Part 3

In respect of intelligence and combining genius, Alexander was Hellenic to the full; in respect of disposition and purpose, no one could be less Hellenic. The acts attesting his Oriental violence of impulse, unmeasured self-will, and exaction of reverence above the limits of humanity, have been recounted. To describe him as a son of Hellas, imbued with the political maxims of Aristotle, and bent on the systematic diffusion of Hellenic culture for the improvement of mankind is in my judgement an estimate of his character contrary to the evidence.

Alexander is indeed said to have invited suggestions from Aristotle as to the best mode of colonizing; but his temper altered so much after a few years of Asiatic conquest, that he came not only to lose all deference for Aristotle’s advice, but even to hate him bitterly. Instead of “Hellenizing” Asia, he was tending to “Asiatize” Macedonia and Hellas. His temper and character as modified by a few years of conquest rendered him quite unfit to follow the course recommended by Aristotle toward the Greeks--quite as unfit as any of the Persian kings, or as the French Emperor Napoleon, to endure that partial frustration, compromise, and smart from personal criticism, which is inseparable from the position of a limited chief.

Plutarch states that Alexander founded more than seventy new cities in Asia. So large a number of them is neither verifiable nor probable, unless we either reckon up simple military posts or borrow from the list of foundations established by his successors. Except Alexandria in Egypt, none of the cities founded by Alexander himself can be shown to have attained any great development. The process of “Hellenizing” Asia, in as far as Asia was ever “Hellenized,” which has so often been ascribed to Alexander, was in reality the work of the successors to his great dominion.

We read that Alexander felt so much interest in the extension of science that he gave to Aristotle the immense sum of eight hundred talents in money, placing under his direction several thousand men, for the purpose of prosecuting zoölogical researches. These exaggerations are probably the work of those enemies of the philosopher who decried him as a pensioner of the Macedonian court; but it is probable enough that Philip, and Alexander in the earlier part of his reign, may have helped Aristotle in the difficult process of getting together facts and specimens for observation from esteem toward him personally rather than from interest in his discoveries.

The intellectual turn of Alexander was toward literature, poetry, and history. He was fond of the “Iliad” especially, as well as of the Attic tragedians; so that Harpalus, being directed to send some books to him in Upper Asia, selected as the most acceptable packet various tragedies of Æschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides, with the dithyrambic poems of Telestes and the histories of Philistus.

HANNIBAL.

BY THEODOR MOMMSEN.

[A Carthaginian statesman and soldier, one of the foremost generals of antiquity, born 247 B.C., died 183. The series of Italian campaigns in which he imperiled the very existence of Rome are commented on by modern military critics as models of brilliancy and daring, combined with far-sighted prudence. Finally compelled to evacuate Italy, he was defeated and his army destroyed by Publius Cornelius Scipio, afterward surnamed Africanus, at the battle of Zama in Africa in 202. Exiled from Carthage, he spent the latter years of his life in fomenting war against Rome among the Eastern nations, and finally committed suicide to prevent being delivered over to the hands of Rome. References: Mommsen’s “History of Rome,” Plutarch’s “Lives.”]

When Hamilcar departed to take command in Spain, he enjoined his son Hannibal, nine years of age, to swear at the altar of the Supreme God eternal hatred to the Roman name, and reared him and his younger sons, Hasdrubal and Mago--the “lion’s brood,” as he called them--in the camp, as the inheritors of his projects, of his genius, and of his hatred.

The man whose head and heart had in a desperate emergency and amid a despairing people paved the way for their deliverance, was no more when it became possible to carry out his design. Whether his successor Hasdrubal forbore to make the attack because the proper moment seemed to him not yet to have arrived, or whether, a statesman rather than a general, he believed himself unequal to the conduct of the enterprise, we are unable to determine. When, at the beginning of 219 B.C., he fell by the hand of an assassin, the Carthaginian officers of the Spanish army summoned to fill his place Hannibal, the eldest son of Hamilcar.

He was still a young man, born in 247 B.C., and now, therefore, in his twenty-ninth year; but his life had already been fraught with varied experience. His first recollections picture to him his father fighting in a distant land and conquering on Ercte; he shared that unconquered father’s fortunes and sympathized with his feelings on the peace of Catulus, on the bitter return home, and throughout the horrors of the Libyan war. While still a boy he had followed his father to the camp, and he soon distinguished himself.

His light and firmly built frame made him an excellent runner and boxer and a fearless rider; the privation of sleep did not affect him, and he knew like a soldier how to enjoy or to want his food. Although his youth had been spent in

the camp, he possessed such culture as was bestowed on the noble Phœnicians of the time; in Greek, apparently after he had become a general, he made such progress under the guidance of his intimate friend Sasilus of Sparta as to be able to compose state papers in that language.

