CAUSES OF THE DOWNFALL OF ROME. any thing be in his hands it is immediately of heaven slowly climbed. The gray sea grew Where slowly the rose gathered and increased. By one that in his hand a lamp doth hold, The still air moves, the wide room is less dim. More bright the East became, the ocean turned Dark and more dark against the brightening sky,— 371 Then sudden, as if a sword fell from on high, CAUSES OF THE DOWNFALL OF [CHARLES DE SECONDAT, BARON De Montesquieu, was born at the Castle of Brède, near Bordeaux, France, in 1689. He studied law, and in 1714 was appointed councillor to the Parliament of Bordeaux, and in 1716, Pre sident. But he occupied himself more with philosophical studies than with legal practice, which was distasteful to him. His first noted work was his Persian Let The Emperor himself is carried upon four elephants in a fine chamber made of timber, lined inside with plates of beaten gold, and outside with lions' skins (for he always travels in this way on his fowling expeditions, because he is troubled with gout). He always keeps beside him a dozen of his choicest gerfalcons, and is attended by several of his Barons who ride And sometimes, on horseback alongside. as they may be going along, and the Emperor from his chamber is holding discourse with the Barons, one of the latter shall exclaim: "Sire! Look out for Cranes!" Then the Emperor instantly has the top of his chamber thrown open, and having marked the cranes, he casts one of his gerfalcons, whichever he pleases; and often the quarry is struck within his view, so that he has the most exquisite sport and diversion, there as he sits in his chamber or lies on his bed; and all the Barons with him get the enjoyment of it likewise! So it is not without reason I tell you that I do not believe there ever existed in the world, or will exist, a man with such sport and enjoyment as he has, or with such rare op-ed to Italy, the Republic could easily hold portunities. DAWN.' The night was dark, though sometimes a faint star The night was long and like an iron bar 1 Publishers: Charles Scribner's Sons, New York. ters (1721). He was at this time elected a member of the French Academy. After visiting a number of foreign countries for the purpose of studying their governments, he produced The Causes of the Grandeur and Decadence of the Romans, and, in 1748, his most famous work, The Spirit of Laws, to which twenty years had been devoted, and which, within one year and a half, passed through twenty-two editions. Montesquieu died in 1755. Our extract is from the treatise on the rise and decline of Rome.] When the dominion of Rome was confin its ground. Every soldier was also a citizen; every consul levied an army; and other citizens went to war under him who succeeded. The number of troops not being excessive, care was taken to receive into the army only men who had sufficient wealth to make them feel an interest in the preservation of the town. Lastly, the senate watched closely the conduct of the generals, and prevented their indulging a thought of doing anything contrary to their duty. But when the legions passed beyond the Alps and the sea, the soldiers, whom it was necessary to leave for several campaigns in the countries which they were subjugating, 372 CAUSES OF THE DOWNFALL OF ROME. lost, little by little, the spirit of citizens; | to the allies who had not as yet ceased to and the generals, who disposed of armies be faithful, and, little by little, she granted and kingdoms, felt their own strength, and it to all. would no longer obey. The soldiers began then to acknowledge only their general-to found on him all their hopes, and to think less of the city. They were no longer soldiers of the Republic, but of Sulla, Marius, Pompey, or Cæsar. Rome could no longer tell whether he who was at the head of an army in a province, was her general or her enemy. Whilst the people of Rome were only corrupted by their tribunes, to whom they could only grant their own power, the senate could easily defend itself, because it acted with constancy, whilst the populace passed incessantly from the extreme of wrath to the extreme of weakness. But when the people could give to their favorites a formidable authority abroad, all the wisdom of the senate became useless, and the Republic was ruined. The reason why free states are less lasting than others is, that the misfortunes which happen to them, and the successes which they enjoy, almost always cause them to lose their liberty; whereas the successes and misfortunes of a state where the people are in subjection alike confirm their servitude. A wise Republic ought to risk nothing which exposes it to good or bad fortune; the only good to which it ought to aspire is the perpetuity of the State. If the greatness of the empire ruined the Republic, the greatness of the city ruined it no less. Rome had subdued all the world with the help of the people of Italy, to whom she had given at various times different privileges. The greater part of these people had not at first cared about the right of Roman citizenship, and some preferred to retain their own customs. But when this right was that of universal sovereignty-when a man was nobody in the world if he were not a Roman citizen, and when with this title he was everybody, the people of Italy resolved to perish or to become Romans. Not being able to attain their end by their solicitations and prayers, they had recourse to arms. They revolted on all that coast which looks toward the Ionian sea: the other allies were ready to follow them. Rome, obliged to fight against those who were, so to speak, the hands with which she enchained the universe, was ruined; she was about to be confined within her own walls; she granted this much-desired right Henceforth Rome was no longer the same city, the people of which had had only one and the same spirit-the same love of liberty, the same hatred of tyranny; where jealousy of the power of the Senate and of the prerogatives of the great, always mingled with respect, was only a love of equality. The people of Italy having become its citizens, each town brought to it its own peculiar talents, its own peculiar interests, and its dependence on some