of theſe ſort of Robbers; when either by the Troubles of particular Times, or the Neglect of Governments, they are not cruſh’d before they gather Strength.
It has been the Caſe heretofore, that when a ſingle Pyrate has been ſuffered to range the Seas, as not being worth the Notice of a Government, he has by Degrees grown ſo powerful, as to put them to the Expence of a great deal of Blood and Treaſure, before he was ſuppreſs’d. We ſhall not examine how it came to paſs, that our Pyrates in the Weſt-Indies have continually increaſed till of late; this is an Enquiry which belongs to the Legiſlature, or Repreſentatives of the People in Parliament, and to them we ſhall leave it.
Our Buſineſs ſhall be briefly to ſhew, what from Beginnings, as inconſiderable as theſe, other Nations have ſuffered.
In the Times of Marius and Sylla, Rome was in her greateſt Strength, yet ſhe was ſo torn in Pieces by the Factions of thoſe two great Men, that every Thing which concerned the publick Good was altogether neglected, when certain Pyrates broke out from Cicilia, a Country of Aſia Minor, ſituate on the Coaſt of the Mediteranean, betwixt Syria on the Eaſt, from whence it is divided by Mount Tauris, and Armenia Minor on the Weſt. This Beginning was mean and inconſiderable, having but two or three Ships, and a few Men, with which they cruiſed about the Greek Iſlands, taking ſuch Ships as were very ill arm’d or weakly defended; however, by the taking of many Prizes, they ſoon increaſed in Wealth and Power: The firſt Action of their’s which made a Noiſe, was the taking of Julius Cæſar, who was as yet a Youth, and who being obliged to fly from the Cruelties of Sylla, who ſought his Life, went into Bithinia, and ſojourned 2 while with Nicomedes, King of that Country; in his Return back
