ished by the cross on which
we were engendered in Christ, and the mystery of our predestination is
accomplished.

Footnotes:
1. Documentum martyrii, t. 9. Bibl. Patr. p. 699.
2. Some objected to these martyrs, that they were not honored with
frequent miracles as those had been who suffered in the primitive
ages.

ST. SOPHRONIUS, PATRIARCH OF JERUSALEM, C.

HE was a native of Damascus, and made such a progress in learning that
he obtained the name of the Sophist. He lived twenty years near
Jerusalem, under the direction of John Moschus, a holy hermit, without
engaging himself in a religious state. These two great men visited
together the monasteries of Egypt, and were detained by St. John the
Almoner, at Alexandria, about the year 610, and employed by him two
years in extirpating the Eutychians, and in reforming his diocese. John
Moschus wrote there his Spiritual Meadow, which he dedicated to
Sophronius. He made a collection in that book of the edifying examples
of virtue which he had seen or heard of among the monks, and died
shortly after at Rome. Athanasius, patriarch of the Jacobites or
Eutychians, in Syria, acknowledged two distinct natures in Christ, the
divine and the human; but allowed only one will. This Demi-Eutychianism
was a glaring inconsistency; because the will is the property of the
nature. Moreover, Christ sometimes speaks of his human will distinct
from the divine, as in his prayer in his agony in the garden. This
Monothelite heresy seemed an expedient whereby to compound with the
Eutychians. The emperor Heraclius confirmed it by an edict called
Ecthesis, or the Exposition, declaring that there is only one will in
Christ, namely, that of the Divine Word: which was condemned by pope
John IV. Cyrus, bishop of Phasis, a virulent Monothelite, was by
Heraclius preferred to the patriarchate of Alexandria, in 629. St.
Sophronius, falling at his feet, conjured him not to publish his
erroneous articles--but in vain. He therefore {567} left Egypt, and came
to Constantinople, where he found Sergius, the crafty patriarch, sowing
the same error in conjunction with Theodorus of Pharan. Hereupon he
travelled into Syria, where, in 634, he was, against his will, elected
patriarch of Jerusalem.

He was no sooner established in his see, than he assembled a council of
all the bishops of his patriarchate, in 634, to condemn the Monothelite
heresy, and composed a synodal letter to explain and prove the Cathol