Vide also Plutarch, “Numa;” Livy, lib. i. c. 34.
Vattel, iii. c. iv., says:—“It is surprising to find among the Romans such justice, such moderation and prudence, at a time too when apparently nothing but courage and ferocity was to be expected from them.”
[311] Gladstone, “Homer and the Homeric Age,” iii. 4.
[312] “To demolish a trophy was looked on as unlawful, and a kind of sacrilege, because they were all dedicated to some deity; nor was it less a crime to pay crime to pay divine adoration before them, or to repair them when decayed, as may be likewise observed of the Roman triumphal arches.... For the same reason, those Grecians who introduced the custom of erecting pillars for trophies incurred a severe censure from the ages they lived in.”—Potters “Archæologia,” ii. c. 12. “Before the Greeks engaged themselves in war it was usual to publish a declaration of the injuries they had received, and to demand satisfaction by ambassadors; which custom was observed even in the most early ages.... It is therefore no wonder what Polybius relates of the Ætolians, that they were held for the common outlaws and robbers of Greece, it being their manner to strike without warning, and make war without any previous or public declaration.”—Id. ii. c. vii. p. 64. (Compare infra, [ch. xv.])
[313] “Omnes portas concionabundus ipse imperator circumiit, et quibuscumque irritamentis poterat, iras militum accuebat, nunc fraudem hostium incusans, qui, pace petita, induciis datis, per ipsum induciarum tempus, contra jus gentium ad castra oppugnando venisset.”—P. Livius, 1. xc.
[314] “De Jure Belli ac Pacis,” l. i. c. l. § x. n n, 1 et 2.
[315] Sir G. C. Lewis (“Method, &c., of Reasoning in Politics,” ii. 35), quotes Mr Ward, “History of Law of Nations” (i. 127), to the effect “That what is commonly called the law of nations, is not the law of all nations, but only of such sets or classes of them as are united together by similar religions and systems of morality.” Sir G. C. Lewis’ view is that “as there are no universal principles of civil jurisprudence which belongs to each community, so there are no universal principles of international law which are common to all communities.”—Id.
[316] Since writing the above, I have read a series of papers (which commenced I think in August 1871) in the Tablet under the title of “Arbitration instead of War,” and I perceive that the writer arrives by a different route at a similar conclusion. I should have had pleasure in incorporating the argument with this chapter, but I shall do better if I induce my readers to peruse and weigh it as it deserves.
[317] I allude to the ancient prophecy of St Malachy. Its authenticity as the prophecy of St Malachy may be questioned; but the antiquity of the prediction, and its existence in print early in the sixteenth century is, I believe, fully established. The copy which lies before me will be found in Moreri’s Dictionary of 1732, in the Pontificate of Innocent XIII. Twelve mottoes given in prediction from that date, fits the motto “crux de cruce,” to the 12th successor of Innocent, viz. Pius IX. Ten other mottoes follow commencing with “lumen in cœlo.”
[318] “The pontifical power is, from its essential constitution, the least subject to the caprices of politics. He who wields it is, moreover, always aged, unmarried, and a priest; all which circumstances exclude ninety-nine hundredths of all the errors and passions which disturb states.”—De Maistre, Du Pape, B. II. chap. iv.