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Edward Gibbon

decline and fall of the roman empire Picture of Elagabalus.

As the at­ten­tion of the new em­per­or was di­ver­ted by the most tri­fling amu­se­ments, he (A.D. 219) was­ted many months in his lux­u­ri­ous pro­gress from Syria to Italy, pas­sed at Nicomedia his first win­ter af­ter his vic­tory, and de­ferred till the en­su­ing sum­mer his tri­umphal en­try into the cap­i­tal. A faith­ful pic­ture, how­ever, which pre­ceded his ar­rival, and was placed by his im­me­di­ate or­der over the al­tar of Vic­tory in the sen­ate-house, con­veyed to the Ro­mans the just but un­wor­thy re­sem­blance of his per­son and man­ners. He was drawn in his sac­er­do­tal robes of silk and gold, af­ter the loose flow­ing fash­ion of the Medes and Phoeni­cians ; his head was cov­ered with a lofty tiara, his nu­mer­ous col­lars and bracelets were ad­orned with gems of an in­es­timable val­ue. His eye­brows were tinged with black, and his cheeks paint­ed with an ar­ti­fi­cial red and white.Dion, l. lxxix. [c. 14] p. 1363. Herodian, l. v. [c. 5] p. 189. The grave sen­a­tors con­fes­sed with a sigh, that, af­ter hav­ing long ex­pe­ri­enced the stern tyran­ny of their own coun­try­men, Rome was at length hum­bled be­neath the ef­femi­nate lux­ury of Ori­en­tal despotism.

His superstition.

The Sun was worshipped at Emesa, un­der the name of Elagabalus,This name is de­rived by the learned from two Syr­i­ac words, Ela a God, and Gabal to form, the form­ing, or plas­tic God, a prop­er, and even hap­py epi­thet for the Sun. Wotton’s His­tory of Rome, p. 378. and un­der the form of a black con­i­cal stone, which, as it was uni­ver­sal­ly be­lieved, had fal­len from heav­en on that sa­cred place. To this pro­tect­ing de­ity, Antoninus, not with­out some rea­son, as­cribed his ele­va­tion to the throne. The dis­play of su­per­sti­tious grati­tude was the only se­ri­ous busi­ness of his reign. The tri­umph of the God of Eme­sa over all the re­li­gions of the earth, was the great ob­ject of his zeal and van­ity : and the ap­pel­la­tion of Ela­gabalus (for he pre­sumed as pon­tiff and fa­vourite to adopt that sa­cred name) was dearer to him than all the ti­tles of Im­pe­r­ial great­ness. In a so­lemn pro­ces­sion through the streets of Rome, the way was strewed with gold dust ; the black stone, set in pre­­cious gems, was placed on a char­­i­ot drawn by six milk­white hors­­es rich­­ly ca­­par­i­­soned. The pi­­ous em­­per­­or held the reins, and, sup­­port­­ed by his min­­is­­ters, moved slow­­ly back­­wards, that he might per­­petually en­­joy the fe­­lic­­i­ty of the di­­vine pres­­ence. In a mag­­nif­­i­­cent tem­ple raised on the Pala­­tine Mount, the sac­­ri­­fices of the god of Ela­­gabalus were cel­e­­brat­­ed with every cir­­cum­­stance of cost and solem­­ni­­ty. The rich­­est wines, the most ex­­tra­­or­­di­­nary vic­­tims, and the rar­est aro­­mat­­ics, were pro­­fuse­­ly con­­sumed on his al­­tar. Around the a­ltar a cho­­rus of Syr­­i­­an dam­­sels per­­formed their las­­civ­­ious danc­es to the sound of bar­­bar­­ian mu­­sic, whilst the grav­est per­­son­­ages of the state and army, clothed in long Phoeni­­cian tu­­nics, of­­fi­­ci­­at­­ed in the mean­­est func­­tions, with af­fect­ed zeal and se­cret in­dig­na­tion.Hero­dian, l. v. [c. 5] p. 190.

