CHAPTER XVIII.

THE IMMEDIATE SUCCESSORS OF JULIAN.

Anecdote.――Accession of Jovian.――His Character.――Christianity reinstated.――Death of Jovian.――Recall of Athanasius.――Wide Condemnation of Arianism.――Heroism of Jovian.――Valentinian and Valens.――Valentinian enthroned.――Valens in the East.――Barbarian Irruptions.――Reign of Theodosius.――Aspect of the Barbarians. ――Rome captured by Alaric.――Character of Alaric.――His Death and Burial.――Remarkable Statement of Adolphus.――Attila the Hun.――Valentinian III.――Acadius.――Eloquence of Chrysostom.――His Banishment and Death.――Rise of Monasticism.

♦IN reference to the death of Julian, an anecdote is related which has been deemed sufficiently authentic to be quoted in most ecclesiastical histories. At the very hour when Julian was dying in Mesopotamia, a pagan scorner, a thousand miles distant, in Antioch, banteringly inquired of a Christian, alluding to Jesus Christ, “What do you think the carpenter’s son is doing now?”

The Christian, as if prophetically witnessing the dying scene upon the Tigris, solemnly replied, “Jesus the Son of God, whom you scoffingly call the carpenter’s son, is just now making a coffin.”

After a few days, the tidings of Julian’s death reached Antioch. The coincidence produced a powerful impression, and was regarded as a supernatural revelation. The death of Julian filled the hearts of pagans with dismay, and elated the Christians with gratitude and hope. The remains of Julian were hastily embalmed, to be transported to the shores of the Mediterranean; and his army, having been utterly routed, commenced a precipitate retreat. Famine devoured them; pestilence consumed them; the arrows and javelins of their triumphant, pursuing assailants strewed with gory corpses the path along which they fled. In the midst of this din of arms and these scenes of dismay, a few voices nominated Jovian, an officer of the imperial guard, as emperor.

Jovian was not merely nominally a Christian, but probably in heart a true disciple of Jesus Christ. He was a man alike majestic in character and stature. When thus nominated to assume the supreme command, he said sadly,――

“I cannot command idolaters. I am a Christian. The displeasure of God is even now falling upon us as an army of his enemies.”

When troubles come, nearly all men are disposed to look to God for aid. The whole army was at that time in imminent peril of annihilation from famine, pestilence, and the sword. The officers in a body gathered around Jovian, and earnestly entreated him to accept the crown.

“We will all,” they said, “be Christians. The reign of idolatry has been too short to efface the teachings of the good Constantine. Lead us, and we will return to the worship of the true God.”

This noble young man was but thirty-two years of age. He had already given proof of remarkable courage, not only upon the field of battle, but in braving the wrath of Julian by refusing to bow down to idols. Jovian, having accepted the perilous office of emperor, soon succeeded in entering into a treaty of peace with the Persians, and in thus extricating the army from otherwise inevitable ruin.

It is refreshing to a spirit weary of the corruptions of mankind to contemplate the sincerity and honesty with which this extraordinary man conducted the most important affairs. For seven months the army was on its march, of fifteen hundred miles; from the Euphrates to Antioch. Jovian maintained the principles of true toleration: all men were allowed to worship as they pleased. The disastrous career of Julian had led to a general distrust of the heathen gods; and the moral influence of a Christian emperor, operating in a thousand ways, increased the disposition of the soldiers to abandon the idols, and to return to Christianity. Paganism had met with but a transient revival. Now, like a hideous dream of the night, it was passing away, to be revived no more forever. The sign of the cross, which Julian had effaced, was replaced upon the Roman banners.

The Arian controversy continued to agitate the Church. Arius had declared the Son to be, not the equal of the Father, but the first-born and highest in rank of all created beings. The Council of Nice, with almost perfect unanimity, had declared the doctrine of Arius to be new, unscriptural, and a dangerous heresy. Jovian adhered to the ancient faith as pronounced by the Council of Nice. He recalled the bishops who had been banished by Julian, and restored the church property which had been confiscated.

