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lover, and Theodosius condescended to accept the pressing and humble invitation of the conqueror of Italy. In the absolute direction of his household, and in the important commissions of peace and war, ,115 the favourite youth most rapidly acquired a fortune of four hundred thousand pounds sterling; and after their return to Constantinople the passion of Antonina at least continued ardent and unabated. But fear, devotion, and lassitude perhaps, inspired Theodosius with more serious thoughts. He dreaded the busy scandal of the capital, and the indiscreet fondness of the wife of Belisarius, escaped from her embraces, and, retiring to Ephesus, shaved his head and took refuge in the sanctuary of a monastic life. The despair of the new Ariadne could scarcely have been excused by the death of her husband. She wept, she tore her hair, she filled the palace with her cries; "she had lost the dearest of friends, a tender, a

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faithful, a laborious friend!" But her warm entreaties, fortified by the prayers of Belisarius, were insufficient to draw the holy monk from the solitude of Ephesus. It was not till the general moved forward for the Persian war that Theodosius could be tempted to return to Constantinople, and the short interval before the departure of Antonina herself was boldly devoted to love and pleasure.

and her son

A philosopher may pity and forgive the infirmities of female nature from which he receives no real injury; but con- Resentment temptible is the husband who feels, and yet endures, his of Belisarius own infamy in that of his wife. Antonina pursued her son Photius. with implacable hatred, and the gallant Photius 116 was exposed to her secret persecutions in the camp beyond the Tigris. Enraged by his own wrongs and by the dishonour of his blood, he cast away in his turn the sentiments of nature, and revealed to Belisarius the turpitude of a woman who had violated all the duties of a mother and a wife. From the surprise and indignation of the Roman general, his former credulity appears to have been sincere: he embraced the knees of the son of Antonina, adjured him to remember his obligations rather than his birth, and confirmed at the altar their holy vows of revenge and mutual defence. The dominion of Antonina was impaired by absence; and when she met her husband on his return from the Persian confines, Belisarius, in his first and transient emotions, confined her person and threatened her life. Photius was

115 In November, 537, Photius arrested the pope (Liberat. Brev. c. 22; Pagi, tom. ii. p. 562). About the end of 539 Belisarius sent Theodosius τὸν τῇ οἰκίᾳ τῇ αὐτοῦ ἐφέστωτα on an important and lucrative commission to Ravenna (Goth. 1. ii, c. 28 [tom. ii. p. 261, ed. Bonn]).

116 Theophanes (Chronograph. p. 204 [ed. Par.; tom. i. p. 373, ed. Bonn]) styles him Photinus, the son-in-law of Belisarius; and he is copied by the Historia Miscella and Anastasius.

more resolved to punish, and less prompt to pardon; he flew to Ephesus, extorted from a trusty eunuch of his mother the full confession of her guilt, arrested Theodosius and his treasures in the church of St. John the Apostle, and concealed his captives, whose execution was only delayed, in a secure and sequestered fortress of Cilicia. Such a daring outrage against public justice could not pass with impunity, and the cause of Antonina was espoused by the empress, whose favour she had deserved by the recent services of the disgrace of a præfect, and the exile and murder of a pope. At the end of the campaign Belisarius was recalled; he complied as usual with the Imperial mandate. His mind was not prepared for rebellion his obedience, however adverse to the dictates of honour, was consonant to the wishes of his heart; and when he embraced his wife, at the command and perhaps in the presence of the empress, the tender husband was disposed to forgive or to be forgiven. The bounty of Theodora reserved for her companion a more precious favour. "I have found," she said, "my dearest patrician, a pearl "of inestimable value; it has not yet been viewed by any mortal 66 eye, but the sight and the possession of this jewel are destined for my friend." As soon as the curiosity and impatience of Antonina were kindled, the door of a bedchamber was thrown open, and she beheld her lover, whom the diligence of the eunuchs had discovered in his secret prison. Her silent wonder burst into passionate exclamations of gratitude and joy, and she named Theodora her queen, her benefactress, and her saviour. The monk of Ephesus was nourished in the palace with luxury and ambition; but instead of assuming, as he was promised, the command of the Roman armies, Theodosius expired in the first fatigues of an amorous interview. The grief of Antonina could only be assuaged by the sufferings of her of her son. son. A youth of consular rank and a sickly constitution was punished without a trial, like a malefactor and a slave; yet such was the constancy of his mind, that Photius sustained the tortures of the scourge and the rack without violating the faith which he had sworn to Belisarius. After this fruitless cruelty the son of Antonina, while his mother feasted with the empress, was buried in her subterraneous prisons, which admitted not the distinction of night and day

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Persecution

a

a This and much of the private scandal in the Anecdota is liable to serious doubt. Who reported all these private conversations, and how did they reach the ears of Procopius?— M.

b This is a strange misrepresentation he died of a dysentery; nor does it appear that it was immediately after this scene. Antonina proposed to raise him to the

generalship of the army-dλλά Tis goτερήσασα δίκη νόσῳ ἁλόντα δυσεντερίας ἐξ vegúrav avrov ¿paviçe [c. 3, tom. iii. p. 28, ed. Bonn]. Procop. Anecd. p. 14. The sudden change from the abstemious diet of a monk to the luxury of the court is a much more probable cause of his death. -M.

He twice escaped to the most venerable sanctuaries of Constantinople, the churches of St. Sophia and of the Virgin; but his tyrants were insensible of religion as of pity, and the helpless youth, amidst the clamours of the clergy and people, was twice dragged from the altar to the dungeon. His third attempt was more successful. At the end of three years the prophet Zachariah, or some mortal friend, indicated the means of an escape: he eluded the spies and guards of the empress, reached the holy sepulchre of Jerusalem, embraced the profession of a monk, and the abbot Photius was employed, after the death of Justinian, to reconcile and regulate the churches of Egypt. The son of Antonina suffered all that an enemy can inflict; her patient husband imposed on himself the more exquisite misery of violating his promise and deserting his friend.

