A zealous monk, Eutyches, superior of a monastery near Constantinople, while combating the heresy of Nestorius, fell into the opposite error, alike contrary to orthodox teaching. Instead of respecting the letter of the dogma, he in his turn became a schismatic, as he maintained that there was only one nature in Jesus Christ--the divine; that this had absorbed the human nature as the ocean absorbs a drop of water. Condemned at Constantinople, he appealed from the sentence to another council assembled at Ephesus, the decrees of which were confirmed by Theodosius II. At the accession of Justinian, the orthodox religion regained all its authority; Eutychianism no longer dared to attack it, but Arianism extended even into Gaul in the track of the victorious armies of Theodoric, Egidius, Odoacer, Totila, and the long-haired kings. The reign of Leo the Isaurian opened up fresh opportunities for error. The sacred images, which had been held in veneration from the earliest ages, became a cause of dispute in the East, where they were disapproved of by Mahomet and forbidden by the Koran. It was alleged that the figurative representation of human beings was subjected to certain astral and diabolical influences, and that it was contrary to religion, not to say sacrilegious, thus to disturb the quiet repose of their souls. Leo the Isaurian, who had imbibed this idea, which was, moreover, taught in oriental magic, issued against all kinds of images the celebrated edict which was excommunicated by the pope, and which convulsed the whole Eastern world. Luitprand, King of the Lombards, the Venetians, Charles Martel and his Franks, were summoned to the aid of the Eternal City, menaced by the forces of the empire, which was determined to impose the condemnation of images upon the Western Church. Charles Martel, by his overthrow of the victorious Saracens on the plains of Poitiers (732), rendered a service of inestimable value to the Christian religion as well as to France, for Islamism was upon the point of subjugating all Christian Europe. [Illustration: Fig. 309.--Amaury’s Disciples burnt by order of Philip Augustus (1208).--Fac-simile of a Miniature in the “Chroniques de St. Denis” (Manuscript of the Fourteenth Century).--Burgundian Library, Brussels.] [Illustration: Fig. 310.--Episode in the Siege of Toulouse, representing, according to tradition, the death of Simon de Montfort, who was killed on the 25th of June, 1218.--Bas-relief in stone in the Church of St. Nazaire, in Carcassonne (Thirteenth Century).]