THE REAL CAUSE OF THE RAPID DECLENSION OF THE ROMAN REPUBLICK.
Dionysius of Halicarnassus observes,[303] that Romulus formed his new
government in many respects after the model of that of Sparta, which
accounts for that great resemblance, we evidently meet with between the
Roman and Spartan constitutions. I may add too, that we cannot help
observing as great a resemblance for some ages at least between the
manners of both those people. For we find the same simplicity in their
houses, diet and apparel; the same contempt for wealth, and quite to the
last period of liberty, the same warlike genius. Publick spirit and the
love of their country was carried in both states to the highest pitch of
enthusiasm; it was deaf to the voice of nature itself; and that amiable
virtue wore a kind of savage aspect at Rome and Sparta. But the
alteration of their manners which alike preceded the loss both of the
Spartan and Roman liberty, will admit of no kind of comparison either as
to degree or progress. Luxury and corruption stole in by very slow
degrees, and were never carried to any remarkable height amongst the
Spartans. But, as Sallust beautifully expresses it,[304] the Roman
manners were precipitated at once to the depth of corruption after the
manner of a resistless torrent. I observe that the destruction of
Carthage is fixed upon by that elegant historian, as the æra from which
the rise of this rapid degeneracy is to be dated. He assigns too the
removal of the dread occasioned by that dangerous rival, as the cause of
this sudden and astonishing change. Because according to his reasoning,
they could then give a full loose to the impetuous fury of their
passions, without restraint or fear. But the cause here assigned is by
no means equal to the effect. For though it might contribute in some
measure to accelerate the progress of luxury, and consequently the
corruption of their manners; yet the real cause of their sudden
degeneracy was widely different.
The Romans founded their system of policy, at the very origin of their
state, upon that best and wisest principle, “the fear of the gods, a
firm belief of a divine superintending providence, and a future state of
rewards and punishments:” their children were trained up in this belief
from tender infancy, which took root and grew up with them by the
influence of an excellent education, where they had the benefit of
example as well as precept.[305] Hence we read of no heathen nation in
the world, where both the publick and private duties of religion were so
strictly adhered to, and so scrupulously observed as amongst the Romans.
They imputed their good or bad success to their observance of these
duties, and they received publick prosperities or publick calamities, as
blessings conferred, or punishments inflicted by their gods. Their
historians hardly ever give us an account of any defeat received by that
people,[306] which they do not ascribe to the omission, or contempt of
some religious ceremony by their generals. For though the ceremonies
there mentioned, justly appear to us instances of the most absurd, and
most extravagant superstition, yet as they were esteemed essential acts
of religion by the Romans, they must consequently carry all the force of
religious principle. We neither exceeded, says Cicero,[307] speaking of
his countrymen, the Spaniards in number, nor did we excel the Gauls in
strength of body, nor the Carthaginians in craft, nor the Greeks in arts
or sciences. But we have indisputably surpassed all the nations in the
universe in piety and attachment to religion,[308] and in the only
point, which can be called true wisdom, a thorough conviction, that all
things here below are directed, and governed by divine providence. To
this principle alone Cicero wisely attributes the grandeur and good
fortune of his country. For what man is there, says he, who is convinced
of the existence of the gods, but must be convinced at the same time,
that our mighty empire owes its origin,[309] its increase, and its
preservation, to the protecting care of their divine providence. A plain
proof that these continued to be the real sentiments of the wiser
Romans, even in the corrupt times of Cicero. From this principle
proceeded that respect for, and submission to their laws, and that
temperance, moderation, and contempt for wealth, which are the best
defence against the encroachments of injustice and oppression. Hence too
arose that inextinguishable love for their country, which, next to the
gods, they looked upon as the chief object of veneration. This they
carried to such a height of enthusiasm,[310] as to make every human tie
of social love, natural affection, and self-preservation give way to
this duty to their dearer country. Because they not only loved their
country as their common mother, but revered it as a place which was dear
to their gods; which they had destined to give laws to the rest of the
universe,[311] and consequently favoured with their peculiar care and
protection. Hence proceeded that obstinate and undaunted courage, that
insuperable contempt of danger, and death itself in defence of their
country, which complete the idea of the Roman character as it is drawn
by historians in the virtuous ages of the republick. As long as the
manners of the Romans were regulated by this first great principle of
religion, they were free and invincible. But the atheistical doctrine of
Epicurus,[312] which insinuated itself at Rome, under the respectable
name of philosophy, after their acquaintance with the Greeks, undermined
and destroyed this ruling principle. I allow that luxury, by corrupting
manners, had weakened this principle, and prepared the Romans for the
reception of atheism, which is the never-failing attendant of luxury.
