Chapter XXXIX: Gothic Kingdom Of Italy.—Part III

After the example of the last emperors, Theodoric preferred the
residence of Ravenna, where he cultivated an orchard with his own
hands. 69 As often as the peace of his kingdom was threatened
(for it was never invaded) by the Barbarians, he removed his
court to Verona 70 on the northern frontier, and the image of his
palace, still extant on a coin, represents the oldest and most
authentic model of Gothic architecture. These two capitals, as
well as Pavia, Spoleto, Naples, and the rest of the Italian
cities, acquired under his reign the useful or splendid
decorations of churches, aqueducts, baths, porticos, and palaces.
71 But the happiness of the subject was more truly conspicuous in
the busy scene of labor and luxury, in the rapid increase and
bold enjoyment of national wealth. From the shades of Tibur and
Praeneste, the Roman senators still retired in the winter season
to the warm sun, and salubrious springs of Baiae; and their
villas, which advanced on solid moles into the Bay of Naples,
commanded the various prospect of the sky, the earth, and the
water. On the eastern side of the Adriatic, a new Campania was
formed in the fair and fruitful province of Istria, which
communicated with the palace of Ravenna by an easy navigation of
one hundred miles. The rich productions of Lucania and the
adjacent provinces were exchanged at the Marcilian fountain, in a
populous fair annually dedicated to trade, intemperance, and
superstition. In the solitude of Comum, which had once been
animated by the mild genius of Pliny, a transparent basin above
sixty miles in length still reflected the rural seats which
encompassed the margin of the Larian lake; and the gradual ascent
of the hills was covered by a triple plantation of olives, of
vines, and of chestnut trees. 72 Agriculture revived under the
shadow of peace, and the number of husbandmen was multiplied by
the redemption of captives. 73 The iron mines of Dalmatia, a gold
mine in Bruttium, were carefully explored, and the Pomptine
marshes, as well as those of Spoleto, were drained and cultivated
by private undertakers, whose distant reward must depend on the
continuance of the public prosperity. 74 Whenever the seasons
were less propitious, the doubtful precautions of forming
magazines of corn, fixing the price, and prohibiting the
exportation, attested at least the benevolence of the state; but
such was the extraordinary plenty which an industrious people
produced from a grateful soil, that a gallon of wine was
sometimes sold in Italy for less than three farthings, and a
quarter of wheat at about five shillings and sixpence. 75 A
country possessed of so many valuable objects of exchange soon
attracted the merchants of the world, whose beneficial traffic
was encouraged and protected by the liberal spirit of Theodoric.
The free intercourse of the provinces by land and water was
restored and extended; the city gates were never shut either by
day or by night; and the common saying, that a purse of gold
might be safely left in the fields, was expressive of the
conscious security of the inhabitants.

69 (return) [See an epigram of Ennodius (ii. 3, p. 1893, 1894) on
this garden and the royal gardener.]

70 (return) [ His affection for that city is proved by the
epithet of “Verona tua,” and the legend of the hero; under the
barbarous name of Dietrich of Bern, (Peringsciold and Cochloeum,
p. 240,) Maffei traces him with knowledge and pleasure in his
native country, (l. ix. p. 230—236.)]

71 (return) [ See Maffei, (Verona Illustrata, Part i. p. 231,
232, 308, &c.) His amputes Gothic architecture, like the
corruption of language, writing &c., not to the Barbarians, but
to the Italians themselves. Compare his sentiments with those of
Tiraboschi, (tom. iii. p. 61.) * Note: Mr. Hallam (vol. iii. p.
432) observes that “the image of Theodoric’s palace” is
represented in Maffei, not from a coin, but from a seal. Compare
D’Agincourt (Storia dell’arte, Italian Transl., Arcitecttura,
Plate xvii. No. 2, and Pittura, Plate xvi. No. 15,) where there
is likewise an engraving from a mosaic in the church of St.
Apollinaris in Ravenna, representing a building ascribed to
Theodoric in that city. Neither of these, as Mr. Hallam justly
observes, in the least approximates to what is called the Gothic
style. They are evidently the degenerate Roman architecture, and
more resemble the early attempts of our architects to get back
from our national Gothic into a classical Greek style. One of
them calls to mind Inigo Jones inner quadrangle in St. John’s
College Oxford. Compare Hallam and D’Agincon vol. i. p.
140—145.—M]

72 (return) [ The villas, climate, and landscape of Baiae, (Var.
ix. 6; see Cluver Italia Antiq. l. iv. c. 2, p. 1119, &c.,)
Istria, (Var. xii. 22, 26,) and Comum, (Var. xi. 14; compare with
Pliny’s two villas, ix. 7,) are agreeably painted in the Epistles
of Cassiodorus.]

