40 THE DECLINE AND FALL ('iiAi'. was detained some days under the walls of Heraclea;
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_ and he had no sooner taken possession of that city, than he was alaraied by the intelligence, that Licinius had pitched his camp at the distance of only eighteen I'he defeat, miles. After a fruitless negociation, in which the two ^ ' princes attempted to seduce the fidelity of each other's adherents, they had recourse to arms. The emperor of the east commanded a disciplined and veteran army of above seventy thousand men; and Licinius, who had collected about thirty thousand Illyrians, was at first oppressed by the superiority of numbers. His military skill, and the firmness of his troops, restored the day, and obtained a decisive victory. The incredible speed which Maximin exei'ted in his flight, is much more celebrated than his prowess in the battle. Twenty- four hours afterwards he was seen pale, trembling, and without his imperial ornaments, at Nicomedia, one hundred and sixty miles from the place of his defeat. The wealth of Asia was yet unexhausted ; and though the flower of his veterans had fallen in the late action, he had still power, if he could obtain time, to draw very numerous levies from Syria and Egypt. But he sur- vived his misfortune only three or four months. His and deatii death, which happened at Tarsus, was variously as- former, cribed to despair, to poison, and to the divine justice. August. As Maximin was alike destitute of abilities and of virtue, he was lamented neither by the people nor by the soldiers. The provinces of the east, delivered from the terrors of civil war, cheerfully acknowledged the authority of Licinius*^. Cruelty ot 'j^hg vanquished emperor left behind him two child- ren, a boy oi about eight, and a gu'l or about seven years old. Their inoffensive age might have excited compassion ; but the compassion of Licinius was a very feeble resource, nor did it restrain him from extin- guishing the name and memory of his adversary. The ^ Zosimu'? mentions the defeat and death of Maximin as ordinary events ; but Lactantius expatiates on them, (de M. P. c. 45 — 50.) ascribing tliem to ♦he miraculous interposition of heaven. Licinius at that time was one of the protectors of the chuich.