But as long as this principle remained, it controlled manners, and
checked the progress of luxury in proportion to its influence. But when
the introduction of atheism had destroyed this principle, the great bar
to corruption was removed, and the passions at once let loose to run
their full career without check, or control. The introduction therefore
of the atheistical tenets attributed to Epicurus,[313] was the real
cause of that rapid depravity of the Roman manners, which has never
been satisfactorily accounted for, either by Sallust, or any other
historians.
The learned, I know, are not a little divided in their opinions about
Epicurus. But a disquisition into what were, or were not the real tenets
of that philosopher, would be wholly foreign to my purpose. By the
doctrine of the Epicureans, I mean that system which Lucretius has
dressed up in his poem with all the beauties of poetry, and all the
elegance of diction. This, like the rest of the atheistick systems,
which are attributed to most of the Grecian philosophers, is pregnant
with the wildest absurdities that ever entered into the human
imagination. Epicurus, if Lucretius has given us his genuine tenets,
ascribes the formation of the universe to the fortuitous concourse of
senseless atoms of matter.[314] His master, Democritus, from whom he
borrowed his system, asserts the same. But Epicurus has exceeded him in
absurdity. For Democritus, if we may credit Plutarch, endowed his atoms
with a certain living-intelligence, which Epicurus scorns to make use
of. He boldly deduces life, intelligence, and free-will itself, from the
direct, oblique, and other various motions of his inanimate atoms. He
admits a sort of insignificant beings, whom he terms gods; but as he
would not allow them to have any hand in the formation of his universe,
so neither will he suffer them to have the least share in the conduct of
it. He has showed them plainly, that he could do without them, and, as
he has made them so egregiously insignificant as to be able to do
neither good nor harm, he has packed them off at a distance, to live an
indolent, lazy life, and to divert themselves just as they think proper.
Thus he has got rid of the troublesome doctrine of a divine
superintending Providence. Sometimes he forgets himself, and seems to
deny their very existence. For he tells us in one place, that the whole
universe contains nothing but matter and empty space, or what arises
from the casual concurrence of these two principles:[315] consequently
that no third nature, different from these two, can possibly be proved
to exist either by the cognizance of our senses, or by the utmost
efforts of our reasoning faculty. He teaches, that the soul is composed
of the finest, and most subtile atoms, consequently discerptible and
mortal. That the identity of man consists in the union of these finer
corpuscles with the grosser ones, which compose the body. That, at their
disunion by death, the soul evaporates, and is dissipated in the upper
regions, from whence it first distilled, and the same man exists no
more.[316] Nay he is so amazingly absurd as to assert, that if the
soul,[317] after its separation, should still retain its consciousness,
and, after a length of time, by some lucky jumble of his atoms, should
happen to animate another body, this new compound would be quite a
different man: consequently, that this new man would be no more
interested in the actions of the former, than the former would be
responsible for the behaviour of the latter, or for that of any future
man, who might happen hereafter to be produced by another casual
assemblage of the atoms of the same soul, united to those of another
body. This doctrine is plainly stolen from the Pythagorean system of the
transmigration of souls; but mutilated, and miserably perverted to the
purposes of atheism. The absurdities in this wild philosophy are so
self-evident, that to attempt a refutation of them, would be an affront
to common sense. Yet, from this source, these philosophers draw their
pretended consolations against the fear of death. That at death the
identity of the man absolutely ceases, and we totally lose our
existence.[318] Yet, from these excellent comforters, our modern
scepticks have revived their senseless tenet of annihilation to serve
the cause of libertinism. The grand _desideratum_, in libertinism, is,
to be able to give an unbounded loose to the sensual passions, to their
