^^y^H OF PR/^c^ 
 
 S35 19i5 
 
 Sample, Robert F. 1829-iqnR 
 Beacon-lights of the 
 reformation 
 
BEACON-LIGHT^- 
 
 OCT 10 1032 
 
 THE REFORMATION; 
 
 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 BY THE 
 
 Rev. ROBERT F. SAMPLE. D.D 
 
 WITH INTRODUCTION 
 
 BY THE 
 
 Rev. JOHN HALL. D.D., LL.D. 
 
 8EC0NP EDITION. 
 
 PHILADELPHIA : 
 
 PRESBYTERIAN BOARD OF PUBLICATION 
 
 AND SABBATH-SCHOOL WORK, 
 
 1915 
 
COPYRIGHT, 1889, BY 
 
 THE TRUSTEES OF THE 
 
 VKESBYTEHIAN BOARD OF PUBLICATIOI? 
 AND SABBATH-SCHOOL WORK. 
 
 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. 
 
 \rESTcoTT & Thomson, 
 Stfreolypers and Electrotypers, Philada, 
 
INTRv UCTION. 
 
 By JOHN HALL, D. D., LL.D. 
 
 The best force in this world is the truth of God's 
 inspired word. If we are to be made wise and liappy, 
 if vice is to be put down and purity of mind and of 
 life to be set up, divine truth is the instrument to be 
 employed. It is the healing medicine for diseased 
 humanity. 
 
 The students of pharmacy attach much importance to 
 the purity of the drugs given to the sick ; and with good 
 reason, for it is easy to see how another element, un- 
 noticed by the ordinary patient, may destroy the healing 
 properties of the remedy prescribed. And so the mix- 
 ture of error unnoticed by the average man, or possibly 
 deemed harmless if not even agreeable, may mar the 
 efficacy of the revealed truth, and so far hinder the 
 work the truth was meant to accomplish. 
 
 The Christian religion was professed, honored by 
 the arts in music, painting, sculpture and architecture, 
 throughout Euroj^e in the fifteenth century. It was 
 
ii INTRODUCTION. 
 
 incorporated with the life of the people, domestic, social, 
 national. It was enforced by the most stringent laws. 
 To say that the Church was joined to the State and the 
 State reverent to the Church is hardly to put the thing 
 fully. The Church, with the Christian religion, with 
 offices, officers, institutions, and pains and penalties en- 
 forced in this world and threatened as to the next, ruled 
 the European nations. 
 
 But a number of men became dissatisfied with the 
 condition of things. They were of different times, 
 lands and languages, but they had one burning wish. 
 They prayed, labored and in some instances suffered for 
 what we have, for three centuries, called " the Reforma- 
 tion." It came about at length over a part of Europe, 
 and we have come to describe them — and even to bless 
 God for them — as Reformers. 
 
 Were the Reformers in the wrong ? Did they make 
 a grave mistake? Should they have left things as they 
 were ? Have the more enlightened portions of the race, 
 the people, that, somehow or other, have been making 
 progress — setting up, for example, new free Protestant 
 nations in these passing centuries — been on wrong lines ? 
 Was the condition of things against which they pro- 
 claimed war, including the pope," the priests, the tradi- 
 tions, the mass, the confessional, the penances, the 
 prayers to angels and others of God's creatures, — was 
 this a condition which they should have accepted ? In 
 
INTRODUCTION. m 
 
 other words, was their work for God's glory and for 
 man's good, or was it a gigantic mistake? 
 
 Outside the Church of Rome there are not many who 
 deplore the Reformation. Well, what was its essence? 
 The putting of divine truth where it was meant to act, 
 and the parting from it as far as possible of the cor- 
 rupting elements that had impaired its efficacy. Should 
 we undo their work ? Ought we to go back again to the 
 mixtures which they cast away? These questions are 
 practical at this moment in the United States, and hence 
 the need and the value of such works as that to which 
 these pages are meant to be — as far as needed — an intro- 
 duction. 
 
 Seven millions of fellow-citizens are not imposing to 
 the imagination in a nation like ours. But one element 
 of strength in the life of the United States, as in that 
 of Great Britain, is that if one great section of the peo- 
 ple is in power it is constantly watched by another great 
 section. So a " balance of power " is maintained. But 
 even a fraction of the nation, if compact and under con- 
 trol, can affect this balance. The government may be in 
 peril if this solid element is with the opposition. The 
 opposition cannot hope for power if it cannot conciliate 
 and hold this part of the community. So a section 
 of people, with this accidental gain, may be courted by 
 those who deem their party's ascendency the hope of the 
 nation from both sides. Politicians without intelligence 
 
i«r INTRODUCTION. 
 
 or principle will buy their support, and even men who 
 could not be so described persuade themselves that, all 
 things being fair in war, policy on this line is justi- 
 fiable. 
 
 It is all the easier to do this in the United States be- 
 cause the nation set out on the line of its national life 
 with the noble and ennobling conviction that no man 
 should suffer in the State for his religious convictions. 
 To glide over into the view that religious beliefs are all 
 alike, that the one thing is to be sincere in them, is an 
 easy process. That the Mormons or the Chinese are 
 sincere in their religious beliefs is a fact which ingenuity 
 can explain, locate or classify elsewhere. How the sin- 
 cere beliefs may affect education and other great interests 
 is a question the answer to which it is easy to postpone. 
 It is pleasant to be " liberal,'' to discard bigotry and nar- 
 rowness and old-fashioned prejudices. And so it has 
 come about that in the common and political life of 
 these United States the system which the Reformers 
 warred against with a success which has blessed the 
 nations — a system which, by its very nature, is illiberal, 
 narrow, despotic and old-fashioned — is regarded with a 
 sort of patronizing kindness. Men can point to indi- 
 viduals that are all that they could wish, though de- 
 vout Roman Catholics; therefore, they argue, to con- 
 demn the system is narrow, and so-forth. Well, there 
 were admirable men and women in '^ the Church " in the 
 
INTRODUCTION. V 
 
 Reformers' days, yet it was renounced, just as there were 
 excellent persons in the British Isles last century, yet 
 American Independence was fought for and secured. 
 
 Another element unfavorable to just thinking on this 
 practical matter is that the study of history of the times 
 before the age of Washington has interested only a por- 
 tion of our people. The condition of Europe for cen- 
 turies when this system, having set the truth aside or 
 buried it under the traditions and inventions of men, 
 made the '^ Dark Ages,'^ they do not understand. Nor 
 does a run to Europe with a glance at cathedrals and 
 the romantic side of Old- World life disenchant such 
 minds. They do not take in the situation nor realize 
 the influence for evil which can be perpetuated in our 
 free country by the well-directed force of a great cor- 
 poration under the sanction of Religion's sacred name — 
 a corporation which claims, wherever it can safely speak 
 out, wherever its officers have no motive for flattering 
 and misleading Protestants, that it is unchanged and 
 unchangeable. ^ 
 
 "But is there not much truth in the Romish sys- 
 tem ?" Undoubtedly. Now and then a skilled villain 
 is found by the police manufacturing dollars largely of 
 copper and tin. There is some silver over the tin, or 
 the counterfeit coin would not pass. And so you can 
 find in the authoritative teachings of Rome many great 
 truths; but over them are errors congenial to fallen 
 
vi INTB on UOTION. 
 
 human nature that warp the truth and make it ineffect- 
 ual. God is woi-shiped and prayed to, but how many 
 others are similarly treated ! Christ's work is magni- 
 fied, but how men must "go about to establish their 
 own righteousness " to get the benefit of it ! The com- 
 mandments are rehearsed, but how often the image is 
 bowed down to, notwithstanding ! Is this loyalty to 
 God ? " Moses is gone," said the Hebrews, " and God 
 we cannot see. Give us something we can see and wor- 
 ship.'' And when the golden copy of the Egyptian 
 bull, with which they had been familiar, was made, and 
 when Aaron made proclamation, " To-morrow is a feast 
 to Jehovah,'' he did not renounce Jehovah. The calf 
 was only an " aid to devotion " to the poor people ! 
 But the righteous God treated them as idolaters. Hear 
 one of our best Bible scholars on it : " So Jehovah judges 
 concerning the image-worship of the people : that they 
 intend to worship him in their service he does not 
 acknowledge. Hence we translate here too, ' These are 
 thy gods ;' in the pretended image of God he sees the 
 germ of idolatry, a deviation from the way of revelation 
 which he had commanded." (See Schaff-Lange's com- 
 mentary on Ex. 32 : 6-8.) It is because errors and 
 germs of errors make up what is distinctive of Roman- 
 ism, and because these set aside and choke the truth, that 
 we want our people to understand the system. 
 
 Then what should be done ? Intelligent people who 
 
INTEOD UCTION. Vil 
 
 love their race and their country shuukl read and learn 
 on this matter. Ministers in preaching the word should 
 explain the warnings and prophetic cautions, in their 
 places, as they do the promises. Our young people 
 should be so instructed as to be able to discriminate 
 between Bible truths and Bible ways, and romance, 
 sentiment, casuistry or positive error. 
 
 " Well, but it will be offensive to fellow-citizens to 
 set forth these things.'^ So it was to the Hebrews when 
 Christ denounced Pharisaic formalism and human inven- 
 tions that made void the word of God. So it was when 
 the apostles set forth the evils and sins of idolatry. 
 Did they hold their peace therefore ? '' Ah ! yes ; but 
 it was one thing for Christ the Son of God to utter 
 denunciation; it is different with you.'^ Yes, if we 
 were originating the hard thoughts and strong words. 
 But we are not. They are not ours ; they are his. Are 
 we to hold our peace about the eternal damnation that 
 unrepented sin brings because some men will not like it? 
 They who are making popular favor their chief end may 
 do so, but for those who have, through a free Bible, a 
 free Church in a free State, and are pledged to re-echo 
 to men the message of the holy and jealous God, there 
 is no other course than to ^' put the brethren in remem- 
 brance of these things." We are to speak ^' in love,'* 
 but it is "the truth" we are to speak. 
 
 This is done in the following pages, and it is a pleas- 
 
viii • INTR OD UCTION. 
 
 lire to commend them to readers, who the more they 
 kuow the truth of God will the better appreciate the 
 grace that enlightened them, will the more fully con- 
 secrate themselves to duty as patriots and as Christians, 
 and, instead of being the slaves of a partisan and self- 
 ish bigotry, will be the more ready to understand, to 
 allow for disadvantages, and to make positive j^atient 
 eifort for the enlightenment of Roman Catholic fellow- 
 citizens. 
 
 New York, October, 1889. 
 
TO THE 
 
 WESTMINSTER CHUECH 
 
 IN THE CITY BY THE FALLS OF ST. ANTHONY, 
 
 MY PASTORAL CHARGE FOR NINETEEN YEARS, 
 
 AND TO THE 
 
 WESTMINSTER CHURCH 
 
 IN THE CITY BY THE SEA, 
 ALIKE FAITHFUL AND DEARLY BELOVED, 
 
 THIS BOOK 
 
 IS 
 
 AFFECTIONATELY DEDICATED 
 
 BY THE AUTHOR. 
 
 Nkw York, N. Y. 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 In the treatment of Romanism there is a tendency 
 to extremes. Some persons are occupied with its evil 
 features only, others exclusively with the good. Some 
 apply to it epithets that are unduly harsh and untrue, 
 others indulge in flatteries that mislead and do incal- 
 culable harm. Extremes are both easy and wrong. 
 To know Romanism as it has been, we must study its 
 history. To know it as it is, we need only to look 
 around. The Romanism of to-day, as it exists in 
 Protestant countries, is modified by its environment. 
 Whilst its principles remain unchanged, it adapts 
 itself, in a measure and outwardly, to the prevailing 
 sentiments and customs of the communities it hopes 
 ultimately to control. To ascertain its real spirit and 
 intent we must inquire in the countries it dominates, 
 such as Spain, Portugal, Brazil and Mexico. Here 
 you will find an exemplification of the divinely-enun- 
 ciated principle, "A corrupt tree bringeth forth corrupt 
 fruit." 
 
 It is not so much with Roman Catholics that we 
 
4 PREFACE. 
 
 shall have to do in the Darratives that will follow a& 
 with the Romish system and religion. Many Roman- 
 ists are kind neighbors, good citizens, devout Christians. 
 They are worthy of our confidence and most affectionate 
 regard. But we are profoundly convinced, after long 
 investigation, that the papacy is anti-Christian and the 
 Romish religion sadly corrupt. The assumption that 
 the pope of Rome is the vicar of Christ, the visible 
 head of the Church on earth, invested vvith authority 
 to govern Christendom and rule the world, infallible 
 in his teachings and entitled to universal reverence, 
 is an insult to God and a malediction to all who ac- 
 cept it. 
 
 Romanism is not a thing of the past with which we 
 have no immediate concern. It is a living issue, and 
 a most serious one. Its history interprets its present 
 life and reveals its future ; it both instructs and warns. 
 We shall be occupied for a little with the salient facts 
 of the great Reformation, especially as associated with 
 its representative men. As we advance, the errors of 
 the Romish Church w^ill pass in review before us ; her 
 degradation of all that is true and good will appear, 
 and her temper and purpose, as opposed to the prerog- 
 atives of God and to both the temporal and spiritual 
 interests of men, will declare themselves as changeless 
 as her postulates are profane. 
 
 There exists a necessitv for constant watchfulness 
 
PREFACE. 5 
 
 against the inroads of Romanism, and unremitted efforts 
 in behalf of true religion. The lines of Protestantism 
 must be pushed continually outward, all great centres 
 of population and influence evangelized and the gospel 
 preached to every creature. Only thus, working in 
 dependence upon God, prompted by love to Christ and 
 souls, shall we secure the supremacy of Bible truth and 
 bring the nations to our Lord, the true Head of the 
 Church, the only Mediator between God and men. 
 Then shall the mystery of iniquity be destroyed, and 
 the glad acclaim of heaven shall answer the hosannas 
 of earth. May God be pleased to use, in some meas- 
 ure, this effort of one of his servants in hastening a 
 consummation which piety devoutly desires, — and to him 
 shall all the praise be ascribed ! 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGB 
 
 THE RISE OF ROMANISM 9 
 
 JOHN WYCLIF 29 
 
 SAVONAROLA 61 
 
 JOHN HUSS : EARLIER LIFE AND WORK ..... 97 
 
 JOHN HUSS AND THE COUNCIL OF CONSTANCE . 119 
 
 MARTIN LUTHER 141 
 
 LUTHER AT LEIPSIC AND THE DIET OF WORMS . 167 
 
 LUTHER'S LAST DAYS 189 
 
 ZWINGLE: THE MOUNTAIN-SHEPHERD 215 
 
 ULRICH ZWINGLE: LATER MINISTRY 233 
 
 CALVIN IN FRANCE 255 
 
 CALVIN IN GENEVA 277 
 
 CRANMER: THE ENGLISH REFORMATION .... 307 
 
 CRANMER : PERSECUTION AND MARTYRDOM . . . 335 
 
 JOHN KNOX, THE REFORMER OF SCOTLAND . . 361 
 
 JOHN KNOX : LATER WORK IN SCOTLAND .... 381 
 
 ROMANISM : ITS PRESENT STATUS 413 
 
 2 r 
 
THE RISE OF ROi^ANIS^, 
 
** Now we beseech you, brethren, by the coming oj our Lord 
 Jesus Christ, and by our gathering together unto him, that ye 
 be not soon shaken in mind, or be troubled, neither by spirit, 
 nor by word, nor by letter as from us, as that the day of Christ 
 is at hand. Let no ma7i deceive you by any means ; for that 
 day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and 
 that ma?i of sin be revealed, the so7i of perdition. '' 
 
 2 Thess. 2 : 1-3. 
 
 " The Supreine fudge, by whom all controversies of religion 
 are to be deter7nined, and all decrees of councils, opinions of 
 ancient writers, doctrines of me?i, and private spirits, are to 
 be examined, and in whose sentence we are to rest, can be no 
 other but the Holy Spirit speaking in the Scripture.'^ 
 
 Confession oe Faith, chap. i. sec. x. 
 
 " No more cunning plot was ever conceived against the free- 
 dom, happiness and virtues of mankind than Romanism.'' 
 
 Gladstone. 
 
THE RISE OF ROMANISM, 
 
 BEFORE considering the rise of Romanism we shall 
 need to take a hasty review of early Christianity. 
 The apostolic Church accomplished a work which has 
 been the wonder of the ages. The purity of its teach- 
 ings, the simplicity of its worship and the obscurity of 
 its first adherents j)romised no such results as were wit- 
 nessed in the first century after Christ. The new relig- 
 ion was opposed to the spirit of the world, and was 
 opposed by it. Accejited philosophies pronounced it 
 the effect of mental disorder, the spawn of moral dis- 
 temper. Earthly kingdoms were arrayed against it 
 and a demoniac rage girdled it with fire. But it went 
 forth to its mission in dependence upon Him who is 
 invisible, and endued with power from on high. It 
 mattered not that no ermine clothed it, that no orators 
 pleaded its cause, that no imperial aegis overshadowed 
 it, that no armies intimidated its foes. It won its con- 
 quests by means of superhuman power, by its adapta- 
 tion to conscious need, its interpretation of reminiscences 
 no speculative philosophy coukl define, its revelation of 
 possibilities of good that would satisfy the race. 
 
 The polity of the early Church was favora])le to its 
 spiritual growth. No hierarchy sought to dominate 
 religious life. The parity of the ministry was main- 
 
 11 
 
12 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 taiijcd. The sacred Scriptures, released from human 
 traditions, were accepted as the only and sufficient rule 
 of faith and conduct. Dedication to Christ was urged 
 by motives drawn from divine authority, from infinite 
 love, from every interest that gathered about human 
 life passing through nature to eternity. 
 
 It is true the Church even then was not perfect. 
 There were stains upon the first pages of its history. 
 The surrounding world sought to corrupt it, and suc- 
 ceeded in marring its beauty. Errors found entrance. 
 Paganism pressed its way into the holy places. Gnos- 
 ticism resisted the essential elements of its faith, whilst 
 older sophistries sought to poison religious life at its 
 sources. Yet the primitive Church was singularly pure, 
 and its spiritual force hewed for itself a path to victory. 
 It passed from Jerusalem into the remotest regions, 
 extending "from Cape Comorin to Britain, and from 
 Scythia to the pillars of Hercnles — " from the far 
 Hiudostan to what was accounted the world's western 
 extreme. The success of the gospel is admitted by 
 heathen and Christian historians alike. Pliny and 
 Tacitus are in accord with Tertullian and Eusebius. 
 The sneers of Celsus carried an admission of its prog- 
 ress. 
 
 The persecutions of the early Church guarded its 
 purity and extended its influence. Roman emperors 
 endeavored to exterminate its followers, but unwittingly 
 multiplied their numbers. If under imperial blows the 
 Church for a little went down, yet like the fabled Ant^us 
 it quickly rose, stronger than when it fell. But it was 
 not long until radical changes occurred. In the fourth 
 century the Church, in the person of a Roman emperor, 
 
THE RISE OF ROMANISM. 13 
 
 ascended the throne of the Caesars. Then it seemed to 
 have reached the summit of power and claimed the 
 world as its ow^n. 
 
 The conversion of Constantine marked a new epoch in 
 ecclesiastical history. This noted emperor had been a 
 pagan. Apollo was his tutelar god. His offerings to 
 imaginary deities were so munificent as to command the 
 admiration of the heathen world and to secure him 
 favorable mention in the history of his age. But in 
 course of time he seems to have felt the need of a high- 
 er form of religious belief. Paganism promised neither 
 victory in Avar nor blessing in peace. He was persuaded 
 that his empire must be established on a better religion, 
 and the more nearly that religion approximated to abso- 
 lute truth the more powerful and permanent would be 
 the throne reared upon it. Then, it may be, there came 
 to him a consciousness of personal need which paganism 
 could not supply. His thoughts may have traveled 
 into the infinite Beyond, around which gathered a deep- 
 ening solemnity, and he may have louged to be assured 
 of real enduring good. Be this as it may, it is recorded 
 that during an Italian campaign, soon after the sun had 
 passed the meridian, there appeared in the firmament a 
 cross, and above it the inscription, " In hoc signo vinces " 
 — By this thou shalt conquer. On the following night 
 it is said that Christ himself appeared unto Constantine 
 and directed him to make a standard in the form of the 
 sign he had seen in the heavens. Thus originated the 
 Laharum which was borne at the head of imperial 
 armies, its presence regarded a pledge of victory. It is 
 not our purpose to discuss the genuineness of Constan- 
 tine's conversion or the motives which may have led to 
 
14 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 his adoption of the Christian religion, but simply to 
 indicate its relation to the subsequent history of the 
 Church. Christianity became the established religion 
 of the empire. The sword of persecution was sheathed. 
 Proscription came to an end. The shame of the cross 
 ceased. The long-venerated Jupiter vanished before the 
 glories of Jehovah, whose dominion is universal and 
 eternal. The house of God displaced the heathen temple. 
 The Christian Sabbath became a civil as well as a relig- 
 ious institution, and its sanctity was guarded from worldly 
 encroachments. The subjugation of every false religion 
 and the establishment of the true seemed assured, and 
 piety rejoiced in the promise of that crowning day. 
 But triumph may be defeat, power may prove weakness, 
 and glory may turn to shame. It was not long until the 
 spirituality of the Church began to wane. The gospel 
 was soon corrupted. Pomp and splendor and gorgeous 
 ceremony supplanted the simple worship of earlier days. 
 The so-called successors of the apostles grew worldly, 
 arrogant, and lovers of themselves rather than of God. 
 The Church of Christ was allied to an earthly king- 
 dom, and suifered in consequence of the incongruous 
 affiliation. 
 
 Previous to the introduction of Christianity the priest- 
 hood of paganism dominated every form of life, from 
 the humblest hearthstone to the throne. Of the Eastern 
 nations history records that their respect for a priest was 
 greater than that for the king. The priests coerced 
 silence by their edicts, and crowned heads were as sub- 
 missive as their vassals. This autocracy did not cease 
 when the Christian religion under Constantine supplanted 
 pagan superstition. It simply passed from the possession 
 
THE RISE OF ROMANISM. 15 
 
 of the former into the hands of the latter priesthood, 
 and then entered upon its westward march. Gaul and 
 Germany and contiguous countries accepted old ideas as 
 to priestly pre-eminence. Great cathedrals were the 
 seats of its power. Sacred places were crowned with 
 monasteries, and the wealth of the latter exceeded the 
 treasures of kings. Earthly potentates thought to atone 
 for their sins by costly gifts to the monastic exchequer. 
 They even transferred cities, castles and provinces to the 
 high officials of the Church, and invested them with 
 royal prerogatives. Spii'itual teachers became secular 
 rulers, and grew more corrupt as they advanced in world- 
 ly power. Out of this perversion of the original func- 
 tions of the ministry grew that hierarchy which destroyed 
 freedom of thought, enslaved nations and subjugated 
 kings. 
 
 In the third century Cyprian had advocated epis- 
 copacy, and hinted that supreme rule was vested in the 
 Roman bishop. The early presbyter was degraded that 
 primacy might be enthroned. Irenseus and Tertulliau 
 insisted upon the equality of all the apostolic churches, 
 and in every question of doctrine or polity deferred to 
 their decisions. Meanwhile, Constantinople sought the 
 pre-eminence. 
 
 But it was not long until Rome, the capital of 
 ^lie great empire of the West, its grandeur crowning 
 the seven hills, its possibilities of advancement acknowl- 
 edged and its claim to perpetual superiority not wholly 
 unquestioned, began to demand ecclesiastical in connec- 
 tion with civil supremacy. The Church in the Orient, 
 on the South and in the West consented that the 
 bishop of Rome should be recognized as supreme, and 
 
16 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 the Bosphorus was compelled to see its sceptre of power 
 traiisferretl to the Tiber. 
 
 Leo L, styled the Great, may be considered the first 
 in the long line of popes. Under him Roman Cathol- 
 icism assumed a theocratic form, and became an in- 
 stitution or polity which has held its place until the 
 present. Until Leo arose in the might of his ambition, 
 the bishop of Rome was in theory simply equal in power 
 with other bishops, although superior deference had been 
 accorded to him because of the unequaled splendor of 
 the city which was the seat of his bishopric. But Leo 
 was not satisfied with this. He claimed that the bishop 
 of Rome was the successor of St. Peter, and that the 
 primacy belonged to that apostle by the direct, positive 
 designation of our Lord. On this rock the Church was 
 to be built. Peter himself had established this suprem- 
 acy at Rome. The basilica by the Tiber, displacing the 
 temple of Jupiter Vatican us, was the monument the 
 Church had reared over the dust of the holy martyr to 
 commemorate both his moral heroism and his ecclesias- 
 tical primacy. ^N'ot by way of Constantinople or Carthage 
 or any other claimant of pre-eminence, but through 
 Rome, came this great distinction. Here Peter, to 
 whom had been committed the keys of heaven and hell, 
 the representative of the absent Christ, as his vicegerent, 
 had erected his seat of jurisdiction. Valentinian III., 
 then occupying the imperial throne, sent forth his decree 
 declaring that the primacy of St. Peter had ceased to be 
 a question of dispute. His appointment to the iwntif- 
 icate by the Lord himself, the decision of the Council of 
 Nice and the dignity of Rome had set the matter for 
 ever at rest, and the supremacy of the Roman See must 
 
THE RISE OF ROMANISM. 17 
 
 be recognized by the bishops of Gaul and all others or 
 they must incur the imperial displeasure. 
 
 Thus under I^eo the Great, iu the middle of the fifth 
 century, the religion of Rome became a government, 
 rearing its throne among the seven hills, demanding the 
 allegiance and submission of the universal Church, con- 
 straining every Christian to bow and worship on the 
 steps of its power. _. 
 
 There is not the slightest evidence that Christ desig- 
 nated Peter to any such lordship over his Church. It 
 was not on this disciple, but on his confession of Christ, 
 that the Church was to be built — on the Fetra, not the 
 Petros. Neither is there any certain proof that Peter 
 was ever in Rome. In none of his Epistles does he 
 intimate it. Paul dwelt in Rome and suffered mar- 
 tyrdom beyond one of its gates, but in his letters to the 
 churches and to personal friends he does not make the 
 slightest allusion to Peter, even as a visitor to the imper- 
 ial city. No manuscript of the first century contains any 
 record by which the Romish Church can substantiate the 
 claim which is made the corner-stone of the papal system. 
 It was not until all the apostles and the generation to 
 which they belonged had passed away, and the second 
 century was about to close, that the Clementine Homilies 
 announced Peter as bishop of Rome. The groundless 
 assumption became a tradition, and the next generation 
 handed it down to its successor. 
 
 The claim of Leo met with opposition. The Eastern 
 Church denied his right to the tiara. Nevertheless, he 
 held his ground and wore the papal crown. It has 
 well been said that "Paul saw the incipient workings 
 of the ^ mystery of iniquity.' The twilight then began 
 
18 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 which advanced in slow progress to midnight dark- 
 ness. Superstition, which is so congenial with the 
 human mind, was added to superstition, and absurdity 
 to absurdity." 
 
 "The Roman hierarchy, amidst alternate successes 
 and defeats, struggled hard for civil and ecclesiastical 
 sovereignty. Leo, Gregory, Innocent and Boniface in 
 their several days advanced the papacy on the ruins of 
 episcopacy and royalty, bishops and kings." The power 
 of this false system attained its culmination under Leo 
 X., when the holy pontiff compelled imperial heads to 
 lay their crowns at his feet and provincial bishops to 
 address him as their god. In the Council of the Lat- 
 eran, Stephen, archbishop of Petraca, declared that Leo 
 possessed " power above all powers, both in heaven and 
 in earth,'' thus exalting him " above all that is called 
 God," and going beyond Marcellus, who in the same 
 council styled the pope "God on earth." From that 
 blasphemous summit, flinging its affront in the face of 
 Jehovah and claiming more than divine prerogatives, 
 the papacy began its descent, and down the long slope, 
 hesitating, resisting and struggling to recover its power, 
 it is going to its burial. In our own day, immediately 
 succeeding the enunciation of papal infallibility by the 
 ecumenical council, the successor of St. Peter lost his 
 temporal power, and instead of Pius IX. reigned Victor 
 Emmanuel, a suggestion of the final and worldwide tri- 
 umph of the King of kings. 
 
 As a religion, in distinction from its government, 
 Roman Catholicism is an admixture of truth and error. 
 It apparently rests on a scriptural foundation. The 
 superstructure is wood, hay and stubble. Yet, bad as 
 
THE RISE OF ROMANISM. 19 
 
 it is, it is better than any form of infidelity — better than 
 any other religion called Christian which directly denies 
 the essential doctrines of our holy faith. The Roman 
 Church in its creed maintains the personality and sov- 
 ereignty of God, the personal Godhead of Jesus Christ, 
 salvation through the blood of the cross, the necessity 
 of holy living and a future state of retribution. At 
 the same time, these cardiual principles are obscured or 
 modified by grave errors. The truth is in the Confes- 
 sion, but is hidden under the rubbish of human tradi- 
 tions, the decrees of councils and the supplementary 
 teaching of popes whose prerogative it is to transmute 
 sin into duty and falsehood iuto truth. Hence by far 
 the larger part of the Romish communion, occupied 
 with the errors of tlie papacy, never discover saving 
 truth. — 
 
 Romanists deny the completeness of the Sacred Script' 
 ures. They teach that doctrines essential to salvation 
 are only obscurely presented in the word of God. 
 Hence the divine revelation finds its complement and 
 interpretation in tradition. The obscurity which en- 
 velops the Bible impairs its value and may mislead 
 souls. The Church is a safer guide to faith — not that 
 it sets aside the Scriptures, but because it discovers 
 their meaning. All this is dishonoring to the word of 
 God, the entrance of which gives light and life. -^ 
 
 The Bible is withheld from the laity. Exceptions 
 are made, but they are reluctantly granted and are few. 
 Gregory VII., Innocent III., Clement XI. and Pius 
 IV. "made the liberty to read any version of the 
 Scriptures dependent on the permission of the priest." 
 In accordance with the action of the Council of Trent, 
 
20 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 any one who reads the Holy Scriptures without the 
 consent of his spiritual adviser "may not receive 
 absolution of his sins except he first deliver up his 
 Bible to the ordinary." Pius IX. pronounced the 
 American and Foreign Bible societies "moral pests." 
 It seems to be assumed that the most of Eoman Catho- 
 lics are unlearned and unstable, and would wrest the 
 Scriptures to their own destruction. It is the province 
 of the priest to read, or to permit to be read, portions 
 of the word of God, and his interpretation of the frag- 
 mentary Scriptures must be accepted by the loyal 
 papist. 
 
 The so-called infallibility of the Church of Rome is 
 against freedom of inquiry and belief of essential truth. 
 If the Church is infallible, then it is unchangeable ; and 
 if unchangeable — and this by a logical sequence — then 
 all the decrees of the popes and councils, however erro- 
 neous, must stand through all ages, and from their 
 supremacy there is no escape. This principle also dis- 
 courages inquiry by the history of its application. 
 The infallible Church burnt heretics, hung them on 
 gibbets, broke them on racks, drowned them in the sea. 
 In doing this it claims to have done the will of God, 
 and what has been done may be done again. The prin- 
 ciples and spirit of Romanism, according to the teach- 
 ings of the Church, cannot change. This being so, 
 restraint upon the papacy is sin, and it only waits an 
 increase of power that it may repeat St. Bartholomew's 
 Day and the Inquisition. 
 
 We think better things of Roman Catholicism than 
 it can logically claim for itself. Nevertheless, the 
 shadow of the past, creeping on with the passing years, 
 
THE RISE OF ROMANISM. 21 
 
 darkens the spiritual UDderstanding by prevcDting accesg~7 
 to the sources of truth. ' 
 
 The office of faith is perverted in the Romish Church. 
 All that is requisite to salvation is " a general intention 
 to believe whatever the Church believes." This inten- 
 tion may exist in connection with pi'ofound ignorance 
 and absolute disbelief. The Church exalts itself above 
 Christ, makes non-essential that which is necessary to 
 salvation, and essential that submission to the Church 
 which God has not required. If it is not necessary to 
 know the truth, then the Bible may be withheld from 
 the people, the worship of the Church may be conducted 
 in an unknown tongue and the pulpit may refrain from 
 a clear enunciation of truth. All that is required is 
 blind assent to the guidance of the Church as a divine 
 institution for saving men, and submission to its author- 
 ity. Out of all this has grown the so-called aphorism 
 of Romanism : " Ignorance is the mother of devotion," 
 evidently accepted by so great a teacher as Cardinal 
 Newman, who said, '^Religious light is intellectual 
 darkness." This directly contravenes the divine dec- 
 laration that we are ^'chosen unto salvation through 
 belief of the truth," and dishonors the Holy Spirit, 
 whose office it is to guide into all truth. 
 
 There is a strange mingling of the false and the true 
 in the Romish religion. Persons received to member- 
 ship are expected to recite, whether they understand 
 and ex animo accept it or not, the Niceue Creed. This 
 contains the fundamental truths of Christianity. But 
 this formula is followed by another confession which 
 incorporates the gravest errors and virtually denies the 
 first. A saving truth is announced, and then it is dis- 
 
22 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 placed by false doctrine, or in the minds of many is 
 obscured by erroneous beliefs and practices that are 
 associated with it. They are happy who stop with the 
 Nicene Creed ; they are to be commiserated who follow 
 false lights into moral jungles and spiritual night. 
 There have always been devout Christians in the Romish 
 Church. Some have towered in piety and have well 
 deserved the appellation of saints. Many priests have 
 trusted in Christ, loved him, and now share his glory. 
 Wyclif and Savonarola were Reformers, but they con- 
 tinued in the Church of Rome. Martin Luther was a 
 Christian before he climbed Pilate's Staircase and re- 
 nounced the papacy. Pascal, Anselm, F^nelon, Madame 
 Guion, Faber, were believers eminent in holiness. There 
 are such Christians in the Romish Church in our day, 
 and such priests as Lacordaire and P^re Hyacinthe, 
 who have planted their feet on the Rock of Ages and 
 trust only in the ascended Lamb. But this fact does not 
 prove the Romish system divine or its teachings in their 
 entirety true. Men and women have been Christians 
 in spite of Romanism, not because of it. They are 
 like some plants which thrive in the shade, where the 
 most of plants would droop and die. 
 
 Among the grave errors of the Romish Church may 
 be mentioned the doctrine of the mass. Concerning it 
 the Council of Trent declared that it is " a true and 
 proper sacrifice of Jesus Christ, offered up to the Father 
 by the hands of the priest ; that it is a propitiation for 
 sin, not only of the living, but of the dead ; that it is 
 rightfully performed when the words of consecration 
 are uttered in an unknown tongue and in a low voice." 
 This doctrine degrades the death of Christ, who " hath 
 
THE RISE OF ROMANISM. 23 
 
 by one offering perfected for ever them that are sancti- 
 fied/' It takes salvation out of Christ's hands and 
 commits it to the priest. It makes the repetition of 
 the sacrifice of the cross necessary to the remission of 
 sins ; and this involves the doctrine of transubstantiation, 
 in which a priest clad in vestments, speaking " in an un- 
 known tongue and in a low voice/' by a single wave of 
 his hand transmutes bread into the actual body and 
 blood of Jesus Christ, and summons the adorable Medi- 
 ator from his throne to repeat his sacrifice for sin. The 
 table which Christ spread the same night in which he 
 was betrayed, designed to be a memorial of the death 
 about to be accomplished, the only and sufficient sacri- 
 fice for all the ages, is supplanted by the offering of 
 Romanism, and another priesthood succeeds the Levitical, 
 presenting not a symbolic sacrifice, but a real one, and 
 that of the enthroned and glorified Christ. We cannot 
 conceive of a more obvious falsehood, a grosser super- 
 stition or a greater crime. 
 
 The Mariolatry of Romanism is a deflection from 
 saving truth, and is unquestionable idolatry. The Virgin 
 Mary receives more honor than her Son. More souls 
 cling to her ski-rts than hide in the cross. Even in our 
 own century Pope Gregory XVI., addressing the faith- 
 ful, said, ^^ Let us raise our eyes to the most Blessed 
 Virgin Mary, who alone destroys heresy, who is our 
 greatest hope — yea, the entire ground of our hope." A 
 Roman Catholic manual now extant contains the follow- 
 ing invocation : " O Holy Virgin, mother of God ; 
 my advocate and patroness ! Pray for thy poor servant, 
 and show thyself a mother to me.'' Observe the follow- 
 ing stanza in the Stabat Mater : 
 
 '6 
 
24 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 " O Christ ! when thou shalt call me hence 
 Grant me, through thy mother, 
 The palm of victory." 
 
 Again : " O most Blessed Virgin, vouchsafe to negoti- 
 ate, for and with us, the work of our salvation by thy 
 powerful intercession." Where now is our ever-to-be- 
 adored Lord, whom the Scriptures declare to be our 
 Advocate with the Father, and able to save unto the 
 uttermost, since he ever liveth to make intercession for 
 us? By what authority, save that of the Romish 
 Church, is Mary declared to be "queen of heaven," 
 " bright queen of heaven," " holy mother " and " sov- 
 ereign queen," "mother of grace and clemency"? Has 
 Christ left his throne ? Has Mary supplanted her own 
 Lord and only Saviour ? Shall this most honored of 
 women so fill the horizon of our most devout hours that 
 her Son shall be practically hidden or remain a helpless 
 babe in the arms of the holy mother? 
 
 Now, far be it from us to say that all Romanists are 
 guilty of this idolatry, or that the Virgin in every instance 
 shuts out of view her greater Son. But, in profound sad- 
 ness be it said, this Mariolatry sweeps a broad circle ard 
 at its altar many perish. The human heart, we know, 
 craves a mother, and when storms are abroad would hide 
 ^'tn her bosom. But it hath pleased the Father that in 
 Christ, our only Mediator, should all fullness dwell. 
 His sympathy exceeds that of a mother, as heaven is 
 higher than the earth and infinity outruns the finite. 
 There is no comforter like him. None has an arm so 
 strong to suj)port. He is the Consolation of Israel, in 
 the folds of whose priestly robes his own mother accord- 
 ing to the flesh humbly hides and there remains. 
 
TEE RISE OF ROMANISM. 25 
 
 Associated with Mariolatry is tlie worship of saints 
 and the veneration paid to their images. This is a 
 rebaptized heathenism. The ancient Greeks worshiped 
 heroes, and by an accepted apotheosis converted them 
 into gods. Hercules was a deified man, so was ^scu- 
 lapius, so were others. There were gods many. They 
 filled the aisles of Minerva's temple and the niches of 
 the Pantheon, and attracted the devout to humbler 
 shrines. Rome has its army of saints, and these, ac- 
 cording to the creed of Pius IV., are to be worshiped 
 and prayed to ; they are believed to offer prayers unto 
 God in behalf of the faithful; their relics are to be had 
 in veneration, and to their images due honor and wor- 
 ship should be paid. This is idolatry. It practically 
 exalts saints to a level with Christ, the only Mediator. 
 It dishonors our Lord, diverts attention from him and 
 separates the soul from the sources of spiritual succor. 
 
 As respects the use of images, it may be urged that 
 they are aids to devotion and a stimulus to holy liv- 
 ing. They transfer the thoughts of the worshiper to the 
 life beyond, and suggest the possibility of attaining to 
 higher stages of piety, even to like distinction with 
 canonized saints, on condition of faithful service to the 
 Church. This is a theoretic interpretation of the office 
 of images which does not, as a rule, aifect the practical 
 result. History and personal consciousness declare the 
 tendency of our nature to idolatry and to the substitu- 
 tion of the images themselves for the spiritual truths 
 they are supposed to suggest. 
 
 The doctrine of purgatory is devoutly held by the 
 Romish Church. The souls confined in it, purified by 
 suffering, may receive aid from surviving friends, and 
 
26 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 tlie coffers of the Church are replenished by offerings 
 which secure the repetition of the mass in behalf of 
 the dead. This doctrine debases the work of Christ, 
 since it declares the insufficiency of his atonement by 
 the supplement of purgatorial pains. The doctrine of 
 purgatory, with the support it gives to other errors, is 
 as mercenary as it is unscriptural. It appeals to the 
 profoundest sympathy and most cherished affections of 
 our nature. Even poverty will suffer great privations 
 that it may serve the departed, whilst wealth enriches 
 the Church by its purchase of prayers for the dead. 
 Many of the faithful in their wills designate large sums 
 to this end in their own behalf. Philip V. of Spain 
 thus ordered one thousand masses to be said for the 
 repose of his soul, and, thinking that this might exceed 
 the necessities in his case, generously provided that the 
 excess, if any, ^' should be credited and made revertible 
 to poor solitary souls concerning whom no person be- 
 stowed a thought." 
 
 This doctrine is a cruel one. The prospect of purga- 
 torial pains darkens the life of such as implicitly believe 
 it. It increases the natural fear of death, and launches 
 the soul with unspeakable dread into the inflictions of an 
 intermediate state. It aggravates the sadness of bereave- 
 ment, since it denies the departed soul an immediate en- 
 trance into heaven, and commits it to sufferings of an 
 indefinite nature and duration. None are exempt from 
 those venial sins which subject to this necessity. Even 
 the pope must take purgatory on his way to heaven, and 
 masses are said for the early release of his soul. In 
 what marked contrast does this stand with the belief of 
 Protestant Christians, tliat the souls of believers are at 
 
THE RISE OF ROMANISM. 27 
 
 their death made perfect in holiness and do innnediately 
 pass into glory — one moment the final farewell to earth, 
 the next the deep swell of the angelic anthem ! 
 
 Thus error hides the truth. The Standards of the 
 Romish Church and the decrees of her councils uphold 
 the essential truths of the gospel, and then by human 
 additions practically destroy them. Many receive the 
 truth, and through it are saved. But we fear a far 
 greater number are occupied with the grass errors which 
 hide the truth or nullify it, and go to their account with 
 a lie in their right hand. 
 
 Not wishing to extend this review of Romanism, it 
 may suffice to say that it insists upon withholding many 
 inherent rights and privileges the exercise and posses- 
 sion of which are needful to the highest interests of the 
 individual and the State. For example, the right of 
 private judgment is denied. Men may not think, judge 
 and decide for themselves. The faculties God gave them 
 may not be used for the purpose evidently intended. 
 The Romanist must bow to the supreme authority of 
 the Holy See or be hung in the halter of excommu- 
 nication. The Vatican also hurls its anathemas against 
 those outside the pale of the Church who dare to exer- 
 cise their own judgment touching matters of faith, though 
 they claim to be guided by the word of God. This is 
 the most fearful appropriation of authority of which 
 history furnishes any record, and deserves, as it has 
 received, the severest condemnation. 
 
 Finally, the Church of Rome has always been hostile to 
 every form of civil liberty. The attitude of Lord Baltimore 
 in these latter times does not disprove this, nor the fact that 
 Charles Carroll of Carrollton, a Roman Catholic, signed 
 
28 R03TANISM AND THE BE FORMERS. 
 
 the Declaration of Americiin Indepeudence, and that 
 many other Roman Catholics have been loyal to the 
 principles of freedom. From the time of Innocent 
 III. until the present, Romanism has maintained this 
 attitude of opposition, and, wlierever it has been pos- 
 sible, has resisted democratic rule and religious free- 
 dom. The Church claims supremacy over the State. 
 The Church, not the people, is the source of power, and 
 may resort to force in the maintenance of this supremacy. 
 It may make kings the servants of its will, as when it 
 constrained Charles IX. of France, through the influ- 
 ence of Catherine de Medici, to order the massacre of 
 St. Bartliolemew ^s Day. The history of the Inquisition, 
 originated by Pope Gregory IX. and continued by his 
 successors, is another outgrowth of this dogma of the 
 Church. The kings of Spain, of France and the Neth- 
 erlands, as servants of the Church, maintained the pow- 
 er of the " Holy Office," and fettered the limbs of their 
 subjects. Isabella, queen of Castile, boasted that "in 
 the love of Christ and his maid mother " she had caused 
 great misery, and had depopulated towns and districts, 
 provinces and kingdoms. She was obedient to the pope, 
 and for her submission well deserved, as interpreted by 
 Romanism, the surname of " The Catholic'' — her memory 
 in some measure relieved of the odium which attaches 
 to it by her favor shown to Columbus, which resulted in 
 the discovery of a New World, the home of Protestant 
 Christianity. 
 
JOHN WYCLIF. 
 
" The entrance of thy words giveth light; it giveth ynder- 
 
 itayiding unto the simple'' 
 
 Ps. 1 1'9 : 130. 
 
 "Although all are not permitted to read the word publicly to 
 the congregatioji, yet all sorts of people are bound to read it 
 apart by themselves, aiid with their families : to which end. the 
 Holy Scriptures are to be translated out of the original into 
 the vulgar languages y 
 
 Larger Catechism, Answ. to Question [56. 
 
WYCLIF. 
 
 WYCLIF has been appropriately styled "the Morn- 
 ing Star of the Reformation/^ The night of 
 Romanism had been long. Trnth had not wholly dis- 
 appeared, but its influence was limited and an intelligent 
 faith was almost unknown. Meanwhile, God reigned 
 and waited his time. Out of the bosom of the night 
 the morning shall be born. 
 
 This result was gradually attained. The law of 
 growth which obtains in nature ruled in the spiritual 
 world. First, there were the intimations of light along 
 the horizon, then the dawn, and at last the day traveling 
 on toward the resplendent noon. In our retrospect we 
 are now to take our stand on the margin of the great 
 Reformation with our faces toward the east, waiting for 
 the morning. Conveyed in thought to that distant age, 
 we are surrounded with the insignia of a rude civiliza- 
 tion. Ignorance, superstition and sin control the masses. 
 The glare of Druid altars, it is true, has disappeared. 
 The woods and the night have ceased to resound with 
 the bowlings of pagan worship. Wodin and Thor have 
 left their thrones, and none remain to do them reverence. 
 The Christian faith which the preceding generations re- 
 ceived from pious merchants who came from the Mean- 
 der and the Hermas, and which the royal Alfred sedulously 
 nourished, had lifted the people to the higher planes of 
 
 31 
 
32 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 life, social and religious, but the elevation was compara- 
 tively sllo-lit. And now even the foothills of human 
 ascent are still higher and their shadows cover the low 
 level. 
 
 The religion of the British isles is a compound of 
 paganism and Christianity. There is much truth in the 
 written summary of belief, little in the apprehensions 
 of the people, still less in their lives. False doctrines 
 and foolish traditions have engaged attention to the 
 neglect of fundamental truth. 
 
 But there appear signs of restlessness. Loyalty to 
 the Koman See is less pronounced than once. The 
 hierarchy whose seat is beyond the Alps is a waning 
 power. The Teutonic spirit is beginning to assert itself, 
 and drops some hints of unwilling subjection to the suc- 
 cessor of St. Peter. Columba was England's saint, and 
 Augustine must take an inferior place. The Synod of 
 Whitby, which in the seventh century enforced a foreign 
 ritual and polity, has become an unpleasant memory to 
 many and they would modify the legacy it left or remand 
 it to the murky Tiber. The ecclesiasticism fostered by 
 William the Conqueror ; the prevalence of Norman ideas, 
 customs and faith ; the elevation of the chair of St. 
 Peter above the throne of the Edwards ; and the humili- 
 ation of England's king, — all this is gradually stirring 
 the slumbering spirit of the Northmen, and gathering 
 the threads which shall yet bind the hands of popes and 
 restrain their power in the adopted lands of the Teutons. 
 The trium})h of the Roman See in the reign of John, 
 surnamed Lackland, which made England an estate of 
 the papal Church and her king a vassal of the pontiff, 
 was succeeded by a counter-victory, which in the year 
 
WYCLIF. 33 
 
 1215 secured to England the Magna Cliarta, the corner- 
 stone of constitutional government and pledge of popular 
 liberty. 
 
 The way is being prepared for conquests in a higher 
 sphere. The kingdom of Christ, in the simplicity and 
 purity of apostolic times, is about to inaugurate a better 
 day and perpetuate a more peaceful reign. In the 
 beginning of the fourteenth century, wellnigh all learn- 
 ing confined to monasteries and a few who supported 
 the dignity of the throne, religious truth obscured and 
 the word of God bound, there is born one whom 
 Heaven has chosen as a herald of a spiritual resur- 
 rection. The voice of a stern prophet is heard amid 
 the solitudes and in i\\Q places of public concourse; 
 and if that generation fail to witness the coming of 
 Christ, they shall at least hear his footsteps portending 
 the promised day. Robert Grossetete, the learned 
 bishop of Lincoln ; Henry Bracton, the eminent jur- 
 ist, versed in English common law ; William of 
 Occam, the • Franciscan who resisted the absolutism of 
 the Roman hierarchy ; and Thomas Bradwardine, styled 
 the "Profound Doctor," and written in history as the 
 " mighty champion of grace," — all these, catching gleams 
 of light from the cross and allured to the higher hills of 
 religious thought, have prepared the way for loftier as- 
 cents. 
 
 John Wyclif appeared in the fullness of time, not to 
 consummate the work of Reformation, but to announce 
 its approach and to lead the Church toward it. As to 
 the precise time and place of 'his birth, certainty has 
 not been reached, but the approximation is quite suffi- 
 cient. John Leland, an eminent historian, said, " It is 
 
34 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 reported that John Wyclif, the heretic, was born at 
 Spresswell, a small village a good mile off from Rich- 
 mond." It is probable that his birth occurred in 1324, 
 although some authorities indicate an earlier date. The 
 place, located in the north-western part of the county 
 of York, in the valley of the Tees, was beautiful for 
 situation. Long ranges of hills overlooked the mead- 
 ows, and wooded slopes extended to the river which 
 wound peacefully toward the German Sea. The educa- 
 tional influence of his natural environment had not a 
 little to do with the formation of Wyclif 's character, as 
 John Knox was influenced by the more rugged features 
 of his northern home and John Calvin by the pictur- 
 esque beauty of France and the grandeur of the Alps 
 which girdled Lake Leman. But there were agencies 
 far more potential that determined his habits of thought 
 and chiseled into impressive form his exceptional man- 
 hood. The period in which he lived, the race to which 
 he belonged, the influence of great minds going imme- 
 diately before, and, above all, the grace of God working 
 through the inspired word, lifted him above the common 
 level. It was well for the Church, waiting release from 
 a cruel, relentless hierarchy, that Wyclif was born in 
 England, of Anglo-Saxon parents, in the beginning of 
 the fourteenth century, rather than on the Campagna 
 divided by the Tiber, of Italian descent and in the 
 time of Hildebrand or of Gregory X. But whilst his 
 family possessed the sterling qualities which made the 
 Saxons a great people, and retained many of the earlier 
 characteristics which distinguished the Germans from 
 the Normans, yet they were unswerving adherents to 
 the papacy, and transmitted their devotion to the gen- 
 
WYCLIF. 35 
 
 erations succeeding. Robert Wyclif, who lived in York- 
 shire, a parish priest of Riidly, died in the faith of his 
 fathers, having no sympathy with the Reformer who 
 was his senior, commending his soul to " Almighty God, 
 to St. Mary and to all the saints.'^ 
 
 It is probable that Wyclif in his boyhood received 
 instruction from the priest to whose parish his family 
 belonged, and at a later period was sent t€ Oxford, even 
 then noted for its educational advantages, though far in- 
 ferior to the universities of the present. It was about 
 the year 1335 that he entered either Baliol or Queen's 
 College, probably the former, where he was much de- 
 voted to '^ logical and dialectical studies.'' He after- 
 ward became a fellow of Merton, and in 1361 was 
 recalled to Baliol as its master. Theological studies 
 had engaged much of his attention, and these compassed 
 a wide range. He was no doubt familiar with the 
 writings of Augustine and Thomas Aquinas and later 
 theologians. He never acquired a knowledge of the 
 Greek language, hence he never read the New Testament 
 in the original text ; but he was a diligent student of 
 the Latin Vulgate. For six years, it is presumed, he 
 was occupied with the study of theology. This period 
 succeeded that which was devoted to general sciences. 
 As master of Baliol he gave lectures on philosophy ; as 
 a bachelor of divinity, on biblical theology; and as 
 warden of Canterbury Hall, on scholastic divinity. He 
 achieved distinction in the leading university of his age 
 as a scholar and teacher. His fame went for beyond 
 the limits of the classic town. It was reported abroad, 
 and correctly, that he was learned in the arts of grammar, 
 rhetoric and logic, called the Trivium ; in arithmetic, 
 
36 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 geometry, astronomy and music, called the Quadrivium : 
 and was familiar with biblical theology and the canon 
 law. Students flocked to him at Oxford from all parts 
 of England, and he well deserved the designation which 
 Roger Bacon had won, the Doctor Mirahilis. In 1361 
 he was made rector of Fillingham, a small parish in the 
 county of Lincoln, but seems to have continued his resi- 
 dence in Oxford, assigning the larger part of his pastoral 
 duties to a curate, yet relinquishing the mastership of 
 Baliol. 
 
 Wyclif became conspicuous during this period in con- 
 nection with a question of political right involving the 
 relations of Church and State. His versatile mind could 
 not be confined to a narrow field. He was a patriot 
 whilst he was a Christian. He was especially interested 
 in a question of church authority which infringed upon 
 prerogatives of the throne. He seems to have been a 
 member of the Parliament of 1361, which was occupied 
 with the papal claim to feudatory tribute. In the pre- 
 vious year Pope Urban V. complained to Edward III. 
 that for a third of a century the Crown had failed to pay, 
 in accordance with the pledge of John, the reigning 
 sovereign, the sum of one thousand marks annually as 
 a rightful tribute to the Roman See. In his authority 
 as feudal superior he demanded payment. The king 
 referred the claim to Parliament. It embraced a ques- 
 tion of grave significance. Shall England bow in abject 
 submission to such a domination as this claim involves, 
 or reject it on pain of pontifical judgments? Wyclif 
 seems to have come to the front in the discussion and 
 settlement of this question. It was decided that John 
 had transcended his prerogatives, that the principle of 
 
WYCLIF. 37 
 
 feudatory superiority residing in the pope was vicious, 
 that the people were absolved from the payment of the 
 feudal tribute, and that the claim would be resisted by 
 the whole power of the English realm. The pope 
 cowered before this expression of righteous indignation, 
 and the papal assumption yielded to the dignity of the 
 Crown. In this action Wyclif has taken issue with the 
 Roman Church, for his hand is evidently in it, and the 
 warden of Canterbury Hall shall suffer for his temerity. 
 His attitude toward the claim of Urban V. may have 
 suggested Wyclif 's appointment as a royal commissary 
 to Bruges in 1374 to bear part in a discussion respecting 
 the relations of the pope to English church officers and 
 the rights of cathedral chapters, and various infringe- 
 ments upon the liberty of the Church. The king 
 reposed confidence in the judgment and loyalty of the 
 Oxford professor, and the people at large recognized the 
 potency of his influence in questions touching the honor 
 of the realm. The teacher of biblical theology is famil- 
 iar with political theology. Is versed in political affairs 
 and is fitted to represent the kingdom in diplomatic 
 conferences with the nuncios of the pope. This em- 
 bassage introduced Wyclif to the leading city of Flan- 
 ders. It was the first time he had crossed the English 
 Channel. Bruges was a great and busy town, distin- 
 guished for the scope of its industries, the weight of 
 Its political influence, the opulence of its burghers and 
 the luxury of its life. But the corruption of the Church 
 must have made a still profounder impression upon this 
 observant stranger. It was an experience similar to 
 Luther's when he went from his secluded home in 
 Saxony to Rome, the seat of papal jurisdiction. It had 
 
88 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 soraetliiiig to do Avith Wyclif s subsequent relations to 
 the hierarcliy that fostered iniquity and hurled anath- 
 emas upon those who disputed its power. Wyclif ^s course 
 as commissary did not commend him to the Italian 
 diplomats or to pontifical favor, nor did the results 
 of the conference materially inure to the benefit of the 
 Anglican Church. But this did not terminate the pro- 
 test against papal encroachments upon the rights of the 
 English cathedrals, the promotion through bribery of 
 incompetent foreigners, the discriminations in favor of 
 the latter in the apportionment of salaries and the sac- 
 rificing of the sacred interests of the Church to the 
 avarice which bought the favor of Rome. The dis- 
 affection extended, and in 1376 the Good Parliament 
 voiced the public dissatisfaction in tones that awakened 
 the papal court to the gravity of the situation. Wyclif 
 was a member of the Parliament. He championed the 
 rights of the national Church in opposition to the in- 
 fringements of the papal throne, and grew more promi- 
 nent as the controversy advanced. 
 
 Soon after this he received a summons to appear be- 
 fore the clerical convocation which was to meet in Lon- 
 don. On Thursday, Feb. 19, 1377, the convocation as- 
 sembled in the street and obstructed the entrance to the 
 great cathedral. At length Wyclif appeared on the 
 slope of Ludgate Hill, the most conspicuous figure in the 
 imposing procession. The duke of Lancaster, his friend, 
 walked at his side. Behind him were armed custodians 
 wearing helmets and swords. Following these were 
 mendicant monks and a goodly company friendly to the 
 Oxford ])reachcr. They found their way with difficulty 
 through the jostling multitude, and at last reached the 
 
wrcLiF. 39 
 
 chapel, where the dignified bishop, with dukes and 
 barons, awaited his coming. Wyclif stood in the im- 
 posing court, a thoughtful man, slender in person, much 
 above the medium stature, clad in a black gown which 
 reached to the floor, and wearing a heavy beard, full and 
 long, imparting strength to a face which betokened the 
 profound student, the unswerving patriot and the devout 
 Christian — a heroic man who could die for ti^e truth, but 
 would not deny it, his calm searching eyes fixed on the 
 bisliop of London, who scowled scornfully upon the 
 culprit at his bar. Then followed a scene of conflict 
 between the court and some of the Reformer's friends, 
 in which Wyclif bore no part. The duke of Lancaster 
 was especially violent in his address to the bishop, and 
 the latter replied in terms quite unbefitting his high 
 office. The report of the personal conflict circulated on the 
 streets, raising a popular indignation in which one party 
 was arrayed against another, each threatening to resort 
 to deeds of violence. Wild commotion prevailed until the 
 princess of Wales interposed and secured peace. Mean- 
 while, attention was diverted from Wyclif; the court 
 had adjourned, and the result suggests a familiar line in 
 the chief of Latin poets : '^ Farturiunt montes, nascetur 
 ridiculus mus.'' Three months after this failure of the 
 convocation to arrest the work of Wyclif (May 22, 1377) 
 Gregory XL, persuaded of his power to do what the 
 English bishops did not accomplish, in the splendid 
 cathedral of San Maria Maggiore at Rome issued five 
 bulls against the Reformer, directing the imprisonment 
 of Wyclif in case it should be established that he \\*as 
 the author of certain theses which disputed rights, secu- 
 lar and spiritual, inherent in the Church of Rome. This 
 
40 ROMANISM AND THE BEFORMERS. 
 
 procedure was probably instigated by the English 
 bishops, who had wrought with marvelous cunning a 
 net in which they hoped to entrap Wyclif and suddenly 
 terminate his power. That he was advancing in popu- 
 lar favor was apparent, and the strong arm of the pon- 
 tifical throne must arrest a career which portended only 
 evil to the apostolic Church. But Gregory failed in his 
 purpose. England sympathized with Wyclif rather than 
 with the successor to St. Peter, and the bulls fell harm- 
 less to the ground. 
 
 Thereafter, Wyclif devoted himself to a work that was 
 more spiritual. He did not crave distinction as a patriot 
 nor as a political reformer, so much as he desired to help 
 rel(!ase the Church from the domination of the papal 
 hierarchy and spread abroad a knowledge of the truth. 
 He now appears as a spiritual teacher, traveling the world's 
 wilderness, predicting a better day and leading toward it 
 — a day whose faint gleam fell on his path, and was 
 granted to others also through his agency, but only 
 when, released from the blinding influence of error, they 
 looked adoringly at the greatest sight that has ever 
 greeted mortal eyes — " the Lamb of God which taketh 
 away the sin of the world.'' 
 
 We are now to study the life of Wyclif in Its more 
 direct relations to Bible truth hi opposition to the false 
 teachings of Rome. The Oxford professor grew more 
 conspicuous as a Reformer, advancing beyond the super- 
 stitious beliefs of early years, and modifying, if he did 
 not wholly renounce, the grosser errors of the papal 
 Church. He came by gradual steps and a deliberate 
 ascent from a realm wrapped with mist to the high table- 
 
WYCLIF. 41 
 
 lands of revelation, where the light was clearer and the 
 air relieved of its spiritual chill. 
 
 As the years advanced he manifested a growing dispo- 
 sition to part company with the papal hierarchy, though 
 he never entirely broke his connection with the Romish 
 Church. He refused to recognize the right of the 
 Roman pontiff to exercise authority over the universal 
 Church, although he had previously consented to it as a 
 temporary expedient. But in 1378, when dissensions 
 arose in the Church, and the French cardinals, assembled 
 at Fondi, elected a pope of their own, violently opposing 
 the successor of Gregory XI. and his adherents, he ex- 
 pressed the opinion that both Urban YI. and Clement 
 VI I. were false popes. They were apostates and limbs 
 of the devil, instead of members of the body of Christ. 
 How, then, could either of them rightfully claim to be 
 the successor of St. Peter or the vicegerent of the as- 
 cended Lord? He denounced the hierarchy as an in- 
 stitution of the Wicked One, and he longed for its 
 extinction. This was a pivotal point in the life of the 
 Reformer. 
 
 From opposition to the papacy he passed to a renun- 
 ciation of some of its essential dogmas. He had long 
 given earnest thought to the church doctrine of the 
 Lord's Supper. At length he arrived at the conclusion 
 that it was unscriptural and to be rejected. He insisted 
 that the consecrated host on the altar was neither Christ 
 nor any part of him. This was a rejection of transub- 
 stantiation. It was a bold step, but he did not hesitate 
 to take it. It was not done without earnest and prolonged 
 consideration, and, having taken it, he maintained his 
 advanced position. He was not moved by impulse. 
 
42 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 and Ik; could uot be intimidated by threats. The storm 
 of indignation his theses against the accepted doctrine 
 raised in Oxford, the condemnation of his heresy by a 
 council of doctors of theology and mendicant monks, 
 and the mandate prohibiting the teaching of so funda- 
 mental an error on pain of excommunication and im- 
 prisonment, did not move him, and although his mouth 
 was closed his pen sent forth vigorous arguments against 
 transubstantiation, and their circulation was more widely 
 extended than if he had simply maintained them within 
 the walls of the university. It does not appear from 
 any of Wyclif's writings or from the teachings of the 
 Church that the withholding of the cup from the laity 
 had as yet received ecclesiastical approval, nor that the 
 doctrine of the sacrifice of the mass as a satisfaction for 
 sin had been incorporated in the Romish creed. Hence 
 his attack was made upon the first of the trinity of 
 errors which subsequently corrupted the sacrament of 
 the Lord's Supper. He insisted that transubstantiation, 
 an '' accident without a substance, was neither taught in 
 the word of God nor supported by tradition," and that 
 for the memorial feast instituted by Christ there was 
 substituted the '' abomination of desolation." Transub- 
 stantiation was contrary to all analogy of speech and to 
 reason. When Christ said at the Supper, " This is my 
 body," a literal meaning was no more intended than 
 when he said, ^' I am the vine" or "I am the door." 
 It was blasphemous also to hold that a priest by a silent 
 signal of his will could convert the wafer into the actual 
 body of our Lord, and to believe it involved the sin of 
 idolatry. 
 
 In all this, though there is somewhat of indefiniteness 
 
WYCLTF. 4e3 
 
 in his teachings, Wyclif stands prominently forth as the 
 advocate of a divinely-instituted and spiritual observance 
 of the Lord's Supper. He seems to have held a more 
 scriptural view of this ordinance than did Martin Luther 
 or John Calvin, approaching the theory taught by 
 Zvvingle, but more nearly in accord with the belief now 
 generally held by Protestant Christendom. The Lol- 
 lards accepted his interpretation of the Lord's Supper, 
 and, largely through their influence, it was continued 
 during succeeding generations. It is not regarded as 
 absolute truth, but a near approximation to it, which 
 prepared the way for the elimination of the grave errors 
 which had deformed the sacrament and opened the door 
 to the holy place of communion with Christ and his 
 elect. 
 
 As a lecturer on divinity in the university at Oxford 
 Wyclif had attracted much attention. By many he was 
 heard with mild approval, whilst some esteemed him an 
 oracle whose words it were folly to gainsay and wicked 
 to deny. He insisted that in the determination of truth 
 there must be a ground of ultimate and unmistakable 
 appeal. He did not repudiate reason, but held that it 
 alone could not discover truth. The light of nature has 
 its place, and he would accept its helpful offices, but the 
 word of God is the final and infallible basis of belief. 
 "Thus it is written." He sought to be a biblical 
 preacher. He listened to the divine voice, and followed 
 where it led. He reported his own convictions, return- 
 ing from the wide fields of revelation as he had been able 
 to explore them, laden with the fruits of pious research 
 as were the spies with the fruits of Canaan. 
 
 Although he was unacquainted with the original Ian- 
 
44 ROMA y ISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 giiages of the Old aud New Testaments, he excelled Id 
 his knowledge of the Latin tongue and was familiar with 
 the Scriptures as rendered in the Vulgate. In the uni- 
 versity his preaching was adapted to the minds he ad- 
 dressed and was in the language with which scholars were 
 acquainted. But Latin sermons were unintelligible to 
 the greater multitude beyond the walls of the university. 
 Ijutterworth was at a far remove from Oxford, though 
 in geographical miles near by, and his humble parish 
 w^as the representative of widespread and urgent need. 
 The doctor whom the learned esteemed great conde- 
 scended in order that he might be useful, preaching in 
 simple terms, in self- forgetful ness, supporting every 
 statement of truth by the word of God, which abideth 
 for ever. 
 
 He expressed his opposition to a style of public dis- 
 course, prevalent in his day, which in some of its fea- 
 tures is not wholly unknown in our time. It has been 
 said of some preachers in the nineteenth century that they 
 go to the Bible for their texts and to Seneca or Herbert 
 Spencer for their sermons. Speculative philosophy 
 furnishes the staple to many homilies, or illustrations 
 drawn from natural sciences and obsolete history obscure 
 for the popular mind the truth its need demands. In 
 other instances the dignity of the pulpit is sacrificed to a 
 low taste, and men commissioned to preach the gospel 
 with a seriousness begotten of a sense of responsibility 
 to God and of the momentous interests involved, play 
 the buffoon before a gaping crowd, whilst souls perish 
 and Heaven weeps. But this, which is exceptional in 
 our age, was common in Wyclif 's day. Against such a 
 prostitution of the sacred office he entered his solemn 
 
WYCLIF. 45 
 
 protest. Old wives' fables, silly traditious, stories about 
 the saints and the miracles they wrought, incidents ex- 
 tracted from the story- writers which were as puerile as 
 misleading, with an occasional recourse to the myths of 
 heathen creation, — these occupied the hour designated for 
 pulpit instruction. The benches were filled, the treasury 
 was enriched, the people applauded and the preacher was 
 content. The earnest, spiritual preaching of the word, 
 accompanied with the unction born of conniiunion with 
 God ; the preaching that recognized man's sinful and help- 
 less condition, a death in trespasses and in sins, with a sol- 
 emn intimation of that doom wdiich for those who perish 
 shall sweep the endless years; the preaching which con- 
 formed in large measure to that of Christ, who came to save 
 the lost, and held all truth aifectionately yet impressively 
 on the border-line of eternity,— such preaching would, 
 for a time at least, terminate the popularity of the pulpit 
 and empty the pews. But Wyclif believed it was the 
 power of God unto salvation, and that the preacher was 
 recreant to his trust and would carry the blood of souls 
 in his skirts to the bar of God unless he preached the 
 preaching the Master had bidden him. Wyclif sought 
 to reform the pulpit. His own idea may not have been 
 wholly scriptural, but it made a long advance toward it, 
 and the result was an ultimate benediction to England. 
 He rejected an unintelligible scholasticism on the one side 
 and a foolish charlatanism on the other. He put little 
 dependence on the graces of oratory and the refinements 
 of rhetoric, but desired to go in humble speech to the 
 sources of saving truth, baptized with the power which 
 comes from God and conducts to him. The Reformation 
 must begin in the pulpit. He put his convictions into 
 
46 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 the concrete form of a personal example. The rector of 
 Lutterworth, pale and thoughtful, himself an inquirer 
 after truth, satisfied there was something better for him 
 and his hearers a little farther on, drew his inspiration 
 from the Sacred Scriptures and sought to impart a spir- 
 itual knowledge to souls that w^ould die eternally without 
 it. His own declaration was that " in every proclama- 
 tion of the gospel the true teacher must address himself 
 to the heart, so as to flash the light into the spirit of the 
 hearer and to bend his will into obedience to the 
 truth." 
 
 It is claimed by some that Wyclif never attained to a 
 full comprehension of the gospel, though he was in ad- 
 vance of his age. It is not improbable that the Aristo- 
 telian philosophy, w^hich exalted human works and 
 diverted the Romish Church from the doctrine of jus- 
 tification by the righteousness of Christ alone, had ob- 
 scured his views of the cross. But there is reason to 
 conclude from his writings, in which he magnifies the 
 work of Christ, that he not only possessed that docility 
 which is a preparation for the revelations of Calvary, 
 but that he had actually gone to its rocky summit and 
 taken his outlook of heaven from thence. He did not 
 see as clearly as did Luther, nor did he formulate his 
 faith as definitely as did Calvin, but he saw the outlines 
 of truth in the gray dawn, and helped his successors to 
 a clearer apprehension of the Christian system than he 
 himself had acquired. His modes of expression were 
 not those of modern theology. Yet his apprehensions 
 of truth were substantially those of the nineteenth cen- 
 tury. His Christology maintained the incomparable 
 glory of the Messiah, the '^Caesar always Augustus," the 
 
WYCLIF. 47 
 
 One altogether lovely, the only Mediator between God 
 and men, and a mighty Conqueror whose steps are 
 Titanic, a greater than Alexander, the like of whom had 
 never crossed the track of the ages. Some of his ex- 
 pressions, epigrammatic and fragrant with the grace of 
 Christ, are repeated to-day by many who have never 
 learned their origin, and the roots of some of our 
 choicest sacred lyrics are found in the pulpit of Lutter- 
 worth, of which we may instance one : " This I suffer 
 for thee ; what dost thou suffer for me T^ 
 
 There seems at times a cold severity in Wyclif 's pres- 
 entation of truth. His denunciations of the corruptions 
 of the Church were often fearful and calculated to arouse 
 bitter antagonism to his work of reform. But we should 
 not judge the fourteenth century in the light of the nine- 
 teenth. The former was a rude age. Rude weapons 
 and heavy blows were not only permitted, but required. 
 Opposition to error thundered at the gates. The batter- 
 ing-ram did effective service. The sleep of ages could 
 be broken only by the shock of earthquakes. The age 
 in which the still small voice would prove more effective 
 had not come. Even John Knox did not live to see it. 
 Yet the preacher of Lutterworth was by no means lack- 
 ing in that tender love of souls and that profound sympa- 
 thy with a misguided people which must ever be the chief 
 elements of pulpit power. There is great sweetness in 
 his portrayals of Christ in the offices of prophet, priest 
 and king. There were the breathings of a brother's 
 affection in his endeavors to direct the attention of the 
 hungry and athirst to Him in whom all fullness dwells. 
 His work, it is admitted, was largely that of a destruc- 
 tionist, and it was reserved for others to build on fourda- 
 
48 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 tloiis relieved of superstructures that were false and 
 dangerous. But this was not his exclusive mission. He 
 declared the truth; he exalted the word of God. To 
 tradition he assigned an inferior place. The decrees of 
 councils were of no authority if they were in conflict 
 with the teachings of the Scriptures. The consensus of 
 Christendom deserved attention, but was to be received 
 with caution. The Bible was the sufficient guide of 
 conduct, the only infallible rule of faith. The " Mixtim 
 theology " followed an ignis fatuus, and its teachers 
 were blind leaders of the blind. Wyclif sought to 
 preach an unadulterated gospel, and that he might an- 
 swer each inquiry after truth he compared scripture with 
 scripture and maintained the attitude of devout disciple- 
 ship in the school of Christ that he might instruct oth- 
 ers. Attention should be called to Wyclif 's extension 
 of the truth by means of preaching itinerants. He sent 
 forth a class of men fitted to teach and in sympathy with 
 his religious views, who sought to influence public senti- 
 ment in the interests of reform and to conduct the peo- 
 ple to the sources of saving knowledge. He insisted 
 that they should not preach tales of saints nor descant 
 about Trojan wars, but take their texts from the Bible 
 and exalt Christ as Mediator and Lawgiver. These 
 itinerants with unshod feet, clad in russet gowns, carry- 
 ing staves, disregarded the usual conventionalities of the 
 priesthood, and without the authority of the Church 
 preached in places of public gathering, in chapels that 
 would admit them, in churchyards and wherever they 
 could secure audience. Trained for their work, probably 
 in Oxford at the first, they were instructed that it was 
 their office and duty faithfully, freely and truly to preach 
 
 I 
 
WYCLIF. 49 
 
 God's word. Their influence was widely felt. Some 
 of them were men of marked ability, and the most of 
 them were exceptionally devout. But they incurred 
 the displeasure of the archbishop of Canterbury, Wil- 
 liam Courtenay, who in the exercise of his episcopal au- 
 thorization commanded them to desist from their work. 
 It was disorderly. They had not obtained the usual 
 authority to teach, which could be given only by the 
 Church. Besides, it was reported that they preached 
 heretical doctrines, and relaxed, if they did not sever, the 
 ties which had bound the people to the papal Church. 
 The air of piety Avhich was a marked characteristic of 
 the itinerants commended them to many, and their enthu- 
 siasm was so great and won for them such success that 
 it was said — with exaggeration, however — that ^^ every 
 second man in England was a Lollard.^' The pilgrim- 
 preachers journeyed on, repeating refreshing messages to 
 souls that had long fed on husks and bowed at the nod of 
 the papal tiara or followed the beck of a corrupt priesthood 
 into the desert of formalism. This system of itinerancy 
 — which had been previously practiced among the Wal- 
 denses, of which fact the Reformers probably had no 
 knowledge — was renewed four centuries later, and John 
 Wyclif again appeared in the person and work of John 
 Wesley. 
 
 The men whom our Reformer educated for evangel- 
 istic work were at a far remove, as respects the subject- 
 matter of their preaching and the spirit which prompted 
 their service, from the monks and friars, the black and 
 gray, who were numerous as the leaves of Vallombrosa, 
 — men who thronged the entrances to the great cathe- 
 drals, and surrounded the seats of political power, and 
 
50 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 frequented the purlieus of the city and the country 
 roads. As a class they were corrupt, and corrupted all 
 whom they influenced. Many of these, though clad in 
 garments of poverty, accumulated wealth, and others 
 aspired to worldly power and luxurious living. 
 
 Wyclif sympathized at first with the mendicant monks 
 in distinction from the old endowed orders, and vindica- 
 ted their habits of life ; and this he did for many years, 
 although there is not sufficient evidence that he stimu- 
 lated or favored the peasants' insurrection, which these 
 friars supported. But when he came to know them 
 better, and especially after they resisted every effort to 
 restore a pure Christianity, traded in indulgences and 
 absolutions and taught that almsgiving might be a sub- 
 stitute for spirituality, he turned against them and sought 
 to break their influence. Of them he humorously said 
 that the Scriptures never referred to them except in the 
 text, " I know you not." In a sickness which it was 
 supposed would terminate fatally a monk visited him, 
 hoping to secure his recantation, but Wyclif promptly 
 rose in his bed and said, " I shall not die, but live to 
 declare the works of the -begging friars." 
 
 We now come to Wyclif 's greatest work, the transla- 
 tion of the Holy Scriptures into thje English tongue. 
 In opposition to the Church of Rome he believed the 
 Bible should be circulated among the people in their own 
 language. God had not intended that it should be the 
 possession of the priesthood only, or that its use by the 
 laity should be contingent on priestly permission. To the 
 translation of the Scriptures into the vernacular of the 
 people he devoted twenty years of vigorous life. The 
 Psalter had been translated into the Saxon language in 
 
WYCLIF. 61 
 
 a precediDg century, and had attained a limited cir- 
 culation. But it was reserved for Wyclif to give to the 
 people the word of God in its entirety. He had only 
 the Latin Bible of Jerome. Unacquainted with the 
 original languages, he could have received no aid from 
 manuscripts to which he may have had no access. In 
 his translation of the Old Testament he was assisted 
 to some extent, by Nicholas Hereford. He began with 
 the Apocalypse, his favorite study, and included the 
 Apocrypha along with the canonical books. At length 
 (in 1382) the work was completed. The translation 
 was not all that he desired, and he entered upon a revis- 
 ion which was carried on by John Purvey and completed 
 about six years later. The printing-press was unknown, 
 and copies were made by the slower process of the age. 
 But many pens were employed, and the multiplication 
 of the word of God was hastened. There remain one 
 hundred and seventy of the copies of Wyclif 's transla- 
 tion until the present. 0;ie may be seen in the Lenox 
 Library in New York. The flames have not been per- 
 mitted to consume them and the centuries have not 
 obliterated the handwriting. The Bible was precious 
 in those days. It required nearly two hundred dollars 
 to buy a single copy. It was beyond the reach of the 
 poor, except as they had access to the house of the 
 wealthy or families united in its purchase. 
 
 The Reformation was born of the work Wyclif 
 accomplished. It was then the Romish Church heard 
 its death-knell. It was evident that the circulation of 
 the Scriptures would lead to the exercise of private 
 judgment, and private judgment would destroy the 
 power of the hierarchy. It was the Vulgate indeed 
 
52 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 which had been rendered into the language of the 
 English people, and the Vulgate was the accepted 
 translation of the Church. But it was for the use of 
 the priesthood only, and by them it was to be inter- 
 preted. Its general circulation was a profanation of 
 the Sacred Oracles. Knowledge would dig the grave 
 of Romish devotion. Hence the Church summoned 
 all her strength to put an end to the threatening evil. 
 Knyton reflected the prevailing sentiment of the papacy 
 when he thus discoursed concerning the Bible : " This 
 Master John Wyclif translated it out of Latin into the 
 Anglican, not the angelic tongue, and thus laid it more 
 open to the laity and to women who could read than it 
 had formerly been to the most learned of the clergy, or 
 even to those of them that had the best understanding. 
 And in this way the gospel pearl is cast abroad and 
 trodden under foot of swine; that which was before 
 precious both to clergy and laity is rendered as it were 
 the common jest of both. The jewel of the Church i.< 
 turned into the common sport of the people, and what 
 was hitherto the principal gift of the clergy and divines 
 is made for ever common to the laity." So said all who 
 were loyal to the Roman See and had incorporated papal 
 corruptions with their life's blood. 
 
 The leading ecclesiastics assembled at St. Paul's 
 church, London, in 1408, and pronounced the reading 
 of Wyclif 's translation a heresy punishable by excom- 
 munication, imprisonment, death. At once the air 
 seemed filled with anathemas ; prison-doors swung on 
 their hinges and fagots were gathered for the burning. 
 Wyclif and the Lollards might cry out against the 
 vices of the clergy and the sins of the people, but let 
 
WYCLIF. 53 
 
 Lim that circulates or reads in his own toDgue the word 
 of God be accursed. Rome dreaded the Bible as night 
 the rising sun. Rome dreads it now. The priest may 
 still read extracts from the word, and interpret them to 
 the people, but a complete Bible would smite the throne 
 of the papacy and break the bands of ignorance asunder. 
 In this the animus of the papacy is seen. It has not 
 changed with the passage of the centuries. The Bible- 
 house stands to-day on the Corso in Rome, but the pope, 
 if it were in his power, would bury it deeper than the 
 Catacombs, and the Church would sing a Te Deum over 
 its grave. It is true the Bible circulates to some extent 
 m Italy, throughout papal Europe and goes abroad 
 over the earth speaking in the tongues of all the 
 nations, but the Church of Rome, if it were possible, 
 would terminate this contact of the truth with popular 
 thought and inquiry for ever. The reasons are obvi- 
 ous : Rome loves darkness rather than light, because 
 her deeds are evil. 
 
 Wyclif's translation inaugurated a new era in the 
 land of the Saxons. It opened visions of the past, and 
 mind communed with mind separated by ages. Again 
 the father of the faithful pitches his tent on the plains 
 of Mamre, and redeemed Israel travels the paths of the 
 wilderness beyond the cloven sea. Again David sings 
 his now plaintive, now joyous psalms, and his royal son 
 puts into flowing numbers, enriched with imagery warm 
 and bright as the overarching Orient, his estimate of the 
 Beloved. Again Isaiah goes to the hill-top of inspira- 
 tion with his face toward the east, and, catching a faint 
 gleam of the dawn, utters seraphic prophecies concern- 
 ing the Child, the Son, whose name is Wonderful, the 
 
54 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace; and Micah, 
 when the son of Amos is asleep with his fathers, climbs 
 the same summit and points to Bethlehem hard by the 
 wood of Ephratah, and lo ! He is born for whom the 
 Church had waited through four thousand years. Nay, 
 more than that : Wyclif 's Bible brought the historic 
 Christ to view — the true Bishop of souls, the only 
 Pontiff of the Church, the world's only Saviour ; and 
 He whom Rome had hidden or misrepresented walks 
 abroad among men, thorn-crowned and nail-pierced, yet 
 living who was dead, unbounded love in his heart, for- 
 giveness in his speech, benedictions on his lips, pointing 
 the weary and sin-burdened and homesick to a land of 
 rest and beauty not afar off. Well did Wyclif say, " To 
 be ignorant of the Scriptures is to be ignorant of Christ.'^ 
 Ah, we who have our Bible in church and home and 
 closet, speaking whenever we will listen, bringing light 
 and comfort, inspiring hope and revealing heaven, can 
 form but a poor conception of what Wyclif 's Bible was 
 to the few who gained access to it. 
 
 Then, as has been often suggested, Wyclif 's transla- 
 tion of the Scriptures greatly elevated English literature, 
 and its fruitage has been gathered in the wide world of 
 letters from his day to ours. It was to England what 
 Luther's Bible was to Germany, and stands at the head 
 of the " Middle English ;" and it is the grateful admis- 
 sion of the nineteenth century ^' that if Chaucer is the 
 father of our Later-English poetry, Wyclif is the father 
 of our Later-English prose." One of the silver-tongued 
 orators of the New World is in full accord with the 
 German biographers when, referring to Wyclif 's Bible, 
 which, although circumscribed in its immediate influence. 
 
WYCLIF, 55 
 
 was born in England to stay, he says : " There was the 
 English Renaissance. Leighton and Owen and Jeremy 
 Taylor became possible afterward — Bacon and Hooker, 
 Shakespeare and Milton, Dry den and Wordsworth, and 
 Robert Burns. The world of letters had found a lan- 
 guage for the magnetic periods of Burke, for Addison's 
 and Macaulay's prose, for Gibbon's sentences, moving as 
 with the tread of an imperial triumph." 
 
 Now Wyclif's work is done. He did not fear mar- 
 tyrdom. For righteousness' sake he would have embraced 
 it joyfully. But he died in his bed on the 31st of 
 December, 1384, and his remains were reverently laid 
 near the Lutterworth pulpit, but not to rest in peace. 
 Thirty years later, in 1415, the Council of Constance, 
 which condemned John Huss and Jerome of Prague 
 and burnt them outside the city-gate, ordered Wyclif 's 
 books to be destroyed and his bones to be exhumed and 
 burned. Pope Martin V. commanded Fleming, bishop 
 of Lincoln, to execute the decree, and it was done, but 
 not until 1428. The harmless bones were consumed 
 and the ashes were thrown into the Swift. 
 
 "The Avon to the Severn runs, 
 The Severn to the sea, 
 And Wyclif s dust shall spread abroad 
 Wide as the waters be." 
 
