country," he said, "belonged to him rather than to the sovereigns" (τῶν κρατούντων). Sophronius averred that legal evidence was forthcoming to prove that Dioscorus had usurped, in Egypt, the authority belonging to the emperor. He added that Dioscorus had taken away his clothes and property, and compelled him to flee for his life; and he charged him, further, with adultery and blasphemy (ib. 1029). Such accusations were then so readily made—as the life of St. Athanasius himself shews—that some deduction must be made from charges brought against Dioscorus in the hour of his adversity; and wrongs done by his agents may have been in some cases unfairly called his acts. Still, it is but too likely that there was sufficient truth in them to demonstrate the evil effects on his character of elevation to a post of almost absolute power; for such, in those days, was the great "evangelical throne." We find him, before the end of his first year, in correspondence with pope Leo the Great, who gave directions, as from the see of St. Peter, to the new successor of St. Mark; writing, on June 21, 445, that "it would be shocking (nefas) to believe that St. Mark formed his rules for Alexandria otherwise than on the Petrine model " (Ep. 11). In 447 Dioscorus appears among those who expressed suspicion of the theological character of Theodoret, who had been much mixed up with the party of Nestorius. It was rumoured that, preaching at Antioch, he had practically taught Nestorianism; and Dioscorus, hearing this, wrote to Domnus, bp. of Antioch, Theodoret's patriarch; whereupon Theodoret wrote a denial (Ep. 83) ending with an anathema against all who should deny the holy Virgin to be Theotokos, call Jesus a mere man, or divide the one Son into two. Dioscorus still assumed the truth of the charge (Theod. Ep. 86), allowed Theodoret to be anathematized in church, and even rose from his throne to echo the malediction, and sent some bishops to Constantinople to support him against Theodoret.
Then, in Nov. 448, the aged Eutyches, archimandrite of Constantinople and a vehement enemy of Nestorianizers, was accused by Eusebius, bp. of Dorylaeum, before a council of which Flavian was president, with an opposite error. He clung tenaciously to the phrase, "one incarnate nature of God the Word," which Cyril had used on the authority of St. Athanasius; but neglected the qualifications and explanations by which Cyril had guarded his meaning. Thus, by refusing to admit that Christ, as incarnate, had "two natures," Eutyches appeared to his judges to have revived, in effect, the Apollinarian heresy—to have denied the distinctness and verity of Christ's manhood; and he was deprived of his priestly office, and excommunicated. His patron, the chamberlain Chrysaphius, applied to Dioscorus for aid, promising to support him in all his designs if he would take up the cause of Eutyches against Flavian (Niceph. xiv. 47). Eutyches himself wrote to Dioscorus, asking him "to examine his cause" (Liberat. c. 12), and Dioscorus, zealous against all anti-Cyrilline tendencies in theology, wrote to the emperor, urging him to call a general council to review Flavian's judgment. Theodosius, influenced by his wife and his chamberlain, issued letters (Mar. 30, 449), ordering the chief prelates (patriarchs, as we may call them, and exarchs) to repair, with some of their bishops, to Ephesus by Aug. 1, 449 (Mansi, vi. 587).
This council of evil memory—on which Leo afterwards fastened the name of "Latrocinium," or gang of robbers—met on Aug. 8, 449, in St. Mary's church at Ephesus, the scene of the third general council's meeting in 431; 150 bishops being present. Dioscorus presided, and next to him Julian, or Julius, the representative of the "most holy bishop of the Roman church," then Juvenal of Jerusalem, Domnus of Antioch, and—his lowered position indicating what was to come—Flavian of Constantinople (ib. 607). The archbp. of Alexandria shewed himself a partisan throughout. He did indeed propose the acceptance of Leo's letter to the council, a letter written at the same time as, and expressly referring to, the famous "Tome"; but it was only handed in, not read, Juvenal moving that another imperial letter should be read and recorded. The president then intimated that the council's business was not to frame a new doctrinal formulary, but to inquire whether what had lately appeared—meaning, the statements of Flavian and bp. Eusebius on the one hand, those of Eutyches on the other—were accordant with the decisions of the councils of Nicaea and Ephesus—"two councils in name," said he, "but one in faith" (ib. 628). Eutyches was then introduced, and made his statement, beginning, "I commend myself to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, and the true verdict of your justice." After he had finished his address, Flavian desired that Eusebius, who had been his accuser, should be called in and heard. Elpidius, the imperial commissioner, vetoed this proposal on the ground that the judges of Eutyches were now to be judged, and that his accuser had already fulfilled his task, "and, as he thought, successfully": to let him speak now would be a cause of mere disturbance (ib. 645). This unjudicial view of the case was supported by Dioscorus. Flavian was baffled, and the council resolved to hear the acts of the synod of Constantinople which had condemned Eutyches. The episcopal deputy of Leo, with his companion the deacon Hilarus, urged that "the pope's letter" (probably including the "Tome" in this proposal) should be read first, but this was overruled; Dioscorus moved that the "acts" should be first read, and then the letter of the bp. of Rome. The reading began (ib. 649). When the passage was reached in which Basil of Seleucia and Seleucus of Amasia had said that the one Christ was in two natures after the incarnation, a storm of wrath broke out. "Let no one call the Lord 'two' after the union! Do not divide the undivided! Seleucus was not bp. of Amasia! This is Nestorianism." "Be quiet for a little," said Dioscorus; "let us hear some more blasphemies. Why are we to blame Nestorius only? There are many Nestoriuses" (ib. 685). The reading proceeded as far as Eusebius's question to Eutyches, "Do you own two natures after the incarnation?" Then arose another storm: "The holy synod
