a city of Macedonia, where St. Paul preached the Gospel with great success, and where his hearers were careful to compare what they heard with the scriptures of the Old Testament, Acts, xvii, 10; for which they are commended, and held out to us as an example of subjecting every doctrine to the sole test of the word of God.

BERENGARIUS, a celebrated mediaeval theologian, was born at Tours, 998 a.d. He was educated in the famous school of Fulbert of Chartres, and early acquired a great reputation for learning, ability, and piety. Appointed in 1031 superintendent of the cathedral school of his native city, he taught with such success as to attract pupils from all parts of France, and powerfully contributed to diffuse an interest in the study of logic and metaphysics, and to introduce that dialectic development of theology which is designated the scholastic. The earliest of his writings of which we have any record is an Exhortatory Discourse to the hermits of his district, written at their own request and for their spiritual edification. It shows a clear discernment of the dangers of the ascetic life, and a deep insight into the significance of the Augustinian doctrine of grace. About 1040 Berengar was made archdeacon of Angers. It was shortly after this that rumours began to spread of his holding heretical views regarding the sacrament of the supper. He had submitted the doctrine of transubstantiation (already generally received both by priests and people, although it had been first unequivocally taught and reduced to a regular theory by Paschasius Radbert only in 831) to an independent examination, and had come to the conclusion that it was contrary to reason, unwarranted by Scripture, and inconsistent with the teaching of men like Ambrose, Jerome, and Augustine. He did not conceal this conviction from his scholars and friends, and through them the report spread widely that he denied the common doctrine respecting the Eucharist. His early friend and school companion, Adelmann, archdeacon of Liège, wrote to him letters of expostulation on the subject of this report in 1046 and 1048; and a ...

BERENICE, an ancient city on the western shore of the Red Sea, in 23° 56' N. lat. and 35° 34' E. long., near the head of the Sinus Immundus or Foul Bay. It was founded or enlarged by Ptolemy II., and grew into great importance as an entrepôt for the trade between Asia and Africa. Its harbour was sheltered on the north-east by an island that had topaz deposits, and in the neighbourhood were emerald mines. The ruins of a temple in the Egyptian style, but with Greek ornaments, are among the most important discovered on the site....

BEREZINA, a river of Russia, in the government· of Minsk, forming a tributary of the Dnieper. It rises in the marshes of Boresoff, and has a course of more than 330 miles, for the most part through low-lying but well-wooded country. Its width increases from 40 or GO feet near Bobruisk to 100 feet at the mouth of the Svesloch, one of its western tributaries. As a navigable river, and forming a portion of the great canal system which unites the Black Sea with the Baltic, it is of great importance for the commerce of the country, but unfortunately it is sub-iect to severe floods. The principal ports along its course are Boresoff, Berezino, Yakshetzee, Bobruisk, and Parichi. In history the river has been rendered famous by the crossing of the army of Napoleon in 1812. See Stucken-berg’s Hydrographie, iii., and Canäle; Güldenstadt’s Heise.

BEREZOFF, a town of Asiatic Russia, capital of a circle in Tobolsk, 700 miles N. of that city, situated on three hills on the left bank of the Sosna, 13 miles above its mouth, and on the Bogul, a tributary of the Sosna, in 63° 55' N. lat. and 64° 7' E. long., at a height of 297 feet above the sea-level. Berezoff was founded in 1593 for the collection of taxes near the Ostyak settlement of Sûmgût-Bozh, which means in Russian Berezovi-Gorod, or Birch-town. Berezoff was more than once exposed to destructive conflagrations, as, for example, in 1719. In the second quarter of the 18th century Berezoff was appointed a place of banishment for certain important royal families. In 1727 Prince Menschikoff was sent thither with his sons and two daughters, of whom the eldest·, Mary, was the first bride of Peter II.; and in 1730 he was followed by Prince Ivan Dolgoruki, with his wife, father, mother, three brothers and three sisters, of whom Catherine was the second bride of Peter II. In 1742 General Osterman was sent to Berezoff with his wife, and died there in 1747. In 1782 the town was raised to the rank of chief town of a district of the Tobolsk government. In 1808 it was again burned down. In 1860 it had two stone churches, a cathedral called the Resurrection of the Lord, near which lie buried Mary Menschikoff and some of the Dolgorukis, and the church of Our Lady’s Conception, built on the site of the Menschikoff building. There are in the town a departmental school, a lazaretto, and a stranger’s hospital. The trade, which is of considerable importance, consists of furs, mammoth bones, dried and salted fish, &c. There is a yearly market, in which the transactions amount to £9000. Population in 1860, 1462.