The empire's extraordinary longevity rested on two pillars: authorities sincerely persuaded (and largely proved to) subjects that power was exercised on their behalf, and a tightly unified Roman-Orthodox identity that made subjects prefer their own rulers over any alternative.

209:16time. They have all of these civil wars. They're like, "Okay." Um, so I think I would give you a two-part answer, so really quickly, as to why this held together so well. First is that an extraordinary effort was made by the authorities to persuade their subjects that they were ruling on their behalf, and I think, for the most part, actually tended to do so. And the second is that it

209:45had a very tightly unified identity as Roman and as Orthodox. In other words, for the most, most time, they knew that they were surrounded by enemies who were not those things. And they did not want to live under the power of non-Romans and non-Christian people. And so those two factors combined, I think, gave everybody reason to hold it together. The alternatives were worse. - Yeah. I mean, that's a really brilliant summary, and I think we should mention

210:17that both the rhetoric and the action are important. I think you've articulated that rhetoric is really powerful, like stating over and over and over- ... that you represent the people, that you're acting on behalf of the people and doing the action. But it's not enough to actually do the action. You would think that's all Machiavelli says that's the only thing that matters. But no. It's the rhetoric actually has a lot of power- ... because it is a uniting idea-

210:42... an ideal that propagates through time, and it pacifies you. It makes you, it puts you at peace. Rhetoric is important. - I'll give you an example. As an academic administrator, right? I mean, I was chair of a department for years and years. There's a difference between a dean who says, "Sorry, bad budget situation. We're just going to have to cut your programs," on the one hand, and a dean who says,

211:13"I am fully on board with what you're trying to accomplish with these programs. I am a defender of the humanities. Unfortunately, we have this budget situation, and we're going to have to cut some of the programs. But I assure you, the moment I'm in this with you together- ... the moment we find the funds, we will restore them." Those two just rhetorical strategies, they're aiming at the same practical outcome,