The Historians' History of the World 04 [Greece to the Roman Conquest]

Here, forsooth, was the danger, lest he should more advantagiously choose his Ground to Encamp on, provide Victuals more carefully, prevent Surprizes and Stratagems more warily, know better when to venture a Battel, range his Army more Soldier-like, or strengthen it with Reserves and Recruits, better than any of those whom I have named knew how to do: Alas! in all these matters, he would have confess’d he had not to deal with a Darius, over whom, being attended with a vast Train of Women and Eunuchs, softened with wearing gold and Purple, and clogg’d with the superfluous Furniture of his luxurious Fortune, he did indeed obtain an unbloody Victory, meeting rather with a Booty than an Enemy, and had only this to boast of, That he durst handsomely contemn such an abundance of Vanity.

He would have had another kind of prospect in Italy than in India, through which he march’d at his ease with a drunken Army, Feasting and Revelling all the way: But here he must have met with the thick woody Forrest, and almost unpassable Streights of Apulia; the lofty Mountains of Lucania, and fresh Tokens of a late Defeat that happen’d to his own Name and Family, where his Uncle Alexander, King of the Epirotes, was hewn to pieces.

We speak hitherto of Alexander, not yet debauch’d with excess of good Fortune, wherein never any Man had less command of himself than he: But if we consider him in his new Habit, and that new Nature, (if I may call it so) which he took up after he had a while been flush’d with Victories, we may avow he would have come into Italy, more like a Darius than an Alexander, and brought with him a bastard Army, altogether degenerated from the Macedonian courage and manners, into the debauches and effeminacies of the Persians. I am asham’d, in so great a Monarch as he was, to relate his proud humors of changing so oft his Garb; his excessive vain-glory, in expecting that Men should adore him by casting themselves prostrate at his feet, when-ever they approached him; his barbarous Cruelties and Butcheries of his nearest Friends amongst his Cups and Banquets, and that ridiculous Vanity of forging a Divine Pedigree, and boasting himself the Son of Jupiter. Nay more, since his Drunkenness and Greediness of wine, his savage Passions and cholerick Phrensies did every day increase (I report nothing but what all Authors agree in), shall we not think that his Abilities, as a General, must quickly have decayed and been wonderfully impaired?

But here perhaps was the danger (which some little trifling Greeks who would cry up the glory even of the Parthians, to depress the Roman name, are often wont to alledge) That the People of Rome would never have been able to endure the very Majesty and dread of Alexanders Name (whom indeed I am apt to think they then scarce ever heard of:) Let us conceit as magnificently as may be of this Prince, yet still it will be but the Grandeur of one Man, acquir’d in little more than twelve Years continued Felicity; and whereas some extol it highly on his Account, That the Romans, though never worsted in any War, have yet been defeated in divers Battels, whereas Fortune was never wanting to Alexander in any one encounter, they do not consider that they are comparing the Exploits of one particular Man, and he too but a Youth, with the atchievements of a People that have now been involv’d in Wars eight hundred years.

Grecian Costume

(After Hope)

You ought rather to compare Man with Man, Captain with Captain, than the Fortune of one with the other. How many Roman Generals may I name, that never suffer’d a Repulse in their days? We can run over whole Pages in the Annals of our Magistrates, full of Consuls and Dictators, whose Success as well as Virtue, was such, as they never gave the Common-wealth so much as one days grief or discontentment. And that which makes them yet to be more admired than Alexander, or any other King in the World; some of them held their Office of Dictator not above ten or twenty days, and none the Consulship beyond a year: Their Levies were often obstructed by the Tribunes of the Commons, so that they set forth too late; and sometimes for holding the Court for Elections, they were sent for home too soon: In the hurry of Affairs the Year was apt to be wheel’d about, and then they must leave all to new Instruments; now the rashness, another time the dishonesty of a Colleague, was either a great hindrance to their Success, or perhaps occasion’d a mischief. Many times they succeeded after the defeat of their Predecessors, or receiv’d a raw and undisciplin’d Army: From all which inconveniences Kings are not only free, but absolute Masters both of their Enterprizes, and the times and means they will take to accomplish them, leading all things by their Councils, and not following them. Had therefore this unconquered Alexander been engaged against these unconquered Captains, he would have hazarded all those past pleasures of Fortunes favor; nay, in this the danger would have been greater, that the Macedonians had but one Alexander, and he not only obnoxious to many Casualties, but voluntarily exposing himself to frequent Dangers. But the Romans had many that were Alexanders equals, both for Glory and the grandeur of their Atchievements, each of whom, might according to his peculiar Fate, either live or dye, without at all endangering the Publick.