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AFTER the lapse of a few days, Arsacius was ordained bishop of
Constantinople; he was a brother of Nectarius who so ably
administered the see before John, although he was then very aged,
being upwards of eighty years old. While he very mildly and peacefully
administered the episcopate, Cyrinus bishop of Chalcedon, upon whose
foot Maruthas bishop of Mesopotamia had inadvertently trodden, became
so seriously affected by the accident, that mortification ensued, and
it became necessary to amputate his foot. Nor was this amputation
performed once only, but was required to be often repeated: for after
the injured limb was cut off, the evil so permeated his whole system,
that the other foot also having become affected by the disease had to
submit to the same operation. I have alluded to this circumstance,
because many have affirmed that what he suffered was a judgment upon him
for his calumnious aspersions of John, whom he so often designated as
arrogant and inexorable, as I have already said. Furthermore as on
the 30th of September, in the last-mentioned consulate, there was
an extraordinary fall of hail of immense size at Constantinople and its
suburbs, it also was declared to be an expression of Divine
indignation on account of Chrysostom's unjust deposition: and the
death of the empress tended to give increased credibility to these
reports, for it took place four days after the hail-storm. Others,
however, asserted that John had been deservedly deposed, because of
the violence he had exercised in Asia and Lydia, in depriving the
Novatians and Quartodecimans of many of their churches, when he went
to Ephesus and ordained Heraclides. But whether John's deposition
was just, as his enemies declare, or Cyrinus suffered in chastisement
for his slanderous revilings; whether the hail fell, or the empress
died on John's account, or whether these things happened for other
reasons, Or for these in connection with others, God only knows,
who is the discerner of secrets, and the just judge of truth itself.
I have simply recorded the reports which were current at that time.
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