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that it was supported by the authority and zeal of no less than six emperors. Even apologists of image worship have been compelled to admit that, after the temporary reaction under the perfidious Irene, "the spirit of Leo so far revived in the Eastern Church, that although pictures are still retained, statues are rigidly excluded."

The effects of this controversy have been denominated slight and transient, while in truth they were so important and abiding, that even the decision of a second Nicene Council of western bishops, convoked by the regicide Empress Irene, could not annul or reverse them, although it decreed the worship of images, and "denounced severe penalties against such as maintained that God is the only object of religious adoration." Even the Latins of the most distant West, the Britons, the Gauls, and Germans, dissented from the decision of the papal Council of Nice, 787 A. D., and Charlemagne, with the unanimous concurrence of a council of three hundred bishops assembled at Frankfort, condemned the worship of images. So potent were the effects, that according to one historian they chiefly occasioned the separation of the Italian provinces from the Grecian empire; while another historian affirms that the rebellion in Italy, in the eighth century, was produced and justified by the heresy of the iconoclasts.

In the mean time the Roman Church was intently prosecuting its long-cherished plan of independence from the empire. Charlemagne in this century consolidated the Teutonic tribes, and became the champion of the West. Favored with the support of the Franks, the Roman Church was on the alert for occasions of controversy with the Greeks, and these conveniently multiplied. Missionaries from Constantinople were successful in converting the Sclavonic tribes of Bulgaria and Moravia. Nicholas had coveted these, and commissioned Roman bishops to draw them away from the Greeks, but they were finally added to the Eastern Church. Five provinces on the eastern border of the Adriatic, together with Sicily, had been transferred from the Roman to the Greek Church. It was clear that Italy was slipping from the grasp of the emperor, and that its retention was no real source of power. He therefore could not tolerate the possession of jurisdiction within his immediate empire by a prelate who would soon cease to be his FOURTH SERIES, VOL. XVII.-22

vassal. He removed the districts in question from the patriarchate of Rome to that of Constantinople, and he confiscated divers estates belonging to the Roman see. The restoration of this property and jurisdiction was demanded up to the time of the final schism. Photius, who had been the chief agent in securing this acquisition to the Eastern Church, had been recently elevated from the civil primacy to the patriarchate. In the light of such recent events his consecration seemed to the Roman pontiff a glaring outrage. Had Photius restored the Calabrian estates, and the Illyrian diocese, and the Bulgarian province, Nicholas might not have discovered the irregularity of his election. But with the loss of these it was clear that he was most unlawfully elected, and Nicholas I. excommunicated Photius from the patriarchate. The intelligent and intrepid Photius referred the case to the Eastern bishops as "the public and momentous cause of the Church." Fresh charges were preferred in council against the Romish Church: that it had changed the time of fasting; had imposed celibacy on the clergy; had interfered with the rite of baptism; had adulterated the Nicene Creed by an interpolation, and had tampered with the observance of Lent. The sum of this was heresy, and the council declared Nicholas deposed and excommunicated. This provoked retaliation from the West. But the proffer of Bulgaria wrought a sudden change of moral judgment, and Pope John VIII. "acknowledged Photius as his brother in Christ." (Mosheim, 9th century, part ii.)

The promise, however, was not redeemed. The dissatisfaction returned. The West demanded not only the condemna.tion of Photius, but the degradation of all the priests and bishops whom he had ordained. The East was shocked by such arrogance. "New controversies were added to the old," and the final separation hastened. Poland was converted and gained by the West. Russia was converted and secured by the East. The Seljukian Turks were threatening the Greek empire. It was a fortunate moment for the aspiring Bishop of Rome, who employed every stratagem to reduce the Eastern Church to his imperious sway. Against this papal arrogance the Greek patriarch earnestly contended, even amid the tumult and trouble of a sinking country. New charges were preferred against the West, but of so trifling a nature as both to reveal