very utmost extent, without any impertinent hints from a certain
disagreeable monitor, called conscience, and the dread of an
after-reckoning. Now as both these terrors are removed by this system of
annihilation, it is no wonder that libertines, who abound in a corrupt
licentious age, should fly eagerly to so comfortable a doctrine, which
at once silences those enemies to their pleasures. This is the creed
introduced by the sect of Epicurus amongst the Romans, which easily
accounts for that sudden, and universal revolution in their manners. For
manners can never be so effectually, and so speedily depraved, as by a
total extinction of all religious principle; and all religious principle
must be necessarily subverted wherever this doctrine of annihilation is
received.[319] I allow that Lucretius gives us some excellent maxims
from Epicurus, and inveighs in many places against the vices of his
countrymen. But the cheat is too gross and palpable, and only proves,
that he has gilt over the pill of atheism to make it go down more
smoothly.[320] For how can a superstructure stand when the foundation is
taken away; and of what service is the best system of morality when the
sanction of future rewards and punishments, the great motive which
should enforce the practice, is removed by the denial of a Providence,
and the doctrine of annihilation? Cicero informs us, that all the fine
things, which Epicurus asserts of the existence of his gods, and their
excellent nature, are mere grimace, and only thrown out to screen him
from censure.[321] For he could not be ignorant, that the laws of his
country punished every man with the utmost severity, who struck at that
fundamental principle of all religion, the existence of a Deity.
Cicero therefore, who had thoroughly examined his tenets, affirms him,
by his own principles, to have been a downright atheist.[322] For in
reality, a man who should assert the existence of such idle gods, as are
neither capable of doing good or hurt, must, if he expects to be
believed, be a greater fool than the man, “who says in his heart there
is no God at all.” Yet this strange system, though fraught with such
absurdities and contradictions as could scarce be palmed upon the genius
of a Hottentot, has been implicitly swallowed by too many of those
gentlemen, who affect to call themselves the _esprits forts_ of the
present age. These are the atheistical tenets of Epicurus, preserved by
Lucretius in his beautiful poem, which, like poison, conveyed in sweets,
please and murder at the same time.
The Greeks were early infected with this execrable doctrine, and shew
the effect it had upon their manners by their violation of publick
faith, and contempt for the most sacred ties of religion. Trust, says
Polybius, but a single talent to a Greek, who has been used to finger
the publick money, and though you have the security of ten counterparts,
drawn up by as many publick notaries, backed by as many seals, and the
testimony of twice as many witnesses, yet, with all these precautions,
you cannot possibly prevent him from proving a rogue.[323] Whilst the
Romans, who, by their various offices, are intrusted with large sums of
publick money, pay so conscientious a regard to the religion of their
office-oath, that they were never known to violate their faith, though
restrained only by that single tie. How greatly they deviated from this
rectitude of manners, after these infidel tenets had taken root amongst
them, we may learn from Cicero, in his orations and epistles. Sallust
too will inform us, how extremely common the crime of perjury was grown,
in that severe reproach, which Lucius Philippus, a patrician, makes to
Lepidus, the consul, before the whole senate. That he neither stood in
awe of men or gods, whom he had so frequently injured, and defied by his
villanies and perjuries.[324]
Polybius gives it as his real opinion, that nothing shows the superior
excellence of the civil government of the Romans, to that of other
people, so much as those religious sentiments with respect to their
gods, which they constantly inculcated and supported.[325] He affirms
too his real sentiments to be, that the chief support and preservation
of the Roman republick arose from that awful fear of the gods, which was
so much ridiculed, and exploded by the Grecians. I have taken the
liberty to render τοῖς ἄλλοις ἀνθρώποις, the Grecians, who are evidently
pointed at in this passage.[326] For so just and accurate a writer as
