of Macedonius in a way which drew his persecution on themselves, and was
remembered in their favour even in the next century by liberal men like
the historian Socrates.

CHAPTER V.

_THE VICTORY OF ARIANISM_.

[Sidenote: The West (337-350).]

Meanwhile new troubles were gathering in the West. While the Eastern
churches were distracted with the crimes or wrongs of Marcellus and
Athanasius, Europe remained at peace from the Atlantic to the frontier
of Thrace. The western frontier of Constantius was also the western
limit of the storm. Hitherto its distant echoes had been very faintly
heard in Gaul and Spain; but now the time was come for Arianism to
invade the tranquil obscurity of the West.

[Sidenote: Magnentian war, 350-353.]

Constans was not ill-disposed, and for some years ruled well and firmly.
Afterwards--it may be that his health was bad--he lived in seclusion
with his Frankish guards, and left his subjects to the oppression of
unworthy favourites. Few regretted their weak master's fate when the
army of Gaul proclaimed Magnentius Augustus (January 350). But the
memory of Constantine was still a power which could set up emperors and
pull them down. The old general Vetranio at Sirmium received the purple
from Constantine's daughter, and Nepotianus claimed it at Rome as
Constantine's nephew. The Magnentian generals scattered the gladiators
of Nepotianus, and disgraced their easy victory with slaughter and
proscription. The ancient mother of the nations never forgave the
intruder who had disturbed her queenly rest with civil war and filled
her streets with bloodshed. Meantime Constantius came up from Syria, won
over the legions of Illyricum, reduced Vetranio to a peaceful
abdication, and pushed on with augmented forces towards the Julian Alps,
there to decide the strife between Magnentius and the house of
Constantine. Both parties tried the resources of intrigue; but while
Constantius won over the Frank Silvanus from the Western camp, the
envoys of Magnentius, who sounded Athanasius, gained nothing from the
wary Greek. The decisive battle was fought near Mursa, on the Save
(September 28, 351). Both armies well sustained the honour of the Roman
name, and it was only after a frightful slaughter that the usurper was
thrown back on Aquileia. Next summer he was forced to evacuate Italy,
and in 353 his destruction was completed by a defeat in the Cottian
Alps. Magnentius fell upon his sword, and Constantius