A Source Book for Ancient Church History - Mirrors

552 A Source Book for Ancient Church History[504]it down and had power to take it again”), He who, because Heis the Lord of glory, despised that which is shame among men,having concealed, as it were, the flame of His life in His bodilynature, by the dispensation of His death, kindled and inflamed itonce more by the power of His own godhead, warming into lifethat which had been made dead, having infused with the infinityof His divine power those humble first-fruits of our nature; madeit also to be that which He himself was, the servile form to be theLord, and the man born of Mary to be Christ, and Him, who wascrucified through weakness, to be life and power, and making allsuch things as are piously conceived to be in God the Word tobe also in that which the Word assumed; so that these attributesno longer seem to be in either nature, being, by commixturewith the divine, made anew in conformity with the nature thatoverwhelms it; participates in the power of the godhead, as if onewere to say that a mixture makes a drop of vinegar mingled inthe deep to be sea, for the reason that the natural quality of thisliquid does not continue in the infinity of that which overwhelmsit.§ 89. The Nestorian Controversy; the Council of Ephesus A. D.431.The Council of Ephesus was called to settle the dispute whichhad arisen between Cyril and the Alexandrians and Nestorius,archbishop of Constantinople, and the Antiochians. Severalcouncils had been held previously, and much acrimonious debate.Both parties desired a council to adjust the dispute. TheEmperor Theodosius II, in an edict of November 19, 430, called acouncil to be held on the following Whitsunday at Ephesus. Thecouncil was opened by Cyril and Memnon, bishop of Ephesus,June 22, a few days after the date assigned. This opening ofthe synod was opposed by the imperial commissioner and theparty of Nestorius, because many of the Antiochians had not yet