the old tradition of Roman superiority could resume its wonted sway.  It soon appeared that the Goths could do nothing with their victory, and sooner or later would have to make their peace with Rome.  Theodosius drove them inland in the first campaign; and while he lay sick at Thessalonica in the second, Gratian or his generals received the submission of the Ostrogoths.  Fritigern died the same year, and his old rival Athanaric was a fugitive before it ended.  When the returning Ostrogoths dislodged him from his Transylvanian forest, he was welcomed with honourable courtesy by Theodosius in person at Constantinople.  But the old enemy of Rome and Christianity had only come to lay his bones on Roman soil.  In another fortnight the barbarian chief was carried out with kingly splendour to his Roman funeral.  Theodosius had nobly won Athanaric’s inheritance.  His wondering Goths at once took service with their conqueror:  chief after chief submitted, and the work of peace was completed on the Danube in the autumn of 382.

[Sidenote:  Baptism of Theodosius.]

We can now return to ecclesiastical affairs.  The dangerous illness of Theodosius in 380 had important consequences, for his baptism by Ascholius of Thessalonica was the natural signal for a more decided policy.  Ascholius was a zealous Nicene, so that Theodosius was committed to the Nicene side as effectually as Valens had been to the Homoean; and Theodosius was less afraid of strong measures than Valens.  His first rescript (Feb. 27, 380) commands all men to follow the Nicene doctrine ’committed by the apostle Peter to the Romans, and now professed by Damasus of Rome and Peter of Alexandria,’ and plainly threatens to impose temporal punishments on the heretics.  Here it will be seen that Theodosius abandons Constantine’s test of orthodoxy by subscription to a creed.  It seemed easier now, and more in the spirit of Latin Christianity, to require communion with certain churches.  The choice of Rome is natural, the addition of Alexandria shows that the Emperor was still a stranger to the mysteries of Eastern partizanship.

[Sidenote:  Suppression of Arian worship inside cities.]

There was no reason for delay when the worst dangers of the Gothic war were over.  Theodosius made his formal entry into Constantinople, November 24, 380, and at once required the bishop either to accept the Nicene faith or to leave the city.  Demophilus honourably refused to give up his heresy, and adjourned his services to the suburbs.  So ended the forty years of Arian domination in Constantinople.  But the mob was still Arian, and their stormy demonstrations when the cathedral of the Twelve Apostles was given up to Gregory of Nazianzus were enough to make Theodosius waver.  Arian influence was still strong at court, and Arian bishops came flocking to Constantinople.  Low as they had fallen, they could still count among them the great name of Ulfilas.  But he could give them little help, for though the Goths of Moesia