ter justice
indifferently, whether between men of equal or unequal condition, do by
this present mandate decree, that if, in the judgment of the aforesaid
Pythias, Ocer have proved himself free-born, you shall at once remove
those who are harassing him with their claims, nor shall they dare any
longer to mock at the calamities of others: these people who once
convicted ought to have been covered with shame for their wicked
designs".

[Illustration:]

CHAPTER X.

THE ARIAN LEAGUE.

Political bearings of the Arianism of the German invaders of the
Empire--Vandals, Suevi, Visigoths, Burgundians--Uprise of the power of
Clovis--His conversion to Christianity--His wars with Gundobad, king of
the Burgundians--With Alaric II., king of the Visigoths--Downfall of the
monarchy of Toulouse--Usurpation of Gesalic--Theodoric governs Spain as
guardian of his grandson Amalaric.

[Illustration:]

The position of Theodoric in relation both to his own subjects and to
the Empire was seriously modified by one fact to which hitherto I have
only alluded casually, the fact that he, like the great majority of the
Teutonic invaders of the Empire, was an adherent of the Arian form of
Christianity. In order to estimate at its true value the bearing of
religion, or at least of religious profession, on politics, at the time
of the fall of the Roman State, we might well look at the condition of
another dominion, founded under the combined influence of martial
spirit and religious zeal, which is now going to pieces under our very
eyes, I mean the Empire of the Ottomans. In the lands which are still
under the sway of the Sultan, religion may not be a great spiritual
force, but it is at any rate a great political lever. When you have said
that a man is a Moslem or a Druse, a member of the Orthodox or of the
Catholic Church, an Armenian or a Protestant, you have almost always
said enough to define his political position. Without the need of
additional information you have already got the elements of his civic
equation, and can say whether he is a loyal subject of the Porte, or
whether he looks to Russia or Greece, to France, Austria, or England as
the sovereign of his future choice. In fact, as has been often pointed
out, in the East at this day "Religion is Nationality".

Very similar to this was the condition of the ancient world at the time
when the general movement of the North