ACCOMMODATION ABYSSINIAN CHURCH spacious subterranean vaults or gloomy caverns, | feared, however, that there is little beside the round the sides of which were cells to receive the name of Christianity among them. Should the dead bodies, the term was employed to denote the reader be desirous to know more of this sect, he grave, or the common receptacle of the dead, may consult Father Lobo's Voyage to Abyssinia; Rom. x. 7. In the symbolical language of the Bruce's Travels; Ludolph's History of Ethiobook of Revelation, its import is somewhat dif- pia; and Dict. of Arts and Sciences, vol. i. p. 15. ferent. In ch. ix. 1-3, at the sounding of the ACADEMICS, a denomination given to the fifth trumpet, a star fell from heaven unto the cultivators of a species of philosophy originally earth; and to him was given the key of the bot-derived from Socrates, and afterwards illus tomless pit, (literally, of the well of the abyss,) trated and enforced by Plato. The contradictory and he opened the bottomless pit; and there systems which had been successively urged upon arose a smoke out of the pit, as the smoke of a the world, were become so numerous, that, from great furnace,—and there came out of the smoke a view of the variety and uncertainty of human locusts upon the earth." On this passage an opinions, many were led to believe that truth lay eminent expositor of prophecy observes, The beyond the reach of our comprehension. The poetic machinery of this vision is taken from the consequence of this conclusion was absolute scepsacred oracular caves of the ancient Pagans, ticism: hence the existence of God, the immorwhich were often thought to communicate with tality of the soul, the preferableness of virtue to the sea or the great abyss, and which were es-vice, were all held as uncertain. This sect, with pecially valued when (like that at Delphi) they that of the Epicureans, were the two chief that emitted an intoxicating vapour; it is used, there- were in vogue at the time of Christ's appearance, fore, with singular propriety in foretelling the rise and were embraced and supported by persons of of a religious imposture." This symbol, accord-high rank and wealth. A consideration of the ingly is interpreted by the best expositors, of the principles of these two sects [see EPICUREANS] rise of the Mahometan delusion in the com- will lead us to form an idea of the deplorable state mencement of the 7th century, and as having a of the world at the time of Christ's birth; and the special allusion to Mahomet's retiring to the cave necessity there was of some divine teacher to conof Hera for the purpose of fabricating his im- vey to the mind true and certain principles of reposture. Although the phrase bottomless pit is ligion and wisdom. Jesus Christ, therefore, is in popular usage employed as of the same import with great propriety called the Day Spring from with hell, yet there is no place in the Scriptures on high, the Sun of Righteousness, that arose upwhere it can be clearly shown to be synonymous on a benighted world to dispel the clouds of ignowith the places of future torment of the wicked. rance and error, and discover to lost man the Faber's Sacred Calendar of Prophecy; Daubuz on path of happiness and heaven. But, as we do the Revelation; Schleusner's Gr. Lexicon.-B. not mean to enlarge much upon these and some ABYSSINIAN CHURCH, that which is other sects, which belong rather to philosoestablished in the empire of Abyssinia. They phy than theology, we shall refer the reader to are a branch of the Copts, with whom they agree Budæus's Introduction to the History of Philoso in admitting only one nature in Jesus Christ, and phy; Stanley's Lives; Brucker's History of rejecting the council of Chalcedon; whence they Philosophy; or (which is more modern) Enare also called Monophysites and Eutychians, field's Abridgment. which see. The Abyssinian church is governed by ACCLAMATIONS, ecclesiastical, were a bishop, styled Abuna. They have canons also, shouts of joy which the people expressed by way and monks. The emperor has a kind of supre- of approbation of their preachers. It hardly macy in ecclesiastical matters. The Abyssinians seems credible to us that practices of this kind have at divers times expressed an inclination to should ever have found their way into the church be reconciled to the see of Rome; but rather where all ought to be reverence and solemnity. from interested views than any other motive. Yet so it was in the fourth century. The people They practice circumcision on females as well as were not only permitted, but sometimes even exmales. They eat no meats prohibited by the law horted, by the preacher himself, to approve his taof Moses. They observe both Saturday and lents by clapping of hands, and loud acclamations