Page:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (1827) Vol 1.djvu/275

 OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE. 251 the Persian monarchy, his code of laws was respected CHAP. as the ground-work of their civil and religious policy ^. ' Several of his sayings are preserved. One of them in particular discovers a deep insight into the constitution of government. " The authority of the prince," said Artaxerxes, ** must be defended by a military force ; that force can only be maintained by taxes ; all taxes must at last fall upon agriculture ; and agriculture can never flourish except under the protection of justice and moderation'." Artaxerxes bequeathed his new empire, and his ambitious designs against the Romans, to Sapor, a son not unworthy of his great father ; but those designs were too extensive for the power of Persia, and served only to involve both nations in a long series of destructive wars and reciprocal calami- ties. The Persians, long since civilized and corrupted. Military were very far from possessing the martial independence, pg^skns. ^^ and the intrepid hardiness, both of mind and body, which have rendered the northern barbarians masters of the world. The science of war, that constituted the more rational force of Greece and Rome, as it now does of Europe, never made any considerable progress in the east. Those disciplined evolutions which har- monize and animate a confused multitude, were un- known to the Persians. They were equally unskilled in the arts of constructing, besieging, or defending re- gular fortifications. They trusted more to their num- bers than to their courage ; more to their courage than to their discipline. The infantry was a half-armed Their infan- spiritless crowd of peasants, levied in haste by the f^^tjl'i allurements of plunder, and as easily dispersed by a victory as by a defeat. The monarch and his nobles transported into the camp the pride and luxury of the '' Eutychius, torn. ii. p. 180. vers. Pocock. The great Chosroes Noushir- wan sent the code of Artaxerxes to all his satraps, as the invariable rule of their conduct. • D'Herbelot, Biblioth6queX)rientale, au mot Ardshir, We may observe, that after an ancient period of fables, and a long interval of darkness, the modern histories of Persia begin to assume an air of truth with the dynasty of the Sassanides.