PREFACE TO THE SEVENTH EDITION. (continued 27)

Although the name “Connexion” is still used, there is no combined or federal ecclesiastical government prevailing. The Congregational polity is practically adopted; and of late years, several of the congregations have become, in name as well as virtually, Congregational churches.

The number of chapels mentioned in the Census as belonging to this Connexion, or described as “English Calvinistic Methodists,” was 109, containing (after an allowance for the sittings in five chapels, the returns for which are defective) accommodation for 38,727 persons. The attendants on the Census Sunday (making an estimated addition for seven chapels, the returns from which were silent on the point) were: Morning, 21,103; Afternoon, 4380; Evening, 19,159.

WELSH CALVINISTIC METHODISTS.

The great revival of religion commenced in England by Wesley and Whitfield had been preceded by a similar event in Wales. The principal agent of its introduction there was Howel Harris, a gentleman of Trevecca, in Brecknockshire, who, with a view to holy orders, had begun to study at Oxford, but, offended at the immorality there prevalent, had quitted college, and returned to Wales. He shortly afterwards began a missionary labour in that country, going from house to house, and preaching in the open air. A great excitement was produced; and multitudes attended his discourses. To sustain the religious feeling thus awakened, Mr. Harris, about the year 1736, instituted “Private Societies,” similar to those which Wesley was, about the same time, though without communication, 502forming in England. By 1739 he had established about 300 such societies in South Wales. At first, he encountered much hostility from magistrates and mobs; but after a time his work was taken up by several ministers of the Church of England; one of whom, the Reverend Daniel Rowlands, of Llangeitho, Cardigan, had such a reputation, that “persons have been known to come 100 miles to hear him preach on the sabbaths of his administering the Lord’s supper;” and he had no less than 2000 communicants in his church. In 1742, 10 clergymen were assisting in the movement, and 40 or 50 lay preachers. The first chapel was erected in 1747, at Builth in Brecknockshire.

In the mean time, North Wales began to be in similar manner roused; and, in spite of considerable persecution, many members were enrolled, and several chapels built. The Rev. Thomas Charles, of Bala, one of the founders of the British and Foreign Bible Society, was, towards the termination of the century, a prominent instrument in effecting this result.

The growth of the movement, both in North and South Wales, was extremely rapid; but the process of formation into a separate body was more gradual and slow. At first, as several of the most conspicuous labourers were clergymen of the Established Church, the sacraments were administered exclusively by them; but, as converts multiplied, the number of evangelical clergymen was found inadequate to the occasion: many members were obliged to seek communion with the various dissenting bodies; till, at last, in 1811, 12 among the Methodist preachers were ordained, at a considerable Conference, and from that time forth the sacraments were regularly administered by them in their own chapels, and the body assumed distinctly the appearance of a separate Connexion.

A county in Wales corresponds with a Wesleyan “Circuit,” or to a Scottish Presbytery. All the Church officers within a county, whether preachers or leaders of private societies, are members of the “Monthly Meeting” of the county. The province of this meeting is to superintend both the spiritual and secular condition of the societies within the county.

The “Quarterly Association” performs all the functions of the Wesleyan “Conference,” or of the “Synod” amongst Presbyterians. There are two meetings held every quarter; one in North Wales, and the other in South Wales. The Association consists of all the preachers and leaders of private societies in the Connexion. “At every Association, the whole Connexion is supposed to be present through its representatives, and the decisions of this meeting are deemed sufficient authority on every subject relating to the body through all its branches. It has the prerogative to superintend the cause of Christ among the Welsh Calvinistic Methodists through Wales and England, to inquire into the affairs of all the private and monthly societies, and to direct any changes or alterations which it may think requisite.” It is at this meeting that the ministers are selected who are to administer the sacraments.

The ministers, among the Welsh Calvinistic Methodists, are itinerant. They are selected by the private societies, and reported to the monthly meetings, which examine into their qualifications, and permit them to commence on trial. A certain number only, who must previously have been preachers for at least five years, are ordained to administer the sacraments, and this ordination takes place at the Quarterly Associations. The preachers are appointed each to a particular county; but generally once in the course of a year they undertake a missionary tour to distant parts of Wales, when they preach twice every day, on each occasion at a different chapel. Their remuneration is derived from the monthly pence contributed by the members of each congregation; out of which fund a trifling sum is given to them after every sermon. In 1837, a college for the education of ministers was established at Bala, and in 1842 another was established at Trevecca.

The doctrines of the Welsh Calvinistic Methodists may be inferred from the appellation of the body, and be said to be substantially accordant with the Articles of the Established Church, interpreted according to their Calvinistic sense.

The number of chapels returned at the Census as pertaining to the body was 828; containing (after an estimate for 53 chapels which made no return of sittings) accommodation for 211,951 persons. The attendance on the Census Sunday was: Morning, 79,728; Afternoon, 59,140; Evening, 125,244. It is computed that the body have expended in the erection and repairs of their chapels, between the year 1747 and the present time, a sum amounting to nearly a million sterling. From the “Dyddiadwr Methodistaidd” for 1853 we learn that the number of ministers was 207, and of preachers 234. The number of communicants was stated on the same authority at 58,577.

503The principal societies supported by the Connexion are those connected with Home and Foreign Missions; the contributions to which amount to about £3000 a year. The operations of the Home Mission are carried on among the English population inhabiting the borders between England and Wales. The Foreign Mission has a station in Brittany (north-west of France)—the language of that country being a sister dialect of the Welsh—and stations at Cassay and Sylhet in India, the presidency of Bengal.

METROPOLITAN. (See Archbishop, Bishop.) The bishop who presides over the other bishops of a province. The writers of the Latin Church use promiscuously the words archbishop and metropolitan, making either name denote a bishop, who, by virtue of his see, presides over or governs several other bishops. Thus in England the archbishops of Canterbury and York, and in Ireland the archbishops of Armagh and Dublin, are metropolitans. But the Greeks use the name only to denote him whose see is really a civil metropolis. There are some bishops in our Church who are metropolitans without the title of archbishop, viz. the bishops of Calcutta and Sydney.

MICHAEL, ST., AND ALL ANGELS. A festival of the Christian Church observed on the 29th of September.

The Scripture account of Michael is; that he was an archangel, who presided over the Jewish nation, as other angels did over the Gentile world, as is evident of the kingdoms of Persia and Greece; that he had an army of angels under his command; that he fought with the dragon, or Satan and his angels; and that, contending with the devil, he disputed about the body of Moses.

As to the combat between Michael and the dragon, some authors understand it literally, and think it means the expulsion of certain rebellious angels, with their head or leader, from the presence of God. Others take it in a figurative sense, and refer it, either to the contest that happened at Rome between St. Peter and Simon Magus, in which the apostle prevailed over the magician; or to those violent persecutions, under which the Church laboured for three hundred years, and which happily ceased when the powers of the world became Christian.

The contest about the body of Moses is, likewise, taken both literally and figuratively. Those who understand it literally are of opinion, that Michael, by the order of God, hid the body of Moses after his death, and that the devil endeavoured to discover it, as a fit means to entice the people to idolatry by a superstitious worship of his relics. But this dispute is figuratively understood to be a controversy about rebuilding the temple, and restoring the service of God among the Jews at Jerusalem, the Jewish Church being fitly enough styled “the body of Moses.” It is thought by some that this story of the contest between Michael and the devil was taken by St. Jude out of an apocryphal book, called “The Assumption of Moses.”—Broughton.

MILITANT. (From militans, “fighting.”) A term applied to the Church on earth, as engaged in a warfare with the world, sin, and the devil; in distinction from the Church triumphant in heaven. It is used in the prefatory sentence of the prayer after the Offertory in our Communion Service, and was first inserted in the Second Book of King Edward VI.

MILLENARIANS and MILLENNIUM. A name which is given to those who believe that Christ will reign personally for a thousand years upon earth, their designation being derived from the Latin words, mille, “a thousand,” and annus, “a year.” In the words of Greswell, we may define their doctrine and expectation, generally, as the belief of a second personal advent or return of our Lord Jesus Christ, some time before the end of the present state of things on the earth; a resurrection of a part of the dead in the body, concurrently with that return; the establishment of a kingdom, for a certain length of time, upon earth, of which Jesus Christ will be the sovereign head, and good and holy men who lived under the Mosaic dispensation before the gospel æra, or have lived under the Christian, since, whether previously raised to life, or found alive in the flesh at the time of the return, will be the subjects, and in some manner or other admitted to a share of its privileges.

This is what is meant by the doctrine of the Millennium in general: the fact of a return of Jesus Christ in person before the end of the world; of a first or particular resurrection of the dead; of a reign of Christ, with all saints, on the earth; and all this before the present state of things is at an end, and before time and sense, whose proper period of being is commensurate with the duration of the present state of things, have given place to spirit and eternity in heaven.

The Millenarian, says the same learned writer, Mr. Greswell, expects the following events, and as far as he can infer their 504connexion, in the following order, though that is not, in every instance, a point of paramount importance, or absolute certainty, on which room for the possibility of a different succession of particulars may not be allowed to exist.

First, a personal reappearance of the prophet Elijah, before any second advent of Jesus Christ.

Secondly, a second advent of Jesus Christ in person, before his coming to judgment at the end of the world.

Thirdly, a conversion of the Jews to Christianity, collectively, and as a nation.

Fourthly, a resurrection of part of the dead, such as is called, by way of distinction, “the resurrection of the just.”

Fifthly, the restitution of the kingdom to Israel, including the appearance and manifestation of the Messiah to the Jews, in the character of a temporal monarch.

