physical force.

[Sidenote: The fall of Rome.]

In the midst of these theological disputes occurred that great event
which I have designated as marking the close of the age of Inquiry. It
was the fall of Rome.

[Sidenote: Spread of the barbarians.]

[Sidenote: Capture and sack of Rome by Alaric.]

In the Eastern empire the Goths had become permanently settled, having
laws of their own, a magistracy of their own, paying no taxes, but
contributing 40,000 men to the army. The Visigoths were spreading
through Greece, Spain, Italy. In their devastations of the former
country, they had spared Athens, for the sake of her souvenirs. The
Eleusinian mysteries had ceased. From that day Greece never saw
prosperity again. Alaric entered Italy. Stilicho, the imperial general,
forced him to retreat. Rhadogast made his invasion. Stilicho compelled
him to surrender at discretion. The Burgundians and Vandals overflowed
Gaul; the Suevi, Vandals, and Alans overflowed Spain. Stilicho, a man
worthy of the old days of the republic, though a Goth, was murdered by
the emperor his master. Alaric appeared before Rome. It was 619 years
since she had felt the presence of a foreign enemy, and that was
Hannibal. She still contained 1780 senatorial palaces, the annual income
of some of the owners of which was 160,000_l._ The city was eighteen
miles in circumference, and contained above a million of people--of
people, as in old times clamorous for distributions of bread, and wine,
and oil. In its conscious despair, the apostate city, it is said, with
the consent of the pope, offered sacrifice to Jupiter, its repudiated,
and, as it now believed, its offended god. 200,000_l._, together with
many costly goods, were paid as a ransom. The barbarian general retired.
He was insulted by the emperor from his fastness at Ravenna.
Altercations and new marches ensued; and at last, for the third time,
Alaric appeared before Rome. At midnight on the 24th of April, A.D. 410,
eleven hundred and sixty-three years from the foundation of the city,
the Salarian gate was opened to him by the treachery of slaves; there
was no god to defend her in her dire extremity, and Rome was sacked by
the Goths.

[Sidenote: Accusations of the Pagans against the Christians.]

Has the Eternal City really fallen! was the universal exclamation
throughout the empire when it became known that Alaric had taken Rome.
Though paganism had been ruined in a national sense, the true Roman