Page:Secret History of the Court of the Emperor Justinian 1674.djvu/81

 eat some time in two days and two nights, espe­cially in Easter week, in which he fasted two whole days, without any thing but Water, and wilde Grapes; and without steeping above an hour, imploying the rest of his time in perpe­tual walking. There is no doubt, but if he had used his faculties to do good, the very parts wherewith Nature had endued him, would have raised the Empire to the highest degree of grandeur and felicity. But he perverted them quite, and imployed them wholly to the de­struction of his subjects, and the ruine of their estates, applying all his watchings, and dili­gences, and labor, to augment the misery and desolation of his people, which was the more easie for him to compass, by how much his wit and invention was mighty quick in forging of crimes, and as prompt in punishing them when he had done: So that the good qualities, both in his body and mind, were of no use, but to make the people more miserable. At his first advancement, he had nothing of the Majesty of an Emperor; on the contrary, he framed himself more to the habit, discourse, and man­ner of the Barbarians. When he was to return an answer in writing, he did not commit it to the Questor, as formerly was the way; but he delivered it himself by word of mouth, though he spake his own language, as ill as a stranger. Afterward the people met in the Court of Justice with several impeachments, but no Judge was to be found to take cognizance of them. Secretaries of State were of the ­est