PREFACE TO THE SEVENTH EDITION. (continued 7)

The third sort of blasphemy was that against the Holy Ghost: concerning which the opinions of the ancients varied. Some applied it to the sin of lapsing into idolatry and apostasy, and denying Christ in time of persecution. Others made it to consist in denying Christ to be God; in which sense Hilary charges the Arians with sinning against the Holy Ghost. Origen thought that whoever, after having received the gifts of the Holy Ghost by baptism, afterwards ran into sin, was guilty of the unpardonable sin against the Holy Ghost. Athanasius refutes this notion, and delivers his own opinion in the following 117manner. “The Pharisees, in our Saviour’s time, and the Arians, in our own, running into the same madness, denied the real Word to be incarnate, and ascribed the works of the Godhead to the devil and his angels.—They put the devil in the place of God—which was the same thing as if they had said, that the world was made by Beelzebub, that the sun rose at his command, and the stars moved by his direction.—For this reason Christ declared their sin unpardonable, and their punishment inevitable and eternal.” St. Ambrose likewise defines this sin to be a denying the Divinity of Christ. There are others, who make it to consist in denying the Divinity of the Holy Ghost. Epiphanius calls these blasphemers πνευματόμαχοι, “fighters against the Holy Ghost.” Others, again, place this sin in a perverse and malicious ascribing the operations of the Holy Spirit to the power of the devil; and that against express knowledge and conviction of conscience.

That the ancients did not look upon the sin against the Holy Ghost, in the several kinds of it here mentioned, as absolutely irremissible, or incapable of pardon, appears from hence, that they did not shut the door of repentance against such offenders, but invited them to repent, and prayed for their conversion, and restored them to communion, upon their confession, and evidences of a true repentance. Wherever they speak of it as unpardonable both in this world and the next, they always suppose the sinner to die in obduracy, and in resistance to all the gracious motions and operations of the Holy Spirit. Whence it must be concluded, that they did not think the sin against the Holy Ghost, whatever it was, in its own nature unpardonable, but only that it becomes so through final impenitence. Thus the author of the book, “Of True and False Repentance,” under the name of St. Austin, says, they only sin against the Holy Ghost, who continue impenitent to their death. And Bacchiarius, an African writer about the time of St. Austin, says this sin consists in such a despair of God’s mercy, as makes men give over all hopes of recovering that state, from which they are fallen.—Synes. Ep. 58. Bingham, ibid. § 3. Cypr. Ep. 10. Hilar. in Mat. Can. 12, p. 164. Athan. in illud, Quicunque dixerit verbum, &c., p. 975. Ambros. Comment. in Luc. lib. vii. c. 12. Epiphan. Hæres. lxxiv. Aug. Quæst. in Vet. et Nov. Test. 102. Bingham, ibid. Aug. de vera et falsa Pœnit. cap. iv. Bacchiar. Epist. de recipiend. lapsis.

St. Austin speaks often of this crime, and places it in a continued resistance of the motions and graces of the Holy Spirit, and persisting in impenitency to our death. “Impenitency is the blasphemy, which has neither remission in this world, nor in the world to come; but of this no one can judge so long as a man continues in this life. A man is a Pagan to-day; but how knowest thou but he may become a Christian to-morrow? To-day he is an unbelieving Jew; to-morrow he may believe in Christ. To-day he is an heretic; to-morrow he may embrace the Catholic truth.” Out of this notion of St. Austin, the schoolmen, according to their usual chymistry, have extracted five several species of blasphemy against the Holy Ghost; viz. despair, presumption, final impenitency, obstinacy in sin, and opposition to the known truth.

If we consider the Scripture account of this sin, nothing can be plainer than that it is to be understood of the Pharisees imputing the miracles, wrought by the power of the Holy Ghost, to the power of the devil. Our Lord had just healed one possessed of a devil, upon which the Pharisees gave this malicious turn to the miracle; “This fellow doth not cast out devils, but by Beelzebub, the prince of the devils.” (Matt. xii. 24.) This led our Saviour to discourse of the sin of blasphemy, and to tell his disciples; “Wherefore I say unto you, all manner of sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men, but the sin against the Holy Ghost shall not be forgiven unto men,” (Ver. 31.) The Pharisees therefore were the persons charged with this sin, and the sin itself consisted in ascribing what was done by the finger of God to the agency of the devil. And the reason why our Lord pronounced it unpardonable is plain, because the Jews, by withstanding the evidence of miracles, resisted the strongest means of their conviction. From all which it will follow, that no person now can be guilty of the sin against the Holy Ghost, in the sense in which our Saviour originally intended it; though there may be sins which bear a very near resemblance to it.—August., Serm. xi. de Verbis Domini. Brouqhton.

BLOOD. From the earliest times the clergy have been forbidden to sit in judgment on capital offences, or in cases of blood; a rule still maintained among us; for the bishops, who, as peers of parliament, are a component part of the highest court of judicature in the kingdom, always retire when such cases are before the House.

118BODY. The Church is called a body. (Rom. xii. 5; 1 Cor. x. 17; xii. 13; Eph. iv. 4; Col. iii. 15.) Like every other body, society, or corporation, it has a prescribed form of admission, baptism; a constant badge of membership, the eucharist; peculiar duties, repentance, faith, obedience; peculiar privileges, forgiveness of sins, present grace, and future glory; regularly constituted officers, bishops, priests, and deacons. The Church is the body, of which Christ is the Head.

BOHEMIAN BRETHREN. A sect which sprung up in Bohemia in the year 1467. In 1503 they were accused by the Roman Catholics to King Ladislaus II., who published an edict against them, forbidding them to hold any meetings, either privately or publicly. When Luther declared himself against the Church of Rome, the Bohemian Brethren endeavoured to join his party. At first, that reformer showed a great aversion to them; but the Bohemians sending their deputies to him in 1535, with a full account of their doctrines, he acknowledged that they were a society of Christians whose doctrine came near to the purity of the gospel. This sect published another confession of faith in 1535, in which they renounced anabaptism, which they at first professed; upon this an union was concluded with the Lutherans, and afterwards with the Zuinglians, whose opinions from thenceforth they continued to follow.

BOUNTY, QUEEN ANNE’S. (See Annates.)

BOWING AT THE NAME OF JESUS. (See East.) It is enjoined by the eighteenth canon of the Constitutions of the Church of England, that “When in time of Divine service the Lord Jesus shall be mentioned, due and lowly reverence shall be done by all persons present, as it hath been accustomed; testifying by these outward ceremonies and gestures, their inward humility, Christian resolution, and due acknowledgment that the Lord Jesus Christ, the true eternal Son of God, is the only Saviour of the world, in whom alone all the mercies, graces, and promises of God to mankind, for this life and the life to come, are fully and wholly comprised.” We do not bow when our Lord is spoken of as Christ; for when we speak of him as the Christ, we speak of his office, the anointed, the prophet, priest, and king of our race, which implies his Divine nature. But Jesus is the name of his humanity, the name he was known by as man; whenever, therefore, we pronounce that name, we bow, to signify that he who for our sakes became man, is also God.

With reference to turning to the east when we say the Creed, and bowing at the name of Jesus, Dr. Bisse remarks: As to the first, it was the custom of the ancient Church to turn to the altar or east, not only at the confessions of faith, but in all the public prayers. And therefore Epiphanius, speaking of the madness of the impostor Elxæus, counts this as one instance of it among other things, that he forbade praying towards the east. (Lib. i. Hæres. 18.) Now this is the most honourable place in the house of God, and is therefore separated from the lower and inferior parts of the Church, answering to the Holy of Holies in the Jewish tabernacle, which was severed by a veil from the sanctuary; and the holy table or altar in the one answers to the mercy-seat in the other. As then the Jews worshipped, “lifting up their hands towards the mercy-seat,” (Psal. xxviii. 2,) and even the cherubim were formed with their faces looking towards it, (Exod. xxv. 19,) so the primitive Christians did in their worship look towards the altar, of which the mercy-seat was a type. And therefore the altar was usually called “the tabernacle of God’s glory,” his “chair of state,” “the throne of God,” “the type of heaven,” “heaven itself:” for these reasons did they always in praying look towards it. But in rehearsing our Creeds this custom is still more proper and significant, for we are appointed to perform it “standing;” by this posture declaring our resolution to stand by, or defend, that faith, which we have professed: so that all these times we resemble, not so much an assembly, as an army: as then in every well-marshalled army all look and move one way, so should we always do in a regular assembly; but especially at the confessions of faith all “Christ’s faithful soldiers” should show, by this uniformity of gesture, that they hold the unity of faith.

The other usage, of bowing at the name of Jesus, seems founded on that Scripture, where it is declared, that “God hath given him a name which is above every name; that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father,” (Isa. xlv. 23; Phil. ii. 9,) &c. Now though the rubric be silent herein, yet the canon of our Church thus enjoins. Now if such reverence be due to that great and ever-blessed name, when it is mentioned in the lesson or sermon, how much more in the Creeds, when we mention it with our own lips, 119making confession of our faith in it, adding the very reason given in the canon, that we believe in him as “the only Son,” or “only-begotten Son of God,” the Saviour of the world; and when too we do this “standing,” which is the proper posture for doing reverence!—Dr. Bisse.

