DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.61893#0373
Ch. X.
THROUGH ITALY.
345
ing, were employed to decorate the capitals of
the most distant provinces. Roads, the remains
of which astonish us even at this day, were
carried from the Roman Forum the centre of
this vast empire, to its utmost extremities ; and
all the tribes and nations that composed it were
linked together, not only by the same laws and
by the same government, but by all the facilities
of commodious intercourse, and of frequent
communication.* Compare the state of Gaul,
of Spain, and of Britain, when covered with
numberless cities, and flourishing- in all the arts
of peace under the protection of Rome, with
their forests, their swamps, and the sordid huts
of half-naked savages scattered thinly over their
wastes previous to their subjugation ; and you
will be enabled to appreciate the blessings which
they owed to Rome.
Hiec est, in gremium victos quae sola recepit,
Humanumque genus communi nomine fovit,
Matris non dominie ritu; civesque vocavit
Quos domuit, nexuque pio longinqua revinxit....
(Armorum legumque parens, quas fundit in omnes.
Imperium primique dedit incunabula juris)....
* “ Liceat dicere,” says Lipsius, with great truth, “ divino
munere Romanos datos ad quidquid rude expoliendura, ad
quidquid infectum faciendum, et loca hominesque elegantia
et artibus passim exornandos.”
THROUGH ITALY.
345
ing, were employed to decorate the capitals of
the most distant provinces. Roads, the remains
of which astonish us even at this day, were
carried from the Roman Forum the centre of
this vast empire, to its utmost extremities ; and
all the tribes and nations that composed it were
linked together, not only by the same laws and
by the same government, but by all the facilities
of commodious intercourse, and of frequent
communication.* Compare the state of Gaul,
of Spain, and of Britain, when covered with
numberless cities, and flourishing- in all the arts
of peace under the protection of Rome, with
their forests, their swamps, and the sordid huts
of half-naked savages scattered thinly over their
wastes previous to their subjugation ; and you
will be enabled to appreciate the blessings which
they owed to Rome.
Hiec est, in gremium victos quae sola recepit,
Humanumque genus communi nomine fovit,
Matris non dominie ritu; civesque vocavit
Quos domuit, nexuque pio longinqua revinxit....
(Armorum legumque parens, quas fundit in omnes.
Imperium primique dedit incunabula juris)....
* “ Liceat dicere,” says Lipsius, with great truth, “ divino
munere Romanos datos ad quidquid rude expoliendura, ad
quidquid infectum faciendum, et loca hominesque elegantia
et artibus passim exornandos.”