From his position as Patriarch in New Rome, the residence of the Emperor, or his personal influence with Theodosius, he could overbear most opposition. What opposition there was came, it had been observed, first from the Laity, then from the Clergy, lastly from the Bishops.
Nestorius, in his first epistle to S. Celestine, told him that he had daily used both 'anger and gentleness' in repressing the Theotocos. His idea of 'anger and gentleness' may be gathered from a formal petition to the Emperors from Basil, a deacon and Archimandrite, and Thalassius a reader and monk, in their petition to the Emperors. In the words of this petition,
By his command and invitation, we went to the See-house, to be fully instructed whether what we had heard concerning him is true. He put us off a second and a third time, and then scarcely bade us say what we wished. But when he had heard from us, that what he had said, that 'Mary only bore a man consubstantial with herself,' and 'what is born of the flesh is flesh,' is not orthodox language, immediately he had us seized, and thence, beaten by the crowd of the officers, we were led to the prison, and there they stripped us naked as prisoners and subject to punishment, bound us to pillars, threw us down and kicked us. What in the civil courts we do not say that Clerks, Archimandrites, or monks, nay, or any secular persons do not suffer, we endured |liii in the Church lawlessly from the lawless ones. Oppressed, famished, we remained a long time under guard, and his mania was not satisfied with this, but after all this, by some deceit we were delivered over to the most Excellent Eparch of this renowned city, and loaded with irons we were led back to the prison, and afterwards were brought up in the Praetorium in the same way with chains, and since there was no accuser, we were again led back by the guard in the prison and thus he again chastised us smiting us on the face, and having discoursed and agreed deceitfully (as appeared from what followed) about Him Who is by nature Son of Grod, that He was born of the holy Mary the Theotocos, since there is another Son; so he dismissed us.'
Basil who relates this, says also,
' Some of the most reverend Presbyters frequently rebuked to the face him who is now entrusted with the Episcopate (if he should be called a Bishop) and, because of his self-will that he will not call the Holy Virgin Theotocos, or Christ by nature true God, have put themselves out of his communion, and so still remain; others do so secretly; others, because they spoke in this holy Church Eirene-by-the-sea against the ill-renewal of this dogma, have been silenced. On this the people, desiring to have the wonted sound teaching, cried out, 'A King we have; a Bishop we have not.' But this essay of the people did not remain unavenged; some were seized by the attendants, and beaten in divers ways in the royal city, as is not practised even among the Barbarians. Some contradicted him publicly to the face in the Church and underwent no little trouble. A monk of the simpler sort was constrained by zeal in the midst of the Church to hinder this herald of impiety from entering in at the Celebration, being a heretic. Him having beaten, he delivered to |liv the Magnificent Governors and being again beaten and paraded publicly, the crier proclaiming (his offence), he [Nestorius] sent him into exile. And not this only, but even in the most holy Church after his impious homily, those on his side who held down every thing, would have shed blood, had not the aid of God prevented it.'
They conclude by asking the Emperor to convene a General Council, 'not, Grod knows, to avenge our wrongs,' but 'to unite the most holy Church, restore the priests of the true faith, before the untrue teaching spread abroad.' They speak of Nestorius as
'intimidating, threatening, driving, expelling, maltreating, acting recklessly and ill, and doing all unsparingly to establish his own mania and ungodliness, neither fearing God, nor ashamed before men, but clothed with contempt of all, confident in his wrath and in the might of some who have been corrupted, and (to speak fearlessly) in your Majesty.'
It is strong language, but language, the more responsible, as formally addressed to one who held absolute power, who used it as no modern Sovereign could, and who was known to favour the Patriarch, against whom it was directed.
Nestorius boasted to S. Celestine of his success against those who had departed from him.
Moreover they have dared to call the Virgin who hare Christ (Christotocos) in a certain way Theotocos. For they do not shudder at calling her Theotocos, although those holy fathers above all praise at Nice are read to have said nothing more as to the holy Virgin than that our Lord Jesus Christ was incarnate of the Holy Ghost and the Virgin Mary. I do not speak of the Holy Scriptures, which every where, both by Angels and Apostles, |lv set forth the Virgin as the mother of Christ, not of God the Word. For which things' sake what strifes we have endured, I suppose that report has, before this, instructed your Blessedness; observing this also, that we have not striven in vain, but by the grace of the Lord, many of those who were departing from us have been amended.'
