with candor the
conduct of these usurpers, it will appear, that they were much oftener
driven into rebellion by their fears, than urged to it by their
ambition. They dreaded the cruel suspicions of Gallienus; they equally
dreaded the capricious violence of their troops. If the dangerous favor
of the army had imprudently declared them deserving of the purple, they
were marked for sure destruction; and even prudence would counsel them
to secure a short enjoyment of empire, and rather to try the fortune of
war than to expect the hand of an executioner.

When the clamor of the soldiers invested the reluctant victims with the
ensigns of sovereign authority, they sometimes mourned in secret their
approaching fate. "You have lost," said Saturninus, on the day of his
elevation, "you have lost a useful commander, and you have made a very
wretched emperor." [164]

[Footnote 164: Hist. August p. 196.]

The apprehensions of Saturninus were justified by the repeated
experience of revolutions. Of the nineteen tyrants who started up under
the reign of Gallienus, there was not one who enjoyed a life of peace,
or a natural death. As soon as they were invested with the bloody
purple, they inspired their adherents with the same fears and ambition
which had occasioned their own revolt. Encompassed with domestic
conspiracy, military sedition, and civil war, they trembled on the edge
of precipices, in which, after a longer or shorter term of anxiety, they
were inevitably lost. These precarious monarchs received, however, such
honors as the flattery of their respective armies and provinces could
bestow; but their claim, founded on rebellion, could never obtain the
sanction of law or history. Italy, Rome, and the senate, constantly
adhered to the cause of Gallienus, and he alone was considered as
the sovereign of the empire. That prince condescended, indeed, to
acknowledge the victorious arms of Odenathus, who deserved the honorable
distinction, by the respectful conduct which he always maintained
towards the son of Valerian. With the general applause of the Romans,
and the consent of Gallienus, the senate conferred the title of Augustus
on the brave Palmyrenian; and seemed to intrust him with the government
of the East, which he already possessed, in so independent a manner,
that, like a private succession, he bequeathed it to his illustrious
widow, Zenobia. [165]

[Footnote 165: The association of the brave Palmyrenian was the most
popu