Sunday sabbaths. Women are obliged to the of praise. The usual words they made use of legal purifications. Brothers marry their brother's were, "Orthodox," "Third apostle," &c. These wives, &c. On the other hand, they celebrate acclamations being carried to excess, and often the Epiphany with peculiar festivity; have four misplaced, were frequently prohibited by the anLents; pray for the dead; and invoke angels. cient doctors, and at length abrogated. Even as Images in painting they venerate; but abhor all late, however, as the seventeenth and eighteenth those in relievo, except the cross. They admit centuries, we find practices that were not very the apocryphal books and the canons of the apos-decorous; such as loud humming, frequent groantles, as well as the apostolical constitutions, for ing, strange gestures of the body, &c. See argenuine. They allow of divorce, which is easily ticles DANGERS, SHAKERS. granted among them, and by the civil judge; nor do their civil laws prohibit polygamy. They have, at least, as many miracles and legends of saints as the Romish church. They hold that the soul of man is not created; because, say they, God finished all his works on the sixth day. Thus we see that the doctrines and ritual of this sect form a strange compound of Judaism and Christianity, ignorance and superstition. Some, indeed, have been at a loss to know whether they are most Christians or Jews: it is to be ACCOMMODATION of SCRIPTURE is the application of it not to its literal meaning, but to something analogous to it. Thus a prophecy is said to be fulfilled properly when a thing foretold comes to pass; and by way of accommodation, when an event happens to any place or people similar to what fell out some time before to another. Thus the words of Isaiah, spoken to those of his own time, are said to be fulfilled in those who lived in our Saviour's, "Ye hypo crites, well did Esaias prophesy, " &c. which same ACOLYTHI words St. Paul afterwards accommodates to the Jews of his time. Isa. xxix. 14. Matt. xv. 8. Acts xiii. 41. Great care, however, should be taken by preachers who are fond of accommodating texts, that they first clearly state the literal sense of the passage. ACCOMMODATION SYSTEM, a name given to a peculiar mode of scriptural interpretation, adopted during the last century by Semler and other German divines, which teaches, that many things, uttered by our Saviour and his Apostles, in the course of their instructions, are not to be understood as expressing the actual reality and verity of things, or conveying true doctrines, but as merely adopted in accommodation to the popular belief, and the deep-rooted prejudice of the Jews. For instance, when our Saviour speaks of persons being possessed with evil spirits, we are not according to this theory, to imagine there was really any such things as demoniacal possession, or that Christ intended to teach that doctrine; but as the notion had been long prevalent among the Jews that men under the influence of certain bodily diseases were possessed by the devil, he accommodated himself in his language to their weakness and simplicity, "that he might win the more." And so the Apostles. See this dangerous doctrine ably canvassed and refuted in Storr's Essay on the Historical Sense, translated by Gibbs, or the original treatise in his Opuscula.-B. ACCURSED, something that lies under a curse or sentence of excommunication. In the Jewish idiom, accursed and crucified were synonymous: among them, every one was accounted accursed who died on a tree. This serves perhaps to explain the difficult passage in Rom. ix. 2, where the apostle wishes himself accursed after the manner of Christ; i. e. crucified, if happily he might by such a death save his countrymen. The preposition here made use of, is used in the same sense, 2 Tim. i. 3, when it obviously signifies after the manner of. ACEPHALI, i. e. headless; from the privative and *Can head; such bishops were exempt from the discipline and jurisdiction of their ordinary bishop or patriarch. It was also the denomination of certain sects; 1. of those who, in the affair of the council of Ephesus, refused to follow either St. Cyril or John of Antioch; 2. of certain heretics in the fifth century, who, at first, followed Peter Mongus, but afterwards abandoned him upon his subscribing to the council of Chalcedon, they themselves adhering to the Eutychian heresy: and, 3. of the followers of Severus of Antioch, and of all, in general, who held out against the council of Chalcedon. ACOEMETÆ, or ACOEMETI, an order of monks at Constantinople in the fifth century, whom the writers of that and the following ages called Ax, that is, Watchers, because they performed divine service day and night without intermission. They divided themselves