Passion, Interest, Or Caprice, Suggested Daily Motives

It Was [totila's] Constant Theme, That National Vice And Ruin Are Inseparably Connected; That Victory Is The Fruit Of Moral As Well As Military Virtue; And That The Prince, And Even The People, Are Responsible For The Crimes Which They Neglect To Punish.

Metellus Numidicus, The Censor, Acknowledged To The Roman People, In A Public Oration, That Had Kind Nature Allowed Us To Exist Without The Help Of Women, We Should Be Delivered From A Very Troublesome Companion; And He Could Recommend Matrimony Only As The Sacrifice Of Private Pleasure To Public Duty.

Whatever Evils Either Reason Or Declamation Have Imputed To Extensive Empire, The Power Of Rome Was Attended With Some Beneficial Consequences To Mankind; And The Same Freedom Of Intercourse Which Extended The Vices, Diffused Likewise The Improvements Of Social Life.

The Possession And The Enjoyment Of Property Are The Pledges Which Bind A Civilised People To An Improved Country.

But [the Arabs'] Friendship Was Venal, Their Faith Inconstant, Their Enmity Capricious: It Was An Easier Task To Excite Than To Disarm These Roving Barbarians; And, In The Familiar Intercourse Of War, They Learned To See, And To Despise, The Splendid Weakness Both Of Rome And Of Persia.