718 



M O R E A. 



Mora. 



Religion. 



the nose, and in a contused manner, men and wo- 

 men all joining together. Of many tunes borrowed 

 from the French and Italian, it is said they never go 

 beyond the first part. " They have an admirable /;/- 

 rie eleison," says Chateaubriand. " It is but one note, 

 kept up by different voices, some bas and some treble, 

 executing andante and mezzo, voce, the octave, the fiith, 

 and the third. The solemn and majestic effect of this 

 kyric is surprising. It is doubtless a relic of the an- 

 cient singing of the primitive church." The fiddle 

 and lyre, or three-stringed guitar, are the usual instru- 

 ments upon which most of the young men, and parti- 

 cularly the sailors, are able to perform. Pan's pipe, 

 and a kind of bagpipe, are also met with in the Levant. 

 Modern travellers give a very unfavourable account of 

 the general strain of music in Greece ; Dr. Clarke, par- 

 ticularly, represents it aa inferior to that of any other 

 European nation, except the very lowest in point of ci- 

 vilization and refinement. " The tone of the vocal 

 part," he says of a certain performer, " resembled ra- 

 ther the howling of dogs through the night, than any 

 sound which might be called musical. And this was 

 the impression made upon us every where by the na- 

 tional music of the modern Greeks, that if a scale were 

 formed for comparing it with the state of music in other 

 European nations, it would fall below every other, ex- 

 cepting only that of the Laplanders, to which, never- 

 theless, it bears some resemblance." 



There is a considerable resemblance in the doctrines 

 and general form of the Greek church, and those of the 

 church of Rome. In the number of the sacraments, 

 the invocation of saints, the belief of the real presence, 

 the practice of auricular confession, the offering of 

 masses for the dead, the division of the elergy into re- 

 gular and secular, the spiritual jurisdiction of the bi- 

 shops and their officials, the distinction of ranks and 

 offices among the ecclesiastics, there is very little dif- 

 ference between the churches of Greece and Home. 

 This resemblance is kept up and increased, in conse- 

 quence of the number of Greek ecclesiastics who study 

 in Italy ; and, in the Morea and Archipelago, there 

 are many Roman Catholic converts among the natives. 

 The Greek clergy are divided into two classes, the Pa- 

 pades, or secular priests, who hold the parishes, and 

 the Caloyers, or monks of St. Basil, who have their se- 

 minaries on Mount Athos, in Chios, and the Prince's 

 Islands. The secular priests, contrary to the casein 

 the church of Rome, are the most ignorant and illite- 

 rate, while the Monks are generally men of a certain 

 degree of education. All orders of the seculars, inferior 

 to bishops, are permitted to marry, provided they 

 choose a virgin, and engage before ordination ; but can 

 never rise higher than to the office of proto-.papa in the 

 church where they serve. All who aim at a mitre 

 must observe celibacy, and assume the monastic ha- 

 bits. 



The parish papas enter into priest's orders by a kind 

 of | ublic election. Being proposed to the congregation 

 or church, the officiating priest asks the audience if he 

 is worthy, and upon their acclamation in the affirma- 

 tive, he is considered as authorised to enter upan his 

 functions. The chapels, which are very numerous, and 

 some of them little better than a cavern with a door 

 and stone altar, must have each their own priest, who 

 cannot officiate in other places of worship, and who, 



though more serviceable than the monks, are not so Morea. 

 well provided for. T" m 



The Caloyers never say mass, and if they take the 

 priesthood, they are called " holy monks," and officiate 

 only on high festivals*. Admission to the brother- 

 hood is obtained by paying to one of these holy monks 

 a sum of (5'J or 70 piastres, without any probation or 

 examination, so that young children are allowed to take 

 the habit, as they thus secure in their miserable coun- 

 try the certainty of being fed. Their monasteries are 

 frequent objects in the valleys, forests,- and hill-sides; 

 and they have farms tenanted by one of their order in 

 mo.it parts of the country. They subsist partly by the 

 lands attached to the monasteries, and partly by the 

 voluntary contributions of the people. On particular 

 days, they go about with little pictures of their saints, 

 which they gire thi ir votaries to kiss, and a jar of holy 

 water with a brush, by which they mark the cross on 

 the foreheads of each person, receiving a para or two 

 from every individual for this service. They abstain 

 wholly from flesh, and observe a very austere mode of 

 living. Most of their time is occupied in a set of su- 

 perstitious devotional exercises, reciting parts of the 

 Psalter, or bowing and kissing the ground for a certain 

 number of times. Three hundred of these bowings 

 must be performed by each individual in every 24 

 hours. Their ignorance and simplicity is extreme, and 

 in few of their monasteries have they any books, not 

 even any part of the Scriptures. The most sacred of 

 the Caloyers are those who have received their educa- 

 tion in the seminaries of Mount Athos, where there are 

 six thousand of the order who occupy themselves in 

 studying and in all kinds of mechanical trades. There 

 is no ground for the charge of these monasteries being 

 the abodes of vice. The head of the church is the Pa- 

 triarch of Constantinople, whom they style the tliir- 

 teenth apostle, but to whom they attach no personal 

 sanctity or official infallibility. The person admitted 

 to the office is invested in a triumphal manner by a 

 minister of the Porte ; and possesses a kind of abso- 

 lute authority over the whole native Greeks. His in- 

 fluence with the Sultan is very great, and his applica- 

 tions r.re generally effectual in every thing relating to 

 his own nation. He can bring any Greek to be pu- 

 nished by fine, deposition from office, imprisonment 

 for life, banishment, or death. This dignity is now 

 regularly exposed to sale, and costs about 60,000 

 crowns. The Patriarch indemnifies himself by selling 

 the other patriarchates of Jerusalem, Antioch, and 

 Alexandria, besides all the archbishopricks, and every 

 lucrative place within his jurisdiction; a practice which, 

 the Greeks themselves introduced by offering to fill 

 these offices for smaller salaries, or by giving for them 

 greater sums, when vacant. The whole of the Pa- 

 triarch's usual revenue does not exceed 3,000; (ex- 

 cept what fines and extortions may yield,) and the 

 richest bishops do not possess more than 300 a year, 

 which is raised by a direct tax upon every Greek bouse 

 within their districts. Contributions are made by de- 

 vout individuals to assist those who make pilgrimages 

 to the holy sepulchre at Jerusalem, and who are after, 

 wards distinjruibhed by the name of " hadje," as among 

 the Turks. The clergy in general have great influence 

 over the people; and receive on certain days gifts of 

 loaves, sweet meats, wax tapers, &c. 



* Cnloyer is supposed to have been a name of the Grecian priests long before the introduction of Cln istinnity, and to be derived from 

 ie words xa>.os it^tis, the " good priest," or xaXo^ijo;, "good old fathers." 



