CHRISTIANITY IN SHOA. 81 



tians of Shoa, founded upon it, would be one of the 

 grossest impositions that could be palmed upon the 

 reading public. I dare not, in fact, attempt any 

 elucidation of the faith professed by the Negoos 

 and monks of Shoa. They, certainly, have no 

 universal creed, nor any Articles to define what is 

 orthodox belief, and what is not. The chief prin- 

 ciple of religion with the heads of the Church in 

 that country seems to be, to think upon this 

 subject exactly as the Negoos does ; for if they 

 do not, they are very soon considered in the light 

 of heretics ; and how far the principles of the 

 Negoos accord with those of the Abune, or Bishop 

 of Gondah, may be judged from the fact, that he 

 has often been judged to be in contempt, by that 

 holy father, and threatened with all the terrors of 

 excommunication. I confess myself, therefore, 

 unequal to the task of giving any account of 

 the Christian religion in Shoa. To give a correct 

 one, would require a man educated entirely for the 

 purpose by a long study of the subject in all its 

 relations, as connected with the Greek Church, 

 and the Archbishopric of Alexandria, to enable 

 him to collect, compare, and arrange that chaos 

 of religious opinions that seem to characterize 

 the modern Abyssinian faith ; and, more especially, 

 that which is professed in Shoa. 



Tellez, in his Travels of the Jesuits in Ethiopia, 

 in the seventeenth century, sums up all that was 

 known in his time ; and I do not think that any 