To this tem­ple, as to the com­mon cen­tre of re­li­gious wor­ship, the Im­pe­r­ial fa­nat­ic at­tempt­ed to re­move the Ancilia, the Pal­la­di­um,He broke into the sanc­tu­ary of Vesta, and car­ried away a stat­ue, which he sup­posed to be the Pal­la­di­um ; but the vestals boast­ed, that, by a pi­ous fraud, they had im­posed a coun­ter­feit im­age on the pro­fane in­trud­er. Hist. August. p. 103. and all the sa­cred pledges of the faith of Numa. A crowd of in­fe­ri­or de­ities at­tend­ed in var­i­ous sta­tions the ma­jesty of the god of Eme­sa ; but his court was still im­per­fect, till a fe­male of dis­tin­guished rank was ad­mit­ted to his bed. Pallas had been first cho­sen for his com­fort ; but as it was dread­ed lest her war­like ter­rors might af­fright the soft del­i­ca­cy of a Syr­i­an de­ity, the Moon, adored by the Afri­cans un­der the name of Astarte, was deemed a more suit­able com­pan­ion for the Sun. Her im­age, with the rich of­fer­ings of her tem­ple as a mar­ri­age por­tion was trans­port­ed with so­lemn pomp from Carthage to Rome, and the day of these mys­tic nup­tials was a gen­er­al fes­ti­val in the cap­i­tal and through­out the em­pire.Dion, l. lxxix. [c. 12] p. 1360. Hero­dian, l. v. [c. 6] p. 193. The sub­jects of the em­pire were ob­liged to make lib­er­al presents to the new-mar­ried cou­ple ; and what­ever they had pro­mised during the life of Ela­gabalus, was care­ful­ly ex­act­ed un­der the ad­min­is­tra­tion of Mamæa.

His profligate and effeminate luxury.

A rational volup­tuary ad­heres with in­vari­able re­spect to the tem­per­ate dic­tates of na­ture, and im­proves the grat­i­fi­ca­tions of sense by so­cial in­ter­course, en­dear­ing con­nec­tions, and the soft colour­ing of taste and the im­ag­i­na­tion. But Ela­gabalus (I speak of the em­per­or of that name), cor­rupt­ed by his youth, his coun­try, and his for­tune, aban­doned him­self to the gros­sest plea­sures with un­governed fury, and soon found dis­gust and sati­ety in the midst of his en­joy­ments. The in­flam­ma­tory pow­ers of art were sum­moned to his aid : the con­fused mul­ti­tude of women, of wines, and of dishes, and the stud­ied va­ri­ety of at­ti­tudes and sauces, served to re­vive his lan­guid a­petites. New terms and new in­ven­tions in these sci­ences, the only ones cul­ti­vat­ed and pa­tro­n­ised by the monarch,The in­ven­tion of a new sauce was lib­er­al­ly re­ward­ed ; but, if it was not rel­ished, the in­vent­or was con­fined to eat of noth­ing else, till he had dis­cov­ered an­oth­er more agree­able to the Im­pe­r­ial palate. Hist. August. [Lamprid. Heliog. c. 29], p. 111. sig­nal­ised his reign, and transmitted his in­famy to suc­ceed­ing times. A capri­cious prodi­gal­i­ty sup­plied the want of taste and ele­gance ; and whilst Ela­gabalus lav­ished away the trea­sures of his peo­ple in the wildest ex­trav­a­gance, his own voice and that of his flat­ter­ers ap­plaud­ed a spir­it and mag­nif­i­cence un­known to the tame­ness of his pre­de­ces­sors. To con­found the or­der of sea­sons and cli­mates,He nev­er would eat sea-fish ex­cept at a great dis­tance from the sea ; he then would dis­tribute vast quan­ti­ties of the rarest sorts, brought at an im­mense ex­pense, to the peas­ants of the in­land coun­try. Hist. Aug. [Lamprid. Heliog. c. 23], p. 109. to sport with the pas­sions and prej­u­dices of his sub­jects, and to sub­vert every law of na­ture and de­cency, were in the num­ber of his most de­li­cious amuse­ments. A long train of con­cu­bines, and a rapid suc­ces­sion of wives, among whom was a vestal vir­gin, rav­ished by force from her sa­cred asy­lum,Dion, l. lxxix. p. 1358. Hero­dian, l. v. p. 192. were in­suf­fi­cient to sat­is­fy the im­po­tence of his pas­sions. The mas­ter of the Ro­man world af­fect­ed to copy the dress and man­ners of the fe­male sex, pre­ferred the distaff to the sceptre, and dis­hon­oured the prin­ci­pal dig­ni­ties of the em­pire by dis­trib­ut­ing them among his nu­mer­ous lovers ; one of whom was pub­licly in­vest­ed with the ti­tle and au­thor­i­ty of the em­per­or’s, or, as he more prop­er­ly styled him­self, of the em­press’s hus­band.Hie­ro­cles en­joyed that hon­our ; but he would have been sup­plant­ed by one Zoti­cus, had he not con­trived, by a po­tion, to en­er­vate the pow­ers of his ri­val, who be­ing found on trial un­equal to his rep­u­ta­tion, was dri­ven with ig­nominy from the palace. Dion, l. lxxix. p. 1363, 1364. A dancer was made præ­fect of the city, a char­i­o­teer præ­fect of the watch, a bar­ber præ­fect of the pro­vi­sions. These three min­is­ters, with many in­fe­ri­or of­fi­cers, were all re­com­mend­ed, enor­mi­tate mem­bro­rum. Hist. August. p. 105.

