International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, Cal. · Feb 18, 1886
General Articles.
By Mrs. E. G. White
The Burning of the Books on Magic.
BY MRS. E. G. WHITE.
THE temple of the goddess Diana at Ephesus, noted for its size and splendor, was one of the wonders of the world, and was the pride of both the city and the nation. The idol itself was but an uncouth wooden image, on which were inscribed characters and symbols that were supposed to possess great power. When pronounced, these mystic words were said to accomplish wonders; when written, they were considered a potent charm to guard their possessor from robbers, from disease, and even from death.
In the days of the apostles, the city of Ephesus was famed for the worship of the goddess Diana and the practice of magic. There were many devotees of magic arts, and numerous and costly books had been written in explanation of these mysteries. Here, in this stronghold of superstition and sorcery, the apostle Paul labored for several years. And the power of God was mightily displayed through his servant in the healing of the sick and the casting out of evil spirits.
The miracles wrought by Paul in the name of Jesus created great excitement among the Ephesians. And certain Jewish exorcists, believing that the sacred name acted as a charm, determined to cast out evil spirits by the same means that the apostle had employed. Seven brothers, the sons of Sceva, a chief priest of the Jews, were of this number. Finding a man who was possessed of an evil spirit, they addressed him, "We adjure you by Jesus, whom Paul preacheth." But the evil spirit answered with scorn, "Jesus I know, and Paul I know; but who are ye?" And the man who was possessed attacked them, and overcame them, "so that they fled out of that house naked and wounded." Their discomfiture was soon known to Jews and Gentiles throughout Ephesus; and it furnished unmistakable proof of the sacredness of the name of Jesus, and of the peril incurred by those who would invoke it while they had no faith in his divine mission.
Many who had hitherto heaped reproach on the name of Jesus now dared not breathe that name aloud. A large number, convinced that Jesus was all that Paul claimed him to be, determined to receive the gospel. These openly renounced the practice of sorcery, and acknowledged their secret arts to be Satanic and deceptive. They brought together the costly books on enchantment, containing the mystic symbols of Diana and the secrets of their art, and burned them in the presence of the people. The value of the books thus sacrificed was estimated at fifty thousand pieces of silver, equal to about ten thousand dollars.
These books contained rules and forms of communication with evil spirits. They were the regulations for the worship of Satan, directions for soliciting his help and obtaining information from him. The system of magic, or sorcery, then extant, was the same as that which in this Christian age and nation is known as Spiritualism. In Paul's day many were deceived by this Satanic delusion, and many are deceived to-day by the same power. Satan finds access to thousands of minds by presenting himself under the guise of departed friends. The Scriptures of truth declare that "the dead know not anything." Their thoughts, their love, their hatred, have perished. The dead do not hold communion with the living. But Satan—true to his early cunning, when in the form of a serpent he deceived the mother of our race—employs this device to gain control of the minds of men.
And "magical books" have not been confined to the apostolic age, or to nations that are called heathen. The freedom of the press has been taken advantage of to spread abroad the influence of this baleful literature. Could all the modern productions of this class—all the publications of Spiritualism—be treated as were these magical books of the Ephesians, one of Satan's most successful avenues by which to gain access to the souls of men would be cut off.
This incident was placed on record that it might serve as an important lesson for every age. When convinced that their magical books were false and pernicious, the Ephesians were unwilling to sell them, and thus place temptation in the way of others. The power of truth triumphed over their prejudices, their favorite pursuits, and their love of money; and though it involved a great personal sacrifice, they promptly burned the records of divination.
The Ephesians directed their efforts against the very sin of which they were guilty. Do the people of God in this age take a similar course? There are many who do not. They manifest supreme devotion to their money, their business, their houses and lands. The covetous man fosters his love of gain. The sensualist is wedded to his darling passion. The ambitious man worships fame as his idol. These love their cherished objects of pursuit more than they love God. They are idolaters. But those who thus venture to cherish the sin which they love best are tampering with Satan's bewitching sorcery. The enchanting power of temptation has paralyzed conscience and blinded reason, so that they do not perceive their danger. The magical books have not been destroyed.
