CHAP. connected those appellations with the Imperial digIII. nity, and they have been preserved by a long suc

of Augus

tus.

cession of emperors, Romans, Greeks, Franks, and Germans, from the fall of the republic to the present time. A distinction was, however, soon introduced. The sacred title of Augustus was always reserved for the monarch, whilst the name of Cæsar was more freely communicated to his relations; and, from the reign of Hadrian, at least was appropriated to the second person in the state, who was considered as the presumptive heir of the empire.

Character The tender respect of Augustus for a free constituand policy tion which he had destroyed, can only be explained by an attentive consideration of the character of that subtle tyrant. A cool head, an unfeeling heart, and a cowardly disposition, prompted him, at the age of nineteen, to assume the mask of hypocrisy, which he never afterwards laid aside. With the same hand, and probably with the same temper, he signed the proscription of Cicero, and the pardon of Cinna. His virtues, and even his vices, were artificial; and according to the various dictates of his interest, he was at first the enemy, and at last the father, of the Roman world. When he framed the artful system of the Imperial authority, his moderation was inspired by his fears. He wished to deceive the people by an image of civil liberty, and the armies by an image of civil go

vernment.

I. The death of Cæsar was ever before his eyes. Image of liberty for He had lavished wealth and honours on his adhethe people. rents; but the most favoured friends of his uncle were in the number of the conspirators. The fidelity of the legions might defend his authority against open rebellion; but their vigilance could not secure his person from the dagger of a determined republican; and the

26 As Octavianus advanced to the banquet of the Cæsars, his colour changed like that of the Cameleon: pale at first, then red, afterwards black, he at last assumed the mild livery of Venus and the graces (Cæsars, p. 309.) This image employed by Julian, in his ingenious fiction, is just and elegant; but when he considers this change of character as real, and ascribes it to the power of philosophy, he does too much honour to philosophy, and to Octavianus.

III.

Romans, who revered the memory of Brutus27, would CHAP. applaud the imitation of his virtue. Cæsar had voked his fate, as much by the ostentation of his powproer, as by his power itself. The consul or the tribune might have reigned in peace. The title of king had armed the Romans against his life. Augustus was sensible that mankind is governed by names; nor was he deceived in his expectation, that the senate and people would submit to slavery, provided they were respectfully assured that they still enjoyed their ancient freedom. A feeble senate and enervated people cheerfully acquiesced in the pleasing illusion, as long as it was supported by the virtue, or even by the prudence of the successors of Augustus. It was a motive of self-preservation, not a principle of liberty, that animated the conspirators against Caligula, Nero, and Domitian. They attacked the person of the tyrant, without aiming their blow at the authority of the emperor.

nate after

la.

There appears, indeed, one memorable occasion, in Attempt which the senate, after seventy years of patience, made of the sean ineffectual attempt to reassume its long forgotten the death rights. When the throne was vacant by the murder of Caligu of Caligula, the consuls convoked that assembly in the Capitol, condemned the memory of the Cæsars, gave the watch-word liberty to the few cohorts who faintly adhered to their standard, and during eight and forty hours acted as the independent chiefs of a free commonwealth. But while they deliberated, the Prætorian guards had resolved. The stupid Claudius, brother of Germanicus, was already in their camp, invested with the Imperial purple, and prepared to support his election by arms. The dream of liberty was at an end; and the senate awoke to all the horrors of inevitable servitude. Deserted by the people, and threatened by a military force, that feeble assembly was compelled to ratify the choice of the Prætorians, and to embrace the benefit of an amnesty, which Claudius had the prudence to offer, and the generosity to observe.

27 Two centuries after the establishment of monarchy, the emperor Marcus Antoninus recommends the character of Brutus as a perfect model of Roman virtue.

28 It is much to be regretted, that we have lost the part of Tacitus, which treated of that transaction. We are forced to content ourselves with

VOL. I.

M

CHAP.

III.

government for

the ar

mies.

II. The insolence of the armies inspired Augustus with fears of a still more alarming nature. The des Image of pair of the citizens could only attempt, what the power of the soldiers was, at any time, able to execute. How precarious was his own authority over men whom he had taught to violate every social duty! He had heard their seditious clamours; be dreaded their calmer moments of reflection. One revolution had been purchased by immense rewards; but a second revolution might double those rewards. The troops profess ed the fondest attachment to the house of Cæsar; but the attachments of the multitude are capricious and inconstant. Augustus summoned to his aid, whatever remained in those fierce minds, of Roman prejudices; enforced the rigour of discipline by the sanction of law; and interposing the majesty of the senate, between the emperor and the army, boldly claimed their allegiance, as the first magistrate of the republic2o.

Theirobe

dience.

