But the imperial Arian was not content with this administrative mutilation.  At the close of the year 371, flushed with successes against the barbarians, Greg. Nyss., C. Eunom. i. fresh from the baptism of Endoxius, and eager to impose his creed on his subjects, Valens was travelling leisurely towards Syria.  He is said to have shrunk from an encounter with the famous primate of Cæsarea, for he feared lest one strong man’s firmness might lead others to resist. Theod. iv. 16.  Before him went Modestus, Prefect of the Prætorium, the minister of his severities, Soc. iv. 16. and before Modestus, like the skirmishers in front of an advancing army, had come a troop of Arian bishops with Euippius, in all probability, at their head. cf. Epp. lxviii., cxxviii., ccxliv. and ccli., and Maran, Vit. Bas. xx. 1; possibly the bishops were in Cappadocia as early as the Eupsychian celebration.  Modestus found on his arrival that Basil was making a firm stand, and summoned the archbishop to his presence with the hope of overawing him.  He met with a dignity, if not with a pride, which was more than a match for his own.  Modestus claimed submission in the name of the emperor.  Basil refused it in the name of God.  Modestus threatened impoverishment, exile, torture, death.  Basil retorted that none of these threats frightened him:  he had nothing to be confiscated except a few rags and a few books; banishment could not send him beyond the lands of God; torture had no terrors for a body already dead; death could only come as a friend to hasten his last journey home.  Modestus exclaimed in amazement that he had never been so spoken to before.  “Perhaps,” replied Basil, “you never met a bishop before.”  The prefect hastened to his master and reported that ordinary means of intimidation appeared unlikely to move this undaunted prelate.  The archbishop must be owned victorious, or crushed by more brutal violence.  But Valens, like all weak natures, oscillated between compulsion and compliance.  He so far abated his pretensions to force heresy on Cappadocia, as to consent to attend the services at the Church on the Festival of the Epiphany. Jan. 6, 372.  At this time in the Eastern Church the celebrations of the Nativity and of the Epiphany were combined.  cf. D.C.A. i. 617.  The Church was crowded.  A mighty chant thundered over the sea of heads.  At the end of the basilica, facing the multitude, stood Basil, statue-like, erect as Samuel among the prophets at Naioth, 1 Sam. xix. 20. and quite indifferent to the interruption of the imperial approach.  The whole scene seemed rather of heaven than of earth, and the orderly enthusiasm of the worship to be rather of angels than of men.  Valens half fainted, and staggered as he advanced to make his offering at God’s Table.  On the following day Basil admitted him within the curtain of the sanctuary, and conversed with him at length on sacred subjects. Greg. Naz., Or. xliii., Greg. Nyss., Adv. Eunom. i., Soz. vi. 16, Theod. iv. 16.  De Broglie well combines the variations which are not quite easy to harmonize in detail.  On the admission within the sanctuary, cf. the concession of Ambrose to Theodosius in Theod. v. 18.