Contempt of decency which distinguished the Roman tyrants.

It may seem prob­a­ble, the vices and fol­lies of Ela­gabalus have been ad­orned by fan­cy, and black­ened by prej­u­dice.Even the cred­u­lous com­pil­er of his Life, in the Au­gus­tan His­tory (p. 111), is in­clined to sus­pect that his vices may have been ex­ag­ger­at­ed. Yet con­fin­ing our­selves to the pub­lic scenes dis­played be­fore the Ro­man peo­ple, and at­test­ed by grave and con­tem­po­rary his­to­ri­ans, their in­ex­press­ible in­famy sur­pass­es that of any oth­er age or coun­try. The li­cence of an east­ern monarch is se­clud­ed from the eye of cu­rios­i­ty by the in­ac­cess­i­ble walls of his se­ra­glio. The sen­ti­ments of hon­our and gal­lantry have in­tro­duced a re­fine­ment of plea­sure, a re­gard for de­cen­cy, and a re­spect for the pu­blic opin­ion, into the mo­dern courts of Eu­rope ; but the cor­rupt and op­u­lent no­bles of Rome grat­i­fied every vice that could be col­lect­ed from the mighty con­flux of na­tions and man­ners. Se­cure of im­puni­ty, care­less of cen­sure, they lived with­out re­straint in the pa­tient and hum­ble so­ci­ety of their slaves and par­a­sites. The em­per­or, in his turn, view­ing every rank of his sub­jects with the same con­temp­tu­ous in­dif­fer­ence, as­sert­ed with­out con­trol his sov­ereign priv­i­lege of lust and luxury.

Discontents of the army.

The most worth­less of man­kind are not af­raid to con­demn in oth­ers the same dis­or­ders which they al­low in them­selves ; and can read­i­ly dis­cov­er some nice dif­fer­ence of age, char­ac­ter, or sta­tion, to jus­ti­fy the par­tial dis­tinc­tion. The li­cen­tious sol­diers, who had raised to the throne the dis­so­lute son of Caracalla, blushed at their ig­no­min­ious choice, and turned with dis­gust from that mon­ster, to con­tem­plate with plea­sure the open­ing virtues of his cous­in Alexander the son of Mamæa. The crafty Mæsa, sen­si­ble that her grand­son Ela­gabalus must in­evitably de­stroy him­self by his own vices, had pro­vided an­oth­er and sur­er sup­port of her fam­i­ly. Em­brac­ing a fav­our­able mo­ment of fond­ness and de­vo­tion, she had per­suad­ed the young em­per­or to adopt Alexander, and to in­vest him with the ti­tle of Cæsar (A.D. 221), that his own di­vine oc­cu­pa­tions might be no longer in­ter­rupt­ed by the care of the earth. In the sec­ond rank that ami­able prince soon ac­quired the af­fec­tions of the pub­lic, and ex­cit­ed the tyrant’s jeal­ousy, who re­solved to ter­mi­nate the dan­ger­ous com­pe­ti­tion, ei­ther by cor­rupt­ing the man­ners, or by taking away the life, of his ri­val. His arts proved un­suc­cess­ful ; his vain de­signs were con­stant­ly dis­cov­ered by his own lo­qua­cious folly, and dis­ap­point­ed by those vir­tu­ous and faith­ful ser­vants whom the pru­dence of Mamæa had placed about the per­son of her son. In a hasty sal­ly of pas­sion, Ela­gabalus re­solved to exe­cute by force what he had been un­able to com­pass by fraud, and by a despot­ic sent­ence de­graded his cous­in from the rank and hon­ours of Cæsar. The mes­sage was re­ceived in the sen­ate with si­lence, and in the camp with fury. The Præ­to­ri­an guards swore to pro­tect Alexander, and to re­venge the dis­hon­oured ma­jesty of the throne. The tears and pro­mises of the trem­bling Ela­gabalus, who only begged them to spare his life, and to leave him in the pos­ses­sion of his beloved Hierocles, di­vert­ed their just in­dig­na­tion and they con­tent­ed them­selves with em­pow­er­ing their præ­fects to watch over the safe­ty of Alexander, and the con­duct of the emperor.Dion, l. lxxix. p. 1365. Hero­dian, l. v. p. 195–201. Hist. Au­gust. p. 105. The last of the three his­to­ri­ans seems to have fol­lowed the best au­thors in his ac­count of the revolution.

