and of Conftantinople were ftill antagonists: The tidings that John, prelate of the latter eity, had affumed the title of oecumenical, or universal bishop, ftruck Pelagius the Roman pontiff with horror. Roufing himfelf at length to repel the fatal blow, he declaimed by his reprefentative Gregory (who afterwards became pope) against the blafphemy of the title; and thundered againft his daring rival the portentous appellation of Antichrift. Perhaps he forgot that his own predeceffors, whofe rights he was thus eager to maintain, had long claimed the jurifdiction implied in the name of universal bishop; and had affumed the kindred dénomination of head of the univerfal church. At this period, however, the Gothic kings of Italy, no less than the Eaftern emperors, denied the unlimited au thority of the pontiff; and exacted from him various tokens of fubmiffion.

The feventh century witneffed the extenfion of the Chriftian faith in the Eaft to China and the remoteft parts of Afia,

chiefly by the labours of the Neftorians. In the Weft the faith of the Gospel became univerfal throughout our own ifland; whence it was carried to Batavia, and other parts of the continent. Compulsory converfions of the perfecuted Jews were urged forward by the emperor Heraclius: and by the monarchs of Gaul and Spain, in the face of the avowed difapprobation of the Roman pontiff. Darkness and ignorance overfpread the Chriftian world, under the aufpicious aid of the fubtleties of Ariftotelian logic. The vices of the monastic clergy augmented with their riches. The fuperftitions of the preceding age multiplied. Penitential discipline was formed into a system; and became generally recognised as a full expiation for fin. By a law of pope Boniface V. the churches were rendered places of refuge to all perfons, who should fly to them for protection: and thus became public afylums for the most abandoned criminals. To the turbulent remains of ancient divifions the new fect

of

of Monothelites was added; and tormented and perlexed the Eaft and the West with metaphysical disputes concerning the unity of will in the two natures of Chrift. In the courfe of this controverfy pope Honorius, and his Monothelite doctrine were formally condemned in the prefence of the papal legates by the general council of Conftantinople: a circumftance which has produced no fmall embarraffment to Roman Catholic writers, who have felt themselves bound by their faith to uphold the perfect infallibility both of general councils and of popes. The claims however of papal fupremacy were urged with fuch unceafing ardor, that Boniface III. fought and obtained, A. D. 606, from the emperor Phocas, one of the most deteftable of tyrants, that very title of œcumenical or univerfal bishop; the defire of which, Gregory, his predeceffor in the fee of Rome, had fligmatifed in John of Byzantium as a characteristic of Antichrift. Yet much fition continued to be made to them by

oppo

temporal.

temporal fovereigns. Pope Martin, having treated the Imperial edicts with extreme contempt, in confequence of their being favourable to Monothelitifm, of which, unlike to the future pope Honorius, he was a bitter enemy; and having folemnly anathematised and configned to the devil and his angels the Monothelites and their patrons; was feized, at the command of the enraged emperor Conftans, by the exarch of Italy, and detained prisoner for a year, with much cruel ufage, in the ifle of Naxos. The ancient Britons and the Scots diftinguished themselves by perfeverance in maintaining their religious independence.

In the midst of these contentions, and from a remote and difregarded corner of the East, a new and tremendous fcourge of Christianity had arisen. Mahomet had established his imposture in Arabia. Born of the nobleft family of the most honourable tribe among his countrymen, yet befet with indigence and obfcurity, he paffed his early years in the humble occupations

of a camel-driver and of a commercial agent to a wealthy widow; until he was raised to distinction by becoming the hufband of his employer. In the political and religious fituation of the inhabitants of Arabia he perceived an opening, by which a daring, and fagacious, and unprincipled adventurer might arrive at unlimited dominion. Divided into a number of unconnected and hoftile tribes, the Arabians were not likely to unite into a general confederacy against any perfon, who might appear to aim at fuperiority over one or two tribes. The very enmity of fome was likely to conciliate to him the friendship and affiftance of others. Those whom private and national antipathies had thus feparated, were kept afunder ftill more widely by differences in religion. Arabia, the land of freedom, was peopled with dif cordant fects of every perfuafion. With Jews it abounded as early as at the day of Pentecoft; and had received numbers of fugitives from the arms of the Romans. In many parts of the country Christianity