He was a more polished scholar than Hilary, and a more devout Christian than Damasus. Hence it was that his energy and skill contributed largely to the success of the Nicene orthodoxy in the West. Those times were troublous, and a cheerful and sunshiny temper like that of Ambrose was a vast auxiliary to the cause. He had been consecrated in 374, eight days after his election; and in 382 he presided at the synod in Aquileia which deposed Palladius and Secundianus, the Arian bishops. By so doing, and by his general attitude, he incurred the anger of Justina, whose son, the younger Valentinian, he always upheld and shielded. The Empress, however, determined to deal with him a good deal as Ahab’s wife dealt with Elijah. This comparison takes additional point from the use which Ambrose himself made of the story of Naboth in his defence of the Portian Church. He had already encountered the smouldering idolatry of old Rome, headed by the rhetorician, Symmachus; but the eloquence of Ambrose had borne down all opposition and that conflict was now at an end. A vindictive woman was, however, a greater danger than a clever orator, and he found this true when Justina, the Empress-mother, allied herself with the heretical Arians. His pious zeal was kindled in a moment. Give up churches to such a schismatic set as these? _Never!_ It was at Easter in the year 386 that the Portian Church and its holy vessels were demanded for the use of the other party. Then stood up both the old Roman and the new Christian in the single person of the Bishop of Milan. He compared the demand to that of Ahab for Naboth’s vineyard; and it may well be supposed that with the rush of such a torrent of speech a current of inference was also borne along which involved Justina herself. The sermon, which has survived to us, was preached on Palm Sunday, and in it he said that he would hold every religious edifice against heresy to the very death. Let them take his property; let them depose or destroy himself; let them do their worst—but for his part he would stand there unshaken for the truth. He would not incite riot and confusion, but he would not yield. It was the anticipation of Luther’s “_Hier stehe ich, ich kann nicht anders! Gott helfe mir!_” For Ambrose proclaimed, almost in these actual words, “Here I stand, I cannot do otherwise. God help me!” He made one magnificent point in this discourse—the focal centre it was of the entire outburst of eloquent declamation. It was when he quoted what our Lord Himself had said. “Yes,” cries Ambrose, “give to Caesar what is Caesar’s, but give to God what is God’s. Is the Church the property of Caesar? Never! It belongs unalterably to God. For God, then, it shall be kept. It shall never be surrendered to Caesar.”