between the Carthaginians and Masinissa king of the Numidians. We shall treat both separately, but at no great length.

SECT. I. CONTINUATION OF THE HISTORY OF HANNIBAL.— When the second Punic war was ended, by the treaty of peace concluded with Scipio, Hannibal, as he himself observed in the Carthaginian senate, was forty-five years of age. What we have farther to say of this great man, includes the space of twenty-five years.

a

Hannibal undertakes and completes the Reformation of the Courts of Justice, and the Treasury of Carthage.—After the conclusion of the peace, Hannibal, at least at first, was greatly respected at Carthage, where he filled the first employments of the state with honour and applause. He headed the Carthaginian forces in some wars against the Africans: but the Romans, to whom the very name of Hannibal gave uneasiness, not being able to see him in arms without displeasure, made complaints on that account, and accordingly he was recalled to Carthage.

On his return he was appointed prætor, which seems to have been a very considerable employment, and to have conferred great authority. Carthage is therefore going to be, with regard to him, a new theatre, as it were, on which he will display virtues and qualities of a quite different nature from those we have hitherto admired in him, and which will finish the picture of this illustrious man.

Eagerly desirous of restoring the affairs of his afflicted country to their former happy condition, he was persuaded, that the two most powerful methods to make a state flourish, were, an exact and equal distribution of justice to all its subjects in general, and a scrupulous fidelity in the management of the public finances. The former, by preserving an equality among the citizens, and making them enjoy such a delightful, undisturbed liberty under the protection of the laws, as fully secures their honour, their lives, and properties; unites the individuals of the commonwealth more closely together, and attaches them more firmly to the state, to which they owe the preservation of all that is most dear and valuable to them. The latter, by a

a Corn. Nep, in Annib. c. 7.

faithful administration of the public revenues, supplies punctually the several wants and necessities of the state; keeps in reserve a never failing resource for sudden emergencies, and prevents the people from being burthened with new taxes, which are rendered necessary by extravagant profusion, and which chiefly contribute to make men harbour an aversion for the government.

Hannibal saw, with great concern, the irregularities which had crept equally into the administration of justice, and the management of the finances. Upon his being nominated prætor, as his love for regularity and order made him uneasy at every deviation from it, and prompted him to use his utmost endeavours to restore it; he had the courage to attempt the reformation of this double abuse, which drew after it a numberless multitude of others, without dreading, either the animosity of the old faction that opposed him, or the new enmity which his zeal for the republic must necessarily draw upon him.

The judges exercised the most flagrant extortion with impunity. They were so many petty tyrants, who disposed, in an arbitrary manner, of the lives and fortunes of the citizens; without there being the least possibility of putting a stop to their injustice, because they held their commissions for life, and mutually supported one another. Hannibal, as prætor, summoned before his tribunal an officer belonging to the bench of judges, who openly abused his power. Livy tells us that he was a questor. This officer, who was of the opposite faction to Hannibal, and had already assumed all the pride and haughtiness of the judges, among whom he was to be admitted at the expiration of his present office, insolently refused to obey the summons. Hannibal was not of a disposition to suffer an affront of this nature tamely. Accordingly, he caused him to be seized by a lictor, and brought him before an assembly of the people. There, not satisfied with directing his resentment against this single officer, he impeached the whole bench of judges; whose insupportable and tyrannical pride was not restrained, either by the fear of the laws, or a reverence for the magistrates. And, as Hannibal perceived

b Liv. 1. xxxiii. n. 46.

that he was heard with pleasure, and that the lowest and most inconsiderable of the people discovered, on this occasion, that they were no longer able to bear the insolent pride of these judges, who seemed to have a design upon their liberties; he proposed a law, (which accordingly passed,) by which it was enacted, that new judges should be chosen annually; with a clause, that none should continue in office beyond that term. This law, at the same time that it acquired him the friendship and esteem of the people, drew upon him, proportionably, the hatred of the greatest part of the grandees and nobility.

с

He attempted another reformation, which created him new enemies, but gained him great honour. The public revenues were either squandered away by the negligence of those who had the management of them, or were plundered by the chief men of the city and the magistrates; so that, money being wanting to pay the annual tribute due to the Romans, the Carthaginians were going to levy it upon the people in general. Hannibal, entering into a large detail of the public revenues, ordered an exact estimate of them to be laid before him; inquired in what manner they had been applied; the employments and ordinary expenses of the state; and having discovered, by this inquiry, that the public funds had been in a great measure embezzled by the fraud of the officers who had the management of them, he declared and promised, in a full assembly of the people, that, without laying any new taxes. upon private men, the republic should hereafter be enabled to pay the tribute to the Romans; and he was as good as his word. The farmers of the revenues, whose plunder and rapine he had publicly detected, having accustomed themselves hitherto to fatten upon the spoils of their country, exclaimed * vehemently against these regulations, as if their own property had been forced out of their hands, and not the sums they had plundered from the public.

