GREGORY
BISHOP OF NAZIANZUS

(Born A.D. 325. Died, 389).

This eminent man needs no introduction from my humble pen. His praises are, and always have been, in the Church. Born near Nazianzus in Cappadocia, he succeeded his father in that episcopate. He cultivated his natural gifts, and increased his learning, at Athens. Thence he went forth to be a champion of the Christian faith, and a luminary in the great Church constellation of the fourth century. After the deliverance from the last effort of paganism contrived and led by the Emperor Julian, who had once been his friend and fellow-collegian, he displayed his great talents and eloquence at Constantinople, of which great Eastern capital for a time he 92 became bishop. But soon he retired to the solitary cell, which he bad before loved and frequented, near his native place, Nazianzus; and there renewed and exercised his gift of sacred poetry, of which, to name but one, his Hymn to God is an undying record, and may bear comparison with any similar composition in any age.