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HISTORICAL SKETCHES; 
 
 ILLUSTRATING 
 
 SOME IMPORTANT EVENTS AND EPOCHS 
 
 A.D. 1400 TO A.D. 1546. 
 
 BY 
 
 JOHN HAMPDEN GURNEY, M.A. 
 
 RECTOR OF ST. MARY'S, MARY-LE-BONE. 
 
 I 
 
 LONDON: 
 
 LONGMAN, BROWN, GREEN, AND LONGMANS. 
 
 1852. 
 
 \ ■ • 
 

 London :. 
 Spottiswoodes and Shaw, 
 New- Street-Square. 
 
THOMAS EDWABD DICEY, ESQ., 
 
 CLAYBROOK HALL, LEICESTERSHIRE. 
 
 My Dear Friend, 
 
 To write History, in these times, seems 
 rather a bold undertaking. I wish to explain 
 how it is that I have been drawn into this path 
 of authorship ; and a few words addressed to you, 
 with the public for a hearer, will answer the 
 double purpose of Dedication and Preface. 
 
 Some years ago, you remember, when we were 
 in the habit of meeting almost weekly, we helped 
 to set up a Mechanics' Institution in the little 
 town where I was labouring as Curate, in the 
 hope of providing healthful instruction and ra- 
 tional entertainment for some of those who lived 
 near us. You, by universal consent, were our 
 
 A 2 
 
IV DEDICATORY LETTER. 
 
 first President; and some of the early lectures 
 fell to my share. Gentlemen were soon found 
 to communicate much that was interesting on 
 popular subjects connected with Natural Philo- 
 sophy; but the wide field of History was un- 
 occupied; and it struck me that, without the 
 expenditure of much time or trouble, I could 
 put together what would impart information on 
 great seras, and stirring events, and noble cha- 
 racters, and, at the same time, help to direct 
 my younger and less-instructed hearers in their 
 choice of books. The experiment succeeded. 
 Finding the sample to their taste, many were 
 induced to pursue the subject for themselves; 
 and the works to which I referred were in im- 
 mediate demand at the Reading-room. Though 
 nothing could be slighter than my first " Sketches," 
 they answered their purpose. My parishioners 
 took kindly what was meant for their good ; and 
 I was glad to traverse scenes of the past with 
 young, inquiring minds, supplying the Christian 
 comment as we went along. 
 
 Four years ago, having left my quiet country 
 parish, I was called to take charge of a Metro- 
 
DEDICATORY LETTER. V 
 
 politan one of overwhelming size; and no time 
 was left, in my new position, for historical diver- 
 sions or extraneous services. But when my first 
 Autumn came, and London and its cares were 
 left behind me for a few weeks, it struck me that 
 some of my Lectures might be worked up into 
 a volume which would supply a want in our 
 juvenile Literature. I knew of no work on 
 General History, at once lively and informing, — 
 neither too much cumbered with details, nor too 
 dry and meagre, — which might be read in the 
 School-room, or by persons of limited leisure, 
 between such books as Mrs. Markham's, and the 
 larger Histories of Robertson, Russell and others. 
 Single volumes on individual characters commonly 
 tell more than is wanted for a first reading, or in- 
 troduce topics which the youthful reader can well 
 spare; while others, professedly written for the 
 young, have often a childish air about them which 
 repels an adult reader, and very much curtails 
 their usefulness. I cannot tell to what extent 
 I have succeeded; but my aim has been to avoid 
 these defects, and to supply a book which may 
 relieve the dulness of a Latin lesson, or be 
 
 A3 
 
VI DEDICATORY LETTER. 
 
 read by mothers to their daughters, or have a 
 favoured place in the Mechanics' Library. To 
 more than this I do not pretend ; and I shall be 
 abundantly satisfied if to youths and maidens and 
 intelligent working men I shall supply some 
 pleasant and useful reading. 
 
 Having this object in view, I have endeavoured 
 to give some variety to my volume by selecting 
 subjects from widely different scenes, and have 
 chosen four distinguished names from the annals 
 of France, England, Spain and Germany. My 
 hope is, that what is told here will fix some great 
 epochs in eager enquiring minds at the age when 
 memory is most retentive, — that their earliest re- 
 collections of the events described will be asso- 
 ciated with just views upon the great questions 
 of social morality, — and that from the starting- 
 points which my simple narratives supply they 
 will go forward in their studies with a healthful 
 appetite for what they will find in the works of 
 more learned writers. 
 
 One thing I wish distinctly to state, that I 
 may not be thought to have neglected my higher 
 calling, while wandering where duty did not lead 
 
DEDICATORY LETTER. vil 
 
 me. The original Lectures have been rewritten 
 and much enlarged; but the work has been my 
 holiday task, taken up and pursued in successive 
 Autumns; and now, on the eve of returning 
 to my more laborious and anxious employment, 
 I commit the fruit of many pleasant hours 
 to the press. Let me hope that my young 
 friends, at any rate, will give me their thanks 
 for stories which assuredly have enough in them 
 to engage their liveliest interest, if they be not 
 spoiled in the telling. 
 
 Under your Presidency my humbler task com- 
 menced. With your name I am glad to connect 
 my bolder venture. My little volume will thus 
 become the memorial of a friendship which has 
 lasted through nearly a quarter of a century, and 
 has proved to me a continual source of pleasure 
 and improvement. Our meetings now are fewer 
 than they used to be. Occasions are scarcely 
 found, amid the ceaseless occupations and dis- 
 tractions of busy London life, for free and full 
 discourse on things new and old, far off and near, 
 such as we held many a time, in-doors or out-of- 
 doors, when we were country neighbours in the 
 
 a4 
 
Vlll 
 
 DEDICATOET LETTER. 
 
 best sense. But the memory of those peaceful 
 years remains ; the profit of them, in connection 
 with my privileged access to your hospitable 
 home, I gratefully acknowledge ; and if my book 
 shall afford some entertainment to yourselves, 
 and some instruction to your children, it will 
 be but a small return in kind for what I have 
 received already, and can never lose. 
 
 I am, 
 Your affectionate Friend, 
 
 J. H. GITRNEY. 
 
 Bonchurch, 
 Oct. 29. 1851. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 Page 
 
 Table of European Sovereigns x 
 
 Chronological Table xii 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 Disastrous Reign of Charles VI. 1 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 Joan of Arc - 7 
 
 Notes and Illustrations - - - - 86 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 Invention of Printing - - - - -101 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 Caxton 127 
 
 Notes and Illustrations - - - - 168 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 Forerunners and Patrons of Columbus - - 179 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 Columbus ------- 198 
 
 Notes and Illustrations _ - - - 307 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 The Reformation Age - - - - - 319 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 Luther - 342 
 
 Notes and Illustrations - 492 
 
TABLE OE SOVEREIGNS, 
 
 WHO REIGNED IN EUROPE FROM A.D. 1400 TO A.D. 1546, 
 
 WITH THE DATES OF THEIR ACCESSION. 
 
 A.D. 
 
 Germany. 
 
 Spain. 
 
 Portugal. 
 
 1385 
 
 . 
 
 
 John I. 
 
 1390 
 
 - 
 
 Henry HX 
 
 
 1400 
 
 Rupert. 
 
 
 
 1406 
 
 - 
 
 John II. 
 
 
 1410 
 
 f Jossus. 
 
 \ Sigismund. : 
 
 
 
 1433 
 
 - 
 
 - 
 
 Edward. 
 
 1438 
 
 Albert II. 
 
 . 
 
 Alfonso V. 
 
 1440 
 
 Frederic ILL 
 
 
 
 1454 
 
 - 
 
 Henry IV. 
 
 
 1476 
 
 - 
 
 f Ferdinand 
 \ and Isabella. 
 
 
 1481 
 
 - 
 
 - 
 
 JohnH. 
 
 1493 
 
 Maximilian I. 
 
 
 
 1495 
 
 - 
 
 - 
 
 Emmanuel. 
 
 1516 
 
 
 Charles I. of 
 Spain (the 
 Emperor 
 Charles V.). 
 
 
 1519 
 
 Charles V. 
 
 
 
 1521 
 
 ■ 
 
 
 John HI. 
 
TABLE OF SOVEREIGNS. 
 
 XI 
 
 TABLE OF SOVEREIGNS — continued. 
 
 A. D. 
 
 England. 
 
 France. 
 
 Roman See. 
 
 1380 
 
 
 Charles VI. 
 
 
 1389 
 
 - 
 
 - 
 
 Boniface LX. 
 
 1399 
 
 Henry IV. 
 
 
 
 1404 
 
 - 
 
 - 
 
 Innocent VHL 
 
 1406 
 
 - 
 
 - 
 
 Gregory XVI. 
 
 1409 
 
 - 
 
 - 
 
 Alexander V. 
 
 1410 
 
 -' 
 
 . 
 
 John XXI. 
 
 1413 
 
 Henry V. 
 
 
 
 1417 
 
 - 
 
 . 
 
 Martin V. 
 
 1422 
 
 Henry VI. 
 
 Charles VII. 
 
 
 1431 
 
 - 
 
 - 
 
 Eugene TV. 
 
 1447 
 
 - 
 
 - 
 
 Nicholas V. 
 
 1455 
 
 - 
 
 - 
 
 Calixtus HI. 
 
 1458 
 
 - 
 
 - 
 
 PiusH. 
 
 1461 
 
 Edward IV. 
 
 Lewis XL 
 
 
 1464 
 
 - 
 
 - 
 
 PaulH. 
 
 1471 
 
 - 
 
 - 
 
 Sixtus rv. 
 
 1483 
 
 C Edward V. ? 
 1 Richard HL J 
 
 Charles VHL 
 
 
 1484 
 
 - 
 
 - 
 
 Innocent VHL 
 
 1485 
 
 Henry VII. 
 
 
 
 1493 
 
 - 
 
 . 
 
 Alexander VI. 
 
 1498 
 
 - 
 
 Lewis XII. 
 
 
 1503 
 
 - 
 
 
 fPiusin. 
 |_ Julius H. 
 
 1509 
 
 Henry VIH. 
 
 
 
 1513 
 
 - 
 
 - 
 
 LeoX. 
 
 1515 
 
 - 
 
 Francis I. 
 
 
 1522 
 
 - 
 
 - 
 
 Adrian VI. 
 
 1523 
 
 - 
 
 - 
 
 Clement VTL 
 
 1534 
 
 - 
 
 " 
 
 Paul HI. 
 
CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. 
 
 CHAPTEES I. and II. 
 
 1396. Charles VI. smitten with madness. 
 
 The King ruled by Philip of Burgundy. 
 
 Contest between John Duke of Burgundy and Louis 
 Duke of Orleans. 
 1407. Assassination of the Duke of Orleans. 
 1412. Disorders and civil war in France. 
 
 Joan of Arc born. 
 1415. Oct. 25. Battle of Agincourt. 
 
 Anarchy in the capital and provinces. 
 
 1419. Assassination of the Duke of Burgundy. 
 Connivance of the Dauphin. 
 
 1420. Treaty of Troyes. 
 
 1422. Death of Henry V. and Charles VI. 
 
 Charles VII. neglects his kingly duties. 
 
 Successes of the English. 
 1425. Joan of Arc begins to hear her Voices. 
 
 1428. Duke of Bedford lays siege to Orleans. 
 Joan's visits to Vaucouleurs. 
 
 Is repulsed by Baudricourt, but prevails by im- 
 portunity. 
 Refuses to visit Duke of Lorraine. 
 
 1429. February. Starts on her journey to the Court. 
 Perils of her journey. 
 
 First meeting with Charles at Chinon. 
 
CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. Xlll 
 
 1429. Is sent to Poictiers for examination by the Uni- 
 versity. 
 
 Her bearing and answers before the doctors. 
 
 Her mission is approved. 
 
 Her banner is prepared. 
 
 Her fame reaches Orleans. 
 
 April. An army gathered at Blois. 
 
 Joan summons the English by letter to leave the 
 country. 
 
 Advances to the relief of Orleans. 
 
 Succeeds in her first military adventure. 
 
 Meeting with Dunois. 
 
 April 29. Enters Orleans by night. 
 
 Has Te Deum chanted in the Cathedral by torch- 
 light. 
 
 Courage of the garrison revived. 
 
 May 4. The first English fort taken. 
 
 May 5. Ascension Day religiously observed in Or- 
 leans. 
 
 May 6. Kenewed fighting; more English forts 
 taken. 
 
 May 7. Last sortie from Orleans. 
 
 Joan commands and heads the attack. 
 
 Hard day's fighting ; Joan wounded ; last fort taken. 
 
 Midnight Hymn of Praise in the Cathedral. 
 
 May 8., Sunday. English raise the siege. 
 
 Battle offered by them, but declined at the bidding 
 of Joan. 
 
 Mass celebrated in the open air. 
 
 Joan presses for instant march to Rheims. 
 
 Is overborne by generals. 
 
 June 18. Decisive victory over the English at Patay. 
 
 Advance to Rheims. 
 
 Burst of popular enthusiasm. 
 
 July 8. Troyes taken. 
 
XIV CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. 
 
 1429. Joan saves the French prisoners. 
 July 15. Charles enters Rheims. 
 July 17. Is crowned there. 
 Joan's address to the King. 
 
 Her letter to the Duke of Burgundy. 
 
 Her longing for home. 
 
 Is persuaded to remain with the army. 
 
 Her mission less clear ; her Voices less express. 
 
 Sept. 8. Assault on Paris. 
 
 It fails, and Joan's reputation declines. 
 
 Her family ennobled by the King. 
 
 Domremy, at her request, exempted from taxation. 
 
 Her piety and simplicity in the camp. 
 
 1430. Compiegne assaulted by the Duke of Burgundy. 
 Joan comes to its rescue with the royal army. 
 May 23. Heads a sortie, and is captured. 
 Many causes at work for her ruin. 
 
 November. Is sold by the Duke of Burgundy to 
 
 the English. 
 Is claimed by Cauchon Bishop of Beauvais. 
 Is surrendered to him for trial. 
 Is confined meanwhile at Beaurevoir. 
 Throws herself from the castle walls. 
 
 1431. Jan. 9. Judicial proceedings commenced at Rouen. 
 Feb. 21. Joan's first appearance before the Court. 
 Charges against her. 
 
 Disputes with Judges about her oath. 
 Repeats the story about her Voices. 
 Joan a heretic or a witch. 
 Irrelevant questions on either supposition. 
 Voices with her in prison. 
 Joan's patience and cleverness. 
 Refuses to condemn herself. 
 March 31. Joan's final answer. 
 Bedford presses for a conviction. 
 
CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. XV 
 
 1431. May 9. Joan threatened with the rack. 
 May 19. Judgment given against her. 
 May 23. Joan recants at place of execution. 
 May 30. Again before her judges. 
 June 1. Is publicly burnt. 
 Impression produced on spectators. 
 English party continually weakened. 
 Dec. 16. Henry VI. crowned at Paris. 
 
 1435. Peace of Arras between Charles and the Duke of 
 
 Burgundy. 
 
 1436. Paris taken by Royalists. 
 
 1440. Duke of Orleans restored to France. 
 
 1449. Normandy reconquered. 
 
 1451. Guienne recovered from the English. 
 
 Their continental possessions reduced to Calais. 
 
 CHAPTER ni. 
 
 Invention of Printing involved in obscurity. 
 
 Commercial reason for this uncertainty. 
 
 Guttenberg assumed to be Inventor at Mayence 
 Jubilee. 
 1430. Traditionary date of earliest printing at Haerlem. 
 1436. Guttenberg resident at Strasburg. 
 1439. Is party to a lawsuit there. 
 1442. Joins Fust at Mayence. 
 
 Prints there with Fust and Schoeffer. 
 1455. Partnership dissolved, and Guttenberg goes else- 
 where. 
 1457. New art first alluded to in book printed by Fust and 
 
 Schoeffer. 
 1462. Mayence taken, and printers scattered. 
 1466. Fust died. 
 1492. Schoeffer died. 
 
XVI CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 1428. Caxton apprenticed. 
 
 1441. His master dies, leaving him twenty marks. 
 
 Goes abroad, and engages in commercial transactions. 
 
 His vocation uncertain. 
 1464. Negotiates a commercial treaty between England 
 and Burgundy. 
 
 Enters the service of the Duchess of Burgundy. 
 
 Begins to translate a French Romance into English. 
 1471. Finishes his translation at Cologne. 
 
 Uncertain where he learnt the printing art, but 
 probably at Cologne. 
 
 1473. Probable date of Caxton's first publication. 
 
 1474. Prints the Game of Chess. 
 
 Prints the Life of Jason, probably in England. 
 1477. Sayings of Philosophers, printed at Westminster. 
 
 Caxton labours steadily as Translator and Printer. 
 
 Publishes Romances. 
 
 His friendship with Lord Rivers. 
 
 Moral publications. 
 
 Account of Pilgrimage of the Soul. 
 
 Historical publications. 
 
 JEsop's Fables, and Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. 
 
 English Language modified in Caxton's time. 
 
 Religious publications. 
 1490. Translates Art and Craft to know well to die. 
 
 Prints it. 
 1492. Caxton dies. 
 
 His memory dear to all who love a book. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 1412. Cape Non passed by Portuguese Navigators. 
 
 Prince Henry devotes himself to maritime science. 
 
CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. xvii 
 
 1418. Sends out his first exploring vessel; Porto Santo 
 
 discovered. 
 
 1419. Madeira discovered. 
 1433. Cape Bojador passed. 
 
 Cape de Yerde reached. 
 
 The Torrid Zone found not destructive of life. 
 Cape de Verde Islands and Azores discovered. 
 Papal grant to Portugal of land between Cape Non 
 
 and India. 
 1473. Prince Henry died. 
 
 John II. follows up his discoveries. 
 Hopes to reach India by sailing round Africa. 
 Gulf of Guinea explored ; Equator passed. 
 1486. Bartholomez Diaz reaches Cape of Good Hope. 
 
 Compelled to return without penetrating to Indian 
 
 Sea. 
 Settles in Abyssinia. 
 Covillam reports that India may be reached by the 
 
 Cape of Good Hope. 
 
 1497. July. Vasco »e Gam a sails with exploring expe- 
 
 dition. 
 Sails round Southern Coast of Africa. 
 
 1498. March. Reaches Mozambique. 
 Crosses Indian Ocean to Calicut. 
 
 1454. John II., King of Castile, died. 
 
 Leaves behind him Henry, Alfonso and Isabella. 
 
 Castile included three-fourths of Modern Spain. 
 
 Henry IY. a feeble and oppressive Sovereign. 
 
 Insurrection headed by Marquis of Villena. 
 1465. Henry formally deposed, and Alfonso proclaimed 
 King. 
 
XVlll CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. 
 
 1465. Nation divided between two Kings. 
 Civil war, and doubtful results. 
 
 1468. Death of Alfonso. 
 
 Throne offered by insurgent party to Isabella. 
 Refused by her. 
 
 The confederates make peace with Henry. 
 Isabella declared presumptive heiress to the Crown. 
 Sought in marriage by Princes of Aragon, Portugal, 
 
 France, and England. 
 Henry favours King of Portugal. 
 Isabella prefers Ferdinand of Aragon. 
 
 1469. Fearing violence she flies to Valladolid. 
 Negotiates her own treaty of marriage. 
 Summons Ferdinand to her help. 
 
 Oct. 19. Marriage of Ferdinand and Isabella. 
 
 Their characters. 
 1474. Henry dies. 
 
 King of Portugal takes up cause of Joanna, the bas- 
 tardized daughter of Henry's wife. 
 
 Invades Castile. 
 
 Isabella deserted by influential friends. 
 
 Her noble qualities shine out. 
 1476. Victory gained by her forces at Toro. 
 1479. Peace concluded. 
 
 Isabella's wise and righteous government. 
 1481. Commencement of last war with the Moors. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 1436. Supposed date of Columbus's birth. ' 
 
 He studies for a short time at University of Pavia. 
 1450. Goes to sea. 
 
CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. XIX 
 
 1450. Serves in maritime and warlike enterprizes of the 
 Mediterranean. 
 Becomes a hardy and skilful navigator. 
 1470. Arrives in Portugal. 
 
 Marries the daughter of one of Prince Henry's 
 
 captains. 
 Lives with his mother-in-law. 
 Receives charts and journals of her deceased 
 
 husband. 
 Has his mind occupied with thoughts of undiscovered 
 
 countries to the West. 
 Assisted in his speculations by his brother-in-law. 
 Collects facts and observations from all quarters. 
 1474. His theories assume a definite shape. 
 
 Makes sure that India may be reached by sailing 
 
 westward. 
 Corresponds with Toscanelli, a learned Florentine. 
 1481. John II. ascends the throne. 
 
 Columbus makes overtures to him. 
 Confides to the King his maps and charts. 
 John makes a treacherous use of them. 
 1484. Columbus leaves Portugal in disgust. 
 1486. Arrives at Palos in Spain. 
 
 Makes a convert of Marchena, a friar. 
 Is sent on by him to the Court. 
 Introduced to Cardinal Mendoza and Ferdinand. 
 Referred by the King to University of Salamanca. 
 • Unfolds his plans. 
 Answers all objections. 
 
 Appeals to the electors on Christian grounds. 
 His scheme pronounced impracticable. 
 1491. Returns to Palos wearied out by delay and dis- 
 appointment. 
 Turns his thoughts towards France. 
 Arrested by Marchena, and invited back to Court, 
 a 2 
 
XX CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. 
 
 1491. Returns, and witnesses the fall of Granada. 
 
 1492. His terms rejected as extravagant. 
 Columbus repulsed, and again recalled. 
 Isabella adopts the scheme. 
 
 His terms all granted. 
 
 Palos selected as the starting-place. 
 
 August 3. Columbus sails with three small vessels. 
 
 September 6. Leaves Canary Islands. 
 
 September 9. Passes Ferro. 
 
 Variation of the needle. 
 
 Ships come within range of trade-wind. 
 
 The crew frightened at these novelties. 
 
 Columbus tries all expedients to encourage them. 
 
 Indications of land. 
 
 September 25. Disappointed hopes. 
 
 Growing discontent and threatened mutiny. 
 
 Columbus immovable. 
 
 Favourable signs multiply. 
 
 Oct. 11. Columbus sees a light on shore. 
 
 Oct. 12. Landing at San Salvador. 
 
 Meeting with the natives. 
 
 Oct. 28. Cuba discovered. 
 
 Columbus occupied in cruising along it. 
 
 Dec. 6, Hayti discovered ; named Hispaniola. 
 
 Friendly intercourse with natives. 
 
 Pinzon, with one of the three ships, separated from 
 the others. 
 
 Dec. 25. Columbus's ship wrecked. 
 
 His account of the country and people. 
 
 Divides his crews, and forms settlement in His- 
 paniola. 
 
 1493. Jan. 4. Sails for Spain with his single remaining 
 
 vessel. 
 Encounters fearful tempests. 
 Feb. 15. Comes within sisrht of the Azores. 
 
CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. XXI 
 
 1493. March 4. Beaches the mouth of the Tagus. 
 Courteously entertained by King John. 
 March 15. Reaches Palos. 
 
 His reception in Spain. 
 
 Meeting with Ferdinand and Isabella at Barcelona. 
 
 Prepares for second expedition. 
 
 Sept. 23. Sails again from Palos. 
 
 Discovers Guadaloupe, Dominica, and Porto Rico. 
 
 Nov. 28. Reaches Hispaniola, and finds settlement 
 
 in ruins. 
 Disasters occasioned by Spanish violence and crime. 
 
 1494. Difficulties of Columbus. 
 Discontent of settlers. 
 
 Their lust for gold, and hatred of control. 
 
 Sanguine hopes of Columbus. 
 
 His mild and upright government. 
 
 Sails on exploring voyage. 
 
 April 29. Cruises along Southern Coast of Cuba. 
 
 Discovery of Jamaica. 
 
 Concludes that Cuba is a continent. 
 
 July 7. Wise address of a native chief. 
 
 Columbus returns to Hispaniola. 
 
 Finds his brother Bartholomew awaiting him. 
 
 Adventures of Bartholomew ; his character. 
 
 Distracted state of the island. 
 
 Two leaders of the malcontents sail for Spain. 
 
 Hostile League amongst the native chiefs. 
 
 Caonabo, the most formidable of them, captured. 
 
 His noole character, and death. 
 
 1495. An army collected against the Spaniards. 
 March 27. Decisive victory over Indians. 
 Their spirit broken ; their land subdued. 
 Columbus pursued by slanderers. 
 
 Margarita and Father Boyle traduce his Government 
 at home. 
 
 a 3 
 
XX11 CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. 
 
 1495. Aguado sent as Commissioner from Spain to inves- 
 
 tigate the charges. 
 Columbus receives him with respect. 
 Resolves to return with him to Spain. 
 March 10. Sails from Hispaniola. 
 June 11. Arrives at Cadiz. 
 
 Contrast between his first reception and his second* 
 Pleads his cause successfully. 
 Eevives hopes and enthusiasm at Court. 
 
 1496. Prepares for his third voyage. 
 Harassing delays. 
 
 1498. May 30. Sails with six vessels on third voyage. 
 July 31. Comes within sight of Trinidad. 
 August. Explores Gulf of Paria, and lands on Con- 
 tinent of America. 
 
 Theories as to the earth's shape, and the garden of 
 
 Eden. 
 Eeturns sick and weary to Hispaniola. 
 Troubles there. 
 
 Insurrection headed by Roldan. 
 Firmness of his brother Bartholomew. 
 Columbus obliged to grant favourable terms. 
 Another insurrection, headed by Ojeda. 
 Roldan an effective auxiliary to Columbus. 
 
 1499. Hostile party formed against Columbus in Spain. 
 Returned colonists in Spain carry calumnious charges 
 
 with them. 
 Isabella's confidence shaken. 
 
 1500. Bobadilla sent out with authority to supersede 
 
 Columbus. 
 His infamous conduct. 
 Columbus loyally submits himself. 
 Mock trial, and unjust conviction. 
 Columbus is sent in irons to Spain. 
 Public indignation excited. 
 
CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. XX1U 
 
 1500. Columbus's vindication of himself. 
 
 Eestored to the Queen's favour, but deprived of his 
 government. 
 
 1501. Is roused by reports of Portuguese commerce with 
 
 India. 
 Prepares for fourth voyage. 
 
 1502. May 9. Sails with Bartholomew. 
 Is forbidden to land at Hispaniola. 
 Spanish fleet lost with Bobadilla and Roldan. 
 Columbus sails for South American Continent. 
 Misses Yucatan and Mexico. 
 
 Explores the coast between Honduras and the Gulf 
 of Darien. 
 
 1503. Winters within a hundred miles of the Pacific. 
 Disastrous conflicts with natives. 
 Columbus cheered by a remarkable dream. 
 May 1. Sails for Hispaniola. 
 
 June 24. Reaches Jamaica with his vessels not in 
 
 sailing condition. 
 Diego Mendez ventures in a canoe to Hispaniola. 
 Columbus writes an account of his voyage for the 
 
 Sovereigns. 
 
 1504. Still a prisoner in Jamaica. 
 
 Jan. 2. A mutiny among his followers. 
 
 Supplies of food run short. 
 
 Columbus's stratagem at time of eclipse. 
 
 June 28. Leaves Jamaica in a vessel sent from 
 
 Hispaniola. 
 Misgovernment of Ovando. 
 Misery of natives. 
 Indignation of Columbus. 
 Resolves to plead their cause in Spain. 
 Nov. 7. Arrives there homeless, sick and poor. 
 Nov. 26. Death of Isabella. 
 
 1505. May. Columbus's last visit to Court. 
 
 a 4 
 
XXIV CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. 
 
 1505. Claims restoration to his government. 
 His suit rejected by Ferdinand. 
 
 1506. May 20. Ascension Day. Death of Columbus. 
 His character. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 Commencement of a new sera. 
 
 Effects of Discovery of Printing. 
 
 Effects of Discovery of a New Continent. 
 1500. Discovery of Brazil. 
 1513. Balboa crosses Isthmus of Darien to the Pacific. 
 
 1520. Magellan sails round South America to Pacific 
 
 Ocean. 
 
 1521. Conquest of Mexico by Cortes. 
 1531. Pizarro sails for Peru. 
 
 Consolidation of the European Kingdoms. 
 
 Empire of Charles V. 
 
 Growing strength of the Monarchy in England, 
 
 France and Spain. 
 Lessening influence of the Papacy before the 
 
 Reformation. 
 Writings of Erasmus. 
 Scandals at Rome. 
 1484. Innocent VIII. ; his avarice and licentiousness. 
 1493. Alexander VI. ; his profligacy, and sanction of his 
 
 son's outrageous crimes. 
 1503. Julius II.; his unscrupulous policy, and delight in 
 
 war. 
 1513. Leo X.; his love of literature, ease, and pleasure. 
 Advancement of learning. 
 
CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. XXV 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 1483. Birth and parentage of Luther. 
 
 His school days. 
 
 Early hardships. 
 
 Cherished by Ursula Cotta. 
 1501. Removes to the University of Erfurth. 
 
 Meets with a Latin Bible there. 
 
 Takes his Bachelor's degree. 
 
 Dangerous illness. 
 1503. Becomes a Doctor of Philosophy. 
 
 Terrors of conscience. 
 
 Resolves to become a Monk. 
 1505. August 17. Enters an Augustinian Convent. 
 
 His hard life there. 
 
 Pursues his studies with eagerness. 
 
 His disappointment and uneasiness. 
 
 Meeting with Staupitz. 
 
 His instruction and advice. 
 
 Luther's gradual emancipation from the spirit of 
 bondage. 
 
 1507. May 2. Is ordained priest. 
 His letter on that occasion. 
 
 1508. Settlement at Wittemberg as Professor. 
 His busy life there. 
 
 Becomes town preacher. 
 Character of his preaching. 
 
 1511. Visit to Rome. 
 
 His surprise at the abominations witnessed there. 
 Returns to Wittemberg. 
 
 1512. Becomes a Doctor of Theology. 
 Traits of Christian character. 
 
 1516. His abounding labours. 
 
 1517. Tetzel and Indulgences. 
 
 Luther meets the purchasers of Indulgences at the 
 Confessional. 
 
XXVI CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. 
 
 1517. His faithful admonitions. 
 
 He preaches against Indulgences. 
 
 Oct. 31. Affixes ninety-five Propositions against 
 
 them to church door at Wittemberg. 
 They are scattered over Europe. 
 Luther alarmed at his own boldness. 
 
 1518. His Propositions controverted. 
 His answers. 
 
 Is summoned before the Pope's Legate at Augsburg. 
 His appeal to the Pope letter informed. 
 
 1519. July. His disputation at Leipsic. 
 His Commentary on the Galatians. 
 His popular writings. 
 
 The Elector Frederic. 
 
 He protects Luther. 
 
 Melancthon. 
 
 Friendship between him and Luther. 
 
 Progress of Luther's mind. 
 
 1520. His works on the Reformation of Religion and Baby- 
 
 lonish Captivity. 
 The Pope's Bull of Excommunication. 
 December 10. Luther burns it. 
 
 1521. Diet or Worms. 
 
 March 24. Luther summoned before it. 
 
 April 2. Leaves Wittemberg. 
 
 His journey. 
 
 Stops at Erfurth, and preaches there. 
 
 His courage and resolution. 
 
 April 16. Arrival at Worms. 
 
 April 17. His first appearance before the Diet. 
 
 Acknowledges his books ; asks time to answer. 
 
 April 18. Refuses to retract. 
 
 His noble reply. 
 
 Popular enthusiasm in his favour. 
 
 Has friends among the German princes. 
 
CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. XXVU 
 
 1521. Condemnation by the Emperor. 
 Attempts to bring Luther to submission. 
 
 April 25. Interview with the Archbishop of Treves. 
 
 Luther leaves Worms. 
 
 Final Edict of the Diet. 
 
 Luther, and all who favoured him, proscribed. 
 
 His journey homeward. 
 
 May 2. Visits Eisenach, and preaches there. 
 
 Is seized on the road, and carried prisoner to the 
 
 Wartburg. 
 Sheltered there by the Elector of Saxony. 
 Advantages of retirement. 
 Letters from his Patmos. 
 Begins his Translation of the -Bible. 
 Controversial and practical works. 
 Perplexity as to Monastic Vows. 
 Enquiries after Luther. 
 Progress of Eeformation. 
 The Lord's Supper supersedes the Mass at Wit- 
 
 temberg. 
 Outbreak of fanaticism. 
 Remonstrances from Luther. 
 
 1522. March 3. He leaves the Wartburg. 
 March 9. Preaches at Wittemberg. 
 His exhortation to patience and charity. 
 His success. 
 
 September. His German New Testament finished, 
 
 and sent forth. 
 Eeceived with eagerness by the people. 
 
 1523. The Decree of Worms not executed. 
 
 Diets held ; new Popes elected ; nothing done against 
 Luther. 
 
 1524. War of the Peasants. 
 Their twelve Articles. 
 They appeal to Luther. 
 His answer. 
 
XXV111 CHEONOLOGICAL TABLE. 
 
 1524. Remonstrates with the nobles, and dissuades the 
 
 people from revolt. 
 
 1525. War concluded with dreadful slaughter. 
 Luther's grief and passion. 
 
 June 14. His marriage. 
 
 History of Catherine Bora. 
 
 His justification of himself. 
 
 Reasons against it. 
 
 His happy home. 
 
 Little John and Magdalene. 
 
 Luther's poverty and disinterestedness. 
 
 His controversies. 
 
 Henry VHI. 
 
 Erasmus publishes on the Freedom of the Will. 
 
 December. Luther replies in his Bondage of the Will. 
 
 Zwinglius. 
 
 Doctrine of the Church of Rome. 
 
 Doctrine of the Sacramentarians. 
 
 Luther's doctrine of Consubstantiation. 
 
 (Ecolampadius and Bucer. 
 1527. The Pope and the Emperor engaged in hostilities. 
 
 June 6. Rome taken and sacked. 
 1529. October. The Turks besiege Vienna, and are re- 
 pulsed. 
 
 Attempted reconciliation between Swiss and German 
 Reformers. 
 
 Luther's intolerance the chief obstacle to peace. 
 
 His patience and charity in other things. 
 
 Settlement of religious worship and ceremonies. 
 
 Evangelical Pastors provided. 
 
 Luther's care for the young. 
 
 Disposal of Endowments. 
 
 Spoliation of Ecclesiastical property arrested by 
 Luther. 
 
 Diet or Spires. 
 
CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. XXIX 
 
 1529. April 25. Protest signed by six Princes. 
 
 1530. Diet op Augsburg. 
 
 Confession of Faith drawn up by Melancthon. 
 June 26. Publicly read before the Emperor. 
 Aug. 3. A Refutation read by the adverse party. 
 Vain attempts at compromise. 
 Decree of the Diet, a sentence of proscription against 
 
 Protestants. 
 Luther at Coburg. 
 His fervent devotions. 
 His despair of peace with Romanists. 
 Luther's Hymns. 
 Their effect upon the people. 
 His popular writings. 
 December 31. League of Smalcald. 
 
 1531. Decree of Augsburg not executed. 
 
 1532. June. Solyman invades Germany with an immense 
 
 army. 
 Protestants take advantage of Turkish invasion. 
 Aug. 2. Procure from the Emperor the Truce of 
 
 Ratisbon. 
 Retreat of the Turkish army. 
 
 1534. Disorders at Munster. 
 
 Fanaticism and excesses of the Anabaptists. 
 They get possession of the city. 
 John of Leyden. 
 
 1535. June 24. The city retaken by the Bishop 
 The cause of the Reformation damaged. 
 Luther's grief. 
 
 Ascribes these disorders to the Evil One. 
 His opinion on Satanic influence. 
 
 1539. Death of Duke George. 
 
 Accession of Lower Saxony to the cause of the 
 Reformation. 
 
 1540. Society of Jesuits founded. 
 
XXX CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. 
 
 1543. ("Luther worn out with excessive labours. 
 
 1544. 1 Disappointed and sick at heart. 
 Progress of the Reformation in Europe. 
 
 1545. Council of Trent begins its sittings. 
 
 1546. Luther's last journey. 
 Feb. 14. His last letter. 
 Feb. 17. His last sickness. 
 Feb. 18. His death. 
 
 Feb. 22. His funeral. 
 
 His monuments in many lands. 
 
FKANCE LOST AND WON; 
 JOAN OF AEC. 
 
HISTORICAL SKETCHES. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 REIGN OF CHARLES VI. AND ITS 
 CONSEQUENCES. 
 
 At the commencement of the fifteenth century, 
 France had the misfortune to have a madman for 
 her king. Charles VI., always excitable and 
 impetuous, with a strong will and a feeble un- 
 derstanding, had been seized in the year 1392 
 with a fit of phrenzy, from the shock of which 
 he never recovered. On a sultry, stifling day in 
 August, as he was travelling on horseback, he 
 became suddenly infuriated, and slew four of his 
 attendants before he could be dismounted and 
 disarmed. Fits of the same kind recurred at 
 intervals throughout the remainder of his life ; 
 and in his sanest moods, though gentle and kindly- 
 natured, grieved for the excesses of his times of 
 violence, and earnest in seeking heavenly aid by 
 prayer and confession, he was quite insensible to 
 reason, and would never brook control. Strange 
 
 B 
 
2 BATTLE OF AGINCOURT. 
 
 to say, when not physically disabled, he remained 
 absolute master of the government ; and, for thirty 
 years together, France was at the mercy of a lu- 
 natic, or of the unprincipled relatives to whom he 
 yielded himself in succession. Philip, Duke of 
 Burgundy, the king's uncle, ruled while he lived ; 
 then came a protracted contest between the Duke 
 of Orleans, Charles's brother, and John, the new 
 Duke of Burgundy, his cousin, which was ter- 
 minated in 1407 by the murder of the 
 
 a.d. 1407. -, -I -i -i -i 
 
 former, — a murder planned and paid 
 for by the rival Duke. The quarrel, however, 
 between the two factions continued with alternate 
 success, and miseries of every kind were heaped 
 on the unhappy nation, while every sentiment 
 of national honour was forgotten, — the Grandees 
 of the kingdom not pretending, in their wars or 
 treaties, to have regard to any thing but their 
 own immediate interest. Each party, in turn, sued 
 to our Henry IV. for assistance, and were bidding 
 against each other for the disgrace of admitting a 
 foreign army into France. 
 
 Henry V. soon after his accession revived the 
 old claim of Edward III. and his successors 
 to the throne of France. Then eame the ter- 
 Oct 25th r ^ e disaster of Agincourt, and for 
 a.i>. 1415. the time the domestic quarrel was 
 
DISORDERS OF FRANCE. 3 
 
 bushel; but the truce was short, and the 
 calamities consequent on a state of anarchy were 
 renewed in the capital and in the provinces. 
 Two dauphins perished successively, after just 
 reaching manhood ; and thus the period was de- 
 ferred from time to time when there was any 
 hope of organising a national party under an 
 efficient head. At last, the rapid successes of 
 the English, their conquests in the North, and 
 their growing influence by means of treaties in 
 the South, roused the dormant patriotism of some 
 of the principal men on both sides, and it was 
 proposed that a meeting should take place on a 
 certain bridge between the Duke of Burgundy, 
 and the new Dauphin, a youth of sixteen, who 
 was completely under the influence of the ad- 
 verse party. There the terms of a lasting peace 
 were to be arranged ; but there, instead, a foul 
 murder was perpetrated ; the Duke, in the very 
 act of bending the knee to his prince, was as- 
 sassinated by some of the Orleans fac- 
 
 J A.D. 1419. 
 
 tion, and the heir of the throne was 
 an accomplice in the crime. He was in the 
 hands of evil counsellors, and was persuaded, 
 doubtless, that to inflict summary punishment 
 on a man who had tyrannized over king and 
 people, — had robbed each in turn, and sold them 
 
 *b2 
 
4 TKEATY OF TKOYES. 
 
 to the common enemy, — was a deed for which 
 his country would thank him. But such crimes 
 bring their own punishment ; and for a long time 
 the plea of the insurrectionary party was one 
 which, whether real or pretended, commanded 
 some respect, that the prince was no prince for 
 France who had thus defiled his conscience with 
 treachery and murder. 
 
 The disgraceful treaty of Troyes soon fol- 
 lowed, by which Henry bargained to 
 
 A.D. 1420. . . 
 
 renounce the title of King of France, 
 receiving in return the hand of the King's 
 daughter, the present government of the kingdom, 
 and the reversion of it on Charles's death. On 
 Advent Sunday, in the year 1420, he entered 
 Paris between the two men to whom he owed 
 his triumph, — the King of France, and Philip, 
 the new Duke of Burgundy, his unprincipled 
 ally. The citizens looked on in wonder, and 
 were sunk so low as to welcome any change 
 which promised them exemption from plunder and 
 massacre. They saw the two kings go together 
 to Notre Dame, but it was the English king who 
 went thence to the Louvre, and his rights as 
 Regent were immediately exercised by his sum- 
 moning the Estates to meet, and sanction what 
 had been done at Troyes. 
 
CHARLES THE SEVENTH. 5 
 
 In less than two years, however, both kings 
 were dead, Charles surviving his son- 
 
 A. D. 1422. 
 
 in-law a few weeks; and the double 
 crown descended to our baby-king, Henry VI., 
 who, happily, was never strong enough to keep 
 what had been so ill gotten. Charles VII. 
 was a full-grown man, nearly twenty, but for 
 the purposes of government hardly better than 
 a child. Devoted to pleasure, and swayed by 
 successive favourites, he was contented with the 
 state of royalty, and cared little for his own 
 dishonour, or the degradation of his kingdom. 
 France, South of the Loire, was mostly his; the 
 Northern portion was possessed and ruled by the 
 Duke of Bedford, Henry the Fifth's brother, as 
 regent for his nephew. For a long time together, 
 little was done in the way of active military 
 operations. Troubles at home made Bedford in- 
 active; and on the French side all was feeble- 
 ness and disunion. The Duke of Orleans, the 
 natural head of a national party, if Charles de- 
 serted his post, was a prisoner in England; and 
 though the treaty of Troyes should have set him 
 at liberty, if it were to make the two countries 
 one for good as well as evil, he was thought too 
 dangerous a person to be restored to France. 
 The great chiefs of the kingdom, many of them, 
 
 B 3 
 
6 SIEGE OF OKLEANS. 
 
 had made their own terms with the English, and 
 were content to rule their principalities as inde- 
 pendent sovereigns. The great monarchy, which 
 had been built up by successive kings of France, 
 seemed to be crumbling to pieces ; and, worst of 
 all, the nation seemed to have lost heart and hope. 
 In the autumn of 1428, the Duke of 
 
 A.D. 1428. .-ii 
 
 Bedford, having received a large rein- 
 forcement from England, determined to prosecute 
 the war south of the Loire, and accordingly laid 
 siege to Orleans, which commands the passage of 
 the river. He contemplated a speedy capture, 
 probably ; but France, by that time, had reached 
 her lowest point, and was raised up again almost 
 by miracle. At this period the public events of 
 the day become connected with the adventures of 
 Joan of Arc; and, in telling her story, we shall 
 be describing the steps by which it pleased 
 God to recover the foremost nation of Continental 
 Europe from death to life. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 [As the facts of the following story are so marvellous, 
 it is very important that we should understand how they 
 are authenticated. Joan of Arc was tried by her enemies 
 before her death, and condemned. Many years after- 
 wards she was tried again, — that is, her fair fame was 
 put upon its trial, — by Charles VIL, and friendly wit- 
 nesses bore willing testimony in her favour. The evi- 
 dence given on both trials is among the historical records 
 of France, and has lately been published in an accessible 
 and readable form. In the course of the two investiga- 
 tions Joan's whole life was brought out to view. Every 
 fact, great and small, that related to her was most fully 
 detailed. What was spoken by her friends seems, in 
 general, probable and trustworthy; but we shall quote 
 mostly from the report of her enemies ; and all that tells 
 in her favour, when adopted by men who hated and 
 killed her, may be taken as proved beyond any reasonable 
 doubt.] 
 
 Joan of Arc* was a peasant's child, Joan's early 
 and born in the village of Domreiny, ^ ears - 
 in Lorraine. Her own account , at her trial, 
 makes the year of her birth 1411, or the begin- 
 ning of 1412. There is conflicting evidence as 
 
 * See NOTE (A). 
 
 B 4 
 
8 JOAN OF ATtC. 
 
 to her home occupations in early life. Hume 
 represents her to have been a groom ; others give 
 her the more romantic character of a shep- 
 herdess. Her own testimony, which may be 
 taken implicitly as to facts within her own know- 
 ledge, declares that, after she was grown up, she 
 never tended cattle. But many of those who 
 knew her in early life, her own cousin inclusive *, 
 speak of having seen her thus employed, without 
 specifying her precise age; and some add that 
 she went to plough sometimes with her father. 
 Her education was that of the period in which 
 she lived. From her mother she learnt to say 
 the Creed and the Lord's Prayer, with the "Ave 
 Maria," which goes along with them in the rudi- 
 ments of Roman Catholic teaching. Reading and 
 writing were no part of her accomplishments; but 
 for spinning and sewing, she said upon her trial, 
 she "did not fear any woman in Rouen." She 
 was remarkable for her extreme bashfulness, and 
 was known among the neighbours for a kind- 
 hearted creature, always ready to nurse the sick 
 or relieve the stranger, and became a marked 
 person in the little village of Domremy, for the 
 gravity of her character and the ardour of her 
 
 * See NOTE (B). 
 
JOAN OF ARC. 9 
 
 devotions. She went often to confession, and was 
 sometimes seen to kneel and pray in the fields.* 
 When her day's work was done, she would run to 
 the church, and sometimes spend hours before the 
 altar in prayer or silent contemplation. She used 
 to call the sexton to account if he missed ringing 
 the bell for prayers, and promised to give him 
 something if he were more regular. Saint Ca- 
 therine and Saint Margaret were her favourite 
 saints, and she loved to deck their images with 
 flowers, and to burn candles in honour of the 
 Virgin. 
 
 The country immediately about Domremy, like 
 the rest of France, was divided between the En- 
 glish and French factions, or the Burgundians and 
 Armagnacs, as the other party was often called 
 after a leading man on the national side, The 
 people of Joan's village, with one exception, 
 were zealous royalists; but some of their neigh- 
 bours were Burgundians ; and the flame of her 
 patriotism was kept alive by feuds and dangers 
 such as civil war can hardly fail to bring in its 
 train. The children had their fights ; Joan's 
 own brothers were sometimes among the combat- 
 ants, and came home with honourable wounds, 
 
 * See NOTE (C). 
 
10 JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 and their tale of victory or defeat. On one 
 occasion, war was presented to her in its sterner 
 aspect. Domremy was taken possession of by a 
 troop of the adverse party, and the inhabitants 
 fled to a neighbouring town with so much of 
 their property as they could carry with them. 
 When they returned, .the church was a ruin ; 
 the enemy had burnt it ; and from that hour, 
 doubtless, rebellion would be associated with 
 sacrilege in the mind of Joan, and the religious 
 sentiment, which coloured her whole life, would 
 be yet more closely blended with devotion to 
 her Prince. 
 
 Joan's With scenes like these before her eyes, 
 
 voices. J oan grew up serious and thoughtful 
 beyond her years. When she was thirteen she 
 began to hear what she called her " Voices. " 
 These, we are sure, were but the whispers of her 
 own excited fancy ; but to her they seemed as 
 real as if some heavenly messenger had stood 
 visibly by her side. With her fervent religious 
 feelings there were mingled thoughts of her 
 unhappy country, and earnest longings for its 
 rescue. A prophecy had become current that 
 France was to be saved by a woman, as it 
 had been ruined by a woman ; and her solitary 
 musings, doubtless, began to shape themselves 
 
JOAN OF ARC. 11 
 
 into some vague, dreamy hopes that she might be 
 called to this glorious work. At any rate, strange 
 as the phenomenon may seem, and assured as 
 we are that she was no inspired prophetess, 
 but a mistaken enthusiast, to her statements, so 
 far as they describe her own convictions, we 
 give implicit belief. Too simple to construct a 
 plot, she was also too good to attempt decep- 
 tion; for, amidst all that was superstitious in 
 her devotions, there was yet the trusting faith 
 and love of a sincere Christian. We grieve per- 
 petually, as we follow one so pure and single- 
 hearted, to find the debasing element of Roman 
 Catholic worship mixing itself with her holiest 
 thoughts and feelings. Gladly would we hear 
 less of the Virgin, and St. Margaret, and St. Ca- 
 therine. But while she believed what her priest 
 had taught her, we cannot doubt, looking at her 
 meekness, her charity, her religious zeal, her noble 
 self-devotion, that she had that better teaching 
 which is vouchsafed to the humble, and that 
 she served God, in her strange eventful course, 
 according to her light. 
 
 Joan's own account was as follows. She was 
 in her father's garden, on a summer's day, at noon. 
 She had fasted on the preceding day. She heard 
 something on her right side, towards the church. 
 
12 JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 and a dazzling light accompanied the sound. She 
 was frightened at first, but still thought it was 
 a good voice, and that it came from God. It 
 charged her to be a good girl and go to church ; 
 and when she had heard it thrice, she made sure 
 it was an angel speaking to her. Then, or shortly 
 afterwards, St. Michael stood visibly before her, 
 and a crowd of angelic messengers were about 
 him. " I saw them," she said, when closely- 
 pressed at Rouen, " with my bodily eyes as 
 plainly as I see you ; and when they left me, I 
 wept, and longed that they would take me away 
 too." St. Margaret and St. Catherine were her 
 visitants at another time, and they had rich and 
 beautiful crowns upon their heads. Two and 
 three times a week she saw the visions, or heard 
 the voices. Then came messages as to her own 
 calling and future destiny. She must not stay 
 where she was, but must go to France, — that 
 being the name by which the provinces forming 
 the crown domain were specially designated. She 
 would carry succours to her prince, and help him 
 to recover his kingdom. She must go to Van- 
 couleurs, and seek out Robert de Baudricourt, who 
 commanded there, and he would give her some 
 men to go with her. * But I am a poor girl," 
 was her answer ; a I know not how to ride, or to 
 
JOAN OF ARC. 13 
 
 lead troops to battle." " Thou shalt go to Mon- 
 sieur de Baudricourt, captain of Vancouleurs," 
 was the reply, " and he will take thee before the 
 King." 
 
 During this period the maid was living alone in 
 the world of her own pure thoughts and excited 
 feelings. Providence seemed to be pointing out 
 some path of heroic enterprise in which she was to 
 walk, and the more steadily she looked at it, the 
 more her gentle nature shrank from the first step 
 of her fated journey. No creature was in her 
 confidence. Her inward convictions grew in in- 
 tensity and strength; but, as she felt herself to 
 be chosen of God to work out the deliverance of 
 France, it became her to watch most carefully 
 lest by any indiscretion she should commit herself 
 too soon. She did not consult with the priest, 
 she says, for fear her secret should get abroad, and 
 the Burgundians might hear of it, and make her 
 journey to the prince impossible. She did not 
 breathe it to her parents ; for her father, she was 
 sure, would never permit her to depart on such a 
 mission. His suspicions had been excited some- 
 how, — possibly by the interest which Joan must 
 necessarily have taken in the events of the war, — 
 by questions, it may be, from which she could not 
 refrain when a stray soldier, or some traveller from 
 
 *B 7 
 
14 JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 a distance, passed through the quiet village of 
 Doinremy; at any rate, he had dreamed that 
 Joan would go along with the soldiers some day; 
 and this was reported by her mother, with the 
 addition that he had said afterwards to her bro- 
 thers, * f If I thought this girl of mine would ever 
 come to that, I would let you drown her ; and if 
 you would not do it, I would drown her myself." 
 Amid perplexities and mental conflicts which such 
 circumstances would necessarily occasion to a 
 person intent only on doing right, Joan reached 
 her seventeenth year. The fair city of Orleans, 
 the last hope of France, was pressed more and 
 more closely by the English armies. To save 
 the kingdom, and to settle its rightful prince se- 
 curely on the throne, became the passionate wish 
 of Joan's heart, to which every other feeling was 
 subordinate. The voices became more explicit. 
 Two things she was commissioned to do, and God 
 and His saints would help her till they were done. 
 She was to raise the siege of Orleans, and she was 
 to conduct the Dauphin to Rheims to receive the 
 crown of his ancestors. 
 
 Something must be done in obedience 
 
 Visit to ° 
 
 Vancou- to these commands, and if no assist- 
 ance can be got from her nearest friends, 
 she must seek advisers elsewhere. It chanced 
 
JOAN OF ARC. 15 
 
 that a brother of her mother's lived between 
 Domremy and Vancouleurs; so she contrived 
 a visit to him, told him of the necessity that 
 was laid upon her to begin her work, and 
 begged him to assist her so far as to announce 
 her mission to Baudricourt, who was to set her 
 forward on her journey. Her earnestness and 
 importunity prevailed ; honest Durand Laxart 
 was the first believer in her mission ; and to Van- 
 couleurs accordingly he went, and reported to 
 the captain all he had heard from Joan of her 
 visions, hopes and projects. "Box the girl's 
 ears, and send her home," was the warrior's reply.* 
 Joan, nothing daunted by this repulse, made her 
 way to the town, and told her own tale to Bau- 
 dricourt. At first she fared no better than her 
 uncle ; the old soldier had no mind to listen to 
 the dreams of a peasant girl, and thought that, 
 if France was to be saved, it must be by wiser 
 heads and stronger arms. But having taken the 
 first step, the Maid was proof against all discou- 
 ragement. She took lodgings in the town, and 
 talked freely of her mission to all comers. Whole 
 days were passed at church ; and her pure simple 
 manners, coupled with the fervour of her devo- 
 
 * See NOTE (D). 
 
16 JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 tions, commended her to many among the crowd. 
 A gentleman, named Jean de Metz, met her in 
 the street, and accosted her thus : " What is your 
 business here, my child ? We must make up our 
 minds to see the king hunted from his kingdom, 
 and must then turn English ourselves." We 
 have her answer on record ; he swore to it in 
 after years, and the words, we are sure, were the 
 very echo of her thoughts at this crisis of her 
 history ; — " Ah ! the Sire de Baudricourt does 
 not heed me, or care for what I tell him ; and 
 yet I must be with the Dauphin before Mid-lent, 
 though to reach him I should wear my legs 
 through to my knees ; for no one else in the world, 
 neither king nor duke, can recover this realm of 
 France. There is no help for it but in me. And 
 yet I would rather stay at home, and spin by my 
 poor mother's side, for this is no work for me. 
 But go I must, and do what I say ; for my Lord 
 so wills it." " And who is your Lord ? " asked 
 the gentleman. " God," she replied. Her 
 words sounded like the voice of inspiration to 
 the astonished enquirer ; and he promised, that 
 very hour, that he would conduct her to the 
 King. 
 
 Joan's fame, it seems, had reached the Duke of 
 Lorraine, who was then suffering from illness. 
 
JOAN OF ARC. 17 
 
 A person of her pretensions, he thought, might 
 
 effect a cure which his physicians had , , 
 
 Joan s so- 
 attempted in vain, and he sent for her briety and 
 
 accordingly. She answered that she 
 had no light from heaven upon that matter; 
 but charged him, as a Christian man, to put 
 away his mistress and take back his wife. Let 
 him help her to the Dauphin, she added, for 
 her mission was to him, and him only ; and then 
 she would thank him, and pray for his re- 
 covery. This anecdote is worth preserving as 
 a specimen of the Maid's perfect truthfulness and 
 simplicity. She could never be seduced to pre- 
 tend to powers which she had not. Even to win 
 a powerful friend at that particular time she 
 would not tamper with her mission. A troop of 
 horse to guard her, and a letter from a great 
 prince of France to ensure an audience with the 
 King, she would gladly have bought at any price. 
 Had she parleyed with the Duke, and given him 
 some pretended charm, she might probably have 
 been far upon her journey in a day. But God, 
 she always said, had not spoken to her on matters 
 of that sort. She had received from Him no gifts 
 of healing. In one character, and in one only, did 
 she ever pretend to be exalted above the crowd ; 
 and no solicitations from princes or from meaner 
 c 
 
18 JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 men could induce her to wander a step beyond the 
 path which she supposed to be marked out for her. 
 Baudricourt, it is said, had communicated in 
 the meantime with the Court, and had the royal 
 permission to send on the Maid. At the command 
 of her Voices she now assumed male apparel, 
 and wore it ever afterwards. The captain gave 
 her a sword for a parting present, but distrusted 
 her too much to advance money for her journey. 
 Among the people some were found more hopeful 
 or more generous, who subscribed sixteen francs 
 for the purchase of a horse ; and, thus provided, 
 she began her journey of a hundred and fifty 
 leagues. Jean de Metz, and another gentleman 
 of kindred spirit, bore her company, with two 
 attendants and two men-at-arms. 
 Journey to -^ was m tne mon th of February, 
 Chinon. 1429? that this little party rode out 
 of Yancouleurs. Some months, therefore, had 
 elapsed since Joan's first visit to Baudricourt, 
 which took place about Ascension Day in the 
 preceding year. In the interval, it seems, she 
 had been at home for a while, and afterwards re- 
 turned to her uncle. The parting with her 
 parents took place, not at Domremy, but at 
 Yancouleurs. They pursued her thither, when 
 the news of her intended journey reached them, 
 and were " almost out of their senses," she says, 
 
JOAN OF ARC. 19 
 
 when they found that prayers and tears could 
 not turn her from her purpose. This would 
 be a sad parting, and a sore conflict, for one 
 like Joan; but One Yoice was to her more 
 authoritative and commanding than those which 
 she had obeyed from childhood; and no pro- 
 phet ever felt more sure of his mission than 
 she did when she took this work in hand. Her 
 judges, on her trial, were sensitively alive to this 
 breach of filial duty, and asked her whether she 
 had done well to leave her parents against their 
 will. She answered that in all things else she 
 gave them reverence, and even for this act, which 
 displeased them once, she had received their 
 pardon. " But did you not sin in doing as you 
 did ? " she was asked again. " When God com- 
 manded," was her simple and pertinent reply, 
 " it was right for me to do it. When God bade 
 me, if I had had a hundred fathers and mothers, 
 and had been a king's daughter, I would, never- 
 theless, have left my home." 
 
 The journey, besides being long and toilsome, 
 had difficulties and perils of its own. The greater 
 part of it lay through country possessed by the 
 enemy, or made unsafe by the disorders which 
 follow in the train of war. English troops had 
 to be escaped, and French brigands. High roads 
 c 2 
 
20 JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 tv ere avoided as much as possible. Rivers were 
 forded at one time, and thick forests were tra- 
 versed at another. Joan never lost heart. Toils 
 and dangers went for nothing now that her great 
 end was gained. Her only trouble was that the 
 men pushed on too fast, and would not let her 
 stop for mass at every town they came to. Still 
 her Voices were with her, and blessed her 
 journey. " God cleared her way for her," — " her 
 brothers of Paradise told her what to do," — were 
 the comfortable sayings with which she cheered 
 her own spirit, and tried to sustain the hopes of 
 her companions. Many, however, by their own 
 confession, were their doubts and misgivings as 
 they travelled onward. More than once the 
 thought entered their minds that Joan was a 
 witch, who might lawfully be made away with ; 
 but, then, what agent of darkness could be so 
 clothed with purity? who but a saint of God 
 could be always ready for devotion ? 
 
 Charles was at Chinon, between 
 
 Interview 
 
 with the Tours and Saumur, in the valley of 
 the Loire. The party halted a few 
 leagues from that place, and, having announced 
 their object, waited the King's permission to 
 go forward. This was readily granted. Recent 
 disasters, especially the battle of Herrings, 
 fought just as Joan had left Vancouleurs, 
 
JOAN or ARC. 21 
 
 made the situation of the Royalists yet more 
 desperate, and strange remedies might well be 
 tried when the emergency was so fearful. After 
 three days she was admitted to the royal presence, 
 singled out Charles at a glance from the crowd 
 of courtiers, and embracing his knees, announced 
 herself as " Joan, the Maid," sent by Heaven to 
 succour him and his kingdom. "Most noble 
 Dauphin," she added, " God sends you word by 
 me that you shall be consecrated and crowned at 
 Rheims ; and you shall be the Lieutenant of the 
 King of Heaven, who is the King of France." 
 Her solemn asseverations, in God's name, that 
 Charles was the true heir of France, that the 
 crown was his by right, and that God would give 
 it him, seem to have chimed in with the train of 
 his own thoughts ; for he had been discouraged 
 by a long tide of evil fortune, and had connected 
 them with the suspicions which hung about his 
 birth. The words which Joan chanced to use re- 
 assured him upon this point, and made him more 
 willing to receive her as a prophetess. Still 
 hope and fear were mixed together in the minds 
 of the men of that age, when any person of su- 
 pernatural pretensions claimed . a hearing. He 
 might come from heaven or from hell ; and if 
 it were a lying spirit that spoke by him, then 
 c 3 
 
22 JOAN OP ARC. 
 
 guilt would be contracted and loss incurred by 
 those who believed the revelation. Churchmen 
 must settle this question : it was too profound for 
 any but holy and learned men who could inter- 
 pret the will of Heaven with something of au- 
 thority. 
 
 Examination S° the Maid was carried to Poitiers, 
 at Poitiers. wnere there was a famous university ; 
 and priests and monks and doctors of theology 
 plied her with hard questions, which were answered 
 with admirable promptitude and discretion. All 
 that fell from her, says an old chronicle, was spoken 
 " grandement et notablement, though in all things 
 else she seemed the simplest shepherd-girl that you 
 could see anywhere." She told her story with simple 
 dignity. Her Voices, — the Saints, — Michael, the 
 Archangel, — the Lord Himself, — had bidden her 
 to go to Orleans, and had promised that, when the 
 enemy was driven from thence, she should lead 
 the Dauphin to Rheims, to receive the crown of 
 France. From this story she never varied: at 
 Vancouleurs, at Chinon, at Poitiers, she claimed 
 to be a prophetess to this extent and no more ; 
 her credit was staked on the accomplishment of 
 these two predictions ; yet, when they were ut- 
 tered, Orleans was all but lost, and between that 
 place and Rheims there was not a single fortified 
 place held by the King's troops. In vain the 
 
JOAN OF ARC. 23 
 
 doctors multiplied their interrogations, and tried 
 her with new tests ; in vain, one after the other, 
 they quoted to her wise saws, and explained their 
 doubts with much parade of learning. " There 
 is more in God's books than in yours," she told 
 them : " I don't know A or B, but I come on be- 
 half of the King of Heaven, and my business is 
 to raise the siege of Orleans, and to crown the 
 King at Rheims." " But what need is there for 
 men-at-arms ? " they said ; " if God will deliver 
 France, He can do it of His own will." " The 
 men will fight," she answered, "and God will give 
 them victory." They demanded some proof that 
 God had spoken by her: without a sign the 
 King's troops must not be endangered. " Alas ! 
 it is not at Poitiers," was the Maid's reply, "that 
 I am to show you signs ; give me soldiers, be they 
 few or many, and lead me to Orleans, and there 
 you shall have signs that will prove my words." 
 
 The decision of the theologians left T ^' 
 
 & J oan s ser- 
 
 the King free to employ the service s vices ac " 
 of Joan. They reported her faith to 
 be sound, and her reputation without a stain. Her 
 words were those of a good Christian, and her 
 manner of life was holy and devout. So she 
 had a body-guard assigned to her, including 
 a brave knight of mature age, a page of noble 
 c 4 
 
24 JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 birth, and six men of meaner rank, one of 
 whom was a brother of her own. Under the 
 direction of her Voices she had a white ban- 
 ner prepared, which figures largely in her history. 
 This she loved " forty times more than her sword ;" 
 for her mission, she maintained all through, 
 was not to kill, but to lead brave men to battle, 
 and to cheer them on in God's name. The ban- 
 ner had a white ground besprinkled with the lilies 
 of France : the Saviour, too, was pictured upon 
 it, holding the world in His hands, with attendant 
 angels, while the words " Jesus, Maria," in legi- 
 ble characters, declared to friends and foes in 
 whose name she fought. 
 
 Meanwhile the reputation of the Maid was 
 spreading far and wide. It had already reached 
 Orleans, and greatly encouraged Dunois, who was 
 in command there, and was sorely pressed by the 
 besiegers. The admiration of the common people 
 was raised to enthusiasm by her look of modesty 
 and words of gentleness, coupled with her assumed 
 character and saintly reputation. Even rude war- 
 riors, whom long years of irregular warfare had 
 hardened and corrupted, could not resist her influ- 
 ence. She would have none enrolled among her 
 troop who had not first confessed themselves. 
 Men, to whom cursing had become like their 
 
JOAN OF ARC. 25 
 
 mother-tongue, restrained themselves in her pre- 
 sence ; and the licence and disorder of the camp 
 were checked by her indignant rebukes. Levies 
 went on in the meantime, and an army for the 
 relief of Orleans began to muster at Blois. Six 
 thousand men were assembled by the middle of 
 April ; and when the Maid gave them a meet- 
 ing there, in white armour, with her head un- 
 covered, seated on a black charger which she 
 managed with graceful ease, the past misfortunes 
 of France were forgotten ; the hearts of men and 
 officers beat high with hope, and they made sure, 
 like herself, of coming victory. 
 
 From Blois Joan wrote, or rather Letter to 
 
 the English 
 
 dictated, a letter to the English gene- commanders. 
 rals, charging them in God's name to 
 save bloodshed by retiring peaceably to their 
 own country. War had no delights for her, 
 and she would neither fight herself, nor en- 
 courage others to fight, till the stern necessity 
 was forced upon her. The letter has something 
 of the "heroic style" about it, as Michelet says, 
 mingled with a " French vivacity" which reminds 
 him of Henry IVth. One thing is quite plain, — 
 its simplicity marks it for her own ; and it is inter- 
 esting to see how the enduring records of her 
 story coincide with the reports which reach us 
 
26 JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 from so many witnesses of her words and deeds. 
 " King of England," she writes, "and you, Duke 
 of Bedford, calling yourself Regent of the king- 
 dom of France, render up to the Maid*, who is 
 sent hither by God the King of Heaven, the keys 
 of all the good towns of France which you have 
 taken and plundered. . . . And as for you, archers 
 and men-of-war, of gentle blood or otherwise, 
 before the town of Orleans, get you gone to your 
 own country ; and if you fail to do so, then hear 
 what I have to tell you of the Maid, who will 
 come presently to do you hurt. King of England, 
 if you won't do this, I am chief commander (chef 
 de guerre), and wherever I shall find your people 
 in France, I will make them go, whether they 
 will or no ; and if they refuse, I will have them 
 all killed. I am sent here by God, the King of 
 Heaven, to meet you bodily, and put you out of 
 France. If they will do this that I tell them, I 
 will show them mercy. Do not think, then, that 
 you shall hold this kingdom of France. I call 
 God to witness, the King of Heaven, the Son of 
 
 * This does not sound in Joan's usual strain. Other 
 words, it seems, were substituted for her own. When 
 charged upon her trial with having used language too as- 
 suming, she defended herself by saying her scribes were in 
 fault. " I said, Restore to the King ; they wrote, Restore 
 to the Maid:' 
 
JOAN OF ARC. 27 
 
 the Holy Virgin, Charles, the true heir, shall have 
 it. This is revealed to him by the Maid, and he 
 shall enter Paris, and many a good companion 
 with him." 
 
 The English, as might be expected, poured 
 scorn upon this summons, and it became necessary 
 for the Maid to do more than send words of defi- 
 ance against the enemy. Her first adventure in 
 war was to accompany a convoy of provisions 
 which had been collected at Blois, and was intended 
 for the relief of Orleans. The complete success 
 of the expedition, coupled with the rumours which 
 had preceded her coming, had its effect both on 
 friends and foes. She had proclaimed herself chef 
 de guerre to the English generals, and, acting in obe- 
 dience to her Voices, she began at once to assume 
 the tone of command. Dunois, the brave com- 
 mander of the garrison, gave her a meeting on the 
 banks of the Loire, as the party approached the 
 city ; and to him she complained that the leaders 
 of her party had gone against her orders, and kept 
 the South side of the river, where the enemy was 
 in least force. " I had so advised them," said the 
 general, " and my most skilful officers did the 
 same." " But the counsel of my Lord," she an- 
 swered, " is wiser than that of men. You thought 
 to deceive me ; but you are deceived yourselves, 
 
28 JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 for I bring you the best help that was ever given 
 to knight or city. It is given not for any love of 
 me, but out of God's pure goodness, who has lis- 
 tened to Saint Louis and Saint Charlemagne, and 
 had pity on this town." 
 
 Entry into It was night when Joan entered Or- 
 A^riTIg l eans > but the whole city was astir, and 
 142 9. its people came forth in crowds to wel- 
 come their deliverer. Men of war marched by 
 her side, and plenty came in her train; so no wonder 
 that to the half- famished inhabitants, radiant as she 
 was with youth and hope, she seemed like an angel 
 from heaven. Women nocked about her to touch 
 her garments, her charger, or her white standard ; 
 but to all of them she spoke with her sweet, 
 modest air, and gentle tones, bidding them hope 
 in God, and not in any human instrument. After 
 her day's march she would not retire to rest till 
 she had committed herself and her countrymen 
 to the Divine protection ; so she led the way to 
 the cathedral, and there " Te Deum" was chanted 
 by torchlight. 
 
 The Maid's presence completely altered the 
 position of affairs before a single blow was struck. 
 For weeks past, rumour had been busy with her 
 name, and a mingled tale of truth and fiction was 
 sure to reach the English camp. Vague alarms 
 
JOAN OF ARC. 29 
 
 began to take possession of the minds of the 
 soldiery, and damped their zeal and courage. 
 " Two hundred English skirmishers would have 
 chased five hundred French but lately," says the 
 old chronicle, recounting the change of feeling in 
 the two parties ; " and now two hundred of the 
 last would have been more than a match for four 
 hundred English." The leaders disguised their 
 apprehensions, but were no longer eager for battle ; 
 so five days after the arrival of the first convoy, 
 a second, with a larger force and a more abundant 
 supply, came in from Blois, and Suffolk kept his 
 men close within their forts, while an armed 
 troop, headed by Dunois and the Maid, joined 
 their friends outside, and carried them trium- 
 phantly within the walls. 
 
 The same afternoon, Joan saw fight- 
 ing for the first time, and did her part first fight, 
 as bravely as if war had been her ay 4 * 
 trade. Not anticipating that there would be any 
 occasion for her services before the morrow, 
 she had retired to her lodging for an hour's re- 
 pose. While she slept, a portion of the army, 
 accompanied by a goodly company of towns- 
 people, flushed with their recent successes, made 
 an unpremeditated sally, and pushed on to one 
 of the principal English forts, called St. Loup. 
 
30 JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 There, however, the besiegers met them in 
 considerable force, and the attacking party, 
 being weak and ill-commanded, were soon re- 
 pulsed. Presently the Maid was in the street*, 
 riding full gallop over the stone pavement, " so 
 that the sparks flew about her." Her Voices had 
 roused her, she said ; her Voices guided her to 
 the place of combat ; her Lord had told her all. 
 Certain it is that she had started suddenly from 
 her bed, had called for her squire, and armed 
 herself in haste; then, complaining that the 
 blood of France was being shed and they never 
 told her of it, made her way straight to the gate 
 of Burgundy. There she met her routed country- 
 men, followed closely by their pursuers ; but her 
 white standard, borne aloft, became a rallying- 
 point for the fugitives. Their courage revived ; 
 the tide of battle was presently turned ; and the 
 contest was renewed within the English lines. 
 The Maid was in the thickest of the fight, and 
 neither Dunois, who had joined her as she issued 
 from the city, nor the bravest captain among his 
 followers, showed themselves more cool and self- 
 possessed in the face of danger. Before the day 
 was over, the great bastille was won, with a loss 
 to the English of eight hundred men. The story 
 
 * See NOTE (E). 
 
JOAN OF ARC. 31 
 
 was current in Orleans that not a Frenchman had 
 been wounded after Joan led the attack ; and, 
 true or false, rumours of this sort were readily 
 believed, and raised the popular enthusiasm to 
 the highest pitch. The besiegers, on the other 
 hand, after the events of that day, could no 
 longer affect to despise the Maid. Their troops 
 were beaten and disgraced ; the spell of victory 
 was broken. They mocked her, and called her 
 foul names, when presently afterwards she stood 
 beneath one of their great towers, and bade 
 them depart in God's name ; but really their 
 hearts began to melt within them, and the panic 
 was such throughout their camp that the leaders 
 were completely bewildered, and knew not what 
 to decide as to their future course. 
 
 A brief interval was given them ; for the day 
 which followed these events was the Feast of the 
 Ascension, and most religiously was it kept by 
 the good citizens of Orleans. Its churches re- 
 sounded with mingled cries of thanksgiving and 
 supplication, Joan setting the example, and 
 charging her companions at arms to prepare for 
 what God might send them, by repentance and 
 confession. But the next day, Friday, 
 
 J ' J May 6. 
 
 saw the fighting renewed. Contrary to 
 
 the Maid's advice, it was resolved to attempt the 
 
32 JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 fortifications on the left bank of the Loire, where 
 the enemy was weakest. For this purpose, the 
 attacking party, headed by Joan and the principal 
 officers, went down the river in boats, and took 
 up their position on a little island separated by 
 two boats' length from the shore. One of the 
 forts, or bastilles, as they were called, was speedily 
 surrendered by the English ; and the French com- 
 manders, contented with this success, were draw- 
 ing off their troops, when the besiegers, having 
 the advantage of numbers, became assailants in 
 their turn, and pursued their enemies to the river 
 side. In the insolence of triumph, it seems, they 
 called after the Maid, and applied to her some 
 scornful epithets ; but as soon as she could dis- 
 engage herself from the rout, she faced round, 
 and put their courage to the proof. The white 
 standard was again displayed ; the voice of com- 
 mand again arrested the flying host. Joan herself 
 advanced " a grand pas" against the enemy, and 
 " the question now was which of her countrymen 
 should best keep pace with her." In the fervour 
 of the moment, all danger was forgotten; no 
 account was taken of disparity of numbers ; the 
 principal bastille, in which the English had con- 
 centrated their forces, was stormed and taken ; 
 and the conquerors took up their position for the 
 
JOAN OF ARC. 33 
 
 night before the last stronghold of the enemy 
 which remained to them on the southern bank of 
 the Loire. Joan, who had fasted all day (it was 
 Friday), and who had received a slight wound in 
 her foot, was persuaded with difficulty to return 
 to the city, and take a night's rest at her lodgings. 
 
 The next day, the 7th of May, T , 
 
 J J Last sortie 
 
 was yet more glorious for the Maid from Orleans 
 and France. Seven only had passed 
 since she entered Orleans, and already she began 
 to be impatient that the enemy were beneath its 
 walls. They were still in strength on the right 
 bank, and, while that was the case, the generals 
 were unwilling to make any serious attack on the 
 remaining bastille, called Les Tournelles. They 
 would wait for reinforcements which could now 
 be poured in without difficulty, and then they 
 would have troops enough to storm the enemy's 
 forts without leaving the city more defenceless 
 than prudence would warrant. When this deci- 
 sion was announced to Joan, she answered, " You 
 have been to your council, and I have been to 
 mine. Be sure that my Lord's design will come 
 to pass, and that of men will come to nought." " I 
 shall have much to do to-morrow," she added, — 
 " more than I have done yet. I shall be wounded, 
 and lose blood. We must be ready betimes in 
 
 D 
 
JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 the morning." So at sun-rise she presented herself 
 at the gate of Burgundy, and demanded to be let 
 out that she might complete the work which had 
 been so well begun on the previous day. The 
 officer, who kept guard there, did not recognise 
 the Maid as chef de guerre, and refused to obey 
 her orders. " You are a bad man," she said, 
 " but whether you choose or not, the men-at-arms 
 shall come out, and shall be conquerors to-day, as 
 they have been before." A crowd collected, and 
 the people were on her side ; so the soldier was 
 obliged to yield to their threats, and the Maid 
 went forth, followed by a mingled crowd of sol- 
 diers and townsmen. They rushed tumultously 
 to the boats, crossed the river, and began, with 
 more of courage than of skill, to assail the for- 
 midable bulwark of which the besiegers still kept 
 possession. Dunois, and his captains, were too 
 generous not to second the Maid when they found 
 the attack was well begun ; so they followed in 
 her track, and fought gallantly by her side. On 
 the opposite bank of the Loire were some of 
 England's best captains, Suffolk, Talbot, Fastolf, 
 and others ; but their men would not stir against 
 " the sorceress ; " dismay had spread through 
 their ranks and turned brave men to cowards; 
 go they looked on in silence, while Gladsdale 
 
JOAN OF AEC. 35 
 
 and his company of five hundred, the flower of 
 the English army, defended their post with heroic 
 bravery. 
 
 Joan was always for rapid onsets and easy 
 triumphs. Delays did not enter into her reckon- 
 ing. Prolonged resistance seemed almost like 
 defiance of the will of heaven. When the fighting 
 had lasted for many hours, and her friends were 
 suffering severely from the English archers and 
 artillery, she seized a scaling ladder, jumped into 
 the ditch, and was in the act of mounting, when 
 an arrow struck her between the neck and the 
 shoulder, and, piercing the flesh, showed its point 
 some inches beyond the wound. The Maid was 
 frightened in the first instance, and shed tears ; 
 but she soon recovered herself, saying that she 
 had seen her saints, extracted the arrow with her 
 own hands, had the wound hastily dressed, and 
 was able to remount her horse. The day, how- 
 ever, wore on; the French were dispirited, and 
 Dunois was for sounding a retreat. u Wait 
 awhile," cried Joan ; "we shall enter presently ; 
 let your people rest, and give them something to 
 eat and drink." For herself, she retired to pray ; 
 and then, assured of victory, gave orders for a 
 fresh assault. Presently Joan, whom the English 
 had seen struck down and carried away, was be- 
 D 2 
 
36 JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 neath the walls, cheering on her friends ; and as 
 night drew near, the enemy were wearied and 
 disheartened. Then came a fresh body of assail- 
 ants from the town, and, crossing a broken bridge 
 on planks, attacked the fort on the side which had 
 been supposed impregnable. Resistance grew 
 fainter ; Gladsdale and his bravest followers were 
 among the slain; and at last, after a desperate 
 day's fighting, when two hundred only of the 
 defenders survived, the fort was carried. 
 
 Joan's return to the city was a march of 
 triumph. The victory was decisive, and the 
 credit of it, in the judgment of her countrymen, 
 was all hers. Every thing had gone well since 
 she entered Orleans. The city had a store of 
 provisions ; the enemy was panic-struck ; fortifi- 
 cations, which it had taken the enemy months to 
 construct, had been destroyed or captured in as 
 many days. The Maid, nothing elated by these 
 brilliant successes, gave God the glory. Again 
 the aisles of the old Cathedral sounded with the 
 midnight hymn of praise ; and they, who had 
 joined in the same act of worship but eight days 
 before, would muse, in solemn thankfulness, upon 
 the strange course of events by which the Maid's 
 promises had been all fulfilled, and their own hopes 
 surpassed. 
 
JOAN OF ARC. 37 
 
 Then came the concluding scene of _ . 
 
 ° The siege 
 
 this marvellous story. While the church raised. 
 
 bells in Orleans were ringing their peal 
 of rejoicing through the night, the English leaders 
 were in council, and the resolve was taken to 
 raise the siege. To cover the shame of their 
 defeat they determined to offer battle first; so 
 when the morning came, they drew up in line 
 beneath the city walls. The French captains 
 would have accepted the challenge, but Joan for- 
 bade it. It was Sunday, the 8 th of May. " For 
 the love of God, and the honour of his blessed 
 day," she cried, " do not begin the battle. It is 
 the good pleasure of God to let them depart, if 
 they will. Should they attack you, defend your- 
 selves with all your might, and you shall be 
 masters.'' Then, while the enemy retired in good 
 order, the townsmen from the walls watching 
 their retreat, and blessing themselves that their 
 good city was safe and free, the Maid had an 
 altar prepared, and mass was celebrated in the 
 open air, and priests were gathered from the 
 churches to chant their hymn of victory. 
 
 Half, then, of Joan's mission was accomplished. 
 Had her advice been followed, it is probable that 
 a fortnight, instead of two months, would have 
 sufficed for the other half. The troops, who 
 
 D 3 
 
38 JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 turned their backs on Orleans were in no fighting 
 humour ; and, on the other hand, the newly-kin- 
 dled enthusiasm of the French was likely to spread 
 further and wider, if no time were given for it to 
 cool. The Maid pressed an instant march to 
 Rheiins, and "her heroic folly," says Michelet, 
 " was the height of wisdom." " Come, gentle 
 Dauphin," was her entreaty to the King at Tours, 
 a few days afterwards, " come and receive your 
 noble crown at Rheims. I am greatly pressed 
 that you should go there. Do not doubt that 
 you shall be anointed as you ought to be." 
 Battle of Pa- But °t ner counsellors prevailed. The 
 taj. June 18. g r0 und must be cleared as they went 
 along ; the enemy must be driven from the for- 
 tresses which lined the banks of the Loire ; all 
 must be done prudently where so much was at 
 stake. Joan was vexed and grieved, but still 
 remained with the army, and did her best for 
 France. Some weeks were spent in inarches and 
 sieges, during which period some places were 
 gained, and nothing lost; but on the 18th of 
 June, the English commanders, Talbot and Fas- 
 tolf, having united their forces, gave battle near 
 the village of Patay, and sustained a decisive 
 defeat. " Shall we fight, Joan ? " the Duke of 
 Alencon had asked, when he saw the English 
 
JOAN OF ARC. 39 
 
 drawn tip for action. " Have you some good 
 spurs?" was her reply. "Shall we have to fly 
 then ? " said the general. " Oh no," answered 
 the Maid ; " in the name of God, go at them ; for 
 they will be routed and fly as fast as they can ; 
 and you will want spurs to follow them." Her 
 words came true. The English fought like men 
 under a spell. Captains, whose names had been 
 a terror to France, fled in terror from the field. 
 Talbot was taken prisoner, and two thousand of 
 his soldiers were slain. England had seen no 
 such day since she first laid claim to France nearly 
 a century before. 
 
 The story of the month which followed j^^ t0 
 the victory of Patay is admirably told by Rheims. 
 Michelet. It seems fitting that a Frenchman should 
 describe the burst of enthusiasm which carried 
 Charles triumphantly to Rheims, and re-inaugu- 
 rated the monarchy within its stately Cathedral. 
 We shall, therefore, prefer his rapid sketch and 
 glowing words to any tamer version of our own. 
 
 " It was now or never the time to venture on 
 the expedition to Rheims. The politicians wanted 
 to remain still on the Loire, and make sure of 
 Cosne and La Charite ; but this time they talked 
 in vain ; no timid counsels could now be listened 
 to. Every day brought people flocking in from 
 
 D 4 
 
40 JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 all the provinces, attracted by the fame of the 
 Maid's miracles, and believing only in her, and in 
 her purpose forthwith to convey the King to 
 Rheims. There was an irresistible outburst of 
 the pilgrim and crusading spirit. The indolent 
 young King himself at last yielded to the popular 
 flood, and suffered himself to be borne along by 
 that vast tide that set in towards the north ; 
 and off they started all together, willingly or 
 perforce, King and courtiers, — the politic and the 
 enthusiastic, — the mad men and wise men. They 
 were twelve thousand when they began their 
 march, but their numbers augmented continually 
 as they advanced ; every hour brought them addi- 
 tional strength, and those who had no armour 
 followed the holy expedition in plain doublets, as 
 archers, or sword-and-buckler men, even though 
 they were of gentle blood. 
 
 " The army marched from Gien on the 28th of 
 June without attempting to enter it, that town 
 being in the hands of the Duke of Burgundy, 
 whom there were reasons for treating with favour. 
 Troyes had a mixed garrison of Burgundians and 
 English, who ventured to make a sortie on the 
 first appearance of the royal army. There seemed 
 small chance of storming a town so well guarded, 
 and that, too, without artillery. On the other 
 
JOAN OF ARC. 41 
 
 hand, how was it possible to advance, and leave 
 such a place in their rear? The army was already- 
 suffering from scarcity. Were it not better to 
 return ? The anti-enthusiasts were triumphant. 
 
 " There was one old Armagnac councillor, the 
 president Macon, who was of a contrary opinion, 
 well knowing that, in such an enterprise, prudence 
 was on the side of enthusiasm, and that men must 
 not reason in a popular crusade. 'When the 
 King undertook this march,' he said, e he did it 
 not by reason of the number of his forces or the 
 abundance of his money, nor because the achieve- 
 ment seemed to him possible. He undertook it 
 because Joan told him to advance, and be crowned 
 at Rheims, and that he would encounter little 
 resistance by the way, such being the good 
 pleasure of God.' The Maid then presented her- 
 self at the door of the council room, and assured 
 them they would be able to enter the town in 
 three days. e We would wait six? said the 
 Chancellor, 'if we were sure what you say is 
 true.' * Six ! you shall enter to-morrow.' 
 
 " She seizes her standard; the whole m 
 
 Troyes 
 
 army follow her to the ditch, and they taken. 
 throw into it all they can lay their hands J 
 on, — faggots, doors, tables, rafters, — with such 
 rapidity that the townspeople thought the ditches 
 
42 JOAN OP ARC. 
 
 would very soon disappear altogether. The English 
 began to be dazzled and bewildered as at Orleans, 
 and fancied they saw a cloud of white butterflies 
 fluttering round the magic standard. The burghers, 
 on their part, were in great dread, recollecting 
 that it was in Troyes the treaty had been con- 
 cluded which disinherited Charles VII., and 
 fearing that an example would be made of their 
 town. Already they were taking refuge in the 
 churches, and crying out that the town must 
 surrender. The fighting men, who desired nothing 
 better, parleyed, and obtained leave to depart 
 with what they had. 
 
 " What they had was chiefly prisoners, French- 
 men. Charles the Seventh's councillors, who had 
 drawn up the capitulation, had stipulated nothing 
 with respect to those unfortunate persons. The 
 Maid alone thought of them. When the English 
 marched out with their prisoners in irons, she 
 stood at the gates, and cried out, f In God's name 
 they shall not carry them off.' She stopped them, 
 in fact, and the King paid their ransom. 
 
 " Master of Troyes on the 9th of July, Charles 
 made his entry into Rheirns on the 15th, and was 
 crowned on the 17th. The Archbishop anointed 
 him with oil out of the holy ampulla brought 
 from St. Remi.* In conformity with ancient 
 
JOAN OF AKC. 43 
 
 usage, he was lifted up to his seat by the ecclesi- 
 astical peers, and served by the lay peers, both at 
 the coronation and the banquet. All the ceremo- 
 nies were completed without any omission or 
 abridgment, and Charles was now the true King, 
 and the only King, according to the notions of the 
 times. The English might now crown Henry, if 
 they would ; but that new coronation could never, 
 in the eyes of the two nations, be more than a 
 parody of the other." 
 
 Durino; the ceremonv the Maid stood 
 
 m m Coronation 
 
 near the altar, with her standard in at Rhiems. 
 
 her hand. The gentlemen of the royal J 
 suite supplied, as well as they could, the places 
 of the great peers of France who ought to have 
 been present ; but to Joan every eye was turned. 
 " She, in fact, under God," says the old chronicle, 
 "was the cause of that same crowning, and had 
 gathered that noble assembly ; and if any one had 
 seen her fall upon her knees before the King, and 
 then clasp his legs and kiss his feet, shedding 
 warm tears the while, he must have had his heart 
 moved within him. Many, indeed, could not re- 
 frain from tears, when she said, ( Gentle King, 
 
 * According to the national legend, a dove had brought it 
 from heaven, and it had been used at the coronation of 
 Clovis and all his successors. 
 