Sixthly, a conformation of this kingdom to a state or condition of society of which Christ will be the head, and faithful believers, both Jews and Gentiles, will be the members.

A distribution of rewards and dignities in it, proportioned to the respective merits or good deserts of the receivers.

A resulting state of things, which though transacted upon earth, and adapted to the nature and conditions of a human society as such, leaves nothing to be desired for its perfection and happiness.

Bishop Newton, in his “Dissertations on the Prophecies,” says, with reference to the millennium, when these great events shall come to pass, of which we collect from the prophecies, this is to be the proper order: the Protestant witnesses shall be greatly exalted, and the 1260 years of their prophesying in sackcloth, and of the tyranny of the beast, shall end together; the conversion and restoration of the Jews succeed; then follows the ruin of the Ottoman empire; and then the total destruction of Rome and of antichrist. When these great events, I say, shall come to pass, then shall the kingdom of Christ commence, or the reign of the saints upon earth. So Daniel expressly informs us that the kingdom of Christ and the saints will be raised upon the ruins of the kingdom of antichrist (vii. 26, 27). “But the judgment shall sit, and they shall take away his dominion, to consume and to destroy it unto the end; and the kingdom and dominion, and the greatness of the kingdom under the whole heaven, shall be given to the people of the saints of the Most High, whose kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and all dominions shall serve and obey him.” So likewise St. John saith, that, upon the final destruction of the beast and the false prophet, (Rev. xx.,) “Satan is bound for a thousand years: and I saw thrones, and they sat upon them, and judgment was given unto them; and I saw the souls of them that were beheaded for the witness of Jesus Christ and for the word of God, which had not worshipped the beast, neither his image, neither had received his mark upon their foreheads or in their hands: and they lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years. But the rest of the dead lived not again until the thousand years were finished. This is the first resurrection.” It is, I conceive, to these great events, the fall of antichrist, the re-establishment of the Jews, and the beginning of the glorious millennium, that the three different dates in Daniel of 1260 years, 1290 years, and 1335 years, are to be referred. And as Daniel saith, (xii. 12,) “Blessed is he that waiteth and cometh to the 1335 years;” so St. John saith, (Rev. xx. 6,) “Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection.” Blessed and happy indeed will be this period: and it is very observable that the martyrs and confessors of Jesus, in Papist as well as Pagan times, will be raised to partake of this felicity. Then shall all those gracious promises in the Old Testament be fulfilled, of the amplitude and extent, of the peace and prosperity, of the glory and happiness of the Church in the latter days. “Then,” in the full sense of the words, (Rev. xi. 15,) “shall the kingdoms of this world become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of his Christ, and he shall reign for ever and ever.” According to tradition, these thousand years of the reign of Christ and the saints will be the seventh millenary of the world; for as God created the world in six days, and rested on the seventh, so the world, it is argued, will continue six thousand years, and the seventh thousand will be the great Sabbatism, or holy rest of the people of God; “One day (2 Pet. iii. 8) being with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.” According to tradition, too, these thousand years of the reign of Christ and the saints are the great “day of judgment,” in the morning or beginning whereof shall be the coming of Christ in flaming fire, and the particular judgment of antichrist and the first resurrection; and in the evening or conclusion whereof shall be the general resurrection of the dead, “small and great; and they shall be judged, every man, according to their works!”

MINIMS. A religious order, in the 505Church of Rome, whose founder was St. Francis de Paulu, so called from the place in Calabria, where he was born in 1416.

He composed his rule in 1493, and it was approved by Pope Alexander VI., at the recommendation of the king of France. This pontiff changed the name of Hermits of St. Francis, which these monks bore, into that of Minims, (the Least,) because they called themselves in humility Minimi Fratres Eremitæ, and gave them all the privileges of the religious mendicant or begging friars. In 1507, the holy founder of this order died, at the age of ninety-one years, and was canonized by Pope Leo X., in 1519. His body was preserved in the church of the convent of Plessis, until the Huguenots, in 1562, dragged it out of its tomb, and burnt it with the wood of a crucifix belonging to the church. His bones, however, were saved out of the fire by some zealous Catholics who mixed with the Calvinist soldiers, and were distributed afterwards among several churches.

This order is divided into thirty-one provinces, of which twelve are in Italy, eleven in France and Flanders, seven in Spain, and one in Germany. It has, at present, about 450 convents. The Minims have passed even into the Indies, where there are some convents which do not compose provinces, but depend immediately on the general.

What more particularly distinguishes these monks from all others, is the observation of what they call the quadragesimal life, that is, a total abstinence from flesh, and everything which has its origin from flesh, as eggs, butter, cheese, excepting in case of great sickness. By this means they make the year one continued Lent fast. Their habit is coarse black woollen stuff, with a woollen girdle of the same colour, tied in five knots. They are not permitted to quit their habit and girdle night nor day. Formerly they went barefooted, but for these last hundred years they have been allowed the use of shoes.

MINOR CANONS. Priests in collegiate churches, next in rank to the canons and prebendaries, but not of the chapter, who are responsible for the performance of the daily service. In cathedrals of the old foundation, they are not often found, their duties being generally performed there by priest-vicars. There are minor canons at St. Patrick’s, Hereford, and Chichester, and formerly were at Salisbury; and at all those places there are priest-vicars also: twelve minor canons at St. Paul’s, and seven at Windsor, where there are only lay-vicars besides. It appears from the original statutes of St. Patrick’s and St. Paul’s, that the minor canons held a middle place between the canons and vicars; and that besides their attendance on the daily service, they were required to take the place of the major canons when required. At Hereford, they are responsible for the reading of the daily prayers, the vicars choral for the Litany and lessons; which seems to mark this office as being more presbyteral than that of the vicars.

As the number of minor canons is generally but four or five, (at St. Patrick’s statutably six, though there never have been more than four,) it would appear as if these offices were originally instituted to supply the place of the four junior canons, whose proper duty it was to perform the daily service of the choir. Thus, in the Causes Celebres, viii. 345, on remarking on the constitution of the cathedral of Verdun, it is stated that, “par le service de chœur, on entend l’obligation des quatre chanonies qui sont dans les ordres sacrés, de porter la chappe, et de faire chœur tous les jours de l’année à leur tour. Cette fonction pénible a déja été retranchée; elle a été exercée par des chapelains, gagés par les nouveaux chanonies,” &c. Chaplain and minor canon are convertible terms in many churches abroad, as at St. Peter’s at Rome, where there are fifty minor canons or chaplains. (Eustace’s Classical Tour.) At Rouen there were eight Moindees Chanonies. They were elsewhere called semi (or demi) prebendaries.

The minor canons of St. Paul and of St. Patrick form corporate bodies, and had their common hall and collegiate buildings in ancient times. There is also a college of vicars-choral at St. Patrick’s. At Hereford the minor canonries are held by priest-vicars; but they have separate estates, as minor canons, with designation, like prebendaries, for their individual stalls.

In the cathedrals of the new foundation there are no priest-vicars, but all the inferior clerical members are minor canons. They ought to be all priests, and skilled in church music, according to the statutes, a qualification required by the laws of all cathedrals. Formerly the minor canons were more numerous than now, being commensurate to the number of the prebendaries: e. g. twelve at Canterbury, twelve at Durham, ten at Worcester: a number by no means too great for the due and solemn performance of the service. They were in fact, but not in name, the vicars of the prebendaries.—Jebb.

506MINISTER. This is the Latin term to designate that officer who is styled deacon in Greek. The term was applied generally to the clergy about the time of the great rebellion, since which time it has been used to denote the preacher of any religion. Joseph Mede protested against our calling presbyters ministers of the Church, or of such or such a parish: we should call them, he observes, ministers of God, or ministers of Christ, not ministers of men, because they are only God’s ministers, who sends them, but the people’s pastors, to teach, instruct, and oversee them. Were it not absurd to call the shepherd the sheep’s minister? The word has, however, obtained such general currency, that it would be pedantic to refuse to use it. The word seems generally to imply an assistant, whether presbyteral or diaconal, in Divine service. Thus in the statutes of the cathedrals of the new foundation, the minor canons and other members of the choir are called minister. These represent the deacons, readers, chanters, &c. of the ancient Church.

Some trace of the division of the service between the superior and inferior clergy, (the priest and the deacon,) is perhaps still visible in our liturgy. The word minister is prefixed, in the order both for Morning and Evening Prayer, to those parts of the service only where there is exhortation, or in which the people audibly join, or which are said kneeling, such as the General Confession, Lord’s Prayer, Apostles’ Creed, and Lesser Litany. Minister also occurs in one of the rubrics respecting the reading of the lessons, which the custom of the Church, both Eastern and Western, has always permitted to the inferior ministers. The word priest is prefixed to the absolution, and to all those prayers which the clergyman performs standing; such as the versicles before the psalms, beginning at the Gloria Patri, and those before the collects. To the collects themselves no direction is prefixed. There are a few exceptions which may be accounted for.

MINORESS. A nun under the rule of St. Clair.

MIRACLE. An effect that does not follow from any of the regular laws of nature, or which is inconsistent with some law of it, or contrary to the settled constitution and course of things: accordingly, all miracles pre-suppose an established system of nature, within the limits of which they operate, and with the order of which they disagree.

