the excited mutineers, 
 and caused the bonds of discipline to regain their hold. 
 
 But the praetorians were dangerously near to Rome, 
 and had already learnt their power to set up or to 
 dethrone their rulers. Their generals-in-chief had taken 
 part in the murder of Domitian, and had influence 
 enough at first to keep their troops in hand, and make 
 The riotous them swear fealty to another Emperoi- But 
 the'^'r^-^^ discontent soon spread among them ; the 
 torians creatures of Domitian plied them with in- 
 
 trigues, and found mouths ready to complain of scanty 
 largess and of slow promotion under the influence of the 
 new regime. The smouldering fire soon burst into a 
 flame. The guards marched in open riot to the palace 
 with ominous cries, and clamoured for the murderers' 
 heads. It was in vain that Nerva tried to soothe their 
 fury ; in vain he bared his neck and bade them strike ; 
 the ringleaders would have their will, and dragged their 
 caused the victims off to death before the feeble Emperor's 
 EmperOT to eyes. Such a confession of his weakness was 
 ian as col- fatal, as he felt, to his usefulness as a ruler. 
 's^iSessor.*^ He knew that stronger hands than his were 
 A.D- 97- needed to steer the state through the troubled 
 
 waters, and he resolved to choose at once a worthy col- 
 league and successor. 
 
 He chose with a rare unselfishness no kinsman or 
 
96- 98. 
 
 Nerva. 
 
 lineage, but a soldier of undoubted merit, who was then 
 in high command among the legions on the German 
 frontier. A few days afterwards the Emperor made his 
 way in state to the temple on the Capitol, to offer thanks 
 for the news of victory just brought from Pannonia to 
 Rome, and there, in the hearing of the crowd, he adopted 
 Trajan as his son, with an earnest prayer that the choice 
 might prove a blessing to the state. Then in the senate 
 house he had the name of Cassar given to his partner in 
 the cares of office, and that done, soon passed away from 
 life, after sixteen months of rule, which served only as a 
 'itting prelude to the government of his successor. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 TRAJAN. A.D. 97-II7. 
 
 Marcus ULPnjs t^raJANUS, a native of Italica in Spain, 
 had been trained from early youth in the hard discipline of 
 Roman warfare, and by long service in the xraian 
 camps had earned a title to the round of avenges the 
 civil honours, and to a place among the senators done to 
 of Rome. Summoned by Domitian from Nerva, 
 Spain at the head of a legion to the Rhine, he haa 
 come probably too late to help in quelling a revolt ; 
 but he had won by his promptitude the honour of a 
 consulship, and was advanced by Nerva to the command 
 of upper Germany, then the most importan: of provincial 
 offices, in which his energy was being proved when the 
 unlooked for news arrived that he was chosen 
 for the imperial succession ; and the tidings '^'^' ^^' 
 of Nerva's death found him still busy with his mihtary 
 duties on the Rhine. He was yet in the full 
 vigour of his manhood when the cares of -^•°-9-J'»n 
 state fell with the purple mantle on his shoulders ; the 
 
8^ The Age of the Afttonmes, a.d. 
 
 changing scenes of his laborious life had taucht him 
 experience of men and manners, and it was with no 
 wavering hands that he took up the reins of office, and he 
 grasped them firmly to the end. Mutiny and discontent 
 seemed to have vanished already at his name ; but he had 
 not forgotten the outrage done to Nerva, nor the parting 
 charge in which he prayed him, like the aged 
 
 ■ ^^' Chryses in the words of Homer, ' to avenge 
 the suppliant's unavailing tears.' Trajan was prompt and 
 secret. The ringleaders of the riot were called away to 
 Germany on various pleas, and none came back to tell 
 how they were treated there. 
 
 But though he could enforce discipline with needful 
 rigour, he had no lack of reverence for constitutional 
 but' writes forms. One of his earUest official acts was a 
 to the _ letter to the senate, full of regard for its august 
 
 senate m ,. . . , ' ,.,.,, . , 
 
 respectful traditions, in the course of which he promised 
 terms. ^^ respect the life of eveiy man of worth. The 
 
 credulous fancy of the age, as reported in the history of 
 Dion Cassius, saw the motive for the promise in a dream, 
 in which a venerable figure came before him, clad in 
 purple robe and with a garland on his head — such as 
 was the painter's symbol for the senate — and laid his 
 finger upon Trajan's neck, leaving his signet stamp first 
 on one side and then upon the other. Whatever we 
 may think the cause, whether sense of justice or mysteri- 
 ous warning prompted him to write that letter, he tried 
 certainly to make good the promise it contained, and trod 
 the dizzy heights of absolute power with the calmness 
 of a serene and balanced temper. He was in no haste to 
 enter Rome or receive the homage of the senate and the 
 people. Perhaps he breathed more freely in the camp, 
 where he lived as simply as his ancient comrades, and 
 mistrusted the parade and insincerity of the great city. 
 Perhaps he waited till he felt his throne secure, and 
 
97-117. Trajan. 9 
 
 till he knew that the far-oft" legions had ratified the choice 
 of Nerva. 
 
 At length, after a year's delay, he quietly set out upon 
 the journey, without any stately train of followers to 
 burden with exactions the towns through which 
 
 - . After a 
 
 they passed. The only trace of ostentation year's delay 
 which he showed was in publishing the items ^^^ ^j^j^. 
 of his travelling expenses side by side with out parade, 
 the accounts of the processions of Domitian. ' ' ' ^^' 
 
 At his first entry into Rome there was the same ab 
 sence of parade. He eschewed the white horses and 
 triumphal car of the imperial pageants ; no numerous 
 body-guard kept the people at a distance, but as his 
 manly figure moved along the streets, men saw him inter- 
 change a hearty greeting with the senators he met, and 
 pass no old acquaintance unobserved. They marked also 
 the same simple earnestness in the bearing of his wife 
 Plotina, who walked calmly by his side, and as she 
 passed into the palace that was now to be her The simple 
 home, prayed with a quiet emphasis, in the h?^^fe°^ 
 hearing of the crowd, that she might leave it Plotina. 
 in the same temper that she entered it. 
 
 A like unassuming spirit was shown in Trajan's deal- 
 ings with the senate. He called upon it to resume its work 
 as in an age of freedom, and to acknowledge Trajan's 
 the responsibihties of power. He honestly respect for 
 
 ,. 1.. , .111 the forms of 
 
 respected its traditions, and wished the theconsti- 
 government to be carried forward in its name. ^""°"' 
 The holders of official rank were encouraged to look 
 upon themselves as ministers of state and not as servants 
 of the Cassar ; and the new generals of the imperial 
 guards had their swords given them with the words, ' Use 
 this in my defence while I rule justly, but against me if 
 I prove to be unworthy.' For there was little danger 
 now that the old constitutional forms should be misused. 
 
10 The Age of the Antonines. a.d. 
 
 The senate was no longer an assembly of great nobles, 
 proudly reliant on the traditions of the past, and on the 
 energy which had laid the world prostrate at their feet. 
 Many of the old families had passed away ; their wealth, 
 their eminence, their historic glories had made them 
 victims to a tyrant's jealousy or greed. Their places had 
 been taken by new comers from the provinces or 
 creatures of imperial favour, and a century had passed 
 away since the senate of the commonwealth had claimed 
 or had deserved to rule. The ancient offices, even the 
 which consulship itself, were little more than empty 
 
 venerable honours, and therefore passed rapidly from 
 were^Ldno hand to hand ; and even Pliny, full as he was 
 real power, ^f sentimental reverence for the past, asked 
 himself if the tribunate which he held awhile had indeed 
 any meaning for his days, or was only a venerable sham. 
 Hence Trajan, strong and self-reliant though he was, had 
 no jealousy of names and titles, and cared little for the 
 outer forms, so the work was done as he would have 
 it. He had little interest in meddling with the mere 
 machinery of government, and though some parts were 
 chiefly ornamental, and others seemed rusty and out- 
 worn, yet he would not pull the whole to pieces for the 
 sake of symmetry and finish, if there were only working 
 wheels enough to bear the necessary strain. He knew 
 that from the force of habit men loved the venerable 
 forms, and that vital changes soon grew crusted over 
 with the fanciful associations of the past, till all seemed 
 old while all was really new. So new coins came from 
 his mints with the symbols of the old republic ; his 
 courtiers were allowed to guard with reverent care their 
 statues of Brutus and Cassius and the Catos, and the 
 once dreaded name of liberty came freely to the pen of 
 every writer of his day. 
 
 He shrank with instinctive modesty from the naked 
 
97-117- Trajan. ii 
 
 assertion of his power; not like Augustus from fear or 
 hypocritic craft, and therefore with the sense His homely 
 of life-long self-restraint, but with the frank- ^^fd^f^ank 
 ness of a soldier who disliked high airs and courtesy 
 stiff parade. He went about the streets almost unguarded, 
 allowed suitors of every class an easy access to his 
 chamber, and took part with genial courtesy in the social 
 gatherings of Rome. 
 
 Flattering phrases had no music for his ear, and made 
 him feel none of the divinity of kingship ; so he delayed 
 as long as possible the customary honours for and fearless 
 his kinsmen, and flatly refused to pose him- confidence, 
 self as a deity before the time. It was therefore only 
 natural for him to rebuke the officious zeal of the 
 informers who reported words or acts of seeming dis- 
 respect, and the old laws of treason which had covered 
 charges, so fatal because so ill-defined, dropped for 
 a while at least into abeyance. After the morbid 
 suspicions of Domitian men could hardly understand at 
 first the fearless trustfulness of the present ruler, and 
 they still told him of their fears and whispered their 
 misgivings of many a possible malcontent and traitor. 
 
 One case of this kind may be singled out to throw 
 light upon the Emperor's temper. Licinius Sura was one 
 of the wealthiest of living Romans, and a marked figure 
 in the social circles in which the intimates of Trajan 
 moved. He had won his sovereign's confidence, who 
 owed his throne, as it was said, to Sura's influence when 
 Nerva was looking round for a successor. Yet sinister 
 rumours of disloyal plots were coupled with his name, 
 and zealous friends soon brought the stories to the 
 Emperor's ear, and wearied him with their repeated 
 warnings. At last he started on a visit to Licinius him- 
 self, sent his guards home, and chatted freely with his 
 host then asked to see the servant who acted as the 
 
1 2 The Age of the A ntonines. a. d. 
 
 doctor of the house, and had himself dosed for some slight 
 ailment. After this he begged to have his friend's own bar- 
 ber sent to him to trim his beard as he sat talking on ; and 
 that done, he stayed to dinner, took his leave, and went 
 away without one word or symptom of suspicion. Ever 
 afterwards he said to those who came to him with any 
 ugly tale about Licinius, * Why did he spare me then, 
 when he hnd me in his power, and his servant's hand 
 was on my throat 1 ' 
 
 But probably his special merit in the eyes of all 
 classes in Italy save the very poorest was his frugal 
 His frugal thrift. Augustus had husbanded with care 
 thrift, the resources of the state and restored the 
 
 financial credit of the empire ; but he drew largely from 
 the purses of his subjects, had recourse at first to pro- 
 scriptions and forced loans, and in spite of angry clamour 
 had imposed succession duties which were odious to all 
 the wealthy Romans. Vespasian had ruled with wise 
 economy and replenished his exhausted coffers ; but then 
 his name recalled the memory of a mean and sordid 
 parsimony that trafficked and haggled for the pettiest 
 gains. Most of the other Caesars had supplied their 
 needs by rapine ; had struck down wealthy victims 
 when they coveted their lands or mansions, or had let 
 the informers loose upon their prey, to harry and to 
 prosecute, and to rake the spoils into the Emperor's 
 and wish to privy purse. But Trajan checked with a firm 
 lighten the i^^^d all the fiscal abuses of the last century 
 
 burdens of . •' 
 
 taxation, that were brought before his eye, withdrew 
 all bounties and encouragements from the informers, and 
 had the disputed claims of his own agents brought before 
 the courts of law and decided on their legal merits. The 
 presents which town councils and other corporate bodies 
 had offered to each sovereign at his accession had grown 
 into a burdensome exaction, and they heard with thank- 
 fulness that Trajan would take nothing at their hands. 
 
97-1 17- 
 
 Trajan. 1 3 
 
 The pressure of the succession duties too was 
 lightened ; near kinsmen were exempted from the charge, 
 and a minimum of property was fixed below which the 
 heir paid nothing. Men's dying wishes also were re- 
 spected. No longer were greedy hands laid on their 
 property in the interests of Caesar, nor quibbling charges 
 brought to quash their wills ; the legacies that fell to 
 Trajan were the tokens of a genuine regard, and not the 
 poor shifts of a dissembling fear which sacrificed a part 
 to save the rest. 
 
 A financial policy so just and liberal was hailed on 
 all sides with a hearty welcome, but shrewd heads may 
 well have thought there was a danger that such self- 
 denial might be pushed too far. The cool accountants 
 and close-handed agents of the treasury ^^^.j^^ ^j^^ 
 
 murmured probably that the state would soon surprise of 
 
 , 1 1 -r 1 • Pliny- 
 
 be bankrupt if systems so lax came mto vogue ; 
 
 and even Pliny in his stately panegyric, after a passing 
 
 jest at their expense, stays the current of 
 
 his unbroken praise to hint that there may ^'^' ^°°" 
 
 possibly be rocks ahead. * When I think,' he says, ' of the 
 
 loyal offerings declined, of the imperial dues remitted by 
 
 the treasury, of the informers thrust aside, and then 
 
 again of the largess granted to the soldiers and the 
 
 people, I am tempted to enquire whether you have 
 
 balanced carefully enough the ways and means of the 
 
 imperial budget.' And indeed the Roman ruler's purse 
 
 was not too full, nor was it an easy task to meet the 
 
 calls upon it. 
 
 The charges of the civil service were a new burden 
 
 of the empire. In the best days of the republic men 
 
 served their country from a sense of duty or Economy 
 
 for honour ; in the worst age of its decline could save 
 
 they received no pay directly from the state, 
 
 but pillaged the poor provmcials at their mercy. Now 
 
14 The Age of the Antojtincs, a.d 
 
 salaries were given to all the officials of the central 
 government throughout the Roman world, save a few only 
 in the capital, and the outlay on this head tended always 
 to mount higher as the mechanism in each department 
 grew more complex. The world had been conquered 
 at the first by troops of citizens, serving only on short 
 campaigns ; and in after years the needy soldiers of the 
 later commonwealth were in great measure fed and 
 pensioned out of the plunder of the provinces : but the 
 standing armies now encamped upon the borders of the 
 empire, though small if measured by the standard of our 
 modern life, were large enough to make their maintenance 
 a problem somewhat hard to solve. The dissolute 
 populace of Rome, too proud to work but not to beg, 
 looked to have their food and pleasures provided for them 
 by the state, and were likely to rise in riotous discontent 
 if their civil hst were pared too close. 
 
 Under these heads there was little saving to be made, 
 and it remained only for the Emperor to stint himself, 
 except in the Happily he had few costly tastes, no pampered 
 Emperor's favouritcs to be endowed, no passion for build- 
 expendi- ing sumptuous palacGs, no wish to squander 
 tare. ^^ revenues of a province on a single stately 
 
 pageant, to be a nine days' wonder to the world. 
 
 He was blessed too with a wife of rare discretion. 
 Content like the old Roman matrons to rule her house 
 with singleness of heart and be the life-long partner of 
 her husband's cares, Plotina showed no restless vanity 
 as the queen of changing fashions in the gay society of 
 the great city, but discouraged luxury and ostentation, 
 and was best pleased to figure in the coinage of her 
 Large out- times as the familiar type of wifely fidelity 
 ^Tbllc ^"^ womanly decorum. Little was spent 
 
 works, upon the imperial household, but there was 
 
 large outlay on great public works, planned and carried ^\\\ 
 
97-117- Trajan, 15 
 
 with grand magnificence. Gradually by patient thrift 
 the funds were gathered for such ends as trade revived, 
 and credit was restored, and capital came forth once 
 more from its hiding places in an epoch of mutual con- 
 fidence and justice. As the national wealth increased 
 under the influence of favouring conditions, the burdens 
 of taxation pressed less heavily, while the revenues ot 
 the state grew larger every year. 
 
 Safety and ease of intercourse are among the primary 
 needs of civilized life, and the Romans might be proud 
 of being the great road-makers of the ancient 
 world. But of late years, we read, the needful 
 works had been neglected, and some of the famous high- 
 ways of old times were fast falling into disrepair. The 
 Appian above all, the queen of roads as it had once 
 been styled, was figured in the coins and bas-rehefs of 
 Trajan's reign as a woman leaning on a wheel, and 
 linploring the Emperor to come to her relief. Succour 
 was given with a liberal hand, and where it ran through 
 the dangerous Pontine marshes, foundations of solid 
 stone were raised above the surface of the boggy soil, 
 bridges were built over the winding rivulets, and houses 
 of refuge erected here and there along the way. 
 
 Other parts of Italy were also the objects of hke 
 care. Three new roads at least connected the great 
 towns that lay upon the coast, and though the frag- 
 mentary annals of the times make no mention of them, 
 the milestones or monuments since found speak of the 
 careful forethought of the ruler whose name they bore. 
 We have also in like forms in other countries the same 
 enduring witnesses to roads and works like and 
 the famous bridge of Alcantara ; and the ^"dges, 
 cost of these was sometimes met by his own pi ivy 
 purse, sometimes by the imperial treasury, or else by 
 Ihe corporate funds of neighbouring towns. 
 
1 6 The Age of the Antonines. a.d. 
 
 Much was done too in the interests of trade to 
 
 open up Italy to foreign navies. The old port of Ostia, 
 
 deepened and improved a century before, had been nearly 
 
 choked by sand and mud. Fresh efforts were now made 
 
 to arrest the forces of decay, and under the 
 
 and ports, r t- • ^ t> i. -^ 
 
 new name of Trajan s Port it appears upon 
 the faces of the coins as a wide bay in which triremes 
 could ride at anchor. But Rome seemed to need a safer 
 outlet to the sea, as the old one at the Tiber's mouth 
 A.D. io6 or was really doomed to fail. A new port was 
 *°'- therefore made at Centumcell?e, the Civita 
 
 Vecchia of later days. Pliny, who went there on a 
 Pliny, vi, '^^^it when the work was going on, describes 
 31- in lively style what was being done before his 
 
 eyes, and tells of the breakwater which, rising at the 
 entrance of the harbour, looked almost like a natuiai 
 island, though formed of rocks from the mainland. 
 
 A third work of the same kind was carried forward 
 on the other coast, in the harbour of Ancona ; and a grand 
 triumphal arch, built of enormous blocks of stone, is left 
 still standing to record the senate's grateful praises of 
 before a.d. the ruler who had spent so much out of his 
 '°9- own purse to open Italy and make the seas 
 
 secure. The Isthmus of Suez too was cared for in the 
 interests of trade ; and the name of Trajan which it bears 
 in Ptolemy points to the efforts of the monarch to carry out 
 the needful works in connexion with the granite quarries 
 of the neighbouring Claudian range, in which inscriptions 
 of the period are found. Nor was Rome neglected while 
 and aque- Other lands were cared for. The great aque- 
 ducts, ducts of the republic and the early empire 
 were not now enough to content the citizens of Rome, 
 arvd complamts were often heard that the streams of 
 water Drought m them from the hills far away were often 
 turbid and impure, and poiluied by the carelessness of 
 
97-117. Trajan. ly 
 
 those who used them. But now the various sources of 
 supply were kept carefully distinct, a lake was 
 formed in and reserved for separate uses ; • • * °- 
 which the waters of the Anio might stand and clear 
 themselves after their headlong course over the rough 
 mountain ground ; and besides these and the purer 
 streams of the Aqua Marcia, others were provided by the 
 bounty of the present ruler and specially honoured with 
 his name. For nearly 300,000 Roman paces the various 
 aqueducts were carried on the long lines of countless 
 arches, and their vast remains still move the traveller's 
 wonder as he sees them stretch from the city walls far 
 into the Campagna, or perhaps even more as he comes 
 here and there upon some stately fragment in the lonely 
 valleys of the Sabine hills. 
 
 The policy of the great statesmen of the Augustan 
 Age, the vanity and pomp of other rulers, had filled the 
 capital with great buildings destined for every ^^^ ^^^^^^ 
 variety of use ; but as if the supply was still and 
 
 . ' , , , ^'^ . , theatres, 
 
 too scanty, fresh baths and porticoes and 
 theatres were raised to speak to future ages of the 
 sovereign who Hved simply but built grandly. For his 
 own personal comfort, it would seem, no mason toiled, 
 and when the great circus was enlarged to hold some 
 thousand more spectators, the Emperor's balcony was 
 swept away, and no projecting lines were left to interrupt 
 the people's view. Pliny had once said of him, in the 
 formal eulogy of earlier days, that his modesty of 
 temper led him to preserve the old works rather than 
 raise new ones, and that the streets of Rome at last had 
 rest from the heavy loads of the contractor's waggons. 
 And this was true perhaps of the first years of his reign ; 
 it may have held good always of the wants of himself 
 and of his family ; but it seems a curious contrast to the 
 words in which, after seeing Trajan's name inscribed 
 /f. C 
 
1 8 The Age of the Afitonines. a.d. 
 
 on one after another of the national monuments Avhich he 
 had raised, Constantine compared it to the parasitic 
 herb which grew as a thing of course on every wall. 
 without But in all this he was only following the 
 
 burdens imperial traditions, and the only trace ot 
 
 of taxation, novelty therein was doing so much without 
 putting fresh burdens on his people. 
 
 Another form of outlay showed a more original concep- 
 tion, and the end and means in this case were both new. 
 In the middle of the eighteenth century some peasants 
 near Placentia (Piacenza) turned up with the plough a 
 Thechari- bronze tablet, which was no less than ten 
 table feet broad, six feet high, and 600 pounds in 
 
 endowments . , ,' , , . . 
 
 for poor weight. It was soon broken mto pieces, some 
 
 children. ^^ which wcre sold as old metal to be melted 
 down for bells, but happily they caught the eyes of 
 men who had scholarship enough to read the Latin 
 words engraved on them. By their liberality and zeal 
 the other fragments were bought up, and the whole when 
 pieced together brought to light one of the longest classical 
 inscriptions yet discovered, written in as many as 670 
 lines. It consists of mortgage deeds by which large 
 aums were lent by the Emperor on landed property 
 throughout some districts near Placentia. The names 
 of the several farms and owners, and the various amounts, 
 were specified in great detail, and the interest at five per 
 cent, was to be paid over to a fund for the maintenance of 
 poor boys and girls whose number and pensions were 
 defined. Fragments of a like inscription have been found 
 since then at Beneventum, and we have reason to believe 
 that throughout Italy there were similar provisions for a 
 measure which history speaks of in quite general terms. 
 
 In this there are several things that call for notice. 
 First as to the end proposed. In Rome itself there had 
 been for two centuries a sort of poor law system, by 
 
97-117- Trajan. 19 
 
 which many thousands of the citizens had received their 
 monthly dole of corn. No Emperor had been rash enough 
 to repeal this law, though thoughtful statesmen mourned 
 over the lazy able-bodied paupers crowded in the capital, 
 and the discouragement to industry abroad. The custom 
 in old times had grown out of no tenderness of charity, 
 but from the wish to keep the populace in good humour 
 at the expense of the provincials who had to pay the cost, 
 and in later times it was kept up from fear of the riots 
 that might follow if the stream ceased to flow. But in 
 all parts there were helpless orphans, or children of the 
 destitute and disabled, to whom the world was hard and 
 pitiless, and for whom real charity was needed, ^j^^ novelty 
 From these the actual government had nothing and use of 
 to hope, nothing to fear, and to care for these 
 was to recognise a moral duty which had never been 
 owned on a large scale by any ruler before Trajan. 
 There was yet this further reason to make their claim 
 more pressing, in that it rested with the father's will to 
 expose or rear the new-born babe. Infanticide was sadly 
 common as hope and industry declined, and good land 
 was passing into desert from want of hands to till the 
 soil. There was no fear then that the increase of popula- 
 tion should outrun the means of living ; but there was 
 danger that the selfish or improvident should decline the 
 cares of fatherhood, hurry out of life again statesman- 
 those whom they had called into the world, or ship shown 
 leave them to struggle at haphazard through of the en™ 
 the tender years of childhood. As to the dowment. 
 end therefore we may say that tender-heartedness was 
 shown in caring for the young and helpless, and also states- 
 manship in trying to rear more husbandmen to till the 
 fields of Italy. The coins and monuments bring both of 
 these aims before our eyes, sometimes portraying Trajan 
 as raising from the ground women kneeling with their little 
 c 2 
 
20 The Age of the Antonines. a.d. 
 
 ones, at other times referring to the methods by which 
 he had provided for the eternity of his dear Italy. 
 
 As to means, again, we may note the measures taken 
 to set on foot a lasting system. Payments from the 
 treasury made by one ruler might have been withdrawn 
 by his successor ; personal caprice or the pressure of 
 other needs might cause the funds to be withheld, and 
 starve the charitable work. The endowment therefore 
 took the form of loans made to the landowners through- 
 out the country, and the interest was paid by them to a 
 special Bounty Office, for which commissioners were 
 named each year to collect and to dispense the sums 
 accruing. There was also this advantage in the course, 
 that the landed interest gained by the new capital em- 
 ployed upon the soil, while needful works, brought to a 
 standstill for the want of funds, could be pushed forward 
 with fresh vigour, to multiply the resources of the 
 country. 
 
 Lastly, we may be curious to know something more of 
 the results. The government had done so much that 
 Others act ^^ might well have been expected that the 
 in a like work would be taken up by other hands, and 
 '^"^ that kindly charities of the same sort would 
 
 spread fast among the wealthy. And some did copy the 
 fashion set them from above. Pliny in his letters tells us 
 how he had acted in like spirit, by saddling some estates 
 with a rent charge which was always to be spent on the 
 maintenance of poor boys and girls, and we may still 
 read an inscription in whicK the town of Como gives him 
 thanks for the kindly charity of his endowment. His 
 beneficence dates probably in its earliest form from 
 Nerva's reign, but others seemingly began to follow the 
 example of their rulers, for the legal codes speak 
 of it as a practice not uncommon ; and each of the 
 three Emperors who followed gave something to help on 
 
97-117- Trajafi. 21 
 
 the cause, in the interest more often of the girls than of 
 the boys, because perhaps they had been less cared for 
 hitherto, and at their birth Roman fathers more often 
 refused to bear the expense of rearing them. 
 
 But in the darker times that were presently in store, 
 later rulers found the treasury bankrupt, and laid greedy 
 hands upon the funds which for a century had helped so 
 many through the years of helplessness, and all notice 
 of them vanishes at last from history in the strife and 
 turmoil of the ages of decline. 
 
 The beneficence of former rulers, we have seen, took 
 the questionable form of monthly doles of corn to the 
 populace of Rome. To fill the granaries and ^j^^ p^jj^^^ 
 stock the markets of the capital they had of Trajan 
 the tribute paid in kind by the great corn- to\hecom 
 bearing provinces. They had bought up ''^^'^^• 
 large quantities of grain and fixed an arbitrary scale of 
 prices, had forbidden the export of produce to any but 
 Italian ports, and had watched over Egypt with a jealous 
 ^are as the storehouse of the empire, in which at first no 
 Roman noble might even land without a passport. But 
 Trajan had the breadth of view to begin a more enhght- 
 ened policy. He trusted wholly to free trade to balance 
 the supply and the demand, declined to fix a legal maxi- 
 mum forwhat hebought, and trusted the producers to bring 
 the supplies in their own way to Rome. Egypt itself was 
 suffering from a dearth because the Nile refused to rise ; 
 but happily elsewhere the failure of her stores was lightly 
 felt, for, thanks to the freedom of the carrying trade, 
 other rich countries stepped into her place, and after 
 keeping the markets of Italy supplied, even fed Egypt 
 with the surplus. 
 
 Trajan's treatment of provincial interests showed the 
 same large-minded policy. A curious light is thrown upon 
 tne subject by the letters written to him by Phny while 
 
22 The Age of the Antonines. a.d. 
 
 governor of Bithynia, and these are still left for us to 
 read, together with the Emperor's replies, 
 riis treat- First we may notice by their help how 
 
 Siann-'°' large a range of local freedom and self- 
 terests as government remained throughout the Roman 
 
 shown in the ° , ^, , . , °,. 
 
 correspond- empire. Though m that distant province 
 P^fny^A.^D. *^^^^ ^^''^ ^^^ citizens of the highest class, 
 I"- and scarcely any municipia or colonies, yet 
 
 Municipal the Currents of free civic hfe flowed strongly. 
 iSeTon Popular assemblies, senates, and elected 
 sufferance; magistrates managed the affairs of every 
 petty town ; the richest men were proud to serve 
 their countrymen in posts of honour, and to spend 
 largely of their means in the interest of all. But these 
 privileges, though in some few cases guaranteed by 
 special treaty dating from the times of conquest, had 
 commonly no legal safeguard to secure them ; they lasted 
 on by sufferance only, because the Roman governors had 
 neither will nor leisure to rule all the details of social life 
 around them. The latter had, however, large powers of 
 provin- interference, subject only to appeal to Rome ; 
 
 cial and if they were passionate or venal they 
 
 governors i j ^i. • x ^-r 
 
 were often abused their power to gratify caprice or 
 interfere '° greed, though often called to account for 
 with them, their misdceds when their term of office had 
 expired. Conscientious rulers also were tempted to 
 meddle or dictate, sometimes from the strong man's 
 Instinctive grasp of power, sometimes from impatience of 
 disorder and confusion, or from a love of symmetry and 
 uniformity of system ; and above all it seemed their duty 
 to step in to prevent such waste or misuse of public 
 funds as might burden future ages or dry the sources of 
 the streams that fed the imperial treasury. 
 
 Pliny was a talker and a student rather than a man 
 of action, and feeling the weight of power heavy, he 
 
97-H7- Trajan. 23 
 
 leant upon the Emperor for support and guidance. Not 
 content with referring to his judgment all grave questions, 
 he often wrote on things of very little moment as was 
 ' Prusa has an old and dirty bath ; may not S'even 
 the town enlarge it on a scale more worthy P.e"y <i"^s- 
 
 r ^ f r t • i i i i /- tions to the 
 
 of the credit of the city and the splendour of Emperor, 
 your reign?' 'The aqueduct at Nicomedia is in ruins, 
 though large sums have been wasted more than once 
 upon the works. As they really are in want of water, 
 would it not be well to see that they spend their money 
 wisely, and use up the old materials as far as they will 
 go, though for the rest bricks will be cheaper than hewn 
 stone?' 'The theatre and gymnasium at Nicasa have 
 been very badly built, ought not an architect to be 
 employed to see if they can be repaired without throwing 
 good money after bad ? ' ' Nicomedia would like to 
 enlarge the area of its market-place, but an old half-ruined 
 temple of the Great Goddess stops the way. Might it not 
 be transferred to a new site, as I can find nothing in the 
 form of consecration to forbid it ? Also there has been 
 great havoc done by fire of late in the same city for the 
 want of engines and the men to work them ; would there 
 be any danger in setting up a guild of firemen to meet 
 like cases in the future, if all due care is taken against 
 possible abuses?' On some of these points indeed the 
 Emperor might wish to be consulted, as they had to 
 do with the power of the purse. But he read with more 
 impatience the requests that Pliny made to him to have 
 architects and surveyors sent from Rome to carry out the 
 works : he reminded him that such artists were no 
 specialty of Italian growth, but were trained more easily 
 in Greece and Asia. Still more emphatic is the language 
 in which he rebuked his minister's ill-timed zeal, which 
 would make light of the charters and traditions of the 
 province. He tells him that it might be convenient, but 
 
24 The Age of the Antonines. a.d. 
 
 would not be seemly, to force the town councillors, as he 
 Trajan wished, to take up at interest on loan the 
 
 sj[)ect local public funds which were then lying idle ; that 
 usages, and ^hg old privilege of Apamea to draw up its 
 
 not meddle S . ^, . . ^ . , 
 
 needlessly, budget for itself Without control must be re- 
 spected, anomaly as it might seem. He has no wish, for 
 the mere sake of symmetry, to set aside the variety of 
 local usages as to the entrance fees paid on admission to 
 the senates ; and in general he repeats that he will have 
 no wanton meddling with any rights based on real 
 charters, or virith any old-established customs. 
 
 As we read the letters, we admire the cautious self- 
 restraint of Trajan in refusing to allow smooth systems 
 or centra- ^^ Centralized machinery to take the place of 
 lize too fast, the motlcy aggregate of local usages; but 
 there are also to be noted some ominous tokens for the 
 future. If the gentle Pliny while in office under Trajan 
 was tempted to propose despotic measures, would not 
 other ministers be likely to go further in that course, with 
 more favour from their master ? If the central govern- 
 ment had such watchful care already for the revenues of 
 every town, would it not in time of need help itself freely 
 to the funds which it had husbanded so jealously 1 
 
 The answer to these questions would reveal in a later 
 age two causes of the empire's slow decline, the para- 
 lysis of the local energy which was displaced by centra- 
 lized bureaux, and the exhaustion of a society over- 
 burdened by taxation. 
 
 Great as were Trajan's merits in the arts of peace, the 
 The world world knew him chiefly as a soldier, re- 
 knew most newing after a century of disuse the imperial 
 
 of Trajan s ... - , i /-. rr^i . 
 
 military traditions of the early Caesars. The genius 
 
 powers, q£ Julius^ the Steady progress of the generals 
 
 of Augustus, had carried the conquering arms of Rome 
 into new lands, and pushed the frontiers forward till 
 
97-117- Trajan. 2$ 
 
 well-defined natural boundaries were reached. Since 
 then there had been little effort to go onward, and save 
 in the case of Britain, no conquest of importance had 
 been made. The Emperors had kept their generals to 
 the border camps, and had shown little taste for warlike 
 enterprise; even those who, like Vespasian, had been 
 trained as soldiers, found the round of official work task 
 all their energies at Rome, or feared the risk of a long 
 absence in a far-off province. Trajan had other views. 
 It seemed to him perhaps that the machinery ^^^^ ^^^^^^ 
 of central government was working smoothly earlier 
 and securely, while his own warlike qualities policy was 
 were rusting away foi want of use. Policy one of war. 
 might whisper that an empire won by force must be 
 maintained by constant drill and timely energy, and that 
 the spirit of the legions might grow faint if they were 
 always cooped up in bolder camps in the dull routine 
 of an inglorious service, while the neighbouring races ol 
 the north were showing daily a bolder and more threaten- 
 ing front. 
 
 On the side of Germany indeed there was for 
 a while no pressing danger. The hostile tribes were 
 weakened by their internecine struggles, and the 
 * Germania ' of Tacitus, which was written early in this 
 reign, records in tones of cruel triumph the bloody feuds 
 which had almost blotted from the book of nations the 
 name of the once powerful Bructeri. But in the Roman 
 ranks themselves there had been licence and disorder, 
 and Trajan seems to have been sent by Domitian to hold 
 the chief command upon the Rhine, as a general who 
 could be trusted to tighten the bands of discipline and 
 secure the wavering loyalty of the legions. One of 
 their chiefs had lately risen in revolt against his master, 
 and the mutiny, though soon put down, had left behind 
 it a smouldering discontent and restlessness in the temper 
 
26 The Age of the Antonines. a.d. 
 
 of the soldiers. The spirit of discipline had commonly 
 declined at once when the highest posts were filled by 
 On the side weak and selfish generals, and it needed a 
 of Germany strong hand and a resolute will to check the 
 content to evils of misrule. He found work enough 
 the^fr?nt!er ^^^^Y ^o his hand to last for years, and even 
 with defen- the tidings of his great rise in life, and of the 
 andhe°did death of Nerva, did not tempt him for some 
 ?eturnr ^° ^'"^^ *° leave his post of military duty. 
 
 He left some enduring traces of his organiz- 
 ^'^' ^ ' ing care in the towns and fortresses which he 
 founded or restored, and in the great line of defence 
 which he strengthened on the frontier. On the site 
 of the old camp or fort (castra Vetera), which was 
 stormed by the Germans in the war of 67, he built the 
 colony of Ulpia Trajana, the name of which reappears 
 in the curious form of the ' little Troy ' in the early 
 German poems, and helped to give currency to the old 
 fancy that the Franks had come from Troy ; while in a 
 later age it changed to that of Xanten (urbs Sanctorum) 
 as the supposed scene of the great massacre of Victor 
 and his sainted followers by the Theban legion. Among 
 the many scenes which he chose for colonies or castles, 
 the most famous probably in later times was that of 
 Aquae (Baden-Baden), where many traces have been 
 found of the legions which were serving under him, and 
 of the soldiers who probably were often glad to take the 
 waters there, like the invalids of later days. But the 
 greatest works on this side of the empire were carried on 
 for the defence of the tithe grounds (' Agri decumates') 
 between the Danube and the Rhine, to which colonists 
 had been invited from all parts of Gaul with the offer of a 
 free grant of lands, subject only to the payment of a tenth as 
 rent-charge to the state. This corner was the weak place 
 \Xi the Roman border on the north and ^s such needed 
 
97-117- 
 
 Trajan, 27 
 
 special lines for its defence ; Drusus and Tiberius had 
 long ago begun to raise them, and they were now pushed 
 on with energy, and continued by succeeding rulers. 
 The ' limes Romanorum ' ran along for many a mile from 
 one great river to the other, with wall and dyke and 
 palisade, and forts at short intervals to protect the works. 
 Remains of them are still left here and there, scarcely 
 injured by the wreck of ages, and are called in the 
 peasants' /<a:/(?zV the ' Devil's Wall ' or ' Heathens' Dyke,' 
 and many more fantastic names. Ages after Trajan some 
 of the defences of this country still bore his name in 
 history as well as local fancy, and witnessed to his energy 
 in office ; and modern travellers have fancied, though 
 with little reason, that ruins found near Mainz belonged 
 to a stone bridge built by him across the Rhine, on the 
 same plan as the famous one upon the Danube. 
 
 His work in Germany v/as done so thoroughly before 
 he left that he never needed to return. But on the 
 Danube there was soon a pressing call for gut his 
 resolute action, and the Emperor answered it presence 
 without delay. The people scattered on both needed on 
 sides of the lower Danube appear in history ihe Danube, 
 under many names, of which the most familiar are 
 Thracians, Geta}, Dacians ; but all seemingly were mem- 
 bers of the same great race. They had come often into 
 hostile contact with the powers of Greece and Rome, till 
 at last, under Augustus,all the southern tribes were brought 
 into subjection, and their land, under the name of Moesia 
 became a Roman province. Their kinsmen on the north 
 retained their independence, and the Dacian „., . 
 
 1111 111 1 , 1 he rise of 
 
 peoples had been lately drawn together and the Dacian 
 welded into a formidable nation by the energy '''"sdom, 
 of Decebalus, their chieftain. Not content with organiz- 
 ing a powerful kingdom within the mountain chains of 
 Transylvania, he had sallied from his natural fastness 
 
28 The Age of the A ntonines. a. d. 
 
 and crossed the Danube to spread havoc among the vil- 
 lages of Mcesia. Domitian had marched in person to 
 the rescue, but found too late that he had neither the 
 soldier's daring nor the general's skill, and was glad to 
 purchase an inglorious peace by the rich presents that the 
 Dacians looked upon as tribute. Artists also and me- 
 chanics were demanded to spread the arts of Roman 
 culture in the north, for Decebalus was no mere barbarian 
 of vulgar aim, but one who had the insight to see the 
 advantages of civilized ways, and to meet his rivals with 
 the weapons drawn from their own armoury. Emboldened 
 d threat ^^ success he raised his terms, and took a 
 ofDeceba- threatening attitude upon the Danube, pre 
 "^' suming on the weakness of the timid Domitian 
 
 and the aged Nerva. But Trajan was in no mood to 
 brook such insults, and when asked for the usual pre- 
 sents he haughtily replied that he at least had not been 
 conquered ; then hearing of fresh insults, and of intrigues 
 with the neighbouring races, and even with the distant 
 Trajan de- Parthians, he resolved on war, and set out 
 "^nd^et^^t himself to secure the safety and avenge the 
 \.D. loi. honour of the empire. With him went his 
 young kinsman Hadrian as ai^Ie-de-camp (comes expe- 
 ditionis Dacicas), and the trusted Licinius Sura was always 
 by his side in the campaign, while the ablest generals 
 of the age were gathered on the scene of action to win 
 fresh laurels in the war. 
 
 He had passed, it seems, unchanged through the 
 luxurious life of Rome, and kept all the hardihood of 
 his earUer habits. His old comrades saw him march 
 bareheaded and on foot, taking his full share of danger 
 and discomfort, joining in the mock fight which varied 
 the sameness of the march, or ready to give and take 
 hard blows without thought of personal dignity or safety. 
 So retentive was his memory that he learnt as it is said, 
 
THE BORDER LANDS 
 
 up OIL tKe 
 
 DANUBE 
 
97-117. Trajan. 29 
 
 the names and faces even of the common soldiers of the 
 legions, could speak to them of their deeds of valour or 
 their honourable wounds, and make each feel that he was 
 singled out for special notice. It was, they saw, no mere 
 holiday campaign such as Emperors had sometimes come 
 from Rome to witness, with its parade of unreal victories 
 and idle triumphs, but the stern reality of war under a 
 commander trained in life-long service, like the great 
 generals of earlier days. Full of reliance in their leader, 
 and in the high tone of discipline which he restored, they 
 were eager to begin the strife and looked forward to 
 success as sure. 
 
 For details of the progress of the war we may look in 
 vain to the histories of ancient writers. The 
 chapters of Dion Cassius which treated of it of the war 
 have come down to us only in a meagre sum- ^^monu-°°^ 
 mary. Later epitomists compress into a page ments more 
 the whole story of the reign. Monumental ancient 
 evidence indeed gives more details. The ^"'^^3- 
 bridges, fortresses, and road works of Trajan stamped 
 themselves in local names upon the common language 
 of the country, and left enduring traces which remain even 
 to this day. We may track the course of the invading 
 legions by the inscriptions graven by pious fingers to the 
 memory of the comrades who had fallen ; and the cun- 
 ning hands of artists have bodied forth to fancy in a 
 thousand varied forms scene after scene in the progress 
 of the conquering armies. But even with such help we 
 can draw at best but the outline of the _, 
 
 ■! /- . The course 
 
 campaigns, and cannot hope for any definite of the 
 precision. The forces that had made their ^^'"P^'g"- 
 way through Pannonia by different routes, were first 
 assembled probably at Segestica (Sissek) on the Save;, 
 which Strabo speaks of as the natural starting poirt for 
 a war in Dacia, and which had long before been strongly 
 
30 The Age of the Antonines. 
 
 fortified for such a purpose. Here boats could be drawn 
 together and sent down the stream for future use. while 
 on the road along the river's banks, at which the legion- 
 aries of Tiberius had toiled already, new magazines and 
 forts were formed to protect their communications in the 
 rear, and letters carved upon the rocks near Ogradina 
 tell us of the energy of Trajan's engineers. Moving 
 steadily to the eastward they at last crossed the Danube 
 at two points between Belgrade and Orsova, probably at 
 Viminacium and Tierna, at each of which a bridge of 
 boats was made where the stream was at its narrowest. 
 
 With one half of the army the Emperor crossed in 
 person, the other was left to the command of Lusius 
 Quietus, a Moor, the most tried and trusted of his 
 generals. The invaders were to move at first by separate 
 roads, but to converge at the entrance of the single 
 mountain pass which led to the stronghold (^i the Dacians. 
 The enemy, meantime, had made no effort to molest them 
 on their march, or to bar their way across the river. 
 
 Envoys came, indeed, as if to treat for peace ; but it 
 was remarked that they were men only of mean rank, who 
 wore long hair and went bareheaded, and 
 they were sent away unheeded. Forged de- 
 spatches, too, were brought as if from neighbouring peoples 
 to urge him to make peace and to begone ; but Trajan, 
 suspecting treachery, was resolute and wary, and in the 
 spring pushed steadily forward on his way. Ambassadors 
 arrived once more, this time of the higher rank that gave 
 the privilege of wearing hats upon their heads, like the 
 Spanish grandees who by special grace might be covered 
 even in the presence of the king. Through them Dece- 
 balus, their master, sued for mercy, and offered to submit 
 to any terms that the ministers of Trajan might impose. It 
 was, however, only to gain time, for he would not meet 
 the Roman envoys, but suddenly appeared in arms, and 
 
97-117. Trafan. 31 
 
 springing upon the legions on their march, closed with 
 them at Tapae in a desperate engagement. The com- 
 batants were fairly matched, and fought on The battle 
 with a desperate valour, for each knew that ofTapse, 
 their sovereign was present in their ranks. The Dacians 
 at length were routed, but the victory was dearly bought, 
 for the battle-field was strewn with the dying and the 
 dead ; there was not even lint enough to dress the wounds 
 and the Emperor tore his own clothes to pieces to stanch 
 the blood of the men who lay about him. The other 
 army had been also waylaid upon its march, but beating 
 its assailants back, it made its way to a junction with the 
 rest. 
 
 They had been moving hitherto since they left the 
 Danube in what is now called the Austrian Banat, from 
 which Transylvania, the centre of the old thead- 
 Dacian kingdom, is parted by a formidable ^^^5^".^° 
 barrier of mountains. One road alone passed vania, 
 through a narrow rift in the great chain, called the Iron 
 Gate, either from the strength of the steep defiles or from 
 the neighbouring mines. Through these the Romans had 
 to pass, like the travellers of later days. A less determined 
 leader might have shrunk from the hazardous enterprise 
 before him ; but Trajan pushed resolutely on, seized the 
 heights with his light troops, and by dint of hard fighting 
 cleared a passage through the mountains. 
 
 Where the narrow valley widens out into the open 
 country in the Hatszeger Thai, the camp may still be seen 
 where the Romans lay for a while entrenched ^^j Roman 
 to rest after the hardships of the march before victories 
 they joined battle with Decebalus once more. Sarmize- 
 gethusa (V^rhely), the stronghold of the Dacian chieftain 
 was now threatened, and in its defence the nation 
 made its last decisive stand. Once more, after hard 
 fighting, they gave way, and resistance now seemed 
 
32 The Age of the Antom?ies. a. a. 
 
 hopeless. The spirit of their king was broken, for his 
 sister in a strongly guarded fort had fallen into the 
 invader's power, and a last embassy of notables was 
 sent, with their hands tied behind their backs, in token 
 of entire submission. Hard terms of peace were offered 
 and accepted. The Dacian was to raze his strongholds 
 to the ground, to give up his conquests from the neigh- 
 bouring peoples, and to send back the artists, mechanics, 
 and drill sergeants who had been enticed across the 
 bring the border to teach the arts of peace and war. 
 a'ciose^'^*° He consented even to send his deputies to 
 A.u. I02. beg the Roman senate to ratify the treaty now 
 agreed on, and stooped so far as to come himself to 
 Trajan's presence, to do homage to his conqueror. 
 
 The war had spread over two years already, and it was 
 hazardous for the emperor to linger so far and so long 
 away from Rome. Eat he could not well have hoped 
 that the struggle was quite ended. Decebalus had been 
 humbled but not crushed ; his own kingdom of Transyl- 
 vania had not been overrun, and his people were brave 
 and loyal still. He might fairly count on the alliance ol 
 his neighbours on the east, and even of the Parthians, 
 who were brought together by their jealousy of Rome. 
 Soon it was heard that he was stirring to avenge his 
 recent losses. The dismantled fortresses were rebuilt 
 and garrisoned afresh ; lukewarm friends or deserters 
 from his cause were made to feel his power, and all his 
 skill in diplomacy was strained to organise a league ol 
 But the warlike nations, and dispose of their forces 
 
 nonasf "^ ii^ the field. Then Trajan knew he must de- 
 long, and lay no longer if he would not see the work ol 
 
 war broke ' , i • • r ^ ^ • 
 
 out again. years crumble mto pieces ; so after a breathmg 
 space of a few months he set out once more for the old 
 scene of action, resolved to turn Dacia at last into a 
 tributary province. 
 
