Chapter III: Seraphin and Louise (3)

The Roman could not read of the warlike glories of his country without finding them mingled with the worship of Jupiter and Mars. He could not take up the verses of his immortal poets without meeting at every page with the gods and goddesses of Olympus. The laws of the empire recalled pagan gods; the customs and festivals and games kept their remembrance fresh in the mind. We do not wonder, then, that paganism was not easily destroyed. It would almost seem that the life of the empire and the life of paganism were one; that the pillars of the pagan temples were, so to speak, identical with the pillars of the state. When we bear all this in mind, we are not so much surprised to find that paganism was still a living thing more than eighty years after the first Christian emperor had taken the Labarum for his military standard, and had lifted Christianity out of the dark caves of the Catacombs to place it on the throne of the Cæsars. We are also more prepared for what we read regarding the Emperor Honorius. When in 404 he visited Rome, in order to celebrate his sixth consulate, pagan temples still surrounded the imperial palace, the sanctuary of Jupiter Tarpeius still crowned the capital, and from sacred edifices still standing on every side a whole host of pagan gods yet looked down, as of old, on Rome and the world. So real a thing was paganism still even in the fifth century that the pagan poet Claudian, who had been appointed to celebrate in verse the occasion just referred to, could with impunity and, we suppose, with apparent propriety, point out the gods as seeming to guard the imperial palace by their divine presence and smile propitiously upon one who was the heir of so many Christian emperors.[180] Some years later a work was written by an unknown author who lived in the time of Honorius or of Valentinian III., giving a topographical description of Rome, and mentioning those monuments which had been spared by the fire and sword of the Goths. The writer enumerates as still existing 43 pagan temples and 480 cediculæ. The Colossus of the Sun, a hundred feet high, still towered aloft close by the Coliseum, where so many holy martyrs had poured out their blood for Christ. The statues of Apollo, of Hercules and Minerva still stood, as of old, at the crossings and in the public squares. Still the fountains flowed under the invocation of nymphs. And this, though Constantine and Theodosius had wielded the sceptre of the empire, and SS. Sylvester and Damasus had sat in the midst on the throne of Peter. Time passes on, and with it the age of the great fathers of the church. Those days which Christianity filled with its spirit, when Gregory and Chrysostom and Basil and Jerome and mighty Augustine preached and taught, go by with their brightness and their glory, and yet in 419, in the time of Valentinian III., we find Rutilius Numatianus celebrating the greatness of pagan Rome, the mother of gods and heroes. Christianity had been throwing bright gleams of light over the whole world for these 400 years, the voices of the great fathers of the church had been thundering in the principal cities of the empire, yet Claudian and Rutilius Numatianus were as though they had caught no glimpse of the light which shone around them nor heard a sound from Hippo or Milan. Claudian had found a cord of that Latin lyre which was broken to pieces on the day when Lucan opened his own veins in the bath. Though living in Christian times, he was as pagan as his great model, and his imagination revelled amid the fabled splendors of Olympus and the baseless fictions of mythology. He can sing of the rape of Proserpine whilst the cultus of our Blessed Lady is taking possession of the temple of Ceres at Catana. He invites the graces, the nymphs, and the hours to prepare their garlands for the fair spouse of Stilico, though she had, in hatred and contempt of the gods of paganism, snatched the golden collar from the neck of the statue of Cybele. His genius takes even a more daring flight when he introduces Christian princes into the abodes of the immortals, and represents Theodosius, the greatest hater of the gods, as holding familiar converse with Jupiter. Rutilius Numatianus, on the other hand, pours out his soul in passionate words of patriotism upon Rome herself, the last and the greatest divinity of the ancient world. To him Rome is the ever beautiful queen of the universe, whose dominion she holds for all ages. To him she is the mother of men and of gods. “When we pray in thy temples,” he exclaims in his burning ardor, “we are not far from heaven. Of all nations she has made one country, of a whole world one city. Her trophies are countless as the stars of heaven, her temples too dazzling for the eyes to look upon. Spread yet further thy laws; they shall govern ages yet unborn which shall become Roman despite themselves, and thou alone, of all earthly things, shalt not fear the power of the fates.”[181]

We might easily imagine on reading these two writers that Christianity had not yet dawned upon the world, yet we are in the fifth century. We naturally ask if the Christian emperors used their power to crush out paganism. History tells us of many imperial edicts which ordered the pagan temples to be closed and the sacrifices to be discontinued. We find those edicts often renewed, and hence, we argue, often disobeyed. Nothing, however, surprises us so much as to find that in the middle of the fifth century the sacred chickens were still kept at the capital, and the consuls, on their appointment to office, went to seek from them the auspices which they were supposed to be able to give. At this date also the public calendar indicated the feasts of the false gods by the side of those in honor of Christ and his saints. In a word, paganism is yet a living power, with its temples and idols, and sacrifices and sacred groves.

