Page:The Greek and Eastern churches.djvu/330

304 We may therefore be certain that this famous man was not the first to introduce Christianity to a Teutonic race. Nevertheless, it is with justice that Ulfilas has been described as "the Apostle of the Goths," because it was owing to his labours that a great part of the nation was won over to the faith of Christ. The discovery of a Gothic account of his life by one of his own disciples has enabled scholars to supplement and correct the prejudiced narratives of the Greek Church historians from a more authentic source. There are reasons for doubting Philostorgius's statement that Ulfilas was a descendant of one of the Cappadocian captives. His name is thoroughly Gothic, and his pupil Auxentius does not hint at a foreign parentage. He was born among the Goths in the year 311. We cannot test the statement of Socrates that he was converted by Theophilus, the bishop who attended the council of Nicæa. If that were correct, he would have been orthodox at first. But afterwards he was identified with one of the schools of Arianism. While quite young, probably in the year 332, when he was twenty-one years of age, he was sent to Constantinople, either as an envoy, or, as seems more likely considering his youth, as a hostage. Arianism was now dominant in the city, and naturally enough Ulfilas came under its influence. While at Constantinople he learnt Latin and Greek, and served in the minor order of a reader in the Church, probably working in the city as an evangelist to his fellow-countrymen