44 JOAN OF AEC. 
 
 now is accomplished the pleasure of God, who 
 willed that you should come to Rheims to receive 
 your crown, thereby showing that you are the 
 true King, to whom the kingdom of right 
 belongs.' " 
 
 The Maid had accomplished wonders in war, 
 and now tried the yet harder task of reconciling 
 sworn foes. That day of Jubilee, the memorable 
 Sunday which witnessed the anointing of Charles, 
 was a fit time for earning the blessing of a peace- 
 maker ; so, with characteristic simplicity and 
 hopefulness, she addressed a letter to the Duke 
 of Burgundy in the following terms : — " Mighty 
 and redoubtable Prince, Joan, the Maid, re- 
 quires, in the name of the King of heaven, 
 my sovereign Lord, that the King of France 
 and yourself shall make a good, firm, and last- 
 ing peace. Forgive one another cordially and 
 entirely, as good Christians ought to do ; and 
 if you will go to war, go against the Turk. 
 Prince of Burgundy, I beg and pray and demand 
 of you, as humbly as I may, not to make war any 
 more against the holy kingdom of France, and to 
 command an immediate and speedy retreat to all 
 your people that are in any places or fortresses of 
 the said kingdom. As for the gentleKing of 
 France, he is ready to make peace with you, 
 
JOAN OF ARC. 45 
 
 saving his honour ; so the matter rests with you. 
 And I would have you know, from the King of 
 heaven, my rightful Lord, for your safety and 
 your honour, that you shall not win the battle 
 against loyal Frenchmen, and that all those who 
 war against the said kingdom of France, war 
 against Jesus, King of heaven and all the world, 
 and my rightful Lord. I beg and pray you, as on 
 my knees, not to give battle, nor war against us, 
 you and your people and your subjects ; for take 
 my word for it, whatever number of people you 
 shall bring against us, they shall not have the 
 better of us ; and it will be a great pity that we 
 should have fighting, and that the blood of those 
 who come against us should be shed. I sent 
 letters to you three weeks ago by a herald, that 
 you might be present at the King's coronation, 
 which is to take place this present Sunday, the 
 17th day of July ; but I have had no answer 
 from you, and have heard no news of my herald 
 since. I commend you to God, praying Him, 
 if He pleases, to have you in His keeping, and 
 that He will bring about a happy peace." 
 Not yet, however, were Joan's la- , , 
 
 J oan s purity 
 
 bours at an end. Her country was and longing 
 
 still far away from " a happy peace ;" 
 
 and to the Maid herself it never came. With 
 
46 JOAN OP ARC. 
 
 war and all its frightful evils she was to be con- 
 versant through all her remaining days of liberty. 
 Yet, in the camp, surrounded by rude warriors, 
 whom she found it easier to lead to battle than to 
 restrain from evil, she kept her pure, gentle na- 
 ture unsullied. After all her triumphs and suc- 
 cesses, she had nothing of the soldier spirit kindled 
 within her. She wore a charmed sword, blessed 
 as she thought by St. Catherine, but she seldom 
 used it. When it was necessary for self-preser- 
 vation, she would use the lance which formed the 
 handle of her standard, or a little battle-axe which 
 she carried by her side; but her business, she 
 thought, was not so much to strike and kill, as to 
 show her countrymen the path to victory. Mili- 
 tary licence found no favour in her eyes, and at 
 times, when food was scanty, she preferred denying 
 herself to living on the enemy. Her confessor, 
 Pasquerel, who testified that he verily believed 
 she was sent of God, as she was " full of all 
 the virtues," mentions that she would never touch 
 what had been procured by plunder. For the 
 dying, too, he said, she had a special care, and 
 when life still lingered in some of the enemy, as 
 they lay helpless in the field, would send priests 
 to confess them. After she had given Charles 
 his crown and half his kingdom, instead of loving 
 
joan or ARC. 47 
 
 the strange, unnatural life to which Providence 
 had led her, she was longing to be back again in 
 her cottage home ; and, in the midst of the most 
 exciting scenes, while keeping company with the 
 captains and heroes of France, would talk, like a 
 banished child, of Domremy and her aged parents. 
 " What a good and pious people," she exclaimed 
 one day, shortly after the coronation at Rheims, 
 when a crowd of peasants met the King in one of 
 his marches, with tears of joy, and greeted him 
 with a Te Deum and other hymns of praise, — 
 " what a good and pious people are these ; when 
 my time comes, I should like well to die and be 
 buried here." Where do you suppose that you 
 shall die, and when?" asked Dunois, who rode 
 by her side. She answered that she knew not, 
 that it would be as God should please, and then 
 added, " I have done what my Lord commanded 
 me, which was to raise the siege of Orleans, and 
 to have the gentle King crowned ; and now I 
 wish they would send me back to my father and 
 mother, to look after their sheep and cattle, and 
 do what I was wont to do." * 
 
 * Michelet winds up the chapter from which I have 
 quoted so largely (book. x. chap. 3.) with this anecdote, and 
 describes the conversation as having been held with the 
 King as he first entered Rheims. He refers to Petitot, 
 
48 JOAN OF AEC. 
 
 The men of France, however, would not spare 
 her. Much was to be done before their country 
 could be won back from its invaders, and her pre- 
 sence with the army seemed to be the pledge of 
 certain victory. The risk and the loss were hers, 
 and the gain was all theirs ; but the King's en- 
 treaties were a law to poor Joan, and her own 
 wishes were surrendered to the supposed neces- 
 sities of the kingdom. She went with the army 
 as before ; she was impetuous and fearless as 
 ever; she witnessed the progress of the royal 
 cause with the most intense delight ; but there 
 was no longer the same confidence as when she 
 left Blois to relieve Orleans, or set forward to- 
 wards Rhehns with the crown of France filling 
 her thoughts and dreams. Her Voices were far 
 less express and frequent, it seems, henceforth ; 
 she had a less definite course of action ; she was 
 less clear and resolved in her own mind, and more 
 swayed by the counsels of others. In the last 
 stage of her active career, commencing from this 
 period, she was like a victim going to the sacrifice, 
 and seems to have had many misgivings as to her 
 coming fate. 
 
 vol. viii. p. 206. as his authority. There, however, we find 
 the conversation reported as having been held at another 
 time, and at another place. 
 
JOAN OF ARC. 49 
 
 In the weeks which followed, " the roads grew 
 smooth before the King ; the towns threw open 
 their gates, and lowered their drawbridges." The 
 English, on the other hand, had almost disappeared 
 from the country of which they were lately mas- 
 ters. Paris was still theirs, but their diminished 
 forces made them tremble even for that. Cardinal 
 Beaufort, who then ruled England in the name of 
 Henry VI., came over with reinforcements, and 
 Bedford, thus strengthened, twice offered battle, 
 which Charles declined. At last, while . 
 
 Attempt on 
 
 the English armies were guarding Nor- Paris. Sep- 
 mandy, he made a dash at Paris, hoping '" . 
 
 to carry it by assault ; but his friends in the city 
 were not strong enough to declare themselves, 
 and he met with a repulse which seriously damaged 
 his cause. Unwillingly, it seems, the Maid had 
 advanced beyond St. Denys. This was sacred in 
 her eyes as the place where the kings of France 
 were buried, and, whenever she could, she loved 
 to linger on holy ground. But when it was re- 
 solved to advance, she led the assailing party 
 herself, crossing one ditch, and trying with her 
 lance the depth of a second which was under the 
 very walls. She was near enough to call to the 
 soldiers on the ramparts, and cried out, like one 
 who was speaking with the authority of heaven, 
 
50 JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 " Give up this city to the King of France ; " but 
 they answered her with foul reproaches and a 
 shower of arrows. One of them wounded her in 
 the thigh, and the faithful squire, who carried her 
 standard, was struck down by her side. Still, 
 undaunted by the pain of her wound, and thinking 
 that faith and courage might overcome all obsta- 
 cles, she bade her countrymen cross the deep fosse 
 and scale the high wall, trusting to God's favour 
 and protection. For some time she lay stretched 
 upon the ground, while her friends were in full 
 retreat, and it was not till late at night that the 
 entreaties of the Duke of Aleneon prevailed upon 
 her to return to St. Denys. 
 
 Fifteen hundred men were wounded in this 
 attack ; but, w T hat was far worse, the Maid's name 
 was damaged by defeat, and her promises were 
 less trusted for the future. The assault was made 
 on the 8th of September, which is kept holy by 
 the Roman Catholic Church as the day of the 
 Virgin Mary's Nativity ; and the citizens of Paris 
 were attending high mass when the alarm was 
 given. This fact was turned against her. Ene- 
 mies and friends alike talked of the profanation 
 of the holy season, and said that Joan, by advising 
 or sanctioning it, had brought the wrath of heaven 
 upon the King and his cause. Many were sure 
 
JOAN OF ARC. 51 
 
 to turn against her from jealousy and ill-will; 
 and others, who followed her most blindly, 
 would begin to doubt and waver, as soon as 
 some decided check was given to her career of 
 conquest. In fact, the retreat from Paris seems 
 to have been the first stage in that downward 
 course which terminated in her imprisonment 
 and death. 
 
 She was ennobled, however, before Joan en _ 
 she was disgraced. At Rheims, doubt- nobled. 
 less, on his Coronation day, Charles would have 
 given any honours that she sought. But such 
 prizes as common men covet were nothing to her. 
 Badges and titles of distinction, — broad lands or 
 heaped-up gold, — would have seemed to her cheap 
 as dirt compared with the privilege of having fa- 
 voured the right cause, and helped the King to 
 his throne. So, for months afterwards, she re- 
 mained, simply, " Joan, the Maid," and never 
 desired to be known by any other name to her 
 own age or to posterity. But in December, to 
 lighten his own burden of obligation, the King 
 granted a patent of nobility to Joan herself, her 
 father, mother and brothers. The document 
 recounts the singular goodness of God in sending 
 to him such special favours by the hand of Joan, 
 and " the praiseworthy, most welcome, and most 
 
 £ 2 
 
52 JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 seasonable services which she had rendered to his 
 kingdom, services which he hopes to see continued 
 and enlarged as time shall serve." Wherefore, to 
 commemorate what God hath done, and to give 
 the world a proof of his royal liberality, he wills 
 that she and her near kindred shall rank to all 
 intents and purposes as if they had been nobly 
 born, and that all the rights of nobility, of what 
 kind soever, shall descend after them to their 
 posterity, male and female. At Joan's own re- 
 quest, another favour was granted which she 
 valued at a higher rate, namely, immunity from 
 taxation for her native village. With the no- 
 bility, who lived in a world far away from her 
 own humble sphere, she did not desire to be num- 
 bered ; but it pleased her well to be able to offer 
 some boon to those among whom she had spent 
 her childhood. So in the Collector's books for 
 that particular department, for three centuries 
 afterwards, there appeared no sum opposite Dom- 
 rerny ; but, instead of it, the expressive words, 
 " Nothing, for the Maid's sake." 
 
 T , t . During the winter that followed the 
 Joan s last o 
 
 days of events which we have been describ- 
 liberty. 
 
 ing, the details relating to Joan's 
 
 history are much scantier than we could wish. 
 
 She seems to have spent her time with the army ; 
 
JOAN OF ARC. 53 
 
 but few enterprises of great importance were un- 
 dertaken, and little advantage was gained on 
 either side. We know only that she was un- 
 spoiled. Her piety and simplicity were still the 
 same. She pretended to no knowledge of the 
 future beyond what her Yoices gave her by spe- 
 cial revelation when her country's need seemed to 
 call for it. When women brought her crosses 
 and chaplets to touch, she would answer, " Why 
 not touch them yourselves, good people ; it will 
 do quite as well." For the poor she retained a 
 special kindness, and loved to mingle with children 
 in the country churches who were preparing for 
 their first communion. When she spoke humbly 
 of her work, and some replied that nothing like 
 it had ever been heard before, or even read in 
 books, " My Lord," she answered, " has a book 
 which no clerk can read, be he ever so clerk-like 
 in his learning." 
 
 With the return of Spring, military 
 
 Her capture, 
 operations were renewed with more 
 
 vigour. The town of Compiegne had surrendered 
 in the preceding summer to the King, and was 
 now attacked by the Duke of Burgundy, who 
 hoped to recover it. The Maid gallantly came to 
 its rescue, and in her usual fashion turned as- 
 sailant at once, making a sortie that very day 
 e 3 
 
54 JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 which took the besiegers by surprise. They 
 speedily rallied, however, and became pursuers in 
 their turn. Then Joan took the post of danger, 
 and tried to protect the rear ; but in so doing she 
 was shut out of the town when the gates were 
 May 23 closed, and captured. The men of France, 
 1430. wno should have been willing, every 
 one of them, to buy her life with theirs, left her a 
 prey to the enemy. The governor of Compiegne, 
 some say, had sold her, and took this method to 
 complete his wretched bargain. At any rate, she 
 was left, when others for whom she had perilled 
 life were safe within the walls ; and being recog- 
 nised by her costume, which had become familiar 
 by this time to English and Burgundians, she 
 was surrounded and made a prisoner. Popular 
 tradition still points out the spot where an archer 
 of Picardy seized her and dragged her from her 
 horse, glad enough to secure such a prize, and as- 
 tonished, perhaps, to find that it could be won 
 so easily. 
 
 Her capture took place on the 23rd of May, 
 1430. Her execution took place on the 1st of 
 June in the following year, and during that weary 
 interval the Maid had to endure the tortures of 
 many martyrdoms. Seldom have there been a rise 
 and a fall like hers. From Domremy to Eheims, 
 
JO AX OF ARC. 55 
 
 — from Hheims to Rouen, — what a wide gulf 
 does there seem in each instance! But the details 
 of the second stage are as sad as the record of 
 the first is romantic and inspiriting. She seemed 
 to have enemies every where, and friends no- 
 where. Too simple and single-hearted to make 
 or court a faction, she had trodden her steep, 
 rough path by herself, had stood alone on the 
 lofty pinnacle of fame, and now was hurled from 
 it without one interposing arm or protesting 
 voice. The basest passions were at work to des- 
 troy her. Some feared to let her live, after seeing 
 what her name and influence had wrought for 
 their overthrow. Some hated with a cruel hatred 
 the girl before whom their armies had fled in 
 terror and disgrace. Some longed to discredit 
 the royal cause by representing its champion to 
 be an agent of the devil. Some were lusting 
 after worldly gains to which they were to be 
 helped at the cost of the poor captive Maid. 
 She was first in the hands of one 
 
 T IT* 1 O 1 T\ 1 J° ai1 SOld t0 
 
 J ean de Digny, a vassal or the Duke the English. 
 of Burgundy, who was glad of an 0Y ' 1430# 
 opportunity of doing what would please his 
 Lord, having his eye upon an estate to which the 
 Duke's influence might help him. Burgundy, 
 just then, was anxious to be on good terms with 
 e 4 
 
56 JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 England for the sake of his trade; and gladly 
 negotiated for the sale of the Maid to her bitter- 
 est enemies, the price being equivalent to a 
 prince's ransom, ten thousand livres. But, even 
 then, some plea was necessary for getting rid of 
 a prisoner of war by violence ; so an ecclesi- 
 astic was found, one Cauchon, Bishop of Beauvais, 
 to claim her as being taken within his jurisdiction, 
 and suspected of heresy and witchcraft ; he, too, 
 having his private ends to serve, for the arch- 
 bishopric of Bouen was vacant, and to please 
 Cardinal Beaufort was the surest path to promo- 
 tion. Thus fear and hatred were leagued together, 
 — ambition and covetousness went hand in hand, 
 — leading men of three different countries were 
 combining their efforts, — and the end which 
 they had in view was the destruction of one pure- 
 minded, heroic girl, whose only fault it was to 
 have loved her King, and served her country, 
 with a devotion that put colder loyalty to shame. 
 Under such circumstances the end could not be 
 doubtful. She was formally surrendered to Cau- 
 chon, as the proper person to take judicial cogni- 
 zance of offences against religion ; and with him 
 was associated the Yicar of the Inquisition in 
 France, an obscure Dominican, to give the tri- 
 bunal a more dignified and impartial character. 
 
JOAN OF ARC. 57 
 
 Months were consumed in these negotiations, 
 and in the interval the poor Maid was a solitary 
 prisoner in the castle of Beaurevoir, at no great 
 distance from Compiegne. The latter place was 
 still in the hands of the King's friends, but close 
 pressed by the English. The rumours of its dis- 
 tress reached her in her captivity, and true as 
 ever to the great principle of her life, she longed 
 for freedom that she might do battle once more 
 for France. Her mind was bewildered, it seems, 
 between the passionate desire to deliver the be- 
 sieged loyalists, and fear of doing any thing 
 forbidden to compass an end so precious ; till, at 
 last, one day, when she was unguarded at the 
 summit of a lofty tower, in a fit, not of despera- 
 tion, as she said herself, but of enthusiastic hope, 
 expecting to be borne up and preserved by an act 
 of divine power, she threw herself headlong from 
 the walls. No miracle was wrought to save her ; 
 she found herself presently on the ground, not 
 free to make straight for Compiegne, but severely 
 hurt, so as to be re-captured without difficulty. 
 The action passed for an attempt at self-destruc- 
 tion ; and while the ladies of Ligny nursed her 
 tenderly, her enemies elsewhere gloried in this 
 supposed blot on her saintly character. 
 
58 JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 Joan's trial It was not till the 9th of January 
 at Rouen. g J 
 
 Jan. 9. that the proceedings were opened at 
 
 Rouen, and the first appearance of Joan 
 before the Court was on the 21st of the follow- 
 ing month, just nine months after her military 
 career had ended. The indictment charged her 
 that, having "discarded all modesty, and being a 
 person of wonderful and monstrous depravity," 
 she had worn garments unsightly to be seen, and 
 suited only to the other sex ; moreover, that she 
 " had proceeded to such a pitch of presumption as 
 to do, say and publish abroad many things con- 
 trary to the Catholic faith ;" — that, in matters of 
 this sort, both in the said diocese of Beauvais, 
 and in many other parts of the kingdom, she had 
 been a grevious offender; — that the Bishop, ac- 
 cordingly, as became his pastoral office, had de- 
 termined to make inquisition into the charges 
 aforesaid; — that John of Luxemburg and the 
 Duke of Burgundy, moreover, " piously desiring 
 that all things might be done for the increase of 
 religion," and the King of England, besides, 
 (i animated by the liveliest zeal for the orthodox 
 faith," had seconded his wishes, and delivered up 
 the said woman into his hands, to be dealt with 
 according to the laws and usages of the Church. 
 More than forty assessors were mustered, includ- 
 
JOAN OF AKC. 59 
 
 ing Abbots, Priors., Canons, Doctors of Theology, 
 and Licentiates in Civil Law ; and before a host 
 like this, the poor Maid had to stand up, without ad- 
 vocate or friend, to answer for herself. Let it be 
 remembered that everything relating to the trial, 
 comes from the judicial documents drawn up by her 
 accusers. All, therefore, that goes to prove Joan's 
 perfect rectitude of purpose, is certified to us, as 
 few things are, or can be, in any historical inquiry. 
 When the Secretary sat in court, and noted down 
 what she said from day to clay, he little thought 
 what a monument he was building up to the 
 prisoner's fame. But there it is ; and as we read 
 what he has written, we marvel successively 
 at her self-possession, her conscientiousness, her 
 pertinent replies, and never-failing patience. She 
 speaks unreservedly at one time, and cautiously 
 at another ; but never, by her speech or silence, 
 is there any effort to conciliate her judges. The 
 good sense and good faith are always on the 
 Maid's side ; the trifling puerilities, and lack of 
 wisdom and fairness, are all on theirs. 
 The first dispute between them was 
 
 , x» • • Feb 2L 
 
 about her oath. Being required to swear 
 upon the holy gospels that she will tell the 
 truth concerning all the things respecting which 
 she should be interrogated, she takes her ground 
 
60 JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 as one not free to tell abroad all that has been 
 revealed to her in times past. "I don't know 
 what you mean to ask me about/' she said. " Per- 
 haps you will ask me what I ought not to tell 
 you. All that relates to my father and mother I 
 will tell you, and what I did when I had taken 
 my journey into France. But there are revelations 
 which I have received from God, which I never 
 told to any living man, except my King, and 
 would not tell, even if I were to have my head 
 cut off." " But at any rate," it was replied, " you 
 may swear to tell the truth about matters which 
 concern our faith ;" and to this the Maid was 
 sworn, upon her bended knees, with both hands 
 upon the Missal. The same scene was renewed 
 on the second day with the same result ; yet on 
 the third day the attack was renewed on the old 
 ground. " You must swear absolutely and without 
 conditions of any sort," said the presiding judge, 
 " to give true answers to all that we shall ask 
 you." (( I have sworn twice already," she said ; 
 " that is enough, and you may well dispense with 
 more." "You lay a heavy load upon yourselves in 
 this matter, and press me more than you ought to 
 do." " You might command me to tell what I have 
 sworn not to tell ; and then I should have the guilt 
 of perjury which you would not wish." It was 
 
JOAN OF ARC. 61 
 
 evident enough that her very scruples on the 
 subject were a better security for truth-telling 
 than twenty oaths lightly taken ; but with dogged 
 resolution, as if to tease and worry their victim, 
 the men plied her with threats and admonitions. 
 Joan was as firm as they, and with better reason. 
 " I am ready to swear to tell the truth about all I 
 know relating to this inquiry," she said again ; 
 and so the matter concluded for that time. 
 
 When this point was settled to the satisfaction 
 of the court, they questioned her about her birth, 
 her religious teachers, her childhood and her early 
 youth. All was told with the greatest frankness 
 and simplicity; — her home pursuits, — her visit 
 to her uncle and journeys to Vancouleurs, — her 
 repulse by Baudricourt, — her importunity and 
 subsequent success, — her journey to Chinon, and 
 meeting with the Kins;. fS I saw St. Michael 
 first," she said, " when I was thirteen, and he 
 had many angels with him. I saw St. Margaret 
 and St. Catherine afterwards. I knew them be- 
 cause they told me who they were. I did all at 
 their bidding, and when I knew the King at 
 Chinon, it was because they prompted me."* Such 
 had been her unvarying testimony since she first 
 
 * See NOTE (F). 
 
62 JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 left her native village and declared that she had a 
 work to do for France ; and word for word it was 
 repeated once again before captious and hostile 
 judges. 
 
 Two questions naturally arose out of 
 
 Joan, a u . 
 
 heretic, or her story: — First, did she see the saints, 
 a Wltch * or not p an( j secondly, if she did not really 
 see them, did she believe her own story, or try 
 to pass a lie upon the world for truth ? Was she a 
 cheat who aimed at notoriety, and cared not how 
 it was won ? or a dreamer of dreams whose fancies 
 had shaped themselves into forms, which to a per- 
 son of her impassioned temperament had all the 
 appearance of reality ? This last conclusion, it 
 seems quite impossible for any candid mind to 
 resist. All the evidence tends that way, and 
 there is no single circumstance which gives the 
 smallest plausibility to the other supposition. A 
 third question, however, perplexed the minds of 
 the men who tried her. " Was she a heretic or a 
 witch?" In either character she might be burnt; 
 but they thought it important to settle which 
 badge of infamy should be fastened upon her 
 before they gave sentence in the Church's name. 
 Still, upon their theory, as it seems to us, nine 
 tenths of their questions might have been spared; 
 and a much shorter process would have been more 
 
JOAN OF ARC. 63 
 
 humane to Joan, and less discreditable to them- 
 selves. It did not much signify, surely, how 
 Joan knew St. Catherine from St. Margaret, — 
 whether they were of the same age, and were 
 dressed alike, — whether she saw any thing but 
 their faces, — whether they had rings in their ears, 
 and long flowing hair under their crowns, — whe- 
 ther they had wings or arms, — whether they both 
 spoke together or in turns ; yet such was the style 
 of the examination often through half a day, 
 while the poor Maid listened, and tried to recal 
 the visions of the past, and answered some ques- 
 tions affirmatively, and some with hesitation, as 
 one fearful to speak a syllable beyond the truth. 
 " I can't remember now ;" — "I knew once, but 
 it is forgotten ;" — "I told them at Poitiers 
 about this ; I remembered then ; you can send 
 there and learn what I said ;" — " Pray, spare 
 me, and pass on to something else ;" — were 
 some of her simple, touching replies at times 
 like these. 
 
 All that had been reported by friends to her 
 honour, or invented by enemies to bring scandal 
 on her name, was turned against her with ingeni- 
 ous, persevering malignity. " Did you know/' 
 asked her judges, " that people on your side had 
 masses celebrated, and prayers offered up, to do 
 
64 JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 you honour ?" " If they had any religious ser- 
 vice on my account," was her answer, " I never 
 told them ; and if they prayed for me, surely 
 they did nothing wrong." " But did they not 
 believe firmly that your mission was from God, 
 and did they believe well in thinking so ?" " I do 
 not know what they believed," said Joan ; " their 
 own hearts can tell that best ; but if they thought 
 I was sent of God, they were not mistaken." 
 es But did you not know what was in the hearts 
 of your people when they kissed your feet and 
 hands and garments?" " Many, doubtless, were 
 pleased to see me ; poor people especially would 
 come about me to embrace me, because I never 
 did them wrong, but took pleasure rather in help- 
 ing them when I could." 
 
 Her Yoices, it seems, had not left her : they 
 Feb. 24. were with her in prison. She says, on 
 one occasion, that she had heard them the day 
 before, — that they woke her in the morning, — that 
 some things were said which she did not under- 
 stand, but, when she was wide awake, they told 
 her to answer boldly, — that she sat upon her bed, 
 and with clasped hands begged for their help and 
 guidance, and they gave for answer that God 
 would help her. Her courage seems to have 
 grown, and her spirit to have kindled, as she 
 
JOAN OF ARC. 65 
 
 recalled the scene ; for after describing it particu- 
 larly, she said to the Bishop, " You call yourself 
 my judge; take care, then, what you do; fori 
 am truly sent from God, and you are running 
 into danger ;" — " I believe firmly, as firmly as I 
 believe that God redeemed us from the pains ot 
 hell, that the Voice came from God." Then came 
 the nice distinctions and refinements of men who 
 had their own theories about angels and spirits, 
 and thought the poor Maid must understand them 
 too. " Was that Voice you speak of," they said, 
 " a single angel, or did it come immediately from 
 God, or was it the voice of some saint, male or 
 female ?" te The voice came from God," she an- 
 swered ; " I believe I don't tell you quite plainly 
 what I know; for I am more afraid of doing 
 wrong by saying what may displease the Voices 
 than I am of answering you." 
 
 The marvel is, that human patience Joan > s va _ 
 
 could hold out against the teazing of the tieuce and 
 . . . . cleverness. 
 
 doctors, with their infinitely small ques- 
 tions a dozen times repeated. Eight times in as 
 many days, sometimes twice in the same day, during 
 the month of March, she was put upon this sort 
 of rack ; and yet, strange to say, she did not turn 
 on the men who baited her, and say, " I am sick 
 and weary of these childish follies ; you know all 
 
66 JOAN OP ARC. 
 
 about me that you need to know ; you can kill 
 me, if you like, for I am but a helpless woman ; 
 but, God helpiog me, I will not speak another 
 word." She went on answering, and her answers 
 were marvellous for their discretion at one time, 
 and for their promptness at another. When the 
 inquiries were most irrelevant, she either brought 
 back her judges to the point from which they had 
 wandered, reminding them that her oath was not 
 binding beyond certain limits, and that to state- 
 ments wholly unconnected with the matter in hand 
 she would not commit herself ; or else she met 
 the grave old gentlemen with some quick-witted 
 retort, without any thing of rudeness or passion, 
 which must have flashed like lightning, almost, on 
 their bewildered intellects. " Was St. Michael 
 naked, when you saw him ? " they said one day ; 
 " Do you think the Lord had not enough to find 
 him clothes ? " answered the Maid. " Did St. 
 Margaret talk English ?" inquired the wiseacres ; 
 " Why, she was not on the English side," Joan 
 reminded them; "how should she talk their 
 tongue ?" " Do St. Margaret and St.. Catherine 
 hate the English ?" was another query ; " They 
 love what our Lord loves," said the pure-hearted 
 girl, " and hate what He hates." " Does God 
 hate the English, think you ?"' " How He 
 
JOAN OF ARC. 67 
 
 esteems their souls I cannot tell," Joan replied, 
 with the charity which never failed her; but 
 added, with her true French heart, in the face of 
 men who were all on the English side, " I know 
 well they shall all be driven out of this land, ex- 
 cept those who perish in it." 
 
 The doubtful points of her life were recurred 
 to again and again, and were strangely coupled, 
 sometimes, with supposed irregularities in military 
 transactions, as if poor Joan, besides being the 
 router of armies, had been presiding judge on 
 courts-martial, and supreme arbitress in every 
 disputed question of campaigning morality. 
 " Were you in mortal sin, when you let a prisoner 
 of war be put to death ; — and again, when you 
 rode on that horse which belonged to the Bishop 
 of Senlis ; — - and again, when you wore man's 
 clothes ; — and again, when you attacked Paris on 
 the festival-day ; — and again, when you threw 
 yourself from the tower of Beaurevoir ?" For the 
 trifling and the serious, in interrogatories of this 
 sort, the Maid was alike prepared. " The prisoner 
 was a bad. man, and was judged for past crimes 
 by the proper officers." " The Bishop got his horse 
 back again ; besides it was but a poor steed for 
 military purposes." Then, " for her man's dress, 
 she had done what she did at God's bidding and 
 
 F 2 
 
68 JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 in His service ; and when He pleased, her male 
 attire should be put off again." " If she did wrong 
 in assaulting Paris, that was the Church's con- 
 cern, and she would confess gladly to a priest." 
 "At Beaurevoir, when she perilled her life by leap- 
 ing from the tower, she did not well, she thinks ; 
 on the contrary, it was ill done ; but it was in 
 charity to the poor suffering townsmen the ven- 
 ture was made, and on that point she made sure 
 that she had a pardon from God." 
 
 More than once the trap was so laid as to render 
 it difficult for her to make her ground good with- 
 out seeming to exalt herself unduly. As far as 
 her Voices went, she claimed to have favours and 
 privileges of no common kind. Did she, then, 
 think herself beyond the reach of danger? Her 
 heavenly visitants encouraged her, she said, to 
 martyrdom by the hope of Paradise. Was it out 
 of the question, then, that she should commit 
 mortal sin ? " I know nothing about it ; I leave 
 that to the Lord," was her reply ; and again, 
 when asked whether she knew herself to be in a 
 state of grace, she gave a reply frank and modest 
 like herself: " If I am not, I pray God to bring 
 me to it ; and if I am, may He keep me in it. I 
 should be the most wretched creature on earth if 
 I thought I were not in God's favour. Besides, 
 
J0A2\ T OF ARC. 69 
 
 if I were in a state of sin, the Voice, I think, 
 would never come to me ; and I should be glad 
 enough to have all the world understand it as well 
 as I do." 
 
 When the ingenuity of the judges Eefogeg ^ 
 was exhausted, and it was difficult to condemn 
 find new questions wherewith to perplex 
 or teaze her, the case against poor Joan seemed 
 but a weak one, and the Court lacked courage to 
 condemn her. Again and again, the poor Maid 
 was pressed to condemn herself, or at any rate to 
 leave the whole matter of her pretensions and 
 doings to be decided on by the Church. Sub- 
 missive and docile in other things, upon one point 
 she was immoveable. Her mission must not be 
 questioned. She had guides who had sent her on 
 her way, higher than any earthly teacher. Doc- 
 tor, Bishop, Pope were no court of appeal, when 
 the saints in heaven had spoken. So she stood 
 out bravely, and answered nobly, " I love the 
 Church and would support it with all my power, 
 as a Christian ought to do ; and reason there is 
 none why I should be kept, as I am, from going 
 to church and hearing mass. As to the good 
 works I have done, I must refer myself to the 
 judgment of the King of Heaven who sent me." 
 " But what of the Church ?" said the churchmen ; 
 f 3 
 
70 JOAN OP ARC. 
 
 " will you not submit your words and deeds to 
 her decision?" " Our Lord and the Church are 
 one," she said in her simplicity. But when she 
 was told that she must distinguish between the 
 glorifie d Church in heaven, and the militant Church, 
 consisting of Pope and Cardinals, and Bishops and 
 Clergy, and faithful men to boot, she went back 
 to her old point : her convictions were more to her 
 than all the nice distinctions of learned men. " I 
 came," she said, " to the King of France on the 
 part of God, the blessed Virgin, the Saints in 
 Paradise, and all the victorious Church on high ; 
 to that Church I submit all that I have done, and 
 all that I shall do ; and as to the Church militant, 
 I will give you no other answer." 
 
 On Good Friday and Easter Sunday, when the 
 churches of Rouen were thronged with worship- 
 pers, she was in her prison fastened to a post by 
 a heavy chain. No mass for her, and no com- 
 munion, though her longings for them were of 
 the intensest kind. On the intervening Satur- 
 day, being the last day of March, Joan 
 was called upon for her final answer to 
 a very long indictment, comprised in seventy ar- 
 ticles, and filling one hundred and twenty printed 
 pages Some she had already admitted ; some 
 she had denied; upon some she had madejudi- 
 
JOAN OF AKC. 71 
 
 cious and appropriate comments ; some she had 
 asked time to consider, that her reply might be 
 given with more of calmness and deliberation. 
 The question about referring herself to the judg- 
 ment of the Church was one of these ; and her 
 well weighed decision is worth quoting from the 
 original document. " As to that which is de- 
 manded of me, I do refer myself to the judgment 
 of God's Church on earth, provided it shall not 
 require of me an impossibility. And that which 
 I have now in my thoughts I call an impossibility ; 
 namely, that I should retract what I have said 
 upon the trial as to my visions and revelations, or 
 what I have done by the command of God. I 
 will not retract it for any body. And for that 
 which God sent me to do, or shall command 
 henceforth, I will not fail to do it for any man 
 living." Here issue was joined, then ; she must 
 be dealt with as wicked laws or unscrupulous 
 judges might determine ; but to her own degra- 
 dation the Maid would never be consenting. 
 
 Meanwhile, the Duke of Bedford 
 grew impatient, and pressed for a con- presses for a 
 demnation which should dishonour the conviction - 
 King of France as having been helped by a witch. 
 Joan had been seriously ill during Passion Week, 
 and it was feared that the English might lose 
 p 4 
 
72 JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 their prey. Cauchon, the Duke's willing instru- 
 ment, was told that it was time this business was 
 settled ; affairs of state must not be kept in sus- 
 pense while they were letting a worthless girl, 
 who had allied herself to the devil, carry on this 
 idle war of words from week to week ; he looked 
 to have his pleasure done, and that speedily. The 
 Bishop stirred himself, and appealed to the lawyers 
 first, whom he found refractory, then to the chap- 
 ter of Rouen, who did not love him well enough 
 to decide promptly as he wished. At last, the 
 university of Paris was tried ; and while an an- 
 swer was expected from that quarter, the judges 
 did their utmost to bring Joan to confession. On 
 the 18th of April, when she was brought very 
 low by illness, the Bishop, and half a dozen doc- 
 tors with him, went to her prison, according to 
 their own story, that they might " lovingly ex- 
 hort, and gently admonish her." To her entreaty 
 that, in her extremity, if her sickness went on to 
 death, she might have the last rites of the Church, 
 and be laid in consecrated ground, they answered 
 that these things were for good Catholics, and she 
 must prove herself one by submission. After- 
 wards they tried her with other weapons. 
 The rack was carried into her prison ; 
 and men stood by ready to put her to the torture ; 
 
JOAN OF ARC. 73 
 
 and, thus confronted, the poor Maid was exhorted 
 
 to confess the truth. But the spirit was still 
 
 strong even in that enfeebled frame. They might 
 
 tear her limb from limb, she said ; but she could 
 
 not vary her story. The angel Gabriel was with 
 
 her the week before. She was well assured that 
 
 God had ruled her in all that she had done, and 
 
 the devil had no power in her. The decision of 
 
 that day is worth giving in the Court's own words. 
 
 " When we saw the obstinacy of her spirit, and 
 
 the fashion of her answers, we, fearing that the 
 
 torture would do her little good, determined to 
 
 delay the infliction of the same until we had taken 
 
 further counsel on the subject." 
 
 The longest things must have an 
 
 , , . . , ,. , Judgment 
 
 end, and so even this weary trial did not against 
 
 last for ever. The reply of the univer- j^' 19 
 
 sity came at length, and was read out on 
 
 the 19th of May. It was as decisive in its tone, 
 
 and as peremptory in its conclusions, as Cauchon 
 
 himself could wish. The judges had done all 
 
 things well ; and for poor Joan, they decreed that 
 
 she was either a wilful, wicked liar, or in alliance 
 
 with Belial, Satan, and Behemoth; that her 
 
 story reflected very much on the dignity of angels ; 
 
 that some of the articles proved her to be much 
 
 given to superstition, a dealer in enchantments, a 
 
74 JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 most unscrupulous story-teller, and a vain boaster; 
 that she was a proved blasphemer and despiser 
 of the holy sacraments, unsound in the faith, and 
 a follower of heathen customs, if not an actual 
 idolater; that she was a crafty and cruel trait- 
 ress, thirsting for human blood ; moreover, a most 
 undutiful and unruly daughter, tampering with 
 the divine command which prescribed piety at 
 home ; and, lastly, to crown the whole, a schis- 
 matic and apostate, who had very bad notions 
 about the unity and authority of the Church. 
 
 Had they burnt her the next day, the judges 
 would have spared something of their own dignity, 
 and. would have been pronounced by posterity not 
 a whit more cruel and unjust. Or if they had 
 kept her in prison to receive monthly lectures on 
 orthodoxy from the doctors, threatening her with 
 death if she did not recant her errors, they might 
 have been supposed to wish well to her soul, 
 though they were wretched, narrow-minded bigots 
 who could not read a character like Joan's. But 
 they took pains to heap infamy on themselves. 
 They parleyed with her, — pretended to pardon her 
 upon conditions, — tried her again on the plea that 
 she had broken faith, — and then burnt her, ap- 
 parently, without any formal sentence, as one who 
 had troubled them too long, and must be put out of 
 
JOAN OF ABC. 75 
 
 the way for peace' sake. History lives, however, 
 thank God, though men die ; and all their mean 
 paltry arts, now that the whole tale is known, 
 recoil upon themselves. One only wonders why 
 they tormented her so long if they meant to play 
 her so foul at last ; but, certainly, if they had 
 wished to give dramatic interest to her story, 
 they could scarcely have contrived it better. 
 We see hard-hearted men of power arrayed 
 against one gentle, friendless maiden, — trickery 
 and fraud met by guileless innocence, — traitors to 
 their country conspiring to destroy the most loyal 
 subject in France, — judges shrinking from the 
 last act of cruelty lest the world should cry shame 
 upon them, while the prisoner bravely stood to 
 all she had said and done, declaring, with simple, 
 straightforward honesty, that duty called her 
 to it. 
 
 Three scenes taken from the last ten Last d 
 days of the Maid's life will bring our nar- of Joan - 
 
 * . & May 23. 
 
 rative to a conclusion. On the 23d 
 of May, behind the beautiful church of St. Ouen, 
 Cardinal Beaufort, with two judges and thirty- 
 three assessors, took their seats on a raised plat- 
 form, while Joan stood on another, amid ushers 
 and torturers. The executioner was in a cart be- 
 neath, and a doctor, noted for his eloquence, stood 
 
76 JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 by her side. The proceedings began with a ser- 
 mon, and the text was this, — " The branch cannot 
 bear fruit of itself except it abide in the vine." 
 The practical application was very obvious, that 
 the Maid must submit herself to the Church, that 
 being the vine, according to the doctor's exposi- 
 tion. She referred herself to God and the Pope, 
 in the first instance ; but on being told the Pope 
 was a long way off, and that Bishops were his 
 proper representatives, she was silent for a while, 
 and gave no answer to a monition thrice repeated. 
 Then, for a few moments, that noble spirit bowed 
 beneath the storm. While Cauchon was in the 
 act of reading out the sentence of death, she said, 
 as her enemies report, that she would be sub- 
 missive to the Church in all things, and would not 
 uphold her visions any longer if holy men pro- 
 nounced them a delusion and a cheat. A bit of 
 parchment was produced containing a few lines, 
 quite different from the recantation published in 
 her name, and when the Maid had drawn a circle 
 and a cross upon it, she was pardoned on two 
 conditions, first, that she should wear proper 
 clothes, like a decent woman, and, secondly, that 
 she should pass the rest of her days in prison, 
 " eating the bread of tears and the water of afflic- 
 tion," as one mercifully spared by the Church. 
 
JOAN OF ARC, 77 
 
 That day week, Joan was again before her 
 judges, dressed like a man. The enquiry ? 
 or rather dispute, which followed, seems 
 almost childish amid such tragic scenes ; but there 
 it is, and a singular conclusion we must pronounce 
 it to this most extraordinary trial. She chose 
 to wear man's clothes, she said ; they suited her 
 best, while she was living among men ; she did 
 not understand that she was pledged never to 
 resume them. Faith had not been kept with her, 
 for she hoped to have the communion when she 
 recanted in the previous week ; besides, her Voices 
 had reproved her for her sin in denying the truth 
 to save her life. " God had sent her," she now 
 repeated ; " and for her recantation, she could but 
 say that it was forced from her by fear. Now, 
 she would dress like a woman, if her judges 
 pleased ; but rather than lie in prison any longer, 
 she would do penance once for all, and die." The 
 fact seems to be that she was entrapped into re- 
 suming her male attire. She could never have 
 got her armour again, if it had not been purposely 
 put in her way ; nay, worse, a witness swore on 
 the second trial, when the secrets of the prison- 
 house came to light, and the foul deeds of her ac- 
 cusers could be safely reported, that she was left 
 before her guards with the choice of her old dress 
 
78 JOAN OV ARC. 
 
 or none, so that her modesty might be outraged 
 or her promise broken. 
 
 All, then, was ready for the sacrifice, the judges, 
 certainly, no less eager than the victim. The 
 next day but one was appointed for the execu- 
 tion ; a few hours' warning was all that was given 
 to the Maid, and we do not like her the less for 
 shrinking at last from the flames, after braving 
 death a hundred times in the battle-field. When 
 her last hope expired, she burst into tears, and said 
 she would rather lose her head seven times over 
 than be burnt. Alluding to the cruel insults she 
 had received in prison, she said, " If I had been 
 in the Church's keeping, and guarded by her 
 officers, things would not have come to this sad 
 end. I appeal to God, the great Judge, for they 
 have injured me most foully." Eight hundred 
 Englishmen, armed with swords and 
 June 1. l anceS5 conducted her to the fishmarket 
 of Rouen. She wept and bewailed her fate, but 
 uttered no word that reflected on her King, or 
 threw a doubt upon her mission. The Bishop of 
 Beauvais began to preach to her, — exhorted her 
 to penitence, — bidding her care for her soul, 
 though the poor body was condemned ; but she 
 needed not man's exhortations at a time like that, 
 for her spirit was calm again, and her death was 
 
JOAN OF ARC. 79 
 
 of a piece with her life. She poured forth many 
 supplications to the blessed Trinity, invoked the 
 Virgin and all the saints, called upon friends and 
 enemies to pray for her, and gave hearty forgive- 
 ness to all who had done her wrong. For some- 
 thing like half an hour, says an eyewitness, this 
 scene continued, and, while it lasted, hard hearts 
 were melted into pity. Cardinal Beaufort wept ; 
 the Bishop of Beauvais wept ; hundreds, to whom 
 her name had been odious hitherto, — citizens of 
 Rouen by the thousand, who were all English in 
 heart, — went away, and said that her end was 
 saintly. 
 
 The pile on which she was to suffer 
 
 .... Her death, 
 was raised to an immense height, that 
 
 she might be a spectacle to the vast assembled 
 multitude, — possibly, too, that her dying testi- 
 mony might not reach any friendly ear. It was 
 heard, however, and is recorded thus: " My Voices 
 were of God ; my Voices did not deceive me." A 
 good monk stood near her, till, on Joan's own 
 warning, he retired from the advancing flames, 
 and then held up the cross before her eyes, which 
 he had fetched for her from the neighbouring 
 church. "I heard her in the flames," he said 
 nearly twenty years afterwards, " calling on the 
 saints to help her. And when she rendered up 
 
80 JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 her spirit, she bowed her head, and pronounced 
 the name of Jesus, in token that she had fervent 
 faith in God, as we read of Saint Ignatius, and 
 many of the holy martyrs." The same witness 
 reported that, before the day was over, the exe- 
 cutioner came to him " overwhelmed with sorrow 
 and contrition," and saying that he feared that his 
 sin would never be forgiven. An Englishman, 
 who had vowed to throw a faggot on the burning- 
 pile, kept to his purpose ; but his hatred was pre- 
 sently turned to terror ; for the demeanour of the 
 Maid so wrought upon his excited mind that he 
 felt like one condemned and forsaken, declaring to 
 his friends that, as Joan sank into death, he saw 
 a dove soar upwards from her ashes. An honest 
 citizen of Rouen declared, in later days, when 
 men could speak what they thought, that he heard 
 all about the Maid's execution, but was not pre 
 sent at it ; for himself, on account of the rumours 
 which had reached him of her piety, he could not 
 bear the sight. " The whole people," he said, 
 " whispered among themselves that foul wrong 
 was done her. I met one returning from the 
 place of punishment, a secretary of the King of 
 England ; and he spoke with pain and bitter sor- 
 row of all that had been done that day, exclaim- 
 ing, ' We are all lost ; for we have burnt a 
 
JOAN OF ARC. 81 
 
 Thus lived, and thus died, the Maid of Orleans. 
 Frenchmen shall not admire her virtues more 
 heartily than we, nor declare more freely that her 
 murder is a part of our inheritance of shame. 
 But if their historians shall remind us, as Michelet 
 has done % in a tone of insolent triumph, that 
 we English prompted the crime for our own 
 selfish and malignant purposes, we will reply 
 that Cauchon, the basest of Joan's enemies, was 
 no Englishman, — that the wretch who sold 
 her belongs not to us, — that Charles VII., who 
 owed more to the Maid than king ever owed to 
 subject, made no attempt at her rescue, — that 
 the citizens of Rouen, who stood still and saw her 
 burnt, were not our ancestors, but the ancestors 
 of the very men who cry shame upon us, — and 
 when we have told them all this, w T e may fairly 
 call upon our revilers to repent of their share in 
 the deed as heartily as we repent of ours. 
 
 Modern Frenchmen, as might be ^he English 
 expected, have done justice to their ex P elled - 
 heroine. " That glorious creature," said one 
 of the wisest of them lately (Guizot), at a ban- 
 quet in Rouen, " without a parallel in the history 
 of the world, — with a nature half angelic, half 
 heroic, — for ever destroyed what the successors 
 
 * See I^OTE (G). 
 G 
 
82 JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 of William of Normandy laboured to effect in 
 France ; " and we shall understand only a part of 
 Joan's greatness unless we add that the work 
 which she began, the deliverance of France, 
 was carried on and completed by other hands. 
 The nation was roused, and never sank back again 
 into despondency, till it had won its own soil, and 
 recovered its ancient fame. For twenty years 
 the tide of conquest hardly ever turned, while 
 town after town, and province after province, were 
 wrested from the English. 
 
 A few months after Joan's death, Bedford, 
 hoping to strengthen his party in Paris, brought 
 
 Dec 16. over our Henry VI., then a boy of ten 
 1431, years, and had him crowned there ; 
 but the townsmen looked on silently and coldly, 
 and could not help connecting the utter poverty 
 and wretchedness of their fair city with the 
 ruinous wars entailed on them by the invaders. 
 Long possession had made the English insolent 
 and imperious, and no pains were taken, even at 
 that critical time, to enlist the popular feeling on 
 their side. They had acted the part of hard, ex- 
 acting masters throughout ; and now the cere- 
 mony of inaugurating the sovereign was performed 
 in the English mode, Cardinal Beaufort placing 
 the crown on the child's head with his own hands. 
 
JOAN OF AEC. 83 
 
 The triumphing, however, was short ; for in less 
 than five years, when the English garrison was 
 reduced to fifteen hundred men, the Constable 
 
 Bichemont appeared before the walls 
 
 /> -o • • i i i r i A - D - 1436 - 
 
 oi Fans with a much larger force ; the 
 
 citizens gladly opened their gates ; and the King 
 
 of France had his own again. 
 
 Yet more important, however, to the national 
 cause, was the peace of Arras, concluded in the 
 year 1435 between Charles and the Duke of 
 Burgundy. Philip the Good, as he was called, 
 the prime mischief-maker through years of dis- 
 aster and defeat, grew weary of the English 
 alliance ; and, after exacting hard terms from the 
 King, and securing some important advantages for 
 himself, consented to become the ally of France, 
 though the name of vassal, for his own life and 
 the King's, was to be renounced. 
 
 The people received the news of this reconcilia- 
 tion with transports of joy. The man who, to 
 avenge his private quarrel, had tried to degrade 
 France to the level of an English province, had 
 repented of his errors, and would do his utmost 
 to repair them. The treaty of Troyes was can- 
 celled at last, and the badges of a long and dis- 
 graceful servitude were disappearing one by one. 
 Even the trophies of Agincourt were given back ; 
 
 G 2 
 
84 JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 for the Duke of Orleans, the King's cousin, one 
 of the prisoners of that terrible day, 
 was released from his twenty-five 
 years' captivity, and, as a pledge of better times, 
 married a nieCe of the Duke of Burgundy, the 
 son of his father's murderer. The King, mean- 
 while, displayed, occasionally and by fits, a vigour 
 and activity of mind which astonished both friends 
 and foes; the monarchy was strengthened by 
 many internal improvements; and the power of 
 the great lords and vassal-princes was reduced 
 within more reasonable limits. 
 
 The prostrate nation, in fact, gathered up its 
 
 strength, and became greater, more united, and 
 
 more powerful, than ever. Even Nor- 
 
 A. D. 1449. 
 
 mandy was conquered, which England 
 had so long regarded as her own, like Kent and 
 Middlesex; the rich province of Guienne, the 
 Garden of France, which Eleanor had brought as 
 her marriage portion to our Henry II. three 
 centuries before, was another prize, — Bourdeaux, 
 
 the capital town, in which the Black 
 
 A.D. 1451. «-.,,;. 
 
 Jrrince bad been more at home than 
 in London, being the last place that held out in 
 the South of France ; and in twenty years from 
 the death of Joan of Arc the English possessions 
 in France were reduced to the single town of 
 
JOAN OF ARC. 85 
 
 Calais. Such were the fruits of Agincourt ; such 
 the results to England of a war which had spread 
 desolation through the towns and provinces of 
 France, while the young grew old, and a fresh 
 generation were reared to middle life. 
 
 " But what good came of it at last ?/' 
 
 Quoth little Peterkin. 
 " Why, that I cannot tell," said he, 
 " But 'twas a famous victory."* 
 
 This narrative has been compiled from the follow- 
 ing works : — 
 
 Michelet's History of France, translated by 
 Kelly, Vol. II. 
 
 BARANTE's HlSTOIRE DES DUCS DE BOURGOGNE, 
 
 Vols. V. and VI. 
 
 Petitot's Collection Complete des Memoires 
 
 RELATIFS A L'HlSTOIRE DE FRANCE, Vol. VIII. 
 
 Quicherat's Proces de Jeanne d'Arc, three oc- 
 tavo volumes in Latin, containing a full Report of the 
 Trial, and of the subsequent Process of Revision in 
 1456. 
 
 Lord Mahon's interesting article in the 138th Num- 
 ber of the Quarterly Review, since republished in his 
 " Historical Essays." 
 
 * Southey's " Battle of Blenheim," which should be duly 
 read and learnt in every royal nursery where English is 
 understood, and translated into other tongues for the benefit 
 of young Princes. 
 
 *g 3 
 
NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 NOTE (A). Page 7. 
 
 Jeanne Djrc, modern historians tell us, is her 
 real name, and that it was so written by a de- 
 scendant of her brother who wrote her history. 
 We have known her too long by the other to 
 make it worth while to change it. An old history 
 of the Siege of Orleans, quoted by Southey, has 
 another reading, and calls her father Jacques Tart 
 By the French writers, she is almost always called, 
 emphatically, " The Maid." 
 
 NOTE (B). Page 8. 
 
 The evidence of this witness, Joan's companion 
 and playmate in early days, is worth quoting at 
 length. " She said that she had known Joan, 
 who was called the Maid, from her youth, and 
 that she was born at Domremy, her parents being 
 James and Isabella d' Arc, honest labouring people 
 and good Catholics. She knows this, because she 
 often stayed in the house of Joan's father as a 
 friend, and slept with her when there. She does 
 not remember about her godfathers and god- 
 mothers, except from hearsay, because Joan was 
 three or four years older than herself. Joan was 
 a good girl, sincere and affectionate, and went 
 willingly and frequently to church and sacred 
 places. She was often abashed because people 
 
NOTES. 8 / 
 
 said to her that slie was too pious, and went too 
 much to church ; for she used often to go to con- 
 fession, and witness has heard the priest say so. 
 Joan's employments were like those of other 
 girls ; she did household work, and span, and 
 sometimes kept her father's cattle. I have seen 
 her keeping them myself. Witness said, more- 
 over, that the tree, which was enquired about, 
 had been called the ( Ladies' Tree ' for a long 
 time, and it was an old saying that the Fairies 
 used to come to it ; but she never heard that any 
 one had seen them. The boys and girls used to 
 go to the tree, and carried bread with them there ; 
 and witness herself had been at the tree some- 
 times along with Joan, who was her playmate, 
 and met parties of young people there ; and then 
 they used to take their meal, and walk about and 
 play. She knew nothing about Joan's going 
 away, and shed many tears when she heard about 
 it ; for she loved her dearly for her goodness, and 
 for old acquaintance sake." — Proces, torn. ii. 417 
 —419. 
 
 It would be a pity not to have this picture of 
 Joan's girlhood. Those sports about the Fairies' 
 Tree should be remembered along with the tri- 
 umph of Orleans, and the tragedy of Rouen. It 
 is curious to see how this old tree figures in the 
 enquiries about Joan. There were suspicions, 
 probably, that she had had dealings with the 
 Fairies, and had got no good from them. The 
 Maid herself at the first trial, and her surviving 
 playmates and companions at the second, had to 
 tell all they knew about Varbre des dames; and 
 little was there to tell after all; for the cousin 
 
 G 4 
 
88 JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 reports that she had never " heard of any one who 
 saw a Fairy there ; " and a dozen witnesses concur 
 in telling the judges that they knew the spot only 
 as a place of sports and pic nics. 
 
 NOTE (C). Page 9. 
 
 Southey was very young when he wrote his 
 " Joan of Arc," he tells us, having begun it the day 
 after he was nineteen ; and but little of his 
 poetical reputation rests upon that youthful per- 
 formance. His faith at that time was very un- 
 settled, and he meant, doubtless, to exalt Joan 
 when he represented her as worshipping out of 
 doors, and despising church ceremonies. Through 
 nearly fifty lines of blank verse, she is made to 
 argue with a priest in the following style : — 
 
 " The forms of worship in mine earlier years 
 Waked my young mind to artificial awe, 
 And made me fear my God. AY arm with the glow 
 Of health and exercise, whene'er I passed 
 The threshold of the house of prayer, I felt 
 A cold damp chill me. .... 
 
 But in riper years, 
 When as my soul grew strong in solitude, 
 
 • . I fled 
 
 The house of prayer, and made the lonely grove 
 My temple, at the foot of some old oak 
 Watching the little tribes that had their world 
 Within its mossy bark," &c 
 
 Bookiii. 411—456. 
 
 Anything more unlike the real Joan it is im- 
 possible to conceive. She prayed in the fields, 
 not because she despised sacred places, — for the 
 church was to her like a second home, — but be- 
 cause the ardour of her devotion broke through 
 the common bounds of time and place. 
 
NOTES. 89 
 
 The poets have not been happy in their treat- 
 ment of this subject. In the first part of Henry 
 the Sixth, Joan figures as a blustering virago, 
 challenging the Dauphin to single combat at her 
 first interview. With her dying breath, too, she 
 proclaims her own shame, and utters frantic curses 
 against her enemies. But Shakspeare wrote 
 with the prejudices of an Englishman, and pro- 
 bably with very imperfect information. Schiller 
 had no such excuses ; yet in his " Maid of Or- 
 leans," he has substituted wretched romance for 
 genuine and most pathetic history. There is a 
 certain Welshman, in his tale, whom Joan con- 
 quers in battle ; and then, having looked too 
 fondly on his handsome face, she bitterly re- 
 proaches herself as being guilty and forsworn, 
 because in thought, for a single moment, she had 
 broken her vow of maiden purity. Afterwards, 
 she submits in silence to the charge of witchcraft 
 brought against her by her own father, is banished 
 by Charles, taken prisoner by the English, breaks 
 her chains by main strength, and receives her 
 death wound in leading the French troops to 
 victory. One does not know what is gained by 
 the dramatist in taking some historical character 
 for his subject, if the history is deliberately falsi- 
 fied all through. 
 
 NOTE (D). Page 15. 
 
 Very different is the part assigned to Baudri- 
 court in some popular works. The following is 
 Ty tier's account of the " heroic Maid," in his 
 Universal History : — " Charles, availing himself 
 
90 JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 of the superstition of the age, projected an extra- 
 ordinary scheme for the recovery of his kingdom 
 by feigning an interposition from Heaven in his 
 favour. A gentleman of the name of Baudricourt 
 saw a young servant maid at an inn in Lorraine, 
 whom he immediately conceived to be a fit person 
 for playing a very extraordinary part. She was 
 taught her cue, and made to counterfeit a divine 
 inspiration. They carried her before the King, 
 when the answers that were put in her mouth, 
 and the demeanour which she assumed, convinced 
 every body that she was inspired." What a sa- 
 gacious man he was who detected in a servant 
 maid the capacity of playing so " very extra- 
 ordinary " a part as that of the Maid of Orleans ! 
 Joan " taught her cue ! " Why, she would never 
 be taught any thing after her mission began. 
 Men had to obey and follow her, but none could 
 manage her. Bedford is condemned by the same 
 author as being guilty of " meanness and cruelty," 
 when he ought to have "respected her intrepidity." 
 But, according to the religious notions of the age, 
 if she really " counterfeited a divine inspiration," 
 she deserved burning, and the Duke was no 
 spiteful enemy, but one who dealt out a just 
 punishment for her crimes. 
 
 NOTE (E). Page 30. 
 
 The following passage, quoted by Lord Mahon 
 from Barante, gives a lively description of the 
 scene : — 
 
 " The day had been a weary one ; Joan threw 
 herself on her bed, and tried to sleep; but she 
 
NOTES. 91 
 
 was disturbed in mind. All of a sudden she 
 called out to the Sire d'Aulon, her esquire, ' My 
 council tells me to march against the English ; 
 but I do not know whether it should be against 
 their bastilles, or against this F ascot ' {her name 
 for Fastolf), you must arm me ! ' The Sire d'Au- 
 lon began accordingly to put on her armour. 
 During this time she heard a great noise in the 
 street, the cry being that the enemy were at that 
 very moment inflicting great hurt upon the French. 
 ' My God,' she exclaimed, ( the blood of our people 
 is flowing. Why was I not wakened sooner ? Oh, 
 that was ill done. My arms ! my arms ! my 
 horse ! ' Leaving behind her esquire, who had 
 not yet clad himself in armour, she hastened down 
 stairs ; and she found her page loitering before 
 the door. ' You wicked boy,' she cried, ( why 
 did you not come to tell me that the blood of 
 France is being shed ? Quick, quick, my horse ! ' 
 Her horse was brought; she desired that her 
 banner, which she had left in the house, might be 
 reached out to her from the window, and without 
 further delay she set forth, hastening towards the 
 Porte Bourgogne, from whence the din of battle 
 seemed to come. When she had nearly reached 
 it, she beheld, carried by her, one of the townsmen 
 grievously wounded. ' Alas ! ' said she, w never 
 have I seen the blood of Frenchmen flow without 
 my hair standing on end.' " — Historical Essays, 
 p. 27. 
 
 NOTE (F). Page 61. 
 
 There is one weak point in Joan's testimony, 
 namely, her varying accounts of her first inter- 
 
92 JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 view with the King. How to account for her 
 contradictions here, as contrasted with the clear- 
 ness, promptness, and consistency of her state- 
 ments generally, is one of the problems of her 
 history. Probably, memory had somehow become 
 bewildered ; or, considering what were the illu- 
 sions of her waking dreams, it would not be a 
 violent supposition that some vision of her sleep- 
 ing hours had become blended with the scene, as 
 she really saw it. Lord Mahon thus describes 
 the uncertainty we speak of : — " The clearness 
 and precision of her replies on these points stand 
 forth in strange contrast to the vague and con- 
 tradictory accounts which she gives of her first 
 interview with the King. On this topic she at 
 first refuses to answer altogether, saying that she 
 is forbidden by the Voices. But afterwards she 
 drops mysterious hints of an angel bringing a 
 crown to Charles from heaven, sometimes saying 
 that the King alone had beheld this vision, and 
 sometimes that it had been before many witnesses. 
 In other examinations she declares that she her- 
 self was this angel ; in others, again, she appears 
 to confound the imaginary crown of the vision 
 with the real one at Rheirns." — Historical Essays, 
 pp. 49, 50. Michelet has a singular explanation, 
 which, after all, may be the real one. " It seems 
 to follow from her replies, which, indeed, are very 
 obscure, that the crafty court abused her sim- 
 plicity, and that, in order to confirm her belief in 
 her visions, it had a sort of mystery enacted 
 before her, in which an angel appeared carrying 
 the crown." — Yol. II. p. 525. 
 
NOTES. 93 
 
 NOTE (G). Page 81. 
 
 The able work of this distinguished writer is 
 deformed by a hatred of England, which would 
 be ludicrous, if it were not painful. Every 
 thins: about us is sneered at or caricatured. 
 Our climate, our scenery, our literature, our 
 manners, our diet, are all held up to scorn, and 
 that in the text of a grave history of France. 
 The narrative is perpetually interrupted for the 
 sake of some comment to show that all that was 
 virtuous, and refined, and noble, was on the 
 French side, while every fault, into which our 
 ancestors of five hundred years ago were be- 
 trayed, is assumed to be national and characteristic. 
 The conceit is simply laughable; but the ma- 
 lignity, which helps to keep alive antipathies 
 between two such nations, is mischievous and 
 wicked. The spirit of the Anti-Jacobin, and of 
 newspapers and pamphlets written in a time of 
 wars and revolutions, is transplanted into a work 
 which assumes to be philosophical, and is designed 
 to instruct future generations. A few specimens 
 are quoted as literary curiosities. 
 
 I. 
 
 The captivity of the Duke of Orleans, who 
 was taken prisoner at Agincourt, and passed the 
 twenty-five best years of his life in England, is a 
 sad tale, and a very disgraceful one. We English 
 will condemn as strongly as Michelet himself the 
 bad faith of a jealous government, which could 
 deal thus with a prisoner of war, because he was 
 of royal blood. But we wonder that a French- 
 
94 ' JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 man could pen no more suitable paragraph on the 
 subject than this. <e Thus he passed long years, 
 treated honourably, but strictly, without society 
 or amusement, except, at most, hawking or doe 
 hunting, w T hich was usually performed on foot, 
 and almost without change of place. It was a 
 dull diversion in that land of ennui and fogs, in 
 which there needs nothing less than all the agi- 
 tations of social life, and the most violent exer- 
 cises, to make one forget the monotony of an 
 unvaried landscape, a climate without a season, 
 and a sky without a sun." — Yol. II. p. 442. 
 
 II. 
 
 Here is a passage suggested by a quotation 
 from Matthew of Westminster, who makes 
 honourable mention of "the fleeces of English 
 sheep," as having warmed the sides, and earned 
 the blessings, of all the nations of the world. 
 Think of a grave historian, one whose business it 
 is to collect facts, and weigh and discriminate 
 at every point, — who must be on his guard con- 
 tinually against generalizing too fast, — professing 
 to have got "an intuition of England," which 
 enabled him to comprehend her at last, in a day's 
 ride from York to Manchester. 
 
 " Wool and meat are what was primitively the 
 making of England, and the English race. Eng- 
 land was a manufactory of meat before she be- 
 came the great manufactory of iron and cloth for 
 the world. Her people have been graziers and 
 cattle-breeders from time immemorial, — a race 
 fed on flesh meat. Hence their fresh complexion, 
 beauty and vigour. Their greatest man, Shak- 
 
NOTES. 95 
 
 speare, was originally a butcher. Let me be 
 allowed in this place to record a personal im- 
 pression. I had seen London, and great part of 
 England and Scotland, and had admired rather 
 than comprehended It was not until my return, 
 as I journeyed from York to Manchester, crossing 
 the island in the direction of its breadth 3 that I, 
 at last, had a real intuition of England. It was a 
 cold, foggy morning, and the land appeared to 
 me not only surrounded, but covered and drenched, 
 by the ocean. A pale sunshine hardly coloured 
 half the landscape. The new red-brick houses 
 would have contrasted offensively with the green 
 turf, if the floating mist had not harmonized the 
 discordant tints. Above the pastures, covered 
 with sheep, flamed the red chimneys of the fac- 
 tories. Pasturage, tillage, manufacturing in- 
 dustry, all were there, combined in a narrow 
 space, accumulated upon, and nourished by, each 
 other; the grass feeding on fog, the sheep on 
 grass, man on blood. In this greedy climate, 
 man, always hungering, can live only by labour. 
 Nature compels him to it ; but he fully retaliates 
 upon her; he makes her labour, and subjugates 
 her with fire and steel. All England pants with 
 strife. Her sons seem flushed by combat. Look 
 at the Englishman's red face, his strange air, 
 You would almost imagine he was drunk; but his 
 head and his hand are steady; he is drunk only 
 with blood and vigour." — Vol. II. p. 144, 145. 
 
 III. 
 
 The following is a curious transition from a 
 narrative about the Black Prince's ill-judged in- 
 
96 JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 terference in the civil wars of Spain : — " The 
 English were exasperated with anger and jealousy, 
 and took upon them to restore Don Pedro, to 
 replace the bloody executioner of Spain; — always 
 that diabolical pride which has so often turned 
 their brains, sensible as they seem to be; the 
 same which made them burn the Maid of Orleans, 
 and which, under Mr. Pitt, would have made 
 them burn France."— Vol. II. p. 237, 238. We 
 do not pretend to say whether pride, hatred, su- 
 perstition, or fear, had most to do with Joan of 
 Arc's murder. But a passion for war seems as 
 natural a motive to attribute to the Black Prince; 
 and, assuredly, in Mr. Burke's " Reflections," and 
 " Thoughts on a Regicide Peace," some grave 
 reasons are given for jealousy of France, quite 
 apart from national pride. 
 
 " Virtues and crimes in them " (the English), 
 he says elsewhere, " are almost always pride. 
 This immense, profound vice is their principle of 
 life, the explanation of their contradictions, the 
 secret of their acts." — Vol. II. p. 574. 
 
 IV. 
 
 One would gladly suppose that ignorance was 
 the excuse for the falseness of the following 
 passage; but how can that be in one who has 
 criticized English literature, as he tells us, in his 
 " Introduction a l'Histoire Universelle " ? Any 
 how it required some hardihood for the country- 
 man of Voltaire, Rousseau and the Encyclopedists 
 to send abroad statements like these ; — 
 
 " From Shakspeare to Milton, from Milton to 
 
NOTES. 97 
 
 Byron, their fine and sombre literature is sceptical, 
 Judaic, Satanic, in a word anti-Christian. e In 
 law,' it has been very well said by a lawyer, 
 ( the English are J ews ; the French are Chris- 
 tians.' What he alleges as to law, a theologian 
 would have asserted with regard to faith. The 
 Indians of America, who often exhibit so much 
 penetration and originality, expressed this dis- 
 tinction after their own manner. Christ, said 
 one of them, was a Frenchman, whom the 
 English crucified in London ; Pontius Pilate was 
 an officer in the service of Great Britain." In a 
 note he adds, " I do not recollect to have seen 
 the name of God in Shakspeare ; if it occur, it is 
 very rarely, by chance, and without the shadow 
 of a religious sentiment." — Vol. II. p. 574, 575. 
 
 V. 
 
 The following scene is from the field of Agin- 
 court. Strange that the sneering tone should 
 pursue a Frenchman thither. 
 
 " An eye-witness says, that a moment before 
 the battle he beheld from the English ranks an 
 affecting spectacle in the other army. The French 
 of all parties threw themselves into each other's 
 arms, exchanged fprgiveness, and broke bread 
 together. From that moment, he adds, hate was 
 changed into love, I do not find that the English 
 became reconciled to each other. They con- 
 fessed ; each man set his own conscience in order, 
 without concernino- himself about the rest. The 
 English army seems to have been a decent, 
 orderly, well-behaved army; there was no gam- 
 
 H 
 
98 JOAN OF ARC. 
 
 bling in it, no wanton girls, no oaths. Really- 
 one hardly sees what they had to confess. Which 
 of the two died in better plight!"— Vol. II. p. 441. 
 Who shall settle the last question with such 
 scanty facts before him? Yet M. Michelet, I 
 think, means it to be understood that he has 
 decided it in his own mind. The French, who 
 embraced before the battle, might be very wicked, 
 surely, and wretchedly unfit to die. The English, 
 who refrained from embracing, might be in a very 
 forgiving mood, notwithstanding. If they really 
 had nothing to confess, the balance seems to be 
 in their favour. Besides, the whole point of the 
 story about the brotherly greetings of the French 
 is connected with the fierce civil war which had 
 been raging so long in France, and dividing the 
 whole country into hostile factions. 
 
 VI. 
 
 The following puff is one of the closing para- 
 graphs in his narrative of Joan of Arc : — "It 
 was fit the Saviour of France should be a woman. 
 France herself was a woman. She had the 
 fickleness of the sex, but also its amiable gentle- 
 ness, its facile and charming pity, and the excel- 
 lence of its first impulses. Even when it took 
 delight in vain elegancies and outward over- 
 refinements, at core it remained nearer to nature. 
 The Frenchman, even though vicious, retained 
 more than any other man, good sense and a good 
 heart."— Vol. II. p. 586. 
 
CAXTON AND THE EARLY 
 PRINTERS. 
 
 H 2 
 
INVENTION OF PRINTING. 101 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 INVENTION OF PRINTING. 
 
 We turn gladly from such a sickening spectacle 
 of guilt and woe to quieter and more homely 
 scenes. From the battle-field and the stake we 
 will pass to the workshop. In that age of strife, 
 — the middle half of the fifteenth century, — 
 while England and France were convulsed by 
 domestic wars, — while Christians and Moors 
 were still contending on Spanish soil, — while the 
 Emperors of Germany were battling with Popes 
 and Electoral Princes respecting the limits of their 
 power, — while Mahomet II. was gathering his 
 victorious forces round the walls of Constantinople, 
 and aiming the last fatal blow at the throne of the 
 Caesars, — a little company of obscure men were 
 busily engaged in contriving a new mode of pro- 
 pagating knowledge, which was to effect greater 
 social changes than all the wars and revolutions 
 of many centuries. It is certain that, at some 
 time during this period, printed books first saw 
 the light. "When Joan of Arc stood before her 
 judges, written documents were the only known 
 
 H 3 
 
102 INVENTION OF PRINTING. 
 
 medium for propagating that which men desired 
 to make known among their fellows ; and forty 
 years later the art had not only been brought to 
 considerable perfection, but the secret was out, 
 and had travelled to many of the countries in 
 Europe. 
 
 We know what the printing-press has done 
 since. It has gone on cheapening and multiply- 
 ing books, till many a working man has a better 
 library than w T as possessed by sovereign princes 
 in the fourteenth century. It is recorded, that 
 the store of books which had descended to 
 Charles V. of France from his ancestors, amounted, 
 in the year 1364, to twenty volumes. Some 
 seventy years later, a copy of Wiclif's New 
 Testament fetched the price of 21. 13s. 4:d. } just 
 the amount of a labouring man's wages for a 
 whole year. Of course, the common people in 
 those days could as little think of possessing a 
 book, as of owning a casket of jewels. Convents, 
 colleges, and here and there some noble patron of 
 letters, had their little treasury of parchment 
 manuscripts, which were valued above gold. Few 
 even of the wealthiest could afford to buy at the 
 rate of a certain Countess of Anjou, who gave for a 
 single copy of some favourite homilies five quarters 
 of wheat, five quarters of barley, five quarters of 
 
 
INVENTION OF PRINTING. 103 
 
 millet, two hundred sheep, and, doubtless, was 
 well pleased with her bargain when she got pos- 
 session of her bundle of parchment, and used it 
 to help her devotions. We need to look back to 
 times like those, that we may understand how 
 favoured we are in having the materials of 
 knowledge, and the means of self-improvement, 
 scattered around us in such abundance. The 
 poor man's shilling, now-a-days, will go as far in 
 the book-market as the Countess's flock of sheep. 
 Not only may he buy a yet better book with it, 
 but he may have a good choice of books besides 
 in the nearest town ; whereas she, perhaps, might 
 have wandered over half a province to collect 
 half a dozen saleable manuscripts, if she had corn 
 and sheep enough left to buy them. 
 
 Gladly, therefore, would we give honour to the 
 man who first learned and practised this wonder- 
 working art. Who was lief Where was his 
 press set up ? The place from which books began 
 to go forth were better worth a pilgrimage than 
 many a shrine whose stones have been worn hollow 
 by kneeling devotees. We should like to know 
 from the man's own lips how he lighted on the 
 discovery, and what was the first rude form in 
 which the idea presented itself to his mind, — 
 how the world received the news when it began 
 
 H 4 
 
104 INVENTION OF PRINTING. 
 
 to be published abroad, — what honours were 
 heaped u]3on him, — or whether, having con- 
 tributed more than all the world besides to 
 make other men famous, he lived and died in 
 obscurity. A simple, trustworthy record of his 
 early struggles, patient labours, and final triumph, 
 would be far more interesting than the tale of 
 Alexander's victories. 
 
 Unfortunately, no such record exists. 
 Origin of The art, which records all other things 
 
 Printing 
 
 obscure. that are done beneath the sun, has given 
 us no distinct or satisfactory account of its 
 own origin. Something of mystery hangs over 
 the birth of this Enchantress. She started up 
 before the world to work changes in human 
 society, beyond the power of the mightiest kings, 
 and the wit of the deepest philosophers ; but she 
 does not tell us whence she came, nor where she 
 tried the magic of her earliest charm. A day's 
 work, four centuries ago, might have saved a 
 world of controversy, and given the inventor his 
 rightful honours with posterity. A single page, 
 printed off with name, place, and date, and sent 
 to every library in Europe, with a challenge to 
 multiply copies of any given manuscript a hundred 
 times faster than the pen, would have settled the 
 question at once, and the man who sent it abroad 
 
INVENTION OF PKINTING. 105 
 
 would have taken his place by the side of Colum- 
 bus and Galileo. But in all the books, with 
 which the world is filled, no such page is found. 
 Instead of a clear narrative of facts, we have 
 disputes and controversies between rival cities. 
 National animosities have been kindled, and eager 
 champions, like knights fighting for the honour 
 of their dames, have wielded the pen on either 
 side. The poor mute press, unable to tell its own 
 tale, has multiplied treatises about itself, and its 
 earliest struggles into existence, till it has become 
 
 on ' 
 
 a laborious and bewildering task to read them all, 
 and harder still to find out the truth amidst such 
 a conflict of opinions. 
 
 The reason of this uncertainty it is not difficult 
 to discover. Self-interest was at work, in the 
 first instance, to keep the secret as close as pos- 
 sible. Up to a certain time manuscripts were the 
 only books. Whatever men desired to perpetuate 
 and multiply had to be copied laboriously by the 
 pen, line for line, and word for word, on paper or 
 parchment. If we think how many days would 
 be consumed by a good penman, supposing him to 
 get up early and go late to rest, in copying out, 
 clearly and legibly, a single volume of moderate 
 size, we may guess how much he must charge for 
 his labour, and consequently how dear each copy 
 
106 INVENTION OF PRINTING. 
 
 would be. While the price was high, some in- 
 genious or fortunate person discovered the means 
 of producing copies with far less expense of time 
 and labour. Wooden blocks, or metal types, cut 
 or cast into the form of letters, and impressing the 
 same characters on many sheets in succession, 
 enabled him to outstrip the readiest scribe, and 
 gave him more copies in a few days than the pen 
 would produce in as many months. Still, for a 
 time, the books would pass for manuscripts, and 3 
 of course, would fetch the price of manuscripts in 
 the market. The printers undersold the scribes, 
 and, so long as they could keep the world in the 
 dark, might reap a golden harvest. Instead of 
 boasting of their cleverness, therefore, they prac- 
 tised the art as cautiously as they could. As few 
 hands were employed as possible, and workmen 
 were sworn to secrecy by their masters. Some 
 years elapsed before the public knew what they 
 were purchasing. Men found that books were 
 much more plentiful and much cheaper than they 
 used to be, and marvelled, probably, where the 
 army of scribes was hidden who must be busy in 
 producing them; but the busy printer kept his 
 secret while he could, and made the most of it. 
 
 The dispute, we have said, is one between rival 
 cities ; and we will state, as clearly as we can, the 
 
INVENTION OF PRINTING. 107 
 
 case that is put forward by the several claimants. 
 Mayence comes first. In August, _ 
 
 Mayence 
 
 1837, a statue, by Thorwaldsen, was and 
 publicly inaugurated in that city, near i& * 
 
 the spot where John Guttenberg once plied 
 the printer's craft. It was a day of jubilee, and 
 thousands of spectators were collected, among 
 whom every country in Europe had its repre- 
 sentatives.* The fine old Cathedral was crowded 
 in every part ; one sight of the day was a copy of 
 Guttenberg's first Bible ; and after this had been 
 displayed, and High Mass performed by the 
 Bishop, the multitude assembled in a vast amphi- 
 theatre opposite the statue. Then a colossal figure 
 of Guttenberg, in bronze, holding a matrix in his 
 hand, was unveiled ; a hymn was sung by a thou- 
 sand voices ; and the day concluded with oratorios 
 and processions by torch-light. 
 
 What then has history recorded respecting this 
 man ? The most particular and authentic account 
 we have is contained in the Annals of Trithemius, 
 finished shortly before his death, which took place 
 in the year 1516. Speaking of the year 1450, 
 he says, " About this time, in the city Account of 
 of Mentz, on the Ehine in Germany, Trithemms. 
 and not in Italy, as some have erroneously writ* 
 * See NOTE (H). 
 
308 INVENTION OF PRINTING. 
 
 ten, that wonderful and unheard-of art of print- 
 ing and characterizing books was invented and 
 devised by John Guttenberger, a citizen of Mentz, 
 who, after expending almost all his substance for 
 the discovery of this art, when he was over- 
 whelmed with difficulties, and found himself 
 foiled, first on one side and then on the other, was 
 just on the point of throwing up the thing in de- 
 spair; but by the advice of John Fust, who was 
 also a citizen of Mentz, and with his money, he 
 went on and completed what he had begun. They 
 first printed the Vocabulary, called 'Catholicon' 
 with the shapes of letters made (scriptis) in a row 
 on wooden blocks, and with forms placed together* 
 But when they could print nothing else with the 
 same forms, because the characters could not be 
 detached from the blocks, but were carved upon 
 them, as we said, at a later period, a more inge- 
 nious device was added to the first invention. 
 They devised a mode of casting all the letters in 
 the Latin alphabet in a mould which they called 
 a matrix, from which they produced characters of 
 copper or tin, hard enough to bear the necessary 
 pressure ; these they had previously cut with the 
 hand. And, truly, this Printing Art had to 
 encounter serious difficulties from the time of its 
 
 * See NOTE (I). 
 
INVENTION OF PRINTING. 109 
 
 first discovery, as I myself heard from Peter 
 Schoeffer, citizen of Mentz, who was son-in-law 
 to the first inventor, John Fust. When they had 
 their edition of the Bible in hand, they expended 
 four thousand florins before they had completed 
 the third quaternion. But this Peter Schoeffer, 
 who was then Fust's servant, and afterwards, as I 
 have said, became his son-in-law, an ingenious, 
 clever man, discovered the method of casting the 
 types more easily, and so brought the art to its 
 present maturity. And these three men made a 
 secret of this printing process for some time, till 
 at last by means of their workmen, whose services 
 they could not dispense with in their calling, it 
 became known at Strasburg first, and by degrees 
 universally among other nations. And thus much 
 for the marvellous ingenuity of this Printing Art. 
 The first inventors were citizens of Mentz, and 
 the three partners in the discovery, namely John 
 Guttenberger, John Fust, and Peter Schoeffer, 
 all lived at Mentz in the house called Zum Jun~ 
 gen, which is called the Printing Office to this 
 day." 
 
 All this is very probable, and hangs well to- 
 gether. We have, first of all, the ingenious in- 
 ventor, as is so often the case, calling in the aid 
 of the more substantial man to help him out with 
 
110 INVENTION OF PRINTING. 
 
 his scheme, — the two coming together as partners, 
 one supplying wit, and the other money, — a third 
 party, who began life as a servant, or apprentice, 
 suggesting improvements in the art, and rewarded 
 most appropriately with the hand of his master's 
 daughter. There is the kind of certainty, more- 
 over, that we want in historical testimony, the 
 author being near enough to the period of which 
 he writes, and moreover receiving his information, 
 not at second-hand, but from the fountain-head, 
 the very workshop in which the first printed 
 sheet is said to have seen the light. There is 
 documentary evidence, too, to support Trithemius's 
 narrative. Undoubtedly, an inscription once 
 existed on the front of the Printing Office at 
 Mayence, giving Guttenberg the undivided honour 
 of the discovery, and bearing the early date of 
 1508. Books, moreover, are found, here and 
 there, with the years 1460, 1465, and 1468 on 
 their title-pages, and all issuing from the Mayence 
 press, when as yet the world knew of no other. 
 
 The weak point in the case is this, — that the 
 main witness, Peter SchoefTer, is a party interested. 
 His own credit was at stake, and that of his part- 
 ners. There is no doubt whatever that theirs 
 was the most famous printing-house in Europe, 
 the best known, and the most productive, when 
 
INVENTION OF PRINTING. Ill 
 
 he told his story to Trithemius ; but his testimony, 
 if there should be any dispute upon the subject, 
 can hardly be considered as conclusive with re- 
 ference to the first rudiments of the art, and the 
 claim of original discovery. There is a circum- 
 stance, too, which curiously contrasts with Peter 
 Schosffer's statement. His son John succeeded 
 to the business, and in the year 1515, in the 
 preface to one of his books, he describes himself 
 as "the grandson of John Fust, who began of his 
 own head (proprio ingenio), in the year 1450, 
 to think out and devise the art of Printing, and 
 in the year 1452, through the Divine favour, 
 completed the discovery, and carried it on to the 
 actual work of printing, not without assistance 
 from the contrivances of Peter SchoefFer, his 
 adopted son." 
 
 It is clear, therefore, that before we Gnttenbero- 
 can prove that Guttenberg has earned at Strasburg. 
 his statue, we must have recourse to other evi- 
 dence. Can we learn any thing respecting him 
 beyond the scanty notice in Trithemius ? Is there 
 any record of his early struggles and difficulties ? 
 May we have a glimpse into his workshop, and 
 see him groping his way to the great secret which 
 he was enabled by Fust to turn to such good 
 account ? The answer to these questions is fur- 
 
112 INVENTION OF PRINTING. 
 
 nished by the records of a lawsuit, which took 
 place at Strasburg, in the year 1439. The heirs 
 of one Drizehn were the complainants, and they 
 alleged as follows : — that Guttenberg, about the 
 year 1436, was carrying on business there as a 
 polisher of stones, and maker of mirrors, — that 
 the deceased and another had entered into part- 
 nership with him, on the understanding that he 
 was to instruct them in those arts, and in some 
 other wonderful secrets, — ■ that while this con- 
 nection lasted, Guttenberg, who resided in the 
 suburbs of Strasburg, was surprised one day by 
 his partners in the exercise of some mysterious 
 craft which had been concealed from them, — 
 that some altercation ensued, and it was agreed 
 that they should share his secret and his venture, 
 certain capital being subscribed, a portion of 
 which was to be returned to their heirs if any 
 of the parties should die within five years. 
 Drizehn died before the term had expired, and 
 his representatives claimed the fulfilment of the 
 contract. Guttenberg, who seems to have been 
 an ill-conditioned and quarrelsome man, and was a 
 party to more than one law- suit, refused payment, 
 and an appeal w T as made to the courts. Evidence 
 was given by carpenters, servants, and others, 
 which makes it almost certain that the mvsterious 
 
INVENTION OF PRINTING. 113 
 
 craft was none other than that of printing. A 
 workman declared that he had been employed, 
 three years before, at a sort of press, and had 
 received a hundred florins for his labour. Im- 
 mediately on Drizehn's death, Guttenberg had 
 given orders to his servant to convey certain 
 implements from the workshop in the suburbs, 
 to a place of secrecy elsewhere ; and, on investi- 
 gation, it appeared that among them were a 
 quantity of letters cut in wood. 
 
 Here we have Trithemius's story abundantly 
 confirmed. To Drizehn's heirs, who brought 
 their quarrel into open court, we are indebted 
 for this tolerably decisive proof that Guttenberg 
 was at work with wooden letters and a press 
 some years before the earliest date that is given 
 to the Mayence establishment. Up to 1442 he 
 was resident iu Strasburg. From that Guttenberg 
 period till 1455 he was in partner- at Ma J en ce. 
 ship with Fust. And in the interval it is quite 
 certain that men had not only learnt to print, 
 but to print large books, with workmanlike skill, 
 in a good clear type. The evidence is all con- 
 sistent and uniform. Trithemius tells us that 
 Guttenberg's substance was expended, and his 
 patience almost exhausted, when he was joined by 
 Fust. The Strasburg witnesses tell us what 
 
114 INVENTION OF PRINTING. ; 
 
 exactly fits on to this statement, for there we fin 
 him first working in secret with very suspicious 
 looking tools, and then cast in a lawsuit relating 
 to some mysterious craft. Doubtless, then, after 
 being partly ruined by costs, — dreading, perhaps 
 to seek a partner in Strasburg, where his doings 
 had been made more public than he wished, — he 
 found his way to Mayence, and lighted, in a happy 
 hour, on Fust, a man of substance, who was suffi- 
 ciently intelligent and enterprising to discern the 
 value of what was offered him, and to venture his 
 capital upon experiments in the printing art, which 
 proved completely successful. 
 His subse- ^ n ^ ne y ear 1455 a dispute between 
 
 quent history, Fust and Q-uttenberg led to a separa^ 
 tion between them, and the first, as the monied 
 partner, kept possession of the Printing Office. 
 At that period the veil was not withdrawn which 
 hid the new-born art from public view. The 
 great revealer of secrets was itself shrouded i 
 obscurity. Consequently, we get no confirmation 
 of Guttenberg's claim from title-pages. No book 
 survives, — probably no book ever saw the light, 
 — bearing on its front the name of the man who 
 is supposed to have taught the world to print. 
 There is no doubt, however, that, while he la- 
 boured at Mayence, the fine Latin folio Bible was 
 
INVENTION OF PRINTING. 115 
 
 completed *, of which a copy was exhibited on 
 the Jubilee day in 1837 ; and its large clear type 
 proves what advances the art had made in so 
 short a period. On leaving the Zum Jungen, he 
 is said to have set up another office at Mayence. 
 Another account makes him wander back to Stras- 
 burg, and try his fortune there ; a third carries 
 him on his travels as far as Haerlem. But apart 
 from Fust he never prospered. His work seems 
 to have been done when he had taught his secret 
 to SchcefFer, the man of skill, and with Fust's 
 money had been enabled to overcome all diffi- 
 culties, and to carry on his art from its earliest 
 rudiments to a very high degree of excellence. 
 
 This narrative enables us to estimate claim of 
 the value of the claim put forward by Strasbur S- 
 Strasburg. " Others have robbed us of our 
 honours," its townsmen say. "Here Guttenberg 
 found out what he carried to Mayence. That may 
 have been the cradle of the art ; but our noble city 
 was its birthplace. Among our fathers he lived till 
 he had learnt to print, and then enriched others 
 by his skill." Having stated the facts of the case, 
 we may leave our readers to dispense the credit o£ 
 
 * See NOTE (K> 
 
 12 
 
116 INVENTION OF POINTING. 
 
 tlie discovery as they please. No doubt, in that 
 workshop in the suburbs, the first printer was 
 making experiments, and preparing his tools; 
 but there is no reason to suppose he ever struck off 
 a single sheet before he got to Mayence. There, 
 so far as we know, the thought came to maturity, 
 and yielded precious fruit. There, certainly, the 
 press was set up which fairly exhibited the triumph 
 and perfection of the art. There, for half a century 
 nearly, he or his partners laboured at their noble 
 craft, and made Europe ring with the fame of 
 their office, as the fountain head from which the 
 fertilising stream had flowed to so many lands. 
 
