mpt which he publicly expressed for the reigning religion; [22]
and it should seem, from his subsequent conduct, that the indiscreet and
unseasonable freedom of Valentinian was the effect of military spirit,
rather than of Christian zeal. He was pardoned, however, and still
employed by a prince who esteemed his merit; [23] and in the various
events of the Persian war, he improved the reputation which he had
already acquired on the banks of the Rhine. The celerity and success
with which he executed an important commission, recommended him to the
favor of Jovian; and to the honorable command of the second school,
or company, of Targetiers, of the domestic guards. In the march from
Antioch, he had reached his quarters at Ancyra, when he was unexpectedly
summoned, without guilt and without intrigue, to assume, in the
forty-third year of his age, the absolute government of the Roman
empire.

[Footnote 19: Ten days appear scarcely sufficient for the march and
election. But it may be observed, 1. That the generals might command the
expeditious use of the public posts for themselves, their attendants,
and messengers. 2. That the troops, for the ease of the cities, marched
in many divisions; and that the head of the column might arrive at Nice,
when the rear halted at Ancyra.]

[Footnote 20: Ammianus, xxvi. 1. Zosimus, l. iii. p. 198. Philostorgius,
l. viii. c. 8, and Godefroy, Dissertat. p. 334. Philostorgius, who
appears to have obtained some curious and authentic intelligence,
ascribes the choice of Valentinian to the praefect Sallust, the
master-general Arintheus, Dagalaiphus count of the domestics, and the
patrician Datianus, whose pressing recommendations from Ancyra had a
weighty influence in the election.]

[Footnote 21: Ammianus (xxx. 7, 9) and the younger Victor have furnished
the portrait of Valentinian, which naturally precedes and illustrates
the history of his reign. * Note: Symmachus, in a fragment of an oration
published by M. Mai, describes Valentinian as born among the snows of
Illyria, and habituated to military labor amid the heat and dust of
Libya: genitus in frigoribus, educatus is solibus Sym. Orat. Frag. edit.
Niebuhr, p. 5.--M.]

[Footnote 21a: According to Ammianus, he wrote elegantly, and was
skilled in painting and modelling. Scribens decore, venusteque pingens
et fingens. xxx. 7.--M.]

[Footnote 22: At Antioch, where he was obliged to attend the emperor
to the table, he struck a priest, who had