by the atonement;[1] nor would he have that eternal sympathy with his church which is so graciously made known to us in the gospel. Compare Heb. ix. 12; vii. 24; and iv. 15.]
The defection of Eutyches from the truth was made a subject of complaint at an occasional synod at Constantinople, by the same Eusebius, then bishop of Dorylea, who while a layman had taken so active a part in repressing the heresy of Nestorius. Summoned before this assembly, and declaring his unchangeable determination to abide by the position he had taken, the archimandrite was degraded, and deprived of his abbey.
The flames of polemical animosity were now kindled afresh. Eutyches had a multitude of partisans both in Constantinople and the East, at the head of whom was Dioscorus, bishop of Alexandria, and successor of St. Cyril. This dignitary prevailed on the emperor to summon a general council for the purpose of allaying the returning troubles of the church; and an assembly was convened at Ephesus, which, from its heterodox decisions, its determined partiality to Eutyches, who was absolved from his penalties, and its brutal treatment of Flavian, the patriarch by whom he was deposed, and who died of the ill usage in a few days, has been denominated in ecclesiastical history the "piratical synod,"—prædatorius synodus.
Theodosius, prejudiced in favour of the new opinion, was in vain requested by the bishop of Rome to indicate
- ↑ Fleury relates an anecdote of Almondar, a Saracen, who had been converted to Christianity, and who, being urged by certain Monophysites to come over to their way of thinking, resisted them on one occasion by the following argument: "He said, 'I have received letters which send me information that the archangel Michael is dead.' 'That,' cried they, 'is impossible.' Almondar replied: 'And how, then, if Jesus Christ had been simply Divine, without having our human nature, could he have been crucified for us, if, as you say, even an angel is incapable of dying?'"
