LORD'S LECTURES

BEACON LIGHTS OF HISTORY, VOLUME IV

IMPERIAL ANTIQUITY. 

BY JOHN LORD, LL. D. , AUTHOR OF "THE OLD ROMAN WORLD, " "MODERN EUROPE, "ETC. , ETC. 

CONTENTS

CYRUS THE GREAT. 

ASIATIC SUPREMACY. 

The Persian EmpirePersia ProperOrigin of the PersiansThe Religion of the IraniansPersian CivilizationPersian rulersYouth and education of CyrusPolitical Union of Persia and MediaThe Median EmpireEarly Conquests of CyrusThe Lydian EmpireCroesus, King of LydiaWar between Croesus and CyrusFate of CroesusConquest of the Ionian CitiesConquest of BabylonAssyria and BabyloniaSubsequent conquests of CyrusHis kindness to the JewsCharacter of CyrusCambyses; Darius HystaspesXerxesFall of the Persian EmpireAuthorities

JULIUS CAESAR. 

IMPERIALISM. 

Caesar an instrument of ProvidenceHis family and personEarly manhood; marriage; profession; ambitionCurule magistrates; the Roman SenateOnly rich men who control elections ordinarily electedVenality of the peopleCaesar borrows money to bribe the peopleElected QuaestorGains a seat in the SenateSecond marriage, with a cousin of PompeyCaesar made Pontifex Maximus; elected PraetorSent to Spain; military services in SpainElected Consul; his reforms; Leges JuliaeOpposition of the AristocracyAssigned to the province of GaulHis victories over the Gauls and GermansCharacter of the races he subduedAmazing difficulties of his campaignsReluctance of the Senate to give him the customary honorJealousy of the nobles; hostility between them and CaesarThe Aristocracy unfit to govern; their habits and mannersThey call Pompey to their aidNeither Pompey nor Caesar will disband his forces; Caesar recalledCaesar marches on Home; crosses the RubiconUltimate ends of Caesar; the civil warPompey's incapacity and indecision; flies to BrundusiCaesar defeats Pompey's generals in SpainDictatorship of CaesarBattle of PharsaliaDeath of Pompey in EgyptBattles of Thapsus and of MundaThey result in Caesar's supremacyHis services as EmperorHis habits and characterHis assassination, --its consequencesCauses of Imperialism, --its supposed necessity when Caesararose; public rebuke of Caesar by CiceroAn historical puzzleAuthorities

MARCUS AURELIUS. 

THE GLORY OF ROME. 

Remarkable character of Marcus AureliusHis parentage and educationAdopted by Antoninus PiusSubdues the barbarians of GermanyConsequences of the German WarsMistakes of Marcus Aurelius; CommodusPersecutions of the ChristiansThe "Meditations, "--their sublime StoicismEpictetus, --the influence of his writingsStyle and value of the "Meditations"Necessities of the EmpireIts prosperity under the Antonines; external gloriesIts internal weakness; seeds of ruinGibbon controverted by Marcus AureliusAuthorities

CONSTANTINE THE GREAT. 

CHRISTIANITY ENTHRONED. 

Constantine and DiocletianInfluence of martyrdomsInfluence of Asceticism, --its fierce protestRise of ConstantineHis civil wars for the supremacy of the Roman worldThe rival Emperors and their fate: Maximinian, Galerius, Maxentius, Maximin, LiciniusConstantine sole Emperor over the West and EastFoundation of Constantinople, --its great advantageThe pomp and ceremony of the imperial CourtCrimes of Constantine; his virtuesConversion of ConstantineHis Christian legislation; edict of TolerationPatronage of the Clergy; union of Church and StateCouncil of NiceTheological discussionDoctrine of the TrinityAthanasius and AriusThe Nicene CreedEffect of philosophical discussions on theological truthsConstantine's work; the uniting of Church with StateDeath of ConstantineHis character and servicesAuthorities

PAULA. 

WOMAN AS FRIEND. 

Female friendshipPaganism unfavorable to friendshipCharacter of Jewish womenGreat Pagan womenPaula, her early lifeHer conversion to ChristianityHer asceticismAsceticism the result of circumstancesVirtues of PaulaHer illustrious friendsSaint Jerome and his great attainmentsHis friendship with PaulaHis social influence at RomeHis treatment of womenVanity of mere worldly friendship^Esthetic mission of womanElements of permanent friendshipNecessity of social equalityIllustrious friendshipsCongenial tastes in friendshipNecessity of Christian gracesSympathy as radiating from the CrossNecessity of some common end in friendshipThe extension of monastic lifeVirtues of early monastic lifePaula and Jerome seek its retreatsTheir residence in PalestineTheir travels in the EastTheir illustrious visitorsPeculiarities of their friendshipDeath of PaulaHer character and fameElevation of woman by friendship

CHRYSOSTOM. 

SACRED ELOQUENCE. 

The power of the PulpitEloquence always a powerThe superiority of the Christian themes to those of Pagan antiquitySadness of the great Pagan oratorsCheerfulness of the Christian preachersChrysostomEducationSociety of the timesChrysostom's conversion, and life in retirementLife at AntiochCharacteristics of his eloquence; his popularity as oratorHis influenceShelters Antioch from the wrath of TheodosiusPower and responsibility of the clergyTransferred to Constantinople, as Patriarch of the EastHis sermons, and their effect at CourtQuarrel with EutropiusEnvy of Theophilus of AlexandriaCouncil of the Oaks; condemnation to exileSustained by the people; recalledWrath of the EmpressExile of ChrysostomHis literary labors in exileHis more remote exile, and deathHis fame and influenceAuthorities

SAINT AMBROSE. 

EPISCOPAL AUTHORITY. 

Dignity of the Episcopal office in the early ChurchGrowth of Episcopal authority, --its causesThe See of Milan; election of Ambrose as ArchbishopHis early life and character; his great abilityChange in his life after consecrationHis conservation of the FaithPersecution of the ManicheansOpposition to the AriansHis enemies; FaustinaQuarrel with the EmpressEstablishment of Spiritual AuthorityOpposition to Temporal PowerAmbrose retires to his cathedral; Ambrosian chantRebellion of Soldiers; triumph of AmbroseSent as Ambassador to Maximus; his intrepidityHis rebuke of Theodosius; penance of the EmperorFidelity and ability of Ambrose as BishopHis private virtuesHis influence on succeeding agesAuthorities

SAINT AUGUSTINE. 

CHRISTIAN THEOLOGY. 

Lofty position of Augustine in the ChurchParentage and birthEducation and youthful folliesInfluence of the Manicheans on himTeacher of rhetoricVisits RomeTeaches rhetoric at MilanInfluence of Ambrose on himConversion; Christian experienceRetreat to Lake ComoDeath of Monica his motherReturn to AfricaMade Bishop of Hippo; his influence as BishopHis greatness as a theologian; his vast studiesContest with Manicheans, --their character and teachingsControversy with the Donatists, --their peculiaritiesTracts: Unity of the Church and Religious TolerationContest with the Pelagians: Pelagius and CelestiusPrinciples of PelagianismDoctrines of Augustine: Grace; Predestination; Sovereignty of God; Servitude of the WillResults of the Pelagian controversyOther writings of Augustine: "The City of God;" Soliloquies; SermonsDeath and characterEulogists of AugustineHis posthumous influenceAuthorities

THEODOSIUS THE GREAT. 

LATTER DAYS OF ROME. 

The mission of TheodosiusGeneral sense of security in the Roman worldThe Romans awake from their delusionIncursions of the GothsBattle of Adrianople; death of ValensNecessity for a great deliverer to arise; TheodosiusThe Goths, --their characteristics and historyElevation of Theodosius as Associate EmperorHe conciliates the Goths, and permits them to settle in the EmpireRevolt of Maximus against Gratian; death of GratianTheodosius marches against Maximus and subdues himRevolt of Arbogastes, --his usurpationVictories of Theodosius over all his rivals; the Empire once more united under a single manReforms of Theodosius; his jurisprudencePatronage of the clergy and dignity of great ecclesiasticsTheodosius persecutes the AriansExtinguishes Paganism and closes the templesCements the union of Church with StateFaults and errors of Theodosius; massacre of ThessalonicaDeath of TheodosiusDivision of the Empire between his two sonsRenewed incursions of the Goths, --Alaric; StilichoFall of Rome; Genseric and the VandalsSecond sack of RomeReflections on the Fall of the Western EmpireAuthorities

LEO THE GREAT. 

FOUNDATION OF THE PAPACY. 

Leo the Great, --founder of the Catholic EmpireGeneral aim of the Catholic ChurchThe Church the guardian of spiritual principlesTheocratic aspirations of the PopesOrigin of ecclesiastical power; the early PopesPrimacy of the Bishop of RomeNecessity for some higher claim after the fall of RomeEarly life of LeoElevation to the Papacy; his measures; his writingsHis persecution of the ManicheansConservation of the Faith by LeoIntercession with the barbaric kings; Leo's intrepidityDesolation of RomeDesigns and thoughts of LeoThe _jus divinum_ principle; state of Rome when this principle was advocatedIts apparent necessityThe influence of arrogant pretensions on the barbariansThey are indorsed by the EmperorThe government of LeoThe central power of the PapacyUnity of the ChurchNo rules of government laid down in the ScripturesGovernments the result of circumstancesThe Papal government the need of the Middle AgesThe Papacy in its best periodGreatness of Leo's character and aimsFidelity of his early successors, and perversions of later PopesAuthorities

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

VOLUME IV. 

The Conversion of Paula by St. Jerome. _After the painting by L. Alma-Tadema_. 

Archery Practice of a Persian King. _After the painting by F. A. Bridgman_. 

Tomyris Plunges the Head of the Dead Cyrus into a Vessel of Blood. _After the painting by A. Zick_. 

Julius Caesar. _From the bust in the National Museum, Rome_. 

Surrender of Vercingetorix, the Last Chief of Gaul. _After the painting by Henri Motte_. 

Marcus Aurelius. _From a photograph of the statue at the Capitol, Rome_. 

Persecution of Christians in the Roman Arena. _After the painting by G. Mantegazza_. 

St. Jerome in His Cell. _After the painting by J. L. Gérôme_. 

St. Chrysostom Condemns the Vices of the Empress Eudoxia. _After the painting by Jean Paul Laurens_. 

St. Ambrose Refuses the Emperor Theodosius Admittance to His Church. _After the painting by Gebhart Fügel_. 

St. Augustine and His Mother. _After the painting by Ary Scheffer_. 

Invasion of the Goths into the Roman Empire. _After the painting by O. Fritsche_. 

Invasion of the Huns into Italy. _After the painting by V. Checa_. 

BEACON LIGHTS OF HISTORY

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CYRUS THE GREAT. 

 * * * * *

559-529 B. C. 

ASIATIC SUPREMACY. 

One of the most prominent and romantic characters in the history of theOriental world, before its conquest by Alexander of Macedon, is Cyrusthe Great; not as a sage or prophet, not as the founder of new religioussystems, not even as a law-giver, but as the founder and organizer ofthe greatest empire the world has seen, next to that of the Romans. Theterritory over which Cyrus bore rule extended nearly three thousandmiles from east to west, and fifteen hundred miles from north to south, embracing the principal nations known to antiquity, so that he wasreally a king of kings. He was practically the last of the great Asiaticemperors, absorbing in his dominions those acquired by the Assyrians, the Babylonians, and the Lydians. He was also the first who brought Asiainto intimate contact with Europe and its influences, and thus may beregarded as the link between the old Oriental world and the Greekcivilization. 

It is to be regretted that so little is really known of the Persianhero, both in the matter of events and also of exact dates, sincechronologists differ, and can only approximate to the truth in theircalculations. In this lecture, which is in some respects an introductionto those that will follow on the heroes and sages of Greek, Roman, andChristian antiquity, it is of more importance to present Orientalcountries and institutions than any particular character, interesting ashe may be, --especially since as to biography one is obliged to sifthistorical facts from a great mass of fables and speculations. 

Neither Herodotus, Xenophon, nor Ctesias satisfy us as to the real lifeand character of Cyrus. This renowned name represents, however, thePersian power, the last of the great monarchies that ruled the Orientalworld until its conquest by the Greeks. Persia came suddenly intoprominence in the middle of the seventh century before Christ. Prior tothis time it was comparatively unknown and unimportant, and was one ofthe dependent provinces of Media, whose religion, language, and customswere not very dissimilar to its own. 

Persia was a small, rocky, hilly, arid country about three hundred mileslong by two hundred and fifty wide, situated south of Media, having thePersian Gulf as its southern boundary, the Zagros Mountains on the westseparating it from Babylonia, and a great and almost impassable deserton the east, so that it was easily defended. Its population was composedof hardy, warlike, and religious people, condemned to poverty andincessant toil by the difficulty of getting a living on sterile andunproductive hills, except in a few favored localities. The climate waswarm in summer and cold in winter, but on the whole more temperate thanmight be supposed from a region situated so near the tropics, --betweenthe twenty-fifth and thirtieth degrees of latitude. It was an elevatedcountry, more than three thousand feet above the sea, and was favorableto the cultivation of the fruits and flowers that have ever been mostprized, those cereals which constitute the ordinary food of man growingin abundance if sufficient labor were spent on their cultivation, reminding us of Switzerland and New England. But vigilance and incessanttoil were necessary, such as are only found among a hardy and courageouspeasantry, turning easily from agricultural labors to the fatigues anddangers of war. The real wealth of the country was in the flocks andherds that browsed in the valleys and plains. Game of all kinds wasabundant, so that the people were unusually fond of the pleasures of thechase; and as they were temperate, inured to exposure, frugal, andadventurous, they made excellent soldiers. Nor did they ever as a nationlose their warlike qualities, --it being only the rich and powerful amongthem who learned the vices of the nations they subdued, and becameaddicted to luxury, indolence, and self-indulgence. Before the conquestof Media the whole nation was distinguished for temperance, frugality, and bravery. According to Herodotus, the Persians were especiallyinstructed in three things, --"to ride, to draw the bow, and to speak thetruth. " Their moral virtues were as conspicuous as their warlikequalities. They were so poor that their ordinary dress was of leather. They could boast of no large city, like the Median Ecbatana, or likeBabylon, --Pasargadae, their ancient capital, being comparatively smalland deficient in architectural monuments. The people lived chiefly invillages and hamlets, and were governed, like the Israelites under theJudges, by independent chieftains, none of whom attained the rank andpower of kings until about one hundred years before the birth of Cyrus. These pastoral and hunting people, frugal from necessity, brave fromexposure, industrious from the difficulty of subsisting in a dry andbarren country, for the most sort were just such a race as furnished anoble material for the foundation of a great empire. 

Whence came this honest, truthful, thrifty race? It is generallyadmitted that it was a branch of the great Aryan family, whose originalsettlements are supposed to have been on the high table-lands of CentralAsia east of the Caspian Sea, probably in Bactria. They emigrated fromthat dreary and inhospitable country after Zoroaster had proclaimed hisdoctrines, after the sacred hymns called the Gathas were sung, perhapseven after the Zend-Avesta or sacred writings of the Zoroastrian priestshad been begun, --conquering or driving away Turanian tribes, andmigrating to the southwest in search of more fruitful fields and fertilevalleys, they found a region which has ever since borne aname--Iran--that evidently commemorated the proud title of the Aryanrace. And this great movement took place about the time that anotherbranch of their race also migrated southeastwardly to the valleys of theIndus. The Persians and the Hindus therefore had common ancestors, --thesame indeed, as those of the Greeks, Romans, Sclavonians, Celts, andTeutons, who migrated to the northwest and settled in Europe. The Aryansin all their branches were the noblest of the primitive races, and havein their later developments produced the highest civilization everattained. They all had similar elements of character, especially love ofpersonal independence, respect for woman, and a religious tendency ofmind. We see a considerable similarity of habits and customs betweenthe Teutonic races of Germany and Scandinavia and the early inhabitantsof Persia, as well as great affinity in language. All branches of theAryan family have been warlike and adventurous, if we may except theHindus, who were subjected to different influences, --especially ofclimate, which enervated their bodies if it did not weaken their minds. 

When the migration of the Iranians took place it is difficult todetermine, but probably between fifteen hundred and two thousand yearsbefore our era, although it may have been even five hundred yearsearlier than that. All theories as to their movements before theirauthentic history begins are based on conjecture and speculation, whichit is not profitable to pursue, since we can settle nothing in thepresent state of our knowledge. 

It is very singular that the Iranians should have had, after theirmigrations and settlements, religious ideas and systems so differentfrom those of the Hindus, considering that they had common ancestors. The Iranians, including the Medes as well as Persians, acceptedZoroaster as their prophet and teacher, and the Zend-Avesta as theirsacred books, and worshipped one Supreme Deity, whom they calledAhura-Mazda (Ormazd), --the Lord Omniscient, --and thus were monotheists;while the Hindus were practically poly-theists, governed by asacerdotal caste, who imposed gloomy austerities and sacrifices, although it would seem that the older Vedistic hymns of the Hindus weretheistic in spirit. The Magi--the priests of the Iranians--differedwidely in their religious views from the Brahmans, inculcating a highermorality and a loftier theological creed, worshipping the Supreme Beingwithout temples or shrines or images, although their religion ultimatelydegenerated into a worship of the powers of Nature, as the recognitionof Mithra the sun-god and the mysterious fire-altars would seem toindicate. But even in spite of the corruptions introduced by the Magiwhen they became a powerful sacerdotal body, their doctrine remainedpurer and more elevated than the religions of the surrounding nations. 

While the Iranians worshipped a supreme deity of goodness, they alsorecognized a supreme deity of evil, both ruling the world--in perpetualconflict--by unnumbered angels, good and evil; but the final triumph ofthe good was a conspicuous article of their faith. In close logicalconnection with this recognition of a supreme power in the universe wasthe belief of a future state and of future rewards and punishments, without which belief there can be, in my opinion, no high morality, asmen are constituted. 

In process of time the priests of the Zoroastrian faith became undulypowerful, and enslaved the people by many superstitions, such as themultiplication of rites and ceremonies and the interpretation of dreamsand omens. They united spiritual with temporal authority, as a powerfulpriesthood is apt to do, --a fact which the Christian priesthood of theMiddle Ages made evident in the Occidental world. 

In the time of Cyrus the Magi had become a sort of sacerdotal caste. They were the trusted ministers of kings, and exercised a controllinginfluence over the people. They assumed a stately air, wore white andflowing robes, and were adept in the arts of sorcery and magic. Theywere even consulted by kings and chieftains, as if they possessedprophetic power. They were a picturesque body of men, with their mysticwands, their impressive robes, their tall caps, appealing by their longincantations and frequent ceremonies and prayers to the eye and to theear. "Pure Zoroastrianism was too spiritual to coalesce readily withOriental luxury and magnificence when the Persians were rulers of a vastempire, but Magism furnished a hierarchy to support the throne and addsplendor and dignity to the court, while it blended easily withprevious creeds. "

In material civilization the Medes and Persians were inferior to theBabylonians and Egyptians, and immeasurably behind the Greeks andRomans. Their architecture was not so imposing as that of the Egyptiansand Babylonians; it had no striking originality, and it was only in thepalaces of great monarchs that anything approached magnificence. Still, there were famous palaces at Ecbatana, Susa, and Persepolis, raised onlofty platforms, reached by grand staircases, and ornamented withelaborate pillars. The most splendid of these were erected after thetime of Cyrus, by Darius and Xerxes, decorated with carpets, hangings, and golden ornaments. The halls of their palaces were of great size andimposing effect. Next to palaces, the most remarkable buildings were thetombs of kings; but we have no remains of marble statues or metalcastings or ivory carvings, not even of potteries, which at that time inother countries were common and beautiful. The gems and signet ringswhich the Persians engraved possessed much merit, and on them werewrought with great skill the figures of men and animals; but the nearestapproach to sculpture were the figures of colossal bulls set to guardthe portals of palaces, and these were probably borrowed from theAssyrians. 

Nor were the Persians celebrated for their textile fabrics and dyes. "Solong as the carpets of Babylon, the shawls of India, the fine linen ofEgypt, and the coverlets of Damascus poured continually into Persia inthe way of tribute and gifts, there was no stimulus to manufacture. " Thesame may be said of the ornamental metal-work of the Greeks, and theglass manufacture of the Phoenicians. The Persians were soldiers, andgloried in being so, to the disdain of much that civilization hasever valued. 

It may as well be here said that the Iranians, both Medes and Persians, were acquainted with the art of writing. Harpagus sent a letter to Cyrusconcealed in the belly of a hare, and Darius signed a decree which hisnobles presented to him in writing. In common with the Babylonians theyused the same alphabetic system, though their languages wereunlike, --namely, the cuneiform or arrow-head or wedge-shaped characters, as seen in the celebrated inscriptions of Darius on the side of a highrock thirty feet from the ground. We cannot determine whether the Medesand Persians brought their alphabet from their original settlements inCentral Asia, or derived it from the Turanian and Semitic nations withwhich they came in contact. In spite of their knowledge of writing, however, they produced no literature of any account, and of science theywere completely ignorant. They made few improvements even in militaryweapons, the chief of which, as among all the nations of antiquity, werethe bow, the spear, and the sword. They were skilful horsemen, and madeuse of chariots of war. Their great occupation, aside from agriculture, was hunting, in which they were trained by exposure for war. They wereborn to conquer and rule, like the Romans, and cared for little exceptthe warlike virtues. 

Such were the Persians and the rugged country in which they lived, withtheir courage and fortitude, their love of freedom, their patriotism, their abhorrence of lies, their self-respect allied with pride, theirtemperance and frugality, forming a noble material for empire anddominion when the time came for the old monarchies to fall into theirhands, --the last and greatest of all the races that had ruled theOriental world, and kindred in their remote ancestry with those Europeanconquerors who laid the foundation of modern civilization. 

Of these Persians Cyrus was the type-man, combining in himself all thatwas admirable in his countrymen, and making so strong an impression onthe Greeks that he is presented by their historians as an ideal prince, invested with all those virtues which the mediaeval romance-writers haveascribed to the knights of chivalry. 

The Persians were ruled by independent chieftains, or petty kings, whoacknowledged fealty to Media; so that Persia was really a province ofMedia, as Burgundy was of France in the Middle Ages, and as Babylonia atone period was of Assyria. The most prominent of these chieftains orprinces was Achaemenes, who is regarded as the founder of the Persianmonarchy. To this royal family of the Achaemenidae Cyrus belonged. Hisfather Cambyses, called by some a satrap and by others a king, married, according to Herodotus, a daughter of Astyages, the last of theMedian monarchs. 

The youth and education of Cyrus are invested with poetic interest byboth Herodotus and Xenophon, but their narratives have no historicalauthority in the eyes of critics, any more than Livy's painting ofRomulus and Remus: they belong to the realm of romance rather thanauthentic history. Nevertheless the legend of Cyrus is beautiful, andhas been repeated by all succeeding historians. 

According to this legend, Astyages--a luxurious and superstitiousmonarch, without the warlike virtues of his father, who had really builtup the Median empire--had a dream that troubled him, which beinginterpreted by the Magi, priests of the national religion, was to theeffect that his daughter Mandanê (for he had no legitimate son) would bemarried to a prince whose heir should seize the supreme power of Media. To prevent this, he married her to a prince beneath her rank, for whomhe felt no fear, --Cambyses, the chief governor or king of Persia, whoruled a territory to the South, about one fifth the size of Media, andwhich practically was a dependent province. Another dream which alarmedAstyages still further, in spite of his precaution, induced him to sendfor his daughter, so that having her in his power he might easilydestroy her offspring. As soon as Cyrus was born therefore in the royalpalace at Ecbatana, the king intrusted the infant prince to one of theprincipal officers of his court, named Harpagus, with peremptory ordersto destroy him. Harpagus, although he professed unconditional obedienceto his monarch, had scruples about taking the life of one so near thethrone, the grandson of the king and presumptive heir of the monarchy. So he, in turn, intrusted the royal infant to the care of a herdsman, inwhom he had implicit confidence, with orders to kill him. The herdsmanhad a tender-hearted and conscientious wife who had just given birth toa dead child, and she persuaded her husband--for even in Media womenvirtually ruled, as they do everywhere, if they have tact--to substitutethe dead child for the living one, deck it out in the royal costume, andexpose it to wild beasts. This was done, and Cyrus remained the supposedchild of the shepherd. The secret was well kept for ten years, and bothAstyages and Harpagus supposed that Cyrus was slain. 

Cyrus meanwhile grew up among the mountains, a hardy and beautiful boy, exposed to heat and cold, hunger and fatigue, and thus was early inuredto danger and hardship. Added to personal beauty was remarkable courage, frankness, and brightness, so that he took the lead of other boys intheir amusements. One day they played king, and Cyrus was chosen torepresent royalty, which he acted so literally as to beat the son of aMedian nobleman for disobedience. The indignant and angry fathercomplained at once to the king, and Astyages sent for the herdsman andhis supposed son to attend him in his palace. When the two mountaineerswere ushered into the royal presence, Astyages was so struck with thebeauty, wit, and boldness of the boy that he made earnest inquiries ofthe herdsman, who was forced to tell the truth, and confessed that theyouth was not his son, but had been put into his hands by Harpagus withorders to destroy him. The royal origin of Cyrus was now apparent, andthe king sent for Harpagus, who corroborated the statement of theherdsman. Astyages dissembled his wrath, as Oriental monarchs can, whoare trained to dissimulation, and the only punishment he inflicted onHarpagus was to set before him at a banquet a dish made of the arms andlegs of a dead infant. This the courtier in turn professed to relish, but henceforth became the secret and implacable enemy of the king. 

Herodotus tells us that Astyages took the boy, unmistakably his grandsonand heir, to his palace to be educated according to his rank. Cyrus wasnow brought up with every honor and the greatest care, taught to huntand ride and shoot with the bow like the highest nobles. He soondistinguished himself for his feats in horsemanship and skill in huntingwild animals, winning universal admiration, and disarming envy by histact, amiability, and generosity, which were as marked as hisintellectual brilliancy, --being altogether a model of reproachlesschivalry. 

For some reason, however, the fears and jealousy of Astyages wererenewed, and Cyrus was sent to his father in Persia with costly gifts. Possibly he was recalled by Cambyses himself, for a father by all theEastern codes had a right to the person of his son. 

No sooner was Cyrus established in Persia, --a country which it wouldseem he had never before seen, --than he was sought by the discontentedPersians to head a revolt against their masters, and he availed himselfof the disaffection of Harpagus, the most influential of the Mediannoblemen, for the dethronement of his grandfather. Persia arose inrebellion against Media. A war ensued, and in a battle between theconflicting forces Astyages was defeated and taken prisoner, but waskindly treated by his magnanimous conqueror. This battle ended theMedian ascendency, and Cyrus became the monarch of both Mediaand Persia. 

Since the Medes belonged to the same Aryan family as the Persians, andhad the same language, religion, and institutions, with slightdifferences, and lived among the mountains exposed to an uncongenialclimate with extremes of heat and cold, and were doomed to hard andincessant labors for a subsistence, and were therefore--that is, theordinary people--frugal, industrious, and temperate, it will be seenthat what we have said of Persia equally applies to Media, except thepossession by the latter of political power as wielded by the sovereignof a larger State. 

Before a central power was established in Media, the country hadbeen--as in all nations in their formative state--ruled by chieftains, who acknowledged as their supreme lord the King of Assyria, who reignedin Nineveh. Among these chieftains was a remarkable man called Deioces, so upright and able that he was elected king. Deioces reignedfifty-three years wisely and well, bequeathing the kingdom he hadfounded to his son Phraortes, under whom Media became independent ofAssyria. His son and successor Cyaxares, who died 593 B. C. , was asuccessful warrior and conqueror, and was the founder of Mediangreatness. With the assistance of Nabopolassar, a Babylonian general whohad also revolted against the Assyrian monarch, Cyaxares succeeded, after repeated failures, in taking Nineveh and destroying the greatAssyrian Empire which had ruled the Eastern world for several centuries. The northern and eastern provinces were annexed to Media, while theBabylonian valley of the Euphrates in the south fell to the share ofNabopolassar, who established the Babylonian ascendency. This in itsturn was greatly augmented by his son Nebuchadnezzar, one of the mostfamous conquerors of antiquity, whose empire became more extensive eventhan the Assyrian. He reigned in Babylon with unparalleled splendor, andmade his capital the wonder and the admiration of the world, enrichingand ornamenting it with palaces, temples, and hanging gardens, andstrengthening its defences to such a marvellous degree that it wasdeemed impregnable. 

Cyaxares the Median meanwhile raised up in Ecbatana a rival power tothat of Babylon, although he devoted himself to warlike expeditions morethan to the adornment of his capital. He penetrated with his invincibletroops as far to the west as Lydia in Asia Minor, then ruled by thefather of Croesus, and thus became known to the Ionian cities which theGreeks had colonized. After a brilliant reign, Cyaxares transmitted hisempire to an unworthy son, --Astyages, the grandfather of Cyrus, whoseloss of the throne has been already related. With Astyages perished theMedian Empire, which had lasted only about one hundred years, and Mediawas incorporated with Persia. Henceforth the Medes and Persians arespoken of as virtually one nation, similar in religion and customs, andfurnishing equally the best cavalry in the world. Under Cyrus theybecame the ascendent power in Asia, and maintained their ascendencyuntil their conquest by Alexander. The union between Media and Persiawas probably as complete as that between Burgundy and France, or that ofScotland with England. Indeed, Media now became the residence of thePersian kings, whose palaces at Ecbatana, Susa, and Persepolis nearlyrivalled those of Babylon. Even modern Persia comprises theancient Media. 

The reign of Cyrus properly begins with the conquest of Media, or ratherits union with Persia, B. C. 549. We know, however, but little of thecareer of Cyrus after he became monarch of both Persia and Media, untilhe was forty years of age. He was probably engaged in the conquest ofvarious barbaric hordes before his memorable Lydian campaign. But we arein ignorance of his most active years, when he was exposed to thegreatest dangers and hardships, and when he became perfected in themilitary art, as in the case of Caesar amid the marshes and forests ofGaul and Belgium. The fame of Caesar rests as much on his conquests ofthe Celtic barbarians of Europe as on his conflict with Pompey; butwhether Cyrus obtained military fame or not in his wars against theTuranians, he doubtless proved himself a benefactor to humanity more inarresting the tide of Scythian invasion than by those conquests whichhave given him immortality. 

When Cyrus had cemented his empire by the conquest of the Turaniannations, especially those that dwelt between the Caspian and Black seas, his attention was drawn to Lydia, the most powerful kingdom of westernAsia, whose monarch, Croesus, reigned at Sardis in Orientalmagnificence. Lydia was not much known to distant States until the reignof Gyges, about 716 B. C. , who made war on the Dorian and Ionian Greekcolonies on the coast of Asia Minor, the chief of which were Miletus, Smyrna, Colophon, and Ephesus. His successor Ardys continued thiswarfare, but was obliged to desist because of an invasion of theCimmerians, --barbarians from beyond the Caucasus, driven away fromtheir homes by the Scythians. His grandson Alyattes, greatest of theLydian monarchs, succeeded in expelling the Cimmerians from Lydia. Aftersubduing some of the maritime cities of Asia Minor, this monarch facedthe Medes, who had advanced their empire to the river Halys, the easternboundary of Lydia, which flows northwardly into the Euxine. For fiveyears Alyattes fought the Medes under Cyaxares with varying success, andthe war ended by the marriage of the daughter of the Lydian king withAstyages. After this, Alyattes reigned forty-three years, and was buriedin a tomb whose magnificence was little short of the grandest of theEgyptian monuments. 

Croesus, his son, entered upon a career which reminds us of Solomon, theinheritor of the conquests of David. Like the Jewish monarch, Croesuswas rich, luxurious, and intellectual. His wealth, obtained chiefly fromthe mines of his kingdom, was a marvel to the Greeks. His capital Sardisbecame the largest in western Asia, and one of the most luxurious citiesknown to antiquity, whither resorted travellers from all parts of theworld, attracted by the magnificence of the court, among whom was Solonhimself, the great Athenian law-giver. Croesus continued the warfare onthe Greek cities of Asia, and forced them to become his tributaries. Hebrought under his sway most of the nations to the west of the Halys, andthough never so great a warrior as his father, he became very powerful. He was as generous in his gifts as he was magnificent in his tastes. Hisofferings to the oracle at Delphi were unprecedented in their value, when he sought advice as to the wisdom of engaging in war with Cyrus. Ofthe three great Asian empires, Croesus now saw his father's ally, Babylon, under a weak and dissolute ruler; Media, absorbed into Persiaunder the power of a valiant and successful conqueror; and his ownempire, Lydia, threatened with attack by the growing ambition of Persia. Herodotus says he "was led to consider whether it were possible to checkthe growing power of that people. "

It was the misfortune of Croesus to overrate his strength, --an erroroften seen in the career of fortunate men, especially those who enterupon a great inheritance. It does not appear that Croesus desired warwith Persia, but he did not dread it, and felt confident that he couldovercome a man whose chief conquests had been made over barbarians. Perhaps he felt the necessity of contending with Cyrus before thatwarrior's victories and prestige should become overwhelming, for thePersian monarch obviously aimed at absorbing all Asia in his empire; atany rate, when informed by the oracle at Delphi that if he fought withthe Persians he would destroy a mighty empire, Croesus interpreted theresponse in his own favor. 

Croesus made great preparations for the approaching contest, which wasto settle the destiny of Asia Minor. The Greeks were on his side, forthey feared the Persians more than they did the Lydians. With the aid ofSparta, the most warlike of the Grecian States, he advanced to meet thePersian conqueror, not however without the expostulation of some of hiswisest counsellors. One of them, according to Herodotus, ventured toaddress him with these plain words: "Thou art about, O King, to make waragainst men who wear leather trousers and other garments of leather; whofeed not on what they like, but on what they can get from a soil whichis sterile and unfriendly; who do not indulge in wine, but drink water;who possess no figs, nor anything which is good to eat. If, then, thouconquerest them, what canst thou get from them, seeing that they havenothing at all? But if they conquer thee, consider how much that isprecious thou wilt lose; if they once get a taste of our pleasantthings, they will keep such a hold of them that we never shall be ableto make them lose their grasp. " We cannot consider Croesus as utterlyinfatuated in not taking this advice, since war had become inevitable, It was "either anvil or hammer, " as between France and Prussia in1870-72, --as between all great powers that accept the fortune of war, ever uncertain in its results. The only question seems to have been whoshould first take the offensive in a war that had been long preparing, and in which defeat would be followed by the utter ruin of thedefeated party. 

The Lydians began the attack by crossing the Halys and entering theenemy's territory. The first battle took place at Pteria in Cappadocia, near Sinope on the Euxine, but was indecisive. Both parties foughtbravely, and the slaughter on both sides was dreadful, the Lydians beingthe most numerous, and the Persians the most highly disciplined. Afterthe battle of Pteria, Croesus withdrew his army to his own territoriesand retired upon his capital, with a view of augmenting his forces;while Cyrus, with the instinct of a conqueror, ventured to cross theHalys in pursuit, and to march rapidly on Sardis before the enemy couldcollect another army. Prompt decision and celerity of movementcharacterize all successful warriors, and here it was that Cyrus showedhis military genius. Before Croesus was fully prepared for anotherfight, Cyrus was at the gates of Sardis. But the Lydian king ralliedwhat forces he could, and led them out to battle. The Lydians weresuperior in cavalry; seeing which, Cyrus, with that fertility ofresource which marked his whole career, collected together the camelswhich transported his baggage and provisions, and placed them in thefront of his array, since the horse, according to Herodotus, has anatural dread of the camel and cannot abide his sight or his smell. Theresult was as Cyrus calculated; the cavalry of the Lydians turned roundand galloped away. The Lydians fought bravely, but were driven withinthe walls of their capital. Cyrus vigorously prosecuted the siege, whichlasted only fourteen days, since an attack was made on the side of thecity which was undefended, and which was supposed to be impregnable andunassailable. The proud city fell by assault, and was given up toplunder. Croesus himself was taken alive, after a reign of fourteenyears, and the mighty Lydia became a Persian province. 

There is something unusually touching in the fate of Croesus after sogreat prosperity. Saved by Cyrus from an ignominious and painful death, such as the barbarous customs of war then made common, the unhappyLydian monarch became, it is said, the friend and admirer of theConqueror, and was present in his future expeditions, and even proved awise and faithful counsellor. If some proud monarchs by the fortune ofwar have fallen suddenly from as lofty an eminence as that of Croesus, it is certain that few have yielded with nobler submission than he tothe decrees of fate. 

The fall of Sardis, --B. C. 546, according to Grote, --was followed by thesubmission of all the States that were dependent on Lydia. Even theGrecian colonies in Asia Minor were annexed to the Persian Empire. 

The conquest of the Ionian cities, first by Croesus and then by Cyrus, was attended with important political consequences. Before the time ofCroesus the Greek cities of Asia were independent. Had they combinedtogether for offence and defence, with the assistance of Sparta andAthens, they might have resisted the attacks of both Lydians andPersians. But the autonomy of cities and states, favorable as it was tothe development of art, literature, and commerce, as well as ofindividual genius in all departments of knowledge and enterprise, wasnot calculated to make a people politically powerful. Only a strongcentral power enables a country to resist hostile aggressions on a greatscale. Thus Greece herself ultimately fell into the hands of Philip, andafterward into those of the Romans. 

The conquest of the Ionian cities also introduced into Asia Minor andperhaps into Europe Oriental customs, luxuries, and wealth hithertounknown. Certainly when Persia became an irresistible power and ruledthe conquered countries by satraps and royal governors, it assimilatedthe Greeks with Asiatics, and modified the forms of social life; itbrought Asia and Europe together, and produced a rivalry which finallyended in the battle of Marathon and the subsequent Asiatic victories ofAlexander. While the conquests of the Persians introduced Oriental ideasand customs into Greece, the wars of Alexander extended the Grecian swayin Asia. The civilized world opened toward the East; but with theextension of Greek ideas and art, there was a decline of primitivevirtues in Greece herself. Luxury undermined power. 

The annexation of Asia Minor to the empire of Cyrus was followed by aprotracted war with the barbarians on his eastern boundaries. Theimperfect subjugation of barbaric nations living in Central Asiaoccupied Cyrus, it is thought, about twelve years. He pushed hisconquests to the Iaxartes on the north and Afghanistan on the east, reducing that vast country which lies between the Caspian Sea and thedeserts of Tartary. 

Cyrus was advancing in years before he undertook the conquest ofBabylon, the most important of all his undertakings, and for which hisother conquests were preparatory. At the age of sixty, Cyrus, 538 B. C. , advanced against Narbonadius, the proud king of Babylon, --the onlyremaining power in Asia that was still formidable. The BabylonianEmpire, which had arisen on the ruins of the Assyrian, had lasted onlyabout one hundred years. Yet what wonders and triumphs had been seen atBabylon during that single century! What progress had been made in artsand sciences! What grand palaces and temples had been erected! What amultitude of captives had added to the pomp and wealth of the proudestcity of antiquity! Babylon the great, ---"the glory of kingdoms, " "thepraise of the whole earth, " the centre of all that was civilized and allthat was corrupting in the Oriental world, with its soothsayers, itsmagicians, its necromancers, its priests, its nobles, --was now to fall, for its abominations cried aloud to heaven for punishment. 

This great city was built on both sides of the Euphrates, was fifteenmiles square, with gardens and fields capable of supporting a largepopulation, and was stocked with provisions to maintain a siege ofindefinite length against any enemy. The accounts of its walls andfortifications exceed belief, estimated by Herodotus to be three hundredand fifty feet in height, with a wide moat surrounding them, which couldnot be bridged or crossed by an invading army. The soldiers ofNarbonadius looked with derision on the veteran forces of Cyrus, although they were inured to the hardships and privations of incessantwar. To all appearance the city was impregnable, and could be taken onlyby unusual methods. But the genius of the Persian conqueror, accordingto traditional accounts, surmounted all difficulties. Who else wouldhave thought of diverting the Euphrates from its bed into the canals andgigantic reservoirs which Nebuchadnezzar had built for purposes ofirrigation? Yet this seems to have been done. Taking advantage of afestival, when the whole population were given over to bacchanalianorgies, and therefore off their guard, Cyrus advanced, under the coverof a dark night, by the bed of the river, now dry, and easily surprisedthe drunken city, slaying the king, with a thousand of his lords, as hewas banqueting in his palace. The slightest accident or miscarriagewould have defeated so bold an operation. The success of Cyrus had allthe mystery and solemnity of a Providential event. Though no miracle waswrought, the fall of Babylon--so strong, so proud, so defiant--was aswonderful as the passage of the Israelites across the Red Sea, or thecrumbling walls of Jericho before the blasts of the trumpets of Joshua. 

However, this account is to be taken with some reserve, since by thediscoveries of historical "cylinders, "--the clay books whereon theChaldaean priests and scribes recorded the main facts of the reigns oftheir monarchs, --and especially one called the "Proclamation Cylinder, "prepared for Cyrus after the fall of Babylon, it would seem thatdissension and treachery within had much to do with facilitating theentrance of the invader. Narbonadius, the second successor ofNebuchadnezzar, had quarrelled with the priesthood of Babylon, andneglected the worship of Bel-Marduk and Nebo, the special patron gods ofthat city. The captive Jews also, who had been now nearly fifty years inthe land, had grown more zealous for their own God and religion, moreinfluential and wealthy, and even had become in some sort a power in theState. The invasion of Cyrus--a monotheist like themselves--must haveseemed to them a special providence from Jehovah; indeed, we know thatit did, from the records in II. Chronicles xxxvi. 22, 23: "The Lordstirred up the spirit of Koresh, King of Persia, that he made aproclamation throughout all his kingdom, and put it also in writing. "The same words occur in the beginning of the Book of Ezra, bothreferring to the sending home of the Jews after the fall of Babylon; theforty-sixth chapter of Isaiah also: "The Lord saith of Koresh, He is myshepherd, and shall perform all my pleasure. "

Babylon was not at that time levelled with the ground, but became one ofthe capitals of the Persian Empire, where the Persian monarch residedfor more than half the year. Although the Babylonian Empire began withNabopolassar, B. C. 625, on the destruction of Nineveh, yet Babylon was avery ancient city and the capital of the ancient Chaldaean monarchy, which lasted under various dynasties from about 2400 B. C. To 1300 B. C. , when it was taken by the Assyrians under Tig Vathi-Nin. The greatAssyrian Empire, which thus absorbed ancient Babylonia, lasted betweensix and seven hundred years, according to Herodotus, although recentdiscoveries and inscriptions make its continuance much longer, and wasthe dominant power of Asia during the most interesting period of Jewishhistory, until taken by Cyaxares the Median. The limits of the empirevaried at different times, for the conquered States which composed itwere held together by a precarious tenure. But even in its greateststrength it was inferior in size and power to the Empire of Cyrus. Tocheck rebellion, --a source of constant trouble and weakness, --thewarlike monarchs were obliged to reconquer, imposing not only tributeand fealty, but overrunning the rebellious countries with fire andsword, and carrying away captive to distant cities a large part of thepopulation as slaves. Thus at one time two hundred thousand Jews weretransported to Assyria, and the "Ten Tribes" were scattered over theEastern world, never more to return to Palestine. 

On the rebellion of Nabopolassar, in 625 B. C. , Babylon recovered notonly its ancient independence, but more than its ancient prestige; yetthe empire of which it was the capital lasted only about the same lengthof time as Media and Lydia, --the most powerful monarchies existing whenCyrus was born. Babylon, however, during its brief dominion, afterhaving been subject to Assyria for seven hundred years, reappeared inunparalleled splendor, and was probably the most magnificent capital theancient world ever saw until Rome arose. Even after its occupancy by thePersian monarchs for two hundred years, it called out the admiration ofHerodotus and Alexander alike. Its arts, its sciences, its manufactures, to say nothing of its palaces and temples, were the admiration oftravellers. When the proud conqueror of Palestine beheld themagnificence he had created, little did he dream that "this greatBabylon which he had built" would become such a desolation that its verysite would be uncertain, --a habitation for dragons, a dreary waste forowls and goats and wild beasts to occupy. 

We should naturally suppose that Cyrus, with the kings of Asia prostratebefore his satraps, would have been contented to enjoy the fruits of hislabors; but there is no limit to man's ambition. Like Alexander, hesought for new worlds to conquer, and perished, as some historiansmaintain, in an unsuccessful war with some unknown barbarians on thenortheastern boundaries of his empire, --even as Caesar meditated a warwith the Parthians, where he might have perished, as Crassus did. Unbounded as is human ambition, there is a limit to humanaggrandizement. Great conquerors are raised up by Providence toaccomplish certain results for civilization, and when these areattained, when their mission is ended, they often pass awayingloriously, --assassinated or defeated or destroyed by self-indulgence, as the case may be. It seems to have been the mission of Cyrus todestroy the ascendency of the Semitic and Hamitic despotisms in westernAsia, that a new empire might be erected by nobler races, who shouldestablish a reign of law. For the first time in Asia there was, on theaccession of Cyrus to unlimited power, a recognition of justice, and theadoration of one supreme deity ruling in goodness and truth. 

This may be the reason why Cyrus treated the captive Jews with so greatgenerosity, since he recognized in their Jehovah the Ahura-Mazda, --theSupreme God that Zoroaster taught. No political reason will account forsending back to Palestine thousands of captives with imperial presents, to erect once more their sacred Temple and rebuild their sacred city. Heand all the Persian monarchs were zealous adherents of the religion ofZoroaster, the central doctrine of which was the unity of God andDivine Providence in the world, which doctrine neither Egyptian norBabylonian nor Lydian monarchs recognized. What a boon to humanity wasthe restoration of the Jews to their capital and country! We read of nooppression of the Jews by the Persian monarchs. Mordecai the Jew becamethe prime minister of such an effeminate monarch as Xerxes, while Danielbefore him had been the honored minister of Darius. 

Of all the Persian monarchs Cyrus was the best beloved. Xenophon madehim the hero of his philosophical romance. He is represented as theincarnation of "sweetness and light. " When a mere boy he delights allwith whom he is brought into contact, by his wit and valor. The king ofMedia accepts his reproofs and admires his wisdom; the nobles of Mediaare won by his urbanity and magnanimity. All historians praise hissimple habits and unbounded generosity. In an age when polygamy was thevice of kings, he was contented with one wife, whom he loved andhonored. He rejected great presents, and thought it was better to givethan to receive. He treated women with delicacy and captives withmagnanimity. He conducted war with unknown mildness, and converted theconquered into friends. He exalted the dignity of labor, and scorned allbaseness and lies. His piety and manly virtues may have been exaggeratedby his admirers, but what we do know of him fills us with admiration. Brilliant in intellect, lofty in character, he was an ideal man, fittedto be the guide of a noble nation whom he led to glory and honor. Otherwarriors of world-wide fame have had, like him, great excellencies, marred by glaring defects; but no vices or crimes are ascribed to Cyrus, such as stained the characters of David and Constantine. The worst wecan say of him is that he was ambitious, and delighted in conquest; buthe was a conqueror raised up to elevate a religious race to a higherplane, and to find a field for the development of their energies, whatever may be said of their subsequent degeneracy. "The grandeur ofhis character is well rendered in that brief and unassuming inscriptionof his, more eloquent in its lofty simplicity than anything recorded byAssyrian and Babylonian kings: 'I am Kurush [Cyrus] the king, theAchaemenian. '" Whether he fell in battle, or died a natural death in oneof his palaces, he was buried in the ancient but modest capital of theancient Persians, Pasargadae; and his tomb was intact in the time ofAlexander, who visited it, --a sort of marble chapel raised on a marbleplatform thirty-six feet high, in which was deposited a giltsarcophagus, together with Babylonian tapestries, Persian weapons, andrare jewels of great value. This was the inscription on his tomb: "Oman, I am Kurush, the son of Kambujiya, who founded the greatness ofPersia and ruled Asia; grudge me not this monument. "

Cyrus was succeeded by his son Cambyses, who though not devoid of finequalities was jealous and tyrannical. He caused his own brother Smerdisto be put to death. He completed the conquests of his father by addingEgypt to his empire. In a fit of remorse for the murder of his brotherhe committed suicide, and the empire was usurped by a Magian impostor, called Gaumata, who claimed to be the second son of Cyrus. His reign, however, was short, he being slain by Darius the son of Hystaspes, belonging to another branch of the royal family. Darius was a greatgeneral and statesman, who reorganized the empire and raised it to thezenith of its power and glory. It extended from the Greek islands on thewest to India on the east. This monarch even penetrated to the Danubewith his armies, but made no permanent conquest in Europe. He made Susahis chief capital, and also built Persepolis, the ruins of which attestits ancient magnificence. It seems that he was a devout follower ofZoroaster, and ascribed his successes to the favor of Ahura-Mazda, theSupreme Deity. 

It was during the reign of Darius that Persia came in contact withGreece, in consequence of the revolt of the Ionian cities of Asia Minor, which, however, was easily suppressed by the Persian satrap. Thenfollowed two invasions of Greece itself by the Persians under thegenerals of Darius, and their defeat at Marathon by Miltiades. 

Darius was succeeded by Xerxes, the Ahasuerus of the Hebrew Scriptures, whose invasion of Greece with the largest army the world ever sawproperly belongs to Grecian history. It was reserved for the heroes ofPlataea to teach the world the lesson that the strength of armies is notin multitudes but in discipline, --a lesson confirmed by the conquests ofAlexander and Caesar. 

On the fall of the Persian Empire three hundred years after the fall ofBabylon, and the establishment of the Greek rule in Asia under thegenerals of Alexander, Persia proper did not cease to be formidable. Under the Sassanian princes the ambition of the Achaemenians wasrevived. Sapor defied Rome herself, and dragged the Emperor Valerian indisgraceful captivity to Ctesiphon, his capital. Sapor II. Was theconqueror of the Emperor Julian, and Chrosroes was an equally formidableadversary. In the year 617 A. D. Persian warriors advanced to the wallsof Constantinople, and drove the Emperor Heraclius to despair. 