73 (return) [ In Liguria numerosa agricolarum progenies,
(Ennodius, p. 1678, 1679, 1680.) St. Epiphanius of Pavia redeemed
by prayer or ransom 6000 captives from the Burgundians of Lyons
and Savoy. Such deeds are the best of miracles.]

74 (return) [ The political economy of Theodoric (see Anonym.
Vales. p. 721, and Cassiodorus, in Chron.) may be distinctly
traced under the following heads: iron mine, (Var. iii. 23;) gold
mine, (ix. 3;) Pomptine marshes, (ii. 32, 33;) Spoleto, (ii. 21;)
corn, (i. 34, x. 27, 28, xi. 11, 12;) trade, (vi. 7, vii. 9, 23;)
fair of Leucothoe or St. Cyprian in Lucania, (viii. 33;) plenty,
(xii. 4;) the cursus, or public post, (i. 29, ii. 31, iv. 47, v.
5, vi 6, vii. 33;) the Flaminian way, (xii. 18.) * Note: The
inscription commemorative of the draining of the Pomptine marshes
may be found in many works; in Gruter, Inscript. Ant. Heidelberg,
p. 152, No. 8. With variations, in Nicolai De’ bonificamenti
delle terre Pontine, p. 103. In Sartorius, in his prize essay on
the reign of Theodoric, and Manse Beylage, xi.—M.]

75 (return) [ LX modii tritici in solidum ipsius tempore fuerunt,
et vinum xxx amphoras in solidum, (Fragment. Vales.) Corn was
distributed from the granaries at xv or xxv modii for a piece of
gold, and the price was still moderate.]

A difference of religion is always pernicious, and often fatal,
to the harmony of the prince and people: the Gothic conqueror had
been educated in the profession of Arianism, and Italy was
devoutly attached to the Nicene faith. But the persuasion of
Theodoric was not infected by zeal; and he piously adhered to the
heresy of his fathers, without condescending to balance the
subtile arguments of theological metaphysics. Satisfied with the
private toleration of his Arian sectaries, he justly conceived
himself to be the guardian of the public worship, and his
external reverence for a superstition which he despised, may have
nourished in his mind the salutary indifference of a statesman or
philosopher. The Catholics of his dominions acknowledged, perhaps
with reluctance, the peace of the church; their clergy, according
to the degrees of rank or merit, were honorably entertained in
the palace of Theodoric; he esteemed the living sanctity of
Caesarius 76 and Epiphanius, 77 the orthodox bishops of Arles and
Pavia; and presented a decent offering on the tomb of St. Peter,
without any scrupulous inquiry into the creed of the apostle. 78
His favorite Goths, and even his mother, were permitted to retain
or embrace the Athanasian faith, and his long reign could not
afford the example of an Italian Catholic, who, either from
choice or compulsion, had deviated into the religion of the
conqueror. 79 The people, and the Barbarians themselves, were
edified by the pomp and order of religious worship; the
magistrates were instructed to defend the just immunities of
ecclesiastical persons and possessions; the bishops held their
synods, the metropolitans exercised their jurisdiction, and the
privileges of sanctuary were maintained or moderated according to
the spirit of the Roman jurisprudence. 80 With the protection,
Theodoric assumed the legal supremacy, of the church; and his
firm administration restored or extended some useful prerogatives
which had been neglected by the feeble emperors of the West. He
was not ignorant of the dignity and importance of the Roman
pontiff, to whom the venerable name of Pope was now appropriated.
The peace or the revolt of Italy might depend on the character of
a wealthy and popular bishop, who claimed such ample dominion
both in heaven and earth; who had been declared in a numerous
synod to be pure from all sin, and exempt from all judgment. 81
When the chair of St. Peter was disputed by Symmachus and
Laurence, they appeared at his summons before the tribunal of an
Arian monarch, and he confirmed the election of the most worthy
or the most obsequious candidate. At the end of his life, in a
moment of jealousy and resentment, he prevented the choice of the
Romans, by nominating a pope in the palace of Ravenna. The danger
and furious contests of a schism were mildly restrained, and the
last decree of the senate was enacted to extinguish, if it were
possible, the scandalous venality of the papal elections. 82

76 (return) [ See the life of St. Caesarius in Baronius, (A.D.
508, No. 12, 13, 14.) The king presented him with 300 gold
solidi, and a discus of silver of the weight of sixty pounds.]

77 (return) [ Ennodius in Vit. St. Epiphanii, in Sirmond, Op.
tom. i. p. 1672—1690. Theodoric bestowed some important favors on
this bishop, whom he used as a counsellor in peace and war.]

