Cæsar was at the height of his power. His achievements had eclipsed the military glory of Pompey, and by his wonderful career he might truly be looked upon as the “man of destiny.” On his return from Gaul, when the Senate had rejected his request for a prolongation of his command, and had ordered him to disband his army and to give up the administration of his province, his popularity was so great that his homeward journey, escorted as he was by his victorious army, was but a continuous triumphal march. Not only Rome, but all Italy welcomed him home as its greatest man, and was ready to heap its greatest, nay even divine honors upon him. The Senate and its chosen commander-in-chief, Pompey, had fled on the approach of Cæsar. In the decisive battle of Pharsalus Cæsar defeated Pompey, and by this victory became the sole ruler of the Roman Republic. Pompey was assassinated on landing in Egypt, as a fugitive, and Cæsar returned to Rome, where he was received with the tumultuous acclamations of the people, and conducted to the Capitol as the savior of the country. The Senate, which had just made war upon him and outlawed him as an enemy of the fatherland, appointed him dictator for ten years with absolute and supreme power, gave him a body-guard of seventy-two lictors to proclaim his majesty and inviolability, and ordered his statue to be placed beside that of Jupiter on the Capitol. A public thanksgiving festival, continuing for forty days, was proclaimed, and four brilliant triumphs for his victories in Gaul, Egypt, Pontus, and Africa, were accorded to him. Never before in the history of Rome had such honors, which seemed to pass the human limit, been conferred on any Roman citizen. It was evident that of the Republic nothing but the name remained, and that Cæsar, the dictator, was in fact the absolute monarch of the immense Empire. Once more the friends of liberty made an effort to shake off the yoke which Cæsar had imposed on the Republic. They flocked to the standards of the sons of Pompey, but the bloody and hard-fought battle of Munda sealed their fate; and Cæsar, again victorious, remained the absolute master of the civilized world,--not without an enemy, but certainly without a rival.