[Sidenote: Conquests of Sulla in Greece.]
At this juncture, Sulla was sent into Greece with fifty thousand men. Athens fell before his conquering legions, B.C. 88, and the lieutenants of Mithridates retreated before the Romans with one hundred thousand foot and ten thousand horse, and one hundred armed chariots. On the plains of Chaeronea, where Grecian liberties had been overthrown by Philip of Macedon, two hundred and fifty years before, a desperate conflict took place, and the Pontic army was signally defeated. Shortly after, Sulla gained another great victory over the generals of the King of Pontus, and compelled him to accept peace, the terms of which he himself dictated, after exacting heavy contributions from the cities of Greece and Asia Minor.
[Sidenote: Death of Sulla.]
The civil war between Sulla and the chiefs of the popular faction that had been created by Marius, which ended in his complete ascendency in Italy, stopped for a while the Roman conquests in the East. Sulla, having undone the popular measures of the last half century, and reigned supreme over all factions as dictator, died B.C. 78, after a most successful career, and left his mantle to the most enterprising of his lieutenants, Cnaeus Pompey, who was destined to complete the Mithridatic war.
[Sidenote: Character of Sulla.]
If Sulla had not been so inordinately fond of pleasure and luxurious self-indulgence, he might have seized the sceptre of universal dominion, and have made himself undisputed master of the empire. He was a man of extraordinary genius, fond of literature, and a great diplomatist. But he was not preeminently ambitious like Caesar, and was diverted by the fascinations of elegant leisure; nor was he naturally cruel, though his passions, when aroused, were fierce and vindictive. He lived in an age of exceeding corruption, when it was evident to contemplative minds that Roman liberties could not be much longer preserved. He had, for a time, restored the ascendency of the senatorial families, but faction was at work among the unprincipled chiefs of the republic.
[Sidenote: Lucullus marches against Mithridates.]
On the death of the great dictator, Mithridates broke the peace he had concluded, and marched into Bithynia, which had been left by will to the Roman people by Nicomedes, with the hope of its reconquest. He had an army of one hundred and twenty thousand foot and fifteen thousand horse. Lucullus, with thirty thousand foot and one thousand horse, advanced against him, and the vast forces of Mithridates were defeated, and the king was driven into Armenia, and sought the aid of Tigranes, his son- in-law, king of that powerful country. He, too, was subdued by the Roman legions, and all the nations from the Halys to the Euphrates acknowledged the dominion of Rome.
[Sidenote: Rising greatness of Pompey.]
Still, Mithridates was not subdued, and Pompey, who had annihilated the Mediterranean pirates, was the only person fit to finish the Mithridatic war. His successes had been more brilliant than even those of Sulla, or Lucullus, or Metellus. He was made Dictator of the East, with greater powers than had ever before been intrusted to a Roman general. He had success equal to his fame; drove Mithridates across the Caucasus; reduced Pontus, and took possession of Syria, which had been subject to Tigranes. The defeated King of Pontus, who had sought to unite all the barbarous tribes of Eastern Europe against Rome, destroyed himself. Pompey, after seven years' continued successes, returned to Italy to claim his triumph, having subdued the East, and added the old monarchy of the Seleucidae to the dominion of Rome, B.C. 61.