eny that the church of
Rome is the true catholic church. They do not baptize their children till
they are three, four, five, six, ten, nay, sometimes eighteen years of
age: baptism is performed by trine immersion. They insist that the
sacrament of the Lord's supper ought to be administered in both kinds, and
they give the sacrament to children immediately after baptism. They grant
no indulgences, nor do they lay any claim to the character of
infallibility, like the church of Rome. They deny that there is any such
place as purgatory; notwithstanding, they pray for the dead, that God
would have mercy on them at the general judgment. They practise the
invocation of saints; though, they say, they do not invoke them as
deities, but as intercessors with God. They exclude confirmation, extreme
unction, and matrimony out of the seven sacraments. They deny auricular
confession to be a divine precept, and say it is only a positive
injunction of the church. They pay no religious homage to the eucharist.
They administer the communion in both kinds to the laity, both in sickness
and in health, though they have never applied themselves to their
confessors, because they are persuaded that a lively faith is all which is
requisite for the worthy receiving of the Lord's supper. They maintain
that the Holy Ghost proceeds only from the Father, and not from the Son.
They believe in predestination. They admit of no images in relief or
embossed work, but use paintings and sculptures in copper or silver. They
approve of the marriage of priests, provided they enter into that state
before their admission into holy orders. They condemn all fourth
marriages. They observe a number of holy days, and keep four fasts in the
year more solemn than the rest, of which the fast in Lent, before Easter,
is the chief. They believe the doctrine of consubstantiation, or the union
of the body of Christ with the sacramental bread.

The Russians adhere to the doctrine and ceremonies of the Greek church,
though they are now independent of the patriarch of Constantinople. The
church service is contained in twenty-four volumes, folio, in the
Sclavonian language, which is not well understood by the common people.

PRIMITIVE CHRISTIANS.

A new sect, professing to be an association of Christians to promote the
revival and spread of primitive Christianity, has recently sprung up at
Bradford, in England. Its originators, or founders, are a Mr. Barker and a
Mr.