 Still let Strasburg have its due. The spot on 
 which some great idea has struggled for birth is 
 no mean spot. If Gruttenberg saw the light there, 
 — was trained among its citizens, — set up his 
 first rude press just without its walls, — spent his 
 substance there in labouring to make his work or 
 his tools more perfect, — let the men of Strasburg 
 tell the world all this, and rejoice to have it so. 
 But they have gone further, and have damaged 
 their just pretensions by claiming more than 
 fairly belongs to them. 
 
 One Mentel is set up against Guttenberg, and 
 John Schotten, who married his granddaughter, 
 claims for him the honour of being the " first in- 
 
INVENTION OF PRINTING. 117 
 
 ventor of printing," in a boastful preface bearing 
 the date of 1520. The same pretensions were 
 formally advanced a century afterwards by a 
 learned physician of the same name, who pre- 
 tended to be descended from the Strasburg printer, 
 and was jealous for the honours of his great grand- 
 father, declaring that the invention was his, and 
 that Guttenberg stole it. Mentel, doubtless, was 
 among the very earliest printers ; none, probably, 
 but the celebrated trio of the Zum Jungen pre- 
 ceded him. There is an old chronicle published 
 at Kome in 1474, which reports, -under the year 
 1458, that " John Mentel, a skilful printer, struck 
 off three hundred leaves in a day ;" and Schoep- 
 pin, the most zealous and able advocate of May- 
 ence, gives him credit for having sent out a 
 German Bible from the Strasburg press about the 
 year 1466. But the probability is, that Gutten- 
 berg was his teacher after he had parted company 
 with Fust ; and with the fact before us, that no 
 publication has an earlier printed date than 1473, 
 we cannot admit his claim to compete with those 
 who were, undoubtedly, at work twenty years 
 sooner. 
 
 Modern writers have taken little ac- Haerlem 
 count of the claims of Haerlem : but ancl Koster - 
 
118 INVENTION OF FEINTING. 
 
 the pretensions of its citizen, Laurence Koster, 
 as an original inventor of printing in its rudest 
 form, seem to me by no means contemptible ; and 
 our story will be incomplete unless his case be 
 stated, as well as that of the Germans. 
 
 Hadrian Junius wrote a history of Holland, 
 which was published in the year 1578, and is in 
 good repute with the learned men of his country. 
 In his account of Haerlem the following remark- 
 able passage occurs ; — "I will tell what I heard 
 from old men whose characters gave weight to 
 what they said ; men who had earned distinction 
 in the service of the state, and who affirmed most 
 gravely that they delivered what was handed 
 down to them by their fathers. About a hundred 
 and twenty-eight years ago*, one Laurence John, 
 having the title of JEdituus or Gustos, dwelt in a 
 house of some pretensions near the market-place, 
 at Haerlem, opposite the royal palace. This man 
 has a rightful claim to the honours which have 
 been usurped by others, as the Inventor of the 
 Art of Printing, and well deserves all the reward, 
 
 * Junius died in 1575, but this portion of the work may 
 have been written much sooner. A hundred and twenty- 
 eight years from 1575 carries us back to a period subse- 
 quent to the early printing operations at Mayence. But it 
 is clear, from a statement which follows, that the author is 
 speaking of a time prior to the year 1442. 
 
 
 
INVENTION OF PRINTING. 119 
 
 in the way of fame, which can be heaped upon 
 him." The historian then proceeds to narrate, 
 with much of detail, how this gentleman, while 
 walking in a wood near the city, amused 
 himself with cutting some beech wood into the 
 shape of letters, — how, with these, inverted like 
 a seal, he stamped a line or two on paper, first for 
 his own amusement, and then for the use of his 
 grandchildren, — how, with the assistance of his 
 son-in-law, Thomas Peter, he went on and in- 
 vented a more glutinous sort of ink, as the com- 
 mon ink was found to run, and then formed blocks 
 on which letters were carved, — how, in this way, 
 he printed a little book called il The Mirror of 
 Redemption,", which the Author had seen, and, 
 as nothing, he says, comes to perfection at once, 
 he found the backs of the leaves pasted together, 
 that the vacant pages might not present an un- 
 sightly appearance. He adds that, as customers 
 multiplied, the inventor became more fond of his 
 art ; — and, being compelled to engage other 
 hands, lighted, in an unlucky hour, on one John, 
 whom the writer does not expressly name, but 
 hints, in connexion with a bad pun, that it was 
 Faustus or Fust. This man, he says, played the 
 knave, and watching his opportunity, stole away, 
 one Christmas Eve, with tools and types, and fled 
 
 I 4 
 
120 INVFNTION OF PRINTING. 
 
 first to Amsterdam, then to Cologne, and settled 
 himself, finally, at Mayence. " There" the his- 
 torian adds, " a grammar which was then much 
 in use, called Alexandri Galli Doctrmale, and the 
 Tractatus Petri Hispani, were printed with the 
 very types which Laurence had used at Haer- 
 lem." 
 
 Some traditionary and personal anecdotes close 
 this story of Hadrian Junius, who is styled by 
 his adversaries a " learned physician, critic and 
 historian." " I recollect," he says, " that Nicholas 
 Gael, my schoolmaster in the days of my youth, 
 who was remarkable for an iron memory, and 
 venerable for his grey hairs, used to relate to me 
 that he had frequently heard Cornelis, the book- 
 binder, a decent old man, nearly eighty years of 
 age, who had assisted at the Printing Office of Lau- 
 rence, relate every particular as he had received 
 them from his master, — such as the manner in 
 which the discovery was made, the subsequent 
 improvements and gradual advancement of the 
 art. " He " (that is, the book-binder) " could not 
 mention the theft without shedding tears of in- 
 dignation at the baseness of the deed. He cursed 
 the nights in which he had slept, for months 
 together, in the same chamber, with such a 
 wretch. All these particulars perfectly accord 
 
INVENTION OF PRINTING. 121 
 
 with the account given by the burgomaster 
 Quirinus Talesius, who informed me that he had 
 heard similar things from the mouth of the book- 
 binder himself." 
 
 It must be allowed that this is not bad tradi- 
 tionary evidence; and it gets confirmation in 
 minute particulars from the registers of Haerlem ; 
 for Cornells, it seems, lived there at the time 
 specified, " in Cross Street," and the name of 
 Quirinus is enrolled among the civic rulers of the 
 day. Guicciardini, too, who was no Dutchman, 
 and who published his account of Holland some 
 years before the narrative of Hadrian Junius was 
 printed, avows his belief that the rudiments of the 
 Printing Art came to light at Haerlem, and were 
 thence conveyed to Mayence by a servant of the 
 original inventor. " There, however? he added, 
 " the art was brought to such perfection that many 
 persons gave the honour of the discovery to the 
 German city." A yet more important witness, 
 because much more ancient, is the unknown au- 
 thor of a Chronicle of Cologne. " The Printing 
 Art," he says, "was first invented at Mentz 
 about the year 1440, and the first inventor was a 
 citizen of Mentz, though a native of Strasburg, 
 John Guttenberg." He adds, however, in the 
 very same paragraph, " Although this art, as it is 
 
122 INVENTION OF PRINTING. 
 
 now used, was discovered at Mentz, yet the first 
 draft, or model, of it was formed and taken from 
 some Donatus's, which before that time had been 
 struck off in Holland. Bet the second invention 
 was greatly beyond the first in ingenuity and 
 workmanlike skill, and is daily advancing to 
 
 greater excellence I heard the beginning 
 
 and progress of the business from Ulrick Zell, an 
 honourable gentleman, who was a native of 
 Hanover, but in this present year, 1499, is exer- 
 cising his printer's art at Cologne, having himself 
 introduced it into that city." Now Zell actually 
 worked at the Mayence press before the year 
 1467, when he settled at Cologne ; and if the 
 Chronicler had told us all he heard from Zell 
 about "the beginning and progress of the busi- 
 ness," we mi^ht have been much wiser than we 
 
 ' CD 
 
 are. As it is, we must not assume, I think, that 
 Zell vouched for the Dutch portion of the story, 
 but only that he described what he knew about 
 the Mayence portion; the passage, however, has 
 a peculiar value about it as showing the current 
 language of the day. The writer, who knew 
 what was said about Holland, begins by telling 
 the world that Guttenberg of Mayence invented 
 printing; then, to save his accuracy, he adds, 
 " The first hint, however, came from Holland ; 
 
INVENTION OF PRINTING. 123 
 
 some books printed there set the Germans think- 
 ing and working ; and the second discovery, and, 
 far the better, was theirs." 
 
 This distinction, we believe, gives the solution of 
 the difficulty. All the world talked as the writer 
 did. "Printing began at Mayence," — that is, 
 printing, as they saw it, with metal types ; whereas 
 few, probably, knew any thing of its earlier stage, 
 and the more learned did not think it necessary, 
 always, to refer to it. Hadrian Junius, in his 
 zeal for his country, says that Koster used " letters 
 of tin;"* but in this, probably, he was mistaken. 
 I think we may assume that metal types were 
 first cast in the Zum Jungen, and gave the May- 
 ence printers that advantage which speedily 
 turned the eyes of Europe to their city as the 
 nursery of the infant art. 
 
 If the question be whether Koster printed 
 clumsily at Haerlem before Guttenberg printed 
 cleverly at Mayence, some documents in the 
 Stadt-house of the Dutch city may help to de- 
 termine it. One is a copy of the " Mirror of Ke- 
 
 * These Were afterwards made into wine cans, he says ; 
 and these might be seen in Roster's house, which had been 
 occupied by his nephew, " a respectable citizen, lately dead." 
 The tin letters might have been worth something as wit- 
 nesses ; the tin cans, I am afraid, will hardly supply their 
 place. 
 
124 INVENTION OF PRINTING. 
 
 demption," a small quarto, printed on one side 
 only of each leaf, the blank side having paper 
 pasted over it, and the pages being made to face 
 each other. None of the lines are straight, and 
 many of the letters stand out of their places. It 
 is quite rude enough to be the first book which 
 ever saw the light, and the tradition of the place 
 assigns a date somewhere about the year 1430. 
 One thing seems tolerably certain, that the man 
 who printed in that style was an independent dis- 
 coverer ; the German printers never taught him ; 
 for they had learned to use good metal types, 
 and to print straight lines, and to put all the 
 letters in their places, before their secret tran- 
 spired. 
 
 Much, therefore, may be said for the claims of 
 Haerlem up to a certain point. But it is very 
 probable that Guttenberg was at work in the 
 suburbs of Strasburg without ever having heard of 
 what Koster was doing at Haerlem ; or, if a sight 
 of a Dutch Donatus, and a rumour about wooden 
 letters, led him to speculate about the possible 
 multiplication of copies by the stamping process, 
 that will make no deduction from his honest fame. 
 Certainly, we shall not do, as some zealous Haer- 
 lemists have done, and connect his name with the 
 story about the runaway servant and the stolen 
 
INVENTION OF FEINTING. 125 
 
 types.* It may be true that Koster's man, John, 
 decamped one Christmas Eve ; or this may be a 
 gossiping tale, invented by some who wished 
 to get for their ingenious countryman the credit 
 of all that had been done at Mayence. But in 
 the absence of any evidence to connect Gutten- 
 berg with Haerlem, or Koster, or with any one 
 who ever saw either of them, we shall not con- 
 clude that he either played the thief, or har- 
 boured the thief, or did any thing unbecoming an 
 upright man. He and his partners were certainly 
 ingenious, enterprising men, and have made the 
 world their debtors. We will gladly believe them 
 all to have been honest men, besides ; and will 
 hope that the story which makes a breach of trust 
 the connecting link between the two offices at 
 Haerlem and Mayence is a romance of a later 
 date. 
 
 Fust and Shoeffer carried on business printing art 
 together after Gruttenberg left them ; made known - 
 and in 1457, a Psalter was published, in which 
 the announcement is made that the work was not 
 executed by the pen, but " ad inventionem arti- 
 jiciosam imprimendi et cliaracterizandV After 
 that period the two names stand together on the 
 
 * See NOTE (L). 
 
126 INVENTION OF PRINTING. 
 
 title-pages which issued from the Mayence press 
 till the year 1466, when Fust died ; and from that 
 time Schoeffer stands alone till 1492, when, after 
 some fifty years of useful service, he followed his 
 father-in-law to the grave. In the lifetime of both 
 of them, however, as early as 1462, the mysteries 
 of their craft were revealed, and men trained under 
 their eye went into other lands to enlighten and 
 enrich them. In that year Mayence was taken 
 after a siege ; the printers were scattered, and the 
 world was not slow to find out the worth of the 
 treasure which they carried with them. These 
 busy men soon got to work elsewhere, and began 
 to date from their new homes. In less than ten 
 years from their dispersion we have certain evi- 
 dence from title-pages that presses were at work, 
 and books published, in Strasburg, Augsburg, 
 Cologne, Nuremburg, Lubeck, Treves, Spires, 
 Venice, Milan, Placentia, Yerona, Pavia, Naples, 
 Bologna, Ferrara, Florence, Parma, Padua, 
 Mantua, Rome and Paris. 
 
C AX TON. 127 
 
 CHAPTER IT. 
 
 CAXTON. 
 
 " It was in the year 1474," says Gibbon, " that 
 our first press was established in Westminster 
 Abbey by William Caxton ; but in the choice of 
 his authors that liberal and industrious artist was 
 induced to comply with the vicious taste of his 
 hearers, to gratify the nobles with treatises on 
 heraldry, hawking, and the game of chess, and 
 to amuse the popular credulity with romances of 
 fabulous knights, and legends of more fabulous 
 saints." If the li knights " were fabulous, that is, 
 never existed, it is difficult to imagine how the 
 f saints " were more fabulous, that is, existed still 
 less ; but though it was not easy for Gibbon to 
 write soberly when saints came in his way, his 
 historical accuracy is undoubted, and the fact 
 which he announces, as to Caxton's pre-eminence, 
 has been admitted, almost universally, by men of 
 letters. The honours of Westminster, how- 
 ever, like those of Mayence, have not been undis- 
 puted ; Caxton, like Guttenberg, has had a rival : 
 
128 CAXTON". 
 
 and, curiously enough, Haerlem figures in both 
 stories. 
 
 It is an undoubted fact, that in the public 
 library at Cambridge there is a small quarto 
 volume, a Latin Exposition of the Acts of the 
 Apostles by St. Jerome, which bears on its title- 
 page these remarkable words, " Printed and 
 finished at Oxford on the 17th of December, 
 1468." On this foundation a story has been 
 built, consisting of certain statements, very posi- 
 tively made, but very scantily proved, by one 
 Richard Atkyns, who published a book on the 
 Origin and Growth of Printing in 1664. Car- 
 dinal Bourchier, he tells us, who w T as Archbishop 
 of Canterbury in the reign of Henry VI., 
 when printing began to make some noise in the 
 world, conceived the idea of buying or stealing a 
 workman from Holland who should teach. En- 
 glishmen this useful art. A thousand marks were 
 required to carry out the plan, of which three 
 hundred were supplied by the archbishop, and the 
 rest from the royal treasury. Mr, Tumour was 
 employed in this mission, " who took to his as- 
 sistance Mr. Caxton, a citizen of good abilities, 
 who traded much with Holland ; " and the two 
 C( went first to Amsterdam, and then to Leyden, 
 not daring to enter Haerlem itself." When the 
 
CAXTON. 129 
 
 thousand marks were all spent " in gifts and ex- 
 pences" (to whom and/br what the historian does 
 not say), they begged five hundred more of the 
 King, which he was liberal enough to send. At 
 last a bargain was struck between Mr. Tumour 
 and two Hollanders to bring off one of the under- 
 workinen, Corsellis by name, who stole away by 
 night and got safe to London. " It was not 
 thought prudent to set him on work there " (why 
 it is impossible to guess) ; so he was sent to Ox- 
 ford, and guarded till he had taught his art to 
 others; so that in that city, Mr. Atkyns saith, 
 "printing was first set up in England, before 
 there was printing press or printer in France, 
 Spain, Italy or Germany, except Mentz." For 
 the truth of this history, he vouches a certain 
 record belonging to the Lambeth library, of which 
 a (t worthy person " gave him a copy ; but the 
 original, so far as appears, no one ever saw. 
 
 It is very extraordinary, certainly, that a man 
 should invent such a story, and then print it ; but 
 it would be much more extraordinary that Caxton, 
 who loves to tell us all about himself and his 
 patrons in his Prefaces, should say nothing about 
 the most important transaction in his life. It 
 would be much more extraordinary that he should 
 have enjoyed for so long a time the undisputed re- 
 
 K 
 
130 CAXTON. 
 
 putation of the first English printer, if there was 
 a rival press in so public a place as Oxford, and 
 books were current, with a date earlier than his 
 earliest, stamped upon their front. Mr. Atkyns's 
 story we do not pretend to account for; but the 
 date of the Oxford Jerome, as Dr. Middleton has 
 argued, is, in all probability, a misprint, and the 
 1468 ought to be 1478. Such errors, as he has 
 shown, are by no means uncommon in the early 
 history of printing ; and the probability of this 
 conjecture is greatly increased by the fact that no 
 other book from the Oxford press has been dis- 
 covered of an earlier date than 1479. 
 
 But, really, if the facts were better vouched 
 for, the question is too trifling to be worth 
 settling. It is not the Mentz and Haerlem ques- 
 tion over again. Whether Guttenberg has a 
 right to his honours, — whether he fairly dis- 
 covered for himself the art which has done more 
 for the world than any other, or merely stole his 
 master's invention, and improved upon it, — this, 
 we cannot help feeling, is a most interesting his- 
 torical inquiry. But whether a certain press 
 which was brought from Holland and set up at 
 Oxford, or a certain other press which was brought 
 from Germany and set up at Westminster, began 
 to work first, cannot at all signify to England or 
 
CAXTON. 131 
 
 the world. In either case, Caxton was the 
 
 FATHER OF ENGLISH PRINTING. His works 
 
 prove that he planted the stately tree in a kindly 
 soil, and watched its early growth, and gathered 
 fruit from its spreading branches for the public 
 good. If Corsellis ever lived, we know that he 
 did not teach Caxton, for Caxton learnt his art 
 not at Oxford, but in Germany. English lite- 
 rature would be precisely where it is if Corsellis 
 had stayed at Haerlem, and died there. Caxton, 
 on the other hand, raised up a school of printers. 
 His workshop was the centre from which light 
 streamed over England for more than one gene- 
 ration. He selected foreign works which he 
 thought would improve his countrymen, and put 
 them into his best English first, and printed them 
 with his best types afterwards. He toiled to 
 extreme old age like one who felt that he had 
 a vocation to do this particular work, and must 
 serve God* with such gifts as he had. The fame 
 of a man like that could not be touched by the 
 date upon half a dozen ancient title-pages, even 
 if they were correctly printed ; and it is highly 
 probable that the one witness produced to mag- 
 nify the Oxford press is a false witness. 
 
 Caxton is his own biographer. Almost all that 
 
132 CAXTON. 
 
 we know of him is supplied by his title-pages, 
 and by the prefaces to his works, in which, before 
 getting to more serious work, he loves to gossip 
 with the reader. We shall cull from these a few 
 particulars which mark the character of the man, 
 and bring before us some of the peculiar features 
 of his age. 
 
 He was born in the Weald of Kent, 
 
 Caxton . . . 
 
 apprenticed and apprenticed to a citizen of London 
 
 A. D. 1428. about the year 14 A g> j n hig youthj he 
 
 tells us, he was " set to school " by his parents, — 
 probably a rare privilege for a youth of his class, 
 as he makes special mention of it fifty years after- 
 wards, and says that he felt bound, on that ac- 
 count, to pray for his father's and mother's souls 
 who had enabled him to " get his living truly." 
 His master was Robert Large, a mercer, who 
 rose to the dignity of lord mayor. Of his youth 
 Ave hear but little, but can hardly doubt that he 
 was gifted by nature with a studious taste, which 
 his situation in early life gave him some oppor- 
 tunities for cultivating. The mercers of those 
 clays were not only dealers in silks and drapery, 
 but general merchants who bought and sold a 
 great variety of articles on commission. The 
 commerce between England and the Low Coun- 
 tries passed mainly through their hands, our wools 
 
 
CAXTON. 133 
 
 being exchanged for such articles of luxury as 
 were in request among the nobles and gentry of 
 the fifteenth century. Among these, manuscripts 
 would sometimes find their way to the mer- 
 chant's house, and a studious lad might get a 
 glance, now and then, at some book of devotion, 
 or tale of chivalry, on its passage to a high-born 
 customer. If his early ideas were thus asso- 
 ciated with literature as something quite beyond 
 the reach of any but the wealthy, he must have 
 rejoiced the more when he began to exercise the 
 art, a mile or two only from his master's shop, 
 which was to make books a marketable commo- 
 dity among persons of humble fortunes. 
 
 Robert Large, who, from his legacies jjis residence 
 to the Church, the poor, and London abroad - 
 Bridge, seems to have been a man of substance, 
 died in the year 1441, and left his " servant, 
 William Caxton, twenty marks," about 13Z. This 
 little capital was, probably, embarked in some 
 foreign venture ; for during thirty years from this 
 time he resided almost constantly in Holland or 
 Flanders. There, it seems, he prospered, and 
 rose to some consequence, though the nature of 
 his employment, and the stages of his advance- 
 ment, are hidden in obscurity ; for in the year 
 1464 we find him named by Edward IV. as one 
 
 K 3 
 
134 CAXTON. 
 
 of two persons appointed to negotiate a com- 
 mercial treaty with the Duke of Burgundy. 
 
 For twenty years before that time the two 
 countries had been proscribing each other's goods, 
 and trying in vain to create home manufactures 
 by ordinances and acts of parliament, — by fine, 
 confiscation, and banishment. " It hath been 
 piteously shewed and complained," says one of 
 the statutes of the day, " by the artificers of 
 manual occupations, how that they be greatly 
 impoverished, and much hindered of their 
 worldly increase, by the great multitude of com- 
 modities, pertaining to their mysteries, being fully 
 wrought and ready made to sale, fetched and 
 brought from beyond the sea, whereof the greatest 
 part in substance is deceitful ; by which the said 
 artificers cannot live as they have done in times 
 past, but divers of them be unoccupied, and do 
 hardly live in great poverty, idleness, and ruin." 
 Wherefore, say the lawmakers, let no man bring 
 in from abroad caps, laces or ribbons, — saddles, 
 stirrups or spurs, — hammers, fire-tongs or drip- 
 ping-pans, — gloves, buskins or shoes, — knives, 
 daggers or bodkins, — chafing-dishes or candle- 
 sticks, — ladles or basins, — hats or brushes, — 
 and if he does, half of the said wares shall be 
 forfeited to the King, and the other half to the j 
 
CAXTON. 135 
 
 person who shall first seize them. To this famous 
 enactment Burgundy replied by an ordinance 
 which bore on the face of it that it was " ever- 
 more to endure, and never to be repealed," de- 
 claring that all English cloth and wool that went 
 thither should be " banned and burnt." 
 
 Under these circumstances, Mr. Knight's con- 
 jecture seems highly probable, that Caxton was, 
 in fact, an " accredited smuggler," and that his 
 irregular business was carried on with the con- 
 nivance of those royal personages who first made 
 absurd laws and then countenanced a contraband 
 trade for their own convenience. This would 
 account for the obscurity which hangs over so 
 large a portion of his life, for his complete silence 
 as to his vocation during the whole of that period, 
 and for his selection as a negotiator when both 
 parties began to long for peace. Two years were 
 occupied in bringing this business to a conclusion ; 
 and in the following year, 1467, Philip the Good, 
 Duke of Burgundy, was succeeded by his son, 
 Charles the Bold, whose impetuous character, and. 
 strange adventurous career, are depicted so vividly 
 by Sir Walter Scott in " Quentin Durward." 
 
 With such a man one of Caxton's habits would 
 seem to have little in common ; but the Duke 
 married Margaret, sister to our Edward IV., and, 
 
 K 4 
 
136 CAXTOtf. 
 
 as an officer in her household, he occupied a place 
 for some time in the court of Burgundy. Here, 
 again, Caxton's particular vocation is unknown. 
 He tells us expressly that he was " servant unto 
 her Grace, and received of her yearly fee," but 
 the nature of the service, and the amount of the 
 fee, he nowhere confides to his readers. It is 
 plain that he was not hard worked, and that he 
 lived on no distant terms with his mistress ; 
 for he took to literature, it seems, through fear 
 of idleness, and consulted with the Duchess 
 respecting his book-making schemes. The an- 
 nouncement of his labours as a translator is plea- 
 santly told by himself in one of his auto-biogra- 
 phical prefaces. 
 
 Caxton a " When I remember that every man 
 
 Translator. - g bounden by the commandment and 
 counsel of the wise man to eschew sloth and 
 idleness, which is the mother and nourisher of 
 vices, and ought to put himself unto virtuous 
 occupation and business,- — then I, having no 
 great charge or occupation, following the said 
 counsel, took a French book, and read therein 
 many strange and marvellous histories, wherein I 
 had great pleasure and delight, as well for the 
 novelty of the same as for the fair language of 
 the French, which was in prose, so well and 
 
CAXTOKT. 137 
 
 compendiously set and written, methought I 
 understood the sentence and substance of every 
 matter.* And forasmuch as this book was new, 
 and late made and drawn into French, and I 
 never had seen it in our English tongue, I 
 thought in myself it should be a good business to 
 translate it into our English, to the end that it 
 might be had as well in the kingdom of England 
 as in other lands, and also for to pass therewith 
 the time, and thus concluded in myself to begin 
 this said work, and forthwith took pen and ink, 
 and began boldly to run forth, as blind Bayard 
 in this present work, which is named the Becule 
 (Summary) of the Trojan Histories. And after- 
 wards when I remembered myself of my simple- 
 ness and unperfectness that I had in both lan- 
 guages, that is to wit in French and in English, 
 (for in France was I never, and was born, and 
 learned mine English in Kent, in the Weald, 
 where I doubt not is spoken as broad and rude 
 English as in any place of England, and have 
 continued by the space of thirty years for the 
 most part in the countries of Brabant, Flanders, 
 Holland, and Zealand ;) and thus when all these 
 things came before me, after that I had made 
 and written five or six quires, I felt in despair of 
 * See NOTE (M). 
 
138 CAXTON. 
 
 this work, and purposed no more to have con- 
 tinued therein, and the quires were lying apart, 
 and in two years after laboured no more in this 
 work, and was fully in will to have left it." But 
 he had shown it one day to the Lady Margaret, 
 and she criticized his English a little, and then 
 told him by all means to go on with the work 
 and finish it, "whose dreadful commandment" 
 was to him a law, so that after his " simple and 
 poor cunning " he " forthwith went and laboured 
 in the said translation," and meekly besought her 
 Highness to "accept and take in gree*, his 
 simple and rude work," and all others who should 
 read it to correct it where it was wrong, and to 
 hold him excused for its simplicity and rudeness. 
 His wander- While Caxton was thus engaged, 
 inglife. he led an unsett i e d life; for he tells 
 
 us the translation was besrun at Bruges, con- 
 tinued at Ghent, and finished at Cologne in 
 the year 1471. The times, he says, were trou- 
 blous and contentious: Duke Charles's motions, 
 we know from other quarters, were rapid and 
 eccentric; and his Duchess, as well as her 
 servant in an unknown capacity, may have been 
 
 * The first obsolete word in the whole passage. " Gree, good- 
 will, favour." — Johnson, who quotes from Spenser, — 
 
 " Which she accepts with thanks and goodly gree." 
 
CAXTON. 139 
 
 compelled to shift their quarters frequently. 
 Caxton meant to have finished his task at the 
 end of the second book, "John Lydgate, monk 
 of Bury, having made a poem out of the third 
 book," which describes the destruction of Troy ; 
 and for himself, as compared with "that wor- 
 shipful and religious man," he did not feel him- 
 self worthy to " bear his ink-horn after him." 
 But Caxton loved the work, evidently, and was 
 loath to part with it. Lydgate's paraphrase was 
 in English, to be sure, but in rhyme, and not in 
 prose ; — and men have different tastes, some 
 liking verse best, and others not ; — and his pre- 
 decessor, possibly, may have translated some 
 other Author ; — and his Lady might take it 
 kindly ; — and, besides all this, he had " good 
 leisure " just then, being in Cologne, and having 
 nothing else to do ; — so for all these reasons he 
 got to work again, and told the world, for the 
 first time, in plain English, how the noble Hector 
 fell, and by what arts Troy was betrayed to 
 ruin. 
 
 So much for the commencement of Caxton a 
 Caxton's labours as an Author. But what Prmter - 
 made him a Printer? Where did he first hear 
 of the new art, and how? From whom did 
 he learn his business, and in what place did he 
 
140 CAXTON. 
 
 set up his first types ? It is singular that, having 
 told us so much about himself, he has not told us 
 any of these things. At the end of the third 
 book of this same " History of Troy," there is a 
 most curious and interesting passage, in which, 
 for the first time, we hear of him in connection 
 with the calling which was to make his name 
 immortal; but even there we have no note of 
 time or place. " Thus end I this book," he says, 
 " which I have translated after mine author, as 
 nigh as God hath given me cunning, to whom be 
 given the laud and praising. And for as much as 
 in the writing of the same my pen is worn, mine 
 hand weary and not stedfast, mine eye dimmed 
 with overmuch looking on the white paper, and 
 my courage not so prone and ready to labour as 
 it hath been, and that age creepeth on me daily^ 
 and feebleth all the body, and also because I have 
 promised to divers gentlemen and to my friends 
 to address to them, as hastily as I might, this 
 said book, — therefore I have practised and learned, 
 at my great charge and dispense, to ordain this 
 said book in print after the manner and form as 
 ye may here see (and is not written with pen and 
 ink as other books are), to the end that every 
 man may have them at once ; for all the books of 
 this story, named the Recule of the Histories of 
 
CAXTON". 141 
 
 Troy, thus imprinted as ye here see, were begun 
 in one day and finished in one day."* 
 
 This was, in all probability, Cax- His ear i[ est 
 ton's earliest publication; and if so, works - 
 we cannot doubt that, while the work was in 
 progress, his thoughts took a new direction, and 
 the work, which he began for the Lady Margaret 
 and a few high-born dames and gentlemen, he 
 finished with quite another intention, having 
 learnt, in the mean time, how copies might be 
 multiplied so that one man should do the work of 
 fifty scribes. Clearly he was not a printer when, 
 at Bruges, in March, 1468, he began to translate 
 romances for the sake of having something to do. 
 We can hardly think that he had learnt the art, 
 or was in the act of mastering its difficult pro- 
 cesses, when, as late as the summer of 1470, per- 
 haps later, he had " good leisure," and continued 
 his work for the " eschewing of idleness." When 
 the History of Troy is all rendered into En- 
 glish, we have it under his own hand that he was 
 at Cologne. We know, too, that by that time 
 the first Cologne press was at work; and some 
 rhymes of Wynkyn de Worde, Caxton's assistant 
 and successor at the Westminster press, expressly 
 inform us that his master printed in that city.f 
 
 * See NOTE (IS T ). f See NOTE (0). 
 
142 CAXTOK 
 
 There we cannot doubt, then, he found what 
 completely cured him of his roving, desultory- 
 habits, developed his latent energies, and gave a 
 new impulse to his character. Being an in- 
 genious, persevering man, fond of quiet pursuits, 
 with a dash of literary ambition in his nature, 
 what was said of the novel art would prove ex- 
 citing and captivating in no common degree. 
 While he was writing and translating, we can 
 easily imagine how the fire would kindle, and 
 how pleasant would be the thought that this 
 famous work, which he prized so highly, might 
 be sold for a reasonable sum, and become the 
 delight of countless readers. When it was finished, 
 therefore, we suppose him to have learnt how to 
 make these dreams realities. At the age of fifty- 
 five he served a second apprenticeship, learned 
 how to set the types, and arrange the pages, and 
 strike off a hundred fair sheets in a day; and, 
 when he had become master of the craft, put to 
 press his own well-loved Tale of Troy. If 
 eighteen months, or two years, were thus occu- 
 pied, 1473 will be the date to be supplied on 
 Caxton's first title-page*; and his second, ■ that 
 which announces the Game and Play of Chess, 
 bears the date of 1474. 
 
 * See NOTE (P). 
 
CAXTOtf. 143 
 
 Again we have a gap in his history which 
 neither his own pen, nor that of biographers, en- 
 ables us to supply. We do not know when he 
 returned to England. The wars of the Roses 
 had left his unhappy country in the last stage of 
 exhaustion, — its wealth consumed, its commerce 
 interrupted, and the flower of its nobility cut off 
 in the field, or on the scaffold. There was 
 little, just then, to attract homewards one who 
 had been so long abroad ; and, as a prudent man, 
 Caxton would desire thoroughly to master his art 
 before he ventured to transplant it to his native 
 soil. The Printer, in those early clays, was a 
 man of many trades. He made his own press, 
 or, at any rate, was competent to overlook its 
 construction, and to give directions for necessary 
 repairs. He had to cast his own types in moulds 
 which were part of his stock in trade, — to bind 
 the printed sheets in volumes, — and then to be 
 his own publisher, — incurring all the risk of un- 
 profitable ventures and unsold copies. With so 
 
 i much to learn and bring home, a year or two 
 would hardly suffice to acquire the competent 
 
 [ skill in each department ; and for a yet longer 
 period it is highly probable that Caxton was a 
 busy resident in Cologne. 
 
 After the publication of the History of 
 
144 CAXTON. 
 
 Returns to Troy, ^ e near n0 m °re of Lady 
 England. Margaret or the court of Burgundy. 
 The Game of Chess was dedicated to the Duke 
 of Clarence, the brother of Edward IV. ; and 
 The Life of Jason, his next work, is humbly and 
 most respectfully presented to the little Prince of 
 Wales, then three or four years old, in the hope, 
 as the author confesses, that the story of the 
 Golden Fleece will be admitted to the royal 
 nursery, and draw the child on to the reading of 
 English. Both works, therefore, were, in all pro- 
 bability, printed in England ; but we have no 
 certain evidence of his being settled here before 
 1477, when he sent forth the Dictes and Sayings 
 of Philosophers, and announced that it was " Em- 
 prynted by William Caxton at Westmestre." 
 
 Caxton's From the time of Caxton's settle- 
 
 Industry. ment in England to the day of his 
 death, his history is traced by his works. His 
 press was set up beneath the roof of West- 
 minster Abbey, and there for some fifteen years, 
 during four successive reigns, it was kept actively 
 at work. Steadily he laboured on at his allotted 
 task, and for one who began late, and had to strug- 
 gle with all the difficulties of a new craft, it is 
 marvellous to see what he lived to accomplish. 
 His translations alone, Dr. Dibdin tells us, amount 
 
CAXTON. 145 
 
 to five thousand folio pages, and would fill twenty- 
 five modern octavos. And all these works he 
 printed, besides a number of others which he 
 found in English, and made current among his 
 countrymen. Before his labours ceased, a new 
 aera had begun for England under the settled 
 and pacific rule of Henry VII. ; and in the age 
 that followed, books had a better chance of beino- 
 
 CD 
 
 sold and read than during the troubled and dis- 
 astrous period of the 15th century. 
 
 Of all the works which he printed p r i n t er of 
 during that period, " romances of fabu- Romances. 
 lous knights" form a large proportion, and were 
 doubtless among the most popular of his publi- 
 cations. There is the Noble History of King Arthur, 
 with a preface to prove it no fable, but a veritable 
 narrative of bygone events, — and the History of 
 the valiant Knight Paris, not him of Troy, but 
 one who loved the fair Yienne, instead of the 
 fairer Helen, — the Knight of the Tower, — the 
 | loves of Prince Blanchardin, son of the King of 
 Ffryse, and the beauteous Eglantine, Queen of 
 Tormady, — Godfrey of Boulogne, too, printed 
 purposely, as he tells us, to rouse England and 
 Christendom to a new Crusade. What Caxton 
 selected of tha,t sort, as well as his Fayt of Arms 
 and Order of Chivalry, containing the rules and 
 
 L 
 
146 CAXTON. 
 
 practice of kighthood, were not intended, merely, I 
 to cater to a prevalent taste. He mourned, in 
 honest sincerity of heart, that the race was dying 
 out which once figured in jousts and tournaments ; 3 
 and what he could do, in his retreat at West- j 
 minster, to check this growing evil he did with 
 all his might. He multiplied books to show the j 
 gentlemen of England what knights of renown 
 had done in better times, and added exhortations 
 of his own to rouse their slumbering manhood, 
 It is amusing to read these laments of the old 
 man, once a mercer and now a printer, and to 
 think how busily he was engaged in making his 
 words of none effect by providing more rational 
 entertainment for the men who wore swords, and 
 had been fond of using them too freely. " ye 
 knights of England," he says, " where is the 
 custom and usage of noble chivalry that was 
 used in those days? (the days of King Arthur 
 and the Round Table). What do ye now, but go 
 to the baths and play at dice ? And some, not 
 well advised, use not honest and good rule, against 
 all order of knighthood. Leave this, leave it, and 
 read the noble volumes of St. Graal, of Lancelot, 
 of Galaad, of Trystram, of Perse Forest, of Per- 
 cy val, of Gawayn, and many more ; there shall ye 
 see manhood, courtesv, and gentleness. . . . Read 
 
CAXTCXN-. 147 
 
 Froissart, and also behold that noble and victorious 
 King Henry the Fifth, and the captains under him, 
 — his brethren, the Earls of Salisbury, Montague, 
 and many other, whose names shine gloriously by 
 their virtuous noblesse and acts that they did in 
 the honour of the order of chivalry. Alas ! what 
 do ye but sleep and take ease, and are all dis- 
 ordered from chivalry ? I would demand a 
 question if I should not displease. How many 
 knights be there now in England that have the 
 use and the exercise of a knight ? that is to wit, 
 that he knoweth his horse, and his horse him. I 
 suppose, an a due search should be made, there 
 should be many found that lack ; the more pity 
 is. I would it pleased our Sovereign Lord that, 
 twice or thrice in a year, or at the least once, he 
 would do cry (cause to be proclaimed) jousts of 
 peace, to the end that every knight should have 
 horse and harness, and also the use and craft of 
 i a knight, and also to tournoye one against one, 
 I or two against two, and the best to have a prize, 
 ; a diamond or jewel, such as should please the 
 prince." 
 
 Many of Caxton's publications, Moral publi- 
 • however, were of a graver character. catl0ns - 
 Among these are the Book of Good Manners, 
 \ — the Life of Christ, — the Golden Legend, — the 
 
 L 2 
 
148 CAXTON. 
 
 Sayings of Philosophers, — the Cordial, or Four 
 Last Things. The two last were supplied to 
 him by the accomplished and unfortunate Lord 
 Rivers, who figures in Shakspeare's " Richard the 
 Third," and was one of the victims of that mo- 
 narch's tyranny. The friendship between him 
 and Caxton was creditable to both, and was the 
 means of turning the Printing Art to its noblest 
 use, the courtier employing his leisure in trans- 
 lating what he judged profitable for his country- 
 men, and the tradesman gladly seconding his 
 wishes by scattering them over the broad realm 
 of England. A passage from the Preface to the 
 Sayings of Philosophers is worth quoting, both 
 as showing the terms on w T hich they lived, and 
 also as affording a good specimen of Caxton's 
 quiet humour, and quaint, homely style. I shall, 
 therefore, give it entire. " Here endeth the 
 Book named the Dictes or Sayings of Philo- 
 sophers, imprinted by me, William Caxton, at 
 Westminster, the year of our Lord 1477; which 
 work is late translated out of the French into 
 English by the noble and puissant Anthony, Earl 
 of Rivers, Governor of my Lord Prince of Wales. 
 And it is so that at such time, as he had accom- 
 plished this said work, it liked him to send it to 
 me in certain quires to oversee ; which forthwith 
 
CAXTOX. 149 
 
 I saw, and found therein many great, notable and 
 wise sayings of the Philosophers, according unto 
 the books made in French which I had oft afore 
 read ; but certainly I had seen none in English 
 till that time. And so afterward I came unto 
 my said Lord, and told him how I had read and 
 seen his book, and that he had done a meritorious 
 deed in the labour of the translation thereof into 
 our English tongue. Then my said Lord desired 
 me to oversee it, and where as I should find fault, 
 to correct it. Wherein I answered unto his 
 Lordship that I could not amend it, for it was 
 right well and cunningly made and translated 
 into right good and fair English. Notwithstand- 
 ing he wished me to oversee it, and shewed me 
 divers things which, as him seemed, might be left 
 out, and also desired me, that done, to put the 
 said book in print. And thus obeying his request 
 and commandment, I have put me in devoir to 
 oversee this his said book, and beholden as nigh as 
 I could how it accordeth with the original, being 
 in French ; and I find nothing discordant therein 
 save only in the sayings of Socrates, wherein I 
 find that my said Lord hath left out clivers con- 
 clusions touching w omen. Whereof I marvelled 
 that my said Lord hath not writ on them, nor 
 what hath moved him so to do, nor what cause 
 
 L 3 
 
150 CAXTON. 
 
 he had at that time. But I suppose that some 
 fair lady hath desired him to leave it out of his 
 book, — or else he was amorous on some noble 
 lady for whose love he would not set it in his 
 book, — or else, for the very affection, love, and 
 goodwill that he hath unto all ladies and gentle- 
 women, he thought that Socrates wrote of women 
 more than truth; which I cannot think that so 
 true a man, and so noble a philosopher, as Socrates 
 was would write otherwise than truth. For if he 
 had made fault in writing of women, he ought 
 not, nor should not, be believed in his other 
 sayings. But I perceive that my said Lord 
 knoweth verily that such defaults be not had nor 
 found in the women dwelling in these parts and 
 regions of the world. Socrates was a Greek, born 
 in a far country from hence, which country is all 
 of other conditions than this is, and men and 
 women of other nature than they be here in this 
 country. For I wot well, of whatsoever con- 
 dition women be in Greece, the women of this 
 country be right good, wise, pleasant, humble, 
 discreet, sober, chaste, obedient to their husbands, 
 true, secret, stedfast, ever busy and never idle, 
 attemperate in speaking, and virtuous in all their 
 works, or, at least, should be so. For which 
 causes so evident, my said Lord, as I suppose, 
 
CAXTCXN". 151 
 
 thought it was not of necessity to set in his book 
 the . sayings of his author, Socrates, touching 
 women. But forasmuch as I had commandment 
 of my said Lord to correct and amend whereas I 
 should find fault, and other find I none save that 
 he hath left out these sayings about the women 
 of Greece, — therefore, in accomplishing his com- 
 mandment, forasmuch as I am not in certain 
 whether it was in my Lord's copy or not, or else 
 peradventure that the wind had blown over the 
 leaf at the time of the translation of his book, 
 I purpose to write those same sayings of that 
 Greek Socrates, which wrote of those women of 
 Greece, and nothing of them of this kingdom, 
 whom I suppose he never knew ; for if he had,, 
 I dare plainly say that he would have reserved 
 (excepted) them in especial in his said Dictes." 
 Then follow certain sayings, not over civil, 
 certainly, respecting the gentler sex, which we 
 hope, for the sake of Athenian morals, or for his 
 own credit as to choice of company, the philo- 
 sopher never spoke. 
 
 One of Caxton's religious publications was the 
 Pilgrimage of the Soul, a curious specimen of the 
 taste and theology of the age in which it was 
 printed and found favour. It is writ'ten partly 
 in poetry, and partly in prose, and the solemn 
 l 4 
 
152 CAXTON. 
 
 and the ludicrous are strangely mingled together. 
 With our notions, the title suggests an allegory 
 relating to our earthly pilgrimage, which shall set 
 forth the toils and perils of the way, furnish us 
 with suitable helps and encouragements, and re- 
 mind us of the blessed home which is to receive 
 the faithful when their work is done. Such is 
 Bunyan's dream, full of imagination, yet practical 
 and useful too, — amusing our childhood with its 
 varied and appropriate symbols, but natural and 
 life-like all through, and teaching us some lesson 
 of heavenly wisdom in almost every parable. 
 Caxton's book is quite of another sort. The story 
 does not belong to this world, every scene being 
 laid beyond its confines. It describes the wan- 
 derings of a soul after it has left the body, — its 
 descent to purgatory, its journeyings through it, 
 and departure out of it. The narrator begins 
 with describing his own death, and sees Dame 
 Misericorde " lap his body in a clean linen cloth, 
 and so full honestly lay it in the earth," while 
 Dame Prayer speeds her to heaven on the errand 
 of pleading his cause there before Sathanas is 
 permitted to seize him. There are specimens in 
 abundance of the wretched taste of the much- 
 lauded medieval times, — conversations in the 
 homeliest style between Dame Misericorde and 
 
CAXTON. 153 
 
 St. Michael, also between Lucifer and Dame 
 Pride, his daughter, — such ditties in rhyme as the 
 " Green Tree's complaint of the Dry for spoiling 
 her sweet apple," — minute descriptions of the 
 torments of hell, — busy fiends, for instance, with 
 bellows and iron forks, — as unlike Milton in the 
 higher flights as it is distant from the good sense 
 and holv feeling of the " Pilgrim's Progress " in 
 the simpler portions. Books of this sort are much 
 better than curiosities for the antiquarian. They 
 are historical monuments, helping us to measure 
 the wide difference between the popular religion 
 of Roman Catholic England, and that which has 
 succeeded it since the Bible and the Reformation 
 have banished puerilities from holy ground. Men 
 carried about poor, wretched tapers because the 
 heavenly light was hidden ; but the tales and alle- 
 gories, which amused both the vulgar and the 
 learned, had no sound in them of the divine 
 parables which enrich the Sacred Volume. 
 
 Caxton was a printer of history, and, Historical 
 in a small way, a writer of history, publications, 
 too. " The fruits of virtue," he writes, " be im- 
 mortal, especially when they be wrapped in the 
 benefice of histories .... Other monuments, dis- 
 tributed in divers changes, endure but for a short 
 time or season ; but the virtue of history, diffused 
 
154 CAXTON. 
 
 and spread by the universal world, hath time, which 
 consumeth all other things, as conservatrice and 
 keeper of her work." This is above his common 
 strain; and the Chronicles which he printed, it 
 must be allowed, are in parts as fabulous as his 
 tales, recording, among other inhabitants of our 
 globe, (i broods that be wonderfully shapen," of 
 whom it is questionable whether they come from 
 Adam and Noah, — Cyclopes, for instance, with 
 one eye, and others who a defend themselves with 
 the shadow of their feet from the heat of the 
 sun." But he did his best, at any rate, in an age 
 when his readers could get nothing more trust- 
 worthy, and materials for authentic history were 
 very scanty. In the chapter which he added to the 
 translation of Trevisa's Polychronicon, embracing 
 the century from 1357 to 1460, he complains that 
 he had been able to get no books of authority save 
 two which he names, and in them he found " right 
 little matter " relating to those times. Froissart, 
 Knyghton, Walsingham, and others, were then in 
 manuscript, but either unknown to Caxton, or so 
 scarce that he could not procure a copy to help 
 him in his work. His Chronicles of England was 
 the first printed history in which our countrymen 
 could read any account of their ancestors; and 
 Caxton's continuation of it to his own time, com- 
 
CAXTON. 155 
 
 prising the first twenty years of Ed ward IV. 's reign, 
 was, doubtless, as interesting to his contemporaries 
 as the more doubtful records of an earlier age. 
 
 One of Caxton's many translations w T as The 
 Image or Mirror of the World, containing a great 
 many very curious disquisitions about a great 
 many different things. The following are some 
 of the headings of the chapters : — " Wherefore 
 God made and created the world," — "Where- 
 fore and how the seven liberal arts were found, 
 and of their order," — "How the four elements 
 be set, and How the earth holdeth him right in 
 the middle of the world," — " Of Nature, how 
 she worketh, and what she is," — " What the 
 roundness of the earth is, and why God made it 
 round," — " Of the serpents, beasts, and precious 
 stones of India," — " How the winds grow," — 
 " Why men see not the sun by night," — "Why 
 money was made," — " How the Scriptures and 
 sciences were saved against the flood," — " Of the 
 virtue of the heaven and the stars," — " Where- 
 fore and why the earth was measured," — " How 
 much the earth hath of height, how much of 
 circuit, and how thick in the middle." 
 
 JEsop's Fables, as might be expected, jEsop ant \ 
 were among Caxton's contributions to the Chaucer - 
 popular literature of his day. He translated 
 
156 CAXTON. 
 
 them from the French, and adorned them with 
 rude cuts, and then gave Englishmen the treasure 
 which has amused and instructed succeeding ge- 
 nerations in so many languages. They, like their 
 neighbours, began to hear how birds and beasts 
 might talk if they had but tongues, and to read 
 the short, lively tales which are made up of the 
 simplest incidents, yet full of that wisdom which 
 the world has never ceased to want for so many 
 centuries. Very precious must the gift have been 
 to all classes when books of rational entertainment 
 were so few ; great must have been the delight 
 in many nurseries as the prints were examined, 
 and the stories spelt out one by one ; and in that 
 sad " first year of king Eichard the Third," while 
 men talked in whispers of the strange disappear- 
 ance of their youthful Prince, and rumours were 
 rife that the new Monarch would not long be 
 unchallenged on his throne, those pleasant tales, 
 late published by Master Caxton, would find a 
 ready welcome, doubtless, and be read with eager 
 interest, in halls and mansions. 
 
 Yet greater was the joy of Englishmen when 
 they began to read in print the works of Chaucer. 
 The commendations of our first great writer, 
 scattered through Caxton's prefaces, are very in- 
 teresting, and well worth quoting as specimens of 
 
CAXTON. 157 
 
 early criticism. " In all his works," we read in 
 one place, " he excelleth in mine opinion all other 
 writers in our English ; for he writeth no void 
 words, but all his matter is full of high and quick 
 
 sentence, and of him all other have borrowed 
 
 sith (since) and taken in all their well saying and 
 writing." Elsewhere he bestows upon his author 
 the high praise of te eschewing prolixity, and 
 casting away the chaff of superfluity," and says 
 that we " ought to give a singular laud unto that 
 noble and great philosopher Geoffrey Chaucer, 
 the which, for his ornate writing in our tongue, 
 may well have the name of a laureat poet. For 
 before that he by his labour embellished, ornated, 
 and made fair our English, in this royaume was 
 had rude speech and incongrue, as yet it appeareth 
 by old books, which at this day ought not to have 
 place nor be compared to his beauteous volumes 
 and ornate writings." 
 
 The Canterbury Tales were now to become the 
 property of hundreds who could never hope to read 
 them in manuscript. They contained entertainment 
 for all classes, — stories grave and gay, — the ro- 
 mantic and the satirical, — tales of love and chivalry 
 followed by humorous descriptive pieces in which 
 homely scenes, and the domestic manners of the 
 times, were depicted to the life. Some of the stories 
 
158 CAXTON. 
 
 should never have been written, their rather in- 
 different wit being a poor apology for coarseness 
 of the most offensive kind ; but the fact that a 
 company of pilgrims, including a prioress and her 
 attendant nuns, should be represented as listening 
 to them without rebuke or shame, is, in itself, a 
 curious specimen of the manners of the age. 
 Others, which are tedious to a modern reader, 
 were full of exciting interest, probably, to an 
 older generation. At any rate, when books were 
 scarce, and poetry in English yet scarcer, our 
 fathers gave a welcome to every one of them ; 
 and so Caxton had to print more than one edition 
 of his well loved tales. 
 Progress of ^ e praise which Caxton gives to 
 
 the English Chaucer we cannot help thinking is 
 language. 
 
 partly Caxton's own. Considering 
 
 what our language had been, — how diligently he 
 laboured in the way of translation, — how few 
 obsolete words we find in his writings as com- 
 pared with those of a preceding age, — and what 
 an engine he had for making his own English 
 current among his countrymen, we can hardly 
 doubt that he contributed a sroocl deal to fix the 
 standard of our language when it was tending to 
 a more permanent form. What progress was 
 made in his time he has told us himself, with 
 
CAXTOX. 159 
 
 much of detail, in one of the last prefaces that he 
 printed; and, certainly, if he has not overstated 
 the case, three centuries and a half can hardly 
 have done so much in modifying our ordinary 
 speech as the time that elapsed between his child- 
 hood and old age. In his translation of the Story 
 of the ^Eneid from the French, he tells us, that 
 he was perplexed as to his choice of words, 
 thinking some that he had employed too curious 
 to be understood by the common people, especially 
 as he had lately been charged by some of his 
 friends to use " old and homely terms " in his 
 translations. "And fain would I satisfy every 
 man," he says, "and so to do, took an old book, 
 and read therein ; and certainly the English was 
 so rude and broad that I could not well under- 
 stand it. And also my Lord Abbot of West- 
 minster did shew to me late certain evidences 
 written in old English for to reduce it into our 
 English now used ; and certainly it was written 
 in such wise that it was more like to Dutch than 
 English. And certainly, our language now 
 varieth far from that which was used and spoken 
 when I was born ; for we Englishmen be born 
 under the domination of the moon, which is never 
 steadfast, but ever wavering, waxing one season, 
 and waneth and decreaseth another season ; and 
 
160 CAXTON. 
 
 that common English that is spoken in one shire 
 varieth from another. In so much that in my 
 clays happened that certain merchants were in a 
 ship in Thames for to have sailed over the sea 
 into Zealand, and for lack of wind they tarried at 
 Foreland, and went to land for to refresh them ; 
 and one of them, named Sheffelde, a mercer, came 
 in to an house, and axed for meat, and especially 
 he axed after egges ; and the good wife answered 
 that she could speak no French ; and the mer- 
 chant was angry, for he also could speak no 
 French, but would have had eggs, and she under- 
 stood him not. And then, at last, another said that 
 he would have eyren ; then the good wife said she 
 understood him well. Lo ! what should a man 
 in thefe days now write ? egges or eyren f Cer- 
 tainly, it is hard to please every man by cause of 
 diversity and change of language. For, in these 
 days, every man that is in any reputation in his 
 country will utter his communication and matters 
 in such terms that few men shall understand them. 
 And some honest and great clerks have been with 
 me, and desired me to write the most curious 
 terms that I could find, and thus between plain, 
 rude, and curious I stand abashed." Happily, 
 Caxton's good sense prevailed ; as he was com- 
 posing and printing for the whole reading public, 
 
CAXTOtf. 161 
 
 and helping, undoubtedly, to form their style and 
 speech, we may be thankful that he rejected the 
 rude and the curious, and chose the -plain, " In 
 my judgment," he adds, " the common terms, that 
 be daily used, be lighter to be understood than the 
 old and ancient English." 
 
 The old man drew near his end, and ,, , 
 
 ' Popular reli- 
 
 the indications are not few, among the gi° us works. 
 
 notices of himself which he has left us, that 
 he was looking on to it with a good hope. " He 
 wrote like one," says his Biographer, Mr Lewis, 
 " who lived in the fear of God, and was very 
 desirous of promoting His honour and glory." 
 His prefaces often conclude with a prayer, ex- 
 pressing the pious wish that God will bless the 
 reader in this world, and bring him safely to 
 eternal joys. The preface to the Mirror of the 
 World concludes thus : " Let us pray the Maker 
 and Creator of all creatures, God Almighty, that 
 at the beginning of this book it list Him, of His 
 bounteous grace, to depart with us that we may 
 learn of the same, — and that (what is) learned, 
 to retain, — and that retained, to teach, — that 
 -we may have perfect science and knowledge of 
 God, that we may get thereby the health of our 
 souls, and to be partners of His glory permanent, 
 and without end." His Golden Legend, besides 
 
 M 
 
162 CAXTON. 
 
 recounting the virtues and miracles of many 3aints, 
 from Saint Andrew to St. Albin, contains the 
 " Stories of the Bible," and popular accounts of 
 the Christian festivals. It was intended, doubt- 
 less, for the use of those to whom the Latin, 
 which was heard in the churches, was an unknown 
 tongue. Wiclif's was a proscribed name, and 
 the popular expositions of Scripture contained in 
 his Postils, of which whole volumes still remain 
 in manuscript, no man, who lived so near " my 
 Lord Abbot of Westminster," could dare to 
 print; but what was approved by ecclesiastical 
 authorities he gladly sent abroad, and tells us 
 plainly what his intent was in his preface to 
 the Doctrinal of Sapience, translated from the 
 French. He saw what a want there was of 
 plain, useful teaching, such as peasants might un - 
 derstand, and apply to the realities of common 
 working life; and that want, besides supplying 
 entertainment for knights and gentlemen, his 
 press should supply. " This that is written in 
 this little book," he says, " ought the priests to 
 learn and teach to their parishes, and also it is 
 necessary for simple priests that understand not 
 the Scriptures ; and it is made for simple people, 
 and put into English." Then follow some com- 
 ments which may serve for our day as well as his, 
 
CAXTON. 163 
 
 when " simple people " have to be instructed. 
 " To hear examples," he says, " stirreth and 
 moveth the people that be simple more to devo- 
 tion than great authority of science." St. Austin 
 taught in this fashion, he adds, and a greater 
 than St. Austin, the Lord Himself. Besides, 
 " the right reverend father and doctor Bede, 
 hath told us in his History of a certain Bishop of 
 Scotland, ' a subtle and great clerk,' who was 
 sent into England to preach the word of God; 
 but he used in his sermons ( subtle authorities,' 
 and the people understood him not ; so he did no 
 good, and went back again. Then came e another 
 of less science,' the which was more plain, and 
 used commonly in his sermons, examples and 
 parables, by which he profited much more unto 
 the erudition of the simple people than did that 
 other." 
 
 The best book of all for rich and The Bible 
 poor, — the wisest and the plainest for prohibited, 
 religious teaching, — Caxton might not print. 
 Sir Thomas More assigns a curious reason why it 
 would have been a hazardous service to take that 
 work in hand. Wiclif 's translation, he says, was 
 forbidden by Archbishop Arundel ; older transla- 
 tions, to be sure, which the Church had never 
 denounced, might lawfully be printed ; but then 
 
 M 2 
 
164 CAXTON. 
 
 " who should know, if the Holy Scriptures were 
 now sent forth, whether the manuscript transla- 
 tion, used as a copy, were made before Wiclif 's 
 days or since ? " In the first case, all would be 
 right ; in the second, error might be mixed with 
 truth. In this state of things, writes the Chan- 
 cellor, one of the Church's most devoted sons, 
 " no printer would lightly be so hot as to put any 
 Bible in print at his own charge, and then hang 
 upon a doubtful trial " as to the time when the 
 copy chanced to have been made. 
 Last works When Caxton's years drew on towards 
 and death, four-score, he translated and put to 
 press the Art and Craft to knoiu well to die. We 
 cannot doubt that he meant to be his own teacher, 
 and had his thoughts busy with the sense, as well 
 as the types, while he formed them into words of 
 pious counsel. The confessions and prayers, 
 which he printed for the dying, he felt were 
 those which he must soon need, and his heart 
 went along with the humblest of them as he 
 laboured at his craft. On the 15th of June 
 1490, the translation of this book was finished. 
 Soon afterwards, probably, it was printed ; and 
 in the accounts of the churchwardens of St. Mar- 
 garet's, Westminster, ending in June 1492, we 
 find an entry relating to four torches and the 
 
CAXTON. 165 
 
 ringing of the bell " at the burying of William 
 Caxton." He died, we may almost say, pen in 
 hand ; for among Wynkyn de Worde's first pub- 
 lications was one in which he has dutifully in- 
 scribed his master's name, and recorded the sin- 
 gular fact that there was no interval between his 
 working time and his final rest. It was " trans- 
 lated," he tells us, " out of French into English 
 by William Caxton, of Westminster, late dead, 
 and finished at the last day of his life." 
 
 Honour to the kindly-natured, patient, hard- 
 working old man who did so good a work for 
 England! Very pleasant company are these 
 BOOKS which then began to see the light, — always 
 communicative, when we are willing to hear, 
 like some sensible, well-bred friend, yet never 
 forward, never captious, never overbearing, — full 
 of information on all sorts of subjects, yet kindly 
 letting us choose our own, and then telling us no 
 more than we wish to know, — imparting some 
 fresh truth continually to curious and eager 
 listeners, or repeating the old with untiring pa- 
 tience ao;ain and as;ain for the benefit of those 
 who learn but slowly, — ready for a tete-a-tete if 
 we wish for retirement, and making society more 
 pleasant when they give out their store among 
 
 M 3 
 
166 CAXTON. 
 
 congenial friends, — never taking it amiss if we 
 do not converse with them for weeks together, 
 and, when we seek them once again, agreeable 
 and free-spoken as before, — accommodating them- 
 selves to all our moods in turn, giving us grave 
 and edifying discourse when we desire instruc- 
 tion, yet merry as the merriest when we are 
 disposed for mirth. Who that loves a BOOK will 
 not thank the man who sent forth such a goodly 
 store, and helped to civilize our fathers by giving 
 them some better employment for their leisure 
 than war, the tournament, and the hunting field ? 
 
 Further information respecting the first Printers 
 will be found in the following works : — 
 
 Biographie Universelle ; Articles Guttenberg, 
 Fust, Schosffer, and Mentel. 
 
 Conversations Lexicon ; Articles Printing and 
 Gdttenberg. 
 
 HlSTOIRE DE L'ORIGINE ET DES PREMIERS PrOGRES 
 
 de lTmprimerie, a valuable compilation, printed at 
 the Hague in 1740. 
 
 The Origin of Printing, in Two Essays ; con- 
 taining the substance of Dr. Middleton's Disser- 
 tation and Meerman's Origines Typographic^. 
 
 Cogan's Letters on the Rhine ; a lively de- 
 
CAXTON. 167 
 
 scription of the Rhine country, published more than 
 fifty years ago, when it was little known to English 
 tourists, and containing a full and clear statement of 
 the case between Haerlem and Mayence. 
 
 Dibdin's Typographical Antiquities. Vol. I. 
 
 Knight's Caxton ; one of his admirable shilling 
 volumes. 
 
 m 4 ; 
 
NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 NOTE (H). Page 107. 
 
 Me. Knight, the celebrated publisher, was 
 there, and England could not have sent a fitter 
 representative. He has described the scene in 
 his interesting Life of Caxton, the first of his 
 shilling Weekly Volumes, itself a marvellous 
 product of the press, whose early history it re- 
 counts. He tells us that, while there was much 
 of zeal and enthusiasm abroad, some listened with 
 supreme indifference to what was passing so near 
 them. A lady, whom he met in a steam-boat on 
 his way, and who was learned in all the lore of 
 German baths and watering-places, advised him 
 by all means to avoid Mayence, " as a crowd of 
 low people from all parts would be there to make 
 a great fuss about a printer who had been dead 
 two or three hundred years." — KnigMs Caxton, 
 p. 81. 
 
 NOTE (I). Page 108. 
 
 I have made the best I can of a hard bit of 
 Latin, — " Imprimis igitur characteribus literarum 
 in tabulis ligneis per ordinem scriptis, formisque 
 compositis, Vocabularium, Catholicon nuncupatum, 
 impresserunt." Perhaps the exact meaning of the 
 terms cannot be given without a sight of the rude 
 materials with which the first printers exercised 
 
NOTES. 169 
 
 their noble art. Others, evidently, have been 
 puzzled besides me. Dr. Cogan translates it thus : 
 " They first printed a vocabulary, called the 
 Catholicon, with the characters of letters carved 
 in wooden tablets in a series, and composed in 
 forms;" and then adds (his correspondent, I sup- 
 pose, being something of a scholar), " Do not 
 you think this the proper translation ? " I cannot 
 say I do. Compositis, I think, must agree with 
 for mis. Mr. Knight gets over the difficulty by 
 omitting the words, " compositis for mis " in his 
 translation. The question is, What was the tabula, 
 and what was the forma? And another very na- 
 tural question is, What can scriptis mean ? Here 
 was no writing surely, but a substitute for writing. 
 If I might imitate the great critics who escape 
 from a difficulty by hazarding a conjecture, I 
 should say scriptis ought to be sculptis. , The 
 letters must have been carved in wood, surely ; 
 and the author, a little farther on, says that the 
 characters were not " amovibiles de tabulis, sed 
 INSCULPTI, sicut diximus." The tabula may have 
 been the block on which a whole word was carved, 
 and the forma a frame holding a line of words, or 
 more. 
 
 NOTE (K). Page 115. 
 
 Mr. Knight quotes a fine passage from 
 Mr. Hallam on the execution of this noble work : 
 " It is a very striking circumstance that the high- 
 minded inventors of this great art tried at the 
 very outset so bold a flight as the printing an 
 entire Bible, and executed it with astonishing 
 success. It was Minerva leaping on the earth in 
 
170 CAXTON. 
 
 her divine strength, and radiant armour, ready, at 
 the moment of her nativity, to subdue and destroy 
 her enemies.'* There is a current story about 
 Fust taking some of these Bibles to Paris for 
 sale, and offering them, in the first instance, for 
 sixty crowns, whereas the price of a manuscript 
 Bible on parchment of that size and quality would 
 have been four or Jive hundred crowns. When 
 the first buyers came to compare their copies, the 
 exact correspondence of each with every other 
 surprised and confounded them. Pages, words, 
 letters, stops, all answered to pages, words, letters, 
 stops elsewhere, without a single deviation or 
 exception. Men wondered and paused ; the sale 
 was less brisk than at first. Then Fust began to 
 reduce the price ; he sold for forty crowns, — for 
 thirty, — at last, for something much less. But 
 soon there was a stir among the purchasers ; for 
 some, who heard of their neighbours' good fortune, 
 thought themselves wronged and plundered ; and 
 bringing back their copies demanded the difference 
 between the highest price and the lowest. Pust 
 had to appeal to the Courts, says one story ; Fust 
 fled away in disgrace says another ; at any rate, 
 the secret was soon divulged, and printed books, 
 like other things, began to have their market- 
 price, and to invite numbers by their cheapness, 
 who had no more thought hitherto of possessing 
 a folio Bible than of possessing a princedom. The 
 story is one of rather uncertain authority ; but it 
 is highly probable that such scenes did take place 
 between the years 1450 and 1460 ; and the price 
 assigned to the manuscript copy, four or five 
 hundred crowns, is no unlikely one. We may 
 look upon the publication of the Sacred Volume 
 
NOTES. 171 
 
 at so early a period as a pledge of the service 
 which the press was going to render to religion ; 
 for the scattering of God's word in the following 
 century was worth more to the cause of the Re- 
 formation than the favour of all its royal and noble 
 patrons put together. 
 
 NOTE (L). Page. 125. 
 
 Among these are Meerman, in his Origines 
 Typographic®, an able and learned work, and 
 Dr. Cogan, in his Letters on the Rhine. They 
 adopt the whole of Hadrian Junius's story, trust 
 old Cornells, the bookbinder, and are as indignant 
 as he was with the false workman who stole 
 away with his master's tools. This man, they 
 think, was not Guttenberg himself, but his elder 
 brother, from whom he learnt to print with 
 wooden letters. The proper name of the two 
 brothers, it is said, was John Geinsfleische (it 
 being by no means uncommon for members of 
 the same family to have the same Christian name), 
 and the younger was called Guttenberg for dis- 
 tinction. It may have been, certainly, that one 
 ran away from Holland in no creditable way, and 
 the other harboured him ; but we have no proof 
 of any sort to fasten such a charge upon them, 
 and, in the absence of it, cannot conclude that 
 either of them was a rogue. 
 
 NOTE (M). Page 137. 
 
 Some persons may be curious to see how Cax- 
 ton spelt. This sentence, therefore, is given as 
 
172 CAXTON. 
 
 it stood in the original black letter, printed by 
 himself. 
 
 " Whan I remembre that every man is bounden 
 by the comandement and counceyl of the wyse 
 man to eschewe slouthe and ydlenes, which is 
 moder and nouryssher of vyces, and ought to put 
 himself unto vertuous occupacion and besynesse, 
 — than I, havynge no grete charge or occupacion, 
 followyng the sayd counceyl, toke a Frenshe 
 booke, and redde therein many straunge mer- 
 vellous historyes, wherein I had grete pleasyr and 
 delyte, as well for the novelte of the same as for 
 the fayr langage of the Frenshe, whyche was in 
 prose, so well and compendiously sette and 
 wreton methonght I understood the sentence and 
 substance of every mater." 
 
 NOTE (X). Page 141. 
 
 Some writers have made a great mystery of the 
 concluding words of this passage. "Clearly," 
 they say, " Caxton could not mean that the book 
 was printed in twenty-four hours, for it consists 
 of 778 folio pages. But then, what did he mean?" 
 The true answer, manifestly? is that furnished by 
 Mr. Knight. The old printer does not say he 
 began and finished his work in the same day, but 
 that each book was begun in one day, and finished 
 in one day ; meaning that all the copies of the 
 first sheet were struck off in a few hours at one 
 time, and all the copies of the last sheet in a few 
 hours at another time. 
 
NOTES. 173 
 
 NOTE (O). Page 141. 
 
 The rhymes are these. They occur in an 
 English translation of Bartholomceus de Proprieta- 
 tibus rerum printed at the Westminster press after 
 Caxton's death ; — 
 
 " And also of your chary te call to remembrance 
 
 The soul of William Caxton first prynter of this boke 
 In Latin tonge at Coleyn himself to advance 
 
 That every well disposyd man may theron loke." 
 
 The meaning of this stanza we have to make 
 out as we can, without help from punctuation. 
 Mr. Knight suggests two renderings. 
 
 1. " William Caxton was the first printer of 
 this book in Latin, at Cologne, and he printed it, 
 as a commercial speculation, himself to advance, or 
 profit." 
 
 2. " William Caxton was the first printer of 
 this book (meaning the English translation), and 
 he printed it at Cologne for the purpose of ad- 
 vancing or improving himself in the Latin tongue.'''' 
 
 He prefers the first. A third, perhaps, might 
 be proposed ; and then let the reader choose. 
 
 " William Caxton was the first printer of this 
 book in Latin, at Cologne, and he printed it to 
 advance, or improve, himself (not in languages, 
 but) in the Printing Art," which we know he did 
 learn at Cologne. It seems hardly worth telling 
 that a book was printed for gain, or in the way of 
 business. But if, while Caxton was learning to 
 print at Cologne, he worked at a Latin edition of 
 Bartolomseus, and, among his reminiscences of 
 by gone times, had mentioned this to Wynkyn de 
 Worde while they, worked together at West- 
 
174 CAXTON. 
 
 minster, we can easily suppose the book had a 
 special interest in the scholar's eyes, and that, 
 when he came to print an English edition, he 
 might think the fact worth recording, and might 
 be glad to couple it with a request that the reader 
 would give one prayer " for the soul " of his 
 honoured master. 
 
 NOTE (P). Page 142. 
 
 Dr. Dibclin, a very high authority in these 
 matters, puts Caxton's earliest publication six 
 years earlier, and Mr. Hallam follows him. It is 
 adventurous to oppose such names ; but it would 
 be presuming to make a contradictory statement 
 without noticing theirs. The argument lies in a 
 very narrow compass. There is a certain French 
 edition of the History of Troy, which, from in- 
 ternal evidence, seems to have been printed as 
 early as 1467. It has no printer's name, but 
 corresponds exactly with Caxton's English edition. 
 The two were printed with the same types, say 
 the learned, or with types cast in the same moulds. 
 Therefore Caxton printed both. " We venture 
 to doubt this," says Mr. Knight, and proceeds to 
 give good reasons for his doubts. Caxton bought 
 his types, no doubt, from the earlier printers, and 
 what these types had printed before they became 
 his, would, of course, correspond exactly with 
 what they printed after he began to use them. 
 The similarity proves nothing as to the identity of 
 the workmen, only as to the identity of the tools. 
 We learn that the English History of Troy, and 
 the Game of Chess, are printed with the same 
 types as those which Fust and Schceffer used at 
 
NOTES. 175 
 
 Mentz ; yet Caxton certainly printed both. The 
 obvious conclusion is that the types had changed 
 masters ; and it is quite clear that the man who 
 lought from the Germans, and sold to the English- 
 man, may have been the printer of the French 
 Tales of Troy. 
 
 Nothing can be inferred with any positiveness, 
 therefore, from the resemblance between the earlier 
 and later editions in respect of typography ; and 
 to us it seems quite plain that we must have 
 positive and uncontradicted evidence to the effect 
 that Caxton did print before 1470 in order to get 
 rid of his own testimony collected from the two 
 passages already quoted. In 1468, and again in 
 1470 or 1471, he took to translating, he tells us, 
 for lack of employment. He had been wandering 
 in the interval from Bruges to Ghent, from Ghent 
 to Cologne. At the later time he was still in the 
 se'rvice of the Duchess of Burgundy. All this is 
 completely inconsistent with his having been a 
 printer from 1467. The whole air and carriage 
 of the man, as he depicts himself at that period, is 
 of another sort. He might work at the press, 
 and be a dabbler in literature, too, as he after- 
 wards was ; but, from the day that Caxton's 
 second life began, he can hardly have said that 
 he had " none other thing to do " but to translate 
 romances. 
 
COLUMBUS 
 
 HIS FORERUNNERS AND PATRONS. 
 
 N 
 
PORTUGUESE DISCOVERIES. 179 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 PORTUGUESE DISCOVERIES — FERDINAND AND 
 ISABELLA. 
 
 If the fifteenth century had been signalized by 
 the Invention of Printing, and nothing else, it 
 might well have ranked with the most remarkable 
 aeras which the world has seen. But it has other 
 distinctions besides. It was the age of mari- 
 time discovery, — all former triumphs over the 
 sea being completely distanced by what was done 
 between its beginning and its close. At the 
 earlier period no European had sailed along the 
 coast of Africa farther than the 27 th degree of 
 North latitude; at the later, Vasco de Gama 
 had sailed round the Cape of Good Hope to India ; 
 Columbus had crossed the Atlantic to America 
 three times ; and an army of adventurers, follow- 
 ing in their track and envying their fame, were 
 scattering themselves, East and West, over the 
 wide Ocean, and connecting Europe by new ties 
 with the other three quarters of the globe. 
 As compared with the present relative . 
 
 positions of our own country and some Henry of 
 . „ . . . Portugal. 
 
 others in respect or maritime power, it 
 
 N 2 
 
180 PORTUGUESE DISCOVERIES. 
 
 is curious to see who were the leaders in this great 
 movement, — to find Englishmen no where men- 
 tioned, and the boldest navigators sailing from 
 Venice, Genoa and Portugal. The last-named 
 country took the lead, and Prince Henry, a 
 younger son of John the First, must rank with the 
 two great explorers whom we have named as having 
 made the sea a highway for commerce. He was 
 no seaman himself; but for nearly fifty years he 
 urged on the race of discovery, helping to turn 
 the minds of thoughtful men throughout Europe 
 to the great subject which filled his own soul. All 
 through that dreary period of our own history 
 and the history of our nearest neighbours, — - 
 when Joan of Arc was growing up, — during the 
 long minority and troubled reign of Henry the 
 Sixth, — while France was half won by the Eng- 
 lish, and wholly lost, — from the commencement 
 of the War of the Roses almost to its close, — 
 this noble Prince was devoting money and time 
 and heart to his favourite studies and projects. 
 He had his dwelling on the shores of the Atlantic, 
 near Cape St. Vincent; and there, with an un- 
 explored expanse of ocean continually before his 
 eyes, he dreamed of new conquests to be won 
 under his auspices which should bring honour 
 to his country, and extend the boundaries of 
 
PORTUGUESE DISCOVERIES. 181 
 
 Christendom. His companions were men of learn- 
 ing who knew what books could teach of the 
 world's size and shape, or seamen who had wan- 
 dered as far as men dared then to venture in 
 unknown seas. 
 
 To the African coast his researches African coast 
 were naturally directed; for he had ex P lored - 
 shared the danger and the glory of his father's 
 expedition against Barbary ; and from Moorish 
 guests, in later days, he had received glowing 
 accounts of the wealth which was hidden in the 
 interior of that vast continent. Cape Non, long 
 the southern boundary of European enterprize, 
 had been passed by some of Kins* 
 
 -x i i i i i ° A. D. 1412. 
 
 Johns naval commanders; but a sail 
 of fifty leagues had brought them to Cape Boja- 
 dor, and from thence they had returned with the 
 report that its rocky cliffs, projecting far into the 
 sea, presented a barrier too formidable to pass. 
 Still the Prince longed to penetrate beyond it, 
 and fitted out a vessel for that express object ; 
 but it was carried out to sea by a gale, and lighted 
 on Porto Santo, more than three hundred miles 
 from shore. Pleased with the discovery, which 
 fell in with his temper and genius, Henry began 
 to colonize, and sent out settlers in the following 
 year, who, after noticing for some time together 
 
 N 3 
 
182 PORTUGUESE DISCOVERIES. 
 
 an object in the distant horizon, which seemed 
 
 always to keep the same position, made 
 
 sail for it, and landed on Madeira. 
 
 The fruitful little island, which still remains in 
 
 the hands of the Portuguese, became a thriving 
 
 colony. The vine and the sugar-cane yielded a 
 
 rich return to the cultivator, and a traffic grew 
 
 up which taught men to navigate the open sea 
 
 more boldly. The formidable Cape 
 A. D. 1433. . J „ x 
 
 Bojador was passed, and Cape Blanco 
 
 and Cape de Verde were reached in succession, — 
 the latter being within fifteen degrees of the 
 Equator. The dreaded Torrid Zone was found 
 not to be destructive of human life ; and as point 
 after point was gained, and the interminable 
 shore was seen stretching yet farther to the South, 
 curiosity was excited; new hopes were raised, 
 and speculations about reaching India by circum- 
 navigating Africa became favourite ones with 
 many inquiring minds. 
 
 Before Prince Henry's death in 1473, the 
 Cape de Yerde Islands were discovered, three 
 hundred miles from the cape of that name, which 
 is the western extremity of Africa; and the 
 Azores, nine hundred miles from Portugal, and yet 
 farther from the southern continent. Triumphs 
 such as these were greatly surpassed by the men 
 
PORTUGUESE DISCOVERIES. 183 
 
 of the next age ; but to the Prince belonged the 
 credit of kindling the spirit which sent them forth. 
 Columbus himself may have had his noble aspira- 
 tions fed and strengthened by what he heard of 
 the Portuguese successes. Henry had been politic 
 enough, moreover, to get the Pope on his side. It 
 would be his endeavour, he said, to carry the light 
 of the Gospel into new lands, and gather bar- 
 barous tribes into the fold of the Church, where- 
 ever God should prosper his enterprizes ; and on 
 the faith of this promise, sincerely made and kept, 
 a grant was made to the Portuguese of all countries 
 discovered by them between Cape Non and the 
 Indian Continent. In those palmy days of the 
 Papacy, pretensions utterly monstrous for their 
 absurdity were acquiesced in by the European 
 powers as a part of the international law of 
 Christendom ; and, accordingly, this gift was re- 
 cognized by them as valid. 
 
 John II. followed in the track of _ 
 
 Progress 
 
 his great uncle, Prince Henry. En- towards 
 couraged by reports, partly true and 
 partly fabulous, about the wealth of distant king- 
 doms in the East, he became more anxious than 
 ever to reach India by sailing along the African 
 coast. The Gulf of Guinea was explored ; the 
 Equator was left behind; the constellations of 
 
 N 4 
 
184 PORTUGUESE DISCOVERIES. 
 
 the southern sky shone out with dazzling bril- 
 liancy ; farther and farther the Portuguese cap- 
 tains penetrated, and brought home word that 
 Ptolemy was mistaken as to the shape of Africa, 
 for, instead of widening as they advanced, the 
 shore contracted itself, and retreated towards the 
 East. An expedition was fitted out, 
 
 A.D. I486. L 
 
 therefore, with special orders to solve 
 the problem, and to sail past Africa eastward, if 
 an outlet could be found. The commander, Bar- 
 tholomew Diaz, passed the Cape of Good Hope, 
 and reached the Great Fish River, some hundred 
 miles beyond it : he was, in fact, on the high 
 road to India, the long-wished-for goal of Por- 
 tuguese explorers ; but shattered vessels and 
 furious storms, combined with a mutinous crew, 
 compelled him to return. For a time nothing 
 more was done. Diaz's report was formidable 
 even to the bold and enterprizing. The long- 
 sought southern promontory, which we know by 
 its fairer name, had been called by him the Cape 
 of Storms, and for ten years it was never passed 
 again. 
 
 In the meantime, however, the subject did not 
 sleep. Information was being gathered from 
 other quarters, and curiosity was quickened as 
 fresh reports came in of what travellers had seen 
 
PORTUGUESE DISCOVERIES. 185 
 
 or heard in the newly-explored parts of Africa, 
 and in the far distant East. Embassies were sent 
 in search of Prester John, a fabulous Christian 
 prince, supposed to reign in Abyssinia or Ethio- 
 pia, or somewhere else, about whom Marco Polo 
 and other early travellers had written, and who, 
 in this stage of European discovery, was often 
 hunted for, but never found. Covillam, a noble- 
 man of distinction, dispatched on an exploring 
 mission just about the time of Diaz's return to 
 Portugal, went through Egypt and Arabia to 
 India, visited Calicut, Goa, and other cities on 
 the Malabar coast, and, having crossed to the 
 western shore of Africa, found his way to Abys- 
 sinia, where he became an influential person at 
 court and spent the remainder of his days. The 
 result of his enquiries was transmitted to Portu- 
 gal, and found favour there. The Cape of Good 
 Hope, Covillam reported, was well known to na- 
 vigators of the Indian seas. At this point, there- 
 fore, the two tracks met by which vessels had 
 steered eastward from Europe, and westward from 
 the ports of Asia. What hindrance could there 
 be to a voyage from one continent to the other ? 
 What was wanting but sound vessels, sufficient 
 provisions, and stout hearts, to effect a maritime 
 communication between Portugal and the untold 
 wealth of India ? 
 
186 PORTUGUESE DISCOVERIES. 
 
 India Then came the crowning triumph in 
 
 reached. ^his memorable progress from Cape 
 Non to India. Emmanuel succeeded his cousin 
 John, and encouraged by favourable reports from 
 so many quarters, determined to spare no pains 
 to win for his country the commerce of the East. 
 So another expedition was fitted out, consisting of 
 three vessels, which sailed for the Cape of Good 
 Hope in July 1497 ; and Vasco de Gama was 
 selected for his skill and courage to conduct the 
 enterprize. The trust was faithfully discharged. 
 Advancing in the track pointed out by his fore- 
 runners, he sailed round the southern coast of 
 Africa, left the Great Fish River behind him, and 
 then sailing northwards, cast anchor opposite the 
 city of Mozambique in the following March. 
 Having explored the coast as far as Melinda, 
 2000 miles from the Cape of Good Hope, he 
 turned his prow eastward across the Indian Ocean, 
 and a run of three and twenty days realized all 
 his hopes and dreams by bringing him to Calicut, 
 then the great mart of commerce in the East. 
 
 Such was the career of discovery which occu- 
 pied eighty years of Portuguese history, — and a 
 noble career it was for a nation not ranking with 
 the first-rate European kingdoms in wealth or 
 power. Now Spain was to rival and surpass her 
 
FERDINAND AND ISABELLA. 187 
 
 neighbour ; for, before Yasco de Gama sailed n 
 his memorable voyage, Columbus had returned 
 from America ; and the marvellous tales from the 
 far West threw into the shade what had been 
 done by Prince Henry and his worthy successors 
 in another field. 
 
 Such was the preparatory work done for Co- 
 lumbus on the seas. The course of events which 
 seated Ferdinand and Isabella on the throne 
 of Spain, and made them powerful enough to 
 carry forward his great enterprize is full of in- 
 terest ; and a brief account of it will fitly intro- 
 duce the narrative which follows. 
 
 In the year 1454, John II., King Isabella and 
 of Castile, died, leaving two sons, her brothers. 
 Henry and Alfonso, and a daughter, Isabella, 
 scarcely three years old. He left behind him a 
 kingdom which embraced about three fourths of 
 modern Spain, the excepted portions being the 
 Moorish kingdom of Granada at the southern 
 extremity, comprised within a circuit of some five 
 hundred miles, — Navarre, less than half as large, 
 lying under the Pyrenees, — and Aragon, con- 
 taining the province of that name, along with 
 Catalonia and Valencia, and shut in between 
 
188 FERDINAND AND ISABELLA. 
 
 Castile, the Pyrenees, and the Mediterranean. 
 His successor, Henry IV., speedily disgusted his 
 subjects by his feebleness of character and habits 
 of reckless extravagance, combined with oppres- 
 sive exactions, and submission to unworthy fa- 
 vourites. A hostile party w T as formed, headed 
 by the Marquis of Villena, a man of great talents 
 and of a restless intriguing spirit, and his uncle 
 the Archbishop of Toledo ; and after some years 
 of smothered indignation or outspoken remon- 
 strance, — when royal pledges had been given and 
 broken, and the national feeling was at last out- 
 raged by Henry's recognition of his wife's daugh- 
 ter, born in adultery, as the heiress to the throne, 
 — in the year 1465, a formal deposition took 
 place with more of ceremony than belongs com- 
 monly to revolutionary movements. A scaffold 
 was erected in an open plain ; and there, upon a 
 chair of state, clad in sable robes, sat an e^gy of 
 King Henry, crowned and sceptred. His crimes 
 were read out, and forfeiture of the crown de- 
 clared to be their rightful punishment ; then pre- 
 lates and nobles stripped the figure of the royal 
 insignia, one by one, and concluded by rolling the 
 bare image from the throne to the dust. 
 
 Henry's younger brother, Alfonso, a youth of 
 eleven, was proclaimed King ; but a large party 
 
FERDINAND AND ISABELLA. 189 
 
 still adhered to Henry ; and for a time the strange 
 spectacle was seen of two rival courts and rival 
 governments in the same kingdom, Then came 
 civil war, — a pitched battle with a 
 
 1 A.D. 1468. 
 
 doubtful issue, — the sudden death of 
 Alfonso, — confusion and bewilderment among 
 the insurrectionary leaders, — and, at last, a reso- 
 lution to rally round the Infanta Isabella, and 
 make her Queen by the people's choice. This il- 
 lustrious Princess had just completed her seven- 
 teenth year, but had a maturity of understanding 
 and a force of character, beyond her years. Trained 
 in privacy under the eye of a watchful mother, 
 she had imbibed lessons of piety which governed 
 her future life, and now that she was tempted on 
 the side of ambition, she had her decision and her 
 answer ready. Nothing should induce her, she 
 said, to occupy the throne which was her bro- 
 ther's by lawful right. She would do what she 
 could to reconcile contending parties, but would 
 not help to perpetuate dissensions which had in- 
 flicted such misery on her country. The confe- 
 derates, deprived of a chief, had no hope of making 
 head against Henry, and terms were agreed upon 
 which promised immunity to the rebels, and put 
 Isabella's title as presumptive heiress to the throne 
 beyond dispute. 
 
