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CHARACTER OF VALENTINIAN,

CHAP. XXVII. inheritance of the empire. If Theodosius had consulted the rigid maxims of interest and policy, his conduct would have been justified by his friends, but the generosity of his behaviour on this memorable occasion has extorted the applause of his most inveterate enemies. He seated Valentinian on the throne of Milan, and, without stipulating any present or future advantages, restored him to the absolute dominion of all the provinces from which he had been driven by the arms of Maximus. To the restitution of his ample patrimony Theodosius added the free and generous gift of the countries beyond the Alps which his successful valour had recovered from the assassin of Gratian.101 Satisfied with the glory which he had acquired by revenging the death of his benefactor and delivering the West from the yoke of tyranny, the emperor returned from Milan to Constantinople, and, in the peaceful possession of the East, insensibly relapsed into his former habits of luxury and indolence. Theodosius discharged his obligation to the brother, he indulged his conjugal tenderness to the sister, of Valentinian; and posterity, which admires the pure and singular glory of his elevation, must applaud his unrivalled generosity in the use of victory.

Character of

A.D. 391.

The empress Justina did not long survive her return to Italy, and, though she beheld the triumph of Theodosius, she was not Valentinian, allowed to influence the government of her son.102 The pernicious attachment to the Arian sect which Valentinian had imbibed from her example and instructions was soon erased by the lessons of a more orthodox education. His growing zeal for the faith of Nice, and his filial reverence for the character and authority of Ambrose, disposed the catholics to entertain the most favourable opinion of the virtues of the young emperor of the West.103 They applauded his chastity and temperance, his contempt of pleasure, his application to business, and his tender affection for his two sisters, which could not, however, seduce his impartial equity to pronounce an unjust sentence against the meanest of his subjects. But this amiable youth, before he had accomplished the twentieth year of his age, was oppressed by domestic treason, and the empire was again involved in the horrors of a civil war. Arbogastes,104 a gallant

101 Τοῦτο περὶ τοὺς εὐεργέτας καθῆκον ἔδοξεν εἶναι, is the niggard praise of Zosimus himself (1. iv. [c. 48] p. 267). Augustin says, with some happiness of expression, Valentiniamisericordissimâ veneratione restituit.

num....

102 Sozomen, 1. vii. c. 14. His chronology is very irregular.

103 See Ambrose (tom. ii. de Obit. Valentinian. c. 15, &c., p. 1178, c. 36, &c., p. 1184). When the young emperor gave an entertainment, he fasted himself; he refused to see an handsome actress, &c. Since he ordered his wild beasts to be killed, it is ungenerous in Philostorgius (1. xi. c. 1) to reproach him with the love of that

amusement.

104 Zosimus (1. iv. [c. 53] p. 275) praises the enemy of Theodosius. But he is detested by Socrates (1. v. c. 25) and Orosius (1. vii. c. 35).

soldier of the nation of the Franks, held the second rank in the service of Gratian. On the death of his master he joined the standard of Theodosius, contributed, by his valour and military conduct, to the destruction of the tyrant, and was appointed, after the victory, master-general of the armies of Gaul. His real merit and apparent fidelity had gained the confidence both of the prince and people; his boundless liberality corrupted the allegiance of the troops; and, whilst he was universally esteemed as the pillar of the state, the bold and crafty barbarian was secretly determined either to rule or to ruin the empire of the West. The important commands of the army were distributed among the Franks; the creatures of Arbogastes were promoted to all the honours and offices of the civil government; the progress of the conspiracy removed every faithful servant from the presence of Valentinian; and the emperor, without power and without intelligence, insensibly sunk into the precarious and dependent condition of a captive.105 The indignation which he expressed, though it might arise only from the rash and impatient temper of youth, may be candidly ascribed to the generous spirit of a prince who felt that he was not unworthy to reign. He secretly invited the archbishop of Milan to undertake the office of a mediator, as the pledge of his sincerity and the guardian of his safety. He contrived to apprise the emperor of the East of his helpless situation, and he declared that, unless Theodosius could speedily march to his assistance, he must attempt to escape from the palace, or rather prison, of Vienne, in Gaul, where he had imprudently fixed his residence in the midst of the hostile faction. But the hopes of relief were distant and doubtful; and, as every day furnished some new provocation, the emperor, without strength or counsel, too hastily resolved to risk an immediate contest with his powerful general. He received Arbogastes on the throne, and, as the count approached with some appearance of respect, delivered to him a paper which dismissed him from all his employments. "My authority," replied Arbogastes, with insulting coolness, "does not depend on the smile or the frown of a "monarch;" and he contemptuously threw the paper on the ground. The indignant monarch snatched at the sword of one of the guards, which he struggled to draw from its scabbard, and it was not without some degree of violence that he was prevented from using the deadly

weapon against his enemy or against himself. A few days His death, after this extraordinary quarrel, in which he had exposed .D. 392, his resentment and his weakness, the unfortunate Valen- May 15.

