] m INTRODUCTION. 



be interested in his conduct. He possessed great military abilities 

 and a wide fieid for the display of these was afforded by the political 

 state of Italy, dividedrinto a number of small but independent dis- 

 tricts. Romulus was continually embroiled with one or other of his 

 neighbours; and war was the only employment by which he and his 

 companions expected, not only to agrandise themselves, but even to 

 subsist. In the conduct of his wars with the neighbouring people, 

 we may observe an adherence to the same maxims by which the Ro- 

 mans afterwards became masters of the world. Instead of destroy- 

 ing the nations he had subjected, he united them to the Roman state ; 

 Whereby Rome acquired a new accession of strength from every 

 war she undertook, and became powerful and populous from that 

 very circumstance which ruins and depopulates other kingdoms. 

 If the enemies with whom he contended had, by means of the art or 

 arms they employed, any considerable advantage, Romulus imme- 

 diately adopted that practice, or the use of that weapon, and improv- 

 ed the military system of the Romans by the united experience of 

 all their enemies. Of both these maxims we have an example in 

 the war with the Sabines. Romulus, having conquered that nation^ 

 not only united them to the Romans, but, finding their buckler pre- 

 ferable to the Roman, instantly threw aside the latter, and made use 

 of the Sabine buckler in fighting against other states. Romulus, 

 though principally attached to war, did not altogether neglect the 

 civil polity of his infant kingdom. He instituted what was called 

 the Senate, a coui't originally composed of a .hundred persons dis» 

 tinguished for their wisdom and experience. He enacted laws for 

 the administration of justice, and for bridling the fierce and unruly- 

 passions of his followers ; and, after a long reign spent in promoting 

 -d P the civil and military interests of his country, was according 

 ' 7 ' to the most probable conjecture, privately assassinated by 



some of the members of that senate which he himself had 

 instituted. 



The successors of Romulus were all very extraordinary person- 

 ages. Numa, who came next after him, established the religious 

 ceremonies of the Romans, and inspired them with that veneration 

 for an oath, which was ever after the soul of their military discipline. 

 Tullus Hostilius, Ancus Martius, Tarquinius Priscus, and Servius 

 Tullus, laboured, each during his reign, for the greatness of Rome. 

 But Tarquinius Superbus, the seventh and last king, having obtain- 

 ed the crown by the execrable murder of his father-in-law Servius> 

 (continued to support it by the most cruel and infamous tyranny. 

 This, together with the insolence of his son Sextus Tarquinius, who., 

 by dishonouring Lucretia, a Roman lady, affronted the whole nation, 

 -« p occasioned the expulsion of the Tarquin family, and with it 

 * o ' the dissolution of the regal government- As the Romans, 



however, were continually engaged in war, they found it ne- 

 cessary to have some officer invested with supreme authority, who 

 might conduct them to the field, and regulate their military enterpri- 

 ses. In the room of the kings, therefore, they appointed two annual 

 magistrates, called consuls, who, without creating the same jea- 

 lousy, succeeded to all the powers of their former sovereigns. This 

 revolution was very favourable to the Roman power and grandeur. 

 The consuls, who enjoyed but a temporary power, were desirous of 

 signalising their reign by some great action ; each vied with those 

 who had gone before him ; and the Romans were daily led out against 