It will be remembered that Athanasius, the renowned Bishop of Alexandria, had been driven into exile by Julian, because, through his preaching, some Grecian ladies of noble birth had been converted and baptized. Jovian recalled the faithful Christian pastor by the following letter, which he published to the world:――

“To the most religious friend of God, Athanasius. As we admire beyond expression the sanctity of your life, in which shine forth marks of resemblance to the God of the universe, and your zeal for Jesus Christ our Saviour, we take you, venerable bishop, under our protection. You deserve it by the courage you have shown in the most painful labors and cruel persecutions. Return to the churches; feed the people of God; offer prayers for us; for we are persuaded that God will bestow upon us, and upon our fellow-Christians, his signal favors, if you afford us the assistance of your prayers.”

The city of Alexandria, in Egypt, had been one of the strongholds of paganism. The pagan priests had represented to Julian that the presence of Athanasius in Alexandria rendered all their magic arts unavailing; that his preaching was causing the temples of the gods to be abandoned in the city and throughout all Egypt; and that, unless he were silenced, there would soon be left no worshippers of the gods. Athanasius, upon his restoration to his church in Alexandria, wrote a letter of thanks to Jovian, in which he says,――

“Be it known to you, emperor, beloved of God, that the doctrine established by the Council of Nice is preached in all the churches,――in those of Spain, of Britain, of Gaul; in all those of Italy, of Campania, of Dalmatia, of Mysia, of Macedonia, and of all Greece; in all those of Africa, of Sardinia, of Cyprus, of Crete, of Pamphylia, of Lycia, of Isauria; in all those of Egypt, of Libya, of Pontus, of Cappadocia, and of the neighboring countries; and those of the East, excepting a few there who follow the opinions of Arius. We know the faith of the churches by the effects produced; and we have received letters from them. The small number of those who are hostile to this faith is scarcely worthy of consideration in opposition to the sentiment of the entire Christian world.”[186]

This is very striking testimony to the almost universal assent of the Church in that day to the equality of the Son with the Father. “The Council of Nice,” writes Athanasius, “has not said merely that the Son is like the Father, or like God, but that he _is God_, and the _true God_. It says that he is consubstantial with the Father. And the bishops have not separated the Holy Spirit as a stranger from the Father and the Son; but they have glorified him with the Father and the Son, because the Holy Trinity has but one and the same divinity.”[187]

Gregory, Bishop of Nazianzen, wrote a very interesting circular letter to all Christians, giving them truly Christian counsel as to the course they should pursue in the new and almost miraculous change in their affairs.

“Let us show our gratitude to God,” he writes, “by purity of soul, by inward peace, by holy thoughts, and a spiritual life. Let us not avenge ourselves upon the pagans, but win them by our gentleness and love. Let him who has suffered most from the pagans refer them to the judgment of God. Let us not think of confiscating their goods, of dragging them before the tribunals, or of inflicting upon them any of the woes which they have inflicted upon us. Let us render them more humane, if it be possible, by our example.”[188]

The army had passed by Tarsus, the birthplace of Paul, where the remains of Julian were consigned to the tomb, and had reached the village of Dadastane, on the confines of Galatia and Bithynia, when Jovian died, in the night of the 17th of February, 364, within about three hundred miles of Constantinople. He was found one morning dead in his bed; having been accidentally stifled, it is supposed, by the fumes of charcoal in his apartment. His broken-hearted wife, who was hastening to greet her husband, met his remains on the road. With the anguish and tears of widowhood, bitter then as now, she accompanied them to the tomb in Constantinople. He was but thirty-three years of age, and had reigned but eight months. The main body of the army, being a little in advance, had then reached Nice, the capital of Bithynia. As soon as the soldiers heard of the death of Jovian, they unanimously elected Valentinian, who was captain of the imperial guard, his successor. Valentinian was also a Christian. The following anecdote illustrates the nobility of his character:――

It was the custom of Julian on special occasions to distribute gifts to those who had merited them. The apostate emperor, who would stoop to every kind of trickery to lure the soldiers, even unconsciously, to pay homage to the idol gods, on one of these occasions, when about to bestow rewards, had an altar erected before him, upon which were placed glowing coals. By the side of the altar stood a table covered with frankincense.

