After the death of Cæsar, upon his return from Apollonia as he was entering the city, on a sudden, in a clear and bright sky a circle resembling the rainbow surrounded the body of the sun; and immediately afterwards, the tomb of Julia, Cæsar's daughter, was struck by lightning. In his first consulship whilst he was observing the auguries, twelve vultures presented themselves as they had done to Romulus. And when he offered sacrifice, the livers of all the victims were folded inward in the lower part; a circumstance which was regarded by those present, who had skill in things of that nature, as an indubitable prognostic of great and wonderful fortune.[137]
After the death of Cæsar, upon his return from Apollonia as he was entering the city, on a sudden, in a clear and bright sky a circle resembling the rainbow surrounded the body of the sun; and immediately afterwards, the tomb of Julia, Cæsar's daughter, was struck by lightning. In his first consulship whilst he was observing the auguries, twelve vultures presented themselves as they had done to Romulus. And when he offered sacrifice, the livers of all the victims were folded inward in the lower part; a circumstance which was regarded by those present, who had skill in things of that nature, as an indubitable prognostic of great and wonderful fortune.[137]
The interpretation of dreams also formed an important part in the determination of the will of the gods, not only among the Romans, but among all ancientnations. The literature of antiquity, both sacred and profane, is filled with dreams. Whether the biographer is Matthew or Plutarch, dreams appear on the pages of both. Chrysippus made a collection of prophetical dreams in order to explain their meaning. Both Galen and Hippocrates believed that dreams were sent by the gods to men. Artemidorus wrote a treatise on the subject, and in it he assures us that it was compiled at the express bidding and under the direction of Apollo himself.
It was in a dream that Joseph was warned not to put away Mary his wife.[138]It was also in a dream that an angel voice warned him to flee into Egypt with the infant Savior to escape the murderous designs of Herod.[139]Nearly every great event, both in Greek and Roman history, seems to have been heralded or attended by dreams. The following account is given by Suetonius of the dreams of Quintus Catulus and Marcus Cicero presaging the reign of Augustus:
Quintus Catulus had a dream, for two nights successively after his dedication of the Capitol. The first night he dreamt that Jupiter out of several boys of the order of the nobility who were playing about his altar, selected one, into whose bosom he put the public seal of the commonwealth, which he held in his hand; but in his vision the next night, he saw in the bosom of Jupiter Capitolinus, the same boy; whom he ordered to be removed, but it was forbidden by the God, who declared that it must be brought up to become the guardian of the state. The next day, meeting Augustus, with whom till that hour he had not the least acquaintance, and looking at him with admiration, he said he was extremely like the boy he had seen in his dream. Some gave a different accountof Catulus's first dream, namely that Jupiter, upon several noble lads requesting of him that they might have a guardian, had pointed to one amongst them, to whom they were to prefer their requests; and putting his fingers to the boy's mouth to kiss, he afterwards applied them to his own.Marcus Cicero, as he was attending Caius Cæsar to the Capitol, happened to be telling some of his friends a dream which he had the preceding night, in which he saw a comely youth let down from heaven by a golden chain, who stood at the door of the Capitol, and had a whip put into his hands by Jupiter. And immediately upon sight of Augustus, who had been sent for by his uncle Cæsar to the sacrifice, and was as yet perfectly unknown to most of the company, he affirmed that it was the very boy he had seen in his dream. When he assumed the manly toga, his senatorian tunic becoming loose in the seam on each side, fell at his feet. Some would have this to forebode, that the order of which that was the badge of distinction, would some time or other be subject to him.[140]
Quintus Catulus had a dream, for two nights successively after his dedication of the Capitol. The first night he dreamt that Jupiter out of several boys of the order of the nobility who were playing about his altar, selected one, into whose bosom he put the public seal of the commonwealth, which he held in his hand; but in his vision the next night, he saw in the bosom of Jupiter Capitolinus, the same boy; whom he ordered to be removed, but it was forbidden by the God, who declared that it must be brought up to become the guardian of the state. The next day, meeting Augustus, with whom till that hour he had not the least acquaintance, and looking at him with admiration, he said he was extremely like the boy he had seen in his dream. Some gave a different accountof Catulus's first dream, namely that Jupiter, upon several noble lads requesting of him that they might have a guardian, had pointed to one amongst them, to whom they were to prefer their requests; and putting his fingers to the boy's mouth to kiss, he afterwards applied them to his own.
Marcus Cicero, as he was attending Caius Cæsar to the Capitol, happened to be telling some of his friends a dream which he had the preceding night, in which he saw a comely youth let down from heaven by a golden chain, who stood at the door of the Capitol, and had a whip put into his hands by Jupiter. And immediately upon sight of Augustus, who had been sent for by his uncle Cæsar to the sacrifice, and was as yet perfectly unknown to most of the company, he affirmed that it was the very boy he had seen in his dream. When he assumed the manly toga, his senatorian tunic becoming loose in the seam on each side, fell at his feet. Some would have this to forebode, that the order of which that was the badge of distinction, would some time or other be subject to him.[140]
Omens also played an important rôle in molding the destiny of the Roman state. In his "Life of Cæsar Augustus," Suetonius says:
Some signs and omens he regarded as infallible. If in the morning, his shoe was put on wrong, the left instead of the right, that boded some disaster. If when he commenced a long journey, by land or sea, there happened to fall a mizzling rain, he held it to be a good sign of a speedy and happy return. He was much affected likewise with anything out of the common course of nature. A palm-tree which chanced to grow up between some stones in the court of his house, he transplanted into a court where the images of the Household Gods were placed, and took all possible care to make it thrive. In the island of Capri, some decayed branches of an old ilex, which hung drooping to the ground, recovered themselves upon his arrival; at which he was sodelighted, that he made an exchange with the Republic of Naples, of the Island of Ischia, for that of Capri. He likewise observed certain days; as never to go from home the day after the Numdinæ, nor to begin any serious business upon the nones; avoiding nothing else in it, as he writes to Tiberius, than its unlucky name.[141]
Some signs and omens he regarded as infallible. If in the morning, his shoe was put on wrong, the left instead of the right, that boded some disaster. If when he commenced a long journey, by land or sea, there happened to fall a mizzling rain, he held it to be a good sign of a speedy and happy return. He was much affected likewise with anything out of the common course of nature. A palm-tree which chanced to grow up between some stones in the court of his house, he transplanted into a court where the images of the Household Gods were placed, and took all possible care to make it thrive. In the island of Capri, some decayed branches of an old ilex, which hung drooping to the ground, recovered themselves upon his arrival; at which he was sodelighted, that he made an exchange with the Republic of Naples, of the Island of Ischia, for that of Capri. He likewise observed certain days; as never to go from home the day after the Numdinæ, nor to begin any serious business upon the nones; avoiding nothing else in it, as he writes to Tiberius, than its unlucky name.[141]
Any unusual happening and all the striking phenomena of nature were regarded by the Romans as prodigies or omens indicative of the will of the gods. The nature of the occurrence indicated the pleasure or the wrath of the deity. An eclipse of the sun and the moon, a shooting star, a rainbow of peculiar color, showers of stones and ashes, were regarded as awful prodigies, and generally threw the Roman Senate into a panic. On such occasions, the pontifical college called a hurried meeting. The augurs and haruspices were summoned to immediate duty; and everything was done to ascertain the will of the gods and to do their bidding. A two-headed snake or a three-legged chicken, such as we frequently see to-day, would have shaken the whole Roman religious system to the center.
Such was the credulity of the Roman people, that the most improbable and impossible stories, mere rumors born of lying imposture, were heard and believed. "Idols shed tears or sweated blood, oxen spoke, men were changed into women, cocks into hens, lakes or brooks ran with blood or milk, mice nibbled at the golden vessels of the temples, a swarm of bees lighted on a temple or in a public place." All such alleged occurrences required sacrifices and expiatoryrites to conquer the fury and regain the favor of the gods.
Fall of the Early Roman Religion.—At the beginning of the Christian era, the old Roman religion, founded upon the institutions of Numa, had almost come to an end. The invasion of Italy by the Greek gods was the first serious assault upon the early Roman faith. The elegant refinement and fascinating influence of Greek literature, philosophy and sculpture, had incrusted with a gorgeous coating the rude forms of the primitive Roman worship. But, as time advanced, the old gods grew stale and new deities were sought. The human soul could not forever feed upon myths, however brilliant and bewitching. The mysterious and melancholy rites of Isis came to establish themselves by the side of those of Janus and Æsculapius. The somber qualities of the Egyptian worship seemed to commend it. Even so good and grand a man as Marcus Aurelius avowed himself an adorer of Serapis; and, during a sojourn in Egypt, he is reported to have conducted himself like an Egyptian citizen and philosopher while strolling through the temples and sacred groves on the banks of the Nile.[142]
The effect of the repeated changes from one form of religious faith to another was to gradually destroy the moral fiber of Roman worship and to shatter Roman faith in the existence and stability of the gods. The first manifestation of that disintegration which finally completely undermined and destroyed the temple of Roman worship was the familiarity with whichthe Romans treated their gods. Familiarity with gods, as with men, breeds contempt. A striking peculiarity of both the Roman and Greek mythologies was the intimate relationship that existed between gods and human beings. Sometimes it took the form of personal intercourse from which heroes sprang, as was the case with Jupiter and Alcmene, of whom Hercules was born. At other times, deities and human beings traveled together on long voyages, as was the case with Minerva and Telemachus on their trip to the island of Calypso. These were instances of what the Greeks regarded as that natural and sympathetic relationship that not only could but should exist between them and their divinities. But in time the Romans entered upon a career of frivolous fellowship and familiarity with their gods which destroyed their mutual respect, and hastened the dissolution of the bonds that had hitherto held them together. They began to treat their divinities as men, deserving of honor indeed, but nevertheless human beings with all the frailties and attributes of mortals. "Arnobius speaks of morning serenades sung with an accompaniment of fifes, as a kind of reveille to the sleeping gods, and of an evening salutation, in which leave was taken of the deity with the wishing him a good night's rest."
The Lectisternia or banquets of the gods were ordinary religious functions to which the deities themselves were invited. These feasts were characterized at times by extreme exclusiveness. It was not right, thought the Romans, to degrade and humiliate the greater gods by seating them at the banquet board with smallerones. So, a right royal fête was annually arranged in the Capitol in honor of Jupiter, Juno, and Minerva. The statue of the great god was placed reclining on a pillow; and the images of the two goddesses were seated upon chairs near him. At other times, the functions were more democratic, and great numbers of the gods were admitted, as well as a few select and distinguished mortals. On such occasions, the images of the gods were placed in pairs on cushions near the table. The Romans believed that the spirit of the god actually inhabited or occupied the statue. This we learn from Lucian. The happy mortals who were fortunate enough to be present at the banquet, actually believed that they were seated among the gods. Livy tells us that once the gods turned on their cushions and reversed themselves at the table, and that mice then came and devoured the meats.[143]
The Roman historians very seriously inform us that special invitations were extended the gods to attend these banquets. They fail to tell us, however, whether R.S.V.P. or any other directions were inserted in the cards of invitation. We are left completely in the dark as to the formality employed by the deities to indicate their acceptance or rejection of the proffered honor.
The purpose of the Lectisternia was at first undoubtedly to promote hospitality and fellowship, and to conciliate the good will of the gods. But finally such intimacy ripened into contempt and all kinds of indecencies began to be practiced against the deities.Speaking of the actions of certain Romans, Seneca says: "One sets a rival deity by the side of another god; another shows Jupiter the time of day; this one acts the beadle, the other the anointer, pretending by gesture to rub in the ointment. A number of coiffeurs attend upon Juno and Minerva, and make pretence of curling with their fingers, not only at a distance from their images, but in the actual temple. Some hold the looking-glass to them; some solicit the gods to stand security for them; while others display briefs before them, and instruct them in their law cases." This rude conduct was practiced by men. But Seneca, continuing, says: "Women, too, take their seats at the Capitol pretending that Jupiter is enamored of them, and not allowing themselves to be intimidated by Juno's presence."[144]
Roman Skepticism.—Of contempt of the gods, which was due to many causes, skepticism was born. The deities of every race had been brought to Rome and placed in the pantheon; and there, gazing into each other's faces, had destroyed each other. The multiplicity of the gods was the chief agency in the destruction of the Roman faith and ritual. The yoke and burden of endless ceremonials had been borne for centuries and were now producing intolerable irritation and nauseating disgust. The natural freedom of the soul was in open rebellion and revolt against the hollow forms and rigid exactions of the Roman ritual. The eagle of the human intellect was already preparing to soar above the clouds of superstition. Cicerogave expression to the prevalent sentiments of educated Romans of his day when he wrote:
I thought I should be doing an immense benefit both to myself and to my countrymen if I could entirely eradicate all superstitious errors. Nor is there any fear that true religion can be endangered by the demolition of this superstition; for as this religion which is united with the knowledge of nature is to be propagated, so, also, are all the roots of superstition to be destroyed; for that presses upon and pursues and persecutes you wherever you turn yourself, whether you consult a diviner or have heard an omen or have immolated a victim, or beheld a flight of birds; whether you have seen a Chaldæan or a soothsayer; if it lightens or thunders, or if anything is struck by lightning; if any kind of prodigy occurs; some of which things must be frequently coming to pass, so that you can never rise with a tranquil mind.
I thought I should be doing an immense benefit both to myself and to my countrymen if I could entirely eradicate all superstitious errors. Nor is there any fear that true religion can be endangered by the demolition of this superstition; for as this religion which is united with the knowledge of nature is to be propagated, so, also, are all the roots of superstition to be destroyed; for that presses upon and pursues and persecutes you wherever you turn yourself, whether you consult a diviner or have heard an omen or have immolated a victim, or beheld a flight of birds; whether you have seen a Chaldæan or a soothsayer; if it lightens or thunders, or if anything is struck by lightning; if any kind of prodigy occurs; some of which things must be frequently coming to pass, so that you can never rise with a tranquil mind.
