197 other states; sentiments which did not proceed from their enmity to the Romans, but from the love of their own liberty; for which they had just cause to fear, when there should be none in a condition to dispute empire with us, and we should become absolute masters of all nations. For the rest, the Rhodians did not aid Perseus. Their only crime, by the consent of their most violent accusers, is to have intended to declare war against us. But how long has the will, the intention only, been a crime? Is there any one among us, that would be willing to subject himself to this rule? For my part, I am sure I would not.* The Rhodians, it is said, are proud. I should be very sorry that my children could justly make me that reproach. But, pray, in what does their pride affect us? Would it become us to make it a crime in them to be prouder than we are?"t

The opinion of so grave and venerable a senator as Cato, prevented a war with the Rhodians. The answer given them did not declare them enemies, nor treat them as allies; but continued them in suspense. They were ordered to remove their governors from the cities of Lycia and Caria. Those provinces were given up to them after the defeat of Antiochus, and now taken from them by way of punishment. They were ordered also to evacuate Caunus and Stratonice. They had bought the first for two hundred talents, of Ptolemy's general, and the second had been given them by Antiochus and Seleucus; they drew from those two cities an annual revenue of one hundred and twenty talents. At the same time the senate granted the island of Delos an exemption from customs, which considerably diminished the revenues of the Rhodians. For, instead of a million of drachmas, to which the revenue from those customs amounted before, it paid afterwards only one hundred and fifty thousand.

The senate's answer having dispelled at Rhodes the fear that the Romans would take up arms against the republic, made all other evils appear light, as is common for the expectation of great misfortunes to make people next to insensible of small ones. However hard those orders were, they submitted to them, and put them in immediate execution. They decreed, at the same` time, a crown of gold to the Romans, of the value of ten thousand pieces of gold, and chose their admiral Theodotus to present it. He had orders to solicit the alliance of the Romans. The Rhodians had not demanded it till then, though for almost one hundred and forty years they had shared in the most glorious expeditions of that republic. They were unwilling to fetter their liberty with the chains of oaths and treaties; while they remained free, and their own masters, they might either aid the kings in distress, or be supported by them upon occasion. In the present conjuncture, they earnestly demanded to be admitted as allies; not to secure themselves against other powers, for they were in no apprehensions of any besides the Romans; but to remove, by that change, all suspicions that might have been conceived to the prejudice of their republic. The alliance was not, however, granted them at this time. They did not obtain it till the following year; nor then without long and warm solicitations. Tiberius Gracchus, at his return from Asia, whither he had been sent in quality of commissioner, to examine into its condition, was of great service to them upon this occasion. He declared that the Rhodians had punctually obeyed the senate's orders, and had condemned the partisans of Perseus to death. After so favourable a report, the Rhodians were admitted into the alliance of the Roman people.

I have before observed, that the Etolians had presented themselves before Paulus Emilius, in mourning habits, at his return from his expedition into Greece, and that he had given them audience at Amphipolis. The subject of

Qui accerime adversus eos dicit, ita dicit; hostes voluisse fieri. Et quis tandem est nostrum, qui, quod ad sese attinent, æquum censeat quempiam pœnas dare ob eam rem, quod arguatur male facere voluisse nemo opinor; nam ego, quod ad me attinet, nolim.

Rhodienses superbos esse aiunt, id objectantes quod mihi a liberis meis minime peci velim. Sint sane superbi. Quid id ad nos attinent? Idne irascimini, siquis superbior est quam nos?

This might amount to twenty-seven thousand dollars.

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their complaints was, that Lycischus and Tisippus, whom the influence of the Romans, to whose interests they were devoted, rendered them very powerful in Etolia, had surrounded the senate with soldiers, lent them by Bibius, who commanded in the province for the Romans; that they had put to death five hundred and fifty of the principal persons in the nation, whose sole crime was their having seemed to favour Perseus; that a great number of others had been sent into banishment, and that the estates of both had been given up to their accusers. The inquiry was confined to knowing, not on which side the injustice and violence had been committed, but whether the parties concerned had been for Perseus or the Romans. The murderers were acquitted. The dead were declared to have been killed, and the exiles to have been banished justly. Bibius only was condemned for having lent his aid in this bloody execution: but why condemned, if it was just? or, if not, why were those acquitted who had been the principal authors of it ?*

