se of the earth interposed in
the defence of Ambrose: the disinterested advice of Theodosius was the
genuine result of piety and friendship; and the mask of religious zeal
concealed the hostile and ambitious designs of the tyrant of Gaul.

The reign of Maximus might have ended in peace and prosperity, could
he have contented himself with the possession of three ample countries,
which now constitute the three most flourishing kingdoms of modern
Europe. But the aspiring usurper, whose sordid ambition was not
dignified by the love of glory and of arms, considered his actual forces
as the instruments only of his future greatness, and his success was the
immediate cause of his destruction. The wealth which he extorted from
the oppressed provinces of Gaul, Spain, and Britain, was employed in
levying and maintaining a formidable army of Barbarians, collected, for
the most part, from the fiercest nations of Germany. The conquest of
Italy was the object of his hopes and preparations: and he secretly
meditated the ruin of an innocent youth, whose government was abhorred
and despised by his Catholic subjects. But as Maximus wished to occupy,
without resistance, the passes of the Alps, he received, with perfidious
smiles, Domninus of Syria, the ambassador of Valentinian, and pressed
him to accept the aid of a considerable body of troops, for the service
of a Pannonian war. The penetration of Ambrose had discovered the snares
of an enemy under the professions of friendship; but the Syrian Domninus
was corrupted, or deceived, by the liberal favor of the court of Treves;
and the council of Milan obstinately rejected the suspicion of danger,
with a blind confidence, which was the effect, not of courage, but of
fear. The march of the auxiliaries was guided by the ambassador; and
they were admitted, without distrust, into the fortresses of the Alps.
But the crafty tyrant followed, with hasty and silent footsteps, in the
rear; and, as he diligently intercepted all intelligence of his motions,
the gleam of armor, and the dust excited by the troops of cavalry, first
announced the hostile approach of a stranger to the gates of Milan. In
this extremity, Justina and her son might accuse their own imprudence,
and the perfidious arts of Maximus; but they wanted time, and force, and
resolution, to stand against the Gauls and Germans, either in the field,
or within the walls of a large and disaffected city. Flight was their
only hope, Aquileia thei