empire, the attachment of the rural slave to the soil, and the change of the slave into the serf, who was as immovable as the soil, and thus, in some degree independent on the caprice and des- potism of his master. 5. The poor and unfortunate in general, above all the widows and orphans, prisoners and sick, who were so terribly neglected in heathen times, now drew the attention of the im- perial legislators. Constantino in 315 prohibited the brand- ing of criminals on the forehead, " that the human counte- nance," as he said, " formed after the image of heavenly beauty, should not be defaced." ^ He provided against the inhuman maltreatment of prisoners before their trial.^ To de- prive poor parents of all pretext for selling or exposing their children, he had them furnished with food and clothing, partly at his own expense and partly at that of the state.^ He like- wise endeavored, particularly by a law of the year 331, to pro- tect the poor against the venality and extortion of judges, ad- vocates, and tax collectors, who drained the people by their exactions." In the year 334 he ordered that widows, orphans, ' Cod. Theod. ix. 40, 1 and 2. ^ G. Theod. ix. tit. 3, de custodia reorum. Comp. later similar laws of the year 409 in 1, 1, and of 529 in the Cod. Justin, i. 4, 22. ' Comp. the two laws De alimentis qute inopes parentes de publico petere de- bent, in the Cod. Theod. xi. 27, 1 and 2. * Cod. Theod. I. tit. 7, 1. 1 : Cessent jam nunc rapaces officialium mauus, cesscnt inquam ! nam si moniti non cessaverint, gladiis praecidentur. 122 THIRD PERIOD. A.D. 311-590. the sick, and the poor should not be compelled to appear be- fore a tribunal outside their own province. Yalentinian, in 365, exempted ^vidows and orphans from the ignoble poll tax.' In 364 he intrusted the bishops with the supervision of the poor. Honorius did the same in 409. Justinian, in 529, as we have before remarked, gave the bishops the oversight of the state prisons, which they were to visit on Wednesda3's and Fridays, to bring home to the unfortunates the earnestness and comfort of religion. The same emperor issued laws against usury and inhuman severity in creditors, and secured benevolent and religious foundations by strict laws against alienation of their revenues from the original design of the founders. Several emperors and empresses took the church institutions for the poor and sick, for strangers, widows, and orphans, under their special patronage, exempted them fi-om the usual taxes, and enriched or enlai'ged them from their pri- vate funds. ^ Yet in those days, as still in ours, the private beneficence of Christian love took the lead, and the state fol- lowed at a distance, rather with ratification and patronage than with independent and original activity.^ § 21. Abolition of GUidiatorial Shows. 6. And finally, one of the greatest and most