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being treated kindly; But Blemmydes had another purpose in persuading him to accept it. For since that man, living a philosophical life, was entirely removed from worldly affairs and was dispassionate towards events, neither being partial to anyone nor indeed hostile, but his mind was such as if it were not held in a body at all, he considered Arsenios and Joseph to be one, not paying attention to the bare events themselves, so as to judge one wronged and the other an aggressor—for he considered these things to be of a base mind and one that had no higher contemplation than present affairs, but knowing God's stability and immovability, and that of men nothing in anything remains the same even for a short time. For Heraclitus rightly said that one cannot step into the same river twice, and Cratylus even more so, that not even once; since things run by like an ever-flowing stream, it was not new nor otherwise strange if Arsenios too were wronged; for the one and only necessary thing was piety; and if this were preserved, the rest was of necessity cast aside by those who chose to live properly. Joseph therefore accepted these things, although he was so disposed toward that man that he did not even come out of his cell to meet him, nor did he rise from afar when he approached, nor do anything else for his sake that smacked of flattery and pettiness. For his inclination toward philosophy and his focus on the forms and only the essentials of things made him implacable toward material things, and holding in his mind that which is desired, he overlooked that which desires. Therefore, focusing not on men but on things, for those he maintained his wonder and was exceedingly astonished and chose to honor them in a different way than the honor among men, which indeed involves greetings and meetings and servile postures and other such things in which we humans delight. And so he was thus respectful of those dispositions and greatly admired them, considering them gifts of God; 441 but toward those who possessed them, as he happened to perceive them, he behaved according to his perception, that not everything that happens happens according to God and worthily, but sometimes also according to man, with God permitting it. Thus, always turning away from such superstition, he also showed Joseph his disposition at that time, not intending to dishonor him, but choosing to have the same judgment for all. For thus he also philosophically fulfilled the role of a philosopher by not showing partiality in such a judgment, which he also judged by himself. But he, knowing that he was a man and would serve