Sedition of the guards and murder of Elagabalus.

It was im­pos­si­ble that such a rec­on­cil­i­a­tion should last, or that even the mean soul of Ela­gabalus could hold an em­pire on such hu­mil­i­at­ing terms of de­pen­dence. He soon at­tempt­ed, by a dan­ger­ous ex­per­i­ment, to try the tem­per of the sol­diers. The re­port of the death of Alexander, and the nat­ur­al suspi­cion that he had been mur­der­ed, in­flamed their pas­sions into fury, and the tem­pest of the camp could only be ap­peased by the pres­ence and au­thor­i­ty of the popu­lar youth. Pro­voked at this new in­stance of their affec­tion for his cous­in, and their con­tempt for his per­sons the em­per­or ven­tured to pun­ish some of the lead­ers of the mutiny. His un­sea­son­able sever­i­ty proved in­stant­ly fa­tal to his min­ions, his moth­er, and him­self. Ela­gabalus was (A.D. 222, 10th March) mas­sa­cred by the in­dig­nant Præ­to­ri­ans, his mu­ti­lat­ed corpse drag­ged through the streets of the city, and thrown into the Tiber. His mem­o­ry was bran­ded with eter­nal in­famy by the sen­ate ; the jus­tice of whose de­cree has been rat­i­fied by posterity.The era of the death of Ela­gabalus, and of the ac­cess­ion of Alexander, has em­ployed the learn­ing and in­ge­nu­ity of Pagi, Tillemont, Valsecchi, Vignoli, and Torre bish­op of Adria. The ques­tion is most as­sured­ly in­tri­cate ; but I still ad­here to the au­thor­i­ty of Dion ; the truth of whose cal­cu­la­tions is un­de­ni­able, and the pu­ri­ty of whose text is jus­ti­fied by the agree­ment of Xiphilin, Zonaras, and Cedrenus. Ela­gabalus reigned three years, nine months, and four days, from his vic­tory over Macrinus, and was killed March 10, 222. But what shall we re­ply to the medals, un­doubt­ed­ly gen­uine, which reck­on the fifth year of his tri­bunit­ian pow­er ? We shall re­ply, with the learned Valsecchi, that the usurpa­tion of Macrinus was an­ni­hi­lat­ed, and that the son of Caracalla dat­ed his reign from his fa­ther’s death. Af­ter re­solv­ing this great dif­fi­cul­ty, the small­er knots of this ques­tion may be easi­ly un­tied, or cut asunder.

Accession of Alexander Severus.

