to Innocent, the bishop of Rome; and the successor of St. Peter is accused, perhaps without foundation, of preferring the safety of the republic to the rigid severity of the Christian worship. But, when the question was agitated in the senate; when it was proposed, as an essential condition, that those sacrifices should be performed in the Capitol, by the authority, and in the presence of the magistrates; the majority of that respectable assembly, apprehensive either of the Divine or of the Imperial displeasure, refused to join in an act which appeared almost equivalent to the public restoration of Paganism.[1]
Alaric accepts a ransom and raises the seige, AD. 409 [rather 408]
The last resource of the Romans was in the clemency, or at
least in the moderation, of the king of the Goths. The senate, who in this emergency assumed the supreme powers of government, appointed two ambassadors to negotiate with the enemy.
This important trust was delegated to Basilius, a senator, of
Spanish extraction, and already conspicuous in the administration of provinces : and to John, the first tribune of the notaries,
[Primicerius Notarium]
who was peculiarly qualified by his dexterity in business as well as by his former intimacy with the Gothic prince. When they
were introduced into his presence, they declared, perhaps in a
more lofty style than became their abject condition, that the
Romans were resolved to maintain their dignity, either in peace
or war; and that, if Alaric refused them a fair and honourable
capitulation, he might sound his trumpets, and prepare to give
battle to an innumerable people, exercised in anus and animated
by despair. "The thicker the hay, the easier it is moved," was
the concise Reply of the Barbarian ; and this rustic metaphor
was accompanied by a loud and insulting laugh, expressive of his
contempt for the menaces of an unwarlike populace, enervated
by luxury before they were emaciated by famine. He then
condescended to fix the ransom, which he would accept as the
price of his retreat from the walls of Rome : all the gold and
silver in the city, whether it were the property of the state or
of individuals; all the rich and precious moveables ; and all the
procession on the calends of March, derived their origin from this mysterious event (Ovid. Fast. iii. 259-398). It was probably designed to revive this ancient festival, which had been suppressed by Theodosius. In that case, we recover a chronological date (March the 1st, A.D. 409) which has not hitherto been observed. [An improbable guess. The siege of Rome was certainly raised in A.D. 408.];
- ↑ Sozomen (1. ix. c. 6) insinuates that the experiment was actually, though unsuccessfully, made; but he does not mention the name of Innocent: and Tillemont (Mem. Ecclés. tom. x. p.645) is determined not to believe that a pope could be guilty of such impious condescension. [The episode of Pompeianus seems to have taken place after the embassy of Basilius and John.]