Thus Persia never lost wholly its ancient prestige, and still remains, after the rise and fall of so many dynasties, and such greatvicissitudes from Greek and Arab conquests, a powerful country twice thesize of Germany, under the rule of an independent prince. There seemsno likelihood of her ever again playing so grand a part in the world'shistory as when, under the great Cyrus, she prepared the transfer ofempire from the Orient to the Occident. But "what has been, has been, and she has had her hour. "

AUTHORITIES. 

Herodotus and Xenophon are our main authorities, though not to be fullyrelied upon. Of modern works Rawlinson's Ancient Monarchies andRawlinson's Herodotus are the most valuable. Ragozin has writteninteresting books on Media, Persia, Assyria, and Chaldaea, makingspecial note of the researches of European travellers in the East. Fergusson, Layard, Sayce, and George Smith have shed light on all thisancient region. Johnson's work is learned but indefinite. Benjamin isthe latest writer on the history of Persia; but a satisfactory life ofCyrus has yet to be written. 

JULIUS CAESAR. 

 * * * * *

100-44 B. C. 

IMPERIALISM. 

The most august name in the history of the old Roman world, and perhapsof all antiquity, is that of Julius Caesar; and a new interest has oflate been created in this extraordinary man by the brilliant sketch ofhis life and character by Mr. Froude, who has whitewashed him, as is thefashion with hero-worshippers, like Carlyle in his history of FrederickII. But it is not an easy thing to reverse the verdict of the civilizedworld for two thousand years, although a man of genius can say manyinteresting things and offer valuable suggestions. 

In his Life of Caesar Mr. Froude seems to vindicate Imperialism, notmerely as a great necessity in the corrupt times which succeeded thecivil wars of Marius and Sulla, but as a good thing in itself. It seemsto me that while there was a general tendency to Imperialism in theRoman world for one or two hundred years before Christ, the wholetendency of modern governments is against it, and has been since thesecond English Revolution. It still exists in Russia and Turkey, possibly in Germany and Austria; yet constitutional forms of governmentseem to be gradually taking its place. What a change in England, France, Italy, and Spain during the last hundred years!--what a breaking up ofthe old absolutism of the Bourbons! Even the imperialism of Napoleon isheld in detestation by a large class of the French nation. 

It may have been necessary for such a man as Caesar to arise when theRomans had already conquered a great part of the civilized world, andwhen the various provinces which composed the Empire needed a firm, stable, and uniform government in the hands of a single man, in order topromote peace and law, --the first conditions of human society. But it isone thing to recognize the majesty of divine Providence in furnishing aremedy for the peculiar evils of an age or people, and quite anotherthing to make this remedy a panacea for all the future conditions ofnations. If we believe in the moral government of this world by a divineand supreme Intelligence whom we call God, then it is not difficult tosee in Julius Caesar, after nearly two thousand years, an instrument ofProvidence like Constantine, Charlemagne, Richelieu, and Napoleonhimself. It matters nothing whether Caesar was good or bad, whether hewas a patriot or a usurper, so far as his ultimate influence isconcerned, if he was the instrument of an overruling Power; for Godchooses such instruments as he pleases. Even in human governments it issometimes expedient to employ rogues in order to catch rogues, or tohead off some peculiar evil that honest people do not know how tomanage. But because a bad man is selected by a higher power to do somepeculiar work, it does not follow that this bad man should be praisedfor doing it, especially if the work is good only so far as it isoverruled. Both human consciousness and Christianity declare that it isa crime to shed needless and innocent blood. If ambition prompts a manto destroy his rivals and fill the world with miseries in order to climbto supreme power, then it is an insult to the human understanding tomake this ambition synonymous with patriotism. A successful conquerormay be far-sighted and enlightened, whatever his motives for conquest;but because he is enlightened, it does not follow that he fights battleswith the supreme view of benefiting his country, like William III. AndGeorge Washington. He may have taken the sword chiefly to elevatehimself; or, after having taken the sword with a view of renderingimportant services, and having rendered these services, he may have beendiverted from his original intentions, and have fought for thegratification of personal ambition, losing sight utterly of the causein which he embarked. 

Now this is the popular view which the world has taken of Caesar. Shakspeare may have been unjust in his verdict; but it is a verdictwhich has been sustained by most writers and by popular sentiment duringthe last three hundred years. It was also the verdict of Cicero, of theRoman Senate, and of ancient historians. It is one of my objects to showin this lecture how far this verdict is just. It is another object topoint out the services of Caesar to the State, which, however great andhonestly to be praised, do not offset crime. 

Caius Julius Caesar belonged to one of the proudest and most ancient ofthe patrician families of Rome, --a branch of the _gens Julia_, whichclaimed a descent from Iules, the son of Aeneas. His father, CaiusJulius, married Aurelia, a noble matron of the Cotta family, and hisaunt Julia married the great Marius; so that, though he was a patricianof the purest blood, his family alliances were either plebeian or on theliberal side in politics. He was born one hundred years before Christ, and received a good education, but was not precocious, like Cicero. There was nothing remarkable about his childhood. "He was a tall andhandsome man, with dark, piercing eyes, sallow complexion, large nose, full lips, refined and intellectual features, and thick neck. " He wasparticular about his appearance, and showed a studied negligence ofdress. His uncle Marius, in the height of his power, marked him out forpromotion, and made him a priest of Jupiter when he was fourteen yearsold. On the death of his father, a man of praetorian rank, and thereforea senator, at the age of seventeen Caesar married Cornelia, the daughterof Cinna, which connected him still more closely with the popular party. He was only a few years younger than Cicero and Pompey. When he waseighteen he attracted the notice of Sulla, then dictator, who wished himto divorce his wife and take such a one as he should propose, --which theyoung man, at the risk of his life, refused to do. This boldness andindependence of course displeased the Dictator, who predicted hisfuture. "In this young Caesar, " said he, "there are many Mariuses;" buthe did not kill him, owing to the intercession of powerful friends. 

The career of Caesar may be divided into three periods, during each ofwhich he appeared in a different light: the first, until he began theconquest of Gaul, at the age of forty-three; the second, the time of hismilitary exploits in Gaul, by which he rendered great services andgained popularity and fame; and the third, that of his civil wars, dictatorship, and imperial reign. 

In the first period of his life, for about twenty-five years, he made amark indeed, but rendered no memorable services to the State and won noespecial fame. Had he died at the age of forty-three, his name wouldprobably not have descended to our times, except as a leading citizen, agood lawyer, and powerful debater. He saw military service, almost as amatter of course; but he was not particularly distinguished as ageneral, nor did he select the military profession. He was eloquent, aspiring, and able, as a young patrician; but, like Cicero, it wouldseem that he sought the civil service, and made choice of the law, bywhich to rise in wealth and power. He was a politician from the first;and his ambition was to get a seat in the Senate, like all other ableand ambitious men. Senators were not hereditary, however nobly born, butgained their seats by election to certain high offices in the gift ofthe people, called curule offices, which entitled them to senatorialposition and dignity. A seat in the Senate was the great object of Romanambition; because the Senate was the leading power of the State, andcontrolled the army, the treasury, religious worship, and the provinces. The governors and ambassadors, as well as the dictators, were selectedby this body of aristocrats. In fact, to the Senate was intrusted thesupreme administration of the Empire, although the source of power wastechnically and theoretically in the people, or those who had the rightof suffrage; and as the people elected those magistrates whose officesentitled them to a seat in the Senate, the Senate was virtually electedby the people. Senators held their places for life, but could be weededout by the censors. And as the Senate in its best days contained betweenthree and four hundred men, not all the curule magistrates could enterit, unless there were vacancies; but a selection from them was made bythe censors. So the Senate, in all periods of the Roman Republic, wascomposed of experienced men, --of those who had previously held the greatoffices of State. 

To gain a seat in the Senate, therefore, it was necessary to be electedby the people to one of the great magistracies. In the early ages of theRepublic the people were incorruptible; but when foreign conquest, slavery, and other influences demoralized them, they became venal andsold their votes. Hence only rich men, ordinarily, were elected to highoffice; and the rich men, as a rule, belonged to the old families. Sothe Senate was made up not only of experienced men, but of thearistocracy. There were rich men outside the Senate, --successfulplebeians, men who had made fortunes by trade, bankers, monopolists, andothers; but these, if ambitious of social position or politicalinfluence, became gradually absorbed among the senatorial families. Those who could afford to buy the votes of the people, and those only, became magistrates and senators. Hence the demagogues were rich men andbelonged to the highest ranks, like Clodius and Catiline. 

It thus happened that, when Julius Caesar came upon the stage, thearistocracy controlled the elections. The people were indeed sovereign;but they abdicated their power to those who would pay the most for it. The constitution was popular in name; in reality it was aristocratic, since only rich men (generally noble) could be elected to office. Romewas ruled by aristocrats, who became rich as the people became poor. Thegreat source of senatorial wealth was in the control of the provinces. The governors were chosen by the Senate and from the Senate; and itrequired only one or two years to make a fortune as a governor, likeVerres. The ultimate cause which threw power into the hands of the richand noble was the venality of the people. The aristocratic demagoguesbought them, in the same way that rich monopolists in our day controllegislatures. The people are too numerous in this country to be directlybought up, even if it were possible, and the prizes they confer are nothigh enough to tempt rich men, as they did in Rome. 

A man, therefore, who would rise to power at Rome must necessarily bribethe people, must purchase their votes, unless he was a man ofextraordinary popularity, --some great orator like Cicero, or successfulgeneral like Marius or Sulla; and it was difficult to get popularityexcept as a lawyer and orator, or as a general. 

Caesar, like Cicero and Hortensius, chose the law as a means of risingin the world; for, though of ancient family, he was not rich. He mustmake money by his profession, or he must borrow it, if he would secureoffice. It seems he borrowed it. How he contrived to borrow such vastsums as he spent on elections, I do not know. He probably made friendsof rich men like Crassus, who became security for him. He was in debt tothe amount of $1, 500, 000 of our money before he held office. He was abold political gambler, and played for high stakes. It would seem thathe had very winning and courteous manners, though he was notdistinguished for popular oratory. His terse and pregnant sentences, however, won the admiration of his friend Cicero, a brother lawyer, andhe was very social and hospitable. He was on the liberal side inpolitics, and attacked the abuses of the day, which won him popularfavor. At first he lived in a modest house with his wife and mother, inthe Subarra, without attracting much notice. The first office to whichhe was elected was that of a Military Tribune, soon after his sojourn oftwo years in Rhodes to learn from Apollonius the arts of oratory. Hisnext office was that of Quaestor, which enabled him to enter the Senate, at the age of thirty-two; and his third office, that of Aedile, whichgave him the control of the public buildings: the Aediles were expectedto decorate the city, and this gave him opportunities of cultivatingpopularity by splendor and display. The first thing which brought himinto notice as an orator was a funeral oration he pronounced on his AuntJulia, the widow of Marius. The next fortunate event of his life was hismarriage with Pompeia, a cousin of Pompey, who was then the foremost manin Rome, having distinguished himself in Spain and in putting down theslave insurrection under Spartacus; but Pompey's great career in theEast had not yet commenced, so that the future rivals at that time werefriends. Caesar glorified Pompey in the Senate, which by virtue of hisoffice he had lately entered. The next step to greatness was hiselection by the people--through the use of immense amounts of borrowedmoney--to the great office of Pontifex Maximus, which made him the paganPope of Rome for life, with a grand palace to live in. Soon after he wasmade Praetor, which office entitled him to a provincial government; andhe was sent by the Senate to Spain as Pro-praetor, completed theconquest of the peninsula, and sent to Borne vast sums of money. Theseservices entitled him to a triumph; but, as he presented himself at thesame time as a candidate for the consulship, he was obliged to foregothe triumph, and was elected Consul without opposition: his vanity everyielded to his ambition. 

Thus far there was nothing remarkable in Caesar's career. He had risenby power of money, like other aristocrats, to the highest offices of theState, showing abilities indeed, but not that extraordinary genius whichhas made him immortal. He was the leader of the political party whichSulla had put down, and yet was not a revolutionist like the Gracchi. Hewas an aristocratic reformer, like Lord John Russell before the passageof the Reform Bill, whom the people adored. He was a liberal, but not aradical. Of course he was not a favorite with the senators, who wishedto perpetuate abuses. He was intensely disliked by Cato, a mostexcellent and honest man, but narrow-minded and conservative, --a sort ofDuke of Wellington without his military abilities. The Senate would makeno concessions, would part with no privileges, and submit to no changes. Like Lord Eldon, it "adhered to what was established, because it wasestablished. "

Caesar, as Consul, began his administration with conciliation; and hehad the support of Crassus with his money, and of Pompey as therepresentative of the army, who was then flushed with his Easternconquests, --pompous, vain, and proud, but honest and incorruptible. Cicero stood aloof, --the greatest man in the Senate, whose aristocraticprivileges he defended. He might have aided Caesar "in the speakingdepartment;" but as a "new man" he was jealous of his prerogatives, andwas always conservative, like Burke, whom he resembled in his eloquenceand turn of mind and fondness for literature and philosophy. Failing toconciliate the aristocrats, Caesar became a sort of Mirabeau, andappealed to the people, causing them to pass his celebrated "LegesJuliae, " or reform bills; the chief of which was the "land act, " whichconferred portions of the public lands on Pompey's disbanded soldiersfor settlement, --a wise thing, which senators opposed, since it tookaway their monopoly. Another act required the provincial governors, ontheir return from office, to render an account of their stewardship andhand in their accounts for public inspection. The Julian Laws also weredesigned to prevent the plunder of the public revenues, the debasing ofthe coin, the bribery of judges and of the people at elections. Therewere laws also for the protection of citizens from violence, and sundryother reforms which were enlightened and useful. In the passage of theselaws against the will of the Senate, we see that the people were stillrecognized as sovereign in _legislation_. The laws were good. Alldepended on their execution; and the Senate, as the administrative body, could practically defeat their operation when Caesar's term of officeexpired; and this it unwisely determined to do. The last thing itwished was any reform whatever; and, as Mr. Froude thinks, there musthave been either reform or revolution. But this is not so clear to me. Aristocracy was all-powerful when money could buy the people, and whenthe people had no virtue, no ambition, no intelligence. The struggle atRome in the latter days of the Republic was not between the people andthe aristocracy, but between the aristocracy and the military chieftainson one side, and those demagogues whom it feared on the other. Theresult showed that the aristocracy feared and distrusted Caesar; and heused the people only to advance his own ends, --of course, in the name ofreform and patriotism. And when he became Dictator, he kicked away theladder on which he climbed to power. It was Imperialism that heestablished; neither popular rights nor aristocratic privileges. He hadno more love of the people than he had of those proud aristocrats whoafterwards murdered him. 

But the empire of the world--to which Caesar at that time may, or maynot, have aspired: who can tell? but probably not--was not to be gainedby civil services, or reforms, or arguments in law courts, or by holdinggreat offices, or haranguing the people at the rostrum, or makingspeeches in the Senate, --where he was hated for his liberal views andenlightened mind, rather than from any fear of his overturning theconstitution, --but by military services and heroic deeds and thedevotion of a tried and disciplined regular army. Caesar was nowforty-three years of age, being in the full maturity of his powers. Atthe close of his term as Consul he sought a province where militarytalents were indispensable, and where he could have a long term ofoffice. The Senate gave him the "woods and forests, "--an unsubduedcountry, where he would have hard work and unknown perils, and fromwhich it was probable he would never return. They sent him to Gaul. Butthis was just the field for his marvellous military genius, then onlypartially developed; and the second period of his career now began. 

It was during this second period that he rendered his most importantservices to the State and earned his greatest fame. The dangers whichthreatened the Empire came from the West, and not the East. Asia wasalready-subdued by Sulla, Lucullus, and Pompey, or was on the point ofbeing subdued. Mithridates was a formidable enemy; but he aimed atestablishing an Asiatic empire, not conquering the European provinces. He was not so dangerous as even Pyrrhus had been. Moreover, the conquestof the East was comparatively easy, --over worn-out races and an effetecivilization; it gave _éclat_ to Sulla and Pompey, --as the conquest ofIndia, with a handful of British troops, made Clive and Hastingsfamous; it required no remarkable military genius, nor was it necessaryfor the safety of Italy. Conquest over the Oriental monarchies meantonly spoliation. It was prompted by greed and vanity more than by asense of danger. Pompey brought back money enough from the East toenrich all his generals, and the Senate besides, --or rather the State, which a few aristocrats practically owned. 

But the conquest of Gaul would be another affair. It was peopled withhardy races, who cast their greedy eyes on the empire of the Romans, oron some of its provinces, and who were being pushed forward to invasionby a still braver people beyond the Rhine, --races kindred to thoseTeutons whom Marius had defeated. There was no immediate danger from theGermans; but there was ultimate danger, as proved by the union they madein the time of Marcus Antoninus for the invasion of the Roman provinces. It was necessary to raise a barrier against their inundations. It wasalso necessary to subdue the various Celtic tribes of Gaul, who weregetting restless and uneasy. There was no money in a conquest overbarbarians, except so far as they could be sold into slavery; but therewas danger in it. The whole country was threatened with insurrections, leagues, and invasion, from the Alps to the ocean. There was aconfederacy of hostile kings and chieftains; they commanded innumerableforces; they controlled important posts and passes. The Gauls had longmade fixed settlements, and had built bridges and fortresses. They werenot so warlike as the Germans; but they were yet formidable enemies. United, they were like "a volcano giving signs of approaching eruption;and at any moment, and hardly without warning, another lava stream mightbe poured down Venetia and Lombardy. "

To rescue the Empire from such dangers was the work of Caesar; and itwas no small undertaking. The Senate had given him unlimited power, forfive years, over Gaul, --then a _terra incognita_, --an indefinitecountry, comprising the modern States of France, Holland, Switzerland, Belgium, and a part of Germany. Afterward the Senate extended thegovernorship five years more; so difficult was the work of conquest, andso formidable were the enemies. But it was danger which Caesar loved. The greater the obstacles the better was he pleased, and the greater wasthe scope for his genius, --which at first was not appreciated, for thebest part of his life had been passed in Rome as a lawyer and orator andstatesman. But he had a fine constitution, robust health, temperatehabits, and unbounded energies. He was free to do as he liked withseveral legions, and had time to perfect his operations. And his legionswere trained to every kind of labor and hardship. They could buildbridges, cut down forests, and drain swamps, as well as march with aweight of eighty pounds to the man. They could make their own shoes, mend their own clothes, repair their own arms, and construct their owntents. They were as familiar with the axe and spade as they were withthe lance and sword. They were inured to every kind of danger anddifficulty, and not one of them was personally braver than the generalwho led them, or more skilful in riding a horse, or fording a river, orclimbing a mountain. No one of them could be more abstemious. Luxury isnot one of the peculiarities of successful generals in barbariccountries. 

To give a minute sketch of the various encounters with the differenttribes and nations that inhabited the vast country he was sent toconquer and govern, would be impossible in a lecture like this. One mustread Caesar's own account of his conflicts with Helvetii, Aedui, Remi, Nervii, Belgae, Veneti, Arverni, Aquitani, Ubii, Eubueones, Treveri, andother nations between the Alps, the Pyrenees, the Rhine, and the sea. Their numbers were immense, and they were well armed, and had cavalry, military stores, efficient leaders, and indomitable courage. When beatenin one place they sprang up in another, like the Saxons with whomCharlemagne contended. They made treaties only to break them. Theyfought with the desperation of heroes who had their wives and children, firesides and altars, to guard; yet against them Caesar was uniformlysuccessful. He was at times in great peril, yet he never lost but onebattle, and this through the fault of his generals. Yet he had ablegenerals, whom he selected himself, --Labienus, who afterwards desertedhim, Antony, Publius Crassus, Cotta, Sabinus, --all belonging to thearistocracy. They made mistakes, but Caesar never. They would often havebeen cut off but for Caesar's timely aid. 

When we consider the dangers to which he was constantly exposed, theamazing difficulties he had to surmount, the hardships he had toencounter, the fears he had to allay, the murmurs he was obliged tosilence, the rivers he was compelled to cross in the face of enemies, the forests it was necessary to penetrate, the swamps and mountains andfortresses which impeded his marches, we are amazed at his skill andintrepidity, to say nothing of his battles with forces ten times morenumerous than his own. His fertility of resources, his lightningrapidity of movement, his sagacity and insight, his perfection ofdiscipline, his careful husbandry of forces, his ceaseless diligence, his intrepid courage, the confidence with which he inspired hissoldiers, his brilliant successes (victory after victory), with theenormous number of captives by which he and the State becameenriched, --all these things dazzled his countrymen, and gave him a famesuch as no general had ever earned before. He conquered a population ofwarriors to be numbered by millions, with no aid from charts and maps, exposed perpetually to treachery and false information. He had to pleaseand content an army a thousand miles from home, without supplies, exceptsuch as were precarious, --living on the plainest food, and doomed toinfinite labors and drudgeries, besides attacking camps and assaultingfortresses, and fighting pitched battles. Yet he won their love, theirrespect, and their admiration, --and by an urbanity, a kindness, and acareful protection of their interests, such as no general ever showedbefore. He was a hero performing perpetual wonders, as chivalrous as theknights of the Middle Ages. No wonder he was adored, like a Moses in thewilderness, like a Napoleon in his early conquests. 

This conquest of Gaul, during which he drove the Germans back to theirforests, and inaugurated a policy of conciliation and moderation whichmade the Gauls the faithful allies of Rome, and their country its mostfertile and important province, furnishing able men both for the Senateand the Army, was not only a great feat of genius, but a greatservice--a transcendent service--to the State, which entitled Caesar toa magnificent reward. Had it been cordially rendered to him, he mighthave been contented with a sort of perpetual consulship, and with theéclat of being the foremost man of the Empire. The people would havegiven him anything in their power to give, for he was as much an idol tothem as Napoleon became to the Parisians after the conquest of Italy. Hehad rendered services as brilliant as those of Scipio, of Marius, ofSulla, or of Pompey. If he did not save Italy from being subsequentlyoverrun by barbarians, he postponed their irruptions for two hundredyears. And he had partially civilized the country he had subdued, andintroduced Roman institutions. He had also created an army ofdisciplined veterans, such as never before was seen. He perfectedmilitary mechanism, that which kept the Empire together after allvitality had fled. He was the greatest master of the art of war known toantiquity. Such transcendent military excellence and such great servicesentitled him to the gratitude and admiration of the whole Empire, although he enriched himself and his soldiers with the spoils of his tenyears' war, and did not, so far as I can see, bring great sums into thenational treasury. 

But the Senate was reluctant to give him the customary rewards for tenyears' successful war, and for adding Western Europe to the Empire. Itwas jealous of his greatness and his renown. It also feared him, for hehad eleven legions in his pay, and was known to be ambitious. It hatedhim for two reasons: first, because in his first consulship he hadintroduced reforms, and had always sided with the popular and liberalparty; and secondly, because military successes of unprecedentedbrilliancy had made him dangerous. So, on the conclusion of the conquestof Gaul, it withdrew two legions from his army, and sought to deprivehim of his promised second consulate, and even to recall him before histerm of office as governor was expired. In other words, it sought tocripple and disarm him, and raise his rival, Pompey, over him in thecommand of the forces of the Empire. 

It was now secret or open war, not between Caesar and the Roman people, but between Caesar and the Senate, --between a great and triumphantgeneral and the Roman oligarchy of nobles, who, for nearly five hundredyears, had ruled the Empire. On the side of Caesar were the army, thewell-to-do classes, and the people; on the side of the Senate were theforces which a powerful aristocracy could command, having the prestigeof law and power and wealth, and among whom were the great names ofthe republic. 

Mr. Froude ridicules and abuses this aristocracy, as unfit longer togovern the State, as a worn-out power that deserved to fall. Heuniformly represents them as extravagant, selfish, ostentatious, luxurious, frivolous, Epicurean in opinions and in life, oppressive inall their social relations, haughty beyond endurance, and controllingthe popular elections by means of bribery and corruption. It would bedifficult to refute these charges. The Patricians probably gavethemselves up to all the pleasures incident to power and unboundedwealth, in a corrupt and wicked age. They had their palaces in the cityand their villas in the country, their parks and gardens, theirfish-ponds and game-preserves, their pictures and marbles, theirexpensive furniture and costly ornaments, gold and silver vessels, gemsand precious works of art. They gave luxurious banquets; they travelledlike princes; they were a body of kings, to whom the old monarchs ofconquered provinces bowed down in fear and adulation. All this does notprove that they were incapable, although they governed for the interestsof their class. They were all experienced in affairs of State, --most ofthem had been quaestors, aediles, praetors, censors, tribunes, consuls, and governors. Most of them were highly educated, had travelledextensively, were gentlemanly in their manners, could make speeches inthe Senate, and could fight on the field of battle when there was anecessity. They doubtless had the common vices of the rich and proud;but many of them were virtuous, patriotic, incorruptible, almost austerein morals, dignified and intellectual, whom everybody respected, --menlike Cato, Brutus, Cassius, Cicero, and others. Their sin was that theywished to conserve their powers, privileges, and fortunes, like allaristocracies, --like the British House of Lords. Nor must it beforgotten that it was under their régime that the conquest of the worldwas made, and that Rome had become the centre of everything magnificentand glorious on the earth. 

It was doubtless shortsighted and ungrateful in these nobles to attemptto deprive Caesar of his laurels and his promised consulship. He hadearned them by grand services, both as a general and a statesman. Buttheir jealousy and hatred were not unnatural. They feared, notunreasonably, that the successful general--rich, proud, and dictatorialfrom the long exercise of power, and seated in the chair of supremestdignity--would make sweeping changes; might reduce their authority to ashadow, and elevate himself to perpetual dictatorship; and thus, bysubstituting imperialism for aristocracy, subvert the Constitution. Thatis evidently what Cicero feared, as appears in his letters to Atticus. That is what all the leading Senators feared, especially Cato. It wasknown that Caesar--although urbane, merciful, enlightened, hospitable, and disposed to govern for the public good--was unscrupulous in the useof tools; that he had originally gained his seat in the Senate bybribery and demagogic arts; that he was reckless as to debts, regardingmoney only as a means to buy supporters; that he had appropriated vastsums from the spoils of war for his own use, and, from being poor, hadbecome the richest man in the Empire; that he had given his daughterJulia in marriage to Pompey from political ends; that he waslong-sighted in his ambition, and would be content with nothing lessthan the gratification of this insatiate passion. All this was known, and it gave great solicitude to the leaders of the aristocracy, whoresolved to put him down, --to strip him of his power, or fight him, ifnecessary, in a civil war. So the aristocracy put themselves under theprotection of Pompey, --a successful but overrated general, who alsoaimed at supreme power, with the nobles as his supporters, not perhapsas Imperator, but as the agent and representative of a subservientSenate, in whose name he would rule. 

This contest between Caesar and the aristocracy under the lead ofPompey, its successful termination in Caesar's favor, and his brilliantreign of about four years, as Dictator and Imperator, constitute thethird period of his memorable career. 

Neither Caesar nor Pompey would disband their legions, as it wasproposed by Curio in the Senate and voted by a large majority. In fact, things had arrived at a crisis: Caesar was recalled, and he must obeythe Senate, or be decreed a public enemy; that is, the enemy of thepower that ruled the State. He would not obey, and a general levy oftroops in support of the Senate was made, and put into the hands ofPompey with unlimited command. The Tribunes of the people, however, sided with Caesar, and refused confirmation of the Senatorial decrees. Caesar then no longer hesitated, but with his army crossed the Rubicon, which was an insignificant stream, but was the Rome-ward boundary of hisprovince. This was the declaration of civil war. It was now "'eitheranvil or hammer. " The admirers of Caesar claim that his act was anecessity, at least a public benefit, on the ground of the misrule ofthe aristocracy. But it does not appear that there was anarchy at Rome, although Milo had killed Clodius. There were aristocratic feuds, as inthe Middle Ages. Order and law--the first conditions of society--werenot in jeopardy, as in the French Revolution, when Napoleon arose. Thepeople were not in hostile array against the nobles, nor the noblesagainst the people. The nobles only courted and bribed the people; butso general was corruption that a change in government was deemednecessary by the advocates of Caesar, --at least they defended it. Thegist of all the arguments in favor of the revolution is: betterimperialism than an oligarchy of corrupt nobles. It is not my provinceto settle that question. It is my work only to describe events. 

It is clear that Caesar resolved on seizing supreme power, in taking itaway from the nobles, on the ground probably that he could rule betterthan they, --the plea of Napoleon, the plea of Cromwell, the plea ofall usurpers. 

But this supreme power he could not exercise until he had conqueredPompey and the Senate and all his enemies. It must need be that "heshould wade through slaughter to his throne. " This alternative wasforced on him, and he accepted it. He accepted civil war in order toreign. At best, he would do evil that good might come. He was doubtlessthe strongest man in the world; and, according to Mr. Carlyle's theory, the strongest ought to rule. 

Much has been said about the rabble, --the democracy, --their turbulence, corruption, and degradation, their unfitness to rule, and all that sortof thing, which I regard as irrelevant, so far as the usurpation ofCaesar is concerned; since the struggle was not between them and thenobles, but between a fortunate general and the aristocracy whocontrolled the State. Caesar was not the representative of the people orof their interests, as Tiberius Gracchus was, but the representative ofthe Army. He had no more sympathy with the people than he had with thenobles: he probably despised them both, as unfit to rule. He flatteredthe people and bought them, but he did not love them. It was hissoldiers whom he loved, next to himself; although, as a wise andenlightened statesman, he wished to promote the great interests of thenation, so far as was consistent with the enjoyment of imperial rule. This friend of the people would give them spectacles and shows, largesses of corn, --money, even, --and extension of the suffrage, but notpolitical power. He was popular with them, because he was generous andmerciful, because his exploits won their admiration, and his vast publicworks gave employment to them and adorned their city. 

It is unnecessary to dwell on the final contest of Caesar with thenobles, with Pompey at their head, since nothing is more familiar inhistory. Plainly he was not here rendering public services, as he did inSpain and Gaul, but taking care of his own interests. I cannot see how acivil war was a service, unless it were a service to destroy thearistocratic constitution and substitute imperialism, which some thinkwas needed with the vast extension of the Empire, and for the goodadministration of the provinces, --robbed and oppressed by the governorswhom the Senate had sent out to enrich the aristocracy. It may have beenneeded for the better administration of justice, for the preservation oflaw and order, and a more efficient central power. Absolutism may haveproved a benefit to the Empire, as it proved a benefit to France underCardinal Richelieu, when he humiliated the nobles. If so, it was only achoice of evils, for absolutism is tyranny, and tyranny is not ablessing, except in a most demoralized state of society, which it isclaimed was the state of Rome at the time of the usurpation of Caesar. It is certain that the whole united strength of the aristocracy couldnot prevail over Caesar, although it had Pompey for its defender, withhis immense prestige and experience as a general. 

After Caesar had crossed the Rubicon, and it was certain he would marchto Rome and seize the reins of government, the aristocracy fledprecipitately to Pompey's wing at Capua, fearing to find in Caesaranother Marius. Pompey did not show extraordinary ability in the crisis. He had no courage and no purpose. He fled to Brundusium, where shipswere waiting to transport his army to Durazzo. He was afraid to face hisrival in Italy. Caesar would have pursued, but had no navy. He thereforewent to Rome, which he had not seen for ten years, took what money hewanted from the treasury, and marched to Spain, where the larger part ofPompey's army, under his lieutenants, were now arrayed against him. These it was necessary first to subdue. But Caesar prevailed, and allSpain was soon at his feet. His successes were brilliant; and Gaul, Italy, Sicily, and Sardinia were wholly his own, as well as Spain, whichwas Pompey's province. He then rapidly returned to Rome, was namedDictator, and as such controlled the consular election, and was chosenConsul. But Pompey held the East, and, with his ships, controlled theMediterranean, and was gathering forces for the invasion of Italy. Caesar allowed himself but eleven days in Rome. It was necessary tomeet Pompey before that general could return to Italy. It wasmid-winter, --about a year after he had crossed the Rubicon. He had withhim only thirty thousand men, but these were veterans. Pompey had ninefull Roman legions, which lay at Durazzo, opposite to Brundusium, besides auxiliaries and unlimited means; but he was hampered bysenatorial civilians, and his legions were only used to Eastern warfare. He also controlled the sea, so that it was next to impossible for Caesarto embark without being defeated. Yet Caesar did cross the sea amidoverwhelming obstacles, and the result was the battle ofPharsalia, --deemed one of the decisive battles of the world, althoughthe forces of the combatants were comparatively small. It was gained bythe defeat of Pompey's cavalry by a fourth line of the best soldiers ofCaesar, which was kept in reserve. Pompey, on the defeat of his cavalry, upon whom he had based his hopes, lost heart and fled. He fled to thesea, --uncertain, vacillating, and discouraged, --and sailed for Egypt, relying on the friendship of the young king; but was murderedtreacherously before he set foot upon the land. His fate was mosttragical. His fall was overwhelming. 

This battle, in which the flower of the Roman aristocracy succumbed tothe conqueror of Gaul, with vastly inferior forces, did not end thedesperate contest. Two more bloody battles were fought--one in Africaand one in Spain--before the supremacy of Caesar was secured. The battleof Thapsus, between Utica and Carthage, at which the Roman nobles oncemore rallied under Cato and Labienus, and the battle of Munda, in Spain, the most bloody of all, gained by Caesar over the sons of Pompey, settled the civil war and made Caesar supreme. He became supreme only bythe sacrifice of half of the Roman nobility and the death of theirprincipal leaders, --Pompey, Labienus, Lentulus, Ligarius, Metellus, Scipio Afrarius, Cato, Petreius, and others. In one sense it was thecontest between Pompey and Caesar for the empire of the world. Cicerosaid, "The success of the one meant massacre, and that of the otherslavery, "--for if Pompey had prevailed, the aristocracy would havebutchered their enemies with unrelenting vengeance; but Caesar hatedunnecessary slaughter, and sought only power. In another sense it wasthe struggle between a single man--with enlightened views and vastdesigns--and the Roman aristocracy, hostile to reforms, and bent ongreed and oppression. The success of Caesar was favorable to therestoration of order and law and progressive improvements; the successof the nobility would have entailed a still more grinding oppression ofthe people, and possibly anarchy and future conflicts between fortunategenerals and the aristocracy. Destiny or Providence gave the empire ofthe world to a single man, although that man was as unscrupulous ashe was able. 

Henceforth imperialism was the form of government in Rome, which lastedabout four hundred years. How long an aristocratic government would havelasted is a speculation. Caesar, in his elevation to unlimited power, used his power beneficently. He pardoned his enemies, gave security toproperty and life, restored the finances, established order, and devotedhimself to useful reforms. He cut short the grant of corn to the citizenmob; he repaired the desolation which war had made; he rebuilt citiesand temples; he even endeavored to check luxury and extravagance andimprove morals. He reformed the courts of law, and collected librariesin every great city. He put an end to the expensive tours of senators inthe provinces, where they had appeared as princes exactingcontributions. He formed a plan to drain the Pontine Marshes. Hereformed the calendar, making the year to begin with the first day ofJanuary. He built new public buildings, which the enlargement ofbusiness required. He seemed to have at heart the welfare of the Stateand of the people, by whom he was adored. But he broke up the politicalascendancy of nobles, although he did not confiscate their property. Heweakened the Senate by increasing its numbers to nine hundred, and byappointing senators himself from his army and from the provinces, --thosewho would be subservient to him, who would vote what he decreed. 

Caesar's ruling passion was ambition, --thirst of power; but he had nogreat animosities. He pardoned his worst enemies, --Brutus, Cassius, andCicero, who had been in arms against him; nor did he reign as a tyrant. His habits were simple and unostentatious. He gave easy access to hisperson, was courteous in his manners, and mingled with senators as acompanion rather than as a master. Like Charlemagne, he was temperate ineating and drinking, and abhorred gluttony and drunkenness, --the vicesof the aristocracy and of fortunate plebeians alike. He wasindefatigable in business, and paid attention to all petitions. He waseconomical in his personal expenses, although he lavished vast sums uponthe people in the way of amusing or bribing them. He dispensed withguards and pomps, and was apparently reckless of his life: anything wasbetter to him than to live in perpetual fear of conspirators andtraitors. There never was a braver man, and he was ever kind-hearted tothose who did not stand in his way. He was generous, magnanimous, andunsuspicious. He was the model of an absolute prince, aside from laxityof morals. In regard to women, of their virtue he made little account. His favorite mistress was Servilia, sister of Cato and mother of Brutus. Some have even supposed that Brutus was Caesar's son, which accountsfor his lenity and forbearance and affection. He was the high-priest ofthe Roman worship, and yet he believed neither in the gods nor inimmortality. But he was always the gentleman, --natural, courteous, affable, without vanity or arrogance or egotism. He was not a patriot inthe sense that Cicero and Cato were, or Trajan and Marcus Aurelius, since his country was made subservient to his own interests andaggrandizement. Yet he was a very interesting man, and had fewer faultsthan Napoleon, with equally grand designs. 

But even he could not escape a retribution, in spite of his exaltedposition and his great services. The leaders of the aristocracy stillhated him, and could not be appeased for the overthrow of their power. They resolved to assassinate him, from vengeance rather than fear. Cicero was not among the conspirators; because his discretion could notbe relied upon, and they passed him by. But his heart was with them. "There are many ways, " said he, "in which a man may die. " It was not awise thing to take his life; since the Constitution was alreadysubverted, and somebody would reign as imperator by means of the army, and his death would necessarily lead to renewed civil wars and newcommotions and new calamities. But angry, embittered, and passionateenemies do not listen to reason. They will not accept the inevitable. There was no way to get rid of Caesar but by assassination, and no onewished him out of the way but the nobles. Hence it was easy for them toform a conspiracy. It was easy to stab him with senatorial daggers. Caesar was not killed because he had personal enemies, nor because hedestroyed the liberties of Roman citizens, but because he had usurpedthe authority of the aristocracy. 

Yet he died, perhaps at the right time, at the age of fifty-six, afteran undisputed reign of only three or four years, --about the length ofthat of Cromwell. He was already bending under the infirmities of apremature old age. Epileptic fits had set in, and his constitution wasundermined by his unparalleled labors and fatigues; and then hisrestless mind was planning a new expedition to Parthia, where he mighthave ingloriously perished like Crassus. But such a man could not die. His memory and deeds lived. He filled a role in history, which could notbe forgotten. He inaugurated a successful revolution. He bequeathed apolicy to last as long as the Empire lasted; and he had renderedservices of the greatest magnitude, by which he is to be ultimatelyjudged, as well as by his character. It is impossible for us to settlewhether or not his services overbalanced the evils of the imperialism heestablished and of the civil wars by which he reached supreme command. Whatever view we may take of the comparative merits of an aristocracy oran imperial despotism in a corrupt age, we cannot deny to Caesar sometranscendent services and a transcendent fame. The whole matter is laidbefore us in the language of Cicero to Caesar himself, in the Senate, when he was at the height of his power; which shows that the orator wasnot lacking in courage any more than in foresight and moral wisdom:--

"Your life, Caesar, is not that which is bounded by the union of yoursoul and body. Your life is that which shall continue fresh in thememory of ages to come, which posterity will cherish and eternity itselfkeep guard over. Much has been done by you which men will admire; muchremains to be done which they can praise. They will read with wonder ofempires and provinces, of the Rhine, the ocean, and the Nile, of battleswithout number, of amazing victories, of countless monuments andtriumphs; but unless the Commonwealth be wisely re-established ininstitutions by you bestowed upon us, your name will travel widely overthe world, but will have no fixed habitation; and those who come afteryou _will dispute about you_ as we have disputed. Some will extol you tothe skies; others will find something wanting, and the most importantelement of all. Remember the tribunal before which you are to stand. Theages that are to be will try you, it may be with minds less prejudicedthan ours, uninfluenced either by the desire to please you or by envy ofyour greatness. "

Thus spoke Cicero with heroic frankness. The ages have "disputed about"Caesar, and will continue to dispute about him, as they do aboutCromwell and Napoleon; but the man is nothing to us in comparison withthe ideas which he fought or which he supported, and which have the sameforce to-day as they had nearly two thousand years ago. He is therepresentative of imperialism; which few Americans will defend, unlessit becomes a necessity which every enlightened patriot admits. Thequestion is, whether it was or was not a necessity at Rome fifty yearsbefore Christ was born. It is not easy to settle in regard to thebenefit that Caesar is supposed by some--including Mr. Froude and thelate Emperor of the French--to have rendered to the cause ofcivilization by overturning the aristocratic Constitution, andsubstituting, not the rule of the people, but that of a single man. Itis still one of the speculations of history; it is not one of itsestablished facts, although the opinions of enlightened historians seemto lean to the necessity of the Caesarian imperialism, in view of themisrule of the aristocracy and the abject venality of the citizens whohad votes to sell. But it must be borne in mind that it was under thearistocratic rule of senators and patricians that Rome went on fromconquering to conquer; that the governing classes were at all times themost intelligent, experienced, and efficient in the Commonwealth; thattheir very vices may have been exaggerated; and that the imperialismwhich crushed them, may also have crushed out original genius, literature, patriotism, and exalted sentiments, and even failed to haveproduced greater personal security than existed under the aristocraticConstitution at any period of its existence. All these are disputedpoints of history. It may be that Caesar, far from being a nationalbenefactor by reorganizing the forces of the Empire, sowed the seeds ofruin by his imperial policy; and that, while he may have given unity, peace, and law to the Empire, he may have taken away its life. I do notassert this, or even argue its probability. It may have been, and it maynot have been. It is an historical puzzle. There are two sides to allgreat questions. But whether or not we can settle with the light ofmodern knowledge such a point as this, I look upon the defence ofimperialism in itself, in preference to constitutional government withall its imperfections, as an outrage on the whole progress of moderncivilization, and on whatever remains of dignity and intelligence amongthe people. 

AUTHORITIES. 

Caesar's Commentaries, Leges Juliae, Appian, Plutarch, Suetonius, DionCassius, and Cicero's Letters to Atticus are the principal originalauthorities. Napoleon III. Wrote a dull Life of Caesar, but it is richin footnotes, which it is probable he did not himself make, sincenothing is easier than the parade of learning. Rollin's Ancient Historymay be read with other general histories. Merivale's History of theEmpire is able and instructive, but dry. Mr. Froude's sketch of Caesaris the most interesting I have read, but advocates imperialism. Niebuhr's Lectures on the History of Rome is also a standard work, aswell as Curtius's History of Rome. 

MARCUS AURELIUS. 

 * * * * *

A. D. 121-180. 

THE GLORY OF ROME. 

Marcus Aurelius is immortal, not so much for what he _did_ as for whathe _was_. His services to the State were considerable, but nottranscendent. He was a great man, but not pre-eminently a great emperor. He was a meditative sage rather than a man of action; although hesuccessfully fought the Germanic barbarians, and repelled their fearfulincursions. He did not materially extend the limits of the Empire, buthe preserved and protected its provinces. He reigned wisely and ably, but made mistakes. His greatness was in his character; his influence forgood was in his noble example. When we consider his circumstances andtemptations, as the supreme master of a vast Empire, and in a wicked andsensual age, he is a greater moral phenomenon than Socrates orEpictetus. He was one of the best men of Pagan antiquity. Historyfurnishes no example of an absolute monarch so pure and spotless andlofty as he was, unless it be Alfred the Great or St. Louis. But thesphere of the Roman emperor was far greater than that of the Mediaevalkings. Marcus Aurelius ruled over one hundred and twenty millions ofpeople, without check or hindrance or Constitutional restraint. He coulddo what he pleased with their persons and their property. Mostsovereigns, exalted to such lofty dignity and power, have been eithercruel, or vindictive, or self-indulgent, or selfish, or proud, or hard, or ambitious, --men who have been stained by crimes, whatever may havebeen their services to civilization. Most of them have yielded to theirgreat temptations. But Marcus Aurelius, on the throne of the civilizedworld, was modest, virtuous, affable, accessible, considerate, gentle, studious, contemplative, stained by novices, --a model of human virtue. Hence he is one of the favorite characters of history. No Roman emperorwas so revered and loved as he, and of no one have so many monumentsbeen preserved. Everybody had his picture or statue in his house. He wasmore than venerated in his day, and his fame as a wise and good man hasincreased with the flight of ages. 

This illustrious emperor did not belong to the family of the greatCaesar. That family became extinct with Nero, the sixth emperor. LikeTrajan and Hadrian, Marcus Aurelius derived his remote origin fromSpain, although he was born in Rome. His great-grandfather was aSpaniard, and yet attained the praetorian rank. His grandfather reachedthe consulate. His father died while praetor, and when he himself was achild. He was adopted by his grandfather Annius Verus. But hismarvellous moral beauty, even as a child, attracted the attention of theEmperor Hadrian, who bestowed upon him the honor of the aequestrianrank, at the age of six. At fifteen he was adopted by Antoninus Pius, then, as we might say, "Crown Prince. " Had he been older, he would havebeen adopted by Hadrian himself. He thus, a mere youth, became the heirof the Roman world. His education was most excellent. From Fronto, thegreatest rhetorician of the day, he learned rhetoric; from HerodesAtticus he acquired a knowledge of the world; from Diognotus he learnedto despise superstition; from Apollonius, undeviating steadiness ofpurpose; from Sextus of Chaeronea, toleration of human infirmities; fromMaximus, sweetness and dignity; from Alexander, allegiance to duty; fromRusticus, contempt of sophistry and display. This stoical philosophercreated in him a new intellectual life, and opened to him a new world ofthought. But the person to whom he was most indebted was his adoptedfather and father-in-law, the Emperor Antoninus Pius. For him he seemsto have had the greatest reverence. "In him, " said he, "I noticedmildness of manner with firmness of resolution, contempt of vain-glory, industry in business, and accessibility of person. From him I learnedto acquiesce in every fortune, to exercise foresight in public affairs, to rise superior to vulgar praises, to serve mankind without ambition, to be sober and steadfast, to be content with little, to be practicaland active, to be no dreamy bookworm, to be temperate, modest in dress, and not to be led away by novelties. " What a picture of an emperor! Whata contrast to such a man as Louis XIV!

We might draw a parallel between Marcus Aurelius and David, when he wasyoung and innocent. But the person in history whom he most resembled wasSt. Anselm. He was a St. Anselm on the throne. Philosophical meditationsseem to have been his delight and recreation; and yet he could issuefrom his retirement and engage in active pursuits. He was an ablegeneral as well as a meditative sage, --heroic like David, capable ofenduring great fatigue, and willing to expose himself to great dangers. 

While his fame rests on his "Meditations, " as that of David rests uponhis Psalms, he yet rendered great military services to the Empire. Heput down a dangerous revolt under Avidius Cassius in Asia, and did notpunish the rebellious provinces. Not one person suffered death inconsequence of this rebellion. Even the papers of Cassius, who aimed tobe emperor, were burned, that a revelation of enemies might not bemade, --a signal instance of magnanimity. Cassius, it seems, wasassassinated by his own officers, which assassination Marcus Aureliusregretted, because it deprived him of granting a free pardon to a veryable but dangerous man. 

But the most signal service he rendered the Empire was a successfulresistance to the barbarians of Germany, who had formed a general unionfor the invasion of the Roman world. They threatened the security of theEmpire, as the Teutons did in the time of Marius, and the Gauls andGermans in the time of Julius Caesar. It took him twenty years to subduethese fierce warriors. He made successive campaigns against them, asCharlemagne did against the Saxons. It cost him the best years of hislife to conquer them, which he did under difficulties as great as Juliussurmounted in Gaul. He was the savior and deliverer of his country, asmuch as Marius or Scipio or Julius. The public dangers were from theWest and not the East. Yet he succeeded in erecting a barrier againstbarbaric inundations, so that for nearly two hundred years the Romanswere not seriously molested. There still stands in "the Eternal City"the column which commemorates his victories, --not so beautiful as thatof Trajan, which furnished the model for Napoleon's column in the PlaceVendôme, but still greatly admired. Were he not better known for hiswritings, he would be famous as one of the great military emperors, like Vespasian, Diocletian, and Constantine. Perhaps he did not add tothe art of war; that was perfected by Julius Caesar. It was with themechanism of former generals that he withstood most dangerous enemies, for in his day the legions were still well disciplined and irresistible. 

The only stains on the reign of this good and great emperor--for therewere none on his character--were in allowing the elevation of his sonCommodus as his successor, and his persecution of the Christians. 

In regard to the first, it was a blunder rather than a fault. Peter theGreat caused _his_ heir to be tried and sentenced to death, because hewas a sot, a liar, and a fool. He dared not intrust the interests of hisEmpire to so unworthy a son; the welfare of Russia was more to him thanthe interest of his family. In that respect this stern and iron man wasa greater prince than Marcus Aurelius; for the law of succession was notestablished at Rome any more than in Russia. There was no danger ofcivil war should the natural succession be set aside, as might happen inthe feudal monarchies of Europe. The Emperor of Rome could adopt orelect his successor. It would have been wise for Aurelius to haveselected one of the ablest of his generals, or one of the wisest of hissenators, as Hadrian did, for so great and responsible a position, rather than a wicked, cruel, dissolute son. But Commodus was the son ofFaustina also, --an intriguing and wicked woman, whose influence over herhusband was unfortunately great; and, what is common in this world, theson was more like the mother than the father. (I think the wife of Elithe high-priest must have been a bad woman. ) All his teachings andvirtues were lost on such a reprobate. She, as an unscrupulous andambitious woman, had no idea of seeing her son supplanted in theimperial dignity; and, like Catherine de'Medici and Agrippina, probablyshe connived at and even encouraged the vices of her children, in ordermore easily to bear rule. At any rate, the succession of Commodus to thethrone was the greatest calamity that could have happened. For fivereigns the Empire had enjoyed peace and prosperity; for five reigns thetide of corruption had been stayed: but the flood of corruption sweptall barriers away with the accession of Commodus, and from that day thedecline of the Empire was rapid and fatal. Still, probably nothing couldhave long arrested ruin. The Empire was doomed. 