The following statement is true beyond controversy:—Man cannot, in the present constitution of his mind, believe that religion has a Divine origin, unless it be accompanied with miracles. The necessary inference of the mind is, that if an Infinite Being act, his acts will be superhuman in their character; because the effect, reason dictates, will be characterized by the nature of its cause. Man has the same reason to expect that God will perform acts above human power and knowledge, that he has to suppose the inferior orders of animals will, in their actions, sink below the power and wisdom which characterize human nature. For, as it is natural for man to perform acts superior to the power and knowledge of the animals beneath him, so reason affirms that it is natural for God to develope his power by means and in ways above the skill and ability of mortals. Hence, if God manifest himself at all—unless, in accommodation to the capacities of men, he should constrain his manifestations within the compass of human ability—every act of God’s immediate power would, to human capacity, be a miracle. But, if God were to constrain all his acts within the limits of human means and agencies, it would be impossible for man to discriminate between the acts of the Godhead and the acts of the manhood. And man, if he considered acts to be of a Divine origin which were plainly within the compass of human ability, would violate his own reason.

Suppose, for illustration, that God desired to reveal a religion to men, and wished them to recognise his character and his benevolence in giving that revelation. Suppose, further, that God should give such a revelation, and that every appearance and every act connected with its introduction were characterized by nothing superior to human power; could any rational mind on earth believe that such a system of religion came from God? Impossible! A man could as easily be made to believe that his own child, who possessed his own lineaments, and his own nature, belonged to some other world, and some other order of the creation. It would not be possible for God to convince men that a religion was from heaven, unless it was accompanied with the marks of Divine power.

Suppose, again, that some individual were to appear either in the heathen or Christian world—that he claimed to be a teacher sent from God, yet aspired to the performance of no miracles—that he assumed to do nothing superior to the wisdom and ability of other men. Such an individual, although he might succeed in gaining 507proselytes to some particular view of a religion already believed, yet he could never make men believe that he had a special commission from God to establish a new religion, for the simple reason that he had no grounds more than his fellows, to support his claims as an agent of the Almighty. But if he could convince a single individual that he had wrought a miracle, or that he had power to do so, that moment his claims would be established in that mind as a commissioned agent from Heaven. So certainly and so intuitively do the minds of men revere and expect miracles as the credentials of the Divine presence.

This demand of the mind for miracles, as testimony of the Divine presence and power, is intuitive with all men; and those very individuals who have doubted the existence or necessity of miracles, should they examine their own convictions on this subject, would see that, by an absolute necessity, if they desired to give the world a system of religion, whether truth or imposture, in order to make men receive it as of Divine authority, they must work miracles to attest its truth, or make men believe that they did so. Men can produce doubt of a revelation in no way until they have destroyed the evidence of its miracles; nor can faith be produced in the Divine origin of a religion until the evidence of miracles is supplied.

The conviction that miracles are the true attestation of immediate Divine agency, is so constitutional (allow the expression) with the reason, that so soon as men persuade themselves they are the special agents of God in propagating some particular truth in the world, they adopt likewise the belief that they have ability to work miracles. There have been many sincere enthusiasts, who believed that they were special agents of Heaven; and, in such cases, the conviction of their own miraculous powers arises as a necessary concomitant of the other opinion. Among such, in modern times, may be instanced Emanuel Swedenborg, and Irving, the Scotch preacher. Impostors also, perceiving that miracles were necessary in order that the human mind should receive a religion as Divine, have invariably claimed miraculous powers. Such instances recur constantly from the days of Elymas down to the Mormon, Joseph Smith.

All the multitude of false religions that have been believed since the world began, have been introduced by the power of this principle. Miracles believed, lie at the foundation of all religions which men have ever received as of Divine origin. No matter how degrading or repulsive to reason in other respects, the fact of its establishment and propagation grows out of the belief of men that miraculous agency lies at the bottom. This belief will give currency to any system, however absurd; and, without it, no system can be established in the minds of men, however high and holy may be its origin and its design.

Such, then, is the constitution which the Maker has given to the mind. Whether the conviction be an intuition or an induction of the reason, God is the primary cause of its existence; and its existence puts it out of the power of man to receive a revelation from God himself, unless accompanied with miraculous manifestations. If, therefore, God ever gave a revelation to man, it was necessarily accompanied with miracles, and with miracles of such a nature, as would clearly distinguish the Divine character and the Divine authority of the dispensation.—Plan of the Philosophy of Salvation.

MIRACLES, or MIRACLE-PLAYS. (See Moralities.)

MISCHNA, or MISNA. A part of the Jewish Talmud. From a word which signifies repetition: i. e. a secondary law. It is believed by the Jews to be the tradition delivered, unwritten, to Moses by God; and preserved only by the doctors of the synagogue till the time of Rabbi Judas the Holy, who committed it to writing about A. D. 180. It is in fact the canon and civil law of the Jews; treating of tithes, festivals, matrimonial laws, mercantile laws, idolatry, oaths, sacrifices, and purifications. The heads of the synagogue who are said to have preserved the Mischna, were thought to have had the privilege of hearing the Bath-Col, or oracular voice of God. (See Bath-Col.) The Mischna contains the text; and the Gemara, which is the second part of the Talmud, contains the commentaries; so that the Gemara is, as it were, a glossary to the Mischna.

MISERERE. The seat of a stall, so contrived as to turn up and down, according as it is wanted as a support in long standing, or as a seat. Misereres are almost always carved, and often very richly; more often, too, than any other part of the wood-work, with grotesques.

MISSAL. (See Mass.) In the Romish Church, a book containing the services of the mass for the various days of the year. In the ancient Church, the several parts of Divine service were arranged in distinct 508books. Thus the collects and the invariable portion of the Communion Office formed the book called the Sacramentary. The lessons from the Old and New Testaments constituted the Lectionary, and the Gospels made another volume, with the title of Evangelistarium. The Antiphonary consisted of anthems, &c. designed for chanting.

About the eleventh or twelfth century it was found convenient, generally, to unite these books, and the volume obtained the name of the Complete or Plenary Missal, or Book of Missæ. Of this description were almost all the liturgical books of the Western Churches, and the arrangement is still preserved in our own.—Palmer’s Origines Liturgicæ.

MISSION. A power or commission to preach the gospel. Thus our blessed Lord gave his disciples and their successors the bishops their mission, when he said, “Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.”

It certainly is essential that the true ministers of God should be able to prove that they have not only the power, but the right, of performing sacred offices. There is an evident difference between these things, as may be seen by the following cases. If a regularly ordained priest should celebrate the eucharist in the church of another, contrary to the will of that person and of the bishop, he would have the power of consecrating the eucharist, it actually would be consecrated; but he would not have the right of consecrating; or, in other words, he would not have mission for that act. If a bishop should enter the diocese of another bishop, and, contrary to his will, ordain one of his deacons to the priesthood, the intruding bishop would have the power, but not the right, of ordaining; he would have no mission for such an act.

In fact, mission fails in all schismatical, heretical, and uncanonical acts, because God cannot have given any man a right to act in opposition to those laws which he himself has enacted, or to those which the apostles and their successors have instituted, for the orderly and peaceable regulation of the Church: he “is not the author of confusion, but of peace, as in all the churches of the saints” (1 Cor. xiv. 33); and yet, were he to commission his ministers to exercise their offices in whatever places and circumstances they pleased, confusion and division without end must be the inevitable result.

Mission can only be given for acts in accordance with the Divine and ecclesiastical laws, the latter of which derive their authority from the former; and it is conferred by valid ordination. It would be easy to prove this in several ways; but it is enough at present to say, that no other method can be pointed out by which mission is given. Should the ordination be valid, and yet uncanonical, mission does not take effect until the suspension imposed by the canons on the person ordained is in some lawful manner removed.

Mr. Palmer, from whom the above remarks are taken, shows, in his Origines Liturgicæ, that the English bishops and clergy alone have mission in England.

MISSIONARY. A clergyman, whether bishop, priest, or deacon, deputed or sent out by ecclesiastical authority, to preach the gospel, and exercise his other functions, in places where the Church has hitherto been unknown, or is in the infancy of its establishment.

MITRE. The episcopal coronet. From Eusebius it seems that St. John wore an ornament which many have considered to be a mitre (φέταλον).

The most ancient mitres were very low and simple, being not more than from three to six inches in elevation, and they thus continued till the end of the thirteenth century. In the fourteenth century they gradually increased in height to a foot or more, and became more superbly enriched; their contours also presented a degree of convexity by which they were distinguished from the older mitres. The two horns of the mitre are generally taken to be an allusion to the cloven tongues as of fire, which rested on each of the apostles on the day of Pentecost.

Mitres, although worn in some of the Lutheran Churches, (as in Sweden,) have fallen into utter desuetude in England, even at coronations. They were worn however at the coronations of Edward VI. and Queen Elizabeth. See Hiereugia Anglicana, p. 81, et seq. In which work, however, at p. 89, there is an assertion of Dr. Milner’s, which is incorrect, viz. that they were worn at the coronation of George III. In the detailed accounts of that ceremony (see e. g. the Annual Register for 1761) the bishops are described as carrying their square caps, and putting them on when the lay peers assumed their coronets. The mitre is now merely an heraldic decoration, and, as such, occasionally carried at funerals.

MODUS DECIMANDI. This is when lands, or a yearly pension, or some money or other thing, is given to a parson in lieu of his tithes.

509MONASTERIES. Convents or houses built for those who profess the monastic life, whether abbeys, priories, or nunneries. (For the origin of monasteries, see Abbey and Monk.)

