Alfred Brittain

“ May I never exist without this purple robe, and may I never live to see the day on which those who meet me shall not address me as Queen. If you wish, O Emperor, to save yourself, there is no difficulty; we have ample funds. Yonder is the sea, and there are the ships. Yet reflect whether, when you have once escaped to a place of security, you will not prefer death to safety. I agree with an old saying that 'Empire is a fair winding-sheet.'"
By these courageous words the resolution of Theodora saved the throne of Justinian. ”

“ Hitherto we have seen the Roman matrons living the simple, diligent, unsophisticated lives of women who were fitting mates for men who held to the plow for support, but dared not let drop the sword. Until then, Rome had been nothing but a city struggling for existence--sometimes a precarious existence. Instances there were when her fortunes waned almost to the vanishing point; when the tide of progress seemed to hang at the ebb. The god of victory, though honored as the tutelary deity of Rome, was frequently partial to her Italian neighbors ”

“ In the Capitol Museum there is a seated figure of Agrippina. It is one of the noblest pieces of statuary in the world. In it is seen none of that feminine sweetness which endeared the young wife of Germanicus to the hearts of the Roman legions; but there is that proud consciousness of moral dignity which Livia could not rival and that imperial manner which Tiberius could not cow. It is a sad, strong-hearted woman. One could fancy that a composite of all the noblest Roman matrons might have made just such a picture. ”

“ When the historian has described the rise and fall of empires and dynasties, and has recounted with care and exactness the details of the great political movements that have changed the map of continents, there remains the question: What was the cause of these revolutions in human society--what were the real motives that were operative in the hearts and minds of the persons in the great drama of history that has been displayed? The mere chain of events as they have passed before the eye as it surveys the centuries does not give an explanation of itself. ”

“ But from the very nature of the appeal which Christianity has made to the world, the place of woman in society has been changed. The new faith appealed to all mankind in the name of the humanity which the Son of God had assumed, and consequently it was forced to treat men and women as on a spiritual equality. It was forced by the natural desire for consistency to break down any barriers that might keep one-half of the human race from the full realization of the possibilities of their natures, which were made in the image of God. ”

“ For this reason her marriage to Antony was as great a failure in the purpose for which it was intended--the winning of the triumvir from his infatuation--as it was a misfortune to herself. That a woman like Octavia should be united to such a man as Mark Antony did not seem to the ancients such a tragedy as it appears to us; and probably the sister of Octavius endured with an unconcern incomprehensible to us the knowledge that her husband had been the lover of many women, some even of the most abandoned sort. ”

“ We now turn to those women of the Gospels who were the acknowledged friends of Jesus and of the founders of Christianity. The central figure is, of course, the Blessed Mother--Mary, honored by Christians above all the daughters of the earth and adored by many millions as the Queen of Heaven; and yet how inadequate, how meagre is the veritable knowledge we possess of this immortal woman! Never has human imagination so magnificently triumphed as in the evolution of the concept of the Blessed Virgin ”

“ Indeed, there is more to evoke our sympathetic appreciation in the Rome of B.C. 150 than in the Europe of A.D. 1000 or in the Asiatic civilizations of to-day. We feel more at home in the patrician villas than in the mediæval castles; just as we find more that is applicable to modern life in the Roman poets than we do in the bards of chivalry. In studying the period when the ancient civilization of Italy was at its best, we discover habits of thought, bits of life, and social customs, which really startle us with their similitude to those to which we ourselves are accustomed. ”

“ I am aware that it will appear fabulous that any human beings should have exhibited such recklessness of consequences; and that, in a city where everything was known and talked of, anyone, much more a consul-elect, should have met the emperor's wife, on a stated day, in the presence of persons called in to seal the deeds, and that she should have heard the words of the augurs, entered the house of the husband, sacrificed to the gods, sat down with the guests at the nuptial banquet, and in every way comported herself as though she had been given away in a marriage entirely lawful. ”

“ Justinian was no mere youth when he married, but a sober gentleman of thirty-five, the heir apparent to the throne, who had to keep in the good graces of the people. Would he at so momentous a time have perpetrated so infamous a scandal? And would it have been possible for a woman of such notorious profligacy to ascend the throne without a protest from patriarch or bishop or senators or populace? The outward life of the Byzantine people, owing to the influence of Christianity, was usually correct. A little later an emperor lost his throne because he divorced one wife and took another. ”

“ It is impossible to reproach the Roman art of portraiture with flattery. It gave what the Romans insisted on--rigid fidelity to nature. It made no exception in favor of the Cæsars and their house, not even for the women. Proofs of this almost repulsive fidelity to nature are to be found. An empress, arrived at a more than mature age, is to be represented as Venus. It is possible that she would be glad to decline the honor. She belongs to that period in life when old ladies drape their withered beauties; but she has duties as Cæsar's spouse, and must resign herself to her fate. ”

“ Literature and art have received from them valuable encouragement. But at the epoch of which we are writing, poetry and art--those social forces by which the soul is elevated--no longer exist. With an Asiatic government and a religion soon to become intolerant, great subjects of thought are prohibited. There is no discussion of political affairs, for the emperor gives absolute commands; no history, for the truth is concealed or condemned to a complaisance which is odious to honest men; no eloquence, for nowhere can it be employed except in disgraceful adulation of the sovereign.... ”

“ VIII WOMEN OF THE FRANKISH CHURCH
We may now consider ourselves to have nearly passed the transition period between the Classic and the Middle Ages, and to have begun to enter that indefinite range of history known as Mediævalism--indefinite as to character rather than extent of period. A new world opens to our view; a world which we examine under the influence of the romanticist more than under that of the philosopher. In the age to which our researches have now brought us we find that the life of woman has wholly changed. Evolution has taken a new beginning. ”

“ During the reign of the dissolute emperors, the virtue of women was but little respected. Nero denied that any person was sincerely chaste. If a woman of any social prominence in those days desired to retain her honor, her beauty was her greatest misfortune. No ties or obligations, not even the sanctity of the Vestals, were respected by the lustful tyrants. If a man rejoiced in a beautiful and modest wife, she might any day be requested to appear at the palace; and the husband, if he would preserve his life, was compelled to bear the dishonor in silence. ”

“ Then Valentinian came to the throne. In this emperor is witnessed that astonishing mixture of vice and virtue, barbarous cruelty and Christian belief which characterized that period. It was an age of bitter warfare; every human force was engaged in deadly contention; both the Church and the Empire were fighting for their lives. The latter could scarcely keep off the hordes of barbarians which were swarming and surging upon its borders, and at times it seemed as if the former had quite succumbed to the heresy of Arianism. It was the most deadly battle that the Church has ever had to wage. ”

“ From the time of Commodus to that of Constantine, Rome had no better government than that which was inspired by the genius and ability of Mammæa; and if the organization and the subordination which existed in the time of Trajan had still prevailed, the rule of this remarkable woman would have equalled in uprightness and beneficence that of any period in the history of the Empire.
The care of Mammæa in the education of her son was rewarded by its good effect upon his character. Virtue for him never lost its charm, and a fearless advocacy of the right made him respected by all. ”

“ Monasticism was not the creation of Christianity; the religions of the East had their devotees, like the Jewish Essenes, who abandoned the common pursuits of men for a life of solitude, idle introspection, and rapt contemplation. The wildernesses and solitary places of the East had been made yet more weird by the presence of unhumanlike hermits, even before the days of John the Baptist. Christian monasticism, also, had its birth in the dreamy East. ”