97- "7- 
 
 Trajan. 33 
 
 He had first to meet treachery before open force was 
 t tried. Assassins were sent to take his hfe in Mcesia 
 [and when the murderous project failed, Longinus, the 
 [commander of a contingent, was decoyed under the 
 )lea of a conference with the Dacian chief, who seized 
 fand held him captive with the threat that he would 
 'only give him back alive if the legions were withdrawn 
 and peace secured. The high-souled Roman had no 
 wish to buy his safety with his country's loss ; he would 
 not even expose his sovereign to the cruel embarrass- 
 ment of choice, but hastened to meet the inevitable death. 
 It was left to Trajan to avenge him. His plan of the 
 [campaign was soon matured, and the needful xrajan 
 preparations set on foot. Of these the made great 
 
 ^ ^ preparations 
 
 greatest was the bridge across the Danube, and built a 
 Not content with having one or more of boats, st"ne*across 
 such as were soon made in the last war, he ^^« Danube, 
 resolved to build upon a grander scale a bridge of stone, or 
 possibly to finish one which had been begun already in 
 the course of the first war, that so he might be secured 
 in his return against frost or a sudden blow. Dion Cassius, 
 who as governor of Pannonia in later years could see 
 so much of the work as time had spared, writes strongly 
 in the expression of his wonder, and regards it as the 
 greatest of the Emperor's creations. Each, he says, of 
 the twenty piers on which the arches rested was 60 feet 
 in breadth and 1 50 high, without taking count of the 
 foundations. It was in ruins in his time ; but the mighty 
 piers were standing to show the greatness of Trajan's 
 aims and the skill of his engineer ApoUodorus. Between 
 the Wallachian Turn-Severin near the town of Czemetz 
 and the Servian Cladova, remains may still be seen of 
 what was probably once the famous bridge. From this 
 point along the right bank of the river runs an old Roman 
 ri/dd which the Wallachs still call Trajan's highway, and 
 
 A. H. D 
 
34 The Age of tJie Antoiiines. a.d, 
 
 passing through a mountain gorge it may be traced as far 
 The legions as Hermannstadt. Where it entered the Car- 
 on"Transyl- pathians it was fortified by works of which 
 vania by the ' Red Towcr ' gives its name to the whole 
 
 various ,..,_,.,_ 
 
 passes, pass, while ' Trajan s Gate ' is still standing in 
 
 memory of his invading army. But the work was to be 
 done thoroughly this time, and the enemy to be taken 
 on all sides. The advancing legions tramped 
 along every great road which from the south 
 or west converged on the little Dacian kingdom that 
 lay entrenched within its fence of mountains. Through 
 the Iron Gates and the Volcan Pass and the gorge of the 
 Red Tower they stormed the defences raised to bar their 
 way, and after many a hard struggle swept their enemies 
 before them by the sheer weight of steady discipline, 
 till at last they stood in the heart of the Dacian king- 
 dom. 
 
 The league on which Decebalus had counted came to 
 nothing : old adherents slunk away, and looked-for allies 
 and after ^^^ stood aloof, SO that he was left to fight on 
 obstinate unaided to the bitter end. Tracked like a wild 
 cnished the beast from lair to lair, he saw one after another 
 ?owe?* of his castles wrested from him, and only when 
 
 A.D. io6. his chief stronghold could hold out no longer, 
 did he close the struggle by a voluntary death. 
 
 Many of his loyal followers were faithful to him to 
 the last, and setting fire to their homes passed from 
 hand to hand the poisoned cup, unwilHng to survive the 
 freedom of the country which they loved. 
 
 When the last city had been stormed, the treasures 
 of the fallen Dacian, in spite of his precautions, passed 
 into the victor's hands. In vain had he turned aside the 
 stream Sargetia (Istrig) from its bed, and had a secret 
 chamber for his hoards built in the dry channel by his 
 prisoners of war. In vain had he, so ran the story, re 
 
97-117- 
 
 Trajan. 3 5 
 
 stored the current to its former bed, and butchered the 
 captives when their work was done. One friend and 
 confidant alone was left alive, but he was languishiog in, 
 Roman bonds, and told the story to buy life or favour. 
 
 The war was over; the kingdom of Dacia had 
 ceased to be, and it remained only to organize the con- 
 quest. No time was lost in completing and extending the 
 great roads which led from the points where Trajan's 
 bridges had been built. Strong works were To complete 
 raised for their defence as they entered the Secoumry 
 mountain passes, and fortresses to command was colo- 
 their outlets from the highlands, while in the garrisoned, 
 central spots on which the highways converged, new 
 towns rose apace with Romanized names and charters 
 of Italian rights. Many of the old inhabitants who had 
 escaped the horrors of the war had left their ruined 
 homesteads, and bidding farewell for ever to their 
 country, had sought a shelter among the kindred races 
 to the east ; but their place was taken by the veterans, 
 who were rewarded for their hardihood with pensions 
 and with land, while yet further to make good the waste 
 of life throughout the ravaged country, colonists came 
 streaming at the Emperor's call from all the border 
 provinces, which were still full of hardy peasants only 
 lately brought within the range of Roman influence, but 
 now ready in their turn to be the pioneers of civilized 
 progress in the far-off Carpathian valleys. After them, 
 01 even with the armies, went the engineers, the architects, 
 the artists of the older culture. Temples and baths, 
 aqueducts and theatres rose speedily among the townships, 
 and monuments of every kind are strewn over the land, 
 so that few regions have had more to tell the antiquarian 
 than this last corner in the Roman empire. Strange to say, 
 even the ancestral faith of the conquered Dacians was 
 lost to view, and while the inscriptions found among their 
 
56 The Age of the Antonines. a.d. 
 
 ruins bear witness to the exotic rites of eastern deities 
 which now took root among them, there are no tokens 
 seemingly of the old national religion. 
 
 Nor are there wanting still more enduring traces of 
 
 the conquest to show how thoroughly the work was 
 
 , , done. Though soon exposed to the pressure of 
 
 and the . ,. ^ . ^ , , ,. . 
 
 language of mvadmg races m the gradual disruption of the 
 sir JveTin Roman world, and torn away completely from 
 the Wal- the rest before two centuries had passed, though 
 Roumanian scourged and pillaged ruthlessly by the Goths 
 howabiding ^^^ Huns, the Slavs and Mongols, who swept 
 w^ her the land by turns and drove its people to their 
 
 mountain homes, it still clung to the memory of 
 Trajan, and gave his name to many a monument of force 
 and greatness, while the language of old Rome planted by 
 his colonists survived the rude shock of barbarous war 
 and the slow process of decay, and as spoken by the 
 mouths of the Roumans and the Wallachs of the Danube 
 still proves its undoubted sisterhood with the French or 
 the Italian of our day. 
 
 To commemorate the glory of successes which had 
 given to the empire a province of 1,000 miles in circuit, 
 The monu- ^ monument at Rome seemed neeeded on a 
 ment of the scale of Corresponding grandeur. To find 
 victory in room for it a space was cleared on the high 
 forum"'* ridge which ran between the Capitoline and 
 
 A.D. 112. Quirinal hills. Within this space a new forum 
 
 was laid out, and the skill of ApoUodorus, the greal 
 designer of the age, was tasked to adorn it worthily. At 
 the entrance rose the triumphal arch, of which some 
 of the statuary and bas-reliefs may still be seen in the 
 arch of Constantine, although disfigured by the taste- 
 less additions of a later age. Opposite was built the 
 great basiUca, one of the covered colonnades which 
 served then for an exchange and law-court, and of 
 
97-117. Trajan. 37 
 
 which the name was borrowed from the portico at 
 Athens, while the form lasted on to set the type of the 
 early Christian churches. In the centre of the forum, as 
 in the place of honour, was a statue of the Emperor on 
 horseback. All around in every corner were statues and 
 warlike emblems of the conquest, to which the later em- 
 perors added in their turn, till art sunk under Constantine 
 too low to do more than spoil the ornaments which it 
 borrowed. Close by was the great library, rich above all 
 others in statute-law and jurisprudence, and graced with 
 the busts of all the undying dead in art and literature and 
 science. 
 
 Far above all towered Trajan's famous column, tlie 
 height of which, 128 feet in all, marked the quantity of 
 earth which had been cleared away below the and tri- 
 level of the hill in the place of which the forum "^pJ,^J 
 stood. Twenty-three blocks of marble only a.d. h?. 
 are piled upon each other to make up the column^s 
 shaft, round which winds in spiral form the long series of 
 sculptured groups, which give us at once a lively portrai 
 ture of the details of Roman warfare and all the special 
 incidents of the Dacian campaigns. Though we have 
 often little clue to time or place or actual circumstance, 
 still we can follow from the scenes before us the invading 
 army on the march, see them cross each river on their 
 bridge of boats, force their way through rock and forest, 
 storm and burn the strongholds of the enemy, and bring 
 the spoils of war to grace the triumph of their leader. We 
 can distinguish the trousered Dacians with their belted 
 tunics, skirmishing outside their quarters, over which 
 flies the national symbol of the dragon, while the stock- 
 ades are decked with the ghastly skulls torn from their 
 fallen enemies. Their ferocity is pictured to our fancy 
 in the scene where the Roman corpses are mangled on 
 their chariot wheels, or where their women gather round 
 
3^ The Age of the Antonines. a.d. 
 
 the captive legionary and hold the lighted torches to his 
 limbs. We see them sue for pardon with their out- 
 stretched hands, or wend their way in sad procession 
 from their homes, with wives and children, flocks and 
 herds, turning their backs upon their devastated country, 
 or when driven like wild beasts to bay, crowd round the 
 poisoned goblet and roll in the agonies of death upon 
 the ground. 
 
 This monument, the crowning glory of the splendid 
 forum, is left to us well-nigh unscathed by the ravages of 
 ^ ^ time, save that the gilding and the colours 
 column is have faded almost wholly from the sculpture, 
 Kwifo?^ and that Trajan's statue which once took its 
 which Con- Stand by natural right upon the top has been 
 looked with replaced by that of the Apostle Peter. Little 
 /^mkn^"' remains to us of all the rest, but we may 
 Marcell. judge somewhat of our loss by the terms in 
 XVI. lo. which an old historian describes the scene as 
 
 it first met the eyes of the Emperor Constantius at his 
 entry into Rome two centuries later. He gazed with 
 wonder, we are told, at the historic glories of the ancient 
 city, but when he came to Trajan's forum he stood speech- 
 less for awhile with admiration at a work which seemed 
 to rise far above the power of words to paint or the art 
 of later days to copy. In despair of doing anything so 
 great as what he looked on, he said at last that he would 
 rest content with having a horse made to match the one 
 which carried Trajan. But Hormisdas, a Persian noble 
 who was standing at his side, said, ' It would be well to 
 build the stable first, for your horse should be lodged as 
 royally as the one which we admire/ 
 The con- While the conquering eagles were thus 
 
 quest of borne over new lands in the far north, the 
 
 frontier line was also carried forward on the 
 south. Cornelius Palma, the regent of Syria marched 
 
97-117- Trajan. 59 
 
 over the sandy deserts of Arabia, which had never seen 
 the arms of Rome since drought and pestilence beat back 
 the soldiers of Augustus. The country of the Idumat^an 
 Petra was subdued, and imperial coins of this ^.d. 105 to 
 period pourtray Arabia in woman's form offer- io7- 
 ing to Trajan incense and perfumes in token of submission, 
 while the fame of these successes brought embassies to 
 sue for peace from countries hitherto unknown. 
 
 The triumph that followed all these victories was one 
 of extraordinary splendour and ferocity. For one hundred 
 and twenty days the long round of bloody spectacles went 
 on : wild beasts of every kind died by thousands in the 
 circus, and the prisoners of war fenced with each other in 
 their bloody sport till the idle populace was gratified and 
 sated by the offering of some ten thousand lives. 
 
 And now for years Trajan and the world had peace, 
 broken only perhaps by a short campaign against the Par- 
 thians, to which some questionable evidence of medals 
 and church writers seems to point, although secular his- 
 tory is wholly silent on the subject. 
 
 There was enough indeed to occupy his thoughts 
 meantime. The cares of office on so vast a scale, the 
 oversight of so much ministerial work, the grandiose 
 constructions in the capital and throughout Italy, the 
 plans for future usefulness and charity described already, 
 formed labour enough for any single mind. There was no 
 (bar therefore that his powers should rust away from in- 
 action in a time of peace. But there might possibly be 
 dangers of another sort. To this period belong seem- 
 ingly the rumours of traitorous designs and plots against 
 his life, to which he gave indeed no open credence, but 
 loftily professed his disregard, which may, however, have 
 ruffled the calm even of his resolute nature, and sickened 
 him of longer stay at Rome. For there was something 
 feverish in the life of the great city ; the air was charged 
 
40 The Age of the Antonines. a.d. 
 
 with thunder clouds which might burst at any moment. 
 Few of the rulers who had lived before him but had cause 
 to fear the fickle passions of the populace or guards, or 
 the jealousy of unscrupulous intriguers. 
 
 Once more therefore he resolved on war, in part per- 
 haps from the feehngs of disquietude at home, in part it 
 may be from the overweening sense of absolute power, 
 and the restlessness of the great conqueror, spurred on 
 by his ambition for more glory. 
 
 There was one rival only of historic name, the Parthian 
 empire of the east, and with that it was not hard to pick 
 War de- ^ quarrel. Its sovereign Chosroes had lately 
 dared claimed to treat Armenia as a dependent fief, 
 
 iparthia, and had set a nephew of his own upon the 
 
 A.D. 113, throne, though the Romans had long looked 
 upon it as a vassal kingdom, and Nero as a suzerain had 
 set the crown upon its prince's head. No time was lost 
 in resenting the affront, and instant war was threatened 
 if the intruder did not withdraw his forces from Armenia, 
 and leave the new-made monarch to his fate. The pre- 
 text was caught at the more gladly, as on this side only of 
 the empire was the frontier line still undecided, and an 
 organized power was left in arms to menace the boundaries 
 of Rome. 
 
 Once more the note of preparation sounded for 
 the war, the arsenals were all astir, and the tramp of the 
 advancing legions was heard along the highways of the 
 east. Before long the Emperor himself was on his way 
 to take the field in person with his troops ; but at Athens, 
 where he halted for a time, he was met by the ambassa- 
 dors who came to sue for peace and offer presents, and 
 beg him in their master's name to accept the homage of 
 another kinsman in place of the one who had already for- 
 feited the kingdom which was given him. For the Par- 
 thians were no longer in the heyday of their national 
 
97-117. 
 
 Trajan. 41 
 
 nen m 
 
 vigour, as when they shattered the hosts of Crassiis on 
 the fatal field of Carrhae, or swept almost without a check 
 through western Asia and drove M. Antonius back 
 from a fruitless and inglorious campaign. Three cen- 
 turies ago they had made themselves a name in his- 
 tory by humbling the dynasty of Syria ; the energy of 
 conquest had carried them from their highland homes 
 and sent the thrones of Asia topphng down whose 
 before them, till all from the Euphrates to the ''""ength 
 
 ^ , ' , , , . , w^s then . 
 
 Oxus and Hydaspes owned their sway ; but its decay, 
 now the tide had spent its force and the great empire 
 was slowly sinking to decay. Like the Turks of later 
 days they had no genius to organize or to create, but 
 were at best an aristocracy of warlike clans, lording it 
 over subject peoples, full of their pride of race and bar- 
 barous disdain of all the arts of civilized progress, en- 
 camped awhile among the great historic cities of the past, 
 but only to waste and to destroy. The currents of the 
 national lifeblood now flowed feebly ; the family feuds 
 of the Arsacidse, the ruling line, threatened to distract 
 their forces, and they could scarcely make good with the 
 sword their right to what the sword alone had won. 
 
 Trajan knew possibly something of their weakness, or 
 expressed only the self-reliance of his own strong will, 
 when he answered the envoys in a haughty strain, telling 
 them that friends were secured by deeds and not by fair 
 words, and that he would take such action as seemed good 
 when he arrived upon the scene. From Athens he went 
 forward on his way to the fortress of Seleucia, the 
 key of Syria, proud of the memory of its xrajan 
 famous siege, and of the gift of Roman free- arrives at 
 
 , ; , . . _. Antioch 
 
 dom won by its stout defence agamst Tigranes. jan. a. d. 
 Thence he marched to the neighbouring An- "'*' 
 tioch, in whose crowded streets the social currents of the 
 East and West were blended, the city where the name of 
 
4-2 The Age of the Antonines. a.d. 
 
 Christian was first heard, but where also the cypress groves 
 of Daphne were the haunts of infamous debauchery in 
 rehgion's name. Thither came ambassadors to ask for 
 peace ; the satraps and petty chieftains met him on his 
 way, and swore fealty to their lord and master. 
 
 He passed on to the Euphrates, and no one appeared 
 in arms to bar his road. The new Arsacid in Armenia, so 
 and lately seated on the throne, had sent already 
 
 th%ug*h n\Qx^ than once to Trajan. But his first letter 
 
 Armenia, was written in lofty style as to a brother king, 
 and was therefore left without an answer ; the second 
 struck a lower note, and offered to do homage through 
 the governor of a neighbouring province. Even this the 
 Emperor scarcely deigned to notice, would not even for a 
 time displace the official from his post, but merely sent 
 the governor's son to bear this answer. 
 
 Before long the legions in their march had crossed 
 the confines of Armenia ; the towns by which they passed 
 were occupied without a blow, and the princely Partha- 
 masiris was summoned to his master's presence in the 
 , . heart of the country that was lately all his own. 
 Parthama?' There on a lofty seat sat Trajan on the earth- 
 to"the'^?rmp works raised for the entrenchments of the 
 to do camp, while the legions stood around as on 
 
 mir.ge, parade. The prince bowed low before the 
 throne, and laid his diadem before the Emperor's feet, 
 then waited silently in hope to see it replaced with 
 graceful courtesy upon his head. But he hoped and 
 waited all in vain ; the soldiers who stood near raised 
 a shout of triumph at his act of self-abasement, and 
 startled at the din he turned as if in act to fly, but only 
 to find himself girt in by armed battalions, from whom 
 escape seemed hopeless. Regaining self-control he 
 begged to be received in private interview ; but baffled 
 oi his hopes, he turned at last with anger and despair to 
 
Trajan. 43 
 
 97-117. 
 
 quit the camp. Before he had gone far he was recalled, 
 Drought once more before the throne, and bidden to 
 make his suit in the hearing of the legions. Then at last 
 the chieftain's pride took fire and he gave his indignation 
 vent. He came, he said, not as a conquered 
 foeman or a humble vassal, but of his free deposed, 
 choice to court the majesty of Rome. He ^hin'heV 
 had laid his crown down as a token of respect, tempted to 
 but looked to have his kingdom given him 
 again, as to Tiridates in like case from Nero's hands. 
 The Emperor's reply was stern and brief. Armenia was 
 to be henceforth a Roman province and its line of kings 
 was closed ; but for the rest the ex-monarch and his 
 followers might go safely where they pleased. But the 
 Armenian prince was too high-spirited to yield without 
 a struggle ; he flew to arms, it seems, and c. Fronto, 
 was slain soon after at a word from Trajan, P""*^- ^'^^• 
 who had not generosity enough to spare the rival whom 
 he had humbled. 
 
 Then a panic spread through all the courts of Asia 
 P'rom far-off regions, little known before, came humble 
 offers of submission to the invader who was so masterful 
 and stern ; and wary intriguers, who had kept away 
 before, found to their dismay that they could 
 
 ' , ■,••., 1 • General 
 
 not longer play upon him with ambiguous terror and 
 words. The distant chiefs indeed were allowed f^^lJ'j^^'"" 
 to hold their own, but in all the country be- neighbour- 
 tween the two great rivers in the track of the *"S ponces, 
 advancing army, the native princes were deposed and 
 Roman governors took their place. 
 
 Meantime the postal service had been organized with 
 special care. On the great roads that led to Rome 
 carriages and relays of horses conveyed the couriers with 
 their state despatches ; and the great city traced from 
 week to week the course of the campaign through scenes 
 
44 The Age of the Antonines. a.d. 
 
 beyond the range of their experience or fancy, listening 
 
 with a lively wonder to the lengthening tale of bloodless 
 
 conquests. The Senate vainly tried to find a list of fitting 
 
 ^^ honours for their prince ; they voted the solemn 
 
 triumph at services and days of thanksgiving, and called 
 
 Rome. j^.j^ Parthicus as they had styled him Dacius 
 
 after the last war, but above all other titles of their choice 
 
 he prided himself the most on that of Optimus (the 
 
 Best), linked as it was in popular fancy with the name of 
 
 Jupiter, mightiest of the gods of Rome, and pointing as 
 
 he seemed to think more to the graces of his character 
 
 than to the glories of his arms. 
 
 But the gladness of the general triumph, both at home 
 
 and at the seat of war, was rudely broken by the tidings 
 
 „ , of a great disaster. While the soldiers were 
 
 But the . n 1 . , , . , . 
 
 great earth- restmg from their labours m their winter 
 
 Am&ch* quarters, an earthquake of appalling force 
 
 spread ruin shook many of the towns of Asia, and 
 
 Siong Tra- marked its power at Antioch by features of 
 
 Sec. i^' especial horror. The fair city was at all times 
 
 A.D^ IIS- a teeming hive of population ; merchants and 
 
 mariners of every land were crowded in its 
 
 port on t^e Orontes ; art and luxury and learning drew 
 
 the votaries of fashion to the great Broadway of 
 
 Epiphanes which ran its level course four miles in length, 
 
 with spacious colonnades on either side. But at this 
 
 time especially the Emperor's presence brought a more 
 
 than usual concourse thither. Soldiers and courtiers, 
 
 litigants and senators, sightseers and traders jostled each 
 
 other in the streets and mingled the languages of East 
 
 and West. The more fatal therefore was the sudden blow 
 
 (vhich carried sorrow and bereavement to men's homes 
 
 in every land. We need not dwell upon the too familiar 
 
 features of all the great earthquakes that we hear of. 
 
 Here, too, we read of the mysterious rumblings under- 
 
97-117. Trajan. 45 
 
 ground, of the heaving and the rocking earth, of the 
 houses crashing into ruins and burying their inmates in 
 the wreck, of the few survivors disinterred at List from 
 what might have been their tomb. It adds little to the 
 genuine horrors of the scene to be told in the fanciful 
 language of a later writer of the babe found sucking at 
 the breast of the mother who was cold and dead, or of 
 the unknown visitor of unearthly stature who beckoned 
 the Emperor from the place of danger to the open ground 
 within the circus, where he stayed for days till the earth- 
 quake passed away- 
 
 But the thoughts of the soldiers were soon called 
 away from these memories of gloom and desolation. In 
 early spring once more the Emperor took the pj^ ^^^^ ^j^^ 
 field with overwhelming forces. 1 1 was no easy ^^f-^"^' 
 task, indeed, to cross the rapid current of the the Tigris 
 Tigris in the face of an enemy drawn up in ^"' "'^' 
 arms upon the bank, and in a country where no timber grew 
 for rafts. But through the winter months the highland 
 forests had been felled far up the river ; shipbuiJders had 
 been busy with their work, and boats were brought in 
 pieces to the water's edge, where they were joined to- 
 gether and floated down the stream to the point chosen 
 for the passage. Then the flotillas suddenly appeared in 
 swarms before the eyes of the startled natives, and manned 
 by overpowering numbers, pushed rapidly across the river, 
 and dislodged the thin lines that stood to bar ^^^^^^ 
 the way. The Parthians, struck with panic at all before 
 their resolute advance or distracted by civil 
 feuds, were swept away before them, and scarcely fronted 
 them again that year to strike a blow for independence. 
 
 Onward the legions tramped in steady progress, but 
 their march was a triumphal pageant. They neared the 
 ruins of Nineveh, capital of the Assyria of ancient story ; 
 passed by the battle-field of Arbela, where the phalanx ol 
 
46 The Age cf the Antonmes. a.d. 
 
 Alexander routed the multitudinous hosts of Persia : 
 at Babylon they saw the wonders done of old by the 
 builders and engineers of early despots. Ctesiphon, 
 with the winter palace of the Parthian king, fell into their 
 hands, with the neighbouring Seleucia, that still retained 
 the semblance of a shadowy republic, though a royal 
 fortress towered above it. Not content with sweeping all 
 before them in Assyria, they pushed onward yet to Susa, 
 the old residence of Persian monarchs. The daughter 
 of the Parthian king became a captive ; his throne of 
 beaten gold was sent as a trophy to the Roman Senate, 
 which heard the exciting tidings that one after another 
 the great cities of historic fame had passed under the 
 Emperor's sway, who was following in the steps of Alex- 
 ander and pining for more worlds to conquer. Indeed, 
 and pushed old as he was, he seemed possessed with 
 the^pSsiS ^^ daring of adventurous youth. Taking 
 Gulf. ship, we read, on the Euphrates, he let the 
 
 current bear him to its mouth, and there upon the shores 
 of ocean saw the merchant-boats set sail for India, 
 the land of fable and romance, and dreamed of enter- 
 prises still to come in countries where the Roman eagles 
 were unknown. 
 
 But his career of triumph was now closed, and the 
 few months of life which still were left to him were 
 clouded with the gloom of failure and disaster. While 
 he was roaming as a knight-errant in quest of adventures 
 far away, the conquered countries were in arms once 
 But the more. The cities of Assyria rose against his 
 
 q1iered*^°" garrisons as soon as the spell of his name 
 r^ii'his ^^^ presence was removed ; Arabia and 
 rear, Edessa flung off their allegiance ; and the 
 
 Jews of Cyrenaica, Egypt, and Cyprus sprung in Wind 
 fury at their Roman masters, as if to avenge the cruelties 
 practised long ago in Palestine by Titus. This fierce 
 
97-117. 
 
 Trajan. 47 
 
 explosion of fanatic zeal from a people girt about by 
 alien races was hopeless, of course, and sternly repressed 
 with fire and sword. To secure his hold on Parthia 
 the Emperor set up a puppet-king, and crowned him 
 with great parade at Ctesiphon, but could not give him 
 the right to claim or the force to secure the loyalty of an 
 unwiUing nation. His generals marched with dubious 
 success against the cities that had risen in revolt, while 
 he took the field himself against a petty and he 
 power of the south, whose only strength lay Jegafn'his 
 in the desert in which it was entrenched, hold upon 
 
 ,. , , . , . ,, , . ,1 them before 
 
 He displayed m the campaign all his old his failing 
 hardihood and valour, and led more than JS^rnffhim 
 once his horsemen to the charge ; but heat to retire. 
 and drought and sickness baffled all his efforts, and drove 
 him back at last with tarnished fame and ruined health. 
 
 Once more he talked of marching to chastise the 
 rebels in Chaldea, but his strength was failing fast, and 
 it was time to leave the scenes where he had won so 
 much of fruitless glory, and swept all before him like a 
 passing storm. He set his face towards Italy upon his 
 homeward way ; but the long journey was too much for 
 his enfeebled frame, and he sank down at Selinus in 
 Cilicia, after nearly twenty years of monarchy and more 
 than sixty of a stirring life. 
 
 So died the strongest and the justest of the imperial 
 rulers whom Rome had seen as yet. Only in the last 
 war can we see the traces of the despot's ^e died at 
 arrogance and vainglory. The Dacian cam- Selinus, 
 
 . .1 1, -ir 1 . August 117. 
 
 paigns might well seem needful to secure a 
 frontier and chastise an insolent aggressor ; and to the 
 soldier's eye, perhaps, there was a danger that, after a 
 century of peace, the Roman empire might His charac 
 settle on its lees, and lose its enf^rgy and self- *'='■• 
 respect. At home, in the routine of civil govermiicnt he 
 
48 The Age of tlie Antonines, a.d. 
 
 was wary and vigilant and self-restrained, rising as ruler 
 and as judge above the suspicion of personal bias and 
 caprice, promptly curbing the wrong-doer and checking 
 the officious zeal of his own ministers. He was natural 
 and unaffected in the gentle courtesies of common life, 
 cared little for the outer forms of rank, and was easy 
 of access to the meanest of his people. 
 
 Dion Cassius, who never fails to insist upon the 
 darker side of every character which he describes, says 
 that he was lascivious in feeling, and given to habits of 
 hard drinking, but owns that he can find no record of 
 any wrong or harm done by him in such moods. The re- 
 fined Pliny paints for us a different picture of the social 
 life in which he took a part. Coming fresh from the 
 meetings of the privy council held for some days in the 
 Emperor's villa, he tells us how he spent the 
 time at court. The fare, it seems, was some- 
 what simple; there was no costly show of entertainments; 
 but public readings amused the guests, and literary dis- 
 cussions followed with pleasant converse far into the night. 
 
 Through the great monuments which were called after 
 liis name, Trajan stood to the fancy of the middle ages 
 His great as a personal symbol of the force and gran- 
 J'orks^of art ^^ur of old Rome ; but art and poetry brought 
 powerfully him forward also as the favourite type of 
 naVra^S^' heathen justice. A scene in the sculptures 
 later ages. Qf j^jg forum represented him as starting for 
 the wars, while a woman was bending low with piteous 
 gesture at his feet. Out of this a legend grew that a poor 
 widow came to him to ask for vengeance on the soldiers 
 Taken as a who had killed her son. ' When I come back 
 hShen jus- I wiH listen to your suit,' the Emperor said, 
 tice in < ^nd who wiU right me if you die ? ' was the 
 
 legend and , , ,, ^ t^r 
 
 art. reply. * My successor.' * Your successor ; 
 
 yesj but his act will not profit you, and it were better 
 
97-117. Trajan, 49 
 
 surely to do the good yourself and to deserve the recom- 
 pense that will follow.' Trajan's heart, so ran the story, 
 was touched by the widow's earnest plea : he waited 
 patiently to hear her case, and would not leave till she 
 had justice done her. Such is the form the legend takes 
 in the poetry of Dante, and it is with this „ 
 
 . , , . , , Purg. X. 
 
 meaning that the scene was pictured to the 
 fancy in many a work of later art, such as that which we still 
 may see at Venice in one of the capitals of the Doge's palace. 
 It was a favourite addition to the story that Gregory 
 the Great was so moved with sympathy when it was told 
 him that he prayed for the soul of the old pagan, who, 
 having not the law, was yet a law unto himself. That 
 very night he saw a vision in his sleep, and heard that, 
 m answer to his prayer, the soul of Trajan had winged its 
 flight to join the spirits of the blest. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 HADRIAN, A.D. II7-I38. 
 
 From the story of the frank and earnest Trajan, we turn 
 with a strange sense of contrast to the life and character 
 of his successor, one of the most versatile and r^, ,. 
 
 ' The earlier 
 
 paradoxical of men. Of the career of P. life of 
 /Ehus Hadrianus, little is known to us for the ^ "^"^ 
 forty years before he gained the throne, and the meagre 
 tale may be soon told. 
 
 Born himself at Rome, he came of a family which 
 drew its name from Hadria in Northern Italy, but had 
 been settled for centuries in Spain. Losing his father at 
 an early age, he came under the care of Trajan, his near 
 kinsman, and after a few years, in which he made such 
 rapid progress in his studies as to be called ' the little 
 Greekling,' he took to hunting with such passion as to 
 
 A.M. fi 
 
50 'File Age of the Auto nines. a.d. 
 
 need a check, and was therefore put at once into the 
 army, a.nd taken by his guardian to the wars. The news 
 of Nerva's death found him in Upper Germany at a dis- 
 tance from his kinsman, and he was the first to carry to 
 him the tidings of his accession to the empire, outstrip- 
 ping, though on foot, the courier sent by his sister's hus- 
 band Servianus, who had contrived to make his carriage 
 break down upon the way. 
 
 The same relative tried also to make mischief by 
 calling Trajan's notice to the debts and youthful follies of 
 his ward ; but Hadrian still had influence at court, and 
 stood high in the good graces of Plotina, married by 
 her help the Emperor's grand-niece, and had a legion 
 given him to command in the second Dacian war. In 
 this, as afterwards in Pannonia and Parthia, his gal- 
 lantry and powers of discipline were spoken of with 
 marked approval ; powerful friends began to rally round 
 him at the court, and to think of him and act for him as 
 a possible successor to the throne. But no decisive word 
 was uttered to encourage friends or to alarm his rivals, 
 His sudden ^^^ ^ "P ^° ^^ ^^^^ were in suspense, till 
 elevation to he heard suddenly in Syria, where Trajan had 
 caused ugly left him in command, first, that the emperor 
 rumours, j^^^^ named him as his heir, and then a few 
 days afterwards that the post of monarchy was vacant. 
 So sudden was the act as to give rise to ugly rumours. 
 Plotina, it was whispered, who loved him fondly if not 
 wisely, had tampered for his sake with her dying hus- 
 band's will, had even kept his death a secret for a time, 
 and written with her own hand the letters to the Senate 
 which named Hadrian his heir. But in what we read 
 elsewhere about Plotina she appears as a type of 
 womanly dignity and honour, and the story serves best 
 perh ips to illustrate the licence of court scandal which 
 absolute monarchy so often fosters. 
 
1 1 7-138. Hadrian. 51 
 
 The first acts of the new soyereign were temperate 
 and wary. His letters to the Senate were full of filial 
 respect for Trajan and regard for constitutional usage. 
 He excused himself because the soldiers in their haste 
 had hailed him Emperor without waiting for their sanction, 
 asked for divine honours for the departed ruler, whose 
 remains he went to look upon with dutiful affection, and 
 ,>ent to be enshrined within the famous column in the 
 forum. Declining the triumph for himself, he had Trajan's 
 likeness borne in state along the streets in the pageant that 
 was to do honour to his exploits. But for all that. Hadrian 
 was in no mood to follow in his steps, had no wish to 
 copy his love of war or his imperial ambition. His mode- 
 On every frontier hostile races were in arms ; S'-J." of^ 
 in far-off Britain as well as in the East, among peace 
 the Moors of Africa and among the bold races of the 
 north there were rumours of invasion or revolt. There 
 was no lack of opportunities, nor, indeed, of armies 
 trained to conquest ; but he was not to be tempted with 
 the hope of military laurels, and his constant policy was 
 one of peace. He withdrew at once the weak pre- 
 tender forced upon the Parthians by the arms of 
 Rome, and left all the lands beyond the Tigris where no 
 western colonists had any claims upon his care. It was 
 far otherwise in Dacia, in which peaceful settlers had 
 found a home for years, and strongholds had been gar- 
 risoned for their defence. It would seem therefore most 
 unlikely that he thought of drawing back his troops from 
 the strong mountain barrier of Transylvania, and of leav- 
 ing the new province to its fate. Later writers, reflecting 
 possibly the discontent of Trajan's generals, said indeed 
 that he was minded to do this, and that he had ac- 
 tually begun to break the bridge across the Danube ; 
 but the facts remain, that the language and the arts 
 of Rome steadily gained ground upon that northern 
 
52 The Age of the Antonines. a.t>. 
 
 border, and that Hadrian surrendered nothing which was 
 worth retaining. For the rest, in other parts of the great 
 empire, he was content to restore order, and waged no 
 offensive warfare. 
 
 Yet, strange to say, not only had he personal hardi- 
 hood and valour, and was ready on the march to face the 
 was accom- heat and labours of the day like the meanest 
 
 panied by soldicr in the ranks, but he always with watch- 
 personal ..',-. . . , 
 hardihood lul care maintamed his armies m a state oi 
 
 regard"or vigour and efficiency that seldom had been 
 discipline, rivalled. He swept away with an unsparing 
 hand the abuses of the past, and insisted on the austere 
 discipline of ancient days, putting down with peremptory 
 sternness the luxurious arrangements of the camp, which 
 even in Germany endangered the soldier's manliness and 
 self-control, and still more in Syria, where the wanton 
 Antioch, hot-bed of licence as it was, spread far around 
 it the contagion of its dissolute and unruly temper. In 
 the spirit of the generals of olden time he walked bare- 
 headed alike through Alpine snows and in the scorching 
 heats of Africa, setting them thus a pattern of robust en- 
 durance. In every land through which he passed he 
 inspected carefully the forts, encampments, arsenals, and 
 stores, and seemed to have lodged in his capacious 
 memory the story of each legion, and the names even of 
 the rank and file. 
 
 In the centre of Algeria we may still trace the 
 ramparts of a camp where an auxiliary force was 
 The inscrip- Stationed to defend the border and to be the 
 c^ ^"in^^ pioneers of civilized progress. On a column 
 Lambaesis. which was raised in the centre of the camp 
 was posted in monumental characters a proclamation 
 of the Emperor to the soldiers of this distant outpost, 
 in which he dwells upon their laborious energy and loyal 
 zeal. 
 
11 -7 178. Tladnan. 53 
 
 Thus trained and organized, his armies were fonnid- 
 able weapons for the hand of an enterprising leader, but 
 he used them wholly for repression or defence, and never 
 with aggressive aims. Even in Britain, where the peace- 
 ful south was harassed by the incursions of the wilder 
 tribes, in place of any war of conquest a great wall, a 
 triple line of earthworks strengthened by a high wall of 
 solid masonry, was carried for many a mile across the 
 country, to be a barrier to the northern savagery ; and 
 fragments of the work may still be seen between 
 Newcastle and Carlisle to show how earnestly defence 
 was sought by the ruler who built on such a scale. 
 
 But it was no love of personal ease that clipped the 
 wings of his ambition. Instead of staying quietly at 
 Rome to take his pleasure, he was always on ^^ ^j.^. 
 the move, and every province witnessed in its veiled 
 
 , , .. -,.. ., constantly 
 
 turn the restless activity of his imperial care, through the 
 The coins struck in his honour as he went to Provinces, 
 and fro upon his journeys, the stately monuments and 
 pubhc works which were called into being by him as he 
 passed along, these are evidence enough, when the meagre 
 accounts of our historians fail to tell us, of the wide range 
 of his long-continued wanderings and of the benefits 
 which followed in his train. 
 
 The empire had long claimed to govern in the 
 interests of the provinces, and not of Rome alone, and 
 here at last was an Emperor who seemed resolved to see 
 with his own eyes all his people's wants, to spend with 
 liberal bounty for the common good, to reform impartially 
 the abuses of old times, and lay the heavy rod of his dis- 
 pleasure upon all his weak or faithless servants. To the 
 largeness of such aims there corresponded a breadth and 
 manysidedness of character and powers ; and few living 
 men were better fitted to enter with fresh interest into 
 the varied life of all the lands through which he travelled 
 
54 The Age oj the Antonines. 
 
 Had he not been emperor he might have been a sort 
 * admirable Crichton.' He had thrown himself with eager 
 curiosity into all the art and learning of his age, and his 
 vast memory enabled him to take all knowledge for his 
 showing in own. Poet, geometer, musician, orator, and 
 all a breadth artist, he had studied all the graces and ac- 
 
 of view and ' , , , 
 
 largeness of complishments of liberal culture, knew some- 
 aLmos^t' ^ thing of the history and genius of every 
 unique. people, could estimate their literary or artistic 
 
 skill, and admire the achievements of the past. 
 
 But he was far from travelling merely as an anti- 
 quarian or art critic, for he left in every land enduring 
 traces of his present care. The bridges, aqueducts, and 
 theatres were repaired, fresh public works were under- 
 taken, municipal accounts were overhauled, the governors' 
 official acts reviewed, and every department of the public 
 service thoroughly sifted and controlled. The imperial 
 treasury was seen to gather in its stores in the interest of 
 the provinces at large, and not for a few dissolute favour- 
 ites at court or for the idle populace of Rome. To 
 symbolize in striking forms his impartial care for all his 
 subjects, he was ready to accept local offices of every 
 kind, and discharge by deputy the magisterial functions 
 in the district towns under every variety of national title. 
 
 In the movements of the imperial tourist there was 
 httle luxury or ostentation. He walked or rode in 
 military guise before his guard, with his head un- 
 covered in all weather, ready to share without a murmur 
 the legionary's humble fare, and to bear all the heat and 
 labour of the day. History gives us few details as to the 
 exact course and order of his wanderings, but inscriptions 
 upon bronze and stone abound with the tokens of his 
 energy in every land, and of the thankfulness with 
 which each province hailed the presence of its ruler. 
 
 In Britain, which had seen no emperor since Claudius^ 
 
 1 
 
 tof I 
 
1 1 7- 1 38. Hadnan. 55 
 
 he came to inspect the menaced frontier, and to plan 
 the long lines of defence against the free „, , 
 
 ^ ■, -I X A,-. ^,,. We hear of 
 
 races of the north. In Africa we find hnn him iu 
 soothing the disquiet caused of late by the ^'■"^*"- 
 panic fears of Jewish massacres and Roman vengeance. 
 His diplomacy and liberal courtesies dispel the 
 clouds of war that gather on the lines of the "'^^' 
 Euphrates and are serious enough to require his presence 
 on the scene. On the plains of Troy we hear of him 
 gazing around him in the spirit of a pilgrim, and solemnly 
 burying the gigantic relics in which his reverent fancy 
 saw the bones of Ajax. The great towns of western Asia 
 are proud to let their Emperor see their wealth, Asia 
 their industry, their teeming populations ; they Mi"or. 
 have to thank him for many a public monument of note, 
 and record upon their coinage in many a varying phrase 
 and symbol his justice, liberahty, and guardian care. 
 
 But it was in Athens that he tarried longest, or hither 
 he came most frequently to find repose as in his favourite 
 home. Here in the centre of the old Hellenic art, he put 
 off awhile the soldier and the prince, and soothed himself 
 with the amenities of liberal culture. He tried to fancy 
 himself back in the Greek life of palmier days ; and in 
 he presided at the public games, sat by to ^o'^elhan 
 witness the feats of literary skill, raised the all, 
 theatres and temples from their ruins, and asked to be 
 admitted to the venerable mysteries of their national 
 faith. To the Athens of old days he added a where he 
 new quarter, to be called henceforth Hadrian's endowed art 
 city ; he gave it a new code of laws to rival and learning, 
 those of Dracon and of Solon, and recalled some shadowy 
 memories of its days of sovereign power by making it 
 mistress of the isle of Kephallonia. It had already 
 academic fame, and drew its scholars from all lands ; its 
 public professorships had given a recognised status to 
 
56 The Age of the Antonines. a.d. 
 
 its studies ; fresh endowments were bestowed upon its 
 chairs with a liberal hand, and nothing was spared for 
 the encouragement of learning. 
 
 The lecturers on rhetoric and philosophy, the so-called 
 sophists, basked in the sunshine of imperial favour, had 
 
 immunities and bounties showered upon them, 
 there"and^ and were raised at times to offices of state and 
 the pro-'^^ high command. One of them was intrusted 
 fessorsof with a princely fortune to beautify the city 
 
 which he honoured with his learned presence. 
 Another found his professional income large enough to 
 feed his fellow citizens in time of famine. A third, the 
 writer Arrian, was taken from his Stoic musings to fill 
 the place of general and governor of Cappadocia, one 
 of the largest of the provinces of Rome. There in his 
 turn he followed the example set him in high quarters, 
 started from Trapezus (Trebizond) upon a journey of 
 discovery round the coasts of the Black Sea, visited the 
 seats of the old colonial enterprises of Miletus, studied 
 with a careful eye the extent of trade and the facilities 
 for intercourse in prosperous regions not yet ruined by 
 the incursions of barbarian hordes. The explorer's 
 journey ended, he wrote a valuable memoir to his 
 master; which is of interest as gathering up all that 
 geography had learned upon the subject. 
 
 There was yet another ancient land which had mani- 
 fold attractions for the tourist. It was seemingly in later 
 Hadrian in life that Hadrian tarried long in Egypt, to 
 Egypt. explore the wonders of its art and study the 
 
 genius of its people. He looked no doubt with curious eye 
 upon the pyramids, the sphinxes, and the giant piles of 
 Carnac, and the rude lines may still be read upon the 
 face of Memnon's vocal statue which tell us of the visit 
 of his wife Sabina. His curious fancy found enough 
 to stir it in the secrets of the mystic lore which hajj 
 
17-138. Hadrian. 57 
 
 been handed down from bygone ages, in the strange 
 medley of the wisdom and the folly which crossed each 
 other in the national thought, in their strong hold on 
 the belief in an unseen world and the moral govern 
 ment of Providence, in the animal worship which had 
 plunged of late a whole neighbourhood into deadly 
 feud about the conflicting claims of cat and ibis, and 
 made rival towns dispute in arms their right to feed in 
 their midst the sacred bull called Apis for the adora- 
 tion of the rest. He could not but admire the great 
 museum of the Ptolemies, the magnificent seat of art and 
 literature and science, the home for centuries of so much 
 academic wit and learning. 
 
 In that land of many wonders the people of Alexandria 
 were not the least. In a letter to his brother-in-law which 
 
 still remains we may see the mocking insight ^^. 
 
 .,,.,, ^ ,. , , , . Hist. Aug. 
 
 with which the emperor studied the changing Vopisci 
 
 moods of the great city, full, as it seemed to ^'""^ * 
 him, of soothsayers, astr ologers, and quacks, of worshippers 
 of Christ and votaries of Serapis, passing in their fickleness 
 from extreme of loyalty to that of licence, so industrious 
 by instinct as to tolerate no idle lounger in their midst, 
 and yet withal so turbulent as to be incapable of govern- 
 ing themselves, professing reverence for many a rival 
 deity, yet all alike paying their court to Mammon. 
 
 But even as he scoffed at the fanciful extravagance of 
 Egypt, he was unmanned by the spell of her distempered 
 thought. As he travelled on the Nile, we read, he was busy 
 with magic arts which called for a human victim. One of 
 his train, a Bithynian shepherd of rare beauty, was ready 
 to devote himself, and died to give a moment's The death 
 pleasure to his master. Another story tells us {h^osis of 
 only that he fell into the river, and died an Antinous. 
 involuntary death. But both agree in this at least, that 
 H'idrian loved him fondly, mourned him deeply, and would 
 
58 The Age of tJie Antonines. a.d. 
 
 not be comforted when he was gone. He could not bring 
 him back to Hfe, but he could honour him as no sovereign 
 had honoured man before. The district where he died 
 must bear his name, and a city grow on the spot where 
 he was buried. If the old nomes of Egypt had their 
 tutelary beasts which they worshipped as divine, the 
 Antinoite might claim like rank for the new hero who had 
 given it a name, might build temples to his memory, con- 
 sult his will in oracles, and task the arts of Greece to lodge 
 him worthily. Soon the new religion spread beyond 
 those narrow bounds. City after city of the Greek and 
 Eastern world caught the fever of this servile adoration, 
 built altars and temples to Antinous, founded festivals to 
 do him honour, and dressed him up to modern fancy in 
 the attributes and likeness of their ancient gods. The 
 sculptor's art lent itself with little scruple to the spreading 
 flattery of the fashion, reproduced him under countless 
 forms as its favourite type of beauty, while poets 
 laureate sung his praises, and provincial mints put his 
 face and name upon their medals. 
 
