LEO
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LEO
iconoclasm. He proposed simply to destroy objects of worship. He made no war upon beauty or art. If, in accomplishing his juirpose, in the face of the furious op- position he met with, he was carried fiu-ther, it was not strange, especially considering his education, the great difficulty of making nice distinctions in such cases and under such circumstances, and the known propensity of human nature to run to extremes in the heat of contro- versy and conflict. Many of the holiest and most or- thiiddx of the early fathers would have proscribed all classical learning, lest with it the classical paganism should be imbibed. But, in fact, neither Gregory nor the monks defended the use of images on esthetic grounds, and if they had they would have compromised their whole cause. It was not at all the beauty of the statue, but the sacred object represented, which gave it its meaning and value. Churches might be made as beautiful and decorated as highly as possible without the people's adoring or bowing down to the chiu-ch, or its altar, or its ornaments. Besides, it is not probable that the images or the pictures of Leo's time were any verv admirable specimens of esthetic achievemeiit; and, if they had been, it is not likely that they Avould have attracted the reverence of the vulgar so much as thej' did. Artistic perfection tends rather to distract and dissipate than to intensify the religious reverence for images. With the development of Grecian art Grecian idolatry lost its hold. It is a remarkable fact that the ugliest, and most misshapen, and hideous idols among the heathen have secured the widest and inteusest de- votion; and among the Christians, it has been some winking or bleeding statue, rudely imitating the human form, and not some Sistine Madonna, that has bent the knees of adoring multitudes. The image whose toe is now devoutly kissed by the faithful at St. Peter's, in Rome, is not remarkable for its esthetic claims. If Leo was a barbarian, Gregory was hardly less so, as is evi- dent from the letters of the latter to his emperor. The ignorance of the pope is almost as remarkable as his im- pudence. He expressly and repeatedly confounds the pious Hezekiah, who destroyed the brazen serpent, with his pious ancestor Uzziah, and under this last name pronounces him a self-willed violator of the priests of God. He apparently confounded them both with Ahaz, v/ho was the grandson of the one and the father of the other. It is true, he professes to quote the passage from the emperor's edict, but it is plain from internal evidence that, in the terms in which he gives it, it coidd not have been in that edict ; and if it had been, he did not know enough to correct the blunder. It is said that Leo was cruel in the execution of his ilecree. It may be so. He was a soldier, a Byzantine emperor, and lived in the 8th century. But if the monks, and the pope, and the priests, and the populace, which they controlled, had not violently resisted the imperial decree, there would have been no cruelty. It is said that Leo acted arbitrarily, as if he had been the master of the minds and con- sciences of men, to make and unmake their religion for them. This is too true, and this was his mistake ; but all his predecessors, with Constantine the Great, had made the same mistake. It was a Byzantine tradition. It was the theory of the age. Protestantism, with the same creed in regard to images, has proceeded upon a different theory, and has succeeded. It is said that the Church, in her general councils, has decided against Leo. If so, it was not till after, in his son's reign, a council styling itself axuraenical, and regularly convoked as such, consisting of no less than 34S bishops, had unani- mously decided in his favor. It is said that, at all events, the question has been historically settled against Leo in the subsequent history of the Church : that icon- oclasm was crushed and brought to naught in the East and in the West, and images achieved a complete tri- umph. Iconoclasm was indeed crushed by the uiniat- ural and murderous monster Irene, whose character will hardly be regarded as superior to that of Leo. In fact, far as images are distinguished i'rom pictures, icono- V,— Z
clasm has thus far trium])hed in the East; and in the West it was not until alter the earnest and manly re- sistance of Charlemagne and the Council of Frankfort that the image-worshipping pope and priests finally, or rather for a time, carried their point.
4. Character of Leo. — Almost all we know of Leo comes to us through his enemies — his prejudiced, bigot- ed, unprincipled, deadly enemies. Some of the most odious acts alleged against him, as the burning of the great library at Constantinople, are purely their malig- nant inventions. His motives are seen only through their jaimdiced or infuriated eyes. His verj' words come to us, for the most part, only through their gar- bled versions; yet, with all their zeal, they have not been able so to distort, or blacken, or liide his true line- aments, but that he still stands out to an impartial ob- server one of the ablest, purest, manliest, and most re- spectable sovereigns that ever occupied the Constanti- nopolitan throne. His rapid rise from obscurity to the pinnacle of power, his firm and successful administration amid foreign assaults and domestic plots, and his reso- lute prosecution of the reformation of the Church, all indicate a wise and provident policy, great vigor, and decision of wiU. His early military life may have ren- dered him cruel and obstinate, but did not taint the pu- rity of his manners. He was in many respects, and particularly in a certain rugged and straightfonvard honesty and strength of purpose, just the man needed for the times. How much better and wiser he was than he appears we cannot say, but there is every reason to believe that a full and fair view of his historv', if it could now be unearthed from the monkish rubljish, and rotten- ness, and filth that have overwhelmed it, would present him in a vastly more favorable light than that in which he has been left to stand. (D. K. G.)