357 /'■ 3U ' r LIBRARY UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA SAN d;ego 1 (X'.'zlw*^'^ REFORMATION AND RENAISSANCE LORENZO DE' MEDICI. From a portrait by Vasari. Frontispiece, REFORMATION AND RENAISSANCE (Circa 1 377-1610) BY J. M. STONE AUTHOR OF ' MARY THE FIRST, QUEEN OF ENGLAND, ' FAITHFUL UNTO DEATH,' ETC. WITH SIXTEEN ILLUSTRATIONS LONDON DUCKWORTH AND CO. MCMIV PREFACE Having been asked to give some account of the two great revolutionary movements of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries from the standpoint of the old religion, I have attempted in the following pages to represent the various aspects of the Reformation and the Renaissance in their relation to the Catholic Church and to the world at large, endeavouring also to show that while they remained distinct forces they sometimes joined issues and played each other's game. In the term Reformation I have included not only the violent measures employed by the enemies of the Church to overthrow authority that was coeval with Christianity, but also the long and more or less effectual efforts within the Church, prior to the Protestant schism, to combat existing abuses ; and finally the universal post-Tridentine revival of Catholic life and work. The Renaissance — a movement far less capable of exact definition — was the development of many phases of human life. Even before the period when the fall of Constantinople flooded Europe with Greek monuments of learning, and classical letters exercised so great a fascination over the minds of scholars that nothing but the ancient world seemed to them any longer worthy of attention, the art of the Middle Ages was already ceasing to be a recognised vehicle for spreading Christian doctrine. Gradually schools of technique had come into being, and painters, now less intent on the lesson to be conveyed by the sufferings of their dying Christs and the joys of the Mater speciosa than on vi Reformation and Renaissance finding the most perfect expression for their art, began to talk learnedly of schemes of composition and colour. And simultaneously with these two phases of the Renaissance — the return to pagan literary culture and the development of painting as a fine art — appeared a conception of the end and meaning of life entirely at variance with mediaeval ideas. The humanism of the Renaissance — literally the triumph of human over divine science — soon influenced every section of society. To lovers of learning it meant the acquisition of a whole storehouse of ancient lore ; to lovers of art it meant beauty of form such as the Greeks imitated at the best periods of their history ; to the majority it meant emancipation from hitherto undisputed precepts, the settling down to the enjoyment of the good things of this world, the glorification of God's gifts to man. The Catholic Church in her broad sympathies made friends with the Renaissance of letters, designed her sanc- tuaries according to classical art and classical architecture, and even as far as might be condescended to the new craving for earthly delights, only drawing a prohibitive line where nature threatened to degenerate into naturalism, liberty into licence, love of freedom into hatred of authority. At that line alone the later Renaissance and the Protestant Reforma- tion met and kissed each other. The result was anarchy and schism in Germany, schism and royal despotism in England, frank paganism in Italy, while France became a prey on the one hand to the licentious literature brought into vogue by Rabelais, and on the other to the narrow- minded fanaticism of Calvin and his followers. Some portion of the material for the present volume has already appeared as articles in The Month and the Dublin Review. By the permission of their respective editors I am allowed to weave it into this narrative. J. M. S. October 1903. CONTENTS CHAPTER I PAGE Introduction ...... i CHAPTER II Europe at the close of the Middle Ages . . 26 The Exile of the Popes at Avignon — The Schism of the Papacy — John Wyclif — John Hus — The Councils of Pisa and Constance. — 1 303-1419. CHAPTER III The Catholic Reformers of Germany and Holland IN THE Fifteenth Century ... 68 Cardinal Nicholas Cusa — Gerhard Groot — Johannes Busch — St. John Capistran — Johannes Geiler. CHAPTER IV The Earlier Renaissance . . . .111 Humanism in Italy — Petrarch — Boccaccio — Nicholas V. — Calixtus III. — Pius II. — Savonarola. — 1 340-1498. CHAPTER V Erasmus of Rotterdam. — 1467-1535 . . . 15S vii viii Reformation and Renaissance CHAPTER VI PAGE The Rise of Protestantism in Germany — Luther AND THE German Humanists. — 1 503-1 526 . 191 CHAPTER VII The End of Religious Authority in England. — 1509-1540 ...... 237 CHAPTER VIII The Renaissance of Letters and the Protestant Reformation in France and Switzerland — Rabelais — Calvin. — 1494-1553 . . . 295 CHAPTER IX Calvin's Influence on the English Reformation — The Protector Somerset — Edward VI. — Cranmer — ^JoHN Knox. — 1547-1554 . . 337 CHAPTER X Queen Elizabeth and her Catholic Subjects . 362 CHAPTER XI Queen Elizabeth and the Revolution . . 392 Her Intrigues with the Huguenots — The Preparation for St. Bartholomew. — 15 58-1 572. Contents ^^ CHAPTER XII PACE The Catholic Revival. • • • • ^^39 APPENDICES Appendix A . • • • • " ^^^ Appendix B . . • • • * ^^' INDEX "^59 Page 306, line 5, for C/aiaic read Louise de Savoie. viii Reformation and Renaissance CHAPTER VI PAGE The Rise of Protestantism in Germany — Luther AND the German Humanists. — 1503-1526 . 191 CHAPTER VII The End of Religious Authority in England. — 1509-1540 ...... 237 CHAPTER IX Calvin's Influence on the English Reformation — The Protector Somerset — Edward VI. — Cranmer — ^John Knox. — 1 547-1 554 . . 337 CHAPTER X •Queen Elizabeth and her Catholic Subjects . 362 CHAPTER XI Queen Elizabeth and the Revolution . . 392 Her Intrigues with the Huguenots — The Preparation for St. Bartholomew. — 1 558-1 572. Contents ix CHAPTER XII PAGE The Catholic Revival. .... 439 APPENDICES Appendix A ..... , 453 Appendix B ..... . 457 INDEX . 459 ILLUSTRATIONS 12. 13- 14. IS' 16. Lorenzo de' Medici, called " The Magnificent." From a portrait by Vasari in the Uffizi Gallery, Florence . Fro7itispiece Geoffrey Chaucer, from an illuminated manuscript on vellum. Early fifteenth century. In the Harleian Collection (No. 4866), British Museum. The poet is indicating some lines of Occleve's translation of De Regimine Principum . .52 Petrarch. From a photograph in the Print Room of the British Museum . . . . . . .111 Giovanni Boccaccio. From a portrait by Andrea del Castagno in the National Museum, Florence . . .116 Pope Pius II. From a seventeenth-century engraving . 125 Erasmus of Rotterdam. From an engraved portrait after Holbein ....... 158 Martin Luther. From a portrait by Lucas Cranach . .191 Martin Bucer. From an engraving by Rene Boyvin . .223 Cardinal Wolsey. From a portrait in the National Portrait Gallery. School of Holbein . . . .25 5 Thomas Crom^well, Earl of Essex. From a picture in the National Portrait Gallery. School of Holbein . . 292 Fran9ois Rabelais. From a portrait in the School of Medicine at Montpellier ...... 297 John Calvin. From an engraving published by Allardt . 319 Edward VL From a picture in the National Portrait Gallery 356 Oueen Elizabeth. From a portrait by N. Hilliard in the National Portrait Gallery ..... 362 Catherine de' Medici, in her old age. From an engraving by Thomas de Leu ..... St. Francis Xavier. From an eighteenth-century engraving xi 428 446 CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION It is not possible to draw a hard-and-fast line between the age of absolute fixed principles in religion and philosophy, and the period when experimentalism, the spirit of adventure and of mental unrest, began to change the face of Europe. We sometimes hear people speak of the Middle Ages, and of the great complex movement which, for want of a better word, we term the Renaissance, as if they were isolated epochs, totally unconnected with each • other, dumped down along the stream of time like cities on a map. But as we cannot with accuracy say precisely when the Middle Ages began, neither can we fix an exact date for their close. In the domain of history, perhaps more clearly defined than in any other, is to be traced a distinct system of development, one period merging into, sometimes over- lapping another, until link by link the chain is forged that reaches from the remotest age to the present time. Where there is life there must of necessity be growth, and some sort of evolutionary process. But in the life of nations this process is accomplished, not with the rhythmic motion which we observe in nature, such as the development of spring into summer, summer into autumn, autumn into winter, but more often as the result of the insufficiency of any condition long to content or to control the mind of man, which is for ever evolving fresh problems, ever seeking to pierce the horizon, to widen its limits, and to better its status, so that even in periods of apparent stagnation invisible under- currents are perpetually making for change. This change sometimes manifests itself in a sudden 2 Reformation and Renaissance manner, forced on by storm and stress, driven from its normal course as one born out of season. But there are no really sudden transitions any more than there are com- pletely isolated chapters in the history of the human race. Every phenomenon that flashes meteor - like upon our startled vision will be found to have at least its partial causation in the more or less remote past, and to have gone through a period of preparation in a foregoing age. Even if it seems to disappear again below the surface of the waters, as if its force were exhausted, it will yet be seen to exercise a greater or lesser influence on the future. To make any historical crisis intelligible we must, therefore, have regard to its antecedents, study its context, and follow the waves it has set in motion, until they come in contact with other forces and are influenced by other winds and tides. As no man can live to himself alone, it is clear that no individual nation can exist without reacting on surrounding nations, and none but the parochial-minded will seek the end of any great social upheaval in the land of its birth. The history of modern Europe is the history of a revolution in every phase of human life, but above all in religion, in politics, in art, and in letters, — a revolution that has its roots in the past, while its branches overshadow us in the twentieth century. All along the Middle Ages the most famous names recall some great movement in Church or State, the glorification of knighthood, the strengthening of feudalism, the spread of the Christian idea. Gregory VII. is the embodiment of those ecclesiastical reforms which had become necessary as the Church came into closer contact with the World. Charlemagne is the per- sonification of the attempt to resuscitate the defunct Roman empire and to unite it in a close alliance with the Church, so that for a brief space the Sovereign Pontifi^ and the civil power were as one. King i\.rthur, if he ever really existed, stands for the very spirit and essence of mediasval chivalry, while the Saxon Alfred illustrates the piety, learning, and valour of a whole epoch. Dante might never have become famous but for the strife of Guelph and Ghibelline, and the mental rivalry between the humanist teaching of Virgil and the philosophy of Aristotle, as it is made to serve Christian metaphysics in the Summa of St. Thomas. Introduction 3 The Renaissance, on the other hand, was the opportunity for the free-lance. It ushered in the era of the individual, as distinct from institutions, and thenceforth none but the mediocre escaped notice. Innovators of every description sprang up and claimed a hearing, systems were attacked and defended, but the combatants attracted even more attention than the cause in dispute. Everything was called in question, from the dispensing power of the Pope to the existence of free-will in man, from the doctrine of good works to the value of quiddities^ for- malities^ and relations in scholastic philosophy. Every man was heard in turn if he were but a little cleverer than his fellows. From the fifth to the thirteenth century — ages that have been too sweepingly described as " dark " — one tremendous power meets us on all sides and commands our attention. The period embraces all the countries of the western world, with their different populations, some sunk in the depths of ignorance, others advancing rapidly in the scale of civilisation, but all looking towards the Church as the one recognised established force, the one teacher and guide in things temporal as well as spiritual. Still young, already vigorous, independent, and completely organised, the Church in the fifth century and for long afterwards was the great rampart against the barbarian as well as the living influence that gradually transformed him into a civilised being. The words attributed to St. Remigius at the baptism of Clovis, '■'■Henceforth burn that which thou hast adored, and adore that which thou hast burned,'' hint vaguely at the atrocities perpetrated by the pagan Franks. But the Church was not only face to face with the outer barbarian ; she had behind her the whole heathen civilisation of the Roman empire, and behind that again a long vista of Greek learning, taste, and refinement irresistibly demanding a place in the new order. By her rejuvenating vitality she assimilated what was noblest and most attractive in the literary past of paganism, and vindicated her claim to universality. St. Clement of Alexandria gave it as his experience that for the Greek world philosophy was a schoolmaster to bring it to Christ. Tertullian, lacking the human sympathy of an apostle, would have none of it, and did all he could to widen 4 Reformation and Renaissance the gulf between paganism and Christianity. But the Church, " with the practical statesmanlike prudence which has seldom deserted it," came to terms with pagan culture, and both St. Jerome and St. Augustine, born about the middle of the fifth century, were penetrated with the spirit of the ancient schools. The scholar St. Jerome taught the great pagan classics to the boys of Bethlehem. St. Augustine, though less erudite, had profound admiration for what was best in the thought of the heathen world, and his reverence for Plato was only second to his reverence for the Holy Scriptures.^ The civil magistrature, wholly chaotic, yet brutally strong, was a terror to the nations. The throne was a mere cipher, and all the other elements of modern society were either in their second childhood or their infancy. The people, clamouring for justice, appealed to the Church, who alone kept alive and spread the idea of order, of a law above all human laws, called at different periods reason and right divine. Formed on the monarchical principle, the Church became the nursing-mother of kings, and when these, betraying the cause of the people committed to their charge, turned government into oppression, she at the solicitation of the oppressed stepped in and exercised her deposing power. The system was, no doubt, open to abuse ; but in general, when a pope or a bishop declared that a sovereign ruler had forfeited his claim to obedience, and that his subjects were released from their oath of fealty, this intervention was salutary and legitimate." One of the prerogatives which the Church prized most highly was the transmission to her children of pure doctrines inspired by the Holy Ghost, drawn from Holy Writ, and from that unwritten tradition which was already implicitly contained in the deposit of faith received from the apostles, and from time to time, as occasion required, explicitly de- fined as part and parcel of the objective accumulation of truth to which it was her duty to testify. To attain this object it was often necessary to forego a certain measure of ^ S. Dill, Roma?i Society in the Last Century of the Roman Empire, p. 385 et seq. ^ Guizot, Histoire de la Civilisation en Europe, pp. 56, 57, 126, 152. This was especially the case in the tenth century. Introduction 5 human favour. As a rule, definitions of articles of faith are not popular ; the human mind likes to go unfettered, to indulge in speculation, and to give a certain play to fancy. Thus in course of time religious opinions sprang up, took hold of the imagination and gained a certain vogue. Then a council was called, the opinion in question was debated by the bishops and archbishops of the Church ; experts among the learned were consulted, and the true doctrine was at last brought out and defined by the Pope, to be for ever after believed under pain of grievous sin. The Church was then logically committed to its defence, and it was her province to see that no erroneous conception of it was infused into the minds of her children. Those convicted of tampering with consciences, who were found guilty of spreading doctrine opposed to that of the Church, to the eternal detriment of souls, were made amenable to her laws, and the punishment for thus pro- mulgating heresy was death. But as it was forbidden to ecclesiastics to pass sentence of death, the secular arm was invoked, and the impenitent heretic was handed over to the civil power. ^ The whole subject of punishment for heresy is repugnant to modern views ; and the difficulty we have, in these days, in associating it with any idea of justice, even as regards mediasval methods, lies in the difference between our modern conception of truth and the conception of truth which was then universally acknowledged. In the fierce battles waged for liberty of private judgment in the sixteenth century something was lost. That something was the belief in objective truth irrespective of subjective bias. If truth has no independent existence, but is simply what it appears to each individual mind, one set of doctrines is as worthy of credence as another that may be diametrically opposed to them ; and if there is no divinely appointed judge of what constitutes revealed truth, it is clear that any one is free to preach and teach whatever may seem good to him. What is merely a matter of individual opinion can by no interpretation be made binding on any conscience. ^ In passing sentence of death judges put on the black cap. This is a remnant of Catholic times. It was done to cover the clerical tonsure in cases where the spiritual and secular tribunal being merged into one, exceptions to the rule had to be made. 6 Reformation and Renaissance But the Church has always considered herself the guardian of a divinely bestowed Revelation which it behoves her to defend at all costs. In the Middle Ages heretics were " more guilty than those who coin false money, for it is more grave to corrupt the faith, which is the life of the soul, than to falsify coins by which that of the body is supported, and thus they are justly put to death like other malefactors." ^ Church and State were of one mind concerning the treat- ment of heresiarchs, and played into each other's hands, the civil power passing laws for their punishment, as under Henry IV. of England for the suppression of Lollardy. But as the State became less barbaric, better organised, and self-conscious, it began to assume an aggressive position, invaded ecclesiastical ground, aimed at controlling papal conclaves, and on the appointment of bishops and abbots sought to prevent their applying to the Pope for confirma- tion. The Church, too, as time went on, suffered from the dual nature of her composition. Although divinely founded, and secured by Christ's own words from every error of doc- trine, built upon a Rock against which the waves of chance and change might beat in vain, her treasure was yet held in fragile earthen vessels, and her teaching conveyed through men, not angels. In the very nature of things prosperity must breed corruption. But so long as the watchman on the high tower was duly vigilant all was still well. Gregory VII., determined to abolish simony and immorality among the clergy, and the imperial pretensions which held the Papacy in bondage, assembled a Council in 1074, wherein it was decreed, among other things, that no layman might confer ecclesiastical benefices, or any cleric receive such from the temporal sovereign. Thus arose the great quarrel of the Middle Ages about investiture — a quarrel which disturbed every country of Europe, and caused a struggle to the death between Church and State. Some of its results were the assassination of the Archbishop of Canterbury, the penitential journey of the Emperor Henry V, to Canossa, and his subsequent agree- ment to forego the investiture of the crozier and the ring. Henry II., for his share in the murder of Becket, was con- ^ Summa Theologica, S. Thomas, pars. 2a, 2a, 2as, O. I, Art. 3. Introduction 7 demned to do penance at the martyr's tomb, and to receive there a public scourging for his sin. The times were rough times, but the Church went through a complete winnowing from the abuses that had crept in ; ecclesiastical discipline was enforced, and the Papacy enjoyed, from the year 1128 to the beginning of the fourteenth century, a kind of universal monarchy altogether free from imperial thraldom. The feudal system, the form in which society developed from the tenth to the thirteenth century, was the depositary of those germs which gave the first impetus to literature. Feudalism exercised a beneficial influence in Germany under the Hohenstaufen emperors, and in France made a significant compromise with Louis IX. While it was the protector of the monarchical principle, it limited the king's power within constitutional limits, as exemplified by the successful efforts of the barons to wring law and liberty from the despot John. But the most striking features in the life and movement of the early Middle Ages were the Crusades, the continuation of the great struggle between the Church and Paganism. The Turk is the hereditary enemy of Christendom ; he looms large throughout the Middle Ages, and haunts the sixteenth century from start to finish. In 1060 he was in undisturbed possession of Jerusalem, having conquered the Eastern Christians, who had fallen into heresy and schism, and extorted a heavy tax from pilgrims, whose devotion prompted them to visit the Holy Sepulchre. Peter the Hermit, touched by their sufferings at the hands of the in- fidel, worked zealously for their deliverance. Pope Urban II., lending a willing ear to his suggestion, gave him leave to collect an army of the faithful to go out and wrest the tomb of Christ from the Musulman. The sequel is well known. Moved by the burning eloquence of the Hermit, a great multitude took the Cross to the cry of Dieu le veult, and streamed, without preparation, guides, or leaders, across Germany and Austria to Constantinople, ultimatelv dis- persing on the plains of Asia Minor, dying by thousands, without reaching the desired goal. Another and a better - marshalled army set out under Godefroi de Bouillon, which, after long and bloody battles and sieges, reduced to half its strength, finally took posses- sion of Jerusalem. In spite of the ignorance, destitution, and 8 Reformation and Renaissance imprudence of the ill-regulated hordes which swarmed into the East at this time, — in spite of their inevitable defeats and failures, — there was, underlying all this unpreparedness and inefficiency, a generous enthusiasm of which a more advanced civilisation showed itself incapable. The first Crusaders, lacking almost everything that we should call organisation, utterly devoid of forethought, as well as of that charity which begins and generally ends at home, were full of the most lively faith. Christ was to them a reality. He offered Himself daily for them on the altars. His words they accepted literally and in all simplicity : " Whoso loveth father and mother more than Me is not worthy of Me." Had He not suffered and died for each one of them ? Was not the place where His sacred body had rested for a short space the holiest on earth ? Was it not a reproach to all Christendom that it should remain in the hands of His enemies ? Without counting the cost, with the impulsive love of devoted children, they would remove that reproach, even if they died in the effort. Afterwards, the great Crusades of the twelfth century, led by kings, and undertaken to expiate crimes or in fulfilment of solemn vows, met alternately with crushing defeat and brilliant success. Conducted more systematically, they were not perhaps in the main prompted by less generous motives. Canonised saints took part in them, and deeds of the utmost heroism largely extenuate the growing worldliness of the movement. But by the end of the thirteenth century all was changed. The motives that had affected the nations two hundred years before affected them no longer. Familiarity with the East had modified men's views. The Turk was despised less and feared more. In the matter of civilisation he was greatly in advance of the European, and the religious feeling that had precipitated a whole continent against the infidel was already undergoing a reaction. Faith had not yet grown cold, but it had lost its young enthusiasm ; and with the death of St. Louis in 1270, chivalrous ideals were forced out of the field by practical politics. From the beginning of the Christian era art had been one of the principal means of teaching Christian doctrine. In figure, in symbol, in mystic signs, the rude pictures on the walls of the Catacombs preached the Incarnation, the Introduction 9 Passion, the Resurrection, the Founding of the Church, the Pastoral Office, the Seven Sacraments. And for centuries after the Church had risen from the Catacombs she made use of art, as she afterwards made use of printing, to spread the knowledge of the truth in the world. All the early Italian painters had special subjects of study and devotion. It Cimabue gloried in his Madonnas, Giotto was flimous for his Crucifixions, for his scenes from the life of Christ, and his frescoes illustrating the history of St. Francis. The Last Judgment of Orcagna, more correctly described as the Resur- rection of the Dead, is derived from Dante's Divina Commedia^ although the painter was content to draw his inspiration from the poet without adhering slavishly to the details.^ His object was to show the twofold aspect of the Resur- rection. The just rise to their reward, the reprobate to their condemnation. The Supreme Judge dispenses mercy as well as justice. Monks and nuns, the painter seems to say, are not to think themselves safe because of the sanctity of their state. More is expected of them than from seculars exposed to the dangers of the world, and they will be more strictly judged. With a certain grim humour he depicts religious as being pitchforked into hell by demons with bats' wings, as well as taken up to heaven by angels shaped like birds. The Church being strong in the Middle Ages she could afford a joke at her own expense, criticise her children, and correct them by showing their faults in a ridiculous light ; there were no weak brethren to be scandalised. There was a medieval saying : " Of Adam we hope, of Solomon we doubt, of Tertullian we despair," and, accord- ingly, in Orcagna's fresco of the Resurrection, Solomon, having just risen from his tomb, looks this way and that, uncertain where to go. The whole picture is a mediasval sermon addressed to simple people full of faith, who, accustomed to plain speak- ing, will know how to appreciate the grotesque touches. Of pathos there is not much, and in this also it follows Dante. All is thoroughly business-like and logical — the good shall rise to glory everlasting, the bad to eternal death in hell. An admirable example of the way in which Catholic doctrine was taught through Catholic art is furnished by Fra ^ Lucifer crushing a sinner in each of his three jaws is the ovXy literal reproduction from the Infer 7iO. lo Reformation and Renaissance Angelico's frescoes in St. Mark's Convent at Florence. Take, for instance, his Annunciation. The blessed Virgin, so teaches the Bible, is " full of grace," and " blessed among women." She is to be the Mother of the Word made Flesh, and Fra Angelico's angel, recognising her dignity, kneels reverently as he salutes her. Expression is given to his words, " Hail, full of grace," by his mien and posture, while she seems hardly to see him, so completely is she rapt in the import of the divine message.^ Now, if we turn to the pictures of the Renaissance period, we shall see that art has gradually ceased to be an exponent of doctrine, and that it has become its own end and raison d'etre. The sentiment, attributed by Vasari to Buffalmacco, who is reported to have said, " We painters occupy ourselves in tracing saints on the walls and on the altars, in order that by this means men, to the great despite of the demons, may be more drawn to virtue and piety," is no longer evident. Art has ceased to teach anything in particular ; it has perfected its technique and its schemes of colour and composition, and it exists simply to give pleasure. In the Annunciations the angel now generally comes in a somewhat condescending manner, with voluminous drapery blown about by the wind. If our Lady kneels the angel stands or hovers in the air. Duvet's celebrated Annunciation., as described by Mrs. Mark Pattison, exhales the very spirit of the Renaissance. She says of it : " The Virgin kneels with an air of state, and receives the heaven-sent messenger with proud humility. Her hands are delicately treated ; the pose of the figure is slightly self-conscious." ^ The change is still more striking if we compare Michel- angelo's Last Judgment in the Sistine Chapel in the Vatican with Andrea Orcagna's fresco at Pisa. Michelangelo has no intention of showing forth anything but form and colour. He dwells on the dark side of his subject because he wishes simply to represent the effect of awful gloom, of Herculean 1 The same subject is treated in exactly the same spirit by Fra Filippo Lippi in his beautiful picture in the National Gallery. In all other angelical salutations the messenger comes with a command. To St. Joseph he says "Arise," to St. Zachary " Fear not," to St. Peter " Arise quickly," but to Mary, "Hail, full of grace." ^ The Renaissance of Art in France, vol. ii. p. 99. Introduction 1 1 forms, and of overwhelming strength, to suit his own parti- cular talent and genius. His Day of Judgment is a Dies ir^e without mercy, a tour de force^ a study of limbs, and of what can be done to describe wrath, punishment, and despair in painting. Of any doctrine concerning the Last Judgment but a one-sided, and, therefore, false idea, could be gained by this stupendous picture. One may say of it that Satan is its hero, just as he is in Milton's Paradise Lost. Christ's attitude is rather that of an athlete than a judge, but His expression says plainly, " Depart, ye cursed," and nothing else. Raphael belongs partly to the Renaissance, partly to the Middle Ages. In his later Roman days he felt the influence of Michelangelo in a remarkable degree, and learned from him much of the technique which distinguishes his later from his earlier work. His genius could at times shake itself free, and escape from the tendencies round him ; but at last he succumbed to the irresistible power of Michelangelo, as seen in the Transfiguration and the Madonna delle Sedia^ which, for flagrant naturalism and rich brilliancy of colour, is as frankly pagan as anything that the Renaissance produced. Although born in 1475, Michelangelo belongs entirely to the sixteenth century. It has been aptly said that the smell of the fire that consumed the old traditions was on him. He was all but the creation of the Medici, who delighted to honour him, and whom he in turn served well. Full of the spirit of the new age, he was, in his artistic conscience, more than half a pagan. His Moses is none other than a colossal Jupiter or Pan ; his David might stand for an Achilles. The Florentines nicknamed this last production "the Giant." If we compare it with the beautiful Gothic statue of St. George by Donatello we reahse how far a cry it is from the great sculptor of the Middle Ages to the great sculptor of the Renaissance. " I have seen Michelangelo," exclaimed the French sculptor Falconet, when Cardinal Richelieu brought back two of the Italian master's statues to France — " he is terrific." We have said that the Middle Ages were essentially the period of great institutions, of methods, and systems that made the times what they were, and laid the foundation for the different order of things that succeeded them. Some of these we have already briefly considered ; three still remain to be glanced at : the Monarchy as it was being formed, the 12 Reformation and Renaissance Monastic Orders in their prime, and the Friars in their first fervour. The first ideas of monarchy reach us through barbaric sources. Nomad tribes elected their chiefs, who in the beginning never ruled by hereditary right. In course of time certain families, richer, nobler, and more distinguished than other families, became the recognised centres from which chieftains were elected. Thus a degree of heredity was constituted. The religious element crept in. Among certain tribes, and notably among the Goths, the conviction grew that their kings descended from the gods. Roman imperialism differed from the barbaric idea in toto. The Roman emperor was the personification of the State, the heir and majesty of the Roman people. He was the representative of the Senate, of the Comitiate, of the entire Republic. Christianity laboured for three centuries to introduce the religious element into the empire, and under Constantine it succeeded partially. The emperor was then a different being ; his dignity had no earthly origin, and he was no longer the representative of the people but God's ambassador. His deputy and lieutenant. Power was given to him, not from below, as in the case of the old Roman empire, but from on high. The principle was a wholesome one ; it involved serious responsibilities, but it worked well, and some other nations adopted it. In the seventh century it became the distinctive feature of monarchy in Spain, as the canons of the Council of Toledo testify. In England the Saxon Heptarchy was conducted on barbaric lines, the different kingdoms being little more than separate tribes, each governed by its own chieftain, though the law of heredity was observed. In France, too, under the Merovingian kings, the same notion of monarchy prevailed with the same law of heredity ; but in Italy in very early times the imperial superseded the primitive idea.^ Soon, however, of all these principles none but the hereditary principle survived in Europe. Society, still in a chaotic state, a prey to perpetual violence, received no support from the king, who was but a local sovereign, with little more than the name. The feudal system, which should have strengthened the ^ Guizot, Histoire de la Civilisation en Europe^ pp. 259-265, 267. Introduction 1 3 royal power, had become in itself a danger to the monarchy. Sixty thousand men, who might at any moment be called by the feudal barons into the field in the service of the king, might by the same means be as easily used against him, and in England the struggle between the barons and the Crown continued to retard the advance of civilisation for centuries. Many noble maidens fled to sanctuary, or took the veil of religion merely to escape from the insults of the rude soldiery who infested the country. A system that deals only with the aggregate ofl-'ers little guarantee to the individual, and in the midst of the social desolation, where there was none to establish order or justice, nothing but the name of king remained. But when he intervened, it was as protector of the weak. Little by little the authority that attached to his name became more real, until at last he was in fact the dispenser of justice, and no longer merely the leader of the hosts in battle. In the twelfth century the king began to play a part in society at large, to exercise a general influence, to be considered the chief magistrate, the personification of law and order ; ^ but it is not until the advent of the Tudors that anything like despotism can be laid to the charge of the monarch. Side by side with the barbarism that knew nothing but fighting, carousing, and spoliation, existed the perfectly organised system of religious life, the strictly observed rules, the careful observance of discipline, the austerity and learning of the cloister. Monasticism had existed in Britain almost from the time of Britain's first conversion to Christianity, but it was in the beginning of the sixth century that it began to expand, to receive fresh vigour, and to assume the form in which we see it throughout the Middle Agres. The lives of these early monks, before the foundation of the Benedictine Order, were divided between prayer, the study of Holy Writ, and agriculture. They rose at day- break, recited the divine ofiice, heard or said Mass, and went out into the fields. They had no cattle, but did them- selves the work of oxen. Dinner consisted of bread with roots and herbs, seasoned with salt. They drank milk mixed with water. When the day's ploughing, reaping, or threshing was done they spent the hours till evening in ^ Guizot, Histoire de Li Chilisatiofi efi Europe, pp. 269, 270. 14 Reformation and Renaissance studying and in transcribing the Scriptures. At the sound of the bell, each one laid aside his occupation, leaving an / undotted or a / uncrossed, and proceeded to the church for the evening devotions. After supper, which was still more frugal than the mid-day meal, silence reigned in the monastery, and each retired to his cell, and his hard, narrow bed. Such was the rule observed in the twelve monasteries founded by St. David, the extirpator of the Pelagian heresy. St. Kentigern, his disciple and successor, added many austerities. Among the Irish founders of religious orders were the famous St. Columba, St. Kieran, and St. Brendan — Columba crossing the Irish Sea in 563 in a rough skin-covered boat, with twelve companions, to bring the faith to the Picts of Caledonia. They landed on the low, barren island of lona, off the west coast of Scotland, and raised the church and monastery which became as the garden of the Lord for holiness and beauty. From Columba and lona to St. Cuthbert, Lindisfarne and the famous Durham Gospels is an easy transition. The kingdom of Northumbria was first evangelised by St. Paulinus, one of the second company of missionaries sent by Pope Gregory to help St. Augustine in his apostolical labours. But the work of Paulinus was in a great measure miserably undone in the Danish wars, and the people, for the most part, had sunk back into paganism, when King Oswald sent for monks from lona to rekindle the torch of faith. Warmly he welcomed St. Aidan, who had already been consecrated bishop at lona, and bade him establish his see on the rocky island of Lindisfarne. According to the Venerable Bede, all who bore company with Aidan, whether monks or laymen, were employed either in poring over the Scriptures or in singing psalms. Wherever he went, and whatever else might be his business, the Bishop of Lindisfarne did the same. If it happened that he was invited to dine with the king he took with him one or two clerks, and having made a small repast, he made haste to be gone with them, either to read or write. The Benedictine rule having been introduced by St. Wilfrid into the Abbey of Ripon, which he founded, the Order soon spread throughout England. Each of the Benedictine houses had schools within their precincts, and some of the larger ones had other schools depending Introduction 1 5 on them in the adjacent towns. These schools were, until the reign of Edward III., frequented mainly by students of the middle and lower classes ; the Anglo-Norman nobility preferring to send their sons to French schools, for fear of their Norman speech being barbarised by any admixture of the English accent.^ At Durham the monks had a poor -school, in which children were taught to read, and were at the same time fed at the charge of the monastery. At Bury, School Street still marks the spot where St. Edmund's poor scholars woke the echoes with their shouts after lesson-time. John of Peckham, afterwards Archbishop of Canterbury, received his education as a poor scholar at the school kept by the Benedictines at Lewes, as did also Alexander of Hales, the " irrefragable doctor." Stanford, in which place was another Benedictine house, threatened at one time to draw away the north country students from Oxford. The social and ecclesiastical disorders of the eighth and ninth centuries, the insecurity of life and property resulting from the frequent invasions of the Danes, were an effectual check on the development of monasticism in England. According to Asser it was held in such contempt in Alfred's reign that no freeman was to be found in all Wessex who would embrace it. Drunkenness and every kind of de- bauchery disgraced the lives of the English, and the religious houses where they existed were peopled with foreign monks. Notwithstanding all that Alfred did to restore monasticism, its complete revival was not in his day.^ The bright light of piety and learning that shone forth from Lindisfarne, Malmesbury, Yarrow, and Croyland was extinct, although Croyland was yet one day to rise gloriously from its ashes. Glastonbury of all the great religious houses alone survived. Unhappily, when St. Dunstan, St. Odo, St. Oswald, and St. Ethelwold and a number of other scholars, had restored sacred studies, and had breathed new life into the monastic institute, the fatal dismemberment of the Carlovingian empire had already begun. This dismemberment was a European calamity. The immense territorial possessions of Charlemagne divided among his grandsons, who were all ^ Drane, Christian Schools and Scholars, vol. ii. p. 129. - Ibid^ vol. i. p. 273. 1 6 Reformation and Renaissance weaklings unable to combine and thus defy the advance of the barbaric hordes from the East, brought about the ruin of France itself, and incidentally also that of Italy and England. The Saracens, infesting the coasts of the Mediterranean, made themselves not only masters of the southern provinces of France and the greater part of Spain, but carried their ravages to the gates of Rome, while the pirate Northmen swept like a destroying flood over the fertile country of the Seine and the Loire. Wherever they passed havoc accom- panied them, social and religious discipline was swept away, and the land was again plunged into the intellectual darkness of an age long since gone by. These Northmen were but another branch of the same great family of barbarians that had made descent after descent upon the English coasts, had overrun Northumbria, and had laid waste the south with fire, sword, and rapine. When in the tenth century they, in a measure, ceased from troubling, the wilderness they had left blossomed forth, and the monastic spirit flourished as it had scarcely done before. If Jumieges, St. Wandrille, Fecamp, and Bernai came to life again, if the Abbey of Bee was full of the richest promise, their English counterparts reflected no less credit on their native land. Fuller says, " The English monks were bookish them- selves, and much inclined to hoard up monuments of learn- mg. It was the boast of the Abbey of Ramsay that none but scholars were counted among its abbots. It possessed 70 breviaries, 100 psalters, 4 hymnals, 32 graduals, and 39 processionals. In spite of the Danish ravages a great many books had escaped the flames, and in course of time there was scarcely a religious house that had not a good library. The books which St. Augustine brought with him from Rome, together with those of Theodore, second Arch- bishop of Canterbury, formed the nucleus of the monastic library of Christ Church, Canterbury. At the dissolution of the monasteries this collection numbered 2000 volumes, and between them the two great religious houses at Canter- bury possessed, when the catalogues were drawn up, over 18,000 books. Peterborough had no fewer than 3560 manuscripts in the fourteenth century, and early in the Introduction 17 fifteenth Durham had nearly three times that number. In 1 240 the library of Glastonbury contained 400 volumes, and among them were the chief Latin classics. The Augus- tinians at York had between 6000 and 7000 volumes at the time of the dissolution. The monks of Hyde Abbey were all learned ; their calligraphy was very beautiful, their illuminations the best of their kind, and they bound their books with great care. The Abbey of St. Albans was en- riched with books by St. Paulinus ; Dover priory, a small house, possessed nearly 500, and the Franciscans at Hereford, though their house was in no way remarkable for its wealth or size, owned a very large number of good books. The great library at Wells had twenty-five windows on each side — a fact which gives us some notion of the number of volumes that filled so large a space. ^ In the English preface to Dugdale's Monasticon ^ mention is made of " an incredible number of books " written by the monks. Eight hundred monasteries were suppressed by Henry VIII., and in consequence eight hundred libraries dispersed. The question naturally arises. What became of the books ^ Bishop Tanner mentions the loss of a great number, " to the unspeakable detriment of the learned world." John Bale, in his Laborious Journey and Search of John Leylande for England's Antiquities, 1549, says that many of these treasures were used "to scour their candlesticks, and some to rub their boots. Some they sold to the grocers and soap- sellers, and some they sent over sea to the book-binders, not in small number, but at times whole ships full, to the wondering of the foreign nations. I know a merchant man, that shall at this time be nameless, that bought the contents of two noble libraries for xl. shillings price, a shame it is to be spoken. This stuff hath he occupied in the stead of waste paper by the space of more than ten years, and yet he hath store enough for many years to come." A few months sufficed to scatter, in many instances utterly to destroy, the patient work of centuries ; and con- sidering the wantonness of the times it is marvellous that so large a number of these monkish books should still be in existence. By far the greater part of the salvage from the ^ Tanner, Notitia Monastica, Preface, p. xl. ed. 1787. 2 P. xii. ed. 1718. 1 8 Reformation and Renaissance general wreck consisted of Bibles, Psalters, Pentateuchs, Missals, as any one who chooses to consult the catalogues of the Cottonian, Harleian, Royal, and other collections in the British Museum and the Bodleian Libraries may see for him- self. But let us turn once more from the enlightened sixteenth century to the Dark Ages, and glance at some of the works of monasticism. The monastery ot St. Gall in Switzerland was one of the wonders of the world in the ninth century, " It lay in the midst of the savage Helvetian wilderness, an oasis of piety and civilisation. Looking down from the craggy mountains, the passes of which open upon the southern extremity of the Lake of Constance, the traveller would have stood amazed at the sudden apparition of that vast range of stately buildings which almost filled up the valley at his feet. Churches and cloisters, the offices of a great abbey, buildings set apart for students and guests, workshops of every description, the forge, the bakehouse, and the mill, or rather mills, for there were ten of them, all in such active operation that they every year required ten new millstones ; and then the houses occupied by the vast number of artisans and workmen attached to the monastery ; gardens too, and vine- yards creeping up the mountain slopes ; and beyond them fields of waving corn, and sheep speckling the green meadows ; and far away, boats busily plying along the lake, and carrying goods and passengers — what a world it was of life and activity ; yet how unlike the activity of a town ! It was in fact not a town but a house — a family presided over by a father, whose members were all knit together in the bonds of common fraternity. I know not whether the spiritual or the social side of such a religious colony were most fitted to rivet the attention. Descend into the valley, and visit all these nurseries of useful toil, see the crowds of rude peasants transformed into intelligent artisans, and you will carry away the impression that the monks of St. Gall had found out the secret of creating a world of happy Christian factories. Enter their church, and listen to the exquisite modulations of those chants and sequences peculiar to the abbey, which boasted of possessing the most scientific school of music in all Europe. Visit the scriptorium, their library, and their school, or the workshop where the monk Tutilo is putting the finishing touch to his wonderful copper Introduction 19 images, and his fine altar frontals of, gold and jewels, and you will think yourself in some intellectual and artistic academy. But look into the choir and behold the hundred monks who form the community at their midnight office, and you will forget everything save the saintly aspect of those servants of God, who shed abroad over the desert around them the good odour of Christ, and are the apostles of the provinces which own their gentle sway. You may quit the circuit of the abbey, and plunge once more into the mountain region which rises beyond, but you will have to wander far before you find yourself beyond the reach of its softening, humanising influence. Here are distant cells, and hermitages with their chapels, where the shepherds come for early mass ; or it may be there meets you, winding over the mountain paths of which they sing so sweetly, going up and down among the hills into the thick forests and the rocky hollows, a procession of the monks carrying their relics, and followed by a peasant crowd. In the schools you may have been listening to lectures in the learned, and even in the Eastern tongues ; but in the churches, and here among the mountains, you will hear these fine classical scholars preach- ing plain truths in barbarous idioms to a rude race who, before the monks came among them, sacrificed to the Evil One and worshipped stocks and stones." ^ Not far from St. Gall, above the Lake of Zurich, to the south, lies Einsiedeln, once a dark, impenetrable forest, now, thanks to the monks, a smiling valley, and on the island of Reichenau in the Lake of Constance was the mother-house of all the Swiss Benedictine monasteries. From Reichenau went out the monk Walafrid, to study at Fulda, where the monastic library was rich in manuscripts of the Bible, in the writings of the Fathers, and in Commentaries on them. The Abbey of Tegernsee in Bavaria was famous for its Hebrew scholars, and for its fine collection of classic authors. Of the 238 Benedictine houses spread throughout France in the eleventh century none was more famous than the Abbey of Cluny. It was in fact the head of them all, and the most important monastery in the whole world. Over it ruled the Abbot Hugh, from 1089 to 1 109, having about 10,000 monks in his obedience. When Peter the Venerable was elected abbot in 11 22 there ^ Drane, Christian Sckools and Scholars^ vol. i. p. 234. 20 Reformation and Renaissance were no fewer than 300 at Cluny itself.^ Cluny had so great a reputation for the faithful observance of the rule, that the abbots of other houses sought to know its customs in the minutest detail, so that they might amend their own on the same pattern. To Hirschau in the Black Forest, a Benedictine monastery of which the learned William was abbot, came one day Ulric, a senior monk of Cluny, sent into Germany on business for his monastery. He was obliged to remain for some time at Hirschau, and Abbot William begged him, as he had experience in the discipline of Cluny, to write out some of the customs of his monastery for their benefit, Ulric promised to do so, and afterwards sent the book concerning them. But, as something was still wanting to the complete understanding of these customs, the Abbot William sent two monks to Cluny, then two more, to investigate the most obscure things of the order.^ The books sent by Ulric con- tained a very minute account, among other things, of the religious exercises of the monks in choir throughout the year, showing what parts of the Scriptures were read at the different seasons, the whole Bible being gone through once every year. Besides this, some books of Scripture were read in the refectory during meals, others only in church, and each monk was expected to know the Psalter by heart. It does not appear wherein this order of reading Scripture differed from that of other monasteries, for that they studied all of them on much the same lines is clear from a very slight acquaint- ance with the religious houses of the Middle Ages. The monastic orders were in a very good condition in the eleventh century ; the rules were well kept, learning and piety flourished, and the singing of the Divine office was faithfully observed. Cluny was a model in these respects. Nevertheless, some of the monks sighed for greater austerities than were practised there, and found its paths of sanctity too pleasant. They desired that the Benedictine rule might be more strictly interpreted than according to the Cluniac reform ; and St. Bernard went out from Cluny and founded the Cistercian Order, in which greater asceticism obtained, with no less learning. The Carthusian Order, on the other hand, founded by ^ S. R. Maitland, Dark Ages, pp. 350, 405. 2 Ibid. p. 154. Introduction 2 1 St. Bruno, in the same century, was not so much the home of learning as a refuge for scholars who desired to escape from the pitfalls of metaphysics, and to renounce even the measure of worldliness that might lie hidden in the cultiva- tion of the intellect. In the rocky desert of La Trappe there was indeed little to flatter the intellect, little to flatter the senses ; amid penance and mortification, labouring for his daily bread by the sweat of his brow, vowed to perpetual silence, the Carthusian won his way heavenward. But great as had been the work done by the monastic orders in the cause of civilisation, learning, and the spread ot Christianity, these effects of their existence had after all been merely accidental, as far as the outside world was concerned. The monk was in fact a refugee from the world ; his object in flying from its dangers and its pleasures was primarily the salvation of his own soul. And the monastic reforms of the eleventh century all tended to accentuate this principle. If their charity had prompted the Benedictines to found poor- schools, if they had led students into the higher paths of scholastic wisdom and knowledge, all honour to them for doing so, for such things formed no part of their rule. If they had been as a city set upon a hill, so much the better for those in the plains, but the cities of the plain had not been the special object of their foundation. By degrees, the learning that had once been exclusively theirs had spread into the world. Through them, at least indirectly, the universities now began to be the great schools of learning, and if the monks frequented them, they did so as students, not as professors. Roman law was revived at Bologna, the study of Aristotle was introduced into Oxford. Paris became the cradle of scholastic philosophy ; Laon and Chartres began to be famous. The University of Paris was intent on the con- troversy waged between William of Champeaux and Abelard. The students of logic, attracted by the former, contributed to the solidity of its academical reputation, — Abelard, in spite of his heterodoxy, being also a powerful magnet, on account of his brilliant gifts. Chartres was happy in its president. Bishop Fulbert, whose learning was less that of a schoolman than of a divine. " He loved of an evening to take his disciples apart in the little 2 2 Reformation and Renaissance garden beside the chapel, and discourse to them of the prime duty of life to prepare for the eternal fatherland hereafter. Without this presiding thought there was infinite danger in the study of letters ; they were only worth cultivating in so far as they ministered to man's knowledge of divine things." ^ Of Ivo, the great lawyer and subsequent Bishop of Chartres, we are told that he was "a religious man, and of great learning, who in his youth had heard master Lanfranc, prior of Bee, treat of secular and divine letters in that famous school which he had at Bee." " Secular letters " meant grammar, reading, interpreting and commenting on the standard works of antiquity. Difficult passages were discussed and analysed ; the pupil's attention was drawn to striking metaphors or to the delicacy of artistic expression. Grammarians preferred the ancient poets to the prose writers. - As apostles and evangelisers the place of the monks was more amply filled by the new orders of friars. Black Friars Preachers, and Grey Friars Mendicants poured by hundreds into the towns. Wherever poverty, misery, and sickness were seen, there were the Franciscans by choice. Their first convent in London was in Stinking Lane. " Go, Francis, and restore my house, which is falling into decay." The young man had heard the divine voice as he prayed in the church of St. Damian at Assisi, and he went and sold all and followed the voice. And soon his own followers were as the sands of the sea in numbers. Early in the thirteenth century they were introduced into England, and Robert Grosseteste, who was Bishop of Lincoln from 1235 to 1253, requested on entering his episcopate that he might have two of the friars constantly with him to encourage him by their example, help him in the service of the poor, and support him by their counsels. Writing to the Bishop of Lichfield he said : " Your discretion knows how useful the presence and intercourse of the Friars Minors are to the people with whom they dwell, since both by the word of preaching and the example of a holy and heavenly conversa- tion, and the devotion of continual prayer, they are indefatig- ^ Robert de Monte, chr. a. 11 17. Quoted by Dr. Poole in Illustra- tions of the History of Mediaeval Thought, p. 114. 2 S. Dill, Roman Society in the Last Century of the Roman Empire, pp. 417-420. Introduction 23 able in promoting peace and in enlightening the country ; and in this part they supply in a great measure the defect of the prelates." ^ To the Pope he wrote of them still more emphatically : " Your Holiness may be assured that in England inestim- able benefits have been produced by the friars ; for they illuminate our whole country with the light of their preaching and learning. Their holy conversation excites vehemently to contempt of the world and to voluntary poverty, to the practice of humility in the highest ranks, to obedience to the prelates and Head of the Church, to patience in tribulation, abstinence in plenty ; in a word, to the practice of all virtues. If your Holiness could see with what devotion and humility the people run to hear the Word of Life from them, for confession and instruction as to daily life, and how much improvement the clergy and the regulars have obtained by imitating them, you would indeed say that they that dwell in the land of the shadow of death, upon them hath the light shined." " The work of the Dominicans or Black Friars lay among the cultured. They were masters of the dialectic methods then in vogue, and they produced trained preachers equally skilled in denunciatory and persuasive oratory. They seemed to have gathered into their intellectual armoury all the genius of the thirteenth century. Had not the " roaring " of the "dumb ox '* of Cologne filled the whole world, according to the prophecy of Albert the Great, the philosophy of St. Thomas Aquinas would still have influenced the works of his contemporaries, such different masterpieces as the Divina Commedia^ and Orcagna's, Cimabue's, and Giotto's paintings being thoroughly imbued with his teaching. Cimabue was, indeed, as a boy, a pupil of the Dominicans at Florence, who cultivated his talent for drawing, and placed him under the Byzantine masters, whom he afterwards surpassed. Near St. Thomas, in point of time, lived his fellow Dominican, Vincent of Beauvais, librarian of the Ste. Chapelle in Paris, whose marvellous accumulation of knowledge was introduced to the world in his Great Mirror^ an epitome of all that had hitherto been discovered concerning natural science, art, and history. Another erudite Dominican was the famous Raymund Martin, the oriental scholar, whose ^ Epis. xxxiv. p. 20. 2 ifji^^ W\\\. p. 180. 24 Reformation and Renaissance labours in establishing Arabic and Hebrew studies in all the Spanish convents of his Order resulted in the conversion of 10,000 Saracens to Christianity.^ Nor was the study of Greek so entirely neglected in the Middle Ages as Hallam and others would have us suppose. It fell to the lot of the Dominicans to sustain controversies with Greek schismatics, and with Jewish and Moorish un- believers, and it was necessary for the friars to be armed with arguments likely to appeal to their adversaries. The Dominican, William de Moerbeka, who became Archbishop of Corinth in 1277, was a friend of St. Thomas, and translated Aristotle into Latin at his request. He also made many translations from Plato, Galen, and Proclus of Tyre. Friar Annibal Annibali, a pupil of Albert the Great, was also learned in Greek and Arabic philosophy. St. Francis, unhke St. Dominic, was no friend of the schools, but he was unable to form his disciples to his own views in regard to scholastic philosophy. The general trend of ideas was against him, and proved too strong for them to resist. Soon after their founder's death they succumbed to the thirst for knowledge that was abroad in the world, and produced the subtlest doctors of the age. One of the com- plaints of the Chancellor of the University of Oxford against the Friars Minor was that no one could procure any books on canon law, arts, or theology, as they were all bought up by these greedy friars, whose pertinacity in forming libraries was incredible. At the same university we find not only a Duns Scotus, but a Roger Bacon, receiving his degree, and writing his Opus Majus^ being also proficient in Greek and Hebrew, and in various oriental languages. Another Oxford Franciscan of the same period was Nicholas de Lyra, also called Harper, who besides being the author of the first commentary of the Scriptures ever printed, converted, by means of his know- ledge of their language and philosophy, 6000 Jews to Christianity. But in time all philosophy was reduced to logic, as the one branch of science deemed worthy to occupy the minds of scholars. Sophistical argumentation took the place of serious reasoning, and scholasticism in its decay showed much the same weakness as in the days of its infancy, before the ^ Drane, vol. ii. p. 91. Introduction 25 great master of the Sentences gave it its definite form, and introduced the method, the precise and logical system which became of so much practical value in the schools. The ages of faith were well-nigh spent, the real dark ages about to begin, when corruption was to invade not only the schools but the sanctuary ; as if once more Christ were asleep in Peter's boat, while the storm raged and the flood threatened to overwhelm it. CHAPTER II EUROPE AT THE CLOSE OF THE MIDDLE AGES The exile of the Popes at Avignon — The Schism of the Papacy — John Wyclif — John Hus — The Councils of Pisa and Constance. 1303-1419 The thirteenth century has been described by Bishop Stubbs as " the golden age of the Church." It is equally true to designate it as the prelude to the most calamitous period the Church has ever known. There was, indeed, much prosperity, a great stir in the world of ecclesiastical learning and art. The building of magnificent churches and their adornment were carried on with vigour, and with taste such as succeeding centuries never surpassed. Gothic architecture, having emancipated itself from purely utilitarian principles, grand as they were, was developing on lines of exquisite beauty. The best work in Westminster Abbey, in Lincoln Cathedral, at Chartres, at Amiens, at Cologne, and in a host of churches scattered throughout the length and breadth of Europe, dates from the thirteenth century. Dante may be said to have about this time created the Italian language, moulding it to serve the purposes of the most orthodox theology. Painting, having escaped from the stiff, unnatural, and therefore unlovely Byzantine school, was depicting nature with a certain degree of realism, yet without renouncing the ideal. Contempt of the world and love of poverty had produced a St. Francis of Assisi, zeal for the dogmas of holy Church a St. Dominic. Scholasticism reached its most perfect expression in St. Thomas Aquinas. The Church was, moreover, triumphant 26 Europe at the Close of the Middle Ages 2 7 over the world ; civilisation was advancing by leaps and bounds. And then there came a cloud over all this prosperity, and satisfaction in what had been accomplished. Then was born that " security," of which it has been truly said that it is " mortal's chiefest enemy." The fervour of many grew cold ; ecclesiastics, forgetful of the truth that the position of the Church in the world must be a militant one, made friends with power and wealth and ease, and as the bad is always more prominent and startling than the good, and as " the evil that men do lives after them," we naturally hear a great deal more of the bad side than of any other, though the zealous were still occupied in building and beautifying churches, and art went on its way in the right direction, and there were still learned men loving books, and the pious were pious still. The growing wealth of the Franciscans was perhaps the first indication of decadence in the religious world. St. Francis had founded his Order of Friars that poverty might abound, but even before his death difficulties as to the manner and degree of its observance had arisen, and have been the cause of all the different reforms, disputes, and divisions that have characterised the history of the Franciscans down to the present day. In direct violation of the principle of poverty they had received magnificent endowments, and the question was raised as to the tenure on which they might possess this property without contravening the terms of their institution.^ Urban VI. declared that they could only enjoy the usufruct of their possessions, the principal belonging to the Holy See. But in 1279 Nicholas III. issued a Bull enforcing absolute poverty as an essential element in the Franciscan rule. This Bull became eventually the law of the Church in the matter, but as it lent itself to various interpretations the dispute was as far as ever from being settled. It allowed the friars " the moderate use of earthly possessions," and opened the door to infinite distinctions between " property " and " use." Clement V. sought to establish peace by an authoritative definition of the rule, but further subtleties arose, and it was not until 1322, when a Chapter of the entire Order was held at Perugia, that the doctrine of evangelical poverty was universally accepted. Even then the Order was split into two sections, comprising ^ Dr. R. L. Poole, Wycliffe and Movemefits for Reform, p. 22. 2 8 Reformation and Renaissance those friars who followed the strict interpretation of the rule as to poverty, and those who inclined to its mitigation. The extremists on both sides fell into error. A certain number made common cause with the Emperor Louis of Bavaria, who had quarrelled with the Pope. John XXII. had accused the Franciscans of heresy on the subject of poverty, and the Dominicans and the University of Paris had sided with him. Their argument was that St. Francis, in eagerly and lovingly obeying our Lord's invitation, " If thou wilt he perfect^ go^ sell what thou hast^ and give to the poor'' was an example for all time of generous renunciation even of things lawful for the better following of Christ. But among his disciples were some who confused what was but a counsel of perfec- tion with a commandment, and taught that riches in themselves were an abomination.^ The original question was now further complicated by political issues, and the Franciscans, irritated, flung back the accusation of heresy against the Pope, who " exalts himself against the evangelical doctrines of perfect poverty, and thus against Christ, the Blessed Virgin, and the company of the apostles who all approved it by their lives." ^ The quarrel was taken up passionately, and pushed to exasperation on both sides. William of Occam, a Franciscan, and Marsilius of Padua, both brilliant schoolmen and daring speculators in political philosophy, in taking their stand against the Papacy, were the undoubted precursors of Wyclif and the later German reformers. Lewis of Bavaria identified himself completely with this movement, achieved a momentary conquest of the city of Rome, succeeded in getting himself crowned there as emperor, and secured not only the deposition of John XXII. by the Roman people, but the election of an anti-pope, in the person of the Franciscan Pietro da Corvaro. Marsilius was appointed papal vicar. But this high-handed scheme was barely realised when the whole fabric collapsed. Lewis was forced to retire to Pisa, where he was joined by Occam and ^ M. Sabatier and others who would claim St. Francis as an apostle of socialism mistake the spirit of the saint ; they should fasten rather on this theory his recalcitrant sons. St. Francis, in spite of his enthusiasm for poverty, always advocated a wise moderation, and discountenanced extravagances. - Pastor, Geschichte der Pdpste, second German edition, vol. i. p. 67. Europe at the Close of the Middle Ages 29 Michael of Cesena. The anti-pope made his submission, the Franciscans, for the most part, were reconciled to the true pope, and the emperor, with Marsilius and Occam alone remained under the ban of the Church till their death. But, as Gregorovius points out,^ Lewis by his rashness let loose the terrible evil of schism upon the Church, and gave a revolutionary turn to the struggle between the Empire and the Papacy. The long and obstinate warfare that ensued resulted not merely in the humiliation of both, but in the creation of a precedent, whereby a few discontented spirits, allying themselves with the lowest demagogues, might bring about the total subversion of order in Church and State. The early history of the Franciscans in England was free from any of these disturbing elements. In all sim- plicity they practised their rule, and won golden opinions from those who prized sanctity and knew the value of the apostolic spirit. " The extraordinarily rapid expansion of the Friars Minor in England," says the Rev. John Morris, " was due, not to an importation of foreigners, but to the multitude of Englishmen who found vocations, . and to English admiration for the extreme personal poverty and unworldliness of the Franciscan rule. The English who had no such vocation could appreciate the spirit of those who had, and kings and burgesses vied with one another in the zeal with which they provided land, houses, and main- tenance for those who cast themselves in all simplicity on the charity of the faithful. The corporations of the towns became trustees, ready to take charge of the alms of the people in behalf of the Friars, who refused to possess pro- perty, or to make any permanent provision for the future." ^ If, in course of time, this spirit of poverty and pen- ance became relaxed, if the learning of the Friars degene- rated into the exaggerations of a system that had worked well in its day, this decadence was but in the nature of all things human. Not only the Bible, but all the works of the great doctors of the thirteenth century, gradually dis- appeared, as it were, under layers of glosses, interpretations, and enlargements ; and English theologians alone contributed 1 History of Rome, vol. vi. pp. 1 53-155. Gregorovius gives as his authority Cod. Vat. 4008. 2 Faithful unto Death, by J. M. Stone, with a Preface by the Rev. J. Morris, Preface, p. vi. 30 Reformation and Renaissance no fewer than i6o commentaries on the Sentences of Peter Lombard. But the recoil from these things contained as great an intellectual evil as the abuse of scholasticism itself, and Brewer, with rare discernment, unveiled the hypocrisy of agitators who would fain be looked upon as reformers, and who, owing all their knowledge to the Friars, turned and rent them despitefully. " The very men," he says, " who in later times were launching the severest sarcasms against the Schoolmen, or ridiculing their subserviency to Aristotle, had been trained to their new freedom and vigour of mind by the men they had learned to despise. The unreservedness with which the Schoolmen ranged through every region of metaphysics and divinity led, in turn, to equal freedom of discussion, equal unreservedness in political discussions. Then, as since, the greatest social innovations ensued. The true sources of our civil wars in the fifteenth century are to be found rather in the teachings of WicklifFe and his followers than the rival claims of Yorkist or Lancastrian ; and Wickliffe is the genuine descendant of the friars, turning their wisdom against themselves, and carrying out the principles he had learnt from them to their legitimate political conclusions." ^ The most serious breach of the peace of Christendom, at the beginning of the fourteenth century, was caused by the aggressive act of Philip the Fair in imposing a tax on the French clergy. The Pope, Boniface VIII., remonstrated, but to no purpose, and his Bull was torn to pieces in the king's council chamber. The Colonna family, enemies of the Pope, having been banished from Rome, took refuge with Philip, who next refused to receive the papal legate, and then imprisoned him in the fortress of Sens. Boniface thereupon threatened to place France under an interdict, and hearing that he was, in fact, excommunicated and deposed, Philip sent emissaries into Italy, who, after heaping insult after insult on the aged Pontiff, left him half-dead in his villa at Anagni. Succumbing to grief and misery, if not to poison administered by Philip's agents, the unfortunate Boniface left the victory to the French king. The reign of Benedict XL was of short duration, and Clement V., a Frenchman, who owed his elevation entirely to Philip's influence, proved but a tool in the king's hands. ^ Monwnenta Franciscana, Preface, p. lix. Europe at the Close of the Middle Ages 3 i He never saw Rome, but fixed his abode in a monastery at Avignon, which city became the seat of the Popes for the next seventy-five years — an exile utterly disastrous to the Church, the cause of more than half the evils of the times, and resulting in the great schism of the West. A conglomeration of circumstances played into the hands of the King of France, and not all his astuteness would have succeeded in capturing the Papacy but for the menacing attitude of the Hohenstaufen emperors, and its results in the strife between Guelph and Ghibelline, which made the existence of the Pope in Italy a perpetual struggle. Rome, meanwhile, became a desert ; cattle grazed in St. Peter's and St. John Lateran's ; and the city of the apostles, with its priceless treasures, was abandoned to the tender mercy of the turbulent Roman factions. Every kind of opprobrious epithet has been expended on the Avignon Popes. Popular historians, not content with the actual dreariness of the picture, have revelled in exaggerations, until not one redeeming point has been left among the seven of them, from Clement V. to Gregory XI. Their solicitude for the conversion of the heathen is passed over in silence, or they receive little credit for the gigantic scale of their missions to the East, carried out at enormous ex- pense, in the midst of the embarrassments with which the Papacy was at that time beset. The financial difficulties under which it laboured, and the questionable means in- vented by the papal financiers for covering the deficit,^ the system of annates, reservations, in commendams and expec- tancies, with all the abuses attending the collection of tribute, occupy so large a portion of the canvas that there is no space left for dwelling on any meritorious qualities these Popes may have possessed. Moreover, on being forced into a lamentable dependence on France, thereby sufi^ering the partial loss of its universality, the Papacy was placed at a marked disadvantage with regard to England, which, more than any other country, had a special reason for its antagon- ism towards the temporal government of the Holy See. That as a nation it occupied any but a filial attitude towards the Pope as spiritual Head of the Church is a fiction that cannot be too emphatically denied. While it must be ^ Pastor, vol. i. p. 65. 32 Reformation and Renaissance allowed that not all the Avignon Pontiffs shared the weak- ness of Clement V,, all were more or less in the hands of unprincipled and mercenary advisers, who used the temporal power for their own ends, and brought it Into discredit in every country of Europe. But England was at war with France during nearly the whole period of papal exile at Avignon, and during the latter part of the time, Englishmen were suffering from the humiliation and bitterness of defeat, from the weight of a double taxation, and from the suspicion that the endowments of the rich benefices bestowed by the Pope on foreign pre- lates went to help the national enemy to make war on England.^ The fact that nearly all the members of the Sacred College were Frenchmen was not calculated to allay the irritation. Papal taxation had been a grievance as far back as the days of Henry III.,- but the tribute which King John had guaranteed to the Pope was seldom forthcoming, and the deficiency had to be made good, since the papal Court, the Cardinals, Nunciatures, foreign missions, and the whole paraphernalia of government, interior and exterior, must be maintained. Nor does it seem to have occurred to any of the princes of Europe to avoid the inconvenience and indignity of a perpetual squabble about annates, by the regular payment of a fixed sum into the papal exchequer to defray the expenses of the Curia. But in the midst of much general confusion, ideas were nevertheless clearly defined on certain points, and no amount of discontent with the levying of taxes argued oppo- sition to any doctrine of the Church, or revolt from the spiritual authority of the Pope. Heresy was practically unknown in England until the middle of the fourteenth century,^ and appeals to Rome were frequent,* as to the highest tribunal on earth. No greater mistake can be made than to suppose that England at any time previous to the Reformation in the sixteenth century was ever anti-papal. The freedom and rights of the English Church had been ^ Rot. Pari. vol. iii. pp. 19, 22, 23. 2 F. W. Maitland, Canon Law in the Church of E?igland, p. 72 et seq. ^ G. M. Trevelyan, England in the Age of Wycliffe^ p. 104.. * Maitland and Pollock, History of English Law, vol. i. p. 114; vol. ii. p. 373. Europe at the Close of the Middle Ages 33 guaranteed by Magna Charta, and remained uninfringed until they were taken away by Henry VIII. Often tried almost to the snapping-point, the dissatisfaction of English- men with the temporal administration of the papal govern- ment had nothing whatever to do with their belief in the Pope as Supreme Head of the Church on earth, and to them the temporal occupant of the Holy See, so often accused of treating England as a " milch cow," was a distinct personage from the Successor of Peter, holding the keys of the king- dom of Heaven.^ The fourteenth-century poet Langland is a fair repre- sentative of public opinion in his own day. His temperament, says M. Jusseraud, is the temperament of his countrymen. He can say plain things to the king, but plainer still to his beloved Commons, and while he raises his voice loudly against papal abuses, he acknowledges the authority of the Pope, and is a faithful son of holy Church. As early as 1324, the French had begun hostilities against England by the invasion of Aquitaine, and in spite of the splendid success of the English arms at Crecy and Poitiers, fifty years later, the towns of Bordeaux and Bayonne were all that remained to the English Crown of that once magnificent appanage. Then followed a period not only of prolonged defeat and national bankruptcy, but of humilia- tion, for in the autumn of 1376, the French landed on our shores, and for some months occupied a part of Sussex. After a brilliant career on the battlefield, that had, how- ever, suffered some eclipse in the merciless massacre of Limoges, the Black Prince lay dying. His son Richard was a child of twelve years old ; his father prematurely aged, and almost imbecile, was governed by an unscrupulous mistress. The most prominent, as well as the most influ- 1 " It (papal authority) was the only guarantee at that time against anarchy in Christendom, and afforded the only visible hope of remedy against outrages like those of Henry VIII., alike on faith and morals. . . . Talk of the intolerable tyranny of the See of Rome ! Who felt it, I wonder ? Who complained of any such oppression ? Not Henry VIII. himself till he found himself disappointed in the expectation which for a while he had ardently cherished, that he could manage by hook or by crook to obtain from the See of Rome something like an ecclesiastical licence for bigamy." — Gairdncr, T/:e English Reformation. What it was and what it has done. D 34 Reformation and Renaissance ential, yet at the same time the most unpopular man in the country, was the king's younger son, John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster. Although the friend of Simon Sudbury, Archbishop of Canterbury, he was the inveterate enemy of the rest of the clerical party, and hated by the nation at large ; he was formidable on account of his nearness to the throne. None knew, in the uncertain state of public affairs, but that he might one day be king. The mismanagement of the war, the excessive taxation, the decline of trade, the corruption of the central govern- ment, were the themes most frequently discussed in Parlia- ment. While a remedy was being sought for the poverty of the country, the eyes of the feudal barons, led by John of Gaunt, were greedily fixed on the wealth of the Church. But abuses were not confined to the clergy ; foremost among the offenders was the king himself. The Black Prince was known to be in favour of State reform, but he died before the grievances of the realm could be redressed by the Good Parliament, and there were few others in the State who could be relied on to act honestly. The Chancellor, William of Wykeham, supported the party that clamoured for reform ; but he had been too successful both in Church and State, too great a pluralist, to inspire absolute confidence. Serious accusations had been brought against him, but his case has never been properly tried, and his political reputation has been most unfairly left under a cloud, though posterity has awarded esteem to the integrity of his private character. The Archbishop of Canterbury was upright, but timid and irresolute. Courtenay, Bishop of London, could alone be counted on to act with decision. But the man of all others who attracted attention at this juncture was John Wyclif. His somewhat elusive and indistinct personality is neither picturesque nor sympathetic, but there is no doubt that he influenced the England of his time more than any of his contemporaries. He it was who first considerably troubled the theological waters, and the rise of Wyclifism is certainly coeval with the rise of Pro- testantism in Europe. So obscure were his beginnings that six namesakes make his early career at Oxford confused and doubtful. In 1 36 1, however, being already of mature age, he was master or warden of Balliol College, and in the same year was presented to the rectory of Fillingham in Lincoln- Europe at the Close of the Middle Ages 35 shire. In 1374 he was Doctor of Divinity, and about this time he begins to be a factor in public affairs. It is as an ecclesiastical politician, entirely occupied with the reform of political abuses in the Church, that he first claims our notice. His dogmatic orthodoxy was not yet impugned, and his view that the Church was falling under the weight of an adminis- tration into which the vices of the world had entered almost too deeply to be eradicated, was shared by many.^ It is notorious that all the great heresiarchs have first brought themselves into notice by attacking evils which every right- minded man deplored. Wyclif was active in the schools of Oxford, well grounded in the decadent scholasticism of his day, and if he thought as a statesman, he expressed himself in the tortuous language of a fourteenth-century schoolman. It was inevitable, when his views became known, that John of Gaunt should discern in him a valuable coadjutor in his schemes for plundering churchmen of their superfluous riches. The duke had succeeded in 1377 in packing a Parliament which promptly brought forward plans in support of his own measures for the disendowment of religious institutions. Their ostensible object was to relieve those suffering from over-taxation, by the distribution of ecclesiastical property among laymen. No security was, however, provided that the poor would really be benefited ; the Lancastrian party counted on a large share of the booty for themselves, while their ally, Wyclif, contented himself with promulgating the theory of disendow- ment, without troubling about any practical application of the plunder at all. The duke was therefore well advised in making use of him. For many years he had been " barking against the Church at Paul's Cross, and elsewhere, running about from church to church," but John of Gaunt relied on his scholastic learning to persuade the Oxford students, and throuojh them the nation, of the blessedness of his schemes. Wyclif's popularity, moreover, ought to counterbalance the suspicion with which he himself was universally regarded. After the loss of Aquitane, it had been resolved in Parliament that the Church should bear the chief burden of the next campaign, and alone of all the clergy Wyclif defended the resolution. A fleet was raised with the tax 1 Dr. R. L. Poole, Illustrations of the History of Medieval Thought, p. 284. 36 Reformation and Renaissance levied on all ecclesiastics throughout the realm, and was placed under the command of the Earl of Pembroke. But it was sunk by the Spaniards off La Rochelle. The English army, moreover, which marched into the very heart of France, was decimated by famine among the mountains of Auvergne. When all was lost, a truce was concluded with France by the Pope's mediation, in 1375. But in the preceding year, Wyclif had been sent into the Low Countries, as second on a Royal Commission, to treat with the papal delegates at Bruges, concerning disputes between the English government and Gregory XL, the papal court having put forward a demand for the arrears of tribute due to Rome under the convention of King John.^ The result of this conference, which lasted fifty days, was an agreement on the part of the Pope to give up reservations — that is, the right to appoint foreigners to English sees, the king undertaking to cease conferring benefices by writ of quare impedit. Wyclif, who shortly before the conference had been presented by the Crown to the rectory of Lutterworth, was on his return from Flanders nominated to the prebend of Aust in the collegiate church of Westbury. Meanwhile John of Gaunt and Lord Percy, who had recently been created Earl Marshal, were virtually the rulers of England ; they were determined on pushing the scheme of disendowment, and Wyclif was well content to be the cat's-paw. Seeing his success with the learned, they were anxious for him to bring his eloquence to bear upon the masses, and they invited him to come from Oxford to London to preach the cause which he no less than they had at heart. Wyclif laid his plans carefully, but immediately came into collision with Sudbury and Courtenay. He had formerly been on good terms with the archbishop, but at the Bruges conference Sudbury was active on the Pope's side, Wyclif signalising himself in the character of " the king's peculiar clerk." During the fifty days the archbishop was confirmed in the conservative direction, the other continuing to advance in that of complete independence of the Pope, the consequence being that after the conference the two never met again as friends." Reports soon began to circulate that Wyclif 's views on ^ Shirley, Fasciculi Zizanioru?n, Introduction. 2 Hook, Lives of the Archbishops of Canterbury, vol. iv. p. 269. Europe at the Close of the Middle Ages 3 7 the subject of ownership were unorthodox. The archbishop was urged to cite the Rector of Lutterworth to appear before his ordinary and the suffragan bishops, to answer certain charges brought against him. But Sudbury was hampered by his double office of archbishop and chancellor ; moreover, he hesitated to meddle with Wyclif on account of John of Gaunt. Although not hitherto preached from the house-tops, none of Wyclif s theories could be called novelties. They had originated with the Albigenses and the Waldenses, called in Germany Paterines, in Italy i^rnoldists (from Arnold of Bresica) ; in England they had been professed about the middle of the twelfth century by the offshoots of a revolu- tionary sect known as Cathari, Manicheeism was the com- mon parent of all.^ In the first quarter of the fourteenth century they had cropped up again in the joint work of Marsilius of Padua and Jean de Jandun, the Defensor Pads, which asserted the absolute sovereignty of the people, the right of the State to tax the Church, to deprive her of the superfluities which were the chief cause of discord, and to limit her to what was strictly necessary. They included the denial of the Church's right to excommunicate without the consent of the community, and the rejection of the Primacy and the Hierarchy as divine institutions.- Wyclif in assimi- lating these notions popularised them to suit the age in which he lived. Starting from the grossest Pantheism, in which everything that is is recognised as God, he was obliged as a logical consequence to arrive at the doctrine of Predestina- tion, in which he foreshadowed Calvin and the Genevan school. If everything is God, then absolute necessity governs all, even the acts of God Himself, who constrains every creature to commit evil as well as good, since evil happens of necessity, and no man can escape the end to which he is predestined. The prayer of the wicked is of no avail, and the predestined may sin with impunity, for he is not respon- sible for the sins which God compels him to commit. The Church is the society of the elect ; it always exists on earth, either externally or through an inward communion of souls, and it is impossible to know of a certainty who does or does not belong to it. Sometimes it consists of a few lay- men dispersed throughout various countries.^ 1 Lechler, Johann von JViclif, vol. i. p. 567. Leipzig, 1873. - Pastor, vol. i. p. 68 et seq. ^ Lechler, vol. i. p. 567. 38 Reformation and Renaissance These heresies, scattered up and down hi Wyclif s writings, were not all before the world in 1376, but his two most import- ant works, De divino Dominio and De civili Dominio, on the Lordship of God, and on Civil Lordship, were already well known. They contained principles distinctly socialistic and revolutionary, subversive of order in Church and State, in the guise of elaborate, scholastic arguments for the secularisa- tion of Church property, which, translated into common parlance, spelt rank communism. Dominion, declared Wyclif in these treatises, is of God alone, and all men hold all things directly from Him. But only the good can really possess anything, and every good man possesses all things. Sin is nothing, and when men sin they become nothing. If then sinners are nothing, they can possess nothing. Considering the spirit of insubordination and discontent then rife throughout the country, these doctrines were likely to prove highly inflammable, and the alarm they created among the party of order cannot be said to have been exaggerated. Many considered them a direct incentive to plunder. Left to himself, the archbishop would perhaps never have found courage to proceed against Wyclif, whom he regarded entirely as the tool of John of Gaunt, but the clearer- sighted Courtenay urged him to action, and the Rector of Lutterworth was summoned to appear at St. Paul's on February 19, 1377. The scene has been often described. It was undignified and productive of no good results. The turbulent elements among the crowd that thronged every corner of the cathedral would alone, it might have been foreseen, have prevented any peaceful hearing of the case. Archbishop Sudbury, torn between its legal and political aspect, between the danger of driving the Lancastrians to extremes, and the danger of seeming to countenance principles that were clearly a menace to society at large, was, if not half-hearted, at least in terror of the consequences, whatever might be the issue of the proceedings. But Courtenay, Bishop of London, knew none of these apprehensions. He was of the highest rank, closely allied to the royal family, a fearless opponent of the power- ful duke, and an uncompromising enemy of the principles Europe at the Close of the Middle Ages 39 for which Wyclif was called to judgment. The accused came protected by his patron, the Duke of Lancaster on one side, and by Lord Percy on the other. He was also accom- panied by several friars, for he was still on the best of terms with them on account of their abhorrence of wealth. A dense crowd of Londoners, who hated the duke, but re- garded Wyclif as a kind of hero — for resistance to the higher powers always had a peculiar fascination for them — blocked the entrance to the cathedral. Lord Percy had, however, brought with him a band of armed men, who frayed a passage by force through the compact mass of citizens to the Lady Chapel, creating a great disturbance. The Bishop of London came forward and protested, saying that he would have excluded the duke and his followers from the church had he known that violence would be used. Gaunt replied insolently that they would do as they pleased, whether he liked it or not. They then seated themselves on the chairs that had been provided for them, and bade Wyclif be seated also, since he would have much to answer, and would need all the softer a seat. But Courtenay replied that it was more becoming that the Rector of Lutterworth should stand, as he was there on a summons from his ordinary, in respect of charges that had been brought against him. The two others began to swear loudly that he should sit, and Lancaster declared that he would bring down Courtenay's pride and that of all the bishops of England. Courtenay would do well not to trust in his father and mother, the Earl and Countess of Devon, for they would have enough to do to take care of themselves. " I trust in no mortal man," replied Courtenay, " but I rely on God, who forsakes none that put their trust in Him." The duke replied that he was inclined to drag Courtenay out of the church by the hair of his head, but hereupon the bystanders became exasperated, and swore that they would stake their lives rather than that their bishop should be injured or dishonoured in his own cathedral. The affair ended in a tumult, Wyclif was hustled out of the church by his supporters, the court broke up in confusion, and there was no trial. ^ The next day London was up in arms, and the mob, 1 CkroTi. Anglia, pp. 118-21. 40 Reformation and Renaissance intending to kill both the Duke of Lancaster and Lord Percy, went forth in search of them. But being warned in time, the two men fled for their lives, crossed the river to Kenninghall Palace, and took refuge with the Princess of Wales. The rioters broke into Lord Percy's house, sought him in every nook and corner, released a man whom they discovered imprisoned there, and made a bonfire with the stocks in which they found him. Then they stormed down to John of Gaunt's palace in the Savoy, and not finding its master, would have completely wrecked it, but for the timely and generous intervention of Courtenay.^ Three years later a still more furious mob, incited to pillage by Wyclif's theories, did indeed raze it to the ground with all the priceless treasures it contained. These acts were not merely reprisals on the duke and his friend for their treatment of the bishop, but were in- tended as a vigorous protest against a Bill then before Parliament, which threatened their municipal liberties. This Bill aimed at placing the government of London in the hands of Lord Percy, as the King's Marshal, reducing the office of Mayor to a mere nominal one. The means taken by the Londoners to prevent its being carried were as efficacious as they were drastic ; nothing further was heard of the Bill. But the Pope did not allow matters to rest, concerning the abortive proceedings in St. Paul's. He issued five Bulls, dated May ii, 1377, one addressed to the king, another to the University of Oxford, and three to the Arch- bishop and the Bishop of London, all condemning Wyclif's doctrines, and likening them " to the perverse opinions and unlearned learning of Marsiglio of Padua and John of Gan- duno of damned memory." These condemned doctrines, which were contained in nineteen conclusions drawn from Wyclif's works, and submitted to Gregory XL, related exclusively to ecclesiastical politics, with the exception of one which treated of the absolution of the penitent in what are called reserved cases, when none but the bishop can absolve. Wyclif's contention was that no difference existed between the higher and lower grades of the clergy, and that every priest had the power to dispense every sacrament un- reservedly.^ Soon he would have dispensed with the priest- 1 Walsingham, i. 325. ^ Lechler, Johann von IViclif, p. 573. Europe at the Close of the Middle Ages 41 hood altogether. Accompanying the Bulls was a bitter protest from the Pope addressed to the Archbishop of Canterbury. " So far as we know, not a single effort has been made for the extirpation of these evils. They have been passed over, tolerated, winked at : yes, you and the other prelates of the Church of England, you who ought to be pillars of the Church, defenders of the faith, you have winked at them. You ought to be covered with shame and blushing, you ought to be conscience- stricken for thus passing over these iniquities." So far, the word " heresy " had not been spoken. Wyclif 's doctrines were as yet only " errors " and *' evils," *' iniquities " " subversive of Church and State." At the worst, they were but said " to savour of heresy." The Pope was slow to condemn their author utterly, and it was not until he attacked the central doctrine of the Church that he stood as a declared heresiarch before the world. But in 1377 no one in England dreamed that Wyclif would do more than write and preach seditiously on the subject of real abuses. Englishmen had had little experience of heresy ; they were addicted to great freedom of speech, and they loved an argument that bordered on the dangerous. Skating over thin ice was a specially prized accomplishment of the later schoolmen. Oxford was therefore indignant, and deeply resented the threat contained in the Pope's Bull to the effect that that eminent seat of learning should be deprived of its privileges if it continued to protect Wyclif. The University was ordered to deliver him over to the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Bishop of London without delay. But immediate action was prevented by the death of Edward III., and Wyclif was merely ordered to consider himself under arrest, pending the examination of his doctrines by the masters.-^ Finally, academical dignity was preserved by the pronouncement that the articles con- demned in the Papal Bull were orthodox, yet so expressed as to be susceptible of an incorrect meaning. Wyclif employed the interval in defending himself in various scholastic treatises, wherein he perhaps uncon- sciously drifted further and further away from the Catholic standpoint. 1 Poole, fVycliffe and Movements for Reform, pp. 8i, 82. 42 Reformation and Renaissance About the middle of December he was cited to appear within thirty days before the papal Commissioners at Lambeth. He presented himself duly, and read a docu- ment, still extant, in defence of the nineteen condemned articles. The death of the old king had effectually broken the power of the Duke of Lancaster, but Wyclif had another friend in the Princess of Wales, mother of Richard II., and before the assembled bishops could proceed to the ad- ministration of justice, they received a message from her, forbidding them to pronounce judgment against the accused. While they were deliberating, on the horns of a dilemma, how to reconcile their loyalty to the princess with their duty to their consciences, they were mercifully interrupted by the sudden and tumultuous invasion of a mob of Londoners which swept like a deluge into the council chamber, and Wyclif 's trial was for a second time brought to a forced and ineffectual conclusion. The Rector of Lutterworth was mildly requested to speak and write no more touching his condemned doctrines, and it is scarcely surprising to find that he paid no attention whatever to the request. A few months later Gregory XI. died, and the great Schism that followed left him free to develop his theories and to spread them abroad. All prohibitive action on the part of the bishops was crippled both by the Schism and the confusion in secular affairs, and a period of spiritual anarchy now set in.'^ To these causes and to the failure of his political hopes may be attributed his sudden stride in heresy. Hitherto Wyclif had contented himself first with being an instrument in the hands of John of Gaunt ; then, passing from his original point of attack, he abandoned his position as a mere political reformer, and made an onslaught on Catholic doctrine pure and simple. In 1378 he again ventured on a new departure, gathered round him a number of disciples, and constituted himself the founder of a sect. Foreign Protestant bodies all look to England as the country in which Protestantism had its rise, and to them Wyclif is the first Protestant.^ We shall have occasion later on to show what they owed to him, and their repayment of the debt in the reign of Edward VI., when his theories having thriven in a German atmosphere at last came home to roost. 1 Stevenson, The Truth about "Jokii Wyclif, p. 58. 2 Lechler, Joha?in von IVicIif, Einleitung, pp. 11, 17. Europe at the Close of the Middle Ages 4.3 The inner circle of those who ralHed round WycUf were men with some reputation for learning, but the ruck were illiterate and crude fanatics, understanding little of the true inwardness of his ideas, not discerning their heretical bent, but translating them into practical socialism. All led a common life, and wore a habit of one colour and pattern, in imitation of the friars, whom Wyclif now denounced as " proctors of Satan." After some form of rapid training, he sent his men forth as itinerant preachers, to frequent fairs, churchyards, markets, and wherever the people flocked in crowds. They were to linger — loiter about, until they saw a chance of addressing a considerable number — hence the terms Lollard and Lollardy.^ The subjects of their dis- course were : the shortcomings of the Church, her incapacity to reform herself, the failings of monks, friars, and the higher ranks of the secular clergy. By degrees they hinted that there was no need for any Church at all, the Sacraments disappeared entirely into the background ; the paramount duty of the Christian minister was to preach ; each one was capable by the direct inspiration of the Holy Ghost to in- terpret the Bible for himself, and to read it was incumbent upon all. Lollardy became a recognised method of dis- seminating Wvclifism. It assumed a warlike attitude towards the Papacy, refused to recognise a living voice in the Church, attacked the right of ecclesiastics to hold property, scoffed at popular devotions and the received order of things in general, including the relations between class and class, and called for an entirely new dispensation in the spiritual and temporal government. So far Wyclif's revolt from authority was complete. His formal denial of Transubstantiation, and the whole sacramental system, which belongs to the year 1380, added nothing to his Protestantism, since having repudiated the teaching office of the Church, it was immaterial what special doctrines he chose to retain. Nevertheless, his denial of Transubstantiation drew a sharp line of demarcation between his earlier and his later history. It was no longer possible 1 Under the common name of Lollards every species of religious mal- contents was included. There were among them restless fanatics, violent enemies of the mendicant orders, socialist preachers and adventurers. Some rejected all doctrines not immediately patent to the meanest capa- city. Nothing appealed to them in all Christianity but the interpreta- tion of the Bible by the most ignorant {Fasciculi Zizatiiorum, Introduction). 44 Reformation and Renaissance to mistake his real position. John of Gaunt broke with him openly. Oxford was ultimately obliged to give him up. The effect of his doctrines became manifest in 138 1, in the Peasant Rising. Although himself no demagogue, Wyclif never repudiated or dissociated himself from the doctrines spread abroad by his " poor priests." Wyclifism was as well recognised a term as Lollardy, and his book on Dominion had been doing its work in the world for about ten years. Harpsfield expressed a common opinion when he called him " the whetstone of revolt." The peasants who rose in 1381 were not at all in a miserable condition. For the last decade they had been accustomed to high wages, and held the whip-hand over the landlords.^ With great difficulty could agricultural labourers be persuaded to remain on the land. If the lord of the soil refused to commute their services for money, and exacted the labour then so much more valuable than in the palmy days of the feudal system, then the villein was at liberty to flit. The landlords therefore made every kind of con- cession in order to retain them on their estates, but were at last obliged to appeal to Parliament to uphold their rights. A law was passed in 1377 ordering special justices of the peace to judge their grievances, and to imprison recalcitrant villeins till they should pay their fines. The rebellion of 1 38 1 revealed the insufficiency of the legislation, and the complicity of the Lollards in fanning the flames of insub- ordination. Three times within the space of four years the much-hated poll-tax had been levied to keep the country out of its financial difficulties. It was the only kind of tax that afi^ected the peasantry, and they loathed it accordingly. Egged on by the Lollard preachers, they saw in it a con- spiracy to crush and annihilate them, and its third levy was the signal for the rising. John Ball, a renegade priest who for many years had promulgated Wyclif 's doctrines, was the immediate instigator of the rebellion. In his attacks on the State he laid immense stress on the iniquity of servage, which, it must be owned, existed at that period only in name. He had long since fallen under ecclesiastical censure, was excommunicated, and shortly before the rising was imprisoned in Maidstone jail. On his way thither, he told the people that he would soon ^ Trevelyan, England in the Age of IV y cliff e, p. 190 et seq. Europe at the Close of the Middle Ages 45 be set at liberty by an army of 20,000 men. His prediction was verified. Essex and Kent rose, and a ragged regiment led by Wat the Tyler, "a proud knave and a malapert,"^ and composed partly of bona fide peasantry, partly of run- away apprentices, fraudulent debtors, thieves, highwaymen, and all haters of law, taxes, and payment of every kind, whose numbers swelled to a hundred thousand men, camped out upon Blackheath. Here they were joined by their idol, John Ball, and his harangue to them was but the continuation of the language with which he, and others of his kidney, had filled their ears for no less than twenty years past. It was an ascending scale of incitement to plunder and murder. Taking for his text the well-known socialistic couplet then much in vogue — When Adam delved and Eve span. Who was then the gentleman P he declared that all men were made equal by God, who, if He had pleased, could have created servants from the beginning. Servitude was brought in by wicked men against the will of God. An opportunity had been given to the people at last to throw off the yoke. It was their turn now to enjoy the liberty for which they had so long craved ; and first of all they must kill off all the great lords of England, then the judges and lawyers, and all pen and inkhorn men who belonged either to Westminster Hall or the Court Christian. All these fellows were enemies of the Commons, and were not to be endured. When all the great men were dead there would be equal liberty for all. Each one should be a noble, none should be greater than others, and power should be equal. The result of this speech was a march on London, which traitors within the gates practically delivered over to the rabble. Lambeth Palace was gutted, John of Gaunt's house completely destroyed, its costly furniture and antique treasures being hurled out of the windows and hacked to pieces in the street below. When the boy-king Richard II. went out to parley with the mob, those within the city murdered Archbishop Sudbury, as he stood at the altar in St. John's Chapel in the Tower, with no other provocation than that he had as chancellor ^ Capgrave, The Chronicle of England, p. 237. 46 Reformation and Renaissance advocated the levy of the poll-tax, and had imprisoned John Ball for sedition.^ " At St. Albans," says Capgrave, " they made a great destruction of houses, burning deeds and charters, books and rolls. . . . But soon after, this seditious man Wat Tyler was killed at London by the hands of William Walworth, Mayor of London, Then was John Straw taken ; and before his death he made this confession openly : ' When we were on the Black Heath, and sent after the king, if he had come unto us we should have killed all the lords and gentlemen that came with him, and led him with us to make the people to suppose that he was the author of our rising. After that, to slay the king, and then each of us should have the rule in divers places in England, and make laws after our own fantasies.' " - It is not surprising to find that Wyclif was at once accused of being the author of the rebellion. John Ball confessed indeed, while lying under sentence of death, that he had learned his revolutionary principles from him. Courtenay, who succeeded the murdered Sudbury as archbishop and chancellor, was directed by Parliament to inquire into the doctrines of the Rector of Lutterworth, on the express ground that he and his preachers had disturbed the peace of the realm. A synod was appointed to meet on May 21 at the Blackfriars, Holborn. It consisted of ten bishops, four Carmelite doctors of theology, three Dominicans, four Augustinians, one Benedictine, eleven doctors of Canon law, two bachelors of law and seven of theology, two Carmelite friars, and one Franciscan. Ten of Wyclif's doctrines were condemned as distinct heresies, and fourteen others as erroneous. The synod adjourned till June 12, and Courtenay prohibited the preaching of these doctrines at the University. But the Lollards were strong at Oxford, and defied the archbishop. Accused of an active part in the rising, they screened themselves behind the friars, who, they declared, stirred up the poor against the rich. The Chancellor of the University, Rygge, flatly refused to silence a Lollard professor, Philip Repingdon, who preached heresy against the Sacrament of the Altar on the feast of Corpus Christi. ^ Walsingham, vol. ii. pp. 32-34, Rolls Series ; and Tanner, Bibl. p. 459' ^ The Chronicle of E?igland, p. 240. Europe at the Close of the Middle Ages 47 " Neither archbishop nor bishop has any authority over the University," said Rygge, "even in matters of heresy."^ He was, however, obUged to agree in the pubUc reading of the acts of the synod that had condemned Wyclif, though the event proved to be more an immediate triumph for the Lollards than a vindication of Catholic doctrine, for Repingdon exhorted the people to rise en masse and plunder the churches. Dr. Hereford, one of the most conspicuous of Wyclif 's followers, had already preached an inflammatory sermon on the same subject, urging his hearers to seize the lands and farms of the abbeys and friaries, on the plea that the men who possessed them were robbers, for everything that they owned, over and above what was absolutely necessary for their food and clothing, was the property of the poor. "The men of whom I am speaking," he said, "build lofty houses and stately churches, which are things expressly forbidden by their rule. If the king and the realm would strip them of these possessions, and thus deprive them of their superfluous wealth, as they ought to do, there would be no need for his majesty to plunder the poor Commons of the realm by taxes, as now is the custom. But woe and alas ! he has no officers who will carry out this act of justice. And since there are none whose special ofiice and function it is to do this work, it devolves upon you, as faithful Christians, to put forth your hands, and carry this work to its one conclusion. And then it is my assured hope that all will prosper with us ; for right well I know that this is the will of Almighty God Himself, and that so it ought to be done." Nevertheless, before this dangerous seed came to fruition, Wyclif had found it advisable to retire permanently to Lutterworth. Four of his immediate companions were excommunicated, but before long they all recanted ; his was a cause which, at least in its earlier stages, claimed no martyrs. After making some sort of a statement, generally supposed to be a recantation of his errors, but which was more like a fresh exposition of his views, he ceased to be a prominent public personage, and to the end of his life figured thence- forth only as parish priest, and the writer of tracts and pamphlets, among which was his well-known Trialogus. That he at one period of his career made a translation of some parts of the Bible appears to be incontestable, but ^ Fasc. Ziz,. p. 296. +8 Reformation and Renaissance modern research and criticism have proved up to the hilt that none of the manuscripts now extant may boast of being his work.i Half of the religious tracts of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries have been uncritically attributed to him, in the absence and even in defiance of all evidence, and it is therefore not surprising that the same want of criticism should have assigned so many manuscripts of the Bible to him and to his followers. " The popular idea of WyclifFe, sitting alone in his study at Lutterworth, and making a complete new translation of the whole Bible with his own hands, is one of the many popular ideas which will not stand the test of historical inquiry." - Recent criticism inclines to the opinion that at the utmost the translation of the New Testament can with any probability be ascribed to the hand of Wyclif himself.^ The translation of the Old Testament was probably due to Dr. Hereford, who, from being an ardent Wyclifite, excom- municated for spreading false doctrine, afterwards recanted, and became a Carthusian monk in the Charterhouse at Coventry, where he died. Abbot Gasquet is of the opinion {The Old English Bible ^ pp. 137-155) that the Enghsh versions now known as the Wyclifite Scriptures, were in reality only the authorised translations circulated in Wyclif's time. His reason for this theory is the fact that many of these versions are written with great care and elaboration, that they have illuminated borders, executed and coloured by skilful artists, and were costly productions, such as Wyclif's " poor priests," hunted and persecuted, would be very unlikely to possess. They would be extremely unsuitable for carrying about the country in a wallet. Moreover, a number of them can be traced as having belonged to kings and princes of the blood royal ; they bear the royal arms and sometimes a monogram that can be identified. Such Bibles must necessarily have been authorised, and could not have emanated from the tainted source which called forth the repeated prohibition of ecclesiastical authority. The very manuscript displayed in the British Museum at the ^ Fasc. Ziz.., Introduction. 2 Blunt, A Plain Account of the English Bible, p. 19. ^ Sir E. Maunde Thompson, Wycliffe Exhibition, British Museum, p. xvii. Forshall and Madden are at one with this learned authority. Europe at the Close of the Middle Ages 49 time of the Wyclif Exhibition, and labelled the " The English Bible, WyclifFe's Translation," belonged to Thomas of Wood- stock, Duke of Gloucester, youngest son of Edward III., the friend of Archbishop Arundel, who once for all broke the strength of Lollardy in England, and was the uncompromising enemy of Wyclifism and all its works. Dr. Adam Clarke, the Biblical scholar who formerly possessed this manuscript, con- sidered that it was not a Wyclifite production. It was illuminated for the Duke of Gloucester, who was murdered at Calais in 1397. " How long," wrote Dr. Clarke, " before 1397 this work was written, is uncertain, but it must have been, in the very nature of things, several years before this time." From the period of Wyclif's retirement to Lutterworth his position becomes an ambiguous one. Hitherto his earlier life, so far as we know it, had been passed in a strenuous endeavour to bring about a reform in the political abuses in the Church ; then, like so many of those who came after him, embittered by his ill-success, his mind fell back on old, rationalistic, already condemned theories, and the disappointed, would-be reformer threw in his lot with the revolution. He discarded doctrines that had been part and parcel of the belief of Englishmen since England became a Christian country, sent his " poor priests " out to tell the people that they were false doctrines, and then went back to Lutterworth to lead the life of an ordinary parish priest of those times. This entailed his saying Mass at least once a week, and on holidays, and he had " protested against the idolatry of the Mass"!^ As if to accentuate his anomalous position, he was hear- ing his curate's Mass, which had proceeded as far as the Elevation, when he received his death-stroke. It was December 28, 1384 ; he succumbed three days later. Capgrave thus chronicles his end : " In the IX year of this king, John Wyclif, the organ of the devil, the enemy of the Church, the confusion of men, the idol of heresy, the mirror of hypocrisy, the nourisher of schism, by the rightful doom of God was smit with a horrible paralysis throughout his body."'^ 1 Lewis Sergeant, John Wyclif^ Last of the Schoolmen and First of the English Reformers, p. 4. 2 The Chronicle of England, p. 240. E 50 Reformation and Renaissance The words are strong, and curiously unlike the delicate language used by some modern writers to describe Wyclif ; but there is a ring of truth in them such as we fail to note in Dr. Creighton's elaborate summing up of a character, in which the late Bishop of London professes to find "deep moral earnestness ; an abhorrence of semblances ; an entire self- forgetfulness in the pursuit of truth, sincerity that refused to be hardened by conceit into consistency ; clearness that would not be led farther than was needful for immediate purposes ; honesty that did not shrink from negation, if negation was all that was possible ; a thorough desire to bring all opinions to the test of practice, and judge them by their results ; a feeling of the moral duty of spreading knowledge, of popularising the results of study, and making them known to all."