an imperial edict appeared which condemned Nestorius to perpetual banishment in the Greater Oasis of Upper Egypt. " The unhappy Nestorius," says a Church his- torian, "was now dragged from the stillness of his for- mer cloister of Euporjjius, before the gates of Antioch, in which he had enjoyed four years of repose, from one place of exile to another — first to Arabia, then to ICgypt — and was compelled to drink the bitter cup of persecu- tion which he himself, in the days of his power, had forced upon the heretics." To his credit, be it said, he bore his sufferings with resignation and indepen- dence. In his e.xile Nestorius busied himself by the writing of several theological works. Thus he wrote a history of his life and of his theological controversy, in which he sought to vindicate himself against the re- liroaches of both friends and foes, significantly entitled a Tnifjedij. (Fragments in Evagrius, Hist. Ecdes. i, 7, and in the Si/nodicon adcersus Trar/oediam Iremei, c. 6. That the book bore the name of Trai/edy is stated by Ebedjesu, a Nestorian metropolitan. The imperial com- missioner, Irenwus, afterwards bishop of Tyre, a friend of Nestorius, composed a book concerning liim and the ecclesiastical history of his time, likewise under the title of Tragedy, fragments of which, in a Latin translation, are preserved in the so-called Syiwdicon, in Mansi, v, 431 sq.) Various accounts are given of the circum- stances which led to his death, but in one thing all are agreed, that his last years were embittered by many acts of harsh and cruel persecuticm. The precise time or place of his death has not been ascertained, but he io believed to have died previous to A.D. 450, when the Eutychian controversy began to attract notice. The account given by Evagrius, that Nestorius's death was caused by a disease in which his tongue was eaten by worms, rests, according to Evagrius himself, on a single and unnamed authority. The more ])robably authentic narratives ascribe his death to the effects of a fall. He was still living A.D. 439, when Socrates wrote his history {Ilist. Ecdes. vii, 34). The Jlonophysite Jacobites are accustomed from year to year to cast stones upon liis supposed grave in Upper Egypt, and have spread the tradition that it has never been moistened by the rain of heaven, which yet falls upon the evil and the good. The emperor, who had formerly favored him, but was now turned entirely against him, caused all his writ- ings to be burned, and his followers to be named after Simon Magus, and stigmatized as Simonians. But though this be his memory in the East, in the West the sad fate and upright character of Nestorius, after having been long abhorred, has in modern times, since Luther, found much sympathy ; while Cyril, by his vio- lent conduct, has incurred much censure. Walch {Ket- zerhist. v, 817 sq.) has collected the earlier opinions. Gieseler and Neauder take the part of Nestorius against Cyril, and think that he was unjustly condemned. So also Milman, who would rather meet the justice of the divine Redeemer loaded with the errors of Nestorius than with the barbarities of Cyril, but does not enter into the theological merits of the controversy (Ifisl. of Latin Christianity, i, 210). Petavius, Baur, llefele, and Eb- rard, on the contrary, vindicate Cyril against Nestorius, not as to his personal conduct, which was anything but Christian, but in regard to the particular matter in (piestion, viz., the defence of the unity of Christ against the division of his personality. Dorner (ii, 81 sq.^ just- ly distributes the right and wrong, truth and error, on both sides, and considers Nestorius and Cyril rei)rescnt- atives of two equally one-sided conceptions, which com- plement each other. Cyril's strength lay on the relig- ious and speculative side of Christology, that of Nesto- rius on the ethical and practical. Kahnis (Dor/matil:, ii, 80) gives a similar judgment. Pcrtiai)S it is near- est the truth to concede that Nestorius was possessed of an honest and pious zeal, but was wanting in that pru- dence and moderation by which zeal should have been controlled.
Literature.— On the sources are to be consulted — (1.)
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In favor of Xestorius : Nestorius, 'OftiKiat, Sermones ; Anathemalismi. Extracts from the Greek original in the A cis of the Council of Ephesus ; in a Latin transla- tion ill Marius IMercator, a North African layman who just then resided in Constantinople (Opera, ed. Garne- rius [Paris, 1G73], pt. ii ; and better ed. Baluzius, Paris, 1684) ; also in Gallandi, Bibl. vet. P. P. (viii, 615-735), and in Migne's Patrol, (torn, xlviii). Nestorius's own account (Evagrius, Hist. Eccles. i, 7) was used by his friend Irenaius (bishop of Tyre till 448) in his Traga- dia s. conim. de rebus in synodo Ephesina ac in Oriente toto gestis, which, however, is lost; the documents at- tached to it were revised in the 6th century in the Synodicon adversus IVagmdiam Irenmi (in Mansi, v, 731 sq.). In favor of Nestorius, or at least of his doc- trine, Theodoret (f 457) in his works against Cyril, and in three dialogues entitled 'EpaviTrrjQ (Beggar). Comp. also the fragments of Theodore of Mopsuestia (f 429).
(2.) Against Nestorius: It has been shown that the great opponent of Nestorius was Cyril of Alexandria. He published 'AvaBej-iartrrfiol, five books Kara fieffro- piov, and several Epistles against Nestorius and Theo- doret, in vol. vi of Aubert's ed. of his Opera (Paris, 1638 [in Migne's ed.], tom. ix). These aim to prove that the Virgin Mary was ^iotokoc, and not xpiffroroKOf. But there are besides a great number of writers against Nes- torius and his heresy whose works are extant. Among these are, Socrates, Hist. Eccles. vii, c. 29-35 (written after 431, but still before the death of Nestorius; comp. c. 34) ; Evagrius, Hist. Eccles. i, 2-7 ; Liberatus (deacon of Carthage about 553), Breviarium causce Nestoriano- rum et Eutychianorum (ed. Gamier, Paris, 1675 ; and printed in Gallandi, Bibl. vet. Patiuni, xii, 121-161); Leontius of Byzantium (monachus), Desectis; and Con- tra Nestoriuni et Eutychen (in Gallandi, Bibl. xii, 625 sq., and 658-700). Besides these should be mentioned Philastrius, Epiphanius, Theodoret, Faustus, Maxentius, Marius Mercator, and many others. A complete collec- tion of all the acts of the Nestorian controversy, see in Mansi, iv, 567 sq. ; and v, vii, ix.