When the truth is presented to the understanding, and exerts its sanctifying power upon the heart, the sins which once reigned in the heart will be put away, that Jesus may occupy the soul-temple. If covetousness has been indulged, it will be given up. If ambition or love of the world has captivated the senses, a higher attraction will break its power. Deceit, falsehood, impurity, will be cleansed from the heart. He who maintains his allegiance to Christ can render no service to Christ's bitterest foe.
When the Ephesian converts burned their books on magic, they laid the ax to the root of the tree. They showed that they hated that which they had once loved, and loved that which they had once hated. The light of truth, shining into their minds, had convinced them of the unlawfulness of their arts, and had stirred their souls with abhorrence of their unholy deeds. However earnest and vigilant they might have been to correct other evils, had they spared this one sin they would eventually have yielded their faith.
Such a change as was wrought in these Ephesians by the preaching of the truth will ever attend true conversion, and is the best evidence of a genuine work of grace in the heart. The world and the church have a right to expect such proof of conversion as was given by the Ephesians,—proof that a new moral taste has been created. You, dear reader, may not have practiced sorcery, you may not have tampered with Spiritualism; but remember that "to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey." If you indulge in any practice forbidden in God's word, you have yielded obedience to Satan; you are his servant.
A person may not be able to tell the exact time or place of his conversion; yet this does not prove him to be unconverted. Said Christ to Nicodemus, "The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh and whither it goeth; so is every one that is born of the Spirit." Though the work of grace is silent and almost imperceptible, it may be fully as effective as when its operations are more apparent. But if the heart has been renewed by the Holy Spirit, the life will bear witness to the98fact. "By their fruits ye shall know them." Light and darkness are not more distinct than are the states of the converted and the unconverted. A change will be seen in the character, the habits, and the pursuits. The contrast will be clear and decided between what they have been and what they are.
The infidel, when converted, will abhor the books that led him to doubt the word of God. The dissolute man who has purified his soul by obedience to the truth, will not, from curiosity or habit, venture into the haunts of dissipation; neither will he permit his mind to dwell on the familiar scenes of vice. He will be awake to his danger, shunning temptation himself, and warning others of its subtle and bewitching power. The converted man will not only resist evil, but he will, so far as possible, place himself beyond the power of Satan's devices. Followers of Christ, have you burned the magical books?
GIVE ME NOT MY OWN DESIRE.
“And he gave them their request, but sent leanness into their soul.” Ps. 106:15.
GIVE me not my own desire!
Would I glittering hoards require?
Have I sighed for fame or power?
Seek I learning's mighty dower?
Is my inmost wish and thought
Into earth's thin tissue wrought?
Heavenly Father! make me see
All below is vanity.
Hath my wish a humbler name?
Would I, all unknown to fame,
By no sordid passion moved—
Of a chosen few beloved—
On some lone and soothing tide,
Down life's stream serenely glide?
Father, on a staff of dust
Leave me not to place my trust.
Haply thou wilt take away
All that cheers my early day,
And will bid me strive and toil
Bound with care's enfeebling coil.
O, then let me not repine!
May my will be lost in thine!
Still the earnest prayer inspire—
Give me not my own desire!
Should I in some weary hour
Yield me to the tempter's power,
And, o'erwhelined by doubt and sin,
Seek no more thy smile to win—
Ask in earthly bliss a share—
Turn thou from my impious prayer;
Hear me not in vengeful ire,
Give me not my own desire!
Ruler of the worlds on high!
In thy guardian hand am I;
Upon me thy light hath shone;
Thou my destiny hast known.
Trusting, joyful, would I still
All thy holy plans fulfill,
Nor to loftier bliss aspire;
Give me not my own desire! —Sel.
The Divine Forgiveness.
