Having thus spoken, Arius took his seat. The words opened up plainly and unmistakably the vast difference that separated the Christianity of the first three centuries from the imperial Church of Constantine: the allegiance that belonged to Jesus alone was in process of being transferred to the emperor. It was to extirpate this very freedom of conscience, this very liberty of the gospel that acknowledged no master but Christ, that Constantine had convened the council; and although he had known that the question must come up, and must be met, and although he had been for years, and especially since the summoning of the bishops, using every artifice, argument, and influence, and urging his ablest agents, to be prepared for it when it might come, he and his partisans had determined that it should be raised out of proceedings to be instituted against Arius upon charges of heresy; but the wonderful adroitness with which the great presbyter had changed the face of the whole matter, and had actually put both the emperor and his council on the defensive, took Constantine utterly by surprise, and for a moment he lost even his marvelous self-control, and cried out in a voice of thunder, "Then why art thou here?"
And Arius, with scintillant eyes, but in placid, melodious tones, responded: "I came hither upon the written order of the emperor, as I supposed it to be the duty of a law-abiding subject to do; but certainly not as an officer of the Roman government, entitled to participate in royal businesses."
This calm and dignified reply still more clearly revealed to all the assembly the fact that their enthusiastic love for Constantine had too much blinded their eyes to the undeniable truth that the council was oecumenical, not apostolical--the affair of the emperor, not of the Christ. This reply was not ostensibly connected with any heretical teachings of Arius, or of any one else, and raised no question of orthodoxy at all; it struck at the very tap-roots of the whole movement. "Whose council is this?" was the question that each involuntarily asked himself, and it was manifest that the simple, unobjectionable words of the Libyan produced a profound impression upon many hearts that began to consider whether the fact that the council was royal did not imply in itself the fact that it was not Christian, but was really treasonable toward Christ; and in the midst of the solemn silence caused by such anxious meditation, the virulent and incautious Bishop of Ancyra cried out: "Who art thou that censurest the victorious and holy emperor, and condemnest the oecumenical council of the Church with thy sly, serpentine wriggle and speech? Art thou not Arius the heretic? Arius the defamer of the Son of God? thou bold scorner of the Holy Trinity! thou cunning madman!"