This sentence gave great terror to all who had expressed any inclination for Perseus, and exceedingly increased the pride and insolence of the partizans of Rome. The principal persons of each city were divided into three factions. The one were entirely devoted to the Romans; others adhered to the party of the kings; both making their court to their protectors by abject flatteries, and thereby rendering themselves powerful in their cities, which they held in an oppressive subjection. A third kind of citizens, in opposition to the other two, observed a kind of medium, neither taking part with the Romans nor the kings; but publicly asserting the defence of their laws and liberty. The latter were in reality, much esteemed and beloved in their several cities; but were in no authority. All offices, embassies, honours, and rewards, were conferred solely upon those who espoused the Roman interest after the defeat of Perseus; and they employed their credit in utterly destroying all those who differed from themselves in opinion.

In this view they repaired in great numbers, from all parts of Greece, to the ten commissioners, appointed by the senate to regulate affairs. They gave them to understand, that besides those who had declared publicly for Perseus, there were many others, secretly the enemies of Rome, who, under the pretext of asserting liberty, influenced the whole people against them, and that those cities would never continue quiet, and perfectly subject to the Romans, unless, after the contrary party were entirely reduced, the authority of those who had only the interest of the commonwealth at heart, was fully established. The ten commissioners were highly pleased with these reasons, and made them the rule of their conduct. What justice could be expected from an assembly that was determined to consider and treat all as criminals, who were not of the Roman party, and to reward all who should declare themselves their accusers and enemies, with numerous favours? We see here to what lengths ambition and the lust of empire carry mankind. They make men blind to all sense of duty and decency, and induce them to sacrifice justice, as well as every thing else, when it opposes their views. The virtue of the pagans was but a weak, and very fluctuating principle, as appears evidently upon this occasion. The Roman general, to whom a list had been given of all those who were suspected, ordered them to attend him from Etolia, Acarnania, Epirus, and Boeotia, and to follow him to Rome, there to make their defence. Commissioners were sent also into Asia, in order to take informations against such as, in public or private, had favoured Perseus.

Of all the small states of Greece, none gave the Roman republic so much umbrage as the Achæan league, which till then had continued formidable by the number and valour of their troops, by the ability of their generals, and, above all, by the union that reigned between all the cities of which it was composed. The Romans, jealous of a power that might prove an obstacle to their ambitious designs, especially if they should join the king of Macedonia,

Liv. 1. xlv. n. 28-32,

or the king of Syria, spared no pains to weaken it, by introducing divisions, and gaining creatures, whom they raised by their influence to all employments, and by whose means they decided in all the assemblies of the league. We have seen what passed in the affair of the Spartan exiles. But it was in the conjuncture we now speak of, the Romans gave the last stroke to their liberty.* After the defeat of Perseus, Callicrates, to complete with the Romans, to whom he had sold himself, the ruin of the partizans of liberty, whom he looked upon as his enemies, had the boldness to accuse, by name, all those to the ten commissioners, whom he suspected to have had any inclination to support Perseus. They did not think it would suffice to write to the Achæans, as they had done to other states, that they should send such of their citizens to Rome, as were accused of having favoured Perseus: but they sent two deputies to declare in person that order to the league. Two reasons induced them to act in this manner. The first was, their fear that the Achæans, who were very jealous of their liberty, and very brave, would refuse obedience to the letters that should be written them; and that Callicrates, and the other informers, should run the risk of their lives in the assembly: the second, because in the letters, which had been found among the papers of Perseus, nothing appeared to convict the accused Achæans.

