CHAPTER XXIX

PAUL, REFUTED BY A CERTAIN MALCHION, ONE OF THE PRESBYTERS WHO HAD BEEN A SOPHIST, WAS DEPOSED

IT was in the reign of this emperor, when a final council was convened, in which a great number of bishops was present, that this arch-heretic at Antioch being detected, and now evidently discarded by all, was excommunicated from the whole catholic church under heaven. He was refuted, and argued out of his lurking-place, chiefly by Malchion, a man well versed in other departments of learning, who had been at the head of the sophist’s Greek school of sciences at Antioch; and who also, on account of his great and sincere faith in Christ, was honoured with the office of presbyter in that church. He was the only one who, after commencing the discussion with him, which, as there were ready writers that took down the whole, we know to be now extant, was able to ferret out the sly and deceitful sentiments of the man.