Letter 7: Theodore Studite, Letter 7; Greek heading: Εἰρήνῃ βασιλίσσῃ.

A voice, he says, was heard in Ramah [a quotation of Jeremiah, here called the most God-beholding Jeremiah], lamentation and much mourning, Rachel then weeping for her children. But the present circumstances—of what kind and how great are they? From where, just yesterday, O our all-good mistress, did there appear angels of your sacred palace, and, sounding into our ears all the praises of your deeds now accomplished, make both our ears truly ring? What, then, is the cause? That you have raised up a signal of so great a piety to the ends of the earth. And behold, there come to you from every side, like clouds flying, supplications in great multitude, glorifying God for your auspicious accomplishments. Tell us, O mistress, who it was that mounted your most pure mind upon the heights of the conceptions of truth, so that, as from some lofty and elevated watchtower, you looked down upon such things as are pleasing to God and holy. Teach us from where so great a love of piety descended upon you, so that you fittingly were insatiable for the things pleasing to God, and drove beyond all measure of sparing in the soulful and bodily, most beneficial forethought on behalf of the Christians. Or was it because, thinking much upon divine things and yearning with a mother's love, you considered it not sufficient only to ransom your people by aid from above, as from a kind of Egyptian slavery—that is to say, from the impious faith—unless you should add the present grace as a kind of crowning summit of the virtues, alongside the foregoing good deeds which had shone forth for you in manifold ways like stars? Holy, holy, holy. The heaven above rejoiced; let us, together with the most sacred-voiced Isaiah, cry aloud—though it be a bold thing—that God has had mercy on his people through you. Indeed your whole kingdom has been filled with joy and exultation, because the lawless yoke that lay upon it has been taken away, and the rod that lay upon the neck of such a dominion. Who has heard such things? Come, tell us, O men; and who has seen under any other kingdom so great a right achievement? Praise her, all you peoples; magnify her together with us, both rulers and ruled, priests and monks and the whole Christian race. For it is wonderful not only that the remission of so many talents of gold has taken place—though that be unsurpassable—but that also a manifold source of injustice has, in this same matter, been most holily cut away together with it. There has been removed from our midst a tangle of violent and soul-destroying exactions, which had escaped the notice of all who came before you, even though some of them reigned piously; for this was reserved for you. There has ceased the swearing of oaths, the multiplying of oaths—or rather the false-swearing—on the part both of those who demanded and of those from whom payment was demanded, both of them consequently perishing thereby: the one trying to conceal what he could, the other extorting because he reckoned the other had hidden too much. There has ceased the oppression of those hard-pressed, and the anxious contrivings of the poor, who sought not so much to find a protective remedy for their poverty (for then the grievance would have been less), but rather to pay off to the tax-collectors that incongruous burden which had somehow stolen in from above like the offspring of sin. No longer are the roads taxed, neither those by land nor those by sea. These things are an answering echo to what was said by the great and holy Chrysostom: no longer are unjust exactions levied in silver from the people of the mainland along the narrow ways by those who sit upon them like some wild demon or untamable beast, gorging itself in every way upon the burden of the poor wayfarer; nor again do the destitute remain at home through fear of such shameful gains, reaching neither the places in the city nor those by the sea; for everywhere the reefs of injustice stood ready. No longer are the sailors who set out and sail down from the east and the west and the north choked, as though from the throat at the narrow straits, in paying over what is taxed. Released are those who practice the hunter's trade, taking it up lightly, O Irene of sacred soul. The fisherman who has perhaps drawn up three fish—and this only after toiling much through the whole day—does not pay over the one. The archer or the fowler, who has hunted perhaps a few birds, from which comes his necessary food, may live well, remaining free of any levy. The soldiers' wives, having their own grief at the loss of their husbands, will not bitterly bewail the pitiable and inhuman exaction demanded on account of the one who has died. And I pass over the swineherds, the sheep-dealers, the wine-sellers; I forbear to mention the butchers, the weavers, the coppersmiths, the leather-cutters, the dyers, and the spice-sellers and master-builders, and, to speak in sum, every trade that is observed in the working of gold, in carpentry, and in every other material. That I may not pay out a long discourse in such detailed enumeration, O all-admirable mistress, they all clapped with their hands and rejoiced with an exceedingly great joy, having said those words: I will bless you, Lord, because you have had mercy on me and have become my salvation; therefore I shall be confident in my God-given kingdom. All these things are full of praise and hymning, O Irene, friend of Christ, sweet both as a thing and as a name. These things will be spread abroad not only within the dominion of your kingdom, but even to the ends of the inhabited world, and foreign nations will hear and will marvel and will be struck with awe at the success of your wise undertakings; for even enemies, he says, stand in awe of men's virtue, as the far-resounding one among the theologians [Gregory the Theologian] declares. Thus is your royal estate kept unbreakable; thus do your subjects yield and obey you gladly; by this you serve the divine, by this you gladden the elect angels of God, and indeed also those who conduct their lives in holiness and righteousness, O Irene, named by God. In these things your piety shines forth; in these every mouth and every tongue is opened to your praise; this truly is the glory of the Church, this the seal of the ancestral and God-inspired orthodoxy of the Christians that has been secured for you, O vindicator of God and champion of the truth—so great are your advances in the virtues. How great and praiseworthy are your wages, how abundant and surpassing your recompense from the God of all. For great indeed is even the saving of one (for how could it not be? since, as the divine Scripture says, he who brings forth the worthy from the unworthy shall be as my mouth), but to save so many souls and the whole of the people—how is this not great and venerable and truly worthy of the great gift from above? You, therefore, the truly great and effectual name, have entered into the royal palace together with all that is good; and may you leave the remnants of righteousness enduring for ever.