into three classes, who alternately succeeded one another, so that they kept up a perpetual course of worship. This practice they founded upon that passage-"Pray without ceasing," 1 Thess. v. 17. ACOLYTHI, or ACOLUTHI, from axoxoubos, a follower, young people who, in the primitive times, aspired to the ministry, and for that purpose continually attended the bishop. In the Romish church, Acolythi were of longer continu-l ACT OF FAITH ance; but their functions were different from those of their first institution. Their business was to light the tapers, carry the candlesticks and the incense pot, and prepare the wine and water. At Rome there were three kinds: 1. those who waited on the pope. 2. those who served in the churches; 3. and others, who together with the deacons, officiated in other parts of the city. ACT OF FAITH (Auto da Fé,) in the Romish church, is a solemn day held by the Inquisition for the punishment of heretics, and the absolution of the innocent accused. They usually contrive the Auto to fall on some great festival, that the execution may pass with the more awe; and it is always on a Sunday. The Auto da Fe may be called the last act of the inquisitorial tragedy: it is a kind of gaol delivery, appointed as often as a competent number of prisoners in the Inquisition are convicted of heresy, either by their own voluntary or extorted confession, or on the evidence of certain witnesses. The process is this:-In the morning they are brought into a great hall, where they have certain habits put on, which they are to wear in the procession, and by which they know their doom. The procession is led up by Dominican friars, after which come the penitents, being all in black coats without sleeves, and barefooted, with a wax candle in their hands. These are followed by the penitents who have narrowly escaped being burnt, who over their black coats have flames painted, with their points turned downwards. Next come the negative and relapsed, who are to be burnt, having flames on their habits pointing upwards. After these come such as profess doctrines contrary to the faith of Rome, who besides flames pointing upwards, have their picture painted on their breasts, with dogs, serpents, and devils, all open-mouthed, about it. Each prisoner is attended by a familiar of the Inquisition; and those to be burnt have also a Jesuit on each hand, who are continually preaching to them to abjure. After the prisoners, comes a troop of familiars on horseback; and after them the Inquisitors, and other officers of the court, on mules: last of all the inquisitorgeneral on a white horse, led by two men with black hats and green hatbands. A scaffold is erected big enough for two or three thousand people; at one end of which are the prisoners, at the other the Inquisitors. After a sermon made up of encomiums on the Inquisition, and invectives against heretics, a priest ascends a desk near the scaffold, and having taken the abjuration of the penitents, recites the final sentence of those who are to be put to death, and delivers them to the secular arm, earnestly beseeching at the same time the secular power not to touch their blood, or put their lives in danger!!! The prisoners, being thus in the hands of the civil magistrate, are presently loaded with chains, and carried first to the secular gaol, and from thence, in an hour or two, brought before the civil judge; who, after asking in what religion they intend to die, pronounces sentence, on such as declare they die in the communion of the church of Rome, that they shall be first strangled, and then burnt to ashes: or such as die in any other faith, that they be burnt alive. Both are immediately carried to the Ribera, the place of execution, where there are as many stakes set up as there are prisoners to be burnt, with a quantity of dry furze about them. The stakes of the professed, that is ADAMITES the church, the council of Jerusalem, and the planting of Christian Churches in the principal provinces of the Roman empire. The history is written with a tolerably strict attention to chronological order, though the author has not affixed a date to any one of the facts recorded by him. But as political events, the dates of which are known, are frequently introduced or alluded to in connexion with the ecclesiastical narrative, the chronology of the whole book is for the most part capable of being pretty definitely settled. The style of the Acts, which was written in Greek, is perspicuous and noble. Though tinctured with Hebraisms, it is in general much purer than that of most other books of the New Testament, particularly in the speeches delivered by Paul. The book forms one of the most important parts of sacred history; for without it neither the Gospels nor Epistles could have been so clearly understood; and by the correspondence of incidental circumstances mentioned in this history and in the Epistles, of such a nature as to show that neither the one nor the other could have been forged, an irrefragable evidence of the truth of Christianity is afforded. Among the most important works expository or illustrative of the Acts of the Apostles are Cradock's Apostolical History; Benson's First Planting of Christianity; Paley's Hora Paulina; Heinrich's Acta Apostolorum; Buddeus' Ecclesia Apostolica.