Polybius could not be ignorant, that the Grecians were the only people
in the world at that time, who had been debauched into atheism by the
pernicious tenets of Epicurus. Polybius firmly believed the existence of
a Deity, and the interposition of a divine superintending Providence,
though he was an enemy to superstition. Yet when he observed the good
effects produced amongst the Romans by their religion,[327] though
carried even to the highest possible degree of superstition, and the
remarkable influence it had upon their manners in private life, as well
as upon their publick counsels, he concludes it to be[328] the result of
a wise, and consummate policy in the ancient legislators. He therefore
very justly censures those as wrong-headed, and wretchedly bungling
politicians, who at that time endeavoured to eradicate the fear of an
after-reckoning, and the terrors of an hell, out of the minds of a
people. Yet how few years ago did we see this miserably mistaken policy
prevail in our own country, during the whole administration of some late
power-engrossing ministers. Compelled at all events to secure a majority
in parliament to support themselves against the efforts of opposition,
they found the greatest obstacle to their schemes arise from those
principles of religion, which yet remained amongst the people. For
though a great number of the electors were not at all averse to the
bribe, yet their consciences were too tender to digest perjury. To
remove this troublesome test at elections, which is one of the bulwarks
of our constitution, would be impracticable. To weaken or destroy those
principles, upon which the oath was founded, and from which it derived
its force and obligation, would equally answer the purpose, and destroy
all publick virtue at the same time. The bloody and deep felt effects of
that hypocrisy, which prevailed in the time of Cromwell, had driven
great numbers of the sufferers into the contrary extreme. When therefore
so great a part of the nation was already prejudiced against whatever
carried the appearance of a stricter piety, it is no wonder that shallow
superficial reasoners, who have not logick enough to distinguish between
the use and abuse of a thing, should readily embrace those atheistical
tenets, which were imported, and took root in the voluptuous, and
thoughtless reign of Charles the second. But that solid learning, which
revived after the restoration, easily baffled the efforts of open and
avowed atheism, which from that time has taken shelter under the less
obnoxious name of deism. For the principles of modern deism, when stript
of that disguise which has been artfully thrown over them, to deceive
those who hate the fatigue of thinking, and are ever ready to admit any
conclusion in argument, which is agreeable to their passions, without
examining the premises, are in reality the same with those of Epicurus,
as transmitted to us by Lucretius. The influence therefore, which they
had upon the manners of the Greeks and Romans, will readily account for
those effects which we experience from them in our own country, where
they so fatally prevail. To patronise and propagate their principles,
was the best expedient which the narrow selfish policy of those
ministers could suggest. For their greatest extent of genius never
reached higher, than a fertility in temporary shifts and expedients, to
stave off the evil day of national account, which they so much dreaded.
They were sensible that the wealth and luxury, which are the general
effects of an extensive trade in a state of profound peace, had already
greatly hurt the morals of the people, and smoothed the way for their
grand system of corruption. Far from checking this licentious spirit of
luxury and dissipation, they left it to its full and natural effects
upon the manners, whilst, in order to corrupt the principles of the
people, they retained, at the publick expense, a venal set of the most
shameless miscreants that ever abused the liberty of the press, or
insulted the religion of their country. To the administration of such
ministers, which may justly be termed the grand æra of corruption, we
owe that fatal system of bribery, which has so greatly affected the
morals of the electors in almost every borough in the kingdom. To that
too we may justly attribute the present contempt, and disregard of the
sacred obligation of an oath, which is the strongest bond of society,
and the best security and support of civil government.