^ We suppose, that by " sincerity that refused to be hardened by conceit into consistency," we are to understand that when Wyclif practised a continual fraud on the Church, and followed a ritual which he considered idolatry, and taught his parishioners the Catholic faith, in which he no longer believed, he was giving an instance not only of his " deep moral earnestness," and of that " clearness that would not be led farther than was needful for immediate purposes " ; but it is hard to see how he could at the same time show forth "an abhorrence of semblances," or "an honesty that did not shrink from negation," By wanting to prove too much, Wyclif's modern admirers are plunged into a hopeless quag- mire of self-contradiction. Of all the epithets that have been bestowed on the Rector of Lutterworth, that of "Morning Star of the Reformation" is perhaps the most just. There is no doubt that he was by his writings, and the doctrines which his disciples popularised, the first Protestant, although it may be objected that there was not much protest in his attitude at the end of his life, as parish priest of a religion which he had renounced. But when all is said and done, his doctrinal innovations took little hold of his English contemporaries, although his political ideas, when translated out of the obscure scholastic language in which they were clothed, were in a measure responsible for the communistic spirit which now from time to time ^ Historical Essays and Reviews, by Mandell Creighton, D.D., D.C.L., LL.D., etc., edited by Louise Creighton, p. 200. Europe at the Close of the Middle Ages 5 1 asserted itself, and helped to give the coup de grace to the moribund feudal system. His political views, carried out logically, were bound to end in the destruction of order in Church and State. ^ His best friends have been unable to clear him from the responsibility of having lighted the torch of revolution. His greatest enemies have never accused him of having personally played the demagogue. His mind was academic, but he took care that his teaching should reach the masses through mouthpieces less fastidious as to terminology. During the reign of Richard II. the Lollards were allowed to sow sedition practically unmolested. But no sooner was Henry IV. on the throne than the famous Act of Parliament of 1401, De h^retico comburendo, made LoUardy a capital offence. Nevertheless, as an immediate conse- quence, only two Lollards are known to have suffered death for their opinions. In 1409 Archbishop Arundel caused a committee to be appointed at Oxford to examine Wyclif's writings. A list of 267 propositions was drawn up and con- demned, and the books which contained them were publicly burned at Carfax.^ But a copy of the erroneous articles was preserved in the public library, and every graduate of the University was made to take an oath against their mainte- nance. Nevertheless, in 1427, Wyclifism had not quite died out among schoolmen, and traces oi it are to be found at Oxford as late as the middle of the century.^ As a popular movement Wyclifism was still active in 1 414. Sir John Oldcastle (Lord Cobham) had identified himself with the sect, and had thrown open his house to the Lollards, fortifying it against the king's men. It was besieged, and Oldcastle was carried a prisoner to the Tower. A rising such as that of 1381 would have been repeated but for the vigilance of the king in securing the gates of London. Oldcastle escaped from the Tower, but stringent measures were adopted by the magistrates after the failure of 1 Pastor, vol. i. p. 134. 2 The words of Archbishop Arundel in this Commission admit of no doubtful interpretation : " The sayth and determination of Holy Church is this, that Christ made St. Peter the apostle His vicar here on earth, and gave the same power to all St. Peter's successors, the which we now call Popes of Rome." Papal supremacy as a divine institution was thus a recognised principle in England in the fifteenth century. 2 Poole, Wycliffe and Movements for Reform, p. 117. 52 Reformation and Renaissance the rising. Thirty-nine of the leaders were executed under the Act of 1 40 1, and some years later, Oldcastle was again arrested and hung as a traitor. A low fire was kindled under his feet to denote the heretical notions that had led him astray. On the meeting of the second Parliament of Henry V. the Lollards were accused of disturbing the peace of the realm, of attempting to subvert the faith, and of plots to destroy the king and the law of the land. Some years before, Chaucer, in " The Shipman's Pro- logue," had put on record the dislike and suspicion with which the Lollards were regarded by the majority : — "I smelle a loller in the wind," quod he. "How ! good men," quod our hoste, "herkneth me ; Abydeth, for goddes digne passion, For we shall hau a predicacioun. This loller heer wil prechen us som-what. " Nay by my fader soule ! that shal he nat," Sayde the Shipman ; heer he shall nat preche, He shal no gospel glosen heer ne teche. We leve^ alle in the grete god," quod he. " He wolde sowen som difficultee, "Or springen cokkeP in our clene corn." But although the small remnant of Wyclifism still gave some trouble to the authorities, and was not wholly exter- minated in the middle of the sixteenth century, when the Protestantism that came from Germany and Geneva was grafted upon it, it had all but died out in England. It was, however, far otherwise with its transplantation to foreign soil. After the marriage of Richard II. with Anne of Bohemia intercourse between England and the Continent became more frequent. Not only did the new queen bring over many of her countrymen, but foreign students flocked to Oxford. Among them was the celebrated Jerome of Prague, who undoubtedly introduced Wyclit's theological works and rationalistic doctrines into Bohemia.^ The state of the Church in Bohemia, Moravia, and, in- deed, throughout Germany was even more deplorable than in England, and DoUinger cannot be accused of exaggerating when he says, " Now at length (meaning the end of the ^ Leve = believe. ^ Springen cokkel = grow tares. ^ Poole, Wycliffe and Movements for Reform, p. 124. 4^ ^ fe- g ^ per: P ^9 ^^-O H^y^ -•■a- Europe at the Close of the Middle Ages 5 3 fourteenth century) burst the ulcer, of which the germ was laid in the body of the Church by the transfer of the Roman See to Avignon." To the exile at Avignon and the schism of the Papacy may be attributed most of the evils of the times. The measures for reform undertaken by the Emperor Charles IV., and Ernest of Pardubitz, Archbishop of Prague, are an indication of the low state of morals into which clergy and laity had fallen Rape and robbery, usury and drunken- ness, were as common as concubinage and every other form of lawlessness. Disorders were not confined to the lower ranks of the clergy ; ignorance, worldliness, and corruption flourished in high places, and, as a natural consequence of a debased standard of morality among ecclesiastics, the laity were more degraded still. ^ But it is significant that what we know of the general condition of the country comes to us through the determined efforts at reform of such men as the Augustinian Conrad of Waldhausen, who represented the German movement in Bohemia, and Milicz of Kremsier, the Moravian enthusiast, Archdeacon of Prague, a Czech of the Czechs. In attacking abuses there was sometimes a tempta- tion to overstep the limits of orthodoxy, and this gradual, almost imperceptible, encroachment on the doctrines of the Catholic Church paved the way for a favourable reception of Wyclif 's opinions. The legitimate rulers, civil and ecclesi- astical, were not blind to the growing radicalism of the Czech people, nor to the fact that radicalism in pohtics meant with them rationalism in religion. John of Jenzenstein, Archbishop of Prague, was pas- sionately alive to the need for reform, and his learning and literary ability were the admiration of his contemporaries. Magister Adalbert Ranconius, Professor of the University of Prague, Thomas of Stitny, Matthias of Janow, John of Stekna, and many others, were irreproachable guardians of the faith, but while chaos reigned in the supreme govern- ment of the Church they could do little to stem the tide of evil. Foremost among the more violent agitators was John Hus or Husinec, born at a village of that name, about the year 1369. He was educated at Prague, and graduated at the University in 1393. Ordained priest in 1400, he subse- quently became Dean of the Faculty of Arts, and Rector of ^ Loserth, Wyclif and Hus, pp. 16-20. 54 Reformation and Renaissance the University, but never proceeded D.D. Hus was appointed preacher at the Bethlehem Chapel, founded by- John of Milheim for the delivery of sermons in the Czech language, and frequently preached against the prevalent disorders in the Church. He was requested by the Arch- bishop to bring all irregularities contrary to ecclesiastical discipline with which he became acquainted to the notice of the archiepiscopal Court. ^ The first dispute between Hus and his ecclesiastical superiors broke out in 1403. Forty-five articles gathered from Wyclifs writings, twenty -four of which had been already condemned by the Synod of Blackfriars, were declared heretical. Their promulgation was forbidden, but Hus and his friends, who had adopted them in their entirety, protested against the sentence, maintaining that the articles as they were drawn up contained many questions not to be found in Wyclifs works. The matter then dropped, but in 1408 Hus's sermons at the Bethlehem Chapel had become so violently Wyclifian that the preacher was called to account. He defended himself eloquently, but was defeated and deprived of his benefice. Nothing is more descriptive of the state of affairs in Prague at that time than the fact that Hus was able to ignore his deprivation, and that he went on preaching as before. In July 141 o Wyclifs writings were solemnly burned in the courtyard of the archiepiscopal palace, but the act was extremely unpopular, and the mob began to riot. Hus, at a meeting of the University, energetically defended Wyclifs opinions, and in his speech showed that he had sucked them in, made them his own, and was in fact absolutely dominated by them. One of these opinions especially, which set forth the principle that only the good — and by the good were meant of course those who followed Wyclif, and consequently Hus — had the right to possess property, was at once foreseen by the party of order in Prague to be dangerous and revolu- tionary. That social rights should be made to depend on a man's religious opinions was in the very nature of things an alarming doctrine, and when Hus further declared that none living in mortal sin could exercise authority as a temporal ruler it became imperative in the interest of social order to ^ Count Lutzow, The Story of Prague, p. 32. (Mediseval Towns Series.) Europe at the Close of the Middle Ages 5 5 take measures for the prevention of the natural conse- quences of such views. The next logical step in the course of events might well be the assertion that the king and the archbishop were in mortal sin, and that therefore general anarchy must be proclaimed. It would depend on the first comer to say who was or who was not a sinner. As in England, these views had resulted in insurrection, murder, and wholesale robbery and destruction of property, so in Bohemia their effects were apparent in so bloody a revolution that nothing was sacred, nothing safe from the outrages of a fanatic and iconoclastic sect. But meanwhile the anti-Pope John XXIII., who had succeeded the anti-Pope Alexander V., summoned Hus, through Cardinal Oddo Colonna, afterwards Pope Martin V., to appear in Rome, and explain his position. But the greater excommunication had been fulminated against him two days after the burning of the books, and he would not trust him- self in Rome. Public excitement grew, and he sent one of his friends, John of Jensenic, with two other theologians, to represent him. Their arguments proving unsatisfactory, Hus was again excommunicated.^ The excommunication was published in nearly all the churches in Prague, and the town itself was placed under an interdict. Hus and his friend Jerome now abandoned all pretence of merely preaching against scandals, and violently attacked not only the sacrilegious sale of indulgences but their use. The Faculty of Theology replied by again condemning Wyclif's forty-five articles, adding six others which were said to contain the heretical opinions of Hus himself on the subject of indulgences. Tumults were of daily occurrence ; a time of anarchy had fairly set in. The city was divided against itself, and Hus fled from Prague in November 141 2, having published an appeal " from the sentence of the Roman Pontiff to the Supreme Judge, Jesus Christ." But he returned secretly from time to time in disguise, thus effectually preventing any calming of the tempest, which raged with unabated fury. He was no independent agitator ; he added nothing to, he discarded nothing of, Wyclif's theories, but fought the battle of Czech radicalism with the self-same weapons with which Wyclif's English followers had stirred up the English ^ Poole, Wycliffe and Movements for Reform^ pp. 156, 1 57. 56 Reformation and Renaissance peasantry.^ The effect was exactly the same in both cases. It has been suggested by Lenz, that Hus, in blindly following Wyclif, was profoundly oblivious of the gulf that opened between the Rector of Lutterworth and the Catholic faith, and that it would seem as though Hus never attained to this knowledge to the hour of his death. But, on the other hand, it must be admitted that he had many oppor- tunities of undeceiving himself, and that the very action taken by his ecclesiastical superiors must have opened his eyes. And although the deplorable divisions in the Papacy may seem to us to offer some excuse for divisions in the body of the Church, Bohemia, as well as the whole of Germany, had agreed to recognise the authority of John XXIII., and those who accepted him as the true Pope were bound to obey him. It was the national boast of Bohemians that heresy had never taken root in the sacred soil of their country ; and repeatedly during the troubles raised by Hus's preaching, the Archbishop of Prague declared in his letters to the Pope that there were no heretics in Bohemia. Such was not, however, the view taken by their neighbours, and John Gersen, Chancellor of the University of Paris, wrote to the Archbishop exhorting him to extirpate heresy in his diocese. " For many years now," said Gersen, " the pernicious tares of the most diverse errors have been scattered in appalling multitudes within the diocese of Prague — errors which have their accursed origin in the books of John Wicklif, which are there defended with the most provoking effrontery." Hus himself was anxious to prove that none were more devoted sons of the Church than he, and on August 27, 1 41 4 he placarded Prague with bills declaring that he was willing to defend his Catholicity before the Archbishop and the Synod.- But the Synod would not admit him to its con- ferences, and he thereupon posted up a notice to the effect that he would repair to the Council then sitting at Constance, and there answer all those who chose to appear publicly against him. This proposal was received with applause, and the Archbishop of Prague made a declaration, saying ^ Loserth, Wyclif and Hus. Introduction, pp. xvi. xliv.-xlvii. p. 144. 2 Loserth, p. 168. Europe at the Close of the Middle Ages 57 that he knew of no heresy in Hus, but only that the Pope had excommunicated him. It is necessary here to go back, and relate briefly the events in the history of the Papacy which had brought about the Council of Constance. Gregory XL, the last Frenchman to ascend the throne of St. Peter, was prevailed on by the pious entreaties of St. Catherine of Siena to put an end to the exile of the Papacy. But a variety of obstacles still blocked the road Romewards. The Pope — weak, sickly, and inordinately attached to his own relations — shrank from plunging into the sea of troubles that awaited him in Italy. Florence was at open war with the Head of the Church, the Roman nobles were disafl^ected, and the populace, estranged from the idea of any sort of settled government for seventy-five years, had become fierce and lawless. The College of Cardinals was composed entirely of Frenchmen as unwilling as Gregory himself to exchange the comparative life of ease in southern France for a militant one in an unknown country. Even when, on September 13, 1376, the Pope had torn himself away from all that he held dear at Avignon, he would have retraced his steps but for the insistence of St. Catherine. It was not until January 1377 that he came to terms with the Romans, and was free to enter the city of the Apostles. The work of Philip the Fair was at last partially defeated, but the results of his attempt to nationalise the Church in the interest of France were only just beginning. On the death of Gregory XI. in the following year, only four Cardinals in the whole college were Italians. Of the twelve remaining members one was a Spaniard, the eleven others were Frenchmen. These twelve were divided between two opinions, only two Cardinals entering the Conclave with perfectly open minds as to the election. The Roman people clamoured for a Roman, or at least an Italian Pope, and as a tumult seemed impending, the Conclave in terror hastily united in favour of the Archbishop of Bari, a Neapolitan, who assumed the title of Urban VI. Scarcely was it known that a Pope had been elected than the mob burst into the Conclave. The Cardinals were seized with a panic, and fearing that the temper of the people would lead to outrages, when it was found that they had not elected a Roman, weakly persuaded Cardinal Tibaldeschi 58 Reformation and Renaissance to personate the new Pope for a time. They then became doubly terrified and took to flight. All this, though it did not in any way invalidate the election of Urban, who was without doubt canonically elected, nevertheless threw such suspicion on the conduct of the Conclave that many right- minded persons and even saints doubted whether he were the true Pope. Eventually order was restored, and Urban VI. was duly proclaimed and crowned. His accession was announced to the principal rulers of Christendom, and all might have gone well, if to his many great qualities he had added prudence and tact. In his eagerness for reform he contrived to offend everybody, made enemies of bishops and prelates by declar- ing them perjurers, and accused the Cardinals openly of simony. But his greatest offence in the eyes of the French Cardinals was his avowed intention of living as much as possible in Rome, and of raising a preponderating number of Italians to the purple. But instead of proceeding with vigour, and in a manner to cause his policy to be respected, he contented himself for a long time with making dis- agreeable speeches, so that even his friends were alienated. When at last, to secure his position, he created twenty-eight new Cardinals, thinking to crush out the French element in the Sacred College, the exasperated French Cardinals went to Anagni, and under the protection of their king, Charles v., chose an anti-Pope, the Genevan Cardinal, afterwards known as Clement VII. ^ This was the most appallingly disastrous trial that ever befell the Church. It meant schism and all the untold misery that attends it. The whole Christian world was for the next thirty-five years hopelessly divided. France naturally supported her own creature, but the University of Paris only accepted him on compulsion. Louis of Anjou, brother of the French king, having been adopted as her successor by Queen Joanna of Naples, that important province also acknowledged Clement. England, moved probably more by enmity to France than by any other motive, declared for Urban, as did also Spain, Portugal, and Germany. The anti-papal legate was not allowed to set foot on English soil. In 1389 Urban died, and the fourteen Cardinals of his ' Pastor, vol i. p. 109, et sej. Europe at the Close of the Middle Ages 59 obedience elected a successor in the Neapolitan Cardinal, who reigned for fifteen years as Boniface IX. Soon after the accession of Boniface, Clement VII. succumbed to an attack of apoplexy. It was a propitious moment for ending the schism ; but the French Cardinals elected Peter de Luna, a Spaniard, who, in taking the title of Benedict XIII., solemnly promised to do all that he could to heal the divisions, even though he were required to abdicate. The University of Paris advised that both Popes should resign, and a deputation, headed by the Dukes of Burgundy, Berry, and Orleans, proceeded to Avignon to urge Benedict to lay down the tiara, but without success.^ Boniface IX. died on October 31, 1404, and each of his Cardinals before entering the Conclave took an oath that if he were elected he would abdicate if abdication were necessary for the restoration of union. Cardinal Cosimo dei Migliorati, another Neapolitan, obtained the largest number of votes, and was proclaimed as Innocent VII. Meanwhile Benedict, upon whom the University of Paris had put extreme pressure, having lived for nearly four years as a prisoner of the citizens of Avignon, made his escape, and travelled Romewards with the professed intention of coming to terms with Innocent. But his journey was made in so leisurely a manner that when he reached Savona Innocent was dead. Hope again revived of a possible arrangement. But once more the Roman Cardinals, deeming it their duty to provide without delay a legitimate successor of St. Peter, elected the aged Angelo Correr, a Venetian, understood to be earnestly bent on the restoration of union, who took the name of Gregory XII. The new Pope, almost eighty years old, moved northwards to meet his opponent, but although they came within a few miles of each other, the meeting never took place. Benedict, however, offered to abdicate, if Gregory would do so likewise, and the end of the schism seemed imminent, when, contrary to the expectation of all, Gregory, it is supposed through pressure put upon him by his relations, suddenly changed his mind, and proved as Httle in earnest as the anti-Pope. The French king, backed by the University of Paris, then announced formally that France withheld her allegiance 1 Poole, p. 132. 6o Reformation and Renaissance from either of the Pontiffs until one Head of the Church was acknowledged by the whole of Christendom. Benedict sealed his own doom by replying with a Bull of excommunica- tion against the king. The university treated the Bull with contumely, and its author, fearing for his life, fled to Perpignan. Gregory XII. would now have been in a fair way to gain universal recognition had not his change of attitude inspired his own friends with suspicion. A party adverse to him was formed among the Cardinals. He retaliated by creating four new Cardinals — an act considered as proof of the insincerity of his pacific expressions. The old Cardinals repudiated their new colleagues, and when Benedict's Cardinals, seeing that the anti-Pope was abandoned by all his former friends, forsook him, they joined hands with Gregory's malcontents. A general council was now universally believed to be the one remedy for the schism, and the two colleges of dis- affected Cardinals, behaving as if the Holy See were vacant, assumed the position of lawful rulers of the Church, and issued proclamations convening a Council to be held at Pisa, in March 1409.-^ But instead of being a legitimate and duly authorised synod, the Council of Pisa only added a new scandal to those already existing, although by filling the measure of iniquities it brought matters to a crisis. Its acts were null and void, its authority incompetent. Nevertheless, at its first sitting it declared itself to be oecumenical, lawfully summoned, and representative of the whole Church. The Cardinals then proceeded to depose both Benedict XIII. and Gregory XII., one of which must, even in their eyes, have been the true Pope. In the absence of both, they then ordered a new election, and elevated the Archbishop of Milan, Petros Filargis, a Greek, who took the name of Alexander V.^ Instead of ending the schism, the unhappy Synod had aggravated it immeasurably, with the result that there was now a three-headed Papacy, a schism within a schism, which, for all the Cardinals knew, might be indefinitely pro- longed. In May 14 10 Alexander V. died, and they immediately ^ Pastor, vol. i. p. 147. ^ Ibid. p. 157. Europe at the Close of the Middle Ages 6 1 elected as his successor Baldassare Cossa, under the title of John XXIII. , a politician and courtier, the incarnation of the spirit of worldliness, a brave soldier, but utterly devoid of any of the qualities of which there was so urgent a need. At this juncture, the salvation of the Church was Sigismund, King of the Romans, and afterwards Emperor of Germany. It came about in the following manner. Ladislas, King of Naples, took possession of Rome in 14 1 3, and obHged John XXIII. to fly. He went to Florence, but the Florentines showed the Pisan Pope the cold shoulder, and as he was in a position of extreme peril he was compelled to make a friend of Sigismund. Sigismund, as the price of his protection, suggested a Bull convening an CECumenical Council to meet at Constance. John XXIII. had no option but to submit, and he also undertook to be present himself and to preside. This point gained, Sigis- mund formally invited Gregory XII. and Benedict XIII. to come to the Council. He next called upon the Kings of France and of Aragon to do all in their power to bring order out of chaos. John XXIII. was perfectly well aware that the Council would not be in his favour, although to pacify him it was declared to be a continuation of that of Pisa, but he was happily not a free agent, and his only hope lay in his numerous following of Italian prelates, which he thought might give him the right of directing the pro- ceedings. But even before entering the city of the Council, he realised the danger in which he had placed himself. Ac- cordinof to Ulrich Von Richenthal he exclaimed on first beholding the Lake of Constance, " This is how foxes are caught ! " We have seen that John Hus had announced his intention of being present and of defending his tenets at the Council. He arrived accordingly on November 3, 14 14. Sigismund has been repeatedly accused of treachery in furnishing him with a safe conduct, which in the event proved to be so much waste-paper. But, as Berger, Lechler, and others truly observe, Sigismund could have promised him nothing more than security and protection for his journey, and his own influence to obtain for Hus a public hearing. As a 62 Reformation and Renaissance matter of fact Hus only received the safe-conduct after his arrival at Constance. The Pisan Pope and his followers were already there, and for a time it seemed as though they might carry all before them. But then Sigismund came upon the scene and immediately dominated the Council, making his influence felt in direct opposition to all other. The two absent Popes were represented by ambassadors. The second session was not held till March. It had been arranged that the Council should vote by nations, in order to obviate the unfair preponderance of Italians, and the wisdom of this procedure became evident when it resulted in all but the Italian nation voting for the abdication of John XXIII. By this time a vast concourse had assembled, the numbers of these present being little short of 100,000 souls. There could be no mistake as to the importance of the assembly. Reform, even more than the actual schism, occupied the first months of deliberation. The case of John Hus was taken in May. He had expected to be allowed an opportunity of expounding his views, and found to his disappointment that a commission had been appointed by John XXIII. to inquire into the nature of his doctrines, and to report upon them. This was a very different matter from holding a vast assembly spell- bound, or carrying it away by his eloquence. The strength of Wyclifism lay in preaching ; a cold-blooded inspection of its thews and sinews always led to its condemnation. Hus had, however, already prepared a tractate on the Church, and on Church government, which, on examination, proved to be drawn exclusively and entirely from the works of Wyclif. The result was that Hus's trial was taken in connection with that of his master ; both must, therefore, stand or fall together. In the end, Wyclif was pronounced to have been " the leader and prince in the conflict against the Church." His doctrines were condemned as heretical, and his writings were ordered to be burned. His bones were to be dug up, and cast into an unconsecrated place. ^ Henceforth the condemna- tion of Hus was a foregone conclusion. His first appearance before the Council was on June 5, and his examination was continued on the yth and 8th. ^ This order was carried out in 1427 by Bishop Fleming. Europe at the Close of the Middle Ages 63 An Englishman, John Stokes, who was present, thought that he saw standing before him " the very Wydif," for Hus was guarded in his answers. The text of his written works was compared with WycHf's, and both were found to agree with verbal fidelity in every place. He was condemned on twenty -nine propositions drawn from his books.^ John Stokes had already observed that Hus need not boast of his doctrines being his own property, for they belonged obviously to Wyclif. His books were publicly burned on June 24. No efforts were spared to induce him to recant. " By my soul ! " said the above-mentioned Englishman, " if I were in your case I would abjure, for in England all the magisters, one after another, albeit very good men, when suspected of Wyclifism, abjured at the command of the Arch- bishop " (Arundel). But the lengths to which Czechs were prepared to go at this time far exceeded that of Englishmen, who, inclined though they were to revolution, had scant desire to be martyrs in the cause. Wyclif was to Bohemians the fifth evangelist," and Hus his inspired interpreter. If Hus had recanted he would probably, on his return to Prague, have been torn to pieces by the disciples whom he had nursed, trained, and fed with Wyclif 's doctrines. In dying for them he became the patron saint of Bohemian Protestantism. He suffered at Constance the death of a heretic by burning, on July 6, 141 5, and most men then regarded him either as an arch-heretic and revolutionist or a martyr. ^ The trial and death of Jerome of Prague followed closely on these events, after which the Council turned its attention to the question of the schism. John XXIIL professed his willingness to resign, if Gregory and Benedict would do so likewise, but it was clear that the declaration was not made in good faith, and his sudden flight to Schaffhausen, disguised as a messenger, was suicidal. If this flight was intended as a stratagem to break up the Council it was abortive, for although it was evident to all that, deprived of its Head, the Council of Constance could as little be called a General or CEcumenical Council as that of Pisa, the Cardinals agreed that it was not dissolved by the withdrawal of the Pope. They went on to declare that 1 Petri de Madenovic^ relacio in Doc. mag. Joannis Hus, p. 308. 2 Fasciculi Zizaniorum, p. 51. 64 Reformation and Renaissance " every one, even the Pope himself, must obey the Council in matters concerning the faith and the ending the schism, and that it had authority over the Pope, as well as over all Christians." ^ By this usurpation of power the Cardinals maintained the superiority of Councils over the Pope, a teaching which the Church has rejected in so far as it is of general application. If it had been intended to limit the decree to the particular case in point, in view of the divided Papacy, and the dire necessity of the Church, it might have passed unchallenged, but to say that a Council might be held without the Pope, and even in direct opposition to him, is as contrary to fact as to say that a body without a head can be a living organism.^ John XXIII. was captured and imprisoned in the castle of Heidelberg, in the charge of the Count Palatine, and was formally deposed by the Council of Constance, which thus undid the work of the Synod of Pisa ; but complications would still have prevented any decisive steps for the ending of the schism, had not Gregory XII., the canonically and validly elected Pope, cut the Gordian knot by abdicating of his own free will. The manner in which this was brought about is highly significant, and places the act far above that of any mere pretender to the papal tiara. Gregory first sent his plenipotentiary to Constance, and summoned the bishops to a Council, his Bull of Convention being solemnly read in public, and as solemnly acknowledged by the assembled bishops of his obedience. The Council having thus a legal basis, might now perform legal and indisputable acts, the consequence being that the bishops of John's obedience joined it. Benedict XIII., accompanied by only three Cardinals, fled, thereby acknowledging himself a schismatic. Gregory XII. having abdicated, it was now a fact patent to all that the Holy See was vacant, and that the Council, the existence of which had been legalised by the only legiti- mate successor of St. Peter, might proceed to an election. Benedict XIII. was formally deposed. Innocent VII., Boniface IX., and Urban VI. were recognised as having been true Popes, and Clement VII., Alexander V., and John XXIII. rejected. On Gregory XII. was conferred the Bishopric of ^ Pastor, vol. i. p. 163. - Ibid. p. 164. Europe at the Close of the Middle Ages 65 Porta, with the title of Cardinal, and rank second only to that of the reigning Pope. He died on October i8, 14 17, before the election, thus escaping the inconvenience of his new position. His conduct has been universally praised as magnanimous, and his death was popularly regarded as a sign of his legitimacy, God not having permitted another Pope to reign during his lifetime. On November 9 of the same year, the Cardinal Deacon Oddo Colonna left the Conclave, which had only sat for one day, as Pope Martin V. Great were the rejoicings of the whole Christian world. Belonging to one of the noblest and most powerful Roman families, the new Pope was remarkable for his simplicity, purity, regular life, and piety, as well as for his knowledge of canon law. He had kept aloof from party questions, and had been very popular at the Council, without any sacrifice of his dignity. All hoped for great things from his Pontificate. He was in the prime of life, and seemed in every way fitted for the part of reformer and restorer of peace ; but his path was beset with difficulties, and reform was again delayed owing to a host of technicalities, and to the unprepared nature of the soil on which new growths of holiness must be planted. Much disappointment was inevitable, but there is this to be said in favour of the slowness with which remedy was applied to what DoUinger aptly termed " the ulcer " in the body of the Church, that if Martin V. had been free to deal as drastically with the disease as he wished, he might have innocently brought about a worse schism than the one just ended. He did what he could, and the city of Rome rose from the ruins and misery into which it had fallen during the exile and division of the Papacy. The unhappy John XXIII., who seems to have sincerely repented of his many sins, being at last released from captivity, went to Rome, and threw himself at the feet of Pope Martin, who received him kindly, and made him Cardinal Bishop of Tusculum. Six months later he died, leaving hardly enough money to pay his legacies.^ The scenes of riot, rapine, and murder which had attended the Peasants' Rising in England were enacted with far greater aggravation in Bohemia after the burning of John Hus. Already, before his departure for Constance, Czech com- ^ Pastor, vol. i. p. 176. F 66 Reformation and Renaissance munism had received a tremendous impetus by the excom- munication of its idol. Passionate scenes were witnessed when the papal Bulls were promulgated, and although it flattered the nationalist spirit to declare that heresy had never taken root in the sacred soil of Bohemia, there could be no doubt henceforth that Hus and his followers had broken with Catholic tradition. But when the news reached Prague that the Council had put their prophet and leader to death, the representative and boldest pioneer of the Czech people,^ the desire of the Hussites for vengeance bordered on frenzy. The whole country sim- mered with rage and despair. The houses of parish priests who were regarded as the enemies of Hus were broken into and demolished. Several of the clergy were either stabbed or thrown into the Moldau ; the palace of the Archbishop of Prague on the Hradschin was closely besieged, so that he only escaped by the skin of his teeth. In the country parts priests who held to Rome were hunted down, and replaced by Hussite ministers. The insurgents invaded every church and monastery in Prague, ferociously maltreated the monks and friars, shattered every sacred image and vessel, and burned the choicest treasures ruthlessly. They soon formed a State within the State, professedly with a religious purpose, but with inevitable political consequence. The weak and cowardly Wenzel took no steps to assert his authority, and Sigismund on his return to Hungary wrote to his brother that " if King Wenzel did not make haste to suppress the Hussite errors in his realm, he would lose his crown, for the whole of Christen- dom would rise in a crusade against Bohemia. But if things went so far, Wenzel would only have himself and his negHgence to thank for it." This letter moved him to action. Jensenic, on whose account Prague had been placed under an interdict, was banished, and the Catholic priests were restored to their parishes. The king allowed the Hussites three churches in which to conduct their services, but instead of regarding this act as a concession they made a fresh tumult because no more were granted to them. The school question was inevitable, and caused fresh ebullitions of frantic nationalism. The Catholic clergy regarded the education of the young as a sacred charge, not to be abandoned, and the Hussites were 1 Lechler, vol. ii. p. 273. Europe at the Close of the Middle Ages 67 equally determined, so that there came to be two schools In each church at Prague, the Catholic children singing in Latin, the Hussite children in Czech. ^ Wenzel died in 141 9, but when Sigismund, who succeeded his brother as King of Bohemia, arrived to take possession of his capital, he found it in a state of insurrection, and two years later was forced to fly for his life, leaving the Hussites practically masters of the city. Happily, divisions in their own camp soon lessened their power. They split into two factions, the more moderate party, representing Hus himself, calling themselves Calixtins, because they accorded the chalice to the laity in communion, the others falling into several branches, united only by a common policy against law and order. These latter were all known as Taborists, or Taborites, from the camp of their leader, John Zizka, which was established at a place called Tabor.- After these stormy and defiant beginnings Czech Protestantism gradually settled down into more peaceful channels, and in time became a completely recognised and tolerated form of nationalism. ^ Lechler, p. 274 et seq. 2 Poole, p. 172. CHAPTER III THE CATHOLIC REFORMERS OF GERMANY AND HOLLAND IN THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY Cardinal Nicholas Cusa — Gerhard Groot — Johannes Busch — St. John Capistran — Johannes Geiler, GuizoT, in his History of Civilisation in Europe^ mentions two sources whence flowed efforts at reform in the fifteenth century. These are the legal reforms undertaken by the ecclesiastical aristocracy at the Councils of Pisa, Constance, and Basle, and the movements set on foot by agitators out- side and against the Church. The first he describes as wisely organised, but hampered and timid, the others as violent and passionate, and leaning to revolution.^ But he leaves out of the question altogether the numerous reformers within the Church, who devoted their whole lives to the extermination of abuses, who were as keen-sighted to detect evil in the sanctuary, and as courageous in denouncing it, as Wyclif, Hus, or Jerome of Prague, but whose careers have been less meteor-like in brilliancy, because they were content to work in an appointed orbit, seeking only the re-establishment of order and justice, and those changes as to which there was no controversy. Of all these truly apostolic men Savonarola alone has won a great name in history, and not so much because of his tragic end as because of his mistake in overstepping the limits of obedience and in descending from the pulpit to the rostrum, thereby becoming a political leader. But when an attempt was made in 1868 to claim him as one of the precursors of the Reformation, by placing his statue on the Luther memorial at Worms, the voice of the whole Catholic world was raised ^ Hi St aire de la Civilisation en Europe^ p. 319. 68 Catholic Reformers 69 in indignant protest, and a pamphlet written by a French Dominican, Pere Rouard, in defence of Savonarola's Catholicity did much to reveal his true character. Since then his sermons and meditations have become more widely known, so that at the present day to number him among the prophets of a Protestant dispensation would be a solecism to which no serious student of history would plead guilty. But while no other preacher of reform approaches Savonarola in fascination, or in the power of his interesting personality, we see in every country of Europe a very solid work being done, as earnest as anything dreamed of by Lollard or Hussite, and on entirely Catholic lines. Side by side with the destroying influences everywhere active, a great regeneration was going on, slow as the mills of God, un- obtrusive as all true reform is, but gradually bringing about a condition of things of which we in the twentieth century are reaping the benefit. Meanwhile the schism that had just been brought to an end in the Papacy was frequently re-enacted in the body of the Church, two bishops often contesting the same see, two abbots jurisdiction over the same monastery, while the clash of steel and the tramp of armed feet were heard in sanctuaries dedicated to prayer and penance. It would have been a miracle if the disorders prevalent among the higher clergy had not communicated them- selves to the lower, and if the nations had not suffered in consequence. In Germany the evil state of the Church was largely owing to the evil state of the realm, and so intimately were the two bound up together that the one could not be reformed without the other. Bishops and abbots were called upon to take active part in the government of the country, and came to regard themselves as temporal rulers and lords of the soil rather than as shepherds ; and by degrees they forgot their higher vocation altogether, ex- changing the crosier for the sword that clanked perpetually at their side. They discarded their ecclesiastical or monastic dress for armour, and rode about like warriors. Thus encumbered with worldly business, they were incapable, even with the best intentions, of minding their spiritual flocks, and appointed coadjutors to replace them in every one of their episcopal functions. These suffragan bishops yo Reformation and Renaissance preached in the cathedral pulpits, pontificated on holy days and other great occasions, ordained priests, consecrated churches, and administered confirmation, while the diocesan was absent in camp, at court, or on the battlefield.^ Among the lower ranks of the clergy the same vicarious principle of fulfilling duties prevailed. Many held benefices, enjoyed emoluments, and delegated the functions attached to these offices to ill-paid substitutes. The bishops might indeed find worthy men to replace themselves, but it was no easy task for canons and parish priests to do the same. Hence the numerous scandals that ensued, and the contempt with which the clergy came to be regarded. In every family where there were several sons it became the custom for one son at least to aspire to a provision out of the many pious foundations that had accumulated in the course of ages. Parents sought to secure such benefices as early as possible, and children were therefore frequently invested with canonries and abbacies, received the tonsure, and, as often as not, minor orders with or without a vocation indifferently. The system was largely condoned by reason of the vast number of benefices to be distributed. Testamentary Masses must be said, under pain of mortal sin, and the small stipend attached to them was unfortunately too often the only motive for the choice of an ecclesiastical career. Many of the priests ordained were in consequence unfit for the cure of souls, and when they had said their Mass, and perhaps done their appointed task in choir, a large number passed the rest of the day in idleness, or gave themselves up to secular pursuits. A mundane trend of thought had penetrated even into the cloister, and among the items of reform enumerated by the Cistercians as indispensable, one of the first provided that no member of their order should devote himself to the study of law, on account of the inducement it afforded to seek worldly preferment. The number of religious orders, and consequently of religious houses, had increased enor- mously during the Middle Ages. Each newly-founded order had its monasteries in every town, almost in every parish ; and while they served for a long while to spread the Christian idea, and to offer to a world sunk in barbarism a spectacle of civilisation, lively faith, ardent charity, and ^ Grube, Johajines Busch, Augustinerprobst zu Hildesheim, p. 2 et seq. Catholic Reformers 71 penitential mortification, it cannot be denied that in the fifteenth century the fervour of many of these religious houses had grown cold. Of the vast multitudes who then entered the cloister, many did so without any serious resolution of keeping the rule, and some relaxed their efforts as time went on. The necessary result was a gradual lowering of the standard. One great cause ot the decay of conventual discipline was that a large number of monasteries were exempt from episcopal visitation. Many of these exempt houses had no supervision whatever, the Pope, their nominal visitor, being far off". If, therefore, an exempt house became relaxed, there was no possibility of recalling it to an observance of its rule ; for if the bishop in whose diocese it was situated ventured to visit it, the community would defend themselves by appealing to apostolic privileges, and were even known to throw themselves on the protection of the magistrature, in which case the monastery gradually merged into a State institution. In degenerate days it was not love of the Holy See that moved so many religious houses to seek exemption, but rather love of independence, and laxness. But the question was hedged round with difficulties, and the best-intentioned failed to invent a solution. Some, aiming at the wholesale abolition of exemptions, believed that if the hands of the bishops were strengthened, the remedy for all abuses would follow. In their excess of zeal they overstepped the limits of justice at the Councils of Constance and Basle, fell into the opposite extreme, and would have placed the bishops above the Pope. The Council of Basle sat from 143 1 to 1437, its sessions being then removed to Ferrara on account of its hostile attitude towards the Papacy, and the discussions that had arisen concerning the reconciliation of the Greeks. Strife and con- fusion marked its career, owing to the fierce zeal of agitators who, in the guise of reform, would hear of nothing but a com- plete overthrow of existing institutions, a clean sweep that would have involved the innocent in one common ruin with the guilty.^ The more thoughtful and the better instructed recognised at once that abuses which were the outcome of centuries could only be abolished by degrees. If, on the one hand, the pressure brought to bear on the ^ Pastor, Geschichte der P'dpste (second German edition), vol. i. p. 253. 72 Reformation and Renaissance monasteries by the magistrature, the tyranny of princes, and the marauding bands of robber-nobles reduced many a religious house to ruin, so that the inmates were in a miser- able state of semi-starvation, on the other hand, many a Benedictine abbey had amassed great wealth, and possessed considerable power in the State. Riches do not necessarily imply corruption, but it must be confessed that with grow- ing opulence the monks had acquired generally a taste for re- finement and luxury altogether at variance with the spirit of their founder. A prince-abbot in armour, attended by armed retainers in camp and at court, was a distinct contradiction of the idea and intention of St. Benedict, no less than the sight so often presented to the public gaze of a monk dressed like a fine gentleman and surrounded by pomp, splendour, and magnificence. Nevertheless, if the picture is a black one, the purple patches are singularly brilliant in places, and a general survey of religious communities in Germany before and at the time of the Reformation reveals a condition of things, if not exemplary, yet not exceptionally bad. Some, indeed, were models of regularity and discipline ; others needed but a fresh infusion of life and energy to flourish again as they had done in the Middle Ages ; and of those that had fallen more deeply, many had succumbed to the fascination of the new ideas, to the spirit of the new age which was tempting mankind, not to mortify the flesh, but rather to rejoice in the pleasures of life, and to cast ofl^ the monastic shackles of sackcloth and ashes. The malady had been of slow growth, and an efficient remedy could only be applied by a careful diagnosis of the symptoms. Physicians were not wanting to lay their fingers on the wounds, and to say, " Thou ailest here, and here." One of the central figures at the Council of Basle was Dr. Nicholas Krebs, who, according to the custom of the times among the learned, was called after his birthplace, Cusa or Cues, near Treves, on the Moselle, and is known to history as Dr., afterwards Cardinal, Cusa. Born in 1401, at the very height of the schism, he was essentially a man of his time, thoroughly imbued with the necessity for reform, and stumbling towards its attainment over a road strewn with mistakes. His magnificent treatise On Catholic Unity ^ written in the cause so near to his heart, contained the flaw that it placed the authority of Councils above that of the Pope, Catholic Reformers 73 and it was only through personal experience of the fallibility of the Council of Basle, which cut itself adrift from the Pope, that he arrived at the actual centre of unity. From the year 1439 it became clear to him that his choice lay between the successor of St. Peter and the henceforth schismatic Council. He generously acknowledged his error, and was rewarded with the confidence of Nicholas V., who entrusted him with a mission to Constantinople, to invite the Greeks to send deputies to Ferrara, whither the Catholic members of the Council had betaken themselves, those who remained at Basle having set up an anti-Pope, Duke Amadeo of Savoy, who called himself Felix V. In 1454 Cusa was raised to the Sacred College, and in 1459 became Bishop of Brixen in the Tyrol. But in the meantime he did a strenuous work in the cause of reform in Germany as papal Legate. The son of a poor fisherman at Cusa, he ever remained simple in speech, manner, and dress, was mindful of his humble origin, and loved humility. Although he had made brilliant studies at the University of Padua, having been received Doctor of Laws at the age of twenty- three, and distinguishing himself in every branch of science, he had no other ambition than to be the lowliest instrument in building up the house of the Lord. But he was no advocate of half-measures, and with true insight he declared at the very beginning of his career : " A mortal sickness has afflicted the whole realm, and death will inevitably follow if a stringent remedy be not applied." His own life was a mirror of every Christian and priestly virtue. He preached to the clergy and to the people, and what he preached he was careful to practise. Indefatigable in his labours, a father to the poor, teaching, reprimanding, comforting, and edifying, he travelled, year in and year out, from one end of Germany to the other, everywhere restoring order, improving the educational status of the clergy, providing for the catechetical instruction of the people.^ Knowing the value of pictures in teaching the simple, he set up in the churches wherever he went illustrations of the Ten Commandments, of the Apostles' Creed, and of the Lord's Prayer, with the text, of which the picture was an explanation, written underneath. 1 Pastor, vol. i. p. 392 et seq. 74 Reformation and Renaissance In the midst of his almost superhuman activities he still remained a student. A man of faith and charity, possessing a mind capable of grasping all human science, yet despising no detail as too elementary or trifling to occupy him, all his knowledge began, centred, and ended in God. " To know, to meditate, to see the truth is a perpetual joy," he wrote, " and the older one grows the greater is the delight which it affords, and the more one gives oneself up to it the greater is one's longing for the possession of all truth." Cusa's way had been prepared in Holland, to which country his legatine mission also ^ed him, by Gerhard Groot, in whose school at Deventer he had so aptly learned to follow after wisdom and pursue it. Groot was the son of a magistrate of Deventer, and was born in 1340. He went to the University of Paris at the age of fifteen, and three years later proceeded M.A. Soon afterwards he was teaching theology and philosophy at Cologne, where his reputation for learning obtained for him the pseudonym of Magnus^ which was at the same time the translation of his surname. Provided with a canonry at Utrecht, and with another at Aix-la-Chapelle, which he held in commendam^ he led a life like many another worldly ecclesi- astic of the times. Then he met with an old friend, the Prior of the Carthusian Monastery at Arnheim, a holy man, and the meeting ended in a marvellous conversion. Groot renounced his benefices, was ordained deacon, wore the poorest clothes over the hair shirt which he thence- forth never left off, and became in short a second Augustine. He travelled through Holland, preaching penance and reform, and devoted all the powers of his cultivated mind to the restoration of the Church. The result was stupendous. It was his custom to preach three times every day, and the people flocked round him from far and wide to listen to his burning words. The churches were all too small to contain the multitudes that came, and he generally preached in the churchyards. When the first sermon was done the congregation would wait among the graves until the time came for the next, and the next. Through his preaching an immense number of people turned from a life of sin, and his name will never be forgotten in connection with the Catholic Catholic Reformers 75 revival in Holland and North Germany, although his modesty was so great that he refused every dignity, even that of the priesthood. Disciples gathered round him and adopted a rule of life under his guidance and that of his friend, Florentius Radewin. They gained their livelihood by copying books of a religious character, which they afterwards disseminated, and by the advice of Florentius threw their earnings into a general fund, shared everything equally with each other, under a superior whom they chose from among themselves, and thus originated the Brothers of the Common Life. They differed from other religious communities by taking no vows, and by earning their bread, for a certain number of hours, like people in the world, the rest of their time being devoted to catechising and other charitable works. But the movement was not allowed to thrive unopposed; the Mendicant Orders were against it from the beginning, and when Groot, worn less by age than by his extraordinary penances and labours, lay on a premature deathbed, it is said that he entreated Florentius to place the brethren under the protection and rule of a religious order. ^ Three years after Groot's death, a monastery, following the Augustinian rule, was founded at Windesheim by three Brothers of the Common Life, and from thence a constant stream of reform flowed through Holland and North Germany, reaching as far south as Franconia. If indeed the books of " The Following of Christ " were written, as it now seems probable, by St. Thomas a Kempis, the work reflects immense lustre on the Brothers of the Common Life, to whom a Kempis belonged. An immense number of people had been influenced by the preaching of Gerhard Groot, and communicated the effects of his labours to others, without actually joining his fraternity. These often wore the same style of dress as the Fraterherren^ as the Brethren of the Common Life were called, and led an austere life in imitation of theirs. One notable example of these was Johannes Zele, whose school at Zwolle became so important a factor in the Catholic Reformation of Holland and Germany. It was attended by eight hundred to a thousand scholars, divided into eight classes, grammar, logic, and ethics forming the curriculum. ^ Grube, pp. 1 1-13. 76 Reformation and Renaissance The course was usually finished at the age of fifteen or sixteen, when the students passed on to the University, unless they chose to take up theological studies in some monastery. The method of instruction was not that of mere lectures, for the scholars took notes, were examined publicly, and were called upon to support theses against their professors. On all Sundays and holidays they assembled in the lecture-room, where in the morning Zele gave an hour's practical exposition of the day's Epistle ; in the afternoon another hour was devoted to a meditation on the Gospel for the day ; and in the evening the master expounded part of one of the books of the Old Testament, taking them in rotation. Every scholar was provided with a Bible and a note-book, in which latter he wrote from dictation the principal points of the instruction given, accumulating thus by degrees a mass of valuable precepts and axioms culled from the Fathers of the Church and other authors, which, at a time when books were scarce, formed a precious intellectual and spiritual equipment for future use. Zele was so careful that none should miss Mass on Sundays and festivals, that he himself accompanied his pupils to the parish church, and watched over them while they were there. He made them acquainted with the daily life of the Church, and with the spirit of the Catholic liturgy, studied choral singing with them, and made them take part on Sundays in Matins and Lauds, Vespers and Compline. His discipline was severe, the rod was not spared on occasion, and a notice written on the door of the schoolhouse ran thus : " Whoever wishes to play pranks here^ and has no desire to be a scholar^ may stay at horned Even the boys' dress received his attention ; he would have no foppish or ridiculous fashions of the day in his school, but desired that every student should don a cassock, or the garb of the Fraterherren. Zele himself observed rigidly all that he instilled into the minds of his scholars, and resembled his friend Gerhard Groot in the austerity of his life. He had graduated at the University of Prague, but had never been ordained, although he lived like the holiest of priests and followed the rule of the Fraterherren. He rose at two o'clock in the morning, recited the Hours of the Blessed Virgin, the seven Penitential Psalms and other prayers, and made a long meditation, after which he dozed a Catholic Reformers 77 little in his chair, but always went punctually at the same hour to his school. If the boys met him out of school hours, or in the moments of interval between the classes, they observed that he was always profoundly recollected, and that his lips moved in prayer.^ As famous as Zele's school at Zwolle was its twin institu- tion at Deventer ; and from all the Low Countries, from Westphalia and from the Rhine Provinces, throughout the fifteenth century, youths streamed to either town to receive their first draughts from the well of knowledge. If Thomas a Kempis, Johannes Voss, and Cardinal Nicholas Cusa made the school at Deventer illustrious, Johannes Busch, amid a throng of kindred spirits, owed everything to Zwolle and Johannes Zele. Busch was a pupil after Zele's own heart, and when in 141 7 he had finished all his classes, his parents seemed justified in anticipating for him a brilliant career. They wished to send him to the University of Erfurt, to study law ; but the young man had other thoughts in his mind, all of which centred in the newly -founded monastery at Windesheim. " Even if thou wert to take a degree, and to wear a furred mantle," he said to himself, " and people took off their hats to thee, saying, ' Good morning. Sir Doctor,' thou mightest perchance still go to hell, and then what would all this honour do for thee ? " So he decided to be a monk, and broke the news to his parents, who were completely crushed and broken-hearted at his determination. For to them death and Windesheim meant much the same. The monks never left the place, even to pay a rare visit to their homes. Hard work, strict obedience, poverty, privation, even hunger, would be his lot there, for there was no mitigation of the rule at Windesheim. But he was deaf to all remonstrance, entreaty, and tears, and seeing that his father and mother would never give their consent, he tore himself away in obedience to the divine call. After a postulate lasting a year and a halt, he was clothed in the monastic habit with three others, and began his novitiate under the happiest auspices. The spirit of Gerhard Groot still seemed to hover over the community. The Prior had been one of his disciples, and was greatly beloved and venerated by the brethren. Shut out from the 1 Herzog's Realencyclopddie, vol. ii. pp. 632, 694, 749. 78 Reformation and Renaissance world, the task of the monks was the salvation and the sanctification of their own souls, and the service of their neighbour through prayer alone. They had no parish, and no cure of souls, and they might not preach, lest haply they should be tempted to pride and display, lose the modesty which became their state, and thus fall into numberless errors. It was the inevitable recoil from the exemptions, privileges, and corruptions of the relaxed monasteries. The Superior, in all the houses of the Windesheim con- gregation, was to be called Prior, not Abbot or Provost, for fear that he should come to consider himself a fine gentle- man ; and for the same reason he was to bear no outward sign or symbol of his priority. The habit which the monks wore was a long white garment, denoting interior purity ; when they went into the garden or the fields, they put over it a black cloak, signifying contempt of the world and its works. Their life was not an entirely contemplative one, but was divided into equal portions, devoted to vocal prayer (the singing of the divine office), meditation, manual labour, and study. As for the manual labour, it was often arduous enough, for they built their monasteries with their own hands, from foundations to roof, and kept them in repair, scrubbed and swept their cloisters, choir, refectory, cells, etc., cooked their own food, grew their own vegetables, ploughed their own fields. So hard was the work, that when the bell rang for Matins, getting up was as great a penance as any. Immediately after Matins, an hour was devoted to copying manuscripts, a work so cherished by the monks that they stole minutes here and there throughout the day for this purpose, and would even curtail their meagre allowance of sleep to find time for it. According to Busch's statement, not a single hour was ever wasted or misspent. But though the labour was great, the food was neither very good nor abundant, the monks' table being so poorly and frugally furnished that a visitor once declared that at Windesheim only the pigs and the guests fared well. Nevertheless, Johannes Busch found there all that he desired, and his probation ended, he was clothed with the religious habit on January 6, 1419.^ After his profession in 1420, he received minor orders, remaining for the next three years at Windesheim. He was then entrusted by his Prior 1 Grube, pp. 19, 23, 24. Catholic Reformers 79 with the important work of reform, and was sent to one religious house after another with this object. Sometimes a lapsed community resented all interference with their manner of life, and only accepted the reform grudgingly, or even refused it altogether. One of the worst cases was that of the Augustinian Monastery of St. Bartholomew at Hildesheim. In 1439 Busch was Sub-Prior of Wittenburg, a house which had incorporated itself with the Windesheim congregation, and which was all that could be desired in regular observance and discipline. Prior Gottfried of Wittenburg resolved to put an end to the scandals reported of the Hildesheim com- munity, and set out with his Sub-Prior for the purpose of visiting it. When they arrived, the Provost told them that he was quite willing to accept the reform, but only on con- dition that it was introduced by the Bishop and Chapter of the diocese. Upon this the visitors returned to Wittenburg, and a week later Busch received an order from Bishop Magnus to visit St. Bartholomew's. A companion was assigned to him, and the two proceeded together to Hildesheim. It was evening when they arrived and found the greater part of the community absent. The Prior received them in a friendly manner, but regretted that he had no guest- chamber to offer them. Meanwhile, a messenger informed them that the monks had returned from the inn, and were sitting outside the church. They were, to say the least, in a convivial mood, and the messenger would not answer for Brother Busch if they encountered him in their present con- dition. Busch at once understood how matters were, and one of the better sort having offered the visitors his room for the night, they retired to it. The bed being too narrow for both, Busch slept on a box. The next morning two officials arrived, sent by Bishop Magnus with instructions to install Johannes Busch as visitor and reformer, whose orders every inmate of the monastery was commanded to obey. The monks made no pretence of welcoming him, but perforce tolerated his presence among them. For a whole week he said nothing, but observed them closely, and came to the conclusion that they were no monsters, although of religious life there was not the slightest trace left in the house. The common table, office, and divine service were 8o Reformation and Renaissance observed, but the latter in the most perfunctory manner. As for the rest, each one did as he pleased, and in his report of the community Busch makes no mention of any occupa- tion as being followed by any of them. They frequented inns, idled away their time in useless visits, and some were even found guilty of illicit connections — a state of things which should inspire little wonder, considering that for the most part they had entered the monastery without vocations, and merely to secure a comfortable provision. At the end of the first week Busch said quite humbly : " I see that you lead no monastic life, and keep no conventual customs ; you neither observe silence, nor anything else that the rule pre- scribes. If you will allow me, I will tell you what you must first of all mend ; but if you do not like to listen to me, you can hear what the Dean says, in the name of the Bishop of Hildesheim." The Provost, a man somewhat advanced in years, re- plied : " Tell us what we must do ; we will listen willingly, but do not let the Dean and Chapter bother us." Hereupon Busch explained the rule of silence, and bade them obey it. They did so, but only when he was within earshot. If they thought themselves alone, they began to chatter as before, even in church. He next re-established the practice of reading aloud in the refectory, at least to a certain extent. At each repast a short portion of the Scriptures was read, after which the monks might talk. This went on for a fortnight, Busch endeavouring to bring them gradually to some outward observances before attempt- ing to restore the monastic spirit among them. Then he sent for some good religious from other houses, in order that the Hildesheim monks might be cor- rected more by example than by precept, taking care at the same time not to choose any from the Windesheim or other distant communities, lest he should irritate those whom he wished to benefit, but making his selection from among their own compatriots in the neighbouring monasteries. Armed with a letter from Bishop Magnus, he went to Riechenberg, and begged from its Friar two exemplary Brothers, who, he afterwards said, behaved in a most prudent and God-fearing way at St, Bartholomew's, and stood by him manfully. The Bishop desired that two of the younger monks, Johannes Graen and Dietrich Riemen- Catholic Reformers 8i Schneider, who bore a questionable reputation, should be sent to two different reformed houses, where they would profit by the good example of those around them, and be saved from their evil ways. But when Busch proposed this plan to them in Chapter, they begged to be dismissed alto- gether. This, however, was deemed unadvisable, on account of the licentiousness to which they would probably abandon themselves if all restraint were removed, and they were told that they must go to whatever place they were sent. But no sooner had Busch taken Graen to Riechenberg than he ran away, a proof of the good order and regularity of that house. The other recalcitrant monk did the same from Wittenburg, and took up his abode in the town of Hildesheim, where he remained till the Bishop threatened him with im- prisonment, when a wholesome terror of the gaoler sent him back to his monastery. These events caused a good deal of ill-feeling, as well on the part of the burghers as among the monks of St. Bartholomew. Several attempts were made on Busch's life, and some of the monks demanded to be released. The perplexed visitor could not make up his mind how to act : if he retained the disorderly subjects, they would probably be the ruin of the house, and if he dismissed them, according to their desire, they would in all likelihood go to the bad utterly. He therefore called a council of the heads of different reformed houses, and debated with them on the best plan of action. In this council it was unanimously resolved that those monks who wished to depart should be allowed to do so for a certain time, some for a year, others for two years, others again for three. In the meanwhile, Busch by diligently training a new set of novices was to restore perfect order in the community, and thus thoroughly to reform the house. Those who went out were to pledge themselves to live respectable, priestly lives in the interval. Six of the monks accepted the con- ditions, and the Provost, soon seeing that he was superfluous, and not wishing to submit to the yoke of strict observance of the rule, decided to resign his office, provided he might end his days in another monastery more in accordance with his tastes, three miles distant from Hildesheim. Leave was granted to him, and Busch seized the opportunity to propose, that either the Prior of Riechenberg, or Prior Gottfried of Wittenburg, should undertake the vacant provostship. But G 82 Reformation and Renaissance they both came to Hildesheim, and entreated Busch to accept the office. This he did after some demur, but his position was far from agreeable. In the monastery, it is true, he met with no further opposition, but the whole town was against him, and complained bitterly that he, a stranger, had driven out their fellow-citizens, and had insinuated him- self into their former possessions. They agitated to such purpose, that the six monks on leave of absence, finding life in the world much more difficult, full of cares and responsibility, than it had been in the cloister, tried to force their way back. They succeeded in obtaining a mandate from the Archbishop of Mainz, ordering Provost Busch to receive them on payment of a sum of money. Busch, alarmed for his reform, proceeded at once to Mainz, and protested with all his might, the Chapter, in the end, being converted to his view. Nevertheless, the day after his return to St. Bartholomew's, the discontented absentees appeared with the Archbishop's mandate and demanded admission. The door had been bolted on their approach, but they forced an entrance, and the Provost was obliged to have recourse to persuasion and entreaty before they would be induced to depart. His whole work at Hildesheim was at stake ; the reform had taken root beyond his expectations, a good spirit pre- vailed in the community, and the number of novices was rapidly increasing. To readmit the original disturbing elements would be to render abortive all that had been done ; yet unless they could be prevailed on to give up the contest, the Archbishop's mandate must be obeyed. Happily, they did not divine the weakness of Busch's position, or their own strength, and perhaps somewhat alarmed at the severity which they saw reigning in the house, they at last allowed themselves to be convinced by his reasoning, and withdrew peaceably. From thenceforth the townspeople ceased their complaints and accusations, and the reform was allowed to prosper.^ Commissioned by Bishop Magnus, Busch next undertook the reform of two convents of women in the Hildesheim district, one of which, a house of Benedictines, was by no means badly relaxed in discipline, but in which the rule was not kept in all points according to primitive observance. ^ Grube, pp. 55-64. Catholic Reformers 83 His task here was comparatively easy, but the reform of the Augustinian nuns at Derneburg was a more complicated matter. They had long been accustomed to possess private property, to be unrestricted in their going and coming, and, if common report was to be credited, some led an immoral life. The nuns had been professed according to the rule of St. Augustine, which they did not keep. They went out when they wished, with the permission of the Prioress, but their absence was often prolonged, and they appeared in choir only when they pleased. It is almost surprising to find that they still wore their habit, took the discipline, and kept up various old customs and ceremonies. By degrees, Busch brought them back to a certain regularity, but the entire reform of the convent was not accomplished without much labour and many disappointments, and at last it was found necessary to introduce Cistercian nuns into the house, who by their good example animated the old community and infused fresh fervour into them.^ During this period, Busch's reforming activities were not confined to the diocese of Hildesheim. Magdeburg also witnessed to the fact that in the fifteenth century souls were not suffered to take a downward course without strenuous efforts to save them. Heinrich Cremer of Riechenberg, Dr. Heinrich Zolter, a man as learned as he was religious-minded, together with Johannes Busch, laboured with marked success to restore monasticism in North Germany to its original fervour. In so doing, they restored also the influence for good which it had formerly exercised over the populations, in the midst of which the religious prayed, toiled, and suffered. As Provost of Halle, Busch subsequently found abundant scope for his energies. Had he accomplished no other work there than the reform of the two Augustinian monasteries, which he set on foot immediately after his arrival, his sojourn in that place would have been an inestimable boon, for from these two centres proceeded a stream of influence determining the spiritual life of many thousands. Both houses had the charge of parishes, both sent out their subjects as confessors into neighbouring districts, and one of them had exclusive control of the schools. Even more important still was Busch's task as ^ Grube, p. 89. 84 Reformation and Renaissance Archdeacon of Halle, an office that belonged to the provost- ship, and which brought with it no little responsibility, placing about one hundred and twenty churches, and upwards of three hundred priests, under his personal super- vision. Having accepted responsibility, Busch was not a man to hesitate or to groan under the burden. When asked what measures he proposed taking, he answered, " I intend to create a new world here." And that promise he did not fail to keep. For a time he was obliged to give up the further reform of religious houses, and to devote himself exclusively to that of parishes and of parish priests. Sometimes, in his desire to abolish even what only might he an occasion of suspicion, he would innocently cause the greatest incon- venience. Thus, he forbade every priest in Halle to keep a female servant, or to suffer any woman, on any pretext, within his doors. They all hereupon dismissed their house- keepers, but were obliged to do the housework themselves as best they could. The Archdeacon soon remarked that on Sundays, after saying their Mass, they appeared no more in church ; and he sent for them all, and ordered them to take part every Sunday in the services of their parish church, in cassock and surplice. One of them answered that since the Archdeacon's order to dismiss their cooks, they were obliged to exchange the church for the kitchen, and to prepare their mid-day meals themselves. But Busch replied, " You preach that on Sundays and holidays men and women should attend High Mass and sermon, and you fail to be present yourselves. Do not suppose for a moment that I will allow this. Order your household arrangements in such a manner that you can be in your places in church at the proper time. I will not oblige you to sing with the school children at High Mass and Vespers ; all that I insist on is that you set a good example by being present. Further, you must not omit taking part in the processions round the churches and churchyards on Sundays and feast-days, in cassock and rochet, so that your presence may incite the people to participation and devotion." ^ Difficulties, however great, generally disappeared when- ever Busch made up his mind to attack them, and the ^ Grube, p. 109. Catholic Reformers 85 processions became so long that as a rule the end was but just leaving the church when the beginning was about to re-enter it. He found the moral condition of the clergy under him, on the whole, better than he had been led to expect, ninety- seven per cent of them being without reproach in this respect. Those whom he found guilty and incorrigible were removed from their benefices, and their places left vacant until they could be filled worthily. To those parishes and com- munities who complained of the privation he replied, " Better no priest at all than a bad one." Nothing escaped his clear eye and severe judgment. He visited every parish under him, industriously, and it must be admitted that the clergy had in him no indulgent superior. A parish was attached to his own conventual church, and he did not rest until he had provided it with an efficient preacher, in the person of Gerhard Dobler, a man after his own heart. Of Dobler Busch himself said : " My preacher was a very zealous man, and often held forth on the ten Commandments, devoting three, four, or five consecutive sermons to the same Commandment, until all in the parish were persuaded to keep it. Once, when the effect was not produced as soon as he hoped, he spoke to the people in this wise : " Why do you not begin to keep this law .? Perhaps you will answer, ' My father and mother were honest folk, who have long since attained everlasting bliss ; why should I be more particular than they ? ' Listen to my answer. If you possess any document which assures you that your parents, who you say were a good sort of people, are in heaven, show it me. I should like to see it. But I don't think that you have any such document. I however can tell you that if they lived as you now live, not keeping God's law any better than you do, I have a very clear document which tells me that they are in hell. And my document is the Mass-book lying on the altar, and contain- ing the Gospel, which Christ our God has sealed as truth with His blood. There it is written : If you would enter into eternal life^ keep the Commandments ; and other like sentences are contained therein. The transgressors of the Com- mandments who are already dead in their sins are, you may 86 Reformation and Renaissance be sure, in hell. This is the teaching of the Catholic Church, the teaching of Christ." Busch says of Dobler and his preaching : " He was not a quoter of many texts, but went straight to his subject, and would say, pointing to individuals, ' Thou in the long mantle, or thou with the embroidered shoes, thou Councillor, thou rich man, or thou poor man, what wilt thou say to this, when thou liest on thy deathbed, and breathest forth thy soul ? Consider it.' " ^ Such preaching as this clearly shows that incentives to the practice of high spirituality would have been out of place, and that men and women needed to be fed with the daily bread of the catechism. We find that in all countries a low state of morality predominated, and that the teaching required was of an earnest, simple, and elementary kind. Nevertheless there were evils far more complex than those which Busch and his colleagues were mainly called upon to combat. They were almost entirely caused by the errors of the Council of Basle, which had introduced deplorable confusion into the German Church. The election of an Anti-Pope had created, first, divisions, then apathy, with regard to the authority of the Holy See ; and Nicholas V,, in sending Cardinal Cusa to Germany, had in view, as a primary object, the strengthening of the bonds between that country and Rome. Cusa was charged to hold Provincial Councils, to pro- mulgate the Jubilee indulgence, and to order prayers for the Pope to be recited every Sunday at Mass. By this means, every priest was reminded of his solemn profession of com- munion with the head of Christendom, and realised more vividly the unity of the Church and his own individual membership.^ At the Provincial Chapter of Benedictines held at Wiirzburg, seventy abbots received from Cusa an impetus to a diligent winnowing of the chaff from the wheat.^ Riding unostentatiously on a mule from place to place, the Legate traversed the whole of Germany from Salzburg to Wiirzburg, through Thuringia to Erfurt, Magdeburg, Hildesheim, Minden, Halle, everywhere putting down abuses and restoring discipline. ^ Grube, p. 113. 2 Pastor, vol, ii. p. 109. ^ /^/^_ Catholic Reformers 87 Johannes Busch was, in the absence of the Archbishop, commissioned to receive him on his arrival in Halle. The meeting between these two remarkable men could not fail to be an interesting occasion. After a sojourn of ten days at Erfurt, where he had visited every monastery and convent, and had charged Abbot Christian with the reform of all Benedictine houses in Thuringia, Cusa set out on June 6, 145 1, very early in the morning, for Halle. A hundred horsemen met him at some distance from the town and formed an escort. At the city gates he was received by the whole body of the clergy, and a multitude of townsfolk, who conducted him, to the sound of bells and singing, to the church of Our Lady, in the market-place. No sooner did the Legate per- ceive Busch, whom he then saw for the first time, than the Cardinal made a very low bow, in deference to the Provost's venerable character, and in recognition of his immense services in the cause of religion. Descending from his mule, he was led into the sacred edifice by Busch and a brother provost, and when the singing was ended, the parish priest was presented to him, and expressed satisfaction at the lively and benevolent interest which the Holy Father showed in the well-being of the Church in Germany. At the Rathhaus a numerous company was assembled to do the Cardinal honour, but he laid his arm on Busch's shoulder and withdrew with the Provost into the embrasure of a window, where they talked long and earnestly, and showed such evident pleasure in each other's society that the assistants thought they must be blood-relations. Cusa re- mained but one day in Halle, and then went to Magdeburg, where he presided over a Provincial Synod.^ At this Synod, among other important resolutions, it was decreed that as the Cardinal could not possibly visit in person every Augustinian house in North Germany, Provost Busch should be appointed his vicar, " as a man who from his youth upwards had lived in faithful observance of the rule of St. Augustine, and who had striven for its observance in different houses of the same order nearly all his life ong. - Henceforth Busch's labours occupied a wider field, and his energies, devoted to still larger issues than before, 1 Karl Grube, p. 133. - Ibid. p. 136. 88 Reformation and Renaissance challenged all the enemies of order, discipline, and authority to a mortal combat. Intrigues beset his path, resistance met him where it was least expected, and in some few instances the religious communities were encouraged by the Bishop and other superiors in a life altogether at variance with their profession. This was notably the case in the diocese of Minden, where three convents obstinately refused the reform, but in the main Busch gained the victory for law, right, and order. His work, principally concerned with North Germany, was continued in the South by St. John Capistran, the famous " Brother John of the Bare-footed Order," who was about sixty-five years old when the Pope sent him to Germany. He was small, withered, and worn, but keen of intellect, learned, and indefatigable. Twenty to thirty thousand people listened every day to his sermons, although he preached in Latin, scarcely a word of which they under- stood. But it was observed that they paid more attention to him than to his interpreter, who afterwards repeated the sermon in German.^ Something in the sanctity of his personality attracted the people and raised their minds to spiritual things ; the holiness that shone through his in- significant appearance was perhaps even more eloquent than his words. On his arrival at Vienna, the crowds that went out to meet him were so dense and compact that the streets could not contain them. As there was no church in the city large enough for his congregation, he preached from a platform erected in the great square. His time was passed in meditation, preaching, visiting, praying with and laying his hands on the sick and dying. He slept little, and always in his habit, rose at daybreak, and remained a long time in prayer. Sometimes he even preached before saying Mass. It was not till towards evening that he broke his fast. He curtailed his already short hours of sleep in order to get time to study the Scriptures. And thus teaching, reforming, and founding houses of his order, St. John Capistran passed through the whole of South Germany, and even penetrated as far north as Halle. Possibly he here came in contact with Johannes Busch, but there is no record of their having met. At Augsburg he ^ Pastor, vol. i. p. 390. Catholic Reformers 89 preached for a week on the follies and sins of the times, after which, we are told, many tresses of false hair, and a pile of gambling-tables and cards, were burned in the market- place.^ At Leipzig, after preaching one day on death, with a skull in his hand, he was accosted by a hundred and twenty students, who had been present at the sermon, with a request for admission into different religious orders. During his progress through Germany, he gave the habit of St. Francis to about two hundred and fifty young men, who had been converted by his preaching." While some were prompted by the needs of the Church and of society, and by their own unquenchable missionary ardour to wander throughout the length and breadth of the land, restoring discipline wherever they went, others, no less zealous, were content to spend themselves in some single corner of the vast congeries of States now represented by the German Empire. Among these latter was Johannes Geiler, the son of a notary at Schaffhausen, born in 1445.^ Soon after his birth his parents removed to the neighbourhood of Kaisersberg in Upper Alsace, where his father died, three years later, from a wound received while bear-hunting. The boy was adopted by his paternal grandfather, and lived happily at Kaisersberg till his fifteenth year. He then began his more advanced studies at the University of Freiburg, which had been founded in 1456 by the Archduke, Albert VI., a prince of the House of Hapsburg. Here Geiler distinguished him- self brilliantly, receiving in quick succession every academic honour. Scarcely had he finished his studies at the Uni- versity of Basle, when he was invited to occupy the Chair of Theology at Freiburg, and on October 31, 1476 he was elected Rector of that University. In the pulpit he was thoroughly at home. Keen and incisive in his speech, he attacked the sins of the age in language at once forcible, original, and convincing. Some of the foremost citizens of Wiirzburg sent to offer him the position of preacher in their town. He preached a trial sermon, with which the burghers were so well pleased that they at once proposed to give him a stipend amounting to the then considerable sum of two hundred gold dollars, until a suitable benefice could be found for him. ^ Pastor, vol. i. p. 392. ^ Ibid. p. 130. " Lindemann, 'Johannes Geiler von Kaisersberg^ pp. 1 1 et seq. 90 Reformation and Renaissance Geiler hastened back to the University to fetch his books, making a halt at Strassburg to visit the Burgomaster, Peter Schott, who knew him at least by reputation, Basle and Freiburg being frequented by many Alsatian students. When Schott found that the learned man, who had already made a name for himself at two Universities, was forsaking the professorial chair for the pulpit, he drew so dreary a picture of the spiritual and moral desolation of Strassburg, and argued so cleverly about the duty which Geiler owed before all to his own country, that he finally persuaded him that it would be wrong for him not to remain there. ^ Schott easily arranged matters with Robert, Bishop of Strassburg ; it was agreed that a certain episcopal chaplaincy should be conferred on the preacher as a means of livelihood, but the actual holder of the benefice would have to be compensated, and Schott agreed to pay him an annuity of thirty gold dollars out of his private fortune. While this business was being arranged to the satisfaction of the Strassburgers, a messenger arrived post-haste from Wiirzburg, in quest of the missing preacher. The citizens of Strassburg became greatly excited, and for fear lest Geiler should be kidnapped, they clapped the emissary into prison until all the pledges and counter-pledges were signed and sealed. When everything had been settled, and Geiler solemnly installed, a second messenger appeared. Him they received in a friendly manner, released the first-comer, stifled his sense of injury with handsome damages, and sent both home with a letter and affectionate salutations to their good friends of W^iirzburg. The action was summary, but characteristic of the way in which disputes were avoided or settled in the 15th century. Subsequently, Bishop Robert, with the consent of his Chapter, erected the preachership into a permanent institution, and at the request of Pope Sixtus IV. confirmed the office by a decretal. The title of episcopal chaplain was suppressed, and the functions belonging thereto were merged into those of the preachership. The Bishop made over to the Dean and Chapter the right of nomination to the new dignity, 1 Wiirzburg being in Franconia, and Strassburg in Alsace, those places were then considered to be in different countries. Although not born in Alsace, Geiler was brought up there, and was always known as Geiler of Kaisersberg. Catholic Reformers 91 reserving to himself the confirmation of their choice. It was made incumbent on them to elect, as far as possible, the worthiest and most experienced candidate, a Licentiate or Doctor of Divinity, who was only to be considered definitely elected after a trial of two months, A certain portion of the revenues of the cathedral was set aside as his stipend, and the Chapter was to provide him with a suitable residence. He was to have a fortnight's holiday in the course of the year, and might not be absent at any other time, even for one night, without the consent of the Dean, and never, under any pretext, during Lent. Illness, or express leave from the Dean, were the only excuses allowed for missing a sermon. Moreover, during his absence or illness, his place must be taken by another secular priest, and the sermon was on no account to be omitted. In Lent there was to be a sermon daily ; at other times of the year, on Sundays and holidays of obligation, besides the vigils of the principal feasts, and on special occasions, such as the visit of a papal Legate, or that of any other important personage. The preacher was dispensed by the Bishop from attendance in choir, but he was obliged to swear obedience to the Chapter. In undertaking this office, Geiler did not blind himself to its difficulties, or to the inevitable struggle that awaited him. He foresaw the resistance he would encounter in attacking deeply-rooted abuses, not only among the laity, and even in the ranks of the magistrature who appeared so friendly and appreciative, but from the clergy themselves. To adopt one of his own expressions, he was like a bugler who, in spite of bullets and bombs, ceased not to call where the battle waged hottest, till his spirited notes were silenced by death.-' He had before long ample opportunity for showing the stufi^ of which his eloquence was made. Bishop Robert died on October 17, 1478, and a month later, day for day, Geiler preached his funeral sermon. The discourse was in Latin, in presence of the new Bishop, of a crowd of princes, counts, bishops, abbots, and other dignitaries. Robert had had failings, but also thoroughly good qualities, and during the latter years of his long reign, which had extended from 1439 to 1478, he had done his ^ Navicula fattiorttm ttirba, p. 103. gz Reformation and Renaissance best to restore order in his principality, to make good the faults of former rulers, as well as to atone in some measure for his own early shortcomings. The verdict of history is not unfavourable to him, and he had certainly been a benevolent patron of Geiler's ; but the preacher, considering the elevated position of the dead prelate, and the talents conferred upon him, refused to extol virtues which he looked upon as very ordinary ones, while he deemed the opportunity favourable for impressing upon all present the vanity of earthly great- ness. " Robert is dead ! " he cried ; " Robert, by the grace of God Bishop of Strassburg, Count Palatine, Duke of Bavaria, Landgrave of Alsace — dead in the arms of his relations, like any other worm of earth." And after ex- pressing a wish that some other than himself, possessed with the eloquence of a Cicero, might have preached this funeral sermon, Geiler went on to speak of the blessings of peace, for which the diocese had to thank its late Bishop, and added : " For this, O Robert, may God grant thee eternal peace ! " Here the preacher paused, and then, with an inspiration at once dramatic and intensely solemn, he, as it were, called up the angry shade of the departed, and caused him to speak thus : " Thou extollest the nobility of my house ; thou extoUest to the sky the benefits of peace, and for these reasons thou lamentest my death. Thou fool ! " *' Wherefore a fool ? " asked Geiler. *' Because fame, riches, enjoyment, even life itself, and all that men praise and seek, is naught." Geiler excused himself by saying that he knew this very well, but did not venture to declare it. Robert himself must expound these hard truths. " Do not venture," continued the dead man, " to magnify noble blood. Have we not all one Father ? Are we not the creatures of one God ? " and he began to enumerate one after another — Saul, David, the apostles — all of whom had been chosen from among the obscure and lowly, showing that there was no value in birth and position, but only in virtue and nobility of soul ; and he discoursed on the utter vanity of human life. Nevertheless, there was something good in life, inasmuch as it was the road to a happy eternity, if only men did not miss it. Catholic Reformers 93 " And which is the road ? " asked the preacher. " Fear God and keep His Commandments ; that is the whole law." " But here are bishops, prelates, abbots ; hast thou no special recommendations for them ? " " They have the rules laid down for them by the Fathers of the Church ; let them follow these. But," continued the shade, " tell me, Johannes, is there not a new bishop in my place already ? Who is he ?'' " He is Albert, thy nephew. Hast thou any command for him ? " " As often as thou seest him, forget not to repeat to him the words of the apostle : ' A bishop should be blameless,' " and from this text the dead man was supposed to describe the whole round of a bishop's duties, and he ended by saying, "Tell him all this." " Albert has heard it himself; he is here," replied Geiler, and then, with one last impressive " God be with thee," he allowed the imagined apparition to sink to rest. Turning to the august assembly, he closed his sermon with the words, " God be with you all. Robert is dead." ^ Bishop Albert continued the work begun by his uncle. He sought to reduce the debts of his diocese, redeemed long- pawned fiefs, and repaired the fortresses and castles of his principality — excellent measures, which enabled those who came after him to withstand the ravages caused by the War of the Peasants. In order to obtain means for carrying out these reforms he induced Pope Sixtus IV. to empower him to receive the revenues of all the vacant benefices in his diocese for the space of one year. This was termed the granting of annates. He further applied for and obtained a dispensation for the diocese of Strassburg from the severity of the Lenten fast ; and the Pope allowed, as in 1344 for Cologne and Treves, the use of butter and eggs. Whoever wished to make use of this dispensation obtained it in exchange for an alms proportionate to his circumstances. So large a number of people availed themselves of it that it was found possible to supply the fortresses with new cannons, which were at once popularly dubbed " Butter -boxes." But the proceeding was extremely repugnant to Geiler, and he ceased not to bewail the departure from the original ^ Lindemann, p. 17. 94 Reformation and Renaissance severity of the Lenten abstinence. His friends doubted whether he even once availed himself of the dispensation, however much he suffered from the rigour of Lent. Meanwhile the reforms which had been set on foot barely extended to spiritualities, although there was some slight improvement in the episcopal palace. Once, by dint of a great effort. Bishop Albert convened a Diocesan Synod. It was in Low Week, 1482. Six hundred priests obeyed the summons, and Geiler was entrusted with the opening sermon. He did not spare his hearers, and even Albert himself was not handled delicately. He told him a parable — " Once a bishop was riding in the midst of a gay throng of warriors and courtiers, and coming to a field saw a peasant staring open-mouthed at the cavalcade, forgetful of plough and furrow. The bishop asked him why he stared so stupidly, and what he was thinking of. The ploughman answered that he was wondering whether St. Martin, who was also a bishop, went about in such attire, and with such company. But the bishop replied that he was not there then as a bishop but as a duke, and that if the man would see him as a churchman he should come to the cathedral on such and such a day, when he would find him in that capacity. Whereupon the peasant began to smile grimly, and answered, * But when the devil carries off the duke what shall become of the bishop .? ' " Geiler ended his harangue, in which he lashed the sins of the sanctuary with a whip of scorpions, by a business-like appeal : — " Now speak, my Lord Bishop, and tell us what you have resolved to do in the way of reform. Show us that you are animated with zeal for the building up of the Church ; that you intend to carry out what has already been determined, for of what use is it to make new resolu- tions when neither the old nor the new are to be kept ? Let the deed follow the word, or it will one day be objected that you have indeed the voice of Jacob, but that your hands are the hands of Esau." ^ The acts of this Synod have not been preserved, and much that was hoped from it was not attained, many hindrances occurring to hamper Bishop Albert's good inten- 1 Sermones et varii tractatus Kaiserbergii, Strassburg, 1 5 1 8. Catholic Reformers 95 tions. But Geiler would not hear of defeat, and continued to work indefatigably in the cause of reform. One of the things which distressed him most was the unhappy fate of condemned criminals, who, according to the prevailing custom, went to their death deprived both of holy Communion and Christian burial. At Strassburg those who were sentenced to be hanged were taken to a small chapel, where a priest exposed the Host on the altar for a short time, after which they were led to the place ot execution at one of the city gates. The same ceremony was observed in the Church of St. Martin, for those who were to suffer death by drowning. The Sacrament of Penance was administered to them on the Schindbriicke (Bridge of Shingles), and they were then flung from the bridge into the 111. Geiler, indignant at this cruel law, demanded its aboli- tion. But the magistrature defended the usage, and the religious Orders were on their side, a single friar, the Carme- lite Johannes Freitag, adopting Geiler's view. The whole city was agitated. The Bishop referred the matter to the learned among his clergy, but opinions were divided. In the meantime a papal Legate, the Franciscan Emmerich von Kemel, arrived at Strassburg, and was at once assailed with the question that was occupying all minds. He refused to give any answer until the opinion of the University of Heidelberg had been ascertained. It proved favourable to Geiler's desire, the Faculties of Theology and Jurisprudence declaring unanimously that if the condemned showed signs of contrition, and a desire to receive holy Communion it ought not to be denied to them. Accordingly, in the first week of Lent 1485, the magis- trature of Strassburg abolished the old law, and decreed that if the confessor of any criminal esteemed him worthy, he might communicate him before execution. This rule con- tinued in force until Strassburg was united to France, when the severe laws of the Gallican Church again deprived him of the privilege of Communion. Other reforms, to obtain which Geiler worked not unsuc- cessfully, related to the abuses connected with certain religious feasts. According to an old ritual of the Cathedral of Strassburg, the Feast of St. Stephen was dedicated to deacons ; that of St. John the Evangelist to priests ; the octave of the 96 Reformation and Renaissance Epiphany to sub-deacons ; and that of the Holy Innocents to the ranks of the clergy below the sub-diaconate, and to choristers. The popular customs, originally full of pic- turesque symbolism, which attached to the Feast of the Holy Innocents and to that of Pentecost, had degenerated, as the religious sense of the people declined, into wild buffoonery bordering on sacrilege. The custom of electing a boy-bishop, whose word was law for one day, in honour of the martyred Innocents, had originated with the Emperor Conrad in 912. The choristers presided at the Divine Office, and their master sang the High Mass. Afterwards the boys rode through the streets in carts, singing, with becoming solemnity, the mysteries of Bethlehem, the adoration of the Wise Men, etc. But gradually the gentle, well-conducted youths of the Bishop's seminary were replaced by rough, untutored fellows, whose religious and dramatic sense was nil, and whose only idea of recreation was what we should call horse-play. For years they had been the annual terror of peaceful folk, making of the scene a hideous pandemonium and a scandal. On the vigil of the feast it was customary for them to choose a bishop from among their number, and when in the vespers of St. John, Deposuit potentes de sede was sung, the boy-bishop, in pontifical vestments, went to the bishop's throne, sang the orations, and gave the blessing, while his comrades in the choir sang the antiphons and responses. The ceremony was repeated the next day, and when the services were over, the boys led their " bishop " travestied through the streets, performing mad pranks on the passers- by, creating disorder and alarm everywhere, and finally forcing an entrance into churches and monasteries, where by their numbers they were able to carry all before them. The subject of these unruly exhibitions was much debated in the fifteenth-century synods, but popular institutions die hard, and in Geiler's day they continued to disgrace the Cathedral of Strassburg. Even more repulsive were the abuses that had grown round the ceremonies of Whitsuntide. In ancient times these ceremonies were as imposing as they were solemn. From, all parishes in the diocese pilgrims, bearing crosses, banners, and relics, streamed into the metro- politan church ; and during the whole octave before Catholic Reformers 97 Pentecost, processions passed through the streets ceaselessly, visiting church after church, singing and praying devoutly. On the feast itself the pilgrims walked in procession after hearing High Mass at the Cathedral, to the so-called Lieb- frauenhaus, where each person received a small coin called the " Whit-penny," a tax which the administrators of the Cathedral Building Fund were bound to pay to the in- habitants of the various communes which had contributed to the building of the sacred edifice. So far there was nothing objectionable ; but one by one elements of popular ribaldry were introduced, until at last it was usual, on the return of the procession to the Cathedral, for a clown to place himself behind a certain grotesquely-carved statue near the organ, where he attracted general attention by the most hideous noises and gestures, interrupting the devotions by vulgar songs bawled out at the top of his voice, and interspersed with impish tricks and grimaces. This creature was called " the roaring ape," and his antics came to be considered an integral part of the Whitsuntide ceremonies.^ But each feast-day throughout the year had its particular scandals, and even a black fast such as Ash Wednesday was not without its revolting practical jokes. No wonder that Geiler, in common with the most earnest men of his time, deplored the frequent recurrence of holy days, and did what he could to lessen their number. Callous and indecent behaviour in regard to sacred things was not confined to the people, but permeated all ranks, and probably had its origin among the higher classes, filtering downward, until no portion of the body-politic was free from it. It was the habit of sportsmen to assemble in Strassburg Cathedral as a kind of meet before hunting, and the great nobles with their retainers might be seen on those days walking up and down in sporting costume, falcons on their wrists or hounds at their heels. Here also the Burgomaster, for whom a special place was reserved, would hold his magisterial court, hear witnesses, and give sentence. The church porch was filled with vendors of all kinds of wares, who were allowed, on payment of a small tax, to erect booths and stalls. Not only were the aisles used as a place of public promenade, even during the singing of the Divine ^ Lindemann, p. 30. H 98 Reformation and Renaissance Office, but the church was habitually treated as a short cut to and from the market-place ; and merchandise bought there was indiscriminately carried home that way. Even young pigs were borne squealing through the sacred building.-^ For years Geiler thundered and waged war in vain against these indecencies. People had grown so much accustomed to the actual condition of things that even the better sort were not easily moved to fight for reform. Nevertheless, the preacher's voice was not raised entirely in vain. In 1480 the magistrature were induced to abolish certain causes of complaint. Social gatherings were for- bidden inside the Cathedral, and the law was no longer administered therein. Women might not thenceforth sit and lounge on the steps of the choir. It was made penal to swear by the different members of Christ's body. No victuals were to be sold in the porches on Sundays and on the four great festivals. A fine of ^^5 was imposed on any man entering a convent of women, and vice versa. The boy-bishop was forbidden to incense the altar or to sing the orations. But against the horrible profanity of " the roaring ape," Geiler not only pleaded and threatened in vain, but his attacks provoked so much antagonism that the scandal was even aggravated. Nevertheless, however partial the result, Geiler continued to spare neither individuals nor corporations ; his animated speech knew no barriers of mere human respect, and it is therefore not surprising to find him, in the year 1500, in open collision with the magistrature. Their complaint against him was that he had denounced them in a sermon as " the devil's own brood," together with their ancestors and their posterity. The expression was undeniably a strong one, but forcible language was the order of the day. The preacher by no means denied the charge, and answered them verbally : " It is true that I have so expressed myself, and with deliberate intention. My reasons are too far-reaching to be given here, but I will not delay to put them before you in writing." The result was a series of twenty-one articles, each article consisting of the statement of a scandal either tolerated or perpetrated by the governing body of Strassburg. The last 1 Lindemann, pp. 33-35. Catholic Reformers 99 article related to the use made by them of the rack, for the purpose of wresting the truth from the lips of the accused in criminal trials. The custom was universal throughout Europe, but Geiler maintained that it was illegal and iniquitous, and that other means of eliciting evidence, more in accordance with Christian and imperial law, must be found. He concluded thus : " Niirnberg, to its eternal honour and glory, has abolished the rack ^ ; let us do like- wise, and this our city of Strassburg will be looked up to by every other city throughout the land. At present every one says, ' It is done at Strassburg ; there they know better than we do ' ; and on this account we should remember our re- sponsibility. I have not written these articles for the hurt or shame of any one, but because of the duty of my ofEce, and of the command I have received to exhort you fraternally." The archives of the city are dumb as to any immediate results obtained by Geiler's articles, and subsequent history mentions but a few points on which the demanded reforms were made. For twenty-three years a man of the purest morality, of the deepest insight into human nature, of the most convinc- ing logic, had stood up in the midst of his people, and had called upon them ceaselessly, in the name of religion, of ethics, of freedom and dignity, to put down crying evils ; and at the end of that time, for all his spent labour, he had obtained but a few grudgingly-bestowed reforms, which left the root of the matter practically untouched. When the morality of a nation is on the decline, it is hard indeed for a preacher, even were he a St, John the Baptist, to arrest the downward movement, even for a day. Despairing to effect any lasting good by means of an inert legislative body Geiler continued to appeal to what remnants of recuperative power might still be found among the people. He warned all whom it might concern against entering the ranks of the clergy without real vocations. Here, he insisted, there must be no question of leading an easy life, of accumulating riches, or of seeking a career. " We priests must betake ourselves to meditation," he said earnestly ; *' our business is not to heap up benefices, to ride about the country with a cavalcade of sixty horses, but to lead a contemplative life." ^ It was in constant use in England a century later. lOO Reformation and Renaissance Again, he addressed parents who regarded the ecclesi- astical state as a means of livelihood for their children, and who comforted themselves with the reflection, " He has nothing to worry about ; he is a priest, and is provided for." Geiler further reproached them with considering that the most wretched and ill-conditioned of their children was good enough to be given to the Church. " Is one of your children a cripple, or in any way infirm ^ (You wish he were at Jericho.) ' Oh/ you say, ' he will make a good enough priest ' ; or ' we will turn him into a monk,' just as when you have a hen with the pip, or a measly sucking-pig, you offer them to St. Anthony. This is the way, forsooth, we give our children to God 1 " You complain of there being so many bad priests. It is your fault for forcing them upon the sanctuary without a vocation, disregarding the Church's laws." ^ He has a word in favour of mutual charity between members of religious orders. " Religious people," he com- plains, " are all opposed to each other, each maintaining that his own Order is higher or holier than all the others. , . . * St. Francis founded my Order, St. Dominic mine, and St. Benedict mine.' It should not be so. Christ our Lord is the Abbot of us all, and we are all under Him ; therefore let no one Order put anything in the way of another, or despise another, for we are all one Order in Christ, Who is our one Abbot. But alas ! one is a Thomist, another a Scotist, another an Albertist, another an Occamist, and no monk calls one of another Order learned. This is folly. Let a man be of what Order he will, if he says what is right and good he is a good teacher." Like Johannes Busch, Geiler devoted a large portion of his time and thoughts to the restoration of discipline in religious communities. His influence was perhaps most permanently seen in the Order of Penitents of St. Mary Magdalen. Finding that they had become considerably relaxed, he succeeded in causing them to adopt the more severe rule of St. Augustine, being cordially seconded in his efforts by their good Superior, Mother Susanna Horwartin. He said Mass for them daily, preached to them often, and translated for their use several ascetic works into German. A large number of the sermons which he preached to these 1 Lindemann, p. 54. Catholic Reformers loi nuns, and to others, have happily been preserved, and show his earnest appreciation of the religious life. They are an amply sufficient answer to those who profess to recognise in Geiler an opponent of monasticism. His line of thought expressed therein is this : Nothing is more praiseworthy than for a soul to consecrate itself to God by the three vows of religion ; no state is nobler or more sublime. In a religious house people may live more purely, fall less often, rise more easily, watch over themselves more successfully, be more carefully supervised, be more freed from worldly cares, may receive richer graces, and prepare themselves better for death and eternity than anywhere else on earth. But the cowl does not make a monk, nor the habit a nun, but the heart. There are two orders : the outer one, by which one appears to be a monk or a nun ; the inner, by which one is in truth and reality a religious. The inner order consists in patience, humility, and charity. To the outer belong the rule, singing, reading, fasting, silence, enclosure. The latter is nothing without the former. Out- ward works have for their object the conversion of the inward man — a difficult task indeed, and many find, it easy to leave the goods of this world, but few to forsake their own wills. Geiler insists on the careful observance of the rule, and on cheerful obedience, and he judges three things indispensable, but also sufficient for securing an effective reform. These are : strict enclosure, community life in all things, and silence. Even in regular houses the ease with which the nuns can see their relations and friends causes restlessness, and preoccupation with the concerns of the outside world, distractions, and a longing for human con- solations. The nuns receive all sorts of presents at the grating, so that conventual poverty becomes a self-deception ; and there are two classes of religious — those who are really poor, and those who belong to rich families. Parents, under the pretext of their children's weak health, bring them every imaginable luxury, and the nuns are at last unable to live without " little birds, little cats, and little dogs." ^ In the unreformed houses community life is a mere name, one may see twenty, thirty, forty different saucepans on the kitchen fire, testifying to the particular appetite or fancy of ^- Lindemann, p. 68. I02 Reformation and Renaissance each sister. Geiler insists on a common table, and on uniformity of clothing. " And this poverty," he observes, with one of his exquisitely gentle touches in the midst of thundering eloquence, " must be put on meekly, and cherished with all your hearts, after the example of our Lord Jesus Christ." If religious life has its joys and consolations, it has also its heavy trials ; gratings and bolts are not able to shut out and keep at a distance tedium, strife, anguish of heart, dryness, temptations. Geiler consoles and edifies the poor tormented soul, and places it in the presence of God. In playful allusion he compares it to a small bird caught • and imprisoned in a narrow room ; it flies to the window, stretches out its neck and would fain be outside. If the sash be open ever so little, it hastens to effect an escape. Even so the soul which has forsaken all earthly things should pine and long for its true home. *' If any happiness is still to be found in this miserable world," he cries, " there is no more likely place for it than in a convent where the rule is faithfully kept." For more than thirty years Geiler gave instructions such as those in the convents, of the regular observance at Strass- burg. The history of the years that followed confirmed all that he had hoped, and also feared. Scarcely were his eyes closed in death, when the day of trial dawned. Some of the religious houses fell completely, others maintained a stout-hearted fidelity. In 1524 the barefooted Carmelites threw off their habits, and gave up their convent to the now Lutheran magistrature. Their example was followed by the Dominicans, of whom, however, a few remained faithful to their vows, and emigrated. The fall of the Poor Clares of Strassburg was a lamentable contrast to the heroic courage with which their sisters of Niirnberg fought the good fight. The Strassburg Dominicanesses of St. Margaret's Convent also waged a victorious war with the powers of darkness, and the Penitents of St. Mary Magdalen were their worthy associates in the struggle. To the end of his life Geiler had guarded these from every danger from without, and was especially careful that they should not fall into the hands of confessors from any of the relaxed mendicant orders. Their convent Catholic Reformers 103 weathered all the storms of the Reformation ; and for a hundred years afterwards, until the French occupation, it was the only place in Strassburg where Catholic worship was still held.