BOWING TO THE ALTAR. A reverent custom still practised at Windsor chapel, in college chapels and cathedrals, of which the synod of 1640 said, “We heartily commend it to all good and well-affected people, that they be ready to tender to the Lord their reverence and obeisance, both at their coming in and going out of church, according to the most ancient custom of the primitive Church in the purest times.” “In the practice or omission of this rite, we desire that the rule of charity prescribed by the apostle may be observed, which is, that they which use this rite despise not those who use it not, and they who use it not, condemn not them who use it.”

BOYLE’S LECTURE. A lecture founded under the will of the Hon. Robert Boyle, in 1691, which consists of a course of eight sermons, to prove the truth of Christianity against infidels, and to answer new difficulties, &c., without entering into controversies existing among Christians.

BRANDENBURG, CONFESSION OF. A formulary, or confession of faith, drawn up in the city of Brandenburg by order of the elector, with a view to reconcile the tenets of Luther with those of Calvin, and to put an end to the disputes occasioned by the Confession of Augsburgh.

BRASSES. Monumental slabs of brass, much used in the middle ages, with effigies carved in outline upon them. An historical and descriptive account of brasses used as sepulchral memorials would occupy too much space for this work. Perhaps as much of the history as we shall be expected to give is included in the following paragraph from the “Manual of Monumental Brasses,” (Oxford, 1848,) to which we may refer for a full discussion on this subject.

“The earliest brass of which we have any record was that of Simon de Beauchamp, who died before 1208, thus mentioned by Leland, “He lyith afore the highe altare of S. Paule’s chirch in Bedeford, with this epitaphie graven in bras, and set on a flat marble stone:—

De Bello Campo jacet hic sub marmore Simon

Fundator de Neweham.”

Several others of the thirteenth century, now lost, are enumerated by Gough.”

At the present time, the earliest brass known is that of Sir John d’Abernon, 1277; one other of the same century still remains at Trumpington. From this period their numbers gradually increased until about the middle of the sixteenth century, when they became less common. The latest observed example is at St. Mary Cray, Kent, 1776. It is remarkable that the earliest brasses are quite equal, in beauty of form and execution, to any of a later date. From the early part of the fifteenth century a gradual decline of the art is visible, and towards the end of the sixteenth century it became utterly degenerate.

It seems needless to add, that the interest of brasses is derived, in a great degree, from the light which they throw on mediæval costume, and the habits of our ancestors. The destruction of brasses at the Reformation was great; at the Rebellion still greater. The mention of this spoliation by Drake, the historian of York, is worth volumes of mere particulars. “Let no man hereafter say, ‘Exegi monumentum ære perennius;’ for now an æris sacra fames has robbed us of most of the ancient monumental inscriptions that were in the church. At the Reformation this hairbrained zeal began to show itself against painted glass, stone statues, and grave-stones, many of which were defaced and utterly destroyed, along with other more valuable monuments of the church, till Queen Elizabeth put a stop to these most scandalous doings by an express act of parliament. In our late civil wars, and during the usurpation, our zealots began again these depredations on grave-stones, and stripped and pillaged to the minutest piece of metal. I know it is urged that their hatred to Popery was so great, that they could not endure to see an “orate pro animâ,” or even a cross, over a monument without defacing it; but it is plain that it was more the poor lucre of the brass, than zeal, which tempted these miscreants to this act, for there was no gravestone which had an inscription cut on itself that was defaced by anything but age throughout this whole church.”

BRAWLING. The act of quarrelling, and, in its more limited and technical sense, the act of quarrelling within consecrated precincts. If any person shall, by words only, quarrel, chide, or brawl in any church or churchyard, it shall be lawful unto the ordinary of the place, where the same offence shall be done, and proved by two lawful witnesses, to suspend every person so offending; if he be a layman, from the 120entrance of the church; and if he be a clerk, from the ministration of his office, for so long time as the said ordinary shall think meet according to the fault. (5 & 6 Edw. VI. c. 4, s. 1.)

BREVIARY. A daily office or book of Divine service in the Romish Church. So called from being a compilation in an abbreviated form, convenient for use, of the various books anciently used in the service, as antiphoners, psalters, &c. After the prayers of the liturgy, or missal, those held in the greatest veneration by Roman Catholics are the prayers contained in the church office, or canonical hours. This office is a form of prayer and instruction combined, consisting of psalms, lessons, hymns, prayers, anthems, versicles, &c., combined in an established order, separated into different hours of the day. It is divided into seven, or rather eight parts; and, like the English liturgy, it has a reference to the mystery or festival celebrated. The festival, and therefore the office, begins with vespers, i. e. with the evening prayer, about six o’clock, or sunset. This office is called, on the eves of Sundays and holidays, the first Vespers. Next follows compline, to beg God’s protection during sleep. At midnight come the three nocturns, as they are called, or matins, the longest part of the office. Lauds, or matin lauds, or the morning praises of God, are appointed for the cock-crowing, or before the break of day. At six o’clock, or sunrise, prime shall be recited; and tierce, sext, and none, every third hour afterwards. (See Canonical Hours.) These canonical hours of prayer are still regularly observed by many religious orders, but less regularly by the secular clergy, even in the choir. When the office is recited in private, though the observance of regular hours may be commendable, it is thought sufficient if the whole be gone through any time in the twenty-four hours. The church office, exclusive of the mass and occasional services, is contained in what is called the breviary. In consequence of a decree of the Council of Trent, Pope Pius V. ordered a number of learned and able men to compile the breviary; and by his bull, Quod a nobis, July, 1566, sanctioned it, and commanded the use thereof to the clergy of the Roman Catholic Church all over the world. Clement VIII., in 1602, finding that the breviary of Pius V. had been altered and depraved, restored it to its pristine state; and ordered, under pain of excommunication, that all future editions should strictly follow that which he then printed at the Vatican. Lastly, Urban VIII., in 1631, had the language of the whole work, and the metres of the hymns, revised. The value which the Church of Rome sets upon the breviary, may be known from the strictness with which she demands the perusal of it. Whoever enjoys any ecclesiastical revenue; all persons of both sexes, who have professed in any of the regular orders; all subdeacons, deacons, and priests, are bound to repeat, either in public or in private, the whole service of the day, out of the breviary. The omission of any one of the eight portions of which that service consists is declared to be a mortal sin, i. e. a sin that, unrepented, would be sufficient to exclude from salvation. The person guilty of such an omission loses all legal right to whatever portion of his clerical emoluments is due for the day or days wherein he neglected that duty, and cannot be absolved till he has given the forfeited sums to the poor. Such are the sanctions and penalties by which the reading of the breviary is enforced. The scrupulous exactness with which this duty is performed by all who have not secretly cast off their spiritual allegiance is quite surprising. The office of the Roman Catholic Church was originally so contrived, as to divide the psalter between the seven days of the week. Portions of the old Scriptures were also read alternately, with extracts from the legends of the saints, and the works of the fathers. But as the calendar became crowded with saints, whose festivals take precedence of the regular church service, little room is left for anything but a few psalms, which are constantly repeated, a very small part of the Old Testament, and mere fragments of the Gospels and Epistles.

The lessons are taken partly out of the Old and New Testaments, and partly out of the Acts of the Saints, and writings of the holy fathers. The Lord’s Prayer, the Hail Mary, or Angelical Salutation, the Apostles’ Creed, and the Confiteor, are frequently said. This last is a prayer, by which they who use it acknowledge themselves sinners, beg pardon of God, and the intercession on their behalf of the angels, of the saints, and of their brethren upon earth. No prayers are more frequently in the mouths of Roman Catholics than these four; to which we may add the doxology, repeated during the psalmody in every office, but though not uniformly at the end of every psalm, and in other places. In every canonical hour a hymn is also said, often composed by Prudentius, or some other ancient father. The Roman breviary contains 121also a small office, in honour of the Blessed Virgin, and likewise what is called the office of the dead. We there find, also, the penitential and the gradual psalms, as they are called, together with the litanies of the saints, and of the Virgin Mary of Loretto, which are the only two that have the sanction of the Church. The breviary is generally printed in four volumes, one for each season of the year.

BRIEFS (see Bulls) are pontifical letters issued from the court of Rome, sealed in red wax, with the seal of the fisherman’s ring: they are written in Roman characters, and subscribed by the secretary of briefs, who is a secretary of state, (usually either a bishop or a cardinal,) required to be well versed in the legal style of papal documents, and in the sacred canons. The word Brief, in our Prayer Book, signifies the sovereign letters patent, authorizing a collection for a charitable purpose; as they are now styled, Queen’s letters. These are directed to be read among the notices after the Nicene Creed.

BROACH. In strictness any spire, but generally used to signify a spire, the junction of which with the tower is not marked by a parapet. Lancet and Geometrical spires are generally thus treated; Decorated, frequently; Perpendicular, rarely.