By Lyman Abbott
THERE is probably no virtue which the average man finds it more difficult to exercise than that of forgiveness of wrong; there is therefore no grace of God which the average man finds it more difficult to comprehend. Theology has not illuminated, it has obscured the teaching of revelation on this subject. The principles upon which God acts in the forgiveness of sins are so large that the human spirit cannot accept them, and therefore it employs the intellect to explain them away. We look at God's love as we look at his sun, through a smoked glass, in order that we may look at it at all. His forgiving kindness is so large, so generous, so free, so trustful, that we cannot think it; when we come across passages in the Bible which teach it, we obliterate or eclipse them with others which we search after for the purpose; when an occasional prophet arises in the church who catches the spirit of Isaiah's prophecy, of Paul's experience, of Christ's life and death, and reflects it in paradoxes—for only a paradox can state the fullness and freeness of God's forgiving love—the church stops its ears against his teaching, as impossible, if not immoral. We have yet to learn that love and trust are greater deterrents from wrong-doing than fear; that men are more easily weaned from sinful courses by spiritual sympathy than by inflicted penalty; that more liars have been cured of falsehood by implicit confidence than were ever cured by the rod; that love casts hate out of the human soul, and wrath and bitterness intrench it there.
Among the declarations of the Bible of divine forgiveness, which we thus habitually minimize, are those which reveal God's feeling and action toward the repentant. When men repent toward society, society receives them only after they have doubly earned a re-entrance; first, expiating their sin by a penalty, and, second, earning confidence and respect by a new life. This is partly a necessity. We have no way of judging of the sincerity of repentance but by a reformed conduct. But God, who reads the heart, answers to its first aspiration. The forgiveness is not merely a remission of penalty. It does not always even include a remission of penalty. Penalty may be a part of forgiveness—a necessary means for the redemption of the wrong-doer from the power and dominion of his sin. But it does always include a reinstatement in the divine confidence and affection. If a man has done wrong, and abandons his wrong-doing, and makes what reparation he can for it, and desires to be cleansed from it, and is willing to acknowledge it, and to bear the just and natural consequences of it, he is by that very fact brought back into God's confidence and esteem. There is no penance here, no purgatory hereafter. The prodigal may hold himself afar off from his father in fear; but his father does not hold himself afar off from the prodigal in distrust. He buries his sin in the depths of the sea; he blots it out of the book of his remembrance; he remembers it no more against him forever. David suffers for his adultery; but David retains his kingship, and is restored to his old condition of filial relationship with God. It is never once brought up as a reproach against him after he has repented of it and done what he can to atone for it. Peter denies his Lord with oaths and cursings,—proves himself both apostate and coward. But his Lord does not wait for him to prove himself faithful and brave. The angel's message after Christ's resurrection is, "Go tell his disciples and Peter." When the risen Lord meets the eleven, he breathes on Peter with the other ten; and in that last interview, just before his ascension, he re-commissions Peter to preach the gospel, and re-intrudes him with even the lambs, in a commission twice repeated, that Peter may know how fully abandonment and repentance of sin have reinstated him in the affection and esteem of his Lord and Master.
In this, as in all else, we are to be followers of Christ; we are to be imitators of God as dear children. We cannot accept a gospel which we refuse to give, nor preach a gospel which we refuse to practice. When we pray, "Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us," we remind ourselves that God expects us to be magnanimous, generous, trusting, in our treatment of repentant wrong-doers, as he is in his treatment of us when we repent of our wrong-doing. Society, if it is Christian, must treat evil-doers who have abandoned their evil life as God treats them. It is true that there is a radical difference. God knows the heart; he needs not, therefore, to wait for demonstration; and he cannot be deceived by illusive repentings. We cannot read the heart. And if there is danger that a too sensuous judgment will drive back repenting souls into despair, there is also danger that a too charitable judgment will pacify their conscience with a mere sensuous and temporary regret. For regret is not repentance; one may regret the sin because of its consequences. Reformation is not repentance; one may reform because a sinful life costs much and pays little. Repentance is the revolt of the conscience against the wrong-doing, because it is a wrong-doing. Its language is that of the fifty-first psalm; that of the prodigal son; that of Paul in more than one passage of his experience. But words are cheap; and one may easily borrow the language of David or Paul who knows nothing of his experience. Only deeds can demonstrate the reality of repentance; and even deeds may be deceptive. Thus we must often wait for evidence which God does not wait for. But if a man has sinned, and we are satisfied that he has repented, and he has given evidence of his repentance by abandoning his sin and by acknowledging it, without concealment, palliation, or defense, and if he has borne unshunkingly the penalty, and has done all that conscience and duty call on him to do to repair the evil of his wrong-doing, the Christian individual, the Christian teacher, the Christian church, Christian society, should both preach and practice the divine forgiveness; they should bury his sin in the depths of the sea, they should remember it no more against him forever, they should blot it out of the book of their remembrance. This is the law of the Christian household, of the Christian church.