In Rome itself, where the smoke of incense ascends to the only true God, the smoke of sacrifice also rises to the false gods of Olympus. And beyond Rome, over Italy and Gaul and throughout the whole of Western Christendom, there are still symbols of pagan worship; still undoubted indications of its enduring influence over thousands who believe that the empire and the pagan gods are equally eternal, and will still be in existence when men here become tired of the folly of the cross and the name of the crucified Nazarene has faded from their minds. How true, then, does it appear that paganism continues to hold its ground to a far greater extent than is commonly imagined! It was a fearful task for Christianity, divine though it was, to level to the ground the temples and idols of pagan worship. Paganism seemed to hold on to the empire with unrelaxing tenacity; it was bound up with its institutions; it seemed built with the very stones into the walls of the great capital.

The incontrovertible fact, then, that paganism still existed and retained a stout hold upon the empire even so late as the fifth century will prepare the reader to believe that its demoralizing principles were still working their natural results. We will not maintain that human sacrifices were as common at this date as they had been some centuries before; but we do not feel sure that they were altogether abandoned. We know that in the time of Constantine, when Christianity was looking down from the throne of the Cæsars over the empire, pagan priests poured out each year a patera of human blood to Jupiter Latial. The example which the Romans themselves had set was followed by the conquered nations, and those dreadful horrors long continued to be practised among them in spite of imperial decrees and prohibitions. “All the laws of civilization,” says F. Ozanam in his striking way, “could not smother the instincts of that savage beast which paganism had unmuzzled in the heart of fallen humanity.” But even if human sacrifices had altogether ceased, yet the essential principles of paganism were still at work. The direct tendency of pagan worship was to enslave man to his senses. The fearful degradation to which mankind were thus brought, it is almost impossible for Christian minds to credit. St. Augustine, in the seventh book of his _City of God_, tells us of horrors which we cannot read without a sense of shame and disgust for our race. Those processions through the towns and fields of Latium on the feast of Bacchus are too shocking to describe. We know, also, that unnamable crimes were honored with a religious cultus, and had temples dedicated to their worship at Cyprus, Samos, at Corinth, and on Mount Eryx. When we read of this utter degradation to which paganism reduces human nature, we wonder how such a religion could endure. But it was precisely because it ministered so readily and so generously to the worst passions of human nature that it maintained its influence so long. When in course of time, and, by the repeated pressure of imperial edicts, the priests of Cybele and the priestesses of Venus were dispersed, paganism still had its temples and its thousands of worshippers in the circus, the theatre, and the amphitheatre. In these centres of resort, where the most reckless and the most unholy passions had full play, the gods were in their strongholds. St. Cyprian had understood the true nature of paganism well when he said that it was “the mother of the games.” Nothing could have seized upon human nature with a more powerful grasp than paganism did by making pleasure into a religious worship. The two strong tendencies of mankind, viz., the religious sentiment and the intense love of pleasure, were thus directed to one and the same object. The combats of the gladiators, which exercised such a fascination on the Romans for so many years, were supposed to appease the spirits of the departed; the dances of the stage were thought to avert the anger of heaven. The symbolism which covered all lent an air of mystery and solemnity to these exciting entertainments. We are told that the courses of the circus represented the evolutions of the stars, the dances of the theatre symbolized the voluptuous whirl of pleasure in which all living beings were hurried along, and the combats of the amphitheatre were a type of the struggles in which the human race is ever engaged. The circus, theatre, and amphitheatre were, then, so many temples of worship, and, as we may well believe, the most popular and the best frequented temples that paganism ever consecrated to its false and corrupting rites. The other religious temples of the Roman were notoriously small and poor, but on these he lavished his gold, his marble, and all that he held most precious, so that he has left behind him nothing grander or richer than the monuments of his pleasures, and, we may add, nothing more defiled, more foul or more bloody.