In their first institution, and in their subsequent uses, there can be no doubt that monasteries were amongst the most remarkable instances of Christian munificence, and they certainly were in the dark ages among the beneficial adaptations of the talents of Christians to pious and charitable ends. They were schools of education and learning, where the children of the great received their education; and they were hospitals for the poor: they afforded also a retirement for the worn-out servants of the rich and noble; they protected the calmer spirits, who, in an age of universal warfare, shrunk from conflict, and desired to lead a contemplative life. But the evils which grew out of those societies seem quite to have counterbalanced the good. Being often exempted from the authority of the bishop, they became hotbeds of ecclesiastical insubordination; and were little else but parties of privileged sectaries within the Church. The temptations arising out of a state of celibacy, too often in the first instance enforced by improper means, and always bound upon the members of these societies by a religious vow, were the occasion of great scandal. And the enormous wealth with which some of them were endowed, brought with it a greater degree of pride, and ostentation, and luxury, than was becoming in Christians; and still more in those who had vowed a life of religion and asceticism.

The dissolution of houses of this kind began so early as the year 1312, when the Templars were suppressed; and, in 1323, their lands, churches, advowsons, and liberties, here in England, were given by 17 Edward II. stat. iii. to the prior and brethren of the hospital of St. John of Jerusalem. In the years 1390, 1437, 1441, 1459, 1497, 1505, 1508, and 1515, several other houses were dissolved, and their revenues settled on different colleges in Oxford and Cambridge. Soon after the last period, Cardinal Wolsey, by licence of the king and pope, obtained a dissolution of above thirty religious houses for the founding and endowing his colleges at Oxford and Ipswich. About the same time a bull was granted by the same pope to Cardinal Wolsey to suppress monasteries, where there were not above six monks, to the value of eight thousand ducats a year, for endowing Windsor and King’s College in Cambridge; and two other bulls were granted to Cardinals Wolsey and Campeius, where there were less than twelve monks, to annex them to the greater monasteries; and another bull to the same cardinals to inquire about abbeys to be suppressed in order to be made cathedrals. Although nothing appears to have been done in consequence of these bulls, the motive which induced Wolsey and many others to suppress these houses, was the desire of promoting learning; and Archbishop Cranmer engaged in such suppression with a view of carrying on the reformation. There were other causes that concurred to bring on their ruin: many of the monks were loose and vicious; they were generally thought to be in their hearts attached to the pope’s supremacy; their revenues were not employed according to the intent of the donors; many cheats in images, feigned miracles, and counterfeit relics, had been discovered, which brought the monks into disgrace; the Observant friars had opposed the king’s divorce from Queen Catharine; and these circumstances operated, in concurrence with the king’s want of a supply, and the people’s desire to save their money, to forward a motion in parliament, that, in order to support the king’s state, and supply his wants, all the religious houses which were not able to spend above £200 a year, might be conferred upon the Crown; and an act was passed for that purpose, 27 Henry VIII. c. 28. By this act about 380 houses were dissolved, and a revenue of £30,000 or £32,000 a year came to the Crown; besides about £200,000 in plate and jewels. The suppression of these houses occasioned discontent, and at length an open rebellion: when this was appeased, the king resolved to suppress the rest of the monasteries, and appointed a new visitation, which caused the greater abbeys to be surrendered apace; and it was enacted by 31 Henry VIII. c. 13, that all monasteries which had been surrendered since the 4th of February, in the twenty-seventh year of his Majesty’s reign, and which thereafter should be surrendered, should be vested in the king. The knights of St. John of Jerusalem were also suppressed by the 32nd Henry VIII. c. 24. The suppression of these greater houses by these two acts produced a revenue to the king of above £100,000 a year, besides a large sum in plate and jewels. The last act of dissolution in this king’s reign was the act of 37 Henry VIII. c. 4, for dissolving colleges, free chapels, chantries, &c., which act was further enforced by 1 Edward VI. c. 14. By this act were suppressed 90 colleges, 510110 hospitals, and 2374 chantries and free chapels.

Whatever were the offences of the race of men then inhabiting them, this destruction of the monasteries was nothing less than sacrilege, and can on no ground be justified. They were the property of the Church; and if, while the Church cast off divers errors in doctrine which she had too long endured, she had been permitted to purge these institutions of some practical errors, and of certain flagrant vices, they might have been exceedingly serviceable to the cause of religion. Cranmer felt this very forcibly, and begged earnestly of Henry VIII. that he would save some of the monasteries for holy and religious uses; but in vain. Ridley also was equally anxious for their preservation. It is a mistake to suppose that the monasteries were erected and endowed by Papists. Many of them were endowed before most of the errors of the Papists were thought of: and the founders of abbeys afterwards built and endowed them, not as Papists, but as churchmen; and when the Church became pure, she did not lose any portion of her right to such endowments as were always made in supposition of her purity. (See Num. xviii. 32; Lev. xxv. 23, 24; Ezek. xlviii. 14.)

Although much of the confiscated property was profligately squandered and consumed by the Russells, the Cavendishes, &c., still, out of the receipts, Henry VIII. founded six new bishoprics, viz. those of Westminster, (which was changed by Queen Elizabeth into a deanery, with twelve prebends and a school,) Peterborough, Chester, Gloucester, Bristol, and Oxford. And in eight other sees he founded deaneries and chapters, by converting the priors and monks into deans and prebendaries, viz. Canterbury, Winchester, Durham, Worcester, Rochester, Norwich, Ely, and Carlisle. He founded also the colleges of Christ Church in Oxford, and Trinity in Cambridge, and finished King’s College there. He likewise founded professorships of divinity, law, physic, and of the Hebrew and Greek tongues in both the said universities. He gave the house of Greyfriars and St. Bartholomew’s Hospital to the city of London, and a perpetual pension to the poor knights of Windsor, and laid out great sums in building and fortifying many ports in the Channel. It is observable that the dissolution of these houses was an act, not of the Church, but of the State, in the period preceding the Reformation, by a king and parliament of the Roman Catholic communion in all points except the king’s supremacy; to which the pope himself, by his bulls and licences, had led the way.

Of the monasteries which had been attached to cathedrals before the Reformation, the heads were called Priors, (which answered to dean,) never Abbots; as the bishop was considered as virtually the abbot. The bishop of Ely actually occupied, as he still does, the abbot’s place in the choir, (i. e. the stall usually assigned by the dean,) as he did since the Reformation at Carlisle, though in the latter place he had a throne also. Christ Church monastery in Dublin, which had always been a cathedral chapter, was also secularized at the Reformation.

MONASTERY. In architectural arrangement, monastic establishments, whether abbeys, priories, or other convents, followed nearly the same plan.

The great enclosure, (varying, of course, in extent with the wealth and importance of the monastery,) and generally with a stream running beside it, was surrounded by a wall, the principal entrance being through a gateway to the west or north-west. This gateway was a considerable building, and often contained a chapel, with its altar, besides the necessary accommodation for the porter. The almery, or place where alms were distributed, stood not far within the great gate, and generally a little to the right hand: there, too, was often a chapel with its altar. Proceeding onwards the west entrance of the church appeared. The church itself was always, where it received its due development, in the form of a Latin cross; a cross, i.e. of which the transepts are short in proportion to the nave. Moreover, in Norman churches, the eastern limb never approached the nave or western limb in length. Whether or no the reason of this preference of the Latin cross is found in the domestic arrangements of the monastic buildings, it was certainly best adapted to it; for the nave of the church with one of the transepts formed the whole of one side and part of another side of a quadrangle; and any other than a long nave would have involved a small quadrangle, while a long transept would leave too little of another side, or none at all, for other buildings. How the internal arrangements were affected by this adaptation of the nave to external requirements, we have seen under the head Cathedral, to which also we refer for the general description of the conventual church.

Southward of the church, and parallel with the south transept, was carried the western range of the monastic offices; but 511it will be more convenient to examine their arrangement within the court. We enter then by a door near the west end of the church, and passing through a vaulted passage, find ourselves in the cloister court, of which the nave of the church forms the northern side, the transept part of the eastern side and other buildings, in the order to be presently described, complete the quadrangle. The cloisters themselves extended around the whole of the quadrangle, serving, among other purposes, as a covered way from every part of the convent to every other part. They were furnished, perhaps always, with lavatories, on the decoration and construction of which much cost was expended; and sometimes also with desks and closets of wainscot, which served the purpose of a scriptorium.

Commencing the circuit of the cloisters at the north-west corner, and turning southward, we have first the dormitory, or dorter, the use of which is sufficiently indicated by its name. This occupied the whole of the western side of the quadrangle, and had sometimes a groined passage beneath its whole length, called the ambulatory, a noble example of which, in perfect preservation, remains at Fountains. The south side of the quadrangle contained the refectory, with its correlative, the coquina or kitchen, which was sometimes at its side, and sometimes behind it. The refectory was furnished with a pulpit, for the reading of some portion of Scripture during meals. On this side of the quadrangle may also be found, in general, the locutorium, or parlour, the latter word being, at least in etymology, the full equivalent of the former. The abbot’s lodge commonly commenced at the south-east corner of the quadrangle; but, instead of conforming itself to its general direction, rather extended eastward, with its own chapel, hall, parlour, kitchen, and other offices, in a line parallel with the choir or eastern limb of the church. Turning northwards, still continuing within the cloisters, we come first to an open passage leading outwards, then to the chapter-house, or its vestibule; then, after another open passage, to the south transept of the church. Immediately before us is an entrance into the church, and another occurs at the end of the west cloister.

The parts of the establishment especially connected with sewerage, were built over or close to the stream; and we may remark that, both in drainage, and in the supply of water, great and laudable care was always taken.

The stream also turned the abbey mill, at a small distance from the monastery. Other offices, such as stables, brew-houses, bake-houses, and the like, in the larger establishments, usually occupied another court; and, in the smaller, were connected with the chief buildings in the only quadrangle. It is needless to say that, in so general an account, we cannot enumerate exceptional cases. It may, however, be necessary to say, that the greatest difference of all, that of placing the quadrangle at the north instead of the south side of the church, is not unknown; it is so at Canterbury and at Lincoln, for instance.

