VI.

CHAP. It was reserved for the virtue of Alexander to relieve them in a great measure from this into5 lerable grievance, by reducing the tributes to al thirtieth part of the sum exacted at the time of 1 his accession *. It is impossible to conjecture? the motive that engaged him to spare so trifling a remnant of the public evil; but the noxious weed, which had not been totally eradicated, again sprang up with the most luxuriant growth, and in the succeeding age darkened the Roman world with its deadly shade. In the eourse of this history, we shall be too often summoned to explain the land-tax, the capitation, and the heavy contributions of corn, wine, oil, and meat, which were exacted from the provinces for the use of the court, the army, and the capital.

Conse

As long as Rome and Italy were respected as quences of the centre of government, a national spirit was sal freedom preserved by the ancient, and insensibly imbibed of Rome. by the adopted, citizens. The principal com

the univer

mands of the army were filled by men who had recieved a liberal education, were well instructed in the advantages of laws and letters, and who had risen, by equal steps, through the regular succession of civil and military honours †. To their influence and example we may partly ascribe the modest obedience of the legions during the two first centuries of the Imperial history.

But

*He who paid ten aurei, the usual tribute, was charged with no more than the third part of an aureus, and proportional pieces of gold were coined by Alexander's order. Hist. August. p. 127. with the commentary of Salmasius.

+ See the lives of Agricola, Vespasian, Trajan, Severus, and his three competitors; and indeed of all the eminent men of those times.

VITY

But when the last enclosure of the Roman CHA P. constitution was trampled down by Caracalla, the separation of professions gradually succeeded to the distinction of ranks. The more polished citizens of the internal provinces were alone qualified to act as lawyers and magistrates. The rougher trade of arms was abandoned to the peasants and barbarians of the frontiers, who knew no country but their camp, no science but that of war, no civil laws, and scarcely those of military discipline. With bloody hands, savage manners, and desperate resolutions, they sometimes guarded, but much oftener subverted, the throne of the emperors.

CHAP.

VII.

The appa

cule,

The Elevation and Tyranny of Maximin.-Rebellion in Africa and Italy, under the Authority. of the Senate.-Civil Wars and Seditions.-Vio-. lent Deaths of Maximin and his Son, of Maximus and Balbinus, and of the three Gordians. -Usurpation and secular Games of Philip.

OF

F the various forms of government, which · have prevailed in the world, an hereditary monarchy seems to present the fairest scope for rent ridi- ridicule. Is it possible to relate, without an indignant smile, that on the father's decease, the property of a nation, like that of a drove of oxen, descends to his infant son, as yet unknown to mankind and to himself; and that the bravest warriors and the wisest statesmen, relinquishing their natural right to empire, approach the royal cradle with bended knees and protestations of inviolable fidelity? Satire and declamation may paint these obvious topics in the most dazzling colours, but our more serious thoughts will respect a useful prejudice, that establishes a rule of succession, independent of the passions of mankind; and we shall cheerfully acquiesce in any expedient which deprives the multitude of the dangerous, and indeed the ideal, power of giving themselves a master.

and solid

In the cool shade of retirement, we may easily advantages devise imaginary forms of government, in which

of heredi

tary succession,

the

271

VII.

the sceptre shall be constantly bestowed on the CHAP. most worthy, by the free and incorrupt suffrage. of the whole community. Experience overturns these airy fabrics, and teaches us, that in a large society, the election of a monarch can never devolve to the wisest, or to the most numerous, part of the people. The army is the only order of men sufficiently united to concur in the same sentiments, and powerful enough to impose them on the rest of their fellow-citizens: but the temper of soldiers, habituated at once to violence and to slavery, renders them very unfit guardians of a legal, or even a civil constitution. Justice, humanity, or political wisdom, are qualities they are too little acquainted with in themselves, to appreciate them in others. Valour will acquire their esteem, and liberality will purchase their suffrage; but the first of these merits is often lodged in the most savage breasts; the latter can only exert itself at the expence of the public; and both may be turned against the possessor of the throne, by the ambition of a daring rival.

man empire

of the great

ties,

The superior prerogative of birth, when it has want of it obtained the sanction of time and popular opi- in the Ronion, is the plainest and least invidious of all productive distinctions among mankind. The acknowledged est calami right extinguishes the hopes of faction, and the conscious security disarms the cruelty of the monarch. To the firm establishment of this idea, we owe the peaceful succession, and mild administration, of European monarchies. To the defect of it, we must attribute the frequent civil

wars

compe

pro

CHAP. wars, through which an Asiatic despot is obliged VII. to cut his way to the throne of his fathers. Yet, even in the East, the sphere of contention is usually limited to the princes of the reigning house, and as soon as the more fortunate, titor has removed his brethren, by the sword and the bow-string, he no longer entertains any jea-.. lousy of his meaner subjects. But the Roman empire, after the authority of the senate had sunk into contempt, was a vast scene of confusion... The royal, and even noble, families of the vinces, had long since been led in triumph before the car of the haughty republicans. The ancient families of Rome had successively fallen beneath the tyranny of the Cæsars; and whilst those princes were shackled by the forms of a commonwealth, and disappointed by the repeated failure of their posterity*, it was impossible that any idea of hereditary succession should have taken root in the minds of their subjects. The right to the throne, which none could claim from birth, every one assumed from merit. The daring hopes of ambition were set loose from the salutary restraints of law and prejudice; and the meanest of mankind might, without folly entertain al hope of being raised by valour and fortune to a rank in the army, in which a single crime would enable him to wrest the sceptre of the world from his feeble and unpopular master. After the mur

der

generations

There had been no example of three suceded their

on the throne; only three instances of sons

fathers. The marriages of the Cæsars (notwithstanding the permission, and the frequent practice of divorces) were generally, unfruitful.