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Reformed Church (Religious body in the United)

a religious body in the United States, whose designation has been changed from that of its progenitor, the Reformed Protestant Dutch Church, which arose in the Netherlands early in the 16th century and attained its form and organization during the struggle against Philip II. under the leadership of the princes of Orange.

The Church was introduced into America early in that century. Public worship was commenced at New Amsterdam in 1643. After the surrender of New Amsterdam to the English in 1664 the growth of the Church was slow. The Dutch language was used exclusively in worship down to 1763. About the middle of the 18th century arose the noted coetus and conferentie controversy, which turned on the question of dependence of the Church of Holland. An independent Church organization was effected in 1771. From 1817 to 1857 the Reformed Church co-operated with other bodies in supporting foreign missions; and from 1836 with the American Board.

In 1857 an amicable separation from the latter was effected, and the missions of Amoy and Arcot were transferred to the Reformed Church. The doctrinal standards of the Church are: (1) the Belgic confession of faith; (2) the Heidelberg catechism; (3) the canons of the Synod of Dort. The synod of 1874 adopted a revised liturgy, the use of which is optional. The government of the Church is according to the Genevan model. The officers are ministers, elders, and deaconsistory, to cons, who compose the consi which the government of the individual church belongs. The classis, consisting of the ministers within a certain district and one elder delegated from each church, corresponds to the presbytery in the Presbyterian Church. The particular synods, of which there are four, New York, Albany, New Brunswick, and Chicago, are delegated bodies composed of four ministers and four elders from each classis within the bounds of each synod.

These are courts of appeal from the decisions of the classis. The general synod is the highest court of appeal, and exercises a general supervisory power over REFORMED CHURCH the Church. It is composed of three ministers and three elders from each classis. In 1867 the word "Dutch" was York, 1828. There are two theological the other in connection with Hope Col- seminaries, one at New Brunswick, N. J., weekly journal devoted to the interests of the Church, was established in New York, 1828. There are two theological seminaries, one at New Brunswick, N. J., the other in connection with Hope College, at Holland, Mich. Statistics, 1919: Churches, 708; ministers, 756; members, 144,166. of the REFORMED CHURCH IN THE UNITED STATES, formerly German Reformed Church in the United States Palatinate in 1727, and settled in Penn- emigrated with about 400 people of the Church of Germany. The first minister was the Rev. George Michael Weiss, who emigrated with about 400 people of Palatinate in 1727, and settled in Pennsylvania, E. of the Susquehanna. In tions. He assembled in Philadelphia the sions in America, and regulate their rela- south Holland to visit their German miscommissioned by the synods of north and south Holland to visit their German missions in America, and regulate their relations. He assembled in Philadelphia the first synod or coetus of the German Reformed Church, 1747. The German Reformed coetus continued under the jurisdiction of the Church of Holland till 1793, when an independent synod was formed. It increased rapidly in memburgh, 1863. The general synod of 1869 over the whole Church, met in Pittstriennial general synod, with jurisdiction over the whole Church, met in Pittsburgh, 1863. The general synod of 1869 resolved to drop the word "German" from the title of the Church. The Heidelberg catechism is the only standard of doctrine. The worship of the Church is liturgical; its government is presbyterian. Reception into the full communion of the Church takes place by the rite of confirmation. Christmas, Good Friday, Easter, and Whitsunday are observed with much solemnity. Eleven English and five German papers are published in the interest of the Church; and there are 16 theological and literary institutions under its control. Statistics, members, 340,671. 1919: Churches, 1,731; ministers, 1,242; members, 340,671.

REFORMED EPISCOPAL CHURCH, a denomination organized by members of the Protestant Episcopal Church, who a denomination organized by members give substantially the following statement of the events and circumstances give substantially the following statewhich, as they believe, justify their tion in England had outwardly a politi- (1) The Protestant Reformacal origin (in the act of the king, Henry ary VIII., renouncing allegiance to course: the Pope, and proclaiming himself head of the English Church), by which the work was biased and cut short. During of the English Church), by which the the Pope, and proclaiming himself head the brief life of the young king, Edward VI., the regent, or protector, being in favor of the Reformation, great progress in it was made. Under Mary the suedged. When Elizabeth became queen, wishing to harmonize. her divided subjects, and hoping for reconciliation with premacy of the Pope was again acknowl- Rome, she strove to have the liturgy elements. At a later period, when she Consequently it contained contradictory had found her hope futile, the articles of elements. At a later period, when she faith adopted were decidedly Protestant.

Thus it came to pass that in the Church of England two parties found support Thus it came to pass that in the Church faith adopted were decidedly Protestant. in her ritual; the one Protestant, the other having an affinity with Rome. (2) After the American Revolution, when became the Protestant Episcopal Church of the United States, the Book of Comthe Church of England in the colonies mon Prayer, having been adopted without material alterations, retained its conflicting elements. (3) The Tractarian movement, which began at Oxford, 1833, was a successful endeavor to revive the principles of antiquity and Catholicity contained in the prayer book, in opposition to its Protestant elements.

