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Wherefore let us go on to consider what virtues of the Romans they
were which the true God, in whose power are also the kingdoms of the
earth, condescended to help in order to raise the empire, and also for
what reason He did so. And, in order to discuss this question on
clearer ground, we have written the former books, to show that the
power of those gods, who, they thought, were to be worshipped with
such trifling and silly rites, had nothing to do in this matter; and
also what we have already accomplished of the present volume, to refute
the doctrine of fate, lest any one who might have been already
persuaded that the Roman empire was not extended and preserved by the
worship of these gods, might still be attributing its extension and
preservation to some kind of fate, rather than to the most powerful
will of God most high. The ancient and primitive Romans,
therefore, though their history shows us that, like all the other
nations, with the sole exception of the Hebrews, they worshipped
false gods, and sacrificed victims, not to God, but to demons, have
nevertheless this commendation bestowed on them by their historian,
that they were" greedy of praise, prodigal of wealth, desirous of
great glory, and content with a moderate fortune." Glory they most
ardently loved: for it they wished to live, for it they did not
hesitate to die. Every other desire was repressed by the strength of
their passion for that one thing. At length their country itself,
because it seemed inglorious to serve, but glorious to rule and to
command, they first earnestly desired to be free, and then to be
mistress. Hence it was that, not enduring the domination of kings,
they put the government into the hands of two chiefs, holding office
for a year, who were called consuls, not kings or lords. But royal
pomp seemed inconsistent with the administration of a ruler
(regentis), or the benevolence of one who consults (that is, for
the public good) (consulentis), but rather with the haughtiness of a
lord (dominantis). King Tarquin, therefore, having been
banished, and the consular government having been instituted, it
followed, as the same author already alluded to says in his praises of
the Romans, that "the state grew with amazing rapidity after it had
obtained liberty, so great a desire of glory had taken possession of
it." That eagerness for praise and desire of glory, then, was that
which accomplished those many wonderful things, laudable, doubtless,
and glorious according to human judgment. The same Sallust praises
the great men of his own time, Marcus Cato, and Caius Caesar,
saying that for a long time the republic had no one great in virtue,
but that within his memory there had been these two men of eminent
virtue, and very different pursuits. Now, among the praises which he
pronounces on Caesar he put this, that he wished for a great empire,
an army, and a new war, that he might have a sphere where his genius
and virtue might shine forth. Thus it was ever the prayer of men of
heroic character that Bellona would excite miserable nations to war,
and lash them into agitation with her bloody scourge, so that there
might be occasion for the display of their valor. This, forsooth, is
what that desire of praise and thirst for glory did. Wherefore, by
the love of liberty in the first place, afterwards also by that of
domination and through the desire of praise and glory, they achieved
many great things; and their most eminent poet testifies to their
having been prompted by all these motives: "Porsenna there, with
pride elate, Bids Rome to Tarquin ope her gate; With arms he hems
the city in, Æneas' sons stand firm to win."
At that time it was their greatest ambition either to die bravely or to
live free; but when liberty was obtained, so great a desire of glory
took possession of them, that liberty alone was not enough unless
domination also should be sought, their great ambition being that which
the same poet puts into the mouth of Jupiter: "Nay, Juno's self,
whose wild alarms Set ocean, earth, and heaven in arms, Shall
change for smiles her moody frown, And vie with me in zeal to crown
Rome's sons, the nation of the gown. So stands my will. There
comes a day, While Rome's great ages hold their way, When old
Assaracus's sons Shall quit them on the myrmidons, O'er Phthia
and Mycenae reign, And humble Argos to their chain."
Which things, indeed, Virgil makes Jupiter predict as future,
whilst, in reality, he was only himself passing in review in his own
mind, things which were already done, and which were beheld by him as
present realities. But I have mentioned them with the intention of
showing that, next to liberty, the Romans so highly esteemed
domination, that it received a place among those things on which they
bestowed the greatest praise. Hence also it is that that poet,
preferring to the arts of other nations those arts which peculiarly
belong to the Romans, namely, the arts of ruling and commanding, and
of subjugating and vanquishing nations, says, "Others, belike,
with happier grace, From bronze or stone shall call the face, Plead
doubtful causes, map the skies, And tell when planets set or rise;
But Roman thou, do thou control The nations far and wide; Be this
thy genius, to impose The rule of peace on vanquished foes, Show
pity to the humble soul, And crush the sons of pride."
These arts they exercised with the more skill the less they gave
themselves up to pleasures, and to enervation of body and mind in
coveting and amassing riches, and through these corrupting morals, by
extorting them from the miserable citizens and lavishing them on base
stage-players. Hence these men of base character, who abounded when
Sallust wrote and Virgil sang these things, did not seek after honors
and glory by these arts, but by treachery and deceit. Wherefore the
same says, "But at first it was rather ambition than avarice that
stirred the minds of men, which vice, however, is nearer to virtue.
