to philofophic Marcus, refufed her company to Commodus's command; the next day, of course, saw him and his wife expire upon a fcaffold. Lightning now ftruck the capitol at Rome, and the great library collected by Adrian, of immenfe value, was burned to the ground. Two thousand people died in one circle of twenty-four hours, from a new peftilence, caufed by the heat and crowd in this thick-thronged mctropolis. Plagues raged at home, and famines wafted them of the empire; whilft the young fovereign, intent on a new frolic, purpofed to fence naked in the amphitheatre, and there exhibit his fymmetric form to forty thousand admirers at once. This fhameless project, this unheard-of folly, revolted the delicacy of his most favoured female, Marcia; and prompted her to reprefent the meannefs of fuch conduct, in terms her uncontradicted paramour was little likely to forgive. He wrote her name on the dead lift immediately: but a fondled baby picking up the paper as he played about the apartments, and . bringing it the lady by mere chance; she refolved to prevent her own' death by her master's; and easily engaging his chamberlains' affistance, who faw themfelves marked down with her for execution-threw her zone round his undefended neck while bathing, and, helped by two affaffins, foon destroyed a prince who, had he met with any other death, had scarce deferved compaffion. Commodus frems to have approached modern exuberance more than any other fovereign we have mentioned yet; he had a genius for mechanic arts. Unlike Flavius Vefpafian, to whom, when fome one prefented a machine for useful purposes, the Emperor faw him rewarded, and the mechanism burnt; for how, faid he, must my subjects live by labour, if all their work is to be done by engines? On the contrary, this youth, elaborately voluptuous, gave immenfe fums to the inventors of umbrella chariots, which, believe, had fprings to them befides. When Pertinax afterwards made a fale of his effects, the people, loft as they were to virtue (fay historians), were ashamed to buy. Thus in this heedlefs, though flagitious confines reign, more evil of every fort had been diffeminated, that the paft fivefcore years of excellence could counteract: nor were his fucceffors, ephemeron monarchs, likely to fupport the dignity of that dominion which dropt from the hands of five or fix pretenders in courfe of only cight months. Though this much must be faid for Pertinax, that he had been a fenator, a præfect, and a commiffary; had taught language in the schools, and carried colours in the field; had fuffered hardships without complaint, and acquired rank without meannefs of folicitation; yet, though a man of incomparable understanding, ftyled by his intimates the tennis-ball of fortune, and earnest to fhew fhe had at length been juft; his name would never have defcended to pofterity, had he not worn the purple eighty-fix days, and feen it torn from him on the eighty-feventh, with life, which he valued lefs-for no fault he had committed, or was even fufpected of. Mean Didius, who had bought the feat of rule with money, parted from it, as might be expected, with more reluctance, like a mifer from his hoard; which Niger arrived not at poffeffing, till after the British and eastern generals had for a while difputed the dangerous pre-eminenee. Accident, concurring with the spirit of riot and impetuofity that now determined every great event, placed Septimus Severus on the throne. The reins of government were held with difficulty even by this active and vigilant commander, Verè Pertinax, Verè Severus, as he was called; who faw astonished, new tokens of rebellion mark various parts of the tumultuous world; and had the affliction to ufe, in his own camp, coins with effigies of Donald, king in Scotland. Haraffed on every fide by a variety of opponents, who, though often conquered to outward appearance, were never-never again completely fubdued in reality; and, more attentive to retain the fovereignty for himself and his two fons, than to fupport the authority of the parent country over nations rifing in refiftance every hour; the gout seized and confined him to a painful bed at York, when fome flatterer expreffing surprise that he could rule fo vaft an extent of dominion, being fo lame, sick, VOL. I. H and and unwieldy-I manage the empire, faid Severus, with my head. and, tender as they be, I will yet strive to keep it down with my fect. The gout however laying hold upon a vital part, he died here in the north of England, where he had long kept a fort of court, in order to be near at hand in cafe of any disturbance from the Gauls: and though an indefatigable general, eminent for the neceffary virtues of foldierlike courage and manly fortitude, he felt in death the imperial power crumbling from his throne, a feat more highly raised than deeply fixed in his day; not as it stood in time of Auguftus Cæfar, to all appearance rooted in a firm and feemingly immoveable stability. Two hundred years about this time elapfing fince our religion first was founded, the retrospective eye refts for a moment upon St. Irenæus's