The Caesars

The Caesars

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Title: The Caesars
Author: Thomas de Quincey
Release Date: October, 2004 [EBook #6672] [Yes, we are more than
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2003]
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THE CÆSARS.
BY THOMAS DE QUINCEY

THE CÆSARS.
The condition of the Roman Emperors has never yet been fully
appreciated; nor has it been sufficiently perceived in what respects it
was absolutely unique. There was but one Rome: no other city, as we
are satisfied by the collation of many facts, either of ancient or modern
times, has ever rivalled this astonishing metropolis in the grandeur of
magnitude; and not many--if we except the cities of Greece, none at
all--in the grandeur of architectural display. Speaking even of London,
we ought in all reason to say--the _Nation of London,_ and not the City
of London; but of Rome in her palmy days, nothing less could be said
in the naked severity of logic. A million and a half of souls--that
population, apart from any other distinctions, is per se for London a
justifying ground for such a classification; _à fortiori_, then, will it
belong to a city which counted from one horn to the other of its mighty
suburbs not less than four millions of inhabitants [Footnote:

Concerning this question-- once so fervidly debated, yet so unprofitably
for the final adjudication, and in some respects, we may add, so
erroneously--on a future occasion.] at the very least, as we resolutely
maintain after reviewing all that has been written on that much vexed
theme, and very probably half as many more. Republican Rome had her
prerogative tribe; the earth has its prerogative city; and that city was
Rome.
As was the city, such was its prince--mysterious, solitary, unique. Each
was to the other an adequate counterpart, each reciprocally that perfect
mirror which reflected, as it were _in alia materia,_ those
incommunicable attributes of grandeur, that under the same shape and
denomination never upon this earth were destined to be revived. Rome
has not been repeated; neither has Cæsar. _Ubi Cæsar, ibi Roma_--was
a maxim of Roman jurisprudence. And the same maxim may be
translated into a wider meaning; in which it becomes true also for our
historical experience. Cæsar and Rome have flourished and expired
together. The illimitable attributes of the Roman prince, boundless and
comprehensive as the universal air,--like that also bright and
apprehensible to the most vagrant eye, yet in parts (and those not far
removed) unfathomable as outer darkness, (for no chamber in a
dungeon could shroud in more impenetrable concealment a deed of
murder than the upper chambers of the air,)--these attributes, so
impressive to the imagination, and which all the subtlety of the Roman
[Footnote: Or even of modern wit; witness the vain attempt of so many
eminent sort, and illustrious Antecessors, to explain in self- consistency
the differing functions of the Roman Cæsar, and in what sense he was
legibus solutus. The origin of this difficulty we shall soon understand.]
wit could as little fathom as the fleets of Cæsar could traverse the Polar
basin, or unlock the gates of the Pacific, are best symbolized, and find
their most appropriate exponent, in the illimitable city itself--that Rome,
whose centre, the Capitol, was immovable as Teneriffe or Atlas, but
whose circumference was shadowy, uncertain, restless, and advancing
as the frontiers of her all-conquering empire. It is false to say, that with
Cæsar came the destruction of Roman greatness. Peace, hollow
rhetoricians! Until Cæsar came, Rome was a minor; by him, she
attained her majority, and fulfilled her destiny. Caius Julius, you say,

deflowered the virgin purity of her civil