Page:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire vol 3 (1897).djvu/435

 OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE 415 nihilated ; if it were possible, after a momentaiy slumber of two hundred years, to display the new world to the eyes of a spectator, who still retained a lively and recent impression of the old; his sui*prise and his reflections would furnish the pleasing subject of a philosophical romance. The scene could not be more advantageously placed than in the two centuries which elapsed between the reigns of Decius and of Theodosius the younger. During this period, the seat of government had been transported from Rome to a new city on the banks of the Thracian Bosphorus ; and the abuse of military spirit had been suppressed by an artificial system of tame and ceremonious sei'vitude. The throne of the persecuting Decius was filled by a succession of Christian and orthodox princes, who had extirpated the fabulous gods of antiquity ; and the public de- votion of the age was impatient to exalt the saints and martyrs of the Catholic church on the altars of Diana and Hercules. The union of the Roman empire was dissolved ; its genius was humbled in the dust ; and armies of vmknown Barbarians, issuing from the frozen regions of the North, had established their victorious reign over the fairest provinces of Europe and Africa.