 Chapter forty-eight, part one, of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, volume four. This is the LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Lizzie Driver. The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, by Edward Gibbon. Chapter forty-eight. Succession and characters of the Greek emperors of Constantinople from the time of Heraclius to the Latin conquest. I have now deduced from Tarjan to Constantine, from Constantine to Heraclius, the regular series of the Roman emperors, and faithfully exposed the prosperous and adverse fortunes of their reigns. Five centuries of the Decline and Fall of the Empire have already elapsed, but a period of more than eight hundred years still separates me from the term of my labours. The taking of Constantinople by the Turks. Should I persevere in the same course? Should I observe the same measure? A prolix and slender thread would be spun through many a volume. Nor would the patient reader find an adequate reward of instruction or amusement. At every step as we sink deeper in the Decline and Fall of the Eastern Empire, the annals of each succeeding reign would impose a more ungrateful and melancholy task. These annals must continue to repeat a tedious and uniform tale of weakness and misery. The natural connection of cause is in events broken by frequent and tasty transitions, and a minute accumulation of circumstances must destroy the light and effect of these general pictures, which compose the use and ornament of a remote history. From the time of Heraclius the Byzantine theater is contracted and darkened. The line of empire, which had been defined by the laws of Justinian, and the arms of Belisarius, recedes on all sides from our view. The Roman name, the proper subject of our inquiries, is reduced to a narrow corner of Europe, to the lonely suburbs of Constantinople, and the fate of the Greek Empire has been compared to that of the Rhine, which loses itself in the sands, before its waters can mingle with the ocean. The scale of dominion is diminished to our view by the distance of time and place, nor is the loss of external splendor compensated by the nobler gifts of virtue and genius. In the last moments of her decay, Constantinople was doubtless more opulent and populace than Athens at her most flourishing era, when a scanty sum of six thousand talents, or twelve hundred thousand pounds sterling, was possessed by twenty-one thousand male citizens of an adult age. But each of these citizens was a free man, who dared to assert the liberty of his thoughts, words and actions, whose person and property were guarded by equal law, and who exercised his independent vote in the government of the republic. Their numbers seemed to be multiplied by the strong and various discriminations of character. Under the shield of freedom, on the wings of emulation of vanity, each Athenian aspired to the level of the national dignity. From this commanding eminence, some chosen spirits soared beyond the reach of a vulgar eye, and the chances of superior merit in a great and populous kingdom, as they are proved by experience, would excuse the computation of imaginary millions. The territories of Athens, Sparta and their allies, do not exceed a moderate province of France or England, but, after the trophies of Salamis and Plataea, they expand in our fancy to the gigantic size of Asia, which had been trampled under the feet of the victorious Greeks. But the subjects of the Byzantine Empire, who assume and dishonour the names both of Greeks and Romans, present a dead uniformity of abject vices, which are neither softened by the weakness of humanity, nor animated by the vigor of memorable crimes. The freemen of antiquity might repeat with generous enthusiasm the sentence of Homer, that on the first day of his servitude the captive is deprived of one half of his manly virtue. But the poet had only seen the effects of civil or domestic slavery, nor could he foretell that the second moiety of manhood must be annihilated by the spiritual despotism, which shackles not only the actions, but even the thoughts of the prostrate votary. By this double yoke, the Greeks were oppressed under the successes of Heraclius. The tyrant, a law of eternal justice, was degraded by the vices of his subjects. And on the throne, in the camp, in the schools, we search, perhaps with fruitless diligence, the names and characters that may deserve to be rescued from oblivion. Nor are the defects of the subject compensated by the skill and variety of the painters. Of a space of eight hundred years, the first four centuries are overspread with a cloud interrupted by some faint and broken rays of historical light. In the lives of the emperors, from Maurice to Alexius, Basil the Macedonian, has alone been the theme of a separate work. And the absence, or loss, or imperfection of contemporary evidence, must be poorly supplied by the doubtful authority of more recent compilers. The four last centuries are exempt from the approach of punery. And, with the Comeninian family, the historic muse of Constantinople again revives. But her apparel is gaudy. Her motives are without elegance or grace. A succession of priests, or courtiers, treads in each other's footsteps in the same path of servitude and superstition. Their views are narrow, their judgment is feeble or corrupt, and we close the volume of copious barrenness, still ignorant of the causes of events, the characters of the actors, and the manners of the time which they celebrate or deplore. The observation which has been applied to a man may be extended to a whole people, that the energy of the sword is communicated to the pen, and will be found by experience that the tone of history will rise or fall with the spirit of the age. From these considerations I should have abandoned without regret the Greek slaves and their servile historians, had I not reflected that the fate of the Byzantine monarchy is passively connected with the most splendid and important revolutions which have changed the state of the world. The space of the lost provinces was immediately replenished with new colonies and rising kingdoms. The active virtues of peace and war deserted from the vanquished to the victorious nations, and it is in their origin and conquests, in their religion and government, that we must explore the causes and effects of the decline and fall of the Eastern Empire. Nor will this scope of narrative, the riches and variety of these materials, be incompatible with the unity of design and composition, as, in his daily prayers, the muscle man of fares or deli still turns his face towards the temper of Mecca. The historian's eyes shall be always fixed on the city of Constantinople. The excursive line may embrace the wilds of Arabia and Tartary, but the circle will be ultimately reduced to the decreasing limit of the Roman monarchy. On this principle I shall now establish the plan of the last two volumes of the present work. The first chapter will contain, in a regular series, the emperors who reigned at Constantinople during a period of six hundred years, from the days of Heraclius to the Latin conquest, a rapid abstract, which may be supported by a general appeal to the order and text of the original historians. In this introduction I shall confine myself to the revolutions of the throne, the succession of families, the personal characters of the Greek princes, the mode of their life and death, the maxims and influence of their domestic government, and the tendency of their reign to accelerate or suspend the downfall of the Eastern Empire. Such a chronological review will serve to illustrate the various argument of the subsequent chapters, and each circumstance of the eventful story of the Barbarians will adapt itself in a proper place to the Byzantine annals. The internal state of the Empire, and the dangerous heresy of the poor Acelians, which shook the East and enlightened the West, will be the subject of two separate chapters. But these inquiries must be postponed till our further progress shall have opened to the view of the world in the ninth and tenth centuries of the Christian era. After this foundation of Byzantine history, the following nations will pass before our eyes, and each will occupy the space to which it may be entitled by greatness or merit, or the degree of connection with the Roman world and the present age. 1. The Franks. A general appellation which includes all the Barbarians of France, Italy and Germany, who were united by the sword and scepter of Charlemagne. The persecution of images and their votaries separated Rome in Italy from the Byzantine throne, and prepared the restoration of the Roman Empire in the West. 2. The Arabs or Saracens. Three ample chapters will be devoted to this curious and interesting object. In the first, after a picture of the country and its inhabitants, I shall investigate the character of Mohammed, the character, religion and succession of the Prophet. In the second, I shall lead the Arabs to the conquest of Syria, Egypt and Africa, the provinces of the Roman Empire. Nor can I check their victorious career till they have overthrown the monarchies of Persia and Spain. In the third, I shall inquire how Constantinople in Europe was saved by the Luxury and Arts, the Division and Decay, of the Empire of the Caliphs. A single chapter will include three the Bulgarians, four Hungarians and five Russians, who assaulted by sea or by land, the provinces in the capital. But the last of these, so important in their present greatness, will excite some curiosity in their origin and infancy. 6. The Normans, or rather the private adventurers of that warlike people, who founded a powerful kingdom in Apulia and Sicily, shook the throne of Constantinople, displayed the trophies of chivalry, and almost realised the wonders of romance. 7. The Latins, the subjects of the Pope, the nations of the West, who enlisted under the banners of the Cross for the recovery or release of the Holy Sepulchre. The Greek emperors were terrified and preserved by the myriads of pilgrims who marched to Jerusalem, with godfrey of bullion and the peers of Christendom. The second and third crusades charred in the footsteps of the first. Asia and Europe were mingled in a sacred war of two hundred years, and the Christian powers were bravely resisted, and finally expelled by Saladin and the Memelukes of Egypt. In these memorable crusades a fleet and army of French and Venetians were diverted from Syria to the Thracian Bosphorus. They assaulted the capital, they subverted the Greek monarchy, and a dynasty of Latin princes was seated near three school years on the throne of Constantin. 8. The Greeks themselves, during this period of captivity in exile, must be considered as a foreign nation, the enemies and again the sovereigns of Constantinople. Misfortune had rekindled a spark of national virtue, and the imperial series may be continued with some dignity from their restoration to the Turkish conquest. 9. The Moguls and Tartars By the arms of Zingas and his descendants, the globe was shaken from China to Poland and Greece. The sultans were overthrown, the Calaises fell, and the Caesars trembled on their throne. The victories of Timur suspended above fifty years the final ruin of the Byzantine Empire. 