The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. Эдвард Гиббон
Чтение книги онлайн.

Читать онлайн книгу The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Эдвард Гиббон страница 13

СКАЧАТЬ life; and that the feeble restraints of order and decency were insufficient to resist the progress of that degenerate spirit which sacrifices, without a blush, the consideration of duty and interest to the base indulgence of sloth and appetite. Ref. 132 The complaints of contemporary writers, who deplore the increase of luxury and depravation of manners, are commonly expressive of their peculiar temper and situation. There are few observers who possess a clear and comprehensive view of the revolutions of society; and who are capable of discovering the nice and secret springs of action which impel, in the same uniform direction, the blind and capricious passions of a multitude of individuals. If it can be affirmed, with any degree of truth, that the luxury of the Romans was more shameless and dissolute in the reign of Theodosius than in the age of Constantine, perhaps, or of Augustus, the alteration cannot be ascribed to any beneficial improvements, which had gradually increased the stock of national riches. A long period of calamity or decay must have checked the industry, and diminished the wealth, of the people; and their profuse luxury must have been the result of that indolent despair which enjoys the present hour and declines the thoughts of futurity. The uncertain condition of their property discouraged the subjects of Theodosius from engaging in those useful and laborious undertakings which require an immediate expense and promise a slow and distant advantage. The frequent examples of ruin and desolation tempted them not to spare the remains of a patrimony which might, every hour, become the prey of the rapacious Goth. And the mad prodigality which prevails in the confusion of a shipwreck or a siege may serve to explain the progress of luxury amidst the misfortunes and terrors of a sinking nation.

      The effeminate luxury which infected the manners of courts and cities had instilled a secret and destructive poison into the camps of the legions; and their degeneracy has been marked by the pen of a military writer who had accurately studied the genuine and ancient principles of Roman discipline. It is the just and important observation of Vegetius that the infantry was invariably covered with defensive armour, from the foundation of the city to the reign of the emperor Gratian. The relaxation of discipline and the disuse of exercise rendered the soldiers less able, and less willing, to support the fatigues of the service; they complained of the weight of the armour, which they seldom wore; and they successfully obtained the permission of laying aside both their cuirasses and their helmets. The heavy weapons of their ancestors, the short sword and the formidable pilum, which had subdued the world, insensibly dropped from their feeble hands. As the use of the shield is incompatible with that of the bow, they reluctantly marched into the field; condemned to suffer either the pain of wounds or the ignominy of flight, and always disposed to prefer the more shameful alternative. The cavalry of the Goths, the Huns and the Alani had felt the benefits, and adopted the use, of defensive armour; and, as they excelled in the management of missile weapons, they easily overwhelmed the naked and trembling legions, whose heads and breasts were exposed, without defence, to the arrows of the Barbarians. The loss of armies, the destruction of cities, and the dishonour of the Roman name ineffectually solicited the successors of Gratian to restore the helmets and cuirasses of the infantry. The enervated soldiers abandoned their own and the public defence; and their pusillanimous indolence may be considered as the immediate cause of the downfall of the empire. Ref. 133

      Footnotes:

       Ref. 002

      Valentinian was less attentive to the religion of his son, since he entrusted [c. ad 364] the education of Gratian to Ausonius, a professed Pagan (Mém. de l’Académie des Inscriptions, tom. xv. p. 125-138). [But in his poem the Ephemeris (before 367 ad; Schenkl, Pref. to his ed. of Ausonius in M.H.G.) he poses not only as a Christian, but as an orthodox Christian.] The poetical fame of Ausonius condemns the taste of his age.

       Ref. 003

      [Decimus Magnus] Ausonius was successively promoted to the Prætorian prefecture of Italy (ad 377) and of Gaul (ad 378), cp. Aus. ii. 2, 42, præfectus Gallis et Libyæ et Latio, and was at length invested with the consulship (ad 379). He expressed his gratitude in a servile and insipid piece of flattery (Actio Gratiarum, p. 699-736) which has survived more worthy productions. [This statement as to the prefectures of Ausonius is not quite accurate; cp. vol. iv. Appendix 5.]

       Ref. 004

      Disputare de principali judicio non oportet. Sacrilegii enim instar est dubitare, an is dignus sit, quem elegerit imperator. Codex Justinian. l. ix. tit. xxix. leg. 3 [2, ed. Krüger]. This convenient law was revived and promulgated after the death of Gratian by the feeble court of Milan.

       Ref. 005

      Ambrose composed, for his instruction, a theological treatise on the faith of the Trinity; and Tillemont (Hist. des Empereurs, tom. v. p. 158, 169) ascribes to the archbishop the merit of Gratian’s intolerant laws.

       Ref. 006

      Qui divinæ legis sanctitatem [aut] nesciendo omittunt [leg. confundunt] aut negligendo violant et offendunt, sacrilegium committunt. Codex Justinian. l. ix. tit. xxix. leg. 1. Theodosius indeed may claim his share in the merit of this comprehensive law.

       Ref. 007

      Ammianus (xxxi. 10) and the younger Victor [Epit. 47] acknowledge the virtues of Gratian, and accuse, or rather lament, his degenerate taste. The odious parallel of Commodus is saved by “licet incruentus”; and perhaps Philostorgius (l. x. c. 10, and Godefroy, p. 412) had guarded with some similar reserve the comparison of Nero.

       Ref. 008

      Zosimus (l. iv. p. 247 [c. 35]) and the younger Victor [ib.] ascribe the revolution to the favour of the Alani and the discontent of the Roman troops. Dum exercitum negligeret, et paucos ex Alanis, quos ingenti auro ad se transtulerat, anteferret veteri ac Romano militi.

       Ref. 009

      Britannia fertilis provincia tyrannorum, is a memorable expression used by Jerom in the Pelagian controversy, and variously tortured in the disputes of our national antiquaries. The revolutions of the last age appeared to justify the image of the sublime Bossuet, “cette isle, plus orageuse que les mers qui l’environnent.”

       Ref. 010

      Zosimus says of the British soldiers, τω̂ν ἄλλων ἁπάντων πλέον αὐθαδείᾳ καὶ θυμῷ νικωμένους [ib. Ausonius describes Maximus as armigeri sub nomine lixa, Ord. urb. nob. l. 70].

       Ref. 011

      Helena, the daughter of Eudda. Her chapel may still be seen at Caersegont, now Caer-narvon (Carte’s Hist. of England, vol. i. p. 168, from Rowland’s Mona Antiqua). The prudent reader may not perhaps be satisfied with such Welsh evidence.

       Ref. 012

      Cambden (vol. i. introduct. p. ci.) appoints him governor of Britain; and the father of our antiquities is followed, as usual, by his blind progeny. Pacatus and Zosimus had taken some pains to prevent this error, or fable; and I shall protect myself by their decisive testimonies. Regali habitu exulem suum illi exules orbes induerunt (in Panegyr. Vet. xii. 23), and the Greek historian, still less equivocally, αὐτὸς (Maximus) δὲ οὐδὲ εἰς ἀρχὴν ἔντιμον ἔτυχε προελθών (l. iv. p. 248 [c. 35]).

       Ref. 013

      Sulpicius Severus, Dialog. ii. 7, Orosius, l. vii. c. 34, p. 556. They both acknowledge (Sulpicius had been his subject) his innocence and merit. It is singular enough that Maximus should be less favourably treated by Zosimus, the partial adversary of his rival.

       СКАЧАТЬ