Pogonatus had his attention directed to it, with the result that lie sent an imperial officer named Simeon to the spot to suppress the movement. Constantine Silvanus and many of his followers were arrested. They refused to lecant, and their faitliful testimony was so striking that it won over Simeon to their side, and he was to be seen later going about as a teacher in the mission under the Pauline name of Silas. Meanwhile Silvanus had been stoned to death, and in the year 690 Simeon and several others among the Paulicians were killed by order of the cruel Emperor Justinian ii.
During the next century divisions broke out among the Paulicians. For a time Paul the Armenian—to whose name some trace the title of the sect—was its leader, and on his death each of his sons, Gegnœsius and Theodore, claimed the succession. Gegnœsius, who was the elder, based his claim on appointment by his father. The doctrine of apostolical succession was now creeping into this church, which had stood at first for spirituality and democratic simplicity. But Theodore claimed to receive his grace, as his father had received grace, direct from God. The unseemly disputes that now arose again called the government's attention to the Paulicians, and in the year 722 Gegnœsius was summoned to Constantinople and brought before Leo the Isaurian. It was well for him and his followers that the emperor was the great protestant Iconoclast. Had he been a bigoted champion of orthodoxy it would have gone ill with the Paulicians; but there was much in common between these people and the iconoclastic emperors,[1] and Leo listened to Gegnœsius very tolerantly and could see no harm in his doctrines, nor could the awed patriarch Germanus detect any lurking error in them. The result was that the accused teacher was sent back home with imperial letters for the protection of the Paulicians. Throughout the reigns of the iconoclastic emperors they generally enjoyed imperial favour and were seldom molested.
After a period of depression owing to divisions and
- ↑ Mr. Conybeare regards the iconoclastic emperors as virtually Paulicians.
