ustly claimed over the Church of
Jerusalem; and what widened the breach between them was their difference
of sentiments with regard to the consubstantiality of the Son, which St.
Cyril had always most zealously asserted.[12] This was sufficient to
render him odious in the eyes of Acacius, who in a council of Arian
bishops convened by him, declared St. Cyril deposed for not appearing,
after two years' warning, to answer to the crimes alleged against him.
One of them was that he had lavished away the goods of the Church, and
had applied its sacred ornaments to profane uses. The ground of the
accusation was, that, in time of a great famine at Jerusalem, he had
sold some of the Church plate, and precious stuffs, to relieve the wants
of the poor. St. Cyril, not looking upon the members of the council as
qualified judges, appealed to higher powers,[13] but yielding to
violence withdrew to Antioch, and thence removed to Tarsus, were he was
honorably entertained by the bishop Sylvaims, and had in great respect,
notwithstanding the sentence of Acacius and his council against him.
Here living in communion with Sylvanus, Eustathius of Sebaste, Basil of
Ancyra. and others, who soon after appeared at the head of the
Semi-Arian faction, this gave rise to the calumny that St. Cyril himself
had espoused it. But nothing could be more falsely alleged against him,
he having always maintained the Catholic faith. He had accordingly, in
349, together with his predecessor Maximus, received the decrees of the
council of Sardica, and consequently those of Nice. And we have already
seen, in his letter to Constantius, that he made an undaunted profession
of the Consubstantial Trinity. To which we may add, that in the council
of Constantinople, in 381, he joined with the other bishops in
condemning the Semi-Arians and Macedonians. And the orthodox bishops
assembled in the same city, in 382, writing to pope Damasus and to the
western bishops, gave a most ample testimony to his faith, declaring,
"That the most reverend and beloved of God, Cyril, bishop of Jerusalem,
had been canonically elected by the bishops of the province, and had
suffered many persecutions-for the faith."[14] Upon the death of
Constantius, in 361, Julian the apostate, partly out of aversion to his
uncle, and partly in hopes to see the Christian sects and the orthodox
more at variance, suffered all the banished bishops to return to their
churches. Thus did God make use of the malic