202 ON THE NATIONAL CHARACTER OF THE ROMANS. 



length, however, he approached the quarter occupied by the Spar- 

 tans, and immediately all the younger men arose and offered him 

 the choice of their seats. We are informed that, upon this, there 

 was a sudden exclamation of applause throughout the whole assem- 

 bly ; and it might have been imagined that the Greeks in general 

 were the best conducted persons in the world. But the old man, it 

 appears, drew a much juster conclusion ; for he remarked that " all 

 the Grecians knew what was proper and becoming — but the Spar- 

 tans alone practised it." 



Perhaps it may not be amiss to observe in this place, that Numa, 

 the legislator of Rome, was a philosopher among the Sabines ; and 

 that this people are commonly thought to have had no small ac- 

 quaintance with the laws of Lycurgus. Filtered, however, through 

 Numa's more philosophic mind, the Italian legislation was certainly 

 an improvement on the severity of the Lacedemonian system. 



To return : Rome was indeed destined to run a proud and tri- 

 umphant career. If we cast a hasty glance over the whole history 

 of ancient times, from the invention of letters to that great era of 

 improvement the introduction of a pure and revealed religion, we 

 shall find that as the sea receives into its vast basin the tributary 

 streams that intersect the earth by which it is surrounded, so the 

 history of Rome, like her own Mediterranean, swallows up that of 

 every other ancient people, with whom her fortunes came in con- 

 tact. 



Of the history of Rome we have, alone, any definite idea. We 

 see her commencing as a petty town, with a few surrounding acres 

 for a territory : we see, also, her decline and approaching ruin, till, 

 like a colossal image overthrown by its own weight, she falls in 

 many vast and long-enduring fragments — for each became in itself 

 a mighty kingdom. The history of Rome, therefore, alone is a 

 complete work : it has a beginning, a middle, and an end : whilst 

 of every other people the questions to be answered are little more 

 than these, namely — from whence they sprung ? what they did or 

 produced ? and at what period they became a part of the Roman 

 empire ? Need it be added, that we are here speaking only of those 

 nations which possess any authentic annals ? 



The history of Rome, I repeat, is one connected book : whilst 

 those of Babylon and Persia, of Egypt, and even Greece, are only 

 episodes. We must not, however, imagine the authors and compil- 

 ers of Roman history to have known all this. It would, indeed, be 

 a curious inquiry, if we could ascertain what was the real impulsive 

 principle which induced the celebrated historians of old to commence 



