Page:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire vol 3 (1897).djvu/285

 OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE 265 republic, whose firmness checked and delayed the unskilful fury of the Barbarians. The senate and people trembled at their approach within an hundred and eighty miles of Rome, and anxiously compai'ed the danger which they had escaped with the new perils to which they were exposed. Alaric was a Christian and a soldier, the leader of a disciplined army ; who understood the laws of war, who respected the sanctity of treaties, and who had familiarly conversed with the subjects of the empire in the same camps, and the same churches. The savage Radagaisus was a stranger to the manners, the religion, and even the language, of the civilised nations of the South. The fierceness of his temper was exasperated by cruel supersti- tion, and it was universally believed that he had bound himself by a solemn vow to reduce the city into a heap of stones and and threat- ashes, and to sacrifice the most illustrious of the Roman sena- tors on the altars of those gods who were appeased by human blood. The public danger, which should have reconciled all domestic animosities, displayed the incurable madness of re- ligious faction. The oppressed votaries of Jupiter and Mercury respected, in the implacable enemy of Rome, the character of a devout Pagan ; loudly declared that they were more apprehen- sive of the sacrifices than of the arms of Radagaisus, and secretly rejoiced in the calamities of their country which condemned the faith of their Christian adversaries.'^^ Florence was reduced to the last extremit^^, and the fainting Defeat and couraare of the citizens was supported only by the authority ofofhisarmy Ci. 1 111 • 4. 1 ■ 1 4 1 -^ . by Stilicho. at. Ambrose, wlio had communicated, ni a dream, the promise a.d. 406 of a speedy deliverance."^ On a sudden, they beheld, from their walls, the banners of oiiiicho, who advanced, with his united force, to the relief of the faithful city, and who soon mai'ked that fatal spot for the grave of the Barbarian host. The appar- ent contradictions of those writers who variously relate the de- feat of Radagaisus may be reconciled, without offering much violence to their respective testimonies. Orosius and Augustin, who were intimately connected by friendship and religion, as- cribe this miraculous victory to the providence of God rather ■ Yet the Jupiter of Radagaisus who worshipped Thor and Woden was very different from the Olympic or Capitoline Jove. The accommodating temper of Polytheism might unite those various and remote deities, but the genuine Romans abhorred the human sacrifices of Gaul and Germany. S Paulinus (in Vit. Ambros. c. 50) relates this story, which he received from the mouth of Pansophia herself, a religious matron of Florence. Yet the archbishop soon ceased to take an active part in the business of the world, and never became a popular saint.