 We may see the tokens at this time of an influence 
 rather cosmopolitan than Roman. By his visible concern 
 for the wellbeing of the provinces, by his long- 
 interests continued wanderings in every land, by his Hel- 
 poiitan lenic sympathies and tastes, Hadrian lessened 
 
 more than certainly the attractive force of the old im- 
 perial city, and dealt a blow at her ascendancy 
 over men's minds. Not indeed that he treated her with 
 any marked neglect. The round of shows and largesses 
 went on as usual : the public granaries were filled, the 
 circus was supplied with costly victims, and the proud 
 paupers of the streets had little cause to grumble. The 
 old religions of home growth were guarded "by the state 
 with watchful care, and screened from the dangerous 
 rivalry of the deeper sentiment or more exciting rituals 
 
117-138. Hadrian. 59 
 
 of the East. In her streets he himself wore the toga, the 
 citizen's traditional dress of state, required the senators to 
 do the like, and so revived for a time decaying custom. 
 But the provinces began to feel themselves more nearly 
 on a level with the central city. Every year the doors of 
 citizenship seemed to open wider as one after another 
 of the towns was raised by special grace to 
 the Latin or the Roman status. Each Emperor provinces 
 had done his part towards the diffusion of the fe^if^^spect. 
 rights which had been the privilege of the the ascend-' 
 capital in olden time ; and Hadrian made Ro'^me°and 
 them feel that he was ruling in the interests f/ngu^age 
 of all without distinction, since he spent his pew 
 life in wandering through their midst, and 
 met their wants with liberal and impartial hand. They 
 looked therefore less and less to Rome to set the tone 
 and guide the fashions. The great towns of Alexandria 
 and Antioch, the thriving marts of Asia Minor, were 
 separate centres of influence and commerce ; and Greece, 
 meanwhile, spectral and decayed as were her ancient 
 cities, resumed her intellectual sway over men's minds, 
 students of all lands flocked to her university of cul- 
 ture, and the tongue which her poets, philosophers, and 
 orators had spoken became henceforth without a rival 
 the literary language of the world. The speech of Cicero 
 and Vergil gradually lost its purity and power ; scholars 
 disdained to pen their thoughts in it : taste and fashion 
 seemed to shun it, and scarcely a great name is added 
 after this to the roll of its writers of renown. 
 
 In the sphere of law and justice another levelling in- 
 fluence had been at work which was carried The level- 
 further at this time. The civil law of Rome, JjUfnce of 
 with its old traditional usages and forms, had tiie 'per- 
 long been seen by statesmen to need expan- edict/ 
 sion in a liberal spirit before the courts could fairly decU 
 
6o The Age of the Antonhies. a.d. 
 
 with the suits of aliens, or with new cases wholly unde- 
 fined. The praetors had for many years put out a state- 
 ment of the principles by which they would be guidec 
 in dealing with the questions where the statute law 
 would fail them or press hardly on the suitors, and many 
 of these rules and forms, though at first binding only 
 for the year, had gradually crystallised into a system 
 of equity, which passed commonly from hand to hand, 
 though somewhat loose and ill-defined, and with much 
 room for individual judgment and caprice. It was a 
 gain to progress when Salvius Julianus, an eminent 
 jurist of the day, sifted and harmonized these floating 
 principles and forms of justice, giving them a systematic 
 shape under the name of Hadrian's * perpetual edict.' 
 It was a great step towards the imperial codes of later 
 days, in which the currents of worldwide experience and 
 Greek philosophy were mingled with the stream of purely 
 Roman thought. The Emperor was the sole legislator of 
 the realm ; the statutes were the expression of his personal 
 will ; but the great jurists who advised him in the council 
 chamber came from countries far away, and reflected in 
 many various forms the universal sense of justice. 
 
 So far we have seen only the strength of Hadrian's 
 character. To organize and drill the armies in a period 
 of almost unbroken peace, and give a tone to discipline 
 which lasted on long after he was gone, to study by 
 personal intercourse the problems of government in 
 every land, dealing with all races on the same broad 
 level of impartial justice, to combine the rigid machinery 
 and iron force of Roman rule with the finer graces of 
 Hellenic culture, this was a pohcy which, borrowed as it 
 was perhaps from the old traditions of Augustus, yet could 
 be carried out only by an intellect of most unusual 
 flexibility and force. For the work which was to be 
 done upon so vast a scale he had only limited resources ; 
 
i,7_,38. Hadrian. 6} 
 
 he dealt with it in a spirit which was at once liberal and 
 thrifty, thus following in the steps of the wisest Hadrian's 
 emperors who had gone before him. In the a^^eood 
 first year of his reign he had remitted the finance, 
 arrears due to the treasury to the amount of 900 million 
 sesterces, burning the bonds in Trajan's forum as a 
 public offering to his memory. The charities lately set 
 on foot for the rearing of poor children were endowed by 
 him with further bounties. We may still read the medals 
 struck in honour of his largesses of money to the 
 populace of Rome, repeated on seven distinct occasions. 
 Prompt succour was given with a kindly hand to the 
 sufferers by fire and plague and earthquake in all parts 
 of the widespread empire. But to meet such calls upon 
 his purse, and to maintain the armies and the civil 
 service, he felt the need of frugal ways and good finance. 
 He revised the imperial budget with the skill of a trained 
 accountant, held the details in his retentive memory, and 
 would have no waste or peculation. Economy was the 
 order of his household ; no greedy favourites or freed- 
 men grew fat and wanton at the treasury's expense ; the 
 purveyors of his table even found that they must be 
 careful, for at his dinners of state he sent sometimes to 
 taste the dishes which were served to the humblest of 
 his guests. 
 
 But great as were Hadrian's talents, and consistent 
 in the main as was his policy as ruler, we are yet 
 told of many a pettiness and strange caprice. If we 
 try to study his real character it seems, like But 
 the legendary Proteus, to take every form by ^efrquali- 
 turns, to pass from the brightest to the dark- ties were 
 est moods by some inexplicable fantasy. One balanced by 
 of the first things we read of him on his rise a^d's^an'^'^e 
 to power is his speech to an old enemy, caprices. 
 ' Now you are safe,' as if he could stoop no longer to the: 
 
62 The Age of the Antonines. a.d. 
 
 meanness of a personal quarrel. He will not listen to the 
 advice of a trusty friend to sweep out of his path three 
 men who might be dangerous rivals ; but shortly after- 
 wards Rome heard with horror that the most eminent of 
 Trajan's generals, Cornelius Palma, the conqueror of 
 Arabia, and Lusius Quietus, perhaps the ablest soldier of 
 Hissus- ^^^ ^^y> ^^^^ other men of special mark, 
 
 picious had been suddenly struck down unheard, 
 
 emper, without any forms of legal trial, on the plea of 
 
 traitorous plots against the Emperor's life. Resenting pro- 
 bably as a personal affront the surrender of the conquests 
 which they had helped to win for Trajan, and despising 
 the scholar prince whose great qualities were as yet un- 
 known, they had made common cause, as it was said, with 
 malcontents at Rome, and joined in a wide-spread con- 
 spiracy. Hadrian indeed was in Dacia at the time, and 
 soon came back in haste, and with good reason, seem- 
 ingly, threw upon the praetorian praefect and the Senate the 
 burden of the dark deed that had been done, promising 
 that henceforth no senator should be condemned except 
 by the sentence of his peers. He kept his word till his 
 reason lost its balance. But years afterwards the instinct 
 of cruelty broke out in fearful earnest. When old age and 
 sickness pressed him hard, and the reins of power were 
 slipping from his hands, his fears of treachery proved 
 fatal to his nearest intimates and kinsmen, to those who 
 had secured his rise to empire, or had shown their loyalty 
 by the service of a life-time. 
 
 As we read the story in the poor chroniclers of a later 
 age the description of his personal habits is full ol 
 striking inconsistencies. He lived with the citizens ol 
 Rome as with his peers, and moved to and fro with little 
 state ; yet he was the first Emperor to employ the ser- 
 vices of knights for the menial offices of the palace filled 
 jhitherto by freedmen. He would hear no more of the 
 
1 1 7-138. Hadrian. 63 
 
 charges of high treason so terrible in years gone by, he 
 would have the courts of law to act without respect of 
 persons; but he organized a system of espion- system of 
 age of a new and searching kind, and read espionage, 
 the familiar correspondence of his friends, twitting them 
 even, now and then, with the reproaches of their wives 
 meant only for the husband's ears. He loved art and 
 literature sincerely, he liked to be surrounded with the 
 men who studied them in earnest, but they thought at 
 least that he took umbrage easily at any fancied rivalry, 
 and was full of jealousy and unworthy spite. 
 
 It was dangerous to be too brilliant where the 
 Emperor wished to shine, and there were few departments 
 of the fine arts in which he did not find him- andjeai- 
 self at home. The scholar Favorinus once trilL'nt 
 was asked why he had given way so easily in powers, 
 a dispute upon a point of grammar when he was in the 
 right, and he answered with good reason, * It is not a 
 prudent thing to call in question the learning of the master 
 of thirty legions.' The professors of repute who moved his 
 envy found their pupils taken from them, or as in the 
 rival lecturers started to irritate and supplant ^^.°^ 
 them. Apollodorus, the great architect, was doms. 
 even more unlucky. Long ago in Trajan's company he 
 had listened with impatience to the future Emperor's 
 critical remarks, and had told him to paint pumpkins and 
 not to meddle with design. Years afterwards, when 
 Hadrian sent him his own plans for the temple of 
 Aphrodite which he wished to build, it was returned 
 with the offensive comment that the statue of the goddess 
 was made upon so large a scale that she could not 
 stand upright in her own house. The critic paid with 
 his life we read, the penalty for his sharp words. 
 
 Even the glory of the immortal dead stirred the 
 jealousy of the artist prince, and he affected to prefer Cato- 
 
64 The Age of t/ie Antofiines. a.d. 
 
 to Cicero, Ennius to Vergil, the obscure Antimachus to 
 Homer. He was said to be jealous of the fame of Trajan, 
 and therefore to attribute to his secret counsels the most 
 unpopular of his own measures ; by way of indirectly 
 blaming him, he would not have his own name put upon 
 any of the pubHc buildings which he raised, while yet he 
 was ready to allow some twenty cities to take their title 
 from him. 
 
 It was a marked feature of his policy to be on 
 good terms with the chieftains of the border races, and 
 His fickle- to win their goodwill with ample presents, a 
 ness, dangerous precedent perhaps for the tribute 
 
 paid to barbarians by later rulers ; but after receiving one 
 of them at Rome with special honour, he treated with 
 contempt the robes of state presented to him by his 
 illustrious guest, dressing up in like attire 300 criminals 
 whom he sent to fight as gladiators in the circus. 
 
 He was courteous and kindly to his friends, granting 
 
 them readily the boons they asked ; yet he listened with 
 
 open ears to scandalous stories to their hurt, and few even 
 
 of the most favoured escaped at last without disgrace. 
 
 Shrewd and hardheaded as he was, he believed 
 
 superstition, . . , , 1 r 
 
 m necromancy, magic, and astrology, and after 
 making much of keeping up the purity of the old national 
 faith, he allowed the flattery of his people to canonize 
 Antinous, the minion who won his love in later years. 
 In fine, says one of the oldest writers of his life, after 
 reckoning up his fickle moods and varied graces, ' he was 
 everything by turns ; earnest and light-hearted, courteous 
 and stern, bountiful and thrifty, frank and dissembling, 
 and para- wary and wanton,' — a very chameleon with 
 doxical changing colours. It seemed as if he gathered 
 
 variety of ,^ ^ j • i j -a a ^ 
 
 temper. up m his paradoxical and manysided nature 
 
 all the fair qualities and gross defects which singly 
 characterised each of the earlier rulers. Yet we have 
 
1 1 7- 1 38. Hadrian. 6 5 
 
 grave reasons for mistrusting the accounts which reach 
 us from such questionable sources as the poor 
 biographies and epitomes of a much later age, mistrusting 
 which often betray a fatal want of judgment accounts of 
 while they reflect the credulous malevolence ancient 
 
 - authors, 
 
 of rumour. 
 
 Rome had no tender feehng for a ruler who seemed 
 more at home in learned Athens, or in the camp among 
 the soldiers, than in the old capital of fashion and of 
 power. The idle nobles doubtless were well pleased to 
 repeat and colour the ill-natured stories which floated in 
 the air, and in the literary circles gathered round the 
 prince there were sensitive and jealous spirits ready to 
 resent a hasty word and think their merits unacknow- 
 ledged, or to point a venomed epigram against the 
 Emperor's sorry taste. Hadrian was a master in the 
 fence of words, and could hit hard in repartees, as when 
 a tippling poet wrote of him in jesting strain, ^ I should 
 not like to be a Csesar, roaming through the wilds of 
 Britain, suffering from Scythian frosts,' he answered in the 
 same metre, * I should not like to be a Florus, wandering 
 among the taverns and keeping pothouso company.' He 
 may well have shown impatience at petty vanities and 
 literary quarrels, or have amused himself at their 
 expense with scant regard for ruffled pride ; but if we 
 pass from words to facts few definite charges can be 
 brought against his dignity or justice as a prince. An 
 enlightened patron of the arts, he fostered learning with 
 a liberal bounty, advanced to posts of trust the scholars 
 whose talents he had noticed, and knew how to turn 
 their powers to practical account, as when Salvius 
 Julianus began, probably by his direction, to compile a 
 code of equity, or when he prompted Arrian to compose 
 his ' Tactics ' and explore the line of border forts upon 
 the Euxine, or when he bade Apollodorus to write his 
 
 A. H. F 
 
66 The Age of the Antoniiics. a..d. 
 
 treatise on artillery (Poliorketica), the opening words of 
 which, though written in exile, betray no personal resent- 
 ment as of one suffering from a wanton wrong. With 
 that exception, if it really was one, there is no clear case 
 of harshness or of cruelty to stain his memory until his 
 reason failed in the frenzy of his dying agony. To set 
 against such rumours and suspicions we have proofs 
 enough, in monumental evidence and in the works which 
 lived on after he was gone, of the greatness of the 
 sovereign, who left abiding tokens of his energy strewn 
 through all the lands of the vast empire, who kept his 
 legions in good humour though busy with unceasing drill, 
 who stamped his influence for centuries upon the forms 
 of military service, drew vast lines of fortresses and walls 
 round undefended frontiers, reorganized departments of 
 the civil service, and withal found leisure enough and 
 width of intellectual sympathies to appreciate and foster 
 all the higher culture of the age. 
 
 We may find perhaps a sort of symbol of his wide 
 range of tastes in the arrangements of the villa and 
 His villa at ^^ gardens which he planned for hunself in 
 TivoiL is old age at Tibur (Tivoli). No longer able 
 
 with his failing strength to roam over the world, he 
 thought of gathering in his own surroundings a sort of 
 pictorial history of the genius of each race and the 
 national monuments of every land. Artists travelled at 
 his bidding, and plied their tools, and reproduced in 
 marble and in bronze the memories of a lifetime and 
 the works of all the ages. A great museum was laid 
 out under the open sky, bounded by a ring fence of some 
 ten miles in circuit ; within it the old historic names 
 were heard again, but in strange fellowship, as the most 
 diverse periods of art and thought joined hands as it 
 were to suit the Emperor's fancy. The parks and avenues 
 were peopled with statues which seemed to have just 
 
p 
 
 ii7_i38. Hadrian. 67 
 
 left the hands of Phidias or Polycletus or many an 
 artist of renowii. 
 
 There was the Academy linked in memory for ever to 
 the name of Plato : there the Lyceum where his scholar 
 d his rival lectured, and the Porch which gave its name 
 the doctors of the Stoic creed, and the Prytaneum or 
 Guildhall, the centre of the civic life of Athens. Not far 
 away were imaged forth in mimic forms the cool retreats 
 of Tempe, while the waters of a neighbouring valley 
 bore the votaries along to what seemed the temple of 
 Serapis at Canopus. Not content with the solid realities 
 of earth, he found room also for the shadowy forms of 
 the unseen world. The scenes of Hades were pour- 
 trayed as borrowed from the poet's fancy, or as repre- 
 sented in dramatic shapes in the Eleusinian mysteries. 
 In the settings of these pictures a large eclectic taste 
 gave itself free liberty of choice. The arts of Greece, 
 of Egypt, and of Asia yielded up their stores at the 
 bidding of a connoisseur who saw an interest or a beauty 
 in them all. 
 
 The famous gardens are now a wilderness of ruins, 
 full of weird suggestions of the past, over which a teeming 
 nature has flung her luxuriant festoons to deck the fairy 
 land of fancy ; but they have served for centuries as a 
 mine which the curious might explore, and the art 
 galleries of Europe owe many of their bronzes, marbles, 
 and mosaics to the industry and skill once summoned 
 to adorn Hadrian's panorama of the history of 
 civihzed progress. Among these the various statues of 
 Antinous are of most interest, partly as they show the 
 methods of ideal treatment then in vogue, and the 
 amount of creative power which still remained, but partly 
 also as the symptoms of the infatuation of a prince who 
 could find no worthier subjects for the artists of his day 
 than the sensuous beauty of a Bithynian shepherd. 
 F 2 
 
68 The Age of the Antonines. a.d. 
 
 At this time indeed his finest faculties of mind were 
 failing, and his death was drawing nigh. He was seized 
 by a painful and hopeless malady, and it was 
 dise^ he time to think of choosing his successor. But 
 hksucces- ^^ ^^^* ^^ could not bear the thought of any- 
 sor, Verus. one preparing to step into his place, and his 
 A.D. 135. jealousy was fatal to the men who were pointed 
 out by natural claims or by the people's favour. After a 
 time he singled out a certain CElius Verus, who had showy 
 accomplishments, a graceful carriage, and an air of culture 
 and refinement. But he was thought to be a sensual, 
 selfish trifler, with little trace of the manly hardihood of 
 Hadrian in his be< days ; and few eyes, save the 
 Emperor's, could see his merits. The world was spared 
 the chances of a possible Nero in the future ; the Emperor 
 himself soon found, to use his own words, * that he was 
 leaning on a totteiing wall/ and that the great sums 
 spent in donatives to the soldiers upon the adoption of the 
 , ,. , new-made Caesar were a pure loss to his 
 
 who died __, \ -, ■, •, «• -i 
 
 Boon after, treasury. The young man s health was fail- 
 A.D. 138, jjjg rapidly ; he had not even strength to 
 make his complimentary speech before the Senate, and 
 the dose which he took to stimulate his nerves was 
 too potent for his feeble system, and hurried the 
 weakling to the grave before he had time to mount the 
 throne. 
 
 Once more the old embarrassment of choice recurred, 
 but this time with a happier issue. By a lucky accident 
 and T. A. One day, we read, the Emperor's eye fell on 
 was adopted Titus Aurelius Antoninus as he came into the 
 in his place, senate house supporting the weakness of his 
 aged father-in-law with his strong arm. He had passed 
 with unstained honour through the round of the offices 
 of state, had taken rank in the council chamber of the 
 prince, where his voice was always raised in the interest 
 
1 1 7-138. Hadrian, 69 
 
 of mercy. All knew his worth, and gladly hailed the choice 
 when the Emperor's mantle fell upon his shoulders ; the 
 formal act of adoption once completed, they could wait 
 now with lighter hearts till the last scenes of Hadrian's life 
 were over. 
 
 The Prince's sun was setting fast in lurid cloud. 
 Disease was tightening its hold upon him, and bringing 
 with it a lingering agony of torment, in which Hadrian'* 
 his strong reason wholly lost its balance, and dying 
 gave way to the fitful moods of a delirious fiffu"^nSods 
 frenzy. Now he was a prey to wild suspicions, of c'^elty. 
 and was haunted by a mania for bloodshed ; now he 
 tried to obtain relief by magic arts and incantations ; 
 and at last in his supreme despair he resolved to die. But 
 his physician would not give him the fatal potion which 
 he called for ; his servants shrank in terror from the 
 thought of dealing the blow which would rid him of his 
 pains, and stole out of his grasp the dagger which he 
 tried to use. In vain he begged them to cut short his 
 sufferings in mercy. The filial piety of Antoninus watched 
 over his bedside and stayed his hand when it was raised 
 to strike himself, as he had already hid from his sight the 
 objects of his murderous suspicions. But the memory 
 of Servianus, whom he had slain but lately, haunted 
 in nightmare shapes the conscience of the stricken 
 sufferer with the words which the victim uttered at the 
 last : — * I am to die though innocent ; may the gods give 
 to Hadrian the wish to die, without the power.' He had 
 also lucid intervals when his thoughts were busy upon 
 the world unknown beyond the gi-ave, and the sceneu 
 that were pictured for him in the gardens of his favoured 
 home of Tivoli. Even on his deathbed he could feel 
 the poet's love for tuneful phrase, and the verses are 
 still left to us which were addressed by him to his soul, 
 which, pale and cold and naked, would soon have to make 
 
70 The Age of the Aiitonines. a.d. 
 
 its way to regions all unknown, with none of its whilom 
 gaiety : — 
 
 Animula, vagula, blandula. 
 Hospes comesque corporis. 
 Quae nunc abibis in loca. 
 Pallidula, rigida, nudula. 
 Nee ut soles dabis jocos. 
 
 The end came at last at Baias. The body was not 
 brought in state to Rome, for the capital had long been 
 His death weary of its ruler. It forgot the justice of 
 at Bajse, j^jg earlier years and the breadth of his im- 
 perial aims, and could not shake off the sense of terror 
 of his moribund cruelty and frenzy. The senators were 
 minded even to proscribe his memory and annul his 
 acts, and to refuse him the divine honours which had 
 been given with such an easy grace to men of far less 
 worth. They yielded with reluctance to the prayers of 
 A.ntoninus, and dropped an official veil over the memories 
 and canoni- of the last few months, influenced partly by 
 ^'^°"- their joy at finding that the victims whom they 
 
 had mourned were living still, but far more out of re- 
 spect for the present Emperor than the past. Was it 
 popular caprice or a higher tone of public feeling, owing 
 to which, Rome, which had borne with Caligula and re- 
 gretted Nero, could not pardon the last morbid excesses 
 of a ruler who for one-and-twenty years had given the 
 world the blessings of security and justice ? 
 
 Though Hadrian cared little for state parade in life, 
 he wished to be lodged royally in death. The mauso- 
 The mauso- ^^^^ ^^ Augustus was already full ; he re- 
 leumpf solved therefore to build a worthy resting- 
 
 a nan. place for himself and for the Csesars yet to 
 come. A stately bridge across the Tiber, in the neigh- 
 bourhood of the Campus Martins, decked with a row of 
 statues on each side, was made to serve as a road of 
 
1 17-138. Hadrian. 71 
 
 state to lead to the great tower in which his ashes were to 
 lie. Above the tower stood out to vicv the groups of 
 statuary whose beauty moved the wonder of the travellers 
 of later days ; within was a sepulchral chamber, in a 
 niche of which was stored the urn which contained all 
 that the flames had left of Hadrian. The tower was built 
 of masonry almost as solid as the giant piles of Egypt, 
 and with the bridge it has outlived the wreck of ages. 
 For almost a century it served only to enshrine the dust 
 of Emperors, but afterwards it was used for other ends, 
 and became a fortress, a papal residence, a prison. 
 When the Goths were storming Rome, the tide of war 
 rolled up against the mausoleum, and when all else failed 
 the statues which adorned it were torn from their pe- 
 destals by the besieged, and flung down upon their 
 enemies below. Some few were found, long centuries 
 after, almost unhurt among the ruins, and may be still 
 seen in the great galleries of Europe. The works of art 
 have disappeared with the gates of bronze and with the 
 lining of rich marble which covered it within, and after 
 ages have done little to it save to replace the triumphal 
 statue of the builder with the figure of the Archangel 
 Michael, whom a Pope saw in his vision sheathing his 
 sword in token that the plague was stayed above the old 
 tower that has since been called the Castle of St. Angelo. 
 The policy of Hadrian was one of peace ; through all 
 his wide dominions a generation had grown The out- 
 up which scarcely knew the crash of war. One p£tin^ 
 race only, the Jewish, would not rest, but a.d. 132,' 
 rose again in fierce revolt. The hopes of the nation 
 had seemingly been crushed for ever by the harsh hand 
 of Titus ; the generals of Trajan pitilessly stifled its vin- 
 dictive passion that had burst out afresh in Africa and 
 Cyprus. It had seen in Palestine the iron force of 
 Roman discipline, and the outcasts in every land had 
 
72 The Age of the Antonines. a. a 
 
 learned how enormous was the empire and how irresist- 
 ible its power. Yet, strange to say, they flung them- 
 selves once more in blind fury on their masters, ana 
 refused to despair or to submit. They could not bear 
 to think that colonists were planted among the ruins 
 of their Holy City ; that heathen temples should be built 
 in spots so full to them of sacred memories, or that 
 the old sound of Jerusalem should be displaced in 
 favour of the motley combination of vElia Capitohna, 
 to which both the Emperor and the chief god of Rome 
 lent each their quota. They nursed their wrath till 
 Hadrian's back was turned, and the bulk of the legions 
 far away ; then at last the fire blazed out again, and 
 wrapped all Palestine in flames. A would-be Messiah 
 showed himself among them, taking the title of Bar- 
 chochebas, after the star whose rising they had waited 
 for so long. The multitudes flocked eagerly around his 
 banner, and Akiba, the great rabbi, lent him the sanction 
 of his venerated name. The patriot armies needed 
 weapons, but the Jewish smiths had bungled purposely in 
 working for the Roman soldiers, that the cast-off arms 
 might be left upon their hands. The dismantled fortresses 
 were speedily rebuilt, the walls which Titus ruined rose 
 afresh, and secret passages and galleries were constructed 
 under the strongholds that the garrisons might find in- 
 gress and egress as they pleased. They would not meet 
 the legions in the field, but tried to distract their energy 
 by multitudinous warfare. The revolt, despised at first; 
 soon grew to such a height as to call for the best general 
 tiast °^ ^^ empire and all the discipline of her 
 terribly armies. Julius Severus was brought from dis- 
 
 3».arapedout. ^^^^ Britain to drive the fanatics to bay and 
 to crush them with his overwhelming forces. One 
 stronghold after another fell, though stubbornly defended, 
 till the fiercest of the zealots intrenched themselves in 
 
117-138. Antoninus Pius. 73 
 
 their despair at Bather, and yielded only to the last ex- 
 tremities of famine. The war was closed after untold 
 misery and bloodshed, and even the official bulletins 
 avowed in their ominous change of style how great was 
 the loss of Roman life. 
 
 All that had been left of the Holy City of the Jews was 
 swept away, and local memories were quite effaced. New 
 settlers took the place of the old people ; statues of the 
 Emperor marked the site where the old Temple stood ; 
 and the spots dear to Christian pilgrims were befouled 
 and hid away from sight by a building raised in honour 
 of mere carnal passion. The Jews might never wander 
 more in the old city of their fathers. Once only in the 
 year were they allowed, on the anniversary of the de- 
 struction of their temple, to stand awhile within the 
 holy precincts and kiss a fragment of the venerable ruin, 
 and mourn over the hopeless desolation of their land. 
 Even this privilege, says Jerome, they dearly bought, 
 for a price was set by their masters on their tears, 
 as they had set their price of old upon the blood of 
 Jesus. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 ANTONINUS PIUS. A.D. 138-161. 
 
 The ancient writer who tells us most of Antoninus twice 
 compares him with the legendary Numa whose reign 
 appears in the romance of early Roman his- The reign o( 
 tory as the golden age of peace and equity, ^arim-*^ 
 when men lived nearest in communion with eventful, 
 heaven. As in that dreamland of olden fancy the out- 
 lines are all faint and indistinct from want of stirring 
 adventure or excitement, so now it might seem as if the 
 
74 The Age of the A ntonines. a. d. 
 
 happiness of the world were too complete to let it care 
 either to make history or to write it. For the new sove- 
 reign was no Trajan, happiest when on the march 
 and proud of his prowess in the field ; he was not bril- 
 liant and versatile like Hadrian, bent on exploring every 
 land in person and exhausting all the experience of his 
 age. His life as Emperor was passionless and uneventful, 
 and history, wearied of unbroken eulogy, bassoon dropped 
 her curtain upon the government of a prince who 
 shunned parade and high ambition, and was content to 
 secure the welfare of his people. To describe him, the 
 Why called popular fancy chose the name of Pius, as Ver- 
 Pms. gjj called the hero of his epic, though not per- 
 
 haps with the same shade of meaning. The Romans 
 meant by piety the scrupulous conscience and the loving 
 heart which are careless of no claims upon them, and 
 leave no task of duty unfulfilled. They used it for the 
 reverence for the unseen world and the mystic fervour of 
 devotion ; but oftener far for the quiet unobtrusive vir- 
 tues of brother, child, or friend. In the case of Anto- 
 ninus other reasons were not wanting to justify the title, 
 but above all, it seemed a fitting name for the tenderness 
 with which he watched over Hadrian's bed of sickness, re- 
 fusing to let him cut short his pains and his despair, or stain 
 his memory with the blood of guiltless victims ; and when 
 death came at last to the sufferer's relief, he would not 
 rest till he wrung from the unwilling Senate the vote 
 which raised the departed Emperor to the rank of god- 
 head. But he had spent the same loving care, it seems, 
 already on many of his kinsmen, had given loans on 
 easy terms to friends and neighbours, and showed to all 
 a gentle courtesy which never failed. A character so 
 His charity kindly could not look with unconcern upon 
 was tender. ^^ endowments for poor children which 
 Trajan's charity had founded. He enlarged their num- 
 
;38-i6i. Antoninus Pius. 75 
 
 ber, and called the g^rls whom he reared at his expense, 
 after the name of his ovvn wife, Faustina. 
 
 But there was no weakness, no extravagance in this 
 goodnature. His household servants, the officials of the 
 court, who had counted perhaps on his indulgence, found 
 to their surprise that his favour was no royal road to 
 wealth. There was no golden harvest to be reaped from 
 fees and perquisites and bribes in the service of a master 
 who had a word and ear for all who came to see him, but 
 made no special favourites, and had a perfect horror of rich 
 sinecures as a cruel tax upon the endurance of his people. 
 Nor did he, like earlier monarchs, use his pa- yet free from 
 tronage to win the loyalty of more adherents, weakness. 
 The offices of state in the old days of the republic had 
 passed rapidly from hand to hand, to satisfy the ambition 
 of the ruling classes ; the first Emperors gave the consul- 
 ship for a few months only, to please men's vanity with 
 the unsubstantial honour, and rarely kept provincial 
 governors long at the same post. But Antoninus had 
 no love of change ; he retained in office the ministers 
 whom Hadrian had named, and seldom displaced the 
 men who had proved their capacity to rule. In this 
 he had chiefly the public interest in view, for he called 
 his agents sharply to account if they were grasping or 
 oppressive : he tried to lighten the burden of taxation, 
 and would not even travel abroad for fear He did not 
 that the calls of hospitality towards his train l^rold, but 
 might be burdensome to the lands through of^^ro>Hnciil 
 which it passed. Yet though the provincials interests, 
 never saw him in their midst, they felt the tokens of his 
 watchful care. He was ready to grant an audience to 
 every deputation ; his ear was open to all the cries for 
 succour or redress ; he seemed quite familiar with the 
 ways and means of all the country towns, and with the 
 chief exDcnses which they had to meet. Had any grave 
 
76 The Age of the Antoriines. a.d. 
 
 disaster from fire or earthquake scourged their neigh- 
 bourhood, the Emperor was prompt with words of con- 
 dolence and acts of grace. He was not ostentatious in 
 his bounty, for he knew that to give freely to the 
 favoured he must take largely from the rest ; and in the 
 imperial budget of those times there was no wide mar- 
 gin for his personal pleasures. In earlier days, indeed, 
 he had readily received the family estates bequeathed 
 andecono- to him by the kinsmen who had prized his 
 mical, dutiful affection, but now he would take no 
 
 legacy save from the childless, and discouraged the mor- 
 bid whim of those who used his name to gratify some 
 spleen against their natural heirs. The eagerness of 
 fiscal agents and informers died away, and the dreaded 
 name of treason was seldom, if ever, heard. 
 
 It is natural to read that far and wide the provinces 
 were prosperous and contented with a prince who ruled 
 thou h them quietly and firmly, who had no hankering 
 
 wars were after military laurels, but liked to say with 
 nee u . Scipio that he would rather save a single fellow- 
 
 countryman than slay a thousand of the enemy. Yet his 
 reign was not one of unbroken peace, like that of fabled 
 Moorish Numa. The Moors and the Britons and the un- 
 and Dacian tamed raccs of the Rhine and Danube tasked 
 babfy''^° the skill and patience of his generals, and the 
 A.D. 139. Jews even, hopelessly crushed as they had 
 War with Seemed to be, flung themselves once more with 
 A??]?' ineffectual fury on the legions. But in the 
 145- main the influence of Rome was spread by 
 
 wise diplomacy rather than with the sword. The neigh- 
 bouring potentates saw Hadrian's machinery of war 
 He ained Standing in strong and burnished trim upon 
 more by their borders, and had no mind to try 
 
 pomacy. .^^ force, while the gentle courtesies of 
 Aitoninus came with a betler grace from one who 
 
138- 1 6 1. Antoninus Pius. 'j'] 
 
 could wield, if need be, such thunderbolts of battle. 
 So kings and chieftains, one after another, sought his 
 friendship. Some came to Rome from the far East to do 
 him honour. Others at a word or sign stopped short in 
 the career of their ambition, appealed to him to be um- 
 pire in their quarrels, or renounced the aims which 
 threatened to cross his will. For in the interests of the 
 empire he would not part with the reality of power, 
 though he cared little for the show of glory ; he grasped 
 the substance, but despised the shadow. 
 
 This is well-nigh all we read about the ruler. It is time 
 to turn to the pictures of the man, in the quiet of the home 
 circle and in the simplicity of rural life. His family on the 
 father's side had long resided at Nemausus (Nismes), in 
 the Romanised Provincia (Provence), but he chose for 
 his favourite resort in time of leisure his country seat at 
 Lorium in Etruria. There he had passed the j^j^ j^^^^^, 
 happy years of childhood ; and though often life at 
 called away to the dignities of office in which o""""' 
 father and ancestors had gone before him, he had gladly 
 returned thither as often as he could lay aside his cares. 
 There, too, as Emperor, he retired from the business and 
 bustle of the city, put off awhile the purple robe of state, 
 and dressed himself in the simple homespun of his 
 native village. In that retreat no tedious ceremonies 
 disturbed his peace, no weariness of early greetings, no 
 long debates in privy council or in judgment hall ; but in 
 their stead were the homely interests of the farm and 
 vintage, varied only by a rustic meny-making or the 
 pleasures of the chase. It was such a life as Curius 
 or Cato lived of old, before the country was deserted 
 for the towns, or slave-labour on the large estates took 
 the place of native yeomen, though the rude austerity 
 of ancient manners was tempered by a genial refinement 
 which was no natural growth upon the soil of Italy. Iji 
 
/8 The Age of the Antofiines. a..d, 
 
 the memoirs of his adopted son, who was one day to 
 succeed him, we find a pleasant picture of the surround- 
 ings of the prince, of the easy tone and unaffected gaiety 
 of the intercourse in his home circle, where all the eti- 
 quette of courts was laid aside, and every neighbour found 
 a hearty welcome. 
 
 The Emperor stood little on his dignity, and could waive 
 easily enough the claims of rank, could take in good part 
 and easy a friendly jest, or even at times a rude retort, 
 temper, jj^ ^^ house of an acquaintance he was one day 
 
 looking at some porphyry columns which he fancied, and 
 asking where his host had bought them, but was uncere- 
 moniously told that under a friend's roof a guest should 
 know how to be both deaf and dumb in season. Such 
 airs disturbed him little, at times served only to amuse 
 him, as when Apollonius came from Colchis to teach 
 philosophy to the young Marcus at the invitation of the 
 prince, but declined to call upon him when he came to 
 Rome, saying that the pupil should wait upon the master, 
 not the master on the pupil. Antoninus only laughed at 
 his pretentiousness and said that it was easier seemingly 
 to come all the way from Colchis than to walk across the 
 street at Rome. Long before, when he was governor of 
 Asia, and had visited Smyrna in the course of a judicial 
 which circuit, he was quartered by the magistrates 
 
 gave a^ ^^^' ^^ ^^ mansion of the sophist Polemon, who 
 slight. was away upon a journey at the time. At the 
 
 dead of night the master of the house came home, and 
 knocked with impatience at the doors, and would not be 
 pacified till he had the place entirely to himself, and had 
 closed the doors upon his unbidden guest. The great 
 man took the insult quietly enough, and when years 
 afterwards the sophist came to Rome to show off his 
 powers of eloquence, the Emperor welcomed him to court 
 without any show of rancour at the past, only telling his 
 
(38-161. Antoninus 'Pius, 79 
 
 own servants to be careful not to turn the door upon hnn 
 when he called. And when an actor came with a com- 
 plaint that Polemon, as stage director, had dismissed him 
 without warning from a company of players, he only asked 
 what time it was when he was so abruptly turned away. 
 'Midday!' was the complainant's answer. * He thrust 
 me out at midnight ! ' said the prince, ' and I lodged no 
 appeal ! ' 
 
 It was the charm and merit of his character that 
 he was so natural in all he said and did, and disliked 
 conventional and affected manners. His young heir was 
 warm and tender-hearted, and would not be comforted 
 when he had lost his tutor. The servants of the court, 
 quite shocked at what seemed an outburst of ^j^ tender 
 3uch vulgar grief, urged him to consult his care of his 
 dignity and curb his feelings, but the Emperor ^ °^^^ ^^' 
 silenced them and said : * Let the tears flow ; neither 
 philosophy nor rank need stifle the affections of the heart.' 
 Happily, he was himself rewarded by the tenderness 
 which he respected in its love for others. He had 
 adopted his nephew long ago by Hadrian's wish, had 
 married him to his own daughter, and watched his career 
 with anxious care. The character thus formed under 
 his eye was dutiful and loyal to the last. For many a 
 year the young man v/as near him always, night and 
 day storing in his memory lessons of statecraft and 
 experience, taking in his pliant temper the impression 
 of the stronger will, and preparing to receive the bur- 
 dens of state upon his shoulder when the old man was 
 forced to lay them down. 
 
 At length the time was come, and Antoninus felt that 
 the end was near. He had only strength to say to whom he 
 a few last words, to commend the empire and left the em- 
 
 1 • -1 1 1 r t • i • 1 pi''e at his 
 
 his daughter to the caie of his successor, to bid death, 
 his servants move into the chamber of his son ^•°- ^^^•' 
 
So The Age of the Antoi ines. a.d. 
 
 the golden statuette of Fortune which had stood always 
 near his bed, and to give the watchword for the last time 
 to the officer on guard, before he passed away after three- 
 and-twenty years of rule. The word he chose was 
 ' Equanimity,' and it may serve as a fitting symbol for 
 the calm and balanced temper, which was gentle yet firm, 
 and homely yet with perfect dignity. History has dealt 
 kindly with the good old man, for it has let his faults fall 
 quite into the shade, till they have passed away from 
 memory, and we know him only as the unselfish ruler, 
 who was rich at his accession, but told his wife that 
 when he took the empire he must give up all besides, 
 who preferred to repair the monuments of others rather 
 than to build new ones of his own, and, prince as he 
 was, recurred fondly in his medals to the memories of 
 the old republic. No great deeds are told of him, save 
 this perhaps the greatest, that he secured the love and 
 happiness of those he ruled. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 MARCUS AURELIUS ANTONINUS. A.D. 147-180. 
 
 Plato had written long ago that there could be no per- 
 fect government on earth till philosophy was seated on 
 . the throne. The fancy was to be realised at 
 
 life of M. last in the person of the second of the Anto- 
 Aurehus. nines, for the whole civilized world was in the 
 hands of one who in the search for truth had sat at the 
 feet of all the sages of his day, and left no source of an- 
 cient wisdom unexplored. M. Annius Verus, for such 
 was the name he bore at first, came of a family which had 
 long been settled in the south of Spain, and thence sum- 
 moned to the capital to fill the highest offices of state. 
 
t47-i8o- Mmxus A urelius Antoninus. ^t 
 
 Left fatherless in infancy, he had been tenderly cared fot 
 by his grandfather, and early caught the fancy of the Em- 
 peror Hadrian, who, because of the frank candour of his 
 childish ways called him playfully Verissimus, a name 
 which he liked well enough in later years to have it put 
 even at times upon the coins struck in his mints. At the! 
 early age of eight he was promoted to a place among the 
 Salii, the priests of Mars, recruited commonly from the 
 oldest of the patrician families at Rome. With them be 
 learned to make the stated round in public through the 
 city with the shields which fell of yore from heaven, to 
 join in the old dances and the venerable litany, to which, 
 among much that had almost lost its meaning to their 
 ears, new lines were added now and then, in honour of the 
 rulers lately deified. When they flung their flowers to- 
 gether on the statue of the god, his was the only garland 
 which lighted on the sacred head, and young as he was he 
 took the lead of all the rest, and knew by heart all the 
 hymns to be recited. He grew apace in the sunshine of 
 court favour, and no pains were spared at home mean- 
 time to fit him for high station, for the greatest of the 
 teachers of his day took part in his instruction. 
 
 Of these Fronto was one of the most famous. By a 
 lucky accident, not many years ago, the letters which 
 passed between him and his young pupil were ^^ ^^^^_ 
 found in an old manuscript, over the fading spondence 
 characters of which another work had been his old ' 
 written at a later date, in accordance with a '"'°''- 
 custom which has saved for us many a pious homily at 
 the expense of classic lore. There is much of pedantry 
 and affectation in the style, and professor of rhetoric as 
 Fronto was, he could not teach his young charge how to 
 write with dignity or grace. Yet if we look below the 
 poor conceits of form and stilted diction, we shall find the 
 gush of warm affections welling up to give a beauty to 
 
 A.H. G 
 
^2 TJie Age of the Antonines. >,.d. 
 
 the boyish letters. There is a genuine ring about the 
 endearing epithets which he lavishes upon his teacher, 
 and a trustfulness with which he counts upon his sym- 
 pathy in all his passing interests. He writes to him of 
 course about his studies, how he is learning Greek and 
 hopes one day to rival the most eloquent Hellenic 
 authors, hx>w he is so hard at work as to have made ex- 
 tracts in the course of a few days from sixty books at 
 least, but playfully relieves his fears by telling him that 
 some of the books were very short. And then among 
 passages of pretentious criticism, which make us fear that 
 he is growing a conceited book-worm, come others of a 
 lighter vein, which show that he has not lost his natural 
 love of youthful pranks. One day he writes in glee to 
 say how he frightened some shepherds on the road where 
 he was riding, who took him and his friends for highway 
 robbers, for, seeing how suspiciously they eyed him, he 
 charged at full speed upon the flock, and only scampered 
 off again when they stood on their defence and began to 
 bandy blows with crook and staff. 
 
 His conver- But happily the lad had other masters who 
 
 rlTetoricTto taught him something better than the quibbles 
 philosophy, and subtleties of rhetoric. Philosophy found 
 him an apt pupil at a tender age, and he soon caught 
 up with eagerness, and pushed even to excess, the lessons 
 of hardihood and self-control. He tried to put his prin- 
 ciples to the test of practice, to live simply in the midst of 
 luxury and licence, to content himself with frugal fare, 
 and to take the bare ground for his bed at night. At last 
 it needed all his mother's gentle influence to curb the 
 enthusiasm of his ascetic humour. 
 
 The old professor whom he loved so well began to be 
 jealous of such rival influence, and begged him not to 
 forsake the Muses for austerer guides, who cared little 
 for the graces of fine language, but seemed to think it 
 
x47-i8o. Marcus Aurelius Antoninus. ^^ 
 
 vain and worldly to dress well or write a decent style. It 
 was indeed no petty jealousy of a narrow heart, for the 
 old man thought sincerely that rhetoric was the queen of 
 all the sciences and arts, and longed to see her ^^ . 
 
 1 11 Tx . 1 1 1 . Thejea- 
 
 seated on the throne. He wished to see his lousy of 
 pupil famous, and could think of no oppor- ^"^o"*^*^- 
 tunities so good as the one which imperial eloquence 
 would have before it. To lecture his subjects on the duty 
 of man, to award the meed of praise or blame, to animate 
 to high endeavours in well-turned periods and graceful 
 phrase — ^herein, he thought, lay the greatness of the ruler's 
 work, not in policy or law-making, or the rough game of 
 war. The interests of humanity therefore were at stake, 
 not personal ambition only, or the credit of his favourite 
 study. He writes to say that he had already passed 
 many a sleepless night, in which he was haunted by the 
 fear that he had culpably neglected to stimulate the 
 progress of his pupil. He had not guarded carefully the 
 purity of his growing taste, had let him turn to question- 
 able models ; but henceforth they should study the grand 
 style together, eschew comedies and such meaner moods 
 of thought and language, and drink only at the sources 
 which were undefiled. 
 
 But the earnest scholar had outgrown his master, 
 and even then was full of serious thoughts about great 
 questions, of *the misgivings of a creature moving 
 about in worlds not realised,' and was not to be 
 moved to give them up for canons of taste and 
 rules of prosody. He gave in after years the 
 Stoic Rusticus the credit of his conversion from ^ ^ ' ' ^* 
 letters to philosophy. * It was he who made me feel how 
 much I needed to reform and train my character. He 
 warned me from the treacherous paths of sophistry, from 
 formal speeches of parade which aim at nothing higher 
 than applause. Thanks to him I am weaned from rhetoric 
 
 G 2 
 
84 The Age of the Antonines. a.u 
 
 and poetry, from affected elegance of style, and can write 
 now with simplicity. From him I have learned to concen- 
 trate my thoughts on serious study, and not to be surprised 
 into agreeing with all the random utterance of fluent speech.' 
 Other influences came in meantime to tempt his 
 Offices of thoughts from graver themes. Honours and 
 state dignities pursued him more as he grew careless 
 
 of their charms. Already at fifteen years of age he was 
 made prefect of the city, or first magistrate of Rome, when 
 the consuls were away to keep the Latin holidays ; he was 
 betrothed also to the daughter of ^Elius Verus, who stood 
 nearest to the imperial succession, and on his death two 
 years later he was, at the express wish of Hadrian, 
 adopted himself by Antoninus, who was raised into 
 the vacant place, and was soon to be left in undisputed 
 power. In accordance with the Roman practice, the 
 young man called himself after the Aurelian family into 
 which he passed, and may be spoken of henceforward as 
 Marcus Aurelius, the name by which history knows him 
 best It was a brilliant prospect that opened now before 
 his eyes. Titles of rank and offices of state followed fast 
 upon each other ; all the priestly colleges were glad to 
 welcome him among their members ; inscriptions in his 
 honour which have been found even in far-off Dacia show 
 and popu- that the eyes of men were turned on the young 
 lar favour CtCsar, who already bore his part of the bur- 
 dens of the empire. They soon learned, it seems, to 
 love him, and to hope fondly of his youthful promise, 
 did not '^^ popular fancy multiplied his portraits, 
 
 turn the and an eyewitness speaks of the rude daubs 
 
 young * and ill-carved statuettes which were every- 
 pnnce, where exposed for sale, and which, in the 
 
 shops and pubUc taverns and over the tables of the 
 moneychangers, showed the well-known features of the 
 universal favourite. 
 
i47-i8o. Marcus Atcrelius Antoninus. 85 
 
 But happily the incense of such flattery did not turn 
 his head or cloud his judgment. Rather it seemed to 
 make him feel more deeply the responsibilities of high 
 estate, and to make him the more resolved to fill it 
 worthily. The sirens of the court had tried on him the 
 witchery of their wanton charms, and the home life of 
 Hadrian, which he shared awhile, had brought him into 
 somewhat questionable circles ; but his mother watched 
 him with her constant care, and screened the purity of 
 his growing manhood — a tender service for which he 
 fondly thanks her memory in later years. Attracted by 
 the high professions of the Stoic creed, he sought the 
 secret of a noble life from the great doctors of the Porch, 
 trusting with their help to find a sure guiding who looked 
 star of duty, and the true measure of all cre^dfo?'^ 
 earthly grandeur. Their principles indeed guidance, 
 had sometimes been austere and hard, counsels of per- 
 fection scarcely fitted for the frail and struggling, coldly 
 disdainful of the weakness of our suffering manhood. 
 But Marcus Aurelius was too generous and tenderhearted 
 to nurse such a lonely pride of philosophic calm. He 
 was vigorous in questioning his heart, but was stern only 
 to himself. 
 
