The conversion of Constantine to Christianity had the natural effect of bringing within the Christian ranks those lukewarm pagans who took their religious views from the Emperor. But the comparative immunity from persecution which the Christians of Greece had enjoyed under the pagan ascendancy led them to treat their opponents with the same mildness. There was no reaction, because there had been no revolution, and the devotees of the old and the new religion went on living peaceably side by side. The even greater temptation to the subtle Greek intellect to indulge in the wearisome Arian controversy, which so long convulsed a large part of the Church in the East, was rejected owing to the fortunate unanimity of the bishops who were sent from Greece to attend the Council of Nice. Their strong and united opposition to the heresy of Arius was re-echoed by their flocks at home, and the Church, undivided on this crucial question, became more and more identified with the people. After Constantine’s death the harmony between the pagans and the Christians was temporarily disturbed. Under Constantius II the public offerings ceased, the temples were closed, the oracles fell into disuse; under Julian the Apostate a final attempt was made to rehabilitate the ancient religion. Julian seemed, indeed, to the conservative party in Greece to have restored for two brief years the silver age of Hadrian, if not the golden age of Perikles. The jealousy of Constantius, by sending him in honourable exile to Athens, had made him an enthusiastic admirer of not only the literature but the creed of the old Hellenes. It was at that time that he abjured Christianity and was initiated into the Eleusinian mysteries, and when he took up arms against Constantius it was to the Corinthians, Lacedæmonians, and Athenians that he addressed Apologies for his conduct. These manifestoes, of which that to the Athenians is still extant among the writings of Julian, had such an effect upon the Greeks, flattered no doubt by such an attention, that they declared in his favour, and on his rival’s death they had their reward. The temples were re-opened, the altars once more smoked with the offerings of the devout, the great games were revived, including the Aktian festival of Augustus, which had fallen into decline with the falling fortunes of Nikopolis. Julian restored that city and others like it, and the Argives did not appeal in vain for a rehearing of a wearisome law-suit with Corinth to an Emperor who was steeped to the lips in classic lore. At Athens he purged the University by excluding Christians from professorial chairs, Christian students were often converted, like the Emperor, by the genius of the place, and the University became the last refuge of Hellenism in Greece, when Julian’s attempted restoration of the old order of things collapsed at his death. Throughout this period, indeed, the University of Athens was not only the chief intellectual centre of the Empire—for Rome