 The influence of the Oxford scholar, the diligent author 
 and the faithful pastor of Lutterworth, whom Milton 
 styled " the divine and admirable Wyclif," has reached 
 far as the sea that received his mortal remains. Out of 
 it sprang the Reformation in Germany and the jBvaugel 
 that sang its heaven-inspired numbers among the moun- 
 
56 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 tains of Switzerland. The East received its light from 
 the West, the continent from the seagirt isle, and a 
 later age transmitted it to lands beyond the Atlantic. 
 Some may insist that this is an unwarranted claim 
 in Wyclif's behalf. But it were to misread history 
 and to misinterpret the law of progress in the spiritual 
 kingdom to conclude that his w^ork died with him, say- 
 ing, as did Rome when his bones turned to ashes, 
 " That is the end of him. ' The immediate results of 
 his work were not great. The light along the hills was 
 faint and soon obscured. No king arose to maintain the 
 truth by the might and influence of regal power. No 
 potential scholars pleaded in its behalf. No agencies, 
 such as afterward appeared, multiplied the words of life 
 and repeated them in every home. Wyclif stood well- 
 nigh alone. He was a solitary star shining in a clouded 
 sky. Nevertheless, his w^ork lived after him. If to 
 some it seem a subterranean potency, unseen and unfelt, 
 yet even they admit that it reappeared in a deeper, 
 broader channel, on its surface the gleam of heaven and 
 along its margin the trees of life. The old university 
 town in which he had spent the most of his life nevei 
 quite escaped the influence of his teachings. Fathei 
 told the story of his life to their sons. The bonfire 
 which consumed the volumes his laborious pen hac 
 written failed to destroy all the products of his busy 
 brain and hand. Even the Avon as it sped on its wayi 
 helped to keep his memory in the hearts of men, andj 
 the Severn sang it to those who passed by. The Bible 
 in England's vernacular lived on. The voices of St. 
 Paul's .church which condemned it were as impotent asi 
 the decrees which issued from the Dominican convent 
 
WYCLIF. 57 
 
 near by. The Lollards carried it under their rough 
 mantles, and read it beside hearthstones and under the 
 trees. The sheen of a better day grew along the horizon. 
 It crossed the Channel and reached even to the valleys 
 of Bohemia. The priest of Prague in the scholastic 
 centre of Europe saw it, and in its light spelled out the 
 story of the cross. The Wittenberg monk caught the 
 gleam from afar. God was not in haste. The vision 
 tarried, and the world waited for it. It came at the 
 appointed time, and did not tarry. Instead of the night 
 was the morning, and in these last times the day is 
 traveling gloriously on. 
 
 Wyclif was truly great. We owe more to him than 
 most of us have supposed. We are occupied with the wealth 
 of thought and blessing which flows like a river through 
 our lives, and forget too often its source, under God, 
 in the study of the Oxford professor and the rectory of 
 Lutterworth. The ^' grand old man, the illustrious 
 pioneer of Reform in England," who stands out to the 
 view of posterity in " solitary and mysterious loneliness," 
 is a Mount Ararat on the pathway of the ages, the first 
 to catch the pencilings of light which betokened the day. 
 He was in advance of his age. He saw the summits of 
 oncoming events which men of lower intellect never saw. 
 lu drastic speech Milton asseverated that " if the stiif- 
 uecked obstinacy of our prelates had not obstructed 
 AV^yclif 's sublime and exalted spirit, the names of the 
 Bohemian Huss and Hieronymus, and even of Luther 
 and Calvin, would at this day have been buried in ob- 
 scurity, and the glory of having reformed our neighbors 
 would have been ours alone." We lay our grateful 
 tribute of praise at his feet, and thank God who gave 
 
58 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS, 
 
 him to these latter ages, as he gave Moses to Israel and 
 Paul to the Gentile world. 
 
 History gives us but a glimpse of the spiritual life of 
 the mediaeval doctor. If he is not known to the 
 Church as a religious genius, like some who lived in 
 cloisters and spent their days in devout meditation, yet 
 he may have held quite as much intercourse with Heaven. 
 He seems to have been exempt, in a measure quite un- 
 common, from those blemishes of character which have 
 marred the memory of many saints. Some of his 
 enemies were conspicuous men whose words have lived 
 until now. But none of them have put on record a single 
 sentence which questions the integrity of his life. They 
 hated the heretic ; they paid unwilling homage to his 
 personal goodness. He was born in a Church which 
 carried with it a sepulchral chill, and he never left it. 
 He had but little in his intercourse with the ecclesiastics 
 of his age to help him up the slopes of a Christ-like life. 
 But he evidently grew in holiness amid surroundings so 
 unfavorable, as some plants thrive in poor soil and as 
 pines grow tall on mountain-summits, rocked by pass- 
 ing storms. To maintain a blameless life and escape 
 defamation in such an age, imperiling his life in the 
 interest of truth, marks him as a rare witness to the 
 power of divine grace. 
 
 In a missal in the library at Prague, Wyclif is repre- 
 sented at the top of an engraving kindling a spark. In 
 the centre Huss is blowing it into a flame. At the foot , 
 Luther is waving the torch aloft. All honor to the Re- 
 former who prepared the way for the Reformation, aftei 
 whom, wearing his mantle, came Huss, Jerome, Savon- 
 arola, Luihtr, Calvin, Cranmer and Knox, completinj 
 
WYCLIF. 59 
 
 the work the lone Englishman began. Thanks be to 
 God that he interrupted the long night, breathing into 
 the ears of the few who were faithful the promise of bet- 
 ter things, when Wyclif appeared, " the Morning Star 
 of the Keformation " 1 
 
Si|V0Ni^R0L4. 
 
*• Now the Spirit speaketh expressly, that in the latter times 
 some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing 
 spirits, and doctri?ies of devils ; speakiiig lies in hypocrisy ; 
 having their conscioice seared with a hot iron ; forbiddi?ig to 
 marry, and commanding to abstain froju meats, which God 
 hath created to be received with thanksgiving of them which 
 believe a?id know the truths 
 
 I Tim. 4. 1-3. 
 
 " The purest churches 7i7ider heaven are subject to mixture 
 and error ; and some have so degenerated, as to becoine no 
 churches of Christ, but synagogues of Satan. Nevertheless, 
 there shall be always a church on earth to worship God 
 according to his will'' 
 
 Confession of Faith, chap. xxv. sec. v. 
 
SAVONAROLA 
 
 r^ OD works in multiform ways. He spake at sundry 
 ^ times and in divers manners unto the fathers by 
 the prophets, leading them on to the more glorious dis- 
 pensation of his Son. By a similar process he accom- 
 plished the great Reformation. He employed agencies 
 that were quite unlike. He wrought along lines which 
 seemed divergent. But, like the weaver who employs 
 threads of different colors and texture and follows the 
 flying shuttle with the crush of the falling beam, and at 
 last completes the fabrics which adorn the palaces of 
 kings, so God by various means and seemingly conflict- 
 ing providences restored the gospel to Europe and the 
 adjacent isles. All things under his superintending 
 providence worked together for the consummation of 
 his purpose and the good of his Church. 
 
 Girolamo Savonarola possessed the spirit of John 
 Wyclif and transferred it to Martin Luther. But 
 whilst his work prepared the way for the triumphs of 
 truth in a later generation, he represented a factor in the 
 final result which differentiated his work from that of 
 his English predecessor and the greater Reformer of 
 Germany. He did not oppose the Church, but he set 
 the might of his intellect, the fervor of his eloquence 
 and the integrity of his life against every form of sin. 
 He was occupied with the fruits of errors rather than 
 
 63 
 
64 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 with their source. Wyclif opposed false doctrine by 
 the word of God^ and, coutinuiug in the Church, sought 
 to recover truth. Martin Luther attacked both error 
 and sin, and separated himself from the Church which 
 was corrupt, persuaded that reform could be secui-ed 
 from without and never from within. He responded to 
 the call which to him seemed to ring out over the plains 
 of Saxony and repeat itself through the Thuringian 
 forests : " Come out from among them, and be ye 
 separate, saith the Lord.'' 
 
 Some are slow to assign Savonarola a place among the 
 Reformers. His work was an apparent failure. His 
 life was like to the northern aurora which flashes along 
 the arch of night, then drops back into darkness. But 
 men may live when they are dead. Streams may wind 
 out of our sight and then reappear in wider and deeper 
 flow. Savonarola was one of God's most honored 
 instruments of radical and lasting reform. In the city 
 of Worms may be seen the conspicuous Luther monu- 
 ment, and in the clustering group around him, noble in 
 bearing, looking afar ofl', is the Dominican monk who 
 electrified Italy with his eloquence and shook the throne 
 of iniquity by the earthquake of his holy rebuke. 
 
 Girolamo Savonarola was born at Ferrara, October 
 12, 1452. His lineage was honorable. He received care- 
 ful religious education in the home, was instructed in the 
 best available schools and was early distinguished for 
 genius and learning. 
 
 The historic city of Ferrara is situated in Northern 
 Italy, near the Apennines, and at a short remove from 
 the more noted city of Venice, the Queen of the Adri- 
 atic. Girolamo was often observed walking the narrow 
 
SAVONAROLA. 66 
 
 streets of lils native city, liogeriug in the shade of high 
 balconies, lost in thonght, taking little notice of the 
 crowd that jostled him along the way. Yet he was 
 occupied with facts he had gathered from observation of 
 the times in which he lived. A careful scrutiny of char- 
 acter and life about him led him to profound meditation 
 upon the condition and needs he had discovered. He was 
 more given to the study of men than to that of books. 
 The disputes of Schoolmen and the speculations of 
 philosophers were in his esteem of little account. They 
 did not touch real life and help it up to higher grounds. 
 Yet among those scholastics who were eminently holy, 
 as he thought, was Thomas Aquinas, the *' Angelic 
 Doctor." Girolamo longed to live the life of the 
 departed saint and to awaken his generation to like 
 aspirations. 
 
 Near by his home lived a noble Florentine who ac- 
 counted himself specially honored in his ancestry and his 
 early association with the ^lite. He had a daughter who 
 was possessed of rare beauty of person, and Girolamo 
 thought the outward grace was an expression of inward 
 excellence. He occasionally met her on the narrow street 
 or saw her looking down upon him from the balcony 
 of her pretentious home. Soon there came into his 
 heart a deep and idolizing affection for the nobleman's 
 daughter. But she was proud ; her family was nobler 
 than Savonarola's. She refused the youth who had 
 sought her regard. The hope which had inspired the 
 recent months went out, and dark shadows fell on all 
 the prospects of a happy domesticity. That event was 
 a pivot on which the life of Girolamo turned. It gave 
 a new complexion to his future, and, diverted from the 
 
66 BOMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 way his heart devised, God led him into a life by which 
 he made himself a Dame for ever. 
 
 His grandfather, Michael Savonarola, had been phy- 
 sician to one of the dukes of the house of Este. The 
 duke had solicited his removal from Padua to Ferrara, 
 received him to his court and honored him for his learn- 
 ing and professional skill. Girolamo's parents had 
 wished their son to become heir to ancestral distinc- 
 tion, and as a physician in Ferrara be the support and 
 solace of their age. But all his plans of life were frus- 
 trated by a disappointed hope. The world's attraction 
 was gone. He had nothing to live for except the culture 
 of his spiritual life and the good of his generation. The 
 medical profession did not attract him, nor did it prom- 
 ise results he desired to achieve. He was not indifferent 
 to the wishes of his parents. He loved them tenderly. 
 His mother was more to him than all the world besides. 
 But there was a voice he thought he could not mistake, 
 the voice of God, calling him away from the shelter of 
 the home-roof and the fond embraces of parental love. 
 Along a path that seemed rugged, conducting into soli- 
 tude and deepening shadows — a path that might ulti- 
 mately lead out into a broader place and more helpful 
 service — he must take his lonely way. An evening came 
 to Ferrara which seemed strangely quiet. Girolamo 
 looked thoughtfully out into the night. He dropped 
 some words which failed to reveal what his throbbing 
 heart would not permit him to utter. The mother was 
 oppressed by a presentiment of some approaching sorrow. 
 The next night, succeeding a festal day in Ferrara, 
 Nicholas Savonarola and his wife found a paper among 
 Girolamo's books Avhich they read through their tears. 
 
SAVONAROLA, 67 
 
 It told tliem of their son's plan of life. God called and 
 he could not disobey. While they communed together 
 a young traveler was knocking at the dooi of the 
 Dominican monastery in Bologna, a day's journey toward 
 the south. It was Girolamo Savonarola. The date of 
 his entrance to the monastery was April 24, 1475, in the 
 twenty-third year of his age. Soon the post carried a 
 message home. Girolamo explained his sudden depart- 
 ure ; " If I had laid open my breast to you, I verily 
 believe that the very idea that I was going to leave you 
 would have broken my heart.'' He also stated the 
 motive which had determined his course — " the misery 
 of the world " and " the iniquities of men." " I could 
 not endure the enormous wickedness of the blinded peo- 
 ple of Italy, and the more so because I saw everywhere 
 virtue despised and vice honored." He had hoped in 
 the monastery to be surrounded with men devoted to 
 holy pursuits — men who communed with Him who is 
 invisible and lived under the power of the world to 
 come. In all this he was sadly disappointed. The en- 
 chantment which distance gave to a monastic life disap- 
 peared. It was evident that the spirit of the world had 
 entered the solitude of the convent. The rough garment 
 of the Dominicans could not hide their native depravity. 
 Devout attitudes and solemn prayer uttered by thought- 
 less lips failed to correct the trend and outward expres- 
 sion of unmoved hearts. He was disappointed, as was 
 the monk of Wittenberg at Rome. The monastery at 
 Bologna was a cage of unclean birds. The life of the 
 world in a quiet current, yet deep, flowed through the 
 seclusion of convent-life, polluting whatever it touched. 
 Exceptional piety may have existed even there. Down 
 
68 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 the long line of cells there may have been found a 
 Thomas Aquinas or John Staupitz, or one who sought, 
 though he may not have reached, the higher experiences 
 of a holy consecration. Where there is one Girolamo 
 there may be another. But the Dominican monastery 
 was a Sodom. Savonarola had forecasted the world's 
 doom when he mingled with the godless people of Fer- 
 rara and heard reports from other parts of virtueless 
 Italy. Now, in contact with the corruptness of the 
 Church in conditions supposed to be most favorable for 
 the cultivation of holiness, he is even more appalled by 
 the threatening clouds which gather over the future, and 
 in a poetic dissertation concerning De Ruina Eccleswe, 
 he sounds the first notes of an alarm which is yet to 
 cross the Apennines and rouse the displeasure of the Holy 
 See. 
 
 For seven years he dwelt in the convent. He was 
 occupied with the study of Plato and Aristotle, and 
 wrote long disquisitions on philosophy which revealed 
 his rare genius as well as his familiarity with the teach- 
 ings of the Academy and the Lyceum. But he seems to 
 have assigned the Sacred Scriptures the highest place in 
 his regard and to have devoted to them his most thought- 
 ful hours. Speculative philosophy, which attained its cul- 
 mination in the golden age of Athens and Attica, was but 
 a dim, uncertain rushlight in comparison with the clear 
 shining of revelation which interpreted the past, illumined 
 the future and answered the profoundest questionings of 
 the human lieart. Much as he had valued the dialectics 
 of Aquinas, he preferred to sit at the feet of St. Paul and 
 commune with the great teacher who came from God. 
 Hence he sought to inspire the monks of Bologna with 
 
SAVONAROLA. 69 
 
 reverence for the word of God — for revelation in its 
 entirety and dependence of parts, though separated by 
 ages. His efforts were not wholly in vain. His lectures 
 on philosophy secured him the respectful regard of his 
 pupils. His communings with God through the inspired 
 volume opened to them visions of spiritual excellence 
 which beckoned them away from the superstition, form- 
 ality and sensuousness of their monastic life. But his 
 sphere of influence was narrow. He yearned for greater 
 things. He saw in the distance the possibilities of moral 
 potency which turned to prophecies, and there entered 
 into the privacy of his cell the radiance of a grander 
 future. 
 
 Then there came rumors of gigantic crimes in the 
 world he had left behind him. A little later the Pazzi 
 conspiracy was an established fact. The two Medici 
 were assailed in the height of their power. In the 
 church of Santa Maria del Fiore, in Florence, during the 
 celebration of the mass, Giuliano was slain. Lorenzo 
 was also smitten by one of the priests, but the stiletto 
 reached no vital part and he escaped. The nepotism 
 of Pope Sixtus IV. suffered defeat. His family, whom 
 he had hoped to advance to power, reaching it over the 
 dead bodies of the Medici, was deeply chagrined by the 
 failure. Had the assassin struck with an unerring aim, 
 the result would have been all the pope and his priestly 
 agents had sought. But Lorenzo lived to inflict a bloody 
 revenge. The archbishop of Pisa, who had directed the 
 as&iissination, his ecclesiastical robes mocking his death- 
 agony, was hung in the view of the populace gathered 'in 
 the Palazzo Yecchio, and hundreds of conspirators were 
 executed for their crime. Then Sixtus IV. thundered 
 
70 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 his anathemas in the ears of Florence. All Italy 
 trembled for a little as if shaken by an internal convul- 
 sion. The quiet which followed was a premonition of 
 future storms. Other scenes of opposition to papal 
 favoritism will be enacted on the ground stained with 
 Giuliano's blood, and in these Fra Girolamo shall bear a 
 notable part. The young monk was profoundly moved 
 by the reports of the conspiracy the Church had insti- 
 gated and its sanguinary sequel. But his time for action 
 had not yet come. 
 
 Convent days crept on. The seven years were num- 
 bered. Savonarola spoke his farewell to the Dominicans 
 of Bologna, his voice trembling with emotion ; for, 
 despite all the sadness connected with the venerable 
 monastery, he had come to love it as Bonnivard loved 
 his prison. 
 
 From Bologna he proceeded at once to Ferrara. It 
 was in January, 1482, that he arrived at his native city. 
 He had not come to resume his early home-life or to 
 rest from his labors among the scenes of other days. 
 He had consecrated himself to God and the highest in- 
 terests of his race. Seven years had not effaced from 
 the minds of the people their early impressions of Girol- 
 amo, the tlioughtful youth of Ferrara, and when it was 
 announced that he would preach to such as might care 
 to listen, many who remembered the son of Nicholas 
 Savonarola hastened to the designated place. But it was 
 mere curiosity that brought them, and that satisfied, the 
 most of them ceased to come. It does not appear that i 
 his preaching was marked by tlie eloquence which at- ' 
 tracted attention in later years. He was still young, 
 scarce thirty years of age. His speech was rude and his - 
 
SAVONAROLA. 71 
 
 manner awkward. Many loved him for Iiis beauty of 
 character, his manifest sympathy with men and his 
 yearning for their good. But his ministry was unsuc- 
 cessful, and when Ferrara became involved in war with 
 Venice, for which Sixtus IV. was largely responsible, 
 the Dominican monks of Ferrara were scattered abroad 
 and Fra Girolamo was sent to Florence, the beautiful 
 capital of Tuscany. Here he was received at the noted 
 convent of San Marco. His reputation as a teacher had 
 preceded him, and in the monastery of Florence he re- 
 sumed the service he had performed at Bologna. A 
 year later he was made Lenten preacher in the church 
 of San Lorenzo. The failure of Ferrara was repeated. 
 His preaching was not relished by the pleasure-loving 
 Florentines. He failed to prophesy smooth things. He 
 did not entertain his hearers with sallies of wit, but was 
 intensely solemn. He seemed to possess much of the 
 spirit of Dante, who walked the streets of Florence 
 with the reflection of eternity on his face, suggesting 
 the remark which the children made as he passed by, 
 " There is a man who has been in hell.'* Savonarola 
 was startled by the wickedness of the city, alarmed in 
 view of the fearful consequences of sin and oppressed 
 with a sense of personal responsibility. He cried aloud 
 and spared not. He showed the people their sins, and 
 besought them to flee from the wrath to come. It was 
 not long until San Lorenzo was wellnigh deserted. 
 Meanwhile the church of San Spirito was crowded. 
 Fra Mariano was an orator, a rhetorician, a time-server, 
 who sought personal popidarity as the supreme good, 
 and cared not if dead souls were the stepping-stones of 
 his ascent. He entertained the people with flights of 
 
72 BOMA^USM AM) THE REFORMERS. 
 
 imagination, with gorgeous woi'd-pic^tures, with lying 
 flatteries. The sermon was a beautiful mosaic on which 
 no shadow rested. The world heard no rebuke, no 
 voi3e of warning, no summons to a pure and heavenly 
 life. The people applauded Fra Mariano; they de- 
 spised the preacher of San Lorenzo. Savonarola was 
 dejected by his want of success, and yet a great hope 
 sustained him : Florence will hear him on some other 
 day. 
 
 He was sent fi-om the gay capital to a church in San 
 Gemigniaro, was removed thence to Brescia, and at last 
 was established in the Dominican chapter of Reggio. 
 In these retired regions his latent powers were rapidly 
 developed. The people hung on his lips, melted into 
 tears, cried aloud for mercy. Hell yawned at their feet, 
 heaven opened wide its gates. The cross, double-armed, 
 told of danger and pointed to a secure, eternal Refuge. 
 His voice was at times as the roar of an avalanche and 
 solemn as eternity ; again, it was plaintive as the sigh- 
 ing of the pines on the mountain-slopes. He dared to 
 do his duty. He drew the curtains which had concealed 
 the chambers of imagery in the hearts froni which God 
 had departed. He seemed endowed with omniscience 
 and discovered the very thoughts of sin. He smote the 
 thrones of iniquity as with the hand of omnipotence. 
 He was a Jonah crying on the highways and byways of 
 sin, portending the speedy ruin of the cities of Italy, 
 depraved as Sodom and Gomorrah, if they failed to 
 repent. 
 
 At the services in the Dominican chapter of Reggio 
 was seen a man whose repute as a scholar was famous. 
 His genius was exceptional. The mountaineers could 
 
SA VONAROLA. 73 
 
 not invent terras to set forth their reverence for the 
 stranger whom Florence rejected ; but in that crowded 
 chapter there was none more deeply moved than Gio- 
 vanni Pico della Mirandola. There came to him impres- 
 sions of God and eternity wholly unknown before. 
 They came to stay. He pronounced Savonarola the 
 greatest orator known to the age. He may have dis- 
 covered defects in the monk^s logic, want of finish in his 
 style and blemishes in his oratory. But his earnestness 
 atoned for all that. He evidently preached the truth, 
 believed the truth, lived under the power of the truth. 
 He did not seek the world's favor, but its salvation. 
 He longed to lift men out of sin up to holiness and 
 into fellowship with God. Admiring his integrity of 
 life and purity of motive, Pico of Mirandola expressed 
 his estimate of the Dominican preacher to Lorenzo de 
 Medici, and the latter solicited Savonarola's return to 
 Florence. After some delay, continuing an unfinished 
 work in Reggio and making a desired visit to Genoa, 
 the invitation was accepted, and the mountain-preacher 
 who had moved his auditors as the winds moved the 
 surrounding forests resumed his ministrations in the 
 gay capital of Tuscany. All that had gone before was 
 largely a preparation for the great work of his life, the 
 fruitage of which shall last for ever. 
 
 At this point it may be well to notice some of the 
 prominent features of that age. It was the period of 
 the Renaissance. Science, literature, painting and sculpt- 
 ure had received a sudden impulse and went onward by 
 rapid strides. The art of printing with movable types 
 had just been discovered. Instead of manuscripts few 
 in number, the most of them hidden away in monaster- 
 
74 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 ies, vv here learning was largely confined, came the printed 
 page. Books were rapidly multiplied and widely dis- 
 tributed. Though costly and beyond the reach of the 
 humbler classes, yet they became accessible to many who 
 were unable to purchase them. The noted Mazarine 
 Bible had issued from the press of Guttenberg at Mentz, 
 After the capture of Mentz by Adolphus the men who 
 had been associated with Guttenberg, Faust and Schoifer 
 were scattered abroad, as were the early disciples by the 
 persecutions which arose in Jerusalem. Printing-presses 
 were soon in use at Subiaco, Milan and Venice. Some 
 of the old classics were thus reproduced at Rome and 
 elsewhere, and other works were issued. Although the 
 revival of learning did not originate with the art of 
 printing, yet it was greatly advanced by it. Dante, 
 Petrarch, Boccaccio and Villani had stirred the world 
 of thought in the preceding century, and other lights 
 had shone amid the ignorance of what we designate 
 as the Mediaeval Age. It is difficult to indicate the 
 bep-innino; of the Renaissance, but the middle of the 
 fifteenth century forms an approximate date. In Italy 
 the revival of learning was aided by eminent scholars 
 who had come hither from the East after the capture of 
 CiJonstantinople by Mohammed II. Princes like Lorenzo 
 de Medici, himself no mean poet, nourished the spirit 
 of the age. Politiau owed much to the fostering sym- 
 pathy of the autocrat of Florence. The names of 
 Ariosto, who wrote the Orlando Furioso, of Boiardo, 
 Macchiavelli, Aretino, Rucellai, Speroue aud others who 
 excelled in tragic poetry and comedy, continue to the 
 present. 
 
 At the same time, the fine arts were urged on to greater 
 
SAVONAROLA. 75 
 
 perfe(!tl()n. Leonardo da Vinci was painting his Cenacola, 
 or Last Supper, in the church of Santo Maria delle 
 Grazie at Milan ; Alberti was planning the church of 
 San Francisco at Rimini; and Ghiberti had just com- 
 })leted the bronze doors of the Baptistery in Florence ; 
 and meanwhile the sailor of Genoa was crossino; the 
 Atlantic to discover a new world when in quest of a 
 passage to India. This was the age in which Savonarola 
 lived, and the Renaissance was in its glory when he re- 
 turned to Florence at the call of Lorenzo. 
 
 It was also an age of great moral corruption. It de- 
 clared the impotency of classical learning and fine arts 
 and speculative philosophy to cure spiritual disorders 
 and restore to man the imacre lost in the fall. Dea:en- 
 eracy in morals seems to have increased as the Renais- 
 sance advanced. The religious sentiment which inspired 
 Raphael, Leonardo and Michael Angelo was largely ab- 
 sent in the latter half of the fifteenth century. Science 
 and art were exalted above religion, and their decadence 
 was an inevitable sequence. Mental culture must be 
 planted in piety, or it will be meagre, unhealtliful and 
 marred. It has been remarked by John Ruskin that 
 from the early period of the Renaissance until now 
 "they have tried to produce Michael Angelos and Leon- 
 ardos by teaching the barren sciences, and still mourned 
 and marveled that no Michael Angelos came, not per- 
 ceiving that these great fathers were only able to secure 
 such nourishment because they were rooted on the Rock 
 of all ages, and that our scientific teaching now-a-days 
 is nothing more or less than the assiduous watering of 
 trees whose stems are cut through.'^ 
 
 At the time when Savonarola came conspicuously to 
 
76 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 view that faith in God which develops both the mental 
 and spiritual faculties was quite unknown, and whilst 
 learning dropped from its former eminence, yet retained 
 much of its former glory, the corruption in morals made 
 alarming progress. Wickedness occupied high places 
 and dominated all classes. The teachers of religion 
 were the slaves of sin. Rioting, drunkenness, licen- 
 tiousness and every form of vice prevailed. God was 
 dethroned from human regard, and the trail of the ser- 
 pent was over all. Even Pope Innocent VIII., who had 
 winked at iniquity, was alarmed by its progress and re- 
 peated the edict of Pius II., which forbade " priests to 
 keep taverns, playhouses or brothels, or to act as paid 
 ao^ents of courtesans." 
 
 Such was the condition of Italy when Fra Girolamo 
 returned to Florence. What could this lone monk ac- 
 complish in the wicked capital? Who would listen to 
 him who had before been tried and found wanting ? The 
 memory of San Lorenzo and the preacher's failure was 
 fresh in the minds of many. Girolamo appears to have 
 shrunk from public notice and resumed his work in the 
 seclusion of San Marco. At first he was occupied with 
 the instruction of monks. When the class-room became 
 inadequate for his purpose, he lectured in the convent- 
 garden. His power was a marvel to the Dominicans. 
 Surely he must have a larger sphere in which to exercise 
 his exceptional gifts. Though Florence had once re- 
 jected him, Florence will hear him now. A voice from 
 Heaven seemed to call the preacher to wider audience. 
 Still, lie advanced by gradual steps. It was announced 
 tliat he would preach in the convent-chapel, and when' 
 the appointed day arrived the place was crowded. Many 
 
5^^ VONABOLA. 77 
 
 were anxious to hear the man who had developed a weird 
 resistless power in the mountain villages and commanded 
 the attention of the great. His next appearance was in 
 the great Florentine cathedral, the rival of St. Peter's 
 at Rome. Mercurial Florence was represented by a 
 multitude seldom equaled in that spacious temple. The 
 pleasure-loving people of the metropolis were as pro- 
 foundly stirred as were the mountaineers who flocked 
 about his pulpit in Reggio. His eloquence fascinated 
 them ; his audacity startled them ; his solemnity of 
 speech awed them into silence. At times the vast as- 
 sembly was moved to tears, and occasional sobs deepened 
 the general impression. There was an indefinable power 
 in the monk's oratory and a singular grandeur in his 
 heroism. There he stands in the high pulpit, the very 
 impersonation of truth, firm as a rock, fearless as the 
 Tishbite prophet, affectionate as the beloved John. His 
 high forehead bears the marks of anxious thought. His 
 deep-blue eyes pierce with a searching scrutiny or melt 
 in faithful love. All his features are strongly marked. 
 His is a Dantean face which once seen can never be for- 
 gotten. His manner is distinguished by intense earnest- 
 ness rather than grace, and his speech by spiritual force 
 than by the finish of studied rhetoric. It suggested the 
 arrow once found on a battle-field of the Orient bearing 
 the inscription, " For Philip's eye." His mission was 
 to rebuke sin without respect of persons, to declare the 
 awful holiness of God, to announce the doom of the 
 finally impenitent, and by every motive he could dis- 
 c;over to win men, if possible, to a life of holiness. His 
 generation revered him, but never learned the full meas- 
 ure of his power. He was one of the Alpine men of 
 
78 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 this later dispensation whose name, for a little obscured, 
 shall live for ever. 
 
 The fame of Savonarola went abroad. Strangers in 
 Florence hastened to the cathedral to hear him. They 
 carried his messages to their homes, and so extended the 
 reach of his influence on both sides the Apennines. As 
 a rule, people are not attracted to preachers who say 
 much about sin and with a Damascus blade smite down 
 self-sufficiency. They prefer those who exalt humanity, 
 make their hearers think well of themselves, and hang 
 out brilliant but folse lights along the circumference of 
 absolute need, and build for immortal souls airy castles 
 that shall disappear before the storm of holy retribution. 
 Yet human consciousness approves the faithful preacher. 
 The soul was made for truth, and the great fact of sin is 
 admitted, though salvation be unsought. Every man 
 carries within him a reminiscence of departed glory and 
 a premonition of doom. In his thoughtful moods a 
 conscious sinner commends the preacher who declares 
 the truth in love, and speaks as from the battlements of 
 the invisible world. There was a reason, grounded in 
 man's religious nature, for the popularity of Girolamo, 
 and the church of San Spirito emptied its throng into 
 the greater Duomo. 
 
 When Lorenzo was dying, although the monk who 
 had been made the prior of San Marco had not accorded 
 to the prince the reverence which he felt was his due, 
 and had by his loud denunciation of sin disturbed his 
 complacency, yet he selected this modern Elijah to be his 
 spiritual adviser, saying, "Send for the prior of San 
 Marco : he is the only true monk I know.'' At the 
 deathbed of the prince Girolamo furnished an additional 
 
SAVONABOLA. 79 
 
 example of his unswerving adherence to duty. Tlien; 
 appeared an undue severity in his treatment of the 
 expiring ruler, a man who combined in his character 
 elements of good and evil, a despot whose power was 
 often wisely and beneficently exercised. But whilst the 
 prior was ready to recognize whatever was good in the 
 private and public life of the prince, yet he was ac- 
 quainted with his vices, and was persuaded that his ex- 
 ample and rule had extended the compass and power of 
 sin in the city and nominal republic of Florence. Lorenzo 
 made confession of his sins. He admitted his grave of- 
 fending iu the sacking of the town of Volterra, in divert- 
 ing the dowries of orphan girls in Florence to the prose- 
 cution of war with Volterra, and the cruel indiscriminate 
 massacre which succeeded the Pazzi conspiracy. The 
 prior was asked to grant absolution. He consented to 
 do it on these conditions : First of all, Lorenzo must 
 confess faith in God, merciful as he is holy ; this the 
 prince was prompt to do. Then he must make restitu- 
 tion to those he had defrauded ; this he was willing to 
 do. Further, he must restore liberty to Florence. To the 
 last condition of priestly absolution Lorenzo refused as- 
 sent. The ambition of his life had been to establish the 
 power of the Medici in Florence. He held the sceptre 
 in his dying clasp, ready to transfer it to his son. Shall 
 it be shivered into fragments at the feet of this Domini- 
 can confessor ? Shall he undo in a moment the result to 
 the accomplishment of which he had devoted all his 
 years ? That cannot be. He heard the hollow tread of 
 death sounding through the thin veil which divided 
 eternity from time, but, flashing his indignation upon 
 the immovable monk, lie turned his face to the wall and 
 
80 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 died. Savonarola left the gilded death-chamber in the 
 palace of Careggi, persuaded that he should not have 
 required more of the dying prince and could not have 
 demanded less. 
 
 Thereafter Girolamo was brought into more immedi- 
 ate relations with the civil life of his people. Piero de 
 Medici succeeded his father. The sadness which had 
 succeeded the news of Lorenzo's death, and the appre- 
 hension of evil which gathered like a pall of darkness 
 around the capital, melted away as the morning mist with 
 the auspicious beginning of Piero's rule. His person- 
 al presence commanded admiration. He had not the 
 scholarly attainments of his father, but his gifts and 
 acquirements made him illustrious. His disposition was 
 supposed to be generous, conciliatory and adapted to the 
 exio:encies of the times. But Florence soon discovered 
 her mistake. The forebodings which followed Lorenzo's 
 death returned. A darker period awaits the capital and 
 state of Tuscany. Perchance a morning lies beyond the 
 night. 
 
 Meanwhile, Fra Girolamo continued his ministry in 
 the church of Santa Maria del Fiore. His power was 
 still in the ascendant. He was a greater than Piero. 
 In some way he may bring better days to Florence. It 
 was a conjecture only. Then, whilst the w^eak, sensual, 
 selfish prince was seeking his own pleasure and binding 
 the fetters of despotism on the people, the prior of San 
 Marco had a vision similar to, and yet quite unlike, that 
 of Constantiue the Great. It was not a cross suspend- 
 ed in the heavens, but a sword with flashing blade 
 pointing downward. On it he read a prophecy of bene- 
 diction and of doom. Judgment was at hand and mercy 
 
SAVONAROLA. 81 
 
 was near ! — Gladius Domini super terram cito et velodter 
 (the sword of the Lord upon the earth shortly and swift- 
 ly). It was not the monk's first vision. There had 
 been others, and they had not misled him. They may 
 have been born of a fevered imagination, or the day- 
 thought may have turned to a dream by night. To him 
 it was intensely real. These manifestations of the unseen, 
 God coming out of the secrecy of his mysterious being 
 and communing with the Dominican, had much to do 
 with the spirit and life of this son of the cloister. He 
 believed God was speaking to him and intended to per- 
 form mighty works by him. This conviction fired his 
 soul with a self-consuming zeal, imparted a burning 
 eloquence to his speech, and clothed with moral courage, 
 never surpassed since apostolic days, this chosen servant 
 of mighty reforms. This furnishes, however, only a 
 partial interpretation of Savonarola's life. It had far 
 deeper roots and more spiritual visions. Like John 
 Bunyan, who heard voices from heaven speaking to him 
 on the Elstow Common, so this preacher of an earlier 
 age drew from the fullness of Christ and was baptized 
 with the power of the Holy Ghost. There was no stain 
 on his character, no deception in his life, no swerving 
 from high and holy purposes when princes threatened 
 and popes pronounced him accursed. 
 
 In the pulpit of Santa Maria the preacher told his 
 vision. '' The sword of the Lord " seemed to hang over 
 Florence. The people trembled with fear, then cherish- 
 ed a new-born hope. The liberty they craved might 
 come, but at what cost they could not foretell. 
 
 The days went on. The king of France, as a de- 
 scendant of the house of Anjou, had claimed the throne 
 
82 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 of Naples. Whilst Girolamo was predicting judgments 
 from heaven, Charles VIII. was moving his armies 
 eastward. The preacher found an interpretation of his 
 vision. Charles VIII. bore the sword of the Lord. 
 If Florence will receive him he will dethrone the house 
 of Medici. Thus liberty may be restored. Piero 
 thought to avert such a termination of his power by sur- 
 rendering to the French, as a peace-offering, five of the 
 fortresses of Tuscany. The indignation of the people 
 knew no bounds. Piero was driven from his palace, and 
 as he fled through the city-gate the people hooted and 
 hissed the departing prince, and would have slain him 
 ere that had not Savonarola bade them leave the sword 
 in God's hands. Thus ended the despotism of Piero de 
 Medici. It had continued two years only. Lorenzo 
 when dying refused liberty to Florence and thought to 
 establish his power for ever. The work of his life suf- 
 fered defeat in the flight of his son. What now ? Des- 
 potism is broken. Nepotism is dead. Reconstruction 
 is required. The sword of the Lord had not shed even 
 a drop of blood. Savonarola would establish by peace- 
 ful means a better reign. To a monarchy none would 
 consent. For a democracy the people were unprepared. 
 An intermediate government might be established em- 
 bracing democratic principles, recognizing the people as 
 the source of power, with the right to choose their rulers, 
 yet limiting the privilege of suffrage to those who might 
 use it intelligently and wisely. Despotism on the one 
 side and anarchy on the other were to be avoided. The 
 ship of state is summoned to the passage between Scylla 
 and Chary bdis. Savonarola must take the helm. Then 
 the Dominican monk directed public sentiment, indicated 
 
SAVONAROLA. 83 
 
 a form of government and suggested a code of laws. 
 He did all this from the pulpit. He left the people 
 assembled in general council to deliberate, formulate and 
 act. He was not personally present at the Piazza nor 
 at the sessions of the Signoria. But whatever he pro- 
 posed they did. The result was a republic closely re- 
 sembling that of Venice. Two councils were formed to 
 which all legislative power was committed. The great 
 council comprised three thousand citizens. The choice 
 of these was restricted to those who had been magistrates 
 or were the sons of magistrates — men of mature years, 
 intelligence and influence. The higher council was 
 composed of eighty citizens of still larger experience, 
 with more extended powers, to which all magistrates 
 were amenable and by which all laws were submitted 
 for confirmation or rejection. In addition to these coun- 
 cils existed the Seigniory endorsed with executive power. 
 This form of government recommended by Savonarola 
 resembles the limited monarchy of England, whilst it 
 approximates to that of the United States, embracing 
 less of the democratic conception, and guards against the 
 evils which would have resulted from universal suffrage 
 — an extension of privilege which is liable to great 
 abuse in any age and imperils any nation in which it 
 obtains. 
 
 Savonarola also suggested a modification of the system 
 of taxation then in vogue, which was specially unjust to 
 some and militated against the interests of all. His 
 suggestion was adopted under the new regime, and, not- 
 withstanding all the civil fluctuations of Florence dur- 
 ing the four centuries succeeding, the system of taxation 
 proposed by the friar has continued until the present. 
 
84 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS, 
 
 In addition to this change, he advised the establishment 
 of a court of appeal which might protect persons charged 
 with gross offences from the injustice of the existing 
 court of eight persons, the decisions of which were often 
 hastily made, often cruel and in all instances final. The 
 people gave their immediate approval. He also advised 
 a general amnesty for political offenders, the establish- 
 ment of a banking system that would guard the poor 
 from the oppressions of usury, and other measures in 
 the interests of public morality. These suggestions were 
 promptly adopted. The prior of San Marco was the 
 statesman of Florence, and his wisdom, so much in ad- 
 vance of his age, and his influence upon the civil ap- 
 pointments of that critical juncture, though the results 
 were evanescent, have made him the admiration of the 
 civilized world in the more advanced stages of its prog- 
 ress. Villari has well said of Savonarola that "he 
 became the very soul of the whole people, and the chief 
 author of the laws on which the new government was 
 constituted. When we enter the halls of the councils 
 we hear the citizens supporting his sentiments and dis- 
 cussing them in his language. The form of government 
 then established was the best, the only secure one, that 
 the people had been able to devise during so many years 
 of tumultuary existence. The greatest Florentine polit- 
 ical historians, after having submitted it to a clcse ex- 
 amination, could not refrain from bestowing upon it their 
 highest commendation.'' 
 
 This record of history is not to be construed as an 
 approval of the secularizing of the clergy. The spir- 
 ituality of the Church is an accepted principle. Civil 
 legislation belongs to the state. No ecclesiastical hierar- 
 
SAVONAROLA. 85 
 
 chy is entitled to the control of the political life. Tem- 
 poral power will invariably destroy spiritual power. 
 The Christian ministry is devoted to a kingdom which 
 is not of this world. But the exigencies of the times 
 and the existing relations of the Church to the State 
 furnish an apology, if any be needed, for Savonarola's 
 indirect yet controlling relation to the political life at 
 that particular juncture. It should also be borne in mind 
 that whilst his public teachings had reference to certain 
 political interests, he insisted most strenuously and always 
 upon the ^' fear of God and the reformation of manners '^ 
 as essential to the welfare of the State. At the same 
 time, he believed the government of the Medici favored 
 corruption of morals, and he would at least greatly 
 modify this result by removing its cause. 
 
 The new republic soon passed away. Its principles 
 were the suggestions of exceptional wisdom. But a re- 
 public cannot last in the absence of reverence for God 
 and submission to his will. The highest form of civil 
 liberty worships at the altars of Jehovah. It reveres 
 God's house, God's day and that divine revelation which 
 furnishes an infallible code of morals. 
 
 As related to the State, the work of Fra Girolamo 
 was a failure. Yet the statement requires qualification. 
 Immediately it was so ; remotely it was not. Its influ- 
 ence lived in other ages, was felt in other lands and will 
 last as long as the world. 
 
 But it is with his labors as a moral reformer that we 
 are most concerned. A great change was wrought in Flor- 
 ence and in Italy through his labors. It extended to all 
 classes. He began with the convent of San Marco, and 
 by means of the cathedral pulpit extended his influence 
 
86 ROMANISM AND THE BEFORMERS. 
 
 through wider spheres. Monastic life had departed 
 from its original simplicity. The vow of poverty had 
 lost its meaning. The prohibition of the devout Antonio 
 which excluded wealth and effeminacy from San Marco 
 had become a dead letter. Possessions had been ac- 
 cumulated ; the convent-walls were richly ornamented ; 
 the tables were laden with luxuries ; self-indulgence dis- 
 placed devotion, and the semblance of piety had wellnigh 
 departed. Savonarola insisted on the most radical re- 
 form, and secured it. The accumulated wedth was de- 
 voted to objects consistent with the purposes of the order. 
 Habits of self-denial were restored. Appetites were 
 curbed. Plainness in dress was required. Useful labor 
 furnished means of subsistence. Time was given to in- 
 tellectual culture, to the study of the Scriptures, to de- 
 vout meditation and stated acts of worship. The prior 
 did not accomplish all he desired. Outward reform did 
 not ensure a corresponding spiritual change. But there 
 was evidence of awakened piety, and many of the monks 
 of San Marco were soon distinguished for consecration 
 to the true intent of monastic life as interpreted by 
 Antonio and reaffirmed by GiroJamo. The influence of 
 the Florentine convent reached to other convents, and 
 these centres of religious power made themselves felt 
 in the contiguous population. Meanwhile, the prior of 
 San Marco came into direct contact with the people of 
 the capital city which influenced Tuscany and regions 
 beyond. The cathedral continued to be crowded from 
 pulpit to doors. To many entrance was impossible. The 
 preacher did not urge monasticism as the cure of sin — 
 did not substitute the form of godliness for its power. 
 He declared the presence of indwelling depravity which 
 
SAVONAROLA. 87 
 
 found its fruitage in external sins, and the necessity of a 
 change of heart in order to a reformation of life. His 
 denunciation of prevailing vices was terrible. His an- 
 nouncement of coming judgment was fearful. Mirandola 
 described the physical effect as unparalleled in the history 
 of the mediaeval pulpit. He represented many of Savon- 
 arola's hearers when he said the voice of thunder brought 
 a shudder to his bones and the hairs of his head stood 
 on end. The call to repentance was as the call of God 
 from a flashing throne wrapped in blackness. But 
 Mercy stood beside Justice. Her hand was on his. 
 Judgment was delayed " yet forty days." The people 
 trembled, wept, prayed. They gave up their sins. 
 Drunkenness ceased. Revelry came to an end. The 
 regalia of folly and sensual pleasures were burned on the 
 public streets. Men who had defrauded their fellows 
 made restitution. The thoughtless grew thoughtful. 
 The churches of Florence were filled. A new order 
 of things displaced the old. The people pronounced 
 Savonarola the savior of Florence. Italy felt the 
 shock of his awful eloquence. The papal throne trem- 
 bled, and well it might, for the worst member of the 
 house of Borgia wore the tiara. The Dominican monk 
 knew not the fear of man. Popes and potentates were 
 as severely rebuked as the servant of the cloister — the 
 great who rolled in wealth as the peasant who spoiled 
 his neighbor's field. Every form of sin, whether prac- 
 ticed in high places or low, by patricians or plebeians, 
 was pierced with a flaming lance that went straight to 
 its mark. But if he was stern and awful as the prophet 
 who met Ahab in Naboth's vineyard and condemned the 
 priests of Baal on Carmel, yet guilt and judgment were 
 
88 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 not his only theme. He also announced the mercy of 
 God in Jesus Christ. There was a way to heaven even 
 from the gates of hell. It ran by the cross. He be- 
 sought the people to receive the faith apostles preached 
 and the Christ in whom Polycarp and Augustine be- 
 lieved. He confessed himself a sinner saved by grace. 
 His faith looked back to Calvary and up to the throne 
 of the Lamb of God. His voice mellowed in tenderness 
 as he spoke of Him who saves, and said for himself, " I 
 have grievously sinned, and thou, Jesu, wert the suffer- 
 er. I have been thine enemy, and thou, Jesu, for my 
 sake, wast nailed to the cross." 
 
 And here we find the secret of his power. He 
 preached sin, and salvation from it, in dependence upon 
 the Holy Ghost, with an earnestness that burned its way 
 to the hearts of men. He was not such an orator as the 
 silver-tongued Chrysostom ; he had not the grace of Pas- 
 cal, the eloquence of F^nelon, the pathos of Whitefield. 
 Yet he was one of the mightiest of preachers. He 
 made it evident that he was moved by love to souls 
 — such love as his hearers had never known before. He 
 sought the good of Florence, and to have secured it as a 
 lasting heritage he was ready to die. His was the spirit 
 of a late Italian, but of higher birth and moved by 
 grander motives, which prompted that immortal utter- 
 ance, "If fifty Garibaldis are imprisoned, let Rome 
 be free." Martin Luther knew more of truth, but 
 he was not a greater hero when he stood unmoved in 
 the Diet of Worms, calm as Daniel in the den when 
 he looked on hungry lions and hungry lions looked 
 on him. 
 
 But there was a determination on the part of many to 
 
SAVONAROLA. 89 
 
 break Savonarola's power. The friends of the Medici 
 were his sworn enemies. Piero was in Rome. Mirano 
 of San Spirito, inflamed with jealousy, was in Rome. 
 Alexander VI., a pope whom a papal historian has des- 
 cribed as one of the greatest and most horrible monsters 
 in nature, was determined to crush the audacious monk. 
 He welcomed Piero de Medici and Mirano as aids in his 
 murderous purpose. But the people had pronounced 
 Girolamo a prophet, and Alexander was not fully assured 
 of their support. If he could by other means stop the 
 mouth of this intrepid preacher or win him back to for- 
 mer allegiance, he would prefer a less hazardous course. 
 Thereupon he invited Savonarola to Rome and proffered 
 him a cardinal's hat. The monk indignantly refused 
 the bribe and expressed his preference for the red hat 
 of martyrdom. When prohibited from preaching he 
 remained silent for half a year, then resumed his minis- 
 try at the request of the Signoria. 
 
 But it then appeared that the popular sentiment was 
 not with him, and his enemies took advantage of the 
 reaction. How shall his influence in the interests of his 
 generation be regained ? or how the power of evil sub- 
 dued? Savonarola could hope for nothing from the 
 pope. He accounted Alexander VI. the son of perdition. 
 Although still clinging to the papacy as a divine ordi- 
 nation, he would not recognize this scion of the Borgias 
 as the vicar of Christ, the visible head of the holy Cath- 
 olic Church. He distinguished the man from the office. 
 Alexander was not pope. God had rejected him. As a 
 man he was vile, contemptible and without power. His 
 interdict was not the interdict of Jesus Christ ; the hand 
 was Joab's. Persuaded of this, Savonarola appealed to 
 
90 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 the leading powers of Europe. He wrote letters to 
 Charles VIII., to Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain, to 
 Maximilian of Germany and to Henry VII. of England, 
 in which he set forth the corruptions of the Church, and 
 referred them largely to the influence of Alexander, who 
 had secured his position by fraud, had given the might 
 of his influence to wickedness, had yielded himself to 
 the power of unbelief, and should be displaced from the 
 papal throne he had dishonored. He insisted on a gen- 
 eral council to depose him and choose a successor, and 
 cited precedents for so summary a course. The appeal 
 was made in vain. Savonarola's influence continued to 
 wane. His faithfulness as a preacher of repentance had 
 provoked opposition in Florence, and many who had 
 withered under his rebukes, biding their time, appeared 
 on the open arena as his sw^orn enemies intent on his 
 destruction. They joined hands with Piero and Alex- 
 ander, and resorted to an expedient by means of which 
 they advanced their purpose. The ordeal of fire — a 
 passage between walls of flame, supposed by the super- 
 stitious Florentines to determine questions of character 
 and soundness of faith — was duly announced, and 
 crowds gathered in the public square to witness the 
 scene. The ordeal did not occur, as the conditions on 
 which Savonarola consented to the test were not grant- 
 ed. The indignation of the disappointed populace w^as 
 aroused, and the people turned against their prophet. 
 It was a repetition of what had occurred at Lystra 
 when the people stoned the man whom they had pro- 
 nounced a god. 
 
 It was a great sorrow to Savonarola. His life-work 
 seemed undone. The partisans of the Medici, who had 
 
SAVONAROLA. 91 
 
 trampled on popular freedom, were again in power. 
 The moral reform had come to an end. It was a 
 meteor which had left a fading trail behind it, and 
 would serve only to make the darkness the more 
 apparent. So it seemed. 
 
 The day following the proposed ordeal of fire an 
 assault was made on San Marco. Francesco Yalori 
 was slain. Girolamo expected to meet a similar fate. 
 He gathered the Dominican brothers in the convent- 
 library and calmly addressed them. There was great 
 pathos in his words. He affirmed his faith in God and 
 in the truth he had preached, then added, in tones of 
 moving tenderness : " I did not know that all the city 
 was so soon to turn against me ; but the will of the 
 Lord be done. This is my last counsel : let faith, 
 patience and prayer be your armor. I leave you in 
 anguish to give me to mine enemies." 
 
 San Marco could not resist the powerful assault, and 
 nothing was left but to submit to the foe. The Signoria 
 commanded the seizure of Fra Girolamo, Fra Dominico 
 and Fra Salvsestro. The first two were immediately 
 imprisoned. Fra Salvsestro surrendered on the day 
 following. 
 
 Then came the mock trial, and it was long protracted. 
 An attempt was made to secure a recantation, but Girol- 
 amo submitted to brutal tortures rather than throw the 
 slightest shadow on his integrity of purpose and devo- 
 tion to truth. It was claimed that he did invalidate his 
 former testimony by humble confession of error. The 
 proof of this is wanting. His enemies were the only 
 witnesses to the confession. When torture had failed to 
 extort self-crimination in reply to questions addressed to 
 
92 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 him, Ceccone, a uotaiy, said, " We will make answers 
 for him.'^ This Ceccone doubtless did. 
 
 The weeks passed on. Girolamo rested on God. He 
 pleaded anew the cleansing blood of Christ : ^' O Lord, 
 a thousand times hast thou wiped out my iniquity. I 
 do not rely on my own justification, but on thy mercy." 
 Thus he asserted that doctrine which Martin Luther 
 restored to the Church — -justification by faith. He had 
 maintained a life of singular integrity ; he had worn 
 the mantle of the holy Antonio. His enemies might 
 pronounce him heretical, but they could not deny his 
 sanctity. Yet his trust was not there, but in the mercy 
 of God exercised through Jesus Christ. 
 
 The trial was resumed, but no charge against him 
 could ])e established. What should be done? There was 
 one in that Florentine Sauhedrin who would not con- 
 sent to his death. The rest were determined on his exe- 
 cution, and to Agnolis Pandolfini they replied, '^A dead 
 enemy fights no more.'' The Signoria pronounced his 
 sentence — death. The three prisoners met, looked sadly 
 into each other's faces, said but little. Fra Girolamo 
 advised quietness and trust in God. He would have 
 no public protestations of innocence ; they would only 
 p:ive occasion to their enemies to mock. It were better 
 to go to their death as did their Lord, opening not their 
 mouths. He breathed forth his love to his brethren in 
 calm and tender tones, and they knelt at the prior's feet 
 whilst he pronounced his final benediction. Then each 
 repaired to his own cell. 
 
 Again the prisoners met. It was in the morning of 
 the day appointed for their execution. They united in 
 the communion of the Lord's Supper, and as their 
 
SAVONAROLA. 93 
 
 thoughts were occupied with the Mau of Sorrows who 
 instituted the Supper the same night on which he was 
 betrayed, their souls grew strong and they welcomed the 
 death that should open to them the portals of heaven. 
 Then Savonarola offered a prayer in which his fellow- 
 prisoners joined : " I know, my Lord, that thou art 
 Trinity, perfect and invisible, Father, Son and Holy 
 Ghost. I know that thou art the eternal Word, that 
 thou didst descend into the bosom of the Virgin Mary, 
 and didst ascend the cross to shed thy most precious 
 blood for the remission of my sins. For all the sins I 
 have done I ask thy pardon — pardon too for everything 
 I may have done injurious to this city and for every 
 unconscious error I may have committed. Amen and 
 Amen." The prayers of Savonarola were ended. All 
 were calm. For themselves the martyrs had no occasion 
 to weep. For Florence and Italy, for the Church of 
 which Christ is the true Bishop, and for the slain of 
 the daughters of Jerusalem they grieved, but from 
 their cells they saw the faint dawning of a better 
 day. 
 
 They passed from the prison in the Palazzo Vecchio 
 to the Piazza, where their ecclesiastical garments were 
 removed, ihe bishop of Vasona saying to Savonarola, 
 " I cnt thee off from the Church militant and tri- 
 umphant;" to which the latter replied, '^Militant, not 
 triumphant — that lies beyond your power.'' Then they 
 were delivered to the secular power, and the sentence of 
 death was read, after which they took their places on a 
 rude scaffold around which were the fagots prepared for 
 the burning. Fra Salvsestro was selected as the first to 
 die, and as the rope was about to be adjusted to his neck 
 
94 B0MANIS3I AND THE BE FORMERS. 
 
 he said, " Into thy hands, O Lord, I commend my 
 spirit." Fra Dominico seemed even joyful as he yielded 
 himself to his executioner. Then came Savonarola. 
 Tlie great Piazza, crowded with dignitaries of the city — 
 the oligarchical Arrabiati and the republican Piagnoni 
 were there, and criminals who had, Barabbas-like, been 
 liberated for the occasion, led the motley crowd in their 
 jeers and cruel mocking. When the prior of San Marco 
 stepped to his place the Piazza was hushed in oppressive 
 silence. Strong men shuddered. Eternity was there. 
 Then a voice broke the stiHness : " Prophet, now is the 
 time for a miracle." Perhaps it brought to Savonarola's 
 mind the cry addressed to his Lord : " If thou be the 
 Christ, come down from the cross." He made no reply. 
 The hangman did his part, and on the 23d of May, 1498, 
 in the forty-fifth year of his age, that noblest of men — 
 wliom princes honored and peasants revered and children 
 loved, of whom Florence was not worthy, the leading 
 statesman, the purest monk, the foremost preacher of the 
 mediaeval ages, who did his duty in the fear of God and 
 triumphed over death through the cross of Christ — suf- 
 fered for righteousness' sake and went to his everlasting 
 reward. After the hanging came the burning. The 
 flames leaped into the air and the smoke hung its pall 
 over the Piazza. At night the ashes were gathered and 
 cast into the Arno. 
 
 Savonarola, though charged with heresy, did not die 
 as a heretic. He had not called in question a single 
 essential dogma of the Church of Rome. He died be- 
 cause he rebuked sin. The mother of Herod ias had 
 again appeared and demanded the head of John the Bap- 
 tist, thinking to cover guilt by destroying the accuser. 
 
SA VONABOLA. 95 
 
 Only a few years had passed when Rome reversed her 
 decision concerning the martyred prior and assigned 
 him a place among her saints. Raphael hung his por- 
 trait in the Vatican. Michael Angelo, with Mirandola, 
 mourned the death of his beloved Girolamo. Even 
 Florence for three centuries scattered May flowers over 
 the spot where he died, and Donatello^s statue of the 
 great preacher still looks silently down on the Palace 
 square. Romanists pay homage to the man who towered 
 among men and gathered the aureole of his fame around 
 the head of the holy Catholic Church. Protestants claim 
 him as one of the Reformers who prepared the way for 
 Luther's coming. Rudelbach and Meier find in his 
 teachings the salient elements of the Reformation. Mar- 
 tin Luther began where Fra Girolamo began, with the 
 corruptness of the Church. He went further, and dis- 
 covered the sources of iniquity in the Romish system. 
 He sought to remove the symptoms by curing the disease. 
 Yet had there been no Savonarola there might have been 
 no Luther. One thing is certain : the Florentine Re- 
 former has lived in every succeeding age. His influence 
 is still felt in Tuscany, Europe, the world. The first 
 Parliament of liberated Italy, Pio Nono a prisoner at 
 Rome, was opened in the Consiglio Maggiore, where 
 Savonarola's great council met when Piero de Medici 
 the autocrat had fled from Florence. The monk of San 
 Marco still declares the awful guilt of sin, salvation 
 through the cross and the value of personal holiness 
 which reflects the beauty of the now glorified Christ. 
 Villari recorded only a partial truth when he said of 
 Savonarola : " He was the first in the fifteenth century 
 to make men feel that a new light had awakened the 
 
96 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 human race ; and thus he was a prophet of a new civil- 
 ization, the forerunner of Luther, of Bacon, of Descartes. 
 Hence the drama of his life became, after his death, the 
 drama of Europe. In the course of a single generation 
 after Luther had declared his mission the spirit of the 
 Church of Rome underwent a change. From the halls 
 of the Vatican to the secluded hermitage of the Apen- 
 nines this revival was felt. Instead of a Borgia there 
 reigned a Caraffa." 
 
JOHN HUSS; EARLIER LIFE AND WORK, 
 
" The son of perdition, who opposeth and exalteth himself 
 
 above all that is called God, or that is worshiped ; so that he 
 
 as God sitteth in the temple of God, showing himself that he is 
 
 Godr 
 
 2 Thess. 2 : 3, 4. 
 
 " God alone is Lord of the consciejice, and hath left it free 
 from the doctrines a?id commandments of men which are in 
 any thing contrary to his ivord, or beside it in matters of faith 
 or worship. So that to believe such doctri?ies, or to obey such 
 commandments out of conscience, is to betray true liberty of 
 conscience; afid the requiri?ig a?i implicit faith, a?td an abso- 
 lute obedience, is to destroy liberty of conscience, and reason 
 also. ' ' 
 
 Con. Faith, chap. xx. sec. ii. 
 
JOHN HUSS : EARLIER LIFE AND WORK. 
 
 BOHEMIA is one of the most interesting countries 
 in Europe. Now a part of the Austrian empire, 
 it was once an independent kingdom, the home of the 
 Celtic Boii, whence it derives its name. It is surround- 
 ed by great mountain-ranges which stand as if to guard 
 it from foreign invasion. It is watered by the Elbe and 
 Moldau, rivers of great beauty, which wind their way 
 through mountain-gorges and bathe the feet of long lines 
 of hills. Rich in its soil, genial in its climate and abound- 
 ing in scenery both picturesque and grand, Bohemia has 
 also much historic interest which may well engage atten- 
 tion. It has been a great battlefield on which truth has 
 contended with error and righteousness with sin, the 
 conflict sanguinary and protracted. Now the smoke of 
 contest is departed, and in this peaceful age we may 
 survey the past, wandering through the labyrinths of 
 its changeful history, listening to the voices of its strife 
 blending with the shouts of victors, and catching the 
 breath of its piety which struggles through the moral 
 miasma. 
 
 We are especially interested in the religious history 
 of Bohemia. The morning star of the great Reforma- 
 tion which shed its prophetic light on the British isles 
 shone on the mountains of Southern Germany, and was 
 
 99 
 
100 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 reflected from the bosom of the Moldau. The dawn 
 was approachiDg, and men of God, standing in anxious 
 expectation, caught, as they sometimes believed, the 
 sheen of the glorious sun breaking through the clouds. 
 
 The continental Church at the close of the fourteenth 
 century was no longer the Church of the apostles, of 
 Polycarp and Augustine. Its glory had departed, its 
 strength had turned to weakness, its devotion to will- 
 worship and its Christology to Mariolatry. Even God 
 himself was rivaled, if not outranked, in human esteem 
 by the Roman PontiiF. Some have believed that proph- 
 ecy was fulfilled in the man who had put on the tiara 
 and grasped the sceptre, and with unholy feet had 
 climbed to the throne of temporal and spiritual empire, 
 opposing and exalting himself above all that was called _ 
 God or that was worshiped ; so that he as God sat in the f 
 temple of God, showing himself that he is God; and 
 meanw^hile evil men and seducers waxed w^orse and 
 worse, deceiving and being deceived. 
 
 Charles IV. held his contested throne in the city 
 divided by the Moldau. He boasted of the place of his 
 royal residence that it w^as the most beautiful on which 
 the sun shone, the home of art, the centre of all culture 
 and the heart of Germany, whose pulsation was felt 
 from the Adriatic to the Gulf of Finland, and from the 
 Danube to the English Channel. The University of 
 Prague was the foremost school in Europe, numbering 
 not less than thirty thousand students, and attracting 
 thither many of the leading scholars of the age. The 
 Hradschin, or Palace Hill, crowned with cathedrals, 
 stood out in bold relief against the background of the 
 Laurenziberg Hills, once lurid with the fires of heathen 
 
JOHN HUSS: EARLIER LIFE AND WORK. 101 
 
 worship ; and the great Karlsbrucke, or Charles's Bridge, 
 which is the wonder of our age, which was left for a 
 succeeding generation to complete, one of the most im- 
 posing structures in Eastern Europe, joined the Hrad- 
 schin to the Kleinsite, the old town to the new. As we 
 look upon the great bridge with its massive arches, its 
 memorials of historic characters which gaze down with 
 stony eyes on the pageants of to-day, we are reminded 
 of another passage by which the past of religious 
 thought and life found its way out of the long niglit 
 of supei'stition into the morning of the Reformation — a 
 morning born amid the convulsions of kingdoms, and 
 sadly obscured for a season as it rose on the heights of 
 the Erzgebirge and Moravian mountains. 
 
 The time had come for great ideas to be born or to 
 emerge from their sepulchres and travel abroad over a 
 regenerated earth. The circle of the primitive Church 
 was about to return upon itself, sweeping out of dark- 
 ness into pristine light. The truth Paul preached was 
 to be in the ascendant, the spiritual cross to extrude the 
 idolatrous symbol, and the Christ of revelation to be a 
 real person in a sense that Rome had forgotten to 
 teach. 
 
 God accomplishes his purposes through human agen- 
 cies. In an obscure village of Bohemia a son is born 
 of humble parents who is to be a master in Israel. If 
 he fail to be a Joshua leading God's chosen people to 
 the land of promise, he shall be a Moses to weaken the 
 power of a cruel hierarchy and inaugurate an exodus 
 from the domination of a modern Pharaoh who know 
 not Joseph. 
 
 John Huss was born July 6, 1369 (some authorities 
 
102 ROMANISM AND TEE REFORMERS. 
 
 say in 1373), at Hussinitz in a southern division of 
 Bohemia. He derived his name from the place of his 
 nativity. Of his parents but little is known. They 
 were poor, but worthy. It is probable that they were 
 more devout than many of their neighbors, and trained 
 their child with a sedulous care which preserved him 
 from the vices that were prevalent in that age. Chil- 
 dren are usually the reflection of the home. So far as 
 is known, no stain rested on the early years and no 
 grave deflection marred the character of the youth 
 whom God designed to honor. 
 
 We find him for a time in one of the monastic schools 
 of Hussinitz, a boy of gentle manners and personal 
 beauty, his large and thoughtful eyes even then seem- 
 ing to catch a glimpse of his conspicuous future. He 
 was an ambitious student. He longed to read the 
 musty parchments, written in a strange tongue, which 
 in his esteem constituted the chief wealth of the place ; 
 and the monks, who took a fancy to the boy, did what 
 they could to furnish him the key to stores of knowl- 
 edge of which they knew but little themselves. He 
 needed advantages the monastery did not afford, and 
 soon removed to a school of considerable importance a 
 little more remote from his home. At Prachatiz he 
 found what he craved, and the possibilities of advance- 
 ment stimulated effort. He soon took high rank among 
 his fellow-students, and in due time completed the pre- 
 scribed curriculum with honor. 
 
 But he was not content with this. He resolved to 
 drink deeply from the Pierian spring and to fit himself 
 for distinguished services. The monks encouraged him 
 to enter the university at Prague, and thither it was (X)n- 
 
JOHN HUSS: EARLIER LIFE AND WORK. 103 
 
 eluded he should go. Accompanied by his mother, he 
 went to the capital city, the far-famed seat of learning 
 as of imperial power. The great town, so unlike the 
 simple village from which he came, with its palaces, 
 cathedrals, schools and mighty priesthood, together with 
 its environment of natural beauty which betokened the 
 special favor of Heaven, made a profound impression 
 on the young student. But the university, with its vast 
 proportions, numerous appointments and great libraries, 
 was the object of his chief admiration. One of the pro- 
 fessors received Huss to his ow^n home and arranged for 
 his support. His progress in study fulfilled the hopes 
 of the partial monks of Prachatiz. With natural gifts 
 of a high order Huss combined a patient endurance 
 which conquered difficulties that discouraged the less 
 resolute. He was thorough in Avhatever he undertook, 
 and he undertook whatever promised advantage. Whilst 
 many were content with superficial advantages, he went 
 to the roots of things where ignorance and knowledge 
 part company. At the same time he w^as^not an un- 
 sympathetic recluse, wrapped in selfishness and gov- 
 erned by a wholly uusanctified ambition. His moral 
 qualities were as admirable as his intellectual, even his 
 enemies being judges. "His affability of manner, his 
 life of austerity and self-denial, against which none 
 could bring a charge, his features pale and melancholy, 
 his body enfeebled, and his gentleness toward all, even 
 of the humblest class, were more effective than any 
 powiT of words." 
 
 The highest academic honors were conferred on Huss. 
 Soon after graduation he was made dean of the theo- 
 logical faculty, and a year later was appointed rector of 
 
 8 
 
104 B03IANJS3I AND THE BEFORMEBS. 
 
 the university. As a preacher in the Betlilehem church, 
 a spacious and elegant structure in the centre of one of 
 the city squares, founded by John of Mul, he attracted 
 not a little attention from tl.e first. His intellectual 
 power was recognized by all who heard him. He soon 
 appeared in the rdle of a reformer — not in the sense of 
 the century following, when multitudes separated them- 
 selves from a corrupt Church, but as a faithful preacher 
 of righteousness urging people to leave off their sins and 
 seek after holiness. He performed his office without 
 fear or favor, and could " neither be frightened nor flat- 
 tered." Nobles applauded him. Distinguished scholars 
 sat at his feet. The common people heard him gladly. 
 His fame spread abroad, alike familiar to members of 
 the royal court and the peasants on the mountain-slopes. 
 Even then there were many who realized the need of 
 reform, but they continued loyal to Kome. The work 
 of renovation was to be done in the Church, and papal 
 power, supposed to come from God, was to be perpetuated 
 until the end of time. Huss thought of nothing else 
 when he thundered from the pulpit of the Bethlehem 
 chapel, and may have dreamed of nothing else when, a 
 martyr to the truth, he Avas bound to the stake. But 
 his faithful revelation and fearless denunciation of 
 wickedness in high places soon arrayed against himself 
 the power of the dominant priesthood, and Rome lifted 
 its iron heel determined to crush the dangerous foe. 
 The doom that awaits the friar of Florence shall be the 
 doom of the preacher of Prague, and Huss and Savon- 
 arola shall bear each other company in the Tartarus 
 prepared for heretics. Rome will consent to sin in its 
 clergy, and there is scarce any depth of depravity to 
 
JOHN HUSS: EARLIER LIFE AND WORK. 105 
 
 which its clemency will not follow those who are loyal 
 to its boastful assumptions, but will not tolerate the man 
 who would destroy the foundations of its power. Yet 
 if Huss had coutented himself with denouncing the 
 irregularities of the people and instituting a moral re- 
 form which should have swept the wdiole field of com- 
 mon life, even a corrupt hierarcliy might have given 
 assent. All that would have contributed to the papal 
 exchequer by diminishing expenditures upon vice, and 
 so have added to the power and luxury of the hierarchy. 
 But the influence of Wyclif had crossed the Channel. 
 His vigorous tractates and a number of his sermons 
 had come into the possession of Huss. At first the 
 Bohemian w^as unwilling to accept the teachings of the 
 English Reformer ; then received sgme of them tentative- 
 ly, and at last adopted them in the main. He was in 
 full accord with Wyclif^s philosophical realism and 
 predestination, but he held the doctrine of transubstan- 
 tiation until the last. It w^as quite evident that Huss 
 was departing from the conservatism which characterized 
 his early ministry. There were lines of philosophical 
 and devotional thought creeping out of the past, assum- 
 ing more definite form, receiving new illumination from 
 current events, and converging in the convictions and 
 teaching of the eloquent preacher of the Bethlehem 
 church. Rome looked with grave apprehensions of harm 
 upon a man whose power was felt far beyond the walls 
 of Prague and dared assault the Holy See itself. He 
 was gathering around him, in full sympathy with his 
 resistance of corruption in doctrine and morals, some of 
 the most influential priests of Bohemia ; and in all this 
 there was much that portended evil to the Church. 
 
106 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 Even rude art was summoned to the aid of reform.* 
 Two Englishmen, James and Conrad of Canterbury, 
 who were in sympathy with Wyclifism, had come to 
 Prague to avail themselves of advantages furnished by 
 the university. They had visited the Bethlehem church, 
 and were delighted with the brave utterances of the 
 preacher. He had not gotten so far on in his search 
 after truth as the English Reformer, but his progress 
 was leading that way. They thought to put into a con- 
 crete form some of the principles he maintained. They 
 would thereby give an expression to personal convictions 
 which, for prudential considerations, they had withheld. 
 They were admitted to the home of Luke Welensky, 
 at a considerable remove from the Capitol Hill, and on 
 the wall of one of the apartments of his house they 
 placed a representation of Christ's triumphal entrance 
 into Jerusalem. The lowly Galilean, humbly clad, 
 bearing marks of exposure to the Syrian sun, rides an 
 ass, advancing slowly down the slopes of Olivet. But 
 the multitude are with Jesus. They strew the road with 
 palm-leaves and olive-branches and shout their hosan- 
 nas, whilst the disciples, unpretending fishermen, walk 
 wonderingly after. There is a blending of majesty and 
 humility in the scene. It is the majesty of royal power 
 obscured by its humble surroundings. It is quite be- 
 fitting the character of Him who came not to be minis- 
 tered unto, but to minister. It is a suggestion to the 
 apostolic succession that humility becomes their office, 
 for the disciple should not be above his Lord. The 
 companion painting is a severe contrast. It represents 
 a papal procession. It is a fete-day in Rome, and honor 
 
 * According: to some authorities. 
 
JOHN HUSS: EARLIER LIFE AND WORK. 107 
 
 is to be sliown to the occupant of St. Peter's chair. The 
 pope, gorgeou.sly arrayed in silver and gold and wearing 
 liis ])ontifical crown, rides a richly-caparisoned horse, 
 accompanied by soldiers who carry spears and halberds, 
 whilst the great and small prostrate themselves before 
 the Holy Father from whom obsequious emperors have 
 received their crowns. 
 
 The painting was an effective preacher. Huss alluded 
 to it in significant terms. Multitudes looked upon it, 
 received its lessons, and turned from a mere man like 
 themselves, whose blasphemous assumptions might well 
 provoke the wrath of Heaven, to the unpretending 
 Galilean, through whose veil of flesh shone the glory 
 of Him who made and governs the world, God over 
 all, blessed for evermore. 
 
 All ranks of the ecclesiastical order were severely cen- 
 sured for their vices and crimes. Italy joined hands 
 with France in the condemnation of a corrupt priesthood, 
 and the fulminations of a Zarabella and a Clemengis 
 shook the foundations of hierarchical presumption and 
 churchly power. 
 
 The pretended miracles which appealed to the super- 
 stitions of the people and fostered them detached the 
 more thoughtful from a system which practiced the 
 grossest deception in support of its treasury and made 
 credulity a stepping-stone to power. One of these mira- 
 cles may be instanced. The historian Neander records 
 it. At Wilsnack a church had been demolished by a 
 knight. A portion of a stone altar remained. In one 
 of its cavities was found a wafer colored red. This 
 singular appearance, the result of purely natural causes, 
 was pronounced miraculous. The blood of Christ, pre- 
 
108 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 served through thirteen centuries or transmitted from 
 the glorified body in heaven, had baptized the Host as it 
 reposed in the altar. The miracle was noised abroad. 
 Scores of pilgrims were seen winding their way down 
 the mountain-slopes. Men and women of strange speech, 
 afflicted with incurable diseases, came from the far North 
 that they might see and be healed. They came from 
 Scandinavia, across the Baltic, from distant villages on 
 the West and from the valleys of the Vaudois. Zyb- 
 neck, archbishop of Prague, was indignant, and deter- 
 mined to put an end to the harmful deception. He sum- 
 moned the Bethlehem preacher to his aid, and Huss was 
 made conspicuous by his refutation of the falsehood wdiich 
 was born of priestly avarice. This controversy did 
 much to release Huss from the superstitions and the domi- 
 nation of a corrupt Church, although he had no thought 
 of separation from the Church itself. It was one of 
 those incidents which seemed fortuitous, but was provi- 
 dential, and was an important link in that concatenation 
 of events by which God wrought out his inscrutable de- 
 signs. The Bohemian priest, who had not joined with 
 the doctors and masters of the university met in the 
 Nigra Rosa chapel in the condemnation of Wyclif 's 
 writings, has got further on in his discovery of abuses 
 in the Church and in a conviction of needed reform. 
 Whilst he had, as yet, the sympathy of the archbishop 
 and of the better portion of the priesthood, the most of 
 the latter were arrayed against him. They determined 
 to break the power of the Reformer. They deemed 
 prompt and decisive action a necessity. They believed 
 a charge of heresy could be sustained. He did not in- 
 terpret the Scriptures in harmony with the Holy Church. 
 
JOHN HUSS: EARLIER LIFE AND WORK. 109 
 
 It was evident that he accepted Augustine as his teacher, 
 was familiar with the writings of Robert of Lincoln 
 and was influenced by Conard Waldhausen and Militz 
 of Kremsier, the Moravian who died under a cloud at 
 Avignon, and Matthias of Janow, once the father con- 
 fessor of Charles IV., who had arraigned the Church at 
 the bar of his censure, daring to pronounce the Holy 
 See the Antichrist of Revelation. 
 
 Huss had taken the complexion of his associations, 
 and had gone beyond his teachers in his denunciation of 
 hierarchical power. The archbishop is alarmed at the 
 temerity of the Bethlehem preacher. He sympathizes 
 with his views concerning the moral corruptness of the 
 Romish Church, but he dare not share his opposition 
 to papal authority. The time for action on the part of 
 the clergy was come. Complaint was made to the arch- 
 bishop of Prague that Huss was a pestiferous heretic 
 who ought to be suppressed. According to Palacky, the 
 terms of their charge were the following : That he had 
 originated a popular feeling against the clergy by which 
 their influence was greatly impaired ; that he had identi- 
 fied himself with the Bohemians in opposition to the 
 Germans in the management of the university and the 
 control of other important interests ; that he had en- 
 couraged disrespect in the Church, and had denounced 
 her right to discipline those who insisted upon freedom 
 of thought ; that he had inveighed against the priests as 
 mercenary, prostituting their holy ofiice to personal ad- 
 vantage ; and that he had spoken in laudatory terms of 
 that arch-heretic Wyclif, and expressed the wish that 
 his soul might go where the soul of Wyclif was. 
 
 Pope Alexander Y., influenced by the archbishop of 
 
110 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 Prague, issued a bull in December, 1409, in which, hav- 
 ing referred to the writings of Wyclif, their circulation 
 in Bohemia and the pernicious results from the dissemi- 
 nation of heresy, he directed the archbishop to take vig- 
 orous measures against whatever tended to extend erro- 
 neous doctrines and to weaken the power of the Church. 
 All public teaching was to be given thereafter in the 
 cathedrals, and so be brought under the control of the 
 Church. The effect of this restriction would be the 
 closing of all private chapels, in which such men as 
 Huss were accustomed to indulge in great freedom of 
 speech. It was also ordered that any of the clergy who 
 had the writings of Wyclif in their possession should 
 transfer them to the authorities of the Church appointed 
 to receive them, and in the event of their refusal to do this 
 they were to be deprived of their livings. This bull was 
 delayed in its passage to Prague, and was not announced 
 until March 9, 1410. It produced great and widespread 
 excitement. It was intended to break the power of 
 heresy in Bohemia and the contiguous countries. The 
 effect was to rouse a more determined resistance to the 
 assumptions of Pome and the restrictions to religious 
 freedom. John Huss insisted that the word of God 
 was the infallible rule of faith, and that the hierarchy 
 had no right to deny the people access to this only reli- 
 able source of truth. He also claimed for himself and 
 others the right to read the writings of such devout men 
 as John AVyclif, of testing their teachings by the supe- 
 rior light of revelation, and of availing themselves of 
 all human thought which was fitted to aid their under- 
 standing of the divine revelation. But the archbishop, 
 who had much to do with the framing of the papal bull, 
 
JOHN HUSS: EARLIER LIFE AND WORK. Ill 
 
 RDcl SO fraiiied it that it would strike directly at the per- 
 son and work of Huss, held his ground. Huss was for- 
 bidden to preach in the Bethlehem chapel, and was com- 
 manded to deliver to the archbishop all heretical writ- 
 ings in his possession. Huss appealed to the king, and 
 general sympathy was aroused in his behalf. But 
 Zybneck proceeded to execute his purpose, and two 
 hundred volumes of Wyclif's writings were burned. 
 This disregard of personal rights of property and 
 attempted restriction of all freedom in religious inquiry 
 served to widen the breach that separated Huss and his 
 friends from the papal power, and gave an impetus to 
 reform which could not be restrained. The conflict with 
 the papacy was definitely inaugurated. It was to sweep 
 a wider field than Huss dreamed of, and only awaited a 
 later Reformer to carry it to the very gate of Rome. 
 Wyclif and Huss suggested the constellation Gemini 
 shining through the papal night, and a little farther on 
 they will give place to the glorious Sun, whose light they 
 portend and in which they will gladly merge their pro- 
 phetic beams. 
 
 The gentle Huss proved himself a brave defender of 
 the truth. Papal bulls did not intimidate him, threat- 
 ened severity could not deflect him from duty. Plant- 
 ing his feet on the rock of eternal truth, he looked on 
 the gathering storm. " I avow it,'' he said, " to be my 
 purpose to defend the truth which God has enabled me 
 to know, and especially the truth of the Holy Scriptures, 
 even to death, since T know that the truth stands and is 
 for ever mighty and abides eternally ; and with Him 
 there is no respect of persons. And if the fear of 
 death should terrify me, still I hope in my God and 
 
112 RCMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 in the assistance of the Holy Spirit that the Lord will 
 oive me firmness. And if I have found favor in his 
 sight he will crown me with martyrdom.'^ 
 
 Wenzel (or Wenceslaus), the emperor of Bohemia, 
 whose hatred of the Romish clergy was most pro- 
 nounced, sympathized with Huss. Many of the lead- 
 ing minds of Bohemia were coming into the light. 
 Whilst popes contended with each other for the succes- 
 sion and supremacy, faith in the papacy was being 
 deeply wounded in the house of its friends. Avignon 
 and Rome were untiringly preparing the way for the Ref- 
 ormation. The council assembled in the great cathedral 
 at Pisa had declared the deposition of both Benedict and 
 Gregory, and had crowned Cardinal Philargi of Milan 
 under the title of Alexander V. The deposed pontiffs 
 continued to perform their functions. The Church wore 
 a triple crown. Alexander V. died soon after at Bologna, 
 and Balthasar Cossa, a Neapolitan, who was the imper- 
 sonation of the worst of vices, under the title of John 
 XXIII., was chosen in his stead. Huss appealed to the 
 new pope for a release from the restriction laid upon his 
 work by his predecessor. King Wenzel wrote the pope 
 at Bologna in favor of Huss, asking that the Bethlehem 
 chapel should be confirmed in its privileges, that John 
 Huss should be permitted to resume his ministerial duties 
 without interruption or restraint, and that the dispute 
 concerning the writings of Wyclif should be brought to 
 a speedy end. 
 
 The pope referred the matter to a commission of car- 
 dinals, of whom Otto de Cologna was the chief. The 
 former sentence against Huss was confirmed, and he was 
 cited to appear before the pope at Bologna. A second 
 
JOHIs' HIJSS: EARLIER LIFE AND WORK. 113 
 
 commission, with Cardinal Francisco a Zabarilla, arch- 
 bishop of Florence, at its head, was favorably disposed 
 toward Huss, but the subsequent reference of the matter 
 to Cardinal Brancas resulted unfavorably to the Bohe- 
 mian. The former sentence was confirmed. Huss was 
 declared a heresiarc^h. Prague was placed under an 
 interdict. The Church arrayed itself against tlie secular 
 power and determined to establish its supremacy. Thus 
 the waves of contention met, then spent their force. At 
 length a compromise restraining both parties to the strife 
 secured temporary quiet. 
 
