This Doctor, like St. Basil, was one of a family of saints; his father, St. Gregory, having been bishop of Nazianzus before him; his mother, St. Nonna, famous for her piety; and two of his sisters, St. Gorgonia and St. Cesarea, also canonized. Gregory was born about the year 328; and his mother, who fondly believed that he had been granted to her prayers, watched over his early education, and guided his first steps in piety and literature. When a boy, he had a singular dream, which he has related himself. He beheld in his sleep two virgins of celestial beauty; they were clothed in white garments, and their faces shone upon him like two stars out of heaven: they took him in their arms and kissed him as if he had been their child. He, charmed by their virgin beauty and their caresses, asked who they were, and whence they came? One of them replied, ‘I am called Chastity, and my sister here is Temperance; we come to thee from Paradise, where we stand continually before the throne of Christ, and taste ineffable delights: come to us, my son, and dwell with us for ever;’ and having spoken thus, they left him and flew upwards to heaven. He followed them with longing eyes till they disappeared, and as he stretched his arms towards them he awoke. This dream—how natural in a boy educated between a tender mother, who had shielded him, as only mothers can, against all sinful temptations, and a lovely and saintly sister!—he regarded as a direct revelation from heaven: it decided his future life, and he made a vow of perpetual continence and temperance. Like the other Greek doctors, he began by the study of profane literature and rhetoric. He went to Athens, where he formed an enduring friendship with St. Basil, and pursued his studies with Julian, afterwards Cæsar and Apostate. After leaving Athens, in his thirtieth year, he was baptized; and, devoting himself solemnly to the service of God and the study of the Scriptures, like his friend Basil, he destroyed his health by his austerities and mortifications: he confesses that they were wholly repugnant to his nature —a nature sensitive, imaginative, poetical; but this of course only added to their merit and efficacy. His aged father withdrew him from his solitude, and ordained him as his coadjutor: in 362 he succeeded to the bishopric of Nazianzus: but great part of his time was still spent at Constantinople, whither he was invited to preach against the Arians. It was a strange spectacle to see, in the capital of the world, a man, from a distant province and an obscure town, of small shrunken stature, bald-headed, wrinkled, haggard with vigils and fasting, poor, ill-clothed, and in his address unpolished and abrupt, stand up to oppose himself to a luxurious court and prevalent sect. The people began by stoning him; but at length his earnestness and eloquence overcame all opposition.