The circus was dedicated to the sun; so proclaimed the obelisk which rose in stately height in the centre of the arena. Everything about the circus breathed idolatry. If we accept the view of the Greeks, its very name was taken from Circe, the daughter of the sun. If we take up the scathing work of Tertullian, _De Spectaculis_, we shall be told that “every ornament of the circus was in itself a temple. The eggs those assign to Castor and Pollux, who blush not in believing that these were born an egg from a swan which was Jupiter. The pillars vomit forth their dolphins in honor of Neptune; they support their Sessiæ, so-called from the sowing of the seed; their Messiæ, from the harvest; their Tutelinæ, from the protection of the fruits. In front of these appear three altars to three gods, mighty and powerful; these they consider to be of Samothrace. The enormous obelisk, as Hermatetes affirmeth, is publicly exposed in honor of the Sun; its inscription is a superstition from Egypt. The council of the gods were dull without their great mother; she therefore presideth there over the Euripus. Consus, as we have said, lieth buried beneath the earth of the Marcian Jail; even this jail he maketh an idol. Think, O Christian! how many unclean names possess the circus. Foreign to thee is that religion which so many spirits of the devil have taken unto themselves!”[182] It would seem that the circus was a sort of Pantheon, where almost every god received his tribute of worship. If the pagan deities had lost some of their temples in the onward advance of Christianity, they still retained a shrine where they were worshipped all at once. And no opportunity was lost when an act of religious worship could be brought in. Before the courses were opened, the gods were carried on rich litters round the circus by a grand cortége of priests. Tertullian speaks of the dazzling _pompa_ which preceded the games, “the long line of images, the host of statues, the chariots, the sacred images, the cars, the chairs, and the robes” with which the gods were clothed. “How many colleges,” he says, “how many priesthoods, how many offices are set in motion, the men of that city know in which the council of the demons sitteth.”[183] Sacrifices without number were celebrated in the course of the performances. They preceded, they came between, they followed them. And it is difficult to conceive the height of frenzy to which the people were excited by these games. “On the longed-for day of the equestrian games,” Ammianus Marcellinus tells us, “ere the clear rays of the sun yet shine, all hurry headlong, outpoured, as though they would outspeed the very chariots which are to contend.” Before the races began, all eyes, wild with the fire of excited passions, were fixed on the magistrate, who held in his hand the handkerchief whose falling was to signal the commencement of the sports. As that handkerchief fell, there came rushing into view those charioteers who were the delight of the Roman people. The crowd raised a wild cry of joy, and then, breathless with suspense, followed with their glaring eyes the rushing horses and the rattling cars as they dashed along the course. As the horses bounded over the ground, now losing, now gaining, on one another, and the dust-clouds rose from beneath the rattling chariot-wheels, louder and wilder rang the shouts of the spectators, and passion rose to its height in Roman hearts. Furious factions were formed, which soon developed into violence and internecine battle. This was the grand climax, sought for and expected. The gods were appeased; Romulus now recognized his people. From this state of wild excitement we naturally expect cruelty and bloodshed. We are quite prepared to believe what Suetonius tells us. He records that Vitellius massacred some of the people because they cursed the faction which he favored. Caracalla is said to have done the same for some jest on a favorite charioteer. But to add more vivid coloring to the picture, we will borrow the striking language of Tertullian. “Behold the people,” he says, “coming to the show already full of madness, already tumultuous, already blind, already agitated about their wagers. The prætor is too slow for them. Their eyes are ever rolling with their lots within his urn. Then they are in anxious suspense for the signal. The common madness hath a common voice. I perceive their madness from their trifling. ‘He hath thrown it,’ they say, and announce to each other what was seen at once by all. I possess the evidence of their blindness. They see not what is thrown; they think it a handkerchief, but it is the gullet of the devil cast down from on high.”[184]

Thus, then, in the stormy days of the fifth century did the great Roman people forget their troubles and their dangers in the excitement of the circus. What was so vividly described by Tertullian went on through the centuries that came after him. The Roman people had, in truth, lost the empire of the world; it had purchased its capital out of the hands of savage hordes by heavy sums of gold; but it forgot all in the delirium of the circensian games. There, as has been said, it found its temple, its forum, its country, and the term of its hopes. Through the storms of war against barbarians, in spite of the thunders of Christian eloquence, under the dazzling light of the Christian Gospel, still the circus stood, and its multitudinous gods received their tribute of worship, and the maddened crowds thronged to the games, as of old. In the year 448, the calendar marks 58 days for the public games. We may well be amazed as we read it. Fifty-eight days still dedicated to this wild self-abandonment, whilst on the Northern borders of the empire the threatening armies of Genseric and Attila were amassed, with the sword of fire and vengeance in their hands, awaiting the signal of God!

