the spouse of a potent
monarch. Conscious of her approaching greatness, she returned from
Paphlagonia to Constantinople; assumed, like a skilful actress, a more
decent character; relieved her poverty by the laudable industry of
spinning wool; and affected a life of chastity and solitude in a small
house, which she afterwards changed into a magnificent temple. Her
beauty, assisted by art or accident, soon attracted, captivated, and
fixed, the patrician Justinian, who already reigned with absolute sway
under the name of his uncle. Perhaps she contrived to enhance the value
of a gift which she had so often lavished on the meanest of mankind;
perhaps she inflamed, at first by modest delays, and at last by sensual
allurements, the desires of a lover, who, from nature or devotion, was
addicted to long vigils and abstemious diet. When his first transports
had subsided, she still maintained the same ascendant over his mind, by
the more solid merit of temper and understanding. Justinian delighted
to ennoble and enrich the object of his affection; the treasures of the
East were poured at her feet, and the nephew of Justin was determined,
perhaps by religious scruples, to bestow on his concubine the sacred and
legal character of a wife. But the laws of Rome expressly prohibited
the marriage of a senator with any female who had been dishonored by
a servile origin or theatrical profession: the empress Lupicina, or
Euphemia, a Barbarian of rustic manners, but of irreproachable virtue,
refused to accept a prostitute for her niece; and even Vigilantia, the
superstitious mother of Justinian, though she acknowledged the wit and
beauty of Theodora, was seriously apprehensive, lest the levity and
arrogance of that artful paramour might corrupt the piety and happiness
of her son. These obstacles were removed by the inflexible constancy of
Justinian. He patiently expected the death of the empress; he despised
the tears of his mother, who soon sunk under the weight of her
affliction; and a law was promulgated in the name of the emperor
Justin, which abolished the rigid jurisprudence of antiquity. A glorious
repentance (the words of the edict) was left open for the unhappy
females who had prostituted their persons on the theatre, and they were
permitted to contract a legal union with the most illustrious of the
Romans. This indulgence was speedily followed by the solemn nuptials of
Justinian and Theodora; her dignity was gradually exalted with