ABSTRACT
IN THE account of the period from the accession of the Em-peror Diocletian to the death of Constantine the Great which lies before us, each section might well demand its own introduction, for events will be narrated not chronologically and by reigns but according to prevailing movements. But if a general introduction to the entire work be wanted, its principal content must be a history of the changing concepts of the character and function of the Emperor during the decline of the Roman Empire in the third century A.D. And this not because all other aspects of history may be derived from the character of the imperial office; but changes in that character do provide a basis for judging a multitude of events, external as well as spiritual, in the period following. Every form and degree which a rule based on force may assume, from the most frightful to the most beneficent, is here to be met with in remarkable alternation. Under the good Emperors of the second century, from Nerva to Marcus Aurelius (96-180 A.D.), the Roman Empire enjoyed an era of peace, which might have been an era of happiness as well if the profound malaise common to aging nations could have been reached by the benevolence and wisdom of even the best of rulers. The great stature, as men and as rulers, of a Trajan, a Hadrian, an Antoninus, or a Marcus Aurelius must not blind us to situations and conditions which had become patent to all. It was inevitable that the three great forces — Emperor, Senate, and Army — must again
tomed since the days of Domitian. Consciousness of dominion over the world and fear of all who might covet his rule begot an urge to quick enjoyment of what was his and to drown anxiety that gave no respite. In a character wanting native firmness such pressures soon evoked a combination of bloodthirstiness and voluptuousness. Occasion was provided by an attempt upon his life, of which his own family was not innocent but which was blamed upon the Senate. It was small wonder that the Prefect of the Guard soon became the first personage in the state and responsible for the life of the Emperor, as had been the case under Tiberius and Claudius, and that the few thousands which he commanded shared his feeling of being masters of the realm. One of these prefects indeed, the energetic Perennis, Commodus made a victim to a deputation of the disaffected Britannic army which, fifteen hundred strong, had made their way to Rome without hindrance. His successor, the Prefect Cleander, Commodus yielded to a hunger riot of the Roman populace; not, to be sure, without cause, for Cleander in his prodigious greed had not only antagonized the upper classes by confiscations and sale of public offices but had incurred the anger of the poor by a monopoly of grain.