It discarded Protestant principles and taught the doctrines of ap cession, priestly absolution, baptismal re- taught the doctrines of apostolic sucgeneration, authority of the Church. (4) These teachings produced a powerful effect in authority of the Church. (4) These generation, the real presence, and the apostolic sucthe United States also. A great increase on, the real presence, and the in ritualism, and of the drift toward Rome, was soon manifested; the opposition between the "High" and the "Low sition between the "High" and the "Low Rome, was soon manifested; the oppopractical measures were adopted by each practical measures were adopted by each subsequent public events fanned the flame of discontent, especially the cenof another for omitting the word "regenerate" in the baptismal office. (6) sure of one clergyman for preaching in Remonstrances and petitions for relief, a Methodist Church, and the suspension which were numerously and urgently presented to the General sions of the Evangelical Alliance in New produced no effect. (7) During the ses. presented to the General Convention, produced no effect. (7) During the ses of the diocese of Kentucky, having, by eral Convention, York in October, 1873, Bishop Cummins tion of the Lord's Supper, in company with representatives of other denominalowship bitterly censured through the tions, was for this act of Christian felpress by members of the "High Church" party. After this, convinced that he could no longer rightfully continue in a church whose theory and practice (as interpreted by the majority of its mem- REFORMED EPISCOPAL REFORMED PRESBYTERIAN bers) denied the brotherhood of believers in Christ, Bishop Cummins withdrew from the ministry of the Protestant Episcopal Church. (8) This led to the organization, Dec. 2, 1873, of the Reformed Episcopal Church, of which Bishop Cummins and the Rev. Dr. Charles E. Cheney were elected bishops. At the same time the following declaration of principles was adopted: I. The Reformed Episcopal Church "holding the faith once delivered to the saints" declares its belief in the Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments as the Word of God, and the sole rule of faith and practice; in the creed "commonly called the Apostles' Creed"; in the divine institution of the sacraments of baptism and the Lord's Supper; and in the doctrines of grace substantially as they are set forth in the Thirty-nine Articles of Religion. II. This Church, recognizes and adheres to Episcopacy, not as of divine right, but as a very ancient and desirable form of Church polity. III. This Church, retaining a liturgy which shall not be imperative or repressive of freedom in prayer, accepts the Book of Common Prayer, as it was revised, proposed, and recommended for use by the General Convention of the Protestant Church, 1785; reserving full liberty to alter, abridge, enlarge, and amend the same as may seem most conducive to the edification of the people, "provided that the substance of the faith be kept entire."

IV. This Church condemns and rejects the following erroneous and strange doctrines as contrary to God's word: (1) That the Church of Christ exists only in one order or form of ecclesiastical policy. (2) That Christian ministers are "priests" in another sense than that in which all believers are "a royal priesthood." (3) That the Lord's table is an altar on which the oblation of the body and blood of Christ is offered anew to the Father. (4) That the presence of Christ in the Lord's Supper is a presence in the elements of bread and wine. (5) That regeneration is inseparably connected with baptism. To this statement it may be added that in this Church the bishops do not constitute a separate order, but are presbyters; in council they vote with and as their brother presbyters, and are subject to confirmation or appointment by the general council. In 1919 the denominations had in the United States and Canada 11,217 communicants.

REFORMED PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH, or CAMERONIANS, a body of Christians who profess to hold the principles of the Church of Scotland at the period of the second Reformation be- REFRACTION tween 1638 and 1650. They claim to be the legitimate successors of that section of the Covenanters which was headed by Cameron and Cargill, who considered that Charles II. had forfeited all title to their allegiance, having broken the solemn vows which he made at his coronation. When William of Orange was called to the throne in 1688 they were among the first to welcome him; but while they avowed their readiness to yield all loyal obedience and submission they they openly openl declared their dissatisfaction with the Revolution settlement. In 1690 Presbyterianism was established in Scotland, but because the state claimed a certain control over the Church this settlement was also repudiated by the Reformed Presbyterians. The position which the sect was thus compelled to occupy was that of dissenters from the Church and protesters against the state.

For upward of 16 years after they had publicly avowed their principles they remained in an unorganized condition and without a regular ministry. The first who exercised this office was the Rev.

John McMillan, who in 1706 demitted his charge as parish minister of Balmaghie, and in 1743 he met with a coadjutor in the Rev. Thomas Na Nairne, whereupon these two constituted a Reformed presbytery in 1743. In 1810 three presbyteries were formed, and in 1811 a synod was constituted. The number of presbyteries was afterward increased to six, and the number of ministers rose to about 40. In 1876 a large portion of them united with the Free Church of Scotland. The Reformed Presbyterians in the United States in 1919 had about 10,000 members.

