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422

CHARACTER OF DIOCLETIAN.

[CH. XIII. ness of superior merit, prompted his aspiring son to pursue the profession of arms and the hopes of fortune; and it would be extremely curious to observe the gradation of arts and accidents, which enabled him in the end to fulfil those oracles, and to display that merit to the world. Diocletian was successively promoted to the government of Moesia, the honours of the consulship, and the important command of the guards of the palace. He distinguished his abilities in the Persian war; and, after the death of Numerian, the slave, by the confession and judgment of his rivals, was declared the rost worthy of the imperial throne. The malice of religious zeal, whilst it arraigns the savage fierceness of his colleague Maximian, has affected to cast suspicions on the personal courage of the emperor Diocletian. It would not be easy to persuade us of the cowardice of a soldier of fortune, who acquired and preserved the esteem of the legions, as well as the favour of so many warlike princes. Yet even calumny is sagacious enough to discover and to attack the most vulnerable part. The valour of Diocletian was never found inadequate to his duty, or to the occasion; but he appears not to have possessed the daring and generous spirit of a hero, who courts danger and fame, disdains artifice, and boldly challenges the alle giance of his equals. His abilities were useful rather than splendid; a vigorous mind, improved by the experience and study of mankind; dexterity and application in business; a judicious mixture of liberality and economy, of mildness and rigour; profound dissimulation under the disguise of military frankness; steadiness to pursue his ends; flexibility to vary his means; and, above all, the great art of submitting his own passions, as well as those of others, to the interest of his ambition, and of colouring his ambition with the most specious pretences of justice and public utility. Like Augustus, Diocletian may be considered as the founder of a new empire. Like the adopted son of Cæsar, he was distinguished as a statesman rather than as a warrior; nor did either of those princes employ force, whenever their purpose could be effected by policy.

information respecting them may be found in Ernesti's Clav. Cicer., and in Eschenbach's Treatise De scribis Romanorum.-SCHREITER.]

* Lactantius (or whoever was the author of the little treatise De Mortibus Persecutorum) accuses Diocletian of timidity in two places,

The victory of Diocletian was remarkable for its singular mildness. A people accustomed to applaud the clemency of the conqueror, if the usual punishments of death, exile, and confiscation, were inflicted with any degree of temper and equity, beheld with the most pleasing astonishment a civil war, the flames of which were extinguished in the field of battle. Diocletian received into his confidence, Aristobulus, the principal minister of the house of Carus, respected the lives, the fortunes, and the dignity, of his adversaries, and even continued in their respective stations the greater number of the servants of Carinus.* It is not improbable that motives of prudence might assist the humanity of the artful Dalmatian: of these servants, many had purchased his favour by secret treachery; in others, he esteemed their grateful fidelity to an unfortunate master. The discerning judgment of Aurelian, of Probus, and of Carus, had filled the several departments of the state and army with officers of approved merit, whose removal would have injured the public service without promoting the interest of the successor. Such a conduct, however, displayed to the Roman world the fairest prospect of the new reign; and the emperor affected to confirm this favourable prepossession, by declaring, that, among all the virtues of his predecessors, he was the most ambitious of imitating the humane philosophy of Marcus Antoninus.t

The first considerable action of his reign seemed to evince his sincerity as well as his moderation. After the example of Marcus, he gave himself a colleague in the person of Maximian, on whom he bestowed at first the title of Cæsar, and afterwards that of Augustus. But the motives of his conduct, as well as the object of his choice, were of a very c. 7, 8. In chap. 9 he says of him, "erat in omni tumultu meticulosus et animi disjectus." In this encomium, Aurelius Victor seems to convey a just, though indirect, censure of the cruelty of Constantius. It appears from the Fasti, that Aristobulus remained prefect of the city, and that he ended with Diocletian the consulship which he had commenced with Carinus. + Aurelius Victor styles Diocletian,

"Parentem potius quam dominum." See Hist. August. p. 30.

The question of the time when Maximian received the honours of Cæsar and Augustus, has divided modern critics, and given occasion to a great deal of learned wrangling. I have followed M. de Tillemont (Histoire des Empereurs, tom. iv. p. 500-505), who has weighed the several reasons and difficulties with his scrupulous accuracy. [Clinton establishes this date of A.D. 286, from Idatius in Fastis, and later authorities-Ev.]

424

CHARACTER OF MAXIMIAN.

[CA. XIIY. different nature from those of his admired predecessor. By investing a luxurious youth with the honours of the purple, Marcus had discharged a debt of private gratitude, at the expense, indeed, of the happiness of the state. By associating a friend and a fellow-soldier to the labours of government, Diocletian, in a time of public danger, provided for the defence both of the east and of the west. Maximian was born a peasant, and, like Aurelian, in the territory of Sirmium. Ignorant of letters,* careless of laws, the rus ticity of his appearance and manner still betrayed in the most elevated fortune the meanness of his extraction. War was the only art which he professed. In a long course of service he had distinguished himself on every frontier of the empire; and, though his military talents were formed to obey rather than to command; though, perhaps, he never attained the skill of a consummate general, he was capable, by his valour, constancy, and experience, of executing the most arduous undertakings: nor were the vices of Maximian less useful to his benefactor. Insensible to pity, and fearless of consequences, he was the ready instrument of every act of cruelty which the policy of that artful prince might at once suggest and disclaim. As soon as a bloody sacrifice had been offered to prudence or to revenge, Diocletian, by his seasonable intercession, saved the remaining few whom he had never designed to punish, gently censured the severity of his stern colleague, and enjoyed the comparison of a golden and an iron age, which was universally applied to their opposite maxims of government. Notwithstanding the difference of their characters, the two emperors maintained, on the throne, that friendship which they had contracted in a private station. The haughty, turbulent spirit of Maximian, so fatal afterwards to himself and to the public peace, was accustomed to respect the genius of Diocletian, and confessed the ascendant of reason over brutal violence.† From a motive, either of pride or superstition, the two emperors assumed the titles, the one