BULL in Cœna Domini. This is the name given to a bull in the Church of Rome, which is publicly read on the day of the Lord’s supper, viz. Holy Thursday, by a cardinal deacon in the pope’s presence, accompanied with the other cardinals and the bishops. The same contains an excommunication of all that are called, by that apostate Church, heretics, stubborn and disobedient to the holy see. And after the reading of this bull, the pope throws a burning torch into the public place, to denote the thunder of this anathema. It is declared expressly, in the beginning of the bull of Pope Paul III., of the year 1536, that it is the ancient custom of the sovereign pontiffs to publish this excommunication on Holy Thursday, to preserve the purity of the Christian religion, and to keep the union of the faithful; but the original of this ceremony is not inserted in it. The principal heads of this bull concern heretics and their upholders, pirates, imposers of new customs, those who falsify the bulls and other apostolic letters; those who abuse the prelates of the Church; those that trouble or would restrain ecclesiastical jurisdiction, even under pretence of preventing some violence, though they might be counsellors or advocates, generals to secular princes, whether emperors, kings, or dukes; those who usurp the goods of the Church, &c. All these cases are reserved to the pope, and no priest can give absolution in such a case, if it be not at the point of death. The Council of Tours, in 1510, declared the bull in Cœna Domini void in respect of France, which has often protested against it, in what relates to the king’s prerogative, and the liberties of the Gallican Church; and there are now but few other Popish princes or states that have much regard to it. So much has the authority of the papal chair declined since the Reformation, even over those who still remain in the communion of what they call the Roman Catholic Church.

BULLS (see Briefs) are pontifical letters, in the Romish Church, written in old Gothic characters upon stout and coarse skins, and issued from the apostolic chancery, under a seal (bulla) of lead; which seal gives validity to the document, and is attached, if it be a “Bull of Grace,” by a cord of silk; and if it be a “Bull of Justice,” by a cord of hemp.

The seal of the fisherman’s ring corresponds, in some degree, with the privy seal; and the bulla, or seal of lead, with the great seal of England.

The bulla is, properly, a seal of empire. The imperial bulla is of gold; and it was under a seal of this description that King John resigned the crown of England to the Pope.

Briefs and Bulls differ from each other.

1. Briefs are issued from the Roman court by the apostolic secretary, sealed with red wax by the fisherman’s ring. Bulls are issued by the apostolic chancellor, under a seal of lead, having on one side impressed the likeness of St. Peter and St. Paul; and, on the other, the name of the reigning pope.

2. Briefs are written upon fine and white skins. Bulls, upon those which are thick, coarse, and rude.

3. Briefs are written in Roman characters, in a legible, fair, and elegant manner. Bulls, though in Latin, are written in old Gothic characters, without line or stop, or that regard to spelling which is observed in briefs.

4. Briefs are dated “a die nativitatis;” Bulls dated “a die incarnationis.”

5. Briefs have the date abbreviated; Bulls have it given in length.

6. Briefs begin in a different form, with the name of the pope: thus “Clem. Papa XII. &c.” Bulls begin with the words “[Clemens] Episcopus servus servorum Dei;” by way of distinct heading.

1227. Briefs are issued before the pope’s coronation, but Bulls are not issued till afterwards. (See on this subject, Corrad. in Praxi Dispens. lib. ii. c. 7, n. 29; Rosam de Executione Liter. Apostol. c. 2, n. 67; Cardinal de Luca. in relat. Romanæ Curiæ, discurs, 7, and other canonists.)

Notwithstanding the above-mentioned differences between Briefs and Bulls, and that greater weight is usually attached to a bull than to a brief, on account of its more formal character, still Briefs have the same authority as Bulls on all the matters to which they relate; both being equally acts of the pope, though issued from different departments of his Holiness’s government.

BURIAL. (See Cemetery, Dead.) Christians in the first centuries used to bury their dead in the places used also by the heathen, in caves or vaults by the wayside, or in fields out of their cities. The heathen used to burn the bodies of the dead, and collect the ashes in urns, but Christians thought it to be a barbarity and insult to destroy a body appointed to a glorious resurrection. They therefore restored the older and better practice of laying the remains decently in the earth. Their persecutors, knowing their feelings on this subject, often endeavoured to prevent them from burying their dead, by burning the bodies of their martyrs, as they did that of Polycarp, bishop of Smyrna; or by throwing their ashes into rivers, as they did those of the martyrs of Lyons and Vienne in France, A. D. 177. And although the heathen seemed to think it unlucky and of evil omen to perform their funerals by day, carrying out their dead after night-fall, and by torch-light; the Christians used to follow their deceased friends to the grave, in the light of the sun, with a large attendance of people walking in procession, sometimes carrying candles in token of joy and thanksgiving, and chanting psalms. It was also the custom, before they went to the grave, to assemble in the church, where the body was laid, and a funeral sermon was sometimes preached. The holy communion was administered on these occasions to the friends of the deceased, for which a service, with an appropriate Collect, Epistle, and Gospel, was set forth in our own Church in the First Book of King Edward VI., and in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, A. D. 1560. The office for the Burial of the Dead used by the English Church corresponds in all respects with the offices of the primitive Church, particularly as regards the psalms, the anthem, “Man that is born of a woman,” &c., and the portions of Scripture appointed to be read.

No person can be buried in the church, or in any part of it, without the consent of the incumbent, to whom alone the common law has given this privilege, because the soil and freehold of the church is in the parson only. But upon the like ground of freehold, the common law has one exception to the necessity of the leave of the parson, namely, where a burying-place within the church is prescribed for as belonging to a manor house. By the common law of England, any person may be buried in the churchyard of the parish where he dies, without paying anything for breaking the soil, unless a fee is payable by prescription, or immemorial usage. But ordinarily a person may not be buried in the churchyard of another parish than that wherein he died, at least without the consent of the parishioners or churchwardens, whose parochial right of burial is invaded thereby, and perhaps also of the incumbent whose soil is broken; but where a person dies on his journey or otherwise, out of the parish, or where there is a family vault or burial-place in the church, or chancel, or aisle of such other parish, it may be otherwise. Burial cannot be legally refused to dead bodies on account of debt, even although the debtor was confined in prison at the time of his death.

By canon 68. “No minister shall refuse or delay to bury any corpse that is brought to the church or churchyard, (convenient warning being given him thereof before,) in such manner and form as is prescribed in the Book of Common Prayer. And if he shall refuse so to do, except the party deceased were denounced excommunicated majori excommunicatione, for some grievous and notorious crime, (and no man able to testify of his repentance,) he shall be suspended by the bishop of the diocese from his ministry by the space of three months.” But by the rubric before the office for Burial of the Dead, the said office likewise shall not be used for any that die unbaptized, or that have laid violent hands upon themselves. The proper judges, whether persons who died by their own hands were out of their senses, are doubtless the coroner’s jury. The minister of the parish has no authority to be present at viewing the body, or to summon or examine witnesses. And therefore he is neither entitled nor able to judge in the affair; but may well acquiesce in the public determination, without making any private inquiry. Indeed, were he to make one, the opinion which he might form from 123thence could usually be grounded only on common discourse and bare assertion. It cannot be justifiable to act upon these in contradiction to the decision of a jury after hearing witnesses upon oath. Even though there may be reason to suppose that the coroner’s jury are frequently too favourable in their judgment, in consideration of the circumstances of the family of the deceased with respect to the forfeiture, and their verdict is in its own nature traversable, yet the burial may not be delayed until that matter upon trial shall finally be determined. On acquittal of the crime of self-murder by the coroner’s jury, the body in that case not being demanded by the law, it seems that the clergyman may and ought to admit that body to Christian burial.

The rubric directs that the priests and clerks meeting the corpse at the entrance of the churchyard, and going before it either into the church or towards the grave, shall say or sing as is there appointed. By which it seems to be discretionary in the minister, whether the corpse shall be carried into the church or not. And there may be good reason for not bringing it into the church, especially in cases of infection.

Canon 67. After the party’s death there shall be rung no more than one short peal, and one before the burial, and one other after the burial.

The corpse that is buried belongs to no one, but is subject to ecclesiastical cognizance, if abused or removed; and a corpse, once buried, cannot be taken up or removed without licence from the ordinary, if it is to be buried in another place, or the like; but in the case of a violent death the coroner may take up the body for his inspection, if it is interred before he comes to view it.—Dr. Burn.

With reference to the Order for the Burial of the Dead in the Book of Common Prayer, we must note that the ignorance and corruption of the latter centuries had not vitiated any of the sacred administrations more than this of burial; on which the fancies of purgatory and prayers for the dead had so great an influence, that most of the forms now extant consist of little else but impertinent and useless petitions for the dead. Our Protestant reformers therefore, remembering St. Augustine’s rule, that all this office is designed rather for the comfort of the living, than the benefit of the dead, have justly rejected these superstitions; and contrived this present form wholly for the instruction, admonition, and comfort of the attendants on this solemnity, and therein have reduced this matter to its prime intention and use. It is not easy to tell exactly what the primitive form of burial was; but the psalms were a principal part of it, as all the fathers testify. They are now also a chief part of this office, and the rest is generally taken out of Holy Scripture, being such places as are most proper to the occasion, so as to form altogether a most pious and practical office.—Dean Comber.

Although all persons are for decency to be put under ground, yet that some are not capable of Christian burial appears not only from the canons of the ancient Church, but also from the following rubric prefixed to our office at the last review: “Here it is to be noted, that the office ensuing is not to be used for any that die unbaptized, or excommunicate, or have laid violent hands upon themselves.”

