Etrnscans had invented a peculiar cut of dress which was widely different from the later Roman style, and which probably was in use at a time when their future conquerors had not yet adopted the toga, the principal article of their grand national costume. Figures i and 2 (,6/. 29) are illustrations of male and female Etruscan attire. Besides these, there were various other styles. Legendary history tells of their great pomp and of their gold-embroidered and gayly-colored dresses— luxuries which need not surprise us in a mercantile people. The Romans, whose political arrangements prevented capital, which has no country, from circulating freely, did not for a long time attain such a degree of splendor.
It is worthy of note that finely-woven transparent fabrics, such as we have found among the Egyptians (p. 123), were used also in truria. But it must remain uncertain whether they were acquired by commerce or were the domestic products of an art which the people had learned in their original home. The garments of the Etrnscans were always worn long, and indicate a certain effeminacy. The only thing they had in com mon with the Greeks and Romans was the custom of leaving the legs unprotected.
The early termination of their national existence interfered with the development of their culture in the various directions which their native talents and industry would scarcely have failed to take. It especially prevented them from leaving written records of their attainments, which would certainly have enlightened us in regard to much that is now utterly obscure. Even the few monumental inscriptions they have left us have not yet been deciphered. It is certain that they continued the pursuit of their industries under the Roman rule, and adhered to their traditional style even after that of the Greeks had become everywhere prevalent through the influence of the Romans.
Roman the Roman people, we must first of all declare ourselves opposed, from the standpoint of the History of Cul ture, to the generally received theory of historians, which has thus far never been disputed, and which represents the period of the Republic as one of glory and progress, and the period of the Empire as one of cor ruption and decay. Carried away by the barbarous virtues of the Repub lic, such as we find displayed neither before nor since in the same abso luteness, and dazzled all the more by these virtues because they enable us by analogy to fill up perceptible gaps in the early history of other nations, we fancy that nothing not equally imposing can be worthy of admiration.
But virtues are certainly to be judged less by the admiration they excite in posterity than by the sources from which they sprung, and particularly by the benefits they conferred upon the contemporary world.
Since the purpose of all history is culture, which in its essence is nothing but civilization (we need not now give a more philosophical defi nition of the term), surely we should give time domestic at least as high a rank as the public virtues, provided both are alike effective in their respective spheres and exist in equal measure. The latter have always the advantage of appearing on the stage of history and of being admired; but in order to estimate them rightly it is necessary to examine the foundations. The former rarely become public, and are never recognized unless genuine.
Unless we look for political merit alone, we need but read the letters of the Younger Pliny to be convinced that Rome in the second century A. D. was far superior as regards real culture to what it was two hundred years before our era. The genuine Roman spirit itself is found repre sented in a manner not inferior to the best times of the Republic. If this spirit does not appear upon the public stage, it is because it finds nothing to do there. Within its narrower fields it is none the less import ant, and it has besides the advantage of viewing events with far less prejudice and with a sharper intuition than it had previously been accus tomed to exhibit. The testimony of Tacitus himself is fully confirma tory of this.
The relation between husband and wife, which is always the test of the moral culture of a people, had at the time of Pliny (as we learn from his letters) become so pure and noble that in this respect the Romans far surpassed the Greeks, and the times of the emperors excelled those of the Republic. We are far from agreeing with that modern degeneracy of historical description which, among other attempts, seeks to palliate the crimes of Tiberius on the ground of custom. But the appearance of some of the corrupt emperors need not dismay us. We learn definitely from later writers that the mass of the people regarded them as objects of moral indignation and abhorrence rather than as models to be imitated. The better rulers among them deserve our admiration all the more because on the dizzy heights of absolute power upon which a Roman emperor stood his virtue must have been firmly rooted indeed if it were to remain unwavering.