married they begin the Feast on Sonday Evening and continue it three or four Days with much jollity during which time the Bride is kept in her Chair and State and almost the whole time waking and the Bridegroom in like manner is obliged to keep his distance and not permitted to consummate the Matrimonial Duty until Wednesday night or Thursday morning when they expose the signs of Virginity in the same manner as the Greeks Turks and Jews do and all other Nations of the East CHAP. XI Their Opinion of Souls in the state of separation and their Ceremonies used towards the dead THEY believe that neither the Souls nor Bodies of any Saints or Prophets departed this life are in Heaven unless it be the Blessed Virgin and Elias the Prophet They believe that a person dying contrite goes not immediately to Heaven nor a Sinner unto Hell but are intercepted in the way and lodged together in the same place which they call Gayank which is the Eighth Heaven where the Stars are and have there no other joy or grief but what proceeds from a good or a bad Conscience Those which dye with the burden of minute sins such as the sins of evil thoughts or words go to the same place and are freed from Punishment by the Alms and good works of the Faithful They believe that until after the day of resurrection the souls of the Righteous shall not see the face of God or enjoy the Beatifical Vision but only be filled and replenished with certain beams of his glory and Divine illumination Notwithstanding which opinion That the Saints shall not enter into Heaven until the day of judgment yet by a certain imitation of the Greek and Latine Churches they invoke them with prayers reverence and adore their Pictures or Images and burn Lamps to them and Candles The Saints which are commonly invoked by them are all the Prophets and Apostles likewise S. Silvester S. Savorich c. As to the Ceremonies used towards their Dead they observe several particulars The Corps of their Bishops and Priests they anoint with confecrated Oyl before they are interred but the Bodies of the Laity are only washed after the manner of the Turks and fashion of the Eastern parts of the World When any dies under the Age of nine years the Parents or Kindred employ some Priest for the space of eight days to make Prayers for the Soul of the deceased who during that time have their entertainment of Meat and Drink defrayed at the charge of such Parents and on the ninth day a solemn Office is performed for the Soul of the Deceased But those who are rich and Religious do yearly at their expence appoint one day for Commemoration of their departed Relations and for performance of those Offices which are instituted and appointed for the same Easter Monday is the day ordained by Custom for visiting the Sepulchres of their deceased Relations where having lamented them a while with howlings and cryes after their manner and the Women with most barbarous Screeches they presently change the Scene and retiring under the shadow of some Tree they eat drink and forget their sorrow which their Wine soon chases away and then they become as dissolute in their Mirth as they were before undecent and extravagant in their Grief This Custom we may suppose to have been derived from those ancient Solemnities which were at first kept at the Tombs where Martyrs had been buried which usually were in the Caemeteria or the Church-yards distinct from the Church and in the Eastern parts are commonly at some distance without the City To these places the people annually resorted to celebrate the memory of Martyrs with Prayers Incense Psalms and Sermons which by the multitude of Martyrs became afterwards so common that the people began to think it their duty to perform this Office at the Graves of their Relations which time hath now made accustomary and is a great part of the service and pastime of Easter Monday CHAP. XII Of the manner how some Friars of the Roman Church perswaded the Armenian Patriarch and Bishops at Constantinople to subscribe a Confession agreeable to the Tenents of the Roman Faith THough the great Marshal Turenne as is credibly reported had alwayes inclinations towards the Roman Church which for many years he concealed for reasons best known to himself Yet being desirous at length to be owned as a Member thereof he suffered himself to be wrought upon by such arguments as were then suggested amongst which none seemed more convincing or forcible to him than that the Eastern Churches concurred with the Roman in all points wherein there was any difference between the Papists and the Protestants to prove which the Ambassadour Resident for his most Christian Majesty at Constantinople in the year 1674 assembled the Armenian Patriarch and some of his Bishops from whom without much difficulty he procured a certain Confession very agreeable to the sense of the Roman Church A Copy of this Confession I saw and read as it was delivered to me from the Martabet or Armenian Bishop wrote in the Armenian Language and Character the which was faithfully