 It may be fitting to introduce in this connection some 
 reference to Jerome Faulfisch, better known in history 
 as Jerome of Prague. He was several years the senior 
 of Huss, and had anticipated him somewhat in the 
 adoption of principles inimical to the papal supremacy. 
 He had spent some time at Oxford, England, and had 
 become familiar with the writings of Wyclif, some of 
 which, having been transcribed by himself or others, he 
 carried with him to Prague, whither he returned in 1398. 
 He admired the English Reformer both for his intel- 
 lectual force and for his moral qualities, and embraced 
 every opportunity of setting forth the views of Wyclif. 
 At first Huss was disturbed by the earnest advocacy of 
 principles so far removed from those which Rome had 
 maintained as absolutely essential, and insisted that 
 Jerome was endangering his own peace of mind and 
 imperiling his soul. He besought him to burn the 
 writings of Wyclif or cast them into the Moldau. But, 
 as we have seen, John Huss soon came into sympathy 
 with Jerome, and even went in advance of him in the 
 maintenance of the Scriptures in opposition to the as- 
 
114 BOMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 sumptions of Rome. Somewhat later, Jerome was charged 
 witli grave ofFeuces against the Church. It was alleged 
 that he had denied the pope's authority to grant indul- 
 gences, condemned the worship of pictures, despised the 
 sacred relics, derided the clergy, rejected trausubstantia- 
 tion and had sought in many ways to bring the authority 
 of the Church into contempt. He was traced in all 
 his travels from Oxford to Paris, from Paris to Heid- 
 elberg, from Heidelberg to Vienna, and thence to 
 Prague, inciting to rebellion against the Church wherever 
 he went. He was also charged with aiding and abetting 
 the heresy of Huss. Some of these allegations he pro- 
 nounced absolutely false, and others true. As concerning 
 his relations to Huss, he frankly replied : " I call God to 
 witness that I have never seen in his conduct nor heard 
 in lectures by him anything exceptional. Nay, I confess 
 that for his gentle and correct life and the sacred truths 
 which he explained to the people from the word of God 
 I was his intimate friend ; for his person and for truth's 
 sake a defender of his honor in whatever place I might 
 find myself." The sympathy of Jerome did much to 
 lighten the sorrows of Huss, and the names of these two 
 Reformers are linked in the reverence and love of the 
 generations following. Jerome in an hour of weakness 
 appended his name to a comprehensive recantation, then 
 was deeply humiliated with a sense of his cowardice, and 
 thereafter stood fast to his convictions, even with the 
 gleam of bayonets about him and the glare of flames on 
 his face. He survived Huss only one year. Condemned 
 in the mUnster at Constance, he chanted the creed in a 
 clear, full voice, his upturned countenance reflecting the 
 glory of the nearing heaven. Then he walked calmly 
 
JOHN HUSS: EARLIER LIFE AND WORK. 115 
 
 out the Gottlieben gate to the clover-field, knelt in 
 prayer before the stake, interceded in behalf of his 
 enemies, and submitted even with joy fulness to the 
 agonies of death, which were so prolonged that it was 
 said, " One might have gone from St. Clement's church 
 at Prague to the bridge over the Moldau before he ceased 
 to breathe/' 
 
 We return to our narrative. The temporary quiet 
 which Huss enjoyed was disturbed by significant events 
 which kindled afresh the fires of persecution. John 
 XXIII., September 9, 1411, issued a bull against King 
 Ladislaus of Naples, who had espoused the cause of 
 Gregory XII. He was pronounced a heretic, a blas- 
 phemer, a base schismatic, whose power must be promptly 
 and for ever broken. Huss opposed the bull. He had 
 opposed the action of the council at Pisa in its recog- 
 nition of Alexander V. and John XXIII. as legitimate 
 popes, the one at Bologna, the other at Rome. But he 
 was no longer in sympathy with John. His vices were 
 so glaring, and his whole life so constant a travesty on 
 the gospel of Jesus Christ, that he could no longer rec- 
 ognize his authority as pontiff nor countenance his mali- 
 cious procedure against the Neapolitan king. 
 
 In Prague the excitement occasioned by the pope's 
 bull advanced to an alarming height. John XXIII. 
 was pronounced Antichrist because he had proclaimed a 
 crusade against Christians. The priests in the cathedral 
 denounced Huss in terms that paled the cheeks of dark- 
 ness. Huss replied firmly, forcibly, in the spirit of his 
 Lord. The people were with him, the papal hierarchy 
 was arrayed against him. The breach was widening 
 and God was leading his own by a way they knew not. 
 
116 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 Huss also vigorously opposed the indulgences by 
 which the pontiff would carry out his designs against 
 Ladislaus. Palatz, once the friend, but later the enemy 
 and accuser, of Huss at Constance, regarded the in- 
 dulgences of John XXIII. as a matter of indifference. 
 Huss denounced them as a violation of divine law and a 
 dishonor to Christ. He said with great feeling — and in 
 saying it broke the tie which had bound the two in a 
 cherished friendship— " Palatz is my friend, truth is my 
 friend, and, both being my friends, it is my sacred duty 
 to give the first honor to truth." 
 
 King Wenzel had approved the papal bull and in- 
 dulgences, and determined to terminate the opposition 
 of Huss and his friends. This purpose w^as perhaps the 
 fruit of ]3ersonal considerations rather than of any in- 
 telligent conviction as to the moral questions involved. 
 But there were many who had listened to the teachings 
 in the Bethlehem chapel who would not consent to the 
 insult to Christ and his truth which papal indulgences 
 inflicted ; and one day, the crowds surging to and fro in 
 the chief cathedral, when the venders of these pressed 
 them upon the people with blasphemous importunity 
 and sought to magnify their benefit, three young men 
 shouted their denial in the ears of the sacrilegious priest : 
 " Thou liest ! Master Huss has taught us better than 
 that." They were seized, imprisoned and condemned to 
 death. Huss pleaded for their release. Students in the 
 university came in throngs demanding the same. But 
 the headsman's axe ended their days. It was a solemn 
 day in Prague. The heavens seemed robed in sackcloth. 
 Some thought they heard the sound of invisible wings 
 overhead, dividing the gloom, letting down a little of 
 
JOHN HUSS: EARLIER LIFE AND WORK. 117 
 
 Heaven's light on the path of God's suifering flock. 
 The martyrs were borne to the Bethlehem chapel. Fu- 
 neral dirges were sung on the way thither, and hymns 
 of confiding trust within the sheltering walls. Huss 
 preached with great tenderness, and a holy wrath bided 
 its time and the will of Him whose kingdom ruleth 
 over all. 
 
 Huss so arrayed the force of argument and of his 
 mighty influence against the whole corrupting system of 
 indulgences that he was gathering the fagots for his 
 burning. But it mattered not. He was prepared at 
 any cost to defend the truth and honor his Master. The 
 spirit of reform would not down at the pope's bidding ; 
 floods could not drown nor flames consume it. It was 
 in the hearts of the people. It breathed in the very air 
 about them. It sung its night-song when storms gath- 
 ered. It climbed to the summits of the mountains, and, 
 turning its face toward the east, waited for the breaking 
 of the day. " It will come," said Huss. " It is near," 
 said Jerome of Prague ; " the Lord will hasten it in his 
 time." 
 
< 
 
JOHN HUSS AND THE COUNCIL OF 
 CONSTi|NCE. 
 
i 
 
 " To the law and to the testimo7iy ; if they speak ?iot accord- 
 ing to this word, it is because there is no light in thefn.'' 
 
 ISA. 8 : 20. 
 
 " The Suprevie Judge, by which all controversies of religion 
 are to be determined, and all decrees of councils, opinions of 
 ancient ivriters, doctrines of men, and private spirits, are to 
 be examined, and in whose sentence we are to rest, can be ?io 
 other but the Holy Ghost speaking in the Scripture.'' 
 
 Confession of Faith, chap. i. sec. x. 
 
JOHN HUSS AND THE COUNCIL OF 
 
 CONSTANCE. 
 
 rpHE city of Constance is situated on tlie beautiful lake 
 -L of the same name, and belongs at present to the 
 duchy of Baden, having been ceded by Austria at the 
 beginning of the present century. At the time of which 
 we write it had a population of fifty thousand, but its 
 decadence began soon after, and it now numbers less than 
 seven thousand inhabitants. The general topography of 
 Constance and the contiguous country is attractive — the 
 peaceful lake on the one side, the wooded hills dividing 
 the great stretch of meadow-lands on the other, the 
 Ehine issuing from the lake forming the Unter See and 
 flowing through historic scenes until it leaps into a lower 
 channel at the Chute du Rhin, passing old Schaffhausen 
 on its way to the Euglisli Channel and the Atlantic. 
 We pronounced Constance, the central feature of this 
 scene, as we saw it from the steamer's deck, a singularly 
 beautiful city — its broad avenues intersected by narrow 
 streets, its venerable churches lifting their spires among 
 the trees, the towers of the great miinster rising con- 
 spicuously above the high houses, and around the ancient 
 town meadows and orchards that seem to be consciously 
 at rest under the subdued light of the setting day. That 
 quiet scene presented a marked contrast to the bustling 
 city of Sigismund\s reign and the unseemly strifes that 
 
 121 
 
122 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 kindled the fires of persecution and irrigated the soil 
 with human blood. 
 
 The famous Council of Constance assembled in 
 November, 1414. Its primary object, an unwitting sub- 
 version of the papacy, was to declare the authority of gene- 
 ral councils superior to that of Roman pontiffs, but it was 
 not confined to its original purpose. It was convened 
 by the emperor, and John XXIII., one of the three 
 rival popes, reluctantly assented to the summons. The 
 stately pontiff, fearing the action of the council as re- 
 lated to his supremacy, yet hoping that some adventi- 
 tious circumstance might establish his claim, set out on 
 his journey northward. As he approached the city, 
 catching a view of its cathedral-towers from an elevation 
 whence its path wound its way into the valley, he ex- 
 pressed a presentiment of evil which had oppressed his 
 spirit along the way. A little later Sigismund, the 
 emperor, accompanied by a royal train, entered Con- 
 stance. On the 11th of October, John Huss left Prague, 
 resolved to appear before the council, let the result be 
 what it might, the emperor pledging his royal word for 
 the security of his person. The bishop of the diocese 
 had previously furnished him a certificate of orthodoxy, 
 given, perhaps, through fear of the people, who accounted 
 Huss such a prophet as John the Baptist. Very painful 
 was the preacher's departure from the Bethlehem chapel. 
 Standing on the little square not far from his own door, 
 he looked at the familiar house of prayer where, with oc- 
 casional interruptions, he had ministered for twelve event- 
 ful years. His soul had been profoundly stirred as he 
 gazed into the sea of faces tliat turned toward the high pul- 
 pit and, an inquiring multitude, listened as for their lives. 
 
HUSS AND THE COUNCIL OF CONSTANCE. 123 
 
 The farewell to his chapel trembled on his lips and be- 
 spoke the depth of his affection for the flock. The great- 
 est intellects are ordinarily associated with the greatest 
 hearts. Whilst his courage did not fail him in sight of 
 any foe, his tender love to his people shrank from parting 
 words which he feared a choked utterance would obscure. 
 Hence he wrote them a message which breathed forth 
 his tender affection and confiding trust : " Beloved, if 
 my death ought to contribute to the Master's glory, 
 pray that it may come quickly and that he may enable 
 me to support all my calamities with constancy. You 
 will probably never more behold my face at Prague ; 
 but should the will of the all-powerful God deign to 
 restore me to you, let us then advance with a firmer 
 heart in the knowledge and the love of his law.'^ He 
 went calmly forth, even as Paul went to Jerusalem, 
 prison-walls frowning upon him. He went as grandly 
 as Martin Luther afterward went to the Diet of Worms. 
 
 We seem to follow him in his journeyings southward. 
 At length he reaches a hill which affords a last view of 
 Prague. He brushes away the tears that he may see it, 
 the city through which flows the Moldau covering the 
 heights and sitting by the river-banks; and he expe- 
 riences sensations more sacred than those which strug- 
 gled in the spirit of Mary Stuart when she caught, 
 across the uneasy waters, her final view of the France 
 she loved. Then he addressed himself to the grander 
 future. He had left his dear Prague for ever. 
 
 The days go on. The streets of Constance are crowded. 
 John the pontiff, Sigismund the emperor, Huss the here- 
 siarch are there. Bishops, archbishops, cardinals and 
 nearly two thousand priests in dark robes pass to and 
 
124 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 fro. Margraves, counts, barous and hooded knights 
 ■stand apart from tlie motley crowd. Electors and 
 dukes and men whose fame has crossed the Rliine 
 impart added dignity to the scene. 
 
 At first Huss was unmolested. Pope John had de- 
 clared that a hair of his head should not be harmed. 
 Like Paul who preached in his hired house at Rome 
 under the very eaves of Nero's palace, the Bohemian 
 preached Christ and holiness to those who came to his 
 lodgings, and with a few friends maintained daily wor- 
 ship in the sanctuary of his temporary home. But this 
 quietness was not for long. His enemies were busy. 
 They even foi-got Benedict and Gregory and John and 
 the unseendy strife among the pontiffs in their hatred 
 of the heretic from Prague. He was, in fact, the chief 
 personage in Constance — a greater than emperors and 
 popes. His name shall outlive theirs, and his influ- 
 ence fill a broader field. The spirit of persecution in- 
 creased. Placards were attached to the walls of the 
 houses and in public places denouncing the enemy of 
 Rome and bidding the people beware of his teachings. 
 An excommunicated lieretic deserved the stake. 
 
 The council, after much delay, was opened on Novem- 
 ber 5th. The arrangements for the impressive initiative 
 were completed with the early dawn. Then the bells in 
 all the church-towers rang out the signal for the convo- 
 cation. A long procession of ecclesiastical dignitaries 
 and ordinary priests and representatives of the secular 
 ])ower moved along the streets which led to tlie great 
 munster. The cathedral was crowded from the doors 
 to the high altar. Confused voices blended with the 
 sound of the organ, and the church-columns cast weird 
 
HUSS AND THE COUNCIL OF CONSTANCE. 125 
 
 shadows over the scene. None could forecast the future 
 of the council now gathered with such pomp in the 
 catliedral by the Rhine. The usual prayers were offered 
 and a sermon was preached. Then the great congrega- 
 tion dispersed. 
 
 On the 16th of November the council was again con- 
 vened. One of the cardinals celebrated mass. John 
 XXIII. preached a sermon from Zech. 7 : 16 : "Speak 
 ^e every man the truth to his neighbor ; execute the 
 judgment of truth and peace in your gates.'' The dis- 
 course condemned the preacher. He was by no means 
 an exponent of the truth, and his vices were notorious, 
 whilst his personal ambitions trampled on every essen- 
 tial to peace. So thought many who listened to the 
 words of the pontiff on that memorable day. Cardinal 
 Zarabella read the papal bull in response to which this 
 council was then convened. 
 
 Whilst the question of the relation of the pope to the 
 general councils of the Church was prominent, involving 
 the right of John XXIII. to occupy the papal chair, 
 this pontiff thouglit his own interests might be ultimate- 
 ly subserved by diverting the attention of the council, 
 for the present, to the case of IIuss the heretic. A zeal 
 for the doctrinal integrity of the Church might strengthen 
 the position of John and give him an advantage over 
 Benedict and Gregory, his rivals. In base violation of 
 his pledge to protect the Bohemian he instigated pro- 
 ceedings against him. 
 
 A few days later a company of soldiers might have 
 been seen in the vicinity of the house where Huss had 
 his lodgings. They were prepared to arrest the heretic 
 and drag him before his inquisitors in case he should 
 
12(3 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 disregard a citation al)(mt to be presented. Presentl}? 
 four men appeared who inquired for Huss. Their 
 dress and bearing indicated the significance of their 
 errand. The mayor of the city was accompanied by 
 two bishops and a knight. They informed Huss that 
 ^•rave charges of heresy had been preferred against him, 
 and that he was cited to appear at once before the po})e 
 and cardinals to make answer to the same. He oifered 
 no resistance. A horse had been provided for his con- 
 veyance to the place of trial. He mounted into the 
 saddle and rode away. John de Chlum, his friend and 
 })rotector, attended him to tlie episcopal palace. Several 
 interviews were held Avith the cardinal and his accusers. 
 At length eight definite charges were formulated and 
 presented. They may be concisely stated as embra- 
 cing a denial of transubstantiation ; of the right of a 
 priest living in flagrant sin to administer the holy sac- 
 raments; of the assumption that the hierarchy is the 
 true Church ; of any advantage accruing to the spirit- 
 ual body as the representative of the truth from its 
 support by the state; of the official superiority of 
 bishops ; of the power of the keys as vested in a cor- 
 rupt Church ; and that, whilst he denied these essential 
 features of the doctrinal system and probity of Rome, 
 he had disregarded the authority of the Church as re- 
 hited to his excommunication, and had continued with- 
 out intermission to discharge the functions of the priest- 
 ly office. He was also represented to be the inciter of 
 seditions, a disturber of the peace and the persistent 
 advocate of errors not enumerated in the charges pre- 
 ferred against him, usually denoniinated Wyclifian, 
 originated by the arch-heretic of England. This latter 
 
HUSS AND THE COUNCIL OF CONSTANCE. 127 
 
 statement was vague, but it was calculated to iuflame 
 the public mind and secure the condemnation of Huss. 
 John Huss was a Realist, as was Wyclif. Eealism 
 was supposed to be antagonistic to the Church. It 
 struck at the authority of pontiffs and councils, whilst 
 it held that the Bible was the sole as it is the sufficient 
 rule of faith and conduct. The head and front of this 
 Bohemian's offence was his disregard of that authority. 
 He was ever asking, What does the word of God teach ? 
 Papal infallibility went down before the revelation which 
 came from heaven. As to the distinction between Real- 
 ism and Nominalism, the council at Constance did not 
 have a clear conception. Both these systems of philos- 
 ophy were occupied with the subject of general ideas in 
 opposition to particular things, which are constantly 
 changing and cannot furnish a basis for a natural science. 
 The Realists held that general ideas or things have a 
 real existence ; so Plato had taught and the leading 
 philosophers of his day. The Nominalists insisted that 
 general ideas are only names or words ; so taught Aris- 
 totle and Porphyry. The Realists were more numerous 
 and influential than the Nominalists. The controversy 
 between them was severe. When argument failed they 
 resorted to the sword. Neither party seemed to have a 
 clear conception of the subject-matter of their dispute. 
 The playful description of the dialectician of an earlier 
 century, as given by John of Salisbury, was quite ap- 
 plicable to the time of Huss. The sagacious and sera- 
 phic philosopher " is prepared to solve the old question 
 about genera and species ; and while he is laboring upon 
 it the universe becomes old ; more time is consumed 
 upon it than the Caesars spent in conquering and subdu- 
 
i.28 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 ing the world ; more money is expended than all the 
 wealth which Croesus ever possessed. For this subject 
 has occupied many so long that, after consuming their 
 whole lives upon it, they have not understood either that 
 or anything else." It was enough for the council to 
 know that Huss accepted Realism. For that he must be 
 condemned. 
 
 It was also alleged that Huss had adopted the teaching 
 of Jacobellus, a priest of St. Michael's church in Prague, 
 respecting the giving of the cup to the laity in the sacra- 
 ment of the Lord's Supper. Matthias of Janow had 
 condemned the withholding of the cup, and Jacobellus 
 had probably received his impressions from Matthias, 
 whose influence upon the religious thought of his age was 
 widespread and potential. Huss insisted that there was 
 no warrant in the institution of the Lord's Supper or in 
 apostolic usage for denying the cup to the laity, as was 
 the custom of the Romish Church. This seems, at 
 first view, a matter of little importance. But it in- 
 volved a grave principle. It was an exercise of private 
 judgment, which was a contravention of an established 
 order and was regarded as contempt of the infallible 
 Church. Rome had settled all questions concerning 
 the Eucharist, and the expression of even an opinion 
 on the subject could not be tolerated. John Huss, 
 it was alleged, deserved the severest condemnation of 
 the Church he had insulted and in which his teach- 
 ings were calculated to create a dangerous schism. 
 This a])peal from pontifical ruling to the word of 
 God and independent interpretations of it was the en- 
 trance of a wedge wliich ultimately divided the Church. 
 The sagacious priesthood discerned the significance of 
 
BU&S AND THE COUNCIL OF CONSTANCE. 129 
 
 the apparently uuimportant iuiiovation, aucl pronounced 
 its author a dangerous heretic* 
 
 The seutiment against tlie Bohemian was a resistless 
 flood. Whatev^er was mythical and real was submerged 
 by it. Trivial things were magnified. The molehill 
 became a mountain. Things that Avere not understood 
 were construed as opposition to the authority to which 
 independent judgment should bow. The mock trial 
 went on. After a few days Huss was sent to the prison 
 of the Dominican monastery on an island near the foot 
 of the lake, a loathsome place, under the yssdh of which 
 flowed the sewage of the city. The prison remains to 
 this day. It was an act of cruelty which all Christen- 
 dom has ever since condemned. No appeal to pope, 
 cardinals or the populace was sufficient to secure his 
 release. 
 
 In the following May, Pope John was deposed. The 
 reasons for this action of the council were obviously 
 sufficient. It .was alleged thiit he was '^the supporter 
 of iniquity, the defender of simonists, the enemy of all 
 virtue, the slave of lasciviousness, a devil incarnate " — 
 a most unworthy successor of St. Peter ; and this fact 
 raises the question whether the apostolic succession, if 
 unbroken until then, could continue itself through such 
 
 *Justherean important statement deserves record. The council 
 had admitted the use of both kinds, the bread and the cup, in the 
 primitive Church, but added that the Romish Church had condennied 
 the giving of the cup to the laity. Now, observe that in doing this 
 it had arrayed itself against Christ, who instituted the Supper. It had 
 exalted itself above God. This is a significant fact, and declares the 
 blasphemous attitude of the Church of Kome. Huss accepted Christ 
 as his teacher, not the pope, not the councils of the Church : for this 
 he must die. 
 
130 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 a pontiff as John XXIII. In anticipation of the de- 
 cision of the council, the pope fled in disguise from Con- 
 stance and gathered a few friends in anxious conference 
 at Schaffhausen. Then followed his imprisonment and 
 formal deposition, and the pope was cast off as an ol)ject 
 of inexpressible loathing, whilst not one of all who had 
 once bowed the knee to this so-called vicar of Christ 
 remained to do him reverence. 
 
 But this procedure against John brought no relief to 
 Huss. He was carried in chains to the castle of Gott- 
 lieben. Again, he was removed to the Franciscan con- 
 vent in Constance. He was repeatedly summoned be- 
 fore the council. The men who had condemned John 
 XXIII. might have been expected to sympathize with 
 Huss. They had denounced the corruptions that en- 
 tered the Church ; they had condemned the strife of the 
 rival popes who jostled each other in the effort to gratify 
 an unholy ambition ; they had humiliated John and 
 cried aloud for general reform in high places and in low. 
 But they were as resolute in their determination to sup- 
 press heresy. Huss was a heretic. He must die. 
 Wherein was he a heretic? Huss repeatedly declared 
 his loyalty to the Church. He even accepted transub- 
 stantiation as a scriptural dogma. He believed in the 
 Trinity. He was in accord ^vith the teachings of 
 Athanasius and Augustine. He had said, '^ I am ready, 
 with all my heart, to fulfill the apostolical mandates ;" but 
 (he had added) '^ I call apostolical mandates the doctrines 
 of the apostles of Christ ; and so far as the papal man- 
 dates agree with these, so far will I obey them most 
 willingly. But if I see anything in them at variance 
 with these, I shall not obey, even though the stake 
 
HUSS AND THE COUNCIL OF CONSTANCE. 131 
 
 were staring me in the face." He was not so far re- 
 moved from Romanism as was Wyclif, but he followed 
 close after him, and had he lived a decade longer he 
 might have been as advanced a Reformer as his great 
 teacher across the Channel. 
 
 His real offence is well stated to have been his com- 
 plaint against the immorality of the priests and his un- 
 willingness to accept the decisions of councils when out 
 of harmony with the word of God. He was a Bible 
 Christian. He planted his feet on the sacred Scriptures 
 as on a rock which had defied the violence of storms and 
 the wear of waves. He exalted Christ above the pope, 
 and determined, whatever pontiffs and councils might 
 require, to glory only in the cross. He was a Protestant, 
 although the name was as yet unknown. He bore the 
 torch of divine truth, and when his course was run he 
 handed it down to the miner of Eisleben, who led God's 
 sacramental host in the light thereof into the Land of 
 Promise. 
 
 The council met in the cathedral. A surging mass of 
 human beings crowded every available space. Sigismund 
 was present ; Robert Hallem was there. Both the dig- 
 nitaries of the Church and the representatives of the 
 secular power had been summoned to condemn the 
 Bohemian, whose integrity of life and beauty of char- 
 acter none could honestly dispute. 
 
 The long array of charges was proclaimed, and Huss 
 attempted to give an answer to each accusation. The 
 council listened or commanded silence as best suited its 
 purpose. Some of the charges were wholly false ; some 
 were true and honored the accused. His enemies found 
 nothing in him worthy of death. But they could not 
 
132 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 be deflected from their purpose. He must burn at the 
 stake. He was arrayed in priestly robes, holding a 
 chalice, as if about to perform the functions of his high 
 office. The rabble mocked him. Priests applauded. 
 The designated officials took from him the chalice, de- 
 claring him a Judas who had sold his Lord. Then they 
 stripped him of his sacerdotal robes, uttering curses 
 loud and deep. He meekly replied that he could readily 
 bear the intended degradation for the truth and the Mas- 
 ter's sake. On his head they placed a paper crown cov- 
 ered with pictures of devils, and devoted his soul to the 
 prince of darkness, whilst he commended himself to his 
 most merciful Master, Jesus Christ. On the crown they 
 wrote his accusation, " Heresiarch.'^ He bore each in- 
 dignity with a holy meekness and thought of his Lord 
 who for him bore a " far rougher and weightier crown 
 of thorns." 
 
 When his degradation was completed the Church com- 
 mitted him to the secular power. Sigismund gave him 
 into the hands of the elector palatine, and the latter 
 transferred him to the mayor of Constance, who directed 
 the executioners to carry out the sentence of death even 
 to its minutest details. The officers of the elector led 
 Huss out of the miinster. A company of armed men 
 surrounded him and an excited multitude followed. The 
 route was circuitous, for the procession must needs pass 
 the episcopal residence, in the vicinity of which the 
 writings of the Bohemian were to be burned. Then they 
 passed down \\\q long street which led them through the 
 Oottlieben gate into the open meadow. Crossing an 
 open space and through the scanty orchards, they came 
 to the place of execution. Tlie stake was erected and 
 
BUSS AND THE COUNCIL OF CONSTANCE. 133 
 
 the fagots were gathered. Huss fell upon his knees and 
 prayed, breathing his souFs desire in the inspired words 
 of the Psalmist, repeatedly saying with holy fervor, 
 " Into thy hands, O Lord, I commend my spirit/' They 
 who stood by were deeply moved by the manner and 
 speech of the man who dared to die rather than be un- 
 true to God and to himself The executioners then bound 
 him Avith a chain, placed about his neck, to the stake. 
 Addressing the multitude about him, Huss said : " The 
 chief aim of my preachiug was to teach men repentance 
 and the forgiveness of sins according to the truth of the 
 gospel of Christ ; therefore I am prepared to die with 
 joyful soul.'' His thoughts were divided between his dear 
 church in Prague, to w^hich he had sent messages of love, 
 and the Church on high, to which he was soon to be 
 joined. Then the fagots were kindled. As the flames 
 leapt upward he sang with a loud voice, " Jesus, Son of 
 the living God, have mercy upon me." Again he re- 
 peated the same words. A third time he assayed to 
 raise the trustful prayer, but with the sweet name of 
 Jesus on his lips his utterance ceased, and John Huss 
 was with his Lord, where the wicked cease from troub- 
 ling and the weary are at rest. Then the executioners 
 gathered his ashes and cast them into the Rhine, and the 
 Rhine bore them to the sea, and the sea hung :ts b )w 
 of hope in the sky. 
 
 One year later Jerome of Prague died for the truth's 
 sake on the same spot, and to-day a great stone, brought 
 from a distance, marks the place in the clover-field 
 whence chariots of fire bore the two Bohemian saints to 
 the home above. 
 
 But though dead they live. The Reformation in 
 
134 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 Gerinany was the fruitage of the Reformation which 
 Huss, under God, inaugurated in Bohemia. The 
 Church he formed has continued, through varied ex- 
 periences, in an unbroken succession of believers until 
 the present. 
 
 Shortly after his death the followers of Huss Avere 
 divided into two parties, the Calixtins and the Taborites. 
 The former, who took their name from calix, a cup, be- 
 cause they insisted on the administration of the Supper 
 in both kinds, were unwilling to separate themselves 
 from the Romish Church. But the Taborites, who 
 took their designation from a mountain on which they 
 had Avorshiped, declared themselves in favor of the 
 formation of a religious organization which should be 
 a protest against the corruptions of Rome and a refuge 
 for the oppressed. After the death of Wenzel political 
 differences arose. Sigismund, the brother of the deceased 
 emperor, claimed the right of succession to the throne. 
 But he was the friend of Rome and had basely sur- 
 rendered Huss to his enemies. Besides all this, he had 
 declared himself entirely opposed to the principles of 
 reform in Church and State which the Hussites main- 
 tained and would carry out to their legitimate results. 
 The people defied his authority. They would escape 
 the tyranny he proposed or die in the attempt to termi- 
 nate his power. At Kuttenberg two ambassadors whom 
 they had sent to negotiate terms of peace were brutally 
 murdered, and four thousand Taborites subsequently 
 shared a similar fate. At Leitmeritz twenty-four lead- 
 ing citizens were seized, bound with ropes and cast into 
 the river — a culmination in cruelty which had a parallel 
 nearly two centuries later when in the Grosse Ring, a 
 
IWSS AND THE COUNCIL OF CONSTANCE. 135 
 
 public square in Prague, near the site of Bethlehem 
 chapel, twenty-seven Protestant Bohemians were be- 
 headed, passing in slow procession under a flashing 
 sword which is still preserved, and their heads carried 
 to one of the towers of Carlsbriicke, or Charles's Bridge, 
 where for ten years they were exhibited to passers-by, 
 who jeered or wept as they beheld the ghastly sight. 
 The Hussites of the fifteenth century were just coming 
 from under the shadow of the papal hierarchy. They 
 \\ere often unwise, not being as yet emancipated from 
 the control of Romish principles which led to brutal 
 deeds, and their attitude of resistance to autocratic rule 
 provoked imperial displeasure. Then Sigismund issued 
 tlie call to arms. Germany clasped hands witli Pome, 
 and they massed their united forces. The extinction of 
 heresy and the liberties of Bohemia seemed assured. 
 The Bohemians looked to God for succor and girded 
 themselves for the strife. They were led to battle by 
 the one-eyed Ziska, one of the greatest generals known 
 to history, who, when entirely blind, saw more than the 
 most of warriors with two eyes. He seemed endowed 
 with a supernatural vision, and directed his armies with 
 a peerless skill, and so inspired them with his own prow- 
 ess that they were never known to turn their backs to a 
 foe. Singing their favorite battle-hymn, '' Ye warriors of 
 God our Lord,'' they went forth to the fight. Sigismund 
 suffered inglorious defeat. The hills of Bohemia caught 
 the shout of the victors, and bore it down the valleys. 
 But it was not long until Ziska was stricken down by 
 the pestilence and went to his grave. The people 
 mourned his untimely death and refused to be com- 
 forted. Near his tomb may be seen the inscription, 
 
 10 
 
136 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 "O Huss, here reposes John Ziska thy avenger, and 
 the emperor himself has quailed before him." 
 
 Again Sigismuud gathered an imposing army two 
 hundred thousand strong. Germany was proud of her 
 stalwart braves. The emperor was confident of success. 
 The Bohemians were, in comparison, an insignificant 
 army. Now liberty and heresy will surely go down. 
 Instead of Ziska was Procop — inferior in some respects 
 to his great master, but not unworthy the mantle the 
 invincible general had bequeathed him. The two armies 
 met near the walls of Toplitz. The Goliath of the 
 North mocked the armies of Bohemia. A brief advan- 
 tage secured by Sigismund's forces was succeeded by the 
 hasty flight of his broken columns, the Hussites pursu- 
 ing them over the long swaths of their dead. The 
 spirit of Ziska seemed to ride in his triumphal chariot 
 as in other days. 
 
 Then came a pause in the strife, and the smoke of 
 battle disappeared. The dead were numbered and the 
 living tested their strength. Rome was troubled. The 
 Bohemians seem unconquerable. Messages were sent to 
 Sigismuud, and pledges of enlarged support. The 
 Church gathered her forces from near and from afar. 
 Cardinal Cessarini exchanged the red hat for a helmet 
 and the shepherd's crook for a sword. The aid of our 
 Lady the Holy ISIother was invoked, and the papal 
 benediction was 2:iven. Bohemia was again on the 
 defensive, and loyalty to flitherland, forgetting all re- 
 ligious differences and conscious of right, advanced to 
 meet the enemv. Cessarini led his forces through the 
 forests of Bohemia on the west, expecting to crush the 
 defiant foe. But in the first shock of battle he was 
 
HUSS AND THE COUNCIL OF CONSTANCE. 137 
 
 driven back. A second time he was repulsed. The 
 Bohemians pursued the retreating armies and thousands 
 perished. The cardinal was humiliated and his forces 
 demoralized. No appeal could rally them to a fresh 
 attack. No entreaty of the pope could persuade Ces- 
 sarini to further conflict. Then followed diplomatic in- 
 trigues by which Sigismund hoped to extinguish heresy 
 and secure the throne. The demands of the Hussites 
 were granted in part, and the Calixtins joined with 
 the Romanists in receiving Sigismund as the emperor 
 of Bohemia. But it was soon apparent that imperial 
 pledges were valueless, and the Taborites, who composed 
 what may be termed the Protestant element, determined 
 upon another effort to secure the liberty for which so 
 many of their brethren had died. But their allies, the 
 Calixtins, had deserted them. One of their own gener- 
 als proved a traitor. The opposing army overwhelmed 
 them and Bohemia was yoked to the imperial car. It 
 had been better if the Hussites had trusted less in carnal 
 weapons, and more, as they afterward did, in the sword 
 of the Spirit, which is the word of God. Yet many be- 
 lieve that they have been, in a measure at least, unjust- 
 ly condemned for their resort to arms. They were not, 
 in fact, the otfensiv^e party. Sigismund inaugurated the 
 contest, and the pope aided it. It was not until the 
 Taborites discovered the perfidy of the emperor the 
 Calixtins had accepted that they assumed the offensive 
 and resisted the encroachments of a powerful and un- 
 scrupulous enemy — the man who had broken his royal 
 word with John Huss, and would rejoice in the exter- 
 mination of all who dared support the principles in 
 defence of which the Bohemian had died. 
 
iTxS ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 Through changeful experiences of hope and fear, of 
 quiet and persecution, the disciples of the martyred Huss 
 held on their way. Banished from home, hunted like 
 • beasts of prey, preparing their food and reading their 
 Bibles and singing their plaintive psalms in the depth 
 of night whilst their enemies slept, they proved their 
 devotion to truth and godliness by the trials they en- 
 dured. Waldensian exiles, crossing the Austrian bound- 
 ary after the burning of Stephen their beloved bishop, 
 associated themselves with their Bohemian brethren, and 
 later still with equally devoted Moravians, under Count 
 Zinzendorf, added another tributary to the widening cur- 
 rent of the Reformed religion. These elements, gathered 
 from different parts of Central Europe, consecrated to 
 God in a baptism of fire, gaining clearer apprehensions 
 of the gospel of Christ as the years went on, maintain- 
 ing a simple and spiritual worship closely conformed to 
 that of apostolic times, and adopting a church polity 
 essentially representative, kindled their watchfires amid 
 the mountain-fastnesses and waited for the salvation of 
 God. They were Protestant Christians. They rebuked 
 tlie corruptions of Rome by their holy living. They 
 bore testimony to the glory of Christ as the only Saviour 
 of sinners, the only Head of the Church, the Comforter 
 of the weary and the unerring Guide to the saints' ever- 
 lasting rest. The persecuted believers who worshiped at 
 Lititz and built their simple chapels along the borders 
 of Bohemia and Moravia, conveying the sweet evangel 
 to their descendants, who gave it to the generations 
 following, known to-day as the Moravian Brethren, 
 eminent for piety and devotion to Bible truth, their 
 mission-stations reaching from the equator to the Arctic 
 
HUSS AXIJ THE COUNCIL OF CONSTANCE. 139 
 
 pole, their zeal stimiilHtiiig the zeal of every branch of 
 the Reformed Church, — are in an important sense the 
 spiritual children of John Huss, his crown of glory, an 
 infinite indemnification for all his sufferings which shall 
 shine with ever-increasing lustre whilst eternity endures. 
 
Sfi^RTIN LUTHER. 
 
^' For the mystery of iniquity doth already wor/i: only he 
 who now letteth will let, until he be taken out of the way. ' ' 
 
 2 Thess. 2 : 7. 
 
 " Who can forgive sins but God only?'' 
 
 Mark 2 : 7. 
 
 ' ' God doth continue to forgive the sins of those that are justi- 
 fied : a7id although they can never fall from the state of justi- 
 fication, yet they may by their si^is fall under God' s fatherly 
 displeasure, a?id not have the light of his countenance restored 
 2mto them, until they hu7nble themselves, confess their sins, beg 
 pardon, a7id renew their faith and repentance'' 
 
 Confession of Faith, chap. xi. sec. v. 
 
MARTIN LUTHER. 
 
 A FTER the conversion of Constantine the Great 
 -^-^ religion adapted itself to its worldly eminence 
 and lost its spiritual power. The decadence of piety 
 continued until the last vestige was ready to disappear. 
 The Dark Ages grew darker, the worldliness of the 
 Church increased and the corruptions of the clergy 
 became more complete as time advanced. Now and 
 then a Wyclif or Tyndall, a Huss or a Savonarola, 
 bore aloft the torch of truth, but it only made the 
 darkness more apparent. The ecclesiastical hierarchy 
 of the fifteenth century was the servant of sin. The 
 Church was an oiFensive sepulchre, full of dead men's 
 bones. 
 
 Then God appeared upon the scene. The world 
 needed him, was lost without him. The truth must 
 be recovered, primitive piety restored and the Church 
 regenerated by power from above. But it is God's 
 plan to work through intermediate agencies and to 
 employ the least promising. As Jesus at the first 
 sought his apostles among the fishing-boats that skirted 
 the Galilean lake, so now he seeks among the humble 
 that man by whom his Church shall arise. And to-day 
 the student of history says, as did the mother of our 
 Lord, ^' He hath put down the mighty fiom their seats, 
 and exalted them of low degree." 
 
 143 
 
144 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 There is no name so familiar to the Christian world 
 of latter ages, and so revered by it, no name whi(.h has 
 been so great a power in the wide domain of religious 
 thought and life, as that which for four centuries has 
 been associated more generally than any gther with 
 the great Reformation — a name which is the synonym 
 of moral heroism, the watchword of the Christian 
 Church and the pledge of glorious triumphs in the 
 ages yet to come. All Christendom is to-day turning 
 over the leaves of history that it may fix its eyes where 
 its thoughts and heart have been — upon the name which 
 graces the most lustrous page of that record which mag- 
 nifies the grace and power of God. 
 
 It may be well to notice here some of the errors which 
 the Reformation discovered and renounced : the denial 
 of private judgment, the corruption of the doctrine of 
 justification by faith, and a system of indulgences, all of 
 which continue until the present in the Roman Church. 
 
 1. In the Romish Church authority virtually rested in 
 the pope, speaking ex cathedra. He was and is the truth. 
 He interpreted the Scriptures, making them to accord 
 with the historic faith of the Church. He appealed to 
 other sources of belief, such as tradition and apocryphal 
 books and the decretals of councils, and compelled as- 
 sent to his dictum as based upon them, or anathematized 
 the recalcitrant. No loyal Romanist was permitted to 
 exercise his reason or interpret the word of God in op- 
 position to the Roman pontiff. If the pope, as pope, 
 said that two and two made six, that the prismatic 
 colors were a mere figment of the imagination, that a 
 wafer was the actual body and blood of Christ, he was 
 to be believed thouo;li the testimonv of the senses and of 
 
MARTIN LUTHER. 145 
 
 consciousness were against his declarations. Intelligence 
 was set aside ; private judgment was forbidden. Reason 
 and conscience were mere vassals and bent the knee to 
 papal authority. Then^ evidently, the pope was the Lord 
 of the conscience and held the keys of heaven and hell. 
 It may be a relief to mental indolence and imbecility 
 to permit a spiritual autocrat to take the soul into his 
 custody, think for it, direct its faith and conduct it into 
 the infinite hereafter. But that were to imperil every 
 interest in both worlds, and to degrade man to the level 
 of the irrational brute bound to the master's crib. 
 
 It was Luther's advocacy of private judgment — that 
 which elevates man to whom the Spirit of the Almighty 
 has given understanding, which imparts a sense of per- 
 sonal accountability to God, which impresses the obliga- 
 tion to search the Scriptures that reveal all duty, the only 
 rational ground of hope and the way of life — that more 
 than anything else roused the indignation of Rome, since 
 it smote down the proud assumptions of the hierarchy 
 and released the people from its spiritual autonomy. 
 
 2. The prevailing system of indulgences was a source 
 of power which Rome utilized. It furnished ofttimes 
 the only solution for financial difficulties, and enabled 
 the hierarchy to surround itself with greater pomp and 
 splendor than were possessed by earthly courts which 
 were its servants. The Church taught that Christ had 
 made such satisfaction for sin that believers were released 
 from its eternal punishment. Their ultimate enthrone- 
 ment with God was assured. But the sacrifice of Christ 
 did not remove the temporal consequences of wrong- 
 doing. Believers were subject to the rod as long as 
 they lived. They might accumulate guilt which would 
 
146 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 prolong their sufferiugs in the world of spirits even 
 until tlie day of judgment. This punishment, present 
 and purgatorial, might be mitigated or arrested by pen- 
 ances and works prescribed by the Church, by fastings, 
 prayers, pilgrimages, wearing of haircloth and spiked 
 girdles and by severe menial service. 
 
 This end might be reached in another way. The 
 payment of money to the Church was accepted as a sub- 
 stitute for penances and meritorious works. These con- 
 tributions secured an appropriation of the works of 
 supererogation performed by others. The sources were 
 two : (1) The superabundant merits of Christ. Cardinal 
 Cajetan in the Diet of Augsburg declared the faith of 
 the Church respecting the value of Christ's death. One 
 drop of his blood would have been a sufficient satisfac- 
 tion for sin. But his sacrifice exceeded the legal de- 
 mand. This excess was a wealth of merit on which the 
 pope — and, under him, the priesthood — might dr^w; 
 and this being imputed to the purchaser, he was released 
 from the obligation to temporal punishment in this life, 
 and it brought early release from purgatorial sufferings. 
 By this theory the supererogatory merits of Christ^% 
 sacrifice and penances prescribed by priests were put on 
 the same level, and the oifender could make his election. 
 Tlie application of the former, involving a pecuniary con- 
 sideration, was preferred alike by the Church and by the 
 subject who availed himself of it. The works of super- 
 erogation performed by the saints were included in the 
 same category. It was possible to do more and to be 
 holier than God required, and this redundance inured 
 to the benefit of imperfect believers, who purchased as 
 required from the chancellors of the holy exchequei. 
 
MARTIN LUTHER. 147 
 
 The pope's check was honored in the Bank of Heaven 
 and he could distribute at his pleasure. Whosesoever sins 
 he remitted were remitted. It requires but little reflection 
 to discover the power which this doctrine of indulgences 
 placed in the hands of the Roman priesthood — a power 
 which wrought immeasurable evil to the Church, which 
 bound the papist in abject submission to his spiritual 
 teachers, and greatly encouraged sin, casting its affront 
 in the face of infinite holiness and dragging souls to 
 perdition. It is no marvel that a clear apprehension of 
 this unscriptural, sordid dogma and an earnest scrutiny 
 of its fruits roused in the mind of Martin Luther a 
 spirit of profound indignation, and inspired the boldness 
 which nailed the theses to the Wittenberg cathedral — 
 a protest against iniquity which rolled its voice of thun- 
 der over papal Europe. 
 
 3. In the fifteenth century Aristotle was in great re- 
 pute, and was not displaced in a later age by even Des- 
 cartes and Kant. He was the oracle to whom philos- 
 ophers appealed. His works were translated into the 
 language of this period. In the Chiircli he was recog- 
 nized as a forerunner of Christ, and his dialectics aided 
 the interpretation of the Scriptures. The very obscurity 
 and ambiguity of Aristotle's writings made him avail- 
 able in the interests of Romish errors. His theory of 
 substantial forms fixvored transubstantiation. His sys- 
 tem of philosophy, as then taught, though not under- 
 stood, minimized sin and modified the doctrines of grace. 
 Then arose a distinction which made justification objec- 
 tive and subjective, the result of faith and of personal 
 holiness. The wedding-garment was not simply, as the 
 term clearly implied, that which clothed the soul and 
 
148 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 was put on from without, or an imputed righteousness, 
 but also an inherent goodness, the two, as warp and 
 woof, constituting the robe of merit which admits to 
 the marriage-supper. This theory ultimately diverted 
 attention from Christ to the appointed ceremonies of the 
 Church, to self- mortification prescribed by the priests, to 
 penances as an atonement for sin, and to offerings made 
 for the purchase of pardon and divine favor. It was 
 admitted that justification as an objective act was secured 
 by the merits of Christ's death, but after its appropriation 
 the recipient wrought out a subjective holiuess by his 
 own exertions, and so shared the final result with God. 
 Martin Luther still clung to this inner element of justi- 
 fication when climbing Pilate's Staircase on his knees. 
 The re d basis of the soul's acceptance was man's work, 
 not di\ine grace. This was the fundamental error of 
 Rome, and it vitiated the whole system of faith. Out 
 of it grew penances, the mass, purgatory, asceticism 
 and all that was self-righteous and servile in the religion 
 of Rome. It was this that darkened the hope and sad- 
 dened the lives and exhausted the strength of a people 
 who were devoutly religious, but had failed to discover 
 the central saving truth of the gospel of Christ. It 
 was this that gave intensity to a superstitious worship, 
 that bound Romanists as with hooks of steel to an 
 arrogant priesthood and deflected them from the way 
 which joined earth to heaven. Luther rejected the 
 falsehood. He exalted the finished work of Christ 
 a])propriated by faith, and puljlished peace to the labor- 
 ing and heavy-ladened. So essential did he esteem the 
 doctrine of justification by faith that he pronounced it 
 the " doctrine of a rising or falling Church." 
 
 I 
 
MARTIN LUTHER. 149 
 
 There were other errors which, together with these, 
 will be noticed in the course of our narrative, which we 
 now resume. 
 
 Martin Luther, the central figure of the Reformation, 
 was born Nov. 10, 1483, at Eisleben, a village of Saxony, 
 at the base of the Hartz Mountains. His birth was as 
 humble as the place of his nativity was obscure. His 
 parents were peasants who had lived in the hamlet of 
 Mora, close by the Thuringian forests. John Luther, 
 his father, was a miner and poor, yet he was a man of 
 rare intelligence in his day, and distinguished by an in- 
 tegrity of character which commanded the respect and 
 confidence of his neighbors. Soon after he removed 
 from Eisleben to Mansfeld, drawn thither by the >!ichness 
 of its mines, he was promoted to several maf:^isterial 
 offices, which he filled with credit to himself and to the 
 advantage of the community which had thus honored 
 him. The mother was exceptionally pious, and, though 
 unduly stern, was characterized by gentle traits which 
 won for her the affection of all who intimately knew 
 her, whilst her kind offices of sympathy cheered many a 
 darkened home. 
 
 Young Martin's life was thoughtful and sol)er. The 
 law of heredity had secured him elements of character 
 which were to fit him for his great mission ; the atmo- 
 sphere of his home fostered natural seriousness and high 
 conceptions of the earnestness and the possibilities of life. 
 
 "When in his fourteenth year he w^as sent to a school 
 at Magdeburg, but was soon transferred to Eisenach, 
 where he continued his studies in the midst of great 
 privations. He was possessed of a sweet voice of much 
 
150 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 compass and power, and was accustomed to add to liis 
 means of subsistence, which were meagre, by singing 
 from door to door and begging his bread. He referred 
 to this in later life when he said, " I myself was once a 
 poor mendicant, seeking my bread at people's houses, 
 particularly at Eisenach, my own dear Eisenach." 
 
 About this time young Martin was employed as a 
 chorister in the village church. A lady of some wealth, 
 an attendant at the same church, was much impressed by 
 the lad's proficiency in the service, his cultured tones and 
 thoughtful face and evident superiority to his compan- 
 ions. One evening she heard the familiar voice in front 
 of her dwelling, and looking out saw on the street the 
 boy who had won her admiration in the church. See 
 God's hand in this. She kindly invited him to her 
 home, and thereafter he was a member of the Cotta 
 household — through necessity a mendicant no more. He 
 cherished with all the tenderness which marked a char- 
 acter truly great the memory of this generous friend 
 in all the years of toil and danger which followed, and 
 often recalled the happy days spent under her roof, de- 
 claring, "There is nothing sweeter on earth than the 
 heart of a woman in which piety dwells." 
 
 No longer constrained to beg for bread, he gave him- 
 self with renewed energy to his studies. It is recorded 
 that he excelled in " Latin, eloquence and poetry." At 
 the age of eighteen he entered the university at Erfurt, 
 that he might prepare himself for the profession of law. 
 Here he familiarized himself with the works of Duns 
 Scotus the Franciscan and Thomas Aquinas, studied the 
 Orations of Cicero and communed with his favorite poet 
 who wrote the ^neid and Georgics. 
 
MARTIN LUTHER. 151 
 
 The old library with its musty volumes was Martin's 
 favorite resort. He also sat at the feet of the men who 
 adorned the Periclean age, approved their philosophies 
 or condemned them, and with that persistence which 
 marked all his life went below the surface, seeking for 
 primal things. But there was one book which absorbed 
 his attention more than all the rest. He read it in an 
 ecstasy of joy or wept over its pages. It taught a 
 diviner philosophy than Aristotle knew, and its poetry 
 surpassed that of the Mantuan bard. All this while he 
 was a devout Romanist; he dwelt among the tombs; 
 ceremony was more to him than faith, and the Virgin 
 Mary than her glorious Son. 
 
 At the age of twenty-two he was made doctor of 
 philosophy, and his fellow-students in a torchlight pro- 
 cession celebrated the event. Encouraged by his suc- 
 cesses, Luther resolved to climb the heights of learning, 
 and, conscious of his power, no obstacle deterred him. 
 Sordid motives urged him on. But God had something 
 better in store for him and led him by a way he knew 
 not. The assassination of his friend Alexis suggested a 
 world to come, and a thunderstorm which overtook him 
 on a country road led him to its borders. Then, deeply 
 conscious of his sins, he bowed to the earth and cove- 
 nanted to sacrifice his worldly ambition to the will of 
 God. Soon after, surrendering all the hopes that had 
 lured him on, he entered a convent and sought by fast- 
 ings, watchings and prayers, by the most menial services 
 as porter, sexton and servant of the cloister, and by the 
 offices of a mendicant on the village streets, to secure 
 divine favor and purchase eternal life. But the days 
 grew darker, his load of sin heavier, and God seemed 
 11 
 
152 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 to recede from him as the twilight which deepens into 
 night. A faint gleam of light came to him with the 
 words uttered in an adjoining cell, '^ I believe in the 
 remission of sins/' and the day dawned when John 
 Staupitz pointed him to the wounds of Jesus as the 
 only remedy for guilt. It was a sweet and ever-to-be- 
 remembered hour w'hen he felt on his bowed head the 
 droppings of the cleansing blood, and caught the voice 
 of infinite Love confirming his faith, saying, " Son, thy 
 sins are forgiven thee for thy Saviour's sake.'' Now 
 Luther has learned that justification is by faith, not by 
 works — that Christ saves, and he alone. The cross 
 stands before him the most conspicuous object under 
 the sun ; beyond it a glorious heaven, and written across 
 the overarching sky in characters of light the words of 
 Paul : " Being justified by faith, w^e have peace wnth God 
 through our Lord Jesus Christ." Thus w^e observe the 
 Reformation was born in the convent-cell. Erfurt be- 
 came the Bethlehem of the Middle Ap-cs. 
 
 This is the first period in the life of Luther. The 
 miner's son is an accomplished scholar and a devout 
 Christian, ready to enter broader fields and do a work 
 which shall bless generations yet unborn. 
 
 The second period in Luther's eventful career, accord- 
 ing to an accepted division, extends from 1507 to 1521, 
 or to the Diet of Worms. After his conversion he was 
 ordained a priest. The ceremony of induction into the 
 sacerdotal office occurred May 2, 1507. John Luther, 
 the father, was present, a sad observer, w^ho regarded 
 the transaction as a "snare of the devil." Jerome, 
 bishop of Bradenburg, according to the usages of the 
 Church, instituted Martin Luther a priest, and as he 
 
MARTIN LUTHER. 153 
 
 put the chalice in Luther's hand repeated the blasphem- 
 ous words : '' Receive the power to offer sacrifice for the 
 liviug and for the dead." 
 
 Soon the night began to close again about the youthful 
 priest. He was discontented in his estate. Sin troubled 
 him, and he knew not how to escape its power. For- 
 giveness needed to be continually sought, for he con- 
 tinually sinned. He often lingered at the altar, his 
 tearful face turned toward heaven, pleading for pardon, 
 and then, repairing to his cell, he spent even whole 
 nights in prayer. All this while he was losing confi- 
 dence in himself and learning more and more his need 
 of Christ. Accustomed to rely on personal righteous- 
 ness, self-sufficiency was tottering to its fall. He be- 
 lieved in justification by faith, but his convictions deep- 
 ened. The morality which Aristotle taught, and which 
 the Romish Church had substituted for the righteousness 
 of Christ, grew more distasteful, and with a stronger 
 faith he clung to the finished work of Christ. And yet 
 he had learned only a partial gospel. He knew that 
 Christ forgives sin, but Christ's relations to personal 
 holiness were not clearly apprehended. He was pass- 
 ing through the lingering mists into the broader light. 
 But even then he was far in advance of the prevailing 
 sentiment of his times. 
 
 A little later, on an important embassage, Luther sets 
 out for Rome. Still burdened in spirit, he exclaims, 
 ^' There at length I shall find rest." There is the head 
 of the Church, the successor of St. Peter. There is the 
 Vatican with its great libraries. There are the goodly 
 temples built of precious stones, adorned with all that 
 art can devise and wealth purchase. There is the outer 
 
154 BO MAN ISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 court of heaven, where may be heard the footsteps of 
 God and the whisperings of his love. Peace, sweet 
 peace, shall soon fill the soul of the yet anxious priest. 
 
 But aloncr the route he was amazed at the sins which 
 defiled the Church's holiest shrines, and the spiritual 
 blindness which ruled in high places. Surely it is not so, 
 he thought, in the Eternal City. At length the journey 
 is completed. Within the sacred walls, hard by the 
 Tiber of wdiich poets had sung, around him the great 
 churches, the dome of St. Peter's towering above the re- 
 mains of a classic age, Luther knelt and raising his eyes 
 to heaven exclaimed, '^ Hail, holy Rome ! made holy by 
 the holy martyrs and by the blood which has here been 
 spilt." " 
 
 The Rome of the Scipios and Caesars was in ruins. The 
 mutilated Coliseum looked down on the Arch of Titus. 
 But what matters this ruin since Christian Rome lives on, 
 and at her altars are granted visions of the New Jerusa- 
 lem which abideth for ever? How bitter was his dis- 
 appointment ! Peace is more remote than when from 
 Wittenberg he set out on his journey hither. No cere- 
 mony, however gorgeous, avails anything. No penance 
 brings God near ; no humiliation amid the splendors of 
 the sacred city purchases the holiness he craves. Climb- 
 ing Pilate's Staircase on his knees, praying and weeping 
 as in painfulness he goes up, he is more unhappy than 
 before. But there, in a way he did not expect, he found 
 the gate of heaven. A voice seeming to speak from out 
 another world sweetly said, " The just shall live by 
 faith." And as the morning clouds disappear and the 
 shadows when the summer's sun comes up, so all his 
 sadness vanished as the revelation of Christ the Sancti- 
 
MARTIN LUTHER. 155 
 
 fier dawned upon him. Jesus pardons. Ah yes ! and 
 he also makes his people holy. He learned at last, what 
 even little children born of God may know now, the 
 fulhiess of the gospel of Christ. He learned what Paul 
 had taught and men had believed before the Sun of 
 righteousness had been obscured by the fogs and death- 
 damps of Rome — that Jesus is all in all, the Author and 
 Finisher of faith, made unto his own wisdom, righteous- 
 ness, sanctification and redemption. And so Luther found 
 in Rome the rest he sought, but God gave it, and not 
 man. St. Peter's church, the Vatican, the imposing 
 hierarchy, the magnificent ritual, — these still have a 
 hold upon him, but the old power is waning. The sun of 
 the Reformation has risen above the hills. From Rome, 
 Luther returned to Wittenberg. Soon after, yielding to 
 the united wish of Frederick, elector of Saxony, and 
 John Staupitz, he was made ^^ doctor of the Holy Script- 
 ures/' and the insignia of his office were conferred ujion 
 him by Carlstadt at Leipzig in 1512. __ 
 
 Mark now the high resolve of Luther. Referring to 
 the imposing ceremony in which was conveyed to him 
 the highest dignity of the university, he says : " I then 
 pledged myself to my well-beloved Scriptures to preach 
 tlieni faithfully, to teach them with purity, to study them 
 all my life, and defend them both in disputation and in 
 writing against all false teachers, so far as God should 
 give me the ability.'^ That day Martin Luther put on 
 his armor, turned his face to the foe and flung out the 
 banner of his strength : " The word of God.'' He 
 thus took issue with Rome, exalting the sacred Script- 
 ures, which were w^ithheld from the people, as the only 
 and infallible rule of faith and practice, infinitely siipe- 
 
156 EOMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 rior to all the sophisms and theology of the schools. 
 He accepted the Nazareue as his teacher rather than 
 Aristotle or Thomas Aquiuas, saying, ^' Within my heart 
 reigns alone, and must reign alone, faith in my Lord 
 Jesus Christ, who alone is the beginning, the middle and 
 the end of my thoughts/^ He also announced the de- 
 cadence of the old philosophies which, coming down to 
 his day, had turned men from Christ. ^Mristotle is de- 
 clining ; he is tottering toward his eternal ruin, which 
 is near at hand." In a tour made in the interests of 
 the cathedral at Wittenberg he impressed upon the monks 
 at Dresden and Erfurt and in the long line of monasteries 
 far as the forests of Thuringia, the great thought which 
 possessed his own soul, the incomparable superiority of the 
 divine word and the value of that fundamental doctrine 
 which is the light and life of men — -justification by faith. 
 " Do not bind yourselves," he said, '' to Aristotle or to 
 any other teacher of a deceitful philosophy, but read the 
 word of God with diligence. Do not look for salvation 
 in your own strength or in your good works, but in the 
 merits of Christ and in the grace of God." 
 
 He was thus unconsciously sowing the seeds of the 
 Reformation. The convents of Germany were the 
 moulders of religious thought, as they were the centres 
 of learning, and whilst Luther was pressing an emanci- 
 pated gospel upon their attention he was preparing them 
 for the great strife with error. And when, by and Iw, 
 the tocsin of holy war was sounded over the plains and 
 among the mountains, there issued from hoary monas- 
 teries a multitude of stalwart men ready to lift high the 
 standard of the cross and do battle for the truth. In 
 the year 1516 the people at large caught their first 
 
MARTIN LUTHER. 157 
 
 glimpse of the sun which betokened a glorious gospel 
 day. 
 
 About this time Luther published his views ou free 
 will, in opposition to the theories of Pelagius, which 
 made man the architect of his own destiny by ascribing 
 to him the power resident in himself of loving God and 
 doing good works, so casting discredit upon the office of 
 the Holy Ghost. Luther said to men enslaved by sin, 
 '^ You need true liberty, and God offers it to you in his 
 gospel." He insisted that without grace there could be 
 no work of love. Yet he set man between " two glories 
 and two grandeurs '' — a glory from which he has fallen, 
 and a glory to which, through Christ, he may attain. 
 This humiliation of man in his natural estate was not 
 grateful to the carnal mind, and for a time the Reformer 
 stood quite alone in his advocacy of what is so funda- 
 mental. Hope begins with hopelessness. When we 
 cease to depend upon ourselves, God comes in the might 
 of his power, not before. 
 
 Now we reach one of the most important epochs in 
 the history of the Reformation. Leo X. occupied the 
 pontifical throne. The great church w^hich Michael 
 Angelo had designed remained unfinished. It was pro- 
 posed to make it what it now is, the most magnificent 
 temple in the world. But the treasury must be replen- 
 ished or St. Peter's church could not be completed. A 
 modern historian has well said, ''Leo had no Mexico to 
 which he might have recourse. His mines were the old 
 faith of the nations, their easy credulity.'^ He had en- 
 trusted this mine in Germany to the Dominicans. The 
 Council of Trent had declared that " the power to grant 
 indulgences had been committed to the Church by Jesus 
 
158 R031AyiSM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 Christ, and the use of them is beneficial to salvation" — 
 a blasphemous, mercenary doctrine which had borne its 
 legitimate fruit in flagitious lives and eternal loss. Men 
 had but to pay silver or gold ducats into the pope's treas- 
 ury and then sin with impunity. Purgatorial fires 
 ceased to alarm them. Or, if they had friends lingering 
 in that world of flame, they might purchase their release 
 and so hasten their passage into heaven. 
 
 At this time Albert, archbishop and elector of Mentz 
 and of Magdeburg, was in need of money, and secured 
 from Leo the privilege, as it was expressed, of '' farming 
 the sins of the Germans." Then John Tetzel, a man 
 whose infamous life did not disqualify him for the ser- 
 vice, was commissioned to conduct the traffic in indul- 
 gences. His assistants were Dominican monks. They 
 rode in carriages and horsemen went on before them* 
 When they approached a city they made their profane 
 announcement, " The grace of God and of the Holy 
 Father is at your gates." Then priests and people, 
 great and small, hastened to meet them, and after humble 
 salutations, the city bells ringing the mean while and all 
 the avenues choking w^ith excited throngs, the mighty 
 pageant moved toward the cathedral or humbler church. 
 Leo's bull of grace, supported by a gilded cushion, was 
 borne in front; close behind it rode the monk Tetzel 
 bearing a red cross, himself the very personification of 
 vice and yet the messenger of the vicegerent of God. 
 The procession with its attendant crowed entered the 
 church, the great organ articulating the j)eople's welcome 
 and waving censers pouring their fragrance on the air. 
 The chief of the Dominicans, elevating the cross and 
 signaling for silence, addressed the crowd. Hear what 
 
MARTIN LUTHER. 159 
 
 the mountebank says ; " Indulgences are the most pre- 
 cious and the most noble of God's gifts. This cross has 
 as much efficacy as the cross of Christ. Come and I. 
 will give you letters, all properly sealed, by which even 
 the sins you intend to commit may be pardoned. But 
 more than this : indulgences avail not only for the living, 
 but for the dead. Do you not hear parents and friends 
 cry from the bottom of the abyss, ^ We are suffering hor- 
 rible torments. A trifling alms would deliver us ; you 
 can give it and you will not ' ?'' 
 
 The monk's voice, clear and sonorous, sounds down 
 the long aisles and fills the transepts. The people look 
 wouderingly and inquiringly at one another. A mo- 
 ment's pause and the monk proceeds. The people dis- 
 believe him, but he declares the Lord God no longer 
 reigns, but has resigned all power to the pope, and, 
 speaking in Leo's name, he solemnly swears that if they 
 will heed the cry from the pit, ^^ at the very instant the 
 money rattles at the bottom of the chest the soul escapes 
 from purgatory and flies liberated to heaven." Then he 
 tells them the bodies of Peter and Paul and a multitude 
 of holy martyrs are the sport of winds and storms with- 
 in the unfinished walls of St. Peter's church, and their 
 money will shelter them whilst it will secure the people 
 a priceless good. Scenes like this are repeated as the 
 weeks go on. The coffers of Leo and Albert are being 
 filled whilst Tetzel rolls in wealth, a greater gainer by 
 this traffic in souls than they. 
 
 At length, Luther, taking counsel of God only, enters 
 the arena, determined, if possible, to check this gigantic 
 wrong. On All Saints' Day, as the people thronged the 
 street leading to the church the elector had built, enriched 
 
160 EOMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 with relics Luther himself had gathered, the resolute 
 Reformer pressed his way through the surging mass, and 
 nailed to the door of the Wittenberg church his famous 
 theses, which convulsed Central Europe and opened 
 prison-doors, that the Church of the living God, weak 
 and unhappy, might come forth. In these theses, 
 ninety-five in all, he denies the power of the pope to 
 forgive sins, and asserts that the hope of being saved by 
 indulgences is a lying and empty hope. Within a month 
 his theses had been printed and scattered through Chris- 
 tendom, and the world was astir. Luther was not pre- 
 pared for this. He would gladly have stilled the tumult 
 of the people and encouraged calmer thought. But this 
 was beyond his power. He was helpless as Canute 
 when the resistless sea laughed at his imperious edict and 
 rolled on. God^s power was working, and Rome trem- 
 bled on the verge of disaster her impiety had evoked. 
 Luther had thought to defeat Tetzel's mission only, but 
 he had struck the pontifical throne itself, and the war 
 was transferred from Wittenberg to Rome. Then, too, 
 the Reformer had directed attention to the grace of God 
 which has provided salvation through Jesus Christ, and, 
 though he knew it not, the kingdom of heaven was at 
 hand. Soon he realized the power of truth. His pen 
 which recorded it was mightier than the sword. The 
 church-door at Wittenberg was the gateway of religious 
 freedom, and through it marched the glorious King who 
 shall reign in righteousness and give his people peace. 
 
 In this controversy Luther had the sympathies of some 
 leading minds in Germany. This was notably true of 
 John Reuchlin, the instructor of Melanchthon, who had 
 risen from ol)Scurity to great distinction, pronounced by 
 
MARTIN LUTHER. 161 
 
 the Roman pontiff deserving of the highest rank among 
 the orators of France and Italy. When he heard of 
 Luther's opposition to Tetzel, alluding to the Dominican 
 monks, he exclaimed, "Thanks be to God! At length 
 they have found a man who will give them so much to 
 do that they will be compelled to let my old age end in 
 peace/' 
 
 Luther also had the support of Erasmus, the sage of 
 Rotterdam, a man of great learning, but of mercurial 
 temperament, who lacked the elements of a Reformer, 
 yet prepared the way for a work which men of sterner 
 stuff were summoned to perform. He had expressed in 
 burning sarcasm his judgment of the teachings and prac- 
 tices of Rome. The monks feared and hated him. The 
 scholars of the age revered him. He agreed with Luther 
 that iu theology the teachings of Scotus and Aquinas 
 should never be accepted when in conflict with those of 
 Christ and his apostles. His Greek Testament displaced 
 the Vulgate, which abounded in errors, and in various 
 ways his learning advanced the truth. He applauded 
 the theses which Luther had given to the world, and yet 
 declared ^^a disadvantageous peace to be better than the 
 most righteous war.'' 
 
 On the other hand, the Reformer encountered the op- 
 position of influential scholars, and the lines of separa- 
 tion were being more closely drawn. Among these 
 scholars may be mentioned Prierio, a Dominican ; Hoch- 
 straten of Cologne ; and Eck, the learned professor of 
 Ingolstadt, who arrayed the Schoolmen against the in- 
 cipient Reformation. 
 
 In the early part of 1518 a general chapter of Au- 
 gustine monks inimical to the Reformation was held at 
 
162 LOMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 Heidelberg, and Luther, as one of its most distinguished 
 members, was summoned thither. Timid friends dis- 
 couraged his attendance, but, trusting in God, he en- 
 tered on the dangerous journey. Part of the passage was 
 made on foot. Dust-covered and footsore he entered 
 Wurtzburg. There he met John Staupitz and Lange, 
 the prior of Erfurt, and joining them in their carriage a 
 three days' journey brought them to Heidelberg and to the 
 shelter of the Augustinian convent. After a brief rest they 
 repaired to the castle, but pleasant companionship could 
 not divert Luther from the great work before him. A 
 public disputation was announced to occur in the chapel of 
 the Augustinian monastery, and multitudes flocked thith- 
 er to see and hear the man whose fame had already become 
 a household word. Here he dwelt on his favorite theme, 
 justification by faith. He was opposed by five learned 
 doctors, but his appeal was to the word of God. Again 
 he opposed Christ to Aristotle, and defended his position 
 with the sword of the Spirit. His utterances, in a voice 
 of great sweetness, were clear, positive and strangely 
 eloquent. Some of his audience said, " He is in many 
 respects like Erasmus, but surpasses him in one thing: 
 he openly professes what Erasmus is content merely to 
 insinuate." Salvation through Christ was not an un- 
 welcome truth to many. The spiritual cross rose to their 
 view. Jesus the Sin-bearer, the Lord our righteousness, 
 was a great sight to men who had groped among old 
 philosophies and bowed at the feet of the popes. A light 
 is beino; kindled in Heidelbero; which shall climb the 
 hoary mountains around it — that shall shine far over 
 Europe and reveal to many who are now lost the way 
 to God. 
 
MARTIN LUTHER. 163 
 
 There were present three young men whose eyes were 
 fixed on the bold defender of the faith once delivered to 
 the saints. They were stirred by his eloquence and 
 deeply affected by the truth. They are even now gird- 
 iuo: themselves for the strife in which this Auo^ustinian 
 monk shall lead the way. Their names are familiar — 
 Martin Bucer, John Brentz and Ehrhard Snepf. They 
 repeated Luther's words when he was gone. Their in- 
 fluence spread throughout Saxony and beyond the Eng- 
 lish Channel. Jesus is preached with power, and the 
 truth is marching in its strength over prostrate super- 
 stitions. Meanwhile Leo X. is looking on. From his 
 pontifical chair he hears the sound of moving feet and 
 preparations for religious war. At first he thought 
 lightly of the controversy which he referred to monkish 
 jealousies. Luther had spoken well of the pope even 
 Avhen nailing his theses on the church-door at Witten- 
 berg, and thought him superior to the age. But return- 
 ing from Heildelberg, he passed a different judgment on 
 the character and life of the Florentine Medici. His 
 regard for the papal tiara ceased. " I care nothing," 
 he said, ^' for what pleases or displeases the pope." Leo's 
 teachings were thereafter tested by the word of God. 
 Christ only is infallible. His cross alone points the way 
 to heaven. His commandments are the only rule of life. 
 Then Luther declared the need of a reformation — not 
 man's work, but God's. The time was at hand. The 
 Church was beginning to awake. " The dike," he says, 
 "is broken, and it is no longer in our power to restrain 
 the impetuous and overwhelming billows." The sun is 
 going toward the zenith. The floods of light are driv- 
 ing away the mists of darkness. " The German people," 
 
164 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 says D'Aubign^, " had heard the voice of the Reformer. 
 The people turned toward him and saluted him with 
 love and respect as the intrepid defender of truth and 
 liberty. If the eloquence of Peter, the hermit of St. 
 Bernard, had inspired the people of the Middle Ages to 
 assume a perishable cross, the eloquence of Luther pre- 
 vailed on those of his day to take up the real cross, the 
 truth which saves.'' 
 
 We cannot speak at length of the Diet at Augsburg • 
 the charges preferred against Luther, friar of the Augus- 
 tinian order ; an appeal to the pope to put an end to his 
 pernicious teachings ; Luther's summons, and his subse- 
 quent appearance at Augsburg instead ; his mock trial 
 before De Vio, surnamed Cajetan ; and the humiliation 
 which came to Rome, Serra Longa and the Italians, en- 
 raged because they were confounded by a German monk, 
 and the wrath of Leo when the tidings reached the 
 Vatican, which the Augustinian had defied. 
 
 Luther took his departure from Augsburg, and has- 
 tened his flight from the hands which sought his blood. 
 It seemed that his expulsion from Germany was only a 
 question of time, and his face was turned toward France. 
 Seated with some friends at a farewell repast, he received 
 a letter from the elector. He opened it, read with trem- 
 bling, and the way grew dark before him. His fears are 
 well grounded. The prince asks why he delays his de- 
 parture. Luther lifts his tearful eyes toward heaven 
 and says, " Father and mother abandon me, but the 
 Lord takes me up." Then he waited for the Roman 
 anathemas which were doubtless traveling northward, 
 but meanwhile drew up a protest against the assumptions 
 of Rome, and then appealed to a general council as " the 
 
MARTIN LUTHER. 165 
 
 only means of safety against that injustice which it was 
 impossible to resist. 
 
 Subsequently, Leo X. issued his famous damnatory 
 bull, in which he condemns as heretical many writings 
 of the Augustinian monk, forbids the reading of the same 
 on pain of excommunication, and threatens, in case Lu- 
 ther does not recant, to deliver him unto Satan for the 
 destruction of liis flesh, and so he with all who aid 
 him in his heretical course shall be for ever accursed. 
 The time had been when the crowned heads of Europe 
 would have trembled before the threatenings of Rome, 
 but now they are wholly disregarded by the brave 
 Reformer. He went calmly on in his work and com- 
 mitted his life, his soul, his all to Christ. As Jerome 
 and Augustine had been alone, so was Luther. '' Yes, 
 I am alone,'' he said, " but I stand serene, because side 
 by side with me is the Lord God ; and with all their 
 boasted numbers this the greatest of powers is not with 
 them." 
 
 The last tie that bound Martin Luther to Rome is 
 about to be sundered. Tlie Reformation is being 
 launched on the broad waters. The gallant ship has a 
 cross for its floating pennon, the name of Christ is writ- 
 ten on its sails, a multitude are on board, their destiny 
 is a quiet haven, and beyond it is a city undefiled. 
 
LUTHER AT LEIPSIC ^D THE DIET OF 
 WORMS. 
 
 12 
 
*'A?id ye shall be brought before governors and kings for 
 my sake, for a testimo7iy against them and the Gentiles. But 
 when they deliver you up, take no thought how or what ye shall 
 speak : for it shall be given you in that same hour what ye 
 shall speak '^ 
 
 Matt, io : i8, 19. 
 
 ''As the providence of God doth, in general, reach to all 
 creatures ; so, after a most special manner, it taketh care of 
 his Church, and disposeth all things to the good thereof' 
 Confession of Faith, chap, v. sec. vii. 
 
 ''Here I stand; I can do no other. May God help me! 
 Amen.'" 
 
 Luther. 
 
LUTHER AT LEIPSIC AND THE DIET 
 OF WORMS. 
 
 THE Augustinian mouk is turniug the world upside 
 down. Nations are in commotion. The waves 
 of the theological strife are beginning to smite the 
 pontifical throne. Evidently something must be done, 
 and done speedily, or Rome will suffer contempt, and 
 perchance far greater disaster. It is decided to concili- 
 ate the elect (,)r of Saxony, who seems friendly to this 
 revolutionary monk, and through him win back the 
 allegiance of the wavering or disaffected. Frederick 
 has not broken with the Church. It is remembered 
 that four years previously he had solicited the pope to 
 grant him the Golden Rose, a beautiful flower,- an 
 emblem of Christ's body, which had been often con- 
 secrated by the papal benediction. Accordingly, the 
 pope's chamberlain, a Saxon noble named Miltitz, was 
 commissioned to visit Frederick and convey to him this 
 valued expression of his pontiff's regard. 
 
 As the chamberlain traveled northward he was increas- 
 ingly impressed with the seriousness of the situation. 
 Many in Germany, including monks and representative 
 men of state, applaud Luther's work and bid it God- 
 speed. Miltitz's mission is variously interpreted. In 
 the judgment of some Luther's life is in peril. He may 
 
 169 
 
170 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 burn as did John Huss and Jerome of Prague. The 
 brave Keformer simply answers, " I await God^s will." 
 
 The death of Maximilian and the temporary admin- 
 istration of the German empire by Frederick, and a 
 variety of political troubles which supervened, were all 
 favorable to the Reformation. Attention was diverted 
 from Luther and the threatening storm was held in 
 abeyance. 
 
 Then, too, the representative of Rome finds that Tet- 
 zel has fallen into disrepute. His traffic in indulgences 
 has roused the indignation of Germany, and Miltitz is 
 compelled to denounce the blasphemous Dominican or 
 himself suffer inglorious defeat. He cowered before the 
 enemies of Rome, v/ho, as he judged, without reason 
 were resolved to compass his death. The college of St. 
 Paul at Leipsic is his retreat, but is not an impregnable 
 defence. The papal nuncio is humiliated, and changes 
 his policy even toward Luther himself. Hear him, as 
 with an assumed tenderness he addresses the German 
 monk : " My dear Martin, I thought you were an old 
 theologian who, seated quietly at his fireside, was labor- 
 ing under some theological crotchet, but I see you are 
 still a young man and in the prime of life.'' Then 
 dropping his voice and speaking in solemn tones, he 
 added : " Do you know that you have drawn away 
 everybody from the pope and attached them to yourself? 
 If I had an army of twenty five thousand men, I do 
 not think I should be able to carry you to Rome.'' 
 
 The nuncio was right. Luther is the master and 
 Miltitz the crouching vassal. The German monk is 
 mightier, even now, in this land of the Saxons, than the 
 hierarchy the chamberlain represents. And yet, strange 
 
LUTHER AT LEIPSIC AND AT WORMS. 171 
 
 ;is it may seem to us now, Luther cliugs to the Chiircli. 
 He would not destroy, but purge it. With a holy bold-* 
 ness that fears not the stake or the sword he denounces 
 its corruption and demands reform. But he would work 
 within the Church, not beyond it. Hence he expresses 
 to the nuncio his regard for the Holy Father, and his 
 unwillingness to disturb the peace except when the 
 vindication of the truth requires it. He would be a 
 faithful son of the Church, but he would have it under- 
 stood that his first allegiance is to Christ, the only 
 supreme Head thereof Miltitz contents himself with 
 the concession thus made, for it is evident he cannot 
 secure more. An agreement is entered into by which 
 Jjuther promises to retract anything offensive to Rome 
 which should be shown him to be inconsistent with the 
 truth. The chamberlain a})peared to be deeply affected. 
 He embraced and kissed the recreant monk, and the latter 
 returned a grim smile, understanding, better than was 
 supposed, tlie artifice of the w^ily Italian. The latter on 
 a Carnival occasion which followed, having drunk too 
 freely of the flowing cup, was thrown off his guard, and 
 discoursed freely of the sinful practices and decaying 
 power of the papal Church, so putting weapons into the 
 Reformer's hands by wdiich to smite the evil that resisted 
 the truth. The result of all this was the advancement 
 of the Reformation in the land of Luther and the humil- 
 iation of the Roman See. The monk has the boldness 
 to write to Leo that whilst he loves the Church, he loves 
 Jesus Christ more, for he alone is Lord of all. 
 
 Meanwdiile the Golden Rose is detained at Augsburg. 
 Frederick stood side by side \vitli Luther. Miltitz and 
 De Vio are en ratted. The truth is not deflected from its 
 
172 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 course. Its chariot, yoked to the sun, travels ou. 
 Neither frowus nor flatteries, gifts nor gibbets, can 
 defeat the purposes of God. 
 
 A new triumph awaits the Reformation at Leipsic. 
 The eyes of Germany have been turned thither. One 
 of Eome's strongest polemics purposes to measure swords 
 with its most stalwart enemies. Carlstadt accepts the 
 challenge. Eck prepares for the disputation, hoping to 
 meet and vanquish a mightier foe. He will plant him- 
 self on the prostrate body of Carlstadt, and then con- 
 tend with Luther, a champion more worthy of his steel. 
 Who ever met this mighty Eck on the open field and 
 prevailed against him ? Lutlier's friends cannot disguise 
 their fears. If other means fail to overcome this fear- 
 less monk, violence may end his career. Burnt in 
 effigy in the Campus di Fiore at Rome, he may burn in 
 person on the streets of Leipsic or perish on the banks 
 of the Tiber. Luther alone is calm, trusting in God. 
 
 It is the day succeeding the festival of the Corpus 
 Christi. We are standing at the Grimma Gate. A pro- 
 cession is passing through. Carlstadt appears first in his 
 carriage, riding alone. Luther and Melanchthon, sitting 
 side by side, follow. After these come Lange, vicar of 
 the Augustinians, Nicholas Arnsdorff and many learned 
 men who have espoused Luther's cause, and two hundred 
 Wittenberg students who are eager to witness the fray. 
 The imposing pageant moves slowly on and approaches 
 the gates of St. Paul's cemetery, whilst the whole city 
 is excited by the scene. 
 
 The day following one of the largest halls in the pal- 
 ace of Duke George is occupied by an anxious throng. 
 The disputants are in their places. The great assembly, 
 
LUTHER AT LEIPSIC AND AT WORMS. 17:?, 
 
 like a field of corn over wliich the summer's wind passes, 
 how their heads, and, kneeling, sing the invocation hymn, 
 " Holy Spirit, come.'^ I doubt not heaven was looking 
 on. Invisible angels on poised wings await a resurrec- 
 tion such as that on which the first Easter morning 
 looked down. Hell too was moving from beneath. It 
 was an impressive and ever-memorable hour in the his- 
 tory of the Church. 
 
 Look at the central figures in this ecclesiastical drama. 
 Eck stands among them, in stature like Saul among the 
 Israelites — muscular, self-reliant, defiant. His voice is 
 like the storm, his speech is rude, his gestures are devoid 
 of grace. With a memory which seldom fails him he 
 speaks without manuscript or notes, and when logic 
 limps vociferates the louder, so holding his power over 
 many with whom noise and truth are interchangeable 
 terms. 
 
 Carlstadt is a man of small stature and dark visage. 
 His voice is attenuated and his presence weak, though 
 in thought he is superior to his scornful opponent. 
 
 Luther is of medium stature, pale and emaciated, with 
 firm yet benignant countenance, evidently weighed down 
 by the responsibilities the occasion brings, his voice clear, 
 sweet and commanding, his arguments a resistless flood, 
 his earnestness a consuming fire and his moral courage 
 the miracle of the age. 
 
 Beside him is Philip Melanchthon, in appearance 
 child-like as Jesse's youngest son when Samuel anointed 
 him king, gentle as a woman and mild in speech, yet 
 possessed of an acute mind and great learning, without 
 whom the ruo^wd Luther could not have carried to a 
 happy issue the conflict with Rome. 
 
174 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 For four days Eck aud Carlstadt disputed conceruiug 
 free will and sovereign grace. The former niaguified 
 human ability ; the latter referred conversion, with tliat 
 consent of the will which marks its latter stage, wholly 
 to the grace of God. The evangelical theories of Carl- 
 stadt were humiliating to human pride ; the carnal lieart 
 opposed them. 
 
 The sentiment of the people was with Eck. Great 
 excitement extended throughout Leipsic. Angry words 
 were succeeded by violent blows. In public resorts the 
 discussions were more excited than in the hall of the 
 duke's palace. Many pronounced Luther a devil or 
 a man in league with the devil, and Carlstadt was 
 almost forgotten in the wrath which his greater asso- 
 ciates had awakened. 
 
 Then Luther became prominent in the disputation. 
 In answer to Eck's assumption tliat the pope was the 
 head of the Church, he affirmed on the testimony of 
 God's word that Jesus Christ was the Head, and not 
 man. '^ He must reign till he hath put all enemies un- 
 der his feet." " Let us not listen," said Luther, " to 
 those who banish Christ to the Church triumphant in 
 heaven." He admitted that the people might elect the 
 pope chief magistrate of the Church, but he could not 
 be such by divine right. To this Eck replied that he 
 would prove the primacy of the pope a divine right 
 l)y the words of Christ : "Thou art Peter, and on this rock 
 will I build my Church ;" and he quoted Augustine in 
 sup])ort of his position. But Luther appealed from 
 Augustine's early interpretation of that word to his 
 maturer judgment, and repeated the saying of Paid, 
 " Other foundation can no man lay than that is 
 
LTJTHKR AT LEIPSIC AND AT WORMS. 175 
 
 laid, which is Jesus Christ." Eek resorted to ridicule, 
 but Luther stood cahuly ou the word of God. He did 
 not even hesitate to declare his sympathy with the teach- 
 ings of the despised Bohemian who was burned at Con- 
 stance, for John Huss sustained his positions not by the 
 decrees of councils, but by the Holy Scriptures. Thus 
 Ijuther struck at the throne of Leo and preferred Christ 
 to Rome. 
 
 We cannot dwell upon other questions of dispute, such 
 as repentance and absolution of the priest and indul- 
 gences. For twenty days the disputation had engaged 
 profound attention. Again the great organ was heard. 
 The Te Deum was sung. The discussion at Leipsic was 
 ended. Mossellams gave it as his judgment that the 
 ignorant, who had grown gray under the old Schoolmen, 
 were with Eck, ^^ but Luther and Carlstadt,'' he said, 
 "are victorious in the opinion of those who possess any 
 learning, understanding and modesty.'^ Luther and 
 Meianchthon left the hall arm in arm, before them a bat- 
 tlefield bounded by the great seas and around them the 
 chariots of the Lord and the horsemen thereof. 
 
