Ὁ ΘΕΟΛΟΓΟΣ.

'THE DIVINE.'

· BIBL

HECT

A CONTRIBUTION TO THE ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY
OF THE FOURTH CENTURY.

BY

DR. CARL ULLMANN,

PROFESSOR EXTRAORDINARY OF THEOLOGY AT HEIDELBERG.

TRANSLATED BY

G. V. COX, M.A.

ESQUIRE-BEDEL IN THE UNIVERSITY OF Oxford.

Πρᾶξις ἐπίβασις θεωρίας.

Greg. Naz.

BO

LONDON:

JOHN W. PARKER, WEST STRAND.

MDCCC LL.

110. OL. 350.

LONDON:

SAVILL AND EDWARDS, PRINTERS,

CHANDOS STREET.

NOTICE BY THE TRANSLATOR.

THE biography of Gregory Nazianzen here presented is

only a half of Dr. Ullmann's volume. It forms, however, a perfect whole in itself; and as its interest is quite of a different kind, and more attractive to the general reader, the dogmatic part (or the statement and examination of Gregory's theological opinions), though nearly finished by the Translator, is for the present withheld.

As the Translator is no theologian, he presumes not to offer any Preface of his own. The fly-leaf will, he thinks, be better filled with the following stanzas, in which Bishop Ken, that saint of the Church of England, draws a parallel between himself and the Bishop of Constantinople, Gregory of Nazianzum.

Bless'd Gregory, whose patriarchal height
Shed on the Eastern sphere celestial light,
To Nazianzum flew, dethron'd by rage,
And spent in songs divine his drooping age.
I, if the least may with the greatest dare
In grief, not gifts or graces, to compare,
Forc'd from my flock by uncanonic heat,
In singing hymns thus solace my retreat.

Bless'd Gregory, with pain and sickness griev'd,
His spirit oft with songs devout reliev'd;
And while on hymns his meditation dwelt,
Devotion sweeten'd ev'ry pang he felt.
Pain haunting me, I court the sacred muse,
Verse is the only laudanum I use.
Eas'd of my sacred load, I live content;
In hymn, not in dispute, my passion vent.

Bless'd Gregory, to sacred verse consigned
The last efforts of his immortal mind,
Those poems loftiest prospects have disclos'd,
On brink of bright eternity compos'd.
I the small dol'rous remnant of my days
Devote to hymn my great Redeemer's praise.
And nearer as I draw t'ward heavenly rest,
The more I love th' employment of the blest.

DR. ULLMANN'S PREFACE.

THE

HE words of Gregory, 'Practice is the way to knowledge,' have been taken for my motto, not only because I am convinced with Gregory, and the author of the excellent letter to Diognetus,1 'that there is no true life without knowledge, and no sure knowledge without true life;' but also because they show at once the principal point of view from which I may be supposed to have contemplated the following biography. Religion and theology rest entirely on the union and mutual co-operation of correct knowledge and a life of truth. It is only the clearly-perceived truth which can operate powerfully upon our mind and will; and it is only in proportion as we apply our knowledge to our lives, and allow the truths of salvation to work in earnest to our real sanctification, that a firm, lively, deep-rooted knowledge of those truths can be attained, a knowledge that is ever developing itself in greater purity and completeness. This holds good of every kind of knowledge whose subject is not external nature, but, either wholly or in part, our own internal being. Nay, it is one and the same way that leads to a solid acquaint

The Epistola ad Diognetum, usually attributed to Justin, but hardly belonging to him, was composed by a truly christian man of the first centuries; towards the end it is written :-ovde yap ζωὴ ἄνευ γνώσεως, οὐδε γνῶσις ἀσφαλῆς ἄνευ ζωῆς ἀληθοῦς.