When Paul preached this doctrine of divine forgiveness, he was denounced as immoral. Do you not see, said the Pharisee, the inevitable effect of preaching this doctrine of a free grace? men will continue in sin, that grace may abound. When Luther preached it, the Roman Catholic Church echoed this condemnation. Both Pharisee and Romanist were doubtless sincere. They both really believed that the preacher of free grace and full forgiveness palliated and excused sin. For they could not understand the love that so hated sin as to welcome to the adoption of son and brother the one who has abandoned and set his life resolutely away from his sin. But Christianity conquered sin, which Pharisaism was powerless to conquer; and the Reformation, with its preaching of free forgiveness, has done infinitely more to redeem Europe from sin than Rome, with its penance and its purgatory. It was not the purest spirits of Palestine who were eager to stone the guilty woman; the purest spirit stooped and wrote with his finger on the ground, that he might not see the shrinking figure and blushing face of the guilty one, and so add to her shame and confusion.
We leave our readers to lay this standard of divine forgiveness alongside the actual teaching of the pulpit, the actual life of the home, the actual treatment of children by parents, and judge for themselves how far we fall below the divine forgiveness in our preaching and our practice; how little, indeed, we even understand what it is.
Solomon’s Prayer and Modern Theology
By Rev. A. F. Schauffer
It has been the habit of some to deny the intelligence of men living in the centuries before Christ, to the great advantage of those living after the advent, and especially of those living in the year 1884. A careful study of this prayer [Solomon's, 1 Kings 8: 22-53] may help to correct this mistake. The theology of many “wise men” in our times might very profitably be exchanged for that of Solomon, or even for that of the much-abused Jacob. Modern improvements still leave much to be desired, whether they run along the line of “new theologies,” “higher criticisms,” or open denials.—Rev. A. F. Schauffer.
The Power of Custom.
It is difficult for people to see the error of that which has the sanctions of age and of numbers. There was an old philosophy which said, "Whatever is, is right." Many religious teachers of to-day have adopted the substance of this maxim with respect to many religious practices, even though they repudiate the form of the utterance. The fact that certain practices are found to-day in the church, and that they are so nearly universal, seems to them conclusive evidence that such practices must be right; and, starting from this conclusion, and because religious practices ought to have their basis in Bible teaching, not a little ingenuity is displayed in the effort to first read such practices into the Bible in order that they may be taught from the Bible. This is notably the case with the practice of infant baptism and the observance of the so-called Sunday Sabbath. If a man is pressed for his Scripture authority for either practice, his reply is quite likely to be, in substance, "Nearly the whole church observes these practices, and ecclesiastical history shows that they are of very long standing." And then the baptism of Lydia and her household is quoted, and the inference is forced into the text that since Lydia had a household to be baptized, there must, of course, have been infants in it at that time; and a single passage in which mention is made of a special meeting held on the first day of the week, which is mentioned only by that name, is made to stand for a fixed custom of observing the day. But the stress of the argument lies in the long-standing and well-nigh universal custom of the church. If men could trace the history of such things a little more carefully, and especially if they could get a correct view of the times in which, the men by whom, and the purposes for which, these practices were introduced, it would perhaps shake their confidence a little in the correctness of the theory that whatever the church has done and is doing must be right, and send them back to look for a more Biblical interpretation of the Bible upon these points.—Sabbath Recorder.
