IV. CHA P. the multitude. In the tumult of civil discord, the laws of society lose their force, and their place is seldom supplied by those of humanity. The ardor of contention, the pride of victory, the despair of success, the memory of past injuries, and the fear of future dangers, all contribute to inflame the mind, and to silence the voice of pity. From such motives almost every page of history has been stained with civil blood; but these motives will not account for the unproyoked cruelties of Commodus, who had nothing A.D. 180. to wish, and every thing to enjoy. The beloved son of Marcus succeeded to his father, amidst the acclamations of the senate and armies *, and when he ascended the throne, the happy youth saw round him neither competitor to remove, nor enemies to punish. In this calm elevated station, it was surely natural, that he should prefer the love of mankind to their detestation, the mild glories of his five predecessors, to the ignominious fate of Nero, and Domitian. Character of Commodus. Yet Commodus was not, as he has been represented, a tiger born with an insatiate thirst of 'human blood, and capable, from his infancy, of the most inhuman actions †. Nature had formed him of a weak, rather than a wicked disposition. His simplicity and timidity rendered him the slave of his attendants, who gradually corrupted his mind. * Commodus was the first Porphyrogenitus (born since his father's accession to the throne.) By a new strain of flattery, the Egyptian medals date by the years of his life; as if they were synonymous to those of his reign. Tillemont, Ilist. des Empereurs, tom. ii. p. 752. Hist. August. p. 46. IV. to Rome. mind. His cruelty, which at first obeyed the CHA P. dictates of others, degenerated into habit, and at length became the ruling passion of his soul *. Upon the death of his father, Commodus He returne found himself embarrassed with the command of a great army, and the conduct of a difficult war against the Quadi and Marcomannit. The servile and profligate youths whom Marcus had banished, soon regained their station and influence about the new emperor. They exaggerated the hardships and dangers of a campaign in the wild countries beyond the Danube; and they assured the indolent prince, that the terror of his name and the arms of his lieutenants would be sufficient to complete the conquest of the dismayed barbarians, or to impose such conditions, as were more advantageous than any conquest. By a dextrous application to his sensual appetites, they compared the tranquillity, the splendour, the refined pleasures of Rome, with the tumult of a Pannonian camp, which afforded neither leisure nor materials for luxury t. Commodus listened. to the pleasing advice; but whilst he hesitated between his own inclination, and the awe which he still retained for his father's counsellors, the summer insensibly elapsed, and his triumphal entry into the capital was deferred till the autumn. His graceful persons, popular address, and imagined virtues, * Dion Cassius, 1. lxxii. p. 1203. † According to Tertullian (Apolog. c. 25.), he died at Sirmium. But the situation of Vindobona, or Vienna, where both the Victors place his death, is better adapted to the operations of the war against the Marcomanni and Quadi. p. 12. Herodian, l. i. IV. CHA P. virtues, attracted the public favour; the honourable peace which he had recently granted to the barbarians, diffused an universal joy*; his impatience to revisit Rome was fondly ascribed to the love of his country; and his dissolute course of amusements was faintly condemned in a prince of nineteen years of age. Is wound ed by an During the three first years of his reign, the forms, and even the spirit of the old administration were maintained by those faithful counsellors, to whom Marcus had recommended his son, and for whose wisdom and integrity Commodus still entertained a reluctant esteem. The young prince and his profligate favourites revelled in all the licence of sovereign power; but his hands were yet unstained with blood; and he had even displayed a generosity of sentiment, which might perhaps have ripened into solid virtue t. A fatal incident decided his fluctuating character. One evening, as the emperor was returning to the palace through a dark and narrow portico in the amphitheatre ‡, an assassin, who waited his passage, rushed upon him with a drawn sword, loudly exclaiming, " The senate sends you this." The menace prevented the deed; the assasin was seized by the guards, and immediately revealed the authors of the conspiracy. It had been *This universal joy is well described (from the medals as well as historians) by Mr Wotton, Hist. of Rome, p. 192. 193. + Manilius, the confidential secretary of Avidius Cassius, was discovered after he had lain concealed several years. The emperor nobly relieved the public anxiety by refusing to see him, and burning his papers without opening them. Dion Cassius, 1. lxxii. p. 1209. + See Maffei degli Amphitheatri, p. 126. IV. been formed not in the state, but within the walls CHA P. of the palace. Lucilla, the emperor's sister, and widow of Lucius. Verus, impatient of the second rank, and jealous of the reigning empress, had armed the murderer against her brother's life. She had not ventured to communicate the black design to her second husband Claudius Pompeianus, a senator of distinguished merit and unshaken loyalty; but among the crowd of her lovers (for she imitated the manners of Faustina) she found men of desperate fortunes and wild ambition, who were prepared to serve her more violent as well as her tender passions. The conspirators experienced the rigour of justice, and the abandoned princess was punished, first with exile, and afterwards with death *. But the words of the assasin sunk deep into the mind of Commodus, and left an indelible impression of fear and hatred against the whole body of the senate. Those whom he had dreaded as importunate ministers, he now suspected as secret enemies. The Delators, a race of men discouraged, and almost extinguished, under the former reigns, again became formidable, as soon as they discovered that the emperor was desirous of finding disaffection and treason in the senate. That assembly, whom Marcus had ever considered as the great council of the nation, was composed of the most distinguished of the Romans; and distinction of every kind soon became criminal. * Dion, 1. lxxii. p. 1205. Herodian, 1. i. p. 16. Hist. August. p. 46. Hatred and cruelty of Commodus towards the senate.. IV. CHA P. The possession of wealth stimulated the diligence of the informers; rigid virtue implied a tacit censure of the irregularities of Commodus; important services implied a dangerous superiority of merit; and the friendship of the father always ensured the aversion of the son. Suspicion was equivalent to proof; trial to condemnation. The execution of a considerable senator was attended with the death of all who might lament or revenge his fate; and when Commodus had once tasted human blood, he became incapable of pity or remorse. tilian bro thers. Of these innocent victims of tyranny, none The Quin died more lamented than the two brothers of the Quintilian family, Maximus and Condianus ; whose fraternal love has saved their names from oblivion, and endeared their memory to posterity. Their studies and their occupations, their pursuits and their pleasures, were still the same. In the enjoyment of a great estate, they never admitted the idea of a separate interest; some fragments are now extant of a treatise which they composed in common; and in every action of life it was observed, that their two bodies were animated by one soul. The Antonines, who valued their virtues, and delighted in their union, raised them, in the same year, to the consulship; and Marcus afterwards entrusted to their joint care the civil administration of Greece, and a great military command, in which they obtained a signal victory over the Germans. The |