:

Disgrace and

Belisarius.

In the succeeding campaign Belisarius was again sent against the Persians he saved the East, but he offended Theodora, and perhaps the emperor himself. The malady of Justinian submission of had countenanced the rumour of his death; and the Roman general, on the supposition of that probable event, spoke the free language of a citizen and a soldier. His colleague Buzes, who concurred in the same sentiments, lost his rank, his liberty, and his health by the persecution of the empress; but the disgrace of Belisarius was alleviated by the dignity of his own character and the influence of his wife, who might wish to humble, but could not desire to ruin, the partner of her fortunes. Even his removal was coloured by the assurance that the sinking state of Italy would be retrieved by the single presence of its conqueror. But no sooner had he returned, alone and defenceless, than an hostile commission was sent to the East to seize his treasures and criminate his actions; the guards and veterans who followed his private banner were distributed among the chiefs of the army, and even the eunuchs presumed to cast lots for the partition of his martial domestics. When he passed with a small and sordid retinue through the streets of Constantinople, his forlorn appearance excited the amazement and compassion of the people. Justinian and Theodora received him with cold ingratitude, the servile crowd with insolence and contempt; and in the evening he retired with trembling steps to his deserted palace. An indisposition, feigned or real, had confined Antonina to her apartment; and she walked disdainfully silent in the adjacent portico, while Belisarius threw himself on his bed, and expected, in an agony of grief and terror, the death which he had so often braved under the walls of Rome. Long after sunset a messenger was announced from the empress he opened with anxious curiosity the letter which contained the sentence of his fate. "You cannot be ignorant how much

VOL. V.

M

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you have deserved my displeasure. I am not insensible of the "services of Antonina. To her merits and intercession I have "granted your life, and permit you to retain a part of your treasures, which might be justly forfeited to the state. Let your gra“titude where it is due be displayed, not in words, but in your future "behaviour." I know not how to believe or to relate the transports with which the hero is said to have received this ignominious pardon. He fell prostrate before his wife, he kissed the feet of his saviour, and he devoutly promised to live the grateful and submissive slave of Antonina. A fine of one hundred and twenty thousand pounds sterling was levied on the fortunes of Belisarius; and with the office of count, or master of the royal stables, he accepted the conduct of the Italian war. At his departure from Constantinople, his friends, and even the public, were persuaded that as soon as he regained his freedom he would renounce his dissimulation; and that his wife, Theodora, and perhaps the emperor himself, would be sacrificed to the just revenge of a virtuous rebel. Their hopes were deceived; and the unconquerable patience and loyalty of Belisarius appear either below or above the character of a MAN.117

117 The continuator of the Chronicle of Marcellinus gives, in a few decent words, the substance of the Anecdotes: Belisarius de Oriente evocatus, in offensam pericu. lumque incurrens grave, et invidiæ subjacens rursus remittitur in Italiam (p. 54).

CHAPTER XLII.

STATE OF THE BARBARIC WORLD. ESTABLISHMENT OF THE LOMBARDS ON THE DANUBE. TRIBES AND INROADS OF THE SCLAVONIANS. ORIGIN, EMPIRE,

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AND EMBASSIES OF THE TURKS. THE FLIGHT OF THE AVARS. · - CHOSROES I., OR NUSHIRVAN, KING OF PERSIA. - HIS PROSPEROUS REIGN AND WARS WITH THE ROMANS. - THE COLCHIAN OR LAZIC WAR. - THE ETHIOPIANS.

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Weakness

pire of

A.D. 527-565.

OUR estimate of personal merit is relative to the common faculties of mankind. The aspiring efforts of genius or virtue, either in active or speculative life, are measured not so much by of the emtheir real elevation as by the height to which they ascend Justinian, above the level of their age or country; and the same stature which in a people of giants would pass unnoticed, must appear conspicuous in a race of pigmies. Leonidas and his three hundred companions devoted their lives at Thermopylæ; but the education of the infant, the boy, and the man, had prepared and almost ensured this memorable sacrifice; and each Spartan would approve, rather than admire, an act of duty, of which himself and eight thousand of his fellow-citizens were equally capable.' The great Pompey might inscribe on his trophies that he had defeated in battle two millions of enemies, and reduced fifteen hundred cities from the lake Mæotis to the Red Sea ; but the fortune of Rome flew before his eagles; the nations were oppressed by their own fears; and the invincible legions which he commanded had been formed by the habits of conquest and the discipline of ages. In this view the character of Belisarius may be deservedly placed above the heroes of the ancient republics. His imperfections flowed from the contagion of the times; his virtues were his own, the free gift of nature or reflection; he raised himself without a master or a rival; and so inadequate were the arms committed to his hand, that his sole advantage was derived from the pride and presumption of his adversaries. Under his command, the subjects of Justinian often deserved to be called Romans; but the unwarlike appellation of Greeks was imposed as a term of reproach by the

2

It will be a pleasure, not a task, to read Herodotus (1. vii. c. 104, 134, p. 550, 615). The conversation of Xerxes and Demaratus at Thermopyla is one of the most interesting and moral scenes in history. It was the torture of the royal Spartan to behold, with anguish and remorse, the virtue of his country.

2 See this proud inscription in Pliny (Hist. Natur. vii. 27). Few men have more exquisitely tasted of glory and disgrace; nor could Juvenal (Satir. x.) produce a more striking example of the vicissitudes of fortune, and the vanity of human wishes.

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