There were, then, some of the Greek emperors who tried to put down the superstitious regard for images; and they were the more set on this because the Mahometans, who abhorred images, reproached the Christians for using them. These emperors, wishing to do away with the grounds for such reproaches, caused the figures of stone or metal to be broken, and the sacred pictures to be smeared over; and they persecuted very cruelly those who were foremost in defending them. Then came other emperors who were in favour of images; or widowed empresses, who governed during the boyhood of their sons, and took up the cause of images with great zeal; and thus the friends and the enemies of images succeeded each other by turns on the throne, so that the battle was fought, backwards and forwards, for a long time, until at length an agreement was come to which has ever since continued in the Greek Church. By this agreement, it was settled that the figures made by carving in stone or wood, or by casting metal into a mould, should be forbidden, but that the use of religious pictures (which were also called by the name of images) should be allowed. Hence it is said that the Greeks may not worship anything of which one can take the tip of the nose between his finger and his thumb. But in the Latin Church the carved or molten images are still allowed; and among the poorer and less educated people there is a great deal of superstition connected with them. CHAPTER II. THE CHURCH IN ENGLAND. A.D. 604-734.