The theatre was another temple where paganism still retained a terrible hold. It was dedicated to Venus, the unholy goddess who swayed the hearts of almost all mankind. If we would see the great Roman people at its lowest, we must look upon it as it lies in prostrate adoration in this temple of Venus. Here it is grovelling in the veriest mire of abasement. Here, more than anywhere else, it forgets its dignity, and plunges into the deepest depths of sensuality and degradation. But we cannot paint the scene in bold colors. The picture would shock by its startling horror and deformity. The eye of Christian modesty would turn away in disgust and pain. We must let the outlines even be faint, lest they should offend the delicate sensitiveness of pure minds.

In the midst of the theatre stood the altar of the unholy goddess, crowned with garlands. Before this altar were represented the shameful histories of the pagan gods. There the wretched mimes, by look, and gesture, and suggestive attitude, displayed before the lascivious eyes of the multitude the loves of Jupiter and the fury of Pasiphaë. But as time went on, and the passions of the people became more and more inflamed, the mute language of look and gesture did not satisfy. Far worse horrors were demanded. Shadows and unrealities were not enough for the hungry fire of unrestrained passion. Realities, revolting, shameless, and unnamable, must be enacted before the eyes of a vast multitude, composed of old and young of both sexes. He who played the part of Hercules must be burned in the presence of a maddened throng; the horrid history of Atys must have a reality answering to it, and be carried into effect before the full gaze of the people. We can conceive nothing more pitiable than the sight of the great Roman people, so sadly fallen into baseness, so completely abandoned to shameful sensualities, and lying prostrate before the foul goddess of unholy passions in the theatre. The empire might perish and the heavens fall upon their heads, but the people must have their pleasures. This was their madness and their worship. Three thousand dancers ministered, like so many priestesses, in the theatre-worship of Rome. For these panderers to their vile pleasures, the Romans were willing to sacrifice all that was dear to them. These favorites they crowned with flowers, and flattered by their manifestations of applause. They retained them in the city, as Ammianus Marcellinus tells us, at a time of severe famine, where a decree was passed which expelled men of letters and those who exercised the liberal professions. Old Ammianus, though a pagan, is filled with wrath at this shameful abandonment of his countrymen, and pours out his indignation in vehement, fiery words. But what hope was there? Corruption had affected every class. The dancers were the favorites of all, and even the senators of Rome were not ashamed to sit in the first seats of the theatre gazing upon the nudity of these priestesses of Venus. Thus had the Romans fallen below even the most fallen of other nations, which had once been great, but had perished for their crimes. Egypt had deified its agricultural products and domestic animals, Phœnicia its commerce, Assyria its sciences, Persia the elements, Greece its arts.[185] But Rome had gone down far deeper than all into folly and idolatry; it had raised altars to its own base passions. And this theatre-worship was existing in its full life in the latter days of the empire. Christianity had not abolished it. The demons held their own in their temples of sinful pleasure, and the people came and adored in countless multitudes, and their passions were kept alive and burned wildly with unholy fire--and all under the dark, bodeful shadow of the storm-cloud which hung so black and threatening in the Northern skies.

