activity of
Hadrian was not less remarkable when compared with the gentle repose of
Antoninus Pius. The life of the former was almost a perpetual journey;
and as he possessed the various talents of the soldier, the statesman,
and the scholar, he gratified his curiosity in the discharge of his
duty. Careless of the difference of seasons and of climates, he marched
on foot, and bare-headed, over the snows of Caledonia, and the sultry
plains of the Upper Egypt; nor was there a province of the empire which,
in the course of his reign, was not honored with the presence of the
monarch. But the tranquil life of Antoninus Pius was spent in the bosom
of Italy, and, during the twenty-three years that he directed the public
administration, the longest journeys of that amiable prince extended no
farther than from his palace in Rome to the retirement of his Lanuvian
villa.

Notwithstanding this difference in their personal conduct, the general
system of Augustus was equally adopted and uniformly pursued by Hadrian
and by the two Antonines. They persisted in the design of maintaining
the dignity of the empire, without attempting to enlarge its limits. By
every honorable expedient they invited the friendship of the barbarians;
and endeavored to convince mankind that the Roman power, raised above
the temptation of conquest, was actuated only by the love of order
and justice. During a long period of forty-three years, their virtuous
labors were crowned with success; and if we except a few slight
hostilities, that served to exercise the legions of the frontier,
the reigns of Hadrian and Antoninus Pius offer the fair prospect of
universal peace. The Roman name was revered among the most remote
nations of the earth. The fiercest barbarians frequently submitted their
differences to the arbitration of the emperor; and we are informed by a
contemporary historian that he had seen ambassadors who were refused
the honor which they came to solicit of being admitted into the rank of
subjects.

The terror of the Roman arms added weight and dignity to the moderation
of the emperors. They preserved peace by a constant preparation for war;
and while justice regulated their conduct, they announced to the nations
on their confines, that they were as little disposed to endure, as to
offer an injury. The military strength, which it had been sufficient
for Hadrian and the elder Antoninus to display, was exerted against the
Parthians and the Germans by th