10. I have already noticed the first appearance of the Turks, and the names of the Fathers, of Seljuk and Othman, discriminated the two successive dynasties of the nation, which emerged in the eleventh century from the Scythian wilderness. The former established a splendid and potent kingdom from the banks of the oxus to Antioch and Nice, and the first crusade was provoked by the violation of Jerusalem and the danger of Constantinople. From unhumble origin the Ottomans arose, the scourge and terror of Christendom. Constantinople was besieged and taken by Mohammed II, and his triumph annihilates the remnant, the image, the title of the Roman Empire in the east. The schism of the Greeks will be connected with their last calamities, and the restoration of learning in the western world. I shall return from the captivity of the new to the ruins of ancient Rome, and the venerable name, the interesting theme, will shed a ray of glory on the conclusion of my labours. The emperor Heraclius had punished a tyrant and ascended his throne, and the memory of his reign is perpetrated by the transient conquest and irreparable loss of the eastern provinces. After the death of Eudosia, his first wife, he disobeyed the patriarch and violated the laws, by his second marriage with his niece, Martina. And the superstition of the Greeks beheld the judgment of heaven in the diseases of the father and the deformity of his offspring. But the opinion of an illegitimate birth is sufficient to distract the choice and loosen the obedience of the people. The ambition of Martina was quickened by maternal love, and perhaps by the envy of a stepmother, and the aged husband was too feeble to withstand the arts of conjural allurements. Constantine, his eldest son, enjoyed in a mature age the title of Augustus. But the weakness of his constitution required a colleague and a guardian, and he yielded with secret reluctance to the partition of the empire. The senate was summoned to the palace to ratify or attest the association of Heraclius, the son of Martina. The imposition of the diadem was consecrated by the prayers and blessings of the patriarch. The senators and patricians adored the majesty of the great emperor and the partners of his reign, and as soon as the doors were thrown open, they were held by the tumultiary but important voice of the soldiers. After an interval of five months, the pompous ceremonies which formed the essence of the Byzantine state were celebrated in the cathedral and the hippodrome. The concord of the royal brothers was effectively displayed by the younger leaning on the arm of the elder, and the name of Martina was mingled in the reluctant or venial acclamations of the people. Heraclius survived this association about two years. His last testimony declared his two sons the equal heirs of the Eastern Empire, and commanded them to honour his widow Martina as their mother and their sovereign. When Martina first appeared on the throne with a name and attributes of royalty, she was checked by a firm, their respectful opposition, and the dying embers of freedom were kingled by the breath of a superstitious prejudice. We reverence, exclaimed the voice of a citizen, we reverence the mother of our princes, but to these princes alone our obedience is due, and Constantine, the elder emperor, is of an age to sustain in his own hands the weight of the scepter. Your sex is excluded by nature from the toils of government. How could you combat? How could you answer the barbarians, who, with a hostile or friendly intentions, may approach the royal city? May heaven avert from the Roman Republic this national disgrace, which would provoke the patience of the slaves of Persia? Martina descended from the throne with indignation, and sought a refuge in the female apartment of the palace. The reign of Constantine III lasted only one hundred and three days. He expired in the thirtieth year of his age, and although his life had been a long malady, a belief was entertained that poison had been the means, and his cruel stepmother the author of his untimely fate. Martina reaped indeed the harvest of his death, and assumed the government in the name of the surviving emperor. But the incestuous widow of Heraclius was universally aboard. The jealousy of the people was awakened, and the two orphans whom Constantine had left became the objects of the public care. It was in vain that the son of Martina, who was no more than fifteen years of age, was taught to declare himself the guardian of his nephews, one of whom he had presented at the baptism font. It was in vain that he swore in the wood of the true cross to defend them against all their enemies. On his deathbed the late emperor had dispatched a trusty servant to arm the troops and provinces of the east in the defense of his helpless children. The eloquence and the morality of Valentine had been successful, and from his camp of Calcedon he boldly demanded the punishment of the assassins, and the restoration of the lawful heir. The license of the soldiers, who devoured the grapes and drank the wine of their Asiatic vineyards, provoked the citizens of Constantinople against the domestic authors of their calamities. And the dome of Saint Sophia re-echoed, not with prayers and hymns, but with the clamours and deprecations of the enraged multitude. At their imperious command Heraclionus appeared in the pulpit with the elders of the royal orphans. Constance alone was saluted as Emperor of the Romans, and a crown of gold which had been taken from the tomb of Heraclius was placed on his head, with the solemn benediction of the patriarch. But in the term of joy and indignation the church was pillaged, the sanctuary was polluted by a promiscuous crowd of Jews and barbarians, and the monophilite pyrus, a creature of the Empress, after dropping a protestation on the altar, escaped by a prudent flight from the zeal of the Catholics. A more serious and bloody task was reserved for the Senate, who had arrived at temporary strength from the consent of the soldiers and the people. The spirit of Rome and freedom revived the ancient and awful examples of the judgment of tyrants, and the imperial culprits were deposed and condemned as the authors of the Death of Constantine. But the severity of the conscript fathers was sustained by the indiscriminate punishment of the innocent and the guilty. Martina and Heraclionus were sentenced to the amputation, the former of her tongue, the latter of his nose, and, after this cruel execution, they consumed the remainder of their days in exile and oblivion. The Greeks, who were capable of reflection, might find some consolation for their servitude, by observing the abuse of power, when it was lodged for a moment in the hands of an aristocracy. We shall imagine ourselves transported five hundred years backwards to the aid of the Antonese. If we listen to the oritation which Constance II pronounced in the twelfth year of his aid before the Byzantine Senate, after returning his thanks for the just punishment of the assassins, who had intercepted the fairest hopes of his father's reign, by the divine providence, said the young emperor, by your righteous decree, Martina and her incestuous progeny, have been cast headlong from the throne. Your majesty and wisdom have prevented the Roman state from degenerating into lawless tyranny. I therefore exhort and beseech you to stand forth as the counsellors and judges of the common safety. The senators were gratified by this respectful address and liberal donative of their sovereign. But these servile Greeks were unworthy and regardless of freedom. And in his mind, the lesson of an hour was quickly erased by the prejudices of the age and the habits of despotism. He retained only a jealous fear, lest the Senate or people, should one day invade the right of Premogeniator and seat his brother Theodosius on an equal throne. By the imposition of holy orders, the grandson of Heraclius was disqualified from the purple. But this ceremony, which seemed to profane the sacraments of the church, was insufficient to appease the suspicions of the tyrant, and the death of the deacon Theodosius could alone expiate the crimes of his royal birth. His murder was avenged by the implications of the people, and the assassin, in the fullness of power, was driven from his capital into voluntary and perpetual exile. Constans embarked for Greece. And, as if he meant to retort the abhorrence which he deserved, he is said, from the imperial galley, to have spit against the walls of his native city. After passing the winter at Athens, he sailed to Teretium in Italy, visited Rome, and concluded a long pilgrimage of disgrace and sacrilege's raping, by fixing his residence at Syracuse. But if Constans could fly from his people, he could not fly from himself. The remorse of his conscience created a phantom who pursued him by land and sea, by day and night. And the visionary Theodosius, presenting to his lips a cup of blood, said, or seemed to say, drink, brother, drink. A short emblem of the aggravation of his guilt, since he had received from the hands of the deacon the mystic cup of the blood of Christ. Odius, to himself, and to mankind, Constans perished by domestic, perhaps by a piscable treason in the capital of Sicily. A servant who waited in the bath, after pouring warm water on his head, struck him violently with the vase. He fell, stunned by the blow, and suffocated by the water. And his attendants, who wandered at the tedious delay, beheld with indifference the corpse of their lifeless emperor. The troops of Sicily invested with the purple and obscure youth, who his inimitable beauty eluded, and it might easily elude, the declining art of the painters and sculptures of the age. Constans had left in the Byzantine palace three sons, the oldest of whom had been clothed in his infancy with the purple. When the father summoned them to attend his person in Sicily, these precious hostages were detained by the Greeks, and a firm refusal informed him that they were the children of the state. The news of his murder was conveyed with almost supernatural speed, from Syracuse to Constantinople. And Constantine, the eldest of his sons, inherited his throne without being the heir of the public hatred. His subjects contributed, with zeal and alacrity, to chastise the guilt and presumption of a province, which had usurped the rights of the senate and people. The young emperor sailed from the helispont, with a powerful fleet, and the legions of Rome and Carthage were assembled under his standard in the harbour of Syracuse. The defeat of the Sillian tyrant was easy, his punishment just, and his beautyous head was exposed in the hippodrome. But I cannot applaud the clemency of a prince, who, among a crowd of victims, condemned the son of a patrician, for deploring with some bitterness the execution of a virtuous father. The youth was castrated, he survived the operation, and the memory of this indecent cruelty is preserved by the elevation of Germanus to the rank of patriarch and saint. After pouring this bloody liberation on his father's tomb, Constantine returned to his capital, and the growth of his young beard during the Sillian voyage was announced by the familiar surname of Paganatus to the Grecian world. But his reign, like that of his predecessor, was stained with fraternal discord. On his two brothers, Heraclius and Iberius, he had bestowed the title of Augustus, an empty title, for they continued to languish without trust or power in the solitude of the palace. At their secret instigation, the troops of the Antolian theme, or province, approached the city on the Asiatic side, demanded for the royal brothers a partition or excuse of sovereignty, and supported their seditious claims by a theological argument. They were Christians, they cried, and orthodox Catholics, the sincere votaries of the Holy and Undivided Trinity. Since there are three equal persons in heaven, it is reasonable there should be three equal persons upon earth. The emperor invited these learned divines to a friendly conference, in which they might propose the arguments to the senate. They obeyed the summons, but the prospects of their bodies hanging on the gibbet. In the suburb of Galata reconciled their companions to the unity of the reign of Constantine. He pardoned his brothers, and their names were still pronounced in the public acclamations. But on the repetition or suspicion of a similar offence, the obnoxious princes were deprived of their titles and noses, in the presence of the Catholic bishops, who were assembled at Constantinople, in the sixth general synod. In the close of his life Paganatas was anxious only to establish the right of primogenitor. The heir of his two sons, Justinian and Heraclius, was offered on the shrine of Saint Peter, as a symbol of their spiritual adoption by the Pope. But the elder alone was exalted to the rank of Augustus, and the assurance of the empire. Roman world evolved to Justinian II, and the name of a triumphant law-giver was dishonoured by the vices of a boy, who imitated his namesake only in the expensive luxury of building. His passions were strong, his understanding was feeble, and he was intoxicated with a foolish pride that his birth had given him the command of millions, of whom the smallest community would not have chosen him for their local magistrate. His