"With these views, Dioclesian had selected and embellished the _residence of Nicomedia_."--Is Nicomedia a princess, whose residence the emperor selected and embellished? This is the most obvious meaning of the sentence. But Nicomedia, we learn from other passages, was a city, the _residence_ itself of the emperor. Yet the author could not tell us this in a few plain words, without spoiling the harmony of the phrase; he chose therefore to leave it obscure and ungrammatical.
"--But the memory of Dioclesian was justly abhorred by the _Protector of the Church_; and _Constantine_ was not insensible to the ambition of founding a city, which might perpetuate the glory of his own name." Who is the _protector of the church_? By Constantine's being mentioned immediately after, one would think he cannot be the person intended; yet on examination, this is found to be the case. But why this separate appellation? It seems the author meant by it to convey this idea; That Dioclesian was a persecutor of the church, therefore his memory was abhorred by Constantine who was its protector; the _cause_ of _Constantine_'s _abhorrence_ is implied, and meant to be unfolded to the reader, in a single epithet. Is this history? I must have the liberty to think that such _terseness_ of stile, notwithstanding the authorities of Tacitus and Gibbon, is a gross corruption and a capital fault.
In description, our author often indulges a figurative poetical manner, highly improper.
"The figure of the imperial city (Constantinople) may be represented under that of an unequal triangle. The obtuse point, which advances towards the east, and the shores of Asia, meets and repels the waves of the Thracian Bosphorus." Here the author soars on poetic wings, and we behold the _obtuse point_ of a _triangle_, _marching_ eastward, _attacking_ and _repulsing_ its _foes_, the _waves_ of the Bosphorus; in the next line, the author sinks from the heights of Parnassus, and creeps on the plain of _simple narrative_--"The northern side of the city is bounded by the harbor."
"On these banks, tradition long preserved the memory of the sylvan reign of Amycus, who defied the _son of Leda_ to the combat of the Cestus." The author takes it for granted that his reader is acquainted with all the ancient fables of Greece and Rome. Such _allusions_ to facts or fables make a wretched figure in _sober history_.[177]