In the room of Ela­gabalus, his cous­in Alexander was raised to the throne by the Præ­to­ri­an guards. His re­la­tion to the fam­i­ly of Severus, whose name he as­sumed, was the same as that of his pre­de­cess­or ; his virtue and his dan­ger had al­ready en­deared him to the Ro­mans, and the ea­ger lib­er­al­i­ty of the sen­ate con­ferred upon him, in one day, the var­i­ous tit­les and pow­ers of tin Im­pe­r­i­al dig­ni­ty.Hist. Au­gust. p. 114. By this un­usu­al pre­cip­i­ta­tion, the sen­ate meant to con­found the hopes of pre­tenders, and pre­vent the fac­tions of the armies. But as Alexander was a mod­est and du­ti­ful youth, of only sev­en­teen years of age, the reins of gov­ern­ment were in the hands of two wo­men, of his moth­er Mamæa, and of Mæsa, his grand­moth­er. Af­ter the death of the lat­ter, who sur­vived but a short time the el­e­va­tion of Alexander, Mamæa re­mained the sole re­gent of her son and of the empire.

Power of his mother Mamæa.

In every age and coun­try, the wis­er, or at least the strong­er, of the two sexes, has usurped the pow­ers of the state, and con­fined the other to the cares and plea­sures of do­mes­tic life. In hered­i­tary mon­ar­chies, how­ever, and es­pe­cial­ly in those of mo­dern Europe, the gal­lant spir­it of chival­ry, and the law of suc­ces­sion, have ac­cus­tomed us to allow a sin­gu­lar ex­cep­tion ; and a woman is of­ten ac­knowl­edged the ab­so­lute sov­ereign of a great king­dom, in which she would be deemed in­ca­pable of ex­er­cis­ing the small­est em­ploy­ment ; civ­il or mil­i­tary. But as the Ro­man em­per­ors were still con­sid­ered as the gen­er­als and mag­is­trates of the re­pub­lic, their wives and moth­ers, al­though dis­tin­guished by the name of Augusta, were never as­so­ci­at­ed to their per­son­al hon­ours ; and a fe­male reign would have ap­peared an in­ex­pi­able prodi­gy in the eyes of those prim­i­tive Ro­mans, who mar­ried with­out love, or loved with­out del­i­ca­cy and re­spect.Metellus Numidicus, the cen­sor, ac­knowl­edged to the Ro­man peo­ple, in a pub­lic ora­tion, that had kind Na­ture al­lowed us to ex­ist with­out the help of women, we should be de­liv­ered from a very trou­ble­some com­pan­ion ; and he could rec­om­mend mat­ri­mo­ny, only as the sac­ri­fice of pri­vate plea­sure to pub­lic duty. Aulus Gellius, i. 6. The haughty Agrippina as­pired, in­deed, to share the hon­ours of the em­pire, which she had con­ferred on her son ; but her mad am­bi­tion, de­test­ed by every cit­i­zen who felt for the dig­ni­ty of Rome, was dis­ap­point­ed by the art­ful firm­ness of Seneca and Burrhus.Tacitus An­nal. xiii. 5. The good sense, or the in­dif­fer­ence, of suc­ceed­ing princ­es, re­strained them from of­fend­ing the pre­ju­dices of their sub­jects ; and it was re­served for the prof­li­gate Ela­gabalus to dis­charge the acts of the sen­ate, with the name of his moth­er Soæmias, who was placed by the side of the con­suls, and sub­scribed, as a reg­u­lar mem­ber, the de­crees of the leg­isla­tive as­sem­bly. Her more pru­dent sis­ter, Mamæa, de­clined the use­less and odi­ous pre­ro­g­a­tive, and a solemn law was en­act­ed, ex­clud­ing women for ever from the sen­ate, and de­vot­ing to the in­fer­nal gods the head of the wretch by whom this sanc­tion should be violated.Hist. Au­gust. p. 102, 107 [Lamprid. Heliog. c. 4 and 18]. The sub­stance, not the pagean­try, of power was the ob­ject of Mamæa’s man­ly am­bi­tion. She main­tained an ab­so­lute and last­ing em­pire over the mind of her son, and in his af­fec­tion the moth­er could not brook a ri­val. Alexander, with her con­sent, mar­ried the daugh­ter of a Pa­tri­cian ; but his re­spect for his fa­ther-in-law, and love for the em­press, were in­con­sis­tent with the ten­der­ness or in­ter­est of Mamæa. The Pa­tri­cian was ex­e­cut­ed on the ready ac­cu­sa­tion of trea­son, and the wife of Alexander dri­ven with ig­nominy from the palace, and ban­ished into Africa.Dion, l. lxxx. [c. 2] p. 1369. Herodian, l. vi. [c. 1] p. 206. Hist. Au­gust. [Lamprid. Alexander Sev. c. 49] p. 131. Hero­dian rep­re­sents the Pa­tri­cian as in­no­cent. The Au­gust­an His­tory, on the au­thor­i­ty of Dexippus, con­demns him, as guilty of a con­spir­a­cy against the life of Alexander. It is im­pos­si­ble to pro­nounce be­tween them : but Dion is an ir­re­proach­able wit­ness of the jeal­ousy and cru­el­ty of Mamæa to­ward the young em­press, whose hard fate Alexander lament­ed, but durst not oppose.