A Sermon on Dancing.
REASONS WHY CHRISTIANS SHOULD NOT DANCE.
The Baltimore American some time since said: At the Second Christian church, corner of Dolphin and Etting streets, the Rev. D. R. Wilkins preached yesterday on dancing. After reading for a text Judges 21: 20, 21, he said that in the days of such men of God as Wycliffe, Tindale, Coverdale, Cranmer, Bede, Huss, Ridley, Luther, and others, the question with the Christian was not, "How much can I be like the world and be saved?" or, "How near can I come to being lost and escape?" but, "How can I best serve my Master?" was the burden of his heart. But now Christianity has grown both popular and fashionable, and therefore not a few Christians are continually asking the question, "What harm is there in dancing? I read in the Bible of people dancing who were good people. What harm can it be?" I believe it is a great evil, and is doing more to demoralize the church and society than the Christian mothers who are training their children for the ball-room, have any idea; and while I see no reason why Christians should engage in dancing, I see many why they should not.
1. It is nowhere commended in the Bible.
2. Although engaged in by men and women of God at times under the old dispensation, it was never sought as a pleasure, as now, but was one of the ways in which they praised God in the time of victory.
3. The sexes did not dance together, as now.
4. The New Testament tells of but one case of dancing; and that in purpose is more like the dancing nowadays than any other dancing mentioned in the whole Bible. This dancing, which was engaged in by the daughter of one of the wicked women of the Roman Empire, resulted in the death of John the Baptist.
5. Dancing is not done in the name of the Lord. Paul says that we are to do all things in the name of the Lord.
6. Dancing is reveling; and Paul says that they who do such things shall not inherit the kingdom.
7. It is heathenish. The less of civilization a nation has, the more dancing.
8. It leads to expensive and gorgeous dress.
9. It unfits the mind for reflection.
10. It leads to the violation of the laws of health, involving great loss of sleep, and too much exercise.
11. It keeps people up all night who are too delicate to sit up with the sick or dying for one hour.
12. The minister of the gospel cannot engage in it without doing serious damage to the religion of Christ.
13. Our Saviour did not dance.
14. The apostles and early Christians did not dance.
15. Dancing is of ill repute.
16. No one dying sends for a dancing-master to comfort him.
17. No good dancer wants it placed on his tombstone when dead that "he was an expert dancer."
18. No one dances in memory of a departed friend.
19. It creates or fosters a love for the fatal cup.
20. It tolerates a freedom between the sexes which is immodest and often results perniciously.
21. Hundreds of blasted characters can date their first step toward ruin to their first visit to the ball-room.
22. It creates jealousy between man and wife, between lover and lover.
23. It requires no brains to be a dancing-master.
24. It weakens a person morally.
25. It weakens his influence for good.
26. It is a useless art.
27. No Christian can attend balls and keep unspotted from the world.
28. We cannot let our light shine in the ball-room.
29. Dancing is not a healthful exercise.
30. We are to glorify God in our bodies and spirits. Can we do it by dancing?—Sel.
"How to Get There."
Two or three generations ago there were pious men in every Scotch village, noted for their frequent use of Scripture language and metaphor. A tall man was spoken of as a "Saul among the people," and a disagreeable man, as "a Mordecai at the gate;" a bad woman was a "Jezebel," and a miser, an "Achan;" a profane man was one who spoke "part in the speech of Ashdod, and part in the Jews' language." A keen politician, a pious church member, during the voting for a member of Parliament, anxious to know the state of the poll and the prospects of his candidate, asked: "Is the young man Absalom safe?" Many of those men of quaint phrases were farm laborers or cobblers, who, though they had read few books, knew their Bible, and the knowledge made them excellent judges of sermons.
The Rev. John Macnab preached at a communion season on "Heaven." It was a long sermon; but the people thought it as beautiful as a series of dissolving views. It had, however, one defect,—the length of the descriptive part left no time for the "application." Old George Brown met the preacher at a friend's house, and astonished him by the resume he gave of the sermon.