The two commissioners sent into Achaia, were C. Claudius and Cn. Domitius Enobarbus. One of them, more abandoned to injustice than the other, Pausanius does not say which, complained in the assembly that many of the most powerful persons of the league had assisted Perseus against the Romans, and demanded that they should be condemned as deserving death, after which he should name them. The whole assembly was shocked at this proposal, and cried out on all sides, that it was an unheard of thing to condemn persons before it was declared who they were, and pressed him to make known the guilty. Upon repeated instances to explain himself, he replied, at the suggestion of Callicrates, that all who had been in office, and commanded the armies, had rendered themselves guilty of that crime. Xenon, upon that, who was a person of great repute, and very much respected by the league, spoke to this effect: "I have commanded the armies, and have had the honour to be the chief magistrate of the league; I protest, that I have never acted in any thing contrary to the interests of the Romans, which I am ready to prove, either in the assembly of the Achæans, or at Rome before the senate." The Romans took hold of this expression, as favourable to his designs, and decreed, that all those who had been charged by Callicrates, should be sent to Rome in order to justify themselves there. The whole assembly was in the highest affliction upon this sentence. Nothing like it had ever been known, even under Philip, or his son Alexander. Those princes, though irresistibly powerful, never conceived the thought of causing such as opposed them to be brought into Macedonia, but referred the trying of them to the council of the Amphictyons, their natural judges. The Romans did not imitate their moderation; but by a conduct, which may justly be called tyrannical, caused more than a thousand of the most considerable citizens of the Achæan league to be seized, and conveyed to Rome. Callicrates became more than ever the object of horror and detestation to all the Achæans. All people avoided meeting him, and shunned his presence as an infamous traitor; and no one would bathe in the public baths after him, till all the water had been first emptied out of them.

Polybius, the celebrated historian, was of the number of those exiles. We have seen Lycortas, his father, distinguish himself by the fortitude and constancy with which he supported the interest of the Achæan league during his government of it. In regard to policy, Polybius had Lycortas his father, a great statesman, for his master; and for war, Philopomen, one of the most able and intrepid generals of antiquity. It was under these tutors he imbibed those

A. M. 3837. Ant. J. C. 167. Liv. 1. xlv n. 31. Pausan. in Achaiao. p. 416, 417.

learned lessons of government and war, which he practised himself, and has transmitted to posterity in his writings.

As soon as he arrived at Rome, whither his reputation had reached before him, his merit made the greatest men of the republic cultivate his friendship. He was particularly intimate with the two sons of Paulus Æmilius, the eldest of whom had been adopted into the family of the Fabii, and the youngest into that of the Scipios. The latter had beer, adopted by P. Cornelius Scipio, son of Scipio Africanus, who conquered Hannibal. I have enlarged sufficiently, in the conclusion of the history of the Carthaginians, upon the intimate friendship of Polybius with the second son of Paulus Æmilius, who afterwards conquered Carthage and Numantia. That young Roman perceived the value of such a friend, and knew how to apply his lessons and counsels to the best advantage. It is very probable, that Polybius composed the greatest part of his history, or, at least, collected his materials for it, at Rome.

When the Achæans arrived at Rome, the senate, without hearing or examining their cause, supposing, without any foundation, and contrary to the most known truth, that they had been tried and sentenced in the assembly of the Achæans, banished them into different towns of Italy. Polybius was excepted from that number.

The Achæans, surprised and afflicted with the fate of their countrymen, sent deputies to Rome, to demand that the senate would vouchsafe to take cognizance of their cause. They were answered, that it had been done, and that they had adjudged it themselves. Upon that reply, the Achæans sent back the same deputies to Rome, with Euræus at their head, to protest again before the senate, that those Achæans had never been heard by their country, and that their affair had never been brought to a trial. Euræus, in conse quence, entered the senate with the other deputies who accompanied him, and declared the orders he had received, praying, that they would take cognizance of the accusation, and not suffer the accused to perish, without passing sentence upon the crime they were charged with. That it were to be wished the senate would examine the affair themselves, and make known the guilty; but in case their other great affairs should not afford them leisure for such inquiry, they had only to refer it to the Achæans, who would do them justice in such a manner, as should evidence the greatness of their aversion for the culpable. Nothing was more equitable than this demand, and the senate was very much at a loss how to answer it. On the one side, they did not think it proper to try the cause, for the accusation was groundless; on the other, to dismiss the exiles, without passing judgment upon them, was to lose irrecoverably all their friends in Achaia. The senate, to leave the Greeks no hopes of retrieving their exiles, and to render them thereby more submissive to their orders, wrote to Callicrates, and other partisans of the Romans, that it did not appear to them, that the return of the exiles consisted with theirs, or the interest of their country. This answer not only threw the exiles, but all the people of Greece, into consternation. A universal mourning succeeded. They were convinced, that there was nothing farther to hope for the accused Achæans, and, that their banishment was perpetual.

