What was the relation between the Two Powers conceived in the mind of Justinian, expressed in his legislation, carried out in his conduct, whether to the Roman Primate or the patriarchs of Alexandria, Antioch, Jerusalem, and Constantinople in his own eastern empire, or to the whole Church when assembled in council, as at Constantinople in 553? Was he merely carrying on as emperor a relation which he had inherited from so many predecessors, beginning with Constantine, or did he by his own laws and conduct alter an equilibrium before existing, and impair a definite and lawful union by transgressing the boundaries which made it the co-operation of Two Powers. If we look back just a hundred years before his _Digest_ appeared, we find, in the great deed[154] in which the emperors Theodosius II. and Valentinian III. convoked the Council of Ephesus, the charge which they considered to be laid upon the imperial power to maintain that union of the natural and the spiritual government on which, as on a joint foundation, the Roman State, in the judgment of its rulers, was itself built. Some of the words they use are: "We are the ministers of Providence for the advancement of the commonwealth, while, inasmuch as we represent the whole body of our subjects, we protect them at once in a right belief and in a civil polity corresponding with it". This first and all-embracing principle of protecting all and every power which existed in the commonwealth, and maintaining it in due position, was most firmly held by Justinian. As to his own imperial authority and the basis on which it rested, he says: "Ever bearing in mind whatever regards the advantage and the honour of the commonwealth which God has entrusted to our hands, we seek to bring it to effect".[155] As to the Two Powers themselves, he recognises them thus: "The greatest gifts of God to men bestowed by the divine mercy are the priesthood and the empire; the former ministering in divine things, the latter presiding over human things, and exerting its diligence therein. Both, proceeding from one and the same principle, are the ornament of human life. Therefore nothing will be so great a care to emperors as the upright conduct of bishops, for, indeed, bishops are ever supplicating God for emperors. But if what concerns them be entirely blameless and full of confidence in God, and if the imperial power rightly and duly adorn the commonwealth entrusted to it, an admirable agreement will ensue, conferring on the human race all that is for its good. We then bear the greatest solicitude for the genuine divine doctrine, and for the upright conduct of bishops, which we trust, when that doctrine is maintained, because through it we shall obtain the greatest gifts from God,[156] shall be secure in the possession of those which we have, and shall acquire those which have not yet come. But all will be done well and fittingly if the beginning from which it springs be becoming and dear to God.