ul child; and
when he received it and placed it in his bosom, it struck a globe which
he had in his right hand to a distance. Now this indicated a change of
circumstances, although those who interpreted it gave favourable answers
when consulted.

2. After this he confessed to his most intimate friends that, as if he
were wholly forsaken, he had ceased to see a secret vision which
sometimes he had fancied appeared to him in mournful guise; and he
believed that the genius who had been appointed to watch over his safety
had abandoned him, as one who was soon to leave the world.

3. For the opinion of theologians is, that all men when they are born
(without prejudice to the power of destiny) are connected with a
superior power of this kind, who, as it were, guides their actions; but
who is seen by very few, and only by those who are endued with great and
various virtues.

4. This may be collected both from oracles and from eminent writers.
Among whom is the comic poet Menander, in whose works these two verses
are found:--

"A spirit is assigned to every man
When born to guide him in the path of life."

5. It may also be gathered from the immortal poetry of Homer, that they
were not really the gods of heaven who conversed with his heroes, or
stood by them and aided them in their combats; but the familiar genii
who belonged to them; to whom also, as their principal support,
Pythagoras owes his eminence, and Socrates and Numa Pompilius and the
elder Scipio. And, as some fancy, Marius, and Octavianus the first, who
took the name of Augustus. And Hermes Trismegistus, and Apollonius of
Tyana, and Plotinus, who ventured upon some very mystical discussions of
this point; and endeavoured to show by profound reasoning what is the
original cause why these genii, being thus connected with the souls of
mortals, protect them as if they had been nursed in their own bosoms, as
far as they are permitted; and, if they find them pure, preserving the
body untainted by any connection with vice, and free from all taint of
sin, instruct them in loftier mysteries.

XV.

Sec. 1. Constantius therefore, having hastened to Antioch, according to his
wont, at the first movement of a civil war which he was eager to
encounter, as soon as he had made all his preparations, was in amazing
haste to march, though many of his court were so unwilling as even to
proceed to murmurs. For no one dare openly to remonstrate or object to
his plan.

2.