Part 5

Marius was an indifferent politician. He perceived as well as any one that violence must not go on, but he hesitated to put it down. He knew that the aristocracy feared and hated him. Between them and the people's consul no alliance was possible. He did not care to alienate his friends, and there may have been other difficulties which we do not know, in his way. The army itself was perhaps divided. On the popular side there were two parties: a moderate one, represented by Memmius, who, as tribune, had impeached the senators for the Jugurthine infamies; the other, the advanced radicals, led by Glaucia and Saturninus. Memmius and Glaucia were both candidates for the consulship; and as Memmius was likely to succeed, he was murdered.

Above the tumults of the factions in the Capitol a cry rising into shrillness began to be heard from Italy. Caius Gracchus had wished to extend the Roman franchise to the Italian states, and the suggestion had cost him his popularity and his life. The Italian provinces had furnished their share of the armies which had beaten Jugurtha, and had destroyed the German invaders. They now demanded that they should have the position which Gracchus designed for them: that they should be allowed to legislate for themselves, and no longer lie at the mercy of others, who neither understood their necessities, nor cared for their interests. They had no friends in the city, save a few far-sighted statesmen. Senate and mob had at least one point of agreement, that the spoils of the Empire should be fought for among themselves; and at the first mention of the invasion of their monopoly a law was passed making the very agitation of the subject punishable by death.

The contrast of character between two classes of population, became at once uncomfortably evident. The provincials had been the right arm of the Empire. Rome, a city of rich men with families of slaves, and of a crowd of impoverished freemen without employment to keep them in health and strength, could no longer bring into the field a force which could hold its ground against the gentry and peasants of Samnium. The Senate enlisted Greeks, Numidians, any one whose services they could purchase. They had to encounter soldiers who had been trained and disciplined by Marius, and they were taught, by defeat upon defeat, that they had a worse enemy before them than the Germans. Marius himself had almost withdrawn from public life. He had no heart for the quarrel, and did not care greatly to exert himself. At the bottom, perhaps, he thought that the Italians were in the right. The Senate discovered that they were helpless, and must come to terms if they would escape destruction. They abandoned the original point of difference, and they offered to open the franchise to every Italian state south of the Po, which had not taken arms, or which returned immediately to its allegiance. The war had broken out for a definite cause. When the cause was removed no reason remained for its continuance.

The panting Senate was thus able to breathe again. The war continued, but under better auspices. Sound material could now be collected again for the army. Marius being in the background, the chosen knight of the aristocracy, Lucius Sulla, whose fame in the Cimbrian war had been only second to that of his commander's, came at once to the front. Too late the democratic leaders repented of their folly in encouraging the Senate to refuse the franchise to the Italians. The Italians, they began to perceive, would be their surest political allies. Caius Gracchus had been right after all. The Roman democracy must make haste to offer the Italians more than all which the Senate was ready to concede to them. Together they could make an end of misrule, and place Marius once more at their head.

Much of this was perhaps the scheming passion of revolution; much of it was legitimate indignation, penitent for its errors and anxious to atone for them. Marius had his personal grievances. The aristocrats were stealing from him even his military reputation, and claiming for Sulla the capture of Jugurtha. He was willing, perhaps anxious, to take the Eastern command. Sulpicius Rufus, once a champion of the Senate and the most brilliant orator in Rome, went over to the people in the excitement. Rufus was chosen tribune, and at once proposed to enfranchise the remainder of Italy.

But Sulla was not so easily got rid of. It was no time for nice considerations. He had formed an army in Campania out of the legions which had served against the Italians. He had made his soldiers devoted to him. They were ready to go anywhere and do anything which Sulla bade them. After so many murders, and so many commotions, the constitution had lost its sacred character; a popular assembly was, of all conceivable bodies, the least fit to govern an empire; and in Sulla's eyes the Senate, whatever its deficiencies, was the only possible sovereign of Rome. The people were a rabble, and their voices the clamor of fools, who must be taught to know their masters. His reply to Sulpicius and to the vote for his recall, was to march on the city. He led his troops within the circle which no legionary in arms was allowed to enter, and he lighted his watch-fires in the Forum itself. The people resisted; Sulpicius was killed; Marius, the saviour of his country, had to fly for his life, pursued by assassins, with a price set upon his head.[6] Twelve of the prominent popular leaders were immediately executed without trial; and in hot haste, swift, decisive measures were taken, which permanently, as Sulla hoped, or if not permanently, at least for the moment, would lame the limbs of the democracy.

[Footnote 6: According to legend Marius took refuge among the ruins of Carthage, comparing his own fallen greatness to that of the city. His dignity in misfortune awed the soldiers who came to seize him, and they left him in peace.]

