[Flavius Claudius Julianus, born 331 A.D., died 363. He was the nephew of Constantine, and was made _Cæsar_ by his cousin the Emperor Constantius in 355. On the death of the latter, Julian became sole emperor in 361. Though bred in the Christian faith, his deep sympathy with the philosophy and letters of Greece, and his aversion to the factional bigotry of the Christian sects, caused him, on assuming the purple, to discard the doctrines of Christ, and attempt the restitution of paganism.] The retired scholastic education of Julian, in which he had been more conversant with books than with arms, with the dead than with the living, left him in profound ignorance of the practical arts of war and government; and when he awkwardly repeated some military exercise which it was necessary for him to learn, he exclaimed, with a sigh, “Oh Plato, Plato, what a task for a philosopher!” Yet even this speculative philosophy, which men of business are too apt to despise, had filled the mind of Julian with the noblest precepts and the most shining examples; had animated him with the love of virtue, the desire of fame, and the contempt of death. The habits of temperance recommended in the schools are still more essential in the severe discipline of a camp. The simple wants of nature regulated the measure of his food and sleep. Rejecting with disdain the delicacies provided for his table, he satisfied his appetite with the coarse and common fare which was allotted to the meanest soldiers. During the rigor of a Gallic winter he never suffered a fire in his bed-chamber; and after a short and interrupted slumber, he frequently rose in the middle of the night from a carpet spread on the floor, to dispatch any urgent business, to visit his rounds, or to steal a few moments for the prosecution of his favorite studies.