red; and at the end of twenty years, in the
recital of the history of Theophylact, the mournful tale was interrupted
by the tears of the audience. [47]

[Footnote 43: In their clamors against Maurice, the people of
Constantinople branded him with the name of Marcionite or Marcionist; a
heresy (says Theophylact, l. viii. c. 9). Did they only cast out a vague
reproach--or had the emperor really listened to some obscure teacher of
those ancient Gnostics?]

[Footnote 44: The church of St. Autonomous (whom I have not the honor to
know) was 150 stadia from Constantinople, (Theophylact, l. viii. c. 9.)
The port of Eutropius, where Maurice and his children were murdered, is
described by Gyllius (de Bosphoro Thracio, l. iii. c. xi.) as one of the
two harbors of Chalcedon.]

[Footnote 45: The inhabitants of Constantinople were generally subject;
and Theophylact insinuates, (l. viii. c. 9,) that if it were consistent
with the rules of history, he could assign the medical cause. Yet such
a digression would not have been more impertinent than his inquiry (l.
vii. c. 16, 17) into the annual inundations of the Nile, and all the
opinions of the Greek philosophers on that subject.]

[Footnote 46: From this generous attempt, Corneille has deduced the
intricate web of his tragedy of Heraclius, which requires more than one
representation to be clearly understood, (Corneille de Voltaire, tom.
v. p. 300;) and which, after an interval of some years, is said to have
puzzled the author himself, (Anecdotes Dramatiques, tom. i. p. 422.)]

[Footnote 47: The revolt of Phocas and death of Maurice are told by
Theophylact Simocatta, (l. viii. c. 7--12,) the Paschal Chronicle, (p.
379, 380,) Theophanes, (Chronograph. p. 238-244,) Zonaras, (tom. ii. l.
xiv. p. 77--80,) and Cedrenus, (p. 399--404.)]

Such tears must have flowed in secret, and such compassion would have
been criminal, under the reign of Phocas, who was peaceably acknowledged
in the provinces of the East and West. The images of the emperor and his
wife Leontia were exposed in the Lateran to the veneration of the
clergy and senate of Rome, and afterwards deposited in the palace of the
Caesars, between those of Constantine and Theodosius. As a subject and
a Christian, it was the duty of Gregory to acquiesce in the established
government; but the joyful applause with which he salutes the fortune of
the assassin, has sullied, with indelible disgrace, the character of the
saint. The succe