Page:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire vol 5 (1897).djvu/223

 OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE 201 their merit 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 aifected to blame the cold and stately resei've 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 sanguinary commands ; and, if any feelings of humanity were left, he was reduced, with the return of sense, to approve the salutary disobedience of his servants. But the most extraordinary feature in the character of Michael is the pi'ofane 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 ignoi*ant folly of a youth who insulted the objects of public veneration. A buf- foon of the court was invested in the robes of the patriarch ; his twelve metropolitans, 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 impious spectacles con- cealed 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 streets, encountered the true patriarch at the head of his clergy, and by their licentious 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 con- duct, the son of Theophilus became as contemptible as he was odious ; every citizen was impatient for the deliverance of his country ; and even the favourites of the moment were appre- hensive that a caprice might snatch away what a caprice had bestowed. In the thirtieth year of his age, and in the hour of intoxication and sleep, Michael the Third was murdered in his chamber l)y the founder of a new dynasty, whom the emperor had raised to an equality of rank and power. The genealogy of Basil the Macedonian (if it be not the };k,-i i. the spurious offspring of pride and flattery) exhibits a genuine A.-o^sei, picture of the revolution of the most illustrious families. The ^^ '