51. Q. What are we told as to the kind of life she led? A. That she embraced a life of celibacy, renounced all vanity in dress, interrupted by frequent fasts her simple and frugal diet, and devoted several hours of the day and night to the exercises of prayer and psalmody. 52. Q. How did her brother Theodosius, who was the nominal emperor, spend his time? A. His days in riding and hunting, and his evenings in modeling and copying sacred books. 53. Q. How long did Pulcheria continue to reign? A. For nearly forty years. 54. Q. What is said of the condition of Hellenism in the meantime? A. It continued to wither in Hellas, while the modern began to spread and strengthen itself in Constantinople. 55. Q. What is said of Hellenic literature from this time onward? A. It produced none of those works by which the memory of nations is honored and perpetuated. 56. Q. To what is its intellectual decline mainly due? A. To the incursions of the barbarians, by which society was shaken to its very foundations, and the genius and enterprise of the nation almost paralyzed. 57. Q. Under what leader did the Huns ravage without restraint and without mercy the suburbs of Constantinople and the provinces of Thrace and Macedonia? A. Attila, called the “Scourge of God.” 58. Q. With the dethronement of what emperor did all political relations between Rome and the Eastern Empire cease? A. Romulus Augustulus in 476. 59. Q. How did the emperors of the East continue to be styled? A. They continued to be styled emperors of the Romans, but legislation, government, and customs became thoroughly Hellenized. 60. Q. What was the mainspring of the success in life of Justinian who became emperor in 527? A. An unrestrained desire for great deeds and his wonderful good fortune in the choice of ministers. 61. Q. What military victories glorified the early years of his reign? A. Splendid victories over the Persians. 62. Q. What general began his career in this war? A. Belisarius, the general who imparted such eminent distinction to the reign of Justinian. 63. Q. What were Justinian’s most glorious and useful memorials? A. The composition of the celebrated collection of laws comprising the Institutes, the Digest or Pandects, and the Code. 64. Q. To whom was the work entrusted? A. To ten law-teachers, over whom the famous Tribonian presided. 65. Q. What are of special importance as among other memorable events which signalized the reign of Justinian? A. The successful wars which he waged against the Vandals in Africa and the Goths in Italy, and his expeditions to Sicily and Spain. 66. Q. Among the many edifices erected during the reign of Justinian which is the most famous? A. That of St. Sophia. 67. Q. To what epoch does the reign of Justinian partly belong? A. To the Roman epoch of the Eastern Empire. 68. Q. What does the reign of Heraklius from 610 to 641 form? A. An integral part of mediæval Hellenism.