Alexis the Third, who came to the throne in 1195, pub lished an edict to the effect that public offices would no longer be sold, but would be given free to the fittest men; but his historian, while adding that such a reform would be one of the most praiseworthy that could be conceived, is care ful to add that his good intentions were not seconded by those nearest to him. The ring of Byzantine nobles rendered him for the time as powerless as the ring of pashas would to-day render a reforming sultan. Nicetas states that the men who formed this ring became immensely rich from the presents of those who wished to obtain any concessions from the govern ment through their intervention. The highest offices both in the cities and in the provinces were publicly sold. Money changers, ignorant men, and even Scythians, were allowed to buy the title of csesar. Creditors were paid by delegations or, to employ the word too well known in Constantinople now, havalesupon the provinces.

The population which would tolerate such a government and such humiliation was as far from the manliness of the barons who, a few years later, were to figure at Eunnymede as they were from the virtue of the Roman legions of the re public during its best period, or from that of the Greek re In truth, it wras not only the spirit which would publics. resent a national injury which had disappeared from the Byzantine nobles, but the virtues of self-respect, patriotism, and courage. The ruling classes had lost all trace of either 213 214 THE FALL OF CONSTANTINOPLE.

Roman or Greek spirit. Cunning and intrigue had come to be recognized as the highest statesmanship. Treaties had been made with foreign states in order to put them off their guard and make them more easy to be attacked. Diplomacy meant dissimulation, and perfidy was substituted for courage. Government existed as machinery for squeezing money out of the provinces. The natural results ensued among the people. The old ideal of Borne as existing for the good of the public had disappeared. Reverence for law and equity as synony mous with justice had perished. The Greek ideal of compact states seeking the benefit of the whole community had been lost. Asiatic influences had filled the governing classes with the same lying and vainglorious spirit which has ever been the fault of all Eastern courts, and made the people regard such classes as the public enemy.

With the effeminacy which may fairly be attributed to AsiPrevaience of a^c influences there existed an amount of superstij . jon which5 witli some hesitation, I should attribute superstition. in great part to the same source. Talismans were almost uni versally used. No important expedition of state was under taken without reference to the astrologers. If their predic tions turned out correct, they were held in honor; if they failed, recourse was had to others, but the belief in the possibility of discerning future events by reading the stars remained un shaken. Faith in magic was yet strong; the statues about the city were all regarded as exercising an occult influence on per sons or events. The figure of Minerva, which appeared to be beckoning towards the West, was destroyed by the mob on the approach of the Crusaders under the belief that it had ex ercised some kind of influence in bringing them to Constanti nople. The Empress Euphrosyne, the wife of Alexis the Third, ordered the