The other fact which obscured the glory of Marcus Aurelius as asovereign was his persecution of the Christians, --for which it is hardto account, when the beneficent character of the emperor is considered. His reign was signalized for an imperial persecution, in which Justin atRome, Polycarp at Smyrna, and Ponthinus at Lyons, suffered martyrdom. Itwas not the first persecution. Under Nero the Christians had beencruelly tortured, nor did the virtuous Trajan change the policy of thegovernment. Hadrian and Antoninus Pius permitted the laws to be enforcedagainst the Christians, and Marcus Aurelius saw no reason to alter them. But to the mind of the Stoic on the throne, says Arnold, the Christianswere "philosophically contemptible, politically subversive, and morallyabominable. " They were regarded as statesmen looked upon the Jesuits inthe reign of Louis XV. , as we look upon the Mormons, --as dangerous tofree institutions. Moreover, the Christians were everywheremisunderstood and misrepresented. It was impossible for Marcus Aureliusto see the Christians except through a mist of prejudices. "Christianitygrew up in the Catacombs, not on the Palatine. " In allowing the laws totake their course against a body of men who were regarded with distrustand aversion as enemies of the State, the Emperor was simplyunfortunate. So wise and good a man, perhaps, ought to have known theChristians better; but, not knowing them, he cannot be stigmatized as acruel man. How different the fortunes of the Church had Aurelius beenthe first Christian emperor instead of Constantine! Or, had his wifeFaustina known the Christians as well as Marcia the mistress ofCommodus, perhaps the persecution might not have happened, --and perhapsit might. Earnest and sincere men have often proved intolerant whentheir peculiar doctrines have been assailed, --like Athanasius and St. Bernard. A Stoical philosopher was trained, like a doctor of the JewishSandhedrim, in a certain intellectual pride. 

The fame of Marcus Aurelius rests, as it has been said, on hisphilosophical reflections, as his "Meditations" attest. This remarkablebook has come down to us, while most of the annals of the age haveperished; so that even Niebuhr confesses that he knows less of the reignof Marcus Aurelius than of the early kings of Rome. Perhaps that is onereason why Gibbon begins his history with later emperors. But the"Meditations" of the good emperor survive, like the writings ofEpictetus, St. Augustine, and Thomas à Kempis: one of the few immortalbooks, --immortal, in this case, not for artistic excellence, like thewritings of Thucydides and Tacitus, but for the loftiness of thoughtsalone; so precious that the saints of the Middle Ages secretly preservedthem as in accord with their own experiences. It is from these"Meditations" that we derive our best knowledge of Marcus Aurelius. Theyreveal the man, --and a man of sorrows, as the truly great are apt to be, when brought in contact with a world of wickedness, as were Alfredand Dante. 

In these "Meditations" there is a striking resemblance to the discoursesof Epictetus, which alike reveal the lofty and yet sorrowful soul, andare among the most valuable fragments which have come down from Paganantiquity; and this is remarkable, since Epictetus was a Phrygian slave, of the lowest parentage. He belonged to the secretary and companion ofNero, whose name was Epaphroditus, and who treated this poor Phrygianwith great cruelty. And yet, what is very singular, the master causedthe slave to be indoctrinated in the Stoical philosophy, on account of arare intelligence which commanded respect. He was finally manumitted, but lived all his life in the deepest poverty, to which he attached nomore importance than Socrates did at Athens. In his miserable cottage hehad no other furniture than a straw pallet and an iron lamp, which lastsomebody stole. His sole remark on the loss of the only property hepossessed was, that when the thief came again he would be disappointedto find only an earthen lamp instead of an iron one. This earthen lampwas subsequently purchased by a hero-worshipper for three thousanddrachmas ($150). Epictetus, much as he despised riches and display andluxury and hypocrisy and pedantry and all phariseeism, living in thedepths of poverty, was yet admired by eminent men, among whom was theEmperor Hadrian himself; and he found a disciple in Arrian, who was tohim what Xenophon was to Socrates, committing his precious thoughts towriting; and these thoughts were to antiquity what the "Imitation ofChrist" was to the Middle Ages, --accepted by Christians as well as bypagans, and even to-day regarded as one of the most beautiful treatiseson morals ever composed by man. The great peculiarity of the "Manual"and the "Discourses" is the elevation of the soul over external evils, the duty of resignation to whatever God sends, and the obligation to doright because it is right. Epictetus did not go into the drearydialectics of the schools, but, like Socrates, confined himself topractical life, --to the practice of virtue as the greatest good, --andvalued the joys of true intellectual independence. To him his mind washis fortune, and he desired no better. We do not find in the stoicism ofthe Phrygian slave the devout and lofty spiritualism ofPlato, --thirsting for God and immortality; it may be doubted whether hebelieved in immortality at all: but he did recognize what is most noblein human life, --the subservience of the passions to reason, the power ofendurance, patience, charity, and disinterested action. He did recognizethe necessity of divine aid in the struggles of life, the glory offriendship, the tenderness of compassion, the power of sympathy. Hisphilosophy was human, and it was cheerful; since he did not believe inmisfortune, and exalted gentleness and philanthropy. Above everything, he sought inward approval, not the praises of the world, --that happinesswhich lies within one's self, in the absence of all ignoble fears, incontentment, in that peace of the mind which can face poverty, disease, exile, and death. 

Such were the lofty views which, embodied in the discourses ofEpictetus, fell into the hands of Marcus Aurelius in the progress of hiseducation, and exercised such a great influence on his whole subsequentlife. The slave became the teacher of the emperor, --which it isimpossible to conceive of unless their souls were in harmony. As aStoic, the emperor would not be less on his throne than the slave in hiscottage. The trappings and pomps of imperial state became indifferent tohim, since they were external, and were of small moment compared withthat high spiritual life which he desired to lead. If poverty and painwere nothing to Epictetus, so grandeur and power and luxury should benothing to him, --both alike being merely outward things, like theclothes which cover a man. And the fewer the impediments in the marchafter happiness and truth the better. Does a really great andpreoccupied man care what he wears? "A shocking bad hat" was perhaps asindifferent to Gladstone as a dirty old cloak was to Socrates. I supposeif a man is known to be brainless, it is necessary for him to wear adisguise, --even as instinct prompts a frivolous and empty woman to puton jewels. But who expects a person recognized as a philosopher to usea mental crutch or wear a moral mask? Who expects an old man, compellingattention by his wisdom, to dress like a dandy? It is out of place; itis not even artistic, --it is ridiculous. That only is an evil whichshackles the soul. Aurelius aspired to its complete emancipation. Notfor the joys of a future heaven did he long, but for the realities andcertitudes of earth, --the placidity and harmony and peace of his soul, so long as it was doomed to the trials and temptations of the world, anda world, too, which he did not despise, but which he sought to benefit. 

So, what was contentment in the slave became philanthropy in theemperor. He would be a benefactor, not by building baths and theatres, but by promoting peace, prosperity, and virtue. He would endurecheerfully the fatigue of winter campaigns upon the frozen Danube, ifthe Empire could be saved from violence. To extend its boundaries, likeJulius, he cared nothing; but to preserve what he had was a supremeduty. His watchword was duty, --to himself, his country, and God. Helived only for the happiness of his subjects. Benevolence became the lawof his life. Self-abnegation destroyed self-indulgence. For what was heplaced by Providence in the highest position in the world, except tobenefit the world? The happiness of one hundred and twenty millions wasgreater than the joys of any individual existence. And what were anypleasures which ended in vanity to the sublime placidity of anemancipated soul? Stoicism, if it did not soar to God and immortality, yet aspired to the freedom and triumph of what is most precious in man. And it equally despised, with haughty scorn, those things whichcorrupted and degraded this higher nature, --the glorious dignity ofunfettered intellect. The accidents of earth were nothing in hiseyes, --neither the purple of kings nor the rags of poverty. It was thesoul, in its transcendent dignity, which alone was to be preservedand purified. 

This was the exalted realism which appears in the "Meditations" ofMarcus Aurelius, and which he had learned from the inspirations of aslave. Yet such was the inborn, almost supernatural, loftiness ofAurelius, that, had he been the slave and Epictetus the emperor, thesame moral wisdom would have shone in the teachings and life of each;for they both were God's witnesses of truth in an age of wickedness andshame. It was He who chose them both, and sent them out as teachers ofrighteousness, --the one from the humblest cottage, the other from themost magnificent palace of the capital of the world. In station theywere immeasurably apart; in aim and similarity of ideas they werekindred spirits, --one of the phenomena of the moral history of our race;for the slave, in his physical degradation, had all the freedom andgrandeur of an aspiring soul, and the emperor, on his lofty throne, hadall the humility and simplicity of a peasant in the lowliest state ofpoverty and suffering. Surely circumstances had nothing to do with thismarvellous exhibition. It was either the mind and soul triumphant overand superior to all outward circumstances, or it was God imparting anextraordinary moral power. 

I believe it was the inscrutable design of the Supreme Governor of theuniverse to show, perhaps, what lessons of moral wisdom could be taughtby men under the most diverse influences and under the greatestcontrasts of rank and power, and also to what heights the souls of bothslave and king could rise, with His aid, in the most corrupt period ofhuman history. Noah, Abraham, and Moses did not stand more isolatedamidst universal wickedness than did the Phrygian slave and the imperialmaster of the world. And as the piety of Noah could not save theantediluvian empires, as the faith of Abraham could not convertidolatrous nations, as the wisdom of Moses could not prevent thesensualism of emancipated slaves, so the lofty philosophy of Aureliuscould not save the Empire which he ruled. And yet the piety of Noah, thefaith of Abraham, the wisdom of Moses, and the stoicism of Aurelius haveproved alike a spiritual power, --the precious salt which was to preservehumanity from the putrefaction of almost universal selfishness and vice, until the new revelation should arouse the human soul to a more seriouscontemplation of its immortal destiny. 

The imperial "Meditations" are without art or arrangement, --a sort ofdiary, valuable solely for their precious thoughts; not lofty soaringsin philosophical and religious contemplation, which tax the brain tocomprehend, like the thoughts of Pascal, but plain maxims for the dailyintercourse of life, showing great purity of character and extraordinarynatural piety, blended with pithy moral wisdom and a strong sense ofduty. "Men exist for each other: teach them or bear with them, " said he. "Benevolence is invincible, if it be not an affected smile. " "When thourisest in the morning unwillingly, say, 'I am rising to the work of ahuman being; why, then, should I be dissatisfied if I am going to do thethings for which I was brought into the world?'" "Since it is possiblethat thou mayest depart from this life this very moment, regulate everyact and thought accordingly (. .. For death hangs over thee whilst thoulivest), while it is in thy power to be good. " "What has become of allgreat and famous men, and all they desired and loved? They are smoke andashes, and a tale. " "If thou findest in human life anything better thanjustice, temperance, fortitude, turn to it with all thy soul; but ifthou findest anything else smaller (and of no value) than this, giveplace to nothing else. " "Men seek retreats for themselves, --houses inthe country, seashores, and mountains; but it is always in thy power toretire within thyself, for nowhere does a man retire with more quiet orfreedom than into his own soul. " Think of such sayings, written down inhis diary on the evenings of the very days of battle with the barbarianson the Danube or in Hungarian marshes! Think of a man, O ye Napoleons, ye conquerors, who can thus muse and meditate in his silent tent, and bythe light of his solitary lamp, after a day of carnage and of victory!Think of such a man, --not master of a little barbaric island or ahalf-established throne in a country no bigger than a small province, but the supreme sovereign of a vast empire, at the time of its greatestsplendor and prosperity, with no mortal power to keep his will incheck, --nothing but the voice within him; nothing but the sense of duty;nothing but the desire of promoting the happiness of others: and thisman a Pagan!

But the state of that Empire, with all its prosperity, needed such a manto arise. If anything or anybody could save it, it was that successionof good emperors of whom Marcus Aurelius was the last, in the latterpart of the second century. Let us glance, in closing, at the realcondition of the Empire at that time. I take leave of the man, --this"laurelled hero and crowned philosopher, " stretching out his hands tothe God he but dimly saw, and yet enunciating moral truths which forwisdom have been surpassed only by the sacred writers of the Bible, towhom the Almighty gave his special inspiration. I turn reluctantly fromhim to the Empire he governed. 

Gibbon says, in his immortal History, "If a man were called to fix theperiod in the history of the world during which the condition of thehuman race was most happy and prosperous, he would, without hesitation, name that which elapsed from the death of Domitian to the accession ofCommodus. "

This is the view that Gibbon takes of the prosperity of the old Romanworld under such princes as the Antonines. Niebuhr, however, a greatercritic, though not so great an artist, takes a different view; and bothare great authorities. If Gibbon meant simply that this period was thehappiest and most prosperous during the imperial reigns, he may not havebeen far from the truth, according to his standpoint of what humanhappiness consists in, --that external prosperity which was the blessingof the Old Testament, and which Macaulay exalts as proudly as Gibbonbefore him. There _was_ this external prosperity, so far as we know, andwe know but little aside from monuments and medals. Even Tacitus shrankfrom writing contemporaneous history, and the period he could havepainted is to us dark, mysterious, and unknown. Still, it is generallysupposed and conceded that the Empire at this time was outwardlysplendid and prosperous. Certainly there was a period of peace, when nowars troubled the State but those which were distant, --on the veryconfines of the Empire, and that with rude barbarians, no moreformidable in the eyes of the luxurious citizens of the capital than arevolt of the Sepoys to the eyes of the citizens of London, or Indianraids among the Rocky Mountains to the eyes of the people of New York. And there was the reign of law and order, a most grateful thing to thosewho had read of the conspiracy of Catiline and the tumults of Clodius, two hundred and fifty years before. And there was doubtless amagnificent material civilization which promised to be eternal, and ofwhich every Roman was proud. There was a centralization of power in theEternal City such as had never been seen before and has never been seensince, --a solid Empire so large that the Mediterranean, which itenclosed, was a mere central lake, around the vast circuit of whoseshores were temples and palaces and villas of unspeakable beauty, andwhere a busy population pursued unmolested its various trades. There wascommerce on every river which empties itself into this vast basin; therewere manufactures in every town, and there were agricultural skill andabundance in every province. The plains of Egypt and Mesopotamiarejoiced in the richest harvests of wheat; the hills of Syria and Gaul, and Spain and Italy, were covered with grape-vines and olives. Italyboasted of fifty kinds of wine, and Gaul produced the same vegetablesthat are known at the present day. All kinds of fruit were plenty andluscious in every province. There were game-preserves and fish-ponds andgroves. There were magnificent roads between all the great cities, --anuninterrupted highway, mostly paved, from York to Jerusalem. Theproductions of the East were consumed in the West, for ships whitenedthe sea, bearing their precious gems, and ivory, and spices, andperfumes, and silken fabrics, and carpets, and costly vessels of goldand silver, and variegated marbles; and all the provinces of an empirewhich extended fifteen hundred miles from north to south and threethousand from east to west were dotted with cities, some of which almostrivalled the imperial capital in size and magnificence. The littleisland of Rhodes contained twenty-three thousand statues, and Antiochhad a street four miles in length, with double colonnades throughout itswhole extent. The temple of Ephesus covered as much ground as does thecathedral of Cologne, and the library of Alexandria numbered sevenhundred thousand volumes. Rome, the proud metropolis, had a diameter ofeleven miles, and was forty-five miles in circuit, with a population, according to Lipsius, larger than modern London. It had seventeenthousand palaces, thirty theatres, nine thousand baths, and elevenamphitheatres, --one of which could seat eighty-seven thousandspectators. The gilding of the roof of the capitol cost fifteen millionsof our money. The palace of Nero was more extensive than Versailles. Themausoleum of Hadrian became the most formidable fortress of Mediaevaltimes. And then, what gold and silver vessels ornamented every palace, what pictures and statues enriched every room, what costly and gildedand carved furniture was the admiration of every guest, what richdresses decorated the women who supped at gorgeous tables of solidsilver, whose very sandals were ornamented with precious stones, andwhose necks were hung with priceless pearls and rubies and diamonds!Paulina wore a pearl which, it is said, cost two hundred and fiftythousand dollars of our money. All the masterpieces of antiquity werecollected in this centre of luxury and pride, --all those arts which madeGreece immortal, and which we can only copy. What vast structures, ornamented with pillars and marble statues, were crowded together nearthe Forum and Capitoline Hill! The museums of Italy contain to-daytwenty thousand specimens of ancient sculpture, which no modern artistcould improve. More than a million of dollars were paid for a singlepicture for the imperial bed-chamber, --for painting was carried to asgreat perfection as sculpture. 

Such were the arts of the Pagan city, such the material civilization inall the cities; and these cities were guarded by soldiers who weretrained to the utmost perfection of military discipline, and presidedover by governors as elegant, as polished, and as intelligent as thecourtiers of Louis XIV. The genius for war was only equalled by geniusfor government. How well administered were all the provinces! The Romansspread their laws, their language, and their institutions everywherewithout serious opposition. They were great civilizers, as the Englishhave been. "Law" became as great an idea as "glory;" and so perfect wasthe mechanism of government that the happiness of the people wasscarcely affected by the character of the emperors. Jurisprudence, theindigenous science of the Romans, is still studied and adopted for itspolitical wisdom. 

Such was the civilization of the Roman world in the time of MarcusAurelius, --that external grandeur, that outward prosperity, to whichGibbon points with such admiration and pride, and to which he ascribedthe highest happiness which the world has ever enjoyed. Far different, probably, would have been the verdict of the good and contemplativeemperor who then ruled the civilized world, when he saw the luxury, thepride, the sensuality, the selfishness, the irreligion, the worldliness, which marked all classes; producing vices too horrible to be evennamed, and undermining the moral health, and secretly and surelypreparing the way for approaching violence and ruin. 

What, then, is the reverse of the picture which Gibbon admired? Whatestablished facts have we as an offset to these gilded material glories?What should be the true judgment of mankind as to this lauded period?

The historian speaks of peace, and the prosperity which naturally flowedfrom it in the uninterrupted pursuit of the ordinary occupations oflife. This is indisputable. There was the increase of wealth, theenjoyment of security, the absence of fears, and the reign of law. Lifeand property were guarded. A man could travel from one part of theEmpire to the other without fear of robbers or assassins. All thesethings are great blessings. Materially we have no higher civilization. But with peace and prosperity were idleness, luxury, gambling, dissipation, extravagance, and looseness of morals of which we have noconception, and which no subsequent age of the world has seen. It wasthe age of most scandalous monopolies, and disproportionate fortunes, and abandonment to the pleasures of sense. Any Roman governor could makea fortune in a year; and his fortune was spent in banquets and fêtes andraces and costly wines, and enormous retinues of slaves. The theatres, the chariot races, the gladiatorial shows, the circus, and the sportsof the amphitheatre were then at their height. The central spring ofsociety was money, since it purchased everything which Epicureanismvalued. No dignitary was respected for his office, --only for the salaryor gains which his office brought. All professions which were notlucrative gradually fell into disrepute; and provided they werelucrative, it was of no consequence whether or not they were infamous. Dancers, cooks, and play-actors received the highest consideration, since their earnings were large. Scholars, poets, and philosophers--whatfew there were--pined in attics. Epictetus lived in a miserable cottagewith only a straw pallet and a single lamp. Women had no education, andwere disgracefully profligate; even the wife of Marcus Aurelius (thedaughter of Antoninus Pius) was one of the most abandoned women of theage, notwithstanding all the influence of their teachings and example. Slavery was so great an institution that half of the population wereslaves. There were sixty millions of them in the Empire, and they weregenerally treated with brutal cruelty. The master of Epictetus, himselfa scholar and philosopher, broke wantonly the leg of his illustriousslave to see how well he could bear pain. There were no publiccharities. The poor and miserable and sick were left to perish unheededand unrelieved. Even the free citizens were fed at the public expense, not as a charity, but to prevent revolts. About two thousand peopleowned the whole civilized world, and their fortunes were spent indemoralizing it. What if their palaces were grand, and their villasbeautiful, and their dresses magnificent, and their furniture costly, iftheir lives were spent in ignoble and enervating pleasures, as isgenerally admitted. There was a low religious life, almost no religionat all, and what there was was degrading by its superstition. Everywhere were seen the rites of magical incantations, the pretendedvirtue of amulets and charms, soothsayers laughing at their ownpredictions, --nowhere the worship of the _one God_ who created theheaven and the earth, nor even a genuine worship of the Pagan deities, but a general spirit of cynicism and atheism. What does St. Paul say ofthe Romans when he was a prisoner in the precincts of the imperialpalace, and at a time of no greater demoralization? We talk of theglories of jurisprudence; but what was the practical operation of lawswhen such a harmless man as Paul could be brought to trial, and perhapsexecution! What shall we say of the boasted justice, when judgments wererendered on technical points, and generally in favor of those who hadthe longest purses; so that it was not only expensive to go to law, butso expensive that it was ruinous? What could be hoped of laws, howevergood, when they were made the channels of extortion, when theoccupation of the Bench itself was the great instrument by whichpowerful men protected their monopolies? We speak of the glories of art;but art was prostituted to please the lower tastes and inflame thepassions. The most costly pictures were hung up in the baths, and weredisgracefully indecent. Even literature was directed to the flattery oftyrants and rich men. There was no manly protest from literary menagainst the increasing vices of society, --not even from thephilosophers. Philosophy continually declined, like literature and art. Nothing strikes us more forcibly than the absence of genius in thesecond century. There was no reward for genius except when it flatteredand pandered to what was demoralizing. Who dared to utter manly protestsin the Senate? Who discussed the principles of government? Who wouldventure to utter anything displeasing to the imperial masters of theworld? In this age of boundless prosperity, where were the great poets, where the historians, where the writers on political economy, where themoralists? For one hundred years there were scarcely ten eminent men inany department of literature whose writings have come down to us. Therewas the most marked decay in all branches of knowledge, except in thatknowledge which could be utilized for making money. The imperial régimecast a dismal shadow over all the efforts of independent genius, on alllofty aspirations, on all individual freedom. Architects, painters, andsculptors there were in abundance, and they were employed and well paid;but where were poets, scholars, sages?--where were politicians even? Thegreat and honored men were the tools of emperors, --the prefects of theirguards, the generals of their armies, the architects of their palaces, the purveyors of their banquets. If the emperor happened to be a goodadministrator of this complicated despotism, he was sustained, likeTiberius, whatever his character. If he was weak or frivolous, he wasremoved by assassination. It was a government of absolute physicalforces, and it is most marvellous that such a man as Marcus Aureliuscould have been its representative. And what could he have done with hisphilosophical inquiries had he not also been a great general and apractical administrator, --a man of business as well as a man of thought?

But I cannot enumerate the evils which coexisted with all the boastedprosperity of the Empire, and which were preparing the way forruin, --evils so disgraceful and universal that Christianity made noimpression at all on society at large, and did not modify a law orremove a single object of scandal. Do you call that state of societyprosperous and happy when half of the population was in base bondage tocruel masters; when women generally were degraded and slighted; whenmoney was the object of universal idolatry; when the only pleasureswere in banquets and races and other demoralizing sports; when no valuewas placed upon the soul, and infinite value on the body; when there wasno charity, no compassion, no tenderness; when no poor man could go tolaw; when no genius was encouraged unless for utilitarian ends; whengenius was not even appreciated or understood, still less rewarded; whenno man dared to lift up his voice against any crying evil, especially ofa political character; when the whole civilized world was fettered, deceived, and mocked, and made to contribute to the power, pleasure, andpride of a single man and the minions upon whom he smiled? Is all thisto be overlooked in our estimate of human happiness? Is there nothing tobe considered but external glories which appeal to the senses alone?Shall our eyes be diverted from the operation of moral law and theinevitable consequences of its violation? Shall we blind ourselves tothe future condition of our families and our country in our estimate ofhappiness? Shall we ignore, in the dazzling life of a few favoredextortioners, monopolists, and successful gamblers all that Christianitypoints out as the hope and solace and glory of mankind? Not thus wouldwe estimate human felicity. Not thus would Marcus Aurelius, as he casthis sad and prophetic eye down the vistas of succeeding reigns, and sawthe future miseries and wars and violence which were the natural resultof egotism and vice, have given his austere judgment on the happiness ofhis Empire. In all his sweetness and serenity, he penetrated the veilwhich the eye of the worldly Gibbon could not pierce. _He_ declares that"those things which are most valued are empty, rotten, andtrifling, "--these are his very words; and that the real _life_ of thepeople, even in the days of Trajan, had ceased to exist, --thateverything truly precious was lost in the senseless grasp after what cangive no true happiness or permanent prosperity. 

AUTHORITIES. 

The "Meditations" of Marcus Aurelius; Epictetus should be read inconnection. Renan's Life of Marcus Aurelius. Farrar's Seekers after God. Arnold has also written some interesting things about this emperor. InSmith's Dictionary there is an able article. Gibbon says something, butnot so much as we could wish. Tillemont, in his History of the Emperors, says more. I would also refer my readers to my "Old Roman World, " toSismondi's Fall of the Roman Empire, and to Montesquieu's treatise onthe Decadence of the Romans. The original Roman authorities which havecome down to us are meagre and few. 

CONSTANTINE THE GREAT. 

 * * * * *

A. D. 272-337. 

CHRISTIANITY ENTHRONED. 

One of the links in the history of civilization is the reign ofConstantine, not unworthily called the Great, since it would bedifficult to find a greater than he among the Roman emperors, afterJulius Caesar, while his labors were by far more beneficent. A new erabegan with his illustrious reign, --the triumph of Christianity as theestablished religion of the crumbling Empire. Under his enlightenedprotection the Church, persecuted from the time of Nero, and neverfashionable or popular, or even powerful as an institution, arosetriumphant, defiant, almost militant, with new passions and interests;ambitious, full of enthusiasm, and with unbounded hope, --a greatspiritual power, whose authority even princes and nobles were at lastunable to withstand. No longer did the Christians live in catacombs andhiding-places; no longer did they sing their mournful songs over thebleeding and burning bodies of the saints, but arose in the majesty ofa new and irresistible power, --temporal as well as spiritual, --breathingvengeance on ancient foes, grasping great dignities, seizing therevenues of princes, and proclaiming the sovereignty of their invisibleKing. In defence of their own doctrines they became fierce, arrogant, dogmatic, contentious, --not with sword in one hand and crucifix in theother, like the warlike popes and bishops of mediaeval Europe, but withintense theological hatreds, and austere contempt of those luxuries andpleasures which had demoralized society. 

The last great act of Diocletian--one of the ablest and most warlike ofthe emperors--was an unrelenting and desperate persecution of theChristians, whose religion had been steadily gaining ground for twocenturies, in spite of martyrdoms and anathemas; and this was so severeand universal that it seemed to be successful. But he had no soonerretired from the government of the world (A. D. 305) than the faith hesupposed he had suppressed forever sprung up with new force, and defiedany future attempt to crush it. 

The vitality of the new religion had been preserved in ages ofunparalleled vices by two things especially, --by martyrdom and byausterities; the one a noble attestation of faith in an age of unbelief, and the other a lofty, almost stoical, disdain of those pleasures whichcentre in the body. 

The martyrs cheerfully and heroically endured physical sufferings inview of the glorious crown of which they were assured in the futureworld. They lived in the firm conviction of immortality, and thateternal happiness was connected indissolubly with their courage, intrepidity, and patience in bearing testimony to the divine characterand mission of Him who had shed his blood for the remission of sins. Nosufferings were of any account in comparison with those of Him who diedfor them. Filled with transports of love for the divine Redeemer, whorescued them from the despair of Paganism, and bound with ties ofsupreme allegiance to Him as the Conqueror and Saviour of the world, they were ready to meet death in any form for his sake. They had become, by professing Him as their Lord and Sovereign, soldiers of the Cross, ready to endure any sacrifices for his sacred cause. 

Thus enthusiasm was kindled in a despairing and unbelieving world. Andprobably the world never saw, in any age, such devotion and zeal for aninvisible power. It was animated by the hope of a glorious immortality, of which Christianity alone, of all ancient religions, inspired a firmconviction. In this future existence were victory and blessednesseverlasting, --not to be had unless one was faithful unto death. Thissublime faith--this glorious assurance of future happiness, thisdevotion to an unseen King--made a strong impression on those whowitnessed the physical torments which the sufferers bore withunspeakable triumph. There must be, they thought, something in areligion which could take away the sting of death and rob the grave ofits victory. The noble attestation of faith in Jesus did perhaps morethan any theological teachings towards the conversion of men toChristianity. And persecution and isolation bound the Christianstogether in bonds of love and harmony, and kept them from thetemptations of life There was a sort of moral Freemasonry among thedespised and neglected followers of Christ, such as has not been seenbefore or since. They were _in_ the world but not _of_ the world. Theywere the precious salt to preserve what was worth preserving in arapidly dissolving Empire. They formed a new power, which would betriumphant amid the universal destruction of old institutions; for thesoul would be saved, and Christianity taught that the soul waseverything, --that nothing could be given in exchange for it. 

The other influence which seemed to preserve the early Christians fromthe overwhelming materialism of the times was the asceticism which soearly became prevalent. It had not been taught by Jesus, but seemed toarise from the necessities of the times. It was a fierce protest againstthe luxuries of an enervated age. The passion for dress and ornament, and the indulgence of the appetites and other pleasures which pamperedthe body, and which were universal, were a hindrance to the enjoyment ofthat spiritual life which Christianity unfolded. As the soul wasimmortal and the body was mortal, that which was an impediment to thewelfare of what was most precious was early denounced. In order topreserve the soul from the pollution of material pleasures, a strenuousprotest was made. Hence that defiance of the pleasures of sense whichgave loftiness and independence of character soon became a recognizedand cardinal virtue. The Christian stood aloof from the banquets andluxuries which undermined the virtues on which the strength of man isbased. The characteristic vices of the Pagan world were unchastity andfondness for the pleasures of the table. To these were added the lesservices of display and ornaments in dress. From these the Christian fledas fatal enemies to his spiritual elevation. I do not believe it was theascetic ideas imported from India, such as marked the Brahmins, nor thevisionary ideas of the Sufis and the Buddhists, and of other Orientalreligionists, which gave the impulse to monastic life and led to theausterities of the Church in the second and third centuries, so much asthe practical evils with which every one was conversant, and which wereplainly antagonistic to the doctrine that the life is more than meat. The triumph of the mind over the body excited an admiration scarcelyless marked than the voluntary sacrifice of life to a sacred cause. Asceticism, repulsive in many of its aspects, and even unnatural andinhuman, drew a cordon around the Christians, and separated them fromthe sensualities of ordinary life. It was a reproof as well as aprotest. It attacked Epicureanism in its most vulnerable point. "Howhardly shall they who have riches enter into the kingdom of God?" Hencethe voluntary poverty, the giving away of inherited wealth to the poor, the extreme simplicity of living, and even retirement from thehabitations of men, which marked the more earnest of the new believers. Hence celibacy, and avoidance of the society of women, --all to resistmost dangerous temptation. Hence the vows of poverty and chastity whichearly entered monastic life, --a life favorable to ascetic virtues. Thesewere indeed perverted. Everything good is perverted in this world. Self-expiations, flagellations, sheepskin cloaks, root dinners, repulsive austerities, followed. But these grew out of the noble desireto keep unspotted from the world. And unless this desire had beenencouraged by the leaders of the Church, the Christian would soon havebeen contaminated with the vices of Paganism, especially such as werefashionable, --as is deplorably the case in our modern times, when it isso difficult to draw the line between those who do not and those who doopenly profess the Christian faith. It is quite probable thatChristianity would not have triumphed over Paganism, had notChristianity made so strong a protest against those vices and fashionswhich were peculiar to an Epicurean age and an Epicurean philosophy. 

It was at this period, when Christianity was a great spiritual power, that Constantine arose. He was born at Naissus, in Dacia, A. D. 274, hisfather being a soldier of fortune, and his mother the daughter of aninnkeeper. He was eighteen when his father, Constantius, was promoted bythe Emperor Diocletian to the dignity of Caesar, --a sort oflieutenant-emperor, --and early distinguished himself in the Egyptian andPersian wars. He was thirty-one when he joined his father in Britain, whom he succeeded, soon after, in the imperial dignity. Like Theodosius, he was tall, and majestic in manners; gracious, affable, and accessible, like Julius; prudent, cautious, reticent, like Fabius; insensible to theallurements of pleasure, and incredibly active and bold, like Hannibal, Charlemagne, and Napoleon; a politic man, disposed to ally himself withthe rising party. The first few years of his reign, which began in A. D. 306, were devoted to the establishment of his power in Britain, wherethe flower of the Western army was concentrated, --foreseeing a desperatecontest with the five rivals who shared between them the Empire whichDiocletian had divided; which division, though possibly a necessity inthose turbulent times, would yet seem to have been an unwise thing, since it led to civil wars and rivalries, and struggles for supremacy. It is a mistake to divide a great empire, unless mechanism is worn out, and a central power is impossible. The tendency of modern civilizationis to a union of States, when their language and interests andinstitutions are identical. Yet Diocletian was wearied and oppressed bythe burdens of State, and retired disgusted, dividing the Empire intotwo parts, the Eastern and Western. But there were subdivisions inconsequence, and civil wars; and had the policy of Diocletian beencontinued, the Empire might have been subdivided, like Charlemagne's, until central power would have been destroyed, as in the Middle Ages. But Constantine aimed at a general union of the East and West onceagain, partly from the desire of centralization, and partly fromambition. The military career of Constantine for about seventeen yearswas directed to the establishment of his power in Britain, to thereunion of the Empire, and the subjugation of his colleagues, --a longseries of disastrous civil wars. These wars are without poeticinterest, --in this respect unlike the wars between Caesar and Pompey, and that between Octavius and Antony. The wars of Caesar inaugurated theimperial régime when the Empire was young and in full vigor, and whenmilitary discipline was carried to perfection; those of Constantinewere in the latter days of the Empire, when it was impossible toreanimate it, and all things were tending rapidly to dissolution, --anexceedingly gloomy period, when there were neither statesmen norphilosophers nor poets nor men of genius, of historic fame, outside theChurch. Therefore I shall not dwell on these uninteresting wars, broughtabout by the ambition of six different emperors, all of whom were aimingfor undivided sovereignty. There were in the West Maximian, the oldcolleague of Diocletian, who had resigned with him, but who hadreassumed the purple; his son, Maxentius, elevated by the Roman Senateand the Praetorian Guard, --a dissolute and imbecile young man, whoreigned over Italy; and Constantine, who possessed Gaul and Britain. Inthe East were Galerius, who had married the daughter of Diocletian, andwho was a general of considerable ability; Licinius, who had theprovince of Illyricum; and Maximin, who reigned over Syria and Egypt. 

The first of these emperors who was disposed of was Maximian, the fatherof Maxentius and father-in-law of Constantine. He was regarded as ausurper, and on the capture of Marseilles, he under pressure ofConstantine committed suicide by strangulation, A. D. 310. Galerius didnot long survive, being afflicted with a loathsome disease, the resultof intemperance and gluttony, and died in his palace in Nicomedia, inBithynia, the capital of the Eastern provinces. The next emperor whofell was Maxentius, after a desperate struggle in Italy withConstantine, --whose passage over the Alps, and successive victories atSusa (at the foot of Mont Cenis, on the plains of Turin), at Verona, andSaxa Rubra, nine miles from Rome, from which Maxentius fled, only toperish in the Tiber, remind us of the campaigns of Hannibal andNapoleon. The triumphal arch which the victor erected at Rome tocommemorate his victories still remains as a monument of the decline ofArt in the fourth century. As a result of the conquest over Maxentius, the Praetorian guards were finally abolished, which gave a fatal blow tothe Senate, and left the capital disarmed and exposed to future insultsand dangers. 

The next emperor who disappeared from the field was Maximin, who hadembarked in a civil war with Licinius. He died at Tarsus, after anunsuccessful contest, A. D. 313; and there were left only Licinius andConstantine, --the former of whom reigned in the East and the latter inthe West. Scarcely a year elapsed before these two emperors embarked ina bloody contest for the sovereignty of the world. Licinius was beaten, but was allowed the possession of Thrace, Asia Minor, Syria, and Egypt. A hollow reconciliation was made between them, which lasted eight years, during which Constantine was engaged in the defence of his empire fromthe hostile attacks of the Goths in Illyricum. He gained greatvictories over these barbarians, and chased them beyond the Danube. Hethen turned against Licinius, and the bloody battle of Adrianople, A. D. 323, when three hundred thousand combatants were engaged, followed by astill more bloody one on the heights of Chrysopolis, A. D. 324, madeConstantine supreme master of the Empire thirty-seven years afterDiocletian had divided his power with Maximian. 

The great events of his reign as sole emperor, with enormous prestige asa general, second only to that of Julius Caesar, were the foundation ofConstantinople and the establishment of Christianity as the religion ofthe Empire. 

The ancient Byzantium, which Constantine selected as the new capital ofhis Empire, had been no inconsiderable city for nearly one thousandyears, being founded only ninety-seven years after Rome itself. Yet, notwithstanding its magnificent site, --equally favorable for commerceand dominion, --its advantages were not appreciated until the genius ofConstantine selected it as the one place in his vast dominions whichcombined a central position and capacities for defence against invaders. It was also a healthy locality, being exposed to no malarial poisons, like the "Eternal City. " It was delightfully situated, on the confinesof Europe and Asia, between the Euxine and the Mediterranean, on anarrow peninsula washed by the Sea of Marmora and the beautiful harborcalled the Golden Horn, inaccessible from Asia except by water, while itcould be made impregnable on the west. The narrow waters of theHellespont and the Bosporus, the natural gates of the city, could beeasily defended against hostile fleets both from the Euxine and theMediterranean, leaving the Propontis (the deep, well-harbored body ofwater lying between the two straits, in modern times called the Sea ofMarmora) with an inexhaustible supply of fish, and its shores lined withvineyards and gardens. Doubtless this city is more favored by nature forcommerce, for safety, and for dominion, than any other spot on the faceof the earth; and we cannot wonder that Russia should cast greedy eyesupon it as one of the centres of its rapidly increasing Empire. Thisbeautiful site soon rivalled the old capital of the Empire in riches andpopulation, for Constantine promised great privileges to those who wouldsettle in it; and he ransacked and despoiled the cities of Italy, Greece, and Asia Minor of what was most precious in Art to make his newcapital attractive, and to ornament his new palaces, churches, andtheatres. In this Grecian city he surrounded himself with Asiatic pompand ceremonies. He assumed the titles of Eastern monarchs. His palacewas served and guarded with a legion of functionaries that made accessto his person difficult. He created a new nobility, and made infinitegradations of rank, perpetuated by the feudal monarchs of Europe. Hegave pompous names to his officers, both civil and military, usingexpressions still in vogue in European courts, like "Your Excellency, ""Your Highness, " and "Your Majesty, "--names which the emperors who hadreigned at Rome had uniformly disdained. He cut himself loose from allthe traditions of the past, especially all relics of republicanism. Hedivided the civil government of the Empire into thirteen great dioceses, and these he subdivided into one hundred and sixteen provinces. Heseparated the civil from the military functions of governors. Heinstalled eunuchs in his palace, to wait upon his person and performmenial offices. He made his chamberlain one of the highest officers ofState. He guarded his person by bodies of cavalry and infantry. Heclothed himself in imposing robes; elaborately arranged his hair; wore acostly diadem; ornamented his person with gems and pearls, with collarsand bracelets. He lived, in short, more like a Heliogabalus than aTrajan or an Aurelian. All traces of popular liberty were effaced. Alldignities and honors and offices emanated from him. The Caesars had beenabsolute monarchs, but disguised their power. Constantine made anostentatious display of his. Moreover he increased the burden oftaxation throughout the Empire. The last fourteen years of his reignwas a period of apparent prosperity, but the internal strength of theEmpire and the character of the emperor sadly degenerated. He becameeffeminate, and committed crimes which sullied his fame. He executed hisoldest son on mere suspicion of crime, and on a charge of infidelityeven put to death the wife with whom he had lived for twenty years, andwho was the mother of future emperors. 

But if he had great faults he had also great virtues. No emperor sinceAugustus had a more enlightened mind, and no one ever reigned at Romewho, in one important respect, did so much for the cause ofcivilization. Constantine is most lauded as the friend and promoter ofChristianity. It is by his service to the Church that he has won thename of the first Christian emperor. His efforts in behalf of the Churchthrow into the shade all the glory he won as a general and as astatesman. The real interest of his reign centres in his Christianlegislation, and in those theological controversies in which heinterfered. With Constantine began the enthronement of Christianity, andfor one thousand years what is most vital in European history isconnected with Christian institutions and doctrines. 

It was when he was marching against Maxentius that his conversion toChristianity took place, A. D. 312, when he was thirty-eight, in thesixth year of his reign. Up to this period he was a zealous Pagan, andmade magnificent offerings to the gods of his ancestors, and erectedsplendid temples, especially in honor of Apollo. The turn of his mindwas religious, or, as we are taught by modern science to say, superstitious. He believed in omens, dreams, visions, and supernaturalinfluences. 

Now it was in a very critical period of his campaign against his Paganrival, on the eve of an important battle, as he was approaching Rome forthe first time, filled with awe of its greatness and its recollections, that he saw--or fancied he saw--a little after noon, just above the sunwhich he worshipped, a bright Cross, with this inscription, [Greek: Entouto nika]--"In this conquer;" and in the following night, when sleephad overtaken him, he dreamed that Christ appeared to him, and enjoinedhim to make a banner in the shape of the celestial sign which he hadseen. Such is the legend, unhesitatingly received for centuries, yetwhich modern critics are not disposed to accept as a miracle, althoughattested by Eusebius, and confirmed by the emperor himself on oath. Whether some supernatural sign really appeared or not, or whether somenatural phenomenon appeared in the heavens in the form of an illuminatedCross, it is not worth while to discuss. We know this, however, that ifthe greatest religious revolution of antiquity was worthy to beannounced by special signs and wonders, it was when a Roman emperor ofextraordinary force of character declared his intention to acknowledgeand serve the God of the persecuted Christians. The miracle rests on theauthority of a single bishop, as sacredly attested by the emperor, inwhom he saw no fault; but the fact of the conversion remains as one ofthe most signal triumphs of Christianity, and the conversion itself wasthe most noted and important in its results since that of Saul ofTarsus. It may have been from conviction, and it may have been frompolicy. It may have been merely that he saw, in the vigorous vitality ofthe Christian principle of devotion to a single Person, a healthierforce for the unification of his great empire than in the disintegratingvices of Paganism. But, whatever his motive, his action stirred up theenthusiasm of a body of men which gave the victory of the MilvianBridge. All that was vital in the Empire was found among theChristians, --already a powerful and rising party, that persecution couldnot put down. Constantine became the head and leader of this party, whose watchword ever since has been "Conquer, " until all powers andprincipalities and institutions are brought under the influence of thegospel. So far as we know, no one has ever doubted the sincerity ofConstantine. Whatever were his faults, especially that of gluttony, which he was never able to overcome, he was ever afterwards strict andfervent in his devotions. He employed his evenings in the study of theScriptures, as Marcus Aurelius meditated on the verities of a spirituallife after the fatigues and dangers of the day. He was not so good a manas was the pious Antoninus, who would, had _he_ been converted toChristianity, have given to it a purer and loftier legislation. It maybe doubted whether Aurelius would have made popes of bishops, or wouldhave invested metaphysical distinctions in theology with so great anauthority. But the magnificent patronage which Constantine gave to theclergy was followed by greater and more enlightened sovereigns thanhe, --by Theodosius, by Charlemagne, and by Alfred; while the dogmaswhich were defended by Athanasius with such transcendent ability at thecouncil where the emperor presided in person, formed an anchor to thefaith in the long and dreary period when barbarism filled Europe withdesolation and fear. 

Constantine, as a Roman emperor, exercised the supreme right oflegislation, --the highest prerogative of men in power. So that his actsas legislator naturally claim our first notice. His edicts were lawswhich could not be gainsaid or resisted. They were like the laws of theMedes and Persians, except that they could be repealed or modified. 

One of the first things he did after his conversion was to issue anedict of toleration, which secured the Christians from any furtherpersecution, --an act of immeasurable benefit to humanity, yet what anyman would naturally have done in his circumstances. If he could haveinaugurated the reign of toleration for all religious opinions, he wouldhave been a still greater benefactor. But it was something to free apersecuted body of believers who had been obliged to hide or suffer fortwo hundred years. By the edict of Milan, A. D. 313, he secured therevenues as well as the privileges of the Church, and restored to theChristians the lands and houses of which they had been stripped by thepersecution of Diocletian. Eight years later he allowed persons tobequeath property to Christian institutions and churches. He assigned inevery city an allowance of corn in behalf of charities to the poor. Heconfirmed the clergy in the right of being tried in their own courts andby their peers, when accused of crime, --a great privilege in the fourthcentury, but a great abuse in the fourteenth. The arbitration of bishopshad the force of positive law, and judges were instructed to execute theepiscopal decrees. He transferred to the churches the privilege ofsanctuary granted to those fleeing from justice in the Mosaiclegislation. He ordained that Sunday should be set apart for religiousobservances in all the towns and cities of the Empire. He abolishedcrucifixion as a punishment. He prohibited gladiatorial games. Hediscouraged slavery, infanticide, and easy divorces. He allowed thepeople to choose their own ministers, nor did he interfere in theelection of bishops. He exempted the clergy from all services to theState, from all personal taxes, and all municipal duties. He seems tohave stood in awe of bishops, and to have treated them with greatveneration and respect, giving to them lands and privileges, enrichingtheir churches with ornaments, and securing to the clergy an amplesupport. So prosperous was the Church under his beneficence, that theaverage individual income of the eighteen hundred bishops of the Empirehas been estimated by Gibbon at three thousand dollars a year, whenmoney was much more valuable than it is in our times. 

In addition to his munificent patronage of the clergy, Constantine washimself deeply interested in all theological affairs and discussions. Heconvened and presided over the celebrated Council of Nicaea, or Nice, asit is usually called, composed of three hundred and eighteen bishops, and of two thousand and forty-eight ecclesiastics of lesser note, listening to their debates and following their suggestions. TheChristian world never saw a more imposing spectacle than this greatcouncil, which was convened to settle the creed of the Church. It met ina spacious basilica, where the emperor, arrayed in his purple and silkrobes, with a diadem of precious jewels on his head, and a voice ofgentleness and softness, and an air of supreme majesty, exhorted theassembled theologians to unity and concord. 

The vital question discussed by this magnificent and august assemblywas metaphysical as well as religious; yet it was the question of theage, on which everybody talked, in public and in private, and which wasdeemed of far greater importance than any war or any affair of State. The interest in this subject seems strange to many, in an age whenpositive science and material interests have so largely crowded outtheological discussions. But the doctrine of the Trinity was as vitaland important in the eyes of the divines of the fourth century as thatof Justification by Faith was to the Germans when they assembled in thegreat hall of the Electoral palace of Leipsic to hear Luther and Dr. Eckadvocate their separate sides. 

In the time of Constantine everything pertaining to Christianity and theaffairs of the Church became invested with supreme importance. All othersubjects and interests were secondary, certainly among the Christiansthemselves. As redemption is the central point of Christianity, publicpreaching and teaching had been directed chiefly, at first, to thepassion, death, and resurrection of the Saviour of the world. Then camediscussions and controversies, naturally, about the person of Christ andhis relation to the Godhead. Among the early followers of our Lord therehad been no pride of reason and a very simple creed. Least of all didthey seek to explain the mysteries of their faith by metaphysicalreasoning. Their doctrines were not brought to the test of philosophy. It was enough for these simple and usually unimportant and unletteredpeople to accept generally accredited facts. It was enough that Christhad suffered and died for them, in his boundless love, and that theirsouls would be saved in consequence. And as to doctrines, all theysought to know was what our Lord and his apostles said. Hence there wasamong them no system of theology, as we understand it, beyond theApostles' Creed. But in the early part of the second century JustinMartyr, a converted philosopher, devoted much labor to a metaphysicaldevelopment of the doctrine drawn from the expressions of the ApostleJohn in reference to the Logos, or Word, as identical with the Son. 

In the third century the whole Church was agitated by the questionswhich grew out of the relations between the Father and the Son. From theperson of Christ--so dear to the Church--the discussion naturally passedto the Trinity. Then arose the great Alexandrian school of theology, which attempted to explain and harmonize the revealed truths of theBible by Grecian dialectics. Hence interminable disputes among divinesand scholars, as to whether the Father and the Logos were one; whetherthe Son was created or uncreated; whether or not he was subordinate tothe Father; whether the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost were distinct, orone in essence. Origen, Clement, and Dionysius were the most famous ofthe doctors who discussed these points. All classes of Christians weresoon attracted by them. They formed the favorite subjects ofconversation, as well as of public teaching. Zeal in discussion createdacrimony and partisan animosity. Things were lost sight of, and wordsalone prevailed. Sects and parties arose. The sublime efforts of suchmen as Justin and Clement to soar to a knowledge of God were pervertedto vain disputations in reference to the relations between the threepersons of the Godhead. 

Alexandria was the centre of these theological agitations, being then, perhaps, the most intellectual city in the Empire. It was filled withGreek philosophers and scholars and artists, and had the largest libraryin the world. It had the most famous school of theology, the learned andacute professors of which claimed to make theology a science. Philosophybecame wedded to theology, and brought the aid of reason to explain thesubjects of faith. 

