rendered its beginning illustrious?

Nevertheless a dark blot lies upon the name and memory of Justinian. He was
not only successor of the great Theodosius in his ardent zeal for the
Church's doctrine and unity, but likewise of Constantine, when he sullied
his greatness and risked all the success of his former life by falling into
the hands of the Nicomedian Eusebius.

The vast event by which the Christian Church had become a ruling power in
the commonwealth had affected from that time forth the whole being of
Church and State. Christian emperors had come to see in bishops the Fathers
and Princes of such a Church, consecrated by God to that office, not
appointed by men.[170] As such they had honoured them, committed to their
wisdom and guidance the salvation of their own souls, and the weal itself
of the commonwealth; not hindered them in the performance of their duties,
not hampered them by restrictive laws. Rather they had protected them by
external force from hindrance when invited thus to show their protection as
heads of the State. Circumstances led them on to a more immediate entrance
into the Church's special domain, and the things which happened in that
domain led to this their entrance. It kept even pace with the developments
and disturbances caused by heresy therein.

Christ had committed to the whole episcopate, under the guidance of the
Holy Spirit, the task of spreading the seed of Christian doctrine over the
earth, of watching its growth, of eradicating the false seed sown in
night-time by the enemy. In proportion as the empire's head took part in
this work, his influence on the episcopate could not but increase. If his
participation was confined within its due limits, if the temporal ruler
hedged the Church round from irruption of external power, if he rooted the
tares out of her field only to clear her enclosure, his relation to the
bishops remained merely external. But if he went on himself to lay down the
limit of the Church's domain, or even if he only took an active part in
such limitation; if he made himself the judge what was wheat and what was
tares, in so doing he had won an influence on the bishops which did not
belong to him. Then Church and State ran a danger of seeing their
respective limits confused. Thus the relation of the bishops to the ruler
of the State became then, and remains always, an unfailing standard of the
Church's freedom and independence.

Now, striking and peremptory as th