 I have dwelt upon this chapter of the Reformation 
 because it marks Luther's separation from Rome. This 
 step, as we have seen, was not hastily taken. The 
 Augustinian monk had hoped to remain in the Church 
 which had grown hoary with years, the Church which 
 had built St. Peter's and the Vatican, which had com- 
 manded the allegiance of empires and the homage of 
 kings, the papal tiara flashing with jewels, and the 
 chair of St. Peter's a grander throne than that of the 
 Caesar called the Great. But Luther saw at last that 
 the interests of the truth re(piired a separation from 
 
176 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 Rome, and the decisive step was taken. He afterward 
 referred with great charity to those who sympathized 
 with his views, yet lingered behind. ^^ I no longer 
 permit myself to be indignant against those who are 
 still attached to the pope, since I, who had for so 
 many years studied the Holy Scriptures, still clung 
 wnth so much obstinacy to him." 
 
 Now equally decisive action must be taken by the 
 pope. A German monk who defies the mighty hier- 
 archy of Rome must be anathematized. The Church 
 demands it; the universities of Cologne and Louvaiu 
 declare it a necessity. George of Saxony insists that 
 the Hussite should be condemned. At the same time, 
 strong arms encircled the Reformer, and voices of love 
 bade him be strong in the Lord. Erasmus, with char- 
 acteristic timidity, hid from the gathering storm. He 
 was a Plato among his books rather than a Socrates on 
 the open field. Ulrich von Hutten and Franz von 
 Sickingen, true men and noble, united in support of 
 the Reformation. The latter pointed Luther to his 
 strong castle, the gate of which stood ajar, and assured 
 him that there, guarded by the high walls and the 
 swords of hundreds of nobles, Sylvester von Schaum- 
 burg at their head, the Reformer would be secure from 
 the hordes of Rome. Then Luther, looking heaven- 
 ward, said, '' God give us all a Christian understand- 
 ing, and especially to the Christian nobles of the Ger- 
 man nation a right spirited courage to do the very best 
 for our poor Church ! Amen." 
 
 Again the blustering Eck appeared on the scene. He 
 came from Rome with the papal bull. The man whom 
 be could not vanquish at Leipsic nmst go down before 
 
LUTHER AT LEIPSIC AND AT WORMS. 177 
 
 the fill mi nation of the pontifical throne. The bull of 
 excommunication is published in Wittenberg. Luther's 
 writings are condemned to the flames. All intercourse 
 with the arch-heretic is forbidden. The loyal sons of 
 Rome are exhorted to secure the person of the Hussite 
 and convey him to the Holy City. The stake is evi- 
 dently erected, the fagots are gathered and the torch is 
 aflame. '^ Cursed/' says Leo, " be the man who asserts that 
 to burn heretics is a sin against the Holy Ghost." 
 
 What does Luther care for the impotent ravings of 
 Leo X., or Germany care for the Italian bull ? Leipsic 
 is amazed at Eck, and for his security the monastery of 
 St. Paul opens its gates. Erfurt, too, derides this ser- 
 vant of the pope, gathers copies of the papal bull and 
 casts them into the river which flows by the town. But 
 in Cologne, Mayence and Louvain the bull is trium- 
 phant, and the books of the heretic ascend in the flames. 
 Standing between his friends and his foes, Luther main- 
 tains a calm demeanor, trusting in Him who controls 
 the wrath of men and turns their hearts as the streams 
 in the south. On the 10th of November he announced 
 that the pope's bull of excommunication and the papal 
 books of canonical law would be burned on the follow- 
 ing day at the Elster Gate. A multitude of students 
 and citizens assembled at the designated time and place. 
 The fire was kindled, and Luther cast the bull and 
 the Roman decretals into it, saying, "Because thou 
 hast offended the Holy One of the Lord, be thou con- 
 sumed with everlasting fire." The smoke of the 
 holocaust melted away in the sky and the sun looked 
 approvingly down. 
 
 On the 29th of March, 1521, Caspar Sturm of Oppen- 
 
178 M03IANIS3I AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 helm arrived in Wittenberg and presented to Luther a 
 summons from the emperor Cliarles V. to appear before 
 him at Worms within twenty-one days, unwillingly 
 promising him, at Frederick's request, a safe-conduct 
 thither. At once Luther prepared himself for the 
 journey. He believed that death awaited him. For 
 Christ and the truth's sake he was ready to die. His 
 friends provided him a simple conveyance, with a cover 
 to shield him from sun and storm. He entered it with 
 a firm step and a resolute heart. Before him rode the 
 imperial herald seated on a royal steed. Beside him in 
 the carriage were his loyal friends Shurff, Arnsdorff and 
 Swaren. All around him on the road were the students 
 and citizens of Wittenberg who had espoused the Ref- 
 ormation, and, invoking God's protection for the great 
 man whom they loved as their own souls, they wept 
 aloud as did the elders of Ephesus when they parted 
 from their beloved Paul, sorrowing most of all that, 
 as they believed, they should see his face no more. 
 Well has it been said, " There is nothing in sacred or 
 profane history grander than the self-immolation of this 
 German monk." 
 
 Luther bade his friends a tender farewell, and in a 
 voice trembling with emotion urged his dear Melanch- 
 tlion to stand fast in the truth. The imperial herald 
 rode on, and Luther followed. Soon the walls and 
 spires of Wittenberg grew dim and disappeared. Lu- 
 ther's purpose did not waver. Leipsic greeted him as he 
 passed, Naumberg extended its hospitality to him, 
 Weimar sheltered him for a nio^ht ; John Crotus, Hessus 
 and Justus Jonas, all men of royal names, accompanied 
 by forty horsemen rode out to meet him on the road to 
 
LUTHER AT LEIPSIC AND AT WORMS. 179 
 
 Erfurt, then conducted him with royal honors into the 
 city and to the old convent Luther knew and loved, 
 where John Lange, the prior, gave him an affectionate 
 welcome. At Eisenach — there was no dearer spot along 
 the way — he tarried a little, memories of the olden time 
 crowding upon him, and down his manly face tears ran 
 as he stood under the window of his beloved Cotta. 
 Tortured with pains to which he was often subject, he 
 passed through Frankfort-on-the-Main, whence he sent 
 this message to a friend : " Christ lives, and I will go 
 to Worms to brave the gates of hell and the powers 
 of the air.'^ 
 
 When approaching Worms he received a message 
 from his friend Spalatin urging him not to imperil his 
 life by entering the city, to which Luther replied in 
 words which generations have repeated : " To Worms 
 I was called, and to Worms I must go. And were 
 there as many devils there as there are tiles upon the 
 roofs, yet would I enter that city.'^ Then there came 
 an invitation from Sickingen to come to his castle at 
 Ebernburg, where he might transact with the emperor 
 through his confessor. But the monk was firm : ^' Not 
 to Ebernburg, but to Worms, have I been summoned. 
 If the imperial confessor have aught to say to me, let 
 him seek me there.'' 
 
 On the morning of the 16th of April, 1521, a watch- 
 man on the cathedral-tower at Worms, looking north- 
 ward, saw an unusual procession approaching the city. 
 An imperial herald led it; close behind was a monk 
 apparently guarded by friends. Just beyond the city- 
 w^alls was a great company of horsemen riding hurriedly 
 outward to meet the approaching cavalcade. Across th« 
 
180 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 iuterv^eniug space a single voice, clear and trustful, was 
 heard singing a German hymn, the ^larseillaise of the 
 Reformation : 
 
 " Ein feste Burg ist uuser Gott." 
 
 At length the city-gate is reached ; crowds are there, 
 men, women and children. Some stand on tiptoe ; others, 
 Zaccheus-like, climb on the walls or look from the win- 
 dows. " That is Luther," says one and another, and 
 hundreds of eyes are fixed on the monk who dares to 
 confront the emperor and the imperial diet. Down the 
 choked streets the procession moved. Leffer, the Bava- 
 rian clown, holding a lighted taper in one hand, in the 
 other a cross, repeated the w^ords : " Ecce advenit quem 
 expectamus in tenebris " (^' Behold he comes whom, in 
 the darkness, w^e have waited for "). It was intended as 
 a sarcasm, but it was well said by Friar Luther's friends, 
 " Children and fools tell the truth." The procession 
 stopped in front of tile mansion of the Knights of St. 
 John. As Luther stepped from his carriage to the 
 ground he said, "God wall be with me." 
 
 The followino^ mornino; he received an official citation 
 to appear before Emperor Charles and the imperial diet. 
 At four o'clock the marshal of the empire notified him 
 that his presence w^as immediately required. For a lit- 
 tle Luther was disturbed. A humble monk, with few 
 friends and they comparatively weak, was to appear 
 before the most solemn tribunal in all the world. The 
 imperial herald led the way ; the marshal of the empire 
 followed ; Luther came last. The streets were even 
 more crowded than on the preceding day. Advance 
 seemed impossible. Then through private dwelling?' 
 
LUTHER AT LEIPSIC AND AT WORMl:^. 181 
 
 and contiguous gardens the Reformer was conducted to 
 the public hall. The passage was filled. Thousands 
 had anticipated the monk's arrival. As the latter pressed 
 his w^ay through the crowd an old soldier, who afterward 
 became renowned for his prowess on the battle-ground 
 of Pavia, laid his hand on Luther's shoulder and said 
 with deep emotion, '^ Poor monk ! poor monk ! thou art 
 now going to make a nobler stand than I or any other 
 captain have ever made on the bloodiest field. But if 
 thy cause is just and thou art sure of it, go forward in 
 God's name and fear nothing. God will not forsake 
 thee." 
 
 How imposing the sight which now meets the Re- 
 former's eyes ! The youthful emperor in imperial robes 
 occupies the august throne. Gathered about him are 
 electors, dukes, margraves, archbishops, bishops, abbots, 
 ambassadors from foreign courts, princes, counts and 
 noble barons, and before them the heretic stands alone. 
 This, remember, is the monk whom Leo has cut oif from 
 the Holy Churcli and remanded to seclusion and silence. 
 But here he stands as did Paul before the most noble 
 Festus, to speak for himself, and crowned heads shall 
 listen. The diet at Worms exalts itself above the 
 pope. The appeal is taken from Leo X. to this German 
 council. The holy pontiff is smitten as with palsy, and, 
 though to some the Reformation seems on the verge of 
 disaster, it is, in fact, marching grandly on. 
 
 The monk remains motionless and silent before the 
 imperial throne. The assembly is solemn as eternity 
 itself. Not a sound is heard. Presently the archbishop 
 of Treves, John ab Eck, not the turgid orator of Leipsic, 
 breaks the silence : '^ Martin Luther, his sacred and in- 
 
182 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 vincil>le imperial majesty has cited you before his throne, 
 in accordance with the councils of the states of the Holy 
 Roman Empire, to require you to answer two questions : 
 First. Do you acknowledge these books to have been 
 written by you ? Second. Are you prepared to retract 
 these books and their contents, or do you persist in the 
 opinions you have advanced ?'^ Luther glanced at the 
 volumes which covered a table near by, the titles of 
 which had been read by demand of one of his friends, 
 and made answer, ^' Most gracious emperor ! gracious 
 princes and lords ! His Imperial Majesty has asked me 
 two questions. As to the first I acknowledge as mine 
 the books that he has just named : I cannot (if un- 
 changed) deny them. As to the second, I entreat Your 
 Imperial Majesty, with all humility, to allow me time 
 that I may answer without offending against the woi'd 
 of God.'' The delay was gmnted, and the imperial 
 herald conducted Luther to his lodging. He was wont 
 to be much alone with God. In this solemn transaction 
 he is consciously weak and needy. He carries all to 
 Him who is the King of kings and the Lord of lords. 
 Again and again he cries, " Faithful and unchangeable 
 God, help me ! For the sake of thy well-beloved Son, 
 who is my defence, my shield and my strong tower, 
 help me! Amen. Amen." He is pleading not so 
 much for himself as for his beloved Germany and for 
 the world, reminding us of the prayer of John Knox, 
 the garden-prayer which the midnight bore to heaven : 
 " O God, give me Scotland or I die !" From the secret 
 place of prayer the Reformer came forth clad in heav- 
 enly armor, calm and hopeful. 
 
 The following day at four o'clock Luther was again 
 
LUTHER AT LEIPSIC AND AT WORMS. 183 
 
 conducted to the diet cliamber. For two hours he was 
 detained at the enti'ance, around him a surging, excited 
 throng. At last the doors were opened. In the flicker- 
 ing lights all objects appeared weird and solemn. There 
 was something strangely ominous in the hour. Did it 
 portend victory for Rome or defeat? As we look at the 
 sun of the Reformation half hidden behind the bare and 
 rugged hills, we raise the question, " Is it a rising or a 
 setting sun?" 
 
 John ab Eck rises in his place, and so also the Wit- 
 tenberg monk. The questions of the previous day were 
 repeated, and Luther replied wisely. He said the books 
 displayed before him were his. As to retracting those, 
 he replied at much length. His argument was ingenious, 
 honest and to many convincing. He could not retract 
 what even Rome did not condemn. Many of his writ- 
 ings were approved by Leo and in harmony with the 
 ancient faith. Other books he knew were distasteful 
 to the Church. He had endeavored in them to honor 
 Christ, to exalt a spiritual cross, to magnify the doctrine 
 which now is sweet to all enlightened believers, the doc- 
 trine of justification by faith, and to point men the way 
 to heaven. He rested every statement conscientiously — 
 and, as he hoped, intelligently — upon the word of God. 
 Then he continued : ^' I cannot submit my faith either 
 to the pope or to councils, because it is clear as the day 
 that they have often erred. Unless, therefore, I am con- 
 vinced by the testimony of Scripture or by the clearest 
 reasoning, I cannot and I loill not retract. Here I stand • 
 I can do no other. May God help me ! Amen.'' What 
 a scene was that ! What strange words were those ! The 
 inspiration of Heaven was in the hour and in that noble tes- 
 
 13 
 
184 ROMAN JSM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 timony for the truth. How grandly the Wittenberg 
 monk stands forth on that solemn battle-ground, a 
 mightier than I^eonidas in the mountain-pass ! Empe- 
 rors, electors, dukes and representatives of Rome look 
 wrathfully down, thirsting for his blood, and the monk 
 whom they stigmatize as a Bohemian recalls the trial in 
 the old miinster at Constance on the Rhine, when Sigis- 
 muud and Hallam sat in the mock trial, and John Huss 
 was sent forth with the maledictions of the so-called 
 vicar of Christ on his head to burn on the clover-field 
 beyond the city-gate. But Luther is calm, and he only 
 is. God is with him ; truth is on his side. Heaven, 
 with its sweet peace, awaits him beyond the conflicts 
 of this soon-to-be-ended life. 
 
 Aleander, the advocate of Rome, whose eloquence 
 papah historians have exalted, whose defence of Leo's 
 damnatory bull secured him the gratitude of a corrupt 
 Church, whose efforts to secure Luther's condemnation 
 had been aided by the bribes Julius de Medicis had sent 
 from Rome, was deeply humiliated by the monk's sig- 
 nal triumph, and would gladly have committed the lat- 
 ter to the flames, so stifling the Reformation at its birth. 
 But the elector of Saxony was on Luther's side. Cau- 
 tious and calm, he advanced with a measured but reso- 
 lute step, and with him were many leading men in 
 Church and State, seeking only the interests of truth 
 at any cost. The power of the pope was broken. 
 Minds long fettered by papal decretals were casting 
 off their chains. Dry bones in the valley of vision 
 were astir, fellow meeting its fellow, and a mighty 
 army clad in the panoply of heaven was ready to 
 spring to its feet and fight for the faith Paul preached 
 
LUTHER AT LEIPSIC AND AT WORMS. 185 
 
 and ill which apostles died. '^ The day of the diet of 
 Worms," said Philip Melanchthon, "is one of the 
 greatest and most glorious days given to the earth be- 
 fore the end of the world.'' 
 
 France caught the beams of the rising sun. England 
 saw the advancing light beyond the Channel. Italy 
 sought the shadow of the pontifical throne, wondering 
 what the issue would be. 
 
 But the days of Luther's safe-conduct are passing 
 and his departure must be hastened. On the 26th of 
 April he left his lodgings, having committed himself 
 and his cause to the care of God. Accursed of the 
 Church, condemned by the emperor, his books burn- 
 ing on the streets of Worms and enemies seeking his 
 life, he walked calmly forth, entered his carriage and 
 preceded, as when he came, by the imperial herald, 
 surrounded by horsemen and crowds of sympathizing 
 friends or jeering foes, he passed out the northern gate. 
 For the present his person is comparatively safe, for 
 Charles dare not break his royal word. But he has 
 decreed the seizure of the heretic at the end of the safe- 
 conduct, purposing to terminate the Reformation by the 
 banishment or death of the defiant monk. The caval- 
 cade journeyed northward. At Friedberg, Luther wrote 
 to the emperor and the states assembled at Worms, ad- 
 dressing both in respectful terms, but reminding them 
 that God and his word were above principalities and 
 powers. These letters he gave to the imperial herald, 
 and permitted him to return to his master, preferring 
 to pursue his journey without the stipulated protection. 
 X mile from Hirschfeldt the chancellor of the monas- 
 tery, accompanied by a troop of cavaliers despatched 
 
186 ROiMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 by the abbot Milius, met Luther and escorted him into 
 the city and, regardless of the imperial edict which for- 
 bade the excommunicated monk to preach, the walls of 
 the old monastery reverberated with the words of life, 
 the abbot and monks receiving the truth with joy. 
 Again, at his dear Eisenach, he told the story of re- 
 deeming love, and although some opposed him on mere 
 prudential grounds, it was quite evident that the most 
 who heard him, turning their backs on Leo, were ready 
 to crown Jesus Lord of all. 
 
 Now Luther and his attendants are entering the 
 Thuringian Forest. Heavy shadows stretch across the 
 road. The winds are sighing among the trees. Nature 
 in its sober mood hushes the voices of the travelers as 
 they ride thoughtfully on. Suddenly horsemen armed 
 and masked issue from the woods. Luther's compan- 
 ions leap to the ground and disappear in the depths 
 of the forest. Luther himself, scarcely realizing what 
 is being done, is seized by the horsemen, who throw 
 around him a military cloak and then bear him away 
 through the darkness, along a circuitous path and up 
 a steep mountain-slope, coming at last to an old castle 
 named the Wartburg, standing silent and grim in the 
 depths of the forest on a lonely height. The draw- 
 bridge is lowered, and Luther crosses it. The gates are 
 opened, then closed behind him. The monk is a pris- 
 oner. But friendly hands have brought him hither. 
 Frederick the elector has thus secured him from vio- 
 lence, and none dares wliisper the secret, for Charles 
 and Leo will scour the land if haply they may find 
 the heretic and make him lick the dust. 
 
 Here for a little we leave the hero of our story; 
 
LUTHER AT LEIPSIC AND AT WORMS. 187 
 
 Kniglit George, the name by which Wartburg knows 
 him, the garb of a monk exchanged for a soklier's dress. 
 God has cared for Luther. In the diet of Worms ho 
 stood alone; yet not alone, for God was with him. 
 And as he looked upon the serried host led on by Em- 
 peror Charles and Pope Leo in the might of state and 
 ecclesiastical power, with eyes aflame and weapons set, 
 urged on by prejudice, lust and hate, bearing down upon 
 him, a lone Augustinian monk, he could say with Paul, 
 " None of these things move me,'' and with Elisha at 
 Dothan, " They that be with me are more than they 
 that be with them." 
 
 The pope, the stirrup of whose saddle emperors had 
 held as he vaulted into his seat, whose jeweled slipper 
 crowned heads had kissed, before whose anathemas 
 thrones had tottered, cannot touch without God's per- 
 mission even a hair of Luther's head ; and until his 
 work is finished the monk is immortal as his Lord, 
 though a thousand fall at his side and ten thousand at 
 his right hand. 
 
 We admire the faith that walked calmly into the very 
 jaws of death. We find the interpretation of it in the 
 secret place of prayer — the hours creeping on, the night 
 deepening, the gray dawn climbing the eastern sky, and 
 Luther on his knees clasping an omnipotent hand 
 and walking among invisible worlds. With passions 
 such as ours, with temptations such as girt us around, 
 with a will and temper that were often a snare, he tri - 
 uraphed over external foes and foes within, and grand- 
 ly triumphed, fearing nothing so much as sin, hating 
 nothing so much as a lie, and longing for nothing so 
 much as the world's salvation through the cross ; and 
 
188 ROMANfSM AXD THE REFORMERS. 
 
 when God comnianded it was his to do and, if need 
 be, die. 
 
 " What ! shall one monk, scarce known beyond his cell, 
 Front Kome's far-reaching bolts, and scorn her frown ? 
 Brave Luther answered, 'Yes;' that thunder swell 
 Rocked Europe, and discharged the triple crown." 
 
LUTHER'S LAST Di^YS, 
 
'* As much as in me is, I am ready to preach the gospel to 
 
 you that are at Rome also.'' 
 
 Rom. I : 15. 
 
 " Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God 
 through our Lord fesus Christ.'" 
 
 Rom. 5:1. 
 
 " The Lord fesus, by his perfect obedience and sac^dfice oj 
 himself, which he through the eternal Spirit once offered up 
 unto God, hath fully satisfied the justice of his Father; and 
 purchased not only reconciliation, but an everlasting inherit- 
 ance i7i the kingdom of heaven, for all those whom the Father 
 hath given tmto him.'" 
 
 Cox. Faith, chap. vii. sec. v. 
 
 " I have fought the good fight, I have finished 7ny course, I 
 have kept the faith.'' 
 
 2 Tim. 4 : 7. 
 
LUTHER'S LAST DAYS. 
 
 &OD is in all history, sacred and profane. His prov- 
 idence is illustrated by every page of the Penta- 
 teuch, in the books of the Kings and in the Acts of the 
 Apostles. It is none the less conspicuous in the history 
 of the Augustan age, the Peloponuesian War, and the 
 great Reformation. Useful lessons may be drawn from 
 these sources. And especially does the recovery of 
 gospel truth, with the instrumentalities by which this 
 was achieved and the incidents which marked its prog- 
 ress, claim our devout and grateful study. 
 
 God was with Luther as ceiiaiuly as he was with Paul. 
 By human agencies he originated the apostolic Church, 
 and by like instrumentalities he restored it. Although 
 Luther was an uninspired man and added nothing to 
 the sacred canon, yet he wrought under the divine direc- 
 tion and was supported by divine power. Hence all 
 that pertains to his life and work is of interest to the 
 Christian. We resume our studies of the Reformation 
 and our observation of Luther in the hope of knowing 
 God better and of being more firmly established in 
 gospel truth. 
 
 In the judgment of many historians the interest in 
 the life of Martin Luther culminated at the diet of 
 Worms. At no period perhaps does he appear to a 
 greater advantage or impress the world more profoundly 
 
 191 
 
192 EOMANJSM ASn THE REFORMERS. 
 
 JLS a polemic and moral hero, a giant among men, called 
 of God to the greatest work of these latter ages. He 
 stands before us as some mountain-height which, lower- 
 ing above the lower peaks, pierces the clouds and is lost 
 to sight. 
 
 But although the subsequent career of Luther contai un- 
 less that is impressively heroic and furnishes fewer oc- 
 casions for his impetuous eloquence, yet it is marked with 
 even greater and more beneficent results. The moun- 
 tain-torrent, which in its descent swept everything be- 
 fore it and startled vast solitudes with its roar, flows 
 quietly through plains, and in its progress is less observed, 
 but more useful, irrigating great spaces, quenching the 
 thirst of men and of lowing herds, bearing on its bosom 
 the traffic of empires, whilst great cities line its shores. 
 So the more rugged features of Luther's character are 
 displaced by the serener elements which beautify a peace- 
 ful domesticity and enrich the life of a resuscitated 
 Church. 
 
 We resume our narrative with the Reformer's sudden 
 disappearance after the diet of Worms. Germany in- 
 quires for him, but no answer is given. When last seen 
 he was entering the forests of Thuringia. Since then 
 no tidings of him have reached any city or hamlet of the 
 land. It is known that the period of his safe-conduct 
 was at an end when he disappeared in that solemn wood. 
 Violent hands, say many, have no doubt terminated his 
 life. Even Wartburg furnishes no solution to the pain- 
 ful mystery, for, so far as is known to the keepers of the 
 old castle, Luther has not passed that way. The grief 
 of his friends is great. A light wdiicli had risen on the 
 horizon of their darkness has suddenly dropped behind 
 
LUTHER'S LAST DAYS. J 93 
 
 the hill.s, and a profouuder night has come. What shall 
 the future of Germany be ? By whom shall the Church 
 arise ? The enemies of the Reformer are alarmed. Leo 
 fears the worst. An avalanche of wrath may descend 
 from the North and bury the papal throne. The arch- 
 bishop of Mayence is startled by a message from a faith- 
 ful papist : " I fear that we shall scarce escape with our 
 lives if we do not everywhere seek him (Luther) witli 
 lanterns and call him back again.'' 
 
 Luther is safe at Wartburg. Friendly hands bore 
 him thither. He enjoys for the time the seclusion of 
 the castle. Worn by the excitement incident to the diet 
 at Worms and the dangerous journey which followed it, 
 he rests quietly in the old fortress or walks unmolested 
 along the avenues of the contiguous woods. From the 
 "region of air and bird-songs," as he describes the 
 Wartburg, " where birds from their liomes in the trees 
 do continually praise God ; from the isle of Patmos,'' 
 he looks across the great battlefield whence he has come, 
 and sweetly sings, in harmony with the voices of the 
 wood, his favorite psalm, "The Lord is our refuge and 
 strength, a very present helj) in trouble." 
 
 But Luther's imagination, fruitful as Bunyan's in a 
 later day, began to people the cell of his prison with 
 evil spirits summoned from the invisible world. Charles 
 and John ab Eck and Aleander do not intrude upon his 
 privacy and have no power to disturb or destroy, but 
 the Prince of the air and subordinate spirits crowd the 
 stairways, whisper their jibes along the corridors, and 
 even force their way through solid walls that they may 
 buffet and torment the worn and weary exile. The phys- 
 ical reaction which succeeded the conflict at Worms, and 
 
194 ROMANISM AXD THE REFORMERS. 
 
 the attendant exhaustion of mental power, may furnish 
 at least a partial explanation for the hallucinations which 
 entered his prison-life. Then, too, he was not released 
 from the superstitions which marked the age, to the 
 power of which he was a ready prey. On a day ever 
 memorable to him — if the story is true — when busied 
 with his translation of the New Testament, the devil 
 entered the room and attempted to wrest the manuscript 
 from Luther's grasp. The spirit of the latter was roused, 
 and he hurled his ink-bottle at his hateful foe. The fly- 
 ing missile seemed to penetrate the spectre and smote the 
 wall. To-day the visitor in the Wartburg Castle is 
 shown an indentation on the wall, vandal hands hav- 
 ing removed the plastered surface which bore the tracies 
 of the effective weapon. 
 
 Relieved of future interruption from this source, he 
 completed his translation of the New Testament. Rome 
 had withheld the word of God from the people ; Luther 
 longed to give it to them. Knowledge is life ; ignorance, 
 death. He rejoiced in the prospect of scattering far 
 and wide the leaves he had plucked from the tree of 
 revelation, and hoped to advance the Reformation by 
 these more rapidly than by the words he had spoken. 
 
 He also wrote his comments on the Gospels and the 
 Epistles for Sundays and festival days, and prepared a vig- 
 orous philippic ^^Against the Idol in Halle,'' or tlie system 
 of indulgences revived in that city by Albert, archbishop 
 of Mayenoe. The publication of the latter was withheld 
 at the request of the elector Frederick, but Luther wrote 
 a letter to Albert threatening the issue of this formidable 
 treatise in case the latter did not desist within two weeks 
 from his nefarious traffic. The archbishop was startled 
 
LUTHER'S LAST DAYS. 195 
 
 by this letter from the Witteuberg friar, whom he had 
 supposed dead. It was a voice of thimder from the 
 cloudless sky. He deemed it best to escape the threat- 
 ened storm, aud terminated at once the sale of indul- 
 gences, sending also a singularly meek reply to the man 
 whom he feared more than Leo X. or the Prince of 
 darkness. 
 
 About this time Luther renewed his efforts to break 
 down the system of monasticism, which endangered the 
 consciences and souls of many. He could find no argu- 
 ment for it in the word of God ; he could find many 
 arguments against it. He would have the monks 
 abandon their cells, resume their mendicancy and live 
 more honorable lives. Marriage, he insisted, was an 
 institution of God for the good of the race. Besides, 
 the indolent habits of the monks were a reproach to the 
 Church, now that God was calling men to earnest work 
 in an aw which must tell on as^es to come. 
 
 Carlstadt, the impetuous Reformer, thought to put 
 into practice the principles enunciated by the absent 
 Luther, but his fiery zeal outran the prudence of his 
 teacher. He turned iconoclast and inaugurated the most 
 ruthless destruction of all that pertained to monasticism. 
 He also overturned the altars of superstition in the 
 churches, tore down the pictures and attempted numer- 
 ous radical changes in old customs, threatening the Ref- 
 ormation even in its stroup-hold at Wittenbero;. 
 
 Tidings of this were borne to the old burg of the 
 landgraves, and Luther resolved to hasten to the dis- 
 tracted city. He left Wartburg, not expecting to return. 
 Down the pathway of the woods he urges his way, turn- 
 ing now and then, it may be, a glance toward the castle 
 
196 ROMANISM AND THE BEFOBMEBS. 
 
 whose gray walls and solemn towers are soon to disap- 
 pear. His Patmos is about to be exchanged for a sea of 
 strife. But he who was prepared to fight wild beasts in 
 the Thuringian forests and wilder men at Worms, is 
 ready to lay down his life at Wittenberg if duty so re- 
 quire. With this purpose he hastens on, and Wartburg 
 fades from sight. And now he is to appear in a new 
 role. Heretofore he has been a radical Reformer. Now 
 he is to enter the field of conservatism and contend with 
 injudicious friends. He will abate not one jot or tittle 
 of his devotion to the great doctrine of justification by 
 faith. Christ and his cross shall still be his theme. But 
 he will check, if possible, the iconoclasm that .has in- 
 censed a loyal people. The pendulum has swung too 
 far. Truth lies between extremes. We admire tlie 
 spirit and purpose of Luther on his way to Wittenberg. 
 
 There occurred a scene at Jena which giv^es an insight 
 into the character of Luther which is both pleasing and 
 suggestive. The great warrior is pre-eminently hu- 
 man. His social magnetism is equal to his public 
 address. 
 
 Two Swiss students enter Jena on their way to Wit- 
 tenberg They have sought in vain for lodging. It is 
 Shrove Tuesday, and the strangers do not readily com- 
 mand attention. But at length they are admitted to 
 the door of the Black Bear. Being shown into a wait- 
 ing-room, tlieir garments much travel-stained, they seek 
 a retired corner, whence they make observations as guests 
 come and go. At a writing-table sits a man of distin- 
 guished appearance. He wears a military dress. His 
 right hand clasps his sword at his side ; his left holds a 
 manuscript. His head is covered with a red leather cap. 
 
LUTHER'S LAST DAYS. 197 
 
 From beneath heavy brows look forth black, sparkling, 
 penetrating eyes, from whose gaze the young men shrink 
 as from the day of judgment. Yet he is gentle and kind, 
 and soon wins their confidence. They enter into con- 
 versation with this man of the mountains. The latter, 
 learning that they are going to Wittenberg, casually re- 
 marks that they, being natives of Switzerland, will there 
 meet two eminent countrymen, Jerome Schurp and 
 Augustine Schurp, his brother. They are surprised 
 to hear this martial guest speak so intelligently of the 
 retired scholars. "We have letters of introduction to 
 these persons," says one of the students. 
 
 The stranger seems familiar with all the great scholars 
 of the age, and is on intimate terms with many of them. 
 Besides, he is himself learned in the ancient languages 
 and holds in his hand a Hebrew Psalter. Presently the 
 innkeeper enters. They ask him if he knows where 
 Martin Luther is — at Wittenberg or elsewhere. The 
 host replies that two days before Luther had been in 
 that room, and had sat beside that very table where this 
 knight is sitting. They expressed their great regret that 
 they had not been present. What an opportunity of 
 seeing the noted friar has been lost ! But they are glad 
 to sit in the same room in which he sat. 
 
 Presently two merchants enter. One of them holds 
 in his hand a copy of Martin Luther^s commentary on 
 Galatians. He speaks of it with much interest, and 
 asks the knight if he has ever seen it. The latter re- 
 plies that he expects soon to secure a copy. Overhearing 
 their conversation with the innkeeper, the knight learns 
 that the merchants are poor, and he whispers to the host 
 that he will gladly receive them as his guests. They 
 
198 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 esteem the honor equal to the kindness. They resume 
 their reflections on Luther and his work. Who in all 
 Germany is not talking about that wonderful monk- 
 man ? One of them says, " I am a plain, unlettered 
 man, but my judgment is that Luther is an angel out of 
 heaven or a devil out of hell." The merchants retired, 
 and soon after this the stranger rose, drew his doublet 
 closely about his person, then, grasping the hands of the 
 young students, gave them his blessing and bade them 
 convey his greetings to Jerome Schurf. " Whose greet- 
 ings f^ they ask. — " Tell him only this. He that cometh 
 seudeth his greetings." He then passed out of the room. 
 If Charles Y. or Leo X. had been present the students 
 could not have been more impressed, for his bearing, 
 conversation and indefinable power over them marked 
 him one of the most remarkable men of the age. Per- 
 haps even Martin Luther^s presence would not have 
 been a source of greater wonderment and delight. Cer- 
 tainly not. For that knight who had just gone to his 
 chamber and will resume his journey with the early 
 morning is Martin Luther himself. 
 
 Having arrived at Wittenberg, Luther set to work 
 to undo the mischief Carlstadt had done. His efforts 
 were successful, and soon there came to the late excited 
 city a calm like that which rested on the Galilean lake 
 when the winds were hushed. It is well that he came 
 from the Wartburg to accomplish so great a result. 
 Mighty to raise a tempest, he was also mighty to subdue 
 the storm. 
 
 About this time Henry VIII. , king of England, then 
 thirty-one years of age, vain and ambitious, stopped in 
 the midst of his rounds of pleasure, and, absenting him- 
 
LUTHER'S LAST DAYS. 199 
 
 self from balls, banquets and tournaments, sat down 
 and wrote a book. He said he would save the Church 
 which silly fanatics threatened. " I will receive in my 
 bosom the poisoned arrows of her assailants." It was 
 not wounds he coveted, but some honorable title from 
 the pope that would put him on a level with the more 
 favored kings of France and Spain. The modest title 
 of his book is, " Defence of the Seven Sacraments against 
 Martin Luther, by the most invincible king of England 
 and France, lord of IreUmd, Henry the Eighth of that 
 name." He wrote with royal contempt of Luther. 
 The mendicant monk was crushed for ever, as Henry 
 supposed, under the heel of his holy wratli. He accom- 
 plished his main purpose, for he received from the pope 
 the title of " Defender of the Faith," and the same has 
 come down the royal line until the present. The papacy 
 was jubilant. The Tudor king was mightier than the 
 German Reformer. 
 
 Luther's indio;nation was unbounded. His friends 
 sought to quiet him, but in vain. He flung his answer 
 in the face of the English throne. It was a fearless 
 defence of the truth in opposition to the empty sophisms 
 of the king. Its spirit was not wholly Christian, yet it 
 needs less apology than many suppose. Luther insisted 
 that he was at liberty to reply in terms of supreme con- 
 tempt to the man in perishable purple who dared to 
 blaspheme the King of kings and by impudent false- 
 hoods profane his holy name. At the same time, his 
 arguments were drawn from the word of God. He 
 magnified the cross and the intercession of Jesus Christ. 
 He bowed adoringly before the eternal throne, and gave 
 all honor unto Him to whom all allegiance is due. 
 
200 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 Shortly after this Luther's version of the German Tes- 
 tament, completed at Wartburg Castle, and revised, with 
 Melanchthon's assistance, at Wittenberg, was issued and 
 scattered broadcast over Germany. Soon there followed 
 portions of the Old Testament, and ultimately the entire 
 word of God. 
 
 Leo X. was dead and Adrian VL occupied St. Peter's 
 chair. The new pope, with even greater determination 
 than his predecessor, endeavored to crush the pestilential 
 heresy. But the truth would not down. It claimed the 
 earth and eternity as its own. Adrian occupied the 
 papal throne for the short space of one year, and was 
 followed by Clement YIL, a member of the Medici 
 family, who thought to accomplish what Adrian had 
 failed to do. The diet of Nuremberg was again con- 
 vened ; stormy days were coming on. Earthly kingdoms 
 were threatened. Frederick's destruction is demanded. 
 Charles V. swears this friend of heresy shall perish. 
 Luther has left his stronghold in the mountains, and 
 he who defies each papal bull shall be silenced by the 
 sword. But God is watching over the interests of the 
 truth. His Son shall be King in Zion ; men shall know 
 the way of life, and the gospel shall extend from the 
 Baltic to the islands beyond the English Channel. The 
 imperial diet disregarded the commands of Clement to 
 crush the Reformer. The principles of the Reformation 
 were accepted in the chief cities of Germany; Albert 
 of Brandenburg, grand-master of the Teutonic Knights, 
 and his bishop, George von Pol en z, and Erhard von 
 Queiss, espoused Luther's cause. But many who had 
 been in sympathy with him grew fearful when they saw 
 the storm was abroad. They would have peace, though 
 
e 
 or- 
 
 LUTIIEE'S LAST DAYS. 20l 
 
 tlie papacy should, for the present, live on. Even John 
 Staupitz shrunk into the shadow, and Erasmus assailed 
 the Reformer. But Luther was not deflected from his 
 course. He planted churches. He gathered the peopl 
 to read the word of God, to sing his praise and to w 
 ship his only Sou. He cared with diligence for the 
 young. A system of education was established whicli 
 has continued until now, the glory of that time and of 
 each succeeding age. The War of the Peasants threw a 
 dark shadow across the track of the Reformation. The 
 sword was unsheathed, and by it a misguided people 
 thought to put down the papacy and declare the people 
 free. Foes in Luther's own household were more to be 
 dreaded by him than external enemies. In Southern 
 Germany insurrection prevailed. Cloisters and castles 
 were burned and the waves of flames swept on. 
 
 Luther issued an address against the peasants, and 
 called upon all who were loyal to the truth to resist 
 their suicidal measures with the sword. The fanatical 
 Miinzer, claiming to act under divine direction, leading 
 a force of eight thousand men, was signally defeated in 
 the battle of Frankenhausen in Thuringia, and he him- 
 self was executed for his crimes. Thus the revolt was 
 arrested, and soon thereafter brought to an end. Sub- 
 mission to civil authority was restored and tlie Reforma- 
 tion advanced by more peaceful means. 
 
 In the midst of this insurrection the elector Frederick 
 died. He had been one of the most judicious friends 
 of the Reformation, and was warmly attached to Luther. 
 Under the shield of his official influence the gospel had 
 been widely extended in Germany, and his name has 
 been held in grateful remembrance by the Reformed 
 
202 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 Church from that time until the present. Duke John 
 succeeded him as the elector of Saxony, and exercised 
 his authority with like wisdom. 
 
 Now, for the first time, Luther puts off the garb of 
 an Augustine monk and assumes a less distinctive dress. 
 He is in appearance and spirit a monk no longer. 
 Many who have been associated with him in monastic 
 life have entered into the marriage relation, deeming it 
 right to break the vow of celibacy, for which there was 
 no divine authority. As for himself, he anticipated the 
 death of a heretic and preferred to live alone. But it 
 afterward appeared to him that this course might be 
 misinterpreted and used to the disadvantage of a divine 
 ordinance, and he concluded to marry, that, as he ex- 
 pressed it, he might spite the devil. He was doubtless 
 moved to this course by other and more tender consid- 
 erations. 
 
 On a pleasant summer evening in June, 1525, a few 
 of Luther's friends gathered at his house and witnessed 
 his marriage to Catherine von Bora, a nun, born of a 
 noble family, who with eight other nuns had escaped 
 from tlie cloister and come to Wittenberg. This mar- 
 riage was of course severely condemned by the papists, 
 and even many of the Reformers were slow to give 
 their approval. But it was clearly ordered of the 
 Lord. It was blessed to Luther, mellowing his char- 
 acter, enlarging his usefulness and smoothing the way 
 to his final rest. Luther and his Katie, in compliance 
 with the instructions of John Frederick, the new elec- 
 tor, occupied the monastery, from which all the Augus- 
 tines had departed. The old castellated building may 
 still be seen, near by one of the city-gates. In con- 
 
LUTHER'S LAST DAYS. 203 
 
 iiection with this the remark of Gustav Freytag may 
 well be quoted : '' From that time the husband, the 
 father, the citizen became likewise the reformer of the 
 domestic life of his nation/' and to-day Romanist and 
 Protestant alike partake of inestimable benefits which 
 j)roceeded from the marriage of the Wittenberg monk. 
 
 Several years of comparative quiet succeeded the War 
 of the Peasants. Luther prosecuted his work in his 
 study, sending fortli his writings to all parts of Ger- 
 many and enjoying the comforts of his Christian home. 
 He continued at this time to promote popular education. 
 This he considered one of the most important agents of 
 human progress. By it he claimed the masses would be 
 elevated, released from the shackles of superstition and 
 from the power of Rome. '' Papacy," he said, " hates 
 popular education, and turns the key of the massive dun- 
 geon upon it. Where the liberal arts are cultivated her 
 baneful light is quenched in a more dazzling effulgence." 
 Previous to this time nearly all learning had been con- 
 fined to the monasteries. The Reformation emancipated 
 it, and not only the profounder pursuits of the cloister, 
 but poetry, painting and the fine arts, have traveled 
 abroad through a regenerated earth. Rome to this 
 day opposes education ; she denounces public schools, 
 and holds her children under her power by retaining 
 them in ignorance, the so-called mother of devotion. 
 
 In course of time Luther was visited with sickness 
 which threatened his life, during which he repeatedly 
 avowed his faith in Christ, his adherence to the princi- 
 ples of the Reformation and his desire to depart and be 
 with the Lord. But He who kills and makes alive 
 brought him back from the gates of the grave. 
 
204 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 Then the plague visited Wittenberg, and, although 
 the university was removed to Jena, Luther remained at 
 honnj, doing what he could to alleviate suffering and to 
 point the dying the way to God. After the plague had 
 abated he issued his catechisms, a great aid to the ac- 
 quisition of doctrinal knowledge. For although the 
 people could repeat the creed, the Lord's Prayer and the 
 ten commandments, they were in deplorable ignorance 
 of the great indwelling principles of Christian faith and 
 practice. But when the Bible and catechisms entered into 
 the homes of Germany the people began to ascend in the 
 scale of being, and the land of the Protestants ultimately 
 became as the garden of the Lord. 
 
 The progress of the truth increased the hostility of 
 Rome. An imperial diet was assembled at Spire. The 
 object of this convention was twofold : first, to take 
 measures by which Germany might be protected from 
 the Turks ; and secondly, for the suppression of heresy. 
 The latter engaged the most attention. The edict of 
 Worms was reaffirmed and a barrier thrown across the 
 track of the Reformation. The action of a general 
 council, it had been hoped by the Reformers, would se- 
 cure greater freedom to the gospel, but the diet at Spire 
 anticipated such a result and opposed itself to all reform, 
 ignoring what had been done at a preceding diet favor- 
 able to Christian liberty. 
 
 There was aroused among the evangelicals a senti- 
 ment of opposition to these restrictive measures which 
 expressed itself in a memorable protest by the princes 
 and rulers who were friendly to the Reformation. Then 
 the Reformers were, for the first time, called Protestants, 
 a name which has been perpetuated to the present. 
 
LUTHER'S LAST DAYS. 205 
 
 They protested against the withdrawal of the religious 
 liberty granted by tlie previous diet, which was to have 
 awaited the action of a general council. They protested 
 against this later action as aifecting not their worldly 
 interests or loyalty to the empire, but the interests of 
 their souls, both in this world and in that which is to 
 come. They protested against the assumption that all 
 power resides in the pope, and insisted that religious 
 controversies sliould be settled by a general council of 
 the Church, for which determination of vital questions 
 no provision had been made. ^' Before all men and liv- 
 ing creatures we protest,'' they said, '^ that we will not 
 consent to the aforesaid resolution of this imperial diet." 
 Thus the gauntlet was thrown down, and many appre- 
 hended such a strife as Germany had not before known. 
 But Luther counseled peace. He would have the people 
 wait in quietness and hope for the more favorable decis- 
 ions of another day. 
 
 The emperor had ordered a diet to be held at Augs- 
 burg the following April. In anticipation of this con- 
 vocation, and by request of the elector, Luther and a 
 number of his friends met at Torgau and agreed upon 
 the course to be pursued at Augsburg. 
 
 Soon after, Luther, still resting under the ecclesiastical 
 ban, and hence not permitted to appear in the diet, w^ent 
 to the castle of Coburg, a four days' journey from Augs- 
 burg, from which point it would be practicable to hold 
 communication with the elector. This is a second Wart- 
 burg. Spacious apartments were assigned him in the 
 castle. The windows commanded a prospect of Thu- 
 ringia and Franconia and the long line of hills beyond, 
 wtilst in the foreground was a little grove where, as 
 
206 E0MANIS3I AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 Luther said, ^^ the daws and the crows held an imperial 
 diet," their hall more beautiful than that of any royal 
 palace, arched by the far-reaching heavens, the floor the 
 meadows inlaid with green branches, and their walls the 
 world's limits. In his castle he is busied with his books. 
 He writes letters to the elector. He thinks much of 
 liome also, and sends messages to wife and children. 
 Very beautiful and tender are the latter, revealing the 
 depth of aifection which nestles in the old warrior's 
 heart. 
 
 Previous to the Augsburg diet, Charles V. had been 
 crowned by the pope at Bologna. The ceremony was 
 inspiring. The vicar of Christ was recognized as the 
 king of nations, claiming for himself the prerogatives 
 of God. The royal Charles, robed in the imperial man- 
 tle s-parkling with diamonds and hemmed with gold, 
 bent the knee to Clement. As the pope placed the 
 crown on the head of Charles he said, '^ Charles, emperor 
 invincible, receive this crown which we place on your 
 head as a sign to all the earth of the authority that is 
 upon thee." Thereupon Charles, kissing the pope's 
 slipper, said, ^^ I swear to be, with all my powers and re- 
 sources, the perpetual defender of the pontifical dignity 
 and of the Church of Rome." Then all the bells of 
 the city rang. The people on the streets rent the air 
 with shouts. The bands of music also gave voice to the 
 common joy. The kingdom of heaven was married to 
 the kingdom of this world in a union which Rome said 
 must not be dissolved. 
 
 The emperor rose from his knees and left the altar of 
 San Petroneo, carrying with him tlie papal benediction, 
 prepared to do the bidding of Rome in the home of the 
 
LUTHER'S LAST DAYS. 207 
 
 Germans. His march toward Augsburg was attended 
 with great pomp. As he proceeded northward the alarm 
 of the Protestants increased. At length they resolved 
 to oppose his advance. ^' Let us collect our troops, 
 march on the Tyrol and close the passage of the Alps 
 against the emperor.^^ Luther discouraged an appeal to 
 arms. " God is faithful/^ he said; " he will not abandon 
 us ;'' and the Coburg Castle resounded with the voice of 
 confiding trust, its echoes extending over the German 
 empire : '' A strong tower is our God." 
 
 Charles's entrance to Augsburg was calculated to 
 deepen the fears of the timid Protestants, for a more 
 magnificent pageant had never been witnessed in that 
 north-west. A company of landgraves were followed 
 by princes, counts and counselors. Then came Bava- 
 rian horsemen, marching five abreast with flashing doub- 
 lets and gleaming armor and on their heads great nod- 
 ding plumes. After these rode nobles from Austria, 
 Bohemia and Spain, all richly attired, followed by the 
 princes with their royal retinue and the elector of Saxony 
 carrying the imperial sword, and, last of all, the emperor 
 himself in gorgeous robes, riding a richly-caparisoned 
 horse, over him a canopy of brilliant colors supported 
 by six senators of Augsbui'g. An inspiring greeting 
 extended by high officials at the gates of the city was 
 succeeded by the discharge of artillery from all the 
 heights and the chiming of bells in all the church- 
 towers. 
 
 At a late hour the emperor entered the great cathedral, 
 the columns wreathed in garlands, floral arches dropping 
 their fragrance, a flood of light making resplendent 
 every nook and alcove of the temple, the organ throb- 
 
208 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 biiig with harmoDies befitting the occasion, and a Te 
 Deum following, whilst the emperor, bowing before 
 the high altar, turned his face and lifted his hands 
 toward an invisible throne beyond the night and far 
 above the miinster towers. 
 
 The days succeeding were filled with disputations, the 
 waves of contention ebbing and flowing as the sea. 
 Meanwhile, messengers are passing between Augsburg 
 and Castle Coburg. Luther at his far remove is the 
 presiding spirit in the imperial diet. He is continually 
 occupied with wrestling prayer. Three morning hours 
 of each day are spent alone with God. At times he 
 seems to forget the presence of man, and down the long 
 corridors of the castle rolls the voice of prayer, climb- 
 ing thence the pathway of the skies. Listen ! '' I know 
 thou art our Father and our God, and that thou wilt 
 scatter the persecutors of thy children, for thou art thy- 
 self endangered with us. All this matter is true, and it 
 is only by thy constraint that we have put our hands to 
 it. Defend us, then, O Father.'' And thus he pleads 
 as the hours go on. Prayer triumphs. God comes 
 down to earth, and vain is the opposition of men though 
 they wear papal tiaras and imperial crowns. 
 
 The Augsburg Confession, in substance the work 
 of Luther, its chastened diction and tempered spirit 
 bearing the imprint of Melanchthon's hand, was read in 
 the Palatine chapel. It set forth those great doctrines 
 which are styled evangelical in opposition to the pagan 
 philosophies which had dominated Pome — Christ exalted 
 as supreme and only Head of the Church ; salvation 
 attained through his sacrifice, which the mass profanely 
 displaces or professes to repeat ; the necessity of personal 
 
LUTHER'S LAST DAYS. 209 
 
 holiness, which is declared to be the will of God and a 
 condition of final salvation ; the word of God the only 
 rnle of faith and life ; and the separation of Church and 
 State, the union of which, a fundamental principle of 
 the papacy, had brought only evil along all the years — a 
 principle opposed by the spirit of the gospel and by 
 the express declaration of the Son of God, whose king- 
 dom is not of this world. 
 
 Here the Protestants plant themselves ; not only the 
 representatives of old monasteries and theological schools, 
 but the elector of Saxony, Philip, landgrave of Hesse, 
 margraves, princes, dukes and royal deputies, declare 
 themselves in sympathy with the Confession and pledge 
 eternal fealty to Him who died that the dead might live 
 and the homeless go home to God. Then Coburg Castle 
 reflects the joy, and Luther, with beaming face turned 
 heavenward, exclaims, '' Christ is in the diet and he does 
 not keep silence ; the word of God cannot be bound." 
 
 The Reformation has reached the table-lands. The 
 gospel is shining over Europe. The long-expected day 
 is come, and generations following shall share the fruits 
 of this great reform, the greatest work accomplished 
 since Paul planted the cross in the city of the Caesars 
 and the New Jerusalem opened its gates above the ^gean 
 isle. From this time Luther pursues his studies and 
 sends forth his books without molestation or fear. He 
 lives happily with his beloved Catherine, and together 
 they anticipate the fellowship of the world beyond. 
 AiSlictions come to them : children that had nestled in 
 their bosoms and cheered them with their innocent prat- 
 tle, and made the old arches resound with their laughter, 
 sicken and die. Luther is mellowed by sorrow, and, 
 
210 ROMANISM AXD THE BEFORMERS. 
 
 like the royal mourner, sends liis fondest thoughts on to 
 the home-coming and the reunions of the skies. 
 
 Luther is approaching the goal of life. " I am old, 
 weary and useless/^ he writes to a friend. " I have fin- 
 ished my journey, and naught remains but for the Lord 
 to gather me to my fathers. Pray for me. I think no 
 more, dear Spalatin, about the emperor and the empii-e, 
 except to refer one and the other to God in my prayers. 
 Grown old and worn like a garment, I long to be folded 
 and laid aside." 
 
 In the midwinter he left Wittenberg that he might 
 revisit his early home and do some work for Christ along 
 the way. Passing safely through the perils of a flood at 
 Halle, he came to Eisleben. Thence he sent affectionate 
 messages to his dear Catherine, on whose face he was 
 never to look again, commending her to God's most lov- 
 ing care. He spoke of his approaching death, of the 
 recognition of friends in heaven and of the joy of being 
 with Christ. At the close of a day spent in exhausting 
 labors he retired to his chamber ; at the window which 
 looked toward Jerusalem he prayed. The shadow of 
 death was on his face. His two sons and friends dearly 
 beloved watched tenderly beside his bed. For a little 
 he slept peacefully as a child, his weary head on the 
 bosom of Him who long had been his refuge in trouble. 
 Near midnight he awoke and looked affectionately into 
 the faces of his anxious friends, bidding them cease their 
 vigils and seek needful rest. Then turning his eyes to- 
 ward heaven, he said, '^ Into thy hands I commit my 
 spirit; thou hast redeemed me, Lord God of truth." 
 Again he said, '^I commend my soul to thee, my Jesus. 
 I am about to quit this terrestrial body, but I know that 
 
LUTHER'S LAST DAYS. 211 
 
 I shall abide eternally with thee." Then he slept for a, 
 little and awoke in heaven. The morning had not yet 
 come to the dear old town, but he was looking upon the 
 face of his Beloved, to whose cross he had clung, for 
 whose cause he had suffered, in devotion to whom he 
 would gladly have endured a martyr's death. 
 
 Luther died on the 18th of February, 1546, in his 
 sixty-fourth year, in the Mansfeld Castle at Eisleben. 
 His life ended where it began. On the 20th the funeral 
 procession left Eisleben, and reached Wittenberg on the 
 third day following, being met by a sorrowing multi- 
 tude at the Elster Gate. At the castle-church Bugen- 
 hagen preached the solemn sermon from the words of 
 St. Paul : " But I would not have you to be ignorant, 
 brethren, concerning them which are asleep, that ye 
 sorrow not, even as others which have no hope. For 
 if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so 
 them also that sleep in Jesus shall God bring with 
 him." Melanchthon, who had been Luther's most in- 
 timate, unwavering friend, then pronounced an affection- 
 ate eulogy upon the departed man, the greatest since 
 apostolic days. Once he had said concerning him 
 "Luther is too great, too wonderful, for me to depict 
 in words. If there be a man on earth I love with my 
 whole heart, that man is Luther. One is an interpreter, 
 another an orator, affluent and beautiful in speech, but 
 Luther is all in all ; whatever he writes, whatever he 
 utters, pierces to the soul, fixes itself like arrows in 
 the heart; he is a miracle among men." Now that 
 he is gone, Melanchthon mourns, and Germany with 
 him. 
 
 Loving hands laid the mortal part of Luther in the 
 
212 ROMANISM AND THE BE FORMERS. 
 
 earth in front of the pulpit in tlie castle-church from 
 which he had often spoken, with a holy boldness and 
 unction unsurpassed, the wonderful words of life. 
 
 Nay, that Wittenberg church is not his tomb, but 
 what Pericles said of another may be more truthfully 
 said of Luther : " The whole earth is the sepulchre of 
 the illustrious man." 
 
 We attempt now no analysis of his character. Our 
 story of him, as it has run on, has suggested the ele- 
 ments of his greatness. He had faults. He was not 
 always wise. To err is human. He lived in an age 
 of the world which encouraged roughness of speech, 
 and he must not be judged by the standard of that 
 better day which he inaugurated. But, take him all 
 in all, he stands supreme among the maguates of eigh- 
 teen centuries, a Mont Blanc among Alpine men, at 
 whom dwellers on the plains and in the valleys gaze 
 with an admiration which increases with advancing 
 time. We think of him as did Thomas Carlyle, as 
 " unsubduable granite, piercing far and wide into the 
 heavens, yet in the clefts of it fountains green, beau- 
 tiful valleys with flowers.'' 
 
 Truly, God exalted the miner's son to the summit 
 of moral power. And although Frederick was good, 
 Erasmus learned and Melauchthon gentle as the beloved 
 John, yet the Augustinian monk in moral grandeur 
 and potential deeds outstripped them all, and no man 
 since Paul and the apostles lived has reached such a 
 stature and cast so long a shadow, in which earth's 
 scorched and weary ones hide, as Martin Luther, born 
 at Eisleben, born again at Erfurt, baptized afresh on 
 Pilate's Staircase, separated from Rome in the con- 
 
LUTHER'S LAST DAYS 213 
 
 test at Leipsic and crowned one of workFy mightiest 
 at the diet of Worms. 
 
 We bless God for this extraordinary man, for it was 
 God who gave him to the world and by him divided 
 the clouds which hung over Europe and darkened it, 
 that the glorious Sun of righteousness might shine 
 through, and men, ignorant, enslaved and lost, might 
 find the way to Christ and heaven. 
 
ZWINGLE: THE MOUNTAIN-SHEPHERD, 
 
 16 
 
" I determined not to knozu anything among you save Jesus 
 Christ, and him crucified.'" 
 
 2 Cor. ^ : 2. 
 
 " Chjdst by his obedience and death, did fully discharge the 
 
 debt of those that are thus justified, and did make a proper, 
 
 real, and full satisfaction to his Father's justice in their 
 
 behalf y 
 
 Con. Faith, chap. xi. sec. iii. 
 
Z WINGLE : THE MOUNTAIN-SHEPHERD. 
 
 TN the great Reformation, Martin Luther occupies the 
 J- first position. A galaxy of stars shone in the night- 
 time of papal supremacy. There was only one polar 
 star. Around it gathered the lesser lights, each bearing 
 its part in the illumination of the long-darkened world. 
 Erasmus was timid and fickle; Melanchthon was cau- 
 tious and moved slowly; Frederick was reluctant to 
 break with Rome ; Carlstadt was aflame with zeal, bat 
 often imprudent. And yet all these rendered valuable 
 service, and the absence of any one of them would 
 have delayed the needful reform. With them were 
 associated many of like spirit, of whom history makes 
 honorable mention. 
 
 Whilst Martin Luther was stirring all Germany with 
 his theses, his vigorous writings and his J3ublic addresses, 
 and Rome feared his power, God was raising up other 
 men in the contiguous kingdoms to battle for the truth. 
 And it is a fact worthy of special mention, indicating 
 the superintending providence of God, that there was no 
 collusion among these national Reformers. They acted 
 independently and yet simultaneously. Thus history 
 repeated itself. As devout men in Israel, Magi in the 
 East and sincere inquirers in the land of Confucius, 
 without interchange of thought, separated by broad, 
 uninhabited spaces, were looking for the Messiah's 
 
 217 
 
218 BOMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 adveDt, so Saxony, Switzerland and France, divided by 
 great mountains, across which travelers seldom went, 
 were watching for tlie return of the glorious gospel day, 
 and making ready for it. God's thought preceded 
 man's. His action antedated luiman eflPort. 
 
 Let us now leave the land of Luther and see what is 
 transpiring in regions lying toward the west. We will 
 pause in our advance among the valleys of Switzerland, 
 beside its beautiful lakes and on its mountain-slopes. 
 Here we shall find the kindlings of light which betoken 
 a better day. God is working silently and unobserved. 
 He is seeking his apostles among the humble, and is 
 about to inaugurate a work which shall bring new beauty 
 to the valleys and new grandeur to the mountains — not 
 material, but spiritual, born of a heavenly day. 
 
 Ascending by a steep path which winds upward 
 through deep forests and across barren slopes, we reach 
 a rustic village called the Wildhaus, two thousand feet 
 above the sheltered waters of the Zurich lake. The 
 river Thun runs near by. The cultivated fields yield a 
 scanty fruitage as a reward of patient toil. The higher 
 mountain-peaks, clad in perpetual snows, silent and 
 solemn sentinels, keep watch over the simple hamlets 
 which sit at their i^fii, A few minutes' ^vftlk from 
 Wildhaus brings us to a cottage built of logs. Seeming 
 to apologize for its presence, it hugs the ground and 
 hides among the trees. Yet there are few spots in 
 Central Europe that have been so honored as that rude 
 cottage on this Alpine height, for here was born Ulrich 
 Zwingle, the Swiss Reformer, a man but little inferior 
 in the attributes of human greatness and in potential 
 deeds to his contemporary, the son of the Eisleben miner. 
 
ZWINGLE: THE MOUNTAIN-SHEPHERD. 219 
 
 His birth occurred Jan. 1, 148'4, less than two months 
 after Luther's, and God designed a simultaneous move- 
 ment in the interests of the truth on both sides of tlie 
 Alps. Ulrich's father was the bailiff of the village 
 parish, and much respected by his fellow-mountaineers. 
 lie was alike devoted to the Swiss Confederation and 
 the Romish Church. At the fireside he talked much 
 with his children of the struggles by which the Zoggen- 
 burg had secured its independence, and descanted in 
 glowing terms on the natural grandeur and civil advan- 
 tages of the Swiss cantons, the Hebrew confederation of 
 Central Europe. His conversation also, though less 
 frequently than that of the mother, embraced higher 
 themes, and the thoughts of young Ulrich dwelt on the 
 stories of Bethlehem and Calvary, and ascended thence 
 to the heaven which received the departed Lord. When 
 yet a mere child he was placed in a school at Wesen, for 
 his father believed he was designed for some more im- 
 portant service than that of a mountain-shepherd. The 
 boy was fond of books and made rapid progress in his 
 studies. When ten years of age he was transferred to 
 Basle, a famous city, where there was much to impress 
 and stimulate the mind of the precocious Ulrich. It 
 was a seat of learning. Here the great scholars congre- 
 gated. The sage of Rotterdam shed an intellectual halo 
 over the university town, for, with all his frailties, Eras- 
 mus was one of the greatest men of his age. George 
 Binzli presided over St. Theodore's School, and there 
 was none better fitted, at this stage in his education, to 
 have the care of Ulrich. Put the boy soon completed 
 the course of studies prescribed in his primary school, 
 and it was deemed best to remove him to Berne, where 
 
220 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 he was placed under the instruction of Lupukis, one of 
 the eminent scholars of that day, who left the imprets 
 of his own unique character upon the ardent pupil. But 
 unexpected perils surrounded the latter. He was urged 
 to enter tlie Dominican convent and devote himself to a 
 monastic life. Then came a peremptory message from 
 Wildhaus to flee from the wiles which endangered his 
 future. It was a trial to leave Lupulus and depart from 
 Berne — beautiful Berne, skirted by the Aar and over- 
 shadowed by the Alps. But his father's authority was 
 regarded, and Ulrich became a student of philosophy 
 in Vienna ; and then, after a brief period, during which 
 he made great advancement in his studies, he again re- 
 turned to Basle, where lie was occupied at first with 
 literary pursuits, and subsequently Avith scholastic the- 
 ology. Thus he came in contact, by these seemingly 
 adverse changes, with the great minds of his age and 
 with the diflPerent phases of religious thought. God was 
 leading him on, step by step, to that eminence in knowl- 
 edge and influence which has linked his name with those 
 of Luther, Calvin and Beza, all of whom shall live in 
 history until the world shall end. 
 
 In the vicinity of Wildhaus, the mountain-village of 
 Zwingle's birth, was the hamlet of Glaris. The little 
 flock on that far height was shepherdless. The people 
 expressed a wish that Zwingle might be their priest. 
 He was accordingly received to holy orders. The cere- 
 mony of induction occurred in the old mlinster at Con- 
 stance, the same in which John Huss was condemned to 
 the stake. He spent a brief season in his native village, 
 performing certain duties of his office, and then, although 
 he had just passed his majority, he went thoughtfully 
 
ZWINGLE: THE MOUNTAIN-SHEFHEBL. 221 
 
 on to Glaris, leaving his simple home and the village 
 church with a presentiment that he might never return 
 to them. He was stepping out on a broad arena and 
 about to enter upon a work that was destined to mould 
 the ages following. In his first parish he labored with 
 commendable zeal. He was a devout papist. As yet 
 he did not question the authority of the pope or the 
 Christless philosophies of the times. 
 
 His ministrations were soon interrupted. He was 
 living in a martial age and caught its spirit. He joined 
 his countrymen in a war wdth France, in which a humil- 
 iating repulse was succeeded by signal victory. Julius 
 IL, the reigning pope, gave the conquering Swiss his 
 benediction and styled them ''defenders of the liberty 
 of the Church.'^ The Alps re-echoed with the shouts 
 of the conquerors, and Rome was confident of continued 
 supremacy in the mountain-girded cantons. 
 
 But already young Zwingle, devoting himself with 
 characteristic zeal to the study of the Scriptures, and 
 communing through their writings with the early 
 Fathers, began to exalt the word of God above the 
 traditions of the Church and to discover some fragments 
 of evangelical truth, long buried by papal decretals and 
 sensuous rites. The corruption of monastic orders, the 
 general dissoluteness of the people, the prevailing ignor- 
 ance of nominal Christians and the almost utter want 
 of reverence for God and sacred things startled the 
 thoughtful priest. '^ Surely," he thought, " the Church 
 is on the verge of great disaster." He was perplexed. 
 He studied more profoundly — now the old philosophies 
 which dominated Rome, now the words of God which 
 evidently opposed them. It was simply a question 
 
222 EOMAiMSiV ASD THE REFORMERS. 
 
 whether Aristotle or Christ should have the supremacy. 
 His classic tastes checked his search for the truth. Pie 
 read Homer and Pindar with great delight. He often 
 went, in admiring thought, to the Bema and Pnyx, and 
 listened to the unexampled oratory which stirred Athens 
 and all Attica, or ling-ered long: on the wooded banks of 
 Cephissus where Plato taught, and then, passing west- 
 ward, yielded his soul to the classic eloquence of Rome 
 in the ages of the Caesars. 
 
 But soon a reaction came. God is infinitely greater 
 than all the sages of Greece and Rome. There is a 
 diviner poetry in the Psalms of David than is to be 
 found in the Odyssey or Iliad. The preacher of Mars' 
 Hill is incomparably more eloquent than Pericles, and 
 is a profounder philosopher than Plato or Aristotle, 
 Zwingle's mind is settled. The word of God must be his 
 rule of faith. If Rome will be pagan, then Rome and 
 he must part company. " Supreme vanity !'' some were 
 ready to say, " this priest of mountain-rustics setting 
 himself against popes and cardinals at whose feet em- 
 perors have bowed !'' 
 
 Zwingle thirsts for companionship with the great 
 thinkers of his age. The fame of some of them, grow- 
 ing with the years, has reached his mountain-home. He 
 resolves to visit Basle, and sets out alone. Deep thoughts 
 stir his soul, and high resolves are being formulated as 
 he descends the mountain-paths and threads the valleys. 
 The great Erasmus welcomes the priest of Claris, pro- 
 nounces him an exceptional genius and predicts for him 
 a wide renown. Very memorable was that visit to 
 Basle. Zwingle had seen Erasmus and talked with him. 
 The scholarship of the sage of Rotterdam was a marvel 
 
ZWJNGLE: THE MOUNTAIN-SHEFHEBD. 223 
 
 to the scholastic priest. His reverence for the word of 
 God confirmed Zwiugle's faith. The latter had received 
 an impulse along the line of scriptural truth which was 
 destined to carry him on to more fruitful fields and to 
 grander results than tlie faint-hearted and temporizing 
 Erasmus ever reached. 
 
 Again he left Glaris. The red banners of Rome were 
 moving northward, and the Swiss, loyal to the Church, 
 went to the aid of Italy against the seditious armies of 
 France. Zwingle remonstrated in vain, then girded on 
 his sword. On the gory field of Marignan brave bat- 
 talions of his countrymen perished, and Zwiugle's soul 
 was wrung with anguish. A great wrong had been 
 committed by Rome, and Rome suffered for it. But out 
 of all this a great good was to come. Although Zwin- 
 gle did not question the righteousness of an appeal to 
 arms when the Church was threatened, yet he was losing 
 his faith in the Church. The pope is corrupt and his 
 influence is corrupting. Cardinals reflect his image. 
 The priesthood is ignorant and sensual. The monas- 
 teries are the sinks of sin. The word of God is bound. 
 The hierarchy holds the public conscience and debases 
 the people. Great is the moral darkness, and beyond 
 it, unless God interpose, a starless, endless night. 
 
 Zwingle returned to his secluded parish. The people 
 knew a great change had come over him. He preached 
 with an increase of power. He knew nothing but the 
 word of God. The Gospels and Epistles kindled a 
 strange, glad light amid the mountain-solitudes — a light 
 which was destined to shine to the utmost limits of the 
 Switzers^ land. 
 
 The preacher is not so much occupied with error as 
 
224 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 with truth. He combats darkuess with light. He does 
 not denounce Rome, but he exalts the doctrines of the 
 apostolic Church, and points to the heights of purity 
 which are attainable and should be sought by all. His 
 work at Glaris is at an end. 
 
 On the high table-land which overlooks the lake at 
 Zurich, three thousand feet above the sea-level, is 
 Einsidlen, a simple village which clusters its homes 
 around a venerable abbey. If you will credit the 
 superstitious monks, this ab])ey has a history which is 
 second in interest only to that of the Bethlehem man- 
 ger. On the spot where it stands, in the days of Char- 
 lemagne, a holy anchorite, bowing before an image 
 of the Virgin Mary, was murdered by two marauders, 
 whose crime was miraculously revealed and punished. 
 Here the Benedictine hermits built a church, and to 
 them was given the sanctity which distinguished the 
 martyred representative of the house of Hohenzollern. 
 Here the abbot Eberard ministered, and the place was 
 consecrated by the presence of Christ and angels ere the 
 bishop of Constance, intending to dedicate the church in 
 accordance with sacred usage, had come. His offices 
 were unneeded. The pope declared the consecration a 
 miracle. On one of tlie stones Christ had left the im- 
 pression of his right hand. Plenary indulgence was 
 granted to all pilgrims who worshiped at the shrine 
 of Our Lady of the Hermits. Each year thereafter 
 a holy festival was kept in the Benedictine abbey, and 
 in anticipation of it devout pilgrims thronged the 
 mountain-paths which led thither. To this shrine 
 Ulrich Zwingle was summoned, and he became the 
 priest of Einsidlen. Glaris was bereft, but God so 
 
ZW INGLE: THE MOUNTAIN-SHEPHERD. 225 
 
 a])pointed. In this secluded spot Zwingle was to com- 
 pJete his preparation for his great work. Here he grew 
 in knowledge of the Scriptures, and by the truth was 
 lifted to a higher spiritual life. His ready and retentive 
 memory was stored with whole books of the sacred word, 
 and his soul was enlarged. Soon he abated his regard 
 for the shrine which attracted pilgrims from afar. God 
 was not confined to Einsidlen. His altar stands not 
 alone on this mountain at Gerizim or at Jerusalem. 
 Nor is he pleased Avith the austerities of an ascetic life, 
 with garments of rough serge girt round with ropes, and 
 wooden sandals that torture the feet, and Pater Nosters 
 and Ave Marias repeated in old abbeys removed from 
 the noise and turmoil of the busy world. God fills all 
 space. He is accessible on the plains, in the city and 
 out on the broad fields of toil as well as in monasteries 
 and cells, and what he claims is the heart's devotion, 
 caring little whether it be clothed in monkish garb 
 or an unconventual dress. Moreover, said Zwingle, 
 " Christ is our sacrifice ; we need no other." " By 
 one offering he hath perfected for ever them that are 
 sanctified." Learned men sat at the feet of the evan- 
 gelical preacher. The expression of a familiar creed, 
 " I believe in the forgiveness of sins," the same which 
 carried a heavenly light into the cell of the Erfurt 
 monk, was invested with a new and strange interest 
 as Zwingle repeated it beside a vacant cross, gazing 
 into heaven. The Sun of righteousness is in the 
 ascendant. The light of a better day is shining over 
 the Switzers' land. 
 
 But error contends with the truth. Rome resists tlie 
 gospel. Another Tetzel appears, and the traffic in indul- 
 
226 HOiMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 gences is repeated. Along the mouutain-roads, when the 
 summer of 1518 was well advanced, a Franciscan monk 
 w^as seen approaching Uri, and as his attendants an- 
 nounced that the pardon of sins past and prospective 
 might be purchased with money, the amount so gradu- 
 ated as to meet their ability, there was at once inaugu- 
 rated a successful trade, and the mercenary monk de- 
 parted laden with his ill-gotten gains. But passing 
 into the contiguous canton, he encountered Zwiugle, 
 and a conflict ensued. " Heaven and hell are subject 
 to my power,'' said Samson, the blaspheming Francis- 
 can. Was he not the representative of Rome, and had 
 not the pope delegated to him the power which releases 
 from purgatorial fires and opens the gates of Paradise? 
 ^'Impossible," said Zwiugle. "Only Christ forgives. 
 He invites the sin-burdened to himself. He is the 
 only Oblation, the only Sacrifice, the only Way." 
 Public sentiment was divided. Some believed a lie, 
 and starved their souls whilst they enriched the papal 
 treasury. Some carried their burdens to Jesus the 
 Christ and found peace. Zwiugle is gaining the con- 
 fidence of a long-enslaved people. The power of Rome 
 is waning. The presumptuous monk seeks other fields 
 and repeats his plunders where there is none to oppose. 
 About this time the canons of the cathedral at Zurich 
 were seeking for a priest to supply a vacancy caused by 
 the departure of a former incumbent. At once some 
 influential friends determined to secure this position for 
 Zwiugle, deeming him eminently fitted for so responsible 
 a trust. But they encountered a most intense and un- 
 scrupulous opposition. Zwingle's character was defamed. 
 His enemies produced witnesses who were ready to sub- 
 
ZWINGLE: THE MOUNTAIN-SHEPHERD. 227 
 
 stantiate the most groundless charges, puerile or grave, 
 as might best subserve their end. They secured a large 
 following, but the more intelligent paid little attention 
 to the falsehoods of these extreme papists. The college 
 of canons met, and Zwingle was chosen by an almost 
 unanimous vote. The news carried consternation to 
 Einsidlen. The people loved their priest. All Switz- 
 erland could not furnish his equal. Many resisted his 
 transfer to Zurich ; some favored it for the truth's sake. 
 What might not this bold and gifted man accomplish as 
 the cathedral preacher in one of the chief cities of their 
 Fatherland ? Zwingle believed it was a call from God. 
 There was much to attract him to Zurich. It was a 
 centre of population, learning and influence, from which 
 the truth might pass along many radiating lines to the 
 utmost limits of Switzerland and cross mountain-ranges 
 into the great empires beyond. Thither he went. 
 
 Zurich is a beautiful city. It was beautiful in Zwin- 
 gle's day : before it and stretching southward the lake 
 which bears the same name, around it the great hills 
 covered with vineyards and orchards, whilst snow-capped 
 mountains cast grateful sliadows over it on the summer 
 days and sheltered it from wintry blasts. The cathedral 
 still remains, though built eight centuries ago. Its cir- 
 cular portals, with quaint cloisters, and long nave sup- 
 ported by pillars and solemn arches, the high walls over- 
 looking the chimney-steeples of the busy town, its double 
 towers catching the first beams of the morning and re- 
 taining the crimson sunset when the lake is dark with 
 shadows, — render the cathedral in which the Helvetian 
 Reformer preached the glorious gospel of a once-crucified 
 but now risen and exalted Lord one of the most interest- 
 
228 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 ing tomples of the Old World. Its architectural attrac- 
 tions are few, and, although an imposing edifice in Zurich, 
 it might be hidden in some unnoticed recess of St. Peter's 
 church at Rome, yet there is a glory crowning it such as 
 the great basilica by the Tiber never knew — a glory born 
 in heaven and luring multitudes to its native skies. 
 
 Having entered upon his duties as cathedral preacher, 
 Zwino;le introduced certain chano;es which were distaste- 
 ful to some of the canons. From the days of Charle- 
 magne only fragmentary portions of the Scriptures were 
 used in connection with the public service, and the com- 
 ments of the priests upon these were greatly lacking in 
 fullness, spirituality and force. Zwingle could not be 
 superficial. His soul craved the roots of things, and to 
 these he sought to lead his hearers. He had distinctly 
 outlined in the hearing of the college canons his purpose 
 in this respect: ^' The life of Christ lias too long been 
 hidden from the people ; I shall preach upon the whole 
 of St. Matthew's Gospel, chapter by chapter, according 
 to the inspiration of the Holy Ghost, without human 
 commentaries, drawing solely from the fountain of Script- 
 ure, sounding its depths, comparing one passage with 
 another and seekino- for understandino; bv constant and 
 earnest prayer. It is to God\s glory, to the praise of his 
 only Son, to the real salvation of souls and to their edi- 
 fication in the true faith, that I shall consecrate my min- 
 istry." Then there followed an ominous silence. The 
 new priest seemed to stand alone. Presently strong ex- 
 pressions of disapproval, in which nearly all the canons 
 sympathized, made it apparent that Zwingle must en- 
 counter much opposition on the very threshold of his 
 work. But God inspired him with a holy boldness and 
 
ZWINQLE: THE MOUNTAIN-SHEPHERlJ. 229 
 
 an unwavering trust. He must preach Christ in Zurich 
 as he had preached him at Glaris and Einsidlen, or the 
 lights kindled on the mountain-slopes will disappear and 
 a profounder night come on. God is in Switzerland as 
 he is in Germany, and when the time to work has ar- 
 rived, Avho can hinder? 
 
 Now let us enter the old cathedral. It is the first day 
 of January, 1519, the birthday of the newly-arrived 
 priest. The cathedral is crowded from the high altar to 
 the outer doors. The people are curious to see the new 
 preacher and hear him. They have learned something 
 of the splendor of his gifts and the eloquence of his ad- 
 dress. They wait in breathless suspense for his appear- 
 ance. The hour for worship arrives, and Zwingle is in 
 his place. His personal appearance is prepossessing. 
 There is not so handsome a man in all the canton of 
 Zurich. He is only thirty-five years of age — too young, 
 think some, to preside over this great church and repre- 
 sent the venerable chapter which has called him from his 
 mountain-parish. But soon their fears are dissipated. 
 His strength has outrun his years. His clear, sympa- 
 thetic voice reaches all ears and moves every heart. 
 Some approve his words, some disapprove them ; but 
 all recognize his power. He repeated, substantially, in 
 the pulpit what he had said to the cathedral canons. 
 Like Paul at Corinth and Luther at Wittenberg, he de- 
 termined to know nothing among them save Jesus Christ, 
 and him crucified. He had been at the cross ; he had 
 also visited the sepulchre and found it vacant. He had 
 gazed into heaven as did the disciples on Olivet, and had 
 seen something of Christ's glory. Now he goes forth in 
 the strength of recovered truth to preach Jesus only. 
 
230 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 The next day is the Sabbath. The Annunciation is his 
 theme. He carries his hearers to Nazareth. They hear 
 an angelic voice, look on a humble virgin, behold the 
 dawning of a glorious day. The service is full of Jesus, 
 who saves his people from their sins. 
 
 Beyond the mighty priesthood, beyond the solemn 
 mass, beyond the confessional and its professed absolu- 
 tion, is the Son of Mary, the only Saviour, mighty to 
 redeem. Many of the people behold that great sight 
 for the first time. They see but dimly, yet joyfully, 
 through their tears. Zurich never saw a day like this. 
 The great cathedral pile never re-echoed with so glad a 
 sound. Is it real or only a dream ? The popular heart 
 is with the preacher. But the college of priests shake 
 their heads, mutter something and go sullenly out. Had 
 you walked down the streets of Zurich that day as the 
 people returned to their homes, you might have heard 
 such exclamations as these : '^ Never has priest preached 
 like that priest ;" ^^ The night is past ;" " We have seen 
 a glorious light to-day f " Thank God for Ulrich Zwin- 
 gle !'^ And nature is in harmony with the common joy. 
 The meridian sun bathes the hills and waters in a soft, 
 sweet radiance. The tops of the Albis Mountains seem 
 to point the Zurichers to heaven, and even to speak of 
 its glorious King. 
 
 Anotlier and a glad surprise awaited the people. The 
 eloquent preacher was also a sympathetic pastor. He 
 had his hours of study, and guarded them from all un- 
 necessary intrusion. Even he could not teach unless he 
 was much alone with God and his word. But he de- 
 voted other hours just as assiduously to pastoral duties. 
 He mingled much with the people. In the marts of 
 
Z WIGGLE: THE MOUNTAIN-SHEPHERD. 231 
 
 trade he reasoned with them out of the Scriptures, and, 
 like Paul in Ephesus, he preached from house to house. 
 The humble recognized in him their friend ; the noble 
 esteemed him their sympathetic peer. Truly, Zurich 
 was glad because of him, and the moral desert blossomed 
 as the rose. 
 
 'The influence of Zwingle was not confined by the 
 walls nor by the boundary-lines of the Zurich canton. 
 Though very unlike Luther, his contemporary beyond 
 the Alps, and not so mighty a factor in the Reformation, 
 yet he was to Helvetia what Martin Luther was to 
 Saxony, and quite as well adapted to the sphere God had 
 assigned him. He was not an Elijah in rough mantle 
 thundering his messages at city-gates and in the palaces 
 of kings. He was a loving John rather, walking softly; 
 resolute, yet gentle, seeking to lead men to Christ by a 
 sweet persuasion rather than to bear them thither in a 
 hurricane of vehemence or on the bosom of a polemic 
 storm. And yet when occasion demanded it he had the 
 mien and the voice of a lion, and, misguided by his age, 
 he even unwisely resorted to carnal weapons in the sup- 
 port of a spiritual kingdom. But his mistakes were few. 
 When opposed in Zurich he acted wisely, and waited 
 patiently for a good which could not be attained at once. 
 There were things about him which he appeared not to 
 see and words of fierce denunciation which he seemed 
 not to hear. Some radical Reformers in Helvetia, like 
 the impetuous Carlstadt in Saxony, had made him the 
 butt of their sarcasm, and claimed that so feeble was he 
 that his voice had never reached beyond his own cathe- 
 dral walls. But even then, though only a mere youth, 
 all Switzerland heard him, and the jealousy, hatred, 
 
232 EOMANJSM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 defamation and organized opposition of enemies only 
 proved his influence and power. 
 
 God is in Switzerland. His hand is marking out the 
 pathways of his truth. The cloud which error has hung 
 over cantons and kingdoms is yielding before the rising 
 sun. The Church shall go forth under the gleam of a 
 rediscovered heaven, fair as the moon, clear as the sun 
 and terrible as an army with banners. Lands yet un- 
 known shall receive the truth ; generations yet unknown 
 shall rejoice in it, and down all the ages the glorious 
 gospel shall press its way until the Lord shall come 
 again. 
 
ULRIGI^ ZWINGLE; LATER MINISTRY, 
 
*' As often as ye eat this bread, and drink this cup, ye do 
 show the Lord's death till he coined 
 
 I Cor. II : 26. 
 
 " In this sacrament Christ is not offered up to his Father, 
 nor any real sacrifice made at all for remission of sins of the 
 quick or dead, but only a commemoration of that once offering 
 up of himself, by hitnself upoji the cross, once for all, and a 
 spiritual oblation of all possible praise zmto God for the same ; 
 so that the popish sacrifice of the mass, as they call it, is most 
 abominably injurious to Christ's one only sacrifice, the alone 
 propitiation for all the sins of the electa 
 
 Confession of Faith, chap, xxix. sec. ii. 
 
ILRICH ZWINGLE: LATER MINISTRY. 
 
 TT7E resume our narrative of the Reformation in 
 * * Northern Switzerland. Zwingle did for this laud 
 of mountain and plain what Luther did for Saxony beyond 
 the Rhine. As the months advanced lines were more 
 clearly drawn ; resistance to the truth became more de- 
 termined on the one side^ and devotion to it more ardent 
 on the other. The Reformer's life was threatened, but 
 he went calmly on in his work. Jesus came not to send 
 peace on the earth, but a sword. His servant was pre- 
 })ared to suffer and, if necessary, to die. He slept peace- 
 fully whilst armed men guarded his home by night, and 
 wrought courageously when foes thirsting for his blood 
 scowled on him by day. When the forests were searched 
 for fugitive friends, torches blazing amid the darkness 
 and the minions of Rome shouting their war-cry on the 
 mountain-heights, he abode in Zurich, believing himself 
 immortal until his work was done. 
 
