Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 11.djvu/193

Rh in the proceedings of the synod which met at Antioch in Caria, principally in connexion with the Meletian schism. At the great oecumenical council held at Constantinople in 381, he was a conspicuous champion of the orthodox faith ; according to Nicephorus, indeed, the additions made to the Nicene creed were entirely clue to his suggestion, but this statement is of doubtful authority. That his eloquence was highly appreciated is shown by the facts that he pro nounced the discourse at the consecration of Gregory of Nazianzus, and that he was chosen to deliver the funeral oration on the death of Meletius the first president of the council. In the following year, moreover (382), he was commissioned by the council to inspect and set in order the churches of Arabia, in connexion with which mission he also visited Jerusalem. The impressions he gathered from this journey .may, in part at least, be gathered from his famous letter De Euntibus Ilierosolyma, in which an opinion strongly unfavourable to pilgrimages is expressed. In 383 he was probably again in Constantinople ; where in 385 he pronounced the funeral orations of the princess Pulcheria and afterwards of the empress Placilla. Once more we read of him in 394 as having been present in that metro polis at the synod held under the presidency of Nectarius to settle a controversy which had arisen among the bishops of Arabia; in the same year he assisted at the consecration of the fine new church of the apostles at Chalcedon, on which occasion there is reason to believe that his discourse com monly but wrongly known as that eis TT/J/ eawou ^etporovtaj/ was delivered. The exact date of his death is unknown ; some authorities refer it to 396, others to 400. His festival is observed by the Greek Church on January 10th ; in the Western martyrologies he is commemorated on March 9th.

{{EB1911 fine print|Gregory of Nyssa is generally admitted to Lave excelled botli his brother Basil and Gregory of Nazianzus alike in the natural vigour of his intellect and in the wide extent of his acquirements. His teaching though strictly trinitarian, shows considerable freedom and originality of thought ; in many points his mental and spiritual affinities with Origeii show themselves with advantage ; though in one particular namely, in his doctrine of awoKcn-aa-Tatm or final restoration his views have since been repudiated by the orthodox. His style has been frequently praised by competent authorities for sweetness, richness, and elegance. His numerous works may be classified under five heads: (1.) Treatises in doctrinal and polemical theology. Of these the most important is that Against Eunomius in twelve books. Its doctrinal thesis (which is supported with great philosophic acumen and rhetorical power) is the divinity and consubstantiality of the Word; incidentally the character of Basil, which Eunomius had aspersed, is vindicated, and the heretic him self is held up to scorn and contempt. This is the work which, most probably in a shorter draft, was read by its author when at Constantinople before Gregory Nazianzen and Jerome in 381 (Jerome, De Vir. III., 128). To the same class belong the treatise To Ablavius, against the tritheists; On Faith, against the Arians; On Common Notions, in explanation of the terms in current employment with regard to the Trinity ; Ten Syllogisms, against the Manich&ans; To ThcopMlus, against the Apollinarians ; an Antirrhetic against the same ; Against Fate, a disputation with a heathen philosopher ; the Oratio Catcchctica Magna ; and the dialogue DC A nima ct Rcsurrcctionc. (2.) Practical treatises. To this category belong the tracts On Virginity and On Pilgrimages; as also the Canonical Epistle upon the rules of penance. (3.) Ex pository and homiletical works, including the Hcxacmcron, and several series of discourses On the Workmanship of Man, On the Inscri}nions of the Psalms, On the Sixth Psalm, On the first three Chapters of Ecdcsiastcs, On Canticles, On the Lord s Prayer, and On the Eight Beatitudes. (4. ) Biographical, consisting chiefly of funeral orations. (5.) Letters. The only complete editions of the whole works are those by Fronton le Due (Fronto Ducreus, Paris, 1615; with additions, 1618 and 1638) and by Migne. Of the new edition projected by F. Oehler only the first volume, containing the Opera Dogniatica, has appeared (1865). There have been numerous editions of several single treatises, as for example of the Oratio Catechetica, De Precationc, and De Anima ct ResurrccMone. See the monograph by Rupp (Grcgors, dcs Bischofs von Nyssa, Lcben und Meinungen, Leipsic, 1834), and compare Heyns (Disputatio historico-theologica de Grctf. Nyss., 1835), Mb ller (Gregorii Nyss. doctrinam de hominis natura ct illustravit ct cum Origcniana com- paravit, 1854), and Stigler, Die Psychologic dcs h. Grcgors von Nyssa (Ratisbon, 1857).}}

 GREGORY,, surnamed in later ecclesiastical tradition (the miracle-worker), was born of noble and wealthy heathen parents at Neocaesarea, towards the begin ning of the 3d century of the Christian era. His original name was Theodorus. Destined by his parents for the bar, he studied civil law at Athens, Alexandria, and Berytus, it is said; he afterwards (about 231) accompanied his sister to Csesarea in Palestine, where he became the pupil and finally the convert of Origen. In returning to Cappadocia some five years after his conversion, it had been his original intention to live a retired ascetic life (Euseb., H. E., yi. 30) ; but this wish he was not permitted to gratify. Urged by Origen, and at last almost compelled by Phsedimus of Amasia, his metropolitan, neither of whom was willing to see so much learning, piety, and masculine energy practi cally lost to the church, he, after many attempts to evade the dignity, was consecrated bishop of his native town (about 240). His episcopate, which lasted some thirty years, was characterized by great zeal, and by so much success that, according to the (doubtless somewhat rhetori cal) statement of Gregory of Nyssa, whereas at the outset of his labours there were only seventeen Christians in the city, there were at his death only seventeen persons in all who had not embraced Christianity. This result he achieved in spite of the Decian persecution (250), during which he had felt it to be his duty to absent himself from his diocese, and notwithstanding the demoralizing effects of an irruption of barbarians who laid waste the diocese in 260. Gregory, although he has not always escaped the charge of Sabellianism, now holds an undisputed place among the fathers of the church; and although the turn of his mind was practical rather than speculative, he is known to have taken an energetic part in most of the doctrinal controversies of his time. He was active at the synods of Antioch which investigated and condemned the heresies of Paul ; and the rapid spread in Pontus of a Trinitarianism approaching the Nicene type is attributed in large measure to the weight of his influence. Gregory is believed to have died in the reign of Aurelian, about the year 270, though some accounts place his death six years earlier. His festival (semiduplex) is observed by the Church of Rome on the 17th of November. For the facts of his biography our earliest and best authority is the Life or rather Panegyric by Gregory of Nyssa ; but there are also incidental notices of him in the writings of Basil the Great. Both these writers represent him as having wrought miracles of a very startling description ; but nothing related by them comes near the astounding narratives given in the Martyrologies, or even in the Breviarium Romanum, in connexion with his name.

 GREGORY,, (c. 540-594), historian of the Franks, was born at Clermont, Auvergne, not earlier than 539 and not later than 543 A.D. He was the youngest son of Florentius, a provincial senator, and head 