bunal of the praefect; but his sentence was final and absolute; and
the emperors themselves refused to admit any complaints against the
judgment or the integrity of a magistrate whom they honored with such
unbounded confidence. [100] His appointments were suitable to his
dignity; [101] and if avarice was his ruling passion, he enjoyed
frequent opportunities of collecting a rich harvest of fees, of
presents, and of perquisites. Though the emperors no longer dreaded the
ambition of their praefects, they were attentive to counterbalance
the power of this great office by the uncertainty and shortness of its
duration. [102]

[Footnote 100: See a law of Constantine himself. A praefectis autem
praetorio provocare, non sinimus. Cod. Justinian. l. vii. tit. lxii.
leg. 19. Charisius, a lawyer of the time of Constantine, (Heinec. Hist.
Romani, p. 349,) who admits this law as a fundamental principle of
jurisprudence, compares the Praetorian praefects to the masters of the
horse of the ancient dictators. Pandect. l. i. tit. xi.]

[Footnote 101: When Justinian, in the exhausted condition of the empire,
instituted a Praetorian praefect for Africa, he allowed him a salary of
one hundred pounds of gold. Cod. Justinian. l. i. tit. xxvii. leg. i.]

[Footnote 102: For this, and the other dignities of the empire, it
may be sufficient to refer to the ample commentaries of Pancirolus and
Godefroy, who have diligently collected and accurately digested in their
proper order all the legal and historical materials. From those authors,
Dr. Howell (History of the World, vol. ii. p. 24-77) has deduced a very
distinct abridgment of the state of the Roman empire]

From their superior importance and dignity, Rome and Constantinople were
alone excepted from the jurisdiction of the Praetorian praefects. The
immense size of the city, and the experience of the tardy, ineffectual
operation of the laws, had furnished the policy of Augustus with a
specious pretence for introducing a new magistrate, who alone could
restrain a servile and turbulent populace by the strong arm of arbitrary
power. [103] Valerius Messalla was appointed the first praefect of Rome,
that his reputation might countenance so invidious a measure; but, at
the end of a few days, that accomplished citizen [104] resigned his
office, declaring, with a spirit worthy of the friend of Brutus, that he
found himself incapable of exercising a power incompatible with public
freedom. [105] As the