BIOGRAPHICAL ANECDOTES AND CHARACTERS. Some Account of THEODORICK, KING of the OSTROGOTHS in MOESIA. TH [From ROBINSON'S ECCLESIASTICAL RESEARCHES.] HIS prince was the moft accomplished man of his age. When he was a little infant (to ufe the words of the hiftorian) that is, in the eighth year of his age, he was delivered by his father Theodemir as an hoftage to the emperor Leo, and as he was brought up at the court of Conftantinople, he had united the elegance and the addrefs of the Greeks with the firm manly virtues of the Goths. He had no literature, but he was a lover of learned men, and a great encourager of arts and fciences. He continued in the unitarian religion of his ancestors, and adopted the fame principles of government, uniformly juft, and perfectly free. The Imperial and the Gothic writers differ on one article. The first say, Zeno fent Theodorick to conquer for him: the laft affirm, the emperour ceded to him his claim on İtaly, and gave him a fettlement there, and this latter feems the truth, for the emperour was greatly in arrears to the Goths; he could not make his payments good, and he gave Italy, as former emperours had other places in Grecce, in lieu of pay to the Goths his allies, However it were, when Theodorick appeared, his reputation was fo great, that the troops and the people chofe to be under his government: his handfome exterior won the hearts of the Imperialists, and his perfonal virtues rendered him the idol of the Goths. Succefs crowned his undertaking; he founded the Oftrogothick kingdom of Italy, fixed his royal refidence at Ravenna, and reigned in glory three and thirty years. His dominion extended over all Italy, the island of Sicily, a part of Provence in Gaul, Rhætia now the country of the Grifons, Vindelicia now Bavaria, Noricum containing feveral countries in Germany, as Aufiria, Stiria, Carinthia, and part of Tirol, and a confiderable part of Hungary then Pannonia, and Sclavonia or that part of Illyricum which lay between Croatia, Bofnia and Servia and the Adriatick fea, and which was then called Dalmatia. "Under the aufpices of this truly great man, as undoubted monuments declare, Italy refpired, the people recovered their fpirits, commerce thrived, artifts were invigorated, literature revived, Rome was happier than it had been for ages. Ravenna rofe into fplendour, and the magnificence of Theodorick is yet feen in the remains of palaces and facred edifices. The catho licks, to their eternal difgrace, plotted to fubvert this government. In time they fucceeded, and now the city is become "one vaft folitude, magni nominis umbra, having neither trade nor mamifactures, and of courfe few handicraftsmen or artificers. The bulk of its inhabitants are idle nobles, who make the intereft of the princes of Europe, that is, the thing of all others the moft foreign to them, their moft important or indeed their only bufinefs." Thefe are the words of a modern celebrated author. What ideas of Almighty God muft thofe writers have, who pretend, he hated Ravenna when it was a paradife, because unitarians made it fo, and admires it now it is a defolate fwamp, becaufe catholicks brood over it! "King Theodorick fubfifted on his own domain, and impofed no heavy taxes on his fubjects. The people in all parts of his empire were perfectly free: the Romans lived under Roman, the Goths under Gothick law. There was no fuch being in the eye of the law as an heretick during the kingdom of the Oftrogoths. The king was an unitarian; but he never perfecuted the catholicks, as they called themfelves. They elected their own bishops, who were afterward fignified to him; and when a contefted election happened, as in the cafe of Symmachus, and an appeal was made to him, he judged the affair by their own canons, or, if they were defective, by principles of natural juftice. After the death of pope Anaftafius, two candidates, Symmachus and Laurence, ftarted for the pontifical chair. The fe nate and the clergy of Rome were divided, and each party elected and ordained its candidate. To put an end to contention, for it was neceffary to nominate the new-elect to the king, they agreed to return both, and to refer the cafe to him, which of the two had been law fully elected. Both the bishops went to Ravenna for this purpofe, and the wife and juft Theodorick, who thought both erroneous enthufiafts, neither examined their perfonal qualities, nor their notions of religion, but enquired which had the majority of votes, and which was elected first. Symmachus was on thefe grounds declared duly