The completion of Roman conquest in the reign of Augustus was another potent influence in the destruction of the old Roman religion. The chief employment of the Roman gods had ever been as servants of the Roman state in the extension of the Roman empire. Their services were now no longer needed in this regard, and their ancient worshipers were ready to repudiate and dismiss them. The Hebrew characteristic of humility and resignation in the presence of divine displeasure was not a Roman trait. The ancient masters of the world reserved the right to object and even to rebel when the gods failed to do their duty after appropriate prayers had been said and proper ceremonies had been performed. Sacrilege, as the result of disappointment, was a frequent occurrence in Romanreligious life. Bitter defiance of the heavenly powers sometimes followed a defeat in battle or a failure in diplomacy. Augustus, as supreme pontiff, chastised Neptune, the god of the sea, because he lost his fleet in a storm, by forbidding the image of the god to be carried in the procession of the next Circensian games. The emperor Julian was regarded as a most pious potentate, but he did not hesitate to defy the gods when he became displeased. At the time of the Parthian war, he was preparing to sacrifice ten select and beautiful bulls to Mars the Avenger, when nine of them suddenly lay down while being led to the altar, and the tenth broke his band. The fury of the monarch was aroused, and he swore by Jupiter that he would not again offer a sacrifice to Mars.[145]Claudius, the commander of the Roman fleet at Drepanum, ordered the sacred pullets to be thrown into the sea because they would not eat. When Germanicus was sick in Asia, his devoted admirers offered frequent prayers to the gods for his recovery. When the report of his death reached Rome, the temples of the unaccommodating deities were stoned, and their altars were overturned.[146]
The same feeling of angry resentment and defiance may be discerned in inscriptions on the graves of relatives prematurely snatched away by death. An epitaph on the monument of a child of five years was this: "To the unrighteous gods who robbed me of my life." Another on the tombstone of a maiden of twenty, named Procope, read as follows: "I lift my handagainst the god who has deprived me of my innocent existence."[147]
The soil of familiarity, contempt and sacrilege which we have just described, was most fertile ground for the growth of that rank and killing skepticism which was destroying the vitals of the Roman faith at the time of Christ. This unbelief, it is true, was not universal. At the time of the birth of the Savior, the Roman masses still believed in the gods and goddesses of the Greek and Roman mythologies. Superstition was especially prevalent in the country districts of both Greece and Italy. Pausanias, who lived about the middle of the second century of the Christian era, tells as that in his time the olden legends of god and hero were still firmly believed by the common people. As he traveled through Greece, the cypresses of Alcmæon, the stance of Amphion, and the ashes of the funeral piles of Niobe's children were pointed out to him. In Phocis, he found the belief still existing that larks laid no eggs there because of the sin of Tereus.[148]Plutarch, who lived about the middle of the first century of our era, tells us that the people were still modeling the gods in wax and clay, as well as carving them in marble and were worshiping them in contempt and defiance of philosophers and statesmen.[149]But this credulity was limited to the ignorant and unthinking masses. The intellectual leaders of both the Greek and Roman races had long been in revolt against the absurdity and vulgarity of the myths which formed the foundationof their popular faiths. The purity and majesty of the soul felt keenly the insult and outrage of enforced obedience to the obscene divinities that Homer and Hesiod had handed down to them. Five hundred years before Christ, Pindar, the greatest lyric poet of Greece, had denounced the vulgar tales told of the deities, and had branded as blasphemous the story of the cannibal feast spread for the gods by the father of Pelops. Xenophanes, also, in the sixth century before Christ, had ridiculed the mythical tales of the Homeric poems, and had called attention to the purely human character of popular religions. He had pointed out that the Ethiopians painted the images of their deities black, and gave them flat noses, in the likeness of themselves; that the Thracians, on the other hand, created their gods blue-eyed and red; and that, in general, every race had reflected its own physical peculiarities in the creation of its gods. He declared it to be his opinion that if the beasts of the field should attempt to produce a likeness of the gods, the horses would produce a resemblance of themselves, and that oxen and lions would ascribe to their own divinities their own images and peculiarities.
The whole structure of the Roman religion, built upon myths and adorned with fables, was ill fitted to stand the tests of analysis and criticism. It was destined to weaken and crumble the moment it was subjected to serious rational inquiry. Such inquiry was inevitable in the progress of that soul-growth which the centuries were sure to bring. Natural philosophy and historical study began to dissolve the sacredlegends and to demand demonstration and proof where faith had before sufficed. Skeptical criticism began to dissect the formulæ of prayer and to analyze the elements of augury and sacrifice. Reason began to revolt against the proposition that Jupiter was justified in rejecting a petition because a syllable had been omitted or a word mispronounced. Men began to ask: "What explanation could be given of the strange changes of mind in the gods, often threatening evil on the first inspection of the victim, and at the second promising good? How did it happen that a sacrifice to Apollo gave favorable, and one to Diana unfavorable signs? Why did the Etruscan, the Elan, the Egyptian, and the Punic inspectors of sacrifice interpret the entrails in an entirely different manner? Again, what connection in nature was there between a fissure in the liver of a lamb, and a trifling advantage to a man, an inheritance to be expected, or the like? And on a man's intending to sacrifice, did a change, corresponding to his circumstances, take place in the entrails of the beast; so that, supposing another person had selected the same victim, he would have found the liver in a quite different condition?"