The persons capable of Christian burial are only those within the pale of the Church, for the rubric excludes all others from this privilege; which is agreeable to the sense of all nations, who have generally thought fit to punish some kinds of malefactors with the want of these rites after their death, as well to afflict the criminal, while he lives, with apprehensions of the disgrace to be done to his body, which is naturally dear to all men; as to perpetuate the odium of the crime, while the corpse is exposed to public scorn after the offender hath parted with his life. Thus murderers were punished among the Romans: and among the Greeks, robbers of temples and sacrilegious persons, as also those that betrayed their country, with divers other notorious transgressors. But none have been so justly and so universally deprived of that natural right, which all men seem to have in a grave, as those who break that great law of nature, the law of self-preservation, by laying violent hands upon themselves. Among the Jews, these were forbidden to be buried, and among the ancient Romans also. And when many of the Milesian virgins made themselves away, the rest were restrained from so vile a crime by a decree, that whosoever so died, she should not be buried, but her naked body should be exposed to the common view. And, to confirm the equity of these customs, we find the Christian councils, as well abroad as at home, have forbidden the clergy to bury those that killed themselves; as doth also our present rubric in imitation of those ancient constitutions. And for very great reason, namely, to terrify all from committing so detestable and desperate a sin, as is the wilful destroying of God’s image, the casting away of their 124own souls, as well as their opportunities of repentance: the Church hereby declaring, that she hath little hopes of their salvation, who die in an act of the greatest wickedness, which they can never repent of after it be committed.

To these are to be added all that die under the sentence of excommunication, who in the primitive times were denied Christian burial also, with the intent of bringing the excommunicated to seek their absolution and the Church’s peace for their soul’s health, ere they leave this world; and, if not, of declaring them cut off from the body of Christ, and by this mark of infamy distinguishing them from obedient and regular Christians.

This office is also denied to infants not yet admitted into the Church by baptism; not so much to punish the infants, who have done no crime, as the parents, by whose neglect this too often happens. And perhaps this external and sensible kind of punishment may move them to be more careful to accomplish the office in due time, than higher and more spiritual considerations will do.

Not that the Church determines anything concerning the future state of those that depart before they are admitted to baptism; but since they have not been received within the pale of the Church, we cannot properly use an office at their funeral, which all along supposes the person that is buried to have died in her communion.

Whether this office is to be used over such as have been baptized by the dissenters or sectaries, who have no regular commission for the administering of the sacraments, has been a subject of dispute; people generally determining on one side, or the other, according to their different sentiments of the validity or invalidity of such disputed baptisms.—Wheatly.

All other persons that die in the communion of the visible Church are capable of these rites of Christian burial, according to the rules and practice both of the primitive and the present ages.—Dean Comber.

Though this rubric was not drawn up till 1661, and none of the regulations which it enjoins, excepting only what relates to persons excommunicate, was before that time specified in any of our articles, or ecclesiastical constitutions, yet it must not be considered as a new law, but merely as explanatory of the ancient canon law, and of the previous usage in England.—Shepherd.

The Order for the Burial of the Dead is much modified from the service in the First Book of King Edward VI. The psalms were the 116th, 139th, and 146th: the prayers were in many respects different; and there are certain passages omitted in the Second Book. The psalms in the First Book were omitted in the subsequent revisals, and the lesson was recited after the anthem, “I heard a voice from heaven:” and the present psalms were not inserted till the last Review.

At solemn funerals it has not been unusual to combine the Burial Service with the office of Evening Prayer, substituting the psalms and lessons for those of the day; but the regularity of this usage is questionable.—Jebb.

BUTTRESS. An external support to a wall, so arranged as to counteract the lateral thrust of roofs and vaulting.

The buttress is not used in Classic architecture, where the thrust is always vertical; and in Romanesque it is hardly developed. It is, in fact, a correlative of the pointed arch, especially when used in vaulting, and so first attains considerable depth in the Lancet period. In the Tudor period, when it had to support fan vaulting of vast expanse and weight, its depth or projection was proportionably increased.

The flying buttress, arch-buttress, or cross-springer, is an arch delivering the weight to be supported at a distance, as of a spire at the angle of the tower, of a clerestory at the aisle buttress, or of the chapter-house roof at Lincoln, to the heavy masses of masonry prepared at a distance to receive it.

The pinnacles which frequently terminate buttresses are intended to add to the weight of the supporting mass. (See Bay.)

CABBALA. (Hebrew.) Tradition. Among the Jews, it principally means the mystical interpretations of their Scriptures, handed down by tradition. The manner in which Maimonides explains the Cabbala, or Traditions of the Jews, is as follows: “God not only delivered the law to Moses on Mount Sina, but the explanation of it likewise. When Moses came down from the mount, and entered into his tent, Aaron went to visit him, and Moses acquainted Aaron with the laws he had received from God, together with the explanation of them. After this, Aaron placed himself at the right hand of Moses, and Eleazar and Ithamar, the sons of Aaron, were admitted; to whom Moses repeated what he had just before told to Aaron. These being seated, the one on the right, the other on the left hand of Moses, the seventy elders of Israel, who 125composed the Sanhedrim, came in. Moses again declared the same laws to them, with the interpretations of them, as he had done before to Aaron and his sons. Lastly, all who pleased of the common people were invited to enter, and Moses instructed them likewise in the same manner as the rest. So that Aaron heard four times what Moses had been taught by God upon Mount Sina; Eleazar and Ithamar three times; the seventy elders twice; and the people once. Moses afterwards reduced the laws, which he had received, into writing, but not the explanations of them; these he thought it sufficient to trust to the memories of the above-mentioned persons, who, being perfectly instructed in them, delivered them to their children, and these again to theirs, from age to age.”

The Cabbala, therefore, is properly the Oral Law of the Jews, delivered down, by word of mouth, from father to son; and it is to these interpretations of the written law our Saviour’s censure is to be applied, when he reproves the Jews for “making the commands of God of none effect through their traditions.”

Some of the Rabbins pretend that the origin of the Cabbala is to be referred to the angels; that the angel Raziel instructed Adam in it; the angel Japhiel, Shem; the angel Zedekiel, Abraham, &c. But the truth is, these explications of the Law are only the several interpretations and decisions of the Rabbins on the Law of Moses; in the framing of which they studied principally the combinations of particular words, letters, and numbers, and by that means pretended to discover clearly the true sense of the difficult passages of Scripture.

This is properly called the Artificial Cabbala, to distinguish it from simple tradition: and it is of three sorts. The first, called Gematria, consists in taking letters as figures, and explaining words by the arithmetical value of the letters of which they are composed. For instance, the Hebrew letters of Jabo-Schiloh (Shiloh shall come) make up the same arithmetical number as Messiach (the Messiah): from whence they conclude that Shiloh signifies the Messiah.

The second kind of Artificial Cabbala, which is called Notaricon, consists in taking each particular letter of a word for an entire diction. For example, of Rereschith, which is the first word of Genesis, composed of the letters B. R. A. S. C. H. J. T., they make Bura-Rakia-Arex-Schamaim-Jain-Tehomoth, i. e. he created the firmament, the earth, the heavens, the sea, and the deep. Or in forming one entire diction out of the initial letters of many: thus, in Atah-Gibbor-Leholam-Adonai, (Thou art strong for ever, O Lord,) they put the initial letters of this sentence together, and form the word Agla, which signifies either, I will reveal, or, a drop of dew, and is the Cabbalistic name of God.

The third kind, called Themura, consists in changing and transposing the letters of a word: thus of the word Bereschith (the first of the book of Genesis) they make A-betisri, the first of the month Tisri, and infer from thence that the world was created on the first day of the month Tisri, which answers very nearly to our September.

The Cabbala, according to the Jews, is a noble and sublime science, conducting men by an easy method to the profoundest truths. Without it, the Holy Scriptures could not be distinguished from profane books, wherein we find some miraculous events, and as pure morality as that of the law, if we did not penetrate into the truths locked up under the external cover of the literal sense. As men were grossly deceived, when, dwelling upon the sensible object, they mistook angels for men; so also they fall into error or ignorance when they insist upon the surface of letters or words, which change with custom, and ascend not up to the ideas of God himself, which are infinitely more noble and spiritual.

Certain visionaries among the Jews believe that our blessed Lord wrought his miracles by virtue of the mysteries of the Cabbala. Some learned men are of opinion, that Pythagoras and Plato learned the Cabbalistic art of the Jews in Egypt; others, on the contrary, say the philosophy of Pythagoras and Plato furnished the Jews with the Cabbala. Most of the heretics, in the primitive Christian Church, fell into the vain conceits of the Cabbala; particularly the Gnostics, Valentinians, and Basilidians.—Broughton.

CABBALISTS. Those Jewish doctors who profess the study of the Cabbala. In the opinion of these men, there is not a word, letter, or accent in the law, without some mystery in it. The first Cabbalistical author that we know of is Simon, the son of Joachai, who is said to have lived a little before the destruction of Jerusalem by Titus. His book, entitled Zohar, is extant; but it is agreed that many additions have been made to it. The first part of this work is entitled Zeniutha, or Mystery; the second Idra Rabba, or the Great Synod; 126the third, Idra Latta, or the Little Synod, which is the author’s last adieu to his disciples.—Broughton.