Among the noted theologians of this Christian capital was a presbyterwho preached in the principal church. His name was Arius, and he was themost popular preacher of the city. He was a tall, spare man, handsome, eloquent, with a musical voice and earnest manner. He was the idol offashionable women and cultivated men. He was also a poet, like Abélard, and popularized his speculations on the Trinity. He was as reproachlessin morals as Dr. Channing or Theodore Parker; ascetic in habits anddress; bold, acute, and plausible; but he shocked the orthodox party bysuch sayings as these: "God was not always Father; once he was notFather; afterwards he became Father. " He affirmed, in substance, thatthe Son was created by the Father, and hence was inferior in power anddignity. He did not deny the Trinity, any more than Abélard did in aftertimes; but his doctrines, pushed out to their logical sequence, were avirtual denial of the divinity of Christ. If he were created, he was acreature, and, of course, not God. A created being cannot be the SupremeCreator. He may be commissioned as a divine and inspired teacher, but hecannot be God himself. Now his bishop, Alexander, maintained that theSon (Logos, or Word) is eternally of the same essence as the Father, uncreated, and therefore equal with the Father. Seeing the foundation ofthe faith, as generally accepted, undermined, he caused Arius to bedeposed by a synod of bishops. But the daring presbyter was notsilenced, and obtained powerful and numerous adherents. Men ofinfluence--like Eusebius the historian--tried to compromise thedifficulties for the sake of unity; and some looked on the discussion asa war of words, which did not affect salvation. In time the bitternessof the dispute became a scandal. It was deemed disgraceful forChristians to persecute each other for dogmas which could not be settledexcept by authority, and in the discussion of which metaphysics sostrongly entered. Alexander thought otherwise. He regarded thespeculations of Arius as heretical, as derogating from the supremeallegiance which was due to Christ. He thought that the very foundationsof Christianity were being undermined. 

No one was more disturbed by these theological controversies than theEmperor himself. He was a soldier, and not a metaphysician; and, asEmperor, he was Pontifex Maximus, --head of the Church. He hated thesecontentions between good and learned men. He felt that they compromisedthe interests of the Church universal, of which he was the protector. Therefore he despatched Hosius, Bishop of Cordova, in Spain, --in whom hehad great confidence, who was in fact his ecclesiastical adviser, --toboth Alexander and Arius, to bring about a reconciliation. As wellreconcile Luther with Dr. Eck, or Pascal with the Jesuits! The divisionswidened. The party animosities increased. The Church was rent in twain. Metaphysical divinity destroyed Christian union and charity. SoConstantine summoned the first general council in Church history tosettle the disputed points, and restore harmony and unity. It convenedat Nicaea, or Nice, in Asia Minor, not far from Constantinople. 

Arius, as the author of all the troubles, was of course present at thecouncil. As a presbyter he could speak, but not vote. He was sixty yearsof age, and in the height of his power and fame, and he was ablein debate. 

But there was one man in the assembly on whom all eyes were soon rivetedas the greatest theologian and logician that had arisen in the Churchsince the apostolic age. He was archdeacon to the bishop of Alexandria, --a lean, attenuated man, small in stature, with fiery eye, haughty air, and impetuous eloquence. His name was Athanasius, --neither Greek norRoman, but a Coptic African. He was bitterly opposed to Arius and hisdoctrines. No one could withstand his fervor and his logic. He was likeBernard at the council of Soissons. He was not a cold, dry, unimpassioned impersonation of mere intellect, like Thomas Aquinas orCalvin, but more like St. Augustine, --another African, warm, religious, profound, with human passions, but lofty soul. He also had thatintellectual pride and dogmatism which afterward marked Bossuet. For twomonths he appealed to the assembly, and presented the consequences ofthe new heresy. With his slight figure, his commanding intellectualforce, his conservative tendencies, his clearness of statement, hislogical exactness and fascinating persuasiveness, he was to churchmenwhat Alexander Hamilton was to statesmen. He gave a constitution to theChurch, and became a theological authority scarcely less than Augustinein the next generation, or Lainez at the Council of Trent. 

And the result of the deliberations of that famous council led byAthanasius, --although both Hosius and Eusebius of Caesarea had moreprelatic authority and dignity than he, --was the Nicene Creed. Who canestimate the influence of those formulated doctrines? They have beenaccepted for fifteen hundred years as the standard of the orthodoxfaith, in both Catholic and Protestant churches, --not universallyaccepted, for Arianism still has its advocates, under new names, andprobably will have so long as the received doctrines of Christianity aresubjected to the test of reason. Outward unity was, however, restored tothe Church, both by prelatic and imperial authority, although learnedand intellectual men continued to speculate and to doubt. The human mindcannot be chained. But it was a great thing to establish a creed whichthe Christian world could accept in the rude and ignorant ages whichsucceeded the destruction of the old civilization. That creed was theanchor of religious faith in the Middle Ages. It is still retained inthe liturgies of Christendom. 

It is not my province to criticise the Nicene Creed, which is virtuallythe old Apostles' Creed, with the addition of the Trinity, as defined byAthanasius. The subject is too complicated and metaphysical. It isallied with questions concerning which men have always differed and everwill differ. Although the Alexandrian divines invoked the aid of reason, it is a matter which reason cannot settle. It is a matter to bereceived, if received at all, as a mystery which is insoluble. Itbelongs to the realm of faith and authority. And the realms of faith andreason are eternally distinct. As metaphysics cannot solve materialphenomena, so reason cannot explain subjects which do not appeal toconsciousness. Bacon was a great benefactor when he separated the worldof physical Nature from the world of Mind; and Pascal was equally aprofound philosopher when he showed that faith could not take cognizanceof science, nor science of faith. The blending of distinct realms hasever been attended with scepticism. "Canst thou by searching find outGod?" What He has revealed for our acceptance should not be confoundedwith truths to be settled by inquiry. It is a legitimate yet underrateddepartment of Christian inquiry to establish the authenticity andmeaning of texts of Scripture from which deductions are made. If thepremises are wrong, confusion and error are the result. We must be sureof the premises on which theological dogmas are based. If as much timeand genius and learning had been expended in unravelling the meaning ofScripture declarations as have been spent in theological deductions andmetaphysical distinctions, we should have had a more universallyaccepted faith. Happily, in our day, the aspirations and ambitions ofexact scholarship are more and more directed to the elucidation of thesacred Scriptures of Christianity. Exegesis and philosophy alike appealto the intellect; but the one can be so aided by learning that the truthcan be reached, while the other pushes the inquirer into an unfathomablesea of difficulties. All moral truths are so bounded and involved withother moral truths that they seem to qualify the meaning of each other. Almost any assumed truth in religion, when pushed to its utmost logicalsequence, appears to involve absurdities. The "divine justice" oftheologians ends, by severe logical sequences, in apparent injustice, and "divine mercy" in the sweeping away of all retribution. 

It may not unreasonably be asked, Has not theology attempted too much?Has it solved the truths for the solution of which it borrowed the aidof reason, and has it not often made a religion which is based ondeductions and metaphysical distinctions as imperative as a religionbased on simple declarations? Has it not appealed to the head, when itshould have appealed to the heart and conscience; and thus has notreligion often been cold and dry and polemical, when it should have beenwarm, fervent, and simple? Such seem to have been some of the effects ofthe Trinitarian controversy between Athanasius and Arius, and theirrespective followers even to our own times. A belief in the unity ofGod, as distinguished from polytheism, has been made no more imperativethan a belief in the supposed relations between the Father and the Son. The real mission of Christ, to save souls, with all the glorious peacewhich salvation procures, has often been lost sight of in the covenantsupposed to have been made between the Father and the Son. Nothing couldexceed the acrimony of the Nicene Fathers in their opposition to thosewho could not accept their deductions. And the more subtile thedistinctions the more violent were the disputes; until at last religiouspersecution marked the conduct of Christians towards each other, --asfierce almost as the persecutions they had suffered from the Pagans. Andso furious was the strife between those theological disputants, estimable in other respects as were their characters, that even theEmperor Constantine at last lost all patience and banished Athanasiushimself to a Gaulish city, after he had promoted him to the great See ofAlexandria as a reward for his services to the Church at the Council ofNice. To Constantine the great episcopal theologian was simply"turbulent, " "haughty, " "intractable. "

With the establishment of the doctrine of the Trinity by the Council ofNice, the interest in the reign of Constantine ceases, although he livedtwelve years after it. His great work as a Christian emperor was tounite the Church with the State. He did not elevate the Church above theState; that was the work of the Mediaeval Popes. But he gave externaldignity to the clergy, of whom he was as great a patron as Charlemagne. He himself was a sort of imperial Pope, attending to things spiritual aswell as to things temporal. His generosity to the Church made him anobject of universal admiration to prelates and abbots and ecclesiasticalwriters. In this munificent patronage he doubtless secularized theChurch, and gave to the clergy privileges they afterwards abused, especially in the ecclesiastical courts. But when the condition of theTeutonic races in barbaric times is considered, his policy may haveproved beneficent. Most historians consider that the elevation of theclergy to an equality with barons promoted order and law, especially inthe absence of central governments. If Constantine made a mistake inenriching and exalting the clergy, it was endorsed by Charlemagneand Alfred. 

After a prosperous and brilliant reign of thirty-one years, the emperordied in the year 337, in the suburbs of Nicomedia, which Diocletian hadselected as the capital of the East. In great pomp, and amid expressionsof universal grief, his body was transferred to the city he had builtand called by his name; it was adorned with every symbol of grandeur andpower, deposited on a golden bed, and buried in a consecrated church, which was made the sepulchre of the Greek emperors until the city wastaken by the Turks. The sacred rite of baptism by which Constantine wasunited with the visible Church, strange to say, was not administereduntil within a few days before his death. 

No emperor has received more praises than Constantine. He was fortunatein his biographers, who saw nothing to condemn in a prince who madeChristianity the established religion of the Empire. If not thegreatest, he was one of the greatest, of all the absolute monarchs whocontrolled the destinies of over one hundred millions of subjects. Ifnot the best of the emperors, he was one of the best, as sovereigns arejudged. I do not see in his character any extraordinary magnanimity orelevation of sentiment, or gentleness, or warmth of affection. He hadgreat faults and great virtues, as strong men are apt to have. If he wasaddicted to the pleasures of the table, he was chaste and continent inhis marital relations. He had no mistresses, like Julius Caesar andLouis XIV. He had a great reverence for the ordinances of the Christianreligion. His life, in the main, was as decorous as it was useful. Hewas a very successful man, but he was also a very ambitious man; and anambitious man is apt to be unscrupulous and cruel. Though he had to dealwith bigots, he was not himself fanatical. He was tolerant andenlightened. His most striking characteristic was policy. He was one ofthe most politic sovereigns that ever lived, --like Henry IV. Of France, forecasting the future, as well as balancing the present. He could nothave decreed such a massacre as that of Thessalonica, or have revokedsuch an edict as that of Nantes. Nor could he have stooped to such apenance as Ambrose inflicted on Theodosius, or given his conscience to aFather Le Tellier. He tried to do right, not because it was right, likeMarcus Aurelius, but because it was wise and expedient; he was aChristian, because he saw that Christianity was a better religion thanPaganism, not because he craved a lofty religious life; he was atheologian, after the pattern of Queen Elizabeth, because theologicalinquiries and disputations were the fashion of the day; but whentheologians became rampant and arrogant he put them down, and dictatedwhat they should believe. He was comparatively indifferent to slaughter, else he would not have spent seventeen years of his life in civil war, in order to be himself supreme. He cared little for the traditions ofthe Empire, else he would not have transferred his capital to the banksof the Bosporus. He was more like Peter the Great than like NapoleonI. ; yet he was a better man than either, and bestowed more benefits onthe world than both together, and is to be classed among the greatestbenefactors that ever sat upon the throne. 

AUTHORITIES. 

The original authorities of the life of Constantine are Eusebius, Bishopof Caesarea, his friend and admirer; also Hosius, of Cordova. Theecclesiastical histories of Socrates, Theodoret, Zosimus, and Sozomenare dry, but the best we have of that age. The lives of Athanasius andArius should be read in connection. Gibbon is very full and exhaustiveon this period. So is Tillemont, who was an authority to Gibbon. Milmanhas written, in his interesting history of the Church, a fine notice ofConstantine, and so has Stanley. The German Church histories, especiallythat of Neander, should be read; also, Cardinal Newman's History of theArians. I need not remind the reader of the innumerable tracts andtreatises on the doctrine of the Trinity. They comprise half theliterature of the Middle Ages as well as of the Fathers. In a lecture Ican only glance at some of the vital points. 

PAULA. 

 * * * * *

A. D. 347-404. 

WOMAN AS FRIEND. 

The subject of this lecture is Paula, an illustrious Roman lady of rankand wealth, whose remarkable friendship for Saint Jerome, in the latterpart of the fourth century, has made her historical. If to her we do notdate the first great change in the social relations of man with woman, yet she is the most memorable example that I can find of that exaltedsentiment which Christianity called out in the intercourse of the sexes, and which has done more for the elevation of society than any othersentiment except that of religion itself. 

Female friendship, however, must ever have adorned and cheered theworld; it naturally springs from the depths of a woman's soul. Howeverdark and dismal society may have been under the withering influences ofPaganism, it is probable that glorious instances could be chronicled ofthe devotion of woman to man and of man to woman, which was notintensified by the passion of love. Nevertheless, the condition ofwomen in the Pagan world, even with all the influences of civilization, was unfavorable to that sentiment which is such a charm in social life. 

The Pagan woman belonged to her husband or her father rather than toherself. As more fully shown in the discussion of Cleopatra, she wasuniversally regarded as inferior to man, and made to be his slave. Shewas miserably educated; she was secluded from intercourse withstrangers; she was shut up in her home; she was given in marriagewithout her consent; she was guarded by female slaves; she was valuedchiefly as a domestic servant, or as an animal to prevent the extinctionof families; she was seldom honored; she was doomed to householddrudgeries as if she were capable of nothing higher; in short, her lotwas hard, because it was unequal, humiliating, and sometimes degrading, making her to be either timorous, frivolous, or artful. Her amusementswere trivial, her taste vitiated, her education neglected, her rightsviolated, her aspirations scorned. The poets represented her ascapricious, fickle, and false. She rose only to fall; she lived only todie. She was a victim, a toy, or a slave. Bedizened or burdened, she waseither an object of degrading admiration or of cold neglect. 

The Jewish women seem to have been more favored and honored than womenwere in Greece or Rome, even in the highest periods of theircivilization. But in Jewish history woman was the coy maiden, or thevigilant housekeeper, or the ambitious mother, or the intriguing wife, or the obedient daughter, or the patriotic song-stress, rather than thesympathetic friend. Though we admire the beautiful Rachel, or the heroicDeborah, or the virtuous Abigail, or the affectionate Ruth, or thefortunate Esther, or the brave Judith, or the generous Shunamite, we donot find in the Rachels and Esthers the hallowed ministrations of theMarys, the Marthas and the Phoebes, until Christianity had developed thevirtues of the heart and kindled the loftier sentiments of the soul. Then woman became not merely the gentle nurse and the prudent housewifeand the disinterested lover, but a _friend_, an angel of consolation, the equal of man in character, and his superior in the virtues of theheart and soul. It was not till then that she was seen to have thosequalities which extort veneration, and call out the deepest sympathy, whenever life is divested of its demoralizing egotisms. The originalbeatitudes of the Garden of Eden returned, and man awoke from the deepsleep of four thousand years, to discover, with Adam, that woman was apartner for whom he should resign all the other attachments of life; andshe became his star of worship and his guardian angel amid theentanglements of sin and cares of toil. 

I would not assert that there were not noble exceptions to thefrivolities and slaveries to which women were generally doomed in PaganGreece and Rome. Paganism records the fascinations of famous women whocould allure the greatest statesmen and the wisest moralists to theircharmed circle of admirers, --of women who united high intellectualculture with physical beauty. It tells us of Artemisia, who erected toher husband a mausoleum which was one of the wonders of the world; ofTelesilla, the poetess, who saved Argos by her courage; of Hipparchia, who married a deformed and ugly cynic, in order that she might makeattainments in learning and philosophy; of Phantasia, who wrote a poemon the Trojan war, which Homer himself did not disdain to utilize; ofSappho, who invented a new measure in lyric poetry, and who was sohighly esteemed that her countrymen stamped their money with her image;of Volumnia, screening Rome from the vengeance of her angry son; ofServilia, parting with her jewels to secure her father's liberty; ofSulpicia, who fled from the luxuries of Rome to be a partner of theexile of her husband; of Hortensia, pleading for justice before thetriumvirs in the market-place; of Octavia, protecting the children ofher rival Cleopatra; of Lucretia, destroying herself rather than survivethe dishonor of her house; of Cornelia, inciting her sons, the Gracchi, to deeds of patriotism; and many other illustrious women. We read ofcourage, fortitude, patriotism, conjugal and parental love; but howseldom do we read of those who were capable of an exalted friendship formen, without provoking scandal or exciting rude suspicion? Who among thepoets paint friendship without love; who among them extol women, unlessthey couple with their praises of mental and moral qualities a mentionof the delights of sensual charms and of the joys of wine and banquets?Poets represent the sentiments of an age or people; and the poets ofGreece and Rome have almost libelled humanity itself by their bittersarcasms, showing how degraded the condition of woman was under Paganinfluences. 

Now, I select Paula, to show that friendship--the noblest sentiment inwoman--was not common until Christianity had greatly modified theopinions and habits of society; and to illustrate how indissolublyconnected this noble sentiment is with the highest triumphs of anemancipating religion. Paula was a highly favored as well as a highlygifted woman. She was a descendant of the Scipios and the Gracchi, andwas born A. D. 347, at Rome, ten years after the death of the GreatConstantine who enthroned Christianity, but while yet the social forcesof the empire were entangled in the meshes of Paganism. She was marriedat seventeen to Toxotius, of the still more illustrious Julian family. She lived on Mount Aventine, in great magnificence. She owned, it issaid, a whole city in Italy. She was one of the richest women ofantiquity, and belonged to the very highest rank of society in anaristocratic age. Until her husband died, she was not distinguished fromother Roman ladies of rank, except for the splendor of her palace andthe elegance of her life. It seems that she was first won toChristianity by the virtues of the celebrated Marcella, and she hastenedto enroll herself, with her five daughters, as pupils of this learnedwoman, at the same time giving up those habits of luxury which thus farhad characterized her, together with most ladies of her class. On herconversion, she distributed to the poor the quarter part of her immenseincome, --charity being one of the forms which religion took in the earlyages of Christianity. Nor was she contented to part with the splendor ofher ordinary life. She became a nurse of the miserable and the sick; andwhen they died she buried them at her own expense. She sought out andrelieved distress wherever it was to be found. 

But her piety could not escape the asceticism of the age; she lived onbread and a little oil, wasted her body with fastings, dressed like aservant, slept on a mat of straw, covered herself with haircloth, anddenied herself the pleasures to which she had been accustomed; shewould not even take a bath. The Catholic historians have undulymagnified these virtues; but it was the type which piety then assumed, arising in part from a too literal interpretation of the injunctions ofChrist. We are more enlightened in these times, since modern Christiancivilization seeks to solve the problem how far the pleasures of thisworld may be reconciled with the pleasures of the world to come. But theChristians of the fourth century were more austere, like the originalPuritans, and made but little account of pleasures which weaned themfrom the contemplation of God and divine truth, and chained them to thetriumphal car of a material and infidel philosophy. As the great andbesetting sin of the Jews before the Captivity was idolatry, which thuswas the principal subject of rebuke from the messengers ofOmnipotence, --the one thing which the Jews were warned to avoid; ashypocrisy and Pharisaism and a technical and legal piety were thegreatest vices to be avoided when Christ began his teachings, --soEpicureanism in life and philosophy was the greatest evil with which theearly Christians had to contend, and which the more eminent among themsought to shun, like Athanasius, Basil, and Chrysostom. The asceticismof the early Church was simply the protest against that materialismwhich was undermining society and preparing the way to ruin; and hencethe loftiest type of piety assumed the form of deadly antagonism to theluxuries and self-indulgence which pervaded every city of the empire. 

This antagonism may have been carried too far, even as the Puritan madewar on many innocent pleasures; but the spectacle of a self-indulgentand pleasure-seeking Christian was abhorrent to the piety of thosesaints who controlled the opinions of the Christian world. The world wasfull of misery and poverty, and it was these evils they sought torelieve. The leaders of Pagan society were abandoned to gains andpleasures, which the Christians would fain rebuke by a loftyself-denial, --even as Stoicism, the noblest remonstrance of the Paganintellect, had its greatest example in an illustrious Roman emperor, whovainly sought to stem the vices which he saw were preparing the way forthe conquests of the barbarians. The historian who does not takecognizance of the great necessities of nations, and of the remedies withwhich good men seek to meet these necessities, is neither philosophicalnor just; and instead of railing at the saints, --so justly venerated andpowerful, --because they were austere and ascetic, he should rememberthat only an indifference to the pleasures and luxuries which were thefatal evils of their day could make a powerful impression even on themasses, and make Christianity stand out in bold contrast with thefashionable, perverse, and false doctrines which Paganism indorsed. AndI venture to predict, that if the increasing and unblushing materialismof our times shall at last call for such scathing rebukes as the Jewishprophets launched against the sin of idolatry, or such as Christ himselfemployed when he exposed the hollowness of the piety of the men who tookthe lead in religious instruction in his day, then the loftiestcharacters--those whose example is most revered--will again disdain andshun a style of life which seriously conflicts with the triumphs of aspiritual Christianity. 

Paula was an ascetic Roman matron on her conversion, or else herconversion would then have seemed nominal. But her nature was notaustere. She was a woman of great humanity, and distinguished for thosegenerous traits which have endeared Augustine to the heart of the world. Her hospitalities were boundless; her palace was the resort of all whowere famous, when they visited the great capital of the empire. Nor didher asceticism extinguish the natural affections of her heart. When oneof her daughters died, her grief was as immoderate as that of Bernard onthe loss of his brother. The woman was never lost in the saint. Anotherinteresting circumstance was her enjoyment of cultivated society, andeven of those literary treasures which imperishable art had bequeathed. She spoke the Greek language as an English or Russian nobleman speaksFrench, as a theological student understands German. Her companions weregifted and learned women. Intimately associated with her in Christianlabors was Marcella, --a lady who refused the hand of the reigningConsul, and yet, in spite of her duties as a leader of Christianbenevolence, so learned that she could explain intricate passages of theScriptures; versed equally in Greek and Hebrew; and so revered, that, when Rome was taken by the Goths, her splendid palace on Mount Aventinewas left unmolested by the barbaric spoliators. Paula was also thefriend and companion of Albina and Marcellina, sisters of the greatAmbrose, whose father was governor of Gaul. Felicita, Principia, andFeliciana also belonged to her circle, --all of noble birth and greatpossessions. Her own daughter, Blessella, was married to a descendant ofCamillus; and even the illustrious Fabiola, whose life is so charminglyportrayed by Cardinal Wiseman, was also a member of this chosen circle. 

It was when Rome was the field of her charities and the scene of hervirtues, when she equally blazed as a queen of society and a saint ofthe most self-sacrificing duties, that Paula fell under the influence ofSaint Jerome, at that time secretary of Pope Damasus, --the most austereand the most learned man of Christian antiquity, the great oracle of theLatin Church, sharing with Augustine the reverence bestowed bysucceeding ages, whose translation of the Scriptures into Latin has madehim an immortal benefactor. Nor was Jerome a plebeian; he was a man ofrank and fortune, --like the more famous of the Fathers, --but gave awayhis possessions to the poor, as did so many others of his day. Nothinghad been spared on his education by his wealthy Illyrian parents. Ateighteen he was sent to Rome to complete his studies. He became deeplyimbued with classic literature, and was more interested in the greatauthors of Greece and Rome than in the material glories of the empire. He lived in their ideas so completely, that in after times hisacquaintance with even the writings of Cicero was a matter ofself-reproach. Disgusted, however, with the pomps and vanities aroundhim, he sought peace in the consolations of Christianity. His ardentnature impelled him to embrace the ascetic doctrines which were sohighly esteemed and venerated; he buried himself in the catacombs, andlived like a monk. Then his inquiring nature compelled him to travel forknowledge, and he visited whatever was interesting in Italy, Greece, andAsia Minor, and especially Palestine, finally fixing upon Chalcis, onthe confines of Syria, as his abode. There he gave himself up tocontemplation and study, and to the writing of letters to all parts ofChristendom. These letters and his learned treatises, and especially thefame of his sanctity, excited so much interest that Pope Damasussummoned him back to Rome to become his counsellor and secretary. Moreaustere than Bossuet or Fénelon at the court of Louis XIV. , he was asaccomplished, and even more learned than they. They were courtiers; hewas a spiritual dictator, ruling, not like Dunstan, by an appeal tosuperstitious fears, but by learning and sanctity. In his coarsegarments he maintained his equality with princes and nobles. To thegreat he appeared proud and repulsive. To the poor he was affable, gentle, and sympathetic; they thought him as humble as the rich thoughthim arrogant. 

Such a man--so learned and pious, so courtly in his manners, so eloquentin his teachings, so independent and fearless in his spirit, sobrilliant in conversation, although tinged with bitterness andsarcasm--became a favorite in those high circles where rank was adornedby piety and culture. The spiritual director became a friend, and hisfriendship was especially valued by Paula and her illustrious circle. Among those brilliant and religious women he was at home, for by birthand education he was their equal. At the house of Paula he was likeWhitefield at the Countess of Huntingdon's, or Michael Angelo in thepalace of Vittoria Colonna, --a friend, a teacher, and an oracle. 

So, in the midst of a chosen and favored circle did Jerome live, withthe bishops and the doctors who equally sought the exalted privilege ofits courtesies and its kindness. And the friendship, based on sympathywith Christian labors, became strengthened every day by mutualappreciation, and by that frank and genial intercourse which can existonly with cultivated and honest people. Those high-born ladies listenedto his teachings with enthusiasm, entered into all his schemes, and gavehim most generous co-operation; not because his literary successes hadbeen blazed throughout the world, but because, like them, he concealedunder his coarse garments and his austere habits an ardent, earnest, eloquent soul, with intense longings after truth, and with nobleaspirations to extend that religion which was the only hope of thedecaying empire. Like them, he had a boundless contempt for empty andpassing pleasures, for all the plaudits of the devotees to fashion; andhe appreciated their trials and temptations, and pointed out, with morethan fraternal tenderness, those insidious enemies that came in thedisguise of angels of light. Only a man of his intuitions could haveunderstood the disinterested generosity of those noble women, and thepassionless serenity with which they contemplated the demons they had bygrace exorcised; and it was only they, with their more delicateorganization and their innate insight, who could have entered upon hissorrows, and penetrated the secrets he did not seek to reveal. He gaveto them his choicest hours, explained to them the mysteries, revealedhis own experiences, animated their hopes, removed theirstumbling-blocks, encouraged them in missions of charity, ignored theirmistakes, gloried in their sacrifices, and held out to them the promisedjoys of the endless future. In return, they consoled him indisappointment, shared his resentments, exulted in his triumphs, soothedhim in his toils, administered to his wants, guarded his infirmities, relieved him from irksome details, and inspired him to exalted labors byincreasing his self-respect. Not with empty flatteries, nor idledalliances, nor frivolous arts did they mutually encourage and assisteach other. Sincerity and truthfulness were the first conditions oftheir holy intercourse, --"the communion of saints, " in which theybelieved, the sympathies of earth purified by the aspirations of heaven;and neither he nor they were ashamed to feel that such a friendship wasmore precious than rubies, being sanctioned by apostles and martyrs;nay, without which a Bethany would have been as dreary as the stalls andtables of money-changers in the precincts of the Temple. 

A mere worldly life could not have produced such a friendship, for itwould have been ostentatious, or prodigal, or vain; allied withsumptuous banquets, with intellectual tournaments, with selfish aims, with foolish presents, with emotions which degenerate into passions_Ennui_, disappointment, burdensome obligation, ultimate disgust, arethe result of what is based on the finite and the worldly, allied withthe gifts which come from a selfish heart, with the urbanities which areequally showered on the evil and on the good, with the graces whichsometimes conceal the poison of asps. How unsatisfactory and mournfulthe friendship between Voltaire and Frederic the Great, with all theirbrilliant qualities and mutual flatteries! How unmeaning would have beena friendship between Chesterfield and Dr. Johnson, even had the latterstooped to all the arts of sycophancy! The world can only inspire itsvotaries with its own idolatries. Whatever is born of vanity will end invanity. "Even in laughter the heart is sorrowful, and the end of thatmirth is heaviness. " But when we seek in friends that which canperpetually refresh and never satiate, --the counsel which maketh wise, the voice of truth and not the voice of flattery; that which willinstruct and never degrade, the influences which banish envy andmistrust, --then there is a precious life in it which survives allchange. In the atmosphere of admiration, respect, and sympathy suspiciondies, and base desires pass away for lack of their accustomednourishment; we see defects through the glass of our own charity, witheyes of love and pity, while all that is beautiful is rendered radiant;a halo surrounds the mortal form, like the glory which mediaevalartists aspired to paint in the faces of Madonnas; and adorationsucceeds to sympathy, since the excellences we admire are akin to theperfections we adore. "The occult elements" and "latent affinities, " ofwhich material pursuits never take cognizance, are "influences as potentin adding a charm to labor or repose as dew or air, in the naturalworld, in giving a tint to flowers or sap to vegetation. "

In that charmed circle, in which it would be difficult to say whetherJerome or Paula presided, the aesthetic mission of woman was seenfully, --perhaps for the first time, --which is never recognized when loveof admiration, or intellectual hardihood, or frivolous employments, orusurped prerogatives blunt original sensibilities and sap the elementsof inward life. Sentiment proved its superiority over all the claims ofintellect, --as when Flora Macdonald effected the escape of CharlesStuart after the fatal battle of Culloden, or when Mary poured thespikenard on Jesus' head, and wiped his feet with the hairs of her head. The glory of the mind yielded to the superior radiance of an admiringsoul, and equals stood out in each other's eyes as gifted superiors whomit was no sin to venerate. Radiant in the innocence of conscious virtue, capable of appreciating any flights of genius, holding their riches ofno account except to feed the hungry and clothe the naked, these friendslived only to repair the evils which unbridled sin inflicted onmankind, --glorious examples of the support which our frail nature needs, the sun and joy of social life, perpetual benedictions, the sweet restof a harassed soul. 

Strange it is that such a friendship was found in the most corrupt, conventional, luxurious city of the empire. It is not in cities thatfriendships are supposed to thrive. People in great towns are toopreoccupied, too busy, too distracted to shine in those amenities whichrequire peace and rest and leisure. Bacon quotes the Latin adage, _Magnacivitas, magna solitudo_. It is in cities where real solitude dwells, since friends are scattered, "and crowds are not company, and faces areonly as a gallery of pictures, and talk but a tinkling cymbal, wherethere is no love. "

The history of Jerome and Paula suggests another reflection, --that thefriendship which would have immortalized them, had they not other andhigher claims to the remembrance and gratitude of mankind, rarely existsexcept with equals. There must be sympathy in the outward relations oflife, as we are constituted, in order for men and women to understandeach other. Friendship is not philanthropy: it is a refined and subtilesentiment which binds hearts together in similar labors and experiences. It must be confessed it is exclusive, esoteric, --a sort of moralfreemasonry. Jerome, and the great bishops, and the illustrious ladiesto whom I allude, all belonged to the same social ranks. They spenttheir leisure hours together, read the same books, and kindled at thesame sentiments. In their charmed circle they unbent; indulged, perchance, in ironical sallies on the follies they alike despised. Theyfreed their minds, as Cicero did to Atticus; they said things to eachother which they might have hesitated to say in public, or among foolsand dunces. I can conceive that those austere people were sometimes evenmerry and jocose. The ignorant would not have understood their learnedallusions; the narrow-minded might have been shocked at the treatment oftheir shibboleths; the vulgar would have repelled them by coarseness;the sensual would have disgusted them by their lower tastes. 

There can be no true harmony among friends when their sensibilities areshocked, or their views are discrepant. How could Jerome or Paula havediscoursed with enthusiasm of the fascinations of Eastern travel tothose who had no desire to see the sacred places; or of the charms ofGrecian literature to those who could talk only in Latin; or of thecorrupting music of the poets to people of perverted taste; or of thesublimity of the Hebrew prophets to those who despised the Jews; or ofthe luxury of charity to those who had no superfluities; or of thebeatitudes of the passive virtues to soldiers; or of the mysteries offaith to speculating rationalists; or of the greatness of the infiniteto those who lived in passing events? A Jewish prophet must have seemeda rhapsodist to Athenian critics, and a Grecian philosopher a conceitedcynic to a converted fisherman of Galilee, --even as a boastful Darwinitewould be repulsive to a believer in the active interference of the moralGovernor of the universe. Even Luther might not have admired MichaelAngelo, any more than the great artist did the courtiers of Julius II. ;and John Knox might have denounced Lord Bacon as a Gallio for advocatingmoderate measures of reform. The courtly Bossuet would not probably havesympathized with Baxter, even when both discoursed on the eternal gulfbetween reason and faith. Jesus--the wandering, weary Man ofSorrows--loved Mary and Martha and Lazarus; but Jesus, in the hour ofsupreme grief, allowed the most spiritual and intellectual of hisdisciples to lean on his bosom. It was the son of a king whom Davidcherished with a love surpassing the love of woman. It was to Plato thatSocrates communicated his moral wisdom; it was with cultivated youththat Augustine surrounded himself in the gardens of Como; Caesar walkedwith Antony, and Cassius with Brutus; it was to Madame de Maintenon thatFénelon poured out the riches of his intellect, and the lofty SaintCyran opened to Mère Angelique the sorrows of his soul. We associateAspasia with Pericles; Cicero with Atticus; Héloïse with Abélard;Hildebrand with the Countess Matilda; Michael Angelo with VittoriaColonna; Cardinal de Retz with the Duchess de Longueville; Dr. Johnsonwith Hannah More. 

Those who have no friends delight most in the plaudits of a plebeiancrowd. A philosopher who associates with the vulgar is neither an oraclenor a guide. A rich man's son who fraternizes with hostlers will notlong grace a party of ladies and gentlemen. A politician who shakeshands with the rabble will lose as much in influence as he gains inpower. In spite of envy, poets cling to poets and artists to artists. Genius, like a magnet, draws only congenial natures to itself. Had awell-bred and titled fool been admitted into the Turk's-Head Club, hemight have been the butt of good-natured irony; but he would have beenendured, since gentlemen must live with gentlemen and scholars withscholars, and the rivalries which alienate are not so destructive as thegrossness which repels. More genial were the festivities of a feudalcastle than any banquet between Jews and Samaritans. Had not Mrs. Thralebeen a woman of intellect and sensibility, the hospitalities sheextended to Johnson would have been as irksome as the dinners given toRobert Hall by his plebeian parishioners; and had not Mrs. Unwin been asrefined as she was sympathetic, she would never have soothed the morbidmelancholy of Cowper, while the attentions of a fussy, fidgety, talkative, busy wife of a London shopkeeper would have driven himabsolutely mad, even if her disposition had been as kind as that ofDorcas, and her piety as warm as that of Phoebe. Paula was to Jeromewhat Arbella Johnson was to John Winthrop, because their tastes, theirhabits, their associations, and their studies were the same, --they wereequals in rank, in culture, and perhaps in intellect. 

But I would not give the impression that congenial tastes and habits andassociations formed the basis of the holy friendship between Paula andJerome. The fountain and life of it was that love which radiated fromthe Cross, --an absorbing desire to extend the religion which saves theworld. Without this foundation, their friendship might have beentransient, subject to caprice and circumstances, --like the gayintercourse between the wits who assembled at the Hôtel de Rambouillet, or the sentimental affinities which bind together young men at collegeor young girls at school, when their vows of undying attachment are sooften forgotten in the hard struggles or empty vanities of subsequentlife. Circumstances and affinities produced those friendships, andcircumstances or time dissolved them, --like the merry meetings of PrinceHal and Falstaff; like the companionship of curious or _ennuied_travellers on the heights of Righi or in the galleries of Florence. Thecord which binds together the selfish and the worldly in the quest forpleasure, in the search for gain, in the toil for honors, at abacchanalian feast, in a Presidential canvass, on a journey toNiagara, --is a rope of sand; a truth which the experienced know, yetwhich is so bitter to learn. It is profound philosophy, as well asreligious experience, which confirms this solemn truth. The soul canrepose only on the certitudes of heaven; those who are joined togetherby the gospel feel alike the misery of the fall and the glory of therestoration. The impressive earnestness which overpowers the mind wheneternal and momentous truths are the subjects of discourse binds peopletogether with a force of sympathy which cannot be produced by thesublimity of a mountain or the beauty of a picture. And this enablesthem to bear each other's burdens, and hide each other's faults, andsoothe each other's resentments; to praise without hypocrisy, rebukewithout malice, rejoice without envy, and assist without ostentation. This divine sympathy alone can break up selfishness, vanity, and pride. It produces sincerity, truthfulness, disinterestedness, --without whichany friendship will die. It is not the remembrance of pleasure whichkeeps alive a friendship, but the perception of virtues. How can thatlive which is based on corruption or a falsehood? Anything sensual infriendship passes away, and leaves a residuum of self-reproach, orundermines esteem. That which preserves undying beauty and sacredharmony and celestial glory is wholly based on the spiritual in man, onmoral excellence, on the joys of an emancipated soul. It is not easy, inthe giddy hours of temptation or folly, to keep this truth in mind, butit can be demonstrated by the experience of every struggling character. The soul that seeks the infinite and imperishable can be firmly knitonly to those who live in the realm of adoration, --the adoration ofbeauty, or truth, or love; and unless a man or woman _does_ prefer theinfinite to the finite, the permanent to the transient, the true to thefalse, the incorruptible to the corruptible there is not even thecapacity of friendship, unless a low view be taken of it to advance ourinterests, or enjoy passing pleasures which finally end in bitterdisappointments and deep disgusts. 

Moreover, there must be in lofty friendship not only congenial tastes, and an aspiration after the imperishable and true, but some common endwhich both parties strive to secure, and which they love better thanthey love themselves. Without this common end, friendship might wearitself out, or expend itself in things unworthy of an exalted purpose. Neither brilliant conversation, nor mutual courtesies, nor activesympathies will make social intercourse a perpetual charm. We tire ofeverything, at times, except the felicities of a pure and fervid love. But even husband and wife might tire without the common guardianship ofchildren, or kindred zeal in some practical aims which both alike seekto secure; for they are helpmates as well as companions. Much more is itnecessary for those who are not tied together in connubial bonds to havesome common purpose in education, in philanthropy, in art, in religion. Such was pre-eminently the case with Paula and Jerome. They were equallydevoted to a cause which was greater than themselves. 

And this was the extension of monastic life, which in their day was theobject of boundless veneration, --the darling scheme of the Church, indorsed by the authority of sainted doctors and martyrs, andresplendent in the glories of self-sacrifice and religiouscontemplation. At that time its subtile contradictions were notperceived, nor its practical evils developed. It was not a withered andcunning hag, but a chaste and enthusiastic virgin, rejoicing in povertyand self-denial, jubilant with songs of adoration, seeking the solutionof mysteries, wrapt in celestial reveries, yet going forth from drearycells to feed the hungry and clothe the naked, and still more, to givespiritual consolations to the poor and miserable. It was a great schemeof philanthropy, as well as a haven of rest. It was always sombre in itsattire, ascetic in its habits, intolerant in its dogmas, secluded inits life, narrow in its views, and repulsive in its austerities; but itsleaders and dignitaries did not then conceal under their coarse raimentseither ambition, or avarice, or gluttony. They did not live in statelyabbeys, nor ride on mules with gilded bridles, nor entertain people ofrank and fashion, nor hunt heretics with fire and sword, nor dictate toprinces in affairs of state, nor fill the world with spies, nor extortfrom wives the secrets of their husbands, nor peddle indulgences forsin, nor undermine morality by a specious casuistry, nor incite tomassacres, insurrections, and wars. This complicated system ofdespotism, this Protean diversified institution of beggars andtyrants, this strange contradiction of glory in debasement anddebasement in glory (type of the greatness and littleness of man), was not then matured, but was resplendent with virtues which extortesteem, --chastity, poverty, and obedience, devotion to the miserable, alofty faith which spurned the finite, an unbounded charity amid thewreck of the dissolving world. As I have before said, it was a protestwhich perhaps the age demanded. The vow of poverty was a rebuke to thatvenal and grasping spirit which made riches the end of life; the vow ofchastity was the resolution to escape that degrading sensuality whichwas one of the greatest evils of the times; and the vow of obedience wasthe recognition of authority amid the disintegrations of society. Themonks would show that a cell could be the blessed retreat of learningand philosophy, and that even in a desert the soul could rise triumphantabove the privations of the body, to the contemplation of immortalinterests. 

For this exalted life, as it seemed to the saints of the fourthcentury, --seclusion from a wicked world, leisure for study and repose, and a state favorable to Christian perfection, --both Paula and Jeromepanted: he, that he might be more free to translate the Scriptures andwrite his commentaries, and to commune with God; she, to minister to hiswants, stimulate his labors, enjoy the beatific visions, and set a proudexample of the happiness to be enjoyed amid barren rocks or scorchingsands. At Rome, Jerome was interrupted, diverted, disgusted. What was aVanity Fair, a Babel of jargons, a school for scandals, a mart of lies, an arena of passions, an atmosphere of poisons, such as that city was, in spite of wonders of art and trophies of victory and contributions ofgenius, to a man who loved the certitudes of heaven, and sought toescape from the entangling influences which were a hindrance to hisstudies and his friendships? And what was Rome to an emancipated woman, who scorned luxuries and demoralizing pleasure, and who was perpetuallyshocked by the degradation of her sex even amid intoxicating socialtriumphs, by their devotion to frivolous pleasures, love of dress andornament, elaborate hair-dressings, idle gossipings, dangerousdalliances, inglorious pursuits, silly trifles, emptiness, vanity, andsin? "But in the country, " writes Jerome, "it is true our bread will becoarse, our drink water, and our vegetables we must raise with our ownhands; but sleep will not snatch us from agreeable discourse, norsatiety from the pleasures of study. In the summer the shade of thetrees will give us shelter, and in the autumn the falling leaves a placeof repose. The fields will be painted with flowers, and amid thewarbling of birds we will more cheerfully chant our songs of praise. "

So, filled with such desires, and possessing such simplicity oftastes, --an enigma, I grant, to an age like ours, as indeed it may havebeen to his, --Jerome bade adieu to the honors and luxuries andexcitements of the great city (without which even a Cicero languished), and embarked at Ostia, A. D. 385, for those regions consecrated by thesufferings of Christ. Two years afterwards, Paula, with her daughter, joined him at Antioch, and with a numerous party of friends made anextensive tour in the East, previous to a final settlement in Bethlehem. They were everywhere received with the honors usually bestowed onprinces and conquerors. At Cyprus, Sidon, Ptolemais, Caesarea, andJerusalem these distinguished travellers were entertained by Christianbishops, and crowds pressed forward to receive their benediction. TheProconsul of Palestine prepared his palace for their reception, and therulers of every great city besought the honor of a visit. But they didnot tarry until they reached the Holy Sepulchre, until they had kissedthe stone which covered the remains of the Saviour of the world. Thenthey continued their journey, ascending the heights of Hebron, visitingthe house of Mary and Martha, passing through Samaria, sailing on thelake Tiberias, crossing the brook Cedron, and ascending the Mount ofTransfiguration. Nor did they rest with a visit to the sacred placeshallowed by associations with kings and prophets and patriarchs. Theyjourneyed into Egypt, and, by the route taken by Joseph and Mary intheir flight, entered the sacred schools of Alexandria, visited thecells of Nitria, and stood beside the ruins of the temples ofthe Pharaohs. 

A whole year was thus consumed by this illustrious party, --learning morethan they could in ten years from books, since every monument and relicwas explained to them by the most learned men on earth. Finally theyreturned to Bethlehem, the spot which Jerome had selected for his finalresting-place, and there Paula built a convent near to the cell of herfriend, which she caused to be excavated from the solid rock. It wasthere that he performed his mighty literary labors, and it was therethat his happiest days were spent. Paula was near, to supply _his_simple wants, and give, with other pious recluses, all the society herequired. He lived in a cave, it is true, but in a way afterwardsimitated by the penitent heroes of the Fronde in the vale of Chevreuse;and it was not disagreeable to a man sickened with the world, absorbedin literary labors, and whose solitude was relieved by visits fromaccomplished women and illustrious bishops and scholars. Fabiola, with asplendid train, came from Rome to listen to his wisdom. Not only did hetranslate the Bible and write commentaries, but he resumed his pious andlearned correspondence with devout scholars throughout the Christianworld. Nor was he too busy to find time to superintend the studies ofPaula in Greek and Hebrew, and read to her his most preciouscompositions; while she, on her part, controlled a convent, entertainedtravellers from all parts of the world, and diffused a boundlesscharity, --for it does not seem that she had parted with the means ofbenefiting both the poor and the rich. 

Nor was this life at Bethlehem without its charms. That beautiful andfertile town, --as it then seems to have been, --shaded with sycamores andolives, luxurious with grapes and figs, abounding in wells of the purestwater, enriched with the splendid church that Helena had built, andconsecrated by so many associations, from David to the destruction ofJerusalem, was no dull retreat, and presented far more attractions thandid the vale of Port Royal, where Saint Cyran and Arnauld discoursedwith the Mère Angelique on the greatness and misery of man; or the sunnyslopes of Cluny, where Peter the Venerable sheltered and consoled thepersecuted Abélard. No man can be dull when his faculties are stimulatedto their utmost stretch, if he does live in a cell; but many a man isbored and _ennuied_ in a palace, when he abandons himself to luxury andfrivolities. It is not to animals, but to angels, that the higherlife is given. 

Nor during those eighteen years which Paula passed in Bethlehem, or theprevious sixteen years at Rome, did ever a scandal rise or a basesuspicion exist in reference to the friendship which has made herimmortal. There was nothing in it of that Platonic sentimentality whichmarked the mediaeval courts of love; nor was it like the chivalrousidolatry of flesh and blood bestowed on queens of beauty at atournament or tilt; nor was it poetic adoration kindled by thecontemplation of ideal excellence, such as Dante saw in his lamented anddeparted Beatrice; nor was it mere intellectual admiration which brightand enthusiastic women sometimes feel for those who dazzle their brains, or who enjoy a great _éclat_; still less was it that impassioned ardor, that wild infatuation, that tempestuous frenzy, that dire unrest, thatmad conflict between sense and reason, that sad forgetfulness sometimesof fame and duty, that reckless defiance of the future, that selfish, exacting, ungovernable, transient impulse which ignores God and law andpunishment, treading happiness and heaven beneath the feet, --such asdoomed the greatest genius of the Middle Ages to agonies more bitterthan scorpions' stings, and shame that made the light of heaven aburden; to futile expiations and undying ignominies. No, it was none ofthese things, --not even the consecrated endearments of a plighted troth, the sweet rest of trust and hope, in the bliss of which we defy poverty, neglect, and hardship; it was not even this, the highest bliss of earth, but a sentiment perhaps more rare and scarcely less exalted, --that whichthe apostle recognized in the holy salutation, and which the Gospelchronicles as the highest grace of those who believed in Jesus, theblessed balm of Bethany, the courageous vigilance which watchedbeside the tomb. 

But the time came--as it always must--for the sundering of all earthlyties; austerities and labors accomplished too soon their work. Evensaints are not exempted from the penalty of violated physical laws. Pascal died at thirty-seven. Paula lingered to her fifty-seventh year, worn out with cares and vigils. Her death was as serene as her life waslofty; repeating, as she passed away, the aspirations of theprophet-king for his eternal home. Not ecstasies, but a serenetranquillity, marked her closing hours. Raising her finger to her lip, she impressed upon it the sign of the cross, and yielded up her spiritwithout a groan. And the icy hand of death neither changed the freshnessof her countenance nor robbed it of its celestial loveliness; it seemedas if she were in a trance, listening to the music of angelic hosts, andglowing with their boundless love. The Bishop of Jerusalem and theneighboring clergy stood around her bed, and Jerome closed her eyes. Forthree days numerous choirs of virgins alternated in Greek, Latin, andSyriac their mournful but triumphant chants. Six bishops bore her bodyto the grave, followed by the clergy of the surrounding country. Jeromewrote her epitaph in Latin, but was too much unnerved to preach herfuneral sermon. Inhabitants from all parts of Palestine came to herfuneral: the poor showed the garments which they had received from hercharity; while the whole multitude, by their sighs and tears, evincedthat they had lost a nursing mother. The Church received the sadintelligence of her death with profound grief, and has ever sincecherished her memory, and erected shrines and monuments to her honor. Inthat wonderful painting of Saint Jerome by Domenichino, --perhaps thegreatest ornament of the Vatican, next to that miracle of art, the"Transfiguration" of Raphael, --the saint is represented in repulsiveaspects as his soul was leaving his body, ministered unto by thefaithful Paula. But Jerome survived his friend for fifteen years, atBethlehem, still engrossed with those astonishing labors which made himone of the greatest benefactors of the Church, yet austere and bitter, revealing in his sarcastic letters how much he needed the soothinginfluences of that sister of mercy whom God had removed to the choir ofangels, and to whom the Middle Ages looked as an intercessor, like Maryherself, with the Father of all, for the pardon of sin. 

But I need not linger on Paula's deeds of fame. We see in her life, pre-eminently, that noble sentiment which was the first development inwoman's progress from the time that Christianity snatched her from thepollution of Paganism. She is made capable of friendship for man withoutsullying her soul, or giving occasion for reproach. Rare and difficultas this sentiment is, yet her example has proved both its possibilityand its radiance. It is the choicest flower which a man finds in thepath of his earthly pilgrimage. The coarse-minded interpreter of awoman's soul may pronounce that rash or dangerous in the intercourse oflife which seeks to cheer and assist her male associates by an endearingsympathy; but who that has had any great literary or artistic successcannot trace it, in part, to the appreciation and encouragement of thosecultivated women who were proud to be his friends? Who that has writtenpoetry that future ages will sing; who that has sculptured a marble thatseems to live; who that has declared the saving truths of anunfashionable religion, --has not been stimulated to labor and duty bywomen with whom he lived in esoteric intimacy, with mutual admirationand respect?

