between the two countries increased rapidly. Cosmas mentions a circumstance which is a striking proof of this fact. In most of the cities of any note in India, he found Christian churches established, in which the functions of religion were performed by priests ordained by the archbishop of Seleucia, the capital of the Persian empire, and who continued subject to his jurisdiction. Accordingly, we learn from this traveller, that Christianity was successfully preached to the Bactrians, the Huns, the Persians, the Indians, the Persarmenians, the Medes, and the Elamites. The coast of Malabar, and the isles of the ocean, Sosorara and Ceylon, were peopled with an increasing multitude of Christians. It is remarkable, however, that, according to the account of Cosmas, none of these strangers were accustomed to visit the eastern regions of Asia, but rested satisfied with receiving their silk, their spices, and other valuable productions, as they were imported into Ceylon, and conveyed thence to the various marts of India.

ARCHITECTURE.

ANTHEMIUS, a celebrated architect. His principal work is the famous church of St. Sophia at Constantinople, which he was employed to build by the emperor Justinian, for whom he also erected several other structures. He was a good mathematician, and well-skilled in experimental philosophy, from a knowledge of which, he succeeded so well in imitating an earthquake, that he alarmed many people in its vicinity, and particularly, frightened a man of the name of Zeno out of his house. He also made experiments in optics, and constructed a lens.

ÆTHERIUS, an architect, who built the wall which runs from the sea to Selimbria, to preserve Constantinople from the Bulgarians and Scythians.

MEDICINE.

ALEXANDER TRALLIAN, a Greek writer on physic, a native of Tralles in Lydia, who lived about the middle of this century. He was the first who opened the jugular vein, and used cantharides as a blister for the gout.

PERIOD XXII.

FROM CONSTANTINE III. TO CONSTANTINE V.

[CENT. VII.]

REMARKABLE EVENTS, FACTS, AND DISCOVERIES.

A.D.

606 The Concessions of Phocas, Emperor of the East, give rise to the Papal power.

622 Mahomet, the false prophet, flies from Mecca to Medina, in Arabia, and lays the foundation of the Saracen empire. His followers compute from this Era, called Hegira, i. e. the Flight.

628 An academy founded at Canterbury.

637 Jerusalem taken by the Saracens.

641 Alexandria in Egypt taken by them, and the grand Library burnt by Omar their Caliph.

643 The Temple of Jerusalem converted into a Mahometan Mosque. 653 The Saracens extend their Conquests on every side, and retaliate the barbarities of the Goths and Vandals upon their posterity. They take Rhodes, and destroy the famous Colossus. The Danes invade England.

663 Glass invented by a Bishop, and brought into England by a Benedictine Monk.

669 Sicily invaded, and Syracuse destroyed by the Saracens. 685 The Britons, after a brave struggle of near 150 years, are totally expelled by the Saxons, and driven into Wales and Cornwall. 698 The Saracens take Carthage, and expel the Romans from Africa.

A NEW period in history commences with the flight of Mahomet, in the year 622, from whence his followers date their era, called the Hegira. Agreeable to our plan of placing the characters in the century in which they were born, the life of Mahomet has been given in the last period. We see every thing prepared for the great revolution which now takes place. The Roman empire in the west annihilated; the Persian empire, and that of Constantinople, weakened by their mutual wars and intestine divisions; the Indians, and other eastern nations, unaccustomed to war, ready to fall a prey to the first invader; the southern parts of Europe in a distracted and barbarous state; while the inhabitants of Arabia, from their earliest origin, accustomed to war and plunder, and now united by the most violent superstition and enthusiastic desire of conquest, were like a flood pent up, and ready to overwhelm the rest of the world.

The northern nations of Europe and Asia, however formidable in after times, were at this period unknown, and peaceable, at least with

respect to their southern neighbours; so that there was in no quarter of the globe any power capable of opposing the conquests of the Arabs. With amazing celerity, therefore, they overran all Syria, Palestine, Persia, Bukharia, and India, extending their conquests farther to the eastward than ever Alexander had done. On the west side, their empire extended over Egypt, Barbary, Spain, Sicily, Sardinia, Majorca, Minorca, &c. and many of the isles in the Archipelago; nor were the coasts of Italy itself free from their incursions; nay, they have even been said to have reached the distant and barren country of Iceland. At last this great empire, like others, began to decline. Its ruin was very sudden, and owing to its internal divisions. Mahomet had not taken care to establish the apostleship in his family, or to give any particular directions about a successor. The consequence was, that the caliphat, or succession to the apostleship, was seized by many usurpers in different parts of the empire; while the true caliphs, who resided at Bagdad, gradually lost all power, and were regarded only as a kind of high priests. Of these divisions the Turks took advantage to establish their authority in many provinces of the Mahometan empire, but as they embraced the same religion with the Arabs, and were filled with the same enthusiastic desire of conquest, it is of little consequence to distinguish between them, as indeed it signified little to the world in general, whether the Turks or Saracens were the conquerors, since both were equally cruel, barbarous, ignorant, and superstitious.