But we have yet to speak of another great centre of paganism and moral corruption--the amphitheatre. “This,” says F. Ozanam, “was the greatest school which was ever opened for the demoralization of men.” It exercised a power of fascination beyond all conception, and was irresistible. The people rushed there in countless thousands, frantic with excitement. The thirst for blood maddened them like a wild indwelling demon. The games of the circus were tame in comparison with the sight of wild beasts engaged in death-struggle or the savage conflict of well-matched gladiators. There the emperors presided under the shadow of their pagan gods; there were gathered together the senators and the great ones of Rome; there rose tier upon tier round the vast arena the waving mass of countless human heads. There all Rome assembled for brutal pleasure and pagan worship, for the amphitheatre was a temple. Tertullian tells us this in his characteristic way. “The amphitheatre,” he says, “is consecrated to deities more numerous and more barbarous than the capitol. It is the temple of all demons. As many unclean spirits sit together as the place containeth men.”[186] Under the shadow, then, of so many pagan gods, breathed upon by so many devils, we can picture to ourselves the wild excitement of these thousands of spectators, as they assemble on occasion of a Roman holiday. They have caught a rumor, perhaps, of what is prepared that day, by a subservient emperor, for the amusement of his people. It may be that hundreds of ferocious beasts are to tear one another to pieces before them, as often happened in the time of Septimius Severus; or it may be that two hundred lions are to die in a horrid, bloody affray, as took place in the reign of one of his successors. Or, perhaps, Roman senators are to descend into the arena, to sacrifice their lives for the amusement of their fellow-citizens, as was the custom from the time of the first Cæsars. Perhaps it is near mid-day, and the crowd has been thronging in for hours. The sun is pouring down his blazing rays over the scene, though their heat is tempered by the canvas awnings which stretch a kind protecting shade wherever it is possible. But the bright light penetrates every nook and corner, and makes every figure stand forth to view. It flashes off the shining armor of Roman knights, dances and glistens in many a dark young eye, falls with a flood of glory upon Cæsar’s throne, and plays around the imperial robes which gold and precious stones so gorgeously bedeck. The brightness of the day adds to the excitement of the people. They talk with vivacity upon the nature of the expected conflicts; they lay their wagers, and become more excited as time flies on. They are impatient for the “shows” to begin; they clamor; they can wait no longer. We will here let a more brilliant pen than ours help to complete the picture. “And now, with peal of trumpets and clash of cymbals, a burst of wild martial music rises above the hum and murmur of the seething crowd. Under a spacious archway, supported by marble pillars, wide folding-doors are flung open, and two by two, with stately step and slow, march in the gladiators, armed with the different weapons of their deadly trade. Four hundred men are they, in all the pride of perfect strength and symmetry, and high training and practised skill. With head erect and haughty bearing, they defile once round the arena, as though to give the spectators an opportunity of closely scanning their appearance, and halt with military precision to range themselves in line under Cæsar’s throne. For a moment there is a pause and hush of expectation over the multitude, while the devoted champions stand motionless as statues in the full glow of noon; then, bursting suddenly into action, they brandish their gleaming weapons over their heads, and higher, fuller, fiercer rises the terrible chant that seems to combine the shout of triumph with the wail of suffering, and to bid a long and hopeless farewell to upper earth, even in the very recklessness and defiance of its despair:

“‘Ave Cæsar! Morituri te salutant!’

“Then they wheel out once more, and range themselves on either side of the arena: all but a chosen band who occupy the central place of honor, and of whom every second man at least is doomed to die.”[187]

We can imagine how the thousands who had come to feast their eyes on the cruel spectacle would now be frantic for the real work to begin. We can picture to ourselves how all would proceed. We see the huge rhinoceros with his overlapping plates of armor led forth into the arena. He rolls his glowing eyes around in the fury of his hunger, but sees only the smooth white sand. He stamps with his large flat foot, and digs madly into the earth with his “horned muzzle.” We see, too, his enemy come sneaking in--the Lybian tiger, with his sleek, striped coat and glaring eyes. They approach each other. The spring is made; they are in a death-struggle. And now that blood is seen, a maddened shout of savage joy from the gratified spectators rends the air. More blood is wanted. The trumpets ring out again. The gladiators step forth and range themselves in opposing ranks. They are “all armed alike with a deep, concave buckler, and a short, stabbing, two-edged blade.” Then is heard the sharp clash of meeting steel. Men’s breath is hushed; their hearts beat quick; their eyes glare with a wild fire and are riveted on the struggling athletes. Then the ranks of the combatants waver and are broken; blood is seen upon the white sand: it flows from large gashes in the gladiators’ sinking forms. The huge giants fall one after another, hard and brave to the last.

