in this promiscuous outrage, the innocent were confounded with the
guilty, and Alexandria was impoverished by the loss of a wealthy and
industrious colony. The zeal of Cyril exposed him to the penalties of
the Julian law; but in a feeble government and a superstitious age, he
was secure of impunity, and even of praise. Orestes complained; but
his just complaints were too quickly forgotten by the ministers of
Theodosius, and too deeply remembered by a priest who affected to
pardon, and continued to hate, the praefect of Egypt. As he passed
through the streets, his chariot was assaulted by a band of five hundred
of the Nitrian monks his guards fled from the wild beasts of the desert;
his protestations that he was a Christian and a Catholic were answered
by a volley of stones, and the face of Orestes was covered with blood.
The loyal citizens of Alexandria hastened to his rescue; he instantly
satisfied his justice and revenge against the monk by whose hand he had
been wounded, and Ammonius expired under the rod of the lictor. At the
command of Cyril his body was raised from the ground, and transported,
in solemn procession, to the cathedral; the name of Ammonius was changed
to that of Thaumasius the wonderful; his tomb was decorated with
the trophies of martyrdom, and the patriarch ascended the pulpit to
celebrate the magnanimity of an assassin and a rebel. Such honors might
incite the faithful to combat and die under the banners of the saint;
and he soon prompted, or accepted, the sacrifice of a virgin, who
professed the religion of the Greeks, and cultivated the friendship
of Orestes. Hypatia, the daughter of Theon the mathematician, [25] was
initiated in her father's studies; her learned comments have elucidated
the geometry of Apollonius and Diophantus, and she publicly taught, both
at Athens and Alexandria, the philosophy of Plato and Aristotle. In the
bloom of beauty, and in the maturity of wisdom, the modest maid refused
her lovers and instructed her disciples; the persons most illustrious
for their rank or merit were impatient to visit the female philosopher;
and Cyril beheld, with a jealous eye, the gorgeous train of horses and
slaves who crowded the door of her academy. A rumor was spread among
the Christians, that the daughter of Theon was the only obstacle to the
reconciliation of the praefect and the archbishop; and that obstacle was
speedily removed. On a fatal day, in the holy season of Lent, Hypatia
was torn