As a part of the ceremony, each one who was to receive an imperial gift was to sprinkle a little of the incense upon the coals, from which a fragrant cloud would gracefully arise. It was a stratagem to lead the Christians to offer incense to the gods, without being conscious that they were doing so. Julian thus endeavored to entrap three of his leading Christian generals,――Jovian (who became his successor), Valentinian, and Valens.

After burning the frankincense, and receiving the imperial gift, Valentinian returned to his tent. As he sat down to partake of some refreshments, he, according to his custom, asked a blessing in the name of Jesus Christ. A pagan companion, observing this, exclaimed, with real or affected astonishment,――

“How is this? Do you invoke the name of Christ after having publicly renounced him?”

“What do you mean?” inquired Valentinian, alarmed and surprised.

“I mean,” was the reply, “that you have just offered incense to the gods upon one of their altars.”

Valentinian immediately rose, and, hastening to the presence of the emperor, laid down at his feet the precious gifts he had received, saying,――

“Sire, I am a Christian. I wish all the world to know it. I have not intentionally renounced my Saviour, Jesus Christ. If my hand has erred, my heart has not followed it: the emperor has deceived me. I renounce the act of impiety, and am ready to make expiation with my blood.”

Jovian, and Valentinian’s brother Valens, did the same with their gifts. The emperor was exasperated. In the first impulse of his rage, he ordered them to be led immediately to execution. As the executioner stood ready with his heavy sword to sever their heads from their bodies, and the victims were upon their knees to receive the death-blow, a herald hastily approached, and arrested the execution. The emperor, upon reflection, deemed it not wise for such an offence to consign to death three of the best and most influential officers in his army.

Another characteristic anecdote is related of Valentinian, worthy of record. He was commander of the imperial guard. As such, it was necessary for him, upon all important occasions, to be at the side of the emperor. At one time, when Julian, in performance of some rites of the pagan religion, was entering the Temple of the Goddess of Fortune, dancing in religious homage, two priests stood, one on each side of the vestibule, to sprinkle the emperor with holy-water. This was a pagan rite which the Papal Church has transferred from the temples of idolatry to the sanctuaries of Christ.

A drop of this water fell upon the dress of Valentinian. Turning to one of the priests, he said, “You have sullied my garments.” Immediately he tore from his robe the portion upon which the water consecrated to idols had fallen.

The emperor was so irritated, that for a time he banished him from his command. It is said that Julian would not put him to death, because, with strange inconsistency, he was unwilling that he should wear the crown of martyrdom. Such was the character of the Christian Valentinian, upon whose shoulders the robes of imperial purple were now placed.

Valentinian seems to have proved himself, in all respects, worthy of his high position. He was majestic in stature, commanding in intellect, and of irreproachable purity of morals. He was crowned by the army at Nice, in Bithynia; his brother Valens receiving from him the appointment of assistant emperor. The Eastern empire, from the Danube to the confines of Persia, was assigned to Valens, with Constantinople for his capital. Valentinian took charge of the Western empire, selecting the city of Milan for his metropolis.

Still the barbarian hordes from all directions were crowding upon the crumbling Roman empire. While Valentinian was struggling against their locust legions in the West, Valens was making an equally desperate and equally unavailing struggle against them in the East. The Huns came howling on from the wilds of Tartary, fierce as the wolves, and in numbers which no man could count. They could not be resisted. In an impetuous flood they surged along, till all the plains of Greece were swept by the inundation. Even the Goths fled in terror before these shaggy and merciless warriors.