During a long period of two hundred and twenty years, from the establishment of this artful system to the death of Commodus, the dangers inherent to a military government were, in a great measure, suspended. The soldiers were seldom roused to that fatal sense of their own strength, and of the weakness of the civil authority, which was, before and afterwards, productive of such dreadful calamities. Caligula and Domitian were assassinated in their palace by their own domestics: the convulsions which agitated Rome on the death of the former, were confined to the walls of the city. But Nero involved the whole empire in his ruin. In the space of eighteen months, four princes perished by the sword; and the Roman world was shaken by the fury of the contending armies. Excepting only this short, though violent, eruption of military licence, the two centuries from Augustus to Commodus passed away unstained with civil blood, and undisturbed by revolutions. The emperor was elect

the popular rumours of Josephus, and the imperfect hints of Dion and Suetonius.

29 Augustus restored the ancient severity of discipline. After the civil wars, he dropped the endearing name of Fellow-Soldiers, and called them only Soldiers (Sueton. in August. c 25.) See the use Tiberius made of the senate in the mutiny of the Pannonian legions (Tacit. Annal. i.)

III.

ed by the authority of the senate and the consent of the CHAP. soldiers 30. The legions respected their oath of fidelity; and it requires a minute inspection of the Roman annals to discover three inconsiderable rebellions which were all suppressed in a few months, and without even the hazard of a battle31.

tion of a

rius.

In elective monarchies, the vacancy of the throne is Designaa moment big with danger and mischief. The Roman successor. emperors, desirous to spare the legions that interval of suspense, and the temptation of an irregular choice, invested their designed successor with so large a share of present power as should enable him, after their decease, to assume the remainder, without suffering the empire to perceive the change of masters. Thus Augustus, after all his fairer prospects had been snatched from him by untimely deaths, rested his last hopes on Tiberius, obtained for his adopted son the censorial of Tibe. and tribunitian powers, and dictated a law, by which the future prince was invested with an authority equal to his own, over the provinces and the armies32. Thus Vespasian subdued the generous mind of his eldest of Titus.. son. Titus was adored by the eastern legions, which, under his command, had recently achieved the conquest of Judæa. His power was dreaded, and, as his virtues were clouded by the intemperance of youth, his designs were suspected. Instead of listening to such unworthy suspicions, the prudent monarch associated Titus to the full powers of the Imperial dignity; and the grateful son ever approved himself the humble and faithful minister of so indulgent a father33.

The good sense of Vespasian engaged him indeed to The race embrace every measure that might confirm his recent

of the Cæ

sars and

the Fla

30 These words seem to have been the constitutional language. See vian famiTacit. Annal. xiii. 4.

31 The first was Camillus Scribonianus, who took up arms in Dalmatia against Claudius, and was deserted by his own troops in five days. The second, L. Antonius, in Germany, who rebelled against Domitian; and the third, Avidius Cassius, in the reign of M. Antoninus. The two last reigned but a few months, and were cut off by their own adherents. We may observe, that both Camillus and Cassius coloured their ambition with the design of restoring the republic; a task, said Cassius, peculiarly reserved for his name and family.

32 Velleius Paterculus, 1. ii. c. 121. Sueton. in Tiber. c. 20. 33 Sueton. in Tit. c. 6. Plin. in Præfat. Hist. Natur,,

ly.

CHAP. and precarious elevation. The military oath, and the fidelity of the troops, had been consecrated by the habits of an hundred years to the name and family of the Cæsars and although that family had been continued only by the fictitious rite of adoption, the Romans still revered, in the person of Nero, the grandson of Germanicus, and the lineal successor of Augustus. It was not without reluctance and remorse, that the Prætorian guards had been persuaded to abandon the cause of the tyrant. The rapid downfall of Galba, Otho, and Vitellius, taught the armies to consider the emperors as the creatures of their will, and the instruments of their licence. The birth of Vespasian was mean; his grandfather had been a private soldier, his father a petty officer of the revenues; his own merit had raised him, in an advanced age, to the empire; but his merit was rather useful, than shining, and his virtues were disgraced by a strict and even sordid parsimony. Such a prince consulted his true interest by the association of a son, whose more splendid and amiable character might turn the public attention, from the obscure origin, to the future glories of the Flavian house. Under the mild administration of Titus, the Roman world enjoyed a transient felicity, and his beloved memory served to protect, above fifteen years, the vices of his brother Domitian.

A. D. 96. Adoption and character of Trajan.

Nerva had scarcely accepted the purple from the assassins of Domitian, before he discovered that his feeble age was unable to stem the torrent of public disorders, which had multiplied under the long tyranny of his predecessor. His mild disposition was respected by the good; but the degenerate Romans required a more vigorous character, whose justice should strike terror into the guilty. Though he had several relations, he fixed his choice on a stranger. He adopted Trajan, then about forty years of age, and who commanded a

34 This idea is frequently and strongly inculcated by Tacitus. See Hist. i. 5. 16. ii. 76.

35 The emperor Vespasian, with his usual good sense, laughed at the genealogists, who deduced his family from Flavius the founder of Reate (his native country), and one of the companions of Hercules. Suet. in Vespasian. c. 12.