To S. Cyril he says,
' Know that those hast been deceived by the Clerks of thine own persuasion, who have been deprived here by the holy Synod, because they were minded as the Manichees.'
S. Cyril in the Synodal letter from Alexandria, announcing his impending excommunication, mentions those whom Nestorius had excommunicated or degraded, as he had 'indicated to Celestine the most holy Bishop of Great Rome and our fellow-bishop.' S. Celestine also requires as a condition of Communion that he should ' restore to the Church all excluded for the sake of Christ its Head.' In his letter to John of Antioch he supposes that this may have been done by others also.
Within Constantinople Nestorius was opposed by those whose position secured them from his aggression: by S. Proclus, appointed Bishop of Cyzicus, whom the Cyzicans declined, wishing to appoint their own Bishop, and who remained a Bishop without a see; and by Eusebius of Dorylaeum, who
' being of great piety and skill among the laymen, having gathered within himself no mean learning, was moved with fervent and devout zeal, and said with |lvi piercing cry, that the Word Himself Who is before the ages endured a second Generation by that after the flesh and from a woman.'
Nestorius answered him by speaking of the 'pollution' of these wretches and saying, "that if there were two births, there must be two sons," i. e. that our 'one Lord Jesus Christ' 'could not be Begotten of the Father before all worlds' and yet 'for us men and for our salvation' be born of the Virgin Mary.
Leontius says that Eusebius was also said to be the author of the parallel between Paul of Samosata and Nestorius.
Different accounts are given of the way in which the minds of the people were affected. S. Cyril says that on the Anathema pronounced by Dorotheus,
' There was a great cry from all the people, and a running out [of the Church.] For they would not communicate with those so minded. And now too the people of Constantinople remain out of communion, except some of the lighter sort and his flatterers. But nearly all the monasteries and their Archimandrites and many of the senate do not communicate: fearing lest they should be wronged as to his faith and that of those with him, whom he brought when he came up from Antioch, who all speak perverse things.'
Nestorius, on the other hand, boasts at the close of his answer to S. Cyril's second letter ,
'Church matters with us advance daily, and the people through the grace of God so grow, that those who see their multitude, cry out with the prophet, that the earth is filled with the knowledge of the Lord, as much |lvii water covereth the sea, and the Emperors are in exceeding joy, being enlightened as to the doctrine; and, to speak briefly, one may see daily, as to all the heresies which fight with God and the orthodoxy of the Church, that word is daily fulfilled with us, the house of Saul waxed weaker and weaker, and the house of David waxed stronger and stronger.'
It is not much that the Emperor told S. Cyril , that the Churches were united and would be yet more, and that he [S. Cyril] was forgiven; (for Nestorius had persuaded him that S. Cyril was a mere disturber of the peace) or that Nestorius on one occasion speaks of the people being thronged . But some were even ready to turn against those who objected to his teaching , and 'many Clergy and laymen from Constantinople coming to Antioch and Beroea agreed with the saying of Dorotheus, as having nothing contrary to Apostolic doctrine or the faith of Nicaea .'
In these three years, S. Cyril had only broken silence three times; once in his letter to the monks in Egypt; a letter to Nestorius, explaining the occasion of that letter when he heard that Nestorius was offended by it; and the second full statement of doctrine in the Epistle, which was received by the Council of Ephesus.
i. The first was his 'letter to the Monks of Egypt.' Grave perplexity had been occasioned to some of them, even as to the Divinity of our Lord, through some writings attributed to Nestorius. S. Cyril |lviii answered them, but without any mention of Nestorius. He himself gives the account of his writing,
' When his [Nestorius'] homilies were brought to Egypt, I learnt that some of the lighter sort were carried away, and said doubtingly among themselves, 'does he say right?' 'Is he in error?' Fearing lest the disease should root in the minds of the simple, I wrote a general Epistle to the monasteries of Egypt, confirming them to the right faith.'