It is true of the Oriental Churches, that they have lost nearly all the essential principles of the Gospel; at least that those principles have, in great measure, ceased to have a practical influence.1 Their views of the Trinity, and of the divine and human natures of Christ, are not unscriptural; but their views of the way of salvation through the Son, and of the work of the Holy Spirit, are sadly perverted. The efficacy of Christ's death for the pardon of sin, is secured to the sinner, they suppose, by baptism and penance. The belief is universal, that baptism cancels guilt, and is regeneration. They also believe baptism to be the instrumental cause of justification. Hence faith is practically regarded as no more than a general assent of the understanding to the creeds of their churches. Of the doctrine of a justifying faith of the heart,--the distinguishing doctrine of the Gospel,--the people of the Oriental Churches are believed to have been wholly ignorant, before the arrival of Protestant missionaries among them. 1 This brief description of the religion of the Oriental Churches, is condensed from a statement by that eminent missionary, Dr. Eli Smith, in a sermon published in 1833, but now accessible to very few. I often use his words, as best adapted to convey the true idea. Subsequent observations, so far as I know, have never called for any modification in his statement. Being thus freed from the condemning power of original sin, and regenerated by baptism, men were expected to work their way to heaven by observing the laws of God and the rites of the church. These rites were fasting, masses, saying of prayers, pilgrimages, and the like, and in practice crowded the moral law out of mind. The race of merit was hindered by daily sins, but not stopped, provided the sins were of a class denominated venial. These could be canceled by the rites of the church, the most important of which was the mass, or the consecration and oblation of the elements of the Lord's Supper. That ordinance is to be observed in remembrance of Christ, but the people of the Oriental Churches are taught to look upon it as a renewal of his death. On the priest's pronouncing the words, "This is my body," the elements are believed to be changed from bread and wine, and thenceforth to contain the body and blood, the soul and divinity, of Christ; so that He is crucified afresh, and made an expiatory sacrifice for sin, every time the consecration is performed; which, in most churches, is almost every morning in the year. Its merit attaches not only to the offerer and the partaker, but to all the faithful, living and dead; especially to those who, by paying the priest, or by some other service, have their names mentioned in the prayers that form a part of the ceremony.