1 It has been objected by Mr. Faber that the horse being, another horse, it ought to designate another and different notion or empire, from that symbolized by the horse of the 1st Seal. But in Gen. xii. 3, 19, we read of seven fat kine first appearing in vision, and then afterwards seven other lean kine. Yet the latter we know, depicted the cattle not of another land than Egypt, but of the same land, only in a new and different state.
2 As it is often explained; bloody. So Hermes (B. 1. Vitsion iv. chap. iii.) " The fiery and bloody colour;" and Epiphanius on the sardine stone in the Apocalyptic vision.-The epithet might be explained either actively or passively. In Hesiod's description of Mars, it has an active force, significative of the blood-shedder. Elsewhere it is used passively, or neutrally, of the persons whose blood has been shed. So I conceive here, after the analogy of the other Seals. Thus Christian confessors who witnessed unto blood were called rubri. Maitland's Catacombs, p. 83.
3The special color of the horse sacred to Mars: " russeum (equum] Marti consecreverunt." Tertull. de Spectac. c. 9.
4 When peace is meant in the abstract, or without speciality of reference, it Is usually without the article. So e. g. Matt. x. 34, " Think not that I came to send peace. &c ; " and in many other passages, which the reader will find on turning to a Greek Concordance.
5 So Niebuhrs Lectures on Roman History (Schmitz' Ed.) ii. 289.
6The epoch is quoted by Montesquieu, as well as Gibbon: also by Schlegel in his Philosophy of History, Heeren, Denina, and Sismondi; as will appear. from subsequent notices in this chapter.
7 The overrunning of one element of evil, prefigured in one vision, into the periods of others figuring other fresh evils, is what I intimated, as a thing reasonable to be expected; and which indeed in real life perpetually happens.
8 Gibbon i. 165.
9 1b. 183-I98
10 lb. 198.
11 Gibbon i. 214, 221.
12 Ib. 230.
13 Ib. 239.
14 See p. 144.
15 Gibbon i. 276.
16 lb. 289.
17 lb. 299.
18 lb. 304.
19 lb. 309-It was by the same river Chaboms, or Chabor, that Ezekiel saw some of the most glorious of his visions. Ezek. i. L,. 15,
20 Gibbon i. 385.
21The word sword here used means properly a small sword; such as in fact the Roman sword was, in comparison of that of various other nations. Hence in the figure of a great sword,a something of unnatural or illegitimate size seems indicated.
22 So Sophocles in his Antigone, v. 127; an undue, improper, and too large use of the tongue being indicated by the figurative phrase a large tongue.
23 So Sismondi, in the extract partially given by me in the preceding p. 141 The third and most calamitous period; that which we have characterized as the period of upstart soldiers of fortune who usurped the imperial power. It lasted 92 years, &c." So too Heeren, speaking of Commodus' assassination; "This was the first commencement of that dreadful military despotism, which forms the ruling character of this period." Manual of History, p. 433. (Engl. Transl.) -And again Montesquieu, who thus contrasts this and the preceding era.
24 " The emperor was elected by the authority of the Senate, and the consent of the soldiers.', Gibbon I 118.-See too Montesquieu in the Note preceding.
25See my sketch of Commodus' reign, after Pereanis' elevation, in this point of view, in my Vindicime pp. 123-130.
26 Conjunctively with Marcia and Electus.
27 Gibb. L 167. This is on the opening of his Chapter about the Pratorians' public sale of the empire, after the assassination of Commodus.
28 In a Letter still extant he himself complains of their license. Gibb. i. 199. 29 Montesquieu sur Is Grandeur ch. 16 and 17 ; Denina Rivoluzioni d'Italia, Book iii. c. 3.-Denina's Primary date is from the increase of the power of the Praetorian Praefect defacto by Commodus, A. D. 85. Severus attached this power to them de jure.--Gibbon dwells much on the increase of their power by Sulp. Severus, who augmented the numbers of the Praetorians from 16,000 to 50,000. Vol. i. p. 200.
29 Montesquieu sur la Grandeur ch. 16 and 17; Denia Rivoluzioni d' Italia, Book iii. c.3. Denina's primary date is from the increase of the power of the Praetorian Praefect de facto by Commodus, A.D 185. Servus attached this power to them de jure. Gibbon dwells much on the increase of their power by Sulp. Servus, who augmented the numbers of the Preaetorians from 16,000 to 50,000. Vol. i p. 200.
30 See the sketch given of Plautian's administration in Dion Cassius lxxv. 14-16, lxxvi. 2; or its abstract in my Vindiciae pp. 135, 136. Also Gibbon i. 200.
31Gibbon i. 20 1.
32 Montesquieu, Grand. et Decad. c. 16. He thus contrasts the nature and the results of Adrian's and Severus' policy respecting the soldiery.
33 i. 254.
34 See Gibbon L 249: also Dion Cass. lxxx. 2, 4.
35Grand. et Decad. c. 16, 17.
36 p. i. 37.
37 So e. g. in the case of the long-continued wars of the rival roses in England.
38 So the old rule is expressed in Justinian's later Digest of Roman Law, Lib. 1. Tit. is.
39 In the third century the phrase jus gladii became a less distinctive one; being then applied sometimes to supreme jurisdiction, with power of life and death, merely over citizens. The sword badge however continued to be still military.
40 See Note 2 p. 147 for illustration.
41 See Gibbon i. 102, with the context.
42 So Dion. Cass. Iiii. 13 says of Augustus; And as the Praetorian Prefect was the acting legate of this his important power in Rome, so I presume for all Italy also; there being within Italy no other delegate.