^ Writers on the pre-Reformation period are wont to lay so much stress on the corruption of ecclesiastical institutions in the fifteenth century, ignoring the rottenness of the whole body, social and politic, that it would appear as though a world thirsting for righteousness had found the cisterns of the Church empty and dry. The result of this false and restricted view has been considerably to confuse the questions at issue. If the Church was in a sorry plight, it was because of its too close contact with a society from which every semblance of justice had departed. Wimpheling, the celebrated humanist, and Geiler's first biographer, shows in his Amoenitates^ that in Germany, as in England, the lusting after other people's goods had far more to do with the secularisation of monasteries and convents than their decad- ence, or any other argument whatever. He says," " In our time covetousness is a veritable disease, and the seducers of our princes seek to persuade them that the clergy are a great deal too rich, and that their goods may be stolen and confiscated without fear of injustice, perjury, or any offence against God. Therefore they begin by taxing heavily all Church property, capital, lands, houses, and farms, in the hope soon to be able to swoop down upon them. Their first pretext is the demoralisation of the clergy, and they bellow loudly against the servants of God, as if they were leeches on the body of the State. But I ask them, ' What do the clergy possess that belongs to you } What have you ever given to the Church .'' Granted that they are richer than many of you who have squandered your inheritance in gaming, luxury, excesses, and every vice. Does that give you a right to steal the property of the Church } There are others who are rich also ; have the poor the right to break into their houses, and to empty their money-boxes and granaries ? You reproach churchmen with making a bad use of their riches, but do you employ in defence of the Church the tithes which you have obtained under the distinct understanding that they should be so used } Each one will be judged at the last day.' " ^ Linderaann, p. 70. - Vol. ii. p. 178. I04 Reformation and Renaissance In many ways, the condition of the world was not unlike what it is at the beginning of the present century. By the side of a nobility sunk to a low moral ebb, and more than half-ruined by habits of luxury, had arisen a strong middle class, intelligent, industrious, and enriched by favourable commercial conditions. This new generation, if more virile than the old, was, above all, remarkable for its flippancy, its ambition and vanity. It loved nothing so much as money. Whoever possessed money was honoured, thought much of, and courted. Women of the middle class dressed themselves like noble dames, worthy wives like courtesans, and these latter like princesses. Geiler's censures on the extravagant fashions in dress would scarcely surprise us in a present-day sermon. " In these days," he declared, " women go about looking like men, with their hair hanging down their backs, wearing little round hats with cocks' feathers. Look at their skirts, cut up like a chessboard, with so many pieces that the making costs more than the material. Some possess so many dresses that they have two for every day in the week, one for the morning, another for the afternoon, and when they go to dances or other amusements they have yet other dresses to wear, and they will rather let the moth eat them than give them to the poor. Do you wish to study Hungarian, Bohemian, Saxon, French, Welsh or Flandrian fashions you must come to Strassburg where they are all to be seen." Even the dress of the clergy did not escape Geiler's criticism, and he blamed them for adopting the French cassock with its absurdly long train. No one was spared. The peasantry, and the lowest class of citizens, so long preserved, by the simplicity of their way of life, from the lax morality of the age, were no longer to be commended, and we hear the preacher bewailing their newly-developed habit of lounging in ale-houses. The small farmers, too, had fallen a prey to the new-fashioned luxury and self-indulgence. They were not now content, forsooth, to wear ticking, and the little, short jacket that had been their costume for centuries, but must needs buy cloth from Mechlin, and have it hacked about, and dyed all sorts of colours. In order to get money to spend on their vanities, they raised the price of corn and wine to an extortionate degree. Their ambition was to get their sons into church benefices, while they Catholic Reformers 105 railed against tithes, and evaded them as often as they could. ■* Lest we should suspect Geiler's account of this state of society to be overdrawn in his zeal for perfection, we may turn to his famous contemporary, Sebastian Brant, who we shall find corroborates it in every point, and almost word for word. Both Geiler and Brant saw the world with sober, healthy eyes, and prophesied dark things in the future, all of which were fully realised. Brant divided the different grades of society into 1 1 3 classes of fools, packed them all into a ship, and while they sailed to Narragonia (Fool's Paradise), detailed the story of their separate foUies with consummate wit." His object was to counteract the rebellious spirit then rising, and to put forward the reasonableness of papal authority. From the Court down to the humblest cowherd, a canker was eating into the life of society. The old forms still remained, but the spirit that had animated them had for the most part gone out of them, and they were doomed to crumble into dust at the slightest shock. It is true that very generally the salt of the earth had lost its savour, and did little to arrest the decay of the moribund social body ; but it is also true that God had not left Himself without witnesses, and apostles, such as Geiler, were raised .up in plenty to show the way of holiness to men of good-will. Geiler was not so much absorbed by his crusade against moral abuses as to neglect other signs of the times — the various heresies that were to be the future war-cries of reformers yet unknown to the world. The fundamental principles of Protestantism by no means grew out of Luther's brain. Wyclif's doctrines had once for all taken root in Bohemia, and were not altogether unknown in German soil. Individuals had long been whispering strange doctrines, which Luther preached from the house-tops in a more concise form. He chose his battlefield cleverly ; its land- marks were faith, indulgences, and good works. But Geiler had anticipated him, and before he propounded his theses they had been already refuted. With what power and lucidity did this great Catholic reformer write of faith : — " Faith is the foundation of all religion ; it enlightens 1 Lindcmann, p. 74. - Brant's Nr.rrenschiff der Zeit. io6 Reformation and Renaissance the understanding, purifies the soul, strengthens and illumines the whole man. It is the morning star which precedes the sun of righteousness ; it is the miraculous star of Bethlehem, that leads to the Saviour of the world. Before all it is necessary to hold fast in the spirit of faith the truths of revelation as they are taught by the Church." His discourses on Scripture are an answer to all the subsequent fallacies put forward by the Protestant reformers. Even at the present time many people are convinced that Luther discovered the Bible, and would be amazed to hear that in Geiler's day nearly a hundred editions of it had been printed, and that at least fifteen of these editions were in high German, and five in the low German dialect. Often and earnestly did the preacher recommend to his hearers the diligent study of the Scriptures, in order that they might learn therein the fear of God, hatred of sin, love of virtue, terror of hell, desire of heaven. Without hesitation he classed the Bible, together with the Holy Eucharist, as one vessel from which must be received the source of Divine wisdom unto eternal life. But they must each be used in the right way ; and here Geiler diverged completely from Protestant principles. He dis- approved in toto of the private interpretation of Scripture. " Many carry their pride, envy, and other passions into their reading of the Bible, and prove it by the way in which they distort its meaning. But the Bible is not to blame for their errors. It has been explained by competent teachers, under the guidance of the same spirit which first inspired it, and we must follow their interpretations and not our own fancies, otherwise each individual might pretend to discover what- ever suited himself. . . . There are people who, when reprehended for their vices, reply : ' We understand Scripture differently from you.' " ^ But if Geiler had to deal with unlearned people who thought themselves able to determine the sense and meaning of every obscure passage in Scripture, the so-called modern opinions which are now flooding the world and are supposed to ^be the particular offspring of our own enlightened age, were not unknown to him. " There are others," he declares, " who think nothing of the Bible, but say that it is a thing imagined — a fable. I have heard them myself at Court. 1 Navicuia fatuorum, p. 102. Catholic Reformers 107 They maintain that it is hke a waxen nose that allows itself to be turned this way and that. Others again say that it is impossible to keep the Commandments ; that man has no choice ; and they deny that God gives to each sufficient grace. Providence is also denied, and chance, the fate of the old heathen world, is placed at the head of affairs. At the best, they say, we know nothing, and we can know nothing, about God." He answered the Babel of contentious voices by ex- pounding Catholic doctrine, original sin and its consequences, grace and its channels the sacraments. He warned his hearers against unpractical and useless dissertations on the manner of Christ's presence in the Eucharist, and recom- mended in place of them frequent Communion after the necessary preparation. He gave instructions on the manner of making a good confession, discoursing on contrition, purpose of amendment, satisfaction, and a change of life. He was careful to teach the difference between mortal and venial sin, and quoted the illustration of St. Augustine, who describes venial sin as a child belonging to a band of robbers, and made use of, to obtain entrance into a house through a very small aperture, in order that he may afterwards throw open the door to them. Geiler's instructions on penance led naturally to teaching on the subject of indulgences, the rallying -point of the Church's enemies, more hated than any other doctrine, and certainly more open to abuse. His definition was exact and clear : " An indulgence is remission of a debt. But of what kind of debt ? Not a debt of mortal sin, for to gain an indulgence one is required to be free from every grave offence. Neither is it remission of eternal punishment, for in hell there is no escape possible ; but it is remission of the temporal punishment which still remains to be borne when contrition and confession have turned everlasting into temporal punishment. Nevertheless, personal works of penance should not be neglected ; for the mortification a man inflicts upon himself is far better than what he acquires of other people's merits by means of an indulgence. One's own penance is at the same time an atonement for sins com- mitted, and a preventative against a relapse into the same. It is wise to make use of both means." ^ 1 Peregrin, fol. lo, x. z. io8 Reformation and Renaissance To Geiler's friends belonged primarily the Schott family. Though not reckoned among the ancient nobility of Alsace, they had been represented in the city councils as far back as 1237, and were accounted patricians of Strassburg. Peter Schott, the Burgomaster who had secured Geiler for the cathedral pulpit, was the last of the Catholic-minded chief magistrates who ruled the city. He had an only son who had been brought up by the learned Johann Miiller of Rastadt, and this youth won golden opinions as well as honours at the University of Bologna. When Geiler arrived at Strassburg young Schott was there also, his studies at Bologna having been interrupted by the plague. He at once took him in hand, and the two became fast friends. On Schott's return to the University disciple and master kept up a correspondence of which the following extract will give some notion, although the original was written in elegant Latin. Geiler had given the young man a rule of life, and had compared the innumerable dangers, by which he would be surrounded, to a swarm of bees : — " The bees of which you spoke," wrote Schott, " are more numerous than you would suppose. The more one beats them off the more persistent they become. Flight is my one resource, and when I have escaped from them I shut the window carefully to keep them out of my room, despising their honey because I fear their sting." In another letter he touches lightly on Geiler's too great love of work : — " I know that my letter will find you in the midst of study and sermons, but this gives me the more courage to write freely, in order that my trivialities may cause you a little to unharness your mind, to which you never accord the least recreation." He reminds him of the suggestive example of Socrates, and continues : — " I hope this year's fast will fall less heavily upon you, on account of the dispensation for eggs and butter, for I cannot believe that you will refuse the favour offered, in spite of your stoical and immutable principles ; but I trust that you will spare yourself for the sake of your labours, otherwise, I fear you will go against the opinion of St. Jerome, in preferring a lesser good to a greater, for any one Catholic Reformers 109 can fast ; but how will you, being exhausted bodily, fulfil your duties as a preacher ? . . . I often vaunt the lot of my fellow-citizens, to whom God has given such a master, and the more especially when I listen to the preachers of whom Italy is proud. They preach neither the Gospels nor the Fathers, but weave a broad web from philosophers and poets, and in order to magnify themselves, exasperate each other, challenge each other to dispute, call each other heretics, and justify themselves, not by the integrity of their faith, but by the favour of their fellow-citizens. Having a contempt for these things, you preach the Word of God ; but for that very reason you should take care of your health in order that your hearers may have you with them as long as possible." ^ His course of philosophy ended, Schott went to Ferrara to study theology, and after overcoming manifold difficulties on the part of his family, was ordained priest in 1432. A canonry was provided for him at Strassburg, and he became Geiler's right hand, and his coadjutor in all his strenuous labours for reform. But an epidemic, supposed to be the plague which appeared at Strassburg in 1490, cut short the promising young life. Schott was deeply mourned, not only in Alsace but throughout Germany, as a scholar, and a model of priestly virtue. Eight years after his death, his works were collected by Wimpheling, at Geiler's request, and were published at Strassburg under the title Petri Schotti Lucu- braciuncul<£ ornatissim^e. They contain more than two hundred letters or memorials, dissertations, and other similar pieces, all in classical Latin, besides a considerable number of poems in the same language and of a religious character. Jakob Wimpheling, who after Schott was Geiler's most intimate friend, was the foremost Alsatian humanist of his day. Born in 1450, he distinguished himself at the Universities of Freiburg, Erfurt, and Heidelberg, after- wards passing fourteen years as a preacher at Speyer, whose bishop, Ludwig von Helmstadt, was one of the best prelates of the fifteenth century. Wimpheling could not have been in a better school ; the Bishop was zealous for reform, held frequent diocesan synods and visitations, and at his death the German Church lost one of its brightest ornaments. But Wimpheling, whose health was weakly, found the post ^ Lindemann, p. 88. no Reformation and Renaissance of preacher too arduous, and aspired to a professorial chair. Like Peter of Blois, his maxim was Extra universitatem non est vita. He was appointed professor of literature at Heidelberg, and three years later was hospitably received by Geiler at Strassburg. The two men had striking points of resemblance with each other. Both were rough and somewhat harsh in manner, more inclined to severity than to mildness, and most at home on the battlefield. But these defects were largely discounted by true manliness and a veritable passion for all that was good and holy, both being possessed of a boundless love of Church and Fatherland. Wimpheling became in a certain way Geiler's secretary, taking the place of the gentle, refined Peter Schott. It would be difficult to overrate the combined influence of Geiler and Wimpheling on the revival of learning in Germany. Encouraged by Wimpheling, Abbot Trithemius wrote the first history of German literature, while both he and Geiler urged Thomas Wolf to compile his well-known history of the city of Strassburg. Geiler inspired Wimphel- ing to revise the hymns of the breviary, and caused him to write his spirited defence of the theologians, against the attacks of a humanist of the new school, Jakob Locher. If Geiler was the most celebrated preacher of his day, Wim- pheling was the first pedagogue, and the improved method of teaching Latin in Germany, in the beginning of the six- teenth century was mainly, perhaps entirely, owing to his works, Elegantia majores^ and Isidoneus germanicus^ while his Adolescentia was an epoch-marking book on the subject of education in the spirit of Christianity, Such men as these would hardly be popular favourites in any age, but all the best and noblest among their contem- poraries understood and valued them as they deserved. To themselves they seemed to fail, and it is true that all their efforts were unavailing to avert the catastrophe which over- whelmed their country a few years later. But it is impos- sible not to see in each Catholic reformer that principle of vitality ever at work in the Church, producing men of the necessary fibre to testify to her divine mission in every crisis of the world's history. PETRARCH. From a photograph in the Print Room, British Museum. To face page III. CHAPTER IV THE EARLIER RENAISSANCE Humanism in Italy — Petrarch — Boccaccio — Nicholas V. — Calixtus III. — Pius II. — Savonarola 1 340-1 498 In the foregoing chapter some account has been given of the zealous, if isolated, attempts at reform in Germany during the fifteenth century. We now propose to deal with the two antagonistic forces at work, in Italy, beginning some- what earlier and covering the whole of that period. The one was an intellectual revival in favour of a return to classical culture, the other a spiritual crusade, not merely against the laxity prevalent in the whole Western Church, but against the new wine of humanism that was beginning to intoxicate alike learned and simple, poets, painters, philosophers, and princes. To these two was added a third great movement, the attempt made by Nicholas V. and Pius II. to reconcile the buoyant life and beauty-loving pagan Renaissance with the principles of Christianity, to breathe the spirit of peace upon the combatants, and to adopt, for the second time in her history, all that could be made to serve the purpose of the Church in that hellenic a^stheticism which appealed so powerfully to the new age. We have already shown that the Renaissance did not flash in a sudden and brilliant revelation upon an astonished world, accustomed to the ascetic sombreness of mediaevalism. It was, on the contrary, the result of cen- turies of preparation, having worked its way through the keen pursuit of knowledge that had animated and inspired scholasticism in its prime, till scholasticism appeared to have said, a hundred years after St. Thomas, its last informing 112 Reformation and Renaissance word. The recoil from what was then an effete and ex- hausted system of metaphysics produced humanism, the pursuit of human letters as distinct from ecclesiastical. As these were only to be found in pagan antiquity, the return to them involved a complete readjustment of the mental position, as regarded life and the whole visible universe. With wits sharpened by the prolonged use of dialectics, men were prepared to refine upon sensuous delights as they had refined on abstract essences. " Even the senses should be served like princes, and all pleasures brought within the domain of art," ^ The Renaissance had on its side much that was winning — amiability, faith in human-nature, light-heartedness. It was in league with the most elementary cravings of the heart for happiness in this world, and it has often been described as nothing more nor less than a resurrection from the winding- sheet of a dead past to the splendour and sunshine of long- forgotten arts and sciences, from the worship of a crucified and agonising Christ to the worship of His living, pulsating humanity, and to the enjoyment of all natural beauty. Its motive power was human sympathy, and the device of each of its votaries was Homosum et nihil humani a me alienum puto^ In its youth it had much to recommend it, in spite of the faults incidental to youth and to undisciplined vitality, before its innocent affectations degenerated into academical formality and conventions. In making terms with this revival, the Church proved her adaptability to all ages and all nations. When men wearied of the Peripatetic, she was willing to adopt the Platonic system of philosophy ; when the symbolism of Gothic architecture no longer appealed to them, she offered them the less austere lines of the Greek basilica. If they could no longer be led heavenwards in the way of monastic discipline or in the contemplation of human misery, let them learn to love God in His works of beauty, in the intellect of man, in his physical perfections, in the sunshine that flooded the earth, in the impressive grandeur, and in the joyousness of nature. The worst effects of paganism had been seen in the apotheosis of the evil side of human nature, and for this reason it has been said that the mistake of mediaeval Christianity was to pronounce too absolute an anathema on ^ Mrs. Mark Pattison, The Re?iaissance in France, vol. i. p. 13. The Earlier Renaissance 113 nature altogether, to live suspended between heaven and earth, viewing the one with ecstacy, the other with fear and horror.^ But in reality, the difference between the Greek, the mediasval, and the humanistic idea is even more funda- mental than modern apologists of the Renaissance would have us suppose. At its ■ best, to the classical pagan, nature was the be-all and end-all of existence. When he imported it into the domain of art he was content if he reproduced it so perfectly that, like the painted fruit which the birds mistook for reality, and came and pecked at it, art, as it were, chal- lenged nature, and aimed at nothing else. And whether a Greek sculptor moulded the symmetrical limbs of an athlete, or showed forth a Zeus, a Pallas Athene, or an Eros, the exposition of perfect corporal beauty was his highest aspiration. When, on the other hand, the mediaeval masters, less entirely absorbed in the exquisite proportion of line to line, and circle to circle, strove to express the divine idea behind its outward semblance, and to lead men's minds up to the source of all natural beauty, it cannot with truth be main- tained that they pronounced " an anathema on nature altogether." Rather be it said that theirs was a still more harmonious conception of the true meaning of all created beauty. In twining leaf and branch and flower round the Gothic capitals of their cathedrals, each a faithful copy of nature, yet each having a mystic raison d'etre, they consecrated nature to divine service, and thereby raised it to a higher level. Thus it may be fairly claimed that the mediaeval mind idealised nature and ran it up to the supernatural, while the Renaissance presented it in a concrete form, and ultimately degraded it into mere naturalism. Nevertheless, although it is clear that during the Middle Ages there was a tremendous and very general reaction against the pagan idea, it never quite died out in places that were perhaps more richly endowed with the colour and warmth of life than with aspirations after Christian perfection. Unconsciously it was retained by the people of southern Italy, who wove it into their religion, their art, and their daily life, and among whom it is still at home to-day. Little wonder then, so congenial was the soil, if the Renaissance ^ Nencioni, La Lirica del Rinascimento. Vita Italiaria nel Rinasci- mento, p. 200. I 114 Reformation and Renaissance took ready root on its appearance in the peninsula in the fifteenth century. In many cases it needed but to be grafted on to the parent stock that had never been destroyed. But even among the learned, the study of the Greek language and literature had not been entirely abandoned, and the Latin classics were more or less in vogue throughout the Middle Ages. Pope Sylvester II, was a good classical Latinist ; Virgil, Horace, Statius, and Sallust were studied at Paderborn in the eleventh century ; Terence, Ovid, Lucan, Martial, Caesar, Livy, and Suetonius were known in the period before mediaeval Latin grew barbarous.^ John of Salisbury, we are told, was familiar with Horace and Cicero, Greek was studied at the Abbey of St, Gall, Grosseteste, Bishop of Lincoln, translated the Testament of the Twelve Patriarchs from Greek into Latin, aided in the work, says Matthew Paris, by a Greek priest. But Italy, on account of its nearness to the East, could boast of a greater number of Greek students in the centuries preceding the revival. This revival began with Petrarch, although insuperable obstacles prevented his acquiring any great proficiency in the Greek language. Scholasticism had been nurtured in uni- versities, but humanism depended for a footing in the world on the enthusiasm and wealth of individuals, and Petrarch dreaming, as a schoolboy at Avignon, of the past glories of Rome, became steeped in the passionate love and admiration of classical antiquity. With something of an exile's yearning for home, he twice adjured the Pope, in his earliest poetical effusions, to renounce the " Babylon " of his captivity for the Eternal City, Petrarch not only succeeded in gaining rich patrons for humanism, but he became himself the centre and soul of the new learning, although it was not until he was nearly forty that he was able to begin the study of Greek. Even then, Boccaccio, his enthusiastic fellow - student, triumphing over manifold difficulties, such as the want of grammars and lexicons, and the absence of really com- petent teachers, alone of the two made any considerable progress. But the aims of Petrarch and Boccaccio, though seem- ingly united, were in fact widely different ; and while 1 The Cambridge Modern History, vol. i. p. 536. The Earlier Renaissance 115 Petrarch represents the orthodox and legitimate grafting of the masterpieces of antiquity on to the Christian system, Boccaccio was, in his literary tendencies, wholly pagan. The prince of story-tellers, he presented classical modes of thought in modern dress, without eliminating their essential im- morality and grossness. He was the first to impart a sense of reality to fictitious personages of romance, surrounding them with minute circumstances, all tending to elucidate character, and help on the story. None since Dante and before Shakespeare had created so many different personalities, placing them in so many different positions. But where Dante found whips of scorpions to express his bitter satire, and Shakespeare's profound knowledge of human nature engendered a more complex sentiment than scorn, Boccaccio passed over the vilest scenes of human passion with a light laugh, and a shrug of the shoulders. Yet, notwithstanding his intrinsic coarseness, and a certain artificial mannerism, he remains the prose poet par excellence of Neapolitan life and scenery. His descriptions of Baia, Posilippo, and Castel- nuovo, of Virgil's tomb and Pozzuoli, Cuma and Caprea, are unique. Chaucer adopted rather less than one-third of Boccaccio's Filostrato in his Trolius and Cryseide. What he altered in the story is an improvement in the ethics of the romance, if indeed it can be said to possess an ethical side. The Knighte' s Tale is a reproduction of Boccaccio's Teseide. Although Chaucer was, on the whole, perhaps too fastidious to make entirely his own any of the stories in the Decameron, their general tendency is, nevertheless, displayed in more than one of the Canterbury Tales} One of the few quotable stories in the Decameron has so direct a bearing on one aspect of the Renaissance as to permit its introduction here. Abraham, a Jew, inclined to become a Christian, determined first to go to Rome and see him who was vicar of God on earth, and study his habits and those of his brother Cardinals. If these appeared such as to recom- mend the Christian religion as superior to the Jewish, Abraham would have himself baptized. The Jew accord- ingly went to Rome, watched the Pope and Cardinals closely, and soon saw that they were gluttons, wine-bibbers, misers, and were in a word sunk in every kind of vice and wicked- 1 Notably in The Shipmannes Tale and the Somnours Tale. 1 1 6 Reformation and Renaissance ness. He then became a sincere Christian, giving as a reason for his conversion, that if so many prelates and even the Supreme Pastor himself were so indefatigable in destroying the Church, which nevertheless continued to live, in spite of them, it must be a sign that the Holy Ghost was its founda- tion and support. In Chaucer's day, owing partly to the influence of Wyclif, who was a secular priest, it was the fashion to belaud the secular clergy and to vilify the regular. Thus nothing could be more appreciative than the well-known description of the parish priest in the prologue to the Canterbury Tales, of whom it is said that — Cristes lore and his apostles twelve He t aught e, and first he folwed it himselve. But throughout his works Chaucer has never a good word for any man of religion except the parish clergy ; on the other hand, all Shakespeare's friars are holy men. In this respect Boccaccio and Chaucer are alike, and most of the stories in the Decameron are an unwarrantable and scurrilous indictment of monks, friars, and nuns in general. This was a gratuitous and sweeping libel, for granted even a wide margin for the deterioration of religious Hfe in the fourteenth and fifteenth certuries, it is certain that a large proportion of religious houses in Italy and in every other country of Europe were not only free from all taint of vice, but that many were engaged in an edifying warfare against the relaxing tendency of the new age. The tone of these stories must, therefore, be attributed less to the moral con- dition of any particular class than to the taste for licentious literature then coming into vogue, and for which Boccaccio himself was mainly responsible. He and many of his imi- tators were satisfied to reproduce the manners and customs of Greece at its worst period of decadence, a few centuries before the Christian era, and the degraded version of the lives of Greek heroes and heroines, as they are represented in Euripides and the /Eneid. Virgil's account of the Trojan war may in a measure explain the mediaeval abhorrence of ancient Greece, and the prevailing ignorance concerning those great masterpieces of hellenic literature, the Iliad and the Odyssey. At the Renaissance, the Christian humanists who sought to harmonise classical learning with the Christian GIOVANNI BOCCACCIO. From a portrait by Andrea del Castagno. To face page 1 16. The Earlier Renaissance 117 idea went back for their inspiration to Homer and the heroic age of ancient Greece. The wideness of the difference between the earUer Greek and the Latin version of the tale of Troy may be estimated by a comparison. Virgil's conception of Helen of Troy, which is also that of the later Greek poets, is a light-hearted, unrepentant adulteress, while Homer's Helen presents a noble type of humility and repentance, unique in a heathen writer. It is the courtesan which Benozzo Gozzoli painted in his well-known picture of the Rape of Helen, now in the National Gallery, and in this character she was condemned by the verdict of the Middle Ages. The new humanism painted her and the whole fallen sister- hood in the same flippant guise, and set them up as types of wantonness for the amusement of the passing hour. If there had been no other phase of the Renaissance than that represented by Boccaccio, the development would have been an unqualified misfortune for the modern world. ^ In his mature age he repented of much that he had written in his youth, deplored the odious and profligate tone of his Corbaccio, and besought his friends to abstain from reading the Decameron. It was even reported that he had gone to do penance in a Carthusian monastery for the harm he had done by his writings. Of his sins against taste and style Boccaccio was per- haps never conscious ; his enthusiasm for Dante and his reverence for Petrarch do not imply any correct view of either. His vulgar and essentially bourgeois mind was as incapable of understanding the excellences of Dante's majestic simplicity and lofty independence of spirit as his own talent for depicting ephemeral amours was impotent before the angelic spirituality of the real Beatrice. ha Fiammetta, redolent of life, and of a certain sensuous charm, may be considered the limit of his powers of poetical feeling and expression. The contrast between Boccaccio and Petrarch is so strong and so radical that it is a question whether, but for their mutual love of classical antiquity, they could ever have 1 This difference is insisted on by Mr. Gladstone, in his studies of Homeric themes, and is discussed by Professor Freeman in one of his essays. 1 1 8 Reformation and Renaissance met in sympathy. Endowed from his childhood with so fine a sense of the beautiful, that even as a schoolboy a single phrase of Cicero's enchanted and threw him into an ecstacy of delight, Petrarch vowed his whole life to the cult of the ancients. He could remember Giotto, Donatello, and other Gothic sculptors and architects, but he was the first of the modern world to recognise the architectural beauty of the old classical buildings, upon which, and to a great extent out of which, mediasval Rome had been built. When he saw them for the first time in 1336, his pleasure in them was intense. Cicero and Virgil were the models on which his literary style was formed ; and if this with all its excellence strikes us as artificial, it must be remembered that artificiality, no less than exuberance, was one of the marks of the Renais- sance, which set out not to create but to imitate, and which was therefore of necessity self-conscious, and even pedantic.^ But while the Renaissance was in fact a pose, an afi^ectation of antiquity which never forgot that it was acting a part, its services to learning cannot easily be overrated. With Petrarch personal sentiment, passion, and colour invaded the formal language of the schools and transformed it. He created the new literary Latin ; and in such a manner that Paolo Cortese was able to say, " All that he writes, bare and denuded as it is, contrives to please somehow." Poggio, Politian, and the still more brilliant Erasmus, inherited the legacy. Petrarch was the first modern scholar to form a library, and he collected it from every civilised corner of Europe. It consisted mainly of classical Latin manuscripts and in- scriptions, a great number of which are now in the Bib- liotheque Nationale in Paris, while the rest are scattered about in various public and private collections in France and Italy. In his old age he was accustomed to speak of his books as having been to him a consuming passion from his youth upwards. At his instigation, sometimes led by him in person, and 1 " In the vulgar idiom," said Vespasiano, " one can represent nothing with ornament as one can in Latin." All that had hitherto been written in Italian was as if it did not exist for the humanists. Even Dante was translated into Latin hexameters, by Matteo Ronto. Philippe Monnier, Le Quattrocento, vol. i. p. 123. The Earlier Renaissance 119 always in touch with him, a band of enthusiastic scholars travelled all over Italy and into Germany and Spain, ran- sacking old monastic libraries in search of manuscripts which they often rescued from the oblivion and dust of centuries. Then and there they would spell them over in haste, their hearts beating high with desire and hope. Here they would discover the speeches of Cicero, there the verses of Catullus, the annals of Tacitus. Others wrote to Constantinople for Greek books, or went there and bought, sometimes stole, whatever they could lay hands on. They would pick up a Sophocles, a Plato, or even an unknown author, with delight ; no remnant of ancient Greek civilisation came amiss to them. Then in 1439 Gutenberg invented printing at Strass- burg, and henceforth the preservation of the classics for the modern world was assured.^ The first years after Petrarch's return to Italy were spent at Milan, in a quiet retreat near the Church of St. Ambrogio. The scholar would rise at midnight, after the few hours of sleep that he allowed himself, and the dawn always found him bending over his books. A severe winter, during which the ink froze in his ink-pot, in nowise altered this habit, and did no harm to his health, thanks to the long woollen gown which covered him from head to foot, and which he left as a legacy to Boccaccio. But illness came from another direction. " I possess," he wrote to a friend, " a fat volume containing Cicero's Letters. In order to reach it easily I placed it, as you know, at the entrance to my library, leaning against the jamb of the door. One day I entered absently, as usual, and caught it in the hem of my gown. It fell and bruised my left leg a little above the heel. I laughed, and cried, ' Eh, my friend Cicero, thou beatest me .? ' Cicero was silent, but the next day he hit me again, and I picked him up, still joking. In short, beaten several times, I grew angry, and seeing that he was displeased with being left on the floor I placed him on a shelf ; but the skin of my leg, under reiterated blows, has turned into a rather serious wound." - In consequence of this wound Petrarch was confined to his 1 Mazzoni, II Poliziano e Pumanisms. Vita Italiana net Rinascimento, p. 155. 2 Pierre de Nolhac, Petrarque et PHumanisme, p. 50. I20 Reformation and Renaissance library for nearly a year. Although he made little progress in the Greek language/ his zeal for humanist studies inspired others with the same love of classical antiquity, and soon after his death the demand for competent Greek masters in Italy created a supply. At first none but Byzantine and modern hellenists were to be had, and as often as not these were ignorant of classical Greek ; but from 1397 to 1400 we find the celebrated Manuel Chrysoloras giving Greek lectures at Florence, and from that time the new learning advanced rapidly in the Peninsula." Humanist scholars may thenceforth be numbered by scores ; and the more eminent, such as Giovanni di Conversino, his pupils Vittorino da Feltre and Guarino da Verona, who translated Chry- soloras's Greek grammar into Latin ; Gasparino da Barzizza ; Francesco Filelfo, as morally reprobate as he was erudite ; the hellenist Theodorus Gaza ; Poggio Bracciolini, a pagan of the pagans ; and Laurentius Valla, the translator of Thucy- dides, lead us up to the learned Tomaso Parentucelli, who, as Pope Nicholas V., gave to the Renaissance of ancient letters and art the seal of the Church. Nicholas V. presents one of the most imposing, pictur- esque, and vigorous personalities of the early Renaissance. No writer of the period has done full justice to his magni- ficent abilities ; while his failure to reform the Church has been none too fairly attributed to him for unrighteousness. But in fact the only methods of reform that could be carried out on a scale worthy of this Pope's grand conceptions were by means of a General Council, and even if the assembling of a Council had not been impossible in the then condition of Europe, it would have been inopportune, con- sidering the state of men's minds, as displayed in the Councils of Basle and Constance, where the rights and prerogatives of councils and their superiority over the authority of the Pope had been so much insisted on, and had led so many astray. The notion of the conciliar systems, as it was then agitating the nations, was another result of the Papal exile and schism. So long a time had elapsed since Europe had witnessed 1 He admitted sadly, " My Homer lies dumb beside me. I am deaf for him, but I revel in the sight of him, and often I embrace him." Epist.fam. 18, 2. - He followed John XXIII. to Constance and died there. The Earlier Renaissance 121 the spectacle of a universally recognised Pope sitting at the head of a Council, and defining dogmas concerning faith and morals, as the highest authority on earth ; and in the interval so much stress had been laid on the paramount importance of Councils, as the one remedy for prevailing scandals, that people had gradually lost sight of the cen- tralisation of authority in the successor of St. Peter. To have assembled a General Council, while erroneous ideas prevailed concerning the relative position of Popes and Councils, might have precipitated a further schism, and have placed the whole question of the Pope's supremacy in danger. Moreover, in the West, England and France were at war ; the East was a scene of confusion and peril, and the capture of Constantinople by the Turks in 1453 threatened the very centre of Christianity. The best that Nicholas could do for the amendment of abuses was to attempt to solve the problem of reforming the Roman curia, and to send Cardinal Cusa and John Capistran into Germany, 'with what results we have already seen. The fall of the Greek empire had a twofold significance for Europe. It not only brought the Turk, the terror of Christendom within its borders, but the destruction of the famous library of Constantinople dispersed Greek arts and sciences, Greek manuscripts, and Greek professors through- out the western world, at a moment when it was most ready to receive them, the soil having been carefully prepared by Petrarch and those later scholars whom he had imbued with the love of classical lore. The disturbing effects of the taking of Constantinople lasted to the end of the sixteenth century, and in some measure still last in the twentieth, but the gain to modern culture in the diffusion of its locked-up treasures was in- calculable. This flood of ancient learning over the Italian peninsula would not indeed of itself have sufficed to deter- mine the future character of the Renaissance. It needed the hospitality of a munificent patron of art and letters, such as Nicholas V., who had no sooner proclaimed a crusade against the Infidel, than he privately sent agents to Con- stantinople to rescue from the general wreck all the manu- scripts they could collect.^ ^ Cambridge Modern History, vol. i. p. 77. Ibid. p. 594. 122 Reformation and Renaissance For years before he became Pope, Parentucelli had pro- moted an important branch of humanistic work in the translation of Greek classics into Latin, and he has with justice been styled the greatest of the papal bibliophiles. He would have deserved this title if he had done no more than build up the Vatican Library, a monumental task, in which perhaps lies his greatest claims to the gratitude of students. A papal collection of books answering to the nucleus of our own Royal Library had indeed existed from time immemorial, and previous to the exile had found a home in the Lateran. These manuscripts had been sub- sequently removed to Avignon, and on the return of the Papacy to Rome were placed in the Vatican. At this period the collection boasted of 120 manuscripts in Hebrew, although it possessed only about half-a-dozen in Greek ; but during the eight years of the Pontificate of Nicholas V, he enriched it by several thousands in all the learned languages. At his death in 1455 it contained in all 5000 volumes of manuscripts. Among these were 824 Latin and 352 Greek books, the latter comprising 40 volumes of St. Chrysostom, the other Greek Fathers being largely represented. The library also contained a number of gospels and parts of gospels, and some scattered portions of the Old Testament. The Codex Vaticanus, how- ever, the oldest Greek manuscript of the Bible, written, it has been said, by St. Tecla, although at that time in the Pope's possession, does not figure in the catalogues of the Vatican Library of the period.^ Before the end of the fifteenth century the Greek manuscripts in this collection grew to about a thousand, those of the Bible numbering fifty-eight. But if Nicholas V. was essentially a student, books being his greatest passion, he was almost as ardent a lover of architecture and painting, and but for his premature death would have completely transformed the city of Rome. Martin V. and Eugenius IV., his immediate predecessors, had done what they could to arrest the decay of the ancient monuments, but time and money were both wanting to them for enlarging and beautifying the city. Nicholas V. formed noble and gigantic projects for doing so, and he was ably seconded in his plans by a whole band of architects and artists, such as Bernardo Rosellino, Leo Battista Alberti, 1 Cambridge Modern History, pp. 595, 597. The Earlier Renaissance 123 Antonio di Francesco, Fra Angelico da Fiesole, and his pupil Benozzo Gozzoli. But he committed one act of vandalism which it is hard to forgive : the Colisseum and a considerable part of the old, imperial city was used as a quarry for the building of Renaissance Rome. Neverthe- less he left a city where he had found a ruin, and among other improvements fortified the walls, rebuilt the Capitol, restored the castle of St. Angelo, reorganised the water supply, and began the fountain of Trevi, besides mending a multitude of dilapidated churches. Insignificant, even mean in person, his appearance betrayed little of the intellect, large-mindedness, ready wit, resourceful- ness, and very consistent piety that characterised him. Only his black, flashing eyes redeemed the want of all other out- ward attractions. His moral character had all his life long been above reproach, his policy as temporal ruler of the Church was eminently pacific, his genius as an organiser, his liberality and generosity to artists and men of letters, cannot be too highly extolled. If he failed to reform the curia it was not that reform was not dear to him, but that the vested interests of officials in the much-abused system of annates, expectancies, reservations, and exemptions rose like a wall of adamant, against which all the early efforts of his Pontificate proved ineffectual. We may regret that he afterwards abandoned his onslaughts in this direction ; but it must'be considered that with all his rich imagination and love of the beautiful, and his desire, even from an assthetic point of view, for order and discipline, his mind was after all exceedingly practical, and his energies prompted him to expend himself in work that promised some measure of success. It was un- doubtedly better to employ his splendid gifts in doing the next best thing, than to have sacrificed all in a vain attempt to undo the effects of a century of disasters. In eight years he accomplished much for the future of Rome ; in double that time, with all the opposition he would have encountered, he would scarcely have reformed one department of the State. His Pontificate occurred at a critical moment in the history of the Church ; the Papacy had lost immensely in prestige ; it was the task of Nicholas V. to render it once more im- posing, magnificent, dominant, — to raise it, as it were, from the dust, and place it in a princely seat among the nations. His election had come as a surprise to the Roman people, 124 Reformation and Renaissance and even to the Cardinals themselves, for Parentucelli was a poor man, of no distinguished family, and had only been a Cardinal for two months and a half. As the Cardinal of Portugal came limping out of the Conclave he was at once surrounded, and clamorous voices demanded whether the Cardinals had elected a Pope. " No," he answered ; " God has chosen a Pope, not the Cardinals." All were at once inclined to echo the sentiment, for ParentuceUi's high, peace- loving character, wonderful capacity, and purity of morals compelled respect and admiration, ^neas Sylvius Piccolo- mini, who became later Pope Pius II., and who knew Nicholas V, perhaps more intimately than any other, mentions his chiefest fault as " trusting too much in himself, and wishing to do everything by himself, thinking that nothing was well done unless he had a hand in it." ^ But this is a fault of strong characters, and almost a natural consequence of being the greatest man of his age. His successor, Calixtus III., cared for few of the things that had interested Nicholas. Not only did the new Pope suspend all the architectural works that were in progress, so that many buildings, half restored, again fell into decay, but, reversing his predecessor's pacific policy, he expended all his energies in an attempt to rouse the lethargic princes of Europe to a crusade against the Turk. Almost all that Calixtus did for art was to employ a few painters to design and execute standards to be borne in battle against the Infidel. His sincere, but rigid, and rather narrow-minded piety led him to undo much that Nicholas had accomplished ; and in his passionate zeal for the triumph of Christendom he had the costly bindings of books in the Vatican Library torn off to realise money for the crusade, while the gold and silver vessels with which the Roman churches had been enriched were melted into coin. At his death he left 150,000 ducats for the purposes of the holy war, but had not succeeded in creating a single wave of enthusiasm for the cause — a proof, if proof were needed, of the uselessness of speaking to the world in a language it no longer understands, and of appeal- ing to sentiments of the day before yesterday. Out of touch with his age, he did not realise that he who would thence- forth lead the hosts must throw in his lot with the Renaissance. Good as he was, his Pontificate was, humanly speaking, a ^ Pius 11., Commentarii, 109. POPE PIUS II. From a seventeenth-century engraving. To face page 125. The Earlier Renaissance 125 failure, and worse than a fiiilure if we consider his flagrant nepotism and weakness in elevating to the purple so unworthy a subject as his nephew Rodrigo Borgia, afterwards Alexander VI. ^neas Sylvius Piccolomini, Pius II., whose election to the Papacy took place on August 19, 1458, united in a remarkable manner some of the great qualities of Nicholas V. and Calixtus III., with additions of his own that made him in many ways an ideal Pope. Like Nicholas V. he was an ardent promoter of learning, but not so exclusively that any movement of the modern world, whether it concerned religion, politics, or art, escaped his attention or interest. He loved books and bought them, and his own contributions to literature are among the most notable things of the early Renaissance, especially his historical works, such as his Universal History and Geography^ and above all, his celebrated Commentaries^ which were continued for five years after his death in the same style and method of arrangement, by his friend and disciple Cardinal Ammannati. As Pius he repudi- ated many of the views of ^neas concerning classical antiquity, and scrupulously avoided in his writings everything approach- ing to heathenism.^ His additions to the Vatican Library were chiefly Christian authors, and he had little sympathy with the paganising school among the humanists. He was scarcely a patron of scholars, owing partly to want of means, and partly on account of his own literary pre-eminence, which constituted him more a judge and somewhat severe critic than was quite pleasing to the Italian brotherhood, who, consider- ing themselves infallible purists as to style, revenged them- selves on the Pope's criticisms by venturing to charge his Latinity with barbarism. He had spent many years in Germany, where, if his classical style had somewhat dete- riorated, his mind had gained breadth, and his judgment solidity. In the buildings which he erected as Pope in his birthplace, Corsignano, near Siena, elevated to the dignity of a bishopric under the name of Pienza, traces of Northern Gothic may be seen, exemplified in the lofty aisles of the cathedral, which, unlike Italian Gothic aisles, are the same height as the nave ; in the arrangement of the five chapels round the apse,- and in the rich, late Gothic ornaments of the ^ Pastor, vol. ii. p. 28. Miintz, La Bibliotheque du Fatican, p. 122. 2 Creighton, Papacy, vol, iii. p. 355. 126 Reformation and Renaissance windows, the facade of the church being pure Renaissance.^ In many ways, of which this is but a trifling instance, Pius II. asserted his independence of local tradition, and displayed not only originality of ideas, but a steady growth of character based upon his varied experience, and that broad universality which had formerly distinguished the Popes, and which the exile at Avignon had done so much to lessen. His lofty, strong, and receptive mind enabled him as he grew in years to develop faculties of which at an earlier period men would have judged him incapable, so that in his old age, racked by pain and disease, hampered in a thousand ways, and impotent to kindle one spark of enthusiasm for religion in minds that should have been in sympathy with his, but which were entirely given over to worldliness, he appears to us a far more attractive personality than in his vigorous youth. Neverthe- less, few believed in his sincerity ; he spoke from deep con- viction, but did not convince ; he was irreproachable, and yet men regarded him with suspicion ; worse than being disliked, he was misunderstood. In one respect above all others, Pius II. belonged to the new age. That cultured delight in nature which distinguished the early Renaissance in its freshness and vitality was very prominent in him. He would frequently escape from the city, and retire to some country place, where, putting aside all pomp and circumstance, he would live for weeks and even months a simple, pastoral life. Crowds of peasants would stand at a respectful distance while he dined, al fresco^ by some clear spring of water, and when he went on his way they would wade into the stream and fish for trout as they followed him, their creels being offered to his attendants at the end of the day.^ A statesman through and through, Pius II. never allowed these villegiature to interfere with business, and would give audiences under some spreading beech tree, and discuss matters of policy and government to the accompaniment of thrushes and nightingales.^ But all these things — literature, statesmanship, love of nature — were entirely subservient to the great desire of his ^ Pastor, vol. ii. p. 215. - Biese, "Die Naturanschauung des Hellenismus und der Renaissance," "Jahrbuch der Koniglich Preusisschen Kunstsammlungen, I. Ivii. 552. 3 Burckhardt, Die Cultur der Renaissance in Italien, II^ 21. The Earlier Renaissance 127 heart, the longing, in which he resembled Calixtus III., to arrest the onward march of the Turk by the combined action of Christian princes. Unaided he could do nothing, and the nations were unhappily more mindful of petty feuds, jealousies, and ambitions than of any possible triumph of the Cross over the Crescent. Few heeded the Pope's supplicating voice, like that of one crying in the wilderness. Venice, indeed, promised to send ships and money, but she was already at war with the Sultan for the possession of her territory in the Levant, and could only be the gainer by a general war against the Infidel. Hungary, for geographical reasons, was even more closely concerned in the Eastern question. The Pope signed an alliance with the Venetian Republic and the King of Hungary, and sent the latter a consecrated sword. Philip of Burgundy had bound himself by a solemn oath to join the crusade if some other prince did so,^ but none could be prevailed on ; and Pius II., old as he was, feeble in health, a martyr to gout and other diseases, himself solemnly took the Cross, in the hope that chivalry might prompt France, and perhaps the other European powers, to follow his example. But France had entered into a secret compact with Florence and Milan against Venice, and would not be led into a war which, if successful, would be to the advantage of the Venetian states. The other Italian cities were requisitioned, but all were apathetic. Perugia, rolling in wealth, could only be induced to contribute a small sum by threats of an interdict. Bologna held back as long as possible, and then gave grudg- ingly. Even the Cardinals, with the exception of two, were opposed to the undertaking, were unwilling to leave their luxurious palaces in Rome, dreaded the plague that had broken out at Ragusa, feared the hostility of the Paterines in Bosnia. But the aged and infirm Pontiff held on tenaciously. He wrote to the Doge, entreating him to come in person and join him and Philip of Burgundy, not knowing that Philip was minded to break his oath. " We shall be three old men," he wrote, " and God rejoices in trinity. Our trinity will be aided by the Trinity of Heaven, and our foes will be trampled under our feet." The Doge tried to shirk the duty on the plea of his age and ill-health, but the Signory compelled him to go.- 1 Pius II., Commentarii, 1 89-191. ^ Sanudo, 1 1 75-1 176. 128 Reformation and Renaissance On June i8, 1464, Pius II. left Rome never to return, and sailed up the Tiber in a barge as far as Otricoli. Here he entered a litter and was carried to Spoleto, and thence by way of Assisi and Loreto to Ancona, where the Venetian fleet was to meet him and the crowd of crusaders who were expected from every country of Europe. But the ships delayed, and the crusaders — for the most part a sorry swarm of incapable, unarmed, and penniless adventurers — were already dying of hunger. In preaching the Crusade care was to have been taken to impress on those willing to take the Cross that only such as could provide themselves with arms and means of subsistence were to set out ; but these precautions had been forgotten, and on the Pope's arrival at Ancona the first thing to be done was to dispense the promised Indulgence, and to send the greater number of would-be crusaders home. The rest, wearying of the con- tinued delay of the Venetians, gradually dispersed, and sold their arms to enable them to return whence they came. When at last the ships arrived, there were no soldiers to embark.-^ This, according to Cardinal Ammannati, was the Pope's deathblow. Consumed with fever Pius II. lay dying ; but he had himself carried to a window of his bedchamber, and at the sight of the ships entering the harbour he ex- claimed, " Until to-day a fleet was wanting to my expedition, now I shall be wanting to the fleet ! " " On the morning of August 13 he received the last sacraments, and expressed himself to the Cardinals and those about him in words befitting the Vicar of Christ. In the night between the 14th and 15 th he passed away, his last words being a request to Cardinal Ammannati that he would pray for him. No sooner did it become known that the Pope was dead, than the Doge, Cristoforo Moro, landed, and sought a con- ference with those members of the Sacred College who were then at Ancona. As a result of the conference, the Arch- bishop of Milan declared that to all appearance the Venetians regretted having undertaken the Crusade, as well as the whole expedition against the Turks. The Cardinals desired nothing more than to return to Rome, and to enter into conclave as soon as possible. They ^ Creighton, vol. iii. p. 327, Gonzaga Archives, Mantua. 2 Pastor, vol. ii. p. 256. The Earlier Renaissance 129 made over to the Venetian Republic the galleys lying fully equipped for the Crusade in the harbour of Ancona, on the condition that they were to be restored to the new Pope it he did not confirm the gift, or wished to pursue the Crusade, Then, having settled sundry other matters, many of them departed the same day, the rest following speedily with the Pope's body. The Doge left Ancona in the night ot August 18, sailed with his whole squadron along the Istrian coast, and returned to Venice, the order being given to disband the ships. ^ The story of this abortive crusade is a striking instance of the way in which the Renaissance was making itself felt, not merely in art and letters, but in the changed condition of public opinion. The generous impulses of the Middle Ages, their chivalry and devotion, were things of the past, and Pius II. would have found it easier to storm the whole Turkish garrison in Constantinople with the few small galleys at his command than to rouse the dormant spirit of faith in nations nominally Christian. The new humanism did not lend itself to ideals ; at its best it was eminently practical, and the few great men, such as Pius himself, who sought to infuse some of the old enthusiasm for religion into the utilitarian minds of the rulers of Europe were apt to die heart-broken in the attempt. In some respects the Renaissance was even more at home in Florence than in Rome. The Academy of Florence founded by Cosmo de' Medici was not only the metropolis of humanism,^ but the mother of all other modern academies, that of Rome being founded in 1460, that of Naples about the same time, by Jovianus Pontanus. These three became the models on which similar societies were formed in nearly every Italian centre of culture, but they differed notably each from each, the Florentine Academy being philosophic, the Roman antiquarian, and the Neapolitan literary. Cosmo de' Medici, of that family of wealthy merchants whose name had already become historic through an assassina- tion in 1 30 1, the richest man in Italy, and the most liberal, was literally master of Florence in 1440. The Medici occupied a position unique in any city and any age, for they ^ Pastor, vol. ii. p. 259. 2 Cambridge Modern History, p. 559. 130 Reformation and Renaissance were rulers and yet private people, with all the prestige and none of the obligations of royalty. They were diplomatists, patrons of art and learning, and their palace was a court which became the centre of the world's great republic of letters. They were not more powerful than they were crafty, cruel, and unprincipled. They seemed alternately noble and base, and while they spent lavishly they were intensely greedy. The exquisite cultivation of their taste and manners was only equalled by the corruption of their morals. Cosmo, appearing to be merely a retired merchant, ruled Florence with a rod of iron. None could withstand his influence, or attain to his capacity for government ; and when he left the city for a time, and went to Venice, where he lived with great magnificence, it was observed that he had taken Florence with him, and a deputation was sent to bring him back. The secret of this immense power lay in the fact that the Medici were men of their time — men of the Renaissance. Their genius responded to the demands of the age ; they fostered the taste of the day, and strengthened their own position by encouraging talent of every kind. Cosmo, gathering round him the new hellenists, founded his Platonic academy. After his death he was unanimously styled Father of his country. Piero, his son, assumed a still more regal position, and brought up his sons, Lorenzo and Giuliano, as princes. When Piero died in 1469, Lorenzo the Magnificent did not hesitate to take upon himself the honours as well as the cares of State, and Florence had, for good or evil, days such as Athens enjoyed under Pericles. The free city of arts and crafts had lost in fact, if not in name, its republican character, and in exchange had acquired the splendour of a Medicean court. The Medici were extremely hospitable, keeping open house, and giving a public entertainment every day. Lorenzo sat at the head of the table, and the first comer sat next to him without regard to rank. Michelangelo was seen there more often than any one else. Here minds were sharpened to their finest points ; vice and virtue sat side by side, having nothing in common but culture and brilliant parts. Lorenzo encouraged the worst tendencies of humanism as well as the best, and his deeds of blood and rapine underlie all the wit, vivacity, and learning of his court, which was one continued scene of revelry and dissipation. The Earlier Renaissance 131 Excessive luxury, gambling, and usury seem to have been the worst faults of which Florentine society was accused during the fifteenth century. The city was very rich and prosperous, and enormous sums were spent on entertainments. When in 1466 Bernardo Rucellai celebrated his marriage with Nannina de' Medici, more than 150,000 lire, according to present currency, were lavished on the feasting and amuse- ments alone. The banqueting and dancing lasted from Sunday morning after Mass till Tuesday evening. Rich jewels, magnificent brocade and velvet dresses sewn with pearls, jewelled embroideries, linen and laces of the most exquisite fineness, sumptuous furs, and gold and silver toilet utensils and other luxuries, composed the bride's trousseau. The dowry amounted to 60,000 lire.^ In Lorenzo's time a number of citizens were com- pletely ruined by expensive habits, a notable example being Benedetto Salutati, whose celebrated banquet to the sons of the King of Naples was a monument of excess. Side by side with riches and commercial prosperity were to be observed usury, fraud, and a system of false weights. The Jews were by no means alone guilty of this particular kind of depravity, supposed to be peculiarly theirs, and preachers fulminated against it from every pulpit. The famous preacher Gabriele da Barletta once simulated in a sermon a conversation between a priest and a citizen of Florence. "Art thou a Christian?" — "Yes, father, and I was baptized in such and such a church." — " What trade dost thou follow } " — " I am a usurer." — " Oh then, if your wife's fine clothes were put under a press, the living blood of the poor would issue from them." ^ The Franciscans, always the friends of the poor, under- took to reform this abuse, and founded the montes pietatisy an institution for lending small sums to needy persons for a shorter or longer time, at first without any interest, and when this was found impracticable, a small tax was imposed to cover the expenses entailed. Nor were noble sentiments entirely absent among those who had accumulated riches by mercantile enterprise. Giovanni Rucellai, the father of the young bridegroom above 1 Biagi, La Vita privata del Fiorentini. Vita Italiana nel RinascimentOy pp. 85, 89. 2 Barletta, SermoneSy ed. 151 1, 48b. 132 Reformation and Renaissance mentioned, kept a commonplace-book, in which he recorded passing events and reflections on his own life. The rich Florentine merchant, feeling the dignity of his position, is as grateful to Providence for the wit to spend his fortune well as for the blessing of having accumulated it. " I believe," he wrote in his Zibaldone, " that I have more honour and more contentment in knowing how to spend than in having known how to earn wealth." And he thanks Almighty God (" Domenedio ") that He has created him " a rational being, a Christian, and not a Turk, Moor, or bar- barian"; that he was born "in that part of Italy which is near to Rome, the centre of the Christian religion, in the province of Tuscany, which is esteemed the noblest and worthiest of all Christendom, and in the city of Florence, which is reputed the worthiest and most beautiful city not only of Christendom, but of the whole universe."^ It was Giovanni Rucellai who commissioned Leo Battista Alberti to undertake the marble facade of the church of Sta. Maria Novella, the Rucellai palace in the Via della Vigna being another notable specimen by the same master of the early Tuscan Renaissance style of architecture. The oratory of San Sepolcro, built in 1467, with a facsimile of the Holy Sepulchre at Jerusalem, is also a munificent legacy of the same pious donor. In the days of Lorenzo the Magnificent artists divided their time between work and amusement, but ambition was never lost sight of, for Florentines were always more difficult to please in matters of art than any other public body. It was still remembered how Donatello, who had migrated to Padua, where he was overwhelmed with flattery, had returned to his native city, because his fellow- citizens always found something to blame in his work, and their criticism spurred him on to renewed efforts, by which he attained still greater perfection. These were the days of Ghiberti's bronze, of Luca della Robbia's terra cotta, of the frescoes of Filippino Lippi, of the canvases of Sandio Botticelli, half medieval, half humanistic. Lorenzo himself led the band of literati. One of the principal lyric poets of the fifteenth century, he displayed a fine sense of reality, and described the outward semblance of things with the graphic precision which we observe in Ghirlandaio's 1 Reumont, Lorenzo de" Medici^ i. 328-329. The Earlier Renaissance 133 paintings. Boiardo and Politian were, on the other hand, like BotticelH, imaginative rather than dramatic, and saw beyond the outward object which they represented some interior quahty that was the very soul, the spiritual essence of their work. But whether Lorenzo describes an inunda- tion or a village beauty, whether he sings a carnival song or a devout hymn, such as Crocifisso a capo chino, or a licentious canzonet, he observes every detail of what he sees in mental vision, like an Emile Zola of the Renaissance. This quality he by no means shared with his contemporary lyrists, whose powers of observation were extremely limited. Among the seasons, spring only seemed worthy of con- sideration, or the rose and the violet among flowers, the nightingale among birds. To them Nature was only sweet and idyllic, and the reader longs in vain for a storm, for snow or rain or wind.^ Into this modern Athens came Fra Girolamo Savonarola, burning with zeal, worn with fasting, vigils, and tears, a strong, strange personality, as much in character with his surroundings as St. John the Baptist at the court of Herod. A stern opponent of the pagan Renaissance, he became its noblest victim. This celebrated Dominican, who like Erasmus of Rotterdam has often been regarded as the enfant terrible of the Church, was born at Ferrara in 1452. His parents intended him for a physician, but the study of St. Thomas Aquinas turned his thoughts into another direction. From his childhood he displayed singular piety, and would pass hours in church, or absorbed in the Holy Scriptures. The altar steps were often found wet with his tears. He devoured the writings of the ancients, composed verses, and studied drawing and music. For a moment his destiny seemed to hang in the balance. The great Florentine family of the Strozzi lived at that time exiled at Ferarra, and the young Girolamo saw and loved a daughter of that proud line, and sought her hand in marriage. He received the haughty reply that no Strozzi might stoop to an alliance with a Savonarola, and once and for ever his hope and belief in earthly happiness were crushed.- Henceforth religion was to fill his whole soul. His daily prayer was : " Lord, make ^ Nencioni, La lirica del Rinascimento. La Vita Italiana nel Rinasci- mento, pp. 179, 180. ■^ Gherardi, p. 4. 134 Reformation and Renaissance known to me the path my soul should tread " ; and in 1474 he heard a sermon at Faenza, preached by an Augustinian friar, which decided his vocation to a religious life. He broke the news to his mother in a sad tune on his lute, without daring once to raise his eyes to hers.^ The next day he fled from home and went to Bologna, where he obtained admittance into a house of the Dominicans, ex- pressing his wish to become the convent drudge, for he had come to do penance for his sins, and not merely to change from an Aristotle of the world to an Aristotle of the cloister. When he arrived in Florence for the first time, he had already been for seven years at Bologna, during part of which period he had filled the ofiice of novice-master. To the Florentines of the Renaissance, clad in soft raiment and living delicately, he seemed like one risen from among tombs. His Superiors found it necessary to restrain his zeal for mortifications ; his life was a perpetual fast. His bed was a grating with a sack of straw upon it, and one woollen cover- ing. It was observed that in modesty, humility, and obedience he surpassed all his brethren. But his preaching was a failure, for although the extent and depth of his learning were apparent, his rough, unmodulated voice, his ungraceful action and uncultivated manner disgusted his audience, com- prised of the most fastidious critics in Europe. Before his course of sermons was ended his hearers had dwindled to twenty uneducated citizens. In 148 1 his Superiors sent him to preach in his native Ferrara. Here he lived dead to the world, saw little of his family, and spent his days in meditation. Still his preaching made little impression, and there was no indication in him of the future orator, whose eloquence was to sway the wills of his adopted people as none have swayed them before or since. But his personal influence was exercised on all who came in contact with him.^ At Reggio, whither Savonarola went to represent his convent at a Provincial Chapter, he met the brilliant young scholar Giovanni Pico della Mirandola, who was admitted by the Dominicans to their sessions, on account of his learning 1 Villari, The Life and Times of Fra Girolamo Savonarola, English version, vol. i, p. 16. 2 Ibid. p. 29. The Earlier Renaissance 135 and virtues. His account of Savonarola's conduct on this occasion is interesting : — " He (Fra Girolamo) was suddenly stirred to action, when the subject under discussion turned from a purely scholastic question, during the elaboration of which he had remained silent, absorbed in thought, his cowl drawn over his head, to a matter which lay close to his heart." " This matter was a point of discipline which Savonarola thought important, and starting to his feet, he thundered out invective after invective against the corruptions from which the Church was suffering, and against those responsible for them.^ For the first time his real vocation was revealed to his brethren, and perhaps to himself also it was the decisive moment in which he received the answer to his prayer for light to see the path whereon his soul should tread. Mirandola's gentle and graceful manners, genial and happy temperament, and somewhat superficial attainments were a distinct contrast to the Dominican's sombre, studious habits and rough, uncultivated speech. The subtle leaning to mysticism that underlay the character of each may account for the sympathy between them. Pico has been credited with knowing no fewer than twenty-two different languages and literatures, but the awe inspired by these philosophical exploits is somewhat lessened when it is seen that a Jew was able to deceive him with regard to sixty books which he pretended were rare manu- scripts, written by command of Esdras, but which some one else discovered to be copies of a well-known and much circulated work. Neo-Platonism had led him to the study of the Cabbala, then thought to be coeval with the patriarch Abraham, but which we now know to be thirteenth century forgeries. Nevertheless, so versatile were the resources of his intellect, that had he not died at the immature age of thirty- one, it is certain that he would have done solid work for the advancement of the new learning. All are familiar with Fra Bartolommeo's portrait of Savonarola, and even once seen, it would be difficult to forget the strong features, expressing so admirably the nature of the mind within, the dark grey eyes gleaming from under heavy brows, deeply furrowed even in youth, and revealing a ^ Burlamacchi, p. 15. 136 Reformation and Renaissance temperament highly-strung, nervous, unevenly balanced ; the swarthy complexion, the aquiline nose, the large mouth, and thick, compressed lips, betraying a firmness amounting to obstinacy. His whole body, except for his beautiful hands, was cast in a rough, coarse mould ; but at times a singularly sweet and melancholy smile would soften his harsh features, and account for the wonderful affection he inspired. When he returned to Florence in 1489, recalled by Lorenzo de' Medici, it was apparent that a remarkable change had come over him. He amazed his former critics by the grace and eloquence of his delivery, by the strength and eloquence of his reasoning, and by the persuasive power of his arguments. Crowds attended his sermons in St. Mark's,^ and he began a long series of prophecies, threats, and warnings by the startHng announcement that the term of his preaching would be accomplished in eight years. These words were verified by his death in 1498. Legends soon began to be circulated about the Prate's visions. Some regarded him as a saint and a true prophet, others saw only in him an hysterical fanatic. His system of philosophy was both admired and ridiculed. Founded originally on St. Thomas, it branched off into singularities and extravagances, but the attempt made by Luther to claim Savonarola as a sympathiser with, if not a precursor of, the new sects, showed a total ignorance of the initial lines of his character and doctrine. His sermons and writings are all in accordance with the teaching of the Catholic Church, the few that were condemned on examination by Paul IV. relatuig to his prophetic utterances, which were then regarded as delu- sions. It must always remain a doubt whether what he himself took for divine revelations were not to be accounted for by his own sagacity and natural foresight. In nothing that he ever spoke or wrote is there the least indication of Luther's doctrine of justification by faith without good works. Savonarola however lashed out freely against bad works, and spared neither prince nor prelate in his indignation. His scorn for those who pretended to guide men's souls by means of Virgil, Horace, and Cicero, while they sacrificed humility, poverty, chastity on the altars of poetry and oratory, was a magnificent protest against the paganism of the Renaissance. ^ Burlamacchi, p. 19. The Earlier Renaissance 137 The Convent of St. Mark's, restored by Cosmo de' Medici, and endowed by his grandson with a fine library, became a centre of learning and piety, and Savonarola delighted, if so sombre and melancholy a nature as his could be truly said to delight in anything, in the austere walls, embellished by the devout frescoes of Fra Angelico and his pupils, whose memory, together with that of St. Antoninus, the saintly friar of St. Mark's and Archbishop of Florence, was still cherished by the brethren. But outside his convent there was nothing on which the Friar's eyes could rest with confidence or hope. The scepticism, luxury, and immorality which Savonarola thought he saw everywhere around him haunted his imagination, and urged him to give vent to those violent denunciations and predictions of woe to Italy that have made him so famous. His vivid imagery attracted the people in such crowds, that soon the Dominican church could no longer hold them; therefore, in the Lent of 1491, he began to preach in the Duomo.^ It was inevitable that he should soon offend Lorenzo and his friends. He sought to avoid this by changing the nature of his discourses ; but he found that his gift of preaching left him unless he followed the path in which he believed God was leading him. For whole nights he wrestled, lying prone on the floor of his cell. Then, declaring that " all other ways, all doctrines save this one," were denied to him, he preached what he himself described as a " terrific sermon " on his own lines : — " Bethink ye well," he concluded, " O ye rich, for affliction shall smite you. This city shall no more be called Florence, but a den of thieves, of turpitude and bloodshed. Then shall you all be poverty-stricken, all wretched, and your name, O ye priests, shall be changed into a terror. I sought no longer to speak in Thy name, O Lord, but Thou hast overpowered me. Thy word has become like unto a fire within me, consuming the very marrow of my bones. Therefore am I derided and despised of the people. But I cry unto the Lord day and night, and I say unto you, know that unheard-of times are at hand." ^ His vehement, threatening, and yet compassionate words found an echo in the hearts of the populace, who are easily ^ Villari, vol. i. p. 124. ^ Ibid. p. 124. 138 Reformation and Renaissance moved by those who take their part against a real or supposed oppressor, but Savonarola's passionate impetuosity carried the preacher beyond all limits of prudence. At Easter he was invited to preach before the Signory, the chief magistrature of the city, when he gave utterance to these words : — " Tyrants are incorrigible because they are proud, because they love flattery, and because they will not restore ill-gotten gains. They leave all in the hands of bad ministers ; they succumb to flattery ; they hearken not unto the poor, and neither do they condemn the rich. They expect the poor and the peasantry to work for them without reward, or sufi^er their ministers to expect this ; they corrupt voters, and farm out the taxes to aggravate the burdens of the people. You must therefore remove dissensions, do justice, and exact honesty from all," ^ Whether Villari is right or not in considering this sermon a direct attack on Lorenzo, it is certain that the Magnificent desired to lessen the Friar's growing influence by every means in his power. Private efforts to induce Savonarola to moderate his language and give up predicting future events having failed, Lorenzo induced the Augustinian Fra Mariano da Gennazzano, a rival preacher, to controvert his conclusions, and to show that his style of oratory was presumptuous and calculated to foment discord. Fra Mariano accordingly launched forth, in a sermon at San Gallo, on Ascension Day, against Savonarola's methods, but in such a way as to bring discredit on his own. The Dominican answered him in another sermon, but with so much unwonted gentleness and moderation that there was no quarrel, and when Mariano left Florence for Rome, they parted on mutual good terms. Nevertheless, Savonarola continued to treat Lorenzo with scant courtesy, and when in the course of the same year, 1 49 1, he was by unanimous consent elected Prior of St. Mark's, he refused to pay the customary ceremonial visit to the head of the Medici family, who was not only the hereditary benefactor and patron of St. Mark's, but also the repre- sentative of the Florentine Republic. Fra Girolamo main- tained that his election was due to God alone, but Lorenzo was deeply offended and complained : " You see a stranger has come into my house, yet he will not stoop to pay me a visit ! " ^ 1 Villari, vol. i. p. 129. ^ Burlamacchi, p. 20 et seq. The Earlier Renaissance 139 He tried to conciliate the new Prior, visiting the con- vent and walking with the friars in the garden, perhaps in the hope of meeting Savonarola, who however purposely remained in his cell. Lorenzo then sent a gift of money as alms to the convent, but, according to Burlamacchi, the Prior resented the act, and immediately distributed the money among the poor, saying that silver and copper were sufficient for the needs of the brethren, and that they had no use for gold. The same authority relates that he exclaimed one day in the pulpit, " A faithful dog does not leave off barking because a bone is thrown to him ! " Already, some time before this, Lorenzo had charged five of the foremost citizens of Florence to interview the Friar, and to persuade him to change his attitude and manner of preaching against him. Savonarola's only answer was a message that the Magnifico should do penance for his sins. *' Tell him," added Fra Girolamo, as the ambassadors were about to leave, defeated in the object of their visit — " tell him that I am a stranger here, and he a citizen ; I, however, shall remain, and he depart." Lorenzo's days were, in fact, drawing to a close.. There are various more or less dramatic accounts of his death in 1492, but none so absolutely trustworthy as that of Politian, who was an eye-witness. According to this authority Lorenzo had already received the last sacraments, when Savonarola appeared at Careggi, the beautiful Medicean villa, about two miles from Florence, where the famous statesman lay. The Friar's mission was not to hear his confession, but to counsel and comfort the dying man. He exhorted him to hold fast the Catholic faith, to resolve to live a good life if he should recover from his illness, and to resign himself to death if it were the will of God that he should die. Lorenzo answered with becoming humility, and when Fra Girolamo was about to leave the room, asked for a farewell blessing. Savonarola then recited the prayers for a passing soul, and Lorenzo made the responses devoutly. Piero, the great Medici's son, inherited his father's vices without his strength and brilliancy. He soon alienated his hereditary friends, made an enemy of France, and broke with Milan. Florence, alarmed, turned to Savonarola for guidance, and soon the Prior of St. Mark's came to be looked upon as the leader of the party henceforth opposed 140 Reformation and Renaissance to the Medici. Those who sided with him began to be styled piagnoni (mourners) ; his enemies were arrabiati (enraged ones) ; and a third party, composed of those who adhered to the Medici, were called ■palleschi from the balls {palle) which formed the Medici arms. These three parties divided Florence between them, and made the city a scene of perpetual strife. If the sins of the Medici excited Savonarola's indig- nation, the crimes of the Borgias brought the Friar to the verge of madness. He believed that he saw a black cross rising from the city of Rome, reaching to the sky and extending its arms over the whole earth. Upon it was written Cross of the Wrath of God. The sky was black as night, the lightning flashed and thunder rolled terrifically, followed by a storm of wind and hail. From out of the midst of Jerusalem he thought he saw a golden cross casting its rays over the world, and upon it was written Cross of the Mercy of God} By dint of meditating on the Scriptures in connection with the actual state of the world, he had come to regard everything that happened as a fulfilment of prophecy. His reverence for the Bible was an integral part of his character ; he could not speak of it without emotion. His own copies, still to be seen at St. Mark's, are scored with marginal notes and different readings of the text ; ^ his allegorical manner of interpretation was, if often strained and far-fetched, at least totally opposed to the licence which Luther and Calvin permitted themselves in dealing with Scripture. In one of his marginal notes these words occur : " It is necessary to have long familiarity with the Bible ; it is necessary to be careful not to run counter to reason, nor to the received opinions of the Church and the learned. We must not turn the Bible to our own ends, for by so doing the human intel- lect would usurp the place of the Divine Word." To this principle Savonarola always adhered in matters of faith, discountenancing by anticipation the novelties of private interpretation. Nevertheless, as he became more and more visionary, his fantastic imagination would see mystical signs and portents in the simplest facts of Biblical history. Thus, whatever he discerned of evil threatening the Church or ^ Compendium Revelationum^ p. 244. ^ Lucas, Fra Girolamo Savonarola^ p, 28. The Earlier Renaissance 141 Italy, or the city of Florence itself, he declared the same to be foretold in the Bible. ^ Next to the Bible the Summa of St. Thomas claimed his attention, and in his sermons, particularly those preached during the Lent of 1494, numerous references were made to it. After Lorenzo's death Savonarola virtually ruled Florence from St. Mark's. The whole people were with him, seeing that his predictions had been verified. He had foretold the death of Pope Innocent VIII, and of Lorenzo the Magni- ficent ; and the evils with which he had threatened the city were beginning to descend upon it. He had prophesied the invasion of Italy by the French, and in the midst of his warnings and denunciations Charles VIII. had crossed the Alps at the head of a large army, and occupied the cities of Lombardy.- Either Savonarola's more than ordinary shrewdness and sagacity read the signs of the times beyond all the foresight of his contemporaries, or the Prior of St. Mark's was, as he believed, gifted with prophetic powers. He had opened his heart to his brethren, and they were, almost to a man, on his side in the reforms which he effected in his convent. Their numbers increased so prodigiously in a short time that the building was too small to contain them, and had to be enlarged. Other communities asked to be dissolved that they might be incorporated with St. Mark's. He was made Provincial of Tuscany, and thus obtained a free hand in all his multifarious undertakings.^ With the exception of the King of Naples, none of the Italian princes were prepared for invasion, and at the first rumour that the French king was marching on Florence, the miserable Piero fled, leaving the city practically in Savonarola's keeping. The people wandered aimlessly about the streets after their ruler's flight, casting covetous glances at the riches around them in the palaces built with the taxes with which they had been loaded. They were on the verge of lawlessness, when the great bell of the Duomo boomed out the call to Savonarola's discourse. Like a gigantic wave the whole population swept into the cathedral. Never before had so dense a crowd been collected within 1 Villari, vol. i. p. 119. 2 /^/^^ p^ jgg. ^ Gherardi, p. 23. 142 Reformation and Renaissance the spacious walls. Steel armour flashed from under the men's cloaks ; they were so closely packed that none could move, and the preacher looked down upon a solid mass of upturned faces. A word from him and they would have sacked the city. That day he was the most powerful man in Italy. But on this occasion he abstained entirely from politics, and expressed his pity for the abandoned people in words of tender affection.^ Critical as the event was for Florence, it was far more critical for Savonarola himself, and well had it been for him if he had never descended from Mount Sinai to mere temporal legislation in the senator's chair. In becom- ing the political representative of the people he abdicated his right to be their spiritual guide, identified himself with their fitful fancies, and ended as the victim of their fickleness. Nevertheless, all he did for the temporal welfare of his fellow-citizens was well done ; the republic which he founded showed him to be a born statesman. A government was formed under his auspices on the pattern of the Grand Council of Venice, with some modifications to suit the Florentine temper. A scheme of taxation was invented which placed the new government on a solid basis, and law and order prevailed in the city. But there was one flaw in the regime : liberty had been vindicated ; the tyrant was a fugitive ; the people were free ; but they were in danger of making their very freedom a heavier bondage than the oppressor's yoke had been. They exalted liberty to the throne of a deity, and ultimately sacrificed everything, even Savonarola himself, to maintain it. He could insist on dis- cipline, but he could not implant the love of duty in their hearts, and even while fighting the revolution he was caught in its toils. All his sermons had thenceforth a political tendency ; social reform was necessary, but political regeneration was his unceasing theme. His dreams and visions were now kept in the background, and he became the most practical of rulers. Detaching himself from the past, to which in many ways he belonged, he threw himself heart and soul into the Florentine cause. He became for its sake a politician, a man of brilliant action, a passer of diplomatic measures, ^ Villari, vol. i. pp. 2 13-2 11;. The Earlier Renaissance 143 always with a good and unselfish motive ; yet not content with pointing heavenward, he now sought to charm away with theories all the suffering of mankind, and to make of the world an El Dorado. Piero, after his flight from Florence, surrendered fortress after fortress to the French, and exasperated, the Florentines formally expelled the Medici, and deprived them of their citizenship.^ That Lent Savonarola preached on the Flood, and likened it to the punishment now pouring in upon Italy for her crimes, her faithlessness, her disregard of the warning voice. But when the French army had advanced as far as Pisa, he went out and solemnly adjured the king to spare Florence, and to uphold the cause of justice in Italy. His exhortation produced the desired effect. Charles VIII., awestruck, pledged himself to behave honourably to the Florentines, so that when he entered the city at the head of about 12,000 soldiers, he was conducted to the palace of the Medici amid shouts of applause. He might have done as he would with them, if he had not offended the people by trying to bring Piero back, when a terrible riot took place. It was quelled, partly by the Friar's strong hand, but mainly by the coolness and capacity with which one of the syndics, Piero Capponi, treated with the French king." But Charles's soldiery signalised themselves by their lawless and insulting behaviour, and the citizens were on the eve of a fresh out- break, when Savonarola induced the king to proceed on his journey. When he at last left, it was found that he had pillaged the palace in which he had been hospitably enter- tained ; but the people were so rejoiced to be rid of their guests that no one mourned over the loss of the costly antique gems and other treasures which the French had carried off. After an easy conquest of Naples, Charles resolved to return to France. But the French had made themselves obnoxious everywhere in Italy, and a coalition, consisting of the Pope, the Emperor, and the King of Spain, was formed against him. He had literally to cut his way back to France with a small remnant of his army. Florence flew to arms at his approach, hearing that Piero was in his camp. ^ Rinuccini, Ricordi Storici, p. 141. 2 Guicciardini, Storia d" Italia, vol. i. p. 117. 144 Reformation and Renaissance All once more turned to Savonarola as to a deliverer. He adopted, as before, a stern, resolute tone towards the king, and, as before, Charles was overawed, and consented to retire.^ A pitched battle took place between his troops and the allies ; he won a contested victory, and recrossed the Alps. But Piero prepared to attack Florence, and Savonarola urged the citizens from the pulpit to defend themselves. At his instigation a price was set on Piero's head. Thus far Savonarola had carried all before him. But now complications arose. Florentines were by no means unanimous in agreeing to the banishment of Piero ; and it was not merely the party represented by the palleschi who wished for his return. The arrabiati, in their hatred of Savonarola and jealousy of his power, made friends with Piero de' Medici and his allies the Venetians, who were inclined to reinstate him in Florence. Nevertheless two- thirds of the people sided with the Friar, and it behoved his enemies to get the Pope on their side if they would enter- tain reasonable hopes of his overthrow. Unfortunately, it was easy enough to put an objectionable construction on much that he uttered from the pulpit concerning his pro- phetic gift ; moreover, the authority which he formerly claimed as a servant of the Word of God he now carried into the political arena, and aroused much political hatred. Hitherto Alexander VI. had refrained from interference with him, but pressure being brought to bear upon the Pope, he now addressed him in a Brief, dated July 21, 1495, ^^^ ending thus : " The Pope has heard many reports of the apostolic labours of Fra Girolamo, whereat he greatly rejoices. And he has further learned, within the last few days, from Savona- rola himself, that the object of his preaching is to promote to the utmost the service of God. But he has also been informed that in his sermons the Friar has declared that his predictions of future events come not from himself, nor from human wisdom, but ' by a divine revelation.' This being so, we are desirous, in accordance with our pastoral duty, to have some conversation with you, and to hear from your own lips what it has pleased God to make known to you, that we may pursue a better course. We therefore exhort ^ Villari, vol. ii. pp. 8, 9, 10. The Earlier Renaissance 145 and command you that, in all holy obedience, you come to us without delay, and we shall receive you with paternal love and charity." ^ Savonarola excused himself from obeying this command by pleading illness, and abstained from preaching for some time. Two months later, another papal Brief, addressed this time to the Friars of Santa Croce who were not on good terms with Savonarola, designated him as " a certain Fra Hieronymo of Ferrara, a seeker after novelty." He sent a detailed reply to the Pope, who in the same Brief had required him to dissolve his congregation, again excusing himself from obeying and showing reason why he could not present himself in Rome, and declaring that he feared if he undertook the journey, to fall a victim to the plots of his enemies. Upon this Alexander again wrote commanding him to preach no more, until such time as it was convenient to him to seek the Pope's presence. Savonarola obeyed the letter of the injunction, but caused Fra Domenico, a brother Dominican, who shared his views, to become his mouthpiece, so that although his own lips were closed, his ideas were still promulgated in Florence. Meanwhile, the Carnival of 1496 drew near, and the people prepared to celebrate it in the accustomed manner. It was usual during the rule of the Medici for the whole city to present at this time a wild scene of revelry and excesses of every kind. Barriers were erected in the streets, and none were allowed to pass them without contributing to the night's entertainment by way of toll. After an evening spent in carousing, bonfires were lighted in the squares (^piazze\ and the people danced and sang round them madly, pelting each other with stones in so brutal a manner that no year passed without some persons being left dead on the ground. This practice is called by the chroniclers " the mad and bestial game of stones." It was frequently forbidden, but in vain ; and Savonarola, seeing that it would be hopeless to dream of abolishing existing customs unless something were substituted in their place, adopted religious instead of brutal ceremonies. He had small altars set up in the streets in the place of barriers, before which stood children begging alms for the poor. ^ Lucas, Fra Girolamo Savonarola, p. i 80. L 146 Reformation and Renaissance Pious hymns took the place of wanton songs, and the game of stones and the gluttonous feasts were abolished.^ A grand procession was arranged for the last day of the Carnival. The following year, the Friar proceeded to bring about a still more thorough reform. Children, by his command, went through the city, knocking at all the doors, and asking for the " anathema," by which was understood all objects of vanity, immoral books and pictures, ornaments for per- sonal adornment, unhallowed superfluities of every kind. These afterwards formed part of the procession to the Piazza della Signoria, were gathered into a pyramid and burned, while the people danced round the bonfire, loudly proclaiming Christ as King of Florence.- Unquestionably, in spite of some exaggerations, the reforms effected by Savonarola in every department of social life were stupendous. All writers on the subject are unani- mous in declaring that at least for the time being the face of Florence was changed. The need for reform was universally admitted, and in many places strenuous efforts were being made to restore discipline in the Church and the world. If the calm reason- ing and stern appeals of a Geiler von Kaisersberg had been almost ineffectual to rouse the dormant sense of religion in the Teuton mind, Savonarola's tempestuous eloquence worked wonders on the more sensitive Tuscan temperament. Gambling was to be punished with torture, blasphemers were to have their tongues pierced with a red-hot iron, the establishment of monte di pieta was to abolish usury. Much has been said about the Friar's vandalism in art, and doubtless, together with the real " anathema," many priceless masterpieces were unnecessarily sacrificed in the general enthusiasm. But the action proceeded from a mind thoroughly imbued with Christian principles. To enforce these Savonarola met the votaries of the pagan Renaissance on their own ground, and pointed out that even heathen philosophers had demonstrated the pernicious effect of sensual images on the minds of the young. Then, passing on to the purer atmosphere of Christianity, he describes what would have been the appearance and dress of the Blessed Virgin, clad modestly, come una poverella, whose face 1 Villari, vol. ii. p. 44.. - Burlamacchi, p. ii^ et seq. The Earlier Renaissance 147 was scarcely ever seen ; and he compared this picture with the meretricious paintings of the Madonna then in vogue, the models for which being often women of notoriously bad character. He not only decreed the destruction of all such profane portraits, but went to the very root of the matter, and sought to emancipate the imagination of his Florentines from the anti- Christian ideas which made such things possible. Besides the principle involved, Savonarola had a natural and very distinct love of the beautiful, and knew how to attract such painters as Baccio della Porta, more famous under the name of Fra Bartolommeo. Lorenzo di Credi, and others of his school, were so much influenced by Fra Girolamo's ideas that they threw into the flames with their own hands those of their paintings which they had learned from Savonarola to consider unworthy of Christian art. Among the " anathema " were included the works of Boc- caccio. In 1497 devotion to the Friar had reached a pitch of fervour which was the high-water mark of his prosperity. The next step was to be a step downwards. He was in bad odour at Rome for his contumacy in disregarding the Pope's summons, and there were elements of opposition even in Florence, which contributed not a little to bring him into collision with Alexander VI., whose politics were totally at variance with those of Savonarola and the piagnoni. The refusal of Florence to abandon France, and to join the Italian League, kept the peninsula in a state of ferment, and Savonarola, who believed that France was the only alter- native to the Medici, was mainly responsible for this refusal. It began to be whispered that there would have been no piagnoni and no arrahiati in Florence if Savonarola had remained at Ferrara.^ The Council of Ten, urged by the piagnoni, had asked and obtained leave for Savonarola to preach the Lenten sermons of 1497, but the arrahiati laid a trap for him, and succeeded in bringing about his fall. Certain words expressed in the first sermon of the series, perfectly orthodox in themselves, and in accordance with principles laid down by St. Thomas, were yet of a kind that by 1 Cosci, Girolamo Savonarola e i nuovi documenti interna al medescino, p. 461. 148 Reformation and Renaissance a slight verbal alteration might easily be made to appear heretical, and the opportunity was not lost by the Friar's enemies.^ Meanwhile Piero, emboldened by the departure of the French from Italy, prepared to attack Florence, and again an Act was passed putting a price on his head. The city was at war with Pisa, but all other undertakings were abandoned in the passionate determination to repulse the Medici. Arrabiati and piagnoni became friends for the moment of common peril, or what was regarded as such, and Piero found himself surrounded by enemies on all sides. His friends melted away silently, and there was nothing for him but to escape. A new Signory was elected, in which the arrabiati pre- dominated over the palleschi, who were far less hostile to Savonarola than the new members, and the result was an immediate diminution in the influence of the Friar. More- over his enemies, led by Fra Mariano, renewed their activities in Rome, and at last a Brief of excommunication against him was wrung from the Pope. The final aggravating cause of the excommunication had been Savonarola's persistent refusal to unite his convent to the newly erected Tuscan and Roman province, or rather it was his reiterated assertion that it was not in his power to compel his brethren to consent to its fusion, which amounted to a refusal. But there were other counts on which Savon- arola was condemned, namely, his disobedience in not re- pairing to Rome, and the reports of certain " pernicious teachings," as to which he had failed to justify himself The Brief was read in the principal churches of Florence by torchlight, in the presence of a vast concourse of people, amid the solemn tolling of bells. At the concluding words the torches were extinguished, and each church was plunged in darkness.^ The convent of St. Mark's was mobbed by the arrabiati^ and all Florence was in an uproar, but the Friar's friends were also rampant, and indignantly supported his protest against his '* surreptitious excommunication." For Savon- arola, far from accepting his condemnation meekly, wrote ^ Villari, Life and Times of Girolamo Savonarola^ English version, vol. ii. p. 55. ^ Gherardi, Nuovi Documenti, p. 95 f/ seq. The Earlier Renaissance 149 a violent manifesto addressed to all Christians, in which he vindicated his prophecies, repudiated the Pope's excom- munication as invalid, and declared that he had always submitted, and did still submit, to the authority of the Church. Granted, however, that his enemies had misrepresented him as to *' pernicious teachings," his conduct towards Alexander VI. had been such that he could not reasonably complain of want of forbearance on the part of the Pope ; and, in spite of his formal assertion that he considered the excommunication null and void, for three months Savon- arola tacitly acknowledged its binding force by refraining from the exercise of every ecclesiastical function. But at Christmas he cast off all restraint, said the customary three Masses, gave communion to the entire community, and to a vast number of the laity, and led his brethren in solemn procession round the Piazza. After this, little persuasion was necessary to induce him to resume his sermons, and he preached in St. Mark's on the invalidity of his excommunication. " If, O Lord," he cried, " I should seek to be absolved from this excommunication, let me be sent to hell ; I should shrink from absolution as from mortal sin." ^ It was an appeal from the Pope to the people, from authority to public opinion, and in his encouragement of timid souls to disregard the fact that they, too, were ex- communicate in accepting his forbidden ministrations, a direct instigation to revolt and lawlessness. And yet it may be maintained with perfect accuracy that his quarrel was with Alexander VI. personally, and that his attitude had nothing whatever to do with false views or heretical opinions about papal authority. The followmg passages, taken from his Triumph of the Cross, written about this time, and certainly after his excommunication, plainly indicate the integrity of his faith on the subject of the Papacy, as on all other subjects. Commenting on the words of the Gospel, " Thou art Peter, and upon this Rock will I build my Church," Savon- arola says : — '* Nor can these words apply to Peter alone, for inasmuch as God has promised that the Church shall endure to the 1 Prediche sopra P E socio, Venice, 1540, f. 12. 150 Reformation and Renaissance end of the world, so they must be held to apply to Peter and the successors of Peter. Wherefore it is manifest that all the faithful should be united under the Pope, as the Supreme Head of the Roman Church, the mother of all other churches ; and that whoever departs from the unity and doctrines of the Roman Church unquestionably departs from Christ." ' And again : — "All that the Roman Catholic Apostolic Church has decided, and all that she may decide in future time, we must accept ; and all that she despises, or may hereafter despise and condemn, we must reject ; for in any doubt, she is the one whom we consult as our first principle, as the infallible rule which God has established for the good of our soul." Savonarola being thus acquitted from heretical notions regarding Papal authority, we must look elsewhere for the explanation of his contumacy. It sprang from a variety of causes, the very uprightness of his intentions proving a snare to him. He had done a great work for Florence ; compared with that of Rome, the moral and social condition of the city was, thanks to his personal influence, almost an ideal one. His conscience accused him of no divergence from Catholic truth ; if he was condemned, it was owing to those who, loving darkness rather than light, had misrepresented him to the Pope. If, therefore, his excommunication was invalid, he committed no sin in disregarding it ; he even went further, and doubted whether a Pontiff so averse from reform were indeed the regular, canonically elected successor of St. Peter or no. He agitated for the assembling of a general council to inquire into the matter, but the letter which he wrote to Charles VIII., urging the consideration upon him, was inter- cepted, and sent to Rome. Fof nearly a year the republic of Florence, in which the Friar's friends now for a time again predominated, carried on an energetic correspondence with the Pope in his defence. Nevertheless, many of his warmest admirers were restrained by the fear of excommunication from holding intercourse with one whom the Pope had formally condemned. For some cause or other he had lost his hold on 1 Book iv. chaps, iv. and v. The Earlier Renaissance 151 the people ; perhaps, even while urging him to disobedience, they despised him for yielding to them, and those who admire him most can only wish that, rightly or wrongly condemned, he had bowed his head in submission. Even his friends lost their enthusiasm for him ; there was no longer the same magic in his name. The Signory at last forbade him to preach even in St. Mark's, for the Pope had threatened that unless the citizens ceased to encourage him, Florence should be placed under an interdict.^ Attacks were made upon him from several pulpits at once, and a Franciscan, preaching at Santa Croce, challenged him to prove the truth of his prophecies by a miracle. Upon this, Fra Domenico da Pescia, who had all through been Savonarola's staunch friend and supporter, declared that he would go through the fire for the prophet. The arrabiati took up the suggestion, pressed the matter, and enlisted the Signory in favour of an ordeal by fire. If he were burned, so much the better ; if he refused the test, he would lose all credit with his adherents.^ But delay after delay ensued ; there was no question of the Friar's submission, but the Signory debated seriously whether Savonarola should not be sent a prisoner to Rome. At last, however, a day was fixed for the ordeal. Having said Mass at St. Mark's, on April 7, the Friars Girolamo and Domenico set forth, arrayed in copes, and preceded by a crucifix borne aloft at the head of a procession of Friars, walked solemnly towards the Piazza della Signoria, where a platform had been erected. Savonarola carried a consecrated Host, which he after- wards deposited on a small altar in one of the compartments of the Loggia dei Lanzi. The place was thronged with spectators ; every coign of vantage was occupied, and the line of curious citizens on the roofs showed black against the sky. The platform was piled with bundles of wood, covered with earth and bricks. Wood, gunpowder, pitch, and resin, stacked in two banks, formed a sort of grove to allow of the passage of the rival champions. All was ready, and the Friars had only to step forward, when the torch would be laid to the pile. Up to this moment Savonarola had tem- porised, while the Franciscans had urged him to accept the 1 Pastor, vol. iii. p. 421. ^ Villari, vol. ii. p. 146. 152 Reformation and Renaissance challenge. Fra Domenico had been all along eager for the test to be applied, so enthusiastic was his faith in the Prior. But now the Franciscans hesitated and made diffi- culties. They insisted on Domenico changing clothes with another, lest his own should be enchanted ; they objected to his carrying the crucifix with him, but when it was under- stood that he intended bearing the Blessed Sacrament into the midst of the flames they attempted to lay violent hands on him. In the midst of the confusion a thunder-storm broke with torrents of rain. It was clear that now no fire could be lighted. Hours had been wasted in raising objections and in discussing them. The indignation of the crowd began to be heard in ugly threats ; they had come to witness a spectacle, to feast on horrors, and there was to be no tragedy after all. They felt themselves to be defrauded ; it was spread about that Savonarola had refused the ordeal, and the city rang with curses. The Dominicans had diffi- culty in regaining their convent, although escorted by a troop of soldiers. Savonarola, entering the church, where a number of women had remained praying all dav, mounted the pulpit and explained that the victory must be ascribed to him, since the failure of the ordeal was due to the frivolous and fraudulent proceedings of the Franciscans. A Te Deum was then sung in thanksgiving, and Savonarola appears to have convinced his friends as well as himself of the triumph of his cause, in the same way as he had before convinced himself and them of the lawfulness of his disobedience. But Florence was of a different opinion, and the davs that followed witnessed scenes of violence and brutality hitherto unknown in the history of the city. The next day was Palm Sunday, and Savonarola preached a short sermon in St. Mark's. When the devotions conducted by Fra Girolamo were over, and the congregation dispersed into the Piazza, they were assailed with stones and other missiles, and many were grievously injured. It was clear that a riot was pending, and the Friars barricaded themselves in St. Mark's, enduring a veritable siege during the whole night and throughout the following day. The mob attacked the convent, which was gallantly defended, but Savonarola took no part in the fray. He remained praying in the church with a few whom he had persuaded to bear him company, while most of the brethren. The Earlier Renaissance 153 with breastplates over their white habits, helmets on their heads, and brandishing enormous halberds, rushed up and down the cloisters with shouts of '* Viva Cristo," defending every point. Foreseeing the attack on the convent a fortnight previ- ously, when the populace had begun to murmur against the Friar, a few citizens had conveyed weapons, offensive and defensive, secretly into St. Mark's, and had watched over them carefully during the interval.^ Smoke penetrated into the church and became suffocat- ing ; flames were at last seen leaping round the doors. Savonarola stood on the altar steps with the Blessed Sacra- ment in his hands reciting prayers. When the novices around him were silenced by the battering at the door, he would say Orate fratres in a low impressive voice, and they would fall again to their prayers. When the church doors were burnt, and had fallen in, the infuriated mob poured into the sacred building. But Savonarola had taken refuge with his little band in the Greek library,^ carrying the Blessed Sacrament into safety, and here he was arrested, together with Fra Domenico, led down into the cloisters, and thence to the Piazza. Those who had once hung on his lips, fascinated by his eloquence, now surged threateningly about him. They would have torn him limb from hmb if he had not been strongly guarded. They kicked him, seized his fingers till they almost broke ; they singed him with their torches, and assailed him with horrid words of insult and ferocity till the prison doors closed upon him.^ When some degree of order was re-established in the city, the arms so injudiciously deposited in St. Mark's, and made use of in a moment of panic, were collected and carried through the streets, " Behold the miracles of St. Mark's, behold the miracles of the Friar," shouted the people, " and the tokens of his love for Florentines." * Meanwhile, Savonarola in prison was put to the torture, a cruelty which he had himself advocated, even in the pulpit. It was a generally accepted means employed by every tribunal in Europe for extracting evidence of guilt from every criminal. Not un- frequently, as in the case of Savonarola, it stultified itself. Weak, and extremely nervous, he soon began to rave ; his 1 Burlamacchi, p. 154. - Ibid. p. 139. 3 Ibid. p. 144. 4 Ibid. p. 145. 154 Reformation and Renaissance replies lost all coherence ; the confessions wrung from him were obviously doctored, edited by the notary. He said and unsaid, affirmed and denied his visions and prophecies. Fra Domenico, always courageous, stoutly defended his friend, and never ceased declaring his firm belief in Savon- arola. The Pope had been made acquainted with the proceedings, and had at first required that the prisoners should be sent to Rome. But this the Signory refused, and two Papal Com- missioners therefore arrived in Florence to aid in the examination and ratify the judgment of the tribunal. Of all the accusations brought against Savonarola, the main indictment consisted of two points, of which he was proved guilty and condemned. These were (i) his endea- vour to procure the deposition of the Pope — a flagrant contravention of a Bull of Pius II. ; (2) by means of a General Council, to be convoked by temporal princes. The three counts on which his sentence was based were con- structive heresy and schism, and contempt of the Holy See.^ Together with Fra Girolamo, two others were to suffer as participators in his guilt, — the faithful Domenico and Fra Silvestro, a disciple who, throughout the story, had been as prominent by his timidity and vacillation, perhaps not alto- gether free from knavery, as Domenico was by his fervour and loyalty. They were sentenced to be first hanged, then cast into the flames. Fra Domenico expressed a wish to be burned alive, so that he might the better testify to the innocence of his master, till reproved for his presumption by Savonarola, who exclaimed that it was not for them to choose the manner of their death. After saying Mass and giving communion to his two companions on Ascension Day, May 23, 1498, Savonarola made his profession of faith, and was led to the gallows, with his two companions. As they passed before the papal delegates each received a plenary indulgence, " as if," says one of Savonarola's latest biographers, " in recognition of at least the possibility that they had acted in good faith." ^ A long platform had been raised on the Piazza della Signoria, a man's height from the ground. A stout beam stood upright at one end, with another nailed across it near ^ Lucas, Fra Girolamo Savonarola, p. 429. 