Page:Dictionary of Christian Biography and Literature (1911).djvu/263

Rh and sometimes obscure, although, as Photius says (Cod. 136), his Thesaurus is remarkable for its lucidity. His comments on Scripture may be charged with excessive mysticism, or with a perpetual tendency to bring forward his favourite theological idea. There may be weak points in his argument—e.g. undue pressing of texts, and fallacious inferences, several of which might be cited from the treatise To the Princesses. But any one who consults, e.g., the Thesaurus, will acknowledge the ability with which Cyril follows up the theological line of Athanasius (see pp. 12, 23, 27, 30, 50), and applies the Athanasian mode of thought to the treatment of Eunomian rationalism (p. 263), and the vividness with which, in this and in other works, he brings out the Catholic interpretation of cardinal texts in N.T. His acquaintance with Greek literature and philosophy is evident from the work against Julian; but he speaks quite in the tone of Hippolytus's "Little Labyrinth" (Eus. v. 28) when he deprecates an undue reliance on Aristotelian dialectics and a priori assumption on mysteries transcending human thought (Thesaur. 87, de recta fide 16, 17).

Fragments of Cyrilline treatises not otherwise extant are preserved in synodal acts and elsewhere, and other works, as his Paschal Cycles and The Failure of the Synagogue, are mentioned by Sigebert and Gennadius. The Monophysites used on festivals a "Liturgy of St. Cyril," which is substantially identical with the Gk. "Liturgy of St. Mark" (see Palmer's Orig. Liturg. i. 86, and Neale's Introd. East. Ch. i. 324), and their traditionary belief, expressed in a passage cited from Abu’lberkat by Renaudot, Lit. Orient. i. 171, is that Cyril "completed" St. Mark's Liturgy. "It seems highly probable," says Dr. Neale, quoting this, "that the liturgy of St. Mark came, as we have it now, from the hands of St. Cyril"; although, as Palmer says, the orthodox Alexandrians preferred to call it by the name of the Evangelist founder of their see. The Coptic Cyrilline Liturgy is of somewhat later date, and more diffuse in character. It seems not improbable that the majestic invocation of the Holy Spirit which is one of the distinctive ornaments of St. Mark's Liturgy, if it was not composed during the Macedonian controversy in the 4th cent., represents to us the lively zeal of the great upholder of the Hypostatic Union for the essential Divinity of the Third Person in the Godhead.

Cyril's works were well edited by John Aubert (1658) in six volumes, an edition not yet superseded; there is no Benedictine St. Cyril. In 1859 Dr. Payne Smith pub. Cyril's Commentary on St. Luke's Gospel, trans. from a Syriac version. An elaborate edition by P. E. Pusey, M.A., of Christ Church, of the Commentary on the Minor Prophets (2 vols.) and the Commentary on S. John's Gospel (3 vols.) is pub. by the Clarendon Press, as is also the text and trans. with Lat. notes of the ''Comm. in Luc.'' ed. by R. P. Smith. An important work has recently been published by Dr. Bethune Baker, of Cambridge, entitled Nestorius and his Teaching, a Fresh Examination of the Evidence, which adduces much, from new discoveries, in vindication of Nestorius from the heresy attributed to him. See also, in D. C. B. (4-vol. ed.). [W.B.]  Cyrillus (13), of Scythopolis (Bethshan), so called from his birthplace, a hagiologist, fl. c. 555. His father, John, was famous for his religious life. Cyril commenced an ascetic career at the age of 16. On leaving his monastery to visit Jerusalem and the holy places, his mother bid him put himself under the instruction of John the Silentiary, by whom he was commended to Leontius, abbat of the monastery of St. Euthymius, who admitted him as a monk in 522. Thence Cyril passed to the Laura of St. Saba, where he commenced his sacred biographies with the Lives of St. Euthymius and St. Saba, deriving his information from the elder monks who had known those saints. He also wrote the Life of St. John the Silentiary and other biographies, affording a valuable picture of the inner life of the Eastern church in the 6th cent. They have been unfortunately largely interpolated by Metaphrastes. The following biographies are attributed to Cyril by Fabricius (Bibl. Graec. lib. v. c. 41, x. 155): (1) S. Joannes Silentiarius (ap. Surium, May 13); (2) S. Euthymius (Cotelerius, Eccl. Graec. Monum. ii. 200); (3) S. Sabas. (ib. iii. 220); (4) Theodosius the Archimandrite (only found in Latin, of doubtful authenticity; (5) Cyriacus the Anchoret; (6) S. Theognius the Ascetic, bp. of Cyprus (Fabric. ''Bibl. Graec. u.s.; Cave, Hist. Lit. p. i. 529). [E.V.]    Dalmatius (4), monk and abbat, near Constantinople at the time of the council of Ephesus (A.D. 431). His influence arose from his eminent piety, strength of character, and fiery zeal. Under Theodosius the Great he had served in the 2nd company of Guards, married, had children, and led a virtuous life. Feeling a call to a monastic life, he left his wife and children, except a son Faustus, and went to be instructed by abbat Isaac, who had dwelt in the desert since his infancy. Isaac at his death made him Hegumenus,'' superior of the monastery, under the patriarch Atticus. Consulted by councils, patriarchs, and emperors, he remained in his cell 48 years without quitting it. He is sometimes addressed as chief of the monasteries of Constantinople; but it is uncertain whether this was a complimentary or official title. He is not to be confounded with Dalmatius, monk at Constantinople, bp. of Cyzicus; because the latter was present at the council of Ephesus in that capacity.

During the supremacy of the Nestorian party at Ephesus, letters were conveyed by a beggar in the hollow of a cane from Cyril and the Athanasian or Catholic bishops to the emperor Theodosius II., the clergy and people at Constantinople complaining that they had been imprisoned three months, that the Nestorians had deposed Cyril and Memnon bp. of Ephesus, and that they were all in the greatest distress. A short memorial was added to the letter of the bishops, probably for Dalmatius. Dalmatius was greatly moved, and believed himself summoned to go forth at length from his retreat in the interests of truth. Accompanied by the monks of all the monasteries, 