favoured ministers were two beings the least susceptible of human sympathy, a eunuch and a monk, to the one he abandoned the palace, to the other the finances. The former corrected the emperor's mother with a scourge, the latter suspended the insolvent tributaries, with their heads downwards, over a small and smoky fire. Since the days of Commodus and Caracalla, the cruelty of the Roman princes had most commonly been the effect of their fear. But Justinian, who possessed some vigour of character, enjoyed the sufferings and braved the revenge of his subjects about ten years, till the measure was full of his crimes and of their patience. In a dark dungeon Leontius, a general of reputation, had grown above three years, with some of the noblest and most deserving of the patricians. He was suddenly drawn forth to assume the government of Greece, and this promotion of a ninja man was a mark of the contempt rather than of the confidence of his prince. As he was followed to the port by the kind offices of his friends, Leontius observed with a sigh that he was a victim adorned for sacrifice, and that inevitable death would pursue his footsteps. They ventured to reply that glory and empire might be the recompense of a generous resolution, that every order of man aboard the reign of a monster, and that the hands of two hundred thousand patriots expected only the voice of a leader. The night was chosen for their deliverance, and in the first effort of the conspirators the prefect was slain, and the prisons were forced open. The emissaries of Leontius proclaimed in every street Christians to censor fear, and the seasonable text of the patriarch, this as to defy the Lord, was the prelude of an inflammatory sermon. From the church the people adjourned to the hippodrome. Justinian, in whose cause not a sword had been drawn, was dragged before these tumultiary judges, and their clamours demanded the instant death of a tyrant. But Leontius, who was already clothed with the purple, cast an eye of pity on the prostrate son of his own benefactor and of so many emperors. The life of Justinian was spared. The amputation of his nose, perhaps of his tongue, was imperfectly performed. The happy flexibility of the Greek language could impose the name of Rhino-Tometis, and the mutated tyrant was banished to Cherosne in crim tartary, a lonely settlement where corn, wine, and oil were imported as foreign luxuries. On the edge of the Scythian wilderness Justinian still cherished the pride of his birth, and the hope of his restoration. After three years' exile he received the pleasing intelligence that his injury was avenged by a second revolution, and that Leontius, in his turn, had been dethroned and mutilated by the rebel Absamar, who assumed the more respectable name of Tiberius. But the claim of linear succession was still formidable to a plebian usurper, and his jealousy was stimulated by the complaints and charges of the Charisanites, who beheld the vices of the tyrant in the spirit of the exile. With a burned of followers attached to his person by a common hope or common despair, Justinian fled from the inhospitable shore to the horde of the Shazars, who pitched their tents between the Tenaeus and Baristianus. The carn entertained with pity and respect the royal suppliant. Phanagoria, once an opulent city, on the Asiatic side of the lake Moetis, was assigned for his residence, and every Roman prejudice was stifled in his marriage with the sister of the Barbarian, who seems, however, from the name of Theodora, to have received the sacrament of baptism. But the faithless Shazar was soon tempted by the gold of Constantinople, and had not the design been revealed by the conjure-love of Theodora, her husband must have been assassinated or betrayed into the power of his enemies. After strangling, with his own hands, the two emissaries of the carn, Justinian sent back his wife to a brother, and embarked on the yuxin in search of new and more faithful allies. His vessel was assaulted by a violent tempest, and one of his pious companions advised him to serve the mercy of God by a vow of general forgiveness, if he should be restored to the throne. "'Of forgiveness,' replied the intrepid tyrant, "'may I perish this instant? May I perish this instant? May the Almighty well me in the waves, if I consent to spare a single head of my enemies?' He survived this impious menace, sailed into the mouth of the Danube, trusted his person in the royal village of the Bulgarians, and purchased the aid of Tobeles, a pagan conqueror, by the promise of his daughter, and of a fair partition of the treasures of the empire. The Bulgarian kingdom extended to the confines of Thrace, and the two princes besieged Constantinople at the head of fifteen thousand horse. Epsomar was dismayed by the sudden and hostile apparition of his rival, whose head had been promised by the Shazar, and of whose evasion he was yet ignorant. After an absence of ten years the crimes of Justinian were faintly remembered, and the birth and misfortunes of this hereditary sovereign excited the pity of the multitude, ever discontent with the ruling powers. And by the active diligence of his adherents, he was introduced into the city and palace of Constantine. Chapter 48 Succession and Characters of the Greek Emperors, Part 2 In rewarding his allies and recalling his wife, Justinian displayed some sense of honour and gratitude. And Tobeles retired, after sweeping away a heap of gold coin, which he measured with his Scythian whip. But never was a vow more religiously performed than the sacred Oath of Revenge, which he had sworn amidst the storms of the Yuxin. The two usurpers, if I must reserve the name of Tyrant for the Conqueror, were dragged into the hippodrome, the one from his prison, the other from his palace. Before their execution Leontius and Epsomar were cast prostrating chains beneath the throne of the emperor, and Justinian, planting a foot in each of their necks, contemplated above an hour the chariot race, while the inconstant people shouted, in the words of the psalmist, Thou shalt trample on the aspen basilisk, and on the lion and dragon shalt thou set thy foot. The universal defection which he had once experienced might provoke him to repeat the wish of Culligula, that the Roman people had but one head. Yet I shall presume to observe that such a wish is unworthy of an ingenious Tyrant, since its revenge and cruelty would have been extinguished by a single blow, instead of the slow variety of tortures which Justinian inflicted on the victims of his anger. His pleasures were inexhaustible. Neither private virtue nor public service could expiate the guilt of active or even passive obedience to an established government. And during the six years of his new reign, he considered the axe, the cord, and the rack as the only instruments of royalty. But his most implacable hatred was pointed against the Charizonites, who had insulted his exile, and violated the laws of hospitality. Their remote situation afforded some means of defence, or at least of escape, and a grievous tax was imposed on Constantinople to supply the preparations of a fleet and army. All our guilty and all must perish was the mandate of Justinian, and the bloody execution was entrusted to his favour at Stephen, who was recommended by the epithet of the savage. Yet even the savage Stephen imperfectly accomplished the intentions of his sovereign. The slowness of his attack allowed the greater part of the inhabitants to withdraw into the country, and the minister of vengeance contended himself with reducing the youth of both sexes to a state of servitude, while roasting a life seven of the principal citizens, with drowning twenty in the sea, and reserving forty-two inch chains to receive their doom from the mouth of the emperor. In their return the fleet was driven on the rocky shores of Anatolia, and Justinian applauded the obedience of the Yixin, which had involved so many thousands of his subjects and enemies in a common shipwreck. But the tyrant was still insatiated of blood, and a second expedition was commanded to extirpate the remains of the prescribed colony. In the short interval the Charizonites had returned to their city, and were repaired to die in arms. The Khan of the Shazars had renounced the cause of his odious brother. The exiles of every province were assembled in Taurus, and Bardane's, under the name of Philippicus, was infested with the purple. The imperial troops, unwilling and unable to perpetrate to the revenge of Justinian, escaped his displeasure by abjuring his allegiance. The fleet, under their new sovereign, steered back a more auspicious course to the harbours of Sinop and Constantinople, and every tongue was prompt to pronounce, every hand to execute, the death of the tyrant. Destitute of friends he was deserted by his barbarian guards, and the stroke of the assassin was praised as an act of patriotism and Roman virtue. His son Tiberius had taken refuge in a church. His aged grandmother guarded the door, and the innocent youth, suspending round his neck the most formidable relics, embraced with one hand the altar, with the other the wood of the true cross. But the popular fury that dares to trample on superstition is death to the cries of humanity, and the race of Heraclius was extinguished after a reign of one hundred years. Between the fall of the Heraclion and the rise of the Assyrian dynasty, a short interval of six years is divided into three reigns. Barden's, or Philippicus, was hailed at Constantinople as a hero who had delivered his country from a tyrant, and he might taste some moments of happiness in the first transports of sincere and universal joy. Justinian had left behind him an ample treasure, the fruit of cruelty and rapine. But this useful fund was soon and idly dissipated by a successor. On the festival of his birthday, Philippicus entertained the multitude with the games of the hippodrome. From thence he paraded through the streets with a thousand banners and a thousand trumpets. Refreshed himself in the baths of Zepichus, and returning to the palace, entertained his nobles with a sumptuous banquet. At the meridian hour he withdrew to his chamber, intoxicated with flattery and wine, and forgetful that his example had made every subject ambitious, and that every ambitious subject was his secret enemy. Some bold conspirators introduced themselves in the disorder of the feast, and the slumbering monarch was surprised, bound, blinded and opposed, before he was sensible of his danger. Yet the traitors were deprived of their reward, and the free voice of the senate and people prompted Atamias, from the office of security to that of emperor. He assumed the title of Anastasius II, and displayed, in a short and troubled reign, the virtues both of peace and war. But after the extinction of the imperial line, the rule of obedience was violated, and every change diffused the seeds of new revolutions. In a mutiny of the feat, an obscure and reluctant officer of the revenue was forcibly infested with the purple. After some months of a naval war, Anastasius resigned the scepter, and the conqueror, Theodosius III, submitted in his turn to the supreme ascendance of Leo, the general and emperor of the Oriental troops. His two predecessors were permitted to embrace the ecclesiastical profession. The restless impatience of Anastasius tempted him to risk and to lose his life in a treasonable enterprise, but the last days of Theodosius were honourable and secure. The single sublime word, health, which he inscribed on his tomb, expresses the confidence of philosophy or religion, and the fame of his miracles was long preserved among the people of Ephesus. Their convenient shelter of the church might sometimes impose a lesson of clemency, but it may be questioned whether it is for the public interest to diminish the perils of unsuccessful ambition. I have dwelt on the fall of a tyrant. I shall briefly represent the founder of a new dynasty, who is known to posterity by the invictives of his enemies, and whose public and private life is involved in the ecclesiastical story of the iconoclasts. Yet, in spite of the clamours of superstition, a favourable predigis for the character of Leo the Isorian may be reasonably drawn from the obscurity of his birth and the duration of his reign. 