105 Gregory of Tours (1. ii. c. 9, p. 165, in the second volume of the Historians of France) has preserved a curious fragment of Sulpicius Alexander, an historian far more valuable than himself.

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le rutence of casts at rari de sucress off his ambiTous teses ma de FynCLA 1 Vis reasts every werment of rota i byar was ennyisted, exDen ame scaten. De шANVI Taster whom the mince if a Fans met pace i ne Ingence. But some remains if true rudes consed the elevation of Angers bleef aui me jude us baraza o it more atualue 21 TL mar de mame if some dependent Recan. He bestved me purple to me mes rean Eugen som he had araty used Sim me place of us aimeste secretary to the rank of master of me ifños. In de worse both of his private and publie were de munt ad Liveys accroved the attachment and abilities of Eugening: ls learning and exquence, supported by the gravity of is manners, recommended him to the esteem of the people, and the reactance with with be seemed to ascend the throne may inspire a favourable prejudice of his vine and moderation. The ambassadors of the new empent were immediately despatched to the out of Theodosis, to communicate, with afected grief, the unfortunate accident of the death of Valentinian, and, without mentioning the name of Arbogastes, to request that the monarch of the East would embrace as his lawful colleague the respectable citizen who had obtained the unanimous suffrage of the armies and provinces of the

15 Godefroy (Dissertat, ad Philostorg. p. 429-4-4) has diligently collected all the circumstances of the death of Valentinian II. The variations and the ignorance of contemporary writers prove that it was secret.

De Obita Valentinian. tom. ii. p. 1173-1196. He is forced to speak a discreet and obscure language: yet he is much bolder than any layman, or perhaps any other ecclesiastic, would have dared to be.

19* See c. 51, p. 1188; c. 75, p. 1193. Dom Chardon (Hist. des Sacremens, tom. i. p. 86), who owns that St. Ambrose most strenuously maintains the indispensable necessity of baptism, labours to reconcile the contradiction.

100

Quem sibi Germanus famulum delegerat exul,

is the contemptuous expression of Claudian (iv. Cons. Hon. 74). Eugenius professed Christianity; but his secret attachment to Paganism (Sozomen, 1. vii. c. 22; Philostorg. 1. xi. c. 2) is probable in a grammarian, and would secure the friendship of Zosimus (1. iv. [c. 54] p. 276, 277).

Theodosius

war.

West.110 Theodosius was justly provoked that the perfidy of a barbarian should have destroyed in a moment the labours and the fruit of his former victory; and he was excited by the tears of his beloved wife to revenge the fate of her unhappy brother, and once more to assert by arms the violated majesty of the throne. But as the second conquest of the West was a task of difficulty and danger, he dismissed, with splendid presents and an ambiguous answer, the ambassadors of Eugenius, and almost two years were consumed in the preparations of the civil war. Before he formed any decisive resolution, the pious emperor was anxious to discover prepares for the will of Heaven; and as the progress of Christianity had silenced the oracles of Delphi and Dodona, he consulted an Egyptian monk, who possessed, in the opinion of the age, the gift of miracles and the knowledge of futurity. Eutropius, one of the favourite eunuchs of the palace of Constantinople, embarked for Alexandria, from whence he sailed up the Nile as far as the city of Lycopolis, or of Wolves, in the remote province of Thebais. In the neighbourhood of that city, and on the summit of a lofty mountain, the holy John 113 had constructed with his own hands an humble cell, in which he had dwelt above fifty years, without opening his door, without seeing the face of a woman, and without tasting any food that had been prepared by fire or any human art. Five days of the week he spent in prayer and meditation, but on Saturdays and Sundays he regularly opened a small window, and gave audience to the crowd of suppliants who successively flowed from every part of the Christian world. The eunuch of Theodosius approached the window with respectful steps, proposed his questions concerning the event of the civil war, and soon returned with a favourable oracle, which animated the courage of the emperor by the assurance of a bloody but infallible victory." The accomplishment of the prediction was forwarded by all the means that human prudence could supply. The

