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But Sergius, persuaded by Pudentius, a man of Tripolis, of whom I made mention in the preceding narrative as having served the Emperor Justinian against the Vandals at the beginning of the Vandalic War, received eighty of the barbarians, their most notable men, into the city, promising to fulfil all their demands; but he commanded the rest to remain in the suburb.
It is said that Justinian's mother told some of her intimates that Justinian was not the son of Sabbatius, her husband, or of any human being; but that, at the time when she became pregnant, an unseen demon companied with her, whom she only felt as when a man has connection with a woman, and who then vanished away as in a dream.
It was probably more important as an influence upon the growth of universities than the works of Aristotle. The greater part of the Corpus Juris was compiled at Constantinople, 529-533 A.D., by certain eminent jurists under the Roman Emperor, Justinian.
From the age of Justinian the Eastern empire was sinking below its former level; the powers of destruction were more active than those of improvement; and the calamities of war were imbittered by the more permanent evils of civil and ecclesiastical tyranny.
We see the energy, the commanding air, the indomitable will, and the firm ability of the man who stamped for ever the character of the Egyptian monarchy and outdid all time in the scale of his works. No other Egyptian king that we know resembled this head; and it stands apart in portraiture, though perhaps it may be compared with the energetic face of Justinian, the great builder and organiser.
Instead of being protected by the valor, Colchos was insulted by the licentiousness, of foreign mercenaries; the benefits of commerce were converted into base and vexatious monopoly; and Gubazes, the native prince, was reduced to a pageant of royalty, by the superior influence of the officers of Justinian.
"Well, sing to her," said Mowbray; "for my part, I am going to visit Plato, Justinian, Blackstone, whose lectures are better than Virgil's heroics, and Coke, who is more learned, if not more agreeable, than any Hesperians. Farewell." And Mowbray saluted Sir Asinus with a smile, and rode on. The knight returned his salute, and continued his way in the opposite direction.
After the fall of the Roman Empire in the West, an interval of fifty years, until the memorable reign of Justinian, is faintly marked by the obscure names and imperfect annals of Zeno, Anastasius, and Justin, who successively ascended the throne of Constantinople.
But Justinian grew more and more jealous of him, and, fancying untruly that he was in a plot for placing Justin on the throne, caused him to be thrown into prison, and sent him out from thence stripped of everything, and with his eyes torn out. He found a little child to lead him to a church door, where he used to sit with a wooden dish before him for alms.
Amidst its humiliations and sorrows, the stricken city had also to mourn the loss of its greatest treasure, its secular palladium, that most precious copy of the Pandects of Justinian, which the Pisan marauders seized and carried back with them to their city on the Arno.
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