1. In an age of manly spirit, the prospect of an imperial reward would have kindled every energy of the mind, and produced a crowd of competitors as deserving as they were desirous to reign. Even in the corruption and debility of the modern Greeks, the elevation of a plebeian from the last to the first rank society supposes some qualifications above the level of the multitude. He would probably be ignorant and disdainful of speculative science, and, in the pursuit of fortune, he might absolve himself from the obligations of benevolence and justice. But to his character we may ascribe the useful virtues of prudence and fortitude, the knowledge of mankind, and the important art of gaining their confidence and directing their passions. It is agreed that Leo was a native of Isoria, and that Conan was his primitive name. The writers, whose awkward satire is praise, describe him as an itinerant peddler, who drove an ass with some paltry merchandise to the country fares, and foolishly relate that he met on the road some Jewish fortune-tellers, who promised him the Roman Empire, on condition that he should abolish the worship of idols. A more probable account relates the migration of his father from Asia Minor to Thrace, where he exercised the lucrative trade of Egrazia, and he must have acquired considerable wealth, since the first introduction of his son was procured by a supply of five hundred sheep to the imperial camp. His first service was in the guard of Justinian, where he soon attracted the notice, and by degrees the jealousy of the tyrant. His valor and dexterity were conspicuous in the Colchian War. From Anastasius he received the command of the Anatolian legions, and by the suffrage of the soldiers he was raised to the empire with the general applause of the Roman world. 2. In this dangerous elevation Leo III supported himself against the envy of his equals. The discontent of a powerful faction, and the assaults of his foreign and domestic enemies. The Catholics, who accuse his religious innovations, are obliged to confess that they were undertaken with temper and conducted with firmness. This silence respects the wisdom of his administration and the purity of his manners. After a reign of twenty-four years he peaceably expired in the palace of Constantinople, and the purple which he had acquired was transmitted by the right of inheritance to the third generation. In a long reign of thirty-four years the son and successor of Leo, Constantine V, surnamed Copronimus, attacked with less temperate zeal the images or idols of the church. Their votaries have exhorted the bitterness of religious gall in their portrait of this spotted panther, this Antichrist, this flying dragon of the serpent's seed, who surpassed the vices of Agabalus and Nero. His reign was a long buttery of whatever was most noble or holy or innocent in his empire. In person the emperor assisted at the execution of his victims, surveyed their agonies, listened to their groans, and indulged, without satiating, his appetite for blood. A plate of noses was accepted as a grateful offering, and his domestics were often scourged or mutilated by the royal hand. His surname was derived from his pollution of his baptismal font. The infant might be excused, but the manly pleasures of Copronimus degraded him below the level of a brute. His lust confounded the eternal distinctions of sex and species, and he seemed to extract some unnatural delight from the objects most offensive to human sense. In his religion the iconoclast was a heretic, a Jew, a Mohammedan, a pagan, and an atheist, and his belief of an invisible power could be discovered only in his magic rites, human victims, and nocturnal sacrifices to Venus and the demons of antiquity. His life was stained with the most opposite vices, and the ulcers which covered his body, anticipated before his death the sentiment of hell-tortures. Of these accusations, which I have so patiently copied, a part is refuted by its own absurdity, and in the private anecdotes of the life of the princes, the lie is more easy, as the detection is more difficult. Without adopting the pernicious maxim, that where much is alleged something must be true, I can, however, discern that Constantine the Fifth was disallude and cruel. Culmini is more prone to exaggerate than to invent, and her licentious tongue is checked in some measure by the experience of the age and country to which she appeals. Of the bishops and monks, the generals and magistrates, who are said to have suffered under his reign, the numbers are recorded, the names were conspicuous, the execution was public, the mutilation visible and permanent. The Catholics hated the person and government of Copronemus, but even their hatred is a proof of their oppression. They dissembled the provocations which might excuse or justify his rigor, but even these provocations must gradually inflame his resentment and harden his temper in the use or the abuse of despotism. Yet the character of the Fifth Constantine was not devoid of merit, nor did his government always deserve the curses or the contempt of the Greeks. From the confession of his enemies I am informed of the restoration of an ancient aqueduct, of the redemption of 2,500 captives, of the uncommon plenty of the times, and of the new colonies with which he repealed Constantinople and the Thracian cities. They reluctantly praise his activity and courage. He was on horseback in the field at the head of his legions, and although the fortune of his arms was various, he triumphed by sea and land, on the Euphrates and the Danube, in civil and barbarian war. Heretical praise must be cast into the scale to counterbalance the weight of orthodox invective. The iconoclasts revered the virtues of the prince. Forty years after his death they still prayed before the tomb of the saint. A miraculous vision was propagated by fanaticism or fraud, and the Christian hero appeared on a milk-white steed, brandishing his lance against the pagans of Bulgaria. An absurd fable, says the Catholic historian, since Copronimus is chained with the demons and the abyss of hell. Leo IV, the son of the fifth and the father of the sixth Constantine, was of a feeble constitution both of mind and body, and the principal care of his reign was a settlement of his succession. The association of the young Constantine was urged by the officious zeal of his subjects, and the emperor, conscious of his decay, complied after prudent hesitation with their unanimous wishes. The royal infant at the age of five years was crowned with his mother Irene, and the national consent was ratified by every circumstance of pomp and solemnity that could dazzle the eyes or bind the conscience of the Greeks. An oath of fidelity was administrated in the palace, the church, and the hippodrome, to the several orders of the state, who adjured the holy names of the son and the mother of God. Be witness, O Christ, that we will watch over the safety of Constantine, the son of Leo, expose our lives in his service, and bear true allegiance to his person and posterity. They pledged their faith in the wood of the true cross, and the act of their engagement was deposited on the altar of Saint Sophia. The first to swear, and the first to violate their oath, were the five sons of Copronimus by a second marriage, and the story of these princes is singular and tragic. The rite of primogeniture excluded them from the throne. The injustice of their elder brother defrauded them on a legacy of about two million sterling. Some vain titles were not deemed a sufficient compensation for wealth and power, and they repeatedly conspired against their nephew, before and after the death of his father. Their first attempt was pardoned. For the second offence they were condemned to the ecclesiastical state, and for the third reason, Nicforius, the eldest and most guilty, was deprived of his eyes, and his four brothers, Christopher, Nictas, Anthemius, and Eudoxus, were punished as the milder sentence by the amputation of their tongues. After five years' confinement they escaped the church of Saint Sophia, and displayed a pathetic spectacle to the people. Countrymen and Christians cried Nicforius for himself and his mute brethren. Behold the sons of your emperor, if you can still recognise our features in this miserable state. A life, an imperfect life, is all that the malice of our enemies has spared. It is now threatened, and we now throw ourselves on your compassion. The rising murmur might have produced a revolution, had it not been checked by the presence of a minister, who sued the unhappy princes with flattery and hope, and gently drew them from the sanctuary to the palace. They were speedily embarked to a grease, and Athens was allotted for the place of their exile. In this calm retreat, and in their helpless condition, Nicforius and his brothers were tormented by the thirst of power, and tempted by a Sclavonian chief, who offered to break their prison, and to lead them in arms, and in the purple to the gates of Constantinople. But the Athenian people, ever zealous in the cause of Irene, prevented her justice or cruelty, and the five sons of Copronimus were plunged in eternal darkness and oblivion. For himself that emperor had chosen a barbarian wife, the daughter of the Khan of the Shazars. But in the marriage of his heir, he preferred an Athenian virgin, an orphan, seventeen years old, whose sole fortune must have consisted in her personal accomplishments. The nuptials of Leo and Irene were celebrated with royal pomp. She soon acquired the love and confidence of a feeble husband, and in his testament he declared the emperor's guardian of the Roman world, and of their son, Constantin VI, who was no more than ten years of age. During his childhood Irene most ably and assiduously discharged in her public administration the duties of a faithful mother, and her zeal in the restoration of images has deserved the name and honours of a saint, which she still occupies in the Greek calendar. But the emperor attained the maturity of youth, the maternal yoke became more grievous, and he listened to the favourites of his own age, who shared his pleasures and were ambitious of sharing his power. Their reasons convinced him of his right, their praises of his ability to reign, and he consented to reward the services of Irene by a perpetual banishment to the isles of Sicily. But her vigilance and penetration easily disconcerted their rash projects. A similar or more severe punishment was retaliated on themselves and their advisers, and Irene inflicted on the ingrateful prince the chastisement of a boy. After this contest the mother and the son were at the head of two domestic factions, and instead of mild influence and voluntary obedience she hurled in chains a captive and an enemy. The empress was overthrown by the abuse of victory. The oath of fidelity, which she extracted to herself alone, was pronounced with reluctant murmurs, and the bold refusal of the Armenian guards encouraged a free and general declaration. The Constantine VI was the lawful emperor of the Romans. In this character he ascended his hereditary throne, and dismissed Irene to a life of solitude and repose. But her haughty spirit condescended to the arts of dissimulation. She flattered the bishops and eunuchs, revived the filial tenderness of the prince, regained his confidence, and betrayed his grudulity. The character of Constantine was not destitute of sense or spirit, but his education had been studiously neglected, and the ambitious mother exposed to the public censure the vices which she had nourished, and the actions which she had secretly advised. His divorce and second marriage offended the prejudices of the clergy, and by his imprudent rigor he fortified the attachment of the Armenian guards. A powerful conspiracy was formed for the restoration of Irene, and the secret, though widely diffused, was faithfully kept above eight months, till the emperor, suspicious of his danger, escaped from Constantinople with the design of appealing to the provinces and armies. By this hasty flight the empress was left on the brink of the precipice. Yet before she implored the mercy of her son, Irene addressed a private epistle to the friends whom she had placed about her person, with a menace, that unless they