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Pyrrhus employed him in various important negociations, in which he was generally successful, through his eloquence and his insinuating talents; so that his master used to say, that Cyneas had gained him more towns by persuasion, than he could ever have conquered by his arms. He was of the epicurean sect in philosophy; and upon its principles, endeavoured to dissuade Pyrrhus from entering into a war with the Romans, using for his argument, that how great soever might be the success of his projects for aggrandisement, he could not add to the enjoyments which were already in his power. Pyrrhus, however, persisted in his determination for war, and dispatched Cyneas with part of his fleet, and a body of troops, to Tarentum, where, by his prudent conduct, he rendered the interest of his king triumphant, and gained the Tarentines for allies. After the first victory of Pyrrhus over the Romans, B.C. 280, Cyneas wisely proposed entering into a negociation for peace, with them, and he was himself sent to Rome for the purpose. There, by means of his eloquence, and the distribution of presents among the senators and their wives, he gained a majority to agree to the terms offered by his master; but the authority of old Appius Claudius the blind, overthrew all his endeavours, and a decree passed for sending him immediately back, and continuing the war. Cyneas, on his return, is said to have told Pyrrhus, that the Roman senate seemed to him an assembly of kings. After a second battle, Cyneas was sent again to Rome, but met with no better success than before, the senate refusing to listen to any conditions till Pyrrhus should have withdrawn all his forces from Italy. Cyneas was after wards dispatched to Sicily, whence overtures had arrived to Pyrrhus; and he successfully prepared the way for his master's reception in that island. After this period we hear no more of him. Pliny, among the examples of extraordinary memory, has mentioned that Cyneas, the day after his arrival at Rome, was able to salute all the senators and knights by their names. Cicero, in one of his epistles, cites a work on the art military, composed by him and Pyrrhus in conjunction. Cyneas also abridged the Tactics of Æneas. Plutarch in Pyrrho. Univers. Hist. Moreri.-A.

CYPRIAN, THASCIUS CECILIUS, a learned and venerable christian father, saint, and martyr, in the third century, was a native of Africa, and, according to some writers, of Carthage, which was the scene in which he passed the greater part of his life. But nothing certain can be determined respecting the place of his birth.

He possessed the advantages of a learned and liberal education, and for some years taught rhetoric in the schools of Carthage, with eminent reputation, and to his no small emolument. During this time he was attached to the gentile religion, in which he had been bred; but when he was considerably advanced in life, and most probably in the year 246, he was converted to Christianity by the arguments of Cæcilius, a presbyter in the church of Carthage, whose name he assumed in honour of his friendship and virtues. Upon his embracing the christian faith, he entirely altered his mode of living, which had before been gay and splendid; sold his estates, for the sake of distributing the produce in works of benevolence and charity; and distinguished himself by the strictness. purity, and humility of his manners. To such a mistaken degree did he carry his self-denial, that he forbad himself many of the most lawful and innocent indulgences, and even separated from his wife, absurdly conceiving that the attainment of christian knowledge and perfection required such unnatural sacrifices. After having given satisfactory proof of the sincerity of his conversion, he was baptised, and in the year 247 ordained a presbyter in the christian church. So exemplary was his conduct, and so satisfactory his services in this situation, that in the year 248, or 249, most probably upon the death of Donatus bishop of Carthage, he was, at the general and earnest desire of the Christians in that city, chosen to be his successor. It was in vain that he attempted to decline that office, in favour of some of his seniors in the faith; the importunity of the people prevailed, and his own inclination was forced to give way to their wishes. For a considerable part of two years after this event, he conducted the affairs of his bishopric without molestation, and with a strict attention to the reformation of the corrupt manners, which at that early period had taken place in the christian church. But in the year 251 the Decian persecution commenced; when the heathens at Carthage, who resented his desertion of their cause, directed their rage particularly against Cyprian, and often demanded, in a clamorous manner, in the theatre and other public places, that he should be thrown to the lions. In these circumstances he thought it most prudent to withdraw from the storm, and was proscribed by government, and his goods confiscated. He, however, declared, that this step was-taken in obedience to a command which he received from God in a vision; and upon that ground he defended it, in opposition to some remon

