e
Emperor's generosity. He gladly received his son; but he took no steps
towards the restoration of those proofs of Parthian victory which
the Romans were so anxious to recover. It was not until B.C. 20, when
Octavian (now become Augustus) visited the East, and war seemed the
probable alternative if he continued obstinate, that the Parthian
monarch brought himself to relinquish the trophies which were as much
prized by the victors as the vanquished. In extenuation of his act we
must remember that he was unpopular with his subjects, and that Augustus
could at any moment have produced a pretender, who had once occupied,
and with Roman help might easily have mounted for a second time, the
throne of the Arsacidse.

The remaining years of Phraates--and he reigned for nearly twenty years
after restoring the standards--are almost unbroken by any event of
importance. The result of the twenty years' struggle between Rome and
Parthia had been to impress either nation with a wholesome dread of the
other. Both had triumphed on their own ground; both had failed when they
ventured on sending expeditions into the enemy's territory. Each now
stood on its guard, watching the movements of its adversary across
the Euphrates. Both had become pacific. It is a well-known fact that
Augustus left it as a principle of policy to his successors that the
Roman Empire had reached its proper limits, and could not with advantage
be extended further. This principle, followed with the utmost strictness
by Tiberius, was accepted as a rule by all the earlier Caesars, and
only regarded as admitting of rare and slight exceptions. Trajan was the
first who, a hundred and thirty years after the accession of Augustus,
made light of it and set it at defiance. With him re-awoke the spirit of
conquest, the aspiration after universal dominion. But in the meantime
there was peace--peace indeed not absolutely unbroken, for border wars
occurred, and Rome was tempted sometimes to interfere by arms in the
internal quarrels of her neighbors--but a general state of peace and
amity prevailed--neither state made any grand attack on the other's
dominions--no change occurred in the frontier, no great battle tested
the relative strength of the two peoples. Such rivalry as remained was
exhibited less in arms than in diplomacy and showed itself mainly in
endeavors on either side to obtain a predominant influence in Armenia.
There alone during the century and a half that interve