Chapter IX
The Psychology of the Emperor Elagabalus
"I would never have written the life of Antoninus Impurissimus," said Lampridius, "were it not that he had predecessors." Even in Latin the task was difficult. In English it would be impossible, at least Lampridius' life. There are subjects that permit of a hint, particularly if it be masked to the teeth, but there are others that no art can drape, not even the free use of Latin substantives. Our task therefore is to deal, rather with their sins of omission, than with the biographers' offences against all canons of good taste in recording the inexpressible. In his work on the Caesars, Suetonius displayed the eccentricities simply, without adding any descriptive placards; therein lay Suetonius' advantage; he was able to describe; nowadays a writer may not, at least not the character we possess of Elagabalus. It is not that he was depraved, for all his house was; it is, that, like many moderns, he made depravity a pursuit, and the aegis of the purple has carried the stories