He was no sooner out of Italy than the democratic party rose, with Cinna at their head, to demand the restoration of the old constitution. Cinna had been sworn to maintain Sulla's reforms, but no oath could be held binding which was extorted at the sword's point. A fresh Sulpicius was found in Carbo, a popular tribune. A more valuable supporter was found in Quintus Sertorius, a soldier of fortune, but a man of real gifts, and even of genius. Disregarding the new obligation to obtain the previous consent of the Senate, Cinna called the assembly together to repeal the acts which Sulla had forced on them.

The wounds of the social war were scarcely cicatrized, and the peace had left the allies imperfectly satisfied. Their dispersed armies gathered again about Cinna and Sertorius. Old Marius, who had been hunted through marsh and forest, and had been hiding with difficulty in Africa, came back at the news that Italy had risen again; and six thousand of his veterans flocked to him at the sound of his name. The Senate issued proclamations. The limitations on the Italian franchise left by Sulla were abandoned. Every privilege which had been asked for was conceded. It was too late. Concessions made in fear might be withdrawn on the return of safety. Marius and Cinna joined their forces. The few troops in the pay of the Senate deserted to them. They appeared together at the gates of the city, and Rome capitulated.

There was a bloody score to be wiped out. Marius bears the chief blame for the scenes which followed. Undoubtedly he was in no pleasant humor. A price had been set on his head, his house had been destroyed, his property had been confiscated, he himself had been chased like a wild beast, and he had not deserved such treatment. He had saved Italy when but for him it would have been wasted by the swords of the Germans. His power had afterward been absolute, but he had not abused it for party purposes. The Senate had no reason to complain of him. He had touched none of their privileges, incapable and dishonest as he knew them to be. His crime in their eyes had been his eminence. They had now shown themselves as cruel as they were worthless; and if public justice was disposed to make an end of them, he saw no cause for interference.

Thus the familiar story repeated itself: wrong was punished by wrong, and another item was entered on the bloody account which was being scored up year after year. The noble lords and their friends had killed the people in the Forum. They were killed in turn by the soldiers of Marius. Fifty senators perished, not those who were specially guilty, but those who were most politically marked as patrician leaders. With them fell a thousand equites, commoners of fortune, who had thrown in their lot with the aristocracy. From retaliatory political revenge the transition was easy to pillage and wholesale murder; and for many days the wretched city was made a prey to robbers and cut-throats.

So ended the year 87, the darkest and bloodiest which the guilty city had yet experienced. Marius and Cinna were chosen consuls for the year ensuing, and a witches' prophecy was fulfilled, that Marius should have a seventh consulate. But the glory had departed from him. His sun was already setting, redly, among crimson clouds. He lived but a fortnight after his inauguration, and he died in his bed on the 13th of January, at the age of seventy-one.

"The mother of the Gracchi," said Mirabeau, "cast the dust of her murdered sons into the air, and out of it sprang Caius Marius."

JULIUS CAESAR

By E. SPENCER BEESLY, M.A.

(100-44 B.C.)

Rome solved the great political problem of the ancient world in the best practicable, if not in the best conceivable, way. To Caesar it fell to put the crowning stroke to that work. The several states of modern Europe have all contributed, though in different degrees, to political progress, and therefore no one of them has the unique importance and glory that belongs to Rome. For the same reason, no modern statesman stands on a level with Caesar. He remains, in Shakespeare's phrase, "the foremost man of all this world." It was the high fortune of Rome that, in the principal crisis of her history, she possessed a citizen so splendidly endowed in intellect, character, and heart. Free to an extraordinary degree from the prejudices belonging to his age and country, with piercing and far-sweeping vision, he saw as from some superior height, the political situation of his own time in its relation to the past and the future of the ancient world. If Rome had till then carried out the work of conquest with considerable method, and upon the whole, with steadiness, she had very inadequately satisfied the need for incorporation. Her oligarchical constitution, admirably adapted for the first task, could not easily reconcile itself to the second. In its best days, and while Carthage and Macedon were still formidable, the Senate had from time to time, prudently though grudgingly, extended the privilege of citizenship to some of the subject Italian states. But the great mass of Italians had only extorted it by rebellion during the boyhood of Caesar, and outside Italy, the conquered nations were still on the footing of subject allies, trampled upon and fleeced for the benefit of Rome, or rather of the Roman nobles and capitalists. If the great dominion was to be maintained in some tolerable degree of well-being for all its members, or even maintained at all, it was absolutely necessary that the so-called Republican constitution, always oppressive for the provinces, and now shamefully corrupt, should be replaced by personal government. For a complete incorporation of the subject peoples was not to be expected from the suffrages of a dominant people, to even the poorest of whom, it would mean the cessation of highly prized privileges and immunities. The provinces would from the earliest moment of their subjection have welcomed such a change. The time was more than ripe for it when the Roman world lay at the feet of Sulla. Sulla had all the ability, self-reliance, prestige, and opportunity that were needed. But his moral nature was below the task. He had neither the insight, nor the sympathy, nor the noble ambition of Caesar, and he preferred to re-establish the senatorial oligarchy.