Whatever the heights to which woman is destined to rise, and howeverexalted the spheres she may learn to fill, she must remember that it wasfriendship which first distinguished her from Pagan women, and whichwill ever constitute one of her most peerless charms. Long and drearyhas been her progress from the obscurity to which even the Middle Agesdoomed her, with all the boasted admiration of chivalry, to her presentfree and exalted state. She is now recognized to be the equal of man inher intellectual gifts, and is sought out everywhere as teacher and aswriter. She may become whatever she pleases, --actress, singer, painter, novelist, poet, or queen of society, sharing with man the great prizesbestowed on genius and learning. But her nature cannot be halfdeveloped, her capacities cannot be known, even to herself, until shehas learned to mingle with man in the free interchange of thosesentiments which keep the soul alive, and which stimulate the noblestpowers. Then only does she realize her aesthetic mission. Then only canshe rise in the dignity of a guardian angel, an educator of the heart, adispenser of the blessings by which she would atone for the eviloriginally brought upon mankind. Now, to administer this antidote toevil, by which labor is made sweet, and pain assuaged, and couragefortified, and truth made beautiful, and duty sacred, --this is the truemission and destiny of woman. She made a great advance from thepollutions and slaveries of the ancient world when she proved herself, like Paula, capable of a pure and lofty friendship, without becomingentangled in the snares and labyrinths of an earthly love; but she willmake a still greater advance when our cynical world shall comprehendthat it is not for the gratification of passing vanity, or foolishpleasure, or matrimonial ends that she extends her hand of generouscourtesy to man, but that he may be aided by the strength she gives inweakness, encouraged by the smiles she bestows in sympathy, andenlightened by the wisdom she has gained by inspiration. 

AUTHORITIES. 

Butler's Lives of the Saints; Epistles of Saint Jerome; Cave's Lives ofthe Fathers; Dolci's De Rebus Gestis Hieronymi; Tillemont'sEcclesiastical History; Gibbon's Decline and Fall; Neander's ChurchHistory. See also Henry and Dupin. One must go to the Catholichistorians, especially the French, to know the details of the lives ofthose saints whom the Catholic Church has canonized. Of nothing isProtestant ecclesiastical history more barren than the heroism, sufferings, and struggles of those great characters who adorned thefourth and fifth centuries, as if the early ages of the Church have nointerest except to Catholics. 

CHRYSOSTOM. 

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A. D. 347-407. 

SACRED ELOQUENCE. 

The first great moral force, after martyrdom, which aroused thedegenerate people of the old Roman world from the torpor and egotism andsensuality which were preparing the way for violence and ruin, was theChristian pulpit. Sacred eloquence, then, as impersonated in Chrysostom, "the golden-mouthed, " will be the subject of this Lecture, for it was bythe "foolishness of preaching" that a new spiritual influence went forthto save a dying world. Chrysostom was not, indeed, the first greatpreacher of the new doctrines which were destined to win such mightytriumphs, but he was the most distinguished of the pulpit orators of theearly Church. Yet even he is buried in his magnificent cause. Who canestimate the influence of the pulpit for fifteen hundred years in thevarious countries of Christendom? Who can grasp the range of itssubjects and the dignity of its appeals? In ages even of ignorance andsuperstition it has been eloquent with themes of redemption and of aglorious immortality. 

Eloquence has ever been admired and honored among all nations, especially among the Greeks. It was the handmaid of music and poetrywhen the divinity of mind was adored--perhaps with Pagan instincts, butstill adored--as a birthright of genius, upon which no material estimatecould be placed, since it came from the Gods, like physical beauty, andcould neither be bought nor acquired. Long before Christianity declaredits inspiring themes and brought peace and hope to oppressed millions, eloquence was a mighty power. But then it was secular and mundane; itpertained to the political and social aspects of States; it belonged tothe Forum or the Senate; it was employed to save culprits, to kindlepatriotic devotion, or to stimulate the sentiments of freedom and publicvirtue. Eloquence certainly did not belong to the priest. It was hisprovince to propitiate the Deity with sacrifices, to surround himselfwith mysteries, to inspire awe by dazzling rites and emblems, to work onthe imagination by symbols, splendid dresses, smoking incense, slaughtered beasts, grand temples. He was a man to conjure, not tofascinate; to kindle superstitious fears, not to inspire by thoughtswhich burn. The gift of tongues was reserved for rhetoricians, politicians, lawyers, and Sophists. 

Now Christianity at once seized and appropriated the arts of eloquenceas a means of spreading divine truth. Christianity ever has made use ofall the arts and gifts and inventions of men to carry out the concealedpurposes of the Deity. It was not intended that Christianity shouldalways work by miracles, but also by appeals to the reason andconscience of mankind, and through the truths which had beensupernaturally declared, --the required means to accomplish an end. Therefore, she enriched and dignified an art already admired andhonored. She carried away in triumph the brightest ornament of the Paganschools and placed it in the hands of her chosen ministers. So that theChristian pulpit soon began to rival the Forum in an eloquence which maybe called artistic, --a natural power of moving men, allied with learningand culture and experience. Young men of family and fortune at last, like Gregory Nazianzen and Basil, prepared themselves in celebratedschools; for eloquence, though a gift, is impotent without study. Seethe labors of the most accomplished of the orators of Pagan antiquity. It was not enough for an ancient Greek to have natural gifts; he musttrain himself by the severest culture, mastering all knowledge, andlearning how he could best adapt himself to those he designed to move. So when the gospel was left to do its own work on people's hearts, aftersupernatural influence is supposed to have been withdrawn, theChristian preachers, especially in the Grecian cities, found itexpedient to avail themselves of that culture which the Greeks evervalued, even in degenerate times. Indeed, when has Christianity rejectedlearning and refinement? Paul, the most successful of the apostles, wasalso the most accomplished, --even as Moses, the most gifted man amongthe ancient Jews, was also the most learned. It is a great mistake tosuppose that those venerated Fathers, who swayed by their learning andeloquence the Christian world, were merely saints. They were theintellectual giants of their day, living in courts, and associating withthe wise, the mighty, and the noble. And nearly all of them were greatpreachers: Cyprian, Athanasius, Augustine, Ambrose, and even Leo, ifthey yielded to Origen and Jerome in learning, were yet very polished, cultivated men, accustomed to all the refinements which grace anddignify society. 

But the eloquence of these bishops and orators was rendered potent byvastly grander themes than those which had been dwelt upon by Pericles, or Demosthenes, or Cicero, and enlarged by an amazing depth of newsubjects, transcending in dignity all and everything on which theancient orators had discoursed or discussed. The bishop, while hebaptized believers, and administered the symbolic bread and wine, alsotaught the people, explained to them the mysteries, enforced upon themtheir duties, appealed to their intellects and hearts and consciences, consoled them in their afflictions, stimulated their hopes, arousedtheir fears, and kindled their devotions. He plunged fearlessly intoevery subject which had a bearing on religious life. While he stoodbefore them clad in the robes of priestly office, holding in his handsthe consecrated elements which told of their redemption, and offering upto God before the altar prayers in their behalf, he also ascended thepulpit to speak of life and death in all their sublime relations. "Therewas nothing touching, " says Talfourd, "in the instability of fortune, inthe fragility of loveliness, in the mutability of mortal friendship, orthe decay of systems, nor in the fall of States and empires, which hedid not present, to give humiliating ideas of worldly grandeur. Nor wasthere anything heroic in sacrifice, or grand in conflict, or sublime indanger, --nothing in the loftiness of the soul's aspirations, nothing ofthe glorious promises of everlasting life, --which he did not dwell uponto stimulate the transported crowds who hung upon his lips. It was hisduty and his privilege, " continues this eloquent and Christian lawyer, "to dwell on the older history of the world, on the beautifulsimplicities of patriarchal life, on the stern and marvellous story ofthe Hebrews, on the glorious visions of the prophets, on the songs ofthe inspired melodists, on the countless beauties of the Scriptures, onthe character and teachings and mission of the Saviour. It was his totrace the Spirit of the boundless and the eternal, faintly breathing inevery part of the mystic circle of superstition, --unquenched even amidstthe most barbarous rites of savage tribes, and in the cold and beautifulshapes of Grecian mould. "

How different this eloquence from that of the expiring nations! Theireloquence is sad, sounding like the tocsin of departed glories, protesting earnestly--but without effect--against those corruptionswhich it was too late to heal. How touching the eloquence ofDemosthenes, pointing out the dangers of the State, and appealing toliberty, when liberty had fled. In vain his impassioned appeals to meninsensible to elevated sentiments. He sang the death-song of departedgreatness without the possibility of a new creation. He spoke toaudiences cultivated indeed, but divided, enervated, embittered, infatuated, incapable of self-sacrifice, among whom liberty was a meretradition and patriotism a dream; and he spoke in vain. Nor couldCicero--still more accomplished, if not so impassioned--kindle among thedegenerate Romans the ancient spirit which had fled when demagoguesbegan their reign. How mournful was the eloquence of this great patriot, this experienced statesman, this wise philosopher, who, in spite of allhis weaknesses, was admired and honored by all who spoke the Latintongue. But had he spoken with the tongue of an archangel it would havebeen all the same, on any worldly or political subject. The oldsentiments had died out. Faith was extinguished amid universalscepticism and indifference. He had no material to work on. Thebirthright of ancient heroes had been sold for a mess of pottage, andthis he knew; and therefore with his last philippics he bowed hisvenerable head, and prepared himself for the sword of the executioner, which he accepted as an inevitable necessity. 

These great orators appealed to traditions, to sentiments which hadpassed away, to glories which could not possibly return; and they spokein vain. All they could do was to utter their manly and noble protests, and die, with the dispiriting and hopeless feeling that the seeds ofruin, planted in a soil of corruption, would soon bear their wretchedfruits, --even violence and destruction. 

But the orators who preached a new religion of regenerating forces weremore cheerful. They knew that these forces would save the world, whatever the depth of ignominy, wretchedness, and despair. Theireloquence was never sad and hopeless, but triumphant, jubilant, overpowering. It kindled the fires of an intense enthusiasm. It kindledan enthusiasm not based on the conquest of the earth, but on theconquests of the soul, on the never-fading glories of immortality, onthe ever-increasing power of the kingdom of Christ. The new orators didnot preach liberty, or the glories of material life, or the majesty ofman, or even patriotism, but Salvation, --the future destinies of thesoul. A new arena of eloquence was entered; a new class of oratorsarose, who discoursed on subjects of transcending comfort to the poorand miserable. They made political slavery of no account in comparisonwith the eternal redemption and happiness promised in the future state. The old institutions could not be saved: perhaps the orators did notcare to save them; they were not worth saving; they were rotten to thecore. But new institutions should arise upon their ruins; creationshould succeed destruction; melodious birth-songs should be heard abovethe despairing death-songs. There should be a new heaven and a newearth, in which should dwell righteousness; and the Prince of Peace--Prophet, Priest, and King--should reign therein forever and ever. 

Of the great preachers who appeared in thousands of pulpits in thefourth century, --after Christianity was seated on the throne of theRoman world, and before it had sunk into the eclipse which barbaricspoliations and papal usurpations, and general ignorance, madness, andviolence produced, --there was one at Antioch (the seat of the oldGreco-Asiatic civilization, alike refined, voluptuous, and intellectual)who was making a mighty stir and creating a mighty fame. This wasChrysostom, whose name has been a synonym of eloquence for more thanfifteen hundred years. His father, named Secundus, was a man of highmilitary rank; his mother, Anthusa, was a woman of rare Christiangraces, --as endeared to the Church as Monica, the sainted mother ofAugustine; or Nonna, the mother of Gregory Nazianzen. And it is apleasing fact to record, that most of the great Fathers received thefirst impulse to their memorable careers from the influence of piousmothers; thereby showing the true destiny and glory of women, as theguardians and instructors of their children, more eager for theirsalvation than ambitious of worldly distinction. Buried in the blessedsanctities and certitudes of home, --if this can be called aburial, --those Christian women could forego the dangerous fascination ofsociety and the vanity of being enrolled among its leaders. Anthusa sofortified the faith of her yet unconverted son by her wise andaffectionate counsels, that she did not fear to intrust him to theteachings of Libanius, the Pagan rhetorician, deeming an accomplishededucation as great an ornament to a Christian gentleman as were the goodprinciples she had instilled a support in dangerous temptation. Her sonJohn--for that was his baptismal and only name--was trained in all thelearning of the schools, and, like so many of the illustrious of ourworld, made in his youth a wonderful proficiency. He was precocious, like Cicero, like Abélard, like Pascal, like Pitt, like Macaulay, andStuart Mill; and like them he panted for distinction and fame. The mostcommon path to greatness for high-born youth, then as now, was theprofession of the law. But the practice of this honorable profession didnot, unfortunately, at least in Antioch, correspond with its theory. Chrysostom (as we will call him, though he did not receive thisappellation until some centuries after his death) was soon disgusted anddisappointed with the ordinary avocations of the Forum, --its lowstandard of virtue, and its diversion of what is ennobling in the purefountains of natural justice into the turbid and polluted channels ofdeceit, chicanery, and fraud; its abandonment to usurious calculationsand tricks of learned and legalized jugglery, by which the end of lawitself was baffled and its advocates alone enriched. But what else couldbe expected of lawyers in those days and in that wicked city, or even inany city of the whole Empire, when justice was practically a marketablecommodity; when one half of the whole population were slaves; when thecircus and the theatre were as necessary as the bath; when only the richand fortunate were held in honor; when provincial governments were soldto the highest bidder; when effeminate favorites were the grandchamberlains of emperors; when fanatical mobs rendered all order amockery; when the greed for money was the master passion of the people;when utility was the watchword of philosophy, and material gains the endand object of education; when public misfortunes were treated with thelevity of atheistic science; when private sorrows, miseries, andsufferings had no retreat and no shelter; when conjugal infelicitieswere scarcely a reproach; when divorces were granted on the mostfrivolous pretexts; when men became monks from despair of finding womenof virtue for wives; and when everything indicated a rapid approach ofsome grand catastrophe which should mingle, in indiscriminate ruin, themasters and the slaves of a corrupt and prostrate world?

Such was society, and such the signs of the times, when Chrysostom beganthe practice of the law at Antioch, --perhaps the wickedest city of thewhole Empire. His eyes speedily were opened. He could not sleep, forgrief and disgust; he could not embark on a profession which then, atleast, added to the evils it professed to cure; he began to tremble forhis higher interests; he abandoned the Forum forever; he fled as from acity of destruction; he sought solitude, meditation, and prayer, andjoined those monks who lived in cells, beyond the precincts of thedoomed city. The ardent, the enthusiastic, the cultivated, theconscientious, the lofty Chrysostom fraternized with the visionaryinhabitants of the desert, speculated with them on the mystictheogonies of the East, discoursed with them on the origin of evil, studied with them the Christian mysteries, fasted with them, prayed withthem, slept like them on a bed of straw, denied himself his accustomedluxuries, abandoning himself to alternate transports of grief andsublime enthusiasm, now contending with the demons who sought hisdestruction; then soaring to comprehend the Man-God, --the Word madeflesh, the incarnation of the divine Logos, --and the still more subtilequestions pertaining to the nature and distinctions of the Trinity. 

Such were the forms and modes of his conversion, --somewhat differentfrom the experience of Augustine or of Luther, yet not less real andpermanent. Those days were the happiest of his life. He had leisure andhe had enthusiasm. He desired neither riches nor honors, but the peaceof a forgiven soul He was a monk without losing his humanity; aphilosopher without losing his taste for the Bible; a Christian withoutrepudiating the learning of the schools. But the influence of earlyeducation, his practical yet speculative intellect, his inextinguishablesympathies, his desire for usefulness, and possibly an unsubduedambition to exert a greater influence would not allow him wholly to buryhimself. He made long visits to the friends and habitations he had left, in order to stimulate their faith, relieve their necessities, andencourage them in works of benevolence; leading a life of alternatestudy and active philanthropy, --learning from the accomplished Diodorusthe historical mode of interpreting the Scriptures, and from theprofound Theodorus the systems of ancient philosophy. Thus did he trainhimself for his future labors, and lay the foundation for his futuregreatness. It was thus he accumulated those intellectual treasures whichhe afterwards lavished at the imperial court. 

But his health at last gave way; and who can wonder? Who can long thriveamid exhausting studies on root dinners and ascetic severities? He wasobliged to leave his cave, where he had dwelt six blessed years; and thebishop of Antioch, who knew his merits, pressed him into the activeservice of the Church, and ordained him deacon, --for the hierarchy ofthe Church was then established, whatever may have been the originaldistinctions of the clergy. With these we have nothing to do. But itdoes not appear that he preached as yet to the people, but performedlike other deacons the humble office of reader, leaving to priests andbishops the higher duties of a public teacher. It was impossible, however, for a man of his piety and his gifts, his melodious voice, hisextensive learning, and his impressive manners long to remain in asubordinate post. He was accordingly ordained a presbyter, A. D. 381, byBishop Flavian, in the spacious basilica of Antioch, and the activelabors of his life began at the age of thirty-four. 

Many were the priests associated with him in that great centralmetropolitan church; "but upon him was laid the duty of especiallypreaching to the people, --the most important function recognized by theearly Church. He generally preached twice in the week, on Saturday andSunday mornings, often at break of day, in consequence of the heat ofthe sun. And such was his popularity and unrivalled power, that thebishop, it is said, often allowed him to finish what he had himselfbegun. His listeners would crowd around his pulpit, and even interrupthis teachings by their applause. They were unwearied, though they stoodgenerally beyond an hour. His elocution, his gestures, and his matterwere alike enchanting. " Like Bernard, his very voice would melt totears. It was music singing divine philosophy; it was harmony clothingthe richest moral wisdom with the most glowing style. Never, since thepalmy days of Greece, had her astonishing language been wielded by sucha master. He was an artist, if sacred eloquence does not disdain thatword. The people were electrified by the invectives of an Athenianorator, and moved by the exhortations of a Christian apostle. In majestyand solemnity the ascetic preacher was a Jewish prophet delivering tokings the unwelcome messages of divine Omnipotence. In grace of mannerand elegance of language he was the persuasive advocate of the ancientForum; in earnestness and unction he has been rivalled only bySavonarola; in dignity and learning he may remind us of Bossuet; in hissimplicity and orthodoxy he was the worthy successor of him who preachedat the day of Pentecost. He realized the perfection which sacredeloquence attained, but to which Pagan art has vainly aspired, --a charmand a wonder to both learned and unlearned, --the precursor of theBourdaloues and Lacordaires of the Roman Catholic Church, but especiallythe model for "all preachers who set above all worldly wisdom thosedivine revelations which alone can save the world. "

Everything combined to make Chrysostom the pride and the glory of theancient Church, --the doctrines which he did not hesitate to proclaim tounwilling ears, and the matchless manner in which he enforcedthem, --perhaps the most remarkable preacher, on the whole, that everswayed an audience; uniting all things, --voice, language, figure, passion, learning, taste, art, piety, occasion, motive, prestige, andmaterial to work upon. He left to posterity more than a thousandsermons, and the printed edition of all his works numbers twelve foliovolumes. Much as we are inclined to underrate the genius and learning ofother days in this our age of more advanced utilities, of progressiveand ever-developing civilization, --when Sabbath-school children knowmore than sages knew two thousand years ago, and socialisticphilanthropists and scientific _savans_ could put to blush Moses andSolomon and David, to say nothing of Paul and Peter, and other reputedoracles of the ancient world, inasmuch as they were so weak andcredulous as to believe in miracles, and a special Providence, and apersonal God, --yet we find in the sermons of Chrysostom, preached evento voluptuous Syrians, no commonplace exhortations, such as we sometimeshear addressed to the thinkers of this generation, when poverty ofthought is hidden in pretty expressions, and the waters of life aremeasured out in tiny gill cups, and even then diluted by weak platitudesto suit the taste of the languid and bedizened and frivolous slaves ofsociety, whose only intellectual struggle is to reconcile the pleasuresof material and sensual life with the joys and glories of the world tocome. He dwelt, boldly and earnestly, and with masculine power, on themajesty of God and the comparative littleness of man, on moralaccountability to Him, on human degeneracy, on the mysterious power ofevil, by force of which good people in this dispensation are in a smallminority, on the certainty of future retribution; yet also on thenever-fading glories of immortality which Christ has brought to light byhis sufferings and death, his glorious resurrection and ascension, andthe promised influences of the Holy Spirit. These truths, so solemn andso grand, he preached, not with tricks of rhetoric, but simply andurgently, as an ambassador of Heaven to lost and guilty man. And can youwonder at the effect? When preachers throw themselves on the cardinaltruths of Christianity, and preach with earnestness as if they believedthem, they carry the people with them, producing a lasting impression, and growing broader and more dignified every day. When they seeknovelties, and appeal purely to the intellect, or attempt to bephilosophical or learned, they fail, whatever their talents. It is thedivine truth which saves, not genius and learning, --especially themasses, and even the learned and rich, when their eyes are opened to thedelusions of life. 

For twelve years Chrysostom preached at Antioch, the oracle and thefriend of all classes whether high or low, rich or poor, so that hebecame a great moral force, and his fame extended to all parts of theEmpire. Senators and generals and governors came to hear his eloquence. And when, to his vast gifts, he added the graces and virtues of thehumblest of his flock, --parting with a splendid patrimony to feed thehungry and clothe the naked, utterly despising riches except as a meansof usefulness, living most abstemiously, shunning the society ofidolaters, indefatigable in labor, accessible to those who neededspiritual consolation, healing dissensions, calming mobs, befriendingthe persecuted, rebuking sin in high places; a man acquainted with griefin the midst of intoxicating intellectual triumphs, --reverence and lovewere added to admiration, and no limits could be fixed to the moralinfluence he exerted. 

There are few incidents in his troubled age more impressive than whenthis great preacher sheltered Antioch from the vengeance of Theodosius. That thoughtless and turbulent city had been disgraced by an outrageousinsult to the emperor. A mob, a very common thing in that age, hadrebelled against the majesty of the law, and murdered the officers ofthe Government. The anger of Theodosius knew no bounds, but wasfortunately averted by the entreaties of the bishop, and the emperorabstained from inflicting on the guilty city the punishment heafterwards sent upon Thessalonica for a less crime. Moreover therepentance of the people was open and profound. Chrysostom had moved andmelted them. It was the season of Lent. Every day the vast church wascrowded. The shops were closed; the Forum was deserted; the theatre wasshut; the entire day was consumed with public prayers; all pleasureswere forsaken; fear and anguish sat on every countenance, as in aMediaeval city after an excommunication. Chrysostom improved theoccasion; and perhaps the most remarkable Lenten sermons ever preached, subdued the fierce spirits of the city, and Antioch was saved. It wascertainly a sublime spectacle to see a simple priest, unclothed evenwith episcopal functions, surrounded for weeks by the entire populationof a great city, ready to obey his word, and looking to him alone astheir deliverer from temporal calamities, as well as their guide infleeing from the wrath to come. 

And here we have a noted example of the power as well as the dignity ofthe pulpit, --a power which never passed away even in ages ofsuperstition, never disdained by abbots or prelates or popes in theplenitude of their secular magnificence (as we know from the sermons ofGregory and Bernard); a sacred force even in the hands of monks, as whenSavonarola ruled the city of Florence, and Bourdaloue awed the court ofFrance; but a still greater force among the Reformers, like Luther andKnox and Latimer, yea in all the crises and changes of both the Catholicand Protestant churches; and not to be disdained even in our utilitariantimes, when from more than two hundred thousand pulpits in variouscountries of Christendom, every Sunday, there go forth voices, weak orstrong, from gifted or from shallow men, urging upon the people theirduties, and presenting to them the hopes of the life to come. Oh, what apower is this! How few realize its greatness, as a whole! What a powerit is, even in its weaker forms, when the clergy abdicate theirprerogatives and turn themselves into lecturers, or bury themselves inliturgies! But when they preach without egotism or vanity, scorningsensationalism and vulgarity and cant, and falling back on the greattruths which save the world, then sacredness is added to dignity. Andespecially when the preacher is fearless and earnest, declaring mostmomentous truths, and to people who respond in their hearts to thosetruths, who are filled with the same enthusiasm as he is himself, andwho catch eagerly his words of life, and follow his directions as if hewere indeed a messenger of Jehovah, --then I know of no moral power whichcan be compared with the pulpit. Worldly men talk of the power of thepress, and it is indeed an influence not to be disdained, --it is a greatleaven; but the teachings of its writers, when not superficial, arecontradictory, and are often mere echoes of public sentiment inreference to mere passing movements and fashions and politics andspoils. But the declarations of the clergy, for the most part, are allin unison, in all the various churches--Catholic and Protestant, Episcopalian, Presbyterian, Methodist and Baptist--which accept GodAlmighty as the moral governor of the universe, the great master of ourdestinies, whose eternal voice speaketh to the conscience of mankind. And hence their teachings, if they are true to their calling, havereference to interests and duties and aspirations and hopes as farremoved in importance from mere temporal matters as the heaven ishigher than the earth. Oh, what high treason to the deity whom thepreacher invokes, what stupidity, what frivolity, what insincerity, whatincapacity of realizing what is truly great, when he descends from thelofty themes of salvation and moral accountability, to dwell on theplatitudes of aesthetic culture, the beauties and glories of Nature, orthe wonders of a material civilization, and then with not half the forceof those books and periodicals which are scattered in every hamlet ofcivilized Europe and America!

Now it was to the glory of Chrysostom that he felt the dignity of hiscalling and aspired to nothing higher, satisfied with his greatvocation, --a vocation which can never be measured by the lustre of achurch or the wealth of a congregation. Gregory Nazianzen, whetherpreaching in his paternal village or in the cathedral of Constantinople, was equally the creator of those opinion-makers who settle the verdictsof men. Augustine, in a little African town, wielded ten times theinfluence of a bishop of Rome, and his sermons to the people of the townof Hippo furnished a thesaurus of divinity to the clergy for athousand years. 

Nevertheless, Antioch was not great enough to hold such a preacher asChrysostom. He was summoned by imperial authority to the capital of theEastern Empire. One of the ministers of Arcadius, the son of the greatTheodosius, had heard him preach, and greatly admired his eloquence, andperhaps craved the excitement of his discourses, --as the people of Romehankered after the eloquence of Cicero when he was sent into exile. Chrysostom reluctantly resigned his post in a provincial city to becomethe Patriarch of Constantinople. It was a great change in his outwarddignity. His situation as the highest prelate of the East was rarelyconferred except on the favorites of emperors, as the episcopal sees ofMediaeval Europe were rarely given to men but of noble birth. Yet beingforced, as it were, to accept what he did not seek or perhaps desire, heresolved to be true to himself and his master. Scarcely was heconsecrated by Theophilus of Alexandria before he launched out hisindignant invectives against the patron who had elevated him, the courtwhich admired him, and the imperial family which sustained him. Stillthe preacher, when raised to the government of the Eastern church, regarding his sphere in the pulpit as the loftiest which mortal geniuscould fill. He feared no one, and he spared no one. None could rob a manwho had parted with a princely fortune for the sake of Christ; nonecould bribe a man who had no favors to ask, and who could live on acrust of bread; none could silence a man who felt himself to be theminister of divine Omnipotence, and who scattered before his altar thedust of worldly grandeur. 

It seems that Chrysostom regarded his first duty, even as theMetropolitan of the East, to preach the gospel. He subordinated thebishop to the preacher. True, he was the almoner of his church and thedirector of its revenues; but he felt that the church of Christ had ahigher vocation for a bishop to fill than to be a good business man. Amid all the distractions of his great office he preached as often andas fervently as he did at Antioch. Though possessed of enormousrevenues, he curtailed the expenses of his household, and surroundedhimself with the pious and the learned. He lived retired within hispalace; he dined alone on simple food, and always at home. The greatwere displeased that he would not honor with his presence theirsumptuous banquets; but rich dinners did not agree with his weakdigestion, and perhaps he valued too highly his precious time to wastehimself, body and soul, for the enjoyment of even admiring courtiers. His power was not at the dinner-table but in the pulpit, and he fearedto weaken the effects of his discourses by the exhibition of weaknesseswhich nearly every man displays amid the excitements of socialintercourse. 

Perhaps, however, Chrysostom was too ascetic. Christ dined withpublicans and sinners; and a man must unbend somewhere, or he loses theelasticity of his mind, and becomes a formula or a mechanism. Theconvivial enjoyments of Luther enabled him to bear his burden. HadThomas à Becket shown the same humanity as archbishop that he did aschancellor, he might not have quarrelled with his royal master. SoChrysostom might have retained his favor with the court and his seeuntil he died, had he been less austere and censorious. Yet we shouldremember that the asceticism which is so repulsive to us, and withreason, and which marked the illustrious saints of the fourth century, was simply the protest against the almost universal materialism of theday, --that dreadful moral blight which was undermining society. Asluxury and extravagance and material pleasures were the prominent evilsof the old Roman world in its decline, it was natural that the protestagainst these evils should assume the greatest outward antagonism. Luxury and a worldly life were deemed utterly inconsistent with apreacher of righteousness, and were disdained with haughty scorn by theprophets of the Lord, as they were by Elijah and Elisha in the days ofAhab. "What went ye out in the wilderness to see?" said our Lord, withdisdainful irony, --"a man clothed in soft raiment? They that wear softclothing are in king's houses, "--as much as to say, My prophets, myministers, rejoice not in such things. 

So Chrysostom could never forget that he was a minister of Christ, andwas willing to forego the trappings and pleasures of material lifesooner than abdicate his position as a spiritual dictator. The secularhistorians of our day would call him arrogant, like the courtiers ofArcadius, who detested his plain speaking and his austere piety; but thepoor and unimportant thought him as humble as the rich and great thoughthim proud. Moreover, he was a foe to idleness, and sent away from courtto their distant sees a host of bishops who wished to bask in thesunshine of court favor, or revel in the excitements of a great city;and they became his enemies. He deposed others for simony, and theybecame still more hostile. Others again complained that he wasinhospitable, since he would not give up his time to everybody, evenwhile he scattered his revenues to the poor. And still othersentertained towards him the passion of envy, --that which gives rancor tothe _odium theologicum_, that fatal passion which caused Daniel to becast into the lions' den, and Haman to plot the ruin of Mordecai; apassion which turns beautiful women into serpents, and learnedtheologians into fiends. So that even Chrysostom was assailed withdanger. Even he was not too high to fall. 

The first to turn against the archbishop was the Lord HighChamberlain, --Eutropius, --the minister who had brought him toConstantinople. This vulgar-minded man expected to find in the preacherhe had elevated a flatterer and a tool. He was as much deceived as wasHenry II. When he made Thomas à Becket archbishop of Canterbury. Therigid and fearless metropolitan, instead of telling stories at histable and winking at his infamies, openly rebuked his extortions andexposed his robberies. The disappointed minister of Arcadius then benthis energies to compass the ruin of the prelate; but, before he couldeffect his purpose, he was himself disgraced at court. The army inrevolt had demanded his head, and Eutropius fled to the metropolitanchurch of Saint Sophia. Chrysostom seized the occasion to impress hishearers with the instability of human greatness, and preached a sort offuneral oration for the man before he was dead. As the fallen andwretched minister of the emperor lay crouching in an agony of shame andfear beneath the table of the altar, the preacher burst out: "Oh, vanityof vanities, where is now the glory of this man? Where the splendor ofthe light which surrounded him; where the jubilee of the multitude whichapplauded him; where the friends who worshipped his power; where theincense offered to his image? All gone! It was a dream: it has fled likea shadow; it has burst like a bubble! Oh, vanity of vanity of vanities!Write it on all walls and garments and streets and houses: write it onyour consciences. Let every one cry aloud to his neighbor, Behold, allis vanity! And thou, O wretched man, " turning to the fallen chamberlain, "did I not say unto thee that money is a thankless servant? Said I notthat wealth is a most treacherous friend? The theatre, on which thouhast bestowed honor, has betrayed thee; the race-course, afterdevouring thy gains, has sharpened the sword of those whom thou hastlabored to amuse. But our sanctuary, which thou hast so often assailed, now opens her bosom to receive thee, and covers thee with her wings. "

But even the sacred cathedral did not protect him. He was dragged outand slain. 

A more relentless foe now appeared against the prelate, --no less apersonage than Theophilus, the very bishop who had consecrated him. Jealousy was the cause, and heresy the pretext, --that most convenientcry of theologians, often indeed just, as when Bernard accused Abélard, and Calvin complained of Servetus; but oftener, the most effectual wayof bringing ruin on a hated man, as when the partisans of Alexander VI. Brought Savonarola to the tribunal of the Inquisition. It seems thatTheophilus had driven out of Egypt a body of monks because they wouldnot assent to the condemnation of Origen's writings; and the poor men, not knowing where to go, fled to Constantinople and implored theprotection of the Patriarch. He compassionately gave them shelter, andpermission to say their prayers in one of his churches. Therefore he wasa heretic, like them, --a follower of Origen. 

Under common circumstances such an accusation would have been treatedwith contempt. But, unfortunately, Chrysostom had alienated otherbishops also. Yet their hostility would not have been heeded had notthe empress herself, the beautiful and the artful Eudoxia, sided againsthim. This proud, ambitious, pleasure-seeking, malignant princess--inpassion a Jezebel, in policy a Catherine de Medici, in personalfascination a Mary Queen of Scots--hated the archbishop, as Mary hatedJohn Knox, because he had ventured to reprove her levities and follies;and through her influence (and how great is the influence of a beautifulwoman on an irresponsible monarch!) the emperor, a weak man, allowedTheophilus to summon and preside over a council for the trial ofChrysostom. It assembled at a place called the Oaks, in the suburbs ofChalcedon, and was composed entirely of the enemies of the Patriarch. Nothing, however, was said about his heresy: that charge was ridiculous. But he was accused of slandering the clergy--he had called them corrupt;of having neglected the duties of hospitality, for he dined generallyalone; of having used expressions unbecoming of the house of God, for hewas severe and sarcastic; of having encroached on the jurisdiction offoreign bishops in having shielded a few excommunicated monks; and ofbeing guilty of high treason, since he had preached against the sins ofthe empress. On these charges, which he disdained to answer, and beforea council which he deemed illegal, he was condemned; and the emperoraccepted the sentence, and sent him into exile. 

But the people of Constantinople would not let him go. They drove awayhis enemies from the city; they raised a sedition and a seasonableearthquake, as Gibbon might call it, and having excited superstitiousfears, the empress caused him to be recalled. His return, of course, wasa triumph. The people spread their garments in his way, and conductedhim in pomp to his archiepiscopal throne. Sixty bishops assembled andannulled the sentence of the Council of the Oaks. He was now morepopular and powerful than before. But not more prudent. For a silverstatue of the empress having been erected so near to the cathedral thatthe games instituted to its honor disturbed the services of the church, the bishop in great indignation ascended the pulpit, and declaimedagainst female vices. The empress at this was furious, and threatenedanother council. Chrysostom, still undaunted, then delivered thatcelebrated sermon, commencing thus: "Again Herodias raves; again shedances; again she demands the head of John in a basin. " This defiance, which was regarded as an insult, closed the career of Chrysostom in thecapital of the Empire. Both the emperor and empress determined tosilence him. A new council was convened, and the Patriarch was accusedof violating the canons of the Church. It seems he ventured to preachbefore he was formally restored, and for this technical offence he wasagain deposed. No second earthquake or popular sedition saved him. Hehad sailed too long against the stream. What genius and what fame canprotect a man who mocks or defies the powers that be, whether kings orpeople? If Socrates could not be endured at Athens, if Cicero wasbanished from Rome, how could this unarmed priest expect immunity fromthe possessors of absolute power whom he had offended? It is the fate ofprophets to be stoned. The bold expounders of unpalatable truth everhave been martyrs, in some form or other. 

But Chrysostom met his fate with fortitude, and the only favor which heasked was to reside in Cyzicus, near Nicomedia. This was refused, andthe place of his exile was fixed at Cucusus, --a remote and desolate cityamid the ridges of Mount Taurus; a distance of seventy days' journey, which he was compelled to make in the heat of summer. 

But he lived to reach this dreary resting-place, and immediately devotedhimself to the charms of literary composition and letters to hisfriends. No murmurs escaped him. He did not languish, as Cicero did inhis exile, or even like Thiers in Switzerland. Banishment was notdreaded by a man who disdained the luxuries of a great capital, and whowas not ambitious of power and rank. Retirement he had sought, even inhis youth, and it was no martyrdom to him so long as he could study, meditate, and write. 

So Chrysostom was serene, even cheerful, amid the blasts of a cold andcheerless climate. It was there he wrote those noble and interestingletters, of which two hundred and forty still remain. Indeed, hisinfluence seemed to increase with his absence from the capital; and thishis enemies beheld with the rage which Napoleon felt for Madame de Staëlwhen he had banished her to within forty leagues of Paris. So a freshorder from the Government doomed him to a still more dreary solitude, onthe utmost confines of the Roman Empire, on the coast of the Euxine, even the desert of Pityus. But his feeble body could not sustain thefatigues of this second journey. He was worn out with disease, labors, and austerities; and he died at Comono, in Pontus, --near the place whereHenry Martin died, --in the sixtieth year of his age, a martyr, likegreater men than he. 

Nevertheless this martyrdom, and at the hands of a Christian emperor, filled the world with grief. It was only equalled in intensity by themartyrdom of Becket in after ages. The voice of envy was at last hushed;one of the greatest lights of the Church was extinguished forever. Another generation, however, transported his remains to the banks of theBosporus, and the emperor--the second Theodosius--himself advanced toreceive them as far as Chalcedon, and devoutly kneeling before hiscoffin, even as Henry II. Kneeled at the shrine of Becket, invoked theforgiveness of the departed saint for the injustice and injuries he hadreceived. His bones were interred with extraordinary pomp in the tomb ofthe apostles, and were afterwards removed to Rome, and deposited, stilllater, beneath a marble mausoleum in a chapel of Saint Peter, where theystill remain. 

Such were the life and death of the greatest pulpit orator of Christianantiquity. And how can I describe his influence? His sermons, indeed, remain; but since we have given up the Fathers to the Catholics, as ifthey had a better right to them than we, their writings are not so wellknown as they ought to be, --as they will be, when we become broader inour views and more modest of our own attainments. Few of the Protestantdivines, whom we so justly honor, surpassed Chrysostom in the soundnessof his theology, and in the learning with which he adorned his sermons. Certainly no one of them has equalled him in his fervid, impassioned, and classic eloquence. He belongs to the Church universal. The greatdivines of the seventeenth century made him the subject of theiradmiring study. In the Middle Ages he was one of the great lights of thereviving schools. Jeremy Taylor, not less than Bossuet, acknowledged hismatchless services. One of his prayers has entered into the beautifulliturgy of Cranmer. He was a Bernard, a Bourdaloue, and a Whitefieldcombined, speaking in the language of Pericles, and on themes whichPaganism never comprehended and the Middle Ages but imperfectlydiscussed. 

The permanent influence of such a man can only be measured by thedignity and power of the pulpit itself in all countries and in allages. So far as pulpit eloquence is an art, its greatest master stillspeaketh. But greater than his art was the truth which he unfolded andadorned. It is not because he held the most cultivated audiences of hisage spell-bound by his eloquence, but because he did not fear to deliverhis message, and because he magnified his office, and preached toemperors and princes as if they were ordinary men, and regarded himselfas the bearer of most momentous truth, and soared beyond human praises, and forgot himself in his cause, and that cause the salvation ofsouls, --it is for these things that I most honor him, and believe thathis name will be held more and more in reverence, as Christianitybecomes more and more the mighty power of the world. 

AUTHORITIES. 

Theodoret; Socrates; Sozomen; Gregory Nazianzen's Orations; the Works ofChrysostom; Baronius's Annals; Epistle of Saint Jerome; Tillemont'sEcclesiastical History; Mabillon; Fleury's Ecclesiastical History; Lifeof Chrysostom by Monard, --also a Life, by Frederic M. Perthes, translated by Professor Hovey; Neander's Church History; Gibbon; Milman;Du Pin; Stanley's Lectures on the Eastern Church. The Lives of theFathers have been best written by Frenchmen, and by Catholic historians. 

SAINT AMBROSE. 

 * * * * *

A. D. 340-397. 

EPISCOPAL AUTHORITY. 

Of the great Fathers, few are dearer to the Church than Ambrose, Archbishop of Milan, both on account of his virtues and the dignity hegave to the episcopal office. 

Nearly all the great Fathers were bishops, but I select Ambrose as therepresentative of their order, because he was more illustrious as aprelate than as a theologian or orator, although he stood high as both. He contributed more than any man who preceded him to raise the power ofbishops as one of the controlling agencies of society for more than athousand years. 

The episcopal office, aside from its spiritual aspects, had become agreat worldly dignity as early as the fourth century. It gave itspossessor rank, power, wealth, --a superb social position, even in theeyes of worldly men. "Make me but bishop of Rome, " said a great Pagangeneral, "and I too would become a Christian. " As archbishop of Milan, the second city of Italy, Ambrose found himself one of the highestdignitaries of the Empire. 

Whence this great power of bishops? How happened it that the humbleministers of a new and persecuted religion became princes of the earth?What a change from the outward condition of Paul and Peter to that ofAmbrose and Leo!

It would be unpleasant to present this subject on controversial andsectarian grounds. Let those people--and they are numerous--who believein the divine right of bishops, enjoy their opinion; it is not for me toassail them. Let any party in the Church universal advocate the divineinstitution of their own form of government. But I do not believe thatany particular form of government is laid down in the Bible; and yet Iadmit that church government is as essential and fundamental a matter asa worldly government. Government, then, must be in both Church andState. This _is_ recognized in the Scriptures. No institution or Statecan live without it. Men are exhorted by apostles to obey it, as aChristian duty. But they do not prescribe the form, --leaving that to besettled by the circumstances of the times, the wants of nations, theexigencies of the religious world. And whatever form of governmentarises, and is confirmed by the wisest and best men, is to be sustained, is to be obeyed. The people of Germany recognize imperial authority: itmay be the best government for them. England is practically ruled by anaristocracy, --for the House of Commons is virtually as aristocratic insympathies as the House of Lords. In this country we have arepresentation of the people, chosen by the people, and ruling for thepeople. We think this is the best form of government for us, --just now. In Athens there was a pure democracy. Which of these forms of civilgovernment did God appoint?

So in the Church. For four centuries the bishops controlled the infantChurch. For ten centuries afterwards the Popes ruled the Christianworld, and claimed a divine right. The government of the Church assumedthe theocratic form. At the Reformation numerous sects arose, most ofthem claiming the indorsement of the Scriptures. Some of these sectsbecame very high-church; that is, they based their organization on thesupposed authority of the Bible. All these sects are sincere; but theydiffer, and they have a right to differ. Probably the day never willcome when there will be uniformity of opinion on church government, anymore than on doctrines in theology. 

Now it seems to me that episcopal power arose, like all other powers, from the circumstances of society, --the wants of the age. One thingcannot be disputed, that the early bishop--or presbyter, or elder, whatever name you choose to call him--was a very humble and unimportantperson in the eyes of the world. He lived in no state, in no dignity; hehad no wealth, and no social position outside his flock. He preached inan upper chamber or in catacombs. Saint Paul preached at Rome withchains on his arms or legs. The apostles preached to plain people, tocommon people, and lived sometimes by the work of their own hands. In acentury or two, although the Church was still hunted and persecuted, there were nevertheless many converts. These converts contributed fromtheir small means to the support of the poor. At first the deacons, whoseem to have been laymen, had charge of this money. Paul was too busy aman himself to serve tables. Gradually there arose the need of asuperintendent, or overseer; and that is the meaning of the Greek word[Greek: episkopos], from which we get our term _bishop_. Soon, therefore, the superintendent or bishop of the local church had thecontrol of the public funds, the expenditure of which he directed. Thiswas necessary. As converts multiplied and wealth increased, it becameindispensable for the clergy of a city to have a head; this officerbecame presiding elder, or bishop, --whose great duty, however, was topreach. In another century these bishops had become influential; andwhen Christianity was established by Constantine as the religion of theEmpire, they added power to influence, for they disbursed greatrevenues and ruled a large body of inferior clergy. They were looked upto; they became honored and revered; and deserved to be, for they weregood men, and some of them learned. Then they sought a warrant for theirpower outside the circumstances to which they were indebted for theirelevation. It was easy to find it. What sect cannot find it? Theystrained texts of Scripture, --as that great and good man, Moses Stuart, of Andover, in his zeal for the temperance cause, strained texts toprove that the wine of Palestine did not intoxicate. 

But whatever were the causes which led to the elevation and ascendencyof bishops, the fact is clear enough that episcopal authority began atan early date; and that bishops were influential in the third centuryand powerful in the fourth, --a most fortunate thing, as I conceive, forthe Church at that time. As early as the third century we read of sogreat a man as the martyr Cyprian declaring "that bishops had the samerights as apostles, whose successors they were. " In the fourth century, such illustrious men as Eusebius of Emesa, Athanasius of Alexandria, Basil of Caesarea, Gregory of Nyssa, Martin of Tours, Chrysostom ofConstantinople, and Augustine of Hippo, and sundry other great men whosewritings swayed the human mind until the Reformation, advocated equallyhigh-church pretensions. The bishops of that day lived in a state ofworldly grandeur, reduced the power of presbyters to a shadow, seatedthemselves on thrones, surrounded themselves with the insignia ofprinces, claimed the right of judging in civil matters, multiplied theoffices of the Church, and controlled revenues greater than the incomesof senators and patricians. As for the bishoprics of Rome, Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch, and Milan, they were greatgovernments, and required men of great executive ability to rule them. Preaching gave way to the multiplied duties and cares of an exaltedstation. A bishop was then not often selected because he could preachwell, but because he knew how to govern. Who, even in our times, wouldthink of filling the See of London, although it is Protestant, with aman whose chief merit is in his eloquence? They want a business man forsuch a post. Eloquence is no objection, but executive ability is thething most needed. 

So Providence imposed great duties on the bishops of the fourth century, especially in large cities; and very able as well as good men wererequired for this position, equally one of honor and authority. 

The See of Milan was then one of the most important in the Empire. Itwas the seat of imperial government. Valentinian, an able general, borethe sceptre of the West; for the Empire was then divided, --Valentinianruling the eastern, and his brother Gratian the western, portion ofit, --and, as the Goths were overrunning the civilized world andthreatening Italy, Valentinian fixed his seat of government at Milan. Itwas a turbulent city, disgraced by mobs and religious factions. TheArian party, headed by the Empress Justina, mother of the young emperor, was exceedingly powerful. It was a critical period, and even orthodoxywas in danger of being subverted. I might dwell on the miseries of thatperiod, immediately preceding the fall of the Empire; but all I will sayis, that the See of Milan needed a very able, conscientious, andwise prelate. 

Hence Ambrose was selected, not by the emperor but by the people, inwhom was vested the right of election. He was then governor of that partof Italy now embraced by the archbishoprics of Milan, Turin, Genoa, Ravenna, and Bologna, --the greater part of Lombardy and Sardinia. Hebelonged to an illustrious Roman family. His father had been praetorianprefect of Gaul, which embraced not only Gaul, but Britain andAfrica, --about a third of the Roman Empire. The seat of this greatprefecture was Treves; and here Ambrose was born in the year 340. Hisearly days were of course passed in luxury and pomp. On the death of hisfather he retired to Rome to complete his education, and soonoutstripped his noble companions in learning and accomplishments. Suchwas his character and position that he was selected, at the age ofthirty-four, for the government of Northern Italy. Nothing eventfulmarked his rule as governor, except that he was just, humane, and able. Had he continued governor, his name would not have passed down inhistory; he would have been forgotten like other provincial governors. 

But he was destined to a higher sphere and a more exalted position thanthat of governor of an important province. On the death of ArchbishopAuxentius, A. D. 374, the See of Milan became vacant. A greatman was required for the archbishopric in that age of factions, heresies, and tumults. The whole city was thrown into the wildestexcitement. The emperor wisely declined to interfere with the election. Rival parties could not agree on a candidate. A tumult arose. Thegovernor--Ambrose--proceeded to the cathedral church, where the electionwas going on, to appease the tumult. His appearance produced a momentarycalm, when a little child cried out, "Let Ambrose our governor be ourbishop!" That cry was regarded as a voice from heaven, --as the voice ofinspiration. The people caught the words, re-echoed the cry, andtumultuously shouted, "Yes! let Ambrose our governor be our bishop!"

And the governor of a great province became archbishop of Milan. This isa very significant fact. It shows the great dignity and power of theepiscopal office at that time: it transcended in influence and power thegovernorship of a province. It also shows the enormous strides which theChurch had made as one of the mighty powers of the world sinceConstantine, only about sixty years before, had opened to organizedChristianity the possibilities of influence. It shows how much morealready was thought of a bishop than of a governor. 

And what is very remarkable, Ambrose had not even been baptized. He wasa layman. There is no evidence that he was a Christian except in name. He had passed through no deep experience such as Augustine did, shortlyafter this. It was a more remarkable appointment than when Henry II. Made his chancellor, Becket, archbishop of Canterbury. Why was Ambroseelevated to that great ecclesiastical post? What had he done for theChurch? Did he feel the responsibility of his priestly office? Did herealize that he was raised in his social position, even in the eye of anemperor? Why did he not shrink from such an office, on the grounds ofunfitness?