Valens entered into an alliance with the Goths, hoping by their aid to resist the still more dreaded Huns. He allowed his barbarian allies to take possession of all the waste lands of Thrace. Availing themselves of this advantageous base of operations, the treacherous Goths ravaged the whole country to the shores of the Adriatic, menacing even Italy with their arms. They laid siege to both the cities of Adrianople and Constantinople. Terror reigned everywhere. Tears and blood, through man’s demoniac ferocity, deluged this whole world. In an awful battle before the walls of Adrianople, the army of Valens was cut to pieces. Valens himself perished upon the bloody field. How little can we imagine, seated by our peaceful firesides, the dimensions of that wail of misery ascending from a whole army perishing beneath the sabres and the battle-axes of merciless barbarians! This is indeed a lost world. Surely history proves that man is a depraved animal. How happy might this world have been had man been the friend, instead of the foe, of his brother-man!

For twelve years Valentinian was engaged in almost an incessant battle. The Picts and Scots were rushing down upon Britain from the mountains of Caledonia. All along the Rhine and the Danube, tribes of uncouth names and habits were desolating, in plundering bands, every unprotected region. Worn down with care, toil, and sorrow, Valentinian fell a victim to a sudden attack of apoplexy in the year 375, in the fifty-fourth year of his age.

Valentinian had a son, Gratian, who, at the time of his father’s death, was but seventeen years old. He succeeded his father on the throne of the Western empire, without inheriting either his virtues or his energy. Retiring to Paris, the boy-emperor surrendered himself to voluptuous indulgence. Discontent created an insurrection, which was led by Maximus, Governor of Britain. Gratian, abandoned by his troops, fled to Lyons, where he was overtaken and slain.

A Christian general by the name of Theodosius had succeeded Valens in the East. Difficulties had arisen between Theodosius and Maximus. War ensued. Maximus was slain. Valentinian, a mere boy, younger brother of Gratian, was placed upon the throne of the Western empire. The poor child was almost immediately assassinated. Theodosius marched to the West to avenge his death, and assumed the government of the whole united empire of the East and of the West. But he was a sick man, and the hand of death was already upon him: in less than four months he breathed his last at Milan.

Theodosius was a zealous Christian: in character he was one of the purest of men, and was earnestly devoted to the welfare of his realms; but his reign was sullied by intolerance,――doubtless conscientious, but none the less bigoted. He issued severe edicts against those Christians who swerved from the established faith as enunciated by the Council of Nice. He unrelentingly demolished or closed all the temples of paganism. He instituted that office of inquisitors of the faith, which, revived in subsequent centuries, became the fruitful source of so much crime and woe.

It was indeed a dark day, in the year of our Lord 379, when Theodosius ascended the throne. There was no stable government anywhere, no protection from violence. The Roman power, which, oppressive as it had been, was far better than anarchy, was now but a crumbling ruin, which no human energy or skill could rebuild.

As we look back through the gloomy centuries upon these dim, tumultuous scenes, a new vision of appalling grandeur rises before the eye. Alaric――the world-renowned Alaric the Goth――appears in the arena at the head of his fierce legions. Like gaunt and famished beasts of prey, his savage hordes swept over Greece, entered Italy, and besieged Milan. These barbarians were a short, chunky, broad-shouldered race of men, of herculean strength. A contemporary writer thus describes their general aspect:――

“Their high cheek-bones, and small, twinkling eyes, gave them a savage and cruel expression, which was increased by their want of nose; for the only visible appearance of that organ consisted of two holes sunk in the square expanse of their faces.”

Onward, ever onward, rolled this flood of hideous and pitiless foes. While this inundation was sweeping along from the East, another similar flood came surging down from the North: the two torrents, blending, eddied around the walls of Rome. For six hundred years the city of Rome had not been insulted by the presence of a foreign foe.

