, was the younger brother of St. Basil, and had an equal care taken
, was the younger brother of St. Basil, and had an equal care taken of his education, being brought up in all the polite and fashionable modes of learning; but, applying himself particularly to rhetoric, he valued himself more upon being accounted an orator than a Christian. On the admonition of his friend Gregory Nazianzen he quitted those studies; and, betaking himself to solitude and a monastic discipline, he turned his attention wholly to the holy scriptures, and the controversies of the age; so that he became as eminent in the knowledge of these as he had before been in the course of more pleasant studies. Thus qualified for the highest dignity in the church, he was placed in the see of Nyssa, a city on the borders of Cappadocia. The exact time of his promotion is not known, though it is certain he was bishop in the year 371. He proved in this station a stout champion for the Nicene faith, and so vigorously opposed the Arian party, that he was soon after banished by the emperor Valens; and, in a synod held at Nyssa by the bishop of Pontus and Galatia, was deposed, and met with very hard usage. He was hurried from place to place, heavily fined, and exposed to the rage and petulance of the populace, which fell heavier upon him, as he was both unused to trouble, and unapt to bear it. In this condition he remained for seven or eight years, during which, however, he went about countermining the stratagems of the Arians, and strengthening those in the orthodox faith; and in the council of Antioch in the year 378, he was, among others, delegated to visit the eastern churches lately harassed by the Arian persecution.