to the licentious fury of the tribes of Germany and Scythia. The proclamation of Alaric when he forced his entrance into the vanquished city, discovered, however, some regard for the laws of humanity and religion. He encouraged his troops boldly to sieze the rewards of valour, and to enrich themselves with the spoils of a wealthy and effeminate people: but he exhorted them, at the same time, to spare the lives of the unresisting citizens, and to respect the churches of St. Peter and St. Paul, as holy and inviolable sanctuaries."

The Goths evacuated Rome on the sixth day and advanced into the southern provinces of Italy. After reigning in Italy above four years without control, they retreated in 412, to the south of France, where they established their kingdom, which they soon extended from the Rhone to the extremity of Spain.

66 THE THIRD OF THE EARTH' WAS BURNT UP.”

The Roman "earth" was divided, as we have seen, into three parts, one of which is burnt up, and accordingly one of them, the European third, is swept by a desolating tempest of war. For, the Visigoths and their allies traversed, occupied, and wasted, nearly forty years, Lower and Upper Mæsia, Thrace, Macedonia, Thessaly, Greece, Epirus, Illyricum, Pannonia, (all the countries south of the Danube to the Julian Alps) Italy, and the southern provinces of Gaul. The host, which issued from Germany under Radagaisus, devastated the provinces from the Danube to Florence; then Gaul and Spain. The Burgundians occupied the Burgundies. The Alemanni and other tribes. siezed Helvetia, Rhætia, and the countries reaching to the Danube. The Neustrian Franks were now pushing from the mouths of the Rhine through Belgium, towards the Loire; and the Austrasian Franks were seated between the Rhine and the Meuse. So that the whole of continental Europe, in its length and breadth, from Constantinople and the Black Sea to the Atlantic Ocean; from the Rhine and the Danube to Cape St. Angelo, and the extreme land of Italy and Spain was

1 The third part of the earth is not in the authorized version; but it is undoubtedly a part of the prophecy, and it is admitted into the text of the most correct editions of the Greek Testament.

traversed, occupied, and wasted by the barbarians of Germany and Scythia.

66 THE THIRD PART OF THE TREES WAS BURNT UP, AND ALL THE GREEN GRASS WAS BURNT UP."

Trees and grass represent, in symbolical language, the inhabitants of a country; and as trees are frequently put for the great and lofty, the grass will signify the inferior people.

As only a third of the trees is burnt, and all the green grass, it is a part of the prophecy, that these invasions, contrary to what usually happens, would be more fatal to the meaner people than to the wealthy. Let us see how history establishes and accounts for this fact.

The first barbaric invaders were inexperienced in the art of taking walled towns. Now, the wealthiest classes in Europe, usually living (as we shall have occasion to show) in cities, or being able to flee to fortified places on the approach of danger, would enjoy a greater measure of safety than the inferior people, who generally dwelt in the country, or if they fled to the towns, would perish with those of like condition, from want of the necessaries of life.

The following examples will show the comparative safety of those who lived in walled towns, and the extreme ignorance of the Goths, the most civilized of the barbarians, in conducting sieges.

When the Goths first revolted, they besieged Hadrianople, but they were soon obliged to raise the siege.

"The resistance of the garrison informed the barbarians, that in the attack of regular fortifications, the efforts of unskilful courage are seldom successful. Their general (Fritigern) acknowledged his error, raised the siege, declaring that he was at peace with stone walls, 3 and revenged his disappointment on the adjacent country."

1 Isaiah, ii. 13; x. 18; xl. 6, 7. When Alaric was threatened with an innumerable people, exercised in arms, "the thicker the hay, the easier it is mowed," was his reply.

2 Decline and Fall, c. xxvi. 3 Pacem sibi esse cum parietibus memorans.

After the battle of Hadrianople, they made a second and an equally unsuccessful attempt.

"The furious assault of the Goths was repulsed; their secret arts of treason and of treachery were discovered; and after an obstinate conflict of many hours, they retired to their tents, convinced by experience, that it would be far more advisable to observe the treaty which their sagacious leader had tacitly stipulated with the fortifications of great and populous cities. The tide of the Gothic inundation rolled from the walls of Hadrianople to the suburbs of Constantinople. The barbarians were surprised with the splendid appearance of the capital of the east, the height and extent of the walls, the myriads of affrighted and wealthy citizens who crowded the ramparts, and the various prospects of the sea and land. They gazed with hopeless desire on the inaccessible beauties of Constantinople."1

The emperor Honorius, surprised and nearly taken prisoner by the Gothic cavalry, was compelled to seek a temporary shelter within the fortifications of Asta. "The siege of an obscure place," says Gibbon, "which contained so rich a prize, and seemed incapable of a long resistance, was instantly formed and indefatigably pressed by the king of the Goths."2

But this obscure place baffled all the efforts of the Gothic army, until it was relieved by Stilicho.

