The Historians' History of the World 06

Peace was the price for which Rome consented to the supremacy of Augustus; his successors, too, really followed a policy of peace. There was not a complete absence of conquests either in the reign of Augustus or of those who came after him, as for instance Trajan. But these predatory wars were chiefly directed to the defence and protection of the older possessions. If we compare the conquests of the republic in five centuries with those of the empire in four we shall clearly see how the republic hastened from one conquest to another, while the object of the empire was to preserve and fortify itself. “Empire is peace”—this watchword, so often abused, was truly expressive of the work of Augustus in battles both at home and abroad.

Cæsar had made war of necessity. His was not the nature of the warrior prince; on the contrary it was as the prince of peace that he loved to be celebrated. When the civil war had come to an end the army was considerably reduced and the superfluous legions were simply discharged. Cæsar had often suffered, and others had suffered more than he, from the insolence and unbridled passions of an army which felt itself master of the situation; the termination of the civil wars was to put an end to all this. From henceforward he no more addressed his troops as comrades but simply as soldiers, and allowed the princes of his house to use no other manner of address. The bodyguard of foreign mercenaries hitherto maintained by him was discharged and replaced by home troops.

The joy at the termination of the civil wars was universal and in nearly every case genuine. Exceptional circumstances and wars at home as well as abroad had gone to make up the history of the past twenty years; during this time a generation had grown up whose only knowledge of lasting peace was derived from hearsay, as if from the all but silent notes of some legend sung in a better day now long past. Those who within the last decade had saved or won anything were eager to rejoice in it. All panted for peace, with no less sincerity than exhausted Europe after the wars between 1790 and 1815, and all were ready to greet as lord of the world the victor who should restore this golden age.

This general yearning for peace found expression in the shutting of the doors of Janus, which was decreed by the senate in order to give a visible proof that the period of war was at an end (Æneid VII, 607):

“Two gates there stand of War—’twas so

Our fathers named them long ago—

The war god’s terrors round them spread

An atmosphere of sacred dread.

A hundred bolts the entrance guard,

And Janus there keeps watch and ward.”

Any one who chanced to be in France when the Prussian War closed and heard the bells ringing out peace from the church towers will not easily underrate the impressiveness of this symbolism.

Cæsar indeed attached all the greater importance to the decree of the senate ordering the doors of Janus to be shut, in that the senate had rarely gone to such lengths. Two centuries had passed since the last occasion in which the temple of Janus was closed. When the First Punic War with all its losses and changing fortunes had finally been concluded to the advantage of Rome, exhausted as she was, she had yet joyfully permitted the performance of these ancient ceremonies which were supposed to date back to King Numa. To this precedent the senate had recourse when in 29 B.C. it ordered the closing of the temple of Janus. The proceeding would have been most impressive had the threefold triumph been terminated with this symbol of peace. This, however, was not in the power of the senate to grant, for its decree had probably been passed at the beginning of the year; there was danger in delay, for the sudden outbreak of a border war or a rebellion might make its performance impossible.

To be accurate we must admit that there was not an absolute cessation of warfare; for the Romans had still to contend with the natives on the German border and in Spain at a time like this in which all resistance had to be broken. But little account was made of such trifles, so great was the promise expected from the impression that the closing of the temple of Janus would create.

Even Cicero, so tell the later accounts at all events, seems to have recognised in the young Caius Octavius, who had been born during his consulate, the man who would put an end to the civil wars; later on, when the Sicilian war had been concluded, a statue was reared to Cæsar with an inscription to him as prince of peace; now at last after the battle of Actium the dream was to turn into reality. What was so yearningly hoped for was pointed out in the premonitions of the gods; even the trophies of victory turned into weapons for peace. Bees made their nests in the trophies taken at the battle of Actium (Anthol. Palat. VI, 236):

“Here brazen beaks, the galley’s harness, lie,

Trophies of Actium’s famed victory,

But bees have built within the hollow arms,