The Historians' History of the World 05

“For the civil wars, which he neither undertook out of fear (as he himself says), or out of ambition, he had to deal with the greatest generals of the age, fighting at the head of many great armies; not barbarian, but Romans, encouraged by their former actions, and by their good fortune, yet he defeated them all; and not one of them but he ruined in a fight or two. But we cannot say of him as of Alexander, that he was never overcome; for he suffered once a great loss against the Gauls, under the conduct of Titurius and Cotta, his lieutenants. In Spain his army was so near blocked up by Petreius and Afranius, that he wanted but little of being besieged. At Dyrrhachium and in Africa they turned their backs; and in Spain, against the young Pompeius they fled. But for Cæsar himself, he was always undaunted; and whatever war he engaged in, came off in the end victorious; and the Roman Empire, which now extends itself by sea and land, from the Euphrates to the Atlantic Ocean, was brought under his power, partly by his valour, and partly by his clemency. He settled himself much better than Sulla, and governed himself with more moderation; for being king in effect, in spite of all the world, he took not that name.

“At last, making his preparations for other wars, he was surprised by death as well as Alexander. Their armies were also alike; for the soldiers of both were cheerful in fight and hardy, but stubborn and mutinous when over-wrought with labour. The deaths of both of them were equally mourned and lamented by their armies, who attributed to them divine honours. They were both well made in body and of noble aspect; both descended from Jupiter; one by Eacus and Hercules, and the other by Anchises and Venus. Though they were inflexible when resisted, they were easier to pardon and be reconciled, and likewise to do good to such as they had vanquished; contented themselves with the victory.

“Hitherto the comparison is just, save only that their beginnings were not equal; for Alexander began with the quality of a king, in which he had been before instructed by his father Philip; but Cæsar was only a private man; and though he were of an illustrious race, yet his fortunes were much encumbered. They both despised the presages that threatened them, without injuring those divines who foretold their death; and almost the same signs happened to them, and a like event; for in the sacrifices made by one and the other twice, they found not the chief of the entrails of the victims; the first time they were only threatened with great danger. Alexander’s happened when besieging the Oxydracæ, being mounted first upon the wall, and the too great weight breaking the ladders behind him, he beheld himself deserted by his men, and threw himself into the midst of his enemies, where having received many wounds on his breast and a great blow on the neck, he was ready to die, when the Macedonians, touched with shame, broke open the gates and relieved him.

“The like happened to Cæsar in Spain in the fight between him and young Pompeius; where, seeing his men went on trembling, he advanced betwixt the two armies, received two hundred darts on his buckler, till such time as fear having given place to shame, all the army ran in and secured him from the danger. Thus the first entrails without the chief threatened only danger of death, but the second were certain presage of death itself. Pythagoras the divine, after having sacrificed, said to Apollodorus, who feared Alexander and Hephæstion, that he need fear nothing, for they both should shortly die. Hephæstion, dying some time after, Apollodorus, doubting lest there might be some conspiracy formed against the king, gave him notice of the prediction; he only laughed at it; and informing himself of Pythagoras what those presages meant, he told him it was a sign of death; whereupon he again laughed, praising Apollodorus’ love and the divine’s freedom.

“As for Cæsar, the last time he went to the senate, as we have said a little before, the same presage presenting, he said, smiling, he had seen the like in Spain, to which the augur answering that he was then in danger, but now the sign was mortal, he yielded in some measure to that advice, and offered another sacrifice; but tired with the length of the ceremony, entered the palace and perished. There happened to Alexander the same thing; for when he returned from the Indies to Babylon with his army, being come nigh the city, the Chaldeans counselled him to defer his entry; to whom having given this verse for answer,

‘Who promises most good’s the best divine,’