 Again the infamous traffic in indulgences projects its 
 shadow across his path. He resisted falsehood with the 
 truth. He preached Christ as the Sin-bearer, the great 
 Forgiver, through whom alone souls are accepted with 
 God and eternally saved. Then the council of Zurich 
 was convened, and Samson the monk was forbidden to 
 enter the city. By a cunning falsehood the latter secured 
 admittance, but was quickly ejected. This result declared 
 
 2?,b 
 
'2.36 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 Zwingle's strength and the already declining power of 
 Rome. Samson departed in a rage, pronouncing anathe- 
 mas on the town. Soon after he was seen climbino^ the 
 steep mountain-road on the south, his face toward Italy, 
 thret. horses drawing after them the gold and silver 
 ducats which Rome loved more than it loved the souls 
 of its superstitious subjects. 
 
 Still other trials and triumphs awaited the Reformer. 
 Physical sufferings brought him down, and his work 
 seemed about to end. This was a darker period in his 
 life than he had known before. But it was appointed 
 for his good. There are lessons that can be learned only 
 in such a school. There are a mellowness of character, 
 a deptli of sympathy and a holy unction which are born 
 only in sick chambers and on the confines of death. 
 The Zurich pastor must go into the wilderness. Many 
 hearts ache and many eyes are wet with tears as the lov- 
 ing shepherd leaves his flock. Away in a darkened val- 
 ley, where lamps were burned at noonday and the roar 
 of mountain-torrents was never hushed, at the baths of 
 Pfeffers, he waited patiently for the troubling of the 
 waters and a healing power that comes from heaven. 
 The interpretation of this providence came sooner than 
 he expected. When strength was returning and hope be- 
 gan to brighten his gloomy dwelling, there came tidings 
 of evil from his dear Zurich. The plague had made its 
 appearance in the city, and the people were going in 
 battalions to their graves. He hastened thither. He 
 ministered to the dying and buried the dead. His voice 
 was like a strain of music in darkened homes. But the 
 plague smote the pastor also. Again Zurich was over- 
 whelmed with fear. Zwingle alone was calm. A poet, 
 
ULRICH ZW INGLE: LATER MINISTRY. 237 
 
 he expressed io simple flowing numbers his trust in 
 Jesus. Listening to death's knock at his unguarded 
 door, he hid himself in the cleft of the Rock, and waited 
 for the appearing of One who is mightier than death. 
 He thinks of those to whom he had ministered in the 
 mountain-valleys, many of whom have fallen, whilst 
 others are about to perish, for Tockenberg is wrestling 
 with the plague and the old home at Wildhaus is dark- 
 ened by sorrow. The rumor spreads throughout Switz- 
 erland that Zwingle at last is dead. Basle is filled with 
 mourning, as was Wittenberg when the funeral cortege 
 came from Eisleben and Luther was laid in the cathe- 
 dral vault. But this sickness was not unto death. 
 Zwingle came back from that border-land where lights 
 mingle with shadows and sobbings with angelic songs. 
 He gathered the fruits of righteousness from the furrows 
 of affliction. " The gospel, which had hitherto been too 
 much regarded by him as a doctrine, now became a great 
 reality. He arose from the darkness of the sepulchre 
 with a new heart. His zeal became more active, his 
 life more holy, his preaching more free, more Christian, 
 more powerful. This was the epoch of Zwingle's com- 
 plete emancipation ; henceforward he consecrated him- 
 self entirely to God." 
 
 It was probably tw^o years after the plague, in 1522, 
 that Zwingle was married to Anna Reinhardt, a widow ; 
 but the fact of his marriage was unwisely concealed 
 until two years later. Zwingle feared that the violation 
 of his vow of celibacy, although the breaking of it was 
 more meritorious than the keeping of it would have been, 
 might militate against his usefulness by wounding the 
 weak consciences of some and increasing the hostilit}' on 
 
238 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 the part of others. Something may be said in palliation 
 of his mistake, since he lived in a peculiar age and in 
 the midst of peculiar trials; but secret marriages are 
 wrong and always to be condemned. His wife was a 
 woman of great excellence of character, of whom Gla- 
 rean said, '^she was to be preferred to a king's daugh- 
 ter.^' She was to Zwingle a faithful and helpful com- 
 panion, and his care of her was as honorable as his love 
 was profound. He also enjoyed the fellowship of a few 
 kindred spirits, chief among whom was Oswald Myco- 
 nius, who had been rector of St. Theodore's School at 
 Berne, later of St. Peter's School at Basle, and afterward 
 a resident of Zurich. Ulrich and Oswald were almost 
 inseparable. Their love was strong as death. Together 
 they talked and toiled and prayed. Their mutual re-i 
 lations were such as those of Luther and Melanchthonj 
 or, at a later day, of Calvin and Farel. The friends 
 parted in great sorrow, each commending the other t( 
 the care of God and breathing that significant and his-l 
 toric word which had come down the ages — Mizpah. 
 
 Occasionally some friend of earlier days visited th< 
 Lake City, and letters came more frequently from Oswald,] 
 Hedio, Capito and others encouraging him in his diffi- 
 cult work. John Glother of Basle expressed his strong! 
 aflPection for the Beformer, and indicated in part tlie] 
 ground of it when he wrote, "Oh, my dear Zwingle, 
 never can I forget you. You have won my affections by 
 that gracefulness of manner, that inexpressible suavity, 
 with which you subdue all hearts." His fame had now 
 crossed the Alps, and messages of commendation and 
 love came to him from those who fought like battles on I 
 other fields. Meanwhile enemies sought his life. Poison i 
 
ULRiCH ZW INGLE: LATER MINISTRY. 239 
 
 and puiguard were summoned to put an end to the Ref- 
 ormation which papal authority could not check. Zwiu- 
 gle was unmoved. He planted his feet on the everlast- 
 ing Rock, within the roar but above the violence of the 
 waves. Standing on that serene height, he predicted 
 tlie downfall of Rome, on his face the gleam of a peace- 
 ful day ; for possessing a soul of more than common 
 stature, he saw the peaks of coming events hidden from 
 other eyes. 
 
 Then Avas assembled the Helvetic diet at Zurich, 
 Zwingle's own city. An effort was made to suppress all 
 preaching which contravened the teachings of Rome or 
 impaired the influence of the old monasteries, the centres 
 of papal power. But Zwingle, firm as Luther at the Diet 
 of Worms, declared his purpose to preach the gospel, cost 
 what it might. If his teachings could be shown to be 
 in conflict with the word of God, he would submit to 
 any censure or punishment the council might inflict. 
 His spirit was temperate and his speech mild. But 
 there he stood, immovable as the mountain which looked 
 down on the distracted city. The moral heroism tri- 
 umphed. God was in it and wrought by it. Zwingle 
 continued to exalt Christ, and new fields opened to the 
 intrepid preacher. Like Paul at Appii Forum, he 
 tlianked God and took courage. 
 
 But there were wars and rumors of w^ars. The sons 
 of Helvetia, noble and humble, had gone down in the 
 shock of battle, and the voice of weeping swept over 
 the land. The enemies of Switzerland had gained a 
 signal victory. French hostility joined hands with 
 Rome, and the Reformation trembled on the verge of 
 extinction. But God was the refuge of his people, and 
 
240 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 they grew calm, even though the seas roared and the 
 mountains shook with the swelling thereof. 
 
 Then light arose in the darkness. One and another, 
 counting the cost, even courting the martyr's crowu, 
 stood forth on the field of truth and pledged undying 
 fealty to the Church. Preachers of the word multiplied. 
 The belt of life widened. Friends of the Reformation as- 
 sembled at Einsidlen, and from its commanding summits 
 surveyed the better future. The conflict, which was to end 
 in a far-reaching peace, was severe. Tlie storm lowered 
 over Lucerne and Zurich, then smote them with its 
 hail. Like Luther at Wartburg, Zwingle betook him- 
 self to God in prayer. His tearful cry joined the wail 
 of the tempest, pierced the clouds, reached the ear of the 
 Lord of Sabaoth, and the Reformer felt the support of 
 an almighty arm, an assuring voice saying, " Lo I am 
 with you alway." 
 
 Zwingle rested his faith on the word of God. His 
 system of doctrine, drawn from this divine source, was 
 substantially that of Augustine, for he was taught by 
 the same Spirit. Being an Augustinian, he was in 
 accord, so far as concerned essential truth, with Mar- 
 tin Luther. These two men, the most remarkable of 
 that age, did not meet until after the work of each was 
 far advanced. Zwingle often said substantially, " If 
 Luther preaches in "Wittenberg the same gospel I 
 preach in Zurich, then I am a Lutheran ; if otherwise, 
 I am not." Every man who believes anything has a 
 creed, for a creed is his credo, or that which he believes. 
 Zwingle had his. Its leading features he had stated. 
 He held that man was created holy, but had fallen. 
 Recovery was not his work, but God's. '' Christ, very 
 
ULBICn ZW INGLE: LATER MINISTRY. 241 
 
 Qiau and very God/' he said, '^ lias purchased for us a 
 never-ending rederaptiou. His sufleriug satisfies the 
 divine justice for ever in behalf of those who by an 
 unshaken faith rely upon it. If we could have been 
 saved by our works, it w^ould not have been necessary 
 for Clirist to die. All who have ever come to God have 
 come to him through the death of Jesus Clirist. Christ 
 lives and acts in him. Christ alone is his leader, and 
 he needs no other guide. Wherever there is faith in 
 God, there God is ; and wherever God abideth, there a 
 zeal exists urging and impelling men to do good works. 
 The life of a Christian is one of perpetual good works, 
 which God begins, continues and completes.'' 
 
 Here you observe the essentials of Christianity. The 
 word of God our rule of life ; Jesus Christ divine and 
 yet human, two natures united in one person, and this 
 Immanuel the representative of sinners; atonement 
 effected by Christ's obedience unto death, availing for 
 all who believe ; the necessity of a holy life and its 
 consummation through grace, succeeded by an eternal 
 residence with Christ in glory. All perish who re- 
 fuse or neglect this great salvation, God's only rem- 
 edy for sin. ^* 
 
 He also held the doctrine of personal election, yet 
 not as conflicting with man's free agency and account- 
 ability to God. He preached the same evangelical sys- 
 tem which has distinguished the Calvinistic churches of 
 these latter days from the Arminian. 
 
 The influence of Zwingle is further seen in the re- 
 sponse the council of Zurich made to the cantons which 
 supported the papacy and complained of the revolution- 
 ary sentiments which were gaining ground in the canton 
 
242 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 of Zurich. The council declared its confidence in Zwin- 
 gle and his associates. " At first, indeed, their doctrine 
 had appeared novel, because they had heard nothing of 
 the kind before ; but when they came to understand that 
 the scope of it was simply this — to exhibit Christ as the 
 Author and Finisher of our salvation, who had shed his 
 precious blood for the sins of the world, and alone de- 
 livered wretched mortals from eternal death, and who is 
 the only Mediator between God and man — they could 
 not but embrace such glad tidings with ardent zeal. . . . 
 That, as to what the bishops said, of its not being law- 
 ful for them to make the Scriptures so common, it was 
 supported by no sufficient reason : they were referred 
 only to Fathers and councils, but their wish was to hear 
 not what men had decreed, but what Christ willed and 
 commanded. . . . That it seemed to them just that the 
 goods of convents and colleges of regulars should be 
 applied to the use of the poor, which was their original 
 design, and not to be employed in pampering persons 
 w^ho did not need them ; yet, in order that no one might 
 have just cause of complaint, they had allowed their 
 present possessors to enjoy them for their lives. . . . 
 That the costly ornamenting of churches was no part 
 of the worship of God, but that the relief of the poor 
 and miserable was higldy acceptable to him ; and 
 Christ's command to the rich young man was, not to 
 hang up his wealth in churches for a show, but to sell 
 all that he had and give to the poor. . . . That what 
 was the worth of auricular confession or the recounting 
 of sins to a priest they would not take upon them to 
 determine; but the confession with which true peni- 
 tents betook themselves to Christ must be esteemed not 
 
ULRTCH ZWINGLE: LATER MINISTRY. 243 
 
 only useful, but indispeusable/' This is a remarkable 
 document to proceed from a state council. It would be 
 I a novelty in our times. It shows that the Reformation 
 was taking long steps among the mountains of Switzer- 
 land, and that Zwingle, who worked quietly, but with 
 a will that amounted to genius, was bringing long- 
 I buried truth to light and laying the foundations for a 
 scriptural and spiritual Church which shall stand until 
 the Lord shall come. 
 
 At the public disputation in Zurich in 1523, Zwingle 
 presented sixty-five theses, in which " both the formal 
 and the material principles of the Reformation are set 
 forth with great completeness and applied with merciless 
 \ logic. But the most characteristic and original feature in 
 \ them is the new principle which is added — the principle 
 \ of ecclesiastical polity which has exercised so decisive an 
 influence on the whole development and organization 
 ! of the Reformed Church. The congregation, and not 
 i the hierarchy, say the theses, is the representative of 
 the Church, and to the congregation, consequently, and 
 I not to the hierarchy, belongs the right of considering 
 the discrepancies which may arise between the doctrine 
 and the practice of the Churcli. The administration of 
 the Church belongs, like all administration, to the state 
 authorities — a proposition which at once overthrows the 
 whole fabric of the Church of Rome. But, the theses 
 add, if the state authorities go beyond the ordinance of 
 Christ, let them be deposed. Tlie disputation ended 
 with a complete victory for Zwingle : the Reformation 
 was formally adopted for the territory of Zurich.'^ Pope 
 Adrian VI., thinking to silence this enemy of the hier- 
 archy, offered him everything but the papal chair, yet 
 
244 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 the Reformer scorned the bribes and stood unmoved in 
 his lot. 
 
 Although the Reformed churches did not agree as 
 regards certain tenets which are styled non-essentials, 
 the acceptance of them not being necessary to salvation, 
 yet they were a unit so far as related to fundamental 
 truth. They planted themselves on the Rock of Ages. 
 They discarded the philosophies of the most cultured 
 age which knew not Christ — philosophies which Rome 
 accepted. They gloried only in the cross. The Re- 
 formers in Germany, Switzerland, Holland, France and 
 England all took the attitude of the wilderness preacher, 
 their backs on Athens, their faces toward Jerusalem, and, 
 moved with profoundest pity for the lost, exclaimed, 
 " Behold the Lamb of God whicli taketh away the sin 
 of the world,'' This was the burden of Zwingle's 
 preaching. 
 
 ^ Of his ministry in Zurich our Reformer says : " By 
 no cunningly devised modes of address, but in the use of 
 simple words of our own country's native growth, I 
 have led the people to the knowledge of their disease, 
 following our Lord's example, who commenced from 
 this point. ... I have earnestly exhorted the people to 
 hold fast the glory of our profession, having a * great 
 High Priest, Jesus the Son of God, who is passed into 
 the heavens,' and not to seek honor one of another — a 
 practice which led away the Jews from faith in Christ. 
 As much as in me lieth I withdraw men from confi- 
 dence in any creature, to the only true God, and Jesus 
 Christ, his only Son, our Lord, in whom whosoever be- 
 lieveth shall never die. With all the earnestness of 
 which I am capable I urge them to seek pardon from 
 
ULRICH ZW INGLE: LATER MLWISTRY. 245 
 
 Him who invites iis to turn to him even when we have 
 sinned, saying, ' Come unto me, all ye that labor and are 
 heavy-laden, and I will give you rest/ This word of 
 his I so firmly believe that should circumstances require 
 I think I have no need of either bishop or priest to 
 make satisfaction for me, for whom Christ hath done 
 that, who ^gave himself an offering for us, and hath 
 washed us from our sins in his own blood.' I exhort 
 men to pray without ceasing, but to do it with the spirit 
 and the heart; Mn spirit and in truth/ as our Lord's 
 words are ; and to persevere therein with an importunity 
 which might seem to be wearisome, according to the 
 parable of the w^idow/' 
 
 Zwingle's statements of evangelical truth were calm, 
 clear and logical. His appeal was always made to the 
 word of God. Less impetuous than Luther, seldom 
 moving great assemblies by that impassioned oratory 
 which distinguislied the Wittenberg monk, and never 
 reaching, in defence of the truth, that moral grandeur 
 which immortalized the latter at the Diet of Worms, in 
 some respects he was a safer guide. He did not agree 
 with Luther's views of the Lord's Supper. Whilst 
 Luther rejected the Romish doctrine of transubstantia- 
 tiou, the conversion of the bread and wine in the sacra- 
 ment into the body and blood of Jesus Christ, the wav- 
 ing of a priest's hand turning mere emblems into a very 
 God — a doctrine alike contradictory to the Scriptures 
 and to common sense — yet, as is well known, he held a 
 view which closely approximates to t ran substantiation 
 and is less comprehensible — commonly called consub- 
 stantiation. He maintained that the bread and the 
 wine remain unchanged, but tliat there is present with 
 
246 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 them the substance of the body of Christ, literally re 
 ceived by the communicant. 
 
 Zwingle taught that the elements in the Eucharist are 
 simply oiiiblems of the body and the blood of Christ. The 
 expression, '^ This is my body/' is not to be literally in- 
 terpreted any more than the like expressions, " I am the 
 door " and ^^ I am the true vine.'' The bread sig-nifies 
 or represents the body ; the wine, the blood of our Lord. 
 In this view Zwingle was undoubtedly correct, and 
 Luther's theory of consubstantiation was wrong. So 
 say most of the Reformed churches of to-day. Yet 
 Zwin2:le, in his reaction from Rome as touchino; this 
 sacrament, erred in making it simply a memorial. It is 
 one of the most effective means of grace, and something 
 more is intended by our Confession, which, in harmony 
 with the view of other evangelical churches, teaches 
 that in the sacrament we receive, not corporally but 
 spiritually, the body and blood of our Lord. Faith 
 feeds upon Christ. The soul is nourished. The de- 
 vout communicant goes up to higher grounds. The 
 graces of the Spirit grow stronger as he communes with 
 Christ in this beautiful and significant rite of Christ's 
 own appointment. Zwingle rejected the mass, which 
 claimed to be a repetition of Christ's sacrifice. The 
 oifering made on Calvary was made for all time. The 
 mass degrades the cross ; it makes the priest a savior. 
 It places the altar of human creation between the soul 
 and the Lamb of God. Zwingle presented his views 
 in the ^reat council. His friend Oswald Mvconius and 
 prominent men of Zurich expressed their accord with 
 him. They asked that the Lord's Supper, as instituted 
 by Christ and observed by the apostles, should be re^ 
 
ULRICH ZWINGLE: LATER MINISTRY. 247 
 
 stored in its simplicity and spiritual significance. The 
 council was deeply moved both by the words and by the 
 spirit of the petitions. It was a solemn and interesting 
 day in the history of the Church. The council decided 
 that the mass should be suppressed and the Lord's Sup- 
 per celebrated in accordance with apostolic usage. 
 
 On the following day, which was '^ Holy Thursday," 
 the old cathedral witnessed the re-establishment of the 
 sacrament. It was like a passage from a sepulchre cold, 
 dark and offensive into the genial sunlight, the air 
 fragrant with flowers and resonant with song. It seemed 
 as if the darkness of ages had been cleft and the light 
 of apostolic days had shone through. The living Christ 
 again sat at the board, and John leaned upon his bosom. 
 For three consecutive days the Supper was celebrated, 
 the communicants being divided into three classes — the 
 young, the middle-aged and the old. The younger 
 people shed tears of joy. The older men and women 
 turned their eyes toward Christ's home, now in sight. 
 We sit in the radiance of that day which gilded the hill- 
 tops and flooded the valleys of the Switzerland. 
 
 Zwingle and Luther met at the council at Marburg. 
 The landgrave of Hesse had convened these men and 
 other representatives of the conflicting views touching 
 the Lord's Supper. They agreed on all other points. 
 The controversy was prolonged. Luther insisted on a 
 real presence in the sacrament. He was immovable. 
 Zwingle was firm, but milder than the sturdy Saxon. 
 At length, agreement being impossible, he said with much 
 gentleness and affection, " Martin Luther, let us confess 
 our union in all things in which we agree, and, as for the 
 rest, let us remember that we are brothers, with the 
 
 17 
 
248 EOMANISM A^^D THE REFORMERS. 
 
 same cause at heart. While we all hold the grand doc- 
 trine of salvation by faith, we cannot consent to <liffer 
 on minor points." The landgrave joined in the appeal. 
 There was an anxious pause. Will Luther yield? 
 Zwingle advanced toward the latter, great tears rolling 
 down his careworn face, and extended his hand. Luther 
 refused it. The principle of Christian union, agreement 
 in essential truths and libertv of thouo;ht in other thino-s 
 was rejected by the man who by the opposite course 
 might have added additional lustre to his name and 
 aided that Reformation of which he was the glorious sun. 
 The Swiss Reformers departed in sadness, yet uttering 
 no words of reproach. We admire Zwingle's spirit 
 at Marburg, and the memory of it mantles his later 
 faults. 
 
 Rome exulted over the disputes of the Reformers. 
 The Reformation suffered a temporary check. i\Iany 
 who were favorably disposed to it feared such divergence 
 of sentiment as would multiply organic divisions in tlie 
 Protestant Church, and so strengthen the power of the 
 papists, who were professedly a unit in their beliefs. 
 Yet these unhappy divisions were no doubt overruled 
 for good. The truth was conserved by them. The 
 Church of the Reformation escaped the snares which 
 beset the Roman hierarchy. The latter had grown to l)e 
 an ecclesiastical monopoly. It arrogated to itself a 
 blasphemous infallibility. It trampled on all freedom of 
 thought and hurried the heretic to the block or the stake. 
 
 Truth is many sided. It is broad and high. No 
 
 mind can comprehend its fullness nor set in order its 
 
 varied relations. Luther's consubstantiation may have 
 
 "embodied an important truth, as did Zwingle's view of 
 
ULEIGH ZW INGLE: LATER MINISTRY. 249 
 
 the sacrameut. The one magnified the presence of Christ ; 
 the other simplified the ordinance, and removed it, further 
 than did Luther's, from the errors of Rome. And now, 
 in the prevailing belief of Christendom, the erroneous 
 elements have been eliminated from both, and we have 
 attained a more scriptural apprehension of the nature 
 and design of this divine ordinance. The Rhone and 
 the Arve of the Reformation, mutually repellant for a 
 time, have become a more harmonious unity, clarified 
 in the passage and more helpful to the spiritual life. 
 
 At this stage, the two Reformers maintaining divergent 
 views, Rome would gladly have received Zwingle back 
 to the bosom of the Church. Papists said liUther was 
 past reclamation, but the Swiss heretic might be restored. 
 Might not a bribe avail? They exhibited the regalia of 
 an imposing hierarchy, and intimated that a bishop's mitre 
 or a cardinal's hat should crown the head of the return- 
 ing prodigal. But Zwingle was immovable as his Saxon 
 brother. Then Lucerne hung him in Q^gy, and so 
 predicted an ignominious death. But he remained firm, 
 trusting in God. Hottinger, who had denounced the 
 mass as a lie, was beheaded. Still, Zwingle was unin- 
 timidated, ready to preach the truth with holy boldness, 
 and ready, too, to wear a martyr's crown. He simplified 
 the worship of the Reformed Church. Pagan features 
 were cast off; crucifixes and pictures were removed from 
 the walls of the churches. Even the organ, which Rome 
 had abused, was rejected. Appeals to the senses and 
 whatever promoted mere sentimentality were discon- 
 tinued. Thereafter the people transacted more directly 
 with God. Worship became less aesthetic but more 
 spiritual, and the Church went up to higher plains. 
 
250 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 But the way was not uniformly smooth nor the 
 ascent continuous. Zwingle kept his eyes on the heights 
 which seemed to touch the jasper walls, but there were 
 rough places in the roacl, sharp stones that pierced the 
 feet and dark ravines through which he traveled wear- 
 ily on. Soon these troubles culminated in war. The 
 five cantons of Switzerland which adhered to the 
 Romish Church were arrayed against the two cantons 
 which supported the Reformation — Zurich and Berne. 
 The papists demanded submission to the pope. An 
 alarming message was sent to the pulpit of the cathe- 
 dral in Zurich. Zwingle heard the mutteriugs of the ap- 
 proaching storm and the tramp of bloodthirsty foes. The 
 red banner is already moving northward. The cathedral 
 seems to grow strangely dark. The place is solemn as 
 eternity. What shall be done? Does Zwingle waver? 
 Not by a hair's breadth. Lifting his hand toward 
 heaven he said, " Never will I deny my Redeemer.'* 
 The scene was sublime. It links itself with the grander 
 attitude of Luther in the presence of Charles Y. and 
 under the shadow of the pontifical sword. He left the 
 ])ulpit, and never returned to it. He had unwisely coun- 
 seled war. His weapons hereafter are to be carnal rather 
 than spiritual. It was a sad mistake. The great coun- 
 cil assembled at Zurich. It vacillated, then decided. 
 The gauntlet was thrown down. The night set in. 
 The elements were in commotion. The tempest rolled 
 its thunders across the dark fields of the sky, and the 
 sobbings of women and children mingled with the wail 
 of the storm. The ringing of bells — a call not to wor- 
 ship, but to war — only seemed to heighten the universal 
 terror. 
 
' ULBICH ZWTNGLE: LATER MINISTRY. 251 
 
 The next raorDing Zwingle mounted his war-steed. 
 He believed God called him, and he was prepared for 
 the worst. If the Reformation must fall on the battle- 
 
 I field, he would fall with it, Without it life would be a 
 burden only and the earth accursed. As he rode down 
 the street his wife looked on with eyes undimmed. She 
 
 II had long been in the school of suffering, and was inured 
 I to pain. She accepted this new trial as direct from God, 
 
 and meekly said, " Holy Father, thy will be done." A 
 
 little baud of Zurichers, not over five hundred in all, 
 
 and Zwingle their captain, went forth to the unhappy 
 
 strife. Over the stormy heights and adown the valleys 
 
 they urged their way. They ascended the Albis. They 
 
 I hastened through Husen. They entered the deep woods 
 
 \ beyond it. Their foes were concealed, watching their 
 
 advance. The guns of the papists were lowered. A 
 
 calm voice sounded down the line, ^' In the name of the 
 
 Holy Trinity, of God the Father, the Son and the 
 
 Holy Ghost, of the Holy Mother of God and of all 
 
 the heavenly host, fire I" Brave Zurichers bit the dust. 
 
 Their surviving brothers were exhorted to quit them- 
 
 j selves like men. Zwingle, as their captain, bade them 
 
 I be strong. ^'Warriors !'' he cried, " fear nothing. Our 
 
 \ cause is good. Commend yourselves to God." The 
 
 \ battle grew fierce. Guns answered guns. Before the 
 
 fire of the Waldstettes the Zurichers fell as the corn 
 
 before the scythe. Lavater, their general, was in the 
 
 j ditch. Gerold Meyer of Knonau, son of Anna Zwingle, 
 
 slept his last sleep. John Haller, the brave preacher 
 
 and courageous soldier, and many of the mighty men 
 
 of Zurich were slain. Zwingle in his warrior dress 
 
 bends over a dying man, bidding him in this dark hour 
 
252 ROMANISM AND THE REFOBMEBS. 
 
 trust in Him who conquered death. As he spoke a stone 
 which the enemy threw smote him to the ground. He 
 rose as the blows thickened, only to fall again. Then a 
 Waldstette thrust him with a lance, and as he saw the 
 life-current flowing out and down, he exclaimed, " They 
 may indeed kill the body, but they cannot kill the soul.'* 
 The words had scarce passed his lips when he fell to the 
 earth, his face toward heaven. The enemy pursued the 
 Zurichers, trampling on the bodies of their dead. The 
 battle at Cappel has issued, for the Protestant cantons, 
 in an inglorious defeat. Their leaders are slain. The 
 flower of their youth cover the high places. Their 
 widows and children mourn and refuse to be comforted. 
 Zwingle, the great and beloved, the Luther of Helvetia, 
 his name the synonym of moral grandeur, whose faults 
 declared him human and magnified the grace of God 
 Avhich wrought in and through him, has perished by the 
 sword. Ages will pass before Switzerland shall know 
 his like again. Only eight-and-forty years of age, not 
 robed in the garment of peace, but in a martial cloak, 
 on his head a helmet and in his hand a sword, he passes 
 through death to the invisible beyond. Would that he 
 had gone, as did Luther who followed him, from the 
 pulpit to the grave, or from loving ministries among his 
 Zurich flock to the green pastures of the better laud ! 
 But God otherwise permitted. And from the shadow 
 of the pear tree under which he died and was burned to 
 ashes there ring out to the earth's limits and down to 
 our happier age the words of Martin Luther, a sad re- 
 proof and an impressive warning: "Christians fight 
 not with sword and arquebuse, but with suiferings and 
 the cross," or that diviner word of the Prince of peace, 
 
ULRICH ZWIiXGLE: LATER MINISTRY. 253 
 
 " Thej that take the sword shall perish with the 
 sword/^ 
 
 There was great lameutatlou in Zurich wheu it was 
 announced, ^^ Zwingle is dead/^ Anna, the sorrow-bur- 
 dened widow, with her children about her. bowed in 
 uncontrollable grief at her Saviour's feet and besought 
 strength to bear her load. And when the cry went down 
 the streets, '' Avengers of Zwingle's death, on to Albis !" 
 an excited throng hastened toward the battle-ground of 
 Cappel. But better counsels jn-evailed. The conquerors 
 entered into a treaty with the vanquished cantons, by 
 which was granted to the latter the undisturbed posses- 
 sion of the faith for which they had so bravely fought. 
 And thus, though at a fearful cost, the Reformation In 
 Zurich and Berne held Its ground. Purged by fire and 
 baptized with blood, it marched forth to grander tri- 
 umphs on the fields of truth. The g<:)spel of peace 
 spread abroad. Down the valleys it extended its benig- 
 nant sway. In Tockenberg and on all the Alpine slopes 
 it reared its sanctuaries, and simple spires pointed heav- 
 enward. Beyond the limits of the Switzer's mountain- 
 girt home, it traveled westward, over the plains of beau- 
 tiful France and across the Channel to the British Isles, 
 whence, in another age, rebaptized with blood. It crossed 
 the Atlantic to dwell amid primeval forests along our 
 eastern coast, pursuing thence Its triumphant way to the 
 Valley of the Mississippi ; nay, far beyond it, to that 
 "continuous wood where flows the Oregon." - 
 
 Thanks be unto God for the precious faith he restored 
 to the race by the hands of Luther and Zwingle ; for the 
 religious freedom of our times ; for all the fruits of 
 ria;hteousuess which beautifv our own and other lands, 
 
254 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 and for the blessed hope which adds histre to our da>'s 
 and ilhimines our nights, that Jesus, the Sin-atoner and 
 Advocate with the Father, will come again and make 
 this sin-defiled, woe-disfigured earth his own fair earth 
 again ! 
 
 O thou blessed Christ, only Head of the Church, only 
 Saviour of the lost, hasten it in thy time ! Amen. 
 
i 
 
 CALVIN IN FRANCE. 
 
''Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, 
 who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly 
 places in Christ : accordirig as he hath chosen 21s in him before 
 the fou7idation of the world, that we should be holy and with- 
 out blame before him in love.'' 
 
 Eph. I : 3, 4. 
 
 " The doctrine of this high mystery of predestination is to be 
 handled with special prudeiice and care, that men attending 
 the will of God revealed in his word, and yielding obedience 
 thereunto, 7nay,from the ceiiainty of their effectual vocation, 
 be ass2i7'ed of their eternal election. So shall this doctrine af- 
 ford matter of praise, reverence, and adriiiration of God ; and 
 of humility, diligence, and abundant consolation to all that 
 sincerely obey the gospel.'" 
 
 Con. Faith, chap. hi. sec. viii. 
 
CALVIN m FRANCE. 
 
 WE are to study the life of John Calvin, the great 
 French Reformer, the expounder and defender of 
 that system of faith which bears his name, the system 
 set forth by Christ and his apostles, which had become 
 obscured by the erroneous teachings of the papacy, and 
 was brought to light again in the sixteenth century with 
 a clearness of annunciation and a measure of spiritual 
 power which made it appear almost a new revelation 
 from heaven. 
 
 For centuries the Church in France, as in the remoter 
 East, had been departing from the simplicity of the Gos- 
 pel. The fundamental doctrine of Christianity — justifi- 
 cation by faith — was fading from the minds of men, and 
 a blind legal obedience had been substituted for the 
 righteousness of our Lord. The intercession of saints 
 was practically extolled above the mediation of Christ; 
 the pope was lifted to the dignity of a god, and a super- 
 stitious worship took the place of spiritual culture. 
 The priesthood was ignorant, depraved and corrupting. 
 The people were sunk in all manner of vice, and the 
 world seemed drifting away into heathenism, dark and 
 hopeless, whilst a material cross, its spiritual significance 
 almost or quite forgotten, lifted to the dome of a Christ- 
 less religion, intercepted the light of the Sun of right- 
 eousness and threw its deadly shadow along the track of 
 
 257 ^ 
 
258 BOMANJSM AND THE REFORMEBS, 
 
 the ages. There remained, it is true, reminiscences of 
 the apostolic faith. There were shreds of truth woven 
 in the winding-sheet of death. A few were able to dis- 
 
 o 
 
 criminate between the true and the false, and now and 
 then appeared examples of piety which shone like tapers 
 in the midst of the darkness, yet failed to disperse the 
 gloom. 
 
 But God has not forgotten his covenant. The world 
 has been purchased by the blood of his Son, and Christ 
 shall inherit it when the fullness of time is come. The 
 truth which is hidden in the imperishable Word shall 
 assert its divine power. The light which struggles 
 through the leaden clouds shall rend them, and the now 
 invisible heavens shall yet flood the earth with glory. 
 
 When the monk of Erfurt was girding himself for 
 his life-work God gave to the world another Reformer, 
 whose mission it was to do for France what Luther did 
 for Germany, and to carry on the Reformation which 
 Luther began. John Calvin was born at Noyon in 
 Picardy, in the north of France, on the 10th of July, 
 1509. His father was procurator fiscal of the county of 
 Noyon ; his mother, Joanna Franc, was reputed to be 
 one of the most beautiful women of her day. John was 
 the second son, and probably had four brothers. There 
 seems to have been in the family a proclivity to heresy, 
 as Rome would style the Protestant faith, for an older 
 brother, when dying, refused the sacrament of extreme 
 unction, and for his impiety received an ignominious 
 burial, whilst the younger members of the family were 
 in accord with the illustrious Reformer. 
 
 In the seventeenth year of hiv^ age we find Calvin in 
 the college of La Marche, in Paris. Here he attracted 
 
CALVIN IN FRANCE. 259 
 
 the attention of the distinguished professor Miithurin 
 Cordier, and between the tAvo there grew up a strong 
 and enduring attachment honorable to both. They were 
 much together during the intervals of study, conversing 
 in the library, walking the college halls or communing 
 with nature in the fields or forest beyond. There was 
 much in the pupiFs sedate deportment, his thirst for 
 knowledge and his maturity of mind, as well as in his 
 quiet and confiding disposition, to call forth the respect- 
 ful regard of the teacher. This association of Calvin 
 with a man of great learning, refined taste and dignity 
 of character had a marked influence on the young student, 
 and he carried with him through all after years grateful 
 remembrance of his college days and the friendship of 
 Cordier. 
 
 But the time came when the teacher and his prot^g^ 
 must part. The separation was a sorrowful one. Cal- 
 vin was intended for a priest, and he must go elsewhere 
 to complete his preparation for holy orders. His con- 
 nection thereafter was with Montaigu College in the 
 same city. Here he outstripped all his fellow-students ; 
 his genius surprised his teachers. His familiarity with 
 the great names and works of the Augustinian age, and 
 his rapid advancement in all branches of study, were 
 perhaps without a parallel in the history of this Parisian 
 college. But he did not seem conscious of his own 
 superiority ; he was diffident, retiring, to a fault. He 
 was far removed from levity and from all the vices into 
 which young men w^re apt to fall. He seemed to move 
 in a sphere of human excellence that comparatively few 
 entered. But he was by no means a Christian. At- 
 tached to the Romish Church, bound hand and foot by 
 
260 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 its superstitious, atteutive to all the ceremouies of a cold, 
 wearisome ritual, he was reputed emineutlj pious. His 
 religion was self-righteousness. His life was death. 
 
 But in the course of time the light which had arisen 
 on Germany advanced westward. Mountains were no 
 barrier to its progress. National lines could set no limits 
 to its onward course. The fame of Luther and Melanch- 
 thon reached Paris. Their names were spoken, at least 
 in whispers, within the walls of the Sorbonne and Mon- 
 taigu. The strongest intellects were the first to grasp 
 the great principles of the Reformation and to expe- 
 rience their power. 
 
 Young Calvin turned his face toward the East, and 
 with an eagle eye looked steadily and inquiringly on the 
 strange light along the horizon. One day, in this atti- 
 tude of inquiry, there stood beside him one of his kins- 
 men, Robert Pierre Olivetan, a convert to the Protestant 
 faith. " There are many false religions," said Olivetan, 
 " and only one true." Calvin replied that the proposi- 
 tion was self-evident. " The false," continued his friend, 
 " are those which men have invented, according to which 
 we are saved by our own works ; the true is that which 
 comes from God, according to which salvation is given 
 freely from on high." Calvin looked bewildered, but 
 weighed every word as Olivetan proceeded: "True re- 
 ligion is not that infinite mass of ceremonies and observ- 
 ances which the Church imposes upon its followers and 
 which separates souls from Christ. O my dear friend, 
 leave off shouting with the papists, The Fathers ! the 
 Doctors ! the Church ! and listen instead to the prophets 
 and apostles. Study i\\Q Scriptures." But Calvin re- 
 sisted the strange heresy. He believed the foundations 
 
CALVIN IN FRANCE. 261 
 
 of popery were on a rock, aud sooner would the dome 
 of the heavens dissolve than the religion of his fathers 
 pass away. But the light which he saw above the hills 
 is traveling upwai-d. It is a solemn time. The words 
 of his friend wake strange echoes in the dimly-lighted 
 chambers of his soul, and will not be stilled. By and 
 by the earth appears to move, and then to sink beneath 
 his feet. He begins to wake as if from a horrid dream. 
 Things are not what they seem. Like the monk of 
 Erfurt, he retires to his chamber. The Holy Spirit 
 convinces him of sin. He is alarmed as he looks at 
 himself in the light of God's holiness and trembles with 
 apprehensions of eternity. He knows his relations to 
 God are wrong ; that he is the servant of sin ; that he 
 has no spiritual acquaintance with Christ ; that he is 
 unprepared for li.fe and unfit for death. His spiritual^ 
 guides — blind leaders, all of them — bade him submit to 
 the teachings of the Church and go on as he had begun. 
 If his sins troubled him, he had but to confess to a 
 priest and receive absolution. If the load returned and 
 was heavier than before, then there was another resort 
 which would not fail him — penances, fastings and pro- 
 longed prayer to the saints. He obeyed. His faith in 
 the Church had been strong. His connection could not 
 be readily destroyed. His religion was not like a gar- 
 ment which is put on and thrown off at pleasure. Like 
 a tree which is not torn from the earth except by a re- 
 sistless storm, with roots lacerated and bleeding, so Cal- 
 vin could be removed from the old faith in which he had 
 been firmly grounded only by a power which was might- 
 ier than man's ; and even that he would resist until every 
 former connection was destroyed and a religion more in 
 
262 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 harmony with the word of God and human need was dis- 
 covered. Weeks went on — weeks of anxious inquiry 
 after the truth. Calvin is walking thoughtfully along 
 a street in Paris. He is approaching the great cathedral 
 of Notre Dame, when he observes a vast assemblage of 
 people jostling each other in the wide court before him. 
 A noted priest has been charged with heresy. False to 
 the Church, he must die. There is a rope about his 
 neck and men are leading him to the place of execution. 
 They bind him to the stake, and this man, who had been 
 received to the confidence of kings and had done service 
 for the Church of Rome, because he will not bow^ the 
 knee to Mary and worship the Host, is burned alive. 
 The glare of that fire shone on Calvin's face, and that 
 day Rome unwittingly cast the hangman's rope around 
 the neck of her own superstition. All thought of being 
 a priest is now dismissed. He had received the tonsure 
 and had been appointed chaplain of the cathedral of 
 Noyon at the early age of twelve, but the father, through 
 whose influence these churchly distinctions had been con- 
 ferred, now consents to his son's prosecuting the study 
 of the law, and Calvin goes to Orleans, where he be- 
 comes the student of Pierre I'Etoile, the most distin- 
 guished jurist of France. The genius of the pupil coukl 
 not escape the notice of the discerning L'Etoile. The 
 latter loved the youth with almost a womanly tendei'- 
 ness, and, great as he was himself, felt honored in hav- 
 ing for his student a young man who, he thought, might 
 yet be one of the leading scholars and jurists of the age. 
 At Orleans, Calvin formed the acquaintance of Mel- 
 chior Wolmar, a teacher of Greek, whose influence over 
 him was marked and lasting. Under the instructions 
 
CALVIN IN FRANCE, 263 
 
 of Wolmar, Calvin became master of the language 
 in which the New Testament was written, and so was 
 being prepared to become the most distinguished com- 
 mentator of the Scriptures in that or any succeeding 
 century. Here observe the wisdom of divine Providence. 
 At Orleans, with Pierre FEtoile to instruct him in the 
 principles of the law and Wolmar in the greater truths 
 of revelation and experience, Calvin is being educated for 
 a position of usefulness and power in which, as a civil 
 magistrate and a teacher of theology, he helped on the 
 Reformation to that glorious triumph which was ever 
 after the joy of the Church and the wonder of the world. 
 Without Calvin the gospel might not have crossed the 
 Rhine or the Reformation might have languished in the 
 land of its birth. But God raised him up to execute 
 his own purposes of grace, and led him, step by step, 
 along what at first seemed a tortuous path, but was, in 
 fact, the only possible way by which he could have been 
 fitted for that work which opened all the avenues of the 
 world to the onward march of the truth. At Orleans 
 the highest honors were conferred on the young Calvin, 
 and at the age of twenty-two — the same at which Martin 
 Luther was made doctor of philosophy — he was pro- 
 nounced the most learned man in Europe, and, a little 
 later, "of Rome, in its decline, the greatest dread.^^ 
 Here he grew in the knowledge of Christ. The mists 
 of 'error which had hung over him were passing away. 
 The Sun of righteousness shone with increased power, 
 and he rejoiced in God his Saviour with exceeding joy. 
 He referred his salvation to sovereign grace. He felt 
 that he deserved nothing, for he had nothing. Christ 
 was his all in all. " I have not merited thee by my 
 
 18 
 
264 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 love, O Christ," he said ; " thou hast loved me of thy 
 free will. I come to thee naked and empty, and I find 
 everything here." And kneeling by the cross, on his 
 head the droppings of the Saviour's blood, he conse- 
 crated himself and his all to Christ. 
 
 Calvin's stay at Orleans was suddenly terminated by 
 the dangerous illness of his father. He spent a season 
 under the roof of his childhood, and after the partial 
 recovery of his father went to Bourges. Here he again 
 met Wolmar, the Greek professor, who supplied him 
 with the writings of Luther, Melanchthon and other 
 German Reformers, and subsequently urged him to be- 
 come himself a preacher of the resurrected faith. Cal- 
 vin doubted his fitness for such a work. Who is suf- 
 ficient for these things? But he became a teacher with- 
 out designing it. Groups of friends clustered about him 
 and listened with delight to his exposition of the Script- 
 ures. Then he was induced to visit the neighboring 
 towns and villages, and he roused the indignation of the 
 priests by his bold denunciation of the errors of the 
 Church. He was sowing the seed from which sprang 
 the three thousand Reformed churches of France in his 
 own day. 
 
 Whilst thus engaged there came a message from 
 Noyon announcing his father's death. He left Bourges 
 with much sorrow, and his sudden departure cast a 
 gloom over the little groups of Christians to whom' he 
 had preached " none but Christ." All the incidents of 
 his life which we shall relate had an important bearing 
 on his relations to his subsequent career of usefulness. 
 Returning homeward, he passed through Paris. Again 
 the fires of persecution were raging. Berquin, a learned 
 
CALVIN IN FRANCE. 265 
 
 Qoble, had been charged with heresy and cast into prison. 
 The day of his trial is come. His heresy is proved. 
 The sentence passed upon him is humiliating, but 
 bravely borne ; thus it runs : " You shall be led to the 
 front of the church of Notre Dame, where you shall do 
 penance to God and the glorious Virgin his Mother. 
 Afterward you shall have your tongue pierced, that 
 instrument of unrighteousness by which you have so 
 grievously sinned. Lastly, you shall be taken to the 
 prison of Monsieur de Paris [the bishop] and be shut 
 up there all your life between four walls of stone, and 
 we forbid you to be supplied either with books to read 
 or pen and ink to write." The queen of Navarre had 
 interceded for him, but in vain. It was evident that 
 Rome intended uothins: less than his death. A little 
 later armed men entered his cell. He knew their 
 errand ; he was ready to suffer for Christ ; he walked 
 forth with a firm step and an unfaltering fliitli which 
 
 ■ took hold on heaven. Arrived at the place of execution, 
 a rope was cast about his neck, and when strangled they 
 cast his dead body into the flames. The queen of 
 Navarre wept; Christians who had tlirowu off the 
 chain of a corrupt religion realized their danger, but 
 said, " We are ready to die. We set our eyes on the 
 life to come." Beyond the smoke of the burning 
 fagots they saw a kingdom of righteousness and peace, 
 and were anxious to enter it, even though the way led 
 through a girdle of fire. Rome thought by persecution 
 to throw an invincible barrier across the path of the 
 Reformation. But from the ashes of each martyr there 
 sprung up a host of Christians, full armed and ready 
 for the fight. The Lord of battles was gathering his 
 
2C)6 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 forces. His enemies may have seemed to triumph, 
 but afterward they were either converted to the truth 
 or made to lick the dust. 
 
 Calvin went forth from the capital more fully resolved 
 than ever before to defend the principles for which noble 
 saints had dared to die. He spent a few months at 
 Noyon, visited his father's grave, walked thoughtfully 
 along the well-worn paths of early years, went, in sad- 
 ness relieved by hope, to the old cathedral where the 
 Virgin Mary obscured her Son ; then returned to Paris. 
 
 Now there arise questions of duty which must be 
 prayerfully met. What is to be the work of his life? 
 The way does not seem clear. There is a cloud upon 
 it, and he can take only one step at a time. But he at 
 length determines to enter upon the work of an evan- 
 gelist. He preached Christ whenever and wherever an 
 opportunity offered — now in the house of some noble 
 Parisian, then to a little group in the gardens, on the 
 banks of the Seine or under the shadow of the college 
 walls. The people said of the gospel, " It is always a fire, 
 but when Calvin explains it the fire shines with unusual 
 brilliancy." Still, comparatively few knew the retiring 
 youth. He walked the streets with bowed head, in 
 though tfulness passing quietly and unobserved. The 
 carriages of the nobility as they rolled by arrested the 
 attention of the loungers at the caf^s or in the gardens 
 of the Palais Royal. Some great pageant swept down 
 the boulevards and the onlookers huzzahed. But who 
 knew John Calvin? Who cared for him? Yet a 
 greater than Francis I. is he. There goes the man 
 who shall yet stir all Europe with his eloquence — who 
 shall enkindle in beautiful France and in the valleys 
 
CALVIN IN FRANCE. 267 
 
 overshadowed by the Alps a light that shall enlighten 
 the world — who shall lift the cross of Christ higher than 
 the dome of St. Peter's or of Notre Dame, that the sin- 
 burdened may see it. His name shall live until the end 
 of time. 
 
 In his preaching Calvin gave much prominence to the 
 justice of God, whilst he did not fail to emphasize the 
 divine love. God was recognized as the moral Ruler as 
 well as a tender Father. The guilt of sin exceeds human 
 comprehension. The jierfectious of God and the integ- 
 rity of the divine government require its punishment. 
 At the same time, the death of Christ satisfies the broken 
 law, is sufficient for the chief of sinners and avails 
 for all who believe. 
 
 The exercise of grace was sovereign. His doctrine 
 of predestination seemed to conflict with free agency, but 
 the two were as reconcilable in his judgment as are 
 the two natures in the per.^^on of Christ. He cut at the 
 roots of self-righteousness, self-reliance and natural 
 ability, and made salvation dependent upon the sovereign 
 and abundant mercy of God exercised through Christ 
 his only Son. There was a strength and a restfulness in 
 his theological system which Pelagianism never knew. 
 The eternal throne was surrounded with a moral glory 
 which men could not have borne had not God spread his 
 cloud upon it and suffered his divine clemency to shine 
 through. There is power in great ideas. They mould 
 character and life. Hence Calvinists in every age have 
 been the strong, potential men in Church and State — 
 men of moral stamina, brave defenders of the truth, 
 leaders in every true reform, holding communion with 
 Him who is invisible, their works wrought under his 
 
268 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 iiispioction aud in the strength wliich comes from above. 
 They were the men who planted the Church on the Brit- 
 ish Isles, who suffered for righteousness' sake at Smith- 
 field and on the Oxford common and in the hill-country 
 of Scotland ; the men who came to the wilds of America 
 that they might receive from God the pattern of the 
 tabernacle ; who laid the foundations of civil aud relig- 
 ious freedom in the New World, and with faces turned 
 toward heaven, fearing nothing so much as sin, seeking 
 grace and guidance and power from above, passed quiet- 
 ly and trustfully westward, filling the solitudes with 
 villages, turning the wilderness into fruitful fields, es- 
 tablishing churches, schools and beneficent government, 
 and advancing every interest which enriches life in both 
 worlds. This is said to the glory of God, who employs 
 human agencies, and ofttimes the humblest, to consummate 
 his holy purpose. In view of this it has well been re- 
 marked that " to have been the spiritual father of the 
 Puritans for three hundred years is itself evidence of 
 moral and intellectual excellence, and will link the name 
 of Calvin with some of the greatest movements that 
 have marked our modern civilization." 
 
 Recognizing Calvin's power, efforts were made at an 
 early period to detain him in the Church of Rome. His 
 friends would make him vicar-general with episcopal 
 power. That position might be only the first round in 
 the ladder up which he might go to the highest office 
 the hierarchy knew. What a field in which to exercise 
 his genius, to command the reverence of men, to gratify 
 a natural love of power ! Will he be ensnared by such 
 a bait? No. The Vatican and St. Peter's have no 
 attractions for him. A nobler destiny is possible than 
 
CALVIN IN FRANCE. 269 
 
 that the pontificate offers. He has covcnauted to live 
 for Christ, to declare the truth, to seek the deliverance 
 of the bound. His mission lies outside the pale of the 
 Romish Church. Reformation within it is impossible. 
 It is God^s purpose that he shall ally himself with the 
 little band of Christians hidden in the valleys of Pied- 
 mont who have never bowed the knee to Baal, holding 
 the truth as it is in Jesus, waiting there for one anointed 
 of the Lord who shall lead them forth into broader fields 
 and on to more glorious triumphs. 
 
 Soon, in disguise, moving cautiously along unfrequent- 
 ed streets, Calvin makes his way out of Paris, an exile 
 from the city he has loved, in which he had hoped to 
 labor undisturbed and long. He traveled many weary, 
 anxious leagues until he came to the venerable city of 
 Angouleme. Here lived his friend Louis du Fillet, 
 canon of the cathedral, who occupied the ancestral man- 
 sion and inherited a library which was one of the most 
 valuable in France. Calvin received a cordial welcome 
 from his friend. In the hospitable mansion, near the 
 cathedral, overlooking the valley through which flowed 
 the Charente, he found a quiet retreat. The cries of 
 martyrs had died away when the spires of Paris faded 
 from his sight. Here in the great library he was happy. 
 His mind could feed on the treasures of the ages and 
 commune with the great whose works outlived them- 
 selves. There were nights that he refused sleep. Por- 
 ing over musty tomes, the light of his lone lamp shone 
 out into the darkness, burning on until the returning 
 sun gilded the cathedral dome. Then a hasty meal and 
 back again to his books, digging as for hid treasure, 
 resting not until the object of his search was found. 
 
270 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 Again, we find him discoiirsiug to a group of intellect- 
 ual meu on the great themes of the gospel. They pro- 
 nounce him an incomparable preacher ; " none can 
 equal him/' they say, " in loftiness of language, concise- 
 ness of arrangement and majesty of style.'' It was 
 observed that he did not simply unfold some particular 
 doctrine of the gospel in a fullness before unknown, but 
 that his comprehensive and logical mind swept a wide 
 circuit of truth and arranged its parts in their mutual 
 relations and dependences, so forming a complete system 
 of faith and a divine unity. Dignitaries of the Church 
 became his disciples, and as he discoursed to them in 
 Latin, the language of the Church, they were drawn 
 into closer sympathy with the preacher and his faith. 
 The more rigid Romanists beo;an to be alarmed. The 
 man who could wield a power so irresistible, even over 
 those who had sworn fealty to the Roman See, was a 
 dangerous teacher. France had reason to dread his 
 presence more than that of the Saracens or the house of 
 Austria who had once and again thundered at her gates. 
 
 From Angouleme, Calvin went to Nerac, where he 
 met Le Fevre, a man of weak presence, but of strong 
 intellect, great learning and unswerving devotion to the 
 doctrine of justification by faith, in the advocacy of 
 which he had anticipated the Reformer of Germany. 
 Calvin regarded the old man with a deep and affectionate 
 interest, but went in advance of him in his idea of Re- 
 form. He insisted that the truth and vital godliness 
 demanded separation from the Church. He would pull 
 down the cathedrals of a corrupt religion and erect a bet- 
 ter sanctuary, from which should be for ever ex(;luded all 
 the errors in doctrine and in i)ractice that had emascula- 
 
CALVIN IN FRANCfJ. '2 VI 
 
 ted the Church of his fathers. Le Fevre surveyed the 
 youth with a look of miugled surprise and liope, saying, 
 " Young man, you will one day be a powerful instru- 
 ment in the Lord's hand. The world will obstinately 
 resist Jesus Christ ; but stand firm on thai Rock, and 
 many will be broken by it. God will make use of you 
 to restore the kingdom of heaven in France.'' It was a 
 touching sight — the aged Le Fevre gathering the dra- 
 pery of the night about him, soon to lie down in death ; 
 the young Calvin girding on his armor and stepping out 
 into the arena of religious strife to do battle for Christ 
 and his truth. They parted in tears, and met no more 
 until they clasped hands in heaven. 
 
 Subsequently, joined by Du Fillet, the young canon 
 of Angouleme, our Reformer went to Poictiers, where 
 some of the noblest men of the realm gathered about 
 him and conversed Avith him touching the questions 
 which were agitating the Cliurch. He boldly denounced 
 the blasphemous dogma of transubstantiation, and ex- 
 alted spiritual fellowship with Christ. At the same time 
 he so magnified the ordinance of the Lord's Supper as to 
 receive the designation of " the sacramentarian." " Lu- 
 ther saw the truth," he said, '^ but he is like those who 
 are walking through a long and winding road : they 
 perceive afar the dim glimmer of a lamp, by means of 
 which they can grope their way along the path they must 
 follow. Zwingle approached the light, but, like those 
 who rush too hastily to good, he went beyond it." Re- 
 jecting the doctrine of Rome, that the wafer of the 
 sacrament is transmuted into ihQ body and blood of 
 Christ, and repudiating Luther's theory of consubstan- 
 tiation, which he could not comprehend, but which 
 
272 EOMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 seemed to savor of a real corporeal presence, he avoided 
 the other extreme of Zwingle, which made the Supper 
 a mere memorial of Christ's death, and took from it 
 much of its sweetness and power; maintaining the view 
 wliich now obtains in nearly all branches of the Re- 
 formed Church, and is thus expressed in the "Westmin- 
 ster Confession of Faith : " They that worthily com- 
 municate in the sacrament of the Lord's Supper, do 
 therein feed upon the body and blood of Christ, not 
 after a corporal or carnal, but in a spiritual manner ; yet 
 truly and really, while by faith they receive and apply 
 unto themselves Christ crucified and all the benefits of 
 his death." 
 
 About this time certain questions were raised as to the 
 relations of science and the Church. The papacy had 
 set its heel on popular learning. The Reformation 
 favored learning ; it clasped hands with science. It said 
 to the latter, ^' Study God in his works whilst we seek 
 him in his word. Nature and revelation are in accord 
 and mutually helpful. Piety will help the scientist 
 in his search for truth, and the discoveries he makes 
 in the realm of nature, in the earth and in the skies 
 shall enlarge the Christian's conception of the infinite 
 Creator." From that day to this the Protestant religion 
 has been the friend of science, opposing it only when 
 it has trampled on the word of God, readily accepting 
 its principles and facts when they have been in harmo- 
 ny with revelation. Although these may have involved 
 the sacrifice of traditional faith, they have never milita- 
 ted against the great essentials of the Christian system. 
 They never can. The same God, and only God, who laid 
 the foundations of the earth, who throirgh the operation 
 
 X 
 
CALVIN IN FRANCE. 273 
 
 of his owu laws arranged the strata of the solid globe 
 from the granite rock up to the friiit-bearlng alluvial, 
 and set the lights in heaven to rule the day and the 
 night, bringing forth Mazzaroth in his season and guid- 
 ing Arcturus with his sons, wrote each page of this rev- 
 elation through the agency of inspired men ; and it is 
 evident that he can never contradict himself A person- 
 al God, Creator and Preserver of all things ; a divine 
 Saviour, arrayed in the robe of human flesh ; salvation 
 for all who will believe in the sacrifice of the cross ; the 
 Bible a revelation of God clearer than that of nature, 
 yet in harmony with it ; a future state of rewards and 
 punishments, — these great principles of the Christian 
 system shall stand more immovable than Gibraltar and 
 more enduring than the stars, bearing us up in our go- 
 ings and girding our way to a better future. 
 
 Calvin, accompanied by Du Fillet, traveled through^ 
 the beautiful yet benighted France, kindling here and 
 there a light w^hich burned on when he passed to regions 
 beyond. He encountered spiritualists and pantheists, 
 with whom he measured swords, vanquishing them 
 with the truth, preaching Christ, proclaiming him the 
 Light of the world and the only blessedness of man. 
 
 Again for a little season in Paris, he met for the first 
 time, Michael Servetus, a young man of his own age, 
 whose wide learning, and especially his acquaintance 
 with natural science, had made him a name among the 
 scholars of that day. Servetus denied the Trinity and 
 mocked at the doctrine of justification by faith. Calvin 
 reasoned with him. " He sought," as he expressed it, 
 'Uo bring to the Spaniard such sentiments that all pious 
 men might take him affectionately by the hand." They 
 
274 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 arranged for a private conference, but Servetas failed to 
 appear. Years went on ; they met in a trying period of 
 the Reformation in the city beside Lake Leman, and 
 their names are associated in the annals of that greatest 
 revolution that ever shook the earth and sent its rever- 
 berating echoes through the heavens. 
 
 The fires of persecution were rekindled in Paris. 
 Calvin and Du Fillet determined to seek an asylum in 
 Germany. They secured a small sum of money, suffi- 
 cient to meet the expenses of the journey, and after a 
 series of painful experiences arrived at Strassburg, 
 strangers in the capital city of Alsace, gazing with won- 
 der on the great cathedral which towered into the sky 
 and threw its deep shadow across their path. Their 
 thoughts went to France. A feeling of homesickness 
 came over them, and yet they breathed more freely in 
 the air which carried in it sweet whispers of the gospel 
 — the first breathings of the great choral anthem which 
 should souud down the valleys of the Rhine and the 
 Rhone and ascend the Alps on its way to meet the songs 
 of angels as they announced the breaking over Europe 
 of the Reformation day. 
 
 Here our narrative must close for the present. We 
 have seen the young man of JSToyou advancing step by 
 step from the darkness into the light. We have noticed 
 the strange yet wise providences of God by which he 
 was being prepared for his work. "A man's heart de-j 
 viseth his way, but the Lord directeth his steps.'' The 
 lawyer of Orleans is to be the theologian of the six- 
 teenth century. The chaplain of the Noyon cathedral, 
 wlio might have climbed into St. Peter's chair, is to be 
 one of God's most honored instruments in the restora- 
 
CALVIN IN FBANQE. . 27.5 
 
 lion of the apostolic faith. He shall carry on the work 
 Luther began. He shall lay stone upon stone and rear 
 the dome of the temple of truth, which shall remain 
 until time shall end. 
 
 The faithfulness of a covenant-keeping God is seen in 
 all this. He will preserve his Church and perpetuate 
 the truth. Out of the darkness shall come a great light. 
 The little flock hidden for ages among the valleys of 
 Northern Italy and concealed in the caves of Central 
 Europe shall come forth from its seclusion at God's ap- 
 pointed time to claim and to possess the earth for Christ, 
 and transfer the crown from the head of the apostate 
 Leo to the Lamb of God, whose right it is to reign. 
 
CALVIN IN mn^. 
 
" Wherefore come ye out from among theju, and be ye separ- 
 ate, saith the Lord, and touch not the imclean thing, and I will 
 receive y 021. '^ 
 
 2 Cor. 6 : 17. 
 
 ''Religious worship is to be give?i to God, the Father. So?i, 
 and Holy Ghost; aiid to him alone; not to angels, saints, or 
 a?iy other creature : a?id since the fall, 7iot witho7it a mediator ; 
 7ior in the mediation of a?iy other but of Christ alo?iey 
 
 Confession of Faith, chap. xxi. sec. ii. 
 
 i 
 

 CALVIN IN GENEVA. 
 
 WE are to coDtinue our sketch of the life-work of 
 John Calvin. We parted with him at Strassburg, 
 There, a fugitive from persecution, attended by his friend 
 Du Fillet, the pious canon of Angouleme, he thought to 
 prepare himself more fully for the work of an evan- 
 gelist. 
 
 He is still a young man, twenty-five years of age, an 
 intellectual prodigy. He does not seem to have toiled 
 upward to this distinction by the slow stages through 
 which most men attain intellectual eminence and power, 
 but to have gone thither by a single stride. The sun 
 was in the zenith even before men looked for the dawn. 
 In him was realized the old dream of mythology con- 
 cerning Minerva — his greatness a creation rather than 
 a growth. Yet this is only a partial truth. Born a 
 genius, he was one of the severest students that any age 
 has produced. His power of will carried him on througli 
 all difficulties and over all obstacles. 
 
 If he turned his back on France and souglit seclusion, 
 it was only because he hoped to live and do great things 
 for God. He does not seem to have feared death. He 
 would have gone calmly to the stake if the Lord had so 
 appointed. But he believed he was called to a pro- 
 
 19 279 
 
280 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 tracted strife, not to early martyrdom ; and he put on 
 his coat of mail, burnished his armor and made ready 
 for the fight. 
 
 There is a portrait of the Reformer, traditionally cor- 
 rect, which is kept in a church on the Khine. It repre- 
 sents him as a young man and with a comely visage. 
 He was of small stature ; his face was pale and thin, its 
 expression intellectual and pensive; his forehead was 
 lofty, his nose prominent, his mouth well formed, and 
 his eyes were the windows of far-reaching thought, 
 seemingly fixed on objects beyond the range of ordinary 
 vision. 
 
 Calvin's family-symbol was a hand presenting to God 
 the sac of a bleeding heart, and his appropriate motto, 
 ^' Shall a dog bark when his master is attacked, and shall 
 I be silent when God's truth is impugned?" 
 
 The young evangelist did not remain long in Strass- 
 burg. He would gladly have lingered with Bucer, 
 whom he loved, but he could not find, even there, the 
 quiet and opportunities for study he desired, and he de- 
 termined to seek a residence in Basle. In his journey 
 southward he met at Friburg the far-famed Erasmus, a 
 man who, had he possessed the moral courage of either 
 Luther or Calvin, might have been the leader in the 
 great Reformation, of which, it was said, " he laid the 
 egg/' The young Frenchman had greatly desired an 
 interview with Erasmus, and, hoping to learn something 
 from the great scholar and profound thinker, he Inter- 
 rogated him as to his opinion on some of the questions 
 which were agitating the Church. Erasmus was cau- 
 tious in his answers, and was startled by the radical 
 sentiments of the young man. He predicted trouble as 
 
CALVIN IN GENEVA. 281 
 
 the result of Calvin's extravagances, as he regarded them, 
 and a manifest disposition at any and all hazards not 
 only to stand by the principles of the Reformation as 
 announced by Luther, but to go beyond, demanding an 
 entire separation from a Church which he claimed was 
 a putrid corpse ready for its burial. The old man felt 
 relieved when the audacious youth departed. As for 
 himself, his race was wellnigh run. He would end his 
 days in peace, and leave the conflict for those of stronger 
 convictions and greater daring. 
 
 Having arrived in Basle, the two travelers found for 
 a time the seclusion they desired. In a dimly-lighted 
 chamber, away from the noisy thoroughfares of the city, 
 to which there came from time to time reports of the 
 massacre of holy men in his beloved Paris, Calvin pre- 
 pared a work which has ever since been recognized as 
 the greatest theological production of the Reformation 
 or any subsequent age. This young man, perhaps only 
 twenty -six years of age, stands before the Christian 
 world the peer of Augustine and a greater than Tertul- 
 lian, holding up The Institutes as his exposition and de- 
 fence of that truth for which men were ready to die in 
 dungeons or burn at the stake. While writing this 
 master-work he spent whole nights without sleep and 
 entire days without food. The dedication of tliis work 
 to Francis I., king of France, was itself sufficient to 
 make its author illustrious. 
 
 The greatest thinkers who have studied The Institutes 
 have expressed their admiration of " the amazing acute- 
 ness and grasp of the author's mind, the classic vigor 
 and elegance of his style, the learning with wliich his 
 views are supported, the thorough understanding of the 
 
282 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 Christian system which it displays, and the high degree 
 of holiness manifestly attained by the author.'' This 
 production at once broke for thousands the fetters that 
 bound them to Rome. It was a sun lifted far above the 
 Jura Mountains, near which it was born, shining on 
 lands far remote, revealing the way to God. It is found 
 to-day in all the great libraries of the world, in the 
 studies of Christian pastors in all Christendom, and, as 
 a great teaclier at Edinburgh well remarked, " Calvin's 
 Institutes form a standard on which men still fall back 
 whenever an earnest belief and an intelligent Christianity 
 sway the heart and life." 
 
 Space will not permit an extended syllabus of this 
 great work. \Ye believe its statements to be in harmony 
 with the word of God. His familiarity with the orig- 
 inal language of the New Testament, his clear discern- 
 ment and far-reaching logic by which he was enabled to 
 see w^hat was hidden from common minds and to set in 
 order the various parts of the Christian system, and 
 that indomitable perseverance which carried him through 
 protracted investigations of truth, together with his earn- 
 est piety, which led him in the spirit of childlike docility 
 and profound reverence to the feet of the great Teacher, 
 — all these qualifications eminently fitted Calvin for 
 bringing the truth to light and formulating the faitli 
 of the Reformed Church. 
 
 Martin Luther held, in the main, the same theological 
 views taught by Calvin. These two Reformers differed 
 chiefly with regard to the sacrament of the Lord's Sup- 
 per. It is not generally understood that they were in 
 so full accord. Lutheran ism set forth by Luther was 
 Calviuisu). Justification by faith was made by both 
 
CALVIN IN GENEVA. 283 
 
 the corner-stone of the Christian system, " the doctrine 
 of a falling or rising Church." 
 
 Calvinism taught, and still maintains, that man was 
 created holy and happy, yet mutable. God gave him 
 the power to obey, then left him to the freedom of his 
 own will. Obedience through a brief term of probation 
 would have secured to himself and all his posterity es- 
 tablishment in holiness and everlastino^ life. Man fell 
 from the estate wherein he was created by sinning 
 against God, and, being the representative of all who 
 were to descend from him by ordinary generation, all 
 mankind sinned in him and fell with him in his first 
 transgression. Referring to this, Calvin thus addressed 
 the self-righteous sinner : " Come down, now, and con- 
 sider thyself. Learn and know" this sin derived from 
 Adam and dwelling in us like a glowing furnace per- 
 petually throwing out flames and sjmrks, and the fire of 
 which not only burns the senses, but pollutes all that is 
 most noble in our souls.'' The Reformer held to the 
 doctrine of total depravity, or the entire deprivation of 
 that principle of holiness wnth which man had been orig- 
 inally endowed. Self-recovery, he maintained, was im- 
 possible. Man could destroy, but he could not re-create, 
 himself He could depart from God, but could not, by 
 his own act, return to him. " If thou pretendest to rise 
 by thine own strength, thou standest on the end of a 
 reed." There he finds no support, and the reed is 
 quickly broken. Salvation is in Christ only. The 
 penalty to which we were subject has been laid on the 
 innocent. 
 
 The divine Founder of the kingdom has suffered in 
 the place of the children of the kingdom. Onr peace 
 
284 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 can be found only in the terrors and agony of Christ 
 our Redeemer. Man has no sooner embraced the atone- 
 m'ent with a faith full of confidence than he experiences 
 peace in his conscience and a sweet and joyful com- 
 munion with God. Faith in its beginning is a feeble 
 principle. Some believe with trembling. They do not 
 see the Sun of righteousness clearly. They only catch 
 some beams of his glory, enough to tell that the night 
 is past and the day is come. 
 "'^ Calvin taught that the soul in Christ was for ever 
 secure. Believing once, the Christian believed always, 
 and Christ completed what he began. ^' The light of 
 faith," he said, ^' is never so extinct that there does not 
 remain some glimmer. The root of faith is never so 
 torn from the heart that it does not remain there, 
 although it seems to lean to this side or that.'' 
 ' The Reformer exalts the office of the Holy Spirit. 
 Conversion is his work, not our own — " A doctrine," 
 he says, " not only useful, but sweet and savory through 
 the fruit it bears." "Grace in all its fullness," wrote 
 D'Aubigne, the historian of the Reformation — '^ grace 
 from the first movement of regeneration until the final 
 accomplishment of salvation — was the keynote of all 
 Calvin's theology; and it is also the powerful artillery 
 with which he batters the Roman fortress. Like St. Paul 
 in the first century, like St. Augustine in the fifth, Cal- 
 vin is the doctor of grace in the sixteenth." 
 
 Some alleged then, as some affirm now, that Calvin- 
 ism is fatalism — that God predestines the wicked to evil, 
 [md they are unjustly condemned, since they execute 
 only what God has determined. Calvin rejected so im- 
 pious a doctrine. " Far from having obeyed God's com- 
 
CALVIN IN GENEVA. 285 
 
 mand, tlie wicked by their lusts rebel against it as far 
 as in them lies. There must be no fencing with God ; 
 there must be no saying with Agamennion in Homer, 
 speaking of evil, ' It is not I who am the cause, but 
 Jupiter and Fate.' God predestinates no one to destruc- 
 tion ; he shuts no one out of heaven by an absolute and 
 arbitrary decree.'' 
 
 With faith the Reformer associated holiness. The 
 love of sin is cast out. The will is in harmony with 
 God's. It chooses w^hat he chooses ; it rejects what he 
 rejects ; the love of righteousness takes the place of the 
 love of sin, and the word of God is made the rule of life. 
 He speaks in strong terms of reprobation of a dead the- 
 ology. He says : " We know those babblers who are 
 content with having the gospel on their lips, whilst it 
 ought to sink to the bottom of the soul, and we detest 
 their babbling. No one can embrace the grace of the 
 gospel but he must depart from the errors of his former 
 life. The soul that is united to Christ enjoys a twofold 
 benefit — the perfect imputation of Christ's righteousness 
 which attends him to the grave, and the commencement 
 of sanctification, which the Holy Ghost, through the 
 truth and ordinances of religion, continually advances, 
 till at length salvation is completed with the resurrection 
 of the body, and the stuj^endous mercy of God is made 
 the subject of everlasting praise in the kingdom which 
 endureth for ever." 
 
 The work of Calvin is accepted, in the main, as a 
 scriptural exposition of faith by all evangelical Chris- 
 tians, whilst by the larger part of Christendom it is re- 
 ceived with scarce a modification. 
 
 The departure of the Romish Church from the apos- 
 
286 EOMA^USM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 tolic faith thus revived by the Reformer may be inferred 
 from the fact that the book was condemned by the Par- 
 liament of Paris to be burned as containing damnable, 
 pernicious, heretical doctrine, and was everywhere, 
 among the papists, the butt of sarcasm, the subject of 
 ceaseless defamation and the object of implacable hatred. 
 
 After giving his Institutes to the world, Calvin went 
 to Ferrara in Italy, where it was said that " his star 
 shone with a purer light than that of the bard of Or- 
 lando or of Godfrey.'' But the persecution which over- 
 came Ariosto and Tasso compelled him to fly to the shores 
 of the Rhine. On the way he stopped at Aosta in North- 
 ern Italy, a city at the base of the Alps, having above 
 it, among the eternal glaciers, the Hospice of St. Ber- 
 nard. Here, in the city where popery preserves among 
 her most sacred relics the jawbone of John the Baptist, 
 the evangelist did good service for the Master. Near by 
 the ancient walls which the emperor Augustus erected 
 is a monument which records the visit of the Reformer 
 three centuries ago. From Aosta he passed through 
 Switzerland ; tarried a while in Noyon in the home of 
 his childhood and among the graves of his dead ; went 
 to Paris, where his friends received him with joy, re- 
 garding him, though so young, as the most noted author 
 and most potential man of that age ; and then he de- 
 parted for his adopted country beyond tlie limits of his 
 loved but persecuting France. 
 
 One evening in the midsummer a diligence came into 
 Geneva from the west and passed quietly on to an 
 inn. It may have attracted little attention except from 
 those who were exiles from France for conscience' sake, 
 and who may have thought to receive through the trav- 
 
CALVIN IN GENEVA. 287 
 
 elers some tidings from their native country. Twc 
 young men and a beautiful young woman, bearing to 
 each other a family resemblance, entered the inn. One 
 of them was a pale, thin man of low stature and modest 
 bearing, and yet there was that in his remarkable face 
 which attracted attention, and the curious about the 
 doors or the loungers in the inn knew that no ordinary 
 character had entered Geneva. But they knew not who 
 he was nor whence he came. He announced his purpose 
 to remain a single night and then continue his journey 
 to the northward. Presently a third young man entered, 
 the ex-canon of the cathedral of Angouleme, Du Fillet, 
 whose name has grown familiar to us, and, glancing 
 rapidly around the apartment, he recognized his friend 
 John Calvin. The meeting was as joyful as it was un- 
 expected. 
 
 After Du Fillet came a man twenty years the senior 
 of Calvin. He is a Frenchman also and a man of 
 might. His face is careworn and his manner uneasy. 
 He has been in many a hard-fought battle with the 
 papacy, but is determined to stand by his colors and 
 fight on to the end, be it victory or defeat. He has 
 undertaken a great work in Geneva, his residence for 
 over two years, and he feels the need of help. He 
 meets Calvin, of whom he has heard. He is not dis- 
 appointed in the young man, though he may have 
 thought his fame an exaggeration. So far from that, 
 he is deeply impressed with the mighty intellect and the 
 moral courage of his countryman who has already done 
 so much for the Reformation. He sees before him the 
 helper for whom he has waited and prayed, and demands 
 of Calvin that he abandon all thoughts of Basle or 
 
288 BOMAXISM ASD THE REFORMERS. 
 
 Strassburg, and at once ideutify himself with the work 
 in Geneva, where his presence is greatly needed. There 
 are in tlie man an imperativeness and an awful earnest- 
 ness that impress Calvin. He hears the voice of God 
 in that little inn, and feels a hand reaching down from 
 heaven holding him to the spot. William Farel has 
 gained his point; Calvin's plans are changed. He had 
 expected to resume his journey in the morning, and per- 
 haps never return. He is to abide in Geneva, and ac- 
 complish a work which shall be the joy of multitudes 
 and the aduiiration of aii^es. 
 
 Soon after he had established his home in Geneva the 
 young Reformer, who had spoken to little groups of 
 Christians in the castles and villas of France, appeared 
 in the cathedral as an expounder of the word of God to 
 large and continually increasing assemblies. The mod- 
 esty of the young man gave a peculiar charm to his 
 teachings. He was great without knowing it. He was 
 surrounded with an aureole of light, but did not realize 
 his power as a teacher or compass the scope of his in- 
 fluence. 
 
 Here in Geneva, a city of no great pretensions, 
 scarcely to be mentioned in connection with Paris or 
 Rome, yet situated on one of the highways of Europe, 
 communicating readily with Germany, France and Italy, 
 and influencing all, Calvin preached a pure gospel, and 
 with a distinctness and force of statement that had been 
 long unknown. From this focal point the truth radiated 
 into three adjoining kingdoms, so that Geneva became 
 to Europe what Jerusalem was to Judea, a centre of 
 religious influence whose circumference was far out of 
 Bight. 
 
CALVIN IN GENEVA. 289 
 
 The preacher attacked the superstitions of Rome with 
 a heroism which was sublime. Penance, indulirences, 
 ima(:»;e-worship, the mass, the ignorance, cupidity, and 
 dissoluteness of the priests, and the blasphemous assump- 
 tions of the pope, were condemned in terms intelligible 
 to all. 
 
 Notice how in a few sentences he effectually demol- 
 ishes the dogma of transubstantiation : ^^ According to 
 Rome, we eat in the Supper either the mortal body of 
 Christ or his glorified body ; if his mortal body, then 
 Jesus is at this hour mortal and passable, while tlie 
 Scriptures declare that he has laid aside all infirmity. 
 If it be his immortal and glorified body, Jesus at the 
 first Supper was seated at the table in his mortal and 
 passable body, and he was at the same time in the hands 
 and mouths of his disciples in his immortal and glorified 
 body. The dreams of Marcion were never so fantastic.'' 
 He then maintained that Christ makes us truly partici- 
 pants of his body and blood, but altogether in a spiritual 
 way, by the power of his Holy Spirit. 
 
 He advocated the frequent observance of the Lord's 
 Supper, since in it we are made partakers of all the 
 benefits of Jesus Christ and furnished with an incentive 
 to brotherly love. He deemed it desirable to celebrate 
 the Supper on every Lord's Day, but inasmuch as this 
 frequency might, through the infirmity of men, bring 
 the ordinance into contempt, he judged a monthly ob- 
 servance of the sacrament to be all that was advisable. 
 The council of Geneva recommended the celebration of 
 the Supper only four times a year. 
 
 Calvin insisted upon spiritual worship as distinguish- 
 ed from papal ritualism, and he removed fiom the 
 
290 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 churches whatever fostered idolatry or disparages! the 
 sacrifice of Christ. He eschewed the mere sesthetic and 
 artistic elements on which the Church of Home relied, 
 and he also carried into the pulpit a simplicity of style 
 and manner ^\hich separated him from conspicuous con- 
 temporaries who were more rhetorical and declamatory. 
 He condemned festivals and holidays, and regarded with 
 an especial aversion that exaltation of saints and of the 
 Virgin Mary which obscured the only Mediator between 
 God and man. 
 
 He approved of a modified and guarded subordination 
 of the Church to the State, and yet, whilst he distin- 
 guished the functions of the clergy from those of civil 
 magistrates, he favored uudne interference of the State 
 with purely ecclesiastical matters. He also made the 
 ministry dependent upon the State for their worldly 
 maintenance, thinking by this means to escape that 
 spiritual domination which the hierarchy sought to con- 
 tinue. 
 
 The friends of the Reformation in Geneva were in 
 the minority. Contentions between the opposing parties 
 ran high. The lines of separation were unyielding. 
 Calvin was ready to suffer, but he would not compromise 
 the truth. He was intelligently and conscientiously 
 pledged to the principles of scriptural reform. On them 
 he stood ; he could do nothing else. Men knew where 
 to find hira. The floods might roll over him and for a 
 time hide him from view, but, when overpast, he was 
 seen standing on the very spot where they smote him. 
 Had he been as vacillating as Erasmus, he would have 
 been the contempt of papists and Protestants alike — a 
 mere cipher in the history of that age, and his name, if 
 
CALVIN IN GENEVA. 291 
 
 continued at all, would have been the synonym of moral 
 weakness. 
 
 At length the violence of popery prevailed over the 
 counsels of the Reformers. The religion of the latter 
 was hated because it rebuked all raafiner of vice by its 
 purity and restrained it by its stern condemnation. Cal- 
 vin and Farel were driven from the city, and all wlm 
 had been leaders in the Reformation were banished. 
 Calvin left Geneva in sorrow — sorrow not so much for 
 himself as for the people who had cast him out. Like 
 his Master, he had done many good works among them. 
 He had striven to lead them into the light and liberty 
 of the gospel, and for this they sent him into exile and 
 rejected the truth which alone was sufficient to enlighten 
 and sav^e them. 
 
 With a heavy heart, yet confiding in God, he went to 
 Basle, and thence to Strassburg, where a warm welcome 
 awaited him and a great calm. Here were some of the 
 most noted men of the age, such as Capito, Bacon and 
 Niger. ^^ What gratitude we owe you," they wrote to 
 Farel, " for resigning Calvin to us !" At once the 
 young doctor is set in the front. He is made lecturer 
 on theology, and students from France and Germany sit 
 at his feet. He founded a church. He preached four 
 times a week ; he met the officers of the church once a 
 week for the study of the Scriptures and prayer. The 
 Lord's Supper was celebrated once a month. He revised 
 his great work The Institutes, enlarged the catechism he 
 had written at Geneva, and composed a treatise on the 
 Lord's Supper, a copy of which he sent to Luther ; and 
 in great poverty, unwilling to receive any remuneration 
 for his publications, he continued his multifarious labors 
 
292 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 without intermission. He also found time to send an 
 occasional message to the faithful few in Geneva, exhort- 
 ing them to stand fast in the truth and assuring them 
 of his affectionate remembrance of them. The tidings 
 that were returned to him were sad. The enemies of 
 evangelical religion cruelly persecuted its adherents, and 
 it seemed that all the Reformation had gained was about 
 to be irretrievably lost. Even in Strassburg there was 
 much to grieve him. Many were disposed to remain in 
 the Romish Church. They thought to sweep the house 
 and garnish it. Calvin held that separation was a ne- 
 cessity — without it no triumph for the truth. He would 
 not consent to live among the tombs and in an atmo- 
 sphere which could only perpetuate the reign of death. 
 He would go out of the Church and seek the heights 
 where the air was pure and the light undimmed. He 
 would go thither, though an exile from those he loved. 
 He would stand alone, and, if needs be, all the world 
 against him, he would die alone, contending to the last 
 for Christ and his known truth. Melanchthon and 
 Bucer thought him strangely rash ; they would moderate 
 his zeal. He could tolerate no compromise with error. 
 Many thought him stubborn, severe, radical. Perhaps 
 there was some ground for the opinion. " Nevertheless,'^ 
 as Froude said at St. Andrews, ^' for hard times hard 
 men are needed, and intellects which can pierce to the 
 roots where truth and lies part company." 
 
 About this time Calvin married a widow, a woman 
 of exceptional intelligence and moral worth, Idilette de 
 Bures, with whom he lived happily for nine years, her 
 early death casting a shadow on his life which was never 
 wholly lifted. He lived thereafter alone — not morose, 
 
CALVIN IN GENEVA. 293 
 
 but resigned, forgetting himself in devotion to the 
 Church he ardently loved. He welcomed a few friends 
 to his retired lodgings, and held cheerful converse with 
 them. Although sedate and dignified, he was approach- 
 able by the humblest. He was not distinguished for 
 wit, and as a postprandial speaker, after the manner of 
 modern times, would have been considered a failure ; 
 yet he excelled as a conversationalist and attracted the 
 great men of his day, who acknowledged his intellectual 
 superiority and lit their torches at the fire he had kindled. 
 
