Part 111

"Nero … was but a variety of the same species [as Caligula]. He also was an amateur, and an enthusiastic amateur, of murder. But as this taste, in the most ingenious hands, is limited and monotonous in its modes of manifestation, it would be tedious to run through the long Suetonian roll-call of his peccadilloes in this way. One only we shall cite, to illustrate the amorous delight with which he pursued any murder which happened to be seasoned highly to his taste by enormous atrocity, and by almost unconquerable difficulty. … For certain reasons of state, as Nero attempted to persuade himself, but in reality because no other crime had the same attractions of unnatural horror about it, he resolved to murder his mother Agrippina. This being settled, the next thing was to arrange the mode and the tools. Naturally enough, according to the custom then prevalent in Rome, he first attempted the thing by poison. The poison failed: for Agrippina, anticipating tricks of this kind, had armed her constitution against them, like Mithridates; and daily took potent antidotes and prophylactics. Or else (which is more probable) the emperor's agent in such purposes, fearing his sudden repentance and remorse, … had composed a poison of inferior strength. This had certainly occurred in the case of Britannicus, who had thrown off with ease the first dose administered to him by Nero," but who was killed by a second more powerful potion. "On Agrippina, however, no changes in the poison, whether of kind or strength, had any effect; so that, after various trials, this mode of murder was abandoned, and the emperor addressed himself to other plans. The first of these was some curious mechanical device, by which a false ceiling was to have been suspended by bolts above her bed; and in the middle of the night, the bolt being suddenly drawn, a vast weight would have descended with a ruinous destruction to all below. This scheme, however, taking air from the indiscretion of some amongst the accomplices, reached the ears of Agrippina. … Next, he conceived the idea of an artificial ship, which, at the touch of a few springs, might fall to pieces in deep water. Such a ship was prepared, and stationed at a suitable point. But the main difficulty remained, which was to persuade the old lady to go on board." By complicated stratagems this was brought about. "The emperor accompanied her to the place of embarkation, took a most tender leave of her, and saw her set sail. It was necessary that the vessel should get into deep water before the experiment could be made; and with the utmost agitation this pious son awaited news of the result. Suddenly a messenger rushed breathless into his presence, and horrified him by the joyful information that his august mother had met with an alarming accident; but, by the blessing of Heaven, had escaped safe and sound, and was now on her road to mingle congratulations with her affectionate son. The ship, it seems, had done its office; the mechanism had played admirably; but who can provide for everything? The old lady, it turned out, could swim like a duck; and the whole result had been to refresh her with a little sea-bathing. Here was worshipful intelligence. Could any man's temper be expected to stand such continued sieges? … Of a man like Nero it could not be expected that he should any longer dissemble his disgust, or put up with such repeated affronts. He rushed upon his simple congratulating friend, swore that he had come to murder him, and as nobody could have suborned him but Agrippina, he ordered her off to instant execution. And, unquestionably, if people will not be murdered quietly and in a civil way, they must expect that such forbearance is not to continue for ever; and obviously have themselves only to blame for any harshness or violence which they may have rendered necessary. It is singular, and shocking at the same time, to mention, that, for this atrocity, Nero did absolutely receive solemn congratulations from all orders of men. With such evidences of base servility in the public mind, and of the utter corruption which they had sustained in their elementary feelings, it is the less astonishing that he should have made other experiments upon the public patience, which seem expressly designed to try how much it would support. Whether he were really the author of the desolating fire which consumed Rome for six days and seven nights [A. D. 64], and drove the mass of the people into the tombs and sepulchres for shelter, is yet a matter of some doubt. But one great presumption against it, founded on its desperate imprudence, as attacking the people in their primary comforts, is considerably weakened by the enormous servility of the Romans in the case just stated: they who could volunteer congratulations to a son for butchering his mother (no matter on what pretended suspicions), might reasonably be supposed incapable of any resistance which required courage, even in a case of self-defence or of just revenge. … The great loss on this memorable occasion was in the heraldic and ancestral honours of the city. Historic Rome then went to wreck for ever. Then perished the 'domus priscorum ducum hostilibus ad-huc spoliis adornatæ'; the 'rostral' palace; the mansion of the Pompeys; the Blenheims and the Strathfieldsayes of the Scipios, the Marcelli, the Paulli, and the Cæsars; then perished the aged trophies from Carthage and from Gaul; and, in short, as the historian sums up the lamentable desolation, 'quidquid visendum atque memorabile ex antiquitate duraverat.' And this of itself might lead one to suspect the emperor's hand as the original agent; for by no one act was it possible so entirely and so suddenly to wean the people from their old republican recollections. … In any other sense, whether for health or for the conveniences of polished life, or for architectural magnificence, there never was a doubt that the Roman people gained infinitely by this conflagration. For, like London, it arose from its ashes with a splendour proportioned to its vast expansion of wealth and population; and marble took the place of wood. For the moment, however, this event must have been felt by the people as an overwhelming calamity. {2707} And it serves to illustrate the passive endurance and timidity of the popular temper, and to what extent it might be provoked with impunity, that in this state of general irritation and effervescence Nero absolutely forbade them to meddle with the ruins of their own dwellings—taking that charge upon himself, with a view to the vast wealth which he anticipated from sifting the rubbish."

