Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, vol 5 | Page 7

scale. With this mutual aid, and opposite
tendency, it is easy for us to poise the balance with philosophic
indifference.
Note: Compare Schlosser, Geschichte der Bilder-sturmender Kaiser,
Frankfurt am-Main 1812 a book of research and impartiality - M.]
[Footnote 19: Some flowers of rhetoric. By Damascenus is styled
(Opera, tom. i. p. 623.) Spanheim's Apology for the Synod of
Constantinople (p. 171, &c.) is worked up with truth and ingenuity,
from such materials as he could find in the Nicene Acts, (p. 1046, &c.)
The witty John of Damascus converts it into slaves of their belly, &c.
Opera, tom. i. p. 806]
[Footnote 20: He is accused of proscribing the title of saint; styling the
Virgin, Mother of Christ; comparing her after her delivery to an empty
purse of Arianism, Nestorianism, &c. In his defence, Spanheim (c. iv. p.
207) is somewhat embarrassed between the interest of a Protestant and
the duty of an orthodox divine.]
The scandal of an abstract heresy can be only proclaimed to the people
by the blast of the ecclesiastical trumpet; but the most ignorant can
perceive, the most torpid must feel, the profanation and downfall of
their visible deities. The first hostilities of Leo were directed against a
lofty Christ on the vestibule, and above the gate, of the palace. A ladder
had been planted for the assault, but it was furiously shaken by a crowd
of zealots and women: they beheld, with pious transport, the ministers
of sacrilege tumbling from on high and dashed against the pavement:
and the honors of the ancient martyrs were prostituted to these
criminals, who justly suffered for murder and rebellion. ^21 The
execution of the Imperial edicts was resisted by frequent tumults in
Constantinople and the provinces: the person of Leo was endangered,
his officers were massacred, and the popular enthusiasm was quelled by
the strongest efforts of the civil and military power. Of the Archipelago,
or Holy Sea, the numerous islands were filled with images and monks:
their votaries abjured, without scruple, the enemy of Christ, his mother,

and the saints; they armed a fleet of boats and galleys, displayed their
consecrated banners, and boldly steered for the harbor of
Constantinople, to place on the throne a new favorite of God and the
people. They depended on the succor of a miracle: but their miracles
were inefficient against the Greek fire; and, after the defeat and
conflagration of the fleet, the naked islands were abandoned to the
clemency or justice of the conqueror. The son of Leo, in the first year
of his reign, had undertaken an expedition against the Saracens: during
his absence, the capital, the palace, and the purple, were occupied by
his kinsman Artavasdes, the ambitious champion of the orthodox faith.
The worship of images was triumphantly restored: the patriarch
renounced his dissimulation, or dissembled his sentiments and the
righteous claims of the usurper was acknowledged, both in the new,
and in ancient, Rome. Constantine flew for refuge to his paternal
mountains; but he descended at the head of the bold and affectionate
Isaurians; and his final victory confounded the arms and predictions of
the fanatics. His long reign was distracted with clamor, sedition,
conspiracy, and mutual hatred, and sanguinary revenge; the persecution
of images was the motive or pretence, of his adversaries; and, if they
missed a temporal diadem, they were rewarded by the Greeks with the
crown of martyrdom. In every act of open and clandestine treason, the
emperor felt the unforgiving enmity of the monks, the faithful slaves of
the superstition to which they owed their riches and influence. They
prayed, they preached, they absolved, they inflamed, they conspired;
the solitude of Palestine poured forth a torrent of invective; and the pen
of St. John Damascenus, ^22 the last of the Greek fathers, devoted the
tyrant's head, both in this world and the next. ^23 ^* I am not at leisure
to examine how far the monks provoked, nor how much they have
exaggerated, their real and pretended sufferings, nor how many lost
their lives or limbs, their eyes or their beards, by the cruelty of the
emperor. ^! From the chastisement of individuals, he proceeded to the
abolition of the order; and, as it was wealthy and useless, his
resentment might be stimulated by avarice, and justified by patriotism.
The formidable name and mission of the Dragon, ^24 his
visitor-general, excited the terror and abhorrence of the black nation:
the religious communities were dissolved, the buildings were converted
into magazines, or bar racks; the lands, movables, and cattle were

confiscated; and our modern precedents will support the charge, that
much wanton or malicious havoc was exercised against the relics, and
even the books of the monasteries. With the habit and profession of
monks, the public and private worship of images was