Chap. XL] OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE 233 was permanent and absolute; she preserved, by art or merit, the affections of Justinian ; and their seeming dissensions were always fatal to the courtiers who believed them to be sincere. Perhaps her health had been impaired by the licentiousness of her youth ; but it was always delicate, and she was directed by her physicians to use the Pythian warm baths. In this journey, the empress was followed by the praetorian praefect, the great treasurer, several counts and patricians, and a splendid train of four thousand attendants ; the highways were repaired at her approach ; a palace was erected for her recep- tion; and, as she passed through Bithynia, she distributed liberal alms to the churches, the monasteries, and the hospitals, that they might implore heaven for the restoration of her health. 38 At length, in the twenty-fourth year of her marriage, The death and the twenty-second of her reign, she was consumed by adora. 6 A.D. cancer ; 39 and the irreparable loss was deplored by her husband, who, in the room of a theatrical prostitute, might have selected the purest and most noble virgin of the East. 40 II. A material difference may be observed in the games of The antiquity : the most eminent of the Greeks were actors, the of the • circus Komans were merely spectators. The Olympic stadium was open to wealth, merit, and ambition ; and, if the candidates could depend on their personal skill and activity, they might pursue the footsteps of Diomede and Menelaus, and conduct their own horses in the rapid career. 41 Ten, twenty, forty, chariots were allowed to start at the same instant ; a crown of leaves was the reward of the victor ; and his fame, with that of his family and country, was chaunted in lyric strains more 38 See John Malala, torn. ii. p. 174 [441]. Theophanes, p. 158. Procopius, de Aedific. 1. v. c. 3. 39 Theodora Chalcedonensis synodi inimica canceris plaga toto corpore [leg. corpore toto] perfusa vitam prodigiose finivit (Victor. Tununensis in Chron. [ad a.d. 549]). On such occasions, an orthodox mind is steeled against pity. Alemannus (p. 12, 13) understands the fi/o-e/Soise/coi^eTj of Theophanes as civil language, which does not imply either piety or repentance ; yet two years after her death St. Theodora is celebrated by Paul Silentiarius (in Proem, v. 58-62). 40 As she persecuted the popes, and rejected a council, Baronius exhausts the names of Eve, Dalila, Herodias, &c. ; after which he has recourse to his infernal dictionary : civis inferni — alumna dsemonum — satanico agitata spiritu — oestro per- cita diabolico, &c. &g. (a.d. 548, No. 24). 41 Read and feel the xxiiid book of the Iliad, a living picture of manners, passions, and the whole form and spirit of the chariot race. West's Dissertation on the Olympio Games (sect, xii.-xvii.) affords much curious and authentic informa- tion.