_T. De Quincey, The Cæsars chapter 3._

ALSO IN: _Suetonius, Lives of the Twelve Cæsars: Nero._

_Tacitus, Annals, books 13-16._

_S. Baring-Gould, The Tragedy of the Cæsars, volume 2._

ROME: A. D. 61. Campaigns of Suetonius Paulinus in Britain.

See BRITAIN: A. D. 61.

ROME: A. D. 64-68. The first persecution of Christians. The fitting end of Nero.

"Nero was so secure in his absolutism, he had hitherto found it so impossible to shock the feelings of the people or to exhaust the terrified adulation of the Senate, that he was usually indifferent to the pasquinades which were constantly holding up his name to execration and contempt. But now [after the burning of Rome] he felt that he had gone too far, and that his power would be seriously imperilled if he did not succeed in diverting the suspicions of the populace. He was perfectly aware that when the people in the streets cursed those who set fire to the city, they meant to curse him. If he did not take some immediate step he felt that he might perish, as Gaius [Caligula], had perished before him, by the dagger of the assassin. It is at this point of his career that Nero becomes a prominent figure in the history of the Church. It was this phase of cruelty which seemed to throw a blood-red light over his whole character, and led men to look on him as the very incarnation of the world-power in its most demoniac aspect—as worse than the Antiochus Epiphanes of Daniel's Apocalypse—as the Man of Sin whom (in language figurative, indeed, yet awfully true) the Lord should slay with the breath of His mouth and destroy with the brightness of His coming. For Nero endeavoured to fix the odious crime of having destroyed the capital of the world upon the most innocent and faithful of his subjects—upon the only subjects who offered heartfelt prayers on his behalf—the Roman Christians. … Why he should have thought of singling out the Christians, has always been a curious problem, for at this point St. Luke ends the Acts of the Apostles, perhaps purposely dropping the curtain, because it would have been perilous and useless to narrate the horrors in which the hitherto neutral or friendly Roman Government began to play so disgraceful a part. Neither Tacitus, nor Suetonius, nor the Apocalypse, help us to solve this particular problem. The Christians had filled no large space in the eye of the world. Until the days of Domitian we do not hear of a single noble or distinguished person who had joined their ranks. … The slaves and artisans, Jewish and Gentile, who formed the Christian community at Rome, had never in any way come into collision with the Roman Government. … That the Christians were entirely innocent of the crime charged against them was well known both at the time and afterwards. But how was it that Nero sought popularity and partly averted the deep rage which was rankling in many hearts against himself, by torturing men and women, on whose agonies he thought that the populace would gaze not only with a stolid indifference, but even with fierce satisfaction? Gibbon has conjectured that the Christians were confounded with the Jews, and that the detestation universally felt for the latter fell with double force upon the former. Christians suffered even more than the Jews because of the calumnies so assiduously circulated against them, and from what appeared to the ancients to be the revolting absurdity of their peculiar tenets. 'Nero,' says Tacitus, 'exposed to accusation, and tortured with the most exquisite penalties, a set of men detested for their enormities, whom the common people called Christians. Christus, the founder of this sect, was executed during the reign of Tiberius by the Procurator Pontius Pilate, and the deadly superstition, suppressed for a time, began to burst out once more, not only throughout Judaea, where the evil had its root, but even in the City, whither from every quarter all things horrible or shameful are drifted, and find their votaries.' The lordly disdain which prevented Tacitus from making any inquiry into the real views and character of the Christians, is shown by the fact that he catches up the most baseless allegations against them. … The masses, he says, called them 'Christians;' and while he almost apologises for staining his page with so vulgar an appellation, he merely mentions in passing, that, though innocent of the charge of being turbulent incendiaries, on which they were tortured to death, they were yet a set of guilty and infamous sectaries, to be classed with the lowest dregs of Roman criminals. But the haughty historian throws no light on one difficulty, namely, the circumstances which led to the Christians being thus singled out. The Jews were in no way involved in Nero's persecution. … The Jews were by far the deadliest enemies of the Christians; and two persons of Jewish proclivities were at this time in close proximity to the person of the Emperor. One was the pantomimist Aliturus, the other was Poppaea, the harlot Empress. … If, as seems certain, the Jews had it in their power during the reign of Nero more or less to shape the whisper of the throne, does not historical induction drive us to conclude with some confidence that the suggestion of the Christians as scapegoats and victims came from them? … Tacitus tells us that 'those who confessed were first seized, and then on their evidence a huge multitude were convicted, not so much on the charge