monians, against each other, were attended, and still less to the violences and ravages occasioned in many cities and states, by the insatiable avarice and barbarous cruelty of tyrants.

An evident proof of the wisdom of the plan adopted by princes, of leaving their dominions to the Romans after their death, is, that their people never exclaimed against that disposition, nor proceeded to any revolt of their own accord, to prevent its taking effect.

I do not pretend to excuse the Romans entirely in this place, nor to justify their conduct in all things. I have sufficiently animadverted upon the interested views and political motives which influenced their actions. I only say that the Roman government, especially with regard to those who submitted voluntarily to them, was gentle, humane, equitable, advantageous to the people, and the source of their peace and tranquillity. There were indeed some individual oppressors, who made the Roman people authorize the most flagrant injustice, of which we shall soon see an example: but there was always in the state a considerable number of citizens, zealous for the public good, who rose up against those violences, and declared loudly for justice. This happened in the affair of Cyprus, which it is now time to relate.

2

58.

Clodius, who commanded a small fleet near Ci- A. M. licia, was defeated and taken prisoner by the pirates 3946. of that coast, against whom he had been sent. He Aut.J.C. caused Ptolemy, king of Cyprus, brother of Ptolemy Auletes, to be desired in his name to send him money to pay his ransom. That prince, who was a kind of prodigy in point of avarice, sent him only two talents. The pirates chose rather to release Clodius, without ransom, than to take so small a

one.

His thoughts were bent upon being revenged on that king as soon as possible. He had found means to get himself elected tribune of the people; an

z Strab. 1. xiv. p. 684.

important office, which gave him great power. Clodius made use of it for the destruction of his enemy. He pretended that that prince had no right to the kingdom of Cyprus, which had been left to the Roman people by the will of Alexander, who died at Tyre. It was determined, in consequence, that the kingdom of Egypt, and that of Cyprus, which depended on it, appertained to the Romans in virtue of that donation; and Clodius accordingly obtained an order of the people to seize the kingdom of Cyprus, to depose Ptolemy, and to confiscate all his effects. To put so unjust an order in execution, he had sufficient influence and address to have the justest of all the Romans elected, I mean Cato, whom he removed from the republic, under the pretext of so honourable a commission, that he might not find him an obstacle to the violent and criminal designs which he was meditating. Cato was therefore sent into the isle of Cyprus, to deprive a prince of his kingdom, who well deserved that disgrace, says an historian, for his many irregu larities; as if a man's vices sufficiently authorised the seizure of all his property.

Cato, upon his arrival at Rhodes, sent to bid Ptolemy retire peaceably, and promised him, if he complied, to procure him the high-priesthood of the temple of Venus at Paphos, the revenues of which were sufficiently considerable for his honourable subsistence. Ptolemy rejected that proposal. He was not, however, in a condition to defend himself against the power of the Romans; but could not resolve, after having worn a crown so long, to live as a private person. Determined therefore to end his life and reign together, he embarked with all his treasures, and put to sea. His design was to have

Plut. in Cato. p. 776.

* P. Clodius in senatu sub honorificentissimo titulo M. Catonem à rep. relegavit. Quippe legem tulit, ut is—mitteretur in insuiam Cyprum, ad spoliandum regno Ptolemæum, omnibus morum vitiis cam contumeliam meritum. VELL. PATERC. l. ii. c. 45.

ship, that it might But when he came

holes bored in the bottom of his sink with him and all his riches. to the execution of his purpose, though he persisted constantly in the resolution of dying himself, he had not courage to include his innocent and well-beloved treasures in his ruin; and thereby showed that he loved them better than he did himself; king of Cyprus indeed, in title, but in fact, the mean slave of his money. He returned to shore, and replaced his gold in his magazines, after which he poisoned himself, and left the whole to his enemies. Cato carried those treasures the following year to Rome. The sum was so large, that in the greatest triumphs the like had scarce ever been laid up in the public treasury. Plutarch makes it amount to almost seven thousand talents (one million and fifty thousand pounds sterling). Cato caused all Ptolemy's precious effects and furniture to be sold publicly; reserving to himself only a picture of Zeno, the founder of the Stoics, the sentiments of which sect he followed.