The fact is, as proved by his subsequent administration, he was theablest man for that post to be found in Italy. He was really the mostfitting man. If ever a man was called to be a priest, he was called. Hehad the confidence of both the emperor and the people. Such confidencecan be based only on transcendent character. He was not selected becausehe was learned or eloquent, but because he had administrative ability;and because he was just and virtuous. 

A great outward change in his life marked his elevation, as in Becketafterwards. As soon as he was baptized, he parted with his princelyfortune and scattered it among the poor, like Cyprian and Chrysostom. This was in accordance with one of the great ideas of the early Church, almost impossible to resist. Charity unbounded, allied with poverty, wasthe great test of practical Christianity. It was afterwards lost sightof by the Catholic Church in the Middle Ages, and never was recognizedby Protestantism at all, not even in theory. Thrift has been one of thewatchwords of Protestantism for three hundred years. One of the boastsof Protestantism has been its superior material prosperity. Travellershave harped on the worldly thrift of Protestant countries. The Puritans, full of the Old Testament, like the Jews, rejoiced in an outwardprosperity as one of the evidences of the favor of God. The Catholicsaccuse the Protestants, of not only giving birth to rationalism, intheir desire to extend liberality of mind, but of fostering a materiallife in their ambition to be outwardly prosperous. I make no comment onthis fact; I only state it, for everybody knows the accusation to betrue, and most people rejoice in it. One of the chief arguments I usedto hear for the observance of public worship was, that it would raisethe value of property and improve the temporal condition of theworshippers, --so that temporal thrift was made to be indissolublyconnected with public worship. "Go to church, and you will thrive inbusiness. Become a Sabbath-school teacher, and you will gain socialposition. " Such arguments logically grow out from linking the kingdom ofheaven with success in life, and worldly prosperity with the outwardperformance of religious duties, --all of which may be true, andcertainly marks Protestantism, but is somewhat different from the ideasof the Church eighteen hundred years ago. But those were unenlightenedtimes, when men said, "How hardly shall they who have riches enter intothe kingdom of God. "

I pass now to consider the services which Ambrose rendered to theChurch, and which have given him a name in history. 

One of these was the zealous conservation of the truths he received onauthority. To guard the purity of the faith was one of the mostimportant functions of a primitive bishop. The last thing the Churchwould tolerate in one of her overseers was a Gallio in religion. Shescorned those philosophical dignitaries who would sit in the seats ofMoses and Paul, and use the speculations of the Greeks to build up theorthodox faith. The last thing which a primitive bishop thought of wasto advance against Goliath, not with the sling of David, but with theweapons of Pagan Grecian schools. It was incumbent on the watchman whostood on the walls of Zion, to see that no suspicious enemy entered herhallowed gates. The Church gave to him that trust, and reposed in hisfidelity. Now Ambrose was not a great scholar, nor a subtle theologian. Nor was he dexterous in the use of dialectical weapons, like Athanasius, Augustine, or Thomas Aquinas. But he was sufficiently intelligent toknow what the authorities declared to be orthodox. He knew that thefashionable speculations about the Trinity were not the doctrines ofPaul. He knew that self-expiation was not the expiation of the cross;that the mission of Christ was something more than to set a goodexample; that faith was not estimation merely; that regeneration was nota mere external change of life; that the Divine government was aperpetual interference to bring good out of evil, even if it were inaccordance with natural law. He knew that the boastful philosophy bywhich some sought to bolster up Christianity was that against which theapostles had warned the faithful. He knew that the Church was attackedin her most vital points, even in doctrines, --for "as a man thinketh, so is he. "

So he fearlessly entered the lists against the heretics, most of whomwere enrolled among the Manicheans, Pelagians, and Arians. 

The Manicheans were not the most dangerous, but they were the mostoffensive. Their doctrines were too absurd to gain a lasting foothold inthe West. But they made great pretensions to advanced thought, andengrafted on Christianity the speculations of the East as to the originof evil and the nature of God. They were not only dreamy theosophists, but materialists under the disguise of spiritualism. I shall have moreto say of these people in the next Lecture, on Augustine, since one ofhis great fights was against the Manichean heresy. So I pass them bywith only a brief allusion to their opinions. 

The Arians were the most powerful and numerous body of heretics, --if Imay use the language of historians, --and it was against these thatAmbrose chiefly contended. The great battle against them had been foughtby Athanasius two generations before; but they had not been put down. Their doctrines extensively prevailed among many of the barbaricchieftains, and the empress herself was an Arian, as well as manydistinguished bishops. Ambrose did not deny the great intellectualability of Arius, nor the purity of his morals; but he saw in hisdoctrines the virtual denial of Christ's divinity and atonement, and aglorification of the reason, and an exaltation of the will, whichrendered special divine grace unnecessary. The Arian controversy, whichlasted one hundred years, and has been repeatedly revived, was not amere dialectical display, not a war of words, but the most importantcontroversy in which theologians ever enlisted, and the most vital inits logical deductions. Macaulay sneers at the _homoousian_ and the_homoiousian_; and when viewed in a technical point of view, it may seemto many frivolous and vain. But the distinctions of the Trinity, whichArius sought to sweep away, are essential to the unity and completenessof the whole scheme of salvation, as held by the Church to have beenrevealed in the Scriptures; for if Christ is a mere creature of God, --acreation, and not one with Him in essence, --then his death would availnothing for the efficacy of salvation; or, --to use the language oftheologians, who have ever unfortunately blended the declarations andfacts of Scripture with dialectical formularies, which are deductionsmade by reason and logic from accepted truths, yet not so binding as theplain truths themselves, --Christ's death would be insufficient for aninfinite redemption. No propitiation of a created being could atone forthe sins of all other creatures. Thus by the Arian theory the Christ ofthe orthodox church was blotted out, and a man was substituted, who wasdivine only in the matchless purity of his life and the transcendentwisdom of his utterances; so that Christ, logically, was a pattern andteacher, and not a redeemer. Now, historically, everybody knows that forthree hundred years Christ was viewed and worshipped as the Son ofGod, --a divine, uncreated being, who assumed a mortal form to make anatonement or propitiation for the sins of the world. Hence the doctrinesof Arius undermined, so far as they were received, the whole theology ofthe early Church, and obscured the light of faith itself. I am compelledto say this, if I speak at all of the Arians, which I do historicallyrather than controversially. If I eliminated theology and politicaltheories and changes from my Lectures altogether, there would be nothingleft but commonplace matter. 

But Ambrose had powerful enemies to contend with in his defence of thereceived doctrines of the Church. The Empress Faustina was herself anArian, and the patroness of the sect. Milan was filled with itsdefenders, turbulent and insolent under the shield of the court. It wasthe headquarters of the sect at that time. Arianism was fashionable; andthe empress had caused an edict to be passed, in the name of her sonValentinian, by which liberty of conscience and worship was granted tothe Arians. She also caused a bishop of her nomination and creed tochallenge Ambrose to a public disputation in her palace on the points inquestion. Now what course did Ambrose pursue? Nothing could be fairer, apparently, than the proposal of the empress, --nothing more just thanher demands. We should say that she had enlightened reason on her side, for heresy can never be exterminated by force, unless the force isoverwhelming, --as in the persecution of the Huguenots by Louis XIV. , or the slaughter of the Albigenses by Innocent III. Or the princeshe incited to that cruel act. Ambrose, however, did not regardthe edict as suggested by the love of toleration, but as thedesire for ascendency, --as an advanced post to be taken in theconflict, --introductory to the triumph of the Arian doctrines in theWest, and which the Arian emperor and his bishops intended shouldultimately be the established religion of the Western nations. It wasnot a fight for toleration, but for ascendency. Moreover Ambrose saw inArianism a hostile creed, --a dangerous error, subversive of what is mostvital in Christianity. So he determined to make no concessions at all, to give no foothold to the enemy in a desperate fight. The leastconcession, he thought, would be followed by the demand for newconcessions, and would be a cause of rejoicing to his enemies and ofhumiliation to his friends; and in accordance with the everlastingprinciples of all successful warfare he resolved to yield not one jot ortittle. The slightest concession was a compromise, and a compromisemight lead to defeat. There could be no compromise on such a vitalquestion as the divinity of our Lord. He might have conceded the wisdomof compromise in some quarrel about temporal matters. Had he, asgovernor of a province, been required to make some concession toconquering barbarians, --had he been a modern statesman devising aconstitution, a matter of government, --he might have acted differently. A policy about tariffs and revenues, all resting on unsettled principlesof political economy, may have been a matter of compromise, --not thefundamental principles of the Christian religion, as declared byinspiration, and which he was bound to accept as they were revealed anddeclared, whether they could be reconciled with his reason or not. Thereis great moral grandeur in the conflict of fundamental principles ofreligion; and there is equal grandeur in the conflict between principlesand principalities, between combatants armed with spiritual weapons andcombatants armed with the temporal sword, between defenceless priestsand powerful emperors, between subjects and the powers that be, betweenmen speaking in the name of God Almighty and men at the head ofarmies, --the former strong in the invisible power of truth; the latterresplendent with material forces. 

Ambrose did not shun the conflict and the danger. Never before had apriest dared to confront an emperor, except to offer up his life as amartyr. Who could resist Caesar on his own ground? In the approachingconflict we see the precursor of the Hildebrands and the Beckets. One ofthe claims of Luther as a hero was his open defiance of the Pope, whenno person in his condition had ever before ventured on such a step. Buta Roman emperor, in his own capital, was greater than a distant Pope, especially when the defiant monk was protected by a powerful prince. Ambrose had the exalted merit of being the first to resist his emperor, not as a martyr willing to die for his cause, but as a prelate in adesperate and open fight, --as a prelate seeking to conquer. He was thefirst notable man to raise the standard of independent spiritualauthority. Consider, for a moment, what a tremendous step that was, --howpregnant with future consequences. He was the first of all the heroes ofthe Church who dared to contend with the temporal powers, not as a manuttering a protest, but as an equal adversary, --as a warrior bent onvictory. Therefore has his name great historical importance. I know ofno man who equalled him in intrepidity, and in a far-reaching policy. Ifancy him looking down the vista of the ages, and deliberately layingthe foundation of an arrogant spiritual power. What an example did heset for the popes and bishops of the Middle Ages! Here was a just andequal law, as we should say, --a beneficent law of religious toleration, as it would outwardly appear, --which Ambrose, as a subject of theemperor, was required to obey. True, it was in reference to a spiritualmatter, but emperors, from Caesar downwards, as Pontifex Maximus, hadbelieved it their right and province to meddle in such matters. See whata hand Constantine had in the organization of the Church, even in thediscussion of religious doctrines. He presided at the Council of Nice, where the great subject of discussion was the Trinity. But theArchbishop of Milan dares to say, virtually, to the emperor, "Thislaw-making about our church matters is none of your concern. Christianity has abrogated your power as High Priest. In spiritualthings we will not obey you. Your enactments conflict with the divinelaws, --higher than yours; and we, in this matter of conscience, defyyour authority. We will obey God rather than you. " See in this defiancethe rise of a new power, --the power of the Middle Ages, --the reign ofthe clergy. 

In the first place, Ambrose refused to take part in a religiousdisputation held in the palace of his enemy, --in any palace where amonarch sat as umpire. The Church was the true place for a religiouscontroversy, and the umpire, if such were needed, should be a priest andnot a layman. The idea of temporal lords settling a disputed point oftheology seemed to him preposterous. So, with blended indignation andhaughtiness, he declared it was against the usages of the Church for thelaity to sit as judges in theological discussions; that in all spiritualmatters emperors were subordinate to bishops, not bishops to emperors. Oh, how great is the posthumous influence of original heroes!Contemplate those fiery remonstrances of Ambrose, --the first onrecord, --when prelates and emperors contended for the mastery, and youwill see why the Archbishop of Milan is so great a favorite of theCatholic Church. 

And what was the response of the empress, who ruled in the name of herson, in view of this disobedience and defiance? Chrysostom dared toreprove female vices; he did not rebel against imperial power. ButAmbrose raised an issue with his sovereign. And this angry sovereignsent forth her soldiers to eject Ambrose from the city. The haughty andinsolent priest should be exiled, should be imprisoned, should die. Shall he be permitted to disobey an imperial command? Where would thenbe the imperial authority?--a mere shadow in an age of anarchy. 

Ambrose did not oppose force by force. His warfare was not carnal, butspiritual. He would not, if he could, have braved the soldiers of theGovernment by rallying his adherents in the streets. That would havebeen a mob, a sedition, a rebellion. 

But he seeks the shelter of his church, and prays to Almighty God. Andhis friends and admirers--the people to whom he preached, to whom he isan oracle--also follow him to his sanctuary. The church is crowded withhis adherents, but they are unarmed. Their trust is not in the armor ofGoliath, nor even in the sling of David, but in that power whichprotected Daniel in the lions' den. The soldiers are armed, and theysurround the spacious basilica, the form which the church then assumed. And yet though they surround the church in battle array, they dare notforce the doors, --they dare not enter. Why? Because the church hadbecome a sacred place. It was consecrated to the worship of Jehovah. Thesoldiers were afraid of the wrath of God more than of the wrath ofFaustina or Valentinian. What do you see in this fact? You see howreligious ideas had permeated the minds even of soldiers. They were notstrong enough or brave enough to fight the ideas of their age. Why didnot the troops of Louis XVI. Defend the Bastille? They were strongenough; its cannon could have demolished the whole Faubourg St. Antoine. Alas! the soldiers who defended that fortress had caught the ideas ofthe people. They fraternized with them, rather than with the Government;they were afraid of opposing the ideas which shook France to its centre. So the soldiers of the imperial government at Milan, converted to theideas of Christianity, or sympathizing with them, or afraid of them, dared not assail the church to which Ambrose fled for refuge. Behold inthis fact the majestic power of ideas when they reach the people. 

But if the soldiers dared not attack Ambrose and his followers in aconsecrated place, they might starve him out, or frighten him into asurrender. At this point appears the intrepidity of the Christian hero. Day after day, and night after night, the bishop maintained his post. The time was spent in religious exercises. The people listened toexhortation; they prayed; they sang psalms. Then was instituted, amidthat long-protracted religious meeting that beautiful antiphonal chantof Ambrose, which afterwards, modified and simplified by Pope Gregory, became the great attraction of religious worship in all the cathedralsand abbeys and churches of Europe for more than one thousand years. Itwas true congregational singing, in which all took part; simple andreligious as the songs of Methodists, both to drive away fear and ennui, and fortify the soul by inspiring melodies, --not artistic music borrowedfrom the opera and oratorio, and sung by four people, in a distant loft, for the amusement of the rich pew-holders of a fashionable congregation, and calculated to make it forget the truths which the preacher hasdeclared; but more like the hymns and anthems of the son of Jesse, whensung by the whole synagogue, making the vaulted roof and lofty pillarsof the Medieval church re-echo the paeans of the transportedworshippers. 

At last there were signs of rebellion among the soldiers. The newspiritual power was felt, even among them. They were tired of theirwork; they hated it, since Ambrose was the representative of ideas thatclaimed obedience no less than the temporal powers. The spiritual andtemporal powers were, in fact, arrayed against each other, --an unarmedclergy, declaring principles, against an armed soldiery with swords andlances. What an unequal fight! Why, the very weapons of the soldier arein defence of ideas! The soldier himself is very strong in defence ofuniversally recognized principles, like law and government, whoseservant he is. In the case of Ambrose, it was the supposed law of Godagainst the laws of man. What soldier dares to fight againstOmnipotence, if he believes at all in the God to whom he is aspersonally responsible as he is to a ruler?

Ambrose thus remained the victor. The empress was defeated. But she wasa woman, and had persistency; she had no intention of succumbing to apriest, and that priest her subject. With subtle dexterity she wouldchange the mode of attack, not relinquish the fight. She sought tocompromise. She promised to molest Ambrose no more if he would allow_one_ church for the Arians. If the powerful metropolitan would concedethat, he might return to his palace in safety; she would withdraw thesoldiers. But this he refused. Not one church, declared he, should thedetractors of our Lord possess in the city over which he presided asbishop. The Government might take his revenues, might take his life; buthe would be true to his cause. With his last breath he would defend theChurch, and the doctrines on which it rested. 

The angry empress then renewed her attack more fiercely. She commandedthe troops to seize by force one of the churches of the city for the useof the Arians; and the bishop was celebrating the sacred mysteries onPalm Sunday when news was brought to him of this outrage, --of thisencroachment on the episcopal authority. The whole city was thrown intoconfusion. Every man armed himself; some siding with the empress, andothers with the bishop. The magistrates were in despair, since theycould not maintain law and order. They appealed to Ambrose to yield forthe sake of peace and public order. To whom he replied, in substance, "What is that to me? My kingdom is not of this world. I will notinterfere in civil matters. The responsibility of maintaining order inthe streets does not rest on me, but on you. See you to that. It is onlyby prayer that I am strong. "

Again the furious empress--baffled, not conquered--ordered the soldiersto seize the person of Ambrose in his church. But they wereterror-stricken. Seize the minister at the altar of Omnipotence! It wasnot to be thought of. They refused to obey. They sent word to theimperial palace that they would only take possession of the church onthe sole condition that the emperor (who was controlled by his mother)should abandon Arianism. How angry must have been the Court! Soldiersnot only disobedient, but audaciously dictating in matters of religion!But this treason on the part of the defenders of the throne was a veryserious matter. The Court now became alarmed in its turn. And this alarmwas increased when the officers of the palace sided with the bishop. "Iperceive, " said the crestfallen and defeated monarch, and in words ofbitterness, "that I am only the shadow of an emperor, to whom you daredictate my religious belief. "

Valentinian was at last aroused to a sense of his danger. He might bedragged from his throne and assassinated. He saw that his throne wasundermined by a priest, who used only these simple words, "It is my dutyto obey God rather than man. " A rebellious mob, an indignant court, asuperstitious soldiery, and angry factions compelled him to recall hisguards. It was a great triumph for the archbishop. Face to face he haddefeated the emperor. The temporal power had yielded to the spiritual. Six hundred years before Henry IV. Stooped to beg the favor andforgiveness of Hildebrand, at the fortress of Canossa, the State hadconceded the supremacy of the Church in the person of thefearless Ambrose. 

Not only was Ambrose an intrepid champion of the Church and the orthodoxfaith, but he was often sent, in critical crises, as an ambassador tothe barbaric courts. Such was the force and dignity of his personalcharacter. This is one of the first examples on record of a priestbeing employed by kings in the difficult art of negotiation in Statematters; but it became very common in the Middle Ages for prelates andabbots to be ambassadors of princes, since they were not only the mostpowerful but most intelligent and learned personages of their times. They had, moreover, the most tact and the most agreeable manners. 

When Maximus revolted against the feeble Gratian (emperor of the West), subdued his forces, took his life, and established himself in Gaul, Spain, and Britain, the Emperor Valentinian sent Ambrose to thebarbarian's court to demand the body of his murdered brother. Arrivingat Treves, the seat of the prefecture, where his father had beengovernor, he repaired at once to the palace of the usurper, and demandedan interview with Maximus. The lord chamberlain informed him he couldonly be heard before council. Led to the council chamber, the usurperarose to give him the accustomed kiss of salutation among the Teutonickings. But Ambrose refused it, and upbraided the potentate forcompelling him to appear in the council chamber. "But, " replied Maximus, "on a former mission you came to this chamber. " "True, " replied theprelate, "but then I came to sue for peace, as a suppliant; now I cometo demand, as an equal, the body of Gratian. " "An equal, are you?"replied the usurper; "from whom have you received this rank?" "From GodAlmighty, " replied the prelate, "who preserves to Valentinian the empirehe has given him. " On this, the angry Maximus threatened the life of theambassador, who, rising in wrath, in his turn thus addressed him, beforeall his councillors: "Since you have robbed an anointed prince of histhrone, at least restore his ashes to his kindred. Do _you_ fear atumult when the soldiers shall see the dead body of their murderedemperor? What have you to fear from a corpse whose death you ordered? Doyou say you only destroyed your enemy? Alas! he was not _your_ enemy, but you were _his_. If some one had possessed himself of your provinces, as you seized those of Gratian, would not he--instead of you--be theenemy? Can you call him an enemy who only sought to preserve what washis own? Who is the lawful sovereign, --he who seeks to keep together hislegitimate provinces, or he who has succeeded in wresting them away? Oh, thou successful usurper! God himself shall smite thee. Thou shalt bedelivered into the hands of Theodosius. Thou shalt lose thy kingdom andthy life. " How the prelate reminds us of a Jewish prophet giving tokings unwelcome messages, --of Daniel pointing out to Belshazzar thehandwriting on the wall! He was not a Priam begging the dead body of hisson, or hurling impotent weapons amid the crackling ruins of Troy, butan Elijah at the court of Ahab. But this fearlessness was surpassed bythe boldness of rebuke which later he dared to give to Theodosius, whenthis great general had defeated the Goths, and postponed for a time theruin of the Empire, of which he became the supreme and only emperor. Theodosius was in fact one of the greatest of the emperors, and the lastgreat man who swayed the sceptre of Trajan, his ancestor. On him thevulgar and the high-born equally gazed with admiration, --and yet he wasnot great enough to be free from vices, patron as he was of the Churchand her institutions. 

It seems that this illustrious emperor, in a fit of passion, ordered theslaughter of the people of Thessalonica, because they had arisen andkilled some half-a-dozen of the officers of the government, in asedition, on account of the imprisonment of a favorite circus-rider. Thewrath of Theodosius knew no bounds. He had once before forgiven thepeople of Antioch for a more outrageous insult to imperial authority;but he would not pardon the people of Thessalonica, and caused someseven thousand of them to be executed, --an outrageous vengeance, a crimeagainst humanity. The severity of this punishment filled the wholeEmpire with consternation. Ambrose himself was so overwhelmed with griefand indignation that he retired into the country in order to avoid allintercourse with his sovereign. And there he remained, until the emperorcame to himself and comprehended the enormity of his crime. But Ambrosewrote a letter to the emperor, in which he insisted on his repentanceand expiation. The emperor was so touched by the fidelity and eloquenceof the prelate that he came to the cathedral to offer up his customaryoblations. But the bishop, in his episcopal robes, met him at the porchand forbade his entrance. "Do not think, O Emperor, to atone for theenormity of your offence by merely presenting yourself in the church. Dream not of entering these sacred precincts with your hands stainedwith blood. Receive with submission the sentence of the Church. " ThenTheodosius attempted to justify himself by the example of David. "But, "retorted the bishop, "if you imitate David in his crime, imitate Davidin his repentance. Insult not the Church by a double crime. " So theemperor, in spite of his elevated rank and power, was obliged to return. The festival of Christmas approached, the great holiday of the Church, and then was seen one of the rarest spectacles which history records. The great emperor, now with undivided authority, penetrated with griefand shame and penitence, again approached the sacred edifice, and openlymade a full confession of his sins; and not till then was he receivedinto the communion of the Church. 

I think this scene is grand; worthy of a great painter, --of a painterwho knows history as well as art, which so few painters do know; yetought to know if they would produce immortal pictures. Nor do I knowwhich to admire the more, --the penitent emperor offering public penancefor his abuse of imperial authority, or the brave and conscientiousprelate who dared to rebuke his sin. When has such a thing happened inmodern times? Bossuet had the courage to dictate, in the royal chapel, the duties of a king, and Bourdaloue once ventured to reprove his royalhearer for an outrageous scandal. These instances of priestly boldnessand fidelity are cited as remarkable. And they were remarkable, when weconsider what an egotistical, haughty, exacting, voluptuous monarchLouis XIV. Was, --a monarch who killed Racine by an angry glance. Butwhat bishop presumed to insist on public penance for the persecutions ofthe Huguenots, or the lavish expenditures and imperious tyranny of thecourt mistresses, who scandalized France? I read of no churchman who, inmore recent times, has dared to reprove and openly rebuke a sovereign, in the style of Ambrose, except John Knox. Ambrose not merely reproved, but he punished, and brought the greatest emperor, since Constantine, tothe stool of penitence. 

It was by such acts, as prelate, that Ambrose won immortal fame, and setan example to future ages. His whole career is full of such deeds ofintrepidity. Once he refused to offer the customary oblation of thealtar until Theodosius had consented to remit an unjust fine. He battledall enemies alike, --infidels, emperors, and Pagans. It was his missionto act, rather than to talk. His greatness was in his character, likethat of our Washington, who was not a man of words or genius. What afailure is a man in an exalted post without character!

But he had also other qualities which did him honor, --for which wereverence him. See his laborious life, his assiduity in the discharge ofevery duty, his charity, his broad humanity, soaring beyond mereconventional and technical and legal piety. See him breaking in piecesthe consecrated vessels of the cathedral, and turning them into money toredeem Illyrian captives; and when reproached for this apparentdesecration replying thus: "Whether is it better to preserve our gold orthe souls of men? Has the Church no higher mission to fulfil than toguard the ornaments made by men's hands, while the faithful aresuffering exile and bonds? Do the blessed sacraments need silver andgold, to be efficacious? What greater service to the Church can werender than charities to the unfortunate, in obedience to that eternaltest, 'I was an hungered, and ye gave me meat'"? See this veneratedprelate giving away his private fortune to the poor; see him refusingeven to handle money, knowing the temptation to avarice or greed. Whata low estimate he placed on what was so universally valued, measuringmoney by the standard of eternal weights! See this good bishop, alwayssurrounded with the pious and the learned, attending to all their wants, evincing with his charities the greatest capacity of friendship. Hisaffections went out to all the world, and his chamber was open toeverybody. The companion and Mentor of emperors, the prelate chargedwith the most pressing duties finds time for all who seek his advice orconsolation. 

One of the most striking facts which attest his goodness was hisgenerous and affectionate treatment of Saint Augustine, at that time anunconverted teacher of rhetoric. It was Ambrose who was instrumental inhis conversion; and only a man of broad experience, and deepconvictions, and profound knowledge, and exquisite tact, could have hadinfluence over the greatest thinker of Christian antiquity. Augustinenot only praises the private life of Ambrose, but the eloquence of hissermons; and I suppose that Augustine was a judge in such matters. "For, " says Augustine, "while I opened my heart to admire how eloquentlyhe spoke, I also felt how truly he spoke. " Everybody equally admired andloved this great metropolitan, because his piety was enlightened, because he was above all religious tricks and pious frauds. He evenrefused money for the Church when given grudgingly, or extorted byplausible sophistries. He remitted to a poor woman a legacy which herbrother had given to the Church, leaving her penniless and dependent;declaring that "if the Church is to be enriched at the expense offraternal friendships, if family ties are to be sundered, the cause ofChrist would be dishonored rather than advanced. " We see here not only abroad humanity, but a profound sense of justice, --a practical piety, showing an enlightened and generous soul. He was not the man to allow afamily to be starved because a conscience-stricken husband or fatherwished, under ghostly influences and in face of death, to make apropitiation for a life of greediness and usurious grindings, by anunjust disposition of his fortune to the Church. Possibly he had doubtswhether any money would benefit the Church which was obtained by wickedarts, or had been originally gained by injustice and hard-heartedness. 

Thus does Saint Ambrose come down to us from antiquity, --great in hisfeats of heroism, great as an executive ruler of the Church, great indeeds of benevolence, rather than as orator, theologian, or student. Yet, like Chrysostom, he preached every Sunday, and often in the weekbesides, and his sermons had great power on his generation. When he diedin 397 he left behind him even a rich legacy of theological treatises, as well as some fervid, inspiring hymns, and an influence for the betterin the modes of church music, which was the beginning of the moderndevelopment of that great element in public worship. As a defender ofthe faith by his pen, he may have yielded to greater geniuses than he;but as the guardian of the interests of the Church, as a stalwart giant, who prostrated the kings of the earth before him and gained the firstgreat battles of the spiritual over the temporal power, Ambrose isworthy to be ranked among the great Fathers, and will continue toreceive the praises of enlightened Christendom. 

AUTHORITIES. 

Life of Ambrose, by his deacon, Paulinus; Theodoret; Tillemont'sMemoires Ecclesiastique, tom. X; Baronius; Zosimus; the Epistles ofAmbrose; Butler's Lives of the Saints; Biographie Universelle; Gibbon'sDecline and Fall. Milman has only a very brief notice of this greatbishop, the founder of sacerdotalism in the Latin Church. Neander's andthe standard Church Histories. There are some popular biographicalsketches in the encyclopedias, but no classical history of this prelate, in English, with which I am acquainted. The French writers are the best. 

SAINT AUGUSTINE. 

 * * * * *

A. D. 354-430. 

CHRISTIAN THEOLOGY. 

The most intellectual of all the Fathers of the Church was doubtlessSaint Augustine. He is the great oracle of the Latin Church. He directedthe thinking of the Christian world for a thousand years. He was notperhaps so learned as Origen, nor so critical as Jerome; but he wasbroader, profounder, and more original than they, or any other of thegreat lights who shed the radiance of genius on the crumbling fabric ofthe ancient civilization. He is the sainted doctor of the Church, equally an authority with both Catholics and Protestants. Hispenetrating genius, his comprehensive views of all systems of ancientthought, and his marvellous powers as a systematizer of Christiandoctrines place him among the immortal benefactors of mankind; while hishumanity, his breadth, his charity, and his piety have endeared him tothe heart of the Christian world. 

Let me present, as well as I can, his history, his services, and hispersonal character, all of which form no small part of the inheritancebequeathed to us by the giants of the fourth and fifth centuries, --thatwhich we call the Patristic literature, --the only literature worthy ofpreservation in the declining days of the old Roman world. 

Augustine was born at Tagaste, or Tagastum, near Carthage, in theNumidian province of the Roman Empire, in the year 354, --a provincerich, cultivated, luxurious, where the people (at least the educatedclasses) spoke the Latin language, and had adopted the Roman laws andinstitutions. They were not black, like negroes, though probablyswarthy, being descended from Tyrians and Greeks, as well as Numidians. They were as civilized as the Spaniards or the Gauls or the Syrians. Carthage then rivalled Alexandria, which was a Grecian city. IfAugustine was not as white as Ptolemy or Cleopatra, he was probably nodarker than Athanasius. 

Unlike most of the great Fathers, his parentage was humble. He owednothing to the circumstances of wealth and rank. His father was aheathen, and lived, as Augustine tells us, in "heathenish sin. " But hismother was a woman of remarkable piety and strength of mind, who devotedherself to the education of her son. Augustine never alludes to herexcept with veneration; and his history adds additional confirmation tothe fact that nearly all the remarkable men of our world have hadremarkable mothers. No woman is dearer to the Church than Monica, thesainted mother of Augustine, and chiefly in view of her intensesolicitude for his spiritual interests, and her extraordinary faith inhis future conversion, in spite of his youthful follies andexcesses, --encouraged by that good bishop who told her "that it wasimpossible that the child of so many prayers could be lost. "

Augustine, in his "Confessions, "--that remarkable book which has lastedfifteen hundred years, and is still prized for its intensity, itscandor, and its profound acquaintance with the human heart, as well asevangelical truth; not an egotistical parade of morbid sentimentalities, like the "Confessions" of Rousseau, but a mirror of Christianexperience, --tells us that until he was sixteen he was obstinate, lazy, neglectful of his studies, indifferent to reproach, and abandoned toheathenish sports. He even committed petty thefts, was quarrelsome, andindulged in demoralizing pleasures. At nineteen he was sent to Carthageto be educated, where he went still further astray; was a follower ofstage-players (then all but infamous), and gave himself up to unholyloves. But his intellect was inquiring, his nature genial, and hishabits as studious as could be reconciled with a life of pleasure, --asort of Alcibiades, without his wealth and rank, willing to listen toany Socrates who would stimulate his mind. With all his excesses andvanities, he was not frivolous, and seemed at an early age to be asincere inquirer after truth. The first work which had a marked effecton him was the "Hortensius" of Cicero, --a lost book, which contained aneloquent exhortation to philosophy, or the love of wisdom. From that heturned to the Holy Scriptures, but they seemed to him then very poor, compared with the stateliness of Tully, nor could his sharp witpenetrate their meaning. Those who seemed to have the greatest influenceover him were the Manicheans, --a transcendental, oracular, indefinite, illogical, pretentious set of philosophers, who claimed superior wisdom, and were not unlike (at least in spirit) those modern _savans_ in theChristian commonwealth, who make a mockery of what is most sacred inChristianity while themselves propounding the most absurd theories. 

The Manicheans claimed to be a Christian sect, but were Oriental intheir origin and Pagan in their ideas. They derived their doctrines fromManes, or Mani, who flourished in Persia in the second half of the thirdcentury, and who engrafted some Christian doctrines on his system, whichwas essentially the dualism of Zoroaster and the pantheism of Buddha. Heassumed two original substances, --God and Hyle, light and darkness, good and evil, --which were opposed to each other. Matter, which isneither good nor evil, was regarded as bad in itself, and identifiedwith darkness, the prince of which overthrew the primitive man. Amongthe descendants of the fallen man light and darkness have struggled forsupremacy, but matter, or darkness, conquered; and Christ, who wasconfounded with the sun, came to break the dominion. But the light ofhis essential being could not unite with darkness; therefore he was notborn of a woman, nor did he die to rise again. Christ had thus nopersonal existence. As the body, being matter, was thought to beessentially evil, it was the aim of the Manicheans to set the soul freefrom matter; hence abstinence, and the various forms of asceticism whichearly entered into the pietism of the Oriental monks. That which gavethe Manicheans a hold on the mind of Augustine, seeking after truth, wastheir arrogant claim to the solution of mysteries, especially the originof evil, and their affectation of superior knowledge. Their watchwordswere Reason, Science, Philosophy. Moreover, like the Sophists in thetime of Socrates, they were assuming, specious, and rhetorical. Augustine--ardent, imaginative, credulous--was attracted by them, and heenrolled himself in their esoteric circle. 

The coarser forms of sin he now abandoned, only to resign himself to theemptiness of dreamy speculations and the praises of admirers. He wonprizes and laurels in the schools. For nine years he was much flatteredfor his philosophical attainments. I can almost see this enthusiasticyouth scandalizing and shocking his mother and her friends by his boldadvocacy of doctrines at war with the gospel, but which he supposed tobe very philosophical. Pert and bright young men in these times oftentalk as he did, but do not know enough to see their own shallowness. 

 "Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring. "

The mind of Augustine, however, was logical, and naturally profound; andat last he became dissatisfied with the nonsense with which plausiblepretenders ensnared him. He was then what we should call a schoolmaster, or what some would call a professor, and taught rhetoric for hissupport, which was a lucrative and honorable calling. He became a masterof words. From words he ascended to definitions, and like all trueinquirers began to love the definite, the precise. He wanted a basis tostand upon. He sought certitudes, --elemental truths which sophistrycould not cover up. Then the Manicheans could no longer satisfy him. Hehad doubts, difficulties, which no Manichean could explain, not even Dr. Faustus of Mileve, the great oracle and leader of the sect, --a subtledialectician and brilliant orator, but without depth orearnestness, --whom he compares to a cup-bearer presenting a costlygoblet, but without anything in it. And when it became clear that thishigh-priest of pretended wisdom was ignorant of the things in which hewas supposed to excel, but which Augustine himself had already learned, his disappointment was so great that he lost faith both in the teacherand his doctrines. Thus this Faustus, "neither willing nor witting it, "was the very man who loosened the net which had ensnared Augustine forso many years. 

He was now thirty years of age, and had taught rhetoric in Carthage, thecapital of Northern Africa, with brilliant success, for three years; butpanting for new honors or for new truth, he removed to Rome, to pursueboth his profession and his philosophical studies. He entered thecapital of the world in the height of its material glories, but in thedecline of its political importance, when Damasus occupied the episcopalthrone, and Saint Jerome was explaining the Scriptures to the high-bornladies of Mount Aventine, who grouped around him, --women like Paula, Fabiola, and Marcella. Augustine knew none of these illustrious people. He lodged with a Manichean, and still frequented the meetings of thesect; convinced, indeed, that the truth was not with them, butdespairing to find it elsewhere. In this state of mind he was drawn tothe doctrines of the New Academy, --or, as Augustine in his"Confessions" calls them, the Academics, --whose representatives, Arcesilaus and Carneades, also made great pretensions, but denied thepossibility of arriving at absolute truth, --aiming only at probability. However lofty the speculations of these philosophers, they weresceptical in their tendency. They furnished no anchor for such anearnest thinker as Augustine. They gave him no consolation. Yet hisdislike of Christianity remained. 

Moreover, he was disappointed with Rome. He did not find there the greatmen he sought, or if great men were there he could not get access tothem. He found himself in a moral desert, without friends and congenialcompanions. He found everybody so immersed in pleasure, or gain, orfrivolity, that they had no time or inclination for the quest for truth, except in those circles he despised. "Truth, " they cynically said, "what_is_ truth? Will truth enable us to make eligible matches with richwomen? Will it give us luxurious banquets, or build palaces, or procurechariots of silver, or robes of silk, or oysters of the Lucrine lake, orFalernian wines? Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die. " Inasmuchas the arts of rhetoric enabled men to rise at the bar or shine infashionable circles, he had plenty of scholars; but they left hislecture-room when required to pay. At Carthage his pupils wereboisterous and turbulent; at Rome they were tricky and mean. Theprofessor was not only disappointed, --he was disgusted. He foundneither truth nor money. Still, he was not wholly unknown orunsuccessful. His great abilities were seen and admired; so that whenthe people of Milan sent to Symmachus, the prefect of the city, toprocure for them an able teacher of rhetoric, he sent Augustine, --aprovidential thing, since in the second capital of Italy he heard thegreat Ambrose preach; he found one Christian whom he respected, whom headmired, --and him he sought. And Ambrose found time to show him anepiscopal kindness. At first Augustine listened as a critic, trying theeloquence of Ambrose, whether it answered the fame thereof, or flowedfuller or lower than was reported; "but of the matter I was, " saysAugustine, "a scornful and careless looker-on, being delighted with thesweetness of his discourse. Yet I was, though by little and little, gradually drawing nearer and nearer to truth; for though I took no painsto learn _what_ he spoke, only to hear _how_ he spoke, yet, togetherwith the words which I would choose, came into my mind the things Iwould refuse; and while I opened my heart to admire how eloquently hespoke, I also felt how truly he spoke. And so by degrees I resolved toabandon forever the Manicheans, whose falsehoods I detested, anddetermined to be a catechumen of the Catholic Church. "

This was the great crisis of his life. He had renounced a falsephilosophy; he sought truth from a Christian bishop; he put himselfunder Christian influences. Fortunately at this time his mother Monica, to whom he had lied and from whom he had run away, joined him; also hisson Adeodatus, --the son of the woman with whom he had lived in illicitintercourse for fifteen years. But his conversion was not accomplished. He purposed marriage, sent away his concubine to Africa, and yet fellagain into the mazes of another unlawful and entangling love. It was noteasy to overcome the loose habits of his life. Sensuality ever robs aman of the power of will. He had a double nature, --a strong sensualbody, with a lofty and inquiring soul. And awful were his conflicts, notwith an unfettered imagination, like Jerome in the wilderness, but withpositive sin. The evil that he would not, that he did, followed withremorse and shame; still a slave to his senses, and perhaps to hisimagination, for though he had broken away from the materialism of theManicheans, he had not abandoned philosophy. He read the books of Plato, which had a good effect, since he saw, what he had not seen before, thattrue realities are purely intellectual, and that God, who occupies thesummit of the world of intelligence, is a pure spirit, inaccessible tothe senses; so that Platonism to him, in an important sense, was thevestibule of Christianity. Platonism, the loftiest development of paganthought, however, did not emancipate him. He comprehended the Logos ofthe Athenian sage; but he did not comprehend the Word made flesh, theWord attached to the Cross. The mystery of the Incarnation offended hispride of reason. 

At length light beamed in upon him from another source, whose simplicityhe had despised. He read Saint Paul. No longer did the apostle's styleseem barbarous, as it did to Cardinal Bembo, --it was a fountain of life. He was taught two things he had not read in the books of thePlatonists, --the lost state of man, and the need of divine grace. TheIncarnation appeared in a new light. Jesus Christ was revealed to him asthe restorer of fallen humanity. 

He was now "rationally convinced. " He accepted the theology of SaintPaul; but he could not break away from his sins. And yet the awfultruths he accepted filled him with anguish, and produced dreadfulconflicts. The law of his members warred against the law of his mind. Inagonies he cried, "Oh, wretched man that I am! Who shall deliver me fromthis body of death?" He shunned all intercourse. He withdrew to hisgarden, reclined under a fig-tree, and gave vent to bitter tears. Hewrestled with the angel, and his deliverance was at hand. It was underthe fig-tree of his garden that he fancied he heard a voice of boy orgirl, he could not tell, chanting and often repeating, "Take up andread; take up and read. " He opened the Scriptures, and his eye alightednot on the text which had converted Antony the monk, "Go and sell allthat thou hast and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure inheaven, " but on this: "Let us walk honestly, as in the day, not inrioting, drunkenness, and wantonness, but put ye on the Lord JesusChrist, and not make provision for the flesh, to fulfil the luststhereof. " That text decided him, and broke his fetters. His conversionwas accomplished. He poured forth his soul in thanksgiving and praise. 

He was now in the thirty-second year of his age, and resolved torenounce his profession, --or, to use his language, "to withdraw from themarts of lip-labor and the selling of words, "--and enter the service ofthe new master who had called him to prepare himself for a highervocation. He retired to a country house, near Milan, which belonged tohis friend Veracundus, and he was accompanied in his retreat by hismother, his brother Navigius, his son Adeodatus, Alypius his confidant, Trigentius and Licentius his scholars, and his cousins Lastidianus andRusticus. I should like to describe those blissful and enchanting days, when without asceticism and without fanaticism, surrounded with admiringfriends and relatives, he discoursed on the highest truths which canelevate the human mind. Amid the rich olive-groves and dark wavingchesnuts which skirted the loveliest of Italian lakes, in sight of bothAlps and Apennines, did this great master of Christian philosophyprepare himself for his future labors, and forge the weapons with whichhe overthrew the high-priests who assailed the integrity of theChristian faith. The hand of opulent friendship supplied his wants, asPaula ministered to Jerome in Bethlehem. Often were discussions with hispupils and friends prolonged into the night and continued until themorning. Plato and Saint Paul reappeared in the gardens of Como. Thusthree more glorious years were passed in study, in retirement, and inprofitable discourse, without scandal and without vanity. The proudphilosopher was changed into a humble Christian, thirsting for a livingunion with God. The Psalms of David, next to the Epistles of Saint Paul, were his favorite study, --that pure and lofty poetry "which strips awaythe curtains of the skies, and approaches boldly but meekly into thepresence of Him who dwells in boundless and inaccessible majesty. " Inthe year 387, at the age of thirty-three, he received the rite ofbaptism from the great archbishop who was so instrumental in hisconversion, and was admitted into the ranks of the visible Church, andprepared to return to Africa. But before he could embark, his belovedmother died at Ostia, feeling, with Simeon, that she could now depart inpeace, having seen the salvation of the Lord, --but to the immoderategrief of Augustine who made no effort to dry his tears. It was not tillthe following year that he sailed for Carthage, not long tarrying there, but retiring to Tagaste, to his paternal estate, where he spent threeyears more in study and meditation, giving away all he possessed toreligion and charity, living with his friends in a complete community ofgoods. It was there that some of his best works were composed. In theyear 391, on a visit to Hippo, a Numidian seaport, he was forced intomore active duties. Entering the church, the people clamored for hisordination; and such was his power as a pulpit orator, and souniversally was he revered, that in two years after he became coadjutorbishop, and his great career began. 

As a bishop he won universal admiration. Councils could do nothingwithout his presence. Emperors condescended to sue for his advice. Hewrote letters to all parts of Christendom. He was alike saint, oracle, prelate, and preacher. He labored day and night, living simply, butwithout monkish austerity. At table, reading and literary conferenceswere preferred to secular conversation. His person was accessible. Heinterested himself in everybody's troubles, and visited the forlorn andmiserable. He was indefatigable in reclaiming those who had strayed fromthe fold. He won every heart by charity, and captivated every mind withhis eloquence; so that Hippo, a little African town, was no longer"least among the cities of Judah, " since her prelate was consulted fromthe extremities of the earth, and his influence went forth throughoutthe crumbling Empire, to heal division and establish the faith of thewavering, --a Father of the Church universal. 

Yet it is not as bishop, but as doctor, that he is immortal. It was hismission to head off the dissensions and heresies of his age, and toestablish the faith of Paul even among the Germanic barbarians. He isthe great theologian of the Church, and his system of divinity not onlywas the creed of the Middle Ages, but is still an authority in theschools, both Catholic and Protestant. 

Let us, then, turn to his services as theologian and philosopher. Hewrote over a thousand treatises, and on almost every subject that hasinterested the human mind; but his labors were chiefly confined to theprevailing and more subtle and dangerous errors of his day. Nor was itby dry dialectics that he refuted these heresies, although the mostlogical and acute of men, but by his profound insight into the cardinalprinciples of Christianity, which he discoursed upon with the mostextraordinary affluence of thought and language, disdaining allsophistries and speculations. He went to the very core, --a realist ofthe most exalted type, permeated with the spirit of Plato, yet bowingdown to Paul. 

We first find him combating the opinions which had originally enthralledhim, and which he understood better than any theologian who ever lived. 

But I need not repeat what I have already said of theManicheans, --those arrogant and shallow philosophers who made such highpretension to superior wisdom; men who adored the divinity of mind, andthe inherent evil of matter; men who sought to emancipate the soul, which in their view needed no regeneration from all the influences ofthe body. That this soul, purified by asceticism, might be reunited tothe great spirit of the universe from which it had originally emanated, was the hopeless aim and dream of these theosophists, --not the controlof passions and appetites, which God commands, but their eradication;not the worship of a Creator who made the heaven and the earth, but avague worship of the creation itself. They little dreamed that it is notthe body (neither good nor evil in itself) which is sinful, but theperverted mind and soul, the wicked imagination of the heart, out ofwhich proceeds that which defileth a man, and which can only becontrolled and purified by Divine assistance. Augustine showed thatpurity was an inward virtue, not the crucifixion of the body; that itspassions and appetites are made to be subservient to reason and duty;that the law of temperance is self-restraint; that the soul was not anemanation or evolution from eternal light, but a distinct creation ofAlmighty God, which He has the power to destroy, as well as the bodyitself; that nothing in the universe can live without His pleasure; thatHis intervention is a logical sequence of His moral government. But hismost withering denunciation of the Manicheans was directed againsttheir pride of reason, against their darkened understanding, which ledthem not only to believe a lie, but to glory in it, --the utterperverseness of the mind when in rebellion to divine authority, in viewof which it is almost vain to argue, since truth will neither beadmitted nor accepted. 

There was another class of Christians who provoked the controversialgenius of Augustine, and these were the Donatists. These men were notheretics, but bigots. They made the rite of baptism to depend on thecharacter of the officiating priest; and hence they insisted onrebaptism, if the priest who had baptized proved unworthy. They seemedto forget that no clergyman ever baptized from his own authority orworthiness, but only in the name of the Father, and the Son, and theHoly Ghost. Nobody knows who baptized Paul, and he felt under certaincircumstances even that he was sent not to baptize, but to preach thegospel. Lay baptism has always been held valid. Hence, such reformers asCalvin and Knox did not deem it necessary to rebaptize those who hadbeen converted from the Roman Catholic faith; and, if I do not mistake, even Roman Catholics do not insist on rebaptizing Protestants. But theDonatists so magnified, not the rite, but the form of it, that they lostthe spirit of it, and became seceders, and created a mournful divisionin the Church, --a schism which gave rise to bitter animosities. Thechurches of Africa were rent by their implacable feuds, and on so smalla matter, --even as the ranks of the reformers under Luther were so soondivided by the Anabaptists. In proportion to the unimportance of theshibboleth was tenacity to it, --a mark which has ever characterizednarrow and illiberal minds. It is not because a man accepts a shibboleththat he is narrow and small, but because he fights for it. As a minutecritic would cast out from the fraternity of scholars him who cannottell the difference between _ac_ and _et_, so the Donatist would expelfrom the true fold of Christ those who accepted baptism from an unworthypriest. Augustine at first showed great moderation and patience andgentleness in dealing with these narrow-minded and fierce sectarians, who carried their animosity so far as to forbid bread to be baked forthe use of the Catholics in Carthage, when they had the ascendency; butat last he became indignant, and implored the aid of secularmagistrates. 

Augustine's controversy with the Donatists led to two remarkabletracts, --one on the evil of suppressing heresy by the sword, and theother on the unity of the Church. 

In the first he showed a spirit of toleration beyond his age; and thisis more remarkable because his temper was naturally ardent and fiery. But he protested in his writings, and before councils, against violencein forcing religious convictions, and advocated a liberality worthy ofJohn Locke. 