Theodosius was the child of Christian parents. At the commencement of his reign, he was but nominally a Christian; that is, he was not a pagan, but had intellectually given his assent to the religion of Jesus. He had not, however, at that time, publicly united with the Church. The perils which were menacing the State, and a severe fit of sickness with which he was seized at Thessalonica, seem to have led him to feel the necessity of personal religion. The emperor sent for Ascole, the pastor of the church in Thessalonica, and, having ascertained that he cordially accepted the doctrines of the Council of Nice, received from him the rite of baptism, and thus enrolled himself among the disciples of Jesus. Notwithstanding the faults of the Christian Emperor Theodosius,――faults to be attributed to the times rather than to the individual,――history has pronounced him one of the purest and noblest monarchs who ever occupied a throne.

Upon the death of Theodosius at Milan, the empire was divided between his two sons: Arcadius was crowned in the East, Honorius in the West. The Eastern empire embraced Thrace, Greece, Asia Minor, Syria, and Egypt: the Western empire included Italy, Africa, Gaul, Spain, Britain, and the Danubian provinces. The Western empire was now much the weaker. Rome had ceased to be the metropolis, and enjoyed only the renown of its former greatness. Milan had become the new capital.

Alaric, with his fierce legions, after a short siege of Milan, was driven back. The timid Honorius was so alarmed by the invasion, that, with his court, he retired from Milan to Ravenna. Alaric, at the head of a hundred thousand men, contemptuously passing by Ravenna, commenced the siege of Rome. The walls surrounding the city still remained in their massive strength. Famine compelled the citizens to purchase a temporary peace at the price of the payment of a vast sum of money, and the surrender of many of the leading citizens as hostages.

When the delegation from the Roman senate, with the offer to surrender, was introduced to Alaric, the members of the delegation ventured to state rather menacingly, that, if Alaric refused them honorable terms, he would rouse against him an innumerable people animated by despair. Alaric replied with a scornful laugh,――

“The thicker the grass, the easier it is mown.”

He then assigned the only terms upon which he would retire. He demanded _all_ the gold and silver in the city, whether it were the property of the State or of individuals; then all the rich and precious movables; then all the slaves who had been captured from the barbarians.

“If such, O king! are your demands,” the ministers replied, “what do you intend to leave to us?”

“Your lives,” the conqueror haughtily replied. Still Alaric somewhat abated the rigor of these demands.

There is but little reliance to be placed in barbarian faith. Alaric and his fierce hordes were soon again encamped before the walls of the imperial city. There were forty thousand slaves (white slaves), the victims of Roman rapacity, within the walls. They conspired with the invaders. At midnight there was a servile insurrection: the gates were thrown open, and the clangor of rushing barbarians resounded through the streets.

It is not in the power of human imagination to conceive the horrors of a city sacked at midnight,――a city of more than a million of inhabitants, men, women, and children, at the mercy of a savage foe.[189] The slaves were glad of a chance to avenge the wrongs of ages. They were of the same race with their masters. The hour of vengeance had tolled. The Romans had thoroughly instructed them and their barbarian confederates in all the arts of cruelty and lust. God alone can comprehend the scenes which were enacted during that awful night. The most venerable and costly memorials of the past were surrendered to conflagration: large portions of the city were consumed.

For six days the Goths held the metropolis; then, reeling in intoxication, encumbered with spoil, and dragging after them their captives,――the young men to groom their horses; the maidens, daughters of Roman senators and nobles, to till their harems,――they rioted along the Appian Way, and surged over all Southern Italy, giving loose to every depraved desire.

It is thus that God punishes guilty nations. Though sentence against an evil work may not be speedily executed, the hour of recompense is sure to come. For four years the whole of the south of Italy was subject to the barbarians. Roman philosophers had long argued that it was right for the stronger nations to enslave the weaker. The Goths were now the stronger, and the Romans the weaker; and the Romans were compelled to drain to the dregs the cup which their own hands had mingled.

Men of senatorial dignity, and matrons of illustrious birth, became the menial servants of half-naked savages. These burly barbarians stretched their hairy limbs beneath the shade of palm-trees; and young men and maidens born in palaces washed their feet, and presented them Falernian wine in golden goblets.

