PROTESTANTISM. 470 PROTISTA. all matters of faith and discipline, is really the foumlation stone of the Reformation, the term Protestant .vas extended from those ^vho s.^ed the Snever protest to all who embraced the fun- lameSSl pnnciplc involved in it. The essence of Protestantism, therefore, does not consist in holdin" anv special system of doctrines and disci- pline, but "in the source from which and tlie way in which it proposes to seek for the truth in all matters of faith and practice; and thus a Church might, in the progress of research, see reason to depart from special points of its hitherto re- ceived creed, without thereby ceasing to be Prot- estant. The symbols or confessions of the Prot- estant churches were not intended as rules ol faith for all time, but as expressions of what was then believed to be the sense of Scripture. hen, at a later time, it was sought to erect them into unchangeable standards of true doctrine, this was a renunciation of the first principle of Prot- estantism, and a return to the Catholic principle; for, in making the sense put upon Scripture by the Reformers the standard of truth, all further investigation of Scripture is arrested, the au- thority of the reformers is set above that of the Bible,' and a new tradition of dogmas and inter- pretation is created which differs from the Catho- lic tradition only in beginning with Luther and Calvin, instead 'of with the Apostolic Fathers. The Protest at Spever has been translated in the "Historical Leaflets," published by Crozier The- ological Seminary, Chester, Pa. (Xo. 1, 1901). See Reformation. PRO'TEUS (Lat., from Gk. II/.uT-nf). In the Homeric poems, a prophetic 'old man of the sea' (a/.(oc yipui', halios geron ) who tends the seal- flocks of Poseidon (Neptune), and has the gift of endless transformation. His favorite residence was the island of Pharos, off the mouth of the Kile; according to Vergil, the island of Car- pathos (now Skarpanto), between Crete and Rhodes. Here he rose at midday from the floods, and slept in the shadow of the rock-y shores, sur- rounded bv the monsters of the deep. Here he must be sought, and captured by surprise, for he prophesied most unwillingly, and sought to es- cape by his power of transformation. If, how- ever, his captor held him firmly in every shape, he resumed his original form and revealed the future unerringly. In Herodotus Proteus has become a King of Egypt, who received Paris and Helen, and retained the latter, while Paris took only a phantom with him to Troy. On the arrival of ilenelaus in Eg^pt after the fall of Troy, Pro- teus restored to him his wife. PROTEUS. A slender pennibranchiate sala- mander {Proteus anfiuinus), called 'olin' by the Germans, which is closely related to the Xorth American mud-puppy (q.v.). and is found in sub- terranean waters, in the absolutely dark limestone caverns of Carniola, Carinthia, and Dalmatia. Almost nothing is knovsTi of its habits. It is 10 or 12 inches long, seldom above half an inch in thickness, and pinkish-white with the gills car- mine-red. Specimens have been kept alive in confinement for several years, in a darkened aquarium, apparently without food. It lays eggs, and fastens them singly to stones under water, and the larv« nearlv resemble the adults. Con- sult Oadov:, Amphibia andReptiles t'Lon(on.QOl) . PRO'TEVANGE'LITJM OF JAMES. See Apocrtpha. PRO'THALA'MION (Xeo-Lat., from Gk.n-pd, pro before + da'/.a/jiioc, thalamios, nuptial, from ed/'aun;, thalamos, bridal chamber). A poem by Edmund Spenser (1596), written for the double marriage of Elizabeth and Catherine Somerset, daughters of the Earl of Worcester. PROTH ALLIUM, Prothallvs (Neo-Lat., from Lat. pro, before + thallus, from Gk. t)a?.'/6(, vounc twig). The sexual generation (gameto- phyte) of ferns; often extended to include the gaiiietophytes of seed-plants. . See Ptekido- PHYTES. PROTHERO, proTH'e-ro', George Walter ( 1848— ) . An English historian and biographer, bom in Wiltshire, and educated at Eton, at Kind's College, Cambridge, and at the Lniver- sitv of Bonn. He was tutor at King's and uni- vefsitv lecturer in history from 1876 to 1804, professor of history at Edinburgh until 1899, and then editor of the'Quartertu Ifeview, on which he succeeded his brother. He wrote: The Life and Times of Simon dc Montfort (1877) and a Memoir of Henry Bradshnic : edited Select Stat- utes, from the reigns of Elizabeth and .James I. (1894) and the Growth of British Policy (189o), by .J R. Seeley, whose life he wrote for the Dic- t'iomini of Xa'tional Biography; and was editor of the" Com bridge Historical Series and co-cditor of the Ctimhridgc Modern History. PROTHERO, Rowland Edmund (1852—). A.n EnMish writer, born at Clifton-on-Teme, in Hampshire, September 6, 1852. He was edu- cated at Marlborough School, and at Balliol Col- leoe Oxford, where he graduated with honors in bolh classics and modern history, and obtained a fellowship of All Souls' College (1875). From 1894 to 1899 he edited the Quarterly Eeiieu-. His principal publications are: Life and Corres.pon- denceof Dean Stanley (ISQ3) ; Letters and Verses of Dean Stanley (1895) ; Letters of Edward Gih- hon (1896); H. li. H. Prince Henry of Batten- lerq (1897) ; Life of Queen Victoria (189, ) : aM Letters and Journals of Lord Byron (1898-1900). PROTH'ESIS. See Etymology, Figures of. PROTHONOTARY WARBLER (OF. pro- thonotaire. Ft. protonotaire, from :SIL. protono- tarius, chief notary, from Gk. jrpwrof, protos. hrst -f Lat. notarius, notary, scribe, from nota. mark, from noscere, to know: ultimately connected with Eno- know). A wood-warbler {Protonotaria cit7ea) of the Mississippi Valley, from southern Illinois southward. It is rich yellow over the head and neck and lower parts, and olive green upon the back, wings, and tail, with the lining of the wings and the tail-coverts white. It is peculiar principally in nesting in holes in old tl'GGS. PROTISTA (Xeo-Lat. nom. pi., from Gk. ^p,i7«770f, very first, superl. of 7r,.iK-of, protos, first, from rr'p6, pro, before). A group-name proposed by Haeckel in 1878 for the lowest Pro- tozoa and'Prolophyta: it forms a neutral king- dom, containing the simplest plants and animals. Haeckel claims that the Protista show m their ex- ternal form, structure, and vital phenomena such a remarkable mixture of animal and vegetable properties that they cannot justly be assigned to either the vegetable or animal kingdom. Haeckel's chief classes are the following, in the order given: Monera, including the bacteria, Lotosa (Amoeba and allies), Gregarina, Flagel-
