bishops. A picture of the Christian life of their times might surprise us with its much brighter colours. Although subsequently an attempt was made to again remove Ælurus, it was frustrated on the plea of his old age, and he was allowed to remain patriarch of Alexandria till his death.
Now the significance of this extraordinary story lies in the fact that, although the conscience of Christendom must have revolted against the enormity of his crime, and although his subtle, intriguing ways proved him to be a cunning schemer as well as a man of violence, Timothy had a powerful following throughout his career, and was permitted to end his days at one of the highest posts of honour in the odour of sanctity. The indignant protest of the bishops voiced the wholesome horror which we should expect all right-minded people to feel at such deeds as he had committed. Yet it only came from the orthodox party, that is to say, from his enemies. His friends the Monophysites were ready to profit by his wickedness and even to condone it for the sake of their cause. The only approach to an excuse for them is that they had a cause which they believed to be right and true, that therefore they were not merely place-hunters. But in view of the development of theological rancour and partizan passion which such a state of affairs reveals, this very excuse is a plain proof how entirely the degenerate monks and their adherents in the mob had substituted metaphysical accuracy as their test of true religion for the old sound idea of the prophet: "What doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?"
Next to Timothy Ælurus the most conspicuous leader of the Monophysites at this time was Peter the Fuller (a.d. 465–474), the patriarch of Antioch. It is difficult to piece together the several accounts of his early life,[1] but according to the arrangement of the data worked out by Tillemont, he first appears as a monk in Bythinia. Expelled
- ↑ In Acacius of Constantinople, Theodore the Reader, and Alexander a monk of Cyprus.
