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John having been informed that the churches in Asia and the
neighborhood were governed by unworthy persons, and that they bartered
the priesthood for the incomes and gifts received, or bestowed that
dignity as a matter of private favor, repaired to Ephesus, and
deposed thirteen bishops, some in Lycia and Phrygia, and others in
Asia itself, and appointed others in their stead. The bishop of
Ephesus was dead, and he therefore ordained Heraclides over the
church. Heraclides was a native of Cyprus, and was one of the
deacons under John: he had formerly joined the monks at Scetis, and
had been the disciple of the monk Evagrius. John also expelled
Gerontius, bishop of the church in Nicomedia. This latter was a
deacon under Ambrosius, of the church of Milan; he declared, I do
not know why, either with an intention to invent a miracle, or because
he had been himself deceived by the art and phantasms of a demon, that
he had seized something resembling an ass,
by night, had cut off its head, and flung it into a grinding house.
Ambrose regarded this mode of discourse as unworthy of a deacon of
God, and commanded Gerontius to remain in seclusion until he had
expiated his fault by repentance. Gerontius, however, was a very
skillful physician; he was eloquent and persuasive, and knew well how
to gain friends; be therefore ridiculed the command of Ambrose, and
repaired to Constantinople. In a short time he obtained the
friendship of some of the most powerful men at court; and, not long
after, was elevated to the bishopric of Nicomedia. He was ordained
by Helladius, bishop of Caesarea in Cappadocia, who performed this
office the more readily for him, because he had been instrumental,
through his interest at court, in obtaining high appointment in the
army for that functionary's son. When Ambrose heard of this
ordination, he wrote to Nectarius, the president of the church of
Constantinople, desiring him to eject Gerontius from the priesthood,
and not permit him and the ecclesiastical order to be so abused.
However desirous Nectarius might have been to obey this injunction,
he could never succeed carrying it into effect, owing to the determined
resistance of the people of Nicomedia. John deposed Gerontius, and
ordained Pansophius, who had formerly been preceptor to the wife of
the emperor, and who, though a man of decided piety and of a mild and
gentle disposition, was not liked by the Nicomedians. They arose in
frequent sedition, and enumerated publicly and privately the
beneficence of Gerontius, and on the liberal advantage derived from
his science, and its generous and active use for the rich and poor
alike; and as is usual when we applaud those we love, they ascribed
many other virtues to him. They went about the streets of their own
city and Constantinople as if some earthquake, or pestilence, or
other visitation of Divine wrath had occurred, and sang psalms, and
offered supplications that they might have Gerontius for their bishop.
They were at length compelled to yield to necessity, and parted with
grief and groans from Gerontius, receiving in his stead a bishop whom
they regarded with fear and aversion. The bishops who had been deposed
all their followers declaimed against John, as the leader of a
revolution in the churches, and as changing the rights of the
ordained, contrary to the ancestral laws; and under the influence of
their grievance, they condemned deeds done by him, which were worthy
of praise according to the opinion of most people. Among other
matters, they reproached him with the proceedings that had been taken
against Eutropius.
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