OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE.

173

lunate change, the new Caesar was not unmind- chap.

ful of his brother Julian, who obtained the ho-__1.

nours of his rank, the appearances of liberty,and the restitution of an ample patrimony. 0

The writers the most indulgent to the memo- Crueltyry of Gallus, and even Julian himself, though prudencehe wished to cast a veil over the frailties of his ofGallu *’brother, are obliged to confess that the Caesarwas incapable of reigning. Transported froma prison to a throne, he possessed neither geniusnor application, nor docility to compensate forthe want of knowledge and experience. Atemper naturally morose and violent, instead ofbeing corrected, was soured by solitude andadversity; the remembrance of what he hadendured disposed him to retaliation rather thanto sympathy; and the ungoverned sallies of hisrage were often fatal to those who approachedhis person, or were subject to his power. p Con-stantina, his wife, is described, not as a woman,but as one of the infernal furies, tormented withan insatiate thirst of human blood/ 1 Instead of

but M. de Tillemont (Hist, des Empereurs , tom. iv, p. 1120; thinks itvery improbable that an heretic should have possessed such virtue.

° Julian was at first permitted to pursue his studies at Constantino-ple , but the reputation which he acquired soon excited the jealousyof Constantins; and the young prince was advised to withdraw him-self to the less conspicuous scenes of Bithynia and Ionia.

p See Julian ad s. p. q. k. p. 271. Jerom. in Chron. Aurelius Vic-tor, Eutropius, x, 14. I shall copy the words of Eutropius , who wrotehis abridgment about fifteen years after the death of Gallus, whenthere was do longer any motive either to flatter or to depreciate his

character. “ Multis incivilibus gestis Gallus Caesar.vir natnrik fe-

“ rox et ad tyrannidem pronior, si suo jure imperare licuisset.”

s Megsera quidem mortalis, inflammatrix saevientis assidua, humanicruoris avida, &c. Ammian . Marcellin. !. xiv, c. 1. The sincerity ofAmmiauus would not suffer him to misrepresent facts or characters,but his love of ambitious ornaments frequently betrayed him into anunnatural vehemence of expression.