Romæ antiquæ descriptio a view of the religion, laws, customs, manners, and dispositions of the ancient Romans, and others : comprehended in their most illustrious acts and sayings agreeable to history / written in Latine by ... Quintus Valerius Maximus ; and now carefully rendred into English ; together with the life of the author.

CHAP. III. Of Forraign Religion rejected.

• 1. By the Roman people.
• 2. P. Cornelius the Pretor.
• 3. Lucius Emilius Paulus▪

1. THe new Custom which was introduced among the Feasts of Bacchus, when it grew to Mad∣ness, was quite taken away. Lutatius, who finished the first Punick War, was forbid by the Senate to go to Preneste to consult Fortune; judging it meet that the Affairs of the Commonwealth should be gover∣ned by their own national Omens, and not those of Forraign Countries.

2. C. Cornelius Hispallus, a forraign Pretor, in the time that Popil••ius Laenas and M. Calpurnius were Consuls, by Edict commanded the Caldeans to depart out of Italy, who by their trivial tricks, and false in∣terpretations

of the Stars, cast a gainful Mist before their eyes.

3. The same person banished those who with a counterfeit worship of Iupiter Sabazius sought to cor∣rupt the Roman Customs.

Lucius Emilius Paulus the Consul, when the Senate had decreed that the Temples of Isis and Serapis should be destroyed, and that none of the Workmen durst lay hands upon the Work, laying his Consular habit aside, and taking a Hatchet, was the first that broke open the Gates.