CAINITES, or CANIANS. Christian heretics, a sect of the Gnostics of the second century: they were called according to Cain’s name, who, they say, was formed by a celestial and almighty power, and that Abel was made by a weak one: they held that the way to be saved was to make trial of all manner of things, and to satisfy their lusts with all wicked actions: they fancied a great number of angels, to which they gave barbarous names, attributing to each of them a particular sin; so that when they were about any wicked action, they invoked the angel whom they fancied to preside over it. They composed a book called St. Paul’s Ascension to Heaven, which they filled with blasphemies and execrable impieties, as if they were the secret words which that apostle heard in his ecstasy: they had a particular veneration for Cain, Corah, Dathan, and Abiram, the Sodomites, and especially for Judas, on whose Gospel they relied, because his treachery occasioned the death of Christ; and they made use of a Gospel that bore that false disciple’s name.

CALENDAR. The word calendar is derived from calendæ, the first day of the Roman month. Our calendar in the Prayer Book consists of several columns. The first shows the days of the month in their numerical order; the second contains the letters of the alphabet affixed to the days of the week; the third, as printed in the larger Common Prayer Books, (and as it ought to be in all,) has the calends, nones, and ides, which was the method of computation used by the old Romans and primitive Christians, and is still useful to those who read ecclesiastical history.

The last four columns contain the course of lessons for morning and evening prayer for ordinary days throughout the year. The intermediate column, namely, the fourth, contains, together with the holy days observed by the Church of England, such Popish holy days as it was thought best to retain. The reasons why the names of these saints’ days and holy days were resumed into the calendar are various. Some of them being retained upon account of our courts of justice, which usually made their returns on these days, or else upon the days before or after them, which were called in the writs, Vigil., Fest., or Crast., as in Vigil. Martin, Fest. Martin, Crast. Martin, and the like. Others are probably kept in the calendar for the sake of such tradesmen, handicraftsmen, and others, as are wont to celebrate the memory of their tutelar saints: as the “Welshmen do of St. David, the shoemakers of St. Crispin, &c. And again, churches being in several places dedicated to some or other of these saints, it has been the usual custom in such places to have wakes or fairs kept upon those days; so that the people would probably be displeased, if, either in this, or the former case, their favourite saint’s name should be left out of the calendar. Besides, the histories which were writ before the Reformation do frequently speak of transactions happening upon such a holy day, or about such a time, without mentioning the month, relating one thing to be done at Lammas-tide, and another about Martinmas, &c.; so that were these names quite left out of the calendar, we might be at a loss to know when several of these transactions happened. For this and the foregoing reasons our second reformers under Queen Elizabeth (though all those days had been omitted in both books of King Edward VI., excepting St. George’s day, Lammas day, St. Laurence, and St. Clement, which two last were in his Second Book) thought convenient to restore the names of them to the calendar, though not with any regard of being kept holy by the Church. For this they thought prudent to forbid, as well upon the account of the great inconveniency brought into the Church in the times of Popery, by the observation of such a number of holy days, to the great prejudice of labouring and trading men, as by reason that many of those saints they then commemorated were oftentimes men of none of the best characters. Besides, the history of these saints, and the accounts they gave of the other holy days, were frequently found to be feigned and fabulous. An effort to reform the calendar was made in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, but was never carried into effect. By the acts 24 Geo. ii. c. 23, and 25 Geo. ii. c. 30, the calendar was reformed, and the new style introduced: in consequence of which the calendar (only so far as its astronomical errors were concerned) has attained to that form in which it is now prefixed to the Prayer Book. See Stephens’s Book of Common Prayer, with notes, where both the ancient and modern calendar are given at length.—Wheatly.

CALL TO THE MINISTRY. There are two sorts of motions or calls to the ministry. First, the outward; whereby those who have a right of recommending a person to the execution of any ecclesiastical office, do fix upon him as one in their 127judgment qualified for it; and the bishop, approving their judgment, does admit him into such office in due manner, as the laws of God and the rites of the Church do require. But the inward call is something preceding this, and is required by our Church as a qualification for the latter. Now it has been some matter of doubt what is meant here by being “inwardly moved by the Holy Ghost.” But I think no one can judge, that the compilers of this office did ever entertain such enthusiastical notions, as to imagine that no persons were to be admitted into any degree of the ecclesiastical orders, without having a special revelation from the Holy Spirit, that God had particularly commissioned them to take upon them that office, as St. Paul says of himself, that he was “an apostle called of God.” (Rom. i. 1; 1 Cor. i. 1.) For such calls as these were miraculous and extraordinary, and remained not much longer than the apostolical times. It remains, therefore, that this motion or call must be something in a more ordinary and common way.

Now we know that the Scripture teaches, that the common and ordinary graces, and all good dispositions and resolutions, are attributed to the Holy Spirit of God. “Every good and perfect gift cometh from above.” (Jam. i. 17.) “It is God that worketh in you, both to will and to do, of his good pleasure.” (Phil. ii. 13.) The apostle calls the ordinary graces of love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, meekness, temperance, “the fruits of the Spirit.” (Gal. v. 22, 23.) Thus the belief of the gospel is called “the spirit of faith.” (2 Cor. iv. 13.) And it is said expressly, that “no one saith that Jesus is the Lord, but by the Holy Ghost.” (1 Cor. xii. 3.) Now, I conceive, all that is here meant by “inward motion of the Holy Ghost,” is his ordinary motion, by which Christians are stirred up to every good resolution which they make, or good action which they do. And whereas a resolution to take upon one the office of the ministry, without any bad design mixing with it, is a good resolution, so he that takes it up may be properly said to be moved by the Holy Ghost to do it. For it must be undoubtedly owned, that such a resolution is a good and pious one, since the apostle says plainly, laying it down as an undoubted truth, “This is a true saying, if a man desireth the office of a bishop, he desireth a good work.” (1 Tim. iii. 1.) And, to be sure, in those times it seldom happened, that this or any other ecclesiastical office was desired, but only from a pure view of doing good. For these were exposed the foremost to the rage of the persecutors, and men must be actuated by a noble zeal for the gospel, to lay themselves under the necessity of being exposed to the most grievous sufferings, or laying down their lives for the sake of it. And in these times, likewise, men may, and frequently, I doubt not, do, take upon them the ecclesiastical employs upon very good aims. Therefore the meaning of this question is, whether, after an impartial examination of their hearts, they find that they do not take this sacred employ upon them, barely for a maintenance in the world, or that thereby they may acquire those superior dignities and profits, which in these peaceable ages of Christianity some of the clergy do partake of; but only that they think they may be serviceable in God’s vineyard, and are willing to contribute the best of their labours therein, “for the promoting of God’s glory and the edifying of his people.” I do not think the question intends, that all who are to be ordained should profess that they would be desirous of this office, though there were no temporal advantages attending it, and though it exposed men not only to starving, but to apparent persecution and death; for then most, even the best persons, as times go now, might justly scruple the answering to such a question: but I take it to mean no more than that, since they are to take upon them some employ or other for their own subsistence and the benefit of the community, they choose to take upon them the office of the ministry, wherein they think they can act more for God’s glory and the benefit of their Christian brethren, than by exercising any temporal calling; and that they verily believe, that it was not without the assistance of God’s good Spirit that they formed this judgment and resolution.—Dr. Nicholls.

The candidate for deacon’s orders has the question of the inward call put to him thus: Do you trust that you are inwardly moved by the Holy Ghost, to take upon you this office and ministration to serve God, in promoting his glory, and the edifying of his people?

This is a great question indeed, and that which no man can give a true and positive answer to, without having searched narrowly into his own heart, and seriously considered the bent and inclinations of his soul. But it is a question very necessary to be propounded, for the Holy Ghost now supplies the place and room of our blessed Saviour in his Church militant here on earth. And therefore, as it was 128by him that the several offices themselves were at first constituted, so it is by him that men are called to the execution of them; and it is by him alone that all ecclesiastical ministrations, performed by such officers, are made effectual to the purposes for which they are appointed; and therefore the Church is bound to take care that none be admitted into her ministry but such as she believes and hopes to be called to it by the Holy Ghost. But she can have no ground to believe this, but only from the persons themselves, none but themselves being acquainted with the motions of God’s Spirit upon their own hearts. And therefore the bishop requires them to deal plainly and faithfully with him and the Church, and to tell him whether they really trust that they are moved by the Holy Ghost to take this office upon them? To which every one is bound to answer, “I trust so:” not that he knows it, or is certain of it, for it is possible that his heart may deceive him in it, but that he trusts or hopes it is so.

But what ground can any one have to trust that he is moved by the Holy Ghost to take the ministry upon him? To that I answer in short, that if a man finds that, upon due examination, the bishop of the diocese, where he is to serve, is satisfied of his abilities and qualifications for the ministry; and that his great end and design in undertaking it is to serve God, for the promoting of his glory and the edifying of his people; he hath good grounds to trust, that he is moved to it by the Holy Ghost, it being only by him that any man can be duly qualified for it, and moved to take it upon him, out of so good and pious a design as that is. But if either of these things be wanting; as, if a man be not fitted for the office, he may conclude he is not called to it by the Holy Ghost, for he neither calls nor useth any but fit instruments in what he doth; or, if a man be moved to it out of a design, not to do good, but to get applause or preferment in the world, he may thence infer that he is not moved to it by the Spirit of God, but by the spirit of pride and covetousness, and then can have no ground to expect that the Holy Ghost should ever bless and assist him in the execution of his office. According to these rules, therefore, they who are to be ordained may discern whether they can truly give the answer required to this great question that will be propounded to them. As for their qualifications for it, the bishop hath already approved of them; but as to their main end and design in undertaking the ministry, that must be left to God and their own consciences, who alone know it, and so can best judge whether they can truly say that they “trust they are moved to it by the Holy Ghost.”—Bp. Beveridge.

