"After a while he was constrained to act the part of mediator between the Visigothic nation and the Homan emperor ^'alens. In the year A.D. 374 the barbarous
horde of the Huns burst upon the kingdom of the Ostro- goths, and, having subdued it, turned their eyes to the lands and possessions of the Vifigoths. Unable to de- fend the line of the Dniester, the latter fell back ujion the Pnnh, hoping for safety amid the inaccessible defiles of the Carpathian mountains. But, sensible that even here they were not secure, a considerable party began to long for an asylum within the Roman dominions, and it was agreed that ambassadors, with Ulphilas among their number, should repair to the court of Ya- lens, and endeavor to obtain a new settlement.
"Valens was an Arian and a controversialist. At this very time he was enforcing at Antioch, ' by other weapons than those of reason and eloquence,' a belief in the Arian theology ; and when the poor bishop presented himself, and requested aid in the dire necessity of his people, the emperor is reported to have persecuted him with discussions on the hypostatic iniion, and to have pressed upon him the necessity of repudiaiing the Con- fession of Nice, and adopting that of Rimini, lliihilas was in a great strait, but, being a simple-minded man, and considering the (piestion one of words, and involv- ing only mcta])hysical subtleties, not worthy of consid- eration in comparison with the sufferings of his jicople, he assented to the emperor's proposal, and promised that the Gothic nation should adopt the Arian Confession. The emperor, oii his part, consented to give up certain lands in Moesia, but annexed to this concession two harsh and rigorous conditions : that before they crossed the Danube the Goths should give up their arms, and suffer their children to be taken from them as hostages for their own fidelity, with the prospect of being educated in the different provinces of Asia.
"On these hard terms instructions were issued to the militarj' governors of the Thracian diocese, bidding them make preparations for the reception of the new settlers. But it was foinid no easy matter to transport across a river more than a mile in iircadth, and swelled bj' incessant rains, upwards of a million of botli sexes and of all ages. For days and nights they passed and repassed in boats and canoes, and before they landed not a few had been carried away and drowned by the vio- lence of the current. But, besides the disciples of Ul- philas, thousands of Goths crossed the river who still contiinied faithful to their own heathen priests and priestesses. Disguising, it is even said, their priests in the garb of Christian l]ishops and fictitious ascetics, they deceived the credulous Romans; and only when on the Roman side of the river did they throw off the mask, and make it clear that Vakns was not easily to have his wish gratified, and see them converted to Arianism. One of the hereditary chiefs, Friiigern, a disciple of Ul- philas, adopted the creed of the empire, the other, Atha- naric, headed the numerous party which still continued devoted to the altars and rites of Woden. The latter faction, placing their chief god on a lofty wagon, dragged it through the (Jothic camp; all who refused to bow down, they burned, with their wives and children; nor did they spare the rude church they had erected, or the confused crowd of women and children who had fled to it for protection. But while the great bulk of the Gothic nation were involved in constant wars with the Roman armies, and, mider the two great divisions of Ostrogoths and Visigoths, were gradually spreading themselves over (;aul. Italy, and Spain, I'lphilas con- tinued, till tlie year .^88, to superintend the temporal and spiritu.al necessities of the peaceful and populous colony of shepherds and herdsmen which, as in another Goshen, he had formed on the slopes of Mount liivnuis, and to whom he had presented the (Jothic Bible in their own tongue.
"The zeal he had displayed found an imitator in the great Chrysostom. What, was the measure of bis suc- cess we have no means of judging, but it is certain that he founded in Constantinople an institution in which Goths might be trained and qualilied to ]>reach tlie (Jos- pel to their fellow-countrymen. Even during the three
MISSIOXS
349
MISSIONS
years of his banishment to the remote and wretched lit- tle town of Cucusiis, among the ridges of Mount Taurus, amid the want of provisions, frequent sickness without the possibility of obtaining medicines, and the ravages of Isaurian robbers, his active mind, invigorated by inis- firtunes, found relief not only in corresponding with churches in all quarters, but in directing missionary op- erations in Phoenicia, Persia, and among the (Joths. In several extant epistles we find him advising the de- spatch of missionaries, one to this point, another to that, consoling some under persecution, animating all by the example of the great apostle Paul, and the hope of an eternal reward. And in answer to his appeals, his friends at a distance supplied him with funds so ample that he was enabled to support missions and redeem captives, and even had to beg of them that their abundant lib- erality might be directed into other channels. How far his exertions prevailed to win over any portion of the Gothic nation to the Catholic communion we have no means of judging. Certain it is that from the West- ern Goths the Arian form of Christianity extended to the Eastern Goths, to the Gcpida;, the Alans, the Van- dals, and the Suevi; and it has been justly remarked tliat we ought not to forget ' that when Augustine, in his great work on the " city of God," celebrates the charity and clemency of Alaric during the sack of Eome, these Christian graces were entirely due to the teaching of Oriental missionaries' " (JIaclear's Missions in the JI id- die Ages, p. 37-43).