The Retreat and Death of Hannibal.-d This double reformation of abuses raised great clamours against Hannibal. His enemies were writing incessantly to the chief men, or their

c Liv. 1. xxiii. n 46, 47.

d Liv. 1. xxiii. n. 45-49.

*Tum verò isti quos paverat per aliquot annos publicus peculatus, velut bonis ereptis, nou furto eorum manibus extorto, infensi et irati, Romanos in Annibalem, et ipsos causam odii quærentes, instigabant. Liv.

friends, at Rome, to inform them, that he was carrying on a secret intelligence with Antiochus king of Syria; that he frequently received couriers from him; and that this prince had privately despatched agents to Hannibal, to concert with him the measures for carrying on the war he was meditating: that as some animals are so extremely fierce, that it is impossible ever to tame them; in like manner this man was of so turbulent and implacable a spirit, that he could not brook ease, and therefore would, sooner or later, break out again. These informations were listened to at Rome; and as the transactions of the preceding war had been begun and carried on almost solely by Hannibal, they appeared more probable. However, Scipio strongly opposed the violent measures which the senate were going to take on their receiving this intelligence, by representing it as derogatory to the dignity of the Roman people, to countenance the hatred and accusations of Hannibal's enemies; to support, with their authority, their unjust passions; and obstinately to persecute him even in the very heart of his country; as though the Romans had not humbled him sufficiently, in driving him out of the field, and forcing him to lay down his arms.

But notwithstanding these prudent remonstrances, the senate appointed three commissioners to go and make their complaints to Carthage, and to demand that Hannibal should be delivered up to them. On their arrival in that city, though other motives were speciously pretended, yet Hannibal was perfectly sensible that himself only was aimed at. The evening being come, he conveyed himself on board a ship, which he had secretly provided for that purpose; on which occasion he bewailed his country's fate more than his own. Sæpiùs patriæ quàm * suorum eventus miseratus. This was the eighth year after the conclusion of the peace. The first place he landed at was Tyre, where he was received as in his second country, and had all the honours paid him which were due to his exalted merit. After staying some days here, he set out for Antioch, which the king had lately left, A. Rom. and from thence waited upon him at Ephesus. The arrival of so renowned a general gave great pleasure to the

It is probable that we should read suos.

A. M. 3812.

556.

king; and did not a little contribute to determine him to engage in war against Rome; for hitherto he had appeared wavering and uncertain on that head. In this city, a philosopher, who was looked upon as the greatest orator of Asia, had the imprudence to make a long harangue before Hannibal, on the duties of a general, and the rules of the art-military. The speech charmed the whole audience. But Hannibal being asked his opinion of it, I have seen,' says he, many old dotards in my life, but this exceeds them all.'*

The Carthaginians, justly fearing that Hannibal's escape would certainly draw upon them the arms of the Romans, sent them advice that Hannibal was withdrawn to Antiochus.† The Romans were very much disturbed at this news; and the king might have turned it extremely to his advantage, had he known how to make a proper use of it.

The first advice that Hannibal gave him at this time, and which he frequently repeated afterwards, was, to make Italy the seat of the war. He required an hundred ships, eleven or twelve thousand land forces, and offered to take upon himself the command of the fleet; to cross into Africa, in order to engage the Carthaginians in the war; and afterwards to make a descent upon Italy, during which the king himself should remain in Greece with his army, holding himself constantly in readiness to cross over into Italy, whenever it should be thought convenient. This was the only thing proper to be done, and the king very much approved the proposal at first.

8 Hannibal thought it would be expedient to prepare his friends at Carthage, in order to engage them the more strongly in his views. The transmitting of information by letters, is not only unsafe, but they can give only an imperfect idea of things,

Hic Poenus liberè respondisse fertur, multos se deliros senes sæpe vidisse: Sed qui magis quàm Phormio deliraret vidisse neminem. Stobæus, Serm. lii. gives the following account of this matter : ̓Αννίβας ἀκούσας Στοϊκοῦ τίνος ἐπιχειροῦντος, ὅτι ὁ σοφὸς μόνος στρατηγὸς ἐστὶν, ἐγέλασε, νομίζων ἀδύνατον εἶναι ἐκτὸς τῆς δι' ἔργων ἐμπειρίας τὴν ἐν τούτοις ἐπιστήμην ἔχειν. i. e. Hannibal hearing a Stoic philosopher undertake to prove that the wise man was the only general, laughed, as thinking it impossible for a man to have any skill in war without having long practised it.

They did more, for they sent two ships to pursue Hannibal, and bring him back; they sold off his goods, rased his house; and, by a public decree, declared him an exile. Such was the gratitude the Carthaginians showed to the greatest generai they ever had. Corn. Nep. in vitâ Hannib, c. 7.