Nichol, John Pringi.k, a British astronomer and philosopher, eminent for his services to the Church by seeking to lianuonize science and revelation, was born at Brecliin, Scotland, in 1804. He was originally edu- cated for the ministry, but turned aside to the study of the natural sciences, especially astronomj', and gained distinction as a lecturer and writer on science. About 183(5 he was appointed professor of astronomj' in the University of Glasgow. He died in 1859. He publish- ed popular works, entitled The Aixhiteciure of the Heavens (1836) ; The Stellar Heavens ; The Solar Sys- tem ; and a Dictionary of the Physical Sciences, He wrote also numerous articles for the Imperial Dictionary of Biography. His style is vigorous and attractive. "In the combined character of lecturer and popular writer," says a writer in TaiCs Mayazine (1848), " Dr. Nichol has done more than any modern scientist to un- case science from its mummy confinements, and to make it ^valk abroad as a free and living thing. . . . Nichol is the prose laureate of the stars. From his writings ascends hitherto the richest tribute of mingled intelli- gence of their laws — love for their beauty — admiration for their still, strong order — hope in the prospects of mankind, as reflected in their mirror— and sense, ever profound and near, of that unseen Power who counts their numbers, sustains their motions, and makes their thousand eyes the organs and the symbols of his om- niscience." Professor Nichol's spirit of reverence is in all his writings, and has made him famous throughout Britain. In this country his writings have not circu- lated as largely as they deserve. See Littell's Living Age, May 6, 1848, art. i ; and the references in Allibone, Diet, of 'Brit, and A mer. A nth. s. v. (J. H. W.)
Nicholas I of Alexandria, an eminent prelate of the Eastern Church, flourished near the opening of the 13th century. He was patriarch of Alexandria at a time when the Greek Church was as low as it ever fell, and when Alexandria alone stood forth the worthy representative of orthodox Christianity in the East. Constantinople was in the hands of the Crusaders, Jeru- salem under Mohammedan rule, and therefore Alexan- dria alone was the prop of the Greek Church at this time. Yet even Alexandria's independence from Rome waned under Nicholas I, who was inclined to acknowledge the authority of the all-powerful pope Innocent III, "that mighty pontiff who raised the authority of St. Peter's chair to its highest pitch." Nicholas, indeed, was once thanked by Innocent for "seeking to console both him- self (i. e. Nicholas) and those who were suffering cap- tivity (Crusaders) for the name of Christ, by the com- forts of the Holy Roman Church." A.D. 1212, when In- nocent called the fourth Lateran Council, and Nicholas found it impossible to attend, he sent a deacon named Germanus as his legate to that Western assembly (In- nocent, Epp. 15, 84). After the death of Innocent III, Nicholas continued his close relation with Rome under Honorius, notwithstanding the erection of a Latin arch- bishopric within the Alexandrian patriarchate. Nicho- las died about 1228. See Neale, History of the Eastern Church, Patriarchate of Alexandria, u, 21 H sq., 294 sq. (J.H.W.)
Nicholas of Argentine. See Nicholas of Strasburo.
Nicholas of Basle, the great lay-preacher of the Middle Ages, and a leader of the Mystics in the 14th century, the man who taught Tauler (q. v.) that God's illuminating grace was not confined to the Church of Rome or her clergy, but comes to every one of God's people directly from Jesus Christ himself, was the son of a wealthy merchant in Basle, and was born in the year 1308. He was a lad of good abilities and irre- proachable conduct, and was from his early years of a decidedly religious disposition. When about fifteen years of age he became oppressed by a great conscious- ness of sin, and, in order to free himself from the burden under which he labored, he resolved to renounce the
world and devote himself to a religious life. Even at this early stage of his career the independence of his character revealed it.self, for he does not appear to have remotely contemplated entering a convent or becoming a priest; he renounced the world, but made the renun- ciation in his own way. For five years he labored to obtain a nearer approach to God, reading the lives of saints and practicing austerities. At length God re- vealed himself to him, and he found peace. Now he began to feel himself specially inspired by God, and specially taught by the Holy Spirit. Immediately after his conversion he began to study the Scriptures, and found that, although he had never received a university education, nor any instruction in theology, he was able, in the space of thirty weeks, to master and understand the Word of God as thoroughly as many learned doc- tors of the Church. While separating himself from the Church, and denying her claim to be the mediator between God and man in the revelation of doctrine, Nicholas did not associate himself with any heretical sects. He had no connection whatever with the Wal- denses, although some of his doctrines were the same as theirs, and he was the determined opponent of the licentious Brethren of the Free Spirit, and of the pan- theistic Beghards. Ho occupied a thoroughly inde- pendent position between the Church, on the one hand, and the different sects on the other; and the fact of his being a layman enabled him to do this with greater ease and safety than if he had been a member of any religious order. His theology was of a very simple kind, and he had not the perplexing logical mind which prevents a thinker from holding doctrines quite irrecon- cilable with each other. On most points of doctrine his opinions were substantially those of the old Catholic Church, but along with these he held two doctrines which, when pushed to their logical consequences, would have yielded results entirely subversive of most of the theology of the Church. These were the doctrines of self-renunciation and of private inspiration ; and in the view of Nicholas they are so mutualh' related that when self-renunciation is complete inspiration follows. Nicholas and his followers made the dogma of self-re- nunciation the principal doctrine of their theology. Prot- estantism, it is true, teaches this doctrine too. Nicho- las of Basle and his friends, however, differed radically from the reformed theology. The latter teaches simply the renunciation of one's own merit in order to gain by confidence in the merit of Jesus Christ a standing before God and peace of conscience in spite of the sense of sin ; making self-renunciation simply the absolute negation of one's own individuality in order to leave all things to God, while Nicholas's doctrine of self-renunciation is the barest and most absolute Quietism (q. v.), and if logically adhered to prevents every kind of human ac- tion and exertion. He went so far as to assert that " temptations to sin should always be faced and never shirked, nor are we to pra\' to be delivered from them ; and in the same way it is not right to pray for any al- teration of circumstances, nor even for the coming of the kingdom of heaven." The highest form of the di- vine life in man is, according to Nicholas, "resignation to the will of God, and prayer is a means of bringing about this state of resignation ; hence the believer shoidd only pray for a right and suitable frame of mind and will — that is, a frame of mind and will resigned to whatever is sent or is to be sent by God in his providence — while to pray for a change in one's circumstances, for forgive- ness of sins, for freedom from temptation, for the com- ing of the kingdom, is to pray that what God sends may be made subject to us, not that we should be made to submit ourselves to it, and so tends to produce self- assertion, not self-renunciation."