I have now, I hope, satisfactorily accounted for that rapid, and
unexampled degeneracy of the Romans, which brought on the total
subversion of that mighty republick. The cause of this sudden, and
violent change of the Roman manners, has been just hinted at by the
sagacious Montesquieu, but, to my great surprise, has not been duly
attended to by any one historian I have yet met with.[329] I have showed
too, how the same cause has been working the same effects in our own
nation, as it invariably will in every country where those fatally
destructive principles are admitted. As the real end of all history is
instruction, I have held up a just portrait of the Roman manners, in the
times immediately preceding the loss of their liberty, to the inspection
of my countrymen, that they may guard in time against those calamities
which will be the inevitable consequence of the like degeneracy. The
unpromising aspect of our affairs, at the time of the sudden and
unexpected alliance between the houses of Bourbon and Austria, gave the
first rise to these reflections. But as the interests and situation of
this kingdom, with respect to France, are so greatly analogous to those
of Carthage with respect to Rome, I shall proceed to compare the
different manners, policy, and military conduct of those two rival
nations. By thus comparing the different policy of these warlike people,
whose views and interests were as diametrically opposite, and as
irreconcilable as those of Great Britain and France, we may learn the
superior advantages which each enjoyed, and the different disadvantages
arising from their different policy, which each people laboured under,
during their long and inveterate contests. The result, which I most
sincerely wish from this inquiry, is, that we may avoid those egregious
blunders on the side of the Romans, which reduced them to the very brink
of ruin, and those more capital defects on the part of the
Carthaginians, which terminated in the utter destruction of their very
being as a people.
[303] Dionys. Halicarn. lib. 2. 65.
[304] Mores majorum non paulatim ut antea, sed torrentis modo
precipitati. Sallust. Fragment. p. 139.
[305] Nulla umquam res publica sanctior, nec bonis exemplis
dititor fuit. Liv. in Præfat.
[306] Dionys. Halicarn. Lib. 2. p. 61, 62.
[307] —Tamen nec numero Hispanos, nec robore Gallos, nec
calliditate Pœnos, nec artibus Græcos.
[308] Sed pietate ac religione, atque hac una sapientia, quod
deorum immortalium numine omnia regi gubernarique perspeximus,
omnes gentes nationesque superavimus. Cic. de. Harus. resp. p.
189.
[309] Quis est qui——cum deos esse intellexerit, non intelligat
eorum numine hoc tantum imperium esse natum, et auctum et
retentum. Ibid. p. 188.
[310] Cari sunt parentes, cari liberi, propinqui et familiares:
sed omnes omnium caritates patria una complexa est. Cic. de
Offic.
[311] Pro qua patria, mori, et cui nos totos dedere, et in qua
nostra omnia ponere, et quasi consecrare debemus. Cic. de Leg.
[312] That the fundamental principles of the stoicks tended to
atheism I readily grant: but as the real philosophers of that
sect inculcated a thorough contempt for what are called the
good things of this life, and were extremely austere in their
morals; their doctrines seem to have had a very different
influence upon the manners of the people wherever they were
received, from those of the Epicureans.—Brutus and Cato the
inflexible champions of liberty, and almost the only virtuous
characters in that corrupt period, were rigid stoicks.—Julius
Cæsar who subverted the constitution of his country, was a
thorough Epicurean, both in principle and practice. His
principles we plainly see in his sophistical speech in Sallust,
where he urges the total extinction of our being at death, as
an argument for sparing the lives of Cataline’s accomplices.
For he audaciously affirms to the senate:—“that death as a
punishment was so far from being an evil; that it released us
from all our sorrows, when labouring under distress and misery:
that it put a final period to all the evils of this life,
beyond which there was no longer room either for grief or joy.”
