124 UNIVERSAL ERUDITION. 



or inhabited by favage nations, or too inconfidc- 

 rable to attract regard. All that was worth the 

 trouble of conquering, and all whofe hiftory is 

 worth the trouble of fludying, was conquered, 

 and in fubjcction to the Roman empire. 7'he 

 hiftory of all the nations of the earth, during the 

 middle age, is therefore included in the annals 

 of the Roman monarchy: and when a people that 

 was unknown, as for example, the Vandals, 

 the Herulians, the Saracens, and others, ap- 

 peared upon the theatre of the world, and made 

 invafions or conquefts in the dominions of the 

 empire ; it is the bufmels of general hiflory to 

 explain the particular hiftory of fiich people, as 

 far as it is capable of explanation. For we cannot 

 avoid confefTmg, that there reigns great obicurity 

 in the middle age, and that there are many 

 chafms in the hiftories of particular nations, who 

 were either in fubjection to the Roman empire, 

 or at war with it. 



III. The firft objects, that offer themfelves in 

 the hiftory of the middle kge, are the Roman 

 monarchy under forty-fevcn emperors, from Au- 

 guftus to Theodofius the Great, who reigned 

 over the known world for 395 years ; and the 

 tranfbtion of the feat of that immenfe empire 

 from Rome to Conftantinople. We then fee the 

 partition of that empire between the two fons of 

 Theodofius, Arcadius and Honorius, and the. 

 cftablifhment of the two empires, the Eaftern 

 and the Weftern, which arofe from that diyifion. 



We 



