Romer

“ It is useless to object that a powerful ambitious man of the Romer mould, contending Atlas-like under a weight of enormous schemes, was not one to harbour such long-lingering rancour against a mere Pariah. ”

“ My opinion of my whole experience varies from time to time. In broad daylight, and at most seasons I am apt to think the greater part of it a mere dream; but sometimes in the autumn, about two in the morning when the winds and animals howl dismally, there comes from inconceivable depths below a damnable suggestion of rhythmical throbbing . . . and I feel that the transition of Juan Romero was a terrible one indeed. ”

“ And Romulus, making a vow to Jupiter, if he should conquer, to carry, himself, and dedicate his adversary's armor to his honor, overcame him in combat, and, a battle ensuing, routed his army also, and then took his city; but did those he found in it no injury, only commanded them to demolish the place and attend him to Rome, there to be admitted to all the privileges of citizens. And indeed there was nothing did more advance the greatness of Rome, than that she did always unite and incorporate those whom she conquered into herself. ”

“ Not a clod must be allowed to lie without the furrow. When the plough reached the different spots at which the gates of the city were to stand, it was carefully lifted over the spaces.
As he guided the plough, Romulus cried to his gods that his city might become strong and endure, and ever grow more powerful in the great world.
Out of a clear sky thunder crashed, lightning flashed over the hills as Romulus uttered his petitions, and the people believed that the storm was the answer of the god Jupiter to the prayers of their king. ”

“ And that this increase might not be altogether empty walls without men, Romulus set up a sanctuary, to which were gathered a great multitude of men from the nations round about. All that were discontented and lovers of novelty came to him. Nor did he take any account of their condition, whether they were bond or free, but received them all. Thus was there added to the city great strength. And the King when he judged that there was strength sufficient, was minded to add to the strength counsel. Wherefore he chose a hundred men for counsellors. ”

“ When the twins, Romulus and Remus, reached manhood, they killed Amulius and restored their grandfather to his kingdom. With other young men from Alba Longa, they then set forth to build a new city on the Palatine, where they had been rescued. As they scanned the sky to learn the will of the gods, six vultures, birds of Jupiter, appeared to Remus; but twelve were seen by Romulus. So Romulus marked out the boundary of the city on the Palatine, and Remus, who in derision leaped over the half-finished wall, he slew in anger. Romulus thus became the sole founder of Rome and its first king. ”

“ The city of Romulus, however, became in the end the queen and mistress of the world. It rose to so exalted a position of influence and power, and retained its ascendency so long, that now for twenty centuries every civilized nation in the western world have felt a strong interest in every thing pertaining to its history, and have been accustomed to look back with special curiosity to the circumstances of its origin. ”

“ The positions in which Remus and Romulus stood in respect to each other, and the feelings which were naturally awakened in their hearts by the circumstances in which they found themselves placed, were such as did not tend to allay any rising asperity which accident might occasion, but rather to irritate and inflame it. In the first place, they were both ardent, impulsive, and imperious. Each was conscious of his strength, and eager to exercise it. ”

“ ROMIERO.
I hear your voices murm'ring in mine ear
Confused and dismal. Words I comprehend not.
What have I done? Some dreadful thing, I fear.
It is delusion this! she is not slain:
Some horrible delusion.
ZORADA (aside to Sebastian) .
Fly, fly, dear father, while he is so wild.
He will not know and will not follow thee.
SEBASTIAN.
No, dearest child! let death come when it will,
I'll now receive it thankfully. Romiero,
Thou wretched murd'rer of thy spotless wife—
Romiero de Cardona !
ROMIERO.
Who is it calls me with that bitter voice? ”

“ What commencement of a political constitution can we conceive more brilliant, or more universally known, than the foundation of Rome by the hand of Romulus? And he was the son of Mars: for we may grant this much to the common report existing among men, especially as it is not merely ancient, but one also which has been wisely maintained by our ancestors, in order that those who have done great service to communities may enjoy the reputation of having received from the Gods, not only their genius, but their very birth. ”

“ Romulus faithfully fulfilled the vow which he had made to Jupiter. On the return of the army to Rome, the soldiers, by his directions, cut down a small oak-tree, and trimming the branches at the top, and shortening them as much as was necessary for the purpose, they hung the weapons and armor of Acron upon it, and marched with it thus, in triumph into the city. ”

“ King Numitor was no ungrateful monarch, and he assigned to his grandsons, while yet alive, all the lands beside the Tiber, and here the brothers determined to build a city and to found a kingdom.
And now there came a sharp division between Romulus and Remus. They were of like age, strength, and courage, and of a like high spirit that ill brooked any kind of control. Both wanted to rule, neither was willing to obey; each of the twins was ambitious to be king in the new city, and to call it after his own name. ”

“ As he said these words, Romulus and Remus came forward, and the vast assembly, after gazing for a moment in silent wonder upon their tall and graceful forms, in which they saw combined athletic strength and vigor with manly beauty, they burst into long and loud acclamations. As soon as the applause had in some measure subsided, Romulus and Remus turned to their grandfather and hailed him king. The people responded to this announcement with new plaudits, and Numitor was universally recognized as the rightful sovereign. ”

“ These were the principal events at home and in the field that marked the reign of Romulus. Throughout - whether we consider the courage he showed in recovering his ancestral throne, or the wisdom he displayed in founding the City and adding to its strength through war and peace alike - we find nothing incompatible with the belief in his divine origin and his admission to divine immortality after death. It was, in fact, through the strength given by him that the City was powerful enough to enjoy an assured peace for forty years after his departure. ”

