at can we say of so
great a man, who has been through so many perils and afflictions, and
who returns to you having been declared innocent by the judgment of
the whole Synod? Receive, therefore, beloved, with all joy and glory
to God, your Bishop Athanasius."

Never had Alexandria seen such rejoicings. The people thronged forth
from the city to meet their exiled Patriarch, singing hymns of
rejoicing, waving branches of trees and throwing rich carpets upon the
road along which he was to pass. Every little hill was crowded with
people thirsting for a sight of that beloved face and figure. It was
six years since they had seen him, and what had they not suffered
during his absence?

As for Athanasius, his one thought, as usual, was to establish his
people in the Faith. Those who had been led astray by the Arians were
pardoned and received with the greatest charity. The weak ones who had
given in through fear were strengthened with tender forbearance. Those
who had been Athanasius' enemies were greeted as friends on their
first sign of repentance. For the time, the Arians were defeated; they
could do nothing. Constans was too strong for them.

The present moment was the Patriarch's, and he determined to use it to
the full. The Bishops of Egypt gathered around him; widows and orphans
were provided for, the poor housed and fed and the faithful warned
against false doctrines. The churches were not large enough to hold
the crowds that flocked to them. It was a time of peace which God
vouchsafed to His people to strengthen them for the coming storm.

New Bishops were consecrated, men of holy life who could be trusted.
Even the monks in their distant monasteries received inspiring letters
from their Patriarch, stirring them up to realize the ideals of the
spiritual life and to pray for the peace of the Church. For in the
midst of all his labors Athanasius still found time to write--letters
against the Arians, treatises in defense of the Faith and on the
religious life, brilliant, strong and convincing. It was necessary to
be vigilant, for the Arians were everywhere trying to seduce men by
their false doctrines, teaching that Christ was not God. Letters from
Athanasius were a powerful weapon in defense of the truth.

So the years passed in incessant prayer and labor, until the whole of
Egypt was strong and steadfast in the Faith. "The Saints of the fourth
century were giants," says a modern writer, "but he of Alexandria was
t