the deplorable state of religion in the East as well as in the West, and to prove that the ever-during, all-pervading element of strife was the conflict of jurisdiction, the Western claim of supremacy. The issue long anticipated was realized when the Roman legates deposited the final anathema on the grand altar of St. Sophia, and departed "shaking the dust from their feet." By secession from the empire, and secession from the Greek Church, papal Rome exchanged its connection with the East for alliance with the young and vigorous Frank power of the West, signalizing the transition by loftier ecclesiastical pretensions. The title of "Pope" or Universal Father was assumed. The right to control the State as well as the Church was assumed. And from Leo IX. to Gregory VII. these claims were pressed with untiring diligence and zeal, and with commensurate success, till Western Europe was subjected to the Roman hierarchy. Papal ambition looked longingly toward the East, and plied every artifice. But the Greek Church had been trained by the experience of six centuries of conflict, and had learned at least two important lessons, devotion to orthodoxy and hatred of the papacy, and she could not be compelled or cajoled into submission. Her spiritual life may have been weak and her religious practice defective. But Christian charity will admit that the darkness of the age was spiritually enervating, and the character of the times sadly corrupting. But the two principles just named she maintained, notwithstanding the failing fortunes of the empire and the ambition of the Roman hierarchy. Four hundred years of trial were endured by the Greek Church such as history seldom records. Artful negotiations were again and again proposed by the sovereign pontiff. Emoluments civil and ecclesiastic were promised, and military assistance offered when the empire, well nigh wrecked, was struggling for existence. The emperor was deceived and won. A reunion was announced at Florence, in 1439 A. D., between the East and the West; but the consent of the Greek Church was withheld. Rome waived every condition but her supremacy. The consent of the Greek Church was still withheld. She saw the empire tottering to its final fall, and the Saracen invaders enter in fierce triumph, and yet withheld her consent, choosing compulsory servitude to the Turks rather than a voluntary submission to the papacy.

The separation of the eleventh century, thus confirmed in the fifteenth, has been maintained complete to the nineteenth century; and to-day the attempt to reconcile the Greek Church to the Roman antichristian claim of supremacy seems as hopeless, as to induce the Protestant Church to forget its protest and submit to antichrist.

This principle of antagonism between the Greek Church and the Roman is one in which Protestants must ever feel a lively interest; while to the Greek Church it is a central antagonism, which gathers around itself and crystallizes every other point of difference, and makes the Eastern a great counterpoise to the Western Church. Destroy this, and the others would dissolve away. This remaining, all the others, great and small, related with it, have significance and force.

ART. II.-THE SUPERANNUATED, AND HOW THEY ARE CARED FOR.

WE propose to discuss the "theory and practice" of the Methodist Church for the temporal relief of its worn-out ministers, and of the widows and children of deceased ministers. In the Discipline adopted at the organization of the Church in 1784 there is found the question, "How can we provide for superannuated preachers, and the widows of preachers?" The Wesleyan Conference, in England, had asked in substance the same question more than twenty years before. With some modifications in language, but the same in spirit, it has been repeated to this day by every General and Annual Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church.

The financial economy of the Methodist Church differs very materially from nearly all other Churches. In no features of that economy is the difference more marked than in its method of raising the means for the support of its ministers, and in the way it decides how much they shall be paid: for the former, depending on the voluntary contributions of the people; and determining the latter without dissent or agreement on the part of the minister. It requires, however, that those who

attend his preaching should have the ability, as well as a liberal disposition in order to furnish the Methodist itinerant a comfortable living. The low money status of a large part of them, in the early period of the Church, made his compensation very small. Nothing less than the persuasion, "Woe is me if I preach not the Gospel," could have induced any man, with such insignificant pay, to dare and to do what he accomplished.

The assistants of Wesley in England, and of Asbury in America, took little thought " what they should eat, or what they should drink, or wherewithal they should be clothed." Moved by an impulse that they believed divine to declare a free salvation to every man that would hear it, their chief solicitude was, first, for an opportunity to utter their message, and then, if the work of the sower promised a spiritual harvest, that they might gather and preserve it in the Church garner. If successful in these, their desires and prayers were fulfilled. If, in addition, they received the welcome of hospitality, and the small contribution, mostly in kind, necessary to supply the scanty wants of a family, and to keep their plain wardrobe in decent repair, they were content. Lest they might be suspected of seeking the fleece rather than the flock, they adopted the minimum of living, rather than the maximum of getting. It is difficult to conceive how they made their expenses subordinate to the small amount they received; and if they could barely live on their scanty allowance when able to work, they had a sorry prospect when age or sickness disqualified them for effective duty. Many, in fear of the "dark day," located, to make to themselves "friends of the mammon of unrighteousness."

The newness of the Church, and the comparative youthfulness of its ministers, would place but few of these in the class of the worn-out for some years after its organization. But there was great "wear and tear" in the excessive labor they performed, and in the privations to which they were exposed; and when the question was introduced into the Discipline in 1784, there were already some so disabled as to make it a practical one, requiring an immediate answer.

It was natural that the child in America should adopt the financial policy of the parent in England. The first provisions of the Church here, to meet the wants of its disabled men,

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