Thus as the learned Dr. Warburton justly remarks, “he took
occasion, with a licentiousness until then unknown to that
august assembly, to explain and enforce the avowed principles
of Epicurus (of whose sect he was) concerning _the mortality of
the soul_.” Divine legation part 2d. pages, 111, 112, last
edition. That his manners were notoriously infamous we may
learn from the history of his life in Suetonius, where he is
termed _the husband of every woman, and the wife of every man_.
Omnium mulierum virum, et omnium virorum mulierem. Sueton. in
vit. Jul. Cæsar, c. 52. ad finem.
[313] I here mean the tenets of the _Epicurean atheists_ as
they are termed by the very learned Mr. Baxter in his treatise
of the immortality of the soul; where he has confuted them at
large in the first volume of that admirable work.
Inquiry into the nature of the human soul. Vol. 1. p. 355.
[314] It has been remarked; that the disciples of the ancient
Greek philosophers have blended so many of their own opinions
with the doctrine of their masters, that it is often difficult
to distinguish the genuine tenets of the latter, from the
spurious ones which have been interpolated by their
followers.... Thus Epicurus taught that the summum bonum or
supreme good consisted in pleasure. His defenders insist: that
he placed it in that refined pleasure which is inseparable from
the practice of virtue. His enemies affirm; that he meant the
grosser pleasure which arises wholly from the sensual
passions.... His friends reply; that this notion was first
broached by the dissolute part of his disciples, who most
injuriously fathered it upon Epicurus, and then alleged his
authority as a plea for their debaucheries; ... they add, that
the true Epicureans, who adhered rigidly to the genuine tenets
of their master, always treated these spurious disciples as
sophists and impostors. But even allowing this to be a true
state of the case; yet that the materiality and dissolution of
the human soul at death was a genuine tenet of Epicurus, is a
truth which the most sanguine of his admirers are not able to
deny. As this pernicious tenet therefore was equally held, and
publickly taught by both these kinds of Epicureans, a very
small knowledge of human nature will enable us to decide, which
of the two opposite notions of pleasure was most likely to
prevail, and gain the greatest number of proselytes amongst a
luxurious and corrupt people.
The dissolute manners of the Romans in the last period of their
republick, prove evidently, in my opinion, that the sensual
doctrines of the later Epicureans were almost universally
received. And if the evidence of Horace in his humourous
description of the manners of those philosophers is to be
depended upon, they seem to have engrossed the _name_ of the
_sect_ wholly to themselves.
Me pinguem et Nitidum, bene curata cute, vises.
Cum ridere voles, _Epicuri de Grege porcum_.
Hor. Epist. 4. lib. 1.
[315]
Omnis, ut est igitur per se natura duabus
Consistit rebus; nam corpora sunt et inane.
Ergo præter inane et corpora tertia per se.
Nulla potest rerum in numero natura relinqui
Nec quæ sub sensus cadat ullo tempore nostros
Nec ratione animi quam quisquam possit apisci.
[316]
Et nebula ac fumus quoniam discedit in auras;
Crede animam quoque diffundi, multoque perire
Ocius, et citius dissolvi corpora prima,
Cum semel omnibus e membris ablata recessit.
[317]
Et si jam nostro sentit de corpore, postquam
Distracta est animi natura, animæque potestas:
Nil tamen hoc ad nos; qui cætu conjugioque
Corporis atque animæ consistimus uniter apti.
[318]
Nil igitur mors est, ad nos neque pertinet hilum,
Quandoquidem natura animi mortalis habetur:
—Ubi non erimus: cum corporis atque animai
Discidium fuerit, quibus e sumus uniter apti,
Scilicet haud nobis quicquam, qui non erimus tum,
Accidere omnino poterit, sensumque movere.
[319] Epicurus vero ex animis hominum extraxit radicitus
religionem, quum Diis immortalibus et opem et gratiam sustulit.
Cic. de Nat. Deor. p. 76 and 77.
