a few years the Mohammedan government has formally granted
permission for the full enjoyment of the Protestant religion; and has
renounced the right of punishing by death, apostates from Islamism.

In August 1843, an Armenian, who had become a Mussulman and subsequently
returned to the religion of his fathers, was beheaded at Constantinople.
The Christian powers of Europe immediately remonstrated, and it was hoped
that the law against apostates from Mohammedanism would be permitted to
become a dead letter. In a few months, however, a firman issued from the
government ordering the decapitation of a young man near Brooza, who was
put to death for having promised in a passion, but had afterwards refused,
to become a Mohammedan. Lord Aberdeen, the British Secretary of Foreign
Affairs, then demanded of the Turkish Sultan that the Porte should not
insult and trample on Christianity, "by treating as a criminal any person
who embraces it;" but should "renounce, absolutely and without
equivocation, the barbarous practice which has called forth the
remonstrance now addressed to it." To this communication the following
answer was made early in 1844: "The Sublime Porte engages to take
effectual measures to prevent, henceforward, the execution and putting to
death of the Christian who is an apostate." On the 15th of November, 1847,
for the first time, a firman was issued recognizing Protestant Christians
as a distinct community, forbidding any molestation or interference "in
their temporal or spiritual concerns," and permitting them "to exercise
the profession of their creed in security." This coming from the Vizier,
did not necessarily survive a change of ministry; but in November, 1850, a
firman was issued from the Sultan himself, _establishing_ the policy of
the empire in respect to Protestants, and confirming them in all needed
civil and religious privileges. Thus has the Mohammedan government
formally and forever renounced the power it had so long wielded, of
causing spiritual death by compelling men to apostatize from Christianity.

The rest of the men not killed, must be those in portions of the Roman
territory not included in the eastern third. The Roman Catholics in the
western parts, were not reformed by the judgments inflicted on the east.
They continued to worship the canonized dead, and to bow down to images of
the saints. Under this trumpet, a mighty movement was to be there
effected, which was symbolized by the descen