martyrdom, and will obferve Origen, furnamed Adamantius, adding new luftre to his great profeffion, while the warm eloquence of bold Tertullian * enforced thofe truths which neither herefy could choke, nor perfecution kill; though controverfy raged between the eastern and the western church with a degree of violence incredible. One may observe, indeed, that early difcuffions in faith or politics add energy and ftrength both to the church and state. When both are founded fafely howfoever, he is the greatest blockhead who difturbs them, and tries to raise a dangerous fermentation; but when decay begins to taint, or atrophy to numb their conftitution, talking their merits and their faults again over, revives a latent spark once more perhaps, and animates them to a longer continuance. int * Of Tertullian's eloquence, fuffice the fine allufion to Chrift's miracle, when fleeping in the little fhip betoffed with ftorms-he waked, rebuked the winds, and there was a great calm. So, fays the orator, 'tis with our Chriftian Church, beaten by perfecution's rougheft waves. Let but our Redeemer arise and speak the word, all fhall at once be ftill. The affinity this has to Horace's ode, "Oh navis refer in mare, &c." is furely no difcredit to the paffage; yet fays Balzac, "On appelle obfcur ce génie énorme; if faut pourtant avouer que l'obfcurité de Tertullien comme le noirceur de l'ébene jette un grand éclat." It is natural for Balzac to like Tertullian. CHAP. CHAP. III. FROM CARACALLA TO THE DEATH OF ALEXANDER SEVERUS. FIRST PORTION OF THE THIRD CENTURY. WE E ftill are chained to biographic anecdotes, few general facts occurring in thefe times on which to fix our retrospective glass, through which indeed the Goths are feen dividing on each fide the Wefer, then Vifurgis; and called Eastphalians and Weftphalians for that cause while the Jews clofed the book they called the Talmud, and Christians openly and without fear celebrated the day the Saviour of our world was born. Of politics, as of an art, little can be predicated, while to the care of one mind only the great and general whole was feen committed. Mankind had hitherto been influenced to good or ill chiefly by the example set them by their rulers,* on whofe immediate fiat all depended; nor did the best among them spend much time in making laws which the next fovereign's lips could on the inftant abrogate or confirm. The lex talionis was their best standard of moral rectitude; and when Auguftus, fupping with a fenator, had seen him enraged against a slave for breaking one of the glaffes that they drank out of, he watched how far paffion would lead the man, refolved to make him suffer the next day, and see how he should like retaliation. But when the poor flave was flung out of the window by his master's order, the Emperor chose not to go so far, but sent an officer early the • Caffiodorus, two hundred and fifty years after this period, fays, next morning to break every glafs in this fenatorial houfe; a punishment that makes a modern reader laugh. Nor could Aurelius manage any better, although his must have really been a faultless character, could he have prevailed upon himself to have fet worthlefs Commodus afide. But if he fell in the fnare of fondnefs for his fon, how must mankind agree in condemnation of mean, felf-interested Severus' cares, when dying, he advised his boys to love each other, to revere his memory, to pay their foldiers well, and laugh at all the world befides. Such counfels fure almost deserved what followed; when the monster Caracalla, foon as his father died, purfued into the weeping widow's arms his brother Geta, whom he murdered there, forcing the affrighted parent not long after into an impious marriage with himself; and erasing every alto relievo in Rome, erected to perpetuate remembrance of him who had shared the pleasures of his childhood. The arca degl orifici remains even now a monument of this unnatural hatred, which the inhabitants of Alexandria, with more indignation than it was prudent to exprefs, ventured to ridicule, and when the Emperor came there in progress, Edipus and Jocafta was acted for his entertainment—a jest, said he, for which I will foon make their boafted river run red to the fea with blood. Nor was he backward to execute the apparently exaggerated menace: when the next night the theatre was opened, a band of foldiers watched the audience out, and murdered, without fparing age or fex, all who had feen the lucklefs representation. When it is reflected on, that these old theatres held from four to five thousand fouls at once, we wonder not that such tyrannic measures foon taught the terrified subjects a new lesson; they hafted to take out the name of Geta from medals, coins, &c. nay even from the comedies of Terence, substituting quickly fome other in its room; nor dared a private man, making his will, bequeath a legacy to one who bore it. Yet could not Caracalla, though temperate in his diet, and delighting in rough exercife, drive from his anxious mind the horrors of a wild diftempered fancy: the figure of his father still purfued |