POMPEY. By THOMAS KERCHEVER ARNOLD.

[Known as Cneius Pompeius Magnus (or the Great), born 106 B.C., assassinated in Egypt by one of his own officers in 48. Best known as the most formidable rival of Julius Cæsar; his career was eminently fortunate till he sunk before the ascendancy of a greater man. He achieved brilliant victories for Rome, and was honored with three triumphs. Pompey was identified in the factional wars of Italy, with the party led by Sulla. He finally became triumvir in the division of power with Cæsar and Crassus. In the civil war which ensued Pompey was defeated by Cæsar at the battle of Pharsalia in Thessaly. After this defeat he fled to Egypt, where, as he was leaving the boat for the shore, he was stabbed in the back.]

The tears shed for Pompey were not only those of domestic infliction; his fate called forth a more general and honorable mourning. No man had ever gained at so early an age the affections of his countrymen; none had enjoyed them so largely, or preserved them so long with so little interruption; and at the distance of eighteen centuries the feeling of his contemporaries may be sanctioned by the sober judgment of history.

He entered upon life as a distinguished member of an oppressed party, which was just arriving at its hour of triumph and retaliation; he saw his associates plunged into rapine and massacre, but he preserved himself pure from the contagion of their crimes; and when the death of Sylla left him almost at the head of the aristocratical party, he served them ably and faithfully with his sword, while he endeavored to mitigate the evils of their ascendancy by restoring to the commons of Rome, on the earliest opportunity, the most important of those privileges and liberties which they had lost under the tyranny of their late master.

He received the due reward of his honest patriotism in the unusual honors and trusts that were conferred on him; but his greatness could not corrupt his virtue; and the boundless powers with which he was repeatedly invested he wielded with the highest ability and uprightness to the accomplishment of his task, and then, without any undue attempts to prolong their duration, he honestly resigned them. At a period of general cruelty and extortion toward the enemies and subjects of the commonwealth, the character of Pompey in his foreign commands was marked by its humanity and spotless integrity.

His conquest of the pirates was effected with wonderful rapidity, and cemented by a merciful policy, which, instead of taking vengeance for the past, accomplished the prevention of evil for the future. His presence in Asia, when he conducted the war with Mithridates, was no less a relief to the provinces from the tyranny of their governors, than it was their protection against the arms of the enemy. It is true that wounded vanity led him, after his return from Asia, to unite himself for a time with some unworthy associates; and this connection, as it ultimately led to all his misfortunes, so did it immediately tempt him to the worst faults of his political life, and involved him in a career of difficulty, mortification, and shame.

But after this disgraceful fall, he again returned to his natural station, and was universally regarded as the fit protector of the laws and liberties of his country when they were threatened by Cæsar’s rebellion. In the conduct of the civil war he showed something of weakness and vacillation; but his abilities, though considerable, were far from being equal to those of his adversary. His inferiority was most seen in that want of steadiness in the pursuit of his own plans which caused him to abandon a system already sanctioned by success, and to persuade himself that he might yield with propriety to the ill-judged impatience of his followers for battle.

His death is one of the few tragical events of those times which may be regarded with unmixed compassion. It was not accompanied, like that of Cato and Brutus, with the rashness and despair of suicide; nor can it be regarded like that of Cæsar, as the punishment of crimes, unlawfully inflicted, indeed, yet suffered deservedly. With a character of rare purity and tenderness in his domestic relations, he was slaughtered before the eyes of his wife and son; while flying from the ruin of a most just cause he was murdered by those whose kindness he was entitled to claim.

His virtues have not been transmitted to posterity with their deserved fame; and while the violent republican writers have exalted the memory of Cato and Brutus; while the lovers of literature have extolled Cicero; and the admirers of successful ability have lavished their praises on Cæsar; Pompey’s many and rare merits have been forgotten in the faults of his triumvirate, and in the weakness of temper which he displayed in conduct of the last campaign.

But he must have been in no ordinary degree good and amiable for whom his countrymen professed their enthusiastic love, unrestrained by servility and unimpelled by faction; and though the events of his life must now be gathered for the most part from unfriendly sources, yet we think that they who read them impartially will continually cherish his memory with a warmer regard.