strances, that by withdrawing from the scene of persecution, he had improperly deserted his post and his principles. In this instance he was either credulous, or guilty of a pious fraud. During his retirement, which lasted for about fourteen months, he diligently employed himself in writing letters to his people, to his clergy, and to the Christians at Rome, and in other parts of the empire, exhorting them to stedfastness in the faith, and abounding in pious advice, free reproofs, and prayers for the peace and edification of the church. When the fury of that persecution was abated, in consequence of the death of the emperor Decius, Cyprian returned to Carthage, and afterwards held different councils for regulating the affairs of the church; in which a variety of points was discussed, chiefly relative to matters of ecclesiastical discipline. One principal subject was, the treatment which should be shewn towards such as had fallen from the profession of their faith during the severity of the preceding persecution, and had saved their lives, either by offering sacrifice, or by burning incense, or by purchasing from the pagan priests and magistrates certificates which excused them from either professing or denying their sentiments. Great numbers of these lapsed christians, when the hour of trial was passed, expressed their desire of being restored to church-communion, but without submitting to the long course of penitential discipline which the ecclesiastical laws then generally received enjoined. Against granting this indulgence Cyprian maintained a firm stand, and carried his point with the African bishops. But the contests to which the subject gave rise, produced commotions and divisions that were essentially injurious to the christian cause. Another question which occasioned acrimonious and long disputes in the church, was that relative to the validity of the baptism of heretics. The opinion which Cyprian maintained was, that all baptism out of the catholic church was null and void, and that they who had received such baptism only, ought to be baptised when they came over from heretics to the church. In this opinion he had the concurrence of the African bishops; but was violently opposed by Stephen bishop of Rome, whose language and conduct displayed much of that spirit of domination and intolerance for which his successors in that see proved so remarkable. It is recorded to the honour of the bishop of Carthage, that though he maintained his opinion vigorously, yet he did it with expressions of the utmost candour towards those who differed from him, and declarations of his

wish to preserve, unbroken, his christian com→ munion with them. About the year 252, when a dreadful pestilential distemper was raging throughout the Roman empire, and Carthage had her share in the calamity, Cyprian, by his exhortations and example, encouraged the Christians in that city to exercise the noblest acts of charity and friendly aid towards the afflicted, of every party and religion, to the great credit of that faith of which he made a profession. On another occasion, the liberal temper and humane generosity of this bishop and his flock were signally displayed, in the large collection which they made to redeem from slavery some Christians of Numidia, who had been carried away captive during the inroads of some neighbouring barbarians into their country. But the greatest glory of his life arose from the fortitude and patience with which he submitted to persecution, and to death itself, sooner than violate his conscience, and renounce those principles which he conceived to be founded in truth. In the year 257 the fire of persecution was kindled anew, by the orders of the emperors Valerian and Gallienus, and Cyprian was summoned before Aspasius Paternus, the proconsul of Africa; when, freely owning himself to be a Christian, and remaining unshaken in that profession, he was banished to Curubis, a town twelve leagues from Carthage, where he resided eleven months, without suffering the penalties of confiscation, or being prohibited the consolatory visits and attention of his christian brethren. This time he employed in writing letters to different Christians who were sufferers for their faith, to encourage them to stedfastness and perseverance, and to chear their minds in their arduous situations. At the expiration of that period, Galerius Maximus, a new proconsul, recalled him to Carthage; but with no favourable intentions towards him. Soon after his return, finding that orders were issued to carry him before the proconsul, who was then at Utica, forty miles distant from Carthage, he retired to a place of temporary concealment, being desirous of bearing his last testimony to the truth of his religion in the presence of that people to whom he had ministered. When the proconsul was come from Utica to Carthage, he no longer avoided those who were sent to apprehend him; and when urged by that magistrate to obey the imperial edict, and to sacrifice to the gods, resolutely refused, and was condemned to be beheaded. To this sentence, which was put in execution at a place called Sexti, near the city of Carthage, Cyprian submitted with firmness and chearfulness, in the