The gods themselves became subjects of inspection and analysis. Their origin and nature were studied historically, and were also reviewed in the light of natural and ethical products. Three hundred years before Christ, Evhemere of Messina boldly declared that the gods were simply ancient kings deified by fear and superstition after death. Anaxagoras sought to identify the several deities with the forces and phenomenaof nature, thus converting the pantheon into an observatory, or into a physical and chemical laboratory. Metrodorus contended that the gods were deifications of mere abstract ethical precepts.
Instances are recorded in history, from time to time, where the philosophers attempted to explain to the people the natural meaning of those things which they believed were pregnant with supernatural import. On a certain occasion, a ram with one horn was found on the farm of Pericles, and, from this circumstance, an Athenian diviner, named Lampon, predicted that the party of the orator would triumph over the opposite faction and gain control of the government. Whereupon Anaxagoras dissected the skull, and demonstrated to the people the natural cause of the phenomenon in the peculiar shape of the animal's brain. But this reformer finally suffered the fate of other innovators, was prosecuted for impiety, and was only saved by the influence of Pericles.
At the beginning of the Christian era, the religion of Rome was privately ridiculed and repudiated by nearly all statesmen and philosophers of the empire, although they publicly professed it on grounds of public policy. Seneca, a contemporary of Jesus, advised observance of rites appointed by law, on patriotic grounds. "All which things," he says, "a wise man will observe as being commanded by the laws, but not as being pleasing to the gods." Again he says: "All that ignoble rabble of gods which the superstition of ages has heaped up, we shall adore in such a way as to remember that their worship belongs ratherto custom than to reality." Ridiculing the popular notions of the matrimonial relations of the deities, the same eminent philosopher says: "And what of this, that we unite the gods in marriage, and that not even naturally, for we join brothers and sisters? We marry Bellona to Mars, Venus to Vulcan, Salacia to Neptune. Some of them we leave unmarried, as though there were no match for them, which is surely needless, especially when there are certain unmarried goddesses, as Populonia, or Fulgora, or the goddess Rumina, for whom I am not astonished that suitors have been wanting."
The prevailing skepticism of the times is well illustrated in a dialogue which Cicero introduces into his first Tusculan Disputation between M, which may be interpreted Marcus, and A, which may be translated Auditor:
Marcus: Tell me, are you not afraid of the three-headed Cerberus in the infernal regions, and the roaring of Cocytus, and the passage over Acheron, and Tantalus, dying with thirst, while water laves his chin, and Sisyphus,"Who sweats with arduous toil in vainThe steepy summit of the mount to gain?"Perhaps you are also afraid of the inexorable judges, Minos and Rhadamanthus, because before them neither L. Crassus nor M. Antonius can defend you, and because appearing before Grecian judges, you will not be permitted to employ Demosthenes, but must plead for yourself before a very great crowd. All these things, perhaps, you fear, and therefore regard death as an eternal evil.Auditor: Do you think I'm such a fool as to give credence to such things?Marcus: What! You don't believe in them?Auditor: Truly, not in the least.Marcus: I am deeply pained to hear that.Auditor: Why?Marcus: Because, if occasion had offered, I could very eloquently have denounced them, myself.[150]
Marcus: Tell me, are you not afraid of the three-headed Cerberus in the infernal regions, and the roaring of Cocytus, and the passage over Acheron, and Tantalus, dying with thirst, while water laves his chin, and Sisyphus,
"Who sweats with arduous toil in vainThe steepy summit of the mount to gain?"
"Who sweats with arduous toil in vainThe steepy summit of the mount to gain?"
Perhaps you are also afraid of the inexorable judges, Minos and Rhadamanthus, because before them neither L. Crassus nor M. Antonius can defend you, and because appearing before Grecian judges, you will not be permitted to employ Demosthenes, but must plead for yourself before a very great crowd. All these things, perhaps, you fear, and therefore regard death as an eternal evil.
Auditor: Do you think I'm such a fool as to give credence to such things?
Marcus: What! You don't believe in them?
Auditor: Truly, not in the least.
Marcus: I am deeply pained to hear that.
Auditor: Why?
Marcus: Because, if occasion had offered, I could very eloquently have denounced them, myself.[150]
The contemptuous scorn of the cultivated Romans of his time is frequently revealed in the writings of Cicero. He refers more than once to the famous remark of Cato, who said that he could not explain why the haruspices did not laugh in each other's faces when they began to sacrifice.
At this point, it is worthy of observation that the prevalent unbelief was not limited to a simple denial of the existence of mythical divinities and of the efficacy of the worship rendered them. Roman skepticism sought to destroy the very foundation of all religious belief by denying not only the existence of the gods, but also the immortality of the soul. Cicero issaid to have been the only great Roman of his time who believed that death was not the end. Students of Sallust are familiar with his account of the conspiracy of Cataline in which it is related that Julius Cæsar, in a speech before the Roman senate, opposed putting the traitor to death because that form of punishment was too mild, since beyond the grave there was neither joy nor sorrow.[151]
Antagonism to the doctrine of the immortality of the soul reached a melancholy refinement in the strange contention that life after death was a cruel thought. Pliny expresses this sentiment admirably when he says:
What folly it is to renew life after death. Where shall created beings find rest if you suppose that shades in hell and souls in heaven continue to have any feeling? You rob us of man's greatest good—death. Let us rather find in the tranquillity which preceded our existence the pledge of the repose which is to follow it.