Alaric in vain besieged Aquileia.

"The learned Rufinus, who was summoned by his enemies to appear before a Roman synod, wisely preferred the danger of a besieged city; and the barbarians who previously shook the walls of Aquileia, might save him from the cruel sentence of another heretic, who, at the request of the same bishops, was severely whipped and condemned to perpetual exile on a desert island."

But while the wealthy, who lived in cities, or could fly to places of refuge, were safe, the inhabitants of the country, as Gibbon writes in continuation, were "exposed to the undistinguishing blaze of war."

"The old man, who had passed his simple and innocent life in the neighbourhood of Verona, was a stranger to the quarrels both of kings

1 Decline and Fall, c. xxvi. p. 375. 2 Ib. xxx. vol. v. p. 45.

and of bishops; his pleasure, his desires, his knowledge, were confined within the little circle of his paternal farm, and a staff supported his aged steps, on the same ground where he had sported his infancy. Yet, even this humble and rustic felicity (which Claudian describes with so much truth and feeling) was still exposed to the undistinguishing blaze of war. His trees, his old contemporary trees, must blaze in the conflagration of the whole country; a detachment of Gothic cavalry might sweep away his cottage and his family; and the power of Alaric could destroy this happiness, which he was not able either to taste, or to bestow."1

The wealthy Romans had large estates in Sicily, in Africa, and in Asia, where many of them fled and found safety, for the first barbaric invaders could not cross the sea.

"The most timid," says Gibbon,2 "when Alaric invaded Italy, who had already embarked their valuable effects, meditated their escape to the island of Sicily or the African coast. . . The ample patrimonies which many senatorian families possessed in Africa, invited them, if they had time and prudence, to escape from the ruin of their country, to embrace the shelter of that hospitable province. The Italian fugitives were dispersed through the provinces, along the coast of Egypt and Asia, as far as Constantinople and Jerusalem."4

Alaric readily spared the inhabitants of a city, on the payment of a sufficient ransom; but the open country was uniformly devastated.

"As soon as the Athenians5 heard the voice of the Gothic herald, they were easily persuaded to deliver the greatest part of their wealth, as the ransom of the city of Minerva and of its inhabitants. The treaty was ratified by solemn oaths, and observed with mutual fidelity.

1 Decline and Fall, c. xxx.

2 Ib. xxx.

3 Ib. xxxi.

4 The Goths could not cross the sea. "No sooner," says Gibbon, "had Alaric reached the extreme land of Italy, than he was attracted by the neighbouring prospect of a fertile and peaceful island. Yet even the possession of Sicily he considered only as an immediate step to the important expedition which he meditated against the continent of Africa. As soon as the first division of the Goths embarked, a sudden tempest arose, which sunk or scattered many of the transports; their courage was daunted by the terrors of a new element; and the whole design was defeated by the premature death of Alaric, which fixed, after a short illness, the fatal term of his conquests."-Decline and Fall, c. xxxi.

5 Ib. vol. iv., c. xxx., p. 33.

But the whole territory of Attica, from the promontory of Sunium to the town of Megara, was blasted by his baleful presence."

Alaric besieged Rome three times, admitting it twice to terms of composition; the third time it was taken. The populace suffered greatly by famine and other casualties; it is, however, said, that when it was taken only one senator perished.

"The writers best disposed to exaggerate the clemency of the Goths have very freely confessed, that a cruel slaughter was made of the Romans, and that the streets of the city were filled with dead bodies, which remained without burial during the general consternation. Whatever might be the numbers of the equestrian or plebeian rank, who perished in the massacre of Rome, it is confidently affirmed, that only one senator lost his life by the sword of the enemy."

The Goths evacuated Rome on the sixth day. "At the head of an army encumbered with rich and weighty spoils, their intrepid leader advanced along the Appian way into the southern provinces of Italy, destroying whatever dared to oppose his passage, and contenting himself with the plunder of the unresisting country."

To recapitulate: The prophecy foretells that a third of the earth, all the grass, and a third of the trees would be burnt by a furious hail storm. It has been shown, that storms, represent invading armies that the earth is the provinces of the Roman empire from the Rhine to the Euphrates-that it was divided into three parts, Europe, Asia and Africa-that grass represents the inferior people, and trees, the rich and great: and it has been shown from history and in the chronological order of the prophecy, that the European third was devastated by barbariansthat the inferior people and the inhabitants of the open country were destroyed by famine, or the undistinguishing blaze of warwhile many of the rich dwelling in, or escaping to the cities, the islands, Africa, and Asia, enjoyed a comparative safety.

1 Decline and Fall, xxxi.