190 FERDINAND AND ISABELLA. 
 
 Thus splendidly endowed, Isabella did 
 
 Her suitors l . ' 
 
 and mar- not want for suitors, lne King ot Ara- 
 
 nage * gon for his son, Ferdinand, — Edward I Y. 
 
 of England, and Louis XL of France, for their 
 respective brothers, — the King of Portugal for 
 himself, — all pressed her in turn ; and, like ladies 
 who have kingdoms for their dower, she seemed 
 likely to have a husband given to her for some 
 political object. But her delicacy and her pride 
 alike revolted against coercion where her happi- 
 ness and her duty were concerned; and threatened 
 violence on her brother's part was met with deter- 
 mined spirit on hers. For his own selfish objects 
 he favoured the old King of Portugal ; for her 
 people's sake, as for her own, she preferred the 
 voung Prince of Aragon ; and when imprisonment 
 in the fortress of Madrid was hinted at, she took 
 counsel with some of the nobles of Castile, nego- 
 tiated her own treaty of marriage, and placed 
 herself by a hasty flight beyond the reach of 
 Henry's unscrupulous advisers. Having reached 
 Valladolid, where the citizens were devoted to her 
 interests, she sent a message to Ferdinand, claim- 
 ing his advice and support ; and assuring him that 
 a speedy union had become necessary to her safety. 
 The Prince, though the most favoured of her 
 lovers, was unhappily the poorest, and could bring 
 
FERDINAND AND ISABELLA. 191 
 
 no army to her rescue. There was insurrection 
 in his father's little kingdom ; and neither soldiers 
 could be spared for his body-guard, nor money for 
 a royal bridal. He was driven, therefore, to take 
 his measures rapidly and secretly. If his journey 
 were publicly known, Henry would not scruple to 
 interrupt it by violence ; so he travelled with half 
 a dozen attendants disguised as merchants, and, 
 when his party stopped for refreshment, took 
 charge of the mules, and did the servant's part at 
 table. At Valladolid he found his mistress, the 
 Archbishop of Toledo, and a party of Isabella's de- 
 voted friends, who gladly gave him homage as 
 their future sovereign ; and there, in humble state, 
 money being borrowed to defray the Q ct 19 
 necessary expences, the marriage took 1469 - 
 place which laid the foundation of the great 
 Spanish monarchy. 
 
 The hero of this romance was in his eighteenth 
 year, and the heroine a year older, — he, not 
 spoiled by luxury, but active and temperate in his 
 habits, wise and experienced beyond his years, 
 handsome, too, and endowed with all knightly 
 accomplishments, — she, adorned with graces, and 
 ennobled by virtues, which the Spanish writers love 
 to paint in the most glowing colours. Isabella 
 the Catholic she was styled by her own age in 
 
192 FERDINAND AND ISABELLA. 
 
 token of her devotion to the Church and the Pope ; 
 but her religion was of that higher kind which 
 purifies and elevates the character, and it kept her 
 safely through the temptations of prosperous and 
 adverse fortune. Her later career was full of 
 honour ; but at the time we speak of, and for 
 many years afterwards, she led a troubled and 
 anxious life. Wisely, therefore, had she chosen 
 for her friend and companion one on whose judg- 
 ment she could rely for aid, and whose tried affec- 
 tion would be worth more to a heart like hers 
 than all the splendours of royalty. 
 
 Henry's death, five years after the 
 
 Distracted J J 
 
 state of marriage of Isabella, was followed by 
 
 pam ' a protracted civil war, which endan- 
 
 gered her throne, but called forth qualities which 
 made her dearer than before to every loyal Cas- 
 tilian. The King of Portugal took up the cause 
 of Joanna, the bastardized daughter of Henry's 
 wife, and, after going through the form of betroth- 
 ment with the lady, who, in respect of years, 
 might have been his daughter, gathered his armies 
 to enforce her claim. So sudden was the inva- 
 sion, — so little expected this hostile attempt from 
 one who was Isabella's own suitor but yesterday, 
 — that at the beginning of the war not a thousand 
 horse could be mustered to oppose his march. 
 
FERDINAND AND ISABELLA. 193 
 
 The nation, too, was distracted and impover- 
 ished; the troops were ill-appointed and half- 
 disciplined ; the civil functionaries left to the 
 Queen by her reckless predecessor were feeble 
 and incompetent ; some of her old friends turned 
 against her, and became bitter enemies, including 
 the Archbishop of Toledo, the first dignitary in 
 Spain. 
 
 In the midst of distresses like these T . ., , 
 
 Isabellas 
 
 Isabella never lost heart or hope. She noble qua- 
 trusted in God and her people ; and did 
 her own part with exemplary prudence and with 
 unfailing energy. When things were at the 
 worst, she hardly gave herself rest or sleep. The 
 night was sometimes spent in dictating dispatches, 
 and the day in rapid visits to garrison towns, in 
 which the allegiance of her subjects was most 
 doubtful. All was done that wisdom and courage 
 could do to maintain her own rights and the in- 
 dependence of her country. While the issue was 
 doubtful, Alfonso offered peace, on condition of 
 having Galicia and two frontier towns ceded to 
 Portugal ; but to such terms Isabella would not 
 listen. With money, if necessary, she would 
 buy for her country a release from the scourge of 
 war ; but Castile was given her in trust to keep 
 o 
 
194 FERDINAND AND ISABELLA. 
 
 and rule, and not an inch of its territory would 
 she consent to resign. 
 
 Victory and ^ last a v i ctoi T> gained near Toro, 
 peace. i n the year 1476, gave a decided su- 
 
 periority to Isabella, and fixed the wavering 
 allegiance of many of the nobles. But for three 
 years longer the contest continued ; and then the 
 war between rival Princesses was terminated by 
 the intervention of lady-peacemakers. An In- 
 fanta of Portugal, sick at heart for the miseries 
 inflicted in both countries, and closely allied both 
 to Alfonso and Isabella, sought a meeting with 
 the latter in a frontier town, and in less time than 
 
 is commonly given to such negotiations 
 A. D. 1479. %.? ° 
 
 the terms of peace were agreed on. 
 
 Alfonso was to renounce his bride, the Pope's 
 
 dispensation for the marriage being withdrawn ; 
 
 Joanna was to resign her pretensions to the 
 
 throne; and, strangely enough, having lost a 
 
 lover who might have been her father, it was 
 
 stipulated that this ill-fated lady should wed 
 
 Isabella's son just born, or retire into a convent. 
 
 She preferred the latter course, and lived to see 
 
 the grandson of Isabella occupy a far more 
 
 splendid throne than that of which she had. a 
 
 glimpse in her own youthful dreams. 
 
FERDINAND AND ISABELLA. 195 
 
 Five years of war had desolated _ ., , 
 J t Eapid acl- 
 
 Spain. Five years of peace followed ; vancement 
 and it may be questioned whether the 
 history of any nation presents a spectacle of such 
 rapid progress in a much more lengthened period. 
 Order succeeded to confusion ; the royal revenue 
 had increased sixfold ; the grandees of the kingdom 
 were no longer permitted to reign like petty tyrants 
 in their own domain ; the people, in town and 
 country, learnt to look to the throne as the foun- 
 tain of justice, and rallied round it with devoted 
 loyalty; ecclesiastical encroachments were firmly, 
 yet temperately resisted # ; above all, the courts 
 were purified, and the laws administered so as to 
 command respect and confidence. The judge's 
 decree, say the Spanish writers, began to be more 
 respected than the warrior's sword; the roads 
 were swept of banditti; fortresses, which had 
 been the strongholds of titled plunderers, were 
 thrown down; the knight and squire, who had 
 oppressed the labouring people without mercy, 
 felt that a stronger arm was upon them which 
 they could not resist. 
 
 Isabella herself was the spring; of 
 . . . . Isabella's 
 
 this improved administration. Her personal 
 
 desire to have her throne established m uence# 
 
 * See NOTE (Q). 
 o 2 
 
196 FERDINAND AND ISABELLA. 
 
 in righteousness gave vigour and directness to all 
 measures of reform. Her wise economy, which 
 never degenerated into meanness, but was varied 
 by noble munificence when the occasion called for 
 it, gave her kingdom a flourishing exchequer 
 •without any harsh exactions. Her Castilian sub- 
 jects every where loved to connect her name with 
 their new-found blessings : while those, who came 
 within the sphere of her personal influence, gave 
 her the tribute of a warmer and livelier admi- 
 ration. The Court, which had been a sink of 
 pollution, became a safe dwelling-place for inno- 
 cence and modesty; and lessons learnt in the 
 palace by the future mothers of her nobles helped 
 to form a far better race than the proud and law- 
 less men who had often proved themselves too 
 strong both against Prince and people.* 
 
 In 1481 the last war with the Moors began, 
 which lasted ten years, and ended in their over- 
 throw and expulsion. It was raging when Co- 
 lumbus first sought the Court of Spain, and 
 Granada was taken just before he sailed on his 
 first voyage. Thus, at the same time, the whole 
 of Spain, with the very slight exception of Na- 
 varre, became consolidated into one kingdom, and 
 a new empire sprang up in the West to increase 
 
 * See NOTE (K). 
 
FERDINAND AND ISABELLA. 197 
 
 its wealth and fame. Yery different was the 
 Spain of Charles the Fifth and Philip the Second 
 from that which Ferdinand and Isabella looked 
 upon as their future inheritance when money was 
 borrowed for their wedding festivities at Valla- 
 dolid; and the different stages of its growth till 
 it became the rival of the foremost nations of 
 Europe, and the dread of many of them, form an 
 important chapter in Modern History. 
 
 o 3 
 
198 COLUMBUS. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 COLUMBUS. 
 
 Sometime in the early part of the year 1486, a 
 stranger stopped at the door of a Franciscan con- 
 vent, near the town of Palos, on the western coast 
 of Spain, and begged of the porter some bread 
 and water for his son. They were journeying 
 on foot to a neighbouring town, where some 
 members of their family resided, and the length 
 of the way had exhausted the younger traveller. 
 As they stood and refreshed themselves with the 
 humble cheer which was readily granted them, 
 the guardian of the convent, one Juan Perez de 
 Marchena passed by, and was attracted by the 
 noble appearance of the stranger, and by his 
 foreign accent. Conversation ensued, and was 
 followed by the offer of hospitality on the friar's 
 part. The convent stood upon a height, and 
 commanded a view of the great Atlantic Ocean. 
 The possibility of crossing it was canvassed ; and 
 some discussion ensued as to the countries and 
 races which might be found on the opposite shore. 
 
COLUMBUS. 199 
 
 The traveller, it seemed, was one who had medi- 
 tated deeply on the world's size and shape. He 
 had conceived the notion that Europe and Africa, 
 and the known parts of Asia, did not comprize 
 the whole of the solid portion of the globe, but 
 that new countries might be discovered by stretch- 
 ing boldly to the West. He talked like one who 
 was bold enough to venture into unknown seas, 
 and test the truth of his theories by actual expe- 
 riment ; but to practical skill he added scientific 
 acquirements of a high order, and showed himself 
 master of all the learning that bore upon his 
 favourite subject. 
 
 The wayfaring man was Columbus, and it 
 chanced that in Marchena he found an intelligent 
 and willing listener. A physician of Palos, 
 Garcia Fernandez, was invited to their confer- 
 ences, a man of some scientific reputation, and 
 one Pinzon, also, who belonged to a wealthy 
 family, and was himself a bold and experienced 
 navigator. To this little party the great explorer 
 announced his hopes and plans. They rested not 
 on fancies and conjectures, but on specious rea- 
 sonings and solid facts. The records of ancient 
 and modern travellers had been searched and 
 sifted. With the stores which were gathered 
 from books he had compared the observations of 
 
 o 4 
 
200 COLUMBUS. 
 
 living men. He could tell of what had been seen 
 at Porto Santo, at Madeira, on the Azores and 
 Canary Islands. Trunks of trees, evidently not 
 of European growth, and reeds of an immense 
 size, of which some were preserved by the Xing 
 of Portugal, had been drifted on those shores by 
 westerly currents; dead bodies, too, belonging 
 to some unknown race, had been found on one of 
 them; and whence could these come but from 
 some undiscovered country beyond the Atlantic ? 
 
 When Columbus's tale was finished, other evi- 
 dence was sought after. The weather-beaten 
 pilots of Palos were sent for and examined ; facts 
 noted by one and another of them were brought 
 together, and pointed to the same conclusion. 
 Then the lofty enthusiasm of Columbus painted 
 his darling project in the most glowing colours, 
 as full of hope to Christendom, and promising 
 lasting glory to Spain, if her rulers would supply 
 the necessary complement of ships and men. 
 
 In the common discourse of Columbus there 
 was the elevation of genius and the fire of elo- 
 quence. The solemn earnestness of his tone 
 marked the sincerity of his convictions, and gave 
 force and weight to all that he said. So his 
 hearers listened, wondered, and believed. Mar- 
 chena, especially, was caught by the grandeur of 
 
COLUMBUS. 201 
 
 the scheme, and charged Columbus to go straight 
 to Cordova, where the Court was then residing, 
 and lay his plans before Ferdinand and Isabella ; 
 at the same time giving him a letter of introduc- 
 tion to Talavera, the Queen's confessor, and pro- 
 mising to take charge of his son till his return. 
 
 A few words will Suffice for the Early history 
 
 previous career of Columbus. His of Columbus. 
 father was a woolcomber at Genoa ; and at a very- 
 early age, probably, there were some indications 
 of genius ; as he studied for a short time at the 
 University of Pavia, and there acquired a good 
 knowledge of Latin, besides the rudiments of 
 geometry, astronomy and navigation. But his 
 passion was for the sea ; so at fourteen his nau- 
 tical life began ; and he grew up to manhood 
 amid the toils and dangers of active service be- 
 tween the great ports of the Mediterranean. 
 
 In the commercial enterprizes, as well as the 
 maritime wars, of that age, there was abundant 
 occupation for an active mind and a fearless spirit. 
 The Italian states were continually battling with 
 each other ; and petty fleets, laden with precious 
 freights, had to be attacked or defended. Pira- 
 tical expeditions were not unfrequent, and men of 
 reputation did not disdain to serve in them for 
 
202 COLUMBUS. 
 
 hire. The common enemy, too, the Mussulman, 
 was braved in his strongholds, or pursued, like a 
 trespasser, upon the high seas. In expeditions of 
 this sort Columbus served a rough apprenticeship, 
 and a better, perhaps, could not have been found 
 for the enterprize which became the business of 
 his life. 
 
 Of this period scarcely any thing is known in 
 detail, for Columbus has left no record of it; 
 and early historians, who wrote to exalt the glory 
 of Spain in connection with his great achievement, 
 took no account of what had been done while he 
 was training up for it in other lands. One inci- 
 dent remains, told by himself, no doubt, to his 
 son Fernando, that while serving with a relative, 
 who was a noted corsair, and had a name so terrible 
 as to be the bugbear of Moorish nurseries, he 
 was once engaged in a desperate action not far 
 from Cape St. Vincent. This man, with his little 
 squadron, attacked four Venetian galleys richly 
 freighted. There was no manoeuvring, but hard 
 fighting between the hostile decks, while each 
 ship was fastened by grappling-irons to its anta- 
 gonist. Columbus's vessel, or the one with which 
 he was engaged, took fire, and both crews were 
 compelled, for safety, to plunge into the sea. He 
 seized an oar, and with the help of that, being a 
 
COLUMBUS. 203 
 
 man of great physical strength and an expert 
 swimmer, escaped to shore two leagues off. So 
 the story runs; and, if it be strictly true, we 
 may well acknowledge, with the dutiful narrator, 
 that " God gave him strength, and preserved him 
 for greater things." 
 
 From this unpromising school Columbus 
 emerged, not only a hardy seaman, but with 
 many scholar-like acquirements, — of a temper 
 calm and patient, yet full of energy, — with aims 
 and motives, moreover, w T hich elevated him far 
 above the crowd of money-seeking or danger- 
 lovinp; adventurers. In 1470 we first •■ . 
 
 ° , . _ . Arrives in 
 
 hear of him in Portugal. During his Portugal, 
 
 residence there, considering its situation, 
 and the known incidents of his story, it is highly 
 probable that he began to speculate concerning the 
 western boundary of the Atlantic, and to dream of 
 lands beyond it. Prince Henry was then alive, 
 and the fame of his discoveries was quite enough 
 to attract a man like Columbus, and to make 
 him wish for some share in the exploring expe- 
 ditions which were pushing the boundaries of the 
 known world yet farther to the South and West. 
 At Lisbon he became acquainted with a noble 
 lady whom he courted and married, the daughter 
 of one of the Prince's band of distinguished cap- 
 
204 COLUMBUS. 
 
 tains. He resided for a time with his mother-in- 
 law, and from her he received, what was more 
 precious in his eyes than a marriage-portion of 
 gold and jewels, the journals and charts of her 
 deceased husband. His wife's sister was married 
 to a man of similar genius and tastes with his 
 own, who had once been governor of Porto Santo, 
 the island from which Madeira had been seen and 
 discovered; at that outpost of the world of dis- 
 covery Columbus himself resided for a time ; and 
 the talk of the two brothers, when they met, 
 would naturally turn upon all that had been 
 done, and all that might yet be done, in the way 
 of discovery on the element with which they 
 were both familiar. Facts were collected from 
 many quarters, which seemed to speak the same 
 language as to far off countries in the West ; and 
 to these were added floating rumours of distant 
 islands sometimes dimly seen by navigators who 
 had been driven by storms beyond the usual 
 track. During this period Columbus was em- 
 ployed sometimes in voyages to Guinea; and 
 when at home eked out his scanty income by 
 drawing maps and charts for sale. Something 
 was saved, however, from his little store to assist 
 his old father at Genoa, and to advance the edu- 
 cation of his younger brother. 
 
COLUMBUS. 205 
 
 By 1474 it is certain that the theory His t i ieory 
 of Columbus had assumed a definite and plans. 
 shape. Reflection, study, observation, and the 
 report of many witnesses, all brought him to the 
 same conclusion. The earth he assumed to be a 
 globe, of which the surface was divided between 
 land and sea, and which might be travelled round 
 from East to West, men on opposite sides of the 
 sphere, of course, standing foot to foot. Mea- 
 suring the known portions of the globe eastward 
 from the Cape de Verde Islands to the extremest 
 point of Asia, he concluded that about two-thirds 
 of the whole circumference were comprized within 
 those limits ; and the remaining third, partly oc- 
 cupied by land and partly by water, had yet to 
 be traversed. The land he supposed to be, not 
 another continent, as he found it, but Asia, 
 known or unknown ; and already he had formed 
 a determination, if ships could be procured, to 
 sail across the intervening ocean in quest of India. 
 As the hope grew up in his mind of finding new 
 lands, peopled with strange, probably barbarous, 
 races, he began to look at the project through the 
 medium of his strong religious feelings. Christ's 
 name would be magnified, and the blessings of 
 redemption extended, possibly, to nations of ido- 
 laters. He thought himself called to a mission 
 
206 COLUMBUS. 
 
 of peace, and longed to bring fresh provinces 
 beneath the Church's rule. In this strain he 
 loved to speak of his great design ; and when he 
 invited the attention of princes, or discoursed 
 about it to learned men, there was in his air, and 
 style, and tones, something of the prophet's man- 
 ner, announcing the high purposes of heaven. 
 Correspon- In his hopes and plans he was en- 
 
 Toscanelli. couraged by a learned Florentine, 
 a.d. 1474. Toscanelli, with whom he corresponded. 
 " Four thousand miles from Lisbon," he said, 
 " must bring you to Mangi and Cathay, — to the 
 Spice Islands, which send their perfume across the 
 ocean, — to Cipango, with its hidden stores of 
 precious stones, — and to the palace of the great 
 Khan, covered with tiles of gold." Such were 
 some of the wonders described by Marco Polo, 
 the celebrated Venetian traveller, who had pene- 
 trated to the remotest parts of Asia a century 
 before. The names here mentioned were for 
 ever in Columbus's mind throughout his earlier 
 voyages; and the map sent to him by Tosca- 
 nelli, which travelled with him when he first sailed 
 across the Atlantic, exhibits India where America 
 ought to be, with islands, small and great, of un- 
 known names, scattered over the intervening 
 ocean. Cipango figures very prominently; a nut- 
 
COLUMBUS. 207 
 
 meg forest is put clown among its supposed pro- 
 ducts; and Syrens are commemorated as some- 
 times visiting its shores. 
 
 Years went by, and reflection did Overtures to 
 but root this theory more strongly in Portu g al - 
 the mind of Columbus ; but there was no hope of 
 its ever coming to any practical result till some 
 European potentate should put an exploring 
 armament at his disposal. Portugal had been 
 the patron of similar projects, and seemed likely 
 to become so again when John the Second, on his 
 accession to the throne, in the year 1481, talked 
 of following up the career of discovery so nobly 
 begun by his great uncle, Prince Henry. So to 
 Portugal he went, and told his tale to the King 
 himself, who referred the whole matter, first, to a 
 body of learned men, and afterwards to his own 
 council. Both reported the scheme to be utterly 
 extravagant ; but John, who had a hankering 
 after the reputation of a discoverer, borrowed the 
 maps and charts of Columbus, and, having fitted 
 out a vessel at the Cape de Yerde Islands, 
 charged the pilot to sail boldly in the track which 
 they indicated till he came to land. Faith and 
 courage to venture very far were naturally want- 
 ing in men who were thus driven forth into 
 unknown seas: they returned with an ill report; 
 
208 COLUMBUS. 
 
 the monarch lost character without gaining his 
 prize ; and Columbus, threatened with an arrest 
 for debt, and disgusted with an act of baseness 
 which might have robbed him of his honest fame, 
 ad 1484 left Portugal after three years of weary 
 expectation. 
 It is rumoured, but not very clearly ascertained, 
 that overtures were next made to Genoa and 
 Venice, and rejected by both of them. To Eng- 
 land he certainly dispatched his brother Bartho- 
 lomew to solicit the countenance of Henry the 
 Seventh for his great undertaking. But up to 
 the time of his appearance at Palos, he had found 
 favour with no European Potentate. Fifty years 
 of a laborious and anxious life were already spent, 
 and his mission still was to "beg his way from 
 court to court, while he offered to princes the 
 discovery of a world." 
 
 In the little sea-port town of Spain, we have 
 seen, he found listeners and friends ; and encou- 
 raged by their approbation, with hopes some- 
 what revived, he sought : the Court of Spain. 
 Columbus at At Cordova he found King and 
 Cordova. Queen, courtiers and soldiers, laymen 
 
 and ecclesiastics, all occupied with an intended 
 attack on Granada ; and a solitary, unfriended 
 
COLUMBUS. 209 
 
 stranger, asking for assistance towards what looked 
 a romantic enterprize, was little likely to find 
 favour, or obtain a hearing, at a time like that. 
 He waited, and sold maps for bread, and went 
 abroad among gay cavaliers with his grave, 
 earnest look, and simple, modest garb, making no 
 secret of his mission, and often mocked at in the 
 streets as a mad enthusiast. Still there was that 
 innate nobleness of soul, and that dignity of look 
 and manner, which arrested observation, and by 
 degrees won listeners among men of education and 
 intelligence. Herrera's may be taken as a faithful 
 portrait, and is worth quoting as the traditionary 
 likeness current among his countrymen, though 
 the historian could hardly have conversed with 
 those who knew Columbus* " He was tall of 
 stature, long visaged, of a majestic aspect, his 
 nose hooked, his eyes grey, of a clear complexion, 
 somewhat ruddy ; his beard and * hair, when 
 young, fair, though through many hardships they 
 soon turned grey. He was witty and pleasant, 
 well spoken and eloquent, moderately grave, 
 affable to strangers, to his own family mild. His 
 conversation was discreet, which gained him the 
 affection of those he had to deal with, and his 
 presence attracted respect, having an air of au- 
 thority and grandeur; always temperate in eating 
 p 
 
210 COLUMBUS. 
 
 and modest in his dress. As to religion, he was 
 very zealous and devout, often saying, " I will do 
 this in the Name of the most Holy Trinity " ; kept 
 the fasts of the Church very strictly, often con- 
 fessed and communicated, said all the canonical 
 hours, abhorred swearing and blasphemy, had a 
 peculiar devotion to our Lady and St. Francis, 
 was very thankful to Almighty God for the mer- 
 cies he received, zealous for God's honour, and 
 very desirous of the conversion of the Indians. In 
 other respects he was a man of an undaunted 
 courage and high thoughts, fond of great enter- 
 prizes, patient, ready to forgive wrongs, and only 
 desirous that offenders should be sensible of their 
 faults ; unmoved in the many troubles and adver- 
 sities that attended him, ever relying on the Divine 
 Providence. In short, had he performed such a 
 wonderful enterprize in the ancient days, as the 
 discovery of the New World, it is likely he would 
 not only have had statues and even temples erected 
 to his honour, but that some star would have 
 been dedicated to him, as was done to Hercules 
 and Bacchus ; and among us his name will be re- 
 nowned whilst the world endures." 
 Introducedto B 7 degrees Columbus won his way 
 Ferdinand. to Cardinal Mendoza, the first ecclesi- 
 astic and Prime Minister of Spain, and by him 
 
 
COLUMBUS. 211 
 
 was introduced to Ferdinand. The King longed 
 to rival Portugal on the high seas, and caught 
 with some eagerness at the sound of an exploring 
 expedition with the promise of such grand results. 
 Talavera, therefore, was instructed to assemble a 
 conclave, comprizing men of the highest dignity 
 and profoundest learning. Dignitaries, professors, 
 and friars of scientific reputation, assembled at 
 Salamanca, the seat of the most famous Uni- 
 versity in Spain ; and there, at last, Columbus 
 had the audience he longed for, — men, as he 
 thought, superior to vulgar prejudices, who would 
 listen to his facts, and weigh his reasonings with 
 calmness and patience ; men, above all, who would 
 look at his great enterprize as Christian men should 
 do, and would sympathize with his earnest long- 
 ings to carry the blessings of redemption to new 
 tribes of the human family. Alas ! his old fate 
 pursued him ; some mocked him as a dreamer ; 
 others thought him more than half a heretic ; few- 
 had the penetration to see how much of sober 
 truth and probability was mixed up with the 
 project that looked so daring ; one only, Diego de 
 Deza, became a convert, and was his advocate and 
 fast friend ever afterwards; and this man, like 
 Marchena, was a friar.* 
 
 * See NOTE (S). 
 p 2 
 
212 COLUMBUS. 
 
 Conference at We d <> not know how lon g tne ex " 
 Salamanca. animation lasted ; nor is there any full 
 
 report of the arguments on either side ; but enough 
 is told to make us long for more. The earth's 
 spherical form was a thing unproved as yet ; so 
 some of the doctors made themselves very merry 
 with the notion of the topsy-turvy world at the 
 Antipodes. Besides, if there were such a world, 
 as Augustine had well argued, how could it be 
 peopled? Not by descendants from Adam, for 
 the ocean was impassable ; and to suppose another 
 progenitor would be to contradict the Bible. — 
 The earth must be flat, moreover, some argued; 
 for did not the Psalmist speak of the heavens as 
 being " spread over it like a curtain ? " But sup- 
 pose it round, and let Columbus sail over the 
 convex surface to India, — how could he possibly 
 return ? for he and his ships would have to climb 
 the slope, and get over what would stand, like a 
 mountain, in their course. Columbus was pre- 
 pared at every point. To the old objection that 
 the torrid zone was uninhabitable, he replied that 
 he had sailed almost to the Equator, and not only 
 lived to come back again, but found Guinea both 
 populous and fruitful. He was at home in the 
 writings of the fathers, and could quote Scripture 
 like the doctors ; only, instead of strained inter- 
 
COLUMBUS. 213 
 
 pretations of particular texts, he gave them a 
 glowing picture of lands rescued from idolatry, 
 and blessed with the knowledge of a Redeemer, 
 — then, pointing to one passage and another of 
 the prophetical writings, he argued that the time 
 was come for their complete fulfilment. His 
 mission, he said, was to find new lands that they 
 might be peopled with obedient converts, who 
 should bring in a fresh tribute of praise to Christ, 
 the universal Lord. 
 
 Very startling, probably, was this strain from a 
 man like Columbus. We can imagine grave men 
 looking from the speaker to each other, and mar- 
 velling where he got his learning and his eloquence. 
 But the physical difficulties remained; the doubts 
 of almost all were too stubborn to be charmed 
 away by reasonings of this sort; the conclave 
 w r as dispersed without coming to any decision ; 
 but Columbus was left to hang about the Court, 
 hoping for renewed deliberations, and a more fa- 
 vourable issue. 
 
 At the end of five years from this Columbus 
 time, Columbus was again at the Con- p^ s t0 
 vent of La Rabida, where he had left A - d.U91. 
 his son. He came to tell his friend, Marchena, 
 that he had done with Spain. He had followed 
 the wanderings of the Court, had been partly 
 p 3 
 
214 COLUMBUS. 
 
 maintained at its charges, had put up with sus- 
 pense and delay through weary months and years ; 
 but now patience was exhausted, and hope from 
 , that quarter was dead. His thoughts were turned 
 to France. Other sovereigns might yet adopt 
 the enterprize which the rulers of Spain had held 
 cheap. At any rate, no pains should be spared 
 on his part to bring about the happy consum- 
 mation in which Christendom had a common 
 interest. 
 
 Arrested by March ena's patriotic feelings took 
 Marchena. a l arm . For n i s C0U ntry he coveted 
 with all his heart the glory of adopting and car- 
 rying out the scheme of Columbus. With his 
 own hand he wrote a letter of remonstrance to 
 Isabella, to whom he had once been confessor, and 
 dispatched it by a trusty messenger. A speedy 
 reply invited his attendance at the royal camp 
 before Granada, and without the loss of an hour 
 he hastened to the royal presence. His hearty 
 commendation of his friend, and earnest entreaties 
 to the Queen not to lose such a golden oppor- 
 tunity of adding to her high renown, won the ear 
 of Isabella, and instant orders were given for the 
 recal of Columbus. He came in time to wit- 
 ness the fall of Granada, the last stronghold of the 
 Moors in Spain, and found the royal councillors 
 more willing than before to listen to new schemes 
 
COLUMBUS. 215 
 
 of conquest, His claims, however, which nothing 
 would induce him to abate, seemed to them per- 
 fectly monstrous and extravagant, for in his 
 poverty, like one born to rule, he would deal with 
 Princes on equal terms, and demanded honours 
 and rewards in proportion to his own estimate of 
 the prize he offered them. Again he was repulsed, 
 mounted his mule, and was on his way to Cordova, 
 when a last effort was made by one zealous friend. 
 To the Queen he spoke of the little that was 
 asked compared with all that might be expected, 
 if the great adventurer should be crowned with 
 success. Her name was great already, and would 
 be yet greater if she allied herself to a noble cause, 
 and carried the Christian faith to other lands. To 
 enlarge the boundaries of knowledge, and solve 
 difficult and perplexing problems, was the work 
 of enlightened Princes ; and if the little fleet were 
 beaten back, and the explorer's hopes should be 
 never realized, something was gained and learnt, 
 and her own part faithfully discharged towards 
 God and man. The Queen's enthusiasm was 
 kindled ; her judgment was decided^ and never 
 wavered more. " For my own crown of Castile/' 
 she said, (i I adopt the enterprize ; and if funds are 
 wanted, my own jewels shall be pledged to raise 
 them." 
 
 f 4 
 
216 COLUMBUS. 
 
 His terms Columbus was pursued and over- 
 
 grantee . taken ; and after a moment's hesitation, 
 (a critical moment in the world's history), he 
 turned his mule's head back towards Granada. 
 His terms were now complied with. He was to 
 be Admiral in all seas, and Viceroy over all lands, 
 discovered by himself; his offices were to be here- 
 ditary ; a tenth of the revenue which the new 
 provinces should yield in the way of tribute or 
 merchandize was to be his ; he or his officers were 
 to be arbiters in all disputes connected with the 
 traffic of the new-found countries. As to all 
 future expeditions, it was settled that he should 
 contribute one-eighth of the outlay, receiving in 
 return one -eighth of the profits. One other article 
 Columbus wished to include, — that the revenue 
 derived from his discoveries should be devoted, in 
 the first instance, to the recovery of the Holy 
 Sepulchre from the infidels. The sovereigns 
 smiled, perhaps, at his haste, but were well pleased 
 with his devotion. The article was not written 
 down as a part of the treaty ; but the wish to 
 furnish funds for a last crusade was the darling 
 wish of Columbus through all his days, and sus- 
 tained him often amidst the vexations and dis- 
 appointments of his troubled life. 
 
 Orders were now given to furnish all that was 
 
COLUMBUS. 217 
 
 necessary for the expedition without delay. Palos, 
 so singularly connected with this romantic story, 
 was chosen for the starting-place. Martin Pinzon, 
 of whom we have heard already, the steady ad- 
 herent of Columbus through all those years of 
 expectation, was now willing to become the partner 
 of his dangers. Two of his brothers joined him ; 
 and their united influence with their fellow towns- 
 men contributed greatly to the completion of the 
 armament. It consisted, at last, but of two light 
 caravels, without decks, save at the prow and 
 stern, commanded by two of the Pinzons, and one 
 ship of larger size commanded by Columbus him- 
 self. Fernandez, the physician, who had shared 
 their early conferences at the old convent, now 
 sailed with them as steward. • One wonders, 
 almost, that Marchena did not go as chaplain, to 
 make the party complete; he did his part, how- 
 ever, on shore, — Columbus reverently confessing 
 himself, and receiving the Communion at the hands 
 of his old friend, when all was ready for his de- 
 parture, and officers and men following the ex- 
 ample of their chief. It was a day of anxiety and 
 gloom for the little community of Palos ; for few 
 among the crews were sustained by the hopes 
 which animated their captains ; and their relatives 
 looked upon them as doomed to destruction. 
 
218 COLUMBUS. 
 
 On the morning of the 3rd of Au- 
 
 Sail for ° 
 
 the Xew gnst, 1492, the three vessels stood out 
 
 to sea, haviDg on board three skilful 
 pilots besides the Pinzons, and a hundred and 
 twenty men. Owing to some delay occasioned 
 by a broken rudder, the Canary Islands were not 
 left till the 6th of September, and on the 9th 
 Ferro was passed, the extremest point hitherto 
 known to European navigators. Then came the 
 plunge into unknown seas, and each day's sail 
 separated the crews more widely from the world 
 which they regarded as their own. No wonder, 
 while their prows pointed steadily to the West, 
 that their eyes were continually searching for 
 shore or mountain in that direction ; but, wherever 
 they looked, all was one wide waste of waters. 
 Evening after evening, for weeks together, the 
 sun went down, and no outline of coast, far or 
 near, could be traced in the glowing sky. A mast 
 floated by them at one time, belonging apparently 
 to a vessel of some size, and the timid began to 
 question whether it were lawful to tempt Pro- 
 vidence by venturing rashly where some unhappy 
 voyagers had perished helplessly before. The 
 needle did not point truly, but varied several de- 
 
COLUMBUS. 219 
 
 grees ; and the pilots, in wonder and alarm, asked 
 whether it were safe to go where the common 
 laws of nature seemed to be suspended, - and the 
 skill and knowledge, which had served them in 
 other seas, might prove altogether useless. They 
 came next within the range of the trade wind 
 blowing steadily from East to West; and for a 
 time they were content to be speeded on their 
 way by gentle, favouring breezes, without the 
 shifting of a sail; then came the apprehension 
 that no other winds might ever blow in those 
 unknown regions, and that return would be im- 
 possible, whether they found land beyond them, 
 or gave up the search as hopeless. 
 
 More than half the sailors, instead Troubles 
 of being willing helpers, had been onboard, 
 pressed into a service from which they shrank 
 with terror. Winds and waves, therefore, now 
 presented less formidable difficulties to the great 
 commander than the wild, refractory crew who 
 held him, like a captive, in their power. An 
 hour's mutiny would be fatal to his purpose. 
 The disaffected had but to seize the helm, and 
 tack about, and tell their own story in Spain, 
 and the dream of his life was at an end. All the 
 resources, therefore, of an ingenious and fertile 
 mind were called into play while he appealed 
 
220 COLUMBUS. 
 
 successively to their hopes and fears, — to their 
 patriotism and sense of shame. He gave them 
 large promises of lands and wealth, and prophesied 
 that the toil of weeks would be recompensed a 
 hundred fold when their great end should be 
 gained. He pictured in glowing words the 
 Paradise of plenty which was to be their future 
 home, told them of the renown which must follow 
 their high achievement, as if it were already 
 finished, and said the meanest man on board would 
 have his share. With visions of this sort his own 
 mind had been filled, and his own hopes sustained, 
 through years of disappointment. But he had to 
 do with vulgar minds, and low, grovelling natures ; 
 and the lengthening track behind, with the unex- 
 plored ocean in front, began by degrees to appal 
 the hearts of the bravest, while a thousand tales 
 of mysterious and unknown horrors were sure to 
 be current among the timid and superstitious. 
 Hopes and Again and again Columbus revived 
 
 fears. their hopes by his own unfailing con- 
 
 fidence. He praised them for their past services, 
 and assured them that perseverance must soon be 
 crowned with success. Let the pathless ocean once 
 be crossed, and not only would they be amply 
 recompensed by their grateful country, but the 
 heroic achievement would be one for Spain and 
 
COLUMBUS. 221 
 
 the civilized world to talk about in future ages. 
 His words were seconded, often, by favourable 
 signs. Patches of green herbs came floating from 
 the West ; birds, neither large nor strong of 
 wing, lighted on the ships, and cheered the sailors 
 with their song; clouds, in the distant horizon, 
 would take the shape of islands, and then hope 
 seemed to be exchanged for certainty. On the 
 25th of September, Martin Pinzon, from the 
 stern of his vessel, cried, " Land, land," and 
 claimed for his own the reward of thirty crowns 
 promised by the government to the man who 
 should first descry it. Columbus threw himself 
 on his knees, and gave thanks to God ; while, 
 from the Pinta, the hymn Gloria in Excelsis 
 was heard, in which the crews of both ships gladly 
 joined. Sailors were soon in the rigging, looking 
 out towards the South- West ; and there, at a great 
 distance, something like land was seen. So their 
 course was altered a few points, and through the 
 night they steered in that direction ; but morning 
 came, and an unbroken expanse of waters was 
 around them as before. 
 
 Disappointments of this sort made Growing 
 the admiral's position one of yet greater discontent. 
 difficulty and peril. His promises were less trusted, 
 and his orders more grudgingly obeyed. Little 
 
222 COLUMBUS. 
 
 groups began to talk in whispers of the necessity 
 of caring for their own safety. They had ventured 
 far enough already ; the duty which they owed to 
 Spain had been faithfully discharged ; they never 
 could be bound, in compliance with the mad 
 wishes of their leader, to pursue this hopeless, 
 endless voyage any farther. Return was possible 
 now, and their ships were sound ; but who could 
 answer for the future in unknown seas ? Delay 
 was dangerous, and the time for resistance was 
 surely come if, on further remonstrance, the Ad- 
 miral should prove deaf to reason. Some hinted 
 at deeds worse than mutiny. One life, they said, 
 was cheap in comparison with many. If they 
 were driven to extremities, and threw Columbus 
 into the sea, they had but to keep their secret, 
 and say that he had fallen overboard while en- 
 gaged in his favourite pursuit of star-gazing. 
 He was no powerful courtier with an army of 
 partizans at his back, — no grandee of Spain 
 whose loss would make a stir at home, — but a 
 stranger in small repute already, whose name 
 would soon perish, or would be remembered only 
 as that of a rash, dreamy adventurer. The temper 
 of the crew could hardly be concealed from 
 Columbus. He must have watched the gathering 
 gloom and discontent with the feeling that his life 
 
COLUMBUS. 223 
 
 hung by a thread ; but he was a brave man, who 
 never feared danger, and a devout man, whose 
 reliance on a watchful and all-disposing Provi- 
 dence did not desert him in the most trying 
 times. While some, therefore, were plotting in- 
 surrection about him, and others looked on him 
 with an evil eye, with thoughts of murder in 
 their hearts, he kept the same unruffled aspect, 
 and gave his orders in a tone of undiminished 
 confidence. 
 
 On the 7th of October, according to his private 
 reckoning, they had sailed seven hundred and fifty 
 leagues, though to his frightened crews he ad- 
 mitted only a little more than six hundred. Ci- 
 pango, if Toscanelli's map might be trusted, was not 
 far off; and hour after hour the Admiral expected 
 to see it come into view. Large flights of field- 
 birds thronged the air above them, and their course 
 was always to the South- West. So, concluding 
 that land must be there, he took a more southerly 
 course for three days. To him every thing looked 
 bright and promising. Small birds came flying 
 by in great numbers as before, and in the same 
 direction ; while a single heron and pelican were 
 eagerly pointed to as signs that some home was 
 near. But the sailors had lost all faith in signs. 
 The boundless sea filled their eyes and imagina- 
 
224 COLUMBUS. 
 
 tions, and to find a shore seemed a sheer impossi- 
 bility. Accordingly, on the evening of the 10th, 
 the long slumbering spirit of insubordination broke 
 out into open mutiny. Men and officers assembled 
 tumultuously on deck, and demanded permission to 
 tack about, and return to Europe that very hour. 
 Columbus Then was seen, on board that little 
 
 immovable. yeggel ^ the br()ad AtlantiCj what hag 
 
 been so often seen on a wider stage, how one 
 resolute spirit can charm numbers into submission ; 
 — how, too, when some work is to be done for the 
 advancement of God's designs on earth, the instru- 
 ment is made ready at the appointed time, and 
 exactly fitted for its purpose. Less of deter- 
 mination in Columbus at that critical moment 
 would have been followed by his complete dis- 
 comfiture ; and, instead of returning to Spain in 
 triumph, he would have been a dishonoured man 
 in his own age, and an unknown man to us. But 
 he met the storm, and quelled it. Nothing should 
 turn him back, he said, till he had done the 
 bidding of his sovereigns. Seek land they must 
 till they found it; and it would be madness to 
 give up the search when every thing indicated 
 that it was close at hand.* So another anxious 
 
 * See NOTE (T). 
 
COLUMBUS. 225 
 
 but yet more hopeful day succeeded. A green 
 fish was observed of a kind that lives among the 
 rocks ; a staff was picked up artificially carved ; 
 and a branch of thorn floated by with the berries 
 on it fresh and red. More cheerfully, therefore, 
 was the Vesper hymn to the Virgin sung that 
 night on board the Admiral's ship, according to his 
 usual custom ; and when he addressed his crew in 
 the language of grateful praise, showing them 
 how God in His goodness had given them gentle 
 breezes and tranquil seas through all their voyage, 
 and almost promising that they should make land 
 that very night, past troubles were forgotten, and 
 every heart beat high with hope. 
 
 The occurrences of the memorable night which 
 followed cannot be better described than in the 
 language of Washington Irving, a writer whose 
 vocation among men of literature has been some- 
 thing like that of Columbus among navigators, it 
 having been the business of his life to link 
 together the great communities of England and 
 America by the bonds of mutual kindness. 
 
 " At sunset," he writes, " they stood , , ,. 
 
 again to the West, and were ploughing covered 
 f ' , 1. Oct.. nth. 
 
 the waves at a rapid rate; the jrmta 
 
 (Pinzon's vessel) keeping the lead from her su- 
 perior sailing. The greatest animation prevailed 
 
 Q 
 
226 COLUMBUS. 
 
 throughout the ships ; not an eye was closed that 
 night. As the evening darkened Columbus took 
 his station on the top of the castle or cabin on the 
 high poop of his vessel. However he might carry 
 a cheerful and confident countenance during the 
 day, it was to him a time of the most painful 
 anxiety ; and now, when he was wrapped from 
 observation by the shades of night, he maintained 
 an intense and unremitting watch, ranging his eye 
 along the dusky horizon in search of the most 
 vague indications of land. Suddenly, about ten 
 o'clock, he thought he beheld a light glimmering 
 at a distance. Fearing that his eager hopes might 
 deceive him, he called to Pedro Gutierrez, a 
 gentleman of the King's bedchamber, and de- 
 manded whether he saw a light in that direction ; 
 the latter replied in the affirmative. Columbus, 
 yet doubtful whether it might not be some de- 
 lusion of the fancy, called another, Rodrigo 
 Sanchez, of Segovia, and made the same enquiry. 
 By the time the latter had ascended the round- 
 house the light had disappeared. They saw it 
 once or twice afterwards in sudden and passing 
 gleams, but they were so transient and uncertain 
 that few attached any importance to them. Co- 
 lumbus, however, considered them as certain signs 
 of land, and, moreover, that the land was in- 
 
COLUMBUS. 227 
 
 habited. They continued on their course till t\vo 
 in the morning, when a gun from the Pinta gave 
 the joyful sign of land. This was now clearly 
 seen about two leagues distant, whereupon they 
 took in sail and laid to, waiting impatiently for 
 the dawn." 
 
 The dawn came at last, and dis- Landing at 
 closed an island, of which the visible St - Salvador. 
 extremities seemed only a few leagues apart. It 
 proved to be one of the Bahamas, and was named 
 by Columbus San Salvador. To the delighted 
 Spaniards, as they first gazed upon it from their 
 vessels, and then landed on the nearest shore, it 
 seemed like an earthly Paradise, with its clusters 
 of unknown fruits, its balmy delicious air, and its 
 beautiful forests sloping to the sea. Columbus 
 was the first to land, as he had a good right to 
 be ; a crucifix was erected, and thanks were de- 
 voutly offered to God, who had guided them 
 safely through unknown seas to so fair a haven ; 
 then a banner was set up emblazoned with the 
 arms of Castile, and the Sovereigns of Spain were 
 proclaimed lords of the new-found territory. 
 Natives came from the woods, and began to 
 throng about the strangers. To them every thing 
 was wonderful alike. Splendid dresses, glittering 
 armour, bearded chins, fair complexions, — all 
 
 Q 2 
 
228 COLUMBUS. 
 
 were new and strange. Ships and men, they 
 thought, must have descended from the skies. 
 The Spaniards, too, gazed in their turn upon a 
 people in all the rude simplicity of nature. Their 
 naked bodies were painted with various devices 
 in white and black and red. Their lances were 
 headed with fish-bones ; and when some handled 
 a Spanish sword, they took it fearlessly by the 
 edge. They bartered freely anything they had 
 for glass beads or trifles which had a showy 
 look. The sea seemed almost like their native 
 element, they paddled their canoes with such 
 dexterity, or swam with so much ease and grace. 
 Questions were put and answered, of course, by 
 signs. Some ornaments of gold soon caught the 
 eye of the strangers; and the natives, when 
 enquiry was made respecting them, pointed to the 
 South. All was interpreted by Columbus in con- 
 nexion with his previous theories. Recollections 
 of Marco Polo haunted him at every step. So 
 the South in his eyes meant Cipango, and there, 
 doubtless, within a few days' sail, was the golden- 
 roofed palace, and the city of the great Khan. 
 
 Real islands were lying; thickly about 
 
 Cuba and m _ j o j 
 
 Hayti dis- him, while he was dreaming of others 
 
 which had no existence. In the course 
 
 of a fortnight's sail, besides three smaller ones, 
 
COLUMBUS. 229 
 
 which he named Santa Maria de la Conception, 
 Fernandina, and Isabella, he reached Qct 2gth 
 a fourth, which he loyally called Juana, 
 in honour of Prince Juan of Spain. After many 
 days of coasting, its shores still stretched far 
 away beyond his sight; mountains, rivers, har- 
 bours, were all on a much grander scale than he 
 had seen elsewhere; and Columbus made sure 
 that he had reached Terra Firma at last. But it 
 was really Cuba, its old name having survived ; 
 and it remains to this day the noblest colonial 
 possession of the Spanish Monarchy. A month 
 was occupied in cruising and landing at dif- 
 ferent points; and then the Eastern extremity 
 was reached, after two hundred miles of the 
 Northern coast had been explored. The name 
 of Alpha and Omega, given by Columbus to 
 the last headland, marked his conviction that he 
 had reached the beginning or the end of Asia. 
 Whither, then, should he steer next? Home- 
 wards, to announce his triumph, — or onwards, to 
 learn yet more ? While this point was undecided, 
 some lofty mountains were seen in the dis- 
 tance, yet more to the East, separated D h 
 by some miles of sea from Cuba ; so 
 onwards he sailed in that direction, and lighted 
 
 Q 3 
 
230 COLUMBUS. 
 
 upon the island which became so famous in his 
 subsequent history, Hatti or Hispaniola. 
 
 The latter name was given from some fancied 
 resemblance to the mother country ; and a little 
 Spain it became in after years, — the seat of her 
 Western Empire, — alternately a mine of wealth, 
 and a theatre of misery and crime, to the count- 
 less adventurers who came flocking to its shores. 
 Nothing, however, could be more friendly than 
 the earliest greetings between the natives and 
 their future masters. Trinkets were exchanged, 
 as before, for golden ornaments. The strangers 
 were still supposed to have come from Turey, 
 the Indian name for heaven. The wild, naked 
 race, at the bidding of their chiefs, entertained 
 Columbus with their games and dances ; and he 
 astonished them, in return, with the flash, and 
 noise, and destructive powers of a cannon which 
 he had brought to shore. A cacique, named 
 Guacanagari, played the host with all possible 
 generosity and consideration. When Columbus's 
 ship was Avrecked on a sand-bank on the morning 
 of Christmas Day, help was freely rendered, and 
 the property of the strangers was safely stored 
 and guarded as if they had been friends or 
 brothers. There was much, in fact, to justify 
 the glowing description of Columbus, in his first 
 
COLUMBUS. 231 
 
 report to his Sovereigns, " These people love 
 their neighbours as themselves; their discourse 
 is ever sweet and gentle, and accompanied by a 
 smile. I swear to your Majesties there is not in 
 the world a better nation, or a better land." 
 
 The beauty of the country, indeed, was a per- 
 petual source of delight to the great discoverer. 
 He revelled in the luxuriant scenery which met 
 his eyes on every side, and was never tired of expa- 
 tiating on the rich, varied landscapes, the fragrant 
 gales, the spreading foliage of the woods, filled as 
 they were with birds of brightest hue and sweetest 
 song. So, at least, they sounded to his ear, though 
 to naturalists it is a known fact that, according to 
 that law of compensation which prevails so ex- 
 tensively in God's works, the most musical note 
 and the most brilliant plumage never go together. 
 " The nightingales," he writes, " and various 
 birds were singing in countless numbers, and 
 that in November ; " but neither in spring nor 
 winter has their song been heard in those lati- 
 tudes by any later travellers. He was half- 
 bewildered, in fact, with joy, and his very senses 
 were under the influence of his strong and active 
 imagination, as he explored the charms of these 
 beautiful lands, and remembered the toil by 
 which he had won his way to them. 
 q 4 
 
232 COLUMBUS. 
 
 Settlement in His followers, too, some of them, 
 Hispaniola. began to look around them, and to 
 covet a place of rest in that delicious climate. 
 The eyes of others were turned wistfully towards 
 their distant homes. So Columbus resolved to 
 divide them into two parties, leaving some to 
 form a settlement in Hispaniola, while he returned 
 with the rest to Spaim Many things concurred 
 to make a speedy return desirable. Pinzon, in 
 the Pinta, had parted from the other vessels, and 
 had not been seen for a whole month. Colum- 
 bus's ship being lost, it was all-important to 
 secure the safe return of the remaining caravel to 
 Europe. Delays were dangerous; and he could 
 ill afford to run any needless risk while he 
 carried with him the burden of such a mighty 
 secret. A convenient site, therefore, having been 
 chosen, a wooden tower was erected, and thither 
 the necessary stores were conveyed. Thirty-nine 
 men were chosen for the garrison from a larger 
 number of volunteers, and one or two cannon 
 were supplied to them from the lost ship. Before 
 he sailed, Columbus specially charged them to be 
 considerate and forbearing in all their dealings 
 with the natives, and for their own safety recom- 
 mended them not to scatter themselves over the 
 
COLUMBUS. 233 
 
 island, but rather to keep themselves within the 
 territories of the friendly cacique, Guacanagari. 
 
 On the 4th of January the solitary 
 vessel left Hispaniola. After a month's Sails for 
 sail, a storm raged for many days 
 without intermission, threatening destruction to 
 ship and crew. His life Columbus would have 
 laid down willingly in any great cause; but to 
 perish in the wide ocean, between the two shores 
 which he was about to bind together after ages of 
 separation, seemed to him a calamity beyond en- 
 durance. He had fallen in with the Pinta shortly 
 after leaving Hispaniola ; but in the tempest she 
 was missing again ; and Pinzon's account of his 
 previous separation made his fidelity very ques- 
 tionable. If his ship had foundered, then every- 
 thing depended on one frail vessel outliving that 
 dreadful tempest ; if he got first to Spain, the 
 temptation would be great to intercept the fame 
 which belonged of right to Columbus himself. 
 In his distress the Admiral adopted the expedient 
 of putting a brief record of his discovery into a 
 cask, and offering a handsome reward to the 
 finder, if he should forward the packet straightway 
 to the court of Spain ; but how small the chance 
 that it would reach its destination ! and how 
 
234 COLUMBUS. 
 
 great the loss if, for generations to come, the tale 
 of wonder should be untold ! 
 
 Eetumto Happily He, who had guided the 
 
 Europe. explorer on his way, stilled the storm 
 
 at the critical moment, and Columbus lived to tell 
 the tale himself. One of the Azores was the first 
 land he touched ; and having been delayed there 
 some days by uncivil treatment at the hands of 
 the Portuguese authorities, and encountered ano- 
 ther storm after he had left the island, he landed 
 on the 4th of March off the rock of Cintra, at the 
 mouth of the Tagus. Thence a courier was dis- 
 patched straightway to Spain, with the tidings of 
 his discovery and safe return*; and when the 
 news reached Lisbon, only a few miles off, he was 
 invited to court by King John, and entertained 
 there with the greatest honour. The events of 
 his voyage were narrated to a crowd of courtiers, 
 who listened with feeling's of mincrled admiration 
 and envy, as they learnt what Spain had won, 
 and Portugal had missed ; then the tale of wonder 
 was repeated for the entertainment of the Queen 
 and her ladies, who gave him yet heartier sym- 
 pathy, and hung delighted at his lips ; at last, the 
 princely offer was made by the Monarch to attend 
 him to the Spanish frontier, and provide the 
 
 * See NOTE (U). 
 
COLUMBUS. 235 
 
 charges of his journey, if he chose to travel by 
 land. But it was fit that the sea should bear him 
 homewards, with his great conquest achieved; 
 so in his good vessel the Nina, he sailed out of 
 harbour once more, and reached Palos on the 
 15th of March, — the same Palos at which we 
 first saw him begging a meal for his child, and 
 which he had left for his great enterprize seven 
 months and a half before. 
 
 There are few scenes of more thril- Reception 
 ling interest in the modern history of m s P am - 
 Europe than that which describes the reception of 
 Columbus, after his first voyage, by the Sove- 
 reign and people of Spain. His journey to Bar- 
 celona, where the court then resided, was like the 
 progress of a sovereign. As he drew near, many 
 of the youthful courtiers and cavaliers, followed 
 by a vast concourse of the populace, came forth 
 to meet him. His entrance into the city had all 
 the solemn state, and much of the picturesque 
 beauty, of a Roman triumph. First were paraded 
 six Indians, whom he had brought from the other 
 side of the globe, painted according to their savage 
 fashion, and decorated with ornaments of gold, 
 looking, to the wondering eye of the multitude, 
 almost like the natives of another planet. After 
 this were borne various kinds of live parrots, to- 
 
236 COLUMBUS. 
 
 gether with stuffed birds and animals of unknown 
 species, and rare plants supposed to be of precious 
 qualities ; while special care was taken to display 
 the Indian coronets, bracelets, and other decora- 
 tions of gold, which might give an idea of the 
 wealth of the newly-discovered regions. Then 
 came Columbus on horseback : every eye was 
 attracted by his look of nobleness and majesty, 
 which corresponded well with the greatness of the 
 occasion, and the magnificence of the spectacle. 
 The streets were almost impassable from the 
 multitude ; the houses, even to the roofs, were 
 crowded with spectators. The Sovereigns awaited 
 his approach under .a rich canopy of gold, and, 
 when he bent the knee and would have kissed 
 their hands, they raised him graciously, and bade 
 him be seated in their presence. After Columbus 
 had recounted the principal events of the voyage, 
 and had spoken, in his glowing style, of wealthy 
 provinces to be added to the Spanish crown, and 
 nations of infidels to be gathered into the Church, 
 — the King and Queen sank on their knees, and 
 with streaming eyes and uplifted hands poured 
 forth their thanks and praise. There was no 
 vulgar applause, no shout of triumph; but the 
 Te Deum was chanted by the choir of the Chapel 
 Roval, and, for the time, all lower feelings seemed 
 
COLUMBUS. 237 
 
 to be swallowed up in adoration of that good 
 Providence which had guided him in his perilous 
 voyage, and brought him back to proclaim his 
 great achievement. 
 
 Spain did her best, during the few succeeding 
 months, to give honour to the man who had ven- 
 tured so much for her, and fulfilled all his pro- 
 mises. But Columbus wished for nothing but to 
 be 'again afloat, with a goodly band of settlers and 
 explorers, who should help him to occupy the 
 new-found territory, and push his discoveries yet 
 farther. So a second expedition was prepared, 
 and numbers gladly joined him, this time, who 
 were eager for adventure, or athirst for gold. 
 A body of ecclesiastics was added by the special 
 command of Isabella ; and to priests and laymen 
 the charge was given to treat the natives with 
 compassionate tenderness, and win them by pa- 
 tience and kindness to the Christian faith. 
 
 By the following September all was g a }i s on se _ 
 ready; and on the 23rd Columbus ^d voyage. 
 sailed from Spain with a fleet consisting of three 
 large vessels and fourteen caravels, — the little 
 port of Palos, made so famous by his history, 
 being once more his starting-place. Six weeks 
 were occupied in crossing the ocean, and after 
 sailing for some time among the Antilles, and 
 
238 COLUMBUS. 
 
 touching at Guadaloupe, Dominica and Porto 
 Rico, another fortnight brought Columbus to the 
 harbour of the Nativity in Hispaniola, where he 
 had left the Spanish settlers. As the vessels 
 approached the shore, darkness prevented him 
 from seeing whether things remained as he had 
 left them; and a night of anxious expectation 
 N 28th preceded his landing. The morning 
 dawned, and he looked anxiously for 
 some signal from his countrymen on shore; but 
 no boat came out; cannon were fired, but no 
 answer was returned ; neither European nor In- 
 dian appeared within sight; and the busy, ani- 
 mated scene, which had met the voyagers on their 
 first arrival, when the land was covered with 
 wondering natives, and the water thronged with 
 their swift canoes, was exchanged for a silent 
 solitude. A boat was sent ashore, and the crew, 
 on their return, reported that the fortress was a 
 ruin. Not a Spaniard was to be found; only 
 fragments of their property were scattered about, 
 which gave rise to fearful conjectures respecting 
 their fate. Two or three Indians lurked among 
 the woods, who fled in terror as the other party 
 approached them. 
 
 Disasters at Such was the first disappointment 
 Hispanioia. of Columbus in the New World, and 
 
COLUMBUS. 239 
 
 it was followed by a thousand others. His hope 
 of peaceful triumphs to be won by wisdom and 
 love over heathen tribes would begin to fade 
 away on that morning of doubt and gloom ; and 
 the tidings which quickly followed changed his 
 fears into certainty. By degrees the sad truth 
 came out. The Christians, who were left behind, 
 had begun by oppressing the natives, and had 
 gone on to dispute among themselves. No disci- 
 pline was kept up ; no rights were respected ; the 
 Indians were stripped of their golden ornaments ; 
 their very homes were assaulted, and their wives 
 and daughters taken away by force. Esteeming 
 themselves invincible, the strangers had taken no 
 precautions for their safety. Instead of continuing 
 together under the shelter of the fort, they wan- 
 dered in groups over the island ; and, while every 
 thing was done to provoke resistance, they despised 
 the natives too much to apprehend the possibility 
 of danger. Still their first friends did not turn 
 against them. The inhabitants of the coast won- 
 dered to see men whom they had been ready to 
 worship as gods thus sunk and debased ; but they 
 bore with their wrongs, and made no effort at 
 retaliation. There were bolder spirits, however, 
 in the interior, who had watched their oppor- 
 tunity; and, when the Spanish force was divided, 
 
240 COLUMBUS. 
 
 assailed and destroyed their stronghold, burnt the 
 surrounding houses, with their sleeping inmates, 
 and cut off the stragglers without leaving a single 
 man alive. " Such," says the historian, " was 
 the first foot-print of civilization in the New 
 World." What a faithful epitome of the injuries 
 and reprisals repeated so often on a larger scale 
 in the commerce between Christian Europe and 
 the Aborigines of Asia, Africa and America ! 
 Discontent The months which followed were 
 
 of settlers. eventful ones in the life of Columbus, 
 and made him acquainted with the countless diffi- 
 culties which rendered his career henceforth one 
 continued scene of trouble and vexation. A co- 
 lony had to be formed, — houses and fortresses to 
 be built, — the land to be cultivated, — natives to 
 be won upon by kindness, and made subservient 
 to the purposes of the settlers. But a large 
 portion of his followers were men utterly incom- 
 petent for services of this sort. Many of them 
 were from the noblest families of Spain, and had 
 come out, not to toil, but to revel in the delights 
 of that land which the glowing fancy of Columbus 
 had pictured to himself and others as an earthly 
 Paradise. Gold was the bait which had figured 
 largely in his descriptions, and drawn many an 
 adventurer from his home. Yellow dust, in con- 
 
COLUMBUS. 241 
 
 siderable quantities, was collected from the beds 
 of rivers; and lumps of the shining metal were 
 brought to them sometimes by the natives; but 
 the mines, for which they enquired, were ever in 
 some distant province, or beyond some lofty 
 mountain. Treasure, therefore, accumulated but 
 slowly, and the necessity of labour was an im- 
 mediate and pressing evil. Provisions became 
 scarce ; mills and other appliances of civilized life 
 had to be furnished ; all hands were wanted ; dis- 
 tinction of ranks was forgotten; and the young 
 hidalgo, who had looked upon any service but 
 military service as degrading, found himself com- 
 pelled by the impartial justice of Columbus to 
 take tool in hand, and to live upon short com- 
 mons. Murmuring and contumacy were followed 
 by restraint ; and then indignation became yet 
 louder against the upstart foreigner. Nothing 
 can be nobler than the manner in which the 
 injured Governor speaks of wrongs like these. 
 " It was then," he writes to the Sovereigns, 
 " that complaints arose, disparaging the enterprize 
 that I had undertaken, because, forsooth, I had 
 not immediately sent the ships home laden with 
 gold ; no allowance being made for the shortness 
 of the time, and all the other impediments of 
 which I have already spoken. On this account, 
 R 
 
242 COLUMBUS. 
 
 either as a punishment for my sins, or, as I trust, 
 for my salvation, I was held in detestation, and 
 had obstacles placed in the way of every thing for 
 which I petitioned." ' 
 
 Columbus, disappointed himself, — finding the 
 natives not all of them so harmless and docile as 
 he hoped, — baffled in his search after the treasure 
 of which he had spoken so largely, — and meeting 
 with unexpected difficulties in his new work of 
 founding a Christian commonwealth among sa- 
 vage tribes, — had to feed the hopes, and satisfy 
 the yearning curiosity of the Spanish court and 
 people. The task was a difficult and delicate 
 one ; particularly as other reports would be sent 
 home, and were sure to be coloured by the dis- 
 content of the factious portion of his followers. 
 Still, in keeping alive the expectations which he 
 had once excited, Columbus did but speak what 
 he believed and hoped. Amidst all that was dis- 
 couraging, he still kept in view the great end of 
 civilizing and improving the simple child-like race 
 who had won his heart by their gentleness. Some 
 were sent home from among the hardier and 
 bolder tribes whom he had encountered in his 
 outward voyage, to be instructed in the useful 
 arts, and to learn the language and religion of 
 Spain ; and all disappointments and disasters were 
 
COLUMBUS. 243 
 
 treated as insignificant compared with the glorious 
 scheme of carrying the light and blessings of 
 Christianity to lands peopled with idolaters. 
 
 Amidst all the difficulties of his 
 anxious, busy life, Columbus never Exploring 
 lost the spirit of adventure which V0 7 a g e - 
 prompted his great enterprize, and had given it 
 success. By the spring of 1494, having founded 
 the first Christian town of the New World, and 
 named it after his royal mistress, — having spent 
 some time, moreover, in exploring the interior of 
 Hispaniola, and done what he could to establish a 
 government which should be respected by the 
 settlers and the natives, — he was ready for an 
 exploring voyage, and started, with his three 
 smallest vessels, for Cuba. He longed to ascer- 
 tain its size and shape, and to put to the test his 
 favourite theory, that the extreme point of Asia 
 was either there or not far away. So 
 
 • • n i -r^ i Mil 29th April. 
 
 beginning from the East he sailed along 
 the Southern coast of the island, cultivating a 
 friendly intercourse with the natives as he pro- 
 ceeded, and gathering from them such uncertain 
 information as could be communicated by names 
 and signs. When he enquired for gold, they 
 pointed South, and, gathering from them that an 
 island lay there which was rich in the precious 
 
 R 2 
 
244 COLUMBUS. 
 
 metal, lie turned his prow in that direction, and a 
 few hours' sail brought him within sight of the blue 
 mountains of Jamaica. He found a land rich in 
 natural beauties, and a people more advanced in 
 intelligence than the inhabitants of the other 
 islands ; but he was disappointed in his search for 
 treasure ; so he returned to his original purpose, 
 and for a month together kept coasting Cuba to 
 the West, hoping more and more confidently, as he 
 passed league after league of unbroken shore, that 
 his great end was gained at last. Only let the 
 land at his right be a continent, and the great 
 Indian Ocean, he made sure, was at no great 
 distance. Thence he could return to Europe, 
 either by circumnavigating Africa, or by sailing 
 up the Red Sea. Visions of this sort kept him 
 ever satisfied and hopeful; but he had to deal 
 with scanty resources and unwilling followers. 
 His little vessels were unequal to a lengthened 
 voyage, and the crews were indisposed, as usual, 
 to venture into new dangers for the sake of specu- 
 lations in which they took no interest. Again, 
 therefore, he was beaten back. His ardent spirit 
 had to check itself when he was in full pursuit. 
 Before he turned, however, he made every man on 
 board sign a declaration that he believed Cuba to 
 be a continent. Doubtless they subscribed the do- 
 
COLUMBUS. 245 
 
 cument with, hearty willingness, having no opposing 
 prejudices in the way, and would have called it by 
 any name Columbus liked best to get back sooner 
 to their homes and friends. The point at which 
 they turned back is tolerably well ascertained; 
 and it is remarkable that they were then almost 
 within sight of the Western extremity of Cuba. 
 A look-out from the mast-head might have dissi- 
 pated all the Indian fancies of Columbus, and 
 given anolher direction to his life of adventure. 
 
 One incident from the narrative of 
 his return voyage is worth extracting. 
 The crews landed one day, after a fatiguing sail, 
 at the mouth of a fine river in a fertile part of the 
 island. Their store of provisions had run short, 
 but was quickly replenished by the generosity of 
 the natives. The commander, as his custom was 
 in places that had anything of a marked character 
 about them, set up a large cross by the river 
 side ; and, it being Sunday morning, mass was 
 celebrated in a grove hard by, while the cacique, 
 or Indian chief, with some of his attendants, 
 looked on in silent wonder. An aged man of 
 fourscore years was among the company, and 
 when the ceremony was over, he thus addressed 
 Columbus: — "I am told that thou hast lately 
 come to these lands with a mighty force, and hast 
 
 B 3 
 
246 COLUMBUS. 
 
 subdued many countries, spreading great fear 
 among the people. But be not, therefore, vain- 
 glorious. Know that according to our belief the 
 souls of men have two journeys to perform after 
 they have departed from the body ; one to a place 
 dismal, foul, and covered with darkness, prepared 
 for such as have been unjust and cruel to their 
 fellow-men ; the other, full of delight, for such 
 as have promoted peace on earth. If, then, thou 
 art mortal, and dost expect to die, beware that 
 thou hurt no man wrongfully, neither do harm to 
 those who have done no harm to thee." What 
 an appropriate and needful homily for many who 
 have gone forth from Christendom to heathen 
 lands and tribes ! How often has the cross been 
 set up in mockery, and plain morality like that of 
 the aged Indian been discarded and forgotten ! 
 Meeting with Columbus returned to Hispaniola 
 his brother. completely exhausted in body and 
 mind. He was carried to his new town of Isa- 
 bella in a state of insensibility ; but found tidings 
 awaiting him there which revived and gladdened 
 him beyond measure. His brother Bartholomew 
 had arrived in his absence. After years of sepa- 
 ration, and a lengthened pursuit, he was come to 
 join counsels and fortunes with the great dis- 
 coverer, and was his best and most faithful helper 
 
COLUMBUS. 247 
 
 ever afterwards. He had qualifications of the 
 highest order for the service to which he was 
 called, being the equal of Columbus in seaman- 
 like skill and daring, generous in temper, resolute 
 in action, of a penetrating and commanding in- 
 tellect, with yet more of sagacity and worldly 
 prudence to shape his own course, or meet the 
 evil designs of others. Surrounded as the Ad- 
 miral was by restless, intriguing spirits, — his 
 greatness always envied, and his authority not 
 unfrequently defied, — one such fast friend was 
 invaluable. To no other could he depute the 
 cares of government so confidently, when sum- 
 moned to a distance ; and with none besides could 
 he consult so freely amid the thousand perplexities 
 of his anxious life. Columbus gladly nominated 
 his brother Adelantado, or Lieutenant-Governor, 
 of all the newly-acquired Spanish territories ; and 
 amply did he justify the appointment by faithful, 
 vigilant service in future years. 
 
 Bartholomew, as we have already Adventures of 
 mentioned, had been dispatched by Bartholomew. 
 Columbus about the year 1486 to solicit from 
 Henry VII. the means of prosecuting the great 
 enterprize which had since been crowned with 
 success. A long time elapsed before the pro- 
 position was fairly laid before the English mon- 
 
 K 4 
 
248 COLUMBUS. 
 
 arch. The country was only just beginning to 
 recover from the exhaustion consequent upon a 
 disputed succession, and ruinous domestic wars ; 
 the temper of the King, moreover, was cau- 
 tious and pacific ; but it chanced that the project 
 met with more favour here than in other Eu- 
 ropean Courts, and Bartholomew was actually 
 on his way to Spain to report to Columbus that 
 ships and men would be supplied to him from 
 England, when the news met him at Paris that 
 Spain had made the venture, and won the prize. 
 He felt immediately that his place was by his 
 brother's side, and a hundred crowns were ad- 
 vanced by the King of France to enable him to 
 prosecute his journey ; but Columbus had sailed 
 on his second voyage before he could reach 
 Seville, and had started again for Cuba before 
 Bartholomew reached Hispaniola. After eight 
 years, however, of strange adventure, each labour- 
 ing in his way towards one common end, they 
 met, at last, in the New World, of which they 
 had so often spoken, and where duties and trials 
 awaited them no less severe than those to which 
 they had been called already. 
 
 During the absence of Columbus, 
 Insubor- tit „ , 
 
 dination at his countrymen had done all that men 
 
 spanioa. cou \ft fo j- ru J n ^q i n f an t colony. 
 
COLUMBUS. 249 
 
 He had left the government too much divided, 
 and the men whom he had invested with autho- 
 rity began soon to quarrel about their respective 
 portions. There was his brother Diego at the 
 head of a council at Isabella, and, associated with 
 him, one Father Boyle, the Apostolical Yicar of 
 the New World, but in heart an ambitious priest, 
 instead of a faithful, devoted missionary. One 
 Margarita was appointed military commander, 
 with orders to make a tour of observation through 
 the island, w T hile Alonzo de Ojeda was left with 
 a small garrison at Fort St. Thomas, which had 
 been erected by Columbus in the strongest part 
 of the country, near the richest mines, and in the 
 territory of the most warlike of the native chiefs, 
 Caonabo. Margarita and his soldiers, instead of 
 exploring the island, lingered wherever they 
 found themselves most comfortable, treated the 
 wealth of the country as if it were their own, and 
 soon roused the indignation of the patient na- 
 tives by their oppressive and licentious conduct. 
 When called to account by Diego Columbus, he 
 claimed to be independent of the council, was 
 supported in his arrogant claim by Father Boyle, 
 and presently found a host of followers among 
 the young nobles of the colony. "Who was 
 Diego Columbus," they said, " to lord it over 
 
250 COLUMBUS. 
 
 men of noble birth? What pretensions had he 
 or his brother to assume the airs of princes, 
 merely because one of them led the way to this 
 new-found country ? " With so many materials 
 for disaffection, it was not difficult to get up a 
 hostile faction; and to such extremities did its 
 leaders proceed that Margarita and Boyle, the 
 two men who were bound by every consideration 
 of duty to keep up discipline and promote good- 
 will among the settlers, actually sailed for Spain 
 to accuse Columbus and his brother to their 
 Sovereigns. 
 
 League among While the Spaniards were thus 
 native chiefs, weakening their forces by discord, 
 the enemy (for so the gentle natives were fast be- 
 coming under repeated provocations) were learn- 
 ing the necessity of union. The whole island 
 was divided between five caciques or sovereign 
 chiefs ; and Caonabo, dreading the encroach- 
 ments of the Spaniards, and indignant at seeing a 
 garrison already established at Eort St. Thomas, 
 in the heart of his own domain, had done his 
 utmost to unite them in a league of mutual pro- 
 tection, and then to watch their opportunity for a 
 combined attack on all the Spanish forces. His 
 endeavours were so far successful that four out of 
 the five were already banded together for this 
 
COLUMBUS. 251 
 
 purpose. The fifth held out against all soli- 
 citations. In fair weather and foul, nothing 
 could shake the devotion of Guacanagari to the 
 Spaniards. He was too conscious of their power, 
 too much awed by their commanding superiority, 
 and, apparently, too much bound by the ties of 
 friendship to their noble leader, to join any hostile 
 confederacy ; and, accordingly, soon after the 
 return of Columbus, full particulars of the in- 
 tended attack were furnished to him by the 
 friendly chief, and the offer was given, at the 
 same time, to assist the Spaniards to the utmost, 
 and to fight by their side if his brother-chiefs 
 should bring matters to the crisis of a battle. 
 
 In this state of things, it was all- capture of 
 important to strike at the head of the Caonabo. 
 opposing league. If Caonabo could be removed, 
 the other caciques would be comparatively harm- 
 less. But he lived in a wild, woodland country, 
 protected by mountain fastnesses, and to attack 
 him in his strongholds, with only a handful of men 
 against a numerous army, was an act of daring 
 on which no prudent commander would venture. 
 Ojeda had already stood a siege in his fort of St. 
 Thomas, with a garrison of fifty men, against 
 Coanabo and his ten thousand warriors; and 
 emboldened by success, and delighting in enter- 
 
252 COLUMBUS. 
 
 prizes of the wildest and most romantic kind, he 
 offered himself to Columbus to penetrate into the 
 very heart of the chieftain's country, and bring 
 him as a friend or foe to the Spanish quarters. 
 He was the very model of an adventurer of that 
 age, half cavalier, half freebooter, trained to all 
 martial exercises and stratagems in warfare 
 with the Moors, with a touch of superstition 
 which made him fancy himself a charmed man 
 when dangers were' thickest. He was the sworn 
 champion of the Virgin ; he invoked her aid in 
 every time of difficulty ; he carried her picture 
 in his knapsack, and, while his treasure was safe, 
 fancied no mortal weapon could do him harm. 
 So with ten of his boldest followers for a body- 
 guard, all well-armed and w t ell-mounted, he 
 sought the cacique in the midst of his own 
 people, and begged him to come to the town of 
 Isabella to make a treaty of peace with Columbus. 
 His chief bribe was the chapel-bell which sum- 
 moned the Spaniards to mass. This had excited 
 the wonder of the natives, partly for its far- 
 reaching music, and partly for the influence 
 which it seemed to exercise over the motions of 
 the strangers, bringing them to their knees by 
 the Vesper-peal, or drawing them from twenty 
 different places at once to the sacred spot at the 
 
COLUMBUS. 253 
 
 appointed times of gathering. Coanabo bad 
 heard of the wonder-working instrument, and had 
 longed to see it. To possess it, he would give up 
 his dream of conquest, and become, for a time at 
 least, the friend and ally of the white man. He 
 was attracted, moreover, by the noble bearing of 
 Ojeda, by his uncommon physical strength, and 
 frank, soldier-like address. He bore no ill- 
 will to the man who had repulsed his armies at 
 the fort, but thought him only the worthier asso- 
 ciate. Caonabo professed his willingness to go 
 to the Admiral, but, as a king, he must be royally 
 attended, and accordingly, to the surprise of 
 Ojeda, an army was assembled for the purpose. 
 A meeting on such terms would not answer the 
 Spaniard's purpose ; so a stratagem was boldly 
 conceived, and executed with complete success, 
 which ranks with the most romantic feats of that 
 romantic age. Producing a pair of manacles of 
 highly-polished steel, Ojeda persuaded the un- 
 suspecting chief that they were princely orna- 
 ments such as were worn on state occasions in 
 the country from whence he came. Then ex- 
 hibiting his own splendid war-horse to the ad- 
 miring Indians, he proposed that, mounted and 
 fettered, like the great king himself whom Ojeda. 
 served, Caonabo should enter the presence off 
 
254 COLUMBUS. 
 
 Columbus. The bait took. The prince ranked 
 with the first of his countrymen for wisdom and 
 for courage ; his spirit and energy had well nigh 
 brought ruin to the intruding strangers ; but he 
 was like a trusting child in the hands of the white 
 man. He let himself be mounted behind Ojeda, 
 and shackled like a prisoner ; then it was no hard 
 matter for the Spanish horsemen, by a little 
 manoeuvring, to separate themselves from the 
 body of Caonabo's followers, to surround their 
 chief, to threaten death to the prisoner if he 
 provoked them by resistance, and to gallop across 
 the country with their prize. 
 
 We give this as a specimen of the mingled 
 subtlety and daring by which the weaker race 
 was made subject to the stronger, — as a sample, 
 too, (must we not add ?) of the crimes by which 
 Christendom was disgraced in the eyes of those 
 whom it should have taught and blessed. Ca- 
 onabo was sent as a prisoner to Spain, but died 
 upon the voyage. Had he lived, neither Spain 
 nor Europe could have boasted a prisoner of more 
 royal bearing. He honoured his captor with 
 special honour as one who had executed a master- 
 stroke in the warfare which he loved. When 
 Columbus visited him, he sat in his prison while 
 Others stood ; when Ojeda entered, he rose and 
 
COLUMBUS. 255 
 
 gave him reverence. He recognized no rank 
 above his own ; but the man, who had the cou- 
 rage and address to seize a warrior in the midst of 
 his fighting-men, was one to whom a prince might 
 make obeisance. The widow of Caonabo was 
 Anacaona, who played an important part in 
 the history of her country. Her beauty and 
 grace were accompanied by commanding talents ; 
 and, in spite of all that she had suffered from the 
 Spaniards, their genius and successes drew her 
 to their side. Her fate, we shall see, was yet 
 sadder, and her story yet more full of shame to 
 the white man, than that of her noble husband. 
 The spring of 1495 found the whole 
 
 A.D. 1495, 
 
 Spanish force arrayed against an im- War and* 
 mense Indian host gathered from al- V1C or ^* 
 most every quarter of the island. Two short years 
 had brought to a close the friendship of early 
 days, and repeated injuries had roused the natives 
 to attempt a last struggle for freedom. For a 
 long time they bore their wrongs in silence, 
 hoping that they would soon be ended. They 
 asked the strangers when they would be returning 
 to Turey, meaning the heavens from which they 
 supposed the white men to have come, and ex- 
 pected, from week to week, to see the last of them 
 depart, as they had come, in their great canoes, 
 
256 COLUMBUS. 
 
 with sails like wings. But when it was found 
 that the arrivals were many, and the departures 
 few,— when rising forts and growing towns be- 
 tokened a lengthened residence, — and acts of 
 tyranny became more frequent as the growing 
 numbers of the colonists made it difficult to re- 
 strain them by discipline, — the most patient and 
 enduring of races began to look to their own 
 safety, and thought the time was come for driving 
 out the intruders. Caonabo's brother, eager to 
 revenge his own private wrongs and those of his 
 suffering countrymen, headed the combined armies 
 of the four hostile caciques, and was on the point 
 of attacking the Spanish forces at Isabella, when 
 Guacanagari, constant in his friendship to Co- 
 lumbus, gave him notice of their coming, Attack, 
 in such a case was better than defence, and a 
 single battle decided the fate of Hispaniola. The 
 
 little Christain army of two hundred 
 March 27th. . J 
 
 men having been so disposed as to 
 
 make the terrifying accompaniments of artillery, 
 horses and blood hounds, as conspicuous as pos- 
 sible, a panic presently seized the Indian host, and 
 left them the unresisting prey of the pursuers. 
 Their spirit was gone from that day, and they 
 sank despairingly into the place of bondsmen. 
 Fortresses were scattered thicklv over their beau- 
 
COLUMBUS. 257 
 
 tiful island; a tribute was imposed which drove 
 
 every youth above fourteen to the streams or to 
 
 the mountain to hunt for gold ; and their life of 
 
 dreamy indolence was exchanged henceforth for 
 
 oppressive, consuming toil. 
 
 One grieves to hear of such wrongs Columbus 
 
 in connexion with a man like Colum- pursued by 
 
 slanderers, 
 bus, who meant better things, and 
 
 longed to exercise a sort of paternal rule over the 
 simple natives. But his difficulties were those 
 which have ever beset the invader, when deter- 
 mined to keep his ground against a people strong 
 in numbers, but far inferior in all the arts of 
 civilization ; and he was surrounded by men 
 whom, as a governor, he could hardly help pro- 
 tecting, but whose crimes were continually 
 thwarting his benevolent intentions. Sometimes 
 their lawless habits compelled him to measures of 
 severity ; and then the outcry was renewed that 
 his rule was harsh and despotic, and fresh resolu- 
 tions were taken, by fair means or foul, to destroy 
 his interest at court. Already had it begun to 
 decline. The representations of Margarita and 
 Father Boyle, though not implicitly trusted, had 
 produced their effect : they might be true, and 
 could only be sifted by enquiries on the spot ; so 
 before the end of 1495 a Commissioner landed in 
 
258 COLUMBUS. 
 
 the New World, with authority from the Spanish 
 Government to report upon the affairs of the 
 colony, and to learn, if possible, how the truth 
 stood between Columbus and his enemies. Com- 
 plainants were invited to come forwards, and 
 obtained a ready hearing ; men who had been 
 punished for their crimes now retorted on the 
 judge ; and mal-administration was easily proved 
 when all the public acts of the Governor were 
 canvassed by reckless accusers before a partial 
 tribunal. Columbus, never unmindful of his 
 dignity, and strong in the sense of his ill-requited 
 services, yielded implicit respect to the Commis- 
 sioner as representing his Sovereigns, permitted 
 the enquiry to proceed without condescending to 
 put himself on his defence, and when the charges 
 were concluded, and Aguado was preparing to 
 carry them back to Spain, resolved to sail with 
 him, and tell his own story in the royal presence. 
 
 a.d. U96. His second progress, after landing, 
 
 themhi 18 was a stran ge contrast to his memo- 
 Spain, rable entry into Barcelona. He met 
 the Sovereigns at Burgos, but he met them, not 
 like a warrior on his day of triumph, but clad in 
 the humble garb of a Franciscan monk. It is 
 not unlikely that this was done in obedience to 
 
COLUMBUS. 259 
 
 some religious vow; but, at any rate, the change 
 agreed but too well with his own faded hopes and 
 altered prospects. Of the dreams of conquest 
 and glory which then filled his mind how little 
 had been realized ! and how much endured of 
 suffering and disappointment ! His companions, 
 too, had quite another look from the hardy 
 seamen who had then followed in his train, proud 
 alike of their leader and their conquest. They 
 were returned colonists, who had come back dis- 
 comfited from the land of promise ; men of broken 
 health or ruined fortunes ; many of them idle, 
 profligate adventurers, who had become speedily 
 disgusted with a settler's life, when they found it 
 did not yield them wealth without toil, and that 
 there was some check to their lawless habits 
 abroad as at home. 
 
 Still, with so much against him, Columbus 
 kept his ground. Accusers and enemies seemed 
 to be charmed away by his noble presence and 
 lofty enthusiasm. As in the convent at Palos, 
 ten years before, it was difficult for those who 
 heard him not to believe what he hoped for so 
 confidently, and pictured in such glowing terms. 
 One of his recent theories made Hispaniola the 
 Ophir of the ancients. A region had been dis- 
 covered, shortly before he left the island, more 
 
 S 2 
 
260 COLUMBUS. 
 
 rich in gold than any that had been previously 
 explored ; there were remains, too, apparently of 
 mines that had been opened and left ; then his 
 imagination travelled back to the reign of Solo- 
 mon, and he made sure that from this very spot 
 the gold had been transported which adorned the 
 Temple at Jerusalem. Cuba had a prominent 
 place in his narrative. He described his adven- 
 tures on its shores, — its natural beauties, — its 
 vast extent, — its promise of wealth, — and then, 
 with scraps from Marco Polo, and well-known pas- 
 sages of Holy Writ, — all made to agree with his 
 own discoveries and teeming fancies, — he dressed 
 up a tale which captivated his royal and noble 
 hearers, and gave him the undisputed victory 
 over his unworthy assailants. 
 Prepares for More ships were promised him, and 
 third voyage, abundant resources for prosecuting his 
 enterprizes ; but again, as in former days, he had 
 to encounter harassing delays, to stand up against 
 intriguing courtiers, to wait for his handful of 
 vessels while a whole fleet was employed to bring 
 home a prince's bride, to bend his noble spirit to 
 all that was most humbling and most trying-, 
 while he begged only of his Sovereigns to be true 
 to their promise, and to exalt their own greatness. 
 Two years were thus spent, and, at the end of 
 
COLUMBUS. 261 
 
 them, vexed, wearied, but still un- May . 30thj 
 broken, Columbus sailed on his third 1498 - 
 voyage of discovery. 
 
 This voyage was made memorable by the dis- 
 covery of the Continent of America. Columbus 
 determined to take a more Southerly course than 
 he had taken hitherto, and accordingly steered 
 South- West from the Cape de Yerde Islands till 
 he got within five degrees of the Equator. There 
 the heat of the climate became intolerable; the 
 Admiral himself was seriously affected in health ; 
 and the crew had before their minds all they had 
 heard of the terrors of a tropical summer ; so their 
 course was shifted to the North- West, and keep- 
 ing steadily in that track they sailed between 
 Trinidad and the main land of South America, 
 landing on the shores of both, and so T , 
 
 ° ' Lands on 
 
 enlarging the great navigator's field of American 
 
 Continent. 
 
 discovery greatly beyond its former 
 limits. As usual, he had his theory to suit the 
 new facts which had recently come under his 
 observation; and, as usual, it contained some 
 shrewd conjectures along with strange, and almost 
 childish, fancies. The immense body of fresh 
 water which was poured into the gulf of Paria, 
 freshening and sweetening the surrounding ocean, 
 s 3 
 
262 COLUMBUS. 
 
 satisfied him that the mouth of some far-flowing 
 river must be near, and that a Continent was 
 wanted to supply room for its lengthened course. 
 As truly, therefore, as if he had seen the lower 
 half of the great western hemisphere mapped 
 out, he inferred that the points of land which he 
 had seen thereabouts were parts of one vast con- 
 tinent, occupying the unexplored space on both 
 sides of the Equator, and reaching far towards 
 the southern pole. Then, to account for the 
 fresh verdure, and soft, delicious air, in so low a 
 latitude, where scorching heat might rather have 
 been expected, he made sure that the surface of 
 the earth was elevated in one direction, so that, 
 instead of being a perfect sphere, it had a pear-like 
 shape. He was nearing the apex, he thought, and 
 the gentle breezes, which just fanned his sails, gave 
 token of the higher, purer region to which his 
 course had conducted him. The summit he ima- 
 gined to be under the equinoctial line, in the 
 centre of the continent which he was now coast- 
 ing.* There he placed the garden of Eden ; and 
 the great rivers which flowed into the surrounding 
 ocean he supposed to issue from the fountain of 
 the tree of life. The continent, we know, was 
 there ; already had he set his foot on it, as he 
 * See NOTE (V). 
 
COLUMBUS. 263 
 
 deserved to do. The great river was there, too, 
 the first land he saw being that which is inter- 
 sected by the branches of the Oronoco. The rest, 
 we know, was fable ; but such fables amused the 
 world's wisest men four centuries ago; and if 
 Columbus was not free from the common delu- 
 sion, at any rate he did more than any man whom 
 the world has seen to undeceive his fellows and 
 give them sounder notions in geography. 
 
 Gladly would he have prosecuted Returns to 
 his discoveries in that quarter; but Hispamola. 
 again he was driven to Hispaniola for supplies. 
 He was suffering, moreover, from a complaint in 
 his eyes, — eyes which had done more service, pro- 
 bably, in six eventful years, watching by night 
 and searching the distant horizon by day, than 
 had ever been done by human sight before. Ex- 
 hausted, crippled by gout which had been brought 
 on by the tropical heats, and almost blind, he 
 landed for a third time from Europe on the island 
 which was more his home than any other spot, 
 hoping to find the repose he wanted, and assured 
 of sympathy and support from his brother Bar- 
 tholomew. But, alas ! rest was not for Columbus 
 in the Old World or the New. From the day he 
 sailed on his first voyage to his dying hour, his 
 life was one of unintermitted labour, and almost 
 
 s4 
 
264 COLUMBUS. 
 
 unceasing vexation. He enriched his adopted 
 country ; he enlarged the field of observation for 
 all who took an interest in man and his doings ; 
 he developed the resources of commerce to an 
 unknown extent ; he stirred the mind and heart 
 of Christendom, we may say, by throwing open 
 such a sphere for enterprize to the strongest 
 intellects and most daring spirits of every Eu- 
 ropean nation ; but his own harvest was that 
 which has so often been reaped by the greatest 
 men, — scanty thanks and bitter envyings from 
 their own generation, who could not appreciate 
 their motives, or measure their services. 
 
 Disorders in Bartholomew, during the absence of 
 his absence, j^g b ro ther, had displayed the vigour 
 and prudence of an enlightened governor, but there 
 had been so much of trouble and confusion that 
 the return of Columbus was most seasonable and 
 welcome. Turbulent spirits had taken advantage 
 of his altered position to bring his authority into 
 disrepute, and had formed themselves into hostile 
 factions which set all government at defiance. 
 The ringleader in sedition was one Eoldan, who 
 had been raised by Columbus from a humble 
 rank to the place of chief judge of the island. 
 All ties of gratitude were broken through, and 
 
COLUMBUS. 265 
 
 obligations of a public kind were utterly disre- 
 garded, while be endeavoured to gather a party 
 which should make him independent of the Ad- 
 miral and all his loyal supporters. 
 
 With fair professions on his lips, — avowing 
 himself the redresser of Indian wrongs, and a 
 faithful subject of the crown of Spain, — declaring 
 to his followers that he would submit himself to 
 the Admiral without reserve, but would own no 
 meaner master, — he soon had a party of devoted 
 adherents, consisting mainly of those who hated 
 restraint and longed for plunder. Bartholomew 
 had tried mild measures at one time, and then, 
 when the insolence of Roldan and his party grew 
 with every fresh overture for peace, had pro- 
 ceeded to outlaw them as traitors. But the 
 country was too wide, and the Spanish rule too 
 imperfectly established, to enable him to pursue 
 and seize them; so threats of punishment did 
 but drive the rebels to wilder courses, and made 
 them reckless oppressors of the natives at one 
 time, and their pretended champions at another. 
 The payment of tribute in gold had become a 
 heavy burden to many of them, and promises of 
 exemption had an inviting sound from men who 
 were in arms against the existing authorities. 
 Others, too, seeing that dissensions had broken 
 
266 COLUMBUS. 
 
 out among the strangers, thought their time was 
 come for throwing off the yoke; so with two 
 caciques in succession the Adelantado had to 
 renew a contest which ended in their capture, but 
 left behind it a more wide-spread feeling of hos- 
 tility to the Spanish rule. 
 
 Such was the island in which Columbus sought 
 the repose he needed. His first measure was to 
 give his public sanction to all that Bartholomew 
 had done; his next, to offer a full pardon to 
 Eoldan upon his instant submission ; and a politic 
 proclamation was issued at the same time, offering 
 a free passage home to all who were tired of the 
 colony. The strength of the rebels, however, 
 had been increased by the arrival of some vessels, 
 which had been dispatched by Columbus from 
 the Canary Islands, and touched first, most in- 
 opportunely, at the part of the island which was 
 in their possession. Representing himself as the 
 officer in command under the Adelantado, Roldan 
 had procured from them arms and stores, and had 
 corrupted many among the crews before his cheat 
 was detected. Thus reinforced, when overtures 
 came from Columbus, he assumed a bolder tone, 
 and, instead of suing for pardon, demanded ex- 
 travagant terms for himself and his followers. 
 
COLUMBUS. 267 
 
 The Admiral saw himself defied by one of his own 
 creatures on the ground which seemed to be his 
 by a special right ; and, what was yet more 
 humbling, when he summoned all loyal Spaniards 
 in the new settlement of St. Domingo to arms, 
 he found that a little handful gathered under his 
 banner, while great numbers, on one plea or 
 another, held themselves aloof. Such a crisis 
 could only be met by concession and compromise. 
 Jealous of his own rights, and yet more jealous 
 for his Sovereigns' honour, Columbus was com- 
 pelled, in spite of himself, to make a treaty of 
 peace with rebels who deserved no mercy. Rol- 
 dan was restored to his office of Judge, while 
 lands and slaves were assigned to his followers. 
 It was stipulated, moreover, that they should be 
 permitted to claim service from the caciques in 
 the cultivation of their estates, in lieu of the 
 tribute which had been paid directly to the 
 crown. A humbling surrender for a noble spirit ! 
 but everything must be hazarded, Columbus 
 thought, to restore peace to the colony; and 
 paltry disputes with underlings and mischief- 
 makers must not be permitted to hold him back 
 from that career of discovery which had been so 
 hopefully begun. 
 
268 COLUMBUS. 
 
 Other troubles of a similar kind suc- 
 
 A.D. 1499. 
 
 ceeded. Ojeda was the next insurgent, 
 and Roldan, anxious to retrieve his reputation 
 for loyalty, proved the Admiral's most devoted 
 auxiliary. Disaffection in the colony was se- 
 conded by treachery in the mother- country ; for 
 a certain Bishop Fonseca, President of the 
 Council for the Indies, having received Colum- 
 bus's letters and charts, describing his outward 
 voyage, showed them to his friend Ojeda, and 
 between them the scheme was contrived of fol- 
 lowing in the track of Columbus, and outstripping 
 him in the race of discovery. Four ships, there- 
 fore, were fitted out by the authority of Fonseca, 
 and a letter of licence was given without any 
 reference to the Sovereigns. With these Ojeda 
 had explored six hundred miles of the Northern 
 coast of South America, beginning from the mouths 
 of the Oronoco. Having touched at the western 
 side of Hispaniola, without seeking any communi- 
 cation with the authorities of the island, he was 
 challenged by Roldan in the name of Columbus, 
 and after dissembling for a while, and promising 
 a speedy visit to St. Domingo, threw off the 
 mask and assumed the vacant post of rebel-chief- 
 tain. Gathering to his standard numbers who 
 longed for change, and many more who had been 
 
COLUMBUS. 269 
 
 punished for their crimes, he proposed to them to 
 march in a body to the seat of government, and 
 there call the brothers to account for the accumu- 
 lated evils which had afflicted the colony. Few- 
 were prepared for so decisive and perilous an 
 enterprize, and at last, by the dexterous manage- 
 ment of Roldan, Ojeda was persuaded to leave 
 the island. Presently, however, almost before 
 the coast was clear of this dangerous intruder, 
 another conspiracy was formed under another 
 Spaniard of distinction, and the incidents of a 
 love-story, with a beautiful daughter of Caonabo 
 for the heroine, connect themselves with a deadly 
 feud between Roldan and a more favoured suitor. 
 The private quarrel grew to be a public one, and 
 a desperate party were concerting measures to 
 seize Columbus and his zealous lieutenant, when 
 they were surprised by the Admiral in the dead 
 of the night, and their chief, by a measure of 
 rare but well-timed severity, was consigned to 
 execution. 
 
 It was hard and trying discipline for one like 
 Columbus to have his time thus frittered away, 
 and his spirit vexed and wearied, when his mind 
 was teeming with great projects which might well 
 fill up the remnant of his days. The seventh 
 year had now expired since his first triumphant 
 
270 COLUMBUS. 
 
 return to Spain, and in that time he had solemnly 
 vowed to heaven that he would contribute from 
 the profits of his government enough to fit out an 
 army of fifty thousand infantry and five thousand 
 cavalry for a last Crusade, More than sixty 
 years of his eventful course were run ; and what 
 hope was there that he could finish his work, and 
 transmit to posterity the legacy he longed to 
 leave with them, if his life were thus consumed 
 in putting down insurgent caciques, or making 
 terms with his own refractory followers ? 
 
 Heavier trials, however, were in 
 Hostile „ , . TT . . , 
 
 party at store for him. His enemies were busy 
 
 ome ' in Spain, and it was no one's vocation, 
 
 and no one's interest, to defend him there. His 
 successes in the colony did but strengthen the 
 case against him. Defeated rebels took their 
 revenge by carrying home complaints and accusa- 
 tions, which found willing listeners, and met with 
 no reply. The men, whose excesses he was 
 bound to punish, had influential friends, many of 
 them, about the court, and by them the malicious 
 charge was invented and propagated that Colum- 
 bus was aiming at an independent sovereignty, or 
 would transfer to the highest bidder this jewel of 
 the Spanish crown. Fonseca was ever at hand 
 
COLUMBUS. 271 
 
 to give force and currency to all that might 
 damage the great subject with his Sovereigns; 
 Ferdinand was of a jealous temper, and only too 
 ready to distrust the man whose services could 
 not be repaid or forgotten ; Isabella herself, 
 assailed from so many quarters, began to waver. 
 To her credit be it spoken, the supposed wrongs 
 of the natives weighed more with her than the 
 clamour of her own complaining subjects. Many 
 of the returned followers of Roldan had brought 
 home slaves assigned to them under the articles 
 of capitulation to which Columbus was forced. 
 Among them were the daughters of caciques, 
 who had been seduced or carried from their 
 homes, and who were the impatient or willing 
 mistresses of many a Spanish gentleman. Her 
 sensibilities were touched by a spectacle like 
 this ; her woman's heart kindled with indignation 
 for the wrongs of her sex ; and as the offenders 
 laid all the blame on the Admiral, she not only 
 condemned him for his inhuman conduct in this 
 particular, but was more ready to believe the 
 stories which were circulated so freely to his dis- 
 advantage. She no longer opposed the measures 
 suggested by the hostile faction. A Commissioner 
 was appointed to proceed to Hispaniola, and in- 
 vestigate the charges on the spot; Francisco 
 
272 COLUMBUS. 
 
 Bobadilla was the person chosen for this office ; 
 and authority was given to supersede Columbus 
 if he should find them true. 
 
 Bobadilla at The name of this man has become 
 
 St. Domingo. ft bye _ word f i n f amv . He ranks 
 
 with the little men who are known to posterity 
 as having crossed the path of great ones, and, in 
 return for the pitiful triumph of an hour, have 
 contempt or execration heaped upon their me- 
 mories. The accusers of Columbus were with him 
 Aug. 23rd, before he landed. When everything 
 should have been done to spare the feelings 
 of the Admiral, everything was done to bring him 
 into contempt. Bobadilla began by demanding 
 that the prisoners who had headed the last in- 
 surrection should be delivered to him for custody ; 
 and when Diego Columbus, who was in com- 
 mand at St. Domingo, refused to take a step so 
 injurious and insulting to his brother, the Com- 
 missioner, sent out by his Sovereigns to institute 
 a judicial enquiry, collected the sailors from the 
 ships and the rabble from the streets, and, having 
 broken open the prison, carried off the insurgents 
 in triumph. Columbus himself was absent. By 
 grant from his Sovereigns he was Governor of all 
 the Spanish possessions in the New World, and 
 Admiral of all the seas which had been discovered 
 
COLUMBUS, 273 
 
 by himself. His office was hereditary, moreover ; 
 and he had privileges and immunities of various 
 kinds such as were seldom granted to a subject. 
 Yet while he was still in possession of all his 
 dignities, — before the court had sat, or the charges 
 had been heard, — Bobadilla took up his residence 
 in the house of Columbus, seized upon his pro- 
 perty, took possession of all his papers, and 
 lightened the imposts due from the colonists to 
 the government, over which he had no more 
 jurisdiction than over the royal domains of Spain, 
 
 Columbus, when he was satisfied Submission 
 respecting the Commissioner's autho- of Columbus. 
 rity, yielded him implicit obedience. He was 
 summoned to St. Domingo, and, without retinue 
 or body-guard, he straightway went thither. He 
 was ordered into irons, and took this last indig- 
 nity without a murmur. He understood his own 
 position too well to provoke an unseemly contest. 
 He wasted no words on the unworthy instrument 
 of a malignant faction. He thought of his royal 
 mistress, and felt sure that her orders had been 
 misinterpreted, or her judgment swayed by false- 
 hood. His two brothers were prisoners like 
 himself, — Bartholomew, who might have led an 
 army against Bobadilla, having received express 
 T 
 
274 COLUMBUS. 
 
 orders from Columbus to submit himself to the 
 royal mandate. 
 
 Then came the mock trial. Miscreants, whom 
 the Admiral had spared or punished, flocked to 
 the place of concourse with their tale of slander. 
 Nothing was sifted, and the most improbable tales 
 were received with eagerness. " The Admiral 
 had kept the natives in darkness that he might 
 make a gain of them by selling heathen men into 
 slavery ; " — " The Admiral had first provoked 
 loyal subjects to resistance by acts of tyranny, 
 and then punished them with unsparing severity;" 
 — " He pretended zeal for his Sovereign and for 
 the interests of Spain ; but all was false and 
 hollow ; he told only what suited himself; he had 
 collected untold treasure in pearls off the coast of 
 Paria, and divulged but half the truth that he 
 might drive a better bargain with the crown." 
 Of course, an enquiry thus conducted could have 
 but one issue. A case was made out which de- 
 termined Bobadilla to send Columbus to Spain ; 
 and for security, — as if he had been an untamed 
 savage, or a convicted desperado, instead of being 
 a man of habitual self-command, a lover of peace, 
 and of tried and devoted loyalty, — he must con- 
 tinue to wear his chains. He wore them proudly, 
 and would not put them off. The commander of 
 
^ COLUMBUS. 275 
 
 the vessel in which he sailed felt as a generous 
 man would feel at having such a prisoner under 
 his charge, and offered to set him at liberty when 
 they were fairly out at sea. " No," said Colum- 
 bus, " their Majesties commanded me by letter to 
 submit to whatever Bobadilla should order in 
 their name. By their authority he has put upon 
 me these chains. I will wear them until they 
 shall order them to be taken off; and I will after- 
 wards preserve them as a memorial of my services 
 and their reward." He kept his promise. The 
 golden crowns of Castile and Aragon would have 
 been well given for those few pounds of iron, if 
 the story of Columbus's degradation might have 
 been buried with them. But he chose that it 
 should live. " I saw the fetters," says his son, in 
 writing his life, " always hanging in his cabinet ; 
 and he requested that they might be laid by his 
 side when dead." 
 
 The news that Columbus had arrived . . 
 
 Arrives m 
 
 as a prisoner at Cadiz was received Spain as a 
 
 . prisoner. 
 
 throughout Spam with a burst of in- 
 dignation. As a proscribed man, he would not 
 venture to address the King or Queen ; but he 
 sent a detailed vindication of his conduct to a 
 lady of the Court, who, as nurse in the royal 
 T 2 
 
276 COLUMBUS. 
 
 household, had ready access to Isabella. Very 
 pathetic, yet devout as usual, are the opening 
 sentences : — " Although it is a novelty for me to 
 complain of the ill-usage of the world, it is never- 
 theless no novelty for the world to practise it. 
 Innumerable are the contests I have had with it, 
 and I have resisted all attacks until now, when I 
 find that neither strength nor prudence is of any 
 avail to me : it has cruelly reduced me to the 
 lowest ebb. Hope in Him who has created us 
 all is my support. His assistance I have always 
 found near at hand." Then, after recounting his 
 services and his usage, he shows how unjust any 
 decision must be which left out of account the 
 difficulties of a position like his. " God is just," 
 he says, " and He will in due time make known 
 all that has taken place and why it has taken 
 place. I am judged in Spain, as a governor who 
 had been sent to a province or city under regular 
 o-overnment, and where the laws could be executed 
 without fear of endangering the public weal ; and 
 in this I receive enormous wrong. I ought to be 
 judged as a Captain sent from Spain to the Indies, 
 to conquer a nation numerous and warlike, with 
 customs and religion altogether different to ours ; 
 a people who dwell in the mountains, without 
 regular habitations for themselves or for us ; and 
 
COLUMBUS. 277 
 
 where, by the Divine Will, I have subdued 
 another world to the dominion of the King and 
 Queen, our sovereigns ; in consequence of which, 
 Spain, that used to be called poor, is now the 
 most wealthy of kingdoms. I ought to be judged 
 as a Captain, who for so many years has borne 
 arms, never quitting them for an instant. I 
 ought to be judged by Cavaliers who have them- 
 selves won the meed of victory; by gentlemen 
 indeed, and not by the lawyers: at least, so it 
 would have been among the Greeks and Romans, 
 or any modern nation in which exists so much 
 nobility as in Spain ; for under any other judg- 
 ment I receive great injury ; because in the Indies 
 there is neither civil right nor judgment -seat." 
 
 Like most that came from the pen or the lips 
 of this illustrious man, this memorial carried con- 
 viction to those who heard it, dispersed the cloud 
 of prejudice which had gathered round his name, 
 and refuted, by anticipation, the long list of 
 Bobadilla's charges. These do not seem even to 
 have been investigated. Columbus's services 
 were unquestioned; his mistakes, if any, might 
 well be forgiven. There were tears on the face 
 of the Queen when she received him ; and the 
 hardy veteran, who had braved wind and storm 
 in so many seas, who had met calumny and ill— 
 
 T 3 
 
278 COLUMBUS. 
 
 usage with an unruffled countenance, was melted 
 into softness by her returning kindness, and when 
 he rose from his knees was for some time unable 
 to speak. 
 
 Good words were given in abundance. Apo- 
 logies were tendered for the indignities he had 
 suffered, and were willingly accepted; but his 
 Princedom, to his mortification and sm*prise, was 
 not restored to him. Fresh discoveries on the 
 South American Continent by other parties had 
 shown Ferdinand what was included in the terms 
 of the original grant to Columbus. The gift was 
 too vast ; the subject would be too like a sove- 
 reign ; no better opportunity could be found of 
 revoking what had been rashly bestowed ; if he 
 should retire, in disgust, from the service of Spain, 
 his successes had put others on the right track, 
 and his place might easily be supplied. An in- 
 terval of repose, therefore, was recommended ; a 
 lengthened absence from Hispaniola would give 
 time for bad passions to subside, and would pro- 
 mote the peace and welfare of the colony. In 
 the meantime, another governor would supersede 
 the incompetent Bobadilla, and do his best to 
 bring the refractory to submission. 
 Superseded Accordingly a man of the name of 
 as Governor. Qvando was appointed, and sailed with 
 
COLUMBUS. 279 
 
 thirty vessels and two thousand five hundred 
 men. This might be good policy for the jealous 
 monarch ; but to be displaced by any one on his 
 own ground, — to be kept in Spain while others 
 were turning his great discoveries to account, — 
 was hardly better than captivity and disgrace in 
 the eyes of Columbus. Besides, each year of 
 inactivity was another year's delay in the execu- 
 tion of his grand scheme with reference to the 
 Holy Land. If his own resources were cut off, 
 he must, at least, be faithful to the spirit of his 
 vow, and stir up others to take the great w T ork in 
 hand. So his leisure time was devoted to the 
 composition of a treatise, addressed to the Spanish 
 Sovereigns, in which what he had done, and what 
 he longed to do, were mixed up with scraps of 
 prophecy and quotations from the fathers, all 
 pointing to the future triumphs of the Church in 
 the conversion of the Gentiles, or the final over- 
 throw of the Mussulman power. Spain had 
 begun well (this was his favourite theme), and 
 would win for herself immortal honour, if she 
 continued in the van of the Christian army. 
 
 While Columbus was thus occupied, 
 rumours came to him from other lands Prepares 
 which made him restless to be again forfourtl1 
 
 o voyage. 
 
 upon the waters. Numbers were fol- 
 
 T 4 
 
280 COLUMBUS. 
 
 lowing in the track of Yasco de Gama, and the 
 commerce of India seemed likely to be the prize 
 of Portugal, which was entering heartily and 
 zealously upon a new career of discovery. " Let 
 them reach the land of spices by sailing East" 
 thought Columbus ; i{ I will reach it by sailing 
 across the Western Ocean. I have found land to 
 the North, and land to the South; between them 
 I doubt not is the strait to which I have not yet 
 been able to penetrate; but let me have good 
 ships and willing crews, and the flag of Spain 
 shall yet wave in the Indian seas." For this 
 purpose four small vessels were entrusted to him, 
 May 9th, an d> a ^ the age of sixty-six, nearly ten 
 1502. years after his first voyage, he started 
 
 for the fourth time across the Atlantic. His 
 brother, Bartholomew, was his companion in this 
 voyage, and a valuable helper he proved under 
 circumstances of extreme peril and difficulty. 
 
 Columbus had received orders not 
 
 Adventures 
 
 offHispa- to touch at Hispaniola for fear of 
 iiiola. ...•-, 4 t 
 
 exciting jealousy. A strange order it 
 
 must have sounded to him when he thought of 
 
 his first voyage to its shores, and the promises 
 
 made to him before and since. Obedience was 
 
 the rule of his life; but one vessel out of his 
 
COLUMBUS. 281 
 
 little fleet proved a bad sailer, and, to exchange it, 
 he made for the well-known port of St. Domingo. 
 On his arrival there he found a great fleet, which 
 had carried out Ovando, ready to sail for Spain. 
 Bobadilla was in it, and Roldan with many of his 
 traitorous adherents, and a rich cargo of gold. 
 Of this some was intended as a present to the 
 Sovereigns, and a good deal belonged to the 
 unprincipled settlers who had not scrupled to 
 amass it by exactions and cruelties of the harshest 
 kind. One little vessel, it is said, the weakest of 
 the whole, had four thousand pieces of gold upon 
 it, which Columbus's agent was remitting to 
 Spain, a scanty portion of the revenue which had 
 been pledged to him by the royal word. The 
 Admiral's experienced eye foresaw an approaching 
 storm, and he sent a message on shore asking 
 shelter for his little squadron, and warning 
 Ovando that it would be most perilous for the 
 fleet to sail under such circumstances. The 
 request and the caution were alike disregarded. 
 On his own seas the old man's experience went 
 for nothing ; in his own harbour he was denied a 
 refuge. His heart naturally swelled within him 
 at this indignity, and his comment on it, in his 
 letter to his Sovereigns describing his fourth 
 voyage, is touching and characteristic : — " What 
 
282 COLUMBUS. 
 
 man was ever born, not even excepting Job, who 
 would not have been ready to die of despair at 
 finding himself, as I then was, in anxious fear for 
 my own safety, and that of my son, my brother 
 and my friends, and yet refused permission either 
 to land, or to put into harbour, on the shores 
 which by God's mercy I had gained for Spain 
 with so much toil and danger?" The storm 
 came down in its fury; Bobadilla's fleet, which 
 had ventured out to sea, was lost, with all on board ; 
 and men, who knew -how the lost treasures had 
 been got together, naturally thought that the spoil 
 and the spoilers had gone down under a curse. 
 
 The ship freighted with Columbus's store got 
 safe to Spain; and when his prophecy of bad 
 weather was talked of in connexion with its ter- 
 rible fulfilment, and his little vessel had survived 
 the storm which had engulphed his enemies and 
 their booty, some thought that the Admiral's 
 good fortune had come back to him after a season 
 of depression, while the superstitious seamen con- 
 jectured that spells and enchantments were at his 
 command, and that he had proved his power over 
 the raging elements. 
 
 In July Columbus sailed for the 
 Sails for . 
 
 South continent of South America, little 
 
 thinking that two years would elapse 
 
COLUMBUS. 283 
 
 between his departure and his return. Yet so it 
 proved ; and in a life crowded with vexations and 
 disappointments, it may be questioned whether 
 he ever spent so many toilsome, anxious months 
 together. Every thing was against him. Winds 
 and waves seemed to bar up his progress. Be- 
 tween Jamaica and Terra Firma he " contended," 
 he says, " against a fearful contrary current for 
 sixty days, and during that time only made seventy 
 leagues." " For eighty-eight days," he adds 
 shortly afterwards, " did this fearful tempest con- 
 tinue, during which I was at sea, and saw neither 
 sun nor stars."* On an island a few leagues 
 from the coast of Honduras he fell in with a 
 cacique, who pointed to the West as the land of 
 wealth, and said that in that direction he would 
 find a country rich in gold, and a powerful people. 
 Had he listened to this advice, a few days' sail 
 might have carried him to Yucatan, and his old 
 age, probably, would have been cheered with 
 the discovery of Mexico and the sight of the 
 Pacific. But he was too busy hunting for the 
 strait through which he hoped to sail for India, 
 and he refused to turn aside for any secondary 
 object. So, descrying some mountains in the 
 distance, he made for the main land, and between 
 
 * See NOTE (X). 
 
284 COLUMBUS. 
 
 Cape Honduras and the gulf of Darien he spent 
 four months in searching the coast, making sure 
 that the longed-for passage to the South could 
 not be far off. Still the weather was an almost 
 unceasing tempest; strong currents carried the 
 vessels far out of their course ; enormous water- 
 spouts at one time, and shoals of ravenous sharks 
 at another, roused the superstitious fears of the 
 sailors. When he landed, too, he found the natives 
 no weak, effeminate race, but hardier and more 
 intelligent than those of the first-discovered 
 islands, better armed and more quick to use their 
 weapons. At last, when Columbus turned, the 
 wind turned too, and with some difficulty a haven 
 was reached on the Yeragua coast, to which he 
 was attracted by the report of its gold mines; 
 k d 1503 there, on the 6th of January, the feast 
 of the Epiphany, he cast anchor in a 
 river which was named Bethlehem in honour of 
 
 the dav. 
 
 j 
 
 Distresses "^° P eace was f° un d on shore, how- 
 
 on the ever, any more than on the stormy 
 
 Continent. J J 
 
 ocean, for the great explorer. A set- 
 tlement was talked of, and it was agreed between 
 the brothers that Bartholomew should remain in 
 Yeragua, while Columbus sailed to Hispaniola 
 for supplies and men. But their plans were 
 
COLUMBUS. 285 
 
 baffled by a warlike cacique, who resented their 
 intrusion ; and after alternate successes and de- 
 feats,— after being captured once, and escaping by 
 a plunge into the sea, — he fairly beat off the 
 strangers. This was a great disappointment; for 
 the country was reported to be rich beyond any 
 they had seen, and Columbus, ever wandering- 
 back to some bygone age, and slow to believe 
 that he had discovered what no books had de- 
 scribed, revelled in the thought that he had 
 reached the Aurea Chersonesus of Josephus, from 
 whence gold had been procured for the building 
 of the temple. Little did he dream while such 
 visions filled his mind, that less than a hundred 
 miles of land-travelling would have carried him 
 across the isthmus, on which he wintered, to the 
 shore of the Pacific, and would have revealed to 
 him a new Ocean beyond, stretching from the 
 newly found America to the long-sought India. 
 
 As it was, he left the South American Con- 
 tinent a defeated and desponding man. Oue of 
 his captains had fallen in conflict with the natives, 
 and many brave men besides. Health and spirits 
 gave way for a time ; but a mind enthusiastic as 
 his rose continually aboA^e depression, and ga- 
 thered new materials for hope from his feverish 
 dreams. His own belief was that, at this time of 
 
286 COLUMBUS. 
 
 his deepest sorrow, a message was graciously sent 
 from heaven to keep him from despair. The 
 passage is too remarkable not to be quoted in his 
 own words. " Groaning with exhaustion," he 
 says, " I fell asleep, and heard a compassionate 
 voice address me thus : — 'O fool, and slow to 
 believe and to serve thy God, the God of all. 
 What did He more for Moses or for David, his 
 servant, than for thee ? From thine infancy he 
 has kept thee under his constant and watchful 
 care, When thou didst arrive at an age which 
 suited His designs respecting thee, He brought 
 wonderful renown to thy name throughout all 
 the land. He gave thee for thine own the Indies, 
 which form so rich a portion of the world, and 
 thou hast divided them as it pleased thee, for He 
 gave thee power to do so. He gave thee, also, 
 the keys of those barriers of the ocean sea which 
 were closed with such mighty chains. Turn to 
 Him, and acknowledge thine error; His mercy 
 is infinite. Thine old age shall not prevent thee 
 from accomplishing any great undertaking. Abra- 
 ham had exceeded a hundred years when he begat 
 
 Isaac ; nor was Sarah young His acts 
 
 answer to his words, and it is his custom to per- 
 form all His promises with interest.' " From his 
 dreams we learn what was the subject of his 
 
COLUMBUS. 287 
 
 waking thoughts. Advancing years, and enfeebled 
 health, made him fear that he should never live 
 to accomplish the greatest of his schemes; yet, 
 even then, with the full persuasion that he, like 
 God's faithful servants of old, had been raised up 
 to do a special work, he kept alive his hope of 
 prolonged service and of yet greater triumphs by 
 recalling the years of the patriarch when the child 
 of promise was given to his prayers. 
 
 The first of May found him sailing 
 
 J ° Eeaches 
 
 northwards, with his only two re- Jamaica, 
 maining caravels, for Hispaniola. He 
 was driven, however, by weather, first to Cuba, 
 and afterwards to Jamaica, reaching the latter 
 island on Midsummer day, with his vessels no 
 longer in a sailing condition. There for a whole 
 year he was kept, like a caged eagle, forty leagues 
 only from his own beloved island. Short as the 
 voyage was for a larger vessel, it was too distant 
 to be safely undertaken in a canoe, and nothing 
 better could be procured in the island. Columbus 
 saw the urgency of the danger. He had no place 
 of defence but the two shattered vessels fastened 
 together on shore. The natives were friendly at 
 present, and brought in supplies of food in ex- 
 change for trinkets; but a single quarrel might 
 lead to strangeness and suspicion. Something, 
 
288 COLUMBUS. 
 
 he felt, must be risked for the common safety ; so 
 he sounded the best and bravest of his followers, 
 one Diego Mendez, as to his willingness to cross 
 to Hispaniola in a canoe, and seek assistance from 
 Ovando. The man was startled, at first, and pro- 
 tested that such a venture would be madness ; 
 but soon a nobler spirit prevailed, and he under- 
 took the service. " I have but one life to lose," 
 he said, to Columbus, " and I am willing to ven- 
 ture it for you and that of my countrymen here. 
 God, who has protected me so often, I trust, will 
 protect me now." He went, and found the ex- 
 pedition, as he feared, one of extremest peril ; but 
 a brave heart, and first-rate skill, and thoughts of 
 the great Columbus cooped up in Jamaica, bore 
 him on through every difficulty. Forty leagues 
 of ocean, — twice as many, as he coasted Hispa- 
 niola against, adverse currents, — and then fifty 
 more over mountains and through forests from 
 St. Domingo to Xaragua, — brought him to 
 Ovando's presence ; but the zeal of the captain 
 contrasted strangely with the indifference of the 
 governor, who gave him fair words, but nothing 
 else, and took no steps for the liberation of Co- 
 lumbus. 
 
 Letter to the During this period Columbus was 
 oveieigns. p art } v occupied with writing, for the 
 
COLUMBUS. 289 
 
 information of his Sovereigns, a report of what 
 had happened to him since he left Spain. The 
 document is a very precious one, and shows us 
 much of what was passing in his mind while he 
 paced the shores of Jamaica, looking Eastward 
 for a distant sail, or sat, sick in body and sick at 
 heart, on board his shattered vessel. With his 
 usual modesty he speaks of all that he had done, 
 and with his usual forbearance of all that he had 
 suffered ; but his swelling heart finds vent some- 
 times in lamentations which sound like reproaches, 
 as he contrasts his own losses and distresses with 
 the gain and glory which his discoveries had 
 brought to Spain. The conclusion is full of 
 dignity, but more deeply affecting than anything 
 that has fallen from his pen. " Such is my fate," 
 he says, " that twenty years of service, through 
 which I passed with so much toil and danger, 
 have profited me nothing ; and at this very day 
 I do not possess a roof in Spain that I can call 
 my own. If I wish to eat or sleep, I have no- 
 where to go to but the inn or tavern, and most 
 
 times lack wherewith to pay the bill I 
 
 have not a hair upon me that is not grey ; my 
 body is infirm ; and all that was left to me, as 
 well as to my brothers, has been taken away and 
 sold, even to the frock that I wore, to my great 
 u 
 
290 COLUMBUS. 
 
 dishonour The honest devotedness I have 
 
 always shown to your Majesties' service, and the 
 unmerited outrage with which it has been repaid, 
 will not allow my soul to keep silence, however 
 much I may wish it. I implore your Highnesses 
 to forgive my complaints. I am indeed in as 
 ruined a condition as I have related. Hitherto I 
 have wept over others ; — may Heaven now have 
 mercy upon me, and may the earth weep for me ! 
 With regard to temporal things, I have not even 
 a blanca for an offering ; and in spiritual things, 
 I have ceased here in the Indies from observing 
 the prescribed forms of religion. Solitary in my 
 trouble, sick, and in daily expectation of death, 
 surrounded by millions of hostile savages full of 
 cruelty, and thus separated from the blessed 
 sacraments of our holy Church, how will my soul 
 be forgotten if it be separated from the body in 
 this foreign land ! Weep for me, whoever has 
 charity, truth and justice. I did not come out 
 on this voyage to gain to myself honour or 
 wealth ; this is a certain fact, for at that time all 
 hope of such a thing was dead. I do not lie 
 when I say that I went to your Highnesses with 
 honest purpose of heart, and sincere zeal in your 
 cause. I humbly beseech your Highnesses that, 
 if it please God to rescue me from this place, you 
 
COLUMBUS. 291 
 
 will graciously sanction my pilgrimage to Rome 
 and other holy places. May the Holy Trinity have 
 you in their keeping, and add to your greatness ! " 
 
 Months went by, and no succour Troubles in 
 came. Mendez on the wide sea, bat- the island * 
 tling with the elements, and keeping up the 
 courage of the Spaniards and Indians who navi- 
 gated his slight canoe, was a happy man compared 
 with his great commander, left on that unfriendly 
 shore, surrounded with barbarous tribes who 
 might turn enemies in a day, and, what was far 
 worse, harassed and endangered by a formidable 
 mutiny among his followers. The first 
 of January found him a captive still ; 
 and, on the second, discontents, like those which 
 pursued him everywhere, broke out into words 
 and deeds of violence. A leader of the name of 
 Porras, — as usual, one who had received special 
 kindness from Columbus, — headed an insurrec- 
 tionary party, and carried with him a large 
 portion of the little company who remained on 
 the island. The Admiral himself was sick, and 
 of those who stayed with him, some were unfit 
 for service. Happily Bartholomew was there ; 
 and all the resources of his active mind, with the 
 coolness and courage which never failed him, were 
 u 2 
 
292 COLUMBUS. 
 
 necessary for the common safety. Without his 
 help, it is almost certain that Columbus must have 
 sunk, and found a grave in Jamaica, — being left 
 to starve by Spaniards, or cut off by a sudden 
 attack of the natives. 
 
 Eclipse of Porras and his crew, with almost 
 
 the Moon. diabolical w i c k e dness, had done all 
 they could to rouse the hostility of the natives 
 against Columbus, hoping to drive him off the 
 island ; and the result of their endeavours was 
 soon seen in failing supplies of food. Famine 
 stared him in the face, and but for an ingenious 
 device, suggested by an approaching eclipse of the 
 moon, he and his party must have perished. The 
 caciques were summoned to a conference, and 
 through an interpreter Columbus addressed them 
 in words like these : — "I and my people worship 
 a God who has his dwelling in the skies. He 
 protects us and takes care of us, and is angry 
 with those who do us wrong. Now He is angry 
 with you, because you will not give us food. If 
 you do not believe my words, look at the moon to- 
 night, and you will see it grow dark before your 
 eyes. This will be a token to you of God's coming 
 judgments." The night came, and the moon rose 
 in her full-orbed beauty; but presently a little 
 speck of darkness was seen, and slowly the shadow 
 
COLUMBUS. 293 
 
 stole over the broad disc till her silvery brightness 
 was all gone, and the natives saw through the 
 gloom only a ball of dusky red. Amazed and 
 terrified they fell at Columbus's feet, promising 
 abundant supplies. " Pray for us," they cried, 
 " that evil may not come upon us, and we will 
 bring you food in plenty henceforth." The Ad- 
 miral retired for a while into his cabin, and 
 the shore and forest resounded with the wailings 
 of the savages ; but presently he came forth and 
 assured them that the divine displeasure had. 
 passed away. " You will see the moon bright 
 again this very night," he said ; " so be true to 
 your promises, and dismiss your fears." Then 
 came the look of wonder, — the pause of expect- 
 ation, — and the universal shout of joy. The 
 artifice, which, under the circumstances, no man 
 will judge severely, was rewarded with unbounded 
 confidence and unstinted plenty while the stran- 
 gers remained upon the island. 
 
 Eight months had passed since Men- Message 
 dez sailed, when a small vessel was fromHis- 
 
 paniola. 
 seen one day nearing the shore. A 
 
 boat put off, and brought a letter to Columbus 
 
 from Ovando, with a barrel of wine and a side of 
 
 bacon. The language of the Governor's letter 
 
 was as insulting as his gift. He could spare no 
 
 u 3 
 
294 COLUMBUS. 
 
 vessel from Hispaniola large enough to bring off 
 Columbus and his people, but he was greatly con- 
 cerned to hear of the Admiral's misfortunes, and 
 hoped soon to be able to relieve him. The officer 
 in command delivered this very singular dispatch, 
 waited for a reply, returned to his ship without 
 seeking further conference, and sailed straight 
 back again. Posterity must think, as the men of 
 Hispaniola thought, that Ovando hoped to hear 
 that his great rival was removed out of his way. 
 His cruel delays had been tolerated too long, and 
 when the news came back that Columbus was 
 alive, hoping and waiting through weary months 
 for the relief which never came, public indigna- 
 tion was roused at last, and compelled the Go- 
 vernor to take immediate steps for his rescue. 
 Two ships were dispatched to Jamaica, and 
 brought off all the Spaniards, loyal and disloyal 
 together. 
 
 They left their prison on the 28th of June; but 
 winds and currents were contrary as usual ; and 
 nearly two months were consumed in beating 
 Eastward through the open sea, and along the 
 shores of Hispaniola, before they reached St. Do- 
 mingo. The most toilsome of his voyages it had 
 been, and the most full of vexations ; but Colum- 
 bus himself called it "the most honourable and 
 
COLUMBUS. 295 
 
 advantageous " of all that he had undertaken, 
 alluding partly to his own enlarged knowledge of 
 the great boundary-lines of sea and land, and 
 partly to the theories which grew out of his re- 
 cent discoveries. How much still remained' to be 
 learnt and done will appear from a single sentence 
 in his own narrative : — " The world is but small ; 
 out of seven portions of it the dry part occupies 
 six, and the seventh is entirely covered with 
 water. Experience has shown it, and I have 
 written it, w T ith quotations from Holy Scripture, 
 in other letters, where I have treated of the situ- 
 ation of the terrestrial Paradise, as approved by 
 the Holy Church." 
 
 If banishment had been wearisome g a( j news at 
 to a man like Columbus, full of ardour Hispaniola. 
 and longing for fresh enterprizes, the news which 
 met him at St. Domingo must have wrung his 
 heart yet more painfully. The government of 
 Ovando had proved a merciless one to the poor 
 natives, whom he had received special orders from 
 Isabella to protect and cherish. A swarm of ad- 
 venturers had gone out with him, all athirst for 
 gold. " For seven years," says Columbus^ 
 writing to the King and Queen, and lamenting 
 this sad invasion of the colony, " I was at your 
 
 u 4 
 
296 COLUMBUS. 
 
 royal court, where every one to whom the enter- 
 prize was mentioned treated it as ridiculous ; but 
 now there is not a man, down to the very tailors, 
 who does not beg to be allowed to become a disco- 
 verer." Tailors and hidalgos, however, both proved 
 but sorry miners ; gold did not grow upon the trees, 
 but had to be dug up by hard toil ; many days of 
 labour brought but a scanty return; and num- 
 bers who had started in high spirits, with spade 
 and knapsack on their shoulders, returned to tell 
 a tale of disappointed hopes, or sank down ex- 
 hausted on the soil which yielded its treasure so 
 slowly. Then came harder and more exacting 
 conditions for the native diggers. Slaves they 
 were not to be in name, the Queen had said, any 
 longer : but compulsory labour was still the rule 
 of the colony, and beneath the ever-growing 
 rapacity and tyranny of their Spanish masters, 
 the feeble, helpless race was rapidly wasting away. 
 War, too, had been desolating the fair fields of 
 Hispaniola, and thinning its native population. 
 Murmurs and threats against the intruding colo- 
 nists passed for grave offences; violence was 
 repressed by the sternest and most relentless 
 policy ; and when one brave cacique had made a 
 last stand for independence, and had failed 
 in the unequal contest, hanging for himself, and 
 
COLUMBUS. 297 
 
 tortures ingeniously cruel for multitudes of his 
 unhappy subjects, were the punishments awarded 
 by the unsparing Governor. Worse than all, 
 friends had been confounded with enemies, and 
 treachery of the basest kind had been practised 
 towards those who had been serviceable allies. 
 Because tribute was paid grudgingly in Xaragua, 
 and quarrels sometimes arose between the con- 
 quered tribes and their unscrupulous rulers, 
 Ovando chose to fancy that a formidable insur- 
 rection was being planned, and took his measures 
 accordingly. A visit of friendship was pretended, 
 and the Governor with four hundred well-armed 
 soldiers set out from the capital. Anacaona, the 
 faithful ally of Spain, who had lately succeeded 
 her brother in the government of the province, 
 gave him a friendly greeting, and, in return, was 
 invited, with her daughter and all her principal 
 officers, to behold a military spectacle in the 
 square of her principal town. Then, at a given 
 signal, Spanish horsemen rushed upon the un- 
 armed multitude, and cut them down without 
 mercy. Eighty men of rank were tortured into 
 confession, and then burnt as criminals. Ana- 
 caona herself had a mock trial, and then died a 
 death of shame. 
 
 No wonder that tidings like these almost broke 
 
298 COLUMBUS. 
 
 the heart of Columbus. His paradise of beauty 
 was spoiled and plundered, — turned into a theatre 
 of crime. Where now were the visions which had 
 solaced him often during the long midnight watches 
 of his early voyages, and proved his stay and com- 
 fort when every thing looked least propitious to his 
 wishes ? What was he now after all his toils, and 
 all his successes ? He had looked to be the richest 
 subject in the world, able to take armies into his 
 pay, and to wrest Palestine from the Infidel. 
 And lo ! he was but a broken-down old man, 
 encumbered with debt, surrounded with hungry, 
 disappointed adventurers, who laid their ruin at 
 his door. He had hoped to be as a father to the 
 gentle tribes which greeted him at his first 
 coming ; to give them European arts and civiliza- 
 tion in return for their simple, trusting kindness ; 
 and to make them brothers in the highest sense, as 
 disciples of one common Redeemer. Instead of 
 this, he found their beautiful land desolated by 
 the oppressions of his countrymen, — their willing 
 service exchanged for bondage like that of 
 Egypt, — their numbers dwindling away beneath 
 the unsparing exactions of their Spanish masters. 
 Little had been done to bring them to the faith of 
 Christ, and more had been done to make them 
 hate the very name of Christian than could be 
 
COLUMBUS. 299 
 
 repaired in two generations. He had soared in 
 thought above the sphere of petty interests and 
 vulgar rivalry. If Providence should guide him 
 to distant lands, his anxious desire was to bind 
 together the scattered members of the great hu- 
 man family by commerce and religion. But life 
 was almost gone, and his aims had all been frus- 
 trated. One great duty remained, and should be 
 discharged without delay. He felt responsible 
 for the miseries and wrongs of the natives, 
 while nothing was done to redress them. He 
 must plead their cause in Spain, and for their 
 sakes, as for the sake of his own injured honour, 
 must ask for powers at least as large as those with 
 which he was originally invested. 
 
 To Spain, accordingly, he went; Arrival 
 
 and, after encountering perils like in Spain, 
 
 Nov. 7th. 
 those of his first return voyage, reached 
 
 Seville, enfeebled and dispirited by sickness, and 
 almost a beggar. Nearly all the money he had 
 been able to collect in Hispaniola had been gene- 
 rously expended to bring home the men who 
 sailed with him, many of them having been of 
 the Porras faction, who deserved punishment 
 rather than favour. And now his own words 
 were too true, — house of his own he had none in 
 
300 COLUMBUS. 
 
 Spain; and of his property nothing seemed to 
 be available for present necessities. Ovando 
 intercepted his rents and dues, and scarcely any- 
 thing of what sounded like a princely revenue 
 came to hand. Painful disease was added to 
 his other troubles, and when he started for the 
 Court to plead his own cause, his strength proved 
 to be completely unequal to the journey. So 
 nothing remained for him but to urge his claims 
 by letter, and to trust to the intercession of one 
 or two zealous friends, who spared no pains to 
 get him righted. But Ferdinand listened coldly 
 to all his complaints. Full justice he was resolved 
 not to render to one whose greatness and services 
 were beyond all rivalry ; so he tried to avoid the 
 subject, or returned shabby and evasive answers. 
 Isabella's Isabella, meanwhile, was disabled 
 
 death, Dy sickness, and, before Columbus had 
 
 Nov. 26th. ' , - o - i • -. 
 
 been a month in bpam, ne received 
 
 the sad tidings of her death. His early patroness, 
 — his steady friend, — who loved him for his 
 own sake, and for his noble deeds, — who hated 
 wrong in every shape, — she would never listen 
 again to his straightforward tale of truth, nor 
 cheer him with her benignant smile when every 
 cloud of suspicion was removed. He seemed now 
 to be left alone in a land of jealous strangers. 
 
COLUMBUS. 301 
 
 Ferdinand was left more free to act according to 
 his mean and selfish nature. Yet the loyalty of 
 Columbus never wavered. Writing to his son, 
 Diego, who was then at Court, he says, " The 
 next thing " (after commending the soul of the 
 Queen " affectionately and with great devotion " 
 to God) " is to watch and labour in all matters 
 for the service of our Sovereign, the King, and 
 to endeavour to alleviate his grief. His Majesty 
 is the head of Christendom. Remember the 
 proverb which says, when the head suffers, all the 
 members suffer. Therefore, all good Christians 
 should pray for his health and long life, and we, 
 who are in his employ, ought more than others to 
 do this with all study and diligence." 
 
 In the following May he found his j^st visit 
 way to Segovia, where the Court was t0 Court - 
 residing. Again his story was told in the royal 
 presence, — all he had seen on the Continent of 
 America, — all he had suffered in Jamaica, — the 
 troubles and discontents of Hispaniola, with his 
 own losses and the wrongs of the gentle, deeply- 
 suffering natives. But no generous emotion was 
 stirred in the breast of Ferdinand, and no progress 
 was made towards the restoration of Columbus 
 to his government. The King's resolve was 
 taken, and he would as soon have parted with 
 
302 COLUMBUS. 
 
 Castile or Aragon, as have given back Hispaniola 
 on the terms of the original grant. Months were 
 consumed by Columbus in fruitless attendance 
 upon the Court; Cardinal Ximenes, Ferdinand's 
 chief adviser, gave him fair speeches like his 
 master; the pecuniary claims were referred to a 
 Council, who met and decided nothing. All 
 knew that the great Admiral was regarded as a 
 troublesome petitioner, whose work was done, 
 and whose services were no longer wanted. 
 
 ,„«„ Columbus's constitutional disease, 
 
 a.d. 1505. 
 
 the gout, at last ended his importunity, 
 and confined him to his chamber. From thence 
 he wrote, claiming the government for his son 
 Diego, according to the terms of the original 
 grant. (i This," he said, " is a matter which 
 concerns my honour; as to all the rest, do as 
 your Majesty thinks proper; give or withhold, 
 as may be most for your interest, and I shall be 
 content." That request was denied, like every 
 other ; and then he was pressed to forego his 
 claim, and to receive in exchange honours and 
 estates in Castile. But he would be no party to 
 his own forfeiture; so, when he found his So- 
 vereign was immoveable, he ceased to trouble 
 him more. " I have done all that I could do," 
 he wrote at last to his steady friend, Diego de 
 
COLUMBUS. 303 
 
 Deza ; " it appears that his Majesty does not 
 think fit to fulfil that which he, with the Queen 
 who is now in glory, has promised me by # word 
 and seal. For me to contend for the contrary, 
 would be to contend with the wind." 
 
 On Ascension Day, in the follow- A . . Kne 
 
 A. D. lo(Jo. 
 
 ins; year, the 20th of May, his troubled Death of 
 
 i t -r-r • i ii i Columbus. 
 
 course was ended. Having done all that 
 duty and affection required, and made a careful dis- 
 position of his affairs by will, attended by his son 
 Diego and a few faithful friends, he commended 
 his spirit to God in the dying words of his 
 Redeemer. As the living man had been neglected, 
 so little respect was paid to his remains. Strangely 
 enough, it seemed as if his dust, like himself, 
 could find no resting-place. No monumental 
 honours were given him in his adopted country, 
 except an epitaph, contained in a single couplet, 
 which was inscribed upon his tomb by Ferdi- 
 nand * ; and, thirty years after his death, his 
 bones were disinterred and carried over the sea, 
 in the old track, to Hispaniola, — thence to be 
 removed, at a yet later day, to Cuba. In the 
 city of Havanna, where the flag of Spain still 
 
 * POR CASTTLLA Y POB LEON 
 
 NUEVO MUKDO HALLO COLON. 
 
 For Castile and Leon Columbus found a New World. 
 
304 COLUMBUS. 
 
 waves, all that remains of the great Columbus 
 found a lasting grave.* 
 
 " I have reached the point," he once wrote in 
 the day of his adversity, " that there is no man 
 so vile but thinks it his right to insult me. If I 
 had plundered the Indies, even to the country 
 where is the fabled altar of St. Peter, and had 
 given them all to the Moors, they could not have 
 shown towards me more bitter enmity than they 
 have done in Spain. The time will come when the 
 world will reckon it a virtue to him who has not 
 given his consent to their abuse." That time 
 has come ; and Europe and America delight to 
 give honour to his name. Not only because his 
 genius and energy broke through the barrier 
 which once parted the Old World and the New, 
 — not only because he stands at the head of that 
 noble band, unequalled, almost, for heroic bravery 
 and indomitable patience and magnanimous self- 
 devotion, who, in successive centuries, have had 
 the " ocean-sea closed with such mighty chains " 
 for their field of triumph, — but yet more for all 
 that was great and generous in his aims, — for his 
 desire to bless mankind with knowledge and 
 
 
 ■&' 
 
 * See NOTE (Y). 
 
COLUMBUS. 305 
 
 religion, — for his fatherly care over the gentle 
 and suffering race whose bonds he meant to be 
 those of grateful love, — for his patience and 
 self-command under accumulated wrongs, — for 
 the piety which gave elevation to his projects, 
 and lifted him far above the vulgar herd of ad- 
 venturers who followed in his track, — millions 
 on both sides of the Atlantic give him the 
 greeting of their honest praise. One of the 
 greatest works, all things considered, that have 
 been wrought by individual effort since men were 
 scattered over the earth, it was the will of Pro- 
 vidence to commit to one of the world's greatest 
 men ; and what he was raised up to do, he ac- 
 complished with singular uprightness, and with 
 marvellous success. 
 
 The reader who wishes for fuller details will find 
 them in the following works : — 
 
 Washington Irving's Life and Voyages or 
 Columbus, in four octavo volumes, of which there is 
 a valuable epitome, made by the author himself, in one 
 smaller volume. 
 
 The Second Book of Robertson's History of 
 America is another version of the same story, for 
 which thousands of the existing generation, and the 
 X 
 
306 COLUMBUS. 
 
 last, have felt deeply grateful to the writer, when 
 they first made acquaintance with Columbus in his 
 pages, and followed him in that memorable voyage 
 across the Atlantic. 
 
 The First Volume of Herrera's History of the 
 West Indies supplies much that is interesting in a 
 simple, unpretending style. 
 
 A valuable publication of modern times is one of 
 the Volumes of the Hakluyt Society, containing the 
 Select Letters of Columbus, in which his four 
 voyages are described by himself. 
 
 Mr. Prescott's able and interesting work on Fer- 
 dinand and Isabella leaves nothing to be desired on 
 that part of the History. 
 
 Columbus's son, Fernando, wrote a life of his 
 father, called the History of the Admiral, which 
 has never been translated. 
 
 The fullest Collection of original documents bearing 
 on all points connected with the Discoverer is in a 
 publication of the present century, by Navarrete, 
 a Spanish writer. This Mr. Irving thought of trans- 
 lating, in the first instance, but ultimately wrote his 
 own Memoir instead, availing himself largely of the 
 materials which it supplied. 
 
 Those who wish to see how Columbus was regarded 
 in his own age will find much respecting him in Las 
 Casas' Relation des Voyages et des Decouvertes 
 des Espagnols, and in Peter Martyr's Letters, 
 both writers having been personally known to him. 
 
 
NOTES AND ILLUSTKATIONS. 
 
 NOTE (Q). Page 195. 
 
 In the year 1482, before Luther was born, 
 Pope Sixtus the Fourth conferred a rich see in 
 Spain on his nephew, Isabella having designed it 
 for her chaplain, a man of piety and learning. 
 An ambassador was despatched to Rome with 
 the remonstrances of the Queen, and returned 
 with an answer from His Holiness that, as Head 
 of the Church, he had an absolute right to dis- 
 pose of ecclesiastical benefices at his pleasure, 
 and was not bound to consult the humour of any 
 earthly potentate. Isabella, devotee as she was, 
 would not brook language or usage like this, and 
 commanded all her subjects to leave Rome. 
 Ecclesiastics, as well as laymen, obeyed ; and the 
 Spanish sovereigns, being thus forcibly reminded 
 of the insolence and rapacity of the Papal Court, 
 began to talk of a General Council to set things 
 right. The sound was ominous to one like 
 Sixtus, and a Legate was despatched from Rome 
 to make concessions ; but to his surprise he re- 
 ceived a peremptory order to quit the kingdom 
 without delay. There was no swaggering, then, 
 about St. Peter and the Supremacy, — no threat- 
 ened excommunication, — no re-assertion of the 
 Pope's right to do with Spain and its wealth as 
 x 2 
 
308 COLUMBUS. 
 
 he pleased. The ambassador became very humble, 
 and begged in the most submissive terms for an 
 audience, which was granted on the interposition 
 of Cardinal Mendoza, Isabella's principal adviser. 
 The Queen was firm, and carried her point ; for a 
 Bull came shortly afterwards from Rome, conferring 
 the vacant Bishopric on the man of her choice, and 
 pledging the Pope to attend to her nomination in 
 future. The consequence was that, instead of the 
 Pope's nephews and others, who understood not a 
 word of Spanish, and came, like foreign adven- 
 turers, to live on plunder, natives of high character 
 and qualifications were promoted to vacant sees. 
 Isabella the Catholic had no confidence in 
 the Pope's infallible judgment as respected Epis- 
 copal qualifications, but wisely, and much to her 
 people's gain, preferred her own. 
 
 NOTE (R). Page 196. 
 
 Mr. Prescott kindles into enthusiasm as he 
 describes the virtues and achievements of this 
 noble-minded Q.ueen ; and there is something ex- 
 ceedingly interesting in the thought that a worthy 
 monument to her fame has been erected by a 
 native of that country which she helped to bring 
 within the pale of civilization. 
 
 " If there be any being on earth," he says, 
 " that may be permitted to remind us of the 
 Deity himself, it is the ruler of a mighty empire 
 who employs the high powers entrusted to him 
 exclusively for the benefit of his people, — who, 
 endowed with intellectual gifts corresponding to 
 
NOTES. 309 
 
 his station, in an age of comparative barbarism, 
 endeavours to impart to his land the light of 
 civilization which illumines his own bosom, and 
 to create from the elements of discord the beau- 
 tiful fabric of social order. Such was Isabella ; 
 and such the age in which she lived." 
 
 NOTE(S). Page 211. 
 
 Columbus never forgot his obligations to the 
 "two friars," but took every opportunity of 
 mentioning them with honour. In a letter de- 
 scribing his third voyage he classes them with 
 the King and Queen as having given him credit 
 and encouragement when all the world was 
 against him. The passage is worth quoting, as a 
 specimen of the modest, unpretending tone in 
 which his own triumphs were referred to. 
 
 " The Blessed Trinity moved your Highnesses 
 to the encouragement of this enterprise to the 
 Indies, and of His infinite goodness has made me 
 your messenger therein. Those who heard of it 
 looked upon it as impossible, for they fixed all 
 their hopes on the favours of fortune, and pinned 
 their faith solely upon chance. I gave to the 
 subject six or seven years of great anxiety, ex- 
 plaining to the best of my ability how great ser- 
 vice might be done to our Lord by this under- 
 taking, in promulgating His sacred name and our 
 holy faith among so many nations, — an enter- 
 prise so excellent in itself, and so calculated to 
 enhance the glory, and immortalize the renown, of 
 
 the greatest sovereign And, finally, your 
 
 Highnesses came to the determination that the 
 x 3 
 
310 COLUMBUS. 
 
 undertaking should be entered upon. In this 
 your Highnesses exhibited the noble spirit which 
 has been always manifested by you on every 
 great subject ; for all others who had thought of 
 the matter, or heard it spoken of, unanimously 
 treated it with contempt, with the exception of 
 two friars, who always remained constant in their 
 belief of its practicability. I, myself, in spite of 
 fatiguing opposition, felt sure that the enterprise 
 would nevertheless prosper, and continue equally 
 confident of it to this day, because it is a truth 
 that, though every thing will pass away, the Word 
 of God will not ; and I believe that every pro- 
 spect which I hold out will be accomplished ; for 
 it was clearly predicted concerning these lands, by 
 the mouth of the prophet Isaiah, in many places 
 in Scripture, that from Spain the holy name of 
 God was to be spread abroad." — Letters of 
 Columbus, pp. 104 — 106. 
 
 NOTE (T). Page 224. 
 
 Robertson, relying on one uncertain authority, 
 Oviedo, adds to the romance of this part of the 
 voyage by representing Columbus as having 
 pledged himself to his mutinous crew to turn 
 back if he did not find land in three days. This 
 promise, according to his account, was given on 
 the 10th, the next day but one before they 
 landed on St. Salvador. Of course, one inclines 
 to the tale which brings things so completely to 
 a crisis, and makes us follow the track of the 
 vessels on the succeeding day with almost breath- 
 less interest. But there is no doubt that this is 
 
NOTES. 311 
 
 a spurious addition to the narrative, which needs 
 no adornment or exaggeration. Columbus him- 
 self never alludes to this supposed capitulation. 
 His son Ferdinand, in his " History of the Ad- 
 miral," is silent about it. Not a word is breathed 
 about any occurrence of the sort by Peter Martyr, 
 or by Las Casas, both of whom knew Columbus. 
 Nay, Columbus's own journal has an entry which 
 shows that at the very time specified he repeated 
 his determination to persevere at all hazards. 
 
 NOTE (U). Page 234. 
 
 Another messenger seems to have been sent 
 from Lisbon, a few days afterwards, with a full 
 report of his voyage and its results. It is ad- 
 dressed to the royal Treasurer ; and for simplicity 
 of style, and the absence of a vainglorious spirit, 
 it may be compared to the Duke of Wellington's 
 despatches announcing his own victories. The 
 commencement is as follows : — 
 
 " Knowing that it will afford you pleasure to 
 learn that I have brought my undertaking to 
 a successful termination, I have decided upon 
 writing you this letter to acquaint you with all 
 the events which have occurred in my voyage, 
 and the discoveries which have resulted from it. 
 Thirty-three days after my departure from Cadiz*, 
 
 * This is a very obvious error which has crept into the 
 Latin copies of the letter, the time occupied in the voyage 
 having been seventy days. The editor of the " Letters " 
 conjectures that Cadiz should be Gomera, one of the Canary 
 Islands, from which Columbus set sail on the 6th. Possibly, 
 Ferro should be substituted, which he passed on the 9th, 
 x 4 
 
312 COLUMBUS. 
 
 I reached the Indian sea, where I discovered many- 
 islands, thickly peopled, of which I took possession 
 without resistance, in the name of our most illus- 
 trious Monarch, by public proclamation, and with 
 unfurled banners. To the first of the islands, 
 which is called by the Indians Guanahani, I gave 
 the name of the blessed Saviour (San Salvador), 
 relying upon whose protection I had reached this 
 as well as the other islands ; to each of these I 
 also gave a name, ordering that one should be 
 called Santa Maria de la Concepcion, another 
 Fernandina, the third Isabella, the fourth Juana, 
 and so with all the rest respectively." — Letters, 
 pp. 1,2. 
 
 The conclusion is in another strain ; and coming 
 from such a man, at such a time, is singularly 
 interesting and beautiful : — 
 
 " Although all that I have related may appear 
 to be wonderful and unheard of, yet the results 
 of my voyage would have been more astonishing if 
 I had had at my disposal such ships as I required. 
 But these great and marvellous results are not to 
 be attributed to any merit of mine, but to the 
 holy Christian faith, and to the piety and religion 
 of our Sovereigns; for that which the unaided 
 intellect of man could not compass, the Spirit of 
 God has granted to human exertions, for God is 
 wont to hear the prayers of his servants who love 
 his precepts even to the performance of apparent 
 impossibilities. Thus it has happened to me in 
 the present instance, who have accomplished a 
 
 and which was the last land that he saw till he reached St. 
 Salvador. Between the 9th of September and the 12th of 
 October there is the precise interval of thirty-three days. 
 
NOTES. 313 
 
 task to which the powers of mortal men had 
 never hitherto attained; for if there have been 
 those who have anywhere written or spoken of 
 these islands, they have clone so with doubts and 
 conjectures, and no one has ever asserted that he 
 has seen them, on which account their writings 
 have been looked upon as little else than fables. 
 Therefore, let the King and Queen, our Princes, 
 and their most happy kingdoms, and all the other 
 provinces of Christendom, render thanks to our 
 Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, who has granted 
 us so great a victory and such prosperity. Let 
 processions be made, and sacred feasts be held, 
 and the temples be adorned with festive boughs. 
 Let Christ rejoice on earth, as he rejoices in 
 heaven, in the prospect of the salvation of the 
 souls of so many nations hitherto lost. Let us 
 also rejoice, as well on account of the exaltation 
 of our faith, as on account of the increase of our 
 temporal prosperity, of which not only Spain, but 
 all Christendom, will be partakers. 
 
 " Such are the events which I have briefly de- 
 scribed. Farewell, 
 
 " Christopher Columbus, 
 Admiral of the Fleet of 
 the Ocean. 
 
 " Lisbon. The 14th of March." 
 
 Letters, pp. 16, 17. 
 
 NOTE (V). Page 262. 
 
 Columbus's speculations and reasonings on this 
 subject are very curious. Certainly, he had ad- 
 
314 COLUMBUS. 
 
 vantages for investigating the other hemisphere 
 which Aristotle had not ; but why " one part of 
 the world ought to be loftier and nearer the sky 
 than the other," neither the philosopher nor the 
 navigator have told us. 
 
 66 On these grounds, therefore, I affirm that 
 the globe is not spherical, but that there is the 
 difference in its form which I have described; 
 the which is to be found in this hemisphere, at 
 the point where the Indies meet the ocean, the 
 extremity of the hemisphere being below the 
 Equinoctial line. And a great confirmation of 
 this is, that when our Lord made the sun, the first 
 light appeared in the first point of the East, where 
 the most elevated point of the globe is. And 
 although it was the opinion of Aristotle that the 
 Antarctic Pole, or the land which is below it, 
 was the highest part of the world, and the nearest 
 to the heavens, other philosophers oppose him, 
 and say, that the highest part was below the 
 Arctic Pole ; by which reasoning it appears that 
 they understood that one part of the world ought 
 to be loftier, and nearer the sky, than the other ; 
 but it never struck them that it might be under 
 the Equinoctial, in the way that I have said, 
 which is not to be wondered at, because they 
 had no certain knowledge respecting this hemi- 
 sphere, but merely vague suppositions, for no one 
 has ever gone or been sent to investigate the 
 matter, until your Highnesses sent me to explore 
 both the sea and the land." — Letters, pp. 133, 134. 
 
NOTES. 315 
 
 NOTE (X). Page 283. 
 
 The description of this storm, and of Columbus's 
 own mind at the time, given in his own simple 
 language, is deeply affecting. Yet was it but 
 one passage in a life of storms : — " My ships 
 lay exposed, with sails torn, and anchors, rigging, 
 cables, boats, and a great quantity of provisions, 
 lost ; my people were very weak and humbled 
 in spirit, many of them promising to lead a reli- 
 gious life, and all making vows and promising 
 to perform pilgrimages, while some of them would 
 frequently go to their messmates to make con- 
 fession. Other tempests have been experienced, 
 but never of so long a duration, or so fearful, as 
 this : many, whom we looked upon as brave men, 
 on several occasions showed considerable trepi- 
 dation ; but the distress of my son, who was with 
 me, grieved me to the soul, and the more, when 
 I considered his tender age, for he was but 
 thirteen years old, and he enduring so much toil 
 for so long a time. Our Lord, however, gave 
 him strength even to enable him to encourage 
 the rest, and he worked as if he had been eighty 
 years at sea ; and all this was a consolation to me. 
 I myself had fallen sick, and was many times 
 at the point of death, but from a little cabin, that 
 I caused to be constructed on deck, I directed 
 our course. My brother was in the ship that 
 was in the worst condition, and most exposed to 
 danger; and my grief on this account was the 
 greater that I had brought him with me against 
 his will. Another anxiety wrung my very heart- 
 strings, which was the thought of my son Diego, 
 
316 COLUMBUS. 
 
 whom I had left an orphan in Spain, and stripped 
 of the honour and property which were due to 
 him on my account, although I had looked upon 
 it as a certainty, that your Majesties, as just and 
 grateful princes, would restore it to him in all 
 respects with increase." — Letters, pp, 172, 173. 
 
 XOTE (Y). Page 304. 
 
 The last removal was so late as the year 1795, 
 when Hayti was transferred by treaty from the 
 Spaniards to the French. The Spanish Admiral, 
 who was engaged in the formal surrender of the 
 island, claimed the mortal remains of Columbus 
 as a relic which, of right, belonged to Spain, and 
 the demand was at once acceded to by the French 
 authorities. The transfer to Cuba was effected 
 with much of religious pomp and solemnity, masses 
 being performed in the principal cathedrals of 
 both islands, and the highest civil and eccle- 
 siastical authorities being gathered round the 
 gilded case in which the bones had been collected. 
 Men of the first distinction carried the coffin on 
 board ; and thus freighted, while symbols of 
 mourning hung from the masts and rigging, a 
 brigantine, called the Discoverer, sailed out of 
 the port of St. Domingo, — that St. Domingo 
 from which, nearly three centuries before, the 
 living man had sailed in chains. 
 
THE REFORMATION AGE 
 AND LUTHEE. 
 
THE REFORMATION AGE. 319 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE REFORMATION AGE. 
 
 The death of Columbus brings us to the opening 
 of the sixteenth century ; and to every thoughtful 
 observer, at that period, it must have been quite 
 plain that a new asra in the world's history had 
 begun. As each age is the parent of the next, 
 what had been done in the fifteenth could not fail 
 to produce immensely important results to the 
 nations of Europe. That marvellous book-cre- 
 ating power was sure to multiply scholars of a 
 certain kind, almost indefinitely. A little handful 
 of men could no longer exercise their old sway, as 
 having the exclusive possession of the records of 
 past times. The relations between the Clergy and 
 the Laity would be completely altered. A power 
 would necessarily grow up, quite apart from terri- 
 torial and military power, — the power of educated 
 and intelligent minds, not wedded, as hitherto, 
 to Church authority, or confined within priestly 
 bounds. 
 
 Then, too, Columbus's great achievement had 
 an effect immensely beyond the addition of vast 
 
320 THE REFORMATION AGE. 
 
 colonial possessions to some European kingdoms. 
 Besides the newly explored ocean, and the islands 
 which were scattered over it, there was an un- 
 explored world beyond, and thither men flocked 
 across the Atlantic in search of adventure or of 
 gold. The boldest spirits caught eagerly at such 
 an inviting field of enterprise. Columbus's early 
 descriptions, all given in good faith, made his 
 beloved island look like an earthly paradise ; and 
 when that dream was over, and the real truth 
 came out, there was still enough to stimulate 
 curiosity and kindle enthusiasm, and stir the 
 noblest and basest passions of man's nature. So 
 to the young, the aspiring, and the reckless, of the 
 next generation, the West was the land of pro- 
 mise, and other nations soon began to share with 
 Spain the glory and the shame connected with 
 the conquest of the New World. Improvement 
 in nautical science, and the growth of commercial 
 power, were the- necessary results. The inter- 
 vening ocean was crossed and re- crossed as easily 
 and safely as the smaller seas had been in the 
 preceding century. Fleets were fitted out from 
 Spain ; while from Portugal and England, and 
 other maritime countries, the captains of single 
 vessels, chartered by the Crown, sailed on their 
 several tracks, or little bands of daring men 
 
THE REFORMATION AGE. 321 
 
 joined company, and began to rove far and wide 
 through the Western seas. 
 
 Soon, too, the field of enterprise p r0 gress of 
 became immensely widened, as new dlscov ery. 
 discoveries were reported, new oceans explored, 
 and new empires founded. In the year 1500 
 Cabral, a Portuguese, having started for India, 
 and taken a more westerly course than usual, 
 lighted on Brazil. In 1513, Balboa, a Spaniard, 
 having crossed the Isthmus of Darien, climbed a 
 mountain range from which the natives assured 
 him that he would see a boundless ocean ; and, 
 having ascended the last height alone, feasted his 
 eyes with the vast Pacific, glittering in the 
 morning sun ; then, descending to the shore, and 
 plunging knee-deep into the water, he claimed 
 sea and land together for the Crown of Spain. 
 In 1520, Magellan, a Portuguese by birth, 
 though in the Spanish service, reached the same 
 Ocean, after sailing through the straits which 
 bear his name ; and though the commander himself, 
 after reaching the Philippine Islands, perished, 
 like our Captain Cook, in a conflict with the 
 natives, one of his vessels, out of the five which 
 left Spain, completed the circumnavigation of the 
 globe, and reached Seville after a voyage of three 
 
322 THE REFORMATION AGE. 
 
 years' duration. During the same period, Cortes 
 was winning Mexico for Spain, — having landed 
 on the American continent in the year that 
 Magellan sailed, and completed his marvellous 
 conquest before the survivors of the expedition 
 returned to the mother country. In 1531, 
 Pizarro sailed with his three small vessels and a 
 hundred and eighty men from Panama to con- 
 quer Peru, and, in little more than two years, 
 after taking the Inca, or reigning Sovereign, in 
 battle, and trying and executing him for idolatry, 
 concubinage and rebellion, remained master of 
 the country. 
 
 Another remarkable feature of the 
 
 Growing . 
 
 power of next age was the consolidation and 
 rapid growth of many of the great 
 European kingdoms. Wars of Succession were 
 over ; religious wars had not yet begun ; and, in 
 the interval, monarchs became more powerful, and 
 had a much greater command of resources. Eng- 
 land gave up the hope of conquering France, 
 and under the Tudor rule, — with its industry 
 protected, its trade expanding, and its wealth 
 no longer drained by foreign or domestic wars, 
 — began to take a far more prominent and 
 influential part in European politics. France, 
 
THE REFORMATION AGE. 323 
 
 under Louis XL, had grown to be a great mo- 
 narchy, no longer checked and controlled by- 
 princes who had all but sovereign rights; and 
 factions like those of Orleans and Burgundy had 
 ceased to divide and disgrace their common 
 country. Spain, united, in a sense, under Fer- 
 dinand and Isabella, became yet more closely 
 compacted under their descendants, and with the 
 addition of the Indies, as its colonial possessions 
 were called, would have been a rich inheritance 
 for Charles V., if no other kingdom had descended 
 to him from his ancestors. 
 
 Spain, however, was but a fragment of the vast 
 empire which became subject to his sway, and 
 which, by a strange combination of events, grew 
 to an almost portentous size. Europe had seen 
 nothing like it since Charlemagne, and saw no- 
 thing like it again till Napoleon began to dis- 
 tribute crowns among his generals and kinsmen. 
 It seemed as if princes and princesses had made 
 conquests and contracted alliances, had lived, 
 married, and died, on purpose to build up an 
 empire for this strangely- endowed child of for- 
 tune. Burgundy and Flanders were his, because 
 Charles the Bold, the last Duke, left no issue but 
 a daughter, who became the wife of Maximilian, 
 Emperor of Germany, and Maximilian was 
 x 2 
 
324 THE KEFORMATION AGE. 
 
 Charles's grandfather. Spain became his, be- 
 cause his mother, Joanna, having survived her 
 brother and elder sister, remained the heiress of 
 Ferdinand and Isabella, and so brought Castile 
 and Aragon as her dowry to the Archduke Philip, 
 Charles's father. Naples and Sicily were his, 
 because the French had driven out the reigning 
 family, and Ferdinand, who was the King's ne- 
 phew, having reconquered them for his kinsman, 
 basely kept them for himself. To this splendid 
 inheritance Charles had succeeded before he was 
 sixteen ; and three years later, after months of 
 expectation, and a series of intrigues and nego- 
 tiations which agitated every court in Europe, 
 
 the unanimous voice of the Electors 
 A.D. 1519. , . . _ . . 
 
 gave mm the Imperial crown. 
 
 Thus order was succeeding to anarchy in the 
 kingdoms we have named. The enormous influ- 
 ence of the great barons, which had grown up 
 under the feudal system, was greatly reduced. 
 The power of the sword was wielded by the head 
 of the state, and larger armies were collected, 
 and better discipline was enforced, as the royal 
 revenues became more fixed and certain. At 
 the same time, much was gained to the mo- 
 narchies of Europe, during the age we speak of, 
 by reo'ularity of succession, and the absence of 
 
THE REFORMATION AGE. 325 
 
 revolutionary wars. In England, the beginning 
 of the preceding century had found an usurper, 
 Henry IV, just seated on the throne. His 
 grandson, Henry VI., was deposed, restored, 
 again deposed, and at last died in the Tower, 
 surviving by a few days the assassination of his 
 heir. Edward IV., after winning the kingdom, 
 flying from it for his life, and then winning it 
 back again, died in peace, bequeathing the crown 
 to his child. But the murder of one king in the 
 Tower, and the miserable end of his guilty suc- 
 cessor on Bosworth Field, closed the list of royal 
 victims ; and then a long peace followed the fatal 
 wars which had been marked by twelve pitched 
 battles on the soil of England. During the whole 
 of the sixteenth century, we find Henry VII., 
 his son and his three grandchildren, sitting, un- 
 challenged, on the throne of England. The same 
 thing; W as seen in France. From the accession 
 of Francis I.*, in the year 1515, he and his 
 descendants held undisputed possession of the 
 crown for seventy-four years, — the reigning 
 sovereigns up to the death of Henry III. being 
 his son, Henry II., and his three grandchildren. 
 Before the end of this period, a new cause of 
 dissension had sprung up ; but, during the fifty 
 
 * See NOTE (Z> 
 y 3, 
 
326 THE REFORMATION AGE. 
 
 years which preceded the breaking out of the 
 religious wars, the country grew rapidly in 
 strength and prosperity. Spain, we have al- 
 ready said, had seen rival claimants to the throne, 
 in the time of Isabella and her father; but no 
 such scenes were repeated in the century that 
 followed, and the close of it saw her descendant 
 of the fourth generation, Philip III., peacefully 
 ascend the throne of his ancestors. Lastly, in 
 Germany only one Emperor had succeeded his 
 father between 1400 and 1493, and that was the 
 last of them, Maximilian ; but the more pacific 
 age was occupied by the reigns of himself, his two 
 grandsons, Charles and Ferdinand, and the son 
 and grandson of the last. 
 
 This growing power of the mo- 
 
 Lesseimig ° or 
 
 influence of narchies of Europe was sure to be 
 felt at Rome. The encroachments 
 and exactions of successive Popes became in- 
 tolerable to Sovereigns who were more inde- 
 pendent of their help than formerly, and many 
 protests were heard, and much of active oppo- 
 sition to the Church's claims was stirred up, 
 before her doctrine began to be assailed. " It is 
 common," says Ranke, iQ to represent the Papal 
 authority as nearly unlimited up to the time of 
 the Reformation; but the fact is that the civil 
 
THE REFORMATION AGE. 327 
 
 governments had possessed themselves of no small 
 share of ecclesiastical rights and privileges as early 
 as the beginning of the sixteenth, or even the 
 latter part of the fifteenth, century." It is com- 
 mon with Roman Catholics, moreover, to repre- 
 sent Christendom as looking up with reverence 
 to the Chair of St. Peter, till Luther poisoned 
 men's minds with heresies, and taught them to 
 speak profanely about sacred things and persons. 
 But the fact is that many besides Luther, and 
 before him, were quite as plain-spoken ; and it is no 
 hard matter to condemn the Popes of that age by 
 witnesses who passed for good sons of the Church 
 to their dying day. " The Pope," said the Em- 
 peror Maximilian one day, " has used me like a 
 rogue. I can fairly say that I have never found 
 sincerity or good faith in any Pope I have met 
 with ; but, please God, I hope this will be the 
 last of them." Erasmus, the first scholar of his 
 age, lived and died in the Romish communion. 
 When the time of conflict came, the Church 
 reckoned him amongst her champions ; yet his 
 writings tell a tale of ecclesiastical corruptions, 
 which made some vigorous reformation neces- 
 sary if the Church was to retain the respect of 
 an intelligent and enquiring age. The frauds 
 and trickeries connected with saint-worship and 
 
 T 4 
 
328 THE [REFORMATION AGE. 
 
 image-worship, — the ignorance and laziness of 
 monks, with the arts practised by them on the 
 common people for the sake of gain, — all these 
 are unsparingly exposed in plain narrative, or in 
 biting satire ; and, certainly, if arguments were 
 wanted to justify the movement which convulsed 
 Europe from end to end before he died, they will 
 be found abundantly in his Dialogues and Letters, 
 audi Praise of Folly*, though, when the time came 
 for bold measures, the timid student shrank into 
 his cell. " Convents," he says, speaking from his 
 own experience, " were places of impiety, where 
 every thing was done to which a depraved ima- 
 gination could lead, under the sanction and mask 
 of religion." "In Churches," he writes again, 
 f e hardly any room is found for comments on the 
 gospel. The holy doctrine of Christ must be sup- 
 pressed, or interpreted contrary to its meaning, 
 for the profit of those who trade in Indulgences." 
 
 Scandals All that was done elsewhere, how- 
 
 at Koine. ever, to dishonour religion, and make 
 men wonder or weep at the desecration of holy 
 things, was as nothing compared with what was 
 allowed and practised at Rome itself. Popes 
 grew bolder in impiety, and plunged deeper into 
 
 * See NOTE (A A), 
 
THE KEFORMATION AGE. 329 
 
 crime. Men were raised up, and permitted to 
 rule the Church in Christ's name, who, not only- 
 had no pretence of saintliness about them, but 
 were utterly shameless in their vices. It seemed 
 as if the patience and credulity of mankind were 
 to be tried to the uttermost, — the claim to in- 
 fallibility being associated with daring profligacy 
 and self-seeking ambition which were a perfect 
 scandal to Christendom. While Luther grew up 
 from infancy to manhood, three Popes in suc- 
 cession sat in the chair of St. Peter, whose his- 
 tory, by itself, would furnish a complete apology 
 for the Reformation. Ingeniously, we may say, 
 they contrived to exhibit the naked deformity of 
 the system in which vices like theirs could coexist 
 with spiritual pretensions of the most exalted 
 kind. A bare statement of what was seen in the 
 Holy City through a single generation, while the 
 Papal sovereignty was still unchallenged, will 
 show to what an extent the common sense of 
 mankind had been shocked, and their moral feel- 
 ings outraged, when they began to demand some- 
 thing that should better satisfy their consciences. 
 
 In the year 1484 the Cardinals were innocent 
 mustered to elect a successor to Sixtus vHX 
 IV. The usual amount of intrigue succeeded, 
 and more than the usual amount of bribery. 
 
330 THE REFORMATION AGE. 
 
 One busy Cardinal, Julian della Rovera, had ar- 
 ranged the price of every vote. Faith was kept 
 on both sides ; Innocent VIII. was elected ; and 
 castles and benefices were divided among his 
 friends. Pope's nephews had become notorious by 
 this time, ecclesiastical dignities and revenues 
 being heaped upon them without scruple ; but the 
 new Pontiff quartered another class of pensioners 
 on the Church. Seven bastard sons by different 
 mistresses were publicly owned by him, and most 
 of them endowed like princes. One of these had 
 a brother-in-law, the son of the famous Lorenzo 
 de Medici ; and, in the wantonness of power, 
 Innocent made him a Cardinal at thirteen. The 
 only proof of vigour or public spirit which marked 
 an inglorious reign was an appeal to the Princes 
 of Christendom, to unite in a Crusade against the 
 Infidels ; and the only result of it was a certain 
 amount of treasure which flowed into his coffers, 
 and was consumed in pomp and state. His avarice 
 had made him odious to the Roman people ; their 
 curses pursued him to the grave ; and when the 
 College met to choose their ruler, their hall was 
 protected by soldiers and cannon. 
 Alexan- Two candidates distanced all compe- 
 
 der VI. titors ; each of them the nephew of a 
 Pope,— Roderic Borgia, and the same busy, clever, 
 
THE REFOEMATION AGE. 331 
 
 and aspiring Julian della Eovera. The first was 
 a man whose scandalous immoralities were the talk 
 of Eome ; but he was the oldest and the richest. 
 In case of his election, three Archbishoprics in 
 Spain, and numerous benefices scattered over 
 Europe, would be vacated and dispensed among 
 his friends. So the younger Cardinal was left 
 for another time ; and Alexander VI., the worst 
 man that ever filled the Papal throne, ^ jnn 
 
 r A. D. 1493. 
 
 had the majority of voices. Then came 
 the distribution of gifts among his creatures, — his 
 palace to one, — an abbey, with its rich dependen- 
 cies, to another, — a bishopric to a third, with costly 
 furniture and delicious wines. His children, like 
 those of his predecessor, were numerous ; and, with 
 unstinted bounty, he placed them on a level with 
 the nobles of Rome. His daughter's marriage 
 was celebrated in the Vatican with lavish magni- 
 ficence ; and all his energies and resources were 
 soon expended in seconding the ambitious schemes 
 of his son, the famous Caesar Borgia. In an age 
 when wickedness was almost licensed, and any 
 scruples about the means of attaining power passed 
 with most for unmanly weakness, this man at- 
 tained to a bad pre-eminence in guilt, and stands 
 out as the representative of a class whom courage 
 and genius and opportunity made utterly reckless 
 
332 THE REFORMATION AGE. 
 
 and shameless, as if to show how much some could 
 dare, and others endure, in a land where good 
 and evil were utterly confounded, and shrines 
 and sanctuaries had become places of pollution. 
 Not content with ruling Rome by terror, hired 
 bravoes being his ministers, and his father's name 
 his tower of strength, he aspired to an independent 
 Sovereignty over the States of the Church, and, 
 by cruelty of the fiercest, or treachery of the 
 basest, kind, cleared out of his path the great 
 families who had made head against successive 
 Popes, and maintained a rival influence in their 
 respective cities. Cautious historians, Ranke 
 among the number, report that he had his own 
 brother murdered and thrown into the Tiber, the 
 cause of hatred making even that crime more 
 hideous ; others pause, and doubt the conclusive- 
 ness of the evidence on this point, but with no 
 thought of the charge being in itself improbable. 
 His brother-in-law was certainly one of his victims. 
 He was attacked on the steps of the palace, but 
 escaped with life ; then, while sheltered under 
 the Pope's roof *, and nursed by his wife and sister, 
 
 * Perhaps the most extraordinary spectacle ever wit- 
 nessed during the Christian era, all things considered, — 
 taking into account the Romish claims as to the Papal su- 
 premacy and the Romish doctrine of clerical celibacy, — 
 
THE REFORMATION AGE. 333 
 
 his chamber was invaded by Caesar, who first 
 drove out the ladies, and then made sure work by- 
 having the wounded man strangled before his 
 eyes. There is no need that we should settle 
 what share Alexander had in his son's crimes, — 
 how many he encouraged, or how many he de- 
 plored. The excuse cannot be made that holy 
 men have had undutiful children, and that the 
 sternest justice cannot turn their heaviest misfor- 
 tunes into crimes. Just as we know that the 
 father ruled, and the son killed and plundered 
 and ran riot in crime, so certainly does History 
 record that the younger Borgia was countenanced 
 and upheld by the elder in his daring and unprin- 
 cipled schemes. The old man delighted in the 
 success of his favourite child, however won, and 
 esteemed himself happy in proportion as his crimes 
 proved fruitful. Their plans and policy were the 
 same, and the power and revenues of the Church 
 
 was that which Rome presented on the days when a guard 
 was set before the door of Alexander VI. to protect the 
 husband of his own bastard daughter from the murderous 
 assault of his own bastard son. And yet the moral pheno- 
 menon is stranger still, — that this man handed on his powers 
 unimpaired to his successor, and that millions still cling to 
 a system of which it is an unquestioned dogma that in him 
 the Spirit of Truth dwelt in unusual measure for the go- 
 vernment and discipline of the Church. 
 
334 THE REFORMATION AGE. 
 
 were employed for the one object of advancing 
 the family greatness, and humbling their common 
 rivals. Alexander died by poison ; and thoughtful 
 men throughout Christendom, one fancies, must 
 have breathed more freely when they heard that 
 his disgraceful reign was ended. The poison was 
 prepared by his own orders for a Cardinal whose 
 wealth he hoped to inherit ; but one of the at- 
 tendants proved false ; or, by mistake, the wrong 
 dish was set before the Pope ; at any rate, the 
 banquet, which was intended to be a murderous 
 one, proved fatal to himself; and the Romans, 
 who gathered round his corpse when it lay in 
 state at St. Peter's, exulted like men from whom 
 some heavy burden had been removed.* 
 
 Then came a new varietv in this strange 
 Julius 3X . . 
 
 succession of rulers of Christ's Church* 
 
 There had been ambitious Popes, and dissolute 
 Popes, and Popes who were unscrupulous dis- 
 pensers of ecclesiastical revenues and dignities, 
 and Popes with little reputation for fair dealing in 
 home politics and foreign negotiations ; now Eu- 
 rope was to be astonished by the feats of a war- 
 like Pope. For a brief interval there was a hope 
 of better things, a gleam of light amidst the sur- 
 rounding gloom ; for a feeble old man, remark- 
 
 * See NOTE (B B). 
 
THE REFORMATION AGE. 335 
 
 able among the Cardinals for his virtues and 
 piety, was strangely preferred to his daring and 
 unprincipled colleagues, took the appropriate name 
 of Pius II., and then, after a reign of twenty- 
 six days, escaped by a peaceful death from scenes 
 unsuited to his nature, and from a task which was 
 beyond his strength. His successor was 
 
 J . ° A.D. 1503. 
 
 the noted Julian della Rovera, — the yet 
 more noted Julius IL, — who set himself to undo 
 what Alexander VI. had done, — namely, to recover 
 for the Church what Caesar Borgia, with his father's 
 connivance, had appropriated to himself. Italy 
 for the Pope seems to have been the dream of his 
 life ; and, had his reign been longer, many think 
 the dream would have been a reality = By making 
 peace and making war, as either suited his pur- 
 pose, — by courting or subduing his neighbours, — 
 by vigour in council, — by courage in the field, — by 
 the lavish use of wealth which he was ingenious 
 in collecting, on one plea or another, from every 
 part of Christendom, — by the dexterous use of 
 spiritual weapons at one time, and by all the craft 
 and guile of a purely temporizing policy at ano- 
 ther, — he made his name terrible, and won the 
 place which he coveted among kings and con- 
 querors. He excommunicated the Republic of 
 Venice, because it refused to restore, on demand, 
 
336 THE REFORMATION AGE. 
 
 cities which had once belonged to the Roman 
 States, — formed a league against them, to which 
 France, Spain and the Emperor, were parties, — 
 pardoned them when they were humbled and con- 
 quered, — and then, when the French had served 
 his purpose, dissolved his own league, and joined 
 alliance with Venice to expel the strangers from 
 Italy. He headed his own armies, delighted in 
 the pomp and circumstance of war, stood in the 
 trenches to encourage the storming party, at the 
 siege of Mirandola, when the snow lay thick upon 
 the ground, and, when the city was taken, entered 
 it triumphantly through the breach, as Alexander 
 might have done, or his namesake, the greatest of 
 the Caesars. 
 
 Julius, with all his faults, should have his due. 
 He conquered for the Church, — or, at any rate, 
 for his successors in the Roman See. He en- 
 riched no nephews by simony or war. He was 
 decorous in his own religious observances, and 
 checked with a firm hand many ecclesiastical irre- 
 gularities. He was a munificent patron of the arts, 
 the friend of Raphael, the founder of St. Peter's. 
 But, as the pretended Vicar of Christ upon earth, 
 it may be doubted whether his infamous prede- 
 cessor gave a greater shock to the moral feelings 
 of religious persons who looked to Rome for light 
 
THE REFORMATION AGE. 337 
 
 and guidance, than this soldier-priest. " The pa- 
 tience of angels and of men," says Waddington, 
 " was exhausted by this last mockery :" and verily 
 men needed, not only an infallible interpreter, but 
 another gospel, if they were to receive such a 
 man as the earthly representative of the Prince 
 of Peace. 
 
 Such were the Church's rulers through thirty 
 dark and troubled years. God bore with them in 
 patience and in mercy, and left their city uncon- 
 sumed. Europe heard the tale of their ambition 
 and lust and cruelty, and gave them reverence 
 still. Indulgences, signed with their hand, and 
 sealed with their seal, were marketable commo- 
 dities — nay, grew cheaper from day to day, and 
 promised larger immunities. Some must have 
 marvelled in secret that God should raise any of 
 His creatures to such a height of power, and let 
 them sink into the mire of pollution, — that the 
 dispensers of pardons should seem to need abso- 
 lution beyond common sinners, — that the light of 
 holiness should be thus quenched where all men 
 were taught to look for special guidance. To 
 those who knew the mysteries of Conclaves*, and 
 were acquainted with the morality of the New 
 Testament, it must have seemed the strangest of 
 
 * See NOTE (C C.) 
 z 
 
338 THE REFORMATION AGE. 
 
 all mysteries, that the juggle of an election, in 
 which votes were notoriously purchased with be- 
 nefices and gold, and political cabals intrigued as 
 in the Councils of Princes, could turn a wicked 
 priest into the accredited Vicegerent of Heaven. 
 But to doubt, in an age like that, was like 
 loosening all hold on the powers of the world to 
 come. The time of endurance was prolonged. 
 A successor was wanted for Julius II., 
 and the Cardinals found one in Leo X., 
 the same John de Medici who was thrust into 
 the sacred college when he ought to have been at 
 school. He proved a man of refined tastes and 
 scholar-like acquirements, a lover of elegant La- 
 tinity, a patron of artists and improvisatori, a 
 companion of those who lived to enjoy and em- 
 bellish life, — at Rome, discharging his graver 
 duties with dignified propriety, — in his country 
 retirement, varying the amusement of the chase 
 with banquets among wits and poetasters, — no 
 more devout than his predecessors, yet of more 
 decorous pleasures, and more measured ambition. 
 He longed to live a life of ease, surrounded with 
 forms of beauty, and drinking in all that could 
 please the ear or charm the fancy ; but he had 
 fallen on evil times for a follower of Epicurus, 
 and was startled from his dream of enjoyment by 
 
THE REFORMATION AGE. 339 
 
 the notes of warning which preceded the Re- 
 formation. While he was yet a Cardinal, Luther 
 had visited Rome. Before he had been Pope five 
 years, Europe was ringing with the Reformer's 
 earliest challenge of Papal prerogatives. 
 
 We must not Omit to notice the Advancement 
 
 formation of a new School of Letters ° eainm S- 
 among the causes which led to the Reformation. 
 There was a growth of intellectual vigour which 
 burst the restraints of a former age, and made it 
 impossible that active, enquiring spirits through- 
 out Christendom should yield unquestioning sub- 
 mission to the tutelage of Rome. " In regard to 
 the nations of new Europe," D'Aubigne has well 
 said, " the age of infancy had passed away, and 
 that of manhood had begun. To the child-like 
 simplicity, which believed every thing, had suc- 
 ceeded a spirit of curiosity, an intellect not to be 
 satisfied without sifting every thing to the bottom. 
 It was asked for what God had spoken to the 
 world, and whether men had a right to station 
 themselves as mediators between God and His 
 creatures. There was only one thing which could 
 have saved the Church, and this was to raise 
 herself still higher above the people. To keep 
 on a level with them was not enough. But, so 
 z 2 
 
340 THE REFORMATION AGE. 
 
 far from this, she was even found to be far be- 
 neath them, having begun to descend at the same 
 time that they began to rise. At the period 
 when mankind began to ascend to the regions of 
 intellect, the priesthood was grovelling below 
 among earthly pursuits and interests." Litera- 
 ture crossed the Alps, moreover, and founded 
 schools among those who had passed hitherto for 
 barbarians with the refined and cultivated men of 
 Italy. That a German could speak Greek was 
 talked of as a wonder, when Eeuchlin's fame 
 began to spread throughout Europe ; and when 
 Hebrew was added to his other accomplishments, 
 and his study of Rabbinical books raised a storm 
 against him as a heretic, curiosity was excited, 
 and his scholars began to multiply. The relative 
 position of scholars and churchmen may be in- 
 ferred from a memorable saying of the Sorbonne, 
 or Theological Faculty of Paris, " There is an 
 end of religion if the study of Greek and Hebrew 
 be permitted ;" and assuredly the permanence of 
 the system, which they called by that holy name, 
 was greatly endangered when men, without 
 bidding from Priest or Pope, held in their hands 
 the key which gave them access to the sacred 
 text. Erasmus, too, a Dutchman, besides being 
 the first Latin scholar of his age 5 was a free trans- 
 
THE REFORMATION AGE. 341 
 
 lator, and a fearless commentator on Scripture. 
 He edited Cyprian and Jerome, two of the most 
 famous Latin fathers ; he translated Athanasius 
 and Chrysostom from Greek into Latin ; ^nd 
 while much was found in these ancient records 
 that was inconsistent with Christianity in its 
 simple purity, no intelligent and candid reader 
 could help seeing that the pretensions of modern 
 Popes had no counterpart in the Church of the 
 third and fourth centuries. The enemies of the 
 Reformation gave too much credit to the elegant, 
 sarcastic and faint-hearted scholar, when they 
 said that " Erasmus laid the egg 3 and Luther 
 hatched it ; " but, unquestionably, the writings of 
 the former were one of the many engines by 
 which it pleased God to prepare men's minds for 
 the great change that was coming. 
 
 z 3 
 
342 LUTHER. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 LUTHER. 
 
 Luther was born at Eisleben, in Saxony, 
 Luther's on the 10th of November, 1483. His 
 parentage, parents were poor people, earning a 
 bare living by hard toil, and compelled, of course, 
 to bring up their children to frugal and indus- 
 trious habits. His father was a miner, and his 
 mother, we learn from himself, had often to carry 
 a burden of wood on her back from the forest. 
 Yet from the first, in the time of their deepest 
 poverty, they valued learning for their children ; 
 and at six years old little Martin could read and 
 write with ease. As time went on, the blessing 
 pronounced upon the godly was in John Luther's 
 home. His store increased ; he moved to Mans- 
 feld, and rose to some consideration among his 
 fellow-townsmen. His house became the resort 
 of some of the neighbouring schoolmasters and 
 ecclesiastics, whose society he valued for his own 
 sake, probably, and for that of his growing chil- 
 dren. Thus, amidst the busy anxieties of working 
 
LUTHER. 343 
 
 life, with occasional glimpses of more refined and 
 cultivated minds, his son passed through the 
 years of childhood to early youth. At school he 
 learnt the Catechism, a few hymns and prayers, 
 and the rudiments of Latin ; and was sent, at 
 fourteen, to an institution of higher pretensions 
 in the town of Magdeburg, his father's own taste 
 of learning having fixed him in the resolve that 
 no pains should be spared to make the boy a 
 scholar. 
 
 For a year or two from this time, the school 
 poor youth served a hard apprenticeship to days - 
 study. The ordinary allowance of food provided 
 for the pupils left them only half satisfied; 
 nothing could be spared from home to eke out 
 Luther's scanty meal ; so what he could not earn, 
 he was compelled to beg in the streets. " Bread 
 for the poor scholars," " Bread for the love of 
 God," was a common cry ; but the petition was 
 accompanied with a concert of many voices, and 
 chants and carols were the favourite strain where- 
 with the young troop sought to touch the hearts 
 of the obdurate, or repaid the offerings of charity. 
 At Eisenach, to which place Luther was removed 
 after a time, the same system prevailed, no sense 
 of degradation attaching to the practice. Some 
 progress was made in learning ; but the life he 
 
 z 4 
 
344 LUTHER. 
 
 led was a cheerless one for a sensitive and aspiring 
 youth ; and painful often was the struggle when 
 hunger drove him abroad for food, and the rude 
 repulse of those who cared for neither prayer 
 nor song made him feel the bitterness, if not the 
 shame, of poverty. 
 
 To (f endure hardness" for a time was no bad 
 discipline for one who was to prove so <e good" 
 a " soldier" of the cross. But kindness, too, 
 was necessary to bring out the hidden qualities 
 of his nature ; and God who, even then, was 
 training His servant for future usefulness, raised 
 up a friend for him, in the midst of strangers, 
 whose love proved to him, at that critical season, 
 a treasure beyond all price. One day, as he 
 stood in the street, hungry and sick at heart, 
 Ursula Cotta, the wife of a citizen of Eisenach, 
 took pity on his friendless condition. She had 
 marked the youth at church, and noticed his 
 reverent demeanour; the peculiar sweetness of 
 his voice had caught her ear ; and, now that she 
 saw him repulsed at other doors, she opened hers 
 to him without reserve, and gave him the food 
 and the kindness for which he pined. The dame 
 proved a second mother to Luther ; for not only 
 did her house become his home, but his mind and 
 heart seemed to expand together beneath her 
 
LUTHER. 345 
 
 gentle influence, and the world itself had an al- 
 tered look now that he lived in an atmosphere of 
 peace and love. Henceforth his studies were 
 pursued with greater earnestness. His time was 
 given in succession to the classics, poetry and 
 rhetoric, and in each of them he outstripped his 
 class-fellows. His soul, at this happy time, was 
 tuned to melody ; and music, which proved his 
 delight and solace through a stormy life, was 
 added to his more solid acquirements. His live- 
 liness and good nature made him an universal 
 favourite ; and, best of all, according to his light, 
 he was fervent in seeking that heavenly guidance 
 without which human wisdom is but folly. From 
 the school he passed, in his eighteenth 
 
 . ° A.D. 1501. 
 
 year, to the University of Erfurth, dis- 
 tinguished among his companions by great natural 
 quickness, a retentive memory, an eager curiosity, 
 and, yet more, by that devoutness and seriousness 
 of spirit so often seen in those whom God in- 
 tends for great things in his Church. 
 
 For two years from this time Luther Luther at 
 pursued the same even track, a free- Erfurth. 
 hearted companion, yet studious and devout, com- 
 manding the admiration of teachers and pupils by 
 a genius and force of character which could not 
 be overlooked or mistaken. Books were rare 
 
346 LUTHER. 
 
 and dear, the art of printing being as yet in its 
 infancy ; and it was only in convents and colleges, 
 and here and there in the palace of some royal 
 patron of letters, that a large collection could be 
 found. Our young student was athirst for know- 
 ledge, and the library at Erfurth was like a re- 
 freshing spring, to which he resorted in his hours 
 of leisure. One day he lighted upon a volume 
 which fixed his attention, and was read for some 
 time with the deepest interest. It was a Latin 
 Bible, the first he had ever seen ; and great was 
 his delight to find that God's message contained 
 so much beyond the fragments which he had 
 heard in the Church, or found in books of devo- 
 tion. He read it for some time, and longed to 
 have it for his own. Samuel's childhood and 
 Hannah's song were the passages on which his eye 
 first rested. He read of the " poor" being lifted 
 " out of the dust," and " the beggar from the 
 dunghill," to be placed by the side of princes, 
 and little thought what the Providence of God 
 had in store for himself; but the narrative 
 charmed him by its beauty, and to have free 
 access to this new source of enjoyment seemed to 
 make a new sera in his life. A new sera it made, 
 too, in the world's history, — this meeting between 
 Luther and God's word ; for the doctrine which 
 
LUTHEK. 347 
 
 he found in its pages first gave freedom to his 
 own soul, and then made him bold enough to pro- 
 claim to Christendom that it was cheated and 
 enslaved while the " lively oracles" were hidden 
 out of sight. 
 
 In the same year Luther took his Takes Ms 
 Bachelor's degree. The intense labour egree ' 
 of his preparatory studies brought on a dangerous 
 illness, and when he recovered from it, he still 
 retained the solemn impressions of his hour of 
 peril. There were now high resolves to do some- 
 thing while life was spared; but no governing 
 motive was at work to give directness to his 
 course ; and two years later, when he became a 
 docter of philosophy, his future vocation was yet 
 to be chosen. His father longed to see him a 
 lawyer. Distinguished, as he was, among his 
 fellow-students, with some reputation already as a 
 public lecturer, there was much to kindle the fire 
 of ambition within him, and make him covet a 
 conspicuous stage. But notoriety of another 
 sort was in store for him, and the steps by which 
 he was conducted to it were all appointed by a 
 higher wisdom than that of the scholar or his 
 friends. 
 
 While his plans were still unset- Terrors of 
 tied, a brother collegian, for whom conscience. 
 
348 LUTHER. 
 
 he had a special regard, was suddenly struck 
 down by death — some say was taken off by vio- 
 lence. The question forced itself upon Luther's 
 sensitive and anxious mind, " What if such a fate 
 were mine ? How could / meet my God if the 
 summons were thus sudden?" His life had been 
 pure, but his conscience was ill at ease ; and the 
 thought of a meeting with the Searcher of hearts 
 confounded and appalled him. At another time, 
 when on his way from Mansfeld to Erfurth, after 
 a visit to his father, a violent storm overtook 
 him. The thunder rolled, and the lightning 
 flashed, and a bolt, which fell close to Luther's 
 feet, showed how near he had been to death. 
 He threw himself on his knees, and pleaded with 
 God for life. In an agony of terror he vowed a 
 vow unto the Lord. The world shall be for- 
 saken, and life henceforth shall be made an offer- 
 ing to God. 
 
 Eesolvesto The storm ceased; Luther's fears 
 be a monk, g^fled ; but the vow remained. 
 There were no human witnesses, but it was 
 registered in heaven ; and the man who abhorred 
 a lie had no thought of breaking it. Come what 
 may, the promise must be kept; the necessary 
 sacrifices shall be made. Sober he had been 
 hitherto, constant in his devotions, persevering in 
 
LUTHER. 349 
 
 his studies, exemplary in all his deportment ; but 
 henceforth he must be holy. He had drunk of 
 the spring of knowledge, and was still athirst. 
 A deeper, purer spring must be found somewhere 
 which would satisfy all his spiritual cravings. 
 Whither shall he go for rest and peace ? how 
 secure a shelter from the temptations of life, and 
 become pure, as he longs to be, from every taint 
 of sin ? In a convent, surely, he will find what 
 he wants, — among the men who serve God, day 
 and night, with prayer and fasting, far away from 
 the world's weary strife and seducing pleasures. 
 So the customs of the age taught, and so Luther, 
 in his ignorance, believed. On the 
 17th of August, when three months 
 were wanting to conclude his twenty-second year, 
 the young collegian gathered his friends at a fare- 
 well supper. There was music, as usual, to 
 charm the ear ; and the conversation, which sea- 
 soned their frugal meal, was the free, cheerful 
 talk of men on whom the world's cares sat lightly, 
 and whose spirits were buoyant with hope. 
 Luther, after a time, checked their gaiety. He 
 announces his purpose, and turns a deaf ear to 
 their solicitations and remonstrances. Gloomy 
 as the monk's life may seem to them, it is the 
 life he has chosen. His mind was made up, and 
 
350 LUTHER. 
 
 from a resolve once taken, approved alike by his 
 judgment and his conscience, no human voice 
 ever turned him back. That very night he 
 knocked at the door of the Augustinian convent, 
 and was admitted. He carried with him a Virgil 
 and a Plautus for his worldly store ; — a strange 
 selection for the monk that would be ; stranger 
 still for the Reformer, and man of God, he was 
 to be. 
 Convent ^ was we ^ tnat ne > whose voice was 
 
 Kfe * to open the doors of a hundred con- 
 
 vents, and send forth their inmates to serve God 
 in the world or the Church, should first be a 
 prisoner himself. None could reproach him in 
 after times for speaking of that which he knew 
 not. " Truly," he said of himself once, " I have 
 been a pious monk, and have followed the rules 
 of my order more severely than I can describe. 
 If ever monk had entered heaven by his monkery, 
 surely I should have found my way thither. Had 
 my course lasted longer, I should have been a 
 martyr even to death by dint of prayer, watch- 
 ings, readings, and other labours." As the 
 youngest, or the most willing, of the brethren, 
 the hardest services were imposed on him. The 
 man who was a doctor but yesterday, and had the 
 path of distinction laid open to him, was now 
 
LUTHER. 351 
 
 porter and sweeper to the convent, waited like a 
 servant on meaner men, and did their bidding 
 without a murmur. When his in-door drudgery- 
 was over, he sought the quiet of his cell, and gave 
 himself to study. But even there his masters 
 pursued him, and the calm, tranquil delights of 
 monastic retirement he soon found were a vision, 
 not a reality. " Come, come," said a rude voice, 
 when his beloved books were spread out before 
 him, " it is not by study that you can benefit the 
 cloister, but by begging bread, corn, eggs, fish, 
 meat and money." So the bag was put upon his 
 shoulder, and through the streets of Erfurth, in 
 which he walked but lately as an admired scholar 
 of the first university in Germany, he now went 
 as a mendicant from door to door. 
 
 The yoke which he had chosen Luther bore 
 with the fortitude of an indomitable nature. 
 Hope, too, sustained him under his burden. He 
 was willing to be humbled to the dust, if thereby 
 the flesh might become a willing servant, and his 
 spirit be strengthened and purified. But, by 
 degrees, this hope grew fainter. The holiness for 
 which he panted was not yet attained. Watching, 
 fasting, scourging, brought him no nearer to his 
 end. " I tormented myself to death," he says, in 
 describing this period of his life, "in order to 
 
352 LUTHER. 
 
 procure peace with God for my troubled con- 
 science ; but, surrounded with fearful darkness, 
 I nowhere found it." His brother monks did 
 not understand him. They went through the 
 appointed routine of duty, and were satisfied; 
 while the trifling conversation which amused their 
 vacant hours was to him a weariness and a burden. 
 Luther's Being excused, after a time, on the 
 
 studies. intercession of some of his University 
 friends, from the drudgery of his early days in the 
 cloister, he betook himself with his usual ardour 
 to study. He found one able and willing to help 
 him in the study of Greek and Hebrew ; and the 
 man, who was to enrich his country one day with 
 his noble translation of the Scriptures into the 
 mother tongue, was already preparing for his 
 work, by acquainting himself with the original 
 text. Other books were read with eagerness, 
 especially those which treated of the great things 
 of salvation ; and soon he learnt to esteem the 
 great Augustine a master in theology, and a 
 faithful expounder of God's word, beyond all to 
 whom he had listened before. What was written 
 a thousand years before about the corruption of 
 the human will found an echo in his own heart. 
 Along with the universal infection, too, he read 
 of the universal remedy, — justification by the 
 
LUTHER. 353 
 
 free grace of God* through the merits of the 
 Saviour; and in his solitary readings, there, in 
 the old convent library, the truth was brought to 
 him, though as yet only half perceived and under- 
 stood, which it became the business of his life to 
 write on the mind and heart of Christendom. The 
 Bible, too, itself, was there, — chained to a desk 
 for the common use ; and the privilege of search- 
 ing for himself into the records of eternal truth, — 
 of drinking at the spring of heavenly wisdom, 
 and getting an answer from Him whose word is 
 light and life, — was not lost upon the enquiring 
 monk. Nor was learning of another sort ne- 
 glected. Though he was to be mighty in the 
 Scriptures, he was not unskilled to use the 
 weapons with which, in those days, all error was 
 assailed, and all truth defended. He read the 
 writings of the Schoolmen, and could draw dis- 
 tinctions, and weave subtle arguments, and detect 
 hidden sophistries, with those who delighted in 
 those intellectual encounters. His clearer vision 
 and sounder understanding made him rate such 
 exercises at their proper worth ; he was too in- 
 tent on great things in after life, — far too earnest 
 in his love of truth for its own sake,- — to spend 
 his time in logical fencing-matches, which could 
 yield no profit ; but none could say that he did 
 
 A A 
 
354 LUTHER. 
 
 not know what learned men had written, though 
 he was taught to put all worldly gifts and ac- 
 complishments far below that heavenly wisdom 
 which the peasant may have, and the philosopher 
 may want. 
 
 Still, while he was thus occupied, the great 
 want remained. After repeated efforts to become 
 holy, he was still baffled and disappointed. Shut 
 out from active employments, cut off from con- 
 genial company, he was left, month after month, 
 to his own self-accusing thoughts, and, while he 
 longed for purity, had a clinging sense of guilt 
 which everywhere pursued him. So, with pallid 
 cheek and sunken eye, he went through the ac- 
 customed duties, or mused in solitude during long 
 daylight and midnight hours, marvelling whether 
 others missed the expected blessing like himself, 
 or whether his deeper sinfulness made rest im- 
 possible for him even in the place of sanctity. 
 As his anxieties deepened, he lived more and 
 more alone. His meals were of the most sparing 
 kind, — his nights often sleepless through disquie- 
 tude. On one occasion, some days had passed 
 without his being seen, and a friend, alarmed for 
 his safety, forced the door of his cell. He found 
 Luther stretched senseless on the floor. Knowing 
 the power of music over him, he collected some 
 
 
LUTHER. 355 
 
 boys from the convent, and charged them to chant 
 an anthem in their softest strain. Consciousness 
 returned, and the monk revived. But the inward 
 melancholy was too deep to be charmed away by 
 song. His fondest hopes had proved vain. In- 
 stead of finding perfection and spiritual freedom 
 in the cloister, his chains were more galling than 
 ever. 
 
 There, however, in the house of Meeting with 
 his bondage, Luther saw the dawn of Stau P ltz - 
 a brighter day. The Vicar-General of the Au- 
 gustines, Staupitz by name, came to inspect the 
 convent ; and his visit, which to others was but 
 a business of routine, proved like an angel's visit 
 to Luther. The superior was a man venerable 
 alike for his years and piety, well taught in the 
 doctrine of Christ, and well pleased to make 
 younger disciples partakers of his hope. The ap- 
 pearance of Luther soon attracted his notice. 
 He felt an interest in the young monk, which was 
 heightened by all he heard. Confidence was soon 
 established between them; and the secrets of 
 Luther's bosom, hidden from common eyes, were 
 unfolded to one who had passed through similar 
 struggles, and could sympathize with his deepest 
 sorrows. His past hopes, his present aims, his 
 constant failures, all his spiritual longings and 
 
356 LUTHEK. 
 
 anxieties, were told at length. " Instead of tor- 
 turing yourself for your faults," was the answer 
 of Staupitz, " cast yourself into the arms of the 
 Eedeemer. Trust in Him, — in the righteousness 
 of His life, in the expiation of His death. Keep 
 not back. God is not angry with thee; it is 
 thou who art angry with God. Listen to the 
 Son of God, who became man to assure thee of 
 the divine favour. He says to thee, ' Thou art 
 my sheep ; thou hearest my voice ; none shall 
 pluck thee out of my hand.'" Luther argued 
 against a doctrine which seemed to make salva- 
 tion so cheap a thing. His repentance was not 
 deep enough ; he must be a changed man before 
 he could be pardoned and accepted; others had 
 penances without number imposed upon them ; 
 and how should he, sinner as he was, escape so 
 easily? " My son," answered the man, who had 
 sounded the depths of his own heart, and now 
 spoke with authority to others, " there is no true 
 repentance but that which begins in the love of 
 God and of righteousness. If you wish to be 
 really converted, do not dwell upon all these mor- 
 tifications and penances. Love Him who first 
 loved thee." " Those words of yours about re- 
 pentance," Luther wrote to Staupitz in later 
 clays, " stuck fast in me, like an arrow drawn 
 
LUTHER. 357 
 
 by a strong man ; " and it is certain that these 
 well-timed conversations poured light upon his 
 enquiring spirit, and made him rejoice like one 
 whose chains were falling off. He searched the 
 Scriptures, and found every word of Staupitz 
 confirmed. The passages, which had most alarmed 
 him hitherto, were now full of the sweetest com- 
 fort. They seemed (to use his own most expressive 
 simile) to " run to him from all sides, to smile 
 upon him like friends, to spring up and play 
 about him." 
 
 His complete emancipation, however, was not 
 the work of a month or a year. In the quietude 
 and seclusion of the convent his spirit preyed 
 upon itself. He forgot his hours, and left his 
 task unsaid ; and then his carelessness in duty lay 
 heavy on his conscience, and sleep was renounced 
 till the tale of prayers was made up. Thus the 
 rule of the convent was a yoke which sometimes 
 lay heavy upon him ; yet was it borne now with 
 more of cheerfulness as a part of the discipline 
 appointed for him by Providence. Sometimes 
 he escaped into the fields at daybreak; and, 
 taking his Bible with him, the gift of Staupitz, 
 preached to the shepherds under a tree, while 
 they repaid his kindness by some strain of rustic 
 
 A A 3 
 
358 LUTHER. 
 
 
 music, to which he loved to listen between sleep- 
 ing and waking. His studies, too, were more 
 purely Biblical. His spirit was braced up by 
 daily contact with the word of life ; and already 
 was the store being laid up, which proved so 
 useful and effective, when his great task was un- 
 dertaken of bringing the almost forgotten Scrip- 
 tures into open day. 
 
 Luther or- The time came for Luther to be 
 
 dained priest. ordained a priegt . and gladly now 
 
 could he look forward to the holy solemnity, and 
 speak with more of boldness to his fellow men of 
 repentance and faith and holiness. His father 
 had never forgiven his turning monk; but, as 
 the day approached, Luther begged him to be 
 present. John Luther came; and to Martin, 
 whose home affections through life were pure and 
 strong in no common measure, the day must 
 have seemed the brightest that had 
 
 May 2. 1507. & 
 
 dawned upon him for years. The 
 simplicity of the times, or the humble condition 
 of the parties, is declared by the father's gift of 
 twenty florins, just two pounds, which was pre- 
 sented as a token of complete reconciliation. 
 
 The earliest letter of Luther's which has come 
 down to us belongs to this period, and it was 
 
LUTHER. 359 
 
 written to John Braun, who is styled, at the head 
 of it, the " Holy and Venerable Priest of Christ 
 and Mary." He was Vicar of Eisenach, and 
 had been the friend of Luther when he was a 
 school-boy there. Early friendships never lost 
 their hold on his warm and generous heart ; and 
 it is interesting to see the man, who was now 
 rapidly advancing to distinction, looking back to 
 bygone scenes, and making the companion of his 
 boyhood the sharer of his inmost thoughts. The 
 letter runs thus, and breathes the humble and 
 grateful spirit of the gospel which Luther was 
 now learning, and about to impart to others : — 
 " God, who is glorious and holy in all his works, 
 having designed to exalt me exceedingly, — me a 
 miserable and every way unworthy sinner, — and 
 to call me, solely out of his abundant mercy, to 
 his sublime ministry, it is my duty, in order to 
 testify my gratitude for a goodness so divine and 
 so magnificent (as far at least as dust can do it), 
 to fulfil with my whole heart the office which is 
 entrusted to me." Thus he gave himself to his 
 great work, not knowing what was before him, 
 but trained for God's service in the Church by 
 that blessed Spirit which had taught him, like St. 
 Paul, that Christ's love and grace had made him 
 "■ a debtor unto all men." 
 
360 LUTHER. 
 
 Removal to Staupitz had marked Luther as 
 
 Wittemberg. one mean t f r usefulness on a public 
 stage. In the following year, therefore, when a 
 Professor of Philosophy was wanted for the new 
 University of Wittemberg, the young priest was 
 recommended by Staupitz to the Elector of 
 Saxony, and willingly accepted. Prom 
 
 A.D. 1508. \ . l 
 
 Erfurth accordingly he removed to the 
 place which his name has made so famous, and 
 there his whole energies were devoted to his new 
 duties. He would have chosen, if left to himself, 
 some other sphere. His soul was athirst for sa- 
 cred knowledge ; and gladly would he have given 
 his days and nights to studies connected with 
 the Scriptures ; but Staupitz was like a second 
 father to him, and when Providence seemed to 
 lead, Luther was now schooled to follow without 
 doubt or misgiving. " I am well by the grace 
 of God," he wrote to Braun soon after his re- 
 moval, " were it not that I must study philosophy 
 with all my might. Ever since I arrived at 
 Wittemberg, I have eagerly desired to exchange 
 this study for that of theology. The theology I 
 mean is, that which seeks out the kernel of the nut, 
 the heart of the wheat, the marrow of the bone. 
 Howbeit God is God ; man is almost always de- 
 ceived in his judgment ; but he is our God, and 
 
LUTHER. 361 
 
 will conduct us by His goodness for ever and 
 ever." 
 
 The study of Greek and Hebrew Busy life 
 was now resumed. A daily lecture on there - 
 some portion of Scripture was delivered to the stu- 
 dents ; and, learning as well as teaching, — getting 
 his own faith confirmed } and his own judgment 
 ripened, as he expounded the word of life, — he 
 went through the book of Psalms and the Epistle 
 to the Romans. To his other duties, on the 
 solicitation of Staupitz, he soon added those of 
 town preacher. For a time he shrank from so 
 responsible a post ; " it was no light matter," he 
 said, " to speak to men in the place of God ; " 
 but when his modesty was overcome, and he stood 
 up before the people as the expounder of God's 
 word, he seemed to have found a congenial ele- 
 ment. The doctrine was more pure, — the tone 
 more free, — the manner at once more persuasive 
 and more commanding, — than men had been used 
 to for many generations. His opponents admit 
 that, as an effective public speaker, he ranked 
 with the first orators of his age. They describe 
 his ready memory, his well-trained intellect, his 
 clear musical voice, his admirable command of 
 his mother tongue. He bore " like a torrent," says 
 one, " on the minds of his hearers ; " he " had a 
 
362 LUTHER. 
 
 lively and impetuous eloquence," says Bossuet, 
 one of the most distinguished advocates of the 
 Papacy, " which hurried people away, and en- 
 tranced them." But his eloquence, then and in 
 later life, was, in reality, the eloquence of truth 
 and sincerity ; and men, who had been famishing 
 on the dry husks of scholastic divinity, listened to 
 the grave, but impassioned, earnestness of the 
 still youthful professor, almost as to a prophet 
 sent from heaven to wake up a slumbering age. 
 
 Journey to ThuS t]iree buS ^ y earS Were S P ent > 
 
 Rome. an( J Luther's reputation was spread 
 
 far and wide as a man of zeal and 
 learning and indefatigable activity. Then, events, 
 in which it is not difficult to trace the guiding 
 hand of Providence, carried him to Rome. To 
 see the Holy City, the capital of Christendom, 
 the abode of him who was the Church's visible 
 Head and Lord, was the dearest wish of Luther's 
 heart. A dispute among the convents of his 
 order opened a way for him. His talents and 
 reputation recommended him to some of their 
 number as a fitting advocate to plead their cause 
 before the Pope. He went up to Rome with 
 trembling joy, like that of a Jewish youth ap- 
 proaching, for the first time, the City and Temple 
 of his God. " Hail to thee, holy Rome, made 
 
LUTHEK. 363 
 
 holy by the blood of martyrs," he exclaimed on 
 his arrival, falling on his knees, and raising his 
 hands to heaven in a transport of thankfulness. 
 He walked the streets, and sought out the most 
 famous places, counting the very dust to be sa- 
 cred. He entered into its homes, mingled with 
 its citizens, was admitted to the confidence of its 
 priests ; — and, to his horror and confusion, he 
 found it a sink of abominations. Julius II. sat 
 in the chair of St. Peter ; and a strange successor 
 to the fisherman of Galilee must one like Luther, 
 so devout and so unworldly, have thought the 
 Pontiff who delighted in war, and led soldiers to 
 the breach. Yet more appalling, however, to 
 the simple, pure-minded German, was the de- 
 moralization of the priests. He heard their pri- 
 vate talk, and found they were mockers of the 
 sacred mysteries. He joined with them in the 
 celebration of the mass, and his ears were shocked 
 with profaneness at the very altar. He carried 
 his own devoutness with him into all companies, 
 but met with raillery, instead of sympathy, from 
 his brother priests. The citizens talked freely 
 of the vices of Alexander VI. and the murders 
 of Cassar Borgia, and that not in whispers, as 
 men might speak of some incredible wickedness, 
 but in a tone of indecent levity. To Luther the 
 
364 LUTHEE. 
 
 prodigy he saw was startling and bewildering. 
 The place was holy no doubt ; the Church which 
 ruled there was the mother of all churches, God's 
 witness and the world's light through successive 
 ages. Among the tombs of apostles, — on the 
 very spot where martyrs had given their lives 
 as an offering to Christ, — how could the faithful 
 seed die out, or the heavenly blessing be for- 
 feited ? Yet sorely tainted with impiety was this 
 spot to which his eyes had turned so fondly ; and 
 sad and sick at heart, lonely and full of grave and 
 solemn thoughts, he paced the famous streets, and 
 surveyed the venerable relics of ancient Rome, 
 or beheld the rising glory of St. Peter's. While 
 there, doubtless, he wished himself back again 
 among his old haunts at Wittemberg ; yet after- 
 wards he rejoiced in the visit as having been 
 most important and gainful. " I would not for 
 a hundred thousand florins have missed seeing 
 Rome," he said. " I should always have felt an 
 uneasy doubt whether I was not, after all, doing 
 injustice to the Pope. As it is, I am quite satis- 
 fied on that point." 
 
 At Rome, Luther made no question of what was 
 told him respecting the virtues of consecrated 
 spots and guarded relics, but joined the stream 
 of devotees who rushed hither and thither, and 
 
LUTHER. 365 
 
 hoped, with the blindest of them, to win the pro- 
 mised blessing. It was a grief to him, he tells 
 us, that his father and mother were still alive ; 
 for, by virtue of masses and penances, as he then 
 thought, he could have delivered their souls from 
 purgatory. He climbed the Sacred Staircase 
 upon his knees, in expectation of the promised 
 indulgence, and never doubted the tradition that 
 it had been miraculously transported from the 
 house of Pilate, and was consecrated by the foot- 
 steps of the Son of God. Yet when he returned 
 to Wittemberg, he taught, in public and in pri- 
 vate, like one who had outgrown these childish 
 follies. He discoursed of the Law and the Gospel, 
 — he pointed to the Lamb of God as the one sin- 
 offering, — he called men to repentance and a 
 living faith, — with so much clearness and force, 
 that the learned could not gainsay his doctrine, 
 while the humble and pious hung delighted on 
 his lips. Such were the anomalies of this stage 
 in the Reformer's progress. " Not yet " (to 
 quote the expressive language of Ranke) " was 
 Luther at one with himself. He still cherished 
 opinions fundamentally at variance with each 
 other. But all his writings breathe a youthful 
 courage, still restrained within the bounds of 
 modesty and reverence for authority, though ready 
 
366 LUTHEK. 
 
 to overleap them ; and a genius, moreover, intent 
 on essentials, tearing asunder the bonds of sys- 
 tems, and pressing forwards in the new path it 
 has discovered." 
 
 Life at From Eome Luther returned to his 
 
 Wittemberg. duties at the University, a sadder and 
 a wiser man. Staupitz again urged him on to 
 dignities which he would have declined, pressing 
 him to become a Doctor of Divinity, — an elevated 
 degree for one so young, and binding him in a 
 special manner to the studies most congenial to 
 his taste. Yet the responsibilities of the post 
 alarmed him. He made many objections, which 
 were all overruled by his friend. " Look out, I 
 pray you, for a more worthy person ; " — " I am 
 weak and sickly, and have not long to live ; " — 
 " None but the Holy Spirit can make a Doctor 
 of Theology," he said, at last. " Do what your 
 convent asks," replied Staupitz, " and what I, 
 your Yicar- General, command. You promised 
 to obey us." " But I am poor, and have not 
 wherewith to pay the fees." " The Prince will 
 do that for you," was the rejoinder. And so at 
 twenty -nine Luther became a Doctor. 
 
 In his oath he promised manfully to 
 
 A.D. 1512. 
 
 defend the truth of the Gospel ; and 
 
LUTHER. 367 
 
 never was oath more faithfully kept. By argu- 
 ment he maintained the doctrine which he had 
 received, not from men, but from God. By learn- 
 ing and industry he did what he could to explain 
 to others the letter and spirit of Christianity. 
 But better than all his accomplishments was the 
 life of faith and charity by which his lessons were 
 enforced and illustrated. His letters of this 
 period overflow with tenderness, and are marked 
 by a spirit of large and generous forbearance, 
 while his friendly exhortations are singularly ju- 
 dicious and appropriate. " I learn that you are 
 agitated by many tempests," he said one day to 
 a burdened brother, " and that your spirit is 
 tossed up and down upon the billows. The cross 
 of Christ is portioned out over all the earth, and 
 each one receives his part. Do not you, then, 
 reject that which is fallen to you. Rather re- 
 ceive it as a holy relic, not in a vessel of gold and 
 silver, but in a meek and patient heart, which is 
 far better." " Show a gentle and loving spirit 
 towards the prior of Nuremberg," he wrote to 
 John Lange, who had taught him Hebrew in the 
 Convent, and whom he now made Prior at 
 Erfurth ; " this is fitting, inasmuch as he has 
 put on a sour and bitter spirit. Bitter is not 
 expelled by bitter, — that is, devil by devil ; but 
 
368 LUTHER. 
 
 sweet expels bitter, — that is to say, the finger of 
 God casts out devils." A plague broke out at 
 Witteniberg, and scattered most of the teachers 
 and students. " You advise me to flee," he writes 
 to a friend ; " but whither shall I flee ? I hope 
 the world will not go to wreck though Friar 
 Martin fall. If the disease makes progress, I will 
 disperse the friars in all directions ; but for myself 
 I am stationed here, and obedience permits me 
 not to flee till He who has called me shall recall 
 me. Not that I do not fear death," he adds, with 
 the candour which never forsook him, " for I am 
 not the Apostle Paul, only his commentator ; 
 but I hope the Lord will deliver me from fear." 
 While he lived, he longed to do good unto all 
 men, and was watchful for opportunities of im- 
 parting some spiritual gift to those who sought 
 his advice, or were willing to receive it. A monk 
 who had spent some time at Wittemberg, and 
 left some trifling commissions to be executed by 
 Luther when he went away, has thus attained a 
 place amorjg his countless correspondents, and the 
 letter of business, which became a letter of pious 
 counsel, has been preserved. " The tunic of 
 Brussels cloth," he says, " and the monk's gown, 
 and the book you wrote about, are all sold ; they 
 produced two florins and a half, and the money 
 
 
LUTHEK. 369 
 
 has been paid according to directions ; " then, 
 turning to graver matters, he adds, " I should 
 like much to know how it is with your soul. Is 
 it not weary of its own righteousness ? Does it 
 breathe at length, and confide in the righteous- 
 ness of Christ ? O, my brother, learn to know 
 God, and Christ crucified. Take care not to pre- 
 tend to such a purity as will make you unwilling 
 to acknowledge yourself a sinner; for Christ 
 dwelleth in none but sinners here. He came down 
 from heaven, where He dwelt among the 
 righteous, that He might dwell also with sinners. 
 Meditate carefully on this love of Christ, and 
 you will derive unspeakable blessing from it. If 
 you believe these things firmly as you ought, 
 receive thy still ignorant and erring brethren as 
 Jesus Christ has received thee. Bear with them 
 patiently ; make their sins thine own ; and if 
 thou hast any thing good, communicate it unto 
 them. It is a sad righteousness which will not 
 bear with others, because it finds them wicked, 
 and which thinks only of seeking the solitude of 
 the desert, instead of doing them good by prayer, 
 example and patience. If thou art the lily and 
 the rose of Christ, know that thy dwelling is 
 among the thorns ; only take care that thou do 
 not, by thy impatience and rash judgments and 
 
 B B 
 
370 LUTHER. 
 
 hidden pride, become thyself a thorn. Christ 
 reigns in the midst of his enemies. Had He 
 been pleased only to live among the good, and to 
 die only for those who loved Him, for whom, I 
 ask, would He have died, and among whom would 
 He have lived ? " Yet while he found time to 
 sell tunics and monk's gowns, he was perhaps the 
 busiest man in Germany. His account of his 
 occupations is amusing, yet most instructive, re- 
 minding us of that unbounded diligence which 
 enabled him to diffuse himself, as it were, through 
 Christendom, when his presiding mind became 
 the spring of a vast, complicated movement, af- 
 fecting the destinies of many nations. " In 
 labours more abundant" might have been his 
 motto for the thirty years which followed the 
 
 period we speak of up to the week in 
 a.d. 1516. which he both worked and died< « J 
 
 almost constantly require two secretaries or 
 chancellors," he writes, " for I do nothing all day 
 long but write letters. I am preacher to the 
 convent, reader of prayers, chaplain at table, 
 pastor and parish minister, rector of the studies, 
 vicar-general, — that is, prior ten times over, — 
 inspector of ponds of Litzkau, counsel for the 
 men of HerL'berg, reader of St. Paul, commen- 
 tator on the Psalms. I have seldom time to say 
 
LUTHER. 371 
 
 my hours and chant ; to say nothing of my com- 
 bat with flesh and blood, the devil, and the 
 world. See how lazy I am." 
 
 It is interesting to see so much of Luther's 
 inner mind at this particular stage of his life. 
 We learn that it was not a barren doctrine that 
 he contended for in after years, but a doctrine 
 which had penetrated his own soul, and elevated 
 and purified his whole character. Before he con- 
 ceived the notion of being a Reformer, he was the 
 humble, painstaking, conscientious, large-hearted 
 Christian. His position was no common one for 
 a man of his age, who had started in life without 
 patronage or connexions. He was the well- 
 trained theologian, the admired lecturer, the ar- 
 biter of disputes, the foremost man in a rising 
 university, the favoured nominee of the wisest 
 Prince in Germany; but better than all, consi- 
 dering the enterprize that was before him, his 
 " feet" were " shod with the preparation of the 
 gospel of peace ; " and it was in Christ's name, 
 and as one who had partaken largely of Christ's 
 Spirit, not certainly from any love of strife, or 
 with any wish for fame, that his great work was 
 undertaken. 
 
 B B 2 
 
372 LUTHER. 
 
 Tetzel and Luther was busy with his own 
 
 Indulgences. wor ^ seeking peace with all men, 
 and using his gifts faithfully for the Church of 
 which he was an obedient son, when great ex- 
 citement began to prevail in some parts of Ger- 
 many, arising out of the sale of Indulgences by 
 emissaries from Rome. This had become a fa- 
 vourite mode of raising money of late; and as 
 the patience and bounty of Christendom seemed 
 well nigh inexhaustible, so the avarice of the 
 Papal Court, and the effrontery of its busy 
 agents, grew rapidly in this time of deepest de- 
 generacy. A Turkish war was talked about 
 again and again, and supplies were wanted to pay 
 the armies of Christendom ; but the Infidel re- 
 mained secure in his strongholds, and what was 
 paid into the Roman treasury was never accounted 
 for. Latterly a new plea had been invented. 
 The Church, which was built over the graves of 
 St. Peter and St. Paul, lay in ruins ; the bones 
 of the holy martyrs, said the piteous story, were 
 exposed to wind and rain. What more blessed 
 work for the faithful than to rear a monument 
 worthy of the dead, to which living pilgrims 
 might resort in future ages ? Commissions were 
 granted by the Pope to levy funds for this pur- 
 pose by the sale of Indulgences ; particular dis- 
 
LUTHER. 373 
 
 tricts were assigned to favoured persons, who 
 gave money for the privilege, and made a good 
 profit generally before their work was finished. 
 In fact, pardons for men's souls were farmed, 
 like highway tolls, to the best bidder, and then 
 hawked by retail among the poor, blinded people.* 
 In the course of the year 1517, a monk of the 
 name of Tetzel, who had chosen Germany for his 
 market, began to ply his trade with unusual zeal 
 and success. When he came near a town, notice 
 of his mission was conveyed to the authorities. 
 " The grace of God and of St. Peter is before 
 your gates," was the style of his proclamation. 
 Instantly the whole place was astir. Priests 
 and nuns, young and old, trades with their ban- 
 ners, and magistrates with their symbols of office, 
 went forth in solemn procession to meet this mes- 
 senger of glad tidings. Bells rang and music 
 played, and the streets were thronged with muU 
 titudes eager to see the spectacle, and to secure 
 the blessing. When the salutations were ended, 
 the whole cavalcade proceeded to the principal 
 church, — the Pope's Bull, or proclamation of 
 grace, carried on a cloth of gold, leading the 
 way, — and his officer, the chief Indulgence-mer- 
 chant, following next, with a great red cross in 
 
 * See NOTE (DD). 
 
 B B 3 
 
374 LUTHEK. 
 
 his hand. The church is filled; the cross is 
 placed upon the altar ; the people look on it in 
 silent awe. Tetzel mounts the pulpit, and, in a 
 loud and commanding tone, begins to address 
 them. The substance of some of his puffing ex- 
 hortations is preserved, and assuredly it would 
 have been a pity if they had perished. Men 
 ought to know what language was heard in 
 Christian churches when the Reformation began. 
 
 " Indulgences," he said, " are the most pre- 
 cious and sublime gift of God. There is no sin 
 too great for an indulgence to remit; and if a 
 man should commit something too shocking to be 
 spoken, let him pay, — let him pay well, and it 
 will be forgiven him. Think that for each mor- 
 tal sin you must, after confession and contrition, 
 do penance for seven years, either in this life or 
 in purgatory. Now, how many mortal sins are 
 committed in a day, — in a week ; yet more in a 
 month, a year, a whole life. Ah ! these sins are 
 almost innumerable ; and innumerable sufferings 
 must be endured for them in purgatory. But 
 now, by means of these letters of Indulgence, 
 you can at once, for life, (in all cases except four, 
 which are reserved to the Apostolic See,) and 
 afterwards at the hour of death, obtain a full re- 
 mission of all your pains and sins. . . . But more 
 
LUTHEK. 375 
 
 than this ; Indulgences not only save tjf.'e living, — 
 they save the dead. For this repentance even is 
 not necessary. Priest, noble, merchant, wife, 
 young girls, young men, hear your friends, your 
 parents, crying to you from the bottom of the 
 abyss. At the very instant when the piece of 
 money chinks on the bottom of the strong box, 
 the soul comes out of purgatory, and flies straight 
 to heaven." 
 
 Luther was seated one day, doing his priest's 
 work, in the confessional at Wittemberg. Citizen 
 after citizen presented himself for absolution, and 
 each acknowledged himself guilty of some grievous 
 sin. The man of God gave them counsel and 
 reproof, — exhorted them to repentance, — charged 
 them solemnly and affectionately to offend no 
 more. What was his surprise to hear the peni- 
 tents declare that they meant to sin on ? They 
 have a pardon made out under the Pope's hand ; 
 and priests and monks could not annul his sen- 
 tence. " Except ye be converted" a voice sounded 
 from the confessional, " you will all perish." In 
 vain they argue and remonstrate ; Luther is im- 
 moveable. They must cease to do evil, and learn 
 to do well, or they would have no pardon from 
 God. 
 
 B B 4 
 
376 LUTHER. 
 
 All Saints' Tetzel, when he heard of what had 
 
 Eve - passed at Wittemberg, began to rave. 
 
 Devout and thoughtful persons, as the rumour 
 was spread abroad, rejoiced that one was found to 
 speak out what was hidden in many hearts. 
 Luther, compelled to take his stand, first preached 
 against Indulgences, and then resolved to assail 
 them in the most public manner. All Saints' 
 Day was approaching, and, in compliment to the 
 festival, a new church, which the Elector of 
 Saxony had built in Wittemberg, and enriched 
 with a vast number of precious relics, was to be 
 thrown open to the multitude. A great assem- 
 blage was expected ; numbers would flock in from 
 the surrounding country ; for an indulgence was 
 promised to all who worshipped and confessed 
 there before the day was over. On the eve of 
 Oct 31 1517 tnat ^ a y Luther fastened to the 
 door of the church his celebrated 
 ninety-five propositions. Men were waiting for 
 a voice like that, and, when it came, they won- 
 dered and rejoiced as if a prophet or an angel had 
 spoken ; but it will be a great mistake to fancy 
 that any thing like the Protestant doctrine upon 
 these parts of the Romish system had grown up, 
 as yet, in Luther's mind. Much was admitted, 
 which he learnt soon afterwards to doubt, and 
 
LUTHER. 377 
 
 went on boldly to deny. The authority of the 
 Pope was as little questioned as the authority of 
 Christ himself; and the flagrant abuses, which 
 were connected with opening a market for the 
 sale of pardons, were all ascribed to unscrupulous 
 men, who abused their powers. " Anathema to 
 him," so run some of these famous sentences, " who 
 speaks against the truth of the Apostolical par- 
 dons; but a blessing on him who opposes the 
 licentiousness of these preachers." — " Christians 
 must be taught that the Pope thinks not, nor 
 wishes, that any one should in any wise compare 
 the act of buying Indulgences with any act of 
 mercy." — " Christians must be taught that the 
 Pope, having more need of a prayer offered with 
 faith than of money, more desires the prayer 
 than the money, when he distributes Indul- 
 gences." — "Christians must be taught that, if 
 the Pope knew of the extortions of the Indul- 
 gence preachers, he would rather the metropo- 
 litan church of St. Peter were burnt than see it 
 built with the skin, the flesh and the bones of 
 his sheep." Other statements were in a higher 
 strain, recalling men from lying vanities and hurt- 
 ful superstitions to the true principles of Chris- 
 tianity. " They are the enemies of the Pope and 
 of Christ, who, to favour the preaching of In- 
 
378 LUTHER. 
 
 dulgences, forbid the preaching of the word of 
 God." — " The true treasure of the Church is the 
 holy gospel of the glory and grace of God." — 
 " Every true Christian, living or dead, has part 
 in all the good things of Christ, or of the Church, 
 by the gift of God, and that without letter of In- 
 dulgence." — " Fie on the prophets, who say to 
 Christ's people, the Cross ! the Cross ! and show 
 us not the cross ! " " Fie on the prophets, who 
 say to Christ's people, Peace ! Peace ! and give 
 us not peace !" 
 Commotion Europe was ready for the message, 
 
 throughout we naV e said ; and so it ran swiftly 
 Europe. 
 
 from country to country. " It was 
 
 as if the angels themselves had been the messen- 
 gers," says one historian, writing of what he saw 
 and heard. In fifteen days the memorial was 
 circulated through Germany, and then it flew 
 in every direction, as on the wings of the wind, 
 till it travelled to the very ends of Christendom. 
 It reached the Prior in his convent, who, finding 
 in them the echo of his own thoughts, ex- 
 claimed with joy, " The man we have been look- 
 ing for so long has come at last." It reached the 
 Bishop in his palace ; and he could but say, 
 " This is all Catholic truth, yet, for peace sake, 
 let the man forbear." It reached the young 
 
LUTHER. 379 
 
 Myconius, the future historian of the Reforma- 
 tion ; and, reading it with a brother monk in a 
 corner of the cloister, he became from that hour 
 a zealous convert and disciple. It reached the 
 aged Reuchlin, who had paved the way for 
 Luther by bringing his Greek and Hebrew learn- 
 ing to bear on the sacred writings ; and, calling 
 to mind his own battles with the monks, he cried 
 out with thankfulness, " Now I shall have peace ; 
 for this man will give them enough to do." It 
 reached Erasmus, in Holland, who said that 
 Luther was " cutting deep into the flesh, but 
 the disease was incurable without it." It reached 
 the Emperor Maximilian ; and the wily politician, 
 thinking only of his own battles with the Pope, 
 wrote to the Elector of Saxony, " Take good 
 care of that Luther, for we may want him some 
 day." The propositions were read and canvassed 
 in France and England and Spain ; and as the 
 rumour of them was spread abroad, thousands of 
 nameless men, who were little versed in theology, 
 but saw with their own eyes to what a height 
 Romish tyranny had grown, blessed the brave 
 monk in their own quiet homes, and wished him 
 God speed in his onward course. 
 
 Luther's new Here, then, was a great crisis in 
 position. Luther's life. He had reached a 
 
380 LUTHER. 
 
 position from which his convictions and his 
 honesty would not allow him to recede ; yet to 
 be the talk of Europe as one who was in rebel- 
 lion against the Church, was far from his 
 thoughts when the contest began, and quite con- 
 trary to his wishes. We know with what feelings 
 he entered on the struggle which lasted through 
 his life ; for his own pen has written it ; and no 
 man who reads the description with an honest 
 mind will doubt its perfect truthfulness. " I 
 was alone," he writes, " and thrown into this 
 struggle without weighing the matter maturely. 
 Under such circumstances, I gave up to the Pope 
 many essential articles. Who was I, a poor 
 miserable monk, that I should make head against 
 the majesty of the Pope, before which the kings 
 of the earth, — nay, earth itself, hell and heaven, — 
 trembled ? What I suffered during the first and 
 second years, — into how deep a dejection I fell, — 
 cannot be conceived by those who, with easy con- 
 fidence, have since rushed along the beaten path 
 to attack the Pope with such fierceness and pre- 
 sumption. Obtaining no light to light me in my 
 dark path from the dead, mute masters (I speak 
 of the books of the theologians and priests), I 
 desired to seek the living counsel of the Churches 
 of God ; so that, if there existed pious men, illu- 
 
LUTHER. 381 
 
 mined by the Holy Spirit, they might take com- 
 passion on me, and give me sound and assured 
 advice for my own good, and that of all Christen- 
 dom. But it was impossible for me to recog- 
 nize them. I looked only to the Pope, cardi- 
 nals, bishops, theologians, canonists, monks, and 
 priests ; it was from them I sought the Spirit ; 
 for I had so thoroughly filled and stuffed myself 
 with their doctrine, that I no longer knew whe- 
 ther I was awake or asleep. Had I then braved 
 the Pope, as I do now, I should have expected 
 the earth to open and swallow me up on the spot, 
 as it did Korah and Abiram." 
 
 Still, while he clung to authority, and com- 
 mended the Pope (ignorantly, we must presume,) 
 as one " worthy of a better age," he was taking 
 his ground firmly and resolutely, like a man in 
 whose eyes duty was every thing, and who knew 
 of but one supreme law and All-wise Ruler. The 
 prior and sub-prior of the Augustinian convent 
 at Wittemberg came to him in early days, and,, 
 like little men, zealous for their little objects,, 
 prayed him to be quiet, as their enemies, the 
 Franciscans, would be sure to turn any evil re- 
 port to their disadvantage at Bome. " Beloved 
 father," calmly replied Luther, Augustinian as 
 he was, and wishing well to the reputation of hi& 
 
 * B B 7 
 
382 LUTHER. 
 
 order, " all this affair will presently fall to the 
 ground, if it be not undertaken in the name of 
 the Lord ; but if it be so, we must leave it to the 
 Lord to finish it." His principles, too, were be- 
 coming clearer and better defined, and the para- 
 mount authority of Scripture was coming out more 
 distinctly to view. A voice was soon heard from 
 Rome, challenging the ninety-five propositions. 
 It came from one Prierias, a man with high- 
 sounding titles, " Prior- General of the Dominican 
 Order, Master of the Sacred Palace, Censor of 
 the Press," and asserted as amongst the "funda- 
 mental or cardinal doctrines, of the gospel, that 
 " whoever did not acquiesce in the doctrine of the 
 Roman Church and the Pope as an infallible 
 rule of faith, whence even Scripture itself de- 
 rives strength and authority, was a heretic ; " and 
 that " the Roman Church could decree what it 
 would concerning faith and morals in word and 
 deed." Part of Luther's answer was as follows ; 
 and it contains the germ of the doctrine which 
 he helped to write on ten thousand hearts before 
 many years were over. " St. Paul has said, 
 6 Prove all things ; hold fast that which is 
 good ; ' — and again, ' Though we, or an angel 
 from heaven, preach any other gospel to you than 
 that which we have preached to you, let him be 
 
LUTHER. 383 
 
 accursed.' St. Augustine, too, once wrote thus 
 to St. Jerome, ' I have learned to render the 
 honour of infallibility to the writers of the Ca- 
 nonical Books, and to none besides. As to others, 
 I do not believe the things that they teach, 
 simply because it is they who teach them.' By 
 these fundamentals, if you, Prierias, under- 
 stand me, you will see that your whole dialogue 
 is overthrown." 
 
 A more formidable opponent was one Doctor 
 Eck, a scholar and divine of high character, who 
 had been a friend of Luther's, but is known to 
 posterity as one of his bitterest and most perse- 
 vering assailants. He wrote like a schoolman, at- 
 tacking the " Propositions" with weapons such 
 as were wielded by the disciples of Aristotle ; 
 but there was a plentiful admixture of terms of 
 abuse, which Luther warmly resented, but too 
 often imitated in his controversial writings. " He 
 calls me drunkard," was the Reformer's com- 
 plaint to a friend, " Bohemian, moreover, and 
 heretic, a seditious and impertinent fellow, besides 
 some lighter reproaches, such as sleepy and silly, 
 and, above all, a despiser of the Sovereign Pontiff." 
 In Luther's reply there is a pithy little sentence 
 which would go far to settle the Romish contro- 
 versy, if men would apply to theology the common- 
 
384 LUTHER. 
 
 sense principles which govern their opinions in 
 other matters. Writing to one who professed 
 himself both an Aristotelian and a Christian, he 
 argues thus : — "It is certainly impudent in any 
 one to teach, as the philosophy of Aristotle, any 
 dogma which cannot be proved by his authority. 
 You grant this. Well, then, it is a fortiori the 
 most impudent of all things to affirm in the 
 Church, and among Christians, anything that 
 Jesus Christ himself has not taught. Now, in 
 what part of the Bible is it said that the treasure 
 of Christ's merits is in the hands of the Pope ? " 
 Some attempts were made at a reconciliation. 
 Eck excused himself by saying that the offensive 
 work was not meant for the public, but was sent 
 as a friendly communication to his Bishop ; a 
 strange apology certainly for writing in a style 
 so little episcopal. But the breach was never 
 healed ; and Eck and Luther are known to pos- 
 terity, not as friends, but as rival disputants. 
 
 The spring and summer of 1518 were a sort of 
 breathing-time in the Reformer's life, after the 
 first note of war was sounded, and before the ac- 
 tual strife commenced. Rome had been defied, 
 or rather, some of her favourite doctrines had been 
 challenged; for defiance of the Pope, we have 
 seen, would have been disclaimed by Luther at 
 
LUTHEK. 385 
 
 this period as eagerly as by the most submissive 
 of Cardinals ; and, as yet, no censure was heard 
 from the patient, easy-living Leo X. In the in- 
 terval, Luther was both learning and teaching, — 
 gathering fresh light from study and reflection, 
 and proclaiming, with yet more of clearness and 
 force, the doctrine which reached men's con- 
 sciences, and touched their hearts. Increasing 
 numbers flocked to Wittemberg, and his pulpit 
 in the old Church was surrounded by students 
 and townsmen, as well as strangers from a dis- 
 tance, who rejoiced to hear his plain comments 
 on the word of God, or his spirit-stirring exhor- 
 tations to repentance and a holy life. His voice 
 was heard in other places, too, and seed was sown, 
 which bore goodly fruit in later years. He tra- 
 velled to Heidelberg to attend a Chapter of his 
 Order; and there, in the presence of the Count 
 Palatine, and the learned men of the University, 
 he held a public disputation, which, not only at- 
 tracted many hearers, but won some serviceable 
 helpers to the good cause. Martin Bucer, and 
 two faithful friends, listened to him in public, and 
 conversed with him in private; and in later 
 years these men dispensed, among many thousand 
 hearers in England and in Germany, what they 
 had first heard from Luther, and then found, by 
 c c 
 
386 LUTHER. 
 
 their own study and reflection, to be the very 
 truth of God. 
 
 Luther at At last, in August 1518, came a 
 
 Augsburg. citation from Leo to Eome ; but, on 
 the interposition of the Elector, a trial was sub- 
 stituted before Cardinal Cajetan, the Pope's Le- 
 gate, at Augsburg. There, all was mildness and 
 civility on the judge's part. Luther's own account, 
 Oct. 11, 12, 13. written on the spot, describes their 
 1518, meetings as being of the most ami- 
 
 cable kind ; but his mind was made up by this 
 time to bear every thing, and retract nothing. 
 " The Legate," he wrote to his friends, " says that 
 he desires to act the part of a father to me ; and 
 yet he will hear nothing from me but the words, 
 I retract and acknowledge my error ; and these 
 words I will never utter. He always styles me 
 his dear son. I know how little that means. 
 Still I doubt not that I should be to him one of 
 the dearest of men, if I would utter the single 
 word, Revoco. But I will not become a heretic 
 by renouncing the faith that has made me a 
 Christian." On the 19th of October Luther left 
 the city privately before daybreak, having de- 
 posited with his friends a solemn " Appeal," to 
 be affixed to the door of the Cathedral, " from 
 
LUTHER. 387 
 
 the Most Holy Lord, the Pope, not well-informed, 
 to the same Lord, when he should be better in- 
 formed" Thousands blessed him going and re- 
 turning ; and the Reformer himself, now that the 
 line was crossed, and he had been confronted 
 with authority, seems to have looked up to the 
 Pontifical throne with an eye less dazzled, and a 
 heart more free. 
 
 Leipsic, one of the principal towns of _ : 
 
 ' r m r Luther at 
 
 Saxony, was the next public stage from Leipsic. 
 which his doctrine was proclaimed, — 
 Doctor Eck being his challenger, and Duke 
 George, the Elector's cousin, among the listeners. 
 The principal subject of discussion was the Pope's 
 supremacy. On that Luther had talked till lately 
 like a zealous Papist; but now he was begin- 
 ning to take higher ground : the early fathers 
 were quoted triumphantly against the later ones ; 
 and courtiers and schoolmen, who filled the great 
 Hall of Assembly, heard new and startling lan- 
 guage respecting the mistakes of councils and the 
 paramount authority of Holy Scripture. Thus 
 was his doctrine sown widely through Germany ; 
 the heart of the nation was stirred ; Luther's 
 name became a household word in. towns and vil- 
 lages; and, month by month, his friends grew 
 more confident, while the thunders of the Vatican 
 
 * c c 2 
 
388 LUTHER. 
 
 were silent, and the brave monk was still un- 
 touched. 
 
 Luther's Nor was his pen idle during this 
 
 writings. "b llS y and anxious period. He wrote 
 letters to the Pope in a strain at once dignified 
 and respectful; for slowly and painfully was he 
 weaned from the belief that all truth was pre- 
 cious in the eyes of the Holy Father, and that all 
 perversions of it came from his unworthy officers. 
 For scholars and divines he published his Latin 
 Commentary on the Epistle to the Galatians*, re- 
 asserting, almost with apostolic force and clear- 
 ness, the doctrine of justification by the Grace of 
 God, through the merits of the Divine Redeemer ; 
 while for the people, who knew only their mo- 
 ther German, he sent forth plain tracts, ex- 
 pounding the Lord's Prayer and the Ten Com- 
 mandments, and thus taught them, in his own 
 fatherly tone, and simple, nervous style, the rudi- 
 ments of the Christian faith. 
 
 Meanwhile, all that came from his pen was 
 caught up and carried by a thousand hands 
 through Germany. Printers and booksellers 
 were on the side of the new doctrine, and proved 
 more effective allies than noble and royal patrons. 
 Men, who had- been monks, renounced the clois- 
 * See NOTE (E E). 
 
LUTHER. 389 
 
 ter, and earned a living by going from town to 
 town with a supply of Luther's works for sale. 
 Thus while the indolent, pleasure-loving Pope 
 was taking his ease, and talking of the German 
 business as a " squabble among the monks," the 
 words of the Reformer were taking root in ten 
 thousand hearts, and an army was collecting, made 
 up of laymen and ecclesiastics, of scholars and 
 artizans, who were prepared to stand by him at 
 all hazards. 
 
 The favour of the multitude would The Elector 
 have availed Luther but little without Frederic. 
 the protection of his Prince ; but happily the 
 Elector of Saxony was one who " loved justice, 
 and loved his subjects; "and the services rendered 
 by him to the cause of the Reformation in its 
 earliest stages give him a claim on the gratitude 
 of posterity. Under any circumstances, the name 
 of Frederic the Wise would have been a memora- 
 ble one, as he is one of the few men who have 
 refused a splendid throne. Without a crime, and 
 without a struggle, he might have been Emperor 
 of Germany; for, on the death of Maximilian, 
 his talents and character recommended him to 
 his brother Electors as the native Prince whom 
 they would have preferred to all others. But the 
 Turk was threatening Christendom ; on the 
 
 c c 3 
 
390 LUTHEK. * 
 
 German frontier, if an invasion were really at- 
 tempted, the conflict would begin. It was most 
 desirable, therefore, to collect resources from 
 abroad, which might be directed against the 
 common enemy at that point. " Choose the Arch- 
 duke Charles," was his advice, " and you will 
 add the resources of Spain and Flanders to the 
 strength of Germany ; then a barrier will be 
 built up against the Infidel, which he will try in 
 vain to pass." His counsel was taken ; but all 
 men knew what a prize had been within his 
 reach, and, in the important deliberations of suc- 
 ceeding years, neither the Emperor nor his sub- 
 jects could forget that he owed his throne to 
 Frederic's magnanimity. When Luther, there- 
 fore, wanted friends, the countenance of the Elec- 
 tor was of incalculable worth ; but that counte- 
 nance was given with much of wariness and re- 
 serve. The Reformer never cringed nor flat- 
 tered, but admired the noble qualities of his pa- 
 tron, and hoped for bolder measures, as more 
 light should be given. The Prince sent Luther 
 occasional presents and messages of encourage- 
 ment, but kept aloof from any personal commu- 
 nication, and clung to the hope that the Church 
 might be reformed, not in defiance of the Pope 
 and ecclesiastical authorities, but with their help 
 
LUTHEK. 391 
 
 and sanction. Devout in his habits, cautious in 
 all his movements, and long accustomed to look 
 to Rome as the fountain of light and truth, he 
 was slowly weaned from his ancient faith, and 
 strongly opposed to any hasty innovation; but 
 still his broad shield was over Luther at the most 
 critical period of his history. It was well under- 
 stood at Rome and elsewhere, that if any violence 
 were attempted, it would be repelled by Frederic; 
 and his name carried too much weight with it for 
 Leo and his ministers to set him at defiance.* 
 
 Better than all God's other gifts Melancthon at 
 to Luther, at the time when his Wittemberg. 
 service began to. be one of peril, was the friend- 
 ship of Melancthon. In the very month in 
 which the citation to Rome had reached him, — a 
 few weeks before he set out for Augsburg, — a 
 young man of twenty-one, whose years seemed 
 still fewer, and whose small stature, and timid, 
 ungainly address, made him look like an awk- 
 ward boy, arrived at Wittemberg, being sent by 
 Reuchlin, at the Elector's request, to fill the 
 place of Greek Professor in the University. 
 Luther, in the first instance, marvelled at the 
 choice; but a Latin oration, delivered by Me- 
 
 * See NOTE (F F). 
 
 c c 4 
 
392 LUTHER. 
 
 lancthon four days afterwards, was received with 
 universal astonishment, and proved him at once 
 to be entitled to the first place among the Re- 
 formed party for scholarship and learning. " We 
 presently lost sight of his stature and his person," 
 Luther wrote to Spalatin, " and rejoiced in the 
 solid substance of worth which was within." The 
 Reformer's graphic pen never drew a truer pic- 
 ture ; and, through all the remainder of his days, 
 that solid substance of worth was his admiration 
 and delight. Melancthon drank in Luther's doc- 
 trine with eagerness, and was drawn to him by 
 that irresistible sympathy which so often binds 
 together men of rather opposite natures. Both 
 were trained for the special work assigned them 
 by Providence, and each supplied what was want- 
 ing in the other. Luther was fearless and ener- 
 getic in action ; Melancthon was wise and tem- 
 perate in counsel. Luther's was the larger and 
 stronger faith, — Melancthon's the more endu- 
 ring patience. Luther, in his vehement assertion 
 of truth, was often not sufficiently tolerant of 
 men's prejudices and infirmities; Melancthon, 
 from his natural timidity and caution, was in 
 danger of yielding too much for peace. Luther, 
 by his noble frankness and unfaltering resolution, 
 won the sympathy of the crowd; Melancthon, 
 
LUTHEE. 393 
 
 by his calm wisdom and well-weighed conclusions, 
 commended his cause to men of intelligence and 
 reflection. They were animated by the same in- 
 tense love of truth ; they drew their strength and 
 wisdom from the same heavenly spring ; they were 
 devoted, heart and soul, to the same noble work. 
 Without jealousy or rivalry, they walked, side 
 by side, through days of perplexity and days of 
 triumph; and when Melancthon, after twenty- 
 seven years of familiar intercourse, pronounced a 
 funeral oration at Luther's grave, all men knew 
 that the world had never seen a nobler or more 
 generous friendship. 
 
 On Trinity Sunday, 1518, Luther Progressof 
 
 had addressed the Pope in terms like Luther's 
 
 mind, 
 these : — " Prostrate at thy feet, most 
 
 blessed Father, I offer myself with all that I am 
 
 and have. Give me life or death ; call or recal 
 
 me, approve or reprove, as seemeth best to thee ; 
 
 I shall recognize thy voice as the voice of Christ 
 
 speaking in thee ; and if I have deserved death, I 
 
 will not refuse to die." Things, however, could 
 
 not stop at this point. The Reformer little 
 
 thought how soon his convictions would impel 
 
 him onwards, and make implicit submission to 
 
 any human authority impossible. Month after 
 
394 LUTHER. 
 
 month his thoughts took a wider range, and pene- 
 trated more to the heart of things. Christian 
 truth, in all its amplitude, was better understood, 
 and the Church's departure from it into a hun- 
 dred devious paths was more clearly seen. " I 
 know not whence these meditations come to me," 
 — such was his strain to his friends and corre- 
 spondents; " greater things will come to the birth, 
 if I write on ; " — " this business is not near its end, 
 as my Lords at Rome are dreaming, but is only 
 just beginning." These words were verified by 
 his noble appeal to the Emperor and Christian 
 nobles of Germany, on the Reformation of Reli- 
 gion, published in June, 1520, and by 
 his celebrated tract on the Babylonish 
 Captivity, sent forth in the following October. 
 In the first, he speaks of the three walls within 
 which the Romans entrenched themselves, as if 
 to stand a siege against all comers. The spiritual 
 power is independent of temporal jurisdiction, they 
 say ; if Scripture be quoted against them, they 
 reply that the Pope only can interpret it ; and if a 
 Council be threatened, the cry is, But the Pontiff, 
 and none else, may convene it. " Now may God 
 help us," said this brave leader, " and give us one 
 of the trumpets with which the walls of Jericho 
 were blown down, that we may, in like manner, 
 
LUTHER. 395 
 
 blow down these straw and paper walls." God 
 did help him ; and the blast was heard through 
 Christendom, — clearer, louder, more piercing, than 
 any that had preceded it. The address was 
 written in the German tongue for German hearts; 
 and the rapid sale of four thousand copies showed 
 how they responded to its call. The Popes and 
 their right royal state, and more than royal 
 ambition, — the Cardinals and their wholesale 
 plunder of the Church, — the priests and their 
 concubines, — the Universities and their neglect 
 of Scripture teaching, — Italians swarming in 
 German benefices, — the Emperor defied on his 
 own soil, — Saints' days turned into seasons of 
 revelry, — abuses unchecked, dioceses unvisited, 
 flocks untaught, — on all these subjects he wrote 
 like a patriot and a Christian ; and peasants and 
 mechanics, as well as princes and nobles, thanked 
 God that one was found to utter what was hidden 
 in so many hearts. 
 
 At length Leo was stirred. Busy The Pope's 
 Doctor Eck had found his way to BuU ' 
 Rome, and brought back with him a Bull of 
 Excommunication. It travelled slowly, but 
 reached Wittemberg at last ; and there, on the 
 10th of December, Luther publicly burnt it, 
 while teachers and students and townsmen stood 
 
396 LUTHER. 
 
 around him, and marvelled at his boldness. Re- 
 treat, of course, from that moment was impos- 
 sible ; all negotiation and compromise were at an 
 end; the Pope's authority, after years of pain- 
 ful doubt and misgiving, was disclaimed; for 
 the issue, whatever it might be, Luther's mind 
 was made up. The last act may seem to have 
 been the result of haste and passion ; and a more 
 dignified protest, we may think, would better 
 have suited the solemnity of the occasion; but 
 the war now was going to be carried from courts 
 and convents into a more open arena. To the 
 Christian people scattered through Germany the 
 Reformer had to make his appeal,— to all who 
 hated the tyranny of Rome, and mourned in se- 
 cret for the Church's manifold corruptions. From 
 them he must look henceforth for help and coun- 
 tenance ; and one significant act would tell them, 
 better than many treatises, where he stood in re- 
 lation to the Pope. Time was precious, as events 
 were hastening to a crisis. The books would 
 have found their way but slowly to the homes of 
 the reading population ; whereas the bonfire of 
 Wittemberg was presently town-talk in every 
 market-place. 
 
LUTHEE. 397 
 
 The season was a remarkable one, 
 
 .. . „ „ « •' i T Diet of 
 
 politically as well as religiously. In Worms. 
 the previous October, Charles V., the 
 newly-elected Emperor, had been crowned at 
 Aix-la-Chapelle. In the following January, a 
 Diet of the Empire was to be held at Worms. 
 The Pope's Nuncio had been importunate with 
 Charles to signalize the commencement of his 
 reign by extinguishing the new-born heresy, and 
 had charged him to proceed against Luther as 
 one already convicted and condemned. Charles's 
 sense of justice, and his German independence, 
 revolted against being thus made a minister of the 
 Pope ; but, in his own person, he resolved to 
 deal with Luther as a troubler of the Church and 
 the empire, and accordingly, on the 24th of March, 
 a herald reached Wittemberg, bringing a sum- 
 mons and a safe conduct from the Emperor. 
 Luther resolved instantly to obey ; 
 
 i i • p • i 5 ttt Luther's 
 
 and his fortnight s progress to Vv orms journey. 
 was to him like a march of triumph. pi 
 
 " Labour in my stead," was his parting charge 
 to Melancthon ; " if you live, it matters little 
 whether I perish." At Leipsic a priest, who 
 loved him, significantly held up to him a portrait 
 of Savonarola, the Italian martyr, adding the 
 seasonable word of encouragement, " Adhere 
 
398 LUTHER. 
 
 firmly to the truth, and thy God will adhere 
 firmly to thee." " They will burn you as they 
 did John Huss," said some. " Though they should 
 make a fire from Worms to Wittemberg, and 
 reaching to the sky, I would pass through it in 
 the name of the Lord," was his reply. His way 
 lay through Erfurth. Alighting at the door of the 
 convent where he once stood with his Plautus 
 and his Virgil^ he was welcomed by his friend, 
 the Prior, and spent Sunday within the old walls 
 where he had worn the yoke of servitude, and 
 tasted the sweets of liberty. He was invited to 
 preach, and took for his text the words, Peace 
 be unto you. And when He had so said, He showed 
 unto them his hands and His side. He spoke of 
 the Christian's peace, of the power and fruits of 
 faith, of the words of blessing which the Ee- 
 deemer dispenses from age to age among his true- 
 hearted disciples ; but not a word about Worms 
 or the Emperor, — no mention of his own trou- 
 bles and dangers, — nothing said from which it 
 could be inferred that he was anything more than 
 a faithful pastor preaching to common hearers the 
 word of life. His friends proved tempters by the 
 way. Bucer met him with a troop of horse, and 
 an offer of protection from a nobleman who had 
 embraced the Reformed faith. " His castle is 
 
LUTHER. 399 
 
 ready for you," was the message ; " the Em- 
 peror's confessor will give you a meeting there ; 
 his influence with his Sovereign is unbounded; 
 be prudent, and all may be settled peaceably." 
 " I go where I am called," Luther calmly said ; 
 " if the Emperor's confessor has anything to say 
 to me, he will find me at Worms." The last 
 warning came from Spalatin, who was with the 
 Elector at Worms, and heard the common talk in 
 all companies that, if Luther came into the net, 
 he was lost ; even the Emperor's safe conduct, 
 it was said, would be no protection for so daring 
 an offender. Luther's journey was almost ended 
 when the messenger met him ; already, we may 
 suppose, the town was in sight, with its array of 
 streets, and the old Cathedral conspicuous among 
 the meaner buildings ; for he replied, in words 
 which Germany remembers to this day, and will 
 never let her children forget : (i Go, tell your 
 master that, were there as many devils in Worms 
 as there are tiles upon the house-tops, I would 
 enter." 
 
 So to Worms he came, and the next 
 
 -n Luther 
 
 day was summoned before the Em- and the 
 
 peror. No grander spectacle had been m peror, 
 seen for many centuries. There was the strength 
 
400 LUTHER. 
 
 of Germany, embodied in the great Electoral 
 Princes, the Dukes and Counts of the empire, 
 and a hundred barons from their hundred cas- 
 tles, — the power of Rome, yet more terrible in 
 that age, represented by two Nuncios and thirty 
 Bishops, — seven Ambassadors from different 
 European Courts, in every one of which the 
 Pope had zealous and serviceable allies, — all this 
 on one side, — and, on the other, speaking only of 
 that which was visible to human eyes, one brave 
 monk standing up for a noble cause. Two 
 
 questions were put to him on his first 
 April 17. ^ r , , • 
 
 appearance ; — whether he acknow- 
 ledged the books condemned by the Pope, and 
 whether he stood by what he had written, or re- 
 tracted it. " The books are mine," he answered; 
 " 1 cannot deny them." For the second ques- 
 tion, considering the greatness of the matters in- 
 volved, he craved time to answer. It was hoped 
 by his enemies that he was wavering ; but he 
 wished only to show that his decision was well 
 weighed, and his ground deliberately taken. He 
 would gain for himself and enemies and friends a 
 few hours more to consider what hung upon his 
 answer. His request was granted, and the fol- 
 lowing day was appointed for his next hearing. 
 Expectation grew with each hour's delay. The 
 
LUTHER. 401 
 
 streets were thronged ; the houses were filled 
 with spectators up to the roofs ; a passage was 
 made with difficulty for Luther to approach the 
 place of meeting. Other business was transacted 
 by the Diet while he waited for two hours in the 
 crowd. At last, on the memorable 18th of April, 
 daylight being gone, and lamps already kindled 
 in the great hall of audience, he was brought be- 
 fore the same assembly, and had the question of 
 the previous day repeated to him. 
 
 " Then Doctor Martin Luther," say the Acts 
 of Worms, " replied in the most humble and sub- 
 missive manner. He did not raise his voice ; he 
 spoke, not with violence, but with candour, meek- 
 ness, suitableness and modesty, and yet with 
 great joy and Christian firmness." He spoke for 
 some time in German, and then was requested by 
 the Emperor to repeat what he had said in Latin. 
 It was well that Luther, a man of the people by 
 birth and in heart, should answer for himself on 
 his own soil in his own tongue ; but it was well, 
 too, that the protest, which all Christendom was 
 to hear, should be spoken in the universal lan- 
 guage of scholars and theologians. His writings, 
 he said, were manifold; some intended for the 
 people on faith and good works ; — some directed 
 against the Papacy, in which he had exposed the 
 
 D D 
 
402 LUTHEE. 
 
 false doctrine, and the scandalous lives, of many 
 who bore rule in the Church ; — some addressed 
 to individuals who had stepped forth as cham- 
 pions of error. The first were useful ; his ene- 
 mies had said as much ; they contained good doc- 
 trine, in plain, intelligible words, and might be 
 read with profit by the unlearned. The second 
 were true ; he had said it, and must stand by it, — 
 the human laws of the Popes were torturing the 
 consciences of the faithful, and their exactions 
 were emptying Christendom of its wealth. The 
 third were faulty, perhaps, in some respects ; he 
 had spoken sometimes with too much heat and 
 violence; but in the substance of what he had 
 set down he saw nothing to retract. Yet " if I 
 have spoken evil" he said, " bear witness of the evil. 
 Prove me by the writings of the prophets and 
 apostles. When you shall have convinced me of 
 my errors in this manner, I will forthwith retract 
 them, and be the first to seize my writings, and 
 cast them into the flames." 
 
 Such is an outline of Luther's answer. Of 
 course, the demand for a retractation was repeated. 
 The cause was settled at Rome already, and could 
 not be reheard. There was no room for argu- 
 ment when the chief authority had given judg- 
 ment. " A clear and definite reply is what we 
 
LUTHER. 403 
 
 want," said the official, speaking for the Council. 
 Then came the memorable words which rang 
 presently like a trumpet-call through Europe, — 
 <e If 1 am not disproved by passages of Scripture, or 
 by clear arguments, I neither can nor will retract 
 any thing ; for it is not safe for a Christian to speak 
 against his conscience." He knew well the import 
 of those decisive words. Looking round upon 
 the assembly, as if to measure his weakness 
 against their strength, he thus gave in his final 
 resolve, " Here I am; I can do no other- 
 wise; God help me. Amen." 
 
 Luther departed from the Council more like a 
 conqueror than a criminal. His temper, at once 
 so lofty and so serene, astonished his enemies, and 
 gave fresh courage to his friends. His bearing, 
 as he stood up with a martyr's self-devotion for 
 the truth, was equally removed from unmanly 
 weakness and vain self-confidence, while his 
 prompt replies gave indication of a mind per- 
 fectly self-possessed, and willing to leave the 
 issue with Him who disposes alike of men's lives 
 and fortunes. The people of Germany rallied 
 round him with enthusiasm ; his answers before 
 the Diet were repeated and re-echoed on every 
 side ; and brave knights were banded together by 
 a solemn pledge that with their lives, if it were 
 
 D D 2 
 
404 LUTHER. 
 
 necessary, they would shield Luther from vio- 
 lence. The assemblage at his apartment next day 
 was like those which are seen in the palaces of 
 monarchs. The Elector Frederic was there, and 
 Philip, Landgrave of Hesse, afterwards a distin- 
 guished champion of the Reformation, — and 
 Duke William of Brunswick, — and others of 
 distinguished name. 
 
 For the present, however, no voice but Lu- 
 ther's was heard in that great assemblage on the 
 side of truth. Charles's will was supreme, and his 
 decision was announced as follows : — " Sprung 
 from the Christian Emperors of Germany, from 
 the Catholic kings of Spain, from the Archdukes 
 of Austria, and from the Dukes of Burgundy, 
 who all rendered themselves illustrious as de- 
 fenders of the Roman faith, I am firmly resolved 
 to follow the example of my ancestors. A single 
 monk, misled by his own folly, stands up against 
 the faith of Christendom. I will sacrifice my 
 kingdoms, my power, my friends, my treasures, 
 my body, my blood, my life, and my spirit, to 
 stop this impiety." After all these high-sounding 
 threats, however, the friends of Rome still wished 
 for a peaceable settlement. They dreaded pro- 
 ceeding to extremities on account of the wide- 
 spread and growing sympathy with Luther and 
 
LUTHER. 405 
 
 his cause, but could not bear the thought of let- 
 ting the man who had braved their power depart 
 as he came. Some proposed to the Emperor to 
 violate his oath, and proceed to judge Luther as 
 an obstinate heretic. This counsel Charles re- 
 jected indignantly ; and, in fact, by this time, it 
 was hardly safe to venture upon such an outrage. 
 At last, the middle course was resolved upon of 
 plying with remonstrances and entreaties the man 
 whom threats could not move. One after ano- 
 ther, — men of authority and men of peace, — 
 some who desired rest for the distracted Church, 
 others who feared for the Reformer's safety, — 
 sought him in his home, and begged him to speak 
 the single word which would end this unseemly 
 strife. But the rock is not more deaf to the 
 beating waves than Luther was to entreaties of 
 this sort. The Emperor grew impatient; the 
 more violent party pressed for judgment; the 
 Archbishop of Treves, a man of moderate coun- 
 sels, obtained leave to make a last effort to bring 
 the Reformer to submission ; but no answer could 
 be got beyond what had been given already, that 
 he stood by the word of God, u What remedy is 
 there," said the Archbishop in their last 
 interview, " lor this state of things * 
 Point out one yourself." " My Lord," said Lu- 
 
 D D 3 
 
406 LUTHER. 
 
 ther, after a moment's silence, " I know of none 
 but Gamaliel's : If this design is a work of men, it 
 will come to nought ; but if it be of God, ye cannot 
 overthrow it ; and beware lest haply ye be found to 
 fight against God." 
 
 Luther was permitted to depart, 
 condemna- and twenty days were allowed him to 
 reach Wittemberg. While he was 
 yet upon his journey, the final edict of the Diet 
 was pronounced ; and terrible did it sound when 
 directed against one apparently so defenceless. 
 It proscribed his books, his friends, his person. 
 After the term of his safe conduct should expire, 
 all persons were declared traitors against the Em- 
 peror who should lodge Luther, conceal him in 
 their houses, give him meat or drink, lend him 
 help or countenance, publicly or secretly, by word 
 or deed. Railing was added, and truth was out- 
 raged, to blacken his reputation. The man Vhom 
 all his friends knew to be holy and devout, a dili- 
 gent student and expounder of God's word, a 
 just and upright citizen, a man of warm and over- 
 flowing charity, was denounced as having "stirred 
 up revolt, division, war, murder, theft and fire," — 
 as one who was " not a man, but Satan himself 
 in the form of a man, covered with a monk's 
 cowl," — as having " collected into one stinking 
 
LUTHEK. 407 
 
 pool all the worst heresies of past times, and 
 
 added many of his own." 
 
 At this time, when all Germany Luther's 
 
 was ringing with Luther's name, his journey. 
 
 thoughts ran back to his humble home, and his 
 
 oldest friends, and the well-remembered scenes 
 
 of childhood. He lingered at Eisenach, where he 
 
 once sang in the streets for bread ; and in the old 
 
 church, Dame Cotta, if she were still alive, might 
 
 have listened to the voice which had 
 
 . n May 2 - 
 
 grown in power since it first caught 
 
 her ear, but retained its sweetness still. He 
 next turned aside to a little village in which his 
 father had been born, and where his grand- 
 mother, a poor old peasant, still lived, besides an 
 uncle and some other relations. With them he 
 spent a tranquil day, and then resumed his jour- 
 ney, accompanied by his brother and a friend. 
 In a lonely part of the road, five horsemen, 
 masked and armed from head to foot, suddenly 
 rushed upon the travellers, seized Luther, placed 
 him on a led horse, and carried him off at a rapid 
 pace, preserving all the while a mysterious silence. 
 In the dead of the night they reached a lonely 
 fortress, situated at the summit of a steep moun- 
 tain. The heavy doors were unbarred, and the 
 prisoner conducted to an inner room, where he 
 
 D D 4 
 
408 LUTHEK. 
 
 found a military dress and a knight's sword. He 
 was speedily stripped of his ecclesiastical habits, 
 and told by those who thus strangely busied them- 
 selves about him, that he was no longer Doctor 
 Martin, but Knight George. By this name the 
 attendants were to know him, and he was never 
 to be seen abroad but in the costume suited to 
 his assumed character. 
 
