God who could die!" The wise and holy men who had been the instructors of the church for more than three hundred years, had never dared to attempt bringing down to the handling and inspection of man's limited and enfeebled reason that divine fact, which inspiration had declared to be "without controversy a great mystery."[1] But Theodore had essayed to do this; and in the estimation of his disciples had succeeded: "In the womb of the virgin was conceived by the Holy Ghost that Son of Man, in whom, as in a temple, the divine Word dwells as a perpetual inhabitant." Hence, he who was born was the man and not the God; and he who died, the same. This certainly was sufficiently simple and intelligible; nevertheless, however paradoxical the assertion may seem, these very pretensions condemned the theory as untrue; for, where the word of God has so explicitly announced the subject as a "great mystery," the Christian believer feels himself obligated to reject a doctrine which would prove it to be the reverse.
II. NESTORIUS.
Nestorius, with whom this doctrine became afterwards so universally identified, had belonged to a monastery near Antioch. His character had been not only irreproachable, but adorned with much excellence; and in the offices of catechist and preacher, he had become widely known as a zealous antagonist of many prevailing errors of the time. Habituated to a life of self-denial and indefatigable study, and endowed with a copiousness of expression, which is said to have called up memories of the eloquence of Chrysostom, his elevation to the see of Constantinople, in the place of Sisinnius, was regarded as an auspicious event for that great diocese. Soon, however, the hopes of the faithful were changed