* In an oration delivered before him (Panegyr. Vet. 2, 8), Mamertinus expresses a doubt whether his hero, in imitating the conduct of Hannibal and Scipio, had ever heard of their names. From thence we may fairly infer, that Maximian was more desirous of being considered as a soldier than as a man of letters; and it is in this manner that we can often translate the language of flattery into that of truth.

Lactantius de M. P. c. 8. Aurelius Victor. As among the Pane gyrics, we find orations pronounced in praise of Maximian, and others

of Jovius, the other of Herculius. Whilst the motion of the world (such was the language of their venal orators) was maintained by the all-seeing wisdom of Jupiter, the invincible arm of Hercules purged the earth from monsters and tyrants.*

But even the omnipotence of Jovius and Herculius was insufficient to sustain the weight of the public administration. The prudence of Diocletian discovered, that the empire, assailed on every side by the barbarians, required on every side the presence of a great army, and of an emperor. With this view he resolved once more to divide his unwieldy power, and with the inferior title of Cæsars, to confer on two generals of approved merit an equal share of the sovereign authority.† Galerius surnamed Armentarius, from his original profession of a herdsman, and Constantius, who from his pale complexion had acquired the denomination of Chlorus, were the two persons invested with the second honours of the imperial purple. In describing the country, extraction, and manners of Herculius, we have already delineated those of Galerius, who was often, and not improperly, styled the younger Maximian, though, in many instances, both of virtue and ability, he appears to have possessed a manifest superiority over the elder. The birth of Constantius was less obscure than that of his colleagues. Eutropius, his father, was one of the most considerable nobles of Dardania, and his mother was the niece of the emperor Claudius.§ Although the youth of Constantius had been spent in arms, he was endowed with a mild and amiable disposition, and the popular voice had long since acknowledged him worthy of the rank which he at last attained. To strengthen the bonds of political by those of domestic union, each of the emperors assumed the

which flatter his adversaries at his expense, we derive some knowledge from the contrast. * See the second and third Panegyrics, parti cularly 3, 3, 10, 14; but it would be tedious to copy the diffuse and affected expressions of their false eloquence. With regard to the titles, consult Aurel. Victor, Lactantius de M. P. c. 52, Spanheim de Usu Numismatum, &c. Dissertat. 12, 8. [See also their coins in Eckhel, D. Num. Vet. vol. iii, p. 9-27.-ED.] Aurelius Victor. Victor in Epitome. Eutrop. 9, 22. Lactant. de M. P. c. 8. Hieronym. in Chron It is only among the modern Greeks that Tillemont can discover his appellation of Chlorus. Any remarkable degree of paleness seems inconsistent with the rubor mentioned in Panegyric. 5, 19.

§ Julian, the grandson of Constantius, boasts that his family was

426

THE REBELLION OF

[сн. хип character of a father to one of the Casars; Diocletian te Galerius, and Maximian to Constantius; and each obliging them to repudiate their former wives, bestowed his daughter in marriage on his adopted son. These four princes distributed among themselves the wide extent of the Roman empire. The defence of Gaul, Spain,† and Britain was intrusted to Constantius; Galerius was stationed on the banks of the Danube, as the safeguard of the Illyrian provinces; Italy and Africa were considered as the department of Maximian; and, for his peculiar portion, Diocletian reserved Thrace, Egypt, and the rich countries of Asia. Every one was sovereign within his own jurisdiction; but their united authority extended over the whole monarchy; and each of them was prepared to assist his colleagues with his counsels or presence. The Cæsars, in their exalted rank, revered the majesty of the emperors; and the three younger princes invariably acknowledged, by their gratitude and obedience, the common parent of their fortunes. picious jealousy of power found not any place among them; and the singular happiness of their union has been compared to a chorus of music, whose harmony was regulated and maintained by the skilful hand of the first artist.I

The sus

This important measure was not carried into execution till about six years after the association of Maximian; and that interval of time had not been destitute of memorable incidents. But we have preferred, for the sake of perspi cuity, first to describe the more perfect form of Diocletian's government, and afterwards to relate the actions of his reign, following rather the natural order of the events, than the dates of a very doubtful chronology.

The first exploit of Maximian, though it is mentioned in a few words by our imperfect writers, deserves, from its singu larity, to be recorded in a history of human manners.

He

derived from the warlike Mosians. Misopogon, p. 348. The Dardanians dwelt on the edge of Mosia. * Galerius married Valeria, the daughter of Diocletian: if we speak with strictness, Theodora, the wife of Constantius, was daughter only to the wife of Maximian. Spanheim, Dissertat. 11, 2. [Maximian married a widow named Galeria Valeria Eutropia, whose first husband, the father of Theodora, is unknown. Eckhel, D. Num. Vet. 8, 33.-ED.] + This division agrees with that of the four prefectures; yet there is some reason to doubt whether Spain was not a province of Maximian. See Tillemont, tem. iv. p. 517.

Julian in Cæsarib. p. 315. Spanheint's notes to the French trans

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