Page:General History of Europe 1921.djvu/249

 A Century of Disorder 177 So the once free Roman citizen had almost no independent life of his own. He was watched by government officials and spies who saw to it that the grain dealers, butchers, and bakers supplied the public and never deserted their occupation. In a word, the Roman government attempted to regulate almost every interest of life, and wherever the citizen turned he felt the irksome inter- ference and oppression of the State. IV. THE TRIUMPH OF CHRISTIANITY AND DIVISION OF THE EMPIRE 280. Constantine (A. D. 324-337). Constantine was the first important Christian emperor, and all his successors were Chris- tians in name (except one, Julian, called by Christians "the Apostate"). A series of struggles had followed Diocletian's death, and from these Constantine the Great emerged victoriously as emperor. The Balkan Peninsula had now become even more important than Italy. It had flourishing towns and furnished many of the troops, and more than one emperor, including Dio- cletian, came from that region. Constantine determined to estab- lish a new Rome on its eastern borders and selected for his site the old Greek town of Byzantium on the Bosporus. Constan- tinople, named after its founder, stood just between Europe and Asia and was well situated to command them both. The emperor stripped many an ancient town of its works of art to adorn his new capital, and before his death it had become a magnificent city, worthy to be the successor of Rome as the seat of the Empire. 281. Division of the Empire. The founding of a second capi- tal in the East tended to bring about a separation of the eastern and western portions of the Empire. When after Constantine's time there were two emperors, as there often were, one was likely to make his quarters in Italy, the other at Constantinople. But the Empire was always regarded as one, and no decree was ever issued dividing it into two parts. The ancient res publica, or Roman commonwealth, was never given up in theory.