"It was a grand sermon as far as it went," he said, after he had finished his report. "I never enjoyed a description of Heaven better. Ye told us a'thing aboot Heaven except hoo to get there; and, Maister Macnab, you'll excuse me, my young friend, for sayin' that should na hae been left oot; for ye'll admit yersel' if that's awantin', a's awantin'. Ye'll mind the king's son's feast? The servants didna only tell that a'thing was ready, but they compelled them to come in."
The young preacher was too intelligent not to see the aptness of the criticism, and when George had retired, he said to his friend,—
"I have been criticised by learned professors and doctors of divinity, by fellow-students and relatives; but that good old man has given me more insight into what preaching should be than all the others put together. I hope as long as I live I shall never again, when delivering God's message to my fellow-men, forget to tell them 'how to get there.'"—The Presbyterian.
Our Time.
By Raymond F. Cottrell
TO-DAY is passing. We intend to do our work. We hope to hear the "well done." But are we doing? Past moments and hours cannot be recalled. To-morrow may not be ours. The present is all we have, and all that we can claim. Are we filling the present moments well? Are we doing duty now? If we are not employing the present moment, how can we hope to accomplish our work? Let us heed the call to labor. It will soon be too late. Every lost day is increasing the probability that all our time will be wasted, and we shall have to take up the sad lamentation,—Too late! too late! The harvest is past, and the summer is ended! Our time has been wasted, and we are lost!
If we would have any reasonable hope that it will not be so with us, upon what can it be founded but upon the fact that now we are doing our duty, drawing near to God, actively engaged in filling up the present time in the performance of duty?
A great work is to be done. Our sins must be overcome, and we must have a preparation from God to labor in his cause. We must have Christ within, that we may confess him to others. We must be living examples of what the grace of God in Christ can do for men. We must have the Spirit's power to accompany our testimony and bear it to the hearts of others. We must have the refreshing, and not always live in hope of it. The wrestling, agonizing ones will obtain it. It will not come unasked. It must come in a way to be prized. And it will come as soon as we are ready.
Let us then get ready. Let us seek God with the whole heart. Let us consider that the time we have, though exceeding short, is of immense value to us, since eternity depends upon our improvement of it. Let us be wise. Let us improve to-day. R. F. COTTRELL.
"Ho, Every One that Thirsteth."
By Charles Seymour Robinson
WHEN I was in Beyrout, ten years ago, it happened that I was walking upon the street with my old friend, the Rev. Dr. Jessup. He called my attention to a strange-looking creature, having a skin bottle of great size slung across his shoulder. "Do you hear what the man is saying?" he asked. I turned to notice him more closely. He was wretchedly clad, and bowed down heavily with his burden; in his left hand he had a pair of what seemed like metal saucers, and these he clinked against each other like two shallow bells; and all the time, as he shuffled along over the stones, he muttered a curious jargon of sounds, apparently repeating the same syllables. I admitted that I heard the noises, but confessed I was painfully short of ideas.
Then the good missionary told me that what he was muttering in Arabic was a street-cry customary to all carriers of water in the Orient; indeed, he was saying exactly what Isaiah repeated at the opening of the fifty-fifth chapter: "Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters!" and then right over again, with ceaseless iteration: "Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters!" Hence the prophet really repeats a street-cry in order to attract attention, and then turns the figure into a swift contrast, as if he should exclaim: "See yonder! hear that water-bearer. He offers you water at a price; I offer you milk and wine, and that without asking any price to be paid. Why will you waste your money on him, when you can have what is more valuable freely, and close at your hand?" And thus he turns the counsel adroitly to the gospel of faith and godly repentance, and the cup Christ brings for the thirst of the soul.—C. S. Robinson, D. D.
A Universalist Answered.