43 This Praetorian Guard, as first instituted by Augustus, consisted of some 10,000 men; but it had been increased in Vitellius's time to 16,000. Tiberius fixed it in a fortified camp, to overawe the city, just outside the walls, near the Porta Viminalis. Of which camp remains are still seen on the broad prolonged summit of the Viminal Hill. See Gibbon i. 168. A sketch of the Praetorian Camp, as designed by Ligario From the ruins remaining in the 16th century, is given in Monticon. iv. 3.
44 Like the Legati of the' ancient Proconsuls of the Republic.
45 Dion Cassius proceeds to notice the Propraetors, appointed by the emperor.
He further states that these badges of the Imperial Lieutenant's office, were only to be assumed by them, on appointment, outside of the pomaerium of Rome; and to be instantly laid down on the cessation of office.
This power of the sword, over soldiers as well as people, given to the imperial Lieutenants. appears to have been very much the same with that given to the Proconsuls in their several provinces under the old Republic. Thus Niebuhr, speaking of the settlement of the first Roman Province, Sicily, observes thus in his Lectures. i. 140: "After the peace which terminated the first Punic war, Sicily was constituted as a Roman Province. This was a new system; and Sicily was the first country to which it was applied. A Province, in the Roman sense of the word, WAS a country in which a Roman general, either during the time of his magistratus curulis, or (in case of his year of office having elapsed) during the time for which his imperium was prolonged, exercised over his soldiers, as well as over the inhabitants of the country, the same power as in times of war, by virtue of the lex de imperio."
46 "CUM insigne potestatis, uti mos erat, pugionern daret." So Victor in his Life of Trajan: also Plin. Paneg. 67; and Dion Cassius 1xviii. 16.
On the passage from Pliny Bernegger has the note following Praefecti praetorio, praeter alia, insigne erat gladius, vel ensis, aut pugio, quo donari atque accingi solebat i principe; quern nonnunquem et ipsi gerebant imperatores. Siquidem soil principes et prmfecti prietorio Rome usum gladii habebant. Reliqui magistratus togati erant. Eo autem merum imperium, et jus vitle ac necis civium. ipsis tribuebatur: cujus nota, et signum gladius. Hinc.. .. gladium poners est prefectura praetorii se abdicare: ut Tigellinus spud Plutarch, in Galba" in which note however Bernegger seems to me to have overlooked the original and more proper power indicated by the sword bearing, as Dion explains it viz. the power of life and death over the soldiery; noting only that over the citizens, which soon came to be included also. The old jurisdiction of the Praetor in criminal cases of life and death was not indeed, I believe, ever formally abrogated; but it was gradually superseded by the superior dignity of the Imperial courts.
47 Rom. xiii. 4; In which passage we ought to mark the sword, the same word for the sword as here, and the transition from the plural, when speaking of governors, to the singular, in speaking of the sword-bearing magistrate in Rome.-Under this sword, shortly after, St. Paul suffered martyrdom. It would seem that there were then two Priefects; appointed by Nero. pro illo vice, in place of Burrus. See Clement's Ep. c. 5, and Jacobson's note on it.
48 So the Consuls and Praetors under the old republic, to whom a horse was assigned by the State. And so too similarly, (the old custom being kept up) the Proprietors and Proconsuls under the Imperial regime. See Note I p 118 supra
49 See the Note I p. 142 supra.
50 See p. 143 supri.
51 Dion Cassius expressly states the. prominent part acted by Laetus in both cases.
52 Their provinces were Pannonia, Syria, Britain ;-all imperial provinces.
53 Macrinus, the assassin and successor of Caracalla, was a Pratorian Prefect. (It is on this occasion that Gibbon writes, The decisive weight of the Praetorian guards elevated the hope of their Prefects;.. who began to assert their legal claim to fill the vacancy of the Imperial throne." i 224.)
Again, Elagabalus Macrinus' successor, was murdered in a sedition of the Previorian bands; who were also afterwards the murderers of Maximus and Balbinus. Moreover their Prefect Philip, acting on the army generally, effected the conspiracy against the younger Gordian, in which that emperor perished.
On the other hand, Maximin, the murderer of Alexander Severus, was one that held the first military command in a provincial army: and Decius, who revolted against Philip, was an Imperial Lieutenant; though as an extraordinary functionary, and on an extraordinary mission to the Moesian army.-After which, in the time of the so-called thirty tyrants, the exemplifications are superabundant.
54 The Praetorians` subsequent history was this. Both in regard of number and powers, they were greatly reduced by Diocletian; and by Constantine the whole body suppressed, their camp destroyed, and their Prefects deprived of military authority, and confined to civil functions. So Aurelius Victor, referred to by Gibbon, ii. 161, 235.
55 See the testimonies of Sismondi, Heeren, Montesquieu, Denina, &c. cited at pp. 142, 144 &c. supra. The subject is noted in much the same way too by Schlegel in his Philosophy of History, ii. 34.
56 254 - a passage cited before in part, p. 144 supra.
57i. 168.
58 See p. 123 supri, Note 3.
59 Herodian, i. 14, says that it was caused either by lightning, or the eruption of some volcanic subterranean flame.
60 The temple had been built by Vespasian to receive his Jewish spoils. The celebrated physician Galen had a shop adjoining, and tells of its destruction.
61 Ibid. So too Herodian. The ruins of this Temple of Peace are still tp be seen, looking across the Via Sacra towards the Palatine.