The subject may be followed out in the several plans of monasteries scattered among our topographical works, and in a paper read by Mr. Bloxam before the Bedfordshire Architectural Society, and published in their Report for 1850.

MONKS. The word monk, being derived from the Greek μόνος, solus, signifies the same as a solitary, or one who lives sequestered from the company and conversation of the rest of the world, and is usually applied to those who dedicate themselves wholly to the service of religion, in some monastery (as it is called) or religious house, and under the direction of some particular statutes, or rule. Those of the female sex who devote themselves in like manner to a religious life, are called nuns. (See Nuns.)

There is some difference in the sentiments of learned men concerning the original and rise of the monastic life. But the most probable account of this matter seems to be as follows:

Till the year 250, there were no monks, but only ascetics, in the Church. (See Ascetics.)

In the Decian persecution, which was about the middle of the third century, many persons in Egypt, to avoid the fury of the storm, fled to the neighbouring deserts and mountains, where they not only found a safe retreat, but also more time and liberty to exercise themselves in acts of piety and Divine contemplations; which sort of life became so agreeable to them, that when the persecution was over, they refused to return to their habitations again, choosing rather to continue in those cottages and cells which they had made for themselves in the wilderness.

The first and most noted of these solitaries were Paul and Anthony, two famous Egyptians, whom therefore St. Jerome calls the fathers of the Christian hermits. Some indeed carry up the original of the monastic life as high as John Baptist and Elias. 512But learned men generally reckon Paul the Thebæan, and Anthony, as the first promoters of this way of living among the Christians.

As yet there were no bodies or communities of men embracing this life, nor any monasteries built, but only a few single persons scattered here and there in the deserts of Egypt, till Pachomius, in the peaceable reign of Constantine, procured some monasteries to be built in Thebais in Egypt, from whence the custom of living in societies was followed by degrees in other parts of the world, and in succeeding ages.

Macarius peopled the Egyptian desert of Scetis with monks. Hilarion, a disciple of Anthony’s, was the first monk in Palestine or Syria. Not long after, Eustathius, bishop of Sebaste, brought monachism into Armenia, Paphlagonia, and Pontus. But St. Basil is generally considered as the great father and patriarch of the Eastern monks. It was he who reduced the monastic life to a fixed state of uniformity, who united the Anchorets and Cœnobites, and obliged them to engage themselves by solemn vows. It was St. Basil who prescribed rules for the government and direction of the monasteries, to which rules most of the disciples of Anthony, Pachomius, and Macarius, and the other ancient fathers of the deserts, submitted. And to this day, all the Greeks, Nestorians, Melchites, Georgians, Mingrelians, and Armenians, follow the rule of St. Basil.

The monastic profession made no less progress in the West. Athanasius, bishop of Alexandria, retiring to Rome, about the year 339, with several priests, and two Egyptian monks, made known to several pious persons the life of Anthony, who then lived in the desert of Thebais; upon which many were desirous to embrace so holy a profession. To this effect several monasteries were built at Rome, and this example was soon followed all over Italy. Benedict of Nursia appeared in that country in the early part of the sixth century, and published his rule, which was universally received throughout the West; for which reason that saint was styled the patriarch of the Western monks, as St. Basil was of the Eastern.

France owes the institution of the monastic life to St. Martin, bishop of Tours, in the fourth century; who built the monasteries of Lugugé and Marmontier. The Council of Saragossa, in Spain, anno 380, which condemns the practice of clergymen, who affected to wear the monastical habits, is a proof that there were monks in that kingdom in the fourth century, before St. Donatus went thither out of Africa, with seventy disciples, and founded the monastery of Sirbita.

Augustine, being sent into England by Gregory the Great, in the year 596, to preach the faith, at the same time introduced the monastic state into this kingdom. It made so great a progress here, that, within the space of 200 years, there were thirty kings and queens who preferred the religious habit to their crowns, and founded stately monasteries, where they ended their days in retirement and solitude.

The monastic profession was also carried into Ireland by St. Patrick, who is looked upon as the apostle of that kingdom, and multiplied there in so prodigious a manner, that it was called the Island of Saints.—Broughton.

The monastic life soon made a very great progress all over the Christian world. Rufinus, who travelled through the East in 373, assures us there were almost as many monks in the deserts, as inhabitants in the cities. From the wilderness (contrary to its original institution) it made its way into the towns and cities, where it multiplied greatly: for the same author informs us, that, in the single city of Oxirinca, there were more monasteries than private houses, and above 30,000 monks.

The ancient monks were not, like the modern, distinguished into orders, and denominated from the founders of them; but they had their names from the places where they inhabited, as the monks of Scetis, Tabennesus, Nitria, Canopus in Egypt, &c. or else were distinguished by their different ways of living. Of these the most remarkable were,

1. The anchorets, so called from their retiring from society, and living in private cells in the wilderness. (See Anchorets.)

2. The Cœnobites, so denominated from their living together in common. (See Cœnobites.)

All monks were, originally, no more than laymen: nor could they well be otherwise, being confined by their own rules to some desert or wilderness where there could be no room for the exercise of the clerical functions. Accordingly St. Jerome tells us, the office of a monk is, not to teach, but to mourn. The Council of Chalcedon expressly distinguishes the monks from the clergy, and reckons them with the laymen. Gratian himself, who is most interested for the moderns, owns it to be plain from ecclesiastical history, that to the time of Pope Sircius and Zosimus, the monks were only mere monks, and not of the clergy.

513In some cases, however, the clerical and monastic life were capable of being conjoined; as, first, when a monastery happened to be at so great a distance from its proper church, that the monks could not ordinarily resort thither for Divine service, which was the case of the monasteries in Egypt and other parts of the East. In this case, some one or more of the monks were ordained for the performance of divine offices among them. Another case, in which the clerical and monastic life were united, was, when monks were taken out of monasteries by the bishops, and ordained for the service of the Church. This was allowed, and encouraged, when once monasteries were become schools of learning and pious education. In this case they usually continued their ancient austerities; and upon this account the Greeks styled them ἱερομοναχοι, clergy-monks. Thirdly, it happened sometimes that a bishop and all his clergy embraced the monastic life by a voluntary renunciation of property, and enjoyed all things in common. Eusebius Vercellensis was the first who brought in this way of living, and St. Augustine lived thus among the clergy of Hippo. And so far as this was an imitation of cœnobitic life, and having all things in common, it might be called a monastic as well as a clerical life.

The Cœnobites, or such monks as lived in communities, were chiefly regarded by the Church, and were therefore under the direction of certain laws and rules of government, of which we shall here give a short account. And,

First, All men were not allowed to turn monks at pleasure, because such an indiscriminate permission would have been detrimental both to the Church and State. Upon this account the civil law forbids any of those officers called curiales to become monks, unless they parted with their estates to others, who might serve their country in their stead. For the same reason servants were not to be admitted into any monastery without their masters’ leave. Indeed, Justinian afterwards abrogated this law by an edict of his own, which first set servants at liberty from their masters, under pretence of betaking themselves to a monastic life. The same precautions were observed in regard to married persons and children. The former were not to embrace the monastic life, unless with the mutual consent of both parties. This precaution was afterwards broke through by Justinian; but the Church never approved of this innovation. As to children, the Council of Gangra decreed that if any such, under pretence of religion, forsook their parents, they should be anathematized. But Justinian enervated the force of this law likewise, forbidding parents to hinder their children from becoming monks or clerks. And as children were not to turn monks without consent of their parents, so neither could parents oblige their children to embrace a monastic life against their own consent. But the fourth Council of Toledo, A. D. 633, set aside this precaution, and decreed that, whether the devotion of their parents, or their own profession, made them monks, both should be equally binding, and there should be no permission to return to a secular life again, as was before allowable, when a parent offered a child before he was capable of giving his own consent.

The manner of admission to the monastic life was usually by some change of habit or dress, not to signify any religious mystery, but only to express their gravity and contempt of the world. Long hair was always thought an indecency in men, and savouring of secular vanity; and therefore they polled every monk at his admission, to distinguish him from seculars; but they never shaved any, for fear they should look too like the priests of Isis. This, therefore, was the ancient tonsure, in opposition to both these extremes. As to their habit and clothing, the rule was the same: they were to be decent and grave, as became their profession. The monks of Tabennesus, in Thebais, seem to have been the only monks, in those early days, who were confined to any particular habit. St. Jerome, who often speaks of the habit of the monks, intimates that it differed from others only in this, that it was a cheaper, coarser, and meaner raiment, expressing their humility and contempt of the world, without any singularity or affectation. The father is very severe against the practice of some who appeared in chains or sackcloth. And Cassian blames others who carried wooden crosses continually about their necks, which was only proper to excite the laughter of the spectators. In short, the Western monks used only a common habit, the philosophic pallium, as many other Christians did. And Salvian seems to give an exact description of the habit and tonsure of the monks, when, reflecting on the Africans for their treatment of them, he says, “they could scarce ever see a man with short hair, a pale face, and habited in a pallium, without reviling, and bestowing some reproachful language on him.”

We read of no solemn vow, or profession, 514required at their admission: but they underwent a triennial probation, during which time they were inured to the exercises of the monastic life. If, after that time was expired, they chose to continue the same exercises, they were then admitted without any further ceremony into the community. This was the method prescribed by Pachomius, the father of the monks of Tabennesus, from which all others took their model.

Nor was there, as yet, any solemn vow of poverty required; though it was customary for men voluntarily to renounce the world by disposing of their estates to charitable uses, before they entered into a community, where they were to enjoy all things in common. Nor did they, after renouncing their own estates, seek to enrich themselves, or their monasteries, by begging, or accepting, the estates of others. The Western monks did not always adhere to this rule, as appears from some Imperial laws made to restrain their avarice. But the monks of Egypt were generally just in their pretensions, and would accept of no donations but for the use of the poor. Some, indeed, did not wholly renounce all property, but kept their estates in their own hands, the whole yearly revenue of which they distributed in charitable uses.

As the monasteries had no standing revenues, all the monks were obliged to exercise themselves in bodily labour to maintain themselves, without being burdensome to others. They had no idle mendicants among them; they looked upon a monk that did not work as no better than a covetous defrauder. Sozomen tells us, that Serapion presided over a monastery of ten thousand monks, near Arsinoë in Egypt, who all laboured with their own hands, by which means they not only maintained themselves, but had enough to relieve the poor.

The monasteries were commonly divided into several parts, and proper officers appointed over each of them. Every ten monks were subject to one, who was called the decanus, or dean, from his presiding over ten; and every hundred had another officer called centenarius, from his presiding over a hundred. Above these were the patres, or fathers of the monasteries, called likewise abbates, abbots, from the Greek ἄββας, which signifies father; and hegumeni (ἡγούμενοι) presidents; and archimandrites, from mandru, a sheep-fold. The business of the deans was to exact every man’s daily task, and bring it to the œconomus, or steward, who gave a monthly account thereof to the father, or abbot. (See Abbot.)

To their bodily exercises they joined others that were spiritual. The first of these was a perpetual repentance. Upon which account the life of a monk is often styled the life of a mourner. And in allusion to this, the isle of Canopus, near Alexandria, formerly a place of great lewdness, was, upon the translation and settlement of the monks of Tabennesus there, called Insulæ Metanœæ, the Isle of Repentance.

The next spiritual exercise was extraordinary fasting. The Egyptian monks kept every day a fast till three in the afternoon, excepting Saturdays, Sundays, and the fifty days of Pentecost. Some exercised themselves with very great austerities, fasting two, three, four, or five days together; but this practice was not generally approved. They did not think such excessive abstinence of any use, but rather a disservice to religion. Pachomius’s rule, which was said to be given him by an angel, permitted every man to eat, drink, and labour, according to his bodily strength. So that fasting was a discretionary thing, and matter of choice, not of compulsion.

Their fastings were accompanied with extraordinary and frequent returns of devotion. The monks of Palestine, Mesopotamia, and other parts of the East, had six or seven canonical hours of prayer. Besides which they had their constant vigils, or nocturnal meetings. The monks of Egypt met only twice a day for public devotion; but, in their private cells, whilst they were at work, they were always repeating psalms, and other parts of Scripture, and intermixing prayers with their bodily labour. St. Jerome’s description of their devotion is very lively: “When they are assembled together, (says that father,) psalms are sung, and the Scriptures read: then, prayers being ended, they all sit down, and the father begins a discourse to them, which they hear with the profoundest silence and veneration. His words make a deep impression on them; their eyes overflow with tears, and the speaker’s commendation is the weeping of his hearers. Yet no one’s grief expresses itself in an indecent strain. But when he comes to speak of the kingdom of heaven, of future happiness, and the glory of the world to come, then one may observe each of them, with a gentle sigh, and eyes lifted up to heaven, say within himself, ‘Oh that I had the wings of a dove, for then would I flee away, and be at rest!’” In some 515places, they had the Scriptures read during their meals at table. This custom was first resorted to in the monasteries of Cappadocia, to prevent idle discourses and contentions. But in Egypt they had no occasion for this remedy; for they were taught to eat their meat in silence. Palladius mentions one instance more of their devotion, which was only occasional; namely, their psalmody at the reception of any brethren, or the conducting them with singing of psalms to their habitation.

The laws did not allow monks to interest themselves in any public affairs, either ecclesiastical or civil; and those who were called to any employment in the Church, were obliged to quit their monastery thereupon. Nor were they permitted to encroach upon the duties, or rights and privileges, of the secular clergy.

By the laws of their first institution, in all parts of the East, their habitation was not to be in cities, or places of public concourse, but in deserts, and private retirements, as their very name implied. The famous monk Anthony used to say, “That the wilderness was as natural to a monk, as water to a fish; and therefore a monk in a city was quite out of his element, like a fish upon dry land.” Theodosius enacted, that all who made profession of the monastic life should be obliged by the civil magistrate to betake themselves to the wilderness, as their proper habitation. Baronius, by mistake, reckons this law a punishment, and next to a persecution of the monks. Justinian made laws to the same purpose, forbidding the Eastern monks to appear in cities; but, if they had any business of concern to be transacted there, they might do it by their Apocrisarii or Responsales, that is, their proctors or syndics, which every monastery was allowed for that purpose.

But this rule admitted of some exceptions. As, first, in times of common danger to the faith. Thus Anthony came to Alexandria, at the request of Athanasius, to confute the Arian heresy. Sometimes they thought it necessary to come and intercede with the emperors and judges for condemned criminals. Thus the monks in the neighbourhood of Antioch forsook their cells, to intercede with the emperor Theodosius, who was highly displeased with that city for demolishing the imperial statues. Afterwards, indeed, this practice grew into an abuse, and the monks were not contented to petition, but would sometimes come in great bodies or troops, and deliver criminals by force. To repress which tumultuous way of proceeding, Arcadius published a law, forbidding any such attempts under very severe penalties.

As the monks of the ancient Church were under no solemn vow or profession, they were at liberty to betake themselves to a secular life again. Julian himself was once in the monastic habit. The same is observed of Constans, the son of that Constantine, who, in the reign of Honorius, usurped the empire in Britain. The rule of Pachomius, by which the Egyptian monks were governed, has no mention of any vow at their entrance, nor any punishment for such as deserted their station afterwards.

In process of time, it was thought proper to inflict some punishment on such as returned to a secular life. The civil law excludes deserters from the privilege of ordination. Justinian added another punishment; which was, that if they were possessed of any substance, it should be all forfeited to the monastery which they had deserted. The censures of the Church were likewise inflicted on deserting monks in the fifth century.

MONOPHYSITES. (From μόνος, only, and φύσις, nature.) A general name given to all those sectaries in the Levant who only own one nature in our blessed Saviour and who maintain that the Divine and human nature of Jesus Christ were so united as to form only one nature, yet without any change, confusion, or mixture of the two natures. (See Eutychians.)

MONOTHELITES. Christian heretics in the seventh century, so called from the Greek words μόνος (only) and θέλημα (will), because they maintained, that, though there were two natures in Jesus Christ, the human and the Divine, there was but one will, which was the Divine.

The author of this sect was Theodore, bishop of Pharan in Arabia, in 626, who first started the question, and maintained that the manhood in Christ was so united to the Word, that, though it had its faculties, it did not act by itself, but the whole act was to be ascribed to the Word, which gave it the motion. Thus, he said, it was the manhood of Christ that suffered hunger, thirst, and pain; but the hunger, thirst, and pain were to be ascribed to the Word. In short, the Word was the sole author and mover of all the operations and wills in Christ.

Sergius, patriarch of Constantinople, was of the same sentiment; and the emperor Heraclius embraced the party so much the more willingly, as he thought it a means of reconciling some other heretics to the Church.

516Pope Martin I. called a council at Rome in 649, upon the question about the two operations and two wills. In this council, at which were present 105 Italian bishops, the doctrine of the Monothelites was generally condemned. The emperor Constans, who looked upon this condemnation as a kind of rebellion, caused Pope Martin to be violently carried away from Rome, and, after most cruel usage, banished him to Chersona.

However, this heresy was finally condemned in the sixth general council, held at Constantinople, under Constantine Pogonatus, in the year 680.

MONTANISTS. Christian heretics, who sprung up about the year 171, in the reign of the emperor Marcus Aurelius. They were so called from their leader, the heresiarch Montanus, a Phrygian by birth, whence they are sometimes styled Phrygians and Cataphrygians.

Montanus, it is said, embraced Christianity in hopes of rising to the dignities of the Church. He pretended to inspiration, and gave out that the Holy Ghost had instructed him in several points which had not been revealed to the apostles. Priscilla and Maximilla, two enthusiastic women of Phrygia, presently became his disciples, and in a short time he had a great number of followers. The bishops of Asia, being assembled together, condemned his prophecies, and excommunicated those who dispersed them. Afterwards, they wrote an account of what had passed to the Western Churches, where the pretended prophecies of Montanus and his followers were likewise condemned.

The Montanists, finding themselves exposed to the censure of the whole Church, formed a schism, and set up a distinct society, under the direction of those who called themselves prophets. Montanus, in conjunction with Priscilla and Maximilla, was at the head of the sect.

These sectaries made no alteration in the creed. They only held that the Holy Spirit made Montanus his organ for delivering a more perfect form of discipline than that which was delivered by the apostles. They refused communion for ever to those who were guilty of notorious crimes, and believed that the bishops had no authority to reconcile them. They held it unlawful to fly in time of persecution. They condemned second marriages, allowed the dissolution of marriage, and observed three Lents.

The Montanists became separated into two branches, one of which were the disciples of Proclus, and the other of Æschines. The latter are charged with following the heterodoxy of Praxeas and Sabellius concerning the Trinity. The celebrated Tertullian was a Montanist.

MONUMENT. The memorial placed over the body of a Christian, after his burial in consecrated ground.

The earliest monuments in England which have come down to us are, perhaps, not older than the Norman Conquest; and the most ancient is the simplest form. A stone coffin is covered with a single stone slab, which is also the only recipient of whatever device may be designed to commemorate the tenant of the narrow dwelling over which it closes. So early as the middle of the ninth century, (840,) Kenneth, king of Scotland, made an ordinance that such coffins should be adorned with the sign of the cross, in token of sanctity, on which no one was on any account to tread; and, perhaps, there were none but purely religious emblems employed for some generations after this time. The sign of the cross still continued for centuries the most usual ornament of tombs, but by-and-by it became associated with others which were most of them intended to designate the profession of him whose dust they honoured. Hence we have the crosier and mitre, with perhaps a chalice and paten, upon the tomb of an ecclesiastic, of an abbot, or a bishop; the knight has a sword, and his shield at first plain, but afterwards charged with his arms on his tomb. Sometimes an approach to religious allegory is discovered on monuments even of these very early ages, such as, for instance, the cross or crosier stuck into the mouth of a serpent or cockatrice, indicating the victory of the cross and of the Church over the devil. These, and the like devices, occurring before any attempt at the human figure was made, are in a low relief, or indented outline.

By-and-by the human figure was added, recumbent, and arrayed in the dress of the individual commemorated; and this figure soon rose from low relief to an effigy in full proportions. The knight and the ecclesiastic are now discovered so perfectly attired according to their order and degree, that the antiquary gathers his knowledge of costume from these venerable remains. Some affecting lessons of mortality are now forcibly inculcated by circumstances introduced into the sepulchre; for instance, the figure of the deceased appears nearly reduced to a skeleton, and laid in a shroud; a few instances occur in which the corpse thus represented is below a representation of the living person. Another 517interesting intimation of the character of the deceased appears in the crossed legs of those who had vowed a pilgrimage to the Holy Land; and the lion is frequently found, as well as the serpent, at the feet of the recumbent figure, perhaps in allusion to the words of the psalmist, “Thou shalt tread upon the lion and adder: the young lion and the dragon shalt thou trample under thy feet.”

All this time the tomb has been gradually increasing in height and in general splendour, the sides are adorned with figures in several compartments, which run into niches or panels, according to the advance of architectural design, and at last they are surmounted with an arch, low at first and little decorated, but afterwards very elaborately wrought into a rich canopy. Religious allegories become more complex on the sides of the tomb, and we have instances of some which have since been borrowed by artists of name, and perhaps accounted new by many; for instance, it is not rare to see a representation of the soul of the dying conveyed to heaven by angels, while the corpse lies upon the litter, and this was a design chosen for the cenotaph of the Princess Charlotte. The relatives of the deceased are sometimes represented by many small statues in the niches; or armorial bearings are introduced, sparing at first, and often, as on the tomb of Lionell Lord Wells, in Methley church, supported on the breasts of angels. Angels also frequently support the head of the recumbent figure, and at the feet are sometimes one or more priests with an open book in their hands. The space in the wall behind the tomb and beneath the canopy allows of allegorical devices, sometimes in fresco, sometimes in mosaic. But what most demands attention are the recumbent figures themselves, generally with both hands raised in the attitude of prayer; or, if they be bishops, with the right hand as if giving a blessing. The effigies of the man and his wife appear always on the same tomb, lying side by side, and in the same pious attitude; a frequently recurring sight, which inspired the lines of Piers Plowman:—

“Knyghts in ther conisance clad for the nones,

Alle it semed seyntes ysacred opon erthe,

And lovely ladies ywrought leyen by her sides.”

And surely there is a beauty and propriety in that character of monuments for Christian men in Christian churches, which could suggest the words,

“Alle it semed seyntes ysacred opon erthe,”

far greater than we recognise in the vain-glorious boastings of success in secular pursuits, perhaps even in sinful undertakings, which cumber church walls. It is a holier thought to remember what was sacred in the Christian man; who, imperfect as he may have been, was yet, as he was a Christian, in some sense a saint, and to embody it in some pious attitude upon his tomb, than to forget everything that is Christian, and to celebrate only the secular or the vicious.

Gorgeous as some of these tombs are, they did not satisfy the splendour of that age, and the canopy swells into an actual chapel, sometimes in the body of the larger church, as that of William of Wykeham, in Winchester, and those of Cardinal Beaufort, and Bishops Waynflete and Fox, in the same cathedral. Sometimes the chapel is a building complete in itself, as that of the Beauchamps, at St. Mary’s church, Warwick, and that of Henry VII. at Westminster.

MORALITIES, MYSTERIES, and MIRACLES. A kind of theatrical representations, which were made by the monks, friars, and other ecclesiastics of the middle ages, the vehicle of instruction to the people. Their general character was the same, but the miracles may be distinguished as those which represented the miracles wrought by the holy confessors, and the sufferings by which the perseverance of the martyrs was manifested; of which kind the first specified by name is a scenic representation of the legend of St. Catherine. The moralities were certain allegorical representations of virtues or vices, always so contrived as to make virtue seem desirable, and vice ridiculous and deformed. The mysteries were representations often of great length, and requiring several days’ performance, of the Scripture narrative, or of several parts of it, as, for instance, the descent of Christ into hell. Of these mysteries two complete series have lately been published from ancient manuscripts, the Townley Mysteries, performed by the monks of Woodchurch, near Wakefield, and the different leading companies of that town; and the Coventry Mysteries, performed with like help of the trades in Coventry, by the Grey Friars of that ancient city. Both of these collections begin with the creation, and carry on the story in different pageants or scenes until the judgment-day.

It will not be supposed that these plays are free from the deformities of every 518other kind of literature of the times to which they are referred; nor that the performance of them was without a great deal more of the coarseness of an unrefined age than would be tolerated now: neither need it be concealed that the theology therein embodied was sometimes rather Popish than Catholic.

On the whole it may fairly be said, that these miracles, mysteries, and moralities, were wholesome for the times; and that though they afterwards degenerated into actual abuses, yet that they are not to be condemned without measure and without mercy.

Their history and character are interesting, not only as giving a fair picture of the character of remote ages, but also because they seem to be the original from which arose stage plays and oratorios.

As a specimen of these old moralities see in Dodsley’s collection of Old Plays—God’s Promises, by Bale, bishop of Ossory, which dramatizes the leading events of the Sacred History. It was printed in 1538.

MORAVIANS, or UNITED BRETHREN. A sect generally said to have arisen under Nicholas Lewis, count of Zinzendorf, a German nobleman of the last century, and thus called because the first converts to the system were some Moravian families. According to the society’s own account, however, they derive their origin from the Greek Church in the ninth century, when, by the instrumentality of Methodius and Cyrillus, two Greek monks, the kings of Bulgaria and Moravia, being converted to the faith, were, together with their subjects, united in communion with the Greek Church. Methodius was their first bishop, and for their use Cyrillus translated the Scriptures into the Sclavonian language.

It is sometimes supposed that because the Moravians have bishops, they are less to be blamed than other dissenting sects. But, to say nothing of the doubt that exists with respect to the validity of their orders, an episcopal church may be, as the Moravians and Romanists of this country are, in a state of schism. And the very fact that the difference between them and the Church is not great, if this be so, makes the sin of their schism, in not conforming, yet greater.

Though the Brethren acknowledge no other standard of truth than the sacred Scriptures, they in general profess to adhere to the Augsburg Confession of Faith. Both in their Summary of Christian Doctrine, which is used for the instruction of their children, and in their general instructions and sermons, they teach the doctrine of the Trinity; and in their prayers, hymns, and litanies address the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, in the same manner as is done in other Christian Churches; yet they chiefly direct their hearers to Jesus Christ, as the appointed channel of the Deity, in whom God is known and made manifest unto man. They dwell upon what he has done and suffered, and upon the glorious descriptions given of him as an Almighty Saviour. They recommend love to him, as the constraining principle of the Christian’s conduct; and their general manner is more by beseeching men to be reconciled to God, than by alarming them with the terrors of the law, and the threatenings against the impenitent, which they, however, do not fail occasionally to set before their hearers. They avoid, as much as possible, everything that would lead to controversy; and though they strongly insist upon salvation by grace alone through faith, yet they will not enter into any explanation, or give any decided opinion, concerning particular election. They have, therefore, been considered by high Calvinists as leaning to Arminianism, and by others as Calvinists; but they themselves decline the adoption of either name, and conceive that the gospel may be preached by both. They profess to believe that the kingdom of Christ is not confined to any party, community, or church; and they consider themselves, though closely united in one body or visible Church, as spiritually joined in the bond of Christian love to all who are taught of God, and belong to the universal Church of Christ, however much they may differ in forms, which they deem non-essentials.

See Crantz’s History of the Brethren; Spangenberg’s Exposition of Christian Doctrine; Ratio Disciplinæ Unit. Fratrum, by Loretz, &c.

MORMONISTS, or LATTER DAY SAINTS. The Census Report published in 1854, gives the following account of these enthusiasts. Although, in origin, the Mormon movement is not English, but American, yet, as the new creed, by the missionary zeal of its disciples, has extended into England, and is making some not inconsiderable progress with the poorer classes of our countrymen, it seems desirable to give, as far as the inadequate materials permit, some brief description of a sect, the history of whose opinions, sufferings, and achievements, shows, perhaps, the most remarkable religious movement that has happened since the days of Mahomet.

519Joseph Smith, the prophet of the new belief, was born in humble life in 1805, at Sharon in the state of Vermont, from whence in 1815 he removed with his parents to Palmyra, New York. When about 15 years old, being troubled by convictions of his spiritual danger, and perplexed by the multitude of mutually hostile sects, he saw, he says, while praying in a grove, a vision of “two personages,” who informed him that his sins were pardoned, and that all existing sects were almost equally erroneous. This vision was repeated three years afterwards, in 1823, when an angel, he reports, informed him that the American Indians were a remnant of the Israelites, and that certain records, written by the Jewish prophets and containing history and prophecy, had, when the Indians fell into depravity, been buried in the earth at a spot which the angel indicated. Smith was further told, that he had been selected as the instrument by which these valuable records should be brought to light; the revelations they contained being necessary for the restoration of that purity of creed and worship from which all the modern churches had alike departed.

Accordingly, upon the 22nd of September, 1823, Smith, the story runs, discovered in the side of a hill, about four miles from Palmyra in Ontario County, a stone box, just covered by the earth, in which was deposited the “Record,”—a collection of thin plates of gold, held together by three golden rings. Part of this golden book was sealed, but the portion open to inspection was engraven thickly with “Reformed Egyptian” characters. Together with the book he found two crystal lenses “set in the two rims of a bow,” apparently resembling an enormous pair of spectacles; this instrument he said was the Urim and Thummim used by ancient seers.

The simple inspection of these treasures was the whole extent of Smith’s achievements on his first discovery of them; he was not permitted by the angel to remove them until four years afterwards, on the 22nd of September, 1827. During the interval he received occasional instruction from his supernatural visitant.

The news of his discovery attracted such attention, and procured him so much obloquy, that, according to the narrative of his biographers, he was exposed to personal violence, and was obliged to fly to Pennsylvania, carrying his golden plates concealed in a barrel of beans. When thus in some security, he, by the aid of the Urim and Thummim, set to work upon the translation of the unsealed portion, which, when complete, composed a bulky volume, which he called the “Book of Mormon”—“Mormon” meaning, he explained, more good, from “mor,” a contraction for more, and “mon,” Egyptian for good. “Mormon,” too, was the name of a supposed prophet living in the fourth or fifth century, who, after the principal portion of the American Israelites had fallen in battle, and the whole of them become degenerate, engraved on plates a summary of their history and prophecies. These plates, his son, Moroni, in the troublous times which followed, hid for safety in a hill then called Cumora, about the year A. D. 420.

Mormons defend the authenticity of this recital, by asserting the improbability that Smith, an illiterate person, could invent it, and, unaided, write so large and peculiar a volume. To the objection that the golden plates are not produced, they give Smith’s own reply to the applications made to him by his disciples for a view—that such an exhibition of them is prohibited by special revelation. Nevertheless, in further proof of Smith’s veracity, three “witnesses” were found to testify that they had actually seen the plates, an angel having shown them; and a similar testimony was borne by eight other “witnesses,”—four of those belonging to a family named Whitmer, and three being the two brothers and the father of Smith. The utmost that Smith did towards allowing access by indifferent parties to the plates, was to give to one of his inquiring followers a copy upon paper of a portion of the plates in the original hieroglyphics, viz. the “Reformed Egyptian.” This was submitted by the yet unsatisfied disciple to Professor Anthon of New York, who, however, did not recognise the characters as those of any ancient language known to him. The Mormon advocates appear to think these evidences irresistible.—Upon the other hand, it is asserted, by opponents of the Mormons, that about the years 1809–12, a person of the name of Solomon Spaulding, who had been a clergyman, conceived and executed the design of writing a religious tale, the scenes and narrative of which should be constructed on the theory that the American Indians were the lost ten tribes of Israel. This work, when finished, he entitled “The Manuscript found;” and the purport of the fiction was, to trace the progress of the tribes from Jerusalem to America, and then describe their subsequent adventures in the latter country,—“Mormon” and his son “Moroni” being 520prominent characters, and Nephi, Lehi, and the Lamanites (names frequently occurring in the Book of Mormon) being also mentioned. The MS. of this production, it is further stated, found its way into the hands of one Sidney Rigdon, who was intimately connected with Smith from the commencement of his career.

The “Book of Mormon” was succeeded by a “Book of Doctrine and Covenants,” being a collection of the special revelations made to Smith and his associates upon all points connected with the course and welfare of the Church. This was continually enlarged as further revelations, consequent upon the varying fortunes and requirements of the body, were received. Amongst these was one by which the “Aaronic Priesthood” was revived—another by which baptism by immersion was commanded—a third for the institution of “Apostles”—and others for the temporal regulation of the Church from time to time. In these productions the peculiar phraseology of the sacred Scriptures was profusely imitated.

It appears that at the end of about three years after Smith’s announcement of himself as a prophet, about thirty persons were convinced of the reality of his pretensions, and from this time forward converts rapidly increased. Smith removed to Kirtland in Ohio, and set up a mill, a store, and a bank.

It was not without opposition that this progress was effected. As appears to be usual upon the rise of new religious sects, the Mormons were accused of holding many outrageous and immoral doctrines, and, amongst them, that of a community of wives. The popular hostility was often violently manifested, and the “saints” were subjected to much ill-treatment. Smith himself, in 1832, was tarred and feathered by a midnight mob; and, in the following year, the whole of the Mormons in Missouri (amounting to above a thousand persons) were expelled from Independence, Jackson County, which had been described by Smith as the Zion appointed by revelation for the resting-place of the “saints.” They removed to Clay County, where, in 1837, they were joined by the prophet himself, whose bank in Kirtland had failed. Meantime, the prejudice against the Mormons followed them to their new habitation, and, in 1838, after several sanguinary outbreaks, Joseph Smith and his brother Hyrum were imprisoned, and the whole community of Mormons were expelled from their possessions in Missouri. They took refuge in the neighbouring state of Illinois. Here, in 1839, their prophet, who had managed to escape from prison, joined them. They now numbered 15,000 souls.

In Illinois, they chose the village of Commerce as their residence, which soon became converted into a considerable town, of which the “prophet” was appointed mayor. This town they called Nauvoo, or “Beautiful,” according to the language of the Book of Mormon. A body of militia, called the Nauvoo Legion, was established—Smith being “General.” In 1841, a “revelation” ordered the construction of a splendid temple, towards which object all the Mormons were to contribute a full tithe of their possessions. It is said that they expended on this structure nearly a million of dollars.

In Nauvoo, the Mormons seem to have increased and prospered greatly: the town extended fast; the temple gradually rose; and the prophet was the absolute head of a comparatively powerful community, which hardly recognised the ordinary laws of the state. In 1843 he became a candidate for the presidency, and put forth a statement of his views. In 1844, however, occurred the final catastrophe of his life. A Nauvoo paper, having printed certain scandal of him, was, by order of the council of the town, suppressed, and its office razed; on which, the editors retired to Carthage, and obtained a warrant against Smith and his brother. This warrant Smith refused to recognise: the county force prepared to execute it; and the “saints” prepared their city for defence. To save the town, however, Smith surrendered on the promise of protection from the governor. This promise proved of little value; for, on the 27th of June, 1844, a mob broke into Carthage prison, and Joseph and Hyrum Smith were shot.

Upon the prophet’s death there were two competitors for the vacant supremacy—Sidney Rigdon and Brigham Young. The former was the earliest associate of Smith, and professed to be acquainted with “all his secrets;” but, as the prominent advocate of the “Spiritual Wife” doctrine, he was looked upon with disfavour as the virtual author of much of the suspicion and hostility with which the Mormons were regarded. Brigham Young succeeded therefore to the post of “prophet,” (which he still retains,) and Rigdon was expelled from the community. An interval of scarcely interrupted progress followed, during which the temple was completed; but in 1845 the troubles were renewed: perpetual conflicts, in which blood was shed, occurred, and the city of Nauvoo 521itself was regularly besieged. At length the Mormons, conscious of their inability alone to cope with their antagonists, and seeing that no confidence could be reposed upon the law for their protection, undertook (since nothing less would satisfy their enemies) that they would altogether quit the State—commencing their departure in the spring of 1846.

This time it was no mere temporary, neighbouring refuge which the Mormons sought. The elders of the church, aware of the hostility to which it would be constantly exposed in any portion of the populated States, resolved, with equal policy and daring, to escape entirely from the settled territory, and to seek far off, beyond the Rocky Mountains, some secluded and unoccupied retreat in which they could, secure from molestation, build their earthly “Zion,” and, by gathering thither from all quarters of the world the converts to their faith, become a thriving and a powerful community, too potent to be further interfered with. This remarkable pilgrimage, involving the removal of some thousands of men, women, children, cattle, and stores, over thousands of untrodden miles—across wide unbridged rivers—by the difficult passes of snow-capped mountains—and through deserts, prairies, and tribes of predatory Indians—was at once commenced. A party of pioneers set out from Nauvoo in February, 1846, when it was still winter—the waggons crossing the Mississippi on the ice. These were to prepare the way for the main body of the citizens, who, according to stipulation, might remain in Nauvoo till these preparations were completed. Their departure was, however, hastened by the fresh hostility of their opponents, who—concluding from the progress still continued in the decorations of the temple that the Mormons secretly intended to elude their promise and return—attacked the town in September, 1846, and expelled the whole of its remaining population. These then followed and overtook the pioneering party, which, after dreadful sufferings from cold and heat, from hunger and disease, had, finding it impossible to reach their destination till the following year, encamped upon the banks of the Missouri, on the lands of the Omahas and Pottawatamies. Here they had sown the land to some extent with grain, the crops of which were to be reaped by their successors. After a dreary winter, spent in this location, they began their march towards their final settlement. In April, 1847, the first detachment of 143, with 70 waggons, crossed the Rocky Mountains; arriving at the basin of the Great Salt Lake, in the latter portion of July, in time to sow the land for an autumn crop. The second party started in the summer with 566 waggons and a great supply of grain. The others followed in the course of 1848—their passage much alleviated by the tracks prepared by their predecessors, and the harvests left for them to gather.