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L. Anneus Florus, who flourished during the reign of Trajan, has left a series of sketches of the different wars from the days of Romulus to those of Augustus. Frontinus epitomized the large histories of Pompeius. Ammianus Marcellinus wrote a history from Nerva to Valens, and is often quoted by Gibbon.
The ruin of Valens was precipitated by the deceitful arts of Fritigern, and the prudent admonitions of the emperor of the West. The advantages of negotiating in the midst of war were perfectly understood by the general of the Barbarians; and a Christian ecclesiastic was despatched, as the holy minister of peace, to penetrate, and to perplex, the councils of the enemy.
Valens was wholly deficient in military genius, and was quite content if he could maintain a certain amount of Roman influence in Armenia and Iberia, while at the same time he protected the Roman frontier against Persian invasion. Sapor was advanced in years, and might naturally desire repose, having been almost constantly engaged in military expeditions since he reached the age of sixteen.
He possessed, however, one quality, which recommended him to Valentinian, and preserved the domestic peace of the empire; devout and grateful attachment to his benefactor, whose superiority of genius, as well as of authority, Valens humbly and cheerfully acknowledged in every action of his life. Part II. Before Valentinian divided the provinces, he reformed the administration of the empire.
Moushegh ruled Armenia with vigor, but was suspected of maintaining over-friendly relations with the Roman emperor, Valens, and of designing to undermine and supplant his master. Varaztad, after a while, having been worked on by his counsellors, grew suspicious of him, and caused him to be executed at a banquet.
I go further, I affirm that the records of the past, the heroic sacrifices which England made in the sixteenth, in the seventeenth century, and in later times, justify the contrary assumption, justify the assumption that at this crisis this grave and momentous crisis, a crisis such as I think no council of men has had to face for many centuries, perhaps not since the embassy of the Goths to the Emperor Valens the ministry or cabinet which but dares, dares to trust this people's resolution, will find that this enthusiasm is not that of men overwrought with war-fever, but the deep-seated purpose of a people strong to defend the heritage of its fathers, and not to swerve from the path which fate itself has marked out for it amongst the empires of the earth.
Valens came forward and declared that he was not one of the Arians, but heartily detested their blasphemies. The creed would do very well as it stood, and the Easterns had accepted it already; but if Phoebadius was not satisfied, he was welcome to propose additions. A stringent series of anathemas was therefore drawn up against Arius and all his misbelief.
There they were attacked by the lieutenants of Valens, and a battle was fought without other result than that of checking for a time the Gothic progress. But only for a time. The various tribes of barbarians, under the able generalship of Fritigern, whose cunning was equal to his bravery, advanced to the suburbs of Hadrianople.
Nor doe wee read, that any such Doctrine was accounted Christian in the time of the Apostles; nor in the time of the Romane Emperours, till the Popes had the Civill Soveraignty of Rome. But to this he hath replyed, that the Christians of old, deposed not Nero, nor Diocletian, nor Julian, nor Valens an Arrian, for this cause onely, that they wanted Temporall forces. Perhaps so.
Valens was only a catechumen, and had no policy to declare for the present. Events therefore continued to develop naturally. The Homoean bishops retained their sees, but their influence was fast declining. The Anomoeans were forming a schism on one side, the Nicenes recovering power on the other. Unwilling signatures to the Homoean creed were revoked in all directions.
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