Lest there be any doubt about the class loyalties of the Met:
As the burden of service and taxation fell increasingly on the humiliates, they sought relief either by fleeing from the land or by finding solace in the promise of religion. But while we might feel sympathy for the plight of the average Roman in the third century A.D., it was the rich, educated, and highly cultivated honestiores who effectively preserved classical civilization and bequeathed it to the medieval and modern worlds.
No harm, no foul then, right?