What folly it is to renew life after death. Where shall created beings find rest if you suppose that shades in hell and souls in heaven continue to have any feeling? You rob us of man's greatest good—death. Let us rather find in the tranquillity which preceded our existence the pledge of the repose which is to follow it.
When skepticism had destroyed their faith in the gods, and had robbed them of the consolations of religion, educated Romans sought refuge and solace in Greek philosophy. Stoicism and Epicureanism were the dominant spiritual and intellectual forces of the Roman empire at the time of Christ. Epicureanism was founded by Epicurus, who was born of an Athenian family in the Island of Samos about 342B.C.Stoicism originated with Zeno, a native of Cittium in Cyprus, born about the year 340B.C.
The original design of the system of Epicurus wasto found a commonwealth of happiness and goodness in opposition to the purely intellectual aristocracy of Plato and Aristotle. Men were beginning to tire of speculation and dialectics, and to long for a philosophy built upon human feeling and sensibility. As a touchstone of truth, it was proposed to substitute sensation for intellect. Whatever was pleasing to the natural and healthful senses was to be taken to be true. The pursuit of happiness was to be the chief aim of the devotees of this system. The avoidance of mental pain and physical suffering, as well as the cultivation of all pleasurable emotions, were to be the leading features of every Epicurean programme. In the beginning, Epicureanism inculcated principles of virtue as a means of happiness. The mode of life of the first followers of Epicurus was simple and abstemious. Barley-bread and water are said to have been their ordinary food and drink. But in time this form of philosophy became identified with the coarsest sensuality and the most wicked lust. This was especially true after it was transplanted from Greece to Italy. The doctrines of this school met with a ready response from the pleasure-seeking, luxury-loving Roman people who were now enriched by the spoils and treasures of a conquered world. "This philosophy therefore became at Rome a mere school of self-indulgence, and lost the refinement which, in Greece, had led it to recognize in virtue that which gave zest to pleasure and in temperance that which prolonged it. It called simply for a continuous round of physical delights; it taught the grossest sensuality; it proclaimed the inanityof goodness and the lawfulness of lust. It was the road—sure, steep and swift, to awful demoralization."
Stoicism, on the other hand, furnished spiritual and intellectual food to that nobler class of Romans who were at once the support and ornament of a magnificent but decadent civilization. This form of philosophy was peculiarly consonant with early Roman instincts and habits. In its teachings were perfectly reflected that vigor, austerity, and manly self-reliance which had made the Roman race undisputed masters of the world. Many of its precepts were not only moral and ennobling, but deeply religious and sustaining. A striking kinship between them and certain Christian precepts has been frequently pointed out. Justice, fortitude, prudence, and temperance were the four cardinal virtues of Stoicism. Freedom from all passions and complete simplicity of life, resulting in perfect purity of manners, was its chief aim. But the fundamental principles of both Epicureanism and Stoicism were destructive of those spiritual elements which furnish complete and permanent nourishment to the soul. Stoicism was pantheism, and Epicureanism was materialism. The Stoic believed that the human soul was corporeal, but that it was animated and illuminated by the universal soul. The Epicurean taught that the soul was composed of material atoms, which would perish when its component parts separated or dissolved. Epicureanism was materialistic in its tendency, and its inevitable result, in perverted form, was sensualism. Stoicism was pervadedthroughout by a melancholy and desolating fatalism. It was peculiarly the philosophy of suicide; or, as a great French writer once described it, "an apprenticeship for death."[152]To take one's life was not only allowable but commendable in certain cases. Zeno, the founder of the sect, taught that incurable disease was a sufficient excuse for suicide. Marcus Aurelius considered it an obligation of nature and of reason to make an end of life when it became an intolerable burden. "Kill thyself and die erect in the consciousness of thy own strength," would have been a suitable inscription over the doorway of every Stoic temple. Seneca furnished to his countrymen this Stoic panacea for all the ills of life:
Seest thou yon steep height, that is the descent to freedom. Seest thou yon sea, yon river, yon well; freedom sits there in the depths. Seest thou yon low withered tree; there freedom hangs. Seest thou thy neck, thy throat, thy heart; they are the ways of escape from bondage.
Seest thou yon steep height, that is the descent to freedom. Seest thou yon sea, yon river, yon well; freedom sits there in the depths. Seest thou yon low withered tree; there freedom hangs. Seest thou thy neck, thy throat, thy heart; they are the ways of escape from bondage.