accomplished she would reveal their treason. Their fear rendered them intrepid. They seized the emperor on the Asiatic shore, and he was transported to the porphyry apartment of the palace, where he had first seen the light. In the mind of Irene ambition had stifled every sentiment of humanity and nature, and it was decreed in her bloody counsel that Constantine should be rendered incapable of the throne. Her emissaries assaulted the sleeping prince, and stabbed their daggers with such violence and precipitation into his eyes as if they meant to execute a mortal sentence. An ambiguous passage of theophane persuaded the analyst of the church that death was the immediate consequence of this barbarous execution. The Catholics had been deceived or subdued by the authority of Baroneus, and Protestant zeal has re-echoed the words of a cardinal, desirous it should seem, to favour the patroness of images. Yet the blind son of Irene survived many years, oppressed by the court, and forgotten by the world. The Asaurian dynasty was silently extinguished, and the memory of Constantine was recalled only by the nuptials of his daughter, Euphrosyne, with the emperor Michael II. The most bigoted orthodoxy has just excreated the unnatural mother, who may not easily be paralleled in the history of crimes. After her bloody deed, superstition has attributed a subsequent darkness of seventeen days, during which many vessels in midday were driven from their course, as if the sun, a globe of fire so vast and so remote, could sympathise with the atoms of a revolving planet. On earth the crime of Irene was left five years unpunished, her reign was crowned with external splendour, and if she could silence the voice of conscience, she neither heard nor regarded the reproaches of mankind. The Roman world bowed to the government of a female, and, as she moved through streets of Constantinople, the reins of four milk-white steeds were held by as many patricians, who marched on foot before the golden chariot of their queen. But these patricians were for the most part eunuchs, and their black ingratitude justified, on this occasion, the popular hatred and contempt. Raised, enriched, entrusted with the first dignities of the empire, they basically conspired against the benefacturists. The great treasurer, Nicophorus, was secretly invested with the purple. Her success was introduced into the palace, and crowned at sense of fear by the venial patriarch. In their first interview she recapitulated with dignity the revolutions of her life. Gently accused the perfidy of Nicophorus, insinuated that he owed his life to her unsuspicious clemency, and for the thrones and treasures which she had resigned, solicitated a decent and honourable retreat. His avarice refused this modest compensation, and in her exile of the Isle of Lesbos, the Empress earned a scanty substance by the labours of her distaff. Many tyrants have reigned undoubtedly more criminal than Nicophorus, but none perhaps of more deeply incurred the universal abhorrence of their people. His character was stained with three odious vices of hypocrisy, ingratitude, and avarice. His want of virtue was not redeemed by any superior talents, nor his want of talents by any pleasing purifications. Unskillful and unfortunate in war, Nicophorus was vanquished by the Saracens and slain by the Bulgarians, and the advantage of his death overbalanced, in the public opinion, the destruction of a Roman army. His son and heir Staracius escaped from the field with a mortal wound, yet six months of an expiring life were sufficient to refute his indecent, no popular deceleration, that he would in all things avoid the example of his father. On the near prospect of his decease, Michael, the great master of the palace, and husband of his sister, Procopia, was named by every person of the palace and city, except by his envious brother. Tenacious of a scepter now falling from his hand, he conspired against the life of his successor, and cherished the idea of changing to a democracy the Roman Empire. But these rash projects served only to inflame the zeal of the people, and to remove the scruples of the candidate. Michael the first accepted the purple, and before he sunk into the grave, the son of Nicophorus implored the clemency of his new sovereign. Had Michael, in an age of peace, ascended an hereditary throne, he might have reigned and died the father of his people. But his mild virtues were adapted to the shade of private life, nor was he capable of controlling the ambition of his equals, or of resisting the armies of the victorious Bulgarians. While his wonderful ability and success exposed him to the contempt of the soldiers, the masculine spirit of his wife Procopia awakened their indignation. Even the Greeks of the Ninth Century were provoked by the insolence of a female, who, in the front of the standards, presumed to direct their discipline and animate their valor. And their licentious clamours advised the new Smyramis to reverence the majesty of a Roman camp. After an unsuccessful campaign, in their winter quarters of Thrace, it disaffected army under the command of his enemies, and their artful eloquence persuaded the soldiers to break the dominion of the Unix, to degrade the husband of Procopia, and to assert the right of a military election. They marched towards the capital. Yet the clergy, the senate, and the people of Constantinople, adhered to the cause of Michael. And the troops and treasures of Asia might have attracted the mischiefs of civil war. But his humanity, by the ambitious it will be termed his weakness, protested that not a drop of Christian blood should be shed in his quarrel. And his messengers presented the conquerors with the keys of the city and the palace. They were disarmed by his innocence and submission. His life and his eyes were spared, and the imperial monk enjoyed the comforts of solitude and religion, above thirty-two years after he had been stripped of the purple and separated from his wife. The famous and unfortunate Bardenis had once the curiosity to consult an Asiatic prophet, who, after prognosticating his fall, announced the fortunes of his three principal officers, Leo the Arminian, Michael the Phrygian, and Thomas the Cappadocian, the successive reigns of the two former, the fruitless and fatal enterprise of the Third. This prediction was verified, or rather was produced, by the event. Ten years afterwards, when the Thracian camp projected the husband of Procopia, the crown was presented to the same Leo, the first in military rank and the second author of the mutiny. As he affected to hesitate, with this sword, says his companion Michael, I will open the gates of Constantinople to your imperial sway, or instantly plunge it into your bosom, if you obstinately resist the just desires of your fellow soldiers. The compliance of the Arminian was rewarded with the Empire, and he reigned seven and a half years under the name of Leo the Fifth. Educated in a camp, and ignorant both of laws and letters, he introduced into his civil government the rigor and even cruelty of military discipline. But if his severity was sometimes dangerous to the innocent, it was always formidable to the guilty. His religious inconstancy was taxed by the epithet of Chameleon, but the Catholics have acknowledged, by the voice of a saint and confessors, that the life of the iconoclast was useful to the Republic. The zeal of his companion Michael was repaid with riches, honours and military command, and his subordinate talents were beneficially employed in the public service. Yet the Phrygium was dissatisfied at receiving as a favour a scanty portion of the imperial prize, which he had bestowed on his equal. And his discontent, which sometimes evaporated in hasty discourse, at length assumed a more threatening and hostile aspect against a prince whom he respected as a cruel tyrant. That tyrant, however, repeatedly detected, warned and dismissed the old companion of his arms, till fear and resentment prevailed over gratitude, and Michael, after his scrutiny into his actions and designs, was convicted of treason and sentenced to be burnt alive in the furnace of the private baths. The devout humanity of the Empress Theofano was fatal to her husband and family. A solemn day, the 25th of December, had been fixed for the execution. She urged that the anniversary of the Saviour's birth would be profound by this inhuman spectacle, and Leo consented with reluctance to his decent respite. But on the vigil of the feast his sleepless anxiety prompted him to visit at the dead of night, the chamber in which his enemy was confined. He beheld him released from his chain and stretched on his jail-as-bed in a profound slumber. Leo was alarmed at these signs of security and intelligence. But though he retired with silent steps, his entrance and departure were noticed by a slave who lay concealed in a corner of the prison. Under the pretence of requesting the spiritual aid of a confessor, Michael informed the conspirators that their lives depended on his discretion, and that a few hours were left to assure their own safety, but the deliverance of their friend and country. On the great festival a chosen band of priests and chanters was admitted into the palace by a private gate to sing matins in the chapel. And Leo, who regulated with the same strictness the discipline of the choir and of the camp, was seldom absent from these early devotions. In the ecclesiastical habit, but with their swords under their robes, the conspirators mingled with the procession, lurked in the angles of the chapel, and expected, as the sign of murder, the intonation of the first psalm by the emperor himself. The imperfect light and the uniformity of dress might have favoured his escape, whilst their assault was pointed against a harmless priest. But they soon discovered their mistake, and encompassed on all sides the royal victim. Without a weapon and without a friend he grasped a weighty cross, and stood at bay against the hunters of his life. But, as he asked for mercy, this is the hour, not of mercy, but of vengeance, was the inexorable reply. The stroke of a well-aimed sword separated from his body the right arm and the cross, until Leo the Armenian was slain at the foot of the altar. A memorial reverse of fortune was displayed in Michael II, who, from a defect in his speech, was surname to the stammerer. He was snatched from the fiery furnace to the sovereignty of an empire, and, as in the turmoil to Smith could not readily be found, the fetters remained on his legs, several hours after he was seated on the throne of the Caesars. The royal blood which should have been the price of his elevation, was unprofitably spent. In the purple he retained the ignoble vices of his origin, and Michael lost his provinces with a supine indifference as if they had been the inheritance of his fathers. His title was disputed by Thomas, the last of the military triumvirate, who transported into Europe fourscore thousand barbarians from the banks of the Tigris and the shores of the Caspian. He formed the siege of Constantinople, but the capital was defended with spiritual and carnal weapons. A Bulgarian king assaulted the camp of the Orientals, and Thomas had the misfortune, or the weakness, to fall alive into the power of the conqueror. The hands and feet of the rebel were amputated. He was placed on an ass, and, amidst the insults of the people, was led through the streets, which he sprinkled with his blood. The deprivation of manors, as savage as they were corrupt, is marked by the presence of the emperor himself. Deft the lamentation of a fellow soldier, he incessantly pressed the discovery of more accomplices, till his curiosity was checked by the question of an honest or guilty minister. Would you give credit to an enemy against the most faithful of your friends? After the death of his first wife, the emperor, at the request of the senate, drew from her monastery Euphrosny, the daughter of Constantin VI. Her august birth might justify a stipulation in the marriage contract, that her children should equally share the empire with their elder brother. But the nuptials of Michael and Euphrosny were barren, and she was content with the title of mother of Theophilus, his son and successor. The character of Theophilus is a rare example