 Two years and a half of exile, filled with labors, 
 soon rolled by. ^The condition of Geneva became de- 
 plorable. The foundations of law and order seemed 
 destroyed. Murders had made the streets to run with 
 blood. The violence of popery had produced a reaction. 
 Many longed for Calvin's return. They asked for it. 
 Messages were sent to him beseeching him to come to 
 their help. The senators of Basle, Berne and Zurich 
 united in the request. The council of Geneva did the 
 same. Calvin hesitated, but at length the path of duty 
 became so clear that he could no longer refuse. 
 
 With many tears, led by the cloudy pillar, he left 
 Strassburg, returned to Geneva, and was received by 
 the people with demonstrations of great joy. The 
 preacher became a legislator and drew up a code of 
 laws for the government of the little republic. These 
 were adopted by the state. They contemplated the 
 extirpation of every vice and of all heresy — of every- 
 thing in social and public life that would tend to the 
 fostering of impurity or weaken abhorrence of sin. 
 They proscribed extravagance in dress, luxurious liv- 
 ing, demoralizing amusements, games of chance and 
 
294 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 everything in private life inconsistent with the word 
 of God. 
 
 Calvin insisted that the Bible was the only infallible 
 rule of faith and conduct. Men should have and ex- 
 press no opinion contrary to it, nor in any of the rela- 
 tions of life contravene its teachino^s. He would recoa:- 
 nize no legislation which was not in harmony with it. 
 He would consent to no standard of morals in the state 
 that fell a hair's breadth below that of the divine. Had 
 Calvin's code prevailed, Geneva would have been a mar- 
 vel in the social life of all the ages — a republic which 
 lives nowhere this side of the millennium. 
 
 The history of all nations has made it evident that 
 mere legislation will not make men pure. A true 
 morality finds its root in religion alone. The heart 
 must be renewed before the life can be right. Calvin 
 did not accomplish all that he proposed. The laws 
 of Geneva were violated, but they stood nevertheless. 
 If they failed to destroy, they at least served to re- 
 strain. 
 
 John Knox visited Geneva, and that little city be- 
 side the lake was to him as the porch of heaven. 
 ^^ Elsewhere," said he, " the word of God is taught as 
 purely, but never anywhere have I seen God obeyed as 
 faithfully.'' Doubtless there was an outward obedience 
 in Geneva surpassing what was known in Scotland, and 
 even this may have prepared the way in many instances 
 for inward grace. The order, quiet and prosperity of 
 the republic under the Reformer were such as to com- 
 mand the admiration of Montesquieu, who said, " The 
 Genevese may bless the day that Calvin was born." 
 
 The spiritual head of the Church and State alike, 
 
CALVIN IN GENEVA. 295 
 
 Calvin's labors for twenty-three years were wellnigli 
 incredible. He preached almost daily; he wrote com- 
 mentaries; he published theological and polemical 
 pamphlets and books; he founded an academy which 
 numbered five hundred students the first year of its 
 existence, and has continued to this day ; he attended 
 the meetings of the church courts and of the civil coun- 
 cils ; gave his advice as to the government of the repub- 
 lic ; carried on an extensive correspondence with all parts 
 of Europe ; received to his house and academy, as dis- 
 ciples, learned men from nearly all parts of the Con- 
 tinent and British Isles ; conferred with Reformers who 
 were twice his own age in reference to the great ques- 
 tions of the day ; whilst from Italy, France and Spain 
 there came families of noble birth and exiles for con- 
 science' sake, drawn thither by his fame, which was like 
 that which brought the queen of Sheba to Jerusalem. 
 
 Theodore Beza was long an intimate friend of the 
 Reformer, and we cannot do better than quote so reli- 
 able an authority concerning Calvin's habits of study 
 and life. Beza says of him : " In living he was so tem- 
 perate as to be equally remote from meanness and any 
 degree of luxury; so sparing in food that for many 
 years he took but one meal a day, and sleeping scarcely 
 any ; of incredible memory, so that he instantly recog- 
 nized those whom he had seen but once many years 
 before, and so that he could, after an interruption of 
 hours, return to what he had dictated and take up the 
 words where he had left off, and never, though oppressed 
 by diversified and endless cares, forgetting any of those 
 things which it was his duty to remember ; of judg- 
 ment so clear and exact, whatever the topic on which he 
 
 20 
 
296 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 was consulted, that he often seemed to be almost pro- 
 phetic. He never seemed to be at a loss for something 
 weighty, apposite or forceful ; nor did his oral discourse 
 much vary from his writing. In the doctrine which 
 he delivered at first he remained firm to the last, and 
 changed nothing ; which has happened to few theologians 
 of our day. 
 
 " As to his manner of life, though nature formed him 
 to be grave, there was no man who had more sweetness 
 in common intercourse. In natural temperament he was 
 undoubtedly choleric, but the Spirit of God had taught 
 him to so moderate anger that he never uttered a single 
 word unworthy of a good man, still less offended in act ; 
 nor was he ever hasty except when the cause of religion 
 was at stake or when he had to deal with men of violent 
 character.'^ 
 
 A great deal has been said and written concerning the 
 burning of Servetus. Calvin has been held responsible 
 for the Spaniard's death. When Romanism has failed 
 to make successful assaults upon Protestantism from all 
 other quarters, it repeats the old charge, and, lifting her 
 hands all covered with the blood of martyrs, points to 
 the stake where Servetus burns, and says, ^' Your wicked 
 Calvin did it." Infidelity does the same. It is the only 
 argument against Christianity which many of its enemies 
 employ. Shutting their eyes against the light, their ears 
 against the truth, they cry, " The founder of your faith 
 burned Servetus." A word just here. The Founder of 
 our faith is Christ. The expounders of it were evang- 
 elists and apostles ; its depository is the word of God. 
 We do not call Calvin or Augustine or Paul master. 
 We follow them as followers of Christ. We are bound 
 
CALVIN IN GENEVA. 297 
 
 to no statement of the Genevan Reformer unless it be 
 fortified by a " Thus saith the Lord." 
 
 As the expounder of Pauline theology and the formu- 
 lator of the evangelical faith we regard Calvin as the 
 greatest teacher of the Reformation. In this respect he 
 towers above Luther, Melanchthon and Zwingle. He 
 was the heaven-appointed Joshua to lead the Church 
 into the promised land. As such we honor him and 
 love him. ^ 
 
 Recognizing him as the formulator of the Reformed 
 faith, which we believe to be scriptural, we would 
 mitigate, whilst we do not wholly deny, the allegation 
 which lays the death of Servetus at his door. It should 
 be borne in mind that the sentiment of the age favored 
 the destruction of heretics, and Calvin had not risen 
 above it. Melanchthon, Farel, Bucer and Beza were in 
 accord with it. The Church of Rome, maintaining 
 these principles, had slain her tens of thousands. Heresy 
 was pursued with swords and fagots and girdled with 
 flames. It had driven the Vaudois Christians to the 
 shelter of the rocks and the refuge of caves. It had 
 strangled Christians with ropes, drowned them in rivers, 
 burned them at stakes. Is it any Avonder that the 
 Reformed Church, not fully emancipated from the errors 
 of the times, should deal somewhat severely with the 
 enemies of the truth ? Is it surprising that the coming 
 of Servetus to Geneva when the Reformation was hold- 
 ing quietly on its way, when the principles of peace and 
 purity were gaining the ascendancy, when Christ was 
 being honored, trusted and adored, and heaven was 
 opening wide its portals over the mountain-girt asylum 
 of refugees from almost every land, should arouse Cal- 
 
298 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 vin to bold resistaace of the heretical teaching of the 
 Spaniard ? Would he not have been recreant to his 
 trust as a spiritual shepherd if he had not given the 
 alarm and condemned the wrong? Servetus opposed 
 the foundation principles of the Reformation. He denied 
 and ridiculed the faith for which so many had died. 
 His influence was evil only. His duplicity, rashness 
 and fanaticism were displayed on many occasions. At 
 Vienna he had been proved guilty of perjury. Intel- 
 lectually strong, he was morally weak. He came to 
 Geneva with malicious intent. He died with blasphemies 
 on his lips. 
 
 Calvin was especially influenced by the teach- 
 ings of Pierre de FEtoile, the great French jurist, a 
 Romanist, whose pupil he had been. Pierre had 
 taught that the prosperity of nations depends upon 
 obedience to the laws, and insisted that if they punish 
 outrages against the rights of man, much more ought 
 they to punish outrages against the rights of God. 
 "What!'' exclaimed the great jurist, "shall the law 
 protect a man in his body and goods, and not in his soul 
 and his .most precious and eternal inheritance?" "A 
 thief shall not be able to rob us of our purses, but a 
 heretic may deprive us of heaven. Those insensate and 
 furious men who proclaim heretical and infamous opin- 
 ions ought first to be delivered up to divine vengeance, 
 and afterward visited with corporal punishment.'^ These 
 principles were modified by the Reformation, but not 
 entirely discarded. 
 
 Calvin felt that the souls of many were endangered by 
 Servetus's teachings. The interests at stake were to a 
 single life as Mont Blanc to the anthill at its base. 
 
CALVIN IN GENEVA. 299 
 
 Believing tins, he had deprecated the Spaniard's coming, 
 and resisted him when he came. He formulated charges 
 against him, and believed he ought to be punished. He 
 was influenced by a mistaken sense of duty to God, to 
 the Church and to a perishing world. Still, it was tiie 
 State rather than Calvin that demanded the death of 
 Servetus, and it was urged by considerations for the 
 safety of the Republic rather than for the interests of 
 the Church. And after the government of Geneva had 
 condemned Servetus to be burned, Calvin asked for a 
 modification of the sentence. This was denied on the 
 ground that the law prescribed the punishment and there 
 remained no room for choice. Servetus had denounced 
 Calvin as a homicide, and had his counsel prevailed 
 the Reformer would have been burned. The Spaniard 
 digged a pit and fell into it himself. We regret the 
 manner of his death. The Protestant Church discour- 
 ages the employment of carnal weapons and forbids 
 corporal punishment. But it holds the Romish Church, 
 rather than the Reformer, responsible for the death of 
 Servetus — the age rather than Calvin. 
 
 But is it not surprising that the burning of Servetus 
 should so stand out in history and be so persistently 
 misrepresented by Romanists and infidels that all the 
 scenes of bloodshed in Paris and Rome and in the val- 
 leys of Piedmont and on the British Isles— blood flowing 
 in rivers, the flames of funeral-piles turning night into 
 day and sending their glare across the continent, — that 
 all these should be almost or quite forgotten, and the 
 death of a lone man should shut out of view the heca- 
 tombs of martyrs for the Protestant faith. ? It declares 
 the weakness of our enemies. It honors the Protestant 
 
300 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 faith. It declares the freedom of the Reformation from 
 the atrocities of popery. The spot it denounces is on 
 the sun, and that rides in glory througli the sky. 
 
 Calvin's name is one of the most honorable in all the 
 annals of the Christian era, and his influence has ex- 
 tended from Geneva to the ends of the earth. The sys- 
 tem of faith formulated from the word of God has lived 
 without material change for three hundred years, and is 
 the faith of the largest part of Christendom to-day. 
 
 We have only gathered up some shreds of the won- 
 derful story. We have spent only a few moments where 
 were enacted the scenes of a marvelous life. 
 
 On all the continent of Europe there is to many no 
 city more interesting than Geneva. St. Peter's cathedral 
 has long been a Protestant church. It stands on the 
 summit of a hill in the ancient town. It is an impos- 
 ing temple, with nave and transept and high arches 
 upborne by massive cohuims, to one of which is attached 
 the pulpit the Reformer occupied three centuries ago. 
 From the porch of St. Peter's we may look out on one 
 of the most inspiring prospects the world aflbrds. Near 
 by is the beautiful Lake Leman, its waters clear as crys- 
 tal, the Jura Mountains casting their shadows over it. 
 The vine-covered Savoy hills form its southern bound- 
 ary. The Plain Palais lies in strange beauty at our feet. 
 AVal nut-groves and orchards and fields of corn reach 
 down to the waters of the Arve and stretch away to the 
 distant hills, and beyond the Grand Sal^ve are the Alpine 
 peaks covered with perpetual snows, whilst far above 
 the Mer de Glace rises Mont Blanc, wearing a gleam- 
 ing crown and looking down upon us as out of another 
 world. 
 
CALVIN IN GENEVA. 301 
 
 Amid scenes of such beauty and grandeur Calvin 
 preached the everlasting gospel ; and if ever he found 
 time to look on the great mountains or that near lake, 
 they may have suggested thoughts of God's power, of 
 the eternity of truth and of the saints' everlasting rest 
 in that ((uiet haven, guarded by the mountain of spices, 
 wherein shall go no galley with oars, neither shall gal- 
 lant ship pass thereby. 
 
 In this cathedral Calvin delivered his last sermon, 
 Feb. 6, 1564; and although, when unable to walk, he 
 was carried thither by his friends, yet he could do no 
 more than utter a few sentences after another had 
 preached. He suffered from severe pain, and an asth- 
 matic trouble which had long harassed him made even 
 ordinary conversation difficult. As the sun of life sank 
 toward its setting his Christian character shone with 
 peculiar beauty. His heart was softened and enlarged. 
 He had been often defamed, even by friends of the Ref- 
 ormation, but he freely forgave, and repeated his oft- 
 expressed desire for closer union among the various 
 branches of the Reformed Church. He longed to see 
 them closing up their ranks and presenting an undivided 
 front to the enemy. Rome boasted of her unity. Why 
 should not the Protestant Church be one? Was there 
 not common ground broad enough on which the churches 
 of Germany, Italy and France might stand? Could 
 not Luther, Zwingle and Calvin maintain the same es- 
 sential system in opposition to the errors of Rome? No 
 one in the sixteenth century prayed and labored so earn- 
 estly as he for the union of the Reformed churches. 
 He wrote books and pamphlets and many letters urging 
 this upon all the friends of evangelical religion. He 
 
.302 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 was as far removed from bigotry as man could be. Nar- 
 row-mindedness and short-sightedness enclosed with lim- 
 ited walls, but his vision was wide and far-reaching, and 
 his heart embraced all wdio loved the Lord Jesus Christ. 
 To the interests of church unity the last hours of his 
 life were devoted. 
 
 A few weeks before his death he was carried to the 
 council-house, and there nominated a new rector for the 
 Gymnasium, to wdiom the usual oath w^as administered. 
 Then rising from his seat with uncovered head, laboring 
 for breath, he thanked the lords for all their expressions 
 of sympathy with him and their acts of kindness in hjs 
 affliction, intimating that he looked on them for the last 
 time. The noble lords bowed their heads and shed tears. 
 His last farew^ell was spoken, and he passed out of the 
 assembly-room never to return. The following Sabbath 
 he was carried to the cathedral in a chair, received the 
 Lord^s Supper, joined in the closing hymn, and then was 
 borne to his own house to die. 
 
 A little later he w^rote to Farel, not expecting to meet 
 him again. There is a marked tenderness breathing 
 through this message to his old and tried friend : "Fare 
 thee well, best and frankest brother, and since it is God's 
 will that thou shouldst outlive me, live mindful of our 
 inward attachment, w^hich will both be useful to the 
 Church and bring us abiding fruit in heaven. I would 
 not that thou shouldst weary thyself for me. My breath 
 is weak, and I hourly look for it to leave me altogether. 
 It is enough that I live and die in Christ, who is gain 
 to his people both in life and death. Yet once more, 
 farewell to thee and the brethren." 
 
 A few days pass by, and we see a man twenty yeare 
 
 I 
 
I 
 
 CALVIN IN GENEVA. 303 
 
 the senior of Calvin entering tlie chamber of the Re- 
 former. His hair is white as the snows of the mountain. 
 His silvery beard is long and flowing. His beai'ing is 
 majestdc ; his eyes are undimmed by years, and whilst 
 his face indicates a man born for strife, it yet wears a 
 benignant expression, and there is somewhat of pensive- 
 ness in the tones of his voice as he addresses witli stronir 
 aifection his dying countryman. It is William Farel, 
 now of Neufchatel, the brother beloved to whom Calvin 
 had written but a little while before — the man who had 
 introduced him to Geneva twenty-three years ago. 
 
 Very touching is their interview. Their souls are 
 knit together with bands of iron. They embrace each 
 other for the last time, look at each other through their 
 tears, and separate to meet no more on earth. 
 
 Calvin^s sufferings increased, but he bore them patient- 
 ly. '^ Thou crushest me, O Lord ! but it is enough for 
 me that it is thy hand.'^ To the sorrowing friends who 
 gathered about liim he calmly spoke of his departure, 
 and then, fixing on them those remarkable eyes which 
 never lost their brilliancy, he uttered eloquent and hoi}' 
 words concerning his Christ and theirs and the glorious 
 rest to which he was going. 
 
 He directed that his worn body should be buried h 
 the cemetery of Plain Palais, and that no monument 
 should be erected over his grave, the place of his sepul- 
 chre to be unknown. 
 
 Just as the sun went down behind the snow-capped 
 Alps, a subdued light on the plain and deepening shad- 
 ows creeping over the peaceful lake, he closed his eyes 
 and fell asleep in Jesus. 
 
 ^' Thus,'' said Theodore Beza, who had watched be- 
 
304 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 side his bed aud with the affectionateDess of a son 
 smoothed his dying pillow, — '^ Thus God withdrew into 
 heaven tliat most brilliant light which was a lamp of the 
 Church. In the following night and day ther^ was 
 immense grief and lamentation in the whole city ; for 
 the republic had lost its wisest citizen, the Church its 
 faithful shepherd, the Academy an incomparable teacher, 
 the Reformation its main support, aud all their best 
 earthly comforter and friend/' 
 
 On the afternoon of the Sabbath the remains were 
 placed in a simple coffin, and on the following day all 
 that was left of John Calvin was laid in the grave. The 
 records of the cemetery mention the day and indicate 
 somewhat indefinitely the place of his burial. In the 
 shade of trees is a small stone rising a few inches above 
 the surface of the ground, with these initials only : 
 ^^ J. C' If not just there, yet somewhere near, lies the 
 dust of the great Reformer awaiting the long-promised 
 day. His monument is broad as the earth, high as 
 heaven and enduring as eternity. 
 X Beza has said of Calvin's life " that it was a beautiful 
 example of piety easy to calumniate, but difficult to 
 imitate." Bullinger declared, " There is no man of whom 
 it has been said with equal justice, in the words of an 
 apostle, ^ he endured, as seeing Him wdio is invisible.' " 
 Even Arminius pronounced him ^' an incomparable in- 
 terpreter of Scripture," and Ernest Renan, an enemy, 
 says of him, " He was the most Christian man of his 
 generation." 
 
 Thus friends and foes bow to the majesty of his name. 
 He was wont to dwell by faith in God above the storm 
 and the cloud, reverential, trustful and unharmed ; grow- 
 
CALVIN IN GENEVA. 305 
 
 ing in greatness by reason of his association with Him 
 who alone is infinite; and, having achieved one of the 
 greatest works ever wrought by man since the first 
 apostles laid the foundations of the Christian Church, 
 he went to his glorious reward, where for three centuries 
 — which seem to him as one day, so swiftly pass the 
 ages of that endless life — he has verified the truth as it 
 is in Christ, and welcomed to that heavenly joy a great 
 nmltitude who, under God, owe their salvation to the 
 converted priest of Noyon, concerning whom Pius IV., 
 hearing of his death, said, " If I had such servants my 
 dominions would extend from sea to sea.'^ 
 
CRANNER: THE ENGLISH REFORMATION, 
 I 
 
 I 
 
 I 
 
" Fear not, little flock ; for it is your Father" s good pleasure 
 to give you the kingdom. '' 
 
 Luke 12 . 32. 
 
 " The Church, as Jerome saith of Arcturus, is much tossed, 
 but never drowned. God is in the midst of her, she shall not 
 be moved : God shall help her and that right early.'' 
 
 SWIXNOCK. 
 
 " The visible Church hath the privilege of being under God's 
 special care and government ; of being protected and preserved 
 in all ages, notwithstanding the oppositio?i of all enemies.'' 
 Larger Catechism, Ans. to Question 63. 
 
L 
 
 CRANMEE: THEEKfillSH REFORMATION, 
 
 TN the revival of apostolic religion in Eugland we 
 -*- find no central figure. No one man rises far above 
 the common level, as did Luther in Germany, Calvin in 
 Switzerland and Knox in Scotland — a man of great in- 
 tellect, powerful will and unfaltering courage, calculated 
 to mould the sentiments of a natiort, to utilize the pow- 
 er of thrones and to lead on an invincible host from con- 
 quest to greater victory. 
 
 God accomplished his purposes concerning England 
 through a variety of agencies. He made the passions 
 of wicked men to serve him, and the ambitions of the 
 worldly great to aid the triumphs of truth. On the 
 stage where was enacted the great drama of Reform we 
 see humble priests, mitred bishops and crowned heads, 
 with here and there a figure more commanding than the 
 rest giving direction to the plot and intelligently or un- 
 wittingly conducting it to an issue which brought glory 
 to God and good to men. 
 
 But the agent gives character to his work. The Ref- 
 ormation in England was not so radical and beneficent 
 as the Reformation in Scotland, and the distinction re- 
 mains until this day. Scotland hated the very appear- 
 ance of superstition, and sundered every tie that had 
 bound her to Rome. England suffered some of the 
 errors of the papacy to linger in her creed, and not a 
 
 309 
 
310 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 little of sensuousness in worship to mar the beauty of 
 her ritual. The chair of St. Peter had one foot on the 
 British Isles and threw its shadow over the land of 
 holy martyrs. 
 
 But there soon appeared two distinct elements in the 
 English Reformation, the hierarchical and the evangeli- 
 cal. The first made much of the Church, apostolic suc- 
 cession and the sacraments ; the other exalted Christ, a 
 spiritual worship and the communion of saints. The 
 latter has preserved the truth to England, and so pre- 
 vented what would otherwise have been an inevitable 
 and early result — relapse to popery, the second condi- 
 tion worse than the first. 
 
 lu the Protestant city of Basle, as the weeks and 
 mouths advance, there sits among his books a student who 
 is a contemporary of Luther. The morning sun, which 
 sets a gleaming crown on the snow-capped Matte rhorn 
 ere it lights the valley and spreads its silvery sheen on 
 the Rhine, wakes the student to his loved employ, and 
 when the lights of the city are wellnigh all extinguished 
 he is toiling on. 
 
 He was one of the ripest scholars of his age, and, 
 though timid and compromising, better fitted for the 
 cloister than for the open field of battle, yet he per- 
 formed an important part, and his restoration of the 
 New Testament to its purity in the original Greek, 
 with its Latin version annexed, was a long step in the 
 direction of Reform. 
 
 It is Erasmus of whom we again speak. His New 
 Testament found its way to the universities of England, 
 and in these centres of influence, where each scholar 
 represented a thousand, it led many into the light. 
 
CRANMER: THE ENGLISH REFORMATION. 311 
 
 Because of this the Roman pontiif was alarmed, bish- 
 ops and priests denounced the heretic, monasteries were 
 all aflame with holy wrath. The Bible is slipping from 
 the hands of the priests, and soon, translated it may be 
 into the language of the common people, it will dig the 
 grave of the papacy. Romanists fancy they see winged 
 armies in the sky mustering for battle. The earth, once 
 so firm under their tread, grows uneasy and yielding as 
 the waves of the sea. Popery dreads the sword of the 
 Spirit, which is the word of God, for that will hew 
 down the trees of error which have shut out the light, 
 and open a highway over which exiled captives may 
 return to God. 
 
 The Greek and Latin Testament was the subject of 
 much comment among the learned. In the universities 
 of Cambridge and Oxford it was diligently searched by 
 students and their instructors. As young men walked 
 arm in arm along the galleries, in the shaded campus 
 or across the contiguous meadows they talked together 
 of the words and works of Jesus. One of these young 
 men was destined to exert a far-reaching influence in the 
 interests of the Reformation. 
 
 He was a pale, thoughtful youth. For months there 
 seemed some shadow on his spirit which deepened as the 
 weeks went on. He had been to the confessional and 
 had told the listening priest his sad story of sins and fore- 
 bodings. He had gone through the prescribed ritual of 
 the Church and had performed all its penances. But no 
 relief had come. He heard of the Greek Testament 
 of Erasmus. He opened it; then shut it with trem- 
 bling. Was it not a proscribed book? Did not his 
 confessor say that the Greek language was the dialect 
 21 
 
312 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 of the lost? But may Dot the priest be an intentional 
 deceiver ? 
 
 The wicked imputation increased his self-condemna- 
 tion. Still, he would know whereof this forbidden 
 volume speaks. There is a crushing load of guilt on 
 his soul as he opens the book and reads : '^ This is a 
 faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that 
 Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of 
 whom I am chief.'' He clasped his hands over the 
 text and exclaimed, ^' What ! St. Paul the chief of 
 sinners ! and yet St. Paul is sure of being saved." He 
 looked again at the strange words. Has he read aright? 
 Even so. '' O assertion of St. Paul, how sweet art thou 
 to my soul !" exclaimed the pale student as the soft light 
 of heaven rested on the book and on his careworn face. 
 He goes away with a new hope in his heart and a new 
 song in his mouth, saying, "Jesus Christ saves; yes, 
 Jesus Christ saves." The young man was Thomas 
 Bilney, of whom we shall hear more hereafter. 
 
 There was another student, whose name is suggested 
 by that of Bilney. He was the son of a Leicester yeo- 
 man, a young man of great promise, who soon pushed 
 his way to the front in the contest for collegiate distinc- 
 tiou, and was at the same time a devout papist — Hugh 
 Latimer. Having completed his classical course, he 
 devoted himself to theological study. Thomas Aquinas 
 and Duns Scotus were his favorite authors. But his 
 attainments in divinity were not such as might have 
 been expected. The superstitious practices of religion 
 engaged his attention and the divine oracles were neg- 
 lected. An abject slave, he bowed the knee to Rome 
 and hated the very semblance of evangelical religion. 
 
CRANMEB: THE ENGLISH REFORMATION. ;jl3 
 
 His oration on the occasion of his receiving his degree 
 of bachelor of divinity was a bold assault on Melauch- 
 thon and the principles of the Keformation. The 
 papists were elated at his eloquent philippic and thought 
 they saw in him a brave defender of their faith. 
 
 That day there sat in the audience a convert to Prot- 
 estanisni rejoicing in the new-found Christ, who regarded 
 the ambitious orator with an absorbing interest. He 
 believed \\\q grace of God would yet make the young 
 man a noble champion for the truth, building up what 
 he now attempts to tear down. The auditor is Bilney. 
 He sought Latimer in the retirement of his study and 
 besought him to hear his confession. It was not what 
 the confessor expected. Bilney gives an account of his 
 conversion — speaks of the guilt that oppressed him, the 
 night of despair which darkened about him, his mis- 
 directed efforts to obtain relief, which issued in disap- 
 pointment only, and then at last his glad surprise when 
 the saying of St. Paul opened to him the gateway to a 
 happy life ; Christ the Sin-bearer thereafter his only and 
 sufficient Saviour. Latimer's interest deepens as the 
 story of religious experience advances, and then, with 
 Bilney at his feet, there rises to his view a nobler sight, 
 even the "Lamb of God which taketh away the sin 
 of the world." 
 
 At once he was overwhelmed with a sense of his great 
 unkindness to the Saviour in having assailed him in tlie 
 person of his friends. He bowed .his head and wept. 
 Bilney said, "Brother, though your sins be as scarlet, 
 tliey shall l)e white as snow.'' Now Latimer feels on 
 his head the droppings of Clirist's cleansing blood, and 
 hears a voice in the silent chambers of his soul declaring 
 
314 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 him forgiven and saved through the atonement made on 
 Calvary. He becomes a preacher of the holy evangel, 
 and vies with Melanchthon in exalting the Son of God. 
 We shall hear more of Hugh Latimer by and by. 
 
 Now we turn to a third. We have said the Reforma- 
 tion in England had no central figure. But if by any 
 construction such a claim can be made — and in a modifieil 
 sense we may accept it — then the man upon whom this 
 distinction rests is Thomas Cranmer, the first Protestant 
 archbishop of England. 
 
 He was twenty years the junior of Latimer, and was 
 born six years after Martin Luther — July 2, 1489. 
 When fourteen years of age he was sent to Cambridge. 
 Here, according to Strype, '^ he was nursed in the gross- 
 est kind of sophistry, logic, philosophy moral and nat- 
 ural ; not in the text of the old philosophers, but chiefly 
 in the dark riddles of Duns and other subtile ques- 
 tionists." 
 
 When twenty-two years of age he turned to more 
 profitable studies. The writings of Fabre, Erasmus and 
 Le F6vre shed a new light into his understanding. He 
 found herein statements of truth which, though mingled 
 with errors, were helpful to his inquiring mind, and he 
 groped in the early dawn waiting for the full-orbed sun. 
 " What says the word of God ?" he asked. " Is not it 
 the only and infallible source of light ?" For three 
 years he searched the Scriptures which testify of Christ. 
 Still he saw men as trees walking, but his vision grew 
 clearer as his studies advanced. He was a slow leai'ner, 
 always cautious in receiving the opinions of others, and 
 not always firm in maintaining his own. But this must 
 be said of him, that he was a Biblicist rather than a 
 
I 
 
 CRA^'MER: THE ENGLTSII REFORMATION. 31,') 
 
 (jhurchman. He would not tie his faith to tlie ip.se divit 
 of the pope nor accept as unquestionable truth whatever 
 was taught by the theologians of Rome. He refused 
 the position of fellow in Wolsey's college — a distinction 
 awarded only to scholars of unusual gifts and learning. 
 
 When thirty-two years of age he received the degree 
 of doctor of divinity, was made a professor in the uni- 
 versity and was advanced to other positions of honor 
 and trust. 
 
 But as yet Cranmer was not fully released from the 
 trammels of the papacy. He stood on middle ground. 
 He wished to know the truth. '' Is it to be found/' he 
 inquired, '^ in Protestantism or in popery ?'' His faith 
 in the latter was shaken. He was not prepared to adopt 
 the principles of the former. So his mind remained in 
 equilibrium. But at length, as the sequel of our story 
 will show, he took decided ground in favor of the Ref- 
 ormation, became its chief support and suffered martyr- 
 dom rather than deny the faith. 
 
 Whilst Cranmer was yet connected with the Univer- 
 sity of Cambridge, Henry VIII. was questioning the 
 lawfulness of his marriage to Catherine of Arragon, 
 who had been the wife of his deceased brother Arthur. 
 He may have had scruples on the subject before his 
 marriage, and at the same time, influenced by political 
 considerations as well as by aifection for the daughter of 
 King Ferdinand, he desired to consummate the relation. 
 Pope Julius II. was favorably disposed, and set aside 
 all questions of conscience and the prohibition of the 
 canon law by a special dispensation. Henry's children 
 by this marriage had all died with the exception of the 
 princess Mary. No queen had ever sat on the throne 
 
316 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 of Englaud. Had this surviving child been a son, the 
 king's scruples respecting his marriage might not have 
 been revived, if indeed they had any previous existence. 
 
 There was another reason why Henry desired a 
 divorce. He had transferred his aifections from his 
 queen to Anne Boleyn, a young maid of honor whose 
 personal attractions had arrested his attention. But a 
 divorce requires the pope's consent. The successor of 
 St. Peter is an ecclesiastical ruler whose prerogatives the 
 crowned heads of Europe have not dared to disregard. 
 Julius II. has been succeeded by Clement VII. Will 
 this head of the Church condemn what his predecessor 
 approved, and grant the divorce for which this royal 
 suppliant sues ? More than that : will he venture to 
 displease Charles V., the nephew of the queen ? The 
 time had been when kings had abjectly bowed in the 
 presence of Roman pontiffs, but their reverence for 
 the successor of St. Peter was beginning to decline. It 
 is not wise to put the devotion of princes to a test too 
 severe when this ghost of apostolic faith is haunting 
 alike the corridors of monasteries and the ancient 
 halls of learning. Pope Clement is perplexed. The 
 two horns of a dilemma are thrust at him. Which shall 
 he take? While he hesitates, Henry employs Cardinal 
 Wolsey to represent his wishes to the pope, and Wolsey 
 solicits the aid of Cardinal Campeggio. They urge 
 the divorce by considerations of State and Church 
 policy. 
 
 Wolsey was influenced in his relations to the matter 
 by his hatred of Charles V., the nephew of Catherine, 
 who had twice defeated his election to the pontificate. 
 The cardinal supposed that the separation could be 
 
CBANMER: THE ENGLISH REFORMATION. :]17 
 
 readily secured, and so he would accomplish his revenge 
 on Charles. Louis XII. had obtained a divorce from 
 his queen, the noble Joan, simply on the ground that he 
 did not have a proper affection for her, and it cannot be 
 tliat Clement will fail to recognize the reasonableness of 
 Wolsey's argument for dissolving the marital tie in this 
 instance, since it was created in violation of the common 
 law of the Church. But lie failed, and in failing lost 
 his courage aud died of a broken heart. He was an un- 
 witting instrument in bringing about the Reformation. 
 Dead men who had sought to gratify personal ambi- 
 tion or revenge were the stepping-stones by which the 
 Church ascended to the throne of spiritual power. 
 
 The question involved even more than at first appear- 
 ed. Had Henry's request been granted he would doubt- 
 less have continued a devout and obedient papist and 
 submitted to the jurisdiction of Rome. Besides, he was 
 not in sympathy with the Reformation. For evangelical 
 religion he had no love, and of a spiritual life he had no 
 experience. He had secured to himself the title of 
 "Defender of the Faith" by writing a book against 
 Lutheranism, and Rome thought to find in him a loyal 
 son for ever. At the same time, he is determined to 
 gratify his passion, cost what it may. He will have 
 his own way, and thrust even the pope from the track 
 of his unholy purpose. He will do this, not because he 
 loves Rome less, but Anne Boleyn more. 
 
 In view of this attitude he was summoned to appear 
 before the pope in person or by proxy. The earl of 
 Wiltshire, Anne Boleyn's father, was commissioned to 
 convey to Clement, in unequivocal terms, Henry's re- 
 fusal to comply with the demand, either in person or by 
 
318 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 another. When the earl entered the audience-room of 
 the pope, His Holiness extended to him the opportunity 
 of kissing his foot. The gracious oifer was treated with 
 indignation, and the final breach between the Holy See 
 and England was foreshadowed. 
 
 Clement decided to adhere to his recognition of the 
 idng's marriage to Catherine. He was quite willing to 
 give his sanction to polygamy in a dispensation allowing 
 Henry to take Anne Boleyn as a second wife, but he 
 could not so stultify his conscience, forsooth ! as to grant 
 a divorce from the first. The king then determined to 
 renounce the jurisdiction of Rome, to separate the 
 Church of England from the Holy See and declare 
 himself its only spiritual head. The reasons which 
 suggested this radical course were doubtless two : one, 
 to make Anne Boleyn his queen ; and the other, to in- 
 crease his own power as a ruler by destroying that of 
 the pope. 
 
 It is in connection with this matter of Henry's rela- 
 tion to Catherine that Cranmer comes into prominent 
 notice. It had been reported to the king that this doc- 
 tor of Cambridge had suggested the reference of this 
 mooted question of divorce to the universities of Europe. 
 In Cranmer's opinion, the appeal to the pope was un- 
 necessary — nay more, a great mistake. This judgment 
 of Cranmer's was pleasing to the king, and he determin- 
 ed to act upon it. He expected thus to carry his point. 
 On the 14th of July, 1532, at Windsor Castle, he held 
 his last interview with Catherine of Arragon, his true 
 and devoted wife for twenty years. On the 14th of the 
 following November he was married to Anne Boleyn, 
 and eleven weeks later the divorce was publicly decreed. 
 
CRANMER: THE ENGLISH REFORMATION. ;Uy 
 
 The iiuligiiiition of the pope was without hounds. 
 The thunders of the Vatican rolled across the Conti- 
 nent, but sank to feeble wdiispers ere they had crossed 
 the Channel. The English Parliament declared the 
 king and his successors the only supreme heads of tlie 
 Church of England. Thus they raised tlie wall of 
 separation from Rome, and papal bulls could no more 
 batter it down than the baying of a dog could intimidate 
 the moon. The sentiment of Henry might have been 
 expressed in the words of the prince of English poet*^ : 
 
 **No Italian priest 
 Shall tithe or toll in our dominions; 
 So tell the pope : all reverence set apart 
 To him or his usurped authority." 
 
 King John, Act III. sc. 1. 
 
 Thomas Cranmer Is now archbishop of Canterbury, 
 and occupies in Henry's esteem the place once held by 
 Wolsey, the man who had served his king faithfully and 
 long, his failure in the matter of the divorce the cause 
 of his fall ; the pliant subject who had always souglit to 
 live in harmony with the royal will ; who had built a great 
 palace, the wonder of the age, then gave it to his master, 
 and Avho died at last a remorseful death, his thoughts 
 divided between the ingratitude of Henry and the dis- 
 pleasure of his injured Lord, as the glory of this world 
 faded from sight exclaiming in ever-memorable words, 
 " Had I but served my God as I have served my king, 
 he would not have given me over in my gray hairs." 
 Unhappy Wolsey ! Many since his day, as before it, 
 have found it a vain thing to put confidence in princes. 
 
 When Cranmer was consecrated archbishop he took 
 
320 EOMANISM ASD THE REFORMERS. 
 
 the customary oath of allegiance — first to the pope, and 
 secondly to the king. But he placed ou record a protest, 
 which was never transmitted to the pope, in which he 
 declared his superior devotion to the supremacy of the 
 English sovereign. This act has been severely con- 
 demned as involving duplicity if not absolute dishonesty. 
 Some have regarded it as simply an interpretation of tlie 
 oath taken. It recognized the broader compass of regal 
 power as extending both to the Church and the State. 
 Henry was also a spiritual ruler. He wore the papal 
 crown on Ensrlish soil. Hence Cranmer's submission 
 to the pope must be modified by his duty to the king. 
 This, however, is not a satisfactory explanation. No 
 doubt there was an element of weakness in Cranmer's 
 course and a fear of royal displeasure. He w^as more 
 anxious to conciliate Henry, who was near by, than 
 Clement, beyond the Channel and the Alps. 
 
 But observe that at this stage the Church of England 
 continues to maintain the old doctrinal basis. Cranmer 
 holds to transubstantiation ; so does Henry, so do the 
 clergy at large. There is no Knox to confront ignorance 
 and wickedness in kings' houses, to confound the enemies 
 of the faith by resistless logic and vehement eloquence, 
 organizing the scattered friends of the Reformation and 
 encourao;ino^ the waverins; and faint-hearted. 
 
 Thomas Cranmer is not made of such stern stuff as 
 Latimer, and in most of the elements of a Reformer is 
 inferior to Tyndale. He is a sincere seeker after truth, 
 but is slow to find it, and wdien he has found it he 
 hesitates to make it known to others. He is cautious to 
 a fault, and aj)parently endangers the Reformation by 
 his timidity. He waits for the people to overtake him, 
 
CRANMER: THE ENGLISH REFORMATION. 321 
 
 theu gives voice to their common convictions of truth 
 and duty. He did not shine by reason of any moral 
 greatness either of courage or piety, " l)ut was well 
 adapted to save a cause in difficult circumstances for a 
 more favorable time/^ Perhaps the Reformation ad- 
 vanced with as much rapidity as was consistent with its 
 ultimate triumph. Should an engine start at the highest 
 attainable speed, it would break all the couplings and 
 leave the train hopelessly stationary on the track. Grad- 
 ual acceleration of movement would secure a more desir- 
 able result. 
 
 D'Aubigne's judgment of Cranmer is alike creditable 
 to the historian and his subject, pronouncing him the 
 right man for England at the tiuie of her separation 
 from the papacy : " Notwithstanding his compromises, 
 he never abandoned the great principles of the Reforma- 
 tion ; notwithstanding his concessions, he took advan- 
 tage of every opportunity to enc.'ourage those who shared 
 his faith to march toward a better future." 
 
 It cost men something in those days to be Reformers. 
 Cranmer had witnessed martyrdoms for the gospePs 
 sake. He had seen the pious Bilney led to the stake, 
 and, although the martyr died with the radiance of 
 heaven on his face and the peace of heaven in his 
 soul, yet the archbishop shrank from such a fate ; and 
 perhaps it is well that he did not court a martyr's 
 death. 
 
 A long step to^vard the Reformation of the Church 
 was taken when, through Cranmer's influence, the Bible 
 was translated and given to the people. Previous at- 
 tempts to do this had failed. The first translation was 
 the work of William Tyndale, assisted by Miles Cov- 
 
322 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 erdale, afterward bishop of Exeter. Both these men 
 were eminently zealous for the gospel of Christ. They 
 were persuaded that the Reformation of the Church and 
 the salvation of the world could be eflPected only through 
 the word of God. For his devotion to the trutii Tyn- 
 dale suffered martyrdom at Vilvoorden, near Brussels. 
 The circulation of the English Bible had been pre- 
 vented by Sir Thomas More and Bishop Tonstall. 
 Four years later it was republished, but by the direc- 
 tion of the bishops and clergy of England was burned. 
 Now Cranraer makes another effort to secure its circu- 
 lation. The Catholic bishops, led by the wicked Gard- 
 iner, resisted the project. They said, ^' The teaching of 
 the Church is sufficient : we must prohibit Tyndale's 
 Testament and the heretical books which come to us 
 from beyond the sea.'' Ah yes ; so it has ever been : 
 popery hates the light. It w^ould keep the people in 
 ignorance, for so only can it keep them within the pale 
 of a corrupt Church. 
 
 With this opposition what can be done ? Cranmer m 
 ready for compromise. If he cannot take two steps for- 
 ward, he is content to take one. It is agreed that the 
 Bible shall be printed in the language of the people, 
 but its circulation shall be confined to the higher and 
 educated classes. Not so did John Knox and the Scot- 
 tish Parliament decide, for they gave the Bible to the 
 peasant as well as to the master, and sent it out on its 
 blessed mission through every city, village and hamlet 
 from the Cheviot Hills to the stormy Minch and Pent- 
 land Frith. But Cranmer hoped for greater liberty in 
 some better day, and rejoiced in the royal sanction given 
 to this initial step. He said of the Bible, ^' It is the 
 
GBANMER: THE ENGLISH REFORMATION. 32:5 
 
 balm that will heal our wounds, and will be a more pre- 
 cious jewel in our houses than either gold or silver." 
 He waits the Lord's appointed day. 
 
 About this time Henry decreed the suppression of i\\\ 
 monasteries and the transfer of their wealth to the royal 
 coffers. The Carthusian monks had refused to recoo- 
 nize Henry's supremacy. They maintained that tlie 
 pontiff whose throne was on the Tiber was God's 
 representative on the earth and the spiritual head of 
 the Church throughout the world. Thereupon Lau- 
 rancCj Webster and Haughton, priors respectively of 
 Belleval, Axholm and London Charter-house, were 
 convicted of high treason. The penalty was death. 
 They went calmly to the gallow^s, protesting to the 
 last that the king w^as not the head of the Church of 
 England, and declaring their unwavering devotion to 
 the principles of the Roman Catholic faith. But one 
 thing was settled : Henry will not share his throne and 
 the affections of his people with the pope of Rome. 
 The bishops of his realm nuist acknowledge him head 
 of the Church as he is of the State. There were some 
 who would not admit so arrogant a claim. 
 
 Then, too, there were those in the Romanist party 
 who continued to condemn his marriage to Anne Boleyn. 
 For this double offence he determined to make an exam- 
 ple of nobler victims than had yet been offered. Kence 
 Bishop Foster and Sir Thomas More — late chancellor 
 of England, who had already been sent to the Tower — 
 were executed as a '^ state necessity." It was a wicked 
 and impolitic deed. It shocked the nation and was con- 
 demned by even the firmest adherents to tlie tlirone. 
 Yet the popular indignation was somewhat modified by 
 
324 ROMANISM AND THE BEFORMERS. 
 
 the fact that Sir Thomas More had himself severely 
 persecuted the Protestants. Noble men, whose only 
 offence was their devotion to the holy evangel, had 
 been burned at Smith field, praying for their murderers 
 with their dying breath. Now he who had defended 
 the Latin faith by fire and sword meets a similar 
 fate. 
 
 The friends of the Reformation were still in the mi- 
 nority. The suppression and spoliation of the monas- 
 teries gave offence to the Romanists. The relaxation of 
 papal domination occasioned alarm and led to rebellion. 
 Then the king thought best to modify his policy, and, 
 the Romanists, being in the ascendency, secured the 
 adoption of the famous Six Articles. These decreed — 1st. 
 Transubstantiation, or the change of the bread and wine 
 of the sacrament, after consecration, into the actual body 
 and blood of Christ : this is also called the doctrine of 
 the real presence. 2d. That the communion in both 
 kinds — that is, in the bread and wine — is not necessary, 
 and should not be permitted to the laity : they receive 
 only the bread or wafer; the priest communicates in 
 both kinds. 3d. The perpetual obligation of vows of 
 chastity. 4th. Tlie efficacy of private masses for the 
 souls of the dead. 5th. The celibacy of the clergy : 
 ])riests are under no circumstances permitted to mar- 
 ry. 6th. The value of auricular confession. Thus was 
 popery striving for the pre-eminence. It could scarcely 
 have asked more except a recognition of the supremacy 
 of the pope. This of course Henry would resist to the 
 last. At the same time it was decreed that any one who 
 opposed the doctrine of transubstantiation should be 
 liable to death by burning, and should forfeit all his 
 
QBANMER: THE ENGLISH REFORMATION. 325 
 
 lauds and goods. The denial of any of the other articles 
 should be deemed felony and involve the forfeiture of 
 all worldly substance. 
 
 These articles were opposed by Archbishop Cranmer 
 for three consecutive days in arguments of great power, 
 presented in terms so modest and grave as even to con- 
 ciliate the king and such advocates of the act as the 
 dukes of Norfolk and Suffolk. The papists alleged that 
 Cranmer opposed the articles because one of them re- 
 quired celibacy, and he was himself married. But he 
 had other reasons and graver for his opposition, and 
 especially did he dislike the severity of the penalty 
 which the act prescribed. This deliverance of the 
 Parliament brought him great sorrow, but he yielded 
 to it. He sent his wife to Germany and went quietly on 
 in his work. 
 
 Meanwhile, Henry wields a sword like that preserved 
 in Dumbarton Castle — double-handed. It smites on the 
 right hand and on the left. The papist denies the su- 
 premacy of the king ; the Protestant denies transubstan- 
 tiation : the Tudor's weapon destroys both. Even Cran- 
 mer is in danger, and only his conciliatory policy and 
 past services can save him. 
 
 Here let it be observed that the Reformation in Eng- 
 land was largely occupied with the modification of the 
 doctrine of the real presence in the Lord's Supper. 
 Transubstantiation, rather than justification by faith, as 
 in Germany, engaged attention. The Reform in Eng- 
 land was further differentiated from the Reform in 
 Scotland by the principle which it applied to church 
 ceremonies. The Anglican Church held that it was 
 proper to employ in divine worship whatever was not 
 
326 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 prohibited in the Scriptures. The Church in Scotland, 
 as did a large part of the continental Church, insisted 
 upon such ordinances and ceremonies only as were direct- 
 ly enjoined in the word of God. 
 
 In England, episcopal ordination was preferred, yet 
 it wa.:- deemed essential by but few. Cranmer maintain- 
 ed the validity of the orders of the foreign Protestant 
 non-episcopal churches. He expressed the opinion that 
 there were not two bishops on the bench or one clergy- 
 man in fifty throughout the Anglican Church who 
 would deny the validity of the order of those continen- 
 tal pastors who had not received their ordination from 
 episcopal hands. He regarded the presbyter as the peer 
 of the bishop in relation to the induction into holy 
 orders. The ecclesiastics who insisted upon apostolic 
 succession were in the minority at the first, but the 
 sentiments they held ultimately gained the ascendency. 
 To this we may refer hereafter. 
 
 Here w^e pause a little to inquire the fate of Anne 
 Boleyn. Respecting her character opposite opinions 
 have been entertained. Froude in his admiration of 
 Henry YIII. throws a shadow over the memory of the 
 queen that he may in some measure justify the cruelty 
 of the former. He maintains that the youthful Anne, 
 who had spent nine years in the French court, the most 
 profligate in Europe, had been contaminated by it. 
 On the other hand. Merle d'Aubign^ held that she 
 was reared in the household of the pious Margaret of 
 Angouleme, a friend of Calvin's and of the Reforma- 
 tion. 
 
 The splendors of the throne attracted her, and for a 
 time, it may be, she wavered in her devotion to Christ. 
 
CllANMER: THE ENGLISH REFORMATION. :J27 
 
 Her piety was severely tested. But it reasserted itself, 
 and by subsequent trials was purged. ^'She looked 
 within herself, and found once more, as queen, that for 
 those who have everything, as well as those who have 
 nothing, there is only one single good — God himself.'' 
 She was in sympathy with Protestantism ; she favored 
 the unlimited circulation of the Bible ; she had the con- 
 fidence of Tyndale and Craumer. She was light-hearted, 
 and in her relations to the king's courtiers was not al- 
 ways guarded. But she was doubtless as pure-minded 
 as she was beautiful in person and unaffected in manner. 
 But the mercurial Henry, who had sent Catherine of 
 Arragon into disgrace and to an early death, transferred 
 his affections from his second queen to Jane Seymour, 
 and Anne, accused of crimes of which she had never 
 been guilty, was arrested, sent to the Tower and after a 
 mock trial condemned to death. When she received her 
 sentence she lifted her hands to heaven and said, ^' O 
 Father ! O Creator ! thou who art the way, the truth 
 and the life, thou knowest I have not deserved this 
 ftite." On the morning of the 19th of May, 1536, she 
 was led out to the place of execution. The dukes of 
 Suffolk and Richmond, the lord chancellor, the lord 
 mayor and other officials were there. There too was 
 the executioner, who had come from Calais, holding 
 his gleaming axe as Anne, attended by four maids of 
 honor, ascended the scaffold. A more beautiful woman 
 lived not in the English realm, and that day her person 
 seemed invested with unwonted charms. The mother of 
 Elizabeth, the future queen, she was but thirty years of 
 age, and no wonder if her young heart clung to life and 
 to her child. Henry is gone miles away from London, 
 
 22 
 
328 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 yet he has arranged for a speedy communication of her 
 death. Anne addressed those who were to witness her 
 execution. " I am not come here," she said, " to justify 
 myself; I leave my justification entirely with Christ, in 
 whom I put my trust. I will accuse no man nor speak 
 anything of that whereof I am accused.'' She knelt a 
 few moments in silent prayer, then arose, laid her head 
 on the block, an expression of strange sweetness on her 
 face and on her lips the prayer, " O Jesus, receive my 
 soul.'' The executioner's axe swept down and her head 
 fell. The next moment an artilleryman on the wall 
 fired the great gun which was to carry to the king the 
 tidings of Anne's death. 
 
 Henry was in Epping Forest with a group of hunters 
 about him. He heard the report of the gun as it swept 
 across the meadows and down the long aisles of the for- 
 est. " Ha ! ha !" shouted the king, " the deed is done ! 
 Uncouple the hounds and away." 
 
 The murky clouds which overhung the old Tower 
 and all London that morning were pierced by one Eye 
 which slumbers not nor sleeps, and a. record of that 
 day's doings was made in the court which is higher 
 than Henry's, and he must meet it when his career of 
 crime is ended. 
 
 The day following Anne's death Henry was married 
 to Jane Seymour, who died at the expiration of a year, 
 having given birth to a son, afterward Edward YI. 
 Next he married Anne of Cleves, a Protestant, from 
 vvhom he was divorced after he had beheaded Thomas 
 Cromwell, who had advised the marriage. He then 
 married the guilty and unhappy Catherine How^ard, 
 whom he soon after beheaded. And finally he chose 
 
CRANMER: THE ENGLISH REFORMATION. 329 
 
 for his sixth wife Catherine Parr, the virtuous widow 
 of Lord Latimer, who survived liini. 
 
 Of the latter part of Heury's hfe w^e can speak but 
 briefly. Through the influence of Craumer important 
 changes were made in the canon law of the Church. 
 Superstitions which had long been practiced were abol- 
 ished, such as creeping to the cross and adoring it, the 
 covering of images in the time of Lent and representa- 
 tions of the Trinity which received idolatrous worship. 
 Other changes of a minor kind were effected, and the 
 Church advanced toward the more scriptural worship 
 which was at a later period to distinguish the Protest- 
 ant from the papal communion. 
 
 After a most eventful career, in which lights and 
 shadows mingled, Henry VIII. departed this life Jan. 
 28, 1547, in the thirty-fifth year of his reign and in the 
 fifty-sixth year of his age. Thomas Cranmer, the arch- 
 bishop and primate of England, was summoned to his 
 bedside, but found the king speechless. Henry pressed 
 Cranmer's hand in token of his faith in God througli 
 Jesus Christ. A theoretical faith we doubt not he had, 
 but, so far as the world knows, he had nothing more. 
 Possibly he applied to Christ at the last for a kingly 
 pardon, and found there was rain enough in the sweet 
 heavens to make even a hand as bloody as his white as 
 snow. We cannot tell. There is a day coming which 
 shall declare his doom. 
 
 It is not a part of our purpose to discuss the (charac- 
 ter of Henry. One has said that but for his matri- 
 monial scandals he would have been respected, if not 
 beloved. His reign, on the whole, was a prosperous one 
 and comparatively peaceful. Though in sympathies and 
 
330 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 faith a Romanist, yet he was for that age a tolerant ruler, 
 and in his day were laid the foundations of that Protest- 
 antism which afterward became the glory and defence of 
 England. 
 
 Froude is lavish in his praise of Henry, although he 
 seems to distinguish between the earlier and latter parts 
 of his reio^n. He thinks that if the kina: had died at 
 the moment when the divorce from Catherine of Arragon 
 was first agitated, his loss would have been deplored as 
 one of the heaviest misfortunes which had befallen the 
 country, and he would have left a name which would 
 have taken its place in history by the side of that of the 
 Black Prince or of the conqueror of Agincourt. 
 
 On the other hand, Hume in his terse style, whilst 
 recognizing Henry's excellences, does not hesitate to say 
 that " a catalogue of his vices would comprehend many 
 of the worst qualities incident to human nature — vio- 
 lence, cruelty, profusion, rapacity, injustice, bigotry, 
 presumption, caprice ;" and yet " this prince not only 
 acquired the regard of his subjects, but was never the 
 object of their hatred, and he seems even in some de- 
 gree to have possessed their love and affection to the 
 last." 
 
 Froude and Hume may take extreme views of his 
 character, and the truth probably lies midway between. 
 We may not denounce Henry as the worst of kings, 
 neither can we ardently admire nor quite forgive the 
 man who beheaded Anne Boleyn, whom, when he was 
 dying, it is alleged, he pronounced innocent — who sent 
 Thomas Cromwell to the scaffold and grew in cruelty 
 as years went on. The standard of our age is different 
 from the standard of his, but even in those rude times 
 
CRANMEB: THE ENGLISH REFORMATION. 331 
 
 natural conscience, though darkened, was not dead, and 
 Henry was not ignorant of the principles of moral hy 
 as set forth in the word of God. He knew his (hity, 
 but he did it not. He loved the wrong, and he pur- 
 sued it. 
 
 A man of noble presence, like Saul among the chil- 
 dren of Israel ; of intellectual abilities equal to those of 
 Wolsey ; an eminent linguist, conversing and writing 
 accurately in four languages ; a mechanical genius of no 
 mean rank; familiar with the science of medicine; and 
 withal a theologian little inferior to his favorite primate, 
 — he might have shone in history as the Constantine 
 of the sixteenth century, in fact, as he was in name, 
 ^Hhe defender of the faith'' whose foundations were 
 laid on Calvary, whose dome pierces the heavens. Such 
 as he was, God used him in the accomplishment of 
 beneficent purposes. As he makes the wrath of man to 
 praise him, so he makes the power of kings subservient 
 to his Church, and wicked passions and wicked men 
 may be employed, as were Noah's carpenters, in build- 
 ing the ark which shall save the faithful and come to 
 anchor in a regenerated world. " The Lord reignetli ; 
 let the earth rejoice, and the multitude of isles be glad 
 thereof." 
 
 Henry had indicated the order of the royal succession, 
 and Edward VI., son of Jane Seymour, ascended the 
 thi'one in 1547, then but ten years of age, but an exam- 
 ple of "intellectual precocity seldom surpassed." At 
 his coronation three swords, representing the three king- 
 doms, were carried in the regal procession. Edward 
 said there should be a fourth, meaning the Bible, which 
 is the sword of the Spirit. " Without that," said he, 
 
332 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 " we are nothing ; we can do nothing. From that alone 
 we obtain all honor, virtue, grace, salvation and what- 
 soever we have of divine strength.'^ 
 
 Edward Seymour, earl of Hertford, the king's uncle, 
 was appointed lord protector and made duke of Somer- 
 set. The Protector was a Protestant, and the Reformers 
 took courage. Europe contributed some of its leading 
 minds, in sympathy with the Reformation, to the uni- 
 versities of Oxford and Cambridge. Supported by 
 these and the power of the throne, Cranmer took long 
 strides in the w^ork of Reform. Ridley also came to the 
 primate's aid. And who was Ridley ? 
 
 He fills an honorable place in the history of that age. 
 Born in 1500, educated at Newcastle-upon-Tyne, at 
 Pembroke Hall at Cambridge, and subsequently in the 
 higher schools of Paris and Louvain, he soon became 
 one of the leading men in the Protestant Reform. He 
 boldly denounced the errors of Rome, w^as made bishop 
 of Rochester by Henry YIII., and after the removal 
 of Bonner was appointed bishop of London in the reign 
 of Edward VI. Ridley was one of the most forcible 
 preachers of the day. The people flocked to hear him. 
 His sermons were fragrant with the gospel of Jesus, 
 sweet as the singing of angels and resistless as the light. 
 Of this man, at whose feet King Edward loved to sit, 
 we shall speak more fully at another time. Suffice it 
 now to say that he labored with Cranmer in the interests 
 of Protestantism, and they rejoiced together in its early 
 ascendency throughout the British realm. 
 
 The famous Six Articles were repealed. In 1552 
 the Book of Common Prayer, prepared by Cranmer, 
 was adopted, and the Forty-two Articles were passed. 
 
CBANMER: THE ENGLISH REFORMATION. 33o 
 
 Transiibstantiation, prayers for the dead, auricular con- 
 fession and the celibacy of the clergy were set aside. 
 The communion was given to the laity in both kinds ; 
 the Church of England, with a confession of faith 
 and an eminently scriptural liturgy, has at last sepa- 
 rated herself from the Church of Rome, and witli 
 an independent existence, purged from the corruptions 
 which had long deformed her ritual, a better day has 
 dawned on England ; which, though it may now and 
 then be obscured by clouds, shall never have a setting. 
 
 This advance was made with all the caution which 
 habitually marked the policy of Cranmer. But it was 
 earnestly opposed. Gardiner and Bonner resisted every 
 change with all the power of their mighty influence 
 and all the violence of their malignant natures. The 
 seizure of the abbey lands, which accrued largely to the 
 benefit of a few, among whom was the duke of Somerset, 
 brought troublous times. The Romanists were in arms. 
 Somerset fell, and Northumberland took his place. 
 
 A little later there came a blow to the Reformation 
 from which it did not soon recover. At the age of 
 sixteen, in the year 1553, Edward VI. died, and shad- 
 ows deep and dark gathered over the prospects of the 
 Anglican Church. Bloody Mary ascended the throne. 
 There are rejoicings on the banks of the Tiber, weeping 
 and bloodshedding on the banks of the Thames. Julius 
 III. now thinks to regain the power in the British realm 
 which Clement YIL lost. 
 
 The primate of England sees a storm gathering and 
 seeks shelter. Strange sounds come from the Continent, 
 as of armies marshaling for the fight. The very waves 
 of the sea as they break on the shore seem to sing a 
 
334 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 mouruful requiem, aud some imagine they see the glare 
 of funeral piles illumine the darkened air, as if a Nero 
 had mounted the throne and an army of Beatous were 
 gathering fagots to burn the enemies of Rome. These 
 fears were not ungrounded. But we will not anticipate. 
 
 This much is certain : God reigns and Christ is King 
 in Zion. What if ^' the kings of the earth set them- 
 selves, and the rulers take counsel together, against the 
 Lord, and against his anointed, saying, Let us break their 
 bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us ? He 
 that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh ; the Lord shall 
 have them in derision." 
 
 Like streams which disappear from view and then 
 emerge from their subterranean channels in broader 
 currents and a deeper flow, so the Reformation, seeming- 
 ly buried for a time, shall rise on some other day to 
 claim all England as its own. 
 
 Ah yes ! Babylon, the mystery of iniquity, shall be 
 destroyed, and Jesus shall reign from the Channel to 
 Cape Wrath. Nay, he shall receive the uttermost parts 
 of the earth for his possession. Happy are all they 
 who serve him. Happy the people who, with hands 
 cleansed by his blood, lift the diadem to his thorn- 
 scan'ed brow and crown him Lord of all. 
 
 "n. 
 
i 
 
 I 
 
 CRi^NMER: PERSECUTION AND MARTYRDOM. 
 
''Quenched the violence of fire , . . . out of weak?iess were 
 made strong.'' 
 
 The Chiuxh ''has ofteti been refined by the most violent 
 pcj'secntions of her enemies. She has not only survived the 
 fiaines kindled agai?ist her, but, as refined gold comes out 
 more beautiful from the furnace, left her dross behind her, 
 and has been wrought into a 7nore beautiful frame by the hand 
 of her g 7'eat Artificer. ' ' 
 
 Charnock. 
 
 " God. in his ordinary providence, maketh use of means, 
 yet is free to work without, above and against them, at his 
 pleasure. ' ' 
 
 Confession of Faith, chap. v. sec. iii. 
 
CRANMER: PERSECUTION AND MAR- 
 TYRDOM. 
 
 rriHE reigD of Edward VI. marked an interesting 
 J- epoch in the English Reformation. It was tlie 
 morning of a long-looked-for day. The snn which had 
 emerged from the bosom of night had risen above the 
 hills. The mists had lifted and passed away. The 
 incense of psalms ascended through the still air, and 
 was met by benedictions descending from heaven. But 
 the promise of the morning is not always fulfilled. 
 The sun may soon be obscured by clouds, and the calm 
 be succeeded by storms. x\nd so in the higlier sphere 
 of spiritual life there are what we call disappointments 
 and great afflictions. 
 
 But there is a needs-be for these. They are blessings, 
 though for a time disguised. The storm purifies the 
 air and leaves a greener earth behind it. Adversity 
 drives us to the shelter of the divine presence, where 
 we learn needful lessons and go thence to nobler and 
 more effective service. 
 
 The good King Edward died just as the Reformation 
 had gained the ascendency. His demise put every in- 
 terest of the Reform in jeopardy. It was preceded by 
 ominous signs and alarming events. Hyde Park in 
 London and the meadows beyond were covered with 
 
 337 
 
338 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 hall red as blood. The Thames seemed to have left its 
 old channel, and the streets from St. Paul's church to 
 Westminster Abbey suggested the Grand Canal and 
 water-paths of Venice. Midnight darkness anticipated 
 tlie going down of the sun, and was made more appar- 
 ent by the flashes of lightning that appalled the stout- 
 hearted, unaccustomed to fear. 
 
 What does all this mean ? The superstitious thought 
 it expressed God's hatred of heresy and his determina- 
 tion to destroy it. Others thought it was a premonition 
 of dark days and fearful carnage which would try the 
 faith of tlie Protestant Church and set back the work 
 of Reform so auspiciously begun. 
 
 Now that Edward is dead there comes the question 
 of succession. Although Henry VIII. had obtained a 
 divorce from Catherine of Arrao;on on the alleo-ed 
 ground of illegitimate marriage, yet he had subsequently 
 indicated his wish, in the event of Edward's death, that 
 her daughter, the princess Mary, should succeed to the 
 throne. When Edward's death seemed probable the 
 papists felt assured of Mary's accession, and the Protest- 
 ants feared it. But there were many who held that her 
 title to the succession was not legal. The dukes of 
 Suffolk and Northumberland urged the claims of Lady 
 Jane Grey, the eldest daughter of Suffolk and the wife 
 of Lord Guilford Dudley, the fourth son of Northum- 
 berland. Cranmer did the same, and for this offence 
 Mary never forgave him. 
 
 No woman had ever occupied the throne of England. 
 Northumberland thought to take advantage of the 
 prejudice against a female sovereign, proclaim Lady 
 Jane queen and put the reigns of government in the 
 
CRANMER: PERSECUTION AND MARTYRDOM. IMV3 
 
 liands of Lord Dudley. Lady Jane had great abilities 
 and greater virtues. In learning she was even superior 
 to Edward, who was about her own age, and wifth whom 
 she had been educated with the most scrupulous care. 
 Proficient in her own language, she also spoke and 
 wrote with equal accuracy and readiness the French, Ital- 
 ian, Latin and Greek. She was also familiar with the 
 Hebrew, Chaldean and Arabic. She was versed in the 
 philosophy of Athens, and preferred Plato and Demos- 
 thenes to the pleasures of the park. She was at the 
 same time fond of music, played skillfully on various 
 instruments and sang with a sweetness of voice and a 
 charm of expression rarely equaled. And all this when 
 she was but sixteen years of age and the bride of Lord 
 Dudley. But her crowning excellence was her piety. 
 She had found Christ in his woixi, and early gave her 
 heart to him in a devotion which never wavered. 
 
 For her the throne had no attractions. When it was 
 suggested to her that she might succeed Edward as the 
 sovereign of England, she declared her preference for 
 private life. When Northumberland pressed her to 
 accept the crown, she thrust it from her^^^ A crown," 
 she said, "which hath been violently wrested from 
 Catherine of Arragon, made more unfortunate by the 
 punishment of Anne Boleyn and others that wore it 
 after her; and wherefore should you have me add my 
 blood to theirs, and be the third victim from whom 
 this fatal crown may be ravished with the head that 
 wears it?" 
 
 But the importunity of injudicious friends prevailed, 
 and she went to the Tower, from w^hence she was i)ro- 
 claimed queen. For ten days only did she wear the 
 
340 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 crowD. Her adherents were far outnumbered by Mary's, 
 and amid warlike demonstrations Lady Jane was dis- 
 placed by the daughter of the divorced Catherine. 
 Mary's ascension to the throne being announced on 
 Cheapside, the people shouted, ^' God save the queen !" 
 and the bells of St. Paul's church in joyful pealings 
 sent the tidings far over London, whilst even Protest- 
 ants, to whom Mary had made pledges of toleration, 
 rejoiced in her enthronement. 
 
 When intelligence of all this was conveyed to Lady 
 Jane she answered, " I better brook this message than 
 that of my advancement to royalty." And what fol- 
 lowed? Lady Jane's palace became her prison. She 
 was adjudged guilty of high treason and condemned to 
 death. The months went by, and at last this beautiful 
 and godly woman, only nineteen years of age, after the 
 execution of her husband and of others who had pro- 
 claimed her queen, was led out to execution on Tower 
 Hill. Having reached the scaffold, she said to the lords 
 and other spectators, ^' I beseech you all to bear me wit- 
 ness that I here die a true Christian woman, professing 
 and avouching from my soul that I trust to be saved by 
 the blood, passion and merits of Jesus Christ my Sa- 
 viour only, and by no other means, casting far behind 
 me all the works and merits of mine own actions, as 
 things so short of the true duty I owe that I quake to 
 think how much they may stand against me." She 
 then knelt and repeated the fifty-first Psalm. After- 
 ward she put i\\Q bandage over her eyes and felt for the 
 block, saying, "What shall I do? where is it?" When 
 conducted to the block she laid her head upon it and 
 said, '^Lord, into thine hands I commend my spirit." 
 
GRANMER- PERSECUTION AND MARTYRDOM. 311 
 
 The axe descended, and the next moment a gate nnseen 
 by mortal eyes swung noiselessly on its hinges of gold, 
 and Lady Jane Grey, entering the metropolis of the 
 universe, ascended a throne which shall stand for ever. 
 
 Thus the reign of Mary was inaugurated with the 
 shedding of blood. Those who died on Tower Hill 
 were charged with high treason, but this was not their 
 only offence ; and it was not because of this at all that 
 their execution was urged by Gardiner and others. It 
 was because they were Protestants. They denied the 
 supremacy of the pope. They rejected the real presence 
 or treated it with indifference, and were chargeable with 
 other departures from the Roman faith. 
 
 Mary had promised to continue to the Protestants 
 the religious liberties they had enjoyed under Edward, 
 but no sooner had she reached the throne than she 
 violated her solemn pledge. She determined to re- 
 establish Pomanism, cost what it might. She boasted 
 herself "a virgin sent from God to ride and tame the 
 people of England.^' Gardiner was a])[)ointed lord chan- 
 cellor. Protestant bishops were ejected from their sees 
 for heresy and wedlock, and their places were filled by 
 pajiists. The marriages of the inferior clergy were 
 pronounced illegal and their children bastards. 
 
 It was thought that by severe persecutions, rapidly 
 multiplied, the Protestants would be driven into the 
 Romish fold. Certainly, they would not give all they 
 had, even life itself, for their groundless faith. Let 
 prisons open and holocausts be kindled, and heresy will 
 die before a twelvemonth is passed. At any rate, Mary 
 will make the experiment. The so-called Holy Catholic 
 Church— which the Church of Rome was not and never 
 
342 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 had been — bids h(.r Godspeed in her work of demolition 
 and death. 
 
 Paul IV., th^ viceregent of God, spread the shield 
 of St. Peter over the English throne and hurled anath- 
 emas at the heads of all heretics. The leaders of the 
 Reformation were threatened and then imprisoned. 
 Many fled to the land of John Knox, and found com- 
 parative quiet in its cities or in the seclusion of the 
 Grampian Hills. Some went to the Continent, and at 
 Frankfort-on-the-Main, at Geneva, where Calvin still 
 taught, at Strassburg and Basle these exiles for right- 
 eousness' sake dwelt in peace. 
 
 Cranmer was urged to flee, but he determined to hold 
 his ground. Perhaps he thought Mary was not forget- 
 ful of services he had rendered her when in Henry's 
 day he had shielded her from her father's wrath. But 
 he was imprisoned at Oxford jail, then deposed from 
 his archbishopric and succeeded by Reginald Pole. 
 Submission to the Romish faith was required of all 
 classes ; to refuse it was to suffer, and perchance to die. 
 
 Cardinal Pole, the pope's legate, professed to prefer 
 milder means, hoping thus to win the erring back to the 
 faith and avoid the reaction severity might produce. 
 Gardiner insisted upon immediate resort to the stake 
 and the headman's axe. Mary approved the chancellor's 
 decision. 
 
 Then the Smithfield fires were kindled. John Rogers,, 
 who has been styled the proto-martyr of the Marian 
 persecution, was burned February 4, 1555. He had 
 been educated at Cambridge, then went to Antwerp in 
 the capacity of a religious teacher. There he met 
 Tyndale and Coverdale, and through their instructions 
 
CRANMER- PERSECUTION AND MARTYRDOM. 3 t3 
 
 came to a knowledge of the truth. He assisted these 
 exiled Protestauts in the translation of the Bible into 
 English, and afterward returned to his own country. 
 Edward Yl. made him a prebend of St. Paul's, and 
 later he was appointed vicar of St. Sepulchre's chunih. 
 After Mary's accession he was charged with liaving 
 uttered heretical sentiments in a sermon preached at St. 
 Paul's cross, and was sent to Newgate prison. The 
 lord chancellor, Gardiner, demanded a full expression 
 of his views, and especially as to the supremacy of the 
 pope. Rogers answered, " I know none other head but 
 Christ of his Catholic Church, neither will I acknowl- 
 edge the bishop of Rome to have any more authority 
 than any other bishop hath by the word of God and by 
 the doctrine of the old and pure Catholic Church four 
 hundred years after Christ." Such sentiments deserved 
 death. Cursed be the man who denies the supremacy 
 of the Roman pontiif! Rogers lingered in Newgate 
 prison with common thieves until the day appointed 
 for his execution. Then he was led to Smithfield and 
 bound to the stake. He endured the suffering of flames 
 without a murmur, verifying the promise of his Lord : 
 "As thy days thy strength shall be." He lifted his 
 hands toward heaven and calmly waited his deliverance. 
 They who stood by saw only a chariot of fire bearing 
 the spirit of the martyr upward, but there came another 
 like tlie Tishbite's, to meet it, and along a path that 
 brightened as it advanced the holy martyr ascended to 
 glory. " Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death 
 of his saints." 
 
 A little later John Bradford was condemned for deny- 
 ing the d(^ctrine of transubstantiation, and sent to the 
 
344 BOMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 Tower, afterward to the Compter iu the Poultry, and 
 then to Newgate. At four o'clock on the morning of 
 his death Smithfield was crowded with those who wished 
 to look once more on the martyr's face and tell him how 
 much they loved him. Five hours they waited for his 
 coming. He was bound to the stake, and John Leaf, a 
 young man, with him. He asked the people to help 
 him with their prayers. He spake words of trust and 
 declared his forgiveness of his murderers. Then he ad- 
 dressed his fellow-martyr, saying, ^' Be of good comfort, 
 brother, for we shall have a merry supper with the Lord 
 to-night." So died holy John Bradford. The influence 
 of his life shall bless the earth and enrich heaven, and 
 his name shall live for ever. 
 
 But time would fail us to speak of all the men and 
 women who during the reign of Bloody Mary died in 
 the flames at Smithfield. And for what? Because they 
 denied the supremacy of the pope and the real presence. 
 They were Protestants, and not papists. Liberty of 
 conscience was denied them. They were required to 
 reject the testimony of the word of God to the headship 
 of Christ, the sufficiency of his sacrifice and the simpli- 
 city of his sacrament — or burn. They preferred the lat- 
 ter alternative. Their Lord died on the cross for them ; 
 they would die at the stake for him. They went out of 
 the world along a path red with blood, but saw there 
 the prints of their Saviour's feet, and were glad to be 
 conformed to his painful death. They shall shine as 
 the stars for ever and for ever. 
 
 We need not dwell on the restoration of the papal 
 religion in England. The English Parliament had 
 declared that the alienation of the abbey lands should 
 
CRANMER PERSECUTION AND MARTYRDOM. 345 
 
 remain. They cared more for mouey and estates than 
 for religion, and having secured the former by making 
 its retention a condition of the restoration of papacy, 
 they were ready to yield submission in all other matters. 
 The dogma of transubstantiation was accepted. The 
 mass for the dead was celebrated with great solemnity. 
 The celibacy of the clergy was required. All that dis- 
 tinguished the Roman from the Protestant religion was 
 revived. Proclamations were issued against heretics and 
 heretical books. A system of espionage was established 
 by which offenders against the Romish faith might be 
 discovered and brought to early trial. It was ordered 
 that all heretical writings should be burned. Any per- 
 sons who secreted and read such writings or exhibited 
 them to others were to be accounted rebels " and with- 
 out any further delay to be executed by martial law." 
 Mary was determined to put down, if possible, all 
 heresy and establish popery on a foundation that could 
 never be moved. But she was perpetually disturbed 
 with fears. What if Elizabeth should succeed her on 
 the throne — Elizabeth the heretic, the daughter of the 
 hated Anne Boleyn, for whom Henry had sacrificed her 
 mother, ever a loyal papist ? Besides, the relations of 
 England to Paul IV. were not the most harmonious. 
 He continued to demand the restoration of the posses- 
 sions of the Church. He charged the English nation 
 with sacrilege, and declared the persons who retained 
 property which belonged to God to be in a state of 
 " eternal damnation.'^ There was guilt at the door of 
 the Parliament. There was guilt in the Church that 
 winked at this iniquity. There was guilt even on the 
 throne, which was too weak to correct the wrong. 
 
316 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 Mary was unhappy. She could not control the nation. 
 As a Romanist she recognized the justice of the pontiff's 
 claim, but the Parliament was unyielding in its opposi- 
 tion to his demand. Then she determined to build mon- 
 asteries at her own expense. The Grey Friars, the Car- 
 thusians and the Knights of St. John were restored to 
 their '^ rookeries." But this was a poor amend for the 
 national wrong. Then, to increase her wretchedness, 
 Philip, her husband, neglected her. The more she 
 sued for his affections, the more heartless he grew. 
 Her religion brought her no solace. She turned her 
 tearful eyes toward heaven, but the dome of her false 
 faith, decked with images of saints and the holy Virgin, 
 and, high above all, an arrogant and cruel pontiff, inter- 
 cepted a view of a happier life. So she turned to per- 
 secution. She will serve the Church, die in the faith 
 and leave her soul with God. 
 
 She determines that Cranmer shall be the next to suf- 
 fer. Already imprisoned in Oxford, he is summoned to 
 Rome for trial. But the doors of his prison remain 
 bolted and barred, and he cannot respond to the 
 papal citation if he would : he is pronounced con- 
 tumacious and condemned to death. 
 
 And now is enacted a species of cruelty for which we 
 can find no name. Mary is resolved that Cranmer shall 
 die, but she will take advantage of his constitutional 
 weakness, and secure, if possible, a denial of the faith 
 he has propagated in her realms. She knew more con- 
 cerning his timidity than the world knew. The latter 
 thought him courageous ; she knew he was not. She 
 directed that he should be treated with apparent sym- 
 pathy and consideration. She would give an impression 
 
CBANMER: PERSECUTION AND MARTYRDOM. ?A1 
 
 of royal clemency and readiness to forgive. If he will 
 but recant all shall be well. Higher ecclesiastical honors 
 shall be his, or, if he prefers it, he sliall live a private 
 life without molestation or fear. He resisted the temp- 
 tation for a time, but at last yielded to it, wrote his re- 
 cantation, repeated it six times, and signed it in the pres- 
 ence of one Sydal and two Spanish friars. Mary has 
 gained her point. Thomas Cranmer, archbishop of 
 Canterbury, primate of the Reformed Church of Eng- 
 land, has deserted the Reformation and returned to the 
 Roman fold ! The papists are jubilant. Cranmer is 
 disgraced. Protestantism is overthrown. Reformers 
 bow their heads in sorrow, with the exclamation of the 
 dying Caesar/' Et tu Brute!" Now let the bells of 
 St. Paul's be rung and Te Deums be raised and the 
 pontiff proclaim thanksgiving in Rome. 
 
 A month passed on and Cranmer is still a prisoner. 
 His soul is pierced with many sorrows. His gray head 
 is bowed in shame. He has saved his life, but at an 
 infinite cost. Saved it? JS'ot so. Mary and the court 
 have decreed his death. His recantation cannot save 
 him. It serves only to embitter his last hours and 
 break his power. 
 
 On the 21st of March, 1556, the archbishop was led 
 out to die. The heavens Avere dark with clouds and 
 3old winds swept down the streets of Oxford. He 
 was first conducted to St. Mary's church, where the 
 sermon usual on such occasions was preached. He 
 stood in the midst of the people, tall and commanding 
 in person ; a venerable man, the sight of whose mild, 
 sorrowful face and gray hairs moved many to teai-s. 
 As the sermon progressed, seemingly oblivious to what 
 
348 R031ANISM Ayn THE REFORMERS. 
 
 was passing around him, he would stretch his hands 
 toward heaven, great tears coursing down his cheeks, 
 as if praying for divine mercy and a speedy passage 
 home. Again he would drop his hands and bow his 
 head, as if a sense of shame had suddenly overcome 
 him. The sermon ended, liberty was given him to 
 speak. First he offered a prayer in which he made 
 humble confession of his sins and pleaded forgiveness 
 for the same : " Have mercy upon me, O Lord, whose 
 property is always to have mercy, for although my sins 
 be great, yet thy mercy is greater. I crave nothing, O 
 Lord, for mine own merits, but for thy Name's sake, 
 that it may be glorified thereby, and for thy dear Son 
 Jesus Christ's sake. Amen.'' 
 
 Then he addressed the people, declaring his faith in 
 all the principles of the Reformed religion, in all the 
 teachings of Christ, his apostles and the holy prophets ; 
 denying the pope to be the supreme head of the Church, 
 but Antichrist rather, and his doctrines false. He re- 
 ferred to his recantation, deploring that great offence 
 against Christ and the truth, saying, " Now I come to 
 the great thing that troubleth my conscience more than 
 any other thing that I ever said or did in my life, and 
 that is the sending abroad of writings contrary to the 
 truth which I thought in my heart, and writ for fear 
 of death and to save my life, if it might be ; and 
 that is all such bills which T have written or signed 
 with mine own hand since my degradation, wherein I 
 have written many things untrue. And forasmuch as 
 my hand offended in writing contrary to my heart, 
 therefore my hand shall first be punished, for if I may 
 come to the fire it shall first be burned. As for the 
 
CBANMER: PERSECUTION AND MARTYRDOM. :M9 
 
 pope, I refuse lilni as Christ's enemy and Antichrist, 
 with all his false doctrine.'^ These were brave words. 
 Like Peter, in an unguarded hour he had denied his 
 Lord, and like Peter he is uow ready to die for Him 
 whom he cannot again deny. Conscious of his own 
 utter weakness, he has taken hold on divine strength. 
 The grace of Christ sustains him. His last utterances, 
 with the glare of flames on his face, are in behalf of the 
 truth and his injured but forgiving Lord. The papists 
 are disappointed and enraged. They hurry him away 
 to the stake in front of Balliol College ; they bind him 
 to it with fiendish delight; they kindle the fires, and 
 then, standing by, mock the martyr. He is calm. His 
 trust in Christ wavers not. The hand which wrote the 
 recantation is held out to the flames, and he says again 
 and again, ^^ Oh this unworthy right hand ! This hand 
 hath offended." And so he died. 
 
 John Strype has touch ingly said : " He was not 
 buried, as many of his predecessors were, in his own 
 cathedral church, nor enclosed in a monument of mar- 
 ble or touchstone. Nor had he any inscription to set 
 forth his praises to posterity ; no shrine to be visited by 
 devout pilgrims, as his predecessors, St. Dunstan and 
 St. Thomas, had. No ! Cranmer's martyrdom is his 
 monument, and his name will outlast an epitaph or 
 shrine.'^ The March winds, sporting with his ashes, 
 scattered them along the highways and byways of 
 Oxford; but the seeds of divine truth which he 
 planted in England have borne immortal fruitage, 
 and, casting the mantle of charity over the faults of 
 the good primate, we shall ever revere the memory of 
 him who laid down his life for Christ, and who, though 
 
350 EOMANISM A XI) THE REFORMERS. 
 
 sentenced by papists to quenchless fires, passed the domes 
 of St. Mary's church and BaUiol College, ascending in 
 triumph to a home above the fitful sky. 
 
 Thomas Cranmer was a man of great attainments in 
 divinity and in the civil and canon laws. He was 
 familiar with the writings of ancient and modern times ; 
 ^^ there were no councils, canons, decrees of the popes, 
 which he had not read.'' His great library attracted the 
 attention of scholars, and his own productions bore the 
 impress of a master mind. His piety was beyond ques- 
 tion, and although it received a temporary shock, yet 
 when the storm had passed by it showed itself more 
 dee])ly rooted than before. 
 
 " The primate of England," says D'Aubigne, " held 
 a torch in his hand which had not the brilliancy of that 
 borne by Luther and Calvin, but the tempest that blew 
 upon it for fifteen or twenty years could not extinguish 
 it. Sometimes he was seized with terror ; as he heard 
 tlie lion roar he bent his head, kept in the background 
 and concealed the truth in his bosom ; but again he rose 
 and again held out to the Church the light he had saved 
 from the fury of the tyrant. He Avas a reed and not 
 an oak — a reed that bent too easily, but through this 
 very weakness he was able to do what an oak with all 
 its strength could never have accomplished. The truth 
 triumphed." 
 
 Hume's estimate of Cranmer's character deserves here 
 a place : " He was undoubtedly a man of merit, possess- 
 ed of learning and capacity and adorned with sincerity, 
 candor and beneficence and all those virtues which were 
 fitted to render him useful and amiable in society. His 
 moral qualities procured him universal respect, and the 
 
CBANMER: PERSECUTION AND MARTYRDOM. .351 
 
 courage of his martyrdom, though he fell short of the 
 rigid inflexibility observed in many, made him the hero 
 of the Protestant party." 
 
