Constans and Constantius were skilled biblical interpreters or theologians. These Roman emperors were more concemed to preserve the unity of the church than to engage in prolonged debates over what to them often seemed theological nitpicking. Manlio Simonetti, for instance, comments that Constantine was “convinced that religious peace could be assured only by a broad concentration of moderate elements” and “was as averse to some of Arius’s more radical opponents as he had been to the radicalism of