-B. ACTS OF THE APOSTLES such as persist in the heresy, are about four | sion of Paul, the admission of the Gentiles into yards high, having a small board towards the top for the prisoner to be seated on. The negative and relapsed being first strangled and burnt, the professed mount their stakes by a ladder, and the Jesuits, after several repeated exhortations to be reconciled to the church, part with them; telling them that they leave them to the devil, who is standing at their elbow, to receive their souls, and carry them with him to the flames of hell. On this a great shout is raised; and the cry is, "Let the dogs beards be made!" which is done by thrusting flaming furzes fastened to long poles against their faces, till their faces are burnt to a coal, which is accompanied with the loudest acclamations of joy. At last, fire is set to the furze at the bottom of the stake, over which the professed are chained so high, that the top of the flame seldom reaches higher than the seat they sit on; so that they rather seem roasted than burnt. There cannot be a more lamentable spectacle: the sufferers continually cry out while they are able, "Pity for the love of God!" Yet it is beheld by all sexes and ages with transports of joy and satisfaction.O merciful God! is this the benign, humane religion thou hast given to men? Surely not. If such were the genius of Christianity, then it would be no honour to be a Christian. Let us, however, rejoice that the time is coming when the demon of Persecution shall be banished out this our world, and the true spirit of benevolence and candour pervade the universe; when none shall hurt or destroy, but the earth be filled with the knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea! See INQUISITION. ACTION FOR THE PULPIT. See DE CLAMATION. There have been several acts of the apostles, such as the acts of Abdias, of Peter, of Paul, St. John the Evangelist, St. Andrew, St. Thomas, St. Philip, and St. Matthias; but they have been all proved to be spurious. ACTS OF PILATE, a relation sent by Pilate to the Emperor Tiberius, concerning Jesus Christ, his death, resurrection, ascension, and the crimes of which he was convicted before him. It was a custom among the Romans, that the proconsuls and governors of provinces should draw up acts or memoirs of what happened in the course of their government, and send them to the emperor and senate. The genuine acts of Pilate were sent by him to Tiberius, who reported them to the senate; but they were rejected by that assembly, because not immediately addressed to them; as is testified by Tertullian, in his Apol. cap. 5, and 20, 21. The heretics forged acts in imitation of them; but both the genuine and the spurious are now lost. ACTS OF THE APOSTLES, the fifth and last of the historical books of the New Testament, containing a great part of the lives and transactions of Peter and Paul, and of the history of the infant church for the space of twenty-nine or thirty years from the ascension of our Lord to the time of Paul's arrival at Rome after his appeal to Cæsar, A. D. 65. That Luke was the author of the Acts of the Apostles is evident both from the introduction, and from the unanimous testimonies of the early Christians. This book, as well as the Gospel bearing his name, is inscribed to Theophilus, and in the very first verse of the Acts there is a reference made to his Gospel, which he calls the former treatise. From the frequent use of the first person plural it is clear ADAMITES, a sect that sprang up in the that he was present at most of the transactions second century. Epiphanius tells us that they he relates. The design of the author does not were called Adamites from their pretending to appear to have been to give a complete ecclesias- be re-established in the state of innocence, such tical history of the Christian church during the as Adam was at the moment of his creation, period embraced in the work; for he has almost whence they ought to imitate him in going naked. wholly omitted what passed among the Jews af- They detested marriage; maintaining that the ter the conversion of Paul, and is totally silent conjugal union would never have taken place concerning the spread of Christianity in the East upon earth, had sin been