masterpieces of antiquity were collected in this centre of luxury and pride,—­all those arts which made Greece immortal, and which we can only copy.  What vast structures, ornamented with pillars and marble statues, were crowded together near the Forum and Capitoline Hill!  The museums of Italy contain to-day twenty thousand specimens of ancient sculpture, which no modern artist could improve.  More than a million of dollars were paid for a single picture for the imperial bed-chamber,—­for painting was carried to as great perfection as sculpture.

Such were the arts of the Pagan city, such the material civilization in all the cities; and these cities were guarded by soldiers who were trained to the utmost perfection of military discipline, and presided over by governors as elegant, as polished, and as intelligent as the courtiers of Louis XIV.  The genius for war was only equalled by genius for government.  How well administered were all the provinces!  The Romans spread their laws, their language, and their institutions everywhere without serious opposition.  They were great civilizers, as the English have been.  “Law” became as great an idea as “glory;” and so perfect was the mechanism of government that the happiness of the people was scarcely affected by the character of the emperors.  Jurisprudence, the indigenous science of the Romans, is still studied and adopted for its political wisdom.

Such was the civilization of the Roman world in the time of Marcus Aurelius,—­that external grandeur, that outward prosperity, to which Gibbon points with such admiration and pride, and to which he ascribed the highest happiness which the world has ever enjoyed.  Far different, probably, would have been the verdict of the good and contemplative emperor who then ruled the civilized world, when he saw the luxury, the pride, the sensuality, the selfishness, the irreligion, the worldliness, which marked all classes; producing vices too horrible to be even named, and undermining the moral health, and secretly and surely preparing the way for approaching violence and ruin.

What, then, is the reverse of the picture which Gibbon admired?  What established facts have we as an offset to these gilded material glories?  What should be the true judgment of mankind as to this lauded period?

The historian speaks of peace, and the prosperity which naturally flowed from it in the uninterrupted pursuit of the ordinary occupations of life.  This is indisputable.  There was the increase of wealth, the enjoyment of security, the absence of fears, and the reign of law.  Life and property were guarded.  A man could travel from one part of the Empire to the other without fear of robbers or assassins.  All these things are great blessings.  Materially we have no higher civilization.  But with peace and prosperity were idleness, luxury, gambling, dissipation, extravagance, and looseness of morals of which we have no conception, and which no subsequent