 The man was not forgotten in the student. We may 
 still read in the famiUar letters which he wrote to his old 
 friend and teacher about the pleasant days he ^^^ without 
 spent in the country house at Lorium, how he loss of ten- 
 dwells fondly on the infant graces of his family affec- 
 children, and watches with anxious care the *^°'^' 
 course of every little ailment He speaks often of his 
 Httle-nestUngs, and forgets his graver thoughts while he 
 is with them. ' The weather is bad, and I feel as may be 
 ill at ease,' he writes, *but when my little fet^t"j.y*jo** 
 girls ai'e well, it seems that my own pains Fronto, 
 are of slight moment, and the weather is quite fair.* 
 
86 The Age of the Antonines. a.d. 
 
 Fronto enters readily enough into the same vein of 
 homely sentiment, sends his loving greeting to the young 
 princesses, ' kisses their fat little toes and tiny hands,' 
 and dwells complacently upon the simple happiness of 
 the prince's circle. ' I have seen your little ones,' he 
 writes, * and no sight could have been more charming to 
 me, foi they are so like you in face that nothing could 
 be more striking than the likeness. I was well rewarded 
 for my pains in journeying to Lorium, for the slippery 
 road and rough ascent ; for I had two copies of yourself 
 beside me, and both happily were strong of voice, and had 
 the look of health upon their faces. One held a morsel 
 of fine white bread in his hands, such as a king's son 
 might eat, the other a hard black crust, fit for the child 
 of a philosopher. In the pleasant prattle of their little 
 voices I seemed to recognise already the clear tones of 
 your harmonious speech.' 
 
 Fronto had learned, it seems, to jest at the austerer 
 studies of his former pupil, but he disliked them still as 
 much as ever. Philosophy indeed was now a great moral 
 force, and the chief teacher of the heathen world ; but 
 he could only think of it as the mere wrangling of pre- 
 tentious quibblers, intent only on hair-splitting or fence 
 of words, and with no power to guide the reason or to 
 touch the heart. Prejudiced and one-sided as 
 Faustina, his Criticism was, it had perhaps some value 
 dute liking whcn he urged the future sovereign to re- 
 fer philo- member the responsibilities of high estate, and 
 sop ers. ^j^^ difference between the purple of the Caesars 
 and the coarse mantle of the Stoic sages. He had also 
 a powerful ally who did not fail to use her influence. 
 Faustina, the mother of thehttle nesthngs whom Fronto 
 wrote about so often, was affectionate and tender as a 
 wife, but had all the pride of birth and the fastidious 
 refinement of the fashionable Roman circles. She had 
 
147 -i8o. Marcus Aurelius Antoninus. Sy 
 
 little liking doubtless for the uncourtly doctors of the 
 Porch, with their philosophic talk about equality and rights 
 of manhood, grudged them their influence with her hus- 
 band, and freely spent her woman's wit in petulant sally or 
 in mocking jest. The sages took it somewhat ill, misjudg- 
 ing her levity of manner, and saw only wantonness or vice 
 in the frank gaiety of the highborn dame. Hence among 
 the earnest thinkers, or in literary circles, harsh sentiments 
 began to spread about Faustina, and stamped themselves 
 perhaps in ugly memories on the page of formal history. 
 Thus the years passed by in serious study and the 
 cares of state, relieved by the tenderness of home affec- 
 tions ; but history has no more details of in- q^ ^j^^ 
 terest to give us, till at length Antoninus closed death of 
 
 ,.,**.'. * ... Antoninus 
 
 his long reign of prosperous calm, leaving he shared 
 the throne to his adopted son, who was al- po^^^'J'S^ 
 ready partner in the tribunician power, the Lucius 
 
 •^ *^ . - , . . , , Verus. 
 
 most expressive of the imperial honours. 
 Marcus Aurelius might now have stood alone without a 
 rival, if he had harboured a vulgar ambition in his soul. 
 But he bethought him of the claims, else little heeded, 
 of Lucius Verus, who like himself, had been adopted, at 
 Hadrian's wish, by the late Emperor, and had grown up 
 doubtless in the hopes of future greatness. He was 
 raised also to the throne, and Rome saw now, ^^^ 
 
 for the first time, two co-rulers share between 
 them on an equal footing all the dignity of absolute power. 
 Their accession was not greeted at the first by fair 
 omens of prosperity and peace, such as the world had 
 now enjoyed for many years. Soon the bright The omin- 
 sky was overcast, and the lowering storms ^fflPSs^n^d 
 began to burst. First the Tiber rose to an war. 
 unprecedented height, till the flood spread over all the 
 low grounds of the city, with fearful loss of property and 
 life, and only retired at length to leave widespread ruin 
 
S8 TJie Age of the Antonines. a.d. 
 
 and famine in its track. Then came rumours of danger 
 and of war in far-ofif lands. In Britain the troops were 
 on the point of rising to assert their liberty of choice 
 and to raise their general to the seat of empire. But 
 their experienced and gallant leader would not be 
 tempted to revolt, and the soldiers soon returned to 
 their allegiance, while their favourite was recalled to do 
 good service shortly in the East. On the northern borders 
 also the native races were in arms, and broke in sudden 
 onset through the Roman lines, and a soldier of mark 
 had to be sent to drive them back. But it was on the 
 The danger Euphrates that the danger seemed most press- 
 on the ing. There the Parthians, long kept in check 
 
 Euphrates , ^ . r t^ • , -r. 
 
 was most by the memory of Trajan's military prowess, 
 pressing. ^^^ ^^ ^j^^ skilful policy of his successors, 
 challenged once more the arms of Rome. Years ago they 
 had taken offence, it seems, because a ruler had been 
 chosen for the dependent kingdom of Armenia, which 
 had been the debateable gi'ound for ages between the 
 empires of the East and of the West. For awhile the 
 war had been averted by fair words or watchful caution, 
 but the storm burst at last at an unguarded moment, 
 and swept over the border lands with unresisted fury. 
 Armenia fell into the invaders' hands almost without 
 a blow. The city in which the Roman general stood at 
 bay was taken by storm ; a whole legion cut to pieces ; 
 and Syria was laid open to the conquerors, who pressed 
 on to ravage and to plunder. 
 
 The danger was imminent enough to call for the 
 presence of an Emperor in the field, and Verus started 
 Verus for the East to rouse the soldiers' courage and 
 
 theEast Organize the forces of defence. With him or 
 A.D. 162. before him went skilled advisers to direct the 
 plan of the campaign, chief among whom was Avidius 
 C'assius^ a leader of ancient hardihood and valour. It wa§ 
 
i47-i8cx- Marcus Anrelius Antojjinus. 89 
 
 well for Roman honour that resolute men were in com- 
 mand. For the soldiers were demoralized by long years 
 of peace. Sloth and self-indulgence in the Syrian cities 
 had proved fatal to their discipline ; and pro- where the 
 fligate Antioch, above all, with its ill-famed ^erfdl- 
 haunts of Daphne, had unnerved the vigour moralised. 
 of their manhood. They cared little, as we read, that 
 their horses were ill groomed and their equipments out 
 of gear, so long as their arms were light enough to be 
 borne with ease, and their saddles stuffed with down. 
 
 Verus, the general-in-chief, vvas worthy of such troops. 
 He was in no haste to reach the seat of war, alarming as 
 were the tidings which each fresh courier brought. He 
 lingered in the south of Italy to enjoy the pleasures of 
 the chase, and dallied amid the isles of Greece, where 
 all his interests seemed to centre in the charms of music 
 and of song. The attractions of the towns upon the 
 coast of Asia tempted him often to halt upon the way, 
 and when at last he came to Antioch he stooped so low 
 as to treat for peace with the invader, and only resolved 
 to prosecute the war in earnest when the Parthians 
 spurned the proffered terms. Even then he had no mind 
 to take the field in person, or risk the hazards of a soldier's 
 life, but loitered far behind, safe in the rear in spite of 
 of all the fighting, and gave himself up with- ^^d\"*^and 
 out reserve to frivolous gaieties and sen- sloth, his 
 sual excess, till even indolent natives of the made^the 
 Syrian towns began to scoff, and courtly ^^'"r^'^^^ 
 panegyrists found it hard to gloss over his peace, 
 slothful incapacity with their flattering phrases. 
 
 But hardier troops were in the field meantime than 
 the licentious garrison of Antioch. The armies of the 
 distant frontiers sent their contingents to the East, and at 
 least eight legions may be traced in the campaigns that 
 followed, besides a multitude of auxiliary forces, 
 
90 The Age of the Auto nines. a.d. 
 
 Happily there were also skilful generals to handle them 
 aright. Statins Priscus, the commander who had been 
 put forward by his men against his will as a pretender to 
 the throne, proved his loyalty once more by his success- 
 ful march into Armenia, and the conquest of its capital 
 Artaxata. Avidius Cassius meantime, with the bulk of 
 the Roman army, pushed on direct towards Parthia, 
 proved his valour and address in many a hard-fought 
 battle, and drove back the beaten enemy at last beyond 
 the walls of Seleucia and Ctesiphon. The humbled 
 Parthians sued for peace, and gained it at the price of the 
 border lands between the two great rivers. The fame of 
 these achievements found an echo possibly in the far 
 regions of the east of Asia, where no sound of western 
 armies had hitherto been heard. The native chroniclers 
 of China date the first Roman embassy to the Celestial 
 Empire, with its presents of tortoiseshell and ivory, from 
 the very year in which the war with Parthia 
 
 •A.D. l66. 1 t i , . . , , . , 
 
 closed ; but the visitors, whether simply 
 merchants or official envoys, entered China from the 
 south, and not by the direct route through central Asia, 
 which when they started was doubtless barred to them by 
 the movements of the armies in the field. 
 
 Five years had passed away in the course of the 
 campaign, and Verus at length unwillingly prepared to 
 Verus leave the scene of his soldiers' glory, but of his 
 
 mer?o?the °^^ shame. Once only, at the urgent en- 
 triumph, treaties of his court, had he moved to the 
 front as far as the Euphrates. He had journeyed also to 
 Ephesus to meet his bride Luc ilia, for fear that Marcus 
 Aurelius might come with her in person, to see for 
 himself the life which his son-in-law was leading. But 
 his time was chiefly spent in listless dalliance and 
 sybaritic ease, in which there was little else to mark the 
 lapse of time except the recurring changes from hi^ 
 
i47-i8o. Marcus Aurelius Antoninus. 91 
 
 winter-quarters to his summer-palace. There was little 
 in such a life to fire the fancy of poet laureate or courtly 
 chronicler. Yet if we read the letter which he wrote to 
 Fronto on the subject of the Parthian war, w-e shall find 
 that he expects the history on which the old professor was 
 engaged to make his name illustrious to future ages. He 
 promises that his generals shall forward their and Fronto 
 account of the battles and campaigns, with ^^jj^^f ^ 
 special memoirs on the nature of the country panegyric, 
 and the climate, and offers even to send some notes 
 himself, so great is his desire for glory. But calmly, as a 
 thing of course, he takes the credit of all the successes 
 won by the valour of his captains, and begs the rhe- 
 torician to paint in striking colours the general dismay 
 in Syria before the Emperor arrived upon the scene to 
 chain victory once more to the Roman eagles. The 
 history which Fronto wrote has not survived ; but we may 
 judge perhaps somewhat of its tone, and of the author's 
 willingness to cater for the vanity of his princely corre- 
 spondent, when we read his pretentious eulogy of the 
 struggle of generosity between the two co-rulers on the 
 subject of the titles to be taken in honour of the successes 
 in the East. Marcus Aurehus declined to be called 
 Parthicus or Armeniacus in memory of a war in which he 
 took no part ; but Verus, not to be outdone in seeming 
 modesty, would only accept the names on condition that 
 he shared them with his colleague. ' To have pressed 
 this point and won it,' says the courtier, in his hyperbolic 
 vein, ' is a greater thing than all the glories of the past 
 campaigns. Many a stronghold like Artaxata had fallen 
 before the onset of thy conquering arms, but it was left 
 for thy eloquence to storm, in the resolute persistence of 
 thy brother to refuse the proffered honours, a fortress 
 more impregnable.' 
 
 Little is told us of what passed meantime during the 
 
92 Tke Age of the Antomnes. a.d. 
 
 five years in Italy, where Marcus Aurelius ruled alone ; 
 M. Aurelius ^^^ ^^^ scanty fragments of our knowledge 
 meantime come chiefly from monumental sources. The 
 charitable endowments for poor children founded by the 
 foundations, charity of recent Emperors were put under the 
 charge of consulai officials instead of simple knights, in 
 token of the importance of the work, while on occasion 
 of the imperial marriage, which bound the princes by 
 fresh ties, the claims of poverty were not forgotten, 
 but fresh funds were set apart to rear more little ones, 
 who were to bear probably the names of the two reigning 
 houses, as the earlier foundlings had been called after 
 Trajan and Faustina. 
 
 Another measure of this date seems to have been 
 prompted by a tender interest for the material welfare 
 of the people. Some four or five officials of high rank 
 had been sent from Rome of late with large powers of 
 appoints jurisdiction in the county courts of Italy, in 
 juridici, the interest alike of central authority and local 
 justice, rising as they did above the town councillors and 
 magistrates of boroughs. These ^ juridici^ as they were 
 called, were now entrusted with the further duty of watch- 
 ing over the supplies of food, and the regulation of the 
 corn trade, for Italy was letting her lands pass out of 
 culture, and growing more dependent every year upon the 
 mercy of the winds and the surplus of foreign harvests. 
 An inscription found at Rimini informs us that the seven 
 wards of the old city, and all the corporations in it, passed 
 a pubUc vote of thanks to one of these officials for his 
 laborious exertions in behalf of themselves and all their 
 and a pr^- neighbours in the hard times of famine, 
 tor to be A third change breathes the same spirit of 
 
 orpharf" ° compassiou for the helpless and the destitute, 
 children, ^ 'praetor' was specially commissioned to 
 ivatch over tne welfare of orphan children, and to see that 
 
147- 1 So- Marcus Atirehus Antoftimes. 93 
 
 the guardians did not abuse their trust or neglect the in- 
 terests of their wards. By a singular coincidence the 
 first of the officials thus appointed became soon after a 
 juridiais in Northern Italy, and also won an honorary 
 notice of the energy with which he had met the crisis 
 of a famine, and brought to countless homes the Emperor's 
 thoughtful tenderness. 
 
 A new provision was closely connected with these 
 chano:es, as well as with the needs of a well- 
 
 , , .„,.,. T 1 ■, 3nd causes 
 
 ordered state. All births m Italy were to be births to be 
 registered henceforth in a public office within ""^s'stered. 
 the space of thirty days — a necessary step if public 01 
 private charity were to try to cope with the spread 01 
 pauperism and despair. 
 
 For the rest the Emperor had no high ambition, nor 
 cared to signalise himself by great achievements. He was 
 content to let the Senate rule, and treated it j^^ ^^^.j^ 
 throughout with marked respect, being always unremit- 
 present at its meetings when he could, and sdfalpublic 
 when business was pressing he sat oftentimes ^"smess ; 
 till nightfall. He never spared himself meantime, but 
 worked on with unremitting labour till his pale face and 
 careworn looks told all who loved him how serious was 
 the strain upon his feeble powers of body, and made his 
 physicians warn him that he must give himself more rest 
 or die. For he was anxious above all things to do justice 
 promptly to his people, by himself or through his 
 servants, and to have no arrears of work. With this 
 view he added largely to the number of the days on 
 which the law courts might be opened, and sought the 
 counsel and the active aid of the most enlightened men 
 around him. His old master Junius Rusticus had to 
 give up his learned leisure, and take perforce to politics, 
 to be consul first, then prefect of the city, to show his old 
 pupil by his own example how to turn the Stoic maxims. 
 
94 TIte Age of the Antonines. a.d. 
 
 to practical account, and prove that the ruler of mankind 
 must learn to govern others by first governing himself. 
 
 But Marcus Aurelius had little leisure after this to 
 
 study the arts of civil rule in peace, for untoward 
 
 destiny required him to spend the best years of 
 
 but was V- i-r . • 1 • r . , 
 
 called away his life m an mglorious warfare with enemies 
 dutTeftothe unknown to fame. His was too gentle and 
 distasteful sensitive a nature to feel at home among the 
 wor o war, ^^j^jgg . ^qq large-minded to be dazzled by the 
 vanity of fading laurels. The war was none of his own 
 •jeeking, and he would gladly have purchased peace at 
 any price save that of honour or of the safety of his 
 people. But the dangers were very imminent and grave, 
 and could not everywhere be safely left to the care of 
 generals of lower rank. The austere lessons of philosophy 
 had taught him not to play the sophist with his con- 
 science, or to shirk distasteful offices when duty called. 
 
 The Roman lines lay like a broad belt around the 
 civilised world, and the trusty legionaries stood there on 
 watch and ward. The wild tribes beyond had been long 
 quiet, cowed seemingly by Trajan's martial energy and 
 Hadrian's armaments of war. But now some passionate 
 impulse seemed to pass like a fiery cross along the 
 borders, and barbarous hordes came swarming up with 
 fury to the attack, and threatened to burst the barriers 
 raised against them. The Parthians had been humbled 
 for a time, but were soon to show themselves in arms 
 once more. The Moors of Africa were on the move, and 
 before long were «?weeping over Spain with havoc and 
 desolation in their track. The Caledonians of the far 
 west were irritated rather than frightened by the long lines 
 of wall and dyke which had been built to shut them in, 
 and their untamed fierceness was enough to make the 
 Roman troops retire before the children of the mist. 
 
 From the mouth of the Dniester to where the Rhine 
 
147- »8o- Marcus Anrelms Antoninus. 95 
 
 bears to the sea the waters of all its tributary rivers a 
 multitude of restless tribes with uncouth names and 
 unknown antecedents, Teutonic, Slave, Finnish, and 
 Tartar, were roaming in hostile guise along the northern 
 frontiers, and ready to burst in at every unguarded point. 
 It is time to enter more into details on the subject of 
 these wars, to see in what spirit the meditative student 
 faced the rough work of war, and how far he showed the 
 forethought of a ruler cast on evil times. 
 
 We turn with natural interest to read of the fortunes 
 of his arms in Britain, but there are only 
 scanty data to reward our search. At the fortunes 
 outset of this period a new commander, rqJ^^ 
 Calpurnius Agricola by name, had been sent arms in 
 
 *^ , ° .•' ' r • • Britain. 
 
 to meet the threatenmg rumours of a rismg 
 among the native or the Roman forces. His name re- 
 called the memory of the famous captain of an earlier 
 age, whose career of glory in the island found in his 
 kinsman Tacitus a chronicler of note. But there is no 
 evidence that the efforts of the later general were crowned 
 with like success. Seven years afterwards at the least he 
 is mentioned in an inscription found near Hadrians wall ; 
 but there is no trace of any forward movement in the 
 course of all these years, not a single monumental notice 
 of a Roman soldier upon Scottish soil, though under 
 Antoninus an imperial legate had pushed his way some 
 eighty miles beyond the old ramparts of defence, and 
 raised a second line of wall and dyke between the Clyde 
 and the Frith of Forth to screen the conquered lands from 
 the indomitable races of the north. Reinforcements had 
 been brought meantime from countries far away ; five 
 thousand horsemen came in one contingent from the lower 
 Danube, where a friendly tribe had taken service in the 
 pay of Rome, but they found their match in the hardy 
 warriors of the Picts and Scots, before whom Sarmatian 
 
96 The Age of the Antonines. a. ft. 
 
 ferocity and Roman discipline combined could scarcely 
 make head or even hold their ground. But formal history 
 hardly deigns to note their doings at this time, and the 
 troubles of that distant province seemed insignificant 
 enough, no doubt, to the imperial court. 
 
 The dangers on another frontier were more threat- 
 ening. The army of defence upon the Danube had been 
 The danger weakened to meet the pressure of the Parthian 
 on the war, and the Marcomanni and their neigh- 
 
 was more bours, who were constantly on the alert, had 
 pressing, taken advantage of the withdrawal of the 
 legions, and harried the undefended provinces with fire 
 and sword. From the mouth of the Danube to the 
 confines of Illyria the barbarian world was on the 
 move, and all those elements of disorder, if allowed 
 to gather undisturbed, might roll ere long as an 
 avalanche of ruin on the south. There was no time to 
 be lost in parrying this danger, when peace was restored 
 on the Euphrates. The acclamations of the city populace 
 had hardly died away, or the pomp of the triumphal 
 show faded from men's thoughts when both Emperors 
 resolved to start together to conduct their armies in the 
 field. But in spite of the successes lately won 
 Emperors they were in no cheerful mood to open fresh 
 f'^r"he campaigns. The tone of public sentiment was 
 
 northern sadly low ; the brooding fancy of the people 
 rentier, ^^^^^ presages of disaster and defeat for 
 coming days from the misfortunes of the present. The 
 while the effects of the famine were still felt in Italy, 
 plague was though ycars had passed since its ravages had 
 rapidly first bcgun, and officers of state had been ready 
 
 rSre,^^^ with their timely succours. A yet more fatal 
 A.D. 167. visitant had stalked among them, and spread 
 a panic through the hearts of men. The soldiers who 
 had come back from the East to take part in the reviews 
 
1 47- 1 So, Marcus Atirelhis Antoninus. 97 
 
 which graced the public triumph, or to return to their old 
 quarters, brought with them the fatal seeds of plague, 
 and spread them rapidly through all the countries of the 
 West. The scourge passed on its desolating course 
 from land to land. In the capital itself numbers of 
 honoured victims fell, while deaths followed so fast upon 
 each other that all the carriages available were needed for 
 the transport of the plague-stricken corpses through the 
 streets. Stringent laws had to be passed to regulate the 
 interment of the bodies, and provisions made in the in- 
 terest of the poorer classes, for whom the state took up the 
 task which slipped from their despairing hands. While 
 men's hearts were thus faihng them for fear, and death was 
 knocking at the door of every class without distinction, 
 appeal was made to the ministrations of religion to soothe 
 and reassure their troubled minds. Lectisternia, as they 
 were called, were solemnised ; days of public mourning 
 and humiliation set apart ; and as if the old national 
 deities were ineffectual to save, men turned in their 
 bewilderment to the mystic rites of alien creeds, and drew 
 near with offering and prayer to the altars of many an 
 unknown god. 
 
 The races of the North meantime, who had learnt that 
 the Emperors were on the way, already heard The border 
 upon the border the tramp of the advancing S?"bef for 
 legions, and their ardour for war was cooling peace ; 
 fast in the presence of the forces of defence. Hardly 
 had the princes arrived at Aquileia, when the tidings 
 came that their enemies had withdrawn beyond the river, 
 and were sending in hot haste envoys to sue for peace, 
 bearing the heads of the counsellors who had urged them 
 to attack the Roman lines. So complete seemed the 
 discouragement among them that the Quadi, who were at 
 the time without a leader, asked to have a chieftain given 
 them by Rome. Verus, we read, in the carelessness ot 
 
 A.H. H 
 
98 The Age of the Antonines. a.d. 
 
 his self-indulgent nature, thought that the danger was 
 quite over, and was urgent to return. But it needed 
 little foresight to discern that it was but a temporary 
 lull in the fury of the storm, and that only a stern and 
 watchful front could maintain the ground 
 long are in which had been won. The meagre annals 
 ^Tthr'"' of the period fail to tell us how long the 
 Emperors, Emperors were in the field. We only hear that 
 to attack within two years of their return they were 
 '^®™' summoned from Rome once more by the news 
 
 A.D. 169, ^^^ ^^ hollow truce was broken, and their old 
 enemies again in arms. They set out together, as before, 
 for Aquileia, where the armies were to be organized and 
 drilled during the winter months, to be ready for the 
 spring when the campaign might open in real earnest. 
 
 But the plague, whose ravages had never wholly 
 ceased meantime, broke out afresh with redoubled fury 
 in the crowded camp, and the death rate mounted with 
 alarming speed. The famous Galen was called in 
 are checked to try all that medical experience and skill 
 spread of could do, but his efforts failed to arrest the 
 the plague, spread of pestilence or bring its victims back 
 to health. In face of such fearful waste of life the plan 
 of the war had to be changed. The camp was broken up 
 without delay ; the various battalions were dispersed in 
 separate cantonments ; and the Emperors set forth on 
 their return. 
 
 They were not far upon the homeward way when, at 
 Altinum, Verus was struck down with a sudden attack, 
 which is from which he never rallied, and Marcus 
 fatal to Aurelius was left to rule alone. Alone indeed 
 
 ^""' he had often stood already ; the colleague 
 
 who was taken from him had helped him little with the 
 cares of state, and there were few who could regret his 
 loss. Unnerved by years of selfish luxury in the East, 
 
i47- i8o. Marcus Aurelius Antoninus. 99 
 
 Verus had come back with shattered body and with 
 diseased mind to startle the sober citizens of Rome with 
 freaks of dissolute wantonness which recalled the 
 memory of Nero and the orgies of his House of Gold. 
 Marcus Aurelius was not blind to the luxury and ex- 
 travagance of his ignoble nature. He had sent him to 
 the East, perhaps, in hope that the braver manhood in 
 him might be roused by the sobering contact of real 
 cares. He had seen to his dismay that the careless 
 worldling had come back with a motley train of actors, 
 dancers, parasites, and buffoons, to be the pastimes of 
 his idle life, while in default of manher pleasures he 
 loved to have the poor gladiators in to fence and hack 
 themselves before his eyes. 
 
 Still the Emperor had borne calmly and patiently the 
 vices of his colleague, and even now that he was dead 
 he proposed the usual vote of honours in the xhence- 
 Senate ; but he dropped some words, perhaps fonh M. 
 unconsciously, which betrayed to watchful reigned^ 
 ears that he had long chafed and fretted, ^^°"*' 
 though in silence, and now was resolved to rule alone 
 without the embarrassment of divided power. He might 
 perhaps have been more careful had he known that 
 rumour was busy with the death of Verus, and point- 
 ing to foul play with which his own name was coupled, 
 though indeed in all days of personal government 
 scandalous gossip circulates about the court, and, as an 
 old biographer remarks, no one can hope to rise above sus- 
 picion if the pure name of M. Aurelius was thus befouled. 
 
 He had lost also a young son whom he loved fondly 
 and mourned deeply, for the sages of the Porch had never 
 taught him, as they did to others, to disguise his feelings 
 under a cloak of Stoic calm, and the Senate's votes of 
 honours and of statues were but a sorry comfort to the 
 tender father 
 
 H 2 
 
loo The Age of the Antonines. a.d. 
 
 But he had little leisure for his grief. The danger on 
 the Danube was still urgent, and the same year saw him 
 once more on his way northward, to guide the 
 soon^Sled plans and share the labours of the war. All 
 to"thrs°eat through his reign that danger lasted ; nor did 
 of war in he ever shirk the irksome duty, but was 
 constantly upon the scene of action, and lived 
 henceforth more on the frontier than at Rome. In 
 default of full details in the ancient writers we may 
 where the judge how arduous was the struggle by the 
 long^llf/''^ evidence of the inscriptions. Of the thirty 
 arduous. legions which made up the regular comple- 
 ment of the Roman army, more than half took part in 
 the Marcomannic war, and have left repeated tokens of 
 their presence in epitaphs or votive offerings. We 
 may find the traces also of the irregular contingents 
 which marched with them to the field from many a far- 
 off province and its fringe of barbarous races, and which 
 though variously manned and armed were welded into 
 unity by the stern discipline of Rome. For she soon 
 learned the lesson, since familiar to the world, to group 
 distinct nationalities round a common centre by a strong 
 imperial system in which each helped in arms to keep 
 the others down. As the war went on, the Emperor had 
 recourse to far more questionable levies, if what we read 
 is true, enrolling exiles, gladiators, and even slaves in two 
 new legions which he brought into the field. The work 
 of recruiting went slowly forward, and could scarcely 
 supply the constant drain of war. The central provinces 
 had long ago wearied of military service, since Augustus 
 raised his legions on the border lands, and at Rome itself 
 no volunteers would answer to the call ; but the lazy 
 rabble hooted as they saw the gladiators go, and said 
 in hot displeasure, * Our gloomy prince would rob us 
 even of our pleasures to make us turn philosophers.' 
 
I47-I80. Marcus A urelius Antcminns. lOi 
 
 The pestilence was still abread^aiid s'preadit^lraVajje^ 
 among the ranks, clouding with discouragement all their 
 hopes and efforts. They showed little courage in the field ; 
 sometimes they were driven back in panic fear. In one 
 such rout the fortress of Aquileia had nearly fallen, but 
 the bravery of its garrison saved it from disaster. To 
 make matters worse, the treasury was empty, drained 
 perhaps by the charitable outlay for the sufferers by 
 plague and famine. The Emperor drew upon his privy 
 purse ; when that too failed, he stripped his palaces of 
 their costly furniture, put up to auction the art-treasures 
 which Hadrian's fine taste had gathered in the course 
 of the journeys of a lifetime, and sold them all without 
 reserve, while for himself he needed little more than the 
 general's tent and soldier's cloak. 
 
 Brighter days set in at last to reward his persevering 
 courage, though dangers meantime had thickened in his 
 path. The tribes of the Rhine and Danube had joined 
 nands, forgetting for a while their mutual rivalries in the 
 hope of carrying the Roman lines in one great simulta- 
 neous assault. Their women were stirred with patriotic 
 ardour, and fought and died beside their husbands. The 
 rigour of the winter could not check them ; for in time of 
 frost, we read, they challenged the legionaries to mortal 
 duel on the ice-bound river, where the southerners, 
 dismayed at first, found a firm footing at the last by 
 standing on their shields, and closing in a death grapple 
 with the foe. In the ranks of Rome none showed more 
 resolution than the Emperor himself, none faced with a 
 calmer or a stouter heart the hardship of the wintry 
 climate, the monotony of the life of camps, or the horrors 
 of the crash of war. At length he v. as rewarded by see- 
 ing the assailants sullenly retire before the firm front of 
 his array ; and the Danubian provinces were left a while 
 undisturbed. 
 
1 02 The A.ge of the A ntonines, a. d. 
 
 . : '.Wl 'copteVt with'^restirfg on his laurels he set forth 
 
 to chastise the Quadi, and drive back the hostile tribes 
 
 yet further from his borders. The hard winter had 
 
 been followed by a hot and parching summer which 
 
 made the labours of the march exhausting to 
 
 When the ^, ^ ^ , . , . , ®, 
 
 Marcoman- the troops. In the midst of the campaign 
 was^ver for ^^^^ ^^^^ lured into a pass where the natives 
 a time, the beset them on all sides. Worn out by heat 
 a^nst^e and thirst, and harassed by continual onsets, 
 foUowed ^^^y vitxQ. on the point of breaking in disgrace- 
 ful rout when the scorching sun was covered, 
 and the rain burst in torrents from the clouds to cool 
 and refresh the weary combatants. The enemy came 
 swarming up once more to the attack, but they were met 
 with pelting hail and lightning flashes, and driven back 
 in utter consternation to lay down their arms before the 
 imperial forces. Dion Cassins, who tells the story in 
 greatest detail, accounts for the marvel by the magic incan- 
 tations of an Egyptian in the army, whose potent spells 
 unlocked the windows of heaven, and called to the rescue 
 powers unseen. And in accordance with the legend we 
 may see on the monumental column, which pourtrays in 
 sculptured forms the mihtary story of this reign, a Jupiter 
 Pluvius of giant stature whose arms and hair seem drip- 
 ping with the moisture which the Romans run to gather, 
 while the thunderbolts are falling fast meantime upon the 
 hostile ranks. But Xiphilinus, the Christian monk who 
 in the abridged the historian's tedious chapters, taxes 
 
 course of his author roundly with inventing a lying tale 
 read of the to support the Credit of the heathen gods. His 
 ^■^vl\% pious fancy fondly dwells upon a miracle of 
 the 'Thun- grace, vouchsafed in answer to the Christian 
 l«^OT.' prayers of a battalion come from Melitene, in 
 A.D. 174. ^.jjg ga^gj. Qf Asia, which was called thenceforth 
 the ' Thundering ' legion, in token of the prodigy wrought 
 
147- 1 8o. Marcus Aurelius Antoninus. 103 
 
 by their ministry of intercession. The fathers of the 
 Church took kindly to the story, and pointed the moral 
 with becoming fervour. But the twelfth legion, which had 
 indeed been sent long since from the siege of Jerusalem 
 to Melitene, to defend the line of the Euphrates, had 
 borne in earlier years the name, not of ' Fulminans ' indeed 
 but ' Fulminata,' and so appears on an inscription which 
 was written as early as the time of Nero. 
 
 There was now a prospect of at least a breathing space 
 in the long struggle with the races of the North. The 
 humbled tribes consented to give back the captives swept 
 away in border forays. The human spoil to be surrendered 
 by the Quadi reached the tale of 50,000, and a neighbour- 
 ing race which had resisted with desperate valour re- 
 stored, we are told, twice that number when the war was 
 closed. Some hordes of the Marcomanni consented to 
 abandon their old homes, and were quartered in the 
 country near Ravenna ; but before long they tired of the 
 dulness of inglorious peace, and took once more to 
 butchery and rapine, till Italy sadly rued the fatal ex- 
 periment which future Emperors were one day to copy. 
 
 The Emperor was still busy with the arrears of work 
 which the war had brought with it in its train, when the 
 alarming news arrived that a governor in the ^, 
 
 T- •. 1 • n ■. •• /. 1 1 I '^e revolt 
 
 East had raised the banner of revolt, and of Ayidius 
 seemed likely to carry with him the whole ^assms; 
 province as well as the legions under his command. 
 Avidius Cassius had won distinction in the Parthian 
 campaigns, and to his skill and energ)'^ the successes of 
 the war were largely due, while the general in chief was 
 lounging at ease in the haunts of Syrian luxury. He 
 had been chosen at the first as a commander of the 
 good old type to tighten the bands of disciphne among 
 the dissolute soldiers who were more formidable to quiet 
 citizens than to the foe. He soon checked with an 
 
I04 The Age of ike Antonines. a.d 
 
 unsparing hand the spread of luxury and self-indulgence, 
 let them stroll no more at will in the licentious precincts 
 of Daphne, or in like scenes of riot, but kept them to hard 
 fare and steady drill, threatening to make them winter in 
 the open field, till he had them perfectly in hand. 
 Before long a new spirit of hardihood and valour spread 
 among the ranks, till the army, going forward with their 
 leader in the path of glory, proved itself worthy of the 
 ancient memories of Rome. 
 
 Yet Verus eyed with jealousy the talents which 
 eclipsed his own, was stung by words or looks of sarcasm 
 which fell sometimes from the hardy soldier, or perhaps 
 divined the latent germs of the ambition which was one 
 
 day to make a rebel of the loyal warrior. He 
 whom M. warned his brother Emperor to be upon his 
 had been guard, and urged him even to dismiss the 
 warned in general from his post before his influence with 
 
 the army grew too potent. The answer of M. 
 Aurelius is recorded, and throws an interesting light on 
 his pure unselfish nature. ' I have read,' he writes, * the 
 letter in which you give utterance to fears ill-becoming 
 an Emperor or a government like ours. If it is the 
 will of heaven that Cassius should mount the throne, 
 resistance on our part is idle. Your own forefather used 
 to say that no prince can kill his own successor. If it is 
 not written in the book of destiny that he shall reign, 
 disloyal efforts on his part will be followed by his fall. 
 Why then deprive ourselves, on mere suspicion, of a 
 good general, whose services are needful to the state ? 
 His death, you say, would secure the prospects of my 
 children. Nay, but it will be time for the sons of M. 
 Aurelius to die when Cassius is able more than they to 
 win the love and further the happiness of our people.' 
 Nor were these mere idle phrases, for Cassius was 
 retained in command of Syria and the border armies, 
 
147- i8o. Marcus Aurehns Antoninus. 105 
 
 and treated with an undiminished confidence, which he 
 repaid by queUing a revolt in Egypt and by victories in 
 Arabia. 
 
 But the man of action seems to have despised the 
 scholar prince as a mere bookworm, fitter to take part in 
 verbal quibbles than in cares of state, to have The con- 
 thought him too easy-tempered and indulgent 'rSsed b" 
 to keep strict watch over his servants and Avidius 
 check their knavery and greed. In a letter to th^poieS 
 his son-in-law, which is still preserved, he ST*^^* 
 
 ' *■ ' Emperor as 
 
 dwells on such abuses, how truly we have no a ruler, 
 means of knowing. ' Marcus is a very worthy man, but 
 in his wish to be thought merciful he bears vulcacii 
 with those of whose character he thinks but Galiicani a 
 ill. Where is Cato the old censor, where are ^^ 
 the strict rules of ancient times .^ They ai-e vanished 
 long ago, and no one dreams of reviving them again ; for 
 our prince spends his time in star-gazing, in fine talk 
 about the elements and the human soul, in questions of 
 justice and of honour, but neglects the interests of state 
 meanwhile. There is need to draw the sword, to prune 
 and lop away with energy, before the commonwealth can 
 be put upon its former looting. As for the governors of 
 the provinces, if governors they can be called who think 
 that offices of state are given them that they may hve 
 at ease and make their fortunes — was not a and com- 
 praetorian praefect only the other day a ^uboSu^^*' 
 starveling mendicant, rich as he is now ? — let nates. 
 them enjoy their wealth and take their pleasure while 
 they can, for if heaven smiles upon my cause they 
 shall fill the treasury with the riches they disgorge.' It 
 would be hazardous to accept the views of a discon- 
 tented rival in place of solid evidence upon this subject ; 
 but it is hkely enough that the Emperor may have 
 been too tolerant and gentle to repress with needful 
 
ro6 TJie Age of the Antonines, a.d. 
 
 promptitude the abuses of his servants. The machinery 
 of government was perhaps out of gear when the chief 
 who applied the motive force was busy with a great 
 war upon a distant frontier, and glad to steal the 
 moments of his leisure for the congenial studies of philo- 
 sophy. 
 
 Certainly if we may trust the stories gleaned by the 
 writers of a later age, Avidius Cassius was not the man 
 to err on the side of sentimental weakness. He had 
 gained a name, it seems, among the soldiers for a severity 
 near akin to cruelty, had invented startling forms of 
 punishment for marauders and deserters, crucifying 
 some in frightful torments, and leaving others hamstrung 
 by the way to be a living warning to the rest. He 
 carried the sternness of his discipline so far as to hurry 
 off to execution the officers who had just returned in 
 triumph from a border foray for which he had himself 
 given no sanction. But we can put little trust in the 
 talk of the day, for few cared to deal tenderly with the 
 memory of an unsuccessful rebel. Probably it is only 
 such an afterthought of history when we are told that he 
 came of the family of Cassius, the murderer of the great 
 Caesar, and that like his ancestor he hated the very name 
 of monarchy, deploring often that the imperial power 
 could only be assailed by one who must be emperor 
 himself. It is idle now upon such evidence as we possess 
 to speculate upon his motives, or to say how far personal 
 We know ambition was disguised by larger and unselfish 
 little, of the aims. Of Marcus Aurelius he seldom spoke, 
 
 motives of . , , . . ^ , ' 
 
 the move- at least m public, save m respectful tones, and 
 So?failed. o^ly appealed to his partisans to rally round 
 A.D 175. him when a false rumour of the prince's 
 death was spread abroad. 
 
 The movement was short-lived, threatening as was 
 its march at first. It spread through Syria without let 
 
i47-i8o. Marcus Aurelius Antoninus. 107 
 
 or hindrance, and all beyond the Taurus was won by the 
 usurper's arms. It seemed that there was no time to be 
 lost ; and the Emperor was on his way to face the struggle 
 in which an empire was at stake, when the news came 
 that Cassius was no more, having met an inglorious 
 death by the hand of a petty officer of his own army, the 
 victim of revenge more probably than loyal ^^ 
 feeling. The Emperor heard the tidings Emperor 
 calmly, showed regret at the death of the tindictivT 
 pretender, and would sanction no vindictive f^^^'"^' 
 measures, though Faustina, whom idle rumour has 
 accused of urging Cassius to revolt, had written to him 
 before in a tone of passionate resentment, praying him 
 not to spare the traitor, but to think of the safety of his 
 children. He answered her with tenderness, chiding her 
 gently for her revengeful language, and reminding her 
 that mercy was the blessed prerogative of imperial power. 
 He wrote in a like spirit to the Senate also, to let its 
 members know that he would have no sentence of at- 
 tainder passed on the wife or children of the fallen leader, 
 and no proscription of his partisans. For himself he only 
 wished that none had died already, to rob him of his 
 privilege of mercy, and now he was resolved that in that 
 cause no more blood should flow. The Senate read his 
 words with gladness, were well pleased to drop the veil 
 on the intrigues in which some of their own body were 
 concerned, and carefully entered on their minutes all the 
 dutiful phrases and ejaculations in which the counsellors 
 showed their thankfulness and admiration. The letters 
 and despatches of the rebel, which were full, probably, 
 of fatal evidence against his accomplices in the army or 
 at Rome, fell into the hands of the governor of Syria, or 
 some said of the Emperor himself, but were burnt without 
 delay to relieve the fears of the survivors. 
 
 The people of Antioch had sided eagerly with 
 
io8 The Age of the Antonines. a.d. 
 
 Cassius, and used their wit in contemptuous jest against 
 but went to their prince, moving him to resent their dis- 
 Se/inthe loyalty by forbidding for a while all public 
 East. gatherings for business or pleasure. Soon^ 
 
 however, he relented, and even visited the city, when he 
 passed by in his state progress to restore order to the 
 troubled East. Now for the first time in his career could 
 he set foot in those far-off regions, and wander among 
 the memories of ancient peoples. Before he left Rome, 
 as it would seem, he had the tribunician title conferred 
 on Commodus, the son who was soon to take his place, 
 and then more than a year was spent in the long journey. 
 His wife ^^^ ^^^^ Faustina died upon the way, at a 
 Faustina tiny village near the range of Taurus, which 
 the way?'^ was raised, in honour of her, to the dignity of 
 A.D. 175. 2i city and a colony. For the empress her- 
 self the Senate passed, at his request, the solemn vote 
 which raised her to the rank of the immortals, and 
 one of the sculptures of his triumphal arch pourtrayed 
 her as borne aloft to heaven by the guardian arms ot 
 Fame. 
 
 He took Egypt in his homeward way, and at Alex- 
 andria was willing to forget the signs of sympathy which 
 the citizens had shown his rival, leaving his daughter to 
 their care in token of the confidence with which he trusted 
 them. At Smyrna he wished to hear the eminent 
 Aristides lecture, whose vanity was such that he would 
 only consent to speak while attended with a long train of 
 pupils, who must have free liberty to clap him when 
 they would. The Emperor let them all in willingly 
 enough, and himself gave the signal for applause at the 
 eloquent periods of the famous sophist. 
 
 At Athens, where he left some lasting traces of his 
 visit in the endowment of professorial chairs, he had 
 himself admitted to the Eleusinian mysteries, whose 
 venerable symbols might haply shadow forth to his in- 
 
i47-i8o. Marcus Aurelius Antoninus. 109 
 
 quiring fancy some new beliefs or hopes about the world 
 unseen. 
 
 For more than a year the Emperor had rest at Rome, 
 and signalised his period of repose by charitable cares 
 for the Puell(2 Faustiniance, the poor girls During his 
 who were to be reared in memory of his wife, short rest at 
 
 , , , ,,_ _, Rome, A.D. 
 
 and bear her name. We may see at Rome a 177, he 
 bas-relief in which the sculptor's fancy has the pl^diEe 
 pourtrayed the maidens clustering round the Faustinianae 
 noble dame, and pouring corn into the folds his son 
 of the garment which one of them is holding Commodus. 
 for the purpose. The medals also of the year record the 
 liberal largess given to the populace of Rome at the 
 festivities which followed the marriage of the youthful 
 Commodus, on which occasion the bonds which the state 
 held against its debtors were thrown into the fire in the 
 forum, while similar munificence was shown in helping 
 the ruined Smyrna to rise once more in its old stately 
 beauty after the havoc caused by a great earthquake. 
 
 Meantime the thunder-clouds were gathering on the 
 northern frontier, and the military chiefs were anxious 
 to have the Emperor again upon the scene. 
 Once more he started for the seat of war, soon fo 
 after observing with a scrupulous care the start again 
 ceremonial customs of old time. The spear- northern 
 head taken from the shrine of Mars was ^'^"' 
 dipped in blood and hurled by the prince's hand in the 
 direction of the hostile borders, within which in the earlier 
 days of the Republic the lance itself was flung as a 
 symbol of the war thereby declared. Once more victory 
 crowned the efforts of the Roman leaders, and the title 
 of Imperator was taken for the tenth time by the prince. 
 The war itself seemed well-nigh over, but M. Aurelius was 
 not permitted to survive it. 
 
 While in Pannonia, either at Vienna or at Sirmium, 
 he was struck down by disease, probably by the plague, 
 
1 lo The Age of the Antonines. a.d. 
 
 whose ravages may still be traced along those countries 
 by the evidence of old inscriptions. Dion Cassius, as 
 and was usual, takes up the vilest story he can find, 
 
 struck and charges Commodus with parricide, in the 
 
 jjwnon IS ^^^^ ^^ poison given by a doctor's hand. 
 A.D. i8o. Other writers tell us only that the dying 
 Emperor's son showed little feeling, save the selfish wish 
 to escape from the danger of contagion by a speedy flight. 
 When the friends who were gathered round his deathbed 
 asked whom he wished to be the guardians of his young 
 successor, he answered only ' Yourselves, if he be worthy ; ' 
 then drawing his Stoic mantle round his head, he died 
 as he had lived, with gentle dignity. His health had 
 never been robust, and it was sorely tried by the hard- 
 ships of a soldier's life, by hurried journeys to and fro, 
 and the rigour of those winters by the Danube. His 
 resolute spirit had drawn thus far on its reserves of 
 moral force to keep the frail body to its work, but the 
 keen blade wore out its sheath at last. 
 
 The Romans mourned their Emperor as they had 
 seldom mourned for one before, yet on the day when the 
 funeral procession passed along the streets 
 grief of his they abstained from outward show of grief, 
 subjects. convinced as they were, says his biographer, 
 that heaven had only lent him for a time, and taken him 
 soon back again to his own place among the immortal 
 Jul. Capito- gods. ' You also,' adds the writer, addressing 
 lini, c. 19- Diocletian his prince, * regard M. Aurelius as 
 a god, and make him the object of a special worship, 
 praying oftentimes that you may copy the virtues of a 
 ruler whom Plato himself, with all his lessons of philo- 
 sophy, could not excel.' 
 
 In honour of the victories which his arms had won 
 over the formidable warriors of those border 
 
 The monu- , , -it-. 
 
 ments in his lands, great monuments were raised at Rome, 
 hcnour. Q^g q£ these, an arch of triumph, stood for 
 
i47-i8o. Marcus Aurelius Antonitms, iii 
 
 nearly fifteen centuries till a Pope (Alexander VII.), 
 ordered it to be thrown down, because it was thought to 
 block the way through which in days of carnival the crowds 
 of masked revellers used to pass. * The arch,' says a 
 modern writer, * had happily escaped the barbarians, the 
 mediaeval times, the Renaissance ; but a Pope was found 
 not only to lay bold hands upon it, but to have the naivet^ 
 to take credit to himself for doing so in an inscription 
 which the curious still may read upon the site.' 
 