78 (return) [ Devotissimus ac si Catholicus, (Anonym. Vales. p.
720;) yet his offering was no more than two silver candlesticks
(cerostrata) of the weight of seventy pounds, far inferior to the
gold and gems of Constantinople and France, (Anastasius in Vit.
Pont. in Hormisda, p. 34, edit. Paris.)]

79 (return) [ The tolerating system of his reign (Ennodius, p.
1612. Anonym. Vales. p. 719. Procop. Goth. l. i. c. 1, l. ii. c.
6) may be studied in the Epistles of Cassiodorous, under the
following heads: bishops, (Var. i. 9, vii. 15, 24, xi. 23;)
immunities, (i. 26, ii. 29, 30;) church lands (iv. 17, 20;)
sanctuaries, (ii. 11, iii. 47;) church plate, (xii. 20;)
discipline, (iv. 44;) which prove, at the same time, that he was
the head of the church as well as of the state. * Note: He
recommended the same toleration to the emperor Justin.—M.]

80 (return) [ We may reject a foolish tale of his beheading a
Catholic deacon who turned Arian, (Theodor. Lector. No. 17.) Why
is Theodoric surnamed After? From Vafer? (Vales. ad loc.) A light
conjecture.]

81 (return) [ Ennodius, p. 1621, 1622, 1636, 1638. His libel was
approved and registered (synodaliter) by a Roman council,
(Baronius, A.D. 503, No. 6, Franciscus Pagi in Breviar. Pont.
Rom. tom. i. p. 242.)]

82 (return) [ See Cassiodorus, (Var. viii. 15, ix. 15, 16,)
Anastasius, (in Symmacho, p. 31,) and the xviith Annotation of
Mascou. Baronius, Pagi, and most of the Catholic doctors,
confess, with an angry growl, this Gothic usurpation.]

I have descanted with pleasure on the fortunate condition of
Italy; but our fancy must not hastily conceive that the golden
age of the poets, a race of men without vice or misery, was
realized under the Gothic conquest. The fair prospect was
sometimes overcast with clouds; the wisdom of Theodoric might be
deceived, his power might be resisted and the declining age of
the monarch was sullied with popular hatred and patrician blood.
In the first insolence of victory, he had been tempted to deprive
the whole party of Odoacer of the civil and even the natural
rights of society; 83 a tax unseasonably imposed after the
calamities of war, would have crushed the rising agriculture of
Liguria; a rigid preemption of corn, which was intended for the
public relief, must have aggravated the distress of Campania.
These dangerous projects were defeated by the virtue and
eloquence of Epiphanius and Boethius, who, in the presence of
Theodoric himself, successfully pleaded the cause of the people:
84 but if the royal ear was open to the voice of truth, a saint
and a philosopher are not always to be found at the ear of kings.

The privileges of rank, or office, or favor, were too frequently
abused by Italian fraud and Gothic violence, and the avarice of
the king’s nephew was publicly exposed, at first by the
usurpation, and afterwards by the restitution of the estates
which he had unjustly extorted from his Tuscan neighbors. Two
hundred thousand Barbarians, formidable even to their master,
were seated in the heart of Italy; they indignantly supported the
restraints of peace and discipline; the disorders of their march
were always felt and sometimes compensated; and where it was
dangerous to punish, it might be prudent to dissemble, the
sallies of their native fierceness. When the indulgence of
Theodoric had remitted two thirds of the Ligurian tribute, he
condescended to explain the difficulties of his situation, and to
lament the heavy though inevitable burdens which he imposed on
his subjects for their own defence. 85 These ungrateful subjects
could never be cordially reconciled to the origin, the religion,
or even the virtues of the Gothic conqueror; past calamities were
forgotten, and the sense or suspicion of injuries was rendered
still more exquisite by the present felicity of the times.

83 (return) [ He disabled them—alicentia testandi; and all Italy
mourned—lamentabili justitio. I wish to believe, that these
penalties were enacted against the rebels who had violated their
oath of allegiance; but the testimony of Ennodius (p. 1675-1678)
is the more weighty, as he lived and died under the reign of
Theodoric.]

84 (return) [ Ennodius, in Vit. Epiphan. p. 1589, 1690. Boethius
de Consolatione Philosphiae, l. i. pros. iv. p. 45, 46, 47.
Respect, but weigh the passions of the saint and the senator; and
fortify and alleviate their complaints by the various hints of
Cassiodorus, (ii. 8, iv. 36, viii. 5.)]

85 (return) [ Immanium expensarum pondus...pro ipsorum salute,
&c.; yet these are no more than words.]

