Page:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (1827) Vol 1.djvu/193

Rh Julia Maesa, her sister, was ordered to leave the court and Antioch. She retired to Emesa with an immense fortune, the fruit of twenty years' favour, accompanied by her two daughters, Soaemias and Mamaea, each of whom was a widow, and each had an only son. Bassianus, for that was the name of the son of Soasmias, was consecrated to the honourable ministry of high priest of the sun ; and this holy vocation, embraced either from prudence or superstition, contributed to raise the Syrian youth to the empire of Rome. A numerous body of troops was stationed at Emesa; and, as the severe discipline of Macrinus had constrained them to pass the winter encamped, they were eager to revenge the cruelty of such unaccustomed hardships. The soldiers, who resorted in crowds to the temple of the sun, beheld with veneration and delight the elegant dress and figure of the young pontiff: they recognised, or they thought that they recognised, the features of Caracalla, whose memory they now adored. The artful Maesa saw and cherished their rising partiality ; and readily sacrificing her daughter's reputation to the fortune of her grandson, she insinuated that Bassianus was the natural son of their murdered sovereign. The sums distributed by her emissaries with a lavish hand silenced every objection, and the profusion sufficiently proved the affinity, or at least the resemblance of Bassianus with the great original. The young Antoninus (for he had assumed and polluted that respectable name) was declared emperor by the troops of Emesa, asserted his hereditary right, and called aloud on the armies to follow the standard of a young and liberal prince, who had taken up arms to revenge his father's death, and the oppression of the military order.