When she had still been in twenty-first-century France, she had once heard Hathor, the goddess of love, say that when Napoleon was in Egypt, he had had a dream near her temple. In the dream, she had asked him whether he wanted a happy family or wanted to become Augustus.
He had chosen to become Augustus, and when he woke, there was an extra sculpture of Augustus's head in his hand.
What the Archbishop had just said reminded her that she could ask the man himself whether he had ever had such a dream. After all, in her time, he had already been dead for two hundred years.
Caesar's nephew Octavian had been born into a good family, but he was not like the poem described: "Strong men create easy times, easy times create weak men." When Caesar was assassinated and the situation became chaotic and dangerous, Octavian had neither panicked nor fled or acted rashly. Instead, he had swiftly returned to Rome. His family had opposed his inheriting anything from Caesar, hoping to keep Caesar's assassins from coming after them, but Octavian had still accepted Caesar's will, changed his name, and quickly gained the support of Caesar's faction.
Georgiana rather liked Mrs. Kaiser, the Junker noblewoman who had changed her own name to win the locals' favor, and she even agreed with many of Frederick the Great's views. But as later Germans said, "Frederick the Great was a great man, but God preserve us from living beneath his scepter."
Fervent faith could unleash violence. Hitler had once said that any violence not founded upon a solid spiritual basis would sooner or later waver and prove unreliable.
Some went on the Crusades seeking redemption, while others intended to protect pilgrims. Behind those glittering slogans lay riches and other motives. Holy