considered reason as the instrument of dispute; they inter preted the laws according to the dictates of private interest and the same pernicious habits might still adhere to their characters in the public administration of the state. The honor of a liberal profession has indeed been vindicated by ancient and modern advocates, who have filled the most important stations, with pure integrity and consummate wisdom: but in the decline of Roman jurisprudence, the ordinary pro motion of lawyers was pregnant with mischief and disgrace. The noble art, which had once been preserved as the sacred nheritance of the patricians, was fallen into the hands of freedmen and plebeians,122 who, with cunning rather than with skill, exercised a sordid and pernicious trade. Some of them procured admittance into families for the purpose of fomenting differences, of encouraging suits, and of preparing a harvest of gain for themselves or their brethren. Others, recluse in their chambers, maintained the dignity of legal professors, by furnishing a rich client with subtleties to confound the plainest truths, and with arguments to color the most unjustifiable pretensions. The splendid and popular class was composed of the advocates, who filled the Forum with the sound of their turgid and loquacious rhetoric. Careless of fame and of justice, they are described, for the most part, as ignorant and rapacious guides, who conducted their clients through a maze of expense, of delay, and of disappointment; from whence, after a tedious series of years, they were at length dismissed, when their patience and fortune were almost exhausted.123

etreat, perhaps a disgrace, of many years, which Mallius (confounded

uiting with the nont Monilius: 200 Fohricing Ribliothee Latin

III. In the system of policy introduced by Aug governors, those at least of the Imperial provinces, vested with the full powers of the sovereign himself ters of peace and war, the distribution of rewards an ments depended on them alone, and they successively on their tribunal in the robes of civil magistracy, and plete armor at the head of the Roman legions. 124 T ence of the revenue, the authority of law, and the c of a military force, concurred to render their power and absolute; and whenever they were tempted to their allegiance, the loyal province which they involved rebellion was scarcely sensible of any change in its state. From the time of Commodus to the reign of tine, near one hundred governors might be enur who, with various success, erected th standard of rev though the innocent were too often sacrificed, the might be sometimes prevented, by the suspicious cr their master.125 To secure his throne and the publi quillity from these formidable servants, Constantine res divide the military from the civil administration, and to lish, as a permanent and professional distinction, a which had been adopted only as an occasional exp The supreme jurisdiction exercised by the Prætorian p over the armies of the empire, was transferred to t masters-general whom he instituted, the one for the c the other for the infantry; and though each of these i ous officers was more peculiarly responsible for the dis of those troops which were under his immediate insp they both indifferently commanded in the field the s bodies, whether of horse or foot, which were united

ture of sound sense, false rhetoric, and extravagant satire. Go (Prolegom. ad Cod. Theod. c. i. p. 185) supports the histor similar complaints and authentic facts. In the fourth century, camels might have been laden with law-books. Eunapius i Edesii, p. 72.

124 See a very splendid example in the life of Agricola, partic c. 20, 21. The lieutenant of Britain was intrusted with the powers which Cicero, proconsul of Cilicia, had exercised in the of the senate and people.

120 The Abbé Dubos, who has examined with accuracy (see de la Monarchie Françoise, tom. i. p. 41-100, edit. 1742) the in tions of Augustus and of Corstantine, observes, that if Otho had put to death the day before he executed his conspiracy, Otho now appear in history as innocent as Corbulo.

same army." 126 Their number was soon doubled by the divis ion of the east and west; and as separate generals of the same rank and title were appointed on the four important frontiers of the Rhine, of the Upper and the Lower Danube, and of the Euphrates, the defence of the Roman empire was at length committed to eight masters-general of the cavalry and infantry. Under their orders, thirty-five military com. manders were stationed in the provinces: three in Britain, six in Gaul, one in Spain, one in Italy, five on the Upper, and four on the Lower Danube; in Asia, eight, three in Egyp and four in Africa. The titles of counts, and dukes,127 by which they were properly distinguished, have obtained in modern languages so very different a sense, that the use of them may occasion some surprise. But it should be recollected, that the second of those appellations is only a corrup tion of the Latin word, which was indiscriminately applied to any military chief. All these provincial generals were therefore dukes; but no more than ten among them were dignified with the rank of counts or companions, a title of honor, or rather of favor, which had been recently invented in the court of Constantine. A gold belt was the ensign which distinguished the office of the counts and dukes; and besides their pay, they received a liberal allowance sufficient to maintain one hundred and ninety servants, and one hundred and fifty-eight horses. They were strictly prohibited from interfering in any matter which related to the administration of justice or the revenue; but the command which they exercised over the troops of their department, was independent of the authority of the magistrates. About the same time that Constantine gave a legal sanction to the ecclesiastical order, he instituted in the Roman empire the nice balance of the civil and the military powers. The emulation, and sometimes the discord, which reigned between two professions of opposite interests

