Page:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire vol 3 (1897).djvu/431

OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE 411 character.*^ The habits of trade and the abuse of luxury had corrupted their manners ; but their impious contempt of monks and the shameless practice of unnatural lusts are the two abo- minations which excite the pious vehemence of Salvian, the preacher of the age.^- The king of the Vandals severely reformed the vices of a voluptuous people ; and the ancient^ noble, ingenuous freedom of Carthage (these expressions of Victor are not without energy) was reduced by Genseric into a state of ignominious servitude. After he had permitted his licentious troops to satiate their rage and avarice, he instituted a more regular system of rapine and oppression. An edict was promulgated, which enjoined all persons, without fraud or delay, to deliver their gold, silver, jewels, and valuable furniture or apparel, to the royal officers ; and the attempt to secrete any part of their patrimony was inexorably punished with death and tortui'e, as an act of treason against the state. The lands of the procon- sular province, which formed the immediate district of Carthage, were accurately measured and divided among the Barbarians; and the conqueror reserved for his peculiar domain, the fertile terri- tory of Byzacium, and the adjacent parts of Numidia and Getulia.^^ It was natural enough that Genseric should hate those whom African he had injured; the nobility and senators of Carthage wercc^uves"* exposed to his jealousy and resentment ; and all those who re- fused the ignominious terms, which their honour and religion forbade them to accept, were compelled by the Arian tyrant to embrace the condition of perpetual banishment. Rome, Italy, and the provinces of the East were filled with a ci'owd of exiles, of fugitives, and of ingenuous captives, who solicited the public compassion ; and the benevolent epistles of Theodoret still pre- serve the names and misfortunes of Caelestian and Maria."^^ The 41 The anonymous author of the Expositio totius Mundi compares, in his bar- barous Latin, the country and the inhabitants ; and after stigmatizing their want of faith, he coolly concludes: Difficile autem inter eos invenitur bonus, tamen in multis pauci boni esse possunt. P. 18. ■12 He declares that the peculiar vices of each country were collected in the sink of Carthage (1. vii. 257 [§ 74]). In the indulgence of vice the Africans applauded their manly virtue. Et illi se magis virilis fortitudinis esse crederent, qui maxime viros foeminei usus probrositate fregissent (p. 268 [§ 87]). The streets of Carthage were polluted by effeminate wretches, who publicly assumed the countenance, the dress, and the character of women (p. 264 [§ 83]). If a monk appeared in the city, the holy man was pursued with impious scorn and ridicule ; detestantibus ridentium cachinnis ([cachinnis et d. r. sibilis] p. 289 [viii. 22]). •*" Compare Procopius de Bell. Vandal. 1. i. c. 5, p. iBg, igo ; and Victor Vitensis, de Persecut. Vandal. 1. i. c. 4. 44 Ruinart (p. 444-457) has collected from Theodoret, and other authors, the mis- fortunes, real and fabulous, of the inhabitants of Carthage.