disclosed the fatal secret of the conspiracy against the late emperor,
aggravated the guilt of murder by the baseness of hypocrisy, and
heightened contempt by detestation. To alienate the soldiers, and to
provoke inevitable ruin, the character of a reformer was only wanting;
and such was the peculiar hardship of his fate, that Macrinus was
compelled to exercise that invidious office. The prodigality of
Caracalla had left behind it a long train of ruin and disorder; and if
that worthless tyrant had been capable of reflecting on the sure
consequences of his own conduct, he would perhaps have enjoyed the dark
prospect of the distress and calamities which he bequeathed to his
successors.

In the management of this necessary reformation, Macrinus proceeded with
a cautious prudence, which would have restored health and vigor to the
Roman army in an easy and almost imperceptible manner. To the soldiers
already engaged in the service, he was constrained to leave the
dangerous privileges and extravagant pay given by Caracalla; but the new
recruits were received on the more moderate though liberal establishment
of Severus, and gradually formed to modesty and obedience. [45] One
fatal error destroyed the salutary effects of this judicious plan. The
numerous army, assembled in the East by the late emperor, instead of
being immediately dispersed by Macrinus through the several provinces,
was suffered to remain united in Syria, during the winter that followed
his elevation. In the luxurious idleness of their quarters, the troops
viewed their strength and numbers, communicated their complaints,
and revolved in their minds the advantages of another revolution. The
veterans, instead of being flattered by the advantageous distinction,
were alarmed by the first steps of the emperor, which they considered
as the presage of his future intentions. The recruits, with sullen
reluctance, entered on a service, whose labors were increased while
its rewards were diminished by a covetous and unwarlike sovereign. The
murmurs of the army swelled with impunity into seditious clamors; and
the partial mutinies betrayed a spirit of discontent and disaffection
that waited only for the slightest occasion to break out on every side
into a general rebellion. To minds thus disposed, the occasion soon
presented itself.

[Footnote 45: Dion, l. lxxxiii. p. 1336. The sense of the author is
as the intention of the emperor; but Mr. Wotton has mistaken both, by
u