96 CHRISTIAN GREECE AND LIVING GREEK. tures to which supposed witches were subjected even in our own country. The most deplorable epoch in the history of the Byzantine Empire, the period in which as- sassination and mutilation most abounded, was that in which it was exposed to the influence of the crusaders and thus brought in contact with Western Europe. During the twenty years be- tween II 83 to 1204, six emperors occupied the shaky throne of the East ; all of them were de- posed, two of them were blinded, and all were put to death, except Isaac IT., who anticipated the executioner by dying in prison. No nation can boast of an immaculate history. The French kingdom, the unity of the Catholic Church of the Middle Ages, and Protestantism have been established through all sorts of crimes and errors. A great man even is constituted by his faults as much as by his good qualities. The roughness, the harsh ways of Napoleon formed to some extent his strength. Had he been well trained, polite, modest, he would not have suc- ceeded ; he would have been no more powerful than we are. If we are to judge the Byzantine court by its fruits, we shall see that it was not, as some writers maintain, the abode of frivolity and