2 I hid, p. 438. The Earlier Renaissance 155 the top. Three halters and three chains hung from it, the first to hang the Friars, the second to hold their dead bodies suspended over the flames that were to consume them. The crowd expressed nothing but fierce joy and brutal callousness, as the condemned, stripped of their religious habits, came forth in their woollen tunics, barefoot and with their hands bound. They were then solemnly degraded and delivered over to the executioners. With great calmness they mounted the gallows and prepared to die. A certain priest named Nerotto asked of Savonarola, " In what spirit dost thou bear this martyrdom .? " and he answered briefly, " The Lord has sufl^ered so much for me." He then kissed the crucifix and was silent to the end. Fra Domenico died enthusiastically as he had lived. He wished to intone the Te Deum in a loud voice, but he was persuaded to refrain and to recite it in a whisper with his friends. His last words proclaimed his faith in Savonarola. The death of Fra Silvestro took place as he pronounced the words In manus tuas Domine. The pile was already lighted and burnmg before the executioner had descended the ladder to apply the torch, for with frenzied haste a man had detached himself from the crowd and had set fire to the wood, exclaiming exultingly, " At last I can burn the Friar who would have liked to burn me ! " The bodies were cut down, the flames devoured them, and the ashes afterwards carefully collected were thrown into the Arno. One of the most painful circumstances of Savonarola's death is his abandonment by the people for whom he had sacrificed everything, by the friends who had hung on his lips, and by his brethren of St. Mark's. The responsibility for his end rests with Church and State. His political career was played out, when having persistently defied the highest ecclesiastical authority with the concurrence of the State, that authority threatened Florence with an interdict which would have entailed its social ostracism and commercial ruin. Alexander VI., it must be admitted, for all his unworthi- ness, had been singularly forbearing in Savonarola's regard. His sins and those of his family and court had been held up for public opprobrium, had been openly discussed in many of the Friar's sermons. He was not only declared unfit to sit in the chair of the Apostle, but had been denounced by 156 Reformation and Renaissance Savonarola as having no canonical right to it, his election having been simonaical. Further, the Friar had committed repeated acts of disobedience, had claimed for himself the gift of prophecy, and finally had conspired with the king of France, and had written letters to four other sovereigns with the object of bringing about a Council that should depose the actual occupant of the Holy See, or rather should decree that he had never really been Pope at all. Over and above the sin of conspiracy, Savonarola was guilty of attempting to precipitate the whole Christian world into anarchy and schism. That in spite of these facts his intention had always been pure and elevated would not necessarily influence his judges in his favour, however righteous they might have been, and it would be a mistake to suppose them all caitiffs and villains. A court of justice does not take cognisance of an accused person's motives but of his acts, and by his acts Savonarola was condemned. Viewing his life and all the circumstances that moulded his thoughts and actions, we who are not his judges may, at this distance of time, form the opinion that, if the Lord was not in the tempest, in the frenzied words of denunciation, in the politics that made for strife, at least He may have been in the upright intention of His servant, and in his humble and ignominious end. Savonarola's entire works were subjected to a severe scrutiny by Pope Paul IV. in 1558. His Dialogue on Prophetic Truths and fifteen of his sermons were alone con- demned, and all the rest allowed to circulate freely. Julius II. allowed Raphael to place his portrait in one of the stanxe of the Vatican, among the most illustrious Doctors of the Church, in the famous Disputa. In the course of the sixteenth century his innocence was considered to be established, and an examination into the ground of his sentence resulted in his rehabilitation. This took place on the occasion of the beatification of Caterina de' Ricci, who was accused of having frequently implored his intercession. During the whole time of the inquiry, St. Philip Neri, who kept the great Dominican's portrait en- circled with a nimbus in his room, prayed " with a fervour amounting to anguish, that this immortal champion of the Christian faith might not be subjected to further condem- nation. When the news was brought to him that Fra The Earlier Renaissance 157 Girolamo's character would be vindicated, he could scarcely restrain his transports of joy. Bronze medals and portraits of the Friar were allowed to be freely circulated in Rome, with inscriptions which styled him Doctor and Martyr. Savonarola is one of the great phenomena of the Renaissance, to which, however, he but partly belonged. By his philosophy, his asceticism, his manner of reasoning, he was of the Middle Ages. Humanism in arts and letters was his abhorrence, and he was apt to detect latent paganism even in the efforts of Christian art to shake off the stiffness of Byzantine tradition, and to expand and develop on its own lines. Armed at all points against the reaction from mediasval austerity and simplicity everywhere apparent, he was yet keenly sensitive to other aspects of the Renaissance, and pandered irresistibly to one of its main principles, the deification of liberty. Individualism, another great charac- teristic of the new age, reached its culminating point in the Friar who deliberately descended from the pulpit to the rostrum, and gave a constitution to Florence. The savour of his personal sanctity remains in the Church which he desired above all things to serve, and the mistakes into which his zeal and political ardour led him may be buried in the movement which called them forth. CHAPTER V ERASMUS OF ROTTERDAM I 467-1 535 To pass from Savonarola to Erasmus is like leaving the tropics to find oneself at the North Pole. The faults of the great Dominican were those of an ardent, highly -strung temperament, of a certain wrong- headedness concerning that which he considered the re- generation of the Church and of society required of him. He was a visionary, but much may be forgiven to the honest enthusiast. He was all aflame with eagerness for God's glory ; zeal for the House of the Lord consumed him. He cared for the triumph of righteousness above all things, and if he was ambitious, it was with the noble ambition of leading men into the paths of goodness and peace. Manifold were the evils from which the age was suffering ; adultery, simony, usury defiled the sanctuary, and his fervid imagination led him in the pursuit of healing to seek remedies where only a new disease was to be found. But his disobedience, viewed in the light of the exceptional circumstances in which he was entangled, was only a little way removed from a great virtue ; and he expiated his aberration by a piteous death, deserted by those for whom he had dared everything. Erasmus, on the other hand, was not of the stuff of which martyrs are made. He was not prepared to suffer in any cause, however just. His chief shortcomings were undeniably those of the heart, and his greatest passion was the passion for learning. His convictions had less hold on him than his fastidious taste. "Atheism," says Brewer, " talking Greek in high places, was a less disagreeable sight to Erasmus than piety in bad Latin, violating the rules of 158 DE5IDERli:5.ERA5MU.S.RuTTLRODAMl\S Qiii Patriae li3men,Q_ui uoftri gloria feclL J.d &aypum[ohann\s Holhnrnr Pt/Foris artifiaojyiimi. {iiiodwfins Lrasmi tsstirnonic a/ "-T ^omam(J\/Grum ofn.jux CanceiLirium pcrscrivto. ' /''"'*' ' '^ /• j-rr -' ' Lon^ejij^ Jimiluij- ftut, Jtiam tiuo-ti aa iA Li^^-rto urero ^ ^ I ■ J-~> 'r ante demf tun Ju. Rise of Protestantism in Germany 203 humanism, and who, after the laudable fashion of Petrarch, Nicholas v., Pius II., Grocyn, Erasmus, Cardinal Grimani, and others, studied the classics from a sincere love of learn- ing, not sharing the meretricious motives of those who were content to reproduce in the sixteenth century all that was least ennobling in the pagan world. The greatest scholar in Germany at the time of the Re- formation was John Reuchlin, sometimes called Capnio, who was born at Pforzheim in 1455. His whole hfe was spent in study, and he came under the influence of most of the European men of letters of his day. He belonged, together with his contemporaries John Colet, Grocyn, Budsus, and Erasmus, entirely to the early humanist tradition, to those who returned to the study of ancient languages for their own sakes, for the sake of philology, and who remained free from the corruptions of heathen antiquity to which the later humanists in Italy and Germany were so facile a prey. John a Lapide, whom he met at the University of Paris, taught and inspired him with a taste for grammar, which became the groundwork of all his future labours. At Basle he began to learn Greek under Andronikus Contoblakas, and was the first to insist in Germany on the necessity of the study of Greek literature. At Paris, Hermonymus, whose scholarship was so highly prized by Sixtus IV., continued his classical education. Being, even at an advanced age, more in touch with his fellows than Erasmus, and feeling a deep interest in the burning questions of the day, Reuchlin did not altogether escape the toils of the Zeitgeist. The younger humanists looked up to him with enthusiasm, although they failed to catch his spirit or to work from his motives. His position,, with regard to the Protestant reformers was akin to that of Erasmus. When Luther approached him with flattery, and sought to attract him to his cause, Reuchlin remained silent. He had sent his nephew Melanchthon to Wittenberg, as professor, but was extremely displeased when Melanchthon joined the Lutherans. He had promised to leave him his library, but withdrew the promise, when he found that his nephew had broken with the Church, and in his later years refused to correspond with him. Reuchlin was of the opinion that Savonarola's death was a necessity ; nevertheless he did not close his eyes to the 204 Reformation and Renaissance existing disorders ; he honoured the philosophy of the Middle Ages, admired Albertus Magnus, but was an opponent of the actual debased scholasticism of the day. After studying law at Tubingen he went to Italy, visited Florence, Lorenzo the Magnificent then being at the height of his power. At Rome, Sixtus IV. took an interest in his studies. The Greek Argyropulus, on seeing a specimen of Reuchlin's scholarship, exclaimed, " Through our exile Greece has flown over the Alps ! " In 1490 Reuchlin paid a second visit to Italy, which proved of great importance to his future studies. He made the acquaintance of Pico della Mirandola, who was the first to introduce cabbala to the learned world, and to attempt to unite the secret lore of the Jews with Christianity. Reuchlin was already a proficient Hebraist, and had com- piled the first complete Hebrew handbook for students, a work which corresponds in significance to Lilly's Latin grammar. His knowledge of the language led him to a profound study of Semitic history, literature, and character, a circumstance which entangled him subsequently in an irritating quarrel, for the Jews were so unpopular in Germany that a word of extenuation in their behalf was considered tantamount to heterodoxy. Later on, the Lutherans were not more tolerant than the Catholics, and all regarded them as the implacable enemies of Christianity. But notwithstanding all the provocation they gave, there was a strong element of unreasonableness in the hatred with which the Jews had been hated in the Middle Ages. Reuchlin would be fair to them in acknowledging the debt owed to them by the Christian world, for their having pre- served the Scriptures intact for so many centuries. He wished, by opening up the original text of the Old Testament, to provide a wholesome alternative to the exaggerated cultivation of pagan antiquity ; " for the Scrip- tures," he complained, " are not merely neglected, but despised and abandoned for the more agreeable study of rhetoric and poetry." ^ Reuchlin himself, carried away by his enthusiasm for his subject, soon regarded rabbinical literature but as the key to cabbalistic signs and marvels, by means of which Christianity might be yet more spiritualised. 1 L. Geiger, "Johann Reuchlin and seine Werke. Leipzig, 1871. Rise of Protestantism in Germany 205 " No science," wrote Pico, " makes us more certain of the divinity of Christ than cabbala and natural magic " ; and Reuchlin added : " The cabbalists desire nothing more fer- vently than to raise the human mind to God, and thus secure for it perfect bliss in this world, and eternal joy in the life to come." It was a partly supernatural, partly rationalistic theo- sophy, and Reuchlin was far from claiming for it any dogmatic teaching in opposition to Catholic doctrines. His object was to serve religion by a better knowledge and understanding of the Judaical books ; but his views were calculated to confuse rather than to enlighten, and opinions were divided as to the usefulness of his work in this direction. The fundamental principle of cabbala is that the visible world is a copy, an image of the invisible, with which it stands in close relationship. To this principle is joined belief in the magical power of certain earthly elements over those connected with them in the celestial world. Thus, in pronouncing certain words, God becomes visible to the spirit, and actually present in the human mind, in a manner in which He was not, before these words were spoken. Neither Pico nor Reuchlin invented the system. Ray- mund Lullus, in the beginning of the fourteenth century, had made profound studies in the secret lore of the Hebrews, and looked upon cabbala as a divine science. He discovered that its teaching agreed with that of Pythagoras, a not very wonderful discovery, since Pythagoras was instructed by the Jews. Both philosophical systems possess certain mysteries in common, and notably that connected with numbers. For example, the number ten was considered pre-eminently sacred. In it all being was comprehended. There were ten names for God, of which the first three were Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Aristotle followed Pythagoras in indicating ten kinds of existence. The world moved in ten spheres. Man has ten fingers and ten toes, and so on. Many read Reuchlin's book and shook their heads. John Colet, Dean of St. Paul's, told Erasmus that the charm of it lay more in the words than in the subject, and that many strange things were supposed to be contained in Hebrew expressions and signs. But he summed up by saying, " Oh, Erasmus, of books and learning there is no end ; but there is nothing better in this short life than to 2o6 Reformation and Renaissance live purely and holily, to strive daily after perfection and enlightenment, as these books teach us ; but that can only be done by a tender love and imitation of Jesus Christ." Reuchlin was a dreamer but no wizard, as some of his enemies have maintained. He made no pretence of being a theologian, for he had too exalted an idea of theology to trespass on territory beyond his province. In his Hebrew works occur frequent passages, such as this : " Of the sense of the words I will not speak as a theologian, but only expound them as a grammarian." He was a man of peace, but con- stant attacks on himself and his works sometimes obliged him to use his pen as a sword. He had small respect for fanatics, and when the theologians of Mainz and Cologne entered the lists against him, he nicknamed them " Diabologen." But his bitterest enemies were the Jewish converts. During the Middle Ages the Jews had been regarded as pariahs, and treated as such. They possessed no rights, and were entirely subject in Germany to the caprice of the Emperors. They were the only class of men for whom the Renaissance did nothing, and a persecution even broke out under Maximilian I., which he at least tolerated, if he did not actually encourage it. Their condition was such that there were strong temptations to embrace Christianity from sordid or other motives than conviction. Such a convert was Victor von Karben, who was baptized at the age of fifty, and wrote a pamphlet against his brethren, full of zeal, but also of deplorable ignorance. Reuchlin's most powerful opponent was, however, another converted Jew, John PfefFerkorn, who possessed some intellectual capacity, though learning was by no means his strongest point. His whole energy was exerted to convert those of his race, and when he despaired of this, his only alternative was to exterminate them out of Germany. They naturally hated and feared him ; for his measures, if he had had his way, would have been pitiless. All their books were to be taken from them and publicly burned ; then they themselves were to be driven out. In return, they cursed and threatened him, and he appealed to the Archbishop of Cologne for protection. Reuchlin undertook to defend the German Jews from Pfefferkorn's fanaticism, which at least equalled their own ; and he wrote a treatise, Der Augenspiegel^ advocating gentle measures and humane treatment, as a more Rise of Protestantism in Germany 207 likely way to draw them into the Church. He praised their rabbinical books, and showed how they had obeyed our Lord's command to search the Scriptures. This treatise, which was not written for the general public, but for the guidance of the Emperor and the Archbishop, was, in spite of some blemishes, a monument of fair and dispassionate reasoning, exhibiting a keen insight into the practical diffi- culties of the case. The universities of Erfurt and Heidel- berg declared for Reuchlin, but Pfefferkorn was all-powerful, and worked upon the scholastics, inciting them to burn Reuchlin's books. The quarrel became loud and furious, and Reuchlin, at the end of his patience, appealed to Rome. Vituperation was part and parcel of every sixteenth- century argument, and in the course of the dispute, even the scholarly and moderate Reuchlin had lost his temper, and had condescended in his book to belabour Pfefferkorn as " a low, dishonourable scoundrel," and as a man "possessed of a devilish nature." Perhaps the fury of his antagonists led him farther than he had intended to, go ; but however thafmay be, they contrived to so thoroughly misrepresent the tendency of the Augenspegel that it was condemned at Rome as " a scandalous and offensive book, unlawfully favourable to the Jews," and Reuchlin was ordered to pay the costs of the suit. The blow was severe, but it threw light on his own position. Hitherto, in common with other Catholic lovers of reform, he had shown some leaning towards Luther and his party, although Luther had no sympathy either for the Jews or for cabbalistic lore ; but Reuchlin was too much a man of the Renaissance not to have been attracted by any opposition to scholasticism. Now, however, he perceived that he was involved in no mere question of the Schools, and the condemnation of his book showed clearly that he must make his choice. He at once generously submitted to the decision of the Church, severed all connection between himself and the revolutionary party, and attempted to detach Melanchthon from them also.^ In a letter addressed to the Bavarian dukes he expressed himself so decidedly against Luther's innovations, that he incurred Hutten's implacable hatred. " Do your worst," thundered the furious demagogue, " and if your age allows it, go to Rome, which you so long to see again, and kiss Pope Leo's foot. Write against us as much as you like, but ^ Geiger, p. 466. 2o8 Reformation and Renaissance in spite of you and your denunciations with those of godless Rome, we shall succeed in shaking off the galling yoke, and in freeing ourselves from that slavery which it is your boast always to have borne willingly, as if it were a thing worthy of you. Luther's cause displeases you, you disapprove of it, and would like to destroy it. But in me you will find a determined antagonist, not merely if you attempt anything against Luther, but if you persist in giving in to the Pope." ^ That there might be no mistake as to his intentions, Reuchlin took up his abode in the house of John Eck, Luther's great enemy ; but when Eck would have burned Luther's books, Reuchlin prevented him, not from any sympathy with their contents, but because burning books was not answering them.^ Luther should be condemned by learning, not by passionate party-spirit and invective. Living in a fighting age Reuchlin was a fighter in spite of himself. He was a scholar, with all a scholar's virtues, and some of the faults of a partisan, but his singleness of purpose saved him from the worst pitfalls, and he more than atoned for the scandal of his mistakes by the large-heartedness of his submission. Among even the earlier German humanists there were few who did not succumb, at least for a time, to the fascina- tion of Luther's doctrines, which were, indeed, so nearly allied to the naturalism of the Renaissance that in Germany Reformation and Renaissance might almost seem convertible terms. John Cochlasus, however, much as he was inclined to favour Luther in the beginning, when the reform of abuses was alone in question, soon discovered the real issue under- lying the assault upon the sale of indulgences, and even before the publication of the papal Bull ceased to believe in his cause. Hitherto he had read few of Luther's writings, for he was engrossed in the older humanism, for which he foresaw a brilliant future, when libraries should be opened up and their hidden treasures made accessible to all. He aspired to the millennium of literature and the reform of abuses, much as Erasmus did, and would have fought for it as Savonarola fought for liberty. Some time elapsed before it became clear that Luther was aiming at something quite different. The ^ Geiger, p. 466 ; Bocking, Hutteni op. suppl. ii. pp. 803, 804. Translated into German by Geiger, pp. 486-488. 2 Geiger, p. 462. Rise of Protestantism in Germany 209 alarm was first sounded when it struck Cochlaeus that if some of Luther's theories were followed up learning would be endangered, and the new light thrown upon old studies practically extinguished. In 1520, however, the plot thick- ened, and Cochlaeus took up arms to defend the Catholic faith against the heresiarch. He demonstrated Lutheranism to be partly a revival of ancient heresies long since condemned, and partly an invention hitherto unheard of — justification by faith alone, without works — the result of Luther's diseased imagination. Dealing with the Friar's assertion that the Sacraments were no means of grace, and that the Mass was no sacrifice, Cochlasus exclaimed : " This, no heretic has until now dreamed of teaching, not even the most shameless and abandoned ! " And in another place his scorn found vent in the words : " It is truly a fine religion which has no Sacrifice, and only sacra- ments that do nothing for those who receive them ! " ^ This attitude of course altered the position of Cochlasus towards those of his friends who had thrown in their lot with Luther, with the exception of Emser and Pirkheimer, who were never entirely committed to Luther's doctrines, and Melanchthon, the least fanatical of his disciples. Wilibald Pirkheimer, familiar to us through Albrecht Diirer's portrait, as a tall man of powerful build, with fine, deeply set eyes, was endowed with mental qualities of no mean calibre, quick and sympathetic perceptions, and a prodigious memory. Having received a liberal education, he went to Italy, and distinguished himself in a seven years' sojourn at the Universities of Padua and Pavia. From his father, Johann Pirkheimer, a patrician (^Patrizier) of Niirn- berg, he inherited statesman-like abilities and polished manners. Wilibald sought to unite the older and younger school of humanism without pronouncing in favour of either, and like Pico della Mirandola prided himself on his aloofness from every party, having, as he expressed himself, " neither disciples nor partisans," and being " no man's follower." He delighted to be in contact with the celebrities of his day. " Of all enjoyments," he declared in his Apology for Reuchlin, " none have been so highly esteemed by me as the friendship of scholars. I rejoice, and congratulate myself that I have friends among the 1 Cochljeus, De Grat. Sacram. fol. 72b. P 2IO Reformation and Renaissance erudite not only in Germany, but throughout Europe," Yet he leaned at one time perceptibly towards the early humanists, and reverenced in Geiler von Kaisersberg a true reformer. Moreover, Pirkheimer was looked upon as one of the pillars of Reuchlinism, when Reuchlin's quarrel with Pfefferkorn raged most fiercely. But unlike Reuchlin his tolerance in an intolerant age proceeded more from a certain cosmopolitanism, and a diplomatic desire to be well with all parties, than from charity and that peace which is the result of profound knowledge. His friendly relations with the Lutherans caused him to be suspected of heretical views, and for a time the strength of the current bore him stream downwards. Even when he returned to the old religion, a certain taint pervaded some of his otherwise orthodox writings. Thus, when Cochlasus sent one of Pirkheimer's theological books to John Fisher, the Bishop of Rochester answered in praise of it " as far as it was Catholic." The revolutionary and anti-Catholic passions excited by Luther began to bear fruit in the year 1524, the immense propaganda carried on by means of the printing-press keep- ing up a perpetual fermentation. Whatever Luther printed was read, and it was difficult to get anything published on the other side.-^ The printing-offices teemed with Lutherans ; even those of Froben, Erasmus's favourite printer, were not free from the infection ; and it was said with truth — Sed in dotno Frobenii Sunt multi pravi bcereticir The Lutherans were, in fact, triumphant all along the line, and were bent on the destruction of Catholic religious life in all its aspects. Niirnberg was one of the first cities of Germany to embrace Protestantism. The change was the more remark- able, as its Catholicity had been in the past of a particularly robust type. Religious institutions had flourished there in a soil singularly well adapted to their requirements. With civic pride the burghers had looked upon the convent and church of St. Clare as their own choice and particular idea, ^ In 1523 the number of books printed in Germany was 498, of which no fewer than 183 were Luther's own. 2 Epistolee obscurorum virorum. Rise of Protestantism in Germany 211 and watched jealously lest any maiden not of pure Niirnberg descent should receive the habit therein. Hence, the nuns were all more or less nearly related to each other and to the members of the town council, who in letters addressed to the convent would recommend themselves to the prayers of their little cousins {Mumelein). Albrecht Diirer's Niirnberg differed little from the Niirn- berg of to-day, in spite of " modern improvements," with its picturesque gables and huge, sloping red roofs of several stories, its house -fronts in stone and wood, elaborately carved in cunning devices, its circuitous streets, wonderful fountains, and quaint bridges. Only then, art and scholar- ship rendered it as famous as it was beautiful, and instead of occupying the dull level of a second-rate provincial town, it was a busy centre and the theatre of all the movement and agitation of the times. Among its foremost families were the Pirkheimers and the Tuchers. The Pirkheimers had already been distinguished for centuries by their talents, their excellent citizenship, their untarnished scutcheon. Wilibald had seven sisters, of whom two became nuns in the convent of St. Clare. The eldest, Charitas, already known to her contemporaries as " the crown of her sex," was born in 1466, at a time when Niirnberg was at the height of its glory and prosperity, *' the inventor, governess, and mother of the arts and sciences," according to the proud language of one of its principal burghers, in his solemn welcome to the papal legate, Cardinal Cajetan.^ With all the Pirkheimers study was a passion, and Charitas was no exception to the rest of her family in this regard. There had nearly always been a Pirkheimer within the walls of St. Clare, and Charitas found there a great-aunt, Katharina, a woman of large intelligence, refinement, and piety, admirably suited to bring up the child in all the excellent traditions of her family. In after years Wihbald congratulated his sister on having so faithfully imitated her virtues that the teacher appeared to be mirrored in the pupil. Later on, he himself contributed not a httle to the broadening of her character and the education of her literary taste ; but it was " Grossmuhme Katharina " who guided the child's first eager footsteps up the hill of knowledge. Her school-life merges, almost imperceptibly to us, into the religious life. In what years Charitas took the veil and the grey habit 1 Binder, Charitas Pirkheimer, Aebtissin von St. Clara xu 'N umber g, p. 5. 2 12 Reformation and Renaissance of the Poor Clares, and made her profession is uncertain ; all we know of the matter is that she fell in love with the studious solitude of the cloister, and at an early age determined to seek her life's work within its peaceful walls. The grave, sweet, book-loving child disappears from sight, and lives a happy hidden life, in the development of those qualities of mind and heart that made her so great a power for good in the troubled days to come. In 1503 Charitas Pirkheimer was elected Abbess of St. Clare's, in spite of the most earnest remonstrances on her part. Perhaps it was a presentiment of the terrors that awaited her, which caused her to take up her important office so timidly, and only when ordered by her superiors in the name of holy obedience, for certainly she was admirably fitted to govern. Already in her thirty-eighth year, having been about twenty-five years a nun, she was as remarkable for the childlike simplicity of her character as for perfect integrity, firmness of purpose, clear judgment, and singleness of heart. And unwillingly as she had received the crozier, when once it had been forced into her hand, she wielded it with no uncertain hold. For the first twenty years of her rule as abbess her life scarcely differed from the ordinary round of convent discipline. Meditation and vocal prayer, the recitation of the divine office, teaching, spinning, embroidering, and sewing occupied the well-filled day. Every article of the nuns' clothing was manufactured and made up within the convent. A consider- able time was also devoted to the practice of music, in order that the choir should be well provided with liturgical subjects ; and from Cochlasus, who composed a book of musical instruc- tion, we learn that the Pirkheimers were noted for their singing. The papal indult of 15 17, by which the convent was allowed to use the organ presented by one of the Tuchers commends the choral proficiency of the Poor Clares of Niirnberg. Nor did their activity end here. The walls that shut them in did not prevent their good works from escaping into the outside world. Connected with the convent, on one side of the nuns' burying-ground, was the pious founda- tion in which a number of poor people were supported at the expense, of the community, and they too came in for a share of the abbess's motherly supervision. Besides these Rise of Protestantism in Germany 213 and other duties, the nuns had the charge of all the ecclesiastical and municipal vestments. Niirnberg was the custodian of the treasures of the realm, and when the newly elected Emperor, Charles V., came to Germany for his coro- nation, the magistrates sent all the ancient coronation robes to St. Clare's, in order that the nuns might report on their condition, and supply defects. Thus we find that the white dalmatica must needs be covered with new silk, and other insignia of the imperial dignity furnished with fresh linings. Occasionally the town councillors were apparently nothing loath to make the nuns feel their dependence on the municipal good pleasure ; and once a year the abbess was obliged to submit her accounts of the income and expenditure of the convent to the chief magistrate, whose duty it was to see that her housekeeping was conducted on sound principles, and that no debts were accumulated. In the midst of these multifarious occupations Charitas by no means neglected the studies which had been her delight from her youth upwards. She had collected a considerable library, with the help of her brother Wilibald ; and Sixtus Tucher, Cochlasus, Emser, the poet Celtis, and others had enriched it with valuable literary gifts. But the Scriptures and the Fathers of the Church formed her most constant study, and that of her nuns. The Bible was read daily in Latin and German in choir, and by each one in particular, so that it might well be said that her convent stood on good evangelical ground. Of the Fathers her favourite author was St. Jerome, styled by Erasmus " the prince of theologians," whom Albrecht Diirer was never weary of portraying, and whom Reuchlin revered, " as an angel." Strict as was the enclosure of the Poor Clares, and their aloofness from the world, which approached them no nearer than the iron grating of their convent parlour, they were to a certain extent allowed to correspond by letter with the little circle of distinguished scholars, whose interest was attracted to St. Clare's by the reputation for learning enjoyed by its abbess. And it lay in the natural order of things that her strong personality, her sympathy, and enthusiasm for the new learning should inspire those under her with the same tastes. Certain it is that her convent came gradually to be considered a centre of intellectual culture, as well as an example of perfect regularity. That this renown resulted 214 Reformation and Renaissance in no sacrifice of spirituality was perhaps due to the exalted character of the abbess, whose qualities were so great that there was no room for vanity. Among her greatest contemporaries she was the observed of all beholders ; and it adds much to her reputation that in the midst of the homage which she received from the most eminent men of the day she remained as simple and as unconscious of her merits as when she was a young novice. Pellicanus, the famous Hebrew scholar of Basle, was proud of her friendship, and cherished as a '* Croesus treasure " the Hebrew Pentateuch which she presented to him. Cochlasus, in his edition of Fulgentius, took the opportunity to render public homage to her virtues and mental endowments. But it was beyond doubt Celtis who spread the reputa- tion of the Pirkheimer sisters throughout Germany, and caused them to be regarded with a kind of patriotic pride all over the country.^ Clara was in all things the pupil and faithful disciple of Charitas, who, when she became abbess, employed her as secretary, assistant, and second self in all matters requiring exceptional intelligence, fidelity, and care. But the younger was something more than the complement of the elder, and Wilibald formed a high opinion of her intellect, altogether distinct from the reflex that shone from her sister's reputation. When Clara was made novice- mistress, he dedicated a small book to her, composed of 238 Greek aphorisms which he had done into Latin, and puWished between Christmas and the New Year, 15 16. The border of the title-page was designed by his friend Albrecht Diirer, and consisted of graceful columns on a black ground, with two small genii bearing the arms of the Pirkheimers, while two others were blowing trumpets. In the dedication he says : — " In order that you^ my dearest Clara^ should experience some emulation of our good sister^ the Mother Abbess— I mean that kind of praiseworthy jealousy described by Hesiod — I have wished to dedicate these aphorisms to you. They are not such as a blind paganism was wont to send in the days of Satur- nalia^ but such as becomes Christian piety at Christmas time''^ Clara's own letters, of which a number have been pre- ^ Janssen, Geschichte des deutscheyi Folkes, vol. i. p. 84. 2 Binder, p. 65. Rise of Protestantism in Germany 215 served, are a charming indication of her character, and overflow with brightness and rippling humour. One hot summer, the light wine used in the convent had become very dear, on account of the drought which threatened the coming vintage, and the abbess had accordingly been obliged to reduce the quantity allowed to each member of the com- munity at the mid-day meal. Then came a most opportune present of wine from Wilibald, accompanied with an enormous glass beaker. Clara is charged to return thanks for the gifts, and writes playfully to her brother : — " We are greatly touched by your kind thought of us^ and the Reverend Mother is especially pleased with the fine large glass. She thinks the Holy Ghost must have informed you how painfully thirsty she is in this hot weather. If it only had the quality belonging to St. Othmars little barrel^ and always remained full^ it would make us very devout to him." Later on she adds : — " Dear brother, I must tell you of a little piece of fun we have had. The whole convent has drunk out of your glass., and some of the sisters trembled much on the brink of it., fearing they might fall in." Two of Wilibald Pirkheimer's daughters took the veil at St. Clare's. These were Katharina and Crescentia, the former of whom was a special favourite with the community and with her aunt the Abbess Charitas. Soon after her entrance Charitas thus wrote to her brother : — *' Tou must know that your daughter is not only beloved by me but by all the sisters., as much for her dignified behaviour as for her intelligence. She conducts herself more like a matron than a girl of fifteen., so modestly., prudently., and thoughtfully . We are all rejoiced to have a girl of so many good qualities in our midst., and we see in her much promise of future excellence." ^ A nun's life is usually barren of events, and Charitas might not unnaturally have looked forward to end her earthly pilgrimage as quietly as it had begun, in the pale sunshine of her learned retreat. But this was not to be. War raged outside her convent walls, the war of angry ^ Binder, p. 68. 2i6 Reformation and Renaissance tongues ; and the sharp sword of the reformers' strife and divisions was already at her gates. Henceforth she must descend from her high watch-tower, and carry the banner of the Church into the thick of the melee. She had never for one moment been led astray by Luther's specious arguments. When Emser entered the lists, and broke a lance in defence of the old religion, the abbess of St. Clare had his eight little books read aloud in the nun's refectory. Yielding to the entreaties of her community and of several friends outside the convent, she wrote to Emser congratulating the " power- ful defender of the Christian faith " in her own name and those of her sixty children. She expressed her gratitude for his manly courage, and thanked God from her heart that He had been pleased to enlighten him and make him a pillar of the Church. The name of Emser, she said, was in great repute in her own and in other convents, far and wide, wherever she had sent his books ; and she described the joy of her religious sisters that there was still one man in the world who knew the truth, and who was not afraid to proclaim it. By some mischance this letter fell into unfriendly hands, and caused the abbess much trouble. The magistrature of Niirnberg had declared for Luther, and thought they saw in the letter reflections on their conduct. The revolutionary party contrived to make the St. Clare nuns understand that they were in disgrace. It was a prelude to what was to come. The abbess's diary, very carefully kept during the stormy period which now set in, gives a detailed account of all that was done against them by the dominating party in Niirnberg. All the letters and documents connected with the struggle were preserved in the convent archives until the fall of St. Clare's, when, with other valuable papers, they found their way to Bamberg, and remained there hidden for three centuries. They were brought to light in 1852, and have greatly contributed to the clearing up of obscure points in the history of the Reformation as it concerned Niirnberg. Ranke, in his History of the Reformation^ pretended that the new doctrines were introduced into that place without perceptible coercion, in all peace and tranquillity. Subsequent writers, who have had access to further material, have admitted that much human passion and lusting after the rich posses- sions of the convents and monasteries became mixed with Rise of Protestantism in Germany 217 other motives ; but the documents discovered at Bamberg show that the zeal of the reforming party was directed against the very existence of the religious houses, and that even the spotless reputation of a Charitas Pirkheimer and her community was impotent to inspire any other considera- tion than greed in the minds of the covetous revolutionists. In 1524 Charitas chronicles in her diary the beginning of the persecution which she suffered with but short intervals of respite till her death. " A great crowd of people of all conditions entered the convent and made the nuns listen to the new things that are now preached from the pulpits^ trying to persuade them of the folly of a cloistered life^ which they said was a state of damnation^ and that it was impossible to be saved in it. ' Nuns,' they declared, ' all belonged to the devil' Some wanted to take their relations away out of the convent, and tried to get them to leave by promises and threats'' As the abbess was as little inclined to the departure of her children as the nuns were to leave, the town council attributed the obstinacy of all concerned to the influence of their confessors, the Franciscans of the strict observance, and they threatened to replace these with the preachers of the new doctrines. Great was the consternation at St. Clare's. The abbess assembled the whole community, and in a few words put them in possession of the facts. One and all declared that they had " no desire to depart from the order and teaching of the Fathers, or to come under the power of dissolute priests and escaped monks " ; and it was unani- mously agreed that the abbess should address a supplication to the magistrature, representing to them the great injury and damage, temporal and spiritual, which they would suffer from such a change, Charitas wrote to her brother Wilibald, entreating him to stand by them ; but he, too, was temporarily in favour of the movement, and had not yet begun to tread the rough road from enthusiasm for Luther to the bitterest disappointment. She also wrote to the three protectors of the convent in the council, one of these being her brother-in-law, Martin Geuder, married to her sister Juliana, a man of great influence, wealth, and experience of public affairs. Her letter, a masterpiece of defence and reasoning, contains some 2 1 8 Reformation and Renaissance remarkable passages showing the utter hypocrisy of most of the charges brought against the religious houses. After declaring that there was "no honest ground" for the dismissal of the discalced Franciscans, they always having served the convent in peace and unity, Charitas goes on to condemn the unseemliness of forcing upon the nuns " confessors who have themselves no faith in the sacrament of penance," and of exacting obedience towards those " who have renounced obedience to the Pope, the bishops, and the universal Christian Church." With great dignity she adds : — " / entreat you not to be credulous as to what is falsely imputed to us, namely^ that the pure Word of God is hidden from us^ for we have the Old and the New Testaments here^ as well as you have them outside the convent, and we read them day and nighty in the choir and at table, in Latin and in Ger?nan, in common, and each one for herself, as she pleases. Therefore^ by God's grace, there is no want among us either of the Gospels or of the Epistles of St. Paul; but I hold more to the necessity of practising them in one's life and works than to have them ever on one's lips, and in one s works to be far from them. It is said that they are only explained and preached to us with the addition of human inventions, and I answer that we take our stand on the text of the Holy Gospels, and that none shall separate us from them, living or dead. But if glosses we must have, we prefer to accept the commentaries of the saints, who clung to the doctrines of the holy Christian Churchy and not the interpretations of a strange doctrine ^ preached by ordinary men whose evangelical fruits are very unlike the fruits and virtues of the saints whom they reject. Our Redeemer has taught us that they are to be known by their fruits:' 2 Nevertheless, the abbess is by no means steeled against just reproof, or the introduction of legitimate improvements, but is wiUing to be instructed in all things of good report. " We have no wish," she continues, " to cause any one scandal, and if any will point out what is blameworthy in our 1 Luther's translation of the Bible was profusely annotated, with the object of proving at every possible and impossible opportunity his doctrine of Justification by Faith without works. 2 Binder, p. ii6. Rise of Protestantism in Germany 219 actions, showing us in what the abuse consists, we will correct it. For we confess ourselves to be fallible creatures, who do not always do right, not relying on our works. Still we demand not to be coerced into doing what is damaging to our salvation, and against our honour and good fame, to the destruction of our convent in spiritual and temporal things'' Concluding, the abbess begs her brother-in-law to take up her cause, and not to allow himself to be influenced by the ignorant advice of others who know as little about governing her convent as she does about the management of their houses. " Believe me," she adds, " as one who has had a long experience." For a short while the violence of the storm abated ; the abbess's supplication was received in good part, and Pirk- heimer wrote kindly, sending his sister books, lately put forward by the friends of the Catholic religion, for her consolation. Among these was Erasmus's De Libera Arbitrio, in answer to Luther's denial of free-will in man. Clara was employed as secretary to return thanks, and to express the Reverend Mother's appreciation of the book which was " an epitome of what they had always believed about the grace of God," denied by the reformers. But some of the other books had been even more acceptable, and in particular "the good old Cipriano," which pleased the abbess " better than all the new evangelists who go about in ruffles and gold chains." " / have never had any temptation to go back to the world,'' said Clara, " but I must own that there is no place on earth that has so much attraction for me as your library. I should not steal many things from it., but only look for one old book of which you have two copies. Those old teachers were by no means fools, although they are despised in these days'' Meanwhile, the religious conference of March 3, 1525, dominated by Osiander, ended after six sessions in a declaration of war against the Church. It was a foregone conclusion. The monasteries were summoned to surrender, and Friar Andrew Stoss, who had defended them during^ the conference, was banished. The Augustinians, the CarmeUtes, the Benedictines, and the Carthusians gave up their houses by degrees, partly under, and partly without, protest. 2 20 Reformation and Renaissance Of the communities of men only two remained, the Franciscans and the Dominicans, and of these latter only a certain number, who were allowed to exist until 1543, when they too were dispersed. The Franciscans held out till the last member of the community died, but they were forbidden to exercise any ecclesiastical function, to preach, or to hear confessions. The direction of the two communities of women, that of St. Clare and of St. Katharine, was taken from them and given to the new clergy. The Poor Clares had the courage to take up arms and try their strength against the violence to which the greater number of the religious had succumbed. The abbess's Memoirs furnish us with every detail of the struggle that had now begun in earnest. On Sunday, March 19, 1525, a deputation from the magistrature appeared at St. Clare's and demanded admit- tance into the interior of the convent, in order to deliver their message to the community. Charitas offered to assemble all the nuns at the parlour grating. This was refused, and she ordered the gates of the enclosure to be thrown open, and the two delegates to be introduced into the winter refectory. The bell for calling the community together was rung, and the nuns filed in. The envoys then began to address them, one after the other, the substance of their discourse being, that as the whole town had now been enlightened by the preaching of the Gospel, the honourable council desired in its paternal solicitude to communicate this blessing to the nuns also, and that in future Poliander, a learned and unctuous preacher from Wiirzburg, would proclaim to them the pure Word of God. The Minorites must, however, be removed, and the magistrates would provide more suitable confessors. To these harangues the abbess replied that she owed her thanks to the Council for its fatherly care and good inten- tions, but that she heard with wonder and sorrow of its determination to remove the Franciscans of the strict obser- vance, who had hitherto also preached the pure Gospel to them, and who had behaved in every sense becomingly. The nuns hoped and trusted that the Council would not force upon them confessors whom they could not accept. The two orders, declared Charitas — Minorites and Poor Clares — had belonged to each other since their foundation, and Rise of Protestantism in Germany 221 their union was ratified by popes and emperors. To introduce a change was for the magistrates to overstep the Umits of their legal authority. " If," concluded Charitas, " we suffer violence, we must commend ourselves to God, before whom we protest and declare that we submit against our will." As she finished speaking the nuns rose in a body to signify their approval of her words. The delegates were obliged to retire without having persuaded one of the nuns ; nevertheless the magistrature proceeded with their measures. But when, in the name of the Gospel, the councillors deprived these defenceless women of their spiritual advisers, and forced them to listen to sermons preached by apostate monks, they bore it with angelic patience. When they were loaded with insults, and the people who had hitherto respected and loved them were stirred up against them, they bore this also. When they were deprived of the sacraments of the Church, even as regarded the dying, when the Mass was taken from them, and their religious habit was torn off, all by virtue of what the reformers were pleased to call the " Word of God," these things also they bore with fortitude and meekness. When the younger nuns were forced, in spite of tears and prayers, to return to the world, those who were left still possessed their souls in peace. There was ceaseless talk among the reformers of love, faith, and charity, while they practised atrocities exceeding those of the Turks. And meanwhile these virtues shone forth unheeded against fearful odds, in the persons of Charitas and her despised and insulted nuns. The abbess knew enough canon law and dogmatic theology to discern the real tendency of the movement against them and all the old institutions ; and she possessed enough insight into character to fathom the intentions of those who only spoke of reform for the purpose of indulging in vituperation of Rome, Pope, Cardinals, and religious orders. Her strong common-sense, no less than her learn- ing, enabled her to sift the true from the false, doctrine from tradition, decrees of councils from papal edicts, essence from form, use from abuse. Standing like a rock in the midst of a seething and blatant crowd, she had ever a calm, well-weighed, and logical reason for the faith and hope that 22 2 Reformation and Renaissance were in her. Deeper than all her learning was her piety ; and when Kaspar Niitzel had expended in vain all his eloquence, in the attempt to bring her round to the side of the reformers — such a prize would have been worth the winning — he declared angrily that now he despaired of her and of her nuns. Charitas answered with modesty and sweetness that she was sorry for it, but that neither she her- self nor her community by any means despaired, and that in firm faith they hoped all things from Divine Providence. Such faith may truly be termed heroic, subsisting as it did in the midst of the most horrible persecution. Soror Katharina told her father in Holy Week 1525 that whenever they heard a knocking at the gates they all began to tremble ; and Clara, writing to the same, about this time said : — " // is evident the convent is to be utterly destroyed and made a heap of ruins. Yesterday a crowd of women came^ so hateful and wicked that I reflected if there were no other fain in hell the fear of being with such as these would be enough to keep one from sinning.'^ Things would not be so bad, she thought, except for the women and the preachers. But it would be far better to be dead than to be obliged, as they were, to listen to the obscene language addressed to them from the pulpit, where they were told they were far worse than the women who lived in the houses of ill-repute. When the abbess was required to release her nuns from their vows, she replied calmly that as far as her person was concerned she would consider them released, but that with regard to their obligations towards Almighty God, it did not beseem a creature to meddle. Although each nun was informed that she was free to leave and to go whither she would, not one of the community accepted the permission, and those who were carried off by their relations had to be dragged away by main force, one being nearly trampled to death by the crowd.^ The rest persevered bravely in spite of the all but im- possible conditions, till one by one death claimed each sister. Charitas died in 1532, and was succeeded as abbess by Clara ; then her niece Katharina held the crozier, and carried on 1 Binder, p. 156. p-^ MIHI PATRIA COELVJW- ,)^ <)>;>l|j>><|ljp»iwai!|| ll»p. From a contemporary engraving by Rene Boyvin. T'-, face page 223. Rise of Protestantism in Germany 223 the old tradition. In 1590 the community died out, and the magistrature of Niirnberg seized the long-coveted prize. The convent church remained closed for some time, and was then converted into a Protestant temple for a short period, after which it was used as a magazine for stores and a place of exhibition. It was then turned into a barracks, but at last, in 1854, it was given back to the CathoHcs, restored and reconsecrated Even worse than the treatment meted out to the Poor Clares of Niirnberg was that to which the equally valiant Dominicanesses of St. Margaret's Convent, Strassburg, were subjected. Their prioress, Ursula von Bock, less learned than Charitas Pirkheimer, was at least as fervent and steadfast in her convictions. The reformer, Martin Bucer, in those days a determined Lutheran, brought all his arguments, intellectual and actual, in vain to bear upon her. Suspecting that her nuns were encouraged by her obstinacy in their resistance to his eloquent appeals to them to give up " weaning themselves from all legitimate joys," because " after a miserable existence contrary to the laws of nature, hell would be their portion for ever," he declared the prioress to be excommunicated. "Who has pronounced the sentence.'*" asked Mother Ursula quietly. " I myself," retorted Bucer ; " it is my right since you despise the Word of God." " Nothing is farther from my thoughts," she answered with deliberation. " I revere the Word of God and the teaching of the Church contained in the writings of the Fathers and the Doctors ; but I despise your words, and those of the apostates, your brethren, because they are a tissue ot falsehood and error." Suffocating with rage, Bucer would have answered with a blow, had not the nuns made a rampart round her. He sprang forward as if to fell her to the ground, but they formed an efficient bodyguard, and succeeded in getting her into an adjoining room, the door of which they barricaded against him, and the ex-Dominican left the convent. In the cloisters he met the Superior of the Knights of St. John, for whom the terrified nuns had sent secretly, and with him was Dr. Fuchs, cure of St. Peter's. As soon as Bucer saw them he began to abuse the prioress, and swore that the nuns should be made to leave, even if it took the 2 24- Reformation and Renaissance devil himself to turn them out. Then he went on his way- vowing vengeance for the insults he had received. They were not empty words only, for soon afterwards, on Satur- day, February 20, 1529, the last Mass was said in the Cathedral of Strassburg, and the next day, for the first time since the city had embraced Christianity, no sacrifice was offered anywhere within its walls. Bucer's hour of vengeance had come. The zealous reformer obtained from the Senate an authorisation to proceed to St, Margaret's with eight companions and demolish the altars in the conventual church. Followed by his all -too -willing coadjutors and a gang of workmen, he strode into the church and began hammering and hacking at the altars, statues, and pictures, till the nave was in a short time blocked with ruins. The nuns, clinging to each other in tearful desolation, watched the scene from behind their choir grating. When all that was breakable was broken, the " servants of the Word " made a visitation in the convent. But all their arguments and persuasion were in vain ; the nuns, one and all, declaring that they had not the least desire to become acquainted with the " earthly paradise " proposed to them, and only asked to be left in peace to live and die faithful to their vocation. The visitors were obliged to withdraw disappointed, but they took with them all the convent keys, even those of the cells, and made frequent descents upon the community, at last threatening that unless the house were evacuated without delay the religious should be expelled by force, for the Senate had decided to raze it to the ground " with all such rat-holes." They were next ordered to send their effects home to their parents, and it was announced that the convent furniture would be divided among them. They answered by declaring unanimously that if necessary they would live in the ex- tremest poverty, but that they would never consent to en- rich themselves with the spoils of their convent. But the protest was disregarded, and their relations were instructed as to the manner in which they should treat them. They were to be extremely amiable to them, feed them abundantly and delicately, and to procure them all kinds of pleasures and amusements, and make them forget their convent ways. " Do not be afraid^'' said one, " to spend a little money Rise of Protestantism in Germany 225 towards this object. The city will see that you are compensated out of the convent revenues ; and when you go to fetch your daughters^ sisters^ nieces^ and cousins^ do not hesitate to force them to follow you if they should resist^ ^ The order was carried out early in the morning of June 24, 1529. A multitude of the nuns' relations arrived, fol- lowed by their servants, bringing horses and carts for the transport of the baggage. A scene ensued that beggars description. The remonstrances of Mother Ursula, her entreaties, tears, rebukes, were laughed to scorn. The crowd burst into the interior of the convent, and in their wake the dregs of the populace, bent on pillage. Thirty-three professed nuns were dragged away. Their despair contrasted with the brutal expressions of joy on the part of the " Pure Gospellers " ; the screams, the laughter, th« coarse jests were like a vivid representation of the infernal regions. At the end of the day. Mother Ursula remained alone with eleven of the older sisters in the wrecked and ravished convent. Even their straw mattresses had been taken away from them by order of the magistrates ; the house was entirely empty, even almost of food. But to lie on the hard boards and often to feel the pangs of hunger were not their worst sufferings. The struggle was renewed from time to time for a month, but the heroic women never once dreamed of leaving the field of battle. When again summoned at the end of that period to deliver up her house, the prioress declared that in default of other help she would appeal to the Emperor. The threat took effect. Strassburg had still some interest in appeasing Charles V,, who was already irritated by its conduct of the last few years. Ursula von Bock and her eleven remaining nuns were left not indeed in peace, but in possession of the convent. They were forced to put on secular garments, but they wore the habit of St. Dominic beneath them. Nearly all the sisters who had been carried off at the sack of the convent petitioned to be allowed to return. Their supplication would have been treated with the same contempt and scorn as before, had not the prioress produced an imperial decree, signed by Charles V., on November 14, 1530, con- 1 De Bussierre, Histoire des Religieuses Dominicaines de Sainte Marguerite €t Sainte Agn}s a Strasbourg, p. <,() et seq. From the MS. Chronicle of St. Margaret's Convent. Q 2 26 Reformation and Renaissance firming the franchise and the privileges of St. Margaret's. Thirteen professed nuns and three novices were therefore permitted to re-enter the fold. Four had already pined to death before the end of one year of exile ; nine had died during the course of two years. Three only, in spite of all the threats, persuasions, and flatteries employed, eventually apostatised and married. But the mourning for the fall of these three never ceased while the community lasted. The four remaining nuns were still forcibly detained by their relations, but later on were allowed to return to the convent. A mere shadow of toleration was granted to the newly- constituted community. They were forbidden to resume their religious habits, to take new subjects, to have Mass, to re-establish their enclosure. Their garden, cloisters, refectory, and courtyard were open to the public. Only their cells remained private, and thenceforth they seldom appeared out of them. They were compelled to assist regularly at the sermons preached in their denuded and altarless church, to the end that they might be instructed in the " true faith.'* Even on their deathbeds they were deprived of all the con- solations of religion. But not one of them fell away. When Mother Ursula herself came to die, her relations, who had nearly all become Lutherans, made a last desperate effort to win her over to the new doctrines. " I will be faithful," was all her reply in the weakness of her last moments, " to the vows which I made at my pro- fession in this house. I have lived and I will die in the Catholic, Apostolic, and Roman faith." We must now return to the year 1524, the decisive period marked by the Diet of Niirnberg, the growing power of Hussite socialism in Germany, and the beginning of the consequences of Luther's revolutionary attitude. By his repudiation of five out of the seven Sacraments of the Catholic Church, and by his assertion that the Bible was clear and intelHgible to all, even the most ignorant, and that each individual was a fully competent judge of the most abstruse portions of Scripture, the door was at once opened to extravagances of every kind, and thenceforth it was scarcely for Luther to set limits to the private judgments of any. Three men of Niirnberg, Georg Penz, and Hans Sebald and Bartholomew Behaim, two brothers, were prosecuted by Rise of Protestantism in Germany 227 the magistrates — Penz for denying the Godhead of Christ and of the Holy Ghost, the Behaims for contempt of the two sacraments which Luther had retained — Baptism and the Lord's Supper. Miinzer and Carlstadt, who had been with Luther from the beginning, now struck out different Hnes for themselves. Miinzer rejected Infant Baptism and the doctrine of the Real Presence, — " Luther," he maintained, " having bewildered Christendom with a false faith." To him Luther is henceforth " that venomous black scorpion whose teaching tends to nothing but the licence of the flesh," whose followers "pufF themselves up," and who, with all their foolish prattle about faith, abuse everything which they wish not to believe, denying that any one can be a Christian who does not accept their definition of Christianity." ^ Some of his epithets for Luther were Doctor Liigner (Liar), Chaste Babylonian woman, Wittenberg Pope, etc., and the only subject on which both were agreed was hatred of Rome. According to Miinzer, a new kingdom of God was to be founded, in which all Christians were to be equal and to possess all things in common. If any princes, nobles, or gentles refused to become members of this kingdom, they were to have their heads cut off or to be hanged." As this doctrine was particularly acceptable to the disaffected masses, Miinzer had an immense following. Wherever he preached, the people assembled in swarms, and riots and insurrections ensued. The first point on which Luther and Carlstadt disagreed was on the subject of marriage. It would have appeared as though no one could have a greater appreciation of matri- mony, barring that it was no sacrament, than Luther, yet Carlstadt soon outdistanced him, teaching that it was the only honourable state, and that none but married men should be allowed to serve churches. Polygamy was far preferable to celibacy. Luther stopped short at bigamy. The two met together at Jena for a conference, but it ended in angry words, in the presence of several witnesses. They called each other liars, and accused each other mutually of vainglory and ambition. Carlstadt reproached Luther with preaching a false Gospel and with perpetually contradicting himself, declaring at the end of a treatise the opposite to what he had said at the ^ Thomas Miinzer, Protestation, fol. C^, D, E^'^. 2 Ibid. Bekenntniss, fol. A^^. 22 8 Reformation and Renaissance beginning/ and he exclaimed, " If what Luther says is true, God grant that the devil may tear me in pieces before you all ! " It was inevitable, that authority in religious matters having been discarded, all kinds of strange theories should be started, the prophet of each new "Gospel" being eager to denounce all other prophets. None were hindered from setting up a new religion, and each sect found its adherents. A disciple of Carlstadt's, a shoemaker, who had the Bible at his fingers' ends, tried to prove from the Old Testament that Luther was in error. Luther protested that he had damned him, " And so you will be damned," replied the shoemaker. " I hold you and each one damned so long as he speaks and teaches in opposition to God and God's truth." And Luther wrote that he thought himself lucky not to be driven out with stones and mud, for some of the people told him to " be gone in the name of a thousand devils, adding the pious wish that he might break his neck before he got out of the town." ^ But notwithstanding all this, Luther was more powerful than Carlstadt, whom he succeeded in getting banished from Saxony, Carlstadt avenging himself by writing to the friends whom he left behind that " in Luther's ranting and raging " they might see " the awful chastisement of God on those who did not accept His grace," and that Luther was " a man of violence, a senseless fool, a horned ass," in whom God's wrath was being manifested. Luther defended himself against these attacks and those of Miinzer in a pamphlet. Wider die himmlischen Propheten^ and accused Carlstadt of having fallen away from the king- dom of Christ, of having made shipwreck of faith, of being Satan's instrument to ruin the teaching of the Gospel by handling Scripture artfully. But he had himself set the fashion of proclaiming his Gospel heaven-sent, and his mouth the mouth of Christ,^ and now every day saw fresh evangelists rising, each announcing a fresh gospel. Private opinion had grown so rapidly that at the beginning of 1525 he wrote to the brethren at Antwerp : " One will have no baptism, another denies the Sacrament, another places a whole world between to-day and the Day of Judgment. Some teach 1 De Wette, vol. ii. p. 579. ^ /^/^_ vol. ii. p. 579. 2 Luther's Sammtliche Werke, vol. xxii. pp. 43-59. De Wette, vol. i. p. 1 29. Rise of Protestantism in Germany 229 that Christ is not God, some say this, some that, and there are almost as many sects and beliefs as there are men and women." ^ Religious and political anarchy were, as we have seen, closely allied, and preacher and insurgent were almost synonymous terms. In July 1524, the whole country was given over to demagogues and agitators. For a time it seemed as if there were no longer any lawful authority in the land. The Emperor could only oppose the Swabian League, the sole stable and compact power in the realm, to the surging hordes of armed peasants. The flames of insurrection were kindled in Swabia and Franconia, in Thuringia, the Vorarlberg, the Tyrol, Salzburg, and the Duchy of Austria. Everywhere the peasants sacked and burned, drank themselves drunk with the wine they found, and carried desolation wherever they passed. They had been ordered by their leaders to pay no more taxes, to sweep religious houses off the face of the land, to murder monks, nuns, and priests, as servants of Satan." Luther himself, although he did not originate the discontent, had sounded the first trumpet - blast to the rising, when he advocated a general raid on monasteries and convents ; " for the errors contained in the doctrine of good works " were " so wretched and deplorable that it would be better that all churches and cloisters all over the world should be rooted out and burned to ashes ; it would indeed be a less grievous calamity, even if done out of malice, than that a single soul should be seduced into such heresy and alto- gether lost. For God has given no commands about churches, but only about souls, which are His real temples. In order to root out error it would be well if, once for all, all churches in the world were turned upside down and made into ordinary houses, and if preaching, worshipping, and baptizing were carried on under the open sky. Dost thou not see why thunderbolts generally strike churches before all other buildings ? It is because they are more hateful to God than any others, and for this reason, that in no murderers' dens, in no houses of ill-repute does such blasphemy, such murder- ing of souls, such desecration of religion, take place as m 1 Brief an die Christen zu Antwerpen, Anfang 1525. Dc Wctte, vol. iii. p. 61. 2 The Archduke Ferdinand to Pope Clement VII., Proceedings of the Vienna Academy, vol. ii. pp. 28-34. 230 Reformation and Renaissance churches. . . ." ^ If the clergy did not mend their ways as he had taught them, Luther wished that his doctrines might be the cause of the destruction of all monasteries and cloisters, and that they might be reduced to a heap of ashes.^ The most celebrated lawyer of the day, Ulrich Zasius, looked upon him as the real cause of the revolution. Writing to his friend Amerbach in 1525, he says : " Everything here (in Freiburg im Breisgau) is marked by unrest and depression, because of the perpetual fear of an attack, and scarcely an hour passes that we do not anticipate some catastrophe. Luther, the peace-destroyer, the most corrupt of all two- legged creatures, has plunged Germany into such a state of frenzy that we have come to think ourselves fortunate if we are not murdered at every moment. I could write pages on the subject, but grief snatches the pen from my hand." ^ Luther was extremely unwilling to be considered the originator of the insurrection, perceiving how much his cause was suffering from the wild words flung about recklessly by his disciples, and by the burning and plundering that went on in the name of the Gospel. When the peasants sent him the Twelve Articles they had drawn up as representing their programme of reform, with his own name heading the list of learned men whom they had chosen " for pronouncement of divine justice," he began to think seriously of damping their ardour. Unfortunately the means he employed drove the peasants to commit still greater atrocities. In a pamphlet entitled An Admonition in Favour of Peace (Ermahnung zum Frieden) he appealed first to the princes and nobles of the empire to abate their tyranny, and to treat the peasants as they would treat a drunken or insane man, pacifying them by agreeing to their just demands, and on no account to take up arms against them, for none knew how the quarrel would end. The second part of his " admoni- tion " was addressed to the peasants, who were, he admitted, so cruelly oppressed by the princes and nobles, who forbade the Gospel to be preached to them, that these well deserved to be hurled from their seats, as men who had grievously sinned against God and their fellow-men. He then went ^ The continuation of the argument is too coarse and indecent for reproduction here. See his Samfntlkhe Werke, vol. vii. pp. 121, 131, 222-223, 330. 2 Ibid, ut supra. 3 ^asii Epist. p. 97. Rise of Protestantism in Germany 231 on to beseech the peasants to lay down their arms and ofFer their cheeks to the smiter, the wickedness of their rulers not justifying conspiracy and rebellion. There was wrong on both sides ; rulers and peasants would mutually compass each other's ruin, and God would thrash one scoundrel by the hand of the other. But language such as this was naturally more calculated to inflame the already fever -heated passions of the mob than to calm them, and fresh outbreaks immediately suc- ceeded the " Admonition." Foremost among the peasant leaders was Georg Metzler, an ex-innkeeper of Ballenberg, who contributed more than most of them to foment the insurrection. His medley of troops styled themselves the " Evangelical Army," and one of their proudest achievements was the sack of the Cistercian monastery of Schonthal, near Ochringen, where, from April 4 to 10, 1525, they occupied themselves desecrating altars, destroying priceless works of art, and dividing the gold and silver vessels of the sanctuary among themselves. All over the country the like deeds were done. Bam- berg, Rotenburg, Heilbronn had still more sickening tales to tell of the "Evangehcal Army," but perhaps the terrors perpetrated at Weinsberg were equal to any in the course or the Peasants' War. Count Ludwig von Helfenstein was in command of the little garrison, which numbered not more than seventy or eighty mounted soldiers. Traitors within the gates were in league with the peasants, and promised them help when they should present themselves before the walls. In the eariy morning of Easter Sunday, Count Helfen- stein received information that the enemy were moving out of their camp and were on the way " to fetch the Weinsberg Easter eggs." Having taken the necessary precautions for the defence of the gates and fortifications, he assembled his little force in the market-place, and encouraged them by saying that he had left his wife and child in the castle, and intended to remain with them in the town, doing all he possibly could for them ; reinforcements would certainly be sent to them before the day was over. He then went to Mass with several of his staff, but before it was over, from six to eight thousand peasants appeared before the walls, and demanded admittance to town and castle. An old witch who accompanied them muttered a spell over the peasant 232 Reformation and Renaissance army, to render it shot- and shell-proof, and then the savage rabble swarmed up the walls into the castle, first plundered and then reduced it to a heap of ruins. Confederates within opened one of the gates of the town and they poured in. The garrison, driven to fortify themselves in the church, held out manfully, fighting for dear life till all were taken. Every one who wore boots and spurs was hewn down ; the priests were massacred wholesale. No quarter was given, and any peasant found saving a prisoner's life was himself run through the body. All day long the bestially drunken peasants staggered about, carrying remonstrances and chalices, silver vessels, silk vestments, and other costly treasures, quarrelling over them, and fighting with each other. They decided to run spears through the bodies of Count Helfenstein and about two dozen nobles, together with a few of their servants, to the beating of drums in a meadow just in front of the lower city gate. The unhappy Countess Helfenstein, a natural daughter of the Emperor Maximilian, threw herself, with her baby son in her arms, at the'feet of Jacklein Rohrbach, the leader of the band, and with streaming eyes entreated him to spare her husband. But she was thrust back, and one of the peasants wounded the child with his spear. The Count himself offered thirty thousand florins for his life, but they answered him, that even if he gave them two tons of gold he would still have to die. Before him marched his former piper, playing lustily. " I have often piped for you at table," he said, " and now it is I who choose the tune of the dance." He snatched the plumed hat from the Count's head and stuck it on his own. " You have worn it long enough," he said ; " it is now my turn to be Count." Helfenstein had scarcely advanced three steps further when he fell to the ground, pierced with a hundred pikes. The old witch dug her knife into his dead body, and smeared her boots with the fat that oozed out. One of the murderous band, Jakob Wirt by name, arrayed himself in the Count's clothes, and came and stood before the distraught lady. "Woman, how do you like me in this suit ?'' he asked brutally. They took away her jewels and even part of her clothing, put her in a filthy cart, together with her attendants, and sent her to Heilbronn, the mob crying out jeeringly after her, " You came here in a golden chariot, but you are leaving in a Rise of Protestantism in Germany 233 dung-cart." "All these things," says the chronicler, "the Countess of Helfenstein bore with Christian humility and meekness. " ^ While this "godly slaughter," encouraged by Miinzer and Carlstadt, was going on, Luther made a journey through the disordered districts, and shortly after his return pubhshed a new pamphlet, which he entitled Jgainst the murderous, thieving hordes of Peasants, He had now quite made up his mind as to the necessity of stringent measures to put down the new terror, and spoke a very different language from that contained in his former manifesto, when he had declared that the unendurable burdens laid by the princes and nobles on the peasants were the sole cause of the dis- turbances. Now, on the contrary, he maintained that the war had been brought about " by God's will, in order that the peasants might be brought to see how much too well off they had been, and that henceforth they should learn to thank God when they had to give up one cow, for letting them enjoy the other in peace. . . . The ruling powers must, on their side, learn from experience to govern with firmness. When there was no order or organisation, all were idle, dis- respectful, and without reverence ; each one did exactly as he pleased. No one would pay anything, but all wanted to feast, drink, dress themselves up and lounge about as if they were great lords. A donkey must be beaten, and the mob must be ruled by force ; this God knew well, and therefore He put a sword and not a fox's brush into the hands of rulers." Not only magistrates, but every individual in the realm ought to join in slaughtering the insurgents. ... It was free to every one to fall upon them, throttle and stab them, openly or in secret, for there was nothing more pestilential, injurious, or diabolical than a rebel. - " What a hue and cry I raised," he wrote on June 15, 1525, "with my little book against the peasants! But now what God did for the world through me is clean forgotten. Now nobles, priests, peasants all are against me and threaten me with death. But if they were already all mad and idiotic, I have given them still more cause to be so, for I have taken a wife." This was the manner chosen by 1 Stalin, Wirtembergische Geschichte, vol. iv. p. 286. Stuttgart, 1873. 2 " Ein Scndbrief von dem harten Biichlein wider die Bauern," S'dmmtliche Werke, vol. xxiv. pp. 295-319. 2 34 Reformation and Renaissance Luther to announce to the world his marriage with the escaped nun Katharina von Bora. When the government recovered from its momentary panic and grappled determinedly with the insurrection, it was speedily stamped out, and before the end of 1525, the peasants had all returned peacefully to their homes. Nor in many cases were the reprisals at all cruel or merciless, especially on the part of ecclesiastical authorities. The Prince Abbot of Murbach was so lenient in the fines he imposed on the rebels that he incurred the hostility of the neighbouring landlords.^ Bishop VVilhelm of Strassburg freely forgave all who had taken part in the revolt and had contributed to the destruction of churches and monasteries.- Gaspard Rieggert, Abbot of Maurusmiinster, whose monastery, church, and library had been wrecked and plundered, and whose life had been threatened, procured the release of many of the wretched prisoners, and was ready for every sacrifice to lessen the misery caused by the war.^ This was, of course, extreme in every way. A hundred and fifty thousand lives had been sacrificed, and not a single good result had been obtained. No reforms were effected, but the former evils were increased and aggravated. Cochlaeus lived long enough to be in a position to com- pare the state of Germany before the beginning of Luther's revolution with its condition after the Peasants' War. " Before Lutheranism was invented," he remembered, " our parents used to teach their still lisping babes the Our Father, the Angelus^ the Creed, and the Ten Commandments, in order that they might learn to pray even before they could well talk, or walk without stumbling. While still in their mother's or nurse's arms, they would be taken to church, to be present at the holy Sacrifice, at sermons, and when hymns were sung, so that by hearing and seeing they might suck in the customs of our religion with their mother's milk, before the spirit of evil inherent in our fallen nature should set up barriers." His description of the havoc wrought by Lutheranism needs toning down that it may not offend modern eyes and ears. " When shall we build up again all these castles, con- ^ Hartfelder, Bauernkrieg, p. 57. - Ibid. p. 174. ^ Ibid. p. 175. Rise of Protestantism in Germany 235 vents, hospitals, churches, and villages that we have burned, destroyed, or laid waste in so short a time ? Who has gained aught in all this indescribable misery ? Who must not pity the many monks and nuns, who through this business have been driven from their honest, God-fearing, meritorious life into shame, vagabondage, and adversity of every kind ? Some live scandalously in the world because they have not the courage to die of starvation, having learned no trade or field-work. Some have left their religious homes, seduced by fair promises, some from misery and despair, on account of the persecution and contempt which they suffered from those who had embraced Luther's doctrines. Many more, however, have been driven out by main force, often helpless persons and aged, who had served God day and night, pray- ing for others, during the space of twenty, thirty and even forty years. They know not where to go, and have no bread to eat. " The shopkeepers and mechanics in towns have lived almost luxuriously from Luther's time till now, and have been wont to look down proudly, contemptuously, and pitilessly on the long-suffering peasants. Nevertheless, we must have compassion on their widows and orphans, the old and the sickly who have fallen into such great misery, poverty, and slavery through this war, and because so many thousands of those who should have contributed to feed and support the poor are slain. Houses have been razed to the ground, fields and vineyards remain uncultivated, goods and chattels, cows and sheep, horses and harness, are daily carried off by robbers, so great is the disorder. The prince and the nobleman demand their rents and taxes. Merciful God ! how are the widows and orphans to pay them ! So much wretchedness might well draw pity from a stone. " Our Lutherans have made many laws and ordinances against mendicant friars, poor students, and other beggars and pilgrims, and will not suffer such in their towns, or allow them to ask alms by the wayside. But God in His anger is sending them for one beggar twenty or thirty, and in time there will be still more." ^ This picture is no imaginary one, and far worse remains untold. The moral condition to which Luther's own ^ Answer to Luther's pamphlet : Wider die mordischen und reubischen Rotten der Bawren. 236 Reformation and Renaissance university town of Wittenberg was reduced by a too consistent following of some of his doctrines was such that the reformer himself was at last unable to live in it, declaring that for wickedness it surpassed the ancient cities of the plain, Lutheranism was the outcome of a humanism unbalanced by sound philosophical principles ; it resulted in revolution, bloodshed, barbaric cruelty, and a complete subversion of civil and religious order. It is almost the only aspect of the Renaissance that Germany presents to the eyes of posterity. German literature had by the middle of the sixteenth century all but touched its lowest level. CHAPTER VII THE END OF RELIGIOUS AUTHORITY IN ENGLAND 1509-1540 While Germany was presenting to the world the spectacle of a huge battlefield, heaped with the dead and dying, the air rent with groans and imprecations, grief, penury, and desolation following swiftly on the heels of revolutionary violence, England was enjoying a brief season of prosperity, a second spring of contentment that stood out in bright con- trast against the background of continental affairs. But England too had passed through the fire, and had come out of it not altogether unscathed. Its history during the fifteenth century had consisted mainly of two great events, the struggle with France and the civil wars of the Roses, which ended in 1485 in the crowning of Henry Tudor, Earl of Richmond, the Lancastrian pretender, on the field of Bosworth. In the hundred years' war with France the monarchy had alone profited ; in the civil wars the ancient baronage of the realm had become almost as extinct as the Middle Ages themselves. Professor Freeman calls attention to the fact that when Henry VII. assembled his first Parliament there were but thirty temporal peers left to obey the summons, and that even some of these had been attainted. The great houses had suffered more than any other portion of the realm, and the Howards, the Stanleys, and the Poles represented almost entirely the older order.^ And so chary was the seventh Henry of conferring honours, that after his reign of twenty-four years no more than thirty-four peers were summoned to his son's first Parliament. ^ Green, A Short History of the English People, p. 284, 237 238 Reformation and Renaissance But not alone the English aristocracy : during the fifteenth century all the old institutions of the Middle Ages had perished, the old feudal liberties had gradually disappeared, and the epoch of internationalism began. Communication between governments became more frequent, political alliances were made, and European state-craft was born. The popes, the dukes of Milan, the Venetian republic, the emperors of Germany, the kings of Spain, France, and England negotiated with one another, power was more evenly balanced, leagues were formed. Even if there had been no revival of classical antiquity, the feudal system must have come to an end in England by reason of the destruction of all the elements by which it had been fed. Nearly a fifth of the land had become Crown property ; but if the nobility had been decimated and ruined, the middle classes, yet in their infancy, were in consequence rapidly growing in wealth and importance, and were in the course of time to recruit their ranks with a large infusion of the modern spirit. And meanwhile the monarchy rose con- solidated from the ruins of feudalism. It was, in fact, a totally new growth, differing entirely from the monarchy of the Middle Ages, developing into tyranny under the Tudor sovereigns, and culminating in the Stuart fallacy of " the divine right of kings," until the exaggeration of the royal prerogative brought about its own downfall. Of literature there had been next to none since the time of Chaucer, if we except Gower, Occleve, and Lydgate, for how could literature flourish in a land deluged with blood ! But far-off echoes of the Renaissance of letters came from Mainz, where the printers Gutenberg and Faust were making movable types in place of the old engraved wooden blocks, and from Aldus, who was multiplying books at Venice. The art of printing had made great progress in Flanders, where William Caxton had spent thirty-five years of his life, as Governor of the English Guild of Merchant adventurers. A press had been set up at Bruges, as early as 1473, by Colard Mansion, and probably he and Caxton had learned printing together at Cologne. But long before he printed, Caxton had taken to translating, " as a preventative against idleness," and his first translation, Le Recueil des Histoires de Troyes^ is supposed to have been printed at Bruges in 1474, although End of Religious Authority in England 239 this must always be a subject of mere conjecture, all the authentic Caxton books being distinguished by the absence of title-pages and dates. In 1476 he brought his newly- acquired art to England, and settled at Westminster under the protection of the Benedictines, setting up his presses within the Abbey precincts. In the following year he pro- duced The Dictes and Sayings of the Philosophers^ the first book printed in this country. His industry was prodigious, the output of fourteen years being eighty different books, most of which he translated as well as printed. To these he added many prefaces of his own c^-mposition, and some of the more popular works passed through several editions. Rather more than four thousand of his printed pages repre- sented his labours as a translator. He printed books to suit all classes of readers : for the learned such classics as were obtainable, service-books for clerics, tales of adventure and romance for Court ladies, as well as all the poetry that the age produced. The Golden Legend^ which he printed in 1483, contained most of the Pentateuch, and a large portion of the Gospels. Sir Thomas Malory's Morte d' Arthur^ a romance of chivalry, full of "joyous and pleasant histories," he printed in 1485. The Canterbury Tales was one of his earliest achievements, and so great was his devotion to " that worshipful man, Geoffry Chaucer, who ought eternally to be remembered," that he reprinted this work as soon as a more correct version of the original text presented itself. A man of mark at Westminster, Caxton was the centre of a group of scholars, of whom the Earl of Arundel, the Archdeacon of Colchester, Richard, Duke of Gloucester, the learned Earl of Worcester, Earl Rivers, brother of Edward the Fourth's Queen, were among the most brilliant. He was, moreover, a favourite of the three kings under whom he lived successively, and printed his Tully under the auspices of Edward IV., while he dictated his Order of Chivalry to Richard III., his Facts of Arms being printed by desire of Henry VII.^ But notwithstanding his marvellous activity, his keenness in the diffusion of books, in spite of his having introduced the most modern art of printing into England, and of having done so much to form and crystallise the literary English of his day, Caxton was far more a man of the age ^ Dictionary of National Biography, article "William Caxton." 240 Reformation and Renaissance that was passing away than a humanist of the Renaissance. He had sufficient learning to have secured for himself a place among modern classicists had he so willed : his energies were unbounded, his taste was pure and elevated, but his ambition was as deficient in self-consciousness as his genius, and he remained a child of the Middle Ages, in the midst of all the movement and stir of which he was in a large degree the author. He was a man of business, but his mind was no less devout than practical, and his simple piety finds apt expression in his preface to Charles the Grete^ when he says, " I am bounden to pray for my fader and moder's souls, that in my youthe sent me to schole, by which by the suffraunce of God I gete my living, I hope truly." He was busy with his translations up to the end of his life, in 1491, and his Arte and Crafte how to Die was almost the last thing he printed. He was buried in St. Margaret's, Westminster, and the parish accounts state that six and eightpence was paid for torches at his burying, " and sixpence for the bell atte the same burying." The absence of further circumstance on this occasion points to a simplicity in death as marked as the unostentatious manner of his well -filled, dignified life. Coming as it did after so long a period of storm and stress, the reign of Henry VII. was well adapted to the needs of the country. If there was little in it to mark visible progress, either in the domestic affairs of the nation or in its foreign prestige, it was important that forces which had been overstrained almost to snapping-point should for a time lie fallow, and regain their spent energies in a period of inaction. Even the king's penuriousness was not without its advantage, as it taught the people to husband their attenuated resources, and to practise the virtue of self-restraint. Nearly the whole of the reign was troubled by Yorkist conspiracies, hatched and matured in the Low Countries, but crushed on English soil by the patience, firmness, and sagacity of the king. His children by Elizabeth of York were : Arthur, Prince of Wales ; Margaret, afterwards married to the King of Scots ; Henry, who was intended for the ecclesiastical state ; and Mary, who married first Louis XII. of France, and secondly Charles, Duke of Brandon. Out of these elements was evolved the tragedy of English affairs to which the eyes of Europe were directed during nearly the whole of the sixteenth End of Religious Authority in England 241 century. It began with a prologue, the marriage of Prince Arthur to Katharine of Arragon, and may be said to have reached its climax with the execution of Mary Queen of Scots in 1587. Katharine of Arragon was born on December 16, 1483, at a moment when the fate of Spain hung in the balance. By the marriage of her parents, Ferdinand the Catholic of Arragon and Isabella of Castile, two important nationalities had been united under the same sceptre. The Moors, against whom the king had waged a seven years' crusade, had lost every foothold in the peninsula except Granada, which Ferdinand also conquered on January 2, 1492. Thus was the national unity of Spain brought about, and the end of the long conflict between Christian and Arab. The monarchy was thereby strengthened and extended, and the Inquisition, an institution at first far more political than religious, was founded to maintain public order. Peace being achieved, Katharine, whose life had till then been passed in camps, where she had learned much of that courage, power of endurance, and fortitude which in after years stood her in such great stead, now followed a more normal course of education. She was instructed in Spanish, French, and Latin, and in all the accomplishments then in fashion. The Spaniards looked upon the English as little short of barbarians ; and when Henry VII. asked for Katharine's hand for his eldest son, only twenty months old, Ferdinand consented, but was much concerned whether or not to accede to the request that his daughter should be sent to England to be educated. On the one hand it was represented to him that it was very undesirable for the princess to go to England till she was grown up, but on the other her only chance of happiness lay in her being sent there before she was old enough to be able to appreciate the superior civilisation of the Spaniards.^ Her mother settled the question by refusing to have her brought up under any eye but her own. The Queen of England then suggested that she should accustom herself to speak French with her Austrian sister-in-law, who was in Spain, the English ladies having no Latin or Spanish. To this advice the Spanish ambassador to England added that it would be well if 1 Bergenroth, Calendar of Letters, Despatches, and State Papers (England and Spain), vol. i. p. 178. R 242 Reformation and Renaissance Katharine learned to drink wine, as the water in England was not drinkable, and that even if it were, the climate did not allow of its being drunk.^ The negotiations were even then not concluded, and years passed, during which Henry and Ferdinand played the game of cat and mouse with each other, on the subject of the bride's dowry, before Katharine was formally betrothed to Prince Arthur by proxy. Six months more elapsed before she arrived at Plymouth, on October 2, 1 501, after a tempestuous voyage, having been tossed about pitilessly for three weeks in the Bay of Biscay, obliged to land near Bilbao, and to re-embark only to encounter still more violent storms, — a striking forecast of the troubles that awaited her in England. But nothing could exceed the cordiality of her welcome. Neither the inclemency of the weather nor the bad roads prevented the nobles, country gentlemen, and yeomen from turning out in vast numbers to do her honour, and by degrees she grew less shy at the bluff good-will of her reception, and laid aside something of the Spanish etiquette in which she had been trained. The sweetness of her manner at once gained for her a place in the hearts of the English which she retained till her sorrowful end. King Henry, indeed, made it easier for her to break through the stringent rules laid down for her conduct by simply setting them aside. Fer- dinand and Isabella had forbidden her suite to allow her to see or speak with him or the prince before the marriage ceremony, but Henry told the Spaniards roundly, that now the princess was in England she must obey the sovereign of the country, and he demanded to see her forthwith, even if she was in bed. Katharine then rose from her couch, and went to meet the king in the entrance to the suite of rooms she was occupying. He was much struck, he afterwards wrote to Ferdinand, with her beauty, grace, and modesty.^ Prince Arthur arrived on the scene half-an-hour later, when the disparity of their ages was at once apparent. Katharine made him a pretty little speech through the interpreters, to which the boy of fourteen replied with some questions about dogs and birds. There was dancing after supper, and all seemed greatly relieved. On November 12 the princess 1 Bergenroth, Calendar of Letters, Despatckes, and State Papers (England and Spain), vol. i. p. 158. 2 Ibid. p. 264. End of Religious Authority in England 243 made her public entry into London, and was lodged at the Bishop's Palace. On the 14th the ceremony of her marriage took place with great magnificence at St. Paul's, after which Prince Arthur made a public declaration, stand- ing on the steps of the cathedral, to the effect that he settled one-third of his lands on her in the event of his death.^ Complimentary letters then followed from Henry and Arthur to King Ferdinand, Henry promising to be a second father to Katharine, and Arthur declaring that he had never felt so much joy in his life as when he beheld the " sweet face of his bride." Turning over the State papers of this period it is hard to realise that this marriage, so long planned, the subject of so much solicitude, diplomacy, and ambitious scheming, had no element of finality in it, except the creation of a baneful quibble through which the whole peace and order of religion in England were to be disturbed. Yet on the 2nd of April following, even before their married life had begun, its pro- mise ended in death. Prince Arthur, whose constitution had always been feeble, succumbing to a sudden illness. From this moment Katharine's destiny was in debate through seven years of trouble and suspense. Henry VII. and Ferdinand began at once to quarrel over her dowry. The Spanish sovereigns had paid but one instalment of three,^ amounting to one-half of the whole sum stipulated, and they now demanded its return. Henry disputed their right to it ; there was nothing he hated so much as parting with money, and a compromise was suggested by which Katharine should marry the King of England's second son Henry, as soon as he should have completed his fourteenth year. When con- sulted as to her wishes on the subject, she replied that she had no desire to contract a second marriage in England, but that she begged her father to dispose of her as best suited himself.^ While the negotiations for her marriage with Prince Henry were proceeding, the sovereigns of Spain and England having undertaken to do their utmost to procure the necessary papal dispensation, Elizabeth of York died, and Henry VII. 1 Rymer's Foedera^ vol. xii. p. 780. 2 Gairdner, History of the English Church in the Sixteenth Century^ p. 8. 2 Mariana, Historia de Rebus Hispania, vol. xxix. p. 545. 244 Reformation and Renaissance made the astounding proposal that he should himself marry Katharine. 1 Although in this particular instance no affinity had been contracted, the notion was repulsive, and Isabella refused to give it a moment's consideration. She was extremely anxious on account of her daughter's sad and solitary position in a strange country, and she implored Julius II. to grant the Bull of dispensation. Even when he had made up his mind as to the merits of the case, the Pope still delayed sending the Bull, for reasons of diplomacy or convenience, but he yielded to Isabella's entreaties when the queen was on her deathbed, and sent her a Brief to that effect in order that she might die in peace.2 The formal Bull had been signed on December 26, 1503, just eleven months before the death of the Queen of Spain. Katharine's misfortune in losing her mother at this juncture far outweighed the advantage of the dispensation, which could not be acted upon until Prince Henry had attained the age of fourteen ; for her father and the King of England, regardless of her comfort or happi- ness, indulged their political and ambitious schemes quite irrespective of their plighted words, and the continued non-payment of her dowry was made the pretext by Henry VII. for treating the unfortunate princess with the greatest cruelty. She was almost penniless, and was com- pelled to sell her plate and jewels to provide food for herself and her household.^ Worse was to follow, and when young Henry reached the age at which he was nominally free to act for himself, his father, irritated at Ferdinand's dilatoriness in paying the remainder of the marriage portion, and conceiving that he might make a more advantageous alliance, forced his son, on the eve of the day originally fixed for his union with Katharine, to sign a formal protest against the marriage, saying that it had been arranged without his consent.^ This caused her much humiliation and sorrow, for she had become deeply attached to her betrothed ; they had been constantly ^ Pocock, Records of the Reformation, \g\. ii. p. 425. This in itself furnished sufficient proof that Katharine had never lived with Prince Arthur as his wife. ^ Gairdner, History of the English Church, etc. p. 9. 2 Bergenroth, vol. i. p. 327. * Ibid. p. 358. End of Religious Authority in England 245 thrown together, and Prince Henry, on his part, had clearly shown that he was not indifferent to her many good qualities and attractions.^ Year after year went by, Katharine's position becoming almost unbearable from the poverty and petty persecution she was made to suffer, till the climax was reached in 1509 by a fresh project of marriage which the King of England had devised between the prince his son and Margaret of Angouleme. Katharine, in desperation, then wrote to her father that she could no longer endure the martyrdom she suffered, that she had sold all that she possessed, and im- plored him to allow her to return to Spain. ^ Scarcely had her letter reached its destination when the whole face of affairs was changed by the death of Henry VII. on April 21, 1 509. The young king hastened gallantly to redeem his pledge to Katharine, and they were privately married without further delay, the public ceremony taking place on June 3 at St. Paul's,^ six weeks after his accession. Then followed halcyon days, not only for Katharine but for the whole realm. The country, at peace at home and abroad, now rejoiced in the fruits of the late king's parsi- mony. His hoard of two millions was unlocked, and began to be spent royally by his successor, whose extremely popular manners excited enthusiasm wherever he showed himself, and he showed himself everywhere. The description given of Henry the Eighth's person, talents, and affability by the Venetian ambassadors at the beginning of his reign, is wonderful reading. They extol his piety, which was so great that he heard from three to five masses daily, his devotion to the Blessed Virgin, his horror of heresy, his loyalty to the Holy See, his love for the queen, his attention to business, his generosity, chivalry, and clemency. As to his appearance, " his Majesty," said Pasqualigo, " is the handsomest potentate I ever set eyes on ; above the usual height, with an extremely fine calf to his leg ; his complexion very fair and bright, with auburn hair combed straight and short in the French fashion, and a round face, so very beautiful that it would become a pretty woman, his throat being rather long and thick." Describing his reception of 1 Brewer, Letters and Papers, vol. iv. No. 5791. 2 Bergenroth, vol. i. p. 469. 3 Lord Herbert of Cherbury, Life of King Henry the Eighth, p. 9. 246 Reformation and Renaissance the Venetian envoys, Pasqualigo goes on to say that they found the king " standing under a canopy of cloth of gold, leaning against his gilt throne, on which lay a gold brocade cushion, with the gold sword of State. He wore a cap of crimson velvet, in the French fashion, and the brim was looped up all round with lacets and gold-enamelled tags. His doublet was in the Swiss fashion, striped alternately with white and crimson satin, and his hose were scarlet, and all slashed from the knee upwards. Very close round his neck he had a gold collar from which there hung a rough-cut diamond, the size of the largest walnut I ever saw, and to this was suspended a most beautiful and very large round pearl. His mantle was of purple velvet lined with white satin, the sleeves open, with a train more than four Venetian yards long. This mantle was girt in front like a gown, with a thick gold cord, from which there hung large golden acorns like those suspended from a cardinal's hat ; over this mantle was a very handsome gold collar, with a pendant St. George entirely of diamonds. Beneath the mantle he wore a pouch of cloth of gold, which covered a dagger ; and his fingers were one mass of jewelled rings." ^ But there was a less dazzling aspect of the picture that must also be considered. The monstrous defects of Henry's character, so obvious later on, were not altogether absent in his youth ; and perhaps the one story told of his childhood may not be altogether without foundation. One day, when his father was beating the boy, the Bishop of Ely intervened, begging that he might be forgiven. Whereupon Henry VII. is said to have answered : " Entreat not for him, for this child will be the undoing of England." ^ Even amidst all the glamour of his accession, glimpses of the cruelty that underlay his vanity were not wanting.^ A slight wound to his self-love, a passing fit of anger, and there stood revealed a pitilessness, a desire for revenge all the more striking from the habitual urbanity of his pleasure-seeking nature. However, as yet the flowers almost hid the sharp thorns of the English briar-rose, and for a brief season the nation ^ Giustinian Desp. vol. i. p. 86. 2 Nicholas Harpsfield, History of the Pretended Divorce (Camden Society), p, 284. 2 John Bruce, History of the Court of Star Chamber, Archaeologia, vol. XXV. p. 372. End of Religious Authority in England 247 sunned itself in the beams of the young king's splendour, deserving well its name of " Merry England." Although luxury was entirely confined to the higher classes, in all the essentials of life the poor were better off than at the present day, the conditions of existence being simpler, and notions as to essentials healthier. Old men in the reign of Elizabeth remembered the time when their fathers and they themselves lay on straw pallets, covered only with a sheet, and a good round log under their heads instead of a bolster. " If it were so that our fathers or the good man of the house had a mattress or flock-bed, and thereto a sack of chafi^ to rest his head upon, he thought himself to be as well lodged as the lord of the town, so well were they contented. Pillows were thought meet only for women in childbed. As for servants, if they had any sheet above them it was well, for seldom had they any under their bodies to keep them from the pricking straws that ran oft through the canvas and raced their hardened hides." ^ On the other hand the state and magnificence kept up by the nobility differed little from those of the Court. If the directions for making the king's bed were as elaborate as the work was laborious,^ the nobles were furnished with very luxurious beds of their own, consisting of feather-bed, mattress, bolster, pillows, blankets, sheets, coverlet, quilt, tester, and curtains. The tapestries on their walls were sumptuous and beautiful, although the cleanliness of the rush -strewn floors often left much to be desired. The magnificence of the gold plate which adorned their banquets added a lustre to the feasting, and of this latter it may be said that it was as prodigious in quantity as it was varied in description. The banquets given by the City Companies were still more substantial, though less ornate.^ 1 Harrison's Preface to Hollinshed's Chronicle. 2 For a description of this royal bed-making see Sneyd's Island of England, p. 102. 3 These differed little between the latter end of the fifteenth and the beginning of the sixteenth centuries, so that a bill of fare for the Worship- ful Company of Wax Chandlers for Lord Mayor's Day, October 29, 1478, may serve, with the price attached to each item, as a sample of such banquets in the early part of the reign of Henry VIII : — " For a capon, 6d. ; a pig, 4d. ; a loin of beef, 4d. ; a leg of mutton 2^d. ; a coney, 2d. ; a dozen pigeons, yd. ; a hundred eggs, 8^d. ; a goose, 6d. ; a loin of mutton and two loins of veal, is. 4d. ; one gallon of red wine, 8d; one kilderkin of ale, is. 8d." 248 Reformation and Renaissance But the most remarkable feature of the young reign was the freshness, the activity shown in the world of letters. Humanism, in the revival of Greek studies, except for the new awakening to the joy of living, and to what may be called the naturalism of the age, was the only development of the Renaissance in England. The country possessed no school of painting to be influenced by the new ideas. The particular form of Gothic architecture, as it had unfolded itself in this country, had almost said its last informing word. The gorgeous chapel and tomb which Henry VII. had built for himself in Westminster Abbey, together with the chapel of King's College, Cambridge, and the cloisters and Lady Chapel of Gloucester Cathedral, were the utmost legitimate expression of symbolism in stone. Beyond these lay only redundancy and retrogression. Cardinal Wolsey's famous buildings at Ipswich, and the more enduring monuments to his memory at Oxford added little to the glories of the Decorated and Perpendicular styles ; and after these we have nothing to mark the period in ecclesiastical architecture but the debased Tudor arch, and miserable windows. Nevertheless, the Renaissance, as Petrarch and Pius II. had understood it, was striking root in England. Erasmus, in a letter to Paul Bombasius, writes that much as he dislikes Courts, he would be glad to return to England, and he speaks highly of Henry's favour to men of letters. As for Katharine she is not only a miracle of learning, but is not less pious than learned. Thomas Linacre is King's Physician ; Tunstall, Master of the Rolls ; More, Privy Councillor ; Pace, Secretary; Mountjoy, Chamberlain of the Household; Colet, preacher ; Stokesley, who is well versed in the school- men and intimately acquainted with three languages, con- fessor.^ In another letter he declares that all the liberality and kindness which he had experienced from the whole College of Cardinals when at Rome were made up to him in Warham.^ And in 15 16 he writes from Cambridge that " the University can now hold its head with the highest, and has excellent theologians." ^ The learned coterie represented by Linacre, Grocyn, Colet, More, and Pace, with Archbishop Warham and Bishop Fisher as patrons, was as effective as the Academy presided ^ Eras. Epist. vol. xi. p. 24. 2 /^y^/, p, 2. ^ Ibid.-^. 10. End of Religious Authority in England 249 over by Lorenzo the Magnificent, if less brilliant and self- conscious. But to Linacre the Academy of Florence had been something of an alma Mater. Even before his sojourn in Italy his appetite for Greek literature had been whetted at Oxford, where, about 1475, Chaundler, Warden of New College, had invited a Greek professor to lecture. At Florence, where Linacre studied under Politian and Chalcon- dylas, together with the sons of Lorenzo, one of them being the famous patron of the later Renaissance, Leo X., he was joined by Grocyn and William Latimer. Grocyn, more conservative than his friends, still held to the medieval schoolmen, preferred Aristotle to Plato, and described the difference between the two philosophers as " simply that between a world of science and a world of myths." On his return to England, Grocyn taught Greek gratuitously at Oxford, and often preached at St. Paul's at Colet's request. He introduced Erasmus to Warham; and Erasmus, keenly sensitive to generosity and open-handedness, having lived for some time at Grocyn's expense, proclaimed his friend "the most upright and best of all Britons," "the patron and preceptor of us all," and praised his Ciceronian Latin. Linacre prolonged his stay in Italy for about six years. He went to Rome, to Venice, to Padua, where he graduated as M.D., stayed at Vicenza, and studied medicine under Leonicaenus, a celebrated physician and scholar, and, returning to England by way of Geneva and Paris, settled at Oxford, where he enjoyed a position of great distinction, on account of his brilliant Latin scholarship and thorough knowledge of Greek. Sir Thomas More was one of his most famous pupils. He was appointed tutor to Arthur Prince of Whales, on whose death he became one of the king's physicians. Henceforth Linacre resided in London and practised medicine, having for his patients all the prominent personages of the day. He took orders late in life, and devoted himself to his clerical calling, as well as to the further pursuit of learn- ing. A ridiculous story was told by Sir John Cheke, to the effect that Linacre discovered the New Testament as an old man, when he was greatly moved by reading the Sermon on the Mount for the first time.^ ^ Dictionary of National Biography. Articles " Thomas Linacre " and " William Grocyn." Cambridge Modern History, vol. i. p. 565. 250 Reformation and Renaissance Yet more famous than either Grocyn or Linacre was Dr. John Colet, Dean of St. Paul's, and founder of St. Paul's School. He too had been in the Arcadia of the early Renaissance, and, on his return from Florence, set himself vigorously to the work of education. A sturdy Catholic and an Englishman to the backbone, he was alike impatient of scholasticism and of pagan licence. He even attacked St. Thomas Aquinas for defining things which in his opinion should have been left vague. In this, as in some other ways, he resembled his friend Erasmus. His violent crusades against scandals, in which it was not always clear that he dis- tinguished the actual devotions from their abuse, laid him open to some misconception, and he was cited to appear before Archbishop Warham on a charge of heresy. The charge was dismissed as groundless, but Colet continued to be un- popular, principally on account of his sermons directed against the worldliness of Churchmen, and of bishops in particular.-^ Nevertheless, to those who sincerely desired reform, and worked for it, he was a very constant friend. William Lilly, who had studied Greek at Rhodes, and who was no less distinguished for his goodness than for his learn- ing, Colet made headmaster of St. Paul's School. For Sir Thomas More he had the deepest affection, and More, who had chosen him as his spiritual guide, placed the utmost confidence in his judgment. Warham appointed him one of the judges to try cases of heresy in the diocese of Canterbury, and Foxe, the martyrologist, includes him in his list of " persecutors," meaning thereby that he was an examiner of heretics. A complaint having been made of him to Henry VIII. Colet was summoned to the royal presence, the result of the audience being that the King dismissed him very honourably, saying, " Let every man have his own doctor ; this man is mine." ^ The venerable figure of William Warham, Archbishop of Canterbury, the friend and patron of this learned band, himself no mean scholar, is familiar to us through the eloquent pen of Erasmus. Simple, even frugal in his manner of life, he presented a striking contrast to most of the great prelates of his day, while his ever-open purse was at the disposal of all who stood in need of his bounty. ^ Gairdncr, History of the English Church in the Sixteenth Century^ p. 60. 2 Ihid.^. 61. End of Religious Authority in England 251 " Had I found such a patron in my youth," wrote Erasmus, " I too might have been counted among the fortunate ones." Scarcely was Warham made Archbishop when he was called upon to accept also the onerous office of the chancellorship, and then began the sharp conflict between his rehgious and secular duties, a conflict that became ever sharper as time went on, and the king grew more imperious and self-willed. Although immersed in public afi^airs, an able orator, and well read in natural equity and public law, Warham was no very active politician, nor did his taste lie that way.^ If he seems to have drifted somewhat perilously near a mistake in the matter of the king's first marriage, and to have consented to something like the insertion of the thin end of the wedge which finally severed the English Church from the Holy See, it must be considered that we who are in possession of the whole facts and see the bearing of initial measures upon the sequence of events, can have little notion of the difficulties which the situation presented to Warham and the English bishops. We are familiar with the idea of a Church, a whole ecclesiastical system, governed by a layman ; in the sixteenth century such a system was so complete a novelty that at first none but the King of England and his Secretary of State fully grasped it. It is certain that while Henry and Crom- well claimed for the king spiritual jurisdiction over the Church of England, Archbishop Warham and his colleagues only meant to admit that the king had taken into his own hands all jurisdiction in the /^wpor^/ aff*airs of the Church which the Pope had hitherto exercised. Warham's protest that there was to be no " derogation of the Roman Pontiff^ or the Apostolic See " is sufficient proof that the king and his minister meant one thing, while Convocation meant another. But this was not all, and the last act of Warham's life was the drafting of an important speech to be delivered in the House of Lords, to show the impossibility of the king's having spiritual jurisdiction. The archbishop based his argument on the very nature of the constitution of the Christian Church.^ But to return to the earlier and happier years of the reign. The revival of learning was by no means restricted 1 Gairdner, History of the English Church, etc. p. 4. 2 Gasquet, The Eve of the Reformation, p. ill. This statement by- Archbishop Warham was printed in the Dublin Review for April 1894. 252 Reformation and Renaissance to those who, like Erasmus, Colet, Warham, and Lord Mountjoy, were in touch with the Court, and were smiled upon by royal favour. The Abbeys of Reading, Ramsey, and Glastonbury were noted for their scholarship. At Oxford the Benedictines, according to the University Registers, kept up a high average of graduates between the years 1506 and 1536. Foxe, Bishop of Winchester, founded Corpus Christi College in 15 16, mainly for the study of Greek, appointing the learned Greek scholar John Claymond its first President. Fisher, Bishop of Rochester, recalled Richard Croke from Leipzig, in 15 19, to continue the work of Erasmus at Cambridge. A large proportion of the students at Cambridge were monks, sent there by their re- spective monasteries to qualify for teaching the novices, and each of the greater religious houses in East Anglia had several of their younger members in training at Gonville Hall, as Caius College was then called.^ Nothing seems to have been farther from people's thoughts than any crisis or change in Church or State, and learning continued to flourish at the Universities up to the time of the influx of foreign Protestants, invited by Thomas Cromwell and Cranmer, Archbishop of Canterbury, After 1535, the period when the dissolution of the larger monas- teries began, there was a marked and rapid decline ; the foreign divines thought of nothing but disputes with each other concerning the varying degrees of the Real Absence, as regarded the Sacrament of the Altar. " It would pity a man's heart," said Latimer in a sermon preached before the king in 1548, "to hear what I hear of the state of Cambridge ; what it is in Oxford I cannot tell." Not a single degree was taken at Oxford in 1547 and 1548. In 1545 Cambridge was at so low an ebb that the total extinction of studies was apprehended.^ Henry VIII.'s taste for theology had doubtless some- thing to do with the overthrow of papal authority in England, and the brilliant success of his book against Luther's Babylonish Captivity of the Churchy in defence of the Seven Sacraments, and Leo X.'s subsequent recognition of its ability, by his conferring on the king the title of Defender of the Faith, acted as a spur in this direction. As he had ^ Venn, Gonville and Caius College^ vol. i. p. 1 6. 2 Cambridge Modern History, vol. i. p. 565 et seq. End of Religious Authority in England 253 been educated, up to the time of his brother's death, with a view to an ecclesiastical career, his father intending him, as it was commonly supposed, for the Archbishopric of Canter- bury, he had some pretension to be considered at least a good amateur theologian. Wolsey, and afterwards Thomas Cromwell, working upon this taste, through adroit flattery and subtle diplomacy, are perhaps mainly responsible for the rest, although in the light of the most recent investigation the theory that it was Wolsey who originated the project of the divorce must be dismissed as groundless.