from the pens of the pagan philosophers, Porphyry, Philostratus, &c.; but these attacks called forth the zeal and talents of many able defenders, as Origen, Dionysius, and Cyprian. A part of the Gauls, Germany, and Britain received in this century the light of the Gospel.

6. In the fourth century, the Christian Church was alternately persecuted and cherished by the Roman emperors. Among its oppressors we rank Diocletian, Galerius, and Julian. Among its favourers, Constantine and his sons, Valentinian, Valens, Gratian, and the excellent Theodósius, in whose reign the pagan superstition came to its final period.

7. From the age of Numa to the reign of Gratian, the Romans preserved the regular succession of the several sacerdotal colleges, the Pontiffs, Augurs, Vestals, Flamines, Salii, &c., whose authority, though weakened in the latter ages, was still protected by the laws. Even the Christian emperors held, like their pagan predecessors, the office of Pontifex Maximus. Gratian was the first who refused that ancient dignity as a profanation. In the time of Theodosius the cause of Christianity and of Paganism was solemnly debated in the Roman senate between Ambrose, archbishop of Milan, the champion of the former, and Symmachus, the defender of the latter. The cause of Christianity was triumphant, and the senate issued its decree for the abolition of Paganism, whose downfal in the capital was soon followed by its extinction in the provinces. Theodosius, with able policy, permitted no persecution of the ancient religion, which perished with the more rapidity, that its fall was gentle and unresisted.

8. But the Christian church exhibited a superstition in some respects little less irrational than Polytheism, in the worship of saints and relics; and many novel tenets, unfounded in the precepts of our Saviour, and his Apostles, were manifestly borrowed from the Pagan schools. The doctrines of the Platonic philosophy seem to have led to the notions of an intermediate state of purification; celibacy of the priests, ascetic mortifications, penances, and monastic seclusion [and are said to have been first practised in Alexandria].

XLVI.-Extinction of the Roman Empire in the West.

1. In the reigns of Arcádius and Honórius, the sons and successors of Theodósius, the barbarian nations esta

blished themselves in the frontier provinces both of the East and West. Theodosius had committed the government to Rufinus and Stilicho during the nonage of his sons; and their fatal dissensions gave every advantage to the enemies of the empire. The Huns, actually invited by Rufinus, overspread Arménia, Cappadócia, and Syria. The Goths under Alaric ravaged to the borders of Italy, and laid waste Achaia to the Peloponnésus. Stilicho, an able general, made a noble stand against these invaders; but his plans were frustrated by the machinations of his rivals and the weakness of Arcádius, who purchased an ignominious peace by ceding to Alaric the whole of Greece.

2. Alaric, now styled king of the Visigoths, prepared to add Italy to his new dominions. He passed the Alps, and was carrying all before him, when, amused by the politic Stilicho with the prospect of a new cession of territory, he was taken at unawares, and defeated by that general, then commanding the armies of Honorius. The emperor triumphantly celebrated on that occasion the eternal defeat of the Gothic nation; an eternity bounded by the lapse of a few months. In this interval a torrent of the Goths breaking down upon Germany, forced the nations whom they dispossessed, the Suevi, Alani, and Vandals, to precipitate themselves upon Italy. They joined their arms to those of Alaric, who, thus reinforced, determined to overwhelm Rome. The policy of Stilicho made him change his purpose on the promise of 4000 pounds weight of gold; a promise repeatedly broken by Honorius, and its violation finally revenged by Alaric, by the sack and plunder of the city, A.D. 410. With generous magnanimity he was sparing of the lives of the vanquished, and with singular liberality of spirit, anxious to preserve every ancient edifice from destruction, [he evacuated the city on the sixth day after the capture and proceeded on his march towards southern Italy].

3. Alaric, preparing now for the conquest of Sicily and Africa, died at this era of his highest glory; and Honorius, instead of profiting by this event to recover his lost provinces, made a treaty with his successor Ataulfus, gave him in marriage his sister Placidia, and secured his friendship by ceding to him a portion of Spain, while a great part of what remained had before been occupied by the Vandals. He allowed soon after to the Burgundians a just title to their conquests in Gaul. Thus

the western empire was by degrees mouldering from under the dominion of its ancient masters.

4. In the East, the mean and dissolute Arcadius died in the year 408, leaving that empire to his infant son Theodosius II., whose sister Pulcheria swayed the sceptre with much prudence and ability; and the weakness of her brother allowed her government to be of forty years' continuance. Honorius died in the year 423. The laws of Arcadius and Honorius are, with a few exceptions, remarkable for their wisdom and equity; a singular phenomenon, considering the personal character of those princes, and evincing at least that they employed some able ministers.

5. The Vandals under Genseric subdued the Roman provinces in Africa. The Huns in the East extended their conquests from the borders of China to the Baltic sea. Under Attila they laid waste Moesia [or Mysia] and Thrace; and Theodosius II., after a mean attempt to murder the barbarian general, ingloriously submitted to pay him an annual tribute. It was in this crisis of universal decay that the Britons implored the Romans to defend them against the Picts and Scots, but received for answer, that they had nothing to bestow on them but compassion. The Britons, in despair, sought aid from the Saxons and Angles, who seized as their property the country they were invited to protect, and founded, in the fifth and sixth centuries, the kingdoms of the Saxon heptarchy. (See Part ii. Sect. 12, §5.)

