Maxentius

“ But Maxentius, putting confidence rather in the arts of sorcery than in the devotion of his subjects, did not dare to go forth beyond the gates of the city, but fortified every place and district and town which was enslaved by him, in the neighborhood of Rome and in all Italy, with an immense multitude of troops and with innumerable bands of soldiers. But the emperor, relying upon the assistance of God, attacked the first, second, and third army of the tyrant, and conquered them all; and having advanced through the greater part of Italy, was already very near Rome. ”

“ Tyranny of Maxentius in Italy and Africa, A.D. 306-312The virtues of Constantine were rendered more illustrious by the vices of Maxentius. Whilst the Gallic provinces enjoyed as much happiness as the condition of the times was capable of receiving, Italy and Africa [50] groaned under the dominion of a tyrant as contemptible as he was odious. The zeal of flattery and faction has indeed too frequently sacrificed the reputation of the vanquished to the glory of their successful rivals ”

“ Meanwhile, Maxentius sorely oppressed the Roman people, treating them as a tyrant rather than as a king, shamelessly violating the wives of the nobles, putting many innocent persons to death, and perpetrating other similar atrocities. The emperor Constantine being informed of this, exerted himself to free the Romans from the slavery under him (i.e. Maxentius) , and began immediately to consider by what means he might overthrow the tyrant. ”

“ Pleasure was still the only business of Maxentius. Concealing, or at least attempting to conceal, from the public knowledge the misfortunes of his arms, [71] he indulged himself in vain confidence which deferred the remedies of the approaching evil, without deferring the evil itself. [72] The rapid progress of Constantine [73] was scarcely sufficient to awaken him from this fatal security; he flattered himself that his well-known liberality, and the majesty of the Roman name, which had already delivered him from two invasions, would dissipate with the same facility the rebellious army of Gaul. ”

“ His intention of carrying the war into Gaul was anticipated by Constantine, who marched into Italy. Maxentius was defeated at Saxa Rubra near Rome and drowned in the Tiber while attempting to make his way across the Milvian bridge into Rome. He was a man of brutal and worthless character ”

“ The most distinguished adherents of Maxentius must have expected to share his fate, as they had shared his prosperity and his crimes; but when the Roman people loudly demanded a greater number of victims, the conqueror resisted, with firmness and humanity, those servile clamors, which were dictated by flattery as well as by resentment. ”

“ Maxentius had never found himself at the head of an army in real warfare; he had continually enjoyed his pleasures in idle tranquillity, and on account of his tyranny and cruelty he was loved by no one, save by his guards and a small number of other troops whom he enriched by robbing the citizens. Constantine’s life, on the contrary, had been one of constant exertion and discipline. He had served with distinction, first under Diocletian, and then under his father Constantius, and had afterwards long contended against the Frankish peoples on the Rhine. ”

“ Civil war between Constantine and Maxentius, A.D. 312 Though Constantine might view the conduct of Maxentius with abhorrence, and the situation of the Romans with compassion, we have no reason to presume that he would have taken up arms to punish the one or to relieve the other. But the tyrant of Italy rashly ventured to provoke a formidable enemy, whose ambition had been hitherto restrained by considerations of prudence, rather than by principles of justice. ”

“ The ambassadors were received courteously, friendship established, and in token of it the effigies of Maxentius and Daia were placed together in public view. Maxentius willingly embraced this, as if it had been an aid from heaven; for he had already declared war against Constantine, as if to revenge the death of his father Maximian. From this appearance of filial piety a suspicion arose, that the detestable old man had but feigned a quarrel with his son that he might have an opportunity to destroy his rivals in power, and so make way for himself and his son to possess the whole empire. ”

“ Zosimus declares that Maxentius incited the rebellion, moved thereto by jealousy of Constantine, a quite plausible supposition. “When Constantine’s effigy according to custom was exhibited at Rome,” he says, “Maxentius, the son of Maximian, could not endure the sight of Constantine’s good fortune, who was the son of a harlot, while himself, who was the son of so great an emperor, remained at home in indolence, and his father’s empire was enjoyed by others. ”

“ However, Maximian was accepted as the true Emperor by the Senate, and made his son Maxentius, Cæsar, while he allied himself with Constantine, to whom he gave his daughter Fausta in marriage. Maxentius turned out a rebel, and drove the old man away to Marseilles, where Constantine gave him a home on condition of his not interfering with government; but he could not rest, and raised the troops in the south against his son-in-law. Constantine's army marched eagerly against him and made him prisoner, but even then he was pardoned ”

“ Constantine, who had inherited from his father along with his Neo-platonic eclecticism his toleration of the Christians, secured to the professors of the Christian faith in his realm the most perfect quiet. Maxentius, too, at first let them alone; but the rivalry and enmity that was daily increasing between him and Constantine, the favourer of the Christians, drew him into close connection with the pagan party, and into sympathy with their persecuting spirit. In A.D. 312 Constantine led his army over the Alps. Maxentius opposed him with an army drawn up in three divisions ”

“ Eusebius shews us the Emperor of Gaul anxiously debating within his own mind whether his forces were equal to the dangerous enterprise upon which he had embarked. Maxentius had a formidable army. He had also laboured to bring over to his side the powers of heaven and hell. Constantine’s information from Rome apprised him that Maxentius was assiduously employing all the black arts of magic and wizardry to gain the favour of the gods. ”

“ The tyranny of Maxentius led his subjects to look to Constantine as a deliverer, who marched to the relief of the Senate and Roman people. He crossed the Alps with forty thousand men. Maxentius collected a force of one hundred and seventy thousand, to maintain which he had the wealth of Italy, Africa, and Sicily. Constantine first encountered the lieutenants of Maxentius in the plains of Turin, and gained a complete victory, the prize of which was Milan, the new capital of Italy. ”

