of Constantinople had been
witnessed by a crowd of strangers from Italy and the West, who related
with grief and indignation the sacrilege of the emperor. But on the
reception of his proscriptive edict, they trembled for their domestic
deities: the images of Christ and the Virgin, of the angels, martyrs,
and saints, were abolished in all the churches of Italy; and a strong
alternative was proposed to the Roman pontiff, the royal favor as the
price of his compliance, degradation and exile as the penalty of his
disobedience. Neither zeal nor policy allowed him to hesitate; and
the haughty strain in which Gregory addressed the emperor displays his
confidence in the truth of his doctrine or the powers of resistance.
Without depending on prayers or miracles, he boldly armed against the
public enemy, and his pastoral letters admonished the Italians of their
danger and their duty. At this signal, Ravenna, Venice, and the cities
of the Exarchate and Pentapolis, adhered to the cause of religion; their
military force by sea and land consisted, for the most part, of the
natives; and the spirit of patriotism and zeal was transfused into the
mercenary strangers. The Italians swore to live and die in the defence
of the pope and the holy images; the Roman people was devoted to their
father, and even the Lombards were ambitious to share the merit and
advantage of this holy war. The most treasonable act, but the most
obvious revenge, was the destruction of the statues of Leo himself: the
most effectual and pleasing measure of rebellion, was the withholding
the tribute of Italy, and depriving him of a power which he had recently
abused by the imposition of a new capitation. A form of administration
was preserved by the election of magistrates and governors; and so high
was the public indignation, that the Italians were prepared to create an
orthodox emperor, and to conduct him with a fleet and army to the palace
of Constantinople. In that palace, the Roman bishops, the second and
third Gregory, were condemned as the authors of the revolt, and every
attempt was made, either by fraud or force, to seize their persons, and
to strike at their lives. The city was repeatedly visited or assaulted
by captains of the guards, and dukes and exarchs of high dignity or
secret trust; they landed with foreign troops, they obtained some
domestic aid, and the superstition of Naples may blush that her fathers
were attached to the cause of heresy. But these