 His constitutional weakness of purpose and his dread 
 of suifering, in the judgment of many people, mantled 
 his life with obloquy. He w^as quite removed from 
 the moral grandeur of Huss and Savonarola. He can- 
 not be ranked with Ridley and Latimer, who in all cir- 
 cumstances were steadfast and unwavering in their de- 
 votion to Christ and his known truth, and went more 
 triumphantly than he to their death. Thousands of 
 saints of whom the world was not worthy, thouo-h com- 
 paratively unknown, are more unhesitatingly accorded 
 the crown of martyrdom than was Cranmer. Yet 
 there was much of grandeur about his last hours. That 
 outstretched hand, that offending hand, w^avering not as 
 the flames consumed it, pleads in behalf of the man who 
 with all his weaknesses was truly great. And it is 
 evident that Cranmer's vacillation and subserviency to 
 the royal will, which brought him great suffering at the 
 last, was overruled to the advantage of the Reformation. 
 The English people were conservative. Their advance 
 was slow. If Cranmer had possessed the spirit of Cal- 
 vin or Knox, and had measures which prevailed in 
 Scotland been imperatively urged in England, the Ref- 
 ormation might have broken dowm before Henry laid 
 off the crown. But the slower process, largely conse- 
 quent upon Cranmer's lack of moral courage, ultimately 
 secured the triumph of truth and minimized the power 
 of Rome in the British Isles. And as the day which 
 has been often obscured with clouds may terminate in 
 Bjilendor, so Cranmer's closing hours radiated the glory 
 
352 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 of that iiuitcliless throne wliich he shall for ever share 
 with his Lord. 
 
 The burning of Cranmer was for the papacy a dam- 
 aging act. Had his recantation been followed by the 
 redemption of the pledge to spare his life, the primate 
 of all England might have been for ever disgraced in 
 the esteem of friends and enemies alike. But Mary and 
 her court unwittingly conferred upon him the highest 
 boon at their disposal wlien they burnt him on the 
 Oxford square and published to the world his bold con- 
 fession. The Reformed Church took heart agrain. The 
 Romish Churcli gnashed her teeth in impotent rage. 
 
 The death of Cranmer gave a new impetus to the 
 Reformation, and the fires of persecution wdiich burned 
 on only served to multiply converts to the faith for 
 which the primate died. The nation seemed just ready 
 to spring to its feet and crush the religion that delighted 
 in carnage and drank the blood of the saints. Mary 
 was hated by the very people who at her coronation 
 rang the cathedral bells and shouted, " Long live the 
 queen V^ and she grew more unhappy as the end of her 
 bloody reign drew nigh. She wandered through the 
 chambers of her palace seeking rest and finding none. 
 Her husband deserted her, returned to Spain, and to her 
 letters, blurred with tears and written with her life's 
 blood, made no answer. 
 
 On the 14th of November, 1558, after a bloody reign 
 of five years. Queen Mary went to her account. On 
 the same day Cardinal Pole also died. It seemed fit- 
 ting that the j)ersecuting queen and her archbishop, 
 " the hangman and scourge of the Church of England," 
 should depart together. 
 
CRA^\MER: PERSECUTION AND MARTYRDOM. 35^^ 
 
 With the demise of these suj)porters of the papacy 
 fche fires of persecution burned out and peace returned. 
 It was God's purpose to make his people glad according 
 to the days wherein they had been afflicted and the years 
 wherein they had seen evil. 
 
 Not wishing to interrupt our narrative of Cranmer's 
 work, we have passed by two noted characters wlio 
 deserve more extended notice — men who did much to 
 advance the Reformation, on whose memory there rests 
 no cloud such as obscured the fame of Bilney and at a 
 later day of Cranmer. We refer to Latimer and Ridley, 
 who joined the army of martyrs a few months before 
 the English primate. Latimer was a brave defender of 
 the truth. He loved life and enjoyed it, but the honor 
 of Christ and of the evangel was more to him than 
 life. He had confronted the English bishops with a 
 bold recital of their frailties and a denunciation of their 
 offences. He had dared to tell Henry YIII. that lie 
 was the chief of sinners and without repentance would_ 
 perish. He had been archbishop of Worcester, but 
 having opposed the Six Articles was imprisoned, and, 
 although liberated after the accession of Edward VI., 
 declined the mitre, yet continued to preach the gospel 
 for which he had suffered. When he had nearly num- 
 bered his threescore years and ten, by request of Arcli- 
 bishop Cranmer he occupied apartments in Lambeth 
 Palace. Everything associated with the holy man is 
 invested with interest. The Christian traveler, having 
 lingered among the tombs of Westminster Abbey and 
 listened to the sweet choral service, crosses the Thames 
 to Lambeth borough and seeks the palace which was 
 the home of the Canterbury bishop. As he approaches 
 
35'1 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 it he muses ou the oldeu time aud the holy dead. The 
 old gray towers speak to him of solemn ages which 
 have borue their record on high. " In this now desolate 
 and silent room/' he says, " when the slant rays of the 
 rising sun shot through that narrow casement and quiv- 
 ered on the wall of its deep embrasure, good old Lati- 
 mer put out his lamp, for the pure light of heaven fell 
 on the broad pages and brazen clasps of his open Bible ; 
 and the old man, having deeply drunk from the foun- 
 tains of truth, rose up to throw open the casement, to 
 look out upon the glistening waters of the broad Thames, 
 and to breathe the morning air fresh with the rushing 
 tide of the full river. Here he stood, his heart swelling 
 with love to the Giver of all good, thanking and prais- 
 ing him for the blessings of light and air, so unheeded 
 by many, because so common to all, but precious to those 
 who like himself had dwelt in prisons such as the old 
 Tower or Bocardo. Here he stood, the light breeze 
 playing with his silver hair and fluttering the leaves of 
 his book, till the rustling sound called him back to his 
 delightful studies.'' 
 
 A little later he fancies he hears the chapel-bell ring, 
 aud sees Latimer, supported by his servant, pass along 
 the old corridor and down to the place of prayer. The 
 grave and gentle Cranmer welcomes the beloved father, 
 and heaven seems to come down to earth as they join in 
 the solemn service and anticipate the communion of the 
 redeemed in the temple not made with hands or in the 
 shade of trees that skirt the river of life. 
 
 But Mary ascends the throne, and Latimer exchanges 
 Lambeth Palace for a secluded vicar's home in the 
 North. Next we find him a prisoner in the old Tower. 
 
CKANMER: PERSECUTION AND MARTYRDOM. 355 
 
 And what a history has that venerable pile ! Here 
 kings and queens have found a home and worn an un- 
 easy crown ; here men and women, nobly born, have 
 looked death in the face, then bared their necks to tlie 
 headsman's axe. Here Sir Thomas More and Bishop 
 Fisher, Anne Boleyn and Lady Jane Grey, Sir Walter 
 Raleigh and many others, met their fate. Here Latimer 
 was imprisoned, and Ridley with him, and afterward both 
 were sent to the Oxford jail. They had been charged 
 with denying the doctrine of transubstantiation and 
 the propitiatory sacrifice of the mass. They maintained 
 that Christ had made one oblation which was sufficient 
 for the sins of the world and for all the age?;. By this 
 declaration they would stand. 
 
 On the 16th of Octobor, 1555, they were led to the 
 stake, passing under the window of the prison in which 
 Cranmer was confined. Ridley preceded his fellow- 
 martyr, and as the venerable Latimer ap})roached he 
 hastened to meet and embrace him, saying, ^' Be of good 
 heart, brother; God will either assuage the flame or else 
 he will strengthen us to abide it.'' A priest who stood 
 near said, '^ Recant, and you shall both live." — ^'^ So 
 long as the breath is in my body," said Ridley, '' I will 
 never deny my Lord Christ and his known truth." 
 Likewise answered liatimer. Then they took their 
 places, one on each side of the stake to which they were 
 bound with an iron chain. As the flames rose about 
 them, the godly Latimer, now past his eightieth year 
 and about to put on immortal youth, with a clear and 
 joyful voice said to his brother, whose face he could not 
 see, "Be of good courage, Master Ridley, and i)lay the 
 man. We shall tliis day light such a caudle, by God'n 
 
356 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 grace, in England as I trust shall never be put out." 
 And thus they witnessed a good confession, as did their 
 Lord before Pontius Pilate, and addressed each other 
 in words of cheer. They glorified God in the fires, 
 then went to that peaceful heaven where the flames of 
 persetution shall never be kindled. 
 
 With the coronation of Elizabeth peace was restored 
 to England. The steeple-towers rang their welcome to 
 the Protestant queen. The headsman laid away his axe 
 and the smith his bloody chain. Protestantism, by rea- 
 son of the infirmity which belongs to man, may some- 
 times wear a scowling face and utter threats, but its 
 habit is to make its conquests by peaceful means, win- 
 ning by love those whom Romanism would drive with 
 bayonets, or, fiiiling in this, trample in the dust. 
 
 Elizabeth was twenty-four years of age when she 
 ascended the throne, and for forty-five years she reigned 
 over England wisely and well. The Bible she received 
 from the hands of a child as she passed under a triumph- 
 al arch on her coronation day furnished the principles 
 which determined her rule. Errors she doubtless com- 
 mitted. The religion she established was not without 
 its blemishes ; but the Reformation was advanced with 
 becoming caution and brought incalculable good to her 
 realm. 
 
 The queen claimed, as did Henry her father, that the 
 sovereign of the state was the head of the English 
 Church, and assumed prerogatives which were alike 
 iniscriptural, corrupting and dangerons. But this act 
 of supremacy, which gave to Elizabeth temporal and 
 spiritual power, put an end to all appeals to Rome and 
 revoked all the laws relating to heresy. The Act of 
 
CRANMEB: PERSECUTION AND MARTYRDOM. 357 
 
 Uuiformity, whilst it left the people free as concerned 
 their doctrinal belief, required the observance of the 
 same rites and ceremonies, which Elizabeth, as head of 
 the Church, was empowered to appoint and change at 
 pleasure. 
 
 The queen sought at the same time to conciliate the 
 Romanists. Hence in the revision of Edward's liturgy 
 she caused to be erased passages oiiensive to the pope, 
 •^uch as that in the Litany, ^' the tyranny of the bishop 
 of Rome and all his detestable enormities," and certain 
 terms respecting kneeling in the sacrament which were 
 distasteful to those who believed in the real presence. 
 The English Church occupied middle ground between 
 Romanism and the Protestantism of Scotland and of the 
 Continent. It retained in its polity and worship much 
 that was papistic. The supremacy of the sovereign 
 was only a transfer of power which the pope had 
 claimed. 
 
 The Anglican Episcopacy, as is well known, made 
 distinctions in the ministry. It had its bishops, priests, 
 and deacons, and traced its succession from the apostles 
 through the Church of Rome. The Protestantism of 
 Scotland maintained the parity of the clergy— equality 
 in prerogative and rank. But the episcopacy of that 
 day was more liberal than it is in ours. Ordination by 
 presbytery was recognized as valid, and ministers thus 
 ordained officiated in English churches, presided over 
 English parishes and maintained intimate and fraternal 
 relations with the clergy who had received episcopal 
 ordination. The distinction which was then made was 
 one of office, not of order. Thomas Cranmer said, 
 "The bishops and priests were at one time one thing. 
 
358 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 and were not two things^ but both one office in the be- 
 ginning of Christ's religion.'' This was the prevalent 
 opinion. It is otherwise now. Pity that it should be 
 so. Think of the ordination of such men as Chalmers, 
 Edwards and the Alexanders ; of Spurgeon, John Hall 
 and the Hoges — men called of God to preach his evan- 
 gel and greatly honored in their work — being denied by 
 any branch of the Christian Church in this age of the 
 world ! Exclusive episcopal ordination is an unscript- 
 ural dogma ; apostolic succession is a myth. But let 
 these pass. The Church of England has embraced in 
 its communion stalwart saints and has done a noble 
 work for Christ. 
 
 Elizabeth was fond of pompous ceremony in imposing 
 cathedrals, and would have her clergy clothed in gor- 
 geous vestments when performing the solemn rites of 
 the Church. She favored images of the saints, the 
 crucifix and a ritual closely approximating to that of 
 Rome. She would have insisted on the celibacy of the 
 clergy had not her secretary Cecil opposed it, and her 
 sacramentarian views were closely allied to those of the 
 papacy. 
 
 The characteristics of the early English Church have 
 been continued with little modification to the present. 
 The sacrameutarianism of the High Church of England 
 is alarming to the evangelicals, and the elimination of 
 the latter element may be only a question of time, fore- 
 shadowed in the Reformed Episcopalianism of America, 
 an organized protest against the assumptions of the 
 mother Church. 
 
 The Act of Conformity at the commencement of 
 Elizabeth's reign was distasteful to many Protestants. 
 
(JEANMER: PERSECUTION AND MARTYRDOM. 35(J 
 
 The nonconformists or Puritans (so called because thev 
 desired greater purity in worship) said they could not in 
 conscience submit to the act, and deplored the engraft- 
 ing upon the Reformed Church of the once-discarded 
 superstitions of Rome. This controversy increased in 
 bitterness, and the Puritans became the subjects of a 
 persecution which threatened to rival the papal In- 
 quisition. 
 
 We cannot trace the history of Puritanism. It grew 
 with the years. James I. considered its principles re- 
 publican. It struck at the power of the throne. Epis- 
 copacy was more in harmony with monarchy. Hence 
 his favorite maxim, ^'No bishop, no kiug,^' and he 
 determined that the Puritans should conform or be 
 banished from the land. This controversy drove many 
 to the New World. They preferred exile to submission, 
 and freedom of conscience in the wilderness to the com- 
 forts of ancestral homes and the domination of a pre- 
 latic Church. Hence the settlements in New England 
 and the kindling of gospel light along our eastern 
 coast which now shines across the continent. Hence, 
 too, the establishment of a government the principles 
 of which are the perfection of human wisdom, and 
 the fruits of which, among a people who fear God, 
 are always beneficent and above all price. 
 
 24 
 
JOHN KNOX, THE REFORMER OF SCOTLAND, 
 
" Clouds and darkness are round about him : righteousness 
 and judgment are the habitation of liis throne.'' 
 
 "■ Trust God when providences seem to run quite contrary to 
 promises.'''' 
 
 Watson. 
 
 " Christ doth gather a7id defend his Church, and subdue 
 their enemies ; furiiisJieth his ministers and people with gifts 
 and graces, and rnaketh intercession for them.'' 
 
 Larger Catechism, Ans. to Question 54. 
 
JOHN KNOX, THE REFORMER OF 
 SCOTLAND. 
 
 AS God in the mysterious exercise of his will per- 
 mitted sin to enter the world and overruled it to 
 his glory, so in every age he has given certain license to 
 wicked men and erroneous doctrine, yet has set bounds 
 to the power of the one and the extension of the other, 
 and demonstrated his superiority to l)oth by raising up 
 human agencies through which he has secured the 
 triumph of the righteous and the establishment of the 
 truth. It is the sword of the Lord and of Gideon 
 that prevails, and oftentimes the insignificance of the 
 agency magnifies the power which employs it. 
 
 It is profitable to study divine providences as they 
 relate to the Church. God is found in history. In the 
 great crises of the world heaven seems to touch the 
 earth, and men awake to the fact that there is a God 
 who takes co2:nizance of the race and controls the 
 machinery of the world's affairs. 
 
 With a view to our spiritual profit we propose to con- 
 sider some of the salient points in the Scottish Refor- 
 mation, and especially as associated with the life of that 
 remarkable man who was the chief instrument of its 
 inauguration and success. 
 
 In the suburbs of Haddington— or, as some believe, 
 
 363 
 
,^64 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 in the village of Giifordgate — Scotland, in the year 1505, 
 was born of honorable parentage a child who, to use the 
 language of the historian Froude, ^' became in that ex- 
 traordinary age its most extraordinary man, and whose 
 character became the mould in which the later fortunes 
 of his country were cast/^ 
 
 This son was born four years after Calvin, and in the 
 same year that Martin Luther entered the Augustinian 
 monastery at Erfurt. He took his name, it is supposed, 
 from the paternal mansion, which was called the Knock. 
 It was situated near the birthplace of William Wallace 
 and the ancestral home of Mary Stuart, and perchance 
 there was sounded in the olden time, before Knox was 
 born, the bugle-cry of contending families which gave pro- 
 phetic intimation of the long-fought battles of later ages. 
 
 Young Knox early evinced an unusual strength of 
 intellect and thirst for knowledge, which induced his 
 2)arents to give him a liberal education. He was ac- 
 cordingly sent to the grammar-school in Haddington, 
 and subsequently, when sixteen years of age, to the 
 University of Glasgow. Education then was not gen- 
 eral. Of Latin schools there were but few. The 
 Greek was an unknown language in Scotland until 
 the middle of the sixteenth century, and Hebrew was 
 not taught in the schools until a much later period. 
 Knox availed himself of. all the advantages his own 
 country afforded, and at mid-life, on the Continent, at- 
 tained to considerable proficiency in Hebrew, and so be- 
 came the better qualified for the study of the Old-Testa- 
 ment Scriptures. 
 
 At the university in Glasgow he had for his preceptor 
 in philosophy and theology a man who was regarded a? 
 
JOHN KNOX, THE REFORMER OF SCOTLAND. 365 
 
 one of the best educators of the day, especially in tlio 
 department which he filled. We refer to John Mair, a 
 man of rugged intellect, strong convictions and progress- 
 ive thought. The intellectual bias and the moral char- 
 acter whiph are to give direction to all the future of 
 life are often early determined by the influences and as- 
 sociations of the school. It is a serious reflection which 
 all parents would do well to consider. Of this we have 
 an illustration in the case of John Knox. As Calvin 
 was indebted for many of the principles which consti- 
 tuted him a successful Reformer to that eminent French 
 jurist, Pierre de PEtoile, his preceptor at Orleans, so 
 Knox received from John Mair the germs of the Scot- 
 tish Keformation. The pupil outstripped the teacher. 
 He entered realms of thought and compassed potent 
 facts of human life of which the Glasgow professor 
 had little or no conception. But the latter gave to the 
 greater mind of the pupil the impetus which carried 
 him on and the direction which determined his goal. 
 Mair held sentiments with respect to the authority of 
 the pope and the prerogatives of kings which few held, 
 and a smaller number dared to express — sentiments 
 which found their fruitage at a later day in religious 
 and civil freedom : on the one hand, freedom of con- 
 science and the humiliation of the papal power ; on the 
 other, the lifting up of the people as the source of all 
 civil authority and the court of highest appeal. These 
 sentiments, which had previously been held by a few on 
 the Continent, were readily imbibed by the young stu- 
 dent. They commended themselves to his innate sense 
 of right, and he w^as prepared to follow them on to 
 their legitimate results. 
 
'd6Q ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 About this time his attention was called to the writ- 
 ings of the early Christian Fathers. He was especially 
 interested in Jerome, who exalted the Bible as the rule 
 of faith, and in Augustine, who, after the example of 
 Paul the apostle, magnified the doctrine of justification 
 by the righteousness of Christ. Here he found the 
 principles of Protestantism, the faith of the apostolic 
 Church. 
 
 The light of distant centuries overleaps the Dark 
 Ages and begins to pierce the clouds which have long 
 darkened the British Isles. John Knox looks up with 
 glad surprise. The gray light betokens day. There is 
 some great good in store for Scotland. Himself a priest 
 of the Romish Church, he becomes increasingly dis- 
 satisfied with his traditional faith. The papacy was 
 alarmingly corrupt. The clergy held half the wealth 
 of the nation. These so-called successors of the apostles 
 had not the spirit of the men who surrendered all for 
 Christ. They clothed themselves with worldly pomp 
 and secular power. They were privy counselors, the 
 lords of sessions and the magnates of Parliament. They 
 lived in pleasure and gloried in their shame. Obedient 
 to the canons of the Church which required celibacy, 
 they were notoriously unclean, and the general morals 
 were corrupted by their vicious example. The priests 
 were also ignorant. Many of them did not understand 
 the language of their mumbled service, and knew as 
 little of the tenets of their corrupt religion. The 
 bishops never preached. This work they delegated to 
 mendicant monks, who were as ignorant and mercenary 
 as are the mendicants of the Greek Church to-day. 
 
 History tells us that the kingdom swarmed with 
 
JOHN KNOX, THE REFORMER OF SCOTLAND. :507 
 
 ignorant, idle, luxurious monks, who like locusts de- 
 voured the fruits of the earth and filled the air with 
 pestilential infection— with friars white, black and gray ; 
 canons regular and of St. Anthony; Carmelites, Cor- 
 deliers, Dominicans, Franciscans, Conventuals, and Oh- 
 servantines, Jacobins ; monks of Tyrone ; Holy Knights 
 of St. John of Jerusalem ; nuns of St. Austin, St. Clair, 
 St. Scholastica and St. Catherine of Sienna ; and others, 
 miserable libels even on ordinary depraved humanity. 
 
 The gospel which Paul and Peter preached was almost 
 unknown. What little of truth remained in the creeds 
 of the Church was buried under the rubbish of human 
 inventions. The altar on which w^as celebrated the 
 mass shut out of view the spiritual cross, and the Vir- 
 gin Mary, around whom was grouped an army of so- 
 called saints, supplanted the only Advocate and prevail- 
 ing Intercessor of the Church. 
 
 The seemingly devout worshipers went from the 
 mass to the ale-house, and from the confessional to the 
 repetition of their sins ; a scriptural faith and holy liv- 
 ing were alike unknown. 
 
 All this is the legitimate fruit of papacy. Where it 
 has had undisputed sway it has kept the people in ignor- 
 ance and substituted the grossest superstitions for saving 
 truth. It is so now. Without Christ there can be no 
 salvation, either from the condemnation or the defile- 
 ment of sin. The history of the world declares this. 
 Yet there is a tendency, inherent in our fallen nature, 
 to will-worship, to a corrupt religion, the fruit of mere 
 human ingenuity, which stultifies the natural conscience, 
 and, while promising heaven to its devotees, paves tlie 
 way to hell. 
 
368 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 Such was the religion of Scotland. It was dark and 
 cold as the mists which came up from the sea. Its 
 cathedrals were architecturally impressive, of vast pro- 
 portions, filled with all the furnishings of a religion 
 which was sensuous only, whilst from crypt to vault- 
 ed roof the air was laden with moral death, seldom 
 stirred by the breathings of even a languid spiritual 
 life. 
 
 At the same time the people of Scotland were not 
 impervious to the truth. They were such stuff as stal- 
 wart saints are made of. Give them a little light and 
 they crave more, and will have it. And even at this 
 period, despite the depression of the dominant religion, 
 they were brave, resolute and powerful, stern as the 
 mountains of the North, and unbridled as the air which 
 swept the Highlands and the moors. 
 
 Bannockburn told the story of their prowess, and 
 England, unable to subjugate her Teutonic brothers, 
 was driven back to the Southland, the border bristling 
 with bayonets and guarded by frowning castles which 
 lifted their dark fronts into the murky sky. Such was 
 the land of our fathers, the birthplace of that civil and 
 religious freedom which has extended its beneficent rule 
 to our Western World. 
 
 It may aid our understanding of the Scottish Ref- 
 ormation to glance at some events which prepared the 
 w^ay for its inauguration. 
 
 Patrick Hamilton, the great-grandson of James II., 
 and one year the senior of John Knox, was made abbot 
 of Feme when only thirteen years of age, and played 
 an important part in the opening drama of the Refor- 
 mation. He had been a student in the University of 
 
JOHN KNOX, THE REFORMER OF SCOTLAND. 369 
 
 Paris. Here he heard of Martin Luther, aiul, h)()kiii<r 
 eastward, he saw the light which, kindled in the valleys 
 of the Rhine and on the shores of the Rhone, was as- 
 cending the Alps to shine thence over the darker re- 
 gions lying to the westward. 
 
 Hamilton was a devout student of tlie sacred lan- 
 guages, and soon was able to read the word of God in 
 the original tongues. Here he found the Christ of revela- 
 tion and the doctrine of justification l)y faith. Having 
 returned to Scotland, Cardinal Beaton of St. Andrews 
 learned of the young man's defection from the faith, 
 charged him with heresy and declared him worthy of 
 death. Hamilton deemed it best to return to Europe, 
 that he might learn more concerning this new religion. 
 In Wittenberg he met Martin Luther, Philip Melanch- 
 thon and Francis Lambert, who helped him on to a 
 clearer knowledge of the truth. Then at Marburg he 
 formed the acquaintance of William Tyndale and John 
 Frith, and in the armory of the gospel they equipped 
 themselves for holy war. 
 
 From his peaceful retreat the young Reformer felt 
 constrained to depart, that he might show his country- 
 men the " more excellent way.'' Hear now how clear- 
 ly he expresses that precious faith which, preserved 
 in the Bible and hidden in the valleys of ISforthern 
 Italy, came to him as from the very lips of Jesus 
 and his apostles. These are his own words : " The law 
 showeth us our sin, the gospel showeth us the remedy 
 for it. The law showeth us our condemnation, the gos- 
 pel showeth us our redemption. The law saith to the 
 sinner, Pay thy debt ; the gospel saith, Christ hath paid 
 it. The law saith. Thou art a sinner; despair— thou 
 
370 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 shall be damned ; the gospel saith, Thy sins are forgiven 
 thee"; be of good comfort — thou shalt be saved." 
 
 In his own country he preached to noblemen and their 
 families who were his own kindred, some of whom be- 
 h'eved. Then he ventured to proclaim the truth in 
 public places and to common people. Some heard him 
 gladly ; others pronounced him a heretic and reported 
 his words to the ecclesiastical autocrat of St. Andrews. 
 
 Hamilton was induced to appear at a conference at St. 
 Andrews for the ostensible purpose of calmly discussing 
 the principles of his faith. Then followed a mock trial, 
 after which the Reformer was cast into the old sea-tower, 
 which still remains, and on a wintry day in 1528 he was 
 burned at the stake. With his dying breath he prayed 
 for his murderers, and then said, "Lord Jesus, receive 
 my spirit.'' When nearly burned through the waist by the 
 fiery chain which bound him to the stake, and when power 
 of speech was gone, a spectator, addressing him from the 
 crowd, asked that if he still had faith in the views for 
 which he was condemned he should indicate it by a sign. 
 Thereupon he lifted his mutilated hand and held it 
 aloft until he died, tlius declaring his unfailing trust in 
 the Crucified One and pointing the way to that heaven 
 which opened for his entrance. 
 
 Thus died, at the age of twenty-four, the proto-mar- 
 tyr of the Scottish Reformation. On the day that he 
 died the papacy unwittingly kindled a fire which shone 
 over all Scotland, in the flames of which it was itself 
 consumed. 
 
 Some of the nobility of Scotland were deeply affected 
 by the martyrdom of this royal youth. Does a Roman 
 cardinal hold in his hands the lives of men nobly born ? 
 
JOHN KNOX, THE REFORMER OF SCOTLAND. 371 
 
 Are we answerable for our faith to a cruel hierarchy ? 
 Whereunto shall this matter grow? Then came the 
 inquiry, " For what did Hamilton die ?" Many sought 
 an answer, and in finding it discovered the truth, and 
 so God made the wrath of man to praise him. 
 
 A few years later the earl of Arran was appointed to 
 administer the government during the minority of the 
 queen. His influence advanced the Reformation. The 
 papacy, which always shuns the light, and to-day joins 
 hands with infidelity in the effort to exclude the Bible 
 from our public schools, had withheld the Scriptures 
 from the people. The man who dared to read and in- 
 terpret for himself God's holy word was accursed. But 
 the Scottish Parliament granted to all the privilege of 
 reading the Sacred Scriptures in their own language. 
 The word of God was no longer bound. The blessed 
 evangel went abroad. The music of heaven, like that 
 heard on the Bethlehem plain, carried its sweet harmo- 
 nies down the valleys and echoed among the hills. 
 
 But Romanism will not die without a protracted 
 struggle. It burnishes its armor, masses its forces and 
 goes out to the fight. Ere long attention is directed to a 
 lone man who, David-like, defies the enemies of Israel, 
 not rashly provoking the rage of the papacy, but quietly 
 pursuing his mission as a preacher of the truth. In the 
 open fields the common people crowd about him to hear 
 the story of Calvary. He tells them of Christ and 
 says little of the Church. He points to the blood of the 
 Lamb that was slain, and says, " There is your atone- 
 ment,'' and so diverts their minds from the superstitions 
 which had shut the Saviour from their sight. It 
 was George Wishart, brother of the laird of Pittarrow. 
 
372 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 He is ever about his Master's business. Montrose and 
 Dundee ''felt and owned the power of his heavenly 
 eloquence.'' 
 
 By and by there follows him, wherever he goes, a 
 thoughtful man of small stature and intellectual coun- 
 tenance, whose love to Wishart, like that of Jonathan 
 for David, passes that of women. The holy fire of the 
 preacher burns into his soul and consumes the last re- 
 mains of a superstitious, Christless faith. 
 
 The day that an attempt was made to assassinate the 
 great preacher this attendant drew his sword, and never 
 returned it to its sheath. But the earl of Bothwell is 
 mightier than the evangelist Wishart. The latter is 
 seized. His faithful friend prefers to share his fate. 
 " God bless you !" said Wishart ; " one is sufficient for 
 a sacrifice ;" and so they parted. That young man who 
 goes sorrowfully away is none less than John Knox — 
 he who is to carry on the work which Wishart lays 
 down. 
 
 Wishart was tried and condemned to death. They 
 put on him a black robe, attached bags of gunpowder 
 to his person, and with a rope around his neck and a 
 chain about his waist led him to the stake. When he 
 came to the place of execution he knelt down and rose 
 again, thrice repeating the prayer, " O thou Saviour of 
 the world, have mercy upon me ! Father of heaven, I 
 commend my spirit into thy hands." A trumpet sounds : 
 it is the signal for the execution. Wishart is bound to 
 the stake and the fires are kindled. Archbishop Beaton 
 looks from his castle-window and " feeds his eyes with 
 the martyr's torments." But there is a chariot, such as 
 the Tishbite's of old, which he saw not, bearing the soul 
 
JOHN KNOX, THE REFORMER OF SCOTLAND. 37:) 
 
 of the holy Wishart to heaven, where the cruel, unre- 
 pentant minions of Antichrist can never go. 
 
 Some who witnessed the martyr's death said, " Beaton 
 is Wishart's murderer, and lie shall die/' " Law, in its 
 pure and proper sense,'' says a modern historian, " there 
 was none in Scotland; the partition-lines between evil 
 and good were obliterated in the general anarchy, and 
 right struggled against wrong with such ambiguous 
 weapons as the wild justice of nature suggested." 
 
 On another day three men made tlieir way along the 
 dark passages of the castle to the chamber of Beaton, 
 into which they forced an entrance. They bade the 
 cardinal "repent him of his former wicked life," after 
 which they smote him with their swords until he died. 
 Then from the window of the castle from which he had 
 witnessed the execution of Wishart they exposed the 
 dead cardinal to the view of the multitude now gathered 
 about the castle-gate, and then carried the body to the 
 old sea- tower in which Hamilton had been imprisoned 
 and before which Wishart had been burned. 
 
 We do not justify the act, though Beaton deserved to 
 die. It was lawless justice smiting down one beyond 
 the reach of law. It suggests the doom of Ahab. The 
 murderer dies for his crimes. And on that day sturdy 
 hands rang the death-knell of papacy in the land of the 
 holy martyrs. Rome is humbled. The night is past 
 and the day is at hand. 
 
 Now John Knox appears again upon the scene, and 
 his subsequent career is woven as the woof into all 
 Scottish history until the final establishment of the Ref- 
 ormation under the shadow of which Scotland sits to- 
 (day, none daring to molest her or make her afraid. 
 
374 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 A year after the death of Archbishop Beaton, Knox 
 was quietly engaged as a teacher in St. Andrews. In 
 the chapel of the castle he read and expounded the 
 Scriptures. These exercises attracted the attention of 
 men of note, into whose minds the gospel in its sweet 
 simplicity was finding entrance. Near by the castle 
 stood the parish church. Here Christ was preached. 
 Faith and holiness were the burdens of each discourse. 
 All this was strange and new, and men listened as for 
 their lives. The preacher, a converted monk late from 
 the monastery in Stirling, was John Rough. He was a 
 man of great power. His preaching was not in the 
 enticing words of man's wisdom, but it was accompanied 
 with spiritual fervor and went directly to the mark. 
 He needed an assistant. He said John Knox was the 
 man he wanted. The people approved his choice. Knox 
 hesitated. The undertaking was great, and he felt him- 
 self inadequate for it. A day was appointed for the 
 election of an assistant. Rough preached a sermon, and 
 at the close of it, looking at Knox in the pew, he said, 
 "Brother, be not offended. In the name of God and 
 of his Son Jesus Christ I charge you that you refuse 
 not this holy vocation." Knox was startled, burst into 
 tears and hastened from the house. But he was not the 
 man to disobey God, and, assured that the call was from 
 him, he entered on the work. 
 
 The parish church is crowded to hear the new preach- 
 er. He makes the arches ring with his vehement elo- 
 quence. He is a radical preacher. Plis hearers said, 
 "Others sued the branches of the papistree, but he 
 strykes at the roote to destroy the bole." He steps 
 boldly out from the papacy, carrying not a shred of 
 
JOHN KNOX, THE REFORMER OF SCOTLAND. :]75 
 
 its superstition with him. He has no words of apology 
 for Rome. He is not content with an attempt to reform 
 what is beyond all redemption. He does not propose to 
 lop off this excrescence and reduce that. He would as 
 soon think to revivify a corpse by amputating a limb. 
 He says the Romish Church is the synagogue of Satan, 
 the pojie is the Man of sin, and the priesthood, as a 
 body, is more degenerate than the men who procured the 
 death of Jesus of Nazareth. The whole hierarchy is a 
 putrefaction, and should be buried so deep that it shall 
 never again pollute the air or have a resurrection. 
 ^^ Prove that the Church is corrupt/' said the i)eoplc. 
 He said, " I will ;" and he did it. His lone voice in 
 St. Andrews church reached farther than the walls 
 that shut him in. All Scotland heard it, and was 
 moved as by an earthquake. Converts to the Refor- 
 mation multiplied as the drops of the morning. Rome 
 was alarmed. Something must be done, and done quick- 
 ly. A French fleet hastens to St. Andrews. The peo- 
 ple see the white sails at the foot of every street, and 
 soon discover that they are surrounded by the enemy. 
 Then comes the contest, but it is unequal. The gar- 
 rison surrenders. The castle is taken. John Knox 
 and many others go aboard the French galleys, and, 
 in violation of solemn pledges, are bound with chains. 
 They are conveyed to France. The ships which cany 
 them lie in the river Loire. The heretics are command- 
 ed to recant, and are threatened with tortures if they 
 refuse. They say they are ready to die, but not to deny 
 the faith. Once the galleys returned to the vicinity of 
 St. Andrews, and when John Knox saw the spire of the 
 parish chapel, though denied his liberty and sick of a 
 
 26 
 
376 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 fever, he said, " I shall not depart this life until that 
 my tongue shall glorify God's goodly name in that 
 place/' The fleet returned to France. After nineteen 
 months of imprisonment it was supposed that heresy 
 had received its deathblow in the consent of the Scotch 
 Parliament to the marriage of the beautiful queen Mary 
 to the dauphin of France, and in the belief of this Knox 
 was contemptuously liberated. For Rome it was a great 
 blunder. John Knox is greater than the Scottish queen, 
 a mightier factor in the world's history than the thrones 
 of Scotland and France combined. The day shall 
 prove it. 
 
 After his liberation Knox sojourned for a time in 
 London. The Reformation had made some advance in 
 England, but the deplorable ignorance of the clergy and 
 their general unfitness as teachers brought reproach upon 
 the Protestant Church and endangered its continuance. 
 There was an urgent need for great minds to guide the 
 people — minds that could rise above all the superstitions 
 and sophistries of Rome and demonstrate the overwhelm- 
 ing importance of the issues involved. Then Knox was 
 again summoned to active service. He threw his mighty 
 energies into the work. His trumpet gave no uncertain 
 sound. The corruptions of the papacy were set forth in 
 unmistakable and convincing terms. His appeals to piety 
 and patriotism determined many to espouse the Protest- 
 ant faith. 
 
 His growing popularity suggested his permanent set- 
 tlement in London, and Archbishop Cranmer appointed 
 him to the vacant living of All Hallows in that city. 
 This tempting benefice was promptly declined He as- 
 signed as his reason for so doing his conviction that the 
 
JOHN KNOX, THE REFORMER OF SCOTLAND. ;J77 
 
 English Church itself needed to be reformed. It had 
 not taken sufficiently high ground. There was a tempor- 
 izing with corruption and an adherence to popish forms 
 which were exceedingly distasteful to Knox, and, as he 
 believed, greatly prejudicial to the interests of the Refor- 
 mation. It was about this time that Edward VI. offered 
 him a bishopric. But he was not to be bought even at 
 such a price. 
 
 He objected to the dogma that there was no ordina- 
 tion to the ministry except by the imposition of the 
 hands of a bishop. He protested against the retention 
 in the English Church of ignorant clergy whose ser- 
 vices consisted in the mumbling of prayers, the sing- 
 ing of the Litany and the chanting of vespers. They 
 were not competent to teach. By their necessities the 
 people pleaded for the bread of life, and these priests 
 could not give it — for a sight of Jesus, and they could 
 not impart what they themselves did not possess. Then, 
 too, the Church made little distinction between virtue 
 and vice. Notoriously wicked persons came to the 
 Lord^s table, and there was no effort to exclude them. 
 Church discipline was unknown. 
 
 To the mind of Knox, under such an order of things 
 reversion to popery was only a question of time, and on 
 the accession of Queen Mary to the throne of England 
 it came. Under the reign of Mary all the fears of the 
 Reformer were more than realized. The Reformation 
 had brought some liberty of conscience to England ; 
 tlie restored i^apacy denied it. Persecution was revived. 
 The heavens were red with flames and the earth with 
 blood. 
 
 Knox was urged by his friends to go to the Continent, 
 
378 ROMANISM AND THE BEFOBMEBS. 
 
 but he refused. They besought him with tears, for his 
 own sake, for theirs, for the cause he had so bravely 
 espoused. He at last yielded to their importuuity and 
 crossed the Euglish Channel to Dieppe. There he lin- 
 gered for a while, that he might receive some intelligence 
 from England ; then traveled into France and Switzer- 
 land. After a time he returned to Dieppe, anxious to 
 receive tidings from home, and again set out for Switz- 
 erland. The fame of Calvin had spread over all 
 Europe. Geneva was his home, and hither Knox re- 
 paired. 
 
 The meeting of these two men was an important 
 event. The representatives of the Reformation in Eng- 
 land and Switzerland clasped hands. Their hearts 
 flowed together. A tender affection was formed that 
 day which grew with the years and was never disturbed 
 or broken. I 
 
 We cannot speak at length of Knox's subsequent 
 labors at Frankfort-on-the-Main, where he preached to 
 English refugees, was disturbed in his work by an un- 
 happy division in the Church, and was constrained to 
 abandon it to others. Again he returned to Geneva, 
 waiting patiently for the time when he might resume 
 his labors in his own land. 
 
 Here for the present we shall leave the Reformer. 
 In that quiet retreat he prepared himself for a grander 
 career. His relations to Calvin were helpful. His 
 study of God's word in the original languages fitted 
 him for the more effective defence of the truth. As he 
 worshiped in the great cathedral which crowned the hill, 
 as he walked in though tfulness along the shores of Lake 
 Leman, as he looked on the green hills which cast their 
 
JOHN KNOX, THE REFORMER OF SCOTLAND. 379 
 
 shadows at evening over the peaceful expanse of waters, 
 as he gazed at the snow-capped Alps, Mont Blanc pierc- 
 ing the clouds, its summit lost to sight in the unclouded 
 heavens, — his soul was expanded and uplifted ; his rev- 
 erence for God, who spread these scenes of grandeur 
 and beauty about him, became a deeper sentiment of the 
 heart ; his faith in the power of Him who setteth fast 
 the mountains — a power which can evoke good out of 
 evil, call the morning out of the bosom of the night, 
 and reduce the strong passions of men to a calm like 
 that of yonder lake — multiplied its strength ; and Scot- 
 land waits the return of the man who shall roll away 
 the stone from the door of the sepulchre, that the glori- 
 ous evangel may go abroad on its beneficent mission. 
 
I 
 
 JOHN KNOX: LATER WORK IN SCOTLAND, 
 
" Then contended I with the rulers, and said, Why is the 
 ho-h se of God forsakeii f ' 
 
 Neh. 13 : II. 
 
 " Scotland heard him zuith the marrow of her bo7ies.'' 
 
 Carijsle. 
 
 " // is the duty of civil magistrates to protect the persoiis and 
 good name of all their people, in such an effectual manner as 
 that 710 perso7i be suffered, either upon pretence of religion or 
 i7/fdelity, to offer any i7idignity, violence, abuse, or injury to 
 a7iy other person whatsoever : a7id to take order, that all i-elig- 
 ious and ecclesiastical assemblies be held without 7nolestation 
 or disturba7ice.'' 
 
 Con. Faith, chap, xxiit. sec. iii. 
 
JOHN KNOX: LATER WORK IN SCOTLAND. 
 
 TT7E have traced the history of the Reformation in 
 * ^ Scotland from its beginning to the time of John 
 Knox's banishment to the Continent after the accession 
 of Bloody Mary to the English throne. We shall now 
 review his later work in his own country. 
 
 To roll back the clouds which overhung Scotland and 
 let the cheerful, life-giving light of heaven down ; to 
 lift a galling yoke from the necks of a people than 
 whom, in all the elements of intellectual strength and 
 moral courage when directed by the truth, there was 
 not a nobler people under the sun ; to make known the 
 evangel to sin-oppressed, careworn and eternity-bound 
 souls, and so point the way to holiness, hope and heaven, 
 —this was the mission of John Knox and his cola- 
 borers. 
 
 This Reformer, now in Switzerland, learning that it 
 was possible for him — as a result, perhaps, of friendly 
 mediation — to return to his native country, made ready 
 for his journey thither. 
 
 Five years had elapsed since he was exiled from 
 England, yet in the mean time he had made a hasty 
 visit to Scotland. For two years he ministered to the 
 English congregation in Geneva. Here he had dwelt 
 in peace, happy in the companionship of his beloved 
 wife and in the birth of two sons. Had he consulted 
 
 383 
 
384 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 persoual and domestic comfort, he would have tarried 
 in that peaceful retreat, but the Master called him back 
 to a life of hard service crowded with dangers, and he 
 was prompt to obey. 
 
 He bade farewell to Calvin for the last time. He 
 turned quickly yet sadly away from the beautiful Geneva, 
 then hastened to the land of his birth and to the Kirk, 
 weak and frighted, which longed for his coming. 
 Denied a passage through England, he sailed directly 
 from Dieppe to Leith, Scotland, and arrived at a most 
 critical period. 
 
 The queen regent, who had seemed to oscillate be- 
 tween papacy and the Reformation, at heart an enemy 
 of the latter, came boldly out in opposition to it, and 
 declared that the leaders of the Reformation ^^ should be 
 banished from Scotland, although they preached as 
 truly as ever Paul did." The Protestant ministers 
 were summoned to appear at Stirling for immediate 
 trial. Knox rested but a day at Edinburgh, then hast- 
 ened to Dundee, and thence, in company with the prin- 
 cipal adherents to the evangelical religion, journeyed 
 toward Stirling. Ari-ived at Perth, the regent directed 
 their journey to be arrested. She feared Knox and the 
 ^^ Congregation," as the Protestants were then called, 
 and professed to have concluded upon a conciliatory 
 policy. But the day of trial having come, the accused 
 parties were '^ outlawed for not appearing," and the 
 power of the realm was evoked for their destruction. 
 
 Tidings of this disgraceful })rocedure reached Perth 
 just as Knox had concluded a sermon on "the idolatry 
 of the mass and image-worship." The people were 
 quietly and sadly dispersing when a Romish priest, to 
 
JOHN KNOX: LATER WORK IN SCOTLAND. 385 
 
 show his contempt of the preacher and his doctrine, un- 
 covered an altar which had been prepared for tlie occa- 
 sion and made ready to celebrate the mass. The rougher 
 portion of the congregation and others who sympathized 
 with them, yielding to sudden passion, destroyed the 
 altar and its images, trampling upon the fragments, and 
 then, swept on by their wrath, assailed the monasteries 
 of the town and utterly overthrew them. 
 
 This riotous proceeding, though severely condemned 
 by Knox and the chief leaders of the Protestants, 
 brought great injury to the Reformation. It aroused 
 the fury of the papists, and for a time a disastrous war 
 seemed inevitable. But this was averted throucrh the 
 influence of the duke of Argyle and the prior of St. 
 Andrews, who were at the same time friends of the Ref- 
 ormation and supporters of the regent. 
 
 It was then determined by the Protestants to repair 
 to St. Andrews, where the adherents of the Reformation 
 were in the ascendency, and establish Protestant worship 
 in that place. As they approached the old town and 
 saw the spire of the cathedral lifted above the trees, 
 John Knox's prophecy when a prisoner on the French 
 galleys, that he would live to preach the gospel of Christ 
 in the parish church, was at once recalled. 
 
 The archbishop of St. xindrews, hearing that Knox 
 proposed to preach in the cathedral, collected a number 
 of armed men, and notified him that if he attempted to 
 address the people he would do it at the peril of his life. 
 The Reformer was urged by the noblemen to preserve 
 silence. But he believed that to yield to this opposition 
 would be to endanger the Reformation. It would be a 
 confession of weakness and a submissioD to unrighteous 
 
386 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 authority. It was now a question of life and death, not 
 of one man, but of the Reformed Church. 
 
 Persuaded of this, Knox announced that he would 
 preach on the following day. To his enemies he said, 
 " I call God to witness that I never preached in con- 
 tempt of any man nor with the design of hurting any 
 earthly creature, but to delay to preach on the morrow, 
 unless forcibly hindered, I cannot agree.'' To his friends 
 he said, "As for the fear of danger that may come to me, 
 let no man be solicitous, for my life is in the custody of 
 Him whose glory I seek. I desire the hand or weapon 
 of no man to defend me. I only crave audience, 
 which if it be denied me here at this time, I must seek 
 where I may have it.'' 
 
 These were manly words. They declare a mcjral 
 courage and faith in God which lift John Knox far 
 above the ordinary grade of human life. Gleaming 
 swords and the red hand of a violent archbishop up- 
 lifted to smite him fail to intimidate the great Reformer. 
 He stands in his purpose immovable as Ben Lomond, 
 which from a serene heaven looks down on the inferior 
 hills. 
 
 The day comes. The sun struggles through the mists 
 which overhang the town. The attention of the people 
 is turned now toward the castle, where the soldiery wait 
 the command of the archbishop to do their work of 
 death, and again to the parish church, toward which a 
 multitude are quietly wending their way. The liour of 
 service is come. John Knox passes fearlessly down the 
 street, enters the church, ascends the pulpit, before him 
 a sea of human faces, around him a company of guard- 
 ian angels, the rustling of invisible wings almost heard 
 
JOHN KNOX: LATER WORK IN SCOTLAND. ;j87 
 
 as in tlie breathless silence of the people he rises in his 
 place. 
 
 He discoursed on the casting out of the profane traf- 
 fickers from the temple of Jerusalem, and was thus led 
 to speak of the corruptions that had been introduced 
 into the Church under the papacy. He pronounced tiie 
 removal of these a duty, and repeated this opinion on 
 several consecutive days, during which he preached with 
 great earnestness to large assemblies. The result was 
 the establishment of the Reformed worship in St. An- 
 drews, the removal of all images and pictures from the 
 church, and the utter demolition of the monasteries 
 which had corrupted and disgraced the town. 
 
 Knox has been condemned for this destruction of 
 buildings which art had beautified, though they were 
 consecrated to superstition. There is a species of idol- 
 atry which substitutes the aesthetics of religion for its 
 divine power. Representations of Christ, the Virgin 
 Mary and the saints, whether in wood or stone or cast 
 upon the canvas, intercept a spiritual view of the only 
 true object of worship ; and great cathedrals with naves 
 and transepts and choir and high arches, and, surmount- 
 ing all, quaint and massive towers climbing heavenward, 
 may under the tuition of Rome receive the homage 
 which is due to Him whose temple is the universe, 
 and who will not suffer his glory to be transferred to 
 the works of men's hands. 
 
 It is unquestionably true that the worship of the 
 Romish Church at this period was almost exclusively 
 idolatrous. At the same time, great cathedrals and the 
 grim old monasteries which had witnessed the passing 
 away of generations were among the chief supports of the 
 
388 ROMANISM AND THE BEFOBMEBS. 
 
 papacy. St. Peter's, St. Paul's and the Lateran church 
 of Kome at the present day sustain this relation to modern 
 popery, and many are determined to a false religion by 
 the grandeur of its temples. 
 
 Knox instructed the people that "the best way to 
 keep the rooks from returning was to pull down their 
 nests ;" and they acted upon the hint. And not only 
 was this work speedily accomplished in St. Andrews, 
 but also in Stirling, Glasgow, Edinburgh, Linlithgow 
 and the leading cities of the kingdom. The times de- 
 manded extreme measures. We must not judge the Re- 
 formers of that age by the rules which obtain in this. 
 We believe that God raised them up for an unusual yet 
 needful work, and they did it. The results justify the 
 wisdom of their course. 
 
 A few months later John Knox set out on an ex- 
 tended tour through Scotland. He preached at Kelso, 
 Jedburgh, Ayr, Stirling, Perth, Montrose and Dundee. 
 His brave denunciation of corruption, accompanied by 
 fervid portrayals of the fulhiess of the glorious gospel, 
 stirred the souls of all who heard him. As Carlyle has 
 said, "The Scotch people heard him with the marrow of 
 their bones." The yoke which Pome imposed was cast 
 oflP. The truth shone into minds long darkened by 
 superstition, and gladder Te Deums were raised in 
 open fields and sheltered glens than had ever been 
 sung in the great cathedrals of Glasgow or Stirling. 
 The people were released from the domination of a 
 corrupt priesthood. They had found Christ. Tliey 
 had planted their feet on the King's highway of holi- 
 ness, and they were going heavenward with palms in 
 their hands and crowns on their heads. How great the 
 
JOHN KNOX: LATER WORK IN SCOTLAND. 389 
 
 chaDge already wrought! It was life from the dead. 
 "It is the Lord's doing, and it is marvelous in our 
 eyes.'' 
 
 On the 24th of August, 1560, the Scottish Parlia- 
 ment terminated by a solemn act the papal jurisdiction 
 and all authority flowing therefrom. But it substituted 
 nothing. It simply left the Church at liberty to legis- 
 late for itself. There is here no union of Church and 
 State. Christ's kingdom is not of this world. The 
 only recognized Head of the Keformed Church of Scot- 
 land was the Lord himself, and to his commands his 
 loyal subjects were ready to bow. 
 
 The General Assembly of the Church of Scotland 
 met for the first time on the 20th of the following 
 December (1560). A confession of faith had already 
 been adopted. The Assembly addressed itself to the 
 preparation of a complete system of ecclesiastical gov- 
 ernment. " They took not their example," says Row, 
 " from any Church in the world ; no, not from Geneva." 
 They drew their plans — so they believed — from tlie 
 word of God. It was Presbyterianism. They insisted 
 it could not well be anything else. It was the syn- 
 agogue of the New Testament Church. It was the 
 Presbyterianism which had lived through all the Dark 
 Ages, preserved by the Waldenses in the mountain re- 
 treats of Northern Italy, a people who refused to be 
 called Protestants, since they had never formed any part 
 of the Romish Church. They alone were the lineal 
 descendants of the apostolic Church. Papacy had apos- 
 tatized from the truth. 
 
 The ordinary permanent officers of the Scottish 
 Church were three — the minister or pastor ; the ruling 
 
390 ROMANISM AND TEE REFORMERS. 
 
 elder, who assisted the minister in the exercise of church 
 discipline ; and the deacon, who had charge of the rev- 
 enues of the church and the care of the poor. 
 
 A board of trustees was unknown. As the number 
 of ministers was inadequate for the supply of all the 
 churches, persons of known piety were selected to read 
 the Scriptures and conduct the devotional exercises on 
 the Sabbath. If these made sufficient advance in knowl- 
 edge and were competent to teach, they were, after due 
 examination, appointed exhorters. The great needs of 
 our day suggest the revival of this scriptural custom. 
 There were also ministers who were commissioned to 
 take the oversight of large districts. They were itine- 
 rant preachers and had the care of vacant churches; hence 
 the name of superintendents by which they were usually 
 known. This arrangement was suggested by the exi- 
 gencies of the times. 
 
 The Church held to the parity of the ministry. The 
 office of bishop, in the papal or episcopal sense, was not 
 recognized as of divine authority. The dogma of apos- 
 tolic succession was repudiated as unscriptural. Besides, 
 what Scotchman would consent to receive ordination at 
 the hands of a Romish bishop, or trace his ministerial 
 descent from the apostles through the corrupt Church 
 out of which he had just come? His ordination must 
 conform to that of Timothy's, and by the laying on of 
 the hands of the Presbytery he is set apart to his sacred 
 office. 
 
 On the Lord's Day the people assembled twice for 
 public worship. The second service was held in the 
 afternoon, and catechising was substituted for preaching. 
 There was also a weekly meeting for the expounding of 
 
JOHN KNOX: LATER WORK IN SCOTLAND. 391 
 
 tlie Scriptures aud for other religious exercises. The 
 Lord^s Supper was admiuistered four times a year, and 
 the ordiuauce of baptism, always accompanied by preach- 
 ing or other religious service, was admiuistered as cir- 
 cumstances required. This was more than three hun- 
 dred years ago. 
 
 Provision was further made for the education of the 
 young. Schools were established as far as practicable in 
 every parish, aud in connection with grammar and Latin 
 the principles of the Christian religion were taught. 
 The question of the Bible in the school was not mooted 
 in those days. These Scotch Presbyterians believed that 
 any education was singularly incomplete which did not em- 
 brace moral as well as intellectual culture, and they were 
 careful as to the intelligence aud piety of those who had 
 charge of their children in the most interesting and the 
 most important, because the formative, period of life. 
 
 Eight months after the first meeting of the General 
 Assembly of the Scottish Church, when the Reformation 
 was fully launched on the quiet waters — a season of calm 
 after a long tempestuous period — Mary, the queen of 
 the Scots, whose husband. King Francis II. of France, 
 was then deceased, returned to Scotland. This occurred 
 Aug. 19, 1561. Mary was then in the nineteenth year 
 of her age. Her great personal beauty, winning ad- 
 dress and native genius, joined with the accomplishments 
 acquired in the schools and in the fashionable society of 
 France, were such as to attract even the rugged Scots. 
 They were proud of their beautiful queen, and to this 
 day, although there rests upon her memory a cloud that 
 may never be lifted, the Scotch people speak tenderly of 
 Mary Stuart, hoping against hope that at some time and 
 
 26 
 
392 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 in some way the overhaDging cloud may yet divide and 
 let down a little of heaven's light on her royal tomb in 
 the old Westminster Abbey. 
 
 Mary's return to Scotland was greeted with many 
 demonstrations of joy. All Edinburgh was alive with 
 enthusiasm. High street was brilliant with banners, 
 and from the windows of the quaint old houses bonny 
 lassies waved their welcome as the royal pageant passed 
 by on its way to the palace. 
 
 But there were some who did not share in this joy. 
 They saw a little cloud on the horizon which they feared 
 might grow and darken the sky. They had just been 
 delivered from the bondage of the papal hierarchy, and 
 thought they saw a prosperous, happy Church reaching 
 down the long perspective of years. 
 
 Mary was a devout Romanist. She at once erected an 
 altar in her chapel and the mass was said by a Romish 
 priest. This was the little cloud, and, although the sky 
 was clear, yet there were heard in the distance the mut- 
 terings of an approaching storm. A stern voice with a 
 clarion riug that awakened Scotland to apprehensions of 
 danger was heard : '^ Shall we suffer that idol (popery) 
 to be erected within this realm ?" It was declared that 
 " one mass was more terrible than ten thousand armed 
 men landed to invade the kingdom.'' Prayers were 
 offered in the churches that God would deliver the 
 queen from papal superstition and bring her into sym- 
 pathy with the Reformed religion ; or, if that great 
 blessing were denied, that Scotland might at any cost 
 maintain the pure evangel. 
 
 Mary was quick to recognize the powerful influence 
 of Knox. The restoration of the papacy could not be 
 
JOHN KNOX: LATER WORK IN SCOTLAND. IVJl'j 
 
 accomplished unless his power was broken. Perhai>s 
 elie can at least silence his opposition to her religion. 
 May she not even now, by flattery, restore him to the 
 bosom of the Cliurch, and so settle all questions con- 
 cerning its re-establishment in Scotland? As soon 
 think to move Arthur's Seat from its place or reverse 
 the course of the Clyde by a mermaid's song. Mary 
 made the trial. She had been in Edinburgh but a few 
 days when she sent for the Reformer, and held an ex- 
 tended interview witli him in the presence of her brotlier, 
 the prior of St. Andrews. The deportment of Knox on 
 this occasion has been misrepresented. Hume evinces 
 his hostility to evangelical religion by apologizing for 
 Mary and condemning Knox, declaring the truth con- 
 cerning neither. John Knox was not guilty of any 
 contempt of authority or discourtesy to a woman in 
 expressing his views on the great questions of the day, 
 and especially when he was ostensibly summoned into 
 the presence of his queen to do this very thing. In the 
 course of this interview she charged him with having 
 taught the people to adopt a religion different from that 
 which was approved by their princes. To this he re- 
 plied that true religion derived its authority from God ; 
 that princes were often most ignorant on this point; that 
 subjects w^ere not bound to frame their religious senti- 
 ments and practices according to the arbitrary will of 
 their rulers, else the Hebrews ought to have conformed 
 to the religion of Pharaoh, Daniel and his associates to 
 that of Nebuchadnezzar and Darius, and the ]->rimitive 
 Christians to that of the Roman emperors. "Yea," 
 replied the queen, " but none of these men raised the 
 sword against their princes. Think you" she con- 
 
394 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 tinued, "that subjects, having the power, may resist 
 their princes ?'' He answered, " If princes exceed 
 their bound, madam, no doubt they may be resisted, 
 even by power. For no greater honor or greater obedi- 
 ence is to be given to kings and princes than God has 
 commanded to be given to father and mother. But tlie 
 father may be struck with a frenzy in which he would 
 slay his children. Now, madam, if the children arise, 
 join together, apprehend the father, take the sword from 
 him, bind his hands and keep him in prison until the 
 frenzy be over, think you, madam, that the children do 
 any wrong? Even so, madam, it is with princes that 
 would murder the children of God that are subject unto 
 them. Their blind zeal is nothing but a mad frenzy ; 
 therefore to take the sword from them, to bind their 
 hands and to cast them into prison till they be brought 
 to a more sober mind is no disobedience against princes, 
 but just obedience, because it agreeth with the will of 
 God." 
 
 After a brief silence the queen replied with deep 
 emotion, " Well, then, I perceive that my subjects should 
 obey you and not me, and will do what they please, and 
 not what I command, and so mnst I be subject to them 
 and not they to me." — "God forbid," replied Knox, 
 " that ever I take upon me to command any one to obey 
 me or to set subjects at liberty to do whatever pleases 
 them ! But my concern is that both princes and subjects 
 may obey God. And this subjection, madam, to God 
 and his Church is the greatest dignity that flesh can get 
 upon the face of the earth, for it shall raise them to ever- 
 lasting glory." — " But you are not the Church that I 
 will nourish," said the queen; "I will defend the 
 
JOHN KNOX: LATER WORK IN SCOTLAND. ;59rj 
 
 Church of Rome, for it is, I thiuk, the true Churcli of 
 God/'— "Your will, madam,'' replied the Reformer, 
 'Ms DO reason, neither doth your thought make the 
 Roman harlot to be the true and immaculate spouse of 
 Jesus Christ. Wonder not, madam, that I call Rome 
 an harlot, for that Church is altogether polluted with 
 all kinds of spiritual fornication, both in doctrine and 
 manners." 
 
 This was unquestionably plain talk. The Reformer's 
 trumpet gave no uncertain sound. Some are of the 
 opinion that on this occasion it blew too strong a blast — 
 that if he was made of such stuff that he could not help 
 speaking his real sentiments, he should have done it in 
 milder and more courteous terms. We confess we can- 
 not see the absence of courtesy or of respect to authority 
 in our Reformer's address. It is to be remembered that 
 the spiritual interests of a realm were at stake, and the 
 civil liberties of Scotland as well. 
 
 John Knox had an intelligent understanding of the 
 case, and " was more kingly than all the race of the 
 Stuarts." He had traveled heights and explored depths 
 the young queen had never seen, and he brought back 
 faithful report of dangers to be shunned, and uttered 
 convictions of duty which subsequent history has sliown 
 to be founded on eternal truth. As a true man, as a 
 patriot, as a friend of his sovereign, he could not have 
 said less ; and as for the tone of his address, though in- 
 tensely earnest, it was as respectful as it was firm. Had 
 he been a temporizer, as was Erasmus, or as pacific as 
 Melanchthon, the Reformation \YOuld have been strangled 
 in its cradle, and Scotland would have reverted to bar- 
 barism and the cruel domination of Rome. The times 
 
396 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 required a brave man and true — one who could speak 
 his Heaven-inspired convictions even with a sword at 
 his throat; and God, who sent Nathan to reprove King 
 David and Elijah to condemn tiie wicked Ahab in the 
 vineyard, commissioned John Knox to utter in the 
 audience-hall of Holyrood Palace the principles of ever- 
 lasting truth, the only sure foundation of domestic peace, 
 of beneficent rule and of human salvation. 
 
 The interview being brought to a close, Knox passed 
 quietly out with the expression of a wish that was 
 sincere and kind : ^' I pray God, madam, that you may 
 be as blessed w^ithin the commonwealth of Scotland as 
 ever Deborah was in the commonwealth of Israel.'^ 
 
 At this time Knox preached in St. Giles's church in 
 Edinburgh, and frequently addressed three thousand 
 people. His sermons were not models of rhetoric, but, 
 like himself, sharp and rugged, and so direct that all 
 knew at what he aimed. He loved Scotland. The 
 wounds he inflicted, being those of a friend, were bet- 
 ter than the kisses of an enemy. 
 
 One day intelligence was brought to Edinburgh that 
 the duke of Guise had made an attack on a Protestant 
 congregation in France whilst assembled for worship, 
 and had murdered many of the defenceless people. 
 Queen Mary received the news with evident satisfaction. 
 The night following Holyrood was brilliant with lights 
 and crowded with courtiers and friends of the queen. 
 Music and dancing were continued until the dawn — a 
 fitting celebration of an event which had brought sorrow 
 to the homes of many French Protestants. 
 
 St. Giles's church witnessed a different scene when the 
 great preacher referred to the massacre in terms of sad- 
 
JOHN KNOX: LATER WORK IN SCOTLAND. :)97 
 
 ness tliat moved iiiaiiy to tears, and in denunciations of 
 the act which provoked to righteous displeasure. False 
 reports of this discourse were carried to the queen, and 
 the Reformer was again summoned into her presence. 
 She charged him with having spoken disrespectfully of 
 the court, aud of herself iu a manner calculated to 
 awaken sentiments of contempt for their sovereign in 
 the minds of her j)eople. Tlie preacher said there were 
 persons then present who had heard the sermon, and he 
 would repeat the substance of it, leaving them to certify, 
 if they were truthful persons, to the faithfulness of his 
 repetition. He admitted he had said that some princes 
 were more exercised in music and dancing than in read- 
 ing or in hearing the word of God, and delighted more 
 in fiddlers and flatterers than in the company of wise 
 and grave men who were capable of giving them whole- 
 some counseL But of charges of irreverence for Her 
 Majesty, such as she had just repeated, he denied them, 
 intimating, perhaps somewhat sarcastically, that people 
 who habitually absented themselves from church should 
 be slow to give credence to the reports they heard of the 
 utterances of the preachers. The queen dismissed him 
 with the remark that his sermon had been misrepresent- 
 ed. And as the ground of the complaint was proved 
 to be false, her disappointment was as great as his satis- 
 fliction was complete. 
 
 Their third interview was at Lochleven, in which 
 Mary resorted to ingenious artifice to accomplish her 
 designs against the Reformation, but failed in her en- 
 deavors. 
 
 They met for the fourth and last time at Holyrood. As 
 Knox entered she burst into tears, saying that never had a 
 
398 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 prince been handled as she had been, and added, ^' I vow 
 to God I shall be at once revenged." He had objected to 
 her marriage with, a Roman Catholic. She inquired, 
 '^ What have you to do with my marriage ? What are 
 you in this commonwealth ?" He calmly stated the 
 grounds of his objection to an alliance with a devotee 
 of Rome. She continued weeping, and he said he never 
 took delight in the distress of any creature ; it was w^ith 
 difficulty he could see his own boys weep when he cor- 
 rected them for their faults, and far less could he rejoice 
 in Her Majesty's tears ; but, seeing he had given her no 
 just reason for offence and had only discharged his duty, 
 he was constrained, though unwillingly, to sustain her 
 tears rather than hurt his conscience or betray the com- 
 monwealth by his silence. 
 
 Subsequently he w^as charged with treason and tried 
 in open convention, at which Mary presided. She hoped 
 to crush him at last, and urged the prosecution with 
 great violence. The Reformer's defence was clear and 
 satisfactory to the majority of the court, who voted for 
 his honorable acquittal and commended him for his 
 amiable demeanor on the occasion. Even the bishop 
 of Ross, who had been the queen's informant, deserted 
 her in the trial, and admitted that, having heard the 
 case, he saw nothing in Knox that was blameworthy. 
 
 Thus the queen was foiled in her attempt to overcome 
 the Reformer. He was invincible as the truth itself, 
 and firm as the rock which supported the old castle 
 beyond the Lawn Market, which had defied a thousand 
 storms and was prepared to defy a thousand more. 
 The progress of the Reformed Church was slow and 
 attended with great difficulties. Opposed at every step 
 
JOHN KNOX: LATER WORK IN SCOTLAND. 391) 
 
 by all the power of the throne and by the intrigues 
 of the lords who adhered to the Romish faith, it 
 seemed that only the unconquerable will and potential 
 influence of Knox prevented a return to the })a[)a('v. 
 And it was so. 
 
 For having delivered a sermon which gave oflence to 
 Darnley, he was commanded by the privy council to 
 desist from preaching whilst the king and Mary sojourn- 
 ed in Edinburgh. In the offensive sermon he had said 
 that God punished wicked Ahab because he did not 
 restrain his idolatrous wife Jezebel. Darnley sup})osed 
 the remark was designed for him. It may have been ; 
 it may not. " The wicked flee when no man pursueth." 
 But the prohibition was of short continuance. Mary 
 and her husband returned to Stirling, one of her places 
 of residence, and Knox went on in his work. 
 
 After a time Darnley professed himself a papist. 
 There followed similar professions by such leading men 
 of the realm as the earls of Lenox, Cassiles and Caith- 
 ness, together with Lords Montgomery and Seton. The 
 queen was now encouraged to renew her effort to restore 
 the papacy. In February, 1566, Cardinal Lorraine 
 communicated with Mary, and sent a copy of the League 
 for the extirpation of the Protestants and for severe 
 piocedures against certain offensive lords, by which it 
 was hoped to restore Scotland to the Romish see. Maiy 
 affixed her signature to the League and matured her 
 plans for securing a papal triumph. 
 
 There was a person of inferior character attached to 
 the household of the queen who had urged this move- 
 ment against the Protestants with all the zeal of a devout 
 Romanist, intensified by his affection for Mary— an uu- 
 
400 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 lawful attachment which was reciprocated by her. He 
 was believed to be an Italian adventurer whose personal 
 accomplishments had commended him to the consider- 
 ation of the queen. He was more probably a disguised 
 legate of the papal Church, sent hither to protect the 
 interests of Rome. Mary made him her private secre- 
 tary, and gave him the affection which only a husband 
 should receive. His name is familiar to all readers of 
 history — David Kizzio. One evening, whilst the queen, 
 Rizzio and a few of Mary's friends were sitting in what 
 was called the supping-room, a small apartment in Holy- 
 rood House, muffled steps were heard on the secret 
 stairway leading to this room. A moment later and 
 Lord Darnley, pale and trembling, entered, followed by 
 armed men, who seized the Italian and slew him, re- 
 gardless of all the entreaties of the queen to spare his 
 life. Mary dried her tears and said, " Now I will study 
 revenge." 
 
 The murder of her paramour, instigated by Darnley, 
 diverted the attention of Mary from her designs against 
 the Reformed Church. She was occupied with but one 
 idea, the avenging of Rizzio's death. The unprincipled 
 earl of Bothwell w^as ready to become her agent. Darn- 
 ley was enticed to an isolated dwelling in Edinburgh, 
 and on the night of the 10th of February, 1569, was 
 murdered, the house in which he was lying being blown 
 up by gunpowder. Mary had found her revenge. Short- 
 ly afterward she was married to Bothwell. 
 
 Before the bar of public opinion if not at the tribunal 
 of God she is pronounced a murderer and an adulteress. 
 We cannot adopt this severe judgment. Thereafter 
 — her hands, as many believe, covered with blood — 
 
JOHN KNOX: LATER WORK IN SCOTLAND. 401 
 
 she is more unhappy than ever before. Her energy of 
 character deserts her. Her guilt haunts her. Avengers 
 seem ever on her track. Her power over lier former 
 friends is broken. Scotland will no longer come at her 
 beck. Armies will no longer fight for the beautiful but 
 wicked queen. Both well is hated and flees for his life. 
 Mary is a prisoner in Lochleven Castle, makes her 
 escape, aided by the Hamiltons and their allies, at- 
 tempts to hew her way back to the throne, is defeated, 
 exiled to England, there imprisoned, and after long con- 
 finement is beheaded. 
 
 Thus closed the sad life of Mary Stuart, who might 
 have been one of the most beloved of sovereigns. Had 
 she possessed moral excellence equal to her personal 
 beauty and her cultivated genius, she would have out- 
 shone her rival. Queen Elizabeth, and erected in the 
 hearts of the Scotch people a memorial to her name 
 which would have been chei'ished by all succeeding 
 generations. But she had little integrity of charac- 
 ter. Her education in the voluptuous court of France 
 and in the pale of a corrupt Church, which made little 
 distinction between virtue and vice, had disqualified her 
 for personal government and the exercise of regal au- 
 thority. In all history there are few sadder chapters 
 than those which record the life and death of Mary, 
 beautiful Mary, queen of the Scots. 
 
 Under the regency of the earl of Murray the king- 
 dom had comparative peace. On the 15th of December, 
 1567, the Scottish Parliament confirmed the action of 
 1560 in favor of the Protestant religion. For three 
 years the growth of Protestantism was rapid. It took 
 deep root and extended its branches. 
 
402 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 Then John Knox, worn with kibor, depressed by 
 disease and in the course of nature approaching the 
 end of life, thought to lay off his armor and compose 
 himself for a change of worlds. But suddenly, with 
 all Scotland, he was startled by the intelligence of the 
 good regent's death. While passing through a narrow 
 street in Linlithgow, Murray was shot and mortally 
 wounded by a concealed assassin, the ingrate Hamilton, 
 son of the archbishop of St. Andrews, whose life, after 
 the battle of Langside, the regent himself had spared. 
 In a few hours Murray, the wise ruler, the earnest 
 Christian, the friend of the Reformation, a man of 
 rare beauty of character, was dead. Scotland mourned 
 his death. John Knox was almost crushed by the blow 
 which smote down the beloved regent. Ever memora- 
 ble is the sermon he preached over the remains of Mur- 
 ray and the prayer he offered on the sad funeral day. 
 
 Shortly after this Knox was stricken with paralysis, 
 and his public life seemed at an end. But he recovered 
 sufficiently to conduct an occasional service. When the 
 interests of the Church were especially imperiled he for- 
 got the weakness of the flesh and rallied the wavering 
 Protestants to the strife with all the vigor of former 
 days. 
 
 Now the papists have grown weary of his resistance to 
 their wicked designs, and again they seek his life. One 
 evening as he takes his accustomed seat at his table he 
 feels impelled to change his place. A moment later a 
 musket-ball passes through the window over his vacant 
 chair; it is deflected from its course and deeply im- 
 bedded in the ceiling. The appointed bound is not yet 
 reached, and Knox is immortal until he reaches it. 
 
JOHN KNOX: LATER WORK IN SCOTLAND. 403 
 
 Yielding to the solicitations of friends, he removed to 
 St. Andrews. Here he continued his work. Numerous 
 controversies engaged his attention. The machinations 
 of the papacy were resisted. Messages of counsel and 
 encouragement were sent to the churches. On the 
 Lord's Day the great Reformer occupied the pulpit 
 of the parish church, the old pulpit in which he began 
 his ministry and had uttered brave words for Christ 
 which had rung out over all Scotland. 
 
 James Melville, a student of St. Andrews, describes 
 the preacher in his last days : " I attended him with ray 
 note-book and pen. In the opening up of his text he 
 was moderate for the space of half an hour, but when 
 he came to the application he made me so thrill and 
 tremble I could not hold a pen to write. He was very 
 weak. I saw him every day go slowly and wearily, 
 with a ruff about his neck, a staff in one hand, and good 
 godly Richard Ballenden holding up the other, from the 
 abbey to the parish kirk ; and the said Richard Ballen- 
 den and another servant lifted him up to the pulpit, 
 where he behoved to lean at his first entrance, but ere 
 he had done with his sermon he was so active and vigor- 
 ous that he was likely to beat the pulpit in pieces and 
 fly out of it." 
 
 In St. Andrews, Knox lived on intimate terms with 
 the professors of St. Leonard's College. One of his 
 favorite recreations was to walk through the college 
 grounds, looking w^ith a paternal interest upon the 
 students, frequently gathering a little group of them 
 around him, imparting to them wise and affectionate 
 counsels and then giving them his blessing. The stu- 
 dents were much affected by these interviews with tho 
 
404 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 venerable man, and carried the memory of them through 
 
 all their after years. 
 
 The weary soldier, laboring as strength would permit, 
 in this classic town, often longed to go away and be at 
 rest. Thus he wrote in the preface to one of his works : 
 ^^ I heartily salute and take my good-night of all the 
 faithful of both realms, earnestly desiring the assistance 
 of their prayers, that without any notable slander to the 
 evangel of Jesus Christ I may end my battle, for, as the 
 world is weary of me, so am I of it." But again he is 
 summoned to Edinburgh : his friends desire to hear his 
 voice once more before he dies. He goes on the con- 
 dition that he should not be required to keep silence 
 respecting the conduct of those who kept the castle, 
 " whose treasonable and tyrannical deeds he would cry 
 out against as long as he was able to speak." 
 
 In the latter part of that summer there came to Ed- 
 inburgh news of the great massacre of Protestants in 
 Paris. Charles IX. had ordered the murder of the pious 
 Coligni, admiral of France, and this was followed by 
 the indiscriminate destruction of the friends of the Ref- 
 ormation, not only in Paris, but in all parts of the 
 kingdom. Men and women, old and young, and little 
 children were put to death. Seventy thousand were 
 butchered by the myrmidons of Rome in the short space 
 of one week. By direction of the pope a season of 
 thanksgiving was observed, and the faithful lifted their 
 bloodstained hands to heaven in services which were an 
 
 ^ abomination to God. 
 
 The Reformed Church on the Continent was bowed 
 down under this great affliction. Scotland was over- 
 whelmed with sorrow. John Knox was sorely distressed, 
 
 < 
 
JOHN KNOX: LATER WORK IN SCOTLAND. 405 
 
 but his faith in Gud and in the success of the Refor- 
 mation did not fliil liim. He asked that he niiglit be 
 carried to the pulpit of old St. Giles's church, and there 
 he forgot his physical pains in the expression of his 
 holy wrath. The wavering grew firm. The discour- 
 aged became hopeful. The voice of the people was as 
 one man : ^^ Come what may, we will hold fast to the 
 holy evangel.'^ — 
 
 A little later Lawsou of St. Andrews was chosen 
 Knox's colleague and successor in the pastorate at Edin- 
 burgh. The installation services were held Nov. 9, 1572. 
 The sermon was preached by John Knox in Tolbooth 
 church, and the services were concluded in the larger 
 auditorium of St. Giles's. His charges to the pastor 
 and people were marked by great pathos. The message 
 seemed to come from one who had already passed within 
 the veil. It Avas a peaceful yet sad occasion. With an 
 exhausted voice Knox pronounced the benediction on 
 his loved people with a tenderness that was deejjly 
 affecting. His life-work was done. Leaning on his 
 staff and supported by an attendant, he walked from 
 St. Giles's church down High street to his home, and 
 never came out of it until he was borne to his grave. 
 On the following Sabbath his elders and deacons and 
 David Lindsay, a minister from Leith, met in Knox's 
 room. The dying Reformer addressed them in impres- 
 sive words. "The day approaches," he said, "and is 
 now before the door, for which I have frequently thirsted, 
 when I shall be released from my great labors and in- 
 numerable sorrows, and shall be with Christ. And now 
 God is my witness, whom I have served in the Spirit in 
 the gospel of his Son, that I have taught nothing but 
 
406 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 the true and solid doctrine of the gospel of the Son of 
 God^ and have had it for my only object to instruct the 
 ignorant, to confirm the weak, the fearful and the dis- 
 tressed by the promises of grace, and to fight against 
 the proud and rebellious by the divine threatenings. I 
 know that many have frequently complained, and do 
 still complain, of my too great severity ; but God knows 
 that my mind was always void of hatred to the persons 
 of those against whom I thundered the severest judg- 
 ments/' 
 
 Other words of the same import he spoke, and then 
 added, addressing the elders and then his successor ; 
 " My dear brethren, do you persevere in the eternal 
 truth of the gospel ; wait diligently on the flock over 
 which the Lord hath set you, and which he redeemed 
 with the blood of his only-begotten Son. — And thou, 
 my dearest brother Lawson, fight the good fight and 
 do the work of the Lord joyfully and resolutely. The 
 Lord from on high bless you and the whole church of 
 Edinburgh, against whom, so long as they persevere in 
 the word of truth which they have heard of me, the 
 gates of hell shall not prevail.'^ That little room on 
 the Netherbow was a place of weeping. Only John 
 Knox was calm. His dim eyes were turned toward 
 heaven whence his Lord should come, and above the 
 dome of dear St. Giles's, which he saw from his window, 
 there stood the gate of pearl, opened now that he might 
 enter. 
 
 The next Friday he was much engaged in meditation 
 and prayer, and was heard to say, ^' Come, Lord Jesus. 
 Sweet Jesus, into thy hand I commend my spirit. Be 
 merciful, Lord, to thy Church which thou hast re- 
 
JOHN KNOX: LATER WORK IN SCOTLAND. 4()7 
 
 deemed. Give peace to this afflicted commonwealth." 
 Many friends visited him, among whom were Lord 
 Lindsay, the bishop of Caithness, the earl of Glen- 
 cairn and Lord Euthven. At his request his wife 
 frequently read to him from God's holy word, and he 
 dwelt with especial delight on the fifteenth chapter of 
 First Corinthians and the Lord's intercessory prayer 
 recorded in the seventeenth chapter of John's Gospel, 
 in which he "first cast anchor." 
 
 On Monday, the 24th of November, he failed rapidly, 
 and yet at nine o'clock he rose, sat a while in his chair, 
 and then, too weak to sit, reclined on his bed. A friend 
 asked him if he had any pain. He answered cheer- 
 fully, " It is no painful pain, but such a pain as shall 
 soon, I trust, end the battle." Again he said, " AYithin 
 a short time I shall, without any great pain of body or 
 anguish of mind, exchange this mortal and miserable 
 life for a blessed immortality through Jesus Christ." 
 About eleven o'clock he said, "Now it is come." 
 Bannytyne, his secretary, requested him to think on 
 the comforting promises of the Saviour Jesus Christ. 
 Being speechless, he could make no reply. Then Ban- 
 nytyne asked that he would give some sign that he died 
 in peace. The pale hand went up, and almost the 
 next moment, without a struggle, the great Eeformer 
 died, in the sixty-seventh year of his age. 
 
 Severely persecuted for righteousness' sake, often ex- 
 iled from his loved Scotland, frequently hunted by the 
 bloodthirsty papists as if he were a wild beast of the 
 forest, and compelled to maintain an almost perpetual 
 warfare in behalf of the truth, leading on to battle and 
 victory, he joyfully went to his everlasting rest. The 
 
 27 
 
408 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 nun of mortal life had set, but it shone on another 
 world. AVithout him Scotland might have remained 
 under the power of Rome and have been in our age 
 what Italy, Spain, and Southern Ireland continue to be. 
 Without liim this land we call ours would not have en- 
 joyed so long the blessings of religious liberty and civil 
 freedom. 
 
 Well did Thomas Carlyle say " that for her liberty 
 Scotland owed more to John Knox than to all other 
 men." His influence was far more potent than that of 
 Robert Bruce, of David II. or of Henry YIII. 
 
 Luther, Calvin, Knox^ glorious trio ! They w^ere the 
 Paul, Peter and John of the Reformed Church. Their 
 names shall live until the end of time, and be inscribed 
 m letters of gold in the archives of heaven. On Wed- 
 nesday, November 26, 1572, John Knox Avas buried in 
 the churchyard of St. Giles's. A multitude of people 
 witnessed his burial. Loving and grateful hands laid 
 him in his grave, and Regent Morton, looking into that 
 lowly resting-place, exclaimed in words immortal as 
 their subject, '^ There lies he who never feared the 
 face of man — who, though often threatened with dag 
 and dagger, hath ended his days in peace.'' 
 
 Now in the stone-paved street, over which day by 
 day carriages roll and a jostling multitude pass, behind 
 St. Giles's church, may be seen a stone, level with the 
 street, bearing two initials and a date, supposed to in- 
 dicate, if not the spot, the vicinity, in which the great 
 man was interred. Just where he lies none can cer- 
 tainly tell. The same may be said of Calvin. Both 
 in this respect were like their Lord, whose sepulchre 
 has been hidden from a-ll the succeeding ages. The 
 
JOHN KNOX: LATER WORK IN SCOTLAND. 4()9 
 
 great of this world leave behind them moDunieiits more 
 enduring than sculptured marble. They live in the 
 lives of each generation that follows. They are not 
 dead, but rather are like the stars, which, unseen by 
 day, hold on their course, riding in glory through the 
 sky. 
 
 We must leave our readers to draw their own lessons 
 from this remarkable life and to learn the features of 
 the Reformer's character from the narrative we have 
 given. Only this shall we say : He was one of the 
 bravest men that ever lived, and yet, whilst he wore a 
 martial cloak, and could not have done otherwise, there 
 beat beneath it a heart that was ever loving and kind, 
 that harbored no revenge and was ever ready to for- 
 give — a heart that clung to Christ and his blessed gos- 
 pel as the ivy to the oak, and loved all who bore the 
 image of our Lord. Froude represents the Reformer as 
 a man of kindly spirit, who sketched the popular feeling 
 in a series of scenes shining with laughter and humorous 
 defiance, but so free from bitterness that even anger 
 seems to melt into contemptuous pity. " They go far 
 wrong," says Carlyle, " who think that Knox was a 
 gloomy, shrieking fanatic. Not at all. He was one of 
 the solidest of men. Practical, cautious, hopeful, patient ; 
 a most shrewd, observing, quickly-discerning man ; broth- 
 er to the high, brother also to the low; sincere in his 
 sympathy with both." A man of great intellectual 
 power, of far-reaching mental vision, of rare attainments 
 in the learning of the schools, he was mighty in the 
 Scriptures and prevalent in prayer. " I know not,' 
 said Smeton, " if ever so much piety and genius were 
 lodged in so frail and weak a body." When human 
 
410 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 helps failed him he took hold on God with a firmer 
 grasp, and the solemn night did often catch up his in- 
 tercession and bear it away to the throne : " Give me 
 Scotland or I die/' 
 
 God bless Scotland, the Northland, surrounded by the 
 Orkneys, the Hebrides and Barra Isles as Saturn by his 
 resplendent rings ; the land of Knox and Murray, of 
 the Erskines and John Blair, of Rutherford and Haly- 
 burton and Anderson, of McCheyne and Chalmers, of 
 Norman McLeod and William Arnot, of Candlish and 
 Thomas Guthrie — grand and mighty men, of whom 
 and others like to them the silver-tongued Everett said 
 that they " had acquired over the minds of men a su- 
 premacy more extensive and more enduring than that of 
 Alexander or Augustus !'' 
 
