terminated by an absolute submission of the barbarians." The new province of Dacia, which formed a second exception to the precept of Augustus, was about thirteen hundred. miles in circumference. Its natural boundaries were the Dniester, the Theiss or Tibiscus, the Lower Danube, and the Euxine Sea. The vestiges of a military road may still be traced from the banks of the Danube to the neighborhood of Bender, a place famous in modern history, and the actual frontier of the Turkish and Russian empires.1

Conquests of Trajan in the East, A.D. 115-117.

Trajan was ambitious of fame; and as long as mankind shall continue to bestow more liberal applause on their destroyers than on their benefactors, the thirst of military glory will ever be the vice of the most exalted characters. The praises of Alexander, transmitted by a succession of poets and historians, had kindled a dangerous emulation in the mind of Trajan. Like him, the Roman emperor undertook an expedition against the nations of the East; but he lamented with a sigh that his advanced age scarcely left him any hopes of equalling the renown of the son of Philip." Yet the success of Trajan, however transient, was rapid and specious. The degenerate Parthians, broken by intestine discord, fled before his arms. He descended the river Tigris in triumph, from the mountains of Armenia to the Persian gulf. He enjoyed the honor of being the first, as he was the last, of the Roman generals who ever navigated that remote sea. His fleets ravaged the coasts of Arabia; and Trajan vainly flattered himself that he was approaching towards the confines of India. Every day the astonished senate received the intelligence of new names and new nations that acknowledged his

20

17 Dion Cassius, 1. lxviii. [c. 6] p. 1123 [c. 14], 1131. Julian in Cæsaribus. Eutropius, viii. 2, 6. Aurelius Victor in Epitome.

18 See a Memoir of M. d'Anville, on the province of Dacia, in the Académie des Inscriptions, tom. xxviii. p. 444-468.

19 Trajan's sentiments are represented in a very just and lively manner in the Cæsars of Julian.

20 Eutropius and Sextus Rufus have endeavored to perpetuate the illusion. See a very sensible dissertation of M. Freret in the Académie des Inscriptions, tom. xxi. p. 55.

sway. They were informed that the kings of Bosphorus, Colchis, Iberia, Albania, Osrhoëne, and even the Parthian monarch himself, had accepted their diadems from the hands of the emperor; that the independent tribes of the Median and Carduchian hills had implored his protection; and that the rich countries of Armenia, Mesopotamia, and Assyria were reduced into the state of provinces." But the death of Trajan soon clouded the splendid prospect; and it was justly to be dreaded that so many distant nations would throw off the unaccustomed yoke, when they were no longer restrained by the powerful hand which had imposed it.

his

A.D. 117.

It was an ancient tradition that, when the Capitol was founded by one of the Roman kings, the god Terminus (who Resigned by presided over boundaries, and was represented, acsor Hadrian, cording to the fashion of that age, by a large stone) alone, among all the inferior deities, refused to yield his place to Jupiter himself. A favorable inference was drawn from his obstinacy, which was interpreted by the augurs as a sure presage that the boundaries of the Roman power would never recede." During many ages the prediction, as it is usual, contributed to its own accomplishment. But though Terminus had resisted the majesty of Jupiter, he submitted to the authority of the Emperor Hadrian." The

21 Dion Cassius, 1. lxviii. [c. 18, seq.]; and the Abbreviators.

22 Ovid. Fast. 1. ii. ver. 667. See Livy [i. 55], and Dionysius of Halicarnassus, under the reign of Tarquin.

23 St. Augustine is highly delighted with the proof of the weakness of Terminus, and the vanity of the augurs. See De Civitate Dei, iv. 29.b

A permanent addition was made to the Roman empire in the reign of Trajan, which Gibbon has omitted to notice. In A.D. 105 the part of Arabia extending east of Damascus down to the Red Sea was conquered by A. Cornelius Palma, and formed into a Roman province under the name of Arabia. (Dion Cass. Ixviii. 14; Ammian. Marc. xiv. 8.) It continued to be a Roman province after the death of Trajan, and was enlarged by Septimius Severus, A.D. 195. (Dion Cass. Ixxv. 1, 2; Eutrop. viii. 18.) Its principal towns were Petra and Bostra, the former in the south and the latter in the north of the province. If we follow the authority of Niebuhr, another permanent addition was made to the empire in the reign of Trajan, by the conquest of Nubia, which he supposes to have remained subject to Rome till the middle of the third century. But the evidence on this point is not conclusive. See Niebuhr's Lectures on the History of Rome, vol. iii. p. 227; and Kleine Schriften, vol. ii. p. 186.-S.

b The turn of Gibbon's sentence is Augustine's: "Plus Hadrianum regem hominum, quam regem Deorum timuisse videatur."-M.

resignation of all the Eastern conquests of Trajan was the first measure of his reign. He restored to the Parthians the election of an independent sovereign; withdrew the Roman garrisons from the provinces of Armenia, Mesopotamia, and Assyria; and, in compliance with the precept of Augustus, once more established the Euphrates as the frontier of the empire." Censure, which arraigns the public actions and the private motives of princes, has ascribed to envy a conduct which might be attributed to the prudence and moderation of Hadrian. The various character of that emperor, capable, by turns, of the meanest and the most generous sentiments, may afford some color to the suspicion. It was, however, scarcely in his power to place the superiority of his predecessor in a more conspicuous light than by thus confessing himself unequal to the task of defending the conquests of Trajan. The martial and ambitious spirit of Trajan formed a very singular contrast with the moderation of his successor.

