AN ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY, ANCIENT AND MODERN, FROM THE BIRTH OF CHRIST, TO THE BEGINNING OF THE PRESENT CENTURY IN WHICH THE RISE, PROGRESS, AND VARIATIONS OF CHURCH POWER, ARE CONSIDERED IN THEIR CONNECTION WITH THE STATE OF LEARNING AND PHILOSOPHY, AND THE POLITICAL HISTORY OF EUROPE DURING THAT PERIOD. BY THE LATE LEARNED, JOHN LAWRENCE MOSHEIM, D. D. And Chancellor of the University of Gottingen. TRANSLATED FROM THE ORIGINAL LATIN, AND ACCOMPANIED WITH NOTES THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY. SECTION I. GENERAL HISTORY OF THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH. L. SECT. I. de propaganda at Rome. THE arduous attempts made by the pontiffs, in CENT.XVIL the preceding century, to advance the glory and majesty of the see of Rome, by extending the lim-The college its of the christian church, and spreading the gos- fide founded pel through the distant nations, met with much opposition; and, as they were neither well conducted nor properly supported, their fruits were neither abundant nor cermanent. But in this century the same attempton vere renewed with vigour, crowned with succeousand contributed not a little to give a new degree of stability to the tottering grandeur of the papacy. They were begun by Gregory XV. who, by the advice of his confessor Narni, founded at Rome, in the year 1622, the famous congregation for the propagation of the faith, and enriched it with ample revenues. This con gregation, which consists of thirteen cardinals, two priests, one monk, and a secretary," is designed to Such is the number of members belonging to this congregation as they stand in the original bull of Gregory XV. see Bullarium Roman. tom. iii. p. 472, edit. Luxemburg. Cerri mentions the same number, in his Etat present de l'Eglise Romaine, p. 259. But a different account |