A UNIVERSALIST once asked a minister, if God was willing that all men should be saved. He answered it by asking him this question, "Do you believe God is willing that all men should live moral and virtuous lives in this world?" Of course he had to answer affirmatively. Then the preacher again asked, "Do all men live thus?" After a little hesitancy he answered, "No." Then said the preacher, "According to your own reasoning, the will of God is not accomplished. But to answer your question more fully: God is as willing that all men should be saved as that all men should live virtuously. If you mean by will, a design, or determination, then I would say that God has not determined that all men should maintain good moral lives; for if he had, they would. Nor has he determined to save all, if he had, all would be saved." —Sel.
Gravitation Before Newton
As flowers, fruits, and grains indicate the living forces in nature, so the products of Christianity show its character.—Sel.
"HE hangeth the earth upon nothing." Gravitation before Newton.
The Ostrogoths and the Visigoths.
By Alonzo Trevier Jones
(Continued.)
"In the hands of a skillful politician, the most different means may be successfully applied to the same ends; and the peace of the empire, which had been forwarded by the divisions, was accomplished by the re-union, of the Gothic nation. Athanaric, who had been a patient spectator of these extraordinary events, was at length driven, by the chance of arms, from the dark recesses of the woods of Caucaland. He no longer hesitated to pass [A. D. 381, Jan 25] the Danube; and a very considerable part of the subjects of Fritigern, who had already felt the inconveniences of anarchy, were easily persuaded to acknowledge for their king a Gothic judge whose birth they respected, and whose abilities they had frequently experienced. But age had chilled the daring spirit of Athanaric; and instead of leading his people to the field of battle and victory, he wisely listened to the fair proposal of an honorable and advantageous treaty.
"Theodosius, who was acquainted with the merit and power of his new ally, condescended to meet him at the distance of several miles from Constantinople, and entertained him at the Imperial city with the confidence of a friend and the magnificence of a monarch. 'The barbarian prince observed, with curious attention, the variety of objects which attracted his notice, and at last broke out into a sincere and passionate exclamation of wonder. I now behold, said he, what I never could believe, the glories of this stupendous capital! And as he cast his eyes around, he viewed and he admired the commanding situation of the city, the strength and beauty of the walls and public edifices, the capacious harbor crowded with innumerable vessels, the perpetual concourse of distant nations, and the arms and discipline of the troops. Indeed, continued Athanaric, the emperor of the Romans is a god upon earth; and the presumptuous man who dares to lift his hand against him is guilty of his own blood.'
"The Gothic king did not long enjoy this splendid and honorable reception; and, as temperance was not the virtue of his nation, it may justly be suspected that his mortal disease was contracted amidst the pleasures of the Imperial banquets. But the policy of Theodosius derived more solid benefit from the death, than he could have expected from the most faithful services, of his ally. The funeral of Athanaric was performed with solemn rites in the capital of the East; a stately monument was erected to his memory; and his whole army, won by the liberal courtesy and decent grief of Theodosius, enlisted under the standard of the Roman Empire. The submission of so great a body of the Visigoths was productive of the most salutary consequences; and the mixed influence of force, of reason, and of corruption, became every day more powerful and more extensive. Each independent chieftain hastened to obtain a separate treaty, from the apprehension that an obstinate delay might expose him, alone and unprotected, to the revenge or justice of the conqueror. The general or rather the final capitulation of the Goths, may be dated [A. D. 382, Oct. 3] four years, one month, and twenty-five days after the defeat and death of the Emperor Valens."
"The original treaty which fixed the settlement of the Goths, ascertained their privileges, and stipulated their obligations, would illustrate the history of Theodosius and his successors. The series of their history has imperfectly preserved the spirit and substance of this singular agreement. The ravages of war and tyranny had provided many large tracts of fertile but uncultivated land for the use of those barbarians who might not disdain the practice of agriculture. A numerous colony of the Visigoths was seated in Thrace; the remains of the Ostrogoths were planted in Phrygia and Lydia; their immediate wants were supplied by a distribution of corn and cattle; and their future industry was encouraged by an exemption from the tribute during a certain term of years [A. D. 383-395]. The barbarians would have deserved to feel the cruel and perfidious policy of the Imperial court, if they had suffered themselves to be dispersed through the provinces. They required and they obtained the sole possession of the villages and districts assigned for their residence; they still cherished and propagated their native manners and language, asserted, in the bosom of despotism, the freedom of their domestic government, and acknowledged the sovereignty of the emperor without submitting to the inferior jurisdiction of the laws and magistrates of Rome.