In the second tract he advocated a principle which had a prodigiousinfluence on the minds of his generation, and greatly contributed toestablish the polity of the Roman Catholic Church. He argued thenecessity of unity in government as well as unity in faith, like Cyprianbefore him; and this has endeared him to the Roman Catholic Church, Iapprehend, even more than his glorious defence of the Pauline theology. There are some who think that all governments arise out of thecircumstances and the necessities of the times, and that there are norules laid down in the Bible for any particular form or polity, since agovernment which may be adapted to one age or people may not be fittedfor another;--even as a monarchy would not succeed in New England anymore than a democracy in China. But the most powerful sects amongProtestants, as well as among the Catholics themselves, insist on thedivine authority for their several forms of government, and all wouldhave insisted, at different periods, on producing conformity with theirnotions. The high-church Episcopalian and the high-church Presbyterianequally insist on the divine authority for their respectiveinstitutions. The Catholics simply do the same, when they make SaintPeter the rock on which the supremacy of their Church is based. In thetime of Augustine there was only one form of the visible Church, --therewere no Protestants; and he naturally wished, like any bishop, tostrengthen and establish its unity, --a government of bishops, of whichthe bishop of Rome was the acknowledged head. But he did notanticipate--and I believe he would not have indorsed--their futureencroachments and their ambitious schemes for enthralling the mind ofthe world, to say nothing of personal aggrandizement and the usurpationof temporal authority. And yet the central power they established on thebanks of the Tiber was, with all its corruptions, fitted to conserve theinterests of Christendom in rude ages of barbarism and ignorance; andpossibly Augustine, with his profound intuitions, and in view of theapproaching desolations of the Christian world, wished to give to theclergy and to their head all the moral power and prestige possible, toawe and control the barbaric chieftains, for in his day the Empire wascrumbling to pieces, and the old civilization was being trampled underfoot. If there was a man in the whole Empire capable of takingcomprehensive views of the necessities of society, that man was theBishop of Hippo; so that if we do not agree with his views of churchgovernment, let us bear in mind the age in which he lived, and itspeculiar dangers and necessities. And let us also remember that his ideaof the unity of the Church has a spiritual as well as a temporalmeaning, and in that sublime and lofty sense can never be controvertedso long as _One Lord, One Faith, One Baptism_ remain the common creed ofChristians in all parts of the world. It was to preserve this unity thathe entered so zealously into all the great controversies of the age, andfought heretics as well as schismatics. 

The great work which pre-eminently called out his genius, and for whichhe would seem to have been raised up, was to combat the Pelagian heresy, and establish the doctrine of the necessity of Divine Grace, --even as itwas the mission of Athanasius to defend the doctrine of the Trinity, andthat of Luther to establish Justification by Faith. In all ages thereare certain heresies, or errors, which have spread so dangerously, andbeen embraced so generally by the leading and fashionable classes, thatthey seem to require some extraordinary genius to arise in order tocombat them successfully, and rescue the Church from the snares of afalse philosophy. Thus Bernard was raised up to refute the rationalismand nominalism of Abélard, whose brilliant and subtile inquiries had atendency to extinguish faith in the world, and bring all mysteries tothe test of reason. The enthusiastic and inquiring young men who flockedto his lectures from all parts of Europe carried back to their homes andconvents and schools insidious errors, all the more dangerous becausethey were mixed with truths which were universally recognized. Itrequired such a man as Bernard to expose these sophistries and destroytheir power, not so much by dialectical weapons as by appealing to thoselofty truths, those profound convictions, those essential and immutableprinciples which consciousness reveals and divine authority confirms. Ittook a greater than Abélard to show the tendency of his speculations, from the logical sequence of which even he himself would have fled, andwhich he did reject when misfortunes had broken his heart, and diseasehad brought him to face the realities of the future life. So God raisedup Pascal to expose the sophistries of the Jesuits and unravel thatsubtle casuistry which was undermining the morality of the age, anddestroying the authority of Saint Augustine on some of the most vitalprinciples which entered into the creed of the Catholic Church. ThusJonathan Edwards, the ablest theologian which this country has seen, controverted the fashionable Arminianism of his day. Thus some greatintellectual giant will certainly and in due time appear to demolishwith scathing irony the theories and speculations of some of theprogressive schools of our day, and present their absurdities andboastings and pretensions in such a ridiculous light that no man withany intellectual dignity will dare to belong to their fraternity, unlesshe impiously accepts--sometimes with ribald mockeries--the logicalsequence of their doctrines. 

Now it was not the Manicheans or Donatists who were the most dangerouspeople in the time of Augustine, --nor were their doctrines likely to beembraced by the Christian schools, especially in the West; but it wasthe Pelagians who in high places were assailing the Pauline theology. And they advocated principles which lay at the root of most of thesubsequent controversies of the Church. They were intellectual men, generally good men, who could not be put down, and who would thriveunder any opposition. Augustine did not attack the character of thesemen, but rendered a great service to the Church by pointing out, clearlyand luminously, the antichristian character of their theories, whenrigorously pushed out, by a remorseless logic, to theirnecessary sequence. 

Whatever value may be attached to that science which is based ondeductions drawn from the truths of revelation, certain it is that itwas theology which most interested Christians in the time of Augustine, as in the time of Athanasius; and his controversy with the Pelagiansmade then a mighty stir, and is at the root of half the theologicaldiscussions from that age to ours. If we would understand the changes ofhuman thought in the Middle Ages, if we would seek to know what is mostvital in Church history, that celebrated Pelagian controversy claims ourspecial attention. 

It was at a great crisis in the Church when a British monk ofextraordinary talents, persuasive eloquence, and great attainments, --aman accustomed to the use of dialectical weapons and experienced byextensive travels, ambitious, ardent, plausible, adroit, --appeared amongthe churches and advanced a new philosophy. His name was Pelagius; andhe was accompanied by a man of still greater logical power than hehimself possessed, though not so eloquent or accomplished or pleasing inmanner, who was called Celestius, --two doctors of whom the schools werejustly proud, and who were admired and honored by enthusiastic youngmen, as Abélard was in after-times. 

Nothing disagreeable marked these apostles of the new philosophy, norcould the malignant voice of theological hatred and envy bring upontheir lives either scandal or reproach. They had none of the infirmitieswhich so often have dimmed the lustre of great benefactors. They werenot dogmatic like Luther, nor severe like Calvin, nor intolerant likeKnox. Pelagius, especially, was a most interesting man, though more of aphilosopher than a Christian. Like Zeno, he exalted the human will; likeAristotle, he subjected all truth to the test of logical formularies;like Abélard, he would believe nothing which he could not explain orcomprehend. Self-confident, like Servetus, he disdained the Cross. Thecentral principle of his teachings was man's ability to practise anyvirtue, independently of divine grace. He made perfection a thing easyto be attained. There was no need, in his eyes, as his adversariesmaintained, of supernatural aid in the work of salvation. Hence aSaviour was needless. By faith, he is represented to mean mereintellectual convictions, to be reached through the reason alone. Prayerwas useful simply to stimulate a man's own will. He was furtherrepresented as repudiating miracles as contrary to reason, of abhorringdivine sovereignty as fatal to the exercise of the will, of denyingspecial providences as opposing the operation of natural laws, asrejecting native depravity and maintaining that the natural tendency ofsociety was to rise in both virtue and knowledge, and of courserejecting the idea of a Devil tempting man to sin. "His doctrines, " saysone of his biographers, "were pleasing to pride, by flattering itspretension; to nature, by exaggerating its power; and to reason, byextolling its capacity. " He asserted that death was not the penalty ofAdam's transgression; he denied the consequences of his sin; and hedenied the spiritual resurrection of man by the death of Christ, thusrejecting him as a divine Redeemer. Why should there be a divineredemption if man could save himself? He blotted out Christ from thebook of life by representing him merely as a martyr suffering for thedeclaration of truths which were not appreciated, --like Socrates atAthens, or Savonarola at Florence. In support of all these doctrines, so different from those of Paul, he appealed, not to the apostle'sauthority, but to human reason, and sought the aid of Pagan philosophy, rather than the Scriptures, to arrive at truth. 

Thus was Pelagius represented by his opponents, who may have exaggeratedhis heresies, and have pushed his doctrines to a logical sequence whichhe would not accept but would even repel, in the same manner as thePelagians drew deductions from the teachings of Augustine which wereexceedingly unfair, --making God the author of sin, and election tosalvation to depend on the foreseen conduct of men in regard to anobedience which they had no power to perform. 

But whether Pelagius did or did not hold all the doctrines of which hewas accused, it is certain that the spirit of them was antagonistic tothe teachings of Paul, as understood by Augustine, who felt that thevery foundations of Christianity were assailed, --as Athanasius regardedthe doctrines of Arius. So he came to the rescue, not of the CatholicChurch, for Pelagius belonged to it as well as he, but to the rescue ofChristian theology. The doctrines of Pelagius were becoming fashionableand prevalent in many parts of the Empire. Even the Pope at one timefavored them. They might spread until they should be embraced by thewhole Catholic world, for Augustine believed in the vitality of error aswell as in the vitality of truth, --of the natural and inevitabletendency of society towards Paganism, without the especial andrestraining grace of God. He armed himself for the great conflict withthe infidelity of his day, not with David's sling, but Goliath's sword. He used the same weapons as his antagonist, even the arms of reason andknowledge, and constructed an argument which was overwhelming, if Paul'sEpistles were to be the accepted premises of his irresistible logic. Great as was Pelagius, Augustine was a far greater man, --broader, deeper, more learned, more logical, more eloquent, more intense. He wasraised up to demolish, with the very reason he professed to disdain, thesophistries and dogmas of one of the most dangerous enemies which theChurch had ever known, --to leave to posterity his logic and hisconclusions when similar enemies of his faith should rise up in futureages. He furnished a thesaurus not merely to Bernard and Thomas Aquinas, but even to Calvin and Bossuet and Pascal. And it will be the marvellouslucidity of the Bishop of Hippo which shall bring back to the truefaith, if it is ever brought back, that part of the Roman CatholicChurch which accepts the verdict of the Council of Trent, when thatfamous council indorsed the opinions of Pelagius while upholding theauthority of Augustine as the greatest doctor of the Church. 

To a man like Augustine, with his deep experiences, --a man rescued froma seductive philosophy and a corrupt life, as he thought, by thespecial grace of God and in answer to his mother's prayers, --the viewsof Pelagius were both false and dangerous. He could find no wordssufficiently intense whereby to express his gratitude for hisdeliverance from both sin and error. To him this Deliverer is sopersonal, so loving, that he pours out his confession to Him as if Hewere both friend and father. And he felt that all that is vital intheology must radiate from the recognition of His sovereign power in therenovation and salvation of the world. All his experiences andobservations of life confirmed the authority of Scripture, --that theworld, as a matter of fact, was sunk in a state of sin and misery, andcould be rescued only by that divine power which converted Paul. Hisviews of predestination, grace, and Providence all radiate from thecentral principle of the majesty of God and the littleness of man. Allhis ideas of the servitude of the will are confirmed by his personalexperience of the awful fetters which sin imposes, and the impossibilityof breaking away from them without direct aid from the God who ruleththe world in love. And he had an infinitely greater and deeperconviction of the reality of this divine love, which had rescued him, than Pelagius had, who felt that his salvation was the result of his ownmerits. The views of Augustine were infinitely more cheerful than thoseof his adversary respecting salvation, since they gave more hope to themiserable population of the Empire who could not claim the virtues ofPelagius, and were impotent of themselves to break away from the bondagewhich degraded them. There is nothing in the writings of Augustine, --notin this controversy, or any other controversy, --to show that Goddelights in the miseries or the penalty which are indissolubly connectedwith sin; on the contrary, he blesses and adores the divine hand whichreleases men from the constraints which sin imposes. This divineinterposition is wholly based on a divine and infinite love. It is thehelping hand of Omnipotence to the weak will of man, --the weak will evenof Paul, when he exclaimed, "The evil that I would not, that I do. " Itis the unloosing, by His loving assistance, of the wings by which theemancipated soul would rise to the lofty regions of peace andcontemplation. 

I know very well that the doctrines which Augustine systematized fromPaul involve questions which we cannot answer; for why should not aninfinite and omnipotent God give to all men the saving grace that hegave to Augustine? Why should not this loving and compassionate Fatherbreak all the fetters of sin everywhere, and restore the primevalParadise in this wicked world where Satan seems to reign? Is He not morepowerful than devils? Alas! the prevalence of evil is more mysteriousthan the origin of evil. But this is something, --and it is well for thecritic and opponent of the Augustinian theology to bear this inmind, --that Augustine was an earnest seeker after truth, even whenenslaved by the fornications of Carthage; and his own free-will inpersistently seeking truth, through all the mazes of Manichean andGrecian speculation, is as manifest as the divine grace which came tohis assistance. God Almighty does not break fetters until there is somedesire in men to have them broken. If men _will_ hug sins, they must notcomplain of their bondage. Augustine recognized free-will, which so manythink he ignored, when his soul aspired to a higher life. When adrunkard in his agonies cries out to God, then help is near. A drowningman who calls for a rope when a rope is near stands a good chance ofbeing rescued. 

I need not detail the results of this famous controversy. Augustine, appealing to the consciousness of mankind as well as to the testimony ofPaul, prevailed over Pelagius, who appealed to the pride of reason. Inthose dreadful times there were more men who felt the need of divinegrace than there were philosophers who revelled in the speculations ofthe Greeks. The danger from the Pelagians was not from theirorganization as a sect, but their opinions as individual men. Probablythere were all shades of opinion among them, from a modest andthoughtful semi-Pelagianism to the rankest infidelity. There always havebeen, and probably ever will be, sceptical and rationalistic people, even in the bosom of the Church. 

Now had it not been for Augustine, --a profound thinker, a man ofboundless influence and authority, --it is not unlikely that Pelagianismwould have taken so deep a root in the mind of Christendom, especiallyin the hearts of princes and nobles, that it would have become the creedof the Church. Even as it was, it was never fully eradicated in theschools and in the courts and among worldly people of cultureand fashion. 

But the fame of Augustine does not rest on his controversies withheretics and schismatics alone. He wrote treatises on almost allsubjects of vital interest to the Church. His essay on the Trinity wasworthy of Athanasius, and has never been surpassed in lucidity andpower. His soliloquies on a blissful life, and the order of theuniverse, and the immortality of the soul are pregnant with the richestthought, equal to the best treatises of Cicero or Boethius. Hiscommentary on the Psalms is sparkling with tender effusions, in whichevery thought is a sentiment and every sentiment is a blazing flame ofpiety and love. Perhaps his greatest work was the amusement of hisleisure hours for thirteen years, --a philosophical treatise called "TheCity of God, " in which he raises and replies to all the great questionsof his day; a sort of Christian poem upon our origin and end, and afinal answer to Pagan theogonies, --a final sentence on all the gods ofantiquity. In that marvellous book he soars above his ordinaryexcellence, and develops the designs of God in the history of States andempires, furnishing for Bossuet the groundwork of his universal history. Its great excellence, however, is its triumphant defence of Christianityover all other religions, --the last of the great apologies which, whilesettling the faith of the Christian world, demolished forever the laststronghold of a defeated Paganism. As "ancient Egypt pronouncedjudgments on her departed kings before proceeding to their burial, soAugustine interrogates the gods of antiquity, shows their impotence tosustain the people who worshipped them, triumphantly sings theirdeparted greatness, and seals with his powerful hand the sepulchre intowhich they were consigned forever. "

Besides all the treatises of Augustine, --exegetical, apologetical, dogmatical, polemical, ascetic, and autobiographical, --three hundred andsixty-three of his sermons have come down to us, and numerous letters tothe great men and women of his time. Perhaps he wrote too much and tooloosely, without sufficient regard to art, --like Varro, the mostvoluminous writer of antiquity, and to whose writings Augustine was muchindebted. If Saint Augustine had written less, and with more care, hiswritings would now be more read and more valued. Thucydides compressedthe labors of his literary life into a single volume; but that volumeis immortal, is a classic, is a text-book. Yet no work of man isprobably more lasting than the "Confessions" of Augustine, from theextraordinary affluence and subtilty of his thoughts, and his burning, fervid, passionate style. When books were scarce and dear, his variousworks were the food of the Middle Ages: and what better books evernourished the European mind in a long period of ignorance and ignominy?So that we cannot overrate his influence in giving a direction toChristian thought. He lived in the writings of the sainted doctors ofthe Scholastic schools. And he was a very favored man in living to agood old age, wearing the harness of a Christian laborer and the armorof a Christian warrior until he was seventy-six. He was a bishop nearlyforty years. For forty years he was the oracle of the Church, the lightof doctors. His social and private life had also great charms: he livedthe doctrines that he preached; he completely triumphed over thetemptations which once assailed him. Everybody loved as well as reveredhim, so genial was his humanity, so broad his charity. He was affable, courteous, accessible, full of sympathy and kindness. He was tolerant ofhuman infirmities in an age of angry controversy and ascetic rigors. Helived simply, but was exceedingly hospitable. He cared nothing formoney, and gave away what he had. He knew the luxury of charity, havingno superfluities. He was forgiving as well as tolerant; saying, It isnecessary to pardon offences, not seven times, but seventy times seven. No one could remember an idle word from his lips after his conversion. His humility was as marked as his charity, ascribing all his triumphs todivine assistance. He was not a monk, but gave rules to monastic orders. He might have been a metropolitan patriarch or pope; but he wascontented with being bishop of a little Numidian town. His only visitsbeyond the sanctuary were to the poor and miserable. As he won everyheart by love, so he subdued every mind by eloquence. He died leaving notestament, because he had no property to bequeath but his immortalwritings, --some ten hundred and thirty distinct productions. He died inthe year 430, when his city was besieged by the Vandals, and in the armsof his faithful Alypius, then a neighboring bishop, full of visions ofthe ineffable beauty of that blissful state to which his renovatedspirit had been for forty years constantly soaring. 

"Thus ceased to flow, " said a contemporary, "that river of eloquencewhich had watered the thirsty fields of the Church; thus passed away theglory of preachers, the master of doctors, and the light of scholars;thus fell the courageous combatant who with the sword of truth had givenheresy a mortal blow; thus set this glorious sun of Christian doctrine, leaving a world in darkness and in tears. "

His vacant see had no successor. "The African province, the cherishedjewel of the Roman Empire, sparkled for a while in the Vandal diadem. The Greek supplanted the Vandal, and the Saracen supplanted the Greek, and the home of Augustine was blotted out from the map of Christendom. "The light of the gospel was totally extinguished in Northern Africa. Theacts of Rome and the doctrines of Cyprian were equally forgotten by theMahommedan conquerors. Only in Bona, as Hippo is now called, has thememory of the great bishop been cherished, --the one solitary flowerwhich escaped the successive desolations of Vandals and Saracens. Andwhen Algiers was conquered by the French in 1830, the sacred relics ofthe saint were transferred from Pavia (where they had been deposited bythe order of Charlemagne), in a coffin of lead, enclosed in a coffin ofsilver, and the whole secured in a sarcophagus of marble, and finallycommitted to the earth near the scenes which had witnessed histranscendent labors. I do not know whether any monument of marble andgranite was erected to his memory; but he needs no chiselled stone, nostoried urn, no marble bust, to perpetuate his fame. For nearly fifteenhundred years he has reigned as the great oracle of the Church, Catholicand Protestant, in matters of doctrine, --the precursor of Bernard, ofLeibnitz, of Calvin, of Bossuet, all of whom reproduced his ideas, andacknowledged him as the fountain of their own greatness. "Whether, " saidone of the late martyred archbishops of Paris, "he reveals to us thefoundations of an impure polytheism, so varied in its developments, yetso uniform in its elemental principles; or whether he sports with themost difficult problems of philosophy, and throws out thoughts which inafter times are sufficient to give an immortality to Descartes, --wealways find in this great doctor all that human genius, enlightened bythe Spirit of God, can explain, and also to what a sublime height reasonherself may soar when allied with faith. "

AUTHORITIES. 

The voluminous Works of Saint Augustine, especially his "Confessions. "Mabillon, Tillemont, and Baronius have written very fully of this greatFather. See also Vaughan's Life of Thomas Aquinas. Neander, Geisler, Mosheim, and Milman indorse, in the main, the eulogium of Catholicwriters. There are numerous popular biographies, of which those ofBaillie and Schaff are among the best; but the most satisfactory book Ihave read is the History of M. Poujoulat, in three volumes, issued atParis in 1846. Butler, in his Lives of the Saints, has an extendedbiography. Even Gibbon pays a high tribute to his genius and character. 

THEODOSIUS THE GREAT. 

 * * * * *

A. D. 346-395. 

THE LATTER DAYS OF ROME. 

The last of those Roman emperors whom we call great was Theodosius. After him there is no great historic name, unless it be Justinian, whoreigned when Rome had fallen. With Theodosius is associated thelife-and-death struggle of Rome with the Gothic barbarians, and thefinal collapse of Paganism as a tolerated religion. Paganism in itsessence, its spirit, was not extinguished; it entered into new forms, even into the Church itself; and it still exists in Christian countries. When Bismarck was asked why he did not throw down his burdens, he isreported to have said: "Because no man can take my place. I should liketo retire to my estates and raise cabbages; but I have work to doagainst Paganism: I live among Pagans. " Neither Theodosius nor Bismarckwas what we should call a saint. Both have been stained by acts which itis hard to distinguish from crimes; but both have given evidence ofhatred of certain evils which undermine society. Theodosius, especially, made war and fought nobly against the two things which mostimperilled the Empire, --the barbarians who had begun their ravages, andthe Paganism which existed both in and outside the Church. For whichreasons he has been praised by most historians, in spite of great crimesand some vices. The worldly Gibbon admires him for the noble stand hetook against external dangers, and the Fathers of the Church almostadored him for his zealous efforts in behalf of orthodoxy. An eminentscholar of the advanced school has seen nothing in him to admire, andmuch to blame. But he was undoubtedly a very great man, and renderedimportant services to his age and to civilization, although he could notarrest the fatal disease which even then had destroyed the vitality ofthe Empire. It was already doomed when he ascended the throne. No mortalgenius, no imperial power, could have saved the crumbling Empire. 

In my lecture on Marcus Aurelius I alluded to the external prosperityand internal weakness of the old Roman world during his reign. Thatoutward prosperity continued for a century after he was dead, --that is, there were peace, thrift, art, wealth, and splendor. Men were unmolestedin the pursuit of pleasure. There were no great wars with enemies beyondthe limits of the Empire. There were wars of course; but these chieflywere civil wars between rival aspirants for imperial power, or tosuppress rebellions, which did not alarm the people. They still satunder their own vines and fig-trees, and danced to voluptuous music, andrejoiced in the glory of their palaces. They feasted and married andwere given in marriage, like the antediluvians. They never dreamed thata great catastrophe was near, that great calamities were impending. 

I do not say that the people in that century were happy or contented, oreven generally prosperous. How could they be happy or prosperous whenmonsters and tyrants sat on the throne of Augustus and Trajan? How couldthey be contented when there was such a vast inequality ofcondition, --when slaves were more numerous than freemen, --when most ofthe women were guarded and oppressed, --when scarcely a man felt secureof the virtue of his wife, or a wife of the fidelity of herhusband, --when there was no relief from corroding sorrows but in thesports of the amphitheatre and circus, or some form of demoralizingexcitement or public spectacle, --when the great mass were ground down bypoverty and insult, and the few who were rich and favored were satiatedwith pleasure, ennuéd, and broken down by dissipation, --when there wasno hope in this world or in the next, no true consolation in sickness orin misfortune, except among the Christians, who fled by thousands todesert places to escape the contaminating vices of society?

But if the people were not happy or fortunate as a general thing, theyanticipated no overwhelming calamities; the outward signs of prosperityremained, --all the glories of art, all the wonders of imperial andsenatorial magnificence; the people were fed and amused at the expenseof the State; the colosseum was still daily crowded with itseighty-seven thousand spectators, and large hogs were still roastedwhole at senatorial banquets, and wines were still drunk which had beenstored one hundred years. The "dark-skinned daughters of Isis" stillsported unmolested in wanton mien with the priests of Cybele in theirdiscordant cries. The streets still were filled with the worshippers ofBacchus and Venus, with barbaric captives and their Teuton priests, withchariots and horses, with richly apparelled young men, and fashionableladies in quest of new perfumes. The various places of amusement werestill thronged with giddy youth and gouty old men who would have feltinsulted had any one told them that the most precious thing they had wasthe most neglected. Everywhere, as in the time of Trajan, wereunrestricted pleasures and unrestricted trades. What cared theshopkeepers and the carpenters and the bakers whether a Commodus or aSeverus reigned? They were safe. It was only great nobles who were indanger of being robbed or killed by grasping emperors. The people, onthe whole, lived for one hundred years after the accession of Commodusas they did under Trajan and Marcus Aurelius. True, there had been greatcalamities during this hundred years. There had been terrible plaguesand pestilences: in some of these as many as five thousand people dieddaily in Rome alone. There were tumults and revolts; there were wars andmassacres; there was often the reign of monsters or idiots. Yet even aslate as the reign of Aurelian, ninety years after the death of Aurelius, the Empire was thought to be eternal; nor was any triumph evercelebrated with greater pride and magnificence than his. And as thevictorious emperor in his triumphal chariot marched along the Via Sacraup the Capitoline hill, with the spoils and trophies of one hundredbattles, with ambassadors and captives, including Zenobia herself, fainting with the weight of jewels and golden fetters, it would seemthat Rome was destined to overcome all the vicissitudes of Nature, andreign as mistress of the world forever. 

But that century did not close until real dangers stared the people inthe face, and so alarmed the guardians of the Empire that they no longercould retire to their secluded villas for luxurious leisure, but wereforced to perpetual warfare, and with foes they had hitherto despised. 

Two things marked the one hundred years before the accession ofTheodosius of especial historical importance, --the successful inroadsof barbarians carrying desolation and alarm to the very heart of theEmpire; and the wonderful spread of the Christian religion. Persecutionended with Diocletian; and under Constantine Christianity seated herselfupon his throne. During this century of barbaric spoliations and publicmiseries, --the desolation of provinces, the sack of cities, the ruin ofworks of art, the burning of palaces, all the unnumbered evils whichuniversal war created, --the converts to Christianity increased, forChristianity alone held out hope amid despair and ruin. The publicdangers were so great that only successful generals were allowed to wearthe imperial purple. 

The ablest men of the Empire were at last summoned to govern it. Fromthe year 268 to 394 most of the emperors were able men, and some weregreat and virtuous. Perhaps the Empire was never more ably administeredthan was the Roman in the day of its calamities. Aurelian, Diocletian, Constantine, Theodosius, are alike immortal. They all alike fought withthe same enemies, and contended with the same evils. The enemies werethe Gothic barbarians; the evils were the degeneracy and vices of Romansoldiers, which universal corruption had at last produced. It was a sadhour in the old capital of the world when its blinded inhabitants werearoused from the stupendous delusion that they were invincible; when thecrushing fact blazed upon them that the legions had been beaten, thatprovince after province had been overrun, that the proudest cities hadfallen, that the barbarians were advancing, --everywhereadvancing, --treading beneath their feet temples, palaces, statues, libraries, priceless works of art; that there was no shelter to whichthey could fly; that Rome herself was doomed. In the year 378 theEmperor Valens himself was slain, almost under the walls of his capital, with two-thirds of his army, --some sixty thousand infantry and sixthousand cavalry, --while the victorious Goths, gorged with spoils, advanced to take possession of the defeated and crumbling Empire. Fromthe shores of the Bosporus to the Julian Alps nothing was seen butconflagration, murders, and depredations, and the cry of anguish went upto heaven in accents of almost universal despair. 

In such a crisis a great man was imperatively needed, and a great manarose. The dismayed emperor cast his eyes over the whole extent of hisdominions to find a deliverer. And he found the needed hero livingquietly and in modest retirement on a farm in Spain. This man wasTheodosius the Great, a young man then, --as modest as David amid thepastures, as unambitious as Cincinnatus at the plough. "The vulgar, "says Gibbon, "gazed with admiration on the manly beauty of his face andthe graceful majesty of his person, while in the qualities of his mindand heart intelligent observers perceived the blended excellences ofTrajan and Constantine. " As prudent as Fabius, as persevering as Alfred, as comprehensive as Charlemagne, as full of resources as Frederic II. , no more fitting person could be found to wield the sceptre of Trajan hisancestor. No greater man than he did the Empire then contain, andGratian was wise and fortunate in associating with himself soillustrious a man in the imperial dignity. 

If Theodosius was unassuming, he was not obscure and unimportant. Hisfather had been a successful general in Britain and Africa, and hehimself had been instructed by his father in the art of war, and hadserved under him with distinction. As Duke of Maesia he had vanquishedan army of Sarmatians, saved the province, deserved the love of hissoldiers, and provoked the envy of the court. But his father havingincurred the jealousy of Gratian and been unjustly executed, he wasallowed to retire to his patrimonial estates near Valladolid, where hegave himself up to rural enjoyments and ennobling studies. He was notlong permitted to remain in this retirement; for the public dangersdemanded the service of the ablest general in the Empire, and there wasno one so illustrious as he. And how lofty must have been his character, if Gratian dared to associate with himself in the government of theEmpire a man whose father he had unjustly executed! He was thirty-threewhen he was invested with imperial purple and intrusted with the conductof the Gothic war. 

The Goths, who under Fritigern had defeated the Roman army before thewalls of Adrianople, were Germanic barbarians who lived between theRhine and the Vistula in those forests which now form the empire ofGermany. They belonged to a family of nations which had the same naturalcharacteristics, --love of independence, passion for war, veneration forwomen, and religious tendency of mind. They were brave, persevering, bold, hardy, and virtuous, for barbarians. They cast their eyes on theRoman provinces in the time of Marius, and were defeated by him underthe name of Teutons. They had recovered strength when Caesar conqueredthe Gauls. They were very formidable in the time of Marcus Aurelius, andhad formed a general union for the invasion of the Roman world. But abarrier had been made against their incursions by those good and warlikeemperors who preceded Commodus, so that the Romans had peace for onehundred years. These barbarians went under different names, which I willnot enumerate, --different tribes of the same Germanic family, whoseremote ancestors lived in Central Asia and were kindred to the Medes andPersians. Like the early inhabitants of Greece and Italy, they were ofthe Aryan race. All the members of this great family, in their earlyhistory, had the same virtues and vices. They worshipped the forces ofNature, recognizing behind these a supreme and superintending deity, whose wrath they sought to deprecate by sacrifices. They set a greatvalue on personal independence, and hence had great individuality ofcharacter. They delighted in the pleasures of the chase. They weregenerally temperate and chaste. They were superstitious, social, andquarrelsome, bent on conquest, and migrated from country to country witha view of improving their fortunes. 

The Goths were the first of these barbarians who signally triumphed overthe Roman arms. "Starting from their home in the Scandinavian peninsula, they pressed upon the Slavic population of the Vistula, and by rapidconquests established themselves in southern and eastern Germany. Herethey divided. The Visi or West Goths advanced to the Danube. " In thereign of Decius (249-251) they crossed the river and ravaged the Romanterritory. In 269 they imposed a tribute on the Emperor Gratian, andseem to have been settled in Dacia. After this they made severalsuccessful raids, --invading Bythinia, entering the Propontis, andadvancing as far as Athens and Corinth, even to the coasts of AsiaMinor; destroying in their ravages the Temple of Diana at Ephesus, withits one hundred and twenty-seven marble columns. 

These calamities happened in the middle of the third century, during thereign of the frivolous Gallienus, who received the news with hisaccustomed indifference. While the Goths were burning the Greciancities, this royal cook and gardener was soliciting a place in theAreopagus of Athens. 

In the reign of Claudius the barbarians united under the Gothicstandard, and in six thousand vessels prepared again to ravage theworld. Against three hundred and twenty thousand of these Goths Claudiusadvanced, and defeated them at Naissus in Dalmatia. Fifty thousand wereslain, and three Gothic women fell to the share of every soldier. On thereturn of spring nothing of that mighty host was seen. Aurelian--whosucceeded Claudius, and whose father had been a peasant of Sirmium--putan end to the Gothic war, and the Empire again breathed; but only for atime, for the barbarians continually advanced, although they werecontinually beaten by the warlike emperors who succeeded Gallienus. Inthe middle of the third century they were firmly settled in Dacia, bypermission of Valerian. One hundred years after, pressed by Huns, theyasked for lands south of the Danube, which request was granted byValens; but they were rudely treated by the Roman officials, especiallytheir women, and treachery was added to their other wrongs. Filled withindignation, they made a combination and swept everything beforethem, --plundering cities, and sparing neither age nor sex. These ravagescontinued for a year. Valens, aroused, advanced against them, and wasslain in the memorable battle on the plains of Adrianople, 9th ofAugust, 378, --the most disastrous since the battle of Cannae, and fromwhich the Empire never recovered. 

To save the crumbling world, Theodosius was now made associate emperor. And in that great crisis prudence was more necessary than valor. NoRoman army at that time could contend openly in the field, face to face, with the conquering hordes who assembled under the standard ofFritigern, --the first historic name among the Visigoths. Theodosius"fixed his headquarters at Thessalonica, from whence he could watch theirregular actions of the barbarians and direct the movements of hislieutenants. " He strengthened his defences and fortifications, fromwhich his soldiers made frequent sallies, --as Alfred did against theDanes, --and accustomed themselves to the warfare of their most dangerousenemies. He pursued the same policy that Fabius did after the battle ofCannae, to whose wisdom the Romans perhaps were more indebted for theirultimate success than to the brilliant exploits of Scipio. The death ofFritigern, the great predecessor of Alaric, relieved Theodosius frommany anxieties; for it was followed by the dissension and discord of thebarbarians themselves, by improvidence and disorderly movements; andwhen the Goths were once more united under Athanaric, Theodosiussucceeded in making an honorable treaty with him, and in entertaininghim with princely hospitalities in his capital, whose glories alikeastonished and bewildered him. Temperance was not one of the virtues ofGothic kings under strong temptation, and Athanaric, yielding to theforce of banquets and imperial seductions, soon after died. The politicemperor gave his late guest a magnificent funeral, and erected to hismemory a stately monument; which won the favor of the Goths, and for atime converted them to allies. In four years the entire capitulation ofthe Visigoths was effected. 

Theodosius then turned his attention to the Ostro or East Goths, whoadvanced, with other barbarians, to the banks of the lower Danube, onthe Thracian frontier. Allured to cross the river in the night, thebarbarians found a triple line of Roman war-vessels chained to eachother in the middle of the river, which offered an effectual resistanceto their six thousand canoes, and they perished with their king. 

Having gradually vanquished the most dangerous enemies of the Empire, Theodosius has been censured for allowing them to settle in theprovinces they had desolated, and still more for incorporating fiftythousand of their warriors in the imperial armies, since they weresecret enemies, and would burst through their limits whenever anopportunity offered. But they were really too formidable to be drivenback beyond the frontiers of the crumbling Empire. Theodosius could onlyprocure a period of peace; and this was not to be secured save by adroitflatteries. The day was past for the extermination of the Goths by Romansoldiers, who had already thrown away their defensive armor; nor was itpossible that they would amalgamate with the people of the Empire, asthe Celtic barbarians had done in Spain and Gaul after the victories ofCaesar. Though the kingly power was taken away from them and they foughtbravely under the imperial standards, it was evident from theirinsolence and their contempt of the effeminate masters that the day wasnot distant when they would be the conquerors of the Empire. It does notspeak well for an empire that it is held together by the virtues andabilities of a single man. Nor could the fate of the Roman empire bedoubtful when barbarians were allowed to settle in its provinces; forafter the death of Valens the Goths never abandoned the Roman territory. They took possession of Thrace, as Saxons and Danes took possessionof England. 

After the conciliation of the Goths, --for we cannot call it theconquest, --Theodosius was obliged to turn his attention to the affairsof the Western Empire; for he ruled only the Eastern provinces. It wouldseem that Gratian, who had called him to his assistance to preserve theEast from the barbarians, was now in trouble in the West. He had notfulfilled the great expectation that had been formed of him. He degradedhimself in the eyes of the Romans by his absorbing passion for thepleasures of the chase; while public affairs imperatively demanded hisattention. He received a body of Alans into the military and domesticservice of the palace. He was indolent and pleasure-seeking, but wasawakened from his inglorious sports by a revolt in Britain. Maximus, anative of Spain and governor of the island, had been proclaimed emperorby his soldiers. He invaded Gaul with a large fleet and army, followedby the youth of Britain, and was received with acclamations by thearmies of that province. Gratian, then residing in Paris, fled to Lyons, deserted by his troops, and was assassinated by the orders of Maximus. The usurper was now acknowledged by the Western provinces as emperor, and was too powerful to be resisted at that time by Theodosius, whoaccepted his ambassadors, and made a treaty with the usurper by which hewas permitted to reign over Britain, Gaul, and Spain, provided that theother Western provinces, including Wales, should accept and acknowledgeValentinian, the brother of the murdered Gratian, who was however amere boy, and was ruled by his mother Justina, an Arian, --thatcelebrated woman who quarrelled with Ambrose, archbishop of Milan. Valentinian was even more feeble than Gratian, and Maximus, notcontented with the sovereignty of the three most important provinces ofthe Empire, resolved to reign over the entire West. Theodosius, who haddissembled his anger and waited for opportunity, now advanced to therelief of Valentinian, who had been obliged to fly from Milan, --the seatof his power. But in two months Theodosius subdued his rival, who fledto Italy, only, however, to be dragged from the throne and executed. 

Having terminated the civil war, and after a short residence in Milan, Theodosius made his triumphal entry into the ancient capital of theworld. He was now the absolute and undisputed master of the East and theWest, as Constantine had been, whom he resembled in his military geniusand executive ability; but he gave to Valentinian (a youth of twenty, murdered a few months after) the provinces of Italy and Illyria, andintrusted Gaul to the care of Arbogastes, --a gallant soldier among theFranks, who, like Maximus, aspired to reign. But power was dearer to thevaliant Frank than a name; and he made his creature, the rhetoricianEugenius, the nominal emperor of the West. Hence another civil war; butthis more serious than the last, and for which Theodosius was obligedto make two years' preparation. The contest was desperate. Victory atone time seemed even to be on the side of Arbogastes: Theodosius wasobliged to retire to the hills on the confines of Italy, apparentlysubdued, when, in the utmost extremity of danger, a desertion of troopsfrom the army of the triumphant barbarian again gave him the advantage, and the bloody and desperate battle on the banks of the Frigidusre-established Theodosius as the supreme ruler of the world. BothArbogastes and Eugenius were slain, and the East and West were once moreand for the last time united. The division of the Empire underDiocletian had not proved a wise policy, but was perhaps necessary;since only a Hercules could have borne the burdens of undividedsovereignty in an age of turbulence, treason, revolts, and anarchies. Itwas probably much easier for Tiberius or Trajan to rule the whole worldthan for one of the later emperors to rule a province. Alfred had aharder task than Charlemagne, and Queen Elizabeth than Queen Victoria. 

I have dwelt very briefly on those contests in which the greatTheodosius was obliged to fight for his crown and for the Empire. For atime he had delivered the citizens from the fear of the Goths, and hadre-established the imperial sovereignty over the various provinces. Butonly for a time. The external dangers reappeared at his death. He onlyaverted impending ruin; he only propped up a crumbling Empire. No humangenius could have long prevented the fall. Hence his struggles withbarbarians and with rebels have no deep interest to us. We associatewith his reign something more important than these outward conflicts. Civilization at large owes him a great debt for labors in another field, for which he is most truly immortal, --for which his name is treasured bythe Church, --for which he was one of the great benefactors. 

These labors were directed to the improvement of jurisprudence, and thefinal extinction of Paganism as a tolerated religion. He gave to theChurch and to Christianity a new prestige. He rooted out, so far asgenius and authority can, those heresies which were rapidly assimilatingthe new religion to the old. He was the friend and patron of those greatecclesiastics whose names are consecrated. The great Ambrose was hisspecial friend, in whose arms he expired. Augustine, Martin of Tours, Jerome, Gregory Nazianzen, Basil, Chrysostom, Damasus, were allcontemporaries, or nearly so. In his day the Church was really seated onthe high-places of the earth. A bishop was a greater man than a senator;he exercised more influence and had more dignity than a general. He wasambassador, courtier, and statesman, as well as prelate. Theodosiushanded over to the Church the government of mankind. To him we datethat ecclesiastical government which was perfected by Charlemagne, andwhich was dominant in the Middle Ages. Anarchy and misery spread overthe world; but the new barbaric forces were obedient to the officers ofthe Church. The Church looms up in the days of Theodosius as the greatpower of the world. 

Theodosius is lauded as a Christian prince even more than Constantine, and as much as Alfred. He was what is called orthodox, and intensely so. He saw in Arianism a heresy fatal to the Church. "It is our pleasure, "said he, "that all nations should steadfastly adhere to the religionwhich was taught by Saint Peter to the Romans, which is _the sole Deityof the Father, the Son, and Holy Ghost_, under an equal majesty; and weauthorize the followers of this doctrine to assume the title of CatholicChristians. " If Rome under Damasus and the teachings of Jerome was theseat of orthodoxy, Constantinople was the headquarters of Arianism. Wein our times have no conception of the interest which all classes tookin the metaphysics of theology. Said one of the writers of the day: "Ifyou desire a man to change a piece of silver, he informs you wherein theSon differs from the Father; if you ask the price of a loaf, you aretold in reply that the Son is inferior to the Father; if you inquirewhether the bath is ready, the answer is that the Son was made out ofnothing. " The subtle questions pertaining to the Trinity were the themeof universal conversation, even amid the calamities of the times. 

Theodosius, as soon as he had finished his campaign against the Goths, summoned the Arian archbishop of Constantinople, and demanded hissubscription to the Nicene Creed or his resignation. It must beremembered that the Arians were in an overwhelming majority in the city, and occupied the principal churches. They complained of the injustice ofremoving their metropolitan, but the emperor was inflexible; and GregoryNazianzen, the friend of Basil, was promoted to the vacant See, in themidst of popular grief and rage. Six weeks afterwards Theodosiusexpelled from all the churches of his dominions, both of bishops and ofpresbyters, those who would not subscribe to the Nicene Creed. It was agreat reformation, but effected without bloodshed. 

Moreover, in the year 381 he assembled a general council of one hundredand fifty bishops at his capital, to finish the work of the Council ofNice, and in which Arianism was condemned. In the space of fifteen yearsseven imperial edicts were fulminated against those who maintained thatthe Son was inferior to the Father. A fine equal to two thousand dollarswas imposed on every person who should receive or promote an Arianordination. The Arians were forbidden to assemble together in theirchurches, and by a sort of civil excommunication they were branded withinfamy by the magistrates, and rendered incapable of civil offices oftrust and emolument. Capital punishment even was inflicted onManicheans. 

So it would appear that Theodosius inaugurated religious persecution forhonest opinions, and his edicts were similar in spirit to those of LouisXIV. Against the Protestants, --a great flaw in his character, but forwhich he is lauded by the Catholic historians. The eloquent Fléchierenlarges enthusiastically on the virtues of his private life, on hischastity, his temperance, his friendship, his magnanimity, as well ashis zeal in extinguishing heresy. But for him, Arianism might possiblyhave been the established religion of the Empire, since not only thedialectical Greeks, but the sensuous Goths, inclined to that creed. Ulfilas, in his conversion of those barbarians, had made them thesupporters of Arianism, not because _they_ understood the subtiledistinctions which theologians had made, but because it was the acceptedand fashionable faith of Constantinople. Spain, however, through thecommanding influence of Hosius, adhered to the doctrines of Athanasius, while the eloquence of the commanding intellects of the age was putforth in behalf of Trinitarianism. The great leader of Arianism hadpassed away when Augustine dictated to the Christian world from thelittle town of Hippo, and Jerome transplanted the monasticism of theEast into the West. At Tours Martin defended the same cause thatAugustine had espoused in Africa; while at Milan, the court capital ofthe West, the venerable Ambrose confirmed Italy in the Latin creed. InAlexandria the fierce Theophilus suppressed Arianism with the sameweapons that he had used in extirpating the worship of Isis and Osiris. Chrysostom at Antioch was the equally strenuous advocate of theAthanasian Creed. We are struck with the appearance of these commandingintellects in the last days of the Empire, --not statesmen and generals, but ecclesiastics and churchmen, generally agreed in the interpretationof the faith as declared by Paul, and through whose counsels the emperorwas unquestionably governed. In all matters of religion Theodosius wassimply the instrument of the great prelates of the age, --the only greatmen that the age produced. 

After Theodosius had thus established the Nicene faith, so far asimperial authority, in conjunction with that of the great prelates, could do so, he closed the final contest with Paganism itself. His lawsagainst Pagan sacrifices were severe. It was death to inspect theentrails of victims for sacrifice; and all other sacrifices, in the year392, were made a capital offence. He even demolished the Pagan temples, as the Scots destroyed the abbeys and convents which were the greatmonuments of Mediaeval piety. The revenues of the temples wereconfiscated. Among the great works of ancient art which were destroyed, but might have been left or converted into Christian use, were themagnificent temple of Edessa and the serapis of Alexandria, uniting thecolossal grandeur of Egyptian with the graceful harmony of Grecian art. At Rome not only was the property of the temples confiscated, but alsoall privileges of the priesthood. The Vestal virgins passed unhonored inthe streets. Whoever permitted any Pagan rite--even the hanging of achaplet on a tree--forfeited his estate. The temples of Rome were notdestroyed, as in Syria and Egypt; but as all their revenues wereconfiscated, public worship declined before the superior pomps of asensuous and even idolatrous Christianity. The Theodosian code, published by Theodosius the Younger, A. D. 438, while it incorporatedChristian usages and laws in the legislation of the Empire, did not, however, disturb the relation of master and slave; and when the Empirefell, slavery still continued as it was in the times of Augustus andDiocletian. Nor did Christianity elevate imperial despotism into a wiseand beneficent rule. It did not change perceptibly the habits of thearistocracy. The most vivid picture we have of the vices of the leadingclasses of Roman society are painted by a contemporaneous Paganhistorian, --Ammianus Marcellinus, --and many a Christian matron adornedherself with the false and colored hair, the ornaments, the rouge, andthe silks of the Pagan women of the time of Cleopatra. Never was luxurymore enervating, or magnificence more gorgeous, but without refinement, than in the generation that preceded the fall of Rome. And coexistentwith the vices which prepared the way for the conquests of thebarbarians was the wealth of the Christian clergy, who vied with theexpiring Paganism in the splendor of their churches, in the ornaments oftheir altars, and in the imposing ceremonial of their worship. Thebishop became a great worldly potentate, and the strictest union wasformed between the Church and State. The greatest beneficent changewhich the Church effected was in relation to divorce, --the facility forwhich disgraced the old Pagan civilization; but Christianity investedmarriage with the utmost solemnity, so that it became a holy andindissoluble sacrament, --to which the Catholic Church, in the days ofdeepest degeneracy has ever clung, leaving to the Protestants therestoration of this old Pagan custom of divorce, as well as theencouragement and laudation of a material civilization. 

The spirit of Paganism never has been exorcised in any age of Christianprogress and triumph, but has appeared from time to time in new forms. In the conquering Church of Constantine and Theodosius it adopted Paganemblems and gorgeous rites and ceremonies; in the Middle Ages itappeared in the dialectical contests of the Greek philosophers; in ourtimes in the deification of the reason, in the apotheosis of art, in theinordinate value placed on the enjoyments of the body, and in thesplendor of an outside life. Names are nothing. To-day we are swingingto the Epicurean side of the Greeks and Romans as completely as they didin the age of Commodus and Aurelian; and none may dare to hurl theirindignant protests without meeting a neglect and obloquy sometimes morehard to bear than the persecutions of Nero, of Trajan, of Leo X. , ofLouis XIV. 

If Theodosius were considered aside from his able administration of theEmpire and his patronage of the orthodox leaders of the Church, he wouldbe subject to severe criticism. He was indolent, irascible, and severe. His name and memory are stained by a great crime, --the slaughter of fromseven to fifteen thousand of the people of Thessalonica, --one of thegreat crimes of history, but memorable for his repentance more than forhis cruelty. Had Theodosius not submitted to excommunication andpenance, and given every sign of grief and penitence for this terribledeed, he would have passed down in history as one of the cruellest ofall the emperors, from Nero downwards; for nothing can excuse, or evenpalliate, so gigantic a crime, which shocked the whole civilizedworld, --a crime more inexcusable than the slaughter of Saint Bartholomewor the massacre which followed the revocation of the edict of Nantes. 

Theodosius survived that massacre about five years, and died at Milan, 395, at the age of fifty, from a disease which was caused by thefatigues of war, which, with a constitution undermined byself-indulgence, he was unable to bear. But whatever the cause of hisdeath it was universally lamented, not from love of him so much as fromthe sense of public dangers which he alone had the power to ward off. Athis death his Empire was divided between his two feeble sons, --Honoriusand Arcadius, and the general ruin which everybody began to fear soontook place. After Theodosius, no great and warlike sovereign reignedover the crumbling and dismembered Empire, and the ruin was as rapid asit was mournful. 

The Goths, released from the restraints and fears which Theodosiusimposed, renewed their ravages; and the effeminate soldiers of theEmpire, who formerly had marched with a burden of eighty pounds, nowthrew away the heavy weapons of their ancestors, even their defensivearmor, and of course made but feeble resistance. The barbarians advancedfrom conquering to conquer. Alaric, leader of the Goths, invaded Greeceat the head of a numerous army. Degenerate soldiers guarded the passwhere three hundred Spartan heroes had once arrested the Persian hosts, and fled as Alaric approached. Even at Thermopylae no resistance wasmade. The country was laid waste with fire and sword. Athens purchasedher preservation at an enormous ransom. Corinth, Argos, and Spartayielded without a blow, but did not escape the doom of vanquishedcities. Their palaces were burned, their families were enslaved, andtheir works of art were destroyed. 

Only one general remained to the desponding Arcadius, --Stilicho, trainedin the armies of Theodosius, who had virtually intrusted to him, although by birth a Vandal, the guardianship of his children. We see inthese latter days of the Empire that the best generals were of barbaricbirth, --an impressive commentary on the degeneracy of the legions. Atthe approach of Stilicho, Alaric retired at first, but collecting aforce of ten thousand men penetrated the Julian Alps, and advanced intoItaly. The Emperor Honorius was obliged to summon to his rescue hisdispirited legions from every quarter, even from the fortresses of theRhine and the Caledonian wall, with which Stilicho compelled Alaric toretire, but only on a subsidy of two tons of gold. The Roman people, supposing that they were delivered, returned to their circuses andgladiatorial shows. Yet Italy was only temporarily delivered, forStilicho, --the hero of Pollentia, --with the collected forces of thewhole western Empire, might still have defied the armies of the Gothsand staved off the ruin another generation, had not imperial jealousyand the voice of envy removed him from command. The supreme guardian ofthe western Empire, in the greatest crisis of its history, himselfremoves the last hope of Rome. The frivolous senate which Stilicho hadsaved, and the weak and timid emperor whom he guarded, were alikedemented. _Quos Deus vult perdere, prius dementat_. In an evil hour thebrave general was assassinated. 