The following is Calvin’s definition of the inward call in his book of Institutes, which being published about ten years before the Ordinal of Edward the Sixth, might probably be a guide to our Reformers in framing this question: “That it is the good testimony of our own heart, that we have taken this office, neither for ambition, covetousness, nor any evil design, but out of a true fear of God, and a desire to edify the Church.” Now this we may know by duly considering, whether it were the external honours and revenues that are annexed to this profession, or any other worldly end, that first or chiefly did incline us to the ministry. If so, we were moved by carnal objects, and led on by our own corrupt will and affections. But if our principal motives were spiritual, that is, a zeal for God’s glory, and a desire to promote the salvation of souls, then we were “moved by the Spirit, and inwardly called by God.” I grant we cannot but know there are honours and rewards piously and justly annexed to this holy function; and, as men, we cannot but hope for a competency of them; yea, this may be a subordinate motive. But I may say of the priesthood, as Christ of the kingdom of heaven, it must be sought in the first place for itself, and the other only as additional consequences thereof. (Matt. vi. 33.) We must love the duties of this calling; reading, study, praying, preaching, &c., more than the rewards. Yea, if persecution should ever strip the Church of these provisions, as it hath often done, we must not cast off our holy ministrations. (1 Cor. ix. 16.)

This inward call thus explained is the first and one of the principal qualifications for him that is to be employed about heavenly things. And therefore it is inserted, not only into ours, but other reformed offices for ordination; where it is inquired, “if they believe that God by the Church calls them to this ministry, and if they did not seek for worldly riches or glory,” as in the liturgy of the Belgic Church. Our candidates know this question will be asked: wherefore let them examine their hearts strictly, and answer it in the sincerity of their souls; not doubting but that good Spirit, who excited them to this work, will assist and bless all their performances.—Dean Comber.

We may here observe, that the first question put to those who are to be ordained 129priests, concerning their being moved by the Holy Ghost to take that office upon them, is now omitted. For, these having been ordained deacons before, it is supposed that they were then moved by the Spirit of Christ to take the ministry of his gospel upon them, and there is no need of any further call from him. For being once called by him, though it was but to the lowest office of his own institution, the Church takes it for granted that it is his pleasure they should be promoted to any higher office, if there be sufficient reason and occasion for it.—Bp. Beveridge.

CALOYERS. A general name given to the monks of the Greek Church. It is taken from the Greek καλεγόροι, which signifies “good old men.”—Hist. des Ord. Relig. P. i. cap. 19. These religious consider St. Basil as their father and founder, and look upon it as a crime to follow any other rule than his. There are three degrees among them; the novices, who are called Archari; the ordinary professed, called Microchemi; and the more perfect, called Megalochemi. They are likewise divided into Cœnobites, Anchorets, and Recluse.

The Cœnobites are employed in reciting their office from midnight to sunset; and as it is impossible, in so long an exercise, they should not be overtaken with sleep, there is one monk appointed to wake them; and they are obliged to make three genuflexions at the door of the choir, and, returning, to bow to the right and left to their brethren. The Anchorets retire from the conversation of the world, and live in hermitages in the neighbourhood of the monasteries. They cultivate a little spot of ground, and never go out but on Sundays and holidays, to perform their devotions at the next monastery; the rest of the week they employ in prayer and working with their hands. As for the Recluse, they shut themselves up in grottos and caverns on the tops of mountains, which they never go out of, abandoning themselves entirely to Providence. They live on the alms sent them by the neighbouring monasteries.

In the monasteries, the religious rise at midnight, and repeat a particular office, called from thence Mesonycticon; which takes up the space of two hours: after which, they retire to their cells till five o’clock in the morning, when they return to the church to say matins. At nine o’clock they repeat the Terce, Sexte, and Mass; after which they repair to the refectory, where is a lecture read till dinner. Before they leave the refectory, the cook comes to the door, and, kneeling down, demands their blessing. At four o’clock in the afternoon, they say vespers; and at six go to supper. After supper, they say an office, from thence called Apodipho; and at eight, each monk retires to his chamber and bed till midnight. Every day, after matins, they confess their faults on their knees to their superior.

They have four Lents. The first and greatest is that of the Resurrection of our Lord. They call it the Grand Quarantain, and it lasts eight weeks. During this Lent, the religious drink no wine, and their abstinence is so great, that if they are obliged, in speaking, to name milk, butter, or cheese, they always add this parenthesis, Timitis agias saracostis, i. e. “Saving the respect due to holy Lent.” The second Lent is that of the holy Apostles, which begins eight days after Whit-Sunday: its duration is not fixed, it continuing sometimes three weeks, and at other times longer. During this Lent, they are allowed to drink wine. The third Lent is that of the Assumption of our Lady: it lasts fourteen days; during which they abstain from fish, excepting on Sundays, and the day of the Transfiguration of our Lord. The fourth Lent is that of Advent, which they observe after the same manner as that of the Apostles.

The Caloyers, besides the usual habit of the monastic life, wear over their shoulders a square piece of stuff, on which are represented the cross, and the other marks of the passion of our Saviour, with these letters, JC. XC. VC., i. e. Jesus Christus Vincit.

All the monks are obliged to labour for the benefit of their monastery, as long as they continue in it. Some have the care of the fruits, others of the grain, and others of the cattle. The necessity the Caloyers are under of cultivating their own lands, obliges them to admit a great number of lay-brothers, who are employed the whole day in working.

Over all these Caloyers there are visitors or exarchs, who visit the convents under their inspection, only to draw from them the sums which the patriarch demands of them. Yet, notwithstanding the taxes these religious are obliged to pay, both to their patriarch and to the Turks, their convents are very rich.

The most considerable monastery of the Greek Caloyers in Asia, is that of Mount Sinai, which was founded by the emperor Justinian, and endowed with sixty thousand crowns revenue. The abbot of this monastery, who is also an 130archbishop, has under him two hundred religious. This convent is a large square building, surrounded with walls fifty feet high, and with but one gate, which is blocked up to prevent the entrance of the Arabs. On the eastern side there is a window, through which those within draw up the pilgrims in a basket, which they let down by a pulley. Not many miles beyond this, they have another, dedicated to St. Catharine. It is situated in the place where Moses made the bitter waters sweet. It has a garden, with a plantation of more than ten thousand palm-trees, from whence the monks draw a considerable revenue. There is another in Palestine, four or five leagues from Jerusalem, situated in the most barren place imaginable. The gate of the convent is covered with the skins of crocodiles, to prevent the Arabs setting fire to it, or breaking it to pieces with stones. It has a large tower, in which there is always a monk, who gives notice by a bell of the approach of the Arabs, or any wild beasts.

The Caloyers, or Greek monks, have a great number of monasteries in Europe; among which that of Penteli, a mountain of Attica, near Athens, is remarkable for its beautiful situation, and a very good library. That of Calimachus, a principal town of the island of Chios, is remarkable for the occasion of its foundation. It is called Niamogni, i. e. “The sole Virgin,” its church having been built in memory of an image of the holy Virgin, miraculously found on a tree, being the only one left of several which had been consumed by fire. Constantin Monomachus, emperor of Constantinople, being informed of this miracle, made a vow to build a church in that place, if he recovered his throne, from which he had been driven; this vow he executed in the year 1050. The convent is large, and built in the manner of a castle. It consists of about two hundred religious, and its revenues amount to sixty thousand piasters, of which they pay five hundred yearly to the Grand Seignor.

There is in Amourgo, one of the islands of the Archipelago called Sporades, a monastery of Greek Caloyers, dedicated to our Lady: it is a large and deep cavern, on the top of a very high hill, and is entered by a ladder of fifteen or twenty steps. The church, refectory, and cells of the religious, who inhabit this grotto, are dug out of the sides of the rock with admirable artifice.

But the most celebrated monasteries of Greek Caloyers are those of Mount Athos in Macedonia. They are twenty-three in number; and the religious live in them so regularly, that the Turks themselves have a great esteem for them, and often recommend themselves to their prayers. Everything in them is magnificent; and, notwithstanding they have been under the Turk for so long a time, they have lost nothing of their grandeur. The principal of these monasteries are De la Panagia and Anna Laura. The religious, who aspire to the highest dignities, come from all parts of the East to perform here their noviciate, and, after a stay of some years, are received, upon their return into their own country, as apostles.

The Caloyers of Mount Athos have a great aversion to the pope, and relate that a Roman pontiff, having visited their monasteries, had plundered and burned some of them, because they would not adore him.

There are female Caloyers, or Greek nuns, who likewise follow the rule of St. Basil. Their nunneries are always dependent on some monastery. The Turks buy sashes of their working, and they open their gates freely to the Turks on this occasion. Those of Constantinople are widows, some of whom have had several husbands. They make no vow, nor confine themselves within their convents. The priests are forbidden, under severe penalties, to visit these religious.—Broughton.