The Roman people here throw off the mask, and shew themselves not such as they had been in the glorious ages of the republic, full of contempt for riches and of esteem for poverty, but as they were become, after that gold and silver had entered Rome in triumph with their victorious generals. Never was any thing more capable of disgracing and reproaching the Romans than this last action. "The "Roman people" (says Cicero)" instead of making

*Procul dubio hic non posse dit dicitias, sed à divitiis possessus ́est; titulo rex insulæ, unimo pecuniæ miserabile mancipium. Val.

Max.

↑ Ptolemæus rex, si nondum sociu, at non hostis, pacatus, quietus, fretus imperio populi Rom., regno paterno atque avito, regali otio perfruebatur. De hoc nihil cogitante, nihil suspicante, est rogatum, ut sedens cum purpurâ et sceptro & illis insignibus regiis, præconi publico subjiceretur, & imperante populo Rom., qui etiam victis bello regibus regna reddere consuevit, rex amicus, nullá injuria commemoratá, nallis repetitis rebus, cum bonis omnibus publicaretur Cyprius miser, qui semper socias, semper amicas

"it their honour, and almost a duty as formerly, to "re-establish the kings their enemies whom they had "conquered, upon their thrones, now see a king, "their ally, or at least a constant friend to the republic, who had never done them any wrong, of "whom neither the senate nor any of our generals "had ever received the least complaint, who enjoy"ed the dominions left him by his ancestors in tranquillity, plundered on a sudden without any formality, and all his effects sold by auction almost "before his eyes, by order of the same Roman people.

66

This" (continues Cicero)" shows other kings, up"on what they are to rely for their security; from "this fatal example they learn, that amongst us, "there needs only the secret intrigue of some sedi“tious tribune, to deprive them of their thrones, and to plunder them at the same time of all their for"tunes."

What I am most amazed at is, that Cato, the justest and most upright man of those times (but what was the most shining virtue and justice of the Pagans!) should lend his name and service in so notorious an injustice. Cicero, who had reasons for sparing him, and dared not blame his conduct openly, shows, however, in the same oration which I have now cited, but in an artful and delicate manner, and under the appearance of excusing him, how much he had dishonoured himself by that action.

During Cato's stay at Rhodes, Ptolemy Auletes, king of Egypt, and brother to him of Cyprus, came thither to him. I reserve for the following book the history of that prince, which merits particular atten

tion.

fuit; de quo nulla unquam suspicio durior aut senatum, aut ad imperatores nostros allata est: vivus (ut aiunt) est & videns, cum victu &, restitu suo, publicatus. En cur cæteri reges stabilem esse suam fortunam arbitrentur, cùm hoc illius funesti anni perdito exemplo videant, per tribunum aliquem se fortunis spoliari (posse) & regno omni nudari, Cic. Orat. pro Sextio, u. 57.

BOOK THE TWENTIETII.

THE

HISTORY

OF

ALEXANDER'S SUCCESSORS,

CONTINUED.

THE twentieth Book is divided into three articles, which are all abridgments: the first, of the history of the Jews, from the reign of Aristobulus to that of Herod the Great; the second, of the history of the Parthians from the establishment of that empire to the defeat of Crassus; the third, of the history of the kings of Cappadocia, to the annexing of that kingdom to the Roman empire.

ARTICLE I.

Abridgement of the history of the Jews from Aristobulus, son of Hyrcanus, who first assumed the title of king, to the reign of Herod the Great, the Idumæan.

As the history of the Jews is often intermixed with that of the kings of Syria and Egypt, I have taken care, as occasion offered, to relate those circumstan

431