REFRACTION. When a beam of a light traveling in a transparent medium, impinges obliquely upon the surface of another transparent medium, what occurs in the vast majority of cases is that a part of it is reflected (see REFLECTION) and a part of it enters the second medium, but in so doing is "refracted" or bent out of its former course. If, for example, the light travel in air and impinge obliquely on glass, the course of the refracted portion is bent so that the refracted light travels more directly or less obliquely through the glass; and, conversely, if the light travel in glass and impinge on an air surface, the portion which is refracted into the air will travel through the air more obliquely with respect to the refracting surface than the original light had approached it. The law of refraction was discovered by Snell in 1621, and is the following: The refracted ray is in the same plane with the incident and the reflected REFRACTION ray, and is therefore in the "plane of incidence," and the sine of the angle of incidence bears to the sine of the angle of refraction a ratio which remains constant, for any two media, whatever be the angle of incidence.

The observed fact that light is differently bent in its course by different refracting media shows that there is a difference between bodies in their power of receiving light through their bounding surface. Newton, in accordance with his corpuscular theory, interpreted this as showing that when the luminous corpuscles come very near the surface of a denser substance they are as it were jerked or made to swerve out of an oblique path and hurried in by the attraction of the denser substance so as to enter that substance more directly; and that when the light quits the denser substance it is retarded by a similar attraction. The consequence of this would be that light would travel in the denser medium perhaps not appreciably faster than in air, but with a mean velocity certainly not less. On the undulatory theory, however, refraction is a necessary consequence of a slower travel of ether-disturbances in the denser medium.

When a spherical wave impinges on a plane surface it is modified into a hyperboloid, the center of curvature of the central portion of which is farther away than or nearer than the center of the sphere in the ratio of the refractive index of the second medium to that of the first. An eye within a rarer medium will thus see the image of a point situated within the denser medium as if it were nearer than it really is; hence a stick appears bent when partly immersed obliquely in water; and, owing to differences in the amount of refraction at different angles, the bottom of a tank looked down upon appears sunk in the middle.

Why ether disturbances of differing wave lengths are differently refracted in such a medium as glass is not yet perfectly clear. The fact that ether disturbances of greater frequencies are propagated more slowly through optically denser matter may be fairly inferred to arise from a mutual interaction of the ether, periodically stressed and released, and the matter amid whose molecules the disturbance is propagated.

The question is complicated by the downright absorption or non-transmission of many particular wave lengths, and by the peculiar behavior of some particular transparent substances which produce "anomalous dispersion"; for example, iodine vapor refracts red light more than blue, and blue more than violet; and Vol. VII-Cyc REFRACTION fuchsine refracts blue and violet light less than it does red, orange, and yellow, while it absorbs the rest. Further, it is found that in these cases of anomalous dispersion the substance generally has in the solid form a surface color different from that seen through its solution; and there are always absorption bands, on the red side of which the refrangibility is increased, while on the other side it is diminished, as if the molecules themselves took up oscillations of particular periods and hurried on the propagation of slightly slower or retarded that of slightly more rapid oscillations of the ether. It appears as if this kind of action were never wholly absent; the spectrum produced by a prism never wholly coincides with the diffraction spectrum in which the deviation for each wave length depends directly on the wave length itself; and the spectrum produced by a prism say of crown glass does not exactly coincide in its visible distribution of colors with a spectrum of equal length made by a flint-glass prism. This is called the "irrationality of dispersion."

If we take two prisms, one of crown, the other of flint-glass and pass a beam of light through; then, if the angles of these prisms be suitable, the rays dispersed by the one will be collected by the other, and there will on the whole be deviation without dispersion; but not absolutely so, on account of the irrationality of dispersion of both prisms, the effect of which is that a calculated ratio of angles and refractive indices which will cause deviation without dispersion for any given pair of wave lengths will, to a very slight extent in most cases, fail to do so for the other wave lengths present in the mixed light transmitted through the system. By the use of three prisms three wave lengths may similarly be achromatized.

Double Refraction. - The wave surface developed when a disturbance originates at a point in a homogeneous medium, like glass, is spherical in form. In uniaxial crystals the disturbance travels with two wave fronts, one spherical, the other ellipsoidal; and the two wave fronts are coincident along the direction of the optic axis. Of such crystals some are "positive," such as quartz and ice, and in these the sphere incloses the ellipsoid; in "negative" crystals, such as Iceland spar and tourmaline, the ellipsoid incloses the sphere. In biaxial crystals the three optical axes are dissimilar, and the wave surfaces become complex; there are two refracted rays.

If a doubly refracting substance be put between two crossed Nicol's prisms light passes; and by this means it is found REFRIGERATION that many substances ordinarily not double refracting become so when exposed to unequal stress, as by pressure, heat, or rapid cooling.