"And Justin the emperor," we are told, came out to meet him as he had been the blessed Peter himself, and after giving him audience promised that he would do all else that was required of him, but that he could not by any means suffer the restoration to the Arian faith of those who had given themselves over to the Catholic religion. So when Pope John came back from Justin, Theodoric took him by craft, and laid the ban of his displeasure upon him.1 After a few days John died.” 2

Writing less than a generation after the event, with the words of the imprisoned philosopher ringing in his ears, and hatred of the persecuting Ostrogoth rankling in his heart, Maximian would naturally be inclined to side with Boethius. Besides, a certain propensity for the marvellous and impossible should make us careful how we accept his account of things as strictly accurate. But in recounting the story of Boethius, there was little scope for the lively imagination that shows itself in the wonderful birth of the dragons, and the signs in the heavens that went before Theodoric's fit of frenzy. And

1 "Et in offensa sua eum esse jubet."

2 I have ventured, for the sake of clearness, to present these two last excerpts from the ‘Anonymus' separately, although in the original the death of Symmachus is mentioned incidentally in the course of the narrative of Pope John's mission.

evidence so nearly contemporary, and so strikingly coincident with Boethius's own version of the matter, is entitled to the fullest measure of consideration.

It will be seen that Procopius, the Byzantian historian (500-565 ?), bears out the words of the "Anonymus.' "Symmachus and Boethius, his sonin-law," he tells us in the first chapter of the first book of his Gothic War,' "both of noble birth, were chiefs of the Roman senate, and became consuls. Their pre-eminence above their fellows in the practice of philosophy, their zeal for justice, the assistance they offered with their wealth to the poverty of many, strangers and fellow-citizens alike, the great renown they acquired,-all this combined to stir up the hatred of villanous men. And when they laid false information Theodoric believed them, and slew the two men, on the charge of plotting a revolution, and confiscated all their property." Let us now hear what Boethius himself has to say on the subject. After enumerating his various services in the cause of his countrymen against the oppression of greedy Gothic officials, he under

2 Of special interest is his defence of the companions against an edict of coemption (a fiscal measure which allowed the State to buy provisions for the army at something under market price), which threatened to ruin the province. Hodgkin, by a comparison of this

takes to justify his defence of the senate's dignity and privileges which has brought about his present undeserved disgrace. "To save Albinus the consular from the punishment consequent on a prejudiced trial, I braved the hatred of the informer Cyprian. It might well be thought that in so doing I incurred animosity enough, and indeed the very fact that my love of justice had left me no place of safety with the court-party ought to have rendered me more secure with the others. Now, who were the informers who struck me down? Basilius, whom pressure of debt-he was long since expelled the king's service-drove to denounce me. Opilio and Gaudentius, who, on account of their countless and various crimes, had been ordered into exile by a royal decree. When they would not obey and sought sanctuary, and the king discovered it, he proclaimed that unless they had left Ravenna by a given day, they should be driven out with the brand of shame on their brows. Could any measure be more stringent? And yet on that self-same day they laid information against me, and their information was admitted.

passage with certain letters of Cassiodorus (Var., iii. 20, 21, and 27), describing the disgrace of one Faustus, prætorian prefect, indentifies him with the governor whom Boethius dared to oppose. See op. cit., vol. iii. p. 533.

1 A member of the Decian gens-Consul in 493.

"Had my services merited this reward, thinkest thou? Or did the previous condemnation of those men invest them with a right to accuse? Had

not for the innocency of infamy of the accuser? heads of the charge They say that I have

Fortune, then, no shame, if the accused, at least for the But thou wouldst know the under which I am arraigned. desired the safety of the senate. How desired it? They accuse me of having prevented an informer from producing documents which were to prove the senate guilty of treason. teacher? Shall I deny putting thee to shame?

What sayest thou, O my the charge for fear of But I did desire it, and

shall never cease to desire it. Shall I plead guilty? Farewell, then, to the task of confuting the informer. Shall I call it a crime to have desired the safety of that illustrious order? It is true that by the decrees it issued against me it did its best to make it a crime. But stupidity, defeating as ever its own objects, cannot alter the rights of things, and, following the teaching of Socrates, I do not deem it right either to hide the truth or to confess a falsehood. Be this as it may, I leave the question to be weighed by thy judgment, and that of the wise. Still, in order that posterity may not miss the connection and the truth of the matter, I have com

1

mitted an account of it to writing. As to those forged letters by which I am accused of having hoped for Roman freedom, what need is there to speak of them? Their forgery would have been patent had I been allowed to make use of the confession of the informers themselves, a form of evidence which in all cases carries the greatest possible weight. (Indeed, what freedom is there left us to hope for? Would there were any!) I would have answered in the words of Cassius, who, when he was cited by Gaius Cæsar, the son of Germanicus, on the charge of being privy to a conspiracy against him, replied, Had I known it, thou shouldst never have known it.' Nor in this affair has grief so dulled my sense as to make me complain that wicked men have tried to outrage virtue; but I am exceedingly astonished that their hopes have been crowned with success. For to desire that which is evil is perhaps in the nature of our mortal weakness, but that every rogue should have power to carry out his designs against innocence is, under God's surveyance, monstrous. Hence not without reason did one of thine own disciples question-'If God indeed is, whence cometh evil; and whence cometh good, if He is 1 I.e., Caligula.