The Gothic king observing the revolutions at the palace, the elevationof incompetent generals, and the general security in which the peopleindulged, resolved to march to a renewed attack. Again he crossed theAlps, with a still greater army, and invaded Italy, destroyingeverything in his path. Without obstruction he crossed the Apennines, ravaged the fertile plains of Umbria, and reached the city, which forfour hundred years had not been violated by the presence of a foreignenemy. The walls were then twenty-five miles in circuit, and containedso large a population that it affected indifference. Alaric made noattempt to take the city by storm, but quietly and patiently enclosed itwith a cordon through which nothing could force its way, --as thePrussians in our day invested Paris. The city, unprovided for a siege, soon felt all the evils of famine, to which pestilence was naturallyadded. In despair, the haughty citizens condescended to sue for aransom. Alaric fixed the price of his retreat at the surrender of allthe gold and silver, all the precious movables, and all the slaves ofbarbaric birth. He afterwards somewhat modified his demands, but marchedaway with more spoil than the Romans brought from Carthage and Antioch. 

Honorius intrenched himself at Ravenna, and refused to treat with themagnanimous Alaric. Again, consequently, he marched against the doomedcapital; again invested it; again cut off supplies. In vain did thenobles organize a defence, --there were no defenders. Slaves would notfight, and a degenerate rabble could not resist a warlike and superiorrace. Cowardice and treachery opened the gates. In the dead of night theGothic trumpets rang unanswered in the streets. The old heroic virtueswere gone. No resistance was made. Nobody fought from temples andpalaces. The queen of the world, for five days and nights, was exposedto the lust and cupidity of despised barbarians. Yet a general slaughterwas not made; and as much wealth as could be collected into the churchesof St. Peter and St. Paul was spared. The superstitious barbarians insome degree respected churches. But the spoils of the city were immenseand incalculable, --gold, jewels, vestments, statues, vases, silverplate, precious furniture, spoils of Oriental cities, --the collectivetreasures of the world, --all were piled upon the Gothic wagons. Thesons and daughters of patrician families became, in their turn, slavesto the barbarians. Fugitives thronged the shores of Syria and Egypt, begging daily bread. The Roman world was filled with grief andconsternation. Its proud capital was sacked, since no one would defendit. "The Empire fell, " says Guizot, "because no one belonged to it. " Thenews of the capture "made the tongue of old Saint Jerome to cling to theroof of his mouth in his cell at Bethlehem. What is now to be seen, "cried he, "but conflagration, slaughter, ruin, --the universal shipwreckof society?" The same words of despair came from Saint Augustine atHippo. Both had seen the city in the height of its material grandeur, and now it was laid low and desolate. The end of all things seemed to beat hand; and the only consolation of the great churchmen of the age wasthe belief in the second coming of our Lord. 

The sack of Rome by Alaric, A. D. 410, was followed in less than half acentury by a second capture and a second spoliation at the hands of theVandals, with Genseric at their head, --a tribe of barbarians of kindredGermanic race, but fiercer instincts and more hideous peculiarities. This time, the inhabitants of Rome (for Alaric had not destroyedit, --only robbed it) put on no airs of indifference or defiance. Theyknew their weakness. They begged for mercy. 

The last hope of the city was her Christian bishop; and the great Leo, who was to Rome what Augustine had been to Carthage when that capitalalso fell into the hands of Vandals, hastened to the barbarian's camp. The only concession he could get was that the lives of the people shouldbe spared, --a promise only partially kept. The second pillage lastedfourteen days and nights. The Vandals transferred to their ships allthat the Goths had left, even to the trophies of the churches andancient temples; the statues which ornamented the capital, the holyvessels of the Jewish temple which Titus had brought from Jerusalem, imperial sideboards of massive silver, the jewels of senatorialfamilies, with their wives and daughters, --all were carried away toCarthage, the seat of the new Empire of the Vandals, A. D. 455, then oncemore a flourishing city. The haughty capital met the fate which she hadinflicted on her rival in the days of Cato the censor, but fell stillmore ingloriously, and never would have recovered from this second fallhad not her immortal bishop, rising with the greatness of the crisis, laid the foundation of a new power, --that spiritual domination whichcontrolled the Gothic nations for more than a thousand years. 

With the fall of Rome, --yet too great a city to be wholly despoiled orruined, and which has remained even to this day the centre of what ismost interesting in the world, --I should close this Lecture; but I mustglance rapidly over the whole Empire, and show its condition when theimperial capital was spoiled, humiliated, and deserted. 

The Suevi, Alans, and Vandals invaded Spain, and erected their barbaricmonarchies. The Goths were established in the south of Gaul, while thenorth was occupied by the Franks and Burgundians. England, abandoned bythe Romans, was invaded by the Saxons, who formed permanent conquests. In Italy there were Goths and Heruli and Lombards. All these races wereGermanic. They probably made serfs or slaves of the old population, orwere incorporated with them. They became the new rulers of thedevastated provinces; and all became, sooner or later, converts to anominal Christianity, the supreme guardian of which was the Pope, whoseauthority they all recognized. The languages which sprang up in Europewere a blending of the Roman, Celtic, and Germanic. In Spain and Italythe Latin predominated, as the Saxon prevailed in England after theNorman conquest. Of all the new settlers in the Roman world, theNormans, who made no great incursions till the time of Charlemagne, wereprobably the strongest and most refined. But they all alike had the samenational traits, substantially; and they entered upon the possessions ofthe Romans after various contests, more or less successful, for twohundred and fifty years. 

The Empire might have been invaded by these barbarians in the time ofthe Antonines, and perhaps earlier; but it would not have succumbed tothem. The Legions were then severely disciplined, the central power wasestablished, and the seeds of ruin had not then brought forth theirwretched fruits. But in the fifth century nothing could have saved theEmpire. Its decline had been rapid for two hundred years, until at lastit became as weak as the Oriental monarchies which Alexander subdued. Itfell like a decayed and rotten tree. As a political State all vitalityhad fled from it. The only remaining conservative forces came fromChristianity; and Christianity was itself corrupted, and had become apart of the institutions of the State. 

It is mournful to think that a brilliant external civilization was sofeeble to arrest both decay and ruin. It is sad to think that neitherart nor literature nor law had conservative strength; that the mannersand habits of the people grew worse and worse, as is universallyadmitted, amid all the glories and triumphs and boastings of theproudest works of man. "A world as fair and as glorious as our own, "says Sismondi, "was permitted to perish. " Rome, Alexandria, Antioch, Athens, met the old fate of Babylon, of Tyre, of Carthage. Degeneracywas as marked and rapid in the former, notwithstanding all thecivilizing influences of letters, jurisprudence, arts, and utilitarianscience, as in the latter nations, --a most significant and impressivecommentary on the uniform destinies of nations, when those virtues onwhich the strength of man is based have passed away. An observer in thedays of Theodosius would very likely have seen the churches of Rome asfully attended as are those in New York itself to-day; and he would haveseen a more magnificent city, --and yet it fell. There is no cure for acorrupt and rotten civilization. As the farms of the old Puritans ofMassachusetts and Connecticut are gradually but surely passing into thehands of the Irish, because the sons and grandsons of the oldNew-England farmer prefer the uncertainties and excitements of ademoralized city-life to laborious and honest work, so the possessionsof the Romans passed into the hands of German barbarians, who werestrong and healthy and religious. They desolated, but theyreconstructed. 

The punishment of the enervated and sensual Roman was by war. We inAmerica do not fear this calamity, and have no present cause of fear, because we have not sunk to the weakness and wickedness of the Romans, and because we have no powerful external enemies. But if amid ourmagnificent triumphs of science and art, we should accept theEpicureanism of the ancients and fall into their ways of life, thenthere would be the same decline which marked them, --I mean in virtue andpublic morality, --and there would be the same penalty; not perhapsdestruction from external enemies, as in Persia, Syria, Greece, andRome, but some grievous and unexpected series of catastrophes whichwould be as mournful, as humiliating, as ruinous, as were the incursionsof the Germanic races. The operations of law, natural and moral, areuniform. No individual and no nation can escape its penalty. The worldwill not be destroyed; Christianity will not prove a failure, --but newforces will arise over the old, and prevail. Great changes will come. Hewhose right it is to rule will overturn and overturn: but "creationshall succeed destruction; melodious birth-songs will come from thefires of the burning phoenix, " assuring us that the progress of the raceis certain, even if nations are doomed to a decline and fall wheneverconservative forces are not strong enough to resist the torrent ofselfishness, vanity, and sin. 

AUTHORITIES. 

The original authorities are Ammianus Marcellinus, Zosimus, Sozomen, Socrates, orations of Gregory Nazianzen, Theodoret, the Theodosian Code, Sulpicius Severus, Life of Martin of Tours, Life of Ambrose by Paulinus, Augustine's "De Civitate Dei, " Epistles of Ambrose; also those ofJerome; Claudien. The best modern authorities are Tillemont's History ofthe Emperors; Gibbon's Decline and Fall; Milmans's History ofChristianity; Neander; Sheppard's Fall of Rome; and Flécier's Life ofTheodosius. There are several popular Lives of Theodosius in French, butvery few in English. 

LEO THE GREAT. 

 * * * * *

A. D. 390-461. 

FOUNDATION OF THE PAPACY. 

With the great man who forms the subject of this Lecture are identifiedthose principles which lay at the foundation of the Roman Catholic powerfor fifteen hundred years. I do not say that he is the founder of theRoman Catholic Church, for that is another question. Roman Catholicism, as a polity, or government, or institution, is one thing; and RomanCatholicism, as a religion, is quite another, although they have beenoften confounded. As a government, or polity, it is peculiar, --theresult of the experience of ages, adapted to society and nations in acertain state of progress or development, with evils and corruptions, ofcourse, like all other human institutions. As a religion, although itsuperadded many dogmas and rites which Protestants do not accept, andfor which they can see no divine authority, --like auricular confession, the deification of the Virgin, indulgences for sin, and theinfallibility of the Pope, --still, it has at the same time defended thecardinal principles of Christian faith and morality; such as thepersonality and sovereignty of God, the divinity of Christ, salvation inconsequence of his sufferings and death, immortality, the finaljudgment, the necessity of a holy life, temperance, humility, patience, and the virtues which were taught upon the Mount and enforced by theoriginal disciples and apostles, whose writings are acceptedas inspired. 

In treating so important a subject as that represented by Leo the Great, we must bear in mind these distinctions. While Leo is conceded to havebeen a devout Christian and a noble defender of the faith as we receiveit, --one of the lights of the early Christian Church, numbered evenamong the Fathers of the Church, with Augustine and Chrysostom, --hisspecial claim to greatness is that to him we trace some of the firstgreat developments of the Roman Catholic power as an institution. Morethan any other one man, he laid the foundation-stone of that edificewhich alike sheltered and imprisoned the European nations for more thana thousand years. He was not a great theologian like Augustine, orpreacher like Chrysostom, but he was a great bishop like Ambrose, --evenfar greater, inasmuch as he was the organizer of new forces in theadministration of his important diocese. In fact he was a greatstatesman, as the more able of the popes always aspired to be. He wasthe associate and equal of princes. 

It was the sublime effort of Leo to make the Church the guardian ofspiritual principles and give to it a theocratic character and aim, which links his name with the mightiest moral movements of the world;and when I speak of the Church I mean the Church of Rome, as presidedover by men who claimed to be the successors of Saint Peter, --to whomthey assert Christ had given the supreme control over all other churchesas His vicars on the earth. It was the great object of Leo tosubstantiate this claim, and root it in the minds of the newly convertedbarbarians; and then institute laws and measures which should make hisauthority and that of his successors paramount in all spiritual matters, thus centring in his See the general oversight of the Christian Churchin all the countries of Europe. It was a theocratic aspiration, one ofthe grandest that ever entered into the mind of a man of genius, yet, asProtestants now look at it, a usurpation, --the beginning of a vastsystem of spiritual tyranny in order to control the minds andconsciences of men. It took several centuries to develop this system, after Leo was dead. With him it was not a vulgar greed of power, but aninspiration of genius, --a grand idea to make the Church which hecontrolled a benign and potent influence on society, and to preventcivilization from being utterly crushed out by the victorious Goths andVandals. It is the success of this idea which stamps the Church as thegreat leading power of Mediaeval Ages, --a power alike majestic andvenerable, benignant yet despotic, humble yet arrogant and usurping. 

But before I can present this subtile contradiction, in all its mightyconsequences both for good and evil, I must allude to the Roman See andthe condition of society when Leo began his memorable pontificate as theprecursor of the Gregories and the Clements of later times. Like allgreat powers, it was very gradually developed. It was as long inreaching its culminating greatness as that temporal empire whichcontrolled the ancient world. Pagan Rome extended her sway by generalsand armies; Mediaeval Rome, by her prelates and her principles. 

However humble the origin of the Church of Rome, in the early part ofthe fifth century it was doubtless the greatest See (or _seat_ ofepiscopal power) in Christendom. The Bishop of Rome had the largestnumber of dependent bishops, and was the first of clerical dignitaries. As early as A. D. 250, --sixty years before Constantine's conversion, andduring the times of persecution, --such a man as Cyprian, metropolitanBishop of Carthage, yielded to him the precedence, and possibly thepresidency, because his See was the world's metropolis. And when theseat of empire was removed to the banks of the Bosporus, the power ofthe Roman Bishop, instead of being diminished, was rather increased, since he was more independent of the emperors than was the Bishop ofConstantinople. And especially after Rome was taken by the Goths, healone possessed the attributes of sovereignty. "He had already toweredas far above ordinary bishops in magnificence and prestige as Caesar hadabove Fabricius. "

It was the great name of ROME, after all, which was the mysterioustalisman that elevated the Bishop of Rome above other metropolitans. Whocan estimate the moral power of that glorious name which had awed theworld for a thousand years? Even to barbarians that proud capital wassacred. The whole world believed her to be eternal; she alone had theprestige of universal dominion. This queen of cities might be desolatedlike Babylon or Tyre, but her influence was indestructible. In her veryruins she was majestic. Her laws, her literature, and her language stillwere the pride of nations; they revered her as the mother ofcivilization, clung to the remembrance of her glories, and refused tolet her die. She was to the barbarians what Athens had been to theRomans, what modern Paris is to the world of fashion, what London everwill be to the people of America and Australia, --the centre of a proudcivilization. So the bishops of such a city were great in spite ofthemselves, no matter whether they were remarkable as individuals ornot. They were the occupants of a great office; and while their cityruled the world, it was not necessary for them to put forth any newclaims to dignity or power. No person and no city disputed theirpre-eminence. They lived in a marble palace; they were clothed in purpleand fine linen; they were surrounded by sycophants; nobles and generalswaited in their ante-chambers; they were the companions of princes; theycontrolled enormous revenues; they were the successors of the highpontiffs of imperial domination. 

Yet for three hundred years few of them were eminent. It is not theorder of Providence that great posts, to which men are elected byinferiors, should be filled with great men. Such are always feared, andhave numerous enemies who defeat their elevation. Moreover, it is onlyin crises of imminent danger that signal abilities are demanded. Men arepreferred for exalted stations who will do no harm, who have talentrather than genius, --men who have business capacities, who have industryand modesty and agreeable manners; who, if noted for anything, are notedfor their character. Hence we do not read of more than two or threebishops, for three hundred years, who stood out pre-eminently amongtheir contemporaries; and these were inferior to Origen, who was ateacher in a theological school, and to Jerome, who was a monk in anobscure village. Even Augustine, to whose authority in theology theCatholic Church still professes to bow down, as the schools of theMiddle Ages did to Aristotle, was the bishop of an unimportant See inNorthern Africa. Only Clement in the first century, and Innocent in thefourth loomed up above their contemporaries. As for the rest, great aswas their dignity as bishops, it is absurd to attribute to them schemesfor enthralling the world. No such plans arose in the bosom of any ofthem. Even Leo I. Merely prepared the way for universal domination; hehad no such deep-laid schemes as Gregory VII. Or Boniface VIII. Theprimacy of the Bishop of Rome was all that was conceded by other bishopsfor four hundred years, and this on the ground of the grandeur of hiscapital. Even this was disputed by the Bishop of Constantinople, andcontinued to be until that capital was taken by the Turks. 

But with the waning power, glory, and wealth of Rome, --decimated, pillaged, trodden under foot by Goths and Vandals, rebuked byProvidence, deserted by emperors, abandoned to decay and ruin, --someexpedient or new claim to precedency was demanded to prevent the Romanbishops from sinking into mediocrity. It was at this crisis that thepontificate of Leo began, in the year 440. It was a gloomy period, notonly for Rome, but for civilization. The queen of cities had beenrepeatedly sacked, and her treasures destroyed or removed to distantcities. Her proud citizens had been sold as slaves; her noble matronshad been violated; her grand palaces had been levelled with the ground;her august senators were fugitives and exiles. All kinds of calamitiesoverspread the earth and decimated the race, --war, pestilence, andfamine. Men in despair hid themselves in caves and monasteries. Literature and art were crushed; no great works of genius appeared. Theparalysis of despair deadened all the energies of civilized man. Evenarmies lost their vigor, and citizens refused to enlist. The oldmechanism of the Caesars, which had kept the Empire together for threehundred years after all vitality had fled, was worn out. The generaldemoralization had led to a general destruction. Vice was succeeded byuniversal violence; and that, by universal ruin. Old laws and restraintswere no longer of any account. A civilization based on material forcesand Pagan arts had proved a failure. The whole world appeared to be onthe eve of dissolution. To the thoughtful men of the age everythingseemed to be involved in one terrific mass of desolation and horror. "Even Jerome, " says a great historian, "heaped together the awfulpassages of the Old Testament on the capture of Jerusalem and otherEastern cities; and the noble lines of Virgil on the sack of Troy arebut feeble descriptions of the night which covered the western Empire. "

Now Leo was the man for such a crisis, and seems to have been raised upto devise some new principle of conservation around which the strickenworld might rally. "He stood equally alone and superior, " says Milman, "in the Christian world. All that survived of Rome--of her unboundedambition, of her inflexible will, and of her belief in her title touniversal dominion--seemed concentrated in him alone. "

Leo was born, in the latter part of the fourth century, at Rome, ofnoble parents, and was intensely Roman in all his aspirations. He earlygave indications of future greatness, and was consecrated to a servicein which only talent was appreciated. When he was nothing but anacolyte, whose duty it was to light the lamps and attend on the bishop, he was sent to Africa and honored with the confidence of the greatBishop of Hippo. And he was only deacon when he was sent by the EmperorValentinian III. To heal the division between Aëtius and Albinus, --rivalgenerals, whose dissensions compromised the safety of the Empire. He wasabsent on important missions when the death of Sixtus, A. D. 440, leftthe Papacy without a head. On Leo were all eyes now fixed, and he wasimmediately summoned by the clergy and the people of Rome, in whom theright of election was vested, to take possession of the vacant throne. He did not affect unworthiness like Gregory in later years, but acceptedat once the immense responsibility. 

I need not enumerate his measures and acts. Like all great and patrioticstatesmen he selected the wisest and ablest men he could find assubordinates, and condescended himself to those details which heinexorably exacted from others. He even mounted the neglected pulpit ofhis metropolitan church to preach to the people, like Chrysostom andGregory Nazianzen at Constantinople. His sermons are not models ofeloquence or style, but are practical, powerful, earnest, and orthodox. Athanasius himself was not more evangelical, or Ambrose more impressive. He was the especial foe of all the heresies which characterized the age. He did battle with all who attempted to subvert the Nicene Creed. Thosewhom he especially rebuked were the Manicheans, --men who made thegreatest pretension to intellectual culture and advanced knowledge, andyet whose lives were disgraced not merely by the most offensiveintellectual pride, but the most disgraceful vices; men who confoundedall the principles of moral obligation, and who polluted even theatmosphere of Rome by downright Pagan licentiousness. He had no patiencewith these false philosophers, and he had no mercy. He even complainedof them to the emperor, as Calvin did of Servetus to the civilauthorities of Geneva (which I grant was not to his credit); and theresult was that these dissolute and pretentious heretics were expelledfrom the army and from all places of trust and emolument. 

Many people in our enlightened times would denounce this treatment asilliberal and persecuting, and justly. But consider his age andcircumstances. What was Leo to do as the guardian of the faith in thosedreadful times? Was he to suffer those who poisoned all the sources ofrenovation which then remained to go unrebuked and unpunished? He mayhave said, in his defence, "Shall I, the bishop of this diocese, theappointed guardian of faith and morals in a period of alarmingdegeneracy, --shall I, armed with the sword of Saint Peter, stop to drawthe line between injuries inflicted by the tongue and injuries inflictedby the hand? Shall we defend our persons, our property, and our lives, and take no notice of those who impiously and deliberately would destroyour souls by their envenomed blasphemies? Shall we allow the wells ofwater which spring up to everlasting life to be poisoned by the impiousatheists and scoffers, who in every age set themselves up against Christand His kingdom, and are only allowed by God Almighty to live, as thewild beasts of the desert or scorpions and serpents are allowed to live?Let them live, but let us defend ourselves against their teeth andfangs. Are the overseers of God's people, in a world of shame, to bemere philosophical Gallios, indifferent to our higher interests? Is it aChristian duty to permit an avalanche of evils to overwhelm the Churchon the plea of toleration? Shall we suffer, when we have the power toprevent it, a pandemonium of scoffers and infidels and sentimentalcasuists to run riot in the city which is intrusted to us to guard? Notthus will we be disloyal to our trusts. Men have souls to save, and wewill come to the rescue with any weapons we can lay our hands upon. TheChurch is the only hope of the world, not merely in our unsettled times, but for all ages. And hence I, as the guardian of those spiritualprinciples which lie at the root of all healthy progress incivilization, and all religious life, will not tamely and ignobly seethose principles subverted by dangerous and infidel speculations, evenif they are attractive to cultivated but irreligious classes. "

Such may have been the arguments, it is not unreasonable tosuppose, which influenced the great Leo in his undoubtedpersecutions, --persecutions, we should remember, which were thenindorsed by the Catholic Church. They would be condemned in our times byall enlightened men, but they were the only remedy known in that ageagainst dangerous opinions. So Leo put down the Manicheans and preservedthe unity of the faith, which was of immeasurable importance in the seaof anarchies which at that time was submerging all the traditions ofthe past. 

Leo also distinguished himself by writing a treatise on theIncarnation, --said to be the ablest which has come down to us from theprimitive Church. He was one of those men who believed in theology as aseries of divine declarations, to be cordially received whether they arefully grasped by the intellect or not. These declarations pertain tomost momentous interests, and hence transcend in dignity any questionwhich mere philosophy ever attempted to grasp, or physical science everbrought forward. In spite of the sneers of the infidels, or the attacksof _savans_, or the temporary triumph of false opinions, let us rememberthey have endured during the mighty conflicts of the last eighteenhundred years, and will endure through all the conflicts of ages, --themight, the majesty, and the glory of the kingdom of Christ. Whoever thusconserves truths so important is a great benefactor, whether neglectedor derided, whether despised or persecuted. 

In addition to the labors of Leo to preserve the integrity of thereceived faith among the semi-barbaric western nations, his efforts wereequally great to heal the disorders of the Church. He reformedecclesiastical discipline in Africa, rent by Arian factions and Donatistschismatics. He curtailed the abuses of metropolitan tyranny in Gaul. Hesent his legates to preside over the councils of Ephesus and Chalcedon. He sat in judgment between Vienna and Arles. He fought for theindependence of the Church against emperors and barbaric chieftains. Heencouraged literature and missions and schools and the spread of theBible. He was the paragon of a bishop, --a man of transcendent dignity ofcharacter, as well as a Father of the Church Universal, of whom allChristendom should be proud. 

Among Leo's memorable acts as one of the great lights of his age was thepart he was called upon to perform as a powerful intercessor withbarbaric kings. When Attila with his swarm of Mongol conquerors appearedin Italy, --the "scourge of God, " as he was called; the instrument ofProvidence in punishing the degenerate rulers and people of the fallingEmpire, --Leo was sent by the affrighted emperor to the barbarian's campto make what terms he could. The savage Hun, who feared not the armiesof the emperor, stood awe-struck, we are told, before the minister ofGod; and, swayed by his eloquence and personal dignity, consented toretire from Italy for the hand of the princess Honoria. And whenafterwards Genseric, at the head of his Vandals, became master of thecapital, he was likewise influenced by the powerful intercession of thebishop, and consented to spare the lives of the Romans, and preserve thepublic buildings and churches from conflagration. Genseric could notyield up the spoil of the fallen capital, and his soldiers transportedto Carthage, the seat of the new Vandal kingdom, the riches and trophieswhich illustrious generals had won, --yea, the treasures of threereligions; the gods of the capitoline temple, the golden candlestickswhich Titus brought from Jerusalem, and the sacred vessels which adornedthe churches of the Christians, and which Alaric had spared. 

Thus far the intrepid bishop of Rome--for he was nothing more--callsforth our sympathy and admiration for the hand he had in establishingthe faith and healing the divisions of the Church, for which he earnedthe title of Saint. He taught no errors like Origen, and pushed out notheological doctrines into a jargon of metaphysics like Athanasius. Hewas more practical than Jerome, and more moderate than Augustine. 

But he instituted a claim, from motives of policy, which subsequentlyripened into an irresistible government, on which the papal structure asan institution or polity rests. He did not put forth this claim, however, until the old capital of the Caesars was humiliated, vanquished, and completely prostrated as a political power. When theEternal City was taken a second time, and her riches plundered, and herproud palaces levelled with the dust; when her amphitheatre wasdeserted, her senatorial families were driven away as fugitives and soldas slaves, and her glory was departed, --nothing left her butrecollections and broken columns and ruined temples and weepingmatrons, ashes, groans, and lamentations, miseries and most bittersorrows, --then did her great bishop, intrepid amid general despair, laythe foundation of a new empire, vaster in its influence, if not in itspower, than that which raised itself up among the nations in theproudest days of Vespasian and the Antonines. 

Leo, from one of the devastated hills of Rome, --once crowned withpalaces, temples, and monuments, --looked out upon the Christian world, and saw the desolation spoken of by Jeremy the prophet, as well as bythe Cumaean sibyl: all central power hopelessly prostrated; law andjustice by-words; provinces wasted, decimated, and anarchical;literature and art crushed; vice, in all its hateful deformity, rampantand multiplying itself; false opinions gaining ground; Christiansadopting the errors of Paganism; soldiers turned into banditti; thecontemplative hiding themselves in caves and deserts; the rich madeslaves; barbarians everywhere triumphant; women shrieking in terror;bishops praying in despair, --a world disordered, a pandemonium of devilslet loose, one terrific and howling mass of moral and physicaldesolation such as had never been seen since Noah entered into the ark. 

Amid this dreary wreck of the old civilization, which had been supposedto be eternal, what were Leo's designs and thoughts? In this mournfulcrisis, what did he dream of in his sad and afflicted soul? To fleeinto a monastery, as good men in general despair and wretchedness did, and patiently wait for the coming of his Lord, and for the newdispensation? Not at all: he contemplated the restoration of the eternalcity, --a new creation which should succeed destruction; the foundationof a new power which should restore law, preserve literature, subdue thebarbarians, introduce a still higher civilization than that which hadperished, --not by bringing back the Caesars, but by making himselfCaesar; a revived central power which the nations should respect andobey. That which the world needed was this new central power, to settledifficulties, depose tyrants, establish a common standard of faith andworship, encourage struggling genius, and conserve peace. Who but theChurch could do this? The Church was the last hope of the fallen Empire. The Church should put forth her theocratic aspirations. The keys ofSaint Peter should be more potent than the sceptres of kings. The Churchshould not be crushed in the general desolation. She was still themighty power of the world. Christianity had taken hold of the hearts andminds of men, and raised its voice to console and encourage amiduniversal despair. Men's thoughts were turned to God and to hisvicegerents. He was mighty to save. His promises were a gloriousconsolation. The Church should arise, put on her beautiful garments, and go on from conquering to conquer. A theocracy should restorecivilization. The world wanted a new Christian sovereign, reigning bydivine right, not by armies, not by force, --by an appeal to the futurefears and hopes of men. Force had failed: it was divided against itself. Barbaric chieftains defied the emperors and all temporal powers. Rivalgenerals desolated provinces. The world was plunging into barbarism. Theimperial sceptre was broken. Not a diadem, but a tiara, must be theemblem of universal sovereignty. Not imperial decrees, but papal bulls, must now rule the world. Who but the Bishop of Rome could wear thistiara? Who but he could be the representative of the new theocracy? Hewas the bishop of the metropolis whose empire never could pass away. Buthis city was in ruins. If his claim to precedency rested on the grandeurof his capital, he must yield to the Bishop of Constantinople. He mustfound a new claim, not on the greatness and antiquity of his capital, but on the superstitious veneration of the Christian world, --a claimwhich would be accepted. 

Now it happened that one of Leo's predecessors had instituted such aclaim, which he would revive and enforce with new energy. Innocent hadmaintained, forty years before Leo, that the primacy of the Roman Seewas derived from Saint Peter, --that Christ had delegated to Petersupreme power as chief of the apostles; and that he, as the successorof Saint Peter, was entitled to his jurisdiction and privileges. This isthe famous _jus divinum_ principle which constitutes the corner-stone ofthe papal fabric. On this claim was based the subsequent encroachmentsof the popes. Leo saw the force of this claim, and adopted it andintrenched himself behind it, and became forthwith more formidable thanany of his predecessors or any living bishop; and he was sure that solong as the claim was allowed, no matter whether his city was great orsmall, his successors would become the spiritual dictators ofChristendom. The dignity and power of the Roman bishop were now based ona new foundation. He was still venerable from the souvenirs of theEmpire, but more potent as the successor of the chief of the apostles. Ambrose had successfully asserted the independent spiritual power of thebishops; Leo seized that sceptre and claimed it for the Bishop of Rome. 

Protestants are surprised and indignant that this haughty and falseclaim (as they view it) should have been allowed; it only shows to whatdepth of superstition the Christian world had already sunk. What aninsult to the reason and learning of the world! What preposterousarrogance and assumption! Where are the proofs that Saint Peter wasreally the first bishop of Rome, even? And if he were, where are theScripture proofs that he had precedency over the other apostles? Andmore, where do we learn in the Scriptures that any prerogative could betransmitted to successors? Where do we find that the successors of Peterwere entitled to jurisdiction over the whole Church? Christ, it is true, makes use of the expression of a "rock" on which his Church should bebuilt. But Christ himself is the rock, not a mortal man. "Otherfoundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ, "--atruth reiterated even by Saint Augustine, the great and acknowledgedtheologian of the Catholic Church, although Augustine's views of sin anddepravity are no more relished by the Roman Catholics of our day thanthe doctrines of Luther himself, who drew his theological system, likeCalvin, from Augustine more than from any other man, except Saint Paul. 

But arrogant and unfounded as was the claim of Leo, --that Peter, notChrist, was the rock on which the Church is founded, --it was generallyaccepted by the bishops of the day. Everything tended to confirm it, especially the universal idea of a necessary unity of the Church. Theremust be a head of the Church on earth, and who could be lawfully thathead other than the successor of the apostle to whom Christ had giventhe keys of heaven and hell?

But this claim, considering the age when it was first advanced, had theinspiration of genius. It was most opportune. The Bishop of Rome wouldsoon have been reduced to the condition of other metropolitans had hisdignity rested on the greatness of his capital. He now became theinterpreter of his own decrees, --an arch-pontiff ruling by divine right. His power became indefinite and unlimited. Just in proportion to thedepth of the religious sentiment of the newly converted barbarians wouldbe his ascendancy over them; and the Germanic races were religiouspeoples like the early Greeks and Romans. Tacitus points out thissentiment of religion as one of their leading characteristics. It wasnot the worship of ancestors, as among the Aryan races until Grecian andRoman civilization was developed. It was more like the worship of theinvisible powers of Nature; for in the rock, the mountain, the river, the forest, the sun, the stars, the storms, the rude Teutonic mind saw aprotecting or avenging deity. They easily transferred to the Christianclergy the reverence they had bestowed on the old priests of Odin, ofFreya, and of Thor. Reverence was one of the great sentiments of ourGerman ancestors. It was only among such a people that an overpoweringspiritual despotism could be maintained. The Pope became to them thevicegerent of the great Power which they adored. The records of the racedo not show such another absorbing pietism as was seen in the monasticretreats of the Middle Ages, except among the Brahmans and Buddhists ofIndia. This religious fervor the popes were to make use of, to extendtheir empire. 

And that nothing might be wanted to cement their power which had beenthus assured, the Emperor Valentinian III. --a monarch controlled byLeo--passed in the year 445 this celebrated decree:--

"The primacy of the Apostolic See having been established by the meritof Saint Peter, its founder, the sacred Council of Nice, and the dignityof the city of Rome, we thus declare our irrevocable edict, that allbishops, whether in Gaul or elsewhere, shall make no innovation withoutthe sanction of the Bishop of Rome; and, that the Apostolic See mayremain inviolable, all bishops who shall refuse to appear before thetribunal of the Bishop of Rome, when cited, shall be constrained toappear by the governor of the province. "

Thus firmly was the Papacy rooted in the middle of the fifth century, not only by the encroachments of bishops, but by the authority ofemperors. The papal dominion begins, as an institution, with Leo theGreat. As a religion it began when Paul and Peter preached at Rome. Itsinstitution was peculiar and unique; a great spiritual governmentusurping the attributes of other governments, as predicted by Daniel, and, at first benignant, ripening into a gloomy tyranny, --a tyranny sounscrupulous and grasping as to become finally, in the eyes of Luther, an evil power. As a religion, as I have said, it did not widely departfrom the primitive creeds until it added to the doctrines generallyaccepted by the Church, and even still by Protestants, those otherdogmas which were means to an end, --that end the possession of power andits perpetuation among ignorant people. Yet these dogmas, false as theyare, never succeeded in obscuring wholly the truths which are taught inthe gospel, or in extinguishing faith in the world. In all theencroachments of the Papacy, in all the triumphs of an unauthorizedChurch polity, the flame of true Christian piety has been dimmed, butnot extinguished. And when this fatal and ambitious polity shall havepassed away before the advance of reason and civilization, as othergovernments have been overturned, the lamp of piety will yet burn, as inother churches, since it will be fed by the Bible and the Providence ofGod. Governments and institutions pass away, but not religions;certainly not the truths originally declared among the mountains ofJudea, which thus far have proved the elevation of nations. 

It is then the government, not the religion, which Leo inaugurated, withwhich we have to do. And let us remember in reference to thisgovernment, which became so powerful and absolute, that Leo only laidthe foundation. He probably did not dream of subjecting the princes ofthe earth except in matters which pertained to his supremacy as aspiritual ruler. His aim was doubtless spiritual, not temporal. He hadno such deep designs as Hildebrand and Innocent III. Cherished. Theencroachments of later ages he did not anticipate. His doctrine was, "Render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's, and unto God thethings which are God's. " As the vicegerent of the Almighty, which hefelt himself to be in spiritual matters, he would institute aguardianship over everything connected with religion, even education, which can never be properly divorced from it. He was the patron ofschools, as he was of monasteries. He could advise kings: he could notimpose upon them his commands (except in Church matters), as BonifaceVIII. Sought to do. He would organize a network of Church functionaries, not of State officers; for he was the head of a great religiousinstitution. He would send his legates to the end of the earth tosuperintend the work of the Church, and rebuke princes, and protestagainst wars; for he had the religious oversight of Christendom. 

Now when we consider that there was no central power in Europe at thistime, that the barbaric princes were engaged in endless wars, and that afearful gloom was settling upon everything pertaining to education andpeace and order; that even the clergy were ignorant, and the peoplesuperstitious; that everything was in confusion, tending to a worseconfusion, to perfect anarchy and barbaric license; that provincialcouncils were no longer held; that bishops and abbots were abdicatingtheir noblest functions, --we feel that the spiritual supremacy which Leoaimed to establish had many things to be said in its support; that hiscentral rule was a necessity of the times, keeping civilization fromutter ruin. 

In the first place, what a great idea it was to preserve the unity ofthe Church, --the idea of Cyprian and Augustine and all the greatFathers, --an idea never exploded, and one which we even in these timesaccept, though not in the sense understood by the Roman Catholics! Wecannot conceive of the Church as established by the apostles, withoutrecognizing the necessity of unity in doctrines and discipline. Who inthat age could conserve this unity unless it were a great spiritualmonarch? In our age books, universities, theological seminaries, thepress, councils, and an enlightened clergy can see that no harm comes tothe great republic which recognizes Christ as the invisible head. Not sofifteen hundred years ago. The idea of unity could only be realized bythe exercise of sufficient power in one man to preserve the integrity ofthe orthodox faith, since ignorance and anarchy covered the earth withtheir funereal shades. 

The Protestants are justly indignant in view of subsequent encroachmentsand tyrannies. But these were not the fault of Leo. Everything good inits day is likely to be perverted. The whole history of society is thehistory of the perversion of institutions originally beneficent. Takethe great foundations for education and other moral and intellectualnecessities, which were established in the Middle Ages by good men. Seehow these are perverted and misused even in such glorious universitiesas Oxford and Cambridge. See how soon the primitive institutions ofapostles were changed, in order to facilitate external conquests andmake the Church a dignified worldly power. Not only are we to rememberthat everything good has been perverted, and ever will be, but that allgovernments, religious and civil, seem to be, in one sense, expediencies, --that is, adapted to the necessities and circumstances ofthe times. In the Bible there are no settled laws definitely laid downfor the future government of the Church, --certainly not for thegovernment of States and cities. A government which was best for theprimitive Christians of the first two centuries was not adapted to thecondition of the Church in the third and fourth centuries, else therewould not have been bishops. If we take a narrow-minded and partisanview of bishops, we might say that they always have existed since thetimes of the apostles; the Episcopalians might affirm that the earlychurches were presided over by bishops, and the Presbyterians that everyordained minister was a bishop, --that elder and bishop are synonymous. But that is a contest about words, not things. In reality, episcopalpower, as we understand it, was not historically developed till therewas a large increase in the Christian communities, especially in greatcities, where several presbyters were needed, one of whom presided overthe rest. Some such episcopal institution, I am willing to concede, wasa necessity, although I cannot clearly see the divine authority for it. In like manner other changes became necessary, which did not militateagainst the welfare of the Church, but tended to preserve it. Newdignities, new organizations, new institutions for the government of theChurch successively arose. All societies must have a government. This isa law recognized in the nature of things. So Christian society must beorganized and ruled according to the necessities of the times; and theScriptures do not say what these shall be, --they are imperative anddefinite only in matters of faith and morals. To guard the faith, topurify the morals according to the Christian standard, overseers, officers, rulers are required. In the early Church they were allbrethren. The second and third century made bishops. The next age madearchbishops and metropolitans and patriarchs. The age which succeededwas the age of Leo; and the calamities and miseries and anarchies andignorance of the times, especially the rule of barbarians, seemed topoint to a monarchical head, a more theocratic government, --agovernment so august and sacred that it could not be resisted. 

And there can be but little doubt that this was the best government forthe times. Let me illustrate by civil governments. There is no law laiddown in the Bible for these. In the time of our Saviour the world wasgoverned by a universal monarch. The imperial rule had become anecessity. It was tyrannical; but Paul as well as Christ exhorted hisfollowers to accept it. In process of time, when the Empire fell, everyold province had a king, --indeed there were several kings in France, aswell as in Germany and Spain. The prelates of the Church never lifted uptheir voice against the legality of this feudo-kingly rule. Then came arevolt, after the Reformation, against the government of kings. NewEngland and other colonies became small republics, almost democracies. On the hills of New England, with a sparse rural population and smallcities, the most primitive form of government was the best. It wasvirtually the government of townships. The selectmen were the overseers;and, following the necessities of the times, the ministers of the gospelwere generally Independents or Congregationalists, not clergy of theEstablished Church of Old England. Both the civil and the religiousgovernments which they had were the best for the people. But what wassuited to Massachusetts would not be fit for England or France. See howour government has insensibly drifted towards a strong central power. What must be the future necessities of such great cities as New York, Philadelphia, and Chicago, --where even now self-government is a failure, and the real government is in the hands of rings of politicians, backedby foreign immigrants and a lawless democracy? Will the wise, thevirtuous, and the rich put up forever with such misrule as these citieshave had, especially since the Civil War? And even if other institutionsshould gradually be changed, to which we now cling with patriotic zeal, it may be for the better and not the worse. Those institutions are thebest which best preserve the morals and liberties of the people; andsuch institutions will gradually arise as the country needs, unlessthere shall be a general shipwreck of laws, morals, and faith, which Ido not believe will come. It is for the preservation of these laws, morals, and doctrines that all governments are held responsible. Achange in the government is nothing; a decline of morals and faith iseverything. 

I make these remarks in order that we may see that the rise of a greatcentral power in the hands of the Bishop of Rome, in the fifth century, may have been a great public benefit, perhaps a necessity. It becamecorrupt; it forgot its mission. Then it was attacked by Luther. Itceased to rule England and a part of Germany and other countries wherethere were higher public morals and a purer religious faith. Some fearthat the rule of the Roman Church will be re-established in thiscountry. Never, --only its religion. The Catholic Church may plant herprelates in every great city, and the whole country may be regarded bythem as missionary ground for the re-establishment of the papal polity. But the moment this polity raises its head and becomes arrogant, andseeks to subvert the other established institutions of the country orprevent the use of the Bible in schools, it will be struck down, even asthe Jesuits were once banished from France and Spain. Its religion willremain, --may gain new adherents, become the religion of vast multitudes. But it is not the faith which the Roman Catholic Church professes toconserve which I fear. That is very much like that of Protestants, inthe main. It is the institutions, the polity, the government of thatChurch which I speak of, with its questionable means to gain power, itsopposition to the free circulation of the Bible, its interference withpopular education, its prelatical assumptions, its professed allegianceto a foreign potentate, though as wise and beneficent as Pio Nono or thereigning Pope. 

In the time of Leo there were none of these things. It was a poor, miserable, ignorant, anarchical, superstitious age. In such an age theconcentration of power in the hands of an intelligent man is always apublic benefit. Certainly it was wielded wisely by Leo, and forbeneficent ends. He established the patristic literature. The writingsof the great Fathers were by him scattered over Europe, and were studiedby the clergy, so far as they were able to study anything. All the greatdoctrines of Augustine and Jerome and Athanasius were defended. Thewhole Church was made to take the side of orthodoxy, and it remainedorthodox to the times of Bernard and Anselm. Order was restored to themonasteries; and they so rapidly gained the respect of princes and goodmen that they were richly endowed, and provision made in them for theeducation of priests. Everywhere cathedral schools were established. Thecanon law supplanted in a measure the old customs of the German forestsand the rude legislation of feudal chieftains. When bishops quarrelledwith monasteries or with one another, or even with barons, appeals weresent to Rome, and justice was decreed. In after times these appeals weresettled on venal principles, but not for centuries. The early Mediaevalpopes were the defenders of justice and equity. And they promoted peaceamong quarrelsome barons, as well as Christian truth among divines. Theyset aside, to some extent, those irascible and controversial councilswhere good and great men were persecuted for heresy. These popes had nosmall passions to gratify or to stimulate. They were the conservators ofthe peace of Europe, as all reliable historians testify. They weregenerally very enlightened men, --the ablest of their times. Theyestablished canons and laws which were based on wisdom, which stood thetest of ages, and which became venerable precedents. 

The Catholic polity was only gradually established, sustained byexperience and reason. And that is the reason why it has been sopermanent. It was most admirably adapted to rule the ignorant in ages ofcruelty and crime, --and, I am inclined to think, to rule the ignorantand superstitious everywhere. Great critics are unanimous in theirpraises of that wonderful mechanism which ruled the world for onethousand years. 

Nor did the popes, for several centuries after Leo, grasp the temporalpowers of princes. As political monarchs they were at first poor andinsignificant. The Papacy was not politically a great power until thetime of Hildebrand, nor a rich temporal power till nearly the era of theReformation. It was a spiritual power chiefly, just such as it isdestined to become again, --the organizer of religious forces; and, sofar as these are animated by the gospel and reason, they are likely tohave a perpetuated influence. Who can predict the end of a spiritualempire which shows no signs of decay? It is not half so corrupt as itwas in the time of Boniface VIII. , nor half so feeble as in the time ofLeo X. It is more majestic and venerable than in the time of Luther. Norare Protestants so bitter and one-sided as they were fifty years ago. They begin to judge this great power by broader principles; to view itas it really is, --not as "Antichrist" and the "scarlet mother, " but as avenerable institution, with great abuses, having at heart the interestsof those whom it grinds down and deceives. 

But, after all, I do not in this Lecture present the Papacy of theeleventh century or the nineteenth, but the Papacy of the fifth century, as organized by Leo. True, its fundamental principles as a governmentare the same as then. These principles I do not admire, especially foran enlightened era. I only palliate them in reference to the wants of adark and miserable age, and as a critic insist upon their notablesuccess in the age that gave them birth. 

With these remarks on the regimen, the polity, and the government of theChurch of which Leo laid the foundation, and which he adapted tobarbarous ages, when the Church was still a struggling power andChristianity itself little better than nominal, --long before it had muchmodified the laws or changed the morals of society; long before it hadcreated a new civilization, --with these remarks, acceptable, it may be, neither to Catholics nor to Protestants, I turn once more to the manhimself. Can you deny his title to the name of Great? Would you take himout of the galaxy of illustrious men whom we still call Fathers andSaints? Even Gibbon praises his exalted character. What would theChurch of the Middle Ages have been without such aims and aspirations?Oh, what a benevolent mission the Papacy performed in its best ages, mitigating the sorrows of the poor, raising the humble from degradation, opposing slavery and war, educating the ignorant, scattering the Word ofGod, heading off the dreadful tyranny of feudalism, elevating thelearned to offices of trust, shielding the pious from the rapacity ofbarons, recognizing man as man, proclaiming Christian equalities, holding out the hopes of a future life to the penitent believer, andproclaiming the sovereignty of intelligence over the reign of bruteforces and the rapacity of ungodly men! All this did Leo, and hisimmediate successors. And when he superadded to the functions of a greatreligious magistrate the virtues of the humblest Christian, --partingwith his magnificent patrimony to feed the poor, and proclaiming (withan eloquence unusual in his time) the cardinal doctrines of theChristian faith, and setting himself as an example of the virtues whichhe preached, --we concede his claim to be numbered among the greatbenefactors of mankind. How much worse Roman Catholicism would have beenbut for his august example and authority! How much better to educate theignorant people, who have souls to save, by the patristic than byheathen literature, with all its poison of false philosophies andcorrupting stimulants! Who, more than he and his immediate successors, taught loyalty to God as the universal Sovereign, and the virtuesgenerated by a peaceful life, --patriotism, self-denial, and faith? Hewas a dictator only as Bernard was, ruling by the power of learning andsanctity. As an original administrative genius he was scarcely surpassedby Gregory VII. Above all, he sought to establish faith in the world. Reason had failed. The old civilization was a dismal mockery of theaspirations of man. The schools of Athens could make Sophists, rhetoricians, dialecticians, and sceptics. But the faith of the Fatherscould bring philosophers to the foot of the Cross. What were materialconquests to these conquests of the soul, to this spiritual reign of theinvisible principles of the kingdom of Christ?

So, as the vicegerents of Almighty power, the popes began to reign. Ridicule not that potent domination. What lessons of human experience, what great truths of government, what principles of love and wisdom areinterwoven with it! Its growth is more suggestive than the rise of anytemporal empires. It has produced more illustrious men than any Europeanmonarchy. And it aimed to accomplish far grander ends, --even obedienceto the eternal laws which God has decreed for the public and privatelives of men. It is invested with more poetic interest. Its doctors, itsdignitaries, its saints, its heroes, its missions, and its laws rise upbefore us in sublime grandeur when seriously contemplated. It failed atlast, when no longer needed. But it was not until its encroachments andcorruptions shocked the reason of the world, and showed a painfulcontrast to those virtues which originally sustained it, that earnestmen arose in indignation, and declared that this perverted institutionshould no longer be supported by the contributions of more enlightenedages; that it had become a tyrannical and dangerous government, to beassailed and broken up. It has not yet passed away. It has survived theReformation and the attacks of its countless enemies. How long thispower of blended good and evil will remain we cannot predict. But onething we do know, --that the time will come when all governments shallbecome the kingdoms of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ; and Christiantruth alone shall so permeate all human institutions that the forces ofevil shall be driven forever into the immensity of eternal night. 

With the Pontificate of Leo the Great that dark period which we call the"Middle Ages" may be said to begin. The disintegration of society thenwas complete, and the reign of ignorance and superstition had set in. With the collapse of the old civilization a new power had become anecessity. If anything marked the Middle Ages it was the reign ofpriests and nobles. This reign it will be my object to present in theLectures which are to fill the next volume of this Work, together withsubjects closely connected with papal domination and feudal life. 

AUTHORITIES. 

Works of Leo, edited by Quesnel; Zosimus; Socrates; Theodoret; Fleury'sEcclesiastical History; Tillemont's Histoire des Empereurs; Gibbon'sDecline and Fall; Beugot's Histoire de la Destruction du Paganism;Alexander de Saint Chéron's Histoire du Pontificat de Saint Leo leGrande, et de son Siècle; Dumoulin's Vie et Religion de deux Papes LéonI. Et Grégoire I. ; Maimbourg's Histoire du Pontificat de Saint Léon;Arendt's Leo der Grosse und seine Zeit; Butler's Lives of the Saints;Neander; Milman's Latin Christianity; Biographie Universelle;Encyclopaedia Britannica. The Church historians universally praisethis Pope.