He appears to have been less conspicuous for consistency in the Arian Controversy. At Tyre he is described by Sozomen and Socrates as assenting to the deposition of Athanasius but Rufinus (H. E. i. 17) tells the dramatic story of the successful interposition of the aged and mutilated Paphnutius of the Thebaid, who took his vacillating brother by the hand, and led him to the little knot of Athanasians. Sozomen (iv. 203) represents him as deposed by Acacius for too zealous orthodoxy, and replaced by Cyril, then a Semiarian. Jerome agrees with Theodoret, and makes Cyril succeed on the death of Maximus in 350 or 351. (Chron. ann. 349.)