unknown. This oband in Egypt, as well as the foundation of the scure and ridiculous sect did not last long. It church of Christ at Rome, as also concerning the was, however, revived with additional absurdities labours and sufferings of most of the other Apos- in the twelfth century. About the beginning of tles besides Peter and Paul; but to relate the the fifteenth century, these errors spread in Germost prominent events connected with the esta- many and Bohemia: it found also some partisans blishment of Christianity, and such as may be in Poland, Holland, and England. They asconsidered to have had the most important bear-sembled in the night; and, it is said, one of the ings upon its subsequent prosperity; among fundamental maxims of their society was conwhich may be reckoned the effusion of the Holy tained in the following verse: Spirit on the day of Pentecost, the persecutions and dispersions of the early disciples, the conver Jura, perjura, secretum prodere noli. 1 ADOPTION ADIAPHORISTS, a name given in the six- | teenth century to the moderate Lutherans who adhered to the sentiments of Melancthon; and afterwards to those who subscribed the Interim of Charles V. [See INTERIM.] The word is of Greek origin (copos,) and signifies indifference or lukewarmness. ADMIRATION is that passion of the mind which is excited by the discovery of any great excellence in an object. It has by some writers been used as synonymous with surprise and wonder; but it is evident they are not the same. Surprise refers to something unexpected; wonder, to something great or strange; but admiration includes the idea of high esteem or respect. Thus, we say we admire a man's excellencies; but we do not say that we are surprised at them. We wonder at an extraordinary object or event, but we do not always admire it. ADMONITION denotes a hint or advice given to another, whereby we reprove him for his fault, or remind him of his duty. Admonition was a part of the discipline much used in the ancient church; it was the first act or step towards the punishment or expulsion of delinquents. In case of private offences, it was performed according to evangelical rule, privately; in case of public offence, openly before the church. If either of these sufficed for the recovery of the fallen person, all further proceedings, in a way of censure, ceased; if they did not, recourse was had to excommunication.—Tit. iii. 10. 1 Thess. v. 14. Eph. vi. 4. ADOPTION adoption is an act of God's free grace, whereby we are received into the number, and have a right to all the privileges of the sons of God. 3. Glorious, is that in which the saints, being raised from the dead, are at the last day solemnly owned to be the children of God, and enter into the full possession of that inheritance provided for them. Rom. viii. 19, 23. Adoption is a word taken from the civil law, and was much in use among the Romans in the Apostles' time; when it was a custom for persons who had no children of their own, and were possessed of an estate, to prevent its being divided or descending to strangers, to make choice of such as were agreeable to them, and beloved by them, whom they took into this political relation of children; obliging them to take their name upon them, and to pay respect to them as though they were their natural parents, and engaging to deal with them as though they had been so; and accordingly to give them a right to their estates, as an inheritance. This new relation, founded in a mutual consent, is a bond of affection; and the privilege arising from thence is, that he, who is in this sense a father, takes care of and provides for the person whom he adopts, as though he were his son by nature; and therefore civilians call it an act of legitima tion, imitating nature, or supplying the place of it. It is easy, then, to conceive the propriety of the term as used by the apostle, in reference to this act, though it must be confessed there is some difference between civil and spiritual adoption. Civil adoption was allowed of and provided for ADONAI, Hebrew, a title of the Su- the relief and comfort of those who had no chilpreme Being in the Scriptures, rendered in En-dren; but in spiritual adoption this reason does glish by the word Lord. The original comes not appear. The Almighty was under no oblifrom Aden, a base, pillar, or supporter; and it is gation to do this; for he had innumerable spirits not a little remarkable that the etymology of our whom he had created, besides his own Son, who vernacular Lord is precisely similar, it being a had all the perfections of the divine nature, who contraction of the old Saxon laford, or hlafford, was the object of his delight, and who is styled from laef, to support or sustain, the same root the heir of all things, Heb. i. 