When Sulla crushed the Marian party Caesar had just arrived at manhood. Though of an old patrician house, he had yet a family connection with the democratic party, Marius having married his aunt. He himself had married a daughter of the democratic leader Cinna, and for refusing to divorce her he was proscribed by Sulla, but managed to keep in hiding till the storm was past. After the death of the great reactionist (B.C. 78), he seized every opportunity of reviving the spirit of the popular party; as, for instance, by publicly honoring the memory of Marius, bringing to justice murderers of the proscription, and courageously raising his single voice in the Senate against the illegal execution of Catiline's partisans (B.C. 63). Clearly seeing the necessity for personal government, at a time when his own services and distinctions were not such as to entitle him to aspire to it, Caesar did his best to secure it for Pompey, then far the foremost man in Rome, by strenuously supporting measures which virtually placed the empire at his absolute disposal for an indefinite period. A fairly good soldier, but a most vain, unreliable, and incompetent statesman, Pompey after five years let these powers slip through his hands.

Caesar was by this time thirty-eight (B.C. 62). He had steadily risen in influence and official rank; and it was, no doubt, now that he determined to take the great task into his own hands. He was the recognized chief of the popular party, which aimed at concentrating Republican government in the hands of a single person, as the only means of bridling the oligarchy. But this was not to be accomplished merely by popular votes, as many a democratic leader had found to his cost. Caesar needed an army and a military reputation, and with rare patience he set himself to acquire both. By a coalition with Pompey--now obliged to treat him as an equal--he obtained the consulship (B.C. 59), which on its expiration entitled him to a great military command.

Roman generals had of late preferred to extend their conquests eastward, and to win comparatively easy and lucrative triumphs in Asia, over people who had possessed for long ages a type of civilization suited to them, and who therefore could never thoroughly assimilate Western manners and institutions. All this time Gaul, lying at the gates of Italy, was neglected (only the district between the Cevennes and the Alps having been reduced), because the people were more warlike, and less booty was to be gained. Yet, till that conquest should be effected, Rome's work of civilizing the world was standing still; nay, it was always menaced by northern invasions. This field of action, then, Caesar marked out for himself, in which he could prepare the means for assuming power at home, and at the same time render the highest service to his country and humanity. His ardent spirit, his incredible energy in all circumstances of his life, astonished his contemporaries. Time pressed, for he was no longer young. While he was absent from Rome, what revolutions might not mar his plans! Yet, ten continuous years did he devote to this great task, which, if he had achieved nothing else, would make his name one of the greatest in history. In those ten years he conquered Gaul, from the Pyrenees to the Rhine and the British Channel; conquered her so thoroughly, and treated her so sensibly, that when the fierce struggle was over, she frankly and even proudly accepted her new position. The culture, the institutions, even the language of the victors, were eagerly adopted. The grandsons of the men who had fought so gallantly against Caesar, won full citizenship, took their seats in the Senate, and commanded Roman armies.

These ten years decided the future of the West, and therefore of Humanity. It is not merely the central position and natural advantages of France, nor yet the admirable qualities of her people, which have made her throughout mediaeval and modern history, the foremost of European states. It is even more the result of her rapid and thorough acceptance of Roman civilization. This made her the heir of Rome. This enabled her, long afterward, to Romanize Germany and England in some degree, and as it were at second-hand, by the arms of Charlemagne and William.

It had been arranged between Caesar and Pompey, that during the absence of the former in Gaul, the latter should act with the popular party, and keep the nobility in the condition of impotence to which it had been reduced in the consulship of Caesar. Partly from jealousy of Caesar, partly from sheer incapacity, Pompey, after much vacillation and duplicity, finally allied himself with the nobles, thinking with their aid to crush his rival and thereafter to be supreme. The nobles, for their part, thought they would know how to deal with Pompey if once Caesar was out of the way. In the negotiations which preceded the civil war, Caesar showed a moderation and fairness in striking contrast with the unscrupulous and headstrong violence of the nobles, who had not even formal legality on their side. But when he was finally summoned to hand over his province and army to a nominee of the Senate, on pain of being declared a public enemy, and when the tribunes who had reversed the resolution of the Senate were obliged to fly for their lives to his camp, he suddenly crossed the river Rubicon, the boundary of his province, and marched on Rome (B.C. 49).

