CONGREGATION

(Lat. congrego, from con, together, and grex, a flock.) At Oxford and Cambridge the a embly of masters and doctors is so called, in v;hich the ordinary busine of giving degrees, . is transacted. Congregation. In Ecclesiastical language, properly an a embly of the people for the purpose of dirine worship. Companies of religious persons, forming subdivisions of monastic orders, are styled in the church of Rome congregations. For an account of the congregations of cardinals at Rome, a species of committees for the transaction of busine of the see of Rome, see Enc. Metropol. art. " Congregation." The " Congregation of the Lord " was an appellation a umed by the first Scotch Presbyterian Di enters, in contradistinction to the Church of England, which they styled the " Congregation of Satan." They first came into notice in 1557, under the Duke of Argyle, and were at a later period led by John Knox. [s. 284]