[320] At etiam liber est Epicuri de sanctitate. Ludimur ab
homine non tam faceto, quam ad scribendi licentiam libero. Quæ
enim potest esse sanctitas, si Dii humana non curant? Cic. de
Nat. Deor. p. 78.
[321] The principles of the new academy, that doubting sect,
which Cicero had espoused, led so directly to scepticism, that
he keeps us in a state of perpetual doubt and uncertainty as to
his opinions. Mr. Baxter in his Inquiry into the nature of the
Human Soul, vol. 2. p. 70. complaining of Cicero’s
inconsistencies and self-contradictions, observes, that—“as
philosophers he teaches men to be scepticks, or to maintain
_that truth is not to be perceived_.” And afterwards adds—“But
it is long since it hath been observed of this _great man_,
that his _academical writings are at variance_ with his other
works; and that he may be confuted out of himself, and in his
own words.”
Dr. Warburton expatiates largely upon the great difficulties
there are in getting to Cicero’s _real sentiments_. I shall
mention only two of them and in his own words. “A fourth
difficulty arises from Tully’s purpose in writing his works of
philosophy; which was, not to deliver his own opinion on any
point of ethicks or metaphysicks; but to explain to his
countrymen in the most intelligible manner, whatsoever the
Greeks had taught concerning them. In the execution of which
design, no sect could so well serve his turn as the _new
academy_, whose principle it was, _not to interfere with their
own opinions_, &c. But the principal difficulty proceeds from
the _several_ and _various_ characters he _sustained_ in his
life and writings; which habituated him to feign and dissemble
his opinions. Here (though he acted neither a weak nor an
unfair part) he becomes perfectly inscrutable. He may be
considered as an orator, a statesman, and a philosopher;
characters all equally _personated_, and no one more the _real
man_ than the other; but each of them taken up and laid down,
for the occasion. This appears from the numerous
inconsistencies we find in him throughout the course of his
sustaining them, &c.” And afterwards, p. 171, the Dr. adds—“We
meet with numbers of the like contradictions delivered in his
own person, and under his philosophical character,” of which he
gives us several instances. In the note upon the word
personated, p. 169. the Dr. observes, “that as a philosopher,
his end and design in writing was not to deliver his own
opinion; but to explain the Grecian philosophy; on which
account he blames those as too curious, who were for having his
own sentiments. In pursuance of his design, he brings in
Stoicks, Epicureans, Platonists, Academicks, new and old, in
order to instruct the Romans in their various opinions, and
several ways of reasoning. But whether it be himself or others
that are brought upon the stage, it is the _academick_ not
Cicero; it is the Stoick, the Epicurean, not Balbus, nor
Velleius, who deliver their opinions.” See Warburton’s Divine
Legation, part 2. book 3. last edition, where the character of
Cicero, as drawn by that very learned and able writer, p. 165,
&c. is the best clew I know of to guide us through his
philosophical works. See also, Critical Inquiry into the
opinions and practice of the ancient philosophers, passim.
[322] Verius est igitur nimirum illud quod familiaris omnium
nostrum Posidonius disseruit in libro quinto de natura deorum,
nullos esse deos Epicuro videri: quæque is de Diis immortalibus
dixerit, invidiæ detestandæ gratia dixisse, p. 78.
[323] Οἱ τὰ κοινὰ χειρίζοντες παρὰ μὲν τοῖς Ἕλλησιν, ἐὰν
τάλαντον μόνον πιστευθῶσιν ἀντιγραφεῖς ἔχοντες δέκα, καὶ
σφραγῖδας τοσαύτας, καὶ μάρτυρας διπλασίους, οὐ δύνανται τηρεῖν
τὴν πίστιν. παρὰ δὲ Ῥωμαίοις, κατά τε τὰς ἀρχὰς καὶ πρεσβείας
πολύ τι πλῆθος χρημάτων χειρίζοντες δι’ αὐτῆς τῆς κατὰ τὸν
ὅρκον πίστεως, τηροῦσι τὸ καθῆκον.
