who drove before them, in a promiscuous crowd, the bishop, the senator, and the virgin, laden with the spoils of their houses and altars.

While one barbarian host arose after another, and the storm was only diverted in its course from one part of the empire to another, the power of Rome was broken, in regions which neither Goths, nor Vandals, nor Germans reached. In the year 407, the British army revolted ;—a name became the passport to empire, and Constantine, a private soldier, was seated on the throne. He invaded Gaul, and subjected to his authority the cities "which had escaped the yoke of the barbarians." He reduced Spain: where Scots and Moors were united under his banner. "The rustic army of the Theodosian family was surrounded and destroyed in the Pyrenees."

But the first great destroyer had again gathered strength, and the tempest, which was never intermitted, speedily burst forth anew with tenfold violence. For after the seat of empire was transferred to Ravenna, and the existence of the imperial throne was no longer compromised, even by the fall of Rome, the city of the Cæsars was thrice besieged and finally sacked by Alaric; and when Rome was evacuated, Italy was ravaged.

"While the ministers of Ravenna expected, in sullen silence, that the barbarians should evacuate the confines of Italy, Alaric, (in the year 408), with bold and rapid marches, passed the Alps and the Po; hastily pillaged the cities of Aquileia, Altinum, Concordia, and Cremona, which yielded to his arms; increased his forces by the addition of thirty thousand auxiliaries; and without meeting a single enemy in the field, advanced as far as the edge of the morass which protected the impregnable residence of the emperor of the West. Instead of attempting the hopeless siege of Ravenna, the prudent leader of the Goths proceeded to Rimini, stretched his ravages along the sea-coast of the Adriatic, meditated the conquest of the ancient mistress of the world. An

*Gibbon's Hist. vol. v. pp. 224-226. c. 30.

Italian hermit encountered the victorious monarch, and boldly denounced the indignation of Heaven against the oppressors of the earth; but the saint himself was confounded by the solemn asseveration of Alaric, that he felt a secret and preternatural impulse, which directed, and even compelled, his march to the gates of Rome. He felt that his genius and fortune were equal to the most arduous enterprises, and he pitched his camp under the walls of Rome. During a period of six hundred and nineteen years, the seat of empire had never been violated by the presence of a foreign enemy.*

"The writers, the best disposed to exaggerate the clemency of the Goths, have freely confessed that (in the sack of Rome) a cruel slaughter was made of the Romans; and that the streets were filled with dead bodies, which remained without burial during the general consternation. The despair of the citizens was sometimes converted into fury; and whenever the barbarians were provoked by opposition, they extended the promiscuous massacre to the feeble, the innocent, and the helpless. The private revenge of forty thousand slaves was exercised without pity or remorse, and the ignominious lashes which they had formerly received, were washed away in the blood of the guilty or obnoxious families. The palaces of Rome were stripped of their splendid and costly furniture. The sideboards of massy plate, and the variegated wardrobes of silk and purple, were irregularly piled in the waggons, that always followed the march of a Gothic army. The most exquisite works of art were roughly handled or wantonly destroyed: many a statue was melted for the sake of the precious materials; and many a vase, in the division of the spoil, was shivered into fragments by the stroke of a battle-axe.—The acquisition of riches served only to stimulate the avarice of the rapacious barbarians, who proceeded, by threats, by blows, and by tortures, to force from their prisoners the confession of hidden treasure. Visible splendour and expense were alleged as the proof of a plentiful fortune: the appearance of poverty was imputed to a parsimonious disposition; and the obstinacy of some misers, who endured the most cruel torments before they would discover the secret object of their affections, was fatal to many unhappy wretches who expired under the lash, for refusing to reveal their imaginary treasures. The edifices of Rome, though the damage has been exaggerated, received some injury from the violence of the Goths. At their entrance through the Salarian gate, they fired the adjacent

Gibbon's Hist. pp. 253-255.

houses to guide their march, and to distract the attention of the citizens; the flames, which encountered no obstacle in the disorder of the night, consumed many private and public buildings; and the ruins of the palace of Sallust remained, in the age of Justinian, a stately monument of the Gothic conflagration."