And the Roman philosopher was not only conscientious but consistent in his teachings. He was heroic enough to take the medicine himself which he had prescribed for others. Indeed, he took a double dose; for he not only swallowed poison, but also opened his veins, and thus committed suicide, as other Stoics—such as Zeno, Cleanthes and Cato—had done before him.
It was not a problem of the Stoic philosophy,
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to sufferThe slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,And by opposing end them?[153]
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to sufferThe slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,And by opposing end them?[153]
A familiar illustration of the advocates of suicide among the Roman writers was that a human body afflicted with incurable disease, or a human mind weighed down with intolerable grief, was like a house filled with smoke. As it was the duty of the occupant of the house to escape from the smoke by flight, so it was the duty of the soul to leave the body by suicide.
But neither Epicureanism nor Stoicism could satisfy the natural longing of the soul for that which is above the earth and beyond the grave. It was impossible that philosophy should completely displace religion. The spiritual nature of the Roman people was still intact and vigorous after belief in myths was dead. As a substitute for their ancient faith and as a supplement to philosophy, they began to deify their illustrious men and women. The apotheosis of the emperors was the natural result of the progressive degradation of the Roman religion. The deification of Julius Cæsar was the beginning of this servile form of worship; and the apotheosis of Diocletian was the fifty-third of these solemn canonizations. Of this number, fifteen were those of princesses belonging to the imperial family.
Divine honors began to be paid to Cæsar before he was dead. The anniversary of his birth became a national holiday; his bust was placed in the temple, and a month of the year was named for him. After his assassination, he was worshiped as a god under the name of Divus Julius; and sacrifices were offered upon his altar. After Julius Cæsar, followed the deification of Augustus Cæsar. Even before his death, Octavian had consented to be worshiped in the provinces,especially in Nicomedia and Pergamus. After his death, his worship was introduced into Rome and Italy.
The act of canonizing a dead emperor was accomplished by a vote of the senate, followed by a solemn ceremony, in which an eagle was released at the funeral pile, and soaring upward, became a symbol of the ascent of the deceased to the skies. A Roman senator, Numerius Atticus, swore that he had seen Augustus ascending to heaven at the time of his consecration; and received from Livia a valuable gift of money as a token of her appreciation of his kindness.
Not only were grand and gifted men like Julius and Augustus Cæsar, but despicable and contemptible tyrants like Nero and Commodus, raised to the rank of immortals. And, not content with making gods of emperors, the Romans made goddesses of their royal women. Caligula had lived in incestuous intercourse with his sister Drusilla; nevertheless, he had her immortalized and worshiped as a divine being. This same Caligula who was a monster of depravity, insisted on being worshiped as a god in the flesh throughout the Roman empire, although the custom had been not to deify emperors until after they were dead. The cowardly and obsequious Roman senate decreed him a temple in Rome. The royal rascal erected another to himself, and appointed his own private priests and priestesses, among whom were his uncle Claudius, and the Cæsonia who afterwards became his wife. This temple and its ministry were maintained at an enormous expense. Only the rarest and most costly birdslike peacocks and pheasants, were allowed to be sacrificed to him. Such was the impious conceit of Caligula that he requested the Asiatics of Miletus to convert a temple of Apollo into a shrine sacred to himself. Some of the noblest statuary of antiquity was mutilated in displacing the heads of gods to make places for the head of this wicked monster. A mighty descent this, indeed, from the Olympian Zeus of Phidias to a bust of Caligula!
Domitian, after his deification, had himself styled "Lord and God," in all documents, and required all his subjects to so address him. Pliny tells us that the roads leading into Rome were constantly filled with flocks and herds being driven to the Capital to be sacrificed upon his altar.[154]
The natural and inevitable result of the decay of the Roman religion was the corruption and demoralization of Roman social life. All experience teaches that an assault upon a people's religious system is an assault upon the entire social and moral organization. Every student of history knows that a nation will be prosperous and happy to the extent that it is religiously intelligent, and in proportion to its loyalty to the laws of social virtue, to the laws of good government, and the laws of God; and that an abandonment of its gods means the wreck and dissolution of its entire social structure. The annals of Rome furnish a striking confirmation of this fact.
The closing pages of this chapter will be devoted to a short topical review of Roman society at the time ofChrist. Only a few phases of the subject can be presented in a work of this character.
