The DEDICATION to Sir EDMUND BACON Knight and Baronet.

WHEN Rome in the revolution of 702. years, was grown pregnant of an uni∣versal Monarchy: After hard labour with foreign Hostilities, and •…orse with inward Rents and Divisions which mangled her own bowels. The State yet free (or Page  240 Loosness mistaken, as it is often, for Liberty) seemed now to stand most in danger of two eminent Gen∣tlemen, Caius Julius Caesar and Cneus Pompeius: The one of all men living, the likeliest to stir up again the Sinders of the Marian, the other of the Syllan Party. These Gallants of the time had some years before, besides their near alliance by Marriage of Pompey to Julius Caesar's Daughter, (a Lady of im∣perious allurement) been likewise united together in a Triumviral Knot with Marcus Crassus, the weal∣thiest of the whole Nobility, which Consortship was in effect a kind of Segregate, or Cabinet-Senate; im∣porting secretly no less, then that no Act of Mo∣ment should pass without consent of all three: So as upon this foundation, by their own personal Pur∣suits, by the mutual Strength and Coherence of their several Dependants; and by all other insi∣nuative and ambient Arts, (in a long corrupted Common-wealth, still forbidden, and still increas∣ing) after they had run through the principal Dig∣nities at home: Crassus on the Eastern side, with a puissant Army (as Money wants no Followers) went Governour of Syria: Pompey Southward, got Li∣bya of new, and retained both Spains under former Lieutenants: As for Caesar, who by an insolent Con∣sulship had awaked much jealousie, they gave him at first only Illyricum, and the nearer Gallia, Pro∣vinces then of little doings, (as it were to impound his spirits:) yet least the People (whose good will had cost him deep) should bluster in his behalf, the Senate was afterwards (between Favour and Fear) content to extend his Commission to Gallia Narbonen∣sis, beyond the Alps. Thus were the Three distributed at distance enough as perchance was thought meet, upon more doubt hitherto of their too much agree∣ment, Page  241 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 Page  242 towards other, they were impatient of all compa∣rison or approach between themselves; and of their former nearness, no fruit remaining but this, That the more inwardly they had then studied and under∣stood each other, they now loved the less. For point of invading the Soveraignty, such narrow Humo∣rists as could look through them, thought Pompey of the two, rather the closer, then the better. For Caesar's was not a smothered, but a flagrant Ambi∣tion, kindling first by Nature, and blown by Ne∣cessity; in the course whereof one might observe a kind of Circular Motion: for as his vast Desires had exhausted him with unmeasureable gifts above private Condition; so again, when he was grown (as he would often sport with himself in earnest) a great deal worth less then nothing: He fell next to resolve (by an usual Coincidence of extreams) that he could not subsist, unless he were Master of all. In their practical ways Pompey had one very ignoble custom, to insert, or (as I may term it) to inoculate himself into other mens merits and praises: So he un∣dermined Lucullus in Asia, and Metellus in Spain: the first a wise and magnificent, the other a good plain Souldier-like Gentleman. But on the other side, all that went for good or bad in Caesar, was clearly his own; having so little need to borrow from any other virtues, or vices, that he left it a Doubt among the best Wits of his time, whether of which him∣self had most, in the two proper Dowries of that Age, Eloquence or Arms.