the civil government:
the person of the emperor was guarded by his eunuchs and domestics, and
at the church door he was solemnly received by the patriarch and
his clergy. The task of applause was not abandoned to the rude and
spontaneous voices of the crowd. The most convenient stations were
occupied by the bands of the blue and green factions of the circus; and
their furious conflicts, which had shaken the capital, were insensibly
sunk to an emulation of servitude. From either side they echoed in
responsive melody the praises of the emperor; their poets and musicians
directed the choir, and long life and victory were the burden of every
song. The same acclamations were performed at the audience, the banquet,
and the church; and as an evidence of boundless sway, they were repeated
in the Latin, Gothic, Persian, French, and even English language, by
the mercenaries who sustained the real or fictitious character of those
nations. By the pen of Constantine Porphyrogenitus, this science of form
and flattery has been reduced into a pompous and trifling volume, which
the vanity of succeeding times might enrich with an ample supplement.
Yet the calmer reflection of a prince would surely suggest that the same
acclamations were applied to every character and every reign: and if he
had risen from a private rank, he might remember, that his own voice had
been the loudest and most eager in applause, at the very moment when he
envied the fortune, or conspired against the life, of his predecessor.

The princes of the North, of the nations, says Constantine, without
faith or fame, were ambitious of mingling their blood with the blood of
the Caesars, by their marriage with a royal virgin, or by the nuptials
of their daughters with a Roman prince. The aged monarch, in his
instructions to his son, reveals the secret maxims of policy and pride;
and suggests the most decent reasons for refusing these insolent and
unreasonable demands. Every animal, says the discreet emperor, is
prompted by the distinction of language, religion, and manners. A just
regard to the purity of descent preserves the harmony of public and
private life; but the mixture of foreign blood is the fruitful source of
disorder and discord. Such had ever been the opinion and practice of the
sage Romans: their jurisprudence proscribed the marriage of a citizen
and a stranger: in the days of freedom and virtue, a senator would have
scorned to match his daughter with a king: