temporal princes; and the lower order of priests have had little but their habit, title, and a few ceremonies to show that they had any connexion with him whose kingdom is not of this world.

Monastic orders have continued to arise. The two most famous since the reformation have been "The Fathers of the oratory of the Holy Jesus," 1613, and the monks of La Trappe, 1664. Laziness, ignorance, voluptuousness, and discord have continued to characterize all those establishments. The popularity of the Jesuits threw into the back ground the whole tribe of monks and friars. All experienced in the French revolution a tremendous overthrow.

The Catholics are still very numerous in the world-probably not less than 100,000,000, an immense power if brought to act under one head. Multitudes in Asia know no other religion than that of the Pope. A large part of Europe, particularly Spain, Portugal, and Italy, are still sunk in ignorance and trammelled with superstition. In South America, too, the Catholic Church remains very splendid and imposing. The number of her priests, monks, temples, festivals, and idle ceremonies, is immense, and the ignorance and superstition of the people are beyond conception. But a free government must sap her foundations, or at least entirely change her character. Already the wealth and power of the priesthood are diminished, monks are ridiculed, feast days are much disregarded, the sale of indulgences is partially stopped, the Bible is getting into free circulation, and Protestants live and die undisturbed. In Great Britain and her dependencies, Catholics are numerous. From the reign of Queen Elizabeth they have there been guarded by the most severe enactments, and numbers have been put to death. Some of these laws have, of late, been repealed. In England there has been for two centuries no regular Romish hierarchy. The whole Church is under the superintendence of the congregation De Propagande Fide at Rome. The clergy here are regarded as missionaries, each of the stations is called a mission, and all are included in the phrase, "The whole mission to England." The Church is governed by four vicars apostolic, appointed by the Pope, with the rank of bishops. In Ireland there are bishops and priests. The Catholics have six-sevenths of the popula tion. In Canada they are sunk in the grossest ignorance. On the United States the Pope and his cardinal have lately cast their 66 eye as a land of promise." Great numbers of

Catholics have emigrated hither from Europe and found employment in our cities, on our canals and rail roads, or spread themselves in the valley of the Mississippi. Churches, colleges, convents, and schools, have risen in every part of the country. Their present number is probably from 6 to 800,000. Their principal colleges are at Baltimore, Georgetown, New Orleans, and St. Louis. Their worship here, as in Europe, is splendid and imposing. But little instruction is given, and no disposition is manifested to relax either in principles, forms, or superstitions.

CHAPTER XIV.

Greek Church. Its history, doctrine, and discipline. Russian Greek Church. Its establishment and separation from the Greek Church. Sect of Isbranki. Efforts of Peter the Great. Doctrines and discipline. Eastern Churches. Ground of their early divisions. Nestorians. Monophysites. Asiatics. Africans. Copts. Abyssinians. Armenians.

THE once happy and flourishing Churches of Greece and Asia soon sunk to decay, when they had drunk the poison of Arius, and had consented with idol Rome, to bow the knee in image worship. By the Saracens they were, from time to time, awfully scourged and rooted up of heaven for their wickedness; but still they flourished in much wealth and splendor while the Byzantine Cæsars held their thrones. This rising power of the Roman Pontiff excited their jealousy; and his pride and haughtiness kindled their rage. In the middle of the ninth century, Photius, the Patriarch of Constantinople, was excommunicated by the Roman Pontiff, for asserting that the Holy Ghost proceeded only from the Father and not from the Son. The act was resented by the Grecian emperor, and the Roman Pontiff was excommunicated in turn. A breach was made between the Eastern and Western Churches, which was soon widened by new subjects of contention, and confirmed in irreconcilable enmity. From this period is dated the rise of the Greek Church; though that Church embraces the primitive Churches planted by the Apostles.

In numbers, wealth, and glory, the Grecian Church far exceeded the spiritual dominion of the Roman See. In the tenth century, she received into her connexion the immense Russian dominions which were converted to the Christian faith. But she had a fatal enemy in the East, before

whom she was rapidly consumed. One after another of her beautiful churches she beheld converted into a Mahometan mosque, while their worshippers were destroyed by the sword, or converted by terrors and bribes to the religion of the impostor. From the west the fanatical crusaders came, pouring in torrents to rescue, if possible, her lost territory. She was jealous of their design, and only submitted to what she could not resist; and while she had little cause to thank them for aid, she had reason to bewail, had her eyes been open to it, the inheritance they left,-a vast deposit of moral corruption.

In 1453, the empire of the Greeks was overthrown by the Mahometan power, and with it perished their religious establishment. For a few years, their haughty conquerors permitted something that bore the name of a religious toleration; but it is part of the religion of a Turk to treat a Christian as a dog, and the toleration was soon exchanged for a rigorous and cruel despotism. For near 400 years, the Greek Church has now continued in a most deplorable bondage, until her religion is but little better than a constant succession of idle ceremonies. Why has it been thus? Eternity will unfold the mysteries of time. But let the Churches which have the bright light that once shone on Asia and Greece, behold and beware.

By a defection of the Russian Church in 1589, the Greek Church became considerably limited in its extent. Her people are now found scattered throughout Greece and Grecian islands, Walachia, Moldavia, Sclavonia, Egypt, Nubia, Lybia, Arabia, Mesopotamia, Syria, Cilicia and Palestine. These countries are comprehended within the jurisdiction of the patriarchs of Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch and Jerusalem. There are also branches of the Greek Church in Circassia, Georgia and Mongrelia.

The boldest and most artful efforts have been repeatedly made to win the Greek Church to the Roman faith, but uniformly in vain. The very youth brought from the east and educated at Rome at the greatest expense in the papal col leges, have, on their return, been the bitterest foes to the papal dominion.

The Greeks, while they pretend to acknowledge the scriptures as the rule of their faith, have many peculiarities which distinguish them from the Catholic and Protestant Churches. They receive the doctrine of the Trinity, and most of the articles of the Nicene and Athanasian creeds,

but rest much upon the procession of the Holy Ghost from the Father, and not from the Son. They hold in abhorrence the supremacy and infallibility of the pope; purgatory by fire; graven images; the celibacy of the secular clergy; and prohibition of the sacrament in both kinds :-but yet use pictures in their worship; invoke saints; have seven sacraments; believe in transubstantiation; admit prayers and services for the dead; have a fast or festival for almost every day in the year; and know of no regeneration but baptism.

Their officers are many; their convents are numerous, and their monks are all priests, who lead a very austere life. Their nunneries are few. Their patriarchs reside at Constantinople, Damascus, Cairo and Jerusalem. The patriarch of Constantinople is at the head of the Church, and is chosen by twelve bishops, and confirmed by the Turkish emperor. The office, however, is generally purchased by an immense sum, of the Grand Vizier. It is a post honorable and lucrative. Its possessor has a vast jurisdiction and dominion. He not only decides controversies in the Church, but administers civil justice among the members of his communion. He has the power of excommunicating any member of the Greek Church, and of commanding his death, exile, or imprisonment for life. He is, in fact, the governor of the Greeks, under the Turkish emperor, and is sustained by his authority. The other patriarchs are poor and debased, as is the whole Church. Without schools, without Bibles, without religious teachers, groaning for near 400 years under an iron bondage, they have sunk into the most deplorable ignorance and moral corruption. With a crowd of bishops and metropolitans, they are almost as ignorant of the true Gospel of Christ, as the benighted savage. The recent deliverance of Greece from the Mahometan yoke, and the establishment of civil and Christian liberty cannot fail to operate most favorably upon their religion and morals. Let Christians pray for those once great and distinguished Churches, now in ruins, and send them back the light of life.

RUSSIAN GREEK CHURCH.

The immense wilds of Russia continued covered with moral darkness long after the rest of Europe had enjoyed the precious light of the Gospel. About the year 900, Methodius, and Cyril the philosopher, travelled from

Greece into Moravia, where they translated some of the Church service into the Sclavonian language, and converted the grand duchess Olga to the Christian faith. Christianity soon spread, and Russia became subject to the patriarch of Constantinople. Of any thing farther we know but little until 1581, when we find the Muscovites publishing the Bible in their own language. In 1589, Russia separated from the government, though not from communion of the Greek Church, and an independent patriarch was established at Moscow.

About the year 1666, a sect called the Isbraniki, or multitude of the elect, pretending to uncommon piety and devotion, separated from the Russian Church, and excited great disturbances throughout the empire. They were treated with severity, but increased, and do still remain, bound up in impenetrable secrecy.

Peter the Great resolved to be the reformer of his Church, as well as of his empire. Happy had it been for Russia, had the light of the reformation dawned upon that noble mind. But he knew no other system than that in which he had been educated, and made, therefore, no change in the doctrines of the Greek Church. These, however, he was resolved his people should understand; and he waged war with the ignorance of the clergy, and the gross superstition which brooded over the whole nation. He quenched the fires of persecution, and established.

universal toleration of all sects and denominations excepting the Catholics. He abolished the office of patriarch, putting himself at the head of the Church; which, under him was to be governed by a synod; diminished the revenues of the clergy; and was once resolved to abolish the monasteries as unfriendly to population. But it was only an age of twilight; and he was induced to continue them, and to erect a magnificent monastery, in honor of Alexander Newsky; whom the Russians number among their distinguished heroes and saints. He caused the Bible to be translated, printed, and circulated, in the Sclavonian lan-. guage; and had he lived in the age of Alexander, he would have placed a Bible in every family.

The Russian Church has increased with the amazing increase of the nation. Happy for her had she grown in knowledge and holiness. But alas! her clergy are ignorant, and her people are without the Bible. The noble Russian Bible Society, under the excellent prince Galitzin,