 A second monument is standing still, but the papal 
 government which dealt so hardly with the arch of 
 triumph, tried to rob the Emperor of this glory also, for 
 the title carved upon his column by the order of a second 
 Pope (Sixtus V.) ascribes the work to Antoninus Pius. Like 
 Trajan's column, of which it is a copy, it is formed of 
 cylinders of marble piled upon each other, round which 
 is coiled in spiral form a long series of bas-reliefs which 
 illustrate the Marcomannic war. The literary records of 
 the ten years' struggle are too meagre to enable us to 
 give their local colour to the scenes pictorially rendered ; 
 the sculptured figures too complacently exhibit the un- 
 varying success of Roman armies to represent with fairness 
 a war in which the German and Sarmatian tribes tasked 
 year after year the military resources of the Empire. One 
 set of images there is which frequently recurs in varying 
 forms, and we may trust to these as evidence of the 
 constant hindrance to the forward movement of the 
 legions in the wild lands beyond the Danube. The 
 broad current of the great river and its tributary streams, 
 the uncleared forest, and the dangerous morasses, are 
 often shown in symbolic guise upon the column, and in 
 these Roman vanity was ready to admit the obstacles and 
 perils which carried with them no dishonour to the eagles. 
 
 Trophies of war were little suited to the character of 
 such a ruler, but happily we have a worthier monument 
 in the ' Thoughts' or ' Meditations ' which, intended for no 
 
112 The Age of the A ntonines. a.d. 
 
 eye but his, reflect his passing sentiments from day to day. 
 Written here and there in the moments of his leisure, 
 His'Medita- sonietimes on the eve of battle in the gene- 
 tions'are a ral's tent, sometimes in the dreary monotony 
 momimenr ^^ winter quarters and by the morasses of the 
 of^is Danube, they have little nicety of style or 
 
 literary finish, they contain no system of philo- 
 sophy set off with parade of dialectic fence ; but there is 
 in them what is better far, the truthful utterance of an 
 reflecting earnest soul, which would lay bare its inmost 
 etrS'^el? thoughts, study the secrets of its strength and 
 enquiry, weakness, and be by turns the accused, the 
 witness, advocate, and judge. 
 
 Self-enquiry such as this had been of old the favourite 
 tenet of Pythagorean schools, it had been pressed by 
 Socrates upon his age with a sort of missionary fervour, 
 it had since passed almost as a commonplace into the 
 current systems of the day, and become a recognised 
 duty with the earnest-minded, just as the practice of con- 
 fession in the Church of Rome. With M. Aurelius it 
 was a lifelong habit, and covered the whole range of 
 Medit. V. thought and action. * How hast thou behaved 
 3^' thus far,' he asks himself, ' to the gods, thy 
 
 parents, brethren, children, teachers, to those who looked 
 after thy infancy, to thy friends, kinsfolk, to thy slaves t 
 Think if thou hast hitherto behaved to all in such a way 
 that this may be said of thee. 
 
 Ne'er has he wronged a man in word or deed. 
 
 Call to recollection how many things thou hast passed 
 through, and what thou hast been able to endure, and 
 that the history of thy life is fully told and thy service 
 drawing to its close ; think how many fair things thou 
 hast seen, and how many pleasures and pains thou hast 
 despised ; how much that the world holds in honour thou 
 
1 47- 1 So. Marcus A urelms A ntoninus. 113 
 
 hast spurned ; and with how many ill-minded folks thou 
 hast dealt kindly.' In the course of such reflexions he recurs 
 with tender gratitude to the memory of those ^^^ ^^^^^^ 
 who watched over his early years, or helped gratitude to 
 to form his character or enrich his thought ; to teachers, 
 the good parents, teachers, kinsmen, friends, kinsmen^'^ 
 for the blessings of whose care he thanks the who had 
 gods so fervently, while he dwells fondly on fom\is° 
 the features of the moral character of each, character. 
 He speaks of his mother's cheerful piety and kindly 
 temper, of the instinctive delicacy with which she 
 shunned not the practice merely but the thought of evil, 
 of how she spent with him the last years of her short 
 life, guarding the virgin modesty of his young mind, 
 that he might grow up with the purity of his manhood 
 unbefouled. 
 
 The twenty years of unbroken intercourse with his 
 adoptive father had not faded from his thoughts when 
 he penned in all sincerity these graceful lines : Medit. vi. 
 ' Do everything as a pupil of Antoninus. Re- 3o- 
 member his constancy in every act which was con- 
 formable to reason, his evenness in all things, his piety, 
 the serenity of his countenance, his sweetness, his dis- 
 regard of empty fame, and his efforts to understand 
 things duly; how he would let nothing pass without 
 having first most carefully examined it and clearly under- 
 stood it ; how he bore with those who blamed him un- 
 justly without blaming them in return ; how he did 
 nothing in a hurry ; how he listened not to calumnies, 
 and how exact an examiner of manners and actions he 
 was ; not given to reproach people, nor timid, nor sus- 
 picious, nor a sophist ; how he bore with freedom of 
 speech in those who opposed his judgments ; the pleasure 
 that he had when any man showed him anything better ; 
 and how religious he was without superstition. Imitate 
 
 A.H. I 
 
i 14 Tke Age of the Antonines. a.d. 
 
 all this, that in thy last hour thou mayest have as good 
 a conscience as he had.' 
 
 He speaks too in later years with thankfulness of his 
 aged guardian's care, which would not trust him to the 
 risks and uncertainties of the public schools, but grudged 
 no outlay on his education, supplying him with the best 
 teachers of the day at home. 
 
 As he passes in memory over the long list of these, 
 he does not care to dwell upon the order of his studies, 
 or how much he learnt from each of them of the stores of 
 art and learning, but he tries rather to remember in each 
 case what was or might have been the moral impress on 
 his character from the examples of their lives. 
 
 His governor, he says, gave him a distaste for the 
 passionate excitement of the circus or the gladiators' fights, 
 Medit I. taught him to * endure labour, and want little ; 
 S"^7- to work with his own hands, and not to 
 
 meddle with the affairs of others, or hsten readily to 
 slander.' Diognetus turned his thoughts from the trifles 
 to the reahties of life, introduced him to philosophy, 
 and made him feel the value of ascetic training, of the 
 coarse dress and the hard pallet bed. Fronto meantime 
 was leading him to note *what envy and duphcity and 
 hypocrisy are in a tyrant, and how commonly the nobles 
 of the day were wanting in parental love.' From Severus 
 he learnt to admire the great men of the past — Thrasea, 
 Helvidius, Cato, Brutus ; ' and from him I received the 
 idea of a polity in which there is the same law for all, 
 a polity administered with regard to equal rights and 
 freedom of speech, and the idea of a kingly government 
 which respects most of all the freedom of the governed.' 
 Rusticus, who did him the good service of introducing 
 him to the mind of Epictetus as expressed in the memoirs 
 of his pupils, led him to see the vanity of sophistic emula- 
 tion and display. In the example of Apollonius he saw 
 
£47 i8o. Marcus A iirelius Antoninus. 115 
 
 ' that the same man can be most resolute and yielding ; ' 
 he had before his eyes a teacher who regarded his skill 
 and experience in instruction as the smallest of his merits ; 
 and from him he learnt *how to receive from friends 
 what are thought favours, M'ithout being either humbled 
 by them or letting them pass unnoticed.' In Sextus he 
 saw the beauty of a genial courtesy, and ' had the example 
 of a family governed in a fatherly manner, and of living 
 conformably to nature, and of gravity without affectation. 
 He had the power of accommodating himself readily to 
 all, so that intercourse with him was more agreeable than 
 any flattery ; and at the same time he was most highly 
 venerated by those who associated with him.' 
 
 Alexander the grammarian never used *to chide 
 those who uttered any barbarous or strange-sounding 
 phrase ; but dexterously introduced the very expression 
 which ought to have been used, in the way of answer 
 or assent, or joining in enquiry about the thing itself, 
 and not about the word.' In Maximus he saw unvary- 
 ing cheerfulness, * and a just admixture of sweetness and 
 of dignity in the moral character. He was beneficent, 
 ready to forgive, free from falsehood, and presented the 
 appearance of a man who could not be diverted from 
 the right, rather than of one who had been improved.' 
 Finally, after the long survey of all the influences 
 of earlier days, he thanks the powers of heaven for all 
 ^ their gifts and inspirations,' which tended to make 
 the path of duty easy, 'though I still fall short of it 
 through my own fault, and from not observing the 
 admonitions, or I may almost say, the direct instructions 
 of the gods.' 
 
 Few who have read the remaining Meditations 
 can think that M. Aurelius is here numbering com- 
 placently his own good qualities of heart and temper, or 
 throwing a decent cloak over his praises of himself. 
 
r l6 The Age of the Antonines. a.d. 
 
 There is a danger doubtless that the habit of constant 
 There is no introspcction may lead to vanity, or at least to 
 ^hy'^or ^ morbid persistency of self-centred thought 
 self-love in which may be fatal to the simple naturalness 
 Te'S-enc^t? ^f healthy action. But in this case at least 
 his own there are no traces of such influence. The 
 
 quahties, 
 
 candour of his early youth seems reflected in 
 the utterances of later years. He has a lively horror of 
 
 ^ ^ deceit and affectation, would have his soul be 
 
 ' simple and single and naked, more manifest 
 
 than the body which surrounds it,' so that the character 
 
 ^. may be written on the forehead as ^true 
 
 affection reads everything in the eyes of those 
 it loves.' 
 
 He wonders ' how it is that every man loves himself 
 more than all the rest of men, but yet sets less value on 
 
 ^.. his own opinion of himself than on the judg- 
 
 ment of the world. If a god or a wise teacher 
 should present himself to a man, and bid him think of 
 nothing and design nothing which he would not express as 
 soon as he conceived it, he could not bear it even for a 
 single day. So much more respect have we to what our 
 neighbours shall think of us than to what we shall think 
 of our own selves.' 
 
 There is yet another danger, which is very real, when 
 earnest thought broods intently upon moral action, and 
 and no dissects its motives and its aims. It often 
 
 undue self- ends in seeing mainly what is mean and 
 
 contempt -tr ■> • ■, • ,/• ,, 
 
 or pessu semsh, m havmg eyes only for the baser side 
 
 mism, Qf human nature, in becoming fretful and 
 
 suspicious, or in feeding an intellectual pride by stripping 
 off what seem the mere disguises of hypocrisy and fashion, 
 and pointing to the cankerworm of selfishness in all the 
 flowers and fruits of social life. Do we find anything 
 in these Meditations which may point to such painfulness 
 
i47-i8o. Marcus Aurelius Antoninus. 117 
 
 of self-contempt, or to any impatient scorn of the pettiness 
 and vices of the men and women whom he knew ? 
 
 A pure and noble nature such as his could not but be 
 keenly sensitive to evil, and he does not shrink from 
 speaking of it often. * Begin the morning by 
 saying to thyself, I shall meet with the busy- 
 body, the ungrateful, arrogant, deceitful, envious, unsocial,' 
 but he goes on to find a motive for patience 
 and forbearance. He was often sick and w^^fften*^ 
 weary, it would seem, of social troubles and of weary of 
 
 • 1 -i , -K,, 1 ^ the evil. 
 
 uncongenial work. ' Men seek retreats for 
 themselves, houses in the country, seashores and 
 mountains ; and thou too art wont to desire 
 such things very much. ... It is in thy power 
 ivhenever thou shalt choose to retire into thyself. For 
 nowhere either with more quiet or more freedom from 
 troubles does a man retire than into his own soul. 
 Constantly then give thyself this retreat, and renew 
 thyself ; and let thy principles be brief and fundamental, 
 which, as soon as thou shalt recur to them, will be 
 sufficient to cleanse the soul completely, and to send 
 thee back free from all discontent with the things to 
 which thou returnest.' He would find rest and comfort 
 in a larger, more hopeful view of things. 'There are 
 briers in the road — turn aside from them. Do 
 not add. And why were such things made in 
 the world ? For thou wilt be ridiculed by a man who is 
 acquainted with nature, as thou wouldst be by a carpenter 
 or a shoemaker if thou didst find fault be- g^ ^^ 
 cause in his workshop there were to be seen tned to be 
 shavings and cuttings from the things which ^'^ '^" 
 
 he was making.' He exhorts himself to imitate the 
 
 patience of the powers of heaven. * The gods 
 
 1 . , 1 , vu. 70. 
 
 who are immortal are not vexed because 
 
 during so long a time they must tolerate continually men 
 
1 18 The Age of tJu Antonines. a.d. 
 
 such as they are, and so many of tliem bad ; and besides 
 this> they also take care of them in all ways. But thou, 
 who art destined to end so soon, art thou weary of en- 
 during the bad, and this too when thou art one of 
 them ? ' But above all he would aim at cheerfulness in 
 the thoughts of what is good and noble. * When thou 
 vi. 48. wishest to delight thyself, think of the virtues 
 and cheer- of those who live with thee ; for instance, the 
 f"i- activity of one, and the modesty of another, 
 
 and the liberality of a third, and some other good 
 quahty of a fourth. For nothing delights so much as the 
 examples of the virtues, when they are set before us in 
 the morals of those who live with us.' 
 
 But M. Aurelius felt the cares of state too deeply 
 to indulge himself in the listless contemplation which 
 He would might unnerve him for the work of life. He 
 Wmseinn* bids himself 'not to be a man of many 
 tempStion," words, or busy about many things,' but to 
 but re- act like 'a Roman and a ruler, who has 
 
 hard work taken his post like a man waiting for the signal 
 of life. which summons him from life.' Or again : 
 
 "^ ^' * In the morning when thou risest unwillingly, 
 ^- *• let this thought be present. I am rising to 
 a man's work. Why then am I dissatisfied if I am 
 going to do the things for which I exist, and for 
 which I was brought into the world ? Or have I been 
 made for this, to lie in the bedclothes and keep my- 
 self warm "i Those who love their several arts exhaust 
 themselves in working at them unwashed and without 
 food. But are the acts which concern society more vile 
 in thy eyes and less worthy of thy labour?' Again : 
 * Reverence the gods and help men. Take 
 care that thou art not made into a Caesar. 
 And to throw light upon his meaning, we may read the 
 Strong words which are poured out so abruptly : * A blacl? 
 
i47-i8o. Marcus Aurelius Antoninus. 119 
 
 character ; a womanish character ; a stubborn character ; 
 bestial, childish, animal, stupid, counterfeit, 
 scurrilous, fraudulent, tyrannical ! ' 
 
 In the fulness of time philosophy was seated in his 
 person on the throne, but he was too wise to entertain 
 heroic aims and hopes of moulding human j^^ 
 nature like the potter's clay. * How worthless 
 are all these poor people who are engaged in too am-°° 
 politics, and, as they think, are playing the J^qq hope°'^ 
 philosopher ! ... Do not expect Plato's Re- f«i i" his 
 public, but be content if the least thing goes ^^°^^' 
 well, and consider s\ich an event to be no small matter. 
 For who can change men's opinions ; and without a 
 change of opinion what else is there than the slavery of 
 men who groan while they are pretending to obey ? Draw 
 me not aside to insolence and pride. Simple and modest 
 is the work of philosophy.' How modest was its aim, 
 how far from all Utopian fancies of the use of force, we 
 may gather from another passage : * What will 
 the most violent man do to thee if thou art still 
 kindly towards him, and if, as opportunity occurs, thou 
 gently admonishest him and calmly correctest his errors 
 at the very time when he is trying to do thee harm, 
 saying. Not so, my child ; we are made by Nature for 
 something else : I shall certainly not be harmed, but 
 thou art injuring thyself? Show him by gentle tact and 
 by general principles that this is so, and that even bees 
 do not as he does, nor any animals of social nature. 
 This thou must do affectionately and without any rancour 
 in thy soul; and not as if thou wert lecturing him, nor 
 yet that any bystander may admire.' 
 
 * The kingdom of heaven cometh not with observa- 
 tion.' Not by the strong hand of the master of thirty 
 legions, nor by the voice of the imperial lawgiver, but 
 |>y the softer influence of loving hearts like his, was 
 
1 20 The Age of the Antomnes, a.d. 
 
 the spirit of a nobler manhood to be spread on earth, 
 but full of For when he speaks, as he often does, of 
 *harU charity, his words are not the old common- 
 
 and antici- places of the schools, but tender phrases full 
 STstfan of delicate refinement and enthusiastic ardour, 
 feeling, gych as no work of heathendom can vie with, 
 
 such as need but little change of words to bring before 
 us the most characteristic graces of the Gospel standard. 
 * Think of thyself not as a part merely of the 
 ^^' ^^' world, but as a member of the human body, 
 else thou dost not yet love men from thy heart ; to do 
 good does not delight thee for its own sake ; thou doest 
 it still barely as a thing of propriety, and not yet as doing 
 good to thine own self.' What is this but the well-known 
 thought, ' If one member suffer, all the members suffer 
 with it?' 
 
 ' As a dog when he has tracked the game, as a bee 
 when he has made the honey, so a man when he has 
 done a good act does not call out for others to 
 come and see, but goes on to another act as 
 a vine goes on to produce again the grapes in season. 
 Must a man then be one of these, who in a manner act 
 thus without observing it ? Yes.' Here we seem to hear 
 the precept, * Let not thy left hand know what thy right 
 hand doeth.' 
 
 Again, on the duty of forgiveness : * When a man has 
 done thee any wrong, immediately consider with what 
 opinion about good or evil he has done wrong. 
 ^^' ^ ■ For when thou hast seen this thou wilt pity 
 him, and wilt neither wonder nor be angry. It is thy 
 duty then to pardon him.' Translate this into Christian 
 language, and we have the words, * Forgive them, for 
 they know not what they do.' Or again : ' Sup- 
 pose that men kill thee, curse thee. . . . 
 if a man should stand by a pure spring and curse it, the 
 
i47-i8o. Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, 12 1 
 
 spring never ceases sending up wholesome water ; and 
 if he should cast clay into it or filth, it will speedily 
 disperse them, and wash them out, and will not be at all 
 polluted.' Surely this is a variation on the theme, * Bless 
 them that curse you and despitefully use you.' 
 
 It was the ardour of this charity which kept from 
 extravagance or bitterness his sense of the pettiness of 
 all the transitory interests of earth. For he ^ut re- 
 often has his mystic moods in which he feels frained from 
 that he is only a stranger and a pilgrim gance or 
 journeying awhile amid vain and unsubstantial fn""hjf 
 shows. 'Consider the times of Vespasian, sense of the 
 Thou wilt see all these things : people marry- e^Wy ^ ° 
 ing, bringing up children, sick, dying, warring, 6°°^ • 
 feasting, trafficking, flattering, suspecting, plotting, .... 
 heaping up treasure, grumbling about the 
 present. Well then, the life of these people *^" ^^' 
 is no more. Pass on again to the times of Trajan. 
 Again all is the same. Their life too is gone. So view 
 also the other epochs c f time and of whole nations, and 
 see how many after great efforts fell, and were resolved 
 
 into the elements For all things soon pass away 
 
 and become a mere tale, and complete oblivion soon 
 
 buries them What then is that about which we 
 
 ought to employ our serious pains ? This one thing ; 
 just thoughts and social acts, and words which never He, 
 and a temper which accepts gladly all that happens.' 
 
 Or as he writes elsewhere, in a still sadder vein, but 
 with the same moral as before : ' Soon, very soon, thou 
 wilt be ashes, or a skeleton, and either a name 
 
 V. 33, 
 
 or not even that ; . . . the things which are 
 much prized in life are empty and rotten, and triflmg, 
 and like little dogs biting one another, and little children 
 quarrelling, laughing, and then straightway weeping. But 
 fidelity and modesty and justice and truth are fled 
 
[22 The Age of the Antonines, a.d. 
 
 Up to Olympus from the wide-spread earth. 
 
 What then is there which still detains thee here ? 
 
 To have good repute amidst such a world as this is an 
 empty thing. Why then dost thou not wait in tranquillity 
 for thy end, whether it be extinction or removal to 
 another state? And until that time comes, what is 
 sufficient "i Why, what else than to venerate the gods 
 and bless them, and to do good to men, and to practise 
 tolerance and self-restraint.' He wearies of his books, ol 
 the life of courts, of dreams of glory and the conqueror's 
 ambition, of the blindness and waywardness of men. 
 ' For this is the only thing, if there be any, 
 which could draw us the contrary way, and 
 attach us to life, to be permitted to live with those who 
 have the same principles as ourselves. But now thou 
 seest how great is the trouble arising from the dis- 
 cordance of those who live together, so that thou mayst 
 say, Come quick, O death, lest perchance I too should 
 forget myself.' 
 
 * Vanity of vanities ! all here is vanity,' he seems 
 to say, ' save reverence and charity and self-restraint ; ' but 
 dinging ^^"® ^° ^^^ Stoic Creed, he still clings firmly to 
 
 also to the the thought that there is a Ruling Providence 
 RuUng ° * and Perfect Wisdom, which is guiding all 
 Providence, things for the best, although its judgments 
 may be tmsearchable and its ways past finding out. 
 
 It is the peculiar feature of his character that this 
 religious optimism has the power not only to content 
 which ^^^ reason, but to stir his heart, and fill it 
 
 stirred his at times to Overflowing with a gush of ten- 
 te^nderness demess and love. ' Everything harmonises 
 and love ^j^j-^ j^g which is harmonious to thee, O 
 Universe. Nothing is too early nor too late for me 
 which is in due time for thee. Everything is 
 ' ' *^' fruit to me which thy seasons bring, O Na- 
 
147-1^0- Marcus Aurelitis Antoninus. 123 
 
 ture ; from thee are all things ; in thee are all things ; to 
 thee all things return. The poet says, Dear city of 
 Cecrops ; and wilt thou not say, Dear city of Zeus ? ' 
 Or again : ' What is it to me to live in a 
 universe devoid of gods ? . . . But in truth they 
 do exist, and they do care for human things, and they 
 have put all the means in man's power to enable him not 
 to fall into real evils.' 
 
 It moves his heart with gratitude to think that the 
 sinner has a place given him for repentance, and may 
 come back from his moral isolation. * Suppose that thou 
 hast detached thyself from the natural unity, 
 yet here there is this beautiful provision, 
 that it is in thy power again to unite thyself. God has 
 allowed this to no other part, after it has been cut 
 asunder, to come together again. But consider the 
 kindness by which He has distinguished man, for He has 
 put it in his power not to be parted at all from the 
 universal, and when he has been parted, He has allowed 
 him to return and to resume his place.' 
 
 This reverent tenderness of feeling and delicate 
 sympathy with Nature made him find a certain loveliness 
 in things which had no beauty to the ancient and deli- 
 world. ' Even the things which follow after pfthf^ih 
 those of natural growth contain something Nature, 
 
 pleasing and attractive Figs when they i"- 2- 
 
 are quite ripe gape open ; and in the ripe olives the 
 very circumstance of their being near to rottenness 
 adds a peculiar beauty to the fruit. The ears of corn 
 bending down, and the lion's eyebrows, and the foam 
 which flows from the mouths of wild boars, and many 
 other things . . . consequent upon the things which 
 are formed by nature, help to adorn them, and they 
 please the mind ; so that if a man showed a feeling 
 and a deeper insight . . . there is hardly one of those 
 
124 Tfte Age of the Antonines, a.d. 
 
 which follow by way of natural sequence which will not 
 seem to him to be in a manner so disposed as to give 
 pleasure.' There was something here beyond what he 
 had learned from his old Stoic masters. They had 
 taught him that the world was ruled by an Intellect 
 Supreme, with which it was man's privilege, as it was his 
 duty, to be in constant unison ; but their phrases were 
 cold and hard and unimpassioned till they were trans- 
 figured by his moods of tender fancy. They had shown 
 their followers how to meet the ills of life with dignity 
 and calm, and to face death with stem composure, if not 
 with a parade of tragic pride, as if philosophy had robbed 
 their last enemy of his fatal sting. But it is a gentler, 
 humbler voice that cries, ' Pass through this 
 
 IV. 48. ,. , . . r , , 
 
 little space of tune conformably to nature, 
 ind end thy journey in content, just as an olive falls off 
 when it is ripe, blessing Nature who produced it, and 
 thanking the tree on which it grew ' 
 
 Yet withal we are haunted by a certain melan- 
 choly which runs through all these Meditations, and as 
 which does ^® rt,2A his earnest words we feel a ring 
 not however of sadness sounding in our ears. For he had 
 certain*^ hopcs and aspirations for which the Stoic 
 melancholy cj-ged could find no place ; and he sorely 
 felt the problems which his reason could not solve. 
 * How can it be that the gods, after having arranged 
 all things well and benevolently for mankind, have over- 
 looked this alone, that some men, and very 
 good men, and men who, as we may say, have 
 had most communion with the Deity, and through pious 
 acts and religious observances have been most intimate 
 with the Deity, when they have once died should never 
 Uve again, but should be quite extinguished ? ' He would 
 fain hush to rest such yearning doubts, but the heart 
 probably remained unconvinced by the poor logic which 
 
i47-i8o. Marcus Aurelius Antonimcs. 125 
 
 his reason had to offer. ' But if this is so, be assured that 
 if it ought to have been otherwise, the gods would have 
 
 done it But because it is not so, if in fact it is not 
 
 so, be thou convinced that it ought not to have been so.' 
 At times too there is something very sad in the 
 confessions of his lonely isolation, for the air is 
 keen and chilling on the heights to which and sense 
 he towered by character as well as station, of isolation 
 
 ' Live as on a mountain Let men see, let them 
 
 know a real man who lives according to 
 Nature. If they cannot endure him, let them 
 kill him. For that is better than to live thus.' Or again . 
 * Thou wilt consider this then when thou art 
 
 X. 36. 
 
 dying, and thou wilt depart more contentedly 
 by reflecting thus. I am going away from such a life, in 
 which even my associates, in behalf of whom I have 
 striven, prayed, and cared so much, themselves wish me 
 to depart, hoping perchance to get some little advantage 
 by it. Why then should a man cling to a longer stay 
 here .? ' 
 
 From the imperfect sympathy of fellow-men he 
 turned, as by natural instinct, to communion with the 
 Eternal and Divine. But here again he found a sorry 
 comfort in the system of his choice. The Universal 
 Mind, the Abstract Godhead, or the Soul Theaus- 
 diffused through all creation and revealed by verity of the 
 Nature's myriad voices — these were cold and could "^[01*" 
 neutral phrases which might indeed convince content him. 
 his reason, but could not animate or stir his heart. He 
 could not therefore rest content to use them always in 
 their austere nakedness, but must invest the cold abstrac- 
 tions with the form and colour of a personifying fancy, 
 bringing thus before us on his pages the postulates of 
 emotion rather than of logic. But meantime the poor 
 artisans and freedmen of the Christian churches were 
 
1 26 The Age of the A ntonines. a.d. 
 
 praying to their Father in heaven with all the confidence 
 The con- °^ trustful childhood. The rabble of the 
 trastofthe streets were clamouring for their lives, and 
 porarjr quickening the loyal zeal of many a Gallio on 
 
 Christians. ^jjg gg^^ Qf judgment ; but they found comfort 
 in the thought of One who called them friends and 
 brothers, and who had gone before them on the road 
 which they must travel, supported by the unseen help of 
 an Eternal Love. They laid their dead within the 
 Catacombs, tracing on the rough-hewn walls the symbol 
 of the Cross or the form of the Good Shepherd ; but they 
 felt no dark misgivings and no inexplicable yearnings, 
 and so were happier in their life and death than the 
 philosophic Emperor of the proud Roman world, who 
 speaks once only of the Christians, and then notices 
 them as facing death with the composure of mere ob- 
 stinate pride. 
 
 It is sad to think that an Emperor so good was 
 followed by a successor so unworthy ; sadder still that that 
 successor was his son. Could not the philo- 
 was un- sophic ruler, Julian asked, rise above a father's 
 
 h?rsu"c-^^ '° doting fondness, and find some one better fitted 
 cesser, to replace him than a selfish stripling who 
 
 Commodus. ^ ^ i.' ir /- \.- ^ ^ 
 
 was soon to prove himself a frantic tyrant 
 with a gladiator's tastes ? He had a son-in-law beside 
 him, Pompeianus, a soldier and a statesman of ripe age, 
 or failing him there were all the worthiest of Rome to 
 choose from, as he himself had been singled out in earlier 
 years, and raised by adoption to the empire. He had 
 himself served for many years of tutelage, under the eyes 
 of Antoninus, to fit him for the responsibilities of absolute 
 power ; was it wise to hope that an inexperienced youth, 
 cradled in the purple, and exposed to the mean arts and 
 flattery of servile spirits while his father was far away 
 upon the Danube, would have the wisdom or the self- 
 
147- 1 8o. Marctis Aurelius Antoninus. 127 
 
 control to provide for the welfare of the subject millions ? 
 Roman gossips had an ugly story of the signs of cruelty 
 which had shown themselves in Commodus already ; how 
 in a fit of passion at a slave who had failed to heat his 
 bath, he ordered him to be flung into the furnace, but was 
 tricked by the smell of frying sheepskin, which, thanks 
 to an attendant's happy thought, took the place of the 
 poor bath -man. True or false, the tale may serve to 
 illustrate the current talk, and show how little men 
 dared to hope that the father's virtues would be continued 
 in the son. 
 
 Was M. Aurelius unfortunate in his wife as well as 
 his successor '^. We must think him so indeed if we believe 
 the common story, so confidently repeated 
 since, that she disgraced him by the profligate in his wife 
 amours which were the talk of the whole Faustina? 
 town and the mark of scurrilous jests upon the stage ; 
 that she intrigued with Cassius and urged him to revolt ; 
 and died by her own hand at last, in fear of imminent 
 detection. 
 
 Yet we have grave reasons to mistrust this picture of 
 Faustina's character, and the evidence on which it rests 
 is very poor. The Emperor himself, in a striking passage 
 of his memoirs, speaks of her in a very different „ 
 
 ,__, . , , ,. r ^ 1, Reasons 
 
 stram. When m the lonehness of the general s for doubting 
 tent beside the Danube, there rise before his S th^^'^ 
 thoughts the memories of the kinsmen, friends, common 
 and teachers who had guided him by their 
 counsels or example, when he thanks the powers of 
 heaven for all their goodness to him in the past, he does 
 not fail to praise them for the blessing of a wife „ , , 
 
 , 1 1. ,-,. . 1 • 1 » Med. I. 17. 
 
 * so obedient, so affectionate, and so simple.' 
 The touching pictures of the Emperor's home life in 
 Fronto's letters bring her to our fancy as the tender wife 
 and loving mother. Her own recorded woi^ls, written 
 
128 The Age of the A ntonines, a. d. 
 
 in hot passion at the news of the revolt of Cassius, are full 
 of affection towards her husband and cries of vengeance 
 on the traitor, and data recently discovered in inscriptions 
 in the Haurin have disposed of the doubts as to their 
 genuineness raised long ago by critics. In the countless 
 medals struck in honour of her by the Emperor or Senate 
 she appeared sometimes as the patroness of Female 
 Modesty, sometimes as the power of Love and Beauty ; 
 and flattery, however gross, would hardly have devised 
 such questionable titles to provoke the flippant wit of 
 Rome had such grave scandals been believed. 
 
 We cannot doubt indeed that some years later there 
 were stories much to her discredit floating through the 
 streets of Rome. One writer of repute now lost to us 
 is expressly charged with blackening her memory ; 
 another (Dion Cassius) raked up commonly into his 
 pages so much of the dirt of calumny that we listen to 
 his statements on the subject with reserve. The feeble 
 writers of the Augustan history a century later repeat 
 the stories, but avowedly as only current rumour, which 
 they had not tested for themselves. But the epitomists 
 of later ages drop out the qualifying phrases altogether, 
 and speak of her without misgiving or reserve as 
 another Messalina on the throne, and later history has 
 commonly repeated the worthless verdict of these most 
 uncritical of writers. If we hesitate to think that such 
 grave charges could be altogether baseless, we may note 
 that Faustina, in her pride of birth and fashion, had 
 little liking for the sages whom her husband gathered 
 round him, and outraged probably the scruples of these 
 ascetic Puritans by her gay defiance of their tastes. 
 But their displeasure may have carried a moral sanction 
 with it, and lived on in literary circles, and influenced 
 the tone of history itself. The rabble of the streets grew 
 now and then impatient of the serene wisdom of their 
 
t.\7-i 80 Marcus A urelius A ntoniniis. 1 2 9 
 
 ruler, and when he was inattentive at the games, or cried 
 £0 lessen the excitement of the gladiator's bloody sport, 
 they thought it a good jest to point to Faustina's fashion- 
 able pleasures, and to hint broadly that it was natural 
 enough that she should look for sympathy elsewhere than 
 to so august a philosopher and bookworm. When Com- 
 mcdus in later years unbared the vileness of his brutal 
 nature, men might perhaps remember all this gossip 
 of the past, and say that he could be no true son of the 
 benign ruler whom they now regretted, thus fondly em- 
 balming the memory of the prince while sacrificing to it 
 the honour of his wife. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE ATTITUDE OF THE IMPERIAL GOVERNMENT 
 TOWARDS THE CHRISTIANS. 
 
 For a century or more the imperial government took 
 little notice of the Christian church as the organized 
 form of a distinct religion. It knew it chiefly ^j^^ ctirts- 
 as a Jewish sect, as a fitting object for tianswere 
 
 . . , ° •' - - for some 
 
 suspicion or contempt, but not commonly for time re- 
 active persecution. The race indeed with fsa'^je^fg^ 
 which they classed it was peculiarly distasteful sect, and 
 to the Roman rulers, as fanatical and unruly, undis- 
 and stirred at times by inexplicable moods of *"'"^®^ • 
 wild excitement. After the terrible struggle of a war 
 almost of extermination they had risen in fierce revolt in 
 Palestine, Cyprus, and Egypt ; in all the great centres of 
 industry and trade in which they spread, they gained a 
 name for turbulence and strife and obstinate self-assertion. 
 Yet for themselves at least their national worship was 
 respected, for the policy of Rome found a place in its 
 pantheon for the gods of all the countries of the Empire, 
 and all might live together unmolested side by side. 
 
 A. H. K 
 
130 The Age of the Anto7iines. ch. vi 
 
 But when they tried to be aggressive, to make 
 proselytes even in the streets of Rome, and to unsettle 
 men's traditional beliefs, the civil power stepped in to 
 check and to chastise the disturbers of the public peace. 
 It was thus that in the old days of the Republic senate 
 arid consuls oftentimes took measures to stay the pro- 
 for the gress of the eastern creeds when they claimed 
 
 Roman ^ right of Settlement at Rome : and the rulers 
 
 government ° ' 
 
 tolerated all of the early empire acted in like spirit as 
 were not ^^ defenders of the national faith when it 
 aggressive, ^^s menaced by what they thought the in- 
 tolerant bigotry of the Jewish zealots. In the reign of 
 Tiberius, for example, large numbers of such aliens, 
 whose uncouth superstitions seemed to spread contagion 
 round them, were flung into the island of Sardinia, to 
 live or die, as it might happen, in the miasma of that 
 pestilential climate. In the days of Claudius again we 
 read of a disturbance among the Jewish immigrants, 
 which grew to such a height as to be followed by a 
 summary edict of general banishment from Rome. The 
 strange words of Suetonius in which he speaks of the 
 impulse given by a certain Chrestus to the tumult, 
 * impulsore Chresto tumultuantes,' point probably to the 
 hot disputes and variance caused among the synagogues 
 by the ferment of the new Christian teaching. The 
 disturbance was soon quieted, and the peremptory order 
 was withdrawn, or followed only by the departure of the 
 leading spirits ; and the little Christian church lived for 
 a time securely screened from notice and attack under the 
 shelter of the legalized religion of the Jews, with which it 
 was commonly confused in the fancy alike of the people 
 and of their rulers. But the story of Pomponia Graecina 
 serves to show that these exclusive creeds might not 
 with impunity overleap the barriers of race and social 
 class. A noble Roman lady was accused of tampering 
 
cH. vj The Empire and Christianity. 131 
 
 with new forms of superstition, and tried, according to 
 the rule of ancient days, before a family council formed 
 by her husband and her nearest kinsmen. After her 
 acquittal we are told that she shunned the world of 
 fashion, and lived for years a sober life of meditation. 
 Ecclesiastical historians have commonly believed that 
 they could read in the somewhat scornful language cf 
 the heathen writer a description of the early type of 
 Christian devotion. 
 
 The story of the cruelties of Nero paints in far more 
 lurid colours the growing hatred of the populace and the con- 
 stant dangers of the infant church, which now, But in the 
 for the first time, clearly appears to view in the ^j||J^ro°we 
 pages ofthe classical historians. The butchery majr trace 
 and the tortures were indeed a mere freak of dislike to 
 unscrupulous ferocity by which the Emperor [j^^^^s^^" 
 thought to divert men's minds from the great such, 
 fire which had made so many thousands homeless, or at 
 least to discharge the lowering thunder-clouds of popular 
 discontent upon the heads of the poor Christian artisans 
 and freedmen. '■ They suffered/ says Tacitus, ' those 
 votaries of a pernicious superstition, not indeed that they 
 were guilty of the fire, but for their hatred of the human 
 kind.' We may well ask ourselves the causes of the 
 horror and repugnance here and elsewhere expressed so 
 strongly, and which served as a convenient excuse for 
 Nero's wanton cruelty, guided possibly by the Jewish 
 jealousy of his wife Poppsea. How could the gentle 
 courtesies of the new morality inspire such feelings in the 
 society which watched its growth? 
 
 The Jewish race was one which could not in those 
 days mingle peacefully with the peoples of the due partly 
 West. In Rome and Alexandria and others jewull'^ 
 of the great ciHes of the ancient world there origin. 
 wei'e frequent frays and tumults in the populous quarters 
 
132 The Age of the Antonines. ch. vi. 
 
 where they flocked ; their peculiar habits and dogged 
 self-assertion stirred the antipathy of their heathen 
 neighbours, who had no eyes for their industry and 
 thrift and the nobler aspects of their moral character. 
 But the Jews had at least an old and national religion, 
 which might be borne with so long as its worshippers kept 
 peacefully to their own circles, while the Christians, though 
 though really, as it seemed, of the same race and 
 
 fekecftheir customs, Seemed to draw themselves apart in 
 claims to still more obstinate isolation, to hold aloof even 
 tbn^which from their countrymen, and exhaust the pa- 
 reHgion'^^ tience of the world by meaningless disputes 
 enjoyed. about the nice points of spiritual dogmas. 
 Then let them do so at their cost. If they disowned 
 their ancient worship, they must forfeit the legal sanction 
 which had screened them hitherto. 
 
 Again, in the personal bearing of the Christians there 
 was much which unavoidably outraged the social senti- 
 ments of others, for they could not easily take 
 reglrded"^^ part in the business or pleasures of a world on 
 soSat and which the Stamp of idolatry was set. They 
 morose must shun the pleasant gatherings of their 
 
 ' friends or neighbours, if they did not wish to 
 compromise their principles or shock the feelings of the 
 rest by their treatment of the venerable forms of heathen- 
 dom. In the family observances at the chief epochs of a 
 Roman's life they could not be present to show their 
 sympathy in joy and sorrow, for religious usages took place 
 at each, and they dared not touch the unclean thing. Ai 
 the recurring seasons of festivity they seemed unmoved 
 amid the general gladness, for they could not worship at 
 the altars, or join in the ceremonial processions, or hang 
 their garlands on the statues of the gods. If they enlisted 
 in the legions, they might be called upon to adore the 
 Genius of the Emperor, or in case of their refusal be 
 
CH. VI. The Empire and Christianity. 133 
 
 charged with rank disloyalty. No wonder if they held 
 themselves aloof from public life, when at every turn they 
 were confronted by the forms of a ritual which was 
 accursed in their eyes. When their fellow-citizens kept 
 holiday, they could not venture to the theatre without a 
 shock to their sense of right and decency, while they 
 turned with loathing from the ghastly horrors of the 
 gladiatorial combats. They saw the dangers and they 
 felt the force of the allurements to vice by which they 
 were surrounded, and they turned away almost with 
 despair from a world which seemed so wholly given over 
 to the power of sensuality and sin. They had no eyes 
 for the beauty of an art which was enlisted in the service 
 of idolatry, nor for the symbolic value of the ancient 
 forms which were one day to be hallowed for church use. 
 Appealing to a higher standard than the will of Caesar 
 or the laws of Rome, they could not accept the current 
 estimates of men and manners, but looked often with a 
 grave displeasure at what seemed innocent to other eyes. 
 Hence men came to think of them as stern fanatics, 
 shunning the pleasures and courtesies of social life, sec- 
 tarians who would cut themselves adrift from all the 
 natural ties of country and of race. 
 
 Nay more, they were branded even with impiety, be- 
 cause they took no part in any recognised forms of wor- 
 ship, but shrank from all the common usages ^^^ ^^^ 
 of national religion. Those who visited their cused of 
 homes found no little niche or shrine to hold ""^^^ ^' 
 the figures of the guardian Lares ; the oratory which per- 
 haps took its place was empty as the temple at Jerusalem 
 which had moved the wonder of the conqueror Pompeius. 
 From the first they had refused all adoration to a Caesar ; 
 still more emphatically they refused it after the cruelties 
 of a Nero had coloured with their stains of blood the 
 Apocalyptic visions of Antichrist and future judgment. 
 
134 The Age of the Antonines. ch. vi. 
 
 In addition to these charges there were others ; wild 
 delusions of distempered fancy, then, as in other ages, 
 while foul greedily caught up by the credulous and 
 stories were prejudiced masses. The simple lovefeasts 
 
 told and f /, _ . , r , , n , j 
 
 credited held at first in token of brotherhood and 
 
 about them, tj^ankful memories were perverted into scenes 
 of foul debauch ; and the stories of accursed pledges, 
 cemented by the blood of slaughtered infants — such as 
 were told of old of Bacchanalian orgies or of the con- 
 spiracy of Catiline — passed once more from mouth to 
 mouth, finding possibly some poor excuse in Eucharistic 
 language misconstrued. They were often classed with 
 the professors of magic and of necromancy, with the 
 charlatans and quacks of every kind who haunted the 
 low quarters of the town and preyed upon the ignorant 
 fancy of the vulgar. Yet among these the Christians 
 often found their bitterest rivals, in the deceivers who 
 feared to be unmasked, or to see the profits of their trade 
 endangered. When once the suspicion and dislike of the 
 populace were roused against them as impious misan- 
 thropes, the wildest stories were invented and believed to 
 justify the hatred which was felt. If the Nile failed to 
 overflow the fields in time of drought ; if the plague 
 spread its havoc through the towns ; if harvest failed or 
 earthquakes left their track of ruins ; the Christians were 
 the guilty wretches by whom the wrath of heaven 
 was caused. In Northern Africa, we read, it was in later 
 days a proverb, * If there is no rain, fix the blame upon 
 the Christians.' 
 
 In the ignorant antipathy of the lower orders lay the 
 chief danger of the early church, and it was on this 
 Nero which Nero reckoned when he made it the 
 
 Sopula? scapegoat of the blind fury of the people. But 
 antipathy, j^jg Cruelty, frightful as it was, was personal 
 only, causing no change of legal status, an exceptional 
 
;h. vt. 
 
 The Empire and Christianity. 135 
 
 moment in a time of toleration. The Christian religion 
 was not yet proscribed, and its professors had little cause 
 to fear the Roman governors or judges, save when the 
 people clamoured loudly for their blood. The reign of 
 Domitian, indeed, is vaguely spoken of as one of persecu- 
 tion; but there is little evidence of this in the annals of 
 the time, though here and there noble Romans, like 
 Clemens and Domitilla,may have suffered for lapsing from 
 the creed of their fathers. 
 
 But with the second century of the empire darker 
 times set in in earnest, and a general ban was put at last 
 by law upon the Christian church. We may 
 find in Pliny's letters the fullest notice of the Christianity 
 change. As governor of Bithynia he wrote to m^eUkgal 
 Trajan from his province to tell him of the till the time 
 new reUgionists who were brought before his 
 seat of justice, and to ask for instructions how to deal with 
 them. He had never had to do with them before, he said, 
 nor ever sat in court when such cases were brought up. 
 He was doubtful whether the name of Christian should 
 be criminal in itself, or if it would be right to look only to 
 the practice impliedun the profession. Information had 
 been sent to him by unknown hands, and many had been 
 denounced to him by name. On enquiry it appeared 
 that while some denied the charge entirely, others 
 admitted that they had been drawn aw./, though they 
 had ceased to be Christians long ago. When sharply 
 questioned as to the practice and belief of the society to 
 which they had belonged, they said its members used to 
 meet from time to time at break of day, and sing their 
 hymns of praise to Christ, and bind themselves by sacred 
 pledges, not to any deed of darkness, but to keep them- 
 selves unstained by fraud, and falsehood, and adultery. 
 There were stated gatherings besides, in which they 
 joined each other in a simple meal, till all such forms ol 
 
136 The Age of the Antonines. en. vi. 
 
 social brotherhood were put down by a special edict 
 To test the truth of such confessions, Pliny had two 
 slave girls tortured, but nothing further was avowed by 
 them nor by the rest who frankly owned that they were 
 Christians, and would not recant or flinch even after 
 repeated threats. 
 
 Their unyielding obstinacy seemed to the writer of 
 itself to call for punishment, though beyond that he could 
 only find the traces of extravagant delusion. But he 
 shrank from acting on his own discretion without instruc- 
 tions from the Emperor himself, so grave were the interests 
 at stake owing to the numbers of every age and sex and 
 social grade whose lives and fortunes were involved. For 
 the contagion, as he called it, had been spreading fast 
 through towns and villages and lonely hamlets ; the 
 ancient temples had been almost deserted, and few were 
 found to buy the offerings for the altars, till fear of 
 punishment had lately quickened into life the forms of 
 wonted reverence. 
 
 Reasons may be urged indeed for doubting the 
 genuineness of this letter, at least in the form in which 
 Trajan's ^^ have it now ; but we may at least accept 
 answer to the reply of Trajan, which was very brief and 
 detennined weighty. He would give no encouragement 
 the law. ^Q official eagemess in hunting out charges of 
 
 this kind : no anonymous evidence should be accepted ; 
 any Christians should meet with pardon for the past if they 
 would adore the national gods ; but punishment must be 
 enforced on all who stubbornly refused. This rescript 
 formally decided the legal status of the new religion 
 and the proceedings of the imperial agents. The 
 Christian church could now no longer claim the protec- 
 tion which the synagogue enjoyed ; the forms and 
 pledges of its union were illegal ; any who would, might 
 
OH. VI. The Empire and Christianity. 137 
 
 come forward to inform against them, and governor 01 
 judge might not pardon even if he wished. 
 
 Indeed, even to enhghtened rulers such as Trajan, 
 who were not disposed to credit the gross calumnies 
 of popular fancy, there was much that might seem 
 dangerous in the mysterious influence of the new re- 
 ligion. Its talk of equality and brotherhood might 
 sound like the watchword of a social revolu- The reasons 
 tion, and the more so as its members were why the 
 
 . -i ■, . n r- t •,• -IT rx,, government 
 
 recruited chiefly from the toiling milhons. The might 
 ties of sympathy between its scattered mem- dfstmft^he 
 bers were like the network of a widespread church. 
 conspiracy, whose designs might be political, though 
 masked under religious names. Its meetings, often held 
 at night, were an offence against the legal maxim that no 
 new clubs must be formed or organized without the 
 sanction of the civil power ; the refusal of its members 
 to comply with a few time-honoured forms, or to swear 
 even by the Emperor's Genius, seemed like the disloyal 
 wish to break wholly with the past and to parade a 
 cynical contempt for the established powers. The 
 obstinate unwillingness to bow even to the will of Caesar, 
 and the claim to be guided by a higher law, had an 
 unwelcome sound in the ears of absolute power. Some 
 too there were, no doubt, who pushed their courageous 
 protest to the extreme of discourteous defiance, in their 
 sensitive fear of dallying with the forms of idol worship, 
 like the soldier who refused to appear before his general 
 with the laurel garland on his head, and whose scruples 
 called out a treatise of TertuUian in their defence ; or 
 who else vaunted openly their indifference to death in 
 their impatient longing for the martyr's crown. It was 
 probably of such as these that Marcus Aurelius was 
 thinking when he penned his single reference to the 
 
138 The Age of the Antonines. ch. vi. 
 
 Christians, saying that the soul should be ready at any 
 moment to be parted from the body, not from mere 
 obstinacy as with them, but considerately and with dignity ^ 
 without tragic show. 
 