Wise and moderate administration.

Not­with­stand­ing this act of jeal­ous cru­el­ty, as well as some in­stanc­es of avarice, with which Mamæa is charged, the gen­er­al tenor of her ad­min­is­tra­tion was equal­ly for the ben­e­fit of her son and of the em­pire. With the ap­pro­ba­tion of the sen­ate, she chose six­teen of the wis­est and most vir­tu­ous sen­a­tors, as a per­pet­u­al coun­cil of state, be­fore whom every pub­lic busi­ness of mo­ment was de­bat­ed and de­ter­mined. The cel­e­brat­ed Ulpian, equal­ly dis­tin­guished by his knowl­edge of, and his re­spect for, the laws of Rome, was at their head ; and the pru­dent firm­ness of this ari­stoc­ra­cy restored or­der and au­thor­i­ty to the gov­ern­ment. As soon as they had purged the city from for­eign su­per­sti­tion and lux­u­ry, the re­mains of the capri­cious tyran­ny of Ela­gabalus, they ap­plied them­selves to re­move his worth­less crea­tures from every de­part­ment of pub­lic ad­min­is­tra­tion, and to sup­ply their places with men of virtue and abil­i­ty. Learn­ing, and the love of jus­tice, be­came the only rec­om­men­da­tions for civ­il of­fices ; valour, and the love of discipline, the only qual­i­fi­ca­tions for mil­i­tary employments.Herodian, l. vi. p. 203. Hist. August. p. 119. The lat­ter in­sin­u­ates, that when any law was to be passed, the coun­cil was as­sist­ed by a num­ber of able lawyers and ex­pe­ri­enced sen­a­tors, whose opin­ions were sep­a­rate­ly giv­en and tak­en down in writing.

Education and virtuous temper of Alexander.

But the most im­por­tant care of Mamæa and her wise coun­sel­lors, was to form the char­ac­ter of the young em­per­or, on whose per­son­al qual­i­ties the hap­pi­ness or mis­ery of the Ro­man world must ul­ti­mate­ly de­pend. The for­tu­nate soil a­ssist­ed, and even pre­vent­ed, the hand of cul­ti­va­tion. An ex­cel­lent un­der­stand­ing soon con­vinced Alexander of the ad­van­tages of vir­tue, the plea­sure of knowl­edge, and the ne­ces­si­ty of labour. A nat­ur­al mild­ness and mo­der­a­tion of tem­per pre­served him from the as­saults of pas­sion, and the al­lure­ments of vice. His un­al­ter­able re­gard for his moth­er, and his es­teem for the wise Ulpian, guard­ed his in­ex­pe­ri­enced youth from the poi­son of flattery.

Journal of his ordinary life.