-^ His talents had been discovered by Henry VII., who had employed him on two delicate missions to foreign courts ; but, although active at the beginning of the new reign, Wolsey, as the king's almoner, was not the prominent figure he afterwards became. But as early as 151 1, he was a member of the Privy Council, and three years later, on the death of Cardinal Bainbridge, was promoted to the Archbishopric of York, having been previously in succession Dean and Bishop of Lincoln. His progress was now rapid, and in 1 5 1 5 the king's influence at Rome, strongly exercised in his favour, procured for him the Cardinalate. In Decem- ber of the same year. Archbishop Warham voluntarily re- signed the Great Seal, and on Christmas Eve the king delivered it to Wolsey, who was at once installed Lord High Chancellor of England. Henceforth all power was centred in the ablest parvenu that had ever ruled Church and State in England. It may be said that he invented modern statecraft, and practised it, without having read a line of Machiavelli's book, which was not yet printed. He became enormously rich. Besides the revenues of the Arch- bishopric of York, he received those of three other sees — Bath, Worcester, and Hereford, whose tenants were foreigners. He was Abbot in commendam of St. Albans, Bishop of Dur- ham until he exchanged it for Winchester, and was a pensioner of France and Spain. Henry rewarded him munificently for his services to the Crown, and the emoluments from his various secular offices were immense.^ In spite of his mag- nificence, his royal pomp and splendour, his lavish generosity, he was unpopular at home and abroad. In vain he sought ^ Gairdncr, " New Lights," etc., English Historical Review, vols. xi. and xii. 2 Green, A Short History of the English People, p. 317. 2 54 Reformation and Renaissance to dazzle the world with his household of 500 noble retainers; even his " master cook " wearing daily damask, satin, or velvet, with a chain of gold about his neck,^ Wolsey's con- temporaries saw the man first, and the statesman only under all the outer semblance of grandeur which displeased them, and betrayed the low-born adventurer.^ Neither his school at Ipswich, his foundation at Oxford, nor his devotion to the affairs of State, by which he marvellously increased the prestige of the country, won for him gratitude, or even the most grudging praise, although his lofty schemes, his diplo- matic genius, his many-sided talents, rendered him one of the most picturesque personalities in Europe. At Oxford he was a power, as elsewhere, but he deceived no one into the belief that love of letters alone inspired the foundation of Cardinal's College. He was, indeed, less a student of books than of men, and of all men he studied the king. Henry VIII., notwithstanding his talents, his gifts for army organisation, his inspiration in all that concerned naval affairs, was, at the beginning of his reign, and for some years afterwards, a mere dilettante in statesmanship. But his vanity was excessive, and Wolsey was obliged to flatter it pro- foundly to get his own ideas carried out, being careful to render an exact account to the king of every diplomatic letter he wrote, as if he and Henry were joint authors of his policy. In this he abundantly proved his knowledge of Henry's character, for only in such an aspect might the minister's greatness be tolerated by a master who would brook no rival, and " who loved nothing worse than to be constrained to do anything contrary to his royal will and pleasure." ^ To others he ever showed a bold, proud front, but to Henry he was only the king's creature, holding all things by the royal favour, the palatial splendour of York Place and Hampton Court, his princely retinue, and the gorgeous hospitality which he dispensed. In all these things the king was made to see himself reflected, and so long as he thought that Wolsey had no other will than the royal will, all went well. ^ Cavendish, The Life and Death of Thomas Wolsey, p. 23, ed. Temple Classics. 2 Busch, Cardinal Wolsey und die englisch-Kaiserliche Allianz. 2 Cavendish, p. 14. CARDINAL WOLSEY. From n picture in the National Portrait Gallery, School of Holbein. To face I: age 2 ;; v End of Religious Authority in England 255 Nevertheless, of the two, Henry was in some ways the more astute. He was keenly alive to the sagacity, the worldly wisdom of Wolscy's policy ; he listened to his advice, and generally acted upon it, although occasionally, as in the abandonment of the French for the imperial alliance, he made the mistake of preferring his own brilliant dreams to Wolsey's politic schemes for his solid advantage. With all his admiration for Wolsey's statecraft, he often withheld his entire confidence from him, kept his own counsel, and hoodwinked his minister. Wolsey was some- times in the dark — Henry never. Wolsey's first great coup was his plan of operations against France in 15 12, which resulted in the capture of Therouanne and Tournay. His arrogance kept pace with the growth of his power. On the arrival of the Venetian envoys in England, the ambassador, Sebastian Giustinian, remarked that Wolsey used to say to him, " His Majesty will do so and so." Subsequently, by degrees, he would forget himself, and begin to say, " We shall do so and so." He then reached such a pitch that he was accustomed to say, *' I shall do so and so." ^ Giustinian, at the beginning of their acquaintance, de- scribes him as about forty-six years old, handsome, learned, eloquent, of vast ability, and indefatigable. He alone trans- acted business, such as that which occupied all the magis- tracies, offices, and councils of Venice, both civil and criminal; and all State affairs were managed by him. He received no one in audience till after the third or fourth attempt. Some- times Giustinian would send his secretary six or seven times to York Place before he could obtain for his master to speak with the Cardinal. It was the custom for ambassadors to dine at court when they went there, and on Giustinian's first arrival in England, they ate at the Cardinal's table, but afterwards no one was served with the viands of the sort presented to the Cardinal till after their removal from before him.2 All that the Venetian envoys report of Wolsey's omni- potence is fully corroborated by other foreigners in England at the same time. The Apostolic Nuncio, writing to the 1 Rawdon Brown, " Report of England by Sebastian Giustinian," Venetian Calendar, vol. ii. p. 560. 2 Ibid. 2^6 Reformation and Renaissance Marquis of Mantua in April 15 17, says that the Cardinal of York governs everything alone, the king not interfering in any matter, but referring the whole to him, whether it relate to foreign or domestic policy, so that foreign envoys fancy themselves negotiating not with a cardinal, but with another king. A little later, he says, " The King pays the Cardinal such respect that he speaks only through his mouth." ^ Despot as Henry was, his main reason for delegating so much of his royal authority to Wolsey proceeded less from a love of ease and a desire to free himself from the tedium of government than on account of the Cardinal's extraordinary fitness for public business. Wolsey's gentle- man usher, the faithful and devoted George Cavendish, only testifies to a well-known fact when he says that his master had " a special gift of natural eloquence, with a filed tongue to pronounce the same, that he was able with the same to persuade and allure all men to his purpose." Intoxicated with so much success, Wolsey boasted in 1520 that he could do or undo whatever he liked. " The Cardinal of York, who is the governor of the King of England," said the Pope, " is a very strange person, and makes the King go hither and thither, just as he pleases." " Two years previously he had crowned his French policy with a treaty, betrothing the infant Dauphin and Henry's only child, the Princess Mary, then about two years old, the affair being managed, as Sir Thomas More declared, " most solely by the Cardinal." But while Wolsey might, according to the Venetian ambassador, well be styled ^^ipse Rex,'' the whole State being, as it were, centred in him, few but the king and his new ally were satisfied with him. The English were not pleased at Tournay being given back to the French, and the Pope, anxious to form a league with the Emperor, the Swiss, and the King of England, against the encroachments of France in Italy, sought to detach Henry from the French treaty. The pretext was a crusade against the Turks, and Katharine, then still a factor in Henry's counsels, was naturally in favour of an alliance with her nephew, the young Archduke Charles, the successful candidate for the empire. For the first time, Wolsey's 1 Fenetian Calendar, vol. ii. Nos. 875, 894. 2 Bergenroth, vol. ii. No. 281. End of Religious Authority in England 257 policy received a check. His hopes of personal advance- ment lay with France ; Katharine had never cordially liked the Cardinal, whose influence had clashed with hers, and she, being the head of the Spanish party in England, did all she could to counteract it. Possessing as she did very considerable abilities, she had been her father's formally accredited agent in the early years of her marriage, and her letters to Ferdinand were official documents.^ In the choice of a husband for her only child, she could not forget that she was a Spaniard, and closely allied to the imperial House of Hapsburg. Henry, notwithstanding the solemn engagements he had entered into with Francis I., which were supposed to have been perpetuated, and made still more binding by the elaborate manifestations of friendship exchanged between himself and the King of France on the Field of the Cloth of Gold, now abandoned him for the more dazzling im- perial alliance, and the hand of his daughter was secretly transferred from the Dauphin to Charles V. Wolsey, too great a politician to appear defeated, threw himself with apparent zest into Henry's plans, and seemed to be the prime mover in the new departure. The Pope, who was sending legates into different countries to arrange the details of the Crusade, proposed Cardinal Campeggio as his special envoy to England. But Henry, perhaps con- sidering that something was due to Wolsey for his chagrin, objected that it was unusual for any foreign cardinal to exercise legatine authority in England ; though, at the same time, he expressed himself willing to waive this objection, provided that the Cardinal of York were made legate a latere, and exercised equal authority with Campeggio.^ The con- dition would probably have been rejected had the Pope been less anxious about the league ; but, as matters were, it was thought that if pressure were brought to bear upon him — and there were no other way out of the difficulty — he would make Wolsey legate, " although there was no man on the face of the earth whom his Holiness detested so heartily " as that Cardinal.^ And so it came to pass ; and the imperial ambassador wrote to his master that it had been very hard ^ Bergenroth, vol. ii, Preface. - Gairdner, History of the English Church, etc. p. 71. / ''' Bergenroth, vol. ii. No. 283. S 258 Reformation and Renaissance work, as the Cardinal of England was much disliked in Rome.^ Nevertheless, both the King of France and the Emperor, on the point of open hostilities, competed for Wolsey's favour, and it was well known that Francis had promised to make him Pope at the next conclave.^ However much or little Wolsey built on this hope, the situation was exactly what he and Henry wished to create ; for the next best thing to an alliance with France was for England to be looked upon as a possible and valuable ally by both Francis and the Emperor. This, Pope Leo was shrewd enough to divine, when he complained that the Cardinal of York wanted to be judge over the princes, and to make his profit out of that occasion.^ Nothing came of the proposed crusade, and Leo X. dying in 1521, the Cardinals assembled in what proved to be the longest conclave on record to elect his successor. The Emperor had also promised Wolsey that he would advance his cause, and declared that he had written letters to various Cardinals in his favour; but as there is not the slightest allusion in any of the despatches of the imperial am- bassador to Wolsey as a candidate, nor any trace of the letters having been sent, it is more than probable that Charles took no steps to have him nominated. All things considered, the Emperor would certainly have been loath to see him on the papal throne. But although no imperial influence was used, Wolsey's name was proposed at the conclave, Henry having sent Richard Pace, who was looked upon as the most able and best-informed of all English diplomatists, to Rome to stir up some interest in his candidature. Even Wolsey him- self was not surprised, or perhaps greatly disappointed, at his failure, but seems to have regarded the matter as one to make his future election more easy. Adrian VL reigned but two years, and the question of Wolsey's prospects of the papacy was again discussed in 1523. But the Emperor was as inactive on his behalf as before, though the French party in the conclave were fairly keen. Wolsey's known leanings towards France would have been an important factor in the coming struggle between that country and the empire, and Henry was not ^ Bergenroth, vol. ii. No. 284. 2 Ibid. No. 285. 3 ii^ij^ No. 312. End of Religious Authority in England 259 slow to perceive the advantages of an English Pope in the balance of power in Europe. " The English think that his election is almost sure," wrote the Duke of Sessa to the Emperor, " as though God would work every day a miracle." ^ The election of Cardinal Alexander Medici as Clement VII., who had shown himself a good friend to Wolsey, was regarded by him with satisfaction. Leo X. had persistently refused to make him legate for life ; but two months after his accession the new Pope conferred this favour upon him." After the battle of Pavia, so disastrous to the French arms, the Emperor, whose betrothal to the Princess Mary of England was still supposed to hold good, practically threw over his allies, the treaty of Windsor was rescinded, and Henry and Wolsey were free to contract new friendships. It was proposed that a marriage should be made between Mary and Francis L, and ambassadors were sent to England to arrange it. The betrothal took place by proxy at Green- wich, but as there were many other items in the treaty to be considered, Wolsey was to proceed to France and discuss them in person with Francis. Henry had been desirous of accompanying the expedition, as he had something to tell Francis which the Cardinal himself did not know, these things being the celebrated " scruples," concerning the validity of his own marriage, by which means he would ascertain whether Francis would be likely to support him in his demand for a decree declaring that the marriage had been null from the beginning, on account of the incom- petency of the Pope to dispense in such a matter. But the French ambassador did not encourage the visit, and therefore Henry probably at this juncture divulged the secret to Wolsey, keeping back, however, everything but the initial plea, the doubt as to the lawfulness of his marriage.^ Wolsey must have been fully aware of Henry's illicit connection with Anne Boleyn, the Duke of Norfolk's niece, for the matter was in fact no secret ; but that the king contemplated raising her to the throne in the event of his divorce from Katharine, occurred to the Cardinal as little as to any of those not immediately concerned. Before his departure on his mission, ^ Bergenroth, vol. ii. No. 606. - Gairdner, History of the English Churchy etc. p. 81. 2 Gairdner, " New Lights," etc., Enghsh Historical Review^ vol. ii. 26o Reformation and Renaissance Henry bade him hold a secret legatine court, in conjunction with Archbishop Warham, to which he was to cite the king to appear and answer the charge of having lived unlawfully for eighteen years with his brother's widow. Wolsey then started on a triple errand, the first and only ostensible one being the negotiation for the marriage treaty of Henry's daughter. The second had in view his own advancement, by winning over the French king, and through him the French Cardinals, to a project for transferring the papal authority to himself. Three Italians were to gain access to Clement VII, , besieged by Spanish troops in the Castle of St. Angelo, and to obtain from him a faculty for Wolsey to act as his vicar during the Pope's captivity. No clue was to be given as to the manner in which the powers confided to him were to be used, but — and this led to Wolsey's third scheme — a special clause was to be inserted in the faculty forbidding appeal from any of his decisions to the Pope, which, of course, meant that Wolsey as locum tenens would proceed to a decree in favour of the King of England's " secret matter," i.e. his divorce.^ Passing on to further developments, Wolsey conceived that Henry would then be free to seek the hand of the Princess Renee, daughter of Louis XII. It was not until his return to England, having broached all these subjects with Francis, except the one relating to Renee, that he discovered to his dismay that Henry had duped him with a half confidence, and that the king's real intention in repudiating Katharine was to effect a marriage with his mistress.' Anne Boleyn, knowing the pressure Wolsey would bring to bear on Henry, contrived to be present at their first interview. Shortly after this the king told him that he intended to marry her, and Wolsey im- plored him on his knees to think better of his resolution. Anne never forgave him this opposition, and even when he turned round and hailed her as the rising star, never rested till she had compassed his ruin. But while the Cardinal was pursuing the ends he had planned by seeking, through his agents, to gain access to the Pope, Henry had secretly ^ Wolsey to Henry VIII., State Papers, vol. i. pp. 205-207, 230, 231, 270, Record Office. Gairdner, "New Lights," etc., English Historical Review, vol. xi. - For the relations existing between Henry VIII. and Anne Boleyn, see the series of love-letters addressed by the king to her in 1527-28, a summary of which is given in Brewer's 4th Calendar. End of Religious Authority in England 261 commissioned his chief secretary to ask Clement for a dis- pensation to enable him to marry Anne whether he was already legally married or not. " A licence for bigamy," observes Dr. Gairdner, Henry conceived was a favour that might just possibly be conceded — especially by a Pope in con- finement, to one who had done so much for the Church as himself, in defending it against Luther." ^ If Clement should refuse this, Knight was to procure him a dispensation to marry one with whom he had already contracted affinity in the first degree,- the dispensation to be used only if the king's actual marriage should be declared null. Wolsey could have told Henry that his " scruples " about his first marriage would apply equally to the one he now proposed to contract, and that the real difficulty would be to set aside his first marriage, showing him that the course he had adopted would be hopeless ; but the Cardinal was purposely left in the dark, and Henry stumbled upon the fact that he had made a mistake, and he wrote to Knight to cancel his former instructions.^ Even then Wolsey was not entrusted with the conduct of the affair ; and Henry sent as ambassadors- extraordinary to Rome, Stephen Gairdiner, " the best canonist in England, subtle in argument, and singularly able as an advocate," and Edward Foxe, afterwards a clever go- between, when Henry was lending a not altogether unwilling ear to the Protestant divines of Germany. Meanwhile, seeing that the tide was against him, the Cardinal of York had, as had always been his habit, turned about, and swam vigorously stream-downwards. It was now his policy to regain Henry's confidence by appearing to be a zealous advocate of the divorce ; but he had offended Anne mortally, and his over- throw was inevitable. The Pope meanwhile had agreed to send Cardinal Campeggio to England to try the case with Wolsey. Campeggio had already distinguished himself by an acute, legal understanding of Henry's marriage problem, and for this reason was among the first of the Cardinals to be con- sulted. As he had already been in England, where he had 1 " New Lights," etc., English Historical Review^ vol. xi. 2 By his connection with Anne Boleyn's sister, Mary. 3 See an autograph letter from Henry VIII. to Knight, Corpus Christi College, Oxford, MS. 318, f. 3. Printed in the Academy, March 15, 1879. 262 Reformation and Renaissance made lasting friendships, and had received substantial benefits, Henry and Wolsey, as soon as they knew that a legate was to be sent, ceased not by letters and envoys to persuade him to undertake the mission. But he was a martyr to gout and other ailments ; and the journey, begun with great pain and difficulty, was prolonged until October 1528. His arrival had been impatiently expected, but he was so suffering when he landed that no public reception could be given him.^ His first efforts were directed towards persuading the king to give up the divorce, and to accept a new dispensation confirming his marriage. But to this Henry would not listen, and began arguing the old opinion that the dispensation obtained from Julius II. was against the divine law. Campeggio told the Pope that he believed " if an angel descended from heaven he would not be able to persuade his Majesty to the contrary." ^ He then tried to induce Katharine to retire into a convent, but she would by no means be brought to make what would have amounted to a tacit acquiescence in the slur cast on her marriage ; and after saying all he could to move her, Campeggio, seeing that she remained firm, in spite of having no one to advise her, wrote to Clement, " I have always thought her a prudent lady, and now more than ever." ^ A subsequent interview with the queen, in which Campeggio repeated his former arguments, and Wolsey on his knees implored her to follow their advice, produced the same result. Campeggio, having exhausted all legitimate means, then refused, to the surprise and annoyance of Henry and Wolsey, who cared not what means were used, to proceed further otherwise than as law and justice permitted. When the legatine court was opened on June 18, 1529, the king answered the summons by proxy, but the queen appeared in person, and presented an appeal to the Pope, and a protest against the jurisdiction of the legates. Upon this, she was cited to appear again, three days later, to hear their decision on her protest. This time the court was crowded ; the king was present, and sat on a raised platform with the queen on his left, but a little lower. Having refused her appeal to the Pope, the legates summoned the king and queen by name. The king responded, but 1 Ehses, Romische Dokumente, Einleitung, pp. xxix, xxx. 2 Brewer, Cal. 4, p. 2101. 3 Brewer, Cal. 4, p. 21 10. End of Religious Authority in England 263 Katharine reiterated her appeal, on the ground that she being a foreigner, and Henry King of England, she could not hope for justice from judges who were in his service and power, holding benefices from him, and she declared on oath that for this reason alone she refused their sentence.^ Henry then rose and pleaded the scruples of conscience from which he had suffered from the time of his marriage, the queen replying that having been silent so long, it was not now the time to speak. He excused himself on account of his great love for her, and said that the Cardinal of York might have been delegated to pronounce sentence, yet for the sake of justice he had induced the sovereign Head of the Church to send another legate to decide the question. Katharine again insisted on her appeal, and rising crossed over to the king and fell on her knees before him. She then gave utterance to words as dignified as they were pathetic, melting to tears all who were present. She spoke with humility, but also with firmness, claiming justice for herself and her daughter, and pity on a lone woman and a stranger. She referred to the circumstances of her marriage, having been, she put it to Henry's conscience, a maid although a widow when she came to him. She appealed to all the world to witness that she had ever been a true wife to the king, and entreated him as a charity, for the love of God, to allow her to prosecute her appeal at Rome before the common Father of all Christians. ^ Katharine then rose, made a low curtsey to the king, and went straight out of the court, leaning on the arm of her faithful servant Griffith. Three times she was summoned to return, but, having been told by her lawyers that if she did so she would thereby recognise the jurisdiction of the court, and stultify her appeal to Rome, when Griffith said, '' Madam, you are called," she replied, " On, on ; it maketh no matter." She was, therefore, declared guilty of contumacy ; but Henry, whose emotion would sometimes break out in the midst of his most tyrannical and brutal measures, had been visibly touched by her words, and he said, " Forasmuch as the queen is gone, I will, in her absence, declare unto you all my lords here presently assembled, she hath been to me as true, as obedient, and as conformable a wife as I could in my 1 Brewer, Cal. 4 ; Sander, The Anglican Schism, P- 53- 2 Pocock, Records of the Reformation, vol. i. p. 219 ; vol. ii. p. 609. 264 Reformation and Renaissance fantasy wish or desire. She hath all the virtuous qualities that ought to be in a woman of her dignity, or in any other of baser estate." ^ The proceedings then went on, and John Fisher, Bishop of Rochester, as the result of two years' study, presented himself before the court to affirm publicly that the king's marriage could not be dissolved by any power human or divine ; in support of which opinion he was ready to lay down his life, and he presented to the court the book which he had written in support of it. The Bishop of St. Asaph spoke also in favour of the marriage, and Dr. Ridley expressed the same opinion. But Wolsey, fully aware that his only hope of continued prosperity, even perhaps of continued life, depended on a sentence agreeable to the king, continually pressed Campeggio for a verdict. 3 On July 23 the king's counsel at the bar having demanded that judgment should be given, Campeggio replied in a noble speech, of which the following was the conclusion : — " I come not so far to please any man, for fear, meed, or favour, be he king or any other potentate. I have no such respect to the persons that I will offend my conscience. I will not for favour or displeasure of any high estate or mighty prince do that thing that should be against the law of God. I am an old man, both sick and impotent, looking daily for death. What should it then avail me to put my soul in the danger of God's displeasure, to my utter damnation, for the favour of any prince or high estate in this world ? My coming and being here is only to see justice ministered according to my conscience, as I thought thereby the matter either good or bad. And forasmuch as I do understand, and having perceivance by the allegations and negations in this matter, laid for both the parties, that the truth in this case is very doubtful to be known, and also that the party defendant will make no answer thereunto, but doth rather appeal from us, supposing that we be not indifferent, considering the king's high dignity and authority within this his own realm, which he hath over his own subjects ; ^ Cavendish, Life a7id Death of Thomas Wolsey, p. ill. 2 As late as June 1529, Campeggio saw no hope of a speedy termina- tion to the affair, and he wrote to Jacomo Salviati, " Prego Dio, ch' io non habbia a restar per sempre in Anglia." — Ehses, Romische Dokumente, p. 108. End of Religious Authority in England 265 and we being his subjects, and having our livings, and dignities in the same, she thinketh that we cannot minister true and indifferent justice for fear of his displeasure. Therefore, to avoid all these ambiguities and obscure doubts, I intend not to damn my soul for no prince or potentate alive. I will therefore, God wilUng, wade no farther in this matter, unless I have the just opinion and judgment with the assent of the Pope, and such other of his counsel as hath more experience and learning in such doubtful laws than I have. Wherefore I will adjourn this court for this time, according to the order of the court in Rome, from whence this court and jurisdiction is derived. And if we should go farther than our commission doth warrant us, it were folly and vain, and much to our slander and blames ; and might be for the same accounted breakers of the orders of the higher court from whence we have (as I said) our original authorities." ^ It was then generally understood that the case was removed to Rome ; and when Campeggio went to Grafton, where the court then was, to take leave of the king, Wolsey accompanied him. Having failed to wring a favourable sentence from Campeggio, he was prepared for a cool reception, but the first intimation of his disgrace was the fact that no lodging had been prepared for him at Court. To the disgust of Anne Boleyn's party, however, he had two long conversations with Henry, one lasting till late at night. He was then obliged to go to Euston, three miles off", to seek hospitality for the night, but although he returned very early in the morning, it was to find that Anne had effectually prevented any further communication with the king. He could only see him to take leave, and they never met again. Wolsey attended the Council meetings until October, but Henry was never present, and the chancellor was then deprived of the Great Seal, indicted on a charge of pra- munire^- and ordered to retire to Esher, a house which he held as Bishop of Winchester. Understanding that the king claimed all his possessions, he assembled the various officers of his household, and told them to bring forth all the different materials which 1 Cavendish, p. 120. 2 Implying that he had procured Bulls from Rome without the king's consent. — Gairdncr, History of the Efig/ish Church, p. 107. 266 Reformation and Renaissance they had in their keeping, so that a number of tables placed in the long gallery at York Place were piled with rich stuffs of silk, brocade, velvet, and satin, with " a thousand pieces of fine Holland cloth." Besides these things, Wolsey delivered over to the king all the cloth of gold and silver with which both sides of the gallery were hung, the rich copes he had had made for his colleges at Oxford and Ipswich, and all the valuables that he possessed. In the two rooms adjoining the gallery, called respectively the gilt chamber and the council chamber, huge tables were set upon tressels, and covered with an incredible amount of gold and silver plate. In the gilt chamber were none but pure gold and silver gilt vessels, some set with pearls and precious stones. In the council chamber were all the silver and " parcel gilt " chalices, dishes, and cups, the weight and value of each piece of plate being entered in books provided for the purpose, the greatest order and exactness being observed.^ Having stripped himself of all his wealth, honours, and offices, flinging them despairingly at the king's feet, Wolsey set out immediately for Esher, going by water to Putney, at which place " he took his mule, and every man his horse." One ray of light pierced the darkness, for the sad cavalcade was scarcely in motion when Sir Henry Norris came riding down Putney hill towards them. Saluting the Cardinal, he gave him a ring as a token from the king, saying that his " majesty had him commended to his grace, and willed him in any wise to be of good cheer, for he was as much in his Highness's favour as ever he was." At this Wolsey alighted and knelt in the dirt upon both his knees, holding up his hands for joy. But the next day Henry, accompanied by Anne Boleyn and her mother, went to York Place to take possession of the fallen minister's treasures.'^ Henry was amazed and rejoiced at the sight of the glittering array of jewels, gold, and priceless stuffs ; but Anne, not content with these, coveted the palace itself, which the Cardinal had lately enlarged and decorated. She determined to have it for her own residence, although it was Church property and belonged to the Archbishopric of York. This, however, constituted no impediment to the favourite and her paramour, and Henry at once sent special messengers to Wolsey, " who ^ Cavendish, p. 133 et seq. - Brewer, Cat. 4, p. 2683. End of Religious Authority in England 267 declared unto him after due salutation that the king's pleasure was to have his house at Westminster." The days of Wolsey's abject pliability to the king's every passing whim were over. A change had come over his proud spirit, and in disgrace he recovered the dignity which he had once been content to barter for pomp and power. His life was in Henry's hand, but at last he re- cognised that his soul was his own to make or mar. " Ye shall make report to the king's highness that I am his obedient subject and faithful chaplain and headman," he said, addressing Judge Shelley, " whose royal commandment and request I will in no wise disobey, but most gladly fulfil and accomplish his princely will and pleasure in all things, and in especial in this matter, inasmuch as ye, the fathers of the law, say that I may lawfully do it. There- fore I charge your conscience and discharge the mine. Howbeit, I pray you, show his majesty from me, that I most humbly desire his highness to call to his most gracious remembrance that there is both heaven and hell." ^ Wolsey remained at Esher the whole of the winter 1529-30, in great poverty, having no money wherewith to pay his servants, and in sickness that once becarne so acute that Henry sent his own physician to attend him, as well as four other doctors to consult with Dr. Buttes. He even persuaded Anne Boleyn to send the Cardinal a token. But in the spring Wolsey begged his former secretary Cromwell " to make suit to the king's majesty that he might remove thence to some other place, for he was weary of Esher ; for with continual use thereof the house waxed unsavoury ; supposing that if he might remove from thence he should much sooner recover his health." " His faithful Cavendish goes on to give another reason for the Cardinal's wish to remove : " And also the Council had put it into the king's head that the new gallery at Esher which my lord had late before his fall set up, should be very necessary for the king, to take down and set it up again at Westminster ; which was done accordingly, and stands at this present day there. The taking away thereof before my lord's face was to him a corrosive, which was invented by his enemies only to torment him, the which indeed discouraged him very sore to tarry any longer there. 1 Cavcudish, p. i6l. ^ Ibid. p. 167. 2 68 Reformation and Renaissance He was allowed to remove to Richmond, where was another of his houses which he had adorned at great cost, the king having given it to him in exchange for Hampton Court. But the Duke of Norfolk and all the Boleyn party, fearing that his nearness to the king might bring about a reconciliation, which they dreaded above all, did not rest until they obtained from Henry a command that Wolsey should betake himself to his Archbishopric. While the necessary funds for his long journey north were being arranged for, he made a retreat at the Charterhouse at Sheen, where, passing in review his whole life and listening to the ghostly counsel of the monks, he was not only per- suaded to give up the last vestiges of worldliness, but formed high resolutions for future devotion to the duties of his spiritual calling. The need of penance for past sin was borne in upon him, and Cavendish tells us that the pious Carthusians " gave him divers shirts of hair, the which he often wore afterwards." The effect of this beneficial heart-searching never wore off ; the rest of Wolsey's life was devout, and all that a great prelate's life should be. His house was ever • open to rich and poor alike ; his pride and arrogance gave place to humility, and a gentle familiarity towards all men. He refused every entertainment and pastime prepared for him by the nobility of the North, declined to hunt in their forests, but travelled about his archdiocese confirming hundreds of children, healing feuds, and performing all the duties of his state with great exactness. On these journeys he was careful not to be a charge to his flock, but distributed alms almost beyond his means. But the malice of his enemies pursued him even to this remote part of the realm. Everything he did was misre- presented to the king. The necessary repairs of his houses, some of which were in a dilapidated condition, were con- strued into architectural embellishments ; his charities were described as a return to his former ostentation, and the love and respect which he inspired were interpreted as a corruption of the loyalty to the king's subjects.^ Being at Cawood, he was arrested by the Earl of Northumberland and Sir Walter Walshe, a gentleman of the king's Privy Chamber, on a charge of high treason. The ^ Brewer, Cal. 4, pp. 2960, 3013, 3035. End of Religious Authority in England 269 immediate cause was a pretended revelation of the Cardinal's Italian physician, who, having gone to London, fell into the hands of the Duke of Norfolk. By flattery and liberal gifts the duke got him to confess that " the Cardinal had solicited the Pope to excommunicate the king, if he did not banish the lady from the court, and treat the queen with due respect." ^ The whole affair was a gross exaggeration, but it served Wolsey's enemies, and the unhappy Cardinal was forced to set out in custody for London. At Sheffield he was met by Sir William Kingston, constable of the Tower, and a guard of twenty-four of his old servants, sent to bring him into the king's presence. Although Kingston was his very good friend, his arrival filled Wolsey with apprehension. Already ill when he left Sheffield, by the time that he reached Leicester Abbey he was suffering from a severe attack of dysentry, and his weakness was such that on alighting from his mule at the abbey gates, foreseeing his approaching end, he said, " Father Abbot, I am come hither to lay my bones among you." From Saturday till Tuesday evening he lay dying, and having made his confession he talked for a long space with Sir William Kingston, and gave him a message for the king. Kingston sought to comfort him with hope, whereupon Wolsey replied, " Well, well, Master Kingston, I see the matter against me how it is framed ; but if I had served God as diligently as I have done the king, He would not have given me over in my grey hairs." Of Henry he said, " He is sure a prince of a royal courage, and hath a princely heart ; and rather than he will either miss or want any part of his will or appetite, he will put the loss of one half of his realm in danger ; for I assure you I have often kneeled before him in his privy chamber on my knees, the space of an hour or two, to persuade him from his will and appetite ; but I could never bring to pass to dissuade him therefrom. Therefore, Master Kingston, if it chance hereafter you to be one of his privy council, as for your wisdom and other qualities ye be meet so to be, I warn you to be well advised and assured what matter ye put in his head, for ye shall never put it out again." " Cavendish, who was present during the whole of his last scene of his master's earthly career, thus describes the end : — 1 Brewer, Cal. 4, p. 3035. ^ Cavendish, pp. 244, 245. 270 Reformation and Renaissance After speaking at some length, and very openly on various subjects, such as that of " the new, pernicious sect of the Lutherans," and of the danger that Wyclif's " seditious opinions " had been to the realm, the dying statesman said : " ' Master Kingston, farewell. I can no more but wish all things to have good success. My time draweth on fast. I may not tarry with you. And forget not, I pray you, what I have said, and charged you withal : for when I am dead ye shall peradventure remember my words much better.' And even with these words he began to draw his speech at length, and his tongue to fail ; his eyes being set in his head, whose sight failed him. Then we began to put him in remembrance of Christ's passion, and sent for the abbot of the place to anneal him, who came with all speed, and ministered unto him all the service to the same belonging ; and caused also the guard to stand by, both to hear him talk before his death and also to witness of the same ; and incontinently the clock struck eight, at which time he gave up the ghost, and thus departed he this present life." ^ His body lay in state till four or five o'clock, when it was carried down to the church with great solemnity by the abbot and convent. All night long a number of poor men, holding torches, watched and prayed, kneeling round the coffin in the Lady Chapel, " while the canons sang dirge and other devout orisons." At about four o'clock the next morning the funeral Mass was sung, and the Cardinal's body committed to the earth, it being six o'clock before all the service was completed. Henry was shooting arrows at Hampton Court when the news was brought to him the next day but one, and betrayed little emotion, though he said that he would liever the Cardinal had lived than twenty thousand pounds. " All that was decent and dignified in his reign was about to disappear," says a recent writer. " The requiems and misereres which wailed through the abbey in the early gloom of that November morning were for the departure of the success and peace which were passing away from Henry VIII. never to return. Wolsey was left in a pauper's grave, and a few years afterwards the abbey church of Leicester was plundered and made desolate. 1 Cavendish, p. 284. End of Religious Authority in England 271 The Cardinal's last resting-place was forgotten, and the sumptuous tomb which he had prepared for himself lay untenanted at Windsor. . . . Nelson sleeps within the sepulchre of Wolsey." ^ It was well for Wolsey that he died as and when he did. Had he lived to reach London there is little doubt but that the gloomy portals of the Tower would have closed behind him, in spite of the king's reassuring messages and Kingston's friendly convictions. He knew Henry better than any, better than Henry knew himself. The star of the Boleyns was yet in the ascendant, and so long as the king was enamoured of Anne they could do with him what they would. From the moment of Kingston's arrival at Sheffield, Wolsey saw nothing but the block, until at Leicester death came as a friend, and blotted out the vision. Meanwhile the Great Seal had been given to Sir Thomas More, and he had accepted the chancellorship on the express understanding that his services would not be used in promoting the divorce, which it was then supposed would not be further pursued." Thomas Cromwell was known to Wolsey in 15 14, although it is not clear when he first entered the Cardinal's service, so adventurous and conflicting were his pursuits, so confused are the different accounts of his youth and early middle age. This much, however, appears certain, that he was born about the year 1485, and was the son of Walter Cromwell, who is variously described as a brewer, a black- smith, and a fuller, at Putney, and who was perhaps all three. Probably as the result of a quarrel with his father, Thomas Cromwell went to Italy, and became a soldier of fortune, bearing French arms, and living, according to his own account, a riotous, disorderly Ufe for some years.^ Eventually he returned to England, married a shearman's daughter, settled down respectably and followed the trade of a cloth and wool merchant, in which his father-in-law would be a valuable ally, to make money and gain favour being Cromwell's absorbing passions. While still in the wool trade, Cromwell practised as a solicitor, becoming a member ^ Galton, Thomas Cromweli, pp. 57, 5^- - Gairdner, History of the English Church, pp. 96, ill. ^ Merriman, Life and Letters of Thomas Cromwell, vol. i. p. 3 et seq. 272 Reformation and Renaissance of Gray's Inn in 1524, after which year we find no further mention of the former business, he having abandoned wool for the law. In 1524 Wolsey employed him in his un- popular design of suppressing the smaller monasteries for the foundation of his two colleges.^ Indeed it is unlikely that, knowing the Cardinal's insatiable ambition, Cromwell him- self may have originated the plan, making use of it to ingratiate himself with Wolsey. His intimate acquaintance with the law concerning real estate, his knowledge of sur- veying and of estimating values, of drawing up deeds for the transference of property, — -all this, combined with a far- seeing, unscrupulous nature, made him at least an admirable tool and confederate. Afterwards, as the Cardinal's state increased, in the difficulty of obtaining admittance to his presence, Cromwell was besieged. He is spoken of as " Councillor to my Lord Legate," and the " Right Wor- shipful Mr. Cromwell." Soon, not only his capacity for business, but his knowledge of human nature made him invaluable." But while he was busy studying Wolsey, and those who would pay court to him, he by no means neglected his opportunity of studying the king, according to the principles laid down by Machiavelli, whose book, // Principe, Cromwell had assimilated to some purpose, a manuscript copy of it being in his possession. When he told Reginald Pole that the A B C of states- manship was to follow up whatever the prince had in view, Pole was convinced that he had already incensed Henry with the notion that if he could not get his way with the Pope he would break away from papal authority altogether, make himself supreme head of the Church in England, and declare it to be high treason to oppose him in any matter. But daring as the scheme was, Cromwell only felt his way by degrees. His conduct on Wolsey's fall was not altogether so generous and disinterested as it has sometimes been made to appear. It is true that he stood by Wolsey in his hour of need, but their interests were just then identical, and Cromwell himself was by no means certain how far he was involved in his master's ruin ; and when, leaving Wolsey at Esher, he went to Court " to make or mar " for them both, ^ Dictionary of National Biography^ Art. "Thomas Cromwell." - Merriman, Life and Letters of Ihomas Cromwell^ vol. i. p. 47. End of Religious Authority in England 273 it was to find out how things stood, to explain his conduct, and to make influential friends,^ Wolsey at first expressed extreme gratitude for all that he had done, but later, when the Cardinal was far away in the north, his confidence in Cromwell waned, and he confessed that it had been reported to him that " Cromwell had not done him so good offices as he might, concerning his colleges and his archbishopric." ^ A few weeks after Wolsey 's death Cromwell was made a Privy Councillor. Henry was at this time depressed and discouraged, hopeless of getting a favourable decree from Rome. The moment was Cromwell's opportunity. He obtained an audience, and proposed his plan with tact and skill. Was not the King above the laws ? and had he not power to change them ? England was at present a monster with two heads — the King and the Pope. It would be better to follow the example of the Lutherans, who had renounced the authority of Rome. If the King took upon himself the supreme power, the clergy would immediately recognise that they were responsible to him.^ It was not the first time that such language had been used in connection with the divorce. Already in 1529, immediately after Campeggio's departure, Henry being at Waltham Abbey with his secretary, Stephen Gardiner, and Foxe, Bishop of Hereford, a young man fresh from the University of Cambridge, Thomas Cranmer, had suggested to either Gardiner or Foxe that the King might even yet have his marriage declared null if he could procure a sufficient number of opinions to that effect from the Universities. When this remark was repeated to Henry, he exclaimed characteristically, " This man, I trow, has got the right sow by the ear ! " and he never afterwards lost sight of him, lodging him with Anne Boleyn's father, and employing him to work up the matter. It was Cranmer, even before Cromwell, who declared that it was for the Archbishop of Canterbury rather than for the Pope to pronounce sentence on the ^ There is certainly no true ring in the letter which he wrote to Wolsey on his disgrace : " I do Relys your grace right happye that ye be now at libertye to serve God and to lerne to experyment how ye shall banysche and exyle the vain desires of this unstable world, which undoubtedly doth nothing else but allure every person therein." 2 Dictionary of National Biography. 3 Cardinal Pole, Apologia ad Carolum Quintum, pars. i. c. xxix. T 2 74 Reformation and Renaissance king's marriage.^ He wrote a book in favour of the divorce, and according to his suggestion the matter was laid before the Universities of Oxford, Cambridge, Paris, Orleans, Toulouse, Bologna, Padua, etc. Oxford and Cam- bridge were easily manipulated ; Henry made it clear to Francis that his friendship would be gauged by the decisions of the learned within the realm of France ; the Univer- sities within the dominions of the Emperor were not asked for an opinion. An English agent was employed to guide the decision of the Italian seats of learning, and by distri- buting bribes obtained the most satisfactory results.^ The Pope was accordingly informed by a letter, which the principal English nobles were coerced into signing, that the unlawfulness of Henry's marriage having been declared by a number of the most famous universities, it was urgent that his Holiness should pronounce sentence against it. Still Clement delayed, but Cromwell carried his point. The submission of the two Houses of Convocation, in spite of the protests of Warham and Tunstall, was followed by the announcement in Parliament that the king, having sought and obtained the opinions of the chief universities of Christendom concerning his marriage, the Bishop of London would lay those opinions before the members of the Upper House. Sir Thomas More, notwithstanding the guarantees he had received that he would not be called upon to act in the question of the divorce, was obliged to deliver the king's message to the Lower House, but when asked for his own opinion on the case, he replied that he had frequently told the king himself what he thought on the subject, and would say no more. His next official act was to surrender the chancellorship and to retire from public life. As yet Henry's intention was to intimidate, not to break entirely with the Pope, and on the death of Archbishop Warham, which took place on August 24, 1532, Cranmer was at once put forward as a candidate for the vacant see. His election was hurried on, in the hope that, if the Pope gave an adverse sentence, the new archbishop might dissolve the marriage by his own authority, and the papal Bulls were to be obtained at the cost of any duplicity. They were in Henry's hands before Clement had any inkling of what was ^ Hook, Lives of the Archbishops of Canterbury^ vol. vi. pp. 458-61. 2 Brewer, Cal. 4, p. 2860. End of Religious Authority in England 275 intended. The sequence of events was now remarkable. In January 1533 Anne Boleyn announced that Henry might expect an heir to the throne, and in order that this heir might be considered legitimate, their marriage was celebrated in all haste and secrecy on the 25th of that month. In March Cran- mer's Bulls arrived from Rome, and the new Archbishop of Canterbury at once brought the subject of the divorce before Convocation. Bishop Fisher was the only member who dared raise any serious opposition to it. The House of Commons played a no less servile part, its fear of a papal interdict, the king's cause being still before the Pope, giving way before its abject terror of the king and Cromwell. Cranmer then received a commission to open an ecclesiastical court at Dunstable, and pronounced the marriage between Henry and Katharine null. Henceforth Cranmer and Cromwell played into one another's hands, and executed all the king's behests slavishly — Cranmer as the mere tool, Cromwell even anticipating his master's desires, and moving boldly forward in the line of policy he had adopted from the beginning. It was indeed his only chance of success. Having committed Henry to the breach with Rome, there was no earthly salvation for him but in widening that breach until it was an impassable gulf. The first thing to be done was to secure him in the position he had created. His spy -system, instituted in 1532, was an invaluable agent. He spent huge sums upon it, and spread it like a fine network over the whole country. No one was safe from it ; it invaded the family circle and intruded itself into the holiest shrines ; it prostituted the name of friendship, and treacherously betrayed the most sacred interests. It was a key wherewith Cromwell unlocked the secrets of every heart, and made himself master of the thoughts of the whole realm. No department of public affairs escaped his keen insight, but he was careful not to lessen the strength of his forces by dividing them. The one end he had in view was the creation of a national church by the separation of England from Rome, and all else was made subservient to it. On July II, 1533, the Pope excommunicated Henry, and declared his remarriage null.^ In return, Henry's 1 Sentence was given at Rome in favour of his first marriage on March 20, 1534. 276 Reformation and Renaissance Council declared that the Pope's authority in England was no greater than that of any other foreign bishop, and it was determined that he should henceforth be spoken of only as Bishop of Rome.^ Parliamentary Acts were then passed abolishing annates, Peter's Pence, appeals to Rome, and the promulgation of papal Bulls. Another Act dealing with the royal succession, and entailing it on the children of Henry and Anne Boleyn, was accompanied by an oath to be taken by every adult person in the kingdom. With consummate skill Cromwell had weakened the power of the bishops and the lower clergy, and having reduced them to submission, he turned his attention to the monasteries, which presented more serious obstacles to the nationalisation of the Church in England. Moreover, Henry had almost entirely dissipated the millions left him by his father, and must be supplied with money. Although a layman, as the king's Vicar-General, Crom- well was authorised to undertake a general visitation of churches, monasteries, and clergy, and in the same capacity he held several ecclesiastical benefices, including the Deanery of Wells and the prebend of Blewbery in Sarum.^ The declared object of this visitation of religious houses was in order that a report as to their moral condition might be laid before the king ; the real object was to inquire into the income of each house, to take an inventory of the goods belonging to it, and to prepare the public mind for their seizure and the suppression of the monasteries. A further reason was the administration of the oath of succession to each monk and friar. The visitation began with the houses of the different orders of friars, and the two first visitors appointed by Cromwell were Dr. George Browne, prior of the Augustinian Hermits, and Dr. Hilsey, provincial of the Dominicans, — servile agents, whose willingness to accept the royal commis- sion seemed to augur greater facility in carrying out the task than the event justified. All seven houses of the Franciscan Observants, whose exemplary life and fidelity to their rule made them fearless of threats that could only affect them temporally, offered a sturdy resistance. On their refusal to acknowledge the king's supremacy in religious matters, it ^ Gairdner, History of the E?iglish Church, etc., p. 144. 2 Dictionary of National Biography, article "Thomas Cromwell," End of Religious Authority in England 277 was represented to them that they deserved to be thrown into the Thames, whereupon Elstow, one of the Greenwich friars, answered coolly that the road to heaven was as ready by water as by land.^ All their houses were suppressed, and the more obstinate members sent to the Tower, and loaded with chains in the vilest dungeons. Friar Forest, who had been Queen Katharine's confessor, and who defended her cause stoutly, was hung in chains and roasted over a fire lighted with the gigantic wooden statue of a Welsh saint.^ Nothing could exceed the steadfastness with which the greater number of the London Carthusians resisted unto death. When called upon to acknowledge the validity of the king's marriage with Anne Boleyn, the prior, John Houghton, replied that what lady the king was pleased to marry or divorce was not a matter that concerned them. But when pressed to declare his mind in the presence of his brethren, he said that " For his part, he could not under- stand how it was possible that a marriage ratified by the Church and so long unquestioned should now be undone." ^ Upon this Houghton and the procurator of the house were committed to the Tower. They were afterwards liberated, but were subsequently brought to trial at Westminster, with two other Carthusian priors, besides Dr. Reynolds, prior of the Bridgettine Monastery of Sion, John Hall, vicar of Isle- worth, and Robert Feron, on the charge of refusing to acknowledge the king Supreme Head of the Church of England, according to an order made in Council, January 15, 1535. All were found guilty except Feron, who sub- mitted, and sentence of treason was passed upon them. The brutality of their execution is sickening reading for the stoutest heart.* These were but the preliminaries to the visitation of the monasteries. Between June 1535 and the end of 1538 various commissioners were appointed to visit all the religious 1 Stowe, Annals, p. 559: "Whereunto Elstow, smiling, said: ' Threaten these things to rich and dainty folk who are clothed in purple, fare delicately, and have their chiefest hope in this world ; for we esteem them not, but are joyful that for the discharge of our duties we are driven hence. With thanks to God, we know the way to heaven to be as ready by water as by land, and therefore we care not which way we go. 2 Harleian MS, 530, f. 120, British Museum. 3 Gasquet, Henry VIII. and the English Monasteries, vol. i. p. 208. 4 Gairdner, Cal. viii. No. 726. 278 Reformation and Renaissance houses, to report on their condition, to assist at their sur- render, or superintend their pillage. The chief of them were Dr. Richard Layton, Thomas Legh, Dr. John Lon- don, and John Ap Rice. Their reports of the character of the various houses they visited bear no relation whatever to the real state of affairs, for their object was not to dis- cover and proclaim the truth, but to play into the king's and Cromwell's hands. But eager as they were to do this, it was a little while before they learned their lesson quite per- fectly. Layton made the mistake of praising the abbot of Glastonbury, when Cromwell caused him to understand that he had not been taken into the king's service for the pur- pose of approving. His answer is calculated to put even the most unwary on their guard against his subsequent reports : " Whereas I understand by Mr. Pollard you much marvel why I would so greatly praise to the king's majesty at the time of visitation the abbot of Glaston, who appeareth not, neither then nor now, to have known God, nor his prince, nor any part of a good Christian man's religion. So that my excessive and indiscrete praise that time un- advisedly made to my sovereign lord must needs now redound to my great folly and untruth, and cannot be well redubbed, but much diminish my credit towards his majesty, and even so to your lordship, whom I most humbly beseech to consider that I am a man and may err, and cannot be sure of my judgment to know the inward thoughts of a monk, being fair in words and outward appearance and inwardly cankered, as now by your discreet inquisition appeareth. And although they be all false, feigned, flatter- ing, hypocritical knaves, as undoubtedly there is none other of that sort. I must therefore now, at this my necessity, most humbly beseech your lordship to pardon me for that my folly then committed, as you have done many times heretofore ; and of your goodness to mitigate the king's highness majesty in the premisses. And from henceforth I shall be more circumspect whom I shall commend either to his grace or to your lordship." 1 Legh was as entirely submissive as Layton, and the value of his reports may be estimated by the frame of mind in 1 Cromwell Correspondence, xx. No. 14, Record Office. Quoted by Dom Gasquet in Henry VIII. and the English Monasteries, vol. i. p. 439. End of Religious Authority in England 279 which he approached his task, as when concerning St. Mary's, York, he " supposes to find evil disposition both in the abbot and the convent, whereof, God willing, I shall certify to you in my next letters," ^ In passing through Oxford on his way from Gloucester- shire, Layton displayed his zeal in the king's cause by a great demonstration, undertaking to deliver the University from all old-fashioned lumber, and to abolish canon law. He then proceeded to make a public holocaust at Carfax of the works of Duns Scotus and other scholastic authors. This was tantamount to closing the schools, for canon law, theo- logy, and scholastic philosophy had been the chief studies in which Oxford had excelled. Having traversed the southern counties in the course of their visitation, and having presented their comperta to Cromwell, Legh and Layton met at Lichfield on their journey northwards. Their account of the monasteries in York- shire, with the bishopric of Coventry and Lichfield, con- tained in their Compendium compertorum, was laid before Parliament, and certainly for bold imputation of the foulest crimes laid to the charge of two -thirds of the religious houses in England it has not its equal. But the prolonged debates called forth by this Black Book, the notorious character of the visitors, and the sweeping nature of their accusations, as well as the reasons they had for reporting as evilly as possible, threw grave doubt on the truth of their information. Scandals doubtless there were in numerous cases, but independent inquiry led to the information that many of the houses against which the commissioners had reported most unfavourably were known to the neighbouring gentry as fair specimens of regularity and observance. However, the comperta served the end and purpose for which they were framed, and after a stormy session, ParUament agreed to suppress all the religious houses having an income of less than ;^200 a year, their revenues to devolve to the Crown. For the moment the great abbeys escaped scot-free, but a second survey was ordered in 1537, to ascertain by special commissioners in each county the value of the convent lands, plate, and other goods, the number and character of the religious, and other details. The report turned out quite differently from that of Cromwell's servile agents, and with ^ Henry Fill, and the English Monasteries^ vol. i. p. 441. 2 8o Reformation and Renaissance a few exceptions the monasteries were found to be of good repute. Nevertheless, they were stripped, even to the bells and the lead on the roofs, and the monks were turned out by thousands, without means of subsistence, to wander up and down the country as beggars. Lincolnshire, deprived of the two great monasteries of Louth Park and Legbourne, that had been a source of income to half the county, providing a permanent impetus to commerce and agriculture, was further subsidised by Parliament, and even the confisca- tion of the plate and processional crosses belonging to the parish churches was threatened. The whole district rose in insurrection, demanding the restoration of the monasteries, the removal of heretical bishops, and the punishment of wicked ministers. ^ Great indignation was expressed against the commissioners. Lin- colnshire was yet smouldering in impotent wrath and gloomy desolation, when Yorkshire broke out into flames. Farmers and parish priests side by side headed the long processions marching upon York, which at once opened its gates to them. Durham and Pomfret followed suit. Lord Dacre, the Percies, the Latimers, Lord Westmoreland, the whole nobility of the north, with the single exception of the Earl of Northumberland, were up in arms, demanding reunion with Rome, " the restoration of the noble blood," i.e. the recognition of the Princess Mary as legitimate heiress to the throne, the reinstatement of the monasteries, and the punish- ment of Cromwell. Had they but been better organised, had they but known their strength, they must have triumphed. An army of 6000 king's men came up rapidly from the south, led by the Duke of Norfolk as plenipotentiary, but Cromwell relied more on treachery than on the blow of the strongest arm, especially as the insurgents numbered 30,000 armed men, and he promised them free pardon and a Parliament at York, giving them hope of further concessions to their demands if they would disperse in peace. With singular confidence in the king's word, they tore off their badges and returned incontinently to their homes. Thus ended the Pilgrimage of Grace. Then came fearful reprisals — martial law in all its severity let loose upon a whole population.2 Men were hung in chains by thousands to the ^ Gairdner, History of the English Church, etc., p. 179. 2 State Papers., vol. i. p. 537, Record Office. End of Religious Authority in England 281 nearest tree, until there were no more chains, and ropes must perforce suffice. The leaders were sent to London and the block. The Abbots of Barlings, Kirkstead, and Jervaulx were hanged. That Henry was perfectly at one with Cromwell in the inhuman slaughter is shown by the letter he wrote to the Duke of Norfolk, in which he says : " You shall without pity or circumstance cause all the monks and canons that be in any wise faulty to be tied up without further delay or ceremony." ^ But not alone in the north were these brutal murders committed. The Abbot of Woburn, for his scruples regard- ing the royal supremacy, was hanged at his own abbey gates ; and with terse words pregnant of meaning, Cromwell wrote in his Remembrances : " Item, the Abbot of Reading to be sent down to be tried and executed at Reading, with his complices. Item, the Abbot of Glaston to be tried at Glaston and also executed there with his complices. Item, to see that the evidence be well sorted and the indictments well drawn against the said abbots and their complices." ^ That the execution of " the said abbots " was a foregone conclusion, and that there was no pretence of a fair hearing, is clearly seen by the above memoranda. Richard Whiting, the last Abbot of Glastonbury, was a man of eighty years of age, known and respected far and wide for his piety, learning, and hospitality, whom even the infamous Layton could not without a struggle vilify. His offence was the possession of some papal Bulls, a book against the king's divorce, and a Life of Becket.3 He was also accused of concealing in his monastery ^300 in money, which he had failed to hand over to Cromwell's commissioners on former visitations. After the pretence of a trial, the venerable old man was dragged on a hurdle through the streets of Glastonbury to the Tor Hill, where he was hideously butchered, his body being divided into four quarters ; his head, impaled on a spear, was placed over his own gateway. Two monks of his abbey suffered with him as " accomplices." Hugh Cook, Abbot of Reading, was hanged the same day at Reading with his "accomplices." Thomas Beche, Abbot of Colchester, was ^ Blunt, Reformation, p. 365. 2 Cotton MS. Titus, B. i. fol. 441, British Museum. 3 Gairdner, Cal. xiv. pt. ii. No. 206. 282 Reformation and Renaissance executed on December i, 1539. Waltham was the last of the great abbeys to surrender ; it was suppressed in March 1540.1 In May 1536, the new prior and twenty monks of the Charterhouse, worn out with resistance, took the oath of supremacy. Ten others, having again once more steadfastly refused it, were committed to Newgate. There they were chained to iron posts by their necks, arms, and thighs, so that they could not move for any purpose whatever, but were obliged to remain standing in one position until they died.2 An heroic woman, Margaret Clement, braved death itself to afford them some relief She bribed the jailers to allow her to visit them, and, disguised as a milkmaid, fed them, putting meat into their mouths and performing other acts of Christian charity for them. Henry, after some days, hearing that they were not dead, ordered a stricter watch to be kept, and the undaunted woman being no longer permitted to enter the prison, climbed on to the roof of their cell, removed some tiles, and contrived to let down meat in a basket, " approaching the same as well as she could unto their mouths as they did stand chained against the posts." ^ After sixteen days of this torture it was reported to the king that the Carthusians were " almost dispatched." * Five of them had died of the treatment.^ Soon only one of the ten survived ; he lingered four years in prison and was hanged at Tyburn. On May 16, 1532, Sir Thomas More had resigned the Great Seal, the imperial ambassador, Eustace Chapuys, thus accurately describing his reasons in few words : " The Chancellor has resigned, seeing that affairs were going on badly, and likely to be worse, and that if he retained his office he would be obliged to act against his conscience, or incur the king's displeasure, as he had already begun to do, for refusing to take his part against the clergy. His excuse was that his salary was too small, and that he was not equal 1 Gairdner, History of the English Church, etc., p. 210. 2 Two years previously three other monks of the Charterhouse had suffered in the same manner. — Gasquet, Henry VIII. and the English Monasteries, vol. i. p. 228. ^ Morris, Troubles of our Catholic Forefathers, ist series, pp. 27, 28. ^ Wright, Suppression of the Monasteries, p. 162. ^ Gasquet, Henry Fill, and the English Monasteries, vol. i. p. 239. End of Religious Authority in England 283 to the work. Every one is concerned, for there never was a better man in the office." ^ He retired to his home at Chelsea, impoverished, but thankful to be delivered from his perilous position, and resolved to keep prudently aloof from public affairs, to devote himself to literary work and to his family. In his peaceful retreat, however, he kept a careful watch on events, and when Cranmer pronounced the king's divorce from Katharine, he was not without apprehension as to the result. " God grant, son," he remarked to his son-in-law, William Roper, " that these matters within a while be not confirmed with oaths." Fisher, Bishop of Rochester, was already under arrest, when Sir Thomas received a joint letter from the Bishops of Durham, Bath, and Winchester, requesting his presence at Anne's coronation, together with ^20 "to buy him a gown." " At their next meeting he said merrily, ' My lords, you required two things of me ; the one I was so well content to grant that I thought I might be the bolder to deny the other.' He then explained that he took the money because the bishops were rich and he was poor ; but his reason for refusing the invitation he illustrated by one of his merry tales, the moral of which was that the bishops were in danger of losing their honour first, and being afterwards destroyed, but as for himself, destroyed he might be, but dishonoured he was resolved he would not be." ^ More's shrewdness was not at fault, and the king's marriage with Anne, and the lawfulness of the succession was ordered to be " confirmed with oaths." Many of the less learned and the great mass of the people were allowed to swear with the saving clause, " as far as would stand with the law of God," and this was connived at for expedience' sake.^ But More and Fisher could accept of no such plank, and they absolutely refused to swear. More was cited to appear before four members of the Council — Cranmer, Archbishop of Canterbury ; Audley, Lord Chancellor ; the Duke of Norfolk, and Thomas Cromwell, who attempted to move him at first by friendly persuasion, and then by brutal ^ Gairdner, Cal. v. No. 1046. 2 Roper, quoted by Rev. T. E. Bridgett in his Life and Writings of Sir Thomas More, p. 316. 3 Gairdner, History of the English Church, etc., p. 1 49. 284 Reformation and Renaissance threats, according to Henry's instructions. But all was in vain, and he returned home in great good spirits, not because the danger was averted, but, as he told Roper, " In good faith I rejoiced that I had given the devil a foul fall, and that with those lords I had gone so far as without great shame I could never go back again." ^ In his answer to the four commissioners he had said : " No man living is there, my lords, that would with better will do the thing that should be acceptable to the King's Highness. Howbeit, I verily hoped I should never have heard of this matter more, considering that I have from time to time always from the beginning so plainly and truly declared my mind unto his Grace ; which his Highness ever seemed to me, like a most gracious prince, very well to accept, never minding, as he said, to molest me more therewith." 2 Henry was furious at the failure of his four picked men, but Lord Audley, with the other commissioners, besought him on their knees not to proceed further in the matter, lest his own cause should be weakened. For once he allowed him- self to be persuaded, and More's name was struck out of the Bill of attainder. Nevertheless, the ex-Chancellor was not de- ceived by appearances, and at his next meeting with the Duke of Norfolk, "By the Mass, Mr. More,";said the Duke, "it is perilous striving with princes ; therefore I would wish you somewhat to incline to the king's pleasure ; for, by God's Body, Mr. More, indignatio principis mors esL'' " Is that all, my lord ? " quoth he ; " then, in good faith, between your Grace and me is but this, that I shall die to-day and you to-morrow." ^ On Low Sunday, April 12, 1534, Sir Thomas More was formally called upon to take the oath declaring the invalidity of Henry's first marriage and the validity of the second. As the Pope had already passed sentence confirm- ing his marriage with Katharine, to swear as the king required was equivalent to a rejection of the Pope's authority. In addition to the prescribed oath, the formula repudiated any previous oath taken " to any foreign authority, prince, or potentate," and amounted, for the clergy, to a violation of their sworn obedience to the Pope. For the laity greater ^ Quoted in T^e Life and Writings of Sir Thomas More, p. 341. 2 Ibid. p. 339. 3 /^/^_ p, ^^2. End of Religious Authority in England 285 stress was laid on the terms of the royal succession than on those of the primacy, but the one question clearly involved the other. On Monday, April 13, More was again called before the commissioners, to whom the Abbot of Westminster was added. It was the day appointed for the general administration of the oath at Lambeth, "the first overt and total renunciation of the authority of the Sovereign Pontiff and separation from the rest of Christendom,"^ and Sir Thomas More was the first to refuse it. He was kept in the custody of the Abbot of Westminster for four days, and on the 17th was sent to the Tower.^ The fifteen months passed in solitary confinement in the upper ward of the Beauchamp Tower neither shook his constancy nor dimmed the brightness of his wit. According to Roper, the Lieutenant, Sir Edward Walsingham, a former friend, visited him soon after his committal, and declared that for old affection's sake and gratitude for favours once received he would gladly "make him good cheer," but that he could not do so without incurring the king's wrath. More answered gaily, " Mr. Lieutenant, I verily believe as you say, and heartily thank you ; and assure yourself I do not mislike my cheer ; but whensoever I do so, then thrust me out of your doors." In May 1535 the oath was once more tendered to him, and after his second refusal to take it the monotony of his life was complete. Not even on days of precept might he attend Mass, and all other consolations of religion were denied him. Once or twice during his imprisonment Lady More was allowed to visit him, and also his beloved daughter, Margaret Roper. Both in different ways sought affectionately to turn him from his purpose. His conversation with his wife is characteristic of her inability even to grasp the outline of his position. Roper thus reports it : — " ' Mr. More,' quoth she, ' I marvel that you, that hitherto have been taken for a wise man, will now so play the fool, to lie here in this close, filthy prison, and be content thus to be shut up among mice and rats, when you might be abroad at your liberty, and with the favour and ^ Bridgett, Life and Writings of Sir Thomas More, p. 352. 2 For the general tenour of the oath of Supremacy, to which More and Fisher owed their death, see Appendix B. 2 86 Reformation and Renaissance goodwill both of the King and his Council, if you would but do as all the bishops and best learned of this realm have done. And seeing you have at Chelsea a right fair house, your library, your gallery, garden, orchard, and all other necessaries so handsome about you, where you might in the company of me, your wife, your children, and household, be merry, I muse what, a God's name ! you mean here still thus fondly to tarry.' After he had awhile quietly heard her, with a cheerful countenance he said unto her, ' Is not this house as nigh heaven as mine own ? ' To whom she, after her accustomed homely fashion, not liking such talk, answered, ' Twittle twattle, twittle twattle ! ' ' How say you, Mrs. Alice, is it not so .f* ' ' Bone Deus, bone Deus, man, will this gear never be left ? ' quoth she. ' Well then, Mistress Alice, if it be so, it is very well ; for I see no great cause why I should much joy in my gay house, or in anything thereunto belonging, when if I should but seven years lie buried under the ground, and then arise and come thither again, I should not fail to find some therein that would bid me get out of doors, and tell me it were none of mine. What cause have I then to like such a house as would so soon forget its master ^ ' " Margaret was one of those who had taken the oath with the clause ' as far as it would stand with the law of God,' and she tried to persuade her father that, as he was with the minority, he ought to give up his own private judgment. But he told her that she was mistaken as to the minority, for that the greater part of Christendom thought with him, and not the fewer part of past ages long since departed to heaven. " Afterwards, seeing her sitting disconsolately in dread of the temporal consequences of his refusal, he exclaimed, smiling, ' How now, daughter Margaret .'* What now. Mother Eve ? Where is your mind now ? Sit not musing with some serpent in your breast upon some new persuasion to offer Father Adam the apple yet once again.' " ' In good faith, father,' she replied, ' I can no further go. For since the example of so many wise men cannot move you, I see not what to say more, unless I should look to persuade you with the reason Master Harry Pattenson -^ 1 More's fool, painted by Holbein in the great picture containing all the members of his family. End of Religious Authority in England 287 made, for he met one day one of our men, and when he had asked where you were, and heard that you were in the Tower still, he waxed angry with you, and said, "Why, what aileth him that he will not swear ? Wherefore should he stick to swear ? I have sworn the oath myself." And so have I sworn.' " Whereupon Sir Thomas laughed, and said, ' That word was like Eve, too, for she offered Adam no worse fruit than she had eaten herself.' " More's fellow-prisoner in the Tower, John Fisher, Bishop of Rochester, with whom Sir Thomas contrived several times to communicate by letter, was, to Henry's intense rage, created a Cardinal by Pope Paul III., and the news of this recognition of Fisher's fidelity to the Holy See arrived in England at the beginning of May 1535. It undoubtedly hastened the end of both martyrs, and possibly of others. On May 4 Margaret Roper had obtained leave to visit her father once more, and as they two were standing by the loophole which served as window to his cell. Dr. Reynolds of the Monastery of Sion, and the three monks of the Charter- house, headed by the holy prior, John Houghton, together with John Hale, Vicar of Isleworth, were led forth to execution.^ Turning to his daughter. Sir Thomas More said : " Lo, dost thou not see, Meg, that these blessed fathers be now as cheerfully going to their deaths as bridegrooms to their marriage ^ Wherefore, thereby mayst thou see, mine own good daughter, what a great difference there is between such as have in effect spent all their days in a strait and penitential and painful life religiously, and such as have in the world, like worldly wretches (as thy poor father hath done), 1 As Houghton mounted the scaffold beneath the gibbet, he thus spoke to the people: "I call Almighty God to witness, and all good people, and I beseech you all here present to bear witness for me in the day of judgment, that being here to die, I declare that it is from no obstinate, rebellious spirit that I do not obey the King, but because I fear to offend the majesty of God. Our holy mother the Church has decreed otherwise than the King and the Parliament have decreed, and therefore, rather than disobey the Church, I am ready to suffer. Pray for me, and have mercy on my brethren, of whom I have been the unworthy prior." All four were hanged with stout ropes that they might not be strangled before the butchery began, and whilst still living they were ripped up one after the other, their limbs torn off and their hearts cut out and rubbed into their mouths and faces {Spanish State Papers, vol. v. p. 726). 2 88 Reformation and Renaissance consumed all their time in pleasure and ease licentiously. For God, considering their long continued life in most sore and grievous penance, will no longer suffer them to remain here in this vale of misery, but speedily hence taketh them to the fruition of His everlasting Deity. Whereas thy silly father, Meg, that like a wicked caitiff hath passed forth the whole course of his miserable life most sinfully, God thinking him not worthy so soon to come to that eternal felicity, leaveth him here still in this world further to be plagued and turmoiled with misery." But he was nearer to his reward than he then thought. On May 7 both he and Fisher were once more examined, and on June 14 three interrogatories were presented to them concerning the king's marriages and supremacy. More declined to answer any of the questions ; Fisher agreed to swear to the Act of Succession, but refused the oath of Supremacy. On the 17th he was brought to trial at West- minster, and on the 22 nd his venerable head fell on the block. Three other Carthusians indicted with him were executed at Tyburn on the 19th. More had not long to wait. His trial was fixed for July i, and his defence was conducted by himself with admirable ability, and with as much zest as if he were not longing " to be dissolved." When he had been found guilty under the new Acts, the reticence he had all along maintained gave place to a fearless freedom of speech, and he declared that he had studied the subject of the statute for seven years, and could never find any good authority to maintain that a temporal man might be head of the spirituality. He con- cluded with the hope that as St. Paul and St. Stephen, whom Paul persecuted, were now friends in heaven, it might be the same with him and his judges.^ One exquisite consolation awaited him. Roper thus describes it : " When Sir Thomas came from Westminster to the Tower, his daughter, my wife, desirous to see her father, whom she thought she should never see in this world after, and also to have his final blessing, gave attendance about the Tower wharf, where she knew he should pass before he could enter into the Tower. There tarrying his coming, as soon as she saw him, after his blessing upon her knees reverently received, she hasting towards him, without 1 Gairdncr, History of the English Church, p. 1 60. End of Religious Authority in England 289 consideration or care of herself, pressing in amongst the midst of the throng and company of the guard, that with halbards and bills went round about him, hastily ran to him, and there openly, in sight of them, embraced him, and took him about the neck and kissed him. Who, well liking her most natural and dear daughterly affection towards him, gave her his fatherly blessing, and many godly words of comfort besides. From whom, after she was departed, she, not satisfied with the former sight of him, and like one that had forgotten herself, being all ravished with the entire love of her father, having respect neither to herself nor to the press of people that were about him, suddenly turned back again, ran to him as before, took him about the neck, and divers times kissed him lovingly, and at last, with a full and heavy heart, was fain to depart from him ; the beholding whereof was to many that were present so lamentable that it made them for very sorrow thereof to weep." On July 5 he wrote to her with a charred stick from his dungeon among other words these : "I never liked your manner towards me better than when you kissed me last ; for I love when daughterly love and dear charity hath no leisure to look to worldly courtesy. Farewell, my dear child, and pray for me, and I shall for you and all your friends, that we may meet merrily in heaven." The next day the noblest heart in England had ceased to beat, and one more foul murder swelled the long list of crimes perpetrated by Henry and his evil genius. Cromwell was strictly consistent. Therein perhaps lay all that was most inhuman in his character, for in carrying out the definite plan which he had conceived, he ruthlessly destroyed every obstacle that opposed it, and in so doing was absolutely insensible to pity or remorse. His plan for the complete nationalisation of the Church of England was realised by the royal divorce, the passing of the Act of Parliament declaring the King's Supreme Headship, the bastardising of the Princess Mary, and the judicial murder of the noblest and best in the realm. It involved the establishment of the spy- system — a thousand times more offensive than the Spanish Inquisition. It necessitated the suppression of the monasteries, and here lay Cromwell's own personal opportunity of enrichment, a considerable share of the confiscated property falling to his lot. This included 290 Reformation and Renaissance the whole of the possessions of the wealthy priory of Lewes, extending through various counties as far as Yorkshire, those of the great priory of St. Osith in Essex, and of the monasteries of Colchester and of Launde in Leicestershire, as well as a portion of the lands taken from the See of Norwich, and many other choice morsels,^ If Cromwell was a man of iron, Cranmer was a man of straw ; and although it had taken a revolution in Church and State to bring an unwilling nation to acknowledge Anne Boleyn as the king's lawful wife, when Henry tired of her it took little more than the stroke of a pen to get rid of her, and to prove her marriage " null and void from the beginning." Scarcely had Katharine been informed that the law now involved the penalty of death to whoever should acknow- ledge her queen, and refuse to swear to the Act of Suc- cession, when Anne's power over Henry visibly declined, and Katharine's death, for which " the concubine " had longed and perhaps plotted, proved the worst misfortune that could have befallen her. Henry would never have repudiated Anne while Katharine lived, but her crimes were conveniently discovered at a moment when Henry realised that he was not only tired of her, but that he was free to contract a legal marriage which none would dispute. Katharine died on January 7, 1536, and in May, Cranmer, whom Anne had virtually raised to the Primacy, and who had declared her marriage " good and valid," now declared it to have always been " null and void " and " without effect " ; and on the very day of her execution granted Henry a dispensation to marry Jane Seymour. But behind the man of straw — Cranmer — was the man of iron — Cromwell, who had hatched all these things in his subtle brain. They were a part of the grand scheme by which he had swung himself into power, and intended to reach still greater heights. So far Henry was entirely at one with his Vicar-General, and in carrying out the measures above described, Cromwell was following in every detail the personal wishes of his master. But when, in the accomplish- ^ Dictionary of National Biography, article "Thomas Cromwell." Cromwell's grandson wasted nearly the whole of the vast inheritance not confiscated by the king, and was, says Spelman, "the first and only peer of the realm not having any land within it." End of Religious Authority in England 291 ment of his design, he spread his network over European politics, Henry was less well satisfied. Long before there was any serious difference of opinion between them, it was noticed that Cromwell retained his position only by an appearance of the most abject subservience. " The king beknaveth him twice a week, and sometimes knocks him well about the pate ; and yet when he hath been well pommelled about the head, and shaken up as it were a dog, he will come out into the great chamber shaking of the bushe (sic) with as merry a countenance as though he might rule all the roast." Cromwell, as we have seen, had but one end in view : Henry had many ends. Scorning all compromise, Crom- well was for making a permanent alliance with the Lutheran princes of Germany, for bringing their influence to bear on the National Church, for flooding the country with heretics of every shade and colour. Thus, he would dispense with the friendship of both Francis and Charles, while the essentially Protestant character of the Church of England would be assured. Henry was by no means averse from this policy when Cromwell first evolved it, but his diplomacy was of a vacil- lating order, especially trying to Cromwell's highly finished scheme. The German Protestant princes, the Emperor's enemies, following what had already been done in England, — the separation from Rome, the suppression of the lesser monas- teries, the destruction of images, the spoliation of the shrine of St. Thomas a Becket, the introduction of a heretical Enghsh translation of the Bible into churches, — and seeing that these things had been met by the Pope with a sentence of excom- munication against the king, eagerly sought the alliance. Three other things only they desired to see reformed, and they sent ambassadors to Henry to treat of them. If the king would agree to give up communion in one kind only, private Masses, and the celibacy of the clergy,^ perfect sympathy might be established between the English Church and the Lutheran. On the return of the ambassadors, Henry gave them a letter to the Duke of Saxony, expressing the hope that much good might be done if he sent over Melanchthon, and other learned divines. A friendly corre- 1 Gairdner, History of the English Churchy etc., p. 202. 292 Reformation and Renaissance spondence then ensued, the Landgrave of Hesse, to whom Luther had given a licence to commit bigamy, urging Henry to discourage Anabaptists. Accordingly, as Supreme Head of the Church of England, Henry conducted a trial for heresy on John Nicholson or Lambert, who, refusing to recant his opinions, was burned at Smithfield. While the king was turning his attention to these novel- ties, and amusing himself by playing at Pope, Cromwell, pursuing his secular policy, in consequence of a book pub- lished by Reginald Pole, On the Unity of the Churchy and more especially because its author had appealed to the Emperor to execute the Pope's Bull of Deposition against Henry, struck at all the members of Pole's family within reach, and threw his mother, brother, and nephew into prison. Spies reported Lord Montague, Reginald Pole's elder brother, to have said to Courtenay, Marquis of Exeter, " Knaves rule about the king," and that he trusted " to give them a buffet some day." The remark was sufficient to send them both to the scaffold, together with Courtenay's wife and Montague's only son. Courtenay's little son Edward grew up in prison and remained there till Queen Mary re- leased him on her accession. For two years the sword hung over Lady Salisbury, and Cromwell himself had gone to his reckoning before it descended upon her head, for no other reason than that she corresponded with her exiled son. Queen Jane had died after giving birth to a son, on October 24, 1537 ; and at the very zenith of his power, Cromwell negotiated the hand of Anne, daughter of John, Duke of Cleves, for his master. The affair lagged for some time, but it seemed an absolute necessity for Henry to secure himself against the possible alliance of the Pope, the Emperor, and the French king. Moreover, the German princes looked upon him as a useful political ally. So far there had been no halt in Cromwell's triumphant policy, and his rewards had been dealt out to him in profusion. The fall of the Earl of Wiltshire in 1536 gave him the Privy Seal. He was raised to the peerage, and took his seat in the House of Lords under the title of Lord Cromwell of Wimbledon. He was made Lord Great Chamberlain of England and Knight of the Garter in 1539, and in this capacity obtained the hand of Anne of Cleves for Henry. In January 1540 he was created Earl of Essex. But at the THOMAS CROMWELL Earl of Essex. From a picture in the National Portrait Gallery. T, face page 292. End of Religious Authority in England 293 very moment when he was putting the crowning touch to his poHcy the whole fabric began to totter. Henry, piqued at being persistently treated by the Pope, the Emperor, and even by his former ally Francis I., as a mere heretic, caused deliberations on the subject of religion to be brought before Parliament. The result was the passing of the famous Act of the Six Articles^ which brought about a reaction in favour of the old religion, Catholicism, as far as it was practicable, minus the Pope. Disgusted as the German princes were, it was still their best policy to be friends with England. Cromwell boasted that he would soon make the king descend to the new doctrines,^ and the match between Henry and Anne of Cleves was concluded. The lady arrived, and the marriage ceremony took place. Had Cromwell succeeded in the last act of his proposed drama, the whole face of Europe would have been changed. His failure to rouse the Lutheran princes to a contest with the Emperor, together with the fact that Charles and Francis were no longer friends, brought Henry to the conclusion that the German Protestants were of no further use to him. But in turning his back upon them he reversed the whole of Cromwell's foreign policy, just as by the passing of the Six Articles of religion his domestic policy had been to a certain extent stultified. Henceforth he had no further need of Cromwell any more than of his Lutheran princes and divines. Not only this, but Cromwell was positively in the way as con- cerned Henry's latest ecclesiastical changes, to which the minister, of course, was altogether opposed. He was arrested and sent to the Tower on charges as numerous as his offices and emoluments. According to the French ambassador, his enemies swarmed round him at the moment of his arrest, calling him a traitor, and saying that it was meet he should be judged by the bloody laws he had himself made. The Duke of Norfolk snatched off the order of St. George which he wore, and the Lord High Admiral untied the Garter. The king declared that he was "the meanest wretch ever born in England," and characteristically seized all his money and spoils of the Church, and caused them to be taken to the royal treasury, "which," added the ambassador, " is a sign that they will not be restored." ^ ^ Correspondance Politique de Castillon et de Marillac, p. 1 89. 2 Ibid.Y'- 193- 2 94 Reformation and Renaissance Not a voice was raised in his favour. He had no friend in the Upper House but Cranmer, who wrote to Henry on his fall that he stood " amazed and grieved," but was glad as a loyal subject that Cromwell's treasons had been discovered.^ Hated and feared throughout the realm, he was regretted by none, and " the meanest wretch ever born in England " whimpered and made his moan to Henry from the Tower, crying " Mercye, mercye, mercye ! " all in vain. Henry, however, had not quite done with him when he flung him into prison. It suited his purpose, before dis- patching him, that Cromwell should make certain statements with regard to his marriage with Anne of Cleves, in order to facilitate a sentence of nullity. But the disgusting narrative did not avail to save him from the block, and his head fell on July 28, 1540. Despot and tyrant as he was at the death of Wolsey, Henry had now become a monster of iniquity. So callous was he in his thirst for blood, that men were hurried to death for the most contradictory reasons. Anxious to prove his Catholicity, in little more than a week after Cromwell's execution he caused three men to be burned at Smithfield on a charge of heresy, while three others were hanged, drawn, and quartered for denying his spiritual Headship. The end of religious authority in England was the beginning of a religious despotism that had been altogether unknown and undreamed of in the days of papal annates and first-fruits, when the Pope's Bulls obtained, and appeals to Rome were frequent. ^ Cranmer's Works, p. 401. Mr. Merriman {Life and Letters oj Thomas Cromwell) describes this as a "pathetic letter" — no more supine abandonment of Cranmer's "own entirely beloved Cromwell" can well be imagined. CHAPTER VIII THE RENAISSANCE OF LETTERS AND THE PROTESTANT REFORMATION IN FRANCE AND SWITZERLAND RABELAIS CALVIN M-94-IS53 Italy, as we have already seen, was the first to welcome the new learning that was as old as ancient Greece, and the new art that, like Beauty in the fairy tale, had slumbered in her midst since the days of pagan dominion. It was in 1494, when the Italian Renaissance was at its height, that Charles VIII. of France made his first expedition across the Alps, and for nearly a century afterwards there was continuous intercourse between France and Italy. More lasting than any of the fruits of his military campaign were the intellec- tual benefits which he brought back with him, the first important result of his expeditions being the arrival of the Byzantine John Lascaris at the University of Paris. This famous scholar, whose lectures on Greek were largely attended during the reigns of Charles VIII., Louis XII., and Francis I., may be said to have introduced the Renaissance of letters into France. The lectures of Lascaris were supplemented in 1508 by those of Alexander, an Italian, learned in Greek, Latin, Hebrew, Arabic, mathematics, astronomy, and music, and whom Louis XII. invited to his court. Alexander had become acquainted with Erasmus at Venice through his printer Aldus, and had helped in the publication of the Adagia. He taught Greek at the universities of Paris and Orleans for six years, during which time he gave great impetus to philological studies. His erudition was rewarded by his being made librarian of the Vatican by Leo X., who 295 296 Reformation and Renaissance also sent him into the Netherlands and Germany as Nuncio. Paul III. raised him to the Cardinalate. But Guillaume Bude (Budasus), a pupil of Lascaris, was undoubtedly the best Greek scholar of his day, not excepting Erasmus, although the literary ability and charm of style of Erasmus were not approached by the Frenchman. Bude was made librarian to Francis I., who sent him as ambassador to the Court of Leo X., but his greatest title to distinction is the foundation of the College Royal. This foundation marked an epoch in the revival of classical studies in France, and restored to the University of Paris something of its lost lustre. The teaching of philosophy had sunk to its lowest level. Text - books bristling with barbarisms formed the study of professors and pupils. Homer, Pindarus, iEschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides had become mere names. Nor were Plato, Xenophon, Theophrastus, Plutarch, much better known. Aristotle was construed by means of bad Latin translations, and even then few troubled themselves to under- stand him. Complete ignorance of Herodotus, Thucydides, and Polybius prevailed, and if Greek was practically un- known, of Hebrew nothing was ever heard. ^ Instead of putting the works of Demosthenes and Cicero into the hands of students, successive generations had been fed with wretched treatises, such as that of Philelfus on education. Where Euclid, Ptolemy, Archimedes, Plato, Aristotle, Xenophon, Homer, and Virgil should have formed the basis of studies, the youth of the day had been nourished with the trivialities of Bavius, Maevius, and Cherillus.^ These things were largely reformed by the College Royal, but under conditions which deprived the Renaissance of that religious element so characteristic of the movement in Spain, and even to some extent in Italy. In France, religion and morality sank as low as philosophy had done, and when literature was revived, and the French language received a much-needed stimulus, the revival came in the guise of pun- gent satire and scathing criticism, but also in that of licen- tiousness and profanity. Under the pretext of rescuing youth from the barbarism of the schools, the most impure works of the ancients were put into the hands of students, as if obsolete methods could not be reformed without sullying ^ Prat, Maldonat et PJJniversite de Paris, p. 46. 2 Goujet, op. cit. vol. i. pp. 27, 28. FRANCOIS RABELAIS. From a portrait in the School of Medicine at Montpellier. To face page 29- In France and Switzerland 297 the mind and wounding the conscience.^ Soon the College de Clermont, founded by the first disciples of St. Ignatius of Loyola, was the only refuge of Catholic education at the University of Paris. Ramus, who began by violent attacks on the philosophy of Aristotle, and who was even then suspected of heresy, ended by openly joining the Protestant party. When at last he threw off the mask, all his pupils deserted the Catholic Church, and signalised their change of religion by removing or smashing the images and statues which adorned their college chapel.- Other professors followed the example of Ramus or became infidels. Dis- belief in the immortality of the soul came to be one of the distinguishing features of many of the colleges.^ A general tendency to shake off authority was manifested throughout the country. Rabelais, Marot, La Borderie, and other authors of the same school devoted their talents mainly to discredit the Church, her ministers, and her teaching. Morality was a subject for ridicule, and heresy, by reason of the licence it permitted, more welcome than sound doc- trine. The Catholic faith was almost submerged, and the Renaissance in some of its later developments, grafted on to religious decadence, produced some of the worst phenomena of the times. Its germs of insincerity and untruth in collusion with Gallic carelessness and love of mirth, unbalanced by sober judgment, resulted in a new literature, distinguished indeed for wit, originality, and clever buffoonery, but which failed to strike any deep, convincing, or inspiring note. Two lines from the prologue to Francois Rabelais' famous satire, Gargantua and Pantagruel, graphically illustrate the temper of the age, and of the people for which the romance was written : Mieulx est de ris que de larmes escripre. Pour ce que rire est le propre de Phomme. In other words — matter enough for tears there is ; but let us eat, drink (especially drink), and be merry, for to-morrow we die ! And now that we have made up our minds to jollity, let us exercise it upon those things which, if we were not resolved to laugh, would move us to mourn overmuch. This was the spirit in which Erasmus wrote his Encomium Mori^, but Rabelais added to it a touch of bitterness, and ^ Maldonat et PUniversite de Paris, p. 62. - Ibid. p. 60. 3 /^/^_ p^ 5^. 298 Reformation and Renaissance a depravity and coarseness of tone beyond anything that Erasmus ever wrote. Censured by the Sorbonne, protected by Francis I., the Cardinals ChatiJlon and Jean du Bellay, the romantic history of Gargantua and Fantagruel has been alike blamed and praised immoderately by modern French critics. The fol- lowing represent the opinions of some of the more judicial minds. Sainte-Beuve describes it as '* clear and limpid as to style, but filthy in matter and sediment." Balzac, on the other hand, says : *' Rabelais has put into his immortal book concise and terrible verdicts on things of the highest interest to humanity, in a style purposely coarse, rustic, and replete with images that are called obscene by those who are ignorant of the manners and language of the epoch." No wonder that at a later date Louis Blanc should have exclaimed, *' Rabelais lends himself to the most contradictory explanations ! " The judgment pronounced by La Bruyere is perhaps more just than any. He says : " Rabelais is inexcusable in having scattered mere filth throughout his writings. His book is a chimera. It is the face of a beautiful woman with the tail of a serpent, or of some other still more unsightly monster. It is a monstrous jumble of a fine and delicately wrought moral, and of the most offensive grossness. Where it is bad it is as bad as it can be — -the very scum of the world might batten on it ; where it is good, nothing can be more choice or excellent ; it can furnish most dainty fare." Of the man himself, opinions have been as divergent as those expressed on his work. Stripped of legend, of the many sayings falsely attributed to him, of exaggerated praise and unmitigated blame, Rabelais stands revealed as a repre- sentative Frenchmen of the later Renaissance, although he preferred Aristotle to Plato, not all the extravagances of the scholastics disgusting him with the severe reasoning of their master.^ St. Thomas he revered, but Duns Scotus was his most illustrious victim. Rabelais may be known by his friendships, by his impatience of restraint, his restless- ness, his power of observation, by the variety of his tastes, the versatility of his pursuits, by his fierce quarrel with the ^ Gebhart, La Renaissance et la Reformer p. 57. In France and Switzerland 299 mediasval schools.^ A still more distinctive mark is his freedom from the superstitions of the Renaissance, and, although no anchorite, he was superior in morality to many of his kind. His early history is not unhke that of Erasmus, although his manner of dealing with his destiny bears little resemblance to that of the more temperate Dutchman. Placed at school with the Franciscans by his father, who was a small inn- keeper at Chinon in Touraine, his thirst for knowledge led him at an early age to enter religion. But not only was he ill suited by character and temperament for a life of con- ventual discipline : he made a further mistake in adopting the Franciscan rule, which in France at least debarred him from the studies he loved and craved for. The result was a surreptitious flight from his convent, after pronouncing his vows and receiving holy orders. He discarded his habit, and after some stay at Montpellier, where he frequented the medical schools, he wandered about Europe as a medical student, and perhaps even more as a student of human nature. He read immensely, and observed with method. Materials are wanting for a consecutive history of his travels and his studies, but it is clear that he became proficient in Greek and Latin, and possessed some Hebrew and Arabic. Natural science was of all subjects that which most delighted him, together with medicine and botany, but he also dabbled considerably in theology, mathematics, jurisprudence, music, geometry, astronomy, and even in painting and versifica- tion.2 But, unlike the majority of the great humanists, he had no taste or feeling for beauty, and his nature was entirely devoid of poetry, although he surpassed in imagina- tion all his contemporaries. He found little to admire at Florence, Httle of interest to say about Rome.-'^ His mind was saturated with the Gallic spirit — the spirit of mockery, of unrestraint, of irreverence. Le besoin de rire possessed him, in and out of season, and he never resisted it. Strangest of all anomalies, in the midst of his wanderings hither and thither, of irregularities, which, however, do not appear to have lapsed into actual immorality, he began to be tormented with remorse, and did not rest until he had 1 Gebhart, La Renaissance et la Reforme, p. 35- 2 Nouvelle Biographie Generale, vol. xii., article " Fran9ois Rabelais." ^ Gebhart, pp. 26-28. 300 Reformation and Renaissance obtained from Clement VII. an indult authorising him to exchange the despised and rejected Franciscan order for that of St. Benedict. He received at the same time the title and habit of a Canon regular, and the faculty to possess benefices. He retired to the monastery of Maillezais, but did not long remain there. Leaving without permission, he adopted the dress of a secular priest, and again ran about the world exercising the healing art in the houses of his Order, sometimes saying Mass and the Divine Office, and sometimes not, for long intervals. It is characteristic of the times, that although Rabelais had incurred ecclesiastical censures as being a renegade from his Order, he was nevertheless hospitably received at the house of the Bishop of his diocese, GeoiFrey d'Estissac, who was not only a man of letters, but a very good bishop as bishops then went, of whom it was said that his library was in even greater repute than his table. His house at Liguge was the resort of scholars, and Rabelais remained there for some time. When he left, it was to act as physician at the public hospital at Lyons, although he had not yet taken his degree. But his incorrigible spirit of vagabondage was his Nemesis even here, and he was dismissed from the hospital for having twice absented himself without leave. ^ It was while practising medicine at Lyons that Rabelais wrote the two first books of Gargantua and Fantagruel^ for the amusement of his patients. They were composed while he ate and drank, and ran about the town, picking up popular anecdotes, imagining buffoonery of the lowest kind, interspersed with curious, prophetic utterances pointing to inventions of modern science, but then totally unknown, ideal, and yet not unpractical, theories concerning education, merry witticisms, and poignant, scurrilous, and indecent sarcasms. He published them under cover of the anagram Alcofrihas Nasier — words composed of all the letters con- tained in his name, Francois Rabelais. Being once more without occupation, Rabelais obtained an appointment as physician in attendance on the learned Cardinal Jean du Bellay, who was then (1536) going to Rome as ambassador. Again devoured with scruples for what he termed his " apostasy " in having deserted his Order, he again applied to the Pope for absolution, and ^ NouveUe Biographic G'enerale. In France and Switzerland 301 obtained from Paul III. a rescript, dated January 17, 1537, ordering him to reassume the Benedictine habit, and to return to a monastery of his rule. But the same rescript gave him leave to practise medicine for charity and without taking money, anywhere and everywhere, wherever he might be. CoUetet, his earliest and most sensible biographer, observes on this occasion that "with all his apparent rationalism, he was nevertheless not without pious senti- ments, and a remarkable deference for the holy institutions of the Catholic and orthodox Church, which he ever recog- nised as his true mother." ^ On his return to France, Rabelais went to Montpellier, armed with the Pope's rescript, to finish his medical studies, and proceeded M.D. some time during the year 1537, after- wards following a special course of anatomy. Immersed in these interests, he seems to have once more lost all desire to return to a monastery, and we find him practising medicine enthusiastically at Narbonne, Castries, and again at Lyons, where he gave his celebrated public demonstration of anatomy on the body of a criminal hanged the previous day. During this time he was living on revenues belonging to a canonry at St. Maur, which Cardinal du Bellay had procured for him. A prey to fresh qualms of conscience, Rabelais again applied to the Pope, who sent him another rescript regulating his position. By this rescript he was obliged to wear his Benedictine habit, and to retire to St. Maur, which place he describes in a letter to Cardinal Chatillon as " a paradise of salubrity, amenity, serenity, and commodity." Thomas Corneille, in his Dictionary of Geography, says that in his time the monks of St. Maur still showed the room once occupied by the author of Pantagruel. Here he remained for some years," not indeed without frequent change of scene, for Rabelais, restless and pursued by a constant desire for movement, was not the man to remain quietly in any " paradise," much less in a monastery, when the Pope's indulgent rescript gave him leave to go where he pleased, in the charitable exercise of the art of 1 Notice sur Francois Rabelais, p. 14. Guillaume Colletet was born at Paris in 1598, and was one of the first members of the Academic Fran^aise, a poet of some excellence, and z protege of Cardinal Richelieu. 2 Colletet, p. 15. 2,02 Reformation and Renaissance healing. Moreover, at the very gates of St. Maur was the chateau of his great patron, the Cardinal du Bellay, whose doors were always open to him, and he never wanted an excuse for presenting himself He often went with him to Rambouillet, to Orleans, to Langey, where a house which he frequently inhabited was long known as le Rabelais. The two first books of his romance, although creating a good deal of scandal, continued to be printed at Lyons, and when the question of publishing the third book arose, Rabelais was in some perplexity. Three of his friends had recently paid for the expression of their opinions with their liberty, if not with their lives ; but do and say what he would, he never came altogether to grief His jovial humour, his insouciance^ the ease with which he amused every one, invariably saved him, and none took him seriously. By the exercise of consummate tact, he obtained from Francis I. permission to print the third part of the Faicts et Diets hero'iques de Gargantua et de son Fils Pantagruel^ acknowledg- ing himself for the first time the author. In vain, the Sorbonne censured the royal imprimatur ; it was forced into silence, and Rabelais, with a malicious smile, pretended to boast that his book had been pronounced free from atheism, and that no actual heresy could be discovered in it. Nevertheless, it was indisputable that it contained a mass of shameless enormities, and remarks as blasphemous as any that fable and prejudice have attributed to him. Thus, even if it be untrue that on his deathbed he flippantly called for a domino, because " Beati mortui qui in Domino moriuntur^'' Pantagruel contains allusions to divine Persons and applications of Scripture in a sense often far more profane than this. If the king, in his capacity of protector of the arts and of literature, was well advised to permit the publication of the book, for the reasons given above, we can have no quarrel, on the other hand, with the Sorbonne for the veto it would have imposed. Moreover, setting aside the question of morals, that of faith was thought to be involved. Calvin had already begun to promulgate his heresies in 1533, when the two first books appeared, and together with Erasmus and many others, Rabelais was suspected of leanings towards them because he attacked abuses. But after the publication of the third book, it became clear that In France and Switzerland 303 he did not regard the teaching of the reformers as in the least degree satisfying to the conscience. Monks he did not spare any more than Erasmus spared them, but even the most biting pages of Pantagruel are free from the doctrinal hostility of Hutten's Pamphlets, of Luther's Table- Talk, or of the Christian Institute of Calvin. Neither the Servo arhitrio (will in bondage) nor the gloomy tenets of predestination would be likely to arrest for a moment the most independent mind and light-hearted spirit of the age. Taking him at a point far above his worst, and a little lower than his best, Rabelais was too thorough a student of Aristotle not to know that right reason, like virtue, is a happy medium between two extremes ; ^ and the greatest proof that he was out of sympathy with the new religionists is the fact that Calvin accused him of being a freethinker, a Sardanapolus, and the worst enemy of all religions. An enemy of religion he can scarcely with truth be considered, for throughout his work it is visibly as much his intention to lash vice as to ridicule folly, although it cannot be said that his own standard is high. On the other hand, it has been aptly pleaded that his book is free from the singular views of morality with which Boccaccio amused the fourteenth and Ariosto reproached the fifteenth century.^ Such a distinction may, no doubt, justly be made, although Rabelais' joviaUty is that of drinking-bouts, and the line between gross and profane jests and moral turpitude is not always clearly defined. His readers are seldom allowed to forget that the atmosphere of the cabaret was his native element, so ubiquitous are the wine-bottles, so repulsive the ribaldry of his half-drunken boors. In 1548 Rabelais was in a more dangerous position than he had ever been. Francis I., who had always protected him, was dead, and the Sorbonne absolutely forbade the publication of the fourth book of Pantagruel, as did also the Parlement of Paris, in spite of the attacks it contained on " the demoniacs Calvin and the impostors of Geneva," whom he passionately hated, giving them a deep place among monsters and all misshapen things.^ 1 Gebhart, p. 98. - Ibid. p. 71. 3 M. Martin-Dupont, with what cannot but be considered perverse judgment, recommends in the most unqualified language the study of Rabelais to the youth of his country {Etudes sur Fran pis Rabelais), while 304 Reformation and Renaissance He therefore divested himself of his benefices, and fled to Rome, He took refuge with Cardinal du Bellay, and found " love of letters, tolerance, and safety." Under the Cardinal's august auspices Rabelais began his fifth book, which, however, was never completed. When his generous patron returned to France, Rabelais accompanied him, and obtained a benefice as cure of Meudon, near Paris. Strange and anomalous as the position was for the author of Panta- gruel, CoUetet assures us that " he played his part as parish priest with all the sincerity, honesty, and charity that one may expect from a man who is resolved to do his duty." During this time never a voice was raised either against his personal conduct or the manner in which he discharged his pastoral office. He said Mass, dispensed the sacraments, and preached frequently. In 1553 the fourth book oi Pantagruel received author- isation, thanks to Cardinal Chatillon, who allowed Rabelais to dedicate it to him. But before the volume appeared Rabelais had resigned his benefice, perhaps feeling the enormous inconsistency of appending the same name to such a work as that with which he described himself as cure of Meudon. But be that as it may, CoUetet declares that at the end of his life Rabelais " rentrant en soi-meme, reconnaissant ses peches, et ayant recours a I'infinie misericorde de Dieu, il rendit son esprit en fidele chretien." ^ At no other epoch could a Rabelais such as we find him have been possible. He was essentially of his time as well as of his country. The Renaissance, in bringing in new ideas, had left those ideas in a state of chaos. Each man made of them what he pleased, and what he could. That Rabelais and Calvin were the products of the same country and of the same movement seems at first scarcely credible. Nevertheless, on reflection it is clear that the main principle of the later Renaissance was licence — a shaking off of the shackles of restraint under recognised authority, the asser- tion of the freedom of the individual to say, think, write, or preach anything and everything. This is by no means to another no less enthusiastic but more discriminating admirer is not afraid to admit "I'impudeur enorme de Rabelais" (Emile Gebhart, Rabelais, la Renaissance et la Reforme). ^ Notice sur Francois Rabelais, p. 19. In France and Switzerland 305 maintain that even the later Renaissance and Protestant Reformation were generally convertible terms, but it is certain that the new ideas running riot in men's lives bred disorders of many kinds, and that in France at least the same original germ was common to both. While Rabelais laughed — some said scoffed — Calvin wrote his Christian Institute^ in which he, in defiance of Catholic doctrine, condemned the greater part of the human race to perdition ; Francis I. had burlesques acted, in which the Pope and Luther came to blows ; his sister Marguerite, Queen of Navarre, listened to heretical sermons at Lyons ; the Queen-Mother consulted the Sorbonne on the means of extirpating Luther- anism ; and Budaeus, in his Passage de T Hellenisme au Christianismey was at pains to show the evil results of schism on religious liberty. The confusion was absurd enough, and led to worse than absurdity in the religious wars which extended throughout the sixteenth century, and which formed the pretext for a fresh attempt on the part of the nobility to regain their former power. The triumph of the monarchy over feudal- ism was as complete in France as in England at the same period, and from precisely the same causes ; but the wars of religion were as much a political struggle as any practical demand for reform or for religious liberty.