While the barbarians of the East were thus grasping at the empire of the whole world, great disturbances happened among the no less barbarous nations of the West. Superstition seems to have been the ruling motive with both. The Saracens and Turks conquered for the glory of God, and his apostle Mahomet and his successors; the western nations professed an equal regard for the divine glory, but which was only to be perceived in the respect they paid to the pope and the clergy. Ever since the establishment of Christianity by Constantine, the bishops of Rome had been gradually extending their power, and attempting not only to render themselves independent, but even to assume an authority over the emperors themselves. The destruction of the empire was so far from weakening their power, that it afforded them opportunities of greatly extending it, and becoming judges of the sovereigns of Italy themselves, whose barbarity and ignorance prompted them to submit to their decisions.

GOVERNMENT.

ROME.

CONSTANTINE III., emperor of the East, son of the emperor Heraclius, and his wife Eudoxia, succeeded his father in 641. His half-brother Heracleonas had been associated with him as his colleague in the empire by his father's testa

ment; and Martina, the mother of Heracleonas, also assumed a share in the government; but the Constantinopolitans insisted on the sole right of Constantine to the succession. He enjoyed the sovereign power but a short time, reigning only three months. He died in his thirtieth year, either from the effects of an originally weak constitution, or from poison, said to be administered to him by his step-mother.

CONSTANS II., emperor of the East, grandson of Heraclius, and son of Constantine III., was raised to the purple in 641, after the senate had deposed the usurper Heracleonas, and his mother Martina. Constans was a Monothelite, and to his patronage of this heresy, the ecclesiastical writers impute the misfortunes and crimes of his reign. In 647 the Saracens overran the imperial dominions in Africa, and afterwards took Cyprus and Rhodes. The emperor himself was defeated by them in a naval engagement, and escaped with difficulty in disguise to Constantinople. He was more successful in a war against the Sclavonians; and the Saracens, in consequence of divisions among themselves, made peace with him, and even consented to become tributary. He compelled his brother Theodosius to take deacon's orders, and he received the sacramental cup from his hand. But not thinking himself secure while Theodosius lived, he caused him to be put to death. The execrations of the people, and his own remorse, however, severely punished this fratricide. He could not bear to remain in his capital any longer, and embarking for Greece, displayed the hatred which he felt, and was conscious he inspired, by spitting against the walls of Constantinople as he left them. He passed the winter at Athens, and thence proceeded to Sicily, continually haunted by the image of his murdered brother, whom he thought he saw presenting to him a cup of blood, and urging him to drink. He appears to have designed to transfer the seat of his empire to Syracuse, but the people of Constantinople prevented this intention by detaining his wife and children. Constans however did not resign the cares of government; for a war breaking out between the Franks and Lombards, he thought it a good opportunity for expelling the latter from Italy. He accordingly fitted out a fleet, and sailing to Tarentum, proceeded to lay siege to Beneventum. But Grimoald its duke, having defeated the Franks, came to the relief of the place, and obliged the emperor to raise the siege and retire to Naples. He thence made a progress to Rome, which he entered with great pomp, having been met at some distance by the pope Vitalianus, and all his clergy, in procession. The return he made to this mark of respect was to plunder Rome of many of its most valuable ornaments, which he sent to Constantinople. He then returned to Syracuse, where he resided five years longer, oppressing by exac

tions all the people within the influence of his authority, and not sparing the riches of the sacred edifices. At length domestic treason put an end to his odious and unhappy reign. As he was using the bath, a servant struck him violently on the back of the head with the vessel which contained the warm water. He fell stunned and was suffocated. This catastrophe happened in 668, after Constans had reigned near twenty-seven

years.

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CONSTANTINE IV., emperor of the East, surnamed POGONATUS, or the BEARDED, the son of Constans II., succeeded his father, in 668. He marched an army into Sicily, in order to revenge his father's death, and depose the usurper, who had been set up. This expedition succeeded, and upon his return to Constantinople with his beard grown, which was only downy when he left it, this trifling circumstance gave him the appellation by which he is distinguished. A fancy taken by some of his troops, that his two brothers ought to share the sovereign power with him, from the example of the three sons in the Trinity, caused a sedition, which he suppressed by the execution of the mutineers, and on its renewal, he cut off the noses of his brothers, that the deformity might disqualify them for the empire. The Saracens in his reign invaded Africa, Sicily, and Cilicia; and at length laid siege to Constantinople itself. They were opposed with courage and vigour; and though they renewed their attempt several successive years, they were forced to abandon the siege with very great loss. The caliph Moawiyah afterwards made a treaty with the emperor, by which several provinces they had siezed were left to the Saracens, on condition of their paying tribute for them. The Bulgarians next made an irruption into Thrace, and having defeated the emperor's lieutenants it was thought necessary to purchase their retreat by an annual pension, and the assignment of a settlement in Lower Mæsia. In 680 an cecumenical council, called the sixth, was held at Constantinople, in which the heresy of the Monothelites was condemned. This prince is favourably spoken of as an obedient son of the church, but appears to have possessed little courage or abilities, died in 685.

JUSTINIAN II., emperor of the East, succeeded his father Constantine Pogonatus, in 685, being then sixteen years of age. He soon betrayed a violent temper, and his fondness for war induced him to break a treaty he had made with the Saracens, and he renewed hostilities against them. He was defeated in consequence of the desertion of the Selair, in his service, with which he was so enraged, that he ordered the rest of the nation to be massacred. On his return to Constantinople he wasted the public money in sumptuous buildings, while he gave up his subjects to be oppressed by his two ministers, a monk and an