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conversation with an illustrious citizen of Narbonne; who afterwards, in
a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, related it to St. Jerom, in the presence
of the historian Orosius. "In the full confidence of valor and victory,
I once aspired (said Adolphus) to change the face of the universe; to
obliterate the name of Rome; to erect on its ruins the dominion of the
Goths; and to acquire, like Augustus, the immortal fame of the founder
of a new empire. By repeated experiments, I was gradually convinced,
that laws are essentially necessary to maintain and regulate a
well-constituted state; and that the fierce, untractable humor of the
Goths was incapable of bearing the salutary yoke of laws and civil
government. From that moment I proposed to myself a different object of
glory and ambition; and it is now my sincere wish that the gratitude of
future ages should acknowledge the merit of a stranger, who employed
the sword of the Goths, not to subvert, but to restore and maintain, the
prosperity of the Roman empire." With these pacific views, the successor
of Alaric suspended the operations of war; and seriously negotiated
with the Imperial court a treaty of friendship and alliance. It was the
interest of the ministers of Honorius, who were now released from
the obligation of their extravagant oath, to deliver Italy from the
intolerable weight of the Gothic powers; and they readily accepted their
service against the tyrants and Barbarians who infested the provinces
beyond the Alps. Adolphus, assuming the character of a Roman general,
directed his march from the extremity of Campania to the southern
provinces of Gaul. His troops, either by force of agreement, immediately
occupied the cities of Narbonne, Thoulouse, and Bordeaux; and though
they were repulsed by Count Boniface from the walls of Marseilles, they
soon extended their quarters from the Mediterranean to the Ocean. The
oppressed provincials might exclaim, that the miserable remnant, which
the enemy had spared, was cruelly ravished by their pretended allies;
yet some specious colors were not wanting to palliate, or justify the
violence of the Goths. The cities of Gaul, which they attacked, might
perhaps be considered as in a state of rebellion against the government
of Honorius: the articles of the treaty, or the secret instructions
of the court, might sometimes be alleged in favor of the seeming
usurpations of Adolphus; and the guilt of any irregular, unsuccessful
act of hosti