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 242 CONGO SNAKE CONGREGATIONALISM Between the cataract and the sea not a single tributary falls into the river on either side. Near the coast the stream is studded with islands, and the adjacent country is low, level, and swampy, abounding in mangrove growths. Further inland hills rise parallel to the banks, and not far from them, to a height of 2,000 ft. The vegetation of the valley is for the most part exceedingly luxuriant. The river forms the N. boundary of the kingdom of Congo, which it separates from Loango. It was once thought to be the outlet of the Niger. The German geographer Petermann regards it as identical with the great river Lualaba recently discovered by Livingstone in central Africa, and hence as connected with the vast lacus- trine system of the equatorial region. Capt. J. K. Tuckey of the British navy, who explored it in 1816, then expressed the opinion that large lake or chain of lakes, considerably to the northward of the line." Further explora- tions of the Congo by scientific expeditions from Europe are now (1873) in progress. CONGO SNARE (amphiuma means, Linn.), one of the batrachian family of the amphiumidce, destitute of gills except at the earliest periods of life, breathing by exposed spiracles or bran- chial openings on the sides of the neck, and undergoing, accord- ing to Holbrook, no metamorphosis. Its general aspect is snake-like ; the head large, lips thick and extensile, snout de- pressed and round- ed, neck contracted with a transverse fold at the throat ; numerous small teeth on the maxilla- ry and palate bones ; a single spiracle on each side of the neck; limbs four, the an- terior very small, with two fingers, and the posterior still smaller, with two toes. It is found in the southern and southwestern United States, attaining a length of 28 inches, of which the head is 2 and the tail 6 inches ; deep bluish black above, tinged with violet, lips and throat lighter, and under surface dark purple. These animals live in muddy waters, or in the mud, burrowing in the ditches of the rice fields, and feeding on small fish, mollusks, and insects; they are sometimes found on land, apparently seeking a favorable locality. They are con- sidered by the southern negroes as highly venomous, but are really entirely harmless. In the A. tridaetylum (Cuv.), the anterior fingers are three and the posterior also; the different number of fingers is the principal dis- tinction between this and the other species. CONGREGATIONALISM, a form of church pol- ity, or a system of ecclesiastical organization, Amphiuma means. management, and control. Its correlatives are Presbyterianism, Episcopacy, Papacy. Its es- sential peculiarity is that it maintains the in- dependence of each particular congregation of Christians, and their sufficiency to perfect and preserve their own organization, to elect and inaugurate their own officers, and, with and through those officers, to perform all needful ecclesiastical acts. Like every other system of church order, it may be connected with any form of doctrine, and with any particular mode of worship. This polity in its general principle is adopted not only by those known as Congre- gationalists, but also by the Baptist denomina- tion, and in this country by Unitarians and Universalists, and by some who hold the theo- logical opinions of the Methodists. In the common, though more limited and strictly de- nominational sense in which it will be used in this article, the word Congregational designates a class of churches which hold in general that system of theology which was maintained by Augustine and Calvin, and which has been explained, advocated, and amended by the theologians of New England in their succes- sive generations. Congregationalists define a church to be an organization of professed be- lievers, statedly meeting in one place, and uni- ted together by covenant for mutual watchful- ness and edification, for the maintenance of divine worship and the observance of Chris- tian ordinances. There is no " Congregational church of the United States," but a collection of Congregational churches. Hence their ef- forts are not directed so much to "church ex- tension " as to the multiplication and strength- ening of churches. The definition given im- plies an organization, and not a mere accident- al assembly, composed of believers in Christ, who profess to be converts, and who give credible evidence of piety by lives of holiness ; they become members by election and by mu- tual covenant, for the sake primarily of the ob- jects stated. Church members, in their indi vidual capacity, are reasonably looked to as leaders in every good work ; they are expected, as opportunity oifers and conscience dictates, to cooperate in missionary, educational, and reformatory enterprises. In fact, these enter- prises owe their chief strength and efficiency to the enlightened and conscientious support of Christians ; yet a church in its organic con- stitution does not exist specifically for any such enterprise, and is seldom called upon as an organization to endorse or espouse specific measures of social, political, or moral reform extraneous to its own body. There is some difference of opinion concerning the relation of the baptized children of Christian parents to the church ; but the universal usage is to admit them to full communion only upon satisfactory evidence of their conversion and piety. A church thus defined is to be distin- guished from the congregation, which includes all who meet in the same place, non- com- municants as well as the church members;
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