of incendiarism as for their hatred to mankind.' Compressed and obscure as the sentence is, Tacitus clearly means to imply by the 'confession' to which he alludes the confession of Christianity; and though he is not sufficiently generous to acquit the Christians absolutely of all complicity in the great crime, he distinctly says that they were made the scapegoats of a general indignation. The phrase—'a huge multitude'—is one of the few existing indications of the number of martyrs in the first persecution, and of the number of Christians in the Roman Church. When the historian says that they were convicted on the charge of 'hatred against mankind' he shows how completely he confounds them with the Jews, against whom he elsewhere brings the accusation of 'hostile feelings towards all except themselves.' Then the historian adds one casual but frightful sentence—a sentence which flings a dreadful light on the cruelty of Nero and the Roman mob. {2708} He adds, 'And various forms of mockery were added to enhance their dying agonies. Covered with the skins of wild beasts, they were doomed to die by the mangling of dogs, or by being nailed to crosses; or to be set on fire and burnt after twilight by way of nightly illumination. Nero offered his own gardens for this show, and gave a chariot race, mingling with the mob in the dress of a charioteer, or actually driving about among them. Hence, guilty as the victims were, and deserving of the worst punishments, a feeling of compassion towards them began to rise, as men felt that they were being immolated not for any advantage to the commonwealth, but to glut the savagery of a single man.' Imagine that awful scene, once witnessed by the silent obelisk in the square before St. Peter's at Rome! … Retribution did not linger, and the vengeance fell at once on the guilty Emperor and the guilty city. The air was full of prodigies. There were terrible storms; the plague wrought fearful ravages. Rumours spread from lip to lip. Men spoke of monstrous births; of deaths by lightning under strange circumstances; of a brazen statue of Nero melted by the flash; of places struck by the brand of heaven in fourteen regions of the city; of sudden darkenings of the sun. A hurricane devastated Campania; comets blazed in the heavens; earthquakes shook the ground. On all sides were the traces of deep uneasiness and superstitious terror. To all these portents, which were accepted as true by Christians as well as by Pagans, the Christians would give a specially terrible significance.… In spite of the shocking servility with which alike the Senate and the people had welcomed him back to the city with shouts of triumph, Nero felt that the air of Rome was heavy with curses against his name. He withdrew to Naples, and was at supper there on March 19, A. D. 68, the anniversary of his mother's murder, when he heard that the first note of revolt had been sounded by the brave C. Julius Vindex, Præfect of Farther Gaul. He was so far from being disturbed by the news, that he showed a secret joy at the thought that he could now order Gaul to be plundered. For eight days he took no notice of the matter. … At last, when he heard that Virginius Rufus had also rebelled in Germany, and Galba in Spain, he became aware of the desperate nature of his position. On receiving this intelligence he fainted away, and remained for some time unconscious. He continued, indeed, his grossness and frivolity, but the wildest and fiercest schemes chased each other through his melodramatic brain. … Meanwhile he found that the palace had been deserted by his guards, and that his attendants had robbed his chamber even of the golden box in which he had stored his poison. Rushing out, as though to drown himself in the Tiber, he changed his mind, and begged for some quiet hiding-place in which to collect his thoughts. The freedman Phaon offered him a lowly villa about four miles from the city. Barefooted, and with a faded coat thrown over his tunic, he hid his head and face in a kerchief, and rode away with only four attendants. … There is no need to dwell on the miserable spectacle of his end, perhaps the meanest and most pusillanimous which has ever been recorded. The poor wretch who, without a pang, had caused so many brave Romans and so many innocent Christians to be murdered, could not summon up resolution to die. … Meanwhile a courier arrived for Phaon. Nero snatched his despatches out of his hand, and read that the Senate had decided that he should be punished in the ancestral fashion as a public enemy. Asking what the ancestral fashion was, he was informed that he would be stripped naked and scourged to death with rods, with his head thrust into a fork. Horrified at this, he seized two daggers, and after theatrically trying their edges, sheathed them again, with the excuse that the fatal moment had not yet arrived! Then he bade Sporus begin to sing his funeral song, and begged some one to show him how to die. … The sound of horses' hoofs then broke on his ears, and, venting one more Greek quotation, he held the dagger to his throat. It was driven home by Epaphroditus, one of his literary slaves. … So died the last of the Cæsars! And as Robespierre was lamented by his landlady, so even Nero was tenderly buried by two nurses who had known him in the exquisite beauty of his engaging childhood, and by Acte, who had inspired his youth with a genuine love."

