GREGORY of Nazianzen, in Cappadocia, one of the most illustrious ornaments of the Greek church in the fourth century, was born in 328, and having studied at Cæsarea in Palestine, and also at Alexandria, he accompanied his countryman, St Basil, to Athens. He was chosen Bishop of Constantinople in 379; but finding his election contested by the bishops of Egypt, he voluntarily resigned his dignity into the hands of the general council, which had been assembled at Constantinople, in the year 381, and died about the year 389. His works, consisting of a hundred and fifty discourses or sermons, a hundred and fifty-eight poems or pieces in verse, and two hundred and thirty-five letters, the greater part of them interesting, were collected and printed at Bâle in 1550. In the Paris edition of 1609, 1611, in two vols. folio, a Latin version by the Abbé de Belly is printed opposite the Greek text. The Benedictines of the congregation of St Maur commenced a beautiful edition, Greek and Latin, in three vols. folio, of which, however, only one volume was published, Paris, 1788, containing the discourses, with a life of the author compiled from his works.