e to reign under the name of some dependent Roman. He
bestowed the purple on the rhetorician Eugenius; whom he had already
raised from the place of his domestic secretary to the rank of master of
the offices. In the course, both of his private and public service, the
count had always approved the attachment and abilities of Eugenius;
his learning and eloquence, supported by the gravity of his manners,
recommended him to the esteem of the people; and the reluctance with
which he seemed to ascend the throne, may inspire a favorable prejudice
of his virtue and moderation. The ambassadors of the new emperor were
immediately despatched to the court of Theodosius, to communicate, with
affected grief, the unfortunate accident of the death of Valentinian;
and, without mentioning the name of Arbogastes, to request, that
the monarch of the East would embrace, as his lawful colleague, the
respectable citizen, who had obtained the unanimous suffrage of the
armies and provinces of the West. Theodosius was justly provoked, that
the perfidy of a Barbarian, should have destroyed, in a moment, the
labors, and the fruit, of his former victory; and he was excited by the
tears of his beloved wife, to revenge the fate of her unhappy brother,
and once more to assert by arms the violated majesty of the throne. But
as the second conquest of the West was a task of difficulty and danger,
he dismissed, with splendid presents, and an ambiguous answer, the
ambassadors of Eugenius; and almost two years were consumed in the
preparations of the civil war. Before he formed any decisive resolution,
the pious emperor was anxious to discover the will of Heaven; and as the
progress of Christianity had silenced the oracles of Delphi and Dodona,
he consulted an Egyptian monk, who possessed, in the opinion of the age,
the gift of miracles, and the knowledge of futurity. Eutropius, one
of the favorite eunuchs of the palace of Constantinople, embarked for
Alexandria, from whence he sailed up the Nile, as far as the city of
Lycopolis, or of Wolves, in the remote province of Thebais. In the
neighborhood of that city, and on the summit of a lofty mountain, the
holy John had constructed, with his own hands, an humble cell, in which
he had dwelt above fifty years, without opening his door, without seeing
the face of a woman, and without tasting any food that had been prepared
by fire, or any human art. Five days of the week he spent in prayer and
meditation; but on Sa