To him the armies looked for their laurels, and the eagles in
every clime turned their aspiring eyes, waiting to bend their flight
according to the signal of his Jovian nod. And all these vast functions
and ministrations arose partly as a natural effect, but partly also they
were a cause of the emperor's own divinity. He was capable of services so
exalted, because he also was held a god, and had his own altars, his own
incense, his own worship and priests. And that was the cause, and that was
the result of his bearing, on his own shoulders, a burthen so mighty and
Atlantean.
Yet, if in this view it was needful to have a man of talent, on the other
hand there was reason to dread a man of talents too adventurous, too
aspiring, or too intriguing. His situation, as Caesar, or Crown Prince,
flung into his hands a power of fomenting conspiracies, and of concealing
them until the very moment of explosion, which made him an object of
almost exclusive terror to his principal, the Caesar Augustus. His
situation again, as an heir voluntarily adopted, made him the proper
object of public affection and caresses, which became peculiarly
embarrassing to one who had, perhaps, soon found reasons for suspecting,
fearing, and hating him beyond all other men.
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