These two things will be sufficiently performed, if I address myself to the second part of the argument, and manifest the truth of the question before us. For thus, if we show that the Roman Empire is by right, not only shall we disperse the clouds of ignorance from the eyes of those princes who have wrongly seized the helm of public government, falsely imputing this thing to the Roman people; but all men shall understand that they are free from the yoke of these usurpers. The truth of the question can be made clear not only by the light of human reason, but also by the ray of God's authority; and when these two coincide, then heaven and earth must agree together. Supported, therefore, by this conviction, and trusting in the testimony both of reason and of authority, I proceed to settle the second question.
II.—Inquiry concerning the truth of the first doubt has been made as accurately as the nature of the subject permitted; we have now to inquire concerning the second, which is: Whether the Roman people assumed to itself of right the dignity of the Empire? And the first thing in this question is to find the truth, to which the reasonings concerning it may be referred as to their proper first principle.
It must be recognised, then, that as there are three degrees in every art, the mind of the artist, his instrument, and the material on which he works, so we may look upon nature in three degrees. For nature exists, first, in the mind of the First Agent, who is God; then in heaven; as in an instrument, by means of which the likeness of the Eternal Goodness unfolds itself on shapeless[200] matter. If an artist is perfect in his art, and his instrument is perfect, any fault in the form of his art must be laid to the badness of the material; and so, since God holds the summit of perfection, and since His instrument, which is heaven, admits of no failure of its due perfection (which is manifest from our philosophy touching heaven), it follows that whatever fault is to be found in the lower world is a fault on the part of the subject matter, and is contrary to the intention of God who makes nature,[201] and of heaven; and if in this lower world there is aught that is good, it must be ascribed first to the artist, who is God, and then to heaven, the instrument of God's art, which men call nature; for the material, being merely a possibility, can do nothing of itself.[202]
Hence it is apparent that, since all Right[203] is good, it therefore exists first in the mind of God; and since all that is in the mind of God is God, according to the saying, "What was made, in Him was life;"[204] and as God chiefly wishes for what is Himself, it follows that Right is the wish of God, so far as it is in Him. And since in God the will and the wish are the same, it further follows that this Right is the will of God. Again it follows that Right in the world is nothing else than the likeness of the will of God, and therefore whatever does not agree with the divine will cannot be Right, and whatever does agree with the divine will is Right itself. Therefore to ask if a thing be by Right is only to ask in other words if it is what God wills. It may therefore be assumed that what God wills to see in mankind is to be held as real and true Right.
Besides we must remember Aristotle's teaching in the first book of his Ethics, where he says: "We must not seek for certitude in every matter, but only as far as the nature of the subject admits."[205] Therefore our arguments from the first principle already found will be sufficient, if from manifest evidence and from the authority of the wise, we seek for the right of that glorious people. The will of God is an invisible thing, but "the invisible things of God are seen, being understood by the things which are made." For when the seal is out of sight, the wax, which has its impression, gives manifest evidence of it, though it be unseen; nor is it strange that the will of God must be sought by signs; for the human will, except to the person himself who wills, is only discerned by signs.[206]
III.—My answer then to the question is, that it was by right, and not by usurpation, that the Roman people assumed to itself the office of Monarchy, or, as men call it, the Empire, over all mankind. For in the first place it is fitting that the noblest people should be preferred to all others; the Roman people was the noblest; therefore it is fitting that it should be preferred to all others. By this reasoning I make my proof; for since honour is the reward of goodness, and since to be preferred is always honour, therefore to be preferred is always the reward of goodness. It is plain that men are ennobled for their virtues; that is, for their own virtues or for those of their ancestors; for nobleness is virtue and ancestral wealth, according to Aristotle in his Politics; and according to Juvenal, "There is no nobleness of soul but virtue,"[207] which two statements refer to two sorts of nobleness, our own and that of our ancestors.[208]
To be preferred, therefore, is, according to reason, the fitting reward of the noble. And since rewards must be measured by desert, according to that saying of the Gospel, "with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again;" therefore to the most noble the highest place should be given. The testimonies of the ancients confirm our opinion; for Virgil, our divine poet, testifies throughout his Æneid, that men may ever remember it, that the glorious king, Æneas, was the father of the Roman people. And this Titus Livius, the famous chronicler of the deeds of the Romans, confirms in the first part of his work, which takes its beginning from the capture of Troy. The nobleness of this most unconquerable and most pious ancestor not only in regard to his own great virtue, but also to that of his forefathers and of his wives, the nobleness of whom was combined in their descendant by the rightful law of descent, I cannot unfold at length; "I can but touch lightly on the outlines of the truth."[209]
For the virtue then of Æneas himself, hear what our poet tells us when he introduces Ilioneus in the first Æneid, praying thus: "Æneas was our king; in justice and piety he has not left a peer, nor any to equal him in war." Hear Virgil in the sixth Æneid, when he speaks of the death of Misenus, who had been Hector's attendant in war, and, after Hector's death, had attached himself to Æneas; for there Virgil says that Misenus "followed as good a man;" thus comparing Æneas to Hector, whom[210] Homer ever praises above all men, as the Philosopher witnesses in his Ethics, in what he writes to Nicomachus on habits to be avoided.
But, as for hereditary virtue, he was ennobled from all three continents both by his forefathers and his wives. From Asia came his immediate ancestor, Assaracus, and others who reigned in Phrygia, which is a part of Asia. Therefore Virgil writes in the third Æneid: "After that it had seemed good to Heaven to overthrow the power of Asia, and the guiltless race of Priam." From Europe came the male founder of his race, who was Dardanus; from Africa his grandmother Electra, daughter of the great king Atlas, to both which things the poet testifies in the eighth Æneid, where Æneas says to Evander: "Dardanus, the father of our city, and its founder, whom the Greeks call the son of Atlas and Electra, came to the race of Teucer—Electra, whose sire was great Atlas, on whose shoulders rests the circle of heaven." But in the third Æneid Virgil says that Dardanus drew his origin from Europe. "There is a land which the Greeks have named Hesperia, an ancient land, strong and wealthy, where the Ænotrians dwell; it is said that now their descendants have named the country Italy, from the name of their king. There is our rightful home; from that land did Dardanus come." That Atlas came from Africa, the mountain called by his name, which stands in that continent, bears witness; and Orosius says that it is in Africa in his description of the world, where he writes: "Its boundary is Mount Atlas, and the islands which are called 'the happy isles.'" "Its"—that is, "of Africa," of which he was speaking.[211]