Even the religious toleration which Theodoric had the glory of
introducing into the Christian world, was painful and offensive
to the orthodox zeal of the Italians. They respected the armed
heresy of the Goths; but their pious rage was safely pointed
against the rich and defenceless Jews, who had formed their
establishments at Naples, Rome, Ravenna, Milan, and Genoa, for
the benefit of trade, and under the sanction of the laws. 86
Their persons were insulted, their effects were pillaged, and
their synagogues were burned by the mad populace of Ravenna and
Rome, inflamed, as it should seem, by the most frivolous or
extravagant pretences. The government which could neglect, would
have deserved such an outrage. A legal inquiry was instantly
directed; and as the authors of the tumult had escaped in the
crowd, the whole community was condemned to repair the damage;
and the obstinate bigots, who refused their contributions, were
whipped through the streets by the hand of the executioner. 8611
This simple act of justice exasperated the discontent of the
Catholics, who applauded the merit and patience of these holy
confessors. Three hundred pulpits deplored the persecution of the
church; and if the chapel of St. Stephen at Verona was demolished
by the command of Theodoric, it is probable that some miracle
hostile to his name and dignity had been performed on that sacred
theatre. At the close of a glorious life, the king of Italy
discovered that he had excited the hatred of a people whose
happiness he had so assiduously labored to promote; and his mind
was soured by indignation, jealousy, and the bitterness of
unrequited love. The Gothic conqueror condescended to disarm the
unwarlike natives of Italy, interdicting all weapons of offence,
and excepting only a small knife for domestic use. The deliverer
of Rome was accused of conspiring with the vilest informers
against the lives of senators whom he suspected of a secret and
treasonable correspondence with the Byzantine court. 87 After the
death of Anastasius, the diadem had been placed on the head of a
feeble old man; but the powers of government were assumed by his
nephew Justinian, who already meditated the extirpation of
heresy, and the conquest of Italy and Africa. A rigorous law,
which was published at Constantinople, to reduce the Arians by
the dread of punishment within the pale of the church, awakened
the just resentment of Theodoric, who claimed for his distressed
brethren of the East the same indulgence which he had so long
granted to the Catholics of his dominions. 8711 At his stern
command, the Roman pontiff, with four illustrious senators,
embarked on an embassy, of which he must have alike dreaded the
failure or the success. The singular veneration shown to the
first pope who had visited Constantinople was punished as a crime
by his jealous monarch; the artful or peremptory refusal of the
Byzantine court might excuse an equal, and would provoke a
larger, measure of retaliation; and a mandate was prepared in
Italy, to prohibit, after a stated day, the exercise of the
Catholic worship. By the bigotry of his subjects and enemies, the
most tolerant of princes was driven to the brink of persecution;
and the life of Theodoric was too long, since he lived to condemn
the virtue of Boethius and Symmachus. 88

86 (return) [ The Jews were settled at Naples, (Procopius, Goth.
l. i. c. 8,) at Genoa, (Var. ii. 28, iv. 33,) Milan, (v. 37,)
Rome, (iv. 43.) See likewise Basnage, Hist. des Juifs, tom. viii.
c. 7, p. 254.]

8611 (return) [ See History of the Jews vol. iii. p. 217.—M.]

87 (return) [ Rex avidus communis exitii, &c., (Boethius, l. i.
p. 59:) rex colum Romanis tendebat, (Anonym. Vales. p. 723.)
These are hard words: they speak the passions of the Italians and
those (I fear) of Theodoric himself.]

8711 (return) [ Gibbon should not have omitted the golden words
of Theodoric in a letter which he addressed to Justin: That to
pretend to a dominion over the conscience is to usurp the
prerogative of God; that by the nature of things the power of
sovereigns is confined to external government; that they have no
right of punishment but over those who disturb the public peace,
of which they are the guardians; that the most dangerous heresy
is that of a sovereign who separates from himself a part of his
subjects because they believe not according to his belief.
Compare Le Beau, vol viii. p. 68.—M]

88 (return) [ I have labored to extract a rational narrative from
the dark, concise, and various hints of the Valesian Fragment,
(p. 722, 723, 724,) Theophanes, (p. 145,) Anastasius, (in
Johanne, p. 35,) and the Hist Miscella, (p. 103, edit. Muratori.)
A gentle pressure and paraphrase of their words is no violence.
Consult likewise Muratori (Annali d’ Italia, tom. iv. p.
471-478,) with the Annals and Breviary (tom. i. p. 259—263) of
the two Pagis, the uncle and the nephew.]