Translated for me which when I well considered it appeared plainly to me to be origiginally the invention form and contrivance of some Fryer of the Roman Church rather than the thoughts or Stile of an Armenian Author For first though I understand little of the Armenian Tongue yet I have some reasons to perswade me that there is nothing in the Idiom of that Language which corresponds with the word Sacrament agreeable to that definition whereby we would understand the notion of Sacramentum Secondly the professed Armenian Doctrine holds That there are no other Saints in Heaven but the blessed Virgin and Elias the Prophet and yet in this Confession they seem to place as many in Heaven it self as the Church of Rome Thirdly in another place one would believe that to avoid confusion they meant to set up the Pope for Head of the Universal Church which when they come to explicate a little farther they only condemn those who allow not the Government of the Church by Bishops and those who believe that one Preacher is sufficient and that one Priest can make another But who this latter sort of people is and where to be found they would have done well to have declared before they had taken so much pains to bestow the Anathema upon them This Confession which I here mention was in part the Occasion and Ground of the Report which in the year 1676 was spread at Constantinople of a new reconciliation which though it was some years after this Confession yet that and the Conversion of an Armenian Bishop to the Church of Rome was the cause of all the discourse but he being a person of no greater Revenue than of 200 Dollars yearly Rent the mistake soon appeared it being probable that the acquisition of a poor ignorant person could have no great influence on
who are most signal for their Piety and Learning The Patriarch of Constantinople besides the extent of his Jurisdiction is of greater power by reason of his Vicinity to the Court but the Alexandrian is of greater Authority in his Ecclesiastical Censures and Civil Regimen stiling himself with the Title of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Judge of the world And the Patriarchs of Antiochia and Jerusalem by reason of their poverty not having sufficient to subsist are little reverenced by the Turks or their own People The Patriarch of Constantinople who was so great and opulent under the Christian Emperours is now reduced to a narrow Fortune being deprived of his certain and setled Revenue by the violence and sacriledge of the common Enemy to the Church of Christ so that the chief income is accidental arising from the death of Bishops Arch-Bishops and ordinary Priests and from such as are consecrated and admitted into their Diocesses and Parishes What a deceased Priest leaves not having Children accrues to the Patriarch as to the common Father and Heir of them all from which arises a considerable Revenue every year The other Patriarchal Sees by reason of the paucity and poverty of the Christians are worse provided but yet being far from the Court have not so many nccessities to satisfie The chief subsistence of the secular Priests is from the charity of the People but they being cold in that Vertue as well as in their Devotion contribute faintly on the days of Offering so that the Clergy who are the Guardians of the Holy Mysteries are forced to sell the Ordinances of the Church for their own subsistence none being able to receive Absolution or be admitted to Confession or procure Baptism for their Children or enter into a state of Matrimony or divorce his Wife or obtain Excommunication against another or Communion for the sick without an agreement first for the price which the Priests hold up as they discover the Zeal and Abilities of the party who cheapens them When the Holy Church triumphed in the days of Constantine the Great the Bishops of Rome and Constantinople were independent each of other and afterwards they were also made of equal honour and power but in regard that for better order and distinction it was necessary they two being to meet and concur in the same Council that the precedency of place should first be determined The priority of Order not of Authority was adjudged to the Pope lest old Rome which was the ancient Mistress of the World should lose her honour in yielding to the new which was Constantinople and had no greater Dignity or Fame than that which she challenged and borrowed from the presence and brightness of the others Emperours and so much Socrates Scholasticus affirms in these words In the Council of Constantinople Anno 385. in the Reign of Theodosius the Emperour when Nectanius was chosen Bishop it was decreed That the Bishop of Constantinople should possess the next place and prerogative after the Bishop of Rome And likewise it was determined in the Council of Chalcedon Can. 28. That the Bishops Seat of new Rome that is Constantinople should enjoy equal priviledges with old Rome and in all Ecclesiastical matters to be extolled and magnified as that of Rome being the