 During the whole period before us there was little 
 change in the attitude of the central power. The 
 justice of Trajan, the refined curiosity of Hadrian, the 
 humanity and gentle wisdom of the Antonines, seemed 
 alike insensible to the goodness and the grandeur of the 
 Christian morality, and alike indisposed to sanction the 
 new influence which was spreading through the heathen 
 world. Its speedy progress might well seem alarming to 
 the defenders of the established order. It has been 
 thought indeed that Pliny's letter must have been 
 tampered with in early times, since the numbers of the 
 Christians are insisted on so strongly by a writer who 
 confesses that beforehand he knew nothing of their tenets. 
 Yet the churchmen of that age proudly point to the 
 striking signs of onward movement. * There is no spot 
 upon the earth,' says Justin, 'even among barbarous 
 peoples, where the name of the Crucified Redeemer is 
 not heard in prayer.' Irenaeus thinks that the church is 
 spread through the whole universe, and Tertullian in the 
 lively phrases of his rhetoric urges, * We are but of 
 yesterday, and we already fill your empire, your cities, 
 your town councils, your camps, your palace, and your 
 forum ; we leave you only your temples to yourselves. 
 Without recourse to arms, we might do battle with you 
 simply by the protest of our separation ; you would be 
 frightened at your isolation.' And the oldest of the Cata- 
 combs of Rome has seemed to competent observers to 
 point in the forms of its symbolic art to the number of 
 the churchmen who, even in that early age, laid their 
 dead within those obscure labyrinths of stone. 
 
 This rapid spread of the young churches^ exag- 
 
cH. VI. The Empire and Christianity. 139 
 
 gerated as it probably has been, was a real element 
 of danger. Not that the Emperors had any persecuting 
 zeal, or any wish to hunt the poor victims down. But 
 the clamours of the populace grew louder, and the pro- 
 vincial governors were often called on to enforce the 
 law without appeal to any higher courts. Some looked 
 on with indifference from the seat of justice while the 
 crowd of ignoble criminals passed before them, marvel- 
 ling only at the conscientious scruples which declined 
 to sprinkle a few grains of incense on the altars. Others 
 were glad to court the favour of the people over whom 
 they ruled by the sacrifice of a few stiff-necked zealots, 
 fearing also to hear the cry, * If thou lettest this man go, 
 thou art not Caesar's friend.' 
 
 So we have the striking fact, that on the one hand, 
 after Trajan's rescript,the lowering clouds seem The sue- 
 to be ever gathering more blackly, and the p^J^^r^ 
 explosions of popular fury grow more frequent ; Incline to 
 
 , T_ , r / 1- • mercy, but 
 
 on the other, each of the Emperors is repre- the popular 
 sented in church history as doing something to gro^g^more 
 shield the Christians from attack or to temper intense. 
 the austerity of justice. Thus we have the letter sent by 
 Hadrian to the governor of Asia Minor, in which he 
 comments strongly on the disorderly attacks upon the 
 Christians, such as might encourage the malice and 
 extortionate claims of false accusers. Only indictments 
 in strict legal form should be accepted ; none should be 
 arrested on vague rumour, and none convicted, save of 
 acting contrary to law. This would amount to virtual 
 toleration, unless taken in connexion with the rule pre- 
 scribed by Trajan which made it penal to refuse to 
 adore the gods of Rome. But even as thus qualified, it 
 would be a boon to the oppressed, as it might tend to 
 check the greed of the informers, and strengthen the 
 hands of an impartial judge. 
 
140 The Age of the Antoiiines. ch. vi. 
 
 But the letter itself is not beyond suspicion, though 
 The f^^i" more credible than one which purports 
 
 Sldm^ °^ ^° ^^ written by one or other of the Antonines 
 andAnto- to a general assembly of the deputies of 
 qu" stion^ Asia. The message, briefly stated, runs some- 
 able, what as follows : ' I hold that the gods may 
 be safely left to vindicate their honour on the heads of 
 those who spurn them. The Christians prefer to die 
 rather than be faithless to the power they worship, and 
 they triumph in the contest, for they are true to their 
 own principles. Their neighbours in their panic fear of 
 natural portents and disasters neglect to pray and offer 
 to their gods, while they persecute the Christians who 
 alone show real religion. Provincial governors often 
 wrote to my sainted father on this subject, and were told 
 not to meddle with the Christians unless they were guilty 
 of treason to the state. I too would follow the same 
 course of action, and have informers warned that they 
 will be liable to penalties themselves if they bring 
 vexatious charges of the sort.' An imperial mandate 
 couched in such strong terms would certainly have 
 screened the Christians from attack and have marked 
 an epoch in the history of the church, and as such have 
 been constantly appealed to in the law courts as also in the 
 writings of Apologists. But it is probable enough that 
 something was done to check the violence of popular 
 feehng or the malice of informers, and that we have the 
 traces of such action, coloured in after days by grateful 
 feeling, or overstated from the fancy that princes so 
 large-hearted and humane must have been in sympathy 
 with the noblest movements of their times. 
 
 Yet, sad to say, to the reign of the philosophic Emperor 
 belongs many a page of the long chronicle of martyrdom 
 and stories are given us at length of the sufferings of con- 
 fessors whom the good ruler was either powerless or 
 
cii. VI. The Empire and Christianity. 141 
 
 indifferent to save. One of the earliest of such records 
 may be found in a letter of the church of r^^^ ^^^^ 
 Smyrna which describes the last days of the ^^^[^°™ °f 
 venerable Polycarp. The passion of the EusebJHist. 
 populace had broken out against the Christians, ^^'^' ^^- ^ ^' 
 and after witnessing the death of meaner victims, they 
 began to clamour 'Away with the Atheists! ' ' Let Poly- 
 carp be sought.' The aged bishop wished to stay in the 
 city at his post of duty, but his friends urged him to 
 withdraw and shun the storm. He was tracked, however, 
 from one house in the country to another, till at length 
 he would fly no further, but waited in his hiding-place 
 for his pursuers, saying only * God's will be done.' As 
 they returned with him to the city they were met by the 
 chief officer of the police, who took up Polycarp into his 
 carriage, and spoke to him with kindness, asking what 
 harm there could be in caUing Caesar lord, and in offering 
 sacrifice to save his life. Polycarp at first made no 
 reply, but at last said, ' I will not do what you advise me.' 
 Threats and violence were of no avail with him, and he 
 went on his way calmly to the governor's presence, 
 though a deafening din was made by the assembled 
 multitude. The proconsul urged him to swear by the 
 Genius of Caesar, and to say ' Away with the Atheists ! ' 
 like the rest. The old man looked gravely at the crowd 
 with a sigh and with uplifted eyes, then said, pointing to 
 them with his finger, 'Away with the Atheists!' The 
 governor urged him further. ' Swear ; curse Christ and I 
 release thee.' ' Eighty and six years,' he answered, 'have 
 I served him, and he has never done me harm, and how 
 can I blaspheme the king who saved me ? ' When still 
 pressed, he said, ' If you wish to know what I am, I tell 
 you frankly that I am a Christian ; if you would hear an 
 account of Christianity, appoint a day and hear me.* 
 The governor, who was no fanatic, and would have 
 
142 The Age of the Antonines. ch. vi. 
 
 gladly saved him, asked him to persuade the people, but 
 he refused to defend himself before them. The threats 
 of the wild beasts and of the stake were all of no avail, 
 and at last it was proclaimed ^ Polycarp has confessed 
 himself a Christian.' Then all the multitude of Gentiles 
 and of Jews who dwelt at Smyrna yelled out in furious 
 clamour, ' This is the teacher of impiety, the father of 
 the Christians, the enemy of our gods, who teaches so 
 many to turn away from worship and from sacrifice.' 
 And they cried with one accord that Polycarp must be 
 burned alive. We need not dwell longer on the story of 
 his martyrdom, the outline of which seems genuine 
 enough, though there are features of it which were added 
 probably by the fancy of a later age. 
 
 A few years afterwards another storm of persecution 
 raged in Gaul, at Vienna and Lugdunum (Lyons;, the 
 iTie perse- record of which is given us at full in a letter 
 cution at from the suffering churches to their brethren of 
 
 Vienna and , . «_. _,, . <- 1 1 • /• 
 
 Lugdunum. Asia Mmor. The various parts of the chief 
 Euseb. V. I. actors in the scene are stated in it with unusual 
 clearness, and some extracts may serve to illustrate the 
 temper of the social forces of the time. The Christians of 
 the neighbourhood had been long exposed to insult and 
 outrage in all public places ; but at length the excitement 
 grew to such a height that a furious mob began to pillage 
 their houses and to drag the inmates off to trial. As 
 they openly avowed their faith before the magistrates 
 and people, they were shut up in prison for a time until 
 the arrival of the Roman governor. As soon as they 
 were brought before him he showed a spirit of ferocious 
 enmity, resorted even to the torture to wring confession 
 from the accused, and admitted, contrary to legal usage, 
 the evidence of heathen slaves against their masters, till 
 fear and malice caused them to be accused of 'Thyestean 
 banquets and CEdipodean incest. No age nor sex was 
 
CH. VI. The Empire and Christianity. 143 
 
 spared meantime. Pothinus, the aged bishop of 
 Lugdunum, was roughly dragged before his judge, and 
 asked who was the Christians' God. He answered only, 
 ' If thou art worthy, thou shalt know.' For this he was 
 set upon and buffeted, and cast into a dungeon, where 
 after two days his feeble body breathed its last. Blandina, 
 a weak woman, was racked from mom till night, till the 
 baffled gaolers grew weary of their horrid work, and were 
 astonished that she was living still. But she recovered 
 strength in the midst of her confession, and her cry, ' I am 
 a Christian, and there is no evil done among us,' brought 
 her refreshment in all the sufferings inflicted on her. 
 As some of the accused were Roman citizens, proceedings 
 were delayed till appeal could be directly made to 
 Caesar, and his will about the prisoners could be known. 
 At length the imperial answer came, that those who 
 recanted should be set free, but that all who persisted 
 in their creed must die. Meantime many who had 
 denied already, but were still kept in bonds, were en- 
 couraged by the ardour of the true champions of the 
 faith, and came forward to the governor's judgment seat 
 to make a good confession, and to be sent by him, such 
 as were citizens of Rome, to be beheaded, and all the 
 rest to the wild beasts. Some, indeed, who had ' no 
 marriage garment ' gave way to their fears ; but the rest, 
 * like noble athletes, endured divers contests, and gained 
 great victories, and received the crown of incorruption.' 
 Last of all Blandina was again brought in along with 
 Ponticus, a boy of about fifteen years of age. ' These 
 two had been taken daily to the amphitheatre to see the 
 tortures which the rest endured, and force was used to 
 make them swear by the idols of the heathen ; but as 
 they still were firm and constant, th£ multitude was 
 furious against them, and neither pitied the bo/s tender 
 years, nor respected the woman's sex. They inflicted on 
 
144 ^^^^ ^^^' of the Antonines, ch. vi 
 
 ihem every torture, but failed to make them invoke their 
 gods; for Ponticus, encouraged by his sister, after endunng 
 nobly every kind of agony, gave up the ghost, while the 
 blest Blandina, last of all, after having like a noble 
 mother inspirited her children, trod the same path of 
 conflict which her children trod before her, hastening on 
 to them with joy at her departure, not as one thrown 
 to the wild beasts, but as one invited to a marriage supper ; 
 . . . the heathens themselves acknowledging that never 
 among them did woman endure so many and so fearful 
 tortures.' 
 
 We cannot read without emotion the story of these 
 heroic martyrs ; but it has, besides, this special interest 
 for us, that it shows the persecution taking its rise, as 
 usual, in the blind fury of the people, and encouraged 
 also by local magistrates, provincial governors, and 
 either by Marcus Aurelius himself, or by his representa- 
 tives at Rome, if the prince was too busy with the 
 Marcomannic war. Yet for none of these can the ex- 
 cuse of ignorance be fairly pleaded. For Christianity 
 had been long before the world ; there was no mystery 
 or concealment of its creed ; its most distinctive features 
 were confessed in the pages even of its hostile critics, 
 and for some years past Apologists had been busy in 
 doing battle with the prejudices of the people, and ap- 
 peaUng to the enlightened judgment of the Caesars. 
 
 Thus even the mocking Lucian, in a single page of 
 his satiric medley, reflects the noble unworldliness of the 
 Lucian's young church, its enthusiastic hopes of a hfe 
 PereErbms beyond the grave, its generous spirit of sym- 
 Proteus pathy and brotherhood, with the longing to 
 
 some noble havc all things in common, which made it 
 tbc^»ari°^ easily the dupe of sanctimonious impostors, 
 church. He describes the life of such a clever rogue, 
 
 under the name of Peregiinus Proteus, who after many 
 
«.H. VI. The Empire and Christianity. 145 
 
 a fraudulent device professed himself a convert, and soon 
 rose to high repute among the Christians by his plausible 
 eloquence and seeming zeal. From his energy he was 
 singled out for persecution, thus winning admiration from 
 the brethren as a confessor and a saint. While he was 
 in prison they spared no trouble or expense to gain his 
 freedom, and, failing in this, they were careful to provide 
 for all his wants. From the dawn of day, old women, 
 widows, and orphans might be seen standing at the 
 prison doors ; the chief members of the sect, having 
 bribed the keepers, slept near him in the dungeon. They 
 brought him all kinds of good cheer, and read the books 
 of Scripture in his presence. Even from cities in Asia 
 Minor came deputies from Christian societies to offer 
 comfort and to plead his cause. . . . ' For nothing,' says 
 Lucian, ' can exceed their eagerness in like cases, or their 
 readiness to give away all they have. Poor wretches ! 
 they fancy that they are immortal, and so they make light 
 of tortures, and give themselves up willingly to death. 
 Their first lawgiver has also caused them to believe that 
 all of them are brothers. Renouncing, therefore, the godj 
 of Greece, and adoring the Crucified Sophist whose laws 
 they follow, they are careless of the goods of life and 
 have them all in common, so entire is their faith in what 
 he told them.' 
 
 About the same time, probably, Celsus the philoso- 
 pher devoted all his acuteness and his wit to an elaborate 
 attack upon the Christian creed, and proved The attack 
 that he had made himself acquainted with the of Celsus, 
 letter of its doctrines, though he had not the earnestness 
 of heart to appreciate its spirit. His work is only known 
 to us in the reply of Origen, but in the course of the ob 
 j actions urged and met, we have brought before us the 
 chief aspects of the new morality. Thus, when he makes 
 the Christians say, * Let no educated or wise man draw 
 
 A. H. L 
 
t4^ The Age of the Antonines. ch. vi, 
 
 near, but whoever is ignorant, whoever is like a child, let 
 him come and be comforted,' he only states in taunting 
 form the well-known paradox of the Gospel teaching ; but 
 in his protest at such ignorant faith he does not stay to 
 ask how a religion which disowned, as he thought, appeal 
 to reason, could give birth to the many heresies and vary- 
 ing sects on which he lays elsewhere such stress as a weak 
 point in the Christian system. Again, though only as a 
 hostile critic, he bears witness to its promises of peace and 
 grace to the sinful and despairing conscience. * They,' he 
 says, ' who bid us be initiated into the mysteries of other 
 creeds begin by proclaiming, ' Let him draw near who is 
 unstained and pure, who is conscious of no guilt, who has 
 lived a good and upright Hfe.' But let us hear the invita- 
 tion of these Christians. ' Whoever is a sinner,' they cry, 
 ' whoever is foolish or unlettered, in a word, whoever is 
 wretched, him will the kingdom of God receive.' With 
 this we may connect his comment on the subject of con- 
 version : ' It is clear that no one can quite change a 
 person to whom sin has become a second nature, even 
 by punishment, and far less then by mercy ; for to bring 
 about an entire change of nature is the hardest of all 
 things.' Celsus knew the chief points of the story of the 
 life and character of Christ, but was unaffected by its 
 moral grandeur. He had heard of humility as a marked 
 feature of the Christian spirit, but it seemed to him a 
 morbid growth, a perversion of the philosopher's ideal. 
 He was familiar with the teaching of God's Providence, 
 and of H is fatherly care for every soul of man ; but he 
 thought it all a vain presumption, and the talk about the 
 dignity of human nature and possibility of its redemption 
 sounded but as idle and unmeaning words to one who 
 was content with the idea of a Great Universe, evolving 
 through unchanging laws an endless round of inevitable 
 results. 
 
cH. VI. The Empire and Christianity. 1 47 
 
 In the next century Christianity found champions 
 who were ready to meet such attack on its own ground, 
 and to furbish for their use the weapons drawn answered 
 from the armoury of philosophic schools, jp'^^f. 
 But the Apologists of that age had other work Apologises 
 to do. Accused as they had been as atheists, ^; J^^ J|f|, 
 misanthropes, magicians, and sensualists of more with 
 
 Z • 1 r ^-L practice 
 
 the worst type, the pressmg need for them than doc- 
 was to rebut such wanton slander, and to ^"®- 
 appeal to the imperial justice from the calumnies of ig- 
 norant malice. They were not like divines engaged on 
 treatises of theologic lore ; but, writing face to face with 
 the thought of speedy death, they turned to meet the 
 danger of the moment, and dwelt on practice as well as 
 on behef. In answer to the coarse falsehoods which were 
 spread about their secret meetings, they described at 
 length their doings in their Sunday gatherings— how they 
 met to read the memoirs of the Apostles and the writings 
 of the Prophets. 'Then, when the reader ceases, the 
 president exhorts to copy these good things, jusiin, 
 Then we rise up all together and offer prayers, ^p°'- '• ^^^ 
 and when we cease from prayer, bread is brought, and 
 wine, and water, and the president offers prayers in like 
 manner, and thanksgivings, and the people add aloud 
 " Amen," and the sharing of those things for which thanks 
 have been given takes place to everyone, and they are 
 sent to those who are not present. Those who have 
 means and goodwill give what they Hke, and the sum 
 collected is laid up with the president, who in person 
 helps orphans and widows, and all who are in need, and 
 those who are in bonds, and those who have come from 
 a strange land, and, in one word, he is guardian to all 
 who are in need.' 
 
 They were spoken of as evil-doers, and possibly so- 
 called Christians might have been such- -Gnostics, or 
 
 L 2 
 
148 The Age of the Antonines. ch. vi. 
 
 heretics of questionable creeds — but if so, urged the 
 writers, they could be no true followers of Him whose 
 Their line of recorded words they quote, and whose influ- 
 argument. g^ce in the past they point to as leading the 
 hearts of men from hatred to love, from vice to virtue. 
 Unsocial and morose they were not, though they must 
 needs shun the forms of idol-worship and the gross offer- 
 ings so unworthy of God's spiritual being. Magicians cer- 
 tainly they were not, and it was an idle taunt to say that 
 the miracles of their Master were the mere works of magic 
 art, for prophecy had long ago foretold them by the 
 mouth of the holy men of God on whom a large measure 
 of the Divine Spirit must have rested. That Spirit or 
 Eternal Logos was incarnate in its fulness only in Christ 
 Jesus, though shared in some degree by the good men of 
 heathen days, like Socrates or Plato. But the Greek 
 sages were not able to persuade anyone to die for his 
 belief, whereas their Master was obeyed by poor ignorant 
 artisans and slaves, who proved the purity of theit 
 religious life by the manly courage of their death as ^ 
 martyrs. Great, however, as was their devotion to their 
 heavenly Master, they had no lack of loyalty to Caesar, 
 for the kingdom to which Christ pointed was no earthly 
 kingdom of material power ; but their hopes and fears of 
 a life beyond the grave were the surest sanctions of 
 morality, and such wholesome restraints on evil-doers 
 all wise governors must welcome. These were the main 
 topics of the earliest Apologies, interspersed at times, 
 now with attacks upon the heathen legends which sanc- 
 tioned the very vices with which Christianity v/as falsely 
 charged, and now with warnings against the malignant 
 action of the demons who had by the allurements of 
 idolatry seduced men from the worship of the living 
 God, and who still made their potent influence felt in 
 the outrages of persecution or the snares of heretical 
 deceivers. 
 
CH. VI. The Empire and Christianity. 149 
 
 We know little but the names of any of the writers of 
 this class before the time of Justin Martyr, and his story 
 is mainly given us in his works, if we except -j-j^^ jjj-^ ^f 
 the record of his martyrdom. Though born Justin 
 in a city of Samaria, he came seemingly ^ ^^^'^' 
 of Gentile parents, and his attention was only drawn to 
 Christianity when he saw how the believers justin, Ap. 
 could face the pains of death. ' For I mjself,' "• ^^• 
 he writes, ' while an admirer of Platonic thought, heard 
 the Christians spoken evil of ; but when I saw them fear- 
 less in regard to death, and to all else that men think 
 terrible, I began to see that they could not possibly be 
 wicked sensualists. For what man who is licentious or 
 incontinent would welcome death with the certainty of 
 losing all that he enjoys ? Would he not rather try to Hve 
 on as before, and to shun the notice of the rulers, instead 
 of giving information against himself which must lead to 
 his death.'" He had passed from one system to another 
 of the ancient schools of thought, seeking from each sage 
 in turn to learn the lessons of a noble life ; but only when 
 he heard of Christian truth was the fire lighted in his 
 soul, and he knew that the object of his search was in his 
 grasp, for the true philosophy was found at last. He 
 tried to pass it on to other men, wearing as before the 
 wandering scholar's mantle, and talked with men of 
 every race about the questions of the faith. 
 
 His Apologies were addressed by him to the Antonines 
 by name, with what effect we may best judge from the 
 fact that he closed his missionary life by a martyr's death 
 while Marcus Aurelius was on the throne ; and we have 
 reason to believe that his sentence was pronounced by 
 Rusticus the Prasfect, who owed his place of office to the 
 monarch's gratitude for earlier lessons of morality. 
 
[ 50 The Age of the Antonines, 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE CHARACTERISTICS OF THE STATE-RELIGION, 
 AND OF THE RITES IMPORTED FROM THE EAST. 
 
 After studying the progress and the dangers of the 
 Christian church we may naturally ask what was the 
 character of the national religion which it tended to dis- 
 place. An old inscription tells us that a vote of thanks 
 was passed by the Roman Senate in honour of Antoninus 
 Pius for his scrupulous care for all the ceremonial obser- 
 Tjjg vances of public life. There was indeed no 
 
 Emperors special reason why the Emperors of this age 
 respected should be attached to the old forms of Roman 
 forn^' of worship. The families from which they sprung 
 
 national had been long resident in foreign lands ; by 
 
 ' taste or from necessity they passed much of 
 their time far from the imperial city ; their culture and 
 the language even of their deepest thought was often 
 Greek, and they had few ties of sentiment to bind them 
 to the rites of purely Italic growth. But it had been part 
 of the pohcy of Augustus to begin a sort of conservative 
 reform in faith and morals, and to lead men to reverence 
 more earnestly the religion of their fathers. His suc- 
 cessors, wanton and dissolute as they often were, pro- 
 fessed at least the same desire, and expressed it often in 
 enduring shapes and costly ceremonials. The Emperora 
 of the second century observed with more consistent 
 care the same tradition, carried it even somewhat to 
 extremes, as when they stamped upon their medals the 
 legendary fancies of an early age, and linked the old 
 poetic fictions to the associations of imperial rule ; just 
 as the literary fashion of their times tried to express its 
 complexities of thought and feeling in the archaic 
 rudeness of an ancient style. 
 

 Forms of Worship Sanctioned by the State. 1 5 \ 
 
 The old religion of Italic growth was a very artless 
 Nature worship, whose deities, with uncouth names, were 
 cold abstractions of the reason, personified as yet by no 
 poetic fency. They were the sexless and mysterious 
 agencies which presided over the processes of husbandry, 
 the powers of stream and forest, and the sanctities of the 
 domestic hearth. After a time, indeed, the exotic growth 
 of Hellenism overlaid the simple forms, which tended 
 perhaps to disappear from the language and thought of 
 educated men, but lingered on in country life, surviving 
 even at the last the ruin of their more attractive rival. 
 Among the earliest and most distinctive of the 
 
 /• , ,. . , , among the 
 
 usages of natural religion were the observances most dis- 
 of the collegia or confraternities which served which were 
 as organized forms of an established worship, t^he customs 
 These priesthoods were still recruited seem- collegia or 
 ingly with the same care as heretofore. The p"«=^''^°°^S' 
 oldest families of Rome were represented in the Salii, 
 among whom a future Emperor,as wehaveseen, wasentered 
 at an early age, and took pride in mastering the niceties 
 of traditional practice ; at the Lupercalia the half-naked 
 priests still ran along the streets of Rome, using the 
 time-honoured words and symbols ; and the Arval 
 Brothers went through their ceremonial round with 
 formularies which had been unchanged for ages. 
 
 The last of these dated certainly from immemorial 
 antiquity, for the foundation legend of the city enrolled 
 the twins of Rhea in the then existing bro- such as 
 therhood. During the whole period of the 5wi^^^* 
 Republic its prayers and offerings continued Brothers, 
 to express the hopes and fears of rural Hfe, though history 
 has passed it by with little notice. Even in imperial days, 
 when liberal schemes of re-endowment, due probably to 
 the policy of Augustus, had raised it in the social scale, 
 \ve should know scarcely anything of the customs of its 
 
152 The Age of the Auto nines. ch. vii. 
 
 members if we were left only to the common literary 
 sources. But a lucky accident has saved for us unusual 
 stores of evidence. Year by year it was the practice to have 
 the official carcful minutes taken of their meetings and of 
 wSstilf ^^ official acts, and to commit them, not to 
 remain, frail materials or the custody of their own 
 
 president, but to monumental characters engraved upon 
 the walls of the temple where they met. Their holy place 
 was not in Rome itself, but in a quiet grove five miles 
 away, which in the course of ages has become a vineyard, 
 while a humble cottage has replaced the shrine. Some 
 of the stone slabs which lined the walls have been 
 worked into the masonry of other buildings, till the 
 letters graven on them have caught here or there some 
 curious eyes. One such, of special value, containing the 
 oldest form of an Italian liturgy, was found a century ago 
 in a chapel of St. Peter's. Only a few years ago the 
 Institute of Archaeology at Rome resolved to explore 
 the field in which the temple stood in search of further 
 evidence. The scattered fragments of the stones were 
 pieced together, and a long series of priestly archives, 
 reaching from the days of Augustus to those of Gordian, 
 reappeared at length as from the tomb. 
 
 The accoimts of the stated meetings and of many 
 occasional gatherings are given with surprising fulness 
 describing of detail, and by their help we gain an insight 
 in ful"'"'^^ quite unique into much of the symbolic ritual 
 detail, and characteristic worship of the Romans. 
 
 Brothers in name, and twelve in number, to correspond to 
 the twelve lunar months in which the round of agricultural 
 labour is completed, they were at first the spokesmen of 
 the Latin husbandmen who offered prayer and thanks- 
 giving for the prospects of a fruitful season ; but in latei- 
 days the noblest families of Rome were proud to figure 
 on the list of a religious guild which reckoned at times 
 an Emperor for its high-priest. 
 
Forms of Worship Sanctioned by the State. 1 5 3 
 
 Its greatest festival came at the end of May, when 
 the firstfruits of the earth were gathered, and a blessing 
 asked upon the works of coming harvest, especially 
 Three days the holy season lasted. The first ^^^^^'^ 
 and third were kept at Rome, but the second festival, 
 must be spent among the scenes of rural life acu rl-at. 
 and the brooding sanctities of Nature. At Arval. 
 early dawn the president passed out of the city walls to 
 the Tetrastylum or Guildhall, enclosed in its four lines 
 of colonnade. Robing himself here in his dress of state 
 with purple stripe, he went at once to the entrance of 
 the sacred grove, where he offered swine on one altar 
 and a white heifer on a second, to appease the sylvan 
 deities whose mysterious peace was to be that day dis- 
 turbed. While the victims were roasting on the flames, 
 the other priests were all assembhng, and each in turn 
 must enter his name on the official register ; which done, 
 they laid their robes aside and breakfasted upon the 
 viands which were now ready on the altars. The hours 
 that followed were given to repose in the cool shade, 
 but at mid-day another service must begin. Robed in the 
 dress of state, with ears of corn wreathed round their 
 heads, they paced in ceremonial procession through the 
 grove up to the central shrine where the lamb was 
 offered on the altar. The wine and meal were sprinkled 
 on the ground, the clouds of incense filled the air, and 
 the jars of antique form which held the bruised meal of 
 earlier days were exposed to reverent adoration in the 
 shrine. Once more they issued from the doors, with 
 censers in their hands, and offerings to the treasury, and 
 libations poured from silver cups. Two priests were then 
 despatched to gather the firstfruits from the fields hard by. 
 The ears of corn were passed from left to right through 
 the whole company, and back again. Then with closed 
 (ioors they touched the jars of meal, and murmured over 
 
f 54 ^^^^ ^S^ of the Antonines. ch. vii. 
 
 each the solemn words of dedication, and brought them 
 out to be flung at last down the hill-side before the 
 temple. The priests rested for a while upon their marble 
 seats, and took from their servants' hands the rolls of bread 
 bedecked with laurel leaves, and poured their unguents 
 on the images around them. The laity must then with- 
 draw ; the doors were barred, while the priests girded 
 their flowing dress about their loins, and took each his 
 copy of the service books in which were written the old 
 liturgies whose meaning no one present knew. The 
 venerable chant was sung with the cadenced movements 
 of the old Latin dance, and then the servants reappeared 
 with garlands which were placed upon the statues of the 
 gods. The solemn forms were at an end. The election 
 of the president for another year was followed by the 
 customary greetings (felicia), and the priests left the grove 
 to rest in their own hall, and to dine in pomp after the 
 labours of the day. The dinner over, they crowned 
 themselves with roses and betook themselves with 
 slippered feet to the amusements of the circus which 
 were held close by, and closed the festival with a supper 
 party in the high-priest's house at Rome. 
 
 In the proceedings of the Arval Brotherhood we may 
 note three features which seem to characterise 
 note in their the national religion of the Romans. 
 Jl^th^^^ (i) Its punctilious regard for ancient forms 
 
 punctilious may be read in every line of those old archives, 
 anaent The deity worshipped in that shrine was a 
 
 forms ; nameless Dea Dia still, as in the days before 
 
 Greek fancy made its way to Latium ; the primitive 
 religious dance (tripodiatus) was scrupulously observed ; 
 the rude instruments of barbarous ages were still used, 
 though else unknown ; the words of the chant they had 
 to sing were so archaic that they could not trust their 
 memories without the book. The fear to employ any 
 
Forms of Worship Sanctioned by the State. 1 5 5 
 
 instruments of iron in the grove ; the changes of dress 
 and posture and demeanour; the careful entry in the 
 registers of each stage in the long ceremonial service ; 
 these are examples of a Pharisaic care for outward 
 usages which may be often found elsewhere in the 
 history of symbolism, but which in this case seem to 
 have passed at last into a stately picture language which 
 spoke nothing to the reason and little to the heart. 
 
 (2) It had therefore little influence on man's moral 
 nature, and scarcely touched the temper of his character 
 or the practice of his workday life. For the most 
 part the deities whom they adored had each his toll of 
 offering and due respect, but did not claim to ^^j^ ^^ 
 guide the will or check the passions. Cere- absence of 
 
 . ,,. .1 J- !• nu)ral or 
 
 monial obedience might serve to disarm their spiritual 
 jealousy or win their favour, and men need not "^"^nce ; 
 look to any spiritual influence beyond. The priests had 
 never been the social moralists of Rome ; preaching and 
 catechizing were unheard of; and the highest function- 
 aries of religion might be and sometimes were men of 
 scandalous life and notorious unbelief. The history of 
 the Arval Brotherhood may help to illustrate the general 
 truth. In the lists recorded in its archives may be found 
 the names of many of the most profligate worldlings of 
 imperial times, but very few of good repute. Court favour 
 gave a title to the priesthood. Its practical concern was 
 the enjoyment of good cheer, and the inscriptions carefully 
 record the sum which was allotted for each banquet by the 
 jtate, and the drinking cup which was put for every guest. 
 One list of the year 37 tells us that the Emperor 
 Caligula presided on the day of the great festival, anc 
 though he was too late to be present at the sacrifice 
 still he was there at least in time for dinner. Of the 
 seven names which follow his, two were borne by noble- 
 men of exceptionally immoral habits, a third is called 
 
156 The Age of the Antomnes ch. vii. 
 
 by Tacitus of a self-indulgent nature, and not one dis- 
 played any great qualities in public life. Five out of the 
 seven died a felon's death, or to escape it laid violent 
 hands upon themselves. 
 
 (3) The Romans had their national worship, their 
 church as established by the state. The priesthoods 
 had been commonly faithful servants of the governing 
 powers, and had never raised the cry of rights of con- 
 science or of spiritual freedom. The Arval Brotherhood 
 3rd, their ^^^ certainly the temper of unquestioning 
 loyalty to loyalty. We need not, indeed, lay special 
 
 established ^ ^, . c ^ ^ 
 
 powers of stress upon the recurrmg usage of state 
 state. prayers in which they joined at every open- 
 
 ing year together with the whole official world ; but it is 
 curious to turn over the archives of the eventful year 69, 
 in which four Emperors followed each other on the 
 throne, and in which the Brothers took the oath of fealty 
 to each with equal readiness, meeting one day under the 
 presidency of their prince, and five days afterwards hail- 
 ing the murderer as his successor. Sometimes they met 
 to commemorate events of national importance, as in the 
 days of festival for Trajan's Dacian victories. But be- 
 sides this we have in the first century a whole series of 
 days of thanksgiving and intercession connected chiefly 
 with the fortunes of the imperial family, whose chiefs had 
 been first patrons and then deities of the old guild. The 
 Flavian dynasty and the Antonines were too sensible and 
 modest to care much for such official flattery, and possibly 
 they may have grudged the sums allotted to such a costly 
 round of entertainments ; so the meetings of the priests 
 grew fewer, and the entries in the registers were rarer, 
 save for the May festivals of early usage. 
 
 The creed and ritual of ancient Rome were too cold 
 and meagre and devoid of all emotional power to content 
 the people's hearts. The luxuriant creations of Hellenic 
 
Forms of Worship Sanctioned by the State. 157 
 
 fancy, the stirring excitements of the Eastern worships, 
 gradually came in to fill the void, till at last 
 all the religions of the world found a home ligionw^' 
 in the imperial city. ^°° cold and 
 
 ^ •' meagre tor 
 
 The Greek colonists who early pushed their men's 
 way along the coasts of southern Italy handed ^^" ^' 
 on the legends and the rites of Greece, which even in 
 the regal period gained, through the Sibylline books, a 
 footing in the state which literary influences constantly 
 increased. As Rome's conquering arms were stretched 
 forth to embrace the world, as strangers flocked to see 
 the mistress of the nations, and slaves of every race 
 were gathered within her walls, the names and attributes of 
 foreign deities began to naturalize themselves almost of 
 right, and to spread insensibly from aliens to Romans. 
 
 Polytheism has commonly a tolerant and elastic 
 system. It seldom tries to impose its creed by force on 
 other races, or to resist the worship of new 
 gods as a dishonour to the old. Accustomed supple- 
 already to the thought of a multitude of un- ^^^"g"^ ^^ 
 earthly powers, it has no scruple in adding creeds and 
 to their number, and prefers to borrow the 
 guardians of other races rather than force them to accept 
 its own. So as land after land was added to the Empire, 
 protection and honour were accorded to the forms of 
 local worship, and all the subject nations were allowed to 
 adore the objects of their choice. If any of them left 
 their homes, they clung, of course, to the old rites, and 
 might enjoy them undisturbed at Rome. It was, how- 
 ever, quite another thing to let them pass beyond the 
 bounds both of country and of race, and to give them the 
 sanction of the state as a form of the established faith of 
 Rome. Still more so when the latest comers, who claimed 
 to set up their altars and their temples in the street?, 
 shocked the old-fashioned scruples of the ruling states- 
 
1 5 8 The Age of. the A ntomnes. ch. vn. 
 
 men by their extravagance or sensual licence, or when 
 it seemed that secret societies were spreading through 
 which were ^^ people under the cover of religious names, 
 only feebly Then the government stepped in with force 
 tS'i^cMl ^ or menace, stamped out the Bacchanalia, for 
 power, example, with terrible decision, and had 
 
 the shrine of I sis levelled to the ground, though the 
 consul's hand had to strike the first blow with the axe 
 when meaner arms were paralysed with fear. Even after 
 the days of the Republic, Augustus, who had shown 
 honour to Serapis in his Egyptian home, forbade his 
 worship on the soil of Italy. ' Yet these were only pass- 
 ing measures, ineffectual to stay the stream of innovation. 
 •On one pretext or another, the sanction of the state was 
 given to the alien rites; a war or a pestilence was at 
 times enough to excuse an appeal to some new tutelary 
 power, and even to cause invitations to be sent to distant 
 gods. As the sense of the imperial unity grew stronger, 
 the distinction between the religious life of the centre and 
 the provinces seemed more arbitrary and unmeaning ; and 
 though many a moralist of antique spirit gravely disap- 
 proved of the tone and temper of the eastern creeds, yet 
 the rulers gradually ceased to put any check upon their 
 spread, so long as each was satisfied to take his place 
 beside the rest without intolerant aggression or defiance 
 of the civil power. 
 
 There was, besides, another tendency which made it 
 easier to enlarge the national Pantheon. Many a scruple 
 was disarmed when men were told that the new-comers 
 were only the old famihar powers disguised in a new 
 shape. Comparison had shown the likeness sometimes 
 of usages and prayers in different lands, sometimes of 
 the attributes assigned, or of the poetic fancies which 
 had grown up in time round venerable names. Sincere 
 tbelievers felt a comfort in the thought that all the multi- 
 
Forms of Worship Sanctioned by the State. 1 59 
 
 tude of rival deities which seemed to have a claim on 
 their respect consisted really of the many masks assumed 
 by the same personal agencies, or were even ^^ ^^^ 
 separate qualities of the One Heavenly Father, welcomed 
 Plutarch, priest of the Pythian Apollo and a uuniTuch 
 devout adherent of the old religion of his as Plutarch 
 fathers, yet wrote a treatise on the gods of Egypt in 
 which he tried to prove that they were in truth only the 
 godsof Greece, worshipped with mysterious rites and some- 
 what weird suggestions of the fancy, which, however,found 
 a counterpart at home in the native outgrowths of the 
 Hellenic mind. The truth which the figurative language 
 of their ritual shadowed forth was one expressed in many 
 another symbol; the powers of heaven were well content 
 that men should read it, and would yield their secrets 
 with a good grace to the earnest seeker. He felt, there- 
 fore, the more attracted to the mystic obscurity of that 
 old culture of the Pharaohs, of which the Sphinxes were 
 the aptest tokens, certain as he was that all its riddles 
 might be read, and would yield an harmonious and eternal 
 truth. 
 
 Plutarch never doubted of the personal existence of 
 tlie beings whom he adored, and never resolved them 
 into mere abstractions. Others there were with piety no 
 less real than his, who regarded all the forms of popular 
 religion as useful in their various degrees, but and Maxi- 
 as all alike inadequate to express the truths ^S^m'"^' 
 which were ineffable. *Doubtless,'says one of 10. 
 them, '■ God the Father and Creator of the Universe is 
 more ancient than the sun or heavens, is greater than 
 time, superior to all that abides and all that changes. 
 Nameless He is, and far away out of our ken ; but as we 
 cannot grasp in thought His being, we borrow the help 
 of words, and names, and animals, and figures of gold 
 and ivnry ; of plants and streams, and mountain heights 
 
i6o The Age of the Aiitonines. ch. vit. 
 
 and torrents. Yearning after Him, yet helpless to attain to 
 Him, we attribute to Him all that is most excellent among 
 us. So do the lovers who are fain to contemplate the 
 image of the persons whom they love; who fondly gaze 
 at the lyre or dart which they have handled, or the chair 
 on which they sat, or anything which helps to bring the 
 dear one to their thoughts. Let us only have the thought 
 of God. If the art of Phidias awakens this thought among 
 the Greeks ; if the worship of animals does the like for 
 the Egyptians ; if here a river and there the fire does the 
 same, it matters little. I do not blame variety. Only 
 let us know God and love Him; only let us keep His 
 memory abiding in our hearts.* 
 
 In place of the matter-of-fact and ceremonious religion 
 of the Latin farmers, we may trace in course of time new 
 thoughts and feelings roused to play their part in a rich 
 variety of spiritual moods. We may trace the mystic 
 reveries and ecstatic visions such as those which convent 
 life h.is often nursed in pious souls of later times, where 
 the fancy, living overmuch in the world of the unseen, 
 loses its sense of the reality and due proportions of the 
 things of earth. We hear of sensitive and enthusiastic 
 natures who see so clearly the special providence which 
 broods over their lives, and feel so keenly love and 
 gratitude for all the mercies given to them, that they 
 speak of themselves as the elect predestined to the favour 
 of heaven. They feel the workings of God's spirit in their 
 hearts; they see in every turn of life the traces of His 
 guiding hand, and airy visitants from other worlds look 
 in upon them in their dreams. 
 
 Such a one was the rhetorician Aristides, who, after 
 suffering for long years from a malady which none could 
 cure, devoted himself to the service of the god Asclepius 
 (whom the Latins called ^sculapius), living mainly in 
 his temple with his priests, seeing him in visions of the 
 
Forms of Worship Sanctioned by the State. i6i 
 
 night, following implicitly the warnings sent in sleep, 
 and falling into trances of unspeakable enjoyment. Proud 
 of the privileges of his special revelation, he 
 wrote out in impassioned style his sacred tides, who 
 sermons^ published, as he said, at the dicta- "^^^^ °^ 
 tion of his heavenly patron. He told the story reveries and 
 of his ecstatic moods, of the promised recovery ^^'°° 
 of strength which followed in due course, of the deliver- 
 ance from instant danger vouchsafed to him at the great 
 earthquake of Smyrna, of the comfort of the abiding 
 presence of a saving Spirit, and his thankfulness for the 
 old trial of sickness which brought him to the notice of a 
 protector so oenign. 
 
 Mystic aspirations point to the hope of a closer union 
 with the Divine than the trammels of our conmion life 
 allow. To rise above these limitations, to lose ^, 
 
 , . 1 , . , , . New moods 
 
 the sense ot personal bemg, and almost m- of ecstatic 
 deed of consciousness, in the pulsations of a *®**"^s. 
 higher life — to this the enthusiasm of devotion points in 
 many a different name and race. Most commonly, with 
 this end in view, the soul would keep the body under 
 and starve it with ascetic rigour, while the spirit beats 
 against its prison bars, panting for a freer and a purer 
 air. Examples of such austerity of self-denial may be 
 also found in heathen times; weary journeyings to 
 holy places visited by countless pilgrims, .- , . . 
 who must be meanly fed and hardly lodged 
 if they would hope to gain the gladness of the beatific 
 vision. Recluses too there were in Egypt, giving their 
 lives without reserve to holy meditation, and hoping to 
 draw nearer to their God by wellnigh ceasing to be men. 
 More frequently they had recourse to the in- excite- 
 fluence of highwrought feeling, to the electric ™®°^' 
 sympathies by which strong waves of passion sweep 
 across excited crowds> and carry them beside themselves 
 
 A. H M 
 
i62 TJie Age of the Antonmes. en. vii. 
 
 in transports of enthusiasm. By the wild dance and 
 maddening din, by fleshly horrors self-imposed, or the 
 orgies of licentious pleasure, by vivid imagery to make 
 the illusion of the fancy more complete, they worked 
 upon the giddy brain and quivering nerves, till the excited 
 votaries of I sis or Adonis passed beyond the narrow 
 range of everyday life into the frenzy of religious ecstasy 
 and awe. 
 
 In the early Roman creed there was little room for 
 the hopes or fears of a life to come. But there is a 
 yearning in the mind to pierce the veil which hides the 
 future from the sight, and many a prophecy was brought 
 from other lands, couched in hopeful or in warning tones, 
 here darkly hinted in enigmas, here loudly proclaimed 
 in confidence outspoken, there acted in dramatic forms 
 before the kindling fancy as in the ancient mysteries of 
 Greece, or in more questionable shapes in the ritual of 
 Eastern creeds. 
 
 Another influence was brought to bear on Western 
 thought in the deeper sense of sinfulness, as the pollution 
 and mystic °^ ^^^ guilty soul and an outrage on the 
 gloom, majesty of God. With this came in natural 
 
 course the greater influence of the priests, to whom the 
 stricken conscience turned in its bewilderment or its 
 despair. For they alone could read with confidence the 
 tokens of the will of heaven, they alone knew the forms of 
 intercession or atonement which might bring peace by 
 promises of pardon. No longer silent ministers engaged 
 in the mere round of outward forms as servants of the 
 j^g state ; they wandered to and fro to spread the 
 
 encouraged worship of their patron saints, sometimes with 
 rdigions of the missionary fervour of devoted faith, some- 
 the East. times working on men's hopes and fears to 
 gain a readier sale for their indulgences and priestly 
 charms, sometimes like sordid mountebanks and jugglers 
 
Forms of Worship Sanctioned by t/ie State. 163 
 
 catering for the wonder-loving taste of credulous folks by 
 sleight of hand and magic incantations. 
 
 Among the most striking of such innovations due to 
 the spread of Oriental symbolism was the costly rite of 
 taurobolium, in which recourse was had to the The striking 
 purifying influence of blood. Known to us ^Yth^tauro- 
 chiefly by inscriptions, of which the earliest boHum. 
 dates from the reign of Hadrian, we have reason to 
 believe that the usage came from Asia as a solemn 
 sacrifice in honour of the Phrygian Mother of the Gods. 
 From Southern Italy it passed to Gaul, and in the busy 
 town of Lugdunum (Lyons), the meeting-point of traders 
 of all races, it was celebrated with more than common 
 pomp. It was the more impressive from its rarity, for so 
 great seemingly was the cost of the arrangements, that 
 only the wealthy could defray it. Corporations, there- 
 fore, and town-councils came forward to undertake the 
 burden, when dreams and oracles and priestly prophecies 
 had expressed the sovereign pleasure of the goddess. 
 Ceremonies on such a scale could be held only by the 
 sanction of the ruling powers, and it would seem that 
 an official character was given to the rites by the presence 
 of the magistrates in robes of state. The crowning act 
 of a long round of solemn forms was the slaughter of the 
 bull itself, from which the whole rite had drawn its name. 
 The votary in whose behalf the offering was made de- 
 scended with silken dress and crown of gold into a sort 
 of fresh-dug grave, above which planks were spread to 
 hold the bull and sacrificing priest. As the IdIow fell 
 upon the victim's neck, the streams of blood which came 
 pouring from the wound flowed through the chinks and 
 fittings of the wood, and bathed the worshipper below 
 From the cleansing virtue of the blood, he became 
 henceforth spiritually regenerate (in asternum renatus), 
 and at the time an object almost of adoration to the 
 
 M 2 
 
164 The Age of the Antonines. ch. vit 
 
 gazing crowds. We need not wonder that the writers 
 of the early church indignantly opposed such heathen 
 rites, which seemed to them a hideous caricature of the 
 two great topics of their faith, Christian Baptism and 
 Redemption. 
 