The senator Boethius 89 is the last of the Romans whom Cato or
Tully could have acknowledged for their countryman. As a wealthy
orphan, he inherited the patrimony and honors of the Anician
family, a name ambitiously assumed by the kings and emperors of
the age; and the appellation of Manlius asserted his genuine or
fabulous descent from a race of consuls and dictators, who had
repulsed the Gauls from the Capitol, and sacrificed their sons to
the discipline of the republic. In the youth of Boethius the
studies of Rome were not totally abandoned; a Virgil 90 is now
extant, corrected by the hand of a consul; and the professors of
grammar, rhetoric, and jurisprudence, were maintained in their
privileges and pensions by the liberality of the Goths. But the
erudition of the Latin language was insufficient to satiate his
ardent curiosity: and Boethius is said to have employed eighteen
laborious years in the schools of Athens, 91 which were supported
by the zeal, the learning, and the diligence of Proclus and his
disciples. The reason and piety of their Roman pupil were
fortunately saved from the contagion of mystery and magic, which
polluted the groves of the academy; but he imbibed the spirit,
and imitated the method, of his dead and living masters, who
attempted to reconcile the strong and subtile sense of Aristotle
with the devout contemplation and sublime fancy of Plato. After
his return to Rome, and his marriage with the daughter of his
friend, the patrician Symmachus, Boethius still continued, in a
palace of ivory and marble, to prosecute the same studies. 92 The
church was edified by his profound defence of the orthodox creed
against the Arian, the Eutychian, and the Nestorian heresies; and
the Catholic unity was explained or exposed in a formal treatise
by the indifference of three distinct though consubstantial
persons. For the benefit of his Latin readers, his genius
submitted to teach the first elements of the arts and sciences of
Greece. The geometry of Euclid, the music of Pythagoras, the
arithmetic of Nicomachus, the mechanics of Archimedes, the
astronomy of Ptolemy, the theology of Plato, and the logic of
Aristotle, with the commentary of Porphyry, were translated and
illustrated by the indefatigable pen of the Roman senator. And he
alone was esteemed capable of describing the wonders of art, a
sun-dial, a water-clock, or a sphere which represented the
motions of the planets. From these abstruse speculations,
Boethius stooped, or, to speak more truly, he rose to the social
duties of public and private life: the indigent were relieved by
his liberality; and his eloquence, which flattery might compare
to the voice of Demosthenes or Cicero, was uniformly exerted in
the cause of innocence and humanity. Such conspicuous merit was
felt and rewarded by a discerning prince: the dignity of Boethius
was adorned with the titles of consul and patrician, and his
talents were usefully employed in the important station of master
of the offices. Notwithstanding the equal claims of the East and
West, his two sons were created, in their tender youth, the
consuls of the same year. 93 On the memorable day of their
inauguration, they proceeded in solemn pomp from their palace to
the forum amidst the applause of the senate and people; and their
joyful father, the true consul of Rome, after pronouncing an
oration in the praise of his royal benefactor, distributed a
triumphal largess in the games of the circus. Prosperous in his
fame and fortunes, in his public honors and private alliances, in
the cultivation of science and the consciousness of virtue,
Boethius might have been styled happy, if that precarious epithet
could be safely applied before the last term of the life of man.

89 (return) [ Le Clerc has composed a critical and philosophical
life of Anicius Manlius Severinus Boetius, (Bibliot. Choisie,
tom. xvi. p. 168—275;) and both Tiraboschi (tom. iii.) and
Fabricius (Bibliot Latin.) may be usefully consulted. The date of
his birth may be placed about the year 470, and his death in 524,
in a premature old age, (Consol. Phil. Metrica. i. p. 5.)]

90 (return) [ For the age and value of this Ms., now in the
Medicean library at Florence, see the Cenotaphia Pisana (p.
430-447) of Cardinal Noris.]

91 (return) [ The Athenian studies of Boethius are doubtful,
(Baronius, A.D. 510, No. 3, from a spurious tract, De Disciplina
Scholarum,) and the term of eighteen years is doubtless too long:
but the simple fact of a visit to Athens is justified by much
internal evidence, (Brucker, Hist. Crit. Philosoph. tom. iii. p.
524—527,) and by an expression (though vague and ambiguous) of
his friend Cassiodorus, (Var. i. 45,) “longe positas Athenas
intrioisti.”]

92 (return) [ Bibliothecae comptos ebore ac vitro * parietes,
&c., (Consol. Phil. l. i. pros. v. p. 74.) The Epistles of
Ennodius (vi. 6, vii. 13, viii. 1 31, 37, 40) and Cassiodorus
(Var. i. 39, iv. 6, ix. 21) afford many proofs of the high
reputation which he enjoyed in his own times. It is true, that
the bishop of Pavia wanted to purchase of him an old house at
Milan, and praise might be tendered and accepted in part of
payment. * Note: Gibbon translated vitro, marble; under the
impression, no doubt that glass was unknown.—M.]

