manners liberal and affable. In him the love of pleasure was corrected by a sense of dignity, nor had the habits of ease deprived him of a capacity for business. The mind of Maximus was formed in a rougher mould. By his valour and abilities he had raised himself from the meanest origin to the first employments of the state and army. His victories over the Sarmatians and the Germans, the austerity of his life, and the rigid impartiality of his justice, whilst he was prefect of the city, commanded the esteem of a people, whose affections were engaged in favour of the more amiable Balbinus. The two colleagues had both been consuls (Balbinus had twice enjoyed that honourable office), both had been named among the twenty lieutenants of the senate; and, since the one was sixty, and the other seventyfour years old, they had both attained the full maturity of age and experience.

*

After the senate had conferred on Maximus and Balbinus an equal portion of the consular and tribunitian power, the title of fathers of their country, and the joint office of supreme pontiff, they ascended to the Capitol, to return thanks to the gods, protectors of Rome. The solemn rites of sacrifice were disturbed by a sedition of the people. The licentious multitude neither loved the rigid Maximus, nor did they sufficiently fear the mild and humane Balbinus. Their increasing numbers surrounded the temple of Jupiter; with obstinate clamours they asserted their inherent right of consenting to the election of their sovereign; and demanded, with an apparent moderation, that, besides the two emperors chosen by the senate, a third should be added, of Greek historian. Balbus obtained the freedom of Rome by the favour of Pompey, and preserved it by the eloquence of Cicero (see Orat. pro Cornel. Balbo). The friendship of Cæsar (to whom he rendered the most important secret services in the civil war) raised him to the consulship and the pontificate, honours never yet possessed by a stranger. The nephew of this Balbus triumphed over the Garamantes. See Dictionnaire de Bayle, au mot Balbus, where he distinguishes the several persons of that name, and rectifies, with his usual accuracy, the mistakes of former writers concerning them. * Zonaras, 1. 12, p. 622. But little dependence is to he had on the authority of a modern Greek, so grossly ignorant of the history of the third century, that he creates several imaginary emperors, and confounds those who really existed. Herodian, 1. 7, p. 256, supposes that the senate was at first convoked in the Capitol, and is very eloquent on the occasion. The Augustan History (p. 116) seems much more authentic.

the family of the Gordians, as a just return of gratitude to those princes who had sacrificed their lives for the republic. At the head of the city-guards, and the youths of the equestrian order, Maximus and Balbinus attempted to cut their way through the seditious multitude. The multitude, armed with sticks and stones, drove them back into the Capitol. It is prudent to yield when the contest, whatever be the issue of it, must be fatal to both parties. A boy, only thirteen years of age, the grandson of the elder, and nephew of the younger, Gordian, was produced to the people, invested with the ornaments and title of Cæsar. The tumult was appeased by this easy condescension; and the two emperors, as soon as they had been peaceably acknowledged in Rome, prepared to defend Italy against

may

the common enemy,

Whilst in Rome and Africa revolutions succeeded each other with such amazing rapidity, the mind of Maximin was agitated by the most furious passions. He is said to have received the news of the rebellion of the Gordians, and of the decree of the senate against him, not with the temper of a man, but the rage of a wild beast; which, as it could not discharge itself on the distant senate, threatened the life of his son, of his friends, and of all who ventured to approach his person. The grateful intelligence of the death of the Gordians was quickly followed by the assurance that the senate, laying aside all hopes of pardon or accommodation, had substituted in their room two emperors, with whose merit he could not be unacquainted. Revenge was the only consolation left to Maximin, and revenge could only be obtained by arms. The strength of the legions had been assembled by Alexander from all parts of the empire. Three successful campaigns against the Germans and the Sarmatians, had raised their fame, confirmed their discipline, and even increased their numbers, by filling the ranks with the flower of the barbarian youth. The life of Maximin had been spent in war, and the candid severity of history cannot refuse him the valour of a soldier, or even the abilities of an experienced general.† It might naturally be expected, that

* Some say that he was a son of the younger Gordian.-GUIZOT. + In Herodian, 1. 7, p. 249, and in the Augustan History, we have three several orations of Maximin to his army, on the rebellion of Africa and Rome. M. de Tillemont has very justly observed, that

a prince of such a character, instead of suffering the rebellion to gain stability by delay, should immediately have marched from the banks of the Danube to those of the Tyber; and that his victorious army, instigated by contempt for the senate, and eager to gather the spoils of Italy, should have burned with impatience to finish the easy and lucrative conquest. Yet, as far as we can trust to the obscure chronology of that period,* it appears that the operations of some

they neither agree with each other, nor with truth. (Histoire des Empereurs, tom. iii. p. 799.) *The carelessness of the writers of that age leaves us in a singular perplexity. 1, We know that Maximus and Balbinus were killed during the Capitoline games. (Herodian, 1. 8, p. 285.) The authority of Censorinus (de Die Natali, c. 18) enables us to fix those games, with certainty, to the year 238, but leaves us in ignorance of the month or day. 2, The election of Gordian by the senate is fixed, with equal certainty, to the 27th of May; but we are at a loss to discover whether it was in the same or the preceding year. Tillemont and Muratori, who maintain the two opposite opinions, bring into the field a desultory troop of authorities, conjectures, and probabilities. The one seems to draw out, the other to contract, the series of events between those periods, more than can be well reconciled to reason and history. Yet it is necessary to choose between them. [The accounts which ancient writers have given of this period are as irregular and confused as were the times of which they wrote. Still the wretched Capitolinus takes credit to himself for having done it well, and abuses the "historicorum inter se certantium imperitiam," whose works are now in part lost. The opposite opinions, to which Gibbon refers, are of older date, but have been best defended by the two learned men whom he names. According to Muratori all the events that occurred from the first revolt in Africa against Maximin to the death of Maximus and Balbinus, these included, took place during the year 238. Tillemont places the first part in the spring of 237, and brings them to a close early in the summer of 238. Whoever compares the reasons assigned by the last of these authors with his authorities and the events themselves, will not hesitate to agree with him. For this it is not necessary to suppose that Maximin employed himself in any external war, and deserved to be likened to Sylla, as, without any just ground, Gibbon has done. On the contrary, he gave at once, to the disturbances in Italy, all the attention which the urgency of the case demanded. First, he sent ambassadors to Rome, in the hope of effecting an amicable settlement. Then he collected more troops and commenced his march, which however was very slow, as Herodian expressly states, and points out the cause (1. 7, c. 8). The autumn and part of the winter were thus spent. In Italy he encountered difficulties, by which he was again delayed; and the siege of Aquileia, for which Tillemont allows only three weeks, must, from all that we know about it, have occupied more time.—WENCK.] [This chronological question has been more