year 258. As a man, and as bishop, he possessed great excellence of character. His piety was unaffected, although not without a strong tincture of enthusiasm, and his morals grave, regular, and exemplary. His episcopal duties he discharged with fidelity, prudence, and affection, and with an unassuming modesty and humility, that endeared him to the flock under his care. His intellectual talents were acute and lively; and his acquired abilities are said to have been very respectable. But, as far as we are enabled to judge from his remains, he was more distinguished by his excellence as a rhetorician, than by his proficiency in philosophy, or profound erudition. The characteristics of his writings are correctness, perspicuity, and persuasive eloquence, not without a due mixture of force, and close argumentative reasoning. If he is sometimes too figurative and declamatory, the fault must be ascribed to the bad taste of the times in which he wrote. According to the judgment of Erasmus, he is the only African writer who attained to the native purity of the Latin tongue. His works that remain consist of treatises upon a variety of subjects, some being defences of the christian religion against Jews and Gentiles, others on christian morality, and others on the discipline of the church; and numerous useful and entertaining epistles. They have been often printed; but the most valuable editions are those of Erasmus, in 1520; of Rigaltius, published at Paris, in 1648, and afterwards in 1666, with very great additions; of bishop Fell, at Oxford, with the Annales Cyprianici of bishop Pearson prefixed, in 1682; and of father Marand, a benedictine monk of the congregation of St. Maur, at Paris, in 1727. They were also translated into English, with useful and valuable notes, by Mr. Marshal, in the year 1717. Euseb. Hist. Eccl. Du Pin. Moreri. Cave's Hist. Lit. vol. I. and Lives of the Fathers. Lardner's Cred. part ii. vol. IV. Mosheim's Hist. Ecc. vol. I.-M.

CYPRIANUS, JOHN, a learned Polish divine, of the confession of Augsburg, was born at Rawitz, in the palatinate of Posnania,' in the year 1642. He pursued his studies at Breslaw, in Silesia, at Leipsic, and at Jena; and by the successive honours to which he arrived-of doctor in the lesser college of princes in 1675, of professor in physics in the following year, of doctor in the great college of princes in 1679, and of doctor and professor of theology in 1699, and 1710-appears to have distinguished himself with eminence among his contemporaries. He died in the year 1723. Among his learned labours, which maintain their place in modern

CYRANO DE BERGERAC, SAVINIEN, a French author of singular character, was the son of a gentleman of Bergerac in Perigord, where he was born, in 1620. He entered young as a cadet in the regiment of guards, where he displayed his courage in the usual mode of that day, by a number of duels. It is somewhat to his credit, however, that his quarrels were not on his own account, but in defence of his friends. His actions obtained him the title of the Intrepid. He was wounded ́ at the sieges of Mousson and of Arras, which, with his love of letters, caused him to quit the army. He studied philosophy under Gassendi, along with Chapelle, Moliere, and Bernier. The vivacity of his imagination, and an inexhaustible fund of pleasantry, obtained him some powerful friends, and he made himself known in the literary world by various publications. His life was irregular, and his opinions free; at length, the consequences of an accidental blow on the head produced a reformation in his conduct, but they occasioned his death fifteen months afterwards, in 1655. He wrote a tragedy, named " Agrippina," and a comedy in prose, the "Pedant Joue," both well received by the public: but he is best known for his "Comic History of the States and Empires of the Moon;" a burlesque piece, in which satire and philosophy are singularly blended. He wrote in the same style a "Comic History of the States and Empires of the Sun." He also published "Letters," "Discourses," and a

Fragment of Physics." His pieces abound in points and equivoques, according to the manner of the age. Moreri. Nouv. Dict. Hist. -A.

CYRIL, bishop of Jerusalem, in the fourth century, who is also honoured with the title of saint, was ordained, presbyter by Maximus bishop of Jerusalem, a strenuous defender of the orthodox doctrine against the Arians, and under him exercised the office of catechist in that church, with great diligence and muchreputation. It was most probably upon the death of Maximus that he was elected his successor, chiefly through the influence of Acacius bishop of Cæsarea, and the bishops of his party;

