§ 166. GKEGOET NAZIANZEX. 911
the theatre." Of course lier piety moved entiroi}- in the :pirit of that time, bore the stamp of ascetic legalism rather th*n of evangelical freedom, and adhered rigidly to certain outward forms. Significant also is her great reverence for sacred things. " She did not venture to turn her back upon the holy table, or to spit upon the floor of the church." Her death was worthy of a holy life. At a great age, in the church which her husband had built almost entirely with his own means, she died, holding fast with one hand to the altar and raising the otheFimploringly to heaven, with the words : " Bt gracious to me, O Christ, my King ! " Amidst universal sorrow, especially among the widows and orphans whose comfort and help she had been, she was laid to rest by the side of her husband near the graves of the martyrs. Her affectionate son says in one of the poems in which he extols her piety and her blessed end : " Bewail, O mortals, the mortal race ; but when one dies, like l^onna, praying, then weep I not."
Gregory was early instructed in the Hol}^ Scriptures and in the rudiments of science. He soon conceived a special predilection for the study of oratory, and through the influence of his mother, strengthened by a dream,' he determined on the celibate life, that he might devote himself without distraction to the kingdom of God. Like the other church teachers of this period, he also gave this condition the preference, and extolled it in orations and poems, though without denying the usefulness and divine appointment of marriage. His father, and his friend Gregory of IsTyssa were among the few bishops whc lived in wedlock.
From his native town he went for his further education to Caesarea in Cappadocia, where he probably already made a preliminary acquaintance with Basil ; then to Ctesarea in Palestine, where there were at that time celebrated schools of eloquence ; thence to Alexandria, where his revered Athanasius wore the supreme dignity of the church ; and finally to
* There appeared to him two veiled virgins, of unearthly beauty, who called themselves Purity and Chastity, companions of Jesus Christ, and friends of those who renounced all earthly connections for the sake of leading a perfectly divine life. After exhorting the youth to join himself to them in spirit, they rose again to heaven. Carmen iv. v. 205-285.
912 THLED PERIOD. A.D. 311-590.
Athens, which still maintained its ancient renown as the seat of Grecian science and art. Upon the voyage thither he survived a fearful storm, which threw him into the greatest men. tal anguish, especially because, tliongh educated a Christian, he, according to a not unusual custom of that time, had not yet received holy baptism, which was to liim the condition of salvation. His deliverance he ascribed partly to the intercession of his parents, who had intimation of h!s peril by presentiments and dreams, and he took it as a second consecration to the spiritual office.
In Athens he formed or strengthejied the bond of that beautiful Christian friendship with Basil, of which we havo already spoken in the life of Basil. They were, as Gregory says, as it were only one soul animating two bodies. He became acquainted also with the prince Julian, who was at that time studying there, but felt wholly repelled by him, and said of him with prophetic foresight: "What evil is the Roman empire here educating for itself!"' He was afterwards a bitter antagonist of Julian, and wrote two invective discourses against him after his death, which are inspired, however, more by the fire of passion than by pure enthusiasm for Christianity, and which were intended to expose him to universal ignominy as a horrible monument of enmity to Christianity and of the retributive judgment of God.^
Friends w'ished him to settle in Athens as a teacher of eloquence, but he left there in his thirtieth year, and returned through Constantinople, where he took with him his brother Csesarins, a distinguished physician,^ to his native city and his
' Oloi' KaKhp T) 'Pctinaluy rpecpei.
' These Invectivae, or \6yot (TT-qAiTivriKol, arc, according to the old order, the Sd and 4th, according to the new the 4th and 5tli, of Gregory's Orations, torn. i. pp. 78-176, of the Benedictine edition.
' To this Caesarius, wlio was afterwards physician in orduiary to the emperor in Constantinople, many, following Photius, ascribe the still extant collection of theological and philosophical questions, Dialogi iv sivc Quajstiones theol. et philoa. 145 ; but without sufficient ground. Comp. Fabricius, Bibl. Gr. viii. p. 435. He was a true Christian, but was not baptized till shortly before his death in 368. Ilil mother Nonna followed the funeral procession in the white raiment of festive joy. He was afterwards, like Ids brother Gregory, Ids sister Gorgonia, and hie mother, received into the number of the saints of the Jatholic church.