CHAP. XVIII.
laxed by prosperity and indulgence, was incapable of
rising to that magnanimity which disdains suspicion,
and dares to forgive. The deaths of Maximian and
Licinius may perhaps be justified by the maxims of
policy, as they are taught in the schools of tyrants; but
an impartial narrative of the executions, or rather murders, which sullied the declining age of Constantine,
will sussfest to our nwst candid thoughts, the idea of a
prince who could sacrifice without reluctance the laws
of justice, and the feelings of nature, to the dictates
either of his passions or of his interest.
His family. The same fortune which so invariably followed the standard of Constantine, seemed to secure the hopes and comforts of his domestic life. Those among his predecessors who had enjoyed the longest and most prosperous reigns, Augustus, Trajan, and Diocletian, had been disappointed of posterity; and the frequent revolutions had never allowed sufficient time for any imperial family to grow up and multiply under the shade of the purple. But the royalty of the Flavian line, which had been first ennobled by the Gothic Claudius, descended through several generations; and Constantine himself derived from his royal father the hereditary honours which he transmitted to his children. The emperor had been twice married. Minervina, the obscure but lawful object of his youthful attachment[1], had left him only one son, who was called Crispus. By Fausta, the daughter of Maximian, he had three daughters, and three sons, known by the kindred names of Constantine, Constantius, and Constans. The unambitious brothers of the great Constantine, Julius Constantius, Dalmatius, and Hannibalianus[2], were permitted to enjoy the most honourable
- ↑ Zosimus and Zonaras agree in representing Minervina as the concubine of Constantine: but Ducange has very gallantly rescued her character, by producing a decisive passage from one of the panegyrics: " Ab ipso fine pueritiæe matrimonii legibus dedisti."
- ↑ Ducange (Farailiae Byzantinae, p. 44.) bestows on him, after Zonaras,
rity of medals. See Commentaire, p. 156. 299. 397. 459. Eusebius, (Oral. c. 5.) alleges, that Constantine dressed for the public, not for himself. Were this admitted, the vainest coxcomb could never want an excuse.
