aking
became every day more difficult, the event more doubtful, and the
possession more precarious and less beneficial. The experience of
Augustus added weight to these salutary reflections, and effectually
convinced him that, by the prudent vigor of his counsels, it would be
easy to secure every concession which the safety or the dignity of Rome
might require from the most formidable barbarians. Instead of exposing
his person and his legions to the arrows of the Parthians, he obtained,
by an honorable treaty, the restitution of the standards and prisoners
which had been taken in the defeat of Crassus.

His generals, in the early part of his reign, attempted the reduction of
AEthiopia and Arabia Felix. They marched near a thousand miles to the
south of the tropic; but the heat of the climate soon repelled the
invaders, and protected the unwarlike natives of those sequestered
regions. The northern countries of Europe scarcely deserved the expense
and labor of conquest. The forests and morasses of Germany were filled
with a hardy race of barbarians, who despised life when it was separated
from freedom; and though, on the first attack, they seemed to yield to
the weight of the Roman power, they soon, by a signal act of despair,
regained their independence, and reminded Augustus of the vicissitude of
fortune. On the death of that emperor, his testament was publicly read
in the senate. He bequeathed, as a valuable legacy to his successors,
the advice of confining the empire within those limits which nature
seemed to have placed as its permanent bulwarks and boundaries: on the
west the Atlantic Ocean; the Rhine and Danube on the north; the
Euphrates on the east; and towards the south, the sandy deserts of
Arabia and Africa.

Happily for the repose of mankind, the moderate system recommended by
the wisdom of Augustus was adopted by the fears and vices of his
immediate successors. Engaged in the pursuit of pleasure, or in the
exercise of tyranny, the first Caesars seldom showed themselves to the
armies or to the provinces; nor were they disposed to suffer that those
triumphs which _their_ indolence neglected should be usurped by the
conduct and valor of their lieutenants. The military fame of a subject
was considered as an insolent invasion of the imperial prerogative; and
it became the duty, as well as interest, of every Roman general to guard
the frontiers intrusted to his care, without aspiring to conquests
which might hav