93 (return) [ Pagi, Muratori, &c., are agreed that Boethius
himself was consul in the year 510, his two sons in 522, and in
487, perhaps, his father. A desire of ascribing the last of these
consulships to the philosopher had perplexed the chronology of
his life. In his honors, alliances, children, he celebrates his
own felicity—his past felicity, (p. 109 110)]

A philosopher, liberal of his wealth and parsimonious of his
time, might be insensible to the common allurements of ambition,
the thirst of gold and employment. And some credit may be due to
the asseveration of Boethius, that he had reluctantly obeyed the
divine Plato, who enjoins every virtuous citizen to rescue the
state from the usurpation of vice and ignorance. For the
integrity of his public conduct he appeals to the memory of his
country. His authority had restrained the pride and oppression of
the royal officers, and his eloquence had delivered Paulianus
from the dogs of the palace. He had always pitied, and often
relieved, the distress of the provincials, whose fortunes were
exhausted by public and private rapine; and Boethius alone had
courage to oppose the tyranny of the Barbarians, elated by
conquest, excited by avarice, and, as he complains, encouraged by
impunity. In these honorable contests his spirit soared above the
consideration of danger, and perhaps of prudence; and we may
learn from the example of Cato, that a character of pure and
inflexible virtue is the most apt to be misled by prejudice, to
be heated by enthusiasm, and to confound private enmities with
public justice. The disciple of Plato might exaggerate the
infirmities of nature, and the imperfections of society; and the
mildest form of a Gothic kingdom, even the weight of allegiance
and gratitude, must be insupportable to the free spirit of a
Roman patriot. But the favor and fidelity of Boethius declined in
just proportion with the public happiness; and an unworthy
colleague was imposed to divide and control the power of the
master of the offices. In the last gloomy season of Theodoric, he
indignantly felt that he was a slave; but as his master had only
power over his life, he stood without arms and without fear
against the face of an angry Barbarian, who had been provoked to
believe that the safety of the senate was incompatible with his
own. The senator Albinus was accused and already convicted on the
presumption of hoping, as it was said, the liberty of Rome. “If
Albinus be criminal,” exclaimed the orator, “the senate and
myself are all guilty of the same crime. If we are innocent,
Albinus is equally entitled to the protection of the laws.” These
laws might not have punished the simple and barren wish of an
unattainable blessing; but they would have shown less indulgence
to the rash confession of Boethius, that, had he known of a
conspiracy, the tyrant never should. 94 The advocate of Albinus
was soon involved in the danger and perhaps the guilt of his
client; their signature (which they denied as a forgery) was
affixed to the original address, inviting the emperor to deliver
Italy from the Goths; and three witnesses of honorable rank,
perhaps of infamous reputation, attested the treasonable designs
of the Roman patrician. 95 Yet his innocence must be presumed,
since he was deprived by Theodoric of the means of justification,
and rigorously confined in the tower of Pavia, while the senate,
at the distance of five hundred miles, pronounced a sentence of
confiscation and death against the most illustrious of its
members. At the command of the Barbarians, the occult science of
a philosopher was stigmatized with the names of sacrilege and
magic. 96 A devout and dutiful attachment to the senate was
condemned as criminal by the trembling voices of the senators
themselves; and their ingratitude deserved the wish or prediction
of Boethius, that, after him, none should be found guilty of the
same offence. 97

94 (return) [ Si ego scissem tu nescisses. Beothius adopts this
answer (l. i. pros. 4, p. 53) of Julius Canus, whose philosophic
death is described by Seneca, (De Tranquillitate Animi, c. 14.)]

95 (return) [ The characters of his two delators, Basilius (Var.
ii. 10, 11, iv. 22) and Opilio, (v. 41, viii. 16,) are
illustrated, not much to their honor, in the Epistles of
Cassiodorus, which likewise mention Decoratus, (v. 31,) the
worthless colleague of Beothius, (l. iii. pros. 4, p. 193.)]

96 (return) [ A severe inquiry was instituted into the crime of
magic, (Var. iv 22, 23, ix. 18;) and it was believed that many
necromancers had escaped by making their jailers mad: for mad I
should read drunk.]

97 (return) [ Boethius had composed his own Apology, (p. 53,)
perhaps more interesting than his Consolation. We must be content
with the general view of his honors, principles, persecution,
&c., (l. i. pros. 4, p. 42—62,) which may be compared with the
short and weighty words of the Valesian Fragment, (p. 723.) An
anonymous writer (Sinner, Catalog. Mss. Bibliot. Bern. tom. i. p.
287) charges him home with honorable and patriotic treason.]

