the annual festival of the exaltation of the
cross. Before the emperor presumed to tread the consecrated ground, he
was instructed to strip himself of the diadem and purple, the pomp and
vanity of the world: but in the judgment of his clergy, the persecution
of the Jews was more easily reconciled with the precepts of the gospel.
* He again ascended his throne to receive the congratulations of the
ambassadors of France and India: and the fame of Moses, Alexander, and
Hercules, was eclipsed in the popular estimation, by the superior merit
and glory of the great Heraclius. Yet the deliverer of the East was
indigent and feeble. Of the Persian spoils, the most valuable portion
had been expended in the war, distributed to the soldiers, or buried,
by an unlucky tempest, in the waves of the Euxine. The conscience of the
emperor was oppressed by the obligation of restoring the wealth of the
clergy, which he had borrowed for their own defence: a perpetual fund
was required to satisfy these inexorable creditors; the provinces,
already wasted by the arms and avarice of the Persians, were compelled
to a second payment of the same taxes; and the arrears of a simple
citizen, the treasurer of Damascus, were commuted to a fine of one
hundred thousand pieces of gold. The loss of two hundred thousand
soldiers who had fallen by the sword, was of less fatal importance
than the decay of arts, agriculture, and population, in this long and
destructive war: and although a victorious army had been formed
under the standard of Heraclius, the unnatural effort appears to have
exhausted rather than exercised their strength. While the emperor
triumphed at Constantinople or Jerusalem, an obscure town on the
confines of Syria was pillaged by the Saracens, and they cut in pieces
some troops who advanced to its relief; an ordinary and trifling
occurrence, had it not been the prelude of a mighty revolution. These
robbers were the apostles of Mahomet; their fanatic valor had emerged
from the desert; and in the last eight years of his reign, Heraclius
lost to the Arabs the same provinces which he had rescued from the
Persians.

Chapter XLVII: Ecclesiastical Discord.--Part I.

Theological History Of The Doctrine Of The Incarnation.--The
Human And Divine Nature Of Christ.--Enmity Of The Patriarchs
Of Alexandria And Constantinople.--St. Cyril And Nestorius.--
Third General Council Of Ephesus.--Heresy Of Eutyches.--
Fourth Gene