THE NESTORIANS.
I. ORIGIN OF THEIR DOCTRINAL ERROR.
The theological dogma which has been associated with the name of Nestorius, and which effected so vast and permanent a schism in the oriental church, did not originate with that prelate; for, about ten years earlier, Leporius, a member of some monastery in Gaul, had broached the same doctrine, but, having been refuted by St. Augustine, had published a retractation of it.[1] The opinions of Nestorius appear also to have been formed under the influence of his master, the eminent Theodore, bishop of Mopsuestia, a most voluminous writer, and a commentator of pre-eminent repute in those days; but a divine whose principles, in relation to some of the great verities of revelation, were such as would be classed in our own time with those distinguished by the term "rationalism." He seems to have been the forerunner of a school, the members of which have not scrupled to consider the teachings of holy writ amenable to the sovereign tribunal of human reason; and every discovery of revelation which does not agree in all respects with the dictates and prescriptions of the mind of man, capable of being modified so as to produce such a conformity. In the course of his investigations Theodore applied himself to the task of divesting the glorious and awful reality of the incarnation of whatever had hitherto been regarded as mysterious and inscrutable. He considered this to be a service to the cause of truth, by removing a stumbling-block to the conversion of the more intelligent Pagans, who affected to be either shocked or amused by the idea of "a God having a mother," "a God three months old," and "a
- ↑ Aug. Epist. 219.
