dgments. Those of
Theophanes (Chronograph. p. 244--279) and Nicephorus (p. 3--16) supply
a regular, but imperfect, series of the Persian war; and for any
additional facts I quote my special authorities. Theophanes, a
courtier who became a monk, was born A.D. 748; Nicephorus patriarch
of Constantinople, who died A.D. 829, was somewhat younger: they both
suffered in the cause of images Hankius, de Scriptoribus Byzantinis, p.
200-246.]

[Footnote 58: The Persian historians have been themselves deceived: but
Theophanes (p. 244) accuses Chosroes of the fraud and falsehood; and
Eutychius believes (Annal. tom. ii. p. 212) that the son of Maurice, who
was saved from the assassins, lived and died a monk on Mount Sinai.]

The first intelligence from the East which Heraclius received, [59]
was that of the loss of Antioch; but the aged metropolis, so often
overturned by earthquakes, and pillaged by the enemy, could supply but
a small and languid stream of treasure and blood. The Persians were
equally successful, and more fortunate, in the sack of Caesarea, the
capital of Cappadocia; and as they advanced beyond the ramparts of
the frontier, the boundary of ancient war, they found a less obstinate
resistance and a more plentiful harvest. The pleasant vale of Damascus
has been adorned in every age with a royal city: her obscure felicity
has hitherto escaped the historian of the Roman empire: but Chosroes
reposed his troops in the paradise of Damascus before he ascended the
hills of Libanus, or invaded the cities of the Phoenician coast. The
conquest of Jerusalem, [60] which had been meditated by Nushirvan,
was achieved by the zeal and avarice of his grandson; the ruin of the
proudest monument of Christianity was vehemently urged by the intolerant
spirit of the Magi; and he could enlist for this holy warfare with
an army of six-and-twenty thousand Jews, whose furious bigotry might
compensate, in some degree, for the want of valor and discipline. [6011]
After the reduction of Galilee, and the region beyond the Jordan, whose
resistance appears to have delayed the fate of the capital, Jerusalem
itself was taken by assault. The sepulchre of Christ, and the stately
churches of Helena and Constantine, were consumed, or at least damaged,
by the flames; the devout offerings of three hundred years were rifled
in one sacrilegious day; the Patriarch Zachariah, and the true cross,
were transported into Persia; and the massacre of ninety thousand