Contrast of

Hadrian and

Antoninus

Pius.

The

restless activity of Hadrian was not less remarkable when compared with the gentle repose of Antoninus Pius. The life of the former was almost a perpetual journey; and as he possessed the various talents of the soldier, the statesman, and the scholar, he gratified his curiosity in the discharge of his duty. Careless of the difference of seasons and of climates, he marched on foot, and bareheaded, over the snows of Caledonia and the sultry plains of the Upper Egypt; nor was there a province of the empire which, in the course of his reign, was not honored with the presence of the monarch." But the tranquil life of Antoninus Pius was spent in the bosom of Italy, and, during the

24 See the Augustan History, p. 5. [Spartian. Hadr. c. 9.] Jerome's Chroni.. cle, and all the Epitomizers. It is somewhat surprising that this memorable event should be omitted by Dion, or rather by Xiphilin.

25

Dion, 1. Ixix. [c. 9] p. 1157. Hist. August. p. 5, 8.

[Spartian. Hadr. 10,

16.] If all our historians were lost, medals, inscriptions, and other monuments would be sufficient to record the travels of Hadrian,a

The journeys of Hadrian are traced in a note on Solvet's translation of Hegewisch, Essai sur l'Epoque de l'Histoire Romaine la plus heureuse pour le Genre Humain, Paris, 1834, p. 123.-M. See also Gregorovius, Geschichte des Römischen Kaisers Hadrian, Königsberg, 1851.-S.

twenty-three years that he directed the public administration, the longest journeys of that amiable prince extended no farther than from his palace in Rome to the retirement of his Lanuvian villa.25

of Hadrian

and the two

Notwithstanding this difference in their personal conduct, the general system of Augustus was equally adopted and uniPacific system formly pursued by Hadrian and by the two Antonines. They persisted in the design of maintainAntonines. ing the dignity of the empire, without attempting to enlarge its limits. By every honorable expedient they invited the friendship of the barbarians, and endeavored to convince mankind that the Roman power, raised above the temptation of conquest, was actuated only by the love of order and justice. During a long period of forty-three years their virtuous labors were crowned with success; and, if we except a few slight hostilities that served to exercise the legions of the frontier, the reigns of Hadrian and Antoninus Pius offer the fair prospect of universal peace." The Roman name was revered among the most remote nations of the earth. The fiercest barbarians frequently submitted their differences to the arbitration of the emperor; and we are informed by a contemporary historian that he had seen ambassadors who were refused the honor which they came to solicit, of being admitted into the rank of subjects." The terror of the Roman arms added weight and dignity to the moderation of the emperors. They preserved peace by a constant preparation for war; toninus. and while justice regulated their conduct, they announced to the nations on their confines that they were as lit

Defensive wars of Marcus An

26 See the Augustan History and the Epitomes.

97 We must, however, remember that, in the time of Hadrian, a rebellion of the Jews raged with religious fury, though only in a single province. Pausanias (1. viii. c. 43) mentions two necessary and successful wars, conducted by the generals of Pius: 1st. Against the wandering Moors, who were driven into the solitudes of Atlas. 2d. Against the Brigantes of Britain, who had invaded the Roman Both these wars (with several other hostilities) are mentioned in the

province.

Augustan History, p. 19. [Capitol. Ant. P. c. 5.]

28 Appian of Alexandria, in the preface to his History of the Roman Wars

[c.7].

tle disposed to endure as to offer an injury. The military strength, which it had been sufficient for Hadrian and the elder Antoninus to display, was exerted against the Parthians and the Germans by the Emperor Marcus. The hostilities of the barbarians provoked the resentment of that philosophic monarch, and, in the prosecution of a just defence, Marcus and his generals obtained many signal victories, both on the Euphrates and on the Danube." The military establishment of the Roman empire, which thus assured either its tranquillity or success, will now become the proper and important object of our attention.

tablishment

emperors.

30

In the purer ages of the commonwealth the use of arms was reserved for those ranks of citizens who had a country to Military es- love, a property to defend, and some share in enof the Roman acting those laws which it was their interest as well as duty to maintain. But in proportion as the public freedom was lost in extent of conquest, war was gradually improved into an art, and degraded into a trade. The legions themselves, even at the time when they were recruited in the most distant provinces, were supposed to consist of Roman citizens. That distinction was generally considered either as a legal qualification or as a proper recompense for the soldier; but a more serious regard was paid to the essential merit of age, strength, and military stature." In all lev

29 Dion, 1. lxxi. [c. 2 seq.]. Hist. August. in Marco. [Capitolinus, c. 9, 17, etc.] The Parthian victories gave birth to a crowd of contemptible historians whose memory has been rescued from oblivion and exposed to ridicule, in a very lively piece of criticism of Lucian.

30 The poorest rank of soldiers possessed above forty pounds sterling (Dionys. Halicarn. iv. 17), a very high qualification at a time when money was so scarce that an ounce of silver was equivalent to seventy pounds' weight of brass. The populace, excluded by the ancient constitution, were indiscriminately admitted by Marius. See Sallust. de Bell. Jugurth. c. 86.

31 Cæsar formed his legion Alauda of Gauls and strangers: but it was during

* On the uncertainty of all these estimates, and the difficulty of fixing the relative value of brass and silver, compare Niebuhr, vol. i. p. 473, etc. Eng. trans. p. 452. According to Niebuhr, the relative disproportion in value between the two metals arose in a great degree from the abundance of brass or copper.-M. Compare also Dureau de la Malle, Economie Politique des Romains, especially L. I. c. ix.-M. 1845.