While Boethius, oppressed with fetters, expected each moment the
sentence or the stroke of death, he composed, in the tower of
Pavia, the Consolation of Philosophy; a golden volume not
unworthy of the leisure of Plato or Tully, but which claims
incomparable merit from the barbarism of the times and the
situation of the author. The celestial guide, whom he had so long
invoked at Rome and Athens, now condescended to illumine his
dungeon, to revive his courage, and to pour into his wounds her
salutary balm. She taught him to compare his long prosperity and
his recent distress, and to conceive new hopes from the
inconstancy of fortune. Reason had informed him of the precarious
condition of her gifts; experience had satisfied him of their
real value; he had enjoyed them without guilt; he might resign
them without a sigh, and calmly disdain the impotent malice of
his enemies, who had left him happiness, since they had left him
virtue. From the earth, Boethius ascended to heaven in search of
the Supreme Good; explored the metaphysical labyrinth of chance
and destiny, of prescience and free will, of time and eternity;
and generously attempted to reconcile the perfect attributes of
the Deity with the apparent disorders of his moral and physical
government. Such topics of consolation so obvious, so vague, or
so abstruse, are ineffectual to subdue the feelings of human
nature. Yet the sense of misfortune may be diverted by the labor
of thought; and the sage who could artfully combine in the same
work the various riches of philosophy, poetry, and eloquence,
must already have possessed the intrepid calmness which he
affected to seek. Suspense, the worst of evils, was at length
determined by the ministers of death, who executed, and perhaps
exceeded, the inhuman mandate of Theodoric. A strong cord was
fastened round the head of Boethius, and forcibly tightened, till
his eyes almost started from their sockets; and some mercy may be
discovered in the milder torture of beating him with clubs till
he expired. 98 But his genius survived to diffuse a ray of
knowledge over the darkest ages of the Latin world; the writings
of the philosopher were translated by the most glorious of the
English kings, 99 and the third emperor of the name of Otho
removed to a more honorable tomb the bones of a Catholic saint,
who, from his Arian persecutors, had acquired the honors of
martyrdom, and the fame of miracles. 100 In the last hours of
Boethius, he derived some comfort from the safety of his two
sons, of his wife, and of his father-in-law, the venerable
Symmachus. But the grief of Symmachus was indiscreet, and perhaps
disrespectful: he had presumed to lament, he might dare to
revenge, the death of an injured friend. He was dragged in chains
from Rome to the palace of Ravenna; and the suspicions of
Theodoric could only be appeased by the blood of an innocent and
aged senator. 101

98 (return) [ He was executed in Agro Calventiano, (Calvenzano,
between Marignano and Pavia,) Anonym. Vales. p. 723, by order of
Eusebius, count of Ticinum or Pavia. This place of confinement is
styled the baptistery, an edifice and name peculiar to
cathedrals. It is claimed by the perpetual tradition of the
church of Pavia. The tower of Boethius subsisted till the year
1584, and the draught is yet preserved, (Tiraboschi, tom. iii. p.
47, 48.)]

99 (return) [ See the Biographia Britannica, Alfred, tom. i. p.
80, 2d edition. The work is still more honorable if performed
under the learned eye of Alfred by his foreign and domestic
doctors. For the reputation of Boethius in the middle ages,
consult Brucker, (Hist. Crit. Philosoph. tom. iii. p. 565, 566.)]

100 (return) [ The inscription on his new tomb was composed by
the preceptor of Otho III., the learned Pope Silvester II., who,
like Boethius himself, was styled a magician by the ignorance of
the times. The Catholic martyr had carried his head in his hands
a considerable way, (Baronius, A.D. 526, No. 17, 18;) and yet on
a similar tale, a lady of my acquaintance once observed, “La
distance n’y fait rien; il n’y a que lo remier pas qui coute.”
Note: Madame du Deffand. This witticism referred to the miracle
of St. Denis.—G.]

101 (return) [ Boethius applauds the virtues of his
father-in-law, (l. i. pros. 4, p. 59, l. ii. pros. 4, p. 118.)
Procopius, (Goth. l. i. c. i.,) the Valesian Fragment, (p. 724,)
and the Historia Miscella, (l. xv. p. 105,) agree in praising the
superior innocence or sanctity of Symmachus; and in the
estimation of the legend, the guilt of his murder is equal to the
imprisonment of a pope.]