3. When men from which also comes the English word loaf. adopt, it is on account of some excellency in the The Hebrew JEHOVAH is likewise translated persons who are adopted: thus Pharaoh's daughLord in our Bibles, and this is known by its ter adopted Moses because he was exceeding fair, being printed in capital letters, whereas in the Acts vii. 20, 21; and Mordecai adopted Esther other case the common small character is employ-because she was his uncle's daughter, and exed. The Jews, from excessive reverence, never pronounce the name JEHOVAH when they meet with it in reading the Hebrew Scriptures, but invariably substitute Adonai, which has the same vowel points. But there is no law forbidding the enunciation of the name JEHOVAH; nor does it appear to have been scrupled by the ancient Jews.-B. ADONISTS, a party among divines and critics, who maintain that the Hebrew points ordinarily annexed to the consonants of the word Jehovah are not the natural points belonging to that word, nor express the true pronounciation of it; but are the vowel points belonging to the words Adonai and Elohim, applied to the consonants of the ineffable name Jehovah, to warn the readers, that instead of the word Jehovah, which the Jews were forbid to pronounce, and the true pronunciation of which had been long unknown to them, they are always to read Adonai. They are opposed to Jehovists, of whom the principal are Drusius, Capellus, Buxtorf, Alting, and Reland. ADOPTION, an act whereby any person receives another into his family, owns him for his son, and appoints him his heir. 2. Spiritual ceeding fair, Est. ii. 7; but man has nothing in him that merits this divine act, Ezek. xvi. 5. In civil adoption, though the name of a son be given, the nature of a son may not: this relation may not necessarily be attended with any change of disposition or temper. But in the spiritual adoption we are made partakers of the divine nature, and a temper or disposition given us becoming the relationship we bear. Jer. iii. 19. "As Much has been said as to the time of adoption. Some place it before regeneration, because it is supposed we must be in the family before we can be partakers of the blessings of it. But it is diffi cult to conceive of one before the other; for although adoption may seem to precede regeneration in order of nature, yet not of time; they may be distinguished, but cannot be separated. many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name." John i. 12. There is no adoption, says the great Charnock, without_regeneration. "Adoption," says the same author, is not a mere relation: the privilege and the image of the sons of God go together. A state of adoption is never without a separation from defilement." 2 Cor. vi. 17. 18. The new name ADULTERY in adoption is never given till the new creature be formed "As many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God." Rom. viii. 14. Yet these are to be distinguished. Regeneration, as a physical act, gives us a likeness to God in our nature; adoption, as a legal act, gives us a right to an inheritance. Regeneration makes us formally his sons, by conveying a principle, 1 Pet. i. 23; adoption makes us relatively his sons, by conveying a power, John i. 12. By the one we are instated in the divine affection; by the other we are partakers of the divine nature." See Ridgley's and Gill's Body of Div. art. Adoption; Charnock's Works, vol. ii. p. 32-72; Flavel's Works, vol. ii. p. 601; Brown's System of Nat. and Rev. Religion, p. 442; Witsii Econ. Feed. p. 165. AERIANS affection is inflicted a wound the most painful and incurable that human nature knows. The infidelity of the woman is aggravated by cruelty to her children, who are generally involved in their parent's shame, and always made unhappy by their quarrel. The marriage vow is witnessed before God, and accompanied with circumstances of solemnity and religion which approach to the nature of an oath. The married offender, therefore, incurs a crime little short of perjury, and the seduction of a married woman is little less than subornation of perjury. But the strongest apology for adultery is, the prior transgression of the other party; and so far, indeed, as the bad effects of adultery are anticipated by the conduct of the husband or wife who offends first, the guilt of the second offender is extenuated. But this can never amount to a justification, unless it could be shown that the obligation of the marriage vow depends upon the condition of reciprocal fidelity: a construction which appears founded neither in expediency, nor in the terms of the vow, nor in the design of the legislature, which prescribed the marriage rite. To consider the offence upon the footing of provocation, therefore, can by no means vindicate retaliation. "Thou