in which religious zeal has allowed, and, perhaps magnified, the virtues of a heretic and a persecutor. His valor was often felt by the enemies, and his justice by the subjects of the monarchy. But the valor of Theophilus was rash and fruitless, and his justice arbitrary and cruel. He displayed the banners of the cross against the Saracens, but his five expeditions were concluded by a signal overthrow. Amorium, the native city of his ancestors, was levelled with the ground, and from his military toils he derived only the surname of the unfortunate. The wisdom of a sovereign is comprised in his institution of laws and the choice of his magistrates, and while he seems without action, his civil government revolves around his centre with the silence and order of the planetary system. But the justice of Theophilus was fashioned on the model of the oriental despots, who, in personal and irregular acts of authority, consult the reason or passions of the moment, without measuring the sentence by the law or the penalty by the offence. A poor woman threw herself at the emperor's feet to complain of a powerful neighbour, the brother of the empress, who had raised his palace wall to such an inconvenient height, that her humble dwelling was excluded from light and air. On the proof of the fact, instead of granting, like an ordinary judge, sufficient or ample damages to the plaintiff, the sovereign had judged to her use and benefit the palace and the ground. Nor was Theophilus content with this extravagant satisfaction. His zeal converted a civil trespass into a criminal act, and the unfortunate patrician was stripped and scourged in the public place of Constantinople. For some venial offences, some defect of equity or vigilance, the principal ministers, a prefect, a questor, a captain of the guards, were banished or mutilated, or scolded with boiling pitch, or burnt alive in hippodrome. And as these dreadful examples might be the effects of error or caprice, they must have alienated from his service the best and wisest of the citizens. But the pride of the monarch was flattered in the exercise of power, or as he thought of virtue, and the people, safe in their obscurity, applauded the danger and debasement of their superiors. This extraordinary rigor was justified, in some measure, by its salutary consequences, since, after a scrutiny of seventeen days, not a complaint or abuse could be found in the court or city. And it might be alleged that the Greeks could be ruled only with a rod of iron, and that the public interest is the motive and law of the supreme judge. Yet, in the crime, or the suspicion of treason, that judge is of all others the most crudulous and partial. Theophilus might inflict a tardy vengeance on the assassins of Leo and the saviours of his father. But he enjoyed the fruits of their crime. And his jealous tyranny sacrificed a brother and a prince to the future safety of his life. A Persian, of the race of assassins, died in poverty and exile at Constantinople, leaving only a son, the issue of a plebeian marriage. At the age of twelve years, the royal birth of Theophobia was revealed, and his marriage was not unworthy of his birth. He was educated in the Byzantine palace, a Christian and a soldier, advanced with rapid steps in the career of fortune and glory, received the hand of the emperor's sister, and was promoted to the command of thirty thousand Persians. Who, like his father, had fled from the Mohammedan conquerors? These troops, doubly infected with mercenary and fanatic vices, were desirous of revolting against their benefactor, and directing the standard of their native king. But the loyal Theophobias rejected their offers, disconcerted their schemes, and escaped from their hands to the camp or palace of his royal brother. A generous confidence might have secured a faithful and able guardian for his wife and his infant son, to whom Theophilus, in the flower of his age, was compelled to leave the inheritance of the empire. But his jealousy was exasperated by envy and disease. He feared the dangerous virtues which might either support or oppress their infancy and weakness. And the dying emperor demanded the head of the Persian prince. With savage delight he recognized the familiar features of his brother. "'Thou art no longer Theophobias,' he said, and, sinking on his couch, he added, with a faltering voice. "'Soon, too soon, I shall be no more Theophilus.' End of Chapter 48 Part 2 Chapter 48 Part 3 Of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire Volume 4 This is a LibriVox recording. All the LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org Recording by Lizzie Driver The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire Volume 4 by Edward Gibbon Chapter 48 Succession and Characters of the Greek Emperors Part 3 The Russians, who have borrowed from the Greeks the greatest part of their civil and ecclesiastical policy, preserved till the last century a singular institution in the marriage of the Tsar. They collected, not the virgins of every rank and of every province, a vain and romantic idea, but the daughters of the principal nobles, who awaited in the palace the choice of their sovereign. It is affirmed that a similar method was adopted in the nuptials of Theophilus. With a golden apple in his hand he slowly walked between the two lines of contending beauties. His eye was detained by the charms of Eccasia. And in the awkwardness of the first declaration the prince could only observe that in this world women had been the cause of much evil. And surely, sir, she pertly replied, they have likewise been the occasion of much good. This affectation of unseasonable wit displeased the imperial lover. He turned aside in disgust. Eccasia concealed her mortification in a convent, and the modest silence of Theodora was rewarded with the golden apple. She deserved the love, but did not escape the severity of her lord. From the palace garden he beheld a vessel deeply laden and steering into the port. On the discovery that the precious cargo of Syrian luxury was the property of his wife, he condemned the ship to the flames with a sharp reproach. That her avarice had degraded the character of an empress into that of a merchant. Yet his last choice entrusted her with the guardianship of the empire and her son Michael, who was left an orphan in the fifth year of his age. The restoration of images, and the final extropation of the iconoclasts, has endeared her name to the devotion of the Greeks, but in the fervour of religious seal. Theodora entertained a grateful regard for the memory and salvation of her husband. After thirteen years of a prudent and frugal administration, she perceived the decline of her influence. But the second Irene imitated only the virtues of her predecessor. Instead of conspiring against the life or government of her son, she retired without a struggle, though not without a murmur, to the solitude of private life. Deploring the ingratitude, the vices, and the inevitable ruin of the worthless youth. Among the successes of Nero and Elagabalus, we have not hithero found the imitation of their vices, the character of a Roman prince who considered pleasure as the object of life, and virtue as the enemy of pleasure. Whatever might have been the maternal care of Theodora in the education of Michael III, her unfortunate son was a king before he was a man. If the ambitious mother laboured to check the progress of reason, she could not call the ablulation of passion, and her selfish policy was justly repaid by the contempt and ingratitude of the headstrong youth. At the age of eighteen he rejected her authority, without feeling his own incapacity to govern the empire and himself. With Theodora, all gravity and wisdom retired from the court. Their place was supplied by the alternate dominion of vice and folly, and it was impossible, without fortifying the public esteem, to acquire or preserve the favour of the emperor. The millions of gold and silver which had been accumulated for the service of the state were lavished on the vilest of men, who flattered his passions and shared his pleasures, and in a rain of thirteen years the richest of sovereigns was compelled to strip the palace and the churches of their precious furniture. Like Nero he delighted in the amusements of the theatre, and sighed to be surpassed in the accomplishments in which he should have blushed to excel. Yet the studies of Nero in music and poetry betrayed some symptoms of a liberal taste. The more ignoble arts of the son of Theophilus were confined to the chariot-race of the hippodrome. The four factions which had agitated the peace still amused the idleness of the capital. For himself the emperor assumed the blue livery. The three rival colours were distributed to his favourites, and in the vile, though eager contention, he forgot the dignity of his person and the safety of his dominions. He silenced the messenger of an invasion, who presumed to divert his attention in the most critical moment of the race. And by his command the importunate beacons were extinguished. The two frequently spread the alarm from Tarsus to Constantinople. The most skilful charioteers obtained the first place in his confidence and esteem. Their marriage was profusely rewarded. The emperor feasted in their houses, and presented their children at the baptismal font. And while he applauded his own popularity, he affected to blame the cold and stately reserve of his predecessors. The unnatural lusts which had degraded even the manhood of Nero were banished from the world. Yet the strength of Michael was consumed by the indulgence of love and intemperance. In his midnight revels, when his passions were inflamed by wine, he was provoked to issue the most sangunary commands. And if any feelings of humanity were left, he was reduced, with the return of sense, to approve the sultry disobedience of his servants. But the most extraordinary feature in the character of Michael is the profane mockery of the religion of his country. The superstition of the Greeks might indeed excite the smile of a philosopher, but his smile would have been rational and temperate. And he must have condemned the ignorant folly of a youth, who insulted the objects of public veneration. A buffoon of the court was invested in the robes of a patriarch. His twelve metropolitan, among whom the emperor was ranked, assumed their ecclesiastical garments. They used, or abused, the sacred vessels of the altar. And in their bacchanalian feasts, the Holy Communion was administered in a nauseous compound of vinegar and mustard. Nor were these empire spectacles concealed from the eyes of the city. On the day of a solemn festival, the emperor, with his bishops or buffoons, rode on asses through the street, encountered the true patriarch at the head of his clergy, and by the less censured shouts and obscene gestures, disordered the gravity of the Christian procession. The devotion of Michael appeared only in some offence to reason or piety. He received his theatrical crowns from the statue of the Virgin, and an imperial tomb was violated, for the sake of burning the bones of Constantine the iconoclast. By this extravagant conduct, the son of Theophilus became as contentable as he was odious. Every citizen was impatient for the deliverance of his country. And even the favourites of the moment were apprehensive, that a caprice might snatch away or to caprice it bestowed. In the thirtieth year of his age, and in the hour of intoxication and sleep, Michael III was murdered in his chamber by the founder of a new dynasty, whom the emperor had risen to inequality of rank and power. The genealogy of Basil the Macedonian, if it be not the spurious offspring of pride and flattery, exhibits a genuine picture of the revolution of the most illustrious families. The Arsacides, the rivals of Rome, possessed the sceptre of the east near four hundred years. A younger branch of these Parthian kings continued to reign in Armenia, and their royal descendants survived the partition and servitude of that ancient monarchy. Two of these, are Atabanus and Collienus, escaped or retired to the court of Lyod I. His bounty ceded them in a safe and hospitable exile. In the province of Macedonia, Adrianople was their final settlement. During several generations they maintained the