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 THE BYZANTINES. 99 time combined to cast obscurity over the renown of some, but the impartiality of more modern writers is at length beginning to do justice to their memory. It is not to the throne alone that we must look in order to find the great names of Byzantine history. Through the whole course of the em- pire's existence, there were never lacking emi- nent men who preserved the best ^traditions of the classical ages. In every period there arose illustrious soldiers, able statesmen, good and saintly ecclesiastics, and men of learning to whom the Greek nation owes at least the almost unique advantage of possessing, in its own lan- guage, its own annals for an unbroken period of more than twenty centuries. From the very foundation of Constantinople, with the afflux of more and more Greeks to this new capital, a most important factor was at work to complete its character, namely, the influence of the Christian Church. The conversion of Constantine the Great and his house to the new world religion promoted the Christian cause to a high degree. The development of the Greek nation under the in- fluence of Christianity is highly interesting. The world language of the East, the elegant Ian-