 It would be too much to say perhaps that any of the 
 thoughts and feelings naturalised in later days at Rome 
 were wholly new and unfamiliar. In weaker moods, in 
 rudimentary forms, they may be traced in the religion ot 
 the earliest days, and so too even the outer forms of 
 worship, the mystic rites and orgies had their counter- 
 The new- parts in ancient Rome. Some scope was 
 comers were given from the first to sacerdotal claims, some 
 Hve side by priestly functions had been claimed by women, 
 pterin the which made it easier in later times for priests 
 imperial to gain asccndancy, and women to play so large 
 
 Pantheon. ^ • .v v • r .u i- • -n 
 
 a part m the religion of the Empire. But 
 the Eastern influence gave intensity of life to what before 
 was faint and unobtrusive. It vivified the unseen world 
 which was vanishing away before the practical materialism 
 of the Roman mind. It coloured and animated with 
 emotional fervour the pale and rigid forms of social 
 duties. It was the informing spirit which was new, and 
 this could pass into any of the multitudinous creeds 
 which now lived side by side in peace. They could and 
 did compete for popular favour, without bitterness or 
 rancour in their rivalry ; and the priests of one deity 
 could be votaries of another, believing, as they often did, 
 that the same Power was worshipped under different 
 disguises of nationality and language. Each took its 
 place within the imperial Pantheon, without the hope or 
 wish to displace others. Two systems only proudly stood 
 aloof — the Jewish Synagogue, whose energies were 
 centred in the work of explaining and commenting on 
 its Sacred Books • the Christian church — which was 
 
Forms of Worship Sanctioned by the State. 165 
 
 turning from its fond hopes of the speedy fulfilment of 
 its kingdom of heaven, to engage in a struggle of life and 
 death, in which all the iron discipline and social forces 
 of the Empire stood arrayed against it, while it was armed 
 only with the weapons of mutual kindliness and earnest 
 faith and inextinguishable hope. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 'JHE LITERARY CURRENTS OF THE AGE. 
 
 The period of the Antonines abounded with hbraries 
 and schools and authors, with a reading public, and all 
 the outward tokens of an educated love of The wide- 
 letters. Never has there been more enthu- |Ksiasm 
 siasm for high culture, more careful study of for learning, 
 
 ° . ^. , •^ 1 but want of 
 
 the graces of a literary style, more critical creative 
 acquaintance with good models, more inter- power, 
 change of sympathy between professors of the different 
 schools ; and yet there were but scanty harvests from all 
 this intellectual husbandry. There was no creative 
 thought evolved, no monument of consummate ait was 
 reared, no conquest of original research achieved. 
 
 The scribendi cacoethes, the mania for scribbling, 
 poured forth vast quantities of literary matter ; but most 
 of it fell at once still-born, and much of what remains has 
 Uttle value for us now, save to illustrate the conditions of 
 the times. The men are of more interest to us than 
 their works. There was colour and variety in the 
 features of their social status ; there were curious 
 analogies to the history of later days ; but we are likely to 
 gather from their writings rather a series of literary 
 portraits, than ideas to enrich the thought and fancy, or 
 models of art to guide our taste. 
 
1 66 The Age of the Antonines. ch. viii. 
 
 The culture of the age was mainly Greek. Hel- 
 lenic influence had spread long since far into the 
 The culture East. Among the populous towns of Asia 
 wa?roa15fy ^^i"or it ruled entirely without a rival ; it had 
 Greek, pushcd its Way through Syria, and almost to 
 
 the line of the Euphrates ; while it held many an oul 
 post of civilised life in the colonies planted long ago 
 among the ruder races of the North. Through all ol 
 these the liberal studies were diffused, and in their 
 schools the language of Demosthenes was spoken with 
 little loss of purity and grace. From them, as well as 
 from Athens and her neighbours, came the instructors 
 who taught the Western world ; from them came the 
 newest literary wares, and the ruling fashions of the 
 season ; and even in countries such as Gaul, where 
 Rome had stamped so forcibly the impress of her 
 language and her manners, scholars who hoped for 
 influence beyond a narrow local circle, often wrote and 
 thought in Greek, as the speech of the whole civilized 
 world. The old Roman tongue grew rapidly more feeble 
 and less pure, with few exceptions the learned declined 
 to write in it, and an Emperor, as we have seen, even in 
 the memoirs written for no eye save his own, expressed 
 his deepest thoughts and feehngs not in Latin but in 
 Greek. 
 
 The career of a man of letters was chiefly professorial, 
 and his works were meant more for the ear than for the 
 and pro- ^^^- "^^^ sphere of action commonly was 
 fessorial. found in lectures, conferences, public readings, 
 panegyrics, debates, and intellectual tournaments of 
 every kind. For the scholars of those days were not 
 content to stay at home and be prophets to their 
 countrymen alone, or to trust to written works to spread 
 tiieir fame ; but they travelled far away from land to 
 land, and ever as they went they practised their ready 
 
CH. VIII. The Literary Currents of the Age. \(yj 
 
 wit and fluent tongue. Like their prototypes in earlier 
 days, the rivals of Socrates and the objects of the sconi 
 of Plato, they were known by the old name of Sophist, 
 which implied their claim to be learned if not to be wise, 
 and the term was used without reproach of the most 
 famous of their number, whose lives were written by 
 Philostratus. Citizens of the world, and self-s=\yled 
 professors in the widespread university of culture, 
 they found full liberty of speech and an eager audience 
 in every town. For though the times were changed 
 many of the habits of the old Republics lingeied still ; and 
 though the stormy debates of politics were silenced, and 
 the thunders of the orators of old were heard no more, 
 still the art of public speech was passionately prized, and 
 men were trained even from their childhood to study the 
 grace and power of language, and to crave some novel 
 form of intellectual stimulus. 
 
 So when the travelling Sophist was heard of in 
 their midst, the townsmen flocked with curious ears about 
 the stranger, as the crowd gathered around ^j^gy^^ous 
 Paul upon Mars' Hill, eager to hear and classes of 
 tell of some new thing. Sometimes it was a ^°p ^^'^ 
 scholar of renown who came with a long train of 
 admirers, for young and old went far afield in search oi 
 knowledge, and attached themselves for years to a great 
 teacher, like the students of the middle ages who passed 
 in numbers from one famous university of Europe to 
 another, attracted by the name of some great master. 
 Then the news passed along the streets, and time and 
 place were fixed for a lecture of display ; the magistrates 
 came in state to do the speaker honour, and even an 
 Emperor at times deigned to look in, and set the example 
 of applause with his own hands. Sometimes a young 
 aspirant came in quest of laurels, to challenge to a triaj 
 of skill the veteran whose art was thought by his country.- 
 
r68 The Age of the Antonines. ch. vm. 
 
 men to be beyond compare. Sometimes came one with all 
 the enthusiasm of a new-found truth, to maintain some 
 striking paradox, to advocate a moral system, or some 
 fresh canon of literary taste. Like the great schoolmen 
 of the age of Dante, or the Admirable Pico of a later 
 time, they posted up the theses which they would hold 
 against all comers, and were ready in their infinite pre- 
 sumption to discourse of all the universe of thought and 
 being (de omni scibili et ente), and when weary of the 
 sameness of the scholar's life wandered like knights-errant 
 round the world in search of intellectual adventures. 
 Sometimes it was a poor vagrant with a tattered mantle, 
 who gathered a crowd around him in the streets, and 
 declaimed with rude energy against the luxury and 
 wantonness of the hfe of cities, bidding men look within 
 them for the sources of true happiness and worthy 
 manhood. Like the preaching friars of the Christian 
 church, they appealed to every class without distinction, 
 startling the careless by their examples of unworldliness, 
 and striking often on the chords of higher feeling, as 
 they spoke to the rich and noble in the plain language 
 of uncourtly warning. Yet often the Cynic's mantle was 
 only a disguise for sturdy beggars, disgusting decent folks 
 by their importunate demands, and dragging good names 
 and high professions through the mire of sensuality and 
 lust 
 
 The name of Sophist was applied in common speech 
 to two great classes, which, rivals as they were for popular 
 falling esteem, and scornful as was each of the pre- 
 
 under the tensions of the other, were yet alike in many 
 
 main divi- ' ^ , ' 
 
 sions of, 1° of the features of their social life, and were 
 SndphUoso- scarcely distinguished from each other by the 
 phere, world. 
 
 The first included the professional morahsts and 
 high thinkers, who claimed to have a rule of active life 
 
CH. VIII. The Literary Currents of the Age. 169 
 
 or a theory of eternal truth which might be of infinite 
 value to their fellow men. Philosophy had somewhat 
 changed its aims and methods since the great systems 
 of original inquiry had parted the schools of Greece 
 among them. The old names, indeed, of Platonist and 
 Peripatetic, Epicurean and Stoic, still were heard ; but 
 the boundary lines were growing fainter, and the doctrines 
 of each were losing the sharpness of their former outlines. 
 Philosophy had lost the keenness of her dialectic, the 
 vigour and boldness of her abstract reasoning ; she had 
 dropped her former subtlety, and was spending all her 
 energy of thought and action on the great themes of 
 social duty. She aspired, and not quite in vain, to be 
 the great moral teacher of mankind. She stepped into 
 the place which heathen religion long had left unfilled, 
 and claimed to be the directress of the consciences of 
 men. When the old barriers were levelled to the ground ; 
 when natural law, and local usages, and traditional 
 standards became effaced or passed away before the 
 levelling action of the imperial unity; when servile flattery 
 began to abdicate the claims of manhood, and to acknow- 
 ledge no source of law and right but the caprices of an 
 absolute monarch, philosophy alone began on sure founda- 
 tions to raise the lines of moral order, philosophy alone 
 was heard to plead in the name of dignity and honour. 
 She left the shadow of the schools, the quiet groves of 
 Academe, the Gardens, and the Porch, and came out into 
 the press and throng of busy life under every variety 
 of social guise. She furnished her lecturers of renown, 
 holding chairs with endowments from the state, and 
 speaking with the authority of men of science. She had 
 her spiritual advisers for great houses, living like domestic 
 chaplains in constant attendance on the wealthy and 
 well-born. There were father confessors for the ruler's 
 ear, rivalling in influence the ladies of the imperial 
 
1 70 The Age of the A ntomnes. ch. viii. 
 
 household. There were physicians of the soul, who had 
 their Httle social circles of which they were the oracleS; 
 guiding the actions of their friends, sometimes by con- 
 fidential letters, sometimes by catechetical addresses, 
 while at times their familiar table talk was gathered 
 up for private use in the diaries of admiring pupils. 
 Missionaries travelled in her name from town to town, 
 with hardy courage and unvarnished phrase, like the 
 Mendicant Friars of later days, speaking to the people 
 mainly in the people's tongue, and denouncing the lust 
 of the eye and the pride of life in the spirit of Christian 
 ascetics. 
 
 The greatest among the heathen moralists of the age 
 was Epictetus. The new-bought slave, for that is the 
 such as meaning of the only name by which history 
 
 Epictetus, knows him, early exchanged his Phrygian 
 home for the mansion of a Roman master, who seems to 
 have been a vulgar soul, cringing to the powerful and 
 haughty to the weak, and who treated him probably with 
 little kindness, even if he did not, as one version of the 
 story runs, break his slave's leg in a freak of wanton 
 jest. Yet, strange as it may seem, his master sent the 
 lame and sickly youth to hear the lessons of the most 
 famous of the Stoic teachers, intending him, perhaps, for 
 literary labour because he was too weak for other work. 
 The pupil made good use of the chances offered him ; and 
 when in after years he gained his freedom, he ruled his 
 Hfe in all things by the system of his choice, proving in 
 the midst of his patient, brave, and unobtrusive poverty 
 how fully he had mastered all the doctrines of the Porch. 
 No cell of Christian monk was ruder than his simple 
 bedroom, of which the only furniture was a pallet bed 
 and iron lamp, and when the latter was taken by a thief, 
 it was replaced by one of clay. 
 
 Epictetus wrote no works and made no parade in 
 
CH. VIII. The Literary Currents of the Age. 171 
 
 public as a sage ; but he talked freely to his friends, and 
 admirers gathered round him by degrees to hear his racy 
 earnest sermons on one moral question or another, and 
 some made notes of what he said, and passed them on in 
 their own circles, till his fame at last spread far and wide 
 beyond the range of personal acquaintance. Arrian, his 
 devoted friend, has left us two such summaries ; one a 
 Manual of his Rule of Life, couched in brief and weighty 
 words, as of a general to his soldiers under tire ; the 
 second, a sort of Table Talk, which, flowing on with less 
 dogmatic rigour, found tenderer and more genial tones 
 to speak to the hearts of those who heard him. He 
 eschewed all subtleties of metaphysics, all show of 
 paradox or hterary graces ; his thoughts are entirely 
 transparent and sincere, expressed in the homeliest of 
 prose, though varied now and then by bursts of rude 
 eloquence and vivid figures of the fancy. In them the 
 whole duty of man, according to the Stoic system, is put 
 forth in the strongest and most consistent form ; and as 
 such, they were for centuries the counsellors and guides 
 of thousands of self-centred resolute natures. 
 
 To bear and to forbear in season, to have a noble 
 disregard for all the passing goods of fortune, and all 
 which we cannot of ourselves control ; to gain an absolute 
 mastery over will and temper, thought and feeling, which 
 are wholly in our power— to make Reason sit enthroned 
 within the citadel of Self, and let no fitful gusts of 
 passion, no mere brute instincts guide our action— these 
 in bare outhne are the dogmas of a creed which insists 
 as few have ever done upon the strength and dignity of 
 manhood. True, there are harsh words at times, full of 
 a stern, ascetic rigour, as when he bids men not to grieve 
 for the loss of friend, or wife, or child, and to let no 
 foolish pity for the ills of any whom he loves cloud the 
 serenity of the sage's temper. Rebuking grief, lie needs 
 
1/2 TTce Age of the Antonines. ch. vm. 
 
 must banish love, for grief itself is only love which feels 
 the lack of what is torn away, and without sympathy to 
 stir us from our moods of lonely selfishness we should 
 bC' merely animals of finer breed and subtler brain. 
 
 But Epictetus could not trample out all feeling ; he 
 rises even to a height of lyric fervour when he speaks ol 
 the providence of God, of the moral beauty of His works, 
 and the strange insensibility of ungrateful men. Nor 
 would he have his hearers rest content with the selfish 
 hope of saving their own souls ; rather, he would have 
 them ever think of the human brotherhood, and live not 
 for themselves but for the world. He falls into a vein of 
 Christian language when he speaks of the true philosopher 
 as set apart by a special call, anointed with the unction 
 of God's grace to a missionary work of lifelong self- 
 devotion, as the apostle of a high social creed. Un- 
 consciously, perhaps, he holds up the mirror to himself in 
 this description, and the rich colouring and impassioned 
 fervour of the chapter redeem the austerity of his moral 
 system. 
 
 The substance of some passages may serve perhaps to 
 complete the brief sketch of his character and thought. 
 _^. ... When asked to describe the nature of the 
 
 ideal Cynic, he said that heaven's wrath would 
 light on him who intruded rashly into a ministry so holy. 
 It called for an Agamemnon to lead a host to Troy ; none 
 but Achilles could face Hector in the fight ; if a Ther- 
 sites had presumed to take that place, he would have 
 been thrust away in mockery or disgrace. So let the 
 would-be Cynic try himself, and count the cost before he 
 starts for the campaign. To wear a threadbare cloak is 
 not enough : something more is needed than to live 
 hardly — to carry stafi" and wallet, and to be rude and un- 
 mannerly to all whose life seems too luxurious or self-in- 
 dulgent. It were an easy matter to do this. But to keep 
 
CH, VIII. Tfie Literary Currents of the Age. 173 
 
 a patient, uncomplaining temper, to root out vain desire 
 and rise above the weakness of anger, jealousy, pity, 
 and every carnal appetite, to make the sense of honour 
 take the place of all the screens or safeguards of door 
 and inner chamber, to have no secrets to conceal, no 
 shrinking fear of banishment or death, in the confidence 
 of finding everywhere a home where sun and moon will 
 shine, and communion will be possible with heaven — this 
 is not an easy thing, but to be able to do this is to be a 
 philosopher indeed. Thus furnished for the work of life, 
 the true Cynic will feel that he has a mission to be a 
 preacher of the truth to erring men who know so little ol 
 what is really good or evil. He is sent as a seer to learn 
 the path of safety, and as a prophet to warn his fellow- 
 men of all their dangers. It is for him to tell them the 
 secret of true happiness, that it does not lie in the comfort 
 of the body, nor in wealth, nor high estate, nor office, nor 
 in anything which lies exposed to the caprice of chance, 
 but only in the things which fall within the range of man's 
 freewill, in his own domain of thought and action. 
 
 Men ask indeed if any can be happy without the 
 social blessings which they prize. It is for the apostle ot 
 philosophy to show that, homeless, childless, wifeless 
 wanderer though he be,, with only a mantle on his body 
 and the sky above his head, he can yet enjoy entirest 
 freedom from all anxiety and fear, and from all the 
 misery of a fretful temper. But let no one rashly fancy 
 that he is called to such a life without weighing well its 
 duties and its dangers. Let him examine himself well, 
 and learn the will of God whose messenger he would 
 claim to be. Outraged and buffeted he may be, like a 
 poor beast of burden ; but he must love his persecutors 
 as his brethren. For him there can be no appeal to 
 Caesar or to Caesar's servants, for he looks only to his 
 Sovereign in heaven, and m.ust bear patiently the trials 
 
1 74 The Age of the A ntonines. ch. 
 
 VIII. 
 
 which He sends him. In a realm of perfect sages there 
 would be no call into the mission-field, and all might 
 innocently enjoy the pleasures of home hfe in peace. 
 But that soldier serves most cheerfully who has no cares 
 of wife or household, and the Cynic who has felt the call 
 to do God's work must forswear the blessings of the life 
 of husband or of father, must rise above the narrower 
 range of civic duties, remembering that all men are his 
 brothers and his city is the world. 
 
 Yet large as is the call upon his self-denial, he should 
 not aim at needless austerity or ascetic gloom. There is 
 no sanctity in dirt or vermin, nothing to win souls or to 
 attract the fancy in emaciated looks and a melancholy 
 scowl ; nor is there any reason why the missionary must 
 be a beggar. Epictetus saw no merit in hardships self- 
 imposed, nor would he have men turn from pleasure as 
 from a traitor offering a kiss; only he would have them 
 alile to part cheerfully with all save truth and honour, in 
 the spirit of pilgrims on the march. ' As on 
 a journey, when the ship is lying at anchor, 
 thou mayest land to take in water, and gather shells and 
 the like upon the shore, but must keep the vessel still in 
 view, and when the steersman beckons, must leave all else 
 at once to come on board : so, too, in life's pilgrimage, 
 if wifelet or little one be given thee for a while, it may be 
 well, but see to it that thou art ready, when the pilot 
 calls, to go at once, and turn not to look back.' 
 
 The life of Dion Chrysostom may serve to illustrate 
 
 still further the ideal of the philosophic propaganda of 
 
 , ^. these times. He was, indeed, no Stoic by pro- 
 
 and Dion r - iti -i- 
 
 Chrysos- fession, and did not use heroic tones ; yet 
 ^°^ like the sage pictured to our fancy in the 
 
 strong words of Epictetus, he felt that he was called to 
 spend his life unselfishly for others, and to preach and 
 plead to every class in the enthusiasm of a religious duty 
 
fcH. viii. T/ic Literary Currents of the Age, 175 
 
 He only gradually awoke, indeed, to the sense of liis vo- 
 cation, and it is curious to read his own account of his 
 conversion to philosophy, and note his confessions of un- 
 vvorthiness. 
 
 Driven by a popular riot from his home at Prusa, in 
 which town he had already filled the highest offices, he 
 betook himself to Rome, where he gained a name by 
 eloquence, and the hatred of Domitian by outspoken 
 satire. He fled away and lived a wandering life, in the 
 course of which, as we have seen already (p. 6), he 
 appeased a mutiny among the legions when the news of 
 »^he tyrant's murder reached their camp upon the northern 
 frontier. During those years of banishment he hid his 
 name but could not hide his talents ; his threadbare 
 cloak was taken for a Cynic's mantle, and men often 
 came to him to ask for counsel. His quibbles of rhetoric 
 availed him little for cases of conscience such as these, and 
 he was driven to meditate in earnest on great themes of 
 duty, and seek for truth at the sources of a higher wisdom. 
 With light so gained he saw the vanity of human wishes, 
 he felt the littleness of his earlier aims, and resolved to 
 devote his eloquence to a higher cause than that of personal 
 ambition. He would spend himself for the needs of 
 every class without distinction, and tend the anxious or 
 despairing as the physician of their souls, regretting only 
 that so few care for serious thought in the season of pro- 
 sperity, and fly to the sage for ghostly counsel only when 
 loss of friends or dear ones makes them feel the need of 
 consolation. 
 
 The details of his life and character are known to 
 us chiefly by his works, some of which are moral essays, 
 sermons, as it were, on special texts which might be 
 preached to any audience alike, while others are set 
 speeches made in public as occasion called him forth in 
 many a far-off city where he sojourned in his wandering 
 
t76 The Age of the Antonines. ch. viii. 
 
 career. In the former class we note that among all the 
 commonplaces of the schools, high thoughts may be met 
 mth here and there, full of a large humanity, and with 
 an entirely modem sound. In a world whose social 
 system rested on a basis of slave labour, he raised his 
 voice not merely to plead for kindliness and mercy, but 
 to dispute the moral right of slavery itself Feeling deeply 
 for the artisan and peasant, whose happiness was sacri- 
 ficed, and whose social status was degraded by the haughty 
 sentiment of Greece and Rome, he spoke in accents 
 seldom heard before of the dignity and prospects of in- 
 dustrial labour. His account of the shipwrecked traveller 
 in Euboea gives us a picture, else unequalled in its vivid- 
 ness, of the breach between the city and the country life, 
 and of the uncared-for loneliness of much of the rural 
 population. 
 
 But the second class of writings best reflects the 
 temper and activity of Dion's efforts to bring philosophy 
 to bear upon the world. They show him as the advo- 
 cate of peace, stepping in with words of timely wisdom 
 to allay the bitterness of long-standing feuds, or the 
 outbreak of fresh jealousies such as had lingered for 
 centuries among the little states of the i^gean, and sur- 
 vived even the tutelage of Roman power. At one time the 
 subject of dispute is the scene of the provincial courts, at 
 another the proud title of metropolis of Asia ; at another 
 some infinitely petty right of fisheries or of pasture. 
 Quarrels such as these brought citizens of rival towns 
 into collision in the streets, and led to interchange of pas- 
 sionate complaints, wearying out the patience of their 
 Roman masters by the vanity and turbulence of these 
 Greek republics. All Dion's tact and all his eloquence 
 were needed in such cases, to enforce the eternal princi- 
 ples of concord and forbearance by the dexterous use of 
 personal appeals. He shows his sense of the importance 
 
CH. VIII. The Literary Currents of the Age. ijy 
 
 of this work by speaking with a sort of fervour of the bo'y 
 functions of this ministry of reconcihation. 
 
 He was jealous of his dignity and independence, 
 stooping to truckle neither to the violence of mob-licence 
 nor to the caprices of a monarch. He startled the disso- 
 lute populace of Alexandria by his bold defiance of their 
 wanton humour, and by his skilful pleading to have the 
 claims of philosophy respected. He bore himself with 
 courteous firmness in the presence of the Court, and lec- 
 tured Trajan on the duties of a royal station without any 
 loss of honest frankness or imperial favour. He preached 
 on the vanity of human glory, and was one day to prove 
 in his own person how treacherous and unsubstantial a 
 thing it is. The cities which had honoured him as 
 their teacher and their friend were presently to grow 
 weary of his counsels, and to show him the indignity ol 
 setting another head upon his statues. Prusa, his birth- 
 place, and the object of his special tenderness, was to 
 tiuTi against him in blind fury, and to denounce him to 
 the Roman governor as a traitor and a thief. 
 
 To the vicissitudes of the career of Dion we may find 
 a striking contrast in the unbroken calm of Plutarch's 
 life. Descended from an ancient family of 
 the Boeotian Chaeroneia, after drawing from 
 the sources of ancient art and learning at their fountain 
 head at Athens, he betook himself in riper years to 
 Rome, where, besides attending to the duties with which 
 he seems to have been charged in the service of his fellow- 
 townsmen, he lectured publicly from time to time, and 
 made good use of the literary stores amassed in the great 
 libraries, and of the interchange of thought in the culti- 
 vated circles of the capital. In the vigour of his intellec- 
 tual manhood he went back to Chaeroneia, where he lived 
 henceforth, for fear, he says, that the little town should 
 lose in him a single citizen; serving with honourable 
 
 A.H, N 
 
1 78 The Age of the Antonines. ch. vm. 
 
 zeal in the whole round of civil and religious offices, and 
 winnmg the respect of all his neighbours as well as of 
 many correspondents from abroad. 
 
 Full of the generous patriotism of the best days of 
 Greece, he gave his time and thought without reserve 
 to the service of his countrymen, though he allowed no 
 glamour of ancient sentiment to cloud his judgment. 
 He told the young aspirants round him that, when they 
 read the harangues of Pericles and the story of their 
 old republics, they must be careful to remember that 
 those times were gone for ever, and that they must 
 speak with bated breath in their assemblies, since the 
 power had passed into the hands of an imperial governor. 
 It was idle to be like the children at their play, who 
 dress themselves as grown-up folks, and put on their 
 fathers' robes of state. And yet the worthy citizen, he 
 says, has no lack of opportunities for action. To keep 
 open house, and so to be a harbour of refuge for the 
 wanderers, to sympathise with joy and grief, to be care- 
 ful not to wound men's feelings by the wantonness of 
 personal display; to give counsel freely to the unwary, to 
 bring parted friends once more together, to encourage 
 the efforts of the good and frustrate the villany of 
 designing knaves, to study, in a word, the common weal, 
 these are the duties which a citizen can discharge until his 
 dying day, whether clothed or not with offices of state. 
 
 For Plutarch did not write merely as a literary artist 
 to amuse a studious leisure or revive the memory of 
 heroic days, but as a moraUst invested by public con- 
 fidence with a sort of priesthood to direct the con- 
 sciences of men. He had, indeed, no new theory of 
 morals to maintain, and made no pretension to original 
 research; he wished not to dazzle but to edify, to touch 
 the heart and guide the conduct rather than instruct 
 tiie reason. His friends or neighbours come to him for 
 
CH. VIII. The Literary Currents of the Age. 179 
 
 counsel on one or other of life's trials, and he sends them 
 willingly the fruit of his study or reflexion. He holds his 
 conferences like a master of the schools, and the privi- 
 leged guests flock willingly to hear the sermons of which 
 the subject has already been announced, and hsten with 
 becoming gravity to the exhortations of the sage. Some- 
 times they are invited to propose a question for debate ; 
 but nothing frivolous can be allowed, nor may any of the 
 audience betray an unseemly lack of interest, ' like the 
 bidden guest who scarcely touches with his lips the viands 
 which his host has spread before him.' The listener's 
 mind must be ever on the alert, *as the tennis player 
 watches for the ball,' and he never should forget that he 
 is sitting, not like a lounger at the theatre, but in a school 
 of morals where he may learn to regulate his life. The 
 lecture ended, or the public conference closed, the privi- 
 leged few remain to discuss the subject further with 
 their master, while here or there a stricken conscience 
 stays behind to confess its secret grief and ask for ghostly 
 admonition. But the teacher's doors are ever open ; all 
 may freely come and go who need encouragement or 
 advice on any point of social duty. Out of such familiar 
 intercourse, and the cases of conscience thus debated, 
 grew the treatises of ethics which, read at Rome and 
 Athens as well as in the little town of Chaeroneia, ex- 
 tended to the world of letters the fruits of his ministry of 
 morals. 
 
 He did not always wait to be applied to, but sought 
 out at times the intimates who seemed to need his counsels, 
 watched their conduct with affectionate concern, and 
 pressed in with warning words amid the business of com- 
 mon life. He tried to recommend philosophy not by pre- 
 cept only but by practice, first testing on himself the value 
 of his spiritual drugs, and working with humility for the 
 salvation of his soul. ' It was for the good of others ' 
 
 N 2 
 
l8o The Age of the Antonines. ch. viii. 
 
 he tells us, *that I first began to write the biographies 
 of famous men, but I have since taken to them for my 
 own sake. Their story is to me a mirror, by the help of 
 which I do my best to rule my life after the likeness of 
 their virtues. 1 seem to enter into living communion 
 with them; while bidding them welcome one by one under 
 the shelter of my roof, I contemplate the beauty and the 
 grandeur of the souls unbared before me in their actions.' 
 
 Yet it was not without other reasons that he lingered 
 over these old passages of history and romance. For, in- 
 deed, with all his width of sympathy and his large human- 
 ityj the mind of Plutarch was cast in an antique mould. At 
 home mainly in the world of books or in the social moods 
 of a petty town of Greece, he knew little of the new ideas 
 which were then leavening the masses. The Christian 
 church, meantime, was setting the hearts of men aglow 
 with the story of a noble life which could find no sort 
 of parallel in his long list of ancient worthies. Dion 
 Chrysostom had dared to call the right of slavery in 
 question, and spoke as feelingly as any modern writer of 
 the sorrows of the proletariate and the dignity of labour. 
 Marcus Aurelius was soon to show what delicate humility 
 and unselfish grace could blossom in the midst of heathen- 
 dom, while straining after visions of perfection not to be 
 realized in scenes of earth. But Plutarch's thought in 
 religion and in morals seems scarcely to have passed 
 beyond the stage of human progress reached long ago in 
 Plato's days, and five centuries had passed away and 
 taught him no new principle of duty. 
 
 He believed in the unity of God, and saw the vanity 
 of idol worship ; but to him the essence of religion lay 
 not in dogmas or rules of life, but in solemn ritual. He 
 clung to the edifying round of holy forms, though the 
 faith to which they ministered of old was swept away, 
 and though he had to people the unseen world with inter- 
 
CH. VIII. The Literary Currents of the Age. i8i 
 
 mediate spirits, and freely resort to allegoric fancy, to 
 justify the whole mythology of Greek religion. 
 
 In morals his ideal is confined to the culture and 
 perfection of the personal aspirant ; and amiable and 
 chastened as are his tones of courtesy, his talk is still ol 
 happiness rather than of duty, and his spiritual horizon 
 is too narrow to take in the thought of the loathsomeness 
 of evil and the enthusiasm of charity. His calm serenity 
 reminds us of the temples of old Greece, which attain in 
 all that is attempted to a simple grace and a consummate 
 art, with none of the gloom and mystery of a Christian 
 cathedral, and with little of its witness to a higher world 
 and its vision of unfulfilled ideals. 
 
 But most of the scholars of the day made no preten- 
 sions to such earnest thought, and shrunk from philosophy 
 as from a churlish Mentor who spoke a ■p. The 
 language harsh and discordant in their ears, ^rds^nd 
 These were hterary artists, word-fanciers, and rhetoricians 
 rhetoricians, whose fluent speech and studied graces 
 won for them oftentimes a world-wide fame, and raised 
 them to wealth or dignity, but did not add a single 
 thought to the intellectual capital of their age, and left 
 behind no monument of lasting value. 
 
 They studied the orators of earlier days to learn the 
 secrets of their power ; but the times were changed since 
 the party-strife of the republican assemblies had stirred 
 into intensity the statesman's genius and passion. The 
 pleadings even of the law courts were somewhat cold and 
 lifeless when all the graver cases were sent up by appeal 
 before the Emperor or his servants. They tried, indeed, 
 to throw themselves back into the past, to re-open the 
 debates of history, and galvanize into spasmodic life the 
 rigid skeletons of ancient quarrels. When men grew 
 weary of these worn-out topics, the lecturers had recourse 
 to paradox to quicken afresh the jaded fancy, startling 
 
1 82 The Age of the Antonines. ch. vm. 
 
 the curiosity by some unlooked-for theme, writing pane- 
 gyrics on Fever and Baldness, Dust and Smoke, the Fly 
 even and the Gnat, or imagining ahnost impossible con- 
 junctures to test their skill in casuistry or their fence of 
 subtle dialectic. To others the subject mattered little. 
 Like the Isaeus of whom Phny writes admiringly, or the 
 improvisatori of a later age, they left the choice to the 
 audience who came to hear them, and cared only to dis- 
 play the stock of images with wh ch their memory was 
 furnished, their power of graceful elocution in which 
 every tone or gesture had artistic value, or their unfailing 
 skill in handling all the arms of logical debate. 
 
 Sometimes it was a question merely of the choice 
 of words. The Greeks commonly were faithful to the 
 purer models of good style ; but the Roman taste, not 
 content with the excellence of Cicero as approved by 
 Quintilian's practised judgment, mounted higher for its 
 standards of Latinity, and prided itself on its familiar 
 use of archaic words or phrases gleaned from Cato or 
 from Ennius, The harmonious arrangement of these 
 borrowed graces was in itself a proof of eloquence, and 
 poverty of thought and frigid feeling mattered little, if the 
 stock of such literary conceits was large enough. 
 
 Fronto of Cirta passed for the first orator of his day 
 at Rome, and was honoured with the friendship of three 
 ,., ,, Emperors, of whom the latest, Marcus Aure- 
 
 likc tronto. ,. , , , , . ., , , , 
 
 lius, had been his pupil, and was to the last a 
 loving friend. When scholars heard early in this cen- 
 tury that the letters which passed between the sove- 
 reign and the professor had been found in a palimpsest 
 under the Acts of the Council of Chalcedon, they were 
 full of eager interest to read them ; but they soon turned 
 with contempt from the tasteless pedantry and tawdiy 
 affectation of the style which was then so much in vogue at 
 Rome. It is curious to find the rhetorician speaking of 
 
CH. VIII. The Literary Currents of the Age, 183 
 
 his favourite art as the only serious study of the age. 
 ' For philosophy/ he thought, ' no style was needed ; no 
 laboured periods nor touching peroration. The student's 
 intellect was scarcely ruffled while the lecturer went dron- 
 ing on in the dull level of his tedious disquisitions. Lazy 
 assent or a few hfeless words alone were needed, and the 
 audience might be even half-asleep while the " firstly " 
 and "secondly" were leisurely set forth, and truisms dis- 
 guised in learned phrases. That done, the learner's work 
 was over ; no conning over tasks by night, no reciting or 
 declaiming, no careful study of the power of synonyms 
 or the methods of translation.' He thought it mere pre- 
 sumption of philosophy to claim the sphere of morals for 
 its special care. The domain of rhetoric was wide enough 
 to cover that as well as many another field of thought ; 
 her mission was to touch the feelings and to guide men by 
 persuasive speech. For words were something infinitely 
 sacred, too precious to be trifled with by any bungler in 
 the art of speaking. As for the thoughts, they were not 
 likely to be wanting if only the terms of oratory were 
 fitly chosen. Yet, with all the pedant's vanity, we see 
 disclosed to us in his familiar letters an honest, true, and 
 simple-minded man, who was jealous for the honour of 
 his literary craft, who lived contentedly on scanty means, 
 and never abused his influence at court to advance him- 
 self to wealth or honour. 
 
 Few, like Fronto, were content to shine only with the 
 lustre of their art. To live a Sophist's life was a pro- 
 verbial phrase for a career of sumptuous luxury. To 
 turn from rhetoric to philosophy was marked by outward 
 changes like that to the monk's cowl from the pleasures 
 of the world. But it was in the Greek cities of the 
 Empire that they paraded their magnificence with most 
 assurance, and ruled supreme over an admiring public. 
 Among the brilliant towns of Asia Minor, which were at 
 
t84 TJie Age of the Antonines. ch. yiii. 
 
 this time at the climax of their wealth and splendour, 
 there flourished an art and literature of fashion, to which 
 the Sophists gave the tone as authors and as critics. 
 
 At Smyrna above all, the sanctuary of the Muses and 
 the metropolis of Asia, as it proudly styled itself, the 
 famous Polemon lorded it without dispute, 
 oemon. deigning to prefer that city for his home 
 above the neighbouring rivals for his favour. When 
 he went abroad, the chariot which bore him was decked 
 with silver trappings and followed by a long train of 
 slaves and hounds. So proud was his self-confidence 
 that he was said to treat the municipalities as his 
 inferiors, and emperors and gods only as his equals. 
 Smyrna, the city of his choice, profited largely by the 
 reputation of its townsman. Scholars flocked to it to 
 hear his lectures. Jarring factions were abashed at his 
 rebuke, and forgot their quarrels in his eulogies of peace. 
 Monarchs honoured him with their favours, and lavished 
 their bounty on his home : Hadrian even transferred his 
 love from Ephesus to Smyrna, and gave the orator a 
 noble sum to beautify the queen of cities. His self-esteem 
 was fully equal to his great renown. When he went to 
 Athens, unlike the other speakers who began with pane- 
 gyrics on the illustrious city, he startled his hearers with 
 the words, * You have the credit, men of Athens, of being 
 accomplished critics of good style ; 1 shall soon see if 
 you deserve the praise.' A young aspirant of distinction 
 came once to measure words with him, and asked him to 
 name a time for showing ofi" his powers. Nothing loth, 
 he offered to speak offhand, and after hearing him the 
 stranger slipped away by night to shun the confession of 
 defeat. When Hadrian came to dedicate the stately 
 works with which he had embellished Athens, the 
 ceremony was not thought complete unless Polemon was 
 sent for to deliver a sort of public sermon on the opening 
 
cii. VIII. The Literary Currents of the Age. 185 
 
 of the temple. When death came at last to carry him 
 from the scene of all his triumphs, he said to the admirers 
 who stood beside his bed, * See that my tomb is firmly 
 closed upon me, that the sun may not see me at last 
 reduced to silence.' 
 
 Ephesus, meantime, which took the second place 
 among the cities of Ionia, had brought Favorinus from 
 his native Aries to honour it with his brilliant 
 talents. But neither of the great professors 
 could brook a rival near his chair, and a war of epigrams 
 and angry words was carried on between them, and was 
 taken up with warmth by the partisans of each. At 
 Pergamos, Aristocles was teaching still, after giving up 
 philosophy and scandalizing serious minds by taking to 
 the theatre and other haunts of pleasure. Each even of 
 the lesser towns had its own school of rhetoric, and 
 its own distinguished Sophist. 
 
 Nor could the intellectual society of Athens fail to 
 have its shining light in all this galaxy of luminous 
 talents. It had its University, with chairs endowed by 
 government, and filled with teachers of distinction. But 
 it had also a greater centre of attraction in its own 
 H erodes Atticus, who devoted his enormous Herodes 
 wealth, his stores of learning and his culti- Atticus. 
 vated tastes, to do honour to his birthplace, and make 
 her literary circles the admiration of the educated world. 
 His father, who came of an old family at Athens, had 
 found a treasure in his house so great that he feared to 
 claim it till he was reassured by Nerva. He used it with 
 lavish generosity, frequently keeping open house ; and 
 at his death nearly all the town was in his debt. No 
 expense was spared in the education of his son, who 
 studied under the first teachers of the day, and made 
 such progress that he was taken to Pannonia as a 
 youth to display his powers of rhetoric before the Env 
 
1 86 The Age of the Antonines. ch. vm. 
 
 peror Hadrian. The young student's vanity was damped, 
 however, by a signal failure, and he nearly drowned him- 
 self in the Danube in despair. Returning home in 
 humbler mood, he gave himself once more to study. 
 There and in Asia, where he served as an imperial com- 
 missioner, he amassed ample stores of learning and 
 formed his style by intercourse with the greatest scholars 
 of the day. After some years spent at Rome, he settled 
 finally on his own estates, and became henceforth the 
 central figure of Athenian society, which was by general 
 consent the most refined and cultivated of the age, and 
 the most free from the insolent parade of wealth. 
 
 The most promising of the students of the University 
 were soon attracted to his side, where they found a 
 liberal welcome and unfailing encouragement and help. 
 Aulus Gellius gives a pleasant picture of the studious 
 retreat in which he entertained them. * In our college 
 life at Athens, H erodes Atticus often bade us come to 
 him. In his country house of Cephissia we were shel- 
 tered from the burning heat of summer by the shade ol 
 the vast groves, and the pleasant walks about the man- 
 sion, whose cool site and sparkling basins made the whole 
 neighbourhood resound with splashing waters and the 
 song of birds.' Here at one time or another came most 
 of the scholars who were to make a name in the great 
 world, and who were glad to listen to the famous lecturer. 
 A privileged few remained after the audience had dis- 
 persed, and were favoured with a course of special com- 
 ments which were heard with rapt attention. Even the 
 applause so usual in the Sophists' lecture halls was then 
 suspended. 
 
 But if an orator of any eminence arrived at Athens 
 and wished to say a word in pubhc, Herodes came 
 with his friends to do the honours of the day, to move 
 the vote of thanks to the illustrious stranger, an^ 
 
CH. VIII. The Literary Currents of the Age. 187 
 
 to display all his practised skill in the tournament of 
 rhetoric. Not indeed that the reception was so courteous 
 always. One Philager had the imprudence to write an 
 offensive letter to Herodes before he came to Athens. 
 On his arrival the theatre in which he had intended to 
 declaim was crowded with the admirers of the Athenian 
 teacher, who had malicious pleasure in detecting an old 
 harangue which was passed off before them as a new one, 
 and hissed the poor Sophist off the stage when he tried 
 vainly to recover credit. Nor did the talents of the 
 orator save him always from a petty vanity. Aristide? 
 wished on one occasion to deliver the Panathenaic speech ; 
 and to disarm the opposition of his rival, whose jealousy 
 he feared, he submitted to his criticism the draft of a 
 weak and colourless address. But instead of this, when 
 the day came to deliver it, the actual speech proved to be 
 of far higher merit, and Herodes saw that he was duped. 
 
 One special object of his care was purity of diction. 
 Not content with forming his style upon the best models 
 of the past, he was known even to consult upon nice points 
 of language an old hermit who lived retired in the heart 
 of Attica. ' He lives in the district,' was his explanation, 
 * where the purest Attic always has been spoken, and 
 where the old race has not been swept away by strangers.' 
 We may find a curious illustration of his affectation of 
 archaic forms in the fact that some of the inscriptions of 
 his monuments are written in Greek characters of a much 
 earlier date, which seemingly in the enthusiasm of the 
 antiquarian he was desirous to revive. 
 
 A like spirit of reverence for the past is shown in his 
 regard for the great religious centres of Hellenic hfe. 
 Not content with adorning Athens, like Hadrian, with 
 stately works of art, he left the tokens of his fond respect 
 at Delphi, Corinth, and Olympia, where new temples and 
 theatres rose at his expense. There were few parts o< 
 
1 88 The Age of the Antonines. ch. viii. 
 
 Greece, indeed, which had not cause to thank the magni- 
 ficent patron of the arts, whose taste inclined, after the 
 fashion of the day, to the colossal, and was turned only 
 with regret from the idea of cutting a canal through the 
 Corinthian Isthmus. 
 
 In spite of all his glory and his lavish oatlay, the 
 Athenians wearied of their benefactor, or powerful 
 enemies at least combined to crush him. Impeached 
 before the governor of the province on charges of oppres- 
 sion, he was sent to Sirmium when Marcus Aurelius was 
 busy with his Marcomannic war. Faustina had been 
 prejudiced against him, the Emperor's little son was taught 
 to lisp a prayer for the Athenians, and the great orator, 
 broken down by bereavement and ingratitude, refused to 
 exert his eloquence in his own behalf, and broke out even 
 into bitter words as he abruptly left his sovereign's pre- 
 sence. But no charges could be proved against him, 
 and the Emperor was not the man to deal harshly with 
 his old friend for a hasty word. 
 
 Among the visitors at Cephissia, in the circle 
 gathered round Herodes, probably was Apuleius, who had 
 left Carthage to carry on his studies in the 
 lecture rooms and libraries of Athens. Phi- 
 losopher and pietist, poet, romanticist, and rhetorician, 
 he was an apt example of the manysidedness of the 
 sophistic training, as it was then spread universally 
 throughout the Roman Empire. He is a curious illustra- 
 tion of the social characteristics of the age, combining as 
 he does in his own person, and expressing in his varied 
 works, most of the moral and religious tendencies which 
 are singly found elsewhere in other writers of these times. 
 1°. There is no originality of thought or style. In every 
 work we trace the influence of Greek models. His cele- 
 brated novel of the Transformation of a Man into an 
 Ass is based upon a tale which is also found in Lucian ; 
 
CH. viii. The Literary Currents of the Age, 189 
 
 the stirring incidents of comedy or tragic pathos which 
 are so strangely interspersed, the description of the robber 
 band, the thrilHng horrors of the magic art, the licentious 
 gallantries therein described, are freely taken rom the 
 Greek romances which he found ready to his hand in 
 many of the countries where he travelled. Even the 
 beautiful legend of Cupid and of Psyche, which hes em- 
 bedded like a pure vein of gold in the coarser strata of 
 his fiction, is an allegoric fancy which belongs to a purer 
 and a nobler mind than his. The style indeed is more 
 attractive than that of any of the few Latin writers of his 
 age, for Apuleius had a poet's fancy, and could pass with 
 ease from grave to gay ; but the author is overweighted 
 by his learning, and spoils the merit of his diction by 
 ill-adapted archaisms and tawdry ornaments of preten- 
 tious rhetoric. 
 
 2°. In him, as in the literature of the times, there 
 is none of the natural simplicity of perfect art, but a 
 constant striving for effect and a parade of ingenuity, 
 as if to challenge the applause of lecture-rooms in a 
 society of mutual admiration. One of his works consists 
 of the choice passages, the lively openings or touching 
 perorations, gleaned from a number of such public lec- 
 tures, to serve, it may be, as a sort of commonplace-book 
 for the beginner's use. 
 
 3°. As a religious philosopher he illustrates the 
 eclectic spirit then so common. From the theories of 
 Plato he accepted the faith in a Supreme Being and an 
 immortal soul; but instead of the types or ideas of the 
 Greek sage, the unseen world was peopled by the fancy 
 of Apuleius with an infinite hierarchy of demon agencies, 
 going to and fro among the ways of men, startling them 
 with phantom shapes, but making themselves at times 
 the ministers of human will under the influence of magic 
 arts and incantations. 
 
1 90 The Age of the Antonines. ch. vm 
 
 4°. We find in him a curious blending of mocking 
 insight and of mystic dread. He vividly expresses in 
 the pages of his novel the imposture and the licence of 
 the priestly charlatans who travelled through the world 
 making capital out of the timorous credulity of the 
 devout. Yet except Aristides no educated mind that 
 we read of in that age was more intensely mastered by 
 superstitious hopes and fears. The mysteries of all the 
 ancient creeds have a powerful attraction for his fancy ; 
 he is eager to be admitted to the holy rites, and to pass 
 within the veil which hides the secrets from the eyes of 
 the profane. Nothing can exceed the fervour of his en- 
 thusiastic sentiment when he speaks of the revelation of 
 the spirit world disclosed in the sacred forms before his 
 kindling fancy. 
 
 5®. Finally, in his case we have brought vividly before 
 our minds the difference between devotion and morality. 
 The sensuality of heathendom is reflected for our study in 
 many a lascivious and disgusting page of Apuleius ; and 
 though he speaks of the chastity and self-denial needed for 
 the pious votary to draw near to the God whom he adores, 
 yet the abstinence must have been perfunctory indeed 
 in one whose fancy could at times run riot in images so 
 foul and lewd as to revolt every pure-minded reader. 
 
 We have seen that the scholars of the times were 
 almost wholly living on the intellectual capital of former 
 ages ; in rhetoric and history, in rehgion and philosophy, 
 they were looking to the past for guidance, and renewing 
 the old jealousies of rival studies. In the credulous and 
 manysided mind of Apuleius all the literary currents 
 flowed on peacefully together side"by side ; but in Lucian 
 we may note the culture of the age breaking all the idols 
 of its adoration and losing eveiy trace of faith and 
 earnestness and self-respect. 
 