And this is the hideous sight which day after day delights and never satisfies the Roman public. It is sad to think of so much noble strength and magnificent bravery sacrificed so ignobly. It sickens the heart to dwell on the brutal, reckless destruction of manly life perpetrated to amuse a blood-thirsty populace in “those Roman shambles.” Yet “so inured were the people to such exhibitions, so completely imbued with a taste for the horrible, and so careless of human life, that scarcely an eye was turned away, scarcely a cheek grew paler, when a disabling gash was received or a mortal blow driven home, and mothers with babies in their arms would bid the child turn its head to watch the death-pang on the pale, stern face of some prostrate gladiator.”[188]

We have now said enough to show the reader the corrupting influence of those three mighty powers of paganism--the circus, the theatre, and the amphitheatre. Many pagan temples had no doubt fallen under the crushing arm of Christian teaching, but these three, in which so many gods and goddesses had taken refuge, stood their ground. They were found in every province of the empire, and everywhere were well frequented. The demoralizing effect produced by them it is not easy to estimate--it was simply never-ceasing and universal. And when the persecutors had passed away, and there was no longer the constant presence of cruel death to keep alive the fervor of Christians, we find that they too came under the demoralizing influence of these mighty powers of evil. This is the cause of that bitter cry of grief which bursts forth from every page of the writings of the great saints of the fourth and fifth centuries. Pagan corruption was rushing upon them like a strong flood on every side. They found themselves overpowered and engulfed. Listen to the plaintive words of SS. Jerome, Chrysostom, and Augustine, laden with the sobs and groans of grief-stricken hearts. Open the pages of Salvian, and you will soon be convinced that mortal degradation has invaded every city and town, and that all classes of society are grovelling in the lowest depths of corruption. The holy bishop pours out his soul in the most moving language. His words sometimes flash with holy wrath and indignation; sometimes they are the wailing cry of despair; sometimes, again, they are the tears of deepest sorrow, flowing out of his inmost soul. “How different,” he exclaims, “is now the Christian people from itself, that is, from what it formerly was!... What is now every assembly of Christians but a sink of vices?... We make it our study not only not to accomplish the precepts, but even to do the contrary. God commands us to love one another; we tear one another to pieces in mutual hatred. God commands us to help the poor; and we all rob others of what belongs to them. God commands every Christian to be chaste even in look; and who is he who does not grovel in the mire? I appeal to the conscience of those to whom I speak. Who is the person who has not to reproach himself with some of these crimes, or, rather, who is the man who is not guilty of all? It is easier to find Christians guilty of all these crimes than to meet with any exempt from some of them; it is easier to find great criminals than ordinary sinners. Many of the Romans who have been baptized have arrived at such a laxity of morals that it is a kind of sanctity amongst the faithful to be less vicious. Audacious criminals rush into the temples of the true God without any respect for the Divine Majesty. They go there to meditate in silence upon some fresh iniquity. Scarcely are the divine mysteries concluded than some return to their thefts, others to drunkenness; these to their bad habits, those to their deeds of violence. What is the life of courtiers? Injustice and iniquity. What is the life of public officers? Lies and calumny. What is the life of soldiers? Violence and rapine. What is the life of merchants? Fraud and deceit. Alas! our vices disinherit us of the beautiful name of Christians; for the depravity of our morals renders us unworthy of the privileges of our birth. Base behavior destroys the glory of an honorable title. As there is no condition which is not disgraced, no place which is not filled with the crimes of Christians, let us no longer glory in this beautiful name. It will only serve to render us more culpable, and to aggravate our offences.”[189]

We think the picture sufficiently complete. Over this huge mass of moral rottenness; over the heads of pagan gods yet standing erect in the midst of this foul corruption; over the great sinning empire, pagan still in its vices and its tastes, the threatening storm-cloud hangs, waiting the moment when God shall bid it belch forth its hidden terrors of fire and flame. That moment is close at hand. Then shall the martyrs be avenged, and this universal crime be punished.

FOOTNOTES:

[179] _Lectures and Essays_, p. 48.

[180] See Claudian, _De Sexto Consulatu Honorii_, v. 43.

[181] See Ozanam, _Civil. au 5me Siècle_, p. 82.

[182] _De Spectaculis_, viii.

[183] _De Spectaculis_, vii.

[184] _De Spectaculis_, xvi.

[185] _Leroy_, vol. ii. p. 450.

[186] _De Spectaculis_, xii.

[187] _The Gladiators_, by Whyte Melville, p. 135.

[188] _The Gladiators_, p. 140.

[189] Salvianus, _De Gubernatione Mundi_, lib. iii. _passim_.

THE LAST DAYS BEFORE THE SIEGE.