great protector. The mutilated city formed no longer a whole; and as people were only citizens of it by a kind of fiction, as they had no longer the same magistrates, the same walls, the same gods, the same temples, the same sepulchres, they no longer viewed Rome with the same eyes, they had no longer the same love for their country, and Roman sentiments no longer existed. Ambitious men caused whole towns and nations to come to Rome to disturb the elections, or to get the votes given to themselves. Their assemblies were really conspiracies; a troop of seditious men was called Comitia; the authority of the people, their laws, they themselves became chimeras; and the anarchy was such that one could no longer tell whether the people had made an ordinance, or whether they had not. Historians only speak of the divisions which ruined Rome, but one cannot see that these divisions were necessary, that they had always been, or that they would always be. It was merely the size of the Republic which did the harm, and which changed popular tumults into civil wars. Rome necessarily had divisions; and her warriors, so proud, so terrible beyond the walls, could not be very moderate within. To require in a free state men bold in war and timid in peace, is to desire impossible things; and, as a general rule, whenever one sees everything tranquil in a state which calls itself a republic, one may be assured that liberty is not there. That which is called union in the body politic, is a very equivocal thing; the true union is a union of harmony, which causes all the parts, however opposed they may appear to us, to concur in the general good of society, as some discords in music tend to complete harmony. There may be union in a state where there only seems troublethat is to say, a harmony whence results THE FRENCH AND ANGLO-SAXON RACES COMPARED. happiness, which alone is true peace. It 373 is like some parts of this universe, eternally bound together by the action of some and THE FRENCH AND ANGLO-SAXON reaction of others. But in the harmony of Asiatic despotism -that is to say, of every government which is not limited-there is always a real division. The laborer, the soldier, the merchant, the magistrate, the noble, are only united because some oppress the others with out resistance; and if one does see union, it is not that of united citizens, but that of dead bodies buried near one another. It is true that the laws of Rome became powerless to govern the Republic; but it is a thing which has been always seen, that good laws which have made a little republic great, become a burden to it when it has increased, because they were such that their natural effect was to form a great people, and not to govern them. There is a great difference between good laws and suitable laws-those which make a people become masters of others, and those which maintain its power when once acquired. Rome was made to grow great, and its laws were admirably suited to that purpose. Thus, under whatever government she may have been-under the power of the kings, under the aristocracy, or under the rule of the people-she never ceased to undertake enterprises which demanded skilful management, and succeeded in them. We do not find her become wiser than all the other states of the earth at once, but gradually. She bore a little, a middling, a great, fortune with the same superiority, and had no prosperity by which she did not profit, and no misfortunes of which she did not make use. She lost her liberty because she finished her work too soon. CONTENT. Sweet are the thoughts that savor of content: ROBERT GREENE, 1552-1592. RACES COMPARED. [WILLIAM EDWARD HARTPOLE LECKY, was born near Dublin, Ireland, March 26, 1838. After travelling extensively in Europe, he devoted himself to historical and philosophical researches, and in 1865, surprised the learned world with his History of the Rise and Influence of the Spirit of Rationalism in Europe, a work of vast erudition, which was soon translated into German and in troduced as a text book into more than one of the Universities of Germany. His next work, A History of European Morals from Augustus to Charlemagne (1869), augmented his reputation. Our extract is from the lat ter work.] The chief national virtues of the French people result from an intense power of sympathy, which is also the foundation of some of their most beautiful intellectual qualities, of their social habits, and of their unrivalled influence in Europe. No other nation has so habitual and vivid a sympathy for great struggles for freedom beyond its border. No other literature exhibits so expansive and ecumenical a genius, or expounds so skilfully or appreciates so generously foreign ideas. In no other land would a disinterested war for the support of a suffering nationality find so large an amount of support. The national crimes of France are many and grievous, but much will be forgiven her because she loved much. The Anglo-Saxon nations on the other hand, though sometimes roused to strong but transient enthusiasm, are habitually singularly narrow, unappreciative, and unsympathetic. The great source of their national virtues is the sense of duty, the power of pursuing a course which they believe to be right, independently of all considerations of sympathy or favor, of enthusiasm or success. Other nations have far surpassed them in many qualities that are beautiful, and in some qualities that are great. It is the merit of the Anglo-Saxon race that beyond all others it has produced men of the stamp of a Washington or a Hampden; men careless indeed for glory, but very careful of honour who made the supreme magnitude of moral rectitude the guiding principle of their lives, who proved in the most trying circumstances that no allurements of ambition, and no storms of passion, could cause them to deviate one hair's breadth from the course they believed to be their duty. This was also a Roman characteristic especially that of In order to pity suffering we must realize it, and the intensity of our compassion is usually and chiefly proportioned to the vividness of our realization. The most frightful catastrophe in South America, an earthquake, a shipwreck, or a