110 Zosimus (1. iv. [c. 55] p. 278) mentions this embassy; but he is diverted by another story from relating the event.

!!! Συνετάραξεν ἡ τούτου γαμετὴ Γάλλα τὰ βασίλεια, τὸν ἀδελφὸν ὀλοφυρομένη. Zosim. l. iv. [c. 55] p. 277. He afterwards says ([c. 57] p. 280) that Galla died in childbed [A.D. 394.-S.]; and intimates that the affliction of her husband was extreme but short. 112 Lycopolis is the modern Siut, or Osiot, a town of Said, about the size of St. Denys, which drives a profitable trade with the kingdom of Sennaar, and has a very convenient fountain, "cujus potû signa virginitatis eripiuntur." See D'Anville, Description de l'Egypte, p. 181. Abulfeda, Descript. Egypt. p. 14; and the curious Annotations, p. 25, 92, of his editor Michaelis.

113 The Life of John of Lycopolis is described by his two friends, Rufinus (1. ii. c. i. p. 449) and Palladius (Hist. Lausiac. c. 43, p. 738), in Rosweyde's great Collection of the Vita Patrum. Tillemont (Mém. Ecclés. tom. x. p. 718, 720) has settled the chronology.

114 Sozomen, 1. vii. c. 22. Claudian (in Eutrop. 1. i. 312) mentions the eunuch's journey: but he most contemptuously derides the Egyptian dreams and the oracles

of the Nile.

400

WAR BETWEEN

CHAP. XXVII. industry of the two master-generals, Stilicho and Timasius, was directed to recruit the numbers and to revive the discipline of the Roman legions. The formidable troops of barbarians marched under the ensigns of their national chieftains. The Iberian, the Arab, and the Goth, who gazed on each other with mutual astonishment, were enlisted in the service of the same prince; and the renowned Alaric acquired, in the school of Theodosius, the knowledge of the art of war which he afterwards so fatally exerted for the destruction of Rome. 115

A.D. 394,

Sept. 6.

The emperor of the West, or, to speak more properly, his general Arbogastes, was instructed by the misconduct and misfortune of Maximus how dangerous it might prove to extend the line of defence His victory against a skilful antagonist, who was free to press or to over Engenius, suspend, to contract or to multiply, his various methods of attack.116 Arbogastes fixed his station on the confines of Italy; the troops of Theodosius were permitted to occupy, without resistance, the provinces of Pannonia, as far as the foot of the Julian Alps; and even the passes of the mountains were negligently, or perhaps artfully, abandoned to the bold invader. He descended from the hills, and beheld, with some astonishment, the formidable camp of the Gauls and Germans that covered with arms and tents the open country which extends to the walls of Aquileia and the banks of the Frigidus," or Cold River. 118 This narrow theatre of the war, circumscribed by the Alps and the Adriatic, did not allow much room for the operations of military skill; the spirit of Arbo

115 Zosimus, 1. iv. [c. 57] p. 280; Socrates, 1. vii. 10. Alaric himself (de Bell, Getico, 524) dwells with more complacency on his early exploits against the Romans. . . . . Tot Augustos Hebro qui teste fugavi.

Yet his vanity could scarcely have proved this plurality of flying emperors.

116 Claudian (in iv. Cons. Honor. 77, &c.) contrasts the military plans of the two

usurpers:

Novitas audere priori

Suadebat; cautumque dabant exempla sequentem.

Hic nova moliri præceps: hic quærere tuta
Providus. Hic fusis, collectis viribus ille;

Hic vagus excurrens; hic intra claustra reductus;
Dissimiles, sed morte pares

117 The Frigidus, a small though memorable stream in the country of Goretz, now called the Vipao, falls into the Sontius, or Lisonzo, above Aquileia, some miles from the Adriatic. See D'Anville's ancient and modern maps, and the Italia Antiqua of Cluverius (tom. i. p. 188).

118 Claudian's wit is intolerable: the snow was dyed red; the cold river smoked; and the channel must have been choked with carcasses if the current had not been swelled with blood.

"Gibbon has embodied the picturesque Moverat Auroram; mixtis hic Colchus Iberis, verses of Claudian :

.... Nec tantis dissona linguis Turba, nec armorum cultu diversior unquam Confluxit populus: totam pater undique secum

Hic mitrâ velatus Arabs, hic crine decoro
Armenius, hic picta Saces, fucataque Medus,
Hic gemmata niger tentoria fixerat Indus.
De Laud. Stil. i. 153.
-M.

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