was twice invested with the consulship, and he obtained the rank of patrician. These civil honours were not incompatible with the enjoyment of leisure and tranquillity; his hours, according to the demands of pleasure or reason, were accurately distributed by a water-clock; and this avarice of time may be allowed to prove the sense which Maximus entertained of his own happiness. The injury which he received from the emperor Valentinian appears to excuse the most bloody revenge. Yet a philosopher might have reflected that, if the resistance of his wife had been sincere, her chastity was still inviolate, and that it could never be restored if she had consented to the will of the adulterer. A patriot would have hesitated before he plunged himself and his country into those inevitable calamities which must follow the extinction of the royal house of Theodosius. The imprudent Maximus disregarded these salutary considerations he gratified his resentment and ambition; he saw the bleeding corpse of Valentinian at his feet; and he heard himself saluted emperor by the unanimous voice of the senate and people. But the day of his inauguration was the last day of his happiness. He was imprisoned (such is the lively expression of Sidonius) in the palace; and, after passing a sleepless night, he sighed that he had attained the summit of his wishes, and aspired only to descend from the dangerous elevation. Oppressed by the weight of the diadem, he communicated his anxious thoughts to his friend and quæstor Fulgentius; and, when he looked back with unavailing regret on the secure pleasures of his former life, the emperor exclaimed, "O fortunate Damocles,[1] thy reign began and ended with the same dinner": a well-known allusion, which Fulgentius afterwards repeated as an instructive lesson for princes and subjects.
His death.A.D. 153, June 12 [May 31] The reign of Maximus continued about three months.[2] His hours, of which he had lost the command, were disturbed by remorse, or guilt, or terror; and his throne was shaken by the seditions of the soldiers, the people, and the confederate
Barbarians. The marriage of his son Palladius with the eldest
- ↑
Districtus ensis cui super impia
Cervice pendet, non Siculae dapes
Dulcem elaborabunt saporem:
Non avium citharæque cantus
Somnum reducent.Horat. Carm. iii. 1.
Sidonius concludes his letter with the story of Damocles, which Cicero (Tusculan. v. 20, 21) had so inimitably told.
- ↑ [Paulo amplius quam bimestris principatus, Sidonius, ib. The date of the death of Maximus is May 31 (Prosper); June 12 is given by Anon. Cuspiniani.]