For glory, honor, and power are desired alike by the good man and by
the ignoble; but the former," he says, "strives onward to them by
the true way, whilst the other, knowing nothing of the good arts,
seeks them by fraud and deceit." And what is meant by seeking the
attainment of glory, honor, and power by good arts, is to seek them
by virtue, and not by deceitful intrigue; for the good and the ignoble
man alike desire these things, but the good man strives to overtake
them by the true way. The way is virtue, along which he presses as to
the goal of possession, namely, to glory, honor, and power. Now
that this was a sentiment engrained in the Roman mind, is indicated
even by the temples of their gods; for they built in very close
proximity the temples of Virtue and Honor, worshipping as gods the
gifts of God. Hence we can understand what they who were good thought
to be the end of virtue, and to what they ultimately referred it,
namely, to honor; for, as to the bad, they had no virtue though they
desired honor, and strove to possess it by fraud and deceit. Praise
of a higher kind is bestowed upon Cato, for he says of him "The less
he sought glory, the more it follOwed him." We say praise of a
higher kind; for the glory with the desire of which the Romans burned
is the judgment of men thinking well of men. And therefore virtue is
better, which is content with no human judgment save that of one's own
conscience. Whence the apostle says, "For this is our glory, the
testimony of our conscience." And in another place he says, "But
let every one prove his own work, and then he shall have glory in
himself, and not in another." That glory, honor, and power,
therefore, which they desired for themselves, and to which the good
sought to attain by good arts, should not be sought after by virtue,
but virtue by them. For there is no true virtue except that which is
directed towards that end in which is the highest and ultimate good of
man. Wherefore even the honors which Cato sought he ought not to have
sought, but the state ought to have conferred them on him unsolicited,
on account of his virtues.
But, of the two great Romans of that time, Cato was he whose virtue
was by far the nearest to the true idea of virtue. Where fore, let us
refer to the opinion of Cato himself, to discover what was the
judgment he had formed concerning the condition of the state both then
and in former times. "I do not think," he says, "that it was by
arms that our ancestors made the republic great from being small. Had
that been the case, the republic of our day would have been by far more
flourishing than that of their times, for the number of our allies and
citizens is far greater; and, besides, we possess a far greater
abundance of armor and of horses than they did. But it was other
things than these that made them great, and we have none of them:
industry at home, just government without, a mind free in
deliberation, addicted neither to crime nor to lust. Instead of
these, we have luxury and avarice, poverty in the state, opulence
among citizens; we laud riches, we follow laziness; there is no
difference made between the good and the bad; all the rewards of virtue
are got possession of by intrigue. And no wonder, when every
individual consults only for his own good, when ye are the slaves of
pleasure at home, and, in public affairs, of money and favor, no
wonder that an onslaught is made upon the unprotected republic."
He who hears these words of Cato or of Sallust probably thinks that
such praise bestowed on the ancient Romans was applicable to all of
them, or, at least, to very many of them. It is not so; otherwise
the things which Cato himself writes, and which I have quoted in the
second book of this work, would not be true. In that passage he
says, that even from the very beginning of the state wrongs were
committed by the more powerful, which led to the separation of the
people from the fathers, besides which there were other internal
dissensions; and the only time at which there existed a just and
moderate administration was after the banishment of the kings, and that
no longer than whilst they had cause to be afraid of Tarquin, and were
carrying on the grievous war which had been undertaken on his account
against Etruria; but afterwards the fathers oppressed the people as
slaves, flogged them as the kings had done, drove them from their
land, and, to the exclusion of all others, held the government in
their own hands alone. And to these discords, whilst the fathers were
wishing to rule, and the people were unwilling to serve, the second
Punic war put an end; for again great fear began to press upon their
disquieted minds, holding them back from those distractions by another
and greater anxiety, and bringing them back to civil concord. But the
great things which were then achieved were accomplished through the
administration of a few men, who were good in their own way. And by
the wisdom and forethought of these few good men, which first enabled
the republic to endure these evils and mitigated them, it waxed greater
and greater. And this the same historian affirms, when he says that,
reading and hearing of the many illustrious achievements of the Roman
people in peace and in war, by land and by sea, he wished to
understand what it was by which these great things were specially
sustained. For he knew that very often the Romans had with a small
company contended with great legions of the enemy; and he knew also
that with small resources they had carried on wars with opulent kings.
And he says that, after having given the matter much consideration,
it seemed evident to him that the pre-eminent virtue of a few citizens
had achieved the whole, and that that explained how poverty overcame
wealth, and small numbers great multitudes. But, he adds, after
that the state had been corrupted by luxury and indolence, again the
republic, by its own greatness, was able to bear the vices of its
magistrates and generals. Wherefore even the praises of Cato are only
applicable to a few; for only a few were possessed of that virtue which
leads men to pursue after glory, honor, and power by the true way,
that is, by virtue itself. This industry at home, of which Cato
speaks, was the consequence of a desire to enrich the public treasury,
even though the result should be poverty at home; and therefore, when
he speaks of the evil arising out of the corruption of morals, he
reverses the expression, and says, "Poverty in the state, riches at
home."
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