The picture drawn by Juvenal of the abominations that infected the whole frame of Roman society that moral leprosy from which neither age nor sex was free-those audacious vices, ostentatiously professed and openly practised, are hideous in the perusal, even when conveyed to us by indignant satire. Speaking of his contemporaries, the poet says

"No age can go beyond us: future times

Can add no further to the present crimes.
Our sons but the same things can wish and do;
Vice is at stand, and at the highest flow.
Some may, perhaps, demand what Muse can yield
Sufficient strength for such a spacious field?
From whence can be deriv'd so large a vein,
Bold truths to speak, and, spoken, to maintain;
When godlike freedom is so far bereft

The noble mind, that scarce the name is left?"*

In giving the " argument" of, or, more properly speaking, a commentary on, Juvenal's Sixth Satire, Dryden thus expresses himself:-"They" (his readers) "will peruse with wonder and abhorrence the vices of an age which was the most infamous of any on record. They will bless themselves when they behold those examples related of Domitian's time. They will give back to antiquity those monsters it produced."

But it was not only in the vices arising out of libertinism that the Romans, at certain periods of

* Juvenal, Sat. i., Dryden's trans.

their history, indulged; for, as if needing a novelty in crime, they sought gratification in cruelties from the perpetration of which even savage tribes might shrink. "The gladiatorial fights under the emperors became, like bread, one of the most indispensable necessaries to the people, and one of the most important objects of concern to its rulers. The Romans were delighted, in the games, to contemplate men (devoted to certain death) contending with savage animals. 'Christianos ad liones,' (the Christians to the lions), was the cry that resounded in the circus. A thirst for blood, after being long the predominant passion of the leaders, became an actual craving in the people-a festive entertainment for the multitude!"*"We might cast an eye upon the manners of Rome, Carthage, and many other states in their last declining period, where we should behold such tragic scenes of cruelty, impiety, and oppression as would confound the most sanguine advocate for the manners of antiquity."†

That the Roman empire should decline into barbarism under such circumstances, does not appear surprising. During the three centuries that elapsed previously to the fall of that vast and unwieldy fabric of despotism and injustice, let us contemplate the conduct of the emperors, and ascertain whether any improvement had taken place. "Their contempt for human suffering, their delight in blood,

* Schleger.

† Shaftesbury's Estimate, 8vo edit., p. 27.

the wild ebullitions of their passions under temporary excitement, their treatment of women, and their degrading personal vices, all which were common in the people, show the state of moral principle at this period."

A distinguished historian and politician says — "In looking to the governments of antiquity, they fell by the gradual decay of national virtue, and the corruption of the people themselves as well as their leaders. In Sparta and in Rome, this corruption may in the beginning be attributed to an influx of wealth; but the precipitate fall of a state like that of Rome into an abyss of profligacy and venality, can only happen when the whole people are stained by political and moral vices.”*

Governments flourish only when power is lodged in the hands of the best men; but during the reigns of Augustus and his successors, the sovereignty was gained by the worst men through interested connivance, fraud, or violence; and it is not surprising that such monarchs should promote agents who most resembled themselves. Augustus was worse in the beginning than in the latter end of his reign; but his execrable successor, Tiberius, grew more wicked every day. In his seclusion at Capreæ, he meditated nothing but impure indulgences and political mischief, having Macro and Sejanus always ready to execute his detestable designs. Caligula

* Lord J. Russell, English Con, p. 460.

was inconvenienced because he could find none equal to himself in all manner of villanies. The stupidity and drunkenness of Claudius were as injurious to the empire as the savage fury of his predecessor. The existence of the monster Nero was a stain upon the world; and Galba no sooner became emperor, than the virtues which had brightened his early career disappeared, and he rivalled the rest in tyranny and dishonesty. His murderer, Otho, was elected to succeed him, for no better reason than that the latter had been the associate of Nero's shameful pleasures. The instruments, therefore, were as base as their masters; and under such circumstances, all evils came in like a flood. Public virtue was stifled, and Rome was filled with a miserable rabble, who cared for nothing but stage plays and mere subsistence. When the Commonwealth was destroyed, valour and virtue were torn up by the roots, and Roman power began to languish.*

So vile a state of things carried with it the seeds of destruction. "Vengeance," says the poet, "will sit above our faults." At length the rude people of the north imitated the skilful military tactics and discipline of their conquerors; and being more numerous, capable of greater endurance, and equal in courage, were not likely to fail when opposed to the enervated and vicious rabble of Italy. The

• See Algernon Sidney on Government.

ardour, the enthusiasm, the certainty of conquest, and the discipline that led the Roman soldier to an easy victory in the days of the Republic, no longer existed. His bravery might remain, but its moral and vital adjuncts were gone. The savage and hardy tribes of the north felt in their turn the stimulants of war and conquest, and subjugated their former

oppressors.

From a deficiency of the elements that constitute true civilisation, we find the Romans, in place of advancing, resemble the Greeks, arrive at a certain point, and then retrograde into barbarism; their oligarchies were more severe, their monarchies more despotic than even amongst the former.

It seems unnecessary to go further into the inquiry; all we need add is, that the fall of the empire of the Cæsars was the consequence of the vices and pollutions that originated and existed individually and collectively in the community. Although a considerable period elapsed from the reign of Constantine to that of Justinian, and the former had professed himself a Christian, yet the precepts of Christianity were little followed; and most truly has it been affirmed*, that the intolerant maxims of the Emperor and his priesthood were as unfriendly to the moral principle and dignity of man, as they were hostile to the true interests of religion and of human happiness.

* Montesquieu.