^ The revolution that was imminent everywhere in some shape at the beginning of the sixteenth century, the question being only as to whether it would be brought about by the Renaissance or by the Re- formation,' was precipitated in Germany by the action of Luther. In England it was the direct outcome of the im- mense, newly-acquired power of the monarchy working upon an enfeebled nobility and a relaxed and subservient episcopate, resulting in a rupture with traditions that were as old as the introduction of Christianity into Britain. The rulers of England, France, and the Empire were all young, and all about the same age. Even the Pope, Leo X., was younger than most of the Sovereign Pontiffs on their accession. In 1516, when he had already reigned three years, he was thirty-nine. Henry VIII. was twenty-four, Francis I. twenty-two, and Charles V., then Archduke of Austria and King of Spain, sixteen. 1 Guizot, Histoire de la civilisation en Europe^ p. 339. 2 Michelet, Histoire de France au seizieme siecle, vol. viii. p. 506, note. X 3o6 Reformation and Renaissance Francis I. came to the throne imbued with the unfortunate notion that it was his duty to save Europe from the Turk and from Austria. Michelet describes him as a man of sanguine temperament, short and thick -set, with a large, sensual, fleshy nose like that of his mother, Claude de Savoie, a true son of Gargantua, and a thorough Rabelaisian, having in his appearance something in common both with a pig and a monkey. The description, though not flattering, agrees in the main with his portrait painted by Titian during the winter he spent in Italy before the fatal battle of Pavia, and which still hangs in the gallery of the Louvre. He was then only thirty-one, but vice had already set its mark upon his face, in crow's-feet and wrinkles, and in an expression that speaks of depravity. But at least his courage and valour were admirable, and when he wrote to his mother after the battle, '* Madame, tout est perdu fors I'honneur," honour had been completely satisfied. He was twice wounded at Pavia, in the face and on the thigh, and his horse fell under him, fairly riddled with bullets. The intense devotion which Francis inspired in his sister Marguerite, Queen of Navarre, points to possible qualities he may have possessed before dissipation, tyranny, and duplicity deprived him of every amiable trait. The subject of their mutual relations has been much discussed by his- torians, and cannot be passed over altogether in silence here, although there appears to be little ground for the dark suspicions of either Michelet ^ or Henri Martin.^ That Mar- guerite entertained for him an affection wildly exaggerated and passionate is clear from many lurid expressions in the letters which she wrote to him after the death of her first husband, the Due d'Alen^on, but one single letter belonging to the beginning of the year 1521 proves beyond doubt the nature of that affection. This letter also contains irre- fragable evidence that Francis did not respond to the mad passion, and that it remained a source of profound misery to her, but not a crime,^ In spite of her pathetic entreaty that ^ Reforme, p. 173. - Histoire de France, vol. viii. p. 83. ^ Nouvelies Lettres de la Reine de Navarre adress'ees au Rot Francis son Frere, publiees d'apres le Manuscrit de la Bibliotheque du Roi, par F. Genin. Supplement a la Notice sur Marguerite d'Angouleme, pp. 4, 23. " Elle avait aime son jeune frere avec une tendresse si exclusive, si ardente, qu'elle avait cesser de I'aimer comme un frere, fatale passion qui fut le secret de son indifference non seulement pour un mari peu digne d'amour. In France and Switzerland 307 the letter might be reduced to ashes, the king, perhaps from mere careless indifference, left it to be a permanent record to all generations of his selfish disregard for his sister's reputation. Next to the king. Marguerite loved religion, A cry for reform was for ever rising from the afflicted Church of France, and when rumours were heard that in Germany a friar had boldly attacked some of the most scandalous abuses, hope stirred in the hearts of many, and it was thought that the day of deliverance was at hand. The movement had gone far towards schism before any suspicion reached France of Luther's real intentions, and it was in this way that many people, the Queen of Navarre included, were accounted heretics when the Wittenberg professor threw off the mask. It is significant that the year 1521 marked an epoch in Marguerite's spiritual and mental life, and the unhappy queen threw herself into the movement for reform as if seeking a plank on which to save herself from shipwreck. Count Sigismund Hohenlohe, in the hope of winning France for Lutheranism, entered into correspondence with her on the subject of religion, and as at that time in France it may be said there were neither Calvinists nor Lutherans, but only Catholics, more or less sincere, and more or less faithful to their religious duties, she may be pardoned for not discern- ing the plot laid for her. Francis was then a captive in Spain, and the Queen- Mother as regent co-operated actively with the Sorbonne in ferreting out and prosecuting those who were suspected of spreading the new heresies. In 1525 the first fires were lighted for the extermination of Lutheranism in France, and several individuals who refused to abjure their errors perished in the flames. Marguerite herself did not escape censure from the Sorbonne on account of a volume of religious poetry, Le Miroir de V dme Pecheresse, which she had written and published, and which was supposed to contain heretical opinions. She herself would perhaps have fared badly but for the opportune return of Francis. When denounced to him as one of the new sectaries, he replied, mais pour les hommages des plus brillants cavaliers de la cour, et qui dans cette ame naturellement honnete autant que tendre rcsta un malheur et ne devint pas un crime." — Nouvelle Biographie G enerale,2irnc\?: "Marguerite d'Angoulcme," note, p. 568. 3o8 Reformation and Renaissance " Let us not speak of her ; she will never believe otherwise than as I believe ; she will never adopt any religion prejudicial to my kingdom. She loves me too much ! " Francis was right. When Marguerite perceived the real trend of the matter, and especially the failure of the reformers to convert the king, she renounced their heresies, although she continued to protect them individually, her court being the refuge of all those whom the Sorbonne persecuted. Foremost among these was the poet and son of a poet, Clement Marot, who, it was supposed, was denounced for heresy by Diane de Poitiers, and thrown into prison in 1535, when many of those who shared his opinions were brought to the stake. The Queen of Navarre obtained his release, and he fled to her in Beam. After some time he went to Renee, Duchess of Ferrara, who protected him for several years ; but on the publication of his Psalms of David, the great metrical religious work of French Calvinism, another storm burst, and Marot escaped to Geneva, where now Calvin practically reigned supreme. But Geneva was scarcely a congenial home for a poet, even for one whose songs were all of Babylon and the Adulteress of the Seven Hills. Calvin himself, a man of granite, implacable and austere, was not one to set much store by poetrv. Moreover, his laws against gambling were stringent, and Marot, having infringed them, had no choice between a prison and instant flight. Leaving the new Jerusalem behind him with much relief, he went to Turin, where he died in 1544. Francis I, varied in his treatment of Protestants accord- ing to the politics of the moment. He had no scruples in making use of those of Schmalkalden as a support against his great enemy Charles V., but in his efl^orts to recover Italy for the French crown the Pope was a far more valuable ally, and it suited the king to pose then as a devout Catholic. After the marriage of his second son, Henry, with Catherine of Medici, niece of Leo X., his Catholicism became more decided, and the heretics had nothing to hope for in France. Marguerite then found it safer to devote herself to mundane literature than to write religious poetry, which, how- ever orthodox in reality, was apt to be suspected, by reason of her friendship with the Huguenots. The Heptameron, In France and Switzerland 309 written in imitation of Boccaccio, if less licentious than it has been accused of being, is a work of little imagination, but of much coarseness and indelicacy, while its moralising is of a particularly tiresome kind. It is neither edifying nor amusing. But notwithstanding her sad history, her contributions to the literature of the Renaissance, and her much vaunted beauty, the Queen of Navarre will always be best remembered as the friend and protectress of the reformers. She had remained a Catholic ; nevertheless but for her, Protestantism might never have struck deep roots in France. Calvin himself had had recourse to her hospitality at the very turning-point of his career, and if a soft place could be found in that curiously constructed vessel, Calvin's heart, it should certainly respond to the name Marguerite d'Angou- leme. And yet there can have been little in common between the passionate, highly-strung, and poetical nature of the princess, and the stern, unyielding, self-sufficient egotist, whom even in his student days his fellows nicknamed " the accusative case." ^ Cast in one mould from the beginning, his character was without lights and shades, subtleties or surprises of any sort. One letter, one act, suffices to reveal him, and is enough whereby to know him. He has been called a type of the ambitious man who is determined to make himself heard, because he has the intense conviction that what he has to say is true.^ The son of an attorney at Noyon in Picardy, John Calvin, the reformer, was born on July lo, 1509. His two brothers were educated for the priesthood, and he also was for some years intended for an ecclesiastical career, receiving the tonsure at the age of twelve. When he was fourteen he went to the University of Paris, and studied classics and philosophy at the colleges of La Marche and Montaigu. Suddenly his father changed his mind with regard to his son's future, and, probably in view of his suc- cessful studies in dialectics, ordered him to apply himself thenceforth to law. To this end Calvin went to Orleans, and studied under Pierre de I'Estoile, afterwards president of the Parlement of Paris, and the cleverest lawyer in France.^ 1 Johnson, John Calvin and the Genevan Reformation, a sketch. 2 Renan, Etudes d'Histoire Religieuse, p. 339. 3 Audin, Histoire de la Vie, des Ouvrages et des Doctrines de Calvin, vol. i. p. 30, 5th edition. 3IO Reformation and Renaissance From Orleans he went to Bourges, where, besides law, under the famous Milanese professor, Alciati, he learned Greek and Lutheranism from Melchior Wolmar. At Bourges he became acquainted with Theodore Beza, after- wards the most cultured of the French reformers, as Melanch- thon was the least infuriated of the Lutherans.^ But at that time Beza thought of nothing less than of heresy and schism, while Calvin was already a fierce iconoclast. Wolmar had little difficulty in persuading him to close his Homer and to give himself up entirely to the study of the Lutheran Bible, or at any rate to the Lutheran explanation of the Scriptures. Even much earlier than this, Calvin had evolved in his own mind that system of fatalism and negation of free-will which has been known ever since as predestination, and perhaps Wolmar's influence only precipitated events. When he left Bourges and returned to Paris, it was to work secretly at first and then openly in the cause of Lutheranism. He gathered round him a number of young men of his own age (he was then about twenty-two), and preached to them con- tempt of sacramental confession and the uselessness of good works. He held forth on all the well-worn topics of the day, on the luxury of bishops, the ignorance of the clergy, and the idleness of monks. The result was a fine crop of fanaticism, and in the end the stake and the fire. Calvin was timid, in spite of his thundering words, his pulpit-beating, and his fatalism. All he dared do in the form of protest, when his disciples were persecuted, was to write a book on Clemency — a commentary on Seneca's two treatises De dementia. Too learned for the ignorant, too ignorant for the learned, the work not only failed to attain the desired end, but was detrimental to the author's literary reputation. In it he confounded the two Senecas, father and son, and considering them as one, made the author of De dementia die at the age of one hundred and fifteen. In 1533 Calvin composed the speech which his friend Nicholas Cop, Rector of the University of Paris, was to deHver in the presence of the Sorbonne. Cop was a Swiss, of no great intelligence, and unlearned in theological matters. Calvin having therefore a free hand, introduced his pet ideas ^ Many Germans declared that they would prefer to be in hell with Beza than in paradise with Calvin. In France and Switzerland 311 and theories into the composition, and the representatives of the University and the Sorbonne who were present were not slow to detect the old heresy, a hundred times refuted and a hundred times revived, of justification by faith alone. It was denounced to the Parlement, and Cop was obliged to defend himself in another speech, at which the whole Uni- versity were present. This time also his words were put into his mouth by Calvin, and the odious proposition was again brought forward. The scandal was immense, and Cop would have been arrested had he not taken flight. A search was then made for Calvin, who escaped out of a window and succeeded in getting away from Paris disguised as a husbandman.-^ He went to the Queen of Navarre, who received him more than kindly, and succeeded in making up his quarrel with the court and the University. At Nerac he was in congenial society ; every subject under heaven was discussed ; there was ample opportunity for ventilating his opinions, and as he was a little in advance of every one else, the admiration he inspired was gratifying. Le Fevre, who had also taken refuge with Marguerite from the anger of the Sorbonne, predicted that he would be the author of the restoration of the Church in France.^ There was nothing to prevent his spreading his heresies in the neighbouring districts, and with his book on Clemency in his hand he succeeded in making many converts, who prided themselves on their resemblance to the primitive Christians. One radical difference was observed even by their admirers : this was, that whereas the early Christians were united in one faith, Calvin's Christians were completely disunited, some believing in the necessity of a second baptism, while others did not ; some holding the doctrine of the Real Presence with Luther, others again rejecting it with Zwingli. Among them were those who clung to the doctrine of free- will in man, and those who held fiercely by predestination. There were those who, like Melanchthon, believed in an ecclesiastical hierarchy, and others who, with Carlstadt, main- tained that every Christian is a priest. There were rational- ists who rejected every mystery of religion, and mystics who vaporised about everything. Some few were antitrinitarians like Servetus, who declared that in God there were but two Persons.^ 1 Audin, vol. i. pp. 56-58. 2 Beza, Fie de Cahin. ^ Audin, vol. i. p. 61. 312 Reformation and Renaissance One of the chief ideas of every great heresiarch has been a return to the simplicity of the early Christian Church. It was the plea of Luther, Zwingli, Calvin, Cranmer, but not one of them ever succeeded in attaining the very first condition of primitive Christianity — unity ; and the tendency has always increased to divide and subdivide more and more. During this time Calvin was occupied in writing his Christian Institute^ which was destined to be the inspired volume of Calvinism, as the Augsburg Confession was the Gospel of every good Lutheran. The Christian Institute was in many respects a fine specimen of humanistic letters, and in so far a valuable contribution to the literature of the Renaissance. As a monument of sectarianism its chiet characteristic was the setting forth of its author's one original idea — predestination. It was the distinctive mark of Cal- vinism, just as the doctrine of justification by faith alone was the hall-mark of Lutheranism. When Calvin left the court of the Queen of Navarre in 1535, he went to Basle, where he had two objects in view — the publication of his book and a meeting with Erasmus. The only account that has reached us of this meeting is so surrounded with improbabilities that it is scarcely worth recording.^ After a few minutes' conversation it is said that Calvin left, and that Bucer, who was present, asked Erasmus what he thought of the new- comer. The sage smiled, but made no reply. Bucer, however, insisted, and at last Erasmus said : "I see a great plague rising up in the Church against the Church." In the first place, Erasmus was not on friendly terms with Bucer, any more than with the other reformers, all of whom he despised for their want of learning. Secondly, by *' the Church " Erasmus and Bucer would at that time have meant two different things. Erasmus was a Catholic, and always remained one ; Bucer, after leaving the Catholic Church, belonged successively to the Lutherans, Anabaptists, and Zwinglians. Calvin in 1535 was certainly outside the Catholic Church, and in telling the story, if indeed he had been in a position to tell it, Bucer would have intended to convey the impression that Erasmus considered the new- comer as a plague to the Protestant Church, making common cause with Bucer. The incident was probably invented by the Germans after Calvin had begun to quarrel with them. ^ Barckhusen, Historische Nachricht uber Calvin^ p. 24. In France and Switzerland 313 On leaving Basle in 1536, Calvin went to Ferrara, where the Duchess Renee, daughter of Louis XIL, held her court, and where Clement Marot, then her secretary,^ was trans- lating the Psalms into French verse. The object of this journey was to spread the new doctrines and to confirm the duchess in the Protestant faith. Calvin's success m both these enterprises emboldened him, on leaving Ferrara, to make some stay at Aosta on his way back to Switzerland, and at first even here he met with some encouragement. But Pietro Gazino, Bishop of Aosta, was a watchful shep- herd, and before the wolf could carry off many lambs from the flock the alarm was raised, and Calvin was obliged to fly for safety to Geneva. According to the laws of Savoy, if he had been caught he would either have been whipped publicly or sent to the galleys.^ Secular as well as spiritual authorities were beginning to be keenly alive in France to the disorders which the new sectaries were creating. The king, indifferent though he was to religion, thought it well to admonish his sister once more on the danger in which she placed the realm by en- couraging the lawless, for France showed signs of repeating the history of the German Reformation, while the Nether- lands were in a state of ferment from the same cause. In consequence of greater vigilance on the^ part of the govern- ment, a large number of French exiles assembled at Geneva. This city, which became the Mecca of Protestantism, had been long in accepting the new doctrines. But for the iron will of Calvin it might have remained as cosmopolitan as it was at the beginning of the sixteenth century, — as free and thoughtless as it was picturesque. Four races had deposited therein the germ of their distinct nationalities, and it has been aptly said that the Savoyard had given it his honesty as well as his order and economy, that the Italian had endowed it with his enthusiasm for art and his vivid imagination, that to the French it owed its love of pleasure and careless gaiety, while the German had bestowed on it his agricultural tastes and his fondness for wine.^ To induce such a complex agglomeration of peoples to settle down into a homogeneous mass, with predestination and the ^ De Costa, Memoires Hutoriques, etc., vol. i. P- 35^* 2 Charpenne, Hist aire de la Reforme et des Refortnateurs de Geneve, Introduction. 314 Reformation and Renaissance divine origin of evil for a religion, and John Calvin as its oracle, might well have been deemed a Herculean task. But Calvin did not shrink from it, nor from the measures necessary for its accomplishment. If he was a hard task- master, the slavery to which he reduced the citizens was in many ways a just retribution for their faithlessness to a government which, if not perfect in every way, was at least benign and paternal. From the beginning of the fifteenth century, Geneva had had a three-headed legislative administration represented by the Bishop, the Duke of Savoy, and the citizens themselves. The bishops of Geneva were both spiritual and temporal princes, and played their difficult part admirably. All were wise, tolerant, enlightened, and devoted to the best interests of the people and the city. If a franchise was in danger, it was the bishop who defended it. He was a citizen before all ; he protected the people in times of war, and if necessary, as in one remarkable instance, he would die for them. In his secular capacity he cared for the city itself, its public buildings, thoroughfares, hospitals, courts of justice, charitable institutions. As a priest he visited the sick, opened his house to the indigent and his purse to the poor traveller and student, while the widow and the orphan were the objects of his special solicitude. As a magistrate he secured the just administration of the law, and punished those who transgressed it.^ This union between Church and State had been singularly happy. The share in the government reserved to the Duke of Savoy was small but odious, and consisted chiefly in carrying out the sentences pronounced on criminals by the syndic. At a short distance from the city was a fortress called Gaillard, belonging to the Duke, where the supreme sentence of the law was administered. The syndics chosen from the people, and representing them, hav- ing received the criminal from the hands of the bishop, who as a churchman could not pass sentence of death, tried the case in their courts, and if they found the individual guilty, handed him over to their chief, the Vidomne {vice Domini)^ the intermediary between the bishop and the secular arm, with orders to carry out the sentence. The Vidomne then led him to the Chateau de I'lsle, which was under the juris- diction of Savoy, and contained the prisons of the duchy. 1 Audin, vol. i. p. 157. In France and Switzerland 315 Here an archer belonging to the duke cried out three times — " Is there any one here for Monsieur de Savoye, lord of Castle Gaillard ? " Then the Vidomne read out the sentence against the malefactor, the executioner was called, and the duke was responsible for the rest.^ But the Dukes of Savoy were by no means content with the small part they were called upon to play, and were always trying to get more power in Geneva. From 151010 1535 the struggle became acute between the duke and the burghers. Not daring to employ force, he had recourse to stratagem, and offered them an annual tribute, on condition that the gates of the city should be in Savoyard hands, at least when the great fairs were held, four times a year. The burghers refused, and unfortunately just about this time Pope Leo X. made John, Duke of Savoy, Bishop of Geneva. A deputation of Genevese to Friburg returned home, having received the freedom of that city, and bringing with them a treaty of alliance which the partisans of the duke refused to accept, and Geneva began at once to be torn between two opposite factions. Those who were for the alliance with Friburg were called by the ducal party Eid- genossen "- or leaguers, and they in their turn contemptuously designated their opponents as Mammelus or slaves. Not content with the friendship of Friburg, the Eidgnots, as they came vulgarly to be called, formed a league with the Bernese, who had long before declared for the reformed religion, and the Mammelus, foreseeing that if the Bernese gained a footing in Geneva, the very existence of the Catholic faith would be threatened, opposed this alliance also. But the Mammelus were soon thrust out of the city altogether as partisans of the Duke of Savoy, and the Eidgnots seized their goods and appropriated or destroyed them. High-handed though the movement was, the Eidgnots feared lest they should not prove strong enough alone to resist the attack which the duke was preparing, and they summoned their ally Berne to come to their help. Berne responded with a large army, twenty pieces of cannon, and William Farel to convert the Catholics. To show that it had embraced the Gospel, says a well-known historian, the Bernese army smashed all the ^ Bonnivard, MS. Chronicle. 2 Literally, " partakers of an oath." From this word the term Huguenot was formed. 3i6 Reformation and Renaissance statues of saints on its way to Geneva, and caused the horses to drink out of the holy-water fonts in the churches.^ Farel was the most violent of all the reformers of that time. The little fiery-red man never entered a town without creating a disturbance. Even those magistrates who invited him to come and preach revolt from the old faith dared harbour him but a short time. When he had roused the people to a certain pitch, they opened the gates of their town and bade him " God-speed," lest it should become impossible to control the mob. He lived among ruins, groans, im- precations, seditions. " The kingdom of heaven suffereth violence" was his favourite text, and wherever he passed, broken crucifixes, statues, and altar-vessels strewed the way. At Aigle, the Catholics were celebrating the feast of Corpus Christi, and a priest carrying the Blessed Sacrament in procession was advancing towards an altar that had been set up in the street. A great crowd of devout worshippers were assembled. Farel, elbowing his way through, reached the altar, seized the remonstrance (" le soleil d'or "), dashed it to the ground, and disappeared. But notwithstanding his bold fanaticism he was neither honest nor straightforward. Erasmus has recorded of him that he never knew " a greater, more virulent, and seditious liar than this new evangelist." "- It is true that Farel had called Erasmus " Balaam " in one of his writings, but Erasmus was not alone in his bad opinion of him, and even CEcolampadius had been obliged to calm Farel's fury and violence by reminding his brother reformer that he was called to evangelise and not to curse. A contemporary writer ^ describes in quaint old French phrase the entry of the Bernese army into Geneva : — " On a certain Tuesday, the feast of ' Monsieur Saint Francois,' the scouts arrived at Morges to requisition lodg- ings for the troops, and at once began depredations, seizing a ship laden with merchandise to the value of a thousand gold crowns, that was about to put over to the other side of the lake. During the following three days, the two cantons of Friburg and Berne continued to pour into Morges, pillaging the poor folk, and leaving behind them neither ^ Audin, vol. i. p. 150. ^ Eras. Epist. xxx. lib. xviii. pp. 598, 798. ^ Le Levain du Calvinisme ou commencement de Pher'esie de Geneve; faict par Rev'erende sceur Jea?ine de Jussie. Chambery, 161 1. In France and Switzerland 317 corn nor wine nor meat, nor, in the houses of the nobles, furniture, for they burned everything they found therein. When the Bernese troops arrived, they got into the choir of the church, and made a great fire in the nave. They took the ciborium, ' auquel reposait le tres-digne sacrement du precieux corps de Jesus-Christ, notre redempteur,' and threw it into the midst of the flames. They then destroyed the fine painting on the high-altar, and burned all the carved- wood statues, and smashed the great, rich stained -glass window behind the high -altar, and in every chapel where they found statues of the glorious saints, they defaced and mutilated them all. . . . And all the priests whom they encountered wearing a long gown they stripped and beat ; and if there were any images either painted on the flat or in relief or in bosses, or any pictures which they could not reach in order to burn them, they pierced their eyes with the point of their pikes and swords, and spit at them to disfigure and efll^ace them. It was a strange thing to see. They burned all the books of parchment — those belonging to the choir and others. ... On the Monday, towards midday, the army entered Geneva, bringing nineteen great pieces of artillery. ... On the following Tuesday, at about eight o'clock in the morning, the Lutherans had the cathedral church of St. Peter opened, and began ringing the bishop's bell for the sermon, for they had brought their cursed preacher, named Master William Farel, who got into the pulpit and began preaching in German. His audience jumped up on to the altars like goats and brute beasts, in great derision of the image of our redemption, of the blessed Virgin Mary, and of all the saints." For two whole years the work of destruction went on, the Catholics gradually losing ground, and the ruthless in- vaders growing every day more powerful. The same con- temporary writer and eye-witness of some of the scenes above described goes on to relate that, in April 1532, the heretics knocked down the small but beautiful church of St. Laurence, " et fut aussi abattue I'eglise de madame saincte Marguerite." In October of the same year the Vicar-General, Amedee de Gingin, being informed that Farel still went on preaching, assembled the canons in conference, who advised him to send for the said preacher. Farel having presented himself, Maistre de Vegi asked him who had sent him to Geneva, in 3i8 Reformation and Renaissance what cause he came, and by what authority. " The poor miserable creature " replied that he was sent by God, and that he came to preach God's Word, "But," objected de Vegi, " you show no sign that you come from God as Moses did before Pharaoh ; and as for preaching to us, you bring no licence from our revered prelate, the Bishop of Geneva ; moreover, you do not wear the dress of those who are accustomed to announce the Word of God to us, but you are dressed like a soldier and a brigand. ..." In 1533 a tumult, which arose from a desperate effort on the part of the Catholics to regain the upper hand, ended in a still more complete victory of the Protestant invaders. Church after church was demolished by them, and they even succeeded in wresting to themselves the supreme judicial authority. In July 1535 Jacques Malbosson, one of the most respected burghers, was beheaded for attempting to bring back the Bishop of Geneva, " in order that, by his means, heresy might be thrust out." The religious orders, most of which were in a good state of fervour and discipline, suffered in the same way as in Germany. Those communities of nuns who would not agree to disperse were subjected to fallacious arguments and insidious flattery, and when these means proved vain, were insulted and treated with violence. The community of St. Clare, like that of Niirnberg, held out valiantly, and after much persecution and suffering were allowed to leave the city en masse and go to Annecy, where the Duke of Savoy gave them a convent. Whoever follows closely the history of the revolution at Geneva comes necessarily to the conclusion that the intro- duction of Protestantism into the city proceeded far more from political causes than from religious convictions. It began not from any opinion as to the superiority of one dogma over another, but from the determination to get rid of the bishops simply because they suspected them of being creatures of the dukes, and the dukes of desiring to rule Geneva. This continued to be the dominant idea throughout, making the burghers patient under the atrocities perpetrated by the Bernese,^ but it was not enough to transform Catholic Geneva, with its ancient religious institutions and ingrained 1 Fazy, Essais d^un precis de Phistoire de la republique de Geneve, vol. i. pp. 188, 432, 244. ■\y.^t:ru.:::'- .,: tKovuuu iciu ticc _: kAI^k . Calvinii5 fic tout iV.Z J^iH. > JOHN CALVIN. From an engraving published by AUanlt. .'■•!? .1.'.' Calvvn To face f age 319. In France and Switzerland 319 faith, Into an imitation of Lutheran Berne. It took all Farel's and Calvin's despotism, intolerance, and iconoclasm to cloud the brightness of the Genevese character, to take from the people the very recollection of the happiness they had care- lessly thrown avv^ay, and to rob them of that spiritual liberty which had been a precious heritage from their Catholic past, and which they had so wantonly abused. It was found necessary, before all, to convince them how greatly they had been deceived by those to whom they had hitherto looked for guidance, and Froment, a worthy associate of Farel's, undertook accordingly to open their eyes. Assembling a great concourse of people, he held forth to them eloquently on the usual stock subjects of the reformers — the short- comings of the Roman court, designated as the prostitute of Babylon, the Pope as Antichrist, the Cardinals as train- bearers of Satan, priests and monks as living monuments of the seven deadly sins. He then promised them that each and every one of them who read the Scriptures with the intention of seeking the truth was certain to be illumined with the Holy Ghost. This was all the theology he knew, but it was of a kind to be easily learned, and soon there were as many disputants as to the meaning of different texts in the Bible as there were men and women who could read and write. Farel and Viret were evangelising the people in this manner, when Calvin arrived at Geneva in August 1536. His intention had been to proceed the next day to Basle, but Farel adjured him so solemnly to remain where he was, that he was constrained to obey. It was time that something more substantial than an edifice of merely uncomplimentary epithets should be raised on the ruins of Catholicism, and Farel knew that he was not the man to accomplish it. He had no doctrine ; his one delight was in destruction. He was, like another and a greater than he, der Geist der stets verneint. Even the Eidgnots were getting weary of him ; they were hesitating between Luther and Zwingli in the choice of a religion ; he had no suggestion to make, and they recognised that despotism, feverish intolerance, and irascible caprice did not constitute a sufficiently definite formula.^ Protestantism had conquered the city, and the question was now. How to establish itself there } Nothing ^ Audin, vol. i. pp. 197, 239. 320 Reformation and Renaissance existed in the Church of Geneva, everything had to be created, and Calvin was admirably equipped for the task. Hitherto, it had only been given to him to follow in Luther's footsteps, without attaining Luther's prestige as founder of a church. But he had arrived at Geneva at the psychological moment both for Geneva and himself, and it has been suggested that his hesitation to accept Farel's pressing invitation to remain there was feigned.^ He began by extracting from his Christian Institute a catechism of doctrine, and then together with Farel he com- posed a confession of faith to take the place of the Apostles' Creed. He then set forth a code of ecclesiastical discipline, the state of the city being far from satisfactory. But here he came into collision with the Eidgnots, who had supported the Bernese invaders simply out of hatred for the Duke of Savoy, and who were by no means anxious for discipline of any kind. The Calvinists denounced them as freethinkers, and would have banished them ; but as they happened to be in a majority, this was admitted to be difficult ; besides which they had behind them thtjeunesse done of Geneva and all the enemies of Calvin. In the midst of the deadlock, Calvin was summoned to Lausanne, to take part in a public dis- putation between Catholics and Protestants as to the degree of authority that might be attributed to the Fathers on the subject of the Eucharist." He took Farel with him, more perhaps from fear of the mischief he might do if left behind than from any hope of valuable contribution on his part to the cause they both wished to further. During their absence two Anabaptists arrived at Geneva to offer their own par- ticular novelties, since religious innovation was the order of the day. They began by assuring the Genevese that the doctrines that had been newly foisted upon them were a tissue of lies, and as the reformers were just then highly un- popular, owing to Calvin's stringent disciplinary measures, the Anabaptists succeeded in getting a very fair hearing. But the conference at Lausanne being ended, Calvin and Farel reappeared suddenly, and with threats of awful pains and penalties warned the poachers off their ground. Sentence of banishment was passed upon them, and the assurance given them that they would be put to death if they reappeared in 1 Leti, Historia Ginevrina, vol. iii. p. 40. 2 Haag, La France Protestante, vol. iii. p. 118. In France and Switzerland 321 the republic of Geneva. The Anabaptist missionaries yielded to force, and left the city, but not before they had gained many disciples. The Council, composed of Lutherans, Anabaptists, and those who were ready to adopt any form of religion, laughed in their sleeve at the drastic measures of 'M'autre Pape," as they nicknamed Calvin, but they had no intention of allowing him to reform them altogether. His person, his words, and his acts, together with the tuft of red goat's beard of his faithful henchman Farel, were held up to ridicule in the taverns, where of an evening the people slipped out of the Puritan yoke they were forced to wear during the day. It was then decreed that the taverns should be closed at nightfall, all games of dice and cards were forbidden, and every sort of blasphemy and swearing was to be punished by imprisonment. It would have been well if the reformers had been content to stop there, for the prisons were full of delinquents, but Calvin insisted on legislating on the subject of dress and personal adornment, and sins of vanity were punished, as if they belonged to the same category as theft and libel. The registers of the republic under date May 20, 1537, contain the following entry : — *' A married woman went out last Sunday with her hair hanging down more than it ought, which is a bad example and contrary to the Gospel preached. The mistress, the maids who accompanied her, and the woman who dressed her hair have been sent to prison." The Council, having been induced to issue an edict of banishment against all those who had not sworn to Calvin's confession of faith, now made an attempt to tighten their hold on the reins of government, which were fast slipping from their hands. Coraud, one of the most violent of Calvin's familiars, persisted in thundering out denunciations from the pulpit against the magistrates, and all those who were in any way opposed to the new ordonnances of the evangelists. Coraud was then forbidden by the Council to preach, and to Calvin and Farel it was intimated that politics must not be discussed in sermons. But Coraud paid no attention to the order, and the next time he preached, abused those who had ventured to find fault with him, roundly. An officer of justice awaited him at the foot of the pulpit stairs and conducted him to prison. The astonishment and anger of Calvin and Farel were curious to behold. They Y 32 2 Reformation and Renaissance had sent many to prison on far slighter grounds. But the Council were firm, insisted on obedience (Calvin and obedience had long since parted company), and reproached them with having refused to admit certain citizens to the Holy Table, arrogating to themselves the right to judge of the state of a conscience, the innermost recesses of which were known to God alone. The result was a formal protest against the action of the Council, and a refusal on the part of the reformers to distribute the Lord's Supper at all. On Easter Sunday large congregations assembled at the Church of St. Gervais and that of St. Peter, where Farel and Calvin were to preach respectively. Both announced that there would be no celebration of the Lord's Supper, Farel adding in a furious voice, " No communion to drunkards and adulterers such as you ! " Immediately there was an uproar ; bare blades flashed out from under the dark cloaks of the citizens, who rushed tumultuously towards the pulpit. They would have made short work of Farel had not a few of his friends formed a rampart round him. All night long the people ran about the streets shouting " Death to the ministers ! "^ The next day the syndics put each man to the vote, and with an almost unanimous voice the people decreed the exile of Calvin and Farel. They were to leave Geneva in three days. Their choice of Berne as a place of exile did not prove fortunate. They met with little sympathy there, although an attempt was made to reconcile them with the Genevese, who became so exasperated at the possibility of their return that if they had then ventured within the walls of the city they would inevitably have been thrown into the Rhone or the lake. Strassburg, where Bucer was conducting his crusade against the religious orders, proved more hospitable. Calvin gave lessons in theology, and organised a religious congregation of 1500 French refugees, preached, and pre- pared a second edition of his Institute. He also found time to look out for, choose, and marry a wife. She was Idelette Stoerder, the widow of an Anabaptist, with several children. The son she bore to Calvin did not survive his birth. She is described as a good housekeeper, very careful, clean, and ^ Haag, I^ie de Calvin, pp. 92, 93. In France and Switzerland 323 tidy, devoted to her children. Calvin has left it on record that she was an example of every domestic virtue. Hospitably as Calvin was received at Strassburg he was no prophet there. Bucer overshadowed him. The Apostle of Geneva was neither an orator nor in any sense an impressive preacher ; his manner was forbidding, and his matter too academic to be popular. He shone most as a professor, and as a writer, although his style was entirely without charm, and although, with the exception of the Christian Institute, there was no great demand for his books. But for his indomitable force of character, his intense belief in himself and his system, combined with his fanatical hatred of the Catholic Church, the world would have heard no more of him than of Farel or Viret. Calm, methodical, and self-poised, he easily gained the reputation of being a greater man than he was.^ He fell into such poverty that he was forced to sell his library, which was not inconsiderable. Often he had no money in his pocket, a serious matter with a wife and household to provide for. Added to these cares, the very sights of Strassburg were an annoyance to him. He could not walk a step outside his door without being confronted with traces of the Catholic religion which was still tolerated there, on account of the Emperor. The Protestant churches, it is true, all flourished, but they were almost as odious to Calvin as the remnants of Popery, and at Strassburg the Lutheran elbowed the Zwinglian in the streets ; the Ana- baptists and the disciples of Miinzer swarmed. Only the Calvinists were in a miserable minority. Meanwhile, at Geneva, Catholicism appeared to be regaining ground. Mass was said almost publicly.^ But the Anabaptists were also multiplying, and the city was threatened with an aggravated form of iconoclasm. The Council had lost ground with the people, and sought to strengthen itself by a fresh amalgamation of politics and religion. But there was neither unity nor cohesion anywhere. No great name rose above the mass of sects that seethed and wrangled, and denounced each other in bad arguments and worse grammar. Both Viret and Farel ^ Bossuet considered that Calvin had a better-regulated mind than Luther. 2 Haag, La France Protestante, vol. iii. p. 120. 324 Reformation and Renaissance were approached, but neither would consent to administer the distressed Church of Geneva without Calvin. In their confusion and helplessness the Council agreed to recall him. He hesitated, pride refusing to accommodate itself to a return to the city that had banished him with so much ignominy. At last the entreaties of Berne and Basle, added to those of Farel, were allowed to prevail, and dignity was saved by the Council agreeing to the stipulation that he should have a free hand to carry out his reforms, and to establish a Consistory or tribunal of morals. This concession was the deathblow to the liberty and self-respect of the burghers. The Consistory, which in tyranny and petty intolerance far surpassed any accusation of the kind ever brought against the Spanish Inquisition, had been rejected by most of the Protestant churches. CEcolampadius had tried it at Basle, and found it wanting. Bullinger was altogether averse from the system. Zwingli disapproved of it ; but it was the life and soul of Calvinism — an imperium in imperio. It was its business to administer the temporal concerns of the Church, to exercise control over the conduct, speech, and private opinions of each of the faithful, without distinction of rank or fortune ; to denounce, admonish, and, in case of backsliding, strike, the guilty with censures and canonical penances, and even to excommunicate them.^ The Consistory of Geneva displayed extreme activity ; it was composed of all the ministers of the Church, and of twelve elders chosen from different congregations. It was the duty of the elders to pay constant visits to certain families assigned to each of them, in order to assure them- selves of the orthodoxy of each member. These inquisitorial visits led to prosecutions for the most trivial causes. The Consistory met in Council once a week, the reports were then read, and the penalties for all shortcomings in- flicted. Non-attendance at church was punished by a fine, adultery by death, gamblers were put in the pillory, the manufacturers of playing-cards into prison. Brides, unless of unblemished character (as understood by the Consistory) were not allowed to wear wreaths at their weddings ; those who approached the Lord's Supper without permission were sent to prison, those who neglected to approach were ^ Haag, La France Protestante, p. 122. In France and Switzerland 325 banished for a year. Every individual confined to bed with sickness for three days, without giving notice to the ministers, was subject to a fine. Torture was in use, and witches were burned. Henri Estienne, for declaring that without hypocrisy no one could be agreeable to the Consistory, was excommunicated and imprisoned. Another was deprived of his liberty because he had told a minister that he was as honest a man as himself; and a certain individual named Chapuis was thrown into prison for persisting in having his son baptized Claude, when the minister had said the child was to be called Abraham.^ One day a relation of Favre, the reformer, pre- sented himself at church with a young woman from Nantes, to whom he was to be married. The officiating minister, Abel Poupin, asked the bridegroom : '* Do you promise to be faithful to your wife ^ " The bridegroom, instead of answering " Yes," bowed his head in affirmation, whereupon a tumult ensued ; he was accused of disrespect, taken to prison, and put on a diet of bread and water, after being obliged to ask pardon. Abel Poupin was reprimanded by Calvin for not having driven the couple out of the church.2 Images and statues were proscribed, as dangerous to the precept to worship in spirit and in truth ; and the elders were required to ascertain whether any were still treasured in the reformed families. Like Luther and Zwingli, Calvin substituted the Bible for the authority of the Church, and proclaimed it to be the only rule of faith ; but forgetting that he, being a man, was subject to error, when he had searched the Scriptures and made up his mind as to their interpretation, he imposed that interpretation upon his Church, and imagined that to attack his teaching was to fight against God in his person.^ In 1543 Calvin gave the Church of Geneva a new liturgy which he professed to have reduced to the simplicity of apostolic times. The service began with the reading aloud of a general confession of sin. A psalm was then sung, after which the minister said a prayer, recited the confession of faith, and addressed the congregation in a ^ Haag, La Trance Pro test ante, p. 123. 2 Charpenne, Histoire de la Re/or me et des Reformatei/rs, etc. p. 463? ^ Haag, La France Protestante, p. 127. 326 Reformation and Renaissance sermon. Another psalm was then sung, the benediction was given, and the service was at an end. The sermon was not only the centre but the principal part of public worship ; but some regretted that Calvin had not, like the English reformers, retained parts of the imposing Roman liturgy. The celebration of the Lord's Supper was stripped of every accessory likely to remind the people of the sacrifice of the Mass. It was his wish that the faithful should communicate every month, but in this he was overruled, and communions were limited to four in the year. Calvin had returned as a conqueror, and he made haste to let his authority be felt, ruling all things, spiritual and temporal, with a rod of iron ; but although he was thence- forth practically King of Geneva his reign was not altogether undisputed. As head and chief of the dominant party he was constantly in the arena, fighting or threatening those who opposed him, and it was fully twelve years before his position was thoroughly won. But then it was such as no pope ever possessed. His ipse dixit on every possible subject and occasion was regarded by himself and his disciples as infallible as any doctrine concerning faith or morals delivered at Rome ex cathedra. His principal weapons were his written sermons, of which there are at the present time 2025 extant in the archives of the Public Library at Geneva, and his correspondence, which would fill at least thirty-five volumes folio. When the force of argument failed there remained the argument of force, and no consideration of mercy or com- passion, far less any misgiving as to his own competence as a judge, ever stayed his avenging hand. His first victim was Sebastian Chateillon, known in the learned world as Castalion, a scholar of great repute and of amazing industry. Rising at dawn, he taught Greek, Latin, and Hebrew for twelve hours a day, and when his lessons were over would earn a few more pence, for he was very poor, at chopping wood. His most sumptuous meals consisted of black bread dipped in milk. When Calvin arrived at Strassburg, Castalion generously laid open to him his treasures of philosophy and medicine, for he was skilled in the art of healing, had studied botany, and knew many things that were still a mystery to the physicians of his day. In return, Calvin gave him a little room in his house, and a week's hospitality, bidding him depart when the room was In France and Switzerland 327 wanted for another guest. This guest, Mademoiselle des Vergers, fell dangerously ill, and Castalion saved her life. When Calvin was recalled from exile he offered him the chair of humanities at the College of Geneva. The scholar accepted, and found time, when his duties were done for the day, to work at a translation of the Bible into Ciceronian Latin, with a philosophical commentary. The work was denounced to the Consistory. Castalion demanded a public disputation with Calvin, but it was decided that the discussion should take place secretly, " it being desirable that such things should not be made public." The result was that Castalion was deprived of his professorship, and obliged to leave Geneva. He went to Basle, where the senate gave him a post as professor of Greek, but before all else it behoved him to defend his honour against Calvin, who, bent on his ruin, had calumniated him in a pamphlet, and stooped to taunt him with having eaten his bread at Strassburg. More than this, he accused the poor scholar of theft, because, to warm his half-starved body, his wife, and eight children, he had fished a little driftwood out of the Rhine. Even as he wrote to reproach Calvin with his cruelty, Castalion was dying of starvation ; and Calvin, enraged at the scholarly defence of human liberty which he had put forth in answer to Calvin's own book on predestination, let him die slowly for want of the bread with which the reformer's table was now so plentifully provided.^ Westphal, an adversary whose ruthless pen was better able to measure words with Calvin than that of the timid, erudite philosopher Castalion, met with no greater' considera- tion. The subject of their quarrel was the blessed Eucharist, one that controversialists might well be expected to treat reverently, but which has called forth more vituperation, gross language, and blasphemy than any other. Strange to relate, Calvin in his dispute with Westphal, having copiously employed the epithets "madman," "mad dog," "son of the devil," and other equally choice expressions, to describe his opinion of his opponent, wrote to Melchior Wolmar that he had contented himself with defending his doctrine, " in all sobriety and modesty." " ^ Castalion's Defensio, pp. 2-26. Nouvelle Biographic Ghierale, art. "Jean Calvin"; Audin, vol. ii. pp. 217-229. - Haag, La France Protestatite, p. 127. 328 Reformation and Renaissance Jerome Bolsec, a physician from Lyons, had taken refuge at Geneva when the persecution of heresy in France had made it no longer safe for him to remain in his own country. In conformity with Calvin's precept to take the Bible as the sole basis of his faith, he had after a long study, in which if he had been perfectly consistent, Calvin would have agreed that the Holy Ghost had illumined him also, Bolsec came to a different conclusion from Calvin on the subject of predestination. He was accused of Pelagianism, and of having insulted Calvin, on which two charges he was arrested and thrown into prison. His trial being concluded, he demanded to be set at liberty ; but Calvin feared that if he were once more free to write and speak, he would attack the very doctrine of predestination itself, and Bolsec remained in prison while the other Swiss churches were consulted about his case. If they had condemned him there is little doubt but that his head would have fallen on the scaffold.^ But the churches of Berne and of Basle were becoming weary of Calvin's dogmatising intolerance ; Berne suggested that charity no less than truth was agreeable to God, and that after all, the dispute depended only on the meaning of certain words ; Basle was of the same opinion, and recom- mended gentleness and silence. Only Zurich was for violence, demanding the death of the heretic. Then began a struggle between Calvin and the Consistory, the latter advising that the prisoner should be set un- conditionally at liberty, clear from the imputation of heresy, and free to live peaceably at Geneva. Calvin would not hear of such a conclusion, and demanded that Bolsec should at least be branded with a mark of infamy on his forehead ! In the end, a compromise was made, and the following sentence was passed : — " We, syndics, in pursuance of the alleged criminal Jerome Bolsec : it is demonstrated that you have risen up with too great effrontery in the holy congregation ; you have proposed an opinion contrary to evangelical truth ; you have been shown by the Word of God and by the opinions of the Churches that your sentiments are false ; you have not been willing to admit it ; you are thus worthy of severe punishment. Nevertheless, we wish to act with ^ Fazy, Essai a'lm precis de Phistoire de la r'cpublique de Geneve, p. 275. In France and Switzerland 329 gentleness, and to commute your penalty ; therefore we banish you for ever from the territory of Geneva." ^ Bolsec's one revenge was to write the life of Calvin — a work which in the light of modern research is proved to be of greater value and authority than his contemporaries imagined it to be. Before his death Bolsec returned to the bosom of the Catholic Church. Jacques Gruet was a Genevese patriot whose high spirits led him to write more or less impertinent verses against " Jean de Noyon " and the other French refugees, who found themselves so thoroughly at home at Geneva that they permitted themselves to censure every one and everything displeasing to them personally. One day a paper was dis- covered affixed to the pulpit of St. Peter's Church ; on it were written in Savoyard patois some contemptuous ex- pressions applied to Calvin. Although the handwriting was not his, the popular voice attributed their authorship to Gruet, and he was arrested. Already several times he had been denounced from the pulpit as a licentious blasphemer, and he had laughed and mocked, and gone on his way, which was that of taverns and convivial company. His house was now searched, and even his dustbin ransacked. Among his papers some fragments of ribald verse were found. On one ot the margins of Calvin's book against the Anabaptists were written the words *' All folly." - Herein lay the kernel of Gruet 's misdemeanours. The draft of a letter also came to light, and served as evidence that the poet had dared to make fun of the reformer. The offence was contained in these words, "As our gallant Calvin has done." Half the prosecutions at Geneva would have fallen to the ground had Calvin possessed a gleam of humour in his composition, or the slightest appreciation of the ridiculous. The twenty -third and twenty -fourth articles of the accusation drawn up against Gruet were : " He must have accomplices, which he must be brought to name," and " He tnust be punished corporally." ^ The words were significant ; they meant torture. The third article, "All enemies of the Reformation (that is, of the ^ Gaberel, Calvin a Geneve, p. 219. - GalifFe, Notices genealogiques sur les families genevoises,yo\.\u. p. 262, note. 2 liiJ. pp. 260, 261. 330 Reformation and Renaissance Church of Geneva) in word or will are rebels against God, and deserve grievous punishment," marks the distance which the reformers had travelled since their first entrance into Geneva, when it was announced that in future thought would be free. Gruet was put on the rack at intervals during a month, and sometimes twice a day, till he cried out in his intense agony, " Finish me in mercy ; I am dying," This was on July 9, 1547 ; the day before, he had admitted in the midst of his torments having placed the incriminating paper on the pulpit at St. Peter's. When almost at his last breath, he was taken off the rack, cordials were administered, and he was allowed to revive. Calvin's object was to get him to accuse Francis Favre, a former colleague and benefactor of the reformer's, and his son-in-law. Ami Perrin,^ but Gruet gave no sign. Fearing that there would be nothing but a corpse to drag to the scaffold, sentence of death was passed on the dying man. One of the terms of the indictment against him was that he had calumniated Calvin, and that he had conspired with the King of France against the reformer's safety, and that of the country. On this charge not a tittle of real evidence was forthcoming. Gruet was executed on July 26, but Calvin was not yet content. Scraps of paper collected from the roof, the hearth, the rubbish heap, were pieced together, forming thirteen pages of hieroglyphics, which Calvin declared to be in Gruet's handwriting, and to contain such enormities and horrible impieties as to close for ever the mouths of those who would excuse their author. As Gruet was no longer alive to affirm or deny anything, the case must remain unproven, for the leaves were formally burned to ashes in front of the poet's house, and Calvin scored another triumph.^ Possibly Gruet was but the scapegoat for the many. The public archives of Geneva for this period are crowded with registers, in which are numberless records of the birth of illegitimate children, of hideous lawsuits full of revolting ^ Perrin only escaped Gruet's fate by flight. Notwelk Biographie Generate, art. "Jean Calvin." '■^ MS. in the archives at Berne, marked " Avis que Calvin donna au Conseil sur la procedure qu'on devoit tenir contre le livre de Gruet^^ written in Calvin's hand. In France and Switzerland 331 details, of wills in which parents denounce their own children, accusing them of unmentionable crimes, of secret information concerning nearly a whole population, and testifying to the kind of reform that had been set up in the place of the old religion. The most notorious of Calvin's victims was Michael Servetus, a Spaniard, born in 1509, and educated by the Dominicans in all the lore of all the ages. He was a marvel of erudition, being proficient in Latin, Greek, Hebrew, theology, medicine, and law. After studying the Renaissance in Italy, he went to Germany, where he adopted many of Luther's heresies, and published at Hagenau in 1531 a book, De Trinitatis erroribus^ full of the most horrible blasphemies against the doctrine of the blessed Trinity. At Basle he disputed with CEcolampadius, and went on to Strassburg with Bucer and Capito. He had the rage for argumentation, and would not rest till he had defended his these, on the Con- suhstantialily of the Word, with Bucer, who afterwards declared that " Servetus deserved to have his entrails plucked out, and his body torn to pieces." ^ Henceforth both Lutherans and Calvinists repudiated him. Servetus abused Calvin's doctrine, and Calvin spoke of him as of one demented ; and his fury against Servetus for presuming to question his infallibility was not to be suppressed. In 1546 he wrote to Farel that if Servetus should come to Geneva he would never suffer him to depart alive.^ He was as good as his word. One of the most remarkable characteristics of the re- formers was their immediate abandonment of the position they had claimed for all, — freedom of conscience and the right of private judgment. No sooner had they shaken themselves free from authority than each set up for himself a separate standard of faith and morals, often diametrically opposed to that of his brother reformer. Moreover, the hatred which they mutually bore to the old religion was not more keen and profound than that with which they anathematised the doctrines of their fellow heretics. Calvin led the advanced ^ Drummond, The Life of Michael Servetus, pp. 10, 11. Drelin- court, Defense de Calvin, p. 285. - Varillas, Revolutions, vol. viii. The original letter from which Varillas translated is in the Bibliothequc du Roi, Collection MS. Dupuy, Nos. 101, 102. 332 Reformation and Renaissance guard of intolerance, and so great was his enmity towards Servetus that he even denounced him as a heretic to Cardinal Tournon, Archbishop of Lyons, Servetus being then in his diocese. But the Cardinal only laughed, and exclaimed, " Here is one heretic accusing another of heresy ! " This accusation was called forth by another book, of which Servetus was the anonymous author, and which he had caused to be secretly printed at Vienne in France, the printers at Basle being afraid to have anything to do with it. It was an attack on Calvin and Melanchthon, and was entitled Christianismi Restitutio. When 800 copies had been printed, Servetus caused them to be made into six parcels, five being addressed to Peter Merrin, a publisher at Lyons, and the sixth to John Frellon, a bookseller with well-known heretical tendencies in the same city. He ordered Frellon to despatch the parcel promptly to Frankfort -on -the -Main, the great market for heretical works in the sixteenth century. But Frellon was inquisitive ; he opened the parcel, and being a friend of Calvin's, when he saw the nature of the work, sub- tracted several copies and sent them to Geneva.^ It was the most able refutation of Calvin's fatalism that had hitherto appeared, and the author of Predestination was beside himself with rage. Servetus was in France, the book was equally obnoxious to Catholics and Calvinists alike, except that the writer had vindicated the authority of the Church against private interpretation of the Scriptures. Calvin's hint to Cardinal Tournon having produced no result, the reformer went to work more systematically. There was at Geneva a French exile named Trie, who having become bankrupt fraudulently at Lyons, had fled from justice to the great refuge for all criminals. He gave him- self out as an evangelist, escaping from Catholic persecution, and had thus obtained help from Calvin, who now made use of him to destroy Servetus. This Trie had a cousin at Lyons, named Antoine Arneys, a Catholic, whose heart was set on bringing the wandering sinner back to the Church, and who therefore kept up an active correspondence with him. Trie showed his cousin's letters to Calvin, who dic- tated answers to them, cleverly insinuating into his defence of Trie's new religion information concerning Servetus and his book, and giving minute details as to his whereabouts 1 Audin, vol. ii. p. 254. In France and Switzerland 333 and the criminality of his arguments, in the assurance that Arneys would denounce him to the authorities. He sub- joined to the letter several leaves of the Christianismi Restitutio. All turned out as Calvin had surmised ; the letter and the pages from the book found their way into the hands of the inquisitor, Matthew Ory, and the Cardinal was now bound to take up the affair, the law of the land com- pelling him. Servetus was imprisoned, and Calvin, always through letters supposed to be written by Trie, supplied the French authorities with evidence on which the prosecution was founded. But the prisoner was so negligently confined that perhaps his escape was connived at, and he left his prison without the least difficulty, at four o'clock on the morning of April 7, 1553, and the authorities were contented with burning him along with his book, in effigy. He intended to have gone to Naples, there to practise medicine, having no further desire to meddle with theology ; but whether he feared to ask his way, or whether at the last moment Italy seemed to offer more dangers than Switzerland, he found himself on the road to the latter country. After three months of walking, hiding, starving, suffering of every kind, he was within a few days of reaching Zurich, where he might consider himself in safety. But the route necessitated his passing through Geneva, and when he asked for a boat to set him across the lake, in order that he might join the high road to Zurich, he was told that the wind did not serve, that the lake was too rough, and he was forced to remain at the inn that night. In the meanwhile he was recognised, and betrayed to Calvin, who hastened to one of the syndics to request that " in virtue of the power attached to his office by the criminal laws he would cause Servetus to be apprehended." The syndic obligingly consented, and Calvin owned that it was on his own suit that Servetus was made prisoner.^ The first examination took place on August 14, when he, " Servetus, a great sower of heresies " should answer concern- ing his writings and opinions to a catalogue of thirty-eight or forty articles drawn up by Calvin, to the effect that he had troubled the churches of Germany by his heresies, that he had been forced to fly to escape punishment, that he had ^ Allvvoerden, p. 64, note. 334 Reformation and Renaissance printed an execrable book which infected many people, that he had privately printed another book containing infinite blasphemies, and had further disseminated his poison by annotations on the Bible, and on Ptolemy's geography. Finally, being a prisoner at Vienne, he had escaped. Reply- ing first to the last clause, Servetus said that it was true he had escaped, but that his prison was kept as unguardedly as if the priests had wished him to save himself by flight ; and he accused Calvin of being the real author of his incarceration at Vienne. His judges then, at Calvin's instigation, limited his answers to " yes " and " no." The inquisitors at Vienne had been more indulgent, and had allowed him to explain in his own sense passages to which exception had been made.^ Servetus, in spite of the injunction, answered as he pleased. The most formidable accusation was reserved for the last of all. It was that he had in his published works inveighed bitterly against a minister of the Word of God in the Church of Geneva, even against Monsieur Calvin and his doctrine, which he had denounced by every injurious epithet which it was possible to invent. Servetus replied that he had written in his own defence, not with any intent to abuse him, but to demonstrate his errors, which he undertook to do once more in a full congregation by solid arguments and the Bible. After a second examination on the doctrines contained in his Christianismi Restitutio^ he was sent back to prison, his petition to be allowed counsel being denied. His books were in Latin, and not one of his judges understood that language, but during the whole time of his trial, Calvin, from the pulpit preached vigorously against his doctrines and his morals, heaping every insult upon an enemy absent and incapable of answering him.- Meanwhile, the unfortunate man was lying on straw in his dungeon, devoured by vermin. After five weeks of great suffering, during which nothing had been concluded, he wrote a touching appeal to the Council. The senators would at least have sent him a shirt and some linen, but Calvin opposed their desire and was obeyed.^ After this, he wrote several letters, demanding justice, and imploring pity on his physical sufferings, which were intensified by the cold and damp of ^ Drummond, pp. 73, 74.. ^ Castalion, Contra libellurn Calvini, p. 25. ^ Galiffe, Notices genealogiques, vol. iii. p. 442. In France and Switzerland 335 his dungeon, all being met with stony silence. At length, on October 21, the court assembled to deliberate on the manner of his punishment. A small number of his judges were for imprisonment, but the great majority voted for death. Again, the manner of death was debated, and it was decided that Servetus should be burned. When the news was brought to him he melted into tears. The next day Farel appeared to conduct him to the stake. After vainly trying to persuade him to recant, he suggested that Servetus should be reconciled to Calvin before he died. The prisoner consented, and Calvin, who came accompanied by two members of the Council, asked him what he wanted. " For- giveness, for all that in which I have offended you," replied Servetus humbly. The pride and self-sufficiency of the reformer's answer make it impossible to listen to it with patience : "God is my witness," said Calvin, " that I do not remember the harm that has been done to me. I have never been other than gentle towards my enemies ; to you I have shown nothing but benevolence, and you have responded to it with outrage. But let us not, I beg you, speak of me ; you have only time to think of God and of your retractation." Servetus was silent and they parted. When the prison doors were opened, the people saw a figure like a corpse coming towards them. His hair had grown quite white in his dungeon ; he looked like a very old man, though he was not quite forty-five. Some of the faces in the crowd were wet with tears. At the town-hall his sentence was read. Servetus fell on his knees crying, " The sword, in mercy, and not the fire, or I may lose my soul from despair ! " Farel raised him up and said : " Confess your crime, and God will have mercy on your soul." " I am not a criminal," answered Servetus ; " I have not merited death. May God help me and forgive me my sins." " In that case," said Farel, " I shall leave you to yourself." Servetus then from time to time lifted his eyes to heaven and murmured, " Oh, Jesus, son of the living God, mercy ! mercy ! " - At the place of execution Farel, pointing to the poor wretch, who had thrown himself on the ground, and was biting the dust, took the opportunity to revile him to the 1 Mosheim, Geschichte des spanischen Arztes Servede, p. 223. 2 Castalion, Contra libellum Calvini, p. 68. 33^ Reformation and Renaissance people. " Behold him ! " he cried, " in the hands of the devil who will not let him go." When Farel exhorted him to confess Jesus Christ the eternal Son of God,^ Servetus remained silent, and the minister left him, with the words : " Listen, Satan is about to take possession of this soul.^ A stake had been driven deep into the ground, and Servetus was bound to it by an iron chain. His neck was held by a rope coiled round it four or five times ; his head was covered with a cap of straw saturated with sulphur. The book Tie Trinitatis erroribus hung on the stake. He remained for a long time in this position, exposed to the eyes of an immense crowd. At last he entreated ;the executioner to make haste ; but the man, with trembling hands, was already heaping round the victim faggots of green wood with all the speed possible. When he set fire to the faggots the feet of the sufferer were soon buried in the flames, while his head was enveloped in sulphur and smoke, through which his lips were seen to move in prayer. When the fire reached his face, a terrible rattle was heard in his throat, so that the people standing round shuddered with horror. Some of the men, moved with pity, ran to help the executioner suffocate him with burning logs. One more sound issued from the midst of the pile, " Jesus, Son eternal^ have pity on me ! " Then all was still, and Calvin closed the window at which he had been sitting to watch the last agony of his hated enemy.^ It was October 27, 1553. Well might Michelet write, " If in any country of Europe there is a cry for blood and for a man who will torture, burn, and murder, that man is at Geneva, ready and willing. He will begin by giving thanks to God, singing psalms in His praise."^ 1 One of his chief errors was the denial of the eternal generation of the Son of God. 2 Gaberel, Calvin a Geneve, pp. 230, 231. ^ Fazy, Ess at d'un precis stir P hist aire de la republique de Geneve, vol. i. p. 276. * Michelet, Histoire de France, vol. x. p. 430. Nouvelle edition. CHAPTER IX Calvin's influence on the English reformation — the protector somerset edward vi, cranmer john knox. 1547-155+ Great as was the revolution eiFected by Henry VIII. in separating England from Rome, and in cutting off all com- munication between Lambeth and the Vatican, thus reversing the customs that had prevailed since it was a Christian country,^ his action was but the prelude to a change of religion which in the next reign became radical and complete. It matters little that Henry neither intended nor foresaw that change : his breach with the Pope was the removal of the keystone which, sooner or later, must have caused the entire arch to collapse, as collapse it did during the minority of his son. The mistaken notion that has prevailed con- cerning the extent of papal jurisdiction in the Church of England has been mainly responsible for the fallacious theory of what has been termed continuity. But that theory has now been thoroughly discredited by the most 1 " The Apostolic See was in the Middle Ages the omnicompetent court of first instance for the whole of Christendom. The Pope was every man's ordinary." — F. W. Maitland, Roman Canon Law in the Church of England^ p. 104. "Already, in the twelfth century, appeals to Rome had become frequent. These were rarely decided by the Pope himself, who usually delegated them to two or three English prelates, who sat, not as English prelates, but as representatives of the Pope." — Ibid. p. 127. "The most permanently important part of the ecclesiastical litigation that went on in this country came before these prelates, who sat, not as 'judges ordinary,' but as papal emissaries. For instance, matrimonial cases were frequently taken to Rome, and were, at any rate, not treated in the secular courts at all, but came under this legislation." — Maitland and Pollock, History of English Law, vol. i. p. 114 ; vol. ii. p. 373. 337 ^ 33 8 Reformation and Renaissance able historians and those in the best position to judge of what really was done in England at the Reformation, and henceforth no serious student of history will care to maintain it.^ If it were still necessary to prove that the old religion was proscribed, and a new one set up in the reign of Edward VI., we should only need to remind the reader of the wholesale destruction of images, the pulling down of altars, and the replacing of them by tables, the abolition of the Mass, the imprisonment of the bishops Bonner and Gardiner, for their refusal to conform to the Book of Common Prayer, and the Act of Uniformity, which made the refusal to use the new service penal. Moreover, but for the clear under- standing that a great repudiation of the old religion had taken place in the preceding reign, a unanimous resolution would not have been passed by both Houses of Parliament under Queen Mary, to return to the Communion of the ^ Dr. James Gairdner, in his learned volume, Th English Church in the Sixteenth Century^ supplies indisputable evidence to prove that the whole religious system of the Church of England was changed at the Reformation, and that the present national church was begun and founded by Henry VIII. The writer of a notable paper in the Church Quarterly Review for April 1903, entitled, "England and Rome in the Middle Ages," says pertinently : "When once the Pope had been recognised as the repositary of the orthodox tradition, it was hard to avoid the conclusion that he had the right to exercise great influence on the National Churches. This was in fact allowed by the most outspoken critics of the Curia and of individual Popes. England produced a fair number of such critics, and some of these were very bold. But there is not one who ventured to deny that the Pope had claims upon the obedience of the English Church. They might allege that he had overstepped the limits of his just prerogative ; they never questioned that the prerogative itself was just and of con- siderable extent. . . . The breach with Rome entailed therefore a violent breach with old habits and old rules of conduct. The Church escaped from a tyranny, but a tyranny in which she had to the last believed. It was necessary in consequence to remodel our ecclesiastical institutions. But this revolution was trifling, as compared wtth the revolution in religious ideas and modes of thought. The elimination of the Papacy meant the introduction of a theory of the Catholic Church which might be patriotic, but had never been Anglican. . . . These facts being con- sidered, it is evidently a mistake to speak of the Reformation as a mere episode in the history of the English Church. . . . The ground which the Papacy had won before the time of Gregory the Great was never called in question by any National Church before the Reformation. This, we venture to think, is the view taken by all the great historical apologists for the Anglican position. They have recognised the futility of appealing to the opinion of the mediaeval Church, and we shall be well advised to follow their example." The English Reformation 339 Catholic Church. When Cardinal Pole pronounced the words of absolution, " from all heresy and schism, and all judgments, censures and penalties for that cause incurred," all present declared that they ratified Gardiner's words, and desired to return to the unity of the Catholic Church.^ As there was nothing ambiguous in the words of reconciliation, neither had there been any mistake as to what the govern- ment intended, and what the nation knew they intended, in the reign of Edward VI, It is therefore the more astonishing when a modern writer of reputation, although not venturing to assert that there was no change of religion at the Reformation in England, has yet maintained that there was in this country no such complete break with the past, no such doctrinal revolution in the history of the English people, as there was in that of the Teutonic nations on the continent.^ With regard to this statement, it is first of all necessary to point out that the breach with the past was far more complete in the case of the French Calvinists than with the Teutonic Lutherans, who clung to a sacramental system, and believed at least in Consubstantiation, while to the Calvinists, the Supper of the Lord was a mere commemoration. Besides this, we have only to read with a little care Calvin's, Bullinger's, and Peter Martyr's correspondence and relations with the Duke of Somerset, Cranmer, and Edward VI. to perceive the solidity of the bond which united the reformers at home and the Calvinists abroad, as well as the common cause that was between them. Calvin's ideas had not been tolerated in England during the reign of Henry VIII., ^ the French reformer having ridiculed Henry's new-fangled supremacy, and scorned the man who had delivered his country " from the primacy of Peter to saddle it with the primacy of Henry." But so palatable was the homage he received from Edward's Council, and so agreeable to him were their views, that he found it convenient to forget that Somerset was acting for the king as Supreme Head of the Church of England. " Never was greater deference paid to foreign opinion 1 Journal of the House of Commons, 38. Pole's Correspondence, Appendix, 315-318. 2 Pollard, England under the Protector Somerset^ P- QI- 3 Gairdner, History of the English Church, p. 227. 340 Reformation and Renaissance than now, in a church which had been emancipated from the jurisdiction of a foreign bishop," ^ and Somerset did more than any other to give practical effect to the Protestant revolution.^ He wrote to ask Calvin's advice on the manner of carrying out the principles of the Reformation in England, and in an immensely long letter, dated October 22, 1548, Calvin replied that he gave thanks to God that the Protector had no need of instruction as to the doctrine he was to uphold, God having enlightened him and given him know- ledge, counsel, and discretion as to the preaching of the pure Gospel.' On October 20, 1549, King Edward wrote to the senate of Zurich : " There is also a mutual agreement be- tween us concerning the Christian religion and true godli- ness, which ought to render this friendship of ours, by God's blessing, yet more intimate." Edward probably wrote this at Somerset's desire, but the Protector was not alone in courting the foreign Protestant divines, and Cranmer, as early as July 1548, wrote to John a Lasco, one of the most violent anti-Catholics, inviting him to come over and to bring with him Melanchthon, that they might "commune together on the building up of religion," for that they in England were " desirous of setting forth in our churches the true doctrine of God, and have no wish to adapt it to all tastes, or to deal in ambiguities ; but laying aside all carnal considerations, to transmit to posterity a true and explicit form of doctrine, agreeable to the rule of the sacred writings ; so that there may not only be set forth among all nations an illustrious testimony respecting our doctrine, delivered by the grave authority of learned and godly men, ^ but that all posterity may have a pattern to imitate. For the purpose of carrying this important design into execution, we have thought it necessary to have the assistance of learned men, who, having compared their opinions together with us, may do away with all doctrinal controversies, and build up an entire system of true doctrine." * 1 Gairdner, History of the English Church, p. 291. 2 Dictionary of National Biography, Art. " Edward Seymour, first Earl of Hertford and Duke of Somerset." 3 Lettres de Jean Calvin, from May 1528 to May 1564. Edition, Jules Bonnet. * Archbishop Cranmer to John a Lasco, Original Letters on the Eng- lish Reformation, vol. i. p. 16, Parker Society. This was probably an The English Reformation 341 This very explicit determination, " to build up an entire system of true doctrine" by the help of the continental reformers, is surely incompatible with any desire to preserve continuity of teaching in the Church of England. Cranmer had formed the project of uniting all the Pro- testant churches, and was very desirous of bringing it about speedily. He thought that England would be the fittest place for the deliberations, and the king was easily per- suaded that he was right. The result was a letter to Melanchthon, and other foreign Protestants, as well as to Calvin himself, lamenting the differences that were in the reformed churches, and inviting their representatives to come to England. Owing to the disturbed state of public affairs both at home and abroad, the purpose of a universal Protestant synod was frustrated ; in the meanwhile, the Catholic bishops and theologians had assembled at the Council of Trent, and in 1552 Cranmer wrote to Calvin as follows : — " Our adversaries are now holding their councils at Trent, for the establishment of their errors ; and shall we neglect to call together a godly synod for the refutation of error, and for restoring and propagating the truth .? They are, as I am informed, making decrees respecting the wor- ship of the host, wherefore we ought to leave no stone unturned, not only that we may guard others against this idolatry, but also that we may ourselves come to an agree- ment upon the doctrine of this sacrament. . . . You have now my wish, about which I have also written to Masters Philip (Melanchthon) and Bullinger ; and I pray you to deliberate among yourselves as to the means by which this synod can be assembled with the greatest convenience. Fare- well. — Lambeth, March 20, 1552. Your very dear brother in Christ, Thomas Cantuar." ^ But Calvin's experience of the amount of tractability that was to be expected from the brethren when it became a question of their mutual agreement in matters of doctrine, invitation to take part in the compilation of the Prayer Book. Melanch- thon could not be persuaded to come, but John a Lasco hastened to obey the summons. 1 Original Letters on the English Reformation^ vol. i. p. 24, Parker Society. 342 Reformation and Renaissance made the Genevan Pope far less keen than Cranmer to assemble them in council. Moreover, he was not in his own natural element at debates and deliberations : if men listened to him as the oracle of God, well and good, but he was never inclined to weigh other men's opinions, much less to tolerate them if they differed by a hair's-breadth from his own ; and perhaps he foresaw the storms and tempests that would inevitably disturb all this brotherly talk of union if once his authority were questioned. Those who wished to be guided by his infallible doctrine had his books already, wherein his mind was reflected. Calvin therefore replied that as for himself, he would not grudge to pass over ten seas if there were need ; that if it were only to contribute some assistance to the kingdom of England he should esteem it a reason lawful enough ; but, much more, he thought he ought to spare no labour, no trouble, to procure a means whereby the churches that were so widely divided might unite among themselves. But he hoped, his weakness and insufficiency being such, he might be spared ; and that he would do his part in prosecuting that with his prayers and wishes which should be undertaken by others. He went on to urge Cranmer to proceed with the matter till he should have some effect at least, though it succeeded not in all respects according to his wish. And so he prayed God to guide him with His Holy Spirit, and to bless his pious endeavours.^ Cranmer was as unsuccessful with Melanchthon as with Calvin ; neither of them could be persuaded to set foot in England, although many of the reformers required no second invitation. Peter Martyr had been one of the first to arrive, and in December 1548 wrote to Martin Bucer from Oxford, where he had obtained a professorship : " Transubstantiation is now, I think, exploded . . . with respect to a change of religion, they can no longer retrace their steps ; for such great innovations have everywhere taken place, and all things are so changed and removed from their former state, that if they were long suffered to remain so, wonder- ful disorders would ensue." Martyr goes on to beg his friend to come to England " and take compassion upon 1 Strype, Memorials of Archbishop Cranmer, vol. i. p. 587, This letter is printed in full in Original Letters on the English Reformation, vol. ii. p. 711 ; also in Cranmer' s Remains, p. 4.32, Parker Society. The English Reformation 343 the Lord's flock. Those who possess any share of learn- ing are either wholly opposed to religion (meaning that they were papists), or if they are actuated by any feeling of it, are either not engaged in the sacred office, or are so cold as altogether to shrink from the endurance of any labours or perils." ^ Bucer arrived at Lambeth in April 1549, accompanied by Fagius the Hebraist, and Cranmer eagerly welcomed them both. He made Bucer regius professor of divinity at Cambridge, Peter Martyr already occupying that chair at Oxford.^ Ochino, a friend of Bucer's and an ex-Capuchin friar, was rewarded with a prebend at Canterbury. John a Lasco was already actively employed. Stumphius and John of Ulm received preferments at Christ Church, Oxford. The foreign prelates, formerly presented to English livings by the Pope, were now represented by men professing every variety of opinion on the one subject of the Eucharist, from Sacramentarians to those who saw in it nothing but a com- memoration. While Bucer attacked the Catholic doctrine of Transub- stantiation, Peter Martyr differed from Bucer, taking a still lower view. Disputations were held at both universities, and the new doctrines introduced from Zurich and Basle were supported by royal authority. Dryander, a Lutheran, whom Cranmer had placed at Cambridge, imagined that the tendency in England was not to form an entire body of definite doctrines, but to reform the public worship in churches.^ He was mistaken ; there was no lack of novelty- preaching in London, but in the country parts the people were still in happy ignorance of the change that was being effected. Martyr deplored the fact, in a letter to Gualter, that in most places they were still opposing the reform "owing to their want of instruction," being "secretly confirmed in their errors by the subtle artifices of the papists." Calvin, in refusing to come to England, by no means washed his hands of the responsibility for what was taking 1 Original Letters, vol. ii. p. 468. 2 His predecessor had been Dr. Richard Smith, who, after recanting at Paul's Cross, returned to the old religion, and had consequently been deprived and replaced by Martyr. — Gairdner, History of the English Churchy p. 263. 3 Original Letters, vol. i. p. 348. 344 Reformation and Renaissance place ; he wrote urging Cranmer to activity in eradicating the last traces of superstition, and Cranmer begged him earnestly to address Edward on the same subject. Accord- ingly, in January 1551, Calvin wrote to him, comparing him to the young King Josias, and encouraging him to persevere in the work begun ; he implored him to abolish prayer for the dead, and the invocation of saints, and he reminded him that having re-established the purity of God's service, it behoved him to break down the high places, that the memory of the idolatrous worship might be destroyed. He sent him two books which he had dedicated to him — one on the Prophet Isaias, the other on the canonical epistles. The books were welcomed at the English court with the greatest delight, and Calvin wrote again to Somerset shortly afterwards, giving him advice how to proceed with the reform. A year later he again addressed a letter to Edward VI., sending him his Brief Explanation of the %']th Psalm^ telling the boy-king that as he was expatiating on the said psalm one day, in a sermon, it seemed to him so particularly profitable to the King of England, that he determined at once to write down his thoughts and to send them to him, begging that he would devote at least an hour of his time to meditating thereon. The reformers took good care that the new doctrines should be well rubbed into the minds of the people. Bibles flowed freely from all the presses of Europe, and the patch- work fabricated by Tyndale and Coverdale had the largest circulation in England. It was impossible to open one of these Bibles without being at once aware of the kind of doctrine it was printed to spread abroad, and it was in reality not so much the open Bible that was aimed at, as the Bible read in a Calvinistic sense. Thus, in the Table of Principal Matters contained in Matthew's Bible, also called the Great Bible of Tyndale, the crucial points of the Chris- tian religion were explained in this fashion : — " Baptism bringeth no grace ; Free will non-existent ; Election by grace, not by works ; the Elect cannot be accused, for God justifieth them ; Merit is nothing ; the Supper of the Lord a holy memory, and giving thanks for the death of Christ ; Bread and Wine received in the Supper of Christ no sacrifice ; the Order of priesthood is translated — The English Reformation 345 that is to say, abolished, ceased, and finished in such wise as there need now be no more, for we are all priests to God." This teaching, and much more of the same kind, was widely disseminated by the Privy Council, who issued Bibles in small, portable form, with ample demonstration that the Pope was anti-Christ, and sacramental grace a de- lusion. Pamphlets of the most scurrilous kind against the old religion were also freely distributed from the same source.^ The change from the Missal to the Book of Common Prayer was gradual. Somerset wrote to Gardiner in June 1 548 that " the questions and controversies concerning the sacrament of the altar and the mass rest at the present in consultation, and with the pleasure of God shall be in small time by public doctrine and authority quietly and truly determined." ^ Cranmer had already given up his belief in the Mass as a sacrifice, and a Bill having passed through Parliament ^ to the effect that Communion should in future be administered '* under both kinds of bread and wine," the Archbishop proceeded to manipulate the Missal, the result being his " new order of divine service." The most im- portant change was the disappearance of the sacrificial char- acter of the Mass. This was done by the introduction of a rubric : '* If it doth so chance that the wine hallowed and consecrate doth not suffice or be enough for them that do take the Communion, the priest, after the first cup or chalice be emptied, may go again to the altar, and reverently and devoutly prepare and consecrate another ; and so the third, or more likewise, beginning at these words : Simili mo do postquam ccenatum est ; and ending at these words : Qiui ■pro vobis et pro multis effundetur in remissionem peccatorumy and without any levation or lifting up." ^ This act of consecration being an essential part of the Sacrifice of the Mass which the priest had already celebrated, to order him to repeat it without completing the action by ^ Gairdner, History of the English Church, p. 266. 2 Burnet, History of the Reformation, vol. ii. p. 154. ^ Of the whole bench of bishops, only ten supported the Bill, five voted against it, and the remaining eleven absented themselves. * This rubric appears in the Book of Common Prayer as it now stands, except that both bread and wine are directed to be freshly consecrated in the same way. 34^ Reformation and Renaissance consuming the Victim in Communion, was tantamount to a denial that the Mass was a sacrifice. Besides this, several other novelties were introduced into the Communion Book^ as this first attempt of Cranmer's was called. The practice of frequent Communion was dis- couraged, private confession to a priest was declared un- necessary, and some slight changes were introduced into the forms of words to be used in the act of administering Com- munion. But these changes were very generally ignored by the priests, and the government determined to take active measures to secure " a uniform, quiet, and godly order, rite and fashion of common and open prayer and administration of the Sacraments." ^ The result was the first Prayer Book, of Edward VI . The book does not appear to have ever been submitted to Convocation, but it was read in the House of Lords on December 14, 1548. A four days' debate followed, between those who held to the old doctrine of the Mass and those who favoured the new opinions. On the Catholic side were Tunstall, Bishop of Durham ; Heath, Bishop of Worcester ; Bonner, Bishop of London ; and Day, Bishop of Chichester. Gardiner was already in prison for preaching the Catholic doctrine of Transubstantiation before the king. On Cran- mer's side were Bishops Ridley of Rochester and Holbeach of Lincoln, and three laymen, the Protector Somerset, Smith, Secretary of State, and the Earl of Warwick. The book contained — and this constituted the subject of the debate — the new order for the Supper of the Lord and the Holy Communion^ commonly called the Mass^ which preserved to a great extent the order and semblance of the Mass. Only, it was the Mass robbed of its sacrificial character, all the parts relating to oblation in reference to the service being removed clean away. " The Bill for Religion " passed the House of Lords on January 2, 1549, reaching its final stage on the 15 th, when it became the law of the land. Heath, Bishop of Worcester, for refusing his consent to it, and subsequently Day, Bishop of Chichester, for dis- obeying the order to demolish and replace by tables all the altars in his diocese, were committed to the Fleet. Measures taken to enforce the new service were met by insurrections everywhere. Bonner, Bishop of London, was 1 Act of Uniformity, 2 & 3 Edward VI. c. i. The English Reformation 347 required by the Council to preach against rebellion at Paul's Cross, and the special points on which he was to insist were dictated to him beforehand. In the actual sermon, he preached on the Real Presence, and insisted strongly on the duty of allegiance, but omitted to say, as he had been ordered, that the king's authority was as great during his early years as if he were thirty or forty years old. For this, and for what he had said about the Sacrament, he was denounced by Hooper and Latimer, and after examination sent to the Marshalsea, where he remained till Mary's accession. To Cranmer he addressed these words on his committal: "Three things I have, to wit, a small portion of goods, a poor car- cass, and mine own soul : the two first ye may take (though unjustly) to you, but as for my soul, ye get it not quia anima me a in manibus meis semper T ^ The people rose all over the country, the rebellion in Cornwall and Devonshire being more distinctly connected with religion than elsewhere, and the first day the new Prayer Book came into use, the parishioners at Sampford Courtenay compelled their parish priest to return to the old ritual, declaring that they would have no alteration of religion till the king was of age.^ Before order was re-estab- lished, 4000 men of Devon perished in the field or by the hand of the executioner.^ Exeter was besieged for five weeks by 10,000 west countrymen under the leadership of Humphrey Arundel, Governor of St. Michael's Mount. Then John Russell, Lord Privy Seal, came to the relief of the beleaguered city. He consented to receive a petition from the insurgents, the tone of which, it must be admitted, was more like a demand than a humble petition. It ran thus : " We will have all the General Councils and holy decrees of our forefathers observed, kept and performed. We will have the Mass in Latin, and celebrated by the priest, without any man or woman communicating with him. We will have the sacrament to hang over the high altar and there to be worshipped. We will that our curates shall minister the sacrament of baptism at all times, as well in the week day as on the holy day. We will have holy bread and holy water every Sunday, palms and ashes at the accustomed times, ^ Foxe, vol. V. p. 791. Gre"^ Friar's Chronicle, p. 26. 2 Gairdner, History of the English Church, p. 267. '^ Lingard, History of England, vol. v. p. 291. 34 8 Reformation and Renaissance images to be set up again in every church ; and all other ancient, old ceremonies used heretofore by our Mother holy Church. We will not receive the new service, because it is like a Christmas game ; but we will have our old service of matins. Mass, evensong, and procession, in Latin, as it was before. And so we, the Cornish men, whereof certain of us understand no English, utterly refuse this new English. We will have every preacher in his sermon, and every priest at the Mass, pray specially by name for the souls in Purgatory, as our forefathers did. . . . We will have Dr. Moreman and Dr. Crispin, which hold our opinion, to be safely sent to us. We will h' e that the half part of the Abbey lands and Chantry 1? is in every man's possession, however he came by them, be given ... to 2 places where 2 of the chief abbeys were, within every county . . . and there established a place for devout persons, which shall pray for the King and Commonwealth." ^ Such was the welcome to the privilege of worshipping God publicly in the vulgar tongue. As it then stood, the Prayer Book was far more Lutheran than Calvinistic, although John a Lasco had resided with Cranmer for several months, and had helped in its com- piling, and the Swiss reformers were scarcely better satisfied with it than were the English people. Moreover, there was a wide divergence between the new Communion Service and the Tyndale-Coverdale Bibles, which emanated from the same authority, and the influence of the Helvetian reformers may be fairly gauged by the changes subsequently made in the Prayer Book. Both Peter Martyr and Martin Bucer undertook to criticise it,^ and Bucer's Censura is eminently characteristic of the man and his method. He began by praising the con- tents and order of Daily Prayers and Communion Service as scriptural and primitive, but to have the choir separate from the rest of the church was anti-Christian, and made the ' Cranmer's answer to this petition is printed in Strype's Life of Arch- bishop Cranmer. 2 Buccr at the request of his diocesan, Goodrich, Bishop of Ely; Martyr on behalf of Cranmer. " For the correction of which, the Arch- bishop, the Bishop of Ely, and the other bishops were by the king's com- mand met together in consultation. And that this work might be the more effectually performed, the Archbishop thought good to have the judgment herein of both the public professors, Bucer and Martyr." — Strype, Memorials of Cranmer^ vol. i. p. 361. The English Reformation 349 ministers, of whatever life and doctrine, nearer, as it were, in station to God than the laity. This criticism was taken into account when the second Prayer Book was compiled, a long rubric being put instead of " the priest being in the quire," etc. In the office of Holy Communion he objected, among other things, to the people still receiving in their mouths, instead of in their hands, and this, as well as the kind of bread used, was altered in the second book. It was anti- Christian, he declared, to say that what was left over of the bread and wine might not come into common use, as if there were any power in the words of consecration to make them other than ordinary food and drink. This point also was altered in the present book. He wound up thus : " At the end of the book you say that touching, kneeling, crossing, knocking the breast may be used or left. They are gestures of the Mass, never to be sufficiently execrated. Away with them." Needless to add, this clause too was abolished There was a general understanding that so far the changes had only been tentative and temporary. Cranmer was feeling his way, constantly changing his own views, and between his first and second Prayer Book lay a whole revolu- tion. The sacrifice of the Mass having been swept away, the destruction of altars followed logically enough, for with- out sacrifice no altar is needed. The bishops were reluctant, but episcopal authority was now practically nil. The five strongest members of the Episcopate — Gardiner, Bonner, Tunstall, Day, and Heath — were in prison, the rest were either overridden or browbeaten into compliance. Goodrich and Ridley were active on the side of the government. The altars in the churches having been destroyed or turned into pens for pigs,^ the images were removed and the walls white- washed, and adorned with the royal arms. Only monu- ^ " Item, whereas in divers places, some use the Lord's board after the form of a table, and some as an altar, whereby dissension is perceived to arise among the unlearned ; therefore, wishing a godly unity to be ob- served in all our diocese, and for that the form of a table may more move and turn the simple from the old superstitious opinions of the popish Mass, and to the right use of the Lord's Supper, we exhort the curates, church- wardens, and questmen here present to erect and set up the Lord's board after the form of an honest table decently covered, in such place ot the choir or chancel as shall be thought most meet by their discretion and agreement, so that the ministers with the communicants may have their place separated from the rest of the people, and to take down and abolish 350 Reformation and Renaissance mental images " of any king, prince, nobleman, or other dead person which hath not been commonly reputed or taken for a saint " might remain ; and no one seems to have been struck with the humour of the situation. The saints being banished, their feasts were forbidden to be kept. Hooper, a strong Calvinist and the '* father of Non- conformity," was made Bishop of Gloucester, though for a long time he refused to "be consecrated, despising ceremonies." Ridley was intruded into Bonner's See of London, Gardiner's See of Winchester was given to Ponet, Bishop of Rochester, and the Princess Mary was persecuted for refusing to adopt the new service. But even before it came into use, the Prayer Book was regarded by Cranmer as a mere temporary stage in the formation of the new religion. On April 26, 1549, Bucer and Fagius wrote to their brethren at Strass- burg : — " We yesterday waited upon the Archbishop of Canter- bury, that most benevolent and kind father of the churches and of godly men, who received and entertained us as brethren, not as dependents. We found at his house, what was most gratifying to us, our most dear friend Doctor Peter Martyr, with his wife and his attendant Julius, Master Immanuel (Tremellius), with his wife, and also Dryander and some other godly Frenchmen whom we had sent before us. All these are entertained by the Archbishop of Canterbury. . . . As soon as the description of the ceremonies now in use shall have been translated into Latin, we will send it to you. We hear that some concessions have been made, both to a respect for antiquity and to the infirmity of the present age ; such, for instance, as the vestments commonly used in the sacrament of the Eucharist, and the use of candles ; so also in regard to the commemoration of the dead and the use of chrism, for we know not to what extent or in what sort it prevails. They affirm that there is no superstition in these things, and that they are only to be retained for a time, lest the people, not having yet learned Christ, should be deterred all other by -altars or tables." — Visitation Articles of the Bishop of London. Already, in i 548, the movement had begun, and John of Ulm wrote to Bullinger that the privileged altars were put down and turned into pens for pigsties. " Those idolatrous altars are now become hogsties — that is, the habitation of swine and beasts." — Original Letters, vol. ii. p. 384. The English Reformation 351 by too extensive innovations from embracing His religion, and that rather they may be won over." ^ Gardiner's deprivation was the result of a visit which the Bishop had received in the Tower from the Lord Chancellor, who took with him the new Prayer Book, promising that it he would accept it, the Protector would be a suitor to the king to show him mercy, Gardiner replied that he looked for justice and not mercy, and that as for the book he would not examine it in prison." Later on, being again pressed to deliver an opinion, he published a calm and dignified answer to Cranmer's perpetually shifting views on the Eucharist, entitled, " An Explication and Assertion of the true Catholic Faith touching the most blessed Sacrament of the Altar." ^ On Somerset's fall, Gardiner wrote to the Parliament : *' I have continued here in this miserable prison one year, one quarter, and one month, with want of air, want of books, want of company, and want of just cause why I should have come hither at all." The lords laughed, saying he had " a pleasant head," but he remained where he was till Mary released him. Bonner, too, now made an attempt to regain his freedom, declaring that they had observed neither law nor order, but extremity, in sending him to prison, where he had been cast into a dungeon among thieves. Hooper, who had been the main instrument in his imprisonment, was now King's Preacher, and one of the leading lights of the new doctrines, and he did not relish the thought of Bonner's release. " Sharp and dangerous," he wrote, *' has been my contest with that bishop ; if he be restored again to his office, I shall be restored to my country and my Father which is in heaven." * Even while the commission for Gardiner's deprivation was sitting, Cranmer was considering the revision of the Prayer Book, which had not been a year in use, and on April 14, 1552, the second Prayer Book of Edward VL, which is in all essentials the same as that used in the Church of England at the present day, was sanctioned by Parliament. The changes made were radical. Everything in the first 1 Original Letters^ vol. ii. pp. 535, 536. April 26, 15+9. 2 Foxe, Acts and Monuments, vol. vi. p. 72- 3 Gairdner, History of th English Church, p. 292. * John Hooper to Bullinger. Original Letters, vol. i. p. 70. 352 Reformation and Renaissance book which Gardiner had pointed out as susceptible of a Catholic interpretation was swept away, and of the sequence of the old worship nothing was left but the Collect, Epistle, Gospel, and Creed. The likeness which the first book bore in general outward appearance to the Mass was now carefully- expunged, even to the word altar, which sometimes occurred in the first book, " table " and *' God's board " being substi- tuted for it. In spite of all the preaching, scolding, arguing, and building up " of an entire system of true doctrine," never had the country been in a worse state morally. Wherever the doctrine of justification by faith without works was taught, it was certain to produce a crop of evil works. Immorality followed in its wake in Germany ; and the state of the public prisons at Geneva after ten years of Calvin's regime is significant. Hugh Latimer, who preached for the last time before the king in 1550, inveighed loudly against "the unparalleled immorality, oppression of the poor, and perversion of justice," that prevailed. "Never," he declared, "was there so much adultery, so much divorcing ; lechery is now a trifle. I would have adultery punished with death by law. I would have Christ's discipline restored. None can devise a better way than God hath done with notable offenders, which is excommunication : to put them from the congregation till they be confounded. Bring into the Church of England open discipline, that open sinners may be stricken withal." But the reformers were far too busy hewing and hacking, burning and defacing, to have any time to spare for enfor- cing the Decalogue, even if they attached much importance to it. If morals were at a low ebb, learning was also in a deplorable condition. Roger Ascham wrote to Cranmer in 1549 that his university was so depressed and drooping " that very few had hopes of coming thither at all, and fewer had any comfort to make long tarrying when they were there, and that abroad it retained not so much as the shadow of its ancient dignity." ^ When a royal commission visited both universities that same year, it appeared as if they would share the fate of the monasteries as to dissolution.^ Dudley, Earl of Warwick, was the iconoclast of studies ^ Strype, Memorials of Cranmer. 2 Dixon, History of the Church of England, vol. iii. p. 99. The English Reformation 353 at Oxford, Somerset himself heading the destructive army at Cambridge. Opposition, remonstrance, argument, availed nothing ; the ravages of Layton, Legh, and Bedyll were exceeded, and completed in this visitation. At Merton College a cartload of manuscripts was destroyed. From Balliol, Queen's, Exeter, and Lincoln came great heaps of books to be burned at Carfax. Of the University Library not a single book or manuscript was left, and it had been so large that the University found it worth while to sell the empty shelves on which so many volumes had reposed.^ Dr. Cox, Dean of Christ Church and Chancellor, was nicknamed for this act of vandalism " Cancellor of the University." Every means was taken to degrade university teaching. From his prison in the Tower, Gardiner, who was still Master of Trinity Hall, Cambridge, contrived to prevent the fusion of Clare Hall with Trinity, but he could do nothing to improve the state of studies or to save the books. In the work of pillage the Duke of Somerset was the greatest vandal of all. After the dissolution of the monasteries the church and abbey of Glastonbury had been conferred upon him by royal warrant. He utterly demolished both build- ings. In the Strand he pulled down the houses of three bishops to provide a site for his own. As the materials of these proved insufficient for the elaborate design he had planned, he proposed to destroy St. Margaret's Church at Westminster to provide himself with more. His workmen had already begun to erect scaffolding for this purpose, when the outraged parishioners of St. Margaret's assembled in an angry crowd, and beat them off with stones and other missiles, even shooting arrows at them. The destruction of precious manuscripts that had been wanton at the dissolution was now vicious and determined ; and all that Henry's commissioners had failed to disperse and scatter to the winds was systematically annihilated. At Malmesbury leaves were torn from their bindings and used to patch broken windows. Bakers of the same town bought them as fuel for supplying heat to their ovens. Of the impetus that had been given to learning by the earlier Renaissance not a trace remained ; the whole intel- lectual movement of the age had died in England with the old religion. ^ Dixon, History of the Church of England, vol. iii. p. 99. 2 A 354 Reformation and Renaissance Even the eighteen grammar-schools of which Edward VI. has been considered the founder had no existence in reality. The only foundation with which he is even reported to have had any connection is Christ's Hospital, and that was not founded as a grammar-school but as a foundling hospital.^ Much was said and done in Edward's name, both good and evil, for which he was not in the remotest degree responsible ; and whenever the acts of his reign are quoted, for Edward VI. we must read Somerset, Warwick (afterwards Duke of Northumberland), and their subordinates, Paget, Mildmay, and the chancellors Audley and Rich. Nearly two hundred grammar-schools existed in England before the reign of Edward VI, , and these were but the survivors of a far greater number that had been aboHshed. In 1535, before the flood- gates of the revolution were opened, a moderate estimate places their number at 300. Most of them were swept away, either under Henry or during his son's short reign, and those that were not swept away were plundered and damaged. The dissolution of the larger monasteries included colleges, hospitals, and other ecclesiastical institutions, and the grammar- schools perished among the rest. It is very generally but erroneously supposed that these schools were comparatively modern post-Reformation inventions, whereas they were of ex- traordinary antiquity.^ Until recent times Winchester was sup- posed to be the oldest of them. In its present form it was founded by William of Wykeham in 1382, but there had been a grammar-school in Winchester since before the Norman Conquest, and at this earlier school William of Wykeham had himself been educated. St. Peter's School, York, existed in the eighth century, and received further endowment from Philip and Mary. Worcester Cathedral King's School dates as a monastic school as far back as 680. Eton College was founded in 1440. The only connection between Edward VI. and the education of his people is that his government took away the lands belonging to the schools, and substituted fixed stipends from the Crown, thus signing the death- warrants of scores of them.^ The somewhat pathetic circumstances of Edward's acces- sion at the age of nine, his motherless condition, his pre- cocious intelligence and early death have surrounded the ^ Leach, English Schools at the Reformation, p. 4. ^ Ibid. p. 5* 3 Ibid. The English Reformation 355 Boy-King with a special interest — almost with a halo of romance. People are convinced that if he had lived he would have presented a very exceptional type of kingship, realising the notions of perfection of each and all. His con- temporaries cherished these sentiments, and the after-world has echoed them. The one cry at the time of the religious changes was that things should be left as they were till the king was of age, and free to do his own will ; and there is no doubt that his premature shrewdness and scholarly attain- ments were very real, and gave promise of much future ability. The Lady Mary, Edward's half-sister, was his godmother, and had always had for the boy the affection of a real mother. Perhaps the strongest feeling he ever entertained was affec- tion for her, but the Duke his uncle severely repressed every expression of it, and after he came to the throne the brother and sister were seldom allowed to meet.^ The narrow Calvinistic principles which were then instilled into him, acting upon the harshness which he seems to have inherited from his father, produced characteristics the reverse of amiable or gentle. Of this we may judge from entries in his journal, written in his own hand. His uncle, Lord Seymour, visit- ing him on one occasion, remarked of the Duke of Somerset that he was growing old. Thereupon Edward replied coolly, " It were better that he should die." And when Seymour was thrown into prison by the Protector, and the Privy Council went in a body to demand authorisation for further proceedings, Edward complied with the greatest readiness, and would have been quite willing that he should be executed. He showed the same heartlessness when the Duke of Somerset was condemned to death, and after signing his death-warrant proceeded to note the event in his diary — " The Duke of Somerset had his head cut off on Tower Hill on January 22, 1551-52.'"