and incompatible manners WOS productive of beneficial and

that the general and the civil governor of a provin either conspire for the disturbance, or should unite service, of their country. While the one delayed to assistance which the other disdained to solicit, the tro frequently remained without orders or without supp public safety was betrayed, and the defenceless subje left exposed to the fury of the Barbarians. The administration, which had been formed by Constantine the vigor of the state, while it secured the tranquillit monarch.

The memory of Constantine has been deservedly for another innovation, which corrupted military discip prepared the ruin of the empire. The nineteen year preceded his final victory over Licinius, had been a p license and intestine war. The rivals who contended possession of the Roman world, had withdrawn the part of their forces from the guard of the general fronti the principal cities which formed the boundary respective dominions were filled with soldiers, who con their countrymen as their most implacable enemies. A use of these internal garrisons had ceased with the civ the conqueror wanted either wisdom or firmness to rev severe discipline of Diocletian, and to suppress a fatal gence, which habit had endeared and almost confirmed military order. From the reign of Constantine, a popu even legal distinction was admitted between the Palat and the Borderers; the troops of the court, as they improperly styled, and the troops of the frontier. T mer, elevated by the superiority of their pay and priv were permitted, except in the extraordinary emergenc war, to occupy their tranquil stations in the heart of the inces. The most flourishing cities were oppressed intolerable weight of quarters. The soldiers insensibly the virtues of their profession, and contracted only the of civil life. They were either degraded by the indus mechanic trades, or enervated by the luxury of baths an atres. They soon became careless of their martial exe curious in their diet and apparel; and while they in

128 Zosimus, l. ii. p. 111. The distinction between the two of Roman troops is very darkly expressed in the historians, the and the Notitia. Consult, however, the copious paratitlon, or ab which Godefroy has drawn up of the seventh book, de Re M of the Theodosian Code, 1. vii. tit. i. leg. 18, 1. viii. tit. i. leg. 10

129

terror to the subjects of the empire, they trembled at the hostile approach of the Barbarians.1 The chain of fortifications which Diocletian and his colleagues had extended along the banks of the great rivers, was no longer maintained with the same care, or defended with the same vigilance. The numbers which still remained under the name of the troops of the frontier, might be sufficient for the ordinary defence; but their spirit was degraded by the humiliating reflection, that they who were exposed to the hardships and dangers of a perpetual warfare, were rewarded only with about two thirds of the pay and emoluments which were lavished on the troops of the court. Even the bands or legions that were raised the nearest to the level of those unworthy favorites, were in some measure disgraced by the title of honor which they were allowed to assume. It was in vain that Constantine repeated the most dreadful menaces of fire and sword against the Borderers who should dare to desert their colors, to connive at the inroads of the Barbarians, or to participate in the spoil.130 The mischiefs which flow from injudicious counsels are seldom removed by the application of partial severities: and though succeeding princes labored to restore the strength and numbers of the frontier garrisons, the empire, till the last moment of its dissolution, continued to languish under the mortal wound which had been so rashly or so weakly inflicted by the hand of Constantine.

The same timid policy, of dividing whatever is united, of reducing whatever is eminent, of dreading every active power, and of expecting that the most feeble will prove the most obedient, seems to pervade the institutions of several princes, and particularly those of Constantine. The martial pride of the legions, whose victorious camps had so often been the scene of rebellion, was nourished by the memory of their past exploits, and the consciousness of their actual strength. As long as they maintained their ancient establishment of six thousand men, they subsisted, under the reign of Diocletian, each of them singly, a visible and important object in the

19 Ferox erat in suos miles et rapax, ignavus vero in hostes et fractus. Ammian. 1. xxii. c. 4. He observes, that they loved downy beds and houses of marble; and that their cups were heavier than their swords.

120 Cod. Theod. 1. vii. tit. i. leg. 1, tit. xii. leg. i. See Howells Hist of the World, vol. ii. p. 19. That learned historian, who is not suffi

siently known labore to justify the obezector and polier of Constantine