en which account he was at first suspected by the catholics of an attachment to the semiarian opinions. He seems, however, soon to have regained his credit with them, by the zeal with which he espoused the Athanasian cause, in consequence of disputes which took place between him and Acacius, relating to the prerogatives of their respective secs. But whatever were the merits of the questions between them, Acacius contrived to lay such a representation of the conduct of Cyril before a convention of the Palestine bishops, as determined them to depose him from his dignity, in the year 357. Against their judgment, Cyril appealed to that of a more numerous council; but was in the mean time obliged to retire to Tarsus, where he met with a friendly reception from Sylvanus, the bishop of that city, and was permitted by him to exercise the clerical functions in his diocese. He was afterwards present at a synod held at Melitina, and at the council of Seleucia in 359, in which he had a seat, and was acknowledged to be a lawful bishop. But at a council held at Constantinople, in the following year, Acacius succeeded in procuring his deposition for the second time. On the accession of the emperor Julian, he was recalled, together with other exiled bishops, and reinstated in his see, in which he continued unmolested until the reign of the emperor Valens. During the reign of that emperor he was a third time deposed from his bishopric, and driven into banishment; but restored upon the accession of Theodosius, if not before, under the edict which Valens published not long before his death, for the recal of the exiled catholic bishops. The latter part of his life appears to have been spent in peace and tranquillity. He died in the year 386. There is much obscurity in the ecclesiastical records, whence the foregoing particulars relative to Cyril are extracted. He is celebrated for his learning, eloquence, and piety; but above all, for his zeal in maintaining the orthodox doctrines against the arian and semi-arian parties. His writings were numerous; but there are none of them remaining excepting twenty-three catechetical lectures, the productions of his early years, and written in a plain and familiar style; and a single letter to the emperor Constantius. This letter contains a marvellous narration of the appearance of a luminous cross in the heavens over the holy sepulchre, on one of the festival days of Pentecost; which we are more willing to resolve into a credulous misconception of some natural phenomenon, than a pious imposition for the purpose of gaining credit to the catholic cause. The

best edition of Cyril's works was published at Paris, by father Touttee, a benedictine monk, in Greek and Latin, folio, 1720. Cave's Hist. Lit. vol. I. and Lives of the Fathers. Du Pin. Moreri.-M.

CYRIL, bishop of Alexandria in the fifth century, who is also denominated saint, was the nephew of Theophilus, bishop of that city, whom he succeeded in his dignity in the year 412. For a long time before that period the bishops of Alexandria had acquired very great authority and power in the city, and had been accustomed to exercise it with much dignity and strictness. Cyril, who was naturally of an ambitious and imperious temper, was so far from being disposed to suffer that authority to be in any degree diminished, that he embraced every opportunity to confirm and increase it. Soon after his elevation to the bishopric, he expelled the Novatians from Alexandria, and stripped their bishop, Theopemptus, of all his property. Some time afterwards, when certain Jews had insulted or ill-treated some of the christian inhabitants, instead of advising them to apply for redress to the civil magistrate, Cyril, with holy fury, put himself at the head of a christian mob, and led them to the assault and plunder of the synagogues and houses of that people, and drove them indiscriminately out of the city. This conduct very justly alarmed the resentment and jealousy of Orestes, the governor of Alexandria, who endeavoured to restrain the episcopal power within its proper limits, and to render the ecclesiastical subordinate to the civil authority. The haughty and turbulent spirit of Cyril, however, and the zeal of his infuriated partisans, proved the occasions of numerous tumults and disorders, which produced shameful and tragical'consequences. Opposite parties were formed, for the purpose of supporting the rival claims of the governor and the bishop, which frequently came to blows in the streets of Alexandria. One day, when Orestes went abroad in his chariot, he was suddenly surrounded by 500 monks, who sallied from their monasteries to revenge the quarrel of their bishop; by whom he was assaulted, and would have been massacred, if the people had not stopped their fury until his guards had time to come to his rescue. The governor caused one of those monks to be apprehended, and, with the view of extorting from him the secret of the insurrection, to be put to the rack with such severity that he died under the torment. However cruel and indefensible his conduct in this instance might be, that of Cyril on the occasion was only calculated to encourage similar seditious

