1The East was as yet unmoved. 1Syria and four legions were held by Licinius Mucianus, a man equally notorious in good fortune and bad. 1As a young man he had ambitiously cultivated distinguished friendships; 1later, his resources worn away, his position precarious, and even Claudius' anger suspected, he was set aside in a remote corner of Asia, and was as near to being an exile as he was afterwards to being emperor. 1A mixture of luxury and energy, courtesy and arrogance, bad qualities and good: excessive pleasures when he had leisure; 1whenever he took the field, great virtues: in public you would praise him, his private life had a bad name: but with subordinates, with intimates, with colleagues he was powerful through various charms, and a man for whom it was easier to hand over the empire than to hold it.
1The Jewish war was being conducted by Flavius Vespasian (Nero had chosen him as general) with three legions. 1Nor had Vespasian any wish or intention against Galba: for he had sent his son Titus to pay him respect and homage, as we shall relate in its place. 1That by the secret workings of fate, and by portents and oracles, the empire was destined for Vespasian and his sons, we believed only after his success.