CHAP. the friends and ministers of Marcus; and when, IV. at a late hour of the night, he was awakened He is acknowledg ed by the with the news that the chamberlain and the præfect were at his door, he received them with intrepid resignation, and desired they would exe-· cute their master's orders. Instead of death, they offered him the throne of the Roman world. During some moments he distrusted their intentions and assurances. Convinced at length of the death of Commodus, he accepted the purple with a sincere reluctance, the natural effect of his knowledge both of the duties and of the dangers of the supreme rank *. Lætus conducted without delay his new emperor to the camp of the Prætorians, diffusing at Prætorian the same time through the city a seasonable reguards; port that Commodus died suddenly of an apoplexy; and that the virtuous Pertinax had already succeeded to the throne. The guards were rather surprised than pleased with the suspicious death of a prince, whose indulgence and liberality they alone had experienced; but the emergency of the occasion, the authority of their præfect, the reputation of Pertinax, and the clamours of the people, obliged them to stifle their secret discontents, to accept the donative promised of the new emperor, to swear allegiance to him, and with joyful acclamations and laurels in their hands to conduct 20. Præfect of the city. Herodian (1. i. p. 48.) does justice to his disinterested spirit; but Capitolinus, who collected every popular rumour, charges him with a great fortune acquired by bribery and corruption. * Julian, in the Caesars, taxes him with being accessary to the death of Commodus. IVA and by the senate, 1st January. conduct him to the senate-house, that the military CHAP. consent might be ratified by the civil authority.s This important night was now far spent with the dawn of day, and the commencement of the new year, the senators expected a summons to A. D. 198. attend an ignominious ceremony. In spite of all remonstrances, even of those of his creatures, who yet preserved any regard for prudence or decency, Commodus had resolved to pass the night in the gladiator's school, and from thence to take possession of the consulship, in the habit and with the attendance of that infamous crew. . On a sudden, before the break of day, the senate was called together in the temple of Concord, to meet the guards, and to ratify the election of a: new emperor. For a few minutes they sat in silent suspense, doubtful of their unexpected deliverance, and suspicious of the cruel artifices of Commodus; but when at length they were assured that the tyrant was no more, they resigned themselves to the transports of joy and indignation. Pertinax, who modestly represented the meanness of his extraction, and pointed out several noble senators more deserving than himself of the empire, was constrained by their dutiful violence to ascend the throne, and received all the titles of Imperial power, confirmed by the most sincere vows of fidelity. The memory of The me Commodus was branded with eternal infamy. mory of The names of tyrant, of gladiator, of public ene- declared my, resounded in every corner of the house. They decreed in tumultuous votes, that his ho nours Commodus infamous. IV. off Legal jurisdiction of RE AHT AND sw asidon, bavot cited CHA P. nours should be reversed, his titles erased from the public monuments, his statues thrown down, This body dragged with a hook into the strippingroom of the gladiators, to satiate the public fury; and they expressed some indignation against those officious servants who had already presumed to screen his remains from the justice of the senate. But Pertinax could not refuse those last rites to the memory of Marcus, and the tears of his first protector Claudius Pompeianus, who lamented the cruel fate of his brother-in-law, and lamented still more that he had deserved it *30-2398. These effusions of impotent rage against a dead emperor, whom the senate had flattered baraba when alive with the most abject servility, betrayed a just but ungenerous spirit of revenge. w bavil The legality of these decrees was however supported by the principles of the Imperial consti tution. To censure, to depose, or to punish with death, the first magistrate of the republic, who had abused his delegated trust, was the ancient and undoubted prerogative of the Roman senate +; but that feeble assembly was obliged to content itself with inflicting on a fallen tyrant that public justice, from which, during his life and reign, he had been shielded by the strong arm of military despotism. the senate over the emperors. Pertinax *linus gives us the particulars of these tumultuary votes, The senate condemned Nero to be put to death more mejo rum, Sueton. c. 49. 94 Pertinax found a nobler way of condemning CHA P. his predecessor's memory; by the contrast of his own virtues, with the vices of Commodus. On the day of his accession, he resigned over to his Fertinax. wife and son his whole private fortune; that they might have no pretence to solicit favours at the expence of the state. He refused to flatter the vanity of the former with the title of Augusta or to correct the inexperienced youth of the latter by the rank of Cæsar. Accurately distinguishing between the duties of a parent and those of a sovereign, he educated his son with a severe simplicity, which, while it gave him no assured prospect of the throne, might in time have rendered him worthy of it. In public, the behaviour of Pertinax was grave and affable. He lived with the virtuous part of the senate, (and, in a private station, he had been acquainted with the true character of each individual,) without either pride or jealousy; considered them as friends and companions, with whom he had shared the dangers of the tyranny, and with whom he wished to enjoy the security of the present time. He very frequently invited them to familiar entertainments, the frugality of which was ridiculed by those who remembered and regretted the luxurious prodigality of Commodus *. VOL. I. M To *Dion (1. lxxiii. p. 1223.) speaks of these entertainments, as a senator who had supped with the emperor. Capitolinus, Hist. August. p. 58.) like a slave, who had received his intelligence from one of the scullions. IV. He endea form the state. CHAP. To heal, as far as it was possible, the wounds inflicted by the hand of tyranny, was the plea sing, but melancholy, task of Pertinax. The invours to re- nocent victims, who yet survived, were recalled from exile, released from prison, and restored to the full possession of their honours and fortunes. The unburied bodies of murdered senators (for the cruelty of Commodus endeavoured to extend itself beyond death) were deposited in the sepulchres of their ancestors; their memory was justified; and every consolation was bestowed on their ruined and afflicted families. Among these consolations, one of the most grateful was the punishment of the delators; the common enemies of their master, of virtue, and of their country. Yet even in the inquisition of these legal assassins, Pertinax proceeded with a steady temper, which gave every thing to justice, and nothing to popular prejudice and resentment, His regulations, The finances of the state demanded the most vigilant care of the emperor. Though every measure of injustice and extortion had been adopted, which could collect the property of the subject into the coffers of the prince; the rapaciousness of Commodus had been so very inadequate to his extravagance, that upon his death, no more than eight thousand pounds were found in the exhausted treasury *, to defray the current expences of government, and to disharge the pressing demand of a liberal donative, which the for Decies. The blameless ceconomy of Pius left his successors a treasure of vicies septies millies, above two and twenty millions sterling. Dion, 1. lxxiii. p. 1231. |