to the East as missionaries, supposed, at first, that the hereditary and traditionary churches of that portion of the world were essentially right, and only needed a little improving. But further acquaintance with them, and a little experimenting on their characters and capabilities, soon taught them their mistake. The sin of those churches is radical and fundamental. Their polity is wrong in principle, in its fundamental principle; and it can never be reformed. The churches must be abandoned and overthrown, and give place to others, founded on better and Gospel principles.

It rec

The original polity of the church was one of liberty. ognized the membership as fit to be trusted, to think for themselves. It gave them the blessed word of God, and encouraged them to study it, and learn from it as much as possible. It interposed no human authority between God and the believer, and subjected him to no law but that of his Maker. It made him, however lowly, a member of the royal priesthood of the Gospel, and taught him to aspire to a noble destiny. It made him Christlike, Godlike. His mind was radiant with divine light; his heart glowed with divine love. He walked with God; he yearned for the salvation of men, and strove to bless them.

The entire membership were a sacred ministry, preaching the Gospel with the convincing evidences of a holy and happy life, and commending it, with irresistible power, to the consciences and hearts of men.

They were no weak enthusiasts, pursuing a bubble that bursts and perishes with the seizing of it. Still less were they the votaries of a blind and dead conservatism, that hoards alike the chaff with the wheat, and can, on no account, consent to a separation of them; but they were noble and generous men, that knew their God and Saviour, and worshipped him, with boundless love, boundless joy, and exalted virtue. They were intelligent, thoughtful, benevolent and magnanimous men, who loved their neighbors as themselves; Davids and Jonathans, in a kind and heroic affection for each other, and in mutual well-doing.

Their words were with power; and fell on the hearts of men, not like snow on the rock, but like grain on the fruitful field, to germinate and grow, and come back again with large increase. They were men to meet the demands of their times, and to meet the demands of all times. The eye that saw them blessed them, and the ear drank in their words like the refreshing rain. God was with them; God was in them. The mighty power of the Holy Spirit was on them; and hard hearts melted, and stubborn wills bowed, under their fervent and soul-stirring appeals.

A country inhabited by such men could never have been vanquished in war, or overrun by an enemy; and a church producing such men, and raising its children to such a pitch of excellence and glory, could never have existed for four hundred years amid the twilight gloom of Mohammedanism, without dispelling its shades, and compelling a universal recognition of its own superior excellence and moral worth.

Christ charged the Jewish church with being in a state of moral death at the time of his advent. The apostles reiterated the charge; and time speedily verified it, under the operation of the divine judgments.

They are a valley of dry

came upon the corrupt come upon the corrupt

The Eastern churches are dead. bones. The judgments of God, that Jews and overwhelmed them, have Greeks and overwhelmed them. There is no true and genial life in the ancient churches in Turkey. There is none in the church of Russia. The Russian church is a great instrument of civil and spiritual despotism. It is the subordinate and dependant on the state; and exists for the glory of its sovereign, not for the glory of God, or the indefinite elevation and improvement of man.

Without religious liberty, Russia will never accomplish an exalted destiny, nor illustrate the power of religion and the glory of God. Greece has become independent, in modern times, without raising herself in the scale of moral dignity, wealth and glory. Her church is a branch of the great Greek church, with

all its corruptions in doctrine, and with all its absolute priestly despotism; and the result is, that death reigns in it, and death reigns under its sway. Like that blasting upas-tree, no green thing can grow within the reach of its pestiferous influence, or flourish under its shade.

The missionary operations of the modern churches, commenced in the East, whatever imperfections may attend them, have this advantage, that all their organizations are essentially free. They appeal to the Scriptures as the supreme rule of faith, and to the law of God and right as the only valid and supreme rule of moral action; and call the people to behold their God, and love, worship and serve him, as their true hope and portion. Such a service is their unspeakable privilege and highest duty, and will, with the divine blessing, become the instrument of their indefinite exaltation.

Great changes may be expected from the influence of a pure Gospel, and a church polity recognizing the essential rights and liberties of mankind, in the Eastern world. The leaven of this improving principle is already there, and is beginning to show its power. New revolutionary organizations have been commenced in most of the principal cities, and many converts made; and it is to be hoped that the day is not distant when the churches of God in Constantinople, and other principal cities of the Turkish empire, will rival the glory and usefulness of the ancient and primitive churches in those regions.

DIVISION II.

THE PAPAL CHURCH.

CHAPTER I.

GENERAL VIEW OF THE PAPAL CHURCH, AND ITS HIERARCHY.

THE Papal church, otherwise denominated Roman Catholic, is the largest, and, in some respects, the mightiest sovereignty that ever existed. It embraces more members than all the rest of Christendom together. According to Malte Brun, the whole number of Roman Catholics throughout the world is, 116,000,000. According to Hassel,

According to the American Encyclopedia,

139,000,000. 124,672,000.

The whole number of the Greek and other Eastern churches is

None of these estimates can be considered as anything more than remote approximations to the truth; but, as such, they show that the power of numbers is on the side of the Roman Catholics.

All these millions of Roman Catholics are the subjects of a single spiritual sovereign, the Pope, and are the most thoroughly drilled in the doctrines and practice of obedience and subjection, of any community on earth. Besides being strong in numbers, this church is rich in money, lands, dwellings and church edifices. Its property is enormous, and is an instrument of enormous power in the prosecution of its purposes. Its wealth is the result of the acquisitions and accumulations of ages, and is capable of being wielded to exert a controlling influence on human affairs, not for the present only, but for ages and ages

to come It boasts a remote antiquity, and some of its branches claim, apparently with good reason, to have come down, in unbroken succession, from the times of the apostles. This is the case with the church of Rome itself. But, in the process of ages, permanent associations are liable to great changes. They undergo many perceptible and violent changes; they undergo many that are imperceptible. It is impossible to avoid change, however strenuously it may be resisted. States change, and churches change, by laws of causalty that are beyond human control.

The fact, therefore, that some portions of the Papal church stand in lineal succession to the churches of the apostles, does not prove that they are now apostolic churches. Neither does it prove anything important to that conclusion. An apostolic Christian church is one organized and administered on the principles of the apostolic churches. Such a church is just as apostolic if it was organized by a secession from a corrupt church sixty years ago, as if it had been perpetuated down to our times, in one unbroken line of succession, from the apostles. Apos tolic succession, therefore, proves nothing, but is liable, in the minds of the ignorant and undiscriminating, to create a prejudice in favor of unworthy claimants.

The great question by which to determine the apostolic character of churches is, are they organized and administered on apostolic and Gospel principles?

To apply this to the Papal church, we ask, is that church constituted and administered according to Gospel and apostolic principles? If it is, it is an apostolic church. If it is not, it is not an apostolic church.

Let us look, then, at the polity of this church, and see what it is. What is its ministry?

One supreme head and father, the Pope.

Seventy cardinals, of whom six are bishops, fifty priests, and fourteen deacons ;

An indefinite number of archbishops;