- Such callousness in a boy of fourteen was not likely to develop into a noble regard for the lives and well-being of his subjects. The mind of Edward VI. was peculiarly the work of the Calvinist reformers ; they alone had had any control over it ^ The Life of Jane Dormer, Duchess of Ferin, pp. 61, 62. - Journal of King Edward'' s Reign, written in the King^s own hand. 35^ Reformation and Renaissance from the time that he came to the use of reason, and the product, so far as they had the opportunity of developing it, was a curious one. By " His Majesty's laws," which the Council proclaimed so loudly during the six years of his reign, they meant chiefly the laws which they had themselves framed ; but if they pulled the strings of government they took good care that the machinery was in working order, and responded to their movements. Never was boy so carefully educated in statecraft ; but it was statecraft on the pattern of that which Calvin exercised at Geneva — the centralisation of power in the person of the elect of the Lord, and the righteousness of all his works. Edward was so constantly compared to the young Josias that he came naturally to believe himself to be endowed with special wisdom from above ; and the boredom of being perpetually preached to ^ was considerably alleviated by the eulogy he received, and the quasi-divinity with which the preachers hedged him round. From his sister Mary alone he heard the truth, and it must occasionally have come as a shock to him. " When the King's Majesty (said she) shall come to such years that he may be able to judge these things himself, his Majesty shall find me ready to obey his orders in religion ; but now in these years, although he good, sweet King have more knowledge than any other of his years, yet is it not possible that he can be a judge in these things. For if ships were to be sent to the seas or any other thing to be done touching the policy of the government of the realm, I am sure you would not think his Highness yet able to consider what were to be done, and much less (said she) can he in these days discern what is fittest in matters of divinity." ^ Just before the second Prayer Book was launched upon the world, and when there was much debate among its com- pilers concerning a rubric Cranmer wished to insert enjoin- ing communicants for the first time, to receive kneeling, a Scotchman who had already attracted attention in the North appeared on the scenes as king's chaplain. John Knox was born at Haddington in 1505, and had been educated for the priesthood. He took orders, and brought much disgrace upon his sacred calling, exercising priestly functions for about ^ It was part of Knox's duties while in London to preach two or three times a week before the king. 2 Acts of the Privy CouTicil, vol. iii. p. 348 et seq. EDWARD VI. From a contemporary painting in the National Portrait Gallery. To pec page 3^h. The English Reformation 357 fifteen years. He then apparently, with some suddenness, ceased to act as a Catholic priest, and became a Calvinist preacher. Of the scholasticism in which he was educated he retained only the argumentative faculty, and although he is said to have been a good scholar in his youth, there is no very marked proof of this in his voluminous writings. He possessed little Hebrew, and little, if any, Greek. His stock of theology was meagre. Ample allowance being made for the party-spirit of his contemporaries, and the prejudices of his biographers, the defects of his character still appear so numerous, and his virtues so doubtful, that the most favour- able impression that can be given of him is by two negatives. He was neither hypocritical nor greedy. His first sermon as a Protestant was directed against the " corruptions of the Papacy." He next attacked the Mass as " an abomination " and as " idolatry," and being prosecuted for his language, he defended himself in a syllogism : '* All service invented by the brain of man in the religion of God, without His own express command, is idolatry. The Mass is invented by the brain of man without the command of God ; therefore it is idolatry."^ In the autumn of 1551 Knox was appointed one of the six royal chaplains, and as king's chaplain took part in re- vising the second Prayer Book of Edward VI. He is credited with the " black rubric," which explains that the act of kneeling at communion meant no adoration, " for that were idolatry to be abhorred of all faithful Christians."^ He afterwards inveighed with great freedom against kneeling at the Lord's Supper, but the question was thought to be sufficiently compromised by retaining Knox's rubric. Cranmer had been at work since 1 549, in the preparation of a series of articles which should " roote out the discord of opinions and stablish the agreement of trew religion." These articles were at first forty-five in number ; the next year they were reduced to forty-two, and subsequently to thirty- nine. Knox went to London in 1552 in his capacity of king's chaplain to help in their preparation, and he objected strongly to the article that was numbered thirty-eight of the ^ Dictio7iary of 'National Biography, article "John Knox." '^ Liturgies of Edzvard VI. (Parker Society), p. 283. This rubric was struck out on the accession of Elizabeth, perhaps with a view to concilia- ting the Catholics, but it was restored in 1662 to meet the scruples of the Puritans, and it still remains to give offence to one section of the Church of England at the present day. 358 Reformation and Renaissance forty-five, and which became in succession the thirty-fifth and the thirty-sixth. As it originally stood it expressly declared the ceremonies enjoined in the new Book of Common Prayer to be agreeable with the liberty of the Gospel, and to be received by all ministers with gladness and thanksgiving. Among these ceremonies was included that of kneeling at the sacrament, and Knox and his associate addressed a remonstrance to the Council concerning it.^ " Besides our judgment on the articles," they said, "which we have committed to the Latin tongue, we offer you our confession on the thirty-eighth article. Kneeling in the action of the Lord's Supper proceeds from the error of opinion. It offends the weak, it injures the Church, seeming to allow idolatry to triumph after so long conten- tion." It was probably this protest that caused the altera- tion in the article under dispute.^ When it was turned into the thirty-sixth, it contained nothing about the Prayer Book, but only about the forms of ordering and consecrating. The Duke of Northumberland offered Knox the bishopric of Rochester, one of his reasons being a wish to keep him near at hand that he might be " a whetstone to Cranmer, who needs one." But Knox declined it, as well as the living of All Hallows, Bread Street. His services, however, could not be dispensed with, and he was sent into Buckinghamshire to preach. Personally, Northumberland was not sorry to be rid of him, for he found him " neither grateful nor pleasable, and he wished to have no more to do with him than to wish him well." Knox's view of the relative value of things was as remark- able as that of Calvin. While the mere mention of cere- monies was enough to throw him into a frenzy, he could contemplate murder and bloodshed without emotion. He thoroughly approved the assassination of Cardinal Beaton, and approved, if he did not himself help to compass, the murder of Rizzio.^ His belief in himself and his certainty of salvation were equal to Calvin's, and his conviction that he and those who ^ Dixon, History of the Church of England, vol. iii. pp. 482, 484, note. '■^ Lorimer, Knox in England, p. 126. •^ This callousness as regarded the sacrifice of human life was shared by all the Reformers. The Englishman, Burcher, in a letter to Bullinger, dated March 3, 1554, says, writing of Wyatt's rebellion, "And now to mention a few things which you will be glad to hear. It is stated that The English Reformation 359 believed with him were the chosen people was almost sublime in its monstrosity. He admitted that he had once been oppressed by a doubt as to whether he was one of the elect, but this was the rarest of his experiences.^ Soon after Edward's death and Mary's accession, Knox went abroad. It was difficult for the English refugees to know where to settle. They could not remain in France — although Knox did actually stay for some time at Dieppe — without conforming to the religion of the country, and they were not much more at home in Germany, for the Lutherans abhorred their sacramental doctrines and the second Prayer Book, almost as much as did Catholics. Switzerland was open to them, but Calvin found their Book of Common Prayer " trifling and childish." When Knox arrived at Geneva, Calvin suggested a compromise, as the worst that it contained were tolerabiles ineptice. Knox made some few alterations which may be studied in The Service^ Discipline^ and Forme of the Common Prayers and Administration of the Sacraments used in the English Church at Geneva^ as it was approved by that most reverend Divine^ M. John Calvin and the Church of Scotland, Humbly presented to the most High Court of Par lament J this present year, 1641. The following are some of the changes made by Knox to please Calvin : after the exhortations, prayers, etc., '* the Minister breaketh the Bread, and delivereth to the people, who distribute and divide the same among themselves. . . . He likewise giveth the Cup." In a note to the reader these words occur : — " If so be that any would marvel why we follow rather this order than any other in the administration of this Sacrament, let him diligently consider, that first of all we utterly renounce the error of the Papists. Secondly, we restore unto the Sacrament his own substance and to Christ his proper place. And as for the words of the Lord's Supper, we rehearse them, not because they should change the substance of the Bread and Wine, or that the repetition thereof with the intent of the sacrificer should make the the rebels have put to death 300 Mass priests ! " Orig. Letters, vol. ii. p. 681. And after the burning of Servetus, Calvin received congratulatory and approving letters from Bucer, Beza, and the churches of Zurich, Schairhausen, Basle, and Berne 1 Dictionary of National Biography, article "John Knox." 360 Reformation and Renaissance Sacrament (as the Papists falsely believe), but they are read and pronounced to teach us how to behave ourselves in that action ; and that Christ might witness our Faith, as it were with his own mouth that he hath ordained these signes for our spirituall ease and comfort, we do first therefore examine ourselves, according to Saint Paul's rule, and prepare our minds that we may be worthy partakers of so high mysteries. Then talcing Bread we give thankes, breake and distribute it as Christ our Saviour has taught us. Finally, the ministra- tion ended, we give thankes again, according to his example, so that without his word and warrant there is nothing in this holy action attempted." At the end of the book these words occur : " If any refuse to heare the congregation let him be to thee as an heathen and as a Publican." This version of the Book of Common Prayer is interest- ing on account of the light which it throws on the meaning and intention of the compilers. Calvin had not objected to any doctrine which the book contained, only to what he termed trivialities and ineptitudes, and Knox was merely concerned to make it acceptable to him. From Geneva the Scottish reformer passed to Zurich, Calvin giving him letters to Bullinger. He then returned to Geneva, and remained there till he received a call from the English congregation at Frankfort-on-the-Main to be one of their ministers. Knox accepted, though unwiUingly, " at the commandment of that notable servant of God, John Calvin." Subsequently Knox returned to Scotland, there to carry on the religious revolution, and spread the doctrine of his friend Calvin with all the energy and fierce intolerance of which he was capable. The Supreme Headship of the King kept English Pro- testantism together for a few generations, the tendency inherent in it to divide and subdivide not developing Non- conformity as a sect until the reign of Charles 11.^ But in Scotland, the Reformation at once produced sectarianism of the most violent kind. Preachers sprang up, as it were, 1 The Dissenters were a disturbing element in the Church of England as early as 1564, at about which time they first received the name of Puritans. They held their first meeting as a body at Wandsworth, near London, in 1572. Not choosing to conform to the statute "for the uniformity of public prayers and administration of the sacraments," about 2000 ministers of the established religion abandoned it in 1662 and took The English Reformation 361 from behind every bush, denouncing and threatening with hell-fire all who differed from them, until they became a terror to the country, the disturbed condition of which played into the reformers' hands. While Catholic life was disorganised, and had grown lax through the feuds of the secular and ecclesiastical nobility, which were fostered by the long minority of the sovereigns James V. and Mary, the Calvinist preachers flattered themselves that severity and narrowness meant reform, and sought to — prove their doctrines orthodox By apostolic blows and knocks. the name of Nonconformists. The Act of Uniformity passed in that year provided that the occupant of a benefice must have been ordained by a bishop, must use only the Book of Common Prayer (a revised version of which was published at that time restoring Knox's "black rubric"), and must take the oath of canonical obedience. He was also required to re- nounce the solemn league and covenant, and to make a declaration that it was unlawful to bear arms against the sovereign on any pretence whatever. CHAPTER X QUEEN ELIZABETH AND HER CATHOLIC SUBJECTS The brief and troubled reign of Mary was an interlude in the onward march of events — a conscientious effort to stem the tide by methods that had become obsolete, and there- fore worse than useless. Mary perished in the attempt to stamp out the revolution : Elizabeth welcomed it as her one chance of success, and stamped out Catholicism as nearly as she could. But the new age was not entirely base-born, in spite of Catherine von Bora and Anne Boleyn ; the stain on its birth cannot hide the vigorous buds of spring which will blossom into a Shakespeare, nor all that intellectual activity which is to people the after-world with scholars and poets. It could not have produced the Dies Ira^ or the Divina Commedia, or even the Canterbury Tales^ but it will know how to echo their strains in its own fashion, and will enrich us with Paradise Lost and a multitude of treasures. On the whole, the later Renaissance of letters was in England far less self-conscious and artificial than that of either France or Italy. When the greatest classic of a period is either a brilliant satire, as in the case of Rabelais' masterpiece, or a graphic description of loose morals, such as the Decameron^ we may argue that the nation which pro- duced it is either in a state of decadence, or its literature is a reflection of some other civilisation. The freshness and spontaneity of English literature in the sixteenth century betoken a youth and vigour which were the direct outcome of the new age, and which owed little to any servile imitation of antiquity. The spontaneity of Rabelais was not that of youth — a jaded cynicism pervading his most extravagant flights, and the immorality of Boccaccio's stories is borrowed 362 QlEEiN ELIZABETH. From a portrait by N. Hillianl in the National Portrait Gallery. Elizabeth and her Catholic Subjects 363 from ancient Greece and Rome. Mary, with all her virtues, — and they were as great and as numerous as her sorrows, — failed to grasp the opportunity set before her. The new forces at work in the world affected every department of human life, making always for progress, though not always for improvement, bearing the visible marks of strife and violence, of wayward impetuosity and impatience of control, yet proving themselves sturdy with the infusion of new life, and rich in the inheritance of the genius of all the ages. Happy, indeed, would have been the ruler who succeeded in unravelling the tangled skein, and who, discerning all that was good in the general restlessness, apart from the fierce dogmatising of heresiarchs, the spiritual pride of religious innovators, the tendency of the multitude to luxuriate in pleasure without a thought beyond the moment's delight, should direct all undisciplined energies into legitimate channels that need not necessarily be the old time-worn ruts. But it would not have been an easy task to the ablest monarch, and it entered into the minds of few to do aught save swim against the tide, or to swim with it. Elizabeth chose the latter course, perhaps seeing that Mary had essayed the impossible. Herself the child of the revolution, it was an open secret, even during Mary's reign, that she sympathised with that party in religion and politics which " brooked no fatherly counsel that should come from Rome." All her instincts, in spite of her oaths that she was a Catholic, prompted her to throw in her lot with the reformers ; all her interests were bound up with the new doctrines, and from the moment of her accession fears were entertained for the safety of the Catholic cause. The Count de Feria, Philip's ambassador, was received by the members of her Council, as he wrote to the king, " like a man who came accredited with the Bulls of a dead Pope." In his interviews with the queen civil speeches were made on both sides, but the Spaniard was not deceived by appearances. " She is a woman extremely vain and acute, he reported to Philip ; " very similar in her manner of pro- ceeding to her father. I greatly fear that in matters of religion she will not be right, because I see her inclined to govern by men who are held to be heretics, and because the women about her are all so." And farther on : *' There is 364 Reformation and Renaissance not a heretic or traitor in the country that has not risen from the dead to come to her with the greatest contentment. Signs were not wanting to confirm De Feria's apprehen- sions. Dr. White, Bishop of Winchester, was arrested for his panegyric of Queen Mary at her funeral ; and Dr. Ogle- thorpe, Bishop of Carlisle, before saying Mass on Christmas Day in the Chapel Royal, was peremptorily ordered not to elevate the Host. He repHed that the queen might dispose of his life as she would, but that she could have no control over his conscience. Elizabeth rose and left the chapel at the offertory, but she abstained from any remark on the subject until it should be seen how her withdrawal was received by Parliament.^ As the time drew near for her coronation, the question arose as to who should perform the ceremony. The death of Cardinal Pole having left the archiepiscopal See of Canter- bury vacant, the duty would devolve on the Archbishop of York. But " the archbishop (Dr. Heath) refused the function, having understood that in some respects it was in- tended to perform the ceremony in a schismatical manner. Many other of the bishops also refused, but at length the Bishop of Carlisle undertook it, not as a favourer of heresy, but lest the queen should be angry if no one would anoint her, and so have a better excuse for overthrowing religion. Nor at this time were things so desperate but that some hoped it might still be possible to turn her from her purpose. The rest of the bishops assisted at the anointing." ^ Elizabeth accepted the condition imposed by the Bishop of Carlisle, that all should be done according to the Roman ritual, and that she should communicate under one species ; she also took the usual oath of Christian kings prescribed by tradition and by law in the most solemn way, swearing to defend the Catholic faith, and to guard the rights and immu- nities of the Church.^ Elizabeth gave no greater proof of her capacity than in the choice of her ministers. Hampered by no scruples, they 1 Camden, 32, 33. - Sanders, Vatican MS, f. 258. This statement proves that Dr. Lee was mistaken {The Church Under Queen Elizabeth, p. 23) in saying that none of the diocesan bishops who were in canonical possession of their sees were present, but that one and all deliberately and intentionally stayed away. 2 Rishton, Th}e Anglican Sc/nsm Renewed Under Elizabeth. Elizabeth and her Catholic Subjects 365 were admirably adapted to second her views, for as hers must necessarily be a fencing policy, it was well that all should have proved themselves facile in matters of religion. Eleven out of the thirty-live members who had composed Mary's Privy Council took office under Elizabeth. Sir William Cecil, afterwards Lord Burghley, had been a zealous Protestant in Edward's reign, and had supported the cause of the Lady Jane Grey. He had signed Edward's will, and the letter written by the Council to Mary calling upon her to submit to her " lawflil sovereign." Later, when Jane had laid down the royal dignity, and Mary had ascended the throne, he wrote his submission to the new queen, beseeching her clemency. The submission, consisting of twenty-one clauses, lays bare the conscience of the man who proved himself out of his own mouth to be cowardly, mean, and untruthful. He had shuffled as long as he dared brave the Duke of Northumberland's anger, and had given in only when the odds in favour of the conspirators had seemed overwhelming. But when ordered to proclaim Queen Jane he " turned the labour on Mr. Throckmorton, whose con- science I saw was troubled therewith, misliking the matter." ^ While Mary reigned, Cecil not only conformed to the Catholic religion, but had his son, afterwards Earl of Exeter, brought up in the same. Common report attributed his safety to that, and to the diligence with which he manipu- lated a monstrous pair of beads every morning in Wimble- don Church. Although he never held any office under Mary, in consequence of the manner in which he had dis- tinguished himself before her accession, he sometimes appeared at court, was rich and influential, and spent most of his time in luxurious ease at his manor of Wimbledon. The first entry in the Easter Book of Wimbledon Parish in 1556 is as follows : " My Master Sir Wilyam Cecell and my lady Myldred his wyff confessed and resaved the Sacrament ot the Altre," the document being endorsed in Cecil's own hand. With the lords Paget and Hastings he was sent to bring over Cardinal Pole, accompanying them probably because having become a Catholic he would be agreeable to Pole, and also to the Emperor. - 1 "A Brief Note of my Submission and of my Doings." Lansdowne MS. 102, f. 2, British Museum. 2 Martin Hume, The Great Lord Burghle\, p. 35. 366 Reformation and Renaissance Although living somewhat in the shade, he was careful to keep his friends in sight, and bided his time. One of his most able apologists, although unwilling to see the flaws in his character, cannot but admit in admiring his brilliant attainments that he was " an adept at fencing and doubling," and that " his craft was unequalled." ^ In a letter to his son, written in his old age. Lord Burghley reveals the springs of his own acts during a lifetime. " Be sure," he writes, " to keep some great man thy friend, but trouble him not for trifles, compliment him often with many and small gifts ; and if thou hast cause to bestow any great gratuity, let it be something which may be daily in sight ; otherwise in this ambitious age thou shalt remain like a hop without a pole, live in obscurity, and be made a football for every insulting companion to spurn at." ^ True to these principles, Cecil was careful, in the last year of Mary's life, to turn his attention towards the rising sun, and Elizabeth was not slow to discern the value of his magnificent talents. " Her Grace commandeth me to write this," said her secretary, Sir Thomas Parry. " Write my commendations in your letter to Mr, Cecil, that I am well assured, tho' I send not daily to him, that he doth not, for all that, daily forget me ; say indeed I assure myself thereof." It would be idle to dispute that Cecil Lord Burghley was the foremost diplomatist, the greatest statesman of his age. He was neither sordid nor fanatical, although remorseless in the pursuit of his ends ; his conduct being founded on that kind of State morality which considers virtue " a felicitous compromise of opposed principles and extreme opinions, making everything legitimate that is expedient, and every- thing expedient that is advantageous to the policy of the individual or of the State." ^ He was the youngest of Elizabeth's advisers, and the only one of them in whom the queen confided. With Cecil as chancellor, two other mem- bers connected with him by blood and alliance, — two who had been banished during the late reign, and one who had always been a zealous partisan of the Princess Elizabeth, — a Council was formed within the Privy Council, possessing the queen's 1 Fraser Tytler, Englajid Under the Reig?is of Edward VI. and Mary. ^ Peck, Desiderata Curios a, P- 47- 2 Madden (R. R.), Penal Laws E?iacted Against Roman Catholics. Elizabeth and her Catholic Subjects 367 ear, and through the queen controlling every department of the State. ^ From the beginning it was clear to all that an alteration of religion was contemplated in spite of Elizabeth's protests that she adhered to the old faith. Cecil had laid his plans carefully. Five new peers of decided Protestant leaning had been added to the Upper House, and a majority in favour of the government had been secured in the Commons by send- ing to the sheriffs a list of candidates among whom the new members of Parliament might be chosen. None were to be appointed even to the least important offices but those who were "young in years," and who "earnestly do favour her high- ness." The sheriffs were obedient, and, although the Catholics were in a majority all over the country, scarcely any were re- turned. No fewer than eleven bishoprics were vacant, and, thus packed with heretics. Parliament met on January 25, 1559. It had been the custom for the abbot and monks of Westminister to receive the monarch with great solemnity at the door of the House on the opening of Parliament, but Elizabeth sent them word that she would dispense with this ceremony. Nevertheless, according to II Schifanoya, the Mantuan ambassador, '* On arriving at Westminster Abbey, the Abbot Fecken- ham, robed pontifically, with all his monks in procession, each of them having a lighted candle in his hand, re- ceived her, giving her first of all incense and holy water. When Her Majesty saw the monks who accompanied her with candles, she said, ' Away with these lights ! We see very well.' And so, her choristers singing the litany in English, she moved in procession to the High Altar under her canopy. Thereupon Dr. Cox, a married priest, who has hitherto been beyond the sea, ascended the pulpit and preached the sermon, in which, after saying many things against the monks, ... he commenced praising Her Majesty . . . exhorting her to destroy images . . . and other things connected with divine worship, and saying much against the Christian religion. " This sermon lasted an hour and a half, the peers stand- ing the whole time, after which they went to the place prepared for the Parliament." - ^ Lingard, History of England^ vol. vii. p. 252. - Venetian Calendar^ January 30, 1559, pp. 22, 23. 368 Reformation and Renaissance Bills were at once introduced for the supremacy of the Crown in matters of religion, for the abolition of all foreign jurisdiction, for conformity of common prayer and ad- ministration of sacraments, for the restitution of first-fruits to the Crown, others equally detrimental to the liberty of the Church, and one Bill was brought forward for restoring the queen in blood. The bishops unanimously opposed all but the last, to which they offered no opposition. Kitchen, Bishop of LlandafF, alone of all the Marian prelates, betrayed his trust, and subsequently took the oath of supremacy. Henry VIII., when he broke with the Catholic traditions, of the country, surprised and terrified the episcopate into submission, with the exception of Fisher, Bishop of Rochester. Elizabeth, on the contrary, stood alone at the head of her Council, in opposition to the whole hierarchy, to the great majority of the heads of colleges in both universities, to all the regular, and by far the greater number of the secular clergy, besides a large number of Catholic laymen. Sir Thomas White, founder of St. John's College, Oxford, and Lord Mayor of London, protested in Parlia- ment against the injustice and folly of abolishing, by means of a set of " beardless boys," a religion that was planted in the country in so marvellous a manner, and by such vener- able and holy men.^ The Supremacy Bill as it was originally drafted was thrown out by the Commons, and the government, un- hampered by the modern legislation which makes it im- possible to reintroduce a Bill in the same session, brought it in again in February with some amendments, and passed it. It went up to the Lords, was twice read and then went into Committee. The Committee was composed of an equal number of Catholics and Protestants, and further amendments were introduced. Elizabeth objected to her title of Supreme Head, and their delay in making the Bill law was mainly owing to her vacillation on this and some other points. The Bill enjoining the new Prayer Book was passed by a majority of three in the Upper House (the eleven vacant bishoprics conveniently turning what would have been a decided minority into a hard-won victory for the govern- ment). It had been announced that the three estates of the 1 Simpson, Edmu?id Campion, p. 5. Elizabeth and her Catholic Subjects 369 realm were to be consulted before any change was made " in matters and ceremonies of religion " ; but it is notorious that all the measures were carried in distinct opposition to the bishops and the main body of the clergy. Of the laity, among others the Marquess of Winchester, the Earl of Shrewsbury, Viscount Montague, the Lords Morley, Stafford, Wharton, Rich, North, and Ambrose Dudley, upheld Catholic religion.^ Parliament rose on Good Friday, and during the Easter vacation the first step was taken to inaugurate the new liturgy, in the form of a religious discussion, held by order of the queen in Westminster Abbey. Three subjects were named for the three days during which the dispute was to last. These were : The use of the Latin tongue in divine service ; the right of churches to alter the ritual ; the Mass as a propitiatory sacrifice for the living and the dead. Eight disputants were appointed for each side ; in defence of the old faith were the four Bishops of Winchester, Lichfield, Chester and Lincoln, and the doctors of theology — Cole, Harpsfield, Chedsey, and Langdale. Both Houses of Parliament were assembled to hear the debate. On the second day. Bishop White of Winchester rose to answer the objections brought by the Protestants the day before against the use of the Latin tongue, but the Lord Chancellor, Sir Nicholas Bacon, objected that this was an infringement of the queen's orders, and that the bishops should now bring forward their arguments in support of the second thesis. It thus became evident that the Catholic disputants were not to have fair play, the last word in each case being allotted to the Protestant champions. The bishops, seeing that they were to be mere puppets in the show, and that it was already decided which side should prevail, refused to state the argument. They declared that they were the representatives of the ancient Catholic faith ; their opponents must present their difficulties, which they would then answer. Bacon replied that they must keep to the prescribed order, or the dispute should come to an end. On the refusal of each to continue on these terms. Bacon summoned Abbot Feckenham to take up the discussion. He also having declined, the assembly broke up. The Bishops of Winchester and Lincoln were at once arrested ^ D'Ewcs, Journal of Both Houses. 2 B 370 Reformation and Renaissance and sent to the Tower ; the others were cited to appear before the Privy Council, and ordered not to leave London. They were punished with heavy fines, amounting in all to When Parliament reassembled the Commons were in- formed that the queen's humility would not allow her to accept the title of Supreme Head, and that they must devise some other form with regard to the supremacy or primacy.^ They accordingly brought in a new Bill on the same subject, in which Elizabeth was styled " governess " instead of " head " ; and as the queen had no objections thus to be styled, the Bill having passed both Houses, gained her assent, and became law. The troubles of her Catholic subjects now began — an unbloody persecution lasting about ten years, to be followed by a period of torture, hanging, quartering, and dis- embowelling. In the meanwhile, whenever a priest refused to adopt the new Prayer Book, or spoke of it slightingly, he was liable to forfeit a year's stipend for the first offence, and to be imprisoned for six months without the option of bail. For the second offence he was ipso facto deprived of his living altogether, and condemned to a year's imprisonment. For a third offence he not only forfeited his goods to the State, but was doomed to languish in prison for the rest of his days. A layman convicted of speaking publicly against the Prayer Book, or of causing a priest to use any other prayers than those contained therein, either in public or private devotions, or of causing him to celebrate any sacrament in a different manner to that prescribed in the Prayer Book, was liable to be fined lOO marks for the first offence, to be paid within six weeks, under pain of six months' imprisonment without the option of bail. For a second offence the punishment was a fine of 400 marks and a year's imprisonment. For a third offence he was sen- tenced to lifelong imprisonment, with the forfeiture of all his goods. The effect of this cleverly contrived engine had been foreseen, and the way in which it was worked was no less ingenious. At first some indulgence was exercised. Men were to be surprised into acceptance of the new service. ^ Hume, Spanish Calendar^ P- S^- Elizabeth and her Catholic Subjects 371 Arrests were few and far between, and were made chiefly for example's sake. The imprisoned bishops were even told that if they would but publicly conform to the prayers of the Established Church, the Oath of Supremacy would not be exacted from them.^ But all persons about to take orders, or to receive degrees in either university, all clergy- men on their promotion to livings, all judges, magistrates, and servants of the Crown, were required to swear to the queen's supremacy. The oath varied little from that framed by Henry VIII., and the alteration of the term "Supreme Head" to "Supreme Governor" was a distinc- tion without a difference. It ran thus : — " I, A B, do utterly testify and declare in my conscience that the Queen's Highness is the only Supreme Governor of this Realm, and of all other Her Highness's Dominions and Countries, as well as in all Spiritual or Ecclesiastical Things and Causes, as Temporal ; and that no foreign Prince, Person, Prelate, State, or Potentate hath or ought to have any Jurisdiction, Power, Superiority, Pre-eminence, or Authority, Ecclesiastical or Spiritual, within this Realm ; and therefore I do utterly renounce and forsake all foreign Jurisdictions, Powers, Superiorities, and Authorities, and do promise that from henceforth I shall bear Faith and true Allegiance to the Queen's Highness, her Heirs and lawful successors, and to my power shall assist and defend all Jurisdictions, Privileges, Pre-eminences, and Authorities granted or belonging to the Queen's Highness, her Heirs and successors, or united and annexed to the Imperial Crown of this Realm. So help me God, and by the contents of this book." - Meanwhile, Pope Pius IV. had been anxiously watching events, and now thought the time ripe for an appeal to Elizabeth's conscience. He therefore sent her the following letter by the hands of the Abbot Parpaglia : — "Very dear daughter in Christ, we send you greeting, health, and the apostolical benediction. How greatly we desire (our pastoral charge so requiring it) to procure the salvation of your soul, and to provide likewise for your honour, and the security of your kingdom withal, God, who is the searcher of all hearts, knoweth, and you yourself 1 Strype, vol. i. part i. pp. 370, 372. - Gibson, CoJex Juris Eccksiastici Jriglkami, p. 51, ed. 1713. 372 Reformation and Renaissance may understand by what we have given in charge to this our beloved son, Vincentius Parpaglia, Abbot of St. Saviour's, a man well known to you, and well approved of us. '* Wherefore we do again and again exhort and ad- monish Your Highness, most dear daughter, that rejecting evil counsellors, which love not you but themselves, and serve their own lusts, you would take the fear of God into council with you, and acknowledging the time of your visita- tion, would show yourself obedient to our fatherly persuasions and wholesome counsels, and promise to yourself from us all things that may make not only for the salvation of your soul, but also whatsoever you shall desire from us, for the establishing and confirming of your princely dignity, ac- cording to the authority, place, and office committed unto us by God. " And if so be (as we desire and hope) that you shall return into the bosom of the Church, we shall be ready to receive you with the same love, honour, and rejoicing that the Father in the Gospel did, his son returning to him ; although our joy is like to be the greater, in that he was joyful for the safety of one son ; but you, drawing along with you all the people of England, shall hear us, and the whole company of our brethren (who are shortly, God willing, to be assembled in a General Council, for the taking away of heresies, and so, for the salvation of yourself and your whole nation) fill the Church universal with rejoicing and gladness. Yea, you shall make glad Heaven itself with such a memorable fact, and achieve admirable renown to your name, much more glorious than the crown you wear. *' But concerning this matter, the same Vincentius shall deal with you more largely, and shall declare our fatherly affection toward you. And we entreat Your Majesty to receive him lovingly, to hear him diligently, and to give the same credit to his speeches which you would to ourself. "Given at Rome, at St. Peter's, May 5, 1560, in the first year of our Pontificate." ^ The effect of this olive branch upon Elizabeth was remarkable. The Pope had solicited the aid of the King of Spain, and his ambassador in England, De Quadra, had in an audience with the queen broached the subject of a 1 MS. Vatican, 2896, n. 214. Cott. MS., Titus C, vii. fol. 11. Brit. Mus. Elizabeth and her Catholic Subjects 373 papal envoy. Elizabeth assumed a humble and penitent tone, declared that she was as good a Catholic as the ambassador himself, and called upon God to witness that her faith was the same as that of every Catholic in her kingdom. Upon being asked by De Quadra why, then, she had violated her conscience, and had committed so great a crime against her CathoHc subjects, she replied that she had been com- pelled to act as she had done, and was certain that he would find excuses for her if he knew how she had been coerced. Before the close of the interview she was brought to declare that the Pope's legate should be welcome, and that it should not be her fault if religion were not restored to what it had been at the death of her sister.^ De Quadra, in his account of the interview, says that he weighed her words carefully, so that it should be impossible to her to declare that they had another meaning if it should suit her purpose later on to do so. He was in no way deceived by the tone she affected, and the sequel proved that he was right in saying, " Her words are other than her thoughts," for no sooner was the treaty of Leith signed, and the French army withdrawn from Scotland, than Eliza- beth again veered round, defied the Pope, and forbade Parpaglia to set foot in England. At first the great difficulty for English Catholics was their uncertainty as to whether they were bound to disregard the order to be present at the services of the new religion. The Book of Common Prayer contained little to which a Catholic could object. The Psalms were the same as those to which they had always been accustomed, and most of the other prayers were taken from the Missal. There was indeed much that they would miss in the new service, for their chief act of worship, the Mass, had been swept away. But they did not look upon the condition of things as a per- manent one, and meanwhile was it not better for the ultimate triumph of their cause to bend a little before the storm .'' Many had Mass said secretly in their own houses, and afterwards appeared at the parish church, to escape the fines, but stopped their ears with wool, lest they should hear the sermons. Among others, Sir Richard Sherborne and his family were indicted for such practices. 1 Raynaldus ad ann. 1561. Quoted by Spillmann in his book Die englischen Martyrer unter Elisabeth. 374 Reformation and Renaissance The penalty for non-attendance at the new service was ultimately fixed at ^20 per lunar month for those possessed of means. The poor were simply thrown into prison. Even when his absence from church had been compounded for, a recusant was liable to a year's imprisonment, and an extra fine of 500 marks each time that he heard Mass'; and when released from prison he was in danger of forfeiting his lands and goods for ever, for the crime of straying five miles from his own door.^ Many rich and influential families were reduced to beggary, for the fines were relatively so enormous that to arrive at a just estimation of their amount we must multiply every figure by twelve. The year 1569 was a decisive one for the English Catholics. After the repeated efforts of his predecessor to reach Elizabeth's conscience, Pope St. Pius V. judged that the time had ceased to be when England might be saved to the Church by patience and longanimity. Henceforth the faithful were in peril of falling away, unless the bent and nature of the conspiracy were exposed. A generation was growing up in ignorance of the Catholic religion, and legis- lation was indispensable in order that sincere and honest Catholics might not be in danger of wandering blindly from the fold. Already, -in 1562, De Quadra had written to the Spanish Ambassador at Rome, praying that the question might be laid before the Pope, whether English Catholics might, without sin, take part in the Anglican service. " The case is a new one, and not easy to settle," he had said. It was laid before the Inquisition in this form: — "May Catholics living in a country in which the practice of their religion is forbidden under pain of death, without danger of losing their souls obey a law which orders them to frequent conventicles, where psalms are sung, passages from the Bible read out in the vernacular, and heretical doctrines are preached ? " The answer was a plain and emphatic " No." Although, it was admitted, they would not be compelled to communi- cate with heretics, they would, in appearance at least, share their belief, and expose their own faith to danger. This was indeed the very object of the law, in order that they might become Protestants by imperceptible degrees. The Emperor Ferdinand had interceded with Elizabeth ^ Lingard, History of England, vol. viii. p. 296. Elizabeth and her Catholic Subjects 375 on behalf of the imprisoned bishops and the suffering people, but in vain ; the queen had no intention of granting liberty of conscience to any of her subjects, and least of all to the Catholics. On February 24, 1569, the Pope signed the famous Bull Regnans in excelsis, deposing Elizabeth, and releasing her subjects from obedience to her. But a year was still to elapse before it was made public. Cecil and his agents were, in the meanwhile, more con- cerned to destroy the ancient worship altogether than to enforce the utmost rigour of the law upon the worshippers. War should first be declared upon stones, and the rehcs and shrines of saints, and then, if the people still refused to bow before the golden image that Elizabeth the Queen had set up, flesh and blood must suffer. This policy played into the hands of the most violent ; greed and cupidity, sacrilege and fanaticism, were rampant all over the country. Blasphemies, expressed in the most revolting language, — acts of barbarism that would have been disgraceful in South Sea Islanders, — were the characteristics of men modestly calling themselves reformers. Much has been said and sung about " the spacious days of Queen Elizabeth," and " spacious " they were no doubt for all those who only asked for room to prosper and flourish and bask in the world's sunshine. For those who would live by their consciences, deny themselves, serve God and win heaven, they were days as narrow as a prison cell. Smashing, hacking, and defacing, as we have already seen, were signs of the "elect" everywhere. A great deal of destruction had been got through in Edward's reign, but much of what was left to destroy was reserved for the iconoclasts of the second and third year of Queen Elizabeth. The headless statues which we see in the abbeys and cathedrals throughout the kingdom are eloquent of the early part of the reign of " Good Queen Bess." Altar-stones were ordered to be inserted into the pavement at the entrance to the churches, where all passers might trample them under foot. John, Lord Sheffield of Mulgrave Castle, had one altar -stone made into a sink for his kitchen ; others were used as swine-troughs or put to similar uses. Pyxes were given as playthings to children, or made into salt-cellars.^ 1 Peacock, English Church Furniture, Reformation Period, pp. 29-171. 37^ Reformation and Renaissance The feasts of Our Lady were abolished, and the' Queen's birthday substituted. In Archbishop Grindal's " Articles to be Enquired of in the Archdiocese of York " for the year 1 57 1, there occurs the following paragraph : — " Whether in your churches and chapels all altars be utterly taken down and clean removed, even unto the founda- tion ; and the place where they stood paved, and the wall whereunto they joined whited over and made uniform with the rest, so as no breach or rupture appear ; and whether your rood-lofts be taken down and altered, so that the upper parts thereof, with the soller or loft, be quite taken down unto the crossbeam, and that the said beam have some convenient crest put upon the same." No one, having studied these injunctions of Grindal's, the " Visitation Articles " for the diocese of Norwich (i 561), the State Papers relating to the first years of Elizabeth's reign, the works of Jewell and of Sandys, and the corre- spondence of Elizabeth's bishops with Cecil, can doubt that these mutilations and defacings were judicial acts of the new bishops, and not the wild freaks of infuriated anabaptists. They were decreed with the distinct object of removing from the people's sight all that could remind them of their former devotions, so that they might be completely weaned from the old form of worship. In the " Injunc- tions " for the see of Durham this entry occurs under Connsclif: — " There remaineth in the church the remnants of the rood-loft untaken down. There remaineth in the choir certain corbel -stones, which were sometime footpaths for images, one on either side of the high altar. There re- maineth yet one altar without the choir door undefaced. The churchwardens to remove and certify." In the " Injunctions" of Archbishop Grindal for 1571 these words are to be found : *' The churchwardens shall see that the altar-stones be broken, defaced, and put to some common use." In 1569 one supreme effort was made by the foremost English Catholics " to restore the crown, the nobility, and the worship of God to their former estate," and to liberate the unfortunate Queen of Scots from captivity. More than half the population of the country was still Catholic ; and it was estimated that in the counties of York, Elizabeth and her Catholic Subjects 377 Durham, and Northumberland there were not ten gentle- men who favoured Elizabeth's proceedings in matters of religion.^ The Earls of Northumberland and Westmoreland entered the city of Durham at the head of only sixty armed horsemen, but they met with so little resistance that they took possession of the city, and caused High Mass to be once more offered in Durham Cathedral, in the presence of several thousand people. They ransacked the property of the Protestant Bishop of Durham and of the new ministers, but they put no one to death.- From Durham they marched through Staindrop, Darlington, Richmond, and Ripon, re- storing the ancient worship as they went. At Branham Moor they mustered 1700 horse and nearly 4000 foot, and, but for the want of a proper understanding with the Catholic population, would undoubtedly have succeeded. But their money was expended before they obtained the promised help from the King of Spain. The Duke of Alva failed to arrive with his hoped-for contingent of men and money, and the cause was lost before any serious battle had been fought. The two earls were taken prisoners, and the queen's fury vented itself on the country folk who had taken up arms in defence of their faith. The Earl of Sussex played the . part of executioner, and was merciless in his anxiety to convince Elizabeth of his loyalty. He had been accused of dilatori- ness in attacking the insurgents ; he could not be convicted either of gentleness or pity in dealing with the vanquished. Cecil had advised that a few inhabitants in each town should be arrested, and, " if need be, should by lack of food " be induced to reveal the names of those among their neigh- bours who had taken part in the rebellion.^ Sussex told him that as 'for the number to be punished, it waS' still uncertain, but that it would " not be under six or seven hundred of the common sort, besides the prisoners taken in the field." More than three hundred executions took place in the county of Durham alone, and between Newcastle and Wetherby, a district of about sixty miles in length and forty in breadth, there was not a town or village in which some of the inhabitants were not hanged as a warning to their fellows. 1 Sadler, ii. 55. 3 Zurich Letters. First Scries. Grindal to Bullinger. Letter 87. 3 Sharpe, Memorials of the Rebellioti, p. 126. 37^ Reformation and Renaissance The rest were pardoned, but on condition that they should take the oaths of allegiance and supremacy. After nearly two years spent as a prisoner at Lochleven, the Earl of Northumberland was delivered into the custody of Lord Hunsdon. The wonderful strength and sweetness of his character so won over his gaoler that Lord Hunsdon, otherwise no friend to Catholics, himself applied to the queen for a pardon. Her only answer was a message to send him forthwith to York, to be executed. Hunsdon replied that it was not his office to conduct noblemen to the scaffold, and that he would rather go to prison himself than obey the command. The task was ultimately assigned to Sir John Foster, who had been enriched with Northumber- land's confiscated estates. It was signified to the condemned man that he should be restored to honour and fortune if he would abjure his religion, but he replied that no greater honour could be conferred on him than the honour of a martyr's death. Even then the new ministers were sent to argue with him, but he did not cease to declare that he would die in the Catholic religion. With a serene and joyful countenance he ascended the scaffold on August 22, 1572.^ The Bull of Excommunication against Elizabeth having been at last published, its immediate result was to render Mary Stuart's captivity closer and harder, and the execution of her devoted adherent, the Duke of Norfolk, was a foreshadowing of her own. He was kept in igno- rance of most of the charges brought against him till he heard the indictment read at his trial, was allowed the aid of no counsel, was debarred from all communication with his friends, and, after having been a close prisoner in the Tower for eighteen weeks, received notice of his trial the night before his arraignment. Then, without notes or books, he was invited to answer charges suddenly brought against him, and ranging over a period of three years.'^ Two of the duke's servants — Barker and Bannister — were examined, the examinations being conducted in a truly Elizabethan manner, as is shown by the following letter from the queen. It is dated September 15, 1571 : — " If they shall not seem to you to confess plainly their knowledge, then we warrant you to cause them both, or 1 Bridgewater, Concertatio Ecclesi^e Catkoliae in Ajiglia, fols. 45-49. - Lingard, History of Enghmd^ vol. viii. p. 87. Elizabeth and her Catholic Subjects 379 either of them, to be brought to the rack, and first to move them with fear thereof, to deal plainly in their answers, and if that shall not move them, then you shall cause them to be put to the rack, and to find the taste thereof, until they shall deal more plainly, or until you shall think meet.'' ^ Two days later. Sir Thomas Smith wrote to Lord Burghley : " I suppose we have gotten as much at this time as is like to be had ; yet to-morrow we do intend to bring a couple of them to the rack, not in any hope to get anything worthy that pain or fear^ but because it is so earnestly com- manded us."" On the 20th he again wrote : " Of Bannister with the rack, of Barker with the extreme fear thereof, we suppose to have gotten all." At the trial it was made to appear as if these confessions had been spontaneous, and henceforth to the end of Eliza- beth's reign the rack and other instruments of torture designed to extort confessions were seldom at rest. Whole families of Catholics emigrated, and their lands and goods were immediately seized by the Crown. Elizabeth com- plained that the court of Philip II. was the resort of all her enemies ; but at home every gaol in the kingdom contained recusants, so that it was sometimes objected that Protestant criminals, their fellow-prisoners, were in danger of being converted. A gentleman, whose name does not transpire, writing to Walsingham, tells him of a visit he has paid to two priests confined in Newgate. He thinks the prisons great nurseries of Popery, and advises that priests should either be banished the realm, or put into solitary confinement. He desires therefore the release of his kinsman, a zealous Protestant, who has been committed to gaol " for consenting to the stealing of the Queen's venison." " It does not appear whether the prayer was granted, but it would have been no exception to the rule ; theft was an incomparably slighter offence than Popery. Justice was never worse administered. The judicial records of Elizabeth's reign form a long procession of trials 1 Cotton MS. Calig. C. 3, fol. 237. A letter of warrant from Elizabeth to Sir Thomas Smith and Dr. Wilson to extort a confession from Barker and Bannister. 2 Harl. MS. 286, fol. 97. 380 Reformation and Renaissance with packed juries, and verdicts that had been foregone conclusions from the beginning. A justice of the peace was defined in Parhament as '* an animal who, for half-a-dozen chickens, would dispense with a dozen laws." Thus, provided an accused person were not indicted for his priesthood, or for the harbouring of priests, for hearing Mass, or for being in possession of Catholic books, vest- ments, or Agnus Dei, he might with a little management easily secure a pardon. The following are a few instances taken at hazard from the records, which teem with documents illustrating the fact that murder was by no means an un- pardonable crime, that forgery was frequently condoned, and that libel was scarcely esteemed an offence at all. " Thos. Webbe, of London, convicted of coining and uttering Elizabeth shillings, was pardoned, provided he depart into the Low Countries within forty days, and do not return without licence.^ " Pardon to Roger Orme, of Whittington, Co. Staf- ford, committed for killing Thos. Pudsey, of Langford, Co. Derby.' *' Pardon to Thos. Towley, yeoman, of London, im- prisoned for burglary." ^ Close upon this last follows another pardon for burglary, and another for George Bostock, of Holt, Denbigh, for killing John Roden.^ A pardon was also granted about the same time for manslaughter, and another for burglary. Henry Goslin, keeper of St. Edmondsbury Gaol, was pardoned for the escape of Francis Hexham, committed for felony and treason. The said Francis Hexham was also pardoned for the above crimes, and for breaking prison. These are followed by two more pardons granted to yeomen for manslaughter, and so on. At the same time it was extremely difficult for a Catholic — much more for a priest accused of any offence whatever — to obtain common justice. Thus Thomas Wright, priest, arrested on suspicion of being concerned in Essex's plot, complains to Cecil from the prison of the Gatehouse : — " I find it written in the forefront of vindictive justice, that no man be punished, especially with death, before trial and judgment ; eighteen weeks have passed, since by your ^ Record Office, Domestic, Elizabeth, vol. ccxlix. July i, 1594. 2 Ibid. Sept. 7, 1594. ^ Ibid. vol. ccl. Oct. 5, 1594. Elizabeth and her Catholic Subjects 381 commission I have been closed within four walls, and buried alive (for life without the use of it may better be termed a burial or a death than a life), without examination or sen- tence. Pray give order that my cause may be tried, and if by law I deserve death, let me rather die once than every day die a new death. If I cannot obtain so much, let me enjoy that liberty of prison granted to common prisoners, and not lie thus rotting in a corner. ... If I obtain this through you, I will pray for you ; if not, God be my judge." ^ Those Catholics who, by dint of paying huge fines, enjoyed comparative liberty were still far from leading a secure or peaceful life. At any hour of the day or night they were exposed to the danger of invasion and destruction of their property. Often, in the dead of the night, their houses would be suddenly surrounded with troops, while the sheriff of the district, accompanied by a band of soldiers, would demand admittance in the queen's name. Then began, among oaths and blasphemies, the work of demolition. Walls were torn down, flooring pulled up in the search for priests' hiding-places and contraband Church furniture. In the North, when a search was made, recusants fled to the Isle of Man, or to Scotland. Some hid in caves, some took refuge in the Peak district, where Robert Eyre, a justice of the peace, whose brother was a Catholic, gave warning at the approach of danger. They were relieved by shepherds who brought food and hid it among the rocks, so that, as one of Cecil's spies wrote, " that country was a sanctuary for wicked men." The " wicked men " were such as Father Boast, or Bost, a northern priest, who, in his examination before Cecil, Sir John Wolley, and Richard TopclifFe, the priest-hunter, said that he was sorry there were not twenty priests in the place of every one throughout the country ; but declared that he loved the queen, and would take her part, even if the Pope sent an army against her ; but that if his Holiness proceeded against her as a heretic, he could not err, and that Catholics must obey the Church. For this statement Boast was declared to be " full of treason." ^ When brought to the 1 R. O. Dom. Eliz. vol. cclxvi. From the Gatehouse, Jan. 20, 1598. 2 TopclifFe to the Lord Keeper, Puckering. Record Office, Dom. Eliz. 1593. 382 Reformation and Renaissance scaffold he wished to God that his blood might be in satisfaction for the queen's sins.^ Lord Sheffield, who was very zealous against recusants, made an attack on Groman Hall, a house " notorious for receiving priests and fugitives from beyond the sea." One Jone Feme, a priest-hunter, writing to Cecil, says : — " The search at Groman Abbey was made as appointed by the intelligencer at 2 a.m. after St. Peter's Day. The recusants have so many eyes in this place that I could not take men enough to compass the house and resist their violence, without discovering the attempt ; therefore I requested the assistance of Lord Sheffield, who has a sincere profession of religion, and was at Mulgrave Castle, three miles off. Your warrant coming to him at 10 p.m., he took the keys of his castle gates into his own hands, and came to the house with thirty-six servants. He left his horses half a mile off, and they compassed the place ; the back doors were open, and there were the steps of a horse and man perceived. I beheve the spy had discovered it (betrayed the news of the intended attack), for he gave me a false plan of the house. He promised to conduct to the house, and remain near, to give advice where to search, but failed in both, and wrote contradictory letters about it. I hope you will punish him as a deluder. "It is difficult to search in that country, for the re- cusants keep scouts day and night, that their cattle should not be seized, and they ride armed. "The case of poor ministers and Protestants is miserable. " In the search, all things for furnishing a Mass were found, and divers Popish books, but nothing else, though floors, ceilings, pavements, and double walls were broken up, and vaults of strange conveyance found out. At the stair- head was a post as thick as a man's body, on which the house seemed to bear, but it was really a removable hinge, locked from beneath, covering a hole at which a man might descend. " His lordship took great pains, and would be much encouraged if his service were made known to her Majesty. I have done my uttermost, and am much grieved at the ill-success of this business." ^ 1 Challoner, Missionary Priests, p. 250, Supplement. 2 Record Office, Dom. Eliz., vol. cclxxi. July 3, 1599. York. Elizabeth and her Catholic Subjects 383 In a subsequent letter the same writer intimates that there are not many like Lord Sheffield, ready to conduct a search in person, and that the Archbishop of York and the Council of the North should have him appointed one of the Council " to encourage him to spend part of the summer at Mulgrave Castle, and make himself a terror to these ungodly recusants." Elizabeth's unbloody persecution of her Catholic subjects came to an end in 1577, when her bloody persecution began. Challoner, in his Memoirs of Missionary Priests, estimates that from this year to the end of Elizabeth's reign, 187 Catholics suffered death for their religion. Of these 1 24 were priests, and the remaining 61^ laymen and women. The first to lay down his life for the faith was Cuthbert Maine, a Cornish gentleman, belonging to an old Catholic family, although he himself had been educated in the new religion. He graduated at St. John's College, Oxford, and took orders in the Established Church. At Oxford he fell in with Edmund Campion, who afterwards suffered in the same way, and who corresponded with him from Douay, Campion entreating him to abandon the ministry he had undertaken. One of his letters fell by chance into the hands of the Bishop of London, who at once sent pur- suivants to Oxford to apprehend Cuthbert Maine and some of his friends, who were also suspected of a leaning towards the old faith. But he contrived to escape, went to Douay, was received into the Church, and some years later became a priest. In 1576 he returned to England to minister to the per- secuted Catholics, and took up his abode in the house of a Catholic gentleman named Tregian, about five miles from Truro, passing in the neighbourhood as Mr. Tregian's steward. But his presence soon attracted suspicion, and when the Bishop of Exeter arrived at Truro, he was re- quested by the sheriff of the county to help to search Mr. Tregian's house for a priest who was supposed to be con- cealed there. Accordingly a party, consisting of the sheriff himself, the bishop's chaplain, and several gentlemen with their servants, proceeded to the place. They were at first refused admittance, on the plea that the sheriff had no warrant from the queen ; but violence being attempted, Mr. Tregian allowed them to enter without further debate. 384 Reformation and Renaissance The whole party went straight to the room occupied by the priest, and beat upon the door with such force that it would have fallen in if it had not been opened on the inside by Father Maine himself. He was hurried off, with his books, papers, and letters, to the bishop, who examined him as to his doctrine. The bishop admitted his learning, but showed him no favour, and the sheriff then took him to Launceston, where he was imprisoned, chained with gyves on his legs to his bed-posts, and left in solitary confinement. Here he remained from June till the judges came on circuit at Michaelmas, when he was brought before them, charged with having in his possession and publishing a papal Bull, with having maintained the Pope's supremacy, denying that of the queen, with having brought an Agnus Dei into the kingdom, and with having said Mass in Mr. Tregian's house. The judge directed the jury to bring the prisoner in guilty of the indictments, urging that where plain proofs were wanting, strong presumption ought to take their place — a most unfair and illogical conclusion ; but law and justice had a very small place in the trials conducted against Catholics in the reign of Elizabeth and the two succeeding reigns. A verdict was given in accordance with the judge's wishes, and although afterwards a dispute arose as to the validity of the sentence, the Council finally agreed that Mr. Maine should be executed " for a terror to the Papists." On the day of his martyrdom his life was offered to him if he would renounce his religion, or at least swear upon the Bible that the queen was the supreme head of the Church of England. He refused, and was led to execution. Accord- ing to his sentence he was to have been first hanged, then cut down and dismembered while still alive. Some of the bystanders murmured at this barbarity ; nevertheless he was cut down before he was dead ; but falling from too great a height he struck his head against the scaffold and was thus rendered almost insensible to further torture. Mr. Tregian, who was convicted of having harboured Father Maine, was deprived of his estates and imprisoned for life.i 1 Challoner, Memoirs of Missmiary Priests, vol. i. Elizabeth and her Catholic Subjects 385 When, in 1566, Queen Elizabeth, dressed in gala robes and attended by ail the pomp she loved, visited Oxford for the first time, Edmund Campion pronounced the address of welcome. The most popular man in Oxford, proctor and public orator, although only twenty -six. Campion shed a lustre upon his college that was reflected upon the whole University. He was perhaps at that time a little dazzled by the golden opinions showered upon him, and though a Catholic at heart, worldly considerations led him to take deacon's orders in the Established Church. So pleased was Elizabeth with the address of welcome, delivered in the deep, rich, and melodious voice for which Campion was remarkable, that Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, sent for him and told him to ask a favour of the queen, for she had commissioned him to find out what she could do for him. '* Do not," he added, " be too modest, for it is not only the queen's command, but my inclination to befriend you. Ask what you like for the present. The queen and I will provide for the future." Cecil also promised him his support, and declared him to be *' one of the diamonds of England." But time and study gave a more serious purpose to the young man's life. His character gained in strength and fibre, and at last he found courage to fly from the too seductive enchantments of a society where his every gesture was imitated, and where his friends prided themselves on being called " Campionists." He went to Douay, applied himself to theology, and, full of remorse for having received the schismatical diaconate, made a vow to enter a religious order. He chose the Society of Jesus, and was received into it by the General, in Rome. After seven years spent in preaching, teaching, and other works of charity, he returned to England, the Jesuits having resolved to send missionaries to share in the labours and perils of the secular clergy. With a mere pretence at concealment he preached almost as openly as if there had been no persecution, and published his Ten Reasons in Favour of the Catholic Religion^ which made a great impression. The government, uneasy at his successes, caused him to be arrested by treachery at a gentleman's house in the country. A few days after his arrival at the Tower a 2 C 386 Reformation and Renaissance strange thing happened. Elizabeth, who remembered the brilliant scene at Oxford, fifteen years before, the eloquent words of the young orator, his charm of manner, his wonder- ful voice, desired to see and speak with him once, and to try what her personal influence could do in drawing him over to her side. From his cramped prison cell, justly called Little Ease, Campion was taken by water to the house of the Earl of Liecester, and there, in the presence of the Earl of Bedford and of the privy councillors, he saw the queen once more face to face. He had been accused of conspiring against her life ; but now they told him that they found no fault with him save that he was a Papist. " And that," he answered enthusiastically, " is my greatest glory." ^ Then the queen offered him life, liberty, riches, honours — even the Archbishopric of Canterbury was for a moment held before his uneager eyes — if only he would conform to the State religion. When she saw that she had failed, there was nothing left open to her by way of persuasion than the persuasion of torture. The original story of conspiracy was again brought forward, and a number of priests and others were associated with Campion in his mock -trial. After frequent and most cruel rackings it was impossible to pro- duce the semblance of a proof, but he and his fellow-martyrs passed from the Tower to judgment at Westminster Hall. He was as eloquent and as brilliant when he refuted the false and degraded witnesses with whom he was confronted, as when he delivered his oration before the queen at Oxford, but none applauded now. Only, when he was required to lift up his racked and helpless arm to plead, one of his fellow-prisoners performed the office for him, and kissed it reverently. Judges and jury had been bought to convict the prisoners, and so well known was the fact, that one of the jurymen afterwards excused himself by saying that if he had not found them guilty he had been no friend of Cassar's. On being asked by the Lord Chief-Justice what reason he and his companions could advance for not suffering death, Campion with a beaming face thus welcomed martyrdom. " It was not our death," he exclaimed, " that ever we feared. But we knew that we were not lords of our own * Simpson, Edmund Campion: a Biography, p. 239 et seq. Elizabeth and her Catholic Subjects 387 lives, and therefore, for want of answer, would not be guilty of our own deaths. The only thing that we have to say now is, that if our religion do make us traitors, we are worthy to be condemned ; but otherwise are and have been as true subjects as ever the queen had. In condemning us you condemn all your own ancestors, all the ancient priests, bishops, and kings, all that was once the glory of England — the island of saints, and the most devoted child of the See of Peter. For what have we taught, however you may qualify it with the odious name of treason, that they did not uniformly teach ? To be condemned with these old lights — not of England only, but of the world — by their degenerate descendants is both gladness and joy to us. " God lives, posterity will live ; their judgment is not liable to corruption, as that of those who are now going to sentence us to death." That sentence was not delayed, and presently Westminster Hall rang and echoed with the jubilant strains of the Te Deum, which Campion's voice sent up, and in which the other prisoners joined. At the place of execution Campion said that he could not ask the queen's pardon, as he had never offended her, but he prayed earnestly for her and all, meekly and sweetly yielding up his soul. His death had so great an effect on the assembled crowd that many were moved to tears. Camden relates that even the queen herself did not believe him or any of his companions guilty.^ One more example will suffice to illustrate the spirit in which all these Elizabethan martyrs laboured and suffered. Robert Southwell, the Jesuit poet and martyr, belonged to an old Norfolk family, and had been educated at Douay. Returning to England in 1586, he took up his abode in Arundel Castle, as chaplain to Lady Arundel, whose husband, the noble Philip Howard, was imprisoned for conscience' sake in the Tower. For six years Father Southwell re- mained hidden at Arundel, though his whereabouts were well known to Catholics, and all who could, under some pretext or other gain access to him, received his ministrations. Sometimes, disguised in various ways, he made expeditions ^ Challoner, Memoirs of Missionary Priests. Bridgewater's Concertatio. Stow. Foley, Records of the English Province. Dictionary of National Biography, article " Edmund Campion." 388 Reformation and Renaissance to houses in the neighbouring counties to say Mass, and give the sacraments to the faithful who assembled secretly at the risk of their liberty and lives. At last he was betrayed by a woman who pretended to be a Catholic, was arrested, sent to prison, and in the space of a few weeks, was tortured ten times, and with such severity that he declared death would have been far prefer- able. Nevertheless, in spite of all that Elizabeth's agents could do to his body, his mind remained so clear and steadfast that he would not even tell them the colour of the horse which he had ridden on a certain day, lest he should be giving the least clue to the discovery of the Catholic house where he had been, and to those who were there with him. He was sent first to the prison of the Gatehouse, kept by the husband of the woman who had betrayed him, and two months later was transferred to the Tower, where he was thrown into so filthy a dungeon that when he was brought forth after a month, his clothes were covered with vermin. So inhuman was the treatment he received that his father presented a petition to the queen, humbly entreating that if his son had done anything for which by law he had deserved death, he might be executed ; if not, as he was a gentleman, he hoped her Majesty would be pleased to order that he should be treated as such, and not be confined in that filthy hole. After this Father Southwell was better lodged, and his father was allowed to provide him with necessary clothing and food ; but for three years, during which time no word of complaint ever escaped his lips, he was closely confined. He then wrote to Cecil, begging that he might be brought to trial, or that at least his friends might visit him. Cecil replied brutally that if he was in so much haste to be hanged, he should have his desire. From the Tower he was taken to Newgate, placed in a dungeon called Limbo, and was from thence removed to Westminster for trial. The verdict of guilty having been returned, he was con- demned for his priesthood to be hanged, drawn, and quartered. Accordingly, on February 22, 1595, he was placed on a hurdle and dragged over the stones and through the mud to Tyburn. Here he addressed the crowd in these words : " ' Whether we live, we live unto the Lord, and whether we die, we die unto the Lord.' This death, Elizabeth and her Catholic Subjects 389 therefore, although it may now seem base and ignominious, can to no right-thinking person appear doubtful ; but that it is beyond measure an eternal weight of glory to be wrought in us who look not to the things which are visible, but to those which are unseen." His behaviour made such an impression on the crowd, that when the executioner would have cut the rope and begun the ghastly work of dismemberment while Father Southwell was still alive, they would not suffer it, and the magistrate present supported them. A Protestant nobleman among the spectators was so deeply moved that he exclaimed, " May my soul be with this man's ! " ^ But in spite of the prisons teeming with human life ; in spite of the rack, the " Scavenger's Daughter," and all the hideous paraphernalia devised to create suffering in every conceivable form ; in spite of midnight raids, priest-hunting, and finally the gibbet and the knife, — the Catholic religion was so deeply rooted in the country that it was no sooner cut down in one part than it sprang up with renewed vitality in another. In a report to the Council on the condition of Lancashire and Cheshire in 1591, the difficulties which the Ecclesiastical Commission met with in those counties are apparent. The report deplored the emptiness of the churches on Sundays and holy days, the number of absentees being greater than ever. Preachers refrained from preaching for lack of hearers. The people swarmed in the streets and ale-houses, during service time, and in many churches only the curate and his clerk were present. They lacked instruction, most of the parsons admitted by the bishops to fat benefices being either unlearned or non-resident in their parishes. Their lordships' letters, commanding the justices to call before them all parsons, vicars, curates, churchwardens, and sworn men, and to examine them on oath as to the statutes of the I St and 3rd of Elizabeth, were disregarded. Some of the coroners and justices with their families were denounced for their non-attendance at church, and at the next quarter session information was to be given with regard to all offenders against these laws. The report includes a list of fourteen justices in Lancashire, of whom three belonging ^ Challoner, Memoirs of Missionary Priests. Stow. Foley, Records oj the English Province. 390 Reformation and Renaissance to the Ecclesiastical Commission were suspected of favouring Popery. Many of them had not communicated at the Lord's Supper since the beginning of her Majesty's reign. The recusants, it went on to say, had scouts about the commissioners, to give notice when anything was intended against them ; and some of the bailiffs attending on the commissioners allowed themselves to be bribed for that purpose, so that the recusants might " shift out of the way, and avoid being apprehended. Some example ought to be made of the bailiffs," It was hard, the report declared, for the Lord President of the North to keep Yorkshire in order, and the other counties adjoining, so long as Lancashire remained unreformed, and the law was power- less in that county. The decree for calling home of children sent to be educated in parts beyond the sea was also evaded.^ But although the Catholics were in a majority in every county except Middlesex and Kent, the representatives of the powerful minority neither slumbered nor slept. Many incidents such as the following are to be found among the records of this time, illustrating the vigilance with which the ports were watched. George Huxley, son of a husbandman at Bunbury, who had been ruined by fines, " all his goods having been taken from him for Papistry," set out on his road to London, to be apprenticed. At Chester he fell in with a friend of his father's, named Thomas Stevenson. This man had been imprisoned for recusancy, and he advised the boy to go to France, promising to place him there better than he could hope to be placed in London. Huxley consented, and two other boys having joined him, they struck a bargain with the captain of a French vessel for their passage over. But Stevenson was overheard by a spy of Cecil's " to repre- hend the religion used in England as false " ; he also said that his object in helping Huxley over the sea was that he might learn the truth. The spy at once gave informa- tion, and two of the boys were captured, and taken before the mayor of Chester, who wrote the matter of their examination to Lord Burghley, praying to know what should be done with them.- ^ Record Office. Dom. Eliz. vol. cclx. 2 Il?id.]\x\y 2, 1595. Elizabeth and her Catholic Subjects 391 All the efforts of Elizabeth's government to foist the new service upon an unwilling nation would perhaps have been useless but for the gigantic machinery of the spy- system. A perfect web of treachery, deceit, and fraud, it was one of the principal agents in the triumph of the religious revolution in England. CHAPTER XI QUEEN ELIZABETH AND THE REVOLUTION Her intrigues with the Huguenots — The preparation for St. Bartholomew 1558-1572 It was the Protestant historian Guizot who, with much discrimination, first expressed the conviction, which has now become almost a truism, that the religious crisis of the six- teenth century was not merely a religious, but essentially a revolutionary movement.^ Among all the arguments brought forward by the reformers to justify their position, it never once occurred to any of them to pretend, either in England or abroad, that the change they had effected was not a radical change. The word Catholic, so dear to the modern Anglican, was an abomination to them. " So long," said Admiral Coligny, " as the Queen of England stands fast in the Protestant religion, so long will many States of Christendom decline from Catholic religion, and especially her countenance will be the occasion that France being won thereto, the rest of Christendom shall follow." If the revolutionary character of the Reformation was disguised at home by the protection lent to it by the throne, Elizabeth's foreign policy, and her alliances with traitors and rebels in France and the Low Countries, show beyond all doubt that revolt from hitherto recognised authority, spiritual and temporal, was the very backbone of the movement. In France the Huguenots were far less a sect than an army. They were divided into twenty-four groups, each having six ^ Histoire de la Civilisation en Europe, p. 356. 392 Queen Elizabeth and the Revolution 393 chiefs, to whom they paid a yearly tribute of 800,000 francs. They could muster in four weeks from 7000 to 8000 horse, and 25,000 foot-soldiers — an army which the King of France could not bring into the field in less than four months.^ The Venetian envoy, Michele, declared that obedience to their superiors was exacted with greater severity than among the Turks. " I am at a loss," wrote Tavannes in his Memoirs, *' what to call the Huguenot faction ; it is not altogether a popular, nor altogether an aristocratic movement, but it is both in a measure. It is a republic in a monarchy, of which it will work the ruin, neither being able to continue its existence without the destruction of the other." Carrero, another Venetian envoy, divided the Huguenots into nobles, burghers, and the people, the first class being ambitious, the second lucre-loving, the third ignorant. Their spiritual guides sprang from the people, were animated with a blind fanaticism, and taught openly that taxes were an abomination, that nobility was a delusion, and that feudal exactions were non-biblical. They urged their hearers no longer to live and die, as their ancestors had done, in besotted ignorance of the people's sovereignty- — sentiments that would not have seemed out of place in the mouths of the Sans Culottes and Terrorists of 1792. One day Francis I. was threatening to imitate Henry VIII. "Sire," replied the papal legate, "you would lose more than the Pope, for a new religion requires a new king."^ At first the Huguenots had laid claim to religious toleration in self-defence, but as they grew stronger, they gradually dropped the plea, and when opportunity occurred were more pitiless towards Catholics than Catholics had ever been towards them. It was one of their tenets that should the king prove hostile to the reform he was to be treated as the obscurest of criminals, whence the doctrine of tyrannicide taught at Geneva, and developed in the writings attributed to Theodore Beza. Beza belonged to a respectable French family ; his father, a devout Catholic, had educated him for the priesthood, and ^ Kervyn de Lettenhove, Les Huguenots et les Gueux, vol. i. p. 31. 2 Monluc, Memoires, vol. ii. p. 366. 2 Brantome, vol. iv. p. 294. 394 Reformation and Renaissance he took his licentiate degree at the age of twenty. Although not yet in holy orders he held several benefices in com- mendam, according to the lax custom of the day. From his master, Melchior Wolmar, he imbibed his first notions of heresy, made friends with his fellow -student, Calvin, and became subsequently one of his most influential disciples. He was, indeed, next to Calvin, le petit hon Dieu of the Huguenots ; all that was done by them was directly or indirectly the result of Beza's influence. He was fond of quoting the Bible, but ancient Roman history was made to serve the Huguenot cause even better, for without any distortion of the text, he could point to the assassination of the tyrant Caesar by Brutus the patriot. Agrippa d'Aubigne was also in the habit of recommending a book entitled Junius Brutus, or a Means of Defence against Tyrants — a work which treated of the limits of obedience due to kings, and of the circumstances under which it was allowable to take arms against them. In August 1559 a secret meeting was held at Vendome, composed of the King of Navarre, the Prince of Conde, Coligny and his brothers, and other prominent Huguenots. Their chief subject of deliberation was a proposed rising in order to snatch the young king, Francis II., from the tutelage of the Guises ; in other words, to usurp the authority lodged in the king's uncles, and to wield it themselves. Francis was to be a prisoner in their hands, and all the Guises were to perish. Coligny promised the support of the whole Protestant party, but even then the number of troops the insurgents could muster would be insufiicient without the help of the Queen of England, because Philip II. of Spain must always be reckoned with, in the question of an attack on the Church and the mon- archical principle. He would, they knew, be ready with a strong contingent of men and money, and double the actual resources of the King of France. A little later, a still more important meeting was held at Nantes, consisting of Huguenot zealots and personal enemies of the Guises. Barry, called La Renaudie, was their chosen representative. An ex-Catholic convicted of forgery, he had been set at liberty by the Duke of Guise, and allowed to retire into Switzerland. He afterwards went to England and offered his services to Elizabeth. To him was confided Queen Elizabeth and the Revolution 395 the mission of exterminating the whole family of the Guises. Some of the conspirators went so far as to declare that the entire line of Henry II., who had so cruelly persecuted the Gospel, must be sacrificed, and a new monarch, inflamed with the Divine Word, set up in their place. By this they meant that Conde should be raised to the throne. Their plan was to seize the king, then at the Chateau of Blois ; but the conspiracy was so badly organised that the plot was discovered almost as soon as it was formed ; the king was removed to his strong castle of Amboise, and a number of the rebels were captured before an attempt could be made on the fortress. Some were executed, but many escaped to form fresh plots, and finally to deluge France with blood. Elizabeth, at her accession, was far from being in an enviable position. All Europe stood at gaze, astounded at her audacity ; but that very audacity, combined with the ability and unscrupulousness of her ministers, rendered her in a short time a power in Europe. Pope Paul IV. thought it incredible that a bastard should have any pre- tensions to a throne which was considered a fief of the Holy See, and his attitude was not such as to mollify her. The Venetian government was so loath to recognise her, that for two years after her accession the Signory was totally unrepresented in England ; and this state of things would probably have continued much longer had not the Venetian merchants, resident in London, fearing the extinction of their trade, elected a vice- Consul on their own responsibility. Her one friend among the rulers of Christendom was Philip II., who was even willing to marry her if she would pledge herself to remain faithful to the religion she had sworn that she professed. But Elizabeth weighed the relative advantages of submission and defiance, and concluded that even alone she would be a match for all her enemies. And she judged rightly ; for contempt for her birth was soon forgotten in respect for her cleverness and fear of her cunning. The very accidents of her position committed her irrevocably to the revolution ; she knew it, and to the end consistently followed out the line of policy which she and her ministers laid down at the beginning. Being the friend of revolution, innovation, licence, she became the natural enemy of all that was stable, fixed, immutable. She would have no Church of hers founded on 39^ Reformation and Renaissance the uncompromising Rock of Peter, and she had as little reverence for monarchical institutions as for the Papacy. Her strength, she knew well, lay not in any confraternity with the crowned heads of Europe, but in her own indomi- table will, leagued with the new spirit of unfaith which claimed for itself licence to question all law, both human and divine. However much Elizabeth might play the despot at home, she could only hope to make herself impos- ing abroad by means of intrigue. Her accession played the Huguenot game, and furnished them with an opportunity of open revolt. For thirty years they had gloried in persecution, making immense capital out of their sufferings ; but with the advent of Elizabeth, their protestations of submission and loyalty came to an end, and the first-fruits of their self-emancipation are to be seen in the conspiracy of Amboise. Sir Nicholas Throckmorton, the English ambassador in Paris, with a shrewdness equal to Elizabeth's own, saw at once the advantage that might be gained by secretly espous- ing the cause of the Huguenots while he appeared to be on the side of loyalty and order. It must, however, be owned that the disguise was of the thinnest, and that before long he was more than suspected of connivance with the rebels. Concerned in various plots under Queen Mary, he had been tried for high treason and acquitted, although public opinion still pronounced him guilty. He had been at Westminster at the time of Mary's death, and had hastened to Hatfield to be the first to announce to Elizabeth her accession. Active, adventurous, unscrupulous, and, accord- ing to the Spanish ambassador, adapted for any nefarious conspiracy, he perceived that the divisions from which France was suffering might become the foundation of England's greatness. His correspondence with Elizabeth and Cecil contains some of the most interesting relics of the age. For importance, his letters may rank with Chapuys' despatches in the reign of Henry VIII., although in Throckmorton the man of the world and the courtier being swamped in the politician, his communications, start- ling though they be, will be found wanting in the fascina- tion which distinguishes Chapuys' lively gossip. They introduce us into a labyrinth of plots and counter-plots ; but while the events take place, as it were, before our very Queen Elizabeth and the Revolution 397 eyes, the actors in the drama are mere lay figures, for he is scarcely ever to be diverted from business for an instant, to record a hon mot, or describe a person, or to give that playful, or sarcastic, or sympathetic touch that breathed life into the people about whom Chapuys wrote. Throck- morton is as devoid of humour as he is lacking in resources. While the imperial envoy knew a hundred devices for toying with an awkward question, keeping the shuttle- cock jumping up and down on his own battledore, till it suited him to send it whizzing back to his adversary, Throckmorton had no other way out of a difficulty than by telling a lie, or by going to bed and feigning illness. Neither was his patriotism of that lofty type which scorns to arrive at a noble end by ignoble means, and if he dreamed of the restoration of Calais, that once bright jewel of England's crown, he cared little by what loss of honour the restoration was effected. In truth, chivalry and high- mindedness were a little out of date when Elizabeth mounted the throne. " Our divisions," says Castelnau, " have been fomented and kept up by the perpetual intercourse Throckmorton had with the Admiral (Coligny) and those of his party. A man of great energy, he took the occasion by storm, neglecting all that belonged to the office of an ambassador, who ought to maintain peace and amity, to side against the king, persuading the Oueen of England that her opportunity lay in the quarrels of the French, and that she would have not only Normandy, but also the greater part of the kingdom of France, to which the kings of England had formerly so much pretension, and which they lost by the union of the French people." ^ The grievance was well founded. On March 21, 1566, Throckmorton wrote to Elizabeth, *' The moment has come to throw our money about ; it will never have been spent more usefully." ^ The chief means he employed to extract money from his parsimonious mistress was the fanning of her resentment against the Guises, for having proposed, on the accession of Francis II., that he should be proclaimed King of England. To Throckmorton's very natural disgust, whenever the English ambassador dined at the French Court he was ^ Memoir es. Book v. chap. i. 2 Forbes, Public Transactions under this date. 39 8 Reformation and Renaissance obliged to eat off plate bearing the arms of England, France, and Scotland quartered, with the style " Francis and Mary, by the Grace of God, King and Queen of France, Scotland, England, and Ireland." He was not ignorant that English sovereigns had quartered the arms of France ever since they had possessed an inch of French soil ; and he was well aware that to none but Elizabeth, sensitive as she was to the stain on her birth, and to any questioning of her right to reign, would the pretext constitute a sufficient ground of complaint. He was, however, determined to make the most of it, and assured the queen that the assump- tion of her arms by the French monarchs was no mere empty show ; but that they were resolved to prosecute Mary Stuart's title to England, and that his mistress's service would not be much set back, if Elizabeth licenced him to come over to her post-haste, to speak with her, as in these cases he could not well commit to writing what he had to say. He added that he had seen the like done in cases of less moment in her father's time. If she consented to his leaving, he desired to know whether he was to make the French king privy, or to accomplish the journey covertly.^ He wrote to Cecil in the same strain, but rather more at length, according to his custom. The result of these com- munications was a letter from Elizabeth, dated October ii, 1559, telling him to come to England to visit his wife, who was " sick with ague, and in more fear than danger," they trusted. And he was to come by post for her comfort and remedy ; and as this might seem somewhat strange to the French king and his ministers, she commanded him to declare the matter to his Majesty, the Cardinal of Lorraine, or the Duke of Guise. He was not to remain in England more than four or five days, and was to return to his place with like speed.^ Cecil kept up the fiction by remarking to Throckmorton on the queen's goodness to his wife, who, indeed, was not so well in health as Cecil could wish. The upshot of this interesting visit does not transpire ; but Throckmorton went to England again in January 1560, and on his return to Paris wrote to Elizabeth's Council warning them against the men who ruled France, and ^ Stevenson, Calendar of State Papers, Foreign Series, Sep. 24, 1559, No. 1369. 2 Forbes, vol. i. p. 251. Queen Elizabeth and the Revolution 399 hoping that the queen " will beat the iron while it is hot, and show her greatness." ^ These absences, in spite of the dust thrown in the eyes of the French government, gave rise to suspicion. The Cardinal of Lorraine told the English ambassador that they had given the world matter to talk and to think that the amity between the King of France and the Queen of England was somewhat doubtful. After some awkward fencing on Throckmorton's part, and bitter complaint on that of the Cardinal, the latter detailed the manner in which Elizabeth had supported the French rebels, who by a parliament of a few sought to order the kingdom for themselves, wherefore the king, for example's sake and for his own honour, was constrained to use force against them. He further asked what there was in this that could be construed into want of friendship for the Queen of England ? Might they not chastise their rebels without offence to her .'' Throckmorton replied that he did not know that the Huguenots were rebels, and that the English had great cause to doubt the preparations of the French for war, however the Cardinal might colour the same. Finally, the Cardinal asked point blank whether Elizabeth meant to assist the rebels in their doings, " which it would not be well for her to do for divers respects," and Throckmorton assured him that there was no speaking of it as contained in his instructions. The ambassador then made a formal complaint on the subject of the Queen of France bearing the arms of England. The Cardinal appeared to be much surprised at the grievance, asking why, if the Queen of England bore those of France, should not his mistress quarter the English arms, being of the same house.? Throckmorton next inquired what had moved the kings of France in times past to ascribe the arms of England to themselves, and the Cardinal replied that being at war with England, they spared nothing that might touch the honour of the English. " But," exclaimed Throckmorton, " they were at war with Mary ; why then should they offer this insult to Elizabeth, by whose means they have peace ^ " He went on to protest that if Elizabeth had consulted ^ Stevenson, Calendar of State Papers, Foreign Series, 1560-61. No. 685. 400 Reformation and Renaissance her own interests more than the peace of Christendom, she might have retaken Calais, and Philip would then have made no peace without England. The Cardinal knew, he said, what interest England would have had in the continuance of the war, being joined with so puissant a prince. *' Here," observed Throckmorton, " he (the Cardinal) put his finger to his nose and scratched it, where I think it did not itch." But throw what dust he might, the ambassador did not deceive the Guises, who were well informed of his trans- actions with the Huguenots. However, the interview ended with protestations of friendship on both sides, and afterwards the Englishman had an audience with the king, and pre- sented Elizabeth's letters. Francis inquired politely whether the queen were fond of hawking and hunting, and without appearing to give the interview anything of a business character, contrived to sandwich between remarks purely ceremonious, a request that the French hostages might be remembered. He was then taken to the queen -mother, with whom was present the young Queen Mary Stuart. After some compliments exchanged with Catherine of Medici, the ambassador turned to Mary, who after some remark of his exclaimed, " The Queen my good sister may be assured to have a better neigh- bour of me, being her cousin, than of the rebels, and so I pray you signify unto her." This might equally apply to France and to Scotland, for Elizabeth's policy was singu- larly consistent in all that concerned her relations with foreign courts, being a very simple process of stirring up strife between subjects and their lawful rulers. The answer she sent to these amenities through her ambassador was framed with her accustomed vagueness. She wished, she said, all causes likely to breed dissension between herself and the French king redressed. She complained of the assumption of her style and arms by his wife, and gave Throckmorton power to appoint commissioners to treat of the subject. She next expressed her willingness to disarm if Francis recalled his forces from Scotland ; and if the Scottish nobles refused to live in obedience to the French king and his wife, she promised to use her persuasion or authority to induce them to do so. The discussion ended at last, but with mutual distrust, Queen Elizabeth and the Revolution 401 the French continuing to arm by sea and land, the English cruisers boarding and plundering French ships with im- punity, while Elizabeth's promises regarding the Scottish rebels remained sterile. Meanwhile the Cardinal of Lorraine and the Duke of Guise wrote to the queen-dowager of Scotland, saying that Elizabeth kept them in constant alarm lest she should begin the war, showing by all her dealings with them that she was "stirring the coals," Nevertheless, she had given them " the fairest words in the world, whereunto the King of France has not so much trusted, but that he has informed the King of Spain of all that she has done." Matters of religion, they went on to say, had gone so far in France, that within the last twelve or eighteen days a plot had been discovered to kill them both, seize the king, and give him masters and governors to bring him up " in that wretched doctrine." Many, however, had been taken prisoners, and they hoped now that the matter was " bolted out and the danger avoided."^ This, of course, referred to the famous conspiracy of Amboise, for which Elizabeth was largely responsible. It is impossible to follow these intrigues of Elizabeth and Throckmorton in France without being reminded of the equally unscrupulous behaviour of Henry II. and his ambassador De Noailles, who fomented at least half the strife and rebellion of Mary's reign, Elizabeth herself having been implicated in their plot. She was to have been married to Courtenay, Earl of Devon, and all the loyal west country was to have been called upon to rise, with the ostensible object of placing the pair on the throne." Elizabeth, with all her shrewdness, perhaps never divined that had Wyatt's rebellion succeeded, the King of France would immediately have abandoned her claims, to advance those of the legitimate heiress, his daughter-in-law, Mary Stuart, in whose interest he had acted throughout. His treachery towards Queen Mary Tudor was fully avenged, however, and the lessons in intrigue which he had given Elizabeth taught her how, while professing to be their friend, to betray his sons and a whole kingdom into the hands of their enemies. But in spite of all that had been done in France by the rebels, on ^ Stevenson, Cal. of State Papers, 1560, No. 879. 2 De Noailles, Ambassades, vol. ii. pp. 309, 310. 2 D 402 Reformation and Renaissance the strength of her understanding with them, she did not " stir the coals " enough to please Throckmorton. In order to induce her to take some definite course, he wrote that the Guises had a pestilent and horrible device to poison her by means of an Italian named Stefano, " a burly man with a black beard, about forty- five years of age," who had gone into Germany, and thence into England, to offer his services to the queen as engineer. . . . Being fore- warned of this danger, she need not fear, but in lieu thereof give good order that he may be taken, to the Guises' confusion and example to such hirelings.^ We hear no more of this terrible black bogey, but Throckmorton and others knew well the particular shape Elizabeth's fear assumed ; and whenever it was desirable to make her come to a decision, some such story as this had to be invented. It became at last so common a stratagem to declare that the Catholics had a plot to poison her saddle, her gloves, or her shoes, or that the agents of Philip and the Guises went about with envenomed daggers lying in wait for her, that it is a wonder she did not grow incredulous from the constant repetition of the same stories. It was inevitable that rumours should reach the French court of the scandals which were taking place in Elizabeth's household, and Throckmorton, writing with real or feigned indignation to the Marquis of Northampton, wishes that he " were dead or hence," that he might not hear " the dishonourable and naughty reports made of the queen, which every hair of my head stareth at and my ears glow to hear." ^ He is almost at his wits' end, and knows not what to say. " One," he says, " laugheth at us, another threateneth, another revileth the queen. Some let not to say, ' What religion is this, that a subject shall kill his wife .? ' and the prince not only bear withal but marry with him, rehearsing the father and grandfather." He continues — " All the estimation the English had got is clean gone, and the infamy passes the same so far " as his heart bleeds to think upon the slanderous bruits he hears, '* which, if they be not slaked, or if they prove true^' their reputation is 1 Stevenson, Cal. of State Papers^ 1560, No. 1066. 2 Ibid. Oct. 10, 1560, No. 623. Queen Elizabeth and the Revolution 403 gone for ever, war follows, and utter subversion of the queen and country. He concludes by begging his correspondent " to slake these rumours, praying that God may not suffer the queen to be opprobrium hominum et abjectio plebis^' and takes his leave with weeping eyes. On the same day that this letter was written Killigrew, the Scottish ambassador, in answer to a complaint of Throck- morton's, writes : — " I cannot imagine what rumours they be you hear there, as you write so strange, unless such as were here, of the death of my Lady Dudley, for that she brake her neck down a pair of stairs, which I protest unto you was done only by the hand of God to my knowledge. But who can let men to speak and think in such cases f" On October 15 Killigrew again wrote that there were " lewd rumours," but that *' nothing could be more false " ; and on the 17th he said that they were "very rife" in England, but that the queen had said " she would make them false." Nothing was, however, done to punish those who circu- lated the reports ; and, naturally, weak denials only acted as stimulants to them. Throckmorton was beside himself with mortification, and reiterated his entreaties that the tongues might be silenced, declaring that if " the bruits respecting the death of Lady Dudley and the queen's marriage with Lord Robert were not prevented God and religion would be out of estimation, the queen discredited, and the country ruined and made a prey. And if the matter be not already determined and so far past as advice will not serve, I require you as you bear a true and faithful heart to her Majesty and the realm, and do desire to keep them from utter desolation and in visceribus Jesu Christi,—\ con- jure you to do all your endeavour to hinder that marriage ; for if it take place there is no counsel or advice that can help."i To Chamberlain, Elizabeth's ambassador in Spain, he had written on the 20th, that his friends told him that the Lord Robert's wife was dead, having by mischance broken her own neck ; but that in Paris it was openly bruited her neck was broken " by other such appurtenances " as he was ^ Stevenson, Cal. of State Papers, Throckmorton to Cecil, Oct. 28, 1560, No. 685. 404 Reformation and Renaissance " withal brought to be weary " of his life, and so evil were the reports that he was ashamed to write them. But whatever grounds there were for concluding that Amy Robsart's death had been compassed by her husband and his mistress, the tongues were apparently at fault in relating that Elizabeth was already married to Dudley. If she ever did marry him, the event took place in 1562. The Spanish ambassador, Alvaro de Quadra, Bishop of Aquila, in whom the bishop was almost entirely merged in the diplomat, secretly favoured Dudley's ambition from purely political motives. The favourite's hopes rose and fell with the arrival and departure of every fresh suitor for Elizabeth's hand ; but Dudley considered himself within measurable distance of the coveted prize, when at length he succeeded in obtaining a conditional promise from Philip II. that he would help him to win it. The condition was that Dudley should undertake to recognise the authority of the Council of Trent, to which all Europe was now anxiously looking. On the feast of St. John the Baptist, 1561, he invited the queen to a splendid fete on the Thames. Together with the Spanish ambassador, they entered a magnificently decorated barge, and there the greetings between the two lovers seem to have called forth some perfectly well-grounded scruples on the part of De Quadra. Dudley, seeing the prelate's abashed look, and turning to Elizabeth exclaimed, " As we have a bishop on board, why should he not marry us .^" De Quadra replied that he would do so willingly, but that the queen must first re-establish religion, and shake off the yoke that was weighing upon her and upon England ; for it had come to this, that she found it impossible to marry without Cecil's leave. ^ Rather more than a year after this episode it was positively asserted that a secret marriage had been performed at the house of the Earl of Pembroke, where Elizabeth and Dudley had spent the day together. On her return to the palace with him the same evening her ladies asked her whether they might not also kiss his hand, to which she replied evasively that they were not to believe all they heard.^ No further authentic information concerning this much- 1 The Bishop of Aquila to Philip, June 30, 1561. Belgian Archives. 2 The same to Cardinal Granvelle, July 11, 1562. Ibid. Queen Elizabeth and the Revolution 405 talked-of marriage has hitherto been forthcoming. It seems highly probable that Throckmorton's, Cecil's, and other influence effectually prevented it. Meanwhile, Francis II. had died, and the crown of France had devolved on his brother, a child only ten years old. In England it was expected that Catherine of Medici, who had enjoyed but little power under the government of her eldest son, now being supreme, would have chosen the King of Navarre as her principal adviser. She did in effect make advances towards him, but committed herself to no policy until it should be clear on which side her interests lay. She professed indeed to uphold the Guises, who, if they were ambitious, were ever found loyal to the king, the country, and the Church. But at the same time she purposely raised the hopes of the Huguenots by affecting to consult Coligny in matters of some weight and importance. She was quite prepared to go much farther if fortune turned the scale in their favour. " Would you continue to obey the king if he became a Huguenot ? " she asked of the Constable of France and of the Marshals St. Andre and De Brissac. " No," they had replied ; and by their firmness perhaps saved France from a line of heretical kings. In the south, where the Huguenots were the most numerous, they showed that they had nothing to fear. They assembled freely, thanks to their relations with Eliza- beth and Throckmorton. At Vassy the Duke of Guise was wounded by a stone thrown at him during a Huguenot sermon in the open air. His servants retorted by drawing their swords. It was the beginning of the civil war. Every- where the Huguenots donned the white casaque, the badge of their cavalry. Having mustered at La Ferte-sous-Jouarre, Conde led them to Orleans, and the city of La Pucelk became the capital of Huguenot France. The Duke of Guise held Paris, which was Catholic to the core, for the king, who remained at the Louvre with the queen-regent. The relations between mother and son at this period were unnatural in the extreme. Catherine was more than a match for Elizabeth in her duplicity and cruelty ; at least there was one point in her character which overlapped all that we know of Elizabeth's potentialities of wickedness, — her 4o6 Reformation and Renaissance systematic persecution of her second son. During the life of Francis II. she had confided Charles to the care of a Huguenot nurse, thinking that in order to balance parties in the State it would be well to make the king's brother chief of the Huguenots. When Francis died, without issue, Charles became king ; and his governor, M. de Cipierre, seeing that he showed signs of noble qualities, and of the stuff of which great kings are made, talked to him of nothing but glory and greatness. Later on, his tutor, Jacques Amyot, fostered his love of arms and taste for literature which he preserved through all the storms of his short and troubled life.^ But Catherine trembled for her own power as he developed qualities which would shortly enable him to take the reigns of government into his own hands, and she con- ceived the diabolical plan of stunting his intelligence, and of stifling all that was noblest in his nature. She removed him from all his former surroundings, and placed him under the care of the Italian, Gondi, with instructions to darken and lower the boy's intellect, and to cultivate his grosser instincts." It is clear that Gondi carried out these instructions faith- fully. He taught him to swear and blaspheme, to flatter and betray. For his intellectual studies he substituted jump- ing and racing. The practice of arms was neglected, and Charles lost his bodily grace and dexterity, and became rough, awkward, and boorish. He was encouraged to pass his time in playing blind-man's buff, and other childish games, and his natural inclination for study was ridiculed, with the result that he was violent, lazy, and in the end averse to mental efl^ort of any kind. More cruelty was to follow, for while pride and vanity were inculcated by every possible means, he was deprived of the innocence that belonged of right to his tender age. Knowing that as a result of this training, soon every duty would give way to the young king's inordinate passion for hunting, Catherine fixed those days for assembling her Council on which she ascertained that he had decided to hunt. In this way she could count on his never being present when she transacted State afi^airs. All this was done in order that Catherine might enjoy to the full her lust of ^ Brantome, vol. v. p. 240. 2 Alava, Letter of Dec. 24, 1566. Nat. Archives. Paris, K, 1507. Queen Elizabeth and the Revolution 407 power, and that the Duke of Anjou, her favourite son, might profit by the imbecility nurtured in Charles.^ The Duke of Anjou was brought up to look with favour on the Huguenots, through whose suffrages he was to attain renown. " I am the little Huguenot," he was accustomed to say ; *' soon I shall be the great Huguenot." While the Prince de Conde was playing the king at Orleans, the rebels were declared guilty of high treason, and condemned to death, their goods being confiscated. In vain did Conde protest, and appeal to Elizabeth and Throckmorton. Not content with either protests or appeals, he busied himself with coining money with the gold and silver altar vessels, melting the church-bells to provide himself with cannon." According to Mezeray, the sacrileges everywhere com- mitted by the Huguenots roused in the people feelings of horror and indignation ; for in all places where they became masters, the images of saints were smashed, relics were thrown to the winds, the altars and the sacraments were pro- faned, and priests and religious outraged, so that all that history has recorded of the atrocities perpetrated by the Goths was eff^aced by the barbarism of the Huguenots. In 1562 they burned all the charters of the Cathedral of St. Theudere, near Vienne. At Tarbes they not only burned the charters but the cathedral itself, leaving mournful traces of their sojourn throughout Beam and Bigorre.^ If Conde was more prominently active at this time, Coligny was by no means idle. In the course of the year 1 56 1 he had several interviews with Throckmorton in the forest of Fontainebleau. In one of these he confided to the English ambassador all that had passed in a recent meeting of the Council, scrupulously begging that Elizabeth alone might be informed of his communications, as he had been lately reproached with revealing State secrets.* In the midst of these calamities Catherine, who was very well informed of Throckmorton's treachery, seemed at one moment disposed to chastise the traitors. She sent an army 1 Kervyn de Lettenhove, Les Huguenots et ies Gueux, vol. ii. p. 5 et sea. 2 Niccolo Tornabuoni, July 6, i 562. Nat. Archives. Paris, K, 1498. ^ Maitland, Dark Ages, p. 264. 4 La Ferriere, Le Xl^P Siecle et les Valois, p. 52. 4o8 Reformation and Renaissance against Conde, commanded by the Duke of Guise, and appealed to Philip for help against the enemies of France and the Church. The army was allowed to advance as far as Chateaudun, and the negotiations with Philip had gone beyond mere preliminaries, when it occurred to her that to call in the Spaniards was a pill too bitter to be swallowed, and she resolved on an interview with Conde. She made a clever, and for the moment, a successful appeal to his patriotism, so that, struck with remorse, he declared himself vanquished,^ So sure of victory was Catherine now, and of a reconciliation with the Huguenots, that she caused a Te Deum to be sung at Vincennes, and the Spanish negotiations came to an abrupt end. But Conde was not proof against Coligny's fanaticism, backed by Theodore Beza, who accused his military chief of faithlessness to a work begun by God Himself. Conde was wax in Beza's hands; he repudiated all his promises to Catherine, and declared himself in favour of a continuance of the war, while Beza went to Germany and thence into Switzerland, to recruit soldiers for the impending campaign. Catherine was stupefied at the result of her policy ; but Charles, furious at losing so valuable a prize, was in favour of making terms with the Huguenots at the price of any humiliation. " Conde," he exclaimed petulantly, " is one of the arms of my body ; my body needs its two arms." ^ The Huguenots were not slow to profit by their advant- ages. From this moment there is a marked increase in the insolence of their tone and the high-handedness of their cruelties. Coligny, writing to his brother from Orleans, says, " We have hung the cure of Saint Paterne ; we treat the Papists differently now from what we used, and we have resolved not to spare them in future." He told him to take advantage of all the means at his disposal, the sack of Paris being one of them. Hoffman, moreover, informed the Elector Palatine, as an inducement to him to send reinforcements, that Conde would give the city up to the Germans to pillage, adding that such a prospect ought to attract large numbers of them. Although the Germans were to have Paris, the English ^ Mezeray, vol. iii. p. 78. 2 Chantonay, June 17, 1562. Nat. Arch. Paris, No. 1498. Queen Elizabeth and the Revolution 409 share of" the booty was by no means inconsiderable. In return for the help Elizabeth had promised, she was to fortify the cities of Normandy and to keep them for herself, — Rouen, Havre, and Dieppe being accounted by Throck- morton a good equivalent for Calais, and worth fighting for.^ Hitherto all the negotiations between Elizabeth and the Huguenots had been of a tentative nature ; henceforth they assumed a more determined character, and a deputation was sent from Conde, composed of the Vidame de Chartres, Briquemart, and La Haye, to treat formally of the invasion of France by the English. This was followed by the more important embassy of the Cardinal de Chatillon of infamous memory. It must be admitted that the main bulk of the Hugue- not party, rebels though they were, had the greatest horror of bringing the enemy of their country into France ; but the necessity of such an act was preached to them from every pulpit, and with such vigour that they had no choice but to stifle their scruples. If possible, additional turpitude is added to the proceedings by the fact that in an interview which took place between Throckmorton and Chantonay, brother of Cardinal Granvelle, the English ambassador took pains to assure him that Elizabeth intended to remain neutral, at the very time when she was haggling with the French insurgents over the price of Calais. Catherine's behaviour was even less edifying. Her want of energy in punishing such of the disaffected as fell into her hands caused suspicion that she secretly favoured them, and it was remarked that she was constantly surrounded by professed or secret Huguenots. But they set little store by her favour, considering her supposed leaning towards them and her hesitation to chastise as mere confessions of weakness. All their hope lav in Elizabeth, however much she trifled with them and sought to evade the day of reckoning. Besides a large sum of money, they called upon her to supply 10,000 foot and as many horse soldiers. This she declared to be excessive, and would at first only undertake to send 6000 infantry, no cavalry at all, and no more than a third of the subsidy demanded.^ 1 Stevenson, Cal. of State Papers, July 27, 1562, No. 370. - Forbes, vol. ii. p. 35. 41 o Reformation and Renaissance Finally, by the terms of the treaty of Hampton Court, which was signed on September 20, 1562, Elizabeth agreed to pay Conde 100,000 gold crowns, in exchange for which she was to fortify and hold the town of Havre until he should put her in possession of the most precious jewel of the French crown, the celebrated town and fortress of Calais.^ In England an official proclamation declared that the army which stood in readiness to cross the Channel was to be sent into France for the sole purpose of succouring Charles IX., while a second proclamation announced that the English troops were about to occupy certain ports on the coast of Normandy, in order that, being so close to England, they should not fall into the hands of those who would con- stitute a danger to the country. The queen's intention was not, the proclamation went on, to make war on the King of France, but to defend the towns and ports nearest to Eng- land against the first authors of the troubles on the other side of the Channel — against those who had placed themselves above the king, and who wished to pursue their unjust and violent designs against England. ^ A third proclamation set forth that Elizabeth was minded to assure liberty of conscience in France, protect the Christian king, her very good brother and his subjects, and her own realm.