While Alaric was thus ravaging Italy, the Emperor Honorius was ignominiously besieged behind the walls of Ravenna. The old Roman empire had so far crumbled away, that Italy alone remained even nominally subject to the emperor. Even large portions of Italy were in the hands of the foe. Persia, Egypt, Turkey, Germany, France, Spain, England, all overrun by barbarians, became the cradles of those monarchies which are flourishing or decaying in those regions at the present day.

Alaric the Goth was one of the most remarkable of men. His native ferocity was strangely mitigated by profound respect for Christianity. Many of the Gothic soldiers had also, at least nominally, adopted the Christian faith. When Rome was taken by storm, Alaric exhorted his soldiers to respect the churches as inviolable sanctuaries. A Goth burst into the house of an aged woman who had devoted herself to the service of the Church. Upon his demanding her gold and silver, she conducted him to a closet of massive plate.

“These,” said she, “are consecrated vessels belonging to the Church of St. Peter. If you touch them, the sacrilegious deed will remain upon your conscience.”

The barbarian was overawed, and sent a messenger to inform the king of the treasure he had discovered. Alaric sent an order that the sacred vessels should be immediately transported, under guard, to the church of the apostle.

“From the extremity, perhaps, of the Quirinal Hill to the distant quarters of the Vatican, a numerous detachment of Goths, marching in order of battle through the principal streets, protected with glittering arms the long train of their devout companions, who bore aloft on their heads the sacred vessels of gold and silver; and the martial shouts of the barbarians were mingled with the sound of religious psalmody.”[190]

Augustine, in his celebrated work entitled “The City of God,” refers with much gratification to this memorable interposition of God in behalf of his Church. Alaric died just as he was entering upon an expedition for the conquest of Syria, having been in possession of Italy for four years.

“The ferocious character of the barbarians,” writes Gibbon, “was displayed in the funeral of a hero whose valor and fortune they celebrated with mournful applause. By the labor of a captive multitude, they forcibly diverted the course of the Busentius, a small river that washes the walls of Consentia. The royal sepulchre, adorned with the splendid spoils and trophies of Rome, was constructed in the vacant bed. The waters were then returned to their natural channel; and the secret spot where the remains of Alaric had been deposited was forever concealed by the inhuman massacre of the prisoners who had been employed to execute the work.”

Adolphus, brother-in-law of Alaric, succeeded, by the vote of the Gothic army, to the supreme command. He was also a remarkable man. His intelligence and moral worth may be inferred from the following remarks which he made to a citizen of Narbonne. The conversation was related by this citizen to St. Jerome, in the presence of the historian Orosius.

“In the full confidence of valor and victory,” said Adolphus, “I once aspired to change the face of the universe; to obliterate the name of Rome; to erect on its ruins the dominion of the Goths; and to acquire, like Augustus, the immortal fame of the founder of a new empire. By repeated experiments, I was gradually convinced that laws are essentially necessary to maintain and regulate a well-constituted State, and that the fierce, intractable humor of the Goths was incapable of bearing the salutary yoke of laws and civil government. From that moment I proposed to myself a different object of glory and ambition; and it is now my sincere wish that the gratitude of future ages should acknowledge the merit of a stranger who employed the sword of the Goth, not to subvert, but to restore and maintain, the prosperity of the Roman empire.”

In accordance with these views, Adolphus opened negotiations with Honorius, the Roman emperor, who was besieged at Ravenna. He entered into an alliance with him to assist in driving out the barbarians who were on the other side of the Alps. He even sought and obtained in marriage Placidia, a Christian lady, the daughter of Theodosius, and sister of Honorius. This illustrious woman, whose adventurous life we cannot here record, had been highly educated at Constantinople. The bride was young and lovely: the bridegroom was also remarkable for dignity of bearing and manly beauty. Thus the daughter of the decaying house of Rome was wedded to the chieftain of a new dynasty just emerging into fame and power.

