With this Act they put an End to the Sessions, and immediately dispatched Ten Deputies to acquaint the Emperor with what had passed, pursuant to his express Command. The like Number was sent by the _Arians_, who had assisted at the Council. These, traveling with great Expedition, arrived at _Constantinople_, where the Court then was, some time before the others; and, being immediately admitted to the Emperor, they prejudiced him to such a Degree against the Orthodox Party, that he would not so much as see their Deputies, pretending to be wholly taken up with the Affairs of the State. They were therefore obliged to deliver the Letter, which the Council had written on this Occasion, to one of his Ministers[893]. They expected every Day to be admitted to an Audience, or, at least, to receive an Answer, and be dismissed. [Sidenote: _who leaves_ Constantinople _without seeing them_.] But, after they had been thus kept for some time in Expectation, the Emperor all on a sudden left _Constantinople_, in order to head his Army against the _Barbarians_, who had broken into the Empire. He was no sooner gone than one of the Ministers came to acquaint them, that it was the Emperor’s Pleasure they should repair forthwith to _Adrianople_, and there wait his Return[894]. However, before he set out, he writ to the Council, giving them notice of his sudden Departure from _Constantinople_; and alleging, by way of Excuse for not having seen or heard their Deputies, the present Situation of public Affairs, which had engrossed his whole Attention, whereas, the discussing and settling of spiritual Affairs required a Mind quite free and disengaged from all worldly Cares. [Sidenote: _He endeavours to tire their Patience with Delays._] He concluded his short Letter with intreating them not to think of separating till he was at Leisure to settle, in Conjunction with them, Matters of so great Importance to the Church, and the whole Christian World[895]. The Design of the most wicked _Constantius_, as _Athanasius_ styles him[896], was to tire out the Bishops with such Delays, hoping they would, in the End, chuse rather to sign the last _Sirmian_ Confession, which he was bent upon establishing in the room of the _Nicene_, than to be long kept, as it were, in Exile, at a Distance from their Sees[897]. But this he could not compass for the present, the Bishops declaring, in their Answer to his Letter, that they could not, and hoped they never should, upon any Consideration whatsoever, depart from what they had so unanimously settled and decreed[898]. _Socrates_ writes, that the Bishops, after having waited some time in vain for the Emperor’s Answer to their Letter, left _Rimini_, and retired to their respective Sees[899]. And here he ends his Account of that Council. It were greatly to be wished, that nothing else could be said of it; but several contemporary and unexceptionable Writers, and _Hilarius_ among