CALVINISTS. Those who interpret Scripture in accordance with the views of John Calvin, who was born at Noyon, A. D. 1509, and afterwards settled at Geneva, and who established a system both of doctrine and of discipline peculiarly his own.

The essential doctrines of Calvinism have been reduced to these five: particular election, particular redemption, moral inability in a fallen state, irresistible grace, and the final perseverance of the saints. These are termed, by theologians, the five points; and ever since the synod of Dort, (see Dort,) when they were the subjects of discussion between the Calvinists and Arminians, and whose decrees are the standard of modern Calvinism, frequent have been the controversies agitated respecting them. Even the Calvinists themselves differ in the explication of them: it cannot therefore be expected that a very specific account of them should be given here. Generally speaking, however, they comprehend the following propositions:—

1st, That God has chosen a certain number in Christ to everlasting glory, before the foundation of the world, according to his immutable purpose, and of his free 131grace and love, without the least foresight of faith, good works, or any conditions performed by the creature; and that the rest of mankind he was pleased to pass by, and ordain them to dishonour and wrath for their sins, to the praise of his vindictive justice.

2ndly, That Jesus Christ, by his sufferings and death, made an atonement only for the sins of the elect.

3dly, That mankind are totally depraved in consequence of the fall; and, by virtue of Adam’s being their public head, the guilt of his sin was imputed, and a corrupt nature conveyed to all his posterity, from which proceeds all actual transgression; and that by sin we are made subject to death, and all miseries, temporal, spiritual, and eternal.

4thly, That all whom God has predestinated to life, he is pleased, in his appointed time, effectually to call, by his word and Spirit, out of that state of sin and death, in which they are by nature, to grace and salvation by Jesus Christ.

And 5thly, That those whom God has effectually called and sanctified by his Spirit, shall never finally fall from a state of grace.

CAMALDOLI. A religious order of Christians founded by St. Romuald, about the end of the tenth century: this man gave his monks the rule of St. Bennet’s order, with some particular constitutions, and a white habit, after a vision he had of several persons clothed so, who were going up on a ladder to heaven. He was of a noble family of Ravenna, and having found on the Apennine hills near Arezzo a frightful solitary place, called Campo Maldoli, he began to build a monastery there, about the year 1009, and this monastery gave its name to all the order. The congregation of hermits of St. Romuald, or of Mount Couronne, is a branch of the Camaldoli, to which it was joined in 1532. Paul Justinian, of Venice, began its establishment in 1520, and founded the chief monastery in the Apennine, in a place called the Mount of the Crown, ten miles from Perugia, and dedicated to our Saviour in 1555.—Hist. des Ord. Relig.

CAMERONIANS. A party of Presbyterians in Scotland, so called from Archibald Cameron, a field preacher, who was the first who separated from communion with the other Presbyterians, who were not of his opinion concerning the ministers that had accepted of his indulgence from King Charles II. He considered the acceptance of the indulgence to be a countenancing of the supremacy in ecclesiastical affairs. The other Presbyterians wished the controversy to drop, till it could be determined by a general assembly; but the Cameronians, through a transport of zeal, separated from them, and some who associated with them ran into excess of frenzy; declaring that King Charles II. had forfeited his right to the crown and society of the Church, by his breaking the solemn league and covenant, which was the terms on which he received the former; and by his vicious life, which, de jure, they said, excluded him from the latter; they pretended both to dethrone and excommunicate him, and for that purpose made an insurrection, but were soon suppressed. Since the accession of King William III. to the crown, they complied with and zealously served the government; and as regards their former differences in Church matters, they were also laid aside, the preachers of their party having submitted to the General Assembly of the Scottish establishment in 1690, of which they still continue members.

CAMISARDS. The popular name of the Protestants who rose in the Cevennes against the oppression of Louis XIV. of France. There are various etymologies of the word; the most probable is that which derives it from camisa or chemise, in allusion to the blouse or smock-frock which was generally worn.

CANCELLI. (See Chancel.)

CANDLES. (See Lights on the Altar.)

CANDLEMAS DAY. A name formerly given to the festival of the Purification of the Virgin Mary, observed in our Church, February 2. In the mediæval Church, this day was remarkable for the number of lighted candles which were borne about in processions, and placed in churches, in memory of him who, in the words of Simeon’s song at the Purification, came to be “a light to lighten the Gentiles, and the glory of his people Israel.” From this custom the name is supposed to be derived.

CANON. The laws of the Church are called canons, the word canon being derived from a Greek word, which signifies a rule or measure.

Since the Church is a society of Christians, and since every society must have authority to prescribe rules and laws for the government of its own members, it must necessarily follow that the Church has this power; for otherwise there would be great disorder amongst Christians. This power was exercised in the Church before the Roman empire became Christian, as appears by those ancient canons which were made before that time, and which are 132mentioned in the writings of the primitive fathers; by the apostolical canons, which, though not made by the apostles themselves, are nevertheless of great antiquity; and by various canons which were made in councils held in the second century, which were not directory alone, but binding, and to be observed by the clergy, under the penalty of deprivation; and by the laity, under pain of excommunication. Under this title we will mention: 1. Foreign canons. 2. Such as have been received here. 3. The power of making new canons.

(I.) As to the first, Constantine the Great, the first emperor who gave Christians some respite from persecution, caused general councils and national and provincial synods to be assembled in his dominions; where, amongst other things, rules were made for the government of the Church, which were called canons; the substance of which was at first collected out of the Scriptures, or the ancient writings of the fathers. We will not trouble the reader with a long history of provincial constitutions, synodals, glossaries, sentences of popes, summaries, and rescripts, from which the canon law has, by degrees, been compiled, since the days of that emperor; it is sufficient to state, that they were collected by Ivo, bishop of Chartres, about the 14th year of our King Henry I., in three volumes, which are commonly called the Decrees. These decrees, corrected by Gratian, a Benedictine monk, were published in England in the reign of King Stephen; and the reason of the publication at that time might be to decide the quarrel between Theobald, archbishop of Canterbury, and Henry, bishop of Winchester, the king’s brother, who being made a legate, the archbishop looked upon it as a diminution of his power, and an encroachment upon that privilege which he had as legatus natus. (See Legate.) These decrees were received by the clergy of the Western Church, but never by those of the East, which is one reason why their priests continued to marry, which the clergy of the West were, by these decrees, forbidden to do.

The next, in order of time, were the Decretals (see Decretals,) which are canonical epistles written by popes alone, or assisted by some cardinals, to determine any controversy; and of these there are likewise three volumes. The first volume of these Decretals was compiled by Raimundus Barcinus, who was chaplain to Gregory IX., and were published by him about the 14th year of King Henry III., A. D. 1226. This was appointed to be read in all schools, and was to be taken for law in all ecclesiastical courts. About sixty years afterwards, Simon, a monk of Walden, began to read these laws in the university of Cambridge, and the next year in Oxford. The second volume was collected and arranged by Boniface VIII., and published about the 27th year of our King Edward I., A. D. 1298. The third volume was collected by Clement V., and published in the Council of Vienna, and likewise here, in the 2nd year of Edward II., A. D. 1308, and from him were called Clementines.

These decretals were never received in England, or anywhere else, but only in the pope’s dominions, which are therefore called by canonists Patriæ obedientiæ, as particularly the canon concerning the investiture of bishops by a lay hand. John Andreas, a celebrated canonist in the fourteenth century, wrote a commentary on these decretals, which he entitled Novellæ, from a very beautiful daughter he had of that name, whom he bred a scholar: the father being a professor of law at Bologna, had instructed his daughter so well in it, that she assisted him in reading lectures to his scholars, and, therefore, to perpetuate her memory, he gave that book the title of Novellæ.

About the tenth year of King Edward II., John XXII. published his Extravagants. But as to the Church of England, even at that time, when the papal authority was at the highest, none of these foreign canons, or any new canons, made at any national or provincial synod here, had any manner of force if they were against the prerogative of the king, or the laws of the land. It is true that every Christian nation in communion with the pope sent some bishops, abbots, or priors, to those foreign councils, and generally four were sent out of England; and it was by those means, together with the allowance of the civil power, that some canons made there were received here, but such as were against the laws were totally rejected.

Nevertheless, some of these foreign canons were received in England, and obtained the force of laws by the general approbation of the king and people (though it may be difficult to know what these canons are); and it was upon this pretence that the pope claimed an ecclesiastical jurisdiction, independent of the king, and sent his legates to England with commissions to determine causes according to those canons, which were now compiled into several volumes, and called Jus Canonicum: these were not only enjoined to 133be obeyed as laws, but publicly to be read and expounded in all schools and universities as the civil law was read and expounded there, under pain of excommunication to those who neglected. Hence arose quarrels between kings and several archbishops and other prelates, who adhered to those papal usurpations.

(II.) Besides these foreign canons, there were several laws and constitutions made here for the government of the Church, all of which are now in force, but which had not been so without the assent and confirmation of the kings of England. Even from William I. to the time of the Reformation, no canons or constitutions made in any synods were suffered to be executed if they had not the royal assent. This was the common usage and practice in England, even when the papal usurpation was most exalted; for if at any time the ecclesiastical courts did, by their sentences, endeavour to force obedience to such canons, the courts at common law, upon complaint made, would grant prohibitions. So that the statute of submission, which was afterwards made in the 25th year of Henry VIII., seems to be declarative of the common law, that the clergy could not de jure, and by their own authority, without the king’s assent, enact or execute any canons. These canons were all collected and explained by Lyndwood, dean of the Arches, in the reign of Henry VI., and by him reduced under this method.