As he grew up, he entered the army of his father to perform his first feats of arms under the paternal eye, and to see him fall in battle by his side. Thereafter he had commanded the cavalry under his sister’s husband Hasdrubal and distinguished himself by brilliant personal bravery as well as by his talents as a leader. The voice of his comrades now summoned him--their tried and youthful leader--to the chief command, and he could now execute the designs for which his father and his brother-in-law had died.

He took possession of the inheritance, and was worthy of it. His contemporaries tried to cast stains of all sorts on his character; the Romans charged him with cruelty, the Carthaginians with covetousness; and it is true that he hated as only Oriental natures know how to hate, and that a general who never fell short of money and stores can hardly have been other than covetous. Nevertheless, though anger and envy and meanness have written his history, they have not been able to mar the pure and noble image which it presents.

Laying aside wretched inventions which furnished their own refutation, and some things which his lieutenants Hannibal Monomachus, and Mago the Samnite, were guilty of doing in his name, nothing occurs in the accounts regarding him which may not be justified in the circumstances and by the international law of the times; and all agree in this--that he combined in rare perfection discretion and enthusiasm, caution and energy.

He was peculiarly marked by that inventive craftiness which forms one of the leading traits of the Phœnician character--he was fond of taking singular and unexpected routes; ambushes and strategems of all sorts were familiar to him; and he studied the character of his antagonists with unprecedented care. By an unrivaled system of espionage--he had regular spies even in Rome--he kept himself informed of the projects of the enemy; he himself was frequently seen wearing disguises and false hair in order to procure information on some point or another.

Every page of history attests his genius as a general; and his gifts as a statesman were, after the peace with Rome, no less conspicuously displayed in his reform of the Carthaginian constitution and in the unparalleled influence which as an exiled strength he exercised in the cabinets of the Eastern powers. The power which he wielded over men is shown by his incomparable control over an army of various nations and many tongues--an army which never in the worst times mutinied against him. He was a great man; wherever he went he riveted the eyes of all.

Hannibal’s cautious and masterly execution of his plan of crossing the Alps into Italy, instead of transporting his army by sea, in its details, at all events, deserves our admiration, and, to whatever causes the result may have been due--whether it was due mainly to the favor of fortune or mainly to the skill of the general--the grand idea of Hamilcar, that of taking up the conflict with Rome in Italy, was now realized. It was his genius that projected the expedition; and the unerring tact of historical tradition has always dwelt on the last link in the great chain of preparatory steps, the passage of the Alps, with a greater admiration than on the battles of the Trasimene Lake and of the plain of Cannæ.

Hannibal knew Rome better, perhaps, than the Romans knew it themselves. It was clearly apparent that the Italian federation was in political solidity and in military resources far superior to an adversary who received only precarious and irregular support from home; and that the Phœnician foot-soldier was, notwithstanding all the pains taken by Hannibal, far inferior in point of tactics to the legionary, had been completely proved by the defensive movements of Scipio. From these convictions flowed two fundamental principles which determined Hannibal’s whole method of operations in Italy, viz., that the war should be carried on somewhat adventurously, with constant changes in the plan and in the theatre of operations; and that its favorable issue could only be looked for as the result of political and not of military successes--of the gradual loosening and breaking up of the Italian federation.

This aim was the aim dictated to him by right policy, because mighty conqueror though he was in battle, he saw very clearly that on each occasion he vanquished the generals but not the city, and that after each new battle, the Romans remained as superior to the Carthaginians as he was personally superior to the Roman commanders. That Hannibal, even at the height of his fortune, never deceived himself on this point is a fact more wonderful than his wonderful battles.

THE GRACCHI.

BY PLUTARCH.

[Tiberius Sempronius and Caius Sempronius, sons of Tiberius Gracchus by Cornelia, daughter of Scipio Africanus, the conqueror of Hannibal and Carthage. The first, born 168 B.C., died in 133; the second, born about 159 B.C., died in 121. The brothers, though on both sides of the highest patrician rank and descent, espoused the democratic cause. Both rose to the rank of tribune. Tiberius carried through an agrarian law dividing the surplus lands of the republic among the poor, and was killed in a popular _emeute_. Caius caused to be passed a poor-law giving monthly distributions of corn. He also transferred the judicial power largely to the equites or knights, and proposed to extend the Roman franchise to all Italy. He committed suicide to save himself from assassination. References: Arnold’s “History of Rome” and Mommsen’s “History of Rome.”]

