FOOTNOTES:
[43] It is remarkable that the most philosophic of the "Good Emperors" departed from the rule of adoption which had apparently been so beneficial to Rome, and left the succession to his son, of whose real character he could hardly have been ignorant. Gibbon, however, thinks that the want of the hereditary principle was one of the great causes of the troubles of the Empire.
[44] In 165 the legions returning from the East are said to have brought the Oriental plague into Europe.
[45] Gibbon reduces the number to nineteen.
[46] The Eastern division of the province.