Always a post of danger, and so regularly closed by assassination, that in
a course of two centuries there are hardly to be found three or four cases
of exception, the imperatorial dignity had now become burdened with a
public responsibility which exacted great military talents, and imposed a
perpetual and personal activity. Formerly, if the emperor knew himself to
be surrounded with assassins, he might at least make his throne, so long
as he enjoyed it, the couch of a voluptuary. The "_ave imperator!_" was
then the summons, if to the supremacy in passive danger, so also to the
supremacy in power, and honor, and enjoyment. But now it was a summons to
never-ending tumults and alarms; an injunction to that sort of vigilance
without intermission, which, even from the poor sentinel, is exacted only
when on duty. Not Rome, but the frontier; not the _aurea domus,_ but a
camp, was the imperial residence. Power and rank, whilst in that
residence, could be had in no larger measure by Caesar _as_ Caesar, than by
the same individual as a military commander-in-chief; and, as to
enjoyment, _that_ for the Roman imperator was now extinct.
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