which he had no kind of capacity or understanding. Would any one, he thought, govern better? To govern, to be emperor, what could it mean but the gratification of every desire, and the punishment of your enemies? Would Heraclius govern better?
At least Heraclius understood something of the duties and responsibilities of an absolute monarch. Of all the emperors he was the one most loved by the people of Constantinople. And it seems hardly credible that he should have retained their affections during the calamities and disasters of the first eight years of his reign. Rather may we believe that he was employing those years in preparing for the stupendous effort which he made at the end of that period. The difficulties before him were very great. The treasury was empty, the civil administration disorganized, the agricultural classes ruined, the soldiers actually deserting their standards to become monks, and the citizens of his capital more and more averse to the dangers and hardships of military life. There was but one flourishing portion of the vast empire, the province of Africa. And so greatly did Heraclius feel the danger of Constantinople, that he proposed to transfer the seat of government to Carthage. The patriarch and the people, however, assembled in the church of St. Sophia, and forced him to swear that he would abandon the idea. What would have become of Constantinople had the project been carried into effect? The immediate result would have been the dispersion of the thousands of idle dependants of the court, and recipients of the daily dole of imperial bread.
