Page:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (1827) Vol 2.djvu/267

 OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE. 249 vailed over that honourable epithet ; and, after the CHAP, revolution of fourteen centuries, still perpetuates the ^ fame of its author ''. The foundation of a new capital is naturally con- F'rm ofgo- nected with the establishment of a new form of civil and military administration. The distinct view of the com])ncated system of policy introduced by Diocletian, improved by Constantine, and completed by his imme- diate successors, may not only amuse the fancy by the singular picture of a great empire, but will tend to illustrate the secret and internal causes of its rapid decay. In the pursuit of any remarkable institution, we may be frequently led into the more early or the more recent times of the Roman history ; but the proper limits of this enquiry will be included within a period of about one hundred and thirty years, from the accession of Constantine to the publication of the Theodosian code**; from which, as well as from the Notitia of the east and west*^, we derive the most copi- ous and authentic information of the state of the em- pire. This variety of objects will suspend, for some time, the course of the narrative; but the interru'ption will be censured only by those readers who are insensi- ble to the importance of laws and manners, while they peruse, with eager curiosity, the transient intrigues of a court, or the accidental event of a battle. The manly pride of the Romans, content with sub- Hierarchy stantial power, had left to the vanity of the east the °^ '^^ ^*' vanity of human ambition, and seems to triumph in the disappointment of Constantine, whose immortal name is now lost in the vulgar appellation of Istambol, a Turkish corruption of ti'c rffv TroXti/. Yet the original name is still preserved : 1. By the nations of Europe. 2. 15y the modern Greeks. 3. By the Arabs, whose writings are diffused over the wide extent of their conquests in Asia and Africa. See d'Herbelot, Bibliotheque Orientale, p. '275. 4. By the more learned Turks, and by the emperor himself in liis public mandates. Cantemir's History of the Othman Kmpire, p. 51. '' The Tlieodosian code was promulgated A.D. 438. Seethe Prolego- mena of Godefroy, c. i. p. 185. •= Pancirolus, in his elaborate commentary, assigns to the Notitia a date almost similar to that of the Theodosian code; but his proofs, or rather conjectures, are extremely feeble. 1 should be rather inclined to place this useful work between the final division of the empire, A.D. 395. and the successful invasion of Gaul by the barbarians, A. D. 407. See Histoire des Anciens Peuples de I'Europe, torn. vii. p. 40.
 * The lively Fontenelle (Dialogues des Morts, xii.) affects to deride the