1. The canons of Stephen Langton, archbishop of Canterbury, made at a council held at Oxford, in the 6th year of Henry III.

2. The canons of Otho, the pope’s legate, who held a council in St. Paul’s church, in the 25th year of Henry III., which from him were called the Constitutions of Otho; upon which John de Athon, one of the canons of Lincoln, wrote a comment.

3. The canons of Boniface, of Savoy, archbishop of Canterbury, in the 45th of Henry III., which were all usurpations upon the common law, as concerning the boundaries of parishes, the right of patronage, and against trials of the right of tithes in the king’s courts against writs of prohibition, &c. Although he threatened the judges with excommunication (some of the judges being at that time clergymen) if they disobeyed the canons, yet they proceeded in these matters according to the laws of the realm, and kept the ecclesiastical courts within their proper jurisdiction. This occasioned a variance between the spiritual and temporal lords; and upon this the clergy, in the 31st of Henry III., exhibited several articles of their grievances to the parliament, which they called Articuli Cleri: the articles themselves are lost, but some of the answers to them are extant, by which it appears that none of these canons made by Boniface was confirmed.

4. The canons of Cardinal Ottobon, the pope’s legate, who held a synod at St. Paul’s, in the 53rd of Henry III., in which he confirmed those canons made by his predecessor Otho, and published some new ones; and by his legantine authority commanded that they should be obeyed: upon these canons, likewise, John de Athon wrote another comment.

5. The canons of Archbishop Peckham, made at a synod held at Reading, in the year 1279, the 7th of Edward I.

6. The canons of the same archbishop, made at a synod held at Lambeth, two years afterwards.

7. The canons of Archbishop Winchelsea, made in the 34th of Edward I.

8. The canons of Archbishop Reynolds, at a synod held at Oxford, in the year 1322, the 16th of Edward II.

9. The canons of Symon Mepham, archbishop of Canterbury, made in the year 1328, the 3rd of Edward III.

10. Of Archbishop Stratford.

11. Of Archbishop Simon Islip, made 1362, the 37th of Edward III.

12. Of Symon Sudbury, archbishop of Canterbury, made in the year 1378, the 2nd of Richard II.

13. Of Archbishop Arundel, made at a synod at Oxford, in the year 1403, the 10th of Henry IV.

14. Of Archbishop Chichely, in the year 1415, the 3rd of Henry V.

15. Of Edmond and Richard, archbishops of Canterbury, who immediately succeeded Stephen Langton.

It was intended to reform these canons soon after the Reformation; and Archbishop Cranmer and some other commissioners were appointed for that purpose by Henry VIII. and Edward VI. The work was finished, but the king dying before it was confirmed, it remains unconfirmed to this day. The book is called “Reformatio Legum Ecclesiasticarum ex Authoritate Regis Henry VIII. inchoata et per Edward VI. prorecta:” it was put into elegant Latin by Dr. Haddon, who was then university orator of Cambridge, assisted by Sir John Cheke, who was tutor to Edward VI. The above canons made by our Church before the Reformation, are, of course, binding on our Church now, and are acted upon 134in the ecclesiastical courts, except where they are superseded by subsequent canons, or by the provisions of an act of parliament.

(III.) The next thing to be considered is, the authority of making canons at this day; and this is grounded upon the statute 25 Henry VIII., commonly called the act of submission of the clergy, by which they acknowledge that the convocation had been always assembled by the king’s writ; and they promised in verbo sacerdotis, not to attempt, claim, or put in use, or enact, promulge, or execute, any new canons in convocation, without the king’s assent or licence. Then follows this enacting clause, viz. That they shall not attempt, allege, or claim, or put in use, any constitutions or canons without the king’s assent; and so far this act is declarative of what the law was before. The clause before mentioned extends to such canons as were then made both beyond sea and in England, viz. to foreign canons, that they should not be executed here until received by the king and people as the laws of the land, and to canons made here which were contrary to the prerogative, or to the laws and customs of the realm. This appears by the proviso, that no canons shall be made or put in execution within this realm, which shall be contrary to the prerogative or laws. But the next are negative words, which relate wholly to making new canons, viz. “nor make, promulge, or execute any such canons without the king’s assent.” These words limit the clergy in point of jurisdiction, viz. that they shall not make any new canons but in convocation: and they cannot meet there without the king’s writ; and when they are met and make new canons, they cannot put them in execution without a confirmation under the great seal. Some years after this statute, the clergy proceeded to act in convocation, without any commission from Henry VIII. But the canons which they made were confirmed by that king and some of his successors, as particularly the injunctions published in the 28th year of Henry VIII., for the abolishing superstitious holy days; those for preaching against the use of images, relics, and pilgrimages; those for repeating the Creed, the Lord’s Prayer, and Ten Commandments in the English tongue. Henry VIII. sometimes acted by the advice of his bishops, out of convocation, as about the injunctions published in the 30th year of Henry VIII., for admitting none to preach but such as were licensed; those for keeping a register of births, weddings, and burials; and for the abolishing the anniversary of Thomas à Becket. The like may be said of those injunctions published in the 2nd year of Edward VI., prohibiting the carrying of candles on Candlemas day, and ashes in Lent, and palms on Palm Sunday. Queen Elizabeth, in the second year of her reign, published several injunctions by the advice of her bishops. And two years afterwards she published a book of orders without the confirmation of her parliament. When she was settled in her government, all Church affairs were debated in convocation. Several canons were made in her reign, and confirmed by her letters patent: but as she did not bind her heirs and successors to the observance of them, those canons expired with her reign. In all these reigns the old canons were still in force, but in the first year of King James, 1603, the clergy being lawfully assembled in convocation, the king gave them leave, by his letters patent, to treat, consult, and agree on canons: these they presented to him, and he gave them his royal assent; and by other letters patent, for himself, his heirs and successors, ratified and confirmed the same. These canons thus established were not then invented, but were collected out of ordinances which lay dispersed in several injunctions published in former reigns, and out of canons and other religious customs which were made and used in those days; and being thus confirmed, are the laws of the land, and by the same authority as any other part of the law; for being authorized by the king’s commission, according to the form of the statute 25 Henry VIII., they are warranted by act of parliament; and such canons made and confirmed, shall bind in ecclesiastical matters as much as any statute. An act of parliament may forbid the execution of any canon; but it has been usual to respect all those which enjoin some moral duty; yet a canon not confirmed by an act of parliament cannot alter any other law. It is agreed that canons made in convocation, and confirmed by letters patent, bind in all ecclesiastical affairs; that no canons in England are absolutely confirmed by parliament, yet they are part of the laws of the land, for the government of the Church, and in such case bind the laity as well as the clergy; that though such canons cannot alter the common law, statutes, or royal prerogative, yet they may alter other canons, otherwise the convocation could not make new canons. All that is required in making such canons is, that the clergy confine themselves to Church affairs, and do not meddle with things which are settled by 135the common law. But though no canons are absolutely confirmed by act of parliament, yet those which are neither contrary to the laws of the land, nor to the queen’s prerogative, and which are confirmed by her, are made good, and allowed to be so, by the statute 25 Henry VIII. And as to those canons which tend to promote the honour of God and service of religion, they must necessarily bind our consciences. Such are those which enjoin the sober conversation of ministers, prohibiting their frequenting taverns, playing at dice, cards, or tables; this was anciently prohibited by the Apostolical Canons, and in the old articles of Visitation here, and in several diocesan synods. Such are those canons, also, which relate to the duties of ministers in praying, preaching, administering sacraments, and visiting the sick.

It may be as well, for the convenience of students, to insert here, from Bishop Halifax’s Analysis of the Civil Law, a few explanations of the method of quoting the Jus Canonicum. The Decretum of Gratian (which must not be confounded with the Decretals) is divided into, 1. Distinctions. 2. Causes. 3. Treatise concerning consecration. The Decretals are divided into, 1. Gregory IX. Decretals in 5 books. 2. The sixth Decretal. (Boniface, 1298.) 3. The Clementine Constitutions (of Pope Clement V.). Now in the Decretum, 1st part, e. g. “1 dist. c. 3,” Lex, [or i. d. Lex,] is the first distinction, 3rd Canon, beginning with the word Lex. In the Decretum, 2nd part, e. g. “3 qu. 9, c. 2,” means the third cause, ninth question, 2nd Canon. The 3rd part of the Decretum is quoted as the first, with the addition of the words de consecratione.

In the Decretals (the first division) is given the name of title, number of chapter, with the addition of extra, or a capital X. E. g. “c. 3, extra de usuris,” means the 3rd chapter of Gregory’s Decretals, inscribed “de usuris,” i.e. the 19th of the 5th book. “c. cum contingat 36 X. de off. et Pot. Jud. del.,” means the 36th chapter beginning with “cum contingat,” of the Title in Gregory’s decrees, inscribed “de officio.” The sixth Decretal, and the Clementine Constitutions, are quoted the same way, except that instead of extra, or X., is subjoined in sexto, or in 6; and in Clementini, or in Clem. The Extravagants of John XXII. are contained in one book, xiv. titles. The following are the