, in the camp, was unfit, though virtuous, to control the turbulent
soldiers, and was found murdered in his bed the very day that Carinus
celebrated the games with unusual magnificence.

(M1123) The army raised C. Valerius Diocletianus to the vacant dignity,
and his first act was to execute the murderer of Numerian. His next was to
encounter Carinus in battle, who was slain, A.D. 285, and
Diocletian--perhaps the greatest emperor after Augustus--reigned alone.
Diocletian is, however, rendered infamous in ecclesiastical history, as
the most bitter of all the persecutors of the Christians, now a large and
growing body; but he was a man of the most distinguished abilities, though
of obscure birth, in a little Dalmatian town. He commenced his illustrious
reign at the age of thirty-nine, and reigned twenty years,--more as a
statesman than warrior,--politic, judicious, indefatigable in business, and
steady in his purposes.

(M1124) This emperor inaugurated a new era, and a new policy of
government. The cares of State in a disordered age, when the empire was
threatened on every side by hostile barbarians, and disgraced by
insurrections and tumults, induced Diocletian to associate with himself
three colleagues, who had won fame in the wars of Aurelian and Carus.
Maximian, Galerius, and Constantine--one of whom had the dignity of
Augustus, and two that of Caesar.

Maximian, associated with Diocletian, with the rank of Augustus, had been
also an Illyrian peasant, and was assigned to the government of the
western provinces, while Diocletian retained that of the eastern. Maximum
established the seat of his government at Milan, giving a death-blow to
the Senate, which, though still mentioned honorably by name, was
henceforth severed from the imperial court. The empire had been ruled by
soldiers ever since pressing dangers had made it apparent that only men of
martial virtues could preserve it from the barbarians. But now the most
undisguised _military_ rule, uninfluenced by old constitutional form, was
the only recognized authority, and the warlike emperors, bred in the camp,
had a disdain of the ancient capital, as well as great repugnance to the
enervated praetorian soldiers, who made and unmade emperors, whose
privileges were abolished forever. Milan was selected for the seat of
imperial government, from its proximity to the frontier, perpetually
menaced by the barbarians; and this city, before a mere military post, now
assumed