adopted; and the Council of Nice, which in 325, condemned those errors, defined in its Creed, that Jesus Christ, “ consubstantial to the Father, for us men, and for our salvation, came down from heaven, and became incarnate, and was made man.” The Virgin Mary was Mother of him thus made man; but this man was God; whence arose the propriety of the expression, Mother of God.—The expression had been very generally used, when, in the following century, one Anastasius, a Priest-the confidential friend of Nestorius, then Bishop of Constantinople—in a sermon to the people, publicly taught, “ that the Virgin Mary ought not to be called the Mother of God; that she was a mortal, and that of such God could not be born.”These words, says the historian, who might himself have been present, gave great offence both to the Clergy and Laity ; " and a tumult arose within the Church.”—I mention this incident, because nothing so clearly marks the commencement of error, as the reclamation of the people, when new expressions assail their ears, or when those, to which they have been habituated, are either censured or omitted.--Nestorius espoused the language of his friend; and, in a short time, not Constantinople only, but the whole Christian Church, took the alarm; the doctrine of man's redemption being manifestly involved in the question. At the head of the orthodox party stood St. Cyril, Bishop of Alexandria, whose reasoning on the subject was comprehensive and profound. But he observed, that it would be well, would men abstain from such enquiries—in which the most learned see obscurely, and the ignorant are perplexed—and embrace, without wavering, the Faith, that, through the Apostles, has been delivered to the Church. However, as the pride of man will not follow this rule, he proceeds to say, on the question before him, that as the Lord Jesus Christ is God, surely, She that bore
