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I. death of Anastasius and the accession of the rough soldier Justin ( 518) put an end to the Monophysite prosperity, and with the withdrawal of the Henoticon also brought the separation from communion with Rome to an end. Except in Egypt, which remained Monophysite, the work of reunion was comparatively easy. The result was a triumph for the papacy and a strengthening of the power of Rome in the Church.

In April 527 Justin's nephew, Justinian, was associated in the government of the empire, and in August he became sole emperor by the death of his uncle. He was a man of simple, frugal habits, most industrious, and very decided in his adhesion to the decision of Chalcedon—proving his orthodoxy in the usual way—by persecuting the heterodox. One of the most important of Justinian's actions marks a further stage in the suppression of paganism. In the year 531 he closed the schools of philosophy at Athens, where the Neo-Platonists, the most determined enemies of Christianity, were teaching. This was the end of the faded glory of ancient Athenian culture. The same year Justinian enacted that all pagans and heretics should be excluded from civil and military offices. According to Procopius, one result of his drastic measures was that some of the ancient