He had but one legion with him; the bulk of his army was far away in its Gallic cantonments. The forces of Pompey were overwhelmingly superior in numbers. But the rapid and daring advance of Caesar prevented their concentration. He came, not merely the adored general of a veteran army, but the long-tried and consistent leader of the liberal party, who had never swerved from his principles, never betrayed his friends, never flinched from dangers. Fascinated by his success and encouraged by his clemency, towns everywhere opened their gates and Pompeian levies joined him, swelling his army at every stage as he swept down Italy.

Pompey, for his part, was not sorry to have a pretext for moving eastward toward the scene of his early triumphs, where his military prestige and his personal influence would cause all the client states to rally round him, and the sulky and suspicious nobles would find themselves overshadowed. So he crossed the Adriatic, leaving the large veteran army in Spain, which was under his orders, to take care of itself. Thither Caesar proceeded as soon as he had secured Italy, bent on making sure of the West before doing anything else. When the Spanish legions were beaten, he lost no time in following Pompey, who had found the respite all too short for drilling his large but raw force of Romans, and organizing the masses of Asiatics whom he had summoned to his standard. In the campaign that ensued, the conqueror of the East fully maintained his old military reputation; but at length, driven by the clamor of the nobles to risk a pitched battle, he suffered a crushing defeat on the field of Pharsalia (B.C. 48). Flying to Egypt, still an independent kingdom, he was assassinated by order of the government.

The beaten party rallied again, first in Africa, then in Spain; and of the three years and nine months of life that remained to Caesar, much the greater portion was spent at the head of his army. He, therefore, had not time to give any complete organization to his new government. But his intentions are clearly discernible in outline. Supreme power, legislative as well as executive, was to be vested in a single ruler, governing not by divine right, but as the representative of the community, and in its interest. This was indeed an ideal by no means novel to Romans. Scipio had brooded over it. Caius Gracchus had for a moment realized it. The oldest institutions and traditions told of it. It was the power of the ancient kings theoretically continued to, and in grave emergencies actually exercised by, the magistrates of the Republic during its best days. It had been increasingly overshadowed by the Senate. That body was now to be reduced to its original consultative office. The functions of the executive had been gradually divided among several magistrates. They were now to be re-concentrated. Above all, annual election--the cherished institution of all oligarchies, open or disguised--was to be replaced by life-tenure, with power to name a successor. The subjects of Rome were to be admitted to citizenship, wherever and whenever fit for it; and there is reason to believe that Caesar intended to move much faster in this direction than his successor did. Rome itself, from the mistress of the Empire, was to become its capital and most dignified municipality. All old parties--Caesar's own included--were to consider themselves at an end. "To the victors the spoils!" was a cry rebuked from the first. For the vanquished of Pharsalia there was not only amnesty, but admission to the highest grades of the public service, if they would bury their old grudge and recognize the government. Pauperism among the lower class, and insolvency among the upper--ulcers not admitting of a radical cure--were treated with judicious palliatives. Taxation was reduced, expenditure was increased, and yet the balance in the treasury at Caesar's death was tenfold what it had ever been before--a proof of the frightful waste and corruption from which the Roman world was rescued by the overthrow of the oligarchy.

Of the administrative work of Caesar it is impossible here to give any adequate idea. A reform of the calendar, which served the West till 1582, and serves Russia still; a recasting of the whole provincial administration; a codification of Roman law; a census of the Empire; a uniform gold coinage; a public library; a metropolitan police; building regulations; sanitary regulations; an alteration of the course of the Tiber, which would have drained the marshes--all these grand projects, and more, some carried to completion, some only sketched out, teemed from the active brain of the great organizer, in the brief moments he could spare from military cares in these last months of his life--a devouring activity, an all-embracing capacity, such as perhaps never shone forth in man before or since. What Roman incorporation meant for the ancient world was at last revealed. The war havoc of seven centuries had found its justification.

In the midst of this glorious and beneficent career, at the age of fifty-five (57?), Caesar, whose frank and fearless spirit disdained suspicion or precaution, was assassinated by a knot of rancorous, perfidious aristocrats, whom he had pardoned and promoted. Their purblind spite was powerless to avert the inevitable advent of monocracy. What they did effectually extinguish for more than a century, was the possibility of amnesty, conciliation, and mutual confidence. Careless as usual of historical truth, the great English poet has glorified the murderers of Caesar. Dante, never forgetting the moral responsibility of art, has reserved the lowest circle of hell for Brutus, Cassius, and Judas Iscariot.