ed to find in the preacher
he had elevated a flatterer and a tool. He was as much deceived as was
Henry II. when he made Thomas a Becket archbishop of Canterbury. The
rigid and fearless metropolitan, instead of telling stories at his
table and winking at his infamies, openly rebuked his extortions and
exposed his robberies. The disappointed minister of Arcadius then bent
his energies to compass the ruin of the prelate; but, before he could
effect his purpose, he was himself disgraced at court. The army in
revolt had demanded his head, and Eutropius fled to the metropolitan
church of Saint Sophia. Chrysostom seized the occasion to impress his
hearers with the instability of human greatness, and preached a sort of
funeral oration for the man before he was dead. As the fallen and
wretched minister of the emperor lay crouching in an agony of shame and
fear beneath the table of the altar, the preacher burst out: "Oh, vanity
of vanities, where is now the glory of this man? Where the splendor of
the light which surrounded him; where the jubilee of the multitude which
applauded him; where the friends who worshipped his power; where the
incense offered to his image? All gone! It was a dream: it has fled like
a shadow; it has burst like a bubble! Oh, vanity of vanity of vanities!
Write it on all walls and garments and streets and houses: write it on
your consciences. Let every one cry aloud to his neighbor, Behold, all
is vanity! And thou, O wretched man," turning to the fallen chamberlain,
"did I not say unto thee that money is a thankless servant? Said I not
that wealth is a most treacherous friend? The theatre, on which thou
hast bestowed honor, has betrayed thee; the race-course, after
devouring thy gains, has sharpened the sword of those whom thou hast
labored to amuse. But our sanctuary, which thou hast so often assailed,
now opens her bosom to receive thee, and covers thee with her wings."

But even the sacred cathedral did not protect him. He was dragged out
and slain.

A more relentless foe now appeared against the prelate,--no less a
personage than Theophilus, the very bishop who had consecrated him.
Jealousy was the cause, and heresy the pretext,--that most convenient
cry of theologians, often indeed just, as when Bernard accused Abelard,
and Calvin complained of Servetus; but oftener, the most effectual way
of bringing ruin on a hated man, as when the partisans of Alexander VI.
brought Savonarola to the tribunal of t