Posterity, in pity to his misfortunes, has cast a veil over his vices. We consider that young prince as the innocent victim of his brother's ambition, without recollecting that he himself wanted power, rather than inclination, to consummate the same attempts of revenge and murder.*

The crime went not unpunished. Neither business, nor pleasure, nor flattery, could defend Caracalla from the stings of a guilty conscience; and he confessed, in the anguish of a tortured mind, that his disordered fancy often beheld the angry forms of his father and his brother, rising into life, to threaten and upbraid him. The consciousness of his crime should have induced him to convince mankind, by the virtues of his reign, that the bloody deed had been the involuntary effect of fatal necessity. But the repentance of Caracalla only prompted him to remove from the world whatever could remind him of his guilt, or recall the memory of his murdered brother. On his return from the senate to the palace, he found his mother in the company of several noble matrons, weeping over the untimely fate of her younger son. The jealous emperor threatened them with instant death; the sentence was executed against Fadilla, the last remaining daughter of the Emperor Marcus; and even the afflicted Julia was obliged to silence her lamentations, to suppress her sighs, and to receive the assassin with smiles of joy and approbation. It was computed that, under the vague appellation of the friends of Geta, above twenty thousand persons of both sexes suffered death. His guards and freedmen, the ministers of his serious business, and the companions of his looser hours, those who by his interest had been promoted to any commands in the army or provinces, with the long-connected chain of their dependants, were included in the proscription; which endeavoured to reach every one who had maintained the smallest corressit vivus, said his brother (Hist. August. p. 91). Some marks of Geta's consecration are still found upon medals. The favourable opinion entertained of Geta by posterity, was not inspired by pity alone. It was confirmed by the universal sentiment of the Romans, and the testimony of contemporary writers. He indulged too freely in the luxuries of the table, and was distrustful of his brother to a violent extreme; but he was kind, affable, and well-informed, and often exerted himself to soften the rigorous orders issued by his father and brother. Herodian, 1. 4, c. 3. Spartianus in Geta, c. 4.—WENCK. + Dion, 1. 77,

pondence with Geta, who lamented his death, or who even mentioned his name.* Helvius Pertinax, son to the prince of that name, lost his life by an unseasonable witticism.† It was a sufficient crime of Thrasea Priscus to be descended from a family in which the love of liberty seemed an hereditary quality. The particular causes of calumny and suspicion were at length exhausted; and when a senator was accused of being a secret enemy to the government, the emperor was satisfied with the general proof that he was a man of property and virtue. From this well-grounded principle he frequently drew the most bloody inferences.

The execution of so many innocent citizens was bewailed by the secret tears of their friends and families. The death of Papinian, the prætorian prefect, was lamented as a public calamity. During the last seven years of Severus, he had exercised the most important offices of the state, and, by his salutary influence, guided the emperor's steps in the paths of justice and moderation. In full assurance of his virtues and abilities, Severus, on his death-bed, had conjured him to watch over the prosperity and union of the imperial p. 1307. * Dion, 1. 77, p. 1290. Herodian, 1. 4, p. 150. Dion (p. 1298) says, that the comic poets no longer durst employ the name of Geta in their plays, and that the estates of those who mentioned it in their testaments, were confiscated. + Caracalla had assumed the names of several conquered nations; Pertinax observed, that the name of Geticus (he had obtained some advantage of the Goths or Getæ), would be a proper addition to Parthicus, Alemannicus, &c. Hist. August. p. 89. Dion, 1. 77, p. 1291. He was probably descended from Helvidius Priscus, and Thrasea Pætus, those patriots, whose firm, but useless and unseasonable virtue has been immortalized by Tacitus. [Virtue is not a good, the worth of which may be calculated like the income of a capital; its noblest triumph is, that it does not succumb, even when it is "useless" for the public advantage, and 'unseasonable" amid surrounding vice, as was that of Thrasea Pætus. "Ad postremum Nero virtutem ipsam exscindere voluit, interfecto Thrasea Pato" (Nero at last wished to exterminate virtue itself, by putting to death Thrasea Pætus) was the remark of Tacitus. How cold is the language of Gibbon, compared with the animated expressions of Justus Lipsius, who, when he came to this illustrious name, exclaimed-" Salve! O salve! vir magne, et inter Romanos sapientes sanctum mihi nomen! Tu magnum decus Gallicæ gentis; tu ornamentum Romanæ curiæ; tu aureum sidus tenebrosi illius ævi. Tua, inter homines, non hominis vita; nova probitas, constantia, gravitas; et vitæ et mortis æqualis tenor!" (Hail! Oh hail! name of a great man, sacred to me among the wise of Rome. Glory of the Gallic race! Ornament of the Roman senate-house! Refulgent star of that be

