medan rule must at least be those of the narrow seas. Perhaps he is right. And yet the effect in the one case was permanent, while in the other the lessons had to be renewed again and again. But it is quite true that, as he says, "a soldier of fortune, just seated on the imperial throne, defeated the long-planned schemes of conquest of the Caliphs Wezid and Suleiman, and it is unfortunate that we have no Isaurian literature." It is well to mark that the success of 718 was followed up by later triumphs, which completed the destruction of the Saracenic terror until the caliphate passed into the hands of the Abassides. So much therefore must be credited to Leo. There were two enemies to the empire, the Slavonians of the West and the Saracens of the East. Either of these might, during the rule of one of his predecessors, have destroyed the empire. He effectually broke the power of one, and struck terror into the other.
This extraordinary man, however, was not only a victorious soldier, but also a reformer, civil and ecclesiastical. Like Napoleon, he brought common sense to bear upon an intricate and obsolete code of laws. The old Roman code, owing to the interruption of communication and other causes, had been here and there supplemented by local usages. Leo was the first emperor strong enough to prepare and issue a new manual of law, to modify and infuse new energy into the military system, and to control the administration of finance. It was by the changes and reforms of Leo that the empire was enabled, for centuries to come, to withstand and drive back the Moslems.