_F. W. Farrar, The Early Days of Christianity, book 1, chapter 4._

ALSO IN: _T. W. Allies, The Formation of Christendom, chapter 10 (volume 2)._

ROME: A. D. 68-96. End of the Julian line. The "Twelve Cæsars" and their successors. A logical classification.

"In the sixth Caesar [Nero] terminated the Julian line. The three next princes in the succession were personally uninteresting; and, with a slight reserve in favor of Otho, … were even brutal in the tenor of their lives and monstrous; besides that the extreme brevity of their several reigns (all three, taken conjunctly, having held the supreme power for no more than twelve months and twenty days) dismisses them from all effectual station or right to a separate notice in the line of Caesars. Coming to the tenth in the succession, Vespasian, and his two sons, Titus and Domitian, who make up the list of the twelve Caesars, as they are usually called, we find matter for deeper political meditation and subjects of curious research. But these emperors would be more properly classed with the five who succeed them—Nerva, Trajan, Hadrian, and the two Antonines; after whom comes the young ruffian, Commodus, another Caligula or Nero, from whose short and infamous reign Gibbon takes up his tale of the decline of the empire. And this classification would probably have prevailed, had not the very curious work of Suetonius, whose own life and period of observation determined the series and cycle of his subjects, led to a different distribution. But as it is evident that, in the succession of the first twelve Caesars, the six latter have no connection whatever by descent, collaterally, or otherwise, with the six first, it would be a more logical distribution to combine them according to the fortunes of the state itself, and the succession of its prosperity through the several stages of splendour, declension, revival, and final decay. Under this arrangement, the first seventeen would belong to the first stage; Commodus would open the second; Aurelian down to Constantine or Julian would fill the third; and Jovian to Agustulus would bring up the melancholy rear."

_T. De Quincey, The Cæsars, chapter 3._

ROME: A. D. 69. Revolt of the Batavians under Civilis.

See BATAVIANS: A. D. 69.

{2709}

ROME: A. D. 69. Galba, Otho, Vitellius. Vespasian. The Vitellian conflict.