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| Second Exile of St. Athanasius.--Ordination and Death of Gregorius.
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Chapter III.—Second Exile of St. Athanasius.—Ordination
and Death of Gregorius.
With these and similar arguments, the bishops assailed the weak-minded
emperor, and persuaded him to expel Athanasius from his church. But
Athanasius obtained timely intimation of their design, and departed to
the west.456
| 456 Easter, a.d. 340. The condemnation was
confirmed at the Council of Antioch, a.d.
341. | The friends of Eusebius had sent
false accusations against him to Julius, who was then bishop of Rome457
| 457 They
were met by a deputation of Athanasians, bringing the encyclical of the
Egyptian Bishops in favour of the accused. Apol. Cont. Ar.
§3. | . In obedience to the laws of the church,
Julius summoned the accusers and the accused to Rome, that the cause
might be tried458
| 458 On
the bearing of these communications with Rome on the question of Papal
jurisdiction, vide Salmon, Infallibility of the Church, p. 405.
Cf. Wladimir Guettée, Histoire de l’Eglise, III. p.
112. | . Athanasius, accordingly, set out
for Rome, but the calumniators refused to go because they saw that
their falsehood would easily be detected459
.
But perceiving that the flock of Athanasius was left without a pastor,
they appointed over it a wolf instead of a shepherd. Gregorius, for
this was his name, surpassed the wild beasts in his deeds of cruelty
towards the flock: but at the expiration of six years he was destroyed
by the sheep themselves. Athanasius went to Constans (Constantine, the
eldest brother, having fallen in battle), and complained of the plots
laid against him by the Arians, and of their opposition to the
apostolical faith460
| 460 For
the violent resentment of the Alexandrian Church at the obtrusion of
Gregorius, an Ultra-Arian, and apparently an illustration of the old
proverb of the three bad Kappas, “Καππάδοκες, Κρῆτες, Κίλικες, τρία κάππα
κάκιστα,” for he was a Cappadocian—vide Ath. Encyc. 3,
4, Hist. Ar. 10. The sequence of events is not without
difficulty, and our author gives here little help. Athanasius was in
Alexandria in the spring of 340, when Gregorius made his entry, and
started for Rome at or about Easter. Constantine II. was defeated and
slain by the troops of his brother Constans, in the neighbourhood of
Aquileia, and his corpse found in the river Alsa, in April, 340.
Athanasius remained at Rome till the summer of 343, when he was
summoned to Milan by Constans (Ap. ad Const. 3, 4).
Results of his visit to
Rome were the adherence of Latin Christianity to the orthodox opinion
(Cf. Milman, Hist. of Lat. Christianity, vol. i. p. 78), and the
introduction of Monachism into the West. Vide Robertson’s Ch.
Hist. ii. 6. | . He reminded him of
his father, and how he attended in person the great and famous council
which he had summoned; how he was present at its debates, took part in
framing its decrees, and confirmed them by law. The emperor was moved
to emulation by his father’s zeal, and promptly wrote to his
brother, exhorting him to preserve inviolate the religion of their
father, which they had inherited; “for,” he urged,
“by piety he made his empire great, destroyed the tyrants of
Rome, and subjugated the foreign nations on every side.”
Constantius was led by this letter to summon the bishops from the east
and from the west to Sardica461
| 461 Now
Sophia, in Bulgaria. The centre of Mœsia was called Dacia
Cis-Danubiana, when the tract conquered by Trajan was
abandoned. | , a city of
Illyricum, and the metropolis of Dacia, that they might deliberate on
the means of removing the other troubles of the church, which were many and
pressing.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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