dignity of their birth, and their Roman patriotism rejected the tempting offers of the Persian and Arabian powers, who recalled them to their native country. But this blender was insensibly clouded by time and poverty, and the father of Basil was reduced to a small farm, which he cultivated with his own hands. Yet he scorned to disgrace the blood of the Arsacides by a plebeian alliance. His wife, a widow of Adrianople, was pleased to count among her ancestors the great Constantine, and their royal infant was connected by some dark affinity of lineage or country with the Macedonian Alexander. No sooner was he born than the cradle of Basil, his family and his city, was swept away by an inundation of the Bulgarians. He was educated as slave in a foreign land, and in this severe discipline he acquired the hardiness of body and flexibility of mind, which promoted his future elevation. In the age of youth or manhood, he shared the deliverance of the Roman captives, who generously broke their fetters, marched through Bulgaria to the shores of the Yucsin, defeated two armies of barbarians, embarked in the ships which had been stationed for their reception, and returned to Constantinople. From whence they were distributed to their respective homes. But the freedom of Basil was naked and destitute. His farm was ruined by the calamities of war. After his father's death, his manual labour or service could no longer support a family of orphans. And he resolved to seek a more conspicuous theatre, in which every virtue and every vice may lead to the path of greatness. The first night of his arrival at Constantinople, without friends or money, the weary pilgrims slept on the steps of the church at St. Diomed. He was fed by the casual hospitality of a monk, and was introduced to the service of a cousin and namesake of the emperor Theophilus. Who, though himself of a diminutive person, was always followed by a train of tall and handsome domestics. Basil attended his patron to the government of Pelo Pinesis, eclipsed by his personal merit, the birth and dignity of Theophilus, and formed a useful connection with the wealthy and charitable matron of Patras. Her spiritual, or carnal love, embraced the young adventurer, whom she adopted as her son. Danielus presented him with thirty slaves, and the produce of bounty was expanded in the support of his brothers, and the purchase of some larger states in Macedonia. His gratitude or ambition still attached him to the service of Theophilus, and a lucky accident recommended him to the notice of the court. A famous wrestler, in the train of the Bulgarian ambassadors, had defied at the royal banquet the boldest and most robust of the Greeks. The strength of Basil was praised. He accepted the challenge, and the barbarian champion was overthrown at the first onset. A beautiful but vicious horse was condemned to be hamstrung. It was subdued by the dexterity and courage of the servant Theophilus, and his conqueror was promoted to an honourable rank in the imperial stables. But it was impossible to obtain the confidence of Michael, without complying with his vices. And his new favourite, the Great Chamberlain of the Palace, was raised and supported by a disgraceful marriage with a royal concubine, and the dishonour of his sister, who succeeded to a place. The public administration had been abandoned to the Caesar Bades, the brother and enemy of Theodora. But the arts of female influence persuaded Michael to hate and to fear his uncle. He was drawn from Constantinople, under the pretense of a Cretian expedition, and stabbed in the tent of audience by the sword of the Chamberlain, and in the presence of the emperor. About a month after this execution, Basil was invested with the title of Augustus, and the government of the empire. He supported this unequal association, till his influence was fortified by popular esteem. His life was endangered by the caprice of the emperor, and his dignity was profaned by a second colleague, who had rowed in the galleys. Yet the murder of his benefactor must be condemned as an act of ingratitude and treason. And the churches which he dedicated to the name of Saint Michael, were a poor and purile expiation of his guilt. The different ages of Basil I may be compared with those of Augustus. The situation of the Greek did not allow him in his earliest youth to lead an army against his country, or to prescribe the nobles of his sons. But his aspiring genius stooped to the arts of a slave. He dissembled his ambition and even his virtues, and grasped, with the bloody hand of an assassin, the empire which he ruled with the wisdom and tenderness of a parent. A private citizen may feel his interest repugnant to his duty. But it must be from his deficiency of sense or courage, that an absolute monarch can separate his happiness from his glory, or his glory from the public welfare. The life, or panegyric of Basil, has indeed been composed and published under the long reign of his descendants. But even their stability on the throne may be justly ascribed to the superior merit of their ancestor. In his character, his grandson Constantine, has attempted to delineate a perfect image of royalty. But that feeble prince, unless he had copied a real model, could not easily have soared so high above the level of his own conduct or conceptions. But the most solid praise of Basil is drawn from the comparison of a ruined and flourishing monarchy, that which he wrestled from the dissolute Michael, and that which he bequeathed to the Macedonian dynasty. The evils which had been sanctified by time and example were corrected by his master hand, and he revived, if not the national spirit, at least the order and majesty of the Roman Empire. His application was interfatigable, his temper cool, his understanding vigorous and decisive. And in his practice he observed that rare and salutary moderation, which pursues each virtue, at an equal distance between the opposite vices. His military service had been confined to the palace. Nor was the emperor endowed with the spirit or the talents of a warrior. Yet under his reign the Roman arms were again formidable to the barbarians. As soon as he had formed a new army by discipline and exercise, he appeared in person at the banks of the Euphrates, curbed the pride of the Saracens, and suppressed the dangerous, though just revolt, of the Manichians. His indignation against a rebel, who had long eluded his pursuit, provoked him to wish and to pray, that by the grace of God he might try three arrows into the head of Chrissacare. That odious head, which had been obtained by trees and rather than by valour, was suspended from a tree, and thrice exposed to the dexterity of the imperial archer. A base revenge against the dead, more worthy of the times than of the character of Basil. But his principal merit was in the civil administration of the finances and of the laws. To replenish an exhausted treasury, it was proposed to resume the lavish and ill place-gifts of his predecessor. His prudence abated one moity of the restitution, and a sum of twelve hundred thousand pounds was instantly procured to answer the most pressing demands, and to allow some space for the mature options for economy. Among the various schemes for the improvement of the revenue, a new mode was suggested of capitation or tribute, which would have too much depended on the arbitrary discretion of the assessors. A sufficient list of honest and able agents was instantly produced by the minister. But on the more careful scrutiny of Basil himself, only two could be found, who might be safely entrusted with such dangerous powers. But they justified his esteem by declining his confidence. But the serious and successful diligence of the emperor established by degree the equitable balance of property and payment of receipt and expenditure. A peculiar fund was appropriated to each service, and a public method secured the interest of the prince and the property of the people. After reforming the luxury, he assigned two patrimonial estates to supply the decent plenty of the imperial table. The contributions of the subject were revised for his defence, and the residue was employed in the establishment of the capital and provinces. A taste for building, however costly, may deserve some praise and much excuse. For thence industry is fed, art is encouraged, and some object is attained of public emolument or pleasure. The use of a road, an aqueduct, or a hospital is obvious and solid, and the hundred churches that arose by the commander Basil were consecrated to the devotion of the age. In the character of a judge who was assiduous and impartial, desire is to save but not afraid to strike. The oppressors of the people were severely chastised, but his personal foes, whom it might be unsafe to pardon, were condemned after the loss of their eyes to a life of solitude and repentance. The change of language and manners demanded a revision of the obsolete jurisprudence of Justinian. The voluminous body of his institutes, pandex, code, and novels, was digested under forty titles in the Greek idiom. And the basilics, which were improved and completed by his son and grandson, must be referred to the original genius of the founder of their race. This glorious reign was terminated by an accident in the chase. A furious stag entangled his horns in the belt of Basil, and raised him from his horse. He was rescued by an attendant, who cut the belt and slew the animal. But the fool, or the fever, exhausted the strength of the aged monarch, and he expired in the palace amidst the tears of his family and people. If he struck off the head of the faithful servant for presuming to draw his sword against his sovereign, the pride of despotism, which had laid dormant in his life, revived in the last moments of despair, when he no longer wanted or valued the opinion of mankind. Of the four sons of the emperor, Constantine died before his father, whose grief and credulity were amused by a flattering imposter, and a vain apparition. Stephen, the youngest, was content with the honors of a patriarch and a saint. Both Leo and Alexander were alike invested with the purple. But the powers of government were solely exercised by the elder brother. The name of Leo VI has been dignified with the title of philosopher, and the union of the prince and the sage of the active and speculative virtues would indeed constitute the perfection of human nature. But the claims of Leo are far short of this ideal excellence. Did he reduce his passions and appetites under the dominion of reason? His life was spent in the pomp of the palace, in the society of his wives and concubines, and even the clemency which he showed, and the peace which he strove to preserve must be imputed to the softness and indolence of his character. Did he subdue his prejudices and those of his subjects? His mind was tinged with the most pure-art superstition. The influence of the clergy and the errors of the people were consecrated by his laws, and the oracles of Leo which reveal in prophetic style the fates of the empire are founded on the art of astrology and divination. If we still inquire the reason of his sage appellation, it can only be replied that the son of Basil was less ignorant than the greater part of his contemporaries in church and state, that his education had been directed by the learned Fiotius, and that several books of profane and ecclesiastical science were composed by the pen, or in the name of the imperial philosopher. But the reputation of his philosophy and religion was overthrown by a domestic vice, the repetition of his nuptials. The primitive ideas of the merit and holiness of celibacy were preached by the monks and entertained by the Greeks. Marriage was allowed as a necessary means for the propagation of mankind. After the death of either party, the survivor might satisfy, by a second union, the weakness or the strength of the flesh, but a third marriage was censured as a state of legal fornication, and a fourth was a sin or scandal as yet unknown to the Christians of the East. In the beginning of his reign, Leo himself had abolished the state of concubines, and condemned, without nulling, third marriages. But his patriotism and love soon compelled him to violate his own laws, and to incur the penance, which in a similar case