attempts against the civil power. For he honoured the dead monk as a saint, and took every opportunity of commending his zeal and his constancy. But his conduct is represented as having been still more atrocious in the instance of a celebrated heathen female philosopher, named Hypatia, with whom Orestes was intimately acquainted, and who was supposed to have encouraged his resistance to the claims of the bishop. She was one day seized by a band who had been tutored for the purpose, and after being dragged with ignominy and cruelty through the streets, was inhumanly butchered and torn to pieces. Cyril has been directly charged with having been the contriver of that scene, without any satisfactory proofs being adduced of his innocence. But the evidences of Cyril's arrogant and furious temper were not confined to his contests for power in the city of Alexandria. They were displayed in the part which he took in the theological and ecclesiastical debates of his time; and particularly in his contest with Nestorius bishop of Constantinople. That bishop had maintained, in some of his discourses, that the Virgin Mary ought not to be called the mother of God, but the mother of our Lord, or of Christ, since the Deity can neither be born nor die, and of consequence the man, Christ Jesus, could only derive his birth from an earthly parent. These discourses fell into the hands of the Egyptian monks, who were persuaded by the arguments of Nestorius to embrace his opinions. But when Cyril obtained knowledge of that fact, he wrote a letter to his monks, in which he maintained that the Virgin Mary ought to be called the mother of God, and denounced bitter censures on the opposite position, and all who should hold it. This letter produced a controversial correspondence between the two bishops, by which their spirits were exasperated against each other, until they began an open war of excommunications and anathemas, which set the whole christian world on fire. In the year 430, with the approbation of Celestine bishop of Rome, whom he had engaged on his side, Cyril held a council at Alexandria, and hurled no less than twelve anathemas at the head of Nestorius. That prelate, instead of sinking under the attack, hurled anathemas against Cyril in return, and retorted against him the accusations laid to his own charge, of derogating from the majesty of Christ. With the hope of putting an end to this controversy, the emperor, Theodosius, called a council at Ephesus, in the year 431, in which were displayed the most indecent partiality, and the grossest mockery of justice. For Cyril himself, though one of the principal parties con

cerned, was appointed to preside in it; who precipitated business with a shameful violence, and, before a considerable number of the eastern bishops had arrived, obtained the condemnation of Nestorius, without his having been heard in his own defence. The consequence was, his deprivation from the episcopal dignity, and banishment to the solitary Egyptian deserts. But when John bishop of Antioch, and the other eastern bishops, for whom Cyril had refused to wait, met at Ephesus, they pronounced as severe a sentence against Cyril as he had thundered against Nestorius; and, after deposing him, and Memnon bishop of Antioch, his creature, ordered them to prison. In a subsequent meeting of this council, however, they were liberated, and absolved from the sentence of deposition. From this time a new dissension prevailed between Cyril and the eastern bishops, which lasted during the life of the former; who had the mortification to see the doctrine of his rival, whom he had so unjustly condemned, most rapidly spreading in the eastern provinces of the Roman empire, and throughout Assyria and Persia. Cyril died at Alexandria, in the year 444. He was a man of undoubted learning, of considerable ingenuity, and of great industry, as appears from the numerous productions which he left behind him. But he was ambitious, overbearing, and intolerant, in the highest degree. He is commended by the catholic writers for his piety, and his zeal in the cause of faith. The particulars already enume rated, are the fruits by which their genuineness and utility are to be tried. Of his private character little notice is taken by his historians.. Of his numerous works, which have been often printed, either entire, or in detached treatises, the best collection is that published at Paris, in Greek and Latin, 1638, in seven volumes folio, under the inspection of John Aubert, canon of Laon. Evagrius Scholasticus's Hist. Eccl. lib. i. Caves's Hist. Lit. vol. I. Du Pin. Moreri. Mosh. Hist. Eccl. Sac. V.-M.

CYRIL-LUCAR, patriarch of Constantinople in the seventeenth century, was born in the island of Candia, in the year 1572. He was educated at Venice, and at Padua; whence he resorted for farther improvement to different universities in Germany. His learning and knowledge of the world are spoken of in very respectable terms; and he is said to have studied with particular attention the distinguishing doctrines and discipline of the protestant and Romish churches. From the circumstances of his after life it appears, that he left Germany with strong impressions on his mind in favour of protestantism. On his return to his native.