The crystallisation of ascetic ideals into monastic institutions was attacked by heathenism and did not meet the unanimous approval of Christendom. Before Constantine the pagans denounced the hermits because they were guilty of the treasonable act, from a Roman view, of fleeing from social and civic duties. After Constantine, when monasticism became the "fad," it was assailed by the aristocratic pagan families, who lost sons, and especially wives and daughters, in the maelstrom of enthusiasm, because it broke family ties and caused the neglect of obvious responsibilities. Julian, the imperial pagan reactionist, called it fanaticism and idolatry. Pagan poets like Libanus and Rutilius denounced it as an institution "hostile to light." Within Christendom hostility came from Christian rulers like Valens, because monasticism withdrew civil and military strength from the state, when all was needed against the barbarians, and because it encouraged idleness and unproductiveness instead of useful activity and heroic virtue[219:1]; from Christians of wealth and indulgence who felt rebuked by the earnestness, poverty, and holy zeal of an ascetic life; from the clergy who did not comprehend the significance of monasticism[219:2]; and from the liberal party in the Church who took a saner view of salvation and ethics. Jovinian (d. 406), like Luther, first a monk and then a reformer, held these five points according to Jerome: (1) that virgins, widows, and wives are all on an equality if good Christians; (2) that thankfully partaking of food is as efficacious as fasting; (3) that spiritual baptism is as effectual in overcoming the devil as baptism; (4) that all sins are equal; (5) that all rewards and punishments will be equal. Jerome answered him and Pope Siricius excommunicated him and his followers as heretics (390).[220:1] Helvidius of Rome denounced the reverence for celibacy and declared that the marriage state was as holy as that of virginity. Again Jerome wielded his intellectual cudgel.[220:2] Bonasus, Bishop of Sardica, was excommunicated for holding the same view (389). Vigilantius, an educated Gallic slave, a disciple of Jovinian, attacked the necessity of celibacy, denied the efficacy of virginity, opposed fasting and torture, ridiculed relics, objected to candles, incense, and prayers for the dead, and doubted miracles. He was a Protestant living in the fifth century.[220:3] He too was assailed by Jerome and put under the papal ban.[220:4] Ærius of Sebasta, a presbyter, called into question the need or value of fasts, prayers for the dead, the inequality of rank among the clergy, and the celebration of Easter and of course was outlawed by the Church.[220:5] Lactantius declared that the hermit life was that of a beast rather than a man and treasonable to society. But all these loud outcries against the monks were branded as heresy and drowned in counter-shouts of praise.