The nuptials were conducted with great splendor at Narbonne, in Gaul. Fifty beautiful boys in silken robes presented the bride each two vases,――one filled with golden coin, and the other with precious gems. Even these treasures formed but a very inconsiderable portion of the gifts which were lavished upon Placidia. Adolphus, assuming the character of a Roman general, marched from Italy into Gaul. Driving out the barbarians there, he took possession of the whole country, from the ocean to the Mediterranean. Here Adolphus ere long died, and Placidia returned to her brother Honorius at Ravenna. After an inglorious reign of twenty-eight years, the timid and imbecile Honorius died at Ravenna. His secretary, John, seized the falling sceptre. Another party advocated the claims of the son of the emperor’s widowed sister Placidia, a child of but six years. John was beheaded. The boy, as Valentinian III., was declared emperor. Placidia was appointed regent.

Attila the Hun, whose devastations have procured for him the designation of “the Scourge of God,” now appears prominent upon the scene. At the head of half a million of men, he swept over Gaul and Italy, creating misery which no tongue can adequately tell: it would seem that humanity could scarcely have survived such billows of unutterable woe. All Venetia was ravaged with unsparing slaughter. A portion of the wretched inhabitants, flying in terror before Attila, escaped to a number of marshy islands, but a few feet above the water, at the extremity of the Adriatic Sea. Here they laid the foundations of Venice, the “Queen of the Adriatic,”――that city of the sea, which subsequently almost outvied Rome in opulence, power, and splendor, and whose magnificence, even in decay, attracts tourists from all parts of the world. “The grass never grows,” said this demoniac warrior, “where my horse has once placed his hoof.”

Valentinian III., having attained early manhood, developed an exceedingly profligate character. The Eastern and Western empires were now permanently divided, never again to be united. Arcadius was emperor at Constantinople. Kings generally contrive to live in splendor, whatever may be the poverty of their subjects. St. Chrysostom, in one of his sermons, speaks reproachfully of the splendor in which Arcadius indulged.

“The emperor,” says he, “wears on his head either a diadem or a crown of gold, decorated with precious stones of inestimable value. These ornaments and his purple garments are reserved for his sacred person alone. His robes of silk are embroidered with the figures of golden dragons. His throne is of massive gold. Whenever he appears in public, he is surrounded by his courtiers, his guards, and his attendants. Their spears, their shields, their cuirasses, the bridles and trappings of their horses, have either the substance or the appearance of gold.

“The two mules that draw the chariot of the monarch are perfectly white, and shining all over with gold. The chariot, itself of pure and solid gold, attracts the admiration of the spectators, who contemplate the purple curtains, the snowy carpet, the size of the precious stones, and the resplendent plates of gold, which glitter as they are agitated by the motion of the carriage.”

St. Chrysostom, from whose works the above extracts are taken, was one of the most distinguished ecclesiastics and preachers of that day. He had been pastor of the church in Antioch, where, in substitution of his true name of John, he had by his eloquence acquired the epithet of Chrysostom, or “the Golden Mouth.” His renown secured for him the unanimous call of the court, the clergy, and the people, to the archbishopric of Constantinople.

Chrysostom was of noble birth, of ardent piety, highly educated, and was one of the most attractive and powerful of pulpit orators. He had been educated for the law. Becoming a Christian, he devoted himself to the gospel ministry. He lived humbly, devoting the revenues of the bishopric to objects of benevolence. His eloquent discourses, couched in copious and elegant language, and enlivened by an inexhaustible fund of illustrations, drew crowds even from the theatre and the circus. Nearly a thousand of his sermons are preserved. They witness to his “happy art of engaging the passions in the service of virtue, and of exposing the folly as well as the turpitude of vice almost with the truth and spirit of dramatic representation.”[191]

From the pulpit of St. Sophia in Constantinople, Chrysostom, with the boldness of one of the ancient prophets, thundered forth his anathemas against the corruptions of the times. He spared neither the court nor the people. A conspiracy was formed against him, in which some of the unworthy clergy, irritated by his denunciations, united. Theophilus, Archbishop of Alexandria, led the clerical party. Eudoxia, the dissolute wife of the Emperor Arcadius, exasperated by the rumor that the audacious preacher had reviled her under the name of Jezebel, arrayed the court influence against him. He was finally banished to the extreme border of the Euxine or Black Sea. The infuriate queen doomed the Christian bishop to exile to Cucusus, a dreary and far-distant town among the defiles of the Caucasian Mountains.