 The great satirist of Samosata was a Syrian by birth, 
 
CH. VIII. The Literary Currents of the Age. 191 
 
 though his genius and language were purely Greek. 
 Apprenticed early to a sculptor, he soon laid down the 
 carver's tools to devote himself to letters, and . 
 
 making little progress at the bar of Antioch, 
 took to the Sophist's wandering life, and, like the others 
 of his trade, courted the applause of idle crowds by formal 
 panegyrics on the Parrot or the Fly. In middle life he 
 grew wearied of such frivolous pursuits, and finding 
 another literary vein more suited to his talents, composed 
 the many dialogues and essays in which all the forms of 
 thought and faith and social fashion pass before us in a 
 long procession, each in turn to be stripped of its show 
 of dignity and grace. 
 
 It was an easy matter to expose the follies of the 
 legendary tales of early Greece, and many a writer had 
 already tried to show that such artless imaginings of 
 childlike fancy were hopelessly at war with all moral 
 codes and earnest thought. But it was left for Lucian 
 to deal with them in a tone of entire indifference, without 
 a trace of passion or excitement, or spirit of avowed 
 attack. The gods and goddesses of old Olympus come 
 foi-ward in his dialogues without the flowing draperies of 
 poetic forms which half disguised the unloveliness of 
 many a fancy ; they talk to each other of their vanities 
 and passions simply and frankly, without reserve or 
 shame, till the creations of a nation's childhood, brought 
 down from the realms of fairyland to the realities of 
 common life, seem utterly revolting in the nudities of 
 homely prose. 
 
 Nor had Lucian more respect for the motley forms 
 of eastern worship to which the public mind had lately 
 turned in its strong need of something to adore. He 
 painted in his works the moods of credulous sentiment 
 which sought for new sources of spiritual comfort in the 
 glow and mystery and excitement of those exotic rites ; 
 
192 The Age of the Antomnes. ch. vin. 
 
 he described in lively terms the consternation of the 
 deities of Greece when they found their council chamber 
 thronged by the grotesque brotherhood of unfamiliar 
 shapes, finding a voice at last in the protests of Momus, 
 who came forward to resist their claims to equality with 
 the immortals of Olympus. 'Attis and Corybas and 
 Sabazius, and the Median Mithras, who does not know a 
 word of Greek and can make no answer when his health 
 is drunk, these are bad enough ; still they could be en- 
 dured ; but that Egyptian there, swathed like a mummy, 
 with a dog's head on his shoulders, what claim has he, 
 when he barks, to be listened to as a god ? What 
 means yon dappled bull of Memphis, with his oracles 
 and train of priests? I should be ashamed to tell of 
 all the ibises, apes, and goats, and thousand deities still 
 more absurd, with which the Egyptians have deluged us; 
 and 1 cannot understand, my friends, how you can bear 
 to have them honoured as much as, or more even than 
 yourselves. And, Jupiter, how can you let them hang 
 those ram's horns on your head ? ' Momus is reminded 
 that these are mysterious emblems, which an ignorant 
 outsider must not mock at, and he readily admits that 
 in those times only the initiated could distinguish between 
 a monster and a god. 
 
 Lucian's banter did not flow from any deeper source of 
 faith in a religion purer than those bastard forms of idol 
 worship. He was entirely sceptical and unimpassioned, 
 and the unseen world was to his thoughts animated by 
 no higher life, nor might man look for anything beyond 
 the grave. His attacks upon the established faith were 
 far from being carried on in the spirit of a philosophic 
 propaganda. He was unsparing in his mockery of the 
 would-be sages who talked so grandly of the contempt 
 for riches and for glory, of following Honour as their only 
 guitie, of keeping anger within bounds, and treating the 
 
CH. vTii. The Literary Currents of the Age. [93 
 
 great ones of the earth as equals, and who yet must have 
 a fee for every lesson, and do homage to the rich, ' They 
 are greedy of filthy lucre, more passionate than dogs, 
 more cowardly than hares, more lascivious than asses, 
 more thievish than cats, more quarrelsome than cocks.' 
 He describes at length the indignities to which they are 
 willing to submit as domestic moralists in the service of 
 stingy and illiterate patrons, or in the train of some 
 fine lady who likes to show at times her cultivated 
 tastes, but degrades her spiritual adviser to the company 
 of waiting maids and insolent pages, or even asks him to 
 devote his care to the confinement of her favourite dog, 
 and to the litter soon to be expected. One by one they 
 pass before us in his pages, the several types of 
 militant philosophy, — the popular lecturer, the court 
 confessor, the public missionary in Cynic dress, the 
 would-be prophets, and the wonder-mongers, astrologers, 
 and charlatans all crowding to join the ranks of a 
 profession where the only needful stock in trade was a 
 staff, a mantle, and a wallet, with ready impudence and 
 fluent tongue. 
 
 Was Lucian concerned for the good name of the 
 earnest thinkers of old time, the founders of the great 
 schools of thought, whose dogmas were parodied by 
 these impostors 1 Not so indeed. The old historic names 
 appear before us in his auction scene ; but the paltry 
 biddings made for each show how he underrated them, 
 and in his pictures of the realms of the departed spirits 
 all the high professions of the famous morahsts of Greece 
 did not raise them above an ignominious want of dignity 
 and courage. 
 
 Thus with mocking irony the scoffer rang out the 
 funeral knell of the creeds and systems of the ancient 
 world. Genius and heroism, high faith and earnest 
 thought, seemed one by one to turn to dust and ashes 
 
 A. H. O 
 
194 The Age of the Antof lines. ch. ix. 
 
 under the solvent of his merciless wit. Religion was a 
 mere syllabus of old wives' fables or a creaking machinery 
 of supernatural terrors ; philosophy was an airy unreality 
 of metaphysic cobwebs ; enthusiasm was the disguise of 
 knaves and badge of dupes ; life was an ignoble scramble 
 uncheered by any rays of higher light and unredeemed 
 by any faith or hope from a despairing self-contempt. 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 THE ADMINISTRATIVE FORMS OF THE IMPERIAL 
 GOVERNMENT. 
 
 The imperial ruler governed with unqualified authority. 
 No checks or balances or constitutional safeguards were 
 The im- provided by the theory of the state, and the 
 
 penal ruler venerable forms which lingered on existed 
 absolute mainly by his sufferance. The Curule offices 
 sovereign, remained only as part of the showy ceremonial 
 of the life of Rome, but with no substantial power. The 
 senate met to help the monarch with their counsels, or to 
 register his decrees in formal shapes ; but the reins had 
 passed entirely from their hands. The local liberties 
 throughout the provinces were little meddled with, and 
 municipal self-rule provoked, as yet, no jealousy ; but it 
 might be set aside at any moment by a Caesar's will, or 
 its machinery abused as an engine of oppression. Mean- 
 time, however, the transition from the unsystematic 
 forms of the Republic was only slowly going on, and the 
 agents of the central government were few compared 
 with those of the widespread bureaucracy of later days. 
 The imperial household had been organized at first 
 
CH, IX. Administrative Forms of Government. 195 
 
 like that of any Roman noble. Educated slaves or freed- 
 men, commonly of Greek extraction, wrote the letters, 
 kept the books, or managed the accounts in wealthy 
 houses, and filled a great variety of posts, partly menial, 
 partly confidential. In default of ministers an^his 
 of state and public functionaries of tried ex- ministers 
 perience, the early Emperors had used their firerWs owm 
 own domestic servants to multiply their eyes domestics, 
 and ears and hands for the multitudinous business to be 
 transacted. Weak rulers had been often tools in the 
 hands of their own insolent freedmen, who made colossal 
 fortunes by working on their master's fears or selling his 
 favour to the highest bidder. 
 
 But the Emperors of the second century were too 
 strong and self-contained to stoop to the meanness of 
 such backstairs intrigue, and we hear little in 
 
 1-1 r ■, • . .r. /-I though 
 
 their days of the smister mfluence of the afterwards 
 imperial freedmen. But the offices which ^*^"*g^'s. 
 they had filled in direct attendance on the ruler were 
 raised in seeming dignity, though shorn perhaps of 
 actual power, when Hadrian placed in them knights who 
 might aspire to rise higher on the ladder of promotion. 
 Of such posts there were four of special trust and con- 
 fidence. 
 
 1° First came the office of the Privy Purse (a 
 rationibus), which controlled all the accounts of the 
 sovereign's revenues, and of the income of the The most 
 Fiscus. The poet Statius describes in lofty 1,7^2"^ 
 style the importance and variety of the cares were 
 which thus devolved upon a powerful freed- rationibus 
 man who held the post for several reigns, (treasurer.) 
 * The produce of Iberian gold mines, of the Egyptian 
 harvests, of the pearl-fisheries of the Eastern seas, of the 
 flocks of Tarentum, of the transparent crystal made in 
 Alexandrian factories, of the forests of Numidia, of the 
 o 2 
 
tg6 The Age of the Antonines. ch. ix. 
 
 ivory of India, whatever the winds waft from every 
 quarter into port — all is entrusted to his single care. 
 The outgoings are also his concern. The suppHes of all 
 the armies pass daily through his hands, the necessary 
 sums to stock the granaries of Rome, to build aqueducts 
 and temples, to deck the palaces of Caesar, and to keep 
 the mints at work. He has scant time for sleep or food, 
 none for social intercourse, and pleasure is a stranger to 
 his thoughts.' 
 
 2°. The prince's Secretary (ab epistulis) required of 
 course a high degree of literary skill, as well as the 
 ° Ab powers of an accomplished penman. * He 
 
 epistulis has,' says the same poet of another freedman, 
 (secretary). < ^^ speed the missives of the monarch through 
 the worlds to guide the march of armies, to receive the 
 glad news of victory from the Rhine, the Danube, the 
 Euphrates, from the remotest lands of Thule, whither the 
 conquering eagles have already made their way. His 
 hand prepares the officers' commissions, and lets men 
 know who have gained the post of centurion or tribune. 
 He has to ask if the waters of the Nile have risen high 
 enough for a good harvest, if rain has fallen in Africa, 
 and to make a thousand like enquiries ; not I sis, nor 
 Mercury himself, has so many messages of moment.' In 
 later days there were two departments of the office, for 
 the language of Greece and for that of Italy. The 
 former of the two was coveted by the most famous scholars 
 of the age, and was looked upon as the natural reward for 
 purity of style and critical discernment. It led in time to 
 the higher rank and the substantial emoluments of office. 
 3°. It was the duty of another minister (a libellis), to 
 open the petitions or complaints intended for his master's 
 3°. a . ear, and probably to make abstracts of their 
 
 (deJk^f contents. If we may trust Seneca's account 
 petitions). the duties were arduous enough, since Polybius, 
 
CH. IX. Administrative Forms of Government. 197 
 
 who discharged them, had little time to nurse his private 
 sorrows. ' Thou hast so many thousand men to hear, so 
 many memorials to set in order. To lay such a mass of 
 business, that flows in from the wide world, in fitting 
 method before the eyes of thy great prince, thou must 
 have thyself unfaltering courage. Thou must not weep, 
 for thou hast so many weeping petitioners to hear. To 
 dry the tears of so many who are in danger, and would 
 fain win their way to the mercy of thy gracious Caesar, 
 thou must needs dry thine own eyes first.' 
 
 4°. The Chamberlains often attained to large in- 
 fluence by their talents and address ; but there seemed 
 something menial in the duties of the office, o ^ ^ubi- 
 which was therefore filled by slaves or freed- cuio (cham- 
 men, though, as the court adopted more of the * ^° * 
 sentiment and language of the East, the overseer of the 
 sacred bedchamber (praspositus sacri cubiculi) filled a 
 larger place in pubHc thought, and gained at times com- 
 plete ascendancy over a weak or vicious monarch, like 
 the mayors of the palace over puppet kings in France. 
 
 Of far higher social dignity were the official friends 
 of Caesar (amici Caesaris), the notables of Rome who were 
 honoured with his confidence, and called on The Privy 
 for advice as members of a sort of Privy (aSia"^ 
 Council or Consistory, which met in varying Cjesaris). 
 numbers at the discretion of the prince, to debate with 
 him on the affairs of state. It was an old custom with 
 great Roman nobles to divide their friends according to 
 gradations of their rank and influence. The Emperor's 
 court was formed on the same model, and it was of no 
 slight moment to the aspirant after honours to be ranked 
 in one or other of the two great privileged classes. Out 
 of these were chosen the companions (comites, counts) 
 of the prince in all his travels, who journeyed with him 
 at his cost, and were entertained by him at his table. 
 
[98 The Age of the Antonines, ch. ix. 
 
 In the first century the rank had proved a dangerous 
 eminence. With moody and suspicious tyrants, a word, 
 a look, had proved enough to hurl the courtier from his 
 post of honour. But in the period before us the lot was 
 a far happier one. The Privy Councillors were treated 
 with a marked respect, and by the Antonines at least 
 they were not burdened with the duties of personal at- 
 tendance on the prince, or the mere etiquette of social 
 intercourse, save when the business of state required 
 their presence. At last the term became a purely 
 honorary title, and the great functionaries throughout 
 the empire were styled the friends or counts of Cassar. 
 
 The imperial officers were not appointed, like the 
 ministers of state in modern times, to great departments, 
 such as War, the Home Office, the Exchequer ; but each 
 held a fraction of delegated power within local limits 
 carefully prescribed. The city of Rome, the prince's 
 bodyguard, the urban watch, a province or an army, 
 were put under the command of officers who looked 
 only to the Emperor for orders. Two of these posts 
 towered high above the rest in dignity and trust. 
 
 (r) The Praefect of the City represented the Emperor 
 in his absence, and maintained civil order in the capital. 
 The Praefect The policc of Rome lay wholly in his sphere 
 of the City, ^f competence, with summary powers to 
 proceed against slaves; or disturbers of the peace, out 
 of which grew gradually the functions of a High Court of 
 Criminal Jurisdiction. 
 
 (2) The Praefect of the Praetorian solders was at first 
 only the commander of the few thousand household 
 ThePrsefect troops who scrved as the garrison of Rome. 
 PrSorian While the Icgious were far away upon the 
 Guards. frontier, the temper of the Praetorians was of 
 
 vital moment, and the Prsefects might and did dispose of 
 the safety of a throne. Sometimes their loyalty seemed 
 
cH. IX. Administrative Forms of Government. 199 
 
 to be secured by boons and honours, or by marriage ties; 
 sometimes two were named together, to balance each 
 other by their rivalries ; but they were always dangerous 
 to their master, till in the fourth century the power of 
 the sword was wholly taken from them and lodged in 
 the hands of separate commanders. Already the great- 
 est jurists of the day had been appointed to the office, 
 to replace the Emperor on the seat of justice, and it 
 became at last the supreme court of appeal in civil juris- 
 diction. 
 
 The whole of the Roman empire, save Italy alone, was 
 divided into provinces, and in each the central govern- 
 ment was represented by a ruler sent from Rome. For 
 the peaceful lands long since annexed, where .^^^ 
 no armed force was needed, a governor Provincial 
 (proconsul or propraetor) was chosen by the ovemors, 
 senate, in whose name the country was administered. 
 For border lands, or others where there was any danger 
 of turbulence or civil feud, a lieutenant (legatus) of the 
 Emperor ruled in his master's name, and held the power 
 of the sword. There were doubtless cases still of cruelty 
 and greed; but the worst abuses of republican misgovern 
 ment had been long since swept away. The prince 01 
 his councillors kept strict watch and ward, and sharply 
 called offenders to account ; the provincial notables 
 sat in the imperial senate, in which every real grievance 
 could find a champion and a hearing. There was a finan- 
 cial agent (procurator) of the sovereign in each country, 
 ready to note and to report all treasonable action ; 
 despatches travelled rapidly by special posts organized 
 by the government along the great highways. The armed 
 force was seldom lodged in the hands of civil rulers ; the 
 payment of fixed salaries for office made indirect gains 
 seem far less venial ; and the old sentiment was gone that 
 the world was governed in the interest of Rome or of its 
 
20O The Age of the Antonines. ch. ix. 
 
 nobles. The responsibilities of power raised the tone of 
 many of the rulers, and moral qualities which had 
 languished in the stifling air of the great city flourished 
 on the seat of justice before the eyes of subject peoples. 
 
 A certain court or retinue followed each governor to 
 his province, some of which received a definite sanction 
 and a salary from the state. There were trusted intimates 
 on whose experience or energy he might rely, trained jurists 
 and their to act as assessors in the courts, and to guide 
 suite. jjjg judgment on nice points of law, young 
 
 nobles eager to see life in foreign lands, literary men to 
 amuse his leisure moments on the journey, or to help in 
 drafting his despatches, practised accountants for 
 financial business, surveyors or architects for public 
 works, together with personal attendants to minister to 
 their master's wants. None of these, save perhaps the 
 notaries (scribas), were permanent officials, and their 
 number on the whole was small, and quite dispropor- 
 tionate to the size and population of the province. For 
 the agents of the central government were few, and local 
 liberties were still respected, though there were ominous 
 signs of coming changes. 
 
 The imperial rulers had shown little jealousy as yet 
 of municipal self-rule, and almost every town was a unit 
 Local of free-life, with many administrative forms of 
 
 magistrates local gro\vth Still Undisturbed. Magistrates 
 were elected year by year in each ; town councils formed 
 of leading citizens and ex-officials ruled all concerns oi 
 public interest ; general assemblies of the townsmen met 
 from time to time, and took an active part in the details 
 of civic life, long after the comitia of Rome were 
 silenced. Nor were these merely idle forms which dis- 
 guised the reality of servitude. Men still found scope for 
 active energy in managing the affairs of their own towns ; 
 they still saw prizes for a passionate ambition in the 
 
CH. IX, Administrative Forms of Government. 201 
 
 places and the honours which their fellow-countrymen 
 could give. 
 
 We have only to follow the career of some of the lead- 
 ing provincials of the age, we have only to turn over the 
 copies of the numerous inscriptions left on stone 01 
 bronze, to see how much remained in outward show at 
 least, of the old forms of republican activity, and local 
 A H erodes Atticus could still be a command- freedom, 
 ing figure in the life of Greece : a Dion Chrysostom 
 could find occasion for his eloquence in soothing the 
 passions of assemblies and reconciUng the feuds of neigh- 
 bouring cities. No sacrifices seemed too costly for the 
 wealthy who wished to be dignitaries in their native 
 boroughs. To gain a year or two of office they spent 
 vast sums in building libraries or aqueducts, or baths, or 
 schools, or temples, squandering sometimes a fortune in 
 the extravagant magnificence of largesses or shows. 
 They disputed with each other not only for the office of 
 duumvir or of aedile, but for honorary votes of every 
 kind, for precedence at the theatres, for statues whose 
 heads were to be presently replaced with those of other 
 men, for a flattering inscription even on the building 
 which the city had accepted at their hands. 
 
 But if we look below the siuface, and listen to 
 moralists like Plutarch, who best reflect the social 
 features of provincial life, we may have cause to think 
 that public spirit was growing fainter every day, and that 
 the securities for freedom and self-rule were very few. 
 
 (i) Rome was the real centre of attraction as of old, 
 the aim of all ambitious hopes. Local distinc- 
 tions were a natural stepping-stone to a guarantees 
 place in the Senate or the Privy Council, and ^^^Yn^e as 
 employments else of little worth found a value illustrated 
 as the lowest rounds of a ladder of promotion, ^ 
 pn which none could mount hig^h until they had made a 
 
202 The Age of the Antonines. en. ix, 
 
 name at Rome. Men of good old families dropped their 
 ancestral titles and latinized their names to pass as 
 descendants of the conquerors of the world. In a spirit 
 (i)The mu- of flattery and mean compliance, the municipal 
 cluned'^^ authorities abridged with their own hands 
 interference, their ancient freedom, tore up their old tra- 
 ditional charters, consulted the governor at every turn, 
 and laid humbly at his feet the reins of power. 
 
 Of such unconscious traitors Plutarch speaks with 
 just severity. He reminds his readers that the invalids 
 who have been wont to bathe and eat only at the 
 bidding of their doctor, soon lose the healthy enjoyment 
 of their strength ; and so too those who would appeal to 
 Caesar or his servants in every detail of public life, find 
 to their cost that they are masters of themselves no 
 longer ; they degrade senate, magistrates, courts, and 
 people, and reduce their country to a state of impotent 
 and debasing servitude. 
 
 He would have them cherish no illusions, and give 
 themselves no airs of independence, for real power had 
 passed out of their hands ; but it was needless folly to 
 seem to court oppression, or to appear incapable of using 
 the liberties which still remained. For these lasted on by 
 sufferance only, and had no guarantees of permanence ; 
 the old federal leagues had passed away, and there was 
 no bond of union between the cities save the tie of 
 loyalty to the Emperor at Rome. As units of free hfe, 
 linked to each other by some system of provincial 
 parliaments, they might have given effective utterance to 
 the people's will, and have formed organized centres of 
 resistance to oppression, but such assemblies can be 
 hardly traced, save here and there in feeble forms, and 
 the imperial mechanism was brought to bear directly on 
 a number of weak and isolated atoms. 
 
cii. IX. Administrative Forms of Government. 203 
 
 (2) The proconsuls or lieutenants of C?csar grew impa- 
 tient of any show of independence or any variety of local 
 usage. Not content with the maintenance of ^^^ ^j^^ 
 peace and order, and with guarding the in- governors 
 
 ^ \ -i 1T1 • 11 began to 
 
 terests of state, they began to meddle m all meddle 
 the details of civic life. A street-riot, or a °^°''^' 
 financial crisis, or an architect's mistake in public works, 
 was excuse enough for superseding lower powers, and 
 changing the whole machinery of local politics. Some- 
 times immunities were swept away, and old customs set 
 aside by self-willed rulers greedy of extended power, 
 ignorant even of the language of the subject peoples, and 
 careless of the associations of the past. Sometimes con- 
 scientious men like Pliny, who rose above sinister or 
 selfish aims, would interpose in the interests of symmetry 
 and order, or wished to prove their loyalty and zeal by 
 carrying out their master's plans with scant regard for 
 old privileges or historic methods. 
 
 (3) The imperial system was one of personal rule, 
 and the stronger and more self-contained the Cassai 
 on the throne, the more was he tempted to ^^ ^^^ 
 make his government felt in every depart- Caesar on 
 ment of his power. The second century was ^^ more* 
 the asre of able and untiring rulers, whose and more 
 
 ,. , . - , . . , appealed to. 
 
 activity was felt m every part of their wide 
 empire. The ministers who knew the temper of their 
 sovereigns appealed to them in every case of doubt, and 
 the imperial posts along the great high roads were kept 
 in constant work with the despatches which went to and 
 fro between every province and the centre. From 
 distant Bithynia came Pliny's questions about a bath, 
 a guild of firemen, the choice of a surveyor, or the status 
 of a runaway slave who had enlisted in the army ; and 
 Trajan thought it needful to write special letters to 
 
204 The Age of the Antonines. ch. ix. 
 
 forbid a couple of soldiers being shifted from their post 
 or to sanction the removal of a dead man's ashes. 
 
 Under cautious princes like the Antonines the effects of 
 an absolutism so unqualified were for a time disguised ; 
 but the evils of misgovernment, which in the last century 
 had been mainly felt at Rome, might now, as the empire 
 grew more centralized, be known in every land. They 
 were not hid from the eyes of Plutarch, who preferring 
 as he does monarchic rule to every other social form, 
 and looking on the sovereign as the representative of 
 heaven on earth, yet insists on the grave danger to the 
 world if the prince has not learnt the lessons of self- 
 mastery. ' He should be like the sun, which moves most 
 slowly when it attains its highest elevation.' 
 
 We shall better understand the perils of the system 
 then adopted if we look forward to some of 
 evils of a the actual evils of the centralized monarchy 
 later age. of the later empire. 
 
 1°. The sums which flowed into the treasury at Rome 
 seem to have been still moderate, if compared with the 
 1° The ^^^* extent of her dominions, and the wealth of 
 
 pressure of many of the subject lands. Much of the ex- 
 ^^ '°°' pense of government fell upon the local re- 
 sources of the towns, which had their own domains, or 
 levied special taxes for the purpose ; but the rest may be 
 brought under three heads, (i) that of the pay and pen- 
 sions for the soldiers of the legions, (2) of the largesses of 
 corn or money, and (3) of the prince's civil hst, includ- 
 ing the charges of his household and the salaries of pubhc 
 servants. The first and second varied liitle in amount ; 
 there were few changes in the number of troops or the 
 expenses of the service save in crises like the Dacian or 
 Marcomannic war ; at Rome the recipients of corn were 
 kept at nearly the same figure, and it was dangerous to 
 peglect the imperial bounties to the populace of the great 
 
CH. IX. Administrative Forms of Government. 205 
 
 towns. The third was the division in which a thrifty ruler 
 might retrench, or a prodigal exhaust his coffers by ex- 
 travagance. The question was one of personal economy 
 or self-indulgence, for the civil servants were not many, 
 and their salaries as yet formed no great item in the 
 budget. It was by the wantonness of insolent caprices 
 that tyrants such as Caligula or Nero drained their 
 treasuries, and were driven to refill them by rapine or 
 judicial murder. But while they struck at wealthy 
 victims they spared the masses of the people, and it 
 was left to an unselfish ruler like Vespasian to face the 
 outcry and the indignation caused by a heavier system of 
 taxation. 
 
 In general the empire had, in that respect at least, 
 been a boon to the whole Roman world, for it had re- 
 placed the licence and extortion of provincial moderate at 
 governors and farmers of the tithes by a ^''^'' 
 system of definite tariff and control. The land-tax levied! 
 in every country beyond Italy had taken commonly the 
 form of a tithe or fraction of the produce, farmed by 
 middlemen (publicani), and collected by their agents, 
 who were often unscrupulous and venal. It was a method 
 wasteful to the state and oppressive to the subjects, and 
 full of inequalities and seeming hardships. The first 
 step taken by Augustus was to carry out a general survey 
 of the empire as a needful condition of a fairer distribu- 
 tion of the burdens ; another was to control the licence 
 of the publicans by a financial agent in each province, 
 holding a commission directly from the prince. 
 
 Further steps were gradually taken, and by the time 
 of Marcus Aurelius the system of middlemen was swept 
 away. Tithes were not levied as before in kind, but a land- 
 tax (tributum soli) of uniform pressure took their place. 
 Italy had long enjoyed immunities under the RepubHc, 
 when she lived upon the plunder of th<» world ; but 
 
2o6 The Age of the Antonines ch. ix. 
 
 custom-duties (portoria) were imposed on her by the 
 first Caesar, and tolls at the markets (centesima rerum 
 venalium) by Augustus, while succession duties (vicesima 
 hereditatum) were levied in the course of the same reign 
 in spite of the indignant outcry of the wealthier Romans. 
 These or their equivalents under other names were the 
 chief sources of revenue, to which we have to add the 
 lands and mines which passed into the imperial domains 
 as the heritage of the state or of the royal houses of the 
 provinces, together with the proceeds of legacies and 
 confiscations. , 
 
 There was no large margin, it would seem, for per- 
 sonal extravagance or a social crisis ; but the Antonines 
 became were happily of frugal habits, and one of them, 
 
 gradually as we have seen, parted with the heirlooms of 
 more tn- the palace rather than lay fresh burdens on 
 tense. j^^g people. Future rulers were less scrupu- 
 
 lous than they. The brilliancy of personal display, the 
 costly splendours borrowed from the Eastern courts, the 
 charge of a rapidly increasing civil service, the corruption 
 of the agents of the treasury, the pensions paid to the 
 barbarian leaders — these and other causes led to a 
 steady drain upon the exchequer which it was harder every 
 year to keep supplied. Fresh dues and tolls of various 
 kinds were frequently imposed ; the burdens on the land 
 grew more oppressive as the prosperity of the wealth- 
 producing classes waned, till at last a chorus of many 
 voices rises to deplore the general misery caused by the 
 pressure of taxation, the insolence of the collectors in 
 the towns, the despair of the poor artisans when the 
 poll-tax is demanded, parents selling their children into 
 slavery, women driven to a life of shame, landowners 
 flying from the exhausted fields to take refuge even with 
 barbarian peoples, and all the signs of universal bank- 
 ruptcy. 
 
;h. rx 
 
 Administrative Forms of Government. 207 
 
 2°. The administrative system gradually became 
 more bureaucratic and more rigidly oppressive. In early 
 days the permanent civil servants of the state 2°. The 
 were few in number. At Rome we read of bu^T °* 
 notaries or accountants (scribse), of javelin cracy 
 men (lictores), and ushers (apparitores) in personal 
 attendance on the magistrates. These were seemingly 
 allowed to form themselves in guilds in defence oi 
 their professional rights, and gained a sort of vested 
 interest in their office, which could at times be even 
 bought or sold. 
 
 But their number and importance was not great. We 
 have little evidence of like classes in the provinces, 
 and the governor's suite went out and returned with him 
 as his own friends or retainers, while doubtless servile 
 labour was largely used upon the spot. 
 
 Such a practice was too rude and immature to last 
 long after the activity of the central government became 
 more intense. In the course of time, there- 
 fore, the whole character of such official work ed by op- 
 was changed ; the accountants and the ^t^JtSons'^on 
 writers rapidly increased in number as the the Civil 
 business grew upon their hands, and the state 
 secured its servants a professional status. This, stiange 
 to say, was called a military service (militia) ; many of 
 the grades of rank adopted in different stages of em- 
 ployment were borrowed from the army ; a certain uni- 
 form was worn at last, and commissions were made out in 
 the Emperor's name, while a sort of martial discipline 
 was observed in the bureaux (scrinia). Honours and 
 privileges and illustrious names were given to the heads 
 of the official hierarchy ; but the state began to tighten 
 its grasp upon its agents, to require a long period of 
 service, to refuse permission to retire until a substitute 
 was found, io force the children to learn their fathers' 
 
2o8 The Age of the Antoninesi. ch. ix. 
 
 craft and step one day into their places, till the whole 
 civil service gradually became one large official caste, in 
 which each generation was bound to a lifelong servitude, 
 disguised under imposing names and military forms. 
 
 3°. A like series of changes may be traced in a 
 
 higher social order. In all the lands through which 
 
 „ „ . Greek or Italian influence had spread, some 
 
 3°. Mum- - •! 1 -I • -1 
 
 cipai sort of town-council had existed as a necessary 
 
 be^me^ element of civic life. The municipal laws of 
 
 onerous the first Csesars defined the functions of this 
 
 order (ordo decurionum, curia), which like the 
 Roman Senate was composed of ex-officials, or other 
 citizens of dignity and wealth. 
 
 For a century or more, while the tide of public hfe 
 flowed strongly in the provinces, the status of a councillor 
 (decurio, curialis) was prized, and leading men spent 
 time and money freely in the service of their fellows. 
 As the empire grew more centralized, local distinctions 
 were less prized, and we find in the inscriptions fewer 
 names of patriots willing, Hke H erodes Atticus, to enrich 
 their native cities with the monuments of their lavish 
 bounty. As municipal honours were less valued, the old 
 relation was inverted, and the councillors had to fill in 
 turn the public offices, which instead of dignities were 
 felt to be oppressive burdens. 
 
 By the time of Trajan we find the traces of unwilling- 
 ness to serve, and in the reign of Marcus Aurelius the 
 reluctance had grown already more intense. The sophist 
 Aristides tells us frankly of his eagerness to escape from 
 civic charges, how he wept and fasted, prayed and 
 pleaded to his gods, till he saw the vision of white maids 
 who came to set him free, and found the dream was 
 followed by imperial despatches which contained the 
 dispensation so much longed for. 
 
 The central government, in its concern, devised more 
 
CH. IX. A dmi7iistrative Forms of Government, 209 
 
 marks of honour and distinction ; but still men grew less 
 willing to wear the gilded chains, for the responsibilities 
 of office grew more weighty. The order of decuriones had 
 not only to meet as it best could the local needs, but to 
 raise the imperial taxes, to provide for the commissariat 
 of the armies, and keep the people in good humour by spec- 
 tacles and corn and grants of money. Men sought to quit 
 their homes and part with their estates, and hoard as best 
 they could the proceeds of the sale, if only they could free 
 themselves from public duties. But still the state pursued 
 them with its claims ; the service of the councillors 
 became a charge on landed property, the citizen of means 
 was a functionary who might not quit his post. He 
 might not sell his fields, for the treasury had a lien on 
 them ; he might not travel at his ease, for that would be 
 a waste of public time ; he might not live unmarried, for 
 his duty was to provide children to succeed him when he 
 died; be might not even take Holy Orders when he 
 would, for folks of narrow means were good enough for 
 that, but 'he must stay in the bosom of his native 
 country, and, like the minister of holy things, go through 
 the ceaseless round of solemn service.' 
 
 In their despair the decuriones try to fly, but they are 
 hunted down without compunction. Their names are 
 posted in the proclamations with runaways and criminals 
 of the lowest class ; they are tracked even to the pre- 
 cincts of the churches, to the mines and quarries where 
 they seek a shelter, to the lowest haunts of the most de- 
 graded outcasts. In spite of all such measures their 
 numbers dwindled constantly, and had to be recruited, 
 while land was given to the newly enrolled to qualify 
 them for the duties of the service. Still the cry was for 
 more to fill the vacant offices of state, and the press-gang 
 gathered in fresh tax-gatherers— for they were little more 
 — from every class. The veteran's son, if weak or idlC; 
 
 A. H. P 
 
210 The Age oj the Antonines. cii. ix 
 
 the coward who had mutilated himself to be unfit for 
 soldiers' work, the deacon who had unfrocked himself or 
 been degraded — all were good enough for this — the 
 priestly gambler even, who had been counted hopeless 
 and excommunicate, and who was declared to be pos- 
 sessed of an evil spirit, was sent not to a hospital but tc 
 the airia. 
 
 4°. The same tendencies were at work meantime on 
 every side in other social grades, for in wellnigh all alike 
 Q the imperial system first interfered with healthy 
 
 andin^ ^ energy by its centralised machinery, dis- 
 beSm^e couraged industry by heavy burdens, and 
 
 hereditary then appealed to force to keep men to the 
 taskwork which they shunned. Its earlier 
 rulers had indeed favoured the growth of trade and the 
 development of industry, had respected the dignity of the 
 labour of free artisans, and fostered the growth of guilds 
 and corporations which gave the sense of mutual pro- 
 tection and of self-respect to the classes among which 
 they sprung. Bounties and privileges were granted to 
 many of such unions, which specially existed for the 
 service of the state, for the carrying trade of Roman 
 markets, or the labours of the post, the arsenals, the 
 docks. 
 
 Over these the control became gradually more strin- 
 gent as the spur of self-interest ceased to prompt the 
 workers to continued effort. Men must be chained, like 
 galley slaves if need be, to their work, rather than the 
 well-being of society should suffer, or government be dis- 
 credited in vital points. The principle adopted in their 
 case was extended to many other forms of industry 
 which languished from the effects of high taxation or 
 unwise restrictions^ and were likely to be deserted in 
 despair. In the rural districts also sturdy amis must be 
 kept to the labours of the field, lest the towns be starved 
 
CH. IX. Administrative Forms of Government. 21 r 
 
 by their neglect ; peasants must not be allowed to roam at 
 will, or betake themselves to other work, but be tied to 
 the fields they cultivated in a state of villeinage or serf- 
 dom. The armies could not safely be exposed to the 
 chances of volunteer recruits ; but the landowners must 
 provide their quota, or the veterans bring up their chil- 
 dren in the camp, or military colonies be planted on the 
 frontier with the obligation of perpetual service. 
 
 So, high and low, through every grade of social status, 
 the tyranny of a despotic government was felt. It drained 
 the life-blood from the heart of every social organism ; 
 it cut at the roots of public spirit and of patriotic pride, 
 and dried up the natural sources of unselfish effort. And 
 then, in self-defence, it chained men to their work, and 
 made each department of the public service a sort of 
 convict labour in an hereditary caste. 
 
 But the toil of slaves is but a sorry substitute for the 
 enlightened industry of freemen ; and the empire grew 
 poorer as its liberties were cramped. It grew weaker 
 also in its energies of self-defence, for when the bar- 
 barians knocked loudest at the gates, instead of the 
 strong cohesion of a multitude of centres of free life 
 bound to each other by a thousand interlacing sym- 
 pathies, they found before them only towns and villages 
 standing alone in helpless isolation, and vainly looking 
 round them for defence, while the central mechanism 
 was sadly out of gear. 
 
 The imperial Colossus seemingly had dwindled to an 
 morganic group of crumbling atoms. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 ADONIS, 162 
 ■**•_ Aelia Capitolina, 72 
 Agri decumates, ■26 
 Agricola, Calpuniius, 95 
 Akiba, 72 
 Alcantara, 15 
 
 Alexander the grammarian. 115 
 Alexandria, 57, 108. 177 
 Algeria, 52 
 Altinum, 98 
 Ancona, 16 
 Anio, 17 
 Antimachus, 64 
 Anlinous, 57 
 
 Antioch, 41, 44, 52, 89, 107. 191 
 Antoninus, Marcus, 78. 80^129, 
 
 137, 144, 205 
 Antoninus, Pius, 68, 70, 73-80, 150 
 Antonlus, Marcus, 41 
 Apamea, 24 
 Apis, 57 
 
 Apollodorus, 36, 65. 65 
 Apollonius, 78, 114 
 Apologists, 147 
 Appian Road, 15 
 Apuleius, 188-190 
 Aqua Marcia, 17 
 Aquae (Baden-Baden), 26 
 Aquileia, 97, 101 
 Arabia, 46 
 Arbela, 45 
 
 Aristides, 108, 160, 187, 190. jo8 
 Aristocles, 185 
 Armenia, 40, 42, 88 
 Arrian, 56, 65, 171 
 Artaxata, 90 
 Arval Brothers, 151-6 
 Asklepios [yEsculapiusi. t6o 
 Assyria, 46 
 
 Athens, 37, 40, 41, 55, 177, 184, 1 
 
 Attica, 187 
 
 Attis, 192 
 
 Augustan history, writers of, 148 
 
 Augu.stus, II, 24, 27, 60, 70, I 
 
 150, 158, 205 
 Aulus Gellius, 186 
 Aurelius, M., vide Antoninus 
 Avidius Cassius, 88. 90, 103-7 
 
 OABYLON, 46 
 ■*-' Bacchanalia, 158 
 Baiae, 70 
 Barchochebas, 72 
 Belgrade, 30 
 Beneventum, i3 
 Bether, 73 
 Bithynia, 135, 20 j 
 Blandina, 143 
 Brigantes, 76 
 Britain, 51, 53, 95 
 Bructeri, 25 
 
 pALEDONIA, 9s 
 ^^ Caligula, 70, 155 
 Calpurnius, v. AgTicol;« 
 Capitoline, the, 36 
 Cappadocia, 56 
 Carlisle, 53 
 Camac, 56 
 Carpathians, the, 35 
 Carrhae, 41 
 Cassius, V. Avidiut 
 Cassius, V. Dion 
 Catacombs, the, lart^ 138 
 Cato, 63, 77, iCvi 
 Olsus, 14s 
 
214 
 
 Index. 
 
 Centumcellae, i6 
 
 Cephalonia, 55 
 
 Cephissia, 186 
 
 Chaeroneia, 177 
 
 Chaldaia, 47 
 
 China, 90 
 
 Chrestus, 130 
 
 Christian Church, the, 129-149, 164, 
 
 180 
 Cicero, 64, i8a 
 Cilicia, 47 
 Cladova, 33 
 Claudius, 54, 130 
 Clemens, 135 
 Clyde, the, 95 
 Colchis, 78 
 Collegia, 151 
 Comnndus, 110, 12S 
 Como, 20 
 
 Constantine, 36, 37 
 Constantius, 38 
 Cornelius Palma, 62 
 Corybas, 192 
 Crassus, 41 
 Ctesiphon, 46, 47, 90 
 Curius, "jj 
 
 Cynic, picture of, 172 
 Cyprus, 46, 71 
 Cyrenaica, 46 
 Czemetz, 33 
 
 P)ACIAN WAR. 28-35 
 
 ■^-^ Dacians. 27 
 
 Dante, 49 
 
 Danube, the, 26-8, 76, 95 
 
 Daphne, 42, 89 
 
 Decebalus, 27, 2S, 30, 32 
 
 Decuriones, 208 
 
 Diocletian, no 
 
 Diognetus, 114 
 
 Dion Cassius, 8, 29, 33, 48, 102, 1 10, 
 
 128 
 Dion Chrysostom, 5, 174-7 
 Dniester, 95 
 
 Domitian, i, 7, 25, 135, 175 
 Domitilla, 1^5 
 Drusus, 27 
 
 PDESSA, 46 
 ■'-' Egypt, 21, 46, 57, 161 
 Eleusinian mysteries, 108 
 Ennius, 64, 182 
 Ephesus, 185 
 Epictetus, i'4, 170-4 
 Epiphanes. 44 
 
 Euphrates, ^i, 46, 55. 88, go, 96 
 
 FAUSTINA, wife of Antoninur. 
 P., 75 . 
 Faustina, wife of M. Aurelim^ 8 
 
 92, 107-8, 127, 188 
 Faustinianse, 109 
 Favorinus, 63, 185 
 Flavian dynasty, 156 
 Flonis, 65 
 Forth, Forth of, 95 
 Fronto, 81, 86, 91, 114, 182 
 
 riALEN, 98 
 
 ^■^ Germania of Tadtus, ag 
 
 Germany, 25, 52 
 
 Getas, 27 
 
 Gnostics, 147 
 
 Gordian, 152 
 
 Goths, 71 
 
 Gregory the Great, 49 
 
 I_r ADRIAN, 28, 49-73, 138 t^9 
 J^i 184, 195 
 Hatszeger Thai, 31 
 Helvidius, 4 
 Hermannstadt, 34 
 Herodes Atticus, 185, 208 
 Hormisdas, 38 
 Hydaspes, the, 41 
 
 TLLYRIA, 96 
 ^ India, 46 
 Irenaeus, 138 
 Iron Gates, the, 34 
 Isseus, 182 
 Isis, 158, 162, 196 
 
 JEROME, 73 
 
 J Jews, 71-3, 76, 129 
 
 Julian, 126 
 
 Julianus Salvius, 60, 65 
 
 Julius Caesar, 24 
 
 Julius Severus, 72 
 
 Junius, V. Rusticus 
 
 Justin Martyr, 138, 149 
 
 T AMB^SIS, 52 
 
 *-' Licinius Sura, ix, afi 
 
 Logos, the, 148 
 
Index. 
 
 215 
 
 Longinus, 33 
 Lorium, 77, 85 
 Lucian, 144, 190-3 
 Lucilla, 90 
 Lugdunum, 142, 163 
 Lupercalia, 151 
 Lusiiis Quietus, 30, 62 
 
 IVT^SIA, 27, 33 
 
 ••■'•*• Mainz, 27 
 
 Marcomanni, 96, 100 
 
 Mausoleum of Augustus, 7 
 
 Mausoleum of Hadrian, 71 
 
 Maximus, 115 
 
 Memnon's statue, 56 
 
 Memphis, 192 
 
 Mithras, 192 
 
 Momus, 192 
 
 Moors, i!:e, 51, 7^, q^ 
 
 ]SJ ERO, 43, 70, 99. 13T 
 ■^ ^ Narva, 1-7 
 Newcastle, 53 
 Nicaea, 23 
 Nicomedia, 23 
 Nineveh, 46 
 
 QGRADINA, 30 
 
 ^^ Origen, 145 , 
 
 Orontes, the, 44 
 
 Orsova, 30 
 
 Ostia, 16 
 
 Oxus, the, 41 
 
 PALESTINE, 46, 71 
 
 -*■ Palma, v. Cornelius, 62 
 
 Panathenaic Speech, 187 
 
 Pannonia, 2^, 33, 50, 109 
 
 Parthamasins, 42-3 
 
 Parthian War, under Trajan 407 ; 
 
 under M. Aurelius, 88-91 
 Parthians, the, 32 
 Peregrinus Proteus 144 
 Persia, 45 
 Phidias, 67, 160 
 Philager, 187 
 Plirygian Mother, 163 
 Placentia, 18 
 
 Plato, 80, 110, 119, 148, i3o 
 Pliny, 3, 13, 16, 20, 21, 48, 133. 203 
 Plotma, 9, 14, 50 
 
 Plutarch, 159, 177-181, 20^! 
 Polemon, 78, 184 
 Polybius, 196 
 Polycarp, 141-2 
 Polycletus, 67 
 Pompeianus, 126 
 Pompeius Magnus, 133 
 Pomponia Graicina, 13c 
 Ponticus, 143 
 Pontine Mjirshes, 15 
 Poppaea, 131 
 Pothinus, 143 
 Praefect of the City, ipB 
 Praefect of the Praetorians, 198 
 Prusa, 23, 175, 177 
 Ptolemies, the, 57 
 Ptolemy, 16 
 
 QUADI, 97, 102 
 Quietus, V. Lusioff 
 ' Quintilian, 182 
 Quirinal, 'he, ^6 
 
 PAVENNA, 103 
 •*^^ Rhine, 25, 76 
 Rimini, ^2 
 Roumanians, 36 
 Rusticus, 83, 93, 114, 149 
 
 CABAZIUS, 192 
 
 "^ Sabina, 56 
 
 Salii/ 81, 151 
 
 Salvius Jfulianus, 60, 65 
 
 Samosata, 190 
 
 Sargetia, 34 
 
 Sarmatians, iii 
 
 Sarmizegethusa, 31 
 
 Save, the, 29 
 
 Segestica, 29 
 
 Seleucia, 41, 46, 90 
 
 Selinus, 47 
 
 Seneca, 196 
 
 Serapis, 57, 158 
 
 Servianus, 50, 6x3 
 
 Severus, Julius, 72 
 
 Sextus, 115 
 
 Sibylline books, 157 
 
 Sirmium, 109, 188 
 
 S^rjTna, 78, io3, 141, 161, tftj 
 
 Socrates, 148, 16-7 
 
 Sophists, 167 
 
 Spain, 80 
 
 Statins the Poet, 13? 
 
2l6 
 
 Index. 
 
 Statius Priscus, 90 
 Stoics, the. 86 122-?, t7i 
 Strabo, a^ 
 Suetonius, 130 
 Suez, Isthmus of, 16 
 Sura, V. Licinius 
 Susa, 46 
 Syria, 38, 41, 50 
 
 •TTACITUS, 5, as, 95. 131 
 -*■ Tapae, 31 
 Taurobolium, 163 
 TauruSj 108 
 Tertulhan, 137, 138 
 Thracians, the, 27 
 Thule, 196 
 Tiberius, 27, 130 
 Tibur, villa at, 66 
 Tierna, 30 
 Tigranes, 41 
 Tigris, the, A", 
 Tiridates, 43 
 Titus, 46, 71 
 
 Trajan, 7-4^, 136, 177, aoa 
 Transylvania, 28, 31 
 Trapezus, 56 
 Troy, 55 
 
 Turks, the, 41 
 Tum-Severin, 33 
 
 ^LPIA TRAJANA, «o 
 
 YENICE,,49 
 ^ Verginius Rufus, 2 
 Verus, /Elius, 68, 84 
 Verus, Lucius, 87, 88-91, 97, 98, ro4 
 Verus, M. Annius, t/. M. Antommig, 
 
 80 
 Vespasian, 12, 25, 205 
 Vienna in Gaul, 142 
 Vienna in Germany, t 
 Viminacium, 30 
 Volcan Pass, 34 
 
 ■y^ALLACKS, ths, 33. jr, 
 
 yANTEN,20 
 •^^- Xiphilinus, ioj 
 
 Printed by Ballantvne, Hanson & Co 
 Edinburgh and London 
 
(« 117 1 
 
.^^.-^im 
 
 .te