 Here we close our account of the great Reformation. 
 The path over which we have traveled has often been 
 red with blood. The grasp of popery is strong as death. 
 Its walls are fire. Its weapons are carnal. Its spirit, 
 like its principles, remains unchanged. It would repeat 
 the Inquisition if it could ; it would establish papal 
 supremacy on our free soil if it had the power. Even 
 now it is the controlling element in nearly all our large 
 cities. It strives for universal pre-eminence, and, unless 
 the friends of civil and religious liberty take the alarm, 
 will rule the decisions of our courts, control our State 
 and national legislation and fill the highest offices of 
 the nation. 
 
 And what then ? It needs no prophetic inspiration to 
 answer. God preserve us from threatening evil ! By 
 every consideration of humanity, patriotism and piety 
 
JOHN KNOX: LATER WORK IN SCOTLAND. 411 
 
 m^ we be impelled to stand by the principles of the 
 holy evangel, long withheld from the world by the 
 corrupt hierarchy which chose for its seat the city of 
 Ihe Caesars ; to restore which God raised up such men 
 as Luther, Calvin and Knox ; to maintain which Patrick 
 Hamilton, George Wishart, Thomas Cranmer, Hugh 
 Latimer, Nicholas Ridley and an army of holy martyrs 
 shed their blood. God grant that the kingdom of 
 Christ, whose emblems are righteousness and jieace, may 
 everywhere prevail ! That day will surely come, though 
 whether, on account of our supineness and sins, there 
 shall lie between a reign such as Bloody Mary's and 
 sucli scenes as were enacted at St. Andrews, at Smith- 
 field and on the Oxford common, only God, who sees 
 the end and traces all the steps thereto, can certainly 
 tell. _ 
 
ROMANISM; ITS PRESENT STATUS. 
 
" Then shall that Wicked be revealed, whom the Lord shall 
 consume with the spirit of his mouth, and shall destroy with 
 the bright?iess of his coming : even him, ivhose coming is after 
 the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying 
 wonders, and with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in 
 them that perish ; because they jxceived not the love of the 
 truth, that they might be saved. And for this cause God shall 
 se?id the7n strong delusion, that they should believe a lie.'' 
 
 2 Thess. 2 :8-ii. 
 
 " /;^ the second petitiofi, ivhich is. Thy kingdom cojue, ive 
 pray, that Satan's kingdom may be destroyed, and that the 
 ki?igdom of grace may be advanced, ourselves and others 
 brought into it, and kept in it, and that the kingdom of glory 
 may be hastened." 
 
 Shorter Catechism, Ans. to QuevStion 102. 
 
 " Christ. . . . shall come again at the last day in great 
 power, and in the full manifestation of his own glory, and 
 of the Father's, with all his holy angels, with a sho7it, with 
 the voice of the archangel, and with the trumpet of God, to 
 judge the world in righteous7iess." ' 
 
 Larger Catechism, Ans. to Question 56. 
 
ROMANISM: ITS PRESENT STATUS. 
 
 FN the preceding sketches we have been occupied with 
 -■- the past. We have contemplated the moral dark- 
 ness which during the Middle Ages gathered over 
 Europe — the simplicity of the gospel a memory only, 
 piety in its decadence, the Church divested of nearly 
 every trace of her early beauty; ignorance, supersti- 
 tion, wickedness and every form of corruption in high 
 places and in low casting heavy shadows over the land 
 and on all the prospects of the future. Then we saw the 
 light arise amid the darkness, a lone star on the liorizon 
 that betokened an approaching morning and beyond 
 that a better day. We have followed on through ages 
 of fear, conflict and toil, during which hope struggled 
 with despair, the glare of martyr-fires on the faces of 
 the timid and strong, the Church arising at last out of 
 the ashes of persecution a goodly temple, its foundations 
 deeply laid, its peaceful dome reflecting heaven and its 
 spacious walls enclosing a multitude of the redeemed. 
 Souls born from above communed with Christ and one 
 another, rejoiced in the truth released from the cerements 
 of death, and, endued with power from on high, girded 
 themselves for the world's conquest to their glorious 
 King. 
 
 Now we look about us in this more favored age that 
 
 415 
 
416 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS, 
 
 we may learu the present condition of Romanisn in the 
 lands where it still holds a place. We shall also notice 
 its claim to universal recognition in these latter times as 
 based upon its history, which reaches back, as we are 
 told, to apostolic times, and was born by the authorita- 
 tive word of Him who liveth and abideth for ever. 
 
 The Church of Rome is less corrupt than once it was. 
 It is not the persecuting power it was in the sixteenth 
 century. It does not maintain its ancient control over the 
 governments of the world, nor command the reverence 
 it inspired when the Gregories and Clements filled the 
 pontifical throne and such princes as Charles V. and 
 Philip II. bowed on the steps of a doubly-crowned au- 
 tocracy. 
 
 There is much in the Roman Catholic Church of to- 
 day to admire. There are elements of good which it 
 were folly to deny; agencies of blessing which have 
 alleviated human woe; examples of piety which can- 
 not be questioned ; and possibilities of usefulness that 
 under divine inspiration and control would lift the 
 world into a higher orbit. 
 
 We are not forgetful of its great charities, the min- 
 istries of its Sisters of Mercy ; its asylums for the suf- 
 fering on both sides of the Atlantic; its monasteries, 
 like those of the Great St. Bernard, the Simplon Pass, 
 Bethlehem and Nazareth, in which the poor are tem- 
 porarily sheltered and fed and where the weary traveler 
 rests. Nor do we forget that its churches are open to 
 the humblest classes, all social distinctions ignored be- 
 fore the altars of St. Peter's basilica and in the rude 
 Alpine chapel. By means of its charitable institutions 
 
EOMANTSM: ITS PRESENT STATUS. 417 
 
 and its recognition of the poor it has greatly extended 
 its power throughout the world and furnished an exam- 
 ple worthy of universal emulation. 
 
 We are also constrained to accord a qualified admira- 
 tion to Rome's steadfastness of purpose, departing not 
 from the early aspiration to " independent sovereignty, 
 control over the princes of the earth and the supremacy 
 of the Church." The Romanism of to-day, though shorn 
 of its temporal power, seeks its recovery, and swerves 
 not from the principles which by logical sequence de- 
 mand its restoration. It secludes the Holy Father in 
 the Vatican, a reputed prisoner in the most brilliant 
 palace in all the earth, and calmly waits the fulfillment 
 of its oft-repeated auguries. The waves of a holy in- 
 dignation beat against the throne of its usurped domin- 
 ion, the light of a pure evangelism glares on all the sur- 
 rounding summits, and Protestantism pushes its con- 
 quests in lands that had sworn allegiance to Rome ; but 
 the papacy sits serenely on the Vatican mount, addresses 
 the faithful of all lands from thence, urges its way along 
 the paths of the world's progress, and from every moun- 
 tain-height flings out the banner of its unwavering hope. 
 
 It is the marvel of the ages. Its inconsistency 
 amounts to genius. '' It is both lofty and degraded ; 
 simple, yet worldly-wise; humble, yet scornful and 
 proud ; washing beggars' feet, yet imposing commands 
 on the potentates of earth ; benignant, yet severe on all 
 who rebel; here clothed in rags, and there reveling in 
 palaces ; supported by charities, yet feasting the princes 
 of the earth ; assuming the title of servant of the serv- 
 ants of God, yet arrogating to itself the highest seat 
 among worldly dignitaries. Was there ever such a 
 
418 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 contradiction ? — glory iu debasement, and debasement 
 in glory, type of the misery and greatness of man ? 
 Was there ever such a mystery, so occult are its arts, 
 so subtile its policy, so plausible its pretensions, so cer- 
 tain its shafts ?" * 
 
 Romanism has many apologists. A mistaken charity 
 magnifies its virtues, ignores its vices and condones its 
 crimes. Thus error is advanced, the nnwary are mis- 
 led and the devotees of a corrupt religion are confirmed 
 in their superstitions. This charity is not the expres- 
 sion of that divine love which would save souls even 
 by a holy violence. 
 
 Romanism boasts of its unity and catholicity. Its 
 unity is specious only, and its catholicity unreal. It 
 claims that before his ascension our Lord indicated the 
 outward form of the Church and directed its organiza- 
 tion with Peter as its head. On the day of Pentecost 
 this external orgauism was completed. From that time 
 onward Peter and his successors were to be recognized 
 as the representatives of Christ, the real but absent 
 Head of the visible Church. The spiritual supremacy 
 of Christendom is thus, by divine appointment, vested 
 in the pope. The Church universal is based on the 
 principle of obedience to him, and a system of doc- 
 trine and an order of worship are maintained in har- 
 mony with this papal despotism and are its effective 
 support. 
 
 Roman Catholicism holds that the unity of the 
 
 Church in respect to its external organization and its 
 
 doctrinal system has continued without interruption or 
 
 variation to the present. Protestantism is pronounced a 
 
 * Lord's Lecture on Hildebrand. 
 
ROMANISM: ITS PRESENT STATUS 419 
 
 heresy, recent as the Reformatiou, and broken into 
 variant divisions, lacking either outward or sj)iiitual 
 coherence, and as changeful as diverse. These assump- 
 tions of the unity of the papacy are groundless, and the 
 alleged disagreements in Protestantism do not exist. ^ 
 
 First: The claim of Eomanism to universal recoirni- 
 tion, as based on the supremacy of the pope and the 
 unbroken succession of the priesthood, cannot be main- 
 tained. History does not support it. Peter was an 
 apostle. The apostolic office was personal, and there- 
 fore could not be communicated to another. It was 
 necessary to the apostleship that he who held the office 
 should be able to bear personal testimony to the resur- 
 rection of Christ — that he should be possessed of an in- 
 fallible inspiration, be endow^ed with the power of work- 
 ing miracles and be able to impart spiritual gifts. These 
 qualifications ceased with the Twelve. The office itself 
 w^as temporary, and therefore there could be no succes- 
 sion. Peter and the other apostles ordained suitable 
 men to the ministry, but did this not as apostles, but as 
 co-ordinate presbyters. The idea of the supremacy of 
 Peter never occurred to the apostles, and received no 
 recognition from the early Church. 
 
 A celebrated Oxford professor, Henry Hod well, ex- 
 pressed his opinion on the subject in somewhat drastic 
 terms. He insisted that " the office of the apostles per- 
 ished with the apostles; in which office there never was 
 any succession to any of them, except to Judas the 
 Traitor." 
 
 Further: Tf the supremacy of Peter were true, yet 
 the pontifical succession cannot be established. Peter 
 stands alone in the supremacy claimed for him by the 
 
420 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 Holy See. Ignatius and Poljcarp speak of no succes- 
 sor. Down to the time of Irenseus, near the close of 
 the second century, there is not the slightest allusion by 
 any historian of the apostolic Church to such a dynastic 
 order. This silence is inexplicable on the basis of this 
 Romish tradition. The reason is obvious: Peter was 
 not a prelatic bishop, and not being a prelatic bishop he 
 could have no prelatic successor. Roman historians at- 
 tempt to fill the hiatus, but do not agree among them- 
 selves. Fabrications are usually inconsistent. Cer- 
 tainty is impossible where facts do not exist. 
 
 But if the line, as respects the chronological order, 
 were one and unbroken, yet there remain other facts 
 that militate against the Romish theory. If we were 
 constrained to accept the assumption that Peter as 
 supreme bishop ordained a successor, yet the succession 
 was evidently broken by the heresy of certain pontiffs, 
 by fraudulent elections and by schisms which originated 
 different pontifical lines, as when Rome was opposed by 
 Avignon and Urban by Clement. There is no bridge 
 to carry the Holy See across the centuries. Arianism 
 setting aside fundamental truth, simony purchasing the 
 papal tiara, mobocracy determining the succession and 
 the dissoluteness of popes have for ever dismissed, in 
 the judgment of the larger part of Christendom, the 
 theory of an apostolic successsion. Many are familiar 
 with the statements of reliable history concerning the 
 immorality of some of the popes. Gregory VII. was 
 guilty of adultery, perjury and murder; Honorius was 
 accused of grave offences by the Council of Constanti- 
 nople ; Eugenius was proved by the Council of Basle to 
 be a simonist, a peijurer and a heretic; Alexander YI. 
 
ROMAN ISM: ITS PRESENT STATUS. 421 
 
 was admitted to be " one of the greatest aud most liorri- 
 ble monsters in nature ;'' and Julius II. was a sodomite. 
 And there were others like to them. We do not iiffirm 
 that every pope was notoriously wicked, but we do in- 
 sist that the immorality of men who claimed to be vicars 
 of Christ, this immorality extending through successive 
 papal dynasties, is quite sufficient to interrupt the flow 
 of apostolic authority, and bring to a perpetual end the 
 Church which conditioned its life on the continuity of a 
 holy apostolic succession. — 
 
 The entire priesthood of the Roman Church is un- 
 scriptural and its perpetuity is an impossibility. The 
 Levitical priesthood was typical and occupied with sym- 
 bolical sacrifices. It terminated with the propitiatory 
 death of Christ. Our High Priest " put away sin by 
 the sacrifice of himself." He is gone into heaven " to 
 appear in the presence of God for us." There is no 
 longer any necessity for a priesthood, for altars and 
 sacrifices. The whole sacerdotal system of Rome is 
 anti-scriptural, dishonoring to Christ and a cruel dece})- 
 tion. The ministry is commissioned to preach the evan- 
 gel, not to wear priestly robes and offer sacrifices and 
 bind the faith of men to a dead Judaism out of which 
 living Christianity was born. Then it follows, since the 
 ancient priesthood has ceased, that succession in the 
 priesthood is an impossibility. The claim of Rome is 
 an offence to ordinary intelligence. It is a profane sub- 
 stitution of a human invention for the divine ordina- 
 tion, and of hierarchical supremacy for the Headsliip of 
 Jesus Christ. 
 
 The true successors of the apostles are those who pos- 
 sess the spirit of the apostles and do their works. Paul 
 
422 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 wrote to Timothy, ^' The things which thou hast heard 
 of me among many witnesses, the same commit thou to 
 faithful men who shall be able to teach others." The 
 gospel is the message. The faithful preacher of the 
 word, called and qualified by the Holy Ghost, whether 
 consecrated to his work by the hands of the Presbytery or 
 of the bishop, is in the line of the apostolic succession. 
 Every minister who maintains a faithful oversight of 
 the flock of Christ is a bishop. He is designated by 
 different names to indicate his several relations to the 
 spiritual needs of the people, appointed for ^^the per- 
 fecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for 
 the edifying of the body of Christ." And the true 
 visible Church, according to the Westminster Confes- 
 sion, consists of all those throughout the world that 
 profess the true religion, together with their children." 
 In agreement with this definition is the statement of the 
 Church of England that '' the visible Church of Christ 
 is a congregation of faithful men, in which the pure 
 word of God is preached and the sacraments are duly 
 administered according to Christ's ordinance, in all 
 these things that are requisite to the same." Accept- 
 ing these definitions as being in harmony with the 
 word of God, it displaces from the line of apostolic 
 succession all unfaithful ministers, and sets aside the 
 assumption of Romanists that they alone constitute the 
 true Church of Christ. 
 
 If we were constrained to accept the papal dogma of 
 apostolic succession, we would seek for it entirely out- 
 side the Romish communion. If it exists at all, it is to 
 l)e found among the godly people who were never iden- 
 tified with Rome ; who abode in the mountain-fastnesses 
 
ROMANISM: ITS PRESENT STATUS. 423 
 
 of Southern and Central Europe; who maintained the 
 simple gospel, a scriptural polity and spiritual worsliip; 
 who were the conservators of the truth during the Dark 
 Ages, at whose altar-fires Reformers kindled the torclies 
 which dispelled the moral darkness and ushered in the 
 glorious day whose sun shall never set. All honor to 
 pious Waldenses among the Cottian Alps, who insisted 
 at the beginning of the Reformation — and not without 
 reason — that they were the true descendants of those 
 who from father to son have preserved entire the apos- 
 tolic faith in the valleys which they then occupied, and 
 who appealed to earthly thrones for permission, as they 
 expressed it, "to enjoy that free exercise of their relig- 
 ion which they had enjoyed from time out of mind, 
 and before the dukes of Savoy became princes of Pied- 
 mont.'' Rorenco, grand prior of St. Roch in Turin, 
 who had examined ancient annals and traced subsequent 
 history, published a volume in 1632 in which he gave it 
 as his opinion, based on adequate testimony, that for at 
 least six or seven centuries, and hence before the time of 
 Hildebrand, the Waldenses had taught the same religion 
 which they held in the time of Luther and Calvin. We 
 have also the statement of Belvidere, the inquisitor, that 
 these ^' heretics have been found in all periods of history 
 in the valley of Angrona." It is worthy of remark 
 that the church polity of the Waldenses approximated 
 very closely to that of modern Presbyterianism, their 
 church courts corresponding to the Presbyterian church 
 Session, Presbytery and Synod, the office of the Moderator 
 of the latter being in no sense episcopal. The parity of 
 the clergy remained intact throughout their entire his- 
 tory, and ordination to the ministry was accomplished 
 
 28 
 
424 R031ANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 by th(3 laying on of the hands of the Moderator and of 
 his co-presbyters. Here is a unity in beliefs, order and 
 polity which is without a parallel in modern history, in 
 marked contrast to that which is claimed by tlie Roman 
 Church, her rock quicksand and her traditions the whis- 
 perings of the empty wind. A continuity of organiza- 
 tion originated several centuries after Christ, and the 
 unification of Romanists in all parts of the world in 
 one visible, external body, together with the subjection 
 of the individual conscience to the judgment and will 
 of the pope, are admitted. But this is not that unity 
 of the Spirit, that uniformity in spiritual apprehension 
 of truth and that loyalty to Jesus Christ, the true and 
 only Head of the Church, which justify the claim of 
 the papal Church. John Milton declared the assump- 
 tion groudless, and insisted that the name ''Roman 
 Catholic " was as inappropriate and illogical as '' Uni- 
 versal Particular.^^ The eleventh article of the creed 
 of Pius IV. should be for ever obsolete ; " I acknowl- 
 edge the Holy Catholic and apostolic Roman Church to 
 be the mother and mistress of all churches.'^ Equally 
 absurd is any modified prelacy which unchurches tlie 
 great company of believers in all the ages since Christ 
 who had maintained the apostolic faith, lived godly and 
 kept tlie ordinances of religion as administered by men 
 who had not accepted ordination from prelatic bishops, 
 yet had been made ministers of the evangel by the 
 Holy Ghost. 
 
 The ckiim of the Romish Church to doctrinal unity 
 is equally fallacious. It is an historic foct that within 
 the fold of assumed ecclesiastical unity the Church has 
 been greatly divided as to doctrinal beliefs. A few 
 
ROMANISM: ITS PRESENT STATUS. 42o 
 
 instances may be cited. With respect to trmh^nhsfnnfia- 
 tion there lias been diversity of opinion. By some con- 
 spicuous ecclesiastics it was classed among the non-essen- 
 tials of the Romish system. Gregory the Great did not 
 insist upon it. Pius IV. was quite willing to surrtndcr 
 it if by so doing he could secure the recognition of his su- 
 premacy on the British Isles. Those who held to the cor- 
 poreal presence in the Lord's Supper supported their view 
 by appeals to Ignatius and Justin Martyr ; others were 
 stumbled by the spiritual view of Tertullian and Au- 
 gustine. The Fathers were not in accord. Ignatius's 
 writings had been interlarded with papal fal)ricati()ns 
 and their testimony was uncertain. Infallible popes 
 had not determined the impoi'tant question. It was re- 
 served for the Council of Trent in the sixteenth century 
 to finally stop all discussion by reaffirming the dogma 
 of transubstantiation and anathematizing all who denied 
 it. From that time onward there has been little resist- 
 ance to a doctrine which practically substitutes a shock- 
 ing cannibalism for the sacrifice of the cross. 
 
 The doctrine of 'purgatory has long had a place in the 
 Romish creed, yet some of Rome's leading theologians 
 have pronounced " purgatorial punishment a matter of 
 human opinion, which can be evinced neither from 
 Scripture, Fathers, nor councils.'' Such names may 
 be mentioned as Barnes, Courager, Alphonsus, Fisher 
 and Polydorus. Some of the strongest advocates of an 
 intermediate state of purification by fire have rested 
 their argument on a passage in the Apocrypha, whilst 
 others have thought to find its su])port in obscure Wxi^ 
 in the canonical Scriptures ; and even these differ in their 
 interpretations until at last any scriptural ground for 
 
426 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 their belief is reduced to such a minimum that a papal 
 bull was necessary to establish an article of faith which 
 should bind the consciences of men who have dismissed 
 the right of private judgment. 
 
 There has been a like difference of opinion respecting 
 the office of extreme unction. Some hold that the appli- 
 cation of oil in the article of death, attended by the 
 prayers of the administrator, secured only the remission 
 of venial sins. Others have maintained as earnestly 
 that the sacrament avails in case of mortal transgres- 
 sions. Roman theologians have diflPered as to the 
 authority on which the so-called sacrament rests. 
 Some say it was instituted by our Lord, others refer 
 it to apostolic custom, and another class accept it only 
 as a vague intimation of the early Fathers, whilst still 
 another class insist that the first four centuries fail to 
 furnish any proof of this institution. It remained for 
 the Council of Trent to exalt a disputed tradition to 
 the dignity of an article of faith, adding the sanction 
 of anathemas that enforced acquiescence. 
 
 In respect to image-ioorship there existed variant be- 
 liefs. Whether images were to be simply an aid to 
 worship, suggestions of spiritual truth, a stairway by 
 which souls went up to the holy hill, or whether they 
 were themselves to be the object of worship, was not 
 settled until the second Council of Nice made a deliver- 
 ance which favored that gross idolatry which late coun- 
 cils modified, and then restored. 
 
 The celibacy of the clergy has been urged as a divine 
 institution, but many accept it on human authority 
 alone and consequently subject to modification or repeal. 
 There is a uniformity in theory which has prevailed in 
 
BOMANISM: ITS PRESENT STATUS. 127 
 
 the later centuries, aud the celibacy of the pricstliood is 
 urged as a meaus of securing greater h)yalty to ilm 
 Church and devotion to her sovereign Head. 
 
 Thus far we have had a view of the absence of unity 
 of belief respecting what may be termed the externals 
 of religion. This want of uniformity has also existed 
 in connection with fundamental truth. Arianism ha^ 
 found a home in the Roman Church. The doctrine of 
 justification has been variously interpreted. Sanctifica- 
 tion has assumed protean shapes. The teachings of the 
 Church respecting original sin, regeneration, the nature 
 and office of faith and other doctrines have become as 
 unreliable as the Epistles of St. Ignatius by reason of 
 the radical changes which have occurred. 
 
 The unity of the Roman Church, then, is disproved. 
 Real unity as respects the great, fundamental doctrines 
 of revelation, with liberty as to things which are non- 
 essential, is found in the Protestant Church only. From 
 the Reformation until now no branch of the Reformed 
 Church has called in question a single doctrine which 
 is related to the salvation of men. The inspiration 
 and authority of the Scriptures, the Godhead of Jesus 
 Christ, the necessity and sufficiency of his death as an 
 atonement for sin, justification by his righteousness 
 appropriated by faith, the personality and work of the 
 Holy Spirit, the necessity of personal holiness, the 
 resurrection of the dead, a general judgment and future 
 retribution, — are facts which are accepted and believed 
 by Reformed Christians of every name. Underneath 
 the superficial lines which divide the communion of tlie 
 Protestant Church— many of which are national only, 
 some of which have respect simply to forms of govern 
 
428 BOMANISM A]>D THE REFORMERS. 
 
 meut or modes of worship — lies the great substratum 
 of saving truth, one and indivisible, on which all Prot- 
 estants stand, declaring their loyalty to Christ and to 
 the holy faith oiice delivered to the saints. In respect 
 to unity in the essentials of religion Protestantism clear- 
 ly holds the vantage-ground. 
 
 Even when error in the Komish Church crystalized 
 in formulas supported by the most solemn sanctions, 
 there existed either an external harmony only or the 
 unity of death. Historically considered, apostolic suc- 
 cession, doctrinal unity and papal infallibility are 
 myths, an affront to truth and an offence to human 
 understanding. 
 
 "^ Roman Catholicism is a rebaptized paganism. In its 
 best features it is a revival of philosophies which pre- 
 vailed before Christ outside the Hebrew Church, and a 
 perversion of the Scriptures which, to a large extent, 
 practically denies what God affirms, and by a way 
 which seems right to blinded souls conducts them to 
 perdition. 
 
 ' — ' An intelligent author, conversant with the religions 
 of China and India, has called attention to the simi- 
 larity between Romanism and Buddhism : ^' Both have 
 a supreme and infallible head ; the celibacy of the priest- 
 hood ; monasteries and nunneries ; prayers in an unknown 
 tongue; prayers to saints and intercessors; also prayers 
 for the dead ; repetition of prayers with the use of the 
 rosary ; works of merit and supererogation ; self-im- 
 posed austerities and bodily inflictions ; a formal daily 
 service, consisting of chants, burning of candles, sprink- 
 ling of holy water, bowings, prostrations, marchings 
 and counter-marchings. Both have also fast-days and 
 
 I 
 
ROMANISM: ITS PRESENT STATUS. 429 
 
 feast-days, religious processions, images and pictures of 
 fabulous legends, and revere and worship relics, real 
 and pretended." * 
 
 The corruption of the priesthood and the moral 
 degradation of the people in papal countries are well 
 known. Where the papacy is least restrained by Prot- 
 estantism its unhappy influence is most felt. In Spain, 
 Mexico and Brazil the Roman priests are the most prof- 
 ligate of men. Many of them are gamblers, drunkards, 
 adulterers and sodomites. They are permitted to cele- 
 brate the mass, receive confession and perform other 
 functions of their office on the assumption that per- 
 sonal immorality does not vitiate the ordinances they 
 administer. In Italy, since the unification of the king- 
 dom under Victor Emmanuel, the priests are liable to 
 the punishment inflicted on common criminals, and 
 there is a measure of outward decency unknown under 
 the old regime. And yet the people who worship at 
 the altars of the great churches of Rome, Naples, Flor- 
 ence, Milan and Venice, and in the rude chapels on the 
 Campagna and along the slopes of the Apennines and 
 the Alps, have little or no confidence in the moral integ- 
 rity of those who are believed to bear the vessels of the 
 Lord. This corruption extends to nuns, monks and all 
 the orders of the Romish hierarchy. The impurity of 
 Cardinal Antonelli was not questioned in Rome, and yet 
 he stood hard by the papal throne, and uttered many 
 pious platitudes concerning the "Holy Gospel" and 
 "my lord the pope.'' In the college of cardinals he 
 was not an exception, nor is the succession broken. 
 
 In Roman Catholic countries we find a sad illustra- 
 * D*-. Nevius in his China ami the Chinese. 
 
430 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 tiou of the divinely-enunciated principle, "A corrupt 
 tree brings forth corrupt fruit/' Every form of vice 
 exists and the worst crimes prevail. There is little 
 morality found in Rome, the seat of the Holy See. 
 What Machiavelli, a Romanist, said in his day, might 
 be repeated now : ^^ We Italians are indebted princi- 
 pally to the Church and the priests for having become 
 impure and immoral." Murders are frequent in Rome, 
 and the yellow Tiber with its lines of blood tells the 
 story. Even Pius IX. admitted " the great increase of 
 those who openly dare to blaspheme the name of God 
 and are known to live in concubinage — nay, even in 
 incest." Vice and crime are not excluded from any 
 land, but are far more jirevalent in those dominated by 
 the Romish Church. Reliable statistics refer seventy 
 per cent, of the crimes in Protestant countries to the 
 Roman Catholic population. Romish priests solicit the 
 chaplaincy of jails and penitentiaries and reformatories 
 on the ground that the majority of the inmates are 
 Roman Catholics. It may be claimed that the con- 
 fessional restrains crime. The evidence does not appear. 
 Its influence seems to be directly the opposite. The 
 priest grants absolution for sin, and so encourages its 
 repetition. 
 
 The superstitions of the Roman Catholic Church of 
 the present are well known. Miracles are attributed to 
 departed saints. Altars are festooned with representa- 
 tions of limbs restored, of incurable diseases cured and. 
 of souls released from purgatory through the interpo- 
 sition of these canonized worthies. The chain of St. 
 Peter in the church of San Pietro de Vinculo in Rome 
 is an object of superstitious worship, and physical con- 
 
ROMANISM: ITS PRESENT STATUS 431 
 
 tact with it secures both physical aiul spii'itual Ix'iicfit.s. 
 Like efficacy attaches to tlie wood of the true cross, to 
 the nails which penetrated the hands and feet of our 
 Lord and the thorns which piei-ced his brow. Tlie 
 number of these sacred relics is sufficient to supply tin* 
 world. They may be found in nearly all Ainorican 
 cathedrals, and obscure chapels are honored witli tlie 
 bones of saints long since departed. In Lower Canada 
 reputed miracles are wrought through the agency of 
 these remains, and the most aggravated diseases have 
 been healed in chuTches along the St. Lawrence dedi- 
 cated to some pious nun or exceptionally godly monk 
 who long ago passed through purgatory on the way 
 to heaven. 
 
 The opposition to the common-school system of the 
 United States is logical, yet it is inconsistent. At one 
 time it is objected that our scliools are purely secular, 
 and Rome would cultivate the moral nature of the 
 young. Again complaint is made whenever the Bil)]e 
 is used, since the reading of it sunders the ties which 
 bind Roman Catholic children to their mother-Church. 
 A remarkable admission ! Romanism seeks an appro- 
 priation of the public-school funds for the purposes of 
 education in the interests of the Church, and resorts to 
 every available artifice to attract the children of Prot- 
 estant families to her schools; and through this agency 
 has succeeded in perverting many to her comnui- 
 niou. Cardinal Antonelli said, "It were better the 
 children should grow up in ignorance than be educated 
 in such a system of schools as prevails in New Eng- 
 land." Pope Pius IX., in an encyclical letter issued 
 December 8, 1864, insisted that the education of the 
 
432 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 young should be under the direction and conduct of the 
 Romish Church, exempt from the control of the state 
 and independent of the opinion of the age, with power 
 to exercise discipline, determine the course of study and 
 select teachers in all public schools. The result would 
 be instruction in Romanism, and ignorance respecting 
 the general subjects taught under the existing system. 
 
 The illiteracy in Roman Catholic countries is admit- 
 ted by the highest authorities in the Church. Where 
 schools have existed they have given almost exclusive 
 attention to the catechism and religious ceremonies of the 
 Church, and imparted only a superficial knowledge of the 
 rudiments of education. In Italy seventy-three per cent, 
 of the people can neither read nor write ; in Spain, sev- 
 enty-five per cent. ; in Mexico, ninety -three per cent. ; 
 and in Portugal the percentage is larger. 
 
 When New Granada adopted a constitution making 
 provision for a system of popular education, Pope 
 Pius IX. declared this action null and void, condem- 
 ning the principle on which it was based. In Sardinia 
 the celebrated Sicardi laws protected "the right of all 
 classes to the benefit of the schools and universities, 
 without regard to sect or party," and the pontiff pro- 
 nounced anathemas upon the government and people 
 who had the temerity to enact and uphold a law sub- 
 versive of the interests of the Church. 
 
 Ignorance and poverty are associated. Mendicancy 
 prevails in all Roman Catholic countries. It is com- 
 paratively unknown in Protestant lauds, and in the 
 latter extreme poverty is largely confined to adherents 
 of the papal Church. The line is unmistakably clear 
 which in this regard separates European countries whic^i 
 
ROMANISM: ITS PRESKNT STATUS. 48.S 
 
 are Roman Catholic from those which are Protestant. 
 Compare Italy with Switzerland, Spain with ITolhm<l, 
 France with England, and Southern Ireland with North- 
 ern Ireland, and the contrast is great. The rehitions of 
 cause and effect are apparent. 
 
 The Romish Church of the present maintains its early 
 animus, and holds with an unyielding tenacity every 
 principle that has supported her govermnent and pre- 
 cluded religious freedom. Ultramontanism insists upon 
 the supremacy of the pope with all the energy of the 
 Dark Ages. The errors incorporated into the creeds 
 of Romanism in the times of Gregory VII. and Pius 
 IV. continue until the present, and the people are re- 
 quired to believe them. 
 
 Romanism retains its original position with regard 
 to the right of private judgment. Protestantism holds 
 that the word of God is the rule of faith. It adduces 
 the evidence of the divine origin of the Scriptures, and 
 submits this evidence to the scrutiny of private judg- 
 ment. The Bible being accepted as the infallible word 
 of God, Protestantism, comparing scripture with script- 
 ure, pursuing its investigations under the guidance of 
 the Holy Spirit, formulates its doctrinal beliefs and 
 ethical conclusions in an intelligent, logical system ; 
 then submits this result also to the examination of 
 private judgment. 
 
 The first premise having been admitted — namely, 
 that the Bible is a revelation from God— Protestantism 
 insists that all its doctrinal statements shall be brouglit 
 to the test of the Scriptures, and maintains that it is the 
 office of private judgment to inquire whether the form- 
 ulated creed is in harmony with the divine word. If it 
 
434 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 is in accord with the Scriptures, it is to be believed ; if 
 it is uot, it is to be rejected. 
 
 Romanism forbids this exercise of judgment. What- 
 ever the Church teaches is to be implicitly believed^ 
 though it be contrary to reason and the evidence of any 
 one or all of the senses. Transubstantiation is main- 
 tained on this basis: on any other it would fall. A 
 candidate for admission to holy orders is required to 
 submit his judgment to the Church. The recusant is 
 rejected. Instances might be cited of persons who were 
 refused admission to the Romish priesthood because they 
 would not accept statements which were contradicted by 
 their natural senses, such as that red was blue, that three 
 was two and a piece of marble was matured fruit. The 
 test was employed to determine the question of subjec- 
 tion to the authority of the Church. 
 
 The Vatican hurls anathemas against all who dare to 
 think and decide for themselv^es. It yokes the human 
 judgment to the papal car, and converts man into a 
 mere machine to be manipulated by that hierarchy 
 which has vaulted into the throne of supreme intelli- 
 gence. This claim of the Romish Church to supremacy 
 over the intellectual powers of men as related to relig- 
 ious beliefs, suspending eternal salvation on subjection 
 to her dogmatism, is one of the most blasphemous and 
 dreadful assumptions of power ever made by fallen 
 humanity. It never has been the office of the Church 
 to create truth; truth is the birth-chamber of the 
 Church. The true Church teaches and conserves the 
 truth. Her attitude toward the word of God is ever 
 that of the Holy Spirit in his relations to the other per- 
 sons of the Trinity and to ourselves in the economy of 
 
ROMANISM: ITS PRESENT STATUS. 4:]5 
 
 redemption, of whom Christ said, '^ Whatsoever he shall 
 hear, that shall he also speak." Melanchthon well said, 
 " Let us hear the Church teaching and admonishing, but 
 let us not regulate our faith by the authority of the 
 Church. The Church has no right to make articles of 
 faith; she can only teach and admonish.'^ The papacy 
 has decided otherwise, and has never surrendered its 
 position. 
 
 The Church of Rome resists all religious toleration in 
 this age as it resisted it in the time of Luther. One of 
 the leading organs of Romanism makes the statement 
 that "the Catholic who says the Church is not intoler- 
 ant belies the sacred spouse of Christ. The Christian 
 who proposes to be tolerant himself is dishonest or ill- 
 informed, or both." A Synojms of Moral Theology pre- 
 pared for Romish seminaries and students of theology 
 repeats in the nineteenth century the judgment of the 
 sixteenth, that "heretics are rightly punished with 
 death," and reaches the conclusion by the old process 
 of reasoning — viz. that if forgers of money are pun- 
 ishable, so are they who forge the faith, and only death 
 is an adequate infliction for the latter. 
 
 The bishop of Minorca in 1876 issued a circular 
 which he required all the clergy in his diocese to read 
 from their pulpits on three consecutive Sundays, and 
 commanded them to enforce its injunctions. In this re- 
 markable missive he said : " We renew and reiterate 
 our sentence of the highest order of excommunication 
 against heretics of every sort, kind and description, 
 against their pupils or adopted children, against their 
 fathers, mothers, preceptors and all who sit at meat 
 with them. We fully excomnumicate all and every 
 
436 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 person or persons who dare to let a liouse to a heretic 
 or Protestant for school or services, and every one who 
 gives money or makes a loan or leaves a legacy to such 
 persons; we excommunicate every one who lives on 
 terms of friendship with such heretics, and every one 
 who dares to say or write one word in their defence." 
 This circular, written and published in the last quar- 
 ter of the nineteenth century, almost within sight of St. 
 Peter's and the Vatican, at least tacitly approved by the 
 pope, finds its echo in expressions of like intolerance in 
 the New World, as when the Shepherd of the Valley 
 said : " If the Catholics ever gain the ascendency here, 
 as they certainly will, religious freedom is at an end." 
 And the Western Watchman in 1888 tells us what the 
 papacy would do with Protestantism if it had the 
 power : "• We would impale it and hang it up for crows' 
 nests. We would tear it with pinchers and fire it with 
 hot irons. We would fill it with molten lead and sink 
 it in hell-fire a hundred fathoms deep." Such intem- 
 perate expressions may be disapproved by many Roman- 
 ists, yet they represent the prevailing spirit and intent 
 of E-oman Catholicism, and one of the most conserva- 
 tive journals in America has truthfully said : " Popery 
 has never done aught but repeat itself in the world. It 
 hobnobs with atheism and infidelity, and repeats and 
 cheers their blasphemies because they are leveled at 
 Protestantism." 
 
 Pope Le«) XIII. in an encyclical letter published in 
 1885 exhorted "all Catholics who would devote careful 
 attention to public manners to take a part in all muni- 
 cipal affairs and elections, and to further the principles 
 of the Church in all public services, meetings and gath- 
 
ROMANISM: ITS PRESENT STATUS. 4;i7 
 
 erings. All Catholics must make themselves felt as 
 active elements in daily political life in the countries 
 where they live. They must penetrate wlierevcr pos- 
 sible into the administration of civil affairs, must con- 
 stantly exert the utmost vigilance and energy to pievent 
 the usage of liberty from going beyond the limits fixed 
 by God's law. All Catholics should do all in their 
 power to cause the constitutions of States and legisla- 
 tion to be moulded to the principles of the true Churcli. 
 All Catholic writers and journalists should never lose, 
 for an instant, from view the above principles." 
 
 There is herein a mixture of truth and error. Chris- 
 tians ought to make their influence felt at the sources of 
 civil power and resist the enthronement of wickedness. 
 But these efforts are misdirected and may result in civil 
 and religious disaster when exerted in the interests of 
 the Church which opposes the right of private judg- 
 ment, freedom of conscience and liberty of worship, 
 and holds that the pope and priests by divine right are 
 entitled to control our temporal affairs and are them- 
 selves amenable only to ecclesiastical courts. Roman- 
 ism to-day dominates the political life of the chief cities 
 of America, and holds the balance of power in the re- 
 public of the West— the greatest religio-political organi- 
 zation in the world. 
 
 The present numerical strength and influence of 
 Romanism in i\\Q countries where it has long existed 
 may properly claim our attention. With the most com- 
 plete organization known to history the Roman Cath- 
 olic Church holds the religious supremacy in Italy, 
 France, Spain, Portugal, Belgium and the Austrian 
 empire^ Lower Canada, Mexico, Central America, Bra- 
 
438 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 zil and Africa, in the West Indies, Sardinia and 
 Malta; in Polynesia, Ceylon and the Asiatic Archi- 
 pelago ; maintaining also a strong position in Ger- 
 many, S(;andinavia, Russia, Switzerland, the Nether- 
 lands, Greece, the Ottoman empire, Great Britain and 
 the United States, and multiplying missions in India, 
 China and Japan ; entering nearly all the large cities 
 of the world ; seeking political ascendency ; establishing 
 churches, schools and hospitals, monasteries and nun- 
 neries, in almost every land ; advertising its presence 
 and exaggerating its numerical strength by means of the 
 peculiar dress of its priesthood and Sisters of Mercy 
 found on every street, in all public conveyances, and 
 made prominent on great national occasions ; entering 
 into the privacy of domestic life through a system 
 of espionage unparalleled in the world, and moulding 
 the beliefs of children through servants who touch life 
 at its fountain-head — ^the largest religious body of the 
 age, equaling the Protestants, Greek, Armenian and 
 Abyssinian churches combined. Evidently, in view 
 of the extension of Komanism, there is a necessity 
 for continued watchfulness and unremitting effort, in 
 dependence upon God, in the interests of evangelical 
 religion and Bible morality as represented by the 
 Reformed Church. 
 
 But there is another aspect of the subject which 
 deserves mention. In Italy the unity of the kingdom 
 has been established by the destruction of the temporal 
 power of the pope. Some of the adherents of the 
 papacy cheerfully accepted this result, largely influenced 
 by political considerations, and in some instances by the 
 belief that the spirituality of the Church would be ad- 
 
ROMANISM: ITS PRESENT STATUS 4;jIJ 
 
 vanced by this elimination of temporal prerogatives. 
 But Pope Pius IX. very naturally condemned tlii.< 
 action of the state, and anathematized Victor Emman- 
 uel and all who had contributed to the suppression of 
 his temporal dominion. Leo XIII., whose attitude had 
 been accounted more liberal, persisted in asserting the 
 right of the vicar of Christ to control civil affairs, and 
 in an encyclical letter insists upon the exercise of tliis 
 power as essential to the highest interests of the Church. 
 In all this the hierarchy is consistent with its claim to 
 supremacy in Church and State. It may be constrained 
 to yield to the opposition of men and seclude itself in 
 the pontifical palace, but its purpose is unchanged, and 
 its hope of the ultimate recovery of temporal power re- 
 lieves the gloom of temporary humiliation. 
 
 On the continent of Europe, Romanism is the domi- 
 nating religion, yet it is in its decadence and as a gov- 
 ernment its power has materially declined. The "Old- 
 Catholic " movement, which was adverse to the suprem- 
 acy of the pope, has made but little advance, but it was, 
 and continues to be, a protest against the dogma of papal 
 infallibility and the centralization of absolute power in 
 the Roman pontiff, that has brought at least a tremor 
 to the papal throne. In Italy the resistance to church ly 
 power is more decided than in any otlier European coun- 
 try, prompted as it is by the law of self-preservation. 
 It is maintained by growing numbers in all classes, and 
 reaches from the Apennines to the adjacent seas. In 
 Austria the civil government has declared its independ- 
 ence of papal control, and has given wide scope to 
 religious freedom and favors that popular education 
 which has always been inimical to papal institutions. 
 
 29 
 
440 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 In France the ancient domination of the pope is })ioba- 
 bly at an end. The people retain the religion of Rome, 
 but the papal hierarchy has lost its power. The prin- 
 ciples of religious toleration are so fully accepted that 
 Protestant churches cluster around the Madeleine and 
 Notre Dame in Paris, and have to some extent evangel- 
 ized, at least outwardly, the priesthood of that potential 
 city. Even in Spain there have been some pulsations 
 of opposition to Rome. During the provisional regency 
 of Espartero the pope's authority was treated with con- 
 tempt. At a later period Catalonia especially endeav- 
 ored to cast oflP the Roman yoke, and a long-established 
 idolatry was thrust, at least temporarily, from its throne. 
 And although Romanism has recovered much of its 
 former power since the suppression of the republic, 
 still the papal hierarchy has lost its ancient prestige, 
 and it may not be many years until the voice of the 
 evangel, now muffled, may be distinctly heard on the 
 plateaus and in the valleys of that summer-land, even 
 from the Escorial on the slope of the Guaderramas in 
 the north to the Alhambra which overlooks the south- 
 ern sea. In Belgium, where Roman Catholicism had 
 long held undisputed sway, a system of public instruc- 
 tion has been established which has already relaxed the 
 power of the Church, and may ultimately terminate 
 papal rule in that prosperous kingdom. The great 
 empire of Russia maintains its opposition to Rome, 
 and Greek patriarchates distribute the ecclesiastical 
 power which Romanism centralizes in the pope, whilst 
 the Church is unified in the semi-sacerdotal headship 
 of the czar, who crowns himself in the cathedral church 
 of the Kremlin, and from the palace by the Neva looks 
 
ROMANISM: ITS PRESENT STATUS. \ 1 1 
 
 diisdainfully out on papal Europe throiigli the window 
 opened by Peter the Great. 
 
 In England the papacy has made some advance (hir- 
 ing the latter part of the nineteenth century: Puseyism 
 stands near the border-line between Protestantism and 
 Romanism, with its face toward the latter, and hiu* 
 facilitated the passage from Anglican rationalism to 
 the communion of Rome. Other influences have 
 favored the papacy on the British Isles, and yet the 
 numerical strength of the Roman Catholic Church is 
 not increased. 
 
 The power of the papacy evidently waning in 
 Europe, Romanism now disputes the supremacy of 
 Protestantism in the empire of the West and persist- 
 ently urges its way to seats of power. Religious 
 toleration favors this aggressive movement. Tlien, 
 too, the multitudes Avho come to us from Roman 
 Catholic Europe bring their devotion to tlie Churcli 
 with them, and their influence fills a widening si)here. 
 A century ago the Roman Catholics of this country 
 numbered only twenty-five thousand, or less than a 
 hundredth part of our population, but they now con- 
 stitute nearly the one-fifth, and are continually receiving 
 large accessions from the Old World. They are rapidly 
 multiplying their church-edifices, monasteries, and paro- 
 chial and theological schools. They establish tliemselves 
 in the great centres of population in the East and are the 
 religious pioneers of the A\^est. They subsidize Miiini- 
 cipal power and State legislation, and hope to make 
 these the stepping-stones to national supremacy. The 
 annexation of the Canadas and of Mexico, countries 
 dominated by Romanism, might soon change the whole 
 
442 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 complexion of our civil and religious institutions and 
 imperil the nation. If Protestantism, in the exercise 
 of a mistaken charity, should throw its moral support 
 on the side of Romanism, ignoring the history of all 
 preceding ages, and should recognize the Roman 
 Church as a helpful member of the true body of 
 Christ, to whom it is the duty of all Christians to 
 bid a hearty God-speed, it would not be long until the 
 principles of the Reformation would become obsolete 
 and the shadow would go far back on the dial of the 
 world's progress. 
 
 But our fears on these grounds are relieved by other 
 well-established facts. Admitting the growth of the 
 Roman Catholic Church, which is less than her statis- 
 ticians claim, yet the growth of Protestantism is pro- 
 portionately greater. Lutheranism is taking long 
 strides ; Presbyterianism is urging her way to the 
 front; Methodism is rapidly growing in power; the 
 several branches of the Baptist Church are greatly 
 multiplying their numbers and strength. Not all 
 Romanists who come hither from Europe remain in 
 communion with their mother-Church. Released from 
 the superstitions that had environed them in Roman 
 Catholic countries, and brought in contact with our 
 largely pre-dominating Protestantism, many of them 
 renounce their corrupt religion and identify themselves 
 with Protestant churches. 
 
 Ireland laments this defection from the faith. The 
 Roman Catholic bishop of Kildare and Leighton says 
 that of every ten Roman Catholics who leave their 
 native land, seven are lost. They are lost to the Rom- 
 ish Church, some of them to find a purer religion, some 
 
ROMANISM: ITS PRESENT STATUS 443 
 
 to substitute infidelity for beliefs that never gave llieni 
 spiritual rest. 
 
 It has been stated by high papal authority, the iv- 
 raark covering the period the hierarchy has existed in 
 the United States, that the Romish Church has lost in 
 numbers far more than it has gained; and this is said in 
 full view of the fact that Romanism has achieved decid- 
 ed results among the freedmen of the South and has 
 welcomed perverts from high social circles in all our 
 chief cities. 
 
 In the great monarchy of Brazil, Protestantism is 
 advancing and Romanism is losing its power. There 
 are pencilings of light along the religious horizon which 
 betoken a better day. The steamers which ply on the 
 Amazon carry the germs of gospel truth into the far 
 interior; the secular press publishes the evangel along 
 the western coast; commerce with Protestant nations 
 aids the advance of pure religion. 
 
 In Mexico, Protestant missions are greatly relaxing 
 the grasp of superstition. The gospel is preached in 
 the old capital of the Aztecs, and Reformed churches 
 are planted on paths once irrigated with human blood. 
 The lights kindled in the darkness do not simply make 
 the gloom more apparent, but gradually extend the in- 
 fluence of the truth and reveal the way to God. 
 
 Yet we recognize in the Church of Rome the possi- 
 bilities of an extended longevity. Confucianism and 
 Buddhism are old, and Mohammedanism is becoming 
 hoary with age. Romanism possesses a like vitality. 
 Through change, decay and dissolution it holds on its 
 way. The Bourbons have lost their thrones, the Neth- 
 erlands and France and Spain have witnessed revolu- 
 
444 ROMANISM AND THE REFORMERS. 
 
 tions that destroyed palaces, overturned dynasties and 
 ploughed empires as with earthquake. But the pope, 
 though robbed of his temporal crown, still reigns tlie 
 mightiest potenate known to these latter ages, and old 
 superstitions, lingering in their seats, constrain multi- 
 tudes of great and small to do reverence to the Holy 
 Father, the vicar of Christ, the supreme head of the 
 visible Church, whose blessing they crave, whose an- 
 athema they dread. The Vatican looks over on the 
 Palatine Hill covered with the ruins of the Augustan 
 age, claiming the centuries for its own and professing 
 to descry its world-wide triumph from afar. Popery 
 consecrates the statue of a pagan divinity, sets it in the 
 aisle of St. Peter's church as an object of worship, and 
 thinks to symbolize in that enduring bronze the per- 
 petuity of its dominion. 
 
 But the wrinkles of decay are on its brow and the 
 tremor of age is in its steps. And even if it should live, 
 shuffling its way down tlie centuries, until the loadstars 
 of eternity shall rise above the hills, yet its overthrow, 
 final and complete, is as certain as the word of Him 
 who sits on the circle of the earth and inhabits eternity 
 — a pledge of the destruction of this great Babylon in 
 the brightness of our Lord's appearing. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 Esthetics of religion, their influ- 
 ence, 387. 
 
 Aleandor humiliated at Worms, 184. 
 
 Antonelli, his character, 429 ; opposes 
 popular education, 431. 
 
 Aristotle, his philosophy, 147. 
 
 Articles, the Six, repealed, 332. 
 
 Augsburg Diet, 205 ; Confession read 
 at, 208 ; Reformation gains ground 
 at, 209 ; the Confession modified by 
 Melanchthon, 208. 
 
 Austria refuses papal control, 439. 
 
 Beaton, Archbishop, assassinated, 
 373. 
 
 Belgium favors popular education, 
 440. 
 
 Bergenhagen preaches at Luther's 
 funeral, 211. 
 
 Berquin executed, 265. 
 
 Bible, the completeness of, denied by 
 Rome, 19 ; withheld from laity, 
 19; exceptional use of, 19; Wyc- 
 lif 's translation, 51 ; Luther's, 
 194; published, 200; translation 
 secured by Cranmer, 321 ; Maza- 
 rine issued, 74. 
 
 Bilney, Thomas, conversion of, 312. 
 
 Boleyn, Anne, married to Henry 
 Vill., 318; her character, 326; 
 her fate, 327. 
 
 Bothwell murders Darnley, 400; 
 marries Queen Mary, 400. 
 
 Bradford, John, executed, 344. 
 
 Buddhism compared with Roman- 
 ism, 428. 
 
 Calvin, John, born at Noyon, 258; 
 parentage, 258 ; in college at 
 Paris, 258; Montaigu College, 
 259 ; a thoughtful student, 260 ; 
 conversations with Olivetan, 260 ; 
 witnesses execution of heretical 
 priest, 262 ; dismisses all thought 
 
 of priesthood, 262 ; goes to Or- 
 leans as student of, law, 262; in- 
 fluenced by Piere I'Etoile, 263 ; by 
 Wolmar, 263 ; scholarship at twen- 
 ty-two, 263 ; his father's death, 
 264; questions of duty, 266; 
 preaches, 266 ; gives prominence 
 to justice and sovereignty of God, 
 267 ; leaves Paris, 269 ; arrives at 
 Angouleme, 269 ; habits of study, 
 269 ; preaches the gospel. 270 ; goes 
 to Nerac, 270 ; meets Le F^vre, 
 270; goes with Du Fillet to Poic- 
 tiers, 271 ; denounces transub- 
 stantiation, 271, 289; views of 
 Lord's Supper, 272 ; travels in 
 France, preaching, 273; meets 
 Servetus at Paris, 273 ; goes to 
 Strassburg, 274 : personal appear- 
 ance, 280; family symbol, 280; 
 meets Erasmus, 280 ; arrives at 
 Basle, 281 ; prepares the Inati- 
 tiite-s, 281 ; exalts oflice of Holy 
 Spirit, 284; insists on personal 
 holiness, 285: his book con- 
 demned by French Parliament, 
 286 ; goes "to Aosta, 286 ; thence 
 to Geneva, 286 ; advocates fre- 
 quent observance of Lord's Sup- 
 per, 289; condemns festivals and 
 holidays, 290; approves modified 
 subordination of Church to StaJe, 
 290 ; driven by persecution to 
 Strassburg, 291 ; lectures on the- 
 ology and founds church at Strass- 
 burg, 291 ; revises InsiituteM, 291 : 
 his marriage, 292; returns to Ge- 
 neva, 293 ; welcomes John Knox 
 to Geneva, 294 ; his varieil labors, 
 295; habits of study, 295; nat- 
 ural temperament, 296; relations 
 to Servetus, 296: asks c<tmmuta- 
 tion of Servetiis's sentence. 299; 
 urges Christian union, 301; last 
 447 
 
us 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 visit to council-house, 302 ; writes 
 Farel, 302; is visited by Farel, 
 303; his sufferings and death, 303 ; 
 burial, 304; character as described 
 by friends and enemies, 304; how 
 estimated by Pius IV., 305. 
 
 Calvinism, leading principles of, 283. 
 
 Calixtines, the, 134. 
 
 Carlstadt at Leipsic, 172 ; impru- 
 dent zeal, 195. 
 
 Catharine de Medici as connected 
 with the massacre on St. Barthol- 
 omew's Day, 28. 
 
 Carlyle, Thomas, his estimate of 
 Knox, 408, 409. 
 
 Catalonia resists Romish rule, 440. 
 
 Cessarini, Cardinal, as a military 
 general, 136 ; enters Bohemia, 
 136; repulsed, 136. 
 
 Charles V. summons Luther to 
 Worms, 178; crowned by Pope 
 Clement, 206; at Diet of Augs- 
 burg, 207. 
 
 Christianity, early, 11 : its successes, 
 11 ; its polity favorable to growth, 
 11 ; errors introduced into, 12; per- 
 secutions, 12 ; influenced by Con- 
 stantine's professed conversion, 
 13; power of priesthood under 
 Constantine, 14; sensuous wor- 
 ship, 14; growth of mona*ticism, 
 15 ; episcopacy advocated by Cyp- 
 rian, 15: Peter's pontificate, 17; 
 temporal power corrupts, 17 ; con- 
 dition of, at birth of Wyclif, 32. 
 
 Church of Scotland, first meeting of 
 General Assembly of, 389 ; holds 
 to parity of ministry, 390 ; makes 
 second Sabbath service expository, 
 390: uses Bible in schools, 391. 
 
 Clementine Homilies assert the pon- 
 tificate of Peter, 17. 
 
 Constance, Jerome of Prague exe- 
 cuted at, 114; city of, described, 
 121; council at, 122; Huss exe- 
 cuted at, 133. 
 
 Constantine, professed conversion. 
 13. 
 
 Council at Constance, 122; impres- 
 sive opening of, 124 : Pope John's 
 sermon at, 125 ; deposed Pope 
 John, 129 ; summoned Huss, 
 131 ; condemned and executed 
 Huss, 132; executed Jerome of 
 Prague, 114. 
 
 Council at Pisa, object, 112; pon- 
 
 tificate of Benedict and Gregory 
 considered, 112; Huss declared a 
 heresiarch, 113; Prague placed 
 under interdict, 113. 
 
 Common Prayer-Book prepared by 
 Cranmer and adopted, 332. 
 
 Common schools opposed by Rome, 
 431. 
 
 Coverdale, Miles, assists Tyndale to 
 translate Bible, 321. 
 
 Crime at Rome, 430 ; in papal coun- 
 tries, 430. 
 
 Cranmer, Thomas, his birth, 314; at 
 Cambridge, 314 ; made archbishop 
 of Canterbury, 319 : holds to tran- 
 substantiation, 320 ; his timidity, 
 320 ; D'Aubigne's estimate of, 321 ; 
 secures translation of Bible, 321 ; 
 opposes Six Articles of Henry 
 VIII., 325 ; imprisoned by Mary, 
 
 346 ; recants, 347 ; his penitence, 
 
 347 ; sentenced to death, 347 : his 
 courage and renewed confession, 
 
 348 ; address to people, 347 ; burned 
 at Oxford, 349 ; attainments and 
 character, 350, 351 ; his death gave 
 new impetus to Reformation, 352 ; 
 views of episcopacy, 357. 
 
 Darxley professes himself a pa- 
 pist, 399; murdered, 400. 
 
 Dodwell, Henry, on apostolic suc- 
 cession, 419. 
 
 EcK at Leipsic disputation, 174. 
 
 Eek, John ab, at AA'orms, 181. 
 
 Education, popular, Luther's rela- 
 tions to, 203; opposed by Rome, 
 431 : in New Grenada, 432 ; in 
 Sardinia, 432; advance in Aus- 
 tria, 439 ; in Belgium, 440. 
 
 Edward VI. succeeds Henrv VIII., 
 331 ; his regard for the Bible. 331 ; 
 dies, 333; succeeded by Bloody 
 Mary, 333. 
 
 Einsidlen, its abbey said to have 
 been consecrated by angels, 224; 
 Zwingle called to, 224. 
 
 Eisenach, Luther's home, 149 ; Cotta 
 family, 150. 
 
 Eisleben, place of Luther's birth. 
 149; of his death, 211. 
 
 Elizabeth ascends English throne, 
 356; peace restored, 356; Act of 
 Uniformity in her reign, 356 ; 
 seeks to conciliate Romanists, 357; 
 
INDEX. 
 
 44tJ 
 
 favors imposing ceremonies, 358 ; 
 gives character to English Refor- 
 mation, 358. 
 
 English Reformation, features of, 
 309 ', occupied with real presence, 
 325 ', prefers episcopacy, 326. 
 
 Episcopacy advocated by Cyprian, 
 1 5 ; Cranmer's views of exclusive, 
 326, 357. 
 
 Erasmus opposes indulgences, 161: 
 meets Calvin, 280; in Basle, 310; 
 his New Testament, 310 ; his influ- 
 ence on Thomas Bilney, 311. 
 
 Farel, William, meets Calvin, 287 ; 
 visits Calvin's deathbed, 302. 
 
 Florence, republic of, 84; its short 
 continuance, 85. 
 
 France, condition of Church before 
 Calvin, 257; papal power in, bro- 
 ken, 440, 
 
 Frederick, elector, secures Luther 
 from violence, 186 ; proflTered the 
 Golden Rose, 169 ; death of, 201. 
 
 Geneva as a centre of influence in 
 Calvin's day, 288 ; described, 300 ; 
 its cathedral, 301 ; Calvin's death 
 at, 303. 
 
 Glaris welcomes Zwingle as her 
 priest, 220. 
 
 Golden Rose, emblem of Christ's 
 body, 169 ; proffered by Rome to 
 Elector Frederick, 169; detained 
 at Augsburg, 171. 
 
 Gospel, the, practically nullified by 
 Rome, 27. 
 
 Grey, Lady Jane, claims to the 
 throne urged, 338 ; her learning, 
 339; her piety, 339; reluctantly 
 accepts crown, 339 ; displaced by 
 Mary, 340 ; executed, 340. 
 
 Hamilton, proto-martyr of Scotch 
 Reformation, 368 ; abbot of Feme, 
 368; meets Luther, 369; impris- 
 oned, 370 ; burned at St. Andrews, 
 370. 
 
 Henry VIIL, his Defence of the Sev- 
 en Sacraments ac/ainst Martin Lu- 
 ther, 199 ; for his book receives 
 title of Defender of the Faith, 199 ; 
 excites Luther's indignation, 199 ; 
 questions his marriage with Cath- 
 erine of Arragon, 315; reasons for 
 divorce, 315; breaks with Rome, 
 
 318; marries Anne Boloyn. 318; 
 declared head of Engli.'=h" Church, 
 319; suppresses monasteries, 323 ; 
 executes convent priors, ."^23 ; exe- 
 cutes Bishop Foster ami Sir Thom- 
 as More, 323; secures adoption of 
 Six Articles, 324 : nuirries .Taiio 
 Seymour, 328; then Anne of Cloves, 
 328; divorced from, ;;2S; marries 
 Catherine Howard, whom he be- 
 heads, 328 ; marries Catherine 
 Parr, 329 ; advances Protestant- 
 ism, 329 ; dies, 329 ; his character, 
 329 ; great gifts and attainments, 
 331. 
 
 Hume, his estimate of Henry VIII., 
 330. 
 
 Huss, John, birth, 101 ; at school iu 
 Praehatiz, 102; entered university 
 at Prague, 103; received highest 
 academic honors, 103; rector of 
 university, 103 ; preacher of Beth- 
 lehem church, 104; exceptional 
 power, 104; accepts teachings of 
 Wyclif, 105 ; exposes pretended 
 miracles, 107; complaints against 
 him, 109; Pope Alexander V. is- 
 sues bull against his erroneous 
 teaching, 110; conflfct with papa- 
 cy inaugurated. 111; pronounced 
 a heretic, 115; opposes indul- 
 gences, 116 ; three of his followers 
 beheaded in Prague, 116; contin- 
 ues his work, 117; leaves Prague 
 in sorrow, 122 ; goes to Constance, 
 123 ; Pope John pledged to protect 
 his person, 124; arrested, 126; 
 grave .charges against him, 126; 
 a Realist, 127 ; in.-^ists on giving 
 the cup to the laity, 12S; impris- 
 oned, 129; declares his loyalty to 
 the Church, 130; his acceptance 
 of transubstantiation,130; charges 
 priests with immorality, 131 ; ex- 
 alts the word of God above Church 
 councils, 131; Christ above the 
 pope, 131 ; summoned before the 
 council, 131 ; condemned by coun- 
 cil, and executed, 132. 
 
 Ignatius, silence respecting apostol- 
 ic succession, 420. 
 
 Illiteracy in Romish countries, -132. 
 
 Images, ofiice of, in Romi.<h Church, 
 426; difi"erent opinions concern- 
 ing, 426. 
 
450 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Indulgences, papal, 157, 225. 
 
 Inquisition, the, originated by Greg- 
 ory IX., 28. 
 
 Institutes, Calvin's, 281 ; revised, 291. 
 
 Isabella, queen of Castile, persecutes 
 beretics, 28. 
 
 Italy resists Church power, 439. 
 
 Jerome op Prague, 113; relations 
 to Huss, 113; charged with grave 
 offences, 114 ; his recantation, 114; 
 subsequent heroism and martyr- 
 dom, 114. 
 
 Judgment, private, denied by Ro- 
 mish Church, 27, 433, 434; favor- 
 ed by Protestantism, 433, 434. 
 
 Justification perverted by Romish 
 Church, 148. 
 
 Knox, John, birth of, 364; origin of 
 name, 364 ; parentage, 364 ; at 
 school in Haddington, 364 ; in 
 universit}' at Glasgow, 364; reads 
 early Fathers, 366 ; observes cor- 
 ruptions of Church, 366 ; teaches 
 at St. Andrews. 374 : assistant to 
 John Rough, 374 ; his preaching, 
 374 ; prisoner on French galleys, 
 375; liberaled. 376; declines ben- 
 efice in London, 376 ; offered a 
 bishopric, 377 ; repudiates exclu- 
 sive episcopal ordination, 377 ; 
 complains of illiteracy of clergy, 
 377; the papacy restored, goes to 
 Continent, 378 ; meets Calvin in 
 Geneva, 378 ; labors at Frankfort- 
 on-the-Main, 378; returns to Scot- 
 land, 384: condemns riotous pro- 
 ceedings at Perth, 385 ; forbidden 
 to preach at St. Andrews, 385 : 
 travels through Scotland, preach- 
 ing, 388: first interview with Mary, 
 393 ; second, 397 ; third, 397 ; fourth, 
 397 ; charged with treason, 398 ; 
 stricken with paralysis, 402 : his 
 life sought, 402 ; removes from 
 Edinburgh to St. Andrews, 403; 
 his preaching described, 403 ; con- 
 templates death, 401: returns to 
 Edinburgh, 404 ; mourns massacre 
 of Protestants in Paris, 404 : last 
 interview with his elders, 405 : 
 death, 407, burial, 408; Carlyle's 
 estimate of, 409 ; Froude's, 409. 
 
 Labarum, the, origin of, 13. 
 
 Latimer, conversion of, 312 ; defend- 
 er of truth, 353 ; at Lambeth Pal- 
 ace, 353 ; a vicar in the North, 
 354; prisoner in old Tower, 354; 
 burnt at Oxford, 355 ; triumphant 
 death, 355. 
 
 Lawson, Knox's successor at Edin- 
 burgh, 405. 
 
 Leipsic, disputation at, 172 ; Carl- 
 stadt accepts challenge of Eck, 
 172; Luther appears, 172, 174; 
 opposes Eck's assumptions touch- 
 ing the pope, 174; absolution and 
 indulgences, 175; Luther victor- 
 ious, 175 ; separates himself from 
 Romish Church, 175; anathema- 
 tized. 176. 
 
 Lord's Supper, Zwingle's views of, 
 246 ; frequent observance of, urged 
 by Calvin, 289. 
 
 Luther, Martin, birth of. 149 ; pa- 
 rentage, 149; at Magdeburg 
 school, 149; at Eisenach, 149; 
 in Cotta family, 1 50 ; made doc- 
 tor of philosophy at twenty-two, 
 151 ; interview with John Stau- 
 pitz, 152; ordained priest, 152; 
 religious disquietude, 153; sets 
 out for Rome, 153: disappoint- 
 ment, 154 : experience on Pilate's 
 Staircase, 154; learns fullness of 
 the gospel, 155; returns to Wit- 
 tenberg, 155: made doctor of 
 Holy Scriptures, 1 55 ; resists phil- 
 osophy of Aristotle, 156; opposes 
 Pelagianism, 157; condemns indul- 
 gences, 159; summoned before 
 chapter of Augustine monks at 
 Heidelberg, 162; damnatory bull 
 of Leo X. against him, 165; ties 
 to Rome dissolving. 165 ; disputa- 
 tion with Eck at Leipsic, 175 ; vic- 
 torious, 175; separates himself 
 from Romish Church, 175; ana- 
 thematized, 177 ; burns papal bull 
 at Elster Gate, 177; summoned 
 to Worms, 178: enters AVorms, 
 180 ; appears before Emperor 
 Charles v., 180; imposing assem- 
 blage, 181 ; citation presented, 
 182; Luther's answer, 182; re- 
 fusal to retract opinions ex- 
 pressed in his books, 183 ; de- 
 parture from Worms, 1 So ; letter 
 to the emperor from Freyburg, 
 185; at Ilirschfeldt, 185; at Eise- 
 
INDEX. 
 
 451 
 
 nach, 186; captured and conveyed 
 to Wartburg Castle, 186; in the 
 hands of friends, 186; known as 
 Knight George, 187 ; story of ink- 
 bottle, 194: translation of New 
 Testament, 194; gospel com- 
 ments, 194; hears of Oarlstadt's 
 imprudent zeal, 195; departs for 
 Wittenberg, 195; interview with 
 students at Jena, 196; restores 
 quiet in Wittenberg, 198; his in- 
 dignation excited by Henry's De- 
 fence of Seven Sacraments, 199; 
 translationof New Testament pub- 
 lished, 200, also portions of Old 
 Testament, 200 ; plants churches, 
 201 ; arrests War of Peasants, 
 201 ; mourns de.ath of Frederick, 
 201; abandons life of monk, 202; 
 marries Catherine von Bora, a 
 nun, 202 ; resides in vacated Au- 
 gustinian monastery at Witten- 
 berg, 202; influence of domestic 
 life, 203 ; relations to popular ed- 
 ucation, 203 ; sickness, 203 ; plague 
 in Wittenberg, 204; diet at Spire 
 opposes Reform, and the Refor tri- 
 ers' protest, 204; at Coburg, 205; 
 communicates with Augsburg, 208 ; 
 writes Augsburg Confession, mod- 
 ified by Melanchthon, 208; do- 
 mestic afflictions, 209 ; death an- 
 ticipated, 210 ; leaves Wittenberg 
 for Eisleben, 210 ; dies at Eisleben, 
 211 ; buried in aisle of church at 
 Wittenberg, 212. 
 
 Mair, John, influence of, on John 
 Knox, 365. 
 
 Mariolatry of Romanism, 23. 
 
 Mary the Bloody ascends English 
 throne, 333; inaugurates perse- 
 cution, 341 ; burns John Rogers, 
 343, and John Bradford, 343 ; re- 
 vives Romish religion, 345 ; builds 
 monasteries, 346; her unhappi- 
 ness, 346 ; imprisons Cranmer, 
 346 ; secures his recantation, 347. 
 
 Mary queen of Scots returns to Scot- 
 land, 391 ; a devout Romanist,392 ; 
 deprecates influence of Knox, 392 ; 
 interview with Knox, 393-396; 
 celebrates massacre of French 
 Protestants, 396; second inter- 
 view with Knox, 397 ; third 
 interview, 397; fourth interview, 
 
 397; charges Knox with troiison, 
 398; marries Bothweil, 400; im- 
 prisoned in Lochlcven and esciipcs, 
 400 ; beheaded, 401 ; compiired 
 with Elizabeth, 401. 
 
 Marignan, on battle-field of, many 
 Swiss perish, 223. 
 
 Mazarine Bible issued, 74. 
 
 Melanchthon at Leipsic, 172 ; esti- 
 mate of Diet of Worms, 185; eu- 
 logy on Luther, 211. 
 
 Mexico, Romanism declining in, 443. 
 
 Miltitz sent to conciliate Elector 
 Frederick, 169; interview with 
 Luther, 170; divulges corruptions 
 of Church, 171. 
 
 Milton, John, his estimate of Wy- 
 clif, 55. 
 
 Minorca, bishop of, excommunicates 
 heretics, 435. 
 
 Monasteries suppressed by Henry 
 VIII., 323. 
 
 Monastic orders in time of Knox, 367. 
 
 Moravian Brethren, spiritual chil- 
 dren of John IIuss, 138. 
 
 More, Sir Thomas, beheaded, 323. 
 
 Murray, earl of, peace during his 
 regency, 401; his death, 402. 
 
 Nuremberg, Diet of, 200. 
 
 Old Catholicism denies supremacy 
 
 of pope, 439. 
 Olivetan, influence on Calvin, 260. 
 Ordination to ministry, exclusive, 
 
 episcopal, 357, 358. 
 
 Papal jurisdiction terminated in 
 Scotland, 389. 
 
 Peter, his pontificate, no scriptural 
 evidence of, 17 ; no early historic 
 evidence of, 17 ; not certain that 
 he visited Rome, 17; his cliain in 
 Rome, 430. 
 
 Preaching, Wyclif 's, contrasted with 
 thatof contemporaries, 44; and Sa- 
 vonarola's witli Mariano's, 71. 
 
 Presbyterianism establisheil in Scot- 
 land, 389; reafhrmed by Scutch 
 Parliament, 401. 
 
 Priesthood, the pagan, 14; its au- 
 tocracy as related to early Chris- 
 tian Church, 14 ; corruption of 
 Christian. 429, 430; immorality 
 of Romish, restrained by Victor 
 Emmanuel, 429. 
 
452 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Protestantism established in Scot- 
 land, 389; confirmed by Parlia- 
 ment, 401 ; recent growth of, 442, 
 443. 
 
 Protestants, origin of name, 204; 
 their protest, 205 ; English, per- 
 secuted, 341-345. 
 
 Purgatory, its office, 25 ; cruelty of, 
 26 ; different views concerning, 
 425. 
 
 Puritans, the, 359. 
 
 Queen Mary of Scots and Bloody 
 Mary. See Mary. 
 
 Reformation, the English, features 
 of, 309 ; occupied middle ground, 
 357; largely occupied with doc- 
 trine of real presence, 325 ; pre- 
 fers episcopal ordination, 326; not 
 exclusive, 357. 
 
 Renaissance, the, in time of Savon- 
 arola, 73; of Knox, 366. 
 
 Reuchlin, John, supports Luther, 
 160. 
 
 Ridley, bishop of London, as a 
 preacher, 332. 
 
 Rizzio, David, in Scotland, 400; bis 
 murder, 400. 
 
 Rogers, John, burned at Smithfield, 
 342 ; his useful life, 342. 
 
 Romanism, its rise, 15; Paul saw its 
 incipient workings, 17; a govern- 
 ment under Leo the Great, 16; ad- 
 mixture of truth and error, 18; 
 better than infidelity, 19; denies 
 completeness of the Sacred Script- 
 ures, 19; claims infallibility, 20; 
 perverts office of faith, 21; doc- 
 trine of mass, 22 ; Mariolatry, 23 ; 
 worship of saints, 25 ; images, 25 ; 
 indulgences, 145 ; purgatory, 25 ; 
 denies private judgment, 27, 144; 
 resists civil liberty, 27 ; its pres- 
 ent status, 415-444; less corrupt 
 than once, 416; elements of good 
 in, 416; inconsistencies, 417; 
 boasts of its unity, 418 ; claim 
 of apostolic succession fallacious, 
 419 ; its priesthood unscriptural, 
 421 ; claim to doctrinal unity 
 groundless, 424 ; different views 
 concerning transubstantiation, 
 425 ; purgatory, 425 ; extreme 
 unction, 426 ; images, 426 : cel- 
 ibacy of clergy, 426; a rebap- 
 
 tized paganism, 428 ; compared 
 with Buddhism, 428; superstitions, 
 430 ; numerical strength, 437 ; 
 countries it controls, 437, 438 ; 
 declining in Europe, 438-441, 
 443 ; seeks control in the United 
 States, 441 ; advances in Eng- 
 land, 441 ; possible longevity of, 
 443 ; final overthrow of, 444. 
 
 Rome, crime in, 430. 
 
 Russia resists papal supremacy, 
 440. 
 
 Sabbath, the, a civil institution 
 under Constantine, 14. 
 
 Saints, worship of, in Romish 
 Church, 25. 
 
 Savonarola, birth, 64; lineage hon- 
 orable, 64 ; early thoughtfulness, 
 65 ; a disappointed hope, 65 ; de- 
 signed for medical profession, 66 ; 
 love to parents, 66 : sorrowful de- 
 parture from home, 66 ; enters 
 Dominican monastery in Bologna, 
 67 ; surprised by the immorality 
 of the monks, 67 : spends seven 
 years in convent, 68; studies Pla- 
 to and Aristotle, 68 ; prefers Sacred 
 Scriptures, 68 ; St. Paul his teach- 
 er rather than Aquinas, 68 ; grow- 
 ing reverence for word of God, 69 ; 
 hears of the Pazzi conspiracy, 69 ; 
 leaves convent, 70 ; returns to Fer- 
 rara, 70 ; preaches without suc- 
 cess, 71; teaches in monastery at 
 Florence, 71 ; Lenten preacher in 
 church of San Lorenzo, 71 ; fail- 
 ure, 71 ; contrasted with Era Ma- 
 riano, preacher of San Spirito, 71 ; 
 established in Dominican chapter 
 of Reggio, 72 ; development of 
 pulpit power, 72 ; Mirandola's es- 
 timate of the preacher, 73 ; in- 
 vited by Lorenzo de Medici to re- 
 turn to Florence, 73 ; the Renais- 
 sance at this period, 73 ; moral 
 corruption prevalent. 75 ; resumes 
 his work in San Marco monas- 
 tery, 76 ; preaches in convent 
 chapel, 76; in cathedral, 77; elo- 
 quence, 77; audacity, directness 
 and solemnity of his speech, 77, 
 cathedral crowded, 78; Lorenzo's 
 confidence in, 78; visits Lorenzo's 
 deathbed, 79; continues his min- 
 istry in Santa Maria del Fiore, 
 
INDEX. 
 
 -^53 
 
 80; a supposed vision, 80; inter- 
 preted by the approach to Flor- 
 ence of Charles VIII., 82 ; inter- 
 feres for protection of the de- 
 throned Piero de Medici, 82 ; sug- 
 gests a form of government and 
 a code of laws adopted by coun- 
 cil, 83; the republic short-lived, 
 85 ; his efforts for moral reform, 
 85 ; elevates monastic life, 86 ; 
 urges repentance, 87 ; his elo- 
 quence resistless, 87 ; secures gen- 
 eral reformation of life, 87 ; op- 
 posed by friends of the Medici, 
 89 ; sentiment turns against him, 
 89 ; appeals to leading powers of 
 Europe in vain, 90 : sees reform 
 in morals come to an end, 91 ; his 
 sorrow and tested faith, 91 ; mock 
 trial, 91 ; death-sentence, 92 ; ex- 
 ecution, 93 ; elements of Refor- 
 mation in his teachings, 95. 
 
 Science encouraged by the Reforma- 
 tion, 272. 
 
 Scotch, characteristics of the, in time 
 of John Knox, 368. 
 
 Servetus and Calvin, 296-299. 
 
 Seymour, Edward, a Protestant, 
 332. 
 
 Sigismund entering Constance, 122 ; 
 successor to Wenzel, 134; attempts 
 execution of hei-etics in Bohemia, 
 135 ; defeated in battle by Huss- 
 ites, 136 ; intrigues, 137; accepted 
 as emperor of Bohemia, 137. 
 
 Spain, Romanism declining in, 440. 
 
 State, relations of Church to, Calvin's 
 theory of, 290. 
 
 Staupitz, John, instructs Luther, 162, 
 
 Superstitions, Romish, 430. 
 
 Taborites, the, 134. 
 
 Temporal power of pope, how re- 
 garded in Italy, 438. 
 
 Tetzel, John, sale of indulgences, 158. 
 
 Toleration, religious, resisted by 
 Rome, 434-436. 
 
 Tradition, office of, in Romish 
 Church, 19. 
 
 Transubstantiation disproved by 
 Calvin, 289; rejected by English 
 Church, 333 ; different views con- 
 cerning, 425. 
 
 Tribute, feudatory, demanded of 
 England by Pope Urban V., 36. 
 
 Trustees, boards of, unknown in 
 
 early history of Scotch Prcsby- 
 terianisra, 390. 
 Tyndale, William, his translution of 
 Bible, 321 : assisted by Miles Cov- 
 erdale, 321; his Testament pro- 
 hibited, 322. 
 
 Ur.TRAMONTANisM Supports suprema- 
 cy of pope, 433. 
 
 Unction, extreme, different viewa 
 concerning, 426. 
 
 Uri, traffic in indulgences at, 226. 
 
 Vienna, Zwingle a student at, 220. 
 
 Waldenses, devotion to truth, 423, 
 424. 
 
 Waldstettes overcome Zurichers, 251. 
 
 Wishart, Gleorge, 371 ; burnt at St. 
 Andrews, 372. 
 
 Wittenberg, papal bull burned at 
 Elster Gate, 177; Luther resides 
 in monastery of, 202, and buried 
 in church of, 212. 
 
 Wolmar, influence of, on Calvin, 262. 
 
 Wolsey, relations to Henry VIII., 
 316 ; urges divorce, 316; his grief, 
 319. 
 
 Worms, Luther summoned to, 178 ; 
 approaching, 179; appears before 
 Emperor Charles V., 180: grand 
 pageant, 181 ; Luther's attitude, 
 183: power of pope broken, 184; 
 Melanchthon's estimate of diet at, 
 185 ; Luther's departure from, 185. 
 
 Wyclif, birth of, 34: family of, 34; 
 instructed by a priest, 35 ; enters 
 Baliol College, 35 : master in Ba- 
 liol, 35 ; reads Augustine and 
 Thomas Aquinas, 35 ; his fame as 
 a scholar, 35 ; member of Parlia- 
 ment, 36 : sent to Bruges, 37 : resists 
 papal encroachments, 38 ; sum- 
 moned before the clerical conven- 
 tion in London, 38 : his moral hero- 
 ism, 39 ; grows conspicuous as a 
 Reformer, 40: rejects essential 
 doctrines of Romish Church. 41 ; 
 views of Lord's Supi)er, A?<: lect- 
 ures on divinity at Oxford. 43 ; 
 unacquainted with original lan- 
 guages of Bible. 43 : familiar with 
 Vulgate, 44; a biblical preacher, 
 44; ministry at Lutterworth. 44; 
 sought to reform the pulpit, 45 ; 
 apparent severity, 47 ; great ten- 
 
454 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 derness, 47 ; trains evangelists, 49 ; 
 translates the Bible into English 
 language, 50 ; devotes twenty years 
 to the work, 50 ,• revises it, 51 ; 
 completed by John Purvey, 51; 
 his translation condemned by lead- 
 ing ecclesiastics in convention, 52 ; 
 reading of, declared heresy and 
 . punishable, 52; it inaugurates a 
 new era in England, 53; influence 
 of, on English literature, 54 ; his 
 death in 1384, and burial at Lut- 
 terworth, 55 ; bones exhumed in 
 1415 and-burned, 55 ; ashes thrown 
 into the Swift, 65 ; John Milton's 
 estimate of, 55 ; his far-reaching 
 influence, 66 ; his spirituality, 58. 
 
 ZiSKA, the one-eyed general, 135 ; 
 one of the greatest of warriors, 
 135 ; stricken down by plague, 
 136. 
 
 Zurich described, 227 ; Zwingle's ap- 
 pearance at, 229 ; Helvetic Diet at, 
 239. 
 
 Zwingle, Ulrich, birth of, 219 : pa- 
 rents of, 219 ; in school at Wesen, 
 219; at Basle, 219; at Vienna, 
 220 ; inducted into priesthood at 
 Constance, 220 ; his charge in 
 Glaris, 221 ; a devout papist, 221 ; 
 in war with France, 221; studies 
 Scriptures and early Fathers, 221 ; 
 
 reads Homer and Pindar, 222 
 devotion to Rome abates, 222 
 meets Erasmus at Basle, 222 
 again in war with France, 223 
 returns to Glaris, 223 ; removes 
 to Einsidlen, 224 ; opposes super- 
 stition, 225 ; resists indulgences, 
 226 ; called to Zurich, 229 ; makes 
 profound profession, 230 ; his char- 
 acteristics, 231 ; he opposes traflSc 
 in indulgences, 235 ; his sickness, 
 236; reported death, 237; his 
 marriage, 237; his personal 
 friends, 238; is in accord with 
 Luther's teachings, 240 ; his sys- 
 tem of faith evangelical, 241 ; ap- 
 proved by council of Zurich, 242 ; 
 presents theses, 243 ; reviews his 
 ministry, 245 ; compared with Lu- 
 ther, 245 ; views of Lord's Supper, 
 246 ; sacrament re-established in 
 Zurich cathedral, 247 : meets Lu- 
 ther at Marburg, 247 ; dispute 
 touching Lord's Supper, 247 ; Ref- 
 ormation temporarily checked, 
 248 ; Rome seeks to win him back, 
 249 ; remains firm, 250 ; reforms 
 worship, 249 ; troubles culminate 
 in war, 250: leaves pulpit, 250; as 
 captain of Zurichers goes out to 
 battle, 251 ; is slain. 252 ; his death 
 mourned in Zurich, 253 ; the gos- 
 pel he preached lives on, 254. 
 
 THE END. 
 
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