PART # 1 > The Extent and Military Force Of The Empire In The Age Of
The Antonines.
In the second century of the Christian Aera, the empire of Rome comprehended the fairest part of the earth, and the most civilized portion of mankind. The frontiers of that extensive monarchy were guarded by ancient renown and disciplined valor. The gentle but powerful influence of laws and manners had gradually cemented the union of the provinces.
# 2 > Their peaceful inhabitants enjoyed and abused the advantages of wealth and luxury. The image of a free constitution was preserved with decent reverence: the Roman senate appeared to possess the sovereign authority, and devolved on the emperors all the executive powers of government. During a happy period of more than fourscore years, the public administration was conducted by the virtue and abilities of Nerva, Trajan, Hadrian, and two Antonines. It is the design of this, and of the two succeeding chapters, to describe the properous condition of their empire; after wards, from the death of Marcus Antoninius, to deduce the most important circumstances of its decline and fall; a revolution which will ever be remembered, and is still felt by the nations of the earth.
# 3 > The principal conquest of the Romans were achieved under the prepublic; and the emperors, for the most part, were satisfied with preserving those dominious which had been acquired by the policy of the senate, the active emulation of the consuls, and the martial enthusiasm of the people. The seven first centuries were filled with a rapid successionof triumphs; but it was reserved for Augustus to relinquish the ambitious design of subduing the whole earth, and to introduce a spirit of moderation into the public councils. Inclined to peace by his temper and situation, it was easy for him to discover that Roman in her present exalted situation, had much less to hope than to fear from the chance of arms; and that, in the prosecution of remote wars, the undertaking became every day more difficult, the event more doubtful, and the possession more precarious, and less benefical. The experience of Augustus added weight to these salutary reflections, and effectually convince him that, by every concession which the safety or the dignity of Rome might require from the most formidable Barbarians. Instead of exposing his person and his legions to the arrows of the Parthians, be obtained, by an honorably treaty, the restitution of the standards and prisoners which had been taken in the defeat of Crassus.
# 4 > His generals, in the early part of his reign, attempted the reduction of Ethiopia and Arabia Felix. They marched near a thousand miles to the south of the tropic; but the heat of the climate soon repelled the invaders, and protected the unwarlike natives of those sequestered regions. The northern countries of Europe scarcly deserved the expense and labor of conquest. The forests and morasses of Germany were filled with a hardy race of barbarians, who despised life when it was separated from freedom; and though, on the first attack, they seemed to yield to the weight of the Roman power, they soon, by a signal act of despair, regained their independence, and reminded Augustus of the vicissitude of fortune. On the death of that emperor his testament was publicly read in the senate. He bequeathed, as a valuable legacy to his successors, the advice of confining the empire within those limits which Nature seemed to have placed as its permanent bulwarks and boundaries; on the west the Atlantic Ocean; the Rhine and Danube on the north; the Euphrates on the east; and toward the south the sandy deserts of Arabia and Africa.
# 5 > Happily for the repose of mankind, the moderate system recommended by the wisdom of Augustus was adopted by the fears the vices of his immediate successors. Engaged in the pursuit of pleasure, or in the exercise of tyranny, the first Caesars seldom showed themselves to the armies or to the provinces; nor were they disposed to suffer that those triumphs which their indolence neglected should be usurped by the conduct and valor of their lieutenants. The military fame of a subject was considered as an insolent in vasion of the Imperial prerogative; and it became the duty, as well an intrest, of every Roman general to guard the frontiers intrusted to his care, without aspiring to conquests which might have proved no less fatal to himself than to the vanquished barbarians.
# 6 > The only accession which the Roman empire received during the first century of the Christian Era was the province of Britain. In this single instance the successors of Ceasar and Augustus were persuaded to follow the example of the former rather than the persuaded of the latter. The proximity of its situation to the coast of Gaul seemed to ivite their arms; the pleasing, though doubtful, intelligence of a pearl fishery attracted theie avarice; and as Britain was viewed in the light of a distinct and insulated world, the conquest scarcely formed any expection to the general system of continental measures. After a war of about forty years, undertaken by the most stupid, maintained by the most dissolute, far greater part of the island submitted to the Roman yoke.
# 7 > The various tribes of Britons possessed valor without conduct, and the love of freedom without the spirit of union. They took up arms with savage fierceness; they laid them down, or turned them against each other with wild inconstancy; and while they fought singlt, they were successively subdued. Neither the fortitude of Caractacus, nor the despair of Boadicea, nor the fanaticism of the Druids, could avert the slavery of their country, or resist the steady progress of the Imperial generals, who maintained the national glory when the throne was disgraced by the weakest or the most various of mankind. At the very time when Domitian, confined to his place, felt the terrors which he inspired, his legions, under the command of the virtuous Agricola, defeated the collected force of the Caledonians at the foot of the Grampian hills; and his fleets, venturing to explore an unknown and dangerous navigation, displayed the Roman arms round every part of the island.
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