Marriage and Divorce.—The family is the unit of the social system; and at the hearthstone all civilization begins. The loosening of the domestic ties is the beginning of the dissolution of the state; and whatever weakens the nuptial bonds, tends to destroy the moral fiber of society. The degradation of women and the destruction of domestic purity were the first signs of decay in Roman life. In the early ages of the republic, marriage was regarded not only as a contract, but as a sacrament as well. Connubial fidelity was sacredly maintained. Matrons of the type of Cornelia, the mother of the Gracchi, were objects of national pride and affection. The spirit of desperation which caused the father of Virginia to plunge a butcher's knife into the chaste and innocent heart of his child to save her from the lust of Appius Claudius, was a tragic illustration of the almost universal Roman respect for virtue in the age of the Tarquins. To such an extent were the marital relations venerated by the early Romans that we are assured by Dionysius that five hundred and twenty years had passed before a single divorce was granted. Carvilius Ruga, the name of the first Roman to procure a divorce, has been handed down to us.[155]
If we are to believe Döllinger, the abandonment of the policy of lifelong devotion to the marriage relationand the inauguration of the system of divorce were due not to the faults of the men but to the dangerous and licentious qualities of the Roman women. In connection with the divorce of Carvilius Ruga, he discusses a widespread conspiracy of Roman wives to poison their husbands. Several of these husbands fell victims to this plot; and, as punishment for the crime, twenty married women were forced to take the poison which they had themselves prepared, and were thus put to death. And, about a half century after this divorce, several wives of distinguished Romans were discovered to be participants in the bacchanalian orgies. From all these things, Döllinger infers that the Roman men began to tire of their wives and to seek legal separation from them.[156]
But, whatever the cause, the marriage tie was so easily severed during the latter years of the republic, that divorce was granted on the slightest pretext. Q. Antistius Vetus divorced his wife because she was talking familiarly and confidentially to one of his freedmen. The wife of C. Sulpicius imprudently entered the street without a veil, and her husband secured a divorce on that ground. P. Sempronius Sophus put away his wife for going to the theater without his knowledge.
Cicero divorced his first wife that he might marry a younger and wealthier woman; and because this second one did not exhibit sufficient sorrow at the death of his daughter, Tullia, he repudiated her.
Cato, the stern Stoic moralist, was several times divorced.To accommodate his friend Hortensius he gave him his second wife Marcia, with her father's consent; and, after the death of the orator, he remarried her.
After being several times previously divorced, Pompey put away Mucia in order that he might wed Julia, Cæsar's daughter, who was young enough to be the child of Pompey.
Cæsar himself was five times married. He divorced his wife, Pompeia, because of her relationship to Clodius, a dashing and dissolute young Roman, who entered Cæsar's house on the occasion of the celebration of the feast of the Bona Dea in a woman's dress, in order that he might pay clandestine suit to the object of his lust. Cæsar professed to believe that the charges against Pompeia were not true, but he divorced her nevertheless, with the remark that "Cæsar's wife must be above suspicion." We are reminded by this that, in ancient as in modern times, society placed greater restrictions upon women than upon men; for Cæsar, who uttered this virtuous and heroic sentiment, was a most notorious rake and profligate. Suetonius tells us that he debauched many Roman ladies of the first rank; among them "Lollia, the wife of Aulus Gabinius; Tertulla, the wife of Marcus Crassus; and Mucia, the wife of Cneius Pompey." It was frequently made a reproach to Pompey, "that to gratify his ambition, he married the daughter of a man upon whose account he had divorced his wife, after having had three children by her; and whom he used, with a deep sigh, to call Ægisthus." But the favorite mistressof Cæsar was Servilia, the mother of Marcus Brutus. To consummate an intrigue with her, he gave Servilia a pearl which cost him six millions of sesterces. And at the time of the civil war he had deeded to her for a trifling consideration, several valuable farms. When people expressed surprise at the lowness of the price, Cicero humorously remarked: "To let you know the real value of the purchase, between ourselves, Tertia was deducted." It was generally suspected at Rome that Servilia had prostituted her daughter Tertia to Cæsar; and the witticism of the orator was adouble entendre, Tertia signifying the third (of the value of the farm), as well as being the name of the girl, whose virtue had paid the price of the deduction. Cæsar's lewdness was so flagrant and notorious that his soldiers marching behind his chariot, on the occasion of his Gallic triumph, shouted in ribald jest, to the multitude along the way:
Watch well your wives, ye cits, we bring a blade,A bald-pate master of the wenching trade.[157]
Watch well your wives, ye cits, we bring a blade,A bald-pate master of the wenching trade.[157]
If this was the private life of the greatest Roman of the world, who, at the time of his death, was Pontifex Maximus, the supreme head of the Roman religion, what must have been the social life of the average citizen who delighted to style Cæsar the demigod while living and to worship him as divine, when dead?
A thorough knowledge of the details of the most corrupt and abandoned state of society recorded in history may be had by a perusal of the Annals of Tacitusand the Satires of Juvenal. The Sixth Satire is a withering arraignment of Roman profligacy and wickedness. "To see the world in its worst estate," says Professor Jowett, "we turn to the age of the satirists and of Tacitus, when all the different streams of evil, coming from east, west, north, south, the vices of barbarism and the vices of civilization, remnants of ancient cults, and the latest refinements of luxury and impurity, met and mingled on the banks of the Tiber." Rome was the heart of the empire that pumped its filthy blood from the center to the extremities, and received from the provinces a return current of immorality and corruption. Juvenal complains that