^ This sounded plausible, and was greedily devoured in England, but Throckmorton told Elizabeth that Conde was well aware that the Huguenot name would be covered with infamy if the king lost the flower of the duchy of Normandy."* And the Cardinal of Lorraine expressed not 1 Harl. MS. II, p. 177, " OfFres faites aux Huguenots par Elisabeth d'Angleterre. " De leur envoyer en France a scs propres frais une armee de 8000 hommes de pied, avec un grand attirail d'artillerie qu'elle entretiendrait jusques a la fin de la guerre, et de jeter son armee en meme temps sur les cotes de Normandie et de Bretagne, pour diviser par ce moyen les forces des Catholiques, et faire diversion des armes du roi. Mais en tel cas, elle voulait que ses allies s'obligeassent de lui faire rendre Calais. . . . D'autant qu'elle savait bien que les Huguenots n'avaient point alors cette ville-la, elle demandait qu'ils lui donassent cependant le Havre de Grace. . . . et qu'avec cela ils eussent a recevoir ses garnisons dans les villes de Rouen et de Dieppe." — Davila, Histoire des Guerres Civiles de France, vol. i. p. 125. " Cotton MS. Calig. e. v, fol. 174. Brit. Mus. ^ La Ferriere, Le XV I^ Steele et les Falois, vol. i. p. yS. * Stevenson, Cal. of State Papers, September 20 and September 24, 1562, Nos. 658 and 690. Forbes, vol. ii. p. 61. Queen Elizabeth and the Revolution 411 only a national feeling, but one in accordance with universal right reason and good faith, when he declared Conde and Coligny to be traitors, by the fact alone of their introducing into France the greatest and oldest enemies of their country. Charles IX. had just made his triumphal entry into Bourges, reconquered by the Duke of Guise, when the news arrived that the English had landed. The queen-regent was still bent on negotiating, but the Duke of Guise dictated to the young king a letter to Elizabeth full of dignity and un- answerable logic, throwing the responsibility of the war upon her, and remonstrating with her for harbouring the Vidame de Chartres, and the other seditious envoys of the Huguenots, in spite of the conditions of the treaty of Cateau Cambresis. He then led the French army towards Rouen, to prevent, if possible, the occupation of the ancient capital of Normandy by the English, who were already in possession of Dieppe. As for the Vidame, he was, he confessed, " sad, usque ad mortem^' to be obliged to deliver up his country to foreigners, and said, " ego deficio sub onere^'' admitting that the Huguenots had accepted the sacrifice of their honour. Later, a good pension from Elizabeth appeared to dispel his sadness and to stifle his conscience.^ While the Duke of Guise pressed the siege of Rouen, the Huguenots within the town awaited in vain the arrival of the Germans. In vain, too, Lord Grey, under cover of the night, introduced 500 English soldiers into the fortress. Resistance was only prolonged for a few days, and the place was taken by storm on October 25. The King of Navarre was killed in the melee. Conde meanwhile was leading an army strengthened by German Reiters towards the walls of Paris. A prayer com- posed by Beza was recited every day in their camp, to call down the blessing of God on the Huguenot prince. " They hoped," said Throckmorton, " to restore order in the capital " ; in other words, to sack it, according to Coligny's promise to the Germans. But this was easier said than done, for Conde never succeeded in doing more than harass the outskirts. The Huguenots had few friends within the walls, and the hopes of their leader continued to lie on the coast of Normandy with the English. On November 21 Conde wrote to Lord Robert Dudley ^ La Ferriere, vol. i. p. 76. 412 Reformation and Renaissance that God, having given him the grace to arrive within eight or nine hours of Paris, he awaited further help from England. The reply was a letter from Cecil to the English agent Thomas Smith, "You can tell the Prince of Conde that the money promised will be at the Havre in ten days." ^ But by this time the Huguenots had learned that Elizabeth was far more ready to pay in men than in money ; and, acting on Coligny's advice, Conde resolved to raise the siege of Paris, and to make his way into Normandy, flattering himself that, thanks to reinforcements from England, and a fresh levy of Germans, they would retake Rouen. On December lo, therefore, his soldiers set fire to their quarters, and marched on Dreux. The Catholic army had also been strengthened with a contingent of Spanish troops ; but even at this advanced stage the queen regent could not be induced to act with firmness, or to cease her one refrain at every crisis — negotiation. She still relied on her power to soften Conde's heart towards his country, and a message to him having proved unavailing, she sought a personal interview. Her estimation of his character was on the whole correct ; once more he wavered, and such was the alarm inspired by his hesitation that Throckmorton advised Elizabeth to withhold all further help till it were known what he would do. His indecision was, however, not so great that it paralysed all action ; he continued his march towards Dreux, under the impression that 4000 English had left Havre to form a junction with him, and nothing appeared likely to intercept his progress. Nevertheless he had a dream announcing, as he told Beza, that a struggle was imminent, and the next day the two armies having met suddenly, an engagement took place under the walls of Dreux. When the Constable of France was taken prisoner, the Duke of Guise seized the command, and changed an almost certain defeat of the loyalists into a brilliant victory. " That night," says Chantonay, " the duke slept in the same bed with Conde, his prisoner, as if they had been the best friends in the world." - Even his enemies could not but admire the chivalry and delicacy with which the conqueror treated the vanquished.^ The Duke of ^ Wright, Elizabeth and her Times, vol. i. p. 102. 2 Letter of December 21, 1562. Belgian Archives. 3 Theodore Beza, The Story of the Campaign, Book vi. Queen Elizabeth and the Revolution 413 Guise had been the first to ahght from his horse to receive Conde with courtesy, and so treated him, said Sir Thomas Smith in his letter to Elizabeth's Council, " that the prince weeps, and says that he never meant but quietness." ^ The battle, which had begun by a little skirmish (re- inforcements arriving from each camp as it went on), was fought on December 19, and on the 24th the duke wrote to Philip to express all that he owed to the courage of the Spanish troops under his command. The Catholic army was victorious, but the prisoners were about equal on both sides, and if Elizabeth had been faithful even to her treachery, the odds would have been almost equally divided. But notwithstanding promises and treaties, to say nothing of Throckmorton's earnest prayer to " scatter a little money," not one crown of the stipulated sum had been paid, and the Huguenots were in dire need of funds to carry on the war. It was this fact as much as the actual victory that strengthened the hands of the Guises. Beza, who had been present at the battle of Dreux, counselled the death of the principal Catholic prisoners, and Coligny had consented, provided that exception were made of his uncle, the Constable of France. The Marshal Saint Andre was murdered in cold blood. When the defeat of the Huguenots became known, Throckmorton fled to Nogent-le-roi, and took refuge with the Duchess de Bouillon, who, however, gave him up the next day to the Duke of Guise. With his accustomed courtesy the duke made him dine with him in his tent, and in the course of dinner asked the ambassador what he thought of the battle. After chatting agreeably for some time, he reminded Throckrnorton of his alliance with the insurgents, and consulted him, as one of the principal instigators of the troubles, in the choice of remedies to be applied, inquiring whether Elizabeth would continue to set the bad example of abetting the king's subjects in their rebellion. " But does not Philip II. interfere also .'' " broke in Throckmorton. " Yes," replied the duke, " but with this difi'erence, that the King of Spain supports the king against the rebels, whereas Elizabeth supports the rebels against the king." The papers found upon Throckmorton compromised ^ Stevenson, Cal. of State Papers, December 22, 1562, No. 1326. 414 Reformation and Renaissance him so deeply that, seeing his share of the responsibility clearly established, he flung away the last vestige of his disguise.-^ There was no longer any pretence of neutrality on the part of the Queen of England, and the situation was perhaps unique — that of a country at war with a sovereign whose ambassador had not been recalled. And notwithstanding all, such was the generosity of the Duke of Guise that Throck- morton was at once set at liberty.^ On receiving news of the victory, Catherine went with her son to the cathedral of Notre Dame to return thanks. The next day there was a solemn procession in honour of the event, but at the same time the queen-mother charged her agent in London to protest to Elizabeth that the battle had been fought at the instigation of the Parisians, and in spite of her orders.^ In keeping with her strange and vacillating policy throughout, Catherine's sole aim was even now to treat with the Huguenots and their allies. Elizabeth answered by offering to give up the places she occupied in Normandy in exchange for Calais. But at last some spark of justice and of regard for the honour of France seemed to kindle in Catherine's mind, and she began to realise that it was too much to concede in her hour of triumph what she had refused to grant throughout her reverses. Hostilities were, therefore, resumed, and the Huguenots set fire to the arsenal of Paris, where a great quantity of powder was stored. A number of houses were destroyed and 300 lives were lost. There was a rumour current that when the Huguenots were beaten they had recourse to assassination, and a popular prophecy foretold, that when the fortune of the Duke of Guise should be at its height he would be struck down by a pistol shot in the midst of his most brilliant achievements. Months before the blow was aimed his death was decreed, at a meeting held in the palace of the Elector Palatine at Heidelberg, the Duke of Wiirtemberg's being the only dissentient voice. On the day of the triumphal entry of the king's troops into Rouen, a Huguenot was discovered lurking in the camp. 1 Chantonay, Lettres Missives. Belgian Archives. 2 Forbes, vol. ii. p. 251. 2 Letter from the Bishop of Aquila to Philip, December 27, 1562. Belgian Archives. Queen Elizabeth and the Revolution 415 On being questioned he admitted boldly that he had come there for the purpose of assassinating the duke, from no per- sonal enmity, but guided alone by zeal for religion. His intended victim dismissed him with those words : '* If your religion teaches you to assassinate those who have never offended you, mine teaches me to forgive my enemies." ^ After the victory of Dreux, his death was publicly prayed for in the Huguenot conventicles. Preachers called down the vengeance of heaven upon him, and Beza appealed aloud to God to deliver France from him. Conde, from his prison at Loches, charged his brother the Cardinal of Bourbon to warn the Duke of Guise that his life was in danger, and so certain was Conde of his enemy's doom, that every morning for a fortnight he inquired of his guards whether the duke were not killed or wounded.^ The honour of doing to death the Catholic champion was reserved for a young man named Poltrot, who was one day overheard to express regret that the King of Navarre had not fallen by his hand. He was sent to Monsieur de Soubise at Lyons, who had at one time been prosecuted for mal- practices with the public money, and had owed his escape from punishment to the Duke of Guise. De Soubise thought he had an excellent opportunity for getting rid of one whose very existence reminded him that he had once been a criminal. He sent Poltrot to Coligny, who welcomed him with these words : " Monsieur de Soubise tells me that you desire greatly to serve religion : serve it well then." This was the signal agreed upon by which Coligny was to make known to Poltrot that his offer was accepted, and he gave him some money. The young man then offered his services to the duke, who accepted them. But Poltrot was not yet so hardened in crime as to be entirely proof against the gentleness and courtesy with which his new master treated him. Three times he begged to be released from the terrible obligation he had incurred, and three times Coligny strengthened him in his resolve. The admiral at last sent him to Beza, who told him that he might act with an easy conscience, that angels would be present at the deed, and that if he did not succeed, but was tried and executed, he 1 Dupleix, p. 655. 2 Chantonay, February 27 and March 2, 1563. Belgian Archives. 4i6 Reformation and Renaissance would go straight to heaven.^ Poltrot then went back to the duke, whose camp was before Orleans, and said that he had been seduced into following the Prince of Conde, but that now, seeing the error of his ways, he had resolved to serve the king faithfully for the rest of his life. Surrounded by treachery on every side, the duke had never learned to be on his guard against his enemies. Him- self frank and loyal in the extreme, there was something childlike in his confidence that these qualities were not mere professions in others ; and although he knew himself to be the object of supreme hatred among the whole Huguenot faction, he was lamentably incapable of suspecting individuals. He received Poltrot kindly, even affectionately, thereby nearly upsetting again the would-be murderer's newly-infused principles. However, another visit to Beza, and a present of loo crowns from Coligny to buy a horse, brought him finally to the " sticking-point," and with the promise that if he succeeded in escaping he was to be the richest man of his house, he resolved to go in and win.^ On February i8, 1563, at dusk, Poltrot, hidden behind a hedge, discharged three bullets into his victim's body. The wound was not deep, but the balls were poisoned. The murderer got away at once, on the horse bought with Coligny's gold, but having ridden all night, found himself at dawn close to the camp he was flying from. Almost paralysed with fear, he hid himself in a peasant's hut, but the occupant remarking his confusion, gave him up to some archers from the royalist camp.^ When questioned he confessed that he had been moved to murder the duke by Beza and Coligny.* Sir Thomas Smith also testified to his incentives. He wrote to Elizabeth that De Soubise had first tempted Poltrot, and that Beza had completed the conquest.^ The duke's agony lasted for five days, during which he edified all who approached him by his resignation and un- affected piety. In touching terms he confessed aloud the sins of his past life, and without naming Coligny, whom all regarded as the chief author of his death, he said, " I forgive you who are the cause of my undoing." He breathed his last on February 24, and on March 20 his funeral honours ^ La Ferriere, vol. i. p. 516. - Lettres (P Etienne Pasquier. 3 Chantonay, February 23, 1563. Belgian Archives. * Ibid. February 27. ^ Forbes, vol. ii. p. 329. Queen Elizabeth and the Revolution 417 were celebrated with great pomp in the cathedral ot Notre Dame at Paris. Sir Thomas Smith declared that there was but one unanimous voice in the camp in praise of the Duke of Guise, and in mourning for his untimely end. " He was," said the Englishman, who will not be accused of partiality, " not only the greatest soldier in France but in all Christendom. Inured to fatigue, of great military experience, courteous, amiable, and generous, he was beloved alike by officers and men," ^ A terrible chastisement awaited the authors of the crime. The young duke, his son, swore not to die till he had avenged his father's death. " A day will come," wrote the English agent, " when Coligny in his turn will be assassinated, in expiation of the murder of the Duke of Guise." That day was the terrible feast of St. Bartholomew, 1572. Coligny was at Caen with Throckmorton and Beza when the news was brought to him of the death of his greatest enemy. He expressed neither regret nor emotion, and sent on the message at once to the Queen of England. When he heard that he was everywhere considered the author of the crime, he felt obliged to write to Catherine and justify himself In this letter he admitted that Poltrot had revealed his intentions to him, and that he had given the assassin money to buy a horse to enable him to escape, and he judged that the result of Poltrot's aim was the greatest blessing that could be. Pasquier observes that Coligny defended himself so coldly that his friends wished he had said nothing, or had expressed himself better, and Conde discovered the only possible way to rehabilitate him, by declaring that the murder of the duke was a tactic of war, and did not come within the jurisdiction of a civil court. The joy of the Huguenots was shared by their English allies. Throckmorton told Elizabeth that the state of affairs would now be improved, and that it would be useful to send the promised money. All Normandy was, with the exception of Rouen, in the hands of the English, and Catherine saw herself in the predica- ment of an English invasion on one side and a German on the other. At Orleans the besieged appeared on the ramparts, dressed in strange garments, and uttering wild cries, while they insulted ^ Forbes, vol. ii. p. 329. 2 E 41 8 Reformation and Renaissance by gestures the Catholic religion and the royal family. Fail- ing to obtain any satisfaction from Coligny, the queen-regent again had recourse to Conde, and partly won over by her arguments, — partly, it is said, influenced by the beauty and charm of a young lady by whom she was accompanied, — he concluded a treaty of peace with her. This treaty accorded to Protestants of noble family the right to practise their religion in their own houses, and certain towns were named in which Huguenots of all classes might do the same. Thus, peace was made with Conde, but with the other chiefs an amnesty only was concluded. When the news became known the Germans proceeded no further ; but Elizabeth was furious. Conde had undertaken to rid France of the English, and with him had seceded the young King of Navarre and certain others. There was no limit to the strong language that poured from Elizabeth's lips. The former " Joshua of the people of God " was henceforth " a traitor, a perjurer, a miserable wretch." She went so far as to say that he was "good for nothing but to be thrown to the dogs." ^ Nevertheless, at the French Court he flourished in the first rank, and the enmity between the Queens of France and England was at last real and sincere. " I am an Englishwoman, and the Queen of France is a Florentine," said Elizabeth in her wrath, " but it shall be seen which of us two shall outwit the other." - Henceforth the war entered a new phase, retaining, how- ever, its revolutionary character, and developing situations as novel as they were discreditable to the principal actors in the drama. The position of the English in France now underwent a change. Elizabeth, in giving the first impetus to the revolu- tionary movement, was in a large measure responsible for the disasters caused by the machinery she had set in motion ; and even when she was no longer the chief motive power of the rebellion she was ever ready to widen the breach she had helped to make between the insurgents and their lawful sovereign. It is remarkable that she was never in any single instance on the side of law and order. But Throck- morton, who was always reminding her that her greatest ^ Stevenson, Cal. of State Papers, 1563, No. 753. - Metnoires de Conde, vol. ii. p. 160. Queen Elizabeth and the Revohition 4.19 chance oi success lay in her idenhfyinn- licrself wltli tlie I'rotestaiit cause, had ceased to intiueiice her policy. My the French loyalists lie was naturally looked upc/n with deep suspicion ; and even the I luguenots, now that their star was in the ascendant, evinced Init little j^ratitude for the help without which it would have heen iiniiossihie for them to have attained the prt)ud position they now enjoyed. ^ Throckniorton's day was }iractically over ; aiui of Elizabeth's two ambassadors in JM-ance, Sir Thomas Smith, although vastly his inferior in shrewdness and experience', was by far the more important and powerful, llis ailvice to the queen to throw over the Huguenots, in (he hope that the King of l^-ance would before long olfer her Calais, was more to the credit of his optimism "than of his political insight. As they, however, in (he first flush of their triumph showed that they esteemed the friendship of Elizabeth but lightly, it was evidently her best policy to pursue her own ends indepeiulently of them. Intoxicated by success, ami keen as ever to discover analogies between their cause aiul that of the ancient jvople of God, the I luguenots compared I'oltrot the assassin to Judith smiting I lolofernes. A book was printeil in order to justily the crime by references to passages in the liible ; and Poltrot was accounted a martyr,' while his portrait, carefully preserveil, was honoured as Catholics honour relics. But while the 1 luguenots were worshi|)ping Toltrot, Coligny was exposed to the hatred of the Catholic populace,' as at least the accomplice of a mean aiul dastardly act, iVom which all true men must recoil in horror. " (iotl give," wrote Sir Thomas Smith, "that he be not killed, as (luy say he killed the Duke of (juise." 1 he fear expressed in these words was no( unfounded, for the whole country writhed under (he yoke of the exuhant rebels. As their power had grown, so had their cruellies. Pillage anti murder were now crimes of daily occurrence. Tours and its castle hail fdlen into their hands, with a good store of anununition. Not far from Tours was the rich abbey of Marmoutier, where they defaced all the statues, and stole the relics and costly treasures from the church. These were but the beginnings, and the city of Orleans will ' Stevenson, CV//. o/St^iW Pupcrs, i 56.1, No. 767 ; I'cyto to 'I'hrockniorton. 42 o Reformation and Renaissance for ever bear the traces of the lawlessness to which it fell a prey under Conde. The churches were wrecked, and the cathedral was turned into barracks. At St. Aignan relics were publicly burned in the market- place, and the Blessed Sacrament was openly profaned. At Patay the Huguenots caused twenty-four persons who had taken refuge from their violence in the belfry to be burned alive. Priests and religious were the special objects of their fury. To the brutality with which these were executed in England a further barbarity was invented. If the victims were still alive, after having been tied to the tails of horses and dragged over the stones to the place of execution, their hands, feet, and noses were cut off, and their eyes dug out. Then they were flayed, and strung up to trees as targets to be shot at.^ Thus it is seen that the abominations com- mitted by the " Beggars " of the Netherlands, by the Anabaptists in Germany, by the Calvinists in Switzerland and England, were equalled, if not surpassed, in France. The infamous Baron des Adrets, whom the people called " the new Attila," was Coligny's faithful agent in the south. In taking possession of Lyons in May 1562, his first act was to declare freedom of conscience and of religious worship ; his next, to abolish Mass, and to forbid any priest to celebrate under pain of death. Twice a week he obliged the Lyonese to listen to a Huguenot discourse composed of invectives against their religion, imposing a penalty of ten livres for each absence. Scarcely a church in the south of France escaped destruction. At Grenoble, monks and nuns were tortured to induce them to apostatise. The Grande Chartreuse was delivered to the flames. The whole population of the little town of Mornes in Provence was put to the sword, and the 300 soldiers who defended it were hurled from the ramparts. Montbrison was entirely given up to the brutality of Des Adrets' soldiery ; and the night which followed the taking of this town was passed in deeds of darkness, of which murder was the least horrible. The sun rose on a scene which beggared description ; livid corpses, hideously mangled, were heaped up in the market-place, and the streets literally ran rivers of blood. ^ 1 Maimbourg, Histoire du Calvinhme en France, p. 244. '^ Allard, Vie du Baron des Adrets. Queen Elizabeth and the Revolution 421 • Even Calvin remonstrated. After the battle of Dreux the king had proclaimed an amnesty in fiivour of the insurgents ; but instead of laying down his arms, Coligny marched into Normandy, leaving fire and blood in his train. At Sully, according to the Protestant historian La Popeliniere, he caused thirty priests to be stabbed, and several others to be thrown into the Loire. We must anticipate events somewhat in order to point out the excesses committed by " those of the religion " after their capture of La Rochelle in 1568. The Jarnac manu- script describes the cruelties practised upon priests and laity as greater than any of which the Turks had been accused. In all the towns which fell into the hands of the Huguenots the same story was repeated ; but Nimes witnessed scenes unequalled for atrocity by any which signalised the fearful vengeance of the night of St. Bartholomew. At Nimes all that was done was done with deliberation, in cold blood. There was an entire absence of that popular frenzy which made every attempt futile to stem the tide of retaliation on the awful night of August 24, 1572. A solemn torchlight procession was formed, and silently, with horrible precision and passionless regularity, such as would not have been out of place in a court of justice, the Catholics were made to march one by one to their death. The place of execution was the crypt of the parish church, where, as each victim arrived, the Huguenot poignard was buried in his breast. Men holding torches were placed on the steeple, and at the belfry windows to light up the scene of carnage, which lasted from eleven o'clock at night till six in the morning.^ The following year the persecution was renewed, but instead of shedding blood, the Huguenots contented them- selves with hurling their victims into a deep well outside the town, and for many years afterwards this well was called by the inhabitants of Nimes " The well of the evil death." 2 What the Baron des Adrets was in the south, such was Gabriel de Montgomery in Normandy, and the history of his progresses is but a repetition of the horrors we have taken at random from a host of similar scenes. They will suffice to form some estimate of the wrongs which embittered ^ Cant^, Histoire Universelle, vol. xv. notes. - La Popeliniere, vol. i. p. 20, 42 2 Reformation and Renaissance the people during the twelve years in which the Huguenots were virtually masters of France. And yet these things have all been forgotten, and the reply of a nation driven to despair is alone remembered and execrated. It was inevitable that when the day of reckoning came it should be an awful one. " To every impartial mind," wrote Segretian, " after half a century of war and massacre, in the midst of scenes of violence to which there promised to be no end, St. Bartholomew is no longer a marvel of horrors of which Catholicism bears the responsibility, witnessing to its own barbarous intolerance. It was far rather the day of retribu- tion for so many similar days celebrated in like manner by the Huguenots. It remains the fulfilment of a perverse policy, but of a policy that was supported by a whole nation, only asking for leave to fall upon their prey, in their thirst to avenge the blood of their murdered brethren, and their religion so long trodden under foot and outraged." ^ In the year 1563 we find the queen-regent embarrassed between the exultant rebels and a party henceforth with- out a leader. Considering that the Huguenots were likely to endanger the very existence of the throne, she determined to make peace with them. Conde, in spite of Elizabeth's anathemas, was very well pleased with the result of his secession. He had obtained from the regent the famous edict of Amboise by which the Protestants were allowed to practise their religion in certain towns named in the edict. But Coligny was dissatisfied ; he considered the terms inadequate, demurred, and reproached the prince with having wrought the ruin of more Protestant churches than the combined forces of the enemy would have destroyed in ten years. Nevertheless, Smith assured Elizabeth that the admiral would not prove a more faithful ally than Conde, and when it was found that both Huguenot chiefs had received from the French government a large share of the sum levied on the Catholic clergy under a pretext of an impoverished exchequer, Coligny's name, as well as that of the prince, was held up to public scorn throughout England. Pending negotiations, Coligny slowly made up his mind, while Catherine in her fortified castle of Blois was uncertain in what spirit he was advancing to meet her. But peace 1 Sixte Quint et He7iri Quatre. Queen Elizabeth and the Revolution 423 was at last signed under the walls of Blois, and on March 25 the admiral entered the town followed by his lawless soldiery. Catherine could see them from her windows, pillaging the neighbourhood for miles around, utterly regard- less of the treaty that had just been signed. She went out, however, to welcome Coligny with expressions of the most cordial friendship, knowing well the value of adroit flattery, and the admiral's particular sensitiveness in this regard. The peace was followed by public rejoicings and mutual congratulations. The Court swarmed with Huguenots ; when the king went to Mass they accompanied him as far as the church door, and it was expected that their service would soon be allowed in the palace. But the turn matters had taken naturally met with no sympathy in England, and the loud assertions of Conde and Coligny that they had had nothing whatever to do with letting the English into Havre, only increased the irritation. The blame of that proceeding they threw on the Vidame de Chartres, and on Beauvoir, who, thus accused, declared that they had acted under the orders of the two chiefs, and had received sealed instructions from Conde. The same day Henry Middlemore, Throckmorton's cousin and secretary, told the Earl of Warwick, who had taken possession of Havre with a large and well -disciplined force, that both Admiral Coligny and the Prince of Conde had pronounced against the restitution of Calais. " The French," he added bitterly, " may change their religion but not their character. Be on your guard against their treachery. Every French- man ought to excite our suspicion, and as they all have the same character, I am not better disposed towards one than towards the others. It behoves us to keep Havre better than we kept Calais." ^ The case was hard ; but Englishmen ought to have re- flected that men who had proved themselves traitors to their country were scarcely likely to remain faithful to their allies, when, instead of disgrace and punishment, wealth and honours awaited them on their return to their allegiance. Elizabeth could do no more for them than the Queen of France was willing to do. It was feared that Conde would desert the Huguenots altogether. '* It only depends on Catherine," wrote Chantonay, "to take him to Mass." 1 Forbes, vol. ii. p. 379. 424 Reformation and Renaissance The regent had invited Coligny to enter her good city of Paris, but it was still so much agitated by the murder of the Duke of Guise, that when the admiral was within two leagues of the capital the Constable of France came out, and advised him to retire, declaring that his presence within the walls would but increase the irritation which the bare mention of his name evoked. If the Constable had not taken him under his protection he would probably have been killed there and then.^ Peace being restored, Charles IX. summoned Elizabeth to evacuate Havre ; but she replied that not having occupied that port in the Huguenot interest, but in her own, she meant to hold it until it was exchanged for Calais. Prepara- tions were therefore made for a siege. On July 6 war was declared against England, and the French troopsipoured into Normandy. Conde appeared under the royal standard when the French army assailed the ramparts of Havre. " His inconstancy is such," wrote Middlemore to Cecil, " and he has so far forgotten God and his honour that he invites those of the religion to serve in this war against the Queen of England." ^ In spite of Middlemore's appeal to Warwick that they should keep Havre better than they had kept Calais, the garrison made but a feeble show of resistance. Their supply of fresh water coming to an end the plague broke out, whereupon the place capitulated only a few moments before the English fleet, bringing provisions and reinforcements of men, appeared on the horizon.^ It only remained for England to lay down her arms, and the treaty of Troyes was accordingly signed on April 11, 1564. Elizabeth made some difficulties about Calais, but Catherine settled for ever the destiny of that port by promising to repay her the money which she had lent to Conde. Charles IX. received the Garter, and the youthful monarch feigned, as was evidently expected of him, to enter the lists as Eliza- beth's suitor. He assured the queen that he esteemed her love and amity more than gold or silver, and that if a woman might be of his order he would send it to her.^ The only discontented person was Throckmorton. 1 Languet, Letter of June 20, 1563. 2 Forbes, vol. ii. p. 473. 3 l^ Frere, p. 208. ^ Stevenson, Ca/. of State Papers, May 12, 1564, No. 389. Queen Elizabeth and the Revolution 425 There had been considerable friction during the negotiations between Ehzabeth's two ambassadors in France ; and at the conclusion of the treaty this friction developed into an open quarrel. Sir Nicholas Throckmorton finally returned to England in disgust, leaving Smith in attendance at the French court. Henceforth Catherine's chief anxiety was to maintain a safe equilibrium between the two parties in the State ; and it must be owned she showed little partiality for either. When the Huguenots took offence at what they considered an undue show of favour towards the Catholics, the queen was quite ready to turn her back upon the Guises, and to give Conde or Coligny some special sign of regard. But before long she became aware of the danger of such a policy. The object of all the concessions made to the Huguenots was the maintenance of the royal authority ; but it was clear that she had, by her want of integrity, decision, and courage, stultified her own object, and had brought about the very catastrophe she wished to avoid. All that the Huguenots did made for revolution, and the more they basked in the royal favour, the less secure was the throne. "The court of France," wrote Cardinal Granvelle, " is now convinced that unless the Catholic religion is restored, it will be impossible to uphold the king's authority." A firm resistance at the beginning of the peace would have kept the rebels in check, and have caused the government to be respected ; a change of poHcy which was clearly the result of fear brought it into contempt. Foremost among the new favourites was Madame de Crussol, celebrated for her piquancy, her sharp tongue, and her political intrigues. A rabid Huguenot, she yet had the disposal of abbeys and benefices, and was even able to appro- priate the revenues of a vacant bishopric in Provence. She kept up a secret correspondence with Elizabeth, and expressed the confidence of the whole Huguenot faction when she declared, " This year the Mass will be abolished throughout France ! " Charles, to whom the saying was reported, replied, " And I will cut ofi^ the head of any one who refuses to go to Mass." ^ The weakness displayed towards them had increased their intolerance a hundredfold. Catherine, whom they had hailed 1 Spanish Despatches of 1564. Nat. Archives, Paris, K, 1501. 426 Reformation and Renaissance at the conclusion of the war as the Esther who was to be their salvation, was now never called by them by any other name than Jezebel. They threatened her with assassination, and circulated a pamphlet in which it was declared lawful to kill any one opposed to what they were pleased to term " the spread of the Gospel." A man, lying under sentence of death, confessed that he and two others had received money from Coligny to assassinate the king,^ and when he was confronted with his accomplices, he repeated his confession ; but it was thought dangerous to found an accusation against Coligny without further proof, and the man's execution was hurried on. The widow of the Duke of Guise, supported by public opinion which never ceased holding him guilty of the duke's murder, demanded in vain that the admiral should be brought to justice, but in spite of the indignation he inspired, no one ventured to attack him. Meanwhile, the court being absent in the south, the Huguenots took the opportunity to multiply their secret meetings, and there was a confused rumour of a call to arms. They divided the whole of France into districts, in order to facilitate a rising, and it was whispered that they would be able to muster 8000 horse in a week. They were ready to rise at Lyons, at Orleans, at Bordeaux, and in Languedoc ; so vast were their numbers that in October 1564, 12,000 of them partook of the Lord's Supper at Orleans alone. There was a report that Conde was to form a junction with the admiral at Compiegne, and that Coligny, supported by the Protestant princes of Germany, was to demand the hand of Elizabeth, Catherine, driven into a corner, made a public profession of her zeal for the Catholic religion in presence of the papal legate at Avignon, and took part in a fervent religious pro- cession. At that moment the Archbishop of Glasgow arrived at Avignon for the purpose of securing her help in a war against England, of which the object was to deliver the persecuted English Catholics, and advance Mary Stuart's claim to the throne. Hereupon followed a network of alliances and counter-alliances, which in their turn were disregarded, and new ones formed in bewildering succession, without serving any cause but that of personal ambition and self-interest. ^ Davila, Histoire des Guerres civiles de France^ vol. i. p. 195- Queen Elizabeth and the Revolution 427 A meeting, long proposed and constantly deferred, at last took place at Bayonne between Catherine and her son-in- law Philip II. At this celebrated interview, the principal subject of discussion was the question of the Huguenot rebels. The sacrifice of a certain number of their leaders would, asserted the Duke of Alva, prevent torrents of blood in the future,^ and his predictions were verified by after events ; but it was soon found that nothing would induce Catherine to act with any degree of firmness or consistency towards them. " All good people have lost courage," said Don Francis Alava, Philip's representative ; '* especially those who have heard the queen -mother talk religion." Promises were not wanting on her part, and Philip was able to write to Cardinal Pacheco : — " My intention having been clearly expressed, of seeing religious affairs settled in France, with entire obedience to the king, the queen-mother has undertaken, in presence of the Duke of Alva, to remedy the evil as soon as possible — that is, as soon as she has returned from her journey. This resolution has been kept secret, for if it were known the remedy would become difficult." But Philip was profoundly ignorant of Catherine's character, if he really placed any reliance on promises v/rung from her when she appeared to be full of fervour and emotion. Her beautiful eyes might indeed fill with tears, and her voice quiver, as she owned that she would be un- grateful to God if she did not make every sacrifice for the upholding of religion ; but she was incapable of any fixed purpose, except the purpose to commit herself to nothing. After the interview at Bayonne, she remained what she had always been, — a true daughter of the Medici and an apt pupil of Machiavelli. The passions of her soul were manifold ; she was cruel, vindictive, and unscrupulous, but her greed for power was stronger in her than all else. She was as ready to sacrifice her children to her own ambition as she was to betray her conscience, and the religion about which she could discourse so eloquently ; her capacity for business was as great as her love of the fine arts, and as for her splendid horsemanship, the French compared her to the goddess Diana. But when the chase was done, arrayed in rich gold ^ Letter of" the Duke of Alva, June 21, 1565, Nat. Archives, Paris, K, 1504. 4^8 Reformation and Renaissance and silver brocades from the looms of Italy, and sparkling with priceless gems that added a lustre to her singular beauty, she could assume a manner suggestive rather of a sultana than of the shrewd woman of business or of the chaste huntress of mythology. Whether or no she actually took part in the disorders for which her court was notorious, she was certainly at no pains to purify its moral atmosphere. At one period she gave herself up to divination and sorcery under the guidance of the Italian Fregoso. Brantome, who drew a vivid, if somewhat imaginative picture of Catherine of Medici surrounded by the wit and beauty of the ladies of her court, compared her and them to a brilliant constellation in a clear sky. The court was brilliant enough, but the sky was far from cloudless. The Huguenots, as might be expected, had no intention of accepting their actual position as permanent and final, although they had attained to a power in the State beyond what had once been their fondest ambition. Conde's bearing became openly insolent. The prince not only called upon Charles IX. with imperious persistence to declare war against Spain, in defence of the insurgents in the Low Countries, but when the king refused, he replied haughtily that he would himself in a few days raise an army of four or five thousand horse, wherewith to make a beginning. On September 28, 1567, Charles was awakened at midnight in the Castle of Monceau with the news that a band of mounted insurgents, under the command of Admiral Coligny and De Genlis, had crossed the Marne, and were advancing rapidly towards Monceau, in order to effect his capture. There was only just time to reach Meaux in safety. Here a conference was held with the Huguenot chiefs, and Charles IX. showed that he had in him the stuff of which great and noble kings are made ; and that if the qualities with which he had been endowed had been allowed free scope to develop, his might not have been the least among the honoured names of history. The delay occasioned by the conference nearly proved fatal to his freedom, and while General PfeifFer with a few companies of Swiss Guards was hastening to his help, he was being gradually hemmed in on every side. Touched by the devotion of the little army of rescue which offered to escort him to Paris, although their ever yJont rien t^eu Je vareiCau iJra? de ctr laf/eau : Ce/} la Xfcre /^s^\^s , et /a J^ eyne Oes H^cynes , Qui par /es ^anJs cffrtz , ^mte /on ' 1 ompeau . ^ T'h. det^c. cC r x ^ . Jl To face page 428. CATHERINE DE' MEDICI IN HER OLD AGE From an engraving by Thomas de Leu. Queen Elizabeth and the Revolution 429 reaching it seemed next to an impossibility, Charles drew his sword, declaring that he would rather die as a king than live a captive ; and, pushing through a country infested by the rebels, continually surprised, intercepted, and harassed by them, he arrived with his handful of troops to within a few leagues of his capital. Here he was met by reinforcements commanded by the Duke d'Aumale. The plot to capture him had failed, but he was heard to declare that he would never forgive the Huguenots their treachery.^ It would at least have been well if he had remembered of what they were capable, and had guarded his interests better in the sequel. Catherine, still temporising, offered the traitors an amnesty if they would lay down their arms in twenty-four hours. But they would listen to no terms, and on October 2 Coligny occupied St. Denis with his army. Conde had hoped to welcome a supply of English troops, but Elizabeth would only furnish him with 300 archers from among the Flemish refugees who had landed at Sandwich, and he hastened from Boulogne to join the bulk of the Huguenot forces. He was received at St. Denis with acclamation, and his first act was to set up barricades so that no person might penetrate without leave into the ancient abbey, in which a long line of French kings had been crowned and anointed. Here, in the presence of a few comrades, he placed upon his own head the crown of St. Louis, and had himself proclaimed, " Louis XIII., by the grace of God, first King of the faithful followers of the Gospel." On October 7 coin was circulated bearing the same device.^ The Constable of France, Anne de Montmorency, in command of the royal army, sent a herald in the king's name, summoning him to retire. Conde received the herald at the entrance to his lodging with these words, " If you dare to pronounce the word rebellion I will have you hanged above this door." ^ But notwithstanding his proud attitude, experience had 1 Brantome, vol. v. p. 267. Nat. Archives, Paris, K, 1508. - Le Frere, p. 239 ; Brantome, vol. iv. p. 343. See also a letter from the Duke of Alva to Chantonay, "Le Prince de Conde s'est fait appcler roi Louis XIIL par le peuple de Saint Denis, battant monnaie, et faisant autres actes de Souverainete." ^ Letter of Don Francis Alava. Nat. Archives, Paris, K, 1508. 430 Reformation and Renaissance taught him that he could not hope to hold his ground with- out allies, and once more he turned for help to Elizabeth. Her sympathy with the " Beggars " of the Netherlands led their brethren in France to believe that when the decisive moment came she would follow up her promises with substantial help. Conde, therefore, wrote her a long letter, claiming her support, and seeking to justify the insurrection. " Were not the early Christians persecuted as the enemies of Cssar .? " he asked. " And was not the cause of the Huguenots identical with theirs, the cause of the Gospel ? " But lest these reasons should not seem potent enough to Elizabeth's practical mind, he was careful to let her know that if she helped them she should not be forgotten in the parcelling out of the soil of France. Elizabeth was, however, menaced by the arrival of a Spanish army in the Netherlands, and she declined to take part in this second civil war. Perhaps also a natural grudge against Conde for his former desertion influenced her refusal. Nor was the attempt to secure the co-operation of the Prince of Orange more successful, although the Huguenot camp was strengthened by the arrival of a few of the boldest and most enterprising of the Gueux ; and Conde perhaps affected an assurance that he did not feel, when he declared that before a month had passed he would march into the Low Countries and deliver his friends from Spanish thraldom. Catherine, in her extremity, had obtained a promise of help from Philip, and on October 4 the Duke of Alva announced that he had received instructions to march to the rescue of the King of France, the queen -regent having solemnly engaged to have done for ever with all fellowship with the enemies of the Catholic religion in France.-^ The Guises, on their part, knowing how little reliance could be placed on Catherine's adhesion to any one line of policy, and desiring at all costs to secure the friendship of Spain, offered the reversion of the crown to Philip II. in the event of Charles IX. dying without issue. Such an arrangement was less extraordinary than at first appears ; for if the salic law were set aside by a recourse to arms, as it so easily might be, Philip could have serious pretensions to that crown through his wife, Elizabeth of France, sister of Charles. Matters being thus arranged, the Spanish contingent, ^ Docu7nents inedits, vol. iv. pp. 465, 470. Queen Elizabeth and the Revolution 431 consisting of 1500 horse and 2000 foot soldiers, entered France, These numbers, although small, obliged Conde to divide his army, in order to defend the bridge at Poissy, and thus considerably to weaken himself. On November 10 was fought the bloody battle of St. Denis, the result of which was to drive the Huguenots from the banks of the Seine, and to make their designs upon the Low Countries impossible. In this battle was seen the strange spectacle of a prince of the Church fighting on the side of heresy and rebellion. This was Cardinal de Chatillon, Bishop of Beauvais, Coligny's brother, who having joined the Huguenots, continued to wear the purple in order to retain his rank in the Council Chamber, The victory was undisputed, but Charles was unable to prevent Conde from besieging Chartres, although the sdf-made king had no money wherewith to pay his soldiers, who began to murmur loudly. He was at length forced to treat with Catherine, who, as usual, instead of profiting by the advantages she had gained, was willing to accept any condition he chose to dictate. Thus the shameful peace of Chartres was signed on March 23, 1568, and the only concession required of Conde was that he should lay down his assumed royalty. With this understanding the king declared him to be his " good cousin and faithful servant," and his followers were not only to have all their rights and privileges restored to them, but were to be styled " faithful and loving subjects." To complete the folly and humiliation, Charles undertook to pay the German Reiters who had invaded his kingdom, and had fought on the side of his rebellious subjects against him. The blindest optimism could scarcely have expected a durable peace to grow out of such a grovelling policy as this. It lasted but a few months. The Huguenots con- sidered it indeed little more than a momentary suspension of hostilities, and they did not even disarm. They retained certain towns which they had agreed to surrender, and fortified themselves in La Rochelle, — henceforth the capital of Huguenot France. Philip II,, disgusted with the terms of the treaty, declared that he was no longer the ally of the French king, whereupon, the Prince of Orange entering France to support the Huguenots, the scale again rose in their favour. It was 43 2 Reformation and Renaissance reported that they had decreed the death of the queen- mother — a crime which we may describe in their own language as unnecessary, since, intentionally or not, she had hitherto ever proved herself their best friend. Conde was now in a better position for securing the help of Elizabeth, and he again wrote to her saying that he counted on a continuance of her favour for the furtherance of so good and holy a cause. ^ Cecil replied by ordering the English ambassador to negotiate with the Huguenot chiefs with a view to an alliance, and on December 6 a treaty was concluded between Elizabeth and Conde to the effect that she should lend him her aid, in return for the salt and salt- springs of Saintonge, and the wool of the Poitou sheep, together with the metal of all bells torn down from the churches and monasteries.^ In the following July, Elizabeth handed over ^20,000 sterling to the Cardinal de Chatillon, for the acknowledged purpose of disseminating rebellion in France. The jewels of the Queen of Navarre were given to her as security for the money .^ The battle of Jarnac, fatal to the Huguenots, was fought on March 13, 1569. Conde was taken prisoner, and then killed, in revenge for the death of the Marshal Saint Andre, who was stabbed when a prisoner after the battle of Dreux, The Huguenots had seized Poitiers, but the Duke of Anjou drove them from that town, and they were again defeated in the famous battle of Moncontour. These victories were celebrated by the royalists with a succession of brilliant fetes and pageants. " So much money is spent in balls and masquerades," said Tavannes, *' that there is none left to pay the soldiers with." But the insurgents were now at last thoroughly alarmed. With the loss of Conde it seemed as if the fortunes of war were turning against them, and they sent an imploring letter to Cecil. " Help us," they wrote, " for we are the advanced guard of England." * A price had been put on Coligny's head, but all that was 1 Le XV P'^^ Steele et les Valois, p. 234. ^ Le Frere, p. 311 ; Castelnau, vol. vii. chap. ii. 3 Lansdowne MS. 102, fol. 80. Brit. Mus. * Letter of October 16, 1569. Record Office. Queen Elizabeth and the Revolution 433 done to bring matters to a decisive issue was constantly- stultified by Catherine's policy of playing ofF one party against the other. It was Elizabeth's interest that no permanent peace should be established in France, and when Catherine pro- ceeded as usual to court the vanquished, in order to humble the victors, the Queen of England offered Coligny a subsidy of 25,000 crowns as the price of his consent not to treat with Charles.^ The Cardinal de Chatillon, now an exile in England, also wrote to his brother entreating him not to separate himself from the English, But Coligny knew well by experience that he could always make good terms at home, and he assured the queen- mother that she possessed no more affectionate servant than he was and always intended to be. A treaty was there- fore signed at St. Germain in spite of Elizabeth, and the Huguenots were declared good citizens, and capable of occupying all public oflices. The fortified towns of La Rochelle, Montauban, Cognac, and La Charite, were assigned to them. But scarcely was the treaty concluded when a report was circulated to the effect that Catherine was setting a trap, whereby the entire Huguenot body was to be exterminated. This supposed trap, called the " Royal Hunt," had in reality no other foundation than a remark made by Charles to the Cardinal Rambouillet, the purport of which was that he had only made peace to save his crown, and that he was minded to follow another road by which one day he would cleanse his whole kingdom.^ Therefore, although peace had been concluded, there was no peace. The Huguenots, practically the masters, seized a quantity of powder which the king was sending to St. Jean d'Angely, and carried it off to La Rochelle. Compromising letters were intercepted at Havre, written by Coligny to Eliza- beth, and such was the universal panic, that Charles, on the eve of his marriage to EHzabeth of Austria, thought it prudent to prevent her further progress towards Paris, and went out to meet her at Mezieres, where the ceremony took place. The state of public insecurity was no barrier to inordi- 1 Letter of Don Francis Alava, June 17, 1570. Nat. Archives, Paris, K, 151 5. - Memoires de la Huguerie, vol. i. p. 9. 2 F 434 Reformation and Renaissance nate display and thoughtless rejoicings on this occasion. The king gave himself up with a kind of frenzy to every extravagant device for his amusement.^ The young queen, however, described by Alava as "an angel of goodness," was not deceived by these appearances, and it was remarked that her eyes constantly filled with tears, but that the king showed her little affection or regard. It was about this time that the Duke of Anjou, under his mother's influence, and supported by Huguenot interests, appeared as an aspirant to the hand of Queen Elizabeth, There could have been little desire on his part for such a marriage, for, besides the disparity of their ages, he was madly in love with the beautiful Mademoiselle de Chateau- neuf, at whose side he would pass weeks and months, ob- livious of war or poHtics,^ He had, moreover, long ceased to identify himself with the Protestants. " Le petit Huguenot " of his childhood had not developed into " le grand Huguenot," in spite of Catherine's system of education ; and, added to these reasons, Catherine herself admitted that the duke was the less willing to marry Eliza- beth, as he had always heard bad reports of her reputation,^ A few weeks later Walsingham declared that the duke seemed cold, undecided, and but little disposed towards a union, the trials and dangers of which he did not underrate. At the very moment when the marriage was publicly an- nounced, it was in fact definitely broken off ; and Walsing- ham told Cecil that neither the threats of the king nor the entreaties of his mother had succeeded in making the Duke of Anjou conclude the match.* He wrote to Elizabeth a letter in which he thanked her for her kindness, but regretted that so many difficulties opposed the accomplishment of what he would otherwise have so ardently desired. He ended by assuring her that she might always count on his feelings of devotion towards her.^ Elizabeth never forgave this insult, and three years afterwards she told Montgomery that if the Duke of Anjou became king, she would dethrone him, even if it cost her her crown. ^ ^ Diuours des noces du roi. Bib. Nat. Paris, 20, 647. 2 Harl. MS. 253, p. 78. Brit. Mus. 2 "D'autant qu'il a toujours si mal oui parler de son honneur," Corr. de la Mothe, Lettre de Catherine de Medici, vol. vii. ^ Foreign Papers, July 27, 1571. Record Office. ^ Ibid. July 31, 1571. *' Castelnau, Memoires, p. 414. Queen Elizabeth and the Revolution 435 The marriage of the King of Navarre with Margaret of Valois was to cement the Peace of St. Germain, by uniting the noblest Huguenot to a Catholic princess of the blood- royal. The bride had been affianced as a child to the Duke of Guise, who now in vain claimed her for his wife. Charles IX. informed the young princess that unless she consented to a union with Henry of Navarre, she would be imprisoned for life in a convent, and to this threat she yielded, hoping that the refusal of the Pope to grant a dispensation would set her free at the last moment. Not only was the dispensa- tion refused, but all means were employed to save her from a marriage which all Catholics deplored. The Pope sent a special legate. Cardinal Alexandrini, to the king, with orders to spare neither entreaty nor remonstrance to avert the marriage. But to every appeal Charles had but one reply, " It is my only means of taking vengeance on my enemies." St. Francis Borgia appeared to be more successful in a like mission to Catherine. She assured him with the fervour she could so easily simulate, that she would rather die than conclude her daughter's marriage without a dispensation.^ Yet, although the dispensation was never granted, two suc- cessive Popes, St. Pius V, and Gregory XIII., having per- sistently refused it, the contract was signed on August 17, 1572. Charles was heard to say that he gave his sister, not merely to the Prince of Navarre, but to all the Huguenots in France, that she might, as it were, espouse them all. The religious ceremony was performed outside the church of Notre Dame, a papal despatch announcing the speedy arrival of the dispensation having been forged for the purpose of deceiving those whose consciences might otherwise have prevented their attendance. A vast platform had been erected in front of the church for the occasion. The bride wore a splendid crown, and a rich bodice of ermine ; her dress sparkled with jewels, and three princesses held up her train of royal blue velvet. But her face was sad, and she made no answer when she was asked whether she accepted the Prince of Navarre for her husband. Charles, however, stepped forward and obliged her to bow her head in token of obedience, the only sign of assent she gave. Mass was then said inside the church, and Margaret was the only assistant. 1 Kervyn de Lettenhove, Les Huguefiots et les Gueux, vol. ii. p. 362. 43^ Reformation and Renaissance Coligny was at the Chateau of Blois, where he held a kind of court, and kept up a semi-regal state, while Charles sought to propitiate him by heaping favours upon him, " The King of France is acting like a madman," said Philip II., and certainly there was little reason for thus flattering a man who was known to be again plotting to lay violent hands on his sovereign. In June 1572 he had made a solemn entry into Paris, and had stirred up the Huguenots to an aggressive demon- stration, the more irritating to the Catholic population, inasmuch as the day chosen for the event was the feast of Corpus Christi. He went straight to the chateau in the Bois de Boulogne, where the king was then staying. As he entered the room, Charles rose, and advanced to meet him, folded him in his arms, and made him sit down by his side. " Never in all my reign," he said, " was any one more welcome to my court." ^ Since the death of Conde, the Guises had fallen into dis- grace, and the Duke of Anjou, who befriended them, was also out of favour. Catherine, in spite of her shuffling policy, was once again, and for always, the object of Hugue- not hatred ; but what was of far greater importance to her, she had entirely lost her influence over the king, who now listened to no advice but Coligny's. The admiral's primary object was to induce Charles to declare war against Spain, and to send an army into the Netherlands. After delivering these provinces from Spanish control, the Duke of Anjou was to be placed on the throne — a stroke of policy that would have the double advantage of driving the Spaniards out of the Low Countries, and of removing the Catholic Duke of Anjou from France, " If," said Coligny, " the king does not carry war into the Netherlands, he will have it at home, and will not only be exposed to the hatred of Philip, but to that of all the Huguenots as well." ^ This threat was the refrain of all his conferences with Charles, and at last he told him roundly that his faction would no longer be fed with fine language ; the Huguenots demanded an answer within the space of four days. Six hundred horse and two thousand foot-soldiers were all that they needed to become masters of the Netherlands. At 1 De Thou, Book Hi. 2 Letter of Petrucci, July 16, 1572. Nat. Archives, Paris. Queen Elizabeth and the Revokition 437 first the king would promise nothing ; but preparations for war were made as if he had consented, and a report was spread that he was about to conclude an alliance with the Turks against Spain. Upon this, the Duke of Alva lost no time, and when at length the Huguenot chief, De Genlis, crossed the frontier to join the Prince of Orange on the Meuse, Don Fabricius of Toledo, Alva's son, assailed and completely routed him. The Parisians, groaning under Huguenot tyranny and savage cruelty, manifested the most tempestuous joy at this defeat. Banquets and bonfires were held in the streets. All Paris was in a state of delirium at the unex- pected prospect of deliverance from the hated yoke. The good news spread like wildfire through the provinces, and the sudden change from the deepest gloom to hope and gladness was more eloquent than any words to describe what the sufferings of the great Catholic majority had been. It was also significant of what the frenzy of their despair would be should the Huguenots again triumph. The disappointment of the Duke of Anjou was even greater than Coligny's ; he had counted on the crown of the Netherlands. As for Catherine, the Huguenot defeat caused her neither satisfaction nor regret. What to her was the joy or sorrow of the nation compared with the paramount importance of her ambition? The king had become a mere tool in the admiral's hands, and his mother's influence was a thing of the past. To regain that lost power seemed to her the one all-sufficient reason for throwing her- self definitely at last on the side opposed to the Huguenots. If Coligny were allowed to live, his voice would henceforth be the only authoritative voice in France, and to silence it for ever was her one chance of regaining her former ascend- ancy over her son's mind. At a secret council held at Monceau she confided to a few devoted friends the fact that a struggle to the death had begun between herself and the admiral, and that she had resolved on his undoing. The blow was to be struck to the sound of marriage bells, and under cover of the festivities following the union of the King of Navarre and Margaret of Valois, her daughter. But even then it was to appear as if the Guises were alone responsible for the deed, lest it should become necessary for Catherine again to treat with 43 8 Reformation and Renaissance the Huguenots. The Venetian ambassador was not, how- ever, deceived by these carefully prepared appearances, and he exculpated the Guises from any share in the plot. " All this business," he told the Doge, " has been the work of the queen-mother from the beginning to the end, combined and directed by her ; the Duke of Anjou has alone had any share in it." ^ But Michele, like any other contemporary witness, could only judge by what he saw of passing events. We, in our day, have the advantage of seeing the whole canvas of the revolutionary picture unrolled before us, and know the parts each character played in the historical drama. But for Queen Elizabeth and her ambassadors in France, the Huguenots would never have risen to be so dangerous a faction in the State ; and had it not been for the inhuman cruelties which they practised, the people would not have been goaded to madness, and Catherine's deed of blood would probably have been limited to one victim. Coligny's answer to the public rejoicing over his defeat was to place thirty pieces of artillery on the Place de Greve. Written orders had been sent to " those of the religion " to be in readiness, and from 30,000 to 40,000 armed men were awaiting his signal.^ Nothing but the interminable feasting and revelry kept the bomb from exploding. Paris was swarming with adventurers of every kind, ready to increase and swell the confusion, whenever the music and dancing should cease and the fighting begin. At the sight of the Huguenot cannon, intended to strike terror into their hearts, the Parisians conceived a frantic hope of deliverance. It was the eve of the massacre of St. Bartholomew. 1 Michele to the Doge, Aug. 25, 1572. Venetian Archives. 2 Corr. de Hain^int. vol. ix, Belgian Archives. CHAPTER XII THE CATHOLIC REVIVAL While monarchs and diplomatists were alternately fighting and feeding the revolution, the Catholic Church was using her own means to bring about reform, striking at the roots ot those things that had caused scandals, and adopting such of the modern ideas of progress and culture as advanced the true interests of religion. As the movement was to be permanent and radical, it was necessarily slow. Festina lente has ever been the motto of real reform. Spirits must be proved before they can be pronounced to be of divine origin. The invention of printing had introduced new methods into the art of saving souls, and all over Europe the vulgar tongue which had hitherto only been used to instruct the peasantry in the elementary truths of religion was now everywhere cultivated. That Dante should have written in mere Italian was, as we have seen, something of a shock to the learned world as late as the fifteenth century, but where he had paved the way others followed. Then Chaucer showed Europe that the English language was fitted to be spoken by others than yokels, and Shakespeare revealed it as a treasure- house containing the richest gems. But French had come to be the language of courts, of the polite world, — the language par excellence of the Renaissance. The most unpoetical tongue in Europe, its genius displayed itself in exquisitely turned periods, in short epigrammatic utterances, in close reasoning, in convincing eloquence. It was admir- ably adapted to pulpit oratory, and the Church fought the sins and follies of the Renaissance with its own weapons, and produced a Bossuet, a Bourdaloue, a Massillon, followed by an army of preachers. 439 440 Reformation and Renaissance On the high seas the age of great navigators had dawned. Its pioneers, unUke the brilHant adventurers of a century- later, — Sir Francis Drake and Sir Walter Raleigh, — were simple, ardent, devout men, who belonged, by their characters, far more to the ages of faith behind them than to the specu- lative era of the Renaissance. These were, in the foremost ranks, Amerigo Vespucci and Christopher Columbus. The discovery of America was due to the missionary zeal of Columbus, whose genius, fired by a longing to spread Christianity to the eastern extremity of Asia, conceived the possibility of reaching India by sailing boldly westward. Unlearned, poor, without connections, he nevertheless, by his boundless integrity and strong personality, succeeded in winning Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain for his project. His vivid, poetical imagination, high character, and generous impulses gained him many friends, but did not fit him to become the leader of such men as his half-savage crew. But he set out to find a new way to India, and discovered a new world in 1492. The naval astronomer, Amerigo Vespucci, from whom the new continent accidentally received its name, was born at Florence in 1451. An inaccurate description of his voyages gave him the credit of having touched that continent before Columbus or Cabot, whereas he did not reach Florida till 1497. If it was the old, Catholic, missionary spirit that stirred Columbus to brave hardships, such as the martyrs for the faith endured, and to risk his life in the conquest of a new hemisphere in which to spread the knowledge and the kingdom of Christ, the means which he employed to reach that object belonged also to another age. The mariner's compass used in the discovery of America had been invented a hundred years before by Gioja of Naples. Even in its best aspects, the Renaissance cannot be said to have originated anything, but merely to have made the world acquainted with arts and inventions long since discovered. The telescope, first employed by Copernicus to prove the revolution of the earth, and by Galileo, to substantiate his theory of the planetary system, was familiar to the Arabians in the Middle Ages. Even in the art of war there was little that was absolutely novel : gunpowder, discovered by Friar Roger Bacon, had been in use since 1320. Thus, although these and other proofs of an advanced civilisation were first The Catholic Revival 441 spread in the world at the period of the Renaissance, they were in reality the products of an entirely Catholic age, and remained distinct from, while they added to, the glory of the new era. It is the custom to denounce the guarded attitude of the Church, in respect to what is deemed progress, as narrow and reactionary. But looking back over the sixteenth century it must be clear to every unprejudiced mind, that but for her watchful solicitude the whole world would have been given over to sensuality and false doctrine. If the paganism of the Renaissance was turned into Christian channels, it was due to that regenerating power that dwells for ever in the Church, acting gently and sweetly upon the most refractory materials, not only bringing good out of evil, but actually in many cases turning evil into good. While Luther's only remedy for abuses was the perpetration of fresh scandals, and a schism leading to years of war and bloodshed, to centuries of division and chaos, the Church was bringing about a true Reformation which still endures, while the violent measures from without are ending in a sea of confusion. It was inevitable, however, that some mistakes should be made in dealing with subjects of which there had been hitherto no practical experience, and for which the world was as yet scarcely prepared. When the Catholic reaction set in, and men once more looked towards the Church for guidance, Aristotle regained his ascendancy over the minds of the learned. A disregard of his teaching was considered by many as only secondary to disregard of an article of faith. Therefore, when Galileo came forward with his theories founded on the Copernican system, which differed toto cxlo from the astronomy of Aristotle, his discoveries were met with the gravest suspicion. The nations had not yet re- covered from novelties that had lost thousands of souls to the Church, and it behoved the authorities to beware of further innovations. Here was a man — a good Catholic indeed, but imprudent, loquacious, hasty, and ill-advised — who, with his theories still unproved, and demonstrated by arguments, many of which were clearly unsound, was for upsetting universally accepted notions of physical science, necessitating the revision of commonly understood literal interpretations of Scripture. Doubtless, the manner in which he was silenced was a mistake, but a mistake for 442 Reformation and Renaissance which Galileo himself was mainly responsible. Had he gone to work differently, giving evidence of his own good faith, and, above all, of his conviction of the truth of his own theories, the issue would have been different. In signing his retractation he showed that either he had not the courage of his opinions, or that he himself con- sidered that he had not strong enough proof of his asser- tions. His theories were condemned at Rome not as heretical, but as temerarious; and the sentence, it is needless to say, does not rank as an ex cathedra definition, but merely as a disciplinary enactment which was repealed in 1757 and in 1820,1 The Catholic revival began in Italy with the foundation of the order of Theatines. Its object was to improve the secular clergy, give them a better training, and raise the standard of discipline among them. This reform was facili- tated by the fact that Italy, at the end of the sixteenth cen- tury, enjoyed forty years of uninterrupted peace, during which time libraries were founded, learned academies flour- ished, and the universities of Padua, Bologna, Salerno, and others, revived theological studies. And what was more, saints again arose, and by the beauty of their holiness capti- vated a world that had gone after shameful pleasures, had worshipped the senses, and bowed the knee to Baal. St. Philip Neri alone, the apostle of Rome, did more by the sanctity of his life and example to repair the ravages that sin had made in the sanctuary, than all Savonarola's violent denunciations, or Erasmus's stinging sarcasms. For more than sixty years he drew souls as the magnet draws steel, by the sheer force of his tenderness and sympathy, and we do not find that he ever uttered a word of direct reproof, much less a sneer. Rome had suffered an awful visitation for its crimes, as Savonarola had predicted ; but St. Philip was not so much concerned to point out the lesson conveyed by the visible wrath of God, as to show forth God's love in the works and words of charity, with which he benefited all sorts and conditions of men. And thus, drawing near to him, they were carried up as by rays to the divine source of all sanctity. Foremost again among Catholic reformers was St. Charles Borromeo, Archbishop of Milan. His labours on 1 Wegg-Prosser, Galileo and his Judges. London, 1889, The Catholic Revival 443 behalf of the clergy of his diocese as regarded their dress, conversation, manners, and morals, were immense. " Woe to him who does the Lord's work negligently " was his con- stant warning, as he exhorted them to be diligent in the choice and matter of their sermons, according to the needs of their hearers, and he charged them to keep in every parish a register of the manner of life of each of its members. He even went so far as to re-establish the ancient custom of public penances for notorious sins, and was himself indefati- gable in visiting personally the most distant and inaccessible parts of his huge diocese. No efforts were spared to bring back the frequentation of the sacraments, and such was his zeal for the observance of the feasts of the Church, that he would cause the crops of the farmers, who persisted in working on forbidden days, to be seized and confiscated for the use of the poor. He exercised a careful control over the books read by his flock, forbidding such as were infected with false doctrine or immorality to be sold in his diocese. He instituted the Congregation of the Oblates of St. Ambrose, known to us as the Oblates of St. Charles, com- posed of secular priests who had taken a special vow of obedience to the archbishop, and who were employed in serving the poorest parishes, and in the great apostolic work of education. At Milan also was founded the Barnabite order, principally devoted to the education of youth. Alexander Sauli, one of its earliest and most distinguished members, was the Italian reformer of philosophical studies. He taught Greek at Pavia, and wrote a Greek grammar for his pupils, leading them on to an appreciation of the Logic of Aristotle, and giving them a taste for mathematics. He had made such profound studies in the Summa of St. Thomas, that it was a common saying at Pavia, that if the book were to disappear out of the world, " Master Alexander could reproduce it from beginning to end." The same order claims the celebrated Bartholomew Gavunto, called the Father of the Liturgy, who was com- missioned by Clement VIII. and Urban VIII. to correct the Roman Breviary. In 1 6 10 Henry IV. of France applied to Paul V. for a mission, composed of Italian Barnabites, to convert the province of Beam, that had been completely devastated by the Calvinists, and in which not a single Catholic church 444 Reformation and Renaissance remained. With the help of St. Francis of Sales they gathered in a rich harvest. This stream of Catholic revival had received a strong impetus from the assembling of the long-deferred Council of Trent in 1545. The questions raised by Luther and other heretics had been investigated, doctrines had been defined, abuses put down, and a formula had been drawn up de- claring the belief of the Church on all points disputed by the iiQW sects. Each time that the Church has been menaced by some great heresy she has, says Cesare Cantu in his work on the Council of Trent, pressed round the successor *' of the great man to whom our Lord left the keys," ^ and in a General Council has declared " Quod visum est nobis et spiritui SanctoT In the sixteenth century the Church was threatened not with one heresy, but with a dozen ; but so completely did she vindicate her doctrines at the Council of Trent, that for more than three hundred years no further Council was necessary. Everywhere the sap was stirring in the living branches that had not been separated from the parent tree, and France was not far behind Italy in heralding the second spring. Bossuet, Bourdaloue, Fenelon, St. Vincent of Paul, are names as illustrious as any in the annals of the Church, and are as significant of reform as those of St. Francis of Paul, St. Francis of Sales, St. Charles Borromeo, and of the famous Cardinals Contarini, Giberti, Caraffa, and others. To Germany, Austria, and Poland was given Peter Canisius, one of the most learned men of his time, whose gigantic labours during fifty-four years effectually arrested the spread of Lutheranism, and restored whole provinces to the Church. He worked among people whom intemperance, ignorance, and long neglect had brutalised almost beyond human reach, but wherever he passed, every village changed its aspect, and vice and heresy fled. His public conferences with the Lutherans were marvels of sound reasoning, based on strict philosophical principle. At the Diet of Worms he stipulated that before the opening of the conferences none but those Protestants who belonged to the Confession of Augsburg, and who were the only regular and to some 1 . . . Del gran viro A cui nostro Signer lascio le chiavi. Dante, Paradiso, Canto xxiv. 35. The Catholic Revival 445 extent disciplined body among them, should take part in the disputations. This condition was accepted, but from the beginning Anabaptists, Sacramentarians, and heretics ot every imaginable sect appeared, and clamied the right ot speech Those of the Augsburg Confession were furious, and refused to make common cause with the new arrivals. Recriminations, invectives, and threats were hurled about the Protestant camp till a formidable tumult was raised. ihe Augsburg Lutherans at last succeeded in turning out the others ; but, ashamed of the spectacle they presented to the eyes of the Catholics, they left Worms secretly, and con- tented themselves with attacking each other in the most vituperative terms. "It was," wrote Canisius, ''as^f ^he giants of old were seeking to rebuild the Tower of Babel. They were visited with the same spirit of confusion, and Melanchthon was punished by the work of his own hands, hke those who are devoured by the wild beasts they have them- selves bred up with great pains and difficulty. Cologne, Strassburg, and his own native Nymwegen came m for a share of the great Jesuit's apostolic labours. The Bishop ot Trent beo-ged Canisius to found a college in his diocese ; the Duke of Bavaria called upon him to conduct the one he had set on foot at Munich, and to establish another at Landshut. But Straubing, by reason of its extreme need, detained him longer than any of these places. _ The Emperor Charles V. had himself been mainly responsible for the worst of the existing difficulties there, on account of the Interim, which granted to all persons permission to communicate under both kinds pending the decision of the Council of Trent. Straubing had availed itself, without exception, of the leave A tew priests had attempted to oppose it, but numberless apos- tasies, and half an insurrection had followed in their action, and now the position had come to be regarded as impreg- nable. Canisius made no attempt to storm the fortress ; he arrived, and was gentleness itself, and had scarcely passed a week in the town when he was looked upon as the friend and adviser of all its principal burghers. At Easter nearly the whole population approached the sacraments, and com- municated, without making the least difficulty, under one kind Even if space permitted it would be superfluous to follow the Apostle of Germany in his journey to Poland, in 44^ Reformation and Renaissance his fruitful sojourn at Augsburg, in his campaign against the Calvinism of the Swiss Protestants. Everywhere the story is the same, and where he planted the seed others followed, and continued the work of Canisius which is flourishing still. But it is to Spain that we must look for the most striking instances of the Catholic Renaissance and Reforma- tion. In that country the new humanism led on to the most brilliant era that had ever dawned upon any nation. After a struggle of 900 years against Islam, Christianity celebrated a complete triumph, and material prosperity followed quickly on the cessation of the war. While the Spanish fleet, imitating the example of Columbus, conquered new dominions under Fernand Cortez, the Spanish legions, commanded by Gonzalvo of Cordova, conquered new territory in Europe. Cardinal Ximenez, breaking with a strong hand the old Spanish feudalism, paved the way for the empire of Charles V. The whole peninsula was at the zenith of its power and glory, and the Kings of Spain and Portugal, whatever their faults, had a very sincere desire for the welfare of their people. National jealousies and the intrigues of political agents render the despatches often misleading as to the real aims and intentions of kings and rulers. But the most recent discoveries throw a difl^erent light on much that has hitherto come down to us in a distorted shape. The character of Phihp II. has been cleared of much blame, and reveals at least a conscientious patriotism that goes far to explain the passionate love of all Spaniards for his memory. The solicitude of John III., King of Portugal, for the evangelisation of his newly acquired dominions in India, and his urgent demands for missionaries, bring us to the foundation of the Society of Jesus, one of the chief works of the Catholic Reformation. It was the special province of Ignatius of Loyola and Francis Xavier to defend the Church against the numberless sects bent upon her ruin, and to bring under her sceptre more converts from idolatry than heresy had deprived her of in Europe. No country but Spain could have produced the particular assemblage of qualities that went to the making of St. Ignatius. He was a Spaniard of the Spaniards before his sanctity soared above all national distinctions, and stamped 'n^'lUt^^') k Q^'^-^n-^r^-- P. FRANCfSCV6^ XAVERIVS SOC.IESV. S£J^^l^^;j2^.iP£i£>\^ FfDF.M TN INDIAM INVEXIT. I. I. IE: '•"i- 441 Arius, 184 Arneys, Antoine, 332 Arthur, King, 2 Arthur, Prince of Wales, eldest son of Henry VII., 240, 241, 242, 243, 249 Art, Catholic, 8, 9 Art, of the Renaissance, 10, 11, 157 Arundel, Archbishop, 49, 51 and note Arundel, Countess of, 347 Arundel, Earl of, 239 Arundel, Humphrey, Governor of St. Michael's Mount, 387 Ascham, Roger, 352 Aubigne, Agrippa d', 394 Audley, Lord Chancellor, 283, 284 Aumale, Duke d', 429 Bacon, Sir Nicholas, Lord Chancellor, 369 Bacon, Roger, 24, 440 Bainbridge, Cardinal, 253 Bale, John, 17 Ball, John, 44, 46 Balzac, 298 Bannister, 37S Barbirius, Peter, letter to, 183 Barker, 378 Barletta, Gabriele, 131 Barry (called La Renaudie), 394 Bartolommeo Fra (Baccio della Porta), 135, 147 Bavaria, the Duke of, 445 Bavius, 296 Beaton, Cardinal, 358 Beche, Thomas, Abbot of Colchester, 281 Becket, a. See St. Thomas of Canterbury Behaim, Bartholomew, 226 Behaim, Hans Sebald, 226 Bellay, Jean du. Cardinal, 298, 300, 304 Benedictines. Sec Monastic Orders Beza, Theodore, 310 and note, 393, 408, 411, 412, 413, 415, 416 Bible, the, 19, 20, 29, 47, 48, 106, 122, 140, 162, 178 and note, 179, 192, 213, 218,226, 319, 325, 327, 344 459 460 Reformation and Renaissance Bible, contd. — Manuscripts of, 19, 122 Greek MSS. of, in the Vatican Library, 122 Translations of, 47, 48, 106, 218 note, 327. 344 read through in monk's choir every year, 20 read in nun's choir daily, 213, 218 and by each nun in private, 213 ordered to be expounded in churches, in the fourteenth century, 179 interpretation of, 106, 140, 184, 218 and note printed editions of, before the Reforma- tion, 178, 192, Appendix A the Lutheran version of, 310 the Calvinist version of, 344 wranglings over disputed passages of, 192, 319 substituted for the authority of the Church, 325 Black Prince, the. See Edward, Prince of Wales Blanc, Louis, 298 Blount, William, Lord Mountjoy, 166, 167, 168, 170, 175, 248, 252 Boast, Father, 381 Boccaccio, 114, 115, 116, 117, 147, 303 Bock, Ursula von. Prioress, 223, 225 Boiardo, 133 Boleyn, Anne, 259, 260, 261, 265, 266, 267, 275. 276, 277, 290, 362 Bolsec, Jerome, 328 Bombasius, Paul, 248 Bonner, Edmund, Bishop of London, 346, 347, 349, 351 Bonvalot, Francis, 189 Bora, Katharina von, 233, 362 Bossuet, 323 note, 439, 444 Botticelli, Sandro, 133 Bourbon, Cardinal of, 415 Bourdaloue, 439, 444 Boy-bishop, the, 96 Branda, Cardinal, 193 Brant, Sebastian, 105 Brethren of the Common Life, 75 Briquemart, 409 Brissac, Charles de Cosse, Marshal, 405 Browfne, Dr. George, 276 Brutus, 394 Bucer, Martin, the reformer, 223, 224, 225, 226, 312, 322, 323, 342, 343, 348, 350 is made regius professor of divinity at Cambridge, 343 criticises the first Prayer-Book of Edward VL at the request of the Bishop of Ely, 348 and note letter from, 350 Budaeus (GulUaume Bude), 203, 296, 305 BufFalmacco, 10 BuUinger, the reformer, 324, 339, 341, 358 note, 360 Butcher, 358 note Busch, Johannes, Catholic reformer, 77-89 devotes himself to the reform of religious houses, 79-83 reforms the parish clergy, 83-85 Buttes, Dr., physician to Henry VIIL, 267 Cabbala, the, 135, 204, 205, 207 Cabot, Sebastian, 440 Caesar, Julius, 1 14, 394 Cajetan, Cardinal, 211 Calixtins, 67 Calvin, John, the reformer, 37, 140, 161, 302, 303, 304, 305, 308, 309-314, 319- 336, 340, 341, 342, 343, 344, 352, 356, .358, 359, 360, 394, 421 his character, 308, 309, 310, 323, 326, his flight from Paris, 311 his flight from Aosta, 313 is exiled from Geneva, 322 his marriage, 322 returns to Geneva, and establishes the Consistory, 324 letter to, 341 urges Cranmer to activity, 343, 344 dedicates and sends books to Edward VL, 344 exhorts him to destroy images and abolish prayers for the dead, 344 his opinion of the Book of Common Prayer, 359, 360 Calvinism, 312, 324 Calvinists. See Huguenots Campeggio, Cardinal, 183, 191, 257, 261, 262, 264 and note, 265, 273 letters to, 183, 191 his arrival in England, 262 his speech, 264 Campion, Edmund, 385-387 is favoured by gueen Elizabeth, 385 enters the Society of Jesus, 385 his Ten Reasons, 385 his interview with the Queen after hi* arrest, 386 his trial and execution, 386, 387 Canisius, Peter, Catholic reformer, 444-446 Capponi, Piero, 143 CarafFa, Cardinal, 444 Carlstadt, the Anabaptist, 199, 226, 227, 228, 232, 311 Carrero, Venetian envoy, 393 Carthusians, the. See Monastic Orders Castalion (Sebastian Chateillon), 326 Castelnau, 397 Catullus, 119 Cavendish, George, gentleman - usher to Cardinal Wolsey, 256, 267, 269 Caxton, William, 238-240 Cecil, Sir William, afterwards Lord Burghley, 365, 366, 367, 375, 376, 377, 379, 381, 382, 388, 396, 398, 405, 412, .432,434 his character, 366 Celtis, the early humanist poet, 213, 214 Chalcondylas, a Greek scholar, 244 Index 461 Chamberlain, Sir Thomas, English am- bassador in Spain, 403 Chantonay, Thomas Perrenot, Count de, Spanish ambassador in France, 409, 412, 423 Chapuys, Eustace, Imperial ambassador in England, 282, 396 Charlemagne. See Emperor Charles V., King of France, 58 Charles VIII., King of France, 141, 143, 144, 295 Charles IX., King of France, 405, 406, 408, 410, 411, 412, 419, 424, 425, 428, 433, 435. 436 Charles, Duke of Brandon, 240 Chateauneuf, Mademoiselle de, 434 Chatillon, Cardinal, 298, 301 Chatillon, Odet de Coligny, Cardinal, and Bishop of Beauvais, 409, 431, 432, 438 Chaucer, Geoffrey, 52, 115, 116, 238, 439 Chaundler, Dr., Warden of New College, Oxford, 249 Chedsey, Dr., 369 Cheke, Sir John, 249 Cherillus, 296 Chrysolaras, Manuel, 120 Church, the, 3, 4, 31, 43, 51, 103, no, 112, 135, 181, 184, 185, 251, 347, 441, 450 her deposing power, 4 her definitions of articles of faith, 4 her punishment of heresy, 5 the dual nature of her composition, 6 abuses in, 7, 69-73, 96, 97, 103, 135, 158, 183 the vitality of, no suffers from her contact with the world, 103 her interpretation of Scripture, 184 devotion of the English people to her ancient ritual, 347 her reforms, 438, 441 her continuance throughout the ages, 450 Cicero, 114, 118, iig, 136, 296 Cimabue, 9, 23 Cipierre, Monsieur de, 406 Cistercians, the. See Monastic Orders Clarke, Dr. Adam, 49 Claude de Savoie, mother of Francis I., 305, 306, 307 Claymond, John, Greek scholar, 252 Clement, Margaret, 282 Cleves, Anne of, 292 Clovis, 3 Cochlaeus (John of Wendelstein), 187, 200, 208, 209, 210, 212, 213, 234 Colchester, the Archdeacon of, 239 Cole, Dr., 369 Colet, Dr. John, Dean of St. Paul's, 166, 167, 173, 180, 190, 203, 205, 248, 250, 252 Coligny, Admiral, 392, 394, 397, 405, 407, 408, 412, 413, 415, 416, 417, 418, 419, 422, 423, 424, 425, 426, 428, 432, 433» 436, 438 Colletet, Guillaume, 301, 304 Columbus, Christopher, 440, 446 Conde, Louis de Bourbon-Vendome, Prince °f> 394. 395. 405. 407. 408. 409, 410. 411, 412, 415, 416, 417, 418, 422, 423. 4^4. 425, 426, 428, 429, 432, 436 plays the king at Orleans, 407 crowns himself at St. Denis, and has himself proclaimed Louis XIII., 429 and fiote seeks to justify the insurrection of the Huguenots, 430 lays down his assumed kingship and loses the battle of St. Denis, 431 is killed after the battle of Jarnac, 432 Conrad of Waldhausen, 53 Consistory, the, at Geneva, 324, 327, 328 Constantinople, the fall of, 121 Contarini, Cardinal, 444 Contoblakas, Andronikus, 203 Cook, Hugh, Abbot of Reading, 281 Cop, Nicholas, 310 Copernicus, 440 Coraud, Calvinist, 321 Corneille, Thomas, 301 Cortese, Paolo, 118 Cortez, Fernand, 446 Council of — Rome, (1074) 6 Toledo, 12 Constance, 56, 57, 61, 63, 64, 68, 71, 120 Pisa, 60, 61, 63 Basle, 68, 71, 72, 73, 86, 120 Trent, 341, 444 Courtenay, Bishop of London, afterwards Archbishop of Canterbury, 34, 36, 38, 39, 40, 41, 46 Courtenay, Edward, Marquis of Exeter, 292 Courtenay, Edward, son of the above, 292, 401 Coverdale, the reformer, 344 Cox, Dr., Dean of Christ Church, Oxford, 353 Cox, Dr., a married priest, 367 Cranmer, Thomas, Archbishop of Canter- bury, 252, 273, 274, 275, 283, 290, 312, 339. 340, 341. 342. 345. 346, 349. 350. 351. 352. 357..358, 359 his invitation to the foreign reformers, 340, 341 introduces his "new order of divine service," 345 his second Prayer-Book, sanctioned by Parliament, 351 Cremer, Heinrich, 83 Criminals pardoned by Elizabeth, 380 Crispin, Dr., 348 Croke, Richard, 252 Cromwell, Thomas, Lord Privy Seal, Earl of Essex, 251, 252, 253, 271-276, 278, 280, 281, 289, 290, 291, 292, 293 his spy-system, 275, 289, 290, 291, 292, 293 4^2 Reformation and Renaissance Cromwell, Thomas, contd. — letter to, 278 his consistency, 289 his share of the plundered monasteries, 289 his scheme of a National Church, 289, 291 solicits the hand of Anne of Cleves for Henry VIII., 292 his disgrace, 293 his execution, 294 Crotus, Rubianus, 202 Crusades, the, 7, 8 Crussol, Madame de, 425 Cusa, Cardinal (Dr. Nicholas Krebs), 72, 74, 77, 86, 87 Dacre, Lord, 280 Dante, 2, 9, 115, 117, 118 note, 439 Dauphin the, Francis, eldest son of Francis I., 256, 257 Day, George, Bishop of Chichester, 346, 349. committed to the Fleet, for refusing to demolish the altars in his diocese, 34-9 Demosthenes, 296 Diane de Poitiers, 308 Dobler, Gerhard, 85 Domenico, Fra, da Pescia, 145, 151, 152, 153. 154 Donatello, 11, 118, 132 Drake, Sir Francis, 440 Dryander, a Lutheran, 343 Dudley, Lord Ambrose, 369 Dudley, Lady Robert, 402, 403 Dudley, Lord Robert, afterwards Earl of Leicester, 385, 403, 404, 411 Duke of Gloucester. See Woodstock, Thomas Duns Scotus, 24, 279, 298 Diirer, Albrecht, 194, 209, 2H, 213, 214 Durham, Bishop of, 377 Eck, Dr. John, 199, 208 Edward, Prince of Wales, called the Black Prince, 33, 34 Edward III., King of England, 15, 33, 41, 42 Edward IV., King of England, 239 Edward VI., King of England, 42, 337, 3.38, 339. 344. 354-356, 365 Egnatius, Baptista, 169 Elector Palatine, the, 408, 414 Elizabeth of Austria, wife of Charles IX., 433, 434 Elizabeth, Queen of England, 363, 364, 366, 367, 370, 372, 373, 374, 375, 378, 379, 382, 383, 389, 392» 394-414, 417, 418 excommunicated by the Pope, 378 her unbloody persecution of the Catholics, 375-383,389-391 her bloody persecution, 383-389 criminals pardoned by, 380 statutes of the ist and 2nd of the reign of, 389 Elizabeth, Queen of England, contd. — her intrigues with the Huguenots, 392, 404-438 her responsibility for the massacre of St. Bartholomew, 438 Elizabeth of France, wife of Philip II., 430 Elizabeth of York, wife of Henry VII., 240, 241, 243 Elstow, Friar, 277 and note Ely, Bishop of, 246 Emperor, the — Charlemagne, 2, 15 Henry V., 6 Louis of Bavaria, 28, 29 Charles IV., 53 Sigismund, 61, 62, 66, 67 Conrad, 96 Maximilian I., 199, 206 Charles V., 159, 160, 175, 184, 201, 213, 225, 22q, 256, 257, 258, 291, 292, 295, 308, 445, 446 Emser, 209, 213, 216 England — its attitude towards the Papacy before the Reformation, 32, 49, 251, 337 and note, 338 and note customs in, during the sixteenth century, 247 and note England, the Church of — begun and founded by Henry VIII., 337, 338 note the condition of, described by Latimer, 352 supreme head of, 384, 395 Episcopius, 189 Erasmus, Desiderius of Rotterdam, 118, 132, 158-190, 202, 203, 205, 219, 248, 249, 250, 251, 252, 295, 296, 297, 298, 302, 303, 312, 316, 442 his character, 158, 163, 213, 295 his part in the Reformation, 161 his birth and early life, 163 enters the cloister, 165 is ordained priest, 165 writes his Enco-nium Moria, 172 professor of Greek at Cambridge, 173 his translation of the New Testament, which he dedicates to the Pope, 178, 184, 186 his repudiation of Luther, 181, 184 his death, 189 Ernest of Pardubitz, 53 Essex, the Earl of, 380 Estienne, Henri, 325 Estissac, Geoffrey d', 300 Euclid, 296 Euripides, 168, 296 Exeter, the Bishop of, 383 Exeter, the Marquis of. See Courtenay Eyre, Robert, justice of the peace, 381 Fabricius of Toledo, Don, 437 Fagius, reformer, 350 Falconet, 1 1 Farel, William, reformer, 315, 316, 317, 319, 320,321,322, 323, 324, 335,336 Index 463 Faust, John, the printer, 238 Favre, reformer, 325 Feckenham, Abbot of Westminster, 367, 369 Fenelon, 444 Ferdinand, Archduke of Austria, 159, 184 Ferdinand, King of Arragon, 241, 242, . 243, 440 Feria, Count de, 363, 364 Feme, Jone, a priest- hunter, 382 Feron, Robert, 277 Feudal System, the, 2, 7, 44, 51, 238 Filelfo, Francesco, 120, 296 Fischart, 201 Fisher, John, Bishop of Rochester, 161, 175, 190, 210, 248, 252, 264, 275, 283, 287, 288, 368 Fisher, Robert, 167 Forest, Friar John, 277 Foster, Sir John, 378 Foxe, Bishop of Hereford, 273 Foxe, Bishop of Winchester, 252 Foxe, Edward, 261 Foxe, John, the Martyrologist, 250 Francesco, Antonio di, 122 Francis of Assisi. See Saint Francis Franciscans, the. See Friars Francis I., King of France, 257, 258, 259, 260, 274, 291, 295, 296, 298, 302, 303, 305, 308, 313, 393 Francis II., King of France, 394, 397, 398, 399, 400, 401, 405, 406 Frederick, Elector of Saxony, 196 Freitag, Johannes, a Carmelite, 95 Frellon, a bookseller at Lyons, 332 Friars, the, 12, 17, 22, 23, 24, 27, 28, 29, 43, 46, 131, 134, 145, 162, 163, 186, 219, 220, 276, 299, 300 Froben, John, and his son Jerome, printers, 175, 189, 210 Froment, 319 Fuchs, Dr., 223 Fulbert, president of the University of Chartres, 21 Galileo, 440, 441 Gardiner, Stephen, Bishop of Winchester, 261. 273' 3457 346, 349> 35o> 3Si. 353 Gasparino da Barzizza, 120 Gavunto, Bartholomew, 443 Gaza, Theodorus, 120 Gazino, Pietro, Bishop of Aosta, 313 Geiler, Johannes, von Kaisersberg, Catholic reformer, 89-110, 146 his preaching, 89, 91, 92 his crusade against abuses, 94, 95, 98 his reform of religious houses, 100 his praise of religious life, 10 1 Geneva, the city of — its character, 313 methods employed to obtain its conversion to Calvinism, 316, 318 its condition after ten years of Calvin's rule, 330 Genlis, General de, the Huguenot chief, 42S, 437 Gerson, John, Chancellor of the University of Paris, 56 Geuder, Martin, letter to, 217 Ghiberti, Lorenzo, 132 Ghirlandaio, 132 Giberti, Cardinal, 444 Gingin, Amedee de, 317 Gioja of Naples, 440 Giotto, 9, 118 Giovanni di Conversino, 120 Giustinian, Sebastiano, Venetian ambassador in England, 255, 256 Glasgow, Archbishop of, 426 Gloucester, the Duke of. See Richard III. Gloucester, the Duke of. See Thomas of Woodstock Godefroi de Bouillon, 7 Goodrich, Thomas, Bishop of Ely, 348 and note, 349 Gondi, Italian preceptor of Charles IX., 406 Gonzalvo of Cordova, 446 Gottfried, Prior of Wittenburg, 31 Gower, John, the poet, 238 Gozzoli, Benozzo, 1 17, 123 Graen, Johannes, 80 Grammar schools, 354 Granvelle, Cardinal, 425 Gray, Sir Thomas, 166 Gregory. See Pope Grey, Lord, 411 Grey, the Lady Jane, 365 Grimani, Cardinal, 169, 170, 203 Grindal, Archbishop of York and Canter- bury — Visitation articles, 376 Grocyn, William, 161, 166, 167, 168, 190, 203, 248, 249 Groot, Gerhard, Catholic reformer, 74, 75, 77 Grosseteste, Bishop of Lincoln, 22, 114 Gruet, Jacques, 329 Guarino da Verona, 120 Guise, Francis, Duke of, 394, 398, 401, 405, 408, 411, 412, 413, 416, 417, 424. 426 Guise, Henry, Duke of, son of the above, _ 417. 435 Guise, Duchess of, 426 Guise, Mary of, Queen-Dowager of Scotland, 401 Guizot, 392 Gutenberg, John, the printer, 119, 238 Hall, John, vicar of Isleworth, 277 Harper. See Nicholas de Lyra Harpsfield, Dr., 369 Hastings, Lord, 365 Heath, Nicholas, Bishop of Worcester, after- wards Archbishop of York, 346, 349, 365 opposes the introduction of the Prayer- Book, and is sent to prison, 346 4^4 Reformation and Renaissance Helfenstein, Count Ludwig, 231, 232 Countess of, 232 Henry II., King of England, 6 Henry III., King of England, 32 Henry IV., King of England, 6, 51 Henry V., King of England, 52 Henry VII., King of England, 237, 240, 241^ 242) 243, 244, 245, 246, 248, 253 character of his reign, 240 his proposal to marry Katharine of Arragon, 244 and note Henry VIII., King of England, 17, 33, 170, i75j 176, 240, 243, 244, 245, 246, 248, 250-277, 282, 283, 284, 289, 290, 291, 292, 293, 294, 305, 337, 368, 371, 393 his character in youth, 246 his patronage of letters, 248 his " scruples," 259 his marriage with Anne Boleyn, 275 conducts a trial for heresy, 292 has three men burned at Smithfield, 294 and three others hanged for denying his Supreme Headship, 294 Henry II., King of France, 308, 395, 401 Henry V., Emperor of Germany. See Emperor Hereford, Dr., 47, 48 Heresy, 5, 37, 38, 46, 51 Act against, 51 Herman of Tergau, 165 Hermonymus, 203 Herodotus, 296 Hesse, Landgrave of, 292 Hilsey, Prior, 276 Hohenlohe, Count Sigismund, 307 Holbeach, Bishop of Lincoln, 346 Holbein Hans, 194 Homer, 117, 120 note, 296, 310 Hooper, Bishop of Gloucester, 347, 350. 351 Horace, 114, 136, 188 Horwartin, Mother Susanna, 100 Houghton, John, Prior of the London Charterhouse, 277, 287 and note Howard, Philip, Earl of Arundel, 328 Hugh, Abbot, 19 Huguenots the, 308, 315, 319, 320, 339, .355) 392-438 origin of their name, 315 rebellious character of, 393, 425, 432 murder the Duke of Guise, 416, 417 are practically masters of France, 433 atrocities committed by, 407, 408,419-422 tyranny of, 437 reprisals on, 438 Humanism, iii, 114, 117, 130, 157, 129 Hunsdon, Lord, 378 Hus, John, the reformer, 53, 57, 6i, 62, 63, 65, 68, 194 Hutten, Ulrich von, 138, 184, 185, 191, 199, 201, 202, 207 Huxley, George, 390 Images, hacked to pieces by the Bernese army in token that it had embraced the Gospel, 315, 317 Calvin exhorts Edward VI. to destroy the, 344 removed from the churches and replaced by the royal arms, etc., 349 Elizabeth is urged to destroy the, 367 smashed and mutilated in the second and third year of Elizabeth, 375 defaced by the Huguenots in France, 407, 419 Isabella of Castile, 241, 242, 243, 244, 440 Ivo, Bishop of Chartres, 22 Jerome of Prague, 52, 55, 68 Jewell, Bishop, 376 Joanna, Queen of Naples, 58 John, Duke of Savoy, Bishop of Geneva, 315) 318 John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, 34, 35, 36, 38, 40, 42, 44, 45 John of Ganduno (Jandun), 37, 40 John of Jensenic, 55, 66 John of Jengenstein, Archbishop of Prague, 5 3) .54, 56 John, King of England, 7, 32, 36 John a Lapide, 203 John of Peckham, Archbishop of Canter- bury, 15 John III., King of Portugal, 446 John a Lasco, reformer, 340 and note 4, 341, 343) 348 John of Milheim, 54 John of Salisbury, 114 John of Stekna, 53 John of Ulm, reformer, 343, 350 note John of Zizka, 67 Jovianus Pontanus, 129 Karben, Victor von, 206 Katharine of Arragon, first wife of Henry VIII., 241-245, 248, 256, 257, 259, 262, 263, 275, 277, 284, 290 her marriage with Henry VIII., 245 her learning, 241, 248 her marriage confirmed by the Pope, 275 note, 284 her death, 290 Kemel, Emmerich von, 95 Kingston, Sir William, Constable of the Tower, 269, 270 Kitchen, Bishop of LlandafF, 368 Knox, John, the reformer. 356-360 takes part in the revision of the Prayer- Book, 357 and note his alterations in the Prayer-Book to please Calvin, 359 La Borderie, 297 La Bruyere, 298 Ladislas, King of Naples, 61 La Haye, 409 Lanfranc, Prior of Bee, afterwards Arch- bishop ot Canterbury, 22 Langdale, Dr., 369 Langland, John, the poet, 33 Index 465 Lascaris, John, 169, 295, 296 Latimer, Hugh, 167, 252, 347, 352 Latimer, William, 249 Layton, Dr., Richard, 278, 279, 281, 353 Lebrixa, Antonio de, 448 Lee, Edward, Dean of Colchester, afterwards Archbishop of York, 176 Le Fevre, 311 Legh, Thomas, 273, 279, 353 Lichfield, the Bishop of, 369 Lilly, William, 159, 180, 204, 250 Linacre, Thomas, 166, 167, 190, 248, 249 Lincoln, Bishop of, 369 Lippi, Filippino, 132 Lippi, Fra Filippo, 10 note Livy, 114 Lollardy. See Wyclifism London, Dr. John, 278 Lorenzo, di Credi, 147 Lorraine, the Cardinal of, 398, 399, 401, 410 Louis of Anjou, 58 Louis IX., King of France, See Saint Louis Louis XIL, King of France, 240, 260, 295 Lucan, 114 Ludwig, Bishop of Helmstadt, 109 Luther, Martin, the reformer, 105, 140, 160, 161, 162, 180, 181, 182, 183, 184, 187, 188, 191, 192, 193, 194, 200, 201, 202, 203, 207, 209, 216, 217, 226, 227, 228, 229, 230, 232, 233, 235, 292, 303, 305, 306, 307, 311, 312, 319, 441, 444 his Table Talk, 194 joins the Augustinians, 194 his exaggerated frame of mind, 195 his doctrine of justification, 196, 197 his dispute about indulgences, 197 his encouragement of anarchy, 229, 230 his attempt to assuage the storm he had raised, 233 his marriage, 233 his licence to commit bigamy, 227, 292 Lutheranism, 199, 234, 235, 305, 307, 310, 3i2> 339' 444. 445 Lydgate, the poet, 238 Machiavelli, 253, 272, 427 Msevius, 296 Magnus, Bishop of Hildesheim, 79, 82 Maine, Cuthbert, proto-martyr of the Eliza- bethan period, 383 Malbosson, Jacques, 318 Malory, Sir Thomas, 239 Manicheeism, 37 Mansion, Colard, 238 Mantua, the Marquis of, 256 Margaret, daughter of Henry VIL, Oueen of Scotland, 240 Marguerite d'Angouleme, sister of Francis I., gueen of Navarre, 305, 306 and note, 307, 308, 309, 311, 312 Marguerite of Valois, daughter of Henry II. and Catherine of Medici, 435, 437 Mariana, 448 Mariano, Fra, da Gennazzano, Augustinian, 138, 143 Marineo, Lucio, 448 Marsilius of Padua, 28, 37 Martial, 114 Martin, Raymund, 23 Martyr, Peter, the reformer, 339, 342, 343, 348, 350 regius professor of divinity at Oxford, 343 criticises the Prayer-Book at Cranmer's request, 348 note Mary, daughter of Henry VII., 240 Mary, daughter of Henry VIII., afterwards gueen, 256, 259, 2S0, 2S9, 347, 350, 351, 354, 355> 359> 3^2, 363, 364, 365, 398, 399> 401 Mary, gueen of Scots, 376, 378, 400, 401, 426 Mass, the, 49, 70, 76, 84, 86, 96, 100, 149, 154, 188, 189, 209, 226, 323, 326, 338, 345, 346, 349, 357, 3^4, 374, 377,j8o, 3S4, 423, 425, 435 a sacrifice, 209, 345, 346 proscribed by the Lutherans, i88, 189 by the Calvinists, 326 in the Church ot England, 338, 344, 349, 35-, 373 penalties for hearing, 374 rising of the people to demand its restora- tion, 347 Masses, testamentary, 70 Massillon, 439 Medici de' — Cosmo, 129, 130, 137 Piero, the elder, 130 Lorenzo, 130, 131, 132, 133, 136, 137, 138, 139, 141, 204, 249 Nannina, 131 Piero, the younger, 139, 141, 143, 144, 148 Alexander. See Pope Clement VII. Catherine, 308, 400, 405, 406, 407, 409, 411, 414, 417, 418, 422, 423, 424, 425, 426, 427, 429, 430, 431, 432, 433,434, 435, 43^, 437, 43^ her inhuman treatment of her son, 406 her character, 427 Melanchthon, Philip, reformer, 187, 203, 207, 209, 291, 311, 332, 340, 341, 342, 445 Merrin, Peter, a publisher at Lyons, 332 Metzler, George, 231 Mezeray, 407 Michael of Cesena, 29 Michelangelo, 10, 11, 130 Michele or Michiel, Giovanni, Venetian ambassador, 393, 438 Middlemore, Henry, 423, 424 Milicz of Kremsier, 53 Milton, II Monarchy, the — in process of formation, 11, 12 its triumph over feudalism, 305 Monasteries, the, in England — Barlings, 281 Charterhouse, the, London, 227, 282, 2S7, 2S8 2 H 466 Reformation and Renaissance Monasteries, co-r.td. — Charterhouse, the, Coventry, 48 Christ Church, Canterbury, 16 Colchester, 281 Dover, \j Durham, 16 Glastonbury, 252, 278, 281, 353 Hyde, 17 Jervaulx, 281 Kirkstead, 281 Launde, 289 Legbourne, 280 Leicester, 269, 270, 271 Lewes, 290 Louth Park, 280 Oxford, 252 Peterborough, 16 Ramsey, 16, 252 Reading, 252, 281 St. Albans, 17, 253 St. Osith, 290 Waltham, 273, 282 Wells, 17 Westminster, 26 Woburn, 2S1 York, 17 suppression of the, 7, 279, 280, 289, 354 Monasteries on the Continent — Bee, 16 Bernai, 16 Cluny, 19, 20 Einsiedeln, 19 Fecamp, 16 Hildesheim, 79 Hirschau, 20 Jumieges, 16 La Trappe, 21 Maurusmiinster, 234 Murbach, 234 Reichenau, 19 Schbnthal, near Ochringen, 231 St. Gall, 1 8 St. Maur, 301, 302 St. Wandrille, 16 Windesheim, 75, 76, 78 Wittenburg, 79 exemptions of, 71 Monastic Orders, the — before the foundation of the Benedictines, 13 introduction of the Benedictines into England, 14 Benedictines, 219, 252, 300, 301 Carthusians, 20, 219, 268, 277 Cistercians, 20, 70, S3, 231 Monks, the — their devotion to learning, 16, 17 at Cambridge, 252 calumniated by Cromwell's agents, 278, 279 their constancy in suffering, 277, 281, 282, 2S7 note, 288 Montague, Viscount. See Pole, Henry Montague. Anthony Browne, Viscount, 369 Montgomery, Gabriel de 421 Montgomery, Hugh, Earl of, 434 Montmorency, Anne de, Constable of France, 405, 412, 413, 424, 429 More, Sir Thomas, Lord Chancellor, 161, 166, 167, 170, 172, 176, 190, 248, 249, 250, 256, 271, 274, 282-289 receives the Great Seal, 271 surrenders the chancellorship, 282 refuses the oath of supremacy, and is com- mitted to the Tower, 285 his execution, 289 More, Lady, 285 Moreman, Dr., 348 Morley, Lord, 369 Moro, Cristoforo, 128, 129 Miiller, Johann, 108 Miinzer, the Anabaptist, 226, 227, 228, 232 Murbach, Prince Abbot of, 234 Musurus, Marcus, 169 Navarre, Antoine de Bourbon, King of, 394, 405,411,415 Navarre, Jeanne d'Albret, Queen of, 432 Navarre, Henry de Bourbon, Prince, after- wards King of, son of the above, 435, 437, 443 Nelson, Lord, 271 Nerotto, 155 Nicholas of Lyra, 24 Nicholson, John, al'iai Lambert, 292 Noailles, Antoine de, ambassador to Eng- land, 401 Nonconformity, 360 and r.ote Norfolk, Thomas Howard, third Duke of, 26S, 269, 280, 283, 284, 293 Norfolk, Thomas Howard, fourth Duke of, 373. Norris, Sir Henry, 266 North, Lord, 369 Northampton, Marquis of, 402 Northumberland, Earl of, 268, 280, 377, 378 Nuiies, 448 Niitzel, Kaspar, 222 Occleve, Thomas, the poet, 238 Ochino, 343 CEcolampadius, the reformer, 184, 316, 324 Oglethorpe, Bishop of Carlisle, 364 Oldcastle, Sir John, 51, 52 Orange, the Prince of, 430, 431 Orcagna, 9, 10 Origen, 184, 1 88 Ory, Matthew, 333 Osiander, 219 Ovid, 114 Pace, Secretary of State under Henry VIIL, i65, 248 Pacheco, Cardinal, 427 Paganism, 4, 17, 112, 146, 204 Paget, Lord, of Beaudesart, 365 Papacy, the, 33 note, 51 note, 337 and note schism of the, 42, 53, 55, 64, 69 its loss of prestige, 123 Index 467 Parentucelli, Tomaso. See Pope, Nicholas V. Paris, Matthew, 114 Parpaglia, Abbot of St. Saviour's, Rome, 371 Pasqualigo, Venetian envoy to England, 245 Pasquier, Etienne, 417 Pattenson, Henry, Sir Thomas More's jester, 286 Peasants, rising of the — in Bohemia, 65-67 in England, 44-47, 65 in Germany, 93, 229-236 Peckham, Archbishop, 179 Pellicanus, the Hebrew scholar, 214 Pembroke, Earl of, 36 Pembroke, first Earl of (new creation), 404 Penz, George, 226 Percy, Lord, 36, 39, 40, 4 1 Peter the Hermit, 7 Peter Lombard, 30 Peter the Venerable, 19 Petrarch, 114, 117, 11S-120, 190,203, 248 Pfefferkorn, John, 206, 207, 210 Pfeiffer, General, 428 Philip the Fair, King of France, 30, 57 Philip IL, King of Spain, 363, 379, 394. 395, 400, 401, 402, 404, 408, 413, 430, 431, 436, 446 Philip, Landgrave of Hesse, 194 Philip, Duke of Burgundy, 127 Piccolomini, ^neas Sylvius. See Pope Pius II. Pico della Mirandola, Giovanni, 134, 135, 204, 205, 209 Pietro da Corvaro, Anti-pope, 28 Pierre de I'Etoile, 309 Pilgrimage of Grace, 280 Pindarus, 296 Pirkheimer — Charitas, 211-222 elected abbess, 212 letters from, 215, 216, 217 her piety and culture, 213, 214 her diary, 216, 217 persecuted by the reformers, 218-222 Clara, 214, 215, 219, 222 letters from, 215, 219, 222 Katharina, the elder, 211 Katharina, the younger, 215, 222 Crescentia, 215 Juliana, 217 Johann, 209 Wilibald, 1S4, 209, 210, 214, 217, 219 letters to, 184 letters from, 214 Plato, 4, 182, 296, 298 Pliny, the elder, 188 Plutarch, 296 Poggio, 118 Pole, Henry, Viscount Montague, 292 Pole, Reginald, Cardinal, 272, 292, 339, 364, 365 Poliander, the reformer, 220 Politian, 118, 133, 249 Poltrot, the assassin of the Duke of Guise, 415, 416, 417, 419 Polybius, 296 Ponet, Bishop of Rochester, 350 Pope — Sylvester II., 114 Gregory VII., 2, 6 Urban II., 7 Nicholas III., 27 Boniface, VIII., 30 Benedict XI., 30 Clement V., 27, 30, 31 John XXII., 28 Gregory XL, 31, 36, 40, 41, 42, 57 Urban VI., 27, 57, 58, 64 Boniface IX., 59, 64 Innocent VII., 59, 64 Gregory XII., 59, 60, 61, 63, 64 Martin V., 55, 65, 122 Eugenius IV., 122 Nicholas V., 73, 86, iii, 120, 121-124, 203, 448 Calixtus III., 124, 127 Pius II., Ill, 125-128, 129, 154, 203, 248 Sixtus IV., 93, 203, 204 Alexander VI., 125, 144, 145' '49' '55 Julius II., 168, 170, 244, 262 Leo X., 160, 169, 172, 178, 1S5, 1S6, 197, 202, 207, 249, 252, 256, 257, 258, 259, 295, 296, 305, 30S, 315 Adrian VI., 258 Clement VII., 259, 260, 261, 262, 269, 272, 274, 275, 276, 2S4, 300 Paul III., 237, 301, 447 Paul IV., 136, 395 Pius IV., 371 St. Pius v., 374, 375. 378, 435 Gregory XIII., 435 Clement VIII., 443 Paul v., 443 Urban VIII., 443 Prayer, the Book of Common, 338, 345, 346, 347, 349' 35O' 35I' 356, 373 preceded by the Communion Book, 345 is opposed by the Catholic bishops, 346 causes an insurrection, 347 is revised by Cranmer, Knox, and the foreign ' Protestants, 348 and r.ote, 35I' 356, 357 . and in its second term is still regarded as temporary, 350 a Bill passed enjoining the use of, 368 penalties for speaking against, 370 Prierias, Sylvester, 186 Princess of Wales, widow of the Black Prince and mother of Richard IL, 40, 42 Ptolemy, 296 Pythagoras, 205 Quadra, Alvaro de. Bishop of Aquila, Spanish ambassador in England, 372, 373, 404 Rabelais, Francis, 297-305, 362 his principal work, 300, 301, 302, 303 Radewin, Fiorentius, 75 468 Reformation and Renaissance Raleigh, Sir Walter, 440 Ramus, 297 Ranconiu3, Adalbert, 53 Raphael Sanzio, 11 Reform within the Church, 68, 72-110, 439-450 Renaissance, the, 3, iii, 113, 118, I2I, 126, 129, 146, 157, 190, 193, 202, 238, 305, 309, 331, 439, 440, 446, 448 general character of, 3, iii, 113, iiS, 121, 129, 248 early characteristics of, 126 its later literary aspects, 190, 297, 304 its pre - Reformation development in Germany, 193 its change of character at the Reforma- tion, 200 its paganism, 146, 157, 202 its pre-Reformation aspect in England, 248 checked by the want of learning of the reformers, 353 its revival in the reign of Elizabeth, 362 its want of originality, 118, 440 Renee, daughter of Louis XII., afterwards Duchess of Ferrara, 260, 308, 313 Repingdon, Philip, 46, 47 Reuchlin, John, 160, 203-208 Reynolds, Dr., Prior of the Bridgettine Monastery of Sion, 277 Rich, Lord, 369 Richard II., King of England, 33, 45, 46, Richard III., 239, 240 Richelieu, Cardinal, 1 1 Ridley, Bishop of Rochester, 346, 349 Ridley, Dr., one of Queen Katharine's theologians, 264 Rieggert, Gaspard, abbot of Maurusmiinster, _ 234 _ Riemenschneider, Dietrich, 80 Rivers, Earl, 239 Rizzio, David, 358 Roaring ape, the, 97 Robbia, Luca della, 132 Robert, Bishop of Strassburg, 90, 91 Rohrbach, Jacklein, 232 Rome, the city of, 31, 123 Ronto, Matteo, n8 note Roper, Margaret, daughter of Sir Thomas More, 285, 286, 287, 288 Roper, William, Sir Thomas More's son-in- law, 283, 285, 288 Rosellino, Bernardo, 122 Rucellai, Bernardo, 131 Rucellai, Giovanni, 131 Russell, John, Lord Privy Seal, 347 Rygge, Dr., Chancellor of Oxford, 46 Sachs, Hans, 201 Saint — Aidan, 14 Ambrose, 188 Antoninus, 137 Athaflasius, 188 Saint, contd. — Augustine of Canterbury, 16 Augustine of Hippo, 4, 107 Bede, 14 Benedict, 448 Bernard, founder of the Cistercian Order, 20 Brendan, 14 Bruno, founder of the Carthusian Order Catherine of Siena, 57 Charles Borromeo, 442, 443, 444 Clement of Alexandria, 3 Columba, 14 David, 14 Dominic, 24, 26, 448 Dunstan, 15 Edmund, 15 Ethelwold, 15 Francis of Assisi, 9,' 22, 24, 28 note, 448 Francis Borgia, 435 Francis of Paul, 444 Francis of Sales, 443, 444 Francis Xavier, 446 Hilary, 188 Ignatius of Loyola, 162, 297, 446, 447, 448 Irenaeus, 188 Jerome, 4, 213 John Capistran, 88 John Chrysostom, 122, 188 John of the Cross, 448 John of God, 448 Kieran, 14 Louis, King of France, 7, 8 Odo, 15 Oswald, 15 Paulinus, 14 Peter of Alcantara, 448 Philip Neri, 156, 442 Remigius, 3 Tecla, 122 Teresa, 448 Theodore, Archbishop of Canterbury, 16 Thomas Aquinas, 2, 23, 24, 26, iii, 133, 136, 141, 147, 298, 443 Thomas of Canterbury, 6, 281, 291 Thomas a Kempis, 75, "jj Thomas of Villanova, 448 Vincent of Paul, 444 Wilfrid, 14 St. Andre, Marshal, 405, 413, 432 Sainte Beuve, 298 Salisbury, Countess of, 292 Sallust, 114 Salutati, Benedetto, 131 Sanchez, 448 Sandys, 376 Saracens, the, 16 Sauli, Alexander, 443 Savonarola, Fra Girolamo, 68, 69, 133-157, 158, 159, 203, 208, 442 his Catholicity, 69, 136 his burning of the vanities, 147 his belief in papal authority, 149 his trial and death, 154, 203 Index 469 Saxony, the Duke of, 291 Say, Sir William, 166 Schott, Peter, the elder, 90, 108 Schott, Peter, the younger, 108, 109 Segretain, 422 Seneca, 18S, 310 Sepulveda, 448 Servetus, Michael, 331-336, 359 mte his book De TrirAtatis errorihus, 331, 336 he is repudiated by Lutherans and Calvin- ists, 331 his Chrisiianhmi restitutio, 332 his escape from prison at Lyons, 333 is made prisoner at Geneva, 333 his treatment, 334 his trial and burning, 335, 336 Sessa, the Duke of, 259 Seymour, Jane, wife of Henry VIIL, 290, 292 Seymour, Lord, of Sudeley, Lord High Admiral, 355 Shakespeare, William, 115, 116, 439 Sheffield, John, Lord, 375, 382 Shelley, Judge, 267 Sherborne, Sir Richard, 373 Shrewsbury, Earl of, 369 Signory, the, 148, 151, 154 Silvestro, Fra, 154, 155 Smith, Dr., Richard, 343 note Smith, Sir Thomas, Secretary of State, and Ambassador to France, 346, 379, 413, 416, 417, 419, 422, 424, 432 Socrates, 108, 188 Solomon, King, 9 Somerset, the Duke of. Lord Protector, 339, 340, 344, 345, 346, 351, 353, 355 Sophocles, 296 Sorbonne, the, 305, 307, 310, 311 Soubise, Monsieur de, 415, 416 Southwell, Robert, 387, 389 Stafford, Lord, 369 Standish, 176 Statius, 114 Stefano, an Italian, 402 Stevenson, Thomas, 390 Stoerder, Idelette, wife of Calvin, 322 Stokes, John, 62 Stokesley, 248 Stoss, Friar, Andrew, 219 Strozzi, the, 133 Stuart, James, Archbishop of St. Andrews, 169, 170 Stumphius, a reformer, 343 Stunica, a Spanish Dominican. 186 Sudbury, Simon, Archbishop of Canterbury, 34, 36, 37, 38, 41, 45 Suetonius, 114 Sussex, Earl of, 377 Synod, the, of Blackfriars, 46, 54 at Strassburg, 94 Taborites, the, 67 Tacitus, 119 Tanner, Bishop, 17 Tavannes, Gaspard de Taulx, seigneur de, 392, 432 Terence, 114, 163 TertuUian, 3, 9 Tetzel, John, 197, 198 Theophrastus, 296 Thomas of Stitny, 53 Thomas of Woodstock, Duke of Gloucester, 49 Throckmorton, Sir Nicholas, English am- bassador to France, 365, 396, 397, 398, 399, 401, 402, 403, 405, 407, 409-413, 417, 418, 419, 423, 424> 425 Thucydides, 120, 296 Tibaldeschi, Cardinal, 57 Titian, 306 TopclifFe, Richard, the priest-hunter, 381 Tournon, Cardinal, Archbishop of Lyons, 332 Tregian, Mr., 383, 3S4 Trent, Bishop of, 445 Trent, Council of, 178 note, 341, 404, 444, 445 Trie, a French exile at Geneva, 332 Trithemius, Abbot, 110 Tucher, Sixtus, 213 Tunstall, Bishop of Durham, 248, 274, 346, 349 Turks, the, 7, 8, 121, 129, 256 take Constantinople, 121. 129 Tuy, Bishop of, iSi Tyndale, the reformer, 344 Ulric, the monk, 20 Ulrich von Richenthal, 61 University of — Alcala, 448 Basle, 89, 90 Bologna, 21, 108, 274 Cambridge, 252, 274, 352, 353 Chartres, 21 Erfurt, 77, 109, 196 Ferrara, 109 Freiburg, 89, 90, 109 Heidelberg, 95, 109, no Laon, 21 Orleans, 274, 295 Oxford, 21, 35, 41, 51, 252, 274, 279, 352, 353 Padua, 73, 209, 274 Paris, 21, 58, 59, 274, 295, 296, 310, 3" Pavia, 209 Prague, 76 Salamanca, 448 Toulouse, 274 Turin, 15, 168 Wittenberg, 196, 197 Urban. See Pope Valla, Lorentius, 120, 180 Vasari, 10 Vegi, Maistre de, 317 Verdenus, Cornelius, 164 47 o Reformation and Renaissance Vergers, Mademoiselle des, 327 Vespasiano, 118 note Vespucci, Amerigo, 440 Victoria, 448 Vidame de Chartres, the, 409, 411 Vincent of Beauvais, 23 Viret, the reformer, 319, 324 Virgil, 2, 114, 115, 118, 136, 188, 296 Vittorino da Feltre, 120 Vives Ludovicus, 448 Voss, Johannes, jj Walafrid, the monk, 19 Walshe, Sir Walter, 268 Walsingham, Sir Edward, Lieutenant of the Tower, 285 Walsingham, Sir Francis, 379, 434 Warham, William, Archbishop of Canter- bury, 161, i58, 170, 173, 174, 190, 248, 249, 250, 251, 252, 253, 260, 274 letter to, 183 Warwick, Earl of, afterwards Duke of Northumberland, 346, 353, 358, 365, 423, 424 Wat, the Tyler, 45, 46 Wenzel, King of Bohemia, 66, 67 Westmoreland, Earl of, 280, 377 Westphal, 327 Wharton, Lord, 369 White, Bishop of Winchester, 364, 369 White, Sir Thomas, 368 Whiting, Richard, last Abbot of Glaston- bury, 278, 281 Wilhelm, Bishop of Strassburg, 234 William, Abbot of Hirschau, 20 William, of Champeaux, 21 William de Moerbeka, Archbishop of Corinth, 24 William, of Occam, 28 William, of Wykeham, 34, 354 Wimpheling, Jakob, 103, 109 Winchester, Marquess of, 369 Wirt, Jakob, 232 Wolf, Thomas, no Wolley, Sir John, 381 Wolmar, Melchior, 310, 327, 394 Wolsey, Thomas, Cardinal, 248, 252, 253- 271, 272, 273 his statecraft, 254, 257 his ostentation, 255 is made legate a latere, 257 his prospects of the Papacy, 258 his fall, 265 his conversion, 268 his death, 270 Woodstock. See Thomas of, Duke of Gloucester Worcester, Earl of, 239 Wright, Thomas, 380 Wiirtemberg, the Duke of, 414 Wyclif, John, 28, 30, 34-51, 62, 63, 68, 194 Wyclifism, 34, 35, 37, 40, 42, 43, 44, 46, 47, 49, 5i> 52, 54, 55, 62, 105, 193, 194, 199 Xavier. See Saint Francis Xenophon, 296 Ximenez, 446, 448 Zasius, Ulrich, 230 Zele, Johannes, Catholic reformer, 75, 76, 77 Ziska, John, 67 Zolter, Dr. Heinrich, 83 Zwingli, Ulrich, 311, 312, 319, 324 THE END Printed by R. & R. Clark, Limited, Edinburgh. ly