ABSTRACT
The Roman Empire was the greatest civil institution ever created by the mind and energy of man. From the Roman Empire a vast body of ideas and institutions passed into the middle Ages, the compelling power of which is still felt. Every nation of Romance stock in Europe today is directly the offspring of Rome; and in those which are not like the Teutonic and the Slavonic nations the effect of Roman influence in molding their ideas and shaping their institutions falls little short of the power of direct Latin tradition. The immediate government of this prefecture Diocletian significantly took for himself, thus showing that he regarded the Greco-Oriental countries as the heart of the Roman Empire. The type of government adopted was modeled on the great oriental monarchy of Persia. Ever since Rome had set foot in the countries of the Levant, the oriental influences had steadily penetrated into the Roman Empire.
