and conference of Counsels and Plots toge∣ther, then of any rupture, or disunion at hand: So short-sighted is that which we call humane Pro∣vidence, and so easily can the Supream Mover de∣lude our Imaginations. For Crassus not long after, either greedy of Fame or Spoil, and too confident (as it should seem) in the weakest of Advantages, Number, being miserably overthrown, and slain by the Parthians. And Iulia a little before dying of an Abort in Child-bed, together with the Infant she bare, it lay thenceforth open and clear in every Mans eye, that the Triumvirate dissolved, and She gone, without any Slip remaining, who had been the fastest Cement to hold her Father and Husband together, there would soon ensue, but a dry and sandy Friendship between them, being now left at large to the Scope and Sway of their voluntary Ap∣petites.
Wherefore, having undertaken for some enter∣tainment of my private time, to compile out of the best of Ancient Memories, that mighty Action which anon under these two Chiefs involved almost the whole World, then known, I impute it not im∣pertinent, to take first a short view how they stood before hand in Parallel together.
They were both, in general, esteemed of Affecti∣ons too strong for their own, or the common Quiet: That the one could not endure a Superior, nor the other an Equal; we are told both in Prose and in Verse, by ingenious Authors: But whether they agreed to leave us a draught of the greatness, or of the weakness of their Minds, I dare not affirm; some seeming Magnanimities being indeed (if you found them well) at the bottom, very Impotencies. Certainly, in sober conceit, howsoever they stood