foreign war deferred the Italian expedition till the ensuing spring. From the prudent conduct of Maximin, we may learn that the savage features of his character have been exaggerated by the pencil of party; that his passions, however impetuous, submitted to the force of reason; and that the barbarian possessed something of the generous spirit of Sylla, who subdued the enemies of Rome, before he suffered himself to revenge his private injuries.*

When the troops of Maximin, advancing in excellent order, arrived at the foot of the Julian Alps, they were terrified by the silence and desolation that reigned on the frontiers of Italy. The villages and open towns had been abandoned on their approach by the inhabitants, the cattle were driven away, the provisions removed or destroyed, the bridges broken down, nor was any thing left which could afford either shelter or subsistence to an invader. Such had been the wise orders of the generals of the senate; whose design was to protract the war, to ruin the army of Maximin by the slow operation of famine, and to consume

recently discussed by Eckhel, who has brought out results seemingly clear and probable. Putting aside historians, whose contradictory statements cannot be made to accord, he has only consulted medals, which have supplied him with facts, in the following order :A.U.C. 990,-Maximin, after having conquered the Germans, returned to Pannonia, went into winter quarters at Sirmium, and prepared to turn his arms against the northern nations. 991,-On the calends of January, he entered on his fourth tribuneship. The Gordians were elected emperors in Africa, probably in the beginning of March. The senate joyfully confirmed this election, and declared Maximin the enemy of Rome. Five days after receiving information of this revolt, Maximin left Sirmium with his army to march into Italy. This took place early in April, and soon afterwards the Gordians were killed in Africa by Capelianus, procurator of Mauritania. The alarmed senate appointed Balbinus and Maximus Papienus emperors, and intrust the latter with the conduct of the war against Maximin. On his march Maximin was stopped near Aquileia, by want of provisions and the melting of the snow, and began the siege of that place at the end of April. Papienus collected his forces at Ravenna. The soldiers of Maximin, irritated by the resistance of Aquileia, assassinate him and his son, probably about the middle of May. On this Papienus returned to Rome, and governed jointly with Balbinus. At the close of July they were murdered, and the younger Gordian placed alone on the throne. (Eckhel, de Doct. Num. Vet., tom. vii., p. 295.)-GUIZOT.]

* Velleius Paterculus, 1. 2, c. 24. The president de Montesquieu (in his dialogue between Sylla and Eucrates) expresses the sentiments of the dictator, in a spirited, and even a sublime manner.

his strength in the sieges of the principal cities of Italy, which they had plentifully stored with men and provisions from the deserted country. Aquileia received and withstood the first shock of the invasion. The streams that issue from the head of the Hadriatic gulf, swelled by the melting of the winter snows,* opposed an unexpected obstacle to the arms of Maximin. At length, on a singular bridge, constructed with art and difficulty, of large hogsheads, he transported his army to the opposite bank, rooted up the beautiful vineyards in the neighbourhood of Aquileia, demolished the suburbs, and employed the timber of the buildings in the engines and towers, with which, on every side, he attacked the city. The walls, fallen to decay during the security of a long peace, had been hastily repaired on this sudden emergency; but the firmest defence of Aquileia consisted in the constancy of the citizens; all ranks of whom, instead of being dismayed, were animated by the extreme danger, and their knowledge of the tyrant's unrelenting temper. Their courage was supported and directed by Crispinus and Menophilus, two of the twenty lieutenants of the senate, who, with a small body of regular troops, had thrown themselves into the besieged place. The army of Maximin was repulsed in repeated attacks, his machines destroyed by showers of artificial fire, and the generous enthusiasm of the Aquileians was exalted into a confidence of success, by the opinion that Belenus, their tutelar deity, combated in person in the defence of his distressed worshippers.†

The Emperor Maximus, who had advanced as far as

* Muratori (Annali d'Italia, tom. ii. p. 294) thinks the melting of the snow suits better with the months of June or July, than with that of February. The opinion of a man who passed his life between the Alps and the Apennines, is undoubtedly of great weight; yet I observe, 1, That the long winter, of which Muratori takes advantage, is to be found only in the Latin version, and not in the Greek text of Herodian. 2, That the vicissitudes of suns and rains, to which the soldiers of Maximin were exposed (Herodian, 1. 8, p. 277), denotes the spring rather than the summer. We may observe, likewise, that these several streams, as they melted into one, composed the Timavus, so poetically (in every sense of the word) described by Virgil. They are about twelve miles to the east of Aquileia. See Cluver. Italia, tom. i. p. 189, &c. + Herodian, 1. 8, p. 272. This Celtic deity was supposed to be Apollo, and received, under that name, the thanks of the senate. A temple was likewise built to Venus the Bald, in honour of he women of Aquileia, who had given up their hair to make ropes for