“ The city of refuge was soon crowded, and many of these rough and criminal folk were then sent to Rome, until Romulus had as many subjects as he wished.
But there were no women among those who fled to the king for protection, and Romulus saw that he would have to find wives for his new subjects.
So he begged the neighbouring tribes, among which was a tribe called the Sabines, to allow their daughters to marry his new subjects. But the king’s request was refused. Give their daughters to robbers and murderers, to men who had been outlawed! ”

“ We think we have penetrated sufficiently far into the mythical, misty and doubtful, if we say that Romulus founded Rome, and then proceed to investigate the wars with the Etruscans, Sabines and Latins, and merely leave Romulus poised in the ether of the past, like the turtle in space upon which Atlas stands to hold the world. ”

“ Paul, which is the more credible, since this hill, though situated in an otherwise unhealthy district, has an extremely fine air: a very important point in investigations respecting the ancient Latin towns, for it may be taken for certain that where the air is now healthy it was so in those times also, and that where it is now decidedly unhealthy, it was anciently no better. The legend now goes on to say that a dispute arose between Romulus and Remus as to which of them should give the name to the town, and also as to where it was to be built. ”

“ The courtiers took the matter of the enlightenment of their prince in hand. They began to hint at things, to sow suspicions, to raise subjects for inquiry. Did the count know anything of this man, anything of his parentage or antecedents? The count knew only that Romée was a man noble in heart and mind, his trusted counsellor and esteemed friend.
No seed grows so quickly as the seed of doubt. No hint but gains strength by repetition. ”

“ The most unequivocal distinctness and directness in giving its responses is a very essential requisite in any tribunal that is called upon as an umpire, to settle disputes; while the ancient auguries and oracles were always susceptible of a great variety of interpretations. When Remus and Romulus commenced their watch no vultures were to be seen from either hill. They waited till evening, still none appeared. They continued to watch through the night. In the morning a messenger came over from the Palatine hill to Remus on the Aventine, informing him that vultures had appeared to Romulus. ”

“ Difficulty of immediately organizing such a community.
However this may have been, it is certain that Romulus, in the course of his reign, laid the foundation of the future greatness and glory of Rome, by the energy with which he acted in introducing order, system, and discipline [Pg 240] into the community which he found gathered around him. He seems to have had the sagacity to perceive from the outset that the great evil and danger which he had to fear was the prevalence of the spirit of disorder and misrule among his followers. ”

“ A temple was raised to him, and a regular priest, called Flamen Quirinalis, was appointed to offer him sacrifices. Romulus was ranked by the Romans among the 12 great gods, and it is not to be wondered that he received such distinguished honours, when the Romans considered him as the founder of their city and empire, and the son of the god of war. He is generally represented like his father, so much that it is difficult to distinguish them. The fable of the two children of Rhea Sylvia being nourished by a she-wolf, arose from Lupa, Faustulus’s wife, having brought them up. ”

“ Calvo, the last of the older men who had been fathers of the people when Romulus founded the city, began to wonder if at last the downfall of the chief was near. He could not see how one man could make peace between the factions, or how he could dominate them by his single will. But it was never the way of the veteran pontiff to talk, when talk would do no good, and he waited to learn what Romulus would do. ”

“ For the moment I was aware that this spot or that, though it looked so improbable, was the scene of deeds which will reverberate forever; they taught me to be tolerant of what I had too lightly supposed fables as serious traditions closely verging on facts. I learned to believe again that the wolf suckled Romulus and Remus, because she had her den no great way off on the Palatine, and that Romulus himself had really lived, since he had died and was buried in the Forum, where they showed me his tomb, or as much of it as I could imagine in the sullen little cellar so called. ”

“ Among the Romans, the conviction prevailed that Romulus, the founder of Rome, had been born of a maiden ravished by a god; that he had been wonderfully preserved alive, rescued from the floods, and suckled by a she-wolf. The ancient date of this poetry cannot be doubted. But did the legend at all times call Romulus the son of Rea Silvia, or of Ilia? Perizonius has first remarked against Ryckius, that Rea Ilia never occurred in combination; that Rea Silvia was the daughter of Numitor, Ilia of Æneas. He is perfectly right. ”

“ And this circumstance was the more to be admired in the case of Romulus because most of the great men that have been deified were so exalted to celestial dignities by the people, in periods very little enlightened, when fiction was easy and ignorance went hand-in-hand with credulity. But with respect to Romulus, we know that he lived less than six centuries ago, at a time when science and literature were already advanced, and had got rid of many of the ancient errors that had prevailed among less civilized peoples. ”

“ In their very infancy, the size and beauty of their bodies intimated their natural superiority; and when they grew up, they both proved brave and manly, attempting all enterprises that seemed hazardous, and showing in them a courage altogether undaunted. But Romulus seemed rather to act by counsel, and to show the sagacity of a statesman, and in all his dealings with their neighbors, whether relating to feeding of flocks or to hunting, gave the idea of being born rather to rule than to obey. ”

“ Carter, better read in Roman history than in hagiology, concluded him to be the “Saint who built Rome and killed his brother.”
Quirinius was the name of the Roman governor whom St. Luke called in Greek Κυρήνιος, and our translators render Cyrenius.
The name of Romulus is thought by many to have been a mere myth made out of that of his city Roma, a word that probably signified strength, and was no inappropriate title for that empire of iron. Ῥώμη is the Greek word for strength; the same root is found in the Latin robur, and it may be in the Teutonic ruhm (fame) . ”

“ Like all the greater works of its writer, it is a study of the heart. And in Romola the subtle wit of Italy is displayed, with curious variety of power, by a writer who had shown herself mistress, long before, of the blunter English humour.
But such a success as that of Romola—the success of an historical novelist for whom history is alive and is not a mere tradition, mere decorative background—is hardly to be made more than once. ”