SECTS. 



185 



moting digestion (as, for instance, the saliva, gastric 

 juice, and bile.) In these secreted fluids are con- 

 tained all the component parts of the blood, 

 slightly changed, together with an alkali. Distin- 

 guished from these are the secretions, which are 

 produced in a similar manner, and are designed to 

 carry off from the system useless matter. 



SECTS. The term sect is generally applied to 

 a party in religion or philosophy, which holds a 

 particular body of doctrines. Thus, in ancient 

 philosophy, there were the Ionic and Italic sects, 

 the Epicurean, the Stoic, the Peripatetic sects. 

 But the philosophical sects are often termed schools, 

 and the word sect is, in its narrower sense, applied 

 particularly to religious parties. Among the Jews, 

 there were the sects of the Pharisees, Sadducees, 

 and Essenes, and, of a more strictly religious 

 character, those of the Caraites, Rabbinists, and 

 Samaritans. The Mohammedans are divided into 

 two great sects, the Sunnites and Shiites, besides 

 numerous smaller sects, as the Ishmaelites, Waha- 

 bees, Nosairians, &c. (see the several articles, and 

 also Islam, Mohammed, and Koran}, who differ from 

 each other not only in their interpretations of the 

 Koran, but in their various views in regard to the 

 genealogy of the prophet's family. The Hindoos 

 are divided into the Sivaites, or those who worship 

 Siva, and the Vishnooites, who pay particular reve- 

 rence to Vishnoo. The Christian world has, from 

 the first introduction of Christianity, been divided 

 into an almost innumerable variety of sects. We 

 have already given a hasty view of the earlier sects 

 under the head of Heretics. The Cathari of the 

 middle ages, who, under various names, opposed 

 the pretensions of the papal see, and to whom the 

 Albigenses and Waldenses mostly belonged, were, 

 with the exception of the latter, extirpated by the 

 inquisition and the inquisitorial tribunals of the 

 church. (See Cathari, and Politicians.} In the 

 thirteenth century arose a new species of sects and 

 schismatic fraternities, whose object was the intro- 

 duction of a new spirit of sanctity among the 

 monastic orders. (See Fraternities.} A party 

 grew up among the Franciscans, which was de- 

 nounced by the popes, and by their own less rigid 

 brethren, and which insisted upon absolute poverty. 

 They were called, in contempt, fratricelli, and spiri- 

 tual friars. (See Franciscans.} They did not 

 meddle with points of faith, but attacked the 

 existing priestly government, and announced its 

 fall. They wandered about, occupied in praying 

 and asking alms, the excommunication which hung 

 over them preventing them from founding monas- 

 teries. Many of the lower classes of both sexes, 

 in France, Germany, and the Netherlands, attached 

 themselves, as a third order, to the Fratricelli, and 

 from these Tertiarians sprang the fraternities of 

 Beghards, Beguines, and Lollards, whose purity of 

 manners and benevolent institutions, for the care 

 of the sick and the instruction of youth, rendered 

 them more respected than their predecessors, 

 whom they resembled in their frequent prayers, 

 the asking alms, and their secret religious exer- 

 cises. The Apostolics, an order which arose in 

 1260, at Parma, but did not obtain the papal con- 

 firmation, continued to subsist in Italy, Switzer- 

 land, and France, till the fourteenth century. The 

 Brethren and Sisters of the Free Spirit, remnants 

 of whom are discoverable during the Hussite dis- 

 turbances in Moravia and Bohemia, under the names 

 of Picards and Adamites, aimed at restoring the 

 state of innocence, by appearing naked in their as- 



semblies, without regard to sex or age. Other fra. 

 ternities, not acknowledged by the church, were 

 distinguished, in the fourteenth century, for their 

 voluntary penances and gross superstitions: such 

 were the Flagellants and the Brothers of the 

 Cross. The Wickliffites in England, and the Huss- 

 ites in Bohemia (see Huss}, resembled the Wal- 

 denses in their zeal for conformity with the Scrip- 

 tures, and their opposition to the abuses of the 

 papacy. These, with the Hussite sects, the Calix- 

 tins, or Utraquists, the Horebites, the Taborites, 

 and the Bohemian Brethren, preceded the reforma- 

 tion of the sixteenth century. The Protestant 

 churches which that event created, were, with the 

 Greek church, considered as sects by the Catholics ; 

 but by Protestant writers the word sect is com- 

 monly applied only to the smaller parties, discon- 

 nected with the Calvinistic and Lutheran churches. 

 The Jansenists, Quietists, and Molinists, notwith- 

 standing the deviations on some doctrinal points, 

 were still orthodox Catholics; the Jansenists even 

 have distinct congregations and clergy in the 

 Netherlands, but yet are by no means considered 

 as forming a separate sect, since they acknowledge 

 the supremacy of the pope, and observe all the 

 Catholic usages, only disputing the pope's infalli- 

 bility. The Appellants, Convulsionists, and Se- 

 curists, Naturalists, and Figurists, Discernants and 

 Melangists, who were produced by the Jansenist 

 controversy, merely had a short existence in France, 

 in the beginning of the eighteenth century. (See 

 Jansenius, and Quietism.} In the Greek church, 

 although it has, in later times, been little addicted 

 to religious speculations, there are some sects. 

 These the tolerant government of Russia treats 

 with indulgence. (See Greek Church.} In the 

 fourteenth century, the Strigolnicks seceded, 

 from aversion to the clergy, but soon became 

 extinct. In 1666, arose the sect of the Roskol- 

 nicians, from whom proceeded the Philippones. 

 The Anabaptists, Socinians, and Schwenkfeldians, 

 though not Protestants in the strict sense of the 

 word, agree with them in the rejection of the 

 papacy. Besides the great division of the Protes- 

 tants into Calvinists and Lutherans (see Reforma- 

 tion, and ReformedChurch}, the former have been 

 much divided. Thus the different views of Calvin 

 and Zuinglius, in regard to church government, 

 formed a ground of distinction which (notwith- 

 standing the consensus Tigurinus of 1549) separated 

 the Zuinglians, or older Swiss reformers, and their 

 adherents in Hungary, from the Calvinists of 

 Geneva, France, Holland, Germany, and England, 

 and the controversy concerning predestination, at 

 the synod of Dort (1618), produced the permanent 

 separation of the Remonstrants or Arminians, from 

 the strict Calvinists. The Reformed in France, 

 under the name of Huguenots (q. v.), acquired a 

 political importance in the sixteenth and seventeenth 

 centuries, and the persecutions to which they were 

 subjected produced its usual effects of religious 

 extravagance and fanaticism. (See Camisards.} 

 The English church is Calvinistic, but many of the 

 clergy are Arminian. (See England, Church of.} 

 Presbyterianism, which in England forms a dis- 

 senting sect, is the established religion of Scotland. 

 (See Presbyterians.} From the bosom of the Eng- 

 lish church have proceeded the Puritans, Inde- 

 pendents, Methodists, Quakers, Baptists, with 

 other less considerable sects. (See these articles, 

 and also Nonconformists.} Unitarians and Univer- 

 salists, who differ from the established church more 