he had imposed on his subjects. In his three first alliances, his nuptial bed was unfruitful. The emperor required a female companion, and the empire a legitimate heir. The beautiful Zoe was introduced into the palace as a concubine, and, after a trial of her fecundity, and the birth of Constantine, her lover declared his intention of legitimating the mother and the child by the celebration of his fourth nuptials. But the patriarch Nicholas refused his blessing. The imperial baptism of the young prince was obtained by a promise of separation, and the contumaceous husband of Zoe was excluded from the communion of the faithful, neither the fear of exile, nor the desertion of his brethren, nor the authority of the Latin Church, nor the danger of failure or doubt in the succession of the empire could bend the spirit of the inflexible monk. After the death of Leo, he was recalled from exile to the civil and ecclesiastical administration, and the edict of union, which was promulgated in the name of Constantine, condemned the future scandal of fourth marriages, and left a tacit imputation on his own birth. In the Greek language, purple and porphyry are the same word, and as the colours of nature are invariable, we may learn that a dark deep red was the Tyrian dye which stained the purple of the ancients. An apartment of the Byzantine palace was lined with porphyry. It was reserved for use of the pregnant empress, and the royal birth of their children was expressed by the appellation of porphyrogenity, or born in the purple. Several of the Roman princes had been blessed with an heir, but this peculiar surname was first applied to Constantine VII. His life and titular reign were of equal duration. But, of fifty-four years, six had elapsed before his father's death, and the son of Leo was ever the voluntary or reluctant subject of those who oppressed his weakness or abused his confidence. His uncle Alexander, who had long been invested with the title of Augustus, was the first colleague and governor of the young prince. But in a rapid career of vice and folly, the brother of Leo had emulated the reputation of Michael, and when he was extinguished by a timely death, he entertained a project of castrating his nephew, and leaving the empire to a worthless favorite. The succeeding years of the minority of Constantine were occupied by his mother Zoe, and a successional council of seven regents, who pursued their interest, gratified their passions, abandoned the Republic, supplanted each other, and finally fannessed in the presence of a soldier. From Lumpuscure origin, Romanus Lecupennus had raised himself to the command of the naval armies, and in the anarchy of the times had deserved, or at least had obtained, the national esteem. With a victorious and affectionate fleet, he sailed from the mouth of the Danube into the harbour of Constantinople, and was hailed as the deliverer of the people, and the guardian of the prince. His supreme office was at first defined by the new appellation of father of the emperor, but Romanus soon disdained the subordinate powers of a minister, and assumed with the titles of Caesar and Augustus the full independence of royalty, which he held near five and twenty years. His three sons, Christopher, Stephen and Constantine, were successively adorned with the same honors, and the lawful emperor was degraded from the first to the fifth rank in this College of Princes, yet in the preservation of his life and crown, he might still applaud his own fortune and clemency of usurper. The examples of ancient and modern history would have excused the ambition of Romanus. The powers and the laws of the empire in his hand, the spurious birth of Constantine, would have justified his exclusion, and the grave or the monastery was open to receive the son of the concubine. But Lecupennus did not appear to have possessed either the virtues or the vices of a tyrant. The spirit and activity of his private life dissolved away in the sunshine of the throne, and in his licentious pleasures, he forgot the safety both of the Republic and of his family. Of a mild and religious character, he respected the sanctity of oaths, the innocence of the youth, the memory of his parents, and the attachment of the people. The studious temper and retirement of Constantine disarm the jealousy of power. His books and music, his pen and his pencil, were a constant source of amusement, and if he could improve a scanty allowance by the sale of his pictures, if their price was not enhanced by the name of the artist, he was endeavoured with a personal talent, which few princes could employ in the hour of adversity. The fall of Romanos was occasioned by his own vices and those of his children. After the decease of Christopher, his eldest son, the two surviving brothers quarreled with each other, and conspired against their father. At the hour of noon, when all strangers were regularly excluded from the palace, they entered his apartment with an armed force, and conveyed him, in the habit of a monk, to a small island in the propontis, which was peopled by a religious community. The rumour of this domestic revolution excited a tumult in the city. But Porphyrio Genitus alone, the true and lawful emperor, was the object of the public care, and the sons of Lechopenis were taught, by Tardy experience, that they had achieved a guilty and perilous enterprise for the benefit of their rival. Their sister Helena, the wife of Constantine, revealed or supposed their treacherous design of assassinating her husband at the royal banquet. His loyal adherents were alarmed, and the two usurpers were prevented, seized, degraded from the purple, and embarked with the same island and monastery, where their father had been so lately confined. Old Romanos met them on the beach with a sarcastic smile. And, after a just reproach of their folly and ingratitude, presented his imperial colleagues with an equal share of his water and vegetable diet. In the fortieth year of his reign, Constantine VII obtained the possession of the eastern world, which he ruled, or seemed to rule, near fifteen years. But he was devoid of that energy of character, which could emerge into a life of action and glory. And the studies, which had amused and dignified his leisure, were incompatible with the serious duties of a sovereign. The emperor neglected the practice to instruct his son Romanos in the theory of government. While he indulged the habits of intemperous and sloth, he dropped the reins of the administration into the hands of Helena, his wife. And, in the shifting scene of her favourite Caprice, each minister was regretted in the promotion of a more worthless successor. Yet the birth and misfortunes of Constantine had endeared him to the Greeks. They excused his failings, they respected his learning, his innocence and charity, his love of justice. And the ceremony of his funeral was mourned with the unfaithful tears of his subjects. The body, according to ancient custom, lay in state in the vestibule of the palace, and the civil and military officers. The petitions, the senate and the clergy approached in due order to adore and kiss the inanimate corpse of their sovereign. Before the procession moved towards the imperial sepulchre, a herald proclaimed this awful admonition. Arise, O king of the world, and obey the summons of the king of kings. The death of Constantine was imputed to poison, and his son Romanos, who derived that name from his maternal grandfather, ascended the throne of Constantineople. A prince, who, at the age of twenty, could be suspected of anticipating his inheritance, must have been already lost in the public esteem. Yet Romanos was rather weak than wicked, and the largest share of his guilt was transferred to his wife, Theophano, a woman of base origin, masculine spirit, and flogacious manners. The sense of personal glory and public happiness, the true pleasure of royalty, were unknown to the son of Constantine. And while the two brothers Nicophorus and Leo triumphed over the Saracens, the hours which the emperor owed to his people were consumed in strenuous idleness. In the morning he visited the circus. At noon he feasted the senators. The greater part of the afternoon he spent in this foreristerium, or tennis court, the only theatre of his victories. From thence he passed over to the Asiatic side of the Bosphorus, hunted and killed four wild boars of the largest size, and returned to the palace, proudly content with the labours of the day. In strength and beauty he was conspicuous above his equals, tall and straight as a young Cyprus. His complexion was fair and florid, his eyes sparkling, his shoulders broad, his nose long and aquiline. Yet even these perfections were insufficient to fix the love of Theophano, and after a reign of four years, she mingled for her husband the same deadly drought which she had composed for his father. By his marriage with this impious woman, Romanus the Younger left two sons, Basil the Second and Constantine the Ninth, and two daughters, Theophani and Anne. The eldest sister was given to Otho the Second, Emperor of the West. The Younger became the wife of Walidomir, great Jew and Apostle of Russia. And by the marriage of her granddaughter with Henry I, King of France, the blood of the Macedonians, and perhaps of the Aracicides, still flows in the veins of the Bourbon line. After the death for her husband, the Empress aspired to reign in the name of her sons. The elder of whom was five, and the Younger only two years of age. But she soon felt the instability of a throne, which was supported by a female who could not be esteemed, and two infants who could not be feared. Theophano looked round for a protector, and threw herself into the arms of the bravest soldier. Her heart was capricious. But the deformity of the new favourite rendered it more than probable that interest was the motive and excuse of her love. Nicophorus' focus united, in the popular opinion, the double merit of a hero and a saint. In the former character his qualifications were genuine and splendid. The descendant of a race illustrious by their military exploits, he had displayed in every station and in every province the courage of a soldier and the conduct of a chief. And Nicophorus was crowned with recent laurels, from the important conquest of the Isle of Crete. His religion was of a more ambiguous caste, and his hair-cloth, his fasts, his pious idiom, and his wish to retire from the business of the world were a convenient mask for his dark and dangerous ambition. Yet he imposed on a holy patriarch, by whose influence, and by a decree of the Senate, he was entrusted, during the minority of the young princes, with the absolute and independent command of the Oriental armies. And as soon as he had secured the leaders and the troops, he boldly marched to Constantinople, trampled on his enemies, afowed with correspondence with the Empress, and without degrading her sons, assumed with the title of Augustus the preeminence of rank and the plentitude of power. But his marriage with Theophany was refused by the same patriarch who had placed the crown on his head. By his second nuptials he incurred a year of canonical penance. A bar of spiritual affinity was opposed to their celebration, and some evasion and perjury were required to silence the scruples of the clergy and the people. The popularity of the Emperor was lost in the purple. In a reign of six years he provoked the hatred of strangers and subjects. And the hypocrisy and avarice of the first Nicophorus were revived in his successor. Hypocrisy I shall never justify or palliate, but I will dare to observe that the odious vice of avarice is of all others most hastily arraigned, and most immersively condemned. In a private citizen our judgment seldom expects inaccurate scrutiny into his fortune and expense, and in a steward of the public treasure, for guilty is always a virtue, and the increase of taxes too often in indispensable duty In the use of his patrimony the generous temper of Nicophorus had been proved, and the revenue was strictly applied to the service of the State. Each spring the Emperor marched in person against the Saracens, and every Roman might compute the employment of his taxes in triumphs, conquests, and the security of the Eastern Barrier. End of Chapter 48 Part 3