in church history, Christian heretics, who assumed this name from Nicholas of Antioch; who, being a Gentile by birth, first embraced Judaism and then Christianity; when his zeal and devotion recommended him to the church of Jerusalem, by whom he was chosen one of the first deacons. Many of the primitive writers believe that Nicholas was rather the occasion than the author of the infamous practices of those who assumed his name, who were expressly condemned by the Spirit of God himself, Rev. ii. 6. And indeed their opinions and actions were highly extravagant and criminal. They allowed a community of wives, and made no distinction between ordinary meats and those offered to idols. According to Eusebius, they subsisted but a short time; but Tertullian says that they only changed their name, and that their heresies passed into the sect of the Cainites.