“A secret hope was entertained,” writes Gibbon, “that the archbishop might perish in a difficult and dangerous march of seventy days, in the heat of summer, through the provinces of Asia Minor, where he was continually threatened by the hostile attacks of the Isaurians. Yet Chrysostom arrived in safety at the place of his confinement; and the three years which he spent at Cucusus were the last and most glorious of his life.

“His character was consecrated by absence and persecution. The faults of his administration were no longer remembered: every tongue repeated the praises of his genius and virtue; and the respectful attention of the Christian world was fixed on a desert spot among the mountains of Taurus.

“From that solitude, the archbishop, whose active mind was invigorated by misfortunes, maintained a strict and frequent correspondence with the most distant provinces; exhorted the separate congregation of his faithful adherents to persevere in their allegiance; extended his pastoral care to the missions of Persia and Scythia; negotiated, by his ambassadors, with the Roman pontiff and the Emperor Honorius; and boldly appealed from a partial synod to the supreme tribunal of a free and general council. The mind of the illustrious exile was still independent; but his captive body was exposed to all the revenge of his oppressors, who continued to abuse the name and authority of Arcadius.

“An order was despatched for the instant removal of Chrysostom to the extreme Desert of Pityus. His guard so faithfully obeyed their cruel instructions, that, before he reached the sea-coast of the Euxine, he expired at Comana, in Pontus, in the sixty-third year of his age.”[192]

Exhausted by the long journey on foot, with his head uncovered in the burning heat of the sun, he joyfully welcomed the approach of death. Clothing himself in white robes, as in a bridal garment, he partook of the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper; offered a fervent prayer, which he closed with the customary words, “Praise be to God for all things!” and sweetly fell asleep in Jesus. His remains were first entombed in the chapel of the martyr St. Basil. After slumbering there thirty years, they were transported, with every demonstration of respect, to Constantinople. The Emperor Theodosius, then upon the throne, advanced as far as Chalcedon to meet them. Falling prostrate upon the coffin, he implored, in the name of his guilty parents Arcadius and Eudoxia, the forgiveness of the wrongs which the Christian bishop had received at their hands. At a later period, the remains of Chrysostom were removed to the Vatican, at Rome, where they now repose.

Over two hundred of the letters which Chrysostom wrote during his exile are still extant. They all breathe a remarkable spirit of cheerful trust in the promise that “all things work together for good to them that love God.”[193]

The terrible persecutions to which the Christians had been exposed had driven many into the wilderness, where they sought refuge amidst rocks and caves. The fearful social corruptions of the times also led some to flee from temptations too strong for flesh and blood to bear. The hut of the hermit and the cell of the monk gradually expanded into the massive and battlemented monastery, where considerable communities took refuge. Though these institutions gradually degenerated, as almost every thing human does, they were in their origin a necessity. Chrysostom, in the earlier periods of his Christian life, had resided for some time with the anchorites who had sought a retreat in the mountains near Antioch.

One can scarcely conceive of a more melancholy spectacle of national wretchedness than Italy now exhibited. Attila the Hun had trampled beneath the feet of his impetuous legions nearly all opposition. This extraordinary man is described by his contemporaries as possessing the coarse features of a modern Calmuck. His head was large and bushy, with an abundance of hair; his complexion was swarthy; with deep-seated eyes, a flat nose, and a few straggling hairs for a beard. Broad shoulders, and a short, stout body, gave indication of immense muscular strength. His bearing was excessively haughty; and he had the habit of wildly rolling his eyes, as if he wished to enjoy the terror which he could thus inspire.