To him, as to Simon, she was
Ennoia, Prunikos, Helen of Troy. She had been Delilah, Lucretia.
She had prostituted herself to every nation; she had sung in the
by-ways, and hidden robbers in the vermin of her bed. But by Simon
she was rehabilitated. It was she, no doubt, of whom Caligula
thought when he beckoned to the moon. In Rome she had her statue,
and near it was one to Simon, the holy god.
But of all manifestations of divinity the most patent was that
which haloed Vespasian. He expected it, Suetonius says, but it is
doubtful if any one else did. One night he dreamed that an era of
prosperity was to dawn for him and his when Nero lost a tooth. The
next day he was shown one which had been drawn from the emperor's
mouth. But that was nothing. Presently at Carmel the Syrian oracle
assured him that he would be successful in whatever he undertook.
From Rome word came that, while the armies of Vitellius and Otho
were fighting, two eagles had fought above them, and that the
victor had been despatched by a third eagle that had come from the
East. In Alexandria Serapis whispered to him. The entire menagerie
of Egypt proclaimed him king. Apis bellowed, Anubis barked. Isis
visited him unveiled. The lame and the blind pressed about him; he
cured them with a touch. There could be no reasonable doubt now;
surely he was a god. On his shoulders Apollonius threw the purple,
and Vespasian set out for Rome.
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