"The hereditary chiefs of the tribes and families were still permitted to command their followers in peace and war; but the royal dignity was abolished, and the generals of the Goths were appointed and removed at the pleasure of the emperor. An army of 40,000 Goths was maintained for the perpetual service of the empire of the East; and those haughty troops, who assumed the title of Fœderati, or allies, were distinguished by their gold collars, liberal pay, and licentious privileges. Their native courage was improved by the use of arms and the knowledge of discipline; and, while the republic was guarded or threatened by the doubtful sword of the barbarians, the last sparks of the military flame were finally extinguished in the minds of the Romans. Theodosius had the address to persuade his allies that the conditions of peace which had been extorted from him by prudence and necessity, were the voluntary expressions of his sincere friendship for the Gothic nation."
"It was generally believed that the Goths had signed the treaty of peace with a hostile and insidious spirit; and that their chiefs had previously bound themselves, by solemn and secret oath, never to keep faith with the Romans; to maintain the fairest show of loyalty and friendship, and to watch the favorable moment of rapine, of conquest, and of revenge. But as the minds of the barbarians were not insensible to the power of gratitude, several of the Gothic leaders sincerely devoted themselves to the service of the empire, or at least of the emperor. . . . And as the impatient Goths could only be restrained by the firm and temperate character of Theodosius, the public safety seemed to depend on the life and abilities of a single man."
"If the subjects of Rome could be ignorant of their obligations to the great Theodosius, they were too soon convinced how painfully the spirit and abilities of their deceased emperor had supported the frail and mouldering edifice of the republic. He died in the month of January; and before the end of the winter of the same year [A. D. 395] the Gothic nation was in arms. The barbarian auxiliaries erected their independent standard, and boldly avowed the hostile designs which they had long cherished in their ferocious minds. Their countrymen, who had been condemned by the conditions of the last treaty to a life of tranquillity and labor, deserted their farms at the first sound of the trumpet, and eagerly resumed the weapons which they had reluctantly laid down. The barriers of the Danube were thrown open; the savage warriors of Scythia issued from their forests; and the uncommon severity of the winter allowed the poet to remark, that they rolled their ponderous wagons over the broad and icy back of the indignant river. The unhappy natives of the provinces to the south of the Danube submitted to the calamities, which, in the course of twenty years, were almost grown familiar to their imagination; and the various troops of barbarians, who gloried in the Gothic name, were irregularly spread from the woody shores of Dalmatia to the walls of Constantinople.
"The interruption, or at least the diminution, of the subsidy which the Goths had received from the prudent liberality of Theodosius, was the specious pretense of their revolt: the affront was imbittered by their contempt for the unwarlike sons of Theodosius, and their resentment was inflamed by the weakness or treachery of the minister of Arcadius. . . . The Goths, instead of being impelled by the blind and headstrong passions of their chiefs, were now directed by the bold and artful genius of Alaric. That renowned leader was descended from the noble race of the Balti, which yielded only to the royal dignity of the Amali; he had solicited the command of the Roman armies; and the Imperial court provoked him to demonstrate the folly of their refusal and the importance of their loss. Whatever hopes might be entertained of the conquest of Constantinople, the judicious general soon abandoned an impracticable enterprise. In the midst of a divided court and a discontented people, the Emperor Arcadius was terrified by the aspect of the Gothic arms; but the want of wisdom and valor was supplied by the strength of the city; and the fortifications, both of the sea and the land, might securely brave the impotent and random darts of the barbarians. Alaric disdained to trample any longer on the prostrate and ruined countries of Thrace and Dacia, and he resolved to seek a plentiful harvest of fame and riches in a province which had hitherto escaped the ravages of war."—Dec. and Fall, chap. 26, par. 29, 31, 32; chap. 30, par. 1. A. T. J.