ny churches, the Arians and Homoousians, who
had renounced each other's communion, continued for some time to join in
prayer. Philostorgius, l. iii. c. 14.]

I. The Roman pontiff, as long as he maintained his station and his
principles, was guarded by the warm attachment of a great people; and
could reject with scorn the prayers, the menaces, and the oblations of
an heretical prince. When the eunuchs had secretly pronounced the exile
of Liberius, the well-grounded apprehension of a tumult engaged them to
use the utmost precautions in the execution of the sentence. The capital
was invested on every side, and the praefect was commanded to seize the
person of the bishop, either by stratagem or by open force. The order
was obeyed, and Liberius, with the greatest difficulty, at the hour of
midnight, was swiftly conveyed beyond the reach of the Roman people,
before their consternation was turned into rage. As soon as they were
informed of his banishment into Thrace, a general assembly was convened,
and the clergy of Rome bound themselves, by a public and solemn oath,
never to desert their bishop, never to acknowledge the usurper Faelix;
who, by the influence of the eunuchs, had been irregularly chosen and
consecrated within the walls of a profane palace. At the end of two
years, their pious obstinacy subsisted entire and unshaken; and
when Constantius visited Rome, he was assailed by the importunate
solicitations of a people, who had preserved, as the last remnant
of their ancient freedom, the right of treating their sovereign with
familiar insolence. The wives of many of the senators and most honorable
citizens, after pressing their husbands to intercede in favor of
Liberius, were advised to undertake a commission, which in their hands
would be less dangerous, and might prove more successful. The emperor
received with politeness these female deputies, whose wealth and dignity
were displayed in the magnificence of their dress and ornaments: he
admired their inflexible resolution of following their beloved pastor
to the most distant regions of the earth; and consented that the two
bishops, Liberius and Faelix, should govern in peace their respective
congregations. But the ideas of toleration were so repugnant to the
practice, and even to the sentiments, of those times, that when the
answer of Constantius was publicly read in the Circus of Rome, so
reasonable a project of accommodation was rejected with contempt and
ridicule. T