[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

the redoubtable Parthian kingdom, and in Gaul, Caesar would
l82 THE PROBLEM OF HISTORY
have to face the fierce-fighting barbarians of the North. With luck,
both would end in disaster, since neither was a trained military
man. As for Pompey, since Spain was quiet, he could stay in Italy
and control the government. Who could ask for more?
It might almost seem that if Pompey reasoned this way, his old
nose for victory had returned. By 53 B.C., Crassus' army was de-
stroyed by the Parthians east of Syria and Crassus himself was
killed.
But Caesar? No, Pompey's luck had not returned. To the as-
tonishment of everyone in Rome, Caesar, who, until then, had
seemed to be nothing but a playboy and intriguer, turned out, in
middle age (he was forty-four when he went to Gaul), to be a
first-class military genius. He spent five years fighting the Gauls,
annexing the vast territory they inhabited, conducting successful
forays into Germany and Britain. He wrote up his adventures in
his Commentaries for the Roman reading public, and suddenly
Rome had a new military hero.  And Pompey, sitting in Italy,
doing nothing, was nearly dead of frustration and envy.
In 54 B.C., though, Julia died, and Pompey was no longer held
back in his animus against Caesar. The senatorial aristocrats, now
far more afraid of Caesar than of Pompey, flattered the latter,
who promptly joined them and married a new wife, the daughter
of one of the leading senators.
When Caesar returned from Gaul in 50 B.C., the Senate ordered
him to disband his armies and enter Italy alone. It was clear that
if Caesar did so, he would be arrested and probably executed.
What, then, if he defied the Senate and brought his army with
him?
"Fear not," said Pompey, confidently, "I have but to stamp my
foot upon the ground and legions will rise up to support us."
In 40 B.C, Caesar crossed the Rubicon River, which represented
the boundary of Italy, and did so with his army. Pompey promptly
stamped his foot and nothing happened. Indeed, those soldiers
stationed in Italy began to flock to Caesar's standards. Pompey
and his senatorial allies were forced to flee, in humiliation, to
Greece.
POMPEY AND CIRCUMSTANCE 183
Grimly, Caesar and his army followed them.
In Greece, Pompey managed to collect a sizable army. Caesar,
on the other hand, could only bring so many men across the sea
and so Pompey now had the edge. He might have taken advantage
of his superior numbers to cut Caesar off from his base and then
stalk him carefully, without risking battle, and slowly wear him
down and starve him out.
Against this was the fact that the humiliated Pompey, still
dreaming of the old days, was dying to defeat Caesar in open
battle and show him the worth of a real general. Worse yet, the
senatorial party insisted on a battle. So Pompey let himself be
talked into one; after all, he outnumbered Caesar two to one.
The battle was fought at Pharsalus in Thessaly on June 29,
48 B.C.
Pompey was counting on his cavalry in particular, a cavalry con-
sisting of gallant young Roman aristocrats. Sure enough, at the
start of the battle, Pompey's cavalry charged round the flank of
Caesar's army and might well have wreaked havoc from the rear
and cost Caesar the battle. Caesar, however, had foreseen this
and had placed some picked men to meet the cavalry, with in-
structions not to throw their lances but to use them to poke di-
rectly at the faces of the horsemen. He felt that the aristocrats
would not stand up to the danger of being disfigured and he was
right. The cavalry broke.
With Pompey's cavalry out, Caesar's hardened infantry broke
through the more numerous but much softer Pompeian line and
Pompey, unused to handling armies in trouble, fled. In one blow,
his entire military reputation was destroyed and it was quite clear
that it was Caesar, not Pompey, who was the real general.
Pompey fled to the one Mediterranean land that was not yet
entirely under Roman control Egypt. But Egypt was in the
midst of a civil war at the time. The boy-king, thirteen-year-old
Ptolemy XII, was fighting against his older sister, Cleopatra, and
the approach of Pompey created a problem. The politicians sup-
porting young Ptolemy dared not turn Pompey away and earn
the undying enmity of a Roman general who might yet win out.
184 THE PROBLEM OF HISTORY
On the other hand, they dared not give him refuge and risk having
Caesar support Cleopatra in revenge.
So they let Pompey land and assassinated him.
And that was the end of Pompey, at the age of fifty-six.
Up to the age of forty-two he had been uniformly successful;
nothing he tried to do failed. After the age of forty-two he had
been uniformly unsuccessful; nothing he tried to do succeeded.
What happened at the age of forty-two? What circumstance
took place in the interval represented earlier in the article by the
line of asterisks that might "explain" this. Well, let's go back and
fill in that line of asterisks.
We are back in 64 B.C.
Pompey is in Jerusalem, curious about the queer religion of the
Jews. What odd things do they do besides celebrate a Sabbath?
He began collecting information.
There was the Temple, for instance. It was rather small and
unimpressive by Roman standards but was venerated without
limit by the Jews and differed from all other temples in the world
by having no statue of a god or goddess inside. It seemed the Jews
worshiped an invisible god.
"Really?" said the amused Pompey.
Actually, he was told, there was an innermost chamber in the
Temple, the Holy of Holies, behind a veil. No one could ever go
beyond the veil but the high priest, and he could only do so on [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]