was stretched on a hard and painful tree. Do not you remember what St. Martin said in his agony, that a Christian ought to die on sack-cloth and ashes ?" He forbade his friends to weep for him; and as his strength failed, often exclaimed, with rapture, "Behold the Bridegroom; let us go forth and meet him." He added, with his eyes raised towards heaven, "Good Jesus, behold, I come." When it was remarked to him, that he might go joyfully to his crown, he was much disturbed, and said, "The crown is for valiant soldiers, not for base cowards such as I am." During the two last days of his life, all the city came in turn, according to their ranks, to receive his blessing. He commanded even the beggars to be admitted, and addressed to every class some short pathetic instructions; after which he departed in peace, in the year 1455. Such ex

amples suffice to shew, that even when the Church was most in need of reformation, the grace of God still continued to produce saving faith, and to sanctify his people.

That serious corruptions in practice, and even in doctrine, had now become common among Christians, is indeed but too evident. Learned and godly men were longing for a reformation of the many evils by which religion was afflicted: but amidst much of human infirmity and sin, we still cannot avoid recognising the continued fulfilment of the promises of God to his Church. The following expressions of Luther on this subject are well worthy of attention. "In this Church," he says, "God miraculously and powerfully preserved baptism; moreover, in the public pulpits, and the Lord's-day sermons, he preserved the text of the Gospel in the language of every nation, besides remission of sins, and absolution as well in confession as in public. Again, the sacrament of

the altar, which at Easter, and twice or three times in the year, they offered to Christians, although they administered only one kind (i. e. the bread). Again, calling and ordination to parishes, and the ministry of the word, the keys to bind and loose, and to comfort in the agony of death. For amongst many it was customary to shew the image of Christ crucified to those who were dying, and admonish them of his death and blood. Then, by a Divine miracle, there remained in the Church the Psalter, the Lord's Prayer, the Creed, the Ten Commandments. Likewise many pious and excellent hymns, which were left to posterity by truly Christian and spiritual men, though oppressed with tyranny. Wherever were these truly sacred relics -the relics of holy men-there was and is the true holy Church of Christ; for all these are ordinances and fruits of Christ, except the forcible removal of one part of the sacrament from Christians. In this Church of Christ, therefore, the spirit of Christ was certainly present, and preserved true knowledge and true faith in his elect."

CHAPTER XIX.

ON THE EASTERN CHURCH.

A.D. 1054-1517.

THE eastern or Greek Church existed under the Greek emperors, in the country now called Turkey in Europe and Asia Minor, and also in Russia, Poland, Bulgaria, Moravia, Sclavonia, Georgia, Mingrelia, Circassia, Syria, Palestine, and Egypt. It was governed by the patriarchs of Con

stantinople, Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem. After the division between the Churches of Rome and Constantinople in 1054, the eastern and western Churches did not immediately withdraw from mutual communion. In 1155, Basil, archbishop of Thessalonica, in an epistle to Adrian IV., allowed that the Latin Churches held the orthodox faith, and formed part of the universal Church, while he denied that the Greek Church was guilty of schism: and in 1203, Demetrius, archbishop of Bulgaria, denied that the Latins were heretics. On the other hand, Peter, abbot of Clugny, and William of Tyre, in the twelfth century, admitted the Greeks to form part of the Catholic Church; and several modes of intercourse existed between the Churches. The popes, however, being full of the notion of their own supremacy over the whole Church, always treated the Greeks as schismatics; and though they entered into many negotiations with the Greek emperors, for the re-union of East and West, the first article always insisted on was, that the Greek Church should obey the pope. Had the popes merely desired to restore the communion of the Churches, leaving the Greeks their ancient independence and equality, there would have been no difficulty; but they refused, and rightly refused, to place their religion, their discipline, their property and persons, at the feet of pontiffs who pretended to infallibility, and who refused to be bound by any laws or canons.

The views of the eastern Church on this subject are exemplified by the words of Nechites, archbishop of Nicomedia, in his conference with a Latin bishop, in 1137: "We do not refuse the Roman Church," he said, "the first rank among her sisters the patriarchal Churches, and we acknowledge that she presides in a general council;

but she separated from us by her pride, when, exceeding her power, she divided the empire and the Churches of the East and West. When she holds a council of western bishops without us, it is well that they should observe their own decrees; but how can we be expected to obey decrees made without our knowledge? If the pope pretends to send us his orders, fulminating from his lofty throne, and to dispose of us and our churches at his own discretion, without advising with us, what paternity or what fraternity is there in that? We should be only slaves, not children of the Church. The Roman Church alone would enjoy liberty, and give laws to all others, without being subject to any herself. We do not find in any creed, that we are bound to confess the ROMAN Church in particular, but one holy, catholic, and apostolic Church. This is what I say of the Roman Church, which I revere with you; but I do not with you believe it a duty to follow her necessarily in all things, nor that we ought to relinquish our rites, and adopt her mode of performing the sacraments, without examining it by reason and the Scriptures."

The crusades, which the popes set on foot for the recovery of the Holy Land, but which led to the subjugation of Constantinople, Cyprus, and a great part of the Greek empire by Latin chieftains, tended much to promote unfriendly feelings between the Churches. Latin bishops were instituted in Jerusalem, Antioch, Constantinople, Greece, and Cyprus, although there were already Greek bishops in those sees; and the crusaders in many places profaned the Greek churches, expelled their clergy, or forced them, on pain of death, to become obedient to Rome. The Greeks retaliated when they were able; and the Churches became much more estranged from each other.

In the year 1261, the Greek emperor Michael Paleologus recovered Constantinople from the Latins; and fearing that the pope would proclaim a crusade against him, he entered into negotiations for the union of the Churches, and compelled some of the Greek bishops to write to the pope and the council of Lyons in 1274, admitting the primacy of the Roman see, and expressing their wish for union. A letter from the emperor was also read in the council, in which he professed his belief in the Roman primacy, in purgatory, transubstantiation, and seven sacraments, as the pope had commanded. The council then permitted the re-union of the Greek Church to the Latin, and did not require any alteration in their form of worship. But in 1280 the pope again excommunicated the Greeks for not obeying his commands, and the temporary union came to an end. When Constantinople was threatened by the Turks, in the fifteenth century, the Greek emperor John Paleologus, desirous of obtaining the pope's assistance for his falling empire, came with several Greek bishops to the synod of Florence in 1438, where, after much disputation, those prelates were compelled to subscribe to the doctrine of purgatory, the papal primacy, and the procession of the Holy Spirit, as held by the Roman Church: but on their return to Greece, they were condemned by the eastern Church, and the proposed union fell to the ground. Constantinople was taken by the Turks in 1453; and the Christians of those countries have been ever since much oppressed by these infidels: but the popes discovered that the attempt to reduce the Greek Church beneath their sway was a hopeless one.