But not every Byzantine was an image worshiper. The hardy mountaineers from Isauria and other parts of Asia Minor still held to the Puritan-like thoughts of their ancestors. They hated images. Then an Isaurian general seized the throne. In addition to hating images, he realized that image worship greatly increased the power of the monks and priests who were now just about as strong as the emperor. Because they hated images, and also to break the power of the church party, he and his son and the other emperors who followed ordered every image to be torn down and many of them destroyed. Then they abolished many monasteries. In some cases they made the monks and nuns parade hand in hand before howling crowds in the Hippodrome, forcing them to choose between marriage or torture and death. These Iconoclast emperors were supported by the soldiers (most of whom were also image breakers; and all wanted a chance to loot church treasures) and by much of Asia Minor. But the monks would not give in, many of them suffering martyrdom first, and _they_ were supported by the people; by the superstitious sailors of the fleet; by all the women; and by many of the empresses who were as stubborn as the monks. Saint Theodora, for instance, although her husband was a strong Iconoclast, never gave up image worship in private and she taught her daughters and granddaughters to do the same. When she was surprised by a dwarf who told the emperor, she said that the figures they were praying to were really dolls and that she was playing with her grandchildren. But later she had the dwarf beaten for good measure. With opposition like that, the Iconoclasts could not hope to win, and in the end they compromised. The images were restored, but they were to be placed high and out of reach. Worshipers could look at them or reverence them, but they could not kiss them or touch them. [Illustration: Men pulling down statue] It was at this time, and probably because harmony now reigned, that the Byzantine church at last felt powerful enough not only to take care of its own peoples’ religion, but to set out to convert their heathen neighbors. Particularly their Slavic neighbors! Many of these still worshiped pagan gods 800 years after Christ. It was Michael the Drunkard, a much better emperor than the name seems to indicate, who ended the Iconoclast controversy. And it was the same Michael who sent out Saint Cyril and Saint Methodius to do their work. They were the most famous missionaries eastern Europe had ever seen. They prepared themselves like generals going into battle, and in a way they were like generals. They carefully restudied the Slavic languages, for since they were from a part of the empire where there were many Slavs, they already knew some Slavic languages. They learned all about Slavic culture and Slavic history. Finally they invented what is known today as the Cyrillic alphabet, which is still used in much of the Slavic world.