 All this would be like a dream at 
 
 A prisoner 
 
 at the first ; but by degrees the truth came 
 
 out. His friends, thinking him a 
 doomed man if he should wander abroad after 
 the publication of the Imperial sentence, con- 
 trived this mode of securing his safety. Only a 
 little handful were in the secret ; the place of re- 
 treat was admirably chosen ; the greatest pains 
 had been taken to prevent the track of his cap- 
 tors from being discovered; there was little pro- 
 bability of chance travellers finding their way to 
 a gloomy old castle, called the Wartburg, situated 
 in the deep, black forests of Thuringia ; and there, 
 under the protection of the Elector of Saxony, 
 it pleased God to shelter his servant, till the 
 tempest, which raged against him, should have 
 spent some of its violence. 
 
 Luther's retreat in this mountain solitude was 
 an important period in his history. After the 
 
LUTHER. 409 
 
 events of Worms, he had to reconsider his posi- 
 tion, to collect his strength, to sink into the 
 depths of his own heart, and enquire how he 
 stood prepared for the future whatever it might 
 be, — above all, to commune much with God, and 
 get from the heavenly treasury, not only the 
 spirit of power with which he was largely en- 
 dued already, but also that soundness of mind, 
 and clearness and strength of judgment, which 
 were, if possible, yet more necessary for the 
 coming conflict. He complains occasionally that 
 his times of solitude are times of idleness. In 
 reality, however, he was never better employed. 
 An eager spirit like his wanted retirement and 
 repose. To be for ever in the fray would bring 
 out too prominently the harder and rougher por- 
 tions of his character. So much was committed 
 to him, — he was the principal arbiter in transac- 
 tions of such mighty consequence, — wisdom was 
 so necessary to guide him in his onward path, and 
 mistakes might be so fatal, — that to be permitted 
 for months together to commune closely with the 
 Father of his spirit, without disturbance from 
 enemies or friends, was a blessing beyond all 
 price, the kindest dispensation perhaps in his 
 eventful and guarded life. He wrote to his friends, 
 and dated From the Wilderness, — From the 
 
410 LTJTHEK. 
 
 Island of Patmos, — From the region of the 
 clouds, — From amidst the birds singing sweetly 
 on the branches, and lauding God day and night 
 with all their strength. These expressions are 
 most significant ; and as it is the privilege of 
 genius to convey a world of meaning sometimes by 
 a single word, we seem to look into the very 
 heart of the man who could thus vividly describe 
 the place of his banishment. If he dwelt in the 
 clouds, it was far away from the scenes of human 
 strife and passion. The wilderness was to him, 
 as to his Lord, a place of temptation ; but angels 
 came and ministered to him likewise. The birds 
 were not the only songsters ; for Luther's heart, 
 when at the fullest, overflowed at his lips, and 
 hymns of praise were sung to tunes of his own or 
 others' composing. His Patmos was no prison, 
 but a place of rest and liberty, where visions, 
 like those of the beloved disciple, greeted his 
 eyes, and the glories of the New Jerusalem, 
 adorned as a bride for her husband, contrasted 
 brightly and pleasantly with the sad looks and 
 torn garments of the distracted Church on earth. 
 
 Occupations Luther had feW b °° ks with Mm at 
 
 in his the Wartburg ; but among them were 
 
 solitude. . 
 
 the Greek and Hebrew scriptures ; 
 
 and these he studied diligently both for his own 
 
LUTHEK. 411 
 
 spiritual improvement and for the lasting gain of 
 his countrymen. He had already commenced 
 his German translation ; and while enemies were 
 hoping he was dead, and friends wondered at not 
 hearing his living voice in the midst of them, he 
 was busy with the work which has enriched mil- 
 lions of his countrymen during the last three cen- 
 turies. Other works, too, of a controversial or 
 practical kind, were poured out from his moun- 
 tain retreat, — a translation of Melancthorfs Latin 
 Apology for the Reformation, — a German Com- 
 mentary upon the Epistles and Gospels for the 
 Year, — treatises on Confession, on Antichrist, on 
 Monastic Vows. The last subject was much in 
 his thoughts, and perplexed him greatly. His 
 honesty made him unwilling to tamper with 
 obligations of any kind. On the other hand, the 
 more he thought on the subject, and the more he 
 saw of the practical evils connected with it, the 
 stronger was his conviction that forced celibacy 
 was a snare for men's souls. At first, with a pru- 
 dence which showed how little disposed he was 
 to push things to extremes, he advised persons 
 who were still young, and repented of their en- 
 gagements to the Church, to feel themselves free 
 to cancel them ; but he " did not dare," to use 
 his own words, to give the same advice to persons 
 
412 LUTHER. 
 
 advanced in life, who had ratified the contract of 
 their youth by the approval of their riper judg- 
 ment. On no subject does his mind seem to have 
 wavered so much. Subsequent reflection or 
 temptation, we know, made him bold enough to do 
 what now he had not the courage to recommend ; 
 but to many his earlier judgment will seem the 
 better ; and too flippant for so grave a question was 
 the saying of a later day, that it " was a duty," not 
 a sin, " to marry, were it only to spite the Pope." 
 
 Enquiries While Luther was confined, Ger- 
 
 after many was not unmoved. His noble 
 
 Luther. .^ 
 
 stand at Worms had made him dearer 
 than ever to the hearts of his* countrymen, and 
 had done more to recommend his doctrine than 
 many months of writing and preaching. His dis- 
 appearance was the subject of conversation in 
 towns and villages. Travellers found groups as- 
 sembled in the market-places, and the question 
 which greeted them was not, " What of the court, 
 or the camp?" but " What of Luther? where 
 is he, and by whom concealed? by friends or 
 foes ? " Sometimes the worst was reported, and 
 the place and manner of his death were set forth 
 by some deceived or deceitful wayfarer ; and then 
 cries of grief were heard, and threats of ven- 
 
LUTHER. 413 
 
 geance were muttered. The partizans of Rome 
 began to tremble at the indications of popular 
 resentment which met them on every side. They 
 had hoped, shortly before, that the Reformer had 
 really been taken off, and would trouble them 
 no more ; now they would have given gold to 
 redeem his life. " The only means of safety 
 now left to us," wrote one of them to the Arch- 
 bishop of Mentz, " is to kindle torches and make 
 a search for Luther over the whole world, in 
 order to restore him to the wishes of the nation." 
 The work, however, did not stand progress of 
 still in the absence of him who had Reformation. 
 guided and controlled it hitherto. It is strange 
 that up to this time, even in places which were 
 thoroughly imbued with the Reformed doctrine, 
 no change had been made in the religious obser- 
 vances of the people. Mass was celebrated as 
 before ; the host was lifted up and worshipped ; 
 Latin was the language of the sanctuary; pil- 
 grimages were made to favourite shrines; and 
 images of the Virgin and favourite saints were 
 decked out with votive offerings. The first steps 
 in advance were taken, not by Luther's autho- 
 rity, but in spite of his wishes. He anticipated 
 large results from the silent, powerful opera- 
 tion of the truth on men's consciences. As the 
 
414 LUTHEK. 
 
 new doctrine should possess their hearts, the old 
 usages, he expected, would fall away and disap- 
 pear, and the work of reformation might prove 
 all the surer if it were not too much precipitated. 
 But the men who had succeeded to his place at 
 Wittemberg were for prompter and more decisive 
 measures. On Christmas-day, 1521, the old 
 Church, in which Luther's spirit-stirring tones 
 had been heard so often, witnessed a stranger and 
 more novel spectacle than any which had pre- 
 ceded it. A little company of faithful men as- 
 sembled there, and received the communion in 
 both kinds at the hands of the ministering priest. 
 It was no mass, but the supper of the Lord. 
 There was no bowing down to the uplifted host, — 
 none of the trickery which had surrounded that 
 most touching memorial of the Redeemer's love 
 with mysterious awe. All was simply done. The 
 consecrating words were spoken in good honest 
 German. The invited guests were all who " felt 
 the burden of sin, and hungered and thirsted for 
 divine grace." Some were found to receive gladly 
 on these terms the offered bread and wine ; and in 
 the following month the Town Council and Uni- 
 versity gave their formal approval to the new 
 mode of celebration by appointing a suitable ser- 
 vice. About the same time the question of vows 
 
LUTHER. 415 
 
 was being practically settled in the same place. 
 Thirteen monks at once left the convent of the 
 Augustines, and betook themselves, in a common 
 garb, to the callings for which they were most 
 fitted ; and the chapter of the monastery, when 
 summoned to give judgment in the matter, de- 
 clared that " in Christ there was neither monk 
 nor lay person ; " all were free to quit the houses 
 in which they could not abide safely or comfort- 
 ably; all who chose to abide under the yoke 
 might remain, and obey their superiors, not by 
 constraint, but in love. 
 
 Thus the leaven was working si- Outbreak of 
 lently and surely where Luther had fanaticism, 
 first hidden it ; but in all times of reformation, 
 when ancient usages are attacked, and first prin- 
 ciples are discussed with freedom, fanaticism is 
 sure to start up, with its wild theories, and rash 
 counsels, and boundless self-sufficiency. Luther 
 had appealed from the Church to the word ; now 
 a new school of Prophets, as they called them- 
 selves, began to appeal from the word to the 
 Spirit. " You quote a book," they said ; " a 
 living voice has spoken to us. We want no 
 human guides. We go where the Holy Ghost 
 shall call us, like the saints in ancient days." 
 
416 LUTHER. 
 
 From Zwickau, a neighbouring town, the infec- 
 tion soon spread to Wittemberg. Melancthon, 
 timid and cautious as usual, would pronounce no 
 positive opinion. Some, who rejected the new 
 revelation, were yet hurried by the temper which 
 it kindled into extreme opinions and rash mea- 
 sures. Carlstadt, a man whose influence with 
 the people was second only to Luther's, led the 
 way, and the effects of his preaching were soon 
 seen in violence and tumult. Churches were in- 
 vaded, and images broken in pieces. Schools 
 were broken up, and students of divinity sent 
 back to the plough. Learning was proclaimed to 
 be an useless incumbrance, and the only theology 
 worth having was held to be that which God 
 taught his own children by immediate revelation. 
 Every thing was unsettled. The good were per- 
 plexed ; the timid began to waver ; the enemies 
 of the Reformation and the friends of Rome began 
 to exult and triumph. 
 
 Voice from Luther heard of all that was pass- 
 
 the Wartburg. ^ an( j tr ; e( j to c heck it by letters 
 of remonstrance. He was willing to bear with 
 images and masses while the work of inward 
 illumination was going on, and trusted that the 
 sanctuary would be cleansed when men's hearts 
 were first made temples of the Holy Ghost. To 
 
LUTHER. 417 
 
 carry on the work of Reformation by popular 
 tumult and violence seemed to him both impo- 
 litic and profane. Rash and hasty innovators 
 he always regarded, not as friends, but as enemies 
 who hindered and disgraced the cause which was 
 dearer to him than life. The inhabitants of Wit- 
 temberg, he said, were " his own brood ; God had 
 entrusted them to him ; he would not shrink from 
 death, if he could do them good." Yet, when it 
 was reported to him that their town had been the 
 scene of disorder, he wrote to rebuke 
 
 , ' _-. Dec. 1521. 
 
 them sharply. " You are directing 
 
 your energies," he says, (e against the mass, and 
 images, and other unimportant matters ; and, in 
 doing so, you are losing sight of faith and charity. 
 Your outrageous conduct has afflicted many pious 
 men, — men better, perhaps, than yourselves. 
 You have forgotten what is due to the weak. ... 
 God granted you a great blessing in giving you 
 His pure and undefiled word. Yet I see you 
 not a whit the more charitable for it. You ex- 
 tend no helping hand to those who have never 
 heard the word, — to our brothers and sisters at 
 Leipsic, at Meissen, and many other places, for 
 whose salvation we are bound to care, as for our 
 own. You have rushed into your present pro- 
 ceedings, ej es shut, head down, like a bull, look- 
 
 E E 
 
418 LTJTHEK. 
 
 ing neither to the left nor to the right. Reckon 
 no longer upon me; I cast you off; I abjure 
 
 you." 
 
 Departure for The evil, however, went on, and 
 Witteinberg. aU eyeg were turne d t the Wart- 
 
 burg. Citizens and Professors, — the men who 
 were guilty of excesses, and the men who de- 
 plored them, — wanted a guiding hand, and a 
 voice of authority. Even the prophets and 
 image-breakers appealed to Luther, and promised 
 to abide by his decision. Under these circum- 
 stances, he could remain no longer in his hiding- 
 place. Danger was abroad, for Duke George, 
 and other enemies of the Reformation, were laying 
 all that was done by the fanatics to his account, 
 and calling on the Elector to take summary mea- 
 sures against the leader and all his followers. But 
 "Wittemberg was the post of duty, and thither he 
 would go at all hazards. He left the 
 Wartburg on Monday the 3rd of 
 March, after ten months of seclusion, and on the 
 following Friday was again among his friends. 
 He wrote to the Elector on his journey, not to 
 claim his protection, but rather to repudiate all 
 help but that which God might give. "In all 
 that concerns me," he says, " you must act as an 
 Electoral Prince. The orders of the Emperor 
 
LUTHER. 419 
 
 must have free course in your towns and villages. 
 Leave your gates open, if any shall come in search 
 of me. No sword can give any help in this cause, 
 God must do it all." 
 
 On the Sunday after his arrival, Sermons on 
 the old church was filled from end to ]Deace - 
 end, and Luther mounted the pulpit from which 
 he had spoken so often like a father to his chil- 
 dren. His .topics were patience and charity and 
 trust in God to carry on his own work. " Let 
 nothing be done upon compulsion," he said; — 
 " The word of God must conquer men's hearts, 
 and no other victory was worth having, as faith 
 and sincerity would be wanting. . . . Their zeal 
 should be like St. Paul's, whose spirit was stirred 
 within him when he saw Athens given to ido- 
 latry ; yet he laid no hand on any of its altars; 
 only preached to them the living God. . . . Their 
 faith should be clear and direct as the sun's pe- 
 netrating light ; no king can stop his rays or 
 divert their course ; but their love, too, should be 
 as diffusive as the sun's heat, radiating in all di- 
 rections, and meeting in turn the wants of every 
 brother." Such was the burden of Luther's ex- 
 hortations. Seven times in eight following days 
 he preached in this strain ; and his triumph was 
 complete. The people were recalled to sobriety 
 
420 LUTHER. 
 
 and moderation; extravagant teachers fell back 
 into obscurity ; timid and anxious' spirits were 
 relieved from perplexing doubts; peace was given 
 back to the distracted flock. Luther at Worms 
 was not greater or nobler than Luther thus de- 
 scending from his mountain solitude, going 
 straight to the pulpit as his throne of judgment, 
 and thence, by calm remonstrance and faithful 
 appeals to God's word, quelling the excited spirits 
 which had sown confusion and strife among his 
 beloved flock. 
 
 Up to this point our narrative has been full 
 and particular. The history of the Reformation, 
 at its earliest period, is the history of Luther's 
 own progress in the discovery of truth, and every 
 step in his advancing career is full of the deepest 
 interest. The formation of his character, the 
 growth of his opinions, the discipline by which he 
 was prepared for his great work, the events which 
 called him from his monk's cell, and his Professor's 
 chair, to be the foremost champion of men's 
 dearest rights, and the leader in that moral revo- 
 lution which gave back the pure gospel to a large 
 portion of Christendom, — all this could not be 
 told without some minuteness of detail ; and time 
 and patience may well be spared for studying the 
 
LUTHER. 421 
 
 most important chapter in the Annals of the 
 Church since the Apostolic Age. But from this 
 point we must content ourselves with describing 
 characteristic incidents, or marked eras, in the 
 Eeformer's life, leaving our readers to fill up our 
 imperfect outline from the ample materials fur- 
 nished by Kanke, D'Aubigne, Waddington, Mil- 
 ner, Michelet and others. 
 
 From the Wartburg Luther had 
 
 ° . Translation 
 
 brought with him the best fruit of his of the New 
 solitude, his unfinished translation of 
 the New Testament, and now, with the help of 
 Melancthon, he set himself to complete and per- 
 fect it. In six months it was ready for the press. 
 The printers hastened the work as if they felt how 
 much depended on it, and before the end of Sep- 
 tember three thousand copies of the word went 
 forth, bearing this simple but expressive title, 
 The New Testament : German : Wittemberg. No 
 human name was given ; but all men knew what 
 hand had unsealed the sacred fountain. The 
 style, like that of our own version, was the best 
 that the literature of his country had yet pro- 
 duced, — popular without being too homely, — such 
 as the scholar might approve, and the peasant un- 
 derstand. It was rapidly carried over Germany ; 
 
 E E 3 
 
422 LUTHER. 
 
 edicts of princes could not stop its march. Men 
 would have for themselves what had been the 
 priest's peculiar treasure too long ; and in twelve 
 years sixty editions, nearly, of this precious 
 volume had gone forth, scattering light, infusing 
 strength, dispensing comfort, in ten thousand 
 homes. A new era commenced for Germany, and 
 men who had been taught to revere the Pope, and 
 to regard Luther as a blaspheming heretic, could 
 now weigh the doctrine of both in the balance of 
 truth. " Common people, women, cobblers even," 
 said the enemies of the Reformation, " are now 
 devouring this book of Luther's ;" and the charge 
 was true. Men were learning their duties as 
 Christians, — were listening to the message of 
 salvation, — were studying page after page of the 
 Holy Book, — eagerly, joyfully, by their own 
 hearths, among their children and familiar friends, 
 and mingled their thanksgivings to God with 
 blessings on their noble countryman to whom they 
 owed this new-found treasure. 
 
 While these things were doing, and Luther, 
 unguarded by any human power, was busily en- 
 gaged in doing God's work, the Decree of Worms 
 remained an empty threat. The Emperor, who 
 ruled in Austria and Hungary and Spain and 
 Flanders and the Indies, did not live more securely 
 
LUTHEK. 423 
 
 in any one of his walled castles or guarded palaces 
 than Luther in his humble dwelling at Wittem- 
 berg. Another Diet assembled at M522, 
 
 Nuremberg, sat for a year, parted and \ 1523 - 
 
 came together again. Two new Popes, in suc- 
 cession, thundered their anathemas against Lu- 
 ther, and called upon the Princes of Germany to 
 rid the world of this troubler of its peace ; but all 
 in vain. The powers of this world were kept in 
 check by Him who rules them all. National jea- 
 lousies, — court intrigues, — the feuds of the Em- 
 pire at one time, — changes in the Vatican at 
 another, — all wrought for one common end, and 
 made a wall of brass around the hated Reformer, 
 within which he lifted up his voice like a trumpet, 
 and spoke those thrilling words which were calling 
 up whole nations to life. 
 
 The war of the peasants made a 
 
 • • • -r 1 7 tp -. • -. War of the 
 
 great crisis in Luther s life, and, inde- peasants. 
 pendently of its political interest, had 
 a prejudicial bearing, undoubtedly, on the cause 
 of the Reformation. In the year 1524, a large 
 portion of Germany was agitated by a general 
 rising of the serfs, or rural bondservants, against 
 their lords. The feeling which was abroad greatly 
 resembled that which flamed out in England at 
 
 E E 4 
 
424 LUTHER. 
 
 the time of Wat Tyler's insurrection. The people 
 were outgrowing the restraints imposed upon 
 them by the feudal system ; the yoke, which had 
 been patiently borne for ages, became an intoler- 
 able burden ; and, in the absence of free institu- 
 tions to check the ruling powers, and give a safe 
 direction to the popular element, threats and vio- 
 lence became their natural weapons. Then came 
 the gathering of armed multitudes, the storming 
 of castles, the plundering of cities, and all the 
 excesses in which long-suppressed resentment is 
 sure to vent itself, when the weak suddenly find 
 themselves irresistibly strong, and the oppressor is 
 driven to sue for mercy at the hands of those who 
 were his drudges yesterday. The flame spread 
 rapidly from one province to another of the great 
 German Empire. It began near the Black Fo- 
 rest; it ran quickly through Suabia, spread to 
 Saxony, startled the nobles of Thuringia and 
 Franconia, and reached the countries bordering 
 on the Rhine. The demands of the insurgents were 
 at last embodied in twelve articles, — some relating 
 to oppressive forest laws, — some complaining of 
 newly-imposed burdens in the way of taxation, — 
 some claiming to be equal to their Lords, as being 
 redeemed by the bloocl of the Son of God, and 
 especially asserting their right to choose their own 
 
LUTHER. 425 
 
 pastors. Their cause very soon became despe- 
 rate; for it was discredited by massacre and 
 pillage ; their leaders were ignorant or intempe- 
 rate men who had no means of access to the ruling 
 powers; and their numbers, amounting at one 
 time to forty thousand men rudely armed, made 
 negotiation difficult and dangerous. Knowing the 
 generosity of Luther's nature, and assured that 
 all his sympathies would be on the side of justice, 
 they appealed to him by name. " Let him arbi- 
 trate between us and our lords," they said : " by 
 the word of God we will be tried ; and if we mis- 
 take concerning it, he can put us right." 
 
 Nothing could be more embarrass- Luther called 
 ing to the Keformer than such a tri- t0 mediate - 
 bute to his greatness. The cry resounded through 
 Germany that for all this harvest of misery and 
 crime his doctrine was responsible. He had taught 
 the people to appeal to reason and Scripture against 
 their priests, it was said ; and now they were but 
 fighting with weapons of his forging, — using for 
 their own wicked purposes the arguments which 
 his books and sermons had made popular wherever 
 men chafed under the yoke of authority, or 
 longed for licence and plunder. Luther's answer, 
 in the first instance, was worthy of himself. Like 
 a heaven-commissioned prophet he would have 
 
426 LUTHER. 
 
 mediated between the nobles who had abused their 
 power, and the peasants who had confounded li- 
 berty with anarchy. " You are the cause of this 
 revolt," he said plainly, addressing the Princes 
 and Bishops of the empire ; " it is not the pea- 
 sants, dear lords, who rise up against you, but it 
 is God himself who wishes to oppose your fury. 
 For the love of God, lay aside your indignation. 
 Treat this poor people with discretion as you 
 would persons drunk and bewildered. Suppress 
 these commotions by gentleness, lest a conflagra- 
 tion break forth and set all Germany in a blaze." 
 To the people he spoke as one sympathizing with 
 their wrongs, yet bound to rebuke their sin. To 
 revolt, he told them, was to act like Pagans ; 
 the duty of Christians was patience, not war. — 
 " The Pope and Emperor have been banded toge- 
 ther against me, yet the more they stormed, the 
 more the gospel has advanced and triumphed. 
 And why ? because I have committed all to God, 
 and awaited his strong hand. It is not with the 
 sword that Christians fight ; but with suffering 
 and the cross. Christ, their Captain, did not 
 handle the sword ; He hung upon the tree." To 
 both parties, in a spirit of impartial faithfulness, 
 he recommended compromise and mutual conces- 
 sions. He spared none; he rebuked and coun- 
 
LUTHER. 427 
 
 selled all. " You, lords," lie said in conclusion, 
 " have Scripture and history against you, which 
 teach you the punishment which has ever followed 
 tyranny. You, peasants, have Scripture and ex- 
 perience against you ; for revolt has never ended 
 well, and God has sternly fulfilled the saying of 
 His own word, c They that take the sword shall 
 perish with the sword.' " 
 
 The storm was too violent to be appeased by 
 words like these. Fanaticism of the wildest kind 
 mingled in the fray. An enthusiast of the name 
 of Munzer assumed the tone of a prophet, and 
 was received in that character by the ignorant 
 multitude who flocked to his standard. Dreams 
 were taken as commands from heaven. The wars 
 of Canaan were to be repeated ; for the earth was 
 given to the saints, and the unbelieving of every 
 name were aliens and intruders. Under these 
 circumstances, to try to make peace was like 
 preaching to the winds. Men of all ranks com- 
 bined for the common safety, and, after many 
 months of conflict in a widely-ex- 
 
 J A. D. 1525. 
 
 tended field, the insurgents were put 
 
 down; but fifty thousand Germans had, first, 
 
 perished with the sword. 
 
 Luther mourned in bitterness and Luther's grief 
 anguish of spirit for the afflictions of ^passion. 
 
428 LUTHER. 
 
 his country. He had become odious to the pea- 
 sants for his efforts to restrain their madness ; and 
 now, because his name had been quoted and his 
 doctrine perverted by ignorant or wicked men, 
 the Romish party charged him as the originator 
 of these fearful evils. The cause, which was 
 dearer to him than life, had its triumphs suddenly 
 arrested. Timid men shrank from innovations 
 which might break down old barriers, and let in 
 a flood of unimagined horrors. He was naturally 
 a man of large compassion and overflowing cha- 
 rity ; but this load of suffering and obloquy for a 
 time completely overmastered him. Letters were 
 written in a tone of almost savage fierceness. The 
 Reformer and man of God seemed to be possessed 
 with the crusading spirit ; and misguided peasants, 
 smarting under a sense of wrong, were talked of 
 as " accursed infidels " had been in other days. 
 He was tempted beyond his strength, and, in the 
 bitterness of his sorrow, forgot his own oft-re- 
 peated lesson that God must work, and man must 
 suffer and wait and pray. 
 
 Luther's At such a time, Luther's tossed and 
 
 marriage. anxious spirit naturally craved a place 
 of refuge; and he found it in a home of peace 
 and love. On the 14th of June, 1525, he married 
 
LUTHEK. 429 
 
 Catherine Bora, a lady of noble birth, of great 
 beauty, and of piety like his own. She had been 
 a nun, but fled from confinement some time before 
 with eight of her companions, and, not knowing 
 where else to go for shelter or counsel, had stopped 
 at the door of Luther's convent. The certainty of 
 provoking a sneer at his own expense did not 
 deter him from doing the work of charity ; and after 
 their parents or nearest relatives had refused to re- 
 ceive them, he took them, like orphans, under his 
 charge, lodged them in the families of his friends, 
 and provided suitable marriages for the younger 
 among them. " I grieve for the poor things 
 from my heart," he had written to Spalatin ; 
 " yet more, I abominate the cruelty of those who 
 thus insulate the weaker sex, and divorce so many 
 from those whom God intends for their guardians 
 and protectors. And what can I do with them, 
 you ask. Why, if their relations will not protect 
 them, I must get others to take them in; and 
 some have promised to do so already. Pray beg 
 some money for me of your rich courtier friends, 
 to enable me to keep them for a week or a fort- 
 night Entreat the Elector to give us ten 
 
 florins, and some dresses new or old, for these 
 poor girls." For two years after his acquaintance 
 with Catherine, Luther certainly had no thoughts 
 
430 LUTHER. 
 
 of changing his state. He had even proposed mar- 
 riage to the lady in other quarters, — had pressed 
 it upon her unduly ; so that she complained of 
 him to a common friend, and said frankly, at the 
 same time, that, if Luther himself should seek 
 her, she was willing to wed, but she must use her 
 woman's privilege of declining to give her hand 
 where her heart would not go with it. At the 
 same time, a rumour having gone abroad that 
 Luther was meditating marriage, one of his friends, 
 a lawyer, had said that, " if the monk should wed 
 the nun, the world and the devil would have their 
 fill of laughter, and all that he had accomplished 
 in the world for good would be undone at a 
 stroke." Both sayings, it seems, — Catherine's and 
 the lawyer's, — were reported to Luther ; and the 
 two combined seem to have precipitated a reso- 
 lution which, undoubtedly, caused much sorrow 
 to many of his best friends, and raised shouts of 
 exultation wherever his name was odious. He 
 would " play the devil and the world a trick," he 
 said. He would show that the work was heaven's, 
 and not his ; and if men, in their blindness, should 
 denounce him as vile for an action which his own 
 conscience told him was lawful, then it would be 
 seen that " the Reformation stood not by the 
 weakness of men but by the power of God." 
 
LUTHEK. 431 
 
 A tone of levity was certainly out of place at 
 such a time ; for the question of marrying, or 
 respecting his vow of celibacy, was a very solemn 
 one, in Luther's case, and should have been set- 
 tled after anxious and prayerful deliberation. 
 More gravely he wrote at other times, — " I wish 
 to bear testimony to the Gospel, not only by my 
 words but by my works ; " — "I wish to preserve 
 no part of my Papistical life;" — " For the edifica- 
 tion of the weak, I mean to leave a striking con- 
 firmation of what I have taught, perceiving that 
 my end is near." And, doubtless, when the step 
 was taken, he had a clear conviction that, in his 
 place, it became him to justify what he had writ- 
 ten, and to proclaim, in the most emphatic man- 
 ner, that marriage was God's ordinance, and that 
 forced celibacy was man's wicked invention. 
 He had done violence to his nature, moreover, 
 when he became a recluse ; he had a generous, 
 almost chivalrous, regard for all that was noble 
 and pure in womanhood, and was formed for the 
 delights of familiar companionship. Still we can- 
 not help wishing that in this respect, as in so many 
 others, the Reformer had been like St. Paul. The 
 mockers and the scoffers of his day, and of later 
 days, who have made themselves merry at his ex- 
 pense, we heed but little. That Luther thought of 
 
432 LUTHEK. 
 
 marriage when he took the first steps toward a se- 
 paration from Rome, is as ridiculous a calumny as 
 any that the advocates of the Papacy ever forged 
 and propagated. But his noble cause was da- 
 maged by this act: all that he wrote on one 
 most important subject was received with jea- 
 lousy and suspicion ever afterwards ; and his 
 spotless name received its first stain in the eyes 
 of many who wished him well. 
 His domestic Melancthon, who knew Luther in 
 character. his happy home, approved his mar- 
 riage ; and, truly, when we see how his spirit was 
 soothed, and his life gladdened, by Catherine's 
 gentle presence, it is more difficult for us to con- 
 demn it. In sober earnestness, or in his jesting 
 moods, he called her sometimes his Empress, at 
 other times, Lord Kate; but to his friends he 
 wrote about her as " kind to him in all things," — 
 6S far beyond his hopes ; " and his bonds, if any, 
 were those of generous confiding love. Children 
 grew up around him ; and their simple ways, and 
 pleasant sports, and trusting nature, afforded him 
 a new field of observation, from which he drew 
 many a lesson of heavenly wisdom. Earth and 
 air and sky all teemed with images which his fancy 
 was for ever weaving into fables and parables; 
 and now his little ones supplied the place of birds 
 
LUTHEE. 433 
 
 and fruits and flowers. His comments, often, on 
 what he saw among them are profoundly wise and 
 touchingly beautiful, "Serve the Lord with fear, 
 and rejoice with trembling. There is no contra- 
 diction in this text, at least to me," he writes. 
 " My little boy, John, does exactly thus with me. 
 But, alas ! I fail towards God. If I am seated at 
 table, and am writing or doing anything, John 
 sings me a little song. If he sings too loud, and 
 I tell him of it, he still sings on, but with some 
 fear, and to himself, as it were. God wills that 
 we also should be constantly gay, but that our 
 gaiety be tempered with fear and reserve." To 
 the same John he wrote during the sitting of the 
 Diet at Augsburg ; and the letter contains a pa- 
 rable in which we read of a beautiful garden, and 
 pretty horses for good children, with golden bri- 
 dles and silver saddles.* He had a father's trou- 
 bles, as well as a father's pleasures ; for two of his 
 daughters went before him to the grave, and the 
 name of his darling Magdalene, his all-dutiful, 
 all-obedient child, is inscribed in the records 
 which will never die. " There thou art ; peace be 
 with thee," he said, as she was put into her coffin, 
 " Dear child, thou wilt rise again ; thou wilt 
 shine like a star, aye, like the sun. I am joyful 
 
 * See NOTE (GG). 
 F F 
 
434 LUTHER. 
 
 in spirit ; but, oh ! how sad in the flesh ! " Then, 
 writing to a friend, he says, " We ought to be 
 glad, I know, for her happy eseape from the 
 power of the flesh, — from world, and Turk, and 
 devil ; yet have we constant weeping and bitter 
 sorrow. At the bottom of my soul are engraven 
 her looks, her words, her gestures. Even the 
 death of Christ (and what are all deaths in com- 
 parison with that?) cannot tear me from this 
 thought as it ought to do." 
 
 As we have been looking into Luther's 
 
 Poverty 
 
 and disin- home, we may just observe that it ac- 
 terestedness. CQrded ratJier w J t J 1 t ^ e obscurity of his 
 
 origin than with the greatness of his fame. He 
 never fared so well, probably, as when he lived at 
 the Elector's charges in the Wartburg. Whatever 
 allowances he had were consumed in a generous 
 hospitality, and in gifts which left him, some- 
 times, almost as needy as those to whom they 
 were sent. "I shall have to quit Wittemberg, 
 and make it up with the Pope and the Emperor," 
 he writes jokingly at one time; "for Staupitz 
 sends us no money, and we are getting deeper into 
 debt." " You ask me for eight florins " (less than 
 a pound), he writes at a later period ; " where on 
 earth am I to get eight florins ? My poor house 
 is drained of its last penny. I have been obliged 
 
LUTHER. 435 
 
 to pawn three goblets, and they were presents 
 from different people." Yet in the same year we 
 find him writing about a plague at Wittemberg, 
 and describing his house as " a regular hospital." 
 Two friends had fallen ill there, and were nursed 
 like sisters. Then the wife of the chaplain died, and 
 as <c every body seemed afraid of the poor fellow, 
 we took him and his children into our house," says 
 Luther. All this was a drain upon his scanty re- 
 sources, his allowance from the Elector amounting 
 only to two hundred florins; and more than 
 once we find him turning his thoughts to some 
 handicraft occupation for a living. He writes for 
 turning tools, — says he has made some progress in 
 clock-making, — announces, too, that he has laid 
 out a garden, and that his " melons, gourds, and 
 pumpkins get on famously." Yet when the book- 
 sellers offered him an annual stipend for all he 
 should write, he would not take it ; what God 
 had enabled him to send forth to instruct man- 
 kind he declared should be a free gift to them, like 
 the light of heaven. Quite of a piece with this 
 noble disinterestness were all his dealings with 
 the Elector. Gifts were not absolutely declined, 
 but he did his best to have them sparingly be- 
 stowed. " I have long delayed to thank you for 
 the clothes and gown," he writes at one time; 
 
 F F 2 
 
436 LUTHER. 
 
 " but I humbly beg your Grace not to believe 
 those who say that I am in want. As a minister, 
 it does not behove me to have any superfluity, 
 nor do I desire it. . . . It would not become me 
 to wear the liver-coloured cloth; yet, the black 
 coat I will wear in honour of your Grace, though 
 it is much too costly for me; and, were it not 
 your Grace's gift, I could never wear such a coat 
 I beg, therefore, that your Grace will wait till I 
 myself complain and ask, so that, through this 
 over-readiness on your Grace's part, I may not 
 be shamed out of asking for others who are much 
 worthier of such favours." Yet, mark how gene- 
 rously the man can give, who is so backward to re- 
 ceive. One of his letters respecting home matters 
 runs thus : — " We must dismiss old John with 
 honour. "We know that he has always served us 
 faithfully and zealously, and as became a Christian 
 servant. . . . You need not remind me that we 
 are not rich. I would gladly give him ten florins 
 if I had them ; but do not let it be less than Jive. 
 He is not able to do much for himself. Pray 
 help him in any other way that you can. There 
 is a silver cup which might be pawned. Sure I 
 am that God will not desert us." 
 
 Luther's con- We must turn to a less inviting 
 troversies. subject, that of Luther's controversies. 
 
LUTHER. 437 
 
 Little need be said about bis royal antagonist. 
 
 Considering wbat Henry the Eighth's morals 
 
 were, bis opinion of the Seven Sacraments can 
 
 signify but little to Christendom, and Luther 
 
 might well have contented himself with his first 
 
 comment on the work which was lauded at court, 
 
 and puffed at Rome, — ce A great boast, I hear, is 
 
 made of a little book by the King of England." But 
 
 the praise which was lavished on it by others roused 
 
 the indignation of Luther, and he spent some good 
 
 argument, and much foul language, on one whom 
 
 flatterers classed with Augustine, Constantine, 
 
 and Charlemagne, but whose championship of the 
 
 Church appears simply ludicrous to all who are 
 
 acquainted with his career of crime. 
 
 Worthier combatants succeeded ; — 
 
 Erasmus. 
 first, the greatest scholar of his age, — 
 
 Erasmus. He was too conspicuous a man to be 
 entirely neutral in a contest which agitated Eu- 
 rope from end to end, and, as he held much in 
 common with the conflicting parties, was ap- 
 pealed to by both in turn. Peace was dearer to 
 him than truth, — life more precious in his eyes 
 than either. " All men have not firmness enough 
 for martyrdom ; " — " With me the authority of the 
 Church has so much weight, that I could be of the 
 same opinion with Arians and Pelagians, had 
 
438 LUTHER. 
 
 the Church signified its approbation of their 
 doctrines;" — " If Pope or Emperor decree 
 right, I follow what is holy ; if wrong, I endure 
 what is safe ; " — " Above all, avoid dissension, — 
 a thing destructive of every good, — and be care- 
 ful to serve the times with a sort of holy craft ; 
 yet in such manner as not to betray the treasure 
 of evangelical truth." In these sentences we read 
 the heart of Erasmus, and for such a man to make 
 common cause with Luther was as impossible as 
 for the hunted hare to turn, with a lion's heart* 
 on its pursuers. For a time they were on terms 
 of distant civility; they corresponded occa- 
 sionally; each admired the genius of the other, 
 and commended what had been well done to- 
 wards their common object. But their paths 
 soon diverged ; the Eeformer was pledged to the 
 service of truth, — the scholar to his own safety, 
 and the cause of peace. Two Popes in succes- 
 sion, Adrian VI. and Clement VII., made suit 
 to Erasmus, and begged his help ; Henry VIII. 
 solicited him to become a brother-champion of 
 the ancient faith ; till at last his natural unwil- 
 lingness was overcome, and, in the sight of all 
 Christendom, he entered the lists against the man 
 of Wittemberg. 
 
 Luther probably had heard some rumour that 
 
LUTHER. 439 
 
 Erasmus was girding himself for the battle. He 
 wrote a laboured letter, entreating him 
 
 . , i April, 1524. 
 
 to be quiet, and not take pen in hand 
 against the good cause. " We admire your 
 powers and gifts," — such was the strain of this 
 curious document, — "we are thankful for all 
 you have done for letters and religion ; but we 
 require of you no efforts beyond your strength. 
 God has not given you energy and courage to 
 attack the monster roundly and boldly ; and while 
 this is the case, it is best you should serve us in 
 your own way. But at any rate do not join your 
 force with our adversaries. If God shall not send 
 you heart and soul amongst us, at least, let me 
 entreat you to remain a silent spectator of our 
 tragedy. Publish no books against me, and I will 
 publish none against you." The tone of this letter 
 was not likely to please Erasmus ; certainly it 
 did not silence him ; for, in the following year, 
 his treatise was published on the Free- 
 dom of the Will. He chose his ground 
 eautiously, and maintained it with great ability. 
 He was much too wise to defend Indulgences 
 or other abominations of the Papacy ; he had 
 written too much about monks and convents to 
 contradict Luther on subjects of that sort ; he did 
 not enter on the difficult question of Church au- 
 
 F F 4 
 
440 LUTHEE. 
 
 thority, nor try to prove that the Pope might 
 decree Arius and Pelagius to be sound and 
 orthodox. He chose to attack rather than de- 
 fend. Luther, in maintaining the doctrine of 
 man's corruption by the fall, and his dependence 
 on divine grace for the beginning of a new life, 
 had written often impetuously and indiscreetly ; 
 and now every exposed and unguarded point was 
 assailed by one who was master of all the 
 weapons of controversy. Luther took a year to 
 reply, and then published his cele- 
 brated treatise on the Bondage of the 
 Will. It was no difficult matter to prove that 
 the doctrine of his antagonist was not the doctrine 
 of St. Paul ; for Erasmus, with all his learning, 
 was a shallow theologian, and, in his eagerness to 
 convict Luther of one class of errors, he had run 
 to the opposite extreme, greatly underrating, "in 
 his argument, that fatal predisposition to evil 
 which is asserted in the Bible, and proved by all 
 history and all experience. But neither did 
 Luther make his own defences good at every 
 point. His peculiar style, dealing so much in 
 vehemence of assertion, and so little in guarded 
 and measured statements, was little adapted for 
 the discussion of the most perplexing of all moral 
 questions ; and, from his reply, as from his pre- 
 
LUTHER. 441 
 
 vious works, quotations may be made which, lite- 
 rally taken, seem to leave man at once helpless 
 and irresponsible. Unhappily, this treatise, like 
 many others, was deformed by railing of the most 
 offensive kind. Vile creature^ — Serpent, — A very 
 fox, — A knave who has mocked God and religion, 
 — are some of the terms of abuse heaped on the 
 first scholar and writer of his day. It is easy to 
 say that such was the style of that age ; it was a 
 - style utterly disgraceful to the literature of any 
 age ; and Luther, who was no slavish follower of 
 old customs, should have taught men better. 
 
 Far more disastrous in its effects Zwinglius 
 was the Sacramentarian controversy, Sacramen- 
 Bitter were the feuds which grew out ta * iall s- 
 of it; and they were feuds between men who 
 should have been united, as a family of brothers, 
 in the bonds of a common faith. Zwinglius, like 
 Luther, had received the gospel, not from man, 
 but from God. " In the year 1516" he began 
 to preach it, he tells us himself, " before any one 
 in Switzerland had heard the name of Luther." 
 Yet to the same conclusions had they been led, 
 without communication or concert of any kind, 
 on the great points which divided the Christian 
 world. " In all my days>" says Zwinglius, " I 
 
442 LUTHER. 
 
 have not written a letter to Luther, nor he to me. 
 I have purposely abstained from correspondence, 
 because I was desirous by this means to let all 
 men see how uniform the Spirit of God is." 
 Alas ! that between men, thus taught and guided, 
 the bond of peace should be broken ! Alas ! that 
 the holy rite, intended by the Saviour to be a 
 pledge of love among all His followers, should 
 have become the war-cry of rival parties ! 
 
 The doctrine of the Church of Rome was simple 
 on the subject of the Eucharist. We may believe 
 it, or reject it, but at least we understand what 
 she meant. The consecrated bread, she tells us, 
 is no longer bread ; but as much, and as certainly, 
 the flesh of Christ, our Lord, as was the body 
 that once hung upon the cross. The doctrine of 
 Zwinglius was simple too. The bread, after con- 
 secration, he tells us, is bread, and nothing more 
 than bread, just as the waters of baptism are 
 the pure, unaltered element ; but, by Christ's ap- 
 pointment, it is made a symbol of His body 
 which was given for the life of the world ; and it 
 is chosen to be a symbol, because, as bread 
 nourishes men's physical frame, so Christ's doc- 
 trine, received by faith, is the spiritual nutriment 
 of His true disciples. Luther's meaning is not 
 so clear. The bread, according to him, was 
 
LUTHEE. 443 
 
 bread still ; but Christ's bodily presence was su- 
 peradded to it. The letter of Scripture, he said, 
 must be our guide : when Christ says His body is 
 in the Sacrament, at our peril shall we deny it, 
 and say He was talking in a figure. The answer 
 has been given a thousand times, that Christ, at 
 that rate, becomes successively a Door, a Rock, and 
 a Vine ; and why symbolical language is less ad- 
 missible in one case than the other, the wit of man 
 has never yet discovered. Yet for his favourite 
 doctrine of Consubstantiation, as opposed to that 
 of Eome and Geneva, the German Eeformer 
 would have gone willingly to the prison or the 
 stake. His own exposition of it was as follows, 
 and the illustration, which he repeats on more 
 occasions than one, is apt and ingenious : — " Fire 
 and iron are two substances; yet are they so 
 mixed in red-hot iron, that every part is both iron 
 and fire. How much more, then, may the glo- 
 rious body of Christ be bread, after the same 
 fashion, in every part of the substance." 
 ' One might have supposed that men thoroughly 
 agreed as to their rule of faith, — rejoicing in one 
 common deliverance, and living from day to day 
 on the same vital truths, — might have taken the 
 Lord's supper each in his own way, and had no 
 wr anglings at the table of their common Lord. Yet 
 
444 LUTHER. 
 
 when Luther was exhorted to peace, and reminded 
 that the points in dispute were secondary matters, 
 he replied indignantly, " One or other, — the 
 Swiss or we, — must be the ministers of Satan." 
 (Ecolampadius from Basle, Bucer from Strasburg, 
 and Zwinglius from Zurich, entered the lists with 
 the great Reformer ; in temper they had greatly 
 the advantage; and, startling as the denial of 
 Christ's bodily presence, in any shape, sounded 
 to those who had been brought up in the opposite 
 faith, none could deny that their learning and 
 ability made their cause plausible, at least. The 
 first of these eminent men was a fellow-townsman 
 of Erasmus, who was consulted by the Senate of 
 Basle before they permitted the work of CEco- 
 lampadius to be published : his public reply was 
 evasive and characteristic ; — " The work was 
 learned, eloquent, elaborate ; -pious he would 
 gladly call it, if any thing could be pious which 
 was contrary to the decisions of the Church." 
 At a later day, writing to a friend, he said, with 
 the candour which made him often so troublesome 
 an ally: — "A new dogma has arisen, that there 
 is nothing in the Eucharist except bread and 
 wine. To confute this is now a very difficult 
 matter; for John (Ecolampadius has fortified it 
 
LUTHER. 445 
 
 by so many evidences and arguments, that the 
 very elect might almost be seduced by them" 
 The year, in which the enemies of 
 
 J . A.D. 1527. 
 
 the Reformation, — the Pope and the 
 Emperor, — were fighting out their own quarrel, 
 was a year of fierce dispute among its friends. 
 Luther supposed himself to be contending for the 
 honour of his Lord, for the truth of Scripture, 
 for all that was vital and precious in one of the 
 Sacraments of the Church. The adverse party, 
 he thought, were denying the very words of 
 Christ, and turning sacred mysteries into vulgar 
 realities. So his zeal kindled, as the controversy 
 went on, and, at last, the Swiss Reformers ranked 
 in his eyes with the blindest and most obstinate 
 adherents of the Papacy. Wise men wished for 
 peace, but all attempts at mediation proved vain. 
 After many failures, a last attempt was made in 
 the autumn of 1529, when, at the earnest entreaty 
 of the Landgrave of Hesse, Luther and Me- 
 lancthon gave the three Sacramentarian divines a 
 meeting at Marburg. One grieves to read 
 words like these addressed to Zwinglius, before 
 the conference began, by Bucer, Luther's own 
 disciple and cordial friend, — " Luther, most re- 
 spectable Zwinglius, is all fury ; do you, I beseech 
 you, be all mildness, and manage him as you 
 
446 LUTHEE. 
 
 would a deranged brother, leading him to truth 
 by fair language." We grieve yet more to learn 
 that Luther had made a proposal, which was 
 scouted by the Landgrave, that "some honest 
 Papists should be present at the conference as 
 witnesses against the Swiss." Coming in this 
 temper, we are not surprised that Luther made 
 all agreement and compromise impossible. Two 
 Oct. 2, 3. days were spent in discussion ; but, 
 
 as he had begun by saying that he 
 would "listen neither to sense nor reason, with 
 the words of God before him" a long journey 
 seemed to have been taken to little purpose. 
 Behind the words Hoc est corpus meum he reso- 
 lutely entrenched himself, and maintained, in 
 reply to all argument from Scripture or from 
 analogy, that one meaning they had, and no other 
 they could have. Very sad is Luther's own 
 account of the parting ; — " They supplicated us 
 to bestow upon them the title of brothers. Zwin- 
 glius implored the Landgrave, with tears, to grant 
 this. We did not, however, accord to them this 
 appellation of brothers ; all we granted was that 
 which charity requires us to bestow even upon 
 
LUTHEK. 447 
 
 Time went on, and every y ear found Luther > s 
 
 the Reformed party yet stronger, enemies kept 
 
 in check. 
 while political combinations of many 
 
 kinds helped to divert the attention, and embarrass 
 the counsels, of their most formidable enemies. 
 According to all human calculation, nothing could 
 have been easier than for the Pope and Emperor 
 to enforce the decree of Worms. Even Saxony 
 was divided ; and Duke George, in the Southern 
 portion, was for ever raging against the new 
 doctrine, while the Elector Frederic, in the first 
 instance, and his brother and successor John, at a 
 later day, let it grow and flourish under their 
 protection. Yet enemies near at hand, and ene- 
 mies afar off, seemed to threaten the Reformer in 
 vain. Clement VII. and Charles V. were allies 
 at one time, and issued anathemas and decrees 
 against Luther and all who harboured or followed 
 him ; but presently peace was exchanged for war, 
 and the heretics were all at large, while the 
 Imperialist forces, after sacking 
 Rome, had made the Pope himself 
 their prisoner. At a later period Charles's own 
 capital was threatened : Solyman, with an im- 
 mense army, was before Vienna, and 
 
 J . , " Oct. 1529. 
 
 m twenty successive assaults di- 
 rected all his strength against that bulwark of 
 
448 LUTHER. 
 
 Christendom ; but by " a great miracle of God," 
 as Luther said truly and devoutly, the siege was 
 raised, and the boasting Infidel arrested in his 
 march of triumph. French wars, — intrigues and 
 conquests in Italy, — journeys to Spain, — Turk- 
 ish invasions, — all came in turn ; and, while 
 the great European potentate was busy with this 
 world's politics, the man, whom he had de- 
 nounced and sentenced years ago, dwelt at Wit- 
 temberg as in a guarded fortress, and with his 
 own favourite weapons, the word of God and faith 
 and prayer, was winning fresh conquests from 
 month to month. 
 
 Much had to be done meanwhile, 
 Beligious ... , . , 
 
 worship and in relation to worship and ceremonies, 
 
 ceremonies. w hi cn required wisdom and prudence 
 of no common kind. It is curious to see how 
 much of patience and charity was exhibited by 
 Luther in arrangements of this sort, as contrasted 
 with the fiery zeal of his controversial writings, 
 and the intolerant spirit manifested towards the 
 Swiss Reformers. At Marburg he would yield 
 nothing for peace. The men who would not 
 interpret literally four words of Scripture were 
 all disowned and denounced as heretics. Yet 
 at Wittemberg, when the churches of Saxony 
 were to be remodelled in accordance with the 
 
LUTHER. 449 
 
 faith of the Reformers, and the delicate question 
 had to be settled how much should be retained, 
 and how much discarded, of the ancient obser- 
 vances, every thing was yielded which did not 
 touch the vital doctrines of the Gospel. Latin 
 hymns and canticles were retained ; the new mi- 
 nisters wore vestments like those of the Romish 
 priests ; altars and lighted tapers were still per- 
 mitted in the churches, and devotees knelt before 
 them at pleasure. These things, Luther said, " we 
 retain till they grow old, or till it seem good to 
 change them. If it please any man to do other- 
 wise, I permit him to do as he likes best." He re- 
 commended the strict observance of Lent, without 
 binding men to it by any positive regulation ; but 
 the excesses of carnival times, and other practices 
 which had become associated with sacred usages, 
 at once dishonouring religion and degrading and 
 corrupting the people, he did his utmost to re- 
 strain. At the same time Catechisms were pro- 
 vided for the young ; and plain comments on the 
 Epistle and Gospel of the day, with well-selected 
 portions of Scripture, were inserted in the Service- 
 book. Homilies, too, of a suitable kind, were pro- 
 vided by his active mind and busy pen, to be read 
 by men who were not gifted as preachers ; and 
 simple expositions of Christian doctrine, or intel- 
 G G 
 
450 LUTHER. 
 
 ligible exhortations to the practical duties of life, 
 took the place of childish legends, and half-serious, 
 half-comic addresses, by which the pulpit was so 
 often disgraced. All was done in concurrence with 
 the civil power ; and in the Elector John, who 
 was at once a wise prince, and a devout, zealous, 
 well-taught Christian, he found an enlightened 
 patron, and a willing helper. Evangelical pastors 
 were settled in parishes; incompetent ministers 
 were removed ; schools were established wherever 
 sufficient funds could be provided. For the last 
 Luther had a special care, charging the town ma- 
 gistrates not to let their youth grow up "like 
 grass in the forest," and reminding them that 
 "serious, honest, well-taught citizens were the 
 safety and strength of their country ; not great 
 treasure, or fine houses, or strong walls, or well- 
 appointed armies." Wisely, too, like one who 
 felt that his work, as the pastor of Christ's flock, 
 and the builder up of a spiritual temple, was to 
 pursue disciples every where, and " by all means " 
 to "gain some " of every age and every class, he 
 was careful to provide milk for babes, as well as 
 meat for strong men. " Above all? he said, " we 
 must bring the simple-minded and the young to 
 the knowledge of the Gospel by perpetual instruc- 
 tion ; and to this end we must read, sing, preach, 
 
LUTHER. 451 
 
 write prose and poetry ; yea, more, — if such 
 means would further this good purpose, I would 
 let them ring all the bells, and play all the organs, 
 and make every possible noise that man can 
 make." 
 
 The re-distribution of ecclesiastical old and New 
 revenues was a subject of anxiety to Endowments. 
 the early Reformers, and the course recommended 
 by Luther was wise and just. "We no longer 
 say masses for the dead," he said, writing to a 
 friend, " or do other things for which these funds 
 were left. They should be resumed by the ruling 
 powers of the state, and employed in doing good 
 to men's souls according to the will of Christ." 
 In some places, where the religious endowments 
 were very large, a portion was set apart for found- 
 ing hospitals and colleges ; provision was made, 
 too, for monks and nuns who held to their vows ; 
 but religious teaching was reckoned the main 
 thing, — teaching for old and young, in plain, 
 intelligible German, out of the pure word of God ; 
 and for this purpose the pastor and the school- 
 master went hand in hand, wherever the influence 
 of Wittemberg extended. 
 
 One evil, which soon began to appear among 
 pretended friends of the Reformation, roused the 
 indignation of Luther, and called forth his sternest 
 
 G G 2 
 
452 LUTHEK. 
 
 censures. In Germany, as elsewhere, the landed 
 proprietors soon began to covet the church lands, 
 and hoped to enrich themselves out of the spoil of 
 abbeys and monasteries. A simpler ritual and a 
 humbler ministry, it was argued, would be main- 
 tained at far less cost than the ancient faith, with 
 its gorgeous spectacles, and its army of monks and 
 priests. Churches might be dispensed with, said 
 some ; teachers exclusively devoted to their office, 
 and supported out of public funds, were not ab- 
 solutely necessary, according to the new order of 
 things, said others ; and what was not wanted for 
 sacred purposes naturally reverted to the original 
 proprietors. These robbers of churches and the 
 poor Luther denounced as a disgrace to Christen- 
 dom. " The matter is very serious," he wrote to 
 Spalatin ; " it torments me exceedingly. When the 
 Prince was here, I forced myself into his bed- 
 chamber, that I might have a private audience 
 with him on the subject." In the face of the 
 court, he presented a remonstrance to the Elector's 
 son, and vowed to his friends that if the evil were 
 not at once repressed with a strong hand, he would 
 arraign the wrong-doers publicly in the face of 
 Europe, and make their names a by- word of re- 
 proach. His voice prevailed, and the work of 
 plunder was arrested. A general visitation was 
 
LUTHER. 453 
 
 ordered through the Elector's dominions for the 
 settlement of questions relating to Church pro- 
 perty and Church discipline ; and laymen of esta- 
 blished reputation were associated with Luther, 
 and his most trusted friends, in the work of 
 reformation. Incompetent or immoral pastors, 
 and those who persisted in teaching false doctrine, 
 were to be deprived. If the common people, in 
 the newly-settled parishes, after warning and in- 
 struction, still clung to their ancient superstitions, 
 they were to be allowed to sell their goods, and 
 depart quietly elsewhere; — " not that the Elector 
 wished to force any man's faith, but those who 
 pertinaciously excited disturbance and sedition 
 must be coerced and chastised." Not yet had the 
 Reformers learnt to give the liberty they claimed ! 
 So much of the old Popish spirit survived in 
 those who had cast off the yoke of Rome ! 
 
 Nor yet was their own battle won. Diet of 
 Peace for Germany, by making one will m Spires. 
 supreme in religious, as in civil, matters, was still 
 the dream of the Emperor's life; and, accordingly, 
 he summoned a Diet to meet at Spires, of which 
 the object was to repeal a tolerant edict formerly 
 passed at the same place, and to claim the execu- 
 tion of the long-suspended Decree of Worms. 
 
 G G 3 
 
454 LUTHER. 
 
 His brother Ferdinand presided. The Catholic 
 Princes came in force with an imposing military 
 array, like men prepared for war. John of Saxony 
 was there, attended, not by a body-guard of sol- 
 diers, but by the peace-loving, peace-breathing 
 Melancthon. Yet little was gained by the domi- 
 nant party, for while the reformed doctrine was 
 proscribed, and further innovations were forbidden, 
 the fearless attitude of the minority, and their 
 bold appeal to a general council of all Christen- 
 dom, or to a free congress of the German States, 
 put courage into many fainting hearts, and won 
 respect even from their enemies. Before God 
 and man, for themselves and their people, the 
 leaders protested against all invasion of the rights 
 of conscience, and claimed to be judged by the 
 word of God, " the sure rule of all doctrine, and 
 April 25, a U ^f e 5" an( i from the day that the 
 1029. document was signed "in a little room 
 
 on the ground floor of the chaplain's house, still 
 shown in St. John's Lane, near St. John's Church 
 at Spires," the term Protestant, or Men of the 
 Protest, has been current throughout Europe. 
 The subscribing parties, besides deputies from four- 
 teen free cities, were the Elector John, the Land- 
 grave Philip of Hesse, the Margrave of Branden- 
 burg, two Princes of Brunswick, and the Prince 
 of Anhalt. 
 
LUTHER. 455 
 
 Yet more important was the advan- Diet of 
 tage gained by the Reformers, in the Augsburg. 
 following year, at Augsburg, though the decree, 
 which issued thence, sounded terrible to many. The 
 Emperor himself was present, having pledged his 
 word to the Pope to do his utmost, as an upright 
 Sovereign, to restore peace to the Church, but 
 having steadily refused to adopt severe measures 
 against his German subjects, till all others had 
 failed. No such assemblage had been seen since 
 the memorable meeting at Worms, nine years be- 
 fore. To that time the Emperor's thoughts must 
 have travelled back. In the interval, he had pros- 
 pered in war and peace ; his name had become 
 the greatest name in Europe ; a King and a Pope 
 had been his prisoners ; his influence was felt in 
 every court; his alliance was sought by all his 
 brother monarchs in turn. But against Luther no 
 advantage had been gained. His doctrine, mean- 
 while, had overspread half Germany. Princes and 
 people were on his side. His books were gaining 
 converts and disciples in other lands. Bulls and 
 anathemas from Rome, — diets and edicts at home, 
 — neither silenced the leader, nor daunted his 
 followers. And now the same process was to be 
 repeated. Were its beginnings more hopeful? 
 Would its results be more prosperous? Such 
 
 GG 4 
 
456 LUTHER. 
 
 might have been the Emperor's reflections when 
 the new Diet was opened ; but men, 
 
 June 20. 1530. r . 
 
 born to power like his, are hard to 
 be persuaded that any thing is impossible to them ; 
 therefore, after many failures, he resolved to at- 
 tempt the work of pacification once more. All 
 Germany united, that her sons might be ready for 
 war against the Turks, was the popular motto of 
 his opening address ; and complaints were added 
 that all his efforts to put a stop to religious dis- 
 sensions through many years had failed and come 
 to nought. 
 
 Luther was not present. It would have looked 
 like braving the Emperor to stand before him 
 while the old sentence of condemnation was still 
 in force. His place was supplied by his three 
 faithful friends, Melancthon, Spalatin, and Justus 
 Jonas, — of whom the last had been to him like 
 a brother or a son ever since the memorable 
 journey to Worms ; he had joined company 
 with the Reformer at Erfurth, had stood by him 
 through those days of peril, and lived by his 
 side at Wittemberg ever afterwards. The pro- 
 testing Princes, too, were present, making com- 
 mon cause with the theologians, and ready to 
 claim for their brethren everywhere a full hearing, 
 and a fair trial, when their time should come. On 
 
LUTHER. 457 
 
 the other side, was the Pope's Legate, Campeggio, 
 come from Italy to see how his master's wishes 
 were carried out, — and a whole tribe of native 
 churchmen and theologians, — Eck, Luther's old 
 antagonist among the number, with four hundred 
 and four propositions ready culled from the writ- 
 ings of the Eeformers, which he offered to prove 
 heretical and damnable. 
 
 Melancthon had brought with him, what he 
 had been carefully preparing for months, the 
 Confession of Faith of the German Reformers, 
 studiously drawn up so as to present the fewest 
 points of antagonism to the established creed, and 
 recommend their doctrine to candid and impartial 
 listeners. The Elector and his friends demanded 
 to have this read; and after some hesitation on 
 the Emperor's part, and a refusal on their part to 
 keep their place in the Diet, or even plead before 
 the Court, on any other terms, it was 
 
 . June 25. 
 
 read. Charles heard it, — and men 
 like Duke George, who hated the Reformation 
 with a blind and cruel hatred, — '■ and the Pope's 
 representative, — and numbers more who had 
 judged of the new doctrine by the report of its 
 enemies, and believed it to be very little better 
 than blasphemy. Before them all, in a clear, 
 strong voice, so that every word was heard to 
 
458 LUTHER. 
 
 the remotest corner of the hall, the Chancellor 
 of Saxony read out this famous document, sen- 
 tence by sentence. The profoundest stillness 
 reigned throughout the Assembly for two whole 
 hours, till the last sentence was concluded ; and 
 when the Emperor took a Latin copy of the Con- 
 fession, and said that the affair was grave, and he 
 must deliberate upon it, the Reformed party felt 
 that, let the decision be what it might, the 
 triumph of that day was really on their side. 
 Luther wrote to the Elector, saying that he 
 "was glad beyond measure to have lived to 
 see the day when, through the medium of such 
 an admirable Confession, Christ was publicly 
 preached before so august an audience." 
 
 The answer to the Confession was a, Refutation, 
 as it was styled, drawn up by the theologians on 
 the other side ; but while the former document 
 was printed in a month, and making its way to 
 every town in Germany, the latter was made so 
 scarce, that the Reformers, after hear- 
 ing it publicly read before the Diet, 
 asked in vain for a copy. Then nearly two 
 months were wasted in trying to make antagonist 
 opinions coalesce. Strange to say, Melancthon 
 was blinded by his love of peace, and hoped 
 against hope that some common ground could be 
 
LUTHER. 459 
 
 found for the men who held by the Church's in- 
 fallibility, and the men who would be judged 
 only by the word of God, — for the advocates of 
 the unyielding Papacy, and the champions of the 
 rights of conscience ; but all his concessions were 
 too few ; mediators and reconcilers, lay and ec- 
 clesiastic, met and talked in vain. So, at last, 
 even the Emperor despaired of bringing the mi- 
 nority to submission, and a decree was promul- 
 gated, such as Clement or his Nuncio 
 
 •11 1 X, 7 • 1 N0V « 19 ' 
 
 might have drawn up. By this the 
 Reformed Faith was utterly proscribed ; deep 
 questions of theology were determined by the 
 supreme authority ; all innovations in doctrine or 
 worship were forbidden as offences against the 
 state ; the armies of the empire were pledged to 
 the assistance of the civil power wherever obe- 
 dience was refused. 
 
 Luther was at Coburg while these Luther at 
 things were doing, situated half way Coburg. 
 between Wittemberg and Augsburg, above a hun- 
 dred miles from both places. It was a mountain 
 solitude, much resembling his Patmos in the 
 Wartburg; and his letters thence breathe the 
 spirit of a man soaring upwards on the wings of 
 faith and prayer, and calmly leaving with God 
 
460 LUTHER. 
 
 the settlement of questions which were beyond 
 the range of worldly politicians. He wrote to 
 encourage his friends at one time, — to remon- 
 strate with them at another. Better than all, 
 he pleaded for them with God in supplications of 
 the deepest earnestness, and of almost unearthly 
 fervour. " Not a day passes but he spends three 
 hours in prayer," wrote a friend at this time to 
 Melancthon ; " I chanced to hear him once, when 
 he was praying ; and O what spirit and faith were 
 there in his very words ! He offers his petitions 
 with all the reverence that is due to God, yet 
 with such hope and faith, as if he felt that he was 
 conversing with a father and a friend." He trem- 
 bled for Melancthon, lest he should yield too much. 
 '■' May the Lord sustain you, that your faith may 
 not fail, but grow and triumph ! " was his message 
 at one time ; " I pray for you, and have prayed, 
 and will pray. I make sure, too, that I am heard, 
 since I feel the Amen in my heart. Should that 
 which we wish not happen, then will something 
 else happen, which is better." He was never 
 betrayed into any hope of reconciliation, and 
 heard with sorrow and alarm what was attempted 
 in that direction. He knew the adversary, and 
 understood his own principles, too well. " So 
 you are engaged in a notable work at Augsburg," 
 
LUTHER. 461 
 
 he wrote to Spalatin ; " that, forsooth, of bring- 
 ing the Pope and Luther to an agreement ; but 
 the Pope will not consent, and Luther cries Nay. 
 Take care ; don't lose your time and pains ; but 
 if you succeed, then I promise to reconcile Christ 
 and Belial." 
 
 It was during the sitting of the Luther's 
 Diet that Luther composed his noble Hymns. 
 paraphrase of the 46th Psalm *, with which the 
 towns and villages of Germany have been ring- 
 ing from that time to this. Indeed, we shall 
 overlook an element of mighty strength in carry- 
 ing the Reformation forwards if we take no ac- 
 count of the hymns which came from the pen of 
 its leader, and found their way to the hearts of 
 his countrymen in every rank. They made a 
 bond of union among men who knew little of 
 Creeds and Articles. While theologians were 
 disputing about niceties of doctrine, every devout 
 man could understand the blessedness of singing 
 God's praises in good honest German, instead of 
 gazing idly at the mass, or joining in a Latin 
 litany. The children learnt Luther's hymns in 
 the cottages, and martyrs sang them on the scaf- 
 fold. In Magdeburg, where Luther had once 
 
 * See NOTE (H H). 
 
462 LUTHER. 
 
 begged bread for the poor scholars, his own 
 strains were heard, and helped to draw many to 
 his side. An old cloth-weaver, sitting in a public 
 part of the city, sang a Lutheran hymn one day, 
 and offered copies of it for sale. A Burgomas- 
 ter, who had just been attending mass, came by; 
 his indignation was kindled by the sound of 
 heresy, and he sent the poor man to prison. 
 The people rose, and on that very day declared 
 that they would have Evangelical preachers, and 
 chose trusty men from their own body to carry 
 out their wishes. In Brunswick, where the new 
 opinions were beginning to spread, and many of 
 the young preachers were already in their favour, 
 the first note sounded in public sometimes was a 
 German Psalm given out from the pulpit, and 
 the people, who were expecting a Latin hymn to 
 the Virgin, gave back the response in a hearty 
 chorus. Priest, thou liest, was a citizen's reply 
 to one who came with learned arguments to prove 
 the Romish doctrine the only true and safe one, 
 and then he gave out the famous hymn, O God. 
 look down from Heaven, which the whole congre- 
 gation sang in triumph. 
 
 Writings for ^ n prose, too, as well as poetry 
 
 the people. an( j SO ng, we must remember Luther 
 wrote for the people. We shall understand only 
 
LUTHER. 463 
 
 half his greatness if we lose sight of his writings 
 on practical divinity. His simple, unrivalled 
 German style made Christianity, not a mystery 
 for the learned, but a household lesson for pea- 
 sants and mechanics. His aim was to elevate and 
 purify men's common life, and to connect all their 
 duties of every kind with God's word and will. 
 Clergymen and schoolmasters have each their 
 lesson. " Take care the people understand you," 
 is the burden of his charge to one ; "Let hu- 
 man learning and gospel truth go hand in hand," 
 is his caution to the other. Masters are provided 
 with texts for the ordering of their families ; and 
 men-servants and maid-servants are warned to be 
 faithful, not only for hire, but for conscience 
 sake. There is the grace for meals, and the 
 morning and evening prayer, and the Catechism, 
 pronounced by the philosophical historian of the 
 Reformation * to be " childlike and profound," 
 which Luther himself, " old doctor as he was," 
 repeated almost daily. " He displayed," says the 
 same trustworthy witness, " a matchless talent for 
 popular teaching." i( He is the patriarch of the 
 austere and devout discipline and manners which 
 
 * Ranke, who exclaims most feelingly, " Happy the man 
 whose soul has been nourished by it, and who holds fast 
 by it ! " 
 
464 LUTHEE. 
 
 characterize the domestic life of Northern Ger- 
 many." To have earned praise like this would 
 have been enough for one life, if no more had 
 been done in it. Had Luther's voice never reached 
 beyond his native land, — if his public services of 
 another kind had not placed him at the head of 
 that noble band who won the great intellectual 
 and moral triumph of the sixteenth century, — 
 he would have ranked, according to this state- 
 ment, with the men who have done the best work 
 for their own times, and established the highest 
 claim on the gratitude of posterity. 
 
 The severity of the decree of Augs- 
 Decreeof . . _ . _. 
 
 Augsburg burg defeated its object ; lor the Jrro- 
 
 not executed. testants were too strong to be thus 
 handed over, as state offenders, for punishment. 
 The Imperial sentence, therefore, was once more 
 enrolled among the archives of Germany, but 
 ao-ain no public officer received commission to 
 brino- the proscribed party to justice. Charles 
 himself, having in the most formal and solemn 
 manner denounced the heresy , left the heretics to 
 disperse themselves to their homes, and was soon 
 busy in entreating the Pope to assemble a Council 
 for all Christendom to give unity to the dis- 
 tracted Church. In fact, the months spent at 
 
LUTHER. 465 
 
 Augsburg had made him a wiser man. He had 
 seen the Protestant leaders in council and debate, 
 and understood them better. He had heard the 
 Protestant Confession, and despised it less. These 
 men were not wild fanatics, haters of law and 
 order ; that creed was not a compound of folly and 
 profaneness. It embraced the Trinity, the In- 
 carnation, the Atonement, repentance, faith, obe- 
 dience to the gospel rule, a future judgment, the 
 resurrection of the saints to eternal life, — baptism, 
 the door of entrance to the visible Church, — the 
 Lord's Supper, a bond of union for the faithful, 
 and a pledge of Christ's continual presence with 
 his people for their spiritual refreshment and com- 
 fort ; and was not this all that the Church itself 
 held to be most precious in Christian doctrine ? 
 had not the most learned fathers and the holiest 
 saints written in almost the same strain, and wit- 
 nessed by their lives and by their deaths for the 
 same truths? So the Emperor might have 
 thought; and so, doubtless, he did think, as he 
 contrasted what the Pope had told him concern- 
 ing Luther and his followers with what he had 
 seen of John of Saxony, and listened to from the 
 pen of Melancthon. 
 
 Besides, when the final decree was League of 
 
 . . . Till Smalcald. 
 
 little more than a month old, the Dec. 31. 
 
 H H 
 
466 LUTHEK. 
 
 Protestant Princes met at Smalcald, and there 
 resolved upon a league of mutual defence. They 
 were joined by the deputies from fifteen ci- 
 ties, Strasburg and Nuremberg heading the list, 
 as they had done at Spires; and their united 
 remonstrance and appeal to the justice of the 
 Emperor was circulated throughout Europe, 
 with a special and urgent request to the kings of 
 England, France, and Denmark, for assistance 
 against their own Sovereign in case of need. 
 This movement towards insurrection was not dis- 
 countenanced by Luther. He did not actively 
 promote it; but neither did he authoritatively 
 forbid it. In other days his language had been, 
 " By the word alone we must combat and con- 
 quer." When violence was apprehended from Duke 
 George and others, and the Elector and Land- 
 grave announced their determination to gather 
 armies, if necessary, in defence of the gospel, 
 he and his brother theologians had implored them 
 to do any thing, and bear any thing, almost, be- 
 fore they had recourse to arms. " War gains 
 little, loses much, and ventures all," they wrote ; 
 " gentleness loses nothing, ventures little, and 
 gains every thing." Luther's change of tone at 
 this period, considering the decision and positive- 
 ness with which he had always counselled sub- 
 
LUTHEE. 467 
 
 mission to Sovereign Princes, is a remarkable fact 
 in his history. Even now, he did not counsel 
 resistance. Jurists, he said, had examined the 
 question, and advised upon it. As a theologian, 
 he knew of no license for rebellion. But it was 
 not his affair ; others must settle it. Either he 
 was daunted by the threatening aspect of public 
 affairs, and driven from his former confidence that 
 God would work out His own will without per- 
 mitting His servants to draw the sword ; or else 
 some of his old energy was gone, and he was more 
 content to let the potentates of this world choose 
 their own policy, and justify to their own con- 
 sciences what seemed doubtful and perplexing. 
 
 Happily the war-cry between the Ee- Truce of 
 formed leaders and the great Emperor Ratisbon. 
 was not yet sounded. Another Turkish invasion 
 was threatened ; and the Protestant Princes, act- 
 ing in their new character of confederates, with 
 interests apart from those of the empire, refused 
 to furnish troops and supplies till they were as- 
 sured of toleration for their religion. The Edict of 
 Augsburg must be repealed, or a religious peace 
 proclaimed, which would give them security and 
 liberty. If these terms were granted, the Em- 
 peror would have no more devoted subjects, and 
 his armies no braver captains. Charles hesitated ; 
 
 H H 2 
 
468 LUTHER. 
 
 but danger pressed. In June, 1532, Solyman 
 crossed the Hungarian frontier with an army of 
 two hundred and fifty thousand men, and was all 
 the bolder and more confident because Germany 
 was divided. " Has your master made peace 
 with Martin Luther?" was his question to 
 Charles's ambassadors, when they sought to ar- 
 rest his progress, and magnified the power and 
 resources of their Sovereign. The Emperor 
 could hardly fail to see what was apparent to the 
 advancing enemy ; so, at last, he did make peace 
 with Martin Luther, and signed the Truce of 
 Ratisbon, giving the Protestants all 
 they asked. Presently the whole 
 empire was astir. The protesting cities were 
 foremost in activity and zeal. Nuremberg alone 
 contributed a thousand lances and fifteen pieces 
 of artillery. An army was mustered near Vienna, 
 such as Christendom had not seen for centuries. 
 The Emperor was at its head, longing for a de- 
 cisive engagement, and a victory, which should 
 resound through Christendom ; but his great 
 rival would not measure his strength with that of 
 united Germany. The battle, for which Europe 
 was waiting with almost breathless expectation, 
 was never fought; Solyman retired as the Im- 
 perial forces advanced, and, at last, after a blood- 
 
LUTHER. 469 
 
 less campaign, withdrew within his own borders, 
 having done the Reformers good service. 
 
 The disorders of the Anabaptists, 
 and the strange scenes enacted by and the 
 them in Munster, must have a place Anabaptists 
 
 ' r A.D. 1534-5. 
 
 in the history of Luther, for the same 
 reason as the Peasants' war. His enemies made 
 him responsible for both. By the despotism of 
 Rome, the human intellect had been enfeebled 
 and enslaved ; no wonder, then, that at the first 
 sound of liberty some broke loose with frantic 
 cries, and ran into the wildest excesses. A people, 
 nurtured in childish ignorance and superstition, 
 could not grow up in a few short years to the 
 wisdom and sobriety of Christian manhood ; an- 
 cient bonds of authority, too, were broken, and 
 religious teachers of the new faith were supplied 
 but slowly ; so false prophets were found in many 
 places to impose upon the vulgar, and enthusiasts 
 to mistake their own dreams for a revelation from 
 heaven. The wildest opinions had been afloat in 
 Holland, and different parts of Germany, before 
 fanaticism gathered its armies, and set up its 
 throne, in Westphalia. Some quoted the Apoca- 
 lypse, making sure that its visions were speedily 
 to become realities ; while others fancied them- 
 
 H H 3 
 
470 LUTHER. 
 
 selves chosen, like Israel of old, to be the Lord's 
 host, and root out the ungodly from the earth. 
 Strasburg was to be the new Jerusalem, said one, 
 and a hundred and forty-four thousand apostles 
 were to be scattered from it to gather in the 
 Elect of God. Charles V., according to another 
 theory, after his successes against the Turks, was 
 to be the Captain of the Saints, to reconquer Je- 
 rusalem, and be crowned there by an angel as 
 Lord, under Christ, of this lower world. 
 
 At Munster, in the year 1534, the spectacle 
 was seen of a city surrendered to men whose 
 religion was no better than madness, and ruled 
 by a prophet-king, whose wild ravings passed for 
 the voice of inspiration. An army of Anabap- 
 tists had swarmed in from the surrounding coun- 
 try ; the cry, Away with the children of Esau, re- 
 sounded through the streets; and all, who would 
 not receive the mark of a fresh baptism, without 
 distinction of age or sex, were driven forth to 
 banishment when the snow lay thick upon the 
 ground. Churches were plundered, — literature 
 and the arts proscribed, — all books burnt, the 
 Bible only being spared. One John of Leyden 
 became autocrat; and, among other privileges, 
 took to himself fourteen wives. One of them 
 displeased him, upon which he publicly beheaded 
 
LUTHER. 471 
 
 her with his own hand, while the rest danced 
 round the bleeding corpse, shouting, Glory to God 
 in the highest Yet for this man his subjects 
 fought as if he had been an angel, and endured a 
 lengthened siege with all the horrors of famine. 
 At last, a nis;ht attack, aided by 
 
 . ?. , ' , June24.1535. 
 
 treachery withm the walls, proved 
 successful, and the Bishop, with his allies, be- 
 came master of the city. Savage cruelty in the 
 conquerors disgraced their triumph ; for the de- 
 posed king, with two of his ministers, was led 
 about for six months from place to place, and 
 made a spectacle to the gazing crowd; and then 
 the three were publicly executed, having first 
 had their flesh torn with red-hot pincers. 
 
 How much Luther had in com- 
 
 Luther 
 mon with the fanatics of Munster and the 
 
 * - t* j n ,1 . p Anabaptists. 
 
 may be interred from the saying oi * 
 
 their chief, that " the world had seen four pro- 
 phets; two of them were true, and two false. 
 King David and John of Leyden were the true 
 ones ; the Pope and Luther were the false ones ; 
 but Luther was worse than the Pope." Yet to 
 many the name of the Reformer became more 
 odious than ever, because the world had seen 
 such a specimen of religious phrensy. Men, who 
 had not faith to appreciate the interests at stake, 
 
 H H 4 
 
472 LUTHER. 
 
 thought that evils in the Church had better be 
 let alone than assailed at such a risk. " Better 
 that men should sleep on, as they had done for 
 ages," numbers said, 6l than wake up to madness, 
 and threaten destruction to civilized society. The 
 common people had learnt in the schools of the 
 new prophets that they might think and do as 
 they pleased ; and now the world had seen what 
 sort of harvest would be reaped if such doctrines 
 were sown more widely." Timid spirits were 
 daunted and amazed. The cause of the Reform- 
 ation became associated in the minds of thou- 
 sands with lawless violence, daring profaneness, 
 and brutish sensuality. Luther mourned in an- 
 guish of spirit for these excesses and their sad 
 consequences. " What can I write respecting 
 these poor wretches at Munster?" he had said, 
 while the fanatics were unsubdued ; " is it not 
 plainly apparent that the devil reigns there, or 
 rather a whole troop of devils ? " This was hot 
 lightly spoken by him, but in sober earnest. It 
 was the expression of a deliberate opinion that a 
 large portion of the evils which afflict mankind 
 came immediately from the Tempter. His own 
 bodily pains and mental anxieties, mysterious 
 deaths, idiotcy, impaired senses, strange noises 
 heard at times of devotion, storms of unusual vio- 
 
LUTHER. 473 
 
 lence, were all referred by him, in common con- 
 versation, to Satanic agency. Even children, he 
 thought, were sometimes stolen by the Evil One, 
 and imps substituted without a human soul. t( I 
 saw a child of this sort myself," he said, " which 
 had no human parents, but proceeded from the 
 devil. In outward form, it exactly resembled 
 other children ; but it consumed as much every 
 day as four threshers could eat. It yelled out 
 like a mad creature when touched ; and if any- 
 thing went wrong in the house, it danced about 
 for joy." 
 
 To account for a belief which 
 
 His doctrine 
 seems to us so strange in so great a on Satanic 
 
 • i , i ,i , -r influence. 
 
 mind, we must remember that .Lu- 
 ther had grown up in a region which superstition 
 and romance had peopled with unearthly beings. 
 These were supposed to haunt the forest and the 
 mine, — to gather round the peasant's fire-side, 
 and look with a grudging eye on his little store, 
 and plot mischievously against his comfort. On 
 a boy and youth so imaginative as Luther these 
 legends would produce an impression never to be 
 effaced ; and, in maturer life, when the Scriptural 
 doctrine respecting the personality of the Tempter 
 was received with entire simplicity, and " to resist 
 the devil" in the world, in the Church, and in his 
 
474 LTTTHEK. 
 
 own heart, became his settled purpose and daily 
 business, the recollections of \ his early years 
 connected themselves with the faith of his man- 
 hood. The powers of the world to come were to 
 him an ever-present reality ; and the Evil One 
 became in his eyes, not only the ruler of the 
 hosts of evil, the active enemy of God and good- 
 ness, but the busy, malicious contriver of almost 
 all that warred against human happiness. The 
 tales which Luther believed and reported as to 
 Satan's visible influence, and troublesome inter- 
 meddling with the affairs of common life, sound 
 ludicrous to our ears ; but by him all was spoken 
 with earnestness and reverence. The worse the 
 infliction, too, — the more pervading and penetrat- 
 ing this antagonist power of evil, roaming over 
 God's earth, hindering His truth, and afflicting 
 His people, — the more fervent were his prayers 
 for the universal diffusion of Scriptural light and 
 knowledge. " Preach the truth, and so expel 
 him who is the father of lies ; give the people 
 wholesome nourishing food, the bread of life, and 
 poison will be loved no longer ; " — this was the 
 burden of many a remonstrance, the theme of 
 letters to Electors, and exhortations to preachers, 
 and treatises scattered far and wide among the 
 German people. This was his cry now that 
 
LUTHER. 475 
 
 Munster, as he thought, was invaded and pos- 
 sessed by the Evil One. " The devil," he 
 wrote, " is a spirit who jeers at horsemen and 
 cuirasses. The most potent weapon against him 
 is the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of 
 God. But our nobles, our bishops and princes, 
 will not permit the gospel to be preached, that 
 the souls of men may be snatched from perdition. 
 They think, forsooth, that it is enough to cut 
 men's throats." 
 
 In the year 1539 a vast accession 
 p i • -, i -n Death of 
 
 ol strength was gained to the Pro- Duke George. 
 
 testant side by the death of Duke A,D - 1539 - 
 George, and the transfer of his dominions to one 
 who was a zealous disciple of the Reformation. 
 By will the Duke bequeathed them to his bro- 
 ther Henry, but with a proviso that, if any reli- 
 gious innovations were attempted, they should be 
 forfeited to the Emperor, and held by him in 
 trust for some more orthodox Prince. The be- 
 quest, with its conditions, was announced to 
 Henry while the Duke was on his death-bed. 
 His reply to the Ambassadors was an indignant 
 refusal to give up his religion for a bribe ; but, 
 before they could return and report his decision, 
 the Duke died. Henry then, as the next heir, 
 
476 LUTHER. 
 
 quietly assumed the government. Luther was 
 summoned to Leipsic; and there, beneath that 
 voice of power, the hearts of the citizens were 
 bowed as the heart of one man. A single ser- 
 mon, it is said, decided them for the Reformation. 
 Silently, no doubt, the leaven had been spreading 
 through many a year ; and now, almost with one 
 consent, the towns and villages of the principality 
 followed the example of the capital. 
 
 The last years of Luther's life, 
 
 Luther's de- ^ • 
 
 clining years, partly through bodily infirmity, partly 
 
 from distresses and anxieties of many 
 kinds, seem to have been years of gloom. His 
 strength was prematurely spent. Never, proba- 
 bly, since the days of the Apostle, who had on 
 him u the care of all the churches," was such a 
 burden laid on any single mind ; and, before old 
 age was reached, the robust frame was bowed 
 down, and the spirit of almost indomitable energy 
 was sighing for repose. His work for many 
 years had been distracting, exhausting, almost 
 consuming, from its extent and variety. He had 
 to answer letters from every country in which the 
 Reformed doctrine was beginning to make way, — 
 to confer with Princes and theologians on subjects 
 of the deepest importance, affecting the destinies 
 
LUTHER. 477 
 
 of the Church for generations to come, — to listen 
 to the tale of fugitive monks and nuns, who 
 thought that Wittemberg was their natural place 
 of shelter, because his writings had unsettled 
 their ancient faith, — to animate and restrain his 
 followers by turns, — to build up with one hand, 
 like the men of Jerusalem in Nehemiah's day, 
 while he held a weapon in the other, — to repel 
 assaults from abroad, and organize a new eccle- 
 siastical system at home, — by frequent preach- 
 ing to instruct his own flock, whom he loved like 
 children, and keep them sound in the faith, while 
 his published writings, in German and in Latin, 
 carried to the Reformers of his own land, and of 
 other lands, his judgment on the thousand ques- 
 tions which were being canvassed throughout 
 Christendom. His works alone are a perfect 
 prodigy of industry and mental activity. The 
 marvel is, that the author did any thing in his 
 generation besides sitting and writing till his 
 hand was tired, and his eye failed, through all the 
 months and years which followed the date of his 
 earliest publication. A complete list of all that 
 he sent abroad, if it could be procured, would be 
 a literary curiosity, such as the world has never 
 seen. "Whether his earliest years were his most 
 fruitful ones cannot perhaps be ascertained ; but 
 
478 LUTHER. 
 
 for them the account stands as follows : — For 
 1520, a hundred and thirty -three publications, — 
 for 1521 (a year partly busy, and partly idle, 
 the year of Worms and the Wartburg), only 
 forty, — for 1522, a hundred and thirty , — for 
 1523, a hundred and eighty-three. No wonder if 
 his " eye was dim," and his " natural force 
 abated," by the time his sixtieth year was 
 reached. " I am feeble and weary of life," he 
 writes in 1543 ; " I would fain bid the world 
 good bye, which is now given over to the Wicked 
 One." " Old and useless," he calls himself next 
 ' year ; and says, " the world is like a worn-out 
 garment." The Emperor and the empire were for- 
 gotten by him, " except in his prayers." Five 
 years before, he had spoken of himself as " aged 
 and Emeritus" and was longing to enjoy " the old 
 man's pleasure in a garden, contemplating God's 
 wonders in creation, musing on trees and birds 
 and flowers ; " but " my sins," he said, " have 
 well deserved that I should lose enjoyments like 
 these, and be condemned to watch over a crowd 
 of affairs so pressing, and so often fruitlesss." 
 And so it was to the end ; not for his sins, we 
 think, but for the good of numbers who were 
 guided by his wisdom and piety, he was kept 
 at his post, toiling on through years of anxiety, 
 
LUTHEE. 479 
 
 watching with eager interest the progress of the 
 great religious movement which covered a widen- 
 ing surface from year to year, yet mourning 
 often, like one defeated and overborne by the 
 antagonist powers of evil, for the wickedness 
 which met and thwarted him in all his efforts. 
 " If I had known in the beginning," he says 
 most touchingly, alluding to disappointments of 
 this sort, " that men were so hostile to the word 
 of God, I should have held my peace. I imagined 
 that they sinned merely through ignorance." 
 These words tell us, as plainly as a whole vo- 
 lume, how much he had dared to hope when his 
 own mind was first enlightened, and the gospel 
 in its purity was given back to Christendom ; 
 and the evening of his days would look dark as 
 compared with the brightness of that early morn. 
 
