From what has been said, it will be understood that the religion of Clovis was not of an enlightened kind; and there was much in his character and actions which did not become his Christian profession. Yet his conversion, such as it was, appears to have been sincere. As his conquests spread, he put down Arianism wherever he found it, and planted the Catholic faith instead of it. And from the circumstance that Clovis was converted to Catholic Christianity at a time when all the other princes of the west were Arians, and when the emperor of the east favoured the heresy of Eutyches,[48] the kings of France got the title of "Eldest Son of the Church."
NOTES
CHAPTER XXVII.
JUSTINIAN.
A.D. 527-565.
It would be wearisome to follow very particularly the history of the Church in the East for the next century and a half after the Council of Chalcedon (A.D. 451).
The most important reign during this time was that of the Emperor Justinian, which lasted eight-and-thirty years, from 527 to 565. Under him the Vandals were conquered in Africa, and the Goths in Italy. Both these countries became once more parts of the empire, and Arianism was put down in both.
Justinian also, in the year 529, put an end to the old heathen philosophy, by ordering that the schools of Athens, in which St. Basil, St. Gregory of Nazianzum, and the emperor Julian had studied together two hundred years before,[49] should be shut up. The philosophers, who had continued to teach their heathen notions there (although they had been obliged to treat the religion of the empire with outward respect), were in great distress at finding their trade taken away from them. They thought it unsafe to remain in Justinian's dominions, and made their way into Persia, where the king was a heathen, and was said to be a friend of learned men. The king received them kindly; but the Persian heathenism was very different from their own, and the ways of the country were altogether strange to them; so that they felt themselves very uncomfortable in Persia, and became so home-sick as to be willing to risk even their lives for the sake of getting back to their own country. Happily for them, the Persian king was able to intercede for them in making a peace with Justinian; and it was agreed that they might live within the empire as they liked, without being troubled by the laws, if they would only remain quiet, and not try to draw Christian youths away from the faith. The philosophers were too glad to return on such terms. I wish I could tell that they became Christians themselves: but all that is said of them is, that when they died, there were no more of the kind, and that heathen philosophy no longer stood in the way of the Gospel.