family. The honest labours of Papinian served only to inflame the hatred which Caracalla had already conceived against his father's minister. After the murder of Geta, the prefect was commanded to exert the powers of his skill and eloquence in a studied apology for that atrocious deed. The philosophic Seneca had condescended to compose a similar epistle to the senate, in the name of the son and assassin of Agrippina.† That it was easier to commit than to justify a parricide, was the glorious reply of Papinian,‡ who did not hesitate between the loss of life and that of honour. Such intrepid virtue, which had escaped pure and unsullied from the intrigues of courts, the habits of business, and the arts of his profession, reflects more lustre on the memory of Papinian, than all his great employments, his numerous writings, and the superior reputation as a lawyer, which he has preserved through every age of the Roman jurisprudence.§

It had hitherto been the peculiar felicity of the Romans, and in the worst of times their consolation, that the virtue of the emperors was active, and their vice indolent. Augustus, Trajan, Hadrian, and Marcus, visited their extensive dominions in person, and their progress was marked by acts of wisdom and beneficence. The tyranny of Tiberius, Nero, and Domitian, who resided almost constantly at Rome, or in the adjacent villas, was confined to the senatorial and equestrian orders. But Caracalla was nighted age! Though among men, not thine the life of man! Unrivalled virtue, firmness, wisdom thine! In life and death, the same thy even way!) Nero himself did not regard the virtue of Thrasea as useless. Soon after the death of this courageous senator, whom he feared and hated, he replied to a man, who complained of the manner in which a lawsuit had been decided by Thrasea: "Would that Thrasea had been as much my friend as he was an upright judge!" Εβουλόμην ἄν Θρασέαν οὕτως ἐμὲ φιλεῖν ὡς δικαστής ἄριστος ἐστὶν. Plutarch. Mor. Пoλirika Пapayyeλuara, c. 14.-GUIZOT.] It is said that Papinian was himself a relation of the empress Julia. Tacit. Annal. 14, 2. Hist. August. p. 88. § With regard to Papinian, see Heineccius's Historia Juris Romani, 1. 330, &c. [Papinian was not the prætorian prefect. On the death of Severus, Caracalla deprived so unwelcome a monitor of the office. So Dion says (p. 1287), and the contrary statement of Spartianus, who affirms that Papinian held the office till his death, is of little weight against that of a senator, who lived in Rome. Papinian had always been odious to Caracalla, as a man of rigid virtue, and as one of Geta's friends.— WENCK.] Tiberius and Domitian never moved from the neigh

the common enemy of mankind. He left the capital (and he never returned to it) about a year after the murder of Geta. The rest of his reign was spent in the several provinces of the empire, particularly those of the east, and every province was, by turns, the scene of his rapine and cruelty. The senators, compelled by fear to attend his capricious motions, were obliged to provide daily entertainments, at an immense expense, which he abandoned with contempt to his guards; and to erect, in every city, magnificent palaces and theatres, which he either disdained to visit, or ordered to be immediately thrown down. The most wealthy families were ruined by partial fines and confiscations, and the great body of his subjects oppressed by ingenious and aggravated taxes.* In the midst of peace, and upon the slightest provocation, he issued his commands, at Alexandria in Egypt, for a general massacre. From a secure post in the temple of Serapis, he viewed and directed the slaughter of many thousand citizens, as well as strangers, without distinguishing either the number or the crime of the sufferers; since, as he coolly informed the senate, all the Alexandrians, those who had perished and those who had escaped, were alike guilty.†