necessity, when he had arranged his own affairs, committed his will to charters—and this was that his monastery should always remain by itself, in no way whatsoever falling subject to another, and whatever benefactions he had from emperors, so that the total of the coins amounted to the number of one hundred pounds, these too, being preserved inalienably for the monastery of the Being God (for it was properly dedicated to the Being), should be for its maintenance and the replenishment of its deficiencies, and he requested that the patriarch himself should sign such a charter of ordinances and also earnestly beseeched that the emperor ratify it, upon his return to the city. And it happened thus, although, after he died, as the saying goes, when the potsherd had turned, they both withdrew the ratifications and dissolved the ordinances, so that the coins were dedicated to this great church for its maintenance, and that monastery was subordinated to the monastery of Galesios as a dependency. At any rate, the hierarch Joseph, having spent a considerable time in the east, returned to Byzantium.

3. How Maria, the daughter of Eulogia, was given in marriage to the Bulgarian emperor Constantine. And a little later, after Irene, the wife of the Bulgarian emperor Constantine, had passed away, the emperor, wishing to bring him into a treaty, so that there would be a truce in the regions around the Haemus and in Macedonia and Thrace itself, since the armies were being greatly depleted by the continuous wars, he sent an embassy, promising to give him in marriage also his own 443 niece Maria, the second of the daughters of Eulogia, to whom indeed

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φιλοφρονούμενος· τῷ δέ γε Βλεμμίδῃ καὶ ἄλλο κατὰ σκοπὸν ἦν τὸ πεῖθον ἐκεῖνον δέχεσθαι. Ἐπειδὴ γὰρ ἐκεῖνος, φιλόσοφον διαζῶν βίον, ὅλος τῶν ὧδε ἐξῄρητο καὶ ἀπαθῶς εἶχε πρὸς τὰ γινόμενα, οὔτε τινὶ προσπαθῶν οὔτε μὴν ἐμπαθῶν, ἀλλ' ἦν ὁ νοῦς ἐκείνῳ ὡς εἰ μὴ σώματι ὅλως κατείχετο, ἓν ἐλογίζετο καὶ Ἀρσένιον εἶναι καὶ Ἰωσήφ, οὐ γυμνοῖς αὐτοῖς προσέχων τοῖς γιγνομένοις, ὡς τὸν μὲν κρίνειν ἀδικηθέντα, τὸν δ' ἐπιβήτοραταῦτα γὰρ χαμερποῦς τινος διανοίας καὶ μηδὲν ἐχούσης τῶν παρόντων πλέον εἰς θεωρίαν ἡγεῖτο, ἀλλ' εἰδὼς Θεοῦ μὲν τὸ εὐσταθὲς καὶ ἀκίνητον, ἀνθρώπων δὲ τὸ μηδὲν ἐν μηδενὶ ἐπὶ τοῦ αὐτοῦ κἂν βραχὺ μένειν. Εὖ γὰρ καὶ Ἡρακλείτῳ εἰρῆσθαι τὸ μὴ ἐπὶ τοῦ αὐτοῦ εἶναι δὶς βάπτειν, καὶ Κρατύλῳ μᾶλλον ὡς μηδὲ ἅπαξ· τῶν πραγμάτων δίκην ἀείρρου ῥεύματος παρατρεχόντων, μὴ καινὸν εἶναι μηδ' ἄλλως ξένον, εἰ καὶ Ἀρσένιος ἀδικοῖτο· τὸ γὰρ ἀναγκαῖον ἓν εἶναι καὶ μόνον τὸ εὐσεβές· τούτου δὲ τηρουμένου, τἆλλ' ἀπερρῖφθαι ἀνάγκῃ τοῖς αἱρουμένοις ζῆν κατὰ τρόπον. Ταῦτ' ἄρα καὶ Ἰωσὴφ ἐδέχετο, καίτοι πρὸς ἐκεῖνον οὕτως ἔχων ὡς μηδὲ τῆς κέλλης ἐξελθὼν προϋπαντῆσαι, ἀλλὰ μηδὲ προσιόντι προεξαναστῆ ναι μακρόθεν, μηδ' ἄλλο τι τῶν εἰς θωπείαν καὶ σμικροπρέπειαν εἰς χάριν αὐτῷ διαπράξασθαι. Τὸ γὰρ πρὸς φιλοσοφίαν ἐπικλινὲς καὶ τὸ πρὸς τὰ εἴδη καὶ μόνα τῶν πραγμάτων ἐπιβλητικὸν ἀμείλικτον ἐκεῖνον ἐτίθει τὰ πρὸς τὴν ὕλην, καὶ τὸ ἐφετὸν κατὰ νοῦν ἔχων παρεώρα τὸ ἐφιέμενον. Ὅθεν οὐκ ἀνθρώποις, ἀλλὰ πράγμασιν ἐπιβάλλων, ἐκείνοις μὲν ἐτήρει τὸ θαῦμα καὶ ὑπερεξεπλήττετο καὶ ἄλλως τιμᾶν ᾑρεῖτο ἢ τὴν κατ' ἀνθρώπους τιμήν, ἣ δὴ δεξιώσεις ἔχει καὶ προϋπαντήσεις καὶ δουλοπρεπεῖς καταστάσεις καὶ ἄλλ' ἄττα οἷς δὴ χαίρομεν ἄνθρωποι. Καὶ ταῖς μὲν ἕξεσιν ἐκείναις οὕτω δὴ τιμητικῶς εἶχε καὶ ὑπερεθαύμαζε, δῶρα Θεοῦ ταύτας ἡγούμενος· 441 τοῖς δ' ἔχουσι, καθὼς ἂν καὶ κατελάμβανεν, εἶχεν, ὡς οὐ παντὸς γινομένου τοῦ γινομένου κατὰ Θεὸν καὶ ἀξίως, ἀλλ' ἐνίοτε καὶ κατ' ἄνθρωπον, παρα χωροῦντος Θεοῦ. Τὴν γοῦν τοιαύτην δεισιδαιμονίαν ἀεί ποτ' ἀποτρεπόμενος, ἔδειξε καὶ τῷ Ἰωσὴφ τότε τὴν ἕξιν, οὐ προθέμενος αὐτὸν ἀτιμοῦν, ἀλλ' ἐπ' ἴσων πᾶσι τὴν κρίσιν ἔχειν αἱρούμενος. Οὕτω γὰρ καὶ τὸ φιλόσοφον φιλοσό φως ἐπλήρου τῷ μὴ λαμβάνειν πρόσωπα εἰς τὴν τοιαύτην κρίσιν, ἣν καὶ καθ' αὑτὸν κέκρικε. Πλὴν κἀκεῖνος εἰδὼς ἄνθρωπος ὢν καὶ τῷ χρεὼν λειτουργήσων, ἐπεί, τὰ καθ' αὑτὸν διαθέμενος, χάρταις ἐδίδου τὸ βούληματὸ δ' ἦν καθ' αὑτὴν τὴν μονὴν ἀεί ποτε διαμένειν, μηδὲν κατὰ μηδένα τρόπον ὑποπεσοῦσαν ἑτέρᾳ, καὶ ἅπερ εἶχεν ἐκ βασιλέων φιλοφρονήματα, ὡς συμποσοῦσθαι τὸ πᾶν τῶν νομισμάτων εἰς ἑκατὸν λιτρῶν ἀριθμόν, καὶ αὐτὰ τῇ μονῇ τοῦ Ὄντος Θεοῦ (τῷ γὰρ Ὄντι κυρίως καὶ προσανέκειτο), ἀναφαίρετα διατηρηθέντα, εἰς περιποίησίν τε καὶ τὴν τῶν ἐλλειμμάτων ἀποπλήρωσιν εἶναι, τὸν δὴ τοιοῦτον τῶν διατεταγμένων χάρτην καὶ αὐτὸν ἠξίου τὸν πατριάρχην ὑποσημαίνεσθαι καί γε βασιλέα ἐπικυροῦν λιπαρῶς ἀξιῶσαι, πρὸς τὴν πόλιν ἐπανελθόντα. Καὶ γέγονεν οὕτω, κἄν, ἀποθανόντος ἐκείνου, ὀστράκου φασὶ μεταπεσόντος, ἀνελάμβανόν τε τὰς ἐπικυρώσεις καὶ τὰ διατεταγμένα διέλυον, ὡς τὰ μὲν νομίσματα τῇ μεγάλῃ ταυτηῒ ἐκκλησίᾳ προσανατεθῆναι εἰς περιποίησιν, τὴν δὲ μονὴν ἐκείνην τῇ τοῦ Γαλησίου μονῇ ὑποτεθῆναι εἰς μετόχιον. Ὁ γοῦν ἱεράρχης Ἰωσήφ, τῇ ἀνατολῇ ἐφ' ἱκανὸν διατρίψας, ὑπέστρεφεν εἰς Βυζάντιον.

γʹ. Ὅπως τῷ Βουλγάρων βασιλεῖ Κωνσταντίνῳ ἡ τῆς Εὐλογίας θυγάτηρ Μαρία εἰς γάμον ἐξεδόθη. Καὶ μετὰ μικρόν, τῆς τοῦ βασιλέως Βουλγάρων Κωνσταντίνου συζύγου Εἰρήνης μεταλλαξάσης, εἰς σπονδὰς ὁ κρατῶν ἐκεῖνον θέλων συνάξαι, ἐς ὃ τοῖς κατὰ τὸν Αἷμον καὶ αὐτῇ γε Μακεδονίᾳ καὶ Θρᾴκῃ ἀνακωχὴν γενέσθαι, ἐπὶ πολὺ δαπανωμένων τῶν στρατευμάτων τοῖς συνεχέσι πολέμοις, πέμψας διαπρεσβεύεται, ὑπισχνούμενος εἰς κῆδος ἐκείνῳ δοῦναι καὶ τὴν 443 ἀδελφιδῆν ἑαυτοῦ Μαρίαν, τὴν τῶν θυγατέρων τῆς Εὐλογίας δευτέραν, ᾗ δὴ