Eusebius of Vercelli

Sardinian by birth, Eusebius was elected bishop of Vercelli around 345 and did there what no one had attempted in the West: he housed his priests under one roof, under a rule, joining monastic life to the ministry of souls — the model the canons regular would later take up. At the Council of Milan in 355, when Constantius II ordered him to subscribe to Athanasius's condemnation, he demanded that the Nicene creed be signed first; Dionysius of Milan was beginning to do so when Valens of Mursa snatched the formula from his hands. He was exiled to Palestine, Cappadocia and then the Thebaid, where he was dragged through the streets. Returning to his see after seven years, he worked some ten years more to recover the Churches of Italy from Arianism.