304 The Empire ROME. The Empire. 
Theodosius was urged to send his soldiers against the place. 
What orders they received are unknown; but they entered 
the town sword in hand, and surrounding the people assem¬ 
bled at the Circensian games, slew upwards of seven thousand 
of them, without distinction of age, sex, or condition, and 
without discriminating the innocent from the guilty. 
St. Ambrose, then bishop of Milan, having heard of this 
horrible execution, sent a monitory epistle to the emperor, 
and exhorted him to expiate his fault by sincere repentance. 
When Theodosius next visited Milan, he was proceeding as 
usual to the cathedral to assist in the celebration of the divine 
mysteries, but was repelled by the pontiff, who de¬ 
clared him excluded from the communion til!, by a public 
penance, he had expiated so public a crime. The emperor 
submitted, and returning to his palace in tears, performed with 
humility the offices prescribed by the canons of the church. 
Theodosius died soon after at Milan of a dropsy, in the 
fiftieth year of his age, after a prosperous and, on the whole, a 
glorious reign of sixteen years, leavingto his son, Arcadius, 
the throne of Constantinople, and to Honorius that of Italy. 
In this place, and before we proceed to narrate the history of 
the eastern and western empires, it is proper to enter into a short 
analysis of the causes of the downfall of the Roman empire. 
The first and last security of a state is the attachment of the 
inhabitants to their native soil. Skill in arms, habits of dis¬ 
cipline, and still more, unity, are important helps to this 
feeling, but they are nothing without it. The most inexperi¬ 
enced savages haveoften made vigorousdefences against the most 
perfect and best disciplined armies; and the divided states of 
Greece resisted the united forces of the east. But history 
furnishes no instance of a state which endured long, whose 
subjects had become indifferent to their government and 
their rulers. 
The course of our narrative has sufficiently shewn that 
whatever amor patriae is derivable from political influence, 
had long since been lost to the Romans: that a few merce¬ 
nary soldiers disposed of the highest office of the state; and 
the emperor, elected by this licentious authority, assumed the 
entire direction of the government. The few occasional gleams 
of a Titus or an Antoninus’ reign, shew but with greater 
force the uniform darkness and desolation of the Roman 
state under the emperors. Long practice in war, and the 
assiduous cultivation of tactics, and the proud consciousness 
of civilization, served, however, to repel, and even subdue 
the divided barbarians who assailed the Roman frontier. 
The compulsory tributes of the provinces fed, in the impe¬ 
rial city, a vast population who were content to buy a life 
of luxury and idleness by occasional valiant campaigns. 
But the increasing extent of the empire soon rendered the 
permanent stay of the legions necessary on the frontiers, 
and obliged them to recruit their thinned ranks from the 
countries they happened to be stationed in. In the reign of 
Constantine, even these failed ; the laws of the time pro¬ 
claim the utter abhorrence with which the indigenous Ro¬ 
mans viewed the profession of anus; and Scythians, Goths, 
and Germans formed the most numerous as well as effective 
portion of the imperial troops. Of these, few' could have 
any attachment to the institutions of Rome, and many 
ardently desired the supremacy of their own chiefs, and the 
prosperity of their original nation. Hence, -when they 
returned to their homes, they exported all the skill in arms, 
with which long experience had instructed Rome, to her 
enemies; who, while they assiduously imitated her weapons 
and discipline, viewed, with the utmost contempt, the dege¬ 
neracy of her sons. But while the Romans were compelled 
to yield to the barbarians the little superiority they had 
hitherto possessed in the art of war, other causes contributed 
to weaken the attachment of the people to their country, 
and to render emigration extremely frequent. In the first 
place, the establishment of Constantinople drew the richer 
inhabitants from Italy; and the impossibility of carrying on 
an extensive commerce in Rome, drew the trading population 
to those ports of the empire which were best screened from the 
inroads of the barbarians. But an excessive weight of taxes 
pressed on all classes, and at once divided, impoverished, 
rendered discontented and enfeebled the spirits of the Romans. 
Thus, according to Gibbon, the agriculture of the Ro¬ 
man provinces was insensibly ruined, and, in the progress 
of despotism, which tends to disappoint its own purpose, 
the emperors were obliged to derive some merit from the 
forgiveness of debts, or the remission of tributes, which their 
subjects were utterly incapable of paying. Of the fertile and 
happy province of Campania, the scene of the early vic¬ 
tories and of the delicious retirements of the citizens of Rome, 
within sixty years after the death of Constantine, an exemp¬ 
tion was granted in favour of three hundred and thirty thou¬ 
sand English acres of desert and uncultivated land ; which 
amounted to one-eighth of the whole surface of the pro¬ 
vince. As the footsteps of the barbarians had not yet been 
seen in Italy, the cause of this amazing desolation, which is 
recorded in the laws, can be ascribed only to the adminis¬ 
tration of the Roman emperors. 
Either from design or from accident, the mode of assess¬ 
ment seemed to unite the substance of a land-tax with the 
forms of a capitation. The returns which were sent of every 
province or district, expressed the number of tributary sub¬ 
jects, and the amount of the public impositions. The latter 
of these sums was divided by the former; and the estimate, 
that such a province contained so many capita, or heads of 
tribute ; and that each head w ; as rated at such a price, was 
universally received, not only in the popular, but even in 
the legal computation. 
Such indeed might be the theory of the Romans; in practice, 
however, this unjust equality was not felt, as the tribute was 
collected on the principle of a real, not of a personal imposi¬ 
tion ; thus several indigent citizens contributed to compose 
a single head, or share of taxation; while the wealthy pro¬ 
vincial, in proportion to his fortune, alone represented 
several of those imaginary beings. 
But this tax on the proprietors of land, would have suf¬ 
fered a rich and numerous class of free citizens to escape. 
With the view of sharing that species of wealth which is 
derived from art or labour, and which exists in money or in 
merchandise, the emperors imposed a distinct and personal 
tribute on the trading part of their subjects. Some exemp¬ 
tions, very strictly confined both in time and place, were 
allowed to the proprietors who disposed of the produce of 
their own estates. Some indulgence was granted to the pro¬ 
fession of the liberal arts ; but every other branch of com¬ 
mercial industry was affected by the severity of the law. 
As this general tax upon industry vvas collected every fourth 
year, it was styled the Lustral Contribution; and the histo¬ 
rian Zosimus laments that the approach of the fatal period 
was announced by the tears and terrors of the citizens, who 
were often compelled by the impending scourge to embrace 
the most abhorred and unnatural methods of procuring the 
sum at which their property had been assessed. The cruel 
treatment of the insolvent debtors of the state, is also attested 
by a humane edict of Constantine, which forbids the use of 
racks and of scourges, and allots a spacious and airy prison 
for the place of their confinement. 
Other causes have been very generally dwelt upon by 
authors to account for the destruction of the Roman do¬ 
minion. Luxury especially has come in for its full share of 
blame, and the effeminate habits of the latter Romans have 
been frequently contrasted with the hardy and simple man¬ 
ners of the republicans. But it should be remembered, that 
the tendency of all large cities is towards the acquisition of 
luxurious modes of life; that, nevertheless, large cities are 
always the most frequent in powerful states: and, however 
our eyes may be dazzled with the contemplation of the 
splendid baths of Caracalla enjoyed by the meanest citizen ; 
the sumptuous tables of the rich, and the abundant and 
tributary harvest consumed by the poor, it must be remem¬ 
bered, that all this was confined to the metropolis. The 
champaign parts of the empire offered no greater induce¬ 
ments to luxury in the age of Constantine, than in the time 
of Cincinnatus. 
Nor can we with many other writers attribute this 
great 