Cornelia, taking upon herself the care of the household and the education of her children, approved herself so discreet a matron, so affectionate a mother, and so constant and noble-spirited a woman, that Tiberius seemed to all men to have done nothing unreasonable in choosing to die for such a woman, who, when King Ptolemy himself proffered her his crown and would have married her, refused it and chose rather to live a widow. In this state she continued and lost all her children, except one daughter, who was married to Scipio the younger, and two sons, Tiberius and Caius.

These she brought up with such care, that though they were without dispute in natural endowments and disposition the first among the Romans of their day, yet they seemed to owe their virtues even more to their education than to their birth. And, as in the statues and pictures made of Castor and Pollux, though the brothers resemble one another, yet there is a difference to be perceived in their countenances between the one who delighted in the cestus, and the other that was famous in the course; so between these two youths, though there was a strong general likeness in their common love of fortitude and temperance, in their liberality, their eloquence, and their greatness of mind, yet in their actions and administrations of public affairs, a considerable variation showed itself.

Tiberius, in the form and expression of his countenance and in his gesture and motion, was gentle and composed; but Caius, earnest and vehement. And so in their public speeches to the people, the one spoke in a quiet, orderly manner, standing throughout on the same spot; the other would walk about on the hustings and in the heat of his orations pull his gown off his shoulders, and was the first of all the Romans to use such gestures. Caius’s oratory was impetuous and passionate, making everything tell to the utmost, whereas Tiberius was gentle and persuasive, awakening emotions of pity. His diction was pure and carefully correct, while that of Caius was rich and vehement.

So likewise in their way of living and at their tables; Tiberius was frugal and plain, Caius, compared with others, temperate and even austere, but contrasting with his brother in a fondness for new fashions and varieties. The same difference that appeared in their diction was observable also in their tempers. The one was mild and reasonable; the other rough and passionate, and to that degree that often in the midst of speaking he was so hurried away by his passion against his judgment that his voice lost its tone and he began to pass into mere abusive talking, spoiling his whole speech.

As a remedy to this excess he made use of an ingenious servant of his, one Licinius, who stood constantly behind him with a sort of pitch-pipe, or instrument to regulate the voice by, and whenever he perceived his master’s tone alter and break with anger, he struck a soft note with his pipe, on hearing which Caius immediately checked the vehemence of his passion and his voice grew quieter, and he allowed himself to be recalled to temper.

Such are the differences between the two brothers, but their valor in war against their country’s enemies, their justice in the government of its subjects, their care and industry in office, and their self-command in all that regarded their pleasures, were equally remarkable in both. Tiberius was the elder by nine years; owing to which their actions as public men were divided by the difference of the times in which those of the one and those of the other were performed. The power they would have exercised, had they both flourished together, could scarcely have failed to overcome all resistance.

Their greatest detractors and their worst enemies could not but allow that they had a genius to virtue beyond all other Romans, which was improved also by a generous education. Besides, the Gracchi, happening to live when Rome had her greatest repute for honor and virtuous actions, might justly have been ashamed if they had not also left to the next generation the whole inheritance of the virtues of their ancestors.

The integrity of the two Romans, and their superiority to money was chiefly remarkable in this--that in office and the administration of public affairs they kept themselves from the imputation of unjust gain. The chief things in general which they aimed at were the settlement of cities and mending the highways; and in particular the boldest design which Tiberius is famed for is the recovery of the public land; and Caius gained his greatest reputation by the addition, for the exercise of judicial powers, of three hundred of the order of knights to the same number of senators.

Tiberius was the first who attempted to scale the walls of Carthage, which was no mean exploit. We may add the peace which he concluded with the Numantines, by which he saved the lives of twenty thousand Romans, who otherwise had certainly been cut off. And Caius, not only at home, but in war in Sardinia, displayed distinguished courage. So that their early actions were no small argument that afterward they might have rivaled the best of the Roman commanders if they had not died so young.

Of the Gracchi, neither the one nor the other was the first to shed the blood of his fellow-citizens; and Caius is reported to have avoided all manner of resistance, even when his life was aimed at, showing himself always valiant against a foreign enemy, but wholly inactive in a sedition. This was the reason that he went from his own house unarmed, and withdrew when the battle began, and in all respects showed himself anxious rather not to do any harm to others than not suffer any himself. Even the very flight of the Gracchi must not be looked on as an argument of a mean spirit, but an honorable retreat from endangering others.

The greatest crime that can be laid to Tiberius’s charge was the disposing of his fellow-tribune, and seeking afterward a second tribuneship for himself. Tiberius and Caius by nature had an excessive desire for glory and honors. Beyond this, their enemies could find nothing to bring against them; but as soon as the contention began with their adversaries, their heat and passions would so far prevail beyond their natural temper that by them, as by ill-winds, they were driven afterward to all their rash undertakings. What would be more just and honorable than their first design, had not the power and faction of the rich, by endeavoring to abrogate that law, engaged them both in those fatal quarrels, the one for his own preservation, the other to avenge his brother’s death who was murdered without law or justice.

