BOHEMIAN BRETH'ItEN is the name of a religious society which was first instituted in Prague about the middle of the 15th century. It was orieinally composed of rem nants ef the Hussites. Dissatisfied with the conduct of the Calixtines they betook themselves, in 1453, to th (borders of Silesia and Monosia, where they settled. I fere they dwelt in separate communities, and were distinguished by the name of Brothers of the Rule of Christ. Their adversaries of ten confounded t hem the 'Waldenses and Pieards, while on account of their being compelled during persecution to hide in eaves and solitary places, they were also called cave-dwellers In spite of oppression, such was the constancy of their faith cud purity of their morals, that they became profoundly respected, and their numbers greatly increased. The chief peculiarity of their creed was the denial of the ordinary Catholic doctrine of transubstantiation; but. in truth, they rejected tradition generally, and professed to found their tenets only on the Billie. Their ecclesiastical constitution and church discipline—of which the Lutheran reformers spoke highly—was a close imitation of that of the primitive Christian communities. They even went the length of practically denying anything to be secular; and, under the Impression that religion should consciously penetrate and characterize the entire life of men, they extended ecclesiastical authority over the very details of domestic life. Their chief functionaries were bishops, seniors and conseniors, presbyters or preachers, tediles, and acolytes. Their first bishop was consecrated by a Waldensian bishop; though they
never united themselves with the Bohemian Waldenses. It was against their principles to engage in war; and having, on several occasions, refused to take up aims, they were at last deprived of their religious privileges. The result was, that, in 1.548, about a thousand of the brethren removed to Poland and Prussia. The contract which these exiles entered into with the Polish reformers at Sandomir, 14th April, 1570, mid, still more, the religious peace concluded by the Polish states in 1572, secured their tolera tion; but subsequently, in consequence of the persecutions of king Sigismund III. ,they united themselves more closely to the Protestants, though even at the present day they retain something of their old ecclesiastical constitution, The brethren who remained in Bohemia and Moravia obtained a little freedom under the emperor Maximilian II., and had their chief seat at Fulnek, in Moravia. In the 17th e., a number removed into Hun gary, but during the reign of Maria Theresa were coerced into Catholicism. The thirty years' war, so disastrous to the Bohemian Protestants, entirely broke up the societies of the B. B.; but afterwards they united again, though in secrecy. Their exodus about 1722 occasioned the formation, in Lusatia, of the United Th'dlu'en, or Berrnhuters.
See MORAVIAN&