6. Attila, with an army of 500,000 men, threatened the total destruction of the empire. He was ably opposed by Etius, general of Valentinian III. now emperor of the West, who was himself shut up in Rome by the arms of the Barbarian, and at length compelled to purchase a peace. On the death of Attila, his dominions were dismembered by his sons, whose dissensions gave temporary relief to the falling empire.

7. After Valentinian III. we have in the West a succession of princes, or rather names; for the events of their reigns merit no detail. In the reign of Romulus, surnamed Augustulus, the son of Orestes, the empire of the West came to a final period. Odoacer, prince of the Heruli, subdued Italy, and spared the life of Augustulus, on the condition of his resigning the throne, A.D. 476 [after which he assumed the title of King of Italy]. From

the building of Rome to this era, the extinction of the Western Empire, is a period of 1228 years.

8. We may reduce to one ultimate cause the various circumstances that produced the decline and fall of this once magnificent fabric. The ruin of the Roman empire was the inevitable consequence of its greatness. The extension of its dominion relaxed the vigour of its frame: the vices of the conquered nations infected the victorious legions, and foreign luxuries corrupted their commanders ; selfish interest supplanted the patriotic affection; the martial spirit was purposely debased by the emperors, who dreaded its effects on their own power; and the whole mass thus weakened and enervated, fell an easy prey to the torrent of barbarians which overwhelmed it.

9. The Herulian dominion in Italy was of short duration. Theodoric, prince of the Ostrogoths (afterwards deservedly surnamed the Great), obtained permission of Zeno, emperor of the East, to attempt the recovery of Italy, and a promise of its sovereignty as the reward of his success. The whole nation of the Ostrogoths attended the standard of their prince; and Theodoric, victorious in repeated engagements, at length compelled Odoacer to surrender all Italy to the conqueror [A.D. 492]. The Romans had tasted of happiness under the government of Odoacer, and it was increased under the dominion of Theodoric, who possessed every talent and virtue of a sovereign. His equity and clemency rendered him a blessing to his subjects: he allied himself with all the surrounding nations, the Franks, Visigoths, Burgundians, and Vandals; and he left a peaceable sceptre to his grandson Athalaric, during whose infancy his mother Amalasonte governed with such admirable wisdom and moderation, as left her subjects no real cause of regret for the loss of her father.

10. While such was the state of Gothic Italy, the empire of the East was under the government of Justinian, a prince of mean ability, vain, capricious, and tyrannical. Yet the Roman name rose for a while from its abasement by the merit of his generals. Belisarius was the support of his throne, yet to him he behaved with the most shocking ingratitude. The Persians were at this time the most formidable enemies of the empire, under their sovereigns Cabades and Cosrhoes; and from the latter, a most able prince, Justinian meanly purchased a peace, by a cession

of territory, and an enormous tribute in gold. The civil factions of Constantinople, arising from the most contemptible of causes, the disputes of the performers in the circus and amphitheatre, threatened to hurl Justinian from the throne, had they not been fortunately composed by the arms and the policy of Belisarius. This great general overwhelmed the Vandal sovereignty of Africa, and recovered that province to the empire. He wrested Italy from its Gothic sovereign, and once more restored it for a short space to the dominion of its ancient masters.

11. Italy was once more subdued by the Goths, under the heroic Totila, who besieged and took the city of Rome, but forbore to destroy it at the request of Belisarius. The fortunes of this great man were now in the wane. He was compelled to evacuate Italy; and on his return to Constantinople, his long services were repaid with disgrace. He was superseded in the command of the armies by the eunuch Narses, who defeated Totila in a decisive engagement, in which the Gothic prince was slain. Narses governed Italy with great ability for 13 years, when he was ungratefully recalled by Justin II. the [nephew and] successor of Justinian [who died A.D. 565]. He invited the Lombards to avenge his injuries; and this new tribe of invaders overran and conquered the country, A.D. 568.

XLVII. Of the Origin, Manners, and Character of the Gothic Nations, before their Establishment in the Roman Empire.

1. The history and manners of the Gothic nations are curious objects of inquiry, from their influence on the constitutions and national character of most of the modern kingdoms of Europe. As the present inhabitants of these kingdoms are a mixed race, compounded of the Goths and of the nations whom they subdued, the laws, manners, and institutions of the modern kingdoms are the result of this conjunction; and in so far as these are different from the usages prevalent before this intermixture, they are, in all probability, to be traced from the ancient manners and institutions of those northern tribes. We purpose to consider, first, The original character of the Gothic nations; and secondly, The change of their manners on their establishment in the Roman empire.

2. The Scandinavian chronicles attribute to the ancient inhabitants of that country an Asiatic origin, and inform