This, Antonine felt, was a deplorable state of affairs—rank atheism if not something worse. He knew the potency of his God, and desired, by gentle means, to set it forth to others that they too might believe. Unfortunately, no one desired belief, and he had to fight against rationalism as well as convention. The Romans were not yet tired of their chase after impossible delights; when they were, another dogma presented itself, and as often as not it was accepted, as being the line of least resistance. If Antonine had given them what Julian did, his success would have been assured. Such was philosophy, freedom, and beauty under the guise of a God whose existence he admitted, but whose intervention he denied. Antonine was not Julian; he was an Eastern monotheist, far nearer to the worship and doctrines of Jehovah than to those of any Western mode of thought. He could not understand the deification of attributes, because he wanted something more tangible, real, and superstitious, something that appealed to his neurotic nature and erotic passions. Thus it is that his vain efforts to unite all worship, all religions in that dedicated to Deus Solus are derided, as well by the monotheistic Hebrew as by the tritheistic Christian. His fault lay in the fact that he was too young for the work, too unaccustomed to the circuitous and mole-like burrowings by which a religion captures society. But the scheme in itself showed purpose and a precocious propensity for the mysterious, unnatural and unhealthy in a child of his age. Had Antonine been born in the twentieth instead of the third century of this era, had he enjoyed the advantages of a modern education, he would have learned that religion and unusual propensities are the last things a gentleman is expected to parade before the world. Further, he would have certainly emerged from the training—which though drastic is certainly most salutary—with his waywardness curbed, his mind and will strengthened, his lithe and graceful body healthy and fit to bear the fatigues and responsibilities which life was going to lay upon his splendid shoulders. Unfortunately for him, he was a Syrian with wonderful eyes and a mystical temperament, and was born at a time when the monarch’s wayward will was a law unto himself and all the world besides; yet despite these drawbacks, with so many of the elements of success to hand, he might have triumphed, if the usual conspirators had not been at work. “Rome was still mistress of the world though she was growing very old. A few more years and the Earth’s new children fell upon her; then the universe was startled by the uproar of her agony. Then and not till then, where the thunderbolt had gleamed did the emaciated figure of the crucifix appear, and upon the shoulders of a prelate descended the purple which had dazzled the world.” BIBLIOGRAPHY ACCURSIUS (BONUS). Vitae Caesarum. 1475. ARNOLD (W. T.). Roman Provincial Administration. Oxford, 1906. AUDOLLENT (A.).