Humanity will be disposed to encourage any report which testifies
the jurisdiction of conscience and the remorse of kings; and
philosophy is not ignorant that the most horrid spectres are
sometimes created by the powers of a disordered fancy, and the
weakness of a distempered body. After a life of virtue and glory,
Theodoric was now descending with shame and guilt into the grave;
his mind was humbled by the contrast of the past, and justly
alarmed by the invisible terrors of futurity. One evening, as it
is related, when the head of a large fish was served on the royal
table, 102 he suddenly exclaimed, that he beheld the angry
countenance of Symmachus, his eyes glaring fury and revenge, and
his mouth armed with long sharp teeth, which threatened to devour
him. The monarch instantly retired to his chamber, and, as he
lay, trembling with aguish cold, under a weight of bed-clothes,
he expressed, in broken murmurs to his physician Elpidius, his
deep repentance for the murders of Boethius and Symmachus. 103
His malady increased, and after a dysentery which continued three
days, he expired in the palace of Ravenna, in the thirty-third,
or, if we compute from the invasion of Italy, in the
thirty-seventh year of his reign. Conscious of his approaching
end, he divided his treasures and provinces between his two
grandsons, and fixed the Rhone as their common boundary. 104
Amalaric was restored to the throne of Spain. Italy, with all the
conquests of the Ostrogoths, was bequeathed to Athalaric; whose
age did not exceed ten years, but who was cherished as the last
male offspring of the line of Amali, by the short-lived marriage
of his mother Amalasuntha with a royal fugitive of the same
blood. 105 In the presence of the dying monarch, the Gothic
chiefs and Italian magistrates mutually engaged their faith and
loyalty to the young prince, and to his guardian mother; and
received, in the same awful moment, his last salutary advice, to
maintain the laws, to love the senate and people of Rome, and to
cultivate with decent reverence the friendship of the emperor.
106 The monument of Theodoric was erected by his daughter
Amalasuntha, in a conspicuous situation, which commanded the city
of Ravenna, the harbor, and the adjacent coast. A chapel of a
circular form, thirty feet in diameter, is crowned by a dome of
one entire piece of granite: from the centre of the dome four
columns arose, which supported, in a vase of porphyry, the
remains of the Gothic king, surrounded by the brazen statues of
the twelve apostles. 107 His spirit, after some previous
expiation, might have been permitted to mingle with the
benefactors of mankind, if an Italian hermit had not been
witness, in a vision, to the damnation of Theodoric, 108 whose
soul was plunged, by the ministers of divine vengeance, into the
volcano of Lipari, one of the flaming mouths of the infernal
world. 109

102 (return) [ In the fanciful eloquence of Cassiodorus, the
variety of sea and river fish are an evidence of extensive
dominion; and those of the Rhine, of Sicily, and of the Danube,
were served on the table of Theodoric, (Var. xii. 14.) The
monstrous turbot of Domitian (Juvenal Satir. iii. 39) had been
caught on the shores of the Adriatic.]

103 (return) [ Procopius, Goth. l. i. c. 1. But he might have
informed us, whether he had received this curious anecdote from
common report or from the mouth of the royal physician.]

104 (return) [ Procopius, Goth. l. i. c. 1, 2, 12, 13. This
partition had been directed by Theodoric, though it was not
executed till after his death, Regni hereditatem superstes
reliquit, (Isidor. Chron. p. 721, edit. Grot.)]

105 (return) [ Berimund, the third in descent from Hermanric,
king of the Ostrogoths, had retired into Spain, where he lived
and died in obscurity, (Jornandes, c. 33, p. 202, edit.
Muratori.) See the discovery, nuptials, and death of his grandson
Eutharic, (c. 58, p. 220.) His Roman games might render him
popular, (Cassiodor. in Chron.,) but Eutharic was asper in
religione, (Anonym. Vales. p. 723.)]

106 (return) [ See the counsels of Theodoric, and the professions
of his successor, in Procopius, (Goth. l. i. c. 1, 2,) Jornandes,
(c. 59, p. 220, 221,) and Cassiodorus, (Var. viii. 1—7.) These
epistles are the triumph of his ministerial eloquence.]

107 (return) [ Anonym. Vales. p. 724. Agnellus de Vitis. Pont.
Raven. in Muratori Script. Rerum Ital. tom. ii. P. i. p. 67.
Alberti Descrittione d’ Italia, p. 311. * Note: The Mausoleum of
Theodoric, now Sante Maria della Rotonda, is engraved in
D’Agincourt, Histoire de l’Art, p xviii. of the Architectural
Prints.—M]

108 (return) [ This legend is related by Gregory I., (Dialog. iv.
36,) and approved by Baronius, (A.D. 526, No. 28;) and both the
pope and cardinal are grave doctors, sufficient to establish a
probable opinion.]

109 (return) [ Theodoric himself, or rather Cassiodorus, had
described in tragic strains the volcanos of Lipari (Cluver.
Sicilia, p. 406—410) and Vesuvius, (v 50.)]