The wise instructions of Severus never made any lasting impression on the mind of his son, who, although not destitute of imagination and eloquence, was equally devoid of judgment and humanity. One dangerous maxim, worthy of a tyrant, was remembered and abused by Caracalla, to secure the affections of the army, and to esteem the rest of his subjects as of little moment.§ But the liberality of

"Et

bourhood of Rome. Nero made a short journey into Greece. laudatorum principum usus ex æquo quamvis procul agentibus. Sævi proximis ingruunt." Tacit. Hist. 4, 75. *Dion, 1. 77, p. 1294. Dion, I. 77. p. 1307. Herodian, 1. 4, p. 158. The former represents it as a cruel massacre, the latter as a perfidious one too. It seems probable that the Alexandrians had irritated the tyrant by their railleries, and perhaps by their tumults. [After these massacres, Caracalla suppressed in Alexandria all public shows and banquets. He raised a wall which divided the city into two parts, and encompassed it by forts, so that the citizens could not quickly intercommunicate with each other. 66 "Thus," said Dion, was wretched This name

an

Alexandria treated by the Ausonian wild beast." oracle had given him, and he is said to have been so much pleased with it that he made it his boast. Dion, 1. 77, p. 1307.-GUIZOT.]

Dion, 1. 77, p. 1266. § Dion, 1. 76, p. 1284. Mr. Wotton

the father had been restrained by prudence, and his indulgence to the troops was tempered by firmness and authority. The careless profusion of the son was the policy of one reign, and the inevitable ruin both of the army and of the empire. The vigour of the soldiers, instead of being confirmed by the severe discipline of camps, melted away in the luxury of cities. The excessive increase of their pay and donatives* exhausted the state to enrich the military order, whose modesty in peace, and service in war, are best secured by an honourable poverty. The demeanour of Caracalla was haughty and full of pride; but with the troops he forgot even the proper dignity of his rank, encouraged their insolent familiarity, and, neglecting the essential duties

(Hist. of Rome, p. 330) suspects that this maxim was invented by Caracalla himself, and attributed to his father. * Dion (1. 78, p. 1343) informs us that the extraordinary gifts of Caracalla to the army amounted annually to seventy millions of drachmæ (about 2,350,0007.) There is another passage in Dion, concerning the military pay, infinitely curious, were it not obscure, imperfect, and probably corrupt. The best sense seems to be, that the prætorian guards received twelve hundred and fifty drachmæ (407.) a year. (Dion, 1. 77, p. 1307.) Under the reign of Augustus, they were paid at the rate of two drachmæ, or denarii, per day, seven hundred and twenty a year. (Tacit. Annal. 1, 17.) Domitian, who increased the soldiers' pay one fourth, must have raised the prætorians' to nine hundred and sixty drachmæ. (Gronovius de Pecuniâ Veteri, 1. 3, c. 2.) These successive augmentations ruined the empire; for, with the soldiers' pay, their numbers too were increased. We have seen the prætorians alone increased from ten thousand to fifty thousand men. [Valesius and Reimarus have suggested a very simple and probable explanation of this passage in Dion, which Gibbon appears to have misunderstood. 'O avròS TOTS στρατίωταις ἆθλα τὴς στρατέιας τοῖς μὲν ἐν τῷ δορυφορικῷ τεταγ μένοις ἐς χιλίας διακόσιας πεντήκοντα τοῖς δέ πεντακισχιλίας λαμBávεiv [εonke] Dion, 1. 77, p. 1307. (He ordered that the reward of military service should be 1250 drachmæ for the prætorians, and 5000 for the others.) Valesius thinks that the numbers have been transposed, and that Caracalla fixed for the prætorians a donative of 5000 drachmæ, and 1250 for the legionaries; the former having always received more than the rest. Gibbon was wrong in making this the annual pay of the soldiers: it was a gratuity which they received, when their term of service expired. The meaning of ἀθλὸν τῆς στραélag is, the reward of military service. Augustus fixed that of the prætorians at 5000 drachmæ, after sixteen campaigns, and that of the legionaries at 3000, at the end of twenty years. Caracalla added 5000 to the former, and 1250 to the latter. Gibbon confounded this gratuity, given on their discharge, with the annual pay, and overlooked the transposition of the numbers, which Valesius detected.-GUIZOT.]