A man of action, grown in simplicity, toughened by a rude life, he
was all at once carried into the midst of the subtlest and most highly
developed civilisation of the ancient world and given the greatest
facilities to enjoy and abuse it that ever man had: as might have been
expected, he was intoxicated; he contracted an almost insane passion
for such a life; he adored Egypt with such ardour as to forget for it
the nation of his birth and the modest home of his boyhood. And then
began the great tragedy of his life, a tragedy not love-inspired, but
political. As the hold of Egypt strengthened on his mind, Cleopatra
tried to persuade him not to conquer Persia, but to accept openly
the kingdom of Egypt, to found with her and with their children a new
dynasty, and to create a great new Egyptian Empire, adding to Egypt
the better part of the provinces that Rome possessed in Africa and in
Asia, abandoning Italy and the provinces of the West forever to their
destiny.

Cleopatra had thought to snatch from Rome its Oriental Empire by the
arm of Antony, in that immense disorder of revolution; to reconstruct
the great Empire of Egypt, placing at its head the first general of
the time, creating an army of Roman legionaries with the gold of the
Ptolemies; to make Egypt and its dynasty the prime potentate of Africa
and Asia, transferring to Alexandria the political and diplomatic
control of the finest parts of the Mediterranean world.

As the move failed, men have deemed it folly and stupidity; but he who
knows how easy it is to be wise after events, will judge this confused
policy of Cleopatra less curtly. At any rate, it is certain that her
scheme failed more because of its own inconsistencies than through the
vigour and ability with which Rome tried to thwart it; it is certain