d to
adore, according to the eastern fashion, the divinity of his lord
and master. [102] Diocletian was a man of sense, who, in the course
of private as well as public life, had formed a just estimate both of
himself and of mankind: nor is it easy to conceive, that in substituting
the manners of Persia to those of Rome, he was seriously actuated by
so mean a principle as that of vanity. He flattered himself, that an
ostentation of splendor and luxury would subdue the imagination of the
multitude; that the monarch would be less exposed to the rude license of
the people and the soldiers, as his person was secluded from the public
view; and that habits of submission would insensibly be productive of
sentiments of veneration. Like the modesty affected by Augustus, the
state maintained by Diocletian was a theatrical representation; but it
must be confessed, that of the two comedies, the former was of a much
more liberal and manly character than the latter. It was the aim of the
one to disguise, and the object of the other to display, the unbounded
power which the emperors possessed over the Roman world.

[Footnote 101: See Spanheim de Usu Numismat. Dissert. xii.]

[Footnote 102: Aurelius Victor. Eutropius, ix. 26. It appears by the
Panegyrists, that the Romans were soon reconciled to the name and
ceremony of adoration.]

Ostentation was the first principle of the new system instituted
by Diocletian. The second was division. He divided the empire,
the provinces, and every branch of the civil as well as military
administration. He multiplied the wheels of the machine of government,
and rendered its operations less rapid, but more secure. Whatever
advantages and whatever defects might attend these innovations, they
must be ascribed in a very great degree to the first inventor; but
as the new frame of policy was gradually improved and completed
by succeeding princes, it will be more satisfactory to delay the
consideration of it till the season of its full maturity and perfection.
[103] Reserving, therefore, for the reign of Constantine a more exact
picture of the new empire, we shall content ourselves with describing
the principal and decisive outline, as it was traced by the hand of
Diocletian. He had associated three colleagues in the exercise of the
supreme power; and as he was convinced that the abilities of a single
man were inadequate to the public defence, he considered the joint
administration of four princes not as a