“ The armies met, and fought with the utmost exertions of valour, and firmly maintained their ground. In the meantime a sedition arose at Rome, and Maxentius was reviled as one who had abandoned all concern for the safety of the commonweal; and suddenly, while he exhibited the Circensian games on the anniversary of his reign, the people cried with one voice, “Constantine cannot be overcome!” Dismayed at this, Maxentius burst from the assembly, and having called some senators together, ordered the Sibylline books to be searched. ”

“ His first public act, after being joyfully received as emperor of the West, was to give the free liberty of religion to the Christians. Maximian, who had been forced to abdicate the government under Dioclesian, to avoid a civil war, availed himself of the usurpation of Maxentius, at Rome, who had caused himself to be declared emperor, in apposition to Constantine; an act, which was not less hostile to the disposition of Galerius. He soon reduced Maxentius, but still had reason to dread Galerius, especially if he should +++++ with Maximin. ”

“ Last night, while acting as master of the feast for a party just from Rome—their extreme youth and inexperience appealed to my compassion—I heard a singular story. Maxentius, the consul, as you know, comes to-day to conduct a campaign against the Parthians. Of the ambitious who are to accompany him there is one, a son of the late duumvir Quintus Arrius. ”

“ Maxentius, tempted by a dubious oracle [4] issued from Rome, crossed the Tiber, and joined battle. His apparently unwise action in staking so much on a pitched battle has its explanation, if we could believe Zosimus (2. 15) , Eusebius (V. C. 1. 38) , Praxagoras, and others. His object was, it is said, by a feigned retreat to tempt Constantine across the bridge of boats which he had built in such a way that it could be broken, and the enemy let into the river. [5] If it was a trick, he at least fell into his own pit. ”

“ After the retirement of Diocletian, ambitions, rivalries, and intrigues were not slow to make head; Maximian reappeared on the scene of empire, but only to speedily disappear (A.D. 310) , leaving in his place his son Maxentius. Constantius Chlorus had died A.D. 306, and his son, Constantine, had immediately been proclaimed by his army Caesar and Augustus. Galerius died A.D. 311 and Constantine remained to dispute the mastery with Maxentius in the West, and in the East with Maximinus and Licinius, the last colleagues taken by Diocletian and Galerius. ”

“ Maxentius, thus stripped, leaped headlong from the tribunal, and was received into the arms of the soldiers. Their rage and clamour confounded the unnatural old man, and, like another Tarquin the Proud, he was driven from Rome. ”

“ After the death of Constans, Maxentius being subdued, the third brother, Constantius, who had before governed Asia, Syria, and Egypt, in the year 353 became sole emperor, and governed the whole empire till the year 361, when he died. Neither of these brothers possessed the disposition or the discernment of their father; yet they all pursued their father's purpose of abolishing the ancient superstitions of the Romans and other pagans, and of propagating the Christian religion throughout the Roman Empire. ”

“ But he, suspecting that Maxentius did not desire his son for the mere purpose of an hostage, but to deceive him, denied the request. After this, Maxentius sending other agents to him to take him off by treachery and stratagem, the plot was discovered; and the soldiers, having then got a favourable opportunity to rebel, conferred the purple robe on Alexander, though he was by birth not only a Phrygian, but a timid cowardly man, and unfit for any difficult undertaking, and was, moreover, of an advanced age. ”

“ Maxentius had imbibed the same implacable aversion to the senate, which had characterized most of the former tyrants of Rome; nor was it possible for his ungrateful temper to forgive the generous fidelity which had raised him to the throne, and supported him against all his enemies. The lives of the senators were exposed to his jealous suspicions, the dishonor of their wives and daughters heightened the gratification of his sensual passions. It may be presumed that an Imperial lover was seldom reduced to sigh in vain; but whenever persuasion proved ineffectual, he had recourse to violence ”

“ There were thus four independent Augusti (to say nothing of the emperor Maxentius) , and the system of Diocletian was a thing of the past.↑ The reference is to the Augustus Maximian. After his abdication he retired to Lucania, but in the following year was induced by his son, Maxentius, to leave his retirement, and join him in wresting Italy and Africa from Severus. It was due in large measure to his military skill and to the prestige of his name that Severus was vanquished and Galerius repulsed. After his victories Maximian went to Gaul, to see Constantine and form an alliance with him. ”

“ Chapter XXXVIII.—Death of Maxentius on the Bridge of the Tiber. [1]
And already he was approaching very near Rome itself, when, to save him from the necessity of fighting with all the Romans for the tyrant’s sake, God himself drew the tyrant, as it were by secret cords, a long way outside the gates. [2] And now those miracles recorded in Holy Writ, which God of old wrought against the ungodly (discredited by most as fables, yet believed by the faithful) , did he in every deed confirm to all alike, believers and unbelievers, who were eye-witnesses of the wonders. ”

“ Maxentius, who at this time ruled Italy, was not recognised by Galerius, so the absence of his name causes no surprise. Maximin’s name is also absent, but we find one of his præfects, Sabinus, addressing shortly afterwards a circular letter to all the Governors of Cilicia, Syria, and Egypt, in which the signal was given to stop the persecution. Like Galerius, Maximin declared that the sole object of the Emperors had been to lead all men back to a pious and regular life, and to restore to the gods those who had embraced alien rites contrary to the spirit of the institutions of Rome. ”

“ Constantine, advancing with his army to Rome, encamped in a field before the city, which was broad and therefore convenient for cavalry. Maxentius in the mean time shut himself up within the walls, and sacrificed to the gods, and, moreover, consulted the Sibylline oracles concerning the event of the war. Finding a prediction, that whoever designed any harm to the Romans should die a miserable death, he applied it to himself, because he withstood those that came against Rome, and wished to take it. ”