_Titus_.--No, Scipio, I can't give place to you in this. In other
respects I acknowledge myself your inferior, though I was Emperor of Rome
and you only her consul. I think your triumph over Carthage more
glorious than mine over Judaea. But in that I gained over love I must
esteem myself superior to you, though your generosity with regard to the
fair Celtiberian, your captive, has been celebrated so highly.
_Scipio_.--Fame has been, then, unjust to your merit, for little is said
of the continence of Titus, but mine has been the favourite topic of
eloquence in every age and country.
_Titus_.--It has; and in particular your great historian Livy has poured
forth all the ornaments of his admirable rhetoric to embellish and
dignify that part of your story. I had a great historian too--Cornelius
Tacitus; but either from the brevity which he affected in writing, or
from the severity of his nature, which never having felt the passion of
love, thought the subduing of it too easy a victory to deserve great
encomiums, he has bestowed but three lines upon my parting with Berenice,
which cost me more pain and greater efforts of mind than the conquest of
Jerusalem.
_Scipio_.--I wish to hear from yourself the history of that parting, and
what could make it so hard and painful to you.
_Titus_.--While I served in Palestine under the auspices of my father,
Vespasian, I became acquainted with Berenice, sister to King Agrippa, and
who was herself a queen in one of those Eastern countries. She was the
most beautiful woman in Asia, but she had graces more irresistible still
than her beauty. She had all the insinuation and wit of Cleopatra,
without her coquetry. I loved her, and was beloved; she loved my person,
not my greatness. Her tenderness, her fidelity so inflamed my passion
for her that I gave her a promise of marriage.
_Scipio_.--What do I hear? A Roman senator promise to marry a queen!
_Titus_.--I expected, Scipio, that your ears would be offended with the
sound of such a match. But consider that Rome was very different in my
time from Rome in yours. The ferocious pride of our ancient republican
senators had bent itself to the obsequious complaisance of a court.
Berenice made no doubt, and I flattered myself that it would not be
inflexible in this point alone. But we thought it necessary to defer the
completion of our wishes till the death of my father. On that event the
Roman Empire and (what I knew she valued more) my hand became due to her,
according to my engagements.
_Scipio_.--The Roman Empire due to a Syrian queen! Oh, Rome, how art
thou fallen! Accursed be the memory of Octavius Caesar, who by
oppressing its liberty so lowered the majesty of the republic, that a
brave and virtuous Roman, in whom was vested all the power of that mighty
state, could entertain such a thought! But did you find the senate and
people so servile, so lost to all sense of their honour and dignity, as
to affront the great genius of imperial Rome and the eyes of her tutelary
gods, the eyes of Jupiter Capitolinus, with the sight of a queen--an
Asiatic queen--on the throne of the Caesars?
_Titus_.--I did not. They judged of it as you, Scipio, judge; they
detested, they disdained it. In vain did I urge to some particular
friends, who represented to me the sense of the Senate and people, that a
Messalina, a Poppaea, were a much greater dishonour to the throne of the
Caesars than a virtuous foreign princess. Their prejudices were
unconquerable; I saw it would be impossible for me to remove them. But I
might have used my authority to silence their murmurs. A liberal
donative to the soldiers, by whom I was fondly beloved, would have
secured their fidelity, and consequently would have forced the Senate and
people to yield to my inclination. Berenice knew this, and with tears
implored me not to sacrifice her happiness and my own to an unjust
prepossession. Shall I own it to you, Publius? My heart not only pitied
her, but acknowledged the truth and solidity of her reasons. Yet so much
did I abhor the idea of tyranny, so much respect did I pay to the
sentiments of my subjects, that I determined to separate myself from her
for ever, rather than force either the laws or the prejudices of Rome to
submit to my will.
_Scipio_.--Give me thy hand, noble Titus. Thou wast worthy of the
empire, and Scipio Africanus honours thy virtue.
_Titus_.--My virtue can have no greater reward from the approbation of
man. But, O Scipio, think what anguish my heart must have felt when I
took that resolution, and when I communicated it to my dear, my unhappy
Berenice. You saw the struggle of Masinissa, when you forced him to give
up his beloved Sophonisba. Mine was a harder conflict. She had
abandoned him to marry the King of Numidia. He knew that her ruling
passion was ambition, not love. He could not rationally esteem her when
she quitted a husband whom she had ruined, who had lost his crown and his
liberty in the cause of her country and for her sake, to give her person
to him, the capital foe of that unfortunate husband. He must, in spite
of his passion, have thought her a perfidious, a detestable woman. But I
esteemed Berenice; she deserved my esteem. I was certain she would not
have accepted the empire from any other hand; and had I been a private
man she would have raised me to her throne. Yet I had the fortitude--I
ought, perhaps, to say the hardness of heart--to bid her depart from my
sight; depart for ever! What, O Publius, was your conquest over
yourself, in giving back to her betrothed lover the Celtiberian captive
compared to this? Indeed, that was no conquest. I will not so dishonour
the virtue of Scipio as to think he could feel any struggle with himself
on that account. A woman engaged to another--engaged by affection as
well as vows, let her have been ever so beautiful--could raise in your
heart no sentiments but compassion and friendship. To have violated her
would have been an act of brutality, which none but another Tarquin could
have committed. To have detained her from her husband would have been
cruel. But where love is mutual, where the object beloved suffers more
in the separation than you do yourself, to part with her is indeed a
struggle. It is the hardest sacrifice a good heart can make to its duty.
_Scipio_.--I acknowledge that it is, and yield you the palm. But I will
own to you, Titus, I never knew much of the tenderness you describe.
Hannibal, Carthage, Rome, the saving of my country, the subduing of its
rival, these filled my thoughts, and left no room there for those
effeminate passions. I do not blame your sensibility; but when I went to
the capitol to talk with Jove, I never consulted him about love affairs.
_Titus_.--If my soul had been possessed by ambition alone, I might
possibly have been a greater man than I was; but I should not have been
more virtuous, nor have gained the title I preferred to that of conqueror
of Judaea and Emperor of Rome, in being called the delight of humankind.