THE NEW SCHAFF-HERZOG
steadily, with insufficient food, that his health failed in 1S27. llv then tried school-teaching at Gainsborough and Lincoln, and became also a Methodist local preacher in 1S29. Differences with the ilethodist superintendents, for which he does not seem to have been altogether at fault, brought him out of sympathy witli religious work. He became a reporter for country newspapers and tried unsuccessfully to obtain work in London. In 1S40 he joined the Chartist movement and for four years was a leader of their extreme party; served two years in Stafford jail on a charge of conspiracy and sedition. After his release he abandoned the Chartists and appeared as a lecturer on historical and poUtical subjects before radical and freethinking audiences. In 1856 his views changed and he became an itinerant preacher, and lecturer on the evidences of natural and revealed religion. In the course of eight and one-half years he preached 1,169 times, lectured 2,204 times, visited every county of England, and many of the counties of Scotland and Wales. In 1866 his health broke do^^Ti and certain of his friends presented him with an annuity of £100; he went back to his work, however, the next year. He joined the General Baptists in 1859. Besides political writings, novels, and poems (collected ed., London, 1877), he pubhshed The Bridge of History over the Gulf of Time; a popular view of the historical evidence for the truth of Christianity (London, 1871; 4th ed., 1889); Plain Pulpit Talk (1872; 2d ed., 1873); his Life, written by himself (1872; popular ed., 1880); God, the Soul, and a Future State (1873); The Verity of Christ's Resurrection (1875; new ed., 1884); The Verity and Value of the Miracles of Christ (1876); Evolution : the stone book and the Mosaic record of creation (1878); The Atonement (1880); Thoughts at Fourscore and Earlier (1885).
COOPERATOR: A priest appointed for an indefinite time to assist the regular incmnbent, dependent upon the latter and strictly subordinate to him; the term is applied especially to an assistant in a mother church which has affiliations.
COPE. See Vestments and Insignia, Ecclesiastical.
COPLESTON, REGINALD STEPHEN: Anglican bishop of Calcutta and metropolitan of India; b. at Barnes (6 m. w. of London), Surrey, Dec. 26, 1845. He studied at Merton College, Oxford (B.A., 1869; M.A., 1871), was ordered deacon in 1872, and ordained priest in 1875. He became a fellow and tutor of St. John's College, Oxford, in 1869, was consecrated bisliop of Colombo in 1875, and translated to the diocese of Calcutta in 1902. He has written /Eftrhylus (London, 1870) and Buddhism, Primitive and Present, in Magadha and in Ceylon (1892).
COPPIN (COPPING), JOHN: English Separatist. He lived at Bury St. Edmunds, became an enthusiastic adherent of Robert Browne (q.v.), preached Browne's doctrines, and disseminated his books. For refusing to conform to the ecclesiastical laws and usages he was imprisoned, 1576, and kept in confinement for seven years, but was treated
leniently. Persisting in his course, using violent language, and behaving offensively, in 1583, with a fellow prisoner named Elias Thacker, he was brought to trial charged with disobeying the laws and " dispersing Browne's books and Harrison's books." Both were convicted and hanged, Thacker on June 4, Coppin on June 5, 1583.
Bibliography: H. M. Dexter, Congregationalism of the Latt Three Hundred Years, pp. 208-210, New York, 1880.
COPTIC CHURCH.
1. History.
To the Death of Justinian, 565 (§ 1). The Arab Dominion, 639-1517 (§ 2). Turkish and Modern Rule (§ 3). Statistics (§ 4). II. Constitution, Ecclesiastical Law, ete.
III. Liturgy, Church Buildings, etc. Liturgies (§1).
Doctrine and Practise (§ 2). Churches (§ 3).
IV. Monasticism.
V. Ecclesiastical Literature.
The Coptic Church is the Monophysite or Jacobite Church of Egypt. The word Coptic " is the European form of the Arabic Kibt, the Greek [Ai]gyptos.
I. History: The traditional apostle of Egypt is St. Mark (as early as Eusebius, Hist, eccl., ii. 16), though evidences of still earlier Christianity may be seen in Acts ii. 10, viii. 26 sqq., xi. 20, xiii. 1, xviii. 24. From apostolic times to the middle of the second century little is heard beyond the names of Alexandrian teachers (see Alexandria, School of) and bishops. Among subsequent bishops the first to stand forth distinctly is Demetrius (d. 231), the friend and later the opponent of Origen (q.v.); of his successors, Dionysius (d. 264) and Peter (qq.v.; d. 311) are conspicuous. It is only by the heavy tribute of martyrs in the persecutions during the lives of these two, to which — under Diocletian— Peter fell a victim, that we realize something of the strength of the new religion in southern Egypt. The peace of Constantine was speedily upset by the Arian disturbance, which appears, however, to have affected mainly the Greek-speaking population of the north. In the southern districts, the real home of Egyptian Christianity, the Athanasians found steady support. On I. To the the basis of the Nicene victory, Atha- Death of nasius had raised his church to a dom- Justinian, inant place, a position maintained for 565. almost a century. His successors, notably Theophilus (d. 412), were ambitious of further magnifying their advantage, and, notwithstanding the rebuff at the Council of 381 (see Arianism), Cyril (d. 444) was eventually able, thanks to the opportunity afforded him by Nestorius (q.v.), to figure at Ephesus (431) as the champion of orthodoxy. The Coptic Church was interested in this struggle by the presence at Ephesus of Shenoute, the famous abbot of the White Monastery (Achmim), Cyril's uncompromising supporter. With Cyril's tactless and violent successor, Dioscurus, the turning-point of the Church's history is reached. Successful at the " Robber Synod " (449), he was defeated and exiled at Chalcedon (451); yet his Monophysite creed (see MoNOphysiteb), condenmed by official orthodoxy, now