elected. About four years after, Feftus and Probinus, two fenators, and fome of the clergy, accufed Symmachus of maladminiftration, and fetting up Laurence again, they divided. Some communicated with Laurence, others continued with Symmachus. At length the affair broke out into open riots; it was dangerous to walk the streets. Complaint was made to the king, and a petition was prefented, befeeching him to appoint a delegate to fettle the affair at Rome. He did fo, and fent a roman catholick prelate, the bishop of Altino, to compofe the difference. from perfecuting the catholicks, he protected them, and loaded them with prefents, and even adorned their churches with rich utenfils. They fay he behaved to their pope at Rome as handfomely as if he had been a catholick, ac fi catholicus. It hath been faid, there was but one Latin philofopher in the fixth century, the celebrated Boëthius, a fenator of Rome and a privy counsellor to Theodorick, and him the king put to death. It ought to be added, that this great man was guilty of high treafon, and that the fenate condemned him. He correfponded Far the able statesman. He fent commiflioners to the court of Constantinople to remonstrate against the injuftice of the perfecution, to require liberty of confcience to be allowed, and the churches to be restored to fuch Arians as had been unjustly deprived of them, at the fame time threatening to fupprefs the catholicks under his government in cafe of refufal. The commiffioners were four fenators and fix bishops, of whom pope John I. was one, and EccleGius bishop at Ravenna another. The emperor complied: but when the commillioners returned, the king put the pope under confinement, because he had been guilty of duplicity. While he pretended to negociate for liberty, he wrote a letter, yet extant, to the catholick bishops of Italy, to inform them that both the emperour and he defired them by all means to get poffeffion of the Arian churches, and in fpite of the king to extirpate Arians root and branch. Gregory of Tours confirms this fact. A few days after he died, the king recommended Felix, and the Romans elected him to the pontificate. Theodorick de parted this life on the 13th of Auguft, in the year 526. His daughter Amalafuinth erected a monument to his memory half a mile from the city, and a porphyry vafe, faid to contain his afhes, is to this day fhewn at Ravenna. It is faftened to the wall of the castle, and under it is an honourable infcription in-marble. with the eastern emperor Juftin, and plotted to fubvert the gothick government in favour of the Greeks: but this was no fin, because the philofopher was a catholick. Symmachus his father-in-law fuffered for the fame crime. Some writers fay, in their opinion, the king was of fended with both, because they would not put Arians into their churches: but divine vengeance punished him for his cruelty, for foon after the execution, as the king was fitting at fupper, the head of a fish on the table affumed the likenefs of Symmachus, and with flaming eyes yawned at him as if threat ening to revenge his death. The king was fo terrified, he retired to his bed, and foon after expired. Saint Gregory declares he was told by a credible monk that a holy her mit, on the day Theodorick died at Ravenna, faw Symmachus and pope John lead him barefooted with his hands bound, and throw him into a burning mountain in Lipari, one of the idles of Sicily. Such vifionary tales need no refutation. The cafe was this. Two or three years before the death of Theodo rick, the emperor Juftin, animated by the intolerant catholicks, publifhed an edict against the unitarians, and the Arians in the empire were deprived of their churches. At the fame time the king was informed of the correfpondence juft now mentioned, which was carrying on in order to effect the fame purpofe in Italy, and having full proof of the guilt and ingratitude of his catholick fubjects, he punifhed the principal confpirators as their crimes deferved. It was evidently their defign to fubvert the free government of the Goths, under pretence that it was administered by Arians. Theodorick conducted his affairs with that cool dignity, which always marks the "Theodorick was a fine figure in his perfon. His manners, acquired in his childhood at the polite court of Conftantinople, were elegant and eafy, at once difplaying the dignity of his rank and the goodness of his heart. He had not a tincture of literature; it was not the fashion of the times; but he had a great fund of natural fenfe, an exquifite tafte A 3 for |