CAIUS MARIUS.

BY JAMES ANTHONY FROUDE.

[An able Roman general and leader of the democratic faction, born 157 B.C., died 86. The military skill of Marius finished the Jugurthine war and saved Rome from the Cimbri and Teutons. Though of plebeian birth he married into an eminent patrician family, and became thereby the uncle of Julius Cæsar, who attached himself to the Marian party in the political wars which raged between the popular and patrician factions, the latter being led by Sylla. The worst stain on the memory of Marius is the massacre which he permitted at the beginning of his last consulate. References: Mommsen’s “History of Rome,” Froude’s “Life of Cæsar,” Plutarch’s “Lives.”]

Marius was born at Arpinum, a Latin township, seventy miles from the capital. His father was a small farmer, and he was himself bred to the plow. He joined the army early, and soon attracted notice by the punctual discharge of his duties. In a time of growing looseness, Marius was strict himself in keeping discipline and in enforcing it as he rose in the service. He was in Spain when Jugurtha[6] was there, and made himself specially useful to Scipio;[7] he forced his way steadily upward by his mere soldier-like qualities to the rank of military tribune. Rome, too, had learned to know him, for he was chosen tribune of the people the year after the murder of Caius Gracchus. Being a self-made man, he naturally belonged to the popular party. While in office he gave offense in some way to the men in power, and was called before the senate to answer for himself. But he had the right on his side, it is likely, for they found him stubborn and impertinent, and they could make nothing of their charges against him.

He was not bidding, however, at this time for the support of the mob. He had the integrity and sense to oppose the largesses of corn, and he forfeited his popularity by trying to close the public granaries before the practice had passed into a system. He seemed as if made of a block of hard Roman oak, gnarled and knotted but sound in all its fibers. His professional merit continued to recommend him. At the age of forty he became prætor,[8] and was sent to Spain, where he left a mark again by the successful severity by which he cleared the provinces of banditti. He was a man neither given himself to talking nor much talked about in the world; but he was sought for wherever work was to be done, and he had made himself respected and valued; for after his return from the peninsula he had married into one of the most distinguished of the patrician families.

Marius by this marriage became a person of social consequence. His father had been a client of the Metelli; and Cæcelius Metellus, who must have known Marius by reputation and probably in person, invited him to go as second in command in the African campaign.[9] The war dragged on, and Marius, perhaps ambitious, perhaps impatient at the general’s want of vigor, began to think he could make quicker work of it. There was just irritation that a petty African prince could defy the whole power of Rome for so many years; and though a democratic consul had been unheard of for a century, the name of Marius began to be spoken of as a possible candidate. Marius consented to stand. The patricians strained their resources to defeat him, but he was chosen with enthusiasm.

A shudder of alarm ran, no doubt, through the senate house when the determination of the people was known. A successful general could not be disposed of as easily as oratorical tribunes. Fortunately Marius was not a politician. He had no belief in democracy. He was a soldier and had a soldier’s way of thinking on government and the methods of it. His first step was a reformation in the army. Hitherto the Roman legions had been no more than the citizens in arms, called for the moment from their various occupations to return to them when the occasion for their services was past. Marius had perceived that fewer men, better trained and disciplined, could be made more effective and be more easily handled. He had studied war as a science. He had perceived that the present weakness need be no more than an accident, and that there was a latent force in the Roman state which needed only organization to resume its ascendancy.

“He enlisted,” it was said, “the worst of the citizens”--men, that is to say, who had no occupation, and became soldiers by profession; and as persons without property could not have furnished themselves at their own cost, he must have carried out the scheme proposed by Gracchus, and equipped them at the expense of the state. His discipline was of the sternest. The experiment was new; and men of rank who had a taste for war in earnest, and did not wish that the popular party should have the whole benefit and credit of the improvements were willing to go with him; among them a dissipated young patrician, called Lucius Sylla, whose name was also destined to be memorable.

Marius had formed an army barely in time to save Italy from being totally overwhelmed. A vast migratory wave of population had been set in motion behind the Rhine and Danube. The hunting-grounds were too strait for the numbers crowded into them, and two enormous hordes were rolling westward and southward in search of some new abiding-place. The Teutons came from the Baltic down across the Rhine into Luxemburg. The Cimbri crossed the Danube near its sources into Illyria. Both Teutons and Cimbri were Germans, and both were making for Gaul by different routes. Each division consisted of hundreds of thousands. They traveled with their wives and children, their wagons, as with the ancient Scythians and with the modern South African Dutch, being their homes. Two years had been consumed in these wanderings, and Marius was by this time ready for them.