They, however, sent two deputies with instructions to demand the return of the exiles; but as supplicants, and as a favour; lest, in taking upon them their defence, they should seem ever so little to oppose the will of the senate. There did not escape any thing in their harangue that was not very well weighed, and sufficiently reserved. Notwithstanding which, the senate continned inflexible, and declared, that they would persist in the regulations already made.

The Achæans would not be rejected, and appointed several deputations at different times, but with no better success; they were particularly ordered to

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demand the return of Polybius. They were in the right to persevere thus in their applications to the senate, in favour of their countrymen. Though their repeated instances had no other effect than to place the injustice of the Romans in full light, they could not be considered as unnecessary. Many of the senators were moved with them, and were of opinion, that it was proper to send home the exiles.*

The Achæans, having received advice of this favourable disposition, in order to improve it to their advantage, appointed a last deputation. The exiles had been already banished seventeen years, and a great number of them were dead. There were very warm debates upon them in the senate; some being for their return into their country, and their being restored to the possession of their estates, and others opposing it. Scipio, at the request of Polybius, had solicited Cato in favour of the exiles. That grave senator, rising up to speak in his turn, "To see us," said he, "dispute a whole day, whether some poor old men of Greece shall be interred by our grave-diggers, or those of their own country, would not one believe, that we had nothing at all to do?" That pleasantry was all that was wanting to make the senate ashamed of so long a contest, and to determine at last to send back the exiles to Peloponnesus. Polybius was desirous that they might be reinstated in all the honours and dignities they possessed before their banishment; but, before he presented that request to the senate, he thought proper to sound Cato upon it, who told him smiling, "Polybius, you do not imitate the wisdom of Ulysses. You are for returning into the cave of the Cyclops for some miserable tatters you have left there." The exiles accordingly returned into their country, but of the thousand that left it, only about three hundred remained. Polybius made no use of this permission, or if he did, he soon rejoined Scipio, for, three years after, he was with him at the siege of Carthage.

SECTION III.--ARLARATHES DIES, AND IS SUCCEEDED BY HIS SON. DEATH OF EUMENES. WAR BETWEEN ATTALUS AND PRUSIAS.

AFTER the defeat of Perseus, new embassies came every day to Rome, either to congratulate the Romans on their victory, or to justify or excuse themselves for the attachment they seemed to have to that prince; and some came to lay complaints before the senate in regard to some allies. We have seen hitherto what relates to the Rhodians and Achæans. In this section I shall collect what concerns Eumenes, king of Pergamus, Prusias, king of Bithynia, and some other particular affairs.

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Prusias, having come to Rome, to offer to the senate and Roman people his congratulations on the success of the war against Perseus, dishonoured the royal dignity by abject flattery. At his reception by the deputies appointed by the senate for that purpose, he appeared with his head shaved, and with the cap, habit, shoes, and stockings of a slave made free; and saluting the deputies," You see," said he, one of your freed-men, ready to fulfil whatever you shall please to command, and to conform entirely to all your customs." When he entered the senate, he stood at the door, facing the senators who sat, and prostrating himself, kissed the threshold. Afterwards, addressing himself to the assembly, "I salute you, gods preservers," cried he; and went on with a discourse suitable to that prelude. Polybius says, that he should be ashamed to repeat it. He concluded with demanding, that the Roman people would renew the alliance with him, and grant him certain lands taken from Antiochus, of which the Gauls had possessed themselves without any right or pretension. He then recommended his son Nicomedes to them. All he asked was granted him; only commissioners were appointed to examine into the condition of the lands in question. Livy, in his account of this audience, omits the abject submissions of Prusias; of which he pretends the Roman historians say nothing: he contents himself with mentioning, in the conclusion, part of what Polybius

*A. M. 3844. Ant. J. C. 160. Polyb. Legat. cxxix cxx.

Plut. in Cato. Cons. p. 341.

A. M. 3854. Ant. J. C. 150.