Page:1909historyofdec04gibbuoft.djvu/243

 chap, xxxix] OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE 209 patrician blood. In the first insolence of victory, he had been tempted to deprive the whole party of Odoacer of the civil and even the natural rights of society ; 9i a tax unseasonably imposed after the calamities of war would have crushed the rising agri- culture of Liguria ; a rigid pre-emption of corn, which was in- tended for the public relief, must have aggravated the distress of Campania. These dangerous projects were defeated by the virtue and eloquence of Epiphanius and Boethius, who, in the presence of Theodoric himself, successfully pleaded the cause of the people ; 95 but, if the royal ear was open to the voice of truth, a saint and a philosopher are not always to be found at the ear of kings. The privileges of rank, or office, or favour, were too frequently abused by Italian fraud and Gothic violence, and the avarice of the king's nephew was publicly exposed, at first by the usurpation, and afterwards by the restitution, of the estates which he had unjustly extorted from his Tuscan neighbours. Two hundred thousand Barbarians, formidable even to their master, were seated in the heart of Italy ; they indignantly supported the restraints of peace and discipline; the disorders of their march were always felt and sometimes compensated ; and, where it was dangerous to punish, it might be prudent to dissemble, the sallies of their native fierceness. When the indulgence of Theodoric had remitted two-thirds of the Ligurian tribute, he condescended to explain the difficulties of his situation, and to lament the heavy though inevitable burdens which he imposed on his subjects for their own de- fence. 96 These ungrateful subjects could never be cordially reconciled to the origin, the religion, or even the virtues of the Gothic conqueror ; past calamities were forgotten, and the sense or suspicion of injuries was rendered still more exquisite by the present felicity of the times. Even the religious toleration which Theodoric had the glory He is pro- of introducing into the Christian world was painful and often- persecute the 94 He disabled them — a licentia testandi ; and all Italy mourned — lamentabili Catholics justitio. I wish to believe that these penalties were enacted against the rebels who had violated their oath of allegiance ; but the testimony of Ennodius (p. 1675-1678) is the more weighty, as he lived and died under the reign of Theodoric. 95 Ennodius, in Vit. Epiphan. p. 1689, 1690 [p. 107-8, ed. Vogel]. Boethius de Consolatione Philosophise, 1. i. pros. iv. p. 45, 46, 47. Eespect, but weigh, the passions of the saint and the senator ; and fortify or alleviate their complaints by the various hints of Cassiodorius (ii. 8 ; iv. 36 ; viii. 5). 96 Immanium expensarum pondus. . . pro ipsorum salute, &c. ; yet these are no more than words. VOL. IV. — 14