CHRISTIANITY. 153 



merit ; and Consistorials, or church government, and the ordering of 

 forms of worship. And here we remark, that the disagreement of 

 Christian sects, on minor points, instead of discrediting, tends rather 

 to prove the truth of those wherein they agree ; as those who have 

 seceded from others, would naturally diverge from them, as widely 

 as their consciences would permit. 



1. The Greek Catholic Church, at the head of which is the Pa- 

 triarch of Constantinople, recognizes tradition, as a source of doctrine, 

 besides the Scriptures. It believes in the seven Roman sacraments, 

 and in trans instantiation ; admits prayers to the saints, and allows 

 their pictures, but not their images, to be worshipped ; and sanctions 

 the monastic system. It also believes that the Holy Ghost proceeds 

 from the Father only : but most of its other doctrines are those of 

 Evangelical protestants ; and its corruptions, may, we think, be 

 traced to its connection with the Roman Church, at periods subse- 

 quent to their separation, A. D. 484. (p. 147). Its Liturgy, or form 

 of worship, consists of the mass, or service of prayer ; together with 

 the reading of passages of Scripture, and legends of the saints ; the 

 rehearsal of the creed; the singing of psalms ; and the performance 

 of various ceremonies. The Russian Church coincides with the 

 Greek, in its doctrines; but since 1701, it has acknowledged the 

 Emperor as its head or Patriarch. Of the Nestorian Church, whose 

 tenets are mostly evangelical, and whose patriarch resides at Mosul 

 on the Tigris, we have no farther room to speak. The Coptic 

 Church, in Egypt, agrees, for the most part, with the preceding; and 

 has a patriarch of its own at Alexandria. 



The Roman Catholic Church, which also assumes the title of 

 catholic, or universal, and at the head of which is the Pope of Rome, 

 originally professed the simple Evangelical doctrines of the Nicene 

 Creed, which it still retains ; but it, moreover, recognizes the author- 

 ity of Tradition, and of the Ecclesiastical Councils, as coordinate 

 with that of the Scriptures ; and, on this ground, it has superadded 

 from time to time new doctrines, which the Scriptures neither contain 

 nor allow. Among these doctrines, sanctioned by the Council of 

 Trent, 1545-63, and still maintained, are that of Seven Sacraments, 

 viz. Baptism, the Eucharist, (or Lord's Supper), Confirmation, Pe- 

 nance, Extreme Unction, Ordination, and Matrimony, which, are 

 maintained to confer grace on those receiving them ; also the doctrine 

 of Transubstantiation, or the actual conversion of the sacramental 

 bread and wine into the body and blood of our Lord ; which, with 

 the accompanying mass, or forms of prayer and ceremonials, is 

 deemed a true propitiatory sacrifice for both the living and the dead ; 

 also the doctrine of Purgatory, or a middle state between Heaven 

 and Hell, for those souls which, though not accepted of God, are still 

 within the reach of salvation, by the prayers of the faithful ; and espe- 

 cially the doctrine of the Supremacy of the Pope, as Christ's Vicar, 

 and the Infallibility of the Church, by which some understand the 

 Pope, but others, solely the Council. By penance is meant acts of 

 supposed expiation for sins committed ; and by extreme unction, the 

 anointing of those dangerously ill, with consecrated oil. 



The Veneration of images, and Worship of saints, or those ca- 

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