Large extracts clearly show how amply and well Gibbon has expounded his text, in the history of the first trumpet, the first storm that pervaded the Roman earth, and the first fall of Rome. To use his words, in more direct comment, we read thus the sum of the matter. The Gothic nation was in arms at the FIRST SOUND OF THE TRUMPET, and in the UNCOMMON SEVERITY OF THE WINTER they rolled their ponderous waggons over the broad and icy back of the river. The fertile fields of Phocis and Baotia were crowned with A DELUGE OF BARBARIANS: the males were MASSACRED; the females and cattle of the flaming villages were driven away. The deep and BLOODY traces of the march of the Goths could easily be discovered after several years. The whole terri tory of Attica was BLASTED by the baneful presence of Alaric. The most fortunate of the inhabitants of Corinth, Argos, Sparta, were saved by death from beholding the CONFLAGRATION OF THEIR CITIES.-In a season of such EXTREME HEAT that the beds of the rivers were dry, Alaric invaded the dominion of the West. A secluded old man of Verona' pathetically lamented the fate of his contemporary TREES, which

must BLAZE in the CONFLAGRATION OF THE WHOLE COUNTRY. And the emperor of the Romans fled before the king of the Goths.

A FURIOUS TEMPEST was excited among the nations of Germany; from the NORTHERN EXTREMITY of which the barbarians marched almost to the gates of Rome. They achieved the destruction of the west.

* Gibbon's Hist. pp. 314 318. c. 31.

The DARK CLOUD which was collected along the coasts of the Baltic, BURST IN THUNDER upon the banks of the Upper Danube. The PASTURES of Gaul, in which flocks and herds grazed; and the banks of the Rhine, which were covered with elegant houses and well cultivated farms, formed a scene of peace and plenty, which was suddenly changed into a DESERT, distinguished from THE SOLITUDE OF NATURE only by SMOKING RUINS. Many cities were cruelly oppressed or destroyed. Many thousands were inhumanly massacred. And the CONSUMING FLAMES OF WAR spread over the greatest part of the seventeen provinces of Gaul.

Alaric again stretched his ravages over Italy. During four years, the Goths ravaged and reigned over it without control. And, in the pillage and FIRE of Rome, the streets of the city WERE FILLED WITH DEAD BODIES; the FLAMES CONSUMED MANY public and private buildings; and the ruins of a palace remained, (after a century and a half,) a stately monument of the GOTHIC CONFLAGRATION.

The FIRST angel sounded, and there followed HAIL and FIRE, mingled with BLOOD, and they were cast upon the EARTH; and the THIRD PART of TREES was BURNT UP, and all green GRASS was BURNT UP.

The concluding sentence of the thirty-third chapter of Gibbon's History, is, of itself, a clear and comprehensive commentary: for, in winding up his own description of the brief, but most eventful period, he concentrates as in a parallel reading, the sum of the history, and the substance of the prediction. But the words which precede it are not without their meaning. "The public devotion of the age was impatient to exalt the saints and martyrs of the catholic church on the altars of Diana and Hercules. The union of the Roman empire was dissolved; its genius was humbled in the dust; and armies of unknown

barbarians, issuing from the frozen regions of the north, had established their victorious reign over the fairest provinces of Europe and Africa."

The last word,—Africa,—is the signal for the sounding of the second trumpet. The scene changes from the shores of the Baltic to the southern coast of the Mediterranean, or from the frozen regions of the north to the borders of burning Africa. And instead of a storm of hail being cast upon the earth, a burning mountain was cast into the sea.

CHAPTER XV.

SECOND TRUMPET.

AFTER Six centuries of tranquillity, undisturbed in Italy by a foreign foe, and of dominion which held the whole world in subjection and awe, the union of the Roman empire was dissolved, on the sounding of the first trumpet; and in the short space of fourteen years, the empire was overspread with hosts of enemies, the transalpine provinces fell, and Rome itself was in the possession of savage and merciless Goths. Alaric died, A. D. 410,-the very year of the sack of Rome. The voice of the first trumpet had been answered and fulfilled. And, in the year 412, the Goths voluntarily retreated from Italy under the conduct of his successor Adolphus.

"A decent and respectful attention was paid to the capital; the citizens were encouraged to rebuild the edifices which had been destroyed or damaged by hostile fire; and extraordinary supplies of corn were imported from the coast of Africa. The crowds that so lately fled before the sword