second in order after her the words are these 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Nor did the Bishop of Rome ever preside in the first six General Councils which only are received by the whole Church either by himself or his Legates This and such-like honour of precedency the Church of Greece may yield unto the Church of Rome and perhaps now rather in these times of Oppression wherein being humbled by the hand of God they seek not worldly Honours nor swelling Titles nor Dominions but are desirous only to govern in the Hearts and Affections of their people Ambitio cupido gloriae faelicium hominum sunt affectus saith Tacitus However the Oriental Confession doth not seem to condescend so far in that it declares That notwithstanding the priority of Honour and Antiquity which was formerly given to Jerusalem and other Churches before that of Constantinople yet afterwards the Council of Constantinople and Chalcedon did give the primacy of honour unto new Rome and to the Clergy thereof by reason of the Imperial Power whose Seat was there But let us not only hear what the Greeks themselves do utter in this point but observe the words of that famous Venetian Father Paul Sarpus who in the 25th Chapter of his History of the Inquisition hath these pertinent and impartial words The Eastern and Western Churches continued both in Communion and Christian Charity for the space of nine hundred years and more in which time the Pope of Rome was reverenced and esteemed no less by the Greeks than by the Latines He was acknowledged for the Successor of St. Peter and chief of all the Eastern Catholick Bishops In the Persecutions raised by Hereticks they implored his Aid and of other Bishops of Italy and this Peace was easily kept because the Supreme Power was in the Canons to which both parts acknowledged themselves subject Ecclesiastical Discipline was severely maintained in each Country by the Prelates of it not arbitrarily but absolutely according to Order and Canonical Rigour none putting his hand into the Government of another but advised one the other to the observance of the Canons In those days never any Pope of Rome did pretend to confer Benefices in the Diocesses of other Bishops neither was the custome yet introduced of getting mony out of others by way of Dispensations or Bulls But as soon as the Court of Rome began to pretend that it was not subject to Canons and that she might according to her own discretion alter any Order of the Fathers Councils and of the Apostles themselves and that she attempted instead of the ancient Primacy of the Apostolical See to bring in an absolute Dominion not ruled by any Law or Canon then the division grew And as this division grew between the Eastern and Western Churches for the causes aforesaid so the same Reasons were the causes of division and separation in the Western Church it self for as to considering men nothing seemed more absurd than the Usurpation of Rome over other Churches independent thereon in secular Government so to the people who lived under its Dominion nothing could be more Tyrannical and oppressive CHAP. IV. The Opinion of the Greek Church concerning that Article in the Nicene Creed I believe one Holy Catholick and Apostolick Church and what Authority and Power is given by them thereunto THE See of Rome taking it for granted that she is the head of the Catholick Church would seem to deduce from that Principle undeniable consequences of Infallibility of Priviledges Power and Jurisdiction as ample and as extensive as the absolute and supreme Authority of our Lord and Master Jesus But this being a Foundation rather
the Church and might have the same effect as if a Country Curate in England were brought over to the Roman Faith This Confession is the Cause also that upon every small accident of complyance a new reconciliation is presently divulged and so it happened in the year 1678. when at Rome for six Months together it was generally reported That the Armenian Patriarch with six and thirty Bishops was on their way thither to submit unto and to acknowledge the Apostolical See Howsoever I perswade my self that were the particulars wherein there is any Controversie between the Church of England and that of Rome well stated according to the Capacity of the Armenians it would not be difficult to procure another Confession at least an Explication of their Doctrine with little variety from that of the Church of England so little Understanding have these People of Controversies the which perhaps would be the sense of most good Christians in the World who laid aside all prepossessions to a Party or Tenent Howsoever I am sure it ought to be the Desire and Prayer of every good Christian that God would be pleased to lessen and close the Differences in the Church of Christ that we may have one God one Faith one Baptism and one Head the Lord Jesus Amen FINIS Histories and other Curious Discourses Printed for and sold by John Starkey in Fleet-Street 1. 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