Polyb. lib. 6. p. 693.
I have called ἀντιγραφεῖς, notary publick, because that office
answers the idea much better, in my opinion, than
_contrarotulator_, from which may possibly be derived our
comptroller, which, I think, is by no means what is here meant.
[324] Te neque hominum neque deorum pudet, quos perfidia et
perjurio violasti. Sall. Fragm. Orat. L. Phil. Cont. Lep. p.
146.
[325] Μεγίστην δέ μοι δοκεῖ διαφορὰν ἔχειν τὸ Ῥωμαίων πολίτευμα
πρὸς τὸ βέλτιον ἐν τῇ περὶ θεῶν διαλήψει. καί μοι δοκεῖ τὸ παρὰ
τοῖς ἄλλοις ἀνθρώποις ὀνειδιζόμενον, τοῦτο συνέχειν τὰ Ῥωμαίων
πράγματα· λέγω δὲ τὴν] δεισιδαιμονίαν. Polyb. lib. 6. p. 692.
[326] There is indeed little occasion for an apology for this
translation. The judicious critick will easily see, that in
this passage there is a plain contrast drawn between the
manners of the Grecians and the Romans in the time of Polybius.
The cause of that difference this able writer justly ascribes
to that δεισιδαιμονία, or awful fear of the gods, so strongly
inculcated amongst the Romans, and so much despised and
ridiculed amongst the Grecians, who were at that time greatly
tinctured with the atheism of Epicurus. The instance he selects
in proof, drawn from the very different effect of an oath upon
the manners of those two people, must convince us beyond a
doubt, that by the words τοῖς ἄλλοις ἀνθρώποις ὀνειδιζόμενον,
he plainly characterizes his own countrymen. As by “οἱ νῦν εἰκῇ
καὶ ἀλόγως ἐκβάλλειν αὐτὰ”, they who now (that is, in his time)
inconsiderately and absurdly reject those great sanctions of
religion, he evidently points at such of the leading men
amongst the Romans, as in his time had embraced the pernicious
tenets of Epicurus. For though he had stigmatized the
Carthaginians immediately before their avarice and lust of
gain, yet no man knew better than Polybius, that the
Carthaginians rather exceeded the Romans in superstition. That
they were sincere too in their belief, is evident from that
most horrible method, by which they expressed their
δεισιδαιμονία, which was their frequent sacrifices of great
numbers of their own children (those of the very first families
not excepted) to their god Moloch, who, by the Greeks and
Romans, was termed Chronos and Saturn.
I thought this remark might not be unuseful, because as none of
the commentators have taken any notice of it, so neither
Casaubon, nor any translator I have yet met with, seems to have
given us the true spirit and meaning of this remarkable
passage.
[327] Ἐπὶ τοσοῦτον γὰρ ἐκτετραγῴδηται καὶ παρεισῆκται τοῦτο τὸ
μέρος παρ’ αὐτοῖς εἴς τε τοὺς κατ’ ἰδίαν βίους, καὶ τὰ κοινὰ
τῆς πόλεως, ὥστε μὴ καταλιπεῖν ὑπερβολήν. Ibid.
[328] Διόπερ οἱ παλαιοὶ δοκοῦσί μοι τὰς περὶ θεῶν ἐννοίας, καὶ
τὰς περὶ τῶν ἐν ᾅδου διαλήψεις οὐκ εἰκῇ καὶ ὡς ἔτυχεν εἰς τὰ
πλήθη παρεισαγαγεῖν, πολὺ δὲ μᾶλλον οἱ νῦν εἰκῇ καὶ ἀλόγως
ἐκβάλλειν αὐτὰ. Lib. 6. p. 693.
[329] But as soon as Epicurus and his followers began to weaken
the foundation and principles of religion, by calling them in
question, all manner of immorality came rolling in like a
mighty torrent, and threw down the banks of law and sobriety.
Lawrence, M. A.