shalt not commit adultery," it must ever be remembered, was an has been punished in almost all ages and nations. By the Jewish law it was punished with death in both parties, where either the woman was married, or both. Among the Egyptians, adultery in the man was punished by a thousand lashes with rods, and in the woman by the loss of her nose, The Greeks put out the eyes of the adulterers. Among the Romans, it was punished by banishment, cutting off the ears, noses, and by sewing the adulterers in sacks, and throwing them into the sea; scourging, burning, &c. In Spain and Poland they were almost as severe. The Saxons formerly burnt the adulteress, and ADORATION, the act of rendering divine honours, including in it reverence, esteem, and love this is called supreme, or absolute. The word is compounded of ad, "to," and os, oris, "mouth" and literally signifies to apply the hand to the mouth, "to kiss the hand;" this being, in the eastern countries, one of the great marks of respect and submission. See Job xxxi. 26, 27. The attitude of adoration, however, we find has not been confined to this mode; standing, kneeling, uncovering the head, prostration, bow-interdict delivered by God himself. This crime ing, lifting up the eyes to heaven, or sometimes fixing them upon the earth with the body bending forward; sitting with the under parts of the thighs resting on the heels, have all been used, as expressive of veneration and esteem. Whatever be the form, however, it must be remembered, that adoration, as an act of worship, is due to God alone, Matt. iv. 10. Acts x. 25, 26. Rev. xix. 10. There is, 2. what may be called adoration human, or paying homage or respect to persons of great rank and dignity. This has been performed by bowing, bending the knee, falling on the face. The practice of adoration may be said to be still subsisting in England, in the ceremony of kiss-over her ashes erected a gibbet, whereon the ing the king's or queen's hand, and in serving them at table, both being performed kneeling on one knee. There is also, 3. adoration relative, which consists in worship paid to an object as belonging to or representative of another. In this sense the Romanists profess to adore the cross, not simply or immediately, but in respect of Jesus Christ, whom they suppose to be on it. This is generally, however, considered by Protestants as coming little short of idolatry. See IDOLATRY. ADULTERY, an unlawful commerce be-edition. tween one married person and another, or between a married and unmarried person.-2. It is also used in Scripture for idolatry, or departing from the true God, Jer. iii. 9.-3. Also for any species of impurity or crime against the virtue of chastity, Matt. v. 28.-4. It is also used in ecclesiastical writers for a person's invading or intruding into a bishopric during the former bishop's life.-5. The word is also used in ancient customs for the punishment or fine imposed for that offence, or the privilege of prosecuting for it. Although adultery is prohibited by the law of God, yet some have endeavoured to explain away the moral turpitude of it; but it is evident, observes Paley, that, on the part of the man who solicits the chastity of a married woman, it certainly includes the crime of seduction, and is attended with mischief still more extensive and complicated: it creates a new sufferer, the injured husband, upon whose adulterer was hanged. King Edmund, in this kingdom, ordered adultery to be punished in the same manner as homicide. Canute ordered the man to be banished, and the women to have her nose and ears cut off. Modern punishments in different nations, do not seem to be so severe. In Britain it is reckoned a spiritual offence, and is cognizable by the spiritual courts, where it is punished by fine and penance. See Paley's Mora and Political Philosophy, p. 309. vol. i. 12th AERIANS, the name of a sect which arose in the fourth century, under the reign of Constantine, so called from Aerius, a presbyter of Sebas tia in Pontus, their founder. The errors laid to the charge of Aerius by Epiphanius are, 1. That a presbyter or elder differs not in order and degree from a bishop, but he who is a presbyter is called a bishop. 2. That there is properly speaking no passover remaining to be observed or celebrated among Christians. 3. That fasts ought not to be fixed to certain and stated annual days and solemnities. 4. That prayers ought not to be offered for the dead. It must be accounted strange, that these doctrines should, with orthodox Christians, ever be adduced as evidence of heresy. And, accordingly, the reader will find in the works of Mr. John Glas, vol. iv. an able attempt to vindi cate the character of Aerius from the opprobrium usually cast upon it by ecclesiastical writers-B. |