The Two Republics, or Rome and the United States of America

CARACALLA AND GETA

A little more than a year afterward, Caracalla murdered Geta in his mother’s arms, who in the struggle to protect him, was wounded in the hand and covered with blood: and immediately following, “under the vague appellation of the friends of Geta, above twenty thousand persons of both sexes suffered death.” This, however, was but the beginning; for “Caracalla was the common enemy of mankind.” He left the city of Rome in A. D. 213, and spent the rest of his reign, about four years, in the several provinces of the empire, particularly those of the East, “and every province was by turn the scene of his rapine and cruelty.”—Gibbon. ¹² The senators were compelled to accompany him wherever he went and to furnish daily entertainment at immense expense, which he gave over to his soldiers. They were likewise required to build in every city where he would come, magnificent palaces and splendid theaters which he would either not visit at all or else visit and order at once to be torn down. TTR 126.2

The property of the most wealthy was confiscated at once, while that of the great mass of the people was taken under the form of taxes heavily increased. In the city of Alexandria in Egypt, simply because they had indulged in a bit of raillery at his expense, he took his station on top of the temple of Serapis, and commanded a general massacre of the citizens, which he directed and enjoyed from his elevated station. Thousands upon thousands of people were thus inhumanly slaughtered. And these are but parts of his wicked ways. Yet Caracalla is not numbered among the persecutors of the Christians, nor did he, in fact, molest the Christians as such. Yet it would be difficult to find an emperor, from Nero to Diocletian, who caused as much suffering to the Christians, as Caracalla did to almost everybody but the Christians. It would not be correct, however, to suppose that the Christians were exempt from his ravages: they of course shared the common lot in his desperate attentions. TTR 127.1

The next in the list of the “Ten Persecutors” is— TTR 127.2