Page:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire vol 6 (1897).djvu/520

 498 THE DECLINE AND FALL persecuted ; and his safety was threatened both in the camp and city. In his absence on the pubhc service, he was accused of treason ; proscribed as an enemy of the church and state ; and delivered, with all his adherents, to the sword of justice, the vengeance of the people, and the power of the devil : his for- tunes were confiscated ; his aged mother was cast into prison ; all his past services were buried in oblivion ; and he was driven by injustice to perpetrate the crime of which he was accused. '^'^ From the review of his preceding conduct, Cantacuzene appears to have been guiltless of any treasonable designs ; and the only suspicion of his innocence must arise from the vehemence of his protestations, and the sublime purity which he ascribes to his own virtue. While the empress and the patriarch still affected the appearance of harmony, he repeatedly solicited the per- mission of retiring to a private, and even a monastic, life. After he had been declared a public enemy, it was his fervent wish to throw himself at the feet of the young emperor, and to receive without a murmur the stroke of the executioner : it was not without reluctance that he listened to the voice of reason, which inculcated the sacred duty of saving his family and friends, and proved that he could only save them by drawing the sword and assuming the Imperial title. Cantacuzene In the strong city of Demotica, his peculiar domain, the em- pire*' ad. peror John Cautacuzenus was invested with the purple buskins ; his right leg was clothed by his noble kinsmen, the left by the Latin chiefs, on whom he conferred the order of knighthood. But even in this act of revolt he was still studious of loyalty ; and the titles of John Palaeologus and Anne of Savoy were proclaimed before his own name and that of his wife Irene. Such vain ceremony is a thin disguise of rebellion, nor are there perhaps any personal wrongs that can authorise a subject to take arms against his sovereign ; but the want of preparation and success may con- firm the assurance of the usurper that this decisive step was the effect of necessity rather than of choice. Constantinople adhered to the young emperor ; the king of Bulgaria was invited to the relief of Hadrianople ; the principal cities of Thrace and Mace- donia, after some hesitation, renounced their obedience to the great domestic ; and the leaders of the troops and provinces were induced, by their private interest, to prefer the loose do- '^^ Nic. Gregoras (1. xii. c. 5) confesses the innocence and virtues of Cantacu- zenus, the guilt and flagitious vices of Apocaucus ; nor does he dissemble the motive of his personal and religious enmity to the former ; viv 6e Sta KaKiav aKKiav, 1341, Oct. 26