 Diets were held year after year, and ^ 
 
 J J 3 Progress of 
 
 the endless question was discussed as the Refor- 
 
 , . -r» . mation. 
 
 to tolerating .Protestantism, or pro- 
 scribing it. In the spring of 1545, the Princes 
 of the empire, with bishops, deputies, and others, 
 were gathered at Worms, as they had been 
 twenty-four years before ; but neither the Em- 
 peror was there, nor Luther. The Princes of the 
 Protestant League were now the parties who re- 
 
480 LUTHEK. 
 
 presented the cause of the Reformation in these 
 national councils, and political questions were 
 mixed up with religious ones, and the opposing 
 parties were assuming an attitude which be- 
 tokened the near approach of actual war. This 
 Luther did not live to see, happily for his own 
 peace. The weapons of our warfare are not carnal 
 was a sentence as deeply engraved on his heart 
 as any portion of the lively oracles. To conquer 
 by the word of God was his purpose all through, 
 and many were the triumphs of that sort which 
 he lived to see. Before he finished his course, 
 Germany and Switzerland were half-won. Eng- 
 land had renounced the Pope, and was receiving 
 fresh light from year to year, as godly preachers 
 were, scattered more widely through her parishes. 
 The first confessors in Scotland were contending 
 bravely for the truth, and Wishart, Knox's 
 teacher, had already sealed his testimony with 
 his blood. The seed was sown widely over the 
 soil of France, — Margaret, the sister of Francis 
 the First, having been among the earliest con- 
 verts, — and many of its large towns had congre- 
 gations of zealous disciples. Italy, the Pope's 
 own land, had been invaded; considerable im- 
 pression was made on some of the Northern 
 cities ; and in its petty courts were found ladies 
 
LUTHER. 481 
 
 of noble and princely birth, who shone, like stars, 
 amid the surrounding gloom. 
 
 Luther lived to witness two events Jesuits and 
 destined to exercise the most im- Council of 
 
 . Trent. 
 
 portant influence on the cause to 
 which his life was devoted. On the 27th of Sep- 
 tember, 1540, Paul the Third, after many doubts 
 and misgivings, sealed the Bull which incorpo- 
 rated the Order of Jesuits. Thus, in the day 
 when vast numbers were falling away from their 
 allegiance to the See of Rome, Loyola and his 
 devoted associates, then a little band, pledged 
 themselves to be the Pope's servants, and the 
 champions of the Church, at all hazards, in all 
 fortunes, wherever and whenever their services 
 were wanted. By the same Pope 
 
 i rx •! n m ■. DeC - 13 ' 1545 - 
 
 the Council of lrent was convened, 
 whose decrees were to fix the faith of the Ro- 
 man Catholic Church, and to build up an im- 
 passable barrier between those who cling to the 
 Papacy and those who receive the word of God 
 as the one rule of their faith and practice. 
 
 Luther's last journey was from "Wit- , , , 
 temberg to Eisleben. After all his death. 
 labours and conflicts, by a remarkable • 
 
 I I 
 
482 LUTHEK. 
 
 Providence, he returned home to die. He had 
 been born on the lands of the Count of Mans- 
 feld, and it chanced that two brothers of that 
 noble house had a dispute, which they entreated 
 Luther to come and settle. He went at the end 
 of January, 1546, and succeeded in his mission. 
 To this journey we owe two or three letters wrh> 
 ten to his wife within a fortnight of his death. 
 This is one of them : — "To the gracious dame, 
 Catherine Luther, my dear spouse, who is tor- 
 menting herself quite unnecessarily, grace and 
 peace in our Lord Jesus Christ. Dear Cathe- 
 rine, thou shouldst read St. John, and what the 
 Catechism says respecting the confidence we ought 
 to have in God. Thou aflflictest thyself just as if 
 God were not All-powerful, and able to raise up 
 new Doctor Martins by dozens, if the old Doctor 
 Martin were to be drowned in the Saale. There 
 is One who takes care of me in His own way, 
 better than thou and all the angels could ever do. 
 He sits by the side of the Almighty Father. 
 Tranquillize thyself, therefore. Amen." 
 
 Another letter, the last he ever penned, runs 
 
 thus : — "To my sweet wife, Catherine Luther 
 
 Yon Bora, grace and peace in the Lord. We 
 
 hope to be with you again this week, if it please 
 
 • God. The Almighty has manifested the power 
 
LUTHER. 483 
 
 pf His grace in this affair. The lords have come 
 to an agreement upon all the points in dispute, 
 except two or three; and, among other great 
 ends achieved, the two Counts are reconciled. 
 God has fulfilled our prayers. I send thee some 
 trout the Countess has given me. The lady is 
 full of joy at seeing peace re-established in her 
 family." He then speaks of some rumours about 
 the Emperor and the French, and adds, " Let 
 them go on with their news; true or false, it 
 matters not ; we await in patience God's decla- 
 ration of His will. 
 
 Martin Luther. 
 
 EebruaryU. 1546." 
 
 Luther, when he started on his journey, was 
 
 feeble and suffering ; but said that he could (( lie 
 
 down on his death-bed with joy if he could first see 
 
 his dear lords reconciled ; " and God gave him both 
 
 his wishes. Three days after be had announced to 
 
 his wife that his peacemaking work was finished, 
 
 his indisposition increased to serious 
 
 .„ , . . , Feb. 17. 
 
 illness ; but at supper-time he joined 
 
 his friends, and conversed in a strain, partly gay 
 
 and partly serious. He spoke of his death as 
 
 near; and the question having been asked by 
 
 some one present, whether departed saints would 
 
 II 2 
 
484 LUTHEK. 
 
 recognize each other in the future world, he said, 
 Yes, he thought they would. In the night, his 
 two sons, and his faithful friend, Justus Jonas, 
 watched by his side; and as he grew rapidly 
 worse, two physicians, and the Countess with me- 
 dicines and cordials, came to offer their aid. But 
 all human help was vain ; the great Reformer's 
 work was done; and where he had played in 
 childhood, it was God's will that he should lie 
 down and die. After midnight, feeling that 
 death was upon him, he thus poured forth his 
 soul in prayer : — " Heavenly Father, everlasting 
 and merciful God! Thou hast revealed to me 
 Thy beloved Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, whom 
 I have preached, whom I have experienced, whom 
 I love and worship as *ny beloved Sacrifice and 
 Redeemer, — Him whom the godless persecute, 
 dishonour, and blaspheme." He then repeated 
 thrice, " Into Thy hands I commend my spirit. 
 Thou hast redeemed me, Thou God of Truth ; 
 surely God hath so loved the world." Between 
 two and three on the morning of the 18th he en- 
 tered into his rest. 
 
 His funeral, His remains were placed at the 
 Feb. 22. disposal of the Elector, who decided 
 that they should rest in the church at Wittem- 
 berg, where his living voice had been so often 
 
LUTHER. 485 
 
 heard. Some fifty miles separated the two 
 places, and as the funeral procession passed from 
 one to the other, the country people, men, women, 
 and children, flocked out of all the villages, and, 
 with weeping eyes, joined the train of mourners. 
 The procession was met at the city-gate by the 
 Prefect, who led the way to All Saints' Church, 
 attended by the leading members of the Univer- 
 sity, and by a great multitude of townsmen, who 
 had watched the Keformer's course through thirty 
 eventful years, had listened often to his stirring 
 exhortations, and gloried, in his expanding fame. 
 The Counts of Mansfeld, Justus Jonas, and Lu- 
 ther's dearest friends, were gathered round the 
 bier ; and to Melancthon it belonged, as of right, 
 to pronounce the funeral oration. His heart was 
 too full for any laboured eulogy ; but he gave a 
 simple, truthful description of the great qualities 
 of the man whom he knew so well, and concluded 
 with a fervent prayer to Him who had bestowed 
 such grace upon His servant, and alone could 
 raise up others like him. A plain tomb marked 
 the spot where Luther's remains were committed 
 to the dust, and the inscription recorded simply 
 his birth-place, his age, and the date of his death. 
 There was no need for a longer Hismonu- 
 epitaph. Luther's deeds are written ments - 
 
 II 3 
 
486 LUTHER. 
 
 in the history of every nation which, in the six- 
 teenth century, embraced Christianity according 
 to God's wordy in the place of the counterfeit 
 Christianity of the middle ages. No Armadas 
 from Spain, now-a-days, carry terror to En- 
 glish ears; the lands of Elizabeth and Philip 
 have changed places, and ours is the Empire 
 on which the sun never sets. We know what 
 Scotland was in that age, — the land of fierce, 
 domestic strife, of lawless chieftains, and a half- 
 barbarous people ; and now she is the very home 
 of peaceful industry ; her rugged soil, on which 
 battles and forays were so frequent, is subdued 
 by skilful husbandry; the rights and duties of 
 citizenship have succeeded to the multiplied evils 
 of clanship ; and her sons, manly, intelligent, en- 
 during, well-principled, have made her name ho- 
 noured wherever it is known. With the weak 
 country made strong, the divided country made 
 one, the poor country grown rich in all the ele- 
 ments of civic and social wealth, we contrast 
 Italy, the Pope's own land, and Ireland, 
 long ruled by his priests ; and if other instances 
 are wanting, we might cross the Atlantic, and 
 point to Brazil and Mexico, on the one hand, 
 and, on the other, to the great and growing com- 
 munities of New England, sprung from Puritan 
 
LUTHER. 487 
 
 settlers, who carried the Bible and their religion 
 with them. In all this we see the results of the 
 great Eevolution which gave light and Christian 
 liberty to some of the European kingdoms, and 
 left others under the cramping, withering influ- 
 ence of Rome. 
 
 We are sure that the word of God, scattered 
 over England for three centuries, preached in our 
 Churches, read in our mansions and our cottages, 
 has made us what we are, — a sober-minded, in- 
 dustrious, peace-loving, law -revering people. The 
 harvest of our own national blessings we rejoice 
 to connect with the sowing-time to which our 
 history refers, and to feel that Luther, in all his 
 greatness, belongs to universal Christendom. In 
 our Courts, our Parliament, our busy Exchanges, 
 our guarded homes, we see the standing memo- 
 rials of what he wrought, and others like him. 
 To the brave-hearted leader, and to those who 
 followed in his track, we will pay our grateful 
 thanks, knowing well that they were fallible and 
 sinful men, subject to the passions, infirmities and 
 prejudices of our common nature, but assured 
 that grace and wisdom were given them to do a 
 great work, zealously and faithfully, the like of 
 which has not been seen since the Gospel accom- 
 plished its first triumph over Heathenism. That 
 
 ii 4 
 
488 LUTHER. 
 
 work the noblest Englishmen have appreciated 
 most truly ; and against all that has been spoken 
 to its disparagement by little men in recent times, 
 we rejoice to quote what was eloquently written 
 by Milton, two centuries ago : " When I recall 
 to mind, at last, after so many ages wherein the 
 huge, overshadowing train of error had almost 
 swept all the stars out of the firmament of the 
 Church, how the bright and blissful Reformation, 
 by Divine power, struck through the black and 
 settled night of ignorance and anti-Christian ty- 
 ranny, methinks a sovereign and reviving joy must 
 needs rush into the bosom of him that reads or 
 hears, and the sweet odour of the returning Gospel 
 imbathe his soul with the fragrancy of heaven. 
 Then was the sacred Bible sought out of the dusty 
 corners, where profane falsehood and neglect had 
 thrown it; the schools were opened; divine and 
 human learning were raked out of the embers of 
 forgotten tongues; the princes and cities came 
 trooping apace to the newly-erected banner of sal- 
 vation, — the martyrs, with the unresistible might 
 of weakness, shaking the powers of darkness." * 
 
 * Of Reformation in England, book i. 
 
LUTHER. 489 
 
 In preparing this Memoir, I have had recourse 
 principally to the following works : — 
 
 1. "Waddington's History op the Reformation 
 on the Continent, in three octavo volumes ; not 
 written in a popular style, but admirable for its so- 
 briety, good sense, and judicial impartiality. Luther's 
 greatness is thoroughly appreciated; and the religious 
 blessings of the Reformation, as well as its incidental 
 benefits, are fully and faithfully detailed; but the 
 faults of those whom the Author most commends are 
 neither concealed nor spared. 
 
 2. D'Aubigne's History op the Reformation 
 in the Sixteenth Century, of which four volumes 
 have appeared ; but the English Reformation is still 
 untouched, and of the German Reformation we have 
 nothing beyond the close of the Diet of Augsburg, in 
 1530. It is hardly necessary to describe a work 
 which has been so extensively read, and, by those who 
 sympathize most cordially with the writer and his 
 subject, so warmly approved.* Our language con- 
 tains no such lively or picturesque narrative of the 
 stirring events of that period, — no such glowing 
 
 * In the Preface to his fourth volume, now six years old, 
 the author tells us, that from 150,000 to 200,000 copies of 
 the former three volumes have been sold in Great Britain 
 and America. Probably the larger number has been 
 reached, and more than reached, since that period, as cheap 
 editions have been multiplied. 
 
490 LUTHER. 
 
 eulogy of the earliest Reformers in Germany, France 
 and Switzerland, — no account, at once so full, so 
 learned, and so popular, of all that they did, and said, 
 and wrote, and taught. " To exalt the name of Lu- 
 ther," it has been well said, " is M. D'Aubigne's 
 labour of love. He is a Protestant of the original 
 stamp, and a biographer of the old fashion, — not a 
 calm, candid, discriminating weigher and measurer of 
 a great man's parts, but a warm-hearted champion of 
 his glory, and a resolute apologist even for his errors." 
 He should not, therefore, be read alone. 
 
 3. Michelet's Life of Luther, written bt 
 Himself, edited and enlarged by Mr. Hazlitt (one of 
 Bogue's cheap volumes), is a precious depository of 
 the most authentic information relating to the Re- 
 former's public and private history. His letters, 
 filling five octavo volumes, and his works, making up 
 nearly twenty folios, have been carefully explored and 
 sifted, with the view of collecting all that illustrates 
 the Reformer's history, character, and opinions; and 
 much that is interesting and characteristic has been 
 added from his Table Talk. As Luther was the frank- 
 est of men, this volume shows him as he really was, 
 in all his simplicity and all his homeliness, with no 
 attempt to hide a single fault, and no thought, cer- 
 tainly, of parading a single virtue. 
 
 4. Ranke's History of the Reformation in 
 Germany, — of which three volumes out of Jive have 
 been translated by Mrs. Austin, — is copious, accurate, 
 
LUTHER. 491 
 
 dispassionate, profound, entering much more largely 
 than the other works I have named into the political 
 bearings of the Reformation, profuse in its informa- 
 tion respecting Diets and other matters purely Ger- 
 man, doing full justice to the Protestant Theologians 
 and Princes in their noble struggle for the rights of 
 conscience, but less calculated certainly for common 
 readers than for those who can make history a study. 
 
 There is a good sketch of the earliest events in 
 Luther's public career, up to the Diet of Worms, in 
 the Second Book of Robertson's Charles V., and 
 a comprehensive statement, occupying some twenty 
 pages, of the causes which contributed to the progress 
 of the Reformation. 
 
 In the same compass there is no such vigorously- 
 drawn and life-like portrait of Luther as in a critique 
 of Sir James Stephen's, first printed in the 138th 
 number of the Edinburgh Review, and now re-pub- 
 lished in the first volume of his Essays on Ecclesias- 
 tical Biography. The extracts from the Reformer's 
 writings are a most valuable selection of Lutheriana ; 
 while the leading incidents of his career are touched 
 upon with discriminating faithfulness, and the promi- 
 nent features of his character are wisely, justly, elo- 
 quently set forth. 
 
 We must not omit to mention, as the last contribu- 
 tion of English writers to a just estimate of Luther, 
 Archdeacon Hare's Note W. in the second volume 
 
492 LUTHER. 
 
 of his work, entitled The Mission op the Comforter. 
 It is a full, learned, and most successful vindication of 
 the great German from the attacks of Mr. Hallam, 
 Sir William Hamilton, Dr. Mill, and Mr. Ward, — 
 written by one who is perfectly master of his subject, 
 and whose cordial sympathy with all that is pure and 
 noble in the leader of the Reformation makes him 
 kindle into fervour as he quotes one passage after 
 another from Luther's writings (many of them little 
 known to the English reader), and dwells upon traits 
 of magnanimity which have been obscured by the 
 mists of controversy. 
 
NOTES AND ILLUSTEATIONS. 
 
 NOTE (Z). Page 325. 
 
 The line of succession to the French crown 
 was very regular for more than two hundred 
 years, from the accession of Charles V. to the 
 death of Henry III., with two exceptions, which 
 took place at the accessions of Louis XII. and 
 his successor Francis I. The first succeeded 
 Charles VIII., the son of his second cousin ; the 
 second was son to the second cousin of his prede- 
 cessor. Charles V. was the common ancestor of 
 all who reigned during the period we speak of; 
 but Louis, the murdered Duke of Orleans, was 
 the common ancestor of all who came after Charles 
 VIII. The following table will help to fix these 
 facts in the reader's mind. 
 
 Charles V. 
 
 I I 
 
 Charles VI. Louis of Orleans. 
 
 I 
 
 Charles VII. Charles of Orleans, John, 
 
 the prisoner of Agincourt. \ 
 
 | Charles of 
 
 Louis XI. Louis XII. Angouleme. 
 
 I I 
 
 Charles VIII. Francis L 
 
494 LUTHER. 
 
 NOTE (A A). Page 328. 
 
 The following is Ranke's description of this 
 clever and most effective satire : — 
 
 " He introduces Folly herself as interlocutor. 
 Moria, the daughter of Plutus, born in the 
 Happy Islands, nursed by Drunkenness and 
 Rudeness, is mistress of a powerful kingdom, 
 which she describes, and to which all classes of 
 men belong. She passes them all in review, but 
 dwells longer and more earnestly on none than on 
 the clergy, who, though they refuse to acknow- 
 ledge her benefits, are under the greatest obliga^ 
 tions to her. She turns into ridicule the laby- 
 rinth of dialectic in which theologians have lost 
 themselves, the syllogisms with which they la- 
 bour to sustain the Church as Atlas does the 
 heavens, and the intolerant zeal with which they 
 persecute every difference of opinion. She then 
 comes to the ignorance, the dirt, the strange and 
 ludicrous pursuits, of the monks, and their bar- 
 barous and objurgatory style of preaching. She 
 attacks the Bishops, who are more solicitous for 
 gold than for the safety of souls, who think they 
 do enough if they dress themselves in theatrical 
 costume, and, under the name of the most re- 
 verend, most holy, and most blessed Fathers in 
 God, pronounce a blessing or a curse. And lastly, 
 she boldly assails the court of Rome and the 
 Pope himself, who, she says, takes only the plea- 
 sure of his station, and leaves its duties to St. 
 Peter and St. Paul. 
 
 " This little work brought together, with singular 
 
NOTES. 495 
 
 talent and brevity, matter which had for some 
 time been current and popular in the world, gave 
 it a form which satisfied all the demands of taste 
 and criticism, and fell in with the most decided 
 tendency of the age. It produced an indescrib- 
 able effect ; twenty-seven editions appearing even 
 during the lifetime of Erasmus. It was trans- 
 lated into all languages, and greatly contributed 
 to confirm the age in its anticlerical dispositions." 
 — -History of the Reformation, vol. i. pp. 289, 290. 
 
 NOTE(BB). Page 334. 
 
 This account of Alexander VI. does not rest 
 on Protestant authority. Guicciardini was no ob 
 scure Lutheran, writing at a distance about remote 
 events, but a distinguished Italian, narrating the 
 events of his own times, a fast friend of the 
 Church, holding employment under three suc- 
 cessive Popes. Hear his story : ■ — 
 
 " All Rome rushed to behold his corpse with 
 incredible festivity ; nor was there any man who 
 could satiate his eyes with gazing on the remains 
 of a serpent which, by his immoderate ambition 
 and pestiferous perfidy, and every manner of 
 frightful cruelty, of monstrous lust, and un- 
 heard-of avarice, trafficking indiscriminately with 
 things sacred and profane, had poisoned the whole 
 world." 
 
 There is a curious letter extant from Peter 
 Martyr, a learned Italian, who spent most of his 
 days in Spain, and received ecclesiastical prefer- 
 ments and dignities from Charles V., written to 
 
496 LUTHER. 
 
 a friend on hearing the news of Alexander's elec- 
 tion to the Papacy. His correspondent is styled, 
 K Alexandri jam Pontificis familiaris." He re- 
 joices, for his friend's sake, at the news, he says ; 
 but stands in doubt about the choice* so far as the 
 interests of religion are concerned. " If he can 
 leave, his covetousness and ambition, and, for- 
 getting his sons, whom he unblushingly thrusts on 
 public view, will give himself to the care of the 
 Church, it will be well for the Holy See. • . ... 
 One whispered in my ear some -base, wicked, 
 sacrilegious rumour that this patron of yours 
 climbed to his elevated position, not by learning, 
 or purity of life, or the -fervour of his piety, but 
 with the help of large promises and golden bribes." 
 —Petri Marty ris Opus JEpistolarum, Epist. 117. 
 
 STOTE(CC). Page 337. 
 
 The History of the Cardinalate, including the 
 origin of its extraordinary power, the mode of 
 exercising it, and some details respecting the 
 intrigues which have preceded the most remark- 
 able elections to the Papal Chair, would make a 
 volume as instructive and useful, perhaps, as any 
 that could be written for these times. Consider- 
 ing what a Pope is, the making of him is infinitely 
 the most important event that can occur to Chris- 
 tendom in any given period of time. If, in prac- 
 tice, it be found that the highest goodness has 
 very seldom attained to that most elevated and 
 responsible of all earthly positions, — that a really 
 devout, humble-minded, unworldly Pope, of self- 
 
NOTES. 497 
 
 denying habits and saintly life, is found, at distant 
 intervals, upon the roll, — while bad men, wretched 
 self-seekers and evil-livers, may be counted by the 
 score, — the historical argument against the whole 
 system is very strong, and to many minds con- 
 clusive. But another' line of proof might be 
 adopted. Looking at the jurisdiction claimed by 
 the Pope, as soon as he is elected, the following 
 questions rnay fairly be asked, and perfectly satis- 
 factory answers ought to be forthcoming : — 
 
 " Who selected him from' the crowd of common 
 men; and whence is their authority derived to do 
 an act so unspeakably momentous? 
 
 " Do they fairly represent the Christian world ? 
 
 " Are they manifestly superior to all dictation 
 from the temporal power ? 
 
 " Do they seem, generally, from all that is 
 known of them at other timefc, to have pre-eminent 
 qualifications for a duty so solemn ? " 
 
 1. Of course we know the Cardinals elect the 
 Pope; but who are the_ Cardinals? We read 
 nothing about them in the Acts of the Apostles. 
 The name never meets us in early Ecclesiastical 
 History. This is strange. The Church had 
 Popes in those days, we are told. Who elected 
 them ? Has the practice altered since ? What 
 becomes of the appeal to antiquity, if, one day, a 
 Pope decreed that, for all time to come, the old 
 mode of election should be abandoned, and a new 
 one adopted ? Yet so it was. After Popes had 
 been nominated by Gothic Kings, and Eastern 
 Emperors, — after Charlemagne and Otho had 
 received from Popes for the time being the pri- 
 vilege of choosing the next Pope, — the current 
 practice in the eleventh century was for the 
 
 K K 
 
498 LUTHER. 
 
 Clergy of Rome to elect, and the people of Rome 
 to approve, — the exercise of this privilege, of 
 course, being more or less controlled by the civil 
 power, according to the political circumstances of 
 the times. Just a thousand years after the 
 Church was founded (a. d. 1059), Nicholas II. 
 was Pope ; and he did not like this mode of elec- 
 tion, for a rival Pope had been chosen, Benedict 
 X., whom he and Hildebrand together managed 
 to expel by force. He procured a decree of the 
 Council of Lateran, therefore, giving the principal 
 voice in the election to the Cardinal Bishops, who 
 were first to debate the matter among themselves, 
 then to call in the Cardinal Clergy, and finally to 
 require the consent of the Clergy and people, 
 "with a certain participation of the Emperor." 
 This lasted for a while; but, after a century, 
 another improvement was suggested. In the 
 year 1179, Alexander III., after being twice 
 driven from Rome by rival Popes, and having 
 retorted by formally deposing the Emperor, 
 Frederic Barbarossa, who favoured them both, 
 decreed that the Cardinals henceforth should have 
 the exclusive privilege of giving a Lord to Chris- 
 tendom, the consent of two-thirds being necessary 
 to make the election valid. 
 
 Still the question recurs, What is a Cardinal ? * 
 The title is given to the incumbents of the prin- 
 cipal parishes of Rome. They were originally 
 seven ; but by the addition of Cardinal Priests to 
 the Cardinal Bishops, the body of electors was 
 
 * The name comes from cardo, a hinge, we are told. 
 The following lines are from an old poem De Curia Ro- 
 mand, quoted by Mr. Thompson, in his Facts from Rome, 
 a little publication full of interesting matter on the election 
 
NOTES. 499 
 
 greatly enlarged, and the College now consists of 
 seventy, though the number is seldom full, and 
 the Pope fills up vacancies at pleasure. 
 
 Gregory X., in the 13th century, was elected 
 after the Cardinals had been three years nearly in 
 consultation ; so he made some regulations, of 
 which the object was to prevent similar delays in 
 future. The electors were to live together, till a 
 Pope was chosen, in one room or conclave, with- 
 out division by walls or curtains. If the election 
 were not concluded within three days, then, for 
 the next Jive days, they were to have one dish for 
 dinner, and one for supper; and if those five days 
 went by without an agreement by two-thirds, 
 then, for the remainder of the time, nothing was 
 to be allowed them but bread, wine and water. 
 The strictness of these regulations has been re- 
 laxed : curtains were first allowed ; and now each 
 Cardinal has his own apartments, and provides 
 his own dinner. Accordingly, two or three car- 
 riages, with eight or ten servants, bring a dinner 
 each day for each elector ; but no Cardinal goes 
 
 and installation of Popes, the ceremonies of Holy Week 
 Relics, and Books of Devotion in current use at Rome. 
 
 " Die age, quid faciunt quibus est a cardine nomen, 
 Post Papam quibus est immediatus honos ; 
 
 Expediunt causas, magnique negotia mundi ; 
 Extinguunt lites ; foedera rupta ligant; 
 
 Isti participes onerum, Papaeque laborum, 
 Sustentant humeris grandia facta suis, 
 
 " Nee ratione vacat quod habent a cardine nomen ; 
 Deservire solent nomina rebus in his ; — 
 Porta suos postes sine cardine claudere nescit, 
 
 N ec bene praeter eos Pastor ovile regit ; 
 Cardo tenet portam, nee quid valet ilia remoto 
 Cardine ; sic Papa nil valet absque viris." 
 k k 2 
 
500 LUTHER. 
 
 beyond the walls of the building till the choice is 
 made. While they are shut up, the populace 
 watches the summit of a certain tin chimney. If 
 smoke issues from it at eleven o'clock or four in 
 each day, they know that the Pope is not elected, 
 as the old gentlemen within are engaged in burn- 
 ing the schedules used at the previous poll (the 
 necessary two-thirds not having been secured for 
 any candidate), and are about to reconsider the 
 matter with a view to a fresh poll. All this to 
 the Roman Catholic mind, doubtless, seems ap- 
 propriate, dignified, worthy of so momentous an 
 occasion, quite suited to the most solemn of all 
 deliberations, in which not Rome only, but half 
 the European nations besides, have the deepest 
 interest. 
 
 2. The second question may be disposed of 
 much more shortly. " Do the Cardinals fairly 
 represent the Christian world?" They ought, 
 surely. No warrant being produced of an autho- 
 ritative character to show that the jurisdiction 
 claimed by them is any thing better than 
 an usurpation, — their charter of incorporaton 
 being a comparatively modern document, — there 
 ought to be some security that the Pope belongs, 
 not to Italy, but to Christendom. What security 
 is there ? Five-sixths of the Cardinals are almost 
 always Italians ; nine-tenths of the Popes have been 
 Italians. What pretensions has Italy to domi- 
 nation like this ? Who will say that her sons are 
 the wisest, noblest, freest, holiest of mankind? 
 As no commission from heaven is produced, sub- 
 jugating Christian nations to Italian priests, some 
 moral fitness ought to be shown, — some pre- 
 
NOTES. 501 
 
 eminent and universally recognised qualification 
 for so high a function. 
 
 3. " Is the College manifestly superior to all 
 dictation from the temporal power ? " This is a 
 main point, considering what a Pope is, in the 
 judgment of those who give him their allegiance, 
 namely, Christ's Representative among men, — 
 the infallible, living interpreter of God's counsels, 
 occupying the place once filled by the Apostles 
 when they assembled at Jerusalem to settle con- 
 troversies in the Church, and to bind and loose 
 with the authority of heaven. How stands the 
 case? Do the Cardinals, supposing them fairly 
 to represent the Church in its spiritual character, 
 act independently, despising all earthly influ- 
 ences that can be brought to bear upon them? 
 Strange to say, the Ambassadors of Austria, France 
 and Spain have, each of them, the privilege . of 
 objecting to one Cardinal, and the objection, if 
 communicated to the Cardinals by the proper 
 officer, the Marshal of the Conclave, at the proper 
 time, before two-thirds have come to an agree- 
 ment, is allowed as a matter of course. So the 
 Ruler of Austria for Austrian purposes, the 
 Ruler of Spain for Spanish purposes, the Ruler 
 of France for French purposes, may exclude the 
 three men most fit to rule the Christian world, 
 and all the remaining Cardinals may chance to be 
 incompetent or unprincipled men. Yet one among 
 them is to be set on that lofty throne, and all 
 men are to believe henceforth that he is marked 
 out by God to wield the superhuman power en- 
 trusted to successive Popes. 
 
 K K 3 
 
502 LUTHEE. 
 
 4. " Do the Cardinals, from all that is known 
 of them, seem to have pre-eminent qualifications 
 for a duty so solemn ? " 
 
 Surely not, unless History is a tissue of 
 fables. Surely not, unless travellers come home 
 to tell us nothing but falsehoods of what they 
 have seen in the Holy City. We never heard 
 that these men were conspicuous for sanctity, 
 eminently faithful as pastors of Christ's flock, 
 evidently living above this world, and laying 
 rank and wealth and social influence, as the wise 
 men laid their offerings, at the Redeemer's feet. 
 Who will say that men are not morally dis- 
 qualified for the duties they perform who, as a 
 body, are the opposite of all this ? 
 
 I know very well that it is impossible in a few 
 pages to fortify an argument of this sort so as to 
 make it unassailable. The Eoman Catholic will 
 refuse, of course, to enter into these matters of 
 detail, and will say boldly, "Christ gave St. 
 Peter authority over the whole Church ; to that 
 authority the Bishops of Rome have succeeded ; 
 the mode of their election He has not seen fit to 
 determine ; that has varied, no doubt, in different 
 ages ; but there they are, and either His promise 
 has failed, or the virtues belonging to the pos- 
 sessor of the Apostolic See must still be living in 
 them." Certainly, if Christ did give power like 
 the Pope's to St. Peter, — and if there is plain 
 proof from Scripture, or early Ecclesiastical His- 
 tory, that the jurisdiction thus given was transmit- 
 ted, in succeeding ages, through one line of Bishops, 
 and that to them all Christians in all lands were 
 to be entirely submissive, — then, faith must strug- 
 
NOTES. 503 
 
 gle with violent improbabilities, and believe that 
 Popes elected by Emperors, mobs, and Cardinals, 
 in turn, — Popes who bought their throne, and 
 Popes who disgraced it, — Popes who had nothing 
 spiritual about them but their pretensions, — were 
 really the Church's heaven-sent and heaven- 
 taught rulers. But if the evidence, at starting, 
 is the very weakest for which credit was ever 
 asked in any historical enquiry, — if, granting that 
 the two texts about the Rock and the Keys could 
 give St. Peter a quarter of what the Pope 
 claims, and granting that the Apostle both saw 
 Rome, and was Bishop of Rome, — the pedigree, 
 or connection between his successors and the ori- 
 ginal grant, is not proved as any Court would 
 insist upon having a disputed title proved to half 
 an acre, — then arguments like these are entitled 
 to a hearing. These squabbles about the Papacy 
 become, then, of mighty consequence. This 
 wretchedly imperfect adaptation of the means to 
 the end must strike a candid enquirer. The ob- 
 livion of all moral considerations, at many of those 
 seasons when the Church was summoned to the 
 most responsible of all its duties, makes it almost 
 impossible, — nay, quite impossible, — that God's 
 voice was speaking through oracles like those, or 
 that the men thus chosen had lawful rule over 
 the consciences of all baptized men in Europe, 
 Asia, Africa and America. 
 
 NOTE (DD). Page 373. 
 
 Modern versions of the Roman Catholic Doc- 
 trine of Indulgences make it much more harmless. 
 
504 LUTHER. 
 
 " An Indulgence," says Dr. Wiseman, " is no 
 more than a remission by the Church, in virtue 
 of the keys, or the judicial authority committed 
 to her, of a portion, or the entire, of the temporal 
 punishment due to sin. The infinite merits of 
 Christ form the fund whence this remission is 
 derived ; but besides, the Church holds that, by 
 the communion of Saints, penitential works per- 
 formed by the just, beyond what their own sins 
 might exact, are available to other members of 
 Christ's body." 
 
 Tetzel's divinity was of another kind. His In- 
 dulgences were a much more marketable com- 
 modity. The people who bought them, and went 
 away pleased with their bargains, would have 
 thought themselves basely cheated, if told that 
 they were no safer than before from eternal per- 
 dition. They ran in this strain : — " I, by the 
 authority of Jesus Christ, of His blessed Apos- 
 tles, Peter and Paul, and of the most Holy See, 
 granted and committed to me in these parts, do 
 absolve thee from all ecclesiastical censures, in 
 whatever manner they have been incurred, and 
 then from all thy sins, transgressions, and ex- 
 cesses, how enormous soever they may be, even 
 from such as are reserved for the cognizance of 
 the Apostolical See. And as far as the keys of 
 the Church extend, I remit to you all punish- 
 ment which you deserve in purgatory on their 
 account ; and I restore you to the Holy Sacra- 
 ments of the Church, to the unity of the faithful, 
 and to that innocence and purity which you pos- 
 sessed at baptism ; so that, if you die now, the 
 gates of punishment shall be shut, and the gates 
 of the Paradise of delight shall be opened. And 
 
NOTES. 505 
 
 " you shall not die at present, this grace shall 
 remain in full force when you are on the point of 
 death. In the name of the Father, and of the 
 Son, and of the Holy Ghor,t." " In spite of the 
 ambiguity of one or two expressions," says Dr. 
 Waddington most truly, "this is nothing less, when 
 fairly interpreted, than an unconditional permis- 
 sion to sin for the rest of life ; and as such it was 
 assuredly received by those classes of the people 
 for which it was chiefly intended, and whose 
 morality is peculiarly confided to the superin- 
 tendence of the clergy." — History of the Church, 
 vol. iii. p. 344. 
 
 NOTE (E E). Page 388. 
 
 Luther and John Bunyan had much in com- 
 mon. Both were fearless confessors ; both sprang 
 from the people, and wrote for them ; both dis- 
 covered for themselves, and then proclaimed with 
 untiring zeal and energy to others, the true doc- 
 trine of the Cross ; both rejoiced in allegory and 
 fable; both suffered, as few of God's servants 
 have done, from those peculiar temptations which 
 we may suppose to have been styled by St. Paul 
 the " fiery darts" of the Wicked One. To thou- 
 sands, in the two last centuries, the PilgrirrHs 
 Progress has been as precious as ever the Re- 
 former's great work was to our gifted country- 
 man in his time of need ; and all who revere the 
 memories of the teacher and the learner will gladly 
 read Bunyan's own account of his earliest meet- 
 ing with any of Luther's works. It runs thus : — 
 
506 LUTHEE. 
 
 " Before I had got thus far out of these my 
 temptations, I did greatly long to see some ancient 
 godly man's experience, who had writ some hun- 
 dreds of years before I was born. Well, after 
 many such longings in my mind, the God, in 
 whose hands are all our days and ways, did cast 
 into my hand one day a book of Maetin Ltj- 
 thee ; it was his Comment on the Galatians ; it 
 was so old that it was ready to fall piece from 
 piece if I did but turn it over. Now I was 
 pleased much that such an old book had fallen 
 into my hands; the which, when I had but a 
 little way perused, I found my condition, in his 
 experience, so largely and profoundly handled, as 
 if his book had been written out of my heart. 
 This made me marvel ; for thus thought I, This 
 man could not know anything of the state of 
 Christians now, but must needs write and speak 
 the experience of former days. Besides, he doth 
 most gravely, in that book, debate of the rise of 
 these temptations, namely, blasphemy, despera- 
 tion, and the like, showing that the law of Moses, 
 as well as the Devil, death, and hell, hath a very 
 great hand therein, — the which at first was very 
 strange to me ; but, considering and watching, I 
 found it so indeed. But of particulars here I 
 intend nothing: only this methinks I must let 
 fall before all men ; I do prefer this book of 
 Martin Luther upon the Galatians (excepting the 
 Holy Bible) before all the books that ever I have 
 seen, as most fit for a wounded conscience." 
 
NOTES. 507 
 
 NOTE (FF). Page 391. 
 
 The Elector at this period sought counsel from 
 Erasmus; and in the course of B December, 1520, 
 a very remarkable interview took place between 
 the wavering Prince and the cautious theologian, 
 which is thus recorded : — 
 
 " The parties conversed standing by the fire- 
 side. Frederic first proposed that they should 
 communicate in Dutch, the native language of 
 Erasmus; but he preferred Latin, which the 
 Elector thoroughly understood without professor 
 to speak it ; accordingly Spalatin acted as his in- 
 terpreter. After the usual preliminary civilities, 
 Frederic opened the discourse by expressing his 
 horror of heresy, and his wish to be swallowed 
 up alive rather than give it any reception or fa- 
 vour. c But, if Luther teaches the truth, I will 
 never suffer any one to oppress him, whatsoever 
 risk there may be, either to myself or to those 
 about me, in defending him. I admit that the 
 subjects in controversy are placed above my know- 
 ledge, and I do not pretend to judge whether 
 Luther be right or not. I want information and 
 the counsel of the learned. I have therefore in- 
 vited you hither that I may learn your sentiment 
 on this matter ; and I conjure you to tell me 
 them with sincerity.' Erasmus stood for a short 
 time musing, with his lips pressed together, and 
 delayed to answer ; while the Prince, as he was 
 wont when discoursing on a serious subject, fixed 
 his eyes steadily and gravely upon his face. At 
 length Erasmus broke silence in these words, — - 
 
508 LUTHEK. 
 
 Luther has committed two sins ; he has touched the 
 Pope upon the croivn, and the monks upon the belly. 
 Upon which the Elector smiled ; and he always 
 remembered that answer, and repeated it a short 
 time before his death. Erasmus then subjoined 
 with earnestness that Luther had done well in the 
 censures which he cast on the abuses of the 
 Church, — that these absolutely required correc- 
 tion, — that the substance of his doctrine was true, 
 but that there was a want of moderation in his 
 manner of advancing it." — Waddingtorts History 
 of the Reformation^ vol. i. pp. 315, 316. 
 
 NOTE (G G). Page 433. 
 
 This letter is too curious not to be given en- 
 tire. We may admire what is fatherly in it, and 
 rejoice to think that Luther at Coburg had his 
 thoughts divided between the scene of theological 
 strife at Augsburg on one side, and his own 
 nursery on the other ; but we may doubt, at the 
 same time, whether the strain is elevated enough 
 for a subject so serious. A very young child can 
 apprehend intense enjoyment apart from sport ; 
 and therefore the picture of a child's heaven seems 
 imperfect in which there is no allusion to the 
 happiness connected with the exercise of good- 
 ness. Here it is, however, as Luther wrote it ; 
 and Catherine, no doubt, or Aunt Magdalene, 
 read it to little John; and graver, nobler 
 thoughts, we dare say, had a place in the Sunday 
 lessons which were given at other times, when 
 the father sat in his loved home at Wittemberg. 
 
NOTES. 509 
 
 " Grace and peace be with thee, my dear little 
 boy ! I rejoice to find that you are attentive to 
 your lessons and your prayers. Persevere, my 
 child, and when I come home I will bring some 
 pretty fairing. I know of a beautiful garden, 
 full of children in golden dresses, who run about 
 under the trees, eating apples, pears, cherries, 
 nuts, and plums. They jump and sing, and are 
 full of glee, and they have pretty little horses, 
 with golden bridles and silver saddles. As I 
 went by this garden, I asked the owner of it who 
 those children were, and he told me that they 
 were the good children, who loved to say their 
 prayers, and to learn their lessons, and who fear 
 God. Then I said to him, — Dear Sir, I have a 
 boy, little John Luther ; may not he, too, come 
 to this garden, to eat these beautiful apples and 
 pears, to ride these pretty little horses, and to 
 play with the other children ? And the man 
 said, — If he is very good, if he says his prayers, 
 and learns his lessons cheerfully, he may come, 
 and he may bring with him little Philip and 
 little James. Here they will find fifes and drums, 
 and other nice instruments, to play upon, and 
 they shall dance and shoot with little cross-bows. 
 Then the man showed me in the midst of the 
 garden a beautiful meadow to dance in. But all 
 this happened in the morning before the children 
 had dined ; so I could not stay till the beginning 
 of the dance, but I said to the man, I will go 
 and write to my dear little John, and teach him 
 to be good, to say his prayers, and learn his 
 lessons, that he may come to this garden. But 
 he has an Aunt Magdalene, whom he loves very 
 much ; may he bring her with him ? The man 
 
510 LUTHEE. 
 
 said, Yes, tell him that they may come together. 
 Be good, therefore, dear child, and tell Philip and 
 James the same, that you may all come and play 
 in this beautiful garden. I commit you to the 
 care of God. Give my love to your Aunt Mag- 
 dalene, and kiss her for me. From your papa, 
 who loves you. 
 
 " Martin Luther." 
 
 NOTE (H H). Page 461. 
 
 So says Ranke, whom we prefer to follow, 
 though another statement is made with confidence, 
 that the hymn and the tune were both composed 
 by Luther on his way to Worms in the year 1521. 
 Both were " improvised " at Oppenheim, says one 
 story; he stood up, and sang some of it in his 
 chariot, as soon as he came within sight of 
 Worms, says another; he passed the following 
 night at his window, says a third, " sometimes 
 meditating with earnestly upcast eyes, sometimes 
 breathing the air of his hymn upon his flute."— 
 Michelet, Note in pp. 80, 81. One would like to 
 believe all this, but does not dare to do so 
 against a well-authenticated counter-statement. 
 Had it been really so, no other date ever could 
 have been assigned ; the tradition among Luther's 
 friends and followers would have been too clear 
 and uniform; whereas writers of the next age, 
 without precise information, might naturally wish 
 to connect the Reformer's best-known poem with 
 the noblest passage in his life, and so might 
 
NOTES. 511 
 
 hazard the conjecture which others received as 
 fact. According to a well-known rule in his- 
 torical inquiries, it will be well for us to distrust 
 what we most wish to believe. 
 
 No translation, probably, can fairly represent 
 to an English ear what has been sung with en- 
 thusiasm by German congregations through ten 
 generations; but the following version by Mr. 
 Carlyle, I presume, is the best that our language 
 supplies. 
 
 " A safe stronghold our God is still, 
 A trusty shield and weapon ; 
 He'll help us clear from all the ill 
 
 That hath us now oe'rtaken. 
 The ancient Prince of Hell 
 Hath risen with purpose fell ; 
 Strong mail of Craft and Power 
 He weareth in this hour, — 
 On earth is not his fellow. 
 
 " With force of arms we nothing can ; 
 
 Full soon were we down ridden : 
 But for us fights the proper Man, 
 
 Whom God himself hath bidden : 
 Ask ye, Who is this same ? 
 Christ Jesus is his name, 
 The Lord Sabaoth's Son, — 
 He, and no other one, 
 
 Shall conquer in the battle. 
 
 " And were this world all Devils o'er 
 And watching to devour us, 
 
 "We lay it not to heart so sore, 
 Not they can overpower us : 
 
 And let the Prince of 111 
 
 Look grim as e'er he will, 
 
 He harms us not a whit : 
 
 For why ? His doom is writ, 
 A word shall quickly slay him. 
 
512 LUTHER. 
 
 " God's word, for all their craft and force, 
 
 One moment will not linger ; 
 But, spite of Hell, shall have its course, 
 
 'Tis written by his finger : 
 And though they take our life, 
 Goods, honour, children, wife, 
 Yet is their profit small ; 
 These things shall vanish all, — 
 
 The City of God remaineth." 
 
 Critical and Miscellaneous Essays, vol. ii. pp. 261, 262. 
 
513 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 /Esop, his Fables, printed by 
 Caxton, 155. 
 
 Aguado, sent from Spain to inves- 
 tigate charges against Colum- 
 bus, 258. 
 
 Agincourt, battle of, 3 ; the Duke 
 of Orleans taken prisoner there, 
 5. 
 
 Alexander VI. elected Pope, 330 ; 
 his character, 331, &c. ; his 
 death, 334. 
 
 Alfonso, younger son of John IT., 
 King of Castile, is proclaimed 
 King by the insurgents, 188 ; 
 his sudden death, 189. 
 
 Alfonso, king of Portugal, seeks 
 Isabella in marriage, 190; is 
 betrothed to Joanna, the pre- 
 tended daughter of Henry IV., 
 192 ; asserts her rights, and 
 makes war on Spain, 192 ; gives 
 up his bride, and consents to 
 terms of peace, 1 94. 
 
 Anacaona, wife of Caonabo, is 
 friendly to the Spaniards, 255 ; 
 cruelly put to death by Ovan- 
 do, 297. 
 
 Anjou, Countess of, high price 
 given by her for some Homi- 
 lies, 102. 
 
 Aragon, King of, seeks the hand 
 of Isabella for his son Ferdi- 
 nand, 190. 
 
 Arras., peace of, between France 
 and Burgundy, 83. 
 
 Athanasius, his works trans- 
 lated by Erasmus, 341 . 
 
 Augsburg, Luther summoned 
 thither by the Pope, 386 ; 
 Diet held their, 455 ; Confes- 
 sion of, 457. 
 
 Azores, discovery of, 182. 
 
 Barante, passage from, quoted by 
 Lord Mahon, 90. 
 
 Barcelona, meeting of Columbus 
 there with Ferdinand and Isa- 
 bella, 235. 
 
 Baudricourt, Robert de, Captain 
 of Vancouleurs, receives a re- 
 port of Joan's visions, 1 5 ; 
 treats it with scorn, 15 ; has 
 an interview with her, 15; 
 communicates with the Court 
 respecting her, 18. 
 
 Beaufort, Cardinal, brings rein- 
 forcements from England, 49 ; 
 presides over the Court which 
 pronounces judgment on Joan, 
 75 ; is present at her execu- 
 tion, 79 ; moved to tears by 
 the scene, 79 ; crowns Henry 
 VI. of England as King of 
 France, 82. 
 
 Bedford, Duke of, brother of 
 Henry V., Regent for Henry 
 
 L L 
 
514 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 VI., 5 ; lays siege to Orleans, 
 6 ; offers battle to Charles, 49 ; 
 presses for the conviction of 
 Joan, 71 ; brings Henry VI. 
 to France and crowns him, 82. 
 
 Bobadilla, Francisco, arrives at 
 Hispaniola as Commissioner, 
 272 ; his insolence and injus- 
 tice, 272 ; puts Columbus in 
 irons, 273 ; encourages charges 
 against him, 274 ; sends him to 
 Spain for trial, 275 ; is super- 
 seded, 278 ; circumstances of 
 his death, 282. 
 
 Bora, Catherine, flees from her 
 convent to Wittemburg, 429 ; 
 her marriage with Luther, 430 ; 
 letters of Luther to her, 482. 
 
 Borgia, Caesar, son of Alexander 
 VI., his crimes, 331, 332. 
 
 Boyle, Father, Apostolical Vicar 
 of the New World, associated 
 with Diego Columbus as head 
 of Council at Isabella, 249 ; 
 sails for Spain to bring charges 
 against Columbus, 250 ; ef- 
 fects of his misrepresentations, 
 257. 
 
 Braun, John, Vicar of Eisenach, 
 his early friendship with Lu- 
 ther, 239 ; Luther's letter to 
 him, 359. 
 
 Brazil, discovery of, 321, 
 
 Bucer, Martin, his first meeting 
 with Luther, 385 ; writes 
 against Luther on the Sacra- 
 mentarian controversy, 444 ; 
 his letter to Zwinglius about 
 Luthei*, 445 ; is present at the 
 Conference of Marburg, 445; 
 
 Bunyan, like Luther in many re- 
 spects, 505 ; his account of his 
 first meeting with the Commen- 
 tary on the Galatian.% 506. 
 
 Burgundy, Philip, Duke of, un- 
 cle of Charles VI., rules the 
 
 King up to the time of his 
 death, 2. 
 
 Burgundy, John, Duke of, son of 
 Philip, a party to the assassina- 
 tion of Louis, Duke of Orleans, 
 2 ; himself assassinated by Or- 
 leanists, 3. 
 
 Burgundy, Philip, Duke of, sur- 
 named The Good, son of John, 
 avenges his father's death by 
 making alliance with Henry V. 
 of England, 4; Joan of Arc's 
 letter to him, 44 ; sells Joan to 
 the English, 56 ; makes peace 
 with Charles VII., 83. 
 
 Cabral, his discovery of Bra- 
 zil, 321. 
 
 Cajetan, Cardinal, the Pope's 
 Legate, Luther summoned be- 
 fore him, 386 ; Luther's ac- 
 count of their meeting, 386. 
 
 Cape rie Verd Islands, discovery 
 of, 182. 
 
 Cape of Good Hope, passed by 
 Bartholomew Diaz, 184. 
 
 Cape Non, long the southern 
 boundary of European enter- 
 prise, 181. 
 
 Caonabo, a native chief, forms a 
 confederacy against the Spa- 
 niards, 250 ; his capture and 
 death, 254, &c. 
 
 Cardinals, What are they ? 497, 
 &c. ; their peculiar privileges, 
 when and how granted, 498 ; 
 their place of meeting, 499; 
 their dinners, scanty once, more 
 abundant now, 499 ; their fit- 
 ness for the office of making a 
 Pope considered, 500, &c. 
 
 Carlstadt encourages the fanati- 
 cal party at Wittemberg, 416. 
 
 Cauchon, Bishop of Beauvais, 
 claims Joan upon her capture ; 
 his claim allowed, 56 ; presses 
 
INDEX. 
 
 515 
 
 forward her trial, 72 ; reads 
 her sentence of death, 76 ; 
 preaches to her at the place of 
 execution, 78 ; is moved to 
 tears by her demeanour, 79. 
 Caxton, William, his birth, edu- 
 cation, and apprenticeship, 132 ; 
 his residence in Holland, 133 ; 
 appointed to negotiate a treaty 
 with the Duke of Burgundy, 
 1 34 ; in the service of the 
 Duchess of Burgundy, 136; 
 translates the Trojan history, 
 137 ; his wandering life, 138 ; 
 how he became a printer, 141, 
 142; History of Troy, 141; 
 Game of Chess, 144 ; Life of 
 Jason, 144; sets up his press 
 in Westminster Abbey, 144; 
 prints romances, 145; moral 
 publications, 147 ; Cordial, or 
 Four Last Things, 148 ; Pilgri- 
 mage of the Soul, 151 ; His- 
 torical publications,! 53; Chro- 
 nicles of England, 1 54 ; Image 
 or Mirror of the World, 155 ; 
 publishes JEsop, 155; and 
 Chaucer, 156 ; helped to fix 
 the standard of the language, 
 1 58 ; his last work, The Art 
 and Craft to Know well to 
 Die, 164; his death, 165; 
 specimen of his spelling, 172 ; 
 date of his earliest publica- 
 tions according to Dr. Dibdin 
 and Mr. Hallam, 174. 
 Charles V., of Germany, elected 
 Emperor, 324 ; summons Lu- 
 ther to the Diet of Worms, 347 ; 
 refuses to violate his safe-con- 
 duct, 405; issues an edict of 
 condemnation, 406 ; at war 
 with the Pope, Clement VII., 
 447 ; summons a Diet to meet 
 at Spires, 453 ; is present at 
 Diet of Augsburg, 455 ; hears 
 
 L L 
 
 the Confession of Augsburg, 
 457 ; promulgates a decree 
 proscribing the Reformed 
 Faith, 459; hesitates to en- 
 force it, 464 ; urges the Pope 
 to summon a General Council, 
 464 ; signs the Truce of Ra- 
 tisbon, 468 ; heads an army, 
 before which Solyman retires, 
 468. 
 
 Charles V., of France, his store 
 of books, 102. 
 
 Charles VI. smitten with mad- 
 ness, 1 ; ruled by relatives, 2 ; 
 surrenders his kingdom to 
 Henry V. of England, 4 ; his 
 death, 5. 
 
 Charles VII., while Dauphin, 
 in the hands of the Orleans 
 faction, 3 ; succeeds his father, 
 5; neglects his kingly duties, 
 5 ; has an interview with Joan 
 of Arc at Chinon, 21 ; accepts 
 her services, 23 ; marches to 
 Rheims, 40 ; is crowned, 42 ; 
 makes an attempt on Paris, 
 49 ; regains possession of Paris, 
 83. 
 
 Chaucer, his works printed by 
 Caxton, 156; his Canterbury 
 Tales, 157; character of them, 
 158. 
 
 Chrysostom, his works translated 
 into Latin by Erasmus, 341. 
 
 Clarence, Duke of, brother of 
 Edward IV., Caxton dedi- 
 cates the Game of Chess to him, 
 144. 
 
 Coburg, Luther's residence there 
 during the Diet of Augsburg, 
 459, &c. 
 
 Columbus, his early history 
 and education, 201 ; his pas- 
 sion for the sea, 201 ; com- 
 mences his nautical life, 201 ; 
 his wonderful escape, 203 ; ar- 
 
 2 
 
516 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 rives in Portugal, 203; his 
 marriage, 203 ; his theory of 
 the earth, 205 ; his correspon- 
 dence with Toscanelli, 206 ; 
 makes overtures to Portugal, 
 207 ; solicits the countenance 
 of Henry VII. of England, 
 208; his appearance at Palos, 
 198 ; unfolds his plans to Mar- 
 chena, 199 ; he seeks the Court 
 of Spain, 208 ; his person and 
 character, 209 ; introduced to 
 Ferdinand, 210; conference 
 with men of science at Sala- 
 manca, 212 ; his theories coldly 
 received, 213 ; returns to Palos, 
 214 ; is recalled to Court, 214 ; 
 is again repulsed, 215; gains 
 the hearty support of Isabella, 
 215; his terms, 246 ; fits out 
 an armament, 217 ; sets sail, 
 218; refractory spirit of his 
 crew, 221 ; discovers St. Sal- 
 vador, 227 ; takes possession 
 in the name of the Sovereigns 
 of Spain, 227 ; discovers Cuba, 
 229; and Hispaniola, 230; 
 his description of the newly- 
 discovered lands, 231 ; forms a 
 settlement in Hispaniola, 232 ; 
 sails for Europe, 233; recep- 
 tion in Portugal, 234 ; in Spain, 
 235 ; by the Sovereigns, 236 ; 
 honours paid him, 237 ; he re- 
 solves on a second expedition, 
 237 ; sets sail, 237 ; reaches 
 Hispaniola, 238 ; his disap- 
 pointment and difficulties there, 
 238 — 242 ; sails on an explor- 
 ing voyage, 243 ; discovers Ja- 
 maica, 244 ; returns to Hispa- 
 niola, and meets his brother 
 Bartholomew, 246 ; receives 
 information of an intended at- 
 tack by the natives, 251 ; gains 
 a complete victory, 256 ; charges 
 
 brought against him, 258 ; re- 
 turns to Spain to defend him* 
 self, 258 ; his triumph over his 
 assailants, 259 ; his third voyage, 
 261 ; discovers the continent 
 of America, 261 ; his theory 
 of the earth's form, 262 ; re- 
 turns to Hispaniola, 263 ; dis. 
 orders in his absence, 264 ; 
 obliged to make concessions to 
 the disaffected, 267; slanders 
 against him in Spain renewed, 
 270 ; Bobadilla authorized to 
 supersede him, 272 ; his digni- 
 fied submission, 273 ; he is put 
 in irons, 273 ; his trial, 274 ; 
 is sent to Spain, 274 ; arrives 
 as a prisoner, 275 ; sends a 
 memorial to the Queen, 276 ; 
 Isabella grants him an inter- 
 view, 277 ; is acquitted of the 
 charges brought against him, 
 277 ; but not restored to his 
 government, 278 ; prepares 
 for his fourth voyage, 279 ; 
 his adventures off Hispaniola, 
 281 ; sails for South America, 
 282 ; encounters fearful tem- 
 pests, 283 ; lands on the conti- 
 nent, 284; his dream, 286; 
 reaches Jamaica, 287 -, his long 
 detention there, 287 ; his let- 
 ter to the Sovereigns, 288 ; 
 returns to Hispaniola, 294 ; 
 lamentable occurrences during 
 his absence, 295, &c. ; returns 
 to Spain to plead the cause of 
 the natives, 299 ; his poverty 
 and sickness, 300 ; his last visit 
 to Court, 301 ; is coldly re- 
 ceived by Ferdinand, 301 ; 
 pleads in vain for restoration of 
 his honours, 302; his death, 
 303 ; removal of his remains to 
 Hispaniola and Cuba, 303 ; 
 righted by posterity, 304 ; his 
 
INDEX. 
 
 517 
 
 letter to his Sovereigns, 309 ; 
 his letter to the Royal Trea- 
 surer, 311; his speculations re- 
 specting the earth, 315. 
 
 Columbus, Bartholomew, sent by 
 his brother to England, SOS ; 
 joins him at Hispaniola, 246 ; 
 his valuable qualities, 247; is 
 appointed Lieutenant Gover- 
 nor, 247 ; imprisoned by Boba- 
 dilla, 273 ; his prudence and 
 vigour at Jamaica, 291. 
 
 Columbus, Diego, brother of 
 Christopher, placed at the head 
 of a Council at Isabella, 249 ; 
 mutiny against him, 250 ; re- 
 fuses to give up insurgents to 
 Bobadilla, 272 ; made prisoner 
 with his brother, 273. 
 
 Columbus, Diego, son of Chris- 
 topher, is present at his father's 
 death, 303. 
 
 Columbus, Fernando, his life of 
 his father, 306. 
 
 Compiegne is attacked by the 
 Duke of Burgundy, 53 ; Joan 
 comes to its rescue, 53; in a 
 sortie from it Joan is taken 
 prisoner, 54. 
 
 Cortes conquers Mexico for Spain, 
 322. 
 
 Cotta, Ursula, her motherly kind- 
 ness to Luther, 344. 
 
 Cuba discovered, 229. 
 
 D'Aubigne, quotation from, 339 ; 
 character of his History of the 
 Reformation, 489. 
 
 Diaz, Bartholomew, passes the 
 Cape of Good Hope, 1 84. 
 
 Dibdin, Dr., his opinion as to 
 the date of Caxton's first work, 
 174. 
 
 Domremy, village of, birthplace 
 of Joan of Arc, 7 ; taken pos- 
 session of by the Burgundians, 
 
 L L 
 
 10 ; excused from taxation for 
 sake of Joan, 52. 
 Dunois, in command of the 
 garrison at Orleans, 24 ; his 
 meeting with Joan of Arc, 27 ; 
 . seconds Joan in her last sortie, 
 33 ; conversation with Joan, 
 47. 
 
 Eck, Doctor, Luther's disputation 
 with him on the Pope's Supre- 
 macy, 387; brings a Bull of 
 Excommunication against Lu- 
 ther from Rome, 395 ; appears 
 against the Reformers at Augs- 
 burg, 457. 
 
 Edward IV., King of England, 
 seeks the hand of Isabella for 
 his brother, 190. 
 
 Eisenach, Luther at school there, 
 343. 
 
 Eisleben, birthplace of Luther, 
 342. 
 
 Emmanuel, King of Portugal, 
 succeeds his cousin John, 186 ; 
 encourages maritime discovery, 
 186. 
 
 Erasmus, his exposure of ec- 
 clesiastical corruptions, 327 ; 
 his scholarship and theological 
 publications, 340, 341 ; his cha- 
 racter, 437, 438 ; is solicited 
 by Kings and Popes to write 
 against Luther, 438 ; Luther's 
 letter to him, 438 ; his Free- 
 dom of the Will, 439 ; his con- 
 versation with the Elector 
 Frederic, 507. 
 
 Erfurth, University of, Luther 
 removes to it, 345 ; his life 
 there, 345 ; finds a Bible there, 
 346 ; leaves it for Augustinian 
 Convent, 349. 
 
 Ferdinand, son of the King of 
 Aragon, a suitor for the hand 
 3 
 
518 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 of Isabella, 1 90 ; travels in dis- 
 guise to meet her at Valladolid, 
 191 ; their marriage, 191 ; his 
 character, 191; Columbus in- 
 troduced to him, 211 ; assem- 
 bles a conclave at Salamanca, 
 21 1 ; his injustice towards Co- 
 lumbus, 301. 
 
 Fernandez, Garcia, a physician 
 of Palos, one of the early 
 friends of Columbus, present 
 when Columbus first unfolds 
 his plans atPalos, 199 ; accom- 
 panies him on his first voyage, 
 217. 
 
 Fonseca, Bishop, President of 
 the Council for the Indies, his 
 treachery to Columbus, 268 ; 
 exerts his influence to injure 
 Columbus, 271. 
 
 Frederic, Elector of Saxony, his 
 character, 389; his refusal of 
 the empire, 389 ; his counte- 
 nance of Luther, 390 ; his cau- 
 tion, 391 ; his interview with 
 Erasmus, 504 ; conveys Luther 
 to the Wartburg for safety, 
 407, 408; Luther's letter to 
 him on leaving his hiding-place, 
 418 ; sends Luther a coat, 
 436. 
 
 Fust, John, in partnership with 
 Guttenberg, 108 ; quarrel and 
 separation between them, 114; 
 carried on business with Schcef- 
 fer, 125; his death, 126. 
 
 Gama, Vasco de, sails to India 
 by Cape of Good Hope, 186. 
 
 Geinsfleische, supposed by some 
 to have been the brother of 
 Guttenberg, and to have taught 
 him the rudiments of printing, 
 having stolen them from Hol- 
 land, 171. 
 
 Gibbon, his mention of Caxton 
 
 as the first English printer, 
 127. 
 
 Guacanagari, one of the five na- 
 tive chiefs of Hispaniola, his 
 meeting with Columbus, 230 ; 
 refuses to join confederacy 
 against the Spaniards, 25 1 ; in- 
 forms Columbus of intended 
 attack, 251 ; informs him of a 
 second intended attack at Isa- 
 bella, 256. 
 
 Guicciardini, his testimony con- 
 cerning Haerlem, 121 ; his 
 character of Alexander VI., 495. 
 
 Guienne recovered by the French, 
 84. 
 
 Guizot, his glowing eulogy on 
 Joan, 81. 
 
 Guttenberg honoured with a sta- 
 tue, and public commemora- 
 tion, as inventor of printing, 
 107; so described by Trithe- 
 mius, 108 ; joins partnership 
 with Fust, 108 ; prints with 
 him and SchoefFer at the Zum 
 Jungen in Mayence, 109 ; his 
 early history at Strasburg, 112; 
 dispute with Fust, 114; sub- 
 sequent history uncertain, 115. 
 
 Haerlam claims to be the birth- 
 place of Printing, 117. 
 
 Hallam, Mr., his opinion as to 
 the date of Caxton's first work, 
 174. 
 
 Hare, Archdeacon, his learned 
 and successful vindication of 
 Luther, 491 n. 
 
 Havanna, the city of, the burial- 
 place of Columbus, 303. 
 
 Henry, Prince of Portugal, 
 younger son of John I., his 
 energy in promoting maritime 
 discovery, 180 ; his success, 
 181,182; his death, 182. 
 
 Henry IV., King of Castile, son 
 of John II., succeeds to the 
 
INDEX. 
 
 519 
 
 throne on the death of his 
 father, 188; his feeble charac- 
 ter, 188; a party formed against 
 him, 188 ; is formally deposed, 
 188 ; his younger brother pro- 
 claimed king, 189 ; his death, 
 192. 
 
 Henry V., King of England, 
 claims the throne of France, 2 ; 
 conqueror at Agincourt, 2 ; 
 party to treaty of Troyes, 4 ; en- 
 ters Paris as regent, 5 ; dies, 6. 
 
 Henry VI., King of England, 
 succeeds to the English crown 
 while still an infant, 5; brought 
 over to Paris by Bedford, 82 ; 
 crowned there, 82 ; coldly re- 
 ceived by its inhabitants, 82. 
 
 Henry VII., King of England, 
 overtures made to by Colum- 
 bus, soliciting the encourage- 
 ment of his enterprise, 208 ; 
 the proposal not at first con- 
 sidered, 247 ; the King after- 
 wards offers supplies, but too 
 late, 248 ; he loses the services 
 of Columbus, 248. 
 
 Herrera, his character of Co- 
 lumbus, 209. 
 
 Hispaniola, discovered, 230 ; ori- 
 gin of its name, 230 ; Colum- 
 bus's description of, 231 ; a 
 settlement formed there, 232 ; 
 Columbus sails from it to Spain, 
 233 ; returns to it, 238; troubles 
 in his absence, 239. 
 
 Innoeent VIII. , Pope, his bare- 
 faced profligacy, 330. 
 
 Irving, Washington, quotation 
 from, 225. 
 
 Isabella, Queen of Spain, daugh- 
 ter of John II., refuses the 
 crown, 189 ; her marriage, 1 91 ; 
 becomes Queen by the death of 
 her brother Henry, 192; her 
 noble qualities, 193 ; refuses to 
 
 dismember her kingdom, 193 ; 
 becomes the unquestioned pos- 
 sessor of the throne, 194; her 
 personal influence, 195; gives 
 her sanction and support to 
 Columbus's first voyage, 215; 
 her honourable reception of him 
 on his return, 236 ; her indig- 
 nation at wrongs of natives, 271 ; 
 supposes Columbus to be re- 
 sponsible for them, 271 ; her 
 generous reception of him after- 
 wards, 277 ; her death, 300. 
 
 Jamaica, discovery of, 244. 
 
 Jean de Metz meets Joan at 
 Vancouleurs, 1 6 ; promises to 
 conduct her to the King, 16 ; 
 escorts her to Chinon, 18. 
 
 Joan of Arc, born at Domremy, 
 7 ; her early years, 8, 86 ; her 
 piety, 9; her Voices, 10 ; her 
 superstitions, 11 ; her doubts 
 and perplexities, 13, 14; her 
 patriotism, 14 ; she consults 
 her uncle, 15; visit to Van- 
 couleurs, 15; reply to the Duke 
 of Lorraine, 17 ; her simplicity, 
 17 ; her journey to Chinon, 19, 
 20; her interview with the 
 King, 21 ; is sent to Poitiers for 
 examination, and approved, 22, 
 23 ; displays her standard, 24 ; 
 checks licence and disorder in 
 the camp, 25 ; goes to meet the 
 army mustering at Blois, 25 ; 
 her letter to the English Gene- 
 rals, 25 ; enters Orleans, 28 ; 
 her first fight and gallant be- 
 haviour, 30 ; second sortie, 32 ; 
 third sortie in spite of generals, 
 34 ; is wounded, 35 ; her hu- 
 mility and piety, 36 ; siege 
 raised, and half of Joan's mis- 
 sion accomplished, 37 ; presses 
 for the other half, 38; pre- 
 
 4 
 
520 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 diction of victory at Patay, 39 ; 
 Joan at Rheiras, 43, 44 ; sends 
 a letter to the Duke of Bur- 
 gundy proposing peace, 44; 
 her gentle and blameless de- 
 meanour in the camp, 46 ; her 
 yearnings for home, 47 ; yields 
 to the King's entreaties to re- 
 main with the army, 48 ; her 
 retreat from Paris, 51 ; is 
 ennobled by the King, 51; pro- 
 cures immunity from taxation 
 for her native village, 52; her 
 kindness to the poor, 53 ; is 
 taken prisoner at Compiegne, 
 54 ; is sold to the English, 56 ; 
 is confined in the Castle of 
 Beaurevoir, 57 ; attempts to 
 escape, but is recaptured, 57 ; 
 her trial at Rouen, 58 ; charges 
 against her, 58 ; asserts her 
 mission, 6 1 ; is encouraged by 
 her Voices in prison, 64 ; her 
 patience under repeated exami- 
 nations, 65 ; promptness and 
 cleverness of her answers, 66 
 — 69 ; is pressed to condemn 
 herself, 69 ; refuses, 70 ; is 
 threatened with the rack, 72; 
 judgment is given against her, 
 73 ; sentence of death pro- 
 nounced, 76 ; her submission 
 and recantation, 76 ; is par- 
 doned on conditions, 76; re- 
 cals her recantation, 77 ; is led 
 to execution, 78 ; her death, 80; 
 testimony of eye-witnesses, 80; 
 Guizot's character of her, 81. 
 Joanna, daughter of the wife of 
 Henry IV. of Spain, is be- 
 trothed to the King of Por- 
 tugal, 192; her claim to the 
 throne of Spain supported by 
 him, 198 ; she resigns her pre- 
 tensions, and retires into a con- 
 vent, 194. 
 
 John II., King of Portugal, his 
 anxiety to reach India by the 
 African coast, 183; his trea- 
 cherous conduct towards Co- 
 lumbus, 207 ; entertains Co- 
 lumbus honourably after his 
 first voyage, 234. 
 
 John, Elector of Saxony, his cha- 
 racter, 450 ; attends the Diet 
 of Spires, 454 ; signs the Pro- 
 test, 454 ; attends the Diet of 
 Augsburg, 456; succeeds in 
 having the Confession read 
 publicly before the emperor, 
 457.. 
 
 Jonas, Justus, his steady friend- 
 ship for Luther, 456 ; attends 
 him to the Diet of Augsburg, 
 456; with him at his death, 
 484. 
 
 Julius II., his election to the 
 Papacy, 335 ; his unscrupulous 
 policy, 335 ; his delight in war, 
 336. 
 
 Junius, Hadrian, author of a His- 
 tory of Holland, supports the 
 claim of Haerlem to be the 
 birthplace of printing, 118. 
 
 Koster, Lawrence, the claim 
 set up for him as the inventor 
 of printing, 1 18, &c. 
 
 Large, Robert, a citizen of Lon- 
 don, Caxton apprenticed to 
 him, 132 ; his legacy to Caxton, 
 133. 
 
 Leipsic, Luther's disputation 
 there, 387. 
 
 Leo X. made a Cardinal at thir- 
 teen, 330 ; elected Pope, 338 ; 
 his character, 338 ; cites Luther 
 to Rome, afterwards to Augs- 
 burg, 386 ; Luther's letter to 
 him, 393 ; issues a Bull of Ex- 
 communication against Luther, 
 395. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 521 
 
 Lorraine, Duke of, applies to Joan 
 for a cure, 17. 
 
 Louis XL, King of France, seeks 
 the hand of Isabella for his 
 brother, 190. 
 
 Loyola, Ignatius, procures a Bull 
 from Paul III. founding the 
 Order of Jesuits, 481. 
 
 Luther, John, father of Martin 
 Luther, 342, 358. 
 
 Luther, Martin, his birth and pa- 
 rentage, 342 ; his school-days, 
 343 ; goes to the University of 
 Erfurth, 345 ; meets with a 
 Latin Bible, 346 ; takes his 
 Bachelor's degree, 347 ; his 
 terrors of conscience, 347 ; re- 
 solves [to be a Monk, 349 ; 
 takes leave of his College 
 friends, 349 ; admitted into an 
 Augustinian Convent, 350 ; 
 his Convent life, 350 ; cheer- 
 fully endures hardships, 351 ; 
 bis self-discipline, 351 ; his 
 diligent studies, 352 ; his con- 
 flicts and anxieties, 354 ; his 
 meeting with Staupitz, 355 ; 
 happy results of his intercourse 
 with him, 356, 357 ; ordained 
 Priest, 358 ; appointed Pro- 
 fessor of Philosophy at Wittem- 
 berg, 360 ; his busy life there, 
 361 ; becomes a Preacher, 361; 
 effect of his Preaching, 362 ; 
 his journey to Rome, 362 ; is 
 shocked by the prevailing im- 
 piety, 364 ; returns to Wittem- 
 berg, 366 ; made Doctor of 
 Divinity, 366 ; his life at Wit- 
 temberg, 370 ; denounces In- 
 dulgences, 375 ; promulgates 
 his 95 Propositions, 376 ; feel- 
 ings with which he entered on 
 his struggle with the Papacy, 
 380; his defence of the 95 
 Propositions against assailants, 
 
 382, 383 ; holds a public dis- 
 putation at Heidelberg, 385 ; 
 cited before the Pope's Legate 
 at Augsburg, 386 ; discussions 
 at Leipsic, 387 ; his Letters to 
 the Pope, 388 ; publishes his 
 Commentary on the Epistle to 
 the Galatians, 388 ; large circu- 
 lation of his writings, 389 ; is 
 countenanced by the Elector of 
 Saxony, 390 ; publishes his ap- 
 peal on the Reformation of Re- 
 ligion, 394 ; and the Babylonish 
 Captivity, 394 ; burns the 
 Pope's Bull, 395 ; summoned 
 to the Diet of Worms, 397 ; 
 his journey, 398 ; appears be- 
 fore the Emperor, 399 ; his 
 noble demeanour, his defence, 
 401 ; his departure, 406 ; ^his 
 condemnation, 406 ; his jour- 
 ney, 407 ; he is intercepted and 
 carried to the Wartburg, 407 ; 
 his occupations there, 410 ; 
 anxious enquiries after him, 
 41 2 ; sends a letter of remon- 
 strance to Wittemberg, 416 ; 
 returns to Wittemberg, 418 ; 
 his Sermons on Peace, 419; 
 publishes his translation of the 
 New Testament, 421 ; remains 
 unmolested at Wittemberg, 
 422, 423 ; his remonstrances 
 with the peasants and nobles, 
 426 ; his grief and passion, 428; 
 his marriage, 429 ; his do- 
 mestic character, 432 ; his po- 
 verty and disinterestedness, 
 434 ; his controversy with 
 Henry VIII., 437 ; with Eras- 
 mus, 437 ; with Zwinglius and 
 the Sacramentarians, 441-8 ; 
 his moderation in regard to 
 religious worship and cere- 
 monies, 448 ; his Catechisms, 
 Homilies, and Commentaries, 
 
522 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 449 ; his wise dealing with en- 
 dowments, 45 1 ; his letters from 
 Coburg, 459 ; his fervency in 
 prayer, 460; his Hymns, 461 ; 
 his writings for the people, 
 462 ; Luther and the Ana- 
 baptists, 471 ; his doctrine on 
 Satanic influence, 473 ; his de- 
 clining years, 476 ; exhausting 
 effect of his labours, 476 ; his 
 journey to Eisleben, 481 ; his 
 last letters, 482; his last ill- 
 ness, 483 ; his last prayer, 
 484; his death, 484; his fu- 
 neral, 485 ; his work, and its 
 results, 486, &c. ; Luther and 
 Bunyan alike in many things, 
 505; letter to Little John, 509; 
 Paraphrase of 46th Psalm, 511. 
 
 Madeira, discovery of, 182. 
 
 Magdeburg, Luther at school 
 there, 343. 
 
 Mansfeld, town of, John Luther 
 removes thither, 342. 
 
 Marchena, Juan Perez de, his 
 meeting with Columbus, 198 ; 
 becomes a convert to his theory, 
 199 ; sends him on to Court of 
 Spain, 201 ; prevents him from 
 applying to other Courts, 214 ; 
 sends a letter of remonstrance 
 to Isabella, 214; interview 
 with the Queen, 214. 
 
 Marco Polo, a Venetian, won- 
 ders described by, 206. 
 
 Margarita, appointed military 
 commander at Isabella, 249 ; 
 his oppressive conduct, 249 ; 
 claims to be independent of the 
 Council, 249 ; sails for Spain 
 to bring charges against Co- 
 lumbus, 250. 
 
 Maritime discovery, the 15th 
 century the age of, 179 ; pro- 
 gress of, 179, &c, 321, 322. 
 
 Margaret, sister of Francis of 
 France, an early convert to the 
 reformed faith, 480. 
 
 Mayence, its claim to be the 
 birthplace of printing, 107. 
 
 Melancthon, Philip, recom- 
 mended by Reuchlin to Greek 
 Professorship at Wittemberg, 
 391 ; Luther's early admiration 
 of him, 391 ; their characters 
 contrasted, 392 ; their warm and 
 steady friendship, 393 ; accom- 
 panies Luther to Conference 
 with the Sacramentarians at 
 Marburg, 445 ; accompanies 
 the Elector John to Diet of 
 Spires, 454 ; draws up the Con- 
 fession of Augsburg, 457 ; at- 
 tempts a compromise with the 
 Romish party, 458 ; Luther's 
 letter to him on that subject, 
 460 ; pronounces a funeral ora- 
 tion over Luther's remains, 485. 
 
 Mendez, Diego, his enterprising 
 voyage from Jamaica to His- 
 paniola, 288. 
 
 Mendoza, Cardinal, introduces 
 Columbus to Ferdinand, 211. 
 
 Mentel, set up as a rival to Gut- 
 tenberg as having been the in- 
 ventor of printing, 116. 
 
 Michelet, extract from his His- 
 tory of France, 39 — 43 ; his 
 hatred of England, 93 — 
 98 ; character of his Life of 
 Luther, 490. 
 
 Munster, occupied by Anabap- 
 tists, 470 ; strange scenes there, 
 470 ; recaptured, 471. 
 
 New Testament, Luther's trans- 
 lation of, 421 ; excellence of 
 its style, 421 ; its rapid dif- 
 fusion, 422. 
 
 Non, Cape, long the Southern 
 
INDEX. 
 
 523 
 
 boundary of European enter- 
 prise, 181. 
 
 Normandy, recovered from the 
 English, 84. 
 
 Nuremberg, Diet assembled at, 
 423. 
 
 CEcolampadius, in concert with 
 Bucer and Zwinglius, enters 
 into controversy with Luther 
 on the Eucharist, 444; his 
 work on the subject, 444 ; 
 present at the discussion with 
 Luther and Melancthon at Mar- 
 burg, 445. 
 
 Ojeda, Alonzo de, left by Co- 
 lumbus in command of garrison 
 at Fort St. Thomas, 249; is 
 besieged there, 251 ; undertakes 
 to bring Caonabo to the Spanish 
 quarters, 252 ; stratagem by 
 which he succeeds, 254 ; be- 
 comes disaffected, 268 ; leaves 
 the island, 269. 
 
 Orleans, besieged by the Duke 
 of Bedford, 6 ; army mustered 
 for its relief at Blois, 25 ; siege 
 raised, 37. 
 
 Orleans, Charles, Duke of, one of 
 the prisoners of Agincourt, 5 ; 
 detained for twenty-five years, 
 84; released, 84. 
 
 Orleans, Louis, Duke of, brother 
 of Charles VI., assassinated, 2; 
 ancestor of the kings of France 
 from Louis XII. to Henry 
 III. Note, 493. 
 
 Ovando, appointed to super- 
 sede Bobadilla as Governor of 
 Hispaniola, 278 ; delays to re- 
 lieve Columbus when detained 
 in Jamaica, 294 ; his cruelty 
 to the natives, 297. 
 
 Palos, a town on the west coast 
 of Spain, Columbus stops at 
 
 a convent there, 1 98 ; sails from 
 it on his first voyage, 218; 
 and lands there on his return, 
 235 ; sails from it on his second 
 voyage, 237. 
 
 Papacy, decline of its influence 
 before the time of Luther, 326. 
 
 Paris in possession of the Eng- 
 lish, 49 ; Joan's retreat from, 
 51 ; recovery by Richemont, 83. 
 
 Paul III., Pope, incorporates 
 the order of Jesuits, 481 ; con- 
 venes the Council of Trent, 481. 
 
 Philip, Landgrave of Hesse, at- 
 tends the Diet of Worms, 404 ; 
 brings about a meeting between 
 Luther and Melancthon and 
 the Sacramentarian Divines, 
 445 ; signs protest at Spires, 
 454. 
 
 Pinzon, Martin, a navigator of 
 Palos, his meeting with Co- 
 lumbus, 199; accompanies him 
 on his first voyage, 217 ; has 
 command of one of the ships, 
 217; he parts company from 
 the other vessels, 232 ; his 
 fidelity questionable, 233. 
 
 Pius II., his election to the 
 Papacy, and death, 335. 
 
 Pizarro, his conquest of Peru, 322. 
 
 Poitiers, University of, examina- 
 tion of Joan before it, 22. 
 
 Popes, great preponderance of 
 bad ones, 497 ; elected succes- 
 sively by emperors, Roman 
 clergy, and cardinals, 497, &c. ; 
 their spiritual pretensions, com- 
 pared with the origin of their 
 power, futile and extravagant, 
 503. 
 
 Porras heads an insurrection in 
 Jamaica, 291. 
 
 Porto Santo, discovery of, 181. 
 
 Prescott, his eulogium on Queen 
 Isabella, 308. 
 
524 
 
 INDEX, 
 
 Prester John, fabulous stories 
 respecting him, 1 85. 
 
 Prince of Wales, son of Edward 
 IV., Caxton dedicates the Life 
 of Jason to him, 1 44. 
 
 Printing, origin of obscure, 104 ; 
 questions as to its birthplace, 
 106, &c. ; rival claims dis- 
 cussed, 107, &c. 
 
 Protestant, origin of the term, 
 454. 
 
 Rabida, La, a Franciscan con- 
 vent, where Columbus left his 
 son, 213. 
 
 Ranke, quotations from, 365 ; 
 his History of the Reforma- 
 tion referred to, 421 ; extracts 
 from, 463 ; quotations from 
 his History of the Reformation, 
 326, 365, 463 ; character of 
 the work, 490. 
 
 Ratisbon, truce of, 467. 
 
 Reuchlin, his proficiency in 
 Greek and Hebrew learning, 
 379 ; sends Melancthon to fill 
 the post of Greek professor at 
 Wittemberg, 391. 
 
 Rheims, march to, 39 ; entry of 
 Charles into the city, and his 
 coronation there, 42. 
 
 Rivers, Lord, friendship be- 
 tween him and Caxton, 148 ; 
 his translation of the Sayings 
 of Philosophers. 
 
 Roldan, his obligations to Co- 
 lumbus, 264 ; his ingratitude 
 and disaffection, 265 ; is out- 
 lawed by Bartholomew, 265 ; 
 Columbus makes terms with 
 him, 267. 
 
 Rome, Luther's visit to it, 362 ; 
 his surprise at the abominations 
 he saw there, 363 ; taken and 
 sacked by Imperial forces, 447. 
 
 Rouen, place of Joan of Arc's 
 
 trial, 58 ; and execution, 79 ; 
 the testimony of its citizens to 
 Joan's character, 80. 
 
 Salamanca, University of, ex- 
 amines theory of Columbus, 
 211 ; rejects it, 212. 
 
 Saxony, Duke George of, lays 
 the violence of the fanatics to 
 the account of Luther, 41 8 ; 
 presses the Elector Frederic to 
 take violent measures against 
 the Reformed Doctrine, 447 ; 
 his death, 475. 
 
 Schiller, his Maid of Orleans, 
 89. 
 
 Schoeffer, Peter, servant and son- 
 in-law to Fust, discovers an 
 improved mode of casting the 
 types, 109 ; carries on busi- 
 ness in partnership with Fust 
 and Guttenberg, 109 ; after- 
 wards with Fust alone, 125; 
 his death, 126. 
 
 Shakspeare, his misconception 
 of Joan's character in the First 
 Part of Henry VI., 89. 
 
 Sixtus IV., Pope, his claim to 
 dispose of all ecclesiastical be- 
 nefices, 307. 
 
 Smalcald, League of, 466. 
 
 Socrates, sayings of, touching 
 the character of women, 149 ; 
 questioned by Caxton, 150. 
 
 Solyman at war with Charles V. , 
 besieges Vienna, 447 ; obliged 
 to raise the siege, 448 ; invades 
 Germany again, 468 ; his en- 
 quiries about Luther, 468 ; re- 
 tires before Imperial army, 468. 
 
 Southey, his Battle of Blenheim, 
 85 note ; his Joan of Arc, 88 ; 
 his false description of Joan, 88. 
 
 Spires, Diet of, 453. 
 
 Staupitz, Vicar- General of the 
 Augustines, his character, 355; 
 
INDEX. 
 
 525 
 
 visits the convent at Erfurth, 
 and becomes acquainted with 
 Luther, 355 ; becomes Lu- 
 ther's teacher and comforter, 
 356 ; recommends him to the 
 Elector of Saxony as Professor 
 of Philosophy at Wittemberg, 
 360 ; induces him to become a 
 preacher, 361 ; and Doctor of 
 Divinity, 366. 
 
 Stephen, Sir James, his admirable 
 sketch of Luther's life and cha- 
 racter, 491. 
 
 Strasburg, claim of, to be the 
 birthplace of printing, 115; 
 Guttenberg resident there, 112; 
 seems to have made experi- 
 ments there in the printing 
 art, 113. 
 
 St. Salvador, one of the Bahamas, 
 Columbus's landing there, 227. 
 
 Tetzel, is commissioned to sell 
 indulgences, 373 ; specimen of 
 his preaching, 374; indignant 
 at Luther's opposition, 376. 
 
 Toledo, Archbishop of, takes an 
 active part in the insurrection 
 against Henry IV. of Spain, 
 188; his ingratitude to . Isa- 
 bella, 193. 
 
 Toscanelli, a learned Florentine, 
 his correspondence with Co- 
 lumbus, 206 ; encourages him 
 to persevere, 206. 
 
 Trent, Council of, convened, 481. 
 
 Troyes, treaty of, between Henry 
 V. of England, Charles VI. of 
 France, and the Duke of Bur- 
 gundy, 4 ; taken by Charles 
 VII., 41. 
 
 Tytler, his absurd account of 
 Joan, 89. 
 
 Villena, Marquis of, heads an in- 
 surrection against Henry IV., 
 King of Spain, 188. 
 
 Waddington, reference to his 
 History of the Church, 421 ; 
 character of the work, 489. 
 
 Wartburg, Luther carried thi- 
 ther for safety, 408; leaves it, 
 418. 
 
 Westminster Abbey, Caxton sets 
 up his printing press there, 
 127. 
 
 Wiclif, his translation of the 
 Bible forbidden by Archbishop 
 Arundel, 163; price of his 
 New Testament, 102. 
 
 Wiseman, Dr., his account of 
 Doctrine of Indulgences not at 
 all like Tetzel's, 503. 
 
 Wish art, his martyrdom in 
 Scotland, 480. 
 
 Worms, Diet of the empire held 
 there, 397 ; Luther's journey 
 to, 397 ; his arrival there, 399. 
 
 Wynkyn de Worde, Caxton's 
 assistant and successor at the 
 Westminster Press, 165. 
 
 Zell, Ulric, introduced the art of 
 printing into Cologne, 122 ; 
 his account of its origin and 
 progress, 122. 
 
 Zum Jungen, a house in May- 
 ence so called, and used as a 
 printing-office by Fust, 115. 
 
 Zwinglius, begins to preach 
 the Reformed faith in 1516, 
 441 ; simplicity of his doctrine 
 of the Eucharist, 442 ; his con- 
 troversy with Luther on the 
 subject, 444 ; their meeting at 
 Marburg, 445. 
 
 THE END. 
 
London : 
 
 Spottiswoodes and Shaw, 
 
 New-street- Square. 
 
ERRATA. 
 
 Page 189. line 3 from bottom, for "immunity " read "impunity." 
 234. line 3 from bottom, for "at " read " on." 
 

 
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