Each
successive emperor had been too anxious for his own immediate security, to
find leisure for the remoter interests of the empire: all looked to the
army, as it were, for their own immediate security against competitors,
without venturing to tamper with its constitution, to risk popularity by
reforming abuses, to balance present interest against a remote one, or to
cultivate the public welfare at the hazard of their own: contented with
obtaining _that_, they left the internal arrangements of so formidable a
body in the state to which circumstances had brought it, and to which
naturally the views of all existing beneficiaries had gradually adjusted
themselves. What these might be, and to what further results they might
tend, was a matter of moment doubtless to the empire. But the empire was
strong; if its motive energy was decaying, its _vis inertia_ was for ages
enormous, and could stand up against assaults repeated for many ages:
whilst the emperor was in the beginning of his authority weak, and pledged
by instant interest, no less than by express promises, to the support of
that body whose favor had substantially supported himself.
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