The sim­ple jour­nal of his or­di­nary oc­cu­pa­tions ex­hibits a pleas­ing pic­ture of an ac­com­plished em­per­or,See his life in the Au­gust­an His­tory. The un­dis­tin­guish­ing com­pil­er has buried these in­ter­est­ing anec­dotes un­der a load of tri­vial and un­mean­ing circumstances. and with some al­low­ance for the dif­fer­ence of man­ners, might well deserve the im­i­ta­tion of mo­dern princ­es. Alexander rose early ; the first mo­ments of the day were con­se­crat­ed to pri­vate de­vo­tion, and his do­mes­tic chapel was filled with the im­ages of those he­roes, who, by im­prov­ing or re­form­ing hu­man life, had de­served the grate­ful rev­er­ence of pos­ter­i­ty. But, as he deemed the ser­vice of man­kind the most ac­cept­able wor­ship of the gods, the great­est part of his morn­ing hours was em­ployed in his coun­cil, where he dis­cussed pub­lic af­fairs, and de­ter­mined pri­vate causes, with a pa­tience and dis­cre­tion above his years. The dry­ness of busi­ness was re­lieved by the charms of lit­er­a­ture ; and a por­tion of time was al­ways set apart for his fav­ourite stud­ies of po­et­ry, his­tory, and phi­los­o­phy. The works of Virgil and Horace, the Re­pub­lics of Plato and Cicero, formed his taste, en­larged his un­der­stand­ing, and gave him the no­blest ideas of man and gov­ern­ment. The ex­er­cises of the body suc­ceed­ed to those of the mind ; and Alexander, who was tall, ac­tive, and ro­bust, sur­passed most of his equals in the gym­nas­tic arts. Re­freshed by the use of the bath and a slight din­ner, he re­sumed, with new vigour, the busi­ness of the day ; and, till the hour of sup­per, the prin­ci­pal meal of the Ro­mans, he was at­tend­ed by his sec­ret­ar­ies, with whom he read and an­swered the mul­ti­tude of let­ters, memo­ri­als, and pe­ti­tions, that must have been ad­dressed to the mas­ter of the great­est part of the world. His table was served with the most fru­gal sim­plic­i­ty ; and when­ever he was at lib­er­ty to con­sult his own in­cli­na­tion, the com­pa­ny con­sist­ed of a few se­lect friends, men of learn­ing and virtue, amongst whom Ulpian was con­stant­ly in­vit­ed. Their con­ver­sa­tion was fa­mil­iar and in­struc­tive ; and the pauses were oc­ca­sion­al­ly en­liv­ened by the re­cit­al of some pleas­ing com­po­si­tion, which sup­plied the place of the dan­cers, co­me­di­ans, and even glad­i­a­tors, so fre­quent­ly sum­moned to the tables of the rich and lux­ur­i­ous Ro­mans.See the 13th Satire of Juvenal. The dress of Alexander was plain and mod­est, his de­mean­our cour­te­ous and af­fable : at the prop­er hours his palace was open to all his sub­jects, but the voice of a crier was heard, as in the Eleusin­ian mys­ter­ies, pro­nounc­ing the same salu­tary ad­mo­ni­tion ; “Let none en­ter those holy walls, un­less he is con­scious of a pure and in­no­cent mind.” See the 13th Satire of Juvenal.

General happiness of the Roman world.

Such an uni­form tenor of life, which left not a mo­ment for vice or fol­ly, is a bet­ter proof of the wis­dom and jus­tice of Alexander’s gov­ern­ment, than all the tri­fling de­tails pre­served in the com­pi­la­tion of Lampridius. Since the ac­cess­ion of Commodus, the Ro­man world had ex­pe­ri­enced, dur­ing a term of forty years, the suc­ces­sive and var­i­ous vices of four tyrants. From the death of Ela­gabalus it en­joyed (A.D. 222–235) an aus­pi­cious calm of thir­teen years. The pro­vinces, re­lieved from the op­pres­sive taxes in­vent­ed by Caracalla and his pre­tende­d son, flour­ished in peace and pros­per­i­ty, un­der the ad­min­is­tra­tion of mag­is­trates, who were con­vinced by ex­pe­ri­ence, that to de­serve the love of the sub­jects was their best and only method of ob­tain­ing the favour of their so­vereign. While some gen­tle re­straints were im­posed on the in­nocent lux­u­ry of the Ro­man peo­ple, the price of pro­vi­sions, and the in­ter­est of mon­ey, were re­duced, by the pa­ter­nal care of Alexander, whose pru­dent lib­er­al­i­ty, with­out dis­tress­ing the in­dus­tri­ous, sup­plied the wants and amuse­ments of the pop­u­lace. The dig­ni­ty, the free­dom, the au­thor­i­ty of the sen­ate were re­stored ; and every vir­tu­ous sen­a­tor might ap­proach the per­son of the em­per­or, with­out fear, and with­out a blush.

Edward Gibbon, The history of the decline and fall of the Roman Empire, 1776–89.