had been invested with supreme command. The discipline of the Romans would never have allowed a tribune or a lieutenant, to apply to the senate for the reward of his services. What reward could a subaltern deserve, whose only virtues were those of valour and obedience; virtues which it was the duty of his general to remunerate? The principle of military subordination was carried so far, that a commander in chief appropriated the glory of his most distant lieutenants,* who were considered as indebted for their success merely to the orders which he had given to them. The emperors therefore, as sole heads of the army, were alone entitled to triumplf for the victories which their genius had obtained, at the same time, on the Rhine and the Euphrates. On this occasion, also, we may perceive the perpetual connection, among the Romans, of religion and policy. The people, in conferring the supreme command, conferred with it the right of taking the auspices, and of interrogating the gods, concerning the fortune of the state. This sacred prerogative established a peculiar connection between the general and the gods of his country. He alone could interrogate them, and solicit their favour by vows, which the state was bound to perform. When his prayers were heard, it belonged, therefore, to him in particular, to demonstrate the public gratitude to the gods; and to lay at their feet hostile spoils and victorious

* Cicer. in Pison, C. xxiii.

+ See the Abbé Bleterie's Dissertation on the title Imperator. Mém. de l'Académ. des Belles Lettres, tome xxi.

trophies.

trophies. To the martial superstition of the Romans, no offerings could appear more acceptable.

In the first ages of the republic, it was easy for the consuls and prætors to unite with their civil functions the management of campaigns, which consisted only in marches of a few days, immediately followed by a battle. But when Rome was obliged to act, both offensively and defensively, in all the provinces of Italy; in Sicily, Spain, and Africa; it became necessary to increase the number of generals, and to extend the military command of the consuls and prætors beyond the term assigned for their civil authority. These proconsuls and proprætors finally became the only generals of the state; and in consequence of the weight of affairs which increased with the extent of the empire, although the same persons continued to exercise both civil and military functions, yet they ceased to exercise them simultaneously. These extraordinary magistrates, who enjoyed the same sacred prerogatives as when they were consuls and prætors, were entitled also to demand a triumph, when their exploits merited that honour. It would have been unjust indeed to debar them from this reward, and to blast their laurels, because the distance of the province and the difficulty of the war had prevented them from terminating it in a single campaign. During the second Punic war, young Scipio demanded a triumph, which he had fairly earned, by avenging the death of his uncles, and by recovering for the republic the great province of Spain. His situation was as singular as

his services. His own boldness and the favour of the people had raised him to supreme command at the age of twenty-four. He became a general without having ever been a magistrate. It appeared dangerous to accustom the favourites of the people to despise civil employments, and to open for themselves shorter roads to power. By refusing a triumph to Scipio, the Romans protested in favour of maxims which themselves had violated: the people were taught to understand that their authority was subordinate to the laws; and that rash ambition was suppressed, which might too probably have been inflamed by the success of Scipio in separating the reward of military glory from the honours of civil magistracy. The senate maintained the cause of wisdom and of discipline; and the conqueror submitted to their refusal. This decree, which was founded on reasons of state, rather felt than expressed, came to be considered as the law of triumphs; which the people never granted to any but magistrates: the precedent in the case of Scipio was thenceforth decisive. The strict sense of this decree allowed a triumph only to those consuls and prætors whose magistracies had been prolonged by the people; but both reason and custom extended this honour to citizens invested by public authority with the power belonging to offices* which they had formerly filled; the indulgence of the senate obliterating, as it were, the years which had elapsed since the term

I can only cite the authority of Livy and the Fasti of the sixth and seventh centuries of Rome.

of

The

of their employment, and considering them as still bearing a character which they had once honourably sustained. I know not how far the senate extended this indulgence; and whether it allowed, for example, the triumph to a prætor of a former year, when invested with proconsular authority. I am inclined to think that this wise council never anticipated the decisions of cases which had not actually happened; and that according to circumstances it would have extended the right of triumph even to a proconsul, who had never held any other magistracy than the ædileship. ædile having attained at least the age of thirtyeight, must have been known for twenty years in the army and in the city. His talents and his character might have been appreciated by his behaviour in the quæstorship, and his political principles could not fail of being discovered in the senate. But both the letter and the spirit of this decree excluded from triumphal honours the simple citizen or knight, that the laws might not be suspended even in favour of the most distinguished merit. The authority of these laws became so thoroughly established, that the people no longer sought to dispense their favours, but agreeably to the order which they prescribed. I know that young Pompey, while yet a simple knight, forced the dictator Sylla to grant him a triumph, at that unhappy crisis when the laws were overwhelmed by the power of individuals. Although the senate

Appian de Bell. Civil. L. i. Cicer. pro leg. Marcil.

afterwards

afterwards bestowed on him a similar power, the authority of Pompey, and the enthusiastic admiration of the multitude, justified an indulgence which would not be construed into a precedent.

3. It is well known that the victorious general, at his return to Rome, assembled the senators in a temple without the walls, and explained to them his just pretensions to a triumph, by supplying them with a written narrative of his victory, confirmed by a solemn oath. The form by which Claudius Nero and Livius Salinator demanded a triumph for their victory at Metaurus was that employed by the subsequent generals. They requested that thanks might be rendered to the gods; and that they themselves might be allowed to enter the city in triumph, for their faithful and courageous management of the affairs of the republic.* I am of opinion that this condition, which admitted of great latitude of interpretation from the prudence and equity of the judges, was the only one essential, although several writers suppose a variety of particular laws, which controlled the deliberations of the senate, and compelled them either to admit or to reject the pretensions of those who demanded a triumph. Yet those writers have not been able to bring forward, on this subject, any thing deserving the sacred name of a law. The particulars which they mention are inferred from a few examples, the force of which is de

* Tit. Liv. xxviii.

↑ V. Onuphr. Panvin. de Triumphis, et Appian in Lybicis. stroyed