Then came the reaction, originated on other grounds. Michael was quite incompetent to sustain the war with the Bulgarians, and in order to save the empire the soldiers elected one of their generals, Leo the Armenian, as its head (a.d. 813), sending Michael like his predecessor into a monastery. The new emperor proved his strength at once by refusing the patriarch's demand that he should follow his predecessor's example and sign a declaration of orthodoxy—which, under the circumstances, meant image worship. In course of time he brought about an effective reorganisation of civil government, and throughout his reign he maintained good order and the regular administration of justice in the law courts. Thus in the second iconoclastic period, as in the first, we see under the reforming emperors both good government and respectable morals. Leo appears to have been in sympathy with Iconoclasm from the first, although as a calm, statesman-like ruler, he desired to act with moderation and to maintain the peace of the Church. But he was urged to take stronger measures against the image worshippers by a remarkable man known as John the Grammarian.
We have now reached the period of Alfred and Alcuin in the West, when a temporary revival of letters seemed to promise an end to the intellectual slumber that was settling down over Europe—a promise doomed to miserable disappointment. At this very time in the Eastern Church we have John the Grammarian, a scholar, versed in the science of his day, which he appears to have acquired from the Arabians. Of course he was accused of magic by the orthodox. But John was an abbot and of an illustrious family. With him were associated other learned men who also repudiated the superstition of image worship. The reformers were numerically weak; but morally and intellectually they were worthy of respect—a small body of clear-sighted, cultivated men, who strove in vain to stem the tide of the popular religion, which consisted of materialistic ideas and sensuous ceremonies. These scholars persuaded Leo to have the pictures removed from the churches which were in