battle, will elicit less compassion than the death of a single individual who has been brought prominently before our eyes. To this cause must be ascribed the extraordinary measure of compassion usually bestowed upon a conspicuous condemned criminal, the affection and enthusiasm that centre upon sovereigns, and many of the glaring inconsistencies of our historical judgments. The recollection of some isolated act of magnanimity displayed by Alexander or Cæsar moves us more than the thought of the 30,000 Thebans whom the Macedonian sold as slaves, of the 2,000 prisoners he crucified at Tyre, of the 1,100,000 men on whose corpses the Roman rose to fame. Wrapt in the pale winding-sheet of general terms the greatest tragedies of history evoke no vivid images in our mind, and it is only by a great effort of genius that an historian can galvanize them into life. The irritation displayed by the captive of St. Helena in his bickerings with his gaoler affects most men more than he thought of the nameless thousands whom his insatiable egotism had hurried to the grave. Such is the frailty of our nature that we are more moved by the tears of some captive princess, by some trifling biographical incident that has floated down the stream of history, than by the sorrows of all the countless multitudes who perished beneath the sword of a Tamerlane, a Bajazet, or a Zenghis Khan. W. E. H. LECKY. The evening brought me a pure delight, the purest I have ever experienced, and, Í believe, ever shall experience. Mozart's Zauberflöte was performed in the theatre... I saw no one. I saw and heard, and floated, as it were, in the magic scene. Midnight is past. I cannot get rest; must put down in words what I have felt. I Mozart's "Zauberflöte" is one of those eternal creations belonging to a pure atmosphere, to the other side of all human passion and struggle. I have often heard how childish the text is, but on this height all action, all events, all personages, all the surroundings, can only be allegorical. All that is hard and circumscribed is removed man becomes a bird, a pure natural life; he becomes love and wisdom. The childlike character, ay, even the childish character of the text is according to nature; it is only over-excited people who can find it tedious and tasteless. i It is the last dramatic work of Mozart, and he revives in it his highest nature, ali the fulness of his genius, as though he were already elevated to heavenly glory. He reviews his separate figures; they become new, less fixed and characteristic, but all the more pure and ethereal. In the best sense of the word, there is something supernatural in the way in which he has here collected and brought together the figures and things elsewhere scattered. The entrance chorus of the priests is the march of humanity, and the chorus, "Oh Isis !" conveys the sunny blessedness of peace. Here is the realization of paradise, a life above the world, whither music alone can bear one into the free ether, raised above all storms and tempests. I have hovered here for hours, and I know not how I have come down below again; and countless thoughts float around me. In this music there is a sublime, self-conscious repose, nothing of oppressed humility; it is like an unfading, blooming life; no, it is the fragrance of ripe fruit. Mozart's last work has a fellow in Less FOLLIES OF FASHION. ing's last work, "Nathan the Wise." Far away above the shattered, struggling world, the mind soars and lives in that pure world, in that realization of peace and piety where there is only a smile bestowed on the vexations of men in their weakness and finiteIn both "Nathan" and the "Zauberflöte," there are splendid gems; they both show that happiness is no delusion, and that he who, while in the actual world, does not bear within him a sense of things above this earth, can conceive it not. ness.. 375 themselves, lopped off a limb or two, and sometimes even died, to imitate their princes. 'Twas as scandalous to be seen with a pair of eyes, or to walk upright in the retinue of a crooked and one-eyed king, as it would be ridiculous to appear at court nowadays in ruffs and caps, or in white buskins and gilded spurs. This Ethiopian fashion was as extravagant and incommodious as can well be imagined. But yet it was the fashion. It was cheerfully followed by the court, and the pain to be endured was less thought on than the honor a man purchased by manifesting so generous an affection for his king. In short, this mode, when supported by a pretended reason of friendship, grew up to a custom and a law that obtained a considerable time. We learn from the relations of those who have travelled in the Levant that this custom is observed in several countriesas also some others as inconsistent with reason and good sense. But there is no necessity of twice cutting the Line to see unreasonable laws and customs religiously observed. We may find the patrons of fantastical and inconvenient fashions nearer home. Our own country will supply us with enow. Wherever there are men not insensible to passions, and the imagination has the supremacy over reason, there will be fantastical humours and humours unaccountable. If there be not so much pain to be endured in going with bare breasts in the most rigid winter season, and stoving up the body in the excessive heats of summer, as in plucking out an eye, or cutting off an arm, yet, the shame should certainly be greater. I confess the pain is not so great, but neither is the reason of undergoing it so apparent; and so the extravagance comes at least to an even poise. deed, I cannot see that the English or French have much reason to laugh at the Ethiopians and savages. At the first time of seeing a crippled or one-eyed king in front of a train of lame and half-sighted courtiers, I confess, a man would scarce forbear laughing; but time would make it familiar, and instead of ridiculing them for an infirmity of mind, he would more adand perfection of their friendship. But 'tis mire, perhaps, the greatness of their courage In not so with the fashions of our modern ladies. Their extravagances have no pretended reason to uphold them; if they have the advantage of being less troublesome, they |