Page:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire vol 5 (1897).djvu/54

32 THE DECLINE AND FALL expect the approaching failure of the human race.'^* Yet the number of citizens still exceeded the measure of subsistence ; their precarious food was supplied from the harvests of Sicily or Egypt ; and the frequent repetition of famine betrays the in- attention of the emperor to a distant province. The edifices of Rome were exposed to the same ruin and decay ; the moulder- ing fabrics were easily overthrown by inundations, tempests, and earthquakes ; and the monks, who had occupied the most advantageous stations, exulted in their base triumph over the ruins of antiquity. It is commonly believed that pope Gregory the First attacked the temples and mutilated the statues of the city ; that, by the command of the barbarian, the Palatine library was reduced to ashes ; and that the history of Livy was the peculiar mark of his absurd and mischievous fanaticism. The writings of (iregory himself reveal his implacable aversion to the monuments of classic genius ; and he points his severest censure against the profane learning of a bishop who taught the art of grammar, studied the Latin poets, and pronounced, with the same voice, the praises of Jupiter and those of Christ."" But the evidence of his destructive rage is doubtful and recent ; the Temple of Peace or the Theatre of Marcellus have been demolished by the slow operation of ages ; and a formal pro- scription would have multiplied the copies of Virgil and Livy in the countries which were not subject to the ecclesiastical dictator."^ The tombs Like Thebcs, or Babylon, or Carthage, the name of Rome th^ apostles^ might liavc been erased from the earth, if the city had not been animated by a vital principle, which again restored her to honour and dominion. A vague tradition was embraced, that two Jewish teachers, a tent-maker and a fisherman, had for- merly been executed in the circus of Nero ; and at the end of five hundred years their genuine or fictitious relics were adored " Gregory of Rome (Dialog. 1. ii. c. 15) relatei a memorable prediction of St. Benedict: Roma a Gentilibus [/ff., gentibus] non exterminabitur sed tempestati- bus, coruscis turbinibus ac terrjs motu [ins., fatigata] in semetipsa marcescet. Such a prophecy melts into true history, and becomes the evidence of the fact after which it was invented. 'i" Quia in uno se ore cum Jovis laiidibus Christi laudes non capiunt, et quani grave nefandumque sit episcopis canere quod nee laico religiose conveniat, ipse considera (1. ix. ep. 4). The writings of Gregory himself attest his innocence of any classic taste or literature. "•^ Bayle (Dictionnaire Critique, lom. ii. p. 598, 599), in a very good article of Grc^goire I., has quoted